Hilarus

ON ST. HILARUS, POPE,

AT ROME

In the year 467.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Hilarus, Pope and conf., at Rome (St.)

BY J. S.

§ I. The memory of the Saint in the ancient and the more recent Calendars: his cultus ancient, yet not universal.

[ ] The memory of St. Hilarus the Pope, whom we shall also often see named Hilarius, The memory of the Saint announced today in the ancient the most ancient Martyrologies celebrate at this X day of September. The Hieronymian ones in Florentinius have it thus: At Rome, the laying to rest of blessed Hilarus the Pope, through whom Victor composed the Paschal Order. The Echternach codex in the same place in the Annotations: At Rome, the laying to rest of Hilarus the bishop. The Corbie codex: At Rome, the laying to rest of blessed Hilarus the Pope. Other more abridged ones published by various editors agree. For in our own work after volume VII of June the Reichenau and the shorter Corbie Martyrologies record the laying to rest of St. Hilarus on the same day. But the Augsburg and the Labbean have "of Hilarus the Pope"; with which agree, in Martène, vol. 3 of the Thesaurus of Anecdota, the one he calls the Most Ancient, and the Tours Martyrology. In the same author, vol. 6 of the Amplissima Collectio, col. 645, the Martyrology which was distinguished with the name of Bede has on this day: The birthday of St. Hilarius the Pope.

[2] Usuard announces the memory of St. Hilarus today in this manner: and classic Martyrologies: yet by Ado, At Rome, of blessed Hilarius the Pope. Rabanus: At Rome, the laying to rest of Hilarus the Pope, through whom Victorius composed the Paschal Order. The Martyrology of Auxerre in Martène, vol. 6 of the Amplissima Collectio, col. 720: The laying to rest of St. Hilarius the Pope. The laying to rest of St. Hilarus the Pope is announced at this day also in some Martyrologies published by Domenico Giorgi after Ado's Martyrology, namely in the Fulda and in the Ottoboni ones. And in the same place St. Hilarus the Pope is recorded today in the Palatine-Vatican Calendar and in the twofold Milanese one. It is doubted whether Ado too inserted St. Hilarus the Pope in his Martyrology. Certainly his memory is announced at this day in some manuscript codices of the Adonian Martyrology, and indeed in the first place, as the said Giorgi observes in his Annotations, who from three codices gave these words: At Rome, the laying to rest of St. Hilarius the Pope, through whom Victorinus composed the Paschal Order. Mosander inserted St. Hilarus in his edition as though recorded by Ado himself. But Rosweyde relegated him to the Appendix, because he did not find him in his own codices.

[3] Giorgi indeed judges that Hilarus is Ado's, as seems more probable, he was omitted. because he is found in the Hieronymian Martyrologies. But Ado did not adopt everything that is read in the Hieronymian Martyrologies; nay, he took very few things from them. Wherefore I rather believe that the words given are not Ado's, both because Notker, who had Ado before his eyes, was silent about St. Hilarus, and because in manuscript Martyrologies some Saints are more frequently added than deleted from them. Most of the more recent martyrologists have likewise referred St. Hilarus the Pope to this day. Among these Baronius has it thus in the Roman Martyrology: At Rome, of blessed Hilarus, Pope and confessor. He adds in the Annotations: Of whom Bede, Usuard, Ado, and other more recent writers on this day. But neither does the genuine Martyrology of Bede mention Hilarus, nor did Ado himself insert this Saint in his Martyrology, as I have already noted seems to me more probable. I do not heap up here more from the more recent Martyrologies for the X day of September.

[4] The Saint's memory referred to other days also, The memory of St. Hilarus is also referred to other days. In our own work, in the Prætermissi at the XX of February, these things were observed: St. Hilarius the Pope is referred to this day in the old Martyrology of the monastery of St. Martin at Trier in these words: "At Rome, of Hilarius, Pope and martyr." St. Hilarus the Pope, who with some is Hilarius, but was not a martyr, is referred by others also to the XXI of February, as we shall say there. Likewise in the Prætermissi at the XXI of February: St. Hilarus, or Hilarius, the Pope, is ascribed on this day in the Florarium of the Saints, and in the Martyrologies of Maurolico, Galesinius and Canisius, and in various Calendars, and in Greven's Supplement to Usuard, where he is wrongly styled a martyr. What is here observed is true; but all the martyrologists recounted, without exception, announce St. Hilarus again at the X of September. The same is done in a Martyrology older than the preceding ones, which Martène published in vol. 6 of the Amplissima Collectio, where at col. 639, at the XX of February, these words are read: The birthday of St. Hilarius the Pope; and at the X of September the words already given: The birthday of St. Hilarius the Pope. Why those Trier Martyrologies record St. Hilarus at the XX of February I do not find; just as I likewise do not know why by other more recent writers, and in some Calendars, he is referred to the XXI of February. But I see well enough that this can be of no use for fixing his death on either day: for if that is to be drawn out from the Martyrologies, those which have been cited for the X of September will by far prevail.

[5] who is venerated in particular churches. Concerning the time at which St. Hilarus began to be honoured with an ecclesiastical cultus I find nothing certain. The Hieronymian Martyrologies adduced, and those of Rabanus and Usuard, persuade in some fashion that that cultus is ancient and probably began before the ninth century; but nothing more determinate can be gathered from them. Pope Gelasius, to be cited below, who sat at the end of the fifth century, calls Hilarus a Pope of holy memory; but those words do not imply a cultus. Wherefore, since I cannot adduce anything more certain about an ancient cultus, I shall transfer hither only what Piazza writes about his present-day veneration in the Sacred Hemerology written in Italian, at the X of September. His festal memory, he says, is celebrated in the church of St. Laurence outside the walls, where his body is held in veneration; and in that of St. John at the Font by the Lateran basilica, where his memory is celebrated as that of a notable benefactor and founder of the two side chapels. We shall see in §8 that the Saint was buried in the church of St. Laurence, and that the chapel of St. John was built by him. St. Hilarus never had a universal cultus throughout the whole Church. Hence by our most holy Lord Benedict XIV, in the Work on the Canonization of the Servants of God, book 3, chap. 32, he is reckoned among those Pontiffs who are ascribed to the Roman Martyrology and are venerated with an ecclesiastical Office in some particular churches, but not throughout the universal Church.

§ II. The deeds of St. Hilarus before his pontificate, especially in his legation to the pseudo-council of Ephesus.

[ ] St. Hilarus, a Sardinian by birth, is the same as Hilarus the deacon, Of the boyhood, youth and earlier deeds of St. Hilarus we find nothing handed down to memory. In Anastasius the Librarian he is only said to have been a Sardinian by birth, of his father Crispinus, who in the older Catalogue in our own work before volume 1 of April, p. XXXIV, is called Crispinianus. Writers everywhere all judge that St. Hilarus the Pope is that very Hilarus the deacon who was sent as legate by St. Leo the Pope to the Council of Ephesus; nor do I see why we can rightly doubt of that matter, although the ancient writers were silent, and neither related of St. Hilarus the Pope that before his pontificate he had been a legate, nor of the legate that he afterwards obtained the pontificate. For the reckoning of time persuades that he is the same, since we know that he was a deacon of the Roman Church and a legate in the year 449, and afterwards made archdeacon, and at last elected Pontiff in the year 461. There is added the inscription which Pope Hilarus set to St. John the Evangelist in a little shrine built in his honour. Baronius gave this at the year 449, p. 96, asserting that the little shrine was founded to St. John the Evangelist, the patron of the city of Ephesus, because by his patronage he had been delivered from the peril of the robbery of Ephesus, as we shall see below. The inscription itself I shall give in §8.

[7] And so the first deed of St. Hilarus which has become known to us [whom St. Leo the Pope in the year 449 sent as legate with two others to the Council of Ephesus.] is his legation to the Council of Ephesus held in the year 449. That that synod was convoked by the emperor Theodosius II, because Eutyches had been condemned in the year 448 by St. Flavian, I have already said today in the Commentary on St. Pulcheria, §9, where more may be seen about what was done in that conventicle, which is frequently called the robbery of Ephesus. Hither I shall transfer only those things which most nearly concern St. Hilarus. St. Leo in Letter 29, formerly 15, to the second synod of Ephesus writes thus about the legates sent by him: I have sent our brothers Julius the bishop, Renatus the presbyter, and my son Hilarus the deacon, and with them Dulcitius the notary, of a fidelity approved by us, that they may be present in my stead at the holy assembly of your fraternity, and may determine together with you by a common judgment those things which will be pleasing to the Lord. The same legates St. Leo recounts again in Letter 30 to Pulcheria Augusta, and in Letter 31 to Julian, bishop of Cos. But of the three legates only two, with the notary, reached Ephesus, as is said in the Breviculum of the History of the Eutychianists, in Labbe, vol. 4 of the Councils, col. [ ], in these words: There were present also (at the council) the vicars directed from the Apostolic See, Julius bishop of Puteoli and Hilarus the archdeacon, since Renatus the presbyter was overtaken by death on the island of Delos. Dulcitius the notary was also present.

[8] The Acts of that robbery rather than council What the legates did in the council could be abundantly known from the Acts, if these had been faithfully written. But we have no other Acts of the robbery of Ephesus than those which were read out in the Council of Chalcedon and inserted in it. And that those Acts are neither complete nor faithfully written appears to me so clear and certain that I wonder it could have been denied by anyone. That they are not complete is shown from contemporary or nearly contemporary writers, from whom we shall give various things done by the legates which are not inserted in the said Acts. That they were not faithfully written, but that certain false things are contained in those Acts,

the authority of the fathers of the Council of Chalcedon establishes, who so frequently accused those Acts of falsehood while they were being read out that Dioscorus at length said, at col. 131: They wish to deny everything that has been confessed. Let them say this also, that we were not even present. Hence Christian Lupus in his Scholia and notes on the Canons, part 1, p. 498, said that those Ephesian Acts are lies and imaginary; and he clearly shows that they were certainly not faithfully written. And so Tillemont, when in note 27 on St. Leo he requires arguments far stronger than Lupus brought forward before he will believe that many false things were inserted in the Acts of the robbery of Ephesus, seems to have believed Dioscorus — whom he also defends in other matters, as we shall see — more than the Fathers of Chalcedon, who protested against those Acts on various occasions.

[9] were written unfaithfully by the notaries of Dioscorus. Let us hear, then, in what manner Dioscorus saw to the writing of the Acts. Theodore, bishop of Claudiopolis, teaches this, who, after the Orientals and the most reverend bishops with them had cried out at col. 127 concerning the Acts read out — "These things we did not say. Who said these things?" — presently subjoined: Let him (Dioscorus) bring forward his own notaries. For, casting out the notaries of all, he made his own men write. Let the notaries come and say whether these things were written, or were read in our presence, or whether anyone examined and subscribed them. Dioscorus was not dumb at this, but showed that the notaries of three, or at least of two, other bishops who admitted it had also written. But it must be observed that Juvenal of Jerusalem and Thalassius of Cæsarea, who acknowledged that their notaries too had written, were the chief men who conspired with Dioscorus in the robbery of Ephesus; and therefore their notaries can be of no use for showing the trustworthiness of the Acts. Otherwise did Dioscorus treat those in whom he had no confidence. For there, at col. 130, Stephen bishop of Ephesus testifies this about his own notaries in the Council of Chalcedon: My notaries were taking it down — Julian, who is now the most reverend bishop of Lebedos, and Crispinus the deacon — and the notaries of the most reverend bishop Dioscorus came and wiped out their tablets and almost broke their fingers, wishing to take away their cases as well: and I neither received copies of those Acts, nor did I know for the rest what was done. Presently it follows that the bishops subscribed on a blank sheet, compelled by cudgels and swords. What use could all that violence be to Dioscorus, if he wished the Acts to be written true, pure and complete? And so we shall leave Tillemont to be blind in the full light, and shall believe rather the bishops of the Council of Chalcedon, who on various occasions accused those Acts of falsehood, than Dioscorus, who saw to their being written by his own notaries or by those of men who adhered to him.

[10] Further, although I do not doubt that the said Acts are false in at least some places, The Pontifical legates refuse to take their place in the council: I would not on that account believe that there is nothing true in them. Hence I shall allege from them those things which seem less suspect. When the legates had come to Ephesus, they turned aside to St. Flavian, by whom they were honourably received, as is read in the Acts at col. 150; and this is altogether likely on account of the friendship and the closest union which flourished between Leo and Flavian. After they had come to the synod, when they saw the first place occupied by Dioscorus, they could sufficiently perceive that an injury was about to be done to the Apostolic See, and that they would not obtain that they should preside over the council in the name of St. Leo — unless they had already understood this before the council. For the emperor Theodosius, by letters addressed to Dioscorus which are found at col. 110, attributed to him authority and primacy in that council; and although this was done manifestly against the canons, as writers everywhere admit, both ancient and modern, yet the legates could scarcely hope that Dioscorus would yield to them. Hence, as Liberatus the deacon testifies, whose words I shall give more fully at num. 15, they did not suffer themselves to sit down — that is, they refused to take the place assigned to them in the order of the bishops; yet they remained in the council outside that order. Tillemont, who writes the contrary to these things, I shall refute below.

[11] After the letter of Theodosius had been read in the council, but they ask that the letters of St. Leo be read, by which the bishops had been summoned to the council, Julius the legate, who in the Acts is called Julian, said briefly that such a letter had also been sent to St. Leo. Then concerning Hilarus this follows at col. 122: Hilarus, the Roman deacon, Florentius bishop of the Lydians interpreting for him, said: The most glorious and most Christian emperors, holding charity and affection toward the Catholic faith, sent venerable letters to our most blessed bishop Leo, the Prelate of the Apostolic See, and entreated that he should be present at this venerable and holy council: whose piety it could have pleased, if in this matter some precedent were held. For your holiness can better know that neither at the Nicene nor at the Ephesian holy synod, nor at any other such holy council, was the Pope of the perpetual most holy See present. For which reason, following the custom of this form, he has sent us. Who, most holy one, not doubting that he is present here in us , whom especially he knows to do all things which pertain to the sincerity of the Catholic faith and to the reverence of St. Peter the apostle: who also through us has sent to your beatitude letters agreeable to the council of the holy fathers, which command to be received and reviewed. Thus far Hilarus, whose words sufficiently suggest that the legates had been sent to preside in the council, as the Pontifical legates had presided at Nicæa and at Ephesus, which he mentions. For Leo did not doubt that he was present through them. But for the dignity of his See he could not be present unless he presided. And so Leo sent the legates with no other intention than that they should preside over the council.

[12] To the words of Hilarus Dioscorus answered in such a way that the legates could hope the letter would be read; and when they had again asked this in vain, nay, he swore that he would see to it that it should be read out to all, as was cast in his teeth in the Council of Chalcedon at col. 123. Yet it is certain that Leo's letter to the council, in which he wrote about the legates themselves, was never read, nor the famous letter of Leo to Flavian, which the legates likewise desired to be read out to the council. Hence, after certain other things had been read out in the council, when Dioscorus asked whether Julius wished the Acts of Constantinople in the case of Eutyches to be read out, Julius answered at col. 150: On this condition we wish the acts to be read again, that first the Pope's letter be read. Hilarus, deacon of the Roman Church, Florentius bishop of the Lydians interpreting for him, said: Since the most holy bishop of the Roman Church also, when these documents whose reading you now seek had been read to him, sent the letter which he wrote, command it to be read. But hear, studious reader, by what artifice Eutyches, whom Dioscorus favoured, evaded that petition. As he was speaking, Eutyches the archimandrite said: The most religious men sent by the most holy and most God-loving Leo, archbishop of the Roman Church, to your holy synod, have become suspect to me. For they stayed with the most religious bishop Flavian and dined with him, and were given gifts, and he showed them every attention. I ask therefore your holiness that, if anything be done by them unjustly against me, it may create no prejudice against me.

