Florentinus

ON ST. FLORENTINUS, OR FLORENTIUS, BISHOP OF TRIER AND TONGEREN,

ABOUT THE MIDDLE OF THE 3RD CENTURY.

HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL COMMENTARY.

Florentinus or Florentius, bishop of Trier and of Tongeren. (S.)

J. V. H.

§ I. The memory of St. Florentinus in the sacred calendars; his shorter Life; the origins of the Churches of Trier and Tongeren reconsidered on the occasion of this saint; first from the ancient Martyrologies and the writers of the history of Trier.

The memory of the saint in the sacred calendars: What we have known about St. Florentinus or Florentius is contained almost entirely in the Martyrologies, and not even in the classical ones. His memory is celebrated first of all by the present-day Roman Martyrology under the 16th day of October in these words: "At Trier, of St. Florentinus, bishop." The Roman announcement had been preceded in time by several Auctaria of Usuard, given by our Sollerius under the 17th day of October, namely the Lübeck-Cologne one, which has: "At Trier, of St. Florentinus, bishop and martyr"; Greven and Molanus speak in exactly the same words: but Galesini seems to have lit the way for the Roman Martyrology, when he is silent about the title of martyr, which nevertheless the Trier Proper, published by order of Johann Hugo von Orsbeck, archbishop elector, about the beginning, as it seems, of the 18th century, attributes to St. Florentinus. With these Ferrarius agrees in his Catalogue of the Saints who are not in the Roman Martyrology, and adds that the saint flourished under Gallus and Volusian (from the year 251 to 253).

[2] The shorter Life from the Proper of the Church of Trier. The Trier Proper, of which we treated above, prescribes a memory, as we commonly say, a simple one, of St. Florentinus, and adds to the Office of St. Hedwig, venerated on this day, a ninth lesson, which we present here: "Florentius, who is also Florentinus, while the persecution of the Gentiles was still raging among the Treveri, before the conversion of Constantine the Great, was made, as he was the successor of blessed Severinus in the see of Trier, so also a sharer in his glorious martyrdom not long after him in time. For since he, as a faithful shepherd, was a diligent gatherer and instructor of the sheep oppressed under Rictiovarus and scattered through various hiding places, he could not long escape the sagacity and fury of the persecutors. And since the Gallic populace raged against bishops no less than the Roman governors, he was betrayed scarcely as the second year was turning, and brought out into the arena, he obtained the palm of martyrdom with the signal praise of fortitude, and dying left us his memory on the sixteenth day before the Kalends of November." Whence the authors of the Proper drew this notice of St. Florentinus, as having suffered after a rule of two years under Rictiovarus, that is, at the beginning of the fourth century, there is no point in my declaring, since I have been able to find nothing among the ancients by which these statements might be in any degree confirmed: I should think that the praised authors followed conjectures, who, since they saw that St. Florentinus in the order of the pontiffs of Trier came rather close to St. Agritius, a bishop of the fourth century, judged that he should be brought back to the times of the persecution of Diocletian. But according to the Catalogue of the bishops of Trier, three prelates must be inserted between SS. Florentinus and Agritius, namely Martin II, Maximinus and Valentinus: wherefore, if the said catalogue should seem worth retaining, of which we shall treat a little below, I should judge that St. Florentinus belongs rather to the middle of the 3rd century, and so preceded Diocletian and his persecution. Whence it also becomes plain that I do not agree with Ferrarius, who says that our saint flourished under Gallus and Volusian.

[3] On the foundation of the Church of Trier in the first century These things having been said, since no other monuments illustrating the deeds of St. Florentinus come to hand, the business would be finished and the pen could be laid down. But the episcopate of St. Florentinus raises another question, often aired already both by our predecessors and by men most distinguished for learning. For there are not a few learned men who think that St. Agritius occupied the see of Trier after St. Maternus, with no other bishop in between, and accordingly that St. Maternus adorned the Church not in the first century, as the more ancient writers commonly supposed, but only in the third or fourth: whence it follows of its own accord that all the bishops who are reported as intermediate between the two saints are to be struck out of the Catalogue of prelates, so that the question remains doubtful whether St. Florentinus and the other intermediate bishops ever existed, and accordingly it is certain, according to their opinion, that the see of Trier is wrongly ascribed to them. And what I have said of the Catalogue of Trier is to be understood in exactly the same way of that of Tongeren, since according to the opinion of the same men no intercalated bishop ought to separate SS. Maternus and Servatius. I shall therefore here also examine, according to my small measure, a question already often treated and retreated in these Acta Sanctorum: if anything should escape me contrary to right criticism, it can be brought back to the balance under the 8th day of December, when St. Eucharius is to be treated, who is held, unless I am mistaken, by the consent of all to be the first bishop of Trier.

[4] is disputed by many, The opinion denying that St. Maternus existed in the first century and that any bishops were intermediate between him and St. Agritius has found as patrons men of the highest learning, among whom are chiefly to be numbered Dom Calmet, abbot of Senones Histoire de Lorraine, volume I, Dissertation on the first bishops of Trier., Johann Nikolaus von Hontheim, bishop of Myriophytos and suffragan of Trier [Historia Trevirensis, volume I, Dissertation on the era of the founding of the bishopric of Trier, p. IX.], and Jean Périer, our hagiographer, in the Preliminary Commentary on St. Maternus on the 14th day of September Acta Sanctorum, volume IV of September, p. 354., whom a crowd of writers then followed. But the very weakness of the proofs forbids me to come down into the opinion of such great men. For whatever is brought forward by the most learned writers reduces to a negative argument, on account of which they would have an ancient tradition, indeed one constant through the eight later centuries, effaced. The learned know that a weapon taken from a quiver of this kind is for the most part feeble [Honoré de Sainte-Marie, De l'usage de la critique, volume I, p. 255 and following.], unless it is strengthened by some positive demonstration. Now the praised writers construct their negative argument first from the silence of the Martyrologies, then because authors older than the 9th or 10th century have nothing about a mission given by St. Peter himself to the first bishops of Trier, and finally because there exist ancient Catalogues of those prelates which place St. Agritius after St. Maternus with no one in between. Let us examine these briefly.

[5] on account of the silence of the more ancient Martyrologies: The authority of the Martyrologies is very great in those things which they state: since, while they present only the principal and highest features of any saint, they are thought to have drawn these accurately from genuine sources. But their silence can scarcely ever prejudice any saint, because no martyrologist ever professed to treat either of all the saints or of all their deeds. And yet those seem to imply this who, because some ancient Martyrologies are silent about discipleship of St. Peter, deny it to SS. Eucharius, Valerius and Maternus. Since the same Martyrologies, omitting SS. Eucharius and Maternus, announce only Valerius, will those therefore have to be struck out of the roll of the saints, and Valerius alone venerated? But someone will reply that in the Hieronymian calendars under the 29th day of January they not only are silent about the discipleship of St. Peter, but do not even attach to the name of Valerius the distinctive sign De Antiquis, "with which, when it is set beside them, the bishops of the first two centuries commonly rejoice in the Hieronymian Martyrologies [Acta Sanctorum, volume IV of September, p. 361, no. 35, and Sollerius, Martyrology of Usuard, 29 January.]." The argument would certainly be valid if that sign were both always set beside the ancients and never added to the more recent. But both conditions collapse: for I see the distinctive sign absent from the name of St. Apollinaris on the 23rd day of July, although, as all confess, he was the first bishop of the people of Ravenna, a disciple of St. Peter, and died within the first century Volume V of July, p. 328.. Then St. Hippolytus, cited in the Hieronymian Martyrologies under the same 29th day of January with De Antiquis set beside him, seems, by the judgment of Fiorentini, to be the bishop of Porto who flourished in the third century. Wherefore the argument has not much strength, since it could with little labour be overthrown by many other examples.

[6] among whom Ado is first, Nevertheless the patrons of the opinion which we are now weighing confess that Ado, who wrote his Martyrology about the year of Christ 838, attributed the discipleship of St. Peter to St. Valerius, when he says on the 29th day of January: "On the same day, the deposition of blessed Valerius, bishop, disciple of St. Peter the Apostle." Usuard follows in the footsteps of Ado, with the word "At Trier" added. From these two martyrologists it is certainly established that the opinion which makes SS. Eucharius, Valerius and Maternus disciples of St. Peter the Apostle was not first born in the 10th or 11th century. But Hontheim objects to Ado the authority of Wandalbert of Prüm and Rabanus of Mainz, who are silent about the quality of disciple of St. Peter; and these, as dwellers on the Rhine, deserve greater credit [Hontheim, Historia Trevirensis, volume I, Dissertation on the era of the founding of the bishopric, p. XIV.]. The argument would indeed bind if Rabanus and Ado declared things opposed to each other, and it could then further be inquired to which of the two credit should be given. But I see nothing here which indicates a contradiction: Rabanus was silent, Ado spoke; the silence of the former can in no way break the authority of the latter. "But," Hontheim goes on, "who will be our guarantor that Ado, in his fuller and more open description of the eulogies, was never deceived by copies of the Acts, or in some other way?" And I reply, who will be our guarantor that Eusebius, Jerome, Augustine, and indeed Hontheim himself, when they cite more ancient documents, were never deceived by trust in copies or in some other way? The reader certainly sees that historical monuments will have no firmness henceforth if they can be overthrown by this ballista, and that all credit must be withdrawn from the Annals if this reasoning should stand.

[7] whose authority is defended, But suppose Ado was deceived by trust in copies; it will certainly follow that this writer was not the first to bring to light the opinion about the discipleship of St. Peter attributed to the first bishops of Trier. Which Hontheim himself indeed confesses Ibid., p. XVI., when he says that Ado was "deceived" by a popular rumour which he had imbibed as a young man at Prüm, against which Wandalbert and Rabanus, learned men of the household, had stood firm. I have already said that nothing is rightly deduced as an argument from the silence of these martyrologists. "Perhaps," Hontheim further says, "the name of Valerius, which is read in the First Epistle of St. Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, gave him occasion to write that our man, different from that ancient one, was a disciple of blessed Peter." It is a conjecture,

which could easily be struck down by another conjecture: and this indeed would suffice; but that Valerius of whom St. Clement speaks is sent as an envoy to Corinth; how then could it come about that Ado, who writes that Valerius was evangelizing the Treveri, should have assigned to him the time for accepting a mission into distant Greece, which any presbyter or deacon of the Roman Church might easily have fulfilled? Whence I conclude with probability that Ado did not confuse Valerius, the envoy of St. Clement, with the bishop of Trier.

[8] attributes the discipleship of St. Peter to blessed Valerius and his companions. "But perhaps," says Hontheim, in the place cited, "we lay too much upon Ado, who may have taken the discipleship of Peter in that sense in which those who had been formed for the faith and the apostolate by the successors of Peter were called disciples of Peter, although that word was afterwards taken by others contrary to its native sense." In confirmation of this excuse is brought forward the testimony of St. Boniface, archbishop of Mainz in the 7th century, who in a certain letter of Charles Martel, unknown to me, is called the Envoy of St. Peter Acta Sanctorum, volume V of June, p. 544, no. 18.. But I find no parity at all between the two texts: when, namely, Charles called St. Boniface, sent into Germany by St. Gregory II, the Envoy of St. Peter, it was easily given to understand in what sense this mission was to be taken. But when I read in some Martyrology the bare title of disciple of St. Peter, such words necessarily call my mind elsewhere and carry me back to the times of St. Peter. Finally, whenever the appellation of Disciple or Envoy of St. Peter occurs in the Martyrologies, I strongly doubt, as I turn over these books, whether it can even once be clearly demonstrated that the saints distinguished by this mark are to be brought down to more recent times. And let what has been said of the Martyrologies suffice.

[9] The second argument is drawn from the Gesta of Trier, often fabulous: Hontheim then comes to the writers who make up the school, as he himself calls it, of St. Matthias near Trier, and who, immediately after the Norman devastation, handed down to posterity in continuous series the inheritance of doctrine and learning received from their predecessors. Certainly the chief source of the ecclesiastical history of Trier is to be sought in this school: from there is to be derived the book which is commonly known under the name Gesta Trevirorum, and which narrates the deeds of those bishops who preceded the times of the Normans. It is objected to the book that it contains very many fabulous things, that the beginnings of this History are sprinkled with trifles and fables, etc., all of which may be seen in the praised Hontheim [Historia Trevirensis, volume I, On the era of the founding of the Church of Trier, p. XVIII.]. I could altogether acquiesce in a censure of this kind, without anyone being able consequently to infer: therefore what is related in the Gesta concerning the discipleship of St. Peter attributed to the first bishops of Trier smacks of fable: no one will readily admit the conclusion: nevertheless, since the authority of the Gesta wavers in some things, it must be seen whether the discipleship of St. Peter should not come to be rejected among doubtful histories Hillar, Vindiciae Trevirenses, p. 49..

[10] whose authority, however, is shown, Before we resolve the question itself, the history of the school of St. Matthias at Trier, from which the Gesta Trevirorum came forth, must be set out in a few words. Hontheim himself confesses that already in the 9th century this school was splendid in the fame of its learning Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. 250.. Florbert, who in the year 885, namely the third year from the Norman devastation, is called by Trithemius Chronicon Hirsaugiense, p. 37. "monk and schoolmaster of the monastery of St. Matthias near Trier, a man certainly most learned in every respect," who was the teacher of many monks, through whom doctrine and learning were thereafter propagated down to late posterity M. Hillar, Vindiciae Trevirenses, pp. 68, 81 and following.. Fatal to the school of St. Matthias, as to the rest of the people of Trier, was the invasion of the Normans, who in the year 882, on the Lord's Supper or the 5th day of April, as the contemporary Annals of Metz say Dom Bouquet, volume VIII, p. 63., "demolished to the ground the whole territory of the city (of Trier) round about; then, burning the city with flames, they direct their line of march to Mediomatricum (Metz) Cf. Trithemius, Chronicon Hirsaugiense, p. 35.." In the same calamity perished the chief, indeed almost all, of the ancient monuments of the Church of Trier, as is testified, besides the Gesta CXXVII, by the author of the Life of St. Felix, archbishop of Trier, on the 26th day of March Acta Sanctorum, volume III of March, p. 622, no. 1.: "In the mention of this thrice-holy Felix," he says, "as in the remembrance of almost all the saints of Trier, we are compelled to bewail the oft-repeated devastation of this city, through which it is established that the huge volumes of the Lives of our holy fathers were so utterly consumed that (had they not been in some measure restored from very few drops, so to speak, of so great a sea, in the most ancient sheets of other places, or even in tablets of lead and marble buried deep in the earth) our instruments, as though hung upon the rivers of our Babylon, would long since have fallen silent in the praise of these saints." Compare also the Life of St. Modoaldus on the 12th day of May Ibid., volume III of May, p. 52..

[11] from the trustworthiness of the writers, And this was the state of things when the school of St. Matthias began to flourish again under Florbert, who died in the year 885. This writer seems to be the first who dug out from the ruins of the burned city the History or Gesta of the Treveri. For Eberhard, his disciple and successor, "himself learned in every respect," says Trithemius Chronicon Hist., p. 37., "who presided over the mastership for almost twenty-four years," is said under the year 909 Ibid., p. 56., among the other monuments of his genius, "to have ADDED a great many things to the History of the Treveri, and also to have written the Life of SS. Eucharius, Valerius and Maternus, the first pontiffs of Trier, in verse as well as in prose, in a more elegant style." Whence, in my judgment, I rightly deduce that already before Eberhard, who was made master in the third year from the Norman devastation and was therefore contemporary with the disaster, there was another who began to write the Gesta Trevirorum, since Eberhard is reported only to have added a great many things to them. I think, therefore, that I do not rashly pronounce that the first of all to collect the Gesta Trevirorum was either Florbert himself or at least another monk of St. Matthias of the same authority.

[12] who in so grave and obvious a matter could neither deceive, This being so, it will altogether have to be said either that these writers knowingly and willingly lied shamefully, or that they faithfully handed down to posterity the knowledge received from their predecessors about the beginnings of the episcopate of Trier, at least as regards its principal features. But no one will lay the charge of falsehood upon religious men whose memory is recalled by posterity with a sense of gratitude. And if anyone should come to such a pitch of impudence as to brand as forgers monks most celebrated for learning and doctrine, what credit, I ask, shall we be able to give to them even when they narrate contemporary facts? By this mode of reasoning all the sincerity of history would perish, since one could always object that the writer wished to impose a falsehood on the reader. Further, for anyone to devote his pen to such ignominy, some motive must be found by which the writer is stirred to dare such a deed; which indeed can be nothing other than his own advantage. But in the History of Trier or the Gesta I find nothing which in even the smallest part seems to favour the monastery of St. Matthias at Trier: nothing is found there by which we are taught the antiquity, splendour or privileges of their own monastery: indeed, while every effort is made to illustrate the prerogative of the see of Trier, there is deep silence about the monastery of St. Matthias itself, whose origins, series of abbots, and compendium of privileges are unknown. The authors who published Gallia Christiana Gallia Christiana, volume XIII, column 544. begin the succession of the prelates of St. Matthias from the year 975; whence it is given to understand that the masters who wrote the Gesta Trevirorum, neglecting their own affairs, pursued the common utility, on account of which no one of sound mind will make himself guilty of a most grave falsehood.

