Maternus

ON ST. MATERNUS, BISHOP,

AT MILAN IN INSUBRIA.

AT THE BEGINNING OF THE FOURTH CENTURY.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

The cult of the Saint, chronology, Acts, and posthumous glory.

Maternus, Bishop, at Milan in Insubria (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR G. C.

Milan, the most famous city of Insubria, and fruitful nurse of Saints, of which we have already often had to treat, celebrates on this day the festival of St. Maternus, once its bishop. Besides that his cult has flourished from time immemorial, The cult is proved from the Missal, the sanctity of this prelate is testified by the Milanese Missal according to the institution of St. Ambrose, printed in the year 1522, in which the following prayers are read. Over the people: "Grant us thy mercy, O Lord, we beseech thee, thy blessed confessor Maternus

and pontiff interceding, mercifully bestow, and be propitious to us sinners by his suffrages. Through, etc." Over the shroud: "Make us, O Lord, to confess the wondrous praises of thy blessed confessor and pontiff Maternus, that, aided by his protections, we may deserve to be continually devoted to thy majesty. Through, etc." Over the offerings: "May the holy prayer of thy blessed pontiff Maternus be present to us, O Lord, we beseech thee, which may unceasingly free us from earthly affections, and make us perfectly to desire heavenly things. Through the Lord, etc." PREFACE: "Eternal God, humbly beseeching, that while we venerate the merits of thy blessed confessor Maternus, we may glory to have acquired the help of thy propitiation: nor do we despair of the bounty of pardon, which through those who have pleased thee we humbly implore. Through Christ, etc." Postcommunion: "May the glorious merits of thy blessed confessor Maternus ever protect us, we beseech thee, O Lord, from all evils, in whose solemnity we have received thy holy things rejoicing. Through, etc."

[2] The Breviary of the Milanese church, printed in the year 1539, in the ancient Breviary, besides various prayers concerning St. Maternus, has three proper Lessons, in which it thus briefly comprises the chief deeds of the holy prelate. Lesson I: "This man, the persecution of Decius ceasing, when the emperor Gallus acted somewhat more mildly toward the Christians, the church, breathing again for a little, in the Philippean basilica, from primicerius of the readers, by divine nod, is chosen and consecrated by the clergy and people: for there was not then present among the priests one fit for this honor, and much less among the clerics." Lesson II: "Now this man of God was so most mild, that even the authors of the persecution themselves venerated him. He in his own times consecrated Maliodorus, a levite of the highest sanctity, bishop of the church of Tortona, which had long been vacant." Lesson III: "Now he was in the times of Gallus, Valerian, Gallienus, Claudius, Aurelian, Probus, Carus, Diocletian, and Maximian. But when he had ruled the Milanese church twelve years, under the reign of Maximian, in holy works the confessor rested in peace; buried at St. Nabor's." I do not see how these Lessons cohere sufficiently among themselves: for if in the time of the emperor Gallus St. Maternus was made from primicerius bishop of Milan, as is hinted in the first Lesson, and according to the third Lesson died under the reign of Maximian, how are only twelve years of the episcopate numbered, when between the reign of Gallus and Maximian easily thirty years elapsed? But concerning the epoch and duration of the episcopate we shall soon treat at greater length.

[3] Another Breviary of the same church, edited at Milan in the year 1635, and the more recent Milanese one, exhibits for three lessons one, the narration of the deeds being changed in this manner: "Maternus, bishop of Milan, under the emperor Maximian, for the faith of Christ and for the church committed to him, at one time bound with chains, at times thrust into prison, often most bitterly beaten with blows, fortified with firm strength of soul and heavenly constancy in enduring torments, then in the disturbance of the people entrusted to him, stirred up by impious tyrants, discharged with great efforts of labor the task of confirming it, with a great sign of his divine piety: kindled by which, he sent the blessed martyrs Carpophorus and Fidelis to the city of Como, that they might contend there for the glory of Christ. He moreover buried with his own hands St. Victor, who had bravely undergone martyrdom at Milan. He consecrated Meliodorus bishop of Tortona. Finally, himself ennobled by distinguished and many confessions of the faith, having holily administered the Milanese church for twelve years, he rested in the Lord; whose body was piously laid up in the basilica of St. Nabor." Of the burial of St. Victor the martyr provided for by Maternus, mention is made in the Acts of the same martyr illustrated by our Henschenius, volume II of May, page 290. Moreover note that in this latter reading certain things are narrated which are not expressed in the three more ancient lessons, nor in the more prolix Acts of St. Maternus.

[4] The hagiologists everywhere in their Martyrologies confirm the cult of this holy bishop. and from the Martyrologies. On this day the Usuardine Supplements of Greven and Molanus celebrate him, the latter of whom reads thus: "At Milan, of St. Maternus bishop and confessor." The same words has the Plantin Bede. Bellinus, the city of Milan being omitted (Greven too passed it over), announces him thus: "On the same day, of St. Maternus bishop and confessor." Galesini inserted the same in his Martyrology with more words thus: "At Milan, of St. Maternus bishop and confessor. He, under the emperor Maximian, for the faith of Christ, and for the church committed to him, at one time bound with chains, at times thrust into prison, often most bitterly beaten with blows, fortified with firm strength of soul and heavenly constancy in enduring torments, then in the disturbance of the people entrusted to him, stirred up by impious tyrants, discharged with great efforts of labor the task of confirming it. But the blessed (perhaps he meant to say 'the blessed martyrs') martyrs Carpophorus and Fidelis he sent to Como, that they might contend there for the glory of Christ: he moreover buried St. Victor at Milan with his own hands. Finally he himself, illustrious for distinguished and many confessions of the faith, fell asleep in the Lord." Ferrari and our Canisius write similar things, which are taken either from the Acts or from the proper lessons. Wherefore, the elogia of these and other more recent writers being passed over, I only subjoin the modern announcement of the Roman Martyrology, which is contained in these words: "At Milan, of St. Maternus bishop, who under the emperor Maximian, for the faith of Christ and for the church committed to him, thrust into prison, and often beaten with blows, at last, illustrious for many confessions, fell asleep in the Lord." And these things seem to me sufficient for proving the cult. Now let us proceed to discuss other matters.