[13] and when Hilarus alone had insisted a third time, Not even then did Dioscorus wholly take away the hope of the letter being read, but only replied: It is consequent and reasonable that first the things which were done in this matter be read again, and so the letter of the most blessed Bishop of Rome. Nevertheless Julius the legate seems to have been unwilling to be present at the council after that day, probably because he perceived that he was being mocked. Certainly a little afterwards he interposed briefly on whether the Acts were true, and thereafter no mention of him is made in the Acts. I judge, therefore, that he withdrew from the council after a due protest, because he neither subscribed to the condemnation of St. Flavian, nor had he to flee from the council lest he should be compelled to do it; as we shall see that St. Hilarus fled. For he remained in the council until the condemnation of Flavian, and before it he again insisted thus at col. 304 that the letter of St. Leo should be read, after various things had been read from the Councils of Nicæa and of Ephesus: The things lately read out and brought forward concerning the faith — both what was set forth at Nicæa and what was formerly confirmed by the holy synod in the city of Ephesus by the holy fathers — the Apostolic See both teaches and venerates. These things therefore I know to agree with the doctrines of the holy fathers: these the Apostolic See has also inserted, O most holy ones, in the letters of its own which it addressed to you: which if you shall command to be recited, you will know them to be in harmony with the truth. So St. Hilarus; but in vain.

[14] but again in vain, Dioscorus mocking the legates, For neither was Leo's letter to the council read there, nor the letter of the same Pontiff to Flavian, whose reading Hilarus probably here sought in order to forestall the unjust sentence against Flavian. Certainly St. Leo himself believed that that evil could have been hindered by the reading of his letters, when in Letter 40, otherwise 25, to Theodosius he wrote about these matters that he had not believed that anything could arise in that council which would do harm: especially, he says, since to the episcopal council which you commanded to be held at Ephesus men were sent so instructed that, if the prelate of Alexandria had permitted the writings which they brought either to the holy synod or to Flavian the bishop to be published to the ears of the bishops, then by the manifestation of that most pure faith which we have both received and hold as divinely inspired, the noise of all contentions would so have been stilled that ignorance would no longer play the fool, nor would rivalry find an occasion of harming. And indeed Dioscorus could not have been ignorant that Leo's opinion was contrary to the Eutychian heresy, and therefore that the reading of his letters would harm Eutyches. And so, since he wished not only to usurp the primacy in the council, but also to absolve Eutyches and to condemn St. Flavian, and thus to promote the Eutychian heresy as much as he could, he never permitted St. Leo's letters to be read. That this was done by him with that intention St. Leo observes in letter 41, otherwise 26, to Pulcheria.

[15] Hence Liberatus the Deacon, besides the first and chief cause on account of which the legates were unwilling to sit in the order of the bishops in the council, they never take their place. adds this also, that the letters had not been read, writing thus in the Breviarium, chap. 12, in Labbe, vol. 5, col. 758: And while those bishops were sitting in the basilica of Mary the Mother of God, the deacons of the Roman Church, holding the place of Pope Leo, did not suffer themselves to sit down, because the presidency had not been given to their holy See. Moreover also, because the letter to Flavian written by Pope Leo on the condemnation of Eutyches had not been read; and his letter directed to that synod through the aforesaid legates had been concealed. Liberatus speaks first of that famous letter of Leo to Flavian, which among the Leonine letters is the 14th, otherwise the 10th; and then of the letter to the synod, among the Leonine letters the 29th, otherwise the 15th, whose

beginning he also subjoins. Further, what Liberatus asserts about the place refused by the legates, because they could not preside, is so consonant with reason that all writers who judge rightly about the primacy of the Apostolic See have everywhere admitted it as true and undoubted, and doubtless will admit it. For Leo everywhere praised his legates after the council, and was satisfied with what they had done there. But he could not have been satisfied with them if they had taken a place after Dioscorus presiding over the council, since they would thus have acted against the dignity of the Roman Church. And so they were present in the council only outside the order, as the words of Liberatus indicate.

[16] Tillemont indeed, as he elsewhere frequently shows himself unfair to the primacy of the Apostolic See, Against Tillemont, who writes the contrary of these things, so here too wished to use some most frivolous little arguments to convict Liberatus of error, and to show that the first place was neither due to the legates nor desired by them — as though Leo had sent legates to the council to be subject to the bishop of Alexandria or to any other president. But the prudent reader will be able to consider that that man wished to live, as long as he was allowed, in the abbey of Port-Royal des Champs, which at the beginning of this century was destroyed by order of King Louis XIV on account of an excessive love of Jansenist doctrines, and to be buried there after his death; and that hence no lowly place has been given him in the Jansenist Calendar. For this cause we can the less wonder that he from time to time went off into such opinions that he sustained a clear opposition not only to the common judgment of Catholics about the dignity of the Apostolic See, but also to ancient monuments. These things being noted beforehand for the sake of the soundly Catholic reader, I shall first show that Dioscorus presided in the council by usurpation alone, and then I shall answer Tillemont's little arguments.

[17] Victor, bishop of Tunnuna, to be cited more fully below, says: In which (synod) Dioscorus of Alexandria, usurping the primacy for himself by imperial favour, etc. He adds that he condemned various bishops by an impious authority. it is shown that Dioscorus presided over the council by usurpation alone, The words of St. Prosper, likewise to be given more fully, have the same force, since he says: Dioscorus … claiming the primacy for himself, etc. St. Leo agrees, in the letter 40 to Theodosius already cited, where he says of Dioscorus: He who claimed for himself the chief place. Why, I ask, is Dioscorus said to have claimed for himself the primacy, or the chief place, if the legates had yielded it to him as readily as the emperor had given it? And so here "to claim" means the same as "to usurp." Tillemont wished to answer these things in note 26 on St. Leo; but he did it, as is wont to be done in a bad cause, without any appearance of probability. He says he does not know whether that usurpation of Dioscorus ought not to be understood in respect of Flavian. For in truth, he says, Flavian was not a party * to the suit. And so he ought to have had there the place due to the first bishop of the East. How unworthy of a learned man this answer is let the fair reader consider. Never had a place before that of Alexandria been given by the Western Church to the bishop of Constantinople: nay, St. Leo took it most ill and declared void what the Oriental bishops afterwards determined on that matter in the Council of Chalcedon in favour of the church of Constantinople. But Victor of Tunnuna, who convicts Dioscorus of usurpation, was a bishop of the Western Church, as was St. Prosper also. Who then does not see that Tillemont is trifling when he suspects that Dioscorus is convicted of usurpation by Victor because he did not give the first place to Flavian?

[18] and that on account of the Apostolic legates being put after him. On the contrary, we cannot doubt that, as an injury was inflicted on Flavian by an unjust judgment, so also on the Roman Church by the usurpation of the first place in the council. Hence Leo in the letter cited to Theodosius exhorts him thus: Keep before your eyes and behold reverently with the whole keenness of your mind the glory of blessed Peter. And below: Defend the unshaken state of the Church against heretics. What Leo suggests more obscurely — perhaps lest he should offend Theodosius — the emperor Valentinian at his request asks more clearly in his letters to Theodosius, in Labbe, vol. 4, col. 51, speaking thus: We ought in our times also to preserve inviolate the dignity of the veneration proper to the blessed apostle Peter: so that the most blessed bishop of the Roman Church, on whom antiquity conferred the primacy of the priesthood over all, may have place and opportunity to judge concerning the faith and concerning priests. Nearly the same things Galla Placidia asks of Theodosius in her letters, col. 54; and in the letter to Pulcheria, col. 56, she clearly declares that this was not observed at Ephesus, writing thus: And so we have learned that in the Council of Ephesus, in which no one kept the order of the priesthood nor its measure, all things were done without consideration of the Divinity, so far that presumption and injustice is said to have obtained force for the condemnation of certain men. In respect of whom the order of the priesthood was violated she suggests below, saying of the Roman Church: In which the first of the Apostles, blessed Peter … held the primacy of the priesthood.

[19] To the objections of Tillemont, who contends that the legates Let us hear at last some objections of Tillemont, who by them strives to show that Liberatus was in error when he says that the place was refused by the legates, and who judges that the second place belonged to Julius and the last to Hilarus. First, in note 27 on St. Leo, he observes that both were present at the council. No one will deny that; but that both were present outside the order we have already said. He observes, secondly, that in the catalogue of the bishops who took part in the council, at col. 115, Julius is placed second — who is there called Julian — with the title of legate of St. Leo, and Hilarus last before Dulcitius the notary. I answer that from that catalogue, if it were genuine, nothing else could be proved than that those places were assigned to the legates by Dioscorus, but not that they were occupied by them. Besides, in the Council of Chalcedon, when the name of Julius, as legate of St. Leo, was being read in the second place from that catalogue, the Orientals and the most reverend bishops with them cried out: "He was cast out; no one received the name of Leo." Which words can be rightly explained in no other way than that no one in the council exercised the office of Apostolic legate — either because Dioscorus was unwilling to acknowledge the authority of the legates, he who refused the reading of the very letters by which their legation should have been made known; or rather because the legates themselves were unwilling to take a place in the council in the order of the bishops as Apostolic legates, since they could not do this consistently with the dignity of the Roman Church, as Liberatus has it.

[20] But against this exposition Tillemont reasons thus: took their place in the council, If the legates had not taken their place, Flavian, who is named fifth in the Acts, would have been fourth; and yet it was acknowledged at Chalcedon that he was fifth. I answer that the cavil which he raises is a wretched one. For some at Chalcedon complained only that no more than the fifth place had been given to Flavian, because he was thus put after all the other patriarchs of the Eastern empire. That remained true whether Julius had occupied the second place or had left it empty. Others did not even admit that a fifth place had been assigned to Flavian, but cried out: This is a manifest calumny — because, forsooth, Flavian had been ordered to be present at the council not as a judge but as one to be judged. Nevertheless Tillemont does not yet lay down his arms. But out of the Acts written by the notaries of Dioscorus, which he prefers to suppose genuine rather than to show them so, he produces another weapon also, to prove that the Apostolic legates sat in the places due to them, namely Julius in the second and Hilarus in the last.

[21] It is clear, he says, that Julius and Hilarus were acknowledged as legates of St. Leo in the Council of Ephesus. an answer is given; and the account of Liberatus, who denies it, is vindicated. Therefore they ought to have had, or at least to have asked for, the place due to them in that capacity. I answer that nothing is more obscure than that imaginary clarity of Tillemont's. He himself confesses that the letters of St. Leo, by which their legation should have been made known to the council, were never read in the council. Whence then is it so clear that they were acknowledged as legates? Is it clear because at the reading of the name of Julius with the title of legate of St. Leo the Fathers of Chalcedon cried out the words already given: He was cast out; no one received the name of Leo? But those words altogether suggest that the title of legate was fraudulently added to the name of Julius by the notaries of Dioscorus, and that nothing can be proved from that title. Nay, the title of legate is never given to Hilarus, and yet it is clear to Tillemont that he was acknowledged as legate in the council. Let us go on, then, to the passage assigned by him for that clarity of his, col. 149 in the Greek, 150 in the Latin, where the legates again ask that the letters of Leo be read, and do not obtain it. But Eutyches says that they have become suspect to him, and demands that their deeds create no prejudice against him, not even giving them the name of legates. The words I gave at num. 12. Is it then clear that they were acknowledged as legates because Eutyches wished that their authority should not be able to harm him? But this very thing again rather indicates that they were not acknowledged as legates. And so it seems altogether to be said that it was indeed known in the council that they had been sent from Rome by Leo to be legates in the council, but that their legation was not lawfully acknowledged, which ought to have been done by the reading of Leo's letters committing the legation.

[22] Tillemont indeed contends that the letters ought to have been shown before the council; but he by no means proves it, nor will anyone be able to prove it for him. For those letters were written to the council, and therefore had to be read in the council, not to one or another before the council. Equally empty are Tillemont's words when he attempts to show that the account of Liberatus is self-contradictory, where he says that the legates were unwilling to sit down in the council because the presidency had not been given, and moreover also because Leo's letters had not been read. This second reason, he says, did not yet exist when the places were to be taken, and so it could effect nothing. I answer that the first reason sufficed for the legates to refuse the place in the meantime, until they should see whether after the reading of Leo's letters they could obtain the right of presiding. The reading of the letters not being obtained, and thus being wronged by a second injury, they had a second reason also for being unwilling to join themselves to the order of the bishops. And this Liberatus rightly relates, whom Tillemont confesses to be an exact writer; and so far is he from showing that he erred in the words given above that he himself has rather fallen into various errors.

* that is, a precedent

* perhaps "in us"

* a party

§ III. Hilarus contradicts the condemnation of St. Flavian; and fleeing, he comes to Rome: his letter to St. Pulcheria: Hilarus becomes archdeacon, and sees to the composing of a Paschal cycle.

[ ] How the deeds of both legates on behalf of St. Flavian are to be reconciled: That Julius the bishop and legate did not remain in the Council of Ephesus until the condemnation of St. Flavian I observed at num. 13; but it is certain that Hilarus was present there at the condemnation itself, and contradicted it not without danger to himself. Nor can we doubt that Julius too opposed himself to that unjust sentence; but it seems uncertain

at what time and in what manner he did so. For he could have protested in general terms against everything that had been done or should be done in the conventicle, before he separated himself from the assembly. He could have done the same in writing, after he had already wholly separated himself. He could also have committed it to Hilarus to protest in the council in the presence of all on behalf of both. And from all that is read in the writers, or in the various letters, about these matters, the affair seems to me to have been carried through thus. St. Flavian, when he saw that proceedings were being taken unjustly against him, so that he could rightly fear that he would be violently crushed, as in fact happened, gave a document of appeal to the Pontifical legates. Hence the legates seem to have written a formula of protest and contradiction which Hilarus should read out in the council in the name of both, and which he then read out intrepidly in the council when Flavian had been condemned. In this way all that is read written about Flavian, about the legates in general, and about Hilarus in particular, is reconciled.

[24] Of the document of appeal offered by Flavian to the legates it is most certainly established from various sources. [he gave a document of appeal to the legates, probably before his own condemnation:] Liberatus, chap. 12: But Flavian, when sentence had been pronounced against him, appealed by a document to the Apostolic See through his legates. St. Leo in letter 39, otherwise 24, to Theodosius: Because our men (the legates) faithfully protested, and Flavian the bishop gave them a document of appeal. The emperor Valentinian in Labbe, vol. 4, col. 51: For for this reason (because the Pontiff has the primacy of the priesthood) the bishop of Constantinople also, according to the solemn usage of councils, appealed to him by documents. Galla Placidia in the same place, col. 54, concerning Flavian: Because he sent a document to the Apostolic See, and to all the bishops of these parts, through those who were directed to the council by the most reverend bishop of Rome. In the Acts of the council, col. 305, when the sentence of condemnation had been pronounced by Dioscorus, Flavian is read to have said only: I appeal from you. In Greek, παραιτοῦμαί σε, that is, I refuse you — namely as judge. Tillemont, in St. Leo, art. 69, cleaving too closely to the Acts of that robbery, observes that the refusal of the judge seems too late, when he was already pronouncing sentence. But there seems no room for doubt that the document of appeal had been offered by him to the legates beforehand, even though Dioscorus perhaps was ignorant of it when he was pronouncing sentence. For after the condemnation St. Flavian was so ill treated by the attendants of Dioscorus that he died on the third day, as Theophanes testifies at p. 87. Who then would believe that liberty was then left him of writing a document and of offering it to the legates? Wherefore it must altogether be said that the document had been offered beforehand, so that it might have its force if an unjust condemnation should follow.

[25] It is likewise certainly established that both legates contradicted the sentence both legates contradicted his condemnation, and duly protested. Of these things the said Liberatus: Further, those who held the place of Pope Leo had contradicted all that was done. St. Leo, just cited: They faithfully protested. In the same letter he had said before: Which our men, sent from the Apostolic See, saw to be so impious and contrary to the Catholic faith that they could be compelled by no oppression to consent; and steadfastly, as was fitting, they protested in the same synod that the Apostolic See would by no means receive what was being determined. The same in letter 41 to St. Pulcheria: And these indeed who were sent … cried out in the synod, as was fitting, against the fury rather than the judgment of one man; protesting that those things which were carried on by force and fear could not prejudice the sacraments of the Church and the very Symbol instituted by the Apostles. Again in letter 45, otherwise 22, to the people of Constantinople: Since indeed a voice of contradiction was there uttered by our men, which the prelate of Alexandria, who claimed the whole ground for his own power, disdained to hear, etc.

