ON ST. ALEXANDER OF BRESCIA, MARTYR,
AT BRESCIA IN ITALY.
Under Nero, as is reported.
A collection concerning his cult, the translation of his body, and his Acts.
Alexander, martyr, at Brescia in Italy (St.)
J. P.
Brescia is an ancient city of Transpadane Gaul among the Italians, the capital of the people of the Cenomani, as we said in volume 11 of February, The Martyr's cult, translation, on the XV day, page 805, where also there are more things concerning the same city. If anyone desires further notices of it, let him go to Ughelli, volume 4 of the Italia Sacra, from column 720 of the earlier edition. But this holy Champion is honored with a public cult among the people of Brescia on this XXVI day of August, on which he is announced in both Catalogues of Ferrari, and in Faino's Martyrology of Brescia. In the Order of the divine Office to be recited in the church of Brescia for the year 1684, which was published by command of the most illustrious Don Bartolomeo Gradonico, bishop of the same church, on the said day is set Of Alexander, martyr of Brescia, semidouble. Ferrari in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, in an annotation upon the history of this Martyr, observes that his acts are seen elegantly painted upon the walls in the parish church dedicated to his name, which the Servite Friars possess. Then he adds: We read, in a certain history published at Brescia in the year of the Lord MDLXXXIV, that his body was carried into Gaul under the emperor Charlemagne; in which history it is also contained that from that time the people of Brescia took to themselves SS. Faustinus and Jovita as patrons, whereas before they had had St. Alexander for the tutelary saint of their city.
[2] Upon what credit these things rest, I do not know; nor does it please me to seek out the history published in that year at Brescia, the time of his martyrdom. since Ferrari does not add of what sort it is, and of what author. Further, that this St. Alexander is altogether distinct from another martyr of the same name at Bergamo will be established from what will be recorded concerning him on this same day. He of Brescia is said to have consummated his martyrdom under Nero, as his Acts have it, which the same Ferrari published from the manuscript monuments of the church of Brescia; which note of time we too have set above, or rather have left set elsewhere. But the following Acts, since we can neither certainly approve nor disapprove them from elsewhere for want of documents, we give upon Ferrari's credit, even though some things are mingled with them which are not without great difficulties.
[3] Alexander, born at Brescia of a noble family, and
instructed in the Christian religion, The Acts when the emperor Claudius was persecuting the Christians, came as a young man to Marseilles to Bl. Lazarus, bishop of that city. Thence, having set out for Aix to Bl. Maximinus the bishop, and being confirmed by him in the faith and kindled to undergo martyrdom for Christ the Lord, he returned to Brescia; where, his household property having been sold and distributed to the poor, in his desire for martyrdom he enters the temple of Diana, and compels the demons in the name of Christ to break the idols in pieces. This being done, he was seized by the priests of the idols and brought to the prefect Felicianus; who, when he had signified the matter to Nero by letters, and the answer had come that Alexander should either sacrifice to the gods, or be tormented with exquisite tortures and put to death, sets forth to him the emperor's command, and exhorts him to sacrifice to Mars.
[4] from Ferrari, And he, kneeling as though he were about to adore the idol of Mars, poured out prayers to Christ the Lord; and presently the statue of Mars, falling, was reduced to dust. Wherefore Felicianus in indignation orders Alexander to be beaten with thongs, and boiling oil with pitch and sulphur to be poured into his mouth. And when the prefect saw that he was in no wise injured by these things, he commanded that his hands be pierced, and a rope drawn through the holes be tied to the neck of an untamed bull, and that the Martyr be thus dragged through the city, and at last, his arms and tongue being cut off, that his head be struck off. And when in that place four lighted torches appeared by divine power at the Martyr's body, and many were converted to Christ by that miracle, it was buried by the bishop Anathalon; and there afterward a church was built to his name by the people of Brescia.
[5] and our observations upon them. Of St. Lazarus, bishop of Marseilles, the Roman Martyrology treats on the XVII day of December, where the difficulties occurring about the time of his see may be weighed. In the latest edition of the Gallia Christiana one is set forth, volume 1, column 631: After this first bishop (St. Eleazar, or Lazarus), if it be certainly established that he was Lazarus the brother of Mary and Martha, recalled by the Lord from the tomb to life, and so that he ruled in the first century of the Church, the pontifical see was vacant for more than two hundred years; or else it must certainly be said that the memory of those who presided has been utterly blotted out. And indeed the bishop named above is there placed in the first rank, but the year of Christ is left blank. As regards St. Maximinus, he is exceedingly liable to chronological entanglements, as may be seen in our work on the VIII day of June, volume 11, page 53, where he is assigned to the I, IV, or VI century. Nor were the editors of the said Gallia Christiana more clear-sighted in this matter; for in the volume cited, column 299, they have these words:
[6] observations. It is the common opinion that the first bishop of Aix was called Maximinus; but who he was, at what time he sat, or what he did, we do not dare to divine. For among almost all the learned those things are now held for doubtful — not to say false — which are commonly said: that when persecution had been stirred up at Jerusalem against the disciples of Jesus Christ, after Saint Stephen had been overwhelmed with stones, Lazarus, Mary Magdalene, Martha, Marcella her handmaid, Maximinus and Chelidonius, against whom the hatred of the Jews chiefly burned, were not only driven from Jerusalem, but were also placed in a ship without oarage into a certain peril of death, and by divine providence came to land upon the coast of Provence; and that Lazarus indeed was made bishop of Marseilles, but Maximinus of Aix. Of St. Anathalon, Ughelli writes in volume 4 of the Italia Sacra, column 727. He is contained in the Roman Martyrology on the XXV day of September, where the difficulties which may arise concerning him can be discussed.