ON SAINT CENSURIUS, BISHOP OF AUXERRE IN GAUL.
ABOUT THE YEAR D.
HISTORICAL COLLECTION.
On his Chronology and cult, and on the writings of others to him.
Censurius, Bishop of Auxerre in Gaul (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR G. H.
Testimony of ancient veneration to this holy Prelate is given by four ancient apographs of the Hieronymian Martyrology, in which to this X June at the end an addition, Memory in the ancient fasti. we have recognized as added here by a Gallic antiquary. They assent in their Martyrologies Rabanus, Usuardus, Notker, the Author of pseudo-Bede, Bellinus and other more recent, with today's Roman Martyrology, generally with these words: At Auxerre the deposition of S. Censurius, Bishop and Confessor. To which in the Ado Ms. these are added: Whose body in the church of S. Germanus with worthy honor, not far from his body, is buried. He was the fourth after B. Germanus: he ruled the Church thirty-eight years, three months, eight days, or as others have, six days. But such a calculation is not without its difficulty, as will be shown below.
[2] These seem taken from the books of Heric the Auxerre monk on the Life and miracles of S. Germanus; where in chapter 1 of the first book it is said, that the second or nearest to S. Germanus was S. Allodius, Time of his See from Heric and others wrongly collected, who for nearly thirty years fulfilled the function of the Pontificate, of whom we shall treat on the day XXVIII September: then the third is placed Fraternus, crowned with martyrdom, and referred by Saussajus to XXIX September and XXX October. To this the aforenamed Censurius is substituted in the fourth place. Thus from the death of most blessed Germanus to this Censurius more or less forty years are gathered. Thus Heric: whose Acts we shall give on June 24. But S. Germanus died in the year 448,
on the day XXXI July: so from this calculation S. Censurius would have been ordained Bishop about the year 489, at the beginning of March. But because S. Censurius, as Heric in book 2 chapter 15 hands down, after having rightly administered the Priesthood for thirty-eight years, three months, as if he had lived until the year 527, six days, died on the IV Ides of June full of sanctity, and abundant in good works, the year of the Christian era 527 ought to be assigned to his death. In the History of the Bishops of Auxerre, published with the said books of Heric by our Philippus Labbe, in volume 1 of the New Library, chapter 10, Censurius is also said to have sat thirty-eight years, five months, six days: and to have been in the times of Felix, namely III, Gelasius, Anastasius, Symmachus and Hormisda, Roman Pontiffs while Anastasius and Justinus the Elder were reigning. These there. From the Pontiffs already named, Felix III lived until the year 492, as we have set forth in his Acts on February 25: but after Hormisdas there could even be added from this calculation the Pontificate of S. John, whom we have said to have administered from the year 523 to the year 526, in his Life on May 27, on which he died. But Anastasius took up the Empire in the year 491, Zeno having then died, in whose reign S. Censurius would have been ordained Bishop. Justinus, substituted for Anastasius, lived to the year 527.
[3] who died about the year 500. Against such a report stands the subscription of Bishops, who were present at the first Council of Orleans, which we judge to have been held in the year 508 or the following: for to this subscribed Theodosius, Bishop of Auxerre: and meanwhile, in the History of the Bishops of Auxerre indicated above, it is said that after the death of Censurius the city was without a Bishop for one year two months; and then Ursus the XI Bishop sat six years, six months; and then Theodosius the XII Bishop sat eight years, in the times of Boniface II, John II, and Agapetus, the first of whom began to sit in the year 530; and is said to have been present at the Council of Bishops, by command of Clovis, at the city of Orleans. Hence we gather that the computation of years does not stand, and there are errors either in the 30 years assigned to S. Allodius, or in the 38 years attributed to S. Censurius, or in both; and that he died about the five-hundredth year. So also, S. Fraternus omitted, Saussajus wrongly wrote in the Gallican Martyrology that S. Censurius followed next after S. Allodius: but on the day XXIX September he writes that S. Fraternus, to whom the said day is sacred, succeeded S. Allodius. In the ancient Auxerre Breviaries no aid is contributed for determining the Chronology, because all things are prescribed to be recited from the Common of a Confessor and Pontiff.