[13] nor could be deceived, And if the masters of the school of St. Matthias have been vindicated, before every fair judge of affairs, from every charge of falsehood and forgery, there remains the other part of the hypothesis, namely that they sincerely handed down what they had received from their predecessors. Whence, further, it is given to understand that the opinion which makes the first bishops of Trier disciples of St. Peter is older than the 9th or 10th century. Whence the exception of Hontheim is struck down, who says Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XII.: "The particular Histories of the Churches and the Gesta of the first bishops, by which so great an antiquity is asserted for them, were compiled only in the 10th and following centuries; in an age, namely, in which there was little or no praise for the critical art, and when it was customary for very many to hunt for commendation and pre-eminence for their Churches from apostolic synchronism." All willingly grant that some centuries have excelled others in greater praise of criticism: wherefore, in investigating the genuineness of some diploma, to use an example, we fully judge present-day criticism to be of a keener nose than that which was applied in the 10th century; for the critical art has been perfected and polished by the great facility, imparted to all after the invention and spread of the art of printing, of comparing manifold monuments of antiquity, from which comparison a judgment arises more securely concerning the authenticity and merits of the individual documents.

[14] although in the accessories they may often have erred. But what is the matter at issue in the present controversy? Namely, to know and attest that the opinion of apostolic synchronism also flourished in the times before the Normans. That the first writers of the Gesta of Trier are suitable witnesses of this, everyone, as I indeed trust, will willingly confess with me: for when anyone testifies to some public and constant fact, I do not think it necessary to have recourse to some more subtle criticism. These things the first writers had received from their fathers, had read in the parchments of their own monastery and of the other Churches of Trier: and for doing this the masters of St. Matthias needed no exquisite sharpness of wit, no huge apparatus of learning, although these too did not seem to be lacking. But if this answer should not satisfy, let hypercritics of this kind consider again and again lest they cast themselves headlong into the pit of historical scepticism. For if the authority of the writers of the 10th century is abolished, I do not see in what way they will be able to fill up this gap; even in those things which the authors of that age saw in person (and certainly they beheld with their own eyes the tradition flourishing in their time), credit will have to be wholly withdrawn from their statements. I shall say nothing of the custom ascribed to the writers of that age, by which it was customary for them to hunt for commendation and pre-eminence for their Churches from apostolic synchronism: for this is nothing other than to lie as a matter of custom, which indeed we have already exploded above at no. 12.

§ II. The same question reconsidered from the authority of the ancient Catalogues of the Church of Trier.

Hontheim seeks the third argument from the Catalogues, Hontheim brings up a third engine, namely that the bishops intermediate between Maternus and Agritius were unknown to antiquity Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XXIV.; whence, the series of pontiffs having been eliminated, the opinion became probable that St. Maternus flourished not in the first century but in the third, verging toward its end. "The first," he says, "and weightiest support for this opinion is offered by the Catalogues of the bishops

of Trier, not indeed the more recent ones, interpolated after the opinion of the monks of St. Matthias had been received, but those purer and original ones, the first trace of which Mabillon showed me in the Annals of the Order of St. Benedict, book 15, § LVIII Annales Ordinis S. Benedicti, volume I, p. 448., where he mentions 'an old Catalogue of the bishops of Trier, which exists in the library of Saint-Ghislain in Hainaut, whose first hand ends at Marinus'" (Marus?): A copy of this Catalogue, such as I recently obtained through the intervention of friends, I communicate as follows:

HERE BEGIN IN ORDER THE NAMES OF THE BISHOPS OF THE TREVERI.

[16] especially the Saint-Ghislain one, Here Hontheim plainly triumphs, inasmuch as he pronounces the Saint-Ghislain Catalogue pure and genuine Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XXVI., and proclaims the arguments drawn from it positive and affirmative Ibid., p. XXVIII.. Yet the Catalogue is not of great antiquity; for the series of bishops reaches the end of the 10th century. Whether, further, the writing may even belong to the following century, I have no data by which it would be permissible to judge. Maurus Hillar, in his Vindiciae of the History of Trier, says P. 70 and following. that the whole codex is written in one and the same hand from head to foot; whence what Mabillon, cited in the preceding number, has, that the first hand ends at Marinus (I suppose he meant to say Marus, bishop from the year 461), is a manifest error. The praised Hillar adds Ibid., p. 74 and following. that the codex seems to have been written not later than the 11th century, both from the parchment, which is rather coarse, thick, less cleaned and less polished (moins dégraissé) than in the subsequent centuries, and from the antiquity of the script. Since it has not fallen to my lot to see the Saint-Ghislain codex, which I have sought in vain both in the royal library at Brussels and in that of Tournai or of Mons in Hainaut, whatever is reported about the quality of the parchment and the antiquity of the script I leave resting on the credit of Pierre Baudry, prior of Saint-Ghislain and writer of the letter to Maurus Hillar cited.

[17] whose antiquity is examined But a scruple moves me not to attribute so great an antiquity to the Saint-Ghislain Catalogue: namely, that the last name, Ruobert, which in our more usual manner of speaking would be written Rupertus, Robertus, is nowhere read in the series of the bishops of Trier after Henry I. Hontheim, indeed, corrects the scribe's slip, and substitutes for the ill-omened name Ludolf, or, according to the manuscript of the Charterhouse of Koblenz, Rudolf Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XXV., who occupied the see of Trier from the year 994 to 1008. And from this epoch too it is deduced that the Saint-Ghislain Catalogue belongs to the 11th century. But from this very fact, that the writer erred in the last name, may I not infer that he was by no means contemporary with Ludolf of Trier, nay rather so distant from the beginning of the 11th century that the memory of Ludolf had already been effaced; whence it would further follow that the Saint-Ghislain Catalogue, Hontheim's Achilles, belongs rather to the 12th century? Then, the antiquity of the codex being admitted, a two-edged argument arises; for if the Saint-Ghislain catalogue strikes out the intermediate bishops between SS. Maternus and Agritius, the codex nevertheless retains the apostolic origin of the Church of Trier, inasmuch as it presents to us the first three bishops as sent by St. Peter himself; but by what criterion Hontheim would keep one part of the codex, I mean the Catalogue of the bishops of Trier, safe and sound as a pure and genuine offspring of antiquity, while on the contrary exploding the other, which asserts the apostolic origin, I plainly do not see.

[18] and whoever would construct a negative argument besides; Nevertheless, in confirmation of his Catalogue Hontheim adduces a text excerpted from the Gesta Trevirorum themselves, chapter CLXVII Gesta Trevirorum, volume I, p. 153, Trier edition of the year 1836., in which is said: "Blessed Agricius, fourth of the bishops of Trier, whose names," says the writer, "we have known." From these words Hontheim concludes, since Bruno, in whose history these things are read concerning St. Agritius, presided over the see of Trier from the year 1103 to 1124, that the writing belongs to the 11th century, whence it also follows that at the same time the succession of bishops such as is presented in chapter XXXVII of the Gesta Gesta Trevirorum, volume I, p. 41. was unknown, or at least held of no account. Then he says Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XXVII.: "I do not doubt that those hedging words, 'whose names are held known,' were employed by this ingenuous writer in deference to that popular rumour about the immediate mission of Eucharius by St. Peter, and also out of reverence for Theodoric and Golscher, whose new catalogues of bishops he preferred to ignore rather than openly contradict." Some weight is added to Hontheim's opinion by the assertion of Calmet, who in his History of Lorraine [Histoire de Lorraine, volume I, preliminary Dissertation, column 7, and Proofs, column IX in the margin.] reports that he saw in the monastery of St. Matthias a handwritten codex in which the series of the bishops intermediate between SS. Maternus and Agritius was lacking. Hontheim indeed confesses Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. XXVI. (thinking that Calmet did not express in what place he had seen this manuscript, whereas he clearly points to the library of St. Matthias) that he had inquired in the said monastery in vain: "yet no one doubts that Calmet in fact saw it, especially since another," he says, "an excellent man and most experienced in these matters, has reported to me that he saw a similar manuscript copy of the Gesta, seen by him in another place, in which likewise there are no names of bishops intermediate between Maternus and Agritius."

[19] for the ancients seem I indeed willingly confess that these intermediate bishops were probably unknown to the first writers of the Gesta of Trier: for certain ancient copies demonstrate this sufficiently, as Maurus Hillar, a monk of St. Matthias, attests Vindiciae Ecclesiae Trevirensis, p. 128., who cites a codex in which this is read: "For as we gather by diligent computation, we know that there were 346 years between the glorious departure of blessed Maternus from this world and the most happy entry of St. Agritius into this city." "And then he judges that during this intervening space of time the episcopate of this see ceased; I consequently conclude" (it is the praised Hillar who speaks) "that this codex must be very ancient, since the names of those mentioned were still unknown to this writer, which were already found by the beginning of the 11th century: whence also in the margin, in a very ancient hand, most difficult to read, it is noted: 'In the Catalogue of the bishops of Trier, 22 bishops are found to have been intermediate between Maternus and Agritius; wherefore the error is plain. Similarly the error is plain that at the same time pagans also held the city, since it is held earlier that innumerable persons were martyred by Rictiovarus not long before the coming of Agritius.'" If no typesetter's error has crept into the 346 years intermediate between SS. Maternus and Agritius, the writer certainly strays from the truth; since St. Agritius ascended the episcopal see about the year 313 Hontheim, Historia Trevirensis, volume I, p. LVIII.; and so St. Maternus, dying about the end of the first century, did not leave so great an interval of time. From the text cited it becomes clear that the series of bishops which was added at a later time to chapter XXVII was unknown to the first writers of the Gesta: but does it follow from this that the intercalation is fabulous and rests on no foundation? This indeed seems to me by no means to follow. For it certainly could have come about that the succession of these bishops became known little by little, and was at length brought to its present state. To this point is what we related above at no. 10 from the Life of St. Felix, archbishop of Trier, in which the Acts of the ancient fathers are said to have been restored from the most ancient sheets of other places, or even from tablets of lead and marble buried deep in the earth.

[20] to have been ignorant of the bishops intermediate between Maternus and Agritius But who would be our guarantor that the Catalogue of Trier did not grow by the same industry? Certainly in a similar way the Catalogues of the bishops of various Churches which we have today have grown. For if the three editions of Gallia Christiana are compared, which Claude Robert gave in the year 1626, the brothers Sainte-Marthe in the year 1656, and finally the Benedictines of the Congregation of St. Maur in the year 1715, manifold additions of names will be found, dug out from various charters and monuments. I shall bring forward one example, since it occurs in this very volume. The Maurists, who published Gallia Christiana with third labours, intercalated as an intermediate bishop of Laon between Serulf and Madelgar one Omotarius Volume IX, column 512., into the knowledge of whom they came through the Prologue of the Life of St. Salaberga, which is inscribed to Pope Omotarius, to Austrudis the abbess, and to a certain Salaberga, as may be seen on the 22nd day of September Acta Sanctorum, September, volume VI, p. 521.. From this inscription, namely, the praised writers rightly deduced that there was a gap in the Catalogue of Laon, which they closed. Whence it further follows that credit is not at once to be withdrawn from a more recent Catalogue because it is fuller than an older one: for it could happen in the course of time that new documents shed greater light on a matter still obscure. Whence it is plain that the Saint-Ghislain monument, even if we granted that it surpassed all the rest in antiquity, does not in every respect wholly favour the expungers.

[21] who were afterwards found. When therefore Hontheim defends his opinion by the authority of the writer saying that St. Agritius was the fourth of the bishops of Trier whose names are held known, it can by no means be wrung from this text that there were no intermediate bishops; but that the names of those who in fact existed were not known with certainty in every respect, whether because at that time they had not yet been discovered, or because the writer of the Gesta, whom I suspect to be Lambert of Liège, thought that all these bishops did not belong to the see of Trier, but were rather regionary bishops attached to no fixed see. And as for Hontheim's addition, that those hedging words, "whose names are held known," were employed by this ingenuous writer in deference to the popular rumour…; this I consider rashly said. For if the writer so much revered either the popular rumour or his predecessors Theodoric and Golscher, nothing compelled him, since he had then undertaken to narrate the deeds of Archbishop Bruno, to touch the controversial opinion with even a little word. From where, then, does Hontheim have it that the praised writer connived at the popular rumour or at reverence for his predecessors? He can put forward one cause for a conjecture of this kind, namely that the apostolic mission of the first bishops displeased him, Hontheim; and so the clear words of the author had to be twisted into another sense; by which it came about that the ingenuous writer approved even by his own vote a badly devised fable. By such an interpretation and, as it were, by one obelus of the pen, Hontheim makes the writers of the Gesta either liars or accomplices of a lie. Which is more severe than that we should give credit to the one who says it.

[22] nor does it help to show that Maternus of Cologne was of the 4th century, Finally, in the opinion of those who judged that the beginnings of the Christian religion among the Treveri must be brought back to the 2nd or 3rd century, it was consistent enough to establish that Maternus, the third prelate among the people of Trier, was the same as the Maternus who was employed as a judge in the controversy of the Donatists and is called bishop of Cologne. This thesis our Jean Périer develops at length in the Preliminary Commentary to the Life of St. Maternus on the day

14th of September Acta Sanctorum, volume IV of September, p. 371, § IX., so that it is not necessary to hammer it out again here. But to confess what I feel, this conjecture rests on no suitable testimony. There was certainly at Cologne, at the beginning of the 4th century, a bishop named Maternus; but what, I ask, prevents another of the same name from having preceded both in that same see and in that of Trier? Indeed, the name Maternus or Maternius was not an outlandish one in the regions near the Rhine: it occurs, namely, on three stones discovered at Mainz Fuchs, Alte Geschichte von Mainz, pp. 5, 60 and 194., and another Maternus held the consulship at Rome in the year of Christ 185 L'Art de vérifier les dates, volume I, p. 354.. Whence it is no wonder that two bishops of the same name existed, one at Trier, the other at Cologne. Then, at the beginning of the fourth century, the city of the Treveri certainly stood out among all those beyond the Alps; wherefore it seems also probable that, if Maternus of Trier and of Cologne had been one and the same, he would nevertheless have retained the title of Trier. But St. Optatus of Milevis indicates otherwise, On the Schism of the Donatists, book I, chapter XXIII Works 22, Paris edition of 1702., who calls Maternus "bishop from the city of Agrippina."

[23] as though he had occupied the see of Trier as well Maternus himself assumes the same title at the Council of Arles of the year 314, to which he subscribes in this form Labbe, Concilia, volume I, column 1430.: "Maternus, bishop, Macrinus, deacon, from the city of the Agrippinenses"; and a little below: "Agraecius, bishop, Felix, exorcist, from the city of the Treveri." From this double subscription it seems to me it can be concluded either that the name of Maternus must be struck out of the diptychs of Trier, or that this Maternus was translated from Trier to Cologne: but neither can be said: not the former, because it is a constant tradition, approved by the adversaries themselves, that St. Maternus was the third bishop of the Treveri after SS. Eucharius and Valerius. Not the latter, namely that Maternus, leaving his former see, occupied that of Cologne; for besides its being a bare conjecture, the translation of bishops was unusual at that period; whence our Sigismund Calles rightly says in his Ecclesiastical Annals of Germany, book III, § VII Annales Germaniae, volume I, p. 178.: "Of this translation there is neither indication, nor any example in the whole West at that time." It remains, therefore, that we establish two Materni, one sitting at Cologne, the other at Trier.

[24] for this was prevented by the discipline in force. But Hontheim replies Historia Trevirensis, volume I, Preface, p. XXXV.: "I remember that it was objected by someone that it can hardly be believed that Maternus passed to the see of Cologne, leaving that of Trier; because that passage seems to be repugnant to the custom of those times. To these I replied: that every translation of Maternus properly so called is out of place here, since it cannot be established where, before the conversion of Constantine, not even a diocese in the proper sense appears in our parts, but a field hitherto undefined and circumscribed by no limits, cultivated and watered by the word of God through Eucharius within narrower bounds, through Maternus within wider ones, and at length divided under him for the greater good of the Church now rejoicing." These things Hontheim brings forward conveniently for his case: but also truly? We rightly doubt it; for although at the beginning of the fourth century the limits of dioceses were not defined, at least insofar as they looked toward the regions of the infidels, yet the see of the bishop was fixed, for the most part in the chief city: similar things occur even today in North America: there too the see is certain, although the boundaries are sometimes uncertain. Whence, even if it were granted to Hontheim, which however he cannot prove, that the see of Cologne was erected at the beginning of the fourth century, and that Maternus passed to it, leaving that of Trier, it will always be true that the translation took place against the custom of the Church then in force, as is plain from Canon II of the praised Council of Arles Labbe, Concilia, volume I, column 1427., which runs thus: "Concerning those who have been ordained ministers in any places whatever, let them remain in those very places." But I should not readily believe that Maternus, who subscribed to the said council and who was one of the three bishops appointed by the emperor Constantine in the case of the Donatists, despising the law of the Church, passed to another see, unless this be shown by a probable document: whence answer is also made to Hontheim, who brings forward these very canons to show that translations of bishops from one see to another were by no means rare in that age: be it so; but no suitable reason appears by which we may be persuaded that the ancient custom was overthrown by Maternus.