[5] Nothing is established concerning the Saint's homeland and kindred. The more ancient writer of the Acts makes no mention of St. Maternus's parents, homeland, kindred, and deeds done before the episcopate. Whence I marvel that Placido Puccinelli, in the Zodiac of the Milanese church, part 2, page 131, depicts his boyhood in such vivid colors, and adorns the virtues shining in his tender age with so many Italian phrases. But, unless I am mistaken, these rhetorical ornaments of the narration proceeded from Puccinelli's pious meditation, who, lest he should give a headless Life, narrated those things which could have been done by the holy boy, although he was ignorant whether they had really been done. Francesco Besozzo, Giovanni de Deis, Carlo of the Basilica of St. Peter, bishop of Novara, and other Italian writers assert that St. Maternus was born at Milan. Although this assertion is not improbable, because before he undertook the episcopal dignity he was primicerius of the Milanese church, yet I could wish it to be proved from ancient monuments. Nor are there lacking those who, without any testimony of the ancient authors, assign us a brother of St. Maternus. Besides the Sammarthani in the catalogue of the archbishops of Reims, volume 1 of Gallia Christiana, page 476, Georg Colvener does this in the catalogue of the same archbishops, which he subjoined to the History of the church of Reims, written by Flodoard, and illustrated with his notes. But there he speaks thus: "St. Maternianus, uterine brother of Maternus, ninth archbishop of Milan, already an old man, is ordained archbishop by St. Julius the Pope in the year 351. He sat nine years. He died on the VII of July, 359." This brotherhood, unknown to all antiquity, Papebroch rightly rejected in the Preliminary Commentary to the Life of St. Maternianus, volume 1 of April, page 758. The same will be abundantly refuted from what we shall now say concerning the epoch of our Saint.

[6] Concerning the time and order in which St. Maternus ascended the Milanese chair, In the controversy concerning the order of the episcopal succession, the authors greatly disagree, as may be seen in the Papebrochian Exegesis on the bishops of Milan, which is prefixed to volume VII of May. Charles, bishop of Novara, just now cited, in the History of the Milanese church, page 44, indicates the cause of this diverse chronology in these words: "From Mona to Dionysius, or rather to Ambrose, I see the reckoning of history among our writers sufficiently disturbed: for some pass over the bishops in silence, others add false ones; nor do they agree in establishing their order." Then he places St. Maternus, whose Acts he strives there to illustrate, between Mona and Eustorgius. But whether St. Eustorgius was the immediate successor of St. Maternus, may be discussed on the XVIII of September, on which day St. Eustorgius, the first of that name, is venerated with solemn veneration. To us at least, against certain Milanese historiographers, it seems more probable that St. Maternus preceded Mirocles in the episcopate, as Giuseppe Ripamonti fully and solidly proves in Decade I of the Histories of the Milanese church, book 2, from page 91, and our Papebroch in the preliminary Exegesis just cited, page 59. To this our opinion the Acts to be given after this Preliminary Commentary give their suffrage, which in number 3 clearly signify that Maternus was the immediate successor of Mona.

[7] Nor is there less variety of opinions concerning the duration of Maternus's episcopate: duration for some authors attribute to him 52, others 22, others finally only 12 years of governance. Ripamonti in the work already praised, book 2, page 120, speaks thus of this diverse chronology of the episcopal rule: "But how long he (namely St. Maternus) lived in his office, I would not indeed dare to affirm by exact number, on account of the varied memory in this kind, and because the ancients, with great effort to this end, nevertheless extricated nothing: they indeed number the years, and define by their own authority; but they can easily be refuted by the reckoning of times and by arguments of facts, if anyone has leisure." It is not sufficiently clear who those are whom Ripamonti here calls "the ancients"; but whether he understands the ancient catalogues of bishops, which attribute only 12 years of spiritual rule to St. Maternus, or wishes to designate the ancient writers of Milanese affairs, whose authority and age in this matter we are ignorant of; at least the Acts, which our Papebroch thinks were written in the sixth century, place St. Maternus in the episcopal see when the fervor of the persecution still kindled by Decius had not yet been extinguished. Whence I marvel that he himself, after in the Exegesis on the page just cited he had assigned him 52 years, on the following page attributes to him only 22; when nowhere in the Acts is it read that the see was vacant so long. Therefore, the whole context of the Acts being weighed, he seems to have entered the Milanese chair in the time of the emperor Gallus, say in the year 252, and to have held the same until the most grievous persecution which Diocletian and Maximian moved against the Christians in the year 303. From these the computation of 52 years, in which St. Maternus ruled the Milanese church, can easily be made. But as regards the ancient catalogue of the Milanese bishops, in which 12 years of the episcopate are assigned to him; what if an unskillful copyist, or the author himself, by the change of one letter wrote 12 (XII) for 52 (LII)? Whatever it be, we follow our Acts, until someone shall bring forward more solid and more ancient arguments against our opinion.