[4] Constantius inscribed the Life of S. Germanus to S. Censurius Heric the aforecited furthermore, While Censurius, he says, flourished in the dignity of Ecclesiastical primacy, Constantius of Lyon, exceedingly most learned, by the impulse or prayers of S. Patiens, then Bishop of that city, most excellently produced a book on the life and virtues of S. Germanus, with wondrous elegance of sentences, and copious choice of words … A work indeed completed and re-woven a long time with laborious diligence at home, with the obtaining of the aforenamed S. Censurius, he afterwards directed to the Auxerre Church, with the author himself to be promulgated more widely. To him he prefixed this epistle: To the Lord, most blessed, and to me venerable with Apostolic honor, Censurius the Papa, Constantine a sinner. My first care is to guard the modesty of a humble conscience: whose bounds if I perhaps transgress in anything, the fault is more of the commanders than mine. So that I might touch even in part the life and deeds of the most blessed Germanus the Bishop, the authority of your Brother the holy Prelate caused it: to whose precept, if not as I ought, yet as I could, I obeyed. And when my obedience had reached the notice of your Beatitude, that I should break out again into temerity, you ordered; commanding, that the little page, which until now was held within the vicinity of secrecy, should proceed more widely with me as author, and I should be in a way the accuser and betrayer of my own guilt. For manifestly condemnation will remain upon me, if the abjection of my words is brought to the hearing of the learned. Therefore having cast aside the veil of modesty, obeying the command, I have transmitted to you the obsequy of strenuous devotion; for confidence of charity beseeching, that you may protect me with a double favor, so far as I may both escape the examination of readers, and my ministry through your intercession may be intimated to the senses of my Lord S. Germanus. These things there.
[5] The body translated to the crypt: Finally the same Heric praised above, in book 2 chapter 15; After, he says, by the sentence of the wise it was judged best to be done, that the Relics of Martyrs, and also the bodies of the blessed Pontiffs of Auxerre, formerly buried in the very church, should be transferred into the crypts, and be placed around the body of the most blessed Germanus with the chief diligence of office … it happened, that the left, that is the Northern, was occupied by the pledges of the glorious Martyr Tiburtius, with the venerable bodies of five Pontiffs added; that is, of S. Fraternus Bishop and Martyr, Censurius, Gregorius, Desiderius and Lupus. These there. Gregorius is venerated on XIX December, and Desiderius on XXVII October. But Bishop Lupus came there with the venerable Queen Crotechildis, and being prevented by his end, was there buried. We were at Auxerre in the year 1662, and with great sense of piety surveyed the said crypt, and venerated the bodies of the Saints themselves.
[6] Sidonius Apollinaris, Bishop of the Arvernians, wrote to S. Censurius epistle 10 of book 6, which, that the persecution of the Goths may be understood, we subjoin; and is of this kind: The bearer of letters is honored by the office of the Levitical Order. epistle of S. Sidonius to Censurius. He with his family avoiding the whirlwind of Gothic depredation, was carried into your territory, by the very weight, so to say, of flight. Where in the matter of the Church, over which Your Sanctity presides, a hungry stranger has cast a small seed on a half-finished sod; whose collection in full he begs to be granted to him. Whom if you cherish with the humanity deputed to the household members of the faith, that is, that you should not seek the canon owed for the clod, he reckons that so small a gain has been granted to him (a stranger man's both purse and mind being narrow) as if he were rusticating in native soil. To him if you grant lawful, as the custom is, payment of a very small harvest, just as if he were sumptuously provisioned for the journey, with thanksgiving he will return. Through whom if you impart to me your style of accustomed dignation, to me and the brotherhood situated here your page will be reckoned as having slipped from heaven. Deign to be mindful of us, Lord Papa. Thus far S. Sidonius, inscribed in the Roman Martyrology on the day XXIII August. I omit the Epistle of Ruricius Bishop of Limoges to Censurius, because it can teach us nothing peculiarly pertaining to history.