§ III. The testimonies of the ancients who seem to favour Hontheim's system are discussed.

Testimonies favourable to Hontheim are brought forward: But Hontheim and the followers of the same opinion employ another engine, which they hold to be impregnable, namely the testimonies of the ancients who teach that the Christian religion was propagated rather late throughout Gaul, and so in the provinces of Belgica I and Germania II See the Notitia of the Roman Empire in Dom Bouquet, volume II, p. 2.. As patrons and assertors of this pronouncement they present Sulpicius Severus, Gregory of Tours, and the Fathers of the Second Council of Tours of the year 567. Let us therefore bring the testimonies one by one to the balance, and investigate accurately how much weight each has. This, however, must be said in advance, that none of them puts forward such a statement as would necessarily require denying an apostolic mission in the parts adjacent to the Rhine: for even if the text of the writers were admitted in the sense most favourable to them, it would not follow that nothing was done among the Gauls, even from the very cradle of the Church, toward propagating the Christian religion. But let us look at the praised testimonies themselves face to face.

[27] first of all that of Sulpicius Severus, The first to meet us, by the merit of antiquity, is Sulpicius Severus, who flourished at the beginning of the 5th century, a contemporary of St. Augustine. He in book II of the Sacred History, chapter XXXII, has this Works of Sulpicius Severus, volume II, p. 173, Verona edition of 1754.: "Then under Aurelius, son of Antoninus, the fifth persecution was set in motion: and then for the first time martyrdoms were seen within Gaul, the religion of God having been received rather late beyond the Alps." The first martyrdoms which are seen in Gaul refer to those Christians of Vienne and Lyon who suffered at Lyon in the reign of Marcus Aurelius, as is plain from the letter written by those Churches to the brethren settled throughout Asia and Phrygia: it exists in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, book V, chapter 1 and following [Eusebius etc., Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 198, Cambridge 1728. Ruinart, Acta sincera martyrum, p. 62, Amsterdam edition of 1713.]. The sense of Sulpicius certainly is that then for the first time, namely in the year of Christ 177, martyrdoms were seen within Gaul, because the religion of God was received rather late beyond the Alps. The argument of Sulpicius, as the adversaries construct it, would indeed be broken if it were shown that there were martyrs in Gaul before these times. Certainly Thierry Ruinart, in the Preface to the History of the Franks of Gregory of Tours, no. 61 Bouquet, volume II, p. 100., writes: "Those are mistaken who think that he spoke of the martyrs of Lyon… in such a way as to deny that there were martyrs before them." Such a one, certainly, the very Church of Vienne claims for itself under the 27th day of May, Zacharias, the second bishop of its see, who is said to have suffered under Trajan Acta Sanctorum, volume VI of May, p. 659., and whom the Martyrology of Vienne calls the Protomartyr of Gaul Charvet, Histoire de l'Église de Vienne, p. 13.. Certainly, if this or similar martyrdoms were established, it would have to be said that the religion of God was not received beyond the Alps so late as some would have it. But that kind of argument is too broad to be contained worthily in one Commentary: it can be investigated in the individual martyrs of Gaul, if any occur in the course of the work.

[28] whose words, however, by a milder explanation, We reply, therefore, with Jacques Longueval in the preliminary dissertation of the History of the Gallican Church Histoire de l'Église gallicane, volume I, preliminary Dissertation, p. LXIX., that Sulpicius does not say that the religion of God was preached rather late beyond the Alps, but received: so that, on account of the multitude of those who embraced the Christian rites, the fury and rage of the Gentiles was stirred up against the saints, as in the Acts of the Martyrs of Lyon Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 199.: for where the Christians were few, a quiet people, a stranger to every crime or offence, there was nothing by which the Gentile populace should be aroused. And that this interpretation is not empty, as though founded on bare conjecture, is shown by the words of the Fathers of the Second Council of Tours, which the adversaries bring forward for their opinion: for these, in their synodal letter directed to St. Radegund the queen, say Labbe, Concilia, volume V, column 873.: "When with the very rise of the Catholic religion the first beginnings of the venerable faith had begun to breathe within the Gallic borders, and the ineffable sacraments of the Lord's Trinity had as yet come to the knowledge of only a few; lest it should gain anything less here than it obtained in the circle of the world through the preaching of the Apostles, he deigned, by the counsel of mercy, to send blessed Martin, of foreign stock, for the illumination of the country. Who, although he was not of the time of the Apostles, yet did not escape apostolic grace." From these words we have most clearly that the Christian religion was preached in Gaul immediately from the beginning, but that nevertheless the evangelical truth came to the knowledge of only a few, by which the distinction laid down in the phrase of Sulpicius between the religion preached and received is confirmed in the highest degree.

[29] both on account of the martyrdoms under Nero And that Sulpicius is to be explained so is further urged upon us by more remote Spain, which already in the first century shows its martyrdoms, as is established from a stone found, as is reported, at the stream of the Pisoraca (Rio Pisuerga), which has this Masdeu, Historia crítica de España, volume V, p. 86.:

NERONI. CL(audio) CÆS(ari) AUG(usto) PONT(ifici) MAX(imo)

OB. PROVINC(iam) LATRONIB(us)

ET. HIS. QUI. NOVAM.

GENERI. HUM(ano)

SUPERSTITIONEM. INCULCAB(ant)

PURGATAM.

. . . . . . . . . .

[To Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus, Pontifex Maximus, for having cleansed the province of brigands and of those who were inculcating a new superstition upon the human race. . . . . . . . . .]

This most precious monument of Christian antiquity was branded as spurious by Joseph Scaliger, Antonio Muratori and Johann Caspar Hagenbuch [Mariana, Historia de España, Observaciones, volume II, p. 489, Valencia edition of 1785.]; it was learnedly vindicated from every calumny by Johann Ernst Walch, public professor at Jena, in a twofold little work, of which the title is: Marmor Hispaniae effossum; which, being attacked by Hagenbuch, brought forth another little work: Persecutionis Christianorum Neronianae in Hispania ex antiquis monumentis probandae uberior explanatio. The objections that have been made against the genuineness of this marble seem to us to rest on a negative argument, which Walch learnedly removes. It is certain that that kind of persecution was worthy of being celebrated by a public monument, since Tacitus and Suetonius rightly brought it into their books, and the words of the praised marble are found in these writers: for Tacitus, Annals XV, chapter XLIV, calls the Christian religion "a deadly superstition," and Suetonius, in his Nero, chapter XVI, "a new and maleficent superstition." Whoever desires to know more, which would lead us further from our aim, may consult the authors praised by us.

[30] in Spain, But if Spain already saw martyrdoms in the first century of the Christian era, we can hardly persuade ourselves that Gaul, through which the traffic from Italy into Spain was more frequent, remained so long a stranger to evangelical preaching, since the intercourse of the Gauls with the Romans was no less than that of the Spaniards. Who, further, will hand down as certain that St. Pothinus, who is presented in the letter of Lyon Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 204. as more than ninety years old and very infirm in body, was the first bishop of Lyon? This indeed I find in Gregory of Tours, History of the Franks, book 1, chapter XXVII Bouquet, volume II, p. 147., but there is not so great an authority of that one man in those things which touch the beginnings of the Gallican Church, as we shall show below, that we should think full credit must be given to this writer. Gallia Christiana Gallia Christiana, volume IV, column 4. judges St. Pothinus to be the first bishop of Lyon; but chiefly, I believe, for this reason, that no older one is found in the calendars of the Church; for the cited letter does not call him the first bishop or founder of that Church, but simply relates that the ministry of the episcopate of Lyon had been entrusted to him: Ὁ τὴν διακονίαν τῆς ἐπισκοπῆς Λουγδούνιῳ πεπιστεύμενος: if he had been the first bishop, if the founder of the Church, would not the writer of the letter have suitably intimated it? Then from the same document it is clear that there was also a bishop at Vienne, whose name is passed over in silence; for there was among the martyrs Sanctus, a deacon of Vienne, Σάγκτος διάκονος ἀπὸ Βιέννης Eusebius, p. 201., by which it is signified that a complete Church had been constituted there, to which certainly ignorance of the name of the bishop then sitting ought not to be prejudicial. There have been those who, to strike down the objection, said that St. Pothinus administered both Churches, but this is asserted without suitable testimony: not only because it was already then provided that one bishop should not preside over two Churches except in a case of true necessity: but because, if St. Pothinus, such necessity compelling, had been set over both Churches, he ought rather to have been called bishop of the Church of Vienne, inasmuch as it is named first at the head Gallia Christiana, volume IV, p. 198.: "The servants of Christ who dwell at Vienne and Lyon in Gaul, to the brethren settled throughout Asia and Phrygia." If therefore they wish to name the bishop of Vienne at that time, they will find no other than St. Justus, taken from the Catalogue which carries the series of the bishops of Vienne back to St. Crescens, the disciple of St. Paul, and which they rightly repudiate in their opinion. Now this Justus is said to have been an exile in Armorica, and at length to have first consecrated the Church of Armorica by his martyrdom Charvet, Histoire de l'Église de Vienne, p. 17.: the more accurate writers of the Armorican Church, however, do not place him in any fixed see, but simply call him bishop Tresvaux, Saints de Bretagne, volume I, p. LVII..

[31] both on account of the absence of the Jews, Another cause of the rarer martyrdoms in Gaul at that time is assigned by Jean Liron, a Maurist Benedictine Singularités historiques, volume IV, p. 105., namely the inveterate hatred of the Jews against the Christians, persecuting the faithful everywhere. But since Jews were rare among the Gauls, it came about from this that the Gentiles were not so hostile. And indeed that these things were not rashly put forward is shown by the Acts of the martyrdom of St. Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, for when the saint had confessed that he was a Christian, the Acts relate Ruinart, Acta sincera martyrum, p. 41, Amsterdam edition of 1713.: "When the herald had proclaimed this, the whole multitude of Gentiles and Jews who dwelt at Smyrna cried out with unbridled anger and a loud voice that Polycarp should be thrown to the beasts; which, because the time of the gladiatorial show was finished, the Asiarch said he was not permitted to do; then all cried out that he should be burned, to which the governor assented, the whole populace at once gathering wood and brushwood from the workshops and baths, the Jews especially, as is their wont, helping in these things with eager spirit." From these last words one may conclude that nothing singular then happened, but what was customary. Wherefore St. Justin, in the Dialogue with Trypho, no. 108, reproaches the Jews with the same crime, saying: "Not only have you not repented, but you have also appointed chosen men, and through them, sent into the whole world, you have proclaimed that an impious and lawless sect has been raised up by a certain deceiver, Jesus the Galilean… Nay, you have added that he taught those impious, unspeakable and detestable deeds which you spread among every race of men against those who confess him as Christ, teacher and Son of God."

[32] persecuting Christians everywhere, show: "Besides this, though your city has been taken and your land laid waste, you do not repent, but you dare to curse him" (Christ) "and all who believe in him." And chief weight is added to this opinion by Eusebius of Caesarea, who not only reports the words of Justin excerpted from the Dialogue in book IV of the Ecclesiastical History, chapter XVIII Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 179., but also says that the Jews sent letters into all nations, to all Jews everywhere, which defamed the doctrine of Christ as a new sect hostile to God, and warned them by letters not to receive it Lumper, Historia theologico-critica, volume II, p. 511.. In this opinion Tertullian also concurs, saying in book 1 To the Nations, chapter XIV: "For what other race" (of men, besides the Jewish) "is the seed-bed of our infamy?" With which Origen agrees, book VI Against Celsus, chapter XXVII Works of Origen, volume I, p. 651, Paris edition, 1733.: "In which matter" (in stirring up war against the Christians) "he seems to be like the Jews, who, when the Christian religion was first being taught, spread calumnies against it: that a boy was slaughtered by the Christians, that they fed on his flesh; and that, wishing to perform the works of darkness, with the lights put out, each lay with whatever woman came in his way." In this way is conveniently explained why Paul, still a persecutor, Acts IX, 2, asked of the chief of the priests letters to Damascus, to the synagogues, that if he found any men and women of this way, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. From what has so far been put forward it is manifest that the hatred of the Jews was at that time often the cause of manifold harassment of the Christians. But if we believe Bardesanes, a writer of the 2nd century, there seem to have been no Jews in Gaul; for the author, in the Commentary on Fate, which I cite from Baronius at the year 175, § XX, in enumerating various nations, omits Gaul. "All Jews," he says, "by the Mosaic law circumcise their boys on the eighth day, and they are neither compelled by the force of any star, nor driven by the climate of the region, nor induced by foreign customs, to do otherwise. For whether among the Syrians, or among the Galatians, or in Italy, or in Greece, or in Parthia, wherever they are, they keep their law." Wherefore I think it not absurd that the absence of the Jews was in some measure the cause why the punishments of the Christians were both rarer and later in the beginning. What they contributed to the persecutions in later times, for it is established from law III On the Jews of the Theodosian Code (XVI 8) Codex Theodosianus, volume VI, p. 242, Leipzig edition of 1741. that Jews thereafter dwelt in Gaul, there is no reason for me to inquire at greater length.

[33] The Fathers of Tours do not favour Hontheim: From what has so far been said it is clear that Sulpicius Severus does not favour the opinion of Hontheim and his followers, insofar as the beginnings of Christianity would have to be carried over into the 2nd or 3rd century. But neither does the synodal letter of the Fathers of Tours, cited above at no. 28, favour it more, since they themselves confess that with the very beginning of the Catholic religion the first beginnings of the venerable faith had begun to breathe within the Gallic borders; and as for what follows, that the ineffable sacraments of the Lord's Trinity had then come to the knowledge of only a few, I think it is not to be taken as if the evangelical light had come to absolutely few: for if anyone should wish to interpret these words so, it would follow that Christianity in Gaul must be restricted within the narrowest bounds right up to toward the end of the 4th century, when St. Martin flourished. No one, surely, will hesitate to acknowledge with me that even before the times of St. Martin the Christian religion had made laudable progress through the Gallic provinces, since he himself was a disciple of St. Hilary, bishop of Poitiers. Let the works of this most holy Doctor be read again; from them it will certainly become manifest that the Gallican Church was well established; without our therefore denying what the Fathers of Tours affirm, that the evangelical doctrine received its greatest increase through the labour of St. Martin. For in order that the words of the cited letter may agree with notorious facts, they can indicate nothing else than that the conversion of Gaul to the true faith was consummated through blessed Martin. This being so, it is clearly established that the synodal letter of Tours brings no support to Hontheim's opinion, nay greatly confirms the contrary view.

[34] the authority of Gregory of Tours, But the most powerful argument of all for Hontheim is the authority of St. Gregory of Tours, inasmuch as he assigns a certain epoch for the foundation of the Churches of Gaul. Gregory has this in the History of the Franks, book 1, chapter XXVIII Dom Bouquet, Recueil des Historiens de France, volume II, p. 147.: "In the time of this man" (namely the emperor Decius) "seven men ordained bishops were sent into Gaul to preach, as the history of the passion of the holy martyr Saturninus relates. For it says: 'Under Decius and Gratus as consuls, as is retained in faithful remembrance, the city of Toulouse had begun to have St. Saturninus as its first and highest priest.' These, then, were sent: to the people of Tours, Gatianus as bishop; to the people of Arles, Trophimus as bishop; to Narbonne, Paul as bishop; to Toulouse, Saturninus as bishop; to the people of Paris, Dionysius as bishop; to the Arverni, Stremonius as bishop; to the Limousins Martial was appointed bishop. Of these, blessed Dionysius, bishop of the Parisians, afflicted with divers punishments for the name of Christ, ended the present life by the impending sword. But Saturninus, already secure of martyrdom, says to his two presbyters: 'Behold, I am now being offered, and the time of my dissolution is at hand. I ask that until I fulfil the due end I be not wholly forsaken by you.' And when, seized, he was being led to the Capitol, he was abandoned by them and dragged along alone. When, therefore, he saw himself deserted by them, he is said to have prayed: 'Lord Jesus Christ, hear me from your holy heaven, that this Church may never deserve to have a pontiff from these citizens for ever.' Which we know to have so come to pass in that city down to the present. He, then, bound to the heels of a raging bull and hurled down from the Capitol, ended his life. But Gatianus, Trophimus and Stremonius, and Paul and Martial, living in the highest holiness, after peoples had been won for the Church and the faith of Christ spread through all parts, departed by a happy confession. And thus, as well the one by martyrdom as these by confession, leaving the earth, are joined together alike in the heavens."

