Cyprian of Antioch and Justina and Theoctistus

ON SS. CYPRIAN OF ANTIOCH AND JUSTINA AND THEOCTISTUS, MARTYRS NEAR NICOMEDIA IN BITHYNIA,

NEAR NICOMEDIA IN BITHYNIA.

In the year CCCIV.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Cyprian, bishop and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Justina, virgin and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Theoctistus or Theognitus, M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

BHL Number: 2048

BY J. C.

§ I. The holy Martyrs are celebrated by the Greeks and the Latins on different days with faulty elogia. Their Acts, both published and in manuscript. St. Gregory Nazianzen makes mention of Saints Cyprian and Justina.

[ ] St. Cyprian, distinct from the famous doctor of Carthage, crowned with martyrdom together with St. Justina the virgin and St. Theoctistus or Theognitus, is celebrated by the Greek Church St. Cyprian, distinct from his namesake of Carthage as well as by the Latin. Wonderful are the things which the monuments of remote antiquity relate about him — mixed and confused, however it be, with the deeds of his namesake the holy bishop — and which afford us a signal example of the divine mercy, which does not desert sinners even when entangled in the most tenacious bonds of vice and carried away by concupiscence, but draws them back with almighty power and binds them with the sweetest of chains. For they show St. Cyprian using magical arts for every crime and leading others astray, and then, by the wondrous working of divine grace, forswearing the demons and giving himself wholly to bringing to Christ those who served the devil. That the memory of our holy Martyrs is most ancient in the Church is abundantly proved by the Oration of Gregory Nazianzen — the eighteenth in the editions with the version of Jacobus Billius — by the poems of the empress Eudocia, wife of Theodosius the younger, a summary of which is found in Photius, Bibliotheca, codex 184, and by the Confession itself published under the name of St. Cyprian, which very many critics, even the more rigid ones, admit to have been written before the age of Constantine. Before we discourse at greater length of each of these and of other matters, it will be well to begin with the martyrologists.

[2] The holy martyrs Cyprian and Justina have their elogium among the Greeks on the 2nd day of October, with SS. Justina and Theoctistus he is venerated by the Greeks where the Menæa sing:

Ἀλγεῖ Σατανᾶς τὸν πάλαι φίλον βλέπων Ξίφει φιλοῦντα συνθανεῖν Ἰουστίνῃ Τμήθη δευτερίῃ σὺν Ἰουστίνῃ Κυπριανός.

Satan grieves, beholding his friend of old Loving to die by the sword together with Justina. On the second day Cyprian was cut down with Justina.

The last verse is read on the same day in the metrical Calendars of the Greeks. In the Sirletian and Basilian Menologies, and in the Anthologies of the Greeks recently printed at Venice, they are likewise celebrated on the 2nd of October; but in the Calendars of Job Ludolf and Leo Allatius I do not find the memory of the holy Martyrs. The elogium in the Menæa and in the Menology is almost the same; the latter, however, is a little more compressed, and such as I here reprint from the Basilian, published at Urbino in the year 1727 by the labor of Cardinal Albani. Cyprian, a wise pontiff, born at Antioch in Syria in the reign of Decius, was at first a philosopher and exceedingly learned in the magical arts, but afterwards became a Christian on this occasion. A certain Greek named Idas ardently loved the virgin Justina, who had been baptized by bishop Optatus; but when he could not obtain what he desired, he took refuge with Cyprian, asking him to induce her by magical arts to consent to him.

[3] But when Cyprian had three times sent demons of fornication to solicit the Virgin, on the 2nd of October, where there is something in their elogia he was nevertheless unable to storm her mind, since she was always intent upon pouring out prayers to God; but rather he himself, being seized by the last demon he had sent (the Greek is: When Cyprian had sent three demons of fornication to the Virgin and had not persuaded her, since she was always praying to God, from the last demon, having compelled it and it having come in to him), understood that the magical art was empty and futile; wherefore, having burned his books, he was baptized, and made such progress in virtue that he was ordained bishop and taught many the faith of Christ. At length, arrested together with Justina by the prefect of Damascus, he was beheaded for Christ. In the Menæa St. Cyprian is said to have been born of noble and wealthy parents; the young man who loved St. Justina to distraction is called Aglaïdas, which the Acts to be enumerated below testify was his name; the Saints are related to have been arrested παρὰ τοῦ τῆς Δαμασκοῦ κόμητος, by the Count of Damascus, in place of which the Menology has Ἄρχοντος, the Prefect. Finally the Menæa add that, shut up in iron gratings and cast into a frying pan, they were afterwards led away to Nicomedia and beheaded; and the elogium there ends with these remarks: But the great Gregory the Theologian says that it was not another, but he himself (St. Cyprian), who was the suitor of the Virgin. And their Birthday is celebrated on their martyrdom, which is

beyond Solomon's.

[4] What things are here to be observed or corrected we shall point out below; [a difference. Among the Latins they are celebrated today with elogia faulty throughout.] let us pass on to the sacred Calendars of the Latins. In the Hieronymian ones SS. Cyprian and Justina are unknown; in the Little Roman Martyrology of Rosweyde they are announced thus on the XXVI of September: At Rome, of Cyprian the bishop, who suffered at Antioch, and was translated to Rome with the martyr Justina. The metrical Bede of d'Achery makes no mention of the Saints; yet it is most likely that what Rabanus has as their elogium was copied, after his manner, from Bede. Thus he announces them at the XXVI of September, which is the day everywhere marked among the Latins by their memory: Of the holy martyrs Cyprian the bishop and Justina, of whom Justina, having endured many things for Christ under Diocletian, converted Cyprian himself to Christ, when he was a magician and was trying by his magic arts to drive her out of her senses; with whom, when he had now been made a bishop and a noble doctor, she suffered martyrdom under the emperor Claudius. Usuard seems to have followed this announcement in such a way as to correct the anachronism, omitting what is there faultily related about their suffering under Diocletian and their martyrdom being completed under the emperor Claudius. The Martyrologist of Vienne pursues the praises of our Saints at greater length. It will be well, on account of the things that will shortly come to be observed in the discussion and sifting of the Acts, to insert the whole elogium here. Thus, then, Ado records at the same day: The Birthday of the holy martyrs Cyprian the bishop and Justina, who suffered under the emperor Diocletian, Eutolmius being judge.

[5] Ado composed his lengthy announcement from the Acts after his manner, Justina's father was Dusius, in the city of Antioch. Hearing the way of religion from a deacon named Prohelius, they were baptized by the holy bishop Optatus. And the virgin Justina, serving the Lord, frequented the church. Agladius the scholastic, seeing her, burned with love of her; and when he could in no way reach her, he asked Cyprian the magician and promised him two talents of gold if he could rouse the virgin Justina to love of him. And Cyprian the magician, having called up the demons, began to work that they should bring the Virgin of Christ to him; and they, coming once, twice, and a third time to the blessed Justina, availed nothing with her by their deceits, but, driven off by the sign of the Cross, withdrew defeated. And Cyprian, when he saw that their power had by no means prevailed against the Virgin, says to the devil: Tell me, how have you been overcome by the virgin Justina? To whom the devil: We cannot tell you unless you first swear to me. And when Cyprian had sworn to them, the devil said: I saw the sign of the Crucified, and I was afraid. Cyprian said: Is the Crucified, then, greater than you? The devil says to him: Yes, for he is greater than all. Hearing this, Cyprian, despising the power of the devil, came running to the bishop Anthimus, fell at his feet and asked that he would teach him and seal him with the baptism of Christ. And the blessed bishop, giving thanks to God, catechized him. And Cyprian, returning to his house, broke all his idols in pieces.

[6] and carefully avoided the things which there Then, returning to the church, he began diligently to listen to the word of salvation. Afterwards, sitting at the hour at which the catechumens were sent out of the church, he was admonished by the deacon to go out with the rest of the catechumens. But turning to the deacon, he says to him: I have been made a servant of Christ, and do you send me out? The deacon says to him: Have you been made a perfect servant of God? Cyprian said: Christ lives for me, who confounded the demons and had mercy on me; for I do not go out from here until I have been made a perfect servant of Christ. And the deacon reported this to bishop Anthimus, who, having instructed him according to the order, baptized him, and not long afterwards ordained him deacon as well; and he, growing in doctrine and in character more than could be told, flourished most brilliantly in the glory of miracles. Indeed, after no long interval of time he was made bishop, and appointed the holy Justina mother of virgins. The devil, not bearing their virtue, brought it about through his satellites, with Eutolmius the count of the East, that Cyprian the bishop and Justina the virgin of Christ should be arrested. And when they had been led bound in chains before his presence, the count said to the blessed Cyprian: Are you Cyprian, the teacher of the Christians, who by your sorceries have made many go astray? The blessed Cyprian said: At one time, set in the perdition of demons, I made many lustful; but God saved me through the virgin Justina, when I wished to tempt her by demons, all of which she, armed with the faith of Christ, despised in every respect. The wicked count ordered that after this the holy Bishop be hung up and torn with iron claws; but that the blessed Justina, after blows on the face, be savagely beaten with raw sinews; then that the holy Bishop be shut up in prison, and the holy Virgin be kept in the house of a certain matron.

[7] And after some days, when they had been brought back into his presence, he ordered them to be roasted in an iron frying pan, give the greater offense. the attendants pouring pitch, fat, and wax over them. And when they were there uttering the praise of almighty God, Athanasius, a priest of the idols, made request of the count, saying: Let your excellency give the order, and in the name of the Gods I will overcome the power of the Christians. And when he had drawn near to the frying pan, a flame burst out and consumed him. The count, having received so many miracles which Christ was working in his Servants, wrote to the emperor to ask what he should order concerning them. And he wrote back that they should be sent to Nicomedia and there be struck with the sword. They were therefore brought to the place of beheading; and a certain Christian, Theognitus, saw them, and running up kissed Cyprian; seeing which, Servius, a kinsman of the king, in anger brought it about that Theognitus should be beheaded with the holy Cyprian and Justina. And the bodies of the Saints lay cast out to the beasts, unburied, for six days. But certain Christian sailors carried them off by night, and sailing away bore them to the city of Rome; and the venerable matron Rufina, receiving them reverently, buried them on her estate. And they suffered on the sixth of the Kalends of October. Thus far Ado, abridging some Passion and at the same time avoiding most of the things which there were bound to offend a critical reader most of all, such as the names of the emperors under whom the Martyrs are said to have suffered and been crowned.

[8] Yet he did not thereby cut away everything on account of which the Acts he used Hence and there the name of St. Theoctistus varies, who seems by the Greeks have fallen under suspicion of forgery and fiction, as we shall see. Notker abridged Ado's announcement again, and in him the proper names are much dislocated. Wandelbert sings thus:

On the sixth the martyr Cyprian rejoices, whom the blessed virgin Justina made to know the kingdom of God, His mad arts and frenzies at last forsaken.

It has not pleased me to review above certain Martyrologies and Calendars which are here and there reckoned among the Hieronymian, in which the mention of our Saints everywhere appears to have been introduced later; I here omit to enumerate other more recent martyrologists after the classic ones, for whatever they hand down has proceeded from those already cited. Ado and Notker join Theognitus to SS. Cyprian and Justina, and he is likewise commemorated in the Brussels supplement to Usuard and in various Acts of the martyrdom. The Martyrology of Notker published by Canisius calls him Theognotus, the Brussels Usuard Theogintus, in which fashion his name is written in various manuscript Passions. Metaphrastes, in the Greek transcript which we have, calls him Theoctistus, whence in Lipomanus and Surius the holy Martyr's name is likewise found written thus, as also in the Acts to be published, which form we shall accordingly retain. The Greeks in the Menæa at the third day of October commemorate SS. Theoctistus, Theogenes, and Theotecnus as distinct persons; whether they are really to be distinguished may be examined at the aforesaid day.

[9] Certainly Theoctistus, of whom no mention is made among the Greeks at the preceding day, to be announced on the 3rd of October. The birthday is uncertain. seems to be that same man who met SS. Cyprian and Justina as they were being hurried to death, and, professing himself a Christian, was joined with them in the laurel. Castellanus in his Universal Martyrology announces St. Theoctistus among the Greeks at the third day of October; among the Addenda for the XXVI of September he notes that there is to be joined to the announcement of our Saints: St. Theoctistus, a sailor, suffered martyrdom by the same sentence. Those Saints have a church at Toulouse, which gives the name of St. Cyprian (S. Subrein) to the suburb where it is situated. In his Aëmeris, again treating of the same man, he says that it is uncertain whether St. Theoctistus is to be venerated on the XXV of September with the Latins or on the 2nd of October with the Greeks. In both numbers there is an error, as is abundantly clear from what has been set out. But why Castellanus asserts that the Saint was a sailor has hitherto been unknown to me. I fear, however, that it may have proceeded from a rather slight conjecture, and that the Saint is believed to have been one of those Catholic sailors who in the Acts are asserted to have carried the bodies of the Martyrs from Nicomedia to Rome. Further, as regards their birthday, whether it is better celebrated on the 2nd of October, on which it is announced by the Greeks, or rather on the XXVI of September, on which it is entered in the Calendars of the Latins, can scarcely, or not even scarcely, be decided. Whatever Latin Acts of their martyrdom I have hitherto seen assert that their death occurred on the XXVI of September; Metaphrastes throws it back to the 2nd of October, from what source he drew this I do not know. Unless he followed much more ancient Acts, it is fair that the Greeks should here yield to the Latins, among whom there are very many testimonies earlier than the age of Metaphrastes, as is beyond doubt from the Martyrologies and from more than one Passion.

[10] Their Greek and Latin Acts in manuscript. And indeed we have the Martyrdom of SS. Cyprian and Justina in two excellent codices preserved in our Museum, of which the one is marked Q. Ms. 6, the other Q. Ms. 7. It is plainly the same, differing only in a few words. I have before my eyes a transcript extracted from a certain anonymous codex, and collated with the manuscripts of St. Maximinus of Trier and of St. Omer, which differ no more from each other than from our codices. Besides the Latin Acts, there were sent to my Predecessors Greek ones transcribed from the Medicean manuscript of the king of France, and I am informed at the head of it that similar ones are found in the manuscript of the queen of Sweden marked num. 13. Papebroch in his Greek-Muscovite Ephemerides testifies that a Greek Passion was seen by him at Rome, a copy of which I have not found. If it is not different from that of which I have the transcript just mentioned, the loss is easily borne, since it is plain that it is the misshapen offspring of Simeon Metaphrastes, of which we have the Latin version in Lipomanus and Surius, much different from and more faulty than the other Latin Acts hitherto reviewed. In the Catalogue of the royal Library of Paris, volume 3 of the Greek manuscripts, various Passions of our Saints are assigned, the openings of which had given me no small hope that I had detected the genuine Acts of SS. Cyprian and Justina which Eudocia used; but the outcome disappointed the hope, of which more below. Edmond Martène, in volume 3 of his Thesaurus anecdotorum, column [ ] and following, published from a manuscript codex of St. Ouen of Rouen the Acts of our holy Martyrs, written, as indeed he says, by a contemporary author, in three books. Similar ones, if not entirely the same, I have in a manuscript transcript which seems to have been part of a larger collection of Lives of the Saints, from which all the rest has been so torn away that I can nowhere discover whence it was extracted or sent to us. A continuous

and scrupulous agreement in almost the very words with the text published by Martène suggests the suspicion that it likewise reached my Predecessors from Rouen. The part, or first book, of these Acts comprises the Conversion of St. Justina, as is set forth in the title; the second, the Penitence of St. Cyprian; the third, finally, the Passion of both. The second part, separated from the rest, had already been published earlier by John Fell, the heterodox bishop of Oxford, at the end of the Works of St. Cyprian, bishop and martyr of Carthage, and he had extracted it from three codices of English libraries. I have the same in two copies, of which one was transcribed from the manuscript codex of St. Maximinus of Trier, the other was sent to us in the year 1666 from that of Orcamp by Louis Nicquet, keeper of the library of the Celestines of Soissons.

[11] All these Confessions, or rather one and the same in different codices, and published. St. Gregory Nazianzen are in Latin. The first, so far as I know, and hitherto the only one to publish in Greek a similar work marked with our Saint's name, and to furnish it with a new version, was Prudentius Maran, a Benedictine of the congregation of St. Maur, who, as he notes in his Preface, completed the edition of the Works of St. Cyprian of Carthage which had been begun by Baluze and cut short by his death. Among the various things which that learned man added to the remains of Baluze, there is inserted among the Opuscula which are commonly ascribed to St. Cyprian a Confession, the Greek manuscript copy of which he testifies that he received from the famous Colbertine library. Before we dispute further about the assertions of the martyrologists enumerated and the worth of the monuments hitherto reviewed, it will be well to have brought forward the testimonies of undoubted writers who were nearer in time to the holy Martyrs and could have had a closer view of their deeds. Among these the first to come is St. Gregory Nazianzen, famous among the Greek Fathers for his erudition and his flood of eloquence. He flourished after the middle of the fourth century, and so is later in age than St. Cyprian by not a full century. But — what is most to be lamented — so many titles that at first suggested the hope of uncovering undoubted truth did not fortify the holy man against the errors into which other writers are wont to slip. For to this day it is plain to the learned that the two Cyprians were so confused by Gregory Nazianzen, and their Acts so intermixed, that what is to be ascribed to which can scarcely, or not even scarcely, be discerned. Indeed it cannot even be decided with sufficient certainty which of them he undertook to praise; so that some contend that the panegyric was delivered on the occasion of the feast of our St. Cyprian of Antioch, while others protest and assert that it was St. Cyprian of Carthage who was praised before the assembly, and that the history or fable of the other was foisted upon him.

[12] Concerning the cult of St. Cyprian of Carthage, so widely spread and famous throughout the East in the time of Gregory Nazianzen, the deeds of our St. Cyprian there is indeed no evidence from elsewhere; but it is most likely that our St. Cyprian was famous there while he lived, and, having suffered in the heart of the East, soon obtained a cult. But the manner in which St. Gregory praises his Cyprian seems again to make it more doubtful of which of the two he is chiefly speaking, or to which of them he applies the deeds of his namesake. For whatever he reviews that pertains to St. Cyprian of Carthage he seems to me to run over as though he knew that his hearers were well acquainted with it from elsewhere; but on the contrary he relates more fully, as though new, whatever has proceeded from the Acts of St. Cyprian of Antioch: which, if I am not mistaken, he would have done the other way about if he had brought the known deeds of the latter into his panegyric and had mingled with them the deeds of the other, less known and not familiar to his hearers. Whatever be the case with this controversy, of which we shall treat elsewhere also, Gregory praised St. Cyprian in the Oration which, among his Works published by Jacobus Billius with a Latin interpretation and Notes, is the eighteenth. Again the learned do not agree as to where the said Oration was delivered. Billius inserted in his Notes the following argument of the Oration from the Greek of Nicetas: A certain steep mountain overhangs Nazianzus, at whose roots there is a spring of hot waters. When, therefore, the Theologian was staying there, partly out of a desire for a quiet and tranquil life, partly for the relief which the use of the baths brought him when he was suffering in the kidneys, he had been unable to be present at the feast of the great Cyprian, whose church was a short distance from the city. On the day after that on which the commemoration of the Martyr was wont to be celebrated, therefore, returning to Nazianzus, he delivered this Oration in his praise. So Nicetas, suitably enough to the matter of the Oration, but perhaps from conjecture alone, which nevertheless has nothing whereby it might be convicted of falsehood. Not a few other writers think that Gregory pronounced on St. Cyprian at Constantinople, where he occupied the episcopal see for some years; according to which opinion he could have delivered that Oration about the year 380, at which time he was governing that same chair; and thus Gregory's words will be understood no less conveniently.

[13] he confused with the affairs of his namesake of Carthage At the beginning of the panegyric Gregory speaks thus: Cyprian has almost escaped us — O what a great loss! and this you have suffered, you who look up to him most of all men and honor him with yearly honors and feasts. From this it becomes plain that the Oration was delivered in a place where the celebrity of St. Cyprian was singular, and it is not credible that this was established there without a particular reason. But which of the aforesaid cities had such a reason I cannot say, so that on this side the whole matter remains altogether uncertain. From another quarter it appears likely to me that Antioch of Pisidia was the native place of both Martyrs, and the neighborhood of Nazianzus, to which the Saints could easily have made an excursion, or their fame have penetrated, furnishes probability for this side; but for Constantinople there can serve both the more famous cult there of all the Martyrs who suffered throughout the whole East, and also the neighborhood of Nicomedia, where the Saints were crowned by the river Gallus. If anything had become known concerning Solomon's, where the Menæa assert that their martyrdom is celebrated, perhaps some light would shine here from that quarter; for I do not know whether the word there omitted after beyond is to be restored by Constantinople as certainly as some hastily assert. Certainly the knowledge of any such place to be located near Constantinople does not occur elsewhere. Be that as it may, if Gregory delivered the panegyric at Constantinople, it is likely that this was done about the time assigned; but if at Nazianzus, since after his father's death he scarcely seems to have discharged episcopal duties there, it is credible that it happened before that death, which is usually placed in the year of Christ 374. In a part of that Oration, moreover, he relates what the manner of (St. Cyprian's) earlier life was, what was the way of his salvation, and what his calling. And he says that his own plan is not to be disapproved, in wishing to narrate the crimes of Cyprian before he was converted to the faith, since Cyprian himself so lashes the foulness of his own earlier life in a long discourse that he offers even the confession of his crimes to God in the place of a gift, and stands as a way for many of those who call back their minds from a wicked and shameful manner of life to hope for something better. From this it appears not obscurely that Cyprian committed to writing a certain narrative of his sins and crimes; for unless this be so understood, Gregory's argument is nothing. What that Confession was will shortly be plain. Let us follow Gregory as he narrates, especially in those things which cannot be ascribed to the doctor of Carthage and are accordingly to be attributed to our St. Cyprian. Consider, therefore (he says), what the wickedness of that man (St. Cyprian) was, and how great and grievous. He was a worshiper of demons who afterwards was a disciple of Christ, and a most bitter persecutor who afterwards stood forth as a great champion of the truth; and both by deed and by words … he troubled our way, who afterwards by both rendered outstanding service to the Christians. Now how great an addition was made to this evil from the magic art, by which above all he had come to men's notice; and how greatly, too, these crimes were aggravated by the intemperance and lust of the body, which has such force that it drives even men otherwise wise into frenzy and compels them to think worse, snatching reason along with it after the manner of a wanton and untamed colt! But now the Oration betakes itself to the very head of the evil.

[14] Nor indeed let anyone, looking upon the earliest part of Cyprian's life, indulge in pleasures; and what our Saint rather let him be chastened by the last part and called back to chastity. There was a certain virgin born of patrician stock and endowed with honorable character … and this Virgin was of exceedingly noble and outstanding beauty, a sincere Bride of Christ… With love of her the great Cyprian was taken captive: whence and how, I hardly know; seeing that the Virgin was safe on every side and endowed with gravity of character… Nor was he only taken captive, but he also assailed her chastity… For the rest, he himself indeed solicited her, and as a procurer he uses, not some old woman fit for such business, but a certain demon that loves bodies and pleasure… But the Girl, as soon as she perceived the evil and understood the snare, … what does she do, and what does she contrive against the artificer of vice? All other remedies being despaired of, she flees to God, and against that detestable love takes her Bridegroom as patron and defender. Here he gathers a few examples of divine protection from Holy Scripture and elsewhere, and then continues: Commemorating these things and more than these, and suppliantly beseeching the Virgin Mary to bring aid to the imperiled Virgin, fortifying herself with the medicine of fasting and of the chameunia (that is, of sleeping upon the pavement or on the ground), partly that she might darken the comeliness of her beauty as being full of snares, and thus withdraw the fuel of the flame and consume the torch of lust, partly that by her own affliction she might render God propitious and easy to entreat… The Virgin conquers, the demon is conquered. The tempter comes to the lover and makes known that he has been overcome, and for that reason is despised by him. Taking this ill, he avenges himself upon one who despised him.

[15] And what is this vengeance? He passes into that very man by whom he had before been worshiped, committed before his conversion, … and from the Virgin indeed he is driven back, just as some engine of war from a firm and strong wall, being put to flight by speech and by prayers; but with him by whom he had been sent he wrestles… What then does that mad Lover and prudent demoniac do here? He seeks and finds the driving off of the evil… He flees to the God of the Virgin …; he betakes himself to her shepherd; as he had been cleansed of love through the blow he received, so he is cleansed of the evil spirit through faith in Christ, and he changes his love. This thing befell the bishop as so new and wonderful that for a long time he refused him credence and drove him off, because it seemed incredible and like a miracle that Cyprian should ever be numbered among the Christians, even if all other men should take up that religion. For the rest, he changes (rather, he is changed or converted, for the Greek is μετατίθεται) and gives a plain proof of his change. For he publicly sets forth his magic books and triumphs over the weakness of that depraved treasure, proclaims his madness, raises a huge flame from them, and consumes with fire that long-lasting imposture which had not been able to bring aid even to one flame of the flesh; he withdraws from the demons, joins himself to God, and — O the wondrous power of grace! — through a wicked love and spirit he finds God and is made a holy sheep of the holy flock, and even, as I have heard from a certain person, its sacristan; and that too after many prayers offered by him, that for the cleansing of his former arrogance

he might practice humility. Then he is made a shepherd, and the best and most approved of shepherds. Thus far Gregory, adding thereafter many things which agree almost entirely with what SS. Jerome, Augustine, and Pontius assert about St. Cyprian of Carthage, as much as everything hitherto recited conflicts with their silence and with their contrary testimonies.

[16] he wrongly attributed to the other. That St. Cyprian of Carthage, before he received the faith, was a lover of the liberal arts and distinguished in philosophical learning and in the praise of eloquence, all these alike hand down; but that he was a magician, and so steeped in diabolical arts that it was chiefly under that name that he was famous among men — this his disciple St. Pontius, and SS. Jerome and Augustine and other writers, could not have been ignorant of, and yet they have brought forward not a word of any such thing. That the doctor of Carthage sought after men's praises and the smoke of empty glory by the art of oratory, as men of that sort were wont to do, these same writers suggest; but that he served lust so shamefully and stained his life with such enormous crimes they do not insinuate — they who have not so much as mentioned in a word, even in those places where the power of divine grace could most of all have been commended by so beautiful an example, that the orator, while still a pagan, was entangled in or given over to such crimes and sins. Finally, St. Cyprian of Carthage himself, in more than one place, and especially in his epistle to Donatus, exaggerating rather than extenuating the errors of his past life out of humility, testifies indeed that he was not free from those sins which are wont to be common to heathen men of the sort of profession he practiced; but not a word occurs from which you might nourish even the slightest suspicion that he had fallen desperately into crimes so horrible as those which Gregory relates of Cyprian. I pass over that whatever is related by him concerning Justina can by no means be attributed to the Carthaginian. These things, therefore, pertain to our Saint; nor are they fictions wrongly foisted from rumors upon Cyprian of Carthage, as we shall prove below. Meanwhile it will be well to remember that these things were said by Gregory scarcely a century after the martyrdom of St. Cyprian of Carthage, and scarcely seventy years after the passion of ours, if it happened under Diocletian. Let us pass on to the more certain testimony of Eudocia Augusta concerning him.

§ II. The work of Eudocia Augusta concerning our holy Martyrs. The assertions of Gregory Nazianzen are compared with it, and inquiry is made into the occasion by which he was led into error in confusing the two SS. Cyprian.

[ ] The empress Eudocia's Eudocia, daughter of Leontius the Athenian philosopher, instructed from her tender years in the humaner letters and in the philosophical and mathematical disciplines, and in the year 421 taken by Theodosius the Younger into the partnership of his bed at the instigation of Pulcheria Augusta, left to posterity several small works, by which she obtained a great name among the learned. Concerning these, Socrates, Photius, and very many of the Greeks. Photius, the schismatic patriarch of Constantinople, no less famous for his erudition than for his crimes, flourished after the middle of the ninth century, and among his very many Works there survives to this day his Bibliotheca, in which he reviews the books he had read. Among these, at page 414 of the edition of our Andreas Schottus, he begins to enumerate the works of Eudocia Augusta. In codex 184 he treats of her work composed in honor of our Saints. His words, although somewhat lengthy, since they will serve us as a touchstone, I have judged should be transferred here entire. He writes thus: I read, in the same kind of verse (heroic, in which he had said the preceding codex, containing the Metaphrase of the Octateuch, was written by the same woman) and the same idiom, the Metaphrase of the Prophetic books, of the blessed Zachariah and of the illustrious Daniel. And the same grace of craftsmanship adorned these also. In this same volume likewise were contained, written in a similar form of verses, three Books in praise of the blessed Cyprian the martyr; and the poems themselves showed, as children are wont to show their mother, that this offspring too was a legitimate one of the Augusta. The first of these Books pursues the affairs of the blessed martyr Justina: how, being adopted into the number of the Christians, she brought over her parents also from the worship of idols to that of the true God; and how a certain man, taken with love of her, having solicited her in vain, betook himself to Cyprian, who was given over to magic arts, asking him to succor a desperate lover and render the Girl compliant to him.

[18] He adds that Cyprian, having tried in vain all the resources of the magic art, sent the most violent and most destructive demons to assail the Virgin's chastity; concerning our Saints but that these, covered with shame and overcome, were driven back by the sign of the most holy Cross, as he learned from them. Wherefore he laid aside his mind's inclination toward those wicked spirits, and gave all his magic books to the flames; and finally, imbued with the Christian faith, he was soon also baptized and appointed doorkeeper of the church. Indeed he even received gifts of charisms from God, and so freed some men from diseases and others from demons, until at last he was adorned also with the dignity of archbishop (so indeed Schottus rendered τὸ ἀρχιερατικοῦ, concerning which below). And these things the first book contains. The second thereafter, while it fetches the affairs of Cyprian a little further back from the beginning, brings him in narrating in his own person his zeal for idols from boyhood onward, and his worship of demons, and his desire and effort to learn the magic art. What other things he thereafter learned concerning the nature of various herbs and plants and living creatures, and how he saw also various mockeries of the demons. Likewise how, having set out from Athens to Argos and thence into Phrygia, he was everywhere appointed a sacrificer to the demons, and gathered much practice of the magic art. He goes on besides to relate how for the same reasons he came into Egypt and attended the games, and what unexpected and very absurd things he saw and observed there, among others the images.

[19] He adds that, when he was already reaching his thirtieth year, metrical work he came to the Chaldeans, and, instructed in their letters, thoroughly learned astrology and whatever else among them seemed worth knowing. And that at last he saw all these things refuted, when, after the foolish — or rather soul-destroying — labor spent upon these arts, he was repulsed by the martyr Justina. He likewise here commemorates certain things by which he at times presented himself as another man, and at times transformed others; and how, withdrawing from the worship of the demons, he felt the evil spirit threatening him and terrifying him even to despair; and how he was freed from the fear of these when he fell in with a godly man whose name was Timothy. How moreover at Antioch, before a crowded audience, he related that he had wrought many wicked and prodigious things, by which he so deceived men that they took him for God. And so, as he wetted his cheeks with tears and mourning over these things from the memory of his wicked deeds, he would have fallen again into despair of salvation, had not a certain Eusebius, an excellent guide to godliness and penitence, scattering the cloud of despair by the words of holy Scripture and by sacred narratives, illumined him with the rays of clear hope, and, having led him into his own house, bidden him take food, worn out as he already was by a three days' fast. He relates likewise how he was led by him into the sacred church, and with his own hand, before the multitude, gave to the flames the books of his magic art which had been brought there, and moreover distributed his goods to the poor, and was thereupon joined to the assembly of the Christians. And this Eusebius, he says, was adorned with the dignity of the priesthood. There is added how Aglaïdas, that troublesome suitor of Justina, when he had not obtained his desire, likewise paid out all his goods of fortune to the poor, and, having sent back word of dismissal to the demons as deceivers, devoted himself to the Christian rites. In which is the end of the second book.

[20] was a faithful metaphrase The third, finally, comprises the martyrdom of blessed Cyprian and of the illustrious virgin Justina, who, while Diocletian and Maximian were reigning at Rome, bore witness to the faith by their death. For they were carried off together to the laurel of martyrdom: Cyprian indeed from his native city Antioch, whose archbishopric also (again Schottus so rendered the same Greek word ἀρχιερατικὸν) he had administered after Anthimus; but Justina from Damascus, for there she openly professed Christ after she had removed from Antioch (which was also the Virgin's native place). These being thus taken, when he was in no way moved by the words of that impious man, they are carried up on high by bonds, and his sides are scraped, while she is beaten with ox-sinews. But when they seem to the tyrant to remit nothing of their constancy, he shuts them up in custody, brought back separately. Thence, when he had summoned them and had tried them in vain with words, he cast the Martyrs of God into a bronze frying pan (with pitch, fat, and wax mixed together in it and a great fire kindled). There, when those Athletes bravely endured amid the torments, and rather praised God joyfully as though in dew, because they had come off superior to the torments, a certain wretched Athanasius, a priest of the demons, formerly on very familiar terms with the blessed Cyprian and then by chance assessor to the judge who was inflicting the torments, seized with blindness of mind, dared, invoking his familiar gods, to enter the fire as well. But while he strove to belittle the miracle, if he too should endure there without harm, he rather increased it: for straightway, consumed by the fire, he was turned to ashes.

[21] of the other little work The judge, therefore, hesitating, determined to send the Martyrs to Diocletian, and to write to him both what torments they had endured and how they had proved superior to all punishments. And when the emperor had learned this at Nicomedia, he ordered the Martyrs to be beheaded at the river near the city whose name is Gallus. With these, and at the very same hour, Theoctistus received the palm of martyrdom, this alone being given as the proof of his godliness, that he had greeted the Martyr of Christ. The relics of those Saints certain sailors, recently brought thither from Rome, with whom the martyr Theoctistus had also been on familiar terms, carried off secretly from the guards and conveyed to Rome, where also a beautiful church was raised for them, next to the forum of Claudius, by the labor of Rufina, a pious matron who traced the stock of her family back to the emperor Claudius. And these things indeed in the third book, where at the same time Photius's extract ends. He had premised, in treating of the same Eudocia's Metaphrase of the Octateuch, what the Augusta's method was in reducing such little works to the laws of meter. Illustrious, he says, is this labor, as in heroic verse, if any other ever was. But while she immerses herself more deeply in the laws of art, in this one point alone — yet a very great one, to the praise of those who judge that books ought to be rendered more closely — she falls short of the art: that she neither strives to soothe the ears of young men by poetic license, changing truth into fables, nor again leads the hearer away from the matter proposed by digressions, but so adapts her meter to those old writings word for word that one who turns them over seems to need nothing from them; for she constantly preserves the propriety of the meanings, neither expanding nor contracting anything at all, and in the words, so far as it can be done, she sets down whatever is nearest and most like. Therefore there is nothing in Eudocia's Metaphrase drawn from imagination or from outside, nothing fetched from elsewhere, but all things are such — if you except the words which must serve the meter — as were read in the books which she undertook to adorn with verse.

[22] Would that the praised Metaphrase of Eudocia concerning the Acts of the holy Martyrs had reached our age! On the testimony of Photius, It is examined how St. Gregory fell into the confusion of the two Cyprians. we could for the truth and credibility of the history do without the books which she rendered into verse, and accordingly there would be no need to labor much in the inquiry whether books such as those which lay before her survive to this day;

to which the loss of Eudocia's work compels us. But before we approach that examination, let us discuss whence Gregory Nazianzen drew the assertions which we have just brought forward from him, so badly mixed with the affairs of St. Cyprian of Carthage; or rather, by what occasion so great a man was led into error and confused the deeds of the two Saints. Assuredly, the more I read his Oration and the oftener I read it over again, so much the more do I wonder at this lapse of his, and the less do I dare to lay down anything certain about it. Yet behold what I conjecture. First, as I have already noted above, it is almost certain to me that Gregory read the Confession of St. Cyprian which furnished the matter for book 2 of Eudocia's Metaphrase, and which seems to survive to this day. This is persuaded to me both by Gregory himself, who manifestly calls it the Ἐξαγόρευσις of St. Cyprian, and by the almost continuous conformity of his assertions with that work, of which matter a little below. Nor does it seem to me more doubtful that he did not see the things which are related in books 1 and 3 of the Acts and of Eudocia's Metaphrase, but was wholly ignorant of all these — except perhaps one thing, which he could have drawn from a particular account. What makes me think so is his deepest silence about everything that pertains to the conversion of St. Justina and to her martyrdom with SS. Cyprian and Theoctistus, which matters the said books treat. About these, I say, Gregory's silence, in the circumstances, leads me to believe that they were by no means known to Gregory. For he was speaking in a place — whether it was Constantinople or Nazianzus — where the cult of that St. Cyprian whom he was praising was famous, and where accordingly it is not credible that his deeds were unknown to all.

[23] Let us grant for a moment that Gregory meant to deliver the panegyric on our Martyr of Antioch, [He does not seem to have had knowledge of any other matters concerning our St. Cyprian] and that he knew all the things which I suspect him to have been ignorant of: what sort of man shall we imagine him, and what account shall we supply for so extraordinary a plan in a sacred orator? For he would have had to expose himself knowingly and willingly to the laughter of his hearers, while he cut away the things which most of all adorned St. Cyprian of Antioch, and substituted other and wholly foreign matters, and certainly not more illustrious ones, and palmed them off on men from all of whom, at the least, he ought to have judged that his error could not lie hidden. Nor may you say that all these things were indeed known both to Gregory and perhaps to some of his hearers, but that the Martyr of Antioch and his deeds had by then been laid aside among the fables; for thus you will convict Eudocia — of whom more a little later — of the greatest ignorance, or rather impudence, in that some years afterwards she wished to thrust that history forward again as true, and at the same time you will turn the opinion toward this, that Gregory meant to treat of St. Cyprian of Carthage. This opinion I have hitherto held as sufficiently probable; and let us here in turn hold it for a moment as admitted, that we may show that Gregory would in that case also have erred most shamefully. And indeed he could not have been ignorant that the Confession treats plainly of that same Cyprian whose Passion — as also the Conversion of him and of Justina — he held to be a fable. With what good faith, then, would he not only have adopted the Confession in preference to the rest, but even have attributed it to the other martyr of the same name, the Carthaginian, to whom the things narrated in it cannot apply — as he certainly ought most of all to have perceived at the very moment when he saw it there attributed to the other, namely to the Antiochene? Thence surely a handle was supplied for doubt and examination, after which, duly instituted, I should not dare to suspect that Gregory would have blundered so grossly and set forth such things before an assembly, without rendering any account of his selection: namely, why he judged that these things, no less suspect of fable, were to be adopted above the rest and applied to the other man.

[24] as having been known to him, except those things Unless I am much mistaken, whoever reads the whole Oration through with me more attentively will judge that Gregory ought so much the more to have rendered his hearers an account of this plan of his, because here and there he leaves for them to turn over in their minds, as being abundantly known, the things about St. Cyprian of Carthage which he could have reviewed in detail, while he is wholly taken up with adorning what he had drawn from the Confession and proclaiming it before the assembly as though it had hitherto been unheard of. That he would have done so, if he had read the two other parts of the history, and much less if he had rejected them as fabulous, I cannot bring myself to believe, lest I imagine Gregory to myself as either too negligent or impudent. But if we lay down that the Confession alone came into his hands, then, whichever Cyprian he meant to praise, the error and the confusion introduced from the deeds of the two Cyprians will be more tolerable. For if he purposed to treat of the Carthaginian, and had heard nothing of the martyrdom of our Antiochene and of the other matters pertaining to him and not mentioned in the Confession, then, having come upon that Confession or Penitence, and not being taught in detail about the affairs of the Carthaginian before his conversion, he could by an easy error, if it happened that he did not doubt, ascribe it to the latter, changing a few things which he judged had been introduced into that Confession by mistake — such as perhaps were the various journeys through the East there described for acquiring skill in the magic art, and Antioch as his native place, where the most notorious scenes are related to have been enacted; all of which Gregory either avoided or knowingly cut away, perhaps suspecting that the Carthaginian martyr Cyprian had by no means acted there.

[25] which in the Confession, Nor will the same error seem much graver if we believe that he delivered the panegyric in praise of our Martyr of Antioch: for if, apart from the Confession, he was ignorant of the rest, it is not so much to be wondered at if he took the deeds of the other man of the same name, and one not so famous there, for the affairs of the former, and so blundered as to attempt to combine these with those in an Oration that was in a manner extemporaneous. However that may be, I find no other way of conceiving Gregory's error than if, as I have already said, we suppose that he had no other knowledge of our St. Cyprian than what is comprised in the Confession. One thing further seems capable of being urged in particular against that conjecture. Gregory, namely, speaks thus toward the end of the Oration: But when that God of the Martyrs by no means endured to grant privately to any one person the common good of all (the relics of the holy Martyr), and by a singular favor toward her to bring detriment upon the public advantage, he brings the body forth into the open by a revelation; and this honor again he confers upon a certain worthy woman, that women too may be sanctified from this, that, as they formerly bore Christ and brought the tidings of his resurrection to the Disciples, so now also they have partly disclosed and partly delivered up Cyprian, that is, the public good of the world. This is the last of his praises: thus he comes forth into the midst who was too unworthy to lie in obscurity, nor is the theft of him suffered to be borne with: since he was of a mind too outstanding and excellent to court those honors which are wont to be paid to bodies.

[26] From these things, I say, it might be argued that it did not escape Gregory famous under his name, how the body of St. Cyprian of Antioch was translated to Rome and received by Rufina; and since this is found described toward the end of the Passion, it is likely that this too was read by him and neglected on account of its little fables. Yet these things are not such as at first glance they perhaps appear, and although they cannot pertain to St. Cyprian of Carthage — whose body was carried in triumph on the night next after his martyrdom to the grounds of Macrobius, and did not thereafter lie hidden with any woman — they can be attributed to our Martyr not without some difficulty either, of which, when we treat of the translations of the relics, we shall speak. Meanwhile Gregory could have received these things either by word of mouth or from some particular written account. Indeed, after a few words interposed, he addresses his hearers thus: It is now your part to add of yourselves what remains, so that you too may offer some gift to the Martyr: namely, the crushing of demons, the driving off of diseases, the foreknowledge of things to come — all of which indeed even the very ashes of Cyprian effect, provided faith be there; as those know who have made trial of this matter, and have transmitted the miracle even to us, and will hand down the memory of it to posterity also. By these last words Gregory indicates that he had not found these things in any monument that could be read by all, but had received them either from an oral account or at least from a particular and recently written one; since he says that the memory is to be commended to posterity, doubtless by some testimony to be written down.

[27] Finally, that he drew some things from the mouths of others he manifestly testifies about the middle of the same Oration, in Eudocia in these words: As I have received from a certain person — namely that St. Cyprian sought with many tears, out of humility, and obtained the office of sacristan or keeper of the church; which he certainly ought not to have said if he had read the first part of our history, where the same thing was asserted, as may be seen from the epitome of Eudocia's Metaphrase in Photius. Further, just as Gregory has nothing of the things related there in books 1 and 3, so whatever he inserted into the Oration about St. Cyprian of Antioch agrees closely with what is narrated in book 2 of Eudocia and with the assertions in the Confession of St. Cyprian; which conformity has brought it about, even among those who hold Cyprian's Confession to be a supposititious invention, that they have believed it was read by Gregory, and they carry back its antiquity to the times of Constantine and the beginning of the fourth century. Nothing, I say, has Gregory in these matters that conflicts with Eudocia's narrative, and there are altogether very few points in which he seems to depart from the Confession which we have to this day. One, noted in the Menæa, could already be observed above: namely, that Gregory makes no mention of Aglaïdas, the Virgin's suitor, who had solicited Justina in every way to love and to marriage and had induced Cyprian to bend her to his will by magic arts; on the contrary, he suggests that Cyprian himself burned with wicked lust toward the Virgin, and set every engine in motion in vain for the sake of possessing her.

[28] But this is a slighter discordance — indeed almost none at all. In the often-mentioned Confession, are related. both Greek and Latin, not Aglaïdas alone but Cyprian himself also is said to have burned with desire for Justina, should the aid sought from the demons give success; meaning that he would treacherously abuse or cheat the wishes of Aglaïdas the suitor and his desire. Gregory, praising Cyprian for the amendment of his life, omitted the loves of Aglaïdas, as he did not a few other things, as being unnecessary to his purpose and not likely to add luster, in order to bring forward the things that pertained to St. Cyprian alone and ought to commend him alone; which certainly is by no means to be wondered at in an orator, as also if he brought forward certain things with some exaggeration. Such is probably what follows. The Virgin conquers, the demon is conquered. The tempter comes to the Lover and makes known that he has been overcome, and for that reason is despised by him. Taking this ill, he avenges himself upon the Despiser: he passes into that very man by whom he was worshiped… What then does that mad Lover and prudent Demoniac do here? Cyprian, namely, whom he depicts in living colors as possessed by a demon or an energumen; by exaggeration, that is, from what he had read in the Confession, that St. Cyprian was violently terrified and almost choked by the demon gnashing over its own defeat

I pass over several similar points in which Gregory seems to depart from the account of the Confession, since it is clear that the whole difference arose from the orator's office and from the flowers of eloquence, and that, these being cut away, the same thing is narrated. But we shall treat at greater length of the testimonies of Gregory and Eudocia compared with the Confession, when we refute Fell, who explodes both this and all the other Acts as fables.

§ III. The remaining monuments written about our Saints are examined; which of them, and of what sort, are to be published.

[ ] Eudocia seems to have combined her Metaphrase from three little works, Since St. Gregory Nazianzen wrote in the same century in which the holy Martyrs were crowned, and the empress Eudocia in the next, and since she indeed treated the material with the purpose I have now often mentioned, those monuments, I think, ought to be more precious to us which most agree with their testimonies; and certainly those are most excellent, if any survive, which could have lain before those writers, such as they are, and have furnished them their material. Let us investigate whether any such have come down to our times. In the first place it is certain that the Acts, such as they were published by Martène, cited at num. 10, are not different, as regards the order and disposition of the material and the narrative, from those which Eudocia rendered into verses in her Metaphrase, as anyone will presently admit who compares them with Photius's analysis. Indeed, whatever I have hitherto seen does not depart much from them, since the Confession of St. Cyprian, which forms Eudocia's book 2, may seem to have been torn away from them, or, if you prefer, to have been inserted into them perhaps by Eudocia herself. Certainly nothing hinders us from holding that Eudocia combined her Metaphrase out of three different little works — namely, the Conversion of St. Justina, which is comprised in book 1; the Confession of St. Cyprian, in the second; and lastly the Passion of both Saints, in the third — whose example was afterwards followed either by the Latin translator or, before him, by some Greek, and from which the Acts such as we have them in Martène grew together.

[30] to which, however that may be, various similar pieces still survive to this day, What makes me think that this rather is what happened are both the titles still there prefixed to the several parts, and the two prologues and the endings dividing one part from another; and also that the Acts which begin The illumination of our Lord agree about these very marks of division, and that the parts are found separated from one another both in Greek and in Latin, as we shall now see. In the first place, as regards the Confession of St. Cyprian, it is everywhere found divided from the remaining parts. The old Latin version is so found in several codices, as I have already noted above at num. 10 and XI; the same is also read separately in Greek, as is plain from that which Maranus published and translated into Latin. The first and third parts also survive, connected together after a fashion, in manifold codices: namely everywhere where the beginning of the Acts is The illumination of our Lord, which we shall presently show to be the same as Martène's, if you except the Confession and a few other things. I have hitherto not seen those parts separated from one another, that is, one without the other, in Latin codices; but Fr. Gabriel Brotier, prefect of our library at Paris, first informed me that the third alone is read in some manuscripts of the library of the king of France, and then diligently transcribed it and most courteously shared it with me. Let us now compare and examine these several items, first with what Martène published, and then with the assertions of Eudocia. And first indeed the Acts which we have in several manuscript codices, comprising the first and third parts of Martène's, begin thus: The illumination of our Lord Jesus Christ the Savior was made from heaven, and, the words of the prophets being fulfilled, the whole world that is under heaven was illumined by the word of God, and those believing in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit were baptized. And there was added also the virgin Justina, whose father was Edusius, in the city of Antioch, which is next to the place that is called Daphne.

[31] In the printed Catalogue of the manuscript codices of the library of the king of France, volume 2, among the Greek manuscripts there are assigned, in Codex 1454, num. 15, Acts of SS. Cyprian of Antioch and Justina, [which are compared with one another. The Conversion of St. Justina to be published,] which begin: τῆς ἐπιφανείας τοῦ Κυρίου ἡμῶν, which seem to be the same from which our Latin version just mentioned was translated. A Passion of SS. Cyprian and Justina occurs more than once elsewhere in the same Catalogue; and since I suspected that the errors which are found in the Latin Acts, and not in one only, had arisen from the translator's ignorance or from the drowsiness of later copyists, I asked the said Fr. Brotier to consult the codices assigned and to inform me whether anything could be hoped from them. He performed both with the same courtesy, and reported that the assigned codex 1454 is so disfigured and eaten away that it can scarcely, or not even scarcely, be read, easily half the letters on each page being effaced. He added that those Acts, both there and in the other codices assigned, can by no means be compared with the others which he transcribed and of which more will have to be said below. John Fell, in the Admonition prefixed to Ado's elogium concerning our Saints, says that he had at first determined to publish the Lives and Martyrdoms of SS. Cyprian and Justina from a Greek codex, but changed his mind because they did not seem worthy to have good paper spent on them. Of what sort those monuments are I do not know from elsewhere; but if he judged them unworthy of the light only for the reasons which I shall refute, the learned will justly lament the omission. Meanwhile for the first part of the Acts, which is entitled the Conversion of St. Justina, we are compelled to use only the old Latin version, whose beginning I have already given; in which it could just now be observed that no mention is made of Diocletian, under whose reign the conversion of St. Justina is placed in Martène's Acts, and which, since it preceded the death of the Saints by many years, does not seem to have been able to fall under the same emperor, as Eudocia says.

[32] In what follows our manuscripts flow along with Martène's as far as these words at the end of column 1624: from that printed by Martène in certain points Then Cyprian assailed her with many devices; for these things, and all that is there related in the two whole columns following about the pestilence and the other vexations sent upon Antioch by the demon on Justina's account, are not found in our manuscripts mentioned above; but after these words, I withdrew, dissolved like smoke, the devil continues thus: But if you wish to learn the power of her victory, swear to me, and I will tell you. Cyprian asks, as in Martène: By what shall I swear to you? and then the rest follows, agreeing almost word for word, to the end of the first part. What is here interposed in Martène is not indeed mentioned by Gregory or Eudocia, but occurs in abridged form in the Confession, both Greek and Latin, whence it could have been transferred into the Acts and amplified. Further, the closing clause of the first part in Martène is not found in our Acts, but after these words, and he increased the flock of Christ, the whole Confession also being omitted, there immediately follows, When the prophetic words had been fulfilled, which is the beginning of the third part of the Acts in Martène. There are few things in this first part to be criticized, which we shall discuss in the following sections. Meanwhile these manuscript Acts of ours seem to excel the printed ones in this, that, as I have already said, they do not place the conversion of St. Justina under the reign of Diocletian, within which, together with the same Saint's passion, it seems it can only with difficulty be included, the other chronological notes standing as they do. Martène's Acts too have indeed their own advantage over ours in this part, in that they designate Antioch only vaguely as St. Justina's native place, where ours, by these words Antioch, which is next to the place that is called Daphne, clearly determine the metropolis of Syria, which at least does not seem to have been the theater where the whole affair was enacted, as we shall see below. However that may be, since this Conversion of ours survives in several most ancient manuscripts, does not deservedly yield to Martène's, and has not hitherto been published, I have determined to print it collated.

[33] But because the passage in Martène of which I spoke in the preceding number is rather long, and chiefly and would extend the Annotations too far, I here subjoin it from our anonymous transcript. Thus the reader will at the same time be able to perceive the slight discrepancy between this and the one which Martène used. It runs thus. Then again Cyprian sought * her with many devices, and could in no way overcome her; nor could any art of the evil one conquer her: not sickness, not fear, not pains, not phantasms, not threats, not flattering thoughts, not possessions, not the sweet desire of food, not the condemnation of her parents, not the onset of robbers, not treacheries. For the Girl overcame all these by the power of Christ. But because our God was testing the merits of his Virgin, the devil was permitted to strike her with a most grievous sickness, so that her friends despaired of her. And her parents wept and mourned; but she, signing herself, said to them: I shall not die, nor do I feel the sickness, but it is to me as though a passing of fever from the breath of the air. And signing herself, she put to flight all the works of the wicked dragon that were done against her. Then the devil, as against Job, so also against the holy Virgin fought with every malice of his power: for, doing many evils to her parents, he caused them to be condemned. He killed their shepherds together with the flocks, and killed the oxen and asses and all the four-footed beasts that were in their house; he wrought destruction of their servants, and slew many of their kindred; for many days and nights too he shook the foundations of their house. But there was there an invisible physician, who, secretly visiting her, scattered all the works of the evil one. But those who were troubled by the enemy's arts, and all her kindred, coming, cried out against the Virgin, saying: All that is ours is perishing. And they entreated the parents of St. Justina and said: Give your Daughter to lawful marriage, for the begetting of children; on her account we have been destroyed by the gods, and on her account we perish. But the holy Justina consoled them in Christ, saying: Be patient and do not despair, but ascribe every loss to me; for you shall receive all things now, and in the world to come life eternal.

[34] Again the enemy by his evil art gave a portent in all Antioch, in one place quite lengthy, announcing through the demons that there would be a mortality in the city unless the virgin Justina were given in marriage: for so the gods had signified. Then almost the whole city was imperiled by a grievous disease: for no small crowd lay in their beds from bodily infirmity. And the multitude of the city rose up against Justina's parents, and all the people cried out at their door and threatened to kill them, urging the Virgin to the union of lawful marriage. But she resisted and gainsaid the divination of the demons. And they cried out to her father, saying: Be a father to the city and not an adversary. If you are a lover of the city, consent

to the city; grant us who ask you that your daughter be joined in marriage. A young man loves a young girl, as nature requires. Why do you transgress the laws of marriage, and defraud men of the birth of children? The gods will this, and we ask it; that the sons of these and their grandsons may be leading men of your city. Have pity on the young man, for your fortunes are perishing. Aclaïdus is not unworthy; accept his service , free your city, vexed with the worst maladies, restrain the people, for it threatens battle: marriages are better than battles. Honor the wedlock, that there may be eternal memory of you in the city. Give us victory over death, that we may live. Fear the divinations of the gods, that you may take away the mortality of the ruined city. Have pity on the people, who do not ask for your Daughter unto death, but unto the harmony of wedlock. All the people of the Antiochenes asked and entreated this. But her father Ædisius quieted the tumult, saying: I too, my lords and brothers, have admonished her of this, adjuring her, and she has not consented to me. But what shall I do to her, since she has chosen to die before marriage? And Ædisius feared every gathering of the people, and wished to flee from the city. But this plan was made known through the devil, and the gates and the streets were guarded. And the people were angry at her father. Yet the whole multitude, running together, seized the Virgin and threatened to kill her, unless she promised to give herself to Aclaïdus; for Aclaïdus was inflamed with exceeding love.