[8] and concerning the time of his death we propose a more probable opinion, Neither do the writers agree in what year the holy Prelate died. Our Papebroch in the Exegesis already mentioned assigns his death to the year 303; but Ughelli, volume 4 of Italia Sacra, column 59, defers the same to the year 307. Others have determined other years of death at their own discretion, as may be seen in Puccinelli in the Zodiac of the Milanese church, part 2, page 139. Although not

it is altogether established which of these years is to be chosen, yet it seems to us more probable that St. Maternus died before the year 305, in which Maximian abdicated the empire, since at the end of his Acts we read this: "The same confessor of Christ was laid to rest under the emperor Maximian." But since Maximian afterward resumed the empire by force, this epoch is not plainly certain. But at least those manifestly erred who deferred the death of St. Maternus beyond the year 313, in which the council was held at Rome, at which Merocles of Milan, successor of St. Maternus, was present, as may be read in our Labbe, volume 1 of the Councils. Certain writers assert, I know not on what foundation, that our Saint before his death was driven into exile; concerning which matter Ripamonti writes thus, book 2, page 119: "There are not lacking those who write that he died in exile, when Caesar had banished him, and, with foolish pride and barbarous license, having dared a matter not within his right, had abrogated his pastoral dignity. This, more because it is not repugnant to the truth than because I have found it in the most certain authors, I thought should be added."

[9] from which a conjecture of Baronius is corrected. From what we have thus far said concerning the chronology of St. Maternus, the conjecture of Baronius falls, who in the Ecclesiastical Annals, in the year of Christ 337, number 74, suspects that St. Maternus bishop of Milan is the same as Julius Firmicus Maternus, who more than thirty years after the death of our Saint composed the book on the mysteries and errors of profane religions, addressed to Constantine (or rather Constantius) and Constans, the Augusti. Whence our Labbe, in the work on Ecclesiastical Writers, volume 1, page 661, writes thus: "The opinion of those also is to be refuted who, from the conjecture of Baronius on the year 337, whom Binius as usual follows, judged that the elder, as they call him, Julius, the conqueror of profane superstition by his little book of thirty chapters with its golden crown, was the same as Julius bishop of Milan, whom they wish to have been present at the Roman council under Julius I the Pope, and who in the Roman Martyrology on the XVIII of July is called Maternus, illustrious for the praise of sanctity and erudition." Pagi, in the Historico-chronological Critique on the year of Christ 337, number 10, speaks thus of the synod which Baronius alleges for his suspicion: "The Roman synod under Pope Julius is nothing else than a certain farrago collected by Isidore Mercator from the Tripartite and others, and reduced into the form of a council; certainly no mention of it in the synodical booklet." Concerning the same synod see more in Tillemont, volume 7 of the Ecclesiastical Memoirs, in the notes on Pope Julius, note 1, pages 772 and 703, where he also refutes the conjecture of Baronius. Now concerning the authority of our Acts some things remain to be said.

[10] The Acts of St. Maternus, Mombritius, volume 2 On the Lives of the Saints, page 144, exhibits the Acts of St. Maternus mutilated, and so disordered, that no one can understand the distorted connection of the narration, or distinguish any series of the events. Therefore our Henschenius, while he was engaged in the cause of the Saints at Milan, copied the Acts of that holy Prelate, whole and well arranged, from an ancient codex of the Ambrosian Library. That codex at first so greatly pleased Papebroch, his companion on the journey, that in the beginnings of his studies he thought it had been written by an author who lived very near the times of St. Maternus. But in the Exegesis on the bishops of Milan, page 59, in his usual manner he candidly confesses his error, and changed his mind, having read these words, which in the Life to be here edited by us stand thus in number 9: "Now let the article turn to his remaining deeds, which are so unknown to many, that by the alluvion of long time they are thought to be blotted out from the memory of almost all." From this "alluvion of long time," or rather oblivion, it is clear enough that the writer of the Acts was not contemporary with St. Maternus. Then, however, Papebroch thinks—which certainly he did not persuade us—that they were written in the sixth century. For the rest, the prologue of the Acts, which is not found in the Ambrosian manuscript, we shall excerpt from the Mombritian edition, and then give the Acts themselves illustrated with certain notes, after we have prefaced a little concerning the posthumous glory of our Saint.

[11] Placido Puccinelli, in the Italian work already several times cited, and his posthumous glory. part 2, page 140, says that the miracles of this holy Pastor are infinite, which he thought should be passed over, lest he should weary the reader. Would that, to the honor of the holy Prelate, he had wearied us with this weariness, or rather joy! Although I do not doubt that through the intercession of St. Maternus very many miracles were wrought, yet I think Puccinelli used this rhetorical omission because he did not have individual knowledge of them; which is also gathered well enough from Ripamonti, who in book 2, page 120, speaks thus of them in general: "But long did that faith concerning Maternus remain, nor is it today wholly blotted out from the minds of men, as if, piously and religiously invoked, he is present to the bound and captive; and many mortals are said to have been freed by his present help, when they implored it from their chains." Afterward the same Puccinelli brings forward a double monument, which in the dominion of Como was anciently built to the memory of the Saint. The first is a certain castle built by the Lombards, which was called by the name of St. Maternus, and whose church still endures and is administered. The other is a monastery, marked with the name of the same Saint, in which nuns of the Order of St. Benedict for some centuries venerated St. Maternus with singular veneration. Then he narrates how the Franciscan Fathers, while at Milan they were laying the foundations of their refectory, found the body of St. Maternus in a wooden chest, and are wont to venerate it every year. Finally he concludes his narration with the most celebrated Jubilee which Callistus III granted to the faithful in the year 1457 on the occasion of the Turkish war; in which he asserts that more than one hundred thousand pilgrims flowed together to Milan, to implore the help of St. Maternus against the Turks. And these are the chief things concerning which I judged the reader should be forewarned in this commentary.