[26] Victor of Tunnuna in his Chronicle, agreeing with what has been said, wrote thus of that whole robbery: as also to the other acts of the council: The second general synod is gathered at Ephesus: in which Dioscorus of Alexandria, usurping the primacy for himself by imperial favour, absolved Eutyches after his lawful condemnation, and condemned by an impious authority his detractors, the teachers of the two natures in Christ — Flavian of Constantinople, Eusebius of Dorylaeum, Theodoret of Cyrus, Ibas of Edessa, and the rest — the legates of the Apostolic See contradicting; and he bent the whole synod to favour him by a sedition of monks and by military violence. Finally, to pass over other things, the Breviculum of the History of the Eutychianists in Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ], has this: Flavian is cast down, the Roman vicars contradicting, and Eutyches is received. There is therefore no doubt that both legates contradicted, not only the condemnation of St. Flavian and of the others, but also all the acts of the pseudo-synod. Further, as both are said to have protested against these things, so Theophanes relates at p. 86 that both legates fled, writing thus: Moreover, when the legates of Leo the Roman Pope beheld the fury of Dioscorus, and that he had in no way permitted the Pope's letter to Flavian, and another to the synod itself, to be read, nay that they themselves were held in derision, they withdrew themselves in flight and returned to Rome.

[27] yet by some almost all the praise Although what we have hitherto adduced is true of both legates, it is nevertheless established from other sources that the zeal of St. Hilarus especially appeared, and that he was thence exposed to greater dangers, because he alone, being present in the conventicle, seems to have contradicted the unjust sentence of Dioscorus. In the very Acts of the pseudo-synod, col. 305, his contradiction is read noted, though most briefly, in these words: Hilarus, deacon of the Roman Church, said: It is contradicted. St. Prosper in the Chronicle at the year 449, or in the consulship of Asturius and Protogenes, has it thus concerning these matters: In which council Dioscorus, bishop of Alexandria, claiming the primacy for himself, Eutyches being absolved, pronounced a sentence of condemnation against Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, Hilarus the deacon protesting — who had been appointed by the Apostolic See in the place of holy Pope Leo, together with Julius, bishop of Puteoli. For when all the bishops set in the council were being compelled by the force and fear of the counts and soldiers, whom the emperor had assigned to Dioscorus, bishop of the city of Alexandria, to lend their consent to this heresy, the said Deacon, set amid so many perils of life, having uttered a voice of contradiction, and there being savage rage against him on this account with peril to himself, left all his belongings there and secretly departed, that he might by his own report set forth to the aforesaid Pope, or to the other priests of Italy, in what manner the Catholic faith had there been violated.

[28] and all the peril is attributed to Hilarus alone, About the danger and flight of St. Hilarus St. Leo agrees in various letters. In letter 40, otherwise 25, to Theodosius he says: For we have learned (the acts of the council) not by an uncertain messenger, but by a most faithful narrator of what was done, our deacon Hilarus, who scarcely escaped being compelled by force to subscribe. In letter 41 to Pulcheria: One (of the legates), escaping the violence of the bishop of Alexandria who claimed all things for himself, faithfully reported to us the order of what was done. He had said before that one of the legates, Hilarus, had returned to him. In letter 42 to Flavian he says that he had learned as much as he could through the Deacon, who slipped away by stealth from Ephesus. Again in letter 45 he writes similar things about the flight and return of Hilarus. Pagi at the year 449, num. XI, wrongly writes that the legates were put under guard. For this is not even likely from the words of St. Prosper and St. Leo adduced. But it is clearly false from Hilarus' own letter to be given below, in which he sets out the cause of his flight in these words: For after I could not share in his (Dioscorus') unjust will and sentence, he attempted to summon me to another council by terrors and snares; in order that either by seductions he might make me — which God forbid — consent to condemning the most holy bishop Flavian, or, if I resisted, might hold me fast, etc. He fled, therefore, lest he be seized, so that he might be able to report everything to St. Leo.

[29] Tillemont, in St. Leo, art. 74, wonders that St. Prosper writes nothing about the protest of Julius the legate in the synod, [which seems to have been done because Hilarus alone was then present in the council:] and speaks of Hilarus alone, although from St. Leo and others it is established that Julius too opposed himself to the unjust acts of Dioscorus. I judge that there is no other cause of this silence about the deeds of Julius than that Julius withdrew himself from the council when he had sufficiently seen that nothing fair could be obtained, and at last entrusted the whole task of protesting and contradicting to Hilarus alone, yet in such a way that those things should be done in the common name of both. For thus is it rightly understood how both resisted Dioscorus, and yet the chief praise was given to Hilarus almost alone. Thus too can it be explained how Theophanes says that both fled, although Prosper and Leo mention the danger of Hilarus alone. Julius could indeed have kept himself in hiding at Ephesus and committed everything to Hilarus, lest both should remain exposed to the violent fury of Dioscorus. However that may be, what Theodoret writes in letter 116, inscribed to Renatus the presbyter, must also be understood of Hilarus, since Renatus did not reach the council, as we saw at num. 7.

[30] We have learned, says Theodoret, of the burning and just zeal of your piety, Theodoret celebrates his fortitude: and of the most just and lawful freedom which you used when you rebuked the things rashly and licentiously done at Ephesus. Nor are we the only ones who have learned these things: but into all the earth has gone out the sound of your right mind, and all sing of your justice, zeal, freedom, and the threats cast by you against iniquity. And these things indeed your piety did when it had beheld a single slaughter (that is, a condemnation, from which the slaughter of Flavian followed). But if you had seen the rest also, which were perpetrated after your departure, you would perhaps have imitated that Phinehas. And of those who were condemned after this I am one, forbidden by royal letters to go thither, and yet condemned in my absence. All these things, I say, are to be understood of Hilarus, since Renatus was not at the council, in whose Acts no mention of him is anywhere made.

[31] For I cannot assent to Baronius, who at the year 449 judges, on account of this letter, for Renatus, to whom that letter is inscribed, was not at the council. that Renatus was present at the council; just as I cannot approve another opinion of his, in which he suggests that Julius and Renatus remained in the council after the flight of Hilarus: for I cannot doubt that Hilarus of the legates remained last in the council, namely until the condemnation of Flavian, and for that cause more evidently underwent the danger. As regards the inscription of Theodoret's letter, some believe that it is corrupt, and that the letter was addressed not to Renatus but to Hilarus. Others prefer to believe that Theodoret really wrote to Renatus, but by an error attributed to him the deeds of Hilarus. This error is not incredible, because Theodoret seems to have known that Renatus had been sent to the council, but to have been ignorant that he had stuck fast on the way. Hence he could have believed that those things had been done by him which he heard proclaimed in Syria about the second

legate of St. Leo. [Hilarus, having escaped by flight, comes to Rome and sets everything before St. Leo,]

[32] Further, St. Hilarus, after he had escaped those impious hands, hastened to Rome through unknown and pathless places, as he himself says, and arrived there in the month of October of the same year 449, as may be gathered from the council celebrated at Rome and from the letters of St. Leo. Nevertheless I do not judge that that council was convoked by St. Leo after he had received Hilarus' narrative about the unhappy outcome of the council. But it appears more likely that it was the ordinary council, which had already been gathered when Hilarus arrived; although perhaps St. Leo had summoned more bishops to the ordinary council in that year than he was wont to do at other times, because he was anxious about the outcome of the Council of Ephesus. Now St. Leo held an ordinary council every year about the end of September, as is clear from his letter 16, otherwise 4, to the bishops of Sicily, of whom he orders three to be present at Rome on the third day before the Kalends of October, that they might take part in the synod. And so we can scarcely doubt that that ordinary council was still sitting when Hilarus came to Rome, who seems to have been present before or about the X of October, since various letters written by Leo in the council after his arrival are read as given on the XIII and XV of the same month, when Hilarus had set out to St. Leo and the synod all the acts of the robbery of Ephesus.

[33] [who together with the gathered council writes various letters about them: Hilarus too] But to the letters which St. Leo on that account sent together with the synod to the emperor Theodosius and to the empress St. Pulcheria, Hilarus joined his own also to St. Pulcheria, in which he relates various things already said and others not yet set out. The whole of it I transfer hither from Labbe's edition, vol. 4, col. 51. To the most glorious and most pious Augusta, Hilarus the deacon. That I had a desire to come to Constantinople after the synod I ought not to say, since there was a manifest necessity which compelled me to present the letters of the most blessed Pope directed to your clemency, that I might at the same time discharge to your piety and to the most unconquered and most Christian prince the duty of veneration which I owed. But to this fitting purpose of mine there came that hindrance which is the enemy of all good men and at which the affection of Christians groans — that is, the bishop of Alexandria, most powerful in the condemnation of blameless men. For after I could not share in his unjust will and sentence, he attempted to summon me to another council by terrors and snares; in order that either (which God forbid) by seductions he might make me consent to condemning the most holy bishop Flavian, or, if I resisted, might hold me fast, so that I should not have liberty to hasten to your piety at Constantinople, or to return to the Roman Church.

[34] writes to St. Pulcheria about what was done in the Synod. Nevertheless, trusting in the help of Christ, as regards the condemnation of that most reverend and most holy man, I kept myself innocent and whole; nor could any scourges or torments make me consent to his sentence: but leaving all behind, I departed thence, coming to Rome through unknown and pathless places, that I might be a fit reporter to the most reverend Pope of all that was done at Ephesus. Let your venerable clemency therefore know that by the aforesaid Pope, with the whole Western council, all that was done at Ephesus against the canons through tumults and secular hatreds by Dioscorus the bishop is disapproved, and that these things can by no means be received in these parts, which were committed through the power of the aforesaid man, not without injury to the faith and prejudice to a most holy and guiltless man. But what was declared by me for the faith with steadfast and strong authority I believe it superfluous to relate: for these things you will be able to learn from the letters of the most blessed Pope. Wherefore, most splendid Lady and most clement Augusta, your adorable piety ought not to abandon those things in which she willingly made a beginning, but to preserve them with religious zeal of the faith and with a constant will.

[35] Since a few things remain to be said about St. Hilarus before his pontificate, Hilarus after the aforesaid legation was made archdeacon; I shall here subjoin them to what has been said. We saw at num. 7 that Hilarus is called archdeacon by one writer, when his legation to the Synod of Ephesus is related. Nor can any doubt remain that he was at some time archdeacon: for while he was archdeacon he saw to the composing of a Paschal cycle, and to the building of something in honour of St. Laurence, as we shall see in their places. Nevertheless it seems certain enough that he was not yet archdeacon when he was sent as legate to Ephesus, since St. Leo, St. Prosper and other writers call him deacon, and none archdeacon, except that single writer who could have attributed the title of archdeacon to him either from mere error, or because Hilarus was afterwards really archdeacon. Hence more probably letter 118 of Theodoret, which is inscribed To the archdeacon of Rome, was not addressed to Hilarus; especially since Theodoret does not suggest that the archdeacon to whom he was writing had been present at the pseudo-synod of Ephesus.

[36] Concerning the day on which Easter was to be celebrated in the year 455 no slight doubt had arisen, and then he asked Victorius to write about the Paschal reckoning: about which St. Leo wrote various letters. Hence St. Hilarus, then archdeacon, probably at St. Leo's bidding, began to turn over the writings of various men about the Paschal reckoning, and asked a learned man, Victorius of Aquitaine, to write on that matter. The letter of Hilarus is read before the Paschal Canon of Victorius, published by Bucher at p. [ ], and runs thus: To his most beloved and honourable holy brother Victorius, Hilarus archdeacon of the city of Rome. When I was reviewing very many writings about the Paschal reckoning, both those translated from the Greek and those composed by Latins, I perceived that the opinions of both sides differ among themselves and clash with one another: so that neither side, while it is attacked by the other, is thought evidently to establish the discipline of this observance. Whence it comes about that, while the Latin or the Greek institution contends that it favours the more its own domestic learning, the time often does not agree, amid their dissensions, for performing our chief duty. Wherefore, most beloved brother, moved by so great an ambiguity of the matter, I confidently enjoin upon the zeal of your love that you diligently inquire at your leisure either whence the aforesaid diversity arises, or by what reasoning above all the truth may be traced out: so that thereafter, the error of dissonant opinion being taken away, the whole body may be able always to hold the same. So that all the faithful in common, freed from all doubts, may be directed in the celebration of the highest mystery by an unstumbling path of devotion. Pray for us, most beloved brother.

[37] Victorius obeyed Hilarus and composed a Paschal Canon, hence Victorius wrote for him a Paschal Canon. not indeed free from all error, yet learned, and approved and praised by not a few learned men, as may be seen in Bucher in the elogia of writers set before it, in which Hilarus is everywhere called Pope. Nevertheless he was not yet Pope in the year 457, when Victorius sent him the Canon, to which he prefaces thus at p. 2: To the truly holy lord, and venerable brother in Christ, Hilarus the archdeacon, Victorius. Would that I were able to obey your commands, venerable archdeacon Hilarus, as much in effect as in desire! For this work is both arduous and the capacity of my understanding is small. But as for me, for my part, even if I be overcome by the quantity of the matter delegated, I count it enough that obedience within my power has not been wanting to your command: which, although it should by no means fulfil the ministry enjoined, would certainly pay the obedience due. And I beseech you that, if anything should turn out otherwise than you wished, weighing my weakness and the burden imposed with fair judgment, you would prefer to esteem the labour of an imperfect work by its dutifulness rather than by its desert. For it is the greatest token of my reverence toward you that I have been willing to spend upon your commands more than I am able. But if I shall have accomplished anything worthy of your reading, it will assuredly be of the divine gift, and then also of your goodwill: whose favour, delighting even the sluggish, rouses them to advancement. Nor will it be doubted that it must be accomplished by the faith of him by whose exhortation it was undertaken. Since I too have confidence that what you command can be carried through, upon whom you enjoin it so confidently. For who would not understand that it has already been anticipated by your prayers, which you believe is to be fulfilled even through me? For you would not have delegated it rashly, where you saw that not so much the industry of my learning as your own judgment was being called for.

§ IV. Hilarus created Pope in the year 461, in the month of November: about the day there is a controversy; but it is more probable that he was elected on the 17th.

[ ] [Hilarus becomes Pontiff in the year 461 after St. Leo, whom Pagi would have die on the 4th of November;] St. Leo the Pope being dead, St. Hilarus was elected his successor in the pontificate. That both happened in the year 461 the more recent writers agree; but the same have disputed much about the month and day, both on which St. Leo died and on which Hilarus was elected. Antonio Pagi in his Critica at the year 461, num. 3, begins to write thus about the day of St. Leo's death: The day and month on which St. Leo the Great departed to God have hitherto been in obscurity, although about the year of his death there has never been controversy. And a little after he sets out his own opinion in these words: His death, which has hitherto lain hidden from all, took place on the day before the Nones of the month of November, that is, on the fourth day of that month. This opinion François Pagi follows after his custom in the Breviary of the Roman Pontiffs, vol. 1, p. 207. But when I turn over Pagi's reasons carefully, I find more things lightly asserted than proved, so that his whole dissertation rests only on uncertain reasonings and conjectures. Our Henschen at the XI of April, in St. Leo, together with the most ancient Hieronymian Martyrologies, referred the death of St. Leo to the X of November, and rightly observed that this day agrees excellently with the day of the election of St. Hilarus which followed seven days later. Henschen was followed by Tillemont in note 73 on St. Leo, and by our Sollier in the Observations on Usuard at the XI day of April, rightly laughing at the excessive confidence of Pagi, who, abandoning an opinion long known and resting on suitable monuments, wished to thrust upon us another as though certain, when I cannot judge it hitherto even probable.

[39] but it is far more probable that he died on the 10th, What I assert about that new discovery of Pagi's, who from time to time hawks slight conjectures as certain arguments — as could easily be shown by six hundred examples — it is worth showing by a brief piece of reasoning alone. Pagi, from what has been said about the length of the sees of Boniface I, Celestine I and Sixtus III, and from the interpontificate which followed the death of Sixtus III, fixed the consecration of St. Leo on the XXII of the month of September, as he himself acknowledges. But about the day of St. Leo's ordination, which he sought by many uncertain reasonings, many others do not agree with Pagi, so that that foundation plainly totters. And after laying that foundation, such as it is, he again uses reasonings and conjectures that are uncertain: for from a few codices and some writers of the middle age he lays down that Leo sat twenty-one years, one month and thirteen days, though he confesses that many other codices have days

26, but by a manifest error, he says, of the copyists. Doubtless this error is manifest because the said days do not agree with Pagi's opinion. For the same cause he determines that the day of death is not to be counted among the thirteen days already mentioned. Besides, he fixes the ordination of St. Hilarus on the XII of November, which will presently be refuted as at least less probable. Now I leave it to the learned reader to judge which he ought rather to believe: that St. Leo died on the IV day of November, sought out through so many uncertain and often gaping reasonings, on which no Martyrologies celebrate his laying to rest; or on the X day of November, on which the most ancient Calendars announce with great consent the laying to rest of St. Leo — especially since by reasoning we can arrive at the X of November with the same ease as at the fourth.

