ON ST. ÆTERNUS, BISHOP OF ÉVREUX AND MARTYR,
AT LUZARCHES IN THE DIOCESE OF PARIS.
From Saussay and Castellan.
About 660.
CommentaryÆternus, bishop of Évreux, in the diocese of Paris (S.)
J. B. S.
Unknown to all the ancient Martyrologies, and therefore passed over, this Saint was first, so far as I know, marked by André Saussay, in his Gallican, not on this but on the XVII day of this month, in these words:
At Évreux in Normandy, He is recorded by Saussay on the 17th of this month; of St. Æternus, bishop and martyr, who in the time of King Clovis, directing the church with an Apostolic spirit, adorned it with the beauty of all religion, and finally with the palm of illustrious martyrdom; and as today he gladdens it by his festivals, so he aids it with perpetual patronage. All these things savor of Saussay's oratorical floods rather than of the Saint's Legend. But when he thus indeterminately names Clovis, beware of understanding any other than the second, since the Saint pertains to the seventh century, whose most probable age we have set down from Castellan, who seems to have examined the matter a little more accurately, explaining also more distinctly the things which pertain to the position, or place of martyrdom, and to the cult; yet I know not whether he has ascertained more certainly the natal day, on which he has more than once testified that he took pains to inquire more laboriously concerning any Saints, since the Saint is venerated at Évreux on the XVI of July.
[2] The things which he here has will suffice for the knowledge of an ignoble place, more distinctly by Castellan on this day. concerning which, as well as concerning St. Æternus himself, we should here have forborne to speak, unless we relied on his testimony and the Office of Évreux for the true cult exhibited to St. Æternus, so that he could safely be placed here. Let us hear him thus speaking from the French into Latin: At Luzarches in the diocese of Paris, of St. Æternus, bishop of Évreux, slain in that place by heretics. His sacred head exists at (Villiers-le-Bel) near Paris in a church dedicated to St. Desiderius, where his feast is celebrated on the first day of September. More clearly, in a note written in Latin by his own hand, he says that the rest of the body is preserved at Luzarches: but that Villiers-le-Bel is distant about four leagues from Paris, midway on the road toward Luzarches. As for what they might relate concerning the Life of the Saint or his deeds, the Sammarthani had nothing, with whom these few words are received from Surius on the XIX of October, in the Life of St. Aquilinus, his successor in the episcopate, number 7: And so, blessed Æternus, bishop of the city of Évreux, having been translated from this light to the eternal one, so that it might be in very deed what hitherto was said in word, the minds of the whole clergy and people are divinely inflamed, that that Aquilinus, the hidden servant of God… should be substituted for him: Nor did we find more things pertaining to the deeds or martyrdom of the Saint, either in the Office or elsewhere.