[35] and is unreliable in chronological matters, If the authority of Gregory of Tours were beyond all exception, and if he had redeemed his credit in this matter from ancient documents, there would be no doubt about the Origin of those Churches which there

are named; though not even then could a decisive argument be drawn tight against other Churches, especially those situated about the Rhine, which was most frequented by the Romans. But it is far from being the case that we can place such great trust in Gregory, a most holy man but not always very careful. For in the first place it has hitherto remained unshaken that the text of Gregory of Tours, insofar as it is drawn from the Acts of St. Saturninus of Toulouse, is authentic, and that its genuineness is not weakened by any variant reading. But the uniformity which was hitherto claimed for the text has been much detracted from since the time when José de Maceda, in his Acta sincera of the Apostles of Navarre, produced a passion of St. Saturninus which carries the mission of the bishop of Toulouse back to the times of Claudius, "who, substituted on the death of Gaius (Caligula), was administering the empire of the Roman state, having obtained it" Actas sinceras nuevamente descubiertas de los Apóstoles de la antigua Vasconia.. The Legendary from which we have excerpted the words above exists at Florence in the Riccardiana library under no. 223, and the writing is said to belong to the 10th century: but what is more to our purpose is that in the said Legendary no saint is to be found more recent than blessed Gregory the Great, who died about the year 604 Maceda, Acta sincera, p. 245.: whence it becomes likely that the Riccardian codex is a copy of another work, whose age reaches the 7th century.

[36] uncertain from a variant reading, Then also those who make most of Gregory's authority in the present controversy confess that he not infrequently stumbles in questions of ancient chronology, such as our disquisition is Ibid., p. 57.. Nay, even in contemporary facts and things placed close at hand Gregory sometimes slips. Let the example be St. Radegund, who, on Gregory's witness, book IX, chapter XL [Tillemont, Mémoires sur l'histoire ecclésiastique, volume IV, p. 710, Paris edition, 1701. Ceillier, Auteurs ecclésiastiques, volume XVII, p. 60. Histoire littéraire de la France, volume III, p. 391. Ruinart in Dom Bouquet, volume II, p. 101.], went to Arles to take up the rule of St. Caesarius after receiving the relics of the Holy Cross. And this is certainly chronologically false. For the saint received the sacred relics while Maroveus was bishop at Poitiers, who could scarcely have entered on his pontificate before the year of Christ 565; for Pascentius II, his predecessor, obtained the see by order of Charibert Dom Bouquet, volume II, p. 357., who began to reign only after the 10th day of November 561, on which his father Clothar died, and the eulogy composed in his honour by Venantius Fortunatus at the head of the Life of St. Hilary Ibid., p. 212. supposes that he continued at least some years in the government of the Church before he left it to be administered by Maroveus, under whom the relics of the Holy Cross were brought to Poitiers. On the other hand it is established that Liliola, in the place of Caesaria the younger, was already governing the monastery of Arles in the year 561, when she received St. Rusticula, as we have from her authentic Life under the 11th day of August Acta Sanctorum, volume I of January, p. 790.. The letter of Caesaria to Richilde and Radegund which exists Acta Sanctorum, volume II of August, p. 657, no. 6., by which she sends the rule of St. Caesarius that had been urgently requested and strongly commends it, must therefore have been written before the year 562; and so, before the relics were received, the rule of St. Caesarius was already being observed at Poitiers, without St. Radegund's having had to go to Arles for that purpose after receiving the relics. More such things could be brought forward, which show that Gregory was not very accurate even in those facts which, on account of nearness of time and place, were very easy to investigate Martène, Thesaurus Anecdotorum, volume I, p. 3..

[37] nor consistent with himself; Another thing which weakens the authority of Gregory of Tours is that, above all, he draws from the Acts of St. Saturninus things which are by no means to be found there: namely, it was indeed retained in faithful remembrance that his episcopate at Toulouse began under Decius and Gratus as consuls: but when he joins to these words, "These, then, were sent," and names six other bishops, their mission was yet not touched by a single word in the Acts cited by him, which run thus Liron, Singularités historiques, volume IV, p. 266.: "At the time when, after the bodily coming of our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ, the Sun of Justice, risen in the darkness, had begun to illumine the western region with the splendour of faith, after the sound of the Gospels had gone out little by little and by degrees into all the earth, and with like progress the preaching of the Apostles had flashed forth in our regions; when rare Churches were rising in the cities through the devotion of a few Christians; but nevertheless temples, numerous through the miserable error of the Gentiles, were smoking with foul fumes in every place; fifty years before, as in the public records, that is, when Decius and Gratus were consuls, as is retained in faithful remembrance, the city of Toulouse had begun to have St. Saturninus as its first and highest priest of Christ." Surely nothing occurs in these words by which a legitimate inference could be shown that six others also were sent to various cities to imbue the inhabitants with the Christian faith: and so it follows of its own accord that Gregory drew this narration not so much from ancient documents, which he would have cited, as from some common opinion. Nay, he is not even consistent with himself in reporting the age of St. Saturninus. For in book 1 of the Miracles, chapter XLVIII Ruinart, Acta sincera martyrum, p. 130., he says: "Saturninus the martyr, as is reported, ordained by the disciples of the Apostles, was sent to the city of the people of Toulouse." There are indeed those who strive to wipe away a contradiction of this kind by saying that by disciples of the Apostles are to be understood those who, although they lived after the Apostles, yet gave the evangelical mission long before, which can be extended to the first three centuries of the Church Bibliotheca Patrum, volume XI, p. 814.. Be it so: but on such a hypothesis the phrase Tillemont, Mémoires sur l'histoire de l'Église, volume IV, p. 710 "as is reported" was useless, nay ridiculous. For the rest, we contend here to show one thing, that the mission of the six bishops does not flow from ancient documents: what concerns St. Saturninus will come to be reconsidered on the 29th day of November, on which his memory is celebrated in the Roman Martyrology.

[38] nay, confuted by the testimonies of more ancient writers, Among the six bishops whom Gregory tied to the middle of the third century occurs also St. Trophimus of Arles, whose birthday is noted on the 29th day of December. Of him the bishops of the whole province of Arles write thus to St. Leo the Great [Works of St. Leo, volume I, p. 993, Venice edition of 1753. Sirmond, Concilia Galliae, volume I, p. 89.]: "It is known to all the regions of Gaul, nor is it held unknown to the holy Roman Church, that the city of Arles first within Gaul merited to have as its priest St. Trophimus, sent by the most blessed Apostle Peter, and that from thence the good of faith and religion was poured little by little into the other regions of Gaul: and it is manifest that other places merited priests from this stream of faith, which the floods of apostolic institution sent to us, before the city of Vienne, which now impudently and notably demands for itself a primacy not its due. For by right and merit that city has always obtained the summit of holy dignity which in St. Trophimus received the first-fruits of our religion, and afterwards poured out within Gaul, by zeal for saving doctrine, what it had obtained by the divine gift… Believing it full of reason and justice that, as through the most blessed Peter, prince of the Apostles, the holy Roman Church holds the primacy over all the Churches of the whole world, so also within Gaul the Church of Arles, which merited to have as its priest St. Trophimus, sent by the Apostles, should claim the power of ordaining." To the same sense speak Usuard on the 29th day of December and Ado, On the Festivals of the Holy Apostles etc., when they allege Pope Zosimus as saying: "From whose fountain all Gaul received the streams of the faith" [Labbe, Concilia, volume II, column 1567. Sirmond, Concilia Galliae, volume I, p. 43.].

[39] especially by the Fathers of the province of Arles: This is not the place to inquire laboriously into the genuineness of the cited letter of the bishops, for that is rightly to be reserved to the 29th day of December, on which the festival of St. Trophimus occurs. But in my judgment either this letter is to be rejected as spurious, or it must be confessed that Gregory of Tours in the celebrated text strayed altogether from historical truth; and so, except perhaps for the epoch of St. Saturninus, does not deserve credit in assigning the age of the remaining bishops. Sirmond doubted the authenticity of this letter, and Launoy attacked it more sharply in the Dissertation on the Two Dionysii Works of Launoy, volume II, part I, p. 114.. But for this monument to be rejected as spurious, the letters V, VII and VIII of Pope Zosimus, which all say the same thing as regards the sense, must likewise be abolished Labbe, Concilia, volume II, 1567, 1570, 1571.. That, however, since it would be excessive rashness, scarcely anyone will dare to attempt. It remains, therefore, that these letters be set aside by a convenient explanation. First of all, the bishops are said to narrate falsehoods Works of Launoy, volume II, part II, p. 114.. But, I ask, is the falsehood in this, that they relate that St. Trophimus was sent into Gaul by the Apostles? That he founded the Church of Arles? But who could better know the origins of their Churches than those bishops who were nearest in time and place to the beginnings of the Gallican Church? But, it is said, the prelates of the province were too compliant with the ambition of their metropolitan: this would surely need solid proof, which they by no means bring; for unless it is clearly demonstrated to me, I shall not bring myself to believe that so many bishops, to flatter the fortune of one man, so shamefully adulterated the truth. Finally, to be sent by St. Peter, to be sent by the Apostles, is the same as to be sent or ordained by their successors, in whom they always live. But if we interpret the Fathers of the province of Arles in this way, how will it be shown that any primacy whatever of the Church founded flows from the person of the sender? Let these things said suffice, since a fuller investigation must necessarily be reserved for the Acts of St. Trophimus.

[40] although, if Gregory is inspected accurately, To what end, further, are all these obstacles heaped against documents that are of themselves clear, namely that his authority may stand for Gregory of Tours, a writer otherwise careless? Truly I do not understand why, the older writers having been rejected, so much is attributed to an author of the very late sixth century, unless, as happens all too often, all the rest is twisted to the norm of some preconceived system. But in the end not even Gregory himself thinks that the beginnings of the Gallican Church are to be tied to the middle of the third century. For to one considering the sequence of the text as it is read in the Acts of St. Saturninus above at no. 36, it is plain that the Gallican Church began already then, nay from apostolic times. For the words of the Acts clearly say this: "with like progress the preaching of the Apostles flashed forth in our regions" (namely the Gallic ones): namely, according to the trustworthiness of the Acts, it is true that some Apostles, although unknown to us,

preached the Gospel in Gaul: nay, Churches, rare indeed but yet some, rose in some cities through the devotion of a few Christians. And if there were Christians, if there were Churches, there must necessarily also have been bishops to rule the people of God. Which is enough for us not to reject rashly the tradition of various Churches; which in my judgment ought to be done only when undoubted historical monuments teach the contrary.

[41] does not deny the apostolic origin of the Gallican Church. Let us at last conclude this whole disputation with the authority of the writers of Gallia Christiana, who certainly in no way favoured the antiquity of the various Churches of Gaul, as is clear enough from the Origins which they assign to the individual Churches. But nevertheless, from the doctrine of the Fathers, they hand down that the Christian religion in Gaul was contemporary with the Apostles themselves, and they refute the testimonies alleged from Sulpicius Severus and Gregory of Tours. We report their arguments in summary Gallia Christiana, volume I, Preface.. After they had said that the ancient Fathers taught that the Gospel was spread by the Apostles throughout the whole world, "What," they say, "do the more severe critics oppose to the most weighty force of so many reasons, of so many testimonies? Namely, the authority of Sulpicius Severus and Gregory of Tours." And as regards Gregory, they show, with the agreement also of Thierry Ruinart in the Preface to the Works of Gregory, no. 61 Bouquet, volume II, p. 100., that he was by no means in that heresy of thinking that there were no bishops older than these seven, and they add that it would not be laborious, had Gregory thought otherwise, to overwhelm his authority with so many testimonies heaped up of far more ancient writers and Fathers. The whole weight of the objection is therefore placed in the testimony of Sulpicius Severus. But he, much younger than Hilary and in other respects inferior in authority, ought not to prevail over the master of St. Martin, who teaches, on Psalm XIV Works of Hilary, p. 62, Paris edition of 1693., that the Apostles prepared very many dwellings for God throughout all the parts of the world that can be reached, nay even in the islands of the Ocean. The Catalogues of bishops, mutilated at the beginning, are objected: but to one turning over documents of this kind it occurs very frequently that the see is certain, although the series of bishops is uncertain and gaping. Finally, they plead the adulterated Acts of the first bishops: but these prove nothing, for just as the histories of the martyrs, although overwhelmed with manifold fable, yet do not bring it about that those martyrs did not exist, as is commonly shown against Dodwell, who had attacked the number of the martyrs by such reasoning.

§ IV. From the propagation of the Gospel throughout the whole world it is argued that Christianity had followers even in Gaul and Germany in the first century.

[The preaching of the Gospel through the whole world is shown from St. Clement of Rome,] Hitherto we have been wholly occupied in refuting the arguments brought by the adversaries of our opinion, which, since they are negative, seem to us rather unfit for overthrowing an ancient tradition which has its foundation in documents now lost. But anyone might with reason remain doubtful about the present controversy unless we at the same time endeavoured to show the ancient tradition supported by no light arguments. Which we shall now try to work out more fully. First of all, as an argument not to be despised, we bring forward the sayings of the ancients, who with one voice announce that the Gospel of Christ was preached in the very first century of the common era. Thus St. Clement of Rome, in his Epistle to the Corinthians Labbe, Concilia, volume I, column 127., which the learned acknowledge as genuine Lumper, Historia theologica, volume I, p. 16., says: "Paul… having become a herald of the word in the East and in the West, obtained the illustrious fame of his faith, instructing the whole world in justice, and coming to the bounds of the West…" From these words, indeed, it cannot be directly drawn out that part of Germany was already then illumined by the evangelical faith; nevertheless we rightly and certainly deduce from these words that St. Paul the Apostle penetrated to the bounds of the West. Although, however, lest we heap questions upon questions, it is not permitted to define a certain region: yet there are not a few who interpret the bounds of the West as Spain, and who stubbornly, and not without probability, defend that St. Paul entered that province Flórez, España Sagrada, volume III, p. 3 and following.: and most of the arguments which can be objected to an opinion of this kind are the same as are wont to be opposed to the tradition of Trier.

[43] from St. Justin, No less effectively do the words of St. Justin, philosopher and martyr, support this tradition, in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, written about the year of Christ 140 Lumper, volume II, p. 88., in which, after he had said Works, p. 270, Commelin edition, 1593. that the Jewish nation is not even now, after the dispersion, from the rising of the sun to its setting, and that there are certain nations where no one of the Jewish race has yet dwelt, the excellent writer goes on thus: "But there is not even one race of mortals, whether of Barbarians or of Greeks, or also of all others, by whatever name they are called, whether of those living in wagons (ἁμαξοβίων), or lacking a house (ἀοίκων), or living in tents and supporting life by their flocks, among whom prayers and thanksgivings (εὐχαριστίαι) are not made to the Father and maker of all things through the name of the crucified Jesus." I know indeed that sayings of this kind are held by some as exaggerated: but whoever will consider with me the reasoning of St. Justin will easily agree that it would have had to be turned back by Trypho if he had been able to point to a huge tract of regions in Gaul and Germany still lying in darkness, on which the evangelical light had not yet shone. There is therefore ground for our rightly conjecturing that already in the year of Christ 140 Christians existed in Gaul and at the Rhine.

[44] from Bardesanes the Syrian, Contemporary with St. Justin, Bardesanes, afterwards fallen into heresy, flourished under Marcus Aurelius Lumper, volume III, p. 39.; and he openly testifies that in his time the Gospel had been preached to all nations, and especially to the Gauls: we transfer the words here from the Annals of Cardinal Baronius at the year 175, § XXI: "But what," says Bardesanes, "shall we say of the sect of the Christians, who are found in every part of the world, nay in every city? Neither do the Parthian Christians marry many wives, nor do the Median ones throw their dead to the dogs, nor do the Persian ones marry their daughters, nor do the Bactrians and Gauls corrupt marriage; nor do the Egyptian ones worship Apis, or the dog, the goat or the cat: but wherever they are, they cannot be compelled to live by foreign laws." Bardesanes here shows that men are not so held by their ancestral laws that free choice does not stand at the disposal of their will, since nations, even those more remote from civilization, can observe and in fact do observe the Christian law. Wherefore he here adduces as examples those peoples who are most remote from the bosom of the Roman empire, Italy and Greece. To the opinion of Bardesanes Cardinal Baronius most aptly subjoins these words: "What pertains to our matter is plainly most worthy of observation: that there was at this time no province in the world, nay not even a city, in which there were not Christians, and likewise that the evangelical preaching was so powerful that it transformed the nature of men into a different and plainly contrary habit, so that, whether they were Persians or Medes, or Parthians or Egyptians, or other barbarian nations who received the Gospel, they forthwith wholly abolished those shameful customs ingrained among their countrymen, and their savage and abominable manners, and renounced them far." Thus Baronius.

