ON SAINT EUSEBIUS THE PRIEST,
AT ROME.
A Sylloge concerning his cult and deeds.
Eusebius, priest, at Rome (S.)
BHL Number: 2740
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
The announcement varies in different sources While we tried at the XXIX of July to vindicate St. Felix II, Pope and martyr, from the too unfair censures of the critics, we at the same time paved the way that this Eusebius also, a strenuous asserter of the faith, should not be deprived of his most deserved praise. The things which are proclaimed of him somewhat more intricately in the ancient Martyrologies we suppose to have been abundantly explained in our observation on Usuard at this day, where we showed that we preferred the most ancient announcement of the Little Roman Martyrology, thus simply conceived: At Rome, of Eusebius, priest and confessor, under Constantius the Arian, buried in the cemetery of Callistus; from which are rightly absent those things which Ado superadded from Acts not sincere, and from which Usuard abstained, rightly also announcing: At Rome on the Appian Way, the birthday of blessed Eusebius, priest and confessor, who, by Constantius Augustus, on account of his defense of the Catholic faith, was shut up in a certain chamber of his own house, and there, constantly persevering in prayer, received his falling asleep. In both places abstinence is made from the title of martyr, which why it can deservedly be attributed to him is easily understood from the long hardships which he suffered. Let us now hear the words of the Roman Martyrology with the observation of Baronius:
[2] At Rome, the birthday of blessed Eusebius the priest, who, by the Arian emperor Constantius, on account of his defense of the Catholic faith, it is restored in the Roman one, was shut up in a certain chamber of his own house, and there, constantly persevering seven months in prayer, received his falling asleep; whose body the priests Gregory and Orosius, gathering it up, buried in the cemetery of Callistus on the Appian Way. Here now is the note: Concerning the same, Bede, Usuard, Ado, and the other more recent writers. Mombritius recites his Acts in volume 1. We have the same in manuscript. There is an old title-church of St. Eusebius, of which mention is had in the first Council held at Rome under Pope Symmachus. There are preserved there the venerable bodies of Sts. Eusebius (add Gregory), Orosius, and Paulinus, and many relics of other martyrs, as the monuments of that same church declare. That same church Pope Zachary, when it had fallen through age, took care to have restored: and these things both the inscriptions carved in marble and also the book on the Roman Pontiffs testify. I have added Gregory, whom the Acts testify to have been cast by the order of Constantius into the same crypt, and to have been buried also in the same.
[3] Somewhat more our Mothier notes on the same Roman Martyrology translated by him into French, and is enlarged by Mothier. when he says that the name of St. Eusebius was always most famous, and his memory in the highest veneration through the whole Church. Likewise that there was once one of the Roman Lenten stations in the church dedicated to God under his name, and that a particular Mass was wont to be celebrated there in his honor, of which nevertheless today only a commemoration is made — at Rome, I suppose, not in today's missal for the whole Church. There is ascribed to him, he says, the title of a simple confessor, although, considering the circumstances of his death, he seems to have deserved the laurel of a Martyr. Rightly indeed, since experience teaches us that the same laurel has been ascribed to so many others who suffered even less. And let these things be said for the most ancient and most famous cult of St. Eusebius. It remains now that concerning the Acts of Mombritius, extant also with us variously in Mss., and lastly published by Baluze in volume 2 of the Miscellanea from page 141, we advise those things which we have judged necessary for saving their integrity.
[4] The Acts of Mombritius There must be premised the observation of the last editor at page 496, which is of this kind: That Life of St. Eusebius, the Roman priest, who was destroyed at Rome by a cruel and new kind of death by the order of the emperor Constantius, Boninus Mombritius had once published, but greatly corrupted. We, when we had found it in four most ancient manuscript codices, of which three are extant in the Colbert library and the fourth in the Royal, diligently reviewed and emended it, and, thus emended, thought that it should be sent forth again: for it contains matters most worthy to be known, of which no mention is extant in the ecclesiastical Annals. You would say that Baluze here exhibits to us some treasure dug up by himself, whereas the whole history, whether as it stands in Mombritius and in so many manuscripts, or as he himself published it, has been so freely embellished, and sprinkled with irreconcilable dialogues, that for the greater part it cannot be admitted. Here it is, whose title he makes:
The Life of Saint Eusebius, the Roman priest.
[5] in the new edition At the same time in which Liberius had been recalled from exile by Constantius the heretical augustus, upon this doctrine only, that they should not rebaptize the people, but should complete the people in one communion, Eusebius, a priest of the city of Rome, began to declare Liberius a heretic and a friend of Constantius. And when many, by holy confession and Catholic faith, avoided the communion of Liberius through the teaching of Eusebius the priest, the churches are seized by Liberius, Felix is cast out of the bishopric, Liberius is substituted, Eusebius the priest is held, both because in his own house, which he himself had built, he gathered the people, and because he strengthened the holy people. Then the emperor Constantius attacks Eusebius the priest with Liberius, saying: Are you alone a Christian in the city of Rome? Eusebius the priest answered: So we trust in the Lord, that Christ will find us faithful, just as we were baptized, and we hold the blessing which we received from blessed Julius. Liberius said: Whose place do we fill, is it not that of Julius our predecessor? Eusebius the priest said: If you had persevered in the faith which in the persecution you at first seemed to hold.