[35] For if he saw hands laying hold of the Virgin, he himself lifted them away, which is lacking in the manuscript, and he fell before he touched * the Virgin's hands. For the people were held by a twofold constraint, and could do her no harm. For Aclaïdus was ready to die before her; and the people were ready to serve the interests of both parties: Aclaïdus indeed for the union with the Virgin, and the Girl in that she should be kept without injury. But when St. Justina strove against the city, the people, accomplishing nothing, cried out saying: Justina, if you will not consent to the city, at least free the sick from this mortality, that we may know the power of your virginity, and conquer the malignant gods and rescue us from death, so that both we and our households may praise your Lord, giving thanks to your virginity. But Justina quieted the people, saying: By your faith I will fulfill the petition; and so they withdrew from her. And on the seventh day of the mortality, when many were dying, the holy Justina, fasting and keeping vigil and entreating the Lord, besought him for the sickness of all; and in that very hour all were made whole, so that many, forsaking the idols, fled for refuge to the church of Christ, knowing that the divinations of the demons are lying. These things, in one and the same number of words, are in our transcript and in the Conversion of St. Justina published by Martène; whether they were afterwards inserted from that source, or rather cut away from it, who shall say? Of all these things, as I have noted, Eudocia has nothing in her Metaphrase, so that our other manuscripts agree the better in this with her assertions. But neither does anything else occur here on account of which I should not judge that this first part of the Acts was translated from a Greek monument which lay before the empress as she composed her first book.

[36] [it differs. The Greek Confession of St. Cyprian, much more than the published Latin ones,] Certainly I do not believe that certain faults, which either crept later into the Greek text or were thrust into the Latin version by the ignorance or carelessness of the translator or of other copyists, can much stand in the way of my opinion. Let us pass on to the second part, which is entitled the Penitence of St. Cyprian and often elsewhere the Confession. I have already noted above that it survives published three times, and that it is besides found in many manuscripts, everywhere separated from the other parts. Passing over the manuscripts, in which nothing worth observing occurs, let us examine the published ones. Between the Confession of St. Cyprian brought to light by Fell from certain libraries of England, and the Penitence of the same our Saint printed by Martène or Durand, there is plainly a slight and almost no discrepancy; but there is a great one between these and the other, which Maranus subjoined in Greek from a Colbertine manuscript with a new Latin version to the Works of the holy Carthaginian martyr edited by Baluze. It would be long, and not worth great labor, to report the several differences here: I shall print Maranus's Confession in Greek and Latin collated with the others; the chief variations the reader will find in the Notes, and he will not disagree with me in what I judge, that the old translator was very negligent and free, if the version proceeded from him out of a similar Greek monument such as we have today in Fell or Martène.

[37] comes nearer to Eudocia's Metaphrase, and is to be printed by us. Further, the Confession of St. Cyprian translated by Maranus, in those points where it differs from the others, comes nearer to the assertions of Eudocia and Gregory — indeed it so accords with them that I do not hesitate to affirm that a similar one, even if, as it exists today, it has been somewhat disfigured by the negligence of copyists, lay before both Gregory and Eudocia, and accordingly has, if not complete integrity (of which later), yet certainly such antiquity as most commends it. Certainly almost at the very beginning it removes a difficulty drawn by some from the old version and twisted against not only its integrity but even its antiquity. Photius, namely, writes that in Eudocia's book 2 Cyprian related, How … having set out from Athens to Argos and thence into Phrygia, he was everywhere appointed a sacrificer to the demons and gathered much practice of the magic art… How he came into Egypt for the same reasons and went to the Indians. Of these journeys of St. Cyprian there is in the old Latin version of the Confession either no mention or at least a rather obscure one; but the same are narrated in the same order and expressly in the Greek text of Maranus. Again, closing book 2, Photius writes from Eudocia's Metaphrase: There is added how Aglaïdas, that troublesome suitor of Justina, when he had not obtained his desire, likewise paid out all his goods of fortune to the poor, and, having sent back word of dismissal to the demons as deceivers, devoted himself to the Christian rites. These things again were passed over by the old translator and are found in the Greek text, which accordingly, both by these and by other points, comes nearer to Eudocia's assertions and commends its own antiquity.

[38] The Greek Passion, from which the old Latin version The third part of the Acts, that is, the Passion of both Saints with Theoctistus, again differs in a few points in Martène from that which in our manuscripts is the second part of the Acts beginning The illumination of our Lord. I shall give in the Notes some variations of small moment observed here and there. From these there differs more the Greek text, which the said Fr. Gabriel Brotier sent me, transcribed from the royal manuscript codex marked num. 520 and collated with another manuscript codex of the same library under num. 1485; who, in a learned annotation appended, informs me that of the codices from which he took the copy, the one is much corrupted by rot in the upper part, the other torn in the lower part, so that they had to be compared and the several passages thus combined. He adds that there was only one passage which he could read in neither codex; and finally, where they differ from one another, he has diligently noted the variant readings in the margin. The difference between the two Greek codices is not great and certainly of small moment, as the curious reader will be able to perceive in the Annotations. That Passion, as it is in codex 1485, is nevertheless a little fuller, and in those respects comes nearer to the one published by Martène, so that I do not at all doubt that the latter proceeded, indeed was translated, from a similar Greek one; in which again he will agree with me who compares those variants, to be assigned in the Annotations, with the third part of the Acts published by Martène. The Martyrdom taken from codex 520, cleared of rubbish not without great labor, seems most ancient, to which small additions were made; for those things which are found in the other codex are not inept or so useless that I should believe them to have been cut away and rejected by some later abridger of the Acts.

[39] Yet since I observe that in those places where it is more compressed the Martyrdom taken from codex 520 seems once and again mutilated, seems to have proceeded, is not free from faults; yet it is to be printed I dare not affirm this more certainly, since, as these things could perhaps be ascribed to a fault of the codex or to the drowsiness of a Greek copyist omitting or corrupting one word or another, so on the other hand nothing much prevents one from suspecting that everything found in the other codex fell out by the fault of one or the other. However it be, since that difference is slight, it may safely be said that from those Acts, or from similar Greek ones, a Latin version was once made by a translator, perhaps not very skilled, which we have to this day both as published by Martène and also, with slight discrepancy, in the manuscripts where it is the second part of the Acts beginning Inluminatio. Further, the things which in the Latin version produce great difficulty are almost all found in our Greek Acts, as we shall afterwards find; yet since some passages are here so read that they seem corrupted by the fault of some later hand, from which certain difficulties have arisen, and since the Latin translator also rendered and amplified certain things quite freely, I shall publish the Greek Acts from the transcript sent to me by the oft-praised Fr. Brotier, and furnish them with a new interpretation. They are not such that I should believe them, in the state in which they are, to have been seen entire by Eudocia; but they certainly have their own not contemptible antiquity, and this above all is notable, that they place the passion of the holy Martyrs under Diocletian; whence it becomes manifest that the letter addressed a little before in these to Claudius Cæsar, as in all the other Latin Acts, was inserted by an inept interpolator, or at least that the emperor's name was corrupted.

[40] And this indeed will be the more easily persuaded, the more manifestly in these Greek Acts the letter of itself betrays, from another quarter, the very marks of corruption or of forgery: with correction and with a new Latin version. since it bears such a title as this: Κλαυδίῳ καίσαρι τῷ γῆς καὶ θαλάσσης δεσπότῃ Διοκλητιανῷ χαίρειν. To Claudius Cæsar, lord of land and sea, to Diocletian, greeting — which certainly signifies nothing. But of these things below. Meanwhile, if you strike Claudius out of that title and either change or delete other things slighter than that error, there is nothing to forbid such a Passion being like that which Eudocia had at hand. Certainly the rest agree much more than the Latin with her Metaphrase according to Photius's account, as could be observed even already from the fixing of the Saints' martyrdom under the reign of Diocletian. For the rest, from what I have hitherto set forth about the first and second parts of the Acts, it is sufficiently clear that they are not such as they were first composed and perhaps still existed in Eudocia's age, but have come down to us disfigured by an unfair, negligent, or unlearned hand. Certainly the famous name of St. Cyprian of Carthage could have furnished occasion for more than one lapse, which

if it led Gregory Nazianzen, in the East, where the names of SS. Cyprian and Justina must have been famous and where they were crowned with martyrdom, into that error scarcely half a century after all these things had happened, so that he partly wove a panegyric on our Cyprian out of the other's deeds, how much more must something similar have befallen writers many centuries later in the West, where the memory of the Carthaginian was more illustrious and that of Cyprian of Antioch less known, and where accordingly they could easily and too inconsiderately borrow certain things from his more widely circulated Acts and thrust them into the Deeds of our Saint. Assuredly I do not at all doubt that the names of the emperors Decius and Claudius crept in this way into certain Passions of SS. Cyprian and Justina. But let us proceed to weigh the difficulties which are urged against our holy Martyrs and their Acts.

Martène: appetiit* Mart.: nativitatibus* Mart.: tui* Mart.: servitium* Mart.: quæ* Mart.: tangeret*

§ IV. The intemperate criticism of John Fell, bishop of Oxford, concerning matters pertaining to SS. Cyprian and Justina is examined.

[ ] From the decree of Pope Gelasius it does not follow, John Fell, as I have already noted above, published the Penitence of St. Cyprian, taken from three libraries of England, among the little works wrongly attributed to St. Cyprian the doctor of Carthage, illustrated with some Notes. He prefixed to it an Admonition to the reader, in which he praises the antiquity of that monument, since he carries it back as far as the age of Constantine the Great; but at the same time he contends that it is not only supposititious and forged by some impostor, but, going further, he desires SS. Cyprian and Justina to be erased at once from the roll of the Martyrs and from that of mortals. Against him have sharpened their pens Durand in the Admonition prefixed to the Acts of those holy Martyrs published in Martène's Thesaurus, Tillemont in volume 5 of his Monuments of the Church, page 329, and most recently the often-praised Prudentius Maranus in §1 of his Life of St. Cyprian of Carthage; from whom, as opportunity is given, I shall borrow what shall seem more effective for refuting Fell. Let us follow him closely, since his animadversions are rather brief and written without much gall. After he has stated from what documents he received the Confession he is publishing, born before the age of Constantine, he admits that it is that same Ἐξαγόρευσις which Gregory Nazianzen used, and which Photius carefully describes from Eudocia's Metaphrase. Yet he asserts that this same work was held apocryphal by Pope Gelasius, and so, paving his way at once to other matters, he denies the little work to St. Cyprian. Whether it be a genuine offspring of the Saint I do not yet inquire; this may be reckoned beyond doubt, that it is uncertain whether the decree of Pope Gelasius in the Roman council strikes that little composition, and strikes it in such a way that from it the work may legitimately be denied to our St. Cyprian.

[42] that the Confession is an offspring falsely ascribed to St. Cyprian. That Roman council was celebrated in the year 494, at which year the decree of Gelasius is read in the collections of Councils by Labbe and Hardouin, and in it indeed it is said: The book which is called the Penitence of St. Cyprian, apocryphal — which, however, does not so strike the said little work. For, in the first place, among the learned that decree is suspected of interpolation and corruption from this, that certain most excellent Works occur there which by no means deserve the censures attached to them. Whether this one of ours could not have a place among them, and was not afterwards thrust into the decree, who may declare with sufficient certainty? Assuredly the suspicion must be increased by this, that the Penitence of St. Cyprian is not reviewed in all copies of that decree: for in the one which Pierre-François Chifflet published from the distinguished Jura codex under the name of Hormisdas, in his Notes on Vigilius of Thapsus, page 149, the alleged words are not found, nor is any mention made of that Penitence. Then Fell could have seen what Baronius judged of these matters in his Annals at the year of Christ 261, num. 46, where he thinks that the discussion in the Decree of Gelasius is of a little work wrongly ascribed to St. Cyprian of Carthage, which bore the title of his Penitence or Retractation in the notorious question about the baptism of heretics. Besides, let us grant what, as is plain, is at the least uncertain, that the censure of Gelasius falls upon this very little work; not even so will it thereupon have to be at once adjudged to our St. Cyprian. For that same Confession could have been ascribed to the holy Carthaginian martyr of the same name, and on that ground, as wrongly attributed to him, rejected by the Pontiff.

[43] Finally — and this alone suffices to show that from that censure it by no means follows that it was falsely ascribed to our St. Cyprian — Ancient it is certain that the term Apocryphal there only signifies that it does not carry such authority that it ought or can be publicly read to the faithful in church, as Fontanini proves of a similar censure in his Antiquities of Horta, book 2, chapter 3, following Baronius, Thomasius, Mabillon, and the rest there cited. But to say, Such a writing ought not to be read in church, and to say, Such a writing is not by the author whose name it bears, are things different as heaven from earth, as is manifest to anyone. And indeed there was no lack of reason why Pope Gelasius should forbid the Penitence of St. Cyprian to be read to the faithful; for, to say nothing of certain things likely to offend the chaste ears of virgins and more modest minds, the greatest part of it is occupied in narrating magic arts and their effects, which certainly would in no way profit the edification of the faithful, their instruction in the mysteries of the faith, or the confirming of the Christians' constancy in it. Let us return to Fell. After he has given an account of what Photius reports about Eudocia's Metaphrase, and has pronounced confidently enough that Metaphrastes interpolated that Metaphrase — which more probably he never saw, indeed of which more probably he had no knowledge at all — he continues thus: The middle part of the whole Work (the Acts of SS. Cyprian and Justina), translated from Greek into Latin, alone has come down to us entire, which we here present; and this we have done the more willingly, since, as has been rightly observed, there is no old book, however supposititious and of ill character, which does not serve some use.

[44] Thanks be to Heaven, we have today not only a part 2 much better than that which Fell published, famous writers, but two others also of such a kind that, the testimonies of Eudocia standing, they will profit us to restore the Saints rashly — to say nothing worse — erased by Fell from the Calendars. Let us hear Fell again. It will be opportune here (he says) to inquire briefly into the standing of the Person to whom these things are attributed; especially since the Roman Church of today, and likewise the Greek, lay down two Cyprians as bishops and martyrs: the first of Carthage, the other of Antioch; and to the latter of these all those matters which pertain to magic and to the love of Justina are referred by both. But on the contrary the ancients everywhere (Note, reader, how many ancients he is going to produce for us), Nazianzen, Prudentius, and, to use the words of Cardinal Baronius, the Greeks in general, confound Cyprian of Antioch with the Carthaginian. Let him who has leisure consult Nicephorus, Syncellus, Cedrenus, and Simeon Metaphrastes as published by Surius himself, and he will find the whole narrative about the magic and the loves of Justina attributed to our one African. Let me here ask of Fell whom he is calling ancient writers, and what Roman Church of today. Gregory Nazianzen and Prudentius I gladly receive among the most ancient Catholic writers; but are there to be erased from their roll the empress Eudocia, most learned and the prodigy of her own and of all ages, who lived about the middle of the fifth century; St. Aldhelm of Sherborne, bishop among the West Saxons, who in the seventh; the author of the Rosweyde or Little Roman Martyrology, and perhaps Bede, who in the eighth; Wandelbert, Rabanus Maurus, Ado, Usuard, Notker, Photius, who lived in the ninth century — while Nicephorus, who wrote in the fourteenth, George Syncellus, who at the close of the eighth, Cedrenus, who in the eleventh, and finally Metaphrastes, who in the tenth, are to be reckoned among the ancients?

[45] Our Saint and his deeds Surely no one of sound judgment will affirm this. And yet all these clearly distinguished St. Cyprian of Antioch from the African. I have given the testimonies of the others at the beginning of this Commentary; receive here the verses of Aldhelm from book 1 On Virginity, or On the Praise of Virgins, published in Canisius, volume 1 of the Ancient Readings, page 744.

Thus too shall I sing in song of chaste Justina, Winning the golden realms by her virgin modesty, Who broke the earthly chains of the marriage bed, Trampling the flowery traffic of the world's life. An illustrious suitor, kindled with depraved love for her, Ceases not to weave in vain the nets of words, That the Virgin might perchance be his dowered bride forever, From whom a posterity of descendants should come. But when the malignant one bore such wickedness in mind, And yet the deceiver could not pervert the guiltless girl, Nor set the Virgin's heart afire with blind flames, He strives to stain that excellent woman with magic poisons. Then Cyprian was famous for his trifling fraud, Learned in the horrid art of wicked magicians, Who then promised to bring aid to him who sought it. Devising very many assaults against that holy mind, So far that he contended with the dread weapons of the demon. These the crafty Magician sent continually to the gracious maid, That they might beat upon her holy breast with the goads of lust.

[46] But when the Virgin of God had spurned the frivolous things of the flesh, they distinguished from his namesake of Carthage and from his affairs Shattering the lurid darts of the foul robbers, The faithful man believed in Christ, the High-throned, who saves the ages, Turned to the Lord with his whole mind. At last the Magician repented, forsaking the filthy idols, Having learned what peril the Virgin could bear, Who could never be overcome by a thousand arts Of harming, but fled the wicked crime of unchastity. After this, when Claudius ruled the world with his sway, The impious man pressing the Saints with cruel edicts — Alas, the crime! — that, condemned, they should deny Christ with their voice; But refusing to follow the tyrant's commands, O how grievously they paid the hard torments of death! Then Justina does not shrink to lay her neck beneath the sword, Or to pour out rivers of blood from her breast. Thus is the happy Virgin adorned with twin triumphs: As a venerable Martyr she reddened with rosy crowns, As a shining Woman she flowered with virgin garlands. With whom the raw athlete of God, Cyprian, by his shed blood * Earned the standards of a bloody martyrdom. And so the Saints alike climbed to the stars of heaven, As alike they bore the dreadful torments of death.

Thus St. Aldhelm, an author of the seventh century. Further, lest anyone, from certain errors which have come into this passage from corrupt Acts, should try to twist everything by what force he may to St. Cyprian of Carthage, let us give some passages from the book which the holy prelate wrote under the same title in prose, and which survives in the Orthodoxographia, volume 2, page 1677, and was more recently published from English manuscripts by Wharton along with some little works of Bede and Egbert.

[47] Here, in chapter 43, Aldhelm writes thus. Finally, Justina, the handmaid of justice, a virgin not to be despised by the orthodox, is therefore no recent thing in the Church of our Martyrs when Diocletian was unhappily wielding the scepters of empire, what great and what manner of things she endured at Antioch for the preserving of her virginity — who, relying on a middling talent, may boast that he can set it forth? He then goes on to relate Cyprian's contrivances for storming her, their outcome, and Cyprian's conversion and promotion to episcopal dignity; and finally the several matters from the Acts

of ours he abridges, and continues: But Justina not only remained to the very end favorably endowed with the glory of her integrity, but also, in taking hold of the palm of the passion, harder than adamant, she did not yield though worn down by various tortures of torments … who, while she was savagely beaten with raw scourges of sinews and buffeted with repeated blows of the palms, was at last ordered to climb into an iron frying pan crackling with tallow and pitch, that the most tender Virgin might be roasted in so great a torment. But Christ … powerfully protected the virgin limbs from the destruction of the frying pan that pressed upon her. Finally, under Claudius Cæsar, … receiving the sentence of beheading together with Cyprian — who now no longer relied on necromancy but was endowed with the pontificate — she grows purple with the most holy crimson of her blood. Behold the Martyrs of Antioch manifestly distinguished from the African in the seventh century; behold Acts of a different sort already existing then, from which the several details, together with their very errors, were taken; behold an author agreeing in almost everything with Eudocia two centuries later, whom others thereafter followed through the centuries even to this our age. Let Fell therefore cease to boast to us of his ancient writers.

[48] Concerning Gregory's lapse, whom alone, with Prudentius, he has favoring him, a memory, as Fell asserts; I shall presently reply more fully to his questions. Meanwhile I am not at all surprised that the Greek writers whom he reviews were deceived by the identity of name, since from another quarter they had Gregory as their standard-bearer, whom they always made so much of, and not undeservedly, that even if they could have been taught otherwise elsewhere, they perhaps preferred to persist in his error. Indeed I cannot doubt that something similar befell Simeon Metaphrastes: for I seem to see the man wretchedly torturing himself in stitching together that history. Whatever it may have been, at the same time we see here what church Fell calls of today, when he asserts that Saints known in the fifth century and before, in the Church both Eastern and Western, were newly invented. I say and before, as is easily proved, at least as regards the Eastern Church. For the empress Eudocia was writing in the fifth century, and writing in the East, and most clearly distinguished Cyprian of Antioch from the African by the deeds done throughout his whole course of life, and expressed most distinctly his passion with Justina, the arena, and the time of the martyrdom. Therefore Cyprian, bishop of Antioch and martyr of Nicomedia, was already then known in the Eastern Church and held to be distinct from the African martyr. Nor let anyone trifle by replying that Eudocia, a most learned woman and at the same time most pious, thrust forward as true history fables which could have been plain to all — and that too, if you please, with no one, so far as we know, contradicting — while meanwhile it must have been known that three new and fabulous bishops were being thrust into the see of Antioch, and that deeds were being taken from a most celebrated Carthaginian martyr to be applied to another, a fictitious one, whose memory, if he had existed, must have been recent, being carried down scarcely through a whole century. Let those think so of Eudocia who are eager to expose themselves to laughter: Fell certainly did not go so far, but silently passed over the difficulty, or tried to break the reasoning to be deduced from it by Gregory Nazianzen's error and by the silence of Eusebius.

[49] whose hypercritical Let us hear him speaking again. Baronius says that this (the confusion of the Acts) happened from the similarity of the name, and that Nazianzen was deceived by the homonymy along with the rest of the Greeks; who either followed Gregory's error without examination, not having seen the Acts of the other Cyprian, or, having seen them, neglected them in order to follow the erring Gregory. And I indeed (Fell resumes) would gladly grant that the Greeks could easily slip in narrating the affairs of the Latins, in which they are perpetual strangers, especially in those things which preceded their own times; but who would say that they were equally ignorant of things done in the East while they themselves were alive and looking on? No sane man surely would say that. But did Gregory live in the time of Diocletian and must he have seen the things that are related as St. Cyprian's deeds? By no means indeed, since he was born only about the year 314, as is shown in the preliminary Dissertation to volume III of September, and accordingly could not behold the things that were done while Diocletian was persecuting the Faithful. I believe that contemporary Antiochenes had the affairs of Cyprian well known, and that one of them wrote Acts which Eudocia afterwards embraced in verse. And indeed, to turn the question upon Fell himself, who would say that in the East some fabulist was found so impudent that perhaps at that very time, or a little after the events he narrates — namely, while Diocletian, Maximian Galerius, or Constantine was reigning — he dared to thrust such unheard-of things upon men who, if they had really been done, must have beheld them with their own eyes; and that Gregory, and afterwards Eudocia, adopted these so silly things without scruple? Yet so it must have happened, if he wishes his own statements to hang together. But how much more absurd is this than the other thing which he so speciously explodes!

[50] from Gregory's Let us go on to hear the Oxford critic. As regards Gregory, he says, was he so senseless that he alone did not know what was being done at Nicomedia a few years before, and that at a most unsuitable time — namely on the anniversary day of Cyprian of Carthage — he laboriously celebrated before his own people, in a sermon, a man of another nation and age? I am compelled to interrupt Fell, and before I answer him, to give notice of some things. It was not at Nicomedia, as is read in our single Greek manuscript against the manifest testimony of Eudocia, but outside, namely at the river Gallus, that the holy Martyrs suffered; and that with slight ceremony and no tumult; for, keeping to the Acts, Diocletian seems to have carefully guarded against both, fearing lest those whom he had learned from the prefect had overcome so many other torments should by new prodigies confirm the Faithful in the faith and convict him of his cruelty. Nor did Gregory laboriously praise before an assembly another man than the most celebrated Carthaginian martyr; he only applied to the one the deeds of the other, perhaps unknown to him: in which, though I see an error, I perceive nothing of senselessness. Now let us in turn question Fell. Was Gregory so senseless, and Eudocia after him so senseless, that they alone did not hold suspect things which, forged some years before, ought to have been exploded by everybody? And yet Fell will again be compelled to admit this if he wishes to defend his own position. Let us go on. Gregory, he says, was not newly summoned to the Christian faith and untaught in the things that pertain to godliness, but from his first years had drunk the milk of the Church: for he had as his father a bishop who was present at the affairs of Diocletian and at the great synod of Nicæa.

[51] Did he never warn his son about the Magician of Antioch lately converted to the faith, error he wishes to deduce about Justina then ennobled by miracles and by her passion, about Aglaïdas the scholastic and Athanasius the magician, about the fires of the frying pan applied in vain at Antioch and the capital punishment at last inflicted at Nicomedia — that he should not attribute these same things to the African who had suffered in the reign of Valerian? I answer. Whence Fell received that the holy Martyrs were afflicted with various torments at Antioch I do not know: I have certainly not yet seen this asserted in ancient monuments. To the rest I reply: if St. Gregory's father had had the deeds of SS. Cyprian and Justina known to him, and had foreseen by a prophetic spirit his son's future lapse in this matter, I do not doubt that, to forestall the error, he would have taught his son those things; but that St. Gregory's father was illumined with the gift of prophecy I have not yet read, nor do I see why in other circumstances he should have been so bound to relate them to his son; and I have no difficulty in understanding how either he could have been ignorant of them, or Gregory, if as a young man he heard the Saints' names and perhaps some other things in a general way, could afterwards have forgotten them. Certainly we find by daily experience how often memory is deceptive, and their lapses teach us that this sometimes befalls men otherwise of the highest rank. But as regards the other point, assuredly it does not follow from Gregory's father having lived in the time of Diocletian that he must have known, at least in detail, whatever was done in each place throughout the whole East while the persecution raged everywhere.

[52] Indeed he could have heard that SS. Cyprian and Justina were slain near Nicomedia, that our holy Martyrs but have been ignorant of the rest; and accordingly he had nothing special from a martyrdom common enough that he should relate it to his son. Certainly at the time when Diocletian was raging everywhere against the Christians, St. Gregory's father was not yet living among the faithful, having been converted to the faith from the heresy of the Hypsistarians only about twenty years after the martyrdom of our St. Cyprian; and since, on the testimony of Gregory Nazianzen himself, this heresy had much taken from the heathen and no less from the Jews, it little concerned his father then to inquire more diligently what was being gloriously done by Christians elsewhere. There is therefore nothing that greatly persuades us that he must have had the deeds of our Martyrs known to him and have narrated them to his son. But if anyone should nevertheless wish to press the point on Fell's behalf, again I shall turn his own words back upon him. For neither do I see why Gregory should the less have been warned that the published Confession was supposititious; why Eudocia should the less have been taught that all the things she had taken as the material of her Metaphrase were fictitious, especially since she too moved continually in the circles of the most learned men: which things indeed I wish applied to what follows. But could it have happened (Fell goes on to ask) that Nazianzen himself, passing often through Nicomedia from Cappadocia to Athens and returning thence, did not at once detect an error so grave and obvious to anyone not utterly stupid?

[53] By the faith of the gods above, how many men otherwise of the greatest rank will have to be convicted of the grossest stupidity, unknown at that time, and only afterwards if on account of this error Gregory must be relegated among the utterly stupid! How rare is a famous writer even of this time, when he has so many guides and monitors, who has not fallen into errors, and no light lapses, in respect of the material he treats, especially where he strays somewhat from that art or science in which he excels and which he chiefly cultivates. Gregory may have flourished in all the other ecclesiastical sciences; in that part certainly he was very sparingly conversant which examines the deeds of the Saints and commends them to posterity. Gregory may have had, as the occasion arose, the more probable task of praising St. Cyprian the Carthaginian martyr; to him he applied a writing which indeed did not fit him, but whose author he did not know from elsewhere; and the things in it that seemed less fitting he cut away, or so twisted that they might not be quite absurdly attributed to the Carthaginian. In this I do not see what there is of such great stupidity. I have already warned Fell above that the Saints were crowned not at Nicomedia but outside it. Nor were they questioned there, nor do they even seem to have entered the city; but presently by Diocletian's command they were beheaded at the river Gallus: all of which conferred no splendor or celebrity upon the martyrdom. Then their holy pledges were secretly carried off elsewhere, and that within very few days after the passion: all of which sufficiently persuades me that the Saints were not much celebrated at Nicomedia, where so many others in the time of the same persecution had fallen for Christ by a more illustrious martyrdom

[54] invented — which the silence of Eusebius proves no better, Though Gregory therefore passed that way, there is no reason why he should have been particularly informed, especially as regards all those things which had preceded the martyrdom and which most of all made them illustrious, but which could have been less well known at Nicomedia, and yet ought most of all to have fortified Gregory against the error. Eusebius's

silence Fell next twists thus: If these things escaped Nazianzen and his father alike, shall we suppose that they lay hidden from Eusebius, that most diligent writer of ecclesiastical history, especially when he relates the martyrdom of Anthimus of Nicomedia, whom Cyprian is feigned to have succeeded? These last words, if they have any force, must have force against Baronius. He believes that St. Cyprian was baptized by this Anthimus and ordained deacon, otherwise than the Acts relate, where the discussion is of Anthimus the bishop of Antioch, not of Nicomedia. Of these things below; meanwhile I likewise hold Eusebius for a diligent writer, but I deny — since more than one of his works on the contests of the holy martyrs has perished, as may be seen in Tillemont, Monuments of the Church, volume 7, article 7, under Eusebius, and as I myself showed at the XXII day of September in §7 of the preliminary Commentary to the Acts of St. Maurice and his companions — that silence here can prove anything, lest we be obliged stupidly to reject countless martyrs whom we know from elsewhere, and whom he could have mentioned, yet did not mention in the Works that survive. And this reply will the more diminish the argument drawn from his silence, the more remote our Martyrs contended from those places whose contests Eusebius narrates — of which matter more below

[55] nor his other Nor did Fell make his hypercriticism any better by the other things he subjoins. After saying that there were formerly many fabulists and impostors in the Church, from whom, from its very beginnings, new Gospels and Longinus and Christopher and similar fictitious Saints proceeded, he at last gathers up his censure thus: To speak freely what I think, it seems to me most likely that some Christian, of the number of those who were eager to adorn the deeds of the Martyrs with new increments and to trim their sails to their reputation by a pious fraud, sought to render Cyprian of Carthage — famous through all the churches everywhere — more adorned by his own paints; and since his piety, learning, proscription, retirement, and martyrdom seemed lowly and everyday matters, wove on additions about the magic arts, the loves of Justina, and the miracles of the frying pan, so that he who was illustrious for his virtues might be more amply ennobled by his vices. Further, the artificer, that he might in some degree do a service to his own country, laid the scene of the drama at Antioch; and these things, since they were exceedingly marvelous and rested upon a history previously received, struck not only the unlearned crowd but the very prelates of the Church. Inept conjectures, destroying themselves. Let us apply Fell's words to the time at which the things he suspects must have happened, and nothing will be more foolish than those conjectures, nothing more stupid than the faithful and the holy Fathers themselves, who were deceived by such inept ravings.

[56] In the fourth century, when St. Cyprian of Carthage was famous throughout the whole East, inept and his deeds known and still recent, a writer of Antioch, that he might do a service to his own country, feigns that some years before (I proceed on Fell's opinion, that all the things which belong to our St. Cyprian were foisted upon St. Cyprian of Carthage) — feigns, I say, a fabulist writing in the time of Constantine the Great or at the beginning of the fourth century, that a notorious magician there was converted to the faith and ordained presbyter and bishop; he feigns that Justina, a virgin of Antioch, was born of noble stock; he names her suitor Aglaïdas, a wealthy young man; he assigns by name Eusebius the intimate of Cyprian and others; and finally he relates many things publicly done, which, if they had happened, could have lain hidden from almost none of the Antiochenes. And all these are false, fabulous, invented, cunningly and rashly forged, such as ought to have been detected at once by everyone. And yet the fabulist writes these things, if we believe Fell, that he may do a service to his own country. Bah — a most impudent impostor thus deserving well of his country, and all the Antiochenes stupid, who repay with gratitude one who stains his country with impostures and hawks as true things fabulous which, if they had happened, very many of them must either have beheld with their own eyes or have received from their parents in the freshest memory!

[57] These things, unless I am mistaken, are all too absurd to be admitted at the invitation of the Oxford critic, the conjectures of John Fell. and that too when the Confession alone is regarded; but from the Acts which Eudocia rendered into verse, consequences are easily deduced from which the intemperance of the Fellian censure appears yet more clearly. Those Acts certainly must have been written not long after the time at which he believes the Confession was drawn up, lest we believe that fables recent in her own time, or histories written long after the deeds, so pleased the most prudent empress Eudocia that she judged them worthy of her labor above so many others. But what will prudent men have to judge of their author, if Fell's criticism stands? He relates many more things publicly done, and speaks of matters transacted in the time of Diocletian, to which the nearer he was, the more he must have feared the rod of contemporary Antiochenes. Shall we believe this man still more brazen than the other, and almost all the Easterners more indulgent toward him and more senseless? Trifles. Therefore all the conjectures and censures of John Fell hitherto brought forward fall to the ground, and our Saints remain undoubted, whom the Church has acknowledged for so many centuries now; and hither Fell may transfer the words which he wrote a little before in the same Admonition: It by no means becomes a sober appraiser of sacred matters to overturn and disturb, on account of slight conjectures (such as certainly are those he has alleged), things consigned to the public writings of the Church and — what perhaps is greater — fortified by her practice. For the rest, let us examine the other things which he has twisted out of the statements of the martyrologists against the Acts of the holy Martyrs, and which have been adopted or rejected by other moderns.

Is it not sanguine fuso*?

§ V. The remaining difficulties raised by Fell against the history of our Martyrs are discussed. Some chronological arrangement of the Acts.

[ ] It is by no means likely that two Cyprians Fell, after what we have brought forward from him and refuted in the preceding section, observes some things about the license of corrupting and fabling even in the earlier centuries of the Church, which, as not pertaining particularly to us here, I knowingly pass over. Let him whom it shall seem to profit provoke his stomach to nausea by reading the Decree of Gelasius: let him remember, however, to take his portion from it moderately and prudently; for not everything found there is tares, as I have already noted above. Let us follow the Oxford critic as he reasons further. It had come to the scent, he says, of men somewhat conversant in the affairs of the Western Church that this splendid history of Cyprian by no means squared with the prelate of Carthage; whence, lest so elegant a fable should perish, a new Asiatic Cyprian was devised who might more rightly sustain that character. Truly, how lightly Fell charges as impostors men somewhat conversant in the affairs of the Western Church! But what, I ask, of the Acts which Eudocia had? Has the critic here forgotten the Metaphrase, of which he gave an account from Photius at the beginning of his Admonition; or did he cunningly pretend, in order the more easily to throw dust in our eyes? Truly, whoever attends to the Acts which the oft-praised empress had before her eyes in the fifth century will not look for such brazen impostors, and those too somewhat conversant in the affairs of the Western Church. Let us go on to hear how Fell depicts those same men to us as stupid and dull. But that invention was so unhappily contrived that not even the circumstances of times, or places, or deeds hang together in any better fashion. Let the reader remember the Eudocian Acts, so that he may at once perceive the emptiness both of this and of most of the following assertions.

[59] were devised to save the fable, The Roman Church (Fell continues) assigns the anniversary day of the passion of this Cyprian to the XXVI of September; the Menology of the Greeks fixes it on the second of October: meanwhile the so-called Martyrology of Jerome published by d'Achery, and the older one brought to light by Maria Florentinius, pass it over in both places. Nothing can profit Fell in the fact that the holy Martyrs are celebrated on one day by the Latins and on another by the Greeks, since this is common to them with almost countless other Saints, while the one Church keeps the memory of the death and the other of the translation or of some similar celebrity. As regards the Martyrology marked with the name of St. Jerome, although I cannot deny that I somewhat wonder that SS. Cyprian and Justina have no place in the older copies, yet that silence ought not much to torture those who know how corrupt everything is there, and how easily they could lie hidden under other twisted and vitiated names, or, like many others, have perhaps been rejected or neglected. And yet, whether their names were omitted or not, it matters little, since their history is abundantly established by monuments older than those Martyrologies. Let us therefore proceed with Fell to other matters. As regards the time of the martyrdom, he says, Aldhelm, Rabanus, Peter de Natalibus, with some others, say that he suffered under Claudius; Notker, Ado, Photius (What have we here to do with Photius again? He ought at least to have said Eudocia, since Photius reports only the empress's assertions, not his own. But Fell takes pains to be perpetually forgetting her) with the noble Annalist relate that he was crowned under Diocletian, namely in the year [ ].

[60] But neither hypothesis answers to the phenomena; Fell's paralogisms, since throughout the whole reign of Claudius — who is not even read to have been at Nicomedia — and almost to the last times of Diocletian, the Church enjoyed peace; and Anthimus himself, whose successor Cyprian is said to be, would have suffered in the very first beginnings of the persecution set in motion by Diocletian, namely in the year CCCIII, so that, by a miracle before unheard of, a martyr by a premature fate should anticipate the persecution by XIV years, and even after the vicissitudes of so many years, still surviving himself, should remain among the living to undergo martyrdom afresh. Let us here stop the critic as he thus wanders and mixes everything together so as to destroy himself. This is true, that the martyrdom of SS. Cyprian and Justina is wrongly placed by Aldhelm and others under the reign of Claudius, by a manifest error proceeding from the corrupted Acts; since the same writers everywhere bring Claudius back among the living after Diocletian in the same elogium. For in their age there had already been introduced into some copies the rather silly letter of Eutolmius which is addressed to Claudius, on which those writers stumbled, taking from it the epoch of the martyrdom. I shall readily grant Fell too that Claudius was not at Nicomedia; but I shall grant him less that from the beginnings of this man's reign to almost the last times of Diocletian the affairs of the Christians flowed on so peacefully that in that interval none of them anywhere, chiefly through the ferocity or avarice of the prefects, underwent torments and met death for Christ: for the contrary has been proved both by Ruinart and Pagi and a hundred times in our own Work by undoubted examples and the strongest arguments.

[61] Yet, that we may not dwell longer on these things to no purpose, in the error of Baronius I gladly acknowledge the error of those martyrologists, and I accept the epoch of the passion as recorded by Eudocia and others under Diocletian — not in the year 290, as the critic wrongly asserts, but in some later year hitherto undetermined; and I show how admirable Fell's criticism here is. In the first place, in order to overturn by contrary phenomena this epoch (let us name his hypothesis in his own words), established by the testimonies of so many venerable monuments, he ought, unless I am mistaken, to have alleged phenomena at least no less firm, or of whose existence there could be no more doubt; he ought, from phenomena demonstrated or admitted by the very man who defends the hypothesis, against

it to fight: but so far is he from performing this, that he alleges phenomena falsely constructed, and from them attacks both the man who does not admit the hypothesis and others who reject those phenomena as invented and spurious. He assails the possibility of the epoch from an error of Baronius, and that not faithfully enough, as though it could not stand if that writer had brought forward through error something that hangs together badly: which reasonings certainly are not those of a philosopher who duly demands systems or hypotheses from phenomena. I say from an error of Baronius, and that not faithfully enough: I prove both. And first indeed, in the Confession and in the elogia of the martyrologists, which alone Fell saw, it is not read that Anthimus, whom St. Cyprian succeeded, was bishop and martyr of Nicomedia. But neither have I hitherto found this elsewhere; indeed in the Acts, where mention is made of Anthimus, he is said to have died not crowned with martyrdom but by a natural death; which surely, even if other evidence from elsewhere were lacking, forbids us to understand it of the most celebrated martyr of Nicomedia, who was slain at the very beginning of the persecution urged on by Galerius, namely in the year 302.

[62] Baronius alone had thought this incongruously; as I noted above, maliciously playing, and it was accordingly from him, whom he had cited a little before, that Fell received that phenomenon, which is deservedly exploded by those who fix the hypothesis or epoch under Diocletian. Further, the most eminent writer erred there, yet not so grossly as to involve himself, or give occasion for involving himself, in those paradoxes and anachronisms which the Oxford critic twists out. For first of all it is false that Baronius ever bound the death of St. Cyprian to the year 290, as Fell unfaithfully plays. Indeed he who in his Annals refers the crown of Anthimus of Nicomedia to the year 302 does not even assert that our St. Cyprian suffered under Diocletian, and accordingly does not admit the hypothesis. At the year 311 he numbers ours only among the Martyrs who obtained the laurel at Nicomedia under Diocletian and afterwards under Maximian Galerius. In the Notes to his Martyrology he speaks thus: For this man (St. Cyprian) of whom we treat was an Antiochene by birth, from a magician a Christian, then a deacon, and, together with Justina, placed in a frying pan under the governor Eutholmius in the times of Diocletian, he consummated his martyrdom at Nicomedia. Finally, that the caution employed by Baronius concerning the epoch of the martyrdom may be doubtful to none, receive his words from the very text of the Martyrology: At Nicomedia, the birthday of the holy martyrs Cyprian and Justina the virgin, who, having endured many things for Christ under the emperor Diocletian and the governor Eutholmius, converted to Christ Cyprian himself, when he was a magician and was trying by his magic arts to drive her out of her senses; with whom she afterwards received martyrdom. Behold again everything so arranged and mixed that from his words alone you cannot prove that the Martyrs were put to death under that same Diocletian.

[63] are refuted. Further, Baronius seems to have carefully guarded against this — which indeed he had no need to guard against so anxiously — because he had read in some perhaps corrupted Acts that Cyprian spent several years in the episcopate, for which he accordingly labored to find room after the year 302, in which he had succeeded Anthimus. But since in most of the better Acts those years are assigned to his presbyterate, and no determined time to his episcopate, that anxiety could safely be laid aside, and the martyrdom of our Saints fixed without scruple under the reign of Diocletian. Let us now grant, the lying year 290 which Fell foisted upon their death being struck out — let us grant, I say, that St. Cyprian was raised to the chair in the year of Christ 302: what will forbid that he was crowned two years later, in the year 304, while Diocletian was still reigning and persecuting the Christians? Must Anthimus therefore, by a miracle before unheard of, have anticipated the persecution by a premature fate by XIV years, and even after the vicissitudes of so many years, still surviving himself, have remained among the living to undergo martyrdom afresh? Must such great anachronisms be swallowed if, from the wavering words of Baronius, retaining the epoch of St. Anthimus's death and St. Cyprian's succession in his place, we defer the martyrdom of our Saints to the reign of Galerius Maximian? By no means indeed. And yet not only in Baronius's opinion, but in any other chronological arrangement whatsoever, such contradictions had to be proved in order that from them the impossibility of the hypothesis or epoch of the martyrdom under Diocletian might be drawn.

[64] The errors of certain other writers proceeding from corrupted Acts Since Fell has effected this much less by his sophisms, he has effected nothing, unless you would have him demonstrate his own bad faith or poverty of arguments. But of these things more than enough: let us weigh his remaining statements. More manifestly (he says, concerning the epoch of the martyrdom, that is) does our Bede fight with himself, who in his Martyrology at the XXVI of September relates that Justina suffered very many things under Diocletian, and was then beheaded with Cyprian under Eutholmius in the time of Claudius; which things fight equally with the credibility of history and with Bede's own judgment. For in the second volume of his Works he assigns to Claudius the year of the world MMMMCCXXIV, but to Diocletian the year MMMMCCXXXVIII. I noted above that in Bede's Metrical Martyrology, which d'Achery published, no mention is made of SS. Cyprian and Justina; whence the opinion of our Sollier may be applied. In Bede's Martyrology, which our Predecessors prefixed to volume 2 of March, they have a place, and there, I confess, is read the anachronism which Fell here justly criticizes. But whether it was Bede's error, or Florus's, or that of some later man who corrupted the text, a feeble argument is thence drawn against the truth of the history; for again I appeal to Eudocia and the Acts which she used, in which those faults are nowhere found; and thence I conclude that they were afterwards corrupted by unlearned interpolators. Let Fell conclude from this what he pleases; he will not detain me. But since criticism arises particularly about those anachronisms, it will be well to have observed something about them here.

[65] They have crept into all the Acts, or all the copies of the Acts, contribute nothing against the truth of the history, which I have hitherto seen, and thence, if you except a few of the more cautious, have passed into all the martyrologists. Namely, in all the Passions there is inscribed toward the end to Claudius Cæsar the letter of the governor Eutolmius, silly in other respects too, and that everywhere after mention has been made in the preceding pages of the emperor Diocletian, under whose reign in some copies the conversion of St. Justina to the faith is placed. I ought not, unless I am mistaken, to say that the said letter, even if it lacked those faults too, is to be left to the invention of the author. For very rarely do critics, and only when convinced by the strongest reasons, admit such monuments as genuine and authentic; since it is not probable that private letters of governors to the emperors came so easily into the hands of others. Whether the letter of Eutolmius was set forth in Eudocia's Acts is uncertain. Photius reports what pertains to this thus: The judge, therefore, hesitating, determined to send the Martyrs to Diocletian, and to write to him both what torments they had endured and how they had been superior to all punishments. Which words leave it doubtful whether the empress set forth the letter; but at the same time they persuade us that, if it was set forth, it was sent to Diocletian and not to Claudius.

[66] Hence too I am persuaded that this error crept in later, makes, and, wondering that it was so universal, I spent labor, useless indeed, in searching whether Diocletian ever bore the name of Claudius. What had impelled me the more to do this was the manuscript Greek Passion, where, as I noted above, it is inscribed: Κλαυδίῳ καίσαρι τῷ γῆς καὶ θαλάσσης δεσπότῃ Διοκλητιανῷ χαίρειν, To Claudius Cæsar, lord of land and sea, to Diocletian, greeting. Here, by a gaping phrase, both names seem to be attributed to the same emperor; nor should I dare to conjecture that Galerius is here called Claudius, since neither is he read to have borne this name, and besides that name, as being only that of a Cæsar, would at least have had to be placed after the name of Diocletian the Augustus. But, as I said, I lost my labor, nor did I anywhere find that Diocletian took the illustrious name of Claudius. Therefore I suspect that some other title, perhaps through the ignorance of copyists, passed in the Greek manuscripts into Claudius; and that some smatterer, finding it joined with Diocletian, preposterously struck out the latter's name in place of the other's; or, if you prefer, that formerly at the beginning of the conversion of St. Justina, that conversion or her birth was assigned to the reign of Claudius and her death to that of Diocletian, and that the one passed into the other's place through a writer's negligence or ignorance. If it so happened, again another man no more learned, having seen in other manuscripts the letter inscribed to Claudius, could ignorantly add that name there to Diocletian, whom he had found in his own copy.

[67] Whatever be the occasion of the error, it is certain that if in the Acts we exchange Diocletian for Claudius, the chronological arrangement flows rightly — which, the occasion being here given, these being corrected, some chronological arrangement of the Acts I am pleased to weave after a fashion. And first indeed let us lay down from Eudocia's testimony that the Saints suffered under Diocletian, and that more probably in the time of the great persecution. The emperor, to whom they were sent by Eutolmius, was at Nicomedia on the XXVI of September, on which the memory of the Saints is kept by the Latins, or at the beginning of October, on which they are celebrated among the Greeks. In those months, while the persecution raged, Diocletian was at Nicomedia only in the year of Christ 304, as Tillemont makes out from the testimonies of writers. To that year, therefore, the martyrdom of SS. Cyprian and Justina must be bound. Let us accept from the Basilian Menology, borrowed probably from an older witness, the birth of St. Cyprian under Decius, and let us place the conversion of St. Justina under the reign of Claudius; and let us combine the other notes of time. Decius began to reign in the year of Christ 249, Claudius in the year 268, and each reigned about two years. In the last year of the latter, the year of Christ 270, St. Justina, converted to the faith, would have been about 16 years of age, and Cyprian 21; in the year of Christ 304, in which they were crowned with martyrdom, he will count his 55th year of age, and she her 50th. In the Confession or Penitence it is read that St. Cyprian set out to the Chaldeans in his 30th year, and that, when he had spent some time there, he returned to Antioch and at the solicitations of Aglaïdas assailed St. Justina with magic arts. The holy Virgin's contests with Aglaïdas and the demons can be fixed about the year of Christ 282, when Cyprian was already 33 years of age and the holy Justina 27; and there will remain until the martyrdom 22 years, in which the remaining deeds can conveniently be fitted: namely the conversion of St. Cyprian, his ordination, sixteen years in the Order of the presbyterate, and the rest spent in the episcopate.

[68] flows unimpeded. It is not proved that before the times of Constantine But if anyone should judge too great an age to be assigned to Justina when she was sought by the loves of Aglaïdas, especially since in the Confession she is called a young girl, and elsewhere such titles are ascribed to her that she seems to have been many years younger than St. Cyprian — as far as I am concerned, let him believe Justina born under Claudius, as Cyprian under Decius, and fix her conversion about the year 282, after which let him at once subjoin the loves of Aglaïdas; the rest of the chronological arrangement will flow no less conveniently, as will easily be plain to one who considers it. Let us return to Fell as he brings up another engine. Meanwhile, he says, if indeed these things are feigned to have been done at Antioch

under Eutholmius the count of the East, these things cannot pertain to the times of Diocletian, since before the times of Constantine no count of the East was appointed there; whence Constantine is beaten in Zosimus for having changed the form of the empire; and John of Antioch, speaking of Felician who was raised to that dignity, adds in express words οὐκ ἦν πρῶτον ἐν τῇ αὐτῇ μεγάλῃ Ἀντιοχείᾳ κόμης ἀνατολῆς ἐγκάθετος. I wonder that the place is not more closely assigned where John of Antioch said this; we should draw out the sense of the words more certainly from the context, which, though now doubtful in some degree, can nevertheless by no means establish Fell's assertion. I render the Greek into Latin word for word: There was not previously in that same great Antioch a count of the East residing — or rather, stationed? Render ἐγκάθετος as you please; but you will not hammer out from it even a semblance that the countship of the East was then first instituted; for these words can be perfectly true in more than one sense, even if there had long before been counts in the East.

[69] that the countship of the East was not instituted. The other cavils As regards Zosimus, I do not know whether he has been alleged by Fell in good enough faith. Certainly in the whole part of the History which treats of Constantine there is not a word about the countship of the East, and nothing which affords even a shadow of Fell's assertion. Toward the end indeed Zosimus rants intemperately against Constantine after his manner, because he had divided the power of the prefect of the prætorium among four prefects and part of it among masters of the soldiery. But Fell, I suppose, will not have the countship of the East understood by the prefecture of the prætorium or by the mastership of the soldiery: for that would be too false and ridiculous. He erred therefore, or imposed upon us, when he alleged the testimony of Zosimus. For the rest, even if I cannot prove with sufficient certainty from elsewhere that in Diocletian's reign there were counts in the East, nothing thence accrues to Fell; for it is his part, who attacks the history, to convict it of falsehood, not mine to prove the several points by other testimonies. And Photius, from Eudocia's Metaphrase, calls the same judge not count of the East but only prefect; whence, if some interpolator afterwards coined count, it would not be a matter for much wonder, nor would the falsehood and forgery of the whole history be duly drawn from it. What Fell subjoins thereafter, in short — not to pursue the several points, for wherever I turn my eyes falsehood shines through — let him delete without scruple, since he has hitherto proved absolutely nothing, and has shown nothing which proves a fable, much less a lie. Nor do the few things he has yet subjoined succeed better with him. Photius, he says, states that Cyprian was made bishop of Antioch after Anthimus. Photius does indeed assert this from Eudocia's words; what then? Whom (Anthimus) it is nevertheless most certain to have been prelate not of that city but of Nicomedia.

[70] Prettily. If this logic holds, then I shall at last show of the same Fell. that no Charles was king of England, because it is most certain that there was an emperor of the Romans, called by the name of Charles, who was not king of England. Let us go on. Nor is what others hand down any more genuine, that he (St. Cyprian) succeeded him at Nicomedia, since the fabulists agree with one mouth that Cyprian was sent by the command of Eutholmius from Antioch to Nicomedia, was there at once crowned with martyrdom, and was beheaded together with Justina at the river Gallus near the city: so that however he may have been Anthimus's successor in martyrdom, he certainly could not succeed him in the episcopate. Thus Fell concludes his observations, who seems here to have felt the weakness of his sophisms drawn from the invented anachronisms about the death of St. Anthimus the martyr of Nicomedia, since he returns again to the same point, generously rubbing Baronius's error off on others as well. As for his saying that all the fabulists agree that Cyprian was sent from Antioch to Nicomedia, as though Eutolmius had been there and had inflicted the torments on the Saints, this is likewise false; indeed I have nowhere seen it asserted. On the contrary Eudocia writes that St. Cyprian was brought to the governor from Antioch and St. Justina from Damascus, by which she sufficiently indicates that the prefect was at that time not at Antioch but in another city, and that the Saints were there questioned, tortured, and thence sent to the emperor. This lapse of Fell's, though it makes little to the point here, I nevertheless wished to have noted, because he so severely harries the errors of others and from them so easily bestows on them the title of fabulist. Now let us discuss the judgments of other critics.

§ VI. The criticisms of Tillemont are examined, and the censures of Baillet and Maranus opposed to them. There is a discussion of the Saints' native place and of St. Cyprian's see at Antioch. Certain writings not with sufficient certainty attributed to our St. Cyprian.

[ ] Baillet deserts Tillemont, who defends the Confession, Tillemont had seen Fell's Admonition, which we have attacked in the two preceding sections, and opposed himself to it in volume 5 of the Monuments of the Church, page 329 and following, discussing what he had found pertaining to our Saints. Besides the Confession published by Fell, he does not seem to have consulted any Acts except those compiled by Metaphrastes, which he acknowledges to have drawn the confusion of the two SS. Cyprian from the error of Gregory Nazianzen and of the other Greeks. He holds and defends the Confession as a genuine offspring of our St. Cyprian; as to the rest, if you except one point or another, he judges that Eudocia is to be followed, since he believes that the genuine Acts lay before her, from which she composed her Metaphrase with great fidelity and without poetic inventions. From these, therefore, he frames the history of our holy Martyrs. Wonderful is the criticism of Baillet, who deserts his own leader Tillemont. Let us give his censure from the Critical Table at the XXVI of September, translated into Latin. He writes thus: There may be seen … the writing entitled The Confession of St. Cyprian, which seems to have been composed already at the very time of their martyrdom. It survives in the last edition of the Works of St. Cyprian of Carthage prepared by Fell and Pearson, who rightly hold it suspect. Tillemont judges more favorably of it, and believes that it served as an authentic document for Gregory Nazianzen and the empress Eudocia along with the lost ancient Acts. Others are found in Surius, but they have Metaphrastes as their author and confound the two Cyprians, as Gregory did. Finally, it must be confessed that nothing about those Saints remains to us which can be held authentic. The pretended Confession of St. Cyprian seems above all to be untenable in many places.

[72] whose censure is wonderfully inconsistent. So Baillet, vaguely and stirring up I know not what. Do Fell and Pearson, then, only hold the Confession suspect, while they contend, with every engine brought to bear, to prove that its author is a fabulist, to whom both the writing itself and the deeds narrated in it are mendaciously attributed? This I do not sufficiently grasp. Certainly those hypercritics hold both the author and the writing itself for fables and impostures. But if Baillet judges it an adulterine offspring falsely ascribed by an impostor to our St. Cyprian, and one which indeed betrays its own falsehood, he could safely have deleted the marginal note which he attaches to the reported censure of Fell: It may nevertheless be doubted whether the Confession is by St. Cyprian himself; for at least it was fitting to believe that St. Cyprian, once converted to the faith, did not hawk as true deeds fables and inventions so extravagant. But perhaps Baillet meant only to signify that, if that little work should happen to be St. Cyprian's, it has certainly been afterwards corrupted by very many errors? Although his wavering words present nothing of the sort, let it be so; but then it was certainly Baillet's part to assign what those things were which could by no means be defended and which he judged to have been later corrupted, and thus to render an account of his censure. But so far is he from having performed anything of the kind, either in the place cited or in the elogium itself, that he seems here to hold as probable not only what has proceeded from the Confession, but other things also which he received from the undoubtedly corrupted Acts of Metaphrastes, and from which, no longer hesitating there, he stitched together his elogium. I could review many such things here, but I do not think it worth the labor to harry his criticism at greater length, because I know it is admitted among the learned that Baillet, when he deserts his Tillemont and has no other leader who has refuted Tillemont, is light and goes astray everywhere.