THE ACTS

From a manuscript of the Ambrosian Library, collated with the edition of Mombritius, volume 2, folio 144.

Maternus, Bishop, at Milan in Insubria (S.)

BHL Number: 5682

FROM THE MANUSCRIPT.

PROLOGUE.

The state of the Church is described, Decius being dead. In those days, the useless bramble of Decius ^a having been cut down by the roots by the divine axe—who, swollen with beastly rage and viperous spite, had in a short time vomited out upon the worshipers of Christ countless disasters of unspeakable punishments; so that, the pastors especially being extinguished—that is, the prelates and masters of the churches—and the flocks also being scattered, as was consequent, everywhere, and the master's folds seeming to have emptied and forsaken themselves, the people of the faithful everywhere through the world, with mouth though groaning, poured forth immense praises to Christ the Lord, their pious defender: and when the whirlwind of the savage persecution seemed for a while to depopulate not only some part of Europe and Hesperia ^b, but the whole regions of the world, for many days, as is reported, the clerical order and the succession of the priestly chair ceased: but, this instigator of malice being removed, when Gallus had undertaken the dignity of the Roman empire (though he too was mad, yet acting a little less against the Christians), the souls of believers soon began to rise up and in some manner be revived, who a little before, hidden through lurking-places, had seemed to have wavered. The pastors, if any survived, visit the forsaken sheepfolds, and each brings back to his own folds the little sheep scattered by fear of the wolves ^c.

ANNOTATIONS.

* read "he would think" (putaret).

CHAPTER I.

The election of St. Maternus to the episcopate, his veneration among the very heathen, his zeal and solicitude for his flock.

In those days the clergy of the Milanese church, and at the same time the people, as many as had escaped the hands of the executioners, The clergy and people of Milan, gathered again to the Philippean ^a basilica, cleansing away the filth of idolatry which had been cast in, and cry out suppliantly to the Lord of heaven, that he would henceforth have mercy on his inheritance, and no longer overlook its perdition. Besides, gravely sighing over the people widowed by the long absence of their pastor, now long since associated with Christ, they ask one another what was to be done. Of the priests indeed there was no one worthy of an honor of this kind, or rather capable of the burden ^b; how much less of any of the clerics of lower grade? Whom therefore they should think ought to be chosen, whom set over themselves, to whom they should commit their prayers and their vows, weighing in a careful balance, they pass days unfed and nights sleepless ^c. At last, to one of the fellow-priests, whom advanced old age and the grace of merits distinguished, the Holy Spirit announces through an ecstasy, whom from the college of all the judgment of the heavenly judge had chosen to be raised with equanimity to the priestly weight, and whom, ready for the crisis of the time, fit in strength, strong in soul and body, he had designated.

[3] For there was at that time in the order of the aforesaid church a certain most reverend doctor and primicerius of the readers, [at the persuasion of a certain old man, St. Maternus, primicerius of their church,] expressing the virtue of the name by his sweet character, Maternus by name; who was so dear to all the clerics, that, for his manifold piety and most kindly charity, which, unshaken, well-planted in his own breast, prodigal to others he reserved to himself, all loved him with exceeding love, and he himself bestowed a motherly affection upon all, so cherishing, admonishing, and correcting them, as sons; so loved, embraced always, and expected by them, as a mother. Him therefore that old man, venerable for his gray hairs and merits, having seized, drags to the midst, and, all standing around, cried out with the voice he could: "Whom do you await? Behold, here is the pastor whom you desire. Believe me, this man, foreelected by the heavenly examination, both can preside over the present flock, and can prevail against the wolves barking around, relying, as I believe, on divine aid. Fear not, I say, nor await any longer your proper pastor from strange sheepfolds."

Behold, you have Maternus, most holy, worthy in all degrees of the virtues to be a vicar of the departed patron: for as Elijah, leaving Elisha, enriched him with a twofold virtue, so also the distinguished prelate Monas ^d, of memory to be celebrated, deserting Maternus in body but not in faith, furnished a twin increase of hereditary virtue."

[4] Therefore, animated by these and other discourses of the excellent old man who were present, they assent to the divine revelation, and as suppliants beseech the man of the Lord, Maternus, that he count not the office of pastor a thing to be despised. He, they raise to the episcopal dignity, because he was most pious, and rather inclined to grant requests, long and scarcely deliberating whether it were fitting to yield to the prayer or to resist, wept without tears, and stood in the midst with astonished ears. But the clergy and the people press with prayers; again and again they tearfully repeat, that he oppose them not. Who could deny what so earnestly the faithful throng, God inspiring, was asking? He yielded therefore graciously, understanding the examination of divine predestination, and did not refuse the necessary function of his fellow-brethren. But since the fervor of the persecution still kindled by Decius had not yet been extinguished; but, the diabolical ministers succeeding one another by turns, and supplying fuel to their own madness, a more atrocious heat was ever and again stirred up through the regions of the world, beyond what can be told, against Christian men ^e; the care and solicitude of this most watchful pastor, of whom we speak, was this, that he should clothe the soldiers of Christ set in the workhouses with the arms of patience, imbue them with boldness for the contest, and revive them with confidence of triumph; and that, if perchance any had fallen, either beheaded by the sentence of the sword, or done to death by sharper torments, he should worthily commit their bodies to burial, visit them by night with constant watches, and, solicitous, take pains that not even the least particle of them, like a most precious pearl of the heavenly treasure, should in any way perish, and, having found them, forthwith more worthily lay them up in caskets.