[45] St. Irenaeus. Contemporary or nearly contemporary with St. Justin and Bardesanes, St. Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon, excellently expresses the same opinion in his work Against Heresies, book 1, chapter 3, in these words Works, p. 53, Paris edition of 1675.: "Although the languages in the world are unlike, yet the force of the tradition is one and the same. And neither do those Churches which are founded in Germany believe otherwise or hand down otherwise, nor those which are among the Iberians, nor those among the Celts, nor those in the East, nor those in Egypt, nor those in Libya, nor those which are established in the middle of the world; but as the sun, God's creature, is one and the same in the whole world, so also the light, the preaching of the truth, shines everywhere and illumines all men who wish to come to the knowledge of the truth." This text of St. Irenaeus, by no means propitious to him, Hontheim tries to elude, saying that the holy Doctor does not treat of Rhenish Germany but of the Eastern, namely that which lies next to the Dacians and Sarmatians Historia Trevirensis, volume I, Preface, p. X and following.. "That we should think it so," he says, "is persuaded above all by that conjunction of 'Sarmatians, Dacians and Germans' which Tertullian Book against the Jews, p. 164, Antwerp edition of 1584. studiously makes." But with what other nations, I ask, could Tertullian join the Germans, when Hontheim himself shows that Germany borders on Dacia and Sarmatia? By what indication, too, does Tertullian betray that he treats only of Eastern Germany, and by no means of that whole region as widely as it extends? But let us grant that Tertullian intended all this; is the same to be thought of St. Irenaeus, who in no way joins the Germans to the Sarmatian nations? Nay, writing in Gaul, is he not, in naming Germany, to be understood rather of Rhenish Germany, bordering on Gaul, and which on account of frequent wars was most well known to the Romans? "But," he says, "Irenaeus separates the Germanic nations from the Gauls or Celts by interposing the Spaniards or Iberians." We have no leisure to inquire laboriously whether we ought to interpret the Celts as Gauls, the Iberians as Spaniards: be it that Hontheim has interpreted rightly; what of it? Will he ever be able to wring out of such an interpretation that Gaul and Germany are separated by Spain? This certainly never came into Hontheim's mind. We do not therefore understand what patronage he wishes to seek for himself from this topographical confusion, whatever it is, attributed to St. Irenaeus: nor is it to be feared, as he himself supposes, lest he set Irenaeus at odds with all the rest of history Place cited, p. XI., since in the whole of history, whether sacred or profane, nothing occurs by which we are compelled to seek the Origin of the Germanic Churches at the Rhine on this side of the first century.

[46] Tertullian, Origen, From the very rapid and universal diffusion of the evangelical truth Tertullian argues against the Jews that Christ, promised to the Fathers, had already come, because the nations believed in him. For alluding to Isaiah XLV he speaks thus in the Book against the Jews, chapter VII Works, p. 165, Antwerp edition of 1584.: "For whose right hand does God the Father hold, if not that of Christ his Son? Whom all the nations have heard, that is, in whom all the nations have believed, whose preachers also, the Apostles, are shown in the Psalms of David: Their sound, he says, has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the earth? For in whom else have the other nations also believed? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and they who dwell in Mesopotamia, Armenia, Phrygia, Cappadocia, and those inhabiting Pontus and Asia and Pamphylia, those sojourning in Egypt, and inhabiting the region of Africa which is beyond Cyrene,

Romans and residents, then also Jews in Jerusalem and the other nations; as now the various peoples of the Gaetulians and the many territories of the Moors, all the bounds of the Spains, and the divers nations of the Gauls, and the places of the Britons inaccessible to the Romans but subject to Christ; and of the Sarmatians and Dacians and Germans and Scythians, and of many hidden nations, and of many provinces and islands unknown to us, and which we are less able to enumerate. In all which places the name of Christ, who has come, reigns." Nor does Origen hand down the same thing less openly, when he says in book IV On First Principles, chapter I Works of Origen, volume I, p. 157, Paris edition of 1733.: "All Greece, and all the barbarian world which extends throughout our whole world, has innumerable people who, having abandoned their ancestral laws, … keep the discipline of the words of Jesus Christ… And if we turn our mind to this too, that in so few years, with so many snares laid against the Christians, this doctrine has been able, … although otherwise the supply of teachers is not great, to be preached everywhere on earth, so that Greeks and Barbarians, wise and unwise, have joined themselves to the true worship of God through Jesus Christ, we shall not hesitate to call it a thing greater than human strength."

[47] and from the mission of St. Pantaenus Nay, from the very beginning of Christianity St. Jerome furnishes us with a clear testimony of the widely spread evangelical preaching [Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, chapter XXXV, volume IV, part II, column 112, Maurist edition, Paris 1706.], with whom Eusebius wholly agrees in his Ecclesiastical History, book V, chapter X Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 222, Cambridge edition 1720.. For when St. Pantaenus, at the request of the Indian nation, was sent by Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, he found that Bartholomew, one of the twelve Apostles, had preached there the coming of the Lord Jesus according to the Gospel of Matthew, which, written in Hebrew letters, he brought back with him on returning to Alexandria. And that this mission of St. Pantaenus is to be tied to about the end of the second century is suggested both by the fact that Eusebius assigns these things to the episcopate of Julian, who died in the year 191 [Eusebius, Chronicle, Mai, Scriptorum Veterum nova Collectio, volume VIII, p. 389.], and by the fact that St. Jerome attributes them to Demetrius, his successor. Our Jean-Baptiste Du Sollier, in his Commentary on St. Pantaenus on the 7th day of July Acta Sanctorum, volume II of July, p. 460, no. 13, treating of this mission, says: "I shall not fear to suppose for the moment that that India is meant here to which St. Athanasius afterwards directed Frumentius, which is Ethiopia itself, subject to the see of Alexandria down to this century in uninterrupted continuity." But these things seem not to have been written with enough consideration: for Ethiopia lies due south of the Egyptians, as will be plain to anyone inspecting any geographical map: but Eusebius has: "This same man (Pantaenus) is reported to have shown so great an ardour of spirit toward the word of God that he became a preacher of the Gospel of Christ to the nations of the East, τοῖς ἐπ᾽ ἀνατολῆς ἔθνεσιν, advancing even to India itself." From which words, although the Roman Martyrology on the 27th day of October marks that the Ethiopians too come under the name of Indians, it is to be concluded that Pantaenus went off from Egypt toward the East, and, having traversed Arabia, advanced, as Eusebius emphatically says, even to India itself, μέχρι και τῆς Ἰνδῶν στειλάμενον γῆς: as though he would intimate that Pantaenus reached the farthest East. This opinion, further, is excellently confirmed by the recent investigations made concerning Indian antiquities by the Asiatic Society of Calcutta. Francis Wilford, a soldier and member of the Asiatic Institute, shows that in the Indian peninsula, as in the rest of the East, there had spread abroad, as Suetonius says Vespasian, chapter IV. Cf. Tacitus, Histories, book V, chapter XIII, "an old and constant opinion that it was in the fates that at that time men setting out from Judaea should gain the mastery": and he brings forward several documents on this matter. I shall adduce one, namely that in the year 3101 of the Indian era, which accurately coincides with the beginning of our common era, a king of India, anxious about his kingdom, curiously ordered inquiry to be made into an infant born of a virgin, who portended the ruin of his empire Asiatic Researches, volume X, pp. 28 and 41..

[48] nay of St. Thomas Further, he connects the beginnings of the Indian Church with the very first beginnings of the Christian religion, and holds as true what is related of the Indian mission of St. Thomas the Apostle Ibid., p. 73. Cf. Assemani, Bibliotheca Orientalis, volume II, part II, p. 435., and at the same time in the course of his treatise he points out various signs of Indian Christianity. Thus also Saceswara, called the king of some sacred period or era, is indicated as residing at Rome in the West and as incarnate there Asiatic Researches, volume X, p. 57.. And since the evangelical history is so intimately interwoven with the Indian fables, it seems to me that this can be drawn into an argument for the antiquity of the Christian cause among those nations; which, moreover, the narration of Eusebius and Jerome indicates: for when Pantaenus traversed the regions of the East and the Indies themselves, he did not indeed plant the faith there, but fostered it when planted: since he found the Gospel of St. Matthew, as Eusebius says in the place cited, among those who were already imbued with the knowledge of Christ, to whom, namely, Bartholomew, one of the twelve Apostles, had formerly, as report has it, preached. And in fact crosses of various forms, although that sign by no means belongs to the theogony of the Indians, occur in those regions: some crosses bearing flowers are from the sect of the Manichaeans, who taught that Christ did not truly die on the Cross, but was surrounded by flowers Asiatic Researches, volume X, p. 61 and following.. But there are also crosses of another form, found in the Indies, published by the praised Francis Wilford in the place cited.

[49] Into India. Nor can I here pass over the statements of Tillemont concerning the deeds of St. Thomas the Apostle, which he holds as uncertain Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire ecclésiastique, volume I, p. 357.. Yet in the Apostolic History of Abdias, commonly rejected, there occurs a king of the Indians, Gundaferus by name, known hitherto to no one but Abdias Codex Apocryphus Novi Testamenti, volume I, p. 691.; when lo, from the farthest East come forth coins of an Indo-Scythian king named Gondophares, who occupied the throne in the first century of the Christian era [Reinaud, Mémoire géographique, historique et scientifique sur l'Inde, Mémoires de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres, volume XVIII, part II, p. 95, Paris 1849.]. Of how much value, then, is the merely negative argument which Tillemont frequently uses, since it is most powerfully shaken by the finding of a single positive argument? Things similar to these could be said of the Chinese empire, in which the Gospel is narrated to have been preached in the first centuries of the Church [Zaccaria, Raccolta di dissertazioni di Storia Ecclesiastica, 7th century, Dissertation III, volume XVIII, p. 103, Rome edition 1796.]. And these things indeed we have adduced so that we may the more easily persuade ourselves that the most flourishing and nearer regions, such as were Gaul and Rhenish Germany, were not neglected by the Apostles while they ran out to distant nations, and that what the Church sings of the Apostles is literally true: "Their sound has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the earth." And these things the adversaries admit after a fashion, with the caution of some exaggeration, which yet could not have been excessive, since it would have been very easy to refute. Yet while they confess that universal diffusion of the apostolic preaching in general, whenever they treat specifically of the Origins of individual Churches they oppose such manifold exceptions that, if we follow them, the sound of the apostolic voice would seem to have to be restricted within the narrowest limits. For there is scarcely any Church, if you except those mentioned in the canonical Scriptures, whose Origins are not called into controversy by the same or similar arguments by which the foundation of the Gallican Churches is attacked. Either, therefore, the ancient Fathers are to be convicted of falsehood and error when they spoke of the universal propagation of the Gospel, or the tradition of the primitive Churches is not to be rashly rejected on account of the lack of contemporary documents, but only then when positively contrary arguments are brought forward, which certainly are not present in the tradition of Trier.

§ V. It is shown more directly that the Christian religion was propagated in Gaul, and so at Trier in Belgica Prima, in the first century.

Under the name of Galatia comes Gaul too, But lest we seem to conduct our case from conjectures alone, although most probable ones, and that we may attack the present controversy at close quarters, it will be worth the trouble to inquire whether antiquity supplies us with arguments directly showing that the Origins of the Christian religion in Gaul, and so in those provinces which lie next to the Rhine, reach the first century of the common era. There occurs first of all the text of St. Paul, II Timothy IV, 10: Κρήσκης εἰς Γαλατίαν (ἐπορεύθη), "Crescens (went) into Galatia," sent by his master. Tillemont interprets Galatia as Gallo-Graecia Mémoires ecclésiastiques, volume I, p. 585., a province of Asia adjacent to Phrygia; while others explain these words of European Gaul. It would in my judgment be a disputation without end to wish to determine which region the Apostle meant to indicate, since he used an ambiguous word, clear to Timothy. For, as Christoph Cellarius teaches in his Ancient Geography, book II, chapter II, §4 Cellarius, Notitia Orbis antiqui, volume I, p. 130, Leipzig edition of 1773., "the Greeks for the most part call Gaul Γαλατίαν and the Gauls Γαλάτας; and so Polybius, Diodorus of Sicily, Dio Cassius, Josephus, Pausanias and others; but the later ones, with the Latins, said Γάλλους, and the region Γαλλίαν, which Latin form of the word Paeanius, the Greek paraphraser of Eutropius, commonly used; the ecclesiastical writers too, Eusebius, book IV, chapter VI, and Socrates, book I, chapter XXXV, and Theodoret, book I, chapter XXXI. But Agathemerus, book II, chapter IV, seems to reconcile the names of different cases in these words: Τῶν Γαλλιῶν, ἃς πρότερον Γαλατίας ἔλεγον, ἑξῆς κειμένων, next lie the Gauls, which formerly they called Galatias." Thus far Cellarius.

[51] and the martyrologists teach that Crescens preached in Gaul; From which it is manifestly clear that it cannot be made out from the bare Pauline text which region the Apostle meant to indicate. Recourse must therefore be had to the interpretation of the ancients, so that we may have a somewhat better explored knowledge of the mission of St. Crescens. And first of all, although Ado and Usuard accurately distinguish Galatia from Gaul, they nevertheless altogether retain the mission of St. Crescens, the disciple of Paul, into Gaul. For thus Usuard, whom Ado amplifies after his custom, speaks under the 27th day of June; we enclose Ado's additions in brackets: "In Galatia, of blessed Crescens, disciple of St. Paul the Apostle, who, making a passage into Gaul, converted many to the faith of Christ by the word of preaching. (He sat for some years at Vienne, a city of Gaul, and there ordained his disciple Zacharias as bishop in his place.) But returning to the nation for which he had been specially given as bishop, the Galatians, he strengthened them in the work of the Lord until the blessed end of his life."

Ado confirms this also in his Chronicle, when he says Bibliotheca maxima Patrum, volume XVI, pp. 788, 789.: "At which time" (midway between Paul's coming to Rome and the Neronian persecution) "Paul is believed to have reached the Spains, and to have left his disciples Trophimus at Arles and Crescens at Vienne to preach… Under which emperor" (Trajan) "the most glorious old man Zacharias, bishop of the Church of Vienne, is crowned with martyrdom. For first Crescens, a disciple of the Apostles, resided at Vienne for some years: when he had returned to Galatia, Martin, the third bishop and a disciple of the Apostles, resided at Vienne… Verus, bishop of Vienne, who was one of the disciples and hearers of the Apostles, flourished in the times of Trajan in doctrine and the confession of the faith." Although, therefore, Usuard and Ado go over to that opinion by which the proper see of St. Crescens is placed in Gallo-Graecia, they do not therefore deny that the Gallic mission was entrusted to St. Crescens by St. Paul: nor must it be passed over that Ado, inasmuch as he was archbishop of Vienne and not ignorant of the affairs of his Church, is of authority not to be despised in this question.

[52] Eusebius, St. Epiphanius and Theodoret: I know indeed that against these authors, inasmuch as they belong to the 9th century, their more recent age is to be objected, on account of which they can scarcely be employed as suitable witnesses in a fact so remote. But we have brought these things forward chiefly for this reason, that it may be established that, even granted the interpretation of the Pauline text which they wish, by which Galatia is said to be Gallo-Graecia, it does not follow that Crescens, the disciple of St. Paul, did not go to Gaul. For we have more ancient testimonies for a mission of this kind. Eusebius either read or interpreted "Gaul" in the Pauline epistle, in the Ecclesiastical History, book III, chapter IV Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, volume I, p. 91.: "Of the rest of Paul's companions," he says, "Crescens is declared by the testimony of Paul himself to have been sent by him into Gaul." Whence Henri de Valois, in the Annotations on this passage, suspects that Eusebius read in the text of St. Paul "Gaul" for "Galatia", which reading occurs in certain codices cited by Mill in his edition of the New Testament: wherefore Tillemont is mistaken in saying Mémoires ecclésiastiques, volume I, p. 583. that no copy today bears Γαλλίας. I willingly confess that this reading is very rare; for which reason St. Epiphanius, since he was persuaded that St. Crescens had been sent into Gaul, seems to have wished the reading of the Pauline epistle corrected. For in Heresy LI, chapter XI Works of Epiphanius, volume I, p. 433, Paris edition of 1622., he says: "To him" (Luke) "the office of preaching the Gospel was entrusted: and he performed it first in Dalmatia, Gaul, Italy and Macedonia, but in Gaul above the rest. As Paul testifies in his epistles concerning some of his companions: Crescens, he says, in Gaul: not in Galatia, as has wrongly pleased some, but in Gaul." In the same sense Theodoret interprets the Pauline text in his Commentary on the Second Epistle to Timothy Works of Theodoret, volume III, part I, p. 694, Halle edition 1771.: "Crescens into Galatia. So he called Gaul; for so they were called anciently: so even now those name them who share in external learning."