[73] Since some difficulties occurred in Tillemont's opinion [Of its genuineness Maranus judges even less favorably, but the ground of his censure] which he perhaps could not remove, lest he seem always to think with him, he preferred to maintain the negative and to follow Fell; but since Fell's criticism tends to erase our Martyrs not only from the roll of Saints but even from that of men, and the remaining cavils rest upon that censure, he who did not dare to follow his leader in the first point could easily be entangled in solecisms and stick fast in the rest. Prudentius Maranus, often praised, who completed the edition of the Works of St. Cyprian of Carthage prepared by Baluze, and censured Fell in §1 of the Life of that same Saint as regards the existence and sanctity of SS. Cyprian and Justina, while disagreeing with Fell as to the antiquity of the oft-mentioned Confession, at the same time withdraws somewhat covertly from Tillemont concerning its genuineness. In the Preface, page 5, Maranus speaks thus: I should not indeed number among the better monuments of antiquity the Confession of Cyprian which the Oxford editor published in Latin. But nevertheless, because … it was held in esteem by Gregory Nazianzen, Eudocia, and Photius, I have not only not suffered it to be lacking in this edition, but have not hesitated to substitute, in place of the Latin interpretation, … the Greek text itself … and a new interpretation. Then in §1 of the Life, attacking Fell, he confesses that he does not subscribe to Fell's opinion about the antiquity of the Confession. Further, he says, Fell himself admits — though in this matter I do not altogether agree with him — that the Confession of Cyprian was written before the times of Constantine, that is, about that time at which he is believed to have undergone martyrdom, namely under Diocletian and Maximian. And indeed, if the said Confession is genuine, Cyprian must have written it before his martyrdom; and since Maranus judges it later than that, he at the same time denies it genuineness, and judges that it was an offspring falsely ascribed to him by another: for he would not, I suppose, have the Martyr brought back among the living, so that after his crown he might recant his crimes by a testimony composed afterwards.

[74] What moved Maranus, Baillet, and others to deny that little work to our St. Cyprian he does not render. The chief errors I do not know: they certainly brought forward no particular ground for their opinion; nor accordingly is it necessary to vindicate it by special arguments for the Saint whose name it bears, and to whom it was attributed by Gregory and Eudocia and so many other writers who followed. I see very many wonderful things in that Confession, but such as I could not convict of falsehood. Let those attempt it who at once with decisive tone relegate such things among the little fables; but let them remember what is read in the books of Job and Tobit and in the New Testament about the demon and his deceits and maleficences, and then let them approach the matter with arguments, not with strong words, so that they may at least be seen to have attempted something and may deserve an answer from others who do not so easily refuse credence to such writings. I meanwhile the oft-mentioned Confession

shall hold as authentic so long until I shall have been taught otherwise and convinced by solid arguments. But let us return to Tillemont, whose criticism Baillet disapproves in the same way with words but with no reasons, and which deserves further examination, since he has quite carefully discussed almost everything in the first and third parts of the Acts, that is, in the Conversion of St. Justina and the Passion of the Martyrs, that produces difficulty. He gathers all those faults in Note 2 on our St. Cyprian, volume V of the Monuments, page 720; whence I select those which fall upon our Acts and have not yet been discussed in connection with Fell's cavils, passing over those which pertain only to the interpolation of Metaphrastes. The first, and in my judgment the one that produces the greatest difficulty, is Antioch, which is said not only to have been the native place of our Saints and the scene where the principal events are related to have been done, but where besides St. Cyprian is said to have obtained the mitre after Optatus, who baptized St. Justina and her parents, and after his successor Anthimus, by whom the Saint was admitted to the Church.

[75] St. Cyprian was not bishop of Antioch in Syria, Further, in the Conversion of St. Justina, which we shall publish from our manuscripts, Antioch of Syria is manifestly designated, which is also known among writers under the added names of Daphnitic Antioch, the Great, or on the Orontes. But it is certain that our St. Cyprian was not archbishop of Antioch, which is the metropolis of Syria, nor that the two others named preceded him in that chair. For Eusebius, in whom we have a Catalogue of the patriarchs of Antioch down to his own times, mentions none of these, whom nevertheless he could the less have passed over since they were his coevals and contemporaries. Add that if deeds so illustrious and wonderful as those of our Saints had happened at Antioch the Great, in the neighborhood, that is, of the region where he was writing, Eusebius could not have been ignorant of them, who, in narrating the affairs of the Christians done for the faith under Diocletian, especially in Syria and the neighboring regions, seems to have been bound to bring in an account of them also. But of these things more presently. The empress Eudocia in Photius does not expressly designate Antioch the metropolis of Syria. What pertains to this — everywhere only Antioch is mentioned — Photius has thus at the beginning of book 3: Ὁ δὲ τρίτος, τὸ μαρτύριον τοῦ ἁγίου Κυπριανοῦ καὶ Ἰουστίνης τῆς καλλιπαρθένου μετρεῖ, οἳ ἐμαρτύρησαν, Διοκλητιανοῦ καὶ Μαξιμιανοῦ τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἀρχὴν ἐχόντων. Συνελήφθησαν δὲ ἐπὶ τὸ μαρτύριον, ὁ μὲν ἐξ Ἀντιοχείας, ἧς καὶ μετὰ Ἄνθιμον τὸν ἀρχιερατικὸν ἴθυνε θεσμὸν, τὴν ἀυτὴν καὶ πατρίδα λαχὼν· ἡ δὲ ἐκ Δαμασκοῦ, ἐκεῖ γὰρ τῆς Ἀντιόχου μεταστᾶσα (ἅυτη δὲ καὶ τῇ Παρθένῳ ἐχρημάτιζε πατρὶς) τὸν Χριστὸν ἐκήρυσσε λαμπρῶς.

[76] but of another city Schottus renders the text thus into Latin: The third (book), finally, comprises the martyrdom of St. Cyprian and of the illustrious virgin Justina, who, while Diocletian and Maximinus (rather, Maximian) were reigning at Rome, bore witness to the faith by their death. For they were carried off together to the laurel of martyrdom: Cyprian indeed from his native city Antioch, whose archbishopric also he had administered after Anthimus; but Justina from Damascus: for there she openly professed Christ after she had removed from Antioch, which was also the Virgin's native place. Schottus, that is, had imbibed the common opinion that Antioch the metropolis of Syria was in question, and so interpreted ἀρχιερατικὸν θεσμὸν as archbishopric, which I believe should be rendered more closely to the text as the pontifical rite or office of the chief priest, so that they may at least be said of a bishop or of one acting in his stead. I should prefer also, more literally, with the error in Photius's text corrected to τῆς Ἀντιοχείας or τῆς Ἀντιόχου πόλεως, to render thus: But she from Damascus: for there, after she had removed from Antioch (this too was named as the Virgin's native place), Christ, etc.; so that no greater suspicion about Antioch on the Orontes may be introduced into the Latin than the Greek text supplies, which, as is clear to one who considers it, does not necessarily present that city to us, except perhaps from the neighborhood of Damascus, of which matter more below. Meanwhile I observe that in the Acts published by Edmond Martène and Durand, Antioch the metropolis of Syria is likewise not distinctly expressed, as neither in our Greek Passion and in some other monuments; against which the manuscript Conversion of St. Justina to be published cannot militate in this point, into which the denomination from the neighboring grove of Daphne could easily have been thrust by an interpolator, to whom either that Antioch alone was known, or who at least judged, not cautiously enough, that it was in question: which ought not to detain us from seeking another Antioch.

[77] There were formerly very many cities marked with this name by the Antiochuses. but of another Besides the metropolis of Syria, Antioch of Pisidia was always famous, which had its own sacred prelates from the times of the Apostles. There were various other cities of the same name. Stephen of Byzantium enumerates thirteen; Eustathius fourteen; Appian in his Syrian Wars is the authority that Seleucus, son of Antiochus, founded sixteen, or at least bestowed on them the name of Antioch; Ortelius and other more recent geographers assign various ones. Among all these let us search out a place for the native city of both Saints and for the see of three bishops, since the Acts cannot be understood of Antioch the Great. Tillemont already attempted this in Note 4, where he stood for Antioch of Phœnicia. Baillet received Tillemont's attempt very ill, closing number 3 in the elogium of our Saints thus, after he had said, as we have already set out, that the discussion in the Confession cannot be of Antioch of Syria. This, he says, compels those who receive it (the Confession) for historical truth rather than for poetic fiction to seek another Antioch which could have been the native place of SS. Cyprian and Justina and have had him as bishop: in which they seem to have tormented themselves quite uselessly. This censure of Baillet's is again without any proof; but Tillemont's conjecture does not appear to me so extravagant and light that, if two things did not hold me back, I would not gladly admit it, with the learned Assemani in his Admonition to the Martyrdom of SS. Lucian and Marcian, whatever Baillet may say. But since it seems such to me, it will be well to give an account both of it and of the considerations opposed to it. Why he chooses Antioch of Phœnicia before the others of the same name, Tillemont sets forth thus at page 722, Note 4: From all that Eudocia relates about SS. Cyprian and Justina it is clear that St. Justina was taken at Damascus and St. Cyprian arrested at Antioch, and that they were dragged before the same judge. Therefore it is most likely that that Antioch was of the same province as Damascus, namely Phœnicia.

[78] These things, I say, granted that Eutolmius was prefect only of a particular province, of a city of the same name, are to me very likely: for Tillemont found an Antioch in Phœnicia, and it would otherwise be understood with difficulty that either Martyr was brought before him from a province in which the prefect had no jurisdiction. As regards Antioch in Phœnicia, Stephen of Byzantium reviews in the fifth place an Antioch founded by Semiramis between Cœlesyria and Arabia. He does not more closely assign its site; but it is quite probable that this Antioch of Stephen was in Phœnicia and very near Damascus. Strabo in book 13 bounds Cœlesyria by Libanus and Antilibanus, from which and from other evidence Cellarius, Ancient Geography, book 3, chapter 12, page 267, makes out that Damascus was situated on the farthest borders of Cœlesyria on this side. It is certain from elsewhere that Cœlesyria on this same side, namely toward the South and the winter East, had both Arabias for its neighbors; whence it follows that Antioch, which is placed midway between the two, must have been near Damascus; and thus an Antioch in Phœnicia is most probably supplied to Tillemont by the ancients, nor accordingly did he spend useless labor in seeking it. Further, receive now, reader, why I do not agree with Tillemont, and think that the Antioch which was our Saints' native place and the scene of their chief deeds is to be sought elsewhere. In the first place I nowhere find Antioch of Phœnicia in the ecclesiastical Notitiæ; and I cannot bring myself to think that so soon after the martyrdom of St. Cyprian that episcopal see fell together with the city of Antioch, so that no further mention of it is found in the councils that followed in the same century or elsewhere. Hence it becomes likely to me that that Antioch no longer existed in the time of our St. Cyprian.

[79] and perhaps Then, if anywhere an argument drawn from the silence of some writer ought to have force, I believe that it demands a place here, so that we may exclude the native place of SS. Cyprian and Justina not only from Phœnicia but also from Cœlesyria and the neighboring regions. Eusebius of Cæsarea, a contemporary author, in book 8, chapter 2 of his History, describes the persecution under Diocletian and the evils and deaths which the faithful then bore; then, narrating with a special theme and purpose the Acts of the Martyrs of Palestine, he reviews the illustrious contests of the bishops of Syria, Phœnicia, Egypt, Arabia, and the neighboring provinces undergone for the faith under Diocletian; he names the governors of those provinces and very many tyrants: and yet among all these no mention is made of SS. Cyprian and Justina, of Eutolmius, and of the other matters pertaining to them, which at least must have pervaded all Syria and struck men by their extraordinary character, had they happened in the metropolis of that province — no mention, I say, is made of these by Eusebius. Certainly here, if ever anywhere, I acknowledge a negative argument and its force; so that this alone would drive me back from Tillemont's opinion. Now further, since another Antioch must be sought, the opinion of Le Quien seems to me more probable, who makes Antioch of Pisidia the episcopal see of Optatus, Anthimus, and our Cyprian, and accordingly the native place of the latter and of St. Justina. In the first place this is favored by the fact that Antioch of Pisidia is called by writers by the simple name of Antioch no less than the other, whereas the other cities of the same name are everywhere used with special added denominations for distinction. Nor indeed do I believe that Eudocia, if she had meant to signify to us some less famous Antioch of two names, would have called it nakedly Antioch.

[80] Antioch Then Photius seems sufficiently to indicate that the empress was not speaking of Antioch of Syria, when, as Tillemont observed, he writes that St. Cyprian was dragged before the judge ἐξ Ἀντιοχείας, from Antioch; since the counts of the East and the prefects of Syria had fixed their seat at Antioch on the Orontes, that is, in the metropolis of the province, and accordingly it is not likely that the Saint had to be led thence elsewhere, but rather thither from elsewhere, before the judge. Thirdly, finally, although it is certain that from the times of the Apostles an episcopal see was erected at Antioch of Pisidia and occupied in succession, yet none of those bishops became known until Eudoxius, mentioned in the sacred Calendars of the Greeks at the XXIII day of June, where he is said to have baptized St. Eustochius the martyr of Ancyra, who was crowned with martyrdom under Maximian Galerius; so that a place is easily found here for our St. Cyprian and his two predecessors to be inserted in the catalogue. Le Quien places Eudoxius first, and then subjoins our three. St. Eustochius was already grown up when he was baptized by Eudoxius, and it might seem doubtful whether at the least twenty years — as many as must certainly be allowed from the conversion of St. Justina under bishop Optatus down to the passion — he was baptized

before St. Eustochius was crowned with martyrdom, and accordingly whether Eudoxius occupied the chair of Antioch so many years before the persecution of Diocletian. But this difficulty will easily be removed if you place Eudoxius — as nothing else forbids — midway between Optatus and Anthimus; for thus you will remove the baptism of St. Eustochius from his passion by as few years as you may wish. Greater is the difficulty already deduced above from Tillemont's reasoning: namely, in the too great distance of this city from Damascus, for the same judge to be reckoned to have had jurisdiction in both. Certainly Damascus, a city of Phœnicia, is separated from Antioch of Pisidia by whole provinces — Pamphylia, Isauria, both Cilicias, and Syria.

[81] If the counts of the East already in Diocletian's time presided over the East with jurisdiction as widespread as they afterwards had, [the metropolis of Pisidia. The Acts are wrongly criticized for asserting that in the third century] this argument ought not to trouble us at all. For it is certain that the counts of the East obtained a most ample administration, yet a vicarious one under the Prefect of the prætorium, as is plain in Boulenger, The Roman Empire, book 4, chapter 25. I showed at num. 69 and following, against Fell, that it must at least be held doubtful whether counts of the East were not instituted in the reign of Diocletian and even before. It is still more uncertain whether at that time magistrates under the name of vicar or another did not obtain as ample a power in the East as that of the counts. Whether therefore Eutolmius was a count, or endowed with similar jurisdiction under another name, he could have summoned the Saints from different provinces for questioning. Besides, even if perhaps Eutolmius did not hold a magistracy of such ample power, if it had become known to him how great and how marvelous were the things that had once happened between St. Cyprian and Justina, he could, impelled either by curiosity or by the sting of superstition, have requested her from the governor of Phœnicia, once Cyprian had been arrested, since he had learned that she had been the cause of St. Cyprian's conversion. However that may be, since we must proceed by conjectures to be drawn out of Eudocia's assertion, I set this conjecture of mine, from which certainly nothing else takes away likelihood, against Tillemont's; to which, as far as I am concerned, let whoever has at hand some reason for excusing Eusebius's silence about our Saints, and the silence of the ecclesiastical Notitiæ about a see of Antioch in Phœnicia, rather subscribe. Tillemont in the same Note 2 finds another error in the Acts in Metaphrastes, which, if it is an error, redounds equally upon ours.

[82] Toward the end of part I, or the Conversion of St. Justina, in Martène one reads thus: there were parthenons or communities of virgins. And Cyprian promoted St. Justina the virgin, making her a deaconess, and appointed her mother of the monastery of virgins; which in our manuscripts is varied thus: And Cyprian the bishop promoted St. Justina the virgin to be abbess in the monastery of virgins and mother of the monasteries of virgins. Now these things displease Tillemont and some others who contend that in the third century monasteries of virgins did not yet exist. But even though such errors could easily be pardoned to an inept translator or interpolator, it seems beyond doubt from elsewhere that those critics are mistaken, since not only then but even long before there existed in the Church assemblies and ascetical houses of virgins, though instituted under a rule far different from what they were afterwards. Concerning houses where a number of virgins gathered together, or widows and deaconesses, lived together from the very first centuries, there is no doubt; and of such the anonymous author seems here to be treating. Whether he wrongly gave the name of monastery to those congregations, let others inquire who like to quarrel about a word: certainly Tillemont himself clearly acknowledges that parthenons existed even before the times of Diocletian, when, in Monuments of the Church, volume 7, page 107, treating of St. Antony, he relates from the Life of him written by St. Athanasius that that Saint brought his sister into a monastery, εἰς παρθενῶνα; which alone, even if very many other proofs were lacking, abundantly defends the anonymous author. And these are the things which I have found to be discussed concerning the Acts of SS. Cyprian and Justina; and from the many remarks sprinkled here and there the reader will easily gather in what estimation they stand with me, and that they are held to have been disfigured in more than one place by an unfair or unlearned hand.

[83] Certain works If any other things occur besides those I have hitherto found fault with, they will certainly be of slighter moment, and will not need so great a discussion that it should not suffice to have warned the reader in the Annotations. Now some things still remain to be said about other little works which bear the name of St. Cyprian and are ascribed to our Martyr. John Fell, often mentioned, subjoins to the Confession the elogium of our holy Martyrs from Ado, and in his preliminary note to it speaks thus: Here two little books ought to follow, the one written in the Latin idiom, the other in Greek. The former is called The Secrets of Cyprian, the other εὐχαὶ Κυπριανοῦ; which indeed I had transcribed from the parchments, with this mind, that since I had undertaken to publish the little works marked with the name of our martyr (St. Cyprian of Carthage), however spurious, I might not seem to have passed over anything through negligence or fraud. But when I found that those treatises teem with the foulest superstition and with inept mysteries of demonology, and indeed smack of a very recent barbarism, I hope I shall be excused for having withheld them from the public light. The said little works I have not found elsewhere, unless perhaps the εὐχαὶ be one Greek Prayer of the two of which presently. As regards the Secrets, it is not contrary to likelihood that such a work was composed by St. Cyprian when already converted, wishing to show the deceits and wiles of the demon and thus to make Christians wary. Fell's criticism, seen in the foregoing, leaves it uncertain enough to me whether those little works are to be repudiated as certainly as he asserts; I fear indeed that, as is his wont, he somewhat too liberally exaggerates the foulest superstition and the inept mysteries. Two other little works besides bear the name of our St. Cyprian, and are inserted in all the editions of the Works of St. Cyprian of Carthage which I have seen.

[84] certain ones Pamelius at page 516 prefixes to the first the title A Prayer of Cyprian for the martyrs; but then in the argument he speaks thus: Now to Cyprian (he means the Carthaginian) not only the manuscript codices of Manutius and Morel constantly ascribe this, but also the English, the Affligem, the Marchiennes, and the Dunes codices; none of which, however, adds that For the Martyrs. Certainly the style too is not foreign to Cyprian. Whether Pamelius found only the name of Cyprian prefixed to those Prayers in his codices, the later editions make me doubt. John Fell in the Oxford edition has of Antioch added in both places; and in the first place indeed he attaches a Note, which I do not believe he would have done if he had added that word of his own. Certainly it would then have been his part to warn the reader in the same Note of the suspicion of an introduced interpolation. In the Preface, giving an account of the little works to be published, he adjudges the same Prayers, sharing the common lot with the Confession, to masked declaimers among the baggage most stuffed with trifles, but adds nothing in particular. Prudentius Maranus left them inserted at column 27 in the edition prepared by Baluze among the Works commonly ascribed to the doctor of Carthage, and left the same titles of Fell prefixed. In the Preface, page 5, he says that these had already been committed to the press by Baluze, and holds them as falsely ascribed to Cyprian — whether to the Carthaginian (whether also to our Antiochene he does not teach). It would be very difficult to say anything about them. I am not so accustomed to the style of the holy doctor of Carthage that from the style in which these shorter little works are drawn up I should dare to pronounce with Pamelius that they must be ascribed to him.

[85] Whence in the editions of Fell and Baluze they were distinctly attributed to our Martyr not with sufficient certainty I do not know; likewise I notice nothing in them for which they must certainly be denied to either. One thing I assert: that the translator was eloquent enough and learned in Latin, if they were translated from the Greek, which without doubt must be judged if they were composed by our St. Cyprian of Antioch. Certainly we everywhere find Hellenisms and I know not what hesitancy of style in monuments translated in antiquity; but here the phrasing seems purer and less encumbered than usual. Yet since the aforesaid Prayers are found in most ancient manuscripts, and perhaps indeed ascribed to Cyprian of Antioch, and since in almost all the centuries there were not lacking men more learned and skilled in Greek letters, I subjoin them here, that the reader may want for nothing. The title of the first I have given above; the rest runs thus in Baluze's edition. Hagios, hagios, hagios, Holy One of holy ones, Father of our fathers, God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, God of the apostles, God of the prophets, God of virgins, God of those who live well, God of believers, God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ thy Son, we invoke thee as suppliants and likewise entreat thee, O only-begotten Son, who wast begotten from the mouth of the Most High before the ordering of the world, and brought forth by a mystery from the womb of Mary the holy Virgin: vouchsafe to grant us who pray a spiritual increase of holy desire and an integrity of heart, that the breast renewed by the saving laver may persist unharmed from carnal offenses. We ask, with faith undefiled, mind uncorrupted, devotion robust, and working or love unceasing, that thou permit us to flourish in thy holy Church; for to thee we bend our knees and bow our necks, to whom angels and archangels, thousands of thousands of martyrs, the choir of Apostles and prophets exult in glory; to whom all the birds sing praises; the tongues of things heavenly, earthly, and infernal confess thee; to thee all waters in heaven and under heaven make confession; insensible things perceive thee; thou alone art, and besides thee and outside thee there is none.

[86] We beseech thee, Lord Father almighty, who art visible to the Son alone (Here Fell notes to St. Cyprian that Pamelius observes that in all the copies is read Conspectabilis; yet the other reading pleases him better, because Prudentius said, he shone forth before them, visible in countenance. Let it be read as one wishes; to theologians seeking a stricter signification in words it will always seem obscure that the Father is beholdable, visible, to the Son alone), whose angels and archangels obey thee, Lord Father: we pray thee to grant us an integral mind, a pure innocence, a devout sincerity, a conscience holy, pure, sober, chaste, living by a glorious faith against all the snares of the world; grant us a breast fortified against the threats of the devil and the enticements of the flesh, that we be not entangled in the deadly nooses of the violent and bloody enemy, and that we may bear through unharmed the sign of eternal salvation. Drive from us all the filth of the world and every persuasion of the devil. Let him be ensnared, let him fall and be overcome by us and be removed, as from Sarah thy handmaid was the most wicked demon Asmodeus, extinguished by thy angel Raphael; and as thou wast present to Tobit, so vouchsafe to be present to me; and as thou didst show mercy to the three children in the furnace and to Daniel, so vouchsafe to do concerning us thy servants. Thou who didst raise the dead, enlighten the blind, who gavest hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, walking to the lame, health to the lepers, so give also to thy servants, who believe with the whole strength of our mind that thou wast born, didst suffer, and wilt come to judge the living and the dead. Stand by us, as by the Apostles in chains, by Thecla in the fires, by Paul in persecutions, by Peter in the waves; thou who sittest upon the seven thrones at the right hand of the Father, look upon us and deliver us from

the destruction of eternal death, one in one, the Father in the Son, the Son in the Father, the Holy Spirit, through whom and with whom is to thee in the holy Church honor, power, brightness, majesty, might, blessing, immortality, both now unto eternity always and unto all ages of ages, amen.

[87] to our Antiochene martyr Why this Prayer, which certainly suits excellently the faithful of any condition, was called for the martyrs, I do not yet perceive. Further, what I said above about the purity of the style I would not have the reader take as though I judged it free of blemishes: for he will easily notice that the phrasing is encumbered in one place or another; but those faults seem to have been easily introduced by a copyist's fault. The Latinity too I praised only in this sense, that it seems above the common run of translators of the middle age. I wish the same said concerning the following one, which in Fell and Maranus, or rather Baluze, is entitled A Prayer of Cyprian of Antioch, which he uttered on the day of his Passion, and which I likewise present. Lord holy Father, hagios, God hagie and hagie my God — for who is greater than thou? To thee I render thanks and praise, God of Abraham, God of Isaac and God of Jacob, God of our fathers, God of the Apostles and God of the prophets and God of the martyrs, who wast before the ordering of the world, God of the living, who art to come to judge the living and the dead, who art the true God, who sittest above the Cherubim and Seraphim the seat of thy honor and lookest upon the abysses, who seest all things before they are born, who hast the power to slay and again to restore, who hast the power to make green out of the dry: thou Lord and ruler of all, free me from this world and hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear the sons of Israel out of the land of Egypt, though they believed neither thee nor thy servant Moses.

[88] in the editions of the Works Woe to my sins! When thou shalt rise up to shatter the earth, under what cleft of the rocks shall I hide myself from before thy power? To what mountain shall I say, Fall upon me; and to what hill, Cover me from before the fear of the Lord, when thou shalt rise up to shatter the earth? I ask, Lord, come to my help; do not judge me according to my deed, for I have obeyed nothing in thy precepts. Hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear Jonah out of the belly of the whale; so mayest thou hear me and cast me forth from death into life. As the Ninevites put on ashes and sackcloth and did penance before the Lord … as I make confession before thy sight for all my sins, thou who art a lover of penitence, have mercy on me. But David also says: Lord, for thy name's sake blot out my sin; and I, entreating * thy majesty, blot out all my sins, and hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear the three children out of the furnace of fire — Ananias, Azarias, Misael — and didst send thy angel with a cloud of dew, and Nebuchadnezzar the head of the kingdom was confounded; for thou art King of them that reign and Lord of them that rule, who alone hast immortality and dwellest in light inaccessible, which no man sees nor can see. Hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear Daniel out of the lions' den, and didst send the prophet Habakkuk, and he brought him a meal and said: Eat the meal which God has sent thee. And Daniel said: God will not forsake those who seek him. Hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear Tobit and Sarah while they prayed in the court of their house; then the angel Raphael offered their prayers for them; so mayest thou also hear my prayers, and admit my prayers to thy holy hall, and continually send thy angel, who may blot out all my offenses, as thou didst blot out the unclean spirit from Sarah the daughter of Raguel, and mayest enlighten my heart, as thou didst enlighten the eyes of Tobit. Hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear Susanna between the hands of the elders; so mayest thou free me from this world, for thou art a lover of a pure conscience.

[89] Hear me when I pray, as thou didst hear Hezekiah the king of Judah, ascribed to St. Cyprian and didst blot out infirmity from him; so also take away from me the infirmity of the flesh, and increase me unto faith, as thou didst increase to him fifteen years unto life. Free me from the midst of this world, as thou didst free Thecla from the midst of the amphitheater; free me from every infirmity of my flesh. I entreat thee, Father of majesty, who at the end of times hadst mercy on us, sending to us Jesus Christ thy Son, our Lord, God, and Savior, born of the Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit, the angel Gabriel announcing it, through whom thou hast freed us from the peril of impending death. And I entreat thee, Son of the living God, who hast wrought such great wonders; who at Cana of Galilee madest wine out of water; who openedst the eyes of the blind; who madest the deaf to hear; who recalledst the paralytic to their limbs; who loosedst the tongues of stammerers, healedst those vexed by the demon, madest the lame run like stags, freedst the woman from the issue of blood, raisedst the dead, walkedst on the water with thy feet; who gavest thy hand to Peter as he was sinking; who didst found the sea and set a bound to it and saidst: Thus far shalt thou come, and here shalt thou break thyself in thy strength. I entreat thee, Son of the living God, for all my transgressions, who art in the heavens the Son in the Father and the Father in thee forever; who sittest above the Cherubim and Seraphim the seat of thy honor. Angels stand by thee, a number innumerable, fearing and trembling at thy honor and power, crying with a loud voice and saying: Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth.

[90] Thou thyself hast made a covenant with us: Ask and you shall receive, knock and it shall be opened to you; Whatsoever you shall ask of my Father in my name, I ask of the Father that you may receive. I ask, that I may receive; I seek, that I may find; I knock, that it may be opened to me; I ask in thy name, that thou mayest ask of the Father and it may be given me. I am ready for thy name's sake to pour out my blood as a victim and to endure any torment whatsoever. Thou art, Lord, my hearer and defender; defend me from my adversary. Let thy angel of light protect me, since thou hast said that what you believing shall ask through prayer shall be given you. Every man is a liar, thou art true. As thou hast promised, thou hast power, Lord, to give me all thy heavenly sacrament, that I may be worthy to see the face of thy Saints. Let thy Spirit work in me, let thy will be done in me; for I have pledged to thee all the days of my life — thou who under Pontius Pilate didst suffer a good confession — who crucified didst descend and didst trample upon the sting of death: death is conquered, the enemy the devil is conquered. Thou didst rise again from the dead and didst appear to thy Apostles; thou sittest at the right hand of the Father, who art to come to judge the living and the dead. Thou shalt bear rule; free me from the hand of him that seeks my soul. By thy name free me from the adverse power, that thou mayest give me help to conquer my enemy; for thou art the mighty champion and advocate of the prayers and petitions of our souls. Day and night mayest thou intercede for my sins; mayest thou bear my prayer to thy Father.

[91] of Carthage And thou, Lord, holy Father, vouchsafe to look upon my prayers, as thou didst look upon the gifts of Abel. Vouchsafe to free me from the fire and the everlasting punishment, and from every torment which thou hast prepared for the wicked: through the good and blessed Jesus Christ our Savior, through whom to thee be praise, honor, power, glory unto the ages of ages, amen. Thus far what is published in Baluze and others; concerning which it will be well to have observed further that I strongly suspect that both he and Fell borrowed everything from Pamelius, and printed it as each found it there, with no other manuscripts consulted. For there are absolutely no variant readings, although Pamelius confesses that he took certain things from the printed texts and manuscripts which he had, in various places, and so combined them. But it would be exceedingly wonderful that those later editors should have found a manuscript in which everything agreed so scrupulously with the text of Pamelius, emended and stitched together at will and from conjectures only. Whatever it be, the reader could again have observed, both in the place which I supplied with dots and elsewhere, that the reading is not so restored that it is not in some places gaping and encumbered. Now I subjoin the Acts.

Perhaps deprecor*.

INTERPOLATED ACTS

By an anonymous author

From manuscripts, collated with the text published by Martène in volume 3 of the Thesaurus anecdotorum

Cyprian, bishop and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Justina, virgin and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Theoctistus or Theognitus, M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

BHL Number: 2047

By an Anonymous author.

PART I.

The Conversion of St. Justina the virgin and of St. Cyprian the bishop.

St. Justina, having heard the Gospels, kindled to the faith The illumination of our Lord Jesus Christ the Savior was made from heaven, and, ^b the words of the prophets being fulfilled, the whole world that is under heaven was illumined by the word of God, and those believing in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit were baptized. And there was added also the virgin Justina, whose father was ^c Edusius, in the city of Antioch, which is next to the place that is called ^d Daphne. She used to hear ^e Prelius the deacon through her window; and sitting there she heard the great works of God: how the Lord our Savior took on manhood, and, according to the announcement of the prophets, how he was born of the Virgin Mary, and the Magi adored him, and the vision of the star, and the ^f glorification of the angels, and the power of signs and prodigies, and the grace of the Cross, and the resurrection from the dead, and the manifestation to the disciples, and the ascension into the heavens, and the sitting at the right hand of the Father, and his immortal kingdom. And when the blessed Virgin heard these things from the deacon through the window, she could not bear the enkindling of the Holy Spirit, but desired to see the deacon face to face. And not bearing the ardor of the Holy Spirit, she said to her mother: My mother, hear me your Daughter; for these things which we adore daily are nothing: they are idols put together of silver and gold and iron and bronze, of lead and stone and wood and the bones of the dead, which, if one of the Galileans should come, before he begins with his hand, he will crush all of them together by his word alone.

[2] But her mother said to her: Be silent, lest perhaps your father hear this thought of yours. she draws her parents to the same faith, who together And she said to her mother: Let it be known to you and to my father that I adore Christ, whom I have learned perfectly through the deacon Prelius, hearing for many days through the window all the wonders which

the Lord did. And this God through the sign of his Cross is always present to those who fear him: for the Christians say, There is no other God in whom we may be saved. And when she had said this, she went away to the church of Christ to pray. And her mother told all these things to her husband in their bedchamber. And when they had lain long awake, sleep came upon them; and Edusius and his wife saw an army of angels and in their midst Christ saying to them: Come to me, and I will give you the kingdom of heaven. And in the morning they rose, and were amazed at what they had seen; and taking their Daughter they came to the church of God together with Prelius the deacon, and asked him to bring them in to bishop ^g Optatus, which the deacon did. And falling at the bishop's feet they besought that they might receive the seal of Christ.

[3] But the bishop did not consent until they had told their vision, are baptized. Solicited in vain to marriage by a suitor how Christ had appeared to them. And they told him also the Virgin's desire concerning Christ. And Edusius ^h shore his head and his beard (for he was a priest of the idols), and falling at the bishop's feet all three received the seal of Christ; and Edusius merited the honor of the presbyterate for one year and ⁱ six months, and departed from the world. And the Virgin went frequently to the church of God. A certain ^k Agladius, a scholastic, seeing the Virgin going frequently to the church, came to desire her, and kept sending men and women to ask her in marriage; and to all of them she said: I am betrothed to Christ my heavenly bridegroom; he will keep me unspotted until his coming. But Agladius, gathering a multitude of men and watching her as she went to the church, wished to carry her off by force. But the women and girls who were with her cried out and made it known in her house, and coming out with swords and clubs they ^l put them all to flight. And the Virgin, making the sign of the Cross on her forehead, was kept safe from every temptation, always frequenting the church and giving herself to prayer. And Agladius went to Cyprian the magician, and promised him two talents of gold and silver, that by sorceries he might catch the virgin Justina for him, not knowing, unhappy man, that the power of Christ is unconquered. And Cyprian by his magic arts called up a demon, and the demon coming said to him: Why have you called me?

[4] Cyprian said to him: I love a Virgin of the ^m Galileans. by various sorceries Can you persuade her and bring her to me? And the demon, having no power, promised him. And Cyprian said to the demon: Tell me your works and I will believe you, that you will bring me the virgin Justina. The demon says to him: I was made a deserter from God, obeying my father; I have troubled men, I have dragged angels down from on high; I persuaded Eve and cheated Adam of paradise; I taught Cain to kill his brother; I persuaded the Jews to crucify Christ; I have shaken cities, dashed down walls, undermined houses; and since I have done many other things, this Virgin will not conquer me. Take, therefore, these drugs and scatter them outside around her house, and I, coming to your aid, will cast my father's mind into her, and at once in that hour she will hearken to me. But the Virgin of God, rising at the third hour of the night, was rendering ⁿ prayer to the Lord her God. And she felt the demon's assault and signed herself and her house with the sign of the Cross, and prayed that the demon might be put to flight; and the virgin Justina said with tears: Almighty ^o only-begotten God, who didst stretch out the heaven, who didst found the earth upon the waters, who didst make man to thine image and likeness: thou, Lord, who madest Eve from the rib of Adam to feast [p] unspotted upon thy creation, but who, when they obeyed the persuasion of the serpent and were given over to death, hadst mercy on them, granting remission of sins and the resurrection of eternal life. Every creature which thou hast made glorifies thee, the true God.

[5] and maleficences Lord God, redeemer, help me and strengthen thy Handmaid, and make me worthy, whom Satan coming in this hour wishes to tempt. And signing her whole body with the sign of the Cross, she breathed upon the demon. And the demon withdrew from her, and coming to Cyprian stood before him; and Cyprian said to him: Tell me, why have you not brought the Virgin? The demon says to him: Do not compel me to say what I cannot; but I saw a certain sign, at which I wasted away. And Cyprian, mocking him, dismissed him, and again by the magic art called up another and stronger demon. And this one likewise boasted and said to Cyprian: I have heard both your command and his powerlessness; I will make it good and do your will. Take, therefore, this [q] heart of mine and scatter it around her house, and I will go and persuade her. And Cyprian, taking it, did as the demon had directed him. But the virgin Justina, rising at midnight, prayed, saying: At midnight I rose to give praise to thee upon the judgments of thy justice; God of all and Lord of mercy, Ruler of things heavenly and earthly, who didst confound the devil and didst receive sacrifice through faith and gavest men power to trample down the enemy's strength, who didst draw the holy Daniel out of the lions' den, who didst slay Bel and the dragon, who didst enlighten things darkened and quicken dead bodies and confound death, who didst grant men resurrection: despise me not, merciful Father; spare thy Handmaid, O almighty King, Lord, and keep me in chastity, and keep my lamp unextinguished, that I may enter with thee into rest. Unspotted Savior, Lord, glory to thee, holy God, to God the Father and to thy only-begotten Son together with the Holy Spirit, amen.

[6] she is tempted to no purpose And signing herself with the sign of the Cross, in the name of Jesus Christ she breathed upon the demon, and he left her. And the demon came to Cyprian and stood before him, and blushing kept silence. Cyprian said to him: Where is the Virgin to whom I sent you? The demon said: I am overcome, I am afraid to say; for I saw a certain terrible sign and wasted away. And Cyprian dismissed this one too with insult, and again by magic arts called up the devil himself, the father of the demons, and says to him: What is this weakness of yours? All your power has been overcome by one Virgin. The devil says to him: I will presently bring her to you; only be you ready. And Cyprian said to the devil: Tell me, what is the sign of your victory? The devil says to him: I will vex her with various frenzies and will set her and her body on fire for fornication, and I will make her frantic by bringing a phantasm to her at midnight, and I will make her ready for you unto the desire of corruption. Then the demon showed himself in the likeness of a virgin to St. Justina, the virgin of God, and went in, and sitting upon her bed says to the holy virgin Justina: I have been sent to you today by Christ to live with you in chastity; but tell me, what is the reward of your contest for virginity? For I see you much wearied by abstinence. The holy virgin Justina said: The reward indeed is great, the labor slight.

[7] The demon says to her: How then was it that Eve, when she was in paradise living [r] a virgin with her husband, keeping herself from all knowledge, by St. Cyprian, who, having found by trial the demon's afterwards they were filled and begot sons and the world was filled? For God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply and fill the earth. For I think that if we remain in virginity we shall make God's word of no account and shall fall into judgment, as despising the Lord and not obeying him. And the holy Virgin, when she had heard this, being troubled by the devil, wished to go out of the door, because she was violently troubled in heart by these thoughts. But she perceived within herself what the Holy Spirit, who dwelt [s] in her, was saying to her; and signing herself and praying she breathed upon the devil; and the devil melted like wax before the face of fire, and appeared no more. And the holy Virgin, coming to herself after the disturbance, at once found the burning of the flesh flee from her, and began to say: Glory to thee, Christ, Son of God, our Savior, who savest those who are weighed down by peril and leadest thy servants to the light and to thy will out of an alien will: Lord, my God, permit not thy Handmaid to be overcome by the malignant Satan; let not the serpent, the enemy, defile thy unspotted Dove, but keep me undefiled for thy Godhead; pierce my flesh with the nails of thy fear, and out of thy law have mercy on me.

[8] And the devil, confounded, appeared to Cyprian; and Cyprian said to him: powerlessness, is converted As I see, you too have been overcome; but how have you been overcome by one Christian Virgin? Tell me, what is her victory? The devil says to him: I cannot tell you; but I saw a certain terrible sign, and I wasted away, and at once I withdrew, dissolved like [t] smoke. But if you wish to learn the power of her victory, swear to me, and I will tell you. Cyprian says to him: By what shall I swear to you? The devil says to him: Swear to me by my great powers, which endure, that you will never depart from me. And Cyprian said: By your great powers I will never depart from you. And the devil said confidently: I saw the sign of the Crucified and at once wasted away and flowed like wax before the face of fire. Cyprian says to him: Is the Crucified, then, greater than you? The devil says to him: Yes, he is greater than all, because through him God had mercy on the world. And whomsoever we here pervert and cause to go astray, there is a [v] brazen fork, and fiery goads are fixed in them with torments, and so they receive the sentence of the inextinguishable fire, to be tormented forever. Cyprian says to him: Then I too must hasten to become a friend of the Crucified, lest I incur such a punishment. The devil says to him: You have sworn to me by the powers of my army, by which no one can forswear himself. Cyprian says to him: I despise you and all your smoking powers; but this night I have learned the power of Christ and the prayer of the Virgin, how she confounded you all and melted you like smoke; wherefore I sign myself and renounce you and your demons: I sign myself, saying, Glory to thee, Christ, Son of God, our Savior. But you, devil, hear me: I have Christ the Lord, who has made me safe. Then the devil departed confounded. And Cyprian, going to the bishop, fell at his feet, saying: Servant of the most high God, sign me and catechize me unto the knowledge of Christ.

[9] to the faith, But the most blessed bishop [u] Antimus, thinking that he had perhaps come to lead the church into error, drove him out, saying: Let those who are outside suffice you, Cyprian; you can do nothing against the church of God, for the power of Christ is unconquered. Cyprian said: I too am certain that the power of Christ is unconquered; for on the night that has passed I sent the prince of the demons and the devil himself to the holy virgin Justina, that by any means they might seduce her; and I learned in her prayers that by the power of the Cross and by prayers she put them and the devil himself to flight: wherefore have mercy on me who entreat you, and save my soul. And the bishop, giving thanks to God, blessed him and let him go, saying to him: Hasten, Son, to the church of God, and render prayer to God without ceasing. Cyprian, going to his house, broke all his idols in pieces, and through the whole night mourned, saying: How have I dared to appear before the power of Christ, when I have done such great evils? How shall I bless him with my mouth, when I have frequently invoked many unclean demons and eaten of the polluted things of the sacrifices? And now I am set in ashes; have mercy on me who [w] await the mercy of God. And on the great day of the [x] Sabbath, going to the church, he prayed, saying: Lord Jesus Christ, if I am worthy to be called thy perfect servant, grant me to hear through the Holy Spirit.

[10] he is baptized, and becomes a presbyter Having entered the holy church, he sought to hear a word of consolation from the holy Scriptures; and when he had come to the threshold of the holy church, those who were chanting cried out, saying: Save thy servant that hopes in thee; and again the reading of the prophet: Behold, my child shall understand; he shall be exalted and greatly glorified; again in the Psalm: Thou hast seen, O Lord, be not silent, O Lord, depart not from me; again the Apostle says: Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law; and again in the holy Gospel he says: This my son was lost and is found. And after this the deacon cried out, saying: Go forth, catechumens. But Cyprian remained seated. And Asterius the deacon says to him: Rise and go out, Cyprian. Cyprian says to him: I have been made a servant of Christ, and will you send me out? The deacon says to him: You have been made perfect I shall have been made a servant of Christ. And the deacon reported this to the bishop. And the bishop, summoning him and asking his will according to the custom of the church, inquiring diligently into everything, catechized him; and so [y] baptized him. And after some time he was made a deacon of the holy Sacraments of Christ, and grace was given him against the demons, and he healed all infirmities. And converting many from the error of the Gentiles he made them Christians. And his life was blameless and his character without malice. And when a year was completed, he was promoted to the rank of the presbyterate, and remained sixteen years in the office of presbyter. And the blessed Antimus, foreseeing his own departure, calls together a [z] synod of bishops and ordained St. Cyprian bishop; and straightway he passed in Christ to the Lord. And Cyprian the bishop promoted St. Justina the virgin to be [aa] abbess in the monastery of virgins and mother of the monasteries of virgins; for Cyprian enlightened many by the word of Christ and converted them, [bb] increasing the flock for Christ.

ANNOTATIONS.

didst plunge. Thou who wast clothed with flesh for our sake, Savior of the world, Jesus, only-begotten, etc., which agree almost entirely with the printed text.

p. After thine likeness, Martène's Acts have: I entreat thee, help me and strengthen thy Handmaid, who promises chastity, and make me worthy in this hour. And signing her whole body, etc., which in ours have been transferred to the beginning of the following number. Our fuller anonymous transcript again agrees with them word for word; but the remaining manuscripts, whatever they have interposed here, are halting and gaping. In the St. Omer copy, after thou, Lord, follows: who didst set him with his rib to feast unspotted upon thy creation; the transcript of St. Maximinus after of Adam continues thus: that with her husband she might feast unspotted upon thy creation; and finally in others, for epulari is everywhere read copulari: faultily everywhere, as is plain, without doubt through the fault of a copyist or of an inept translator.

q. Here most of the transcripts have medicamentum; the shorter anonymous one and another of St. Maximinus of Trier have formium, which word was read in the same manuscripts in the preceding number for medicamina. It is likely that cor meum, which is manifestly read in our codices, arose from formeo: and this indeed from what source? φόρβια in Latin are medicamenta; φόρβιον or φόρμιον is the name of a plant which is used for weaving mats and little coverings. Du Cange in his Glossary, under the word Formus, cites Papias, who interprets formeum as warm blood.

r. Again in the various manuscripts the sentence varies much here. Martène's exhibit it thus: How then was it that when Eve was in paradise, a virgin coming together with her husband, they were separated from all knowledge; but when they consented to eat of the tree of knowledge, they were at once filled with all knowledge and begot sons — which are indeed more correct, yet not without faults, and make the demon reason ridiculously.

s. Here too the published Acts are somewhat faulty as regards the sense, where one reads thus: Then the holy Virgin, hearing these things, inflamed with the poison of the serpent, rose up troubled, wishing to go out of the door, being violently troubled in her heart by these thoughts. But God, who does not permit his servants to be tempted above what they can bear, but makes with the temptation a defense, that they may be able to endure, revealed to the Virgin through the Holy Spirit that it was the devil who was speaking. Which in all the shorter manuscripts, almost as in the one we print, are truncated and defective.

t. In Martène and in our fuller transcript very many things are interposed here, which I have given in the preliminary Commentary, num. 33 and following. Further, I wish that what I noted above at letter i, referred to the preliminary Commentary, num. 67 and following, be observed concerning them. For the rest, the lengthy interpolation inserted here in the published Acts seems to have proceeded and to have been expanded from the assertions in the Confession, as I shall note in that place; the rest about the loves of Aglaïdas and the magical contrivances of St. Cyprian were likewise taken from there; wherefore I equally refer the reader who desires more about these things to that place. After the interpolation, Martène's Acts return thus to ours: After these things, Cyprian, seeing so many and such great things — that in everything he is overcome by the sign of Christ — again by magic arts called up the devil, the prince of the demons, and says to him: Tell me the power of that sign by which the Girl overcomes you. The devil says to him: Swear to me, etc.

v. The readings vary not a little in this sentence. What Martène published, with most of the transcripts, has egerimus; a little later furiella aërea for furcella, or furcilla, as the St. Omer copy has, ænea. Du Cange in his Glossary, under the word Furiella, cites the passage from the Acts of SS. Justina and Cyprian published by Martène, and conjectures that it was badly rendered from the Greek word Θύελλα. I confess that ænea and aërea are words very close in their characters, and that the one could easily have been read and transcribed for the other; yet I suspect from what follows that torments must be designated, and accordingly I do not believe that one should read aërea procella from the Greek Θύελλα, but fornax ænea, a brazen furnace, as our shorter transcript has, or something similar. For the rest, I wonder at the demon's speech here, which certainly is not that of one commending himself or courting goodwill. In the Confession we shall see the devil compelled to confess his own weakness.

u. This Anthimus is not the bishop of Nicomedia who underwent martyrdom at the beginning of the persecution, as Baronius wrongly thought, but another of the same name, who probably sat at Antioch of Pisidia. See what is discussed in the preliminary Commentary, num. 79 and following, num. 60 and following, and finally what was cited above at letter g.

w. These things again are twisted and dislocated in various ways in the various manuscripts. Martène reads: and now I am set in the ashes of his mercies, awaiting them. The shorter anonymous transcript has thus: and putting ashes upon his head he prayed to the Lord that he would have mercy on him, which as to the sense are without doubt more correct.

x. Le Quien in the Catalogue of the bishops of Antioch of Pisidia, into which he inserts St. Cyprian with the predecessors enumerated above, says that St. Cyprian was made a Christian on the 20th day of June; on what arguments he relies in asserting this I do not know. By the great day of the Sabbath perhaps the Great Sabbath, or the day which immediately precedes Easter, is designated; but this can never fall in the month of June, much less on the 20th of it. Solemn baptism among the Orientals was also wont to be conferred on the vigil of Pentecost, as you have in Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 40. But since Easter is never removed beyond the 25th of April, Pentecost cannot fall on a day later than the 13th of June. It must be, therefore, that Le Quien asserted these things from other sources.

y. Concerning the things which formerly preceded and accompanied baptism, Tertullian and Ambrose deserve a hearing. The former, in the book On the Soldier's Crown, chapter 3: To begin from baptism, he says, when we are about to approach the water, we testify somewhat earlier in the church under the bishop's hand that we renounce the devil and his pomp and his angels. And St. Ambrose in book 2 On the Sacraments, chapter 7: You were asked, he says, Do you believe in God the Father almighty? You said, I believe, and you were plunged in. Again you were asked, Do you believe in our Lord Jesus Christ and in his Cross? You said, I believe, and you were plunged in. A third time you were asked, Do you believe in the Holy Spirit? You said, I believe, and you were plunged in. St. John Chrysostom too may be consulted on all these matters, in Catechesis I to those about to be enlightened.

z. Of a synod there is no mention in Martène, where only this is read: Calling St. Cyprian, he ordained him bishop. Perhaps a Greek word signified an assembly, namely of some bishops, which the translator rendered by synod.

aa. It is criticized by most, among other things, that the Acts introduce parthenons into the Church already in the third century. We have vindicated this in the preliminary Commentary, num. 82, which consult.

bb. In Martène and in our longer transcript there follows: With whom to God the Father be glory, together with the holy life-giving Spirit, now and always and unto the ages of ages; amen; and thus part 1 is closed and the Confession is subjoined. In our manuscript Acts, with no intervening title, there follows at once When they had been fulfilled, which is the introduction to the Passion or third part. See the Annotations there at letter a.

PART II

The Confession or Penitence of St. Cyprian, edited and translated by Prudentius Maranus the Benedictine, collated with the other published texts.

CHAPTER I.

St. Cyprian relates how, consecrated to the idols by his parents, he frequented all the schools of superstition, and what he learned in each.

Ὅσοι τοῖς τοῦ Χριστοῦ μυστηρίοις προσκόπτετε, τοῖς ἐμοῖς δάκρυσιν ἐπιβλέψατε, καὶ γνῶτε πάντων τῶν ἐμφερομένων ἐν αὐτοῖς τὴν δύναμιν. Ὅσοι τοῖς δαιμονικοῖς ἐπιτέρπεσθε τρόποις, παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ μάθετε τὴν ματαιότητα τῶν ἐν αὐτοῖς χλευασμάτων. Οὔτε γὰρ ὑμῶν ἐμοῦ δεισιδαιμονέστερος πότε γενέσθαι δυνήσεται, οὔτε διερευνήσασθαι τὰ περὶ θεῶν τῶν λεγομένων, οὔτε ἐφικέσθαι τῆς παρ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐνεργείας. Ἐγώ εἰμι Κυπριανὸς, ὁ ἐξ ἀπαλῶν ὀνύχων ἀνατεθεὶς τῷ Ἀπόλλωνι κειμήλιον, μυηθεὶς ἔτι νήπιος τὴν τοῦ δράκοντος δραματουργίαν. Ἑπτὰ οὔπω ἤμην ἐτῶν ὅτε καὶ τοῖς τοῦ Μίθρου προσῆλθον μυστηρίοις, καὶ ὡς Ἀθηναῖος ἐπήλυτος ὢν, ὑπὸ δὲ τῶν γεννησάντων με διὰ σπουδῆς πολίτης γενόμενος, ἔτι ὢν δέκα ἐτῶν, ἐδαδούχησα τῇ Δημήτρᾳ, καὶ τῆς κόρης τὸ λευκὸν πένθος ὑπέμεινα, καὶ τῆς ἐν τῇ ἀκροπόλει Παλλάδος τῷ δράκοντι ἐλειτούργησα, εἰς προκοπὴν νεωκόρου καταστάς. Ἐγενόμην καὶ ἐν τῷ Ὀλυμπίῳ ὄρει, τῶν θεῶν, ὡς λέγουσιν, οἰκητηρίῳ, καὶ ἐμυήθην ἤχους ὁμιλιῶν καὶ ψόφων διήγησιν. Εἶδον ἐκεῖ φαντάζοντα πρέμνα, καὶ πόας ἐνεργεῖν δοκούσας θεῶν ἐπισκοπαῖς. Εἶδον ἐκεῖ ὡρῶν διαδοχὰς, πνευμάτων ὑπαλλασσόντων, καὶ ἡμερῶν διαφορότητα ὑπό τινων ἐνεργειῶν ἐναντίων συνισταμένων. Εἶδον ἐκεῖ χοροὺς δαιμόνων ὑμνούντων, καὶ ἄλλων πολεμούντων, καὶ ἑτέρων ἐνεδρευόντων, ἀπατώντων, συγχεόντων, καὶ ἑκάστου θεοῦ καὶ θεᾶς ἐθεασάμην ἐκεῖ τὴν φάλαγγα, μείνας αὐτόθι ἡμέρας τεσσαράκοντα· ὁπόθεν ὡς ἐκ βασιλείων ἀποστέλλονται τὰ πνεύματα, ἐνεργεῖν ἕκαστον αὐτῶν ἐν τῇ γῇ καὶ ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς ἔθνεσι.