[40] These things being briefly observed about the day of St. Leo's death, I proceed to the day on which St. Hilarus was elected, and that Hilarus was elected on the 17th of the same month; which is in some way connected with it. The said Henschen in St. Leo the Great, num. 5, rightly has it thus: These most ancient Martyrologies are greatly favoured both by the time of the vacancy of the see and by the election of his successor Hilarus, which falls on the XV of the Kalends of December, or the XVII day of November, since from the said laying to rest, that is, from the X day of November, the episcopate had ceased for seven days, as is indicated in the Roman Pontifical, etc. This opinion, that Hilarus was elected on the XVII day of November, Bianchini follows in the Chronological Notes to Anastasius the Librarian very lately reprinted, vol. 3, p. 145, where he has it thus: But the vacancy of the see for seven days agrees wonderfully with the X of November as the day of Leo the Great's laying to rest, and the election of Hilarus his successor with the XVII of the same month; and the coronation or ἐντρονίσμος follows two days later, on Sunday the XIX of November. These things he had already proved in Celestine I, p. 93, from the Roman council; which argument Henschen likewise uses. Pagi attempted to accommodate the date of that council in some fashion to his own opinion also; but with little probability, as we shall presently see.

[41] Hilarus in the year 465 celebrated in the month of November a council with the bishops as is shown from the council of the year 465, who had come for his anniversary, as we shall see more fully in §7. About the day on which the council was celebrated Pagi himself at the year 465, num. 5, notes this: that in Lupus' edition it is noted as the XVI of the Kalends of December; in Labbe's, on the day of the XV of the Kalends of December; on the day of the XII (of the Kalends) in the appendix of the Dionysian codex and in the Mainz one. And so, according to the codices or editions, that council was held on the XVI, XVII or XIX of November, and was finished in a single day, as I shall show in its place. Pagi, who believes that the anniversary, or day of Hilarus' ordination, was the twelfth of November, says that the synod was held some days later, and expresses his opinion thus: The bishops, gathered on that day (the XII of November), begin with divine worship, and persevere in it for the two following days, namely Saturday and Sunday. These being finished, they exhort the Pope "to treat with more diligent care whatever things belong to ecclesiastical discipline," as is read at the beginning of the synodal Acts; and they come together again on the following days, and lay down and decree those things which Hilarus himself sets out in his letter to the people of Tarragona. All these things he borrowed from the heterodox Tentzel, who has nearly the same words in his Schediasma on the Anniversaries of bishops, num. 2.

[42] which was held not four days after the anniversary of Hilarus, But that whole exposition is improbable, and sought out solely that some reason might be given why the council was deferred from the XII to the XVI or XVII of November. For four days the bishops are said to have prepared themselves for a council which was perhaps finished in two hours. For three days consequently they applied themselves to divine worship: of this neither Tentzel nor Pagi will persuade me, unless it be first shown that the anniversary of a Pontiff was celebrated for three days. What is added, that on the fourth day the bishops exhorted the Pontiff to treat of ecclesiastical matters, is a plainly ridiculous invention of Tentzel, who ill understood the words of St. Hilarus. For Hilarus at the beginning of the council addresses the bishops thus: Since this religious assembly, gathered by the Holy Spirit, exhorts us to treat with more diligent care whatever things are necessary for ecclesiastical discipline. If Pagi had considered these words a little more attentively, he would not have made the bishops exhorters of the supreme Pontiff; but he would have seen that Hilarus says he was roused by the fitting occasion of bishops coming together for the festival to treat of ecclesiastical matters. Wherefore it is not likely that that council was held four, five or seven days after the anniversary of Hilarus; and therefore that anniversary is less probably fixed on the XII of November.

[43] but on his anniversary itself On the contrary it appears far more probable that that council was celebrated on the very anniversary day of Hilarus, whether that be of his ordination or of his election: for it is rightly doubted whether the Pontiffs celebrated as their anniversary the day of their election or of their ordination. Nay, if we consult the Sermons of St. Leo delivered on the anniversary day of his assumption, we shall presently see in the first that he speaks of his election, not of his ordination, so that he probably celebrated the day of his election as his anniversary, and Hilarus after his example; and not the day of his ordination, as Pagi supposes. But whatever be the case about this observation, on which the chief controversy does not depend, from the letter of Hilarus which he wrote to the bishops of the province of Tarragona according to what was treated in that synod, it seems to me to be established that the synod was held on the very anniversary of Hilarus. For thus does the Pontiff speak in the said letter, in Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ]: Your letters therefore having been read in the assembly of the brethren whom the festival of my anniversary had gathered, etc. Those words, whom the festival of my anniversary had gathered, signify the same as these: who had been gathered on account of the festival of my anniversary. But a gathering on account of a festival takes place on the festival itself. That synod, therefore, was held on the very anniversary of Hilarus. Certainly the Pontiff's words cannot be explained in a manner equally natural; nor is there anything to hinder their being so expounded, as I shall show in §7, where I shall treat more fully of that synod, which was nothing but a brief consultation of the supreme Pontiff.

[44] Those who remove that synod from the festival itself doubtless understand those words, whom the festival of my anniversary had gathered, was held. in such a way as to believe that the bishops came to Rome on account of the festival, and on that occasion were summoned to a council. But the words of Hilarus signify more, who does not speak of a coming together to the same city, but of an assembly in which the letters were read, that is, of a coming together into one place. And so, since that assembly was made on account of the festival, it was also made on the festival. For the bishops could indeed flow together to Rome on other days on account of the festival; but they did not come together into one place on account of the festival except on the festival itself. Wherefore it must altogether be said that the council was held on the anniversary itself; and consequently, since it is said by no one to have been held on the XII day of November, St. Hilarus was neither elected nor ordained on that day — which is improbable on other grounds also, because that day is too near to the day of St. Leo's death, that is, the X of November. But if after this we count seven days, during which the see is said to have been vacant after the death of Leo, we have Hilarus elected on the XVII of November, on which that synod is fixed in Labbe; and since in the year 461, in which Hilarus was elected, the XIX of November was a Sunday, his consecration could have been performed on the XIX, on which others have fixed the synod. And so, whether we look to the day of St. Leo's death or to the day of the said Roman council, both agree rightly, and both persuade that Hilarus was elected on the XVII day of November of the year 461.

§ V. The Saint's deeds in his pontificate for the confirmation of the faith, and with Leontius of Arles and the other bishops of Gaul for ecclesiastical discipline.

[ ] The Saint writes for the faith and against heresies: Anastasius the Librarian begins to recount the deeds of St. Hilarus in his pontificate in this manner: He made a decretal, and throughout the whole East scattered letters about the Catholic and Apostolic faith, confirming the three synods, the Nicene, the Ephesian and the Chalcedonian, and the tome of the holy Archbishop Leo (namely his letter to St. Flavian); and he condemned Eutyches and Nestorius and Dioscorus and all their followers, and all heresies, and confirmed the authority and primacy of the holy Apostolic See. In the older catalogue of the Pontiffs in our own work before volume 1 of April, p. XXXIV, only the following is read about these matters: He made a decretal and directed it throughout the whole East, and letters about the Catholic faith. It cannot be doubted that St. Hilarus, after the example of St. Leo, wrote not a few letters to the emperor of the East and to the patriarchs of the Eastern Church against the heresies of Nestorius and Eutyches, which were not yet at rest at that time; but those have perished. Nevertheless it is less certain whether in some single decretal letter he so confirmed the three ecumenical synods enumerated above as to pass over that of Constantinople, held under the reign of Theodosius the Great and the pontificate of St. Damasus, which is numbered second among the ecumenical ones. If this was done, Hilarus did not wish to recount all the ecumenical synods, but to confirm only those which were then most of all in the mouths of all. Such was the Nicene, of which most frequent mention is made at Ephesus and at Chalcedon. Such were these too, on account of the most recent heresies condemned in them. Baronius at the year 461, num. 14, judges that these things were done by Hilarus at the beginning of his pontificate, which is neither improbable nor certain. He doubtless informed Leo, emperor of the East, and the chief Eastern bishops of his own election, and on that occasion could have sent that decretal.

[46] likewise to Leontius of Arles about his own election, The care of writing to the Orientals perhaps brought it about that he wrote somewhat later about his election to the bishops nearer at hand. Baronius at the year 462, num. 2, says: At the beginning of this year, namely in the month of January, … Pope Hilarus wrote letters about his own creation, according to custom, to all the churches. Then he subjoins the letter addressed to Leontius of Arles, in which he bids him write about that election throughout the whole province. But hence it is plain that Hilarus wrote only to the metropolitans or primates, that they might write further to the bishops subordinate to them. I transfer hither the whole letter from Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ]: To his most beloved brother Leontius, Hilarus. How much reverence is paid to the blessed apostle Peter and to his See in the Spirit of God, who dwells in the priests subject to Him, I judge to be known to all who keep the traditions of the fathers uncorrupted: whom, since we wish them to rejoice with us at the beginnings of our ordination, we have thought that the works which the condescension of the divine goodness has shown toward us should be made known to your holiness: that you first, through that affection which we always mutually bestow upon one another, may, by the Lord's granting, rejoice;

and then that by the arrangement of your fraternity it may become known to all the brethren and fellow priests throughout the whole province, that the right hand of the Lord has deigned to visit my lowliness, and has committed it to the government of the Apostolic See — not for merit, but for the most abundant bounty of His own grace. Accordingly, dearest brother, what we have made plain to your holiness in this present discourse you will deign to bring to the notice of all the brethren (as we have said): that, about to make supplication to our Lord Jesus Christ, they may join to us both the joys of exultation and the vows of their prayers, which shall profit the universal Church. May the Lord keep you in safety, dearest brother. Given on the VIII * of the Kalends of February, in the consulship of our Lord Severus Augustus.

[47] on account of which letter he is undeservedly censured. Tillemont, vol. 16, in St. Hilarus, observes that the Pontiff suggests some kind of joy at his own election, and thence says that he greatly doubts whether St. Augustine and St. Gregory would ever have used words of that sort in writing. But I answer that the censure is destitute of a suitable foundation. Certainly the Apostle says in the first letter to Timothy, chap. 3: If any man desire the episcopate, he desires a good work. But if it is lawful to desire the episcopate, provided the desire arise from a good intention, it is also lawful to rejoice at the episcopate obtained — especially if one acknowledges that he has been advanced by a divine benefit, as St. Hilarus does. St. Hilarus, who always showed an excellent zeal for preserving ecclesiastical discipline, could after his election rejoice that an occasion had been given him of doing much good. He could, I say, rejoice on that account and give thanks to God, even if he had been in such a disposition that, if he had believed it more pleasing to God, he would have preferred humbly to flee the pontifical dignity — as not a few Saints have laudably shunned dignities of every kind. Wherefore, if perhaps SS. Augustine and Gregory would have been unwilling to use the same words about their own election, we can conclude nothing from that but that the Saints tend to the same end by different ways. And so I do not see that St. Hilarus writes anything in that letter which is contrary to Christian humility, which both in this very letter and in others he shows without affectation: for those are not the most humble who display the greatest humility in words, which is from time to time affected. These things I thought should be briefly answered to Tillemont's censure, whose lust for carping at the Roman Pontiffs was so great that he seized every occasion, and was unwilling to abstain even from the Saints. But let us return to our path.

[48] Leontius of Arles had already heard of the election of Hilarus before he received his letters, Leontius congratulates Hilarus, and congratulated him by letters addressed to him before he had received Hilarus' letter. These letters of Leontius d'Achery published in vol. 5 of the Spicilegium, p. 578, from which I transfer them hither: To the lord most praiseworthy in the eminence of his merits and most worthy of the Apostolic See, the lord Pope Hilarus. That death has taken away Leo your most holy predecessor, who kept watch against heresies and rooted up the tares in the Lord's field, alas too luxuriantly growing, we grieve. That He has made repair through your Holiness, we rejoice. For a son rejoices at the honour of his mother; and since the Roman Church is the mother of all, we had cause to rejoice that amid so great a consternation of affairs and weakness of the times He has raised you over her, that you may judge the peoples in equity and direct the nations upon the earth. Whence, when that news was brought to us through Concordius, deacon of our church, who was present at the time when your Holiness was raised to that lofty summit of honour, we rendered thanks to our God, and resolved to greet you as soon as possible by this letter of our lowliness; that thus the affection which has long grown up between your Holiness and us may be strengthened in the Lord and hereafter increased, with the due reverence with which it befits sons to attend upon a Father.

[49] Blessed therefore is he that comes in the name of the Lord. and commends to him the rights of the church of Arles. Now must your Holiness bravely toil and pant, that what the most holy Pope Leo began you may bring to its appointed bound; and that with Gideon's army, by the trumpets sounding in the mouths of the strong and by the lamps shaken and waved in the sturdy hand, your Holiness may cause the accursed walls of Jericho, so often already anathematized and shaken, to be thrown down. For the rest, since our church of Arles has always been adorned by the Apostolic See with ample favours and privileges, we ask your Holiness that nothing be taken from us through it, but rather increased: that we may be able both to labour with you in the vineyard of the Lord God of Sabaoth, and to break the attempts of the envious, who, if there were no authority restraining them, would certainly grow worse from day to day; for the malice of those who hate us rises ever higher. Given on the K… in the consulship of Severus Augustus. The date, partly erased, designates at least the year 462, in which Severus was consul in the West. And from the K, which is the beginning of the word Kalends, we may conjecture that these letters were written about or after the middle of the month of February, when the days before the Kalends of March were being counted; since they were written before Hilarus' letters were received, but in such a way that Hilarus wonders in his reply that his own had not yet been delivered when these were being written.

[50] Having received Leontius' letters, St. Hilarus again addressed others to him. These I subjoin from Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ]. To his most beloved brother Leontius, Hilarus. A second letter of Hilarus to Leontius, To my love, which abounds toward the Gallican churches and all the priests of the Lord in them, even those set in a lower rank, there comes much increase in that through the honourable man Pappolus, our son, the first words of your discourse have been delivered to me. From which, however, I gather that the page which I sent some time ago about the beginnings of my episcopate had not yet been delivered to you when you were writing: about which certainly you would not have kept silence, unless some cause had delayed the bearer. Whence I signify that I long ago discharged what both custom and charity demanded; and I desire you to know this more fully from the very copies of the letters which I sent, that you may understand that I have in no way been slothful in a brotherly office: and that we may thus in turn be zealous to make our converse frequent, so that the care of writing may make up to us for the exchange of a common presence, dearest brother.

[51] very kind and friendly: And so you have not suffered the grace of your affection to perish: since I learn that you are intent on this solicitude, that you desire me to be zealous for keeping the rules of the fathers' canons; than which desire nothing more healthful can be conceived, that in the one Church, in which there ought to be nothing of spot or wrinkle, there should be in all one observance of discipline. And if anything of instruction or of correction must be added to it, it will most rightly be provided for by your diligence, if, as you deigned to write, a person be directed to us so instructed that he can fully inform our inquiry on all points. For I promise, so far as the grace of God grants me to promise, that I shall so provide for the universal concord of the Lord's priests that all may not dare to seek their own, but may be zealous to obtain the things that are Christ's. May God keep you in safety, dearest brother. Thus far Hilarus, who seems to answer certain things not expressed in Leontius' letters. Perhaps this came about because Pappolus, the bearer of the letter, added some things by word of mouth. The time of Hilarus' letter is not added; but we may conjecture that it was written in the month of March or April.