[53] nor is it permitted to interpret their words of Cisalpine Gaul. Let no one think that what we have so far argued was said as though we wished to defend that St. Paul in the alleged text spoke of European Gaul. As far as I am concerned, let the word Galatia be taken in that sense in which it is taken in Acts XVI, 6, I Corinthians XVI, 1, I Peter I, 1, in which places the very sequence of the discourse compels us to interpret Galatia as Gallo-Graecia. But yet from the testimony of the cited writers this inescapable argument arises, that the ancients were persuaded that the evangelical light shone on European Gaul immediately in the first century. Tillemont also confesses this, when he teaches Mémoires ecclésiastiques, volume I, p. 585. that the very corruption of the primitive text (although a little above he had said that the text unanimously retained the word Galatia, and so had remained uncorrupted) seems to indicate that Crescens came into Gaul, and that, lest an equivocation should at some time arise, Gaul was substituted for Galatia. "This conjecture," he goes on further, "might have some probability if it rested on the tradition of the Gallican Church: but this is contrary to the conjecture"; and he adduces the celebrated passage of Sulpicius Severus which we gave above at no. 27 and following. And if he should judge the objection to be by no means removed by such an answer, it will follow that the most weighty authority of the ancient Fathers, which the tradition of many centuries supports, is to be held of no account, so that his honour may remain to the testimony of Sulpicius alone, which, moreover, being put forward in passing, is pliable into various senses; since Sulpicius treats not so much of the preaching of the Gospel as of its reception, on account of which alone martyrdoms could be seen in Gaul. And indeed, to escape reasonings of this kind, they lay down that all those things which tie the evangelical preaching in Gaul to the first century are to be referred to Cisalpine Gaul: Petau holds this as settled, who in his Animadversions on the text of Epiphanius alleged above, Heresy LI Works, volume II, part II, p. 90, writes: "That Luke preached in Gaul no one, so far as I know, has recorded. And I rather think he means Cisalpine Gaul, through which he made his way into Dalmatia and Greece." To avert the objection, Pierre de Marca, in the Letter to Henri de Valois on the beginnings of the Gallican Church, which the latter prefixed to his edition of Eusebius, had said that already from the time of Augustus the name of Cisalpine Gaul had become obsolete; and so, whenever the name of Gaul occurs in Christian writers, it is to be understood of Transalpine. Launoy refutes this at length in the Dispunctio of the letter of Pierre de Marca, and shows that the appellation of Gaul remained to Northern Italy even in later times Works of Launoy, volume II, part II, p. 78.. Be it so; but one thing remains to be proved, namely that the name of Gaul, put forward simply, without its being possible to judge from the circumstances of the writer or of the place or from other things which Gaul is in question, was ever employed to designate Cisalpine Gaul. For as long as this is not shown, even the highest learning is feeble, since the mark is not touched. Certainly the text of Theodoret adduced above speaks of that Gaul of which, in the time of the Arian persecution, Paulinus of Trier was the metropolitan, as he narrates in the Ecclesiastical History, book II, chapter XII Works of Theodoret, volume III, p. 861..

[54] The Life of St. Mary Magdalene, written in the 9th century, The ancient tradition that Christianity was propagated already in the first century, even in the Rhine region, is attested by the Life of St. Mary Magdalene attributed to blessed Rabanus Maurus, abbot of Fulda and afterwards archbishop of Mainz. From which testimony, insofar as it has Rabanus or another contemporary author, it follows that the opinion of the antiquity of the Church of Trier is earlier than the eleventh century, as Hontheim would have it. This Life, hitherto lying hidden in the library of the College of St. Mary Magdalen at Oxford, was first brought to light by the Reverend Mr. Faillon, presbyter of the Congregation of St. Sulpice, in his most learned work on the unpublished Monuments concerning the apostolate of St. Mary Magdalene in Provence [Monuments inédits sur l'apostolat de Sainte Marie-Madeleine en Provence, 2 volumes in 8vo, Paris 1848.]. The author vindicates the authenticity of Rabanus's book both from the controversies and the state of the Gallican Church in the 9th century, which are described in the Life Ibid., volume II, p. 18 and following., and from the style and the opinions proper to Rabanus, which are exhibited there exactly Ibid., p. 26 and following.. I indeed in no way hesitate to agree fully with the opinion by which the book is held to have been produced in the ninth century; for this is most plainly indicated by the errors which are incidentally attacked, and the division of the provinces of Gaul, but especially what is reported of Bordeaux, "now the metropolis of Aquitania Secunda" Ibid., p. 539.; for anciently Bordeaux belonged to the metropolis of Bourges Histoire du Languedoc, volume I, p. 732., yet it was already reckoned among the metropolises under Charlemagne, as is established from the Breviary of the division of the treasures, in which is read Sirmond, Concilia Galliae, volume II, p. 264.: "The names of the metropolitan cities to which alms or largess was given are these: Rome … Bordeaux." Since, therefore, the metropolitan right attributed to Bordeaux is treated as a recent fact, which the particle "now" signifies, it is sufficiently shown that the writer of the Life is ancient and can scarcely exceed the 9th century.

[55] and attributed to Rabanus; Thus far I wholly agree with the Reverend Mr. Faillon. But some scruples keep me from further admitting Rabanus plainly as the author of the Life of St. Mary Magdalene. First of all, that among the fathers and founders of the Gallican Church is reported Irenaeus, "who in the division of the provinces obtained Lyon, metropolis of Lugdunensis Tertia" Monuments de Sainte Marie-Madeleine, volume II, p. 539.. Rabanus was too well versed in the Fathers to have been able to be ignorant that St. Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon, flourished at the end of the second century. The objection, however, is conveniently enough washed away by saying that this passage has been dislocated by the fault of a copyist; for Lyon was not the metropolis of Lugdunensis Tertia but of Prima, and Gatianus of Tours, who obtained the Third Lugdunensis, has been omitted. But a graver difficulty occurs to me, namely that Rabanus, if he is the author of the Life, is not consistent with himself. For in the praised Life, chapter XXXVII Ibid., treating of the companions of St. Mary Magdalene, whom he calls leaders of the Christian warfare, he reckons among them St. Frontinus or Fronto, as preaching among the Petragorae, a city of Aquitania Secunda Ibid., p. 549.. But Rabanus seems to teach altogether contrary things in his Martyrology on the 1st day of October [Canisius, Thesaurus Monumentorum, volume I, part II, p. 343, Amsterdam edition 1775.]: "The birthday of Fronto, bishop and confessor; in the borders of the city of Périgueux, from the place which is called Linicasium, he took the happy beginning of the light. And thus, living devoutly in service among the monks, he shone with many virtues, and converted many to the faith of Christ: but at the last, after sacred labours which shone forth through the marks of his virtues, he passed from the present tribulation to eternal rest." I shall say nothing of the monkhood of St. Fronto, because in apostolic fashion he could cultivate the clerical life together with the monastic, together with his disciples: but Rabanus openly teaches that the saint was born in the territory of Périgueux Cf. Gallia Christiana, volume II, column 1447., which departs too far from what is related in the Life of St. Magdalene for both books to have had one and the same author.

[56] to which the Martyrology is in part opposed, Among the remaining apostles praised in the Life there occurs also Feroncius, who is read to have obtained Besançon, the metropolis of the province of Maxima Sequanorum Monuments de Sainte Marie-Madeleine, volume II, p. 539., and so to have attained the episcopate. But further, this Feroncius seems to be the same as Ferrutius, who is celebrated in the Roman Martyrology on the 16th day of June together with Ferreolus, and together with his companion is held to be the founder of the Church of Besançon; but Rabanus, with whom the present-day Roman calendars agree,

says under the same 16th day of June Canisius, Thesaurus, volume II, part II, d. 331.: "Of Ferreolus, presbyter, and Ferrutio, deacon, in the city of Besançon, who under Claudius the judge, etc." These again by no means seem to agree with each other: for one who fell as a martyr deacon cannot be presented by the same writer as metropolitan of the province of Maxima Sequanorum. Add to this that, although some doubt whether Ferreolus was a bishop, yet no one, so far as I know, has ascribed such a dignity to his deacon Ferrutius. In like manner the author of the praised Life assigns to Valerius Trier, the metropolis of Belgica Prima Monuments, p. 539.: here indeed the Life and the Rabanian Martyrology agree aptly. But the writer of the Life collides with history or tradition in another way: for it is known that, if any special province was assigned to the first preachers, the metropolis of Trier fell to Eucharius Gesta Trevirorum, chapter XX, volume I, p. 31, Trier edition 1836.: and so it could not have been assigned to Valerius, the disciple of Eucharius, in the division of the provinces. But I can scarcely be brought to believe that Rabanus, born and, if you except shorter journeys, always living in Germany, was ignorant of the series of the pontiffs of a primary and domestic Church such as that of Trier was. Finally, it is not without its difficulty that the author of the Life hands down as an undoubted thing that Saturninus preached at the city of Toulouse Monuments, volume II, p. 540.; whereas in the Martyrology is read Canisius, Thesaurus, volume III, part II, p. 348. "martyr, AS IS REPORTED, ordained by the disciples of the Apostles," which two statements do not agree well enough with each other.

[57] perhaps wrongly published under his name, The considerations set out so far would make me judge that the Life of St. Mary Magdalene is not to be adjudged to Rabanus, were it not that from an accurate reading of the Rabanian Martyrology a suspicion arises in me that the work which is commonly presented under his name is not genuine, or at least is so dislocated that full authority cannot be attributed to it. Nay, there are not lacking those who forbid that Martyrology to be reckoned among the genuine works of Rabanus [Baillet, Vies des Saints, volume I, Discourse on the history of the Lives of the Saints, preface XXXI, Paris edition 1739.]; but this indeed is too severe: since we have two dedicatory letters of Rabanus, to Radeleich, abbot of Seligenstadt, and to Grimold the archchaplain Canisius, Thesaurus, volume I, part II, p. 290., there can be no doubt that he wrote a Martyrology, which our Sollerius also attributes to him in the Preface of the Martyrology of Usuard, chapter I, article III, §2 Sollerius, Martyrology of Usuard, Preface, p. XIX.. Yet I do not hesitate to say that it has been corrupted in many places, as is clear enough from the eulogy of St. Frontinus cited above, and from the names of cities and regions foolishly noted, for example when it says of St. Saturninus "in the city of Mannetae" instead of Toulouse; which citations indeed could easily be multiplied. But what is graver, and declares the compilation of an unskilled copyist rather than the skill of a most learned man, is that it produces the same saints on different days with a varied eulogy: thus under the 7th day before the Ides (the 9th) of March it reports the passion of the Forty Holy Martyrs, quite similar, even as regards the words, to the present-day Roman Martyrology. But two days later, on the 5th day before the Ides of March, it brings back the same champions, but surrounded with stupendous miracles: for the stones hurled at the Christians struck down the stoners, the ice on which they sat, its cold being tempered, was dissolved and made into warm water, so that it must seem a wonder that even one of the Forty, terrified by fear of the punishments, fled to the bath, as is narrated in one continuous account.

[58] commonly put about, The Martyrology exhibits a similar repetition under the 16th day before the Kalends of April (the 17th of March) and the 3rd day before the Ides (the 13th) of May: for in both places it celebrates Mary the virgin, the handmaid of Tertullus, a leading man, who, when she was on the point of undergoing the capital sentence, a great rock to which she had been brought having opened, was received and enclosed on every side. All the circumstances, the same in both eulogies, are of such a kind that they can fit only one and the same person. But I can scarcely believe that Rabanus was so careless as to indulge himself in similar repetitions without reason. To adjudge the whole Martyrology away from Rabanus, however, the style of Rabanus and the tenor of his speaking and thinking are not familiar enough to me: but I in no way hesitate to assert that, if anything of Rabanus is in the whole book, it has been interpolated in manifold ways, and perhaps also mutilated. Wherefore I wholly subscribe to the judgment put forward by Basnage Canisius, Thesaurus, volume II, part II, p. 290., with whom the most learned Binterim agrees Binterim, Denkwürdigkeiten, volume V, part I, p. 63.: "Very many things would have to be observed concerning this Martyrology, if it were permitted to weigh each point, to open what is obscure, to repair what is spurious." In this way, therefore, insofar as we should not have the genuine Martyrology of Rabanus, it can be maintained that the Life of St. Mary Magdalene has Rabanus as its author. Yet I do not see how the objection about Valerius can be washed away, who is there said to be the founder of the Church of Trier in place of Eucharius. Finally, this too must not be concealed, that Rabanus cultivated the friendship of Hilduin, abbot of Saint-Denis and author of the Areopagitica, to whom he also inscribed his Commentaries on the four books of Kings Histoire littéraire de la France, volume V, p. 160.: whence the suspicion can arise that he too, if he is the author of the Life, was carried away by the desire of exaggerating the antiquity of Transalpine Christianity: for Pagi, in the Critica of Baronius at the year 834, § X and following, solidly demonstrates that Dionysius of Paris is different from the Athenian, and at the same time that he was sent into Gaul by St. Clement of Rome Cf., however, Acta Sanctorum, volume IV of October, p. 887.. And indeed this very thing demonstrates the candour of Rabanus, that, although a friend, he made no mention whatever of Dionysius; nay, when he named so many leaders of nascent Christianity in Gaul, he yet keeps a deep silence about Dionysius, which certainly could by no means please his friend Hilduin.

[59] teaches that St. Mary Magdalene But at last let us present the text itself, as it is read in the Life of St. Mary Magdalene Monuments de Sainte Marie-Madeleine, volume II, p. 538: "Having therefore entered the waves of the sea with Mary Magdalene, glorious to God, and her most blessed sister Martha, the holy archbishop Maximinus and blessed Parmenas the archdeacon, the bishops too Trophimus, Eutropius, and also the remaining leaders of the Christian warfare, the east wind blowing, leaving Asia … by a prosperous course they put in … at the city of Marseille, where the Rhône is received by the Gallic sea. There, having invoked God, the great prince of the world, they divided among themselves, by his inspiration, the provinces of the region to which the Spirit had driven them: and presently setting out they preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word with signs following … The holy archbishop Maximinus obtained Aix, metropolis of the province of Narbonensis Secunda; … Paul Narbonne, metropolis of Narbonensis Prima; Austrogisilus Bourges, metropolis of Aquitania Prima; Hirenaeus Lyon, metropolis of Lugdunensis Tertia? Sabinus and Potentianus Sens, metropolis of Lugdunensis Quarta; Valerius Trier, metropolis of Belgica Prima; Feroncius Besançon, metropolis of the province of Maxima Sequanorum; Eutropius Saintes, a city of Aquitania Secunda, whose metropolis now is Bordeaux; Trophimus Arles, then metropolis of the province of Viennensis. These ten provinces of Gaul believed through their preaching. The other teachers preached not to the remaining seven provinces, but to seven cities of the provinces. Eutropius at Orange, a city of the province of Viennensis; Frontinus among the Petrogorae, a city of Aquitania Secunda; George at Velay, a city of Aquitania Prima; Julian at Le Mans, a city of Lugdunensis Tertia; Martial at Limoges, a city of Aquitania Prima; Saturninus at the city of Toulouse, of Narbonensis Prima, in which he was hurled down from the Capitol for the faith of Christ; Parmenas at the city of the Avenici, of the province of Viennensis, withdraws with the venerable handmaid of the Lord the Saviour, St. Martha.

[60] landed in Gaul with very many others. "Rouen with its province, Lugdunensis Secunda, which is now Normandy; Mainz with its province, Germania Prima; Cologne with its province, Germania Secunda; Octodurus with its province of the Graian and Pennine Alps; the metropolis of Auch with its province, Novempopulania; the metropolis of Embrun with its province of the Maritime Alps; the metropolis of Reims with its province, Belgica Secunda, were reserved for other teachers. And of those who were destined by the Apostles for the Spains these are the names: Torquatus, Thesiphum, Secundus, Indalecius, Caecilius, Esicius, Euphrasius. These seven joined the seven provinces of the Spains to the Christian faith." The text cited so far needs some elucidation. We have already noted above that it suffers from a certain fault in the case of Irenaeus of Lyon, both because he is much later, and because Lyon was the metropolis not of the third but of the first Lugdunensian province. For this reason the often-praised editor suspects a gap, which he fills thus: "Irenaeus Lyon, metropolis of Lugdunensis (Prima; Gatianus Tours, metropolis of Lugdunensis) Tertia." Which is necessary for this reason, that ten provinces may be had, whereas with the metropolis of Tours omitted only nine are counted. Another thing is that Rouen is said to be the metropolis of Lugdunensis Secunda, "which is now Normandy": the appellation of Normandy could not have arisen before the tenth century; wherefore he judges that this addition crept into the text from the margin, which not rarely happens in geographical and chronological notes by the error of copyists Ibid., p. 15.. What has been said so far sufficiently demonstrates that the opinion of the Christian religion having been propagated through Gaul already in the first century was not first born in the eleventh century.

§ VI. The opinion that the Christian religion was propagated already in the first century is confirmed from the history of the Roman legions at the Rhine.