[5] whom, for the sanctity of his life, the very heathen venerate, By these and such pursuits of the virtues the holy Man, intent, obtained the greatest prerogative of sanctity before God and before men: to such a degree that even by the princes of cruelty themselves, for his greatness and the fatherly cheerfulness of his serene mind, so to speak, devoted to him, heaped with veneration and deserved honor, he was called father of his country: and unless he should reprove them for their senseless mind and unspeakable slavery, no calumny was suffered to be brought any longer against him or against his very foot-servants; to the judgment of which matter a certain number of the worshipers of Christ had been assigned to his discipleship, so that, this man being imbued with the rule of the Christian faith, and freely dwelling where he wished, they might permit the rest to be occupied with the imperial rites and theatrical games. Finally, there was no doubt that very many ministers of the royal court flattered the worshipers of Christian doctrine by seeking their favor: since some, whose mind partly had been driven by the divine goad, partly stirred by the shouts of the spiritual hunters, even then not a little dreaded to be girded with the military cloak, crowned with the cap, adorned with the robe of state, scarcely to attend Caesar or the consul, rarely to enter the amphitheater, rarely to mingle in the public gatherings and games, as they were wont.

[6] and imitate him. Very wonderful! You would have seen the affections of many suddenly transmuted from their long-standing root, and by no means have perceived from what cause this happened. But they, conscious of the divine secrets, preferred to be hidden for a time under the old habit, and to put on the new man, marking diligently in the secret chamber of the mind not the dubious miracles of Apollo, but rather the examples and salutary precepts of Christ. But some of them, having solicitously contemplated the contests of the Martyrs, did not delay to hand them down to the memory of posterity in writing, and faithfully to insert them into the Christian libraries, as it happens to be seen; so that, these being left behind, the souls of the soldiers who followed might be revived, and conceive in mind a like strength, and not care for the momentary losses of the combatants. Therefore, as I ought to have said before, a certain medicine, procured then unexpectedly by the divine piety and sought out by the art of Christ Jesus, had poured itself forth to the people of Milan; when to the bishop Maternus too, endowed with Christian liberty together with his own, it was permitted to go forth wherever he wished. And although the term of the Christians ought to have been fixed, shortened, and diminished by the edict then hanging over them, nonetheless it was no less enlarged and multiplied daily, the very executioners and torturers flying to the faith, Christ the just judge, forsooth, so dispensing, through whom everything which the mad princes proposed to their worshipers for punishment, was by a higher counsel turned to glory.

[7] But, that I may pursue what I have proposed, Gallus ^f Caesar, The holy Prelate, Valerian persecuting the church, when he had held the empire not a full two years, deprived of human affairs and of life, left the principate to Valerian. He, in the first time of his empire, showed himself very humane and most kindly to the servants of God, so much that they were held in veneration with him, so that he made the household of his house a church of Christ; I believe indeed fearing the sudden extirpation of his predecessors, which no one has doubted was brought on solely by the vexation of the Christian name. Meanwhile, when in the course of time he submitted himself to the most wicked tutelage of a certain magician, depraved in mind, and cast down from the solid ground, he ordered the tutors of the Christians to be persecuted and exterminated, as betrayers of the magic arts to which he had given himself: and when day by day the growing fury of the ill-bewitched Caesar slew some with the swords of the executioners, afflicted others with tortures and various kinds of torments, killed some by the squalor of prisons and the weights of chains, and moreover threatened a like punishment lest anyone approach them at all; nevertheless the provident majesty of almighty God granted that its confessor, the holy bishop Maternus, remained quiet amid so many wars; as if, disposing to reserve him for future contests, it warned him that tranquillity had been conferred upon him not without great forewarning.

[8] Which thing the man of the Lord, weighing with sagacious mind, earnestly fashioned the arms of justice as much for himself as for the people committed to him, he exhorts his own to fortitude, showing himself and his ministers in much patience, in vigils and in many fasts, and continually sounding the apostolic trumpet: "Behold now," saying, "the acceptable time; behold now the day of salvation"; and thereafter, "Be solicitous," he said, "my brethren and my sons, and with the eyes of the mind as of the body watch, lest the unlooked-for quiet of the time, making you idle and slothful, suffer you not to bear with equanimity the whirlwind of the wrath to come. Do not, I beseech, yield; do not for a moment be stripped of the spiritual arms; the enemy has not yet perished; the incitements of the furies are not yet extinguished: the master of all deceit and fraud still has something to add, who, if he shall find us torpid and unprepared, will miserably slaughter us; but if he shall perceive us standing over our watches and armored with breastplates, when in vain he shall have hurled from the opposite side a shower of darts, conquered and confounded he will flee forthwith; and all his craftinesses thereafter will be held as nothing. Therefore, while there is leisure, let us prepare the Christian battle-lines against all his snares, and against each dart of the devil let us fashion an equal missile: supplying enticements, he is to be conquered by continence; inflicting injuries and torments, he is to be conquered by patience. O how happy will they be who shall have conquered!"