[52] [then he sharply rebukes Leontius for not having warned him about Hermes the bishop,] However great a love toward Leontius Hilarus showed in the foregoing letters, he nevertheless wrote sharply to him in the same year, because he had not been warned by him about a certain deed contrary to ecclesiastical discipline, which I shall presently explain. But that the studious reader may perceive how earnestly he wished watch to be kept, and how he himself kept watch, lest anything should be done against the discipline of the Church, I shall here recite his letter to Leontius from the said Labbe. To his most beloved brother Leontius, Hilarus. We marvel that your fraternity is so unmindful of the Catholic law that, whatever iniquitous things and things contrary to the statutes of our fathers are done in the province which belongs to your rule, if you yourself either will not or cannot correct them, you do not even permit us to correct them, by the silence of your muteness. For, as we have learned both by report and by diligent inquiry from John the deacon, who was made known to us by the letters of the magnificent man our son Frederick, a certain Hermes has by a most iniquitous usurpation presumed with execrable rashness upon the episcopate of the city of Narbonne. Which matter it had befitted your holiness to indicate to us on the spot. On which account, dearest brother, we admonish you that, if credit is to be given to what is asserted, all excuse being laid aside, you send to us a report subscribed by your own hands, both of your love and of our brethren, either by the bearer of these letters or by whomever you yourselves shall choose; that you may be able to learn from a returning page what we can determine. May God keep you in safety, dearest brother. Given on the III of the Nones of November. This letter too was given in the same year 462, since we shall see that that whole case was entirely concluded before the end of the year.

[53] Tillemont, in St. Hilarus, art. 3, sets out thus the deed of Hermes which Hilarus so sharply rebukes. [who, elected to the see of Béziers and shut out from it, had occupied that of Narbonne,] Hermes, who was archdeacon of St. Rusticus of Narbonne, as is clear from letter 2 of St. Leo, otherwise 92, was ordained bishop of Béziers, but the people of Béziers were unwilling to admit him — for what cause is not known — nor did Hermes pursue his right. Then, St. Rusticus being dead, Hermes is promoted to the bishopric of Narbonne. This matter had been reported to Hilarus by John the deacon, sent by Frederick, brother of Theodoric king of the Visigoths, as Tillemont would have it. All these things are contained partly in the letter of Hilarus presently to be cited, partly in the one given. But Tillemont adds that Hermes seems to have been designated successor by St. Rusticus, and that Rusticus wrote to St. Leo to consent to that arrangement, but that he was unwilling to consent. He gathers this from obscure words of Hilarus. Wherefore I subjoin the beginning of that letter, which is the eighth among the letters of Hilarus in Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ]: Although the knowledge of your love — how great and what sort of things have long since been committed in the church of Narbonne and of Béziers — is not hidden, and the wickedness of the presumption, reaching even to us, is doubtless manifest to the regions of Gaul, nevertheless it belongs to Apostolic solicitude not to keep silence about faults detected in our examination, lest by an unfitting silence we should seem to have a share of connivance with those who act unjustly.

[54] Then follow the words indicated by Tillemont: For formerly the prelates of the aforesaid cities brought no less grief * to my predecessor of holy memory than they then did to us also, although St. Leo had been unwilling to consent to it: Hilarus, by daring to pursue with unlawful petitions what could scarcely be soothed before our patience by the mere lamenting of necessities. So writes Hilarus, after he had consented, in a manner to be explained below, that Hermes

should preside over the church of Narbonne, so that this seems really to have been requested by the bishop of Narbonne and of Béziers, and refused by St. Leo. Tillemont, however, could find nothing in that whole affair which was contrary to the ecclesiastical discipline of that time. But Hilarus, after he had examined the affair with a numerous council, goes on thus in the letters cited: For by what precedents, as you also prove, is the deed established, and with what rebuke is it not most worthy — a thing which is repugnant to the decrees of the holy fathers and to the very institutes of the canons? Since for this reason our brother and now fellow bishop Hermes believed himself to be received by right by the church of Narbonne, because he said that he was unworthily shut out by the people of Béziers, for whom he had been ordained. Who, if he truly grieved in this matter and had known how to come to the aid of his own injury by a lawful remedy, ought rather to have hoped for vindication of what he had suffered than for pardon of what he had perpetrated. By the words given Hilarus suggests that Hermes was not unwillingly shut out by the people of Béziers. Perhaps he had heard that he was being sought by the people of Narbonne after the death of Rusticus. However that may be, Hilarus disapproves that he did not pursue his own right; and he judged, after a consultation held in a numerous council of bishops, that Hermes had sinned against ecclesiastical discipline — so that we may easily despise the reasonings of Tillemont, who has sustained a dispute about an affair whose circumstances are not sufficiently known today, against the judgment of SS. Leo and Hilarus.

[55] having received information, examines the matter in council and disapproves it: Further, not long after the letter written to Leontius, Hilarus received more exact information about the case of Hermes — whether Leontius himself sent it before receiving Hilarus' letters, or the Pontiff received it from other bishops of Gaul who were flowing to Rome to celebrate his anniversary, or Hermes sent legates to Rome to defend his cause. Certainly Hilarus set that matter forward to be judged and settled in the same month, in the council which he held at Rome on his anniversary, that is, on the day of his election or ordination, whether the XVII or the XIX of November; and there a twofold legation was present, one against Hermes and the other for Hermes, so far as we can conjecture. Concerning this judgment Hilarus writes thus in the letter 8 already cited: Concerning which (excesses of Hermes), a numerous council of the brethren presiding *, gathered by the grace of God from various provinces for the day of our anniversary in honour of the blessed apostle Peter — our brothers and fellow bishops Faustus and Auxanius presiding, and very many things being transacted which regard the vigour and authority of judgment — this was determined by us out of love of peace, that in the sentence which, at the inspection of both legations directed thither, we pronounced by the inspiration of Christ our Lord, neither the charity of Evangelical indulgence nor the rod of Apostolic discipline should be wanting: for indulgence did not make us wholly remit, nor affection wholly restrain.

[56] yet he tempers the sentence with such mildness, But what the sentence of the council was Hilarus made known by these very letters, given on the III of the Nones of December of the year 462, to the bishops of the provinces of Vienne, Lyons, Narbonensis Prima and Secunda, and of the Pennine Alps, to whom they are read inscribed in Labbe. And in them he disapproves the presumption of Hermes in words so clear that I wonder Tillemont could dispute so much to excuse a deed known to him only in part, and examined by the holy Pontiff in council. Let us hear, then, Hilarus again, who does not seem to praise the character of Hermes, as Tillemont thinks, but rather to disapprove it. Finally, he says, if now at least he (Hermes) would use the common mind of all the Lord's priests; if he would imitate their example; if in addition to these things, which by regard for ecclesiastical quiet are in some fashion lulled to rest in peace or in faith, he would consider the errors which are manifold: there is assuredly nothing which he too would not rebuke, and he would blush that that should be granted to himself which in another he had laudably disapproved. He speaks of some deed unknown to us which Hermes could have disapproved while he was archdeacon and was sent to Rome by St. Rusticus, as we have it from letter 2 of St. Leo. Then Hilarus goes on thus: For we know, and have long had nothing doubtful about the manner of life of the said brother, since, turning over in our mind the course of his past life and what was formerly set before it , we judge that he rather fell into than committed these excesses of which we accuse him. These are those words by which Tillemont asserts that the character of Hermes was commended by Hilarus. But to me the contrary rather appears, especially if we follow the reading of Baronius, who first published that letter: for according to it the Pontiff says that from Hermes' past life he fears lest he rather willed of his own accord to fall into those excesses than to flee them.

[57] But whether the life of Hermes was approved by Hilarus, [that Hermes remains bishop of Narbonne, but without the right of ordaining suffragans;] or in some fashion disapproved on account of the ambition by which he seems to have deserted the church of Béziers in order to obtain the metropolitan see of Narbonne, the matter was settled with such moderation that he remained bishop of Narbonne, but without metropolitan right, which nevertheless after his death was to return again to the church of Narbonne, and in the meantime was given to the senior bishop of the province of Narbonne, who was then Constantius of Uzès. To him, he says, who is now permitted to preside over the church of Narbonne, we have taken away the power of ordaining bishops on account of these things which were wrongly done; which power we have judged to belong to our brother and fellow bishop Constantius, prelate of the church of Uzès, because he is said to be first in seniority of honour *; so that, if he should die while bishop Hermes survives, this care shall regard him whom the episcopal order shall find to be first. But when bishop Hermes dies, let the custom of making prelates be presently restored to the church of Narbonne, which lost it not through the city but through the case of presumption. These things show that Hilarus was a severe avenger of ecclesiastical discipline, but tempered severity with clemency, as we shall see in other examples also.

[58] These things being set out, Pope Hilarus exhorts all the bishops to whom he writes he also ordains other things pertaining to discipline after the said council. not to imitate what was done in the province of Narbonne, but to be zealous to observe the canons of the Church. Hence he ordains that every year a council of bishops be convoked from various provinces at that place and time which Leontius of Arles shall appoint, that in that council judgment may be given on ecclesiastical cases, and that in settling the graver cases which cannot be concluded there, the opinion of the Apostolic See be consulted. He ordains besides that bishops should not go into another province without letters from their metropolitan, and certain other things pertaining to ecclesiastical discipline or to the advantage of the churches, which may be seen in the cited letter 8. But the judgment about certain churches which Leontius complained had been taken from the province of Arles he remits to an assembly of the bishops of Gaul. For the rest, we cannot doubt that St. Hilarus set forth all those things in the aforesaid council, although he alone afterwards directed those orders into Gaul.

[59] In the year 463 other complaints were brought to St. Hilarus against St. Mamertus, bishop of Vienne, [When Mamertus of Vienne had been accused of consecrating a bishop for the people of Die,] who had been gravely accused by Gunduicus, prefect of the soldiers, of having ordained a bishop for the people of Die against their will. Tillemont and others believe that Gunduicus, as he is called in the letter, was the king of the Burgundians, who in Gregory of Tours, book 2, chap. 28, is called Gundeuchus. Whoever that accuser was, we have that exaggerated accusation from letter 9 among the letters of St. Hilarus in Labbe, col. [ ], in which he writes thus to Leontius of Arles: In what manner Mamertus, bishop of Vienne, coming against the constitutions of the Apostolic See, has exceeded priestly moderation, we ought to have learned by the report of your love, that we might pronounce upon such daring a timely judgment, fitting according to the order of the ecclesiastical rules. He then bids Leontius discuss the matter in the synodal assembly which, he says, according to our statutes is to be gathered every year with you presiding over it; and then he desires that what has been found after the examination of the matter be written to him with the letters of all. This letter was given on the VI of the Ides of October of the year 463. Leontius obeyed the command of Hilarus, with the bishops summoned to a council, and from all of them the Pontiff received information about the deed, as is plain from his letter XI.

[60] Hilarus, the matter having been examined by many bishops, disapproves the deed, Having heard this information, Hilarus in the following year 464, on the sixth of the Kalends of March, wrote letter XI to twenty bishops of Gaul, in which he declares that Mamertus had exceeded the limits fixed for him by the Apostolic See and had acted against the right of the bishop of Arles. Hence he says that he has written to Veranus the bishop — who is doubtless St. Veranus of Vence — that as legate of the Apostolic See he should confront Mamertus, so that, he says, he may learn what you have reported concerning him; that is, that he may declare that he wrongly ordained a bishop for the people of Die. Then he wills that Mamertus should declare that he will thereafter observe the determination of the Apostolic See without any transgression; and he threatens that he will take away from the church of Vienne its four suffragan churches, unless he be willing to be content with them. Finally he wills that the bishop who had been ordained for the people of Die, and whom Hilarus otherwise acknowledged to be worthy, be confirmed at the discretion of Leontius of Arles.

[61] and corrects it by a mild remedy: This correction was assuredly kindly and mild; nor does Hilarus dissemble in his letters that a heavier penalty could have been inflicted both on Mamertus of Vienne, who had ordained a bishop of Die outside his own province, and on him who had been ordained in that manner. But, he says, for the quiet of the churches, mindful of Apostolic wisdom, we wish the wounds of so great a transgression to be treated first with poultices, that a member of our body which perhaps needs healing may be recalled to its former soundness by gentler medicines; and let it not be believed to be neglected because it is not for the present warned that it must be cut off. These things and others show that St. Hilarus did not dissemble the fault of Mamertus, who had most clearly acted against the statutes of St. Leo, as writers everywhere acknowledge: for St. Leo had determined that the church of Die should be suffragan to the church of Arles, and not to that of Vienne, to which he had adjudged only four suffragan churches, as I set out in St. Cæsarius of Arles, vol. VI of August, pp. 54 and 55. Tillemont, vol. 16, in St. Mamertus, art. 1, acknowledges that Mamertus acted against the ordinance of St. Leo — whether, he says, because he believed that in that matter he ought not to subject himself to the authority of St. Leo (and that is the chief cause of Hilarus' complaints), or because the city of Die as well as Vienne was at that time under the Burgundians, and hence its intercourse with the city of Arles, which up to that time was subject to the Romans, was less free. So he; whose first reason, if it be true, makes me in no way wonder that Hilarus wrote more sharply against the deed of Mamertus.

[62] wherefore it must not be said that Hilarus was deceived, Baronius at the year 464 recites the whole letter of St. Hilarus, and, out of reverence for the holiness of Mamertus, subjoins this observation at num. 8: Do not wonder, reader, that Hilarus the Roman Pontiff rises up so vehemently against Mamertus, a man (as the outcome declared) distinguished for holiness: for in those things which contentious

belong to the court of litigation, it is very easy for anyone to be deceived … Who does not know that it often happens that the ears of Pontiffs are filled with false accusations and surreptitious representations, and that, while they think to do what appears just, they harry an innocent man? So indeed the Most Eminent writer. But Tillemont, in Mamertus, art. 2, however much he fights for Mamertus against Hilarus, could not discover that Hilarus was deceived, or that the matter was not sufficiently examined at his command. To me too it does not seem that anything of that kind intervened in the said judgment. The first accusation indeed was not without exaggeration, but Hilarus did not judge according to it: having received that denunciation, he ordered the whole matter to be examined in a council of the bishops of Gaul, and an account of his deed to be exacted from Mamertus in the council, and at last the facts to be written to him with the letters of all, as is plain from letter 9, which he wrote on that account to Leontius. He could certainly not have proceeded more safely, nor guarded himself more against being deceived. Wherefore that excuse of Baronius does not seem legitimate, or rather is by no means necessary; since I cannot find that letter XI of Hilarus to be so sharp that such a one could not have been written by a supreme Pontiff to a bishop clearly exceeding the limits recently fixed for him.

[63] I see indeed that Tillemont is here vehemently opposed to me, nor that he dealt too harshly with St. Mamertus, who in St. Mamertus, arts. 1, 2 and 3, complains much of Hilarus on account of certain harsher words inserted in Hilarus' letters, which he himself much exaggerates. Certainly he ought to have omitted, and not to have attributed to Hilarus, what is read in his letter 9, since there Hilarus speaks only from the mouth of the accuser, and adds, if it is so, by which he declares that he doubts the accusations. Only those things could be brought forward which are read in Hilarus' letter XI, where of his own judgment he calls him a transgressor; and — what most of all offends Tillemont — he inserted these words in them: To whom has a rebellious mind ever profited? or whom has the elation of pride not brought low? Higher is the grace of humility, to which by poverty of spirit the way of the heavenly kingdom is opened unto the reward of the promised beatitude. But Hilarus could write these things in order that Mamertus might beware of rebellion and pride, since that ordination, directly contrary to the statutes of St. Leo, seemed to lead that way. But, says Tillemont, whatever Pope Hilarus thought of St. Mamertus, the Church will always the more venerate his holiness than the holiness of that Pope, although the latter by other deeds could also deserve the title of Saint.

[64] I answer that I am not disputing about the greater or lesser glory of two Saints, [who had to be judged from the deed, although his exceptional holiness was afterwards established.] nor do I doubt the notable holiness of Mamertus, but he attained to that exceptional holiness by other deeds. But when he was ordaining a bishop in another's province, St. Hilarus had to consider Mamertus not as a Saint but as a bishop exceeding the limits prescribed for him. If perhaps Mamertus, for reasons unknown to us, believed that the ordination was not unlawful for him, and therefore did not sin before God, Hilarus could be ignorant of this, who had to consider the deed as it appeared before men. Wherefore St. Hilarus by that deed as by others could increase his own holiness, and by a just rebuke bring it about that Mamertus too should attain a greater purity of life; since I have no doubt that this Saint received the commands of the supreme Pontiff with due humility and submission of mind, and thereafter obeyed them. Tillemont indeed doubts it in art. 2, but undeservedly, since the case was then ended, and the division of the churches between the metropolitan sees of Arles and Vienne, which had given occasion to all these things, was not changed in the time of St. Mamertus. Of this Saint we treated at the XI day of May. For the rest, St. Hilarus on that occasion also wrote his letter 10 to the bishops of the provinces of Vienne, Lyons, Narbonensis Prima and Secunda, and of the Alps, in which he warns that no one should overstep his own bounds, and that councils be gathered every year.