[2] Καὶ ἐσιτούμην ἀκρόδρυα μόνον μετὰ δύσιν ἡλίου, καὶ δή ὢν ἔτι ἐτῶν πεντεκαίδεκα ἐμυούμην τὴν ἑκάστου αὐτῶν ἐνέργειαν ὑπὸ τῶν ἑπτὰ ἱεροφαντῶν· λίαν γὰρ οἱ ἐμοὶ γονεῖς ἔσπευδόν με ἐπιγνῶναι τὰ γῆς, ἀέρος καὶ θαλάσσης, οὐ μόνον τὰ κατὰ φύσιν φθορᾶς καὶ γενέσεως ποῶν καὶ πρέμνων καὶ σομάτων, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐν πᾶσιν αὐτοῖς ἐνεργείας, ἃς ὁ ἄρχων τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἐνετύπωσεν, ἐναντιούμενος πρὸς τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ διατύπωσιν. Ἦλθον καὶ ἐν Ἄργει ἐν τῇ τῆς Ἥρας τελετῇ, ἐμυήθην ἐκεῖ βουλὰς ἑνότητος, ἀέρος πρὸς αἰθέρα, καὶ αἰθέρος πρὸς ἀέρα, ἅμα δὲ καὶ γῆς πρὸς ὕδωρ, καὶ ὕδατος πρὸς ἀέρα. Ἔφθασα καὶ ἐν τῇ Ἰλιάδι, καὶ τὴν ταυρόπολιν Ἄρτεμιν κατέλαβον ἐν Λακεδαίμονι, ἵνα μάθω ὕλης σύγχυσιν καὶ διαίρεσιν, καὶ μετεωρισμοὺς λοξῶν καὶ ἀγρίων διηγήσεων, καὶ τὰ κατὰ μαντικὴν κατείληφα παρὰ Φρυγῶν, καὶ ἡπατοσκοπίαν ἔμαθον· καὶ ἐν βαρβάροις οἰωνισμὸν, καὶ τετραπόδων καμπὰς, καὶ γνωστικῶν κληδονισμοὺς· καὶ φωνὴν τρισμοῦ παντὸς ξύλου, καὶ λίθου, καὶ νεκρῶν ἐν τάφοις, καὶ θυρῶν ψόφους, καὶ παλμοὺς μελῶν ἔγνων, καὶ αἱμάτων φορὰς ἐν τοῖς σώμασι κατ᾽ ἐνέργειαν, καὶ μυρμηκιασμῶν συστάσεις καὶ ἀνατάσεις, καὶ βολὰς λόγων καὶ ἀριθμῶν εἰς λόγους, καὶ λόγων εἰς ἀριθμοὺς· καὶ ἐπιπολαίους κακώσεις σωμάτων, ὡς φυσικὰς, καὶ τὰς φυσικὰς ὡς ἐπιπλάστους, καὶ ὅρκους ἀκουομένους καὶ μὴ ἀκουομένους, καὶ συμφωνίας εἰς ἐναντίωσιν. Καὶ οὐδὲν ἐν γῇ καὶ ἐν θαλάττῃ καὶ ἐν ἀέρι με ἔλαθεν, οὔτε φασματικὸν, οὔτε γνωστικὸν, οὔτε πολύτροπον, οὐ μηχανικὸν, οὐκ ἔντεχνον, ἄχρι τῆς τῶν γραφῶν μεταφορᾶς μαγγανικῆς, καὶ τῶν τοιούτων

ἁπάντων.

[3] Μετὰ τὰ τοιαῦτα εἴκοσι γενόμενος ἐτῶν, παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις εἰς Μέμφιν ἦλθον, κἀκεῖ τῶν ἀδύτων λαμβάνω πεῖραν, ἐν οἷς πρὸς τὰ περίγεια ἑνοῦνται, καὶ κατὰ ποῖον ἀποτρόπαιοί εἰσι τόπον, καὶ τίσιν ἐπιτέρπονται ἄστροις καὶ θεσμοῖς καὶ πράγμασι, καὶ ἐν τίσι φυγαδεύονται· πῶς σκότος τηροῦσι, καὶ ἐν τίσι πράγμασιν ἄλλοις τὴν ἀντίστασιν ἔχουσιν. Ἔγνων ἐκεῖ πόσοι ἄρχοντες σκότους εἰσὶ, καὶ πῶς ἐν ψυχαῖς κατορθοῦσι καὶ σώμασιν ἑαυτῶν κοινωνίαν ἔχουσι, καὶ ποία ἐνέργεια δι᾽ αὐτῶν κατορθοῦται, δρόμος, γνῶσις, μνήμη, φόβος, τέχνη ἔνδολος, ἀθρύλλητος ὁρμὴ, λήθη καὶ ὄχλου παίγματα, καὶ τὰ τοιουτότροπα. Ἐκεῖ ἔγνων σεισμῶν καὶ ὑετῶν ὁμοιότητα, καὶ γῆς καὶ θαλάσσης ἐπιτετηδευμένην ὁρμὴν, ὡς ἂν εἰς ἐναντίωσιν τῆς ἐποπτικῆς κινήσεως τοῦ θεοῦ. Ἐκεῖ εἶδον γιγάντων ψυχὰς ὑπὸ σκότους τηρουμένας, καὶ φασματικῶς ὀρθούσας γῆν, ὡς ἄν τις ἐπ᾽ ὥμων φέρῃ φορτίον βαρύτατον. Ἐκεῖ εἶδον δρακόντων κοινωνίας μετὰ δαιμόνων, καὶ τὴν ἐξ αὐτῶν προϊεμένην πικρίαν εἰς ὄλεθρον τῶν ἐπιγείων. Ὅθεν μετέχοντα τὰ ἀέρια πνεύματα τοὺς ἀνθρώπους τὰ πάνδεινα διατίθενται, ὡς βοηθείας ὑλικῆς ἀπολαύοντα. Εἶδον καὶ γῆν βαρουμένην ὑπὸ πνεύματος, καὶ μὴ χαλωμένην ἐπὶ τοῦ ὕδατος, διὰ τὴν ἐπαναφορὰν τῶν στηριγμάτων αὑτῆς τῶν φυσικῶν, Ἦλθον ἐν χώρῳ ὅπου αἱ ἰδέαι τῶν μεταμορφώσεων τοῖς δαίμοσι γίνονται ἣν ὁ δράκων ἀντιδιατασσόμενος τῇ θείᾳ διατυπώσει πρὸς τὴν τῆς πλάνης παράταξιν ἐπετήδευσε, δι᾽ ὧν τὰ πονηρὰ πνεύματα λειτουργοῦσι τοῖς συσπόνδοις αὐτῶν ἐν ἀσεβείᾳ ἀνθρώποις. Ἐκεῖ εἶδον πῶς συνίσταται ἀσεβὴς εὐσέβεια καὶ ἄλογος γνῶσις, καὶ ἄδικος δικαιοσύνη, καὶ συγκεχυμένη κατάστασις.

[4] Ἐκεῖ εἶδον εἶδος τοῦ ψεύδους, μορφὴν ἔχον παμποίκιλον, καὶ τὸ εἶδος τῆς πορνείας τρίμορφον, αἱματῶδες, ἀφρῶδες, λιπῶδες. Εἶδος ὀργῆς, πετρῶδες, ἔρημον, καὶ τραχὺ καὶ θηριωδέστατον. Εἶδος δόλου, πυκνὸν, σύμφυτον, πολλαῖς γλώσσαις κατάκομον. Εἶδος μίσους τυφλὸν, ἔχον τέσσαρας ἐν τῷ ὀπισθοκρανίῳ ὀφθαλμοὺς, φεύγοντας ἀεὶ τὸ φῶς, καὶ πόδας ἔχον πολλοὺς εὐθὺς ἠρτημένους ἀπὸ τῆς κεφαλῆς, καὶ μὴ ἔχον κοιλίαν διὰ τὴν ἄσπλαγχνον ὁρμήν· εἶδος φθόνου ὅμοιον τῷ ζήλῳ, διαφερόμενον δὲ ὅτι τὴν γλῶσσαν προσφέρει ὡς δρέπανον. Εἶδος πονηρίας εἶδον ἐκεῖ, λεπτῶδες, τὸ πολυόφθαλμον, ἀντὶ τῶν κόρων βέλη ἔχον, πρὸς ἐπιβουλὴν τὴν ὁρμὴν κεκτημένον. Εἶδος ἀπληστείας, κεφαλὴν ἔχον στενὴν καὶ μακρὰν, στόμα δὲ εἶχε καὶ ὄπισθεν καὶ πρὸς τῷ θώρακι τὴν γῆν ἀνιμώμενον, καὶ τοὺς λίθους, καὶ λεπτότερον ἐγίνετο, μηδὲν προσιέμενον. Εἶδος λυπότητος, ὀξὺ ὅλον τὸ σῶμα ἔχον κατὰ τὴν ἄρπην, καὶ τὰς κόρας τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν ἔχον συνδυνούσας εἰς ἔκλειψιν. Εἶδος ἐμπορίας, κονδὸν, γοργὸν, ῥυποῦν, ἔχον ἐπὶ τοῦ νώτου δεσμὸν περιέχοντα πᾶσαν αὐτοῦ τὴν ὑπόστασιν. Εἶδος ματαιότητος, εὔτροφον, εὔσαρκον, μὴ ἔχον δὲ ὀστᾶ τὸ συνόλον. Εἶδος εἰδωλολατρείας, ὑψιπετὲς, τὰ πτερὰ ἔχον ἐν τῇ κεφαλῇ, καὶ πάντα σκέπειν ἐπαγγελλόμενον, μηδὲ ἓν μέλος ἔχον ὑπ᾽ αὑτῶν σκιαζόμενον. Εἶδος ὑποκρίσεως, ὅλον πεπονηρευμένον, καὶ ἔχον στέρνα μεγάλα, ἀλλὰ λεληθότως διαῤῥέοντα, καὶ ὡς ἐπὶ τῶν ἀνεμίων εἰς μυρία περιστρεφόμενον. Εἶδος ἀνοίας, νέον, ἀῤῥενόθηλυ, γυμνὸν, ἀναιδὲς, ἀπερίστατον. Εἶδος προπετείας, γλῶσσαν ἔχον μακρὰν τοῦ ἄλλου σώματος. Εἶδος μωρίας, κεφαλὴν ἔχον καρσίον, καρδίαν χαύνην διαχεομένην, καί μηδὲν βαστάσαι ἰσχύουσαν. Καὶ ἑκάστου ἐλαττώματος εἶδον ἐκεῖ μορφὴν, ἣν ἕκαστος δαίμων ἐνδυόμενος ἐπὶ τὸν κόσμον προΐεται.

[5] Τριακόσια ἐξηκονταπέντε παθῶν εἴδη εἶδον ἐκεῖ, καὶ τῆς κενοδοξίας καὶ κενῆς ἀρετῆς, καὶ κενῆς σοφίας, καὶ κενῆς δικαιοσύνης, ἐν οἷς πλανῶσι τοὺς Ἑλλήνων φιλοσόφους. Ὅλως γὰρ ἐστολισμένα εἰσὶν, ἀλλ᾽ ὑπόστασιν οὐκ ἔχουσι, τὰ μὲν ὡς κονιορτὸς, τὰ δὲ ὡς σκιὰ θᾶττον διαῤῥέοντα· ἐν γὰρ τοῖς τριακοσίοις ἐξηκονταπέντε πάθεσι τὰ δαιμόνια ἐνεργεῖν παρασκευάζουσιν εἰς ἀποπλάνησιν. Καὶ ἵνα μὴ τὰ πολλὰ λέγων πολλὰς βίβλους καταγράψωμαι, βραχέα εἰπὼν ἐκ τῶν πολλῶν, τὴν σπουδὴν τῆς ἀσεβείας μου ὑμῖν παραινίττομαι. Τριάκοντα ἐτῶν ἤδη γεγονὼς, παρ᾽ Αἰγύπτου στέλλομαι πρὸς τοὺς Χαλδαίους, ἵνα μάθω τοῦ αἰθέρος τὴν ὁρμὴν, ἣν αὐτοὶ οὗτοι ἐπὶ πυρὸς λέγουσιν, οἱ δὲ ἀκριβεῖς αὐτῶν ἐπὶ φωτός. Παρ᾽ αὐτῶν ἔγνων ἀστέρων ὡς ἐπὶ βοτανῶν διαφορὰς, καὶ χοροὺς ἄστρων, ὡς ἐπὶ πολέμων διαταγαῖς. Οὗτοί μοι κατέλεξαν οἴκους ἑνὸς ἑκάστου, καὶ κοινωνίας, καὶ τροφὰς καὶ πόματα, καὶ συνουσίας νοερὰς ἐπὶ φωτὸς ἀνθρώποις τελουμένας. Οὗτοί μοι διείλαντο αἰθέρα τρόποις τριακοσίοις ἐξηκονταπέντε, καὶ φύσιν ἕκαστον ἔχοντα κοινωνὸν ἐνεργείας ὑλικῆς, καὶ συμβουλίᾳ χρωμένους τῇ τοῦ ἄρχοντος διαταγῇ, καὶ παραμηνύοντα τὴν βουλὴν τοῖς κινήμασι, καὶ κρύπτοντα μυστικὴν ἐντολὴν, καὶ πειθόμενα λόγοις πραγματικοῖς τοῖς ἐκ θυσιῶν καὶ σπονδῶν. Τινὰ δὲ μὴ πειθόμενα, ἀλλὰ διάθεσιν τηροῦντα πρὸς τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ φωτός. Ἔδειξαν δέ μοι πῶς ἐπείσθησαν μετέχειν σκοτεινῆς βουλῆς, καὶ ἀντιπαρασχεῖν βουλὴν φωτὸς εἰς ἐπικράτησιν. Εἶδον τοὺς μεσίτας, καὶ ἐθαύμασα, ὅτι καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἀερίοις τοῦ σκότους πνεύμασιν ὁ βίος κατακερματίζεται. Ἔγνων τὰς πρὸς ἀλλήλους διαθήκας, καὶ ἐξεπλάγην ὅτι ὅρκοις ἰδίοις κεκράτηνται.

[6] Ἐκεῖ διαθέσεις, ἐκεῖ ἐντολαὶ, ἐκεῖ σπουδὴ καὶ ἔννοια, ἵνα τῆς μετουσίας αὐτῶν ἀπολαύσωσιν, ἣν ὁ ἄρχων σοφίᾳ δεινῇ ἐξεῦρεν. Ἐκ γὰρ ἀέρος τὸν νοῦν ἐπλήρωσε συνέσεως, ἐκ δὲ γῆς τὴν γλῶσσαν δολιότητος, ἐκ δὲ τῶν καταχθονίων τὴν προαίρεσιν κακούργου πράξεως· καὶ οὕτως ἀπησχόλησε τὸν πάντα χρόνον, ἀποστῆναι πίστεως καὶ Θεοῦ καὶ τῆς εὐσεβείας αὐτοῦ. Πάντα ἐν τῇ πλάνῃ ἐνεπορεύσατο· πάντα συνέχεε, καὶ αὐτὸς ἐν πηγῇ ματαιότητος βασιλεύει τῆς ἀνομίας. Ἐμοὶ πιστεύετε, ὅτι αὐτὸν τὸν διάβολον ἐθεασάμην, ἐμοὶ πείθεσθε, καὶ ἠσπασάμην αὐτὸν, καὶ συνελάλησα, καὶ τῶν παρ᾽ αὐτῷ τὰ πρῶτα ἐχόντων ἐνομίσθην. Εὐφυὲς με μειράκιον προσεῖπε, νέον Ἰαμβρὴν, εὔτονον εἰς λειτουργίαν, ἄξιον τῆς κοινωνίας ἐκείνου. Ἐπηγγείλατό με ἄρχοντα ποιήσειν μετὰ τὴν τοῦ βίου τελευτὴν, ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς κατὰ τὸν βίον συνεργεῖν. Διὸ ὡς τιμὴν ἔχοντί μοι παρ᾽ αὐτῷ, καὶ φάλαγγα δαιμόνων ἐνεπίστευσεν. Ἀνδρίζου, μοι ἐξίοντι ἀνεβόησε, σπουδαιότατε Κυπριανὲ, καὶ προέπεμψέ με ἀναστὰς, ὅπερ καὶ πάντες ἐθαύμασαν. Διὸ καὶ πάντες οἱ ἄρχοντες αὐτοῦ ὑπήκουόν μοι, εἰδότες τὴν τιμήν μου τὴν παρ᾽ αὐτῷ. Ἦν δὲ τὸ εἶδος αὐτοῦ ὡς ἄνθος χρυσίου τιμίοις λίθοις κεκοσμημένον, καὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν ἐστεφάνωτο λίθοις συμπλεκομένοις, ὧν αἱ ἐνάργειαι τοπάδιον ἐκεῖνο κατηύγαζον· καὶ ἡ στολὴ οὐκ ἀνόμοιος· καὶ ἔσειε τὸν χόρτον περιστεφόμενος.

[7] Πολλὴ δὲ ἡ περὶ τὸν θρόνον αὐτῷ παράστασις διαφόρων ταγμάτων κεκλικότων πρὸς ὑποταγὴν αὐτῷ τὰς εἰδέας καὶ ἐνεργείας. Ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐνεδείκνυτο ὡς τὸν τόπον φωτίζει καὶ ἐφάνταζεν, οὐ μετρίως καταπλήττων ἅπαντας. Καὶ γὰρ ἐν πᾶσιν ἄστροις καὶ ἐν φυτοῖς, καὶ ἐν τοῖς τοῦ Κυρίου κτίσμασιν ὁμοιότητας ἑαυτῷ παρέπλεξε πρὸς πόλεμον Θεοῦ καὶ τῶν ἀγγέλων αὐτοῦ παραταττόμενος. Δι᾽ ὧν ἐδόκει τοὺς ἀνθρώπους πλανᾷν ὡς Θεὸς, μηδὲν ἔχων ἐν ὑποστάσει, τὰ δὲ πάντα ζωγραφίᾳ σκιώδει οἰόμενος ὑφιστᾷν καὶ προβάλλεσθαι. Ὅθεν ὅταν φαίνωνται ἐν μορφαῖς οἱ δαίμονες, διαλύονται· σπουδάζουσι γὰρ κἂν διὰ τῶν εἰκόνων δεικνῦναι αὐτῶν τὴν ἐξουσίαν. Πῶς δὲ ἔχει τῶν σκιῶν τούτων ὕλην ἐρῶ. Ὅτι οὐκ ἄλλοθεν, ἀλλ᾽ ἢ ἐκ τῶν θυσιῶν. Αἱ γὰρ ἀναθυμιάσεις ἐκ τῶν κνισσῶν ἐκείνων γίνονται αὐτῷ, ὡς ἔριον καὶ λῖνον καὶ ἱστῶνες καὶ βάμματα, τέχνη τε ναοῦ καὶ ὄργανα. Καὶ ἐν αὐτοῖς ἑαυτοὺς ἀμφιέννυσι, ταῖς σκιαῖς αὐτῶν ἀντὶ μορφῶν χρώμενοι. Διὰ τοῦτο αἰτεῖ θυσίαν, ἄχρι καὶ μύρμηκος, καὶ ὕδατα ἀπαιτεῖ καὶ ἔρια, καρποὺς, καὶ πάντα τὰ ἐπὶ γῆς, ἵνα ἔχῃ ἐν αὐτοῖς τῶν φαντασιωδῶν σκιῶν τὴν ἀπόχρησιν. Ὥσπερ οὖν τῶν θανόντων τὰς μνήμας ἐμμόρφους ἔχομεν ἐν διανοίᾳ, καὶ ὁρῶμεν αὐτοὺς μὴ φαινομένους, καὶ μὴ ὁμιλοῦσι συνομιλοῦμεν, οὕτω καὶ ὁ διάβολος τῶν ἀφιερωμένων αὐτῷ τὰς μορφὰς ἀνατυπούμενος, ἑαυτῷ τε καὶ τοῖς ἑαυτοῦ περιτίθησιν, ὑετὸν διδοὺς, ἀλλ᾽ οὐχ ὕδωρ· ποιῶν πῦρ, ἀλλὰ μὴ καῖον· διδοὺς ἰχθῦν, ἀλλ᾽ οὐ τροφήν· καὶ χρυσὸν δωρούμενος, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἐνύπαρκτον. Καὶ γὰρ ἐκ τῶν ἄλλων ὑλῶν συμμορφαζόμενος, πόλιν δείκνυσι, καὶ οἴκους καὶ χώρας, ὄρη τε καὶ πατρίδας, ὡσαύτως καὶ πόαν καὶ ἄνθη καὶ ἔρια, καὶ ἄνθινα ἁπλώματα, καὶ ὀνείρων ὑπόστασιν δείκνυσι· καὶ γὰρ αὐτὸς ἐν νυκτὶ φαντάζει τὰς ψυχάς. Καὶ ταῦτα μὲν ἐκεῖνος φαντάζει, οἱ δὲ ἀσεβεῖς ἄνθρωποι θεραπεύοντες παρασκευάζουσιν αὐτὸν, καὶ ταῦτα ποιεῖν.

From his tender years Whoever you are that are ^b hostile to the mysteries of Christ, look upon my tears, and learn what power all things have that are contained in these mysteries. Whoever you are that delight in the institutions of the demons, learn from me the vanity of the mockeries that are found in them. For no one of you will ever be able to be more superstitious than I, or to investigate more accurately those who are called gods, and to attain to their ^c operation. I am Cyprian, who from tender nails was consecrated as a gift to Apollo, and while still an infant was initiated into the arts of the dragon. I was not yet seven years old when I approached the mysteries of ^d Mithras; and when I had come to Athens, and by the care and solicitude of my parents had been made a citizen, at ten years of age I ^e bore the torch in the mysteries of Ceres, and endured the bright mourning of the maiden, and ^f ministered to the dragon of Pallas on the citadel, having been advanced to the office of sacristan. I came also to Mount Olympus, the seat, as it is said, of the ^g gods, and was initiated into sounds of discourses and into narrations of noises. I saw there in phantasy trees and herbs which seem to work by the ^h presence of the gods. I saw there the successions of the hours, spirits taking their turns, and the distinction of days constituted by certain contrary operations. I saw there choirs of demons singing, and of others waging war, and of others lying in wait, deceiving, confounding; and I beheld there the phalanx of each god and goddess, having stayed there forty days; whence, as from a certain palace, the spirits are sent forth, that each may work upon the earth and among all the nations.

[2] I fed only on ⁱ fruits after the setting of the sun, and I was taught the efficacy of each of them by seven presidents of the sacred rites, devoted to the service of the idols, in various schools when I had not yet completed my fifteenth year. For my parents were very eager that I should know the things that are in the earth and in the air and in the sea; and not only the natural generations and corruptions of herbs and trees and bodies, but also the powers implanted in all these, which the prince of this world ^k impressed upon them, that he might oppose the ordinance of God. I came also to Argos at the rites of ^l Juno. I saw there the counsels of the union of air with ether, and of ether with air, and likewise of earth with water and of water with air. I penetrated also into the ^m Iliad, and to

[3] in every superstition Afterwards, at twenty years of age, I came to [q] Memphis in Egypt, and there, being admitted into the inner shrines, I learned what is the communication of those (demons) with earthly things, in what places they are averters of evil, in what stars and laws and things they delight, by what they are put to flight; how they keep darkness, and in what other things they offer resistance. I learned there how many are the princes of darkness, and how they succeed in the souls and bodies of those who have communication with them, and what sort of operation is brought to completion by them — running, knowledge, memory, fear, crafty art, silent impulse, forgetfulness and the mockeries of the crowd, and other things of that kind. I saw there the likeness of earthquakes and of rains, and the motion of earth and sea deliberately stirred up, that the overseeing motion of God might be thwarted. I saw there the souls of giants held under darkness, and in phantasy upholding the earth, as though one should carry a most heavy burden upon his shoulders. I saw there the communications of dragons with demons, and the bitterness sent forth from them to the destruction of earthly things; whence the spirits of the air, sharing in it, most grievously afflict men, being helped by the aid of matter. I saw also the earth weighed down by the wind, and not plunged into the water because of the raising up of its natural props, which the [r] dragon, who opposes the divine ordinance, wrought out for the contriving of fraud. I came also to the place where the demons have the forms of their transfigurations, through which the wicked spirits minister to men joined with them by a covenant in impiety. I saw there how an impious piety subsists, and a knowledge void of reason, and an unjust justice, and a confused state.

[4] and of the magic I saw there the appearance of falsehood, having a form varied with every kind; and the appearance of fornication, threefold — bloody, foamy, greasy; the appearance of anger, rocky, desert, and rough and savage; the appearance of guile, compacted and dense, shaggy with many tongues; the appearance of hatred, blind, having four eyes in the back of the head, always shunning the light, and many feet hung directly from the head itself, without a belly, by reason of its bowel-less disposition of mind; the appearance of envy, like emulation, yet differing in this, that it puts forth its tongue like a sickle. I saw there the appearance of wickedness, slender, having many eyes, and arrows in place of pupils, equipped with an impulse toward treachery. The appearance of greed, having a narrow and long head, and a mouth behind and at the breast, draining away the earth and the stones; and yet it became the thinner thereby, taking nothing to itself. The appearance of sadness, having its whole body sharp like a sickle, and the pupils of its eyes sinking, so that they seem to fail. The appearance of trade, [s] uncomely, swift, filthy, bearing on its back a bundle which contains all its substance. The appearance of vanity, sleek and fat, but altogether lacking bones. The appearance of idolatry, flying higher, and having wings on its head, and promising to cover all things, but not having even one member that is overshadowed by these wings. The appearance of hypocrisy, acting wholly wickedly, and having a great breast, but one that gradually flows away, and, like the things that are moved by the wind, is carried about into wellnigh infinite parts. The appearance of madness, young, male-female, naked, shameless, foolish. The appearance of rashness, having its tongue far from the rest of the body. The appearance of folly, having a crooked head, a loose and flowing heart, and one that can bear nothing. I saw there the form of each several vice, clothed in which each demon goes forth into the world.

[5] I saw there three hundred and sixty-five species of vices, [art] and of vainglory and of empty virtue, and of empty wisdom, and of empty justice, by which they deceive the philosophers of the Greeks. For they are wholly adorned, but have no substance, now flowing away swiftly like dust, now like a shadow; for in three hundred and sixty-five vices the demons prepare their operations for deceiving. But lest by saying more I should write many books, relating a few things out of many, I intimate to you my zeal for impiety. Being now [t] thirty years old, I set out from Egypt into Chaldæa, that I might learn the force of the ether, which they themselves indeed say is placed in fire, but the more [v] accurate among them, in light. From these I learned the distinctions of the stars, as of herbs, and their choirs as [u] drawn-up battle lines. These related to me the house of each one, and their communications, and their foods and drinks, and their spiritual meetings with men in the light. These divided the ether for me into three hundred and sixty-five [w] parts, and each one (demon) endowed by nature with a share of material power, and obedient to the command of the prince, and indicating his counsel by his motions, and concealing the secret command, and [x] obeying the words made effective by sacrifices and libations; yet some do not obey, but keep their disposition toward the counsel of the light. They showed me how they were brought to be sharers in the counsel of darkness, or to set the counsel of the light against it for the sake of mastery. I saw the mediators, and I marveled that even among the spirits of the darkness of the air life is torn into the smallest parts; I learned their covenants with one another, and was astonished that they are held by oaths of their own.

[6] There are dispositions, there commands, there zeal and thought, precepts that they may be made sharers in that communication which the prince found out by a crafty wisdom; for out of the air he filled the mind with prudence, out of the earth the tongue with guile, out of the infernal regions the will with depraved actions; and so he spends all his time in drawing men away from the faith and from God and his worship. He has contrived all things through fraud, he has confounded all things, and in the very fountain of vanity he holds the kingdom of iniquity. Believe me, I saw the devil himself; believe me, I embraced him and conversed with him, and was reckoned one of those who held the first place with him. He greeted me as a noble youth, a new Jambres, firm and fit for his ministry, and worthy of communication with him. He promised that he would make me a prince after the end of my life, and would be present to me in all things while I lived. Wherefore, since I was in honor with him, he committed to me a phalanx of demons. Be of good courage, he cried out as I departed, most excellent Cyprian; and rising he escorted me forth, at which indeed all marveled. Hence all his princes obeyed me, since they knew of what account I was with him. And his appearance was like a flower of gold, [y] adorned with precious stones, and on his head a crown of linked gems, whose splendor lighted up that place; and his robe was not unlike it, and as he turned he made the enclosure tremble.

[7] And a very great retinue of various orders stood about his seat, St. Cyprian is instructed. submitting their forms and operations to his rule. This too was shown me, how he illuminates the place and displays appearances, striking all with no small astonishment; for in all the stars and in the plants and in the works of the Lord he has bound likenesses to himself, prepared to wage war with God and his angels. Whence he seems to deceive men as though he were God, although he has nothing solid, but seems to constitute and produce all these things as by a certain shadowy painting; hence, when the demons are seen in their own forms, they are dissolved; for they make it their study to display their power at least through images. But how he has the material of such shadows I will explain. From no other source assuredly than from the sacrifices. For the vapors from those savors become for him as wool and linen and woven stuffs and dyes, and the craft of a temple and its instruments. For with these they clothe themselves, and use the shadows of them in place of forms; for this reason he demands sacrifice, even down to an ant, and requires waters and wools and fruits and whatever is on the earth, that in these he may have the use of shadows pertaining to [z] phantasy. As, therefore, we have the forms of the dead impressed on our memory and mind, and see them although they are not seen, and converse with them though they do not speak, so also the devil, expressing the forms of the things that are consecrated to him, puts them about himself and his own; giving rain, but not water; making fire, but such as does not burn; giving a fish, but not food; bestowing gold, but by no means solid. For gathering forms also from other materials, he shows a city and houses and fields and mountains and native lands, and grass and flowers and wools and flowery coverlets, and displays the stuff of dreams. For he himself by night exhibits appearances to souls. And these things indeed he counterfeits in phantasy; but impious men, while they worship him, incite and sharpen him to do these things.

ANNOTATIONS.

almost every line certain things occur in the old version; but I shall not henceforth detain the reader with continual notices where it shall not seem worth the labor.

[e.] Δημήτηρ, as it were γημήτηρ, mother of the earth, is the name by which Ceres is called; the old translator expressed Demetra as though a proper name, and he presently went vehemently astray also when he rendered thus: and I awaited the mourning of the white pupil of the idol. Namely, he took τῆς κόρης for pupil, deceived by the ambiguity, whereas by these words Proserpina is manifestly signified, as is plain from Diodorus Siculus and other Greek historians who use this word indifferently. Further, the discourse here is of the most celebrated Eleusinian rites of the Greeks, named from the town of Eleusis in Attica, situated not far from Athens, with which what is here asserted agrees exceedingly well. He is said to have been made a citizen of Athens by his parents' care, because access to the greater Eleusinian rites was not open to foreigners. Concerning the use of tapers or torches in those rites Lactantius writes in book 1: Ceres is said to have sought her (namely, the ravished Proserpina) in Sicily with torches kindled at the summit of Ætna; and for that reason her rites are celebrated with the tossing of burning brands. And Statius, book 4 of the Silvæ:

And thou, Attic Ceres, for whom with panting course We silent initiates shake the votive lamp.

And those who bore the torches in those rites of Ceres were called Δαδοῦχοι, whence is this ἐδαδούχησα. He who desires more about these things may consult Fell's Notes and the learned little work of Castellanus On the Festivals of the Greeks, and John Meursius's little treatise On the Eleusinian Rites: he will find there the use of white garments in them, whence perhaps he will prefer to interpret λευκὸν here as white rather than bright.

p. Maranus notes that in the codex is read καμπτὰς, and that καμπὰς is to be substituted, as I print. Receive what he subjoins in the same Note as worth observing. A little after, some letters in the manuscript codex have fallen out through age, which nevertheless it was not difficult to supply. For it is read thus: ἐπιποπλαίοις … ώσεις σωμάτων ὡς φυσικὰς, καὶ τὰς φυ .. κὰς ὡς ἐπιπολάστοις (perhaps above one should likewise read ἐπιπλάστοις) καὶ ὅρκοις … ονομένοις. So also below, ἐποπτικῆς κινή … τοῦ θεοῦ ἐκεῖ εἶδον γιγάντων ψυχὰς ὑπὸ σκότο .. ουμένας.

q. Memphis, a most illustrious city of Egypt situated at the head of the Delta, is mentioned in the sacred Letters by the prophets as a most celebrated dwelling of superstition and idolatry. Famous there were the shrines of Osiris or Apis. Strabo in book 17 writes of Memphis: The temple of Apis adjoins that of Vulcan, which is a building sumptuously adorned in the greatness of the temple and in other respects. At the front of the racecourse lies a colossus of a single stone… At Memphis there is also a shrine of Venus, who is reckoned a Greek goddess; some call it a shrine of the moon. He hands down that it was in his time a great and populous city, and it lasted until the seventh century of Christ, in which it was destroyed by the Arabs. Fell notes that a diagram of the magical system is exhibited by Origen Against Celsus, book 6, and is called διάγραμμα. Concerning very many superstitions in the writings he cites Jamblichus, chapters 4 and 5, and adds that he contends that great power for magical uses lies in Egyptian names, but that they cannot be translated into another tongue; to which perhaps what is here asserted has regard. For the rest, Del Rio teaches that tempests and by these

similar true things can be done by magicians through the demons; yet here the discourse is everywhere of sleights. Concerning the particular power of magicians and demons over serpents and dragons, see the oft-praised Martin, book 2, question 13.

r. What is enclosed in brackets Maranus notes must be transposed after ἐπετήδευσε in order to make the sense which he expressed in Latin, but in which I stick somewhat, not sufficiently grasping how the natural raising of the earth's props can be said to have been wrought out by the dragon for the contriving of fraud. The passage needs emendation; what if for ἥν we read ἅς — will not the sense be fuller? Then I shall render it thus: I saw also the earth weighed down by the wind and not pressed down into the water, because of the resistance of its natural props. I came also to the place where the demons have the forms of transfigurations, which the dragon, who opposes the divine ordinance, prepared for the contriving of fraud, and through which the wicked spirits minister to men leagued with them in impiety. Further, concerning the earth carried by the water or hanging in the waves, you have the opinion of certain men in Apuleius, On the World, just after the beginning.

s. So Maranus renders, who judges that one should read ἄκορδαν for κορδὸν, as he notes in his Notes. But if in the manuscript was read, as he here expressed in the text, κονδὸν, it could safely be left and rendered small, which is its meaning. Concerning the bodies which the demons put on, and the manner in which in these they mock and harm mortals, consult Del Rio, book 2, question 27, where he treats this matter at greater length, as also book 1, chapter 4, question 3.

t. Up to this point, from the beginning of our number 2, the old translator omitted everything, which Fell had already observed, reading in Photius's abridged collection what is here contained. Further, the epoch of thirty years was of use to us in deducing such a chronological arrangement as we gave in §5, num. 67, of the preliminary Commentary, which consult if you please. Here and in what follows the old interpretation is much different and more compressed.

v. Among the Prophets, Chaldæa comprehends almost the whole region which lies between the Tigris, the Euphrates, and Arabia Deserta, and so Babylon and its neighborhood, which later geographers except from it and call Babylonia, so that they make Chaldæa only a part of Babylonia. Concerning the Chaldeans Cicero has, in book 1 On Divination, chapter 1, what pertains here, as follows: The Chaldeans, named not from a word for their art but for their nation, are thought by long observation of the stars to have produced a science by which it might be foretold what would befall each man and under what fate each was born. Because the Chaldeans were most skilled in astronomy, from which they afterwards turned aside to astrology, that name was everywhere given to astrologers and magicians. See Strabo, book 16, after the beginning, and Diodorus Siculus, book 2 of the Library, about the middle, where you have their philosophy and superstition described. Maranus explained τοῦ αἰθέρος τὴν ὁρμὴν as the force of the air; I should prefer to interpret it the impulse of the ether, that is, its motion and impetus, or rather the principle by which it is impelled and moved. To this belong the words of Apuleius in his book On the World, after the beginning. Heaven itself, he says, and the heaven-bearing stars and the whole starry frame is called Ether; not, as some think, because it is fiery and kindled, but because it is always whirled in rapid courses. It is an element indeed, not one of the four which are known to all, but far different, fifth in number, first in order, divine and inviolable in kind. Of this element, unless I am mistaken, is the discourse here. For the rest, concerning the conjectures and divinations of astrologers from the various disposition of the stars and especially of the planets, as also concerning conjecture from the horoscope of the newborn, you have various matters in the aforesaid Del Rio.

u. In the magic art too the use of herbs is famous, which, namely, were believed to have powers according to their various signatures, and, being assigned to various stars, to exercise their powers in them. Hence Pliny, book 24, chapter 2: The persuasion handed down endures among a great part of the common people, that eclipses of the sun and moon are compelled by poisonings and by herbs. Seneca in the Medea has more of these and similar things. The old version has here: These showed me the powers of the several spirits of the air, making me abstain from the flesh of animals and from wine and from intercourse, which vary much down to that place where Cyprian relates his entrance to the prince of the demons. I suspect that either in the Greek text which he had before his eyes the narrative was abridged, or that it was cut short by the translator himself.

w. Fell notes from Irenæus, book 1, chapter 23, and from others, that that number was sacred to Mithras. Strabo, praised above, a little earlier also writes some things pertaining here about the priests of Heliopolis, situated on the other bank of the Nile opposite Memphis; as do also SS. Jerome in his Commentary on Amos, Augustine in his book On Heresies, Epiphanius in Heresies 24, and Theodoret in his book Of Heretical Fables.

x. Maranus inserted at his pleasure into the Greek sentence — encumbered by mixed genders and numbers — the word demon, to which all is to be referred; yet I do not know whether the discourse be not about the parts of the ether, which the magicians fabled to be animate. What follows the old translator expressed thus awkwardly: I saw their Meditators (Fell better printed Mediatores, from the Greek Μεσίτας) and I marveled, because even in heavenly things they rule the world by money. For I learned what contentions they have with one another, and I was astonished, because they are held by nefarious oaths; which neither hang together with each other nor agree with the Greek text. For the rest, receive here Fell's learned Note. From an old tradition, which Jamblichus, Porphyry, Plotinus, Julian the Apostate, and the rest who after the propagation of the Christian faith turned aside to magic made more commendable, very many marvels were ascribed to good angels and to their ministry. Hence magic was divided into White and Black; and that which was derived from the spirits of light was called Theurgy, but that from the spirits of darkness, Goetia. Between these were posited spirits of a middle nature and power, who were called Mediators, concerning whom Hierocles and the rest of the followers of that madness. On these matters Martin Del Rio deserves to be read, book 2, question 27, section 2, where he treats at length of the various kinds and offices of demons.

y. The oft-mentioned Del Rio, in book 2, question 28, section 3 of the Magical Disquisitions, contends from more than one example that the demon, when magicians enter into a pact with him, first appears in a comely manly form; but after the pact is made, he is seen by his worshipers shaggy and deformed in the likeness of a goat. He treats also at greater length of the appearances of demons in pomp, in book 2, question 4, where you have the matter proved and confirmed by many examples and arguments.

z. Concerning the manner in which, and the matter out of which, demons assume visible appearances, Del Rio again discourses much in book 2, question 28; but here the discourse is of sleights that cast a mist over the eye. Here again the old version varies very greatly, where one reads thus: And he (the demon) made all similar things through phantasies against the power of the Lord God, and in the ministries and works of phantasms he set an example, resisting the Godhead, and established a battle against every ordinance of the Lord. And having the demons transfigured about him into the likeness of the holy angels, he showed by his phantasies the error of man. As a painter by the tempering of colors fashions things immovable and movable, and makes them like to things movable and rational, so also the devil; for there is nothing firm among them: for they make rain to be seen, but there is no water; they display fire, but it does not burn; they furnish food, but not true food; they give gold, but it does not endure in substance; and they display houses and regions and cities and men and rivers and seas and mountains and plains and trees and herbs and flowers and beasts of burden, creeping things and wild beasts and coverlets and things of various colors and diverse robes; and all these are empty and are nothing, but are as dreams: for such is their power. For their prince and they, doing harm, seduce by phantasies the souls of wicked men, who also worship them with sacrifices and libations and impious works. These things, if they proceeded from a similar Greek text, the translator rendered quite freely. Although Maranus's version here is also a little more obscure. Certainly a little before, that the sense may be plainer, I should prefer to render: For he receives from the smoke of the fat that is burned for him dense vapors, and out of these he forms deceptive likenesses of wool and linen and woven stuffs and dyes and of temples and other works — which, if they seem rendered a little freely, will certainly better express the sense of the Greek text. But how the demons contrive such deceits, Del Rio teaches at length in book 2, question 28.

CHAPTER II.

Induced by Aglaïdas, the suitor of St. Justina, St. Cyprian tries every device of his art to storm the Virgin's chastity, which St. Justina renders vain by the sign of the Cross. The demon, having confessed the power of the Cross and his own powerlessness against Christians, is driven off by St. Cyprian.

Τί δὲ πρὸς ἐμὲ βουλόμενον Θεῷ προσελθεῖν, καὶ γνῶναι τὴν ἀτονίαν τοῦ δράκοντος, καὶ πᾶσαν αὐτοῦ τὴν δύναμιν καὶ ἀλαζονείαν, ὅτι κατώρυγμαι ἐν σκότει τῆς ἀσεβείας. Ἐπείρασα γὰρ αὐτοῦ τὸ ψεῦδος, εἰδὼς, ὅτι φαντάζει μόνον, οὐδὲν δὲ ποιεῖ ἀληθές. Ἔγνων ἐκ τῆς παρθένου Ἰουστίνης τοὺς δαίμονας ὅτι καπνός εἰσι, καὶ οὐδὲν ἰσχύουσιν. Εἶδον ἐν τῇ Κόρῃ τῇ Χριστιανῇ τὸν τοσαῦτα φυσῶντα δράκοντα, μήτε κώνωπος ἰσχὺν ἔχοντα. Ἐπείσθην ἐκ τῆς εὐσεβοῦς Παρθένου τὸν τηλικαῦτα ἐπαγγελλόμενον βασιλέα τοῦ σκότους, ὅτι ἐψεύδετο· ὁ γὰρ δράκων ὡς σκώληξ κατεπατήθη ὑπὸ Ἰουστίνης τῆς κόρης. Ὁ βασιλεὺς τῶν δαιμόνων παρέμενε τῇ θύρᾳ τῆς παιδὸς, εἰσελθεῖν μὴ δυνάμενος. Ὁ μυρίαις φάλαγξι δορυφορούμενος σανίδιον τῆς θύρας αὐτοῦ διαῤῥῆξαι οὐκ ἠδύνατο. Ὁ νομίζων πάντων κρατεῖν, ὑπὸ Κόρης ἐπαίζετο. Ὁ τὴν ὑπ᾽ οὐρανὸν σείειν βρενθυόμενος, γυναικὸς τὴν φύσιν πάρεργον ἐγίνετο· οὐ γὰρ ἠδύνατο τοὺς λογισμοὺς αὐτῆς ἀλλοιῶσαι, ὁ τὸν οὐρανὸν λέγων περιτρέπειν. Ὁ ὡς λέων κατὰ πάντων ὠρυόμενος, ὡς κώνωψ ἐν τῷ προαυλίῳ αὐτῆς παρεκαθέζετο, μηδὲν ἐπιχειρῆσαι τολμῶν· καὶ ὁ δοκῶν πάντας ἐκφοβεῖν, εἰς δειλίαν οὐκ ἐνέβαλε τὴν Κόρην.

[9] Ὡς γὰρ παρείην ἀπὸ τῆς Χαλδαίων γῆς, τὴν Ἀντιόχειαν κατέλαβον, καὶ θαυματουργῶν ἤμην ὡς εἷς τῶν ἀρχαίων, καί

πεῖραν ἐδίδουν τῆς γοητείας, καὶ ὀνομαστὸς ἤμην μάγος φιλόσοφος, πολλὴν τῶν ἀοράτων ἔχων κατάληψιν. Πολλούς τε εὐεργετεῖν ἐδόκουν, καὶ μυρίοι ἦσαν οἱ ταῖς φαντασίαις μου προσεδρεύοντες· οἱ μὲν διὰ λογιότητα, οἱ δὲ διὰ τέχνης ἀσεβοῦς ἀπόπειραν, οἱ δὲ διὰ πάθη φιληδονίας, φθόνω, ζήλῳ, κακίᾳ λεηλατούμενοι. Καὶ πᾶσι συνηρχόμην, τοῖς μὲν ἡδονὴν ῥάστην ποιῶν, τοῖς δὲ τὸν ζῆλον τρέπων εἰς τοὺς ἐναντίους, ἢ τοὺς ἐναντιουμένους ὑποτάσσων, ἢ φιλονεικοῦντας ἀναιρῶν. Καὶ γὰρ ὑπὲρ θυγατέρων πατέρες ἐπρέσβευον συμβιωταῖς κακοῖς λεηλατουμένας ὁρῶντες· καὶ ὑπὲρ δουλίδων ἕτεροι, καὶ ἄλλοι ὑπὲρ μητέρων καὶ ἀδελφῶν. Καὶ οὐδεὶς ἀπετύγχανε διὰ τῶν προσόντων μοι δαιμόνων. Ὅθεν ἐπειθόμην μὴ εἶναι θεὸν ἄλλον, ἢ τὸν διάβολον, διότι πάντων κρατεῖ καὶ περιγίνεται. Οὐκ ᾕδειν δὲ, ὦ ἄνδρες, ὅτι ἐπὶ τοῖς ἐμοὶ ὁμοίοις ἰσχύει· οὐκ ἐνενόουν ὅτι ἀδυνατεῖ πρός τινας, ἐπειδὴ ἠγνόουν εἶναι ἑτέραν δύναμιν μείζονα. Εἰ καὶ τὰ μάλιστα ὑπὸ τοῦ συνειδότος ἐνυττόμην, ὅτι ἀδίκως παρέχει πολλὰ, λοιμοὺς, φθορὰς, ἀγχονας, καὶ ὅτι ἀσεβέσι καὶ ἀδίκοις συντρέχει, καὶ ἀνελεήμοσι, καὶ φονεῦσι, καὶ ἅρπαξι. Πλὴν διὰ τὸ πάντα αὐτὸν δύνασθαι, ἢ πλανῶντα, ἢ βιαζόμενον, ἔπαυόν μου τὴν συνείδησιν πρὸς τὴν θεραπείαν αὐτοῦ. Ἐλθόντος δὲ σὺν τοῖς πολλοῖς Ἁγλαΐδου τινὸς κομψοῦ μειρακίου, καὶ περὶ ἔρωτος ἀναθεμένου μοι Ιουστίνης τινὸς παρθένου, ἐν καθέζει γίνομαι τῆς τοῦ δράκοντος ἀσθενείας. Καὶ γὰρ πᾶσα ἡ φάλαγξ ἡ δεδομένη μοι πρὸς βοήθειαν εἰσήλασεν ἐν τῇ Παρθένῳ, καὶ ἀνέκαμττον ἄπρακτοι. Ἀλλ᾽ οὐδὲ ἀποσταλέντα εἰς βοήθειαν τοῦ Αγλαΐδου συνεργεῖν δοκοῦντα δαιμόνια ἡ τῆς Κόρης ἀφίησιν εὐχὴ, κἂν ποσῶς ἐνεργῆσαι. [10] Καὶ δὴ μετὰ πολλὰς τοῦ νεανίσκου ἀγρυπνίας, καὶ πολλὰς περιεργίας, καὶ τοῦ διαβόλου φιλονεικίας, ἐν ἑβδομήκοντα ἡμέραις συμβεβλημένας, αὐτὸς ὁ διάβολος σὺν τοῖς πρώτοις ἄρχουσιν αὐτῇ παρατάσσεται· οὐκέτι γὰρ ὁ Αγλαΐδης εἴχετο μόνος ἐρωτικῶς τῆς Κόρης· ἀλλὰ κᾀγώ· καὶ ἦν ἰδεῖν τὰς τοσαύτας δυνάμεις σὺν τῷ δράκοντι ὑπὸ μιᾶς κόρης καταργουμένας, καὶ ἐκπλαγῆναι. Ἀλλ᾽ οὐδὲ τὴν ἐπιθυμίαν ἡμῶν τρέψαι ἠδυνήθη ὁ διάβολος, καίπερ πολλὰ πειρασθεὶς ἐπιτηδεύσαι. Εἶπον γὰρ αὑτῷ· εἰ ὅλως σοι τὸ τῆς φύσεως σύγκριμα ὑποτάσσεται, κᾄν τὴν ἐπιθυμίαν ἡμῶν ἄμβλυνον, ἵνα μή γελασθῶμεν ἐπιμένοντες καὶ μηδὲν ἐξανύοντες. Διὸ ἐπ᾽ ἐμοῦ καλέσας τὸν τῆς πορνείας δαίμονα, πάμπολλα αὐτὸν ἐπετίμησε, κελεύσας ποιεῖν ὃ προεῖπον, λέγων· Εἰ μὴ χαυνωθῇ ὁ Αγλαΐδης, τὰ πάνδεινα ὑποστήσετε. Ἀλλὰ πολλὰ δράσας, οὐκ ἠδυνήθη, οὔτε ἐν τούτῳ ἐνεργῆσαι ἐν ἡμῖν, δεικνύντος τοῦ θεοῦ, ὅτι οὐ δύναται πρὸς τὴν φύσιν ὁ διάβολος, ἀλλὰ μετὰ τῆς φύσεως μεγάλα φρονεῖ, ὡς ὅτε τις κυλλὸς, ἢ χωλὸς ἵππῳ πολεμεῖν εἰδότι χρησάμενος, δοκοίη τὰ κατορθώματα εἰς οἰκεῖον πρόσωπον ἀναφέρεσθαι· ἡ γὰρ μελέτη τοῦ νέου σώματος ἐξάπτει τὸν πόθον, καὶ τὴν φύσιν πλέον ἐγείρει εἰς ὄρεξιν. Ἦν οὖν πολλὴ ζυγομαχία ἐμοῦ πρὸς τοὺς δαίμονας, καὶ τῶν δαιμόνων πρὸς ἑαυτοὺς, καὶ ἀλλήλοις ἀπεδυσπέτουν. Ἐγὼ δὲ τὴν ἀναχώρησιν τῷ δράκοντι ἠπείλουν ἐπιφυόμενος· ὁ δὲ οὔτε ἔβρυξε συνορῶν ἑαυτοῦ τὴν ἀσθένειαν· κατεβόων τε αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἔφερε δεδιώς μου τὴν ἀναχώρησιν. Ἐν τῇ πεντηκοστῇ οὖν ἡμέρᾳ ἠβουλήθη πλανῆσαι τὸν Αγλαΐδαν εἰς νεανίδα τινὰ, καὶ οὐκ ἴχυσεν, οὔτε τῆς σκιᾶς τῆς Ιουστίνης περιγενέσθαι, καίπερ μεταμορφωθεῖσαν τὴν κόρην, οὐκ ἦν εἰδέναι αὐτῆς ὅμοιόν τι. Ἐπέγνων οὖν αὐτῶν τὴν πλάνην, καὶ προσετίθουν τὴν κατάγνωσιν. [11] Τέλος οὖν, τὸν τῆς πορνείας δαίμονα κατασκευάζει ὁ διάβολος μορφὴν Ιουστίνης δεῖξαι τῷ νεανίσκῳ, καὶ τὴν μὲν μορφὴν ἐδόκει δεικνύναι· ὡς δὲ ἐπλησίασε τῷ Αγλαΐδᾳ περιχαρῇ γενομένῳ καὶ προσφωνήσαντι, καλῶς ἦλθεν Ιουστίνα ἡ ὁλόκαλος· πρὸς τὴν ὀνομασίαν τῆς Παρθένου εὐθὺς ἡ μορφὴ ἀφαιρεῖτο, καὶ ὁ διάβολος ὡς καπνὸς διελύθη, καὶ πρὸς φυγὴν ἐτράπη· οὕτως ὅτι καὶ τὸ ὄνομα τῆς Παρθένου βαρὺ ἦν τοῖς δαίμοσι. Ἐγὼ παρήμην, ὦ ἄνδρες, τούτων σκευαζομένων· ἐγὼ τὴν πεῖραν ἔχων τῆς πίστεως αὐτῆς, καὶ τῆς τοῦ δράκοντος εὐτελείας· συνεχυνόμην, ἠγρύπνουν, παρήδρευον, εἰς γυναῖκα μετεμορφούμην, πετεινὸν ἐγινόμην· ἀλλὰ μόνον ἔφθανον τῆς προσαυλίου τὴν θύραν, ἀναχωρούσης τῆς φαντασίας, Κυπριανὸς ἤμην τῆς τέχνης κατηργημένης. Ἐποίησα ποτὲ στρουθίον τὸν Αγγαΐδαν, καὶ ἀναπτάσας ἔστη ἔμπροσθεν τοῦ δώματος τῆς Ιουστίνης· ὡς δὲ προέκυψεν ἡ Ἁγία, ἀπολώλει τοῦ εἶναι στρουθίον, καὶ ἔμελλεν ἀπόλλυσθαι ἐξ ἄκρου ἑστηκώς ὁ ἄθλιος, εἰ μὴ ἐλέει τῆς Παρθένου, εὐφυῶς κατηνέχθη ἀπὸ τῆς ἀσθενεστάτης ἐξοχῆς τοῦ δώματος. Παραινέσασα οὖν αὐτὸν ἡσυχίαν ἄγειν, καὶ Θεὸν εὐσεβεῖν, ἐκβάλλει τῆς προαυλίου. Οὐ νόσος, οὐ βάσανος, οὐκ αἰκισμὸς ἄλλος τις αὐτῆς περιγέγονεν· ὅτι καὶ ἐν τούτοις καὶ τοῖς τοιούτοις αὐτὴν κατέτεινεν ὁ διάβολος. Πολλάκις οὖν αὐτὴν ἀπαγορευομένην ὑπὸ τῶν ἰατρῶν ἔκλαιον οἱ γονεὶς, ἡ δὲ πρὸς αὐτοὺς ἔφη. Μὴ κλαίετε, ὅτι οὔτε θνήξομαι, οὐδὲ γὰρ ἀθυμῶ, οὐδὲ ἀλγῶ τι· οὐδὲ αἰσθάνομαι ἀσθενείας, ἢ μόνον ἐπιπολαίου τινὸς καύματος, ὡς ἐξ ἀέρος μοι περιχυνομένου. Τί γὰρ οὐκ ἐποιήσαμεν, ἢ τι οὐκ ἐδράσαμεν αὐτᾖ; Ἡ δὲ ἐποίει τὸ σημεῖον τοῦ Χριστοῦ, καὶ ἀπήλαυνε τὰς ἐνεργείας τῶν δαιμόνων. Ἐκάκωσα οὖν αὐτῆς τοὺς γονεῖς, ποίμνας αὐτῶν ἀνεῖλον, βόας καὶ ὑποζύγια. [12] Ἡ δὲ παρῄνει μὴ ἀθυμεῖν καὶ μὴ ἀπελπίζειν, καὶ διὰ τῆς νουθεσίας αὐτῆς, ἐπῆλθεν ἀπολήψεσθαι πολυπλασίονα, τοῦ Θεοῦ εὐλογοῦντος τὰ περιλειπόμενα. Ἔδεισαν τὴν ἐπικειμένην αὐτῇ ὀργὴν καὶ πάντες κατεβόων ἐπιδοῦναι τῷ νεανίᾳ ἑαυτὴν, οὐ πρὸς φθορὰν, ἀλλὰ πρὸς γάμον ἔννομον. ἀλλὰ Ιουστίνα τῷ σταυρῷ τοῦ Χριστοῦ ἰᾶτο αὐτῶν τὰς ἀσθενείας, καὶ ἔπαυε τῆς ὀχλήσεως· καὶ τῷ δήμῳ λοιμὸν προσήγαγεν ὁ διάβολος, καὶ χρησμὸν δίδωσι μὴ ἀπαλλαγήσεθαι, ἐὰν μὴ ἡ Ιουστίνα συναφθῇ τῷ Αγλαΐδᾳ. Ἀλλὰ καταβοῶντα τὸν δῆμον ἠ εὐχὴ αὐτῆς κατέστειλεν, ὁμοῦ καὶ τὸν λοιμὸν ἀποδιώξασα τῆς πόλεως· ὧν οἴσθησιν λαβόντες οἱ πολῖται μεταβαλλόμενοι τὸν Χριστὸν ἐδόξαζον, ἐμὲ δὲ ὡς τῆς πόλεως ἐπίβουλον ἐλοιδόρουν σφοδρῶς, ὥστε με λεληθότως προἳέναι καὶ ἐντρέπεσθαι προσυπαντᾷν τοῖς γνωρίμοις μου. Τέλος ὡς εἴδον, ὅτι οὐδὲν τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ σφραγίδος περιγίνεται, ἐν ἐμαυτῷ γενόμενος, εἶπον πρὸς αὐτὸν τὸν διάβολον· Ὀλέθριε, καὶ πάσης πλάνης χορηγὲ, καὶ θησαυρὲ ἀσεβείας, τί μου τῇ ψυχῇ ἐπεβούλευσας, συνειδώς σου τῇ ἀσθενείᾳ; εἰ γὰρ ἡ σκιὰ τοῦ Χριστοῦ περιγίνεταί σου, τί δράσεις, ἐὰν αὐτὸς παραγένηται; καὶ εἰ μόνον ὀνομάζεται Χριστὸς, καὶ τρέμεις, τί ποιήσεις ἐὰν θελήσῃ σοι ἐπιθέσθαι; εἰ τὸ σημεῖον τοῦ πάθους αὐτοῦ ἀσθενῆ σε ποιεῖ, τῇ ἐνεργείᾳ αὐτοῦ ποῦ ἂν εὑρεθήσῃ; εἰ σφαγίζει, καὶ οὐ τολμᾷς ἐπιβῆναι τῷ ὄρῳ αὐτοῦ, τίνας οὖν δυνήσῃ ἐξελέσθαι ἐκ χειρὸς αὐτοῦ; Οὐδὲν εἶ, οὐδὲ ἔχεις ὑπόστασιν πρὸς ἄμυναν, οὐδὲν ἰσχύεις, οὔτε πάρεστί σοι δύναμις εἰς ἐκδίκησιν. Νῦν ἔγνων σου τὴν πλάνην· ἐπαίχθην ταῖς φαντασίαις σου· ἔγνων σου τὴν ἁσθένειαν· οὐδὲ γὰρ ἔχεις τὶ ἐνυπόστατον, ἀλλὰ ματαίας καὶ προσκαίρου ῥοπῆς ἀπολαύσεις. οὔτε οἱ τύποι σου, οὔτε οἱ θεσμοί σου, οὕς ἀντιτέθεικας τῇ εὐσεβείᾳ, ἀληθεῖς εἰσιν, ἀλλὰ πλάνη καὶ φαντασία. [13] Διέφθειράς μου τὴν διάνοιαν, ἀπώλεσάς μου τὴν ψυχὴν, τὰς ἐλπίδας μου διέῤῥηξας, πᾶσάν μου τὴν λογικὴν κατάστασιν εἰς χάος κατέσπασας, ἀπώλεσας τὴν ζωήν μου, καὶ τῇ κακίᾳ κατεδαπάνησας, καὶ πᾶσάν μου τὴν κατάστάσιν τῆς φύσεως διώλεσας. Μεγάλως ἐπλανήθην πιστεύσας σοι, ὑπερβαλλόντως ἠσέβησα, ἀφρόνως ἠνέχθην, ἐπιδούς σοι ἐμαυτόν· ἐματαιώθην ἐπὶ γράμμασι, τῆι παιδείᾳ μου ἐπιβλαβῶς ἐχρησάμην ὑπακούσας σου· ἀπώλεσά μου χρήματα καὶ πράγματα ἐξακολουθήσας σου τῇ ἀπάτῃ. Μετὰ γὰρ τῆς πατρικῆς οὐσίας, καὶ τὴν ψυχήν μου προσεζημίωσας Εἰδ᾽ ἔνειμα χρήζουσι τὰ ἐν σοὶ ἀπολλόμενα, εἶχον κᾂν γοῦν βραχείαν σωτηρίας ἐλπίδα.όυαί μοι, τί πεπονθα; Δεινῶς κατεφθάρην, ἀνιάτως ἐτραυματίσθην, νεκρὸς ὤν ζῇν ἐνόμιζον καὶ ἐλάνθανον πολλῷ χρήματι τάφον ὠνησάμενος, ζῶν ἐπικινδύνως σοι προσεδρεύσας. Δεῖ με παρακαλέσαι Χριστιανοὺς, ἵνα με ἐλεήσωσι· χρή με ὑποπεσεῖν τοῖς εὐσεβέσιν, ἵνα με οἰκτειρήσωσι· δεῖ με καὶ τῆς Ιουστίνης τῶν ποδῶν ἐφάψασθαι, ἵνα μου προνοήσῃ τῆς σωτηρίας. Ἄπελθε απ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἄνομε, βέβηλε, ἀποστάτα· ἀποχώρει μου ἐκθρὲ τῆς ἀληθείας καὶ τῆς εὐσεβείας ἀναντίε. Ὁ δὲ ἀκούσας καὶ ἐπιδραμών μοι, ὥρμησε τοῦ ἀνελεῖν με, καὶ ἐπιπεσὼν πνίγειν με ἐπειρᾶτο· ὡς δὲ οὐκ εἶχον ἰσχύν λεαινόμενος αὐτοῦ τῇ βίᾳ, καὶ πᾶσα ἐλπίς μοι περιῄρετο τοῦ ζῇ· ὑπεμνήσθην τοῦ σημείου, οὗ ἡ Παρθένος ἐχρᾶτο, καὶ λέγω· ὁ Θεὸς Ιουστίνης βοήθησόν μοι, καὶ μετὰ τῆς φωνῆς εὐθέως ἐνισχύθην, καὶ τὴν χεῖρα κινήσας κατασφραγίζομαι· Ὁ δὲ ὡς βέλος ἁποῤῥιφεὶς ἀπέστη μου, καὶ στὰς ἐπειρᾶτο ἀπειλεῖν, ξίφος κατ᾽ ἐμοῦ χρησόμενος· καὶ δὴ πεῖραν λαβὼν διὰ τῆς σφραγίδος Χριστοῦ, θαρσαλεώτερος γέγονα πλέον ἔτι καὶ συχνὸν Χριστὸν ἐπιβοώμενος. Τότε οὖν ἀπήει ἀπειλῶν μοι καὶ λέγων· Οὐ μή σε σώσῃ ἐκ τῶν χειρῶν μοῦ ὁ Χριστός· καὶ γὰρ βδελύσσεται ἀσεβεῖς· καὶ δόλωι νῦν σοι βοηθεῖ, ἵνα τῷ ὀλέθρῳ σε παραδῶι· ὅτε οὖν σε ἀπώσηται, ἐγώ σοι δείξω τί ποιεῖ τὸ καταφρονεῖν τοῦ κράτους μου· ὅτι καὶ ὁ Χριστὸς οὐ προσίεται τοὺς ἐμοὺς· ἐστερήθης γοῦν καὶ τῆς ἐμῆς διαθέσεως, κἀικεῖνος οὐδέν σε ὠφελήσειεν. [14] Ἐπὶ τούτοις τοῖς λόγοις ἐφοβήθην σποδρῶς· δεινῶς γὰρ μοι ἀπεκρίνατο. Διὸ ὑμῖν τοῖς παροῦσι λέγω· ἐλεήσατέ μου τὴν ἀθλιότητα, εἴπατέ μοι περὶ Χριστοῦ, εἰ δύναμαι αὐτὸν ἐξιλεώσασθαι, εἰ μετανοῦντά με δέχεται, εἰ ἐπιδίδωσί μοι βοήθειαν εἰς τῆς ἔμπροσθεν ἀσεβείας ἀπαλλαγήν. Ὁς δὲ οἱ πλείονες ἡσύχασαν, εἷς τις διᾴρας τὸ στόμα λέγει· θάρσει Κυπριανὲ, ὅτι δέξεταί σε ὁ Χριστὸς, ἀγνοῶν γὰρ ἐποίησας· κἀγώ πρός αὐτὸν, μὴ ἆρα, ὡς εἶπέ μοι ὁ διάβολος, οὕτω μοι ὁ Χριστὸς ποιήσειεν, ἔσχατόν μου ἀπωθούμενος; Ὁ δὲ εἶπε πρός με· ἔγνως, ὅτι ψεύστης ἐστὶν ὁ διάβολος, καὶ τοῖς ἐκείνου λόγοις πιστεύεις; Οὐκ ἔστι δόλος παρὰ Χριστῶι, Κυπριανὲ, ὅτι αὑτός ἐστιν ἀλήθεια· οὐκ ἔστι ψεῦδος παρ᾽ αὐτῶ, ὅτι ἐξ αὐτοῦ πηγάζει ἡ δικαιοσύνη. Ινα δὲ μάθῃς ὅτι πηγή ἐστι χρηστότητος, ὁ Θεὸς πάντων ὼν καὶ δημιουργὸς, ἂνθρωπος γέγονε δι᾽ ἡμᾶς, καὶ ὑπὲρ ἠμῶν κατεδέξατο θανεῖν, ἵνα ἠμεῖς θανάτου ἁμαρτιῶν ὑπεράνω γενώμεθα δι᾽ αὐτοῦ· καὶ ὁ παντοκράτωρ Θεὸς κατηλλάγη ἡμῖν, καὶ ἐλπίδα ζωῆς αἰωνίου ἔχειν ἡμᾶς παρεσκεύασε, τὸν ὑπογραμμὸν ἡμῖν διὰ Χριστοῦ παρασχόμενος, ὅπως βιώσωμεν εἰς ἐπίγνωσιν ἀναστάσεως. Εἰ οὖν ὁ Χριστὸς διὰ τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς καὶ ἁμαρτωλοὺς ἀπέθανε, θάρσει Κυπριανὲ, ὅτι σὲ