Roman soldiers inclined to religion: The arguments which we have so far brought forward to confirm our opinion of the Christian religion having been propagated through Gaul already in the first century are such that we willingly confess that exception can be taken against them on the ground either of generality or of more recent age. And indeed, if the reasons brought by us were beyond all exception, we should call our opinion no longer probable but certain. Nor would there have been need of such great circuits if we had direct and contemporary documents before us. But such being lacking, we heap reasons upon reasons, both to confirm our opinion and so that, from the collision as it were of various considerations, the truth, which alone we desire in historical disquisitions, may at length shine out more and more. Wherefore we produce a new argument, hitherto for the most part untouched and neglected, and to be treated the more accurately because it has hitherto been sufficiently weighed neither by the supporters nor by the adversaries of our opinion: namely, what part in propagating the Christian religion military men may rightly claim for themselves, especially the soldiers of the Roman legions. That soldiers were inclined to religious things we are taught both by the questions directed to St. John the Baptist, Luke III, 14, and by the wonderful faith of the Centurion asking the health of his servant, Luke VII, 5, and also by the prodigious conversion of Cornelius, centurion of the Italian cohort, who is said in Acts X, 2, to be "devout and fearing God with all his house, giving many alms to the people and

praying to God always." We know, further, that the first-fruits of the Christians from among the Gentiles were consecrated in this Cornelius. Nor did the Roman soldiers afterwards degenerate from such lofty beginnings: for the Martyrologies are full of the names of those soldiers who fought for the name of Christ to the shedding of their blood and to death: lest my discourse run on too long, I shall list only those soldier martyrs who occur in the month of January in the Roman Martyrology and are reported to have suffered in the first three centuries of the Church. Thus on the 1st day of January is recorded at Rome a crown of 30 soldiers under Diocletian; on the 2nd, at Tomis in Pontus, under Licinius, three brothers, Argeus, Narcissus and Marcellinus; on the 3rd, at Caesarea in Cappadocia, Gordius, a centurion; on the 12th, in Africa, besides SS. Zoticus, Rogatus, Modestus and Castulus, a crown of 40 soldiers; on the 13th, at Rome, under Gallienus, another crown likewise of 40 soldiers; on the 18th, in Pontus, the soldiers Moseus and Ammonius; on the 20th, at Rome, under Diocletian, St. Sebastian, chief of the first cohort; on the 29th, at Rome under Diocletian, Papias and Maurus.

[62] which some could already learn in their homeland, From these it appears how truly Tertullian said in his Apologeticus, chapter XXXVII Works of Tertullian, p. 78, Antwerp edition 1584.: "We are foreigners (most read 'of yesterday') and we have filled all that is yours, cities, islands, forts, municipalities, meeting-places, THE CAMPS THEMSELVES, the decuries, the palace, the senate, the forum." And since so many soldiers were being slain, it could not be that others did not inquire into the cause of their death, and accordingly learn and approve the new religion itself. Then it must also be diligently noted that these soldiers, dispersed through various provinces, especially the most remote, had for the most part been enlisted in distant regions. Thus the 22nd Legion, which was surnamed Primigenia Pia Fidelis, exhibits its soldiers as natives of Mantua Codex inscriptionum Romanarum Rheni, no. 429., Bologna Ibid., no. 430., Vercelli Ibid., no. 431., or such whose names indicate the gens Claudia Ibid., no. 413., Flavia Ibid., no. 412., Julia Ibid. 419., Baebia Ibid., no. 418., all of which draw their origin from plebeian Roman families Ibid., no. 416.. Whence it is made probable that soldiers of this kind both drew the knowledge of the Christian doctrine and faith from their families, and, having drawn it, propagated it also to their fellow-soldiers. Nay, the apostolic men would have to be called careless of evangelical preaching if, having obtained a most opportune occasion of excellently advancing the Christian cause, they had neglected it and put off the benefit of Christianity to the second or third century, when everything was paving the way for promoting the true religion: ease of communication, the familiarity of fellow-citizens, the nearness of the region. What? We see the cult by which Isis Ibid., nos. 521, 700, 728, 961. and Mithras Ibid., nos. 51, 155, 888, 920, etc., scarcely granted Roman citizenship, were worshipped, widely propagated through Germany, especially at the Rhine, and shall we think the ministers of the truth more sluggish and more faint-hearted about spreading the evangelical light into all the nations to which they had been sent by Christ God! This, certainly, the first Fathers and ecclesiastical writers do not indicate, when they extol with such great praises the alacrity, skill and industry of the Apostles in sowing the word of salvation. And these things indeed have so much weight with me that, unless the contrary is shown by suitable documents, I cannot persuade myself that the tracts of Gaul and Rhenish Germany remained strangers to the Christian religion through the first two centuries.

[63] which is shown from the 22nd Legion For Tacitus most plainly teaches us that the transfers of legions into Rhenish Germany from other provinces illumined by the evangelical light were very frequent. Let us say nothing, indeed, of the German legions which fought at Bedriacum between Verona and Cremona in the year of Christ 69, and then went back to the German shores, such as were the First Italica Tacitus, Histories, volume II, p. 41., which then under Vespasian was stationed at Mainz Ibid., volume IV, p. 37.; the Fourth Macedonica Ibid., volume III, p. 22., likewise at Mainz under the same emperor Ibid., volume IV, p. 37.; the Eighth, which besieges Cremona Ibid., volume III, p. 10. and bears arms against Civilis in Germany Ibid., volume IV, p. 68.; the Thirteenth and Fourteenth, engaged in the principal battle at Bedriacum Ibid., volume II, p. 43., afterwards placed at Novaesium Ibid., volume IV, p. 26. among the Ubii (today Neuss in the province of Düsseldorf) and among the Nervii and Tungri Ibid., volume IV, p. 79.. We pass over also the Second Legion Adjutrix, which, newly enrolled in Italy under Vespasian, was soon led across into Germany Ibid., volume IV, p. 68.; the Sixth Victrix and the Tenth Gemina, first employed in Spain Ibid., volume III, p. 44, and volume II, p. 58., then under the same emperor in Germany Ibid., volume V, pp. 14 and 19.. Although for us as we inquire there remain arguments neither doubtful nor few which teach that very many soldiers of these legions were imbued with the Christian faith, we prefer nevertheless to circumscribe our investigation within the 22nd Legion alone.

[64] which alone, from Jerusalem There are not a few learned men who say that there were two legions, one named Deiotariana, the other Primigenia Pia Fidelis. That the latter had its stations in Germany manifold monuments demonstrate Fuchs, Alte Geschichte von Mainz, 161–178.. That the Deiotariana was summoned from Alexandria to bring help to Titus besieging Jerusalem Tacitus testifies in these words Histories, volume V, p. 1.: "He (Titus) added from Syria the twelfth, and the twenty-seconds and the thirds brought from Alexandria." But whether this duplication of the 22nd Legion is correct may rightly be doubted: both because no monument of the Deiotariana more recent than the siege of Jerusalem has been found in the parts of the East, and because no monument of the Primigenia older than the same siege has yet been found on the German shores. From which there arises as if of its own accord the opinion of a single, not a double, 22nd Legion, which, having served in the Jewish war, was brought from Syria into Italy and then across the Alps. And even if some later monument of the 22nd Legion should be found after the destruction of Jerusalem, the matter would not on that account be settled: for of one and the same Fifth Legion Macedonica there exist contemporary records in Dacia and at Heliopolis in Egypt under the emperor Philip Secchi, Iscrizioni greche, p. 39 and following., whether because the legion had been divided among various provinces for the necessity of war, or because in one province there were military stations, and in another colonies of the same.

[65] came into Germany I know indeed that Gabriel Brotier, of our Society, the celebrated editor and commentator of Tacitus, would have Tacitus so emended that, whenever he treats of the eighteenth legion (XVIII), he judges that the twenty-second (XXII) should be read [Notes and emendations to Tacitus' Histories, volume II, p. 6. Works of Tacitus, volume III, p. 408 and following, Paris edition 1771.], by which reading it becomes certain that the 22nd Legion had its stations on the German shores before Vespasian, and so before the capture of Jerusalem. And he says that the reading proposed by him is to be accepted because various manuscript codices express this latter number, above all the Florentine one of the best quality, which various editors have since followed, as may be seen in the Tacitus edited by Georg Ruperti [Works of Tacitus, volume IV, p. 373, Panckoucke edition, Paris, 1830. Ruperti, Works of Tacitus, volume III, p. 45, Hanover edition 1839.]. But besides the fact that most codices, whether handwritten or printed, retain the 18th Legion, whence the reading always remains doubtful, the chief reason of those who think the 22nd Legion should be read is that the 18th Legion is said to have been destroyed in the disaster of Varus, and its memory therefore effaced. But this, in my judgment, is to take as established the very thing which is in controversy. For if most have rightly read the 18th Legion in Tacitus, it follows that it either was not utterly destroyed, or at least was restored to its former state by a new enrolment of soldiers: the latter of which is more probable, since it appears again under Trajan (the years of Christ 98–117), as may be seen in Brotier Brotier, Works of Tacitus, volume III, p. 412.. Then we should wish the reader to remember what we noted a little before, namely that no monument of the 22nd Legion Primigenia has yet been found which certainly preceded the siege of Jerusalem, just as the Deiotariana after the same epoch left no trace of itself in the East, as the authors of the Real-Encyclopädie, written in German, openly confess, although otherwise they favour the opinion of Brotier Walz and Teuffel, Real-Encyclopädie, under the word Legio.. The Eastern origin of the 22nd Legion is betrayed by an inscription of Mainz which joins a cohort of Ituraeans with it Steiner, Inscriptions, no. 416. Cf. ibid., no. 827.:

D. M.

TITO. STATILIO. TAVRO.

PRÆF. FABRORVM.

PRÆF. COH(ortis) I. AVG(ustæ) ITVRE

OR(um) ET VI THRACVM. TRIB(unus).

MIL(itum). LEG. XXII. PR(imigeniæ). P(iæ). F(idelis). VIXIT.

ANN(is). XXXV. STATILIVS. FOR

TVNATUS. LIB(ertus). F(ieri). C(uravit).

[To the Departed Spirits. To Titus Statilius Taurus, prefect of the engineers, prefect of the 1st Augustan cohort of the Ituraeans and of the 6th of the Thracians, tribune of the soldiers of the 22nd Legion Primigenia Pia Fidelis. He lived 35 years. Statilius Fortunatus, his freedman, had this made.]

Then a station or colony of the same legion was at Patras in Achaia [Wiener, De Legione Romana XXII, p. 74. Fuchs, Das alte Mainz, volume I, Preface, no. XI.], namely in that place where St. Andrew underwent his martyrdom: for no valid reason occurs, even if a double 22nd Legion were to be admitted, why we should ascribe this colony to the Deiotariana.

[66] and some traces there For the rest, whichever side we may at length embrace in this controversy concerning the 22nd Legion, the place of origin of the soldiers both of this and of other legions (cf. above no. 60) indicates sufficiently that it could scarcely have been that many should not be found among them who followed the Christian rites. For although the demonstration would flow more easily if soldiers summoned from Palestine were shown, yet since we see them coming forth from those regions which first received the faith, our reasoning suffers no great loss. Now further, if we call to mind what we said above about the inclination of soldiers toward the Christian cause, and about the homeland of many being already imbued with the faith, we shall easily persuade ourselves that the twenty-second legion did not remain a stranger to the faith of Christ, and that, the seed of the evangelical word having been conceived and gradually growing, it also propagated its faith to others. And in putting these things forward we do not rely on conjectures alone, although very solid ones; but we also prove our assertion by monuments. I shall not, indeed, add much weight to the various sepulchral inscriptions reported by Joseph Fuchs Das alte Mainz, pp. 164–173., which namely do not bear the impious sigla D. M. (Dis Manibus), but begin from the very name of the deceased: I shall bring forward one, as an indication of the rest Ibid., p. 172.:

C. RITTIUS. C. F.

VOL. PAULUS.

VIENNA. MIL. LEG.

XXII. PRIM. ANN.

XXXVIII. STIP. XVIII.

H. S. E.

ET. AVE.

ET. VALE.

[Gaius Rittius Paulus, son of Gaius, of the Voltinian tribe, from Vienne, soldier of the 22nd Legion Primigenia, aged 38 years, of 18 years' service, lies here. Both hail and farewell.]

I confess indeed that the sigla H. S. E. (hic situs est, "here he lies") savour of a certain heathenism, since, as P. J. Marchi rightly observes Monumenti primitivi delle arti cristiane, p. 63., these words indicate the sense of something irrevocable; as do also these others often used among the Gentiles, positus, compositus ("laid", "laid to rest"): wherefore the Christians preferred to use the word depositus ("deposited"), in that sense, indeed, in which Cicero says De officiis, book III, chapter XXIII. that deposits are not always to be returned, and Ulpian more clearly Law (Digest, On deposit, book XV, chapter III).: "A deposit is what has been given to someone to be kept." Nevertheless, although this scrupulousness of words, openly demonstrating Christianity, is absent from the inscriptions of Mainz, yet nothing in them offends the Christian faith: nay, the last words ave and vale ("hail" and "farewell") are full of a certain hope of immortality, as though spoken to friends who hear and are some day to be seen again. Yet I am not one who would dare to ascribe the funeral formulas which I cite to Christians departed this life: especially since I find a similar one in Catullus Catullus, Epigram XCVIII.:

Receive these, flowing much with a brother's weeping, And for ever, brother, hail and farewell.

[67] in the sign of the fish We bring forward, therefore, more certain indications and monuments of Christianity in the 22nd Legion. It is known, further, how frequent among the early Christians was the symbol of the fish [Cf. Mamachi, Origines Christianae, volume I, p. 54 and following. Münter, Sinnbilder der alten Christen, p. 31 and following.], which Clement of Alexandria reports among the chief seals of the Christians, saying Paedagogus, book II, chapter II. Works, p. 246, Paris edition 1641.: "Let our seals be a dove, or a fish, or a ship … or a musical lyre." And this very symbol of the fish we know to have been recently dug up at Arensburg in Hesse in the year 1842 Archiv für Hessische Geschichte, volume III., with the inscription LEGIO XXII PRimitiva Fidelis formed on a baked brick. Nor must it be passed over that the fish shown seems very like a dolphin, which Aringhi shows is not without its mystery, book VI of Roma subterranea, chapter XXXIX [Roma subterranea, volume II, p. 333, Paris edition 1659. Cf. Secchi, Epigramma greco cristiano dei primi secoli in Augustoduno.].

[68] and of the cross I present another monument dug up in the same place and year Archiv für Hessische Geschichte, volume III., which shows a cross very well formed, with the name of the 22nd Legion Primigenia Pia Fidelis inscribed:

How ancient further is the custom of Christians of signing themselves and their things with the figure of the cross is too well known for us to unfold it at length here: for whoever has greeted ecclesiastical antiquities even from the threshold knows that nothing occurs more frequently than the cross in ancient monuments; wherefore the ancient faithful were called Σταυρολάτραι, Cross-worshippers, whence Caecilius in the Octavius reproaches the Christians Minucius Felix, p. 105, Leiden edition 1672. with crosses not to be adored but to be undergone, wherefore Octavius replies Ibid., p. 284.: "Crosses, moreover, we neither worship nor wish for," because, namely, the Christians worshipped him who hung upon the cross.

[69] left: Does not the fragment of an inscription found at Mainz, in which these things are read, indicate the ardour of faith, though somewhat immoderate Fuchs, Altes Mainz, p. 39 and following.:

…QUI…

FERREO. FUSTE.

PERCUSSIT. DIANAM.

From this fragment it becomes probable that there was someone who threw down a statue of Diana in order to destroy the worship of idols; but the Gentiles, in order to keep the honour of their goddess safe and sound, had this inscribed on the base, which was skilfully built, as is clear from Fuchs's illustration Ibid., plate III.. And this shows not only the antiquity of the Christian religion but also its propagation; since in those who read such an inscription curiosity would easily arise to inquire what kind of men at length went so far as to be injurious to the statues of the gods; whence it could not be that much talk about the Christian faith did not arise. There is nothing, however, in the adduced fragment which designates the 22nd Legion, although deeds of this kind seem by no means foreign to the military character. Nor must this be passed over in silence, that soldiers were always employed both in guarding the Christians in prison and in leading them to punishment, during which, as ecclesiastical history testifies, very frequent miracles were wrought by the martyrs. But how could it be that the necessary spectators should not diligently inquire into the cause of the death or of the prodigy, and so become desirous of thoroughly learning the Christian doctrine? Unless, further, we would accuse the first preachers of the Gospel of some stupendous faint-heartedness, we must confess that they embraced so opportune and spontaneously offered an occasion of announcing the truth, and could easily, by following the barracks of the Roman soldiers, scatter the seed of the divine word in every direction. For, to keep to the example of the 22nd Legion proposed by us, there exist to this day monuments which show that it had its stations through the whole course of the Rhine, from Solothurn in Switzerland as far as Vetera Castra (Xanten, in the duchy of Cleves). Here is the Solothurn stone Steiner, Inscriptions, no. 547.:

DEÆ. EPONÆ. M(atri).