[65] [When he had granted something to Auxanius by surreptitious representation concerning the fort of Nice,] What has just been set out about the case of St. Mamertus shows brilliantly how great a lover of discipline and justice St. Hilarus was, without any respect of persons. This appears again from letter 4, which lacks a note of time, but which teaches that the Saint was unwilling to defend his own statutes to the prejudice of any church, and preferred to confess that he had been deceived rather than to derogate from the right of the church of Embrun. The controversy was carried on between Ingenuus, bishop of Embrun, and Auxanius, bishop of an uncertain see, who had obtained something by surreptitious representation from Hilarus concerning the fort of Nice, which today is the city of Nicæa, called by the French Nice and by the Italians Nizza. We are moved, he says, by the reasoning of justice, which, although it ought to be kept by all who are rightly minded, is especially not to be rashly neglected by the priests of the Lord, by whose instruction it is fitting that the rest be formed. Our brother and fellow bishop Ingenuus of Embrun, therefore, always supported by the honour of metropolitan of the province of the Maritime Alps, records that we, at the request of our brother and fellow bishop Auxanius, laid down certain things to his own prejudice, as the annexed documents declare, which would run counter to all the defences in this same cause. He adds that he had learned from the reports, through Veranus the bishop — doubtless of Vence — that what had been elicited from him by surreptitious representation ought not to have been asked for.

[66] [he wills that all be restored to its former state, and the matter judged according to the canons.] Then, delegating the cognizance of the cause to Leontius of Arles, Veranus of Vence and Victurus the bishops, to whom he writes, he uses these words: Nevertheless, lest we be moved by hatred or by favour, which ought not to exist in the settling of causes, we so delegate to your charity the cognizance of the annexed complaint that nothing may prevail against the venerable canons, nothing against the judgment of my predecessor of holy memory, whatever shall be established to have been obtained from us by stealth. For we do not wish, dearest brothers, the privileges of the churches, which must always be preserved, to be confounded; nor do we permit one priest to have right in the province of another; because through this there is no less an offence against the sanctions of the holy traditions than a springing forward into injury against the Lord Himself, whose expectation * of the fruit of our ministry is placed not in the breadth of regions but in the winning of souls. Finally he wills that all be observed which St. Leo had determined concerning the churches of the city of Cemenelum and of the fort of Nice … that the aforesaid places may return to the government of one prelate. The city of Cemenelum, which already then seems to have been gradually falling into decay, was near Nice and not far from the river Var, where some ruins of it with one church are said still to survive. But Nice before that seems never to have had another bishop than the one of Cemenelum. Some things about these matters also had to be said in St. Veranus of Vence, of whom we have just treated.

* elsewhere, III

* "to us," I think

* in Baronius, "griefs"

* that is, "sitting"

* that is, "favour"

* perhaps "every purpose"

* Baronius: "fled"

* in the same place: "we may judge"

* that is, "in the time of his episcopate"

* perhaps "expectation" (in the ablative)

§ VI. The deeds of Hilarus for ecclesiastical discipline in response to a consultation of the bishops of Spain, and the council held about these matters at Rome in the year 465.

[ ] Ascanius of Tarragona with the bishops of his province consults Hilarus In the year 465 the prelates of Tarraconensian Spain exercised the zeal of St. Hilarus for ecclesiastical discipline by two letters addressed to him. Each is from Ascanius, metropolitan of Tarragona, and from all the bishops of that province together, whose names are not expressed. The first, since it was written long before the second, may belong to the year 464: for the second is certainly of the year 465. The first, in Labbe, col. 1033, they begin thus: Even if there were no * necessity of ecclesiastical discipline, we should truly have had to seek out that privilege of your See, by which, the keys of the kingdom having been received after the resurrection of the Saviour, throughout the whole world the singular preaching of the most blessed Peter provided for the enlightenment of all: whose Vicar's primacy, as it is eminent, so is it to be feared and loved by all. Accordingly we, adoring God deeply in you, whom you serve without complaint, have recourse to the faith praised by an Apostolic mouth, seeking answers thence, whence nothing is commanded by error, nothing by presumption, but all by pontifical deliberation. These things Tillemont partly gave, in St. Hilarus, art. 7, as spoken in his praise; so that we may the more wonder that that writer sought in almost every action of St. Hilarus something which he might carp at by a sinister interpretation. I should prefer, however, to believe that the Spanish bishops pronounce those praises of the Roman Pontiffs in general. But what is read at the beginning of the second letter must be understood of St. Hilarus, where it is said: What care your Apostleship takes of the priests of its provinces we have learned by the report of our son, the illustrious Vincentius of our province.

[68] After the aforesaid, in the first letter they set out their complaints about Silvanus, bishop of Calahorra *, about the unlawful ordinations of Silvanus of Calahorra; because seven or eight years before he had ordained a bishop with no peoples asking for it, and, having been admonished, had not corrected himself. Then, because he had ordained as bishop a presbyter of another diocese, and that one unwilling, in the same place which had been destined for the other. They add that the bishop of Saragossa had wished to apply a remedy to that evil, but in vain. They desire therefore to be instructed by Apostolic words what is to be done, and, concluding their letter, they speak thus: It will assuredly be your triumph, if in the times of your Apostleship the Catholic Church hears what the Chair of St. Peter holds, if the new seeds of tares shall have been rooted out. After they had long awaited an answer to this letter and had not yet obtained it — perhaps because Hilarus was seeing to it that other information also should be brought to him from Spain — they addressed a second letter to Hilarus, in which they briefly mentioned the preceding one, urgently asking an answer; and they set forth at the same time another question, or rather a supplication.

[69] And this they explain in the following words: The bishop of the city of Barcelona, holy Nundinarius, has fulfilled the lot of the human condition. He, leaving to the venerable bishop our brother Irenaeus, whom he himself had before appointed in his diocese with our consent, what his poverty could have, chose by the arbitrament of his last will that he should be substituted in his own place; [and then he asks that Irenaeus, translated to the see of Barcelona from another, be confirmed.] but the judgment of the deceased does not waver as to his merit. Since indeed the whole clergy and people of that city, and the best and most numerous of the provincials, hoped from us, with consent given, that he should keep his place. We, considering the judgment of the deceased and approving his life, and the nobility and multitude of those who asked, and at the same time the advantage of the said church, judged it best that to so great a priest, who had passed to divine things, a prelate of no less merit should be substituted — especially since it is established that the church of that municipality, in which he had before been ordained, was always of the diocese of this city's church. Therefore we suppliantly beseech your Apostleship that you confirm by your authority the decree of our lowliness, which seems to have been justly made by us.

[70] But Hilarus, celebrating a council on his anniversary. When the festival of St. Hilarus' anniversary had come, which I showed in §4 was celebrated on the XVII or XIX of November, the holy Pontiff celebrated a council with the bishops, who are enumerated in the acts as forty-eight; where the questions proposed by the said bishops of Tarragona were also treated. That council in Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ], is noted as held in the consulship of the most illustrious men Flavius Basiliscus and Herminericus, on the day of the fifteenth of the Kalends of December, that is, on the XVII day of November of the year 465; and this date I judge more probable than the rest according to what was said in §4, yet in such a way that I would not disapprove the opinion of those who believe it was held two days later. Further, if we diligently inspect the Acts of that council, we shall see that the whole was finished in a single day, and indeed in a few hours. For St. Hilarus addressed the assembled prelates in a brief discourse, and set before them first the canons pertaining to the ordinations of clerics, which he doubtless had drawn up himself before the council. Then he asked the opinion of the bishops about those four canons, who with many acclamations approved the canons proposed. And of these canons such an abridgement as this is given in Labbe, where they may be read entire with the acclamations of the bishops: 1. That the Nicene canons and the decrees of the Apostolic See be kept. 2. That men twice married, or the husbands of a widow or of a woman who has been corrupted, do not come to the ecclesiastical grades (or rather to sacred orders). 3. That penitents, or the unlettered, or those who through a defect of members or through amputation have anything less, do not come to a higher Order. 4. That those things which a bishop, or his predecessor, ordained unlawfully be amended by him who survives.

[71] treats with the bishops about the confirmation sought for Irenaeus, Then Hilarus proceeded to the fifth canon, which regards the petition of the bishops of the province of Tarragona. And this he set forth in these words: Besides, brethren, new and unheard-of seeds of perversities (as has reached us by a sure report in letters sent from Spain) are springing up from time to time in certain places. In short, some think the episcopate, which is given only for preceding merits, to be not a divine gift but a hereditary profit; and they believe that, like perishable and mortal goods, the priesthood too can be handed on as it were by legal or testamentary right. For very many priests, set on the border of death, are reported to substitute others in their own place by naming them; so that, forsooth, no lawful election is awaited, but the favour of the deceased is held for the consent of the people. How grave this is, consider. And therefore, if it please you, let us take away this licence too generally from the churches, lest anyone should think (shameful to say) that what is God's is owed to a man. These things having been said, Hilarus ordered the second letter of the bishops of Tarragona to be read in the council, by which the confirmation of Irenaeus in the bishopric of Barcelona was sought, because Nundinarius when dying had asked that he should be substituted for himself. The words I gave at num. 68. But the bishops, interposing at the reading of the letter, said among other things: Let this presumption never happen.

[72] Finally Hilarus ordered the first letter of the bishops of Tarragona to be read, [and about the ordinations of Silvanus: and they judge that both must be corrected:] by which Silvanus of Calahorra was accused, as was said at num. 68. And this being read, the bishops acclaimed concerning what had been read out that those things must be amended and cut away, and the canons kept. But when Hilarus asked the opinions of each individually, Maximus, bishop of Turin, spoke first, then Ingenuus of Embrun; these were followed by four others, each in turn briefly delivering his opinion. Then it was said by all the bishops: We all follow the opinions of the brethren, we all confirm them, and we decree that they must be observed. Hear, O Christ; life to Hilarus: it was said six times. Let the things ill committed be corrected by you: it was said eight times. Let what is not lawful not be done: it was said eight times. And so, since the bishops had approved all the canons proposed, and left to the Pontiff the correction of those things which had been read out from the letters of the bishops of Tarragona, the synod was ended in this manner: Hilarus, bishop of the Church of the city of Rome, presiding over the synod, said: Since we decree that the form of the present definition, which is according to the judgment of the statutes of the Saints, should come to the knowledge of all the churches, lest through ignorance of it what is not lawful should be permitted to anyone, the diligence of the notaries shall see to publishing the acts.

[73] Baronius at the year 465, num. 26, observes that Hilarus wrote about this synodal judgment to the bishops of Tarragona on the third of the Kalends of January, that council, from which nothing is lacking, was finished in a single day. and thence gathers that the synod lasted one month and twelve days, namely up to the day of the letter's date: Of which, he says, some sessions seem to be lacking, as among other things those which were brought forward by the opposing party on behalf of Silvanus the bishop, as the same Pope Hilarus teaches in the said letter. He subjoins that that constitution of Hilarus is also lacking which Anastasius the Librarian mentions in these words: He made a constitution concerning the Church in the basilica at holy Mary the Virgin Mother of God, in the consulship of Basiliscus and Hermenerichus, on the XVI of the Kalends of December. But I can scarcely doubt that that constitution is those canons which we have in Labbe, and which Hilarus wished to come to the knowledge of all the churches. No more do I judge that other sessions are lacking, or that the council lasted longer than one day. What was brought forward to the Pontiff on behalf of Silvanus doubtless came into Hilarus' hands after the council was finished; and these caused him to defer for a longer time after the council his letter to the bishops of Tarragona, because a new cause for deliberation arose from them. Certainly from that very letter, on account of which Baronius believed the council lasted so long, it is abundantly clear that it had been held a good while before. For Hilarus speaks of it thus: Your letters having been read in the assembly of the brethren whom the festival of my anniversary had gathered, etc. The word "had gathered" shows that the council was past when he was writing. There is nothing, therefore, why we should believe that the council lasted more than one day, since the Acts altogether suggest that the bishops were gathered only once, and that everything could easily have been finished in the space of two hours.

[74] Then, when the peoples of various cities interceded for Silvanus; Further, who wrote on behalf of Silvanus, and undertook to excuse rather than wholly to defend his cause, Hilarus declares at the beginning of his letter to Ascanius and the rest of the bishops of Tarragona in this manner: After we received the letters of your love, in which you asked that the presumptions of Silvanus, bishop of the church of Calahorra, should be checked, … it is established that letters were thrust upon us from the men of honour and the landholders of Tarazona, Cascante, Calahorra, Virgilia *, Tricium, Legio and Civitas, with the subscriptions of various persons; through which they excused what your complaint had set forth about Silvanus. But their otherwise just allegation was not free from a most just reproof; because it became clear that priests had been ordained for several cities without the knowledge of the metropolitan, our brother and fellow bishop Ascanius. On the peoples enumerated I observe that the Turiassonenses are so called from the city of Turiaso or Turiasso in Aragon, commonly called Tarazona, not from Tarraco the metropolis, as Tillemont wrongly explains. The Cascantenses are the inhabitants of the town of Cascantum in the kingdom of Navarre, which is commonly called Cascante. The people of Calahorra were defending their own bishop. Who are designated by the Virgilienses, Tricienses, Legionenses and Civitatenses, Tillemont says he does not know. Cardinal de Aguirre, in the Collection of the councils of Spain, vol. 2, p. 230, says in general terms: Almost all (those peoples) now, after twelve centuries, retain the same ancient names, even in the Spanish tongue. But besides the Turiassonenses and Cascantenses, the others will have to be sought far from the city of Calahorra, if they are designated by names still in use, such as are the Legionenses and Civitatenses.

[75] Hilarus indeed disapproves the ordinations of Silvanus, But whoever those peoples were who supported the cause of Silvanus before St. Hilarus, we cannot doubt that Hilarus remitted something of his rigour either to their reasons or to their prayers — perhaps lest a schism should be stirred up: for the intercession of so many peoples shows that Silvanus was powerful and in favour. The Pontiff therefore replied by a letter given in the same year on the third of the Kalends of January to Ascanius and the other bishops of the province of Tarragona, which is found in Labbe, col. 135. In it, after the words just given, he goes on thus: Whence, since we see whatever has been reported by either side to be confounded with all perversity, the necessity of the times being perceived, we decree for this reason that what has been done shall belong to pardon, on condition that nothing thereafter be attempted against the precepts of the blessed Apostle, nothing against the constitution of the Nicene canons. In the private letter to Ascanius of Tarragona, which follows in Labbe, col. [ ], he indicates more clearly what he thinks about the ordinations of Silvanus, and why he does not order those ordained by him to be deposed along with their author. I subjoin the words: And although those who were ordained priests without the knowledge and consent of your love ought to have been removed together with their authors, yet, lest we should decree anything austere in so great a necessity, we wish those who have been made bishops to remain, provided they be not found liable under the Apostolic precepts and the statutes of the holy fathers, and that thereafter nothing be perpetrated which runs counter to ecclesiastical discipline, as has been done hitherto.

[76] The holy Pontiff says the same in the earlier letter, but does not deprive those ordained of their bishoprics: in which he confirms the bishops ordained by Silvanus, yet under these conditions: if they be not twice married, or the husbands of a widow or of a woman who has been corrupted. He forbids that there be two bishops in the same church; that the unlettered, or penitents, or those who had been condemned to public penance, be promoted to the episcopate; and above all that anyone be consecrated a prelate without the knowledge and consent of the metropolitan. Then he admonishes the bishops not to yield to importunate prayers of the people, in these words: And do not think the petitions of the peoples to be of such force that, while you desire to obey them, you forsake the will of our God, who forbids us to sin. Whose indignation is the more gravely stirred by this, that His kindness is offended when unlawful things are done by those who are the interpreters of His appeasement. Thus St. Hilarus replied to the first letter of the bishops of Tarragona. But I cannot find that he said that what the bishops of Tarragona had reported was partly false, although Tillemont affirms that he says so. I rather see that he did as St. Gregory the Great afterwards wrote must be done in the Church, in letter 64 of book XI to Augustine, bishop of the English, speaking thus: For at this time holy Church corrects some things by fervour, tolerates some by gentleness, and out of consideration overlooks and bears with some, so that often, by bearing and overlooking, she restrains the evil which opposes her. This the said Cardinal de Aguirre has already prudently observed.