[9] and lamenting the miseries of various men, By these and many other exhortations and precepts, which for brevity I unfold not, the magnificent bishop, continually fortifying the minds of his hearers, made almost all fervent concerning the glory of martyrdom. That especially, as it was praiseworthy in all the merits of the blessed Man, so also was it not hidden: that in the midst of preaching, or of doing some good work, touched inwardly by a certain compassion of mind, with frequent fountains of tears he bedewed his face and breast: and although the care of the flock committed to him not a little distressed him, yet he never shut off the affection of the inner light from assiduous prayer. To his wondering disciples, and asking why he thus wept, he is said to have answered at a certain time: "Not I, my sons, lament the losses of frail things, but the miseries of human souls; while I see those subjugated under the heavy bond of slavery, whom I know to have been made from nothing by the Creator of all unto the highest glory of liberty. Behold, man, who had been created to praise God, wretched applauds himself as enslaved to the services of demons; nor does the madman reconsider, that he sets libations to those who will burn with him in hell for ages: concerning which I much grieve; that they may sometime come to their senses through the mediator Christ, I cease not to pray. Nay, also for those who, by the calumny of the Christian profession, have chanced to be afflicted with the horrors of prisons, the weights of chains, the racks, the scourges, the mines, the exiles, the burnings, the mutilations, and various kinds of torments, with the utmost effort I cease not to intercede, that upon all who contend for their cause that heavenly physician may pour the dew of mercy, granting them untiring constancy of mind, unconquered patience, and sure confidence of overcoming; so that the envy of the persecuting enemy may not prevail against them, but rather the strong right hand of the Crowner may conquer.

[9] he is solicitous for his flock. Me too, me very unworthy of so great an office of pastor, before all and after all I lament, greatly weighing the dread scrutiny of the prince of pastors concerning the sheep entrusted to me, lest by any fraud of the wolves clamoring around I lose those whom, by the hidden dispensation of his judgment, the arbiter of the whole world committed to me to be reared in faith and holiness; for whom also again and again I frequently groan and weep, crying humbly with the same Christ Jesus and saying: 'Holy Father, keep in thy truth those whom thou hast given me.' Now, now, O most beloved, now let that prophetic oracle occur to us: 'Thou wilt feed us, O Lord God, with the bread of tears, and wilt give us tears to drink in measure': I trust, I say, since 'in measure,' because he will not suffer us to be tempted above what we can bear: nor will he be angry with us forever, but will be propitious to his servants, giving the accustomed tempering of his mercy, that we may be able to sustain it." These things I have noted from the sayings of the holy Man, that it may easily be recognized of how great a sanctity, and how great a meekness, he had the fullness. Now let the article turn to his remaining deeds, which are so unknown to many, that by the alluvion of long time they are thought to be blotted out from the memory of almost all ^g.

ANNOTATIONS.

* read "something" (quidpiam)

CHAPTER II.

His episcopal care, constancy in persecutions, confirmation of the faithful, and pious death.

Therefore in that storm, as I have said before, when throughout the whole Roman empire the various magnates of Valerian were gravely agitating the church of Christ, and, in the manner of rabid dogs, dragging the weak and simple men by the very heel and staining them with a pestilent bite, Valerian being dead, and Gallienus reigning, the distinguished bishop Maternus, fortified by the divine defense, remained unharmed with the sheep subject to him. And without delay, the grief of the impious Caesar was turned upon his own head, and his iniquity descended upon his own crown with sufficiently worthy vengeance: for he who had, by savage rite, made many parents bereaved of their children, himself, captured by the barbarians and deprived of his eyes, perished, void at once of kingdom and of life ^a. After whom his son Gallienus ^b, obtaining the sum of affairs, terrified by his father's destruction, resolved to act more gently and mildly toward Christian men. Decrees being immediately given, he forbade the tortures, and extinguished the persecutions, permitting each to use the better ceremonies, as is dear to his heart; who, after he reached the end of life, left the summit of the kingdom to Claudius: after whom Aurelian, and then Probus, next * Cajus, and after a little Diocletian and Maximian arose as lords of affairs ^c.

[12] So it happened that from the first year of Gallienus to the tenth of Diocletian, about thirty years, St. Maternus visits his diocese; though with a somewhat dim and lukewarm peace, the persecution of the churches of Christ ceased; but I would say "a somewhat dim peace," saving this, that always the profane envy the good, the perfidious the faithful, the impious the pious, as usual, and, as far as concerns them, though the sentence ceases, the malice does not cease. During that same time the most glorious bishop of God, Maternus, watching over his sheep, as I have said before, with all zeal, fattened them most elegantly, the necessary pastures being applied, and, traversing all the parishes of the Italians subject to the Metropolitan see, both near and far extended, imbued them with the ecclesiastical offices: indeed those long since destitute of their proper pastors he revived, masters being then at last foreelected from the clergy of those same churches, filled with dignity of morals and vigor of faith, and, like a pious mother, in a manner by his own diligence he animated them.

[13] At which time the same man, worthy to be preferred, is recorded to have illustrated by his visitation the church also of the city of Tortona ^d, already long widowed by the death of its proper pastor. Finally, and, the city of Tortona long bereaved of a bishop that I may not begin from the opinion of vulgar rumor alone, but succinctly depict the tissue of the deed under a fitting order; Marcianus ^e of most holy memory having been carried over through the glory of his passion to the heavenly prelacy—who, in the first times of his faith, a little before he was assigned to the episcopal care of the same people, is known to have been instructed by the tutelage of Blessed Calimerus ^f, bishop of Milan, and to have been for some time his most faithful companion in preaching—for very many courses of years the people of the aforesaid Tortona remained without the priestly benediction, content with the offices of presbyters or deacons alone: these too being removed by the whirlwind of persecution, rarely in that region could you find dispensers of the heavenly mysteries.