OPILIVS. RESTIO. M(iles)

(l)EG. XXII. ANTONI NIANÆ. P(rimig.) P(iæ) F(idelis)

…S. COS. CVPA(tor) SA

(lie)NS(ium) VICO. SALOD.

III. KAL. SEPTEMB.

D. N. ANTONINO.

II. ET. SACERDO(te).

COS. V. S. L. M.

[To the goddess Epona, the Mother. Opilius Restio, soldier of the 22nd Legion Antoniniana Primigenia Pia Fidelis, …, curator of the Salienses, in the village of Solothurn, on the third day before the Kalends of September, our lord Antoninus for the second time and Sacerdos being consuls, willingly and deservedly fulfilled his vow.]

Another inscription, found at Vetera Castra, runs thus:

HERCVLI. SAX

ANO. SACRVM.

C. SVLPICIVS. MA

TVRVS LEG XXII

PR. P. ET COMMI

LITONES. LEG. EIV

SDEM. QVI. SVB.

EO. SVNT.

V. S. L. M.

[Sacred to Hercules Saxanus. Gaius Sulpicius Maturus, of the 22nd Legion Primigenia Pia, and the fellow-soldiers of the same legion who are under him, willingly and deservedly fulfilled their vow.]

[70] accompanied these Christians To conclude our matter at last, we judge with the often-praised Joseph Fuchs Das alte Mainz, Preface, § II. that the Christian religion was brought into many provinces chiefly through the Roman legions: and this is suggested by the military temperament, most apt for embracing the faith, by the number of soldiers who poured out their life for Christ, by the facility which the comradeship and frequent migrations of the soldiers offered to apostolic men, and finally by the very ardour of propagating the Gospel which urged the Apostles and their immediate successors, according to the Lord's precept Matthew XXVII, 19., to teach all nations and baptize them. I think, therefore, that in such a way Rhenish Germany obtained its first Apostles, and that SS. Eucharius, Valerius and Maternus were of the number of those who are called by Eusebius "evangelists of the word of God" Historia ecclesiastica, book V, chapter X, p. 142, Amsterdam edition 1695., who, kindled with a certain divine emulation, after the example of the Apostles hastened to devote their zeal to the building up of the faith and the increase of the divine word, and such as Eusebius testifies still existed about the end of the second century.

[71] bishops and presbyters, Yet I should wish the reader to understand what has been said so far in such a way that I do not therefore say that these first bishops of the provinces had stable sees and the boundaries of their dioceses defined in all their particulars; wherefore, where we read of a bishop of Trier, of Cologne or of Tongeren, let us not imagine prelates of Churches such as we see today, who, attached to one people, know accurately what comes under the name of their Church. But these first bishops are to be held as regionary, to whom no special see was assigned, but whose mission was to preach the Gospel to the nations and to extend the bounds of the Church more and more widely. But someone will object that it does not seem likely that, with soldiers such as were the Roman legionaries, whose stations were uncertain and the dangers of their life enormous, bishops were sent to look after the Christian cause among a few (for the monuments certainly indicate that very many of the 22nd Legion were given to the worship of idols); that it seems useless to set the summit of the priestly dignity on such slender and tottering foundations. To these I shall reply that the office of preaching to the nations was incumbent upon bishops not only chiefly and primarily, as it is now also [Council of Trent, session V, chapter II on reform, and session XXIV, chapter IV on reform.], but as it were solely, and so that those whom we called above evangelists of the word of God were for the most part bishops, as we could show by many examples adduced.

[72] even if the flock was small at the beginning We shall adduce one from the Life of St. Gregory, bishop of Neocaesarea, written by St. Gregory of Nyssa, in which it is clearly shown that the Church in appointing bishops looked not so much to the number of faithful already inhabiting some region as to the more abundant fruit which might be hoped for from an episcopal mission. Here are the words [Works of St. Gregory of Nyssa, volume III, p. 574 and following, Paris edition 1638.]: "When he" (Gregory the Wonderworker) "foresaw his death, he searched zealously and diligently the whole city and the neighbouring country around, wishing to know whether any were still left outside the faith. When therefore he learned that there were not more than seventeen who had remained in the ancient error: 'This indeed is bitter,' he said, looking up to God, 'that anything should be lacking to the fullness of those who are being saved: nevertheless,' he said, 'it is a thing worthy of great thanksgiving that he was leaving to the one who was to succeed him in the Church as many worshippers of images as he himself had received Christians.'" From which passage it is easy to conclude that the earliest bishops, in taking colleagues to be sent into some city, considered not so much the number of Christians as the hope of a more abundant harvest; for, as Gregory of Nyssa narrates in the same Life Works of St. Gregory of Nyssa, volume III, p. 545, Paris edition 1638., Phaedimus, bishop of Amasea, destined and assigned to Gregory that city which up to those times had happened to be so given to the error of images that, while those who inhabited the city itself and the surrounding region were countless, not more than seventeen were found who had received the word of faith.

[73] and little by little extended themselves to further regions: Let these things be said, therefore, to answer Hontheim, who confesses Prodromus Historiae Trevirensis, volume I, p. 69. that "it is credible that, whether in the armies or outside them, there were already at Trier before" (the middle of the 3rd century, when he places the first bishop there) "a few scattered persons who followed the standards of Christ, yet it will never be proved in the present light of history that there was there such an assembly of Christians, furnished with a bishop, as it would be fitting to call a Church." Why, further, is this not approved by Hontheim? Certainly for this reason, because the Christians were few, and those scattered: were the followers of that name more numerous at Neocaesarea when St. Gregory established his see there? Then, how would that little flock of Trier have been preserved, with no priest assisting? Wherefore one may judge in like manner of the German mission of SS. Eucharius, Valerius and Maternus and of that of Neocaesarea in Pontus. Nor is the fewness of those Christians with whom they were associated to be weighed, but rather the great door which was opened to them for disseminating the word of God ought to be before our minds. Then, if the tradition of the Churches of Trier, Cologne and Tongeren rested only on popular fables, there seems no sufficient reason why the two latter Churches should have been so modest, instead of being able to begin the series of their bishops from a first bishop

Eucharius, and thus to reach the very times of St. Peter, they nevertheless stopped at the third bishop, St. Maternus: for if they had gaped after the popular breeze, nothing would have been easier than to weave their fable so that the foundation of the three Churches would be ascribed to Eucharius alone, or at least that they would divide the foundations man by man. But they say nothing of these things, because they find nothing of the kind among the more ancient writers; for unless they were following some tradition, their fabrication appears absurd. For the rest, the topography favours the tradition as much as possible; for it is easy enough to suppose that the apostolic men came first to Trier, to the city which was held among the chief cities of Gaul; then went down to Cologne, bordering on the territory of Trier, and at length went off to the Tungri, neighbours of the people of Cologne toward the north and west. Nor shall I therefore say that the bounds of these bishoprics were then marked out; nay, I think it more probable that that whole region was administered as one and the same diocese; of which thing indeed examples will occur frequently to one considering the progress of the Christian religion: thus even today we see that from one single mother, the Church of Baltimore in the United States of America, manifold daughters have been born, who themselves too, since the Catholic cause continues to prosper there, already now stand forth as fruitful mothers of a noble offspring.

[74] On account of these weighty reasons we judge that the tradition of the Church of Trier, and so of Tongeren, is rather to be accepted than rejected, especially since the reasons of the adversaries turn on a negative argument, from all which our opinion becomes probable. and that indeed the most unfortunate of all, since they are compelled to confess that the chief, nay almost all, ecclesiastical monuments of these regions perished in the plunderings of the Normans in the [ ] century. For if, the ancient books having been preserved, the writers, as one ascends higher, had always kept an unbroken silence about that series of bishops, the negative argument would have some validity, although it can scarcely become robust unless it is supported from elsewhere. But in the present controversy there is objected to our opinion the silence of the more ancient writers, whose writings we know to have been irreparably lost. Let it be said, as far as I am concerned, that the tradition is not certain in every respect, since we cannot establish it by affirmative and contemporary testimonies: but, the reasons of both opinions having been brought to the balance, I confess that in my judgment the affirmative side wins, and that accordingly that series of bishops is to be retained until something more certain can be established. And toward this side another argument also bends me, which is not without its weight: namely the portable altar of St. Willibrord, on which are listed the names of saints of Trier who seem to belong to the epoch before St. Agritius, and who therefore very well establish our opinion.

[75] which is confirmed by the inscription of the Willibrord altar There existed, namely, until the end of the 18th century, in the church of St. Mary ad Martyres at Trier, a portable altar with this inscription: THIS ALTAR BLESSED WILLIBRORD CONSECRATED IN HONOUR OF THE LORD SAVIOUR, UPON WHICH ON A JOURNEY HE WAS WONT TO OFFER THE OBLATIONS OF MASSES TO GOD: IN WHICH IS CONTAINED SOME OF THE WOOD OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST, AND OF THE NAPKIN OF HIS HEAD Brower, Annales Trevirenses, volume I, p. 364.. That signal monument of the eighth century was preserved in the year 1806 by Johann Peter Schernati, parish priest of the Blessed Virgin Mary within Trier, as we are taught by a dissertation written in the hand of Anton Oehmbs, then professor of Sacred Scripture, which was generously communicated to us. On each side of this altar, on silver plates, images of saints are shown in relief work, with their names added: namely, on the Epistle side, or to the right of the celebrating priest: Agritius, Maximinus, Paulinus, Felix, Alexander, Severus, Sylvester, Cyrillus, Magnericus, Felicissimus: and on the Gospel side, or to the left of the celebrant: Basinus, Marus, Severinus, Nicetius, Bonosus, Legontius, Vincentius, Modoaldus, Nicolaus, Martinus. Calmet presents the same catalogue somewhat differently [Calmet, Histoire de Lorraine, volume I, Dissertation on the bishops of Trier, p. VIII.]; for first of all he gives the names of only eighteen saints, omitting namely SS. Sylvester and Cyril; then for Magnericus, placed in the ninth position in Oehmbs's catalogue, he has Alpitius, whom he interprets as Auspicius; for Felicissimus in the tenth place Calmet writes Felix; finally, the one who is Felix for him is Severus for Oehmbs; the rest agree aptly. I have no leisure to inquire more curiously which catalogue is to be preferred to the other; although Oehmbs's pleases me more, because it is presented by an author who inspected the monument in person and described it most minutely; but whichever is taken, I seem to myself able to deduce from the monument an argument which excellently confirms our opinion. For among the saints here reported there occur fifteen who are certainly bishops of Trier, and whose names for that reason we have expressed in capital letters, one further doubtful, namely Felicissimus, whom one may perhaps interpret as the other Felix presented by Calmet, and therefore we have marked him in letters commonly called italic; finally there are four who certainly do not belong to the series of the bishops of Trier or Tongeren, namely Vincent, who is shown in deacon's habit, and whom I judge to be the celebrated martyr of Valencia, Nicholas, probably the bishop of Myra, and Alexander and Sylvester, Roman pontiffs.

[76] listing the saints of Trier. Later in age than all the saints named is St. Basinus, archbishop of Trier, who our predecessors say on the 4th day of March died toward the end of the 7th century Volume I of March, p. 313.: and hence it can be shown, since no saint more recent than St. Willibrord is reported in the praised catalogue, that the altar belongs to the age of the Apostle of the Frisians. Further, among the saints occurs Severinus, but I find no archbishop of this name except him who immediately precedes our St. Florentinus: from which one may conclude that in the time of St. Willibrord, that is, at the beginning of the eighth century, all were persuaded that some intermediate bishops were to be interposed between SS. Maternus and Agritius. The same is also attested by Warnefrid, commonly called Paul the Deacon, a writer of the 8th century, in the History of the Bishops of Metz, which Calmet says is brief and rather poor in deeds: elle est courte et peu chargée de faits it is short and not heavily laden with facts Histoire de Lorraine, volume I, column 528., and which I therefore judge to have been drawn from genuine sources, though not very abundant ones. He then, after he had said that St. Peter Ibid., Proofs, column LXII. sent excellent and learned men from his company to various cities of Italy which he names, goes on thus: "At that time, therefore, when Mediomatricum in Gallia Belgica, which is also called Metz, a city situated on the very bank of the river Moselle, was abounding in copious throngs of peoples, the blessed Apostle Peter sent to it Clement by name, an excellent man and approved by merits, raised to the pontifical dignity; together with whom, as an ancient account hands down, other religious teachers also were sent by the same prince of the Apostles to win over to the word of faith those cities which were the chief cities of Gaul." That Trier is to be numbered among the chief cities of Gaul no one will deny, and since moreover it is very near to Metz, inasmuch as it sits on the same river Moselle, it cannot be but that Warnefrid understood Trier among the chief cities of Gaul, or else was deceived in reporting the ancient account about the apostolic mission. Whence it becomes altogether manifest that our opinion is not younger than the ninth century, but had its roots in remote antiquity. The antiquity of the Church of Metz and the succession of its bishops has been defended in a special writing by the Reverend Mr. Chaussier, canon of Metz De l'origine apostolique de l'Église de Metz, Paris 1847..

[77] Of St. Florentinus little But to return to the point from which we digressed, to our St. Florentinus, antiquity has begrudged us little, nay everything, if you except his name and quality. For this is what the Gesta Trevirorum relate of the first bishops of Trier Volume I, chapter XXVII, p. 41, Trier edition 1836.: "Then (namely after St. Maternus) Auspicius held the government of the Church. Then by lawful successions there arose distinguished men, strong in holiness and grace. To Auspicius succeeded a man Celsus by name and by merits. He was lofty in spirit and famous in birth, not sluggish, ever great in affection for his country, serene in pious honour and in action. To Celsus succeeded Felix the first, to Felix Mansuetus; then presided Clement, Moses, Martin the first, Anastasius, Andrew, Rusticus the first, Auctor the first, Fortunatus the first, Cassian, Mark, Navitus, Marcellus, Metropolus, Severinus the first, Florentinus, Martin the second, Maximinus, Valentinus, of whom the last eight (namely from Navitus) are known to have presided also over the Church of Tongeren. All of whom, at different times, being industrious and illustrious not only in their own province but also in the most remote and furthest parts, existing not only in confession but also in martyrdom, overcame even the kingdoms of tyrants. All these bishops are believed to have been buried in the church of St. Eucharius. But in the times of which emperors or consuls each of them flourished, and what end their life had, and for how many years each administered the office of the pontificate, or how much each increased the revenues of his Church, since the overthrow of all Gaul wrought by the Huns and Northmen has abolished it, let no reader's demand require it of us."

[78] for the rest became known, We append, however, what Christoph Brower has in the Annals of Trier, book III Brower, Annales Trevirenses, volume I, p. 204.: "Severinus, president of the sacred things of the Church of Trier, when he had lately merited the crown of martyrdom by the happy outcome of his contest, leaving his memory in the Church on the 24th of October, left as his successor Florentius, whom some Martyrologies have also published by another name, Florentinus. He, since the Gallic populace raged against bishops no less than the Roman governors, was dragged into the arena scarcely as the second year was turning, and merited the palm of martyrdom with like praise of fortitude, and is venerated on the 16th day before the Kalends of November." Hontheim indeed doubts the martyrdom of St. Florentinus Prodromus Historiae Trevirensis, volume I, p. 75., because Metropolus, his second predecessor, is said by some to have fallen as a martyr in the year of Christ 303, at which time, on the witness of Lactantius De mortibus persecutorum, chapters 15 and 16., the persecution against the Christians had ceased in Gaul: Hontheim would indeed rightly doubt, if the year 303 of the death of Metropolus held good; but since the Gesta Trevirorum expressly confess that they do not know in the times of which emperors or consuls the individual bishops flourished, nothing certain can be pronounced about the epoch or the martyrdom of these prelates. Wherefore, until we are better taught, we ascribe the palm of martyrdom to St. Florentinus together with the Church of Trier.

[79] besides his name and the succession of his dignity. Finally, by way of a finishing touch, we think there should be shown here the signal reliquary-case of Tongeren, which contains a notable part of the wood of the Holy Cross. This gift had formerly been sent by the people of Liège to the people of Tongeren in memory and testimony of love and brotherhood. The front part, which alone we publish here, consists of two leaves, in the middle of which two angels are shown standing and burning incense. And on the border the following verses are read:

This wood, a pledge of saving love to you, Tongeren, Liège gives, a sign venerable to all.

On the same border, besides the images engraved in bronze which show figures and stories pertaining to the mysteries of the Holy Cross, there is painted in many-coloured enamel the series of the bishops who sat at Tongeren. They proceed

in this order, all adorned with pontifical mitres: Maternus, Navitus, Marcellus, Metropolus, Severinus, Florentius, Martinus, Maximinus, Valentinus, Servatius. This last, Tongeren having been destroyed, transferred the episcopal see to Maastricht on the Meuse Cf. Acta Sanctorum Belgii, volume I, p. 245.; until at length in the eighth century St. Hubert began to sit as bishop at Liège, and there the bishopric continues down to our times.