οὐ μὴ ἀποβάληται· εἷς εἶ τῶν ἀσεβῶν καὶ πάντως ἐξιλάσεταί σε. Σύνες γοῦν ἐκ τῆς εὐσπλαγχνίας τὸν Χριστὸν, καὶ μὴ φρόντιζε περὶ ὧν ἔπραξας· καὶ εἰ περὶ τῶν σταυρωσάντων προσηύξατο, πῶς σὲ ὑπερόψεται; Λέγει γὰρ τῷ Πατρὶ περὶ αὐτῶν, Πάτερ ἄφες αὐτοῖς, οὐ γὰρ οἴδασι τί ποιοῦσι· καὶ πῶς σοὶ οὐκ ἀφήσει τὰς ἀσεβείας σου, ἃς μετὰ ἀγνοίας ἐποίησας; Μὴ φοβοῦ μηδὲ δειλία, ἀλλ᾽ ἀναστὰς, ἄπελθε πρὸς τὸν ἐπίσκοπον ἡμῶν, καὶ ὑποδείξει σοι τὴν προσέλευσιν τὴν πρὸς τὸν Χριστόν. Ταῦτα οὖν αὐτοῦ εἰπόντος, ἦλθον εἰς ἐμαυτὸν, καὶ ψυχὴν ἔλαβον· ἠρξάμην οὖν ὁμιλεῖν μετὰ θάρσους καὶ λέγειν· Ἆρα ἑταῖρε Τιμόθεε, οὕτως ἔχει ὡς λέγεις μοι; Ὁ δὲ πολλοῖς λόγοις με ἑτέροις ἐπιστώσατο.

St. Cyprian, by his magic arts But what does it profit me, who wish to come to God, to know the weakness of the dragon and all his power and foolish arrogance, since I have been sunk in the darkness of impiety? For I detected his falsehood, and saw that he only sets before us empty appearances, but does ^a nothing true. I learned from the virgin Justina that the demons are smoke, and can do nothing. I saw in a Christian Virgin that that dragon, so ^b puffed up, has not even the strength of a gnat. The pious Virgin persuaded me that the king of darkness, while he promises so many and such great things, has lied: for the dragon was trampled like a worm by the virgin Justina; the king of the demons remained at the Girl's door, unable to enter; and he whom innumerable phalanxes attend could not break the little bar of the door; he who thinks he lords it over all was mocked by a Virgin; he who boasts that he shakes the earth was overcome without trouble by a Woman: for he who says that heaven is ^c wheeled about by him could not change her purpose; he who roars like a lion against all sat like a gnat in the vestibule of her court, daring to attempt nothing; and he who seems to terrify all could not cast fear upon the Virgin.

[9] For when I was returning from the nation of the Chaldeans, I came to Antioch, to entice St. Justina and wrought marvels, as one of the ancients, and gave men opportunity to make trial of the magic art; and I was a famous magician-philosopher, endowed with much knowledge of invisible things. I seemed to do good to a great many, and wellnigh countless people sat about my sleights, some for learning's sake, that they might make trial of the impious art; others by reason of the disease of lust, driven by envy, emulation, and wickedness. And I helped them all indeed: to some rendering their pleasure easy, to others turning their emulation against their adversaries, or subjecting their adversaries to them, or killing their rivals. For fathers too made entreaty on behalf of their daughters, whom they saw vexed by wicked husbands; others on behalf of maidservants, others on behalf of mothers and sisters. Nor did any fall short of his hope, because the ^d demons were at hand for me. Whence I was persuaded that there was no other god but the devil, as one who ruled over all things and subjected all to himself; but I did not know that he could do anything against men like myself, nor did I consider that there were some against whom he could do nothing, since I was ignorant that there was another and greater power. But my conscience pricked me most of all in that many things proceed from him unjustly — plagues, corruptions, and hangings — and that he brings help to the unjust and impious and to the cruel and to ^e murderers and robbers; but nevertheless, because he can do all things either by fraud or by force, I quieted my conscience so as to worship him. But when Aglaïdas, an elegant young man, had come with many others, and had told me of his love for a certain virgin Justina, I detected the dragon's weakness: for that whole phalanx which had been given me for help rushed upon the Virgin; but they returned with nothing done, nor did the Virgin's prayer permit that the demons sent to help Aglaïdas, who seemed to be aiding him, should accomplish anything at all.

[10] strives, but recognizing And after many vigils and curious operations of the young man, and after the contentions of the devil, which consumed seventy days, the devil himself also engages with his chief princes; for now not Aglaïdas alone was held by love of the Girl, but ^f I myself suffered the same. And one might see so many and such great powers, together with the dragon, crushed and struck down by one Virgin. But neither could the devil change our desire, although he often tried to accomplish it. For I said to him: If the whole mass of nature is subject to you, at least blunt our desire, that we may not be laughed at for persevering and yet advancing nothing. Wherefore, when he had called the demon of fornication before me, he threatened him with many things, and thus commanded him to do what I have already said: Unless Aglaïdas be released, you shall pay the heaviest penalties. But though he did much, not even in this could he work upon us, God showing that the devil can do nothing against nature, but that, helped by nature, ^g he claims great things for himself; as if a bent or lame man, using a horse skilled in war, should seem to refer his brilliant successes to his own person. For the exercise of a youthful body kindles desire, and rouses nature the more to appetite. There was therefore much wrangling between me and the demons, and among the demons themselves. They threatened one another, and bore the matter ill. And I threatened the dragon with departure, ^h rushing upon him. But he did not even growl, since he was conscious of his own weakness; I reviled him, and he bore it, fearing lest I should depart from him. On the fiftieth day, therefore, he wished to deceive Aglaïdas by a certain young girl; but he could not attain even to the shadow of Justina; and although the girl was clothed in another form, nothing could be seen like Justina. I recognized therefore their deceit, and condemned them.

[11] the vanity of the art At last the devil brought it about that the demon of fornication should show the young man the form of Justina. And he seemed indeed to show the form; but after he had come near to Aglaïdas, who was exulting with joy and crying out, Right welcome is the most beautiful Justina, at the naming of the Virgin the form at once vanished, and the devil was dissolved like smoke and turned to flight, because even the Virgin's very name was ⁱ grievous to the demons. I was present, O men, when these things were done; I made trial of her faith and of the dragon's worthlessness. I was covered with shame, I kept vigil, I sat by, I was transformed into a woman, I became a bird; but as soon as I had reached the door of the vestibule, the empty form withdrew, and I was Cyprian, my art having no issue. Once I made ^k Aglaïdas a sparrow, and when he had flown up he stood before Justina's house; but when the Saint looked out, the form of the sparrow perished, and the wretched man, standing on high, would have perished, had he not by the Virgin's mercy been gently let down by the slenderest projection of the house. Having exhorted him, therefore, to be at rest and to worship God, she ^l casts him out of the vestibule. No sickness, no torment, no other blow whatsoever overcame her; for the devil vexed her with these and with other such things. Often, therefore, her parents wept for her when she was despaired of by the physicians; but she said to them: Do not mourn, for I shall not die, nor do I fail in spirit or feel any pain, nor do I perceive any sickness, save perhaps some slight heat, as though transmitted to me from the air. For what did we not try, or what did we not do to her? But she fortified herself with the sign of Christ, and drove off the operations of the demons. I did evil, therefore, to her parents; I killed their flocks and their oxen and beasts of burden.

[12] But she exhorted them not to lose heart or despair, and the demon's powerlessness and by her prudent counsel it came about that they received far more, God blessing what remained to them. They feared the wrath that hung over her, and all cried out that she should give herself to the young man, not for defilement but for lawful marriage. But Justina by the Cross of Christ healed their diseases and quieted the tumult. The devil inflicted a plague upon the people, and gave an oracle that they should not be delivered unless Justina were joined to Aglaïdas. But Justina's prayer quieted the clamoring people and at the same time drove the plague from the city. When these things had been noticed, the citizens, being changed, celebrated Christ, and reviled me vehemently as a plotter against the city, so that I went out secretly and ^m feared to meet those who knew me. At last, when I saw that the sign of Christ was overcome by nothing, and was communing with myself, I said to the devil himself: O destructive artificer of every fraud and treasury of impiety, why have you plotted against my soul, conscious as you were of your own weakness? For if the shadow of Christ conquers you, what will you do if he himself should come? If Christ is only named, and you tremble, what will you do if he himself should wish to attack you? If the sign of his passion makes you weak, where will you be before his power? If he signs, and you do not dare to approach his boundary, whom then will you be able to snatch from his hand? You are nothing, nor have you anything solid for defense; you can do nothing, nor have you strength to avenge. Now I have learned your fraud; I have been deluded by your phantasies; I have learned your weakness; for you have nothing that stands firm, but you enjoy an empty and swiftly vanishing moment. Nor do the fashions and laws which you have ⁿ set against piety have anything of truth, but they are error and phantasy.

[13] You have corrupted my mind, you have destroyed my soul, he acknowledges, you have broken my hopes, you have dragged the whole state of my reason into chaos; you have ruined my life and consumed it with wickedness, and you have destroyed the whole ^o state of my nature. Greatly did I err in believing you; in exceeding measure was I impious, foolishly was I swept away in giving myself to you; I became empty in letters, and abused the instruction of learning to my own destruction in obeying you; I lost my substance in following your frauds: for together with my paternal estate you have damaged my soul as well. But if I had distributed to the needy what has perished upon you, I should at least have some small hope of salvation. Woe is me, what have I suffered! I have utterly perished, I have been incurably wounded! I seemed to myself to live, when I was dead, nor did I see that I was buying a sepulcher with much money, while living perilously in attendance upon you. I must entreat the Christians and fall at the feet of the godly, that they may have mercy on me, and embrace the feet of Justina, that she may be touched with care for my salvation. Flee from me, wicked, profane, deserter; depart, enemy of truth and of piety. Hearing this, and running upon me, he made an assault to kill me, and rushing at me tried to [p] strangle me. But when my strength failed, oppressed by his violence, and all hope of living had been taken away, I remembered that sign which the Virgin used, and I say: God of Justina, help me; and with the word strength came at once, and moving my hand I sign myself. And he, hurled off like a dart, withdrew from me, and standing began to brandish a sword, wishing to kill me. But when I had made trial of the sign of Christ, I became more confident, invoking Christ more and more. Then therefore

he departed from me threatening and saying: Christ will not save you out of my hands, for he detests the impious. And now he helps you by guile, that he may hand you over to death. When therefore he has cast you off, I will show you what it is to despise my rule; since indeed Christ does not admit those who are mine. You are deprived, therefore, of my favor, and he will help you in nothing.

[14] he is converted to Christ. By these words I was vehemently terrified, for he had answered me craftily. Wherefore I say to you who are present: Have pity on my calamity. Tell me about Christ, whether I can appease him, whether he will receive me repentant, whether he will help me, that I may be freed from my former impiety. When most of them were silent, [q] one opened his mouth and said: Be confident, Cyprian, Christ will receive you; for you did it in ignorance. Then I to him: May not Christ perhaps do to me as the devil said, driving me off at the last? But he said to me: You know that the devil is a liar, and do you believe his words? There is no guile with Christ, Cyprian, since he himself is the truth; there is no falsehood with him, since from him justice wells up. And that you may learn that he is the fountain of goodness: since he is God of all and creator, he was made man for our sake, and met death for us, that we might be freed by him from the death of sins; and almighty God was reconciled to us and gave us the hope of eternal life, presenting through Christ a pattern, that we might live in the knowledge of the resurrection. If then Christ died for the impious and for sinners, be confident, Cyprian, he will not cast you away; you are one of the impious, and he will assuredly be appeased toward you. Know Christ, therefore, from his mercy, and be not anxious about the things you have done. If he prayed for those who crucified him, how will he despise you? For he says of them to the Father: Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. How will he not forgive you your impieties, which you committed unwittingly? Fear not, neither be afraid; but rise and go to our bishop, and he will show you how you may come to Christ. When he had said this, therefore, I collected myself and recovered my spirit, and began to converse confidently and to say: Are these things so as you say, most dear Timothy? And he confirmed me with many other discourses.

ANNOTATIONS.

[c.] How the demon mocks astrologers and magicians and ascribes to himself the motions and government of the stars and heavens, Cyprian taught in chapter 1, num. 5. How great a power over the stars and constellations the ancients boasted for magic, Del Rio proves in book 2, question 9. I gather a few things from him. Virgil in Eclogue 8 sings:

Songs can even draw down the moon from heaven.

Ovid in Metamorphoses, book 14, of Circe:

She frames her prayers and utters words of entreaty, And adores unknown gods with an unknown chant, By which she is wont to confound the face of the snowy moon, And to weave thirsty clouds beneath her father's head.

Again of Medea, in the Epistle of Hypsipyle:

She strives to draw down the reluctant moon from her course, And to hide the horses of the sun in darkness.

Tibullus, book 1, Elegy 2:

Her I have seen leading the stars down from heaven.

In Petronius a witch boasts thus:

Why do I speak of lighter things? The image of the moon Comes down, drawn by my songs; and trembling Phœbus Is compelled to turn his raging steeds, his orb rolled back.

Horace sang of a witch in Ode 5 of the Epodes:

She who by Thessalian voice charms down The stars and the moon from heaven:

And finally Lucan, book 6, of Erichtho:

The alternations of things ceased, and day, delayed By a long night, stood still; the ether obeyed not its law, And the headlong world grew numb at the sound of the chant; And Jupiter, urging on the poles impelled by their swift axles, Marvels that they do not move. Then they fill all things With rains and bring forth clouds beneath a warm sun, And heaven thunders while Jove knows nothing of it.

More may be seen in him.

Neither you, nor your laws, nor your dispositions, nor your figures, by which you think to resist by phantasies the disposition of God, are anything but error and falsehood.

p. Gregory Nazianzen writes that the demon, thus badly treated by the penitent St. Cyprian, entered into him. But this variation, such as it is, must be ascribed to the oratorical style and the flowers of eloquence, as I noted in §2, num. 28, of the preliminary Commentary. Further, the speech in which the Saint inveighs against the demon the translator amplified quite freely. Whatever our text has here continues to agree closely with Photius's analysis. Of the power of the Cross against demons you have an example in Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 3 against Julian, where he relates how that apostate, when about to consult a demon and terrified by specters, fortified himself out of his former custom with the sign of the Cross, at which the demons at once fled and the terrors ceased.

q. He was called Timothy, as is plain from the end of this number. Photius names the same man, where the things here narrated concerning him are read in abridged form.

CHAPTER III.

St. Cyprian relates how at Antioch he publicly confessed his crimes before the assembly of the faithful, and how, struck down by their atrocity and their multitude, he was brought almost to despair.

Τὀτε ἠρξάμην ἔμπροσθεν πάντων ἐξαγγέλλειν μου τὰς ἀσεβείας, καὶ λέγειν· ἀρα ἀφίησί μοι ὅσα διεπραξάμην, ἄνδρες Αντιοχεῖς; πολλὰ γὰρ ἠσέβησα, καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν ἀριθμὸς, οὐδὲ λόγος εἰς ἐξήγησιν τῶν κακῶν μου· ἐν γαστρὶ ἐχούσας τοῖς δαίμοσιν ἀνέτεμον, καὶ εὐγενίδας μεταμορφῶν, τῶν οἰκείων πόλεων ᾐχμαλώτιζον καὶ συλλαμβανούσας ἐκ πορνείας ἀνῄρουν· νήπια γαλουχοοῦντα ἐσφαγίασα ὐποκάτω τῆς γῆς· ἄλλα ἔπνιξα, ἕτερα ἀπεστραγγάλωσα ἐπ᾽ ἀγγελίᾳ βοηθείας τοῦ δράκοντος· ἡβῶντας ἤδη ἐσφαγίαζον, ἄλλους προἳόντας τῆ ἡλικίᾳ συνέχωσα τῷ Πλούτωνι, καὶ διὰ τὴν Ἑκάτην ξένων ἀνδρῶν τὰς κεφαλὰς ἀπέτεμον· γυναικῶν ἔτι παρθένων τὸ αἷμα τῇ Παλλάδι κατέσπεισα, τῷ δὲ Ἄρῃ καὶ Κρόνῳ ἄνδρας ἤδη τελείους· καὶ συχνοὺς ἄλλους δαίμονας διὰ τοιούτων θυσιῶν ἐπληροφόρησα, ἵνα οὕτως αὐτῷ προσέλθῳ διαβόλῳ. Καί ὅτε ἤμελλον αὐτῷ προσιέναι, αἷμα παντὸς ζώου ἐν σκεύει αὐτῷ χρυσῷ προσήνεγκα, καὶ δεξάμενος ἐῤῥάντισε πρῶτον αὐτοῦ τὸν στέφανον, καὶ τὰς δυνάμεις αὐτοῦ, εἶτα καὶ ἐμὲ, εἰπὼν· Λάβε καὶ σὺ ἐξουσίαν ἐπὶ πᾶσαν ψυχὴν ἀλόγων καὶ λογικῶν φίλοις παρεχόμενος· Ἀπείρους ἄλλους ἐφόνευσα, πένητας πολλοὺς κατέστησα· αἱ μὲν οὖν εὐεργεσίαι μου οὐκ εἶχον ὄνησιν, ὅτι οὐκ εἶχον ὑπόστασιν, ὡς φαντασίαι· αἱ δὲ ἀδικίαι μου ἀληθεῖς ἐγίνοντο, ἐπειδὴ ἐνήργουν οἱ δαίμονες ἐπιβλαβῆ εἰς τὰς ὑπάρξεις, παρασχεῖν δὲ ὕπαρξιν οὐκ ἠδύναντο. Εἴ τινι χρυσὸν ἐδίδουν, πρὸς ἡμέρας τρεῖς ἴσχυεν, ὅθεν οἷς ἔλεγον τὸν δόλον, θᾶττον αὐτὸν συναλλάττοντες ἐζημίουν τοὺς συνναλλάττοντας. Οὐκ ἔχω εἰπεῖν ὅσας μοιχείας καί παιδεραστείας ἔδρασα, ἅμα ἐμοὶ καὶ ἑτέρὼν πολλῶν παρατρέπων τὰς ψυχὰς καὶ μὴ θελούσας. Ὅσα ἐτεχνασάμην εἰς μοχθηρίαν, εἰς πολέμον, εἰς ἀπώλειαν καὶ ὄλεθρον τίς ἂν εἴη ἱκανὸς ἐγγράψασθαι; Πῶς οὖν πάντα συγχωρήσει ὁ Θεὸς, ὦ φίλοι; πῶς με ἐλεήσει, ἑαυτὸν μὴ ἐλεήσαντα; εἰ ἦν μοι ὁ λόγος περὶ μιᾶς, ἢ δυό ψυχῶν, εἶχον ἐλπίδα πρὸς ἀπολογίαν μου· πολλά εἰσιν ἃ ἔδρασα φαῦλα. [16] Τίνα παρήσομαι, ἢ τίνα ἐξαγορεύσω; γένους ὄλεθρον, φίλων ἔνδολον διάθεσιν, ξένων ἀναίρεσιν, τῶν ἄλλων ἀνθρώπων τὴν κατασφαγὴν, τῶν εὐσεβῶν τοὺς διωγμοὺς, τῶν χριστιανῶν τὰς ἐπιβουλὰς, τὰς φθορὰς τῶν παρθένων, τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν τὰς καθαιρέσεις, τῶν εὐκτηρίων οἴκων ἐρήμωσιν, τῶν σεμνῶν γυναικῶν τὴν δημαγωγίαν, τὰς ἐπὶ πᾶσιν ἐπινοίας κατὰ τῶν μυστηρίων, ὅτι πολλοὺς ᾕκιζον ἐξαγγεῖλαι, καὶ ἀκούων ἔλεγον, καὶ διηγούμενος ἐχλεύαζον, καὶ τὰς ἁγίας γραφὰς ἐφενάκιζον, ἔῤῥιπτον, ἐξουδένουν, ἔκναιον· τοὺς διασπαραγμοὺς τῶν προσεδρευόντων τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ, τὸ μῖσος, τὸν γέλωτα τοῦ βαπτίσματος, τὴν ἔχθραν τὴν πρὸς τοὺς κληρικοὺς, τὴν ὑπόνοιαν, τὰς κατ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐπιβουλὰς, τὴν χλεύην τῶν προσευχῶν, τὸν μυκτηρισμὸν τῆς λειτουργίας, αὐτοῦ τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ Ιησοῦ τὰς δυσφημίας, τῶν εὐαγγελίων αὐτοῦ τὴν ἐπίληψιν. Τί μοι οὖν ἆρα ἀφήσει πρῶτον ὁ Χριστὸς, ἢ τί μοι συγχωρήσειεν; τὰ πάντα γὰρ φαῦλα καὶ ἀσεβείας μεστά· οὐκ ἐπαρκεῖ μοι πρὸς ἀπολογίαν ὁ χρόνος τῆς ζωῆς τῆς ἐμῆς· Οὐκ οἶδα εἰ ζήσομαι ἄλλα εἰκοσι ἔτη· μιᾶς μου πράξεως μόλις ἔχει μετάνοιαν· τίς μοι χρόνος ὑπάρξειε πρὸς τὰς ἀπείρους ἀσεβείας μου. Εἴπατέ μοι, φίλοι, τί ποιήσω, τί διαπράξωμαι; Ἐπέγνων Χριστοῦ τὴν θεότητα, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἔχω δύναμιν ὅπως αὐτὸν ἐξιλεώσωμαι· ἐπέγνὼν τῶν ἱερέων αὐ᾽ οὐ τολμῶ ἅψασθαι, ὑπὸ τοῦ συνειδότος ἐλεγχόμενος· ἐπέγνων ὄτι μυστήριον ἀθάνατον ἡ πίστις Χριστοῦ, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἔχω ἰσχὺν ἐκμειλίξασθαι αὐτῆς τὸ ἐνάρετον· ἐπέγνων τῆς ἐκκλησίας τὴν κατάστασιν, ἀλλ᾽ αἰδοῦμαι κᾂν τοῖς προσαυλίοις ἐγγίσαι. Συνῆκα Θεὸν, καὶ πῶς αὐτῷ ἀπολογήσασθαι ἀπορῶ. [17] Εὐσεβῆσαι ποθῶ, καὶ ἡ ἀσέβειά μου περιγίνεται· ἐπιθυμῶ δοῦλος ἀκοῦσαι Χριστοῦ, καὶ ἀγνοῶ εἰ θίλει ἐμὲ πριᾶσθαι εἰς αὐτὸν· πολῶ ἐμαυτὸν, καταγράφω δοῦλον αὐτῷ· οὐ θέλω ἀντιτίμησιν, μόνον με προσδέξηται· εἰ μὴ θέλει μου συγνῶναι, ἐμαυτῶ ἐπιγράφω τὴν αἰτίαν, μόνον κᾂν ὡς ἀσεβῆ με ἐπιβλέψῃ. Ἣν οἶδα ὅτι αἰωνίου ὀλέθρου ἄξιός εἰμι· οὐ παραιτοῦμαι τὴν τιμωρίαν, μόνον αὐτοῦ κελεύσαντος ἀποθανεῖν ἀξιωθῶ· ὑπὸ τὴν αὐτοῦ ἐξουσίαν γενόμαι, κᾂν γοῦν θανατῶσαί με βούληται· οὐκ αἰτῶι ἄφεσιν· ὑπερβάλλει γὰρ τὸ χρέος τάχα τὴν αὐτοῦ χρηστότητα· οὐ πειράζων προσέρχομαι· πεῖραν ἔχω τῆς δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ Ιουστίνης, καὶ καταγράφω ἐμαυτῶι θάνατον. ἴδω μόνον πῶς προσκυνεῖται Χριστός. Εἴπατέ μοι, ὦ φίλοι, εἰ δύναμαι κᾂν ὡς ἀλλότριος ἐπιστῆναι τοῖς εἰρημένοις, ἵνα μήκοθεν ὁρῶ αὐτοῦ τὴν θεότητα. τήκων μου τὴν ψυχὴν καταμαρανῶ· Οὐ πιστεύω ὅτι ἀφίενσί μοι· οὐ πείθομαι γὰρ χείρονά μου γεγενῆσθαι ἄνθρωπον, ὑπερβαλὼν Ιαννὴν καὶ Ιαμβρὴν τοὺς λεγομένους· ἐκεῖνοι ἐν τῷ γοητεύειν ὡμολόγησαν Θεοῦ δάκτυλον· ἐγὼ δὲ παντελῶς διεκείμην μὴ εἶναι Θεὸν· εἰ ἐκείνοις ὁ Θεὸς οὐ συνεχώρησε, κᾂν ἐν μέρει ἐπιγνοῦσιν αὐτὸν, ἐμοὶ πῶς συγχωρήσειε παντάσιν ἀγνοήσαντι; Οὐ καυχῶμαι ἐπὶ ταῖς ἀσεβείαις μου. οὐ γὰρ τὸ ψεῦδος πάλιν θεραπεύειν ὀφείλων, ἀγνοῶ τὴν χάριν, ἀλλ᾽ οἶδα ὅτι ἀληθείας ἀντιποιεῖται. Τίς ὑμῖν διηγήσεται ἀσεβείας πέλαγος; τίς ὑμῖν ἄβυσσον βλασφημίας διαγράψοιτο, τίς ὑμῖν ἐπιστήσειε κακίας τοὺς θησαυρούς; ἐγὼ πᾶσαν αὐτὴν ἐχώρησα, καὶ ἐν ἐμοὶ ἄβυσσοι αὐτῆς ἐχώρησαν. Ἐν ἐμοὶ πολλοὶ ὑπ᾽ αὐτῆς ἐναυάγησαν. [18] Οὐκ εἰμὶ μόνος ἐν τῇ ἀπωλείᾳ μου, οὐδὲ ἐμαυτὸν μόνον ἐβαράθρωσα · πολλοὺς ἄλλους σὺν ἐμοὶ κατέσπασα. Ποῖα δὲ κλαύσω; περὶ τίνος δακρύσω; περὶ τῶν σωματικῶς ἀναιρεθέντων, ἢ περιέργως πραχθέντων μοι; περὶ τῶν μαθόντων δι᾽ ἐμοῦ, ἢ τῶν ἐμὲ μιμησαμένων; Ἄφθονος ἐγενόμην ἀσεβείας διδάσκαλος, σπουδαῖος κήρυξ τῆς κακίας γέγονα· ἀπείρους εἶχον τοὺς μανθάνοντας, πολλοῖς μετέδωκα τοῦτο τὸ δηλητήριον· φίλοις δοκῶν παρέχειν, ξίφος προσεπηγνυον· καὶ συγγενεῖς οἰόμενος ὀφελεῖν, αἴτιος αὐτοῖς ὀλέθρου κατέστην, καὶ διὰ πρεσβείας αὐτῶν συχνοὺς ἐποίησα γόητας· νέους προεβίβασα κακῶς γηράσαι, καὶ γέροντας ἔπεισα ἐναποθανεῖν ματαιότητι, ξένους ἀποδημεῖν πρὸς γοητείαν· καὶ καλὰ δρῶντας οὐκ εἴασα προκόψαι πρὸς εὐσέβειαν· Ἐμύησα ὡς ἱερεὺς, ὡς δαιμόνων νεωκόρος ἐδίδαξα, πρὸς ἅπατην ἐπότισα, ἐπεδειξάμην πρὸς πλάνην· ὡς ἱεροφάντης ἐτέλεσα ἑκατόμβην, καὶ ὡς πολλὰ ἰσχύων, οὐδενὸς ἐφεισάμην. Πολλοὺς ἐξῆψα πρὼς μίμησιν, καὶ ἐμοὶ ἐρίζοντας πολλοὺς ἐφόνευσα· πολλοὶ δείσαντές με κατέπιπτον, καὶ προδότης ἐγενόμην τῶν θελόντων μοι ἀντιστῆναι· ἀξιούμενος ἐποίησα ἐν ἀέρι πέτασθαι, καὶ ἐν θαλάσσῃ βαδίσαι, καὶ ὡσεὶ παρέχον ἀνέμους πλεῦσαι, ἱπταμένους καὶ μὴ βαδίζοντας ἀποδημῆσαι παρεσκεύασα· ἀνέμους ἀπέλυσα καὶ πάλιν ἐκώλυσα· νῆας ὑποβρυχίους γενέσθαι, καὶ ἄλλας ἐπώκειλα· πρὸς γέλωτα ὕδωρ ἐν ἐρήμῳ ῥεῦσαι ἐφάντασα, καὶ ἐν οἴκοις λιμνάζειν ἔδειξα· γύναια διώκεσθαι ἀπὸ τῶν συμβίων πρὸς τοὺς μοιχοὺς ἐποίησα· τεκνοφορίαν ἐδείκνυον εὐχερῆ χάριν θανάτῳ παρέχων, οἴκους ὅλους παρεδίδουν εἰς ὄλεθρον, φίλους δολοφονηθῆναι ἠνεσχόμην, οἰκετῶν γνησίων συχνοὺς ἐζημίωσα. Ἐν τούτοις ἔνιοι ἠξίουν ὁμοιωθῆναι θαυμάζοντες, καὶ οἱ δαίμονες συγχαίροντες, ὅτι με προετρέποντο. [19] Εἴπατε γοῦν μοι, ὡ φ;ίλοι, εἰ ἔστιν ἐπίνοιά τις πρὸς τὴν τούτων ἀπαλλαγὴν, ἢ μᾶλλον χρὴ ἑλέσθαι τὸν δι᾽ ἀγχόνης θάνατον; τὸ γὰρ ζῆν ἐν τοιαύτῃ μνήμῃ πονηρῶν πράξεων, κᾂν μηκέτι γένωνται, ἐσχάτου θανάτου ἐστὶν ἄξιον. Ἤθελον οὗν κἀγὼ ἀκοῦσαι περί τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ δυνάμεως, καὶ οὕτω θανεῖν τὸν ὡρισμένον μοι θάνατον. ταύτην τὴν ἐπιθυμίαν ἔχων ἀνέχομαι ἔτι τοῦ ζῆν· οἶδα γὰρ ὅτι πᾶσά μοι σωτηρίας ἐλπὶς περιῄρηται. Οὐ φέρω εἰπεῖν τὰ λοιπὰ, ἵνα μὴ τὴν μνήμην μου ξίφος γενέσθαι παρασκευάσω· οὐχ ὑπομένω φάσαι τὰ ὑπέρτερα, ἵνα μὴ ἀναστάντες ἀποδράσητε· οὐκ ὀφείλω ἐπιδοῦναι ἐπὶ τὰ μείζονα, ἵνα μὴ καὶ ὁ οἶκος αὐτὸς εἰς τέλειον ἔδαφος κατασπασθῇ. Ἔνια ὑμῖν μόνον δείκνυμι ὁποῖός εἰμι ἐγὼ ἀσεβῆς, ὅτι τὴν ψυχὴν ἰδία τοῦ σώματος ἐν ταρτάροις εἶχον, συκοφαντοῦσαν, πολεμοῦσαν πολὺ τῶν εἰρημένων ἀνοσιώτερον· τοῖς ἐν ἀέρι βουλὰς ἐδίδουν ζηλοῦν, καὶ τοὺς κάτω πρὸς τὰ ἄνω συνέβαλον, καὶ ἐμαυτὸν παρεῖχον ἐκατέροις τεκμήριον. Οὐ χωρῶ διελθεῖν τὸ κατάλοιπον, οὐ γὰρ συμφέρει τοῖς ἀκούουσι. Πῶς οὖν λέγετε, ὅτι Χριστός σε παραδέξεται, ἀγνοοῦντες τὰ κατ᾽ ἐμέ; Ιουδαίους μοι εἰς μέσον ἠγάγετε, ἐπειδὴ ἔτυχον ἱλασμοῦ· ἐγὼ καὶ αὐτοὺς τοὺς χριστοκτόνους, θεομαχήσαντας ὑπερέβαλλον, τάχα δὲ καὶ τοὺς ἐνεργήσαντας εἰς αὐτοὺς δαίμονας· καὶ ὑμῖν πλείστη χάρις, ἐγὼ δε οὐκ ἐλπίζω ἔτι σώζεσθαι, τοσαύτην ἐπιδεδειγμένος εἰς Θεὸν καὶ ἀνθρώπους ἀσέβειαν. Οἶδα ὅτι εἶπον ἐμαυτὸν μείζονα θεοῦ· ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐγέλων αὐτὸν ἄγροικον ἀποκαλῶν· ἐδείκνυον γὰρ καὶ νεκροὺς ὡς ζῶντας, καὶ χωλοὺς ὡς τρέχοντας· καὶ πολλοὺς ἐνεπόδισα αὐτῷ πιστεύσαι, ὅτι θεός ἐστιν· ἀλλὰ καὶ λόγῳ ἐκώλυον μὴ γενέσθαι χριστιανοὺς, πείθων ὅτι οὐκ ἔστι θεὸς ὁ Χριστὸς, ὅθεν καὶ ἐσταυρώθη ὑπὸ Ιουδαίων, τοῦ διαβόλου ἐνεργήσαντος. [20] Ἰδιώτην ἔλεγον αὐτὸν καὶ μαγγανικὸν, καὶ μηδ᾽ ὅλως ἔχοντα ἐπίγνωσιν, οὐ λέγω τῶν ἀοράτων, ἀλλ᾽ οὐδὲ τῶν ὁρατῶν. Καὶ πῶς μοι λέγετε, δέξεταί σε ὁ Χριστὸς, τοσαῦτα εἰς αὐτὸν ἁμαρτήσαντα; περί τίνος δὲ δυνήσομαι μετανοῆσαι; ὧν ἐκώλυσα σωθῆναι, ἤν ὧν ἔπεισα ἀπολ;έσθαι; ὧν

ἔδρασα φόνων, ἢ ὧν ἔπεισα σφαγιάσαι; ὧν ἠσέλγησα ἢ ὧν ἔπεισα ἀσελγεῖν; ὧν ἐπεβούλευσα, ἢ ὧν ἐχλεύασα, ἥρπασα, ἠδίκησα, ψυχὰς καθελὼν ἀπὸ φωτὸς εἰς τὸ σκότος τὸ ἐξώτερον; Ὅτι γὰρ ἠδυνήθην γνῶναι θεότητα ἀληθινὴν, οὐκ ἀρκεῖ μοι· διὰ τοῦτο συνορῶν κρεῖττον εἶναι, τοῦ αἰτεῖν χάριν Χριστὸν παύομαι, μήποτε χείρονι περιπέσω ἀσεβείᾳ, οἰόμενός με δυνατὸν εἶναι Θεῷ προσελθεῖν. Σιωπῶ ἵνα μή μου ὑπόμνησιν ποιήσηται οὐκ εἰς ἄφεσιν, ἀλλ᾽ εἰς ὑπερβάλλουσαν κόλασιν. Καὶ δὴ τοῖς δάκρυσι συσχεθεὶς, ἐπὶ τούτοις ἐσιώπησα· ἔκλαιον δὲ καὶ πάντες οἱ συμπαρακαθήμενοι σφοδρῶς, ὅτι δίκαια λέγω· καὶ ἦν μέγας κοπετὸς δοκιμαζόντων, ὅτι εἰκότως ἐφρόνησα ἀπαγορεύσας Χριστοῦ πρόσοδον, ἀνάξιος ὢν τῆς θείας αὐτοῦ παραστάσεως. Καὶ περιῤῥηξάμενος τὴν ἐσθῆτα καὶ κόμην πασάμενος ἐκείμην ἐπὶ τοῦ ἐδάφους, πένθος μέγα ἀράμενος, καὶ ἀλαλήτοις δάκρυσι τὸ οὐαί μοι ἀναφωνῶν, ὅτι ἀπωλόμην ὁ ἄθλιος.

St. Cyprian again Then I began to relate before them all my impieties and to say: Will he forgive me whatever I have committed, men of Antioch? For I have done many impious things, nor is there any numbering or reckoning to relate my evils. I cut open women with child for the demons; clothing noblewomen in other forms, I carried them off captive from their own cities, and I killed women pregnant from unchastity. I slaughtered suckling children under the earth, others I smothered, others I strangled for the promised ^a help of the dragon. I butchered youths, and others more advanced in age I buried to Pluto, and for ^b Hecate's sake I cut off the heads of foreign men. I poured out the blood of virgins to ^c Pallas, and to Mars and Saturn I immolated men of ripe age, and by these sacrifices I bound many other demons to myself, that so I might come to the devil himself. When I was about to come to him, I offered him the blood of ^d every kind of animal in a golden vessel; and he, receiving it, first sprinkled his own crown and his powers, and then me also, saying: Receive you too power over every soul of things void of reason and of things using reason, ^e that you may help your friends. I killed countless others; I reduced many to want. And my benefits indeed profited nothing, because they had no substance, being phantasies. But my mischiefs were real, for the demons inflicted damage upon real goods, but could not give them. If I gave anyone gold, it lasted ^f three days; hence those to whom I told the fraud quickly exchanged it and harmed those who dealt with them. I cannot say how many adulteries and defilements of boys I committed, perverting the souls of many along with my own, even against their will. How many and how great things I contrived toward wickedness, toward war, toward ruin and destruction, who could write? How then, friends, will God forgive all these? How will he have mercy on me, who had no mercy on myself? If I had to render account for one or two souls, I should have hope of excuse; but many are the wicked things I have done.

[16] Which shall I pass over, and which shall I relate? The destruction of a family, gathering up his sins treacherous counsels concerning friends, the slaying of guests and of other men, the vexations of the godly, the snares laid for ^g Christians, the defilements of virgins, the overturnings of churches, the devastation of oratories, the carrying off of chaste women; and besides, the arts devised against the mysteries, which I compelled many by stripes to ^h declare; and when I had heard them, I related them, and in relating them I mocked; and I held the holy scriptures for a laughingstock, cast them away, made nothing of them, tore them in pieces; the ⁱ tearing apart of those who were constantly occupied in the church; hatred and mockery of baptism; enmities with the clergy; suspicions and the snares laid for them; mockery of prayers; jests and loud laughter at the liturgy; and blasphemies even against God himself and Christ Jesus, and hands laid upon his Gospels. What then will Christ forgive me first, or what will he pardon? For all are wicked and full of impiety; nor does the whole time of my life suffice me for expiation. I do not know whether I shall live another twenty years; they would scarcely fill up the penitence for one of my deeds. What time could remain to me for my ^k countless impieties? Tell me, friends, what shall I do, what shall I pursue? I know the Godhead of Christ, but I cannot appease him; I know the piety of his priests, but I do not dare to present my face to them; I know the grace of the Gospels, but I do not dare to touch them, driven as I am by the goads of conscience; I know that the faith of Christ is an immortal mystery, but I ^l cannot soften its severe power; I know the order and state of the church, but I fear to approach even its very porches; I know God, and there is no way of pleading my cause before him.

[17] I desire to live piously, and am overcome by impiety; I desire to be called the servant of Christ, their and I do not know whether he wishes to buy me for himself. I sell myself, and make myself over to him in servitude; I ask no price, ^m only let him receive me. If he will not pardon, I ascribe the cause to myself; only let him look upon me at least as one impious. One thing I know, that I am worthy of eternal death; I do not beg off the punishment, only let me be worthy to die at his bidding; I submit myself to his power; let him at least, then, command me to die. I do not ask pardon; for perhaps the greatness of the debt ⁿ exceeds his goodness. I do not come to tempt him; I have experienced his power in Justina, and I condemn myself to death; only let me see how Christ is adored. Tell me, friends, whether I may be present at the things that are said, at least as a stranger, that I may behold his divinity from afar. Wasting away, I shall wear out my soul with grief. I do not think that he will pardon me; nor do I persuade myself that any man was worse than I, since I surpass those notorious men Jannes and ^o Mambres. For they in their magical sleights confessed the finger of God; but I contended altogether that there is no God. If God did not spare them, although they in part acknowledged him, how will he [ ] to me, who was wholly ignorant of him? I do not glory in my impieties, nor do I take up the part of falsehood to be worshiped again; I do not know grace, but I know that truth is his care. Who could relate to you the sea of impiety? Who could describe the abyss of blasphemy, who unlock the treasuries of wickedness? For I took in all wickedness, and its abysses were contained in me. Many through me made shipwreck in it.

[18] enormity I have not perished alone, nor cast myself alone headlong; I have dragged many others with me. Which then shall I bewail and mourn? Those whom I killed, or the things I curiously performed? Those whom I had as disciples, or those whom I had as imitators? I stood forth a lavish teacher of impiety and a diligent herald of wickedness. I had countless disciples, and made many sharers of this ruin; and when I seemed to myself to do a kindness to friends, I was driving in a sword; and when I seemed to help kinsmen, I was to them the cause and origin of death, and at their request I made very many magicians. I taught young men to [p] grow old wickedly; I persuaded old men to die in vanity; strangers, to travel abroad for the sake of magic; and those who bore themselves well, I did not suffer to advance to piety. I initiated as a priest, I taught as a sacristan of the demons, I gave drink unto fraud, I offered myself as a specimen unto error; I sacrificed a [q] hecatomb as a hierophant; and as one able to effect many things, I spared no one. I kindled many to imitate me, and killed many who contended with me. Many, seized with fear, fell at my feet, and I was the betrayer of those who [r] wished to resist. I made those who asked to fly in the air, or to walk on the sea, and [s] to sail like the winds, or to go abroad flying and not walking. I sent forth winds, and again restrained them. I sank ships, and carried others out to the deep. I made it happen, for sport, that water seemed to flow in desert places, or to stand in pools in houses. I made women go from their husbands to [t] adulterers. I opened easy ways to abortion, that I might do a kindness to death; I cast whole households into ruin, I suffered friends to be killed by guile, I damaged many faithful servants. In these things some, admiring me, longed to imitate me, and the demons rejoiced with me, because they had urged me on.

[19] and by their multitude he is variously moved Tell me therefore, friends, whether anything can be found by which I may be freed from these evils, or whether life must rather be ended with a noose? For to live in such a memory of nefarious deeds, even if they are done no more, is a thing worthy of the cruelest death. I should wish, therefore, to be instructed about the power of Christ, and so to undergo the death appointed. This desire still holds me in life; for I know that all hope of salvation has been cut off from me. I cannot relate the rest, lest my memory be as a sword; I cannot utter graver things, lest you rise up and flee; I ought not to proceed to greater things, lest the very house be brought to ruin and leveled with the ground. Some things only do I show you, from which you may perceive my impiety. For my soul, apart from my body, [v] dwelt among the infernal regions, slandering, waging war, far more wickedly than I have said. I exhorted the demons of the air to envy and emulation, and set the lower against the higher, and offered myself as a portent of both. I cannot run through what remains; for it would not profit those who hear. How then do you say, Christ will receive you, being ignorant and unacquainted with my affairs? You bring the Jews forward to me, who obtained mercy. But I surpassed even those very men who killed Christ and waged war with God, and perhaps even the demons by whom they were impelled. And to you indeed I owe the greatest thanks; but I do not hope to obtain salvation, who have displayed such impiety toward God and men. I know that I said that [u] I was greater than God; nay more, I mocked him, calling him a rustic. For I displayed the dead as though living, and the lame as though running; and I deterred many from believing that he is God. And by argument too I hindered them from becoming Christians, persuading them that Christ is not God, as one who was driven to the cross by the Jews at the devil's working.

[20] I called him unskilled and a cheat, and endowed with no knowledge at all, not only of invisible things and he moves those present to tears. but not even of visible. And how do you say to me, Christ will receive you, who have sinned so many and such great things against him? And what sin shall I be able to expiate by penitence? Those called away from salvation, or those cast into ruin? The slaughters perpetrated by me, or those committed by my counsel? The outrages I committed, or those I persuaded others to commit? The snares I laid, or the mockeries and robberies and injuries done to souls, which I turned away from the light into the outer darkness? For that I have been able to come to the knowledge of the true Divinity does not suffice me; wherefore I make an end of asking grace from Christ, perceiving that this is better, lest perhaps I fall into greater impiety, thinking myself fit to come to God

I am to come. I am silent, lest he remember me not unto pardon but unto the heaviest punishment. Having said this I fell silent, my tears forbidding me; and all who sat with me wept vehemently, and there was a great lamentation, and I seemed to them to speak justly and to judge rightly, in that I did not dare to approach Christ, as being unworthy to come forward before his Divinity. And, my garment torn and my hair sprinkled with ashes, I lay upon the ground, crying out with the greatest mourning and force of tears: Woe is me, for I have perished, wretched man!

ANNOTATIONS.

Hecate, the daughter of Jupiter and Latona, as the poets fable, and sister of Apollo, is called Luna in heaven, Diana on earth, and Proserpina among the infernal regions. Seneca named her threefold, Ovid three-headed, because she was feigned to have three heads. To this belongs that verse of Virgil:

And threefold Hecate, the three faces of the virgin Diana.

For the rest, it is known that foreigners were wont to be slaughtered for the Taurian Diana. The old translator has thus: I frequently immolated many infants to the demon who is called Pluto, and to her who is called Hecate.

p. Hence it is plain that certain things in the old version were disfigured by the carelessness of later copyists: for there is read in Fell: Multos juvenes docui male se nescire — the last two words, namely, badly divided and proceeding from senescere.

[q.] Hecatumbe, compounded from the Greek ἑκατόν and βοῦς, a hundred and an ox, was a kind of sacrifice in which a hundred oxen, or, taken more broadly, a hundred animals of the same species, were slaughtered; to which tends that verse of Ovid, Metamorphoses 8:

Minos pays his vows to Jove with the bodies of a hundred bulls.