[77] More severely did Hilarus reply to the second petition of the bishops of Tarragona, but orders Irenaeus to return to his own church: because Irenaeus the bishop could easily remain in his own church, and only his translation to the church of Barcelona was being sought, so that this had not been entirely carried out. Since this translation was both in itself contrary to the canons, and because Irenaeus had been sought for the church of Barcelona through the preceding bishop,

Hilarus replied that the wishes of the people of Barcelona were exceedingly unlawful, and rebuked the bishops for demanding that they should be held ratified. Then he says that he is sending the decrees of the council held on his anniversary, and goes on thus: Whence, Irenaeus the bishop being removed from the church of Barcelona and sent back to his own, and the wishes being calmed by priestly moderation which through ignorance of the ecclesiastical laws desire to obtain what is not lawful, let such a bishop be ordained forthwith for the people of Barcelona from their own clergy as it especially befits you, brother Ascanius, to choose and becomes you to consecrate. He adds below: But if Irenaeus the bishop shall neglect to return to his own church, laying aside the circuit of his shamelessness — which will be granted him not by judgment but by kindness — let him know that he is to be removed from the fellowship of bishops.

[78] Finally, that all might the better be committed to execution, and he sends a subdeacon that his orders may be observed. Hilarus gave his letters to Trajan the subdeacon to be carried into Spain, as he notes in the first letter, and again in the second to Ascanius alone in these words: Nor let two prelates be permitted to one church; which we delegate to be done more opportunely by the insistence of the aforesaid subdeacon (Trajan), whom also, for the preserving of the discipline of the Church, the authority of our arrangement has caused to journey to Spain. Thus did Hilarus wish to settle ecclesiastical affairs in the province of Tarragona, partly by mildness, partly by severity — whose deeds all declare that he was a most diligent avenger of ecclesiastical discipline, but equally kindly in correcting those things which had already been ill done.

* "he would dictate"

* Galahorta

* elsewhere, "of the city of the Varegienses"

§ VII. The Saint resists a Macedonian heretic: the year and day of his death are discussed.

[ ] The Saint resists a heretic who was the emperor's friend: Besides the sacred places built or adorned by St. Hilarus, of which I shall treat after recording his death, one deed remains to be related, from which it may be gathered that this holy Pontiff was no less strenuous a defender of the faith than of ecclesiastical discipline. The emperor Anthemius, when he first came to Rome, was on familiar terms with Philotheus, a Macedonian heretic; and he wished to abuse that familiarity for corrupting the city of Rome with his heresy, but found St. Hilarus bravely resisting him. This deed would have lain hidden from posterity, like many other deeds of St. Hilarus, if St. Gelasius the Pope had not mentioned it in his letter 13 to the bishops of Dardania, in Labbe, vol. 4, col. [ ], where he has it thus: Pope Hilarus also, of holy memory, when Philotheus the Macedonian, supported by his familiarity, wished to bring into the City new conventicles of various sects, publicly restrained the emperor Anthemius with a clear voice at the tomb of the blessed apostle Peter, that this should not be done, so far that the same emperor promised with the interposition of an oath that those things should not be done. From this deed also it is clear that St. Hilarus lived until the reign of Anthemius.

[80] The death of St. Hilarus is fixed by Marcellinus and others in the year 467: Marcellinus in the Chronicle at the year 461, in which he rightly begins the pontificate of St. Hilarus, writes that he sat six years; and consequently at the year 467 he places the beginning of the emperor Anthemius and of St. Simplicius the Pope, who succeeded St. Hilarus when he died. And so, if we believe Marcellinus, St. Hilarus died in the same year in which Anthemius took up the empire, which some say happened in the month of April, others in the month of August. And so, if Marcellinus wrote the truth, Hilarus' death did not occur in the earlier months of the year, that is in the month of February or March, as some would have it, but may have occurred in the month of September, as others believe. Idatius in his Chronicle fixes the elevation of Anthemius to the empire in the eighth year of the reign of Leo, in the month of August, that is, in the year 465; and the death of Hilarus, six years of his priesthood being completed, two years later — so that he too designates the year 467. Marianus Scotus, whom some have thought should also be alleged for fixing the death of Hilarus, places his death at the year 469, on the IX of the Kalends of March. The same at the year 461 says: Hilarius, the forty-sixth Pope after Peter, is ordained on the 2nd of the Ides of November, who sat seven years and six months. I in no way doubt that there are almost as many errors as words; and yet both the Pagis wonderfully kiss the opinion of this writer here for the days assigned to his ordination and death.

[81] [the opinion of the more recent writers about the day and year of his death is various:] The Catalogues of the Roman Pontiffs do not agree in designating the length of the pontificate. The ancient catalogue published by us before volume 1 of April, p. 34, has this: He sat five years, three months, ten days. The Work on the Lives of the Pontiffs attributed to Anastasius the Librarian has in several codices: He sat six years, three months, ten days. Some codices, however, attribute seven years to Hilarus with the months and days already mentioned, as do also Platina in the Lives of the Pontiffs, and an anonymous author in the manuscript Lives of the Pontiffs carried down to the year 1430. More recent writers disagree about the year and day of his death. Baronius indeed at the year 467, num. 4, has it thus: For in this year, on the fourth of the Ides of September, the same Pontiff Hilarus dies, having sat six years (he meant to say five, as is clear from the beginning and end of the pontificate assigned by himself, and so he corrected it in vol. 10, p. 960), ten months, less two days. Our Papebroch, in the Propylæum of May, in Hilarus, believed that his death must be fixed on the XXI day of February of the same year 467; but I judge that that opinion must be abandoned for the reasons presently to be given; nor did Papebroch himself believe it certain, but more conformable to our catalogue of the Roman Pontiffs. Tillemont, in note 2 on St. Hilarus, remains uncertain whether he died on the X of September of the year 467, or on the XXI of February or the 2nd of March of the year 468. And all these declare their opinion, without much contention, as the more probable.

[82] But such is not the manner of Pagi in the Critica on Baronius at the year 467, num. 3. Pagi contends that Hilarus died on the XXI day of February of the year 468; He brings forward nothing but what is certain, if only we are willing to believe him as he says it. Marcellinus in the Chronicle, he says, has hitherto deceived Baronius, Papebroch and others, who under the consuls of this year recited the beginning of Simplicius, the successor of Pope Hilarus. For the death of St. Hilarus took place only in the following year: and he administered the Roman Church not five years and some months, as all the more recent writers have attributed to him, but six years, three months, ten days, as is clear both from Anastasius, Ordericus book 2, Liutprand, Abbo of Fleury and Honorius of Autun, and from the Vatican-Palatine Catalogue, our six catalogues, Regino, Hermann Contractus and others, except where the numbers have been copied faultily. Marianus Scotus in the Chronicle, who taught us the day of his birthday, rightly noted also the day of his death. For he writes: "Pope Hilarius died on the IX of the Kalends of March, that is, on the XXI day of the month of February": on which day Bolland says that he is ascribed in the Florarium of the Saints, and in the Martyrologies of Maurolico, Galesinius and Canisius, and in various Calendars, and in Greven's Supplement to Usuard. Hilarus therefore was not laid to rest on the X day of the month of September, on which he is venerated in the Roman Martyrology, or on which Anastasius says he was buried, but on that day his body was translated; since the six years, three months and ten days during which he presided over the Roman Church are completed on the XXI day of the month of February of the year of Christ 468. After his death the see was vacant, not ten days, as Anastasius, the Author of the fuller catalogue of the Roman Pontiffs, and various catalogues of ours have it, but only four days, as we shall see from Anastasius himself at the death of Simplicius. Thus far Pagi, heaping up many things, but most of them altogether useless to the point.

[83] For, if we weigh everything with mature judgment, even Marcellinus alone but neither the authority of Marianus, who contradicts himself, (with whom, however, Idatius also agrees), compared with the ancient Martyrologies, will outweigh Pagi's whole heap. Wherefore I do not hesitate to assert first in general that the documents cited by him do not so much favour his opinion as oppose it; and that there is none among them all from which it can be proved that St. Hilarus died on the XXI of February of the year 468, even if the sure credit of the document were established. There is one only, Marianus Scotus, who agrees with Pagi about the day of death, and the same disagrees about the year and about the length of the pontificate. Nay, he is contrary to himself, since the seven years and six months which he attributes to the pontificate do not agree with the beginning and end laid down by himself. It is certain, therefore, that Marianus Scotus errs in the year of St. Hilarus' death, and in the years and months of his pontificate; nor did Pagi wish to follow him in these things, as neither in the day of St. Leo's death, nor in the year of St. Simplicius' death. I should like to know, then, why both Pagis make so much of Marianus here, so that the former at the year 461, num. 14, asserts without hesitation that he found the day of St. Hilarus' ordination noted in some ancient monument, and the latter affirms the same about the day of his death with equal confidence, in Hilarus, num. 13. In vain shall I here search out any other reason for that assertion than that the days assigned by Marianus in his account of Hilarus pleased Pagi and agree in some fashion with his own reasonings. Hence those were found in an ancient monument; but the rest were written by Marianus through error.

[84] nor is the authority of some more recent martyrologists to be much valued here: To Marianus Pagi joins five Martyrologies and some Calendars, in which the memory of St. Hilarus is placed at the XXI of February. So quickly had he forgotten what he had said at the year 461, num. 4, discussing the day of St. Leo's death: And hence it is most evidently plain that the common opinion which has prevailed through so many centuries, and which even now can scarcely be plucked from the minds of many — namely that the Saints flew to heaven on the days on which they are venerated — can have no place hereafter. Wrongly indeed does Pagi say these things, as I shall show below. But meanwhile it is most evidently plain that Pagi lightly rejects the authority of the most ancient Calendars when they are contrary to his reasonings, and yet does not blush to bring into the number of his proofs modern Martyrologies when he believes them to favour him: for of all those which he has adduced there is none older than the fifteenth century. Such Martyrologies certainly cannot be of use for investigating the day of death of a Saint who died in the fifth century. Besides, in all of them the memory of St. Hilarus is also announced on the X day of September, as I have already observed at num. 4. And so those Martyrologies, as much as Marianus Scotus, are useless for proving Pagi's opinion. Perhaps some martyrologist assigned that day to Hilarus from Marianus, and then others, as happens, followed that first one.

[85] [nor the length of the pontificate, which would rather lead to the XXVIII of February,] The remaining monuments cited by Pagi do not have it that St. Hilarus died on the XXI of February. On the contrary Abbo of Fleury says of St. Hilarus: Who was buried at St. Laurence in the crypt

beside the body of blessed Xystus the bishop, on the IV of the Ides of September. He cited, therefore, the catalogues of the Pontiffs and the other writers enumerated, in order to show from them that Hilarus sat six years, three months and ten days, and in order that from that length of pontificate he might come from the XII day of November of the year 461 to the XXI day of February of the year 468. This is the chief and only foundation of Pagi's opinion. But I observe, first, that St. Hilarus died not on the XXI of February but on the XXVIII of that month, if that length of pontificate is true which most catalogues assign along with the writers who afterwards followed them: for the pontificate of Hilarus ought not to be begun from the XII day of November, but more probably from the XVII of that month, as I showed in §4. Tillemont, cited above, prefers to extend that length as far as the 2nd of March, because he begins the pontificate of St. Hilarus on the XIX of November, that is, from the day of his ordination. These things being observed, that the reader may understand that the six years, three months and ten days during which St. Hilarus is said to have sat do not necessarily lead to the XXI of February, it remains to be examined whether it must be believed at all that that space of his See is exact.

[86] The whole doubt comes down to this: whether more credit should be given to the catalogues of the Pontiffs or to the ancient Martyrologies which agree with one another. from catalogues which, by Pagi's own judgment, often go astray, Baronius everywhere followed the ancient Martyrologies against the catalogues, when he knew that holy Pontiffs were noted in the ancient Martyrologies. Pagi himself wished to correct Baronius from the ancient Calendars against the computations of the said catalogues. Take, studious reader, the example which first offered itself to me. At the year 398, num. 2, he wished to correct Baronius about the day of St. Siricius' death in these words: We find the death of St. Siricius the Pope marked at the VI of the Kalends of December, or at the XXVI day of the month of November, in the printed Martyrology of Bede (which is not Bede's), in that attributed to the divine Jerome, in that of Rabanus, and in others cited by Bolland at the XXII day of the month of February among the Prætermissi. Wherefore, since he was consecrated Roman Pontiff on the XXII day of the month of December of the year 384, he sat thirteen years, eleven months, five days, and not, as Anastasius and the catalogues everywhere have it, fifteen years, eleven months and twenty-five days. So at the year 423, num. 6, he determines the day of St. Boniface the Pope's death from the Hieronymian Martyrology, not from the catalogues. I do not ask whether all that Pagi says here and there is true; this only I observe, that the authority of the ancient Martyrologies can, by his own judgment too, be preferred to the computations of the catalogues. But the laying to rest of St. Hilarus is read in more ancient Calendars at the X of September than is the laying to rest of St. Siricius at the XXVI of November. And so, even by Pagi's own judgment, we must here stand by the Calendars, not by the catalogues which frequently go astray — especially since Marcellinus too stands against Pagi for the year 467.

[87] At the year 402, num. 16, Pagi again determines the death of Pope Anastasius from the Martyrologies against the Pontifical book. it ought to seem so certain, The same Pagi at the year 418, num. 71, says: The length of the See of Zosimus as to months and days … is faultily copied in all the copies of Anastasius cited by others or seen by me. At the year 440, num. 2, he says: The same Anastasius, from the death of Pope Damasus to the death of St. Leo (that is, in eight Pontiffs consecutively), has noted no interpontificate without error, but has circumscribed nearly all of them with the same number of days, namely XX or XXI — even that which followed the death of Sixtus: which evidently shows that he was blind in this chapter, and followed his own reckoning and not any ancient monuments. So Pagi himself; from whom I wished to bring forward those few things which first offered themselves in the same volume, so that the studious reader may notice in what place he holds the Pontifical catalogues, wherever he cannot accommodate his own chronology to them. He confidently increases or diminishes the years, months and days enumerated in them, and often for a slight cause. Pagi judged, therefore, that those catalogues are not free from sufficiently frequent errors when they enumerate the years, months and days of the supreme Pontiffs; and about that I myself cannot doubt when I survey those catalogues. Hence I cannot sufficiently wonder by what reasoning at last Pagi wished to thrust upon us as certain his opinions or computations resting on so ambiguous a foundation, since nothing certain can be found by reasoning unless the foundations be in some measure certain. Let anyone bring forward the most prudent conjectures for correcting the catalogues, or for reconciling them with more certain monuments; by a laudable labour he will be able to bring forward probabilities, not certainties or things undoubted, since certainties cannot be drawn out of uncertainties.

[88] so that we should not rather stand by the most ancient Martyrologies Let us now see whether an equally uncertain foundation for the day of some Saint's death is had from the ancient Martyrologies distinguished with the name of St. Jerome. St. Gregory the Great, book 8, letter 29, to Eulogius, speaks of that Martyrology when he says: Yet in that same volume it is not indicated who suffered in what manner; but only the name, the place, and the day of the passion is set down. And so, on Gregory's testimony, the Saints at that time were written in the Martyrologies on that very day on which they had been crowned with martyrdom, and consequently the confessors on the day on which they had died. But the name of St. Hilarus the Pope is ascribed in all the Hieronymian Calendars everywhere to the X day of September, nor is it read on any other day in the said Calendars. It is far more probable, therefore, that he died on the X day of September, and in the year 467, than on any other day. I confess indeed that it sometimes happens that the name of some Saint is read in the Hieronymian Calendars on a day other than that on which he died; but this happens more rarely, and then some reason went before, which does not seem able to have place in the case of St. Hilarus, especially since he is announced at Rome, and on one day only in those Calendars.

