The conversion of Cyprian had a great effect on the pagan gentleman who paid his
addresses to Justina, and he in a short time embraced Christianity.
During the persecutions of Diocletian, Cyprian and Justina were seized upon as
Christians, the former was torn with pincers and the latter chastised,
and after suffering other torments, both were beheaded.
Eulalia, a Spanish lady of a Christian family, was remarkable in her youth for
sweetness of temper and solidity of understanding seldom found in the
capriciousness of juvenile years.
Being apprehended as a Christian, the magistrate attempted by the mildest
means to bring her over to paganism, but she ridiculed the pagan deities with
such asperity that the judge, incensed at her behaviour, ordered her to be tortured.
Her sides were accordingly torn by hooks and her breasts burnt in the most shocking
manner until she expired by the violence of the flames, December AD 303.
In the year 304, when the persecution reached Spain, Dacian, the governor of
Tarragona, ordered Valerius the bishop and Vincent the deacon to be seethed,
loaded with irons and imprisoned.
The prisoners being firm in their resolution, Valerius was banished and
Vincent was racked, his limbs dislocated, his flesh torn with hooks, and he was laid
on a gridiron which had not only a fire placed under it, but spikes at the top
which ran into his flesh.
These torments neither destroying him nor changing his resolutions, he was remanded
to prison and confined in a small loathsome dark dungeon, strewed with sharp
flints and pieces of broken glass, where he died, January 22 304.
His body was thrown into the river.
The persecution of Diocletian began particularly to rage in AD 304,
when many Christians were put to cruel tortures and the most painful and
ignominious deaths, the most eminent and particular of whom we shall enumerate.
Saturninus, a priest of Albertina, a town of Africa, after being tortured,
was remanded to prison and there starved to death.
His four children, after being variously tormented, shared the same fate with their
father.
Dativus, a noble Roman senator, Thelico, a pious Christian, Victoria,
a young lady of considerable family and fortune, with some others of less
consideration, all auditors of Saturninus, were tortured in a similar manner and
perished by the same means.
Agrippe, Keonia and Irene, three sisters, were seized upon at Thessalonica when
Diocletian's persecutions reached Greece.
They were burnt and received the crown of martyrdom in the flames, March 25,
AD 304.
The governor, finding that he could make no impression on Irene, ordered her to be
exposed naked in the streets, which, shameful order having been executed,
a fire was kindled near the city wall amidst whose flames her spirit ascended
beyond the reach of man's cruelty.
Agatho, a man of a pious turn of mind, with Cassisi, Philippa and Eutychia,
were martyred about the same time, but the particulars have not been
transmitted to us.
Marcellinus, bishop of Rome who succeeded Caius in that sea, having strongly opposed
paying divine honours to Diocletian, suffered martyrdom by a variety of
tortures in the year 324, comforting his soul until he expired with the prospect of
these glorious rewards it would receive by the tortures suffered in the body.
Victorius, Carpophorus, Severus and Severianus were brothers, and all four
employed in places of great trust and honour in the city of Rome.
Having exclaimed against the worship of idols, they were apprehended and scourged
with the plumbetti or scourges, to the ends of which were fastened leaden
balls.
This punishment was exercised with such excess of cruelty that the pious brothers
fell martyrs to its severity.
Timothy, a deacon of Mauretania, and Maura, his wife, had not been united
together by the bands of wedlock above three weeks, when they were separated from
each other by the persecution.
Timothy, being apprehended as a Christian, was carried before Ariannas, the governor
of Thebaeus, who, knowing that he had the keeping of the holy scriptures,
commanded him to deliver them up to be burnt, to which he answered, Had I
children, I would sooner deliver them up to be sacrificed than part with the word
of God.
The governor, being much incensed at this reply, ordered his eyes to be put out with
red-hot irons, saying, The books shall at least be useless to you, for you shall not
see to read them.
His patience under the operation was so great that the governor grew more
exasperated.
He therefore, in order, if possible, to overcome his fortitude, ordered him to
be hung up by the feet with a weight tied about his neck and a gag in his mouth.
In this state, Maura, his wife, tenderly urged him for her sake to recant,
but when the gag was taken out of his mouth, instead of consenting to his wife's
entreaties, he greatly blamed her mistaken love and declared his resolution of dying
for the faith.
The consequence was that Maura resolved to imitate his courage and fidelity,
either to accompany or follow him to glory.
The governor, after trying in vain to alter her resolution, ordered her to be
tortured, which was executed with great severity.
After this, Timothy and Maura were crucified near each other, A.D.
304.
Sabinus, bishop of Assisium, refusing to sacrifice to Jupiter and pushing the idol
from him, had his hand cut off by the order of the governor of Tuscany.
While in prison he converted the governor and his family, all of whom suffered
martyrdom for the faith.
Soon after their execution, Sabinus himself was scourged to death,
December, A.D.
304.
Tired with the farce of state and public business, the emperor Diocletian resigned
the imperial diadem and was succeeded by Constantius and Galerius, the former
prince of the most mild and humane disposition, and the latter equally
remarkable for his cruelty and tyranny.
These divided the empire into two equal governments, Galerius ruling in the east
and Constantius in the west, and the people in the two governments felt the
effects of the dispositions of the two emperors, for those in the west were
governed in the mildest manner, but such as resided in the east felt all
the miseries of oppression and lengthened tortures.
Among the many martyred by the order of Galerius, we shall enumerate the most
eminent.
Amphionus was a gentleman of eminence in Lucia, and a scholar of Eusebius.
Julita, a Lycaonian of royal descent, but more celebrated for her virtues than
noble blood.
While on the rack, her child was killed before her face.
Julita of Cappadocia was a lady of distinguished capacity, great virtue,
and uncommon courage.
To complete the execution, Julita had boiling pitch poured on her feet,
her sides torn with hooks, and received the conclusion of her martyrdom by being
beheaded, April 16, A.D.
305.
Hermuleus, a venerable and pious Christian of a great age, and an intimate
acquaintance of Pantelians, suffered martyrdom for the faith on the same day,
and in the same manner as Pantelian.
Eustratius, secretary to the governor of Armena, was thrown into a fiery furnace
for exhorting some Christians who had been apprehended to persevere in their faith.
Nicander and Martian, two eminent Roman military officers, were apprehended on
account of their faith.
As they were both men of great abilities in their profession, the utmost means were
used to induce them to renounce Christianity, but these endeavours being
found ineffectual, they were beheaded.
In the kingdom of Naples, several martyrdoms took place.
In particular, Januarius, bishop of Beneventum, Socius, deacon of Mycenae,
Proculus, another deacon, Eutychius and Acuteus, two laymen, Festus, a deacon,
and Desiderius, a reader, all on account of being Christians, were condemned by the
governor of Campania to be devoured by the wild beasts.