Hierophant, further, is here taken for the greatest priest among the sacrificers and the chief teacher of the superstitions.

r. Maranus notes that the reading οὐ θελόντων pleases him better, so that in Latin the sense is, I was the betrayer of those who did not wish to withstand me, which indeed the context seems to demand.

s. I have substituted in the Greek ὡσεί for ναυσί; for so also the translator read, when he renders and they sailed like the wind. The old version departs much from our text in other respects too here, in which is read thus: At the request of many men I made them run in the air; others the demons carried over the sea and they sailed like the wind. Likewise I made others travel abroad walking through the air. I hindered winds and I sold winds. I made ships that were sailing well to be wrecked, and made others sail over the land. Concerning all those sleights and translations of bodies by demons, and the evils they are wont to inflict upon the goods of fortune, see the oft-praised Del Rio, book 2, question 6 and following.

t. In the printed text is I made women to be driven out by their husbands into the houses of adulterers, which agrees well enough with the Greek; but Maranus thinks one should read διοίχεται, so as to make the sense which he rendered, and which seems genuine.

v. Concerning the Lapps, or Laplanders, whom they also assert to sell winds, what is here read some also relate in this fashion, that the soul, absent from the body for no small space of time, wanders elsewhere; and they add very many wonders from the things that happen to the body while the soul is absent. Of them Olaus writes thus in book 3, chapter 18 of his Description of the Northern Kingdoms: If any traveler desires to know something certain about the condition of his own people, they contrive that within the space of XXIV hours he may learn what is being done with them, even if they be CCC miles away, in this manner. The enchanter, after he has addressed his gods with the accustomed ceremonies, suddenly falls down and is deprived of sense, as though, he being truly extinguished, the soul departed from the body; for neither does any breath seem to be left in him, nor any sense or motion to remain with life; but there must always be some present to guard the prostrate and lifeless body. When this is not done, the demons carry it off. When XXIV hours have elapsed, the spirit returning, the lifeless body awakes with a groan as from a deep sleep, as though he who had fallen were recalled into life from death. Afterwards, thus restored, he answers the questions put to him; and, to gain credit with his questioner, he recounts something which the other recognizes and knows for certain to have taken place in his own house or in that of his kinsmen. On these matters Del Rio observes and disputes at great length in book 2, question 25; and he admits the fact itself indeed from the testimonies of various authors, but denies the manner. In the first place he proves that it is false that the soul is then separated from the body, since it is beyond the demon's power to take the soul from the body and restore it again. Yet that deluded magicians both believe and assert this very thing he readily grants; for he proves that the demon can cause ecstasies and raptures in a man by binding or loosing the exterior senses. But if more than one Saint, in ecstasies sent upon him by God, believed and asserted that his soul, separated at that time from the body, had been in other places, what wonder is it that magicians do so, whom the devil, to display his own power, strives in every way to mock? Therefore the bodies of those Laplanders truly remain joined to the soul, though, all the senses being stopped up, they seem separated; nor does the soul wander elsewhere, but what is done there is suggested to the magician by a swift demon, and by him to the other. Judge the same of the things here narrated. And indeed, even if St. Cyprian had known what he accomplished by the demon's working, it is nevertheless not necessary to believe that he also understood in what manner each thing was accomplished.

u. Simon Magus, Apollonius of Tyana, and others boasted the like, emulating in pride their father the devil. The horrid blasphemies against Christ and his Virgin Mother which the demon exacts of magicians see, if it be necessary, in Del Rio, book 2, question 4.

CHAPTER IV.

Eusebius consoles and exhorts to a firm hope of pardon St.

Cyprian, who, animated by his discourse, is brought to the bishop, is instructed in the mysteries of the faith, and is baptized. Hearing these things, Aglaïdas too, having forsworn the demon, is converted to Christ.

Τότε δὴ πάντων συγχυθέντων, ὁ ἑταῖρος Εὐσέβιος ἀποκριθεὶς λέγει. Κυπριανὲ, μὴ ἀπελπίσῃς, τούτων γὰρ πάντων ἡ λύσις ἐστὶν, ὅτι ἀγνοῶν ἐποίησας· ἐνόμισας γὰρ ἐνθέοις ἑαυτὸν ἔργοις ἐπιδεδωκέναι, ἀναπαύσας τὸν διάβολον· ἡ ἄγνοια τόπον σοι δίδωσιν ἀπολογίας. Ἵνα τὶ σπαράττεις σεαυτὸν διωλύγιον; ἵνα τὶ συνέπεσας τοῖς διαλογισμοῖς πρὸς ὅλεθρον τῆς ψυχῆς; Ἐμοῦ ἄκουσον τοῦ φιλοῦντός σε, παράσχου μοι ἡσυχίαν, ἵνα σε πληροφορήσω. Οἶδα πολλοὺς, ὦ Κυπριανὲ, εἰ καὶ μὴ ταῖς πράξεσιν, ἀλλά γε ταῖς προθέσεσι προσελθόντας Χριστῷ καὶ δεχθέντας· ἀπὸ τοῦ μέρους ἐπίγνωθι τὸ ὅλον. Ἐκεῖνοι γόητες καὶ ἐδέχθησαν, καὶ σὺ γόης πάντως ὅτι κατ᾽ ἐκείνους δεχθήσῃ· ἕως πότε οὖν κόπτεις σεαυτὸν καὶ τιμωρεῖς, καίπερ ὢν ἐξ ἀσθενείας πολλῆς; ἄπιδε μὴ καὶ ταύτὴν σοι τὴν ἀνελπιστίαν ὁ διάβολος δώῃ παραδέξασθαι· δεινός ἐστιν, ὡς καὶ σὺ κάλλιον γινώσκεις· ἢ ἀγνοεῖς, ὃ πρὸ τοῦ φωνῆσαι ἀλέκτορα ἐν νυκτὶ μετὰ δόλου σοι ἀπεκρίνατο, καὶ πῶς ἀπεσεισθη ἀπειλῶν; οὐκ εἶπέ σοι ὅτι ὁ Χριστὸς μισεῖ τοὺς ἐμοὺς, καὶ μετὰ δόλου, φησὶ, συνῆλθέ σοι, ἵνα σε χωρίσας ἀπ᾽ ἐμοῦ πάλιν ἀπώσηται, καὶ ποιήσει εἰς σὲ ὃ βούλεται; Τέως οὖν ὀφείλεις εἰδέναι ὅτι, παρόντος Χριστοῦ, οὐδὲν ἰσχύει ὁ διάβολος· κατασφράγισαί σου τὴν καρδίαν, ἵνα ἀφαιρεθῇ ἐξ αὐτῆς ἡ τῆς ἀνελπιστίας ἔννοια· ἐπικάλεσαι Χριστὸν, ἵνα πεῖραν αὐτοῦ λάβης τῆς χρηστότητος. Οὐκ αἰτεῖ σε δῶρα, οὐδὲ χρόνου δέεται πρὸς τὸ ἔλεος· οὐ διὰ μεσιτειῶν φαντασίας σοι ποιεῖ τὴν βοήθειαν αὐτοῦ· λέγει γὰρ ὁ μαθητὴς Χριστοῦ Παῦλος ὁ ἀπόστολος· Ἐγγύς σου ἐστὶ τὸ ῥῆμα ἐν τῷ στόματὶ σου, καὶ ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ σου. Ποῖον τοῦτο ῥῆμα; τῆς εἰς αὐτὸν πίστεως καὶ ἐπικλήσεως δηλαδῂ. Στόματι γὰρ, φησὶν, ὁμολογεῖται εἰς σωτηρίαν, καρδίᾳ δὲ πιστεύεται εἰς δικαιοσύνην. [22] Ἀποδέχομαί σου τὴν ἐξομολόγησιν, ὅτι ἐξήγγειλάς μοι τὰς ἀσεβείας τὰς οὔσας και τὰς μὴ οὔσας· διὸ καὶ ἡσύχασα, καὶ τοὺς φίλους τοῦτο ποιῆσαι ἔπεισα, ἵνα ἐμέσαντός σου τοῦ ἐχθροῦ τὸ φρόνημα, ἐπικουφισθῇ σου ἡ διάνοια, ἀνανεύσασα πρὸς τὴν εὐσέβειαν. Λοιπὸν οὐν κατάστα Κυπριανὲ, σύνες ὅτι ἄνθρωπος εἷ, νόησον τὴν πλάνην, τὴν ἄγνοιαν· εἰ γὰρ ἐπιγνοὺς Χριστοῦ τὴν δύναμιν τῇ ἀσεβείᾳ ἐπέμεινας, τάχα ἄν τις τὴν ἀνελπιστίαν σου ἀπεδέξατο· εἰ δὲ νῦν ἔγνως, καὶ ἀποστρέφῃ τὸν ἐχθρὸν, δῆλον ὅτι καὶ πάλαι, εἴ τις ἄν σοι περὶ Χριστοῦ ἐξηγήσατο, προτροπάδην τὴν ἀσέβειαν ἀπεκήρυττες. Νῦν οὖν τὸ μέν δακρύειν σοι παρείσθω διὰ τὴν Χριστοῦ σοι καταλλαγὴν, τὸ δὲ φρόνημα ῥωμαλέον κτησάμενος ἴθι πρὸς τὴν αὐτοῦ βούλησιν. οὕτω γὰρ ἂν πλείονας ὧν ἀπώλεσας προσενέγκαι δυνήσῃ Χριστῷ, πᾶσιν ὑποτιθέμενος τὰ συνοίσοντα. Κἀγὼ ἔφην· δακρύειν οὐ παύομαι τῷ συνειδότι πληττόμενος· τὸ δὲ τά πολλὰ λέγειν παρεὶς, (μίαν γὰρ πάλιν φροντίδα ἔχω τῆς ἁγίας Ιουστίνης ἐπιβουλῆς, εἰ περόψεται Χριστὸς τὴν αὐτῆς καταπόνησιν, καὶ ἐμοὶ συγγνώσεται, δι᾽ ἣν καὶ παιδοκτονίαν καὶ ἡπατοσκοπίαν ἐν γυναιξὶ, καὶ τὴν λοιπὴν ἄθεσμον τέχνην πεποίημαι,) παρακαλῶ οὖν, πάτερ Εὐσέβιε, παῦσόν μοι ποθοῦντι ἐκ τῶν γραφῶν τοῦ Χριστοῦ, εἴ τινα τῶν κατ᾽ ἐμὲ ἀσεβῶν ἐπιστρέψαντα ἐγκλημάτων ἀπήλλαξε. [23] Καὶ ὁ Εὐσέβιος ἔφη· καὶ ὁ ἀπόστολος Χριστοῦ, Παῦλος τοὔνομα, εἰ καὶ μὴ μάγος ἦν, ἀλλὰ διώκτης γέγονε τῶν δούλων αὐτοῦ ἀκροθίνιος ἀμέλει· συνευδόκησε τῇ ἀναιρέσει Στεφάνου· ἀλλὰ καὶ δημοσίοις γράμμασι τοὺς κατὰ Δαμασκὸν Χριστῷ λατρεύοντας ἐξεδίωκε τῆς χώρας καὶ πάσης πόλεως· ἀλλ᾽ ἐπιστρέψας σκεῦος ἐκλογῆς αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο, ὡς καὶ ὡμολόγησεν εἰπών· Ἠλεήθην ὑπὸ Χριστοῦ, ὅτι ἀγνοῶν ἐποίησα. Ἐν δὲ ταῖς πράξεσι τῶν ἀποστόλων αὐτοῦ περιέχει, ὃτι ικανοὶ τῶν τὰ περίεργα πραξάντων ἐμπρήσαντες τὰς μαγικὰς βίβλους αὑτῶν προσεδέχθησαν Χριστῷ, καὶ βαπτισθέντες ἀφέσεως ἁμαρτιῶν ἔτυχον, τῆς δὲ ἀσεβείας καὶ τῆς δι᾽ αὐτὴν κολάσεως ὑπεράνω γενόμενοι. Εἰ δέ σοι χρὴ καὶ τὸν Βαβυλώνιον Ναβυχοδονόσωρ εἰς μέσον ἐνεγκεῖν, οὗτος μετὰ πεῖραν Θεοῦ, ἣν εἶδεν ἐν καμίνῳ πυρὸς κατηργημένης ῥυσθέντων τριῶν παίδων Θεοῦ, ἀσεβήσας, καὶ ἐκδιωχθεὶς ἀπὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπον, κτῆνος γεγονὼς, μετανοήσας ἐδέχθη, ὥστε τὸ ἐξ ἀρχῆς κράτος ἀπολαβεῖν. Καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τούτοις Μανασσὴς δὲ ὁ βασιλεὺς Ισραὴλ, καὶ πολλοὶ ἄλλοι βασιλεῖς καὶ ἰδιῶται, καὶ μετὰ θεογνωσίαν τὰ πάντα δεινὰ δράσαντες, καὶ μεταμελιθέντες ἐδέχθησαν, ἀνεθέντες τῆς διὰ τὰ εἴδωλα βαρυτάτης κολάσεως· καίπερ ὁμοῦ σὺν αὑτοῖς δήμους ὁλοκλήρους συγκατασπάσαντες, καὶ προφήτας ἀνελόντες, καὶ τὰ ἱερὰ μιάναντες. Ἀλλὰ καὶ πάντα τὸν Ισραὴλ ἄχρι τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ παρουσίας συχνῶς ἀσεβοῦντα, καὶ συχνῶς μετανοοῦντα πελάγει ἀνεξικακίας καὶ ἐλέους προσεδέξατο· καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς Ἐκκλησίας ἡ κουροκόμος ματάνοια ἰσχύει πολλὰ ἕως νῦν· ὥστε καὶ τοὺς λίαν ἐξασθενήσαντας ἁμαρτίαις προσίεσθαι ἐπιστρέφοντας· ἡ δὲ δύναμις αὐτῆς ἐστι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον· αὐτὸ γάρ ἐστι τὸ μάννα τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ χάριτος, ὃπως οἱ ἀσεβοῦντες ἐν αὐτῷ ἐλούμενοι μὴ κατακρίνωνται· διὸ λέγει τῶ Πέτρῳ· Ὅτι οὐ μόνον ἑπτάκις ἑπτὰ ἀφήσεις τῷ ἀδελφῷ σου, ἀλλὰ ἑβδομηκοντάκις ἑπτὰ. Πῶς οὖν σοι οὐκ ἀφήσει ὁ ἀνθρώποις ἐπιτρέπων ἔχειν τοσαύτην χρηστότητα; Ἵνα δὲ μάθῃς τὴν σύγκρισιν τοῦ ἐλέους Θεοῦ πρὸς ἀνθρώπους, μαρτυρεῖ τις βοῶν· Ἔλεος ἀνθρώπου ἐπὶ τὸν πλησίον αὐτοῦ, ἔλεος δὲ Θεοῦ ἐπὶ πᾶσαν σάρκα. [24] Τί οὖν εἶ σὺ πρὸς πᾶσαν σάρκα, ὅτι νομίζεις ἐκκενοῦσθαι αὐτὸν, ἐὰν εἰς σὲ χρηστεύσηται; Ἐπὶ Νινευίτας ὤρισε θάνατον, ἀσεβήσαντας ὑπὲρ σὲ, οὐ λέγω καθ᾽ ἕνα, ἀλλὰ τοὺς πάντας ὁμοῦ· καὶ ἐπιστρέψαντας οὐκ ἀπώλεσε· καὶ σὺ εὐτόνως αὐτὸν παρακάλεσον, ὅτι οὐ μὴ σε ἀπώσηται. Τῷ ληστῇ ῥοπῇ τὸν παράδεισον δωρεῖται διὰ τὴν ὑπερβολὴν τῆς πίστεως, καὶ σοὶ οὐ συγχωρεῖ κᾂν εἰς πελάγη κακίας κατωρυγμένος ᾖς, ἐὰν γνησίως αὐτὸν ἐπικαλέσῃ; Ἀνάγνωθι τοὺς προφήτας, καὶ εἴσῃ αὐτοῦ τὴν χρηστότητα. Λέγει Ωσηὲ τῷ Ισραήλ· Ὡς Σόδομα θήσομαί σε, καὶ ὡς Σεβωεὶμ· καὶ εὐθὺς ἐπάγει· καὶ ἐστράφη ἡ καρδία μου καὶ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ συνεταράχθη ἡ μεταμέλειά μου· σημαίνων ὃτι ἕτοιμός ἐστι τοὺς μετανοῦντας προσδέχεσθαι. Λέγει τῷ Ηλίᾳ· Ἴδες πῶς κατηνύγη ὁ Αχαὰβ ἀπὸ προσώπου μου; οὐ μὴ ἐπάξω ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις αὐτοῦ τὰ κακὰ, καίπερ δι᾽ αὐτοῦ τοῦ Ηλία ὁρίσας αὐτῷ θάνατον περί τινος Ναβουθαὶ, ὃν δόλῳ ἐφόνευσεν Ιεζάβελ ἡ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ· καὶ δι᾽ αὑτὸν πῶς σεαυτὸν ἀπελπίζεις σωθῆναι τοσούτῳ πελάγει οἰκτιρμῶν περιβληθησόμενος; Οὐ μόνον λιτῶς σοι δείκνυμι Θεὸν χρηστευόμενον· ἵνα γὰρ μηδεὶς ἑαυτὸν σωτηρίας ἀπαγορεύσῃ, ὄμνυσι λέγων· Ζῶ ἐγὼ, λέγει κύριος, εἰ θελήσει θέλω τὴν θάνατον τοῦ ἁμαρτωλοῦ, ὡς τὸ ἐπιστρέψαι, και εἰς ζωὴν ἐλθεῖν. Ἐξ ὅλης καρδίας μετανόησον, καὶ ἐρεῖ σοι· Ἐὰν ζῇς ἔτη ἑκατὸν ἐν ἀσεβείᾳ, καὶ ἐν τῇ ἐσχάτῃ ἡμέρᾳ μετανοήσῃς, οὐ μὴ ἀποθάνῃς, λέγει κύριος, ἀλλὰ ζωὴν ζήσεις ἐνώπιόν μου· οὐ δύναται Θεὸς ψεύσασθαι, αὐτὸς γάρ ἐστιν ἡ ἀλήθεια· μὴ διὰ σὲ ἔχει παλιλλογῆσαι, Κυπριανὲ, ὅς γε τοῦ ἰδίου υἱοῦ οὐκ ἐφείσατο διὰ τὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων γένος, καὶ ἐπὶ σοὶ ἔχει νικηθῆναι ἡ ἀγαθότης αὐτοῦ; τὰ ἐννενηκονταεννέα πρόβατα ἐν οὐρανοῖς κατέλειπε, δηλαδὴ τὰ ἐπουράνια τάγματα, καὶ πρὸς ἓν κατελήλυθε τὸ ἀπολωλὸς, καὶ ἐπὶ σοῦ ἔχει συστεῖλαι αὐτοῦ τὴν χρηστότητα; [25] Διὰ τὸν ἄνθρωπον ἐσταυρώθη, καὶ ὀκνεῖ ἀσεβεῖ ἐπιστρέφοντι ἑαυτὸν ἐπιδοῦναι; λοιδορούμενος τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς προσκαλεῖται, καὶ δοξαζόμενος ἀπώσεταί σε; ἀπιστούμενος τοὺς ἁμαρτωλοὺς προσεκαλέσατο, καὶ πιστευόμενος οὐ χρηστεύσεταί σε; πάσχων οὐκ ἀπεστράφη τὸν ληστὴν, καὶ προσκυνούμενος πρός σε οὐκ ἐπιστραφήσεται εἰς ἱλασμὸν; εἰ μείζων τῶν ἀγγέλων ὁ Θεὸς, πάντως ὄτι μειζόνως χρηστεύεται· πάντα τὰ ἐπουράνια χαίρουσιν ἐπὶ ἁμαρτωλῷ ἑνὶ μετανοοῦντι, καὶ πῶς ὁ Θεός σε ἀποστραφήσεται; Θάρσει Κυπριανὲ, οὐκ ἦλθεν ὁ Χριστὸς καλέσαι δικαίους, ἀλλ᾽ ἁμαρτωλοὺς εἰς μετάνοιαν· μόνον σὺ μετανόησον ὡς χρὴ, καὶ ὄψει αὐτὸν περιπτυσσόμενόν σε. Ὅτι εὗρε τὸ ἀπολωλὸς πρόβατον οὐ μόνον ἐχάρη, ἀλλὰ καὶ ὡς τέκνον αὐτὸ ἐπὶ τῶν ὤμων ἐβάστασεν, ἵνα ἔργῳ μάθῃς τὸ ὑπερβάλλον Θεοὖ πρὸς ἀγγέλους, καὶ σὺ λέγεις ὅτι ἐμὲ περιόψεται; Σὺ μόνον ποίησον καρπὸν ἄξιον τῆς μετανοίας, καὶ τότε μου μνησθήση, ὅτε κληρονόμος ἔσῃ τῆς βασιλείας ὡς υἱός· ὃς βρέχει ἐπὶ ἁμαρτωλοὺς καὶ δικαίους, καὶ ἀνατέλλει τὸν ἥλιον αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ ἀγαθοὺς καὶ πονηροὺς, καὶ λέγεις ὅτι σε ἀποβάλλεται; τοὺς μὴ πιστεύοντας εὐεργετεῖ, καὶ σὲ τὸν στενάζοντα οὐ προσδέξεται; Ἐν τῷ Ησαΐᾳ λέγει· ὅτε ἀποστραφεὶς στενάξεις, τότε σωθήσῃ, καί σοι ἐγκάρπως μετανοήσαντι οὐκ ἐπιδώσειε χάριν εἰς τὴν αἰώνιον ἀπόλαυσιν; λέγει γὰρ καὶ ἐν τῷ Παύλῳ, ὅτι πάντας ἀνθρώπους θέλει σωθῆναι, καὶ εἰς ἐπίγνωσιν ἀληθείας ἐλθεῖν. [26] Καὶ ταῦτα μέν σοι παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἐκ πολλῶν ὀλίγα, Κυπριανέ· ὅταν δὲ πρὸς τοὺς διδασκάλους ἴῃς, ἀκούσῃ τά περὶ μετανοίας σαφῶς, κᾀμὲ ἐν φοιτητῶν τάξει σχῆς, τὸ πλάτος τοῦ δόγματος καταπλαγείς· καὶ γὰρ ἄφθονοί εἰσιν, καὶ χαίροντες χεῖρα ὀρέγουσιν· οὐκ ἔστι παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς τύφος, οὐ στολὴ περίβλεπτος ἐπίδειξιν σημαίνουσα, οὐ σοφιστικὴ οἴησις, οὐκ ἐλπίδι μισθῶν ὑπέρθεσις ἀνελεύθερος. Καὶ γὰρ ἀπὸ τῶν κεφαλαιωδῶν ἄρχονται, πᾶσαν λήψεως ὑπόνοιαν ἐξορίζοντες· οὐχ ὡς οἱ σοφισταὶ ἀπ᾽ ἐλαττόνων ἀνάγονται τὸν νοῦν, ἀλλὰ χωρὶς, ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν, τῇ κρηπίδι πλησιάσαι τῆς σοφίας παρακαλοῦσιν· εὐειδότες δεῖν πρῶτον τὸν θεμέλιον ὁριζειν ὅτι κράτιστον, εἶθ᾽ οὕτως ἀζημίως ἐποικοδομεῖν τὰ ἀκόλουθα. Ὄψει ἐκεῖ σεμνὴν λειτουργίαν, οὐ κυμβάλοις καὶ ὀργάνοις περιηχουμένην, οὐ κρότον ἀκοὴν ἐκθηλύνοντα, οὐκ αὐλοὺς ἠχοῦντας λελυμένας ᾠδὰς, οὐ τῦμπανα ὁρμὴν κλῶντα ἐπιεικείας, οὐ χορὸν μουσικῇ τὸ πλέον προσέχοντα, καὶ οὐκ εὐνομίᾳ· οὐ φωνὴν ἀλόγων δονοῦσαν διάνοιαν, οὐ θύματα καὶ κόπρους καθαιρομένους, οὐ ξύλα καὶ πῦρ ἀλόγων σωμάτων ἀμυντήρια· οὐχ ἱερέα οἱονεὶ ἀλόγῳ πολέμῳ καθοπλισμένον, οὐ νεωκόρους ταύρων τροποῦντας ἰσχὺν· οὐ λόγον ἀκόλαστον, οὐ γέλωτα αἰσχρότατον, οὐ βλέμμα μετέωρον, οὐ θοίνην ἄτακτον, οὐ τρόπον ἀσχήμονα· ἀλλὰ τὸ πᾶν ἡσυχίας γνώμην, καὶ κατάστασιν ἄτυφον· δι᾽ ὧν παιδευθείη τις ἂν ὁρῶν κομιδῆ νηπίους τὴν αὐτὴν πρεσβύταις ἔχοντας εὐταξίαν, ὡς ἐκ τινὸς θειώδους συνθήματος οἴεθαι τὸ νέον αὐτῶν καταβραβεύεσθαι. Πάντων οὖν ἐν κύκλῳ ἑστώτων, ἴδοις ἂν πόλιν ἱερὰν ἑνὶ πειθαρχοῦσαν ἡγεμόνι, ἑτέρους δὲ νεωκόρους ἀκολουθίᾳ τάξεως τὴν ἱερὰν τράπεζαν περιβάλλοντας· εἰθ᾽ οὕτως ὁ ψαλμωδὸς ἀφελὴς τῷ λόγῳ καὶ ὕμνῳ

κατανυκτικὸς εἰς παράκλησιν, οἱονεὶ περικαθαίρων τὰ στόματα καὶ τὰς ἀκοὰς ᾠδῶν κοσμικῶν πρὸς τὰ μέλλοντα ἀναγνώσματα. [27] Μὴ αἰδεσθῇς οῦν τὴν πρόσοδον, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν παῤῤησίᾳ προσπέλαζε, καὶ ἀναστὰς ἀπονήστεσαι, τρίτην ταύτην τὴν ἡμέραν ἄσιτος ὤν· καὶ κοινωτέρως ἴωμεν τέως πρὸς τὴν τῆς ἑσπέρας εὐχὴν· ἐξῆς δὲ τῇ πανεόρτῳ συνάξει ἐπιμένοντες· ἔθος γὰρ τῶν ἑπτὰ ἡμερῶν τῇ πρώτῃ ποιεῖν ἀναστάσεως Χριστοῦ μνείαν, μεθ᾽ ἣν τῷ πάπᾳ προσελθόντες τὰ εἰκότα δρῶμεν καὶ λέγομεν. Σαυτοῦ γενοῦ Κυπριανέ· τάχα γὰρ πλείονας σώσεις, παρ᾽ οὓς ἀπώλεσας, καί μου μνήσθητι ὅταν εὖ σοι γένηται, μεθημερινά σοι ἐνύπνια διακρίνοντι πρὸς πολλῶν ὠφέλειαν. Εγὼ οὖν ἀναστὰς ἀπρὶξ εἰχόμεν αὐτοῦ τῆς κεφαλῆς, καὶ στέρνα αὐτοῦ τοῖς ἐμοῖς προθέμενος, πατέρα καὶ ἄγγελον ἀπεκάλουν. Κᾀμὲ μέσον ἔχοντες ἑαυτῶν αὐτὸς καὶ ὁ τούτου υἱὸς συνηλικιώτης μου ὢν, καὶ τῆς αὐτῆς μοι τῶν πραγμάτων διατριβῆς γεγονὼς, εὐσεβείᾳ δὲ προύχων, εἰ καί τις ἄλλος, οἴκαδε ἀγαγόντες, παρετίθουν τὰ πρέποντα. Εἰθ οὕτως ἀπήειμεν εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ ἴδον τὸν χορὸν οὐρανίων ἐοικότα Θεοῦ ἀνθρώπων, ἢ χορῷ ἀγγέλων Θεῷ ἀναμέλποντι, Ἑβραἳκήν τε λέξιν ἐκάστῳ στίχῳ ἐπαγαγόντες μιᾷ φὠνῇ, ὡς πείθεσθαι αὑτοὺς μὴ εἶναι ἀνθρώπους, ἀλλὰ φύσιν λογικὴν σύγκλυδον ἀπηχοῦσαν θαυμάσιον ἦχον, ὃν οἱ προφῆται θανόντες διὰ τῶν ζώντων πάλιν προεφήτευον. [28] Καὶ οἱ ἀπόστολοι οὐδὲν ἧττον ὡς παρόντες ἐφθέγγοντο, οὐ χρῄζοντες ἑρμηνείας· ἁπλούστατοι γάρ εἰσιν οἱ λόγοι ἐν διανοίαις συγκείμενοι· καὶ δὴ τὸ πλῆθος θαυμάσαν ἡμῶν τὴν εἴσοδον, γέγονε ξενισθῆναι· καὶ πάλιν οἴκοι καταχθέντες ἡσυχάσαμεν. Καὶ τῇ ἐξῆς εἶπον· πάτερ Ευσέβιε, διατί μὴ καίωμεν τὰς βίβλους τοῦ διαβόλου; Δημοσίᾳ οὖν τοῦτο δράσαντες εἴδομεν καὶ τὸν ἐπίσκοπον, καὶ πάντα καθώς μοι ἐπηγγείλατο, ἐν ἀνθρώπῳ ἄγγελός μοι γενόμενος Ευσέβιος, ἀκηκόαμεν. Ὡς δὲ ἤκουσε καὶ ἡ ἁγία Ιουστίνα τὰς τρίχας ἀποκειραμένη, καὶ τὸν θάλαμον σὺν τῇ προικὶ διοικήσασα πένησι διένειμεν, διπλῆν ἡγησαμένη σωτηρίαν τὴν ἐμὴν μετάνοιαν· καὶ γὰρ ὁ Αγλαΐδας ἀποταξάμενος τὸν διάβολον ἐνέπρησεν, ὅτι τὸ ξίφος τοῦ ὀλέθρου ἑαυτῷ περιέπηρεν, τοῦ Χριστοῦ πλέξαντος ἡμῖν διά Ιυστίνης σωτηρίαν δίδυμον. Επεὶ δὲ κᾀγὼ διένειμον τὰ πράγματα καὶ ἤμεν σὺν τῷ πατρὶ Ευσεβίῳ γενομένῳ πρεσβυτέρῳ τῆς ἐκκλησίας, τυχὼν τῆς σφραγίδος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἐξηγονιζόμεν κηρύττων πᾶσι, καὶ πολλοὺς πείθων ἐπιστρέψαι πρὸς τὸν κύριον· ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐπείσθησαν ἐν Κυρίῳ Ιησοῦ Χριστῷ, δι᾽ οὗ καὶ μεθ᾽ οὗ τῷ πατρὶ δόξα, κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰωνων, Αμήν. Eusebius the presbyter But then, when all were suffused with shame and modesty, my friend ^a Eusebius said: Cyprian, do not despair, for the remedy of all these things is that you did them in ignorance. For you seemed to yourself to be given over to divine works, when you were doing what pleased the devil; your ignorance gives you room for excuse. Why do you tear yourself beyond measure? Why have you fallen into these thoughts to the ruin of ^b your soul? Hear me who love you, and lend me a patient ear, that I may persuade you. I know many, Cyprian, who, though they came to Christ not by excellent deeds but yet by the affections of their mind, were received. Learn the whole from the part. Those men were magicians and were received; you too, a magician, will be received in exactly the same way as they. How long, then, will you beat and avenge yourself, weak as your health is? See lest the devil have cast you into this despair also. For he is crafty, which is plainer to you than to me. Do you not know what he answered you, not without guile, before the cock crowed in the night, and how he broke out threatening? Did he not say to you: Christ hates those who are mine, and he helps you by guile, that when he has drawn you away from me he may cast you off again? And did he not add that he would then take vengeance on you at his own pleasure? You ought to know, therefore, that while Christ is present the devil can do nothing: sign your heart, that the thought of despair may be taken from you. Invoke Christ, that you may experience his kindness. He does not demand gifts from you, nor does he need time for mercy, nor does he help you by a phantasy of mediators; for the disciple of Christ, Paul the apostle, says: The word is near, in your mouth and in your heart. What ^c word is that? Of faith in him and of invocation, that is. For with the mouth, he says, confession is made unto salvation, but with the heart one believes unto justice.

[22] I approve your confession, in which you have related to me the impieties committed by you and those ^d not committed. St. Cyprian, brought almost to despair by the memory of his sins, Wherefore I kept silence, and persuaded my friends to do the same, so that, after you had vomited out the thought inspired by the enemy, your mind might be lightened and raised up to look upon godliness. Henceforth, then, stand firm in mind, Cyprian; consider that you are a man; understand your error and ignorance. For if, having known the power of Christ, you were to remain in impiety, your despair would not undeservedly be approved. But if you now know him and turn away from the enemy, it is clear that long ago, if anyone had told you of Christ, you would without delay have cast off impiety. Now therefore restrain your tears, because Christ is appeased toward you, and, taking a strong spirit, follow where he wills. For thus you will be able to bring to Christ more than you destroyed, ^e suggesting to all what is profitable. But I said: I make no end of weeping, stricken by conscience. And not to delay with many words (for there is one thing that racks me with anxiety, the snares laid for Justina: whether Christ will make little of her ^f labor and pardon me, on whose account I committed the slaughter of children and the inspection of the liver in women and the other crimes of that nefarious art) — I beg you, father Eusebius, satisfy what I long to know from the Scriptures of Christ, whether from among those who professed a like impiety he has freed any converted man from his guilt.

[23] by various arguments Then Eusebius said: The Apostle of Christ, Paul by name, though he was not a magician, was certainly the foremost persecutor of his servants. He consented to the death of Stephen; and by public letters he drove those who worshiped Christ at Damascus out of that region and out of every city. But being converted he was made a vessel of his election, as he himself also confesses: I obtained mercy from Christ, he says, ^g because I did it in ignorance. And in the Acts of his Apostles it is read that many of those who had practiced curious arts, when they had burned their magic books, were received by Christ, and being baptized received remission of sins, freed from their impiety and from the punishments deserved for it. But if the Babylonian Nebuchadnezzar too must be brought forward for you: he, when he had borne himself impiously, after he had beheld the power of God in the ^h furnace of fire, from which the three children of God were rescued, the flame being checked, was cast out from the society of men and made a beast; but being penitent he was received, so that he recovered his empire again. Besides, Manasses king of Israel, and many other kings and private men, when after the knowledge of God they had perpetrated every crime, were received on repentance and released from the heaviest punishments for idolatry, although they had dragged whole peoples down with them, and had killed prophets, and had defiled holy things. But all Israel too, down to the coming of Christ, often lapsing into impiety and often repenting, he received as it were in a certain sea of patience and mercy. And in the Church penitence, having hitherto ⁱ its hair shorn, avails very much, so that those who are most weakened by sins are received on conversion. And its power is the Gospel, which is the manna of the grace of Christ, that the impious who have obtained mercy in it may not be condemned. Wherefore he says to Peter: Not only seven times seven shall you forgive your brother, but seventy times ^k seven. How then shall he not forgive you, who commends such kindness to men? And that you may learn the comparison of divine mercy with human, one testifies, crying out: The mercy of man is toward his neighbor; but the mercy of God is upon all flesh.

[24] unto penitence What are you compared with all flesh, that you should think him exhausted if he be kind to you? For the Ninevites, whose impiety surpassed yours, he appointed death — I say not for individuals, but for all together; yet when they were converted he did not destroy them. Do you too invoke him again and again, that he may not drive you away. To the thief in a moment of time he grants paradise for the excellence of his faith; and will he not spare you, even if you have been sunk in a sea of wickedness, provided you invoke him truly and from the heart? Read the prophets, and you will see his kindness. Hosea says to Israel: I will make you as Sodom, as Zeboim; and at once he adds: My heart is turned within me, and at the same time my repentance is troubled — signifying that he is ready to receive the penitent. He says to Elijah: Do you see how Ahab has been pricked with compunction before my face? I will not bring the evils in his days; although through Elijah himself he had appointed death for him, on account of a certain Naboth, whom Jezebel his wife had killed by guile that she might do him a pleasure. How do you despair of salvation, surrounded by so great a sea of compassions? Nor do I merely show you God to be merciful; but lest anyone despair of his own salvation, he swears, saying: As I live, says the Lord, I do not will with my will the death of the sinner, but rather that he be converted and ^l come to life. Repent with your whole heart, and he will say to you: Even if you live a hundred years in impiety, and on the last day repent, you shall not die, says the Lord, but living you shall live before me. God cannot lie, for he himself is truth. Will he for your sake bring it about, ^m Cyprian, that he change his word, and that his kindness be overcome in you — he who spared not his own Son for the sake of the human race? He left ninety-nine sheep in the heavens, namely the heavenly orders, and came down to the one that had perished; and will he shut up his kindness toward you?

[25] For man's sake he was crucified, and will he be slow to give himself to an impious man converted? a firm faith Assailed with reproaches he calls the impious to himself, and glorified will he drive you away? Not believed in, he called sinners to himself; and believed in, will he not be kind to you? Suffering, he did not turn against the thief; and adored, will he not turn to you for mercy's sake? If God is greater than the angels, assuredly his kindness is greater. But all the heavenly powers rejoice over one sinner doing penance. How then shall God turn away from you? Be confident, Cyprian; Christ did not come to call the just, but sinners to penitence. Only do penance as is fitting, and you will see him embracing you. Because he had found the lost sheep, not only did he rejoice, but he even carried it on his shoulders as a son, that from the fact itself you may learn how far God surpasses the angels; and do you say, He will despise me? Only bring forth worthy fruit of penitence, and then remember me, when

you shall be heir of the kingdom as a son. He rains upon sinners and upon the just, and makes his sun to rise upon the good and the evil; and do you say that you are driven away by him? He does good to those who do not believe, and will he not receive you who groan? In Isaiah he says: When being converted you shall groan, then you shall be saved; and to you, doing a penitence not unfruitful, will he not give grace unto eternal joys? For he says also in Paul that he wills all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

[26] And these things indeed are a few from many, from me to you, Cyprian. in God's promises and mercy But when you come to the teachers, you will hear clearly what pertains to penitence; and you will have me in the number of the hearers, struck by the greatness of the doctrine. For they deal at length and liberally, and gladly stretch out their help. There is among them no arrogance, no conspicuous garment for display, no puffing up after the manner of the sophists, no ungenerous procrastination in hope of a fee. For they begin from the things that contain the head and the sum of the matter, driving away all suspicion of gifts; nor, like the sophists, do they take their beginning of forming the mind from lesser things; but they exhort each to come to the base and foundation, so to speak, of wisdom, well knowing that first the best possible foundation must be laid, and then without loss the rest must be built upon it. You will see there a venerable ⁿ liturgy: not resounding with cymbals and instruments, no noises softening the hearing, no pipes indulging in dissolute measures, no drums breaking a modest disposition, no choir attending for the most part to the music and not to right laws, no voice stirring up minds void of reason, no victims and dung cleared away, no wood and fire as bulwarks of bodies void of reason, no priest armed as though for a war void of reason, no sacristans breaking the strength of bulls, no unchaste speech, no most shameful laughter, no proud arching of the eyes, no ^o banquet loosed from laws, no unbecoming manner of acting; but a wholly tranquil spirit and a discipline free from arrogance; from which anyone, seeing that even infants keep the same discipline of order as the old, may easily perceive that their youth is governed by some divine sign. When all, therefore, stand in a circle, you may see a sacred city obeying one leader, and the other sacristans standing in order of rank about the sacred table; then the psalm-singer, simple in speech and compunctious in his hymn unto exhortation, cleanses mouths and hearing from worldly songs for the readings that are to come.

[27] he exhorts him; and the Saint, moved by his discourse, Do not fear, therefore, to approach, but come freely, and rise and take food, having now fasted [p] three days; and let us go together to the evening prayer; and tomorrow we will remain at the assembly celebrated by all; for it is the custom on the first of the seven days to celebrate the memory of the resurrection of Christ, on which day, coming to the bishop, we do and say what is fitting. Attend to yourself, Cyprian, for perhaps you will save more than you destroyed; and see that you remember me, when it goes well with you, as you interpret daily dreams for the profit of many. Then I, rising, embraced his head and breast, calling him father and angel. Then he and his son, my equal in age and [q] instructed in the same school of letters, but excelling, if any man did, in piety, having me between them, led me home and set before me [r] fitting food. Then we went into the church, and I saw a choir of heavenly men of God, or like a choir of angels singing to God, [s] adding a Hebrew word to each verse with one voice, so that they did not seem to be men, but a rational nature gathered together and giving forth a wonderful sound, by which the Prophets, being dead, again gave oracles through the living.

[28] publicly burns his magic books, and, instructed by the bishop, is baptized. The Apostles preached no otherwise than as though present; nor was there need of interpretation, for their words are most simple, set in their meanings. And it happened that the multitude, marveling at our entrance, was astonished; and returning home we rested. And on the next day I said: Father Eusebius, why do we not burn the books of the devil? When therefore we had done this publicly, we went also to the bishop, and heard all things as Eusebius, whom I held as an angel in a man, had promised me. And when the holy Justina had heard these things, she shore her hair, and [t] distributed to the poor her bridal chamber and her dowry, when they had been sold, esteeming my penitence a twofold salvation. For Aglaïdas also, who had carried about the sword of death for himself, burned the devil, [v] departing from him, Christ weaving for us through Justina a twofold salvation. And after I had distributed my own goods as well, I was together with father Eusebius, who was a presbyter of the church; and having obtained the seal of Christ, I strove to preach to all and to persuade many to be converted to the Lord. And they were persuaded in the Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom be glory and dominion to the Father unto the ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. Eudocia expressly set forth even this three days' fast. See the preliminary Commentary, num. 19. Further, whatever is here mentioned agrees closely with the ancient rites of the Eastern Church; and if you wish to make trial of it, consult Thomassin.

q. Maranus judges that for πραγμάτων one should read γραμμάτων, because from the context it is not credible that Eusebius's son also studied magic. But I do not see why πρᾶγμα must here necessarily be turned to mean magic and taken in a bad sense.

r. Again by the whole heaven differ the things which the old version has here: for there it is read thus: Then I, Cyprian, kissed his head and his breast, and called him father. And he was also my fellow student in letters; for Eusebius himself was faithful from infancy, and while I was in my error he often admonished me to pass over to better things. And on another day, while it was still night, we went into the church of God. These things certainly are so different that I should scarcely dare to suspect that they proceeded from the same text.

s. Maranus observes that the Greeks of today still add Alleluia to each verse in the funeral rites of the dead; which indeed among them in other Offices, and especially the Paschal ones, is so frequently repeated that it may be said to be added to each verse. I have corrected καὶ ἴδον from καὶ ἰδεῖν, as Maranus prefers.

t. Behold again a sentence of the old translator far different from ours. When therefore, he says, the handmaid of God Justina had heard of my conversion, she lighted lamps and shore her hair for God. And her parents consecrated her bridal chamber to the ministry of the holy church. And she herself, selling her ornaments together with her dowry, paid out everything to the poor, giving thanks to God for my salvation. In our chronological arrangement the Saint's father was certainly no longer among the living; but the assertions of an anonymous writer, whether erring or interpreting, ought not to torture us.

v. In the old version nothing is read about the conversion of Aglaïdas, which nevertheless is most plainly asserted also by Eudocia in Photius, in whom the second book of the Eudocian Metaphrase is closed with the narration of it.

PART III.

The Martyrdom of the holy martyrs Cyprian and Justina

By an anonymous author

From codex 520 of the royal library of Paris, collated with codex 1485. Translated by J. C.

Τῶν Προφητικῶν λόγων νῦν πληρουμένων, τῶν τε λόγων τοῦ Κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ περὶ τῆς σπορᾶς τοῦ σίτου τῶν τε ζιζανίων πληθυνομένων, καὶ τοῦ λαοῦ σκορπιζομένου, τοῦ τε λύκου σοβοῦντος τὴν ποίμνην τοῦ Χριστοῦ· ὁ ἅγιος Κυπριανὸς πάντας δι᾽ ἐπιστολῶν διωρθωσάμενος κατὰ πᾶσαν πόλιν καὶ χώραν, πολλοὺς ἀνέσπασεν πλανωμένους ἐκ τῆς θήρας τοῦ λύκου. Ὁ δὲ ἀρχέκακος ὄφις βασκαίνων, ὑπέβαλεν Εὐτολμίῳ, τῷ κόμητι τῆς Ἀνατολῆς, ὅτι Κυπριανὸς ὁ διδάσκαλος τῶν Χριστιανῶν καθεῖλε τὴν δόξαν τῶν θεῶν· γοητεεύει δέ πάντας ἅμα τινὶ παρθένῳ, καὶ ἀνασίει πᾶσαν τὴν Ἀνατολὴν, καὶ τὴν οἰκουμένην δι᾽ ἐπιστολῶν. Ὁ δὲ κόμης θυμοῦ πλησθεὶς ὑπὸ δεσμοὺς καὶ πᾶσαν ἀσφάλειαν τῶν ἀρχόντων ἐκέλευσεν αὐτοὺς ἀπαντῆσαι εἰς τὴν Δαμασκόν. Προελθόντας δὲ αὐτοὺς ἡρώτω ὁ κόμης. Σὺ εἶ ὁ διδάσκαλος τῶν Χριστιανῶν, ὁ πολλοὺς ποτὲ συναθροίσας τῇ δυνάμει τῶν θεῶν; Νυνὶ δὲ διὰ τῆς τοῦ ἐσταυρωμένου ἐμφαίνων ἀπάτης περικλύζεις τὰς τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἀκοάς, προκρίνων τὸν ἐσταυρωμένον τῶν ἀθανάτων θεῶν. Ὁ ἅγιος Κυπριανὸς λέγει· Σὺ δὲ εἶπέ μοι· πῶς τολμᾷς ἑαυτὸν συνιστᾷν τῷ κομπῳ τῆς ἀλαζονείας καὶ τῆς διαβολικῆς μανίας; Ἐγὼ γὰρ πρώην ὥσπερ καὶ σὺ σήμερον, ἤμεν ἐξωγρημένος ὑπὸ τοῦ ἀλλοτρίου τᾑ σοφίᾳ τῶν Ἑλλήνων ἐσκοτισμένος. Πολλοὺς μέν ἀπέκτεινα, πολλοὺς δὲ καὶ πορνεύειν ἐδίδαξα. Ἀλλὰ νῦν ἔσωσέ με ὀ Χριστὸς διὰ τῆς ἁγίας ταυτῆς Παρθένου. Σκολαστικὸς γάρ τις, ὀνόματι Αγλαΐδος, ὁ τῶν Κλαυδίου, ἐρασθεὶς αὐτῆς καὶ τῷ νόμῳ ἦν ἀσπαζόμενος γάμον, καὶ μηδὲν ἀνύσας πρός με ἐλθὼν ἠξίωσέ με τῆς τοῦ φίλθρου μανίας ἐπαπολαύειν αὐτῇ. [2] Ἐγὼ δὲ θαῤῥῶν ταῖς βίβλοις μου ταῖς μαγικαῖς ἔπεμψα δαίμονα πρὸς αὐτὴν· καὶ τοῦτον ἐξήρανε τῇ σφραγίδι τοῦ Χριστοῦ. Ἀλλὰ καὶ ἕως τρίτου ἀρχοντικοῦ δαίμονος ἔπεμψα, καὶ τούτους κατέστρωσε τῷ αὐτῷ σημείῳ. Ἐγὼ δὲ ἐσπούδασα μαθεῖν την τοῦ σημείου δύναμιν, πολλὰ ὁρκίσας τὸν δαίμονα· καὶ ὁ δαίμων ὑπὸ ἀγγέλων μαστιγωθεὶς πάντα μοι ἀνήγγειλεν. Τότε ἐγὼ ἀνανήψας τῷ πρὸ ἐμοῦ ἐπισκόπῳ προσαγαγών μου τὰς βίβλους, παρόντων καὶ τῶν πρώτων τῆς πόλεως, ἐνέπρισα ἐν πυρί. Διὸ καί σε παρακαλῶ ἀποστῆναι τῆς τῶν εἰδώλων μανίας, καὶ ἐλθεῖν εἰς τὴν δόξαν τοῦ Θεοῦ, ὅπου ὁ ἀληθινὸς Θεὸς εὐσεβῶς καὶ ἀληθῶς δοξάζεται, καὶ τότε γνώσῃ τὴν ἀνίκητον τοῦ Χριστοῦ δύναμιν. Ὁ δὲ κόμης ὀργισθεὶς θυμῷ ἐλεγχόμενος ὑπὸ τῆς οἰκείας συνειδήσεως ἐκέλευσεν αὐτὸν κρεμασθῆναι καὶ ξέεσθαι, τὴν δὲ ἁγίαν Παρθένον ὠμοῖς δέρμασι μαστίζεσθαι κατ᾽ ἄμφω ἀλλήλων. Ἡ δὲ Παρθένος ἤρξατο λέγειν· Δόξα σοι ὁ Θεὸς ὅτι ἀναξίαν με οὔσαν οἰκείωσας πρὸς τό σου θέλημα, καὶ καταξίωσάς με ὑπέρ τοῦ ὀνόματός σου ταῦτα παθεῖν. Τῶν δὲ δημίων ἀτονησάντων, καὶ τῆς ἁγίας ὑμνούσης τῶν Θεὸν, ἐκέλευσεν παύσασθαι αὐτούς. Τοῦ δὲ ἁγίου Κυπριανοῦ ἐπὶ πλεὸν ξεομένου, οὐδὲν ἐφρόντιζεν ὅλως. Λέγει πρὸς αὐτὸν ὁ Κόμης· διὰ τί ἀπονενόησαι. Ο δὲ μακάριος Κυπριανὸς λέγει πρὸς αὐτόν. Σὺ ἀπονενόησαι ἀποστάτης ὤν τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ δραπέτης τῆς εἰς Χριστὸν πίστεως. Ἐγὼ δὲ ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἐπιγινωσκόμενος εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν φθᾶσαι σπουδάζω, ἵνα καταξιωθῶ διὰ τῶν βασάνων τούτων ἐπιτυχεῖν τῶν αἰωνίων ἀγαθῶν. [3] Ὁ δὲ τύραννος οὐκ ἐπαύσατο τῶν βασάνων εἰπὼν· Εἰ βασιλείαν σοι οὐρανῶν περιποιοῦμαι, μείζοσιν ὑποβληθήσῃ βασάνοις. Καὶ ἐκέλευσεν αὐτὸν καθαιρεθέντα βληθῆναι ἐν τῇ φυλακῇ, τὴν δὲ ἁγίαν Παρθένον εἰς τὰ Τερεντίου προσέταξεν εἶναι. Εἰσελθούσης δὲ αὐτῆς τὴν οἰκίαν, ἐφωτίσθη πᾶς ὁ οἶκος αὐτοῦ τῇ χάριτι τοῦ Χριστοῦ. Μετὰ δε ὁλίγας ἡμέρας ἐκέλευσεν ὁ κόμης προσαχθῆναι αὐτοὺς, καὶ λέγει τῷ Κυπριανῳ· Μὴ ἀπάτῃ καὶ μαγείᾳ τοῦ τεθνηκότος ἀνθρώπου ἑαυτοὺς ἀποκτεῖναι θελήσητε. Ο δὲ μακάριος Κυπριανὸς λέγει· Οὗτος ὁ θάνατος τοῖς ποθοῦσιν αὐτὸν αἰωνίον ζωὴν περιποιεῖται. Τότε ὁ κόμης σύννους γενόμενος ἐκέλευσε τήγανον πυρωθῆναι, καὶ βληθῆναι ἐν αὐτῷ πίσσαν, καὶ κηρίον καὶ στέαρ, καὶ βληθῆναι ἐν αὐτῷ τὸν μακάριον Κυπριανὸν ἅμα τῇ Παρθένῳ. Τοῦ δὲ μακαρίου ἐμβληθέντος οὐχ ἥψατο αὐτὸν τὸ πῦρ· τῆς δὲ ἁγίας Παρθένου ἐλθούσης ἐγγὺς, ὁ μισόκαλος δαίμων δειλίαν ὑπέβαλεν. Τότε λέγει αὐτῇ ὁ μακάριος Κυπριανὸς· Δεῦρό μοι ἡ ἀμνὰς τοῦ Χριστοὕ, ἡ τὰς πύλας τῶν οὐρανῶν μοι ἀνοίξασα, καὶ δείξασά μοι τὴν δόξαν τοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἡ τοὺς δαίμονας νικήσασα, καὶ τὸν ἄρχοντα αὐτῶν εἰς οὐδὲν ἠγησαμένη τῇ σταυροφόρῳ δυνάμει τοῦ Χριστοῦ. [4] Ἣ δὲ τὸν σταυρὸν ἐπὶ τοῦ σώματος ποιήσασα ἐπέθη τῷ τηγάνῳ· καί ἦσαν ἀμφότεροι ἀναπαυόμενοι ὡς ἐπὶ δρόσου, ὡς εἰπεῖν τὸν μακάριον Κυπριανὸν. Δόξα ἐν ὑψίστοις Θεῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς εἰρήνη ἐν ἀνθρώποις εὐδοκία· τοῦ γὰρ διαβόλου ἐκπεσόντος ἐκ τῶν οὐρανῶν τὰ σύμπαντα εἰρήνης πεπλήρωται. Χριστὸς γὰρ ἐλθὼν ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς τὸν διάβολον ἐτροπώσατο, καὶ τῇ σταυροφόρῳ, δυνάμει τὸν κόσμον ᾠκτείρησεν. Διὸ εὐχαριστῶ σοι, Θεὲ καὶ Κύριε τοῦ ἐλέους, ὅτι τὴν κόλασιν ταύτην ὑπὲρ τοῦ ὀνόματός σου ἐκτελῶ, καὶ παρακαλῶ σε ἵνα τὰς θυσίας ἡμῶν ὀσφρανθεὶς προσδέξῃ εἰς ὀσμὴν εὐωδίας. Ἀκούσας δὲ ὁ κόμης εἶπεν· Ἐγὼ σήμερον ἐλέγξω ὑμᾶς, καὶ τὴν τέχνην τῆς μαγείας ὑμῶν ἐκπομπεύσω. Ἀθανάσιος δέ τις συγκάθεδρος ὢν αὐτοῦ καὶ φίλος, ἱερεὺς δὲ πρῶτος, λέγει αὐτῷ· Κελεύσει με ἡ ἀρετή σου ἐπὶ τῷ βρασμῷ τοῦ τηγάνου στῆναι ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματι τῶν θεῶν, καὶ νικήσω τὴν νομιζομένην δύναμιν τοῦ Χριστοῦ. Καὶ ἐπέτρεψεν ὁ κόμης τῷ Ἀθανασίῳ· καὶ ὁ Ἀθανάσιος, προσελθῶν τῷ τηγάνῳ, λέγει· Μέγας εἶ ὁ θεὸς Ἡρακλῆς, καὶ ὁ πατὴρ τῶν θεῶν Ἀσκληπιὸς, ὁ τὴν ὑγείαν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις παρέχων. Καὶ ταῦτα εἰπῶν, καὶ μόνον προσεγγίσας τῷ βρασμῷ τοῦ τηγάνου κατεκυριεύθη ὑπὸ τοῦ πυρὸς, καὶ ἡ γαστὴρ αὐτοῦ διεῤῥάγη, καὶ τὰ σπλάγχνα αὐτοῦ ἐγυμνώθησαν, καί τὰ ὀστὰ αὐτοῦ διεσπαράχθησαν, καὶ ἐξεχύθησαν· ὁ δὲ μακάριος Κυπριανὸς ἄμωμος ἔμεινε σὺν τῇ Παρθένῳ δοξάζων τὸν Θεόν. [5] Τότε ἀνέκραξεν ὁ Κόμης λέγων· Τάχα ἀνίκητός ἐστιν ἡ δύναμις τοῦ Χριστοῦ. Τοῦτο δὲ μόνον μέλει μοι ὅτι τὸν ἱερέα, καὶ μόνον ὄντα φίλον μου ἀπέκτεινεν. Καλέσας οὖν Τερέντιον τὸν συγγενῆ αὐτοῦ, λέγει· τί ποιήσω τοῖς κακούργοις τούτοις. Λέγει αὐτῷ ὁ Τερέντιος· Μηδέν σοι πρὸς τοὺς ἁγίους τούτους· μὴ δὲ ἀντίπιπτε τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, ἀνίκητος γάρ ἐστιν ὁ Θεὸς τῶν Χριστιανῶν· ἀλλὰ παράπεμψον αὐτοὺς τῷ βασιλεῖ, δηλῶν τὰ κατ᾽ αὐτούς. Ὁ δὲ κόμης γράφει ἀναφορὰν τοιαύτην· Κλαυδίῳ καίσαρι τῷ γῆς καὶ θαλάσσης δεσπότῃ Διοκλητιανῷ χαίρειν· Κατὰ τὸν θεσμὸν τῆς βασιλείας σου συνέλαβον Κυπριανὸν τὸν διδάσκαλον τῶν Χριστιανῶν ἅμα Παρθένῳ ἐν τῇ Ἀνατολῇ, ὡς διὰ τῶν ὑπομνημάτων γνώσῃ, ὅτι τοσαύταις βασάνοις ὑποβληθέντες οὐκ ἐπείσθησαν· δι᾽ ὃ τῷ σῶ κράτει τούτους ἀνέπεμψα. Ὁ δὲ βασιλεὺς ἐγκύψας τοῖς σκρινίοις, καὶ τὰς βασάνους τοῦ μακαρίου θαυμάσας, ἐλογίσατο μετὰ τῶν φιλῶν αὐτοῦ καὶ λέγει· Κυπριανὸς ὁ τῆς Ἀντιοχείας διδάστκαλος, καὶ ἡ παρθένος Ἰουστίνα, ἐκλεξάμενοι τὴν ματαίαν αἵρεσιν τῶν Χριστιανῶν, καὶ παραλιπόντες τὸ ζῇν, τὸν Θεὸν αὐτῶν προετίμησαν, τὴν διὰ ξίφους τιμωρίαν ἐπενεχθῆναι. [6] Ἀπενεχθέντων δὲ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τὸν ποταμὸν Γάλλον ἐν τῇ Νικομηδέων πόλει, μικρὰν διορίαν ἠτήσαντο τοῦ προσεύξασθαι, καὶ μνησθῆναι τῶν κατὰ κόσμον ἐκκλησιῶν καὶ πάντων τῶν πιστῶν, καὶ τὴν ἐν Κυρίῳ ποιήσας σφραγίδα ὁ ἅγιος Κυπριανὸς, ἐκ δεξιῶν λαβῶν τὴν Παρθένον, πρὸ αὐτοῦ τελειωθῆναι ἠξίου. Καί τούτου γενομένου εἶπεν ὁ μακάριος Κυπριανὸς. Δόξα σοι Χριστέ. Θεόκτιστος δέ τις διαβαίνων ἐξ ἀποδημίας ἡσπάσατο τὸν ἅγιον Κυπριανὸν. Φουλεανὸς δὲ ὁ συγκάθεδρος… Ἐκέλευσεν αὐτῶν εἰς βοῤῥὰν τοῖς κυσὶ ῥιφῆναι. Προκειμένων δὲ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ πολλὰς ἡμέρας τοῖς αἱμωβόροις, ναῦταί τινες Ῥωμαῖοι πιστοὶ ἀκουσαντες ὅτι περετελειώθῃ ὁ ἅγιος Κυπριανὸς, ὢν αὐτοῖς ὁμόφυλος Ῥωμαίοις, ἔξ ἡμέρας παραμείναντες, καὶ πάντας τοὺς φυλάσσοντας λαθόντες, ἔλαβον τὰ λείψανα σὺν τοῖς παραχθεῖσιν ὑπομνήμασι· καὶ ἀναχωρήσαντες ἐκεῖθεν ἀνέβησαν ἐν πλοίῳ καὶ ἐπανῆξαν ἐν Ῥώμῃ, κομίζοντες δῶρον τίμιον τὰ λείψανα. Καὶ προσήγαγον αὐτά τινι Ῥουφίνῃ ματρώνῃ γένους Καβάρου, ἥτις λαβοῦσα τὰ λείψανα ἔθετο ἐν τόπῳ ἐπισήμῳ, ἐν ᾧ πάντες οἱ συνερχόμενοι ἱάσεις λαμβάνοντες δοξάζουσι Θεόν. Ἐπράχθη δὲ ταῦτα ἐν ὑπαθείᾳ Διοκλητιανοῦ ἐν τῇ ἐπιφανειτάτῃ Νικομηδείᾳ, καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς δὲ βασιλεύοντος τοῦ Κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ᾧ ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰώνας τῶν αἰώνων, ἀμήν. SS. Cyprian and Justina, arrested, are questioned When the ^b words of the prophets were fulfilled, and those which were spoken by our Lord Jesus Christ concerning the seed of the wheat, and the tares had multiplied, and the people were scattered, and the wolf was scattering the flock of Christ, St. Cyprian, strengthening all by his letters throughout every city and place, snatched very many from the jaws of the wolf. But the most wicked serpent, in envy, suggested to Eutolmius the ^c count of the East that Cyprian, the teacher of the Christians, was destroying the glory of the gods; that with a certain Virgin he was perverting all men by sleights, and was stirring up the whole East and the whole world by his letters. The count, full of wrath at this, ordered them to be brought together to ^d Damascus in chains and under the full custody of the prefects. When they had arrived there, the count asked: Are you the teacher of the Christians, who once gathered many to the power of the gods, but now, working signs by the fraud of the Crucified, bewitch the ears of men, preferring the Crucified to the immortal gods? St. Cyprian said: Do you tell me, how do you dare to exalt yourself with the arrogance of empty pride and of diabolical madness? I indeed once, as you do even today, ^e swelled with pride, darkened by the enemy with the knowledge of the pagans. I killed many, and taught many to fornicate; but now

Christ has saved me through this ^f holy Virgin. For a scholastic named Aglaïdus, ^g of the family of Claudius, was dying for love of her, and, as is usual, eagerly desired marriage; and when he had profited nothing, coming to me he induced me to assail her with the madness of a love-potion.