[6] somewhat more fully Liberius said: In the presence of the Augustus do you think me so contumacious? Eusebius said: The thing itself teaches and declares you. The emperor Constantius said: And what is there between faith and faith? Eusebius the priest answered: As regards us sinners, we hold it entire. As regards you, it is the madness of the devil and the envy of your superstition, that you sent into exile, for a cause of condemnation, bishop Felix, whom you have not been silent about as Catholic and as invoking the Lord Jesus Christ, declared by all a pure priest, who nevertheless in his little estate gives himself to prayers. And indeed by your order you have commanded slaughter and death to be brought upon Christians, especially upon clerics and priests and deacons. Then Constantius, angered, at the substitution of Liberius, shuts up Eusebius the priest in a certain chamber of his own house, which was low, four feet in breadth; and there, constantly persevering many months in prayer, though shut up, after seven months he received his falling asleep on the nineteenth of the Kalends of September. Whose body the priests Gregory and Orosius, his kinsmen, gathered up and buried in a crypt beside the body of blessed Sixtus, martyr and bishop, on the Appian Way in the cemetery of Callistus, where also, writing his title, they placed it for his commemoration: To Eusebius, the man of God.
[7] At the same time it was heard by the emperor Constantius that the priests Gregory and Orosius had gathered up the body of Eusebius the priest, are set forth; and he commanded Gregory to be shut up alive in the same crypt. Then Orosius the priest gathered up blessed Gregory half alive by night, secretly, on account of Constantius Augustus, and, when he had given up his spirit, buried him beside the body of holy Eusebius the priest. And this same Orosius wrote these deeds. From that same day, by the order of the emperor Constantius, whoever within the churches should be found not to confess or to communicate as Liberius did, was without inquiry to be punished with the sword. Wherefore in the streets and in the lanes and in the churches or in the baths they were butchered with the sword, Constantius persecuting the Christians together with Liberius.
[8] What in that Life ought deservedly to displease you will at once understand, but they need correction if you remember that Constantius was not at Rome at the same time with Liberius and Eusebius. He came triumphing into the City toward the end of the month of April in the year 357, whence, a slight delay being interposed, at the end of May of the same year he departed to Milan, at which time it is the constant opinion of Chronologers that Liberius had not yet returned to Rome from exile; so that accordingly that meeting and somewhat bitter conversation could by no means have been held in the said year, much less in the following year 358, in which Liberius returned from exile, namely then when the emperor Constantius was far from the City. Add that matters are so connected as if Eusebius, while Cæsar was still staying at Rome, had been destroyed in his prison, inasmuch as he ordered Gregory, because he had buried the Saint, to be cast headlong into the same crypt, whence half alive by Orosius
he was drawn out, and a little after buried together with Eusebius himself.
[9] From these various difficulties we are freed by a far briefer eulogy of Eusebius in Peter de Natalibus, bishop of Equilio, so that the history of Eusebius is to be preferred in which all things can be rightly explained, if we judge that Liberius, being sick, used the imperial authority to repress the more ardent zeal of Eusebius and Gregory, although Constantius himself was far from Rome. Hear the bishop of Equilio: Eusebius the priest was famous at Rome in the time of Constantius Augustus and of Pope Liberius, heretics; who, a Catholic man and distinguished for doctrine, while he steadfastly defended the Catholic faith, and proclaimed Constantius Augustus and Liberius bishop of the city of Rome heretics, because they had consented to the Arian faith, was detained by that same Constantius at the request of Liberius; shut up in a certain chamber of his own house, having in breadth four feet, and there for many months he persevered in prayer. Being still shut up, after seven months he received his falling asleep on the XIX of the Kalends of September. Whose body the priests Gregory and Orosius buried on the Appian Way in the cemetery of Callistus, beside the body of blessed Sixtus, Pope and martyr, in a crypt. Hearing which, Constantius Augustus seized Gregory the priest, and buried him alive in the same crypt; where after three days he rested in peace.
[10] the heresy of Liberius being expunged; This narration, if you expunge the appellation of heretic crudely fastened upon Liberius, is tolerable enough; from which we wish this chiefly to be plain, with how great zeal St. Eusebius strove to defend the Catholic cause, having merited from Christ the Lord that crown whereby he can deservedly be reckoned among the bravest confessors or defenders of the faith, nay even under the title of martyr. For drawing out from anywhere a certain day of his death we have labored in vain, so that we must stand by today's; on which, whether some translation or a dedication of a church or another festivity be kept, this is most certain, that from the very first centuries of the Church after his death, as Mothier noted above, the memory of St. Eusebius was in the highest veneration through the whole Church on this very day, although concerning the first institution of the feast or its cause no ancient monuments make mention. Piazza in his Roman Menology advises that the church of St. Eusebius today has the Celestine Fathers, among whom his memory is celebrated, as may be seen more fully in Panciroli, treating of the Roman churches, page 166.
[11] why Gregory is omitted. The place would require that I here subjoin Gregory, who suffered death in the same cause, if his memory had been recorded, as in Greven, so in any ancient sacred Calendars or in the Roman Martyrology. It will be enough with Ferrari in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy modestly to insinuate here: Concerning St. Gregory, priest and martyr at Rome, see in the Life of St. Eusebius the priest above on this same day, on which day also the memory of St. Orosius, priest and Confessor, the companion and familiar of the aforesaid, is noted. Where he sufficiently clearly hints that nothing has been handed down concerning them beyond what is recorded above in the Acts already given. Nor is it lawful for us to decree them any further cult. Let the metrical eulogy of Wandelbert have place here at last:
The day which is the nineteenth before the Kalends of September Hallows and celebrates blessed Eusebius at Rome.