ON ST. EXPLETIUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR,
AT METZ IN BELGICA I.
In the year 390.
CommentaryExpletius, Bishop and Confessor, at Metz in Belgica I (St.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
It is quite wondrous that this Expletius was first marked among the Saints by Ferrarius in the general Catalogue, in these words: At Metz, of St. Expletius, bishop of that city. But, bringing forward his sureties, he notes that he received it from the records of the church and the Catalogue of the bishops of Metz, Although he is absent from the standard Martyrologies, and also from the Calendar of Lorraine. What records he names determinately, or what Calendar of Lorraine, I do not have sufficiently ascertained: in the Catalogue of the bishops of Metz prefixed to Meurisse, it is certain that the title "Saint" or "St." is prefixed to his name, although in the very course of the history he abstains from that appellation; yet speaking of him so as—though in few words—abundantly to demonstrate that he was distinguished for the fame of his holiness. His words, from the French, I make Latin: At the time when blessed Ambrose was elected bishop of Milan, and in the same year in which the glorious St. Martin took up the government of the church of Tours, Expletius ascended the chair of Metz, namely in the year 375, who, after he had holily governed the flock for sixteen years, full of glory and blessings, died in the year 390, Pope Siricius sitting at Rome, and Valentinian II and Theodosius I reigning.
[2] Whatever therefore St. Expletius has been passed over by the received standard and other Martyrologies, nevertheless the cult seems due to him. there seem to have been sufficient arguments to guide Ferrarius, by which he numbered him among the Saints, nor do we think it lawful for us to exclude him from our work, Saussay too in his Martyrology on this day so expressly recording him: At Metz, of St. Explecius, bishop and confessor, who, succeeding holy Auctor, ruled that church for sixteen years in all holiness, and, consummated in the office of piety, under Pope Siricius flew away to heaven. Concerning the certain day of his death I have nothing to controvert or indeed to define; let it suffice that his festivity is commemorated on this day, whatever Castellanus, in his additions and corrections, notes as to his being marked on the twenty-seventh of July: At Metz, of St. Expletius, bishop, whose passing he refers to the year not expressly 390, with Meurisse, but about 400. But just as concerning the day of his death, so neither concerning the certain year of his death is there at hand what we may decree, so that in this part we think we can acquiesce in Meurisse, a sufficiently accurate illustrator of the ecclesiastical matters of Metz.