[2] and are afflicted with various torments Trusting in my magic books, I sent a demon to her, and she rendered him powerless by the sign of Christ. But I sent even up to the third ruling devil, and she routed them by that same sign. Then I strove to learn the power of that sign, adjuring the demon much. And the demon, scourged by angels, ^h disclosed everything to me. Then, when I had come to my senses, I brought my books to the bishop ⁱ who was before me, and, in the presence of the chief men of the city, tore them and burned them in the fire. Wherefore I too beg you to leave the madness of the idols and to come to the ^k faith of God, in which the true God is piously and truly glorified; and then you will know the unconquered power of Christ. But the count, boiling with anger and driven inwardly by the goads of conscience, ordered him to be hung up and scraped; but the holy Virgin to be beaten with raw sinews by two men ^l alternately. And the Virgin began to say: Glory to thee, God, that thou hast taken up me, unworthy as I am, according to thy will, and hast judged me worthy to suffer these things for thy name. And when the executioners were failing, while the Saint praised God with hymns, the ^m count ordered them to desist. And when St. Cyprian was being violently scraped, he cared nothing at all for the torments. And the count said to him: Why have you taken no account of yourself? But St. Cyprian answered: You yourself have taken no account of yourself, apostate from God and deserter from the faith in Christ. But I, mercifully acknowledged by him as his own, strive to enter into the kingdom of heaven, having been held worthy by these torments to obtain eternal goods.

[3] [steadfast in their confession, they are cast into a frying pan, in which unharmed] But the tyrant did not cease from inflicting torments, saying: If thus I procure the kingdom of heaven for you, I will subject you to heavier torments. Then he ordered him, worn out by torments, to be cast into prison; but the holy Virgin he commanded to be kept in the house of ⁿ Terentius; and when she had entered it, the whole house was illumined by the grace of Christ. And after not many days the count again ordered the Saints to be brought forward, and said: Do not obstinately call down death upon yourselves by the fraud and sleights of a man punished with death. But the blessed Cyprian answered: This death repays eternal life to those who desire it. Then the count, having weighed the matter with himself, ordered a frying pan to be heated and pitch, wax, and tallow to be put into it, and blessed Cyprian with the Virgin to be thrown into it. Cyprian, therefore, being put into the frying pan, the fire did not touch him; but when the holy Virgin had come near to him, the devil, the hater of good, cast fear upon her. Then blessed Cyprian said to her: Come hither, Lamb of Christ, who hast opened to me the gates of heaven and shown me the glory of Christ, who hast overcome the demons and reduced their prince to nothing by the power of the Cross of Christ.

[4] Then the Saint, having signed herself with the sign of the Cross, leapt into the frying pan; they endure: a heathen approaching it is burned up. and both were refreshed there as ^o in dew, so that blessed Cyprian said: Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men of good will; for after the devil fell from heaven, all things were filled with peace: for Christ, coming upon the earth, bound the devil and by the power of the Cross mercifully delivered the world. Wherefore I give thanks to thee, God and Lord of mercy, that I suffer these torments for thy name; and I beseech thee to admit these our holocausts unto an odor of sweetness. And the count, hearing this, said: Today I will convict you and make your magical frauds plain. Now a certain Athanasius, his assessor and friend and formerly a priest of the idols, said to him: Let your power command me to stand in the boiling of the frying pan in the name of the gods, and I shall conquer the [p] falsely supposed power of Christ. The count assented to Athanasius, who, drawing near to the frying pan, said: Great art thou, god Hercules, and father of the gods Asclepius, who givest health to men. And saying this, when he had only come near to the flames of the frying pan, he was swallowed up by the fire, and his belly was burst, his entrails laid bare, and his bones torn apart and scattered; but the blessed Cyprian with the Virgin remained untouched, glorifying God.

[5] Then the count cried out, saying: Perhaps the power of Christ is unconquered! This alone grieves me, [Seeing the prodigies, the prefect sends the Saints to the emperor, at whose command] that it has killed the priest of the gods, my one friend. Calling at last Terentius his kinsman, he said: What shall I do with these sorcerers? Terentius answered him: Attempt nothing against those Saints, nor strive against the truth; for the God of the Christians is unconquered; but send them to the [q] king, reporting what has been done with them. The count accordingly wrote a report of this kind: To Claudius [r] Cæsar, lord of land and sea, to Diocletian, greeting. According to the law of your empire I arrested Cyprian, the teacher of the Christians, with the Virgin in the East, as you will learn from the records. But since, subjected to such great torments, they did not obey, I have therefore sent these to your majesty. And the emperor, when he had read this, marveling at the torments which the Saint had suffered, having consulted his friends, said: Let Cyprian, the teacher of the Antiochenes, and the virgin Justina, who, following the foolish heresy of the Christians and despising life, have preferred their God, [s] undergo the punishment of the sword.

[6] And when they had been led away to the river Gallus [t] in the city of Nicomedia, [they are struck with the sword, and St. Theoctistus is joined to them. The bodies of all translated to Rome.] they asked a short delay for praying and for commending all the churches and all the faithful. And St. Cyprian, when he had made the sign of the Lord, setting the holy Virgin on his right, judged it expedient that she should be put to death [v] before him. When this had been done, blessed Cyprian said: Glory to thee, Christ. And Theoctistus, passing that way on a journey, embraced St. Cyprian. But [u] Phuleanus the assessor … ordered their (bodies) to be cast to the dogs toward the North. And when they had lain for many days exposed to the beasts, certain faithful Roman sailors, having heard that St. Cyprian, [w] of the same faith as the Romans, had been consummated, after six days had passed, secretly from all the guards carried off the sacred remains together with the records attached, and departing thence boarded a ship and returned to Rome, bearing the sacred bodies as a most precious gift; and they brought them to Rufina, sprung of the family of the [x] Cabari, who, having received the sacred relics, laid them in a distinguished place, where all who assemble there, obtaining healing, praise God. This happened under the consulate of [y] Diocletian in the most celebrated Nicomedia, our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom be honor and glory unto the ages of ages, amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

and in our transcript, which agrees with them everywhere, only this is read: A certain scholastic, named Aclaïdus, fell in love with her and through many persons did many things, etc. I wonder that it was there passed over that he was of the family of Claudius. Was this perhaps not read formerly in the Greek text?

p. So I have rendered, judging this to be the true sense. What follows about Athanasius, Eudocia again has in Photius, yet so that there Athanasius is said to have been formerly on very familiar terms not with the prefect but with St. Cyprian himself.

q. So indeed I have rendered; but the Greek word βασιλεύς is everywhere attributed to the emperor.

r. I have conjectured some things about these errors in §5, num. 65 and following, of the preliminary Commentary, which consult if you please. Certainly both here and elsewhere the letter is silly on other grounds too, and seems either inserted or at least corrupted by an unlearned interpolator. The prefect writes to the emperor, who was at Nicomedia, that he had arrested the Saints in the East: the interpolator, namely, was of the opinion that Syria was in question. In Martène the prefect writes that he arrested them at Antioch, which can be understood of Cyprian; but St. Justina was taken at Damascus, and St. Cyprian was led away from Antioch elsewhere, and they were tortured elsewhere, as Eudocia hands down. See what I have discussed in §6, num. 79 and following, of the preliminary Commentary.

s. In the Greek the word κελεύω or something similar seems to have fallen out, unless one prefers to say that it is understood. The old interpretation has: These I order to be handed over to the punishment of the sword.

t. So also in Martène; but in Photius it is read: He ordered the Martyrs to be beheaded at the river near the city, whose name is Gallus. Further, concerning the origin and course of the river Gallus the geographers do not agree, as may be seen in Cellarius, Ancient Geography, book 3, chapter 4. Yet they seem to agree in this, that it did not wash Nicomedia, but was rather several miles removed from it toward the winter East. Cellarius a little below merges the river Gallus into the Sagaris or Sangarius near Nicæa. But thus it seems to be removed too far from Nicomedia.

v. Fearing, namely, lest the holy Virgin should be too much stricken at the sight of his death; as above she is written to have trembled with a certain natural terror at the spectacle of the frying pan.

u. He is called in Martène Fervinus … a kinsman of the king, in our manuscripts everywhere Fervius. For the rest, both Greek codices are so mutilated in this place that, though all diligence was used, it could not be read. Take, reader, the sentence from our Latin manuscripts, that you may conjecture what has been omitted at the point I have marked with dots. A certain Fervius, a kinsman of the king, saw Theognitus kissing Cyprian, and in anger ordered him to be beheaded. And being consummated in the Lord, Cyprian, Justina, and Theognitus completed their martyrdom. And Fervius ordered their bodies to be cast to the dogs.

w. So I have rendered; the old version in Martène has: But faithful sailors, fellow provincials (in the manuscripts it is from the province) of Theoctistus. Eudocia in Photius writes, Certain sailors recently brought thither from Rome, with whom the martyr Theoctistus had also been on familiar terms; hence perhaps Castellanus made St. Theoctistus a sailor. See § I, num. 9, of the preliminary Commentary.

x. Of this stock or name I have found no mention among the famous families of the Romans, nor of the Crauari, as it is written in Greek codex 1485; Eudocia has of Claudius, which name accordingly is corrupted in our manuscripts.

y. In §5, num. 67, of the preliminary Commentary we bound the martyrdom of our Saints more probably to the year of Christ 304, because in that year, and not in others, at the time of the raging persecution, Diocletian seems to have been at Nicomedia — namely in the months of September and October, in one of which, on account of the memory in the sacred Calendars, it must be reckoned to have happened. Diocletian then held his ninth consulate, which number has perhaps fallen out here.

POSTHUMOUS GLORY

of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theoctistus, martyrs.

Cyprian, bishop and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Justina, virgin and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Theoctistus or Theognitus, M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

BY J. C.

§ I. The first translation of the sacred relics and their deposition at Rome, related in the ancient monuments, is illustrated. Their discovery and deposition in the Lateran basilica, and the present-day cult of the Saints in the city of Rome.

[ ] The first translation of the relics from Nicomedia to Rome The first translation of the bodies of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theoctistus took place soon after their martyrdom, and is narrated, though in a somewhat different manner, in almost all the monuments which we have concerning their passion. Let us hear Eudocia in Photius. The relics, she says, of those Saints certain sailors recently brought thither (to Nicomedia) from Rome, with whom the martyr Theoctistus had also been on familiar terms, carried off secretly from the guards and conveyed to Rome, where also a beautiful church was raised for them, next to the forum of Claudius, by the labor of Rufina, a pious matron who traced the stock of her family back to the emperor Claudius. The Latin Passions, differing among themselves in a few words, narrate the translation thus. But Fervius ordered the bodies to be cast to the dogs. And they were set out for six days, and the dogs did not touch them. But faithful sailors, fellow provincials of Theoctistus, coming by night while the guards slept, took the bodies of the most blessed Martyrs and lifted into their ship a burden more precious than much gold, and sailed from Nicomedia to Rome, receiving from certain holy men their Acts written from beginning to end: those, namely, of the holy Cyprian and of the holy virgin Justina and of St. Theoctistus, who was consummated with them. These precious gifts they brought to Rome. And a certain matron Rufina, of illustrious family, received them, caring for the holy bodies of the most blessed Martyrs, and laid them in a praiseworthy place, in which place now all who have demons and various infirmities receive health from the Lord.

[2] it is narrated in the older monuments. Similar are the things which are said in the published Greek Acts, and they differ somewhat from the assertions of Eudocia; adhering to which alone, Rufina could have raised a church to the holy Martyrs a considerable time after the sacred bodies had been brought to Rome, otherwise than is understood from the Passions, where it is intimated that the same Rufina received the sacred relics from the sailors and buried the Saints in some church; which, the epoch of the martyrdom standing, could have happened once the church had been given peace by Constantine. Yet the testimony of Eudocia ought here to prevail over the Acts all the more, the more it seems to approach the words of St. Gregory Nazianzen. Certainly he, unless he goes altogether astray and says nothing at all, intimates that the sacred treasures of our St. Cyprian were not first handed over to the same woman by whom they were afterwards set forth for the veneration of the peoples. Let us hear him speak. But when (he says) he (St. Cyprian) had passed the last day of his life … here too a miracle worthy of a life most holily led is marked out. For although the name of Cyprian was among all … most illustrious and most celebrated, yet his body was obscure, and this treasure was hidden with a certain woman fervent in piety, and that for a very long time; whether because God wished by this means that the pious matron should be honored, and therefore she held the Martyr in her embrace, or also that he might exercise our desire, whether, namely, we should be distressed by this loss and take it bitterly that we were deprived of the most holy relics.

[3] But when the same God of the Martyrs by no means endured to grant privately to any one person the common good of all, and by a singular favor to bring detriment upon the public advantage, More probably a public cult was rendered to the Saints there he brings the body forth into the open by a revelation, and this honor again he confers upon a certain worthy woman, that women too may be sanctified from this, that, as they formerly bore Christ and brought the tidings of his resurrection to the disciples, so now also they have partly disclosed and partly delivered up Cyprian, that is, the public good of the world. Thus far Gregory, in the translation of Billius; which, the trappings of words being cut away, signify, unless I am mistaken, that the body of St. Cyprian, to which the relics of the two other Martyrs had remained joined, was soon handed over to a pious woman, and by her kept secretly for private devotion; and that then, when she perhaps had died, it lay hidden until it was revealed to another woman and set forth for public veneration: all of which are less foreign to Eudocia's assertions than to the narrative of the Passion. And I said above, unless Gregory goes altogether astray; for unless these things are referred to our Eastern Martyr, Gregory says nothing at all, since they can by no means be applied to the relics of St. Cyprian of Carthage, as was shown in volume IV of September, page 339, where in chapter 2 of the Posthumous Glory the cult of that Saint is treated.

[4] Nicetas indeed, in Billius's Notes on Gregory Nazianzen, asserts some years after the relics had been brought to Rome; that the same Rufina was also called Matrona, and that by those two proper names the same woman is designated; thus intimating that the first woman, who by Gregory is called matrona

and who is said by him to have kept the sacred bodies received from the sailors secretly with herself for private veneration, spent her labor in setting them forth for public veneration. But it by no means appears probable that Matrona is there a proper name, and much less that Rufina is designated by it, since she is said by Eudocia to have raised a church to the Saints — certainly for public veneration — which things indeed suit the second woman in Gregory better than the first. Further, who that Rufina of Eudocia may be is uncertain enough from other sources; indeed there are some things which may cast the suspicion that the learned empress perhaps blundered in the name, and that she took the name from the name of the basilica which that woman either raised or adorned, and into which she brought the sacred remains of our Martyrs, as will easily occur to anyone from what follows. Eudocia says that Rufina was of the family of Claudius; but neither from that does any light shine, since that clan was a very ample one; and in the Greek Passions, for of Claudius is read Καβάρου, and in another manuscript Κραυάρου, concerning which see, if you please, the Annotations there. From the church which she is said to have provided for our Saints we are far from obtaining more certain knowledge. For Eudocia does not declare what title that basilica bore; but adhering to her words, it becomes likely enough that it received its title from the Saints for whom it had been raised, and accordingly that it was called of St. Cyprian, perhaps with his Companions, either named or designated by that common word; but again other things to be met with below will make this opinion about the basilica's title less credible.

[5] where on the Via Labicana a basilica was once dedicated to St. Cyprian, Let us nevertheless set forth the things in it which may have some likelihood. It is certain that in the sixth century a church existed on the Via Labicana which bore the name of St. Cyprian. This is plain from an old inscription which Antonio Bosio exhibits in his Roma Subterranea, book 2, chapter 8, and Aringhi in book 2, chapter 10, num. 23, and which they assert to have survived in their own time, transferred from the Vatican, in the atrium of the church of St. Angelo in Borgo. It seems to have been cut in marble in the sixth century; for various donations are reviewed in it, made on account and in view of Boëthius, laid to rest on the VIII Kalends of November, in the XI Indiction, in the XII year of Justin the Younger, in the III year of Tiberius Constantine Cæsar; all which notes converge upon the year 577, as Pagi proves in his Critica at the year of Christ 574, num. 6 and following. Further, on the left side of the said inscription there stand the following, which pertain here:

✠ SET QUA

TTVOR VNCI

AS FVNDI EVCARPI

ANI QVOD EST CONSTI

TVM IVXTA SCM̄CYPRIAN

VM VIA LABICANA INTER A

FFINES FVNDIC APITINIANI

IVRIS SC̄Ē EC̄C̄L̄ R̄ŌM SE

D ET FVNDI FLAVIANI

IVRIS PVBLICI IVXTA

SABINIANUM

EXPLICIT

(That is: But four ounces of the estate Eucarpianum, which is situated next to St. Cyprian's on the Via Labicana, among the adjoining properties of the estate Capitinianum, of the right of the holy Roman Church, and also of the estate Flavianum, of public right, next to Sabinianum. The end.)

[6] but perhaps not to ours. From these things it at once appears that a certain basilica marked with the name of St. Cyprian existed on the Via Labicana. There could be added to the same purpose some observations about its site and about the Forum of Claudius, in whose neighborhood Eudocia asserted it was founded, and about which, from the very many monuments along that same road which bore the name of Claudius, it would be easy to conjecture something; but it does not seem worth the labor to toil much over it, since in the first place it is uncertain enough whether our St. Cyprian or another of the same name had a special cult there; and finally certain monuments seem to persuade us that the empress is not speaking of that church. And indeed, as regards the first of these points, although I hold it for certain that our holy Martyrs, famous for as many prodigies as Gregory, Eudocia, and others relate them to have flourished with, were not so neglected by the Romans that no monument dedicated to their name existed there; yet since it is also most well known from elsewhere that St. Cyprian, bishop and martyr of Carthage, was most celebrated there, it remains at least doubtful to which of the two that church was sacred. Now let us come down to those things which give rise to some suspicion concerning Eudocia's assertion about Rufina. Several things persuade us that the remains of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theoctistus were indeed deposited in a basilica marked with the name of St. Rufina, but that this St. Rufina is altogether different from the matron by whose care that church was built; concerning which, before we bring forward our conjectures about Eudocia's assertions, some things must here be gathered.

[7] The bodies of our Saints seem Onofrio Panvinio, in his work On the Seven Churches of the City, at page 158 in my copy, describing the portico of St. Venantius, which is seen before the baptistery of the Lateran or Constantinian church, speaks thus: The apse has a marble altar dedicated to God and to the holy virgins Rufina and Secunda, under which the bodies of those same virgins were laid by Pope Anastasius IV in the year of the Lord MCLIV; who, when before his Pontificate he was Cardinal of Sabina and vicar of the Pope, had found them, and, being made Pontiff, himself consecrated that altar. But the other little chapel … has an altar fixed to the wall, dedicated by the same Pontiff in honor of SS. Andrew the apostle and Lucy the virgin, and consecrated with the relics of both Saints laid within; which dedication was made on the VI Kalends of October, the day of SS. Cyprian and Justina, whose bodies also, laid in a marble chest, he placed under the same altar — bodies which he had found under the altar of the holy virgins Rufina and Secunda, when, in order to find those very bodies, he had dug the ground deeper in that part. With these agrees Baronius in the Annals at the year of Christ 1154, num. 2, writing thus: This year, at its very end, dies Pope Anastasius, reproached for excessive easiness; concerning whom let us bring to light what we have found written in the Vatican codex of the Roman Pontiffs. Namely: This Pope Anastasius IV placed the bodies of SS. Rufina and Secunda, when found, beside the baptistery of the Lateran church, at the side of the same, near the apse; and opposite the same apse he laid the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina, and also relics of St. Lucy the virgin.

[8] Almost the same things are inserted in the Office of our Saints, which on this XXVI day of September is prescribed as a simple in the Roman Breviary, to have been found in the church toward the end of the second Lesson, in these words: Whose … bodies … were first buried on the estate of Rufina, a noble woman; afterwards, translated into the city, they were laid in the Constantinian basilica near the baptistery. Further, from all these things it becomes plain that the bodies of St. Cyprian and his Companions were found in the same place where the sacred treasures of SS. Rufina and Secunda had been found. But the words of Baronius, and indeed of Panvinio, might leave some doubt concerning the very place from which the sacred treasures were transferred to the Lateran church. John the Deacon, an author contemporary with Anastasius IV, assigns it no more distinctly; his following words the praised Aringhi adduces from a Lateran manuscript in Roma Subterranea, book 2, chapter 16, num. 5. Behind the basilica of the Savior (says John) there are four oratories; one of which has two apses: under one is the altar of the holy virgins Rufina and Secunda, under which are laid the precious bodies of those same virgins, which were found under Pope Anastasius IV, of happy memory, before he was raised to the Apostolic dignity; and after their discovery, an altar having been built in honor of the same, he consecrated that altar with his own hands, all of us standing by, etc.

[9] From these things, I say, it is by no means distinctly known in what determined place Anastasius found the bodies of SS. Rufina and Secunda, of SS. Rufina and Secunda, and to have been first deposited there by a woman, and accordingly also of our holy Martyrs. Panciroli in The Hidden Treasures of the City of Rome, and other more recent writers, designate it more closely. In the Acts of the holy martyrs Rufina and Secunda, which our Pinius on the X day of July, page 29, somewhat timidly held suspect of interpolation only in the dialogues, it is narrated that Plautilla, warned in her sleep from heaven, found the bodies of the martyrs on the Via Cornelia at the tenth milestone from the city of Rome, on the estate which is called Buxus, on her own property, and built a tomb for them there, which became famous for mighty prodigies. The said writers add that in the same place a church was afterwards built, and that a cathedral one, which was wont to be given to Cardinal bishops with the title of SS. Rufina and Secunda. They teach besides that, when the said basilica was gradually ruined and had fallen down, in the year 1156 (perhaps that union would better be fixed about the year 1120 and the Pontificate of Callistus II) the bishopric was united to the see of Ostia, and that about the same time the bodies of SS. Rufina and Secunda were found there and translated to the Lateran church, together with the venerable relics of SS. Cyprian and Justina. Further, these things are altogether likely and cohere excellently with the testimonies of certain older writers recited above. What pertains to the beginnings of that church Baronius and Aringhi gathered from ancient monuments; and he indeed, in book 2, chapter 16, relates from old monuments that the basilica of SS. Rufina and Secunda was begun by Pope Julius, who came to the Roman chair in the year 336, and was then completed by Damasus, who died in the year 384.

[10] whom Eudocia perhaps calls Rufina, All these things having been set forth, let us return to Eudocia and the Rufina mentioned by her. It is altogether probable, as will become plain from what follows, that the sacred remains of St. Cyprian and his Companions were found, and accordingly had long before been laid, in the said basilica of St. Rufina. Eudocia could, by an error easily enough borne, have attributed the name from the title of the church to the matron who founded it. Examples were not lacking in the Constantinian and various other basilicas which took their name from their founders. It could also be that that matron was truly called Rufina, and raised that church to the holy martyr of the same name, her patroness, and brought into it the bodies of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theoctistus, lately obtained. Whichever you admit, the conjecture will flow not foreign to probability. In the first place, the epoch of the building or restoration of the church of SS. Rufina and Secunda, mentioned in the times of the Pontiffs Julius and Damasus, agrees with the assertions of Gregory Nazianzen. For he seems to have delivered his Oration about the year 380, by which time the holy bodies had already been brought into the church for public cult, having been revealed some years before to the second woman, Rufina. Nor ought it to stand in the way that in the monuments alleged by Baronius and Aringhi the Pontiffs Julius and Damasus are said to have built the church of St. Rufina; for different men could not undeservedly be called its authors in different respects. Rufina may have supplied the ground and the expenses, and the said Pontiffs may have taken care and contributed some outlay for its adornment and their labor in dedicating it, and all could be said to have built that church and be held its founders.

[11] as conjectures persuade But neither do Eudocia's assertions about the place where the treasures of the Saints were laid, and about the church which was next to the Forum of Claudius, so oppose our conjecture that, if in such great darkness there is room for somewhat freer conjectures, they cannot be understood of that same church of SS.

Rufina and Secunda. Let us make the trial. In the Acts of SS. Rufina and Secunda, praised above and printed in our Work in volume III of July, page 30, the following are read as regards the site of the burial and of the ancient basilica: Then Archesilaus ordered them (SS. Rufina and Secunda) to be led into the wood on the Via Cornelia at the tenth milestone from the city of Rome, on the estate which is called Buxus, and one of them to be beheaded there and the other to be struck down. And so their bodies to be left unburied … At length the matron Plautilla, on whose estate this was done, saw them in a vision … saying to her … come to your estate and you will find our bodies. There you shall bury those same bodies where you shall be able to find them. And Plautilla, rising, came to the place, and finding the bodies of the holy virgins without stench and without any injury, adored and believed and built a tomb for the Virgins of Christ, in which place the benefits of their prayers display a great fruit of miracles. Concerning the Buxus and the wood mentioned in the Acts, which writers assert was formerly called the Black Wood and afterwards, from the Martyrs' laurel there, the White Wood, they proceed by conjectures only.

[12] Our Kircher, in his Chorography of Ancient Latium, marks out, at the 7th milestone from the City and about one to the left as one goes to Rome by the Via Aurelia, about the place where the church of St. Rufina the village of St. Rufina, which Laderchi in chapter 2 of his historical Dissertation on the Basilicas of SS. Marcellinus and Peter calls a country house of the arch-hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia. So far as I can gather, the more recent Roman writers think that in that same place, or certainly in its neighborhood, there was formerly the city and the episcopal church of SS. Rufina and Secunda mentioned above. Further, that village in Kircher's map is distant from the Port of Claudius by about the seventh milestone. Let us admit this so far, as also the other assertions of the authors which I have alleged. Eudocia may have erred in naming a Forum for a Port; or let us suspect, if we wish to defend her, that the place had two names, or that another near it was called a Forum from the same Claudius. Or, if the empress is speaking of that same basilica of Rufina, did she err in the distance? For my part I do not see it, especially since ἐγγίζων, which Schottus rendered next to, ought strictly to be rendered approaching, which certainly allows a greater latitude. Yet I do not know whether the said basilica of SS. Rufina and Secunda was in that place and as far removed from the Port of Claudius as that village still today called St. Rufina's. Take, reader, the ground of my doubt. From the Acts of those holy martyrs we have it that they were buried by Plautilla there where they had been slain, namely on the estate Buxus, which was in the Wood, on the Via Cornelia at the 10th milestone from the City.

[13] Of all these marks scarcely any suits the village of today. once stood. Certainly it is distant only by the seventh milestone from Rome, and is near not to the Via Cornelia but to the Aurelia, as at once becomes plain to those who look into it. Then it is not in the White Wood as marked out by Kircher, but distant from it by the third milestone; which things assuredly render that opinion at the least suspect. If Kircher rightly assigned the White Wood, and in it was the church of St. Rufina, and in that the tomb of our Saints, Eudocia's words will be still more easily reconciled, since the White Wood is scarcely four miles distant from the Port of Claudius. Whatever be the case with all those conjectures, since the Romans believe that the sacred bodies of our Martyrs were found in the same place with the relics of SS. Rufina and Secunda, and were thence translated together and honored in the Lateran basilica by Anastasius IV, it is altogether likely to me that they were first laid, and became famous for miracles, in that church near the White Wood. Where that basilica was precisely situated, those who are nearer to those places could investigate further; I illustrate in a few words the present-day cult of St. Cyprian and his Companions in the City, and review some relics.

[14] I have observed more than once above that the Romans believe that the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina are still today preserved in the Lateran basilica, where they were first deposited by Pope Anastasius IV about the middle of the twelfth century; The relics and cult of the Saints at Rome. but they bear it so easily that it is not believed they survive there entire, that they themselves confess that in other churches of their City various portions of the same are shown and set forth for veneration. For Piazza in his Sacred Hemerology at this XXVI day of September testifies that the feast of our holy Martyrs is celebrated with plenary indulgences not only in the oft-mentioned oratory of the Constantinian basilica near the baptistery, but besides in the church of St. Mary across the Tiber, where an arm of those Saints and a rib of St. Cyprian are kept. Other relics of the same he then assigns to various churches of Rome: namely, St. Peter's in the Vatican, St. Mary in Via, St. Nicholas in Carcere, St. Alexius, SS. Clement and Marcellinus. The chief part, therefore, of the sacred relics, which may be called the body, is left only to the Lateran church; whether others rightly assert that it has been taken from it, let us examine.

§ II. The monuments on which the men of Piacenza rely, contending that the bodies of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theoctistus were translated to Piacenza and rest there.

[ ] Manuscript monuments by the men of Piacenza Piacenza, an old and noble city in Italy, claims for itself not only the body of St. Justina, whose cult has been famous there for many centuries and to whom the cathedral church is dedicated, but also the bodies of her fellow martyrs Cyprian and Theoctistus. On what monuments its case rests, let us examine. Besides those things pertaining to that contention which have been printed in the writers of Piacenza, I have manuscript instruments given to us by distinguished men of Piacenza. The first is a copy of an authentic attestation of the History of the translation of St. Justina, transcribed from a Piacenza manuscript codex, and of some other monuments pertaining thereto. Receive, reader, its beginning and end, from which our transcript may take its authority. In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

[16] courteously communicated to us, Be it known to all who shall inspect this present public transcript, that we, Alexander Boschius, doctor of both laws of Bologna and apostolic protonotary, vicar and lieutenant general in spirituals and temporals of the most illustrious and most reverend father in Christ and Lord P. Claudius Rangonus, by the grace of God and of the Apostolic see bishop and count of Piacenza, being requested by the illustrious and most reverend lords Augustinus de Clericis, doctor of both laws and archdeacon, and Ludovicus Garosa, canon of the church of Piacenza, of those deputed by the reverend clergy of Piacenza, went together with the notary and the witnesses named below into the upper sacristy of the said church of Piacenza; and there, at the instance of the said reverend deputies and by our mandate, the chests of the same archive existing in that sacristy having been opened by the illustrious and most reverend lords Lodula, doctor of both laws, and count Arcellatinus Arcellus, theologian, chosen from among the canons of the same church for the custody of that church's archive, and a certain great book having been drawn out, written by hand on kidskin, of CCCXLVII leaves, covered with boards, we saw, together with the same notary and the witnesses named below, that the book itself is very old, as it appears, containing histories and Lives of various Saints and homilies and Sermons divided into Lessons, whose beginning etc. begins with a rubric in red: A sermon of the venerable Bede the presbyter on the chains of St. Peter, and the history of the English. Which Lessons written in that book, as we were there assured by some of the older beneficed clergy of the same church, had formerly at a certain time of year been wont to be read in that church among the divine Offices, during the time when the Office was recited according to the rite and Breviary of the church of Piacenza, until the reform of the new Roman one published by order of Pius V, Pope of happy memory. And on leaf XXXV verso of the same book and the following we saw and inspected, together with the notary and the witnesses as above, the nine Lessons written below with their rubric in red, of the following tenor: N. B. The translation of blessed Justina, virgin and martyr, from Rome to Piacenza, whose body, together with the martyr Cyprian, the venerable Pope John — who was formerly the prelate of this city — handed over to bishop Sigifredus.

[17] There follow then the history divided into Lessons and some other monuments, and of which we have a double transcript; after which the instrument is closed thus: Which book and Lessons and instruments, and the other book described above, having been diligently inspected, at the request of the same most reverend lords deputed by the clergy, we ordered those Lessons from the aforesaid book, and the passages set above from the instruments and the other book respectively, to be copied and transcribed and reduced to public form; decreeing and willing that full and the same credit be henceforth given to this public transcript or copy anywhere, in all and each of the places where it shall be needful, and that the transcript itself make faith and be stood by, as if the books themselves and the instruments were produced; to all and each of which we have interposed our authority and decree; and for the fuller evidence of the premises we have ordered letters patent signed by our hand to be fortified with the seal of the most illustrious and most reverend lord bishop, and to be subscribed by the same notary. Done at Piacenza in the upper sacristy of the cathedral church, in the year of the Incarnation MDCIII, Indiction II, on the XXX day of January, in the Pontificate of the most holy father in Christ and our Lord Clement VIII, by divine providence Pope, in his XIII year, there being present as witnesses the illustrious and most reverend lord Antonius Landus, apostolic protonotary, and the most reverend lord Petrus Maria Campus, canon of the collegiate church of St. Antoninus of Piacenza, presbyters of Piacenza, called and asked as witnesses to the premises, etc.

Place ✠ of the seal.

[18] And because I, Claudius Marana, notary of Piacenza and chancellor of the episcopal curia of Piacenza, was present at all and each of the aforesaid things while they were done as is set forth above, therefore in faith and testimony of the premises I have subscribed and signed, and have fortified it with the usual (here a certain word is so twisted that I cannot read it. I should guess that one should read of Piacenza, but then the word seal seems to have fallen out elsewhere) of the chancery of the episcopal curia, which is kept by me, being asked and required, as above. It has pleased me, reader, to transcribe these rather long passages, because upon those Lessons rests almost the whole case of the men of Piacenza, as we shall see in the course of this. The said instrument was given to our Papebroch, perhaps while he was staying at Piacenza with Henschen, or was certainly sent to him afterwards, as a Note added in his hand makes one conjecture. It seems to have been drawn up for the sake of those who were giving their labor to composing or enlarging the proper Offices of the church of Piacenza. Certainly about that time, when a little before the church of Piacenza had adopted the Roman Breviary, proper Offices were given by the same bishop Claudius Rangonus and approved at Rome, as I am informed by the attestation which, to the Offices of Piacenza, of which we have a printed copy

printed at Piacenza in the year 1635, is appended, and is as follows; since indeed the discussion of them will recur more than once hereafter, it will be well to have inserted this too here. The Offices for the city and diocese of Piacenza, granted at the bishop's instance and approved by the sacred Congregation of Rites on the XXIII day of March MDCII and the XV of April MDCIII, newly and more diligently emended, together with certain other Offices of Saints proper to the same city and diocese which had been omitted in those first granted, having been reviewed and emended by the order and mandate of the same sacred Congregation and subscribed by the most illustrious and most reverend lord Cardinal Bellarmine — these the same sacred Congregation of Rites approved, and gave and granted license that they may be freely and lawfully recited in the city and diocese of Piacenza, and also, for greater convenience, may be printed, on the XIX day of April MDCVIII. Dominicus, bishop of Ostia, Cardinal Pinelli, etc.

[19] one with observations for their defense. All the chronological notes, namely, conspire in the conjecture which I have mentioned concerning the Lessons excerpted from the aforesaid archive and the instrument drawn up concerning them. Yet we shall afterwards observe that in the praised proper Offices of the church of Piacenza at the XVII day of August, where the feast of the Translation of St. Justina, virgin and martyr, is prescribed to be celebrated under a double rite, some variation concerning the history of the translation occurs in the Lessons of the second Nocturn; so that he who composed them seems not to have approved everything in the manuscript Lessons. Further, those same Lessons the learned man the reverend lord Christopher Poggiali, provost of St. Agatha at Piacenza, transcribed from the manuscript Legendary of Piacenza and most courteously communicated to my colleagues who some years ago traveled through Italy. The learned man added his own Notes to the Lessons; and finally, in a most ample letter given to my colleagues at Piacenza on the Ides of June in the year 1753, he defends Campi, the author of the Ecclesiastical History of Piacenza, and the cause of his own country, that is, the possession of the bodies of SS. Cyprian, Justina, and Theognitus, and strives to satisfy the objections either already made or which he had perhaps foreseen might be made by us. All these things furnish me here with matter for discussion; and Poggiali, I trust, will bear it with the same courtesy with which he offered them to us for examination, if I shall not have been able to approve any of his arguments. That whole contention certainly seems to me sprinkled with so many difficulties and so entangled on every side that scarcely anything certain — indeed not even scarcely — can be laid down, especially concerning the body of St. Justina; but it seems that we must proceed by conjectures, which in a matter so uncertain, as also some doubts of my own, I have determined only to set forth, leaving to each his own judgment. Let us therefore approach the examination of the instruments already mentioned, a few things being premised about the ancient cult of St. Justina among the men of Piacenza.

[20] Already from the ninth century the cult of St. Justina was famous at Piacenza, For several centuries now the men of Piacenza have particularly venerated St. Justina the virgin, and that veneration is demonstrated by ancient monuments, so that already from the beginning of the ninth century the cathedral church there bore her name, joined to the names of the holy patrons Antoninus and Victor. In Campi, Ecclesiastical History of Piacenza, volume 1, page 455, in a privilege of Charlemagne which was given in the year 808, is read: The venerable man Julianus, bishop of the holy church of the city of Piacenza, which is built in honor of SS. Antoninus and Victor and also of Justina the virgin, has besought our clemency. Again in the same place, page 446, in a diploma of Charles the Fat, given in the year 881, there is mention of the church which is established in honor of SS. Antoninus, Victor, and Justina. In another privilege of the same Charles the Fat, which was signed in the year 883, the emperor says that certain presbyters of Piacenza, Cardinals also of the church of St. Justina, virgin and martyr of Christ, had asked for his protection. On these matters the oft-to-be-praised Christopher Poggiali notes in his Observations that after the middle of the ninth century a new cathedral within the walls of the city (for the one that bore the title of SS. Antoninus, Victor, and Justina stood outside in the suburb) was founded by bishop Seufridus and dedicated to St. Justina alone, and that its canons were called Cardinals of St. Justina.

[21] to whom then the cathedral there was already sacred. Seufridus, who is not rarely also called Gofredus, died in the year of Christ 870, according to Ughelli, who hands down that the building of the new cathedral was indeed conceived beforehand by Seufridus, but was completed only by his successor Paulus, which Campi likewise asserts in book 7 of the History of Piacenza, page 215. I suspect that it was finished not much before the year 881, and perhaps in that very space of time which elapsed between the two cited diplomas of Charles the Fat, since after the first I do not find in the diplomas the name of St. Justina joined to the other patrons of the other basilica, and the second diploma is the first in which St. Justina alone is alleged as patroness of the church. Whatever it may have been, certainly from that time the cathedral church of Piacenza was famous under the name and title of St. Justina alone, and there is very frequent mention of it in the monuments of later times. But Campi, and Poggiali in his Observations, chiefly desire this to be observed in them, that nowhere in the instruments earlier than the year 1001 is it intimated even by a word that the relics of St. Justina already rested there, although of the body of St. Antoninus this is manifestly asserted there once and again; whereas on the contrary in the monuments drawn up after the year 1001 some such thing is read added about the sacred remains of St. Justina resting in the church of Piacenza. Let us give specimens gathered by Poggiali from the instruments cited by Campi and collated with the originals.

[22] In the first place, mention of them is found in the Donation of count Lanfrancus and his wife Bertha, [and mention of whose relics resting there is made in instruments of the eleventh century,] whose beginning is this: In the name of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ, Arduinus by the grace of God king, in the first year of his reign, by God's favor, in the month of July, the fifteenth Indiction. The church of blessed Justina, virgin and martyr, where her buried body rests, situated within this city of Piacenza. Campi gave this instrument entire in volume 1, page 497, where the chronological notes, in a sufficiently barbarous style, designate the year of Christ 1002. Again, in another charter of a donation made in the year 1010, it is read thus: To the oratory and altar of St. Justina, virgin and martyr of Christ, which is built within the city of Piacenza, at the house of the bishopric of the holy church of Piacenza, where her holy buried body rests. Finally, the same formula is attached to an instrument of donation marked with the year 1018, in these words: Or let us place it upon the altar of St. Justina, where her buried body rests. The two later charters are printed in the cited Campi at pages 498 and 501. Further, the men of Piacenza confess that, although they venerated St. Justina as their patroness long before, they nevertheless had no relics of that Saint until the year 1001, but that then first they obtained her body, and indeed at the same time obtained the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Theognitus or Theoctistus, her fellow martyrs. Let us treat first particularly of the body of St. Justina and examine the case of the men of Piacenza.

[23] From the instruments hitherto alleged (I do not know whether the originals are still preserved at Piacenza) it seems certain by which later writers assert that her body was brought to Piacenza, that already at the beginning of the eleventh century it was believed that the body of some St. Justina rested at Piacenza. That opinion the writers of that city also handed down in the following centuries, and among them two of the more famous, Musso and Locati. Giovanni de Mussis, whose Chronicle of Piacenza, ending in the year 1402, Muratori printed among the Writers of Italy, volume 16, page 446, writes thus at the aforesaid year 1001: The body of blessed Justina was brought from Rome to Piacenza in the time of Sigifredus, bishop of Piacenza, which was handed over to the men of Piacenza by the lord Pope John XVII, who had been bishop of Piacenza. Let Umberto Locati follow him, the author of the Origins of Piacenza, who writes thus at the year 982: He (John the antipope), while he bore himself as Supreme Pontiff, gave as a gift to the citizens of Piacenza the body of the lady Justina, virgin and martyr; which body indeed was first laid in the church of St. John the Evangelist, but afterwards was translated into the greater church. I pass over other more recent writers, for these suffice for anyone to be assured that the same opinion about the body of St. Justina persisted among the men of Piacenza. Yet Musso, who wrote in the fifteenth century, and Locati, who wrote in the following one, do not seem to have written from tradition alone or from the opinion of the crowd; indeed I rather suspect — what appears more clearly to me concerning Umberto Locati — that both had older monuments before their eyes, from which they drew their statements.

[24] perhaps following the manuscript History of the translation. This is persuaded to me by the circumstances concerning Sigifredus and John, which seem to have been received from monuments other than the charters mentioned above or the tradition of the crowd, especially since it is established for us that in the centuries in which they wrote there probably existed the History of the translation, where such things are narrated, from which the praised chroniclers may seem to have abridged their statements. Certainly, unless we take it so, the authority in the present matter of writers more than four centuries later than the deeds will be slight. Then that they preferred to follow monuments rather than the rumor of the crowd becomes clear to me from this, that they wrote things rather opposed to than favoring the rumors already spread in their own time not only at Piacenza but through Italy and elsewhere as well. For from Jacobus de Voragine and Petrus de Natalibus I learn that at the time when they wrote there was a report that not only the sacred relics of St. Justina alone, but also those of her holy companions Cyprian and Theoctistus, had been translated to Piacenza. Jacobus de Voragine subjoins to the Passion of our Saints: Their bodies, when they had remained cast to the dogs for seven days, were afterwards translated to Rome; but now, as is said, they rest at Piacenza. The like, down to that very phrase as is said, Petrus de Natalibus writes in his Catalogue; from which it is plain that in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in which they wrote, the report ran thus. Yet Musso and Locati kept silent about these things, for this reason alone, unless I am mistaken: because they had not found that asserted in the History of the translation, as neither is it found there today. Since, therefore, the case of the men of Piacenza rests almost on that alone, I proceed to examine it.

§ III. The history of the Translation of St. Justina, cited by Campi from the manuscript codex of the church of Piacenza and submitted to us, is examined.

[ ] The author of the manuscript History speaks thus, In the first place, as regards the antiquity of the oft-mentioned history, the matters there are everywhere narrated as by one who not only lived at the same time, but was also present at the translation. For the narrative of how the men of Piacenza obtained the relics of St. Justina at Rome is as follows. And so, by the inspiration of the supreme grace of the Holy Spirit, at that time to Rome

we came, and approached that same lord Pope (John the antipope, of whom more below), now robbed of the sight of his eyes and stripped of the faculty of ill-flattering riches… And he, questioning us about our journey more shrewdly than usual, and adding that it was strange why we should have turned aside to so mutilated and deformed a man — we, turning over variously in our hearts how many and what sort of things would befit so prudent a man, at length broke silence, disclosed the matter which we sought, and earnestly begged that he would not take it ill if, moved by our prayers, he should bestow upon us what he cherished. But he, hearing this and drawing deep sighs from his inmost being, fell silent; nay rather, filling himself with many tears and beating his breast with cruel fists, his hair torn and plucked out on every side, wailing, he scarcely broke into speech. Alas for me, alas for me! why do you lay grief upon grief, why do you furrow my sad and torn breast with heavier sorrows? That which I always desired to do is granted to another to perform. I choose that my body should undergo the pain of bitter death, once I have learned that the people of Piacenza has so great an honor without me. Behold, the inestimable pearl which you seek is now at hand; drain it with your eyes, all ambiguity cut away, touch it with your own hands, bend your knees, lift up a pure heart to God, redouble your thanks without ceasing, that in your times you have deserved to handle so holy a body…

[26] Hearing this, and moved by the words of so pitiable a man, as though he had been present at the translation. we burst into tears, and, following with words of consolation, we accomplished nothing; but with bent knees he prayed long and silently. At last, raising himself, he delivered over to us what we desired… And we, … refreshed with unspeakable joy, took up the long-desired gifts, which we committed to chests under the impress of a seal. Then with swift course and on the appointed days, with a favoring breeze, we came to the manor which is called Varsia. And it is to be thought that not without reason is that place called Varsia, as it were Varia; because men thought variously about this. Some indeed said, It is she herself; but very many said, No, but it will be proved to be a Roman falsehood. The contention which is here intimated I do not believe was any other than that about the body of St. Justina, the Romans already then denying that the relics which the men of Piacenza had were those of that Saint. And it is proved that the Romans were mistaken from this, that certain miracles occurred at the invocation of St. Justina; whether that be a convincing argument, let others decide. Meanwhile I observe that it is at the least very doubtful, both whether the words of the original writer are reported in those Lessons, and whether they have not been so adapted to the use of the clergy that he plays the part of the city, and also whether that history ever existed otherwise than as composed for the use of the choir. But in either case, as is plain, nothing compels us to elicit from the manner of narration an author either contemporary or nearly so. Let us see what from elsewhere may seem to suggest the contrary.

[27] From the contentions between the Romans and the men of Piacenza about the body of St. Justina just mentioned, nor can it certainly be convicted of falsehood: yet it relates some things it might perhaps seem to some that the author is later than the time in which the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina were translated by Anastasius IV, as we said in the preceding section; since then first the occasion for contention seems to have been given, when the sacred bodies were found and translated at Rome, long after the men of Piacenza asserted they had been carried off thence by theft. But it must occur to one who considers the matter more attentively that perhaps on another occasion, chiefly in the circumstances of the time which we shall shortly set forth more fully, quarrels could arise among the common people, and that these are what are treated in the narrative. What seem more able to render suspect so great an antiquity of the history and the prerogative of a contemporary writer are the things narrated in the passage described above about John, bishop of Piacenza, and about the manner in which the relics were obtained, and which certainly need no small elucidation. John the antipope, of whom the discussion here is, and who in the Life of St. Nilus is called the archimandrite Philagathus, was a Greek by origin, born at Rossano in Calabria, and especially dear to the empress Theophanu. By craft and hypocrisy he had crept not only into the court of Otto II, where he held illustrious offices, but even into his friendship, and had cunningly obtained the very rich abbey of Nonantola, as is plain from a diploma of Otto II, concerning which Muratori in Antiquities of Italy, Dissertation 63. Not yet satisfied, while the empress Theophanu was acting in Italy, when in the year 989 Sigulphus, bishop of Piacenza, died, he occupied that chair under the empress's protection, and afterwards obtained that it should be raised by Pope John XV into a metropolitan or archiepiscopal see. Nor did his ambition stop here: for when, Pope Gregory V having been expelled, Crescentius had seized the tyranny at Rome, John, returning to Rome from a legation at Constantinople, entered with him into a detestable pact, that the temporal rule of Rome should remain with Crescentius under the protection of the emperor of the East, while he himself, made Pontiff, should have the spiritual government of the Church.

[28] about John, bishop of Piacenza On these terms, therefore, he was elected by the faction of Crescentius and thrust into the Chair as a manifest antipope, against whom presently thunderbolts were hurled by all the bishops of Italy, Germany, and Gaul. And these things thus far are taken almost wholly from Muratori's Annals of Italy, from which also the following must be drawn for our purpose. The emperor Otto III, roused by these disturbances, came into Italy in the year 998, and with Pope Gregory V, leading a numerous army, made for Rome. John did not await their coming, but, having changed his garments, after he had invaded the Roman see for about ten months, was planning flight; but he was detected and arrested by the Romans. What then followed Peter Damian relates in his second Epistle to Cadalous, the antipope who had assumed the name of Honorius II, which is the last of book 1 in the edition of Cajetan, where he describes John thus: Piacenza is a region neighboring you (Cadalous, bishop of Parma), whose bishop not long before our age was a contriver of crafty cunning, and after your fashion burned with the ambition of loftiness and glory more than enough, so that he first obtained that a silver cross be carried before him, as you too are now said to do; who also was said to have a mystery of obscene business with the empress who then was; then, gradually leaping to greater things, at last violently invaded the Apostolic see under the patronage of money familiar to you.