[14] at the request of the people, For which cause the citizens, immoderately disturbed, by supplicatory writings entreat the pontiff of the Metropolitan see, over which, by the authorship of God, distinguished by the heralding of his merits, in those days the man of the Lord Maternus presided: they announce the shaken and almost fallen house of God, that is, the people of the faithful, and that unless help come running forthwith, it is about to fall; it complained that it could not bear the immense calamities, destitute of the suffrages of a consoler: because while it loses those by which it could be propped, there is no longer place in its strength whereby it may endure the heavy and sudden concussions of the winds. Whence it is needful that an architect come, and succor the fabric committed to him, as he himself better finds. The holy bishop, bent by such prayers of the afflicted people, immediately seized the road, and on the same day entered the aforesaid fortress of Tortona.

[15] he set Meliodorus as bishop. These things being known, the citizens run together from this side and that: some, meeting him at the very ford of the Po ^g, and most reverently supplicating the pastor of the people, say this with tearful eyes: "Hail, O hope of Italy, ornament of Liguria ^h, and splendor of Aemilia ⁱ, long desired from the Cottian Alps ^k; like the late rain, at last awaited thou comest: and what is sweeter to the parched and squalid clods of the earth, than the fullness of the heavenly rain? Enter, enter, approved physician of souls, and mercifully revive with whatever antidotes those afflicted with various discomforts. But when thou shalt have restored the sick sheep to fitting soundness, commend them also to a necessary pastor, learned and provident, in thy stead, that no longer by thy solicitude the flocks revived through the sheepfolds of many sheep scattered piecemeal, but not placed in thy sight, may fall away, and again the nations say: 'Where is their God?'" Having entered therefore, the nourishing Man, like a radiant sun, in his own virtue drove away all the darkness of idolatry from the city, and brought in the light of the faith of Christ, which he always breathed: nay more, he reformed the scattered and almost annulled order of the clergy, and, together with the consent of the people, adorned with the episcopal ministry Maliodorus ^l, a levite of the highest sanctity foreelected from the diaconate, and gave a pastor to the people asking for one. These deeds of the blessed Man, which arose on the side, being noted by way of foretaste, now at length we wish to make an excursion to the term of his glorious contest according to the following form.

[16] Diocletian and Maximian, having obtained the dignity and dominion of the Roman empire; Diocletian and Maximian, the latter of whom adorns the city of Milan, the one gave to himself the parts of the East, the other of the West of the Roman world. Therefore Diocletian, tending toward the East, committed to Maximian, whom he had made his colleague in the kingdom and Augustus with himself, the western regions of the world to be ruled: establishing for himself the imperial seat in the city of Nicomedia, he imposed on him the scepters of the Roman citadel, and at Milan, as it were in the middle ^m of the parts running together from this side and that, he placed the imperial palace: which city Maximian, beyond all who before him were princes of the Roman kingdom, cherished, augmented, and loved, so much that he added to a greater amplitude no small circuit of wall, and, adorning it also with various figures, made it akin to ancient Rome; and, what is much more notable, drenched with the rosy blood of innumerable martyrs, he rendered it so comely among neighboring cities, that much more, by the divine grace, it stands even now fortified by the protections of the Saints who suffered in it, than by the Maximianic bulwarks. I shall proceed therefore to note what was his and his colleague's mildness toward Christian men in the first year of their empire, and how great, a little after, the vexation, though from without; and thus indeed, so that from these, how great was the unshaken constancy of mind in the admirable man Maternus, how effective the advance of the times according to the sentence of the foreteller, may most easily be understood, even while I am silent.

[17] Therefore, the diadem of the imperial summit being undertaken by each, at the beginning of their empire they permit the Christian religion, they gave themselves mild and bland to the show of all: their wives, daughters ⁿ, and the household of almost the whole house they by no means disdained to be imbued with the sacraments of the Christian faith. And now also those who were of the secrets, of the cups, of the bedchamber of the king, were washed with the laver of Christ, and, under the cloak of the earthly empire, lay hidden, soldiers of Jesus Christ sworn together by the heavenly sacraments: by whose protection very many bishops of the churches had received the imperial edict, licitly to instruct with their tutelage whom they wished, a fixed number of the faithful being distributed both to the Roman and to the Milanese church, and to some other prelates of the metropolitan see, as I said above. But far otherwise, the industry of the heavenly Sower providing for the sacred seed of the Gospel, the more the appointed wall strove to gird the Lord's part from the envious one, the more, its joints spread apart, they, confounded exceedingly and stupefied, the surface of the whole heaven and earth being filled, were unable to attend to it as it spread abroad wandering.

[18] but, the number of Christians increasing, first the soldiers, For this cause, first of all among the military men the spark of persecution, coalescing, stirred up throughout the whole world an immense fire: for, an examination being made, if any of the soldiers were Christians, that they should either sacrifice, or lay down their military service and their life together, very many laid down their military service for the faith of Christ, some also their souls. Hence the flame, taking its beginning, burned up almost all the worshipers of the Christian name in one conflagration. Impossible to tell how many noble and industrious men of the military order, sublime in honor and worldly dignity, the voracious flame in a short wrath consumed. Finally, as time went on, the heat of the envy stirred up growing heavier from day to day, innumerable martyrs were made daily through each and every city and province. It happened also, when the solemn day of Easter drew near, that the edicts of the princes were publicly read out to all the peoples, commanding that all the churches throughout the world be destroyed to the ground, that the noble Christians be made infamous, that all their bishops be cast into chains, and by grievous tortures be compelled to sacrifice to the gods.