The savage animals, however, would not touch them, and so they were beheaded.
Quirinus, bishop of Sicia, being carried before Metineus, the governor,
was ordered to sacrifice to the pagan deities, agreeably to the edicts of
various Roman emperors.
The governor, perceiving his constancy, sent him to jail and ordered him to be
heavily ironed, flattering himself that the hardships of a jail, some occasional
tortures and the weight of chains, might overcome his resolution.
Being decided in his principles, he was sent to Amantius, the principal
governor of Pannonia, now Hungary, who loaded him with chains and carried him
through the principal towns of the Danube, exposing him to ridicule wherever he went.
Arriving at length at Sabaria, and finding that Quirinus would not
renounce his faith, he ordered him to be cast into a river with a stone fastened
about his neck.
This sentence being put into execution, Quirinus floated about for some time,
and exhorting the people in the most pious terms, concluded his admonitions with this
prayer.
It is no new thing, O all-powerful Jesus, for thee to stop the course of rivers,
or to cause a man to walk upon the water, as thou didst thy servant Peter.
The people have already seen the proof of thy power in me.
Grant me now to lay down my life for thy sake, O my God.
On pronouncing the last words, he immediately sank and died June 4,
A.D.
308.
His body was afterwards taken up and buried by some pious Christians.
Pamphilus, a native of Phoenicia, of a considerable family, was a man of
such extensive learning that he was called a second origin.
He was received into the body of the clergy at Caesarea, where he established a
public library and spent his time in the practice of every Christian virtue.
He copied the greatest part of the works of origin with his own hand, and,
assisted by Eusebius, gave a correct copy of the Old Testament, which had suffered
greatly by the ignorance or negligence of former transcribers.
In the year 307 he was apprehended and suffered torture and martyrdom.
Marcellus, Bishop of Rome, being banished on account of his faith, fell a martyr to
the miseries he suffered in exile, Jan.
16, A.D.
310.
Peter, the sixteenth Bishop of Alexandria, was martyred Nov.
25, A.D.
311, by order of Maximus Caesar, who reigned in the East.
Agnes, a virgin of only thirteen years of age, was beheaded for being a Christian,
as was Cyrene, the Empress of Diocletian.
Valentine, a priest, suffered the same fate at Rome, and Erasmus, a bishop,
was martyred in Campania.
Soon after this, the persecution abated in the middle parts of the Empire,
as well as in the West, and Providence at length began to manifest vengeance on the
persecutors.
Maximian endeavoured to corrupt his daughter Fausta to murder Constantine,
her husband, which she discovered, and Constantine forced him to choose his
own death, when he preferred the ignominious death of hanging, after being
an emperor near twenty years.
Constantine was the good and virtuous child of a good and virtuous father,
born in Britain.
His mother was named Helena, daughter of King Coilus.
He was a most bountiful and gracious prince, having a desire to nourish
learning and the good arts, and did oftentimes used to read, write,
and study himself.
He had marvellous good success, and prosperous achieving of all things he
took in hand, which then was, and truly is supposed to precede of this, for that he
was so great a favourer of the Christian faith, which faith, when he had once
embraced, he did ever after most devoutly and religiously reverence.
Thus Constantine, sufficiently appointed with strength of men, but especially with
strength of God, ended his journey coming towards Italy, which was about the last
year of the persecution, A.D.
313.
Maxentius, understanding of the coming of Constantine, and trusting more to his
devilish art of magic than to the goodwill of his subjects, which he little deserved,
does not show himself out of the city, nor encounter him in the open field,
but with privy garrisons laid wait for him by the way in sundry straits, as he should
come, with whom Constantine had diverse skirmishes, and by the power of the Lord
did ever vanquish them, and put them to flight.
Notwithstanding, Constantine yet was in no great comfort, but in great care and dread
in his mind, approaching now near unto Rome, for the magical charms and sorceries
of Maxentius, wherewith he had vanquished before Severus sent by Galerius against
him.
Wherefore, being in great doubt and perplexity in himself, and revolving many
things in his mind, what help he might have against the operations of his
charming, Constantine, in his journey drawing toward the city, and casting up
his eyes many times to heaven, in the south part, about the going down of
the sun, saw a great brightness in heaven, appearing in the similitude of a cross,
giving this inscription, IN HOC VINCE, that is, in this overcome.
Eusebius Pamphilus doth witness that he had heard the said Constantine himself
oftentimes report, and also to swear this to be true and certain, which he did see
with his own eyes in heaven, and also his soldiers about him.
At the sight whereof, when he was greatly astonished, and consulting with his men
upon the meaning thereof, beheld in the night season, in his sleep, Christ
appeared to him with the sign of the same cross which he had seen before,
bidding him to make the figuration thereof, and to carry it in his wars
before him, and so should he have the victory.
Constantine so established the peace of the Church, that for the space of a
thousand years we read of no set persecution against the Christians,
unto the time of John Wycliffe.
So happy, so glorious was this victory of Constantine, surnamed the Great,
for the joy and gladness whereof the citizens who had sent for him before,
with exceeding triumph, brought him into the city of Rome, where he was most
honourably received, and celebrated the space of seven days together, having
moreover in the market-place his image set up, holding in his right hand the sign of
the cross with this inscription.
With this wholesome sign, the true token of fortitude, I have rescued and delivered
our city from the yoke of the tyrant.
We shall conclude our account of the tenth and last general persecution, with the
death of St. George, the titular saint and patron of England.
St. George was born in Cappadocia, of Christian parents, and given proofs of
his courage, was promoted in the army of the Emperor Diocletian.
During the persecution, St. George threw up his command, went boldly to the Senate
House, and avowed his being a Christian, taking occasion at the same time to
remonstrate against paganism, and point out the absurdity of worshipping idols.
This freedom so greatly provoked the Senate, that St. George was ordered to be
tortured, and by the Emperor's orders was dragged through the streets and beheaded
the next day.
The legend of the dragon which is associated with this martyr, is usually
illustrated by representing St. George seated upon a charging horse, and
transfixing the monster with his spear.
This fiery dragon symbolises the devil, who was vanquished by St. George's
steadfast faith in Christ, which remained unshaken, in spite of torture and death.
Chapter 3.
Persecutions of the Christians in Persia The Gospel having spread itself into
Persia, the pagan priests who worshipped the sun were greatly alarmed and dreaded
the loss of that influence they had hitherto maintained over the people's
minds and properties.
Hence they thought it expedient to complain to the Emperor that the
Christians were enemies to the State, and held a treasonable correspondence with
the Romans, the great enemies of Persia.
The Emperor Sapuris, being naturally averse to Christianity, easily believed
what was said against the Christians, and gave orders to persecute them in all
parts of his empire.