[29] and antipope Gregory therefore having been cast out, a kinsman indeed of the emperor Otto, he obtained the chair of the Roman Church, not as a great priest but as a thief and a tyrant; but a little after, the people of the Quirites coming to their senses and unanimously blazing up in zeal for a worthy vengeance, they rush upon him, lay hands on him, tear out his eyes, cut off his ears and nostrils… And, that we may pursue to the end a history worthy of your attention: after the Romans had, as has been said, answered the pontiff, presently they set the glorious horseman upon a little ass turned backwards, and, as he held in his hands the tail of his mount, along the public street of the whole City they drove him to chant this: Let him, he says, suffer such a punishment who strives to drive the Roman Pope from his see. The Saxon chronographer, or the Quedlinburg Chronicle published by Leibniz in volume 2 of the Brunswick Affairs, disagrees concerning the manner of the punishment; where, at the year 998, after narrating John's flight, he speaks thus: Then certain men, friends not so much of the emperor as of Christ, pursuing John, arrested him; and fearing that, if they sent him to the Augustus, he would go off unpunished, they cut off his tongue and his nostrils alike and utterly tore out his eyes. The Life of St. Nilus, to be published at this day, agrees with the Saxon chronographer concerning the punishment inflicted on John; for it is written there thus: Στερηθεὶς γὰρ παρ᾽ αὐτῶν τῶν χρειωδεστέρων μελῶν, ὀφθαλμῶν, λέγω, καὶ γλώττης καὶ ῥινὸς ἔῤῥιπτο εἰς φυλακὴν ἐλεινός τε καὶ ἀπροστάτευτος — For he (John), deprived by them of the most necessary members, of his eyes, I say, and his tongue and his nose, and cast into prison, lay full of miseries and destitute of all help.*

[30] Further, from these things it would at once follow that what is related in the History of the translation as having been said by John to the men of Piacenza is false and invented, and the manner in which the sacred bodies were obtained by him since tongueless men are not wont to speak articulately; but since Peter Damian agrees with them, the history cannot indubitably be convicted of error or forgery; yet no slight suspicion remains from the contrary testimonies of two other writers, in this matter perhaps not inferior in authority to Damian, concerning John's tongue being torn out. Whether the same suspicion ought not to be increased from elsewhere, let us examine, the circumstances of the times being first combined. The things which pertain here the Lessons have thus: The body of blessed Justina, the virgin of Antioch, was found together with the reverend bishop and martyr Cyprian …, long thrust away in the hiding place of the earth, known to few by reason of its exceeding antiquity, elegantly buried in the basilica of St. Rufina, once a noble Roman matron. Then, after several matters interposed which do not pertain to the discovery, it continues thus: The holy body, namely, of the undefiled virgin Justina was found by wondrous means, embalmed with fragrant spices; whose head only a little cloak veiled, the other garments being now consumed by age; but all her sacred bones were seen white as wool whitened by a fuller; and the nostrils of all the citizens standing by were filled with an insatiable and most sweet odor beyond what could be believed. And while all wept for exceeding joy and anxiously sought the help of Christ, the precious gift was stealthily taken from the tomb, and was received by a certain comely and noble bishop John, who then ruled the Apostolic chair of the blessed key-bearer Peter.

[31] The praises and titles lavished on John both here and elsewhere everywhere carried off by theft I readily pardon to a writer flattering on behalf of his own country, that I may weigh his other assertions more attentively. Unless I am much mistaken, the discussion here is of one and the same discovery of the sacred relics, and it took place a little before, or at almost the same time when, the sacred remains, scarcely yet laid in the tomb for public cult amid the rejoicing and applause of the Romans, were fraudulently carried off by someone and brought to John; and all these things happened at the time when John the antipope was in power, and accordingly in the year 997, or at the beginning of the following one. This last point I see denied by the oft-to-be-praised Poggiali, but I find no convincing reason. Besides, indeed, that it could scarcely be asserted in clearer words than those we have produced from the anonymous author, other things are read in the same writer which likewise seem to persuade that John received the body of St. Justina before he was expelled from the see which he had sacrilegiously invaded. To the legates of Piacenza asking that the sacred relics be granted them for transfer, John answers: That which I always desired to do is granted to another to perform. I choose that my body should undergo the pain of bitter death, once I have learned that the people of Piacenza has so great an honor without me.

[32] Here again, unless I am mistaken, the Lessons intimate that the body of St. Justina had already been with John for some years, and that he had always desired to transfer it to Piacenza, the sacred bodies were, which he was now forbidden to do; and that thence arose his great grief, that what he had desired to do by himself he must now leave to others

be compelled. Then it does not appear to me more likely that John, once expelled from the chair, could obtain the sacred treasures of St. Justina rather than while he was still powerful in the City. For if John, so ill-treated by the Romans who upheld the party of Gregory V, remained at Rome until the year 1001, it cannot be doubted that he was there closely guarded and diligently watched. But who could bring himself to think that in those circumstances the bodies could be carried off so secretly from the tomb, where they were venerated by the Romans with particular veneration, and could come to John, so that no one got wind of the theft and no one tried to hinder it? That the theft could lie so hidden, when the relics had been but recently translated into a new tomb and the celebrity of their cult begun, does not seem likely to me; nor will I let myself be persuaded that the Romans were so indulgent toward a man against whom they had displayed their hatred almost to the point of fury, that they suffered him to be enriched with impunity by spoils stolen from their city.

[33] things which may seem Some of these things, I confess, are hard to grasp, even if, following the narrative, we believe that John, having obtained the sacred relics earlier, only then granted them to the men of Piacenza, as we shall presently see; but this at least follows from it, that he could more easily obtain them by guile and fraud while he was in power — which Locati too judged — than after he had already paid the penalties of his ambition. Poggiali indeed says in his Observations: There was no reason why John, master at Rome, should have feared if he had sent even six hundred bodies of Saints elsewhere; nor does it appear probable that he would have deferred the translation for three years. But it would be easier to defend the assertions of the history in this point than in the rest. For although John, exercising his tyranny, could perhaps have done both this and more, while the Romans gnashed their teeth in vain, yet if there is any place for prudence alongside ambition, he could have judged from prudence that it was better to accomplish the thing secretly than to exasperate the minds of the Romans more and more. Then if we grant that John obtained the relics a little before Gregory arrived at Rome with Otto — being about to be shortly driven from the see he had wickedly occupied, and to be afflicted with so many punishments — no one, so far as I suspect, will ask of him with much sincerity why amid these events he deferred transferring the relics to Piacenza.

[34] to render suspect Certainly in this matter, the narrative being admitted as it stands in the Lessons, it seems to me much less likely that John amid such bitter misfortunes took such care of the relics that, all other things being lost, he guarded these alone so anxiously; or that the Romans were so indulgent as to leave to a most hateful man the sacred spoils of their city, snatched from public cult. Yet not these things alone render the account of the translation suspect. Indeed the very time at which they contend that the sacred bodies were obtained by the men of Piacenza has such circumstances that I shall not give it undoubted credence without better testimony. For whether John be believed to have obtained the said bodies long before, or not long before he handed them over, this is clearly asserted there, that he gave them to the legates of Piacenza to be transferred after he had already, mutilated in his eyes and nostrils, paid the penalties of his sacrilegious ambition — and that indeed at Rome, where I shall scarcely believe that he was so left to himself by hostile citizens that he could contrive any such thing and receive clandestine embassies. And indeed the whole affair does not seem from the narrative to have been carried out with great caution. Nowhere does John by a word commend silence and secrecy to the men of Piacenza. At the first request the sacred relics are at hand; and having obtained them, the legates return indeed with swift course; but they had scarcely come to Varsia when already, everything being without doubt made public, contentions over the body of St. Justina are recorded to have arisen.

[35] the account, which neither by the men of Piacenza, But did not heavier vexations from the Romans await John from this, since it could not lie hidden? Ought not one so crafty in other matters to have foreseen and forestalled these? So indeed it seems to me, who again cannot picture to myself John so imprudent and the Romans so careless; but I rather suspect that in all those circumstances the conjecture has not been happy enough. The men of Piacenza will not take my suspicion ill if they observe that its credibility has been called into doubt by the men of Piacenza themselves. I have already exhibited the learned Poggiali thinking in some measure contrary to the history concerning the time at which the bodies were carried off by theft. I do not fear to affirm that the account was suspect to Claudius Rangonus, bishop of Piacenza, and to those who in his time composed the proper Offices of the church of Piacenza. I have already observed above that about the time when those Offices were composed the manuscript codex of Piacenza was consulted and the history of the translation transcribed from it, as the praised attestation makes credible; nor do I at all doubt that the bishop, or those to whom he entrusted the composing of the Lessons, saw the same, since most of the matters at the XVII day of August, on which the Translation of St. Justina is prescribed to be celebrated with a double rite, are taken and abridged from it. I say most, indeed almost all, if you except the manner in which the Lessons relate that the relics of St. Justina were obtained from John and brought to Piacenza: which, agreeing in the rest, but varying in the manner, seem to intimate that the narrative was not here approved.

[36] In the proper Offices at the said day, in the first Lesson of the second Nocturn, after the first translation of the holy bodies from Nicomedia to Rome has been related, was approved on every side. it is read thus: And first they (the bodies of the Martyrs) were buried on the estate of Rufina, a noble woman; afterwards, translated into the city, they were laid in the Constantinian basilica near the baptistery. At length thence those pledges of the Saints, in the reign of Otto III, were taken and given to the men of Piacenza, and happily transmitted to Piacenza for the increase of the piety of the godly toward the holy Martyrs, and especially toward blessed Justina, patroness of the greater church and of that city as well. The same words are repeated there word for word at the XXVI day of September at the end of the third Lesson of the second Nocturn. Further, to one who compares these with the anonymous author's narrative the variation will at once occur; and to one who considers the words more attentively almost every one will seem carefully chosen. In the first place the anonymous author does not mention the Constantinian basilica even by a word; indeed he sufficiently intimates that they were deposited in a tomb in the basilica of St. Rufina, where the sacred bodies had been found, and thence carried off by theft. Moreover everything in the Office sounds of a lawful donation and translation, without any mention of theft or of John the antipope; and it is intimated that the bodies were not carried off, but that the pledges of the Saints were taken from the Lateran church. It is asserted indeed that the translation took place in the time of Otto III; and I readily believe too that what seemed odious in the narrative of the translation was passed over or changed by the men of Piacenza; but I do not grasp why things contrary to the assertions of the Lessons should have been substituted by them, if they had given credence to them. But what in the Offices is new about the relics being taken from the Lateran basilica not only does not agree with the account of the History, but does not seem easily reconcilable with the epoch drawn from the reign of Otto III.

[37] For if Anastasius IV about the middle of the twelfth century translated the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina from the ruined basilica of SS. Rufina and Secunda near the White Wood to the Lateran, Other doubts concerning the aforesaid relics, which I proved above to be most likely, the same could not a century and a half earlier have been taken from the Constantinian basilica, where they were not yet, and granted to the men of Piacenza to be transferred. From all these things I conclude that the narrative of the translation was suspect at least to them, as it is hitherto to me — lest, namely, everything did not take place in the manner in which the deeds are there narrated. I do not deny to the men of Piacenza the translation and possession of the relics of St. Justina; I observe, however, that their case does not stand in so good a position as their writers everywhere assert. For, the credibility of the History of the translation being once shaken, there are other things which might generate a suspicion concerning those sacred relics no more pleasing to the men of Piacenza. Let us grant that the author of the Lessons is somewhat later in time, yet had heard that the body of St. Justina had been granted to his country by John the antipope; indeed let us admit that in reality at that time, while he was in power at Rome, John handed over the relics of St. Justina to the men of Piacenza: not yet will all suspicion be torn up by the roots and every occasion for cavils be shut off. For some will be able to doubt whether the men of Piacenza asked for the sacred bones of our St. Justina, the virgin of Antioch, and whether John granted what they asked.

[38] [which nevertheless do not certainly overturn the tradition of the men of Piacenza,] As regards the first point, it is most likely and almost beyond doubt that the men of Piacenza desired the sacred remains of that St. Justina whom from of old they had specially venerated and held as patroness. But now it may seem ambiguous enough whether this was not another and a namesake virgin, different from ours. Certainly I have hitherto found nothing in the older monuments of Piacenza from which it is sufficiently established that our Martyr of Nicomedia was venerated by them; and when I ask myself why they should have venerated her in particular, I cannot suggest a sufficiently probable reason. From another quarter again it is beyond doubt that there were several martyrs of the same name, and that John could more easily give to the men of Piacenza the sacred bones of some martyr Justina buried in the Roman cemeteries and crypts than the body of ours, famous among the Romans. I add that the antipope could give nameless relics under this name, that he might seem to gratify them the more — to whom I shall do no injury even if I hold him suspect of a slighter fraud in this whole affair. And these are, unless I am mistaken, all the objections that can be made against the men of Piacenza, and which nevertheless, though perhaps they cannot be utterly refuted by open reasons, since they are born only of suspicions and rest upon them, ought not to undermine the tradition of the men of Piacenza.

[39] provided they leave no small part to the Romans For indeed, if they be unwilling to defend the account of the translation too pertinaciously, they have from other sources testimonies, some of which we have produced above, which sufficiently confirm the possession of the relics of St. Justina, by whatever means they obtained them. They would moreover fortify it against many cavils if they would settle the dispute with the Romans, and concede to them something more than the writers of Piacenza seem willing to grant. Poggiali indeed in his oft-praised Observations urges that what we excerpted at num. 7 from Baronius's Annals and from the Roman Breviary about the remains of the Saints deposited in the Lateran basilica in the twelfth century by Anastasius IV ought in no way to stand against the men of Piacenza. For, he says, as Baronius himself notes at the year DCCLXI and often elsewhere, When the sacred bodies of Saints used to be translated, some part was wont to be left in the former place. Hence he deduces that, although the body of St. Justina had been translated to Piacenza long before, yet some part left there by John and afterwards found by Anastasius was called the body. That this custom was religiously observed even by thieves I do not believe; hence Baronius's assertion does not seem to have place here, if Poggiali adheres too tenaciously to the assertions of his Lessons.

[40] let them leave, But if he shall admit with me that the relics were obtained by another way and manner, provided he does not leave so small a part to the Romans that by the common and broader name it cannot be called a body, I for my part shall here agree with him. How great a portion survives at Rome I do not know; nor yet how great a one the men of Piacenza have. He says

indeed, Poggiali, that the relics at Piacenza have been inspected more than once, but he does not teach in particular how many and how great the sacred bones were that were found, although he repeatedly contends for a body. I believe that those relics are everywhere called a body in the instruments of the recognitions, and that Poggiali relies on this; but one who knows from manifold example how small relics are wont to be honored with this title, and that the Romans are more liberal on this very point, suspects that he ought to prove by a more distinct enumeration that his portion is so great that elsewhere there can be no parts of the same body which deserve to be called a body, since he grudges that to others. It would be better, unless I am mistaken, and sufficient to settle the dispute, if the men of Piacenza should leave a notable part of the relics of St. Justina to the Romans and ascribe as much to themselves. Thus both, in the common manner, will be able to glory hereafter also in the body of St. Justina.

Perhaps rependissent*.

§ IV. Inquiry is made whether the men of Piacenza deservedly glory in the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Theoctistus. The sacred remains elsewhere of martyrs of the same name, or of ours.

The older writers make no mention Whatever we have hitherto examined here pertains chiefly, and almost solely, to the sacred remains of St. Justina, as the reader has doubtless noticed. The case of the men of Piacenza seems to stand in a worse position in the contention about the body of St. Cyprian, which they likewise claim for themselves. In the diplomas praised above, in which mention is found of the body of St. Justina resting at Piacenza, there is none of relics of St. Cyprian translated thither as well. There is no trace of that translation in Musso, none likewise in Locati, where he treats of John the antipope and the relics of St. Justina; indeed the oft-mentioned History of the translation does not even in this point support the men of Piacenza. I pass over the title, since that, as is usual, was probably added by another; I consult the account itself. Thus speaks its anonymous author, after he had said before that the body of St. Justina had been found together with the reverend bishop and martyr Cyprian: On his feast days, he says, a heavenly gift was conferred on us; namely, the holy body of the undefiled virgin Justina, found by wondrous means. Again below, where he speaks of the theft, he mentions the body of St. Justina alone. Again John is narrated to hand over only the body, and neither there nor anywhere in what follows is there mention of relics of St. Cyprian; so that, if we had to stand on that instrument alone, I should not hesitate to affirm that the legates demanded the body of St. Justina their patroness alone, and that John gave that alone. Further, that continual silence in the said monuments ought to drive every prudent man to the opinion that the men of Piacenza did not obtain the body of St. Cyprian along with the relics of St. Justina.

[42] Certainly the writers of Piacenza have hitherto brought forward no testimony on this matter of the body of St. Cyprian translated to Piacenza; older than the thirteenth century, and everything sufficiently persuades that, from the fact that St. Cyprian was St. Justina's companion in martyrdom and in the first translation and burial, it gradually began to be believed that the sacred remains of those whose memory was everywhere found joined in the sacred calendars had remained joined and had come to Piacenza. The first testimony which the oft-praised Poggiali alleges from Campi is a Deed of the notary Johannes Carmangiarius, preserved in the archive of the nuns of St. Raymund at Piacenza, where it is read that the miracles of St. Raymund were reported to bishop Graimerius while he was praying in his cathedral before the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina; but that is two centuries later than the translation, and the tradition could already have arisen from the occasions just mentioned. Poggiali besides alleges Jacobus de Voragine, Petrus de Natalibus, certain supplements to Usuard, and Maurolycus, where in the elogia of our Saints mention is made of the translation of all the bodies indiscriminately to Piacenza. Concerning Jacobus de Voragine and Petrus de Natalibus I observe that those writers, by no means critical, nevertheless here added the phrase as is said, which assuredly is everywhere wont to intimate a writer's doubt; but the statements of the others, since they are not earlier than the thirteenth century, can add no weight.

[43] but this opinion is more recent: For further proof they bring forward Breviaries and Bulls of Pope Julius II; but all these are still more recent, and the learned know how much authority such monuments carry in a purely historical matter. Poggiali writes that the sacred bodies lie under the high altar of the lower church in a leaden chest, and that on it is read this inscription:

✠ HERE REST THE BODIES

OF THE SAINTS JUSTINA AND CYPRI

AN, MARTYRS, TRANSLATED IN THE YEAR

[ ] OF THE LORD. M. I.

But this inscription may be no older than the thirteenth century; and there survives another which certainly does not yield to this in antiquity and can be set against it for the contrary opinion, expressed namely by Muratori in volume 16 of the Writers of Italian Affairs, column 619. Poggiali believes that it is that same part of the Chronicle of Giovanni de Mussis, and adds that already in his age, namely in the fifteenth century, it seemed to that author commendable for its antiquity.

[44] certainly only I accept Poggiali's opinion, although here both points seem doubtful, and reprint the inscription from him. It runs thus:

The holy Virgin of God is signed in this feigned Name Justina, of Antioch by birth: She, taming the flesh, joined * Cyprian and his art And at last, signing herself, drove back the ancient enemy. This church standing, Pope John adorned it With the body of Justina, so chaste and gracious a virgin.

These inelegant verses may have been carved, as one may conjecture, upon an image or tomb of St. Justina; certainly here again the discussion is only of the body of St. Justina, not a word about the sacred remains of St. Cyprian, and that although mention is made of him; and accordingly the negative argument again receives force from this.

[45] the head of the Saint In the same fragments, indeed, which Muratori subjoined to the Chronicle of Giovanni de Mussis, under the title The bodies of Saints which rest in the churches of Piacenza, it is read at the very beginning: In the greater church of Piacenza, of blessed Justina, Cyprian, etc.; but what this compiler, whoever he be, and what probably the other later writers called a body, the author of the description of the city of Piacenza intimates — whom Muratori judges to be the same Musso, and whose little work he appended immediately to his Chronicle. Certainly there, at column 570, under the title Of the churches of secular priests and their dignities, it is expressly written thus: In the said church are many bodies of Saints: namely, of St. Justina, virgin and martyr, and the head of St. Cyprian, and the bodies of SS. Artemius and Candida his wife. Umberto Locati, printed in Graevius's Thesaurus of Italian Antiquities, volume 3, part 1, toward the end of column 94, has the same word for word, so far as it pertains here. Namely, these writers not only do not attribute the body of St. Cyprian to their own country, but on the contrary quite manifestly and distinctly deny it. For if in their time it had been proved, indeed if they had even doubted about it, they would not have so expressly excepted it among the enumerated sacred pledges of other Saints who rest at Piacenza, nor would they have specified the head of St. Cyprian, even with some breaking of the sense, unwilling as they were to speak in the common manner of other writers and to call that portion of the sacred body a body.

[46] And these things, unless I am mistaken, ought to decide the dispute here with a fair appraiser of matters; [the men of Piacenza had. They likewise claim for themselves the body of St. Theoctistus] for although the monuments which I designated a little before are perhaps genuine, in which the body of St. Cyprian is everywhere asserted to belong to the men of Piacenza, yet the so distinct expression of the two later writers ought at least to prove this, that we should believe the rest spoke less distinctly, and called the head, the nobler portion of the body, a body, after a manner much used in this matter. Concerning the body of St. Theoctistus or Theognitus, I do not know whether the men of Piacenza have a controversy with the Romans: certainly I have hitherto not found that they claim it for themselves in particular; but if there is any, it must have arisen from this, that his holy bones were once deposited with the relics of the two other of our Martyrs on the estate of Rufina, and thence are believed to have been translated together into the Constantinian basilica, and are not known to have been carried elsewhere afterwards. The men of Piacenza on the other hand, since they believe that they have obtained the sacred pledges of SS. Justina and Cyprian, deduce from the same circumstances that they have obtained the body of St. Theognitus or Theoctistus, as Poggiali informs me in his oft-praised manuscript observations. Further, Campi and Poggiali relate that the body of this holy Martyr remained in the church of St. John the Evangelist, where the bones of SS. Justina and Cyprian too had first been deposited; and that when these had been translated thence into the cathedral newly adorned by Sigifredus, it was for several centuries thereafter preserved there, until, perhaps (these are the words of the oft-praised Poggiali) about the year MDXLIV, in which by Apostolic authority the church of St. John was leveled with the ground, in order more becomingly to enlarge the square before the cathedral itself, it was translated into the church of the Benedictine monks of St. Sixtus in this same city, in which now also it rests laid with sufficient honor.

[47] Of the body of St. Theognitus brought to the men of Piacenza there is nowhere any mention in the older monuments mentioned above; but with arguments not solid enough. indeed not even in the proper Offices themselves is there any particular discussion of him. The first, and almost the only, testimony which the writers of Piacenza bring forward is that of Gerardus Adrianus, in an instrument printed in Campi, part 2, column 386, testifying thus in the year 1215, at column 387: Moreover I say that in the said altar (of St. John the Evangelist) there are many relics which I have seen, and the bodies of holy Martyrs rest there, which likewise I have seen with my own eyes; of whom one is called Theognitus, and the other Sebastian; as we have been informed by our fathers, and as we have known from the pictures carved there, in whose honor a Prayer is constantly chanted by the priest when Mass is celebrated. It can at once be observed here that the name of St. Theognitus became known then from no other source than tradition, and that he was as unknown from other sources as St. Sebastian; so that the said witness, though desiring to designate those Saints more distinctly, found absolutely nothing. Hence indeed it becomes doubtful to me whether at that time St. Theognitus was already held for St. Theoctistus, companion of SS. Cyprian and Justina in the passion, and whether the men of Piacenza knew his deeds better than those of the St. Sebastian mentioned there. Whatever it be, I shall not firmly believe that the body of our holy Martyr, or even a part of it so notable as to deserve to be called a body, is preserved at Piacenza, unless I shall be informed by other testimonies.

[48] For the rest, I have already noted that the translation of St. Justina is solemnly celebrated with a double rite on the XVII of August, and the feast of St. Justina on the XXVI of September with an Octave; The special cult of the Saints at Piacenza. on its third day, that is, on the XXVIII of September, a double of the Feast of St. Cyprian is appointed there; but nowhere does any special mention of St. Theognitus occur. To the cult of the holy Martyrs at Piacenza belongs also what Poggiali notes in his observations: namely, that the canons and chapter of the cathedral church, on each Sunday after Vespers, in supplication

go to visit the altar sacred to St. Justina, singing a Hymn, an antiphon, and a Prayer, which is found at the end of the little book of the proper Offices of the church of Piacenza. Poggiali is probably speaking of a more recent edition, for in the Offices printed in the year 1635 I do not find them assigned. He suspects likewise that this custom flowed from an indult of Pope Julius II, from whose Bull given on the XII day of August in the year 1512 he excerpts the following: Likewise to all who on each Sunday of the whole year visit the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina lying in the said church, which the Roman Pontiff John XVII, predecessor of his Holiness, who had been bishop of the said church, gave to the aforesaid church, and who stretch out helping hands there, an Indulgence of seven years. About to put an end to these matters, I note that the instrument is at the least suspect to me, where Julius calls John, a most undoubted antipope, the predecessor of his Holiness; and accordingly that no effective argument is drawn from it for the possession of the body of St. Cyprian.

[49] It does not seem to be the head of our St. Justina which is preserved Besides the Roman and Piacenza churches already mentioned, several others besides seem to ascribe to themselves some of the sacred bones of our Saints. I have before my eyes an original instrument once sent to Papebroch by Fr. Philip Schouville and laid aside for this day, which I here present. To all who shall see this, greeting in the Lord. I, the undersigned unworthy pastor at Villereux, of the deanery of Luxembourg, in the district of Lorraine, testify that I obtained at Rome, from the liberality of Alexander VII, Supreme Pontiff of happy memory, the entire head of St. Justina, virgin and martyr, except some teeth from the upper jaw which are lacking, by a special favor, and that I have brought it hither: which holy relics, duly authentic, approved, and recognized by the most illustrious and most reverend lord suffragan of Trier, I have here set forth, and do set forth, in my aforesaid parish for the veneration of all, to the greater glory of God thrice best and greatest, who is wonderful in his Saints; whose feast is celebrated here with a great concourse of people on the XXVI day of September, on which day she is venerated by the universal Church with St. Cyprian, with plenary Indulgences. In faith whereof I have subscribed with my own hand on the X day of July MDCLXXI. Philippus Carolus Tilly, pastor, as above.

[50] in the village of Villereux in Lorraine. The said parish priest then adds, his name being again subscribed: Note that on the head there is a manifest bruise impressed on the skull, mingled with fat and blood, as appears (here with an unskilled enough hand he has tried to depict the wound), extending from below upwards, of the size of one giulio of Roman coin. Since in the Acts St. Justina is said to have been beheaded, even if all else were lacking, the scar impressed on the skull and adhering to this day would at once cast a doubt, since the holy martyr whose skull was brought thence to Rome seems from the scar to have undergone martyrdom struck by leaded scourges or cudgels. Nor is it so likely, on other grounds, that Pope Alexander VII took relics from the Lateran basilica to be carried off into Belgium, as that by a special favor he granted to the parish priest a skull found in the Roman cemeteries with that particular mark of martyrdom. The name of Justina could be given to nameless virgin martyrs, and it was a greater benefit conferred on the parish priest if the sacred treasures were found with the name, as sometimes happens. What the praised pastor says in his attestation, that the relics were duly authentic and approved, is not, I think, to be referred to this, that the Pontiff gave them to him as the head of St. Justina, the companion of St. Cyprian in martyrdom, but that they were the sacred bones of some St. Justina, virgin and martyr. Probably the parish priest, in asking a cult for them in his church, chose, as is everywhere the custom, that day on which a famous Justina occurred in the sacred Calendars.

[51] Concerning the head of St. Justina in which the people of Lucca in Italy glory, It is doubtful whether that which for many centuries judgment cannot so easily be passed; for they assert that they possess it from almost the same time at which the men of Piacenza contend that they obtained the body of St. Justina. There is at Lucca, famous already from the tenth century, a monastery of nuns of the Order of St. Benedict, which formerly bore the name of St. Salvator in Presciano, and at the beginning of the eleventh century began to be called of St. Justina, because about that time the head of St. Justina was brought thither, or a new church was raised to the Saint, as our Papebroch conjectures at the XXI day of May, in the preliminary Commentary to the Life of St. Silaus, num. 2. Cesare Franciotti treats at greater length of that convent in the History of the miraculous image and of the sacred treasures of the city of Lucca, page 549. Francesco Maria Fiorentini in chapter 12 of the Life of St. Silaus, which he published in Italian, also treats at greater length of that monastery, from which I select the following as pertaining here. From the many monuments adduced by him it becomes plain that already in the middle of the eleventh century the said monastery bore the title of St. Justina. Of the head of that Saint preserved there, undoubted mention is first made in a Brief of Indulgences which Peter, Cardinal of St. Cecilia, and Soffredus, Cardinal of St. Mary in Via Lata, Apostolic Legates in Etruria, and William, bishop of Lucca, grant on the XXVIII day of July in the year 1188.

[52] For there the feasts of SS. Justina and Agatha are ordered to be solemnly celebrated, and at last it is said: the people of Lucca have, Since therefore the monastery of St. Justina, situated within the walls of the city of Lucca, is held distinguished by the head of that same Virgin and Martyr, etc. The same Fiorentini, skilled in antiquity, observes that on the bottom of a silver casket, skillfully adorned with many sacred images and with the martyrdom of St. Justina, there is read, engraved in the characters used at that time, what follows:

✠ In the name of God, in the year of the Lord one thousand eighty-nine. ✠ This little coffer holds many relics shut up within, ✠ Among which is one forearm of Nicomedes the martyr, ✠ And also thy head, O virgin Justina, is shut up here.

From these the people of Lucca prove the ancient cult and famous veneration of St. Justina among them. In the third verse, if St. Cyprian were designated, and they had his forearm or arm-bone enclosed in the same casket, another advantage would accrue thence to the people of Lucca; for from the joined relics of St. Cyprian it would be almost beyond doubt inferred that already then the people of Lucca believed that they possessed the relics not of any Justina whatever, but of this our Virgin of Antioch and Martyr of Nicomedia; which is not yet sufficiently established.

[53] Franciotti indeed heaps up many things for asserting this at page 505 of his History; is our holy Martyr's. At Utrecht but I find words, and nothing of reasons. To the suspicion which I have just intimated would profit the people of Lucca, they themselves also set themselves in opposition, since not only do they reckon no relics of St. Cyprian in their sacred treasury, but they review among the sacred treasures of that same convent of St. Justina the arm with the hand of a certain Nicomedes, a martyr, of which name there were several. This indeed the praised Franciotti does at page 551. Let the people of Lucca therefore consider by what monuments they can establish Franciotti's assertions and prove the antiquity of the tradition; for although it is not incredible that in the eleventh century they received from Rome, on the occasion of the relics of St. Justina being translated to Piacenza, or afterwards from the men of Piacenza themselves, a part of them, which they thereafter held for the skull or head of that Virgin, yet unless they defend Franciotti's bare assertions by some reason, a certain doubt will always remain, arising from martyrs of the same name: lest, namely, these be relics to which opinion and tradition — perhaps not sufficiently ancient either — have accrued from the celebrity of the holy Martyr of Nicomedia. Our own Belgium too once believed itself enriched with no small relics of the holy martyrs Cyprian and Justina. For the church of Utrecht once gloried in them.

[54] there were also formerly relics William Heda, who at the beginning of the sixteenth century composed a History of the bishops of that see, in his account of Frederick of Baden, the 56th prelate of Utrecht, at page 320 brings forward an authentic attestation of that bishop, signed in the year 1515, where it is read thus: With great affection of pious devotion we have learned that the most reverend father in Christ, of revered memory, the lord Bernoldus, twentieth bishop of Utrecht, our predecessor (as is read in the Annals of the histories), to the praise and glory of almighty God and of his most exalted Mother the ever Virgin Mary and of all the Saints, and to the happy memory of his own remembrance, among his other laudable works of piety and virtue, founded at magnificent expense three churches in our city of Utrecht: one he marked with the title of the lord Peter, prince of the Apostles, another with that of blessed John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Lord; and the third, a conventual one, he raised to the everlasting memory of St. Paul the apostle, doctor of the Gentiles; each of them he adorned with various gifts, privileges, and liberties; and who in the said church of St. John devoutly laid the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina, where at the present day they are venerated with unspeakable honor. This instrument was drawn up by Frederick on the occasion of a leaden chest, with very many relics of Saints, having been found in the altar when the said church of St. John the Baptist was being repaired; which relics, duly recognized, he decrees to be set forth for public cult, and grants Indulgences to those who should contribute anything to their adornment, that God, who is glorious in his Saints, may be honored at the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina, and that the relics now, as is set forth above, found in the said altar … may be attended with due observances.

[55] held for the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina, Bernoldus, who is said to have brought the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina into the newly founded basilica, is elsewhere called Bernulphus, Benno, and Berno in certain monuments, and has a place among the Saints in our Work at the XIX day of July, where at page 654 you have his ancient cult proved by Cuper. Whence that holy prelate obtained relics of our holy Martyrs so distinguished I nowhere find, nor do I know the historical Annals which Frederick praises. St. Bernoldus died in the year 1054, and accordingly must have obtained them at almost the same time at which the men of Piacenza and of Lucca fix the translation of their relics. But both these and almost all the other deeds of St. Bernoldus are unknown from other sources. This is certain, that at the beginning of the sixteenth century the cult of SS. Cyprian and Justina was most celebrated at Utrecht, as is plain not only from Frederick's words mentioned above but also from other evidence. We have two Utrecht Breviaries published in print in the year 1508 at Gouda and at Leiden. In both, at the XXVI day of September, there are proper Lessons. The one printed at Gouda formerly belonged either to a canon or to some other presbyter specially attached to the church of St. John the Baptist; for at the front of the Breviary there is a little manuscript composition in the characters of that century, on the ten honors of St. John the Baptist, running through several leaves, after which follow various antiphons for the season, Chapters, and Collects In the commemoration of St. John the Baptist; and similar manuscript pieces on the same Saint have likewise been added in the body of the book to the common Suffrages.

[56] Further, in this codex at the XXVI day of September and the said Lessons about our Saints, by the same hand

Double is noted. which, whither they came, is unknown, Feast, as at the end of the book. And here, in the same hand, certain proper pieces are written about the patrons of that church, or the Saints whose sacred remains were venerated there — namely St. Servatius, St. Anne, St. John the Baptist, St. Gereon — and finally, in the last place, a double feast of SS. Cyprian and Justina, martyrs, is prescribed. The Office is assigned from the Common, except for six Lessons which were composed from the first part of the Acts, or the Conversion of St. Justina. Neither there nor in any other place, so far as I know, is mention made of the translation of the relics, about which I have nothing further from elsewhere to add. For the rest, the church of St. John at Utrecht had the same lot as almost all the sacred buildings in Holland. Anthony Matthæus, in the Foundations of the churches of his country at Utrecht, book 1, foundation 3, num. 4, page 123, writes that a public library, rich with the heaped-up books of the Carthusians and others, occupies the whole choir today; the remaining part has been assigned to the assemblies of the Calvinists. The same Matthæus observes that that church was most rich in sacred treasures, but that these, amid the Dutch troubles, like almost all sacred things, were scattered and lost. I have it from elsewhere that a great part of the Utrecht relics, rescued from the destruction by the zeal and care of certain Catholics, was carried to Cologne. Whether the sacred treasures of SS. Cyprian and Justina met that lot, I have not ascertained. Gelenius at page 297 numbers the head of St. Justina the virgin among the sacred treasures of the collegiate church of the Holy Apostles at Cologne; but one of the companions of St. Ursula also bore the name of Justina. In Raissius and others there are also reviewed relics which bear the names of our Saints; but since there is no lack of Saints of the same name to whom they may belong, I omit to review them. And I print the History of the Translation — although it is not a little suspect to me, both for the reasons given above and for those to be given in the Annotations — from an older transcript, with which I shall compare Poggiali's reading here and there.

Perhaps Cyprianum vicit & artem*.

THE TRANSLATION

of blessed Justina, Virgin and Martyr, from Rome to Piacenza, whose body, together with the Martyr Cyprian, the venerable Pope John — who was formerly the prelate of this city — handed over to bishop Sigifredus.

From the manuscript codex of the church of Piacenza.

Cyprian, bishop and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Justina, virgin and M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

Theoctistus or Theognitus, M., near Nicomedia in Bithynia. (S.)

BHL Number: 2054

From manuscripts.

Lesson I. While our Lord Jesus Christ was reigning and governing the fabric of the whole world — he who is consubstantial and [b] coeternal with the almighty Father and with the Holy Breath, The relics of St. Justina who encloses all things in his fist, and to whose law all things are subject; to whom also the blind depth of the abyss lies open, and in whose great power the heavenly things rejoice together, the earthly bow down, the seas applaud, and even the nether regions obey; whose care it is also to transfer man, made to his own image and likeness and redeemed by his precious blood, through humility to that glory from which our first parent, at the suggestion of the enemy of truth, fell weeping and unhappy through disobedience; in whom, and under whom, and through whom are all things, who by surrounding fills the world and by filling surrounds it — there was found the sacred body of blessed Justina, the virgin of Antioch, together with the reverend bishop and martyr Cyprian: a precious treasure, namely, long thrust away in the hiding place of the earth, known to few by reason of its exceeding antiquity, [c] elegantly buried in the basilica of St. Rufina, once a noble Roman matron; who also, while she still breathed, on account of the merit of her service, commended to the earth the bodies of the Saints from a foreign land, with the rest of Christ's soldiers, applauding with mighty exultation and spending the due observances with more diligent care; not being ignorant that precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints.

[2] an illustrious martyr, Lesson II. O blessed death of the Saints, free from every offense, who by dying conquer the author of death, that they may not attain the second death; for they rejoice always to be ready to suffer reproaches for the name of Jesus, that they may be able, taken to Christ, to be crowned with laurel-bearing blood. ^d Truly a strong hand is that of the Ordainer, which so frees his own in the burning furnace of persecution that the gifts of divine recompense are not emptied out. And so the rich rave, the senseless are troubled; yet the Saints are not broken as they feel horrible torments; they see the crowns prepared for them by God, they set at nought the threats brought by their torturers, their cut limbs hang down and they cry out: What god is great, as our Lord God, mild and lofty! Inflamed with this desire, the blessed virgin Justina, already refined by the Holy Spirit, did not tremble to enter upon a manly contest, that she might be able to receive a clear share of the blessed recompense; and spurning the soft and deceitful words of the venomous plotter, she followed the counsels — sweeter than honey and the honeycomb — of our saving Redeemer; for she preferred to be called the Bride of Christ and the temple of the Holy Spirit rather than the fuel and disciple of the devil; she chose rather to have her throat cut beforehand by the inescapable sword of a savage executioner than to linger in the company of a deceitful wolf; she gave over her fair body to sharper torments, that for so glorious a trophy everlasting glory might be increased for her.

[3] in the reign of Otto III, Lesson III. And at that same time the third illustrious Otto, sprung of famous birth and flourishing in the first bloom of youth, was governing with a strong hand and an even rein the honor of this now forsaken Italy; [e] alas, unaware what the last day would bring forth, and how swift and pitiless a death would snatch away the fruit of an untimely tree in its season — a death which, to small and great, to slaves and freemen, to the rich and also to the needy, born under an equal condition, knows not how to smile, but drags all to their own fall by harsh imitation, that whence they were created, thither they may return, to remain until the dread day of the last judgment. Yet we hold a sure hope that he obtains a share of the blessed recompense, since he devotedly cared for the holy vineyard of Christ and its cultivators, toiling with a father's affection and so keeping watch. ^f For on his feast days a heavenly gift was conferred upon us, namely the holy body of the undefiled virgin Justina, found by wondrous means, embalmed with fragrant spices; whose head only a little cloak veiled, the other garments being now consumed by age; but her ^g sacred bones were seen white as wool whitened by a fuller; and the nostrils of all who stood about were filled with an insatiable and most sweet odor, beyond what could be believed. And while all wept for exceeding joy and anxiously sought the help of Christ, the precious gift was stealthily taken from the tomb and was received by a certain comely and venerable bishop John, who then ruled the ^h Apostolic chair of the blessed key-bearer Peter; who, weeping and trembling, took it into his arms, and becomingly laid the precious fruit, dear to God, in a new box, as the discourse of the present pen goes on to relate to you who wish to hear.

[4] Lesson IV. For it is worth the labor to make known to you, most beloved faithful, from John the antipope, in what manner God, the origin of all goodness, abundantly poured out upon us his immense loving-kindness, granting to us, undeserving, so delightful a gift, whereby God is honored and continual health is bestowed on ailing souls. And so, by the inspiration of the supreme grace of the Holy Spirit, at that time we came to Rome and approached that same lord Pope, now robbed of the sight of his eyes and stripped of the faculty of ill-flattering riches, which choke men who place their hope in them, and swallow the foolish alive, and plunge them without mercy into the depths of the pit. And he, questioning us about our journey more shrewdly than usual, and adding that it was strange why we should have turned aside to so mutilated and deformed a man — we, turning over variously in our hearts how many and what sort of things would befit so prudent a man, at length broke silence; we ⁱ disclosed the matter which we sought, earnestly begging that he would not take it ill if, moved by our prayers, he should bestow upon us what he cherished. But he, hearing this and drawing deep sighs from his inmost being, fell silent; nay rather, filling his cheeks with many tears and beating his breast with cruel fists, his hair torn and plucked out on every side, wailing, he scarcely broke into speech. Alas for me! Alas for me! why do you lay grief upon grief? Why is my sad and torn breast now ^k torn with so great a sorrow? That which I always desired to do is granted to another to perform. I choose that my body should undergo the pain of bitter death, once I have learned that the people of Piacenza has so great an honor without me. Behold, the inestimable pearl which you seek is now at hand; drain it with your eyes, all ambiguity cut away, touch it with your own hands, bend your knees, lift up a pure heart to the Lord, redouble your thanks without ceasing, for in your times you have deserved to handle so holy a body. This the supreme Trinity grants you, that, joined to charity and chastity and the other virtues, you may so ^l serve her on earth that together with her you may be able to be joined to the fellowships of virgins in heaven.

[5] Lesson V. Hearing this, and moved as by the words of a pitiable man, now miserably mutilated by the Romans, they are obtained and translated. we burst into tears, and, following with words of consolation, we accomplished nothing; but with bent knees he prayed long and silently. At last, raising himself, he delivered over to us what we desired, demanding that they be handled so becomingly that we should not fall into the wrath of the Savior for the receiving of the merits of so many good things. And we, having implored the almighty Father of Olympus, lifting our eyes to the high mountain and turning our hands toward the South, refreshed with unspeakable joy, took up the long-desired gifts, which we committed to chests under the impress of a seal. Then with swift course and on the appointed days, with a favoring breeze, we came to the manor which is called Varsia. And it is to be thought that not without reason is that place called Varsia, as it were ^m Varia, because men thought variously about this. Some said, It is she herself; but very many said, No, but it will be proved to be a Roman falsehood. And there, laying down our light yet precious burden, we appointed faithful ministers who should serve it with unwearied observances under the soldiery of Christ, and should urge the Lord with continued prayers, that he would refresh our mind, still wavering, and, the shadows being removed, would make clear the rumor of the people fanned about through every wandering quarter, lest what they noised abroad in ignorance should turn into a heap of the swiftest condemnation.

[6] [At these relics a deaf woman and another suffering from an issue of blood are healed:] While many useless things were being turned over in our hearts, the immense loving-kindness of Christ shone forth, mindful of the labors and hardships which the most famous Virgin, secure, did not tremble to suffer for the name of Jesus. For, while all who were then present looked on, he restored hearing to a certain woman, and so gave her back to her former health as though she had never suffered any ill. And from the opposite quarter another woman came who suffered from an issue of blood; drawing near to the chests and pouring out prayers with sighs, she departed joyful at her recovered health, who had come vexed with a long-standing infirmity. Then first, the various ⁿ revilings there being removed, as a mist scattered on every side by a violent wind, into one concordant

judgment we came, declaring: Blessed be the Lord, who has visited us, impure as we are, and has strengthened us with so great a gift of loving-kindness received.

[7] a paralytic is raised up: Lesson VI. These things therefore being discovered, refreshed with a more excellent joy, we turned elsewhere. What more? We lodged near the city. The body, which, laid in a bier, was now being carried by men, is laid up beside a certain altar. Vigils having been begun in praise of the Virgin, there was brought by two bearers a certain paralytic, deprived of the use of almost all his limbs; he was wrapped in what linen he could have; and they, setting him down, stood at a distance. Then indeed the eyes of all were fixed upon him. He, now made secure of Christ's protection, rose little by little, wavering, and standing upright cried out: Rejoice with me, and pour forth with me praises to the most high Thunderer, for I have obtained the health which I did not hope for, and I who made use of others' feet shall go back to my own home on my own. And so all, passing the night in continual prayer and lifting up their hearts with pure hands, gave voice to the Most High, saying: Blessed be the name of the Lord, and blessed art thou, true Handmaid of Christ, who comest to save us in the name of the Lord. And as the morning light grew red, there was a great concourse of both sexes, so that the place in which the sacred body was set could scarcely be reached; and the exulting people, going before and following after, cried to the Lord with the sound of a tuneful voice, so that the earth seemed to bellow and heaven to thunder — the more joyful, the more certain they were of the Lord's benefits freely given.

[8] a woman possessed is freed from the evil demon. While we were murmuring on all sides amid these things, there came a certain countrywoman grievously vexed by a demon, with eyes drawn tight and mouth open, crying out horribly: O blessed Justina, why do you break into our dwelling? Why do you drive us out from our borders? Was it not enough for you that, our forces being broken, you turned Antioch to Christ by your victory, and cast us out from our own country as exiles and captives? Was it not enough that you overcame us all by your patience, and stole Cyprian from our magic art? Do you now again take up your strength, to tear from our jaws these lofty and lowly ones? Groaning such words, the demon dashed her down, and, compelled, withdrew from her, leaving the trace of a most foul stench, granting us a sure hope of praising the Lord and honoring his Martyr.

[9] Lesson VII. And seeing such stupendous miracles The sacred remains, first laid down in the suburb, as were diligently wrought through the Handmaid of Christ, they fell prone upon their faces and drenched the whole ground with tears, having no trembling, so that they might seek not a milder but a richer help of the Lord through the prayers of the most sacred Virgin; and pressing on the more tenaciously with unhindered steps, they came near the city. Then those who were present declared that they had never seen so immense a multitude of men and women, of boys and girls, of known and unknown; who all, with hands lifted up to the Fashioner of peoples and with cheeks thick with tears, their eyes wet as though they were set in an ecstasy, applauding with one mouth and with equal desire, said: Come, Bride of the Lord, adorned with inestimable pearls; come, unspotted Lamb of Christ, save this people, long entangled in the snares of the pestilent dragon and the insatiable wolf, and now committed to you. At length, scorched with excessive heat and weakened with immense sweat, they turned aside into the suburb, where the bodies of the blessed [p] Antoninus and Victor are buried, refreshing a little their weary bodies.

[10] O fellowship of the blessed Just, in which God dwells, are brought into the city to the church of St. John, as he himself testifies: Where two or three shall be gathered in my name, there am I also in the midst of them. Who could ever grasp with human mind how great is the praise, how unspeakable the jubilation, where the true light puts all darkness to flight, where the unfailing sun drives away all obscurities, where rest is given after labor, gladness after grief, relief after weariness, and a joy that shall abide without failing, where the Lord is in them and they abide in the Lord forever. Among men overwhelmed with the mass of their sins, defiled with the dregs of their offenses, driven by the goads of windy pride, so great a gladness grew up as no one imbued with skill in letters could tell. And as the sun sank toward evening, lifting the precious gift, they entered the walls, with many lamps and crosses going before, and came as far as the church of blessed John the [q] Evangelist; and there, laying down the holy body and prolonging the sacred vigils until midnight, weary indeed but not satisfied, they went away and were silent until morning.

[11] Lesson VIII. And when the morning star rose, which is at hand for those who purely seek him, where a paralytic is made whole; and the mists of superstitious thoughts were removed, they rose from their beds and came again in haste to visit the holy places, that they might once more be filled with the delights of the Redeemer's workmanship, and that the guile of the venomous and crooked dragon might be extinguished, and the living praise of the most unconquered Shepherd renewed. When they had begun to implore the Lord in emulation, there came a certain needy man struck perhaps with palsy, all the strength of his body estranged. With such effort as he could he strove to touch the Virgin's body, helped by two little stools, supported by no one's aid; whose heels were so joined to his hinder parts that, bent double and rolled together, he had not risen more than one cubit's length from the ground. Then, drawn by divine power, he rose up so straightened as though he had complained of suffering nothing; for his limbs, long bent, returned to their proper state wholly healed; no trace of injury appearing there where the healing hand of the Savior had wrought salvation. Leaving his supports there, he went away unharmed, who had come sorrowful with long-contracted sinews; now secure of the health he had received, he laughed at the palsy of his limbs, and returned to his own home without wavering of his feet, and offered to God from his poor purse what he could, without confusion of mind, rejoicing to fulfill what is written; for he fulfilled all who did what he could.

[12] a blind man is given sight; When he had gone away, it happened that a certain blind man came creeping forward on his hands, earnestly asking that by the intercessions of the blessed martyr Justina a twofold grace be granted him: that he might receive the sight of his eyes for beholding the ill-deceiving works of this world, and the clear light of his darkened mind, that he might be able to serve unceasingly the Lord his Creator. And because he asked faithfully, he deserved to find it; and while he devoutly sought such things, the helping mercy of Christ was at hand, which does not suffer those devoted to him to knock in vain, but is quick to open the bosom of its great loving-kindness to those who seek what is right; and presently it granted him clear light. Yet since he obtained the gift which he sought to obtain carnally, we do not doubt that he obtained the spiritual one, since we saw him so amended by the bond of charity that we did not hear anything unbecoming or base uttered by him thereafter; but, worn out with fastings and afflicted with prayers, he awaited the end of the recompense he desired. Happy is he who among so manifold a crowd of so slippery an age deserved to obtain the grace of health. And on that same day, in the joy of [r] five miracles, the people gave their devout praises to the most high Lord.

[13] Women invoking the Saint's patronage, a boat coming of its own accord, Lesson IX. Who ever, imbued with lofty knowledge, having so pure a breast and turning so eloquent a tongue, could tell such and so great miracles as were accomplished at that time by the Lord's help through the virgin Justina, which are known to none save to him from whom nothing remains hidden? Many indeed have fallen from memory through negligence, and very many through [s] sloth, which has a certain punishment. For through five years there was scarcely a day that passed empty of miracles. We shall tell a great matter which we heard, though not seen, yet which we have certainly known to have happened. The fame of such great powers being everywhere heard, the mind of each was eager to come to so great a glory of divine power; and those who not merely carried the report desired to see the grace for themselves. And so certain women, hastening from distant borders and wearied by a long journey, came as far as the river which is called [t] Taro; and while they sat long lamenting on its bank, all hope of crossing being taken away by the greatness of the water, turning their hearts in different directions and not knowing what to do, yet by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit they pursued what seemed better. For, their knees fixed on the ground, praying, they sought the help of Christ, that by the intercessions of blessed Justina the means of crossing which they had greatly desired might be given.

[14] cross the river; another, lest As soon as they had made an end of their prayer — wonderful to tell! — while they looked on, a boat which was seen on the other side, its rope loosed from the stake to which it was tied and clung, without a boatman making its own way, swam across to them. They, terrified at this and astounded in mind, received the gift granted by God, and confidently vied with one another in entering, and, the same steersman guiding the boat, crossed over. And so, magnifying Christ their God, they came out unharmed, and taking the path they came rejoicing to the holy place, and told all men all the things that had befallen them on the way, comforting us and calling us blessed, who were enriched by the merits of so great a Virgin. Who out of his senses would doubt that we were made glad by such great miracles, whom so great and innumerable powers had diligently made festive? By yet another miracle wrought we were refreshed, saying that certain men coming by boat along the Po, and now seeing the city at a distance, one of them, no one knowing it, fell into the water. And they, hearing the sound but seeing nothing, began to cry out to one another, asking what it might be. And when the fact was discovered, with a loud and tearful voice they said: St. Justina, if you have deserved anything with the Lord, help our unbelief.

[15] And as they trembled and anxiously asked what they should do, he be drowned in the waters, is prodigiously preserved. suddenly he was seen swimming upon the water with a cheerful face, unaware that his companions were making an outcry. For, the right hand of the Lord upholding him, he was delivered; and he began to inquire why they had faces so pale and eyes wet with tears. And they related the matter as it had happened, in order. He declared that he had felt nothing else save the hand of a certain Woman bearing him upon the water and speaking this consolation: Fear not, for I am with you — whom we believe for certain to be St. Justina. These indeed and many other signs, which no mortal can count, were wrought by the Lord's working through the virgin Justina in the place of her repose, and wherever the memory of her name is celebrated, in the year from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ one thousand and one, on the sixteenth of the Kalends of September, in the fourteenth Indiction; and more are wrought today, to the praise and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns God through the infinite ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

Lessons; as, that the sacred bones of St. Cyprian were handed over to the men of Piacenza together with the body of St. Justina, about which matter there is afterwards deep silence. See what I have observed on these points in the Posthumous Glory, num. 41 and following. Further, what Poggiali supplies about the said Sigifredus pertains here, as follows. When John, bishop of Piacenza, he says, had been thrust into the Pontificate at the end of the month of May in the year DCCCCXCVII, Pope Gregory V set over Piacenza a certain Sigifredus, about whom nothing is certain except that he was a Benedictine monk, as is drawn from some of his charters. Ughelli and Campi exhibit Sigifredus as already sitting at Piacenza from the year 997, from a certain diploma of Otto. I believe, therefore, that Sigifredus was given as coadjutor to John, who was for the most part occupied at court and on legations. Further, Sigifredus is again not mentioned below among the legates of Piacenza. These things, therefore, and the other new matters here, a writer not contemporary, who prefixed them to the Lessons, probably added from conjecture. To his error or flattery too I attribute the titles so liberally lavished upon John, a manifest antipope.

p. The men of Piacenza have St. Antoninus as their patron and venerate him with a particular cult on the 4th day of July, on which he has been discussed in our Work. They keep the feast of St. Victor, their first bishop, on the 7th day of December. To both was that suburban church dedicated, and enriched with the sacred remains of both. Already from the beginning of the ninth century there had been added to the two titles, as I observed in the Posthumous Glory, num. 20, the name of St. Justina, which it seems to have lost together with the episcopal chair after the middle of the ninth century, when a new cathedral was founded within the walls of the city and dedicated to St. Justina alone.

q. Poggiali notes in his oft-praised Observations what pertains here, as follows. When these sacred pledges were first brought to Piacenza, they were not at once placed in the cathedral, but were for a short time deposited in a neighboring church called St. John de domo. When the two aforesaid (the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Justina) had been translated thence into the cathedral, the body of St. Theognitus, whether by gift or by some other title I know not, remained there and was preserved for some centuries, as the charter of the year MCCXV cited above (see it, reader, in the Posthumous Glory, num. 47) informs us; until perhaps about the year MDXLIV, in which by Apostolic authority the church of St. John was leveled with the ground in order more becomingly to enlarge the square before the cathedral itself, it was translated into the church of the Benedictine monks of St. Sixtus in this same city, in which now also it rests laid with sufficient honor. Concerning the bodies of SS. Cyprian and Theognitus, whom the men of Piacenza hold for St. Theoctistus, I have examined the assertions of Poggiali and other writers in the Posthumous Glory, §4.

r. This is the sixth prodigy in order enumerated by the anonymous author. But not all were wrought in the same place or on the same day; his discourse therefore is of others, which either he did not know distinctly or wished — the reason I do not know — to keep silent from us.

s. That no one wrote down miracles which were known to God alone I do not wonder. Further, the reader can here observe how cautiously the anonymous author wraps himself and his age in mists. Not without a bitter feeling of mind he complains that through negligence and sloth the memory of many miracles has fallen away; he asserts that for five years almost every day was marked by new prodigies; but of all these he reports none to us. These things would at once give rise to the opinion that he wrote no small time after the translation was made; but presently he alleges as something new that he is about to relate not what he had seen but what he had heard. Was he then present at the other miracles and at the translation? So indeed he everywhere exhibits himself; but see what in the Posthumous Glory

num. 33 and following we have gathered together more on this matter.

t. The Tarus, called by those who dwell along it il Taro, and by the French le Tar, rises from the Apennine range in the district of Piacenza and on the border of the Genoese dominion. It gives its name to the principality of the Val di Taro, through which, as also through the duchy of Parma, it flows; between Parma and Julia Fidentia it cuts across the Æmilian Way, and at last flows into the Po thirteen miles below Cremona. Baudrand, from whose Lexicon I take these particulars, adds that it is a destructive river when it swells with rains or with the melting of the snows.