[19] then the priests, Then indeed a great spectacle were the priests of the Lord everywhere made to this world and to angels and to men. You would have discerned the prelates and ministers of Christ, in the manner of the accused, bound with the bonds of chains, shut up in horrid prisons, and consigned to the custody of adulterers and parricides; at the same time also with them illustrious men and noble matrons urged by the princely edicts, either to deny Christianity, or to relinquish Roman liberty; the unwilling shamelessly and dishonorably dragged to the public place, openly stripped before all, and, by the laws of robbers, beaten with leaded rods and cudgels. Everywhere mourning, everywhere grief, everywhere a foul and miserable spectacle; the sacred houses of prayer, and the churches of the living God, overthrown and torn down by them from the very foundations; oh, wickedness! the books of the divine Scripture burned with fire in the midst of the streets; in the cities a sudden silence from the praises of God, in the prisons the constant and sweet modulations of the servants of Christ, through the streets no one of the clergy. It is not for this work to measure the enormity of that so great persecution.

[20] and the other faithful, Therefore, when at Nicomedia, that city of the East, this flame of cruelty, kindled by Diocletian, had boiled up through innumerable provinces set near and far—which the author himself of the cruelty, like a bloody and fierce lion, always gaping for the destruction of the pious, had chosen rather for scattering than for ruling—no less active in the parts of the West was his co-heir and partner of the kingdom and at once of the military service, kindled with equal furies against the church of God: nay more, unequal to him in nothing, neither in beastly rage nor in the fury of an unbridled mind. Traversing all the cities of Italy and all the places of the West, if he found perchance any worshiper of Christ, commanding him either to be slain with the sword, or burned with fire, or torn with scourges, or scraped with claws, or done to death with whatever torments, he did not desist from his undertaking, until he was seen to have surpassed his colleague in all kinds of crimes: for when he entered within the walls of the Milanese, the edicts preceding; soon by the voice of the herald it was proclaimed in the whole city: "The emperor Caesar Herculeus Maximian Augustus, ever unconquered, greatest triumpher, has come: behold, run together, citizens, bring back the ancestral gods, run together, citizens, and venerate them. You, you, far from the city, profane, to you it is said, withdraw, Christians."

[21] And when on the next day he had ascended the tribunal prepared on high in the hippodrome of the circus with imperial pomp, they cruelly persecute; radiant with the diadem, he harangued in the Latin manner to the peoples standing by: "It behooves, O noble citizens," saying, "to follow the statutes of ancestral customs, and to inform therewith our vigilant minds, lest perchance, by luxuriating through other things, we at once degenerate from our dignity and likewise our liberty. Whence, recalling the memory to the sacrosanct worship of the gods, gratefully offer to the almighty divinities the libations of sacrifices. Furthermore, the rite of profane superstition being blown away, and those who affect such things being hissed off, be willing in nothing to be partakers; nay rather, cause them to be dragged to our will, boasting audacity [p], as they deserve, and, for the example of others, cutting them down, foully stripped, through the streets." A great shout of the pagan people arises; they pray a longer eternal glory to the greatest Caesar, ever conquering, happily bringing back golden ages: and forthwith is fulfilled that saying of the Lord foretelling: "Brother," he says, "will deliver up brother to death, and the father the son, and children will rise up against parents, and put them to death": for no affections of blood-relationship, no regard of the dearest friends, availed to restrain from the crime of betrayal. Mothers betrayed their only daughters, whomsoever they knew to be betrothed with the ring of the Christian faith: and no less did fathers expel from their houses their most Christian sons, to be dragged to the amphitheater, as profane, mad, and epileptic. On the contrary, some, foully defaming their own parents, delivered them to the torturers of the martyrs to be punished.

[22] But, that I may pursue what I have begun, amid these dangers the man of the Lord Maternus, groaning over the concussion of his sons, whom St. Maternus stirs up to patience, and dies piously. persisted immovable like a most strong tower; now bearing these, now those blows of the raging adversary with the unshaken foundation of his mind, and rendering the ranks of the combatants committed to him most safe with an impenetrable wall. How often, among others, bound with chains, how often presented to the most wicked prince with the rest? At times also ordered to be shut up in the workhouse of the prison, how often afflicted with atrocious scourges, cannot easily be comprehended by the page of this abridgment. Amid which, always protected by the shield and helmet of Christ, the excellent soldier stood against the hostile assaults. These things therefore and many such doing, which to bring forth and express through us, as is worthy, the poor speech cannot; better will your affection of the highest alacrity tell them to you. He was a worshiper and guardian of souls in earnestness, cutting off cupidities, repressing wraths, extirpating malices. This Man was the more necessary in those times, in which so great iniquity, its strength taken up daily, justice failing, grows strong. And indeed he, set in this pilgrimage in body alone, dwelt by thought and eagerness in that eternal fatherland, and, like a good reckoner, as if reaching out his hand to the hundredfold, always transferred from the left to the right, and laid up in heaven his sweats: for although here his works are seen, thither the merits of the works have passed. Let us, as far as we can, press upon his footsteps, who, hastening through that too-narrow way to the ample things of heaven, showed us that which we might follow. The same confessor of Christ was laid to rest under the emperor Maximian [q], on the fifteenth Kalends of August, our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor and glory unto the ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. "To boast" (pompare) is sometimes the same as to be proud, or to make a show; but at times it signifies to lead forth to pomp and mockery, as in the Miscellaneous History concerning Leo the Isaurian: "He led in mock-triumph one sitting naked upon an ass with face turned backward." This word seems here to be taken in the latter signification, although it can also be explained in the former.

q. From this chronological note I have tried, as far as could be done, to determine the time of St. Maternus's death.

* read Carus.