On account of this mandate, many eminent persons in the Church and State fell
martyrs to the ignorance and ferocity of the pagans.
Constantine the Great, being informed of the persecutions in Persia, wrote a long
letter to the Persian monarch, in which he recounts the vengeance that
had fallen on persecutors, and the great success that had attended those who had
refrained from persecuting the Christians.
Speaking of his victories over rival emperors of his own time, he said,
I subdued these solely by faith in Christ, for which God was my helper, who gave me
victory in battle, and made me triumph over my enemies.
He hath likewise so enlarged to me the bounds of the Roman Empire, that it
extends from the western ocean almost to the uttermost parts of the east.
For this domain I neither offered sacrifices to the ancient deities,
nor made use of charm or divination, but only offered up prayers to the
Almighty God and followed the cross of Christ.
Rejoiced should I be if the throne of Persia found glory also, by embracing the
Christians, so that you with me and they with you may enjoy all happiness.
In consequence of this appeal, the persecution ended for the time,
but it was renewed in later years when another king succeeded to the throne of
Persia.
Persecutions under the Aryan heretics.
The author of the Aryan heresy was Arius, a native of Libya and a priest of
Alexandria, who in A.D.
318 began to publish his errors.
He was condemned by a council of Libyan and Egyptian bishops, and that sentence
was confirmed by the council of Nice, A.D.
325.
After the death of Constantine the Great, the Aryans found means to ingratiate
themselves into the favour of the Emperor Constantinus, his son and successor in the
east, and hence a persecution was raised against the Orthodox bishops and clergy.
The celebrated Athanasius and other bishops were banished, and their seas
filled with Aryans.
In Egypt and Libya, thirty bishops were martyred and many other Christians cruelly
tormented, and A.D.
386, George, the Aryan bishop of Alexandria, under the authority of the
Emperor, began a persecution in that city and its environs, and carried it on with a
most infernal severity.
He was assisted in his diabolical malice by Catephonius, governor of Egypt,
Sebastian, general of the Egyptian forces, Faustinus, the treasurer, and Heraclius,
a Roman officer.
The persecutions now raged in such a manner that the clergy were driven from
Alexandria, their churches were shut, and the severities practised by the Aryan
heretics were as great as those that had been practised by the pagan idolaters.
If a man accused of being a Christian made his escape, then his whole family were
massacred and his effects confiscated.
Persecution under Julian the Apostate This Emperor was the son of Julius Constantius
and the nephew of Constantine the Great.
He studied the rudiments of grammar under the inspection of Mardonius, a eunuch and
a heathen of Constantinople.
His father sent him sometime after to Nicomedia to be instructed in the
Christian religion by the bishop of Eusebius, his kinsman, but his principles
were corrupted by the pernicious doctrines of Eusebius the rhetorician and Maximus
the magician.
Constantius, dying the year 361, Julian succeeded him, and had no sooner
attained the imperial dignity than he renounced Christianity and embraced
paganism, which had for some years fallen into great disrepute.
Though he restored the idolaters' worship, he made no public edicts against
Christianity, he recalled all banished pagans, allowed the free exercise of
religion to every sect, but deprived all Christians of offices at court,
in the magistracy, or in the army.
He was chaste, temperate, vigilant, laborious, and pious, yet he prohibited
any Christian from keeping a school or public seminary of learning, and deprived
all the Christian clergy of the privileges granted them by Constantine the Great.
Bishop Basil made himself first famous by his opposition to Arianism, which brought
upon him the vengeance of the Arian Bishop of Constantinople.
He equally opposed paganism.
The Emperor's agents in vain tampered with Basil by means of promises, threats,
and racks.
He was firm in the faith, and remained in prison to undergo some other sufferings,
when the Emperor came accidentally to Ancyra.
Julian determined to examine Basil himself, when that holy man being brought
before him, the Emperor did everything in his power to dissuade him from persevering
in the faith.
Basil not only continued as firm as ever, but with a prophetic spirit foretold the
death of the Emperor, and that he should be tormented in the other life.
Enraged at what he heard, Julian commanded that the body of Basil should be torn
every day in seven different parts, until his skin and flesh were entirely
mangled.
This inhuman sentence was executed with rigour, and the martyr expired under its
severities, on June 28, A.D.
362.
Donatus, Bishop of Arezzo, and Hilarinus, a hermit, suffered about the same time,
also Gordian, a Roman magistrate.
Artemius, commander-in-chief of the Roman forces in Egypt, being a Christian,
was deprived of his commission, then of his estate, and lastly of his
head.
The persecution raged dreadfully about the latter end of the year 363, but as many of
the particulars have not been handed down to us, it is necessary to remark in
general that in Palestine many were burnt alive, others were dragged by their feet
through the streets naked until they expired, some were scalded to death,
many stoned, and great numbers had their brains beaten out with clubs.
In Alexandria, innumerable were the martyrs who suffered by the sword,
burning, crucifixion, and stoning.
In Arethusa, several were ripped open, and corn being put into their bellies,
swine were brought to feed therein, which in devouring the grain likewise
devoured the entrails of the martyrs.
And in Thrace, Aemilianus was burnt at a stake, and Domitius murdered in a cave,
whither he had fled for refuge.
The Emperor Julian, the apostate, died of a wound which he received in his
Persian expedition, A.D.
363, and even while expiring uttered the most horrid blasphemies.
He was succeeded by Jovian, who restored peace to the Church.
After the decease of Jovian, Valentinian succeeded to the Empire and associated to
himself Valens, who had the command in the East, and was an Arian and of an
unrelenting and persecuting disposition.
Persecution of the Christians by the Goths and Vandals Many Scythian Goths,
having embraced Christianity about the time of Constantine the Great,
the light of the Gospel spread itself considerably in Scythia, though the two
kings who ruled that country and the majority of the people continued pagans.
Fritigern, king of the West Goths, was an ally to the Romans, but Athanaric,
king of the East Goths, was at war with them.
The Christians in the dominions of the former lived unmolested, but the latter,
having been defeated by the Romans, wreaked his vengeance on his Christian
subjects, commencing his pagan injunctions in the year 370.
In religion, the Goths were Arians and called themselves Christians, therefore
they destroyed all the statues and temples of the heathen gods, but did no harm to
the Orthodox Christian churches.
Alaric had all the qualities of a great general.
To the wild bravery of the Gothic barbarian, he added the courage and skill
of the Roman soldier.
He led his forces across the Alps into Italy and, although driven back for the
time, returned afterward with an irresistible force.
The Last Roman Triumph After this fortunate victory over the Goths,
a triumph, as it was called, was celebrated at Rome.
For hundreds of years, successful generals had been awarded this great honour on
their return from a victorious campaign.
Upon such occasions, the city was given up for days to the marching of troops laden
with spoils, and who dragged after them prisoners of war, among whom were often
captive kings and conquered generals.
This was to be the Last Roman Triumph, for it celebrated the Last Roman Victory.
Although it had been won by Stilicho, the general, it was the boy Emperor
Honorius who took the credit, entering Rome in the car of victory and driving to
the capital amid the shouts of the populace.
Afterward, as was customary on such occasions, there were bloody combats in
the Colosseum, where gladiators armed with swords and spears fought as furiously as
if they were on the field of battle.
The first part of the bloody entertainment was finished, the bodies of the dead were
dragged off with hooks, and the reddened sand covered with a fresh clean layer.
After this had been done, the gates in the wall of the arena were thrown open,
and a number of tall, well-formed men in the prime of youth and strength came
forward.
Some carried swords, others three-pronged spears and nets.
They marched once around the walls, and stopping before the Emperor,
held up their weapons at arm's length, and with one voice sounded out their
greeting, Ave Caesar morituri te salutant!
Hail Caesar, those about to die salute thee!
The combats now began again.
The gladiators with nets tried to entangle those with swords, and when they
succeeded, mercilessly stabbed their antagonists to death with the
three-pronged spear.
When a gladiator had wounded his adversary and had him lying helpless at his feet,
he looked up at the eager faces of the spectators and cried out, Ho cabit!
He has it!
and awaited the pleasure of the audience to kill or spare.
If the spectators held out their hands toward him with thumbs upward,
the defeated man was taken away to recover, if possible, from his wounds.
But if the fatal signal of thumbs down was given, the conquered was to be slain,
and if he showed any reluctance to present his neck for the death blow, there was a
scornful shout from the galleries, Recipe ferum!
Receive the steel!
Privileged persons among the audience would even descend into the arena to
better witness the death agonies of some unusually brave victim before his corpse
was dragged out at the death-gate.
The show went on.
Many had been slain, and the people, madly excited by the desperate bravery of
those who continued to fight, shouted their applause.
But suddenly there was an interruption.
A rudely-clad, robed figure appeared for a moment among the audience, and then boldly
leaped down into the arena.
He was seen to be a man of rough but imposing presence, bare-headed and with
sun-browned face.
Without hesitating an instant, he advanced upon two gladiators engaged in
a life-and-death struggle, and laying his hand upon one of them sternly reproved him
for shedding innocent blood, and then turning toward the thousands of angry
faces ranged around him, called upon them in a solemn, deep-toned voice which
resounded through the deep enclosure.
These were his words, Do not requite God's mercy in turning away the swords of your
enemies by murdering each other.
Angry shouts and cries at once drowned his voice.
This is no place for preaching.
The old customs of Rome must be observed.
On, gladiators!
Thrusting aside the stranger, the gladiators would have again attacked each
other, but the man stood between, holding them apart and trying in vain to
be heard.
Sedition!
Down with him!
was then the cry, and the gladiators, enraged at the interference of an outsider
with their chosen vocation, at once stabbed him to death.
Stones, or whatever missiles came to hand, also rained down upon him from the furious
people, and thus he perished in the midst of the arena.
His dress showed him to be one of the hermits who vowed themselves to a holy
life of prayer and self-denial, and who were reverenced by even the
thoughtless and combat-loving Romans.
The few who knew him told how he had come from the wilds of Asia on a pilgrimage to
visit the churches and keepers' Christmas at Rome.
They knew he was a holy man, and that his name was Telemachus, no more.
His spirit had been stirred by the sight of thousands flocking to see men slaughter
one another, and in his simple-hearted zeal he had tried to convince them of the
cruelty and wickedness of their conduct.
He had died, but not in vain.
His work was accomplished at the moment he was struck down, for the shock of such a
death before their eyes turned the hearts of the people.
They saw the hideous aspects of the favourite vice to which they had blindly
surrendered themselves, and from the day Telemachus fell dead in the Colosseum no
other fight of gladiators was ever held there.
Persecutions from about the middle of the fifth to the conclusion of the seventh
century.
Proterius was made a priest by Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, who was well
acquainted with his virtues, before he appointed him to preach.
On the death of Cyril, the sea of Alexandria was filled by Discorus,
an inveterate enemy to the memory and family of his predecessor.
Being condemned by the council of Chalcedon for having embraced the errors
of Eutyches, he was deposed, and was approved of by the emperor.
This occasioned a dangerous insurrection, for the city of Alexandria was divided
into two factions, the one to espouse the cause of the old, and the other of the new
prelate.
In one of the commotions, the Eutycheans determined to wreak their vengeance on
Proterius, who fled to the church for sanctuary.
But on Good Friday, A.D.
457, a large body of them rushed into the church and barbarously murdered the
prelate, after which they dragged the body through the streets, insulted it,
cut it to pieces, burnt it, and scattered the ashes in the air.
Hermony Gildas, a Gothic priest, was the eldest son of Leo Vigildas,
a king of the Goths in Spain.
This prince, who was originally an Arian, became a convert to the Orthodox faith by
means of his wife, Ingonda.
When the king heard that his son had changed his religious sentiments,
he stripped him of the command at Seville, where he was governor, and threatened to
put him to death unless he renounced the faith he had newly embraced.
The prince, in order to prevent the execution of his father's menaces,
began to put himself into a posture of defence, and many of the Orthodox
persuasion in Spain declared for him.
The king, exasperated at this act of rebellion, began to punish all the
Orthodox Christians who could be seized by his troops, and thus a very severe
persecution commenced.
He likewise marched against his son at the head of a very powerful army.
The prince took refuge in Seville, from which he fled, and was at length
besieged and taken at Asiata.
Loaded with chains, he was sent to Seville, and at the feast of Easter,
refusing to receive the Eucharist from an Arian bishop, the enraged king ordered his
guards to cut the prince to pieces, which they punctually performed,
April 13, A.D.
586.
Martin, bishop of Rome, was born at Todi, in Italy.
He was naturally inclined to virtue, and his parents bestowed on him an
admirable education.
He opposed the heretics called Monothelites, who were patronised by the
emperor Heraclius.
Martin was condemned at Constantinople, where he was exposed in the most public
places to the ridicule of the people, divested of all episcopal marks of
distinction, and treated with the greatest scorn and severity.
After lying some months in prison, Martin was sent to an island at some
distance, and there cut to pieces, A.D.
655.
John, bishop of Bergamo, in Lombardy, was a learned man and a good Christian.
He did his utmost endeavours to clear the church from the errors of Arianism,
and joining in this holy work with John, bishop of Milan, he was very successful
against the heretics, on which account he was assassinated on July 11, A.D.
683.
Killian was born in Ireland, and received from his parents a pious and Christian
education.
He obtained the Roman pontiff's licence to preach to the pagans in Franconia,
in Germany.
At Würzburg, he converted Gosbert, the governor, whose example was followed
by the greater part of the people, in two years after.
Persuading Gosbert that his marriage with his brother's widow was sinful,
the latter had him beheaded, A.D.
689.
Persecutions from the early part of the 8th to near the conclusion of the 10th
century.
Boniface, archbishop of Mence and father of the German church, was an Englishman,
and is in ecclesiastical history looked upon as one of the brightest ornaments of
this nation.
Originally, his name was Winfrid, or Winfrith, and he was born at Curtin,
in Devonshire, then part of the West Saxon kingdom.
When he was only about six years of age, he began to discover a propensity to
reflection, and seemed solicitous to gain information on religious subjects.
Wulfred, the abbot, finding that he possessed a bright genius, as well as a
strong inclination to study, had him removed to Nutsella, a seminary of
learning in the diocese of Winchester, where he would have a much greater
opportunity of attaining improvements than at Exeter.
After due study, the abbot, seeing him qualified for the priesthood, obliged him
to receive that holy order when he was about thirty years old, from which time he
began to preach and labour for the salvation of his fellow creatures.
He was released to attend a synod of bishops in the kingdom of West Saxons.
He afterwards, in 719, went to Rome, where Gregory II, who then sat in Peter's
chair, received him with great friendship, and finding him full of all virtues that
compose the character of an apostolic missionary, dismissed him, without
commission at large, to preach the gospel to the pagans wherever he found them.
Passing through Lombardy and Bavaria, he came to Thuringia, which country had
before received the light of the gospel.
He next visited Utrecht, and then proceeded to Saxony, where he converted
some thousands to Christianity.
During the ministry of this meek prelate, Pepin was declared King of France.
It was that prince's ambition to be crowned by the most holy prelate he could
find, and Boniface was pitched on to perform that ceremony, which he did at
Soissons in 752.
The next year, his great age and many infirmities lay so heavy on him that with
the consent of the new king and the bishops of his diocese, he consecrated
Lullus, his countryman and faithful disciple, and placed him in the see of
Mence.
When he had thus eased himself of his charge, he recommended the church of Mence
to the care of the new bishop in very strong terms, desired he would finish the
church at Fuld, and see him buried in it, for his end was near.
Having left these orders, he took boat to the Rhine and went to Friesland,
where he converted and baptised several thousands of barbarous natives,
demolished the temples, and raised churches on the ruins of those
superstitious structures.
A day being appointed for confirming a great number of new converts, he ordered
them to assemble in a new open plain near the river Borde, the day he repaired the
day before, and pitching a tent determined to remain on the spot all night in order
to be ready early in the morning.
Some pagans, who were his inveterate enemies, having intelligence of this,
poured down upon him and the companions of his mission in the night, and killed him
and fifty-two of his companions and attendants, on June 5, A.D.
755.
Thus fell the great father of the Germanic church, the honour of England,
and the glory of the age in which he lived.
Forty-two persons of Armorian, in Upper Phrygia, were martyred in the
year 845 by the Saracens, the circumstances of which transactions are as
follows.
In the reign of Theophilus, the Saracens ravaged many parts of the Eastern Empire,
gained several considerable advantages over the Christians, took the city of
Armorian, and numbers suffered martyrdom.
Flora and Mary, two ladies of distinction, suffered martyrdom at the same time.
Perfectus was born at Cordoba in Spain, and brought up in the Christian faith.
Having a quick genius, he made himself master of all the useful and polite
literature of that age, and at the same time was not more celebrated for his
abilities than admired for his piety.
At length he took priest orders, and performed the duties of his office
with great assiduity and punctuality.
Publicly declaring Muhammad an imposter, he was sentenced to be beheaded,
and was accordingly executed A.D.
850, after which his body was honourably interred by the Christians.
Adalbert, Bishop of Prague, a Bohemian by birth, after being involved in many
troubles, began to direct his thoughts to the conversion of the infidels,
to which end he repaired to Danzig, where he converted and baptised many,
which so enraged the pagan priests that they fell upon him, and dispatched him
with darts, on April 23, A.D.
997.
Persecutions in the Eleventh Century Alfedge, Archbishop of Canterbury,
was descended from a considerable family in Gloucestershire, and received an
education suitable to his illustrious birth.
His parents were worthy Christians, and Alfedge seemed to inherit their
virtues.
The See of Winchester being vacant by the death of Æthelwold, Dunstan, Archbishop of
Canterbury, as primate of all England, consecrated Alfedge to the vacant
bishopric, to the general satisfaction of all concerned in the diocese.
Dunstan had an extraordinary veneration for Alfedge, and when at the point of
death, made it his ardent request to God that he might succeed him in the See of
Canterbury, which accordingly happened, though not until about eighteen years
after Dunstan's death, in 1006.
After Alfedge had governed the See of Canterbury about four years, with great
reputation to himself and benefit to his people, the Danes made an incursion into
England, and laid siege to Canterbury.
When the design of attacking the city was known, many of the principal people made a
flight from it, and would have persuaded Alfedge to follow their example.
But he, like a good pastor, would not listen to such a proposal.
While he was employed in assisting and encouraging the people, Canterbury was
taken by storm, the enemy poured into the town, and destroyed all that came in their
way by fire and sword.
He had the courage to address the enemy, and offer himself to their swords as more
worthy of their rage than the people.
He begged they might be saved, and that they would discharge their whole
fury upon him.
They accordingly seized him, tied his hands, insulted and abused him in a rude
and barbarous manner, and obliged him to remain on the spot until his church was
burned and the monks massacred.
They then decimated all the inhabitants, both ecclesiastics and laymen,
leaving only every tenth person alive, so that they put 7,236 persons to death,
and left only four monks and 800 laymen alive, after which they confined the
archbishop in a dungeon, where they kept him close prisoner for several months.
During his confinement, they proposed to him to redeem his liberty with a sum of
3,000 pounds, and to persuade the king to purchase their departure out of the
kingdom with a further sum of 10,000 pounds.
As Alphage's circumstances would not allow him to satisfy the exorbitant demand,
they bound him and put him to severe torments, to oblige him to discover the
treasure of the church, upon which they assured him of his life and liberty.
But the prelate piously persisted in refusing to give the pagans any account of
it.
They remanded him to prison again, confined him six days longer, and then,
taking him prisoner with them to Greenwich, brought him to trial there.
He still remained inflexible with respect to the church treasure, but exhorted them
to forsake their idolatry and embrace Christianity.
This so greatly incensed the Danes, that the soldiers dragged him out of the
camp and beat him unmercifully.
One of the soldiers, who had been converted by him, knowing that his pains
would be lingering, as his death was determined on, actuated by a kind of
barbarous compassion, cut off his head, and thus put the finishing stroke to his
martyrdom, April 19, A.D.
1012.
This transaction happened on the very spot where the church at Greenwich,
which is dedicated to him, now stands.
After his death, his body was thrown into the Thames, but being found the next day,
it was buried in the Cathedral of St. Paul's, by the bishops of London and
Lincoln, from whence it was in 1023, removed to Canterbury by Ethelmoth,
the archbishop of that province.
Gerard, a Venetian, devoted himself to the service of God from his tender years,
entered into a religious house for some time, and then determined to visit the
Holy Land.
Going into Hungary, he became acquainted with Stephen, the king of that country,
who made him bishop of Csonad.
Uwe and Peter, successors of Stephen, being deposed, Andrew, son of Ladislaus,
cousin German to Stephen, had then a tender of the crown made him, upon
condition that he would employ his authority in extirpating the Christian
religion out of Hungary.
The ambitious prince came into the proposal, but Gerard, being informed of
his impious bargain, thought it his duty to remonstrate against the enormity of
Andrew's crime, and persuade him to withdraw his promise.
In this view, he undertook to go to that prince attended by three prelates,
full of like zeal for religion.
The new king was at Alba Regalis, but as the four bishops were going to
cross the Danube, they were stopped by a party of soldiers posted there.
They bore an attack of a shower of stones patiently, when the soldiers beat them
unmercifully and at length dispatched them with lances.
Their martyrdoms happened in the year 1045.
Stanislaus, bishop of Kraków, was descended from an illustrious Polish
family.
The piety of his parents was equal to their opulence, and the latter they
rendered subservient to all the purposes of charity and benevolence.
Stanislaus remained for some time undetermined whether he should embrace a
monastic life or engage among the secular clergy.
He was at length persuaded to the latter by Lambert Zula, bishop of Kraków,
who gave him holy orders and made him a canon of his cathedral.
Lambert died on November 25, 1071, when all concerned in the choice of a
successor declared for Stanislaus, and he succeeded to the prelacy.
Moleslaus, the second king of Poland, had by nature many good qualities,
but giving away to his passions he ran into many enormities, and at length had
the appellation of cruel bestowed upon him.
Stanislaus alone had the courage to tell him of his faults, when, taking a private
opportunity, he freely displayed to him the enormities of his crimes.
The king, greatly exasperated at his repeated freedoms, at length determined at
any rate to get the better of a prelate who was so extremely faithful.
Hearing one day that the bishop was by himself in the chapel of St. Michael,
at a small distance from the town, he dispatched some soldiers to murder him.
The soldiers readily undertook the bloody task, but when they came into the presence
of Stanislaus, the venerable aspect of the prelate struck them with such awe that
they could not perform what they had promised.
On their return, the king, finding that they had not obeyed his orders,
stormed at them violently, snatched a dagger from one of them, and ran furiously
to the chapel, where finding Stanislaus at the altar, he plunged the weapon into his
heart.
The prelate immediately expired on May 8, A.D.
1079.
Chapter Four Papal Persecutions Thus far, our history of persecution has been
confined principally to the pagan world.
We now come to a period when persecution, under the guise of Christianity,
committed more enormities than ever disgraced the annals of paganism.
Disregarding the maxims and the spirit of the gospel, the papal church, arming
herself with the power of the sword, vexed the church of God and wasted it for
several centuries, a period most appropriately termed in history the Dark
Ages.
The kings of the earth gave their power to the beast, and submitted to be trodden on
by the miserable vermin that often filled the papal chair, as in the case of Henry,
Emperor of Germany.
The storm of papal persecution first burst upon the Waldenses in France.
Persecution of the Waldenses in France Popery, having brought various innovations
into the church and overspread the Christian world with darkness and
superstition, some few, who plainly perceived the pernicious tendency of such
errors, determined to show the light of the gospel in its real purity,
and to disperse those clouds which artful priests had raised about it in order to
blind the people and obscure its real brightness.
The principal among these was Berengarius, who about the year 1000 boldly preached
gospel truths according to their primitive purity.
Many, from conviction, assented to his doctrine, and were on that account called
Berengarians.
To Berengarius succeeded Pier Bruis, who preached at Toulouse under the
protection of an earl named Hildefonsus, and the whole tenets of the reformers,
with the reasons of their separation from the church of Rome, were published in a
book written by Bruis under the title of Antichrist.
By the year of Christ 1140, the number of the reformed was very great, and the
probability of its increasing alarmed the Pope, who wrote to several princes to
banish them from their dominions, and employed many learned men to write
against their doctrines.
In A.D.
1147, because of Henry of Toulouse, deemed their most eminent preacher,
they were called Heniricians, and if they would not admit of any proofs relative to
religion but what could be deduced from the scriptures themselves, the Popish
party gave them the name of Apostolics.
At length, Peter Waldo or Voldo, a native of Lyon, eminent for his piety
and learning, became a strenuous opposer of Popery, and from him the reformed at
that time received the appellation of Waldenses or Waldoes.
Pope Alexander III, being informed by the Bishop of Lyon of these transactions,
excommunicated Waldo and his adherents, and commanded the bishop to exterminate
them if possible from the face of the earth, hence began the papal persecutions
against the Waldenses.
The proceedings of Waldo and the reformed occasioned the first rise of the
inquisitors, for Pope Innocent III authorized certain monks as inquisitors to
inquire for and deliver over the reform to the secular power.
The process was short, as an accusation was deemed adequate to guilt, and a candid
trial was never granted to the accused.
The Pope, finding that these cruel means had not the intended effect, sent several
learned monks to preach among the Waldenses, and to endeavour to argue them
out of their opinions.
Among these monks was one Dominic, who appeared extremely zealous in the
cause of Popery.
This Dominic instituted an order, which from him was called the Order of
Dominican Friars, and the members of this order have ever since been the principal
inquisitors in the various inquisitions in the world.
The power of the inquisitors was unlimited.
They proceeded against whom they pleased, without any consideration of age,
sex, or rank.
Let the accusers be ever so infamous, the accusation was deemed valid,
and even anonymous information sent by letter was thought sufficient evidence.
To be rich was a crime equal to heresy, therefore many who had money were accused
of heresy, or of being favourers of heretics, that they might be obliged to
pay for their opinions.
The dearest friends or nearest kindred could not without danger serve anyone who
was imprisoned on account of religion.
To convey to those who were confined a little straw, or give them a cup of water,
was called favouring of the heretics, and they were prosecuted accordingly.
No lawyer dared to plead for his own brother, and their malice even extended
beyond the grave.
Hence the bones of many were dug up and burnt as examples to the living.
If a man on his deathbed was accused of being a follower of Waldo, his estates
were confiscated, and the heir to them defrauded of his inheritance, and some
were sent to the Holy Land, while the Dominicans took possession of their houses
and properties, and when the owners returned would often pretend not to know
them.
These persecutions were continued for several centuries under different Popes
and other great dignitaries of the Catholic Church.
Persecutions of the Albigensies The Albigensies were a people of the reformed
religion who inhabited the country of Albi.
They were condemned on the score of religion in the Council of Lateran by
order of Pope Alexander III.
Nevertheless, they increased so prodigiously that many cities were
inhabited by persons only of their persuasion, and several eminent noblemen
embraced their doctrines.
Among the latter were Raymond, Earl of Toulouse, Raymond, Earl of Foix,
the Earl of Béziers, etc.
A friar named Peter, having been murdered in the dominions of the Earl of Toulouse,
the Pope made the murderer pretense to persecute that nobleman and his subjects.
To effect this, he sent persons throughout all Europe in order to raise forces to act
coercively against the Albigensies, and promised paradise to all that would
come to this war, which he termed a Holy War, and bear arms for forty days.
The same indulgences were likewise held out to all who entered themselves for the
purpose as to such as engaged in crusades to the Holy Land.
The brave Earl defended Toulouse and other places with the most heroic bravery and
various success against the Pope's legates, and Simon, Earl of Montfort,
a bigoted Catholic nobleman.
Unable to subdue the Earl of Toulouse openly, the King of France and the Queen
Mother and three archbishops raised another formidable army, and had the art
to persuade the Earl of Toulouse to come to a conference, when he was treacherously
seized upon, made a prisoner, forced to appear barefooted and bareheaded before
his enemies, and compelled to subscribe an abject recantation.
This was followed by a severe persecution against the Albigensies, and express
orders that the laity should not be permitted to read the sacred scriptures.
In the year 1620 also the persecution against the Albigensies was very severe.
In 1648 a heavy persecution raged throughout Lithuania and Poland.
The cruelty of the Cossacks was so excessive that the Tartars themselves were
ashamed of their barbarities.
Among others who suffered was the Reverend Adrian Chilinski, who was roasted alive by
a slow fire, and whose sufferings and mode of death may depict the horrors which the
professors of Christianity have endured from the enemies of the Redeemer.
The reformation of papistical error very early was projected in France,
for in the third century a learned man named Almericus and six of his disciples
were ordered to be burnt at Paris for asserting that God was no otherwise
present in the sacramental bread than in any other bread, that it was idolatry to
build altars or shrines to saints, and that it was ridiculous to offer
incense to them.
The martyrdom of Almericus and his pupils did not however prevent many from
acknowledging the justness of his notions, and seeing the purity of the reformed
religion, so that the faith of Christ continually increased, and in time not
only spread itself over many parts of France, but diffused the light of the
gospel over various other countries.
In the year 1524, at a town in France called Meldon, one John Clarke set up a
bill on the church door wherein he called the Pope Antichrist.
For this offence he was repeatedly whipped and then branded on the forehead.
Going after a demence in Lorraine, he demolished some images for which he had
his right hand and nose cut off, and his arms and breast torn with pincers.
He sustained these cruelties with amazing fortitude, and was even sufficiently
called to sing the one hundredth and fifteenth psalm which expressly forbids
idolatry, after which he was thrown into the fire and burnt to ashes.
Many persons of the reformed persuasion were about this time beaten, racked,
scourged, and burnt to death in several parts of France, but more particularly at
Paris, Molde, and Limousin.
A native of Molde was burnt by a slow fire for saying that mass was a plain denial of
the death and passion of Christ.
At Limousin, John de Cadurco, a clergyman of the reformed religion, was apprehended
and ordered to be burnt.
Francis Bribard, secretary to Cardinal de Pellet, for speaking in favour of the
reformed, had his tongue cut out, and was then burnt, A.D.
1545.
James Cobard, a schoolmaster in the city of St. Michael, was burnt, A.D.
1545, for saying that mass was useless and absurd, and about the same time fourteen
men were burnt at Malta, their wives being compelled to stand by and behold the
execution.
A.D.
1546, Peter Chapeau brought a number of Bibles in the French tongue to France,
and publicly sold them there, for which he was brought to trial, sentenced,
and executed a few days afterward.
Soon after, a cripple of Maud, a schoolmaster of Ferra, named Stephen
Pollio, and a man named John English, were burnt for the faith.
Monsieur Blondel, a rich jeweller, was in A.D.
1548 apprehended at Lyon, and sent to Paris.
There he was burnt for the faith by order of the court, A.D.
1549.
Herbert, a youth of nineteen years of age, was committed to the flames at Dijon,
as was Florent Vernotte in the same year.
In the year 1554, two men of the reformed religion, with the son and daughter of one
of them, were apprehended and committed to the castle of Niverne.
On examination, they confessed their faith, and were ordered to execution.
Being smeared with grease, brimstone, and gunpowder, they cried, Salt on,
salt on, this sinful and rotten flesh.
Their tongues were then cut out, and they were afterward committed to the
flames, which soon consumed them, by means of the combustible matter with
which they were besmeared.
The Bartholomew Massacre at Paris, etc.
On the twenty-second day of August, 1572, commenced this diabolical act of
sanguinary brutality.
It was intended to destroy at one stroke the root of the Protestant tree,
which had only before partially suffered in its branches.
The King of France had artfully proposed a marriage between his sister and the Prince
of Navarre, the Captain and Prince of the Protestants.
This imprudent marriage was publicly celebrated at Paris, August 18,
by the Cardinal of Bourbon, upon a high stage erected for the purpose.
They dined in great pomp with the Bishop, and supped with the King at Paris.
Four days after this, the Prince, Coligny, as he was coming from the
Council, was shot in both arms.
He then said to More, his deceased mother's minister, O my brother,
I do now perceive that I am indeed beloved of my God, since for his most holy sake I
am wounded.
Although the Vidame advised him to fly, yet he abode in Paris and was soon after
slain by Bemgeus, who afterwards declared he never saw a man meet death more
valiantly than the Admiral.
The soldiers were appointed at a certain signal to burst out instantly to the
slaughter in all parts of the city.
When they had killed the Admiral, they threw him out at a window into the
street, where his head was cut off and sent to the Pope.
The savage Papists, still raging against him, got off his arms and private members,
and after dragging him three days through the streets, hung him by the heels without
the city.
After him they slew many great and honourable persons who were Protestants,
as Count Rochefoucauld, Tillinius, the Admiral's son-in-law, Antonius,
Clarimontus, Marquis of Ravelis, Louis Boucius, Bandinius, Pluvielius,
Berneus, etc., and, falling upon the common people, they continued the
slaughter for many days.
In the three firsts they slew, of all ranks and conditions, to the number
of ten thousand.
The bodies were thrown into the rivers, and blood ran through the streets with a
strong current, and the rivers appeared presently like a stream of blood.
So furious was their hellish rage that they slew all Papists whom they suspected
to be not very staunch to their diabolical religion.
From Paris the destruction spread to all quarters of the realm.
At Orléans a thousand were slain of men, women, and children, and six thousand at
Rouen.
At Meldith two hundred were put into prison and later brought out by units and
cruelly murdered.
At Lyon eight hundred were massacred.
Here children, hanging about their parents, and parents affectionately
embracing their children, were pleasant food for the swords and bloodthirsty minds
of those who call themselves the Catholic Church.
Here three hundred were slain in the bishop's house, and the impious monks
would suffer none to be buried.
At Augustobona, on the people hearing of the massacre at Paris, they shut their
gates that no Protestants might escape, and searching diligently for every
individual of the Reformed Church, imprisoned and then barbarously murdered
them.
The same cruelty they practiced at Avaricum, at Troyes, at Toulouse,
Rouen, and many other places, running from city to city, towns and villages through
the kingdom.
As a corroboration of this horrid carnage, the following interesting narrative,
written by a sensible and learned Roman Catholic, appears in this place with
peculiar propriety.
The nuptials, says he, of the young king of Navarre with the French king's sister,
was solemnized with pomp, and all the endearments, all the assurances of
friendship, all the oaths sacred among men were profusely lavished by Catherine the
Queen Mother and by the king, during which the rest of the court thought of nothing
but festivities, plays, and masquerades.
At last, at twelve o'clock at night on the eve of St. Bartholomew, the signal was
given.
Immediately all the houses of the Protestants were forced open at once.
Admiral Colligny, alarmed by the uproar, jumped out of bed when a company of
assassins rushed in his chamber.
They were headed by one Besmer, who had been bred up as a domestic in the
family of the Guise.
This wretch thrust his sword into the Admiral's breast, and also cut him in the
face.
Besmer was a German, and being afterwards taken by the Protestants, the Rocheleurs
would have brought him in order to hang and quarter him, but he was killed by one
Bretonville.
Henry, the young Duke of Guise, who afterwards framed the Catholic League
and was murdered at Blois, standing at the door until the horrid butchery should be
completed, called aloud, "'Besmer, is it done?' Immediately after this the
ruffians threw the body out of the window, and Colligny expired at Guise's feet.
Count de Telligny also fell a sacrifice.
He had married about ten months before Colligny's daughter.
His countenance was so engaging that the ruffians, when they advanced in order to
kill him, were struck with compassion, but others more barbarous, rushing
forward, murdered him.
In the meantime all the friends of Colligny were assassinated throughout
Paris.
Men, women, and children were promiscuously slaughtered, and every
street was strewed with expiring bodies.
Some priests, holding up a crucifix in one hand and a dagger in the other,
ran to the chiefs of the murderers and strongly exhorted them to spare neither
relations nor friends.
Tavannes, Marshal of France, an ignorant superstitious soldier who joined the fury
of religion to the rage of party, rode on horseback through the streets of
Paris, crying to his men, Let blood, let blood, bleeding as wholesome in August
as in May.
In the Memories of the Life of this Enthusiastic, written by his son,
we are told that his father, being on his deathbed and making a general confession
of his actions, the priest said to him with surprise, What, no mention of St.
Bartholomew's massacre?
to which Tavannes replied, I consider it as a meritorious action that will wash
away all my sins.
Such horrid sentiments can a false spirit of religion inspire.
The king's palace was one of the chief scenes of the butchery.
The king of Navarre had his lodgings in the Louvre, and all his domestics were
Protestants.
Many of these were killed in bed with their wives.
Others, running away naked, were pursued by the soldiers through the several rooms
of the palace, even to the king's antechamber.
The young wife of Henry of Navarre, awaked by the dreadful uproar,
being afraid for her consort and for her own life, seized with horror and
half-dead, flew from her bed in order to throw herself at the feet of the king,
her brother.
But scarce had she opened her chamber door when some of her Protestant domestics
rushed in for refuge.
The soldiers immediately followed, pursued them in sight of the princess,
and killed one who crept under her bed.
Two others, being wounded with halberds, fell at the queen's feet so that she was
covered with blood.
Count de la Rochefoucauld, a young nobleman greatly in the king's favour for
his comely air, his politeness, and a certain peculiar happiness in the
turn of his conversation, had spent the evening until eleven o'clock with the
monarch in pleasant familiarity, and had given a loose, with the utmost
mirth, to the sallies of his imagination.
The monarch felt some remorse, and being touched with a kind of
compassion, bid him two or three times not to go home, but lie in the Louvre.
The count said he must go to his wife, upon which the king pressed him no
farther, but said, Let him go.
I see God has decreed his death.
And in two hours after, he was murdered.
Very few of the Protestants escaped the fury of their enthusiastic persecutors.
Among these was young La Force, afterwards the famous Marshal de la Force,
a child about ten years of age whose deliverance was exceedingly remarkable.
His father, his elder brother, and he himself, were seized together by
the Duke of Anjou's soldiers.
These murderers flew at all three, and struck them at random, when they all
fell and lay one upon another.
The youngest did not receive a single blow, but appearing as if he was dead,
escaped the next day, and his life, thus wonderfully preserved, lasted
fourscore and five years.
Many of the wretched victims fled to the waterside, and some swam over the Seine to
the suburbs of Saint-Germain.
The king saw them from his window, which looked upon the river, and fired
upon them with a carbine that had been loaded for that purpose by one of his
pages, while the queen mother, undisturbed and serene in the midst of
slaughter, looking down from a balcony, encouraged the murderers, and laughed at
the dying groans of the slaughtered.
This barbarous queen was fired with a restless ambition, and she perpetually
shifted her party in order to satiate it.
Some days after this horrid transaction, the French court endeavoured to palliate
it by forms of law.
They pretended to justify the massacre by a calumny, and accused the admiral of a
conspiracy which no one believed.
The Parliament was commended to proceed against the memory of Coligny,
and his dead body was hanged in chains on Montfaucon gallows.
The king himself went to view this shocking spectacle.
So one of his courtiers advised him to retire, and complaining of the stench of
the corpse, he replied, a dead enemy smells well.
The massacres on St Bartholomew's Day are painted in the Royal Saloon of the Vatican
at Rome with the following inscription, Pontifex Coligny Necem Probat,
that is, the Pope approves of Coligny's death.
The young king of Navarre was spared through policy rather than from the pity
of the queen mother, she keeping him prisoner until the king's death in order
that he might be as a security and pledge for the submission of such Protestants as
might effect their