[89] [compared with Marcellinus: from which his death must be fixed in the year 467, on the X day of September.] For since he is recorded in the Calendars at Rome, where he doubtless died, it is not credible that this is done on account of some translation: for no translation of the body ever seems to have been made, or at any rate none has become known. Nor is it likely that the day of Hilarus' death was unknown when he was inserted in the Calendars; and therefore it is more probable that his name is read in the Calendars on the day on which he died, as I have already noted commonly happens in the Hieronymian Calendars. There is added the authority of Marcellinus, who fixes the death of St. Hilarus in the year 467. But in that year he certainly did not die if he died in the month of February or March, because Anthemius was not yet emperor in those months of the year 467. On the contrary, the year assigned by Marcellinus will be able to agree rightly with the month of September, because Anthemius had certainly taken up the empire and had come to Rome in the year 467 before the month of September. Wherefore it is permissible to conclude that so far is Pagi's opinion from seeming certain that the judgment of Baronius appears far more probable too, and that this ought to have been said by Pagi himself, if he had always weighed the ancient monuments in the same manner.

§ VIII. The sacred places built, founded and adorned by St. Hilarus, and other tokens of his munificence.

[ ] Hilarus added three oratories to the Lateran baptistery, The magnificence of St. Hilarus in building and adorning sacred places I have kept for this place, because it cannot be brought back to an order of time. Anastasius in his Hilarus begins about these things thus: He made three oratories in the baptistery of the Constantinian basilica (which is otherwise called the Lateran, and which was founded by Constantine the Great): of St. John the Baptist, and of John the Evangelist, and of the holy Cross, all of silver and precious stones. Those three oratories are as many separate buildings joined to the Lateran baptistery. The Lateran basilica, and all the buildings pertaining to it which still stand or once stood, are described in a special Work entitled On the Lateran Basilica and Patriarchate by Cesare Rasponi, a canon of that basilica, afterwards raised to the Cardinal's purple; and the same author at p. 386 sets before the eyes a ground plan of all the ancient buildings pertaining to that most famous basilica. A similar ground plan Giovanni Ciampini gave in his Work on the sacred buildings constructed by Constantine the Great, p. 14, where he also treats of the Lateran basilica after Rasponi.

[91] Both treat of the baptistery, and agree that it is a notable building of octagonal form. and completed the baptistery itself, That it was built by Constantine the Great beside the basilica Rasponi writes, book 3, chap. 1, yet not entirely completed, which he attributes to St. Sixtus III the Pope, whom, after the intervening St. Leo, Hilarus succeeded. But Ciampini at p. 24 recites this inscription from Gruter, p. 1163: This place, once heaped up with the squalor of a filthy mound, has by the cost and zeal of Hilarus the Bishop, servant of Christ, with the Lord's help — so great a mass of rubbish having been removed as the height that is now seen — been adorned and dedicated for the offering of a gift to Christ our God. Now since this inscription was, on Gruter's testimony, at the font, or in the baptistery of St. John Lateran, it seems to be gathered thence that St. Hilarus put the last hand to the baptistery, and at length dedicated the place to divine worship. Wherefore the opinion of Ciampini pleases me, who judges that that splendid building was only begun by Constantine, advanced by Sixtus III, and completed by Hilarus. To this opinion what is read in Anastasius the Librarian under Sixtus III is in no way repugnant: He made in the Constantinian basilica an adornment over the font, which was not there before — that is, he erected marble architraves and porphyry columns which Constantine Augustus had gathered and left, and had ordered to be erected, and which he also adorned with verses. For, these things being done, many things could remain to be completed, and Hilarus is said to have completed them.

[92] And to this baptistery, on two sides opposite one another, St. Hilarus added the aforesaid oratories of St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. and on its two opposite sides he founded two oratories. The ornaments of each the Librarian describes, going on thus after the words given above: He made the confession of St. John the Baptist of silver, which weighed a hundred pounds; and a golden cross. And he made the confession of St. John the Evangelist of silver, which weighed a hundred pounds; and a golden cross; and in both oratories doors of bronze plated with silver. The most eminent Rasponi, book 3, chap. 7, says of the doors: First of all he saw to it that doors were fashioned of bronze and ingeniously set off with various silver reliefs, with two inscriptions: on the right, In honour of St. John the Baptist; on the left, Hilarus the bishop, servant of God, offers this. Of which doors the bronze indeed survives entire in the same form in which it was of old; but the innumerable disasters which after the times of Hilarus the City and the Church meanwhile received from the injuries of enemies and citizens have not suffered the silver to remain unharmed. The said writer there also

attributes certain other ornaments from Anastasius to these chapels, of which I shall treat below.

[93] the second, of St. John the Baptist, which is described, Then he goes on thus: The form of this oratory is square, and to those entering it the approach lies open on the right of the baptistery, and above the marble architrave of the door this epigraph is read: Hilarus the bishop to the holy people of God. Which architrave is supported by two elegant little porphyry columns with green capitals of ophite stone, which they call serpentine. The oratory itself is small, but its vaulting is seen most elegantly interlaced with mosaic work, and gleams with various emblems of peacocks and other living creatures, and has in the centre a lamb, the solemn image of Christian meekness. The altar is fixed to the wall and is held up by two most precious fluted columns of ophite stone, and in a marble niche of more elegant incrustation stands an image of St. John the Baptist. And it has on the right likewise and on the left two little apses, and at last the whole shrine was adorned with plaster work lately by Clement the Eighth; for that this whole oratory was of old incrusted with marble tablets Panvinio testifies, and that in its angles, which were four, there were three columns of alabaster and one of marble, with this inscription cut above the frieze of its vestibule: Lord, I have loved the beauty of your house. Various things about the offerings and relics of the same oratory may be seen in Rasponi.

[94] the second, of St. John the Evangelist, in thanksgiving: This writer presently, in chap. 8, concerning the oratory of St. John the Evangelist, which St. Hilarus built opposite the other, observes that it was built by him because he believed that he had escaped unharmed from that robbery of Ephesus, of which I treated in §§2 and 3, by the protection of St. John, patron of the city of Ephesus. This is confirmed by the inscription, about which, describing the door of the oratory, he has it thus: It has a marble door, on whose architrave, which is supported by two columns of porphyry stone, like the door of the other oratory, these words are cut: To his Deliverer John the Evangelist, Hilarus the bishop, servant of Christ. Besides what has already been given, he brings forward this also to our purpose: Its (the oratory's) figure is like half a cross: the vault, of wondrous work, is made of most elegant little stones of mosaic construction, marked off with most beautiful garlands of flowers, in the midst of which the figure of the venerable Lamb strikes the eyes of the beholders. The chapel is built upon four arches, and Clement VIII, having repaired it, clothed it with various choice marbles … The altar of this oratory adheres to the wall and is adorned with two columns of alabaster, whose bases and capitals are of bronze wrought with wonderful skill; and in the middle place there is seen a statue of St. John the Evangelist most elegantly finished in cast work … The leaves of the door with which the oratory is closed are of bronze, yet different from those which were made by Hilarus the Pontiff, the founder of this oratory, etc.

[95] [the third is that of the holy Cross, now destroyed, which he endowed with many ornaments;] Concerning the oratory of the holy Cross Rasponi in chap. 9 has this: Toward the West, on the side of the baptistery, there was formerly an oratory of the holy Cross, likewise built by the Pontiff Hilarus, and to which there was a way through the door of the same sacred font. This oratory was still standing in the time of Sixtus V, and had before it a small court surrounded by a portico, which was supported by seven columns and three pilasters. And the peristyle of the door was upheld by two fluted columns of alabaster … The doors were of bronze inlaid with silver, and the shrine itself, reproducing the form of a cross in a square structure, was of such elegant and skilful workmanship that there are not lacking most weighty authors who hand down that the design of the Vatican basilica was drawn by Michelangelo from this oratory, etc. Concerning the ornaments of this oratory made by Hilarus the Librarian has it thus: For the oratory of the holy Cross he made a confession, where he placed the wood of the Lord, with a golden cross with gems, which weighed twenty pounds. He made of the purest silver doors in the confession, weighing fifty pounds; above the confession a golden arch, which weighed four pounds, which onyx columns bear, where stands a golden lamb weighing two pounds; a golden crown before the confession; lamp-stands with dolphins (they are instruments for holding lights, so called from their figures), which weigh five pounds; golden lamps four in number, weighing two pounds. Thus far concerning the ornaments made within the oratory.

[96] Then he relates other things erected before the oratory, going on thus: and before which he built a magnificent nymphæum: He built a nymphæum and a triple portico before the oratory of the holy Cross, where there are columns of wondrous size, which are called hecaton, penta. On these words Bianchini observes that Nardini reads hecatopeda for hecaton, penta; and he thinks the sense to be that the columns are called hundred-foot from their wondrous height. The word hecatonpenta, otherwise hecatompeta and hecatompeda, varies wonderfully, so that it is uncertain what is signified by it. Obscure also is what follows, which Anastasius adds about the same place: Two basins and two triantal shells with porphyry columns, fluted and pierced, pouring forth water; and in the middle a porphyry place with a shell assirta in the middle pouring forth water, surrounded on the right and left; in the middle adorned with bronze screens and columns with pediments and architraves, everywhere with mosaic, and with Aquitanian columns, that is, of Aquitanian marble, and with Tripolitan and porphyry ones. All these things pertain to the nymphæum and its place. Now by a Nymphæum there is here designated a fountain of leaping water artificially arranged, which was in the place or building which was a triple portico, that is, consisted of three porticoes, and had been built for the washing there of the hands or the head. Hence the basins for holding the water, and the shells for receiving it. The columns served partly for adornment, partly for supporting the porticoes; the rest for adornment. But now not even a trace of this so exceptional a structure survives, says the said Rasponi.

[97] But Anastasius returns to the oratory of St. John, the gifts offered to the oratory of St. John, and to the Lateran basilica, recounting other gifts offered to it in this manner: Before the confession of blessed John (he made) a silver crown, weighing twenty pounds; a bowl-shaped lamp-stand, weighing twenty-five pounds. Likewise at St. John's, within the holy font, a golden lamp with ten sockets * for lights, weighing five pounds; a silver tower with dolphins, weighing sixty pounds; a golden dove, weighing two pounds. Then he recounts some things given to the Lateran basilica itself, going on thus: In the Constantinian basilica ten silver bowl-lamp-stands, which hang before the altar, weighing twenty pounds each; a golden cup, weighing six pounds; golden chalices, weighing one pound each; two silver cups, weighing ten pounds each; another golden cup, weighing five pounds; twenty silver chalices for the ministry, weighing two pounds each; five silver flagons, weighing ten pounds. Thus far concerning the gifts to the Lateran church. On these things I observe only that crowns, bowl-lamp-stands or lamp-stand-bowls are instruments of various forms on which many lights were set at once. On these one may see the description of the Vatican basilica in our work, vol. VII of June, p. 129 and following.

[98] likewise to the basilicas of St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Laurence, After the foregoing Anastasius begins to recount the gifts offered to the church of St. Peter, of which he speaks thus: To blessed Peter the apostle (he made) a golden cup weighing fifteen pounds; another golden cup with green and hyacinth gems, weighing four pounds; ten silver chalices for the ministry, weighing two pounds each; two silver flagons, weighing eight pounds each; twenty-four silver bowl-lamp-stands, weighing five pounds each. Of a like liberality toward the church of St. Paul he goes on thus: To blessed Paul the apostle, a golden cup weighing five pounds each *; four silver cups, weighing six pounds each; ten silver chalices for the ministry, weighing seven pounds each; two silver flagons, weighing ten pounds each. He subjoins more to these, given to the church of St. Laurence: To blessed Laurence the martyr (he made) a golden cup with green and hyacinth gems, weighing four pounds; a golden lamp of ten sockets, weighing five pounds; a cup of the purest gold, weighing five pounds; two golden lamps, weighing one pound each; a golden bowl-lamp-stand, weighing two pounds; a silver tower with dolphins, weighing twenty-five pounds; three silver cups, weighing thirty-four pounds each; twelve silver chalices for the ministry, weighing two pounds each; a silver altar, weighing forty pounds; ten silver lamps, weighing two pounds; two silver flagons, weighing ten pounds; in the basilica of blessed Laurence the martyr ten silver bowl-lamp-stands, weighing ten pounds each; twenty-six bronze bowls; silver vessels for baptism, ten pounds; bronze lamp-stands, fifty pounds. All these things I judge to have been given to the same church of St. Laurence, nor should I think a distinction must be made between the phrases "to St. Laurence" and "in the basilica of blessed Laurence."

[99] and for the stations: What follows in Anastasius is more obscure; but it seems it must be expounded in this sense, that they be reckoned as given for the use of many places at once where the stations were. I shall give the words with such punctuation as sets forth the sense which I judge more probable. If any prefer to understand the passage otherwise, they may abide by their own judgment. In the city of Rome he appointed ministers who should go about the appointed stations: a golden cup with handles, weighing eight pounds; twenty-five silver cups for the title-churches, weighing ten pounds each; twenty-five silver flagons, weighing ten pounds each; fifty silver chalices for the ministry, weighing two pounds each. All these things he laid up, set in the Constantinian basilica, or at St. Mary's. Bianchini by "ministers who should go about" understands clerics assigned to serve at the Sacred rites in those places where a station was celebrated. Baronius at the year 467, num. 9, explains all the words adduced of ornaments and instruments of ministry; and thus the earlier words agree more rightly with the later. Certainly by "ministerials" vestments or books may be understood. Yet whatever is here signified by the word "ministerials," I readily assent to Bianchini that all the things recorded were prepared by St. Hilarus and deposited in the churches likewise named, so that at the time of the stations they might be carried to that place where the station was then held.

[100] I return to Anastasius, who at last recounts some buildings of St. Hilarus in these words: monasteries, libraries, and other buildings of Hilarus: He made monasteries (of clerics or canons, I suppose) at St. Laurence's, and a bath and a prætorium of St. Stephen *. And he made an oratory of St. Stephen in the Lateran baptistery. And he made two libraries also in the same place; likewise a monastery within the City at the Moon. These buildings are today scarcely known, because most of them have been destroyed. The oratory of St. Stephen in the Lateran baptistery the most eminent Rasponi believes to be that which was afterwards called St. Venantius', near the oratory of St. John the Evangelist, and which now

more frequently named St. Mary at the Springs. He treats of it in book 3, chapters 10 and 12. The same author discusses, in chapter 14, the libraries founded there by St. Hilarus, and in the ground-plan of the Lateran basilica he assigns the place where he thinks certain traces of those libraries survive. Blanchini, however, in his Annotations on Anastasius, has the following: In the garden situated by the church of St. Eusebius on the Esquiline, about twenty years ago we saw walls of a church uncovered, together with an adjoining building, when the soil had been dug out to about twenty palms; and from there columns were drawn forth, and an epistyle carved by Hilarus, then archdeacon, under the patronage of blessed Laurence: which epistyle, inscribed as follows, is now preserved in the lapidary collection of the most eminent Cardinal Alessandro Albani.

✠ with the help of our Lord God Jesus Christ, and at the prayer of blessed Laurence the martyr, Hilarus the archdeacon made this.

Hence the writer just cited judges that in that place stood the monastery which St. Hilarus founded at the Moon; and to prove this he brings forward several arguments, which may be seen in the same place. Of the other monasteries which were founded at St. Laurence's not even traces can be found, because that tract of ground was too greatly devastated, as the same writer observes.

[101] his ordinations, and his place of burial. What has been said thus far concerning the buildings, the ornaments of sacred places, and the most precious furnishings of the churches, plainly shows how remarkable was the munificence of St. Hilarus, and how wonderfully he loved the beauty of the house of God. To these things I append the last words of Anastasius concerning Hilarus. He held an ordination in the City in the month of December, of twenty-five priests, six deacons, and twenty-two bishops for various places: he also was buried at St. Laurence's, in the crypt beside the body of the blessed bishop Sixtus, and the episcopate was vacant for ten days. Tillemont, speaking less accurately, wrote that St. Hilarus was buried beside the body of St. Laurence, whereas he was buried beside St. Sixtus the Pope, who was the third of that name: but here in Anastasius he is read to have been buried beside the body of blessed Laurence, so that St. Hilarus was not far distant from him.

b. he says.

e. lamps.

f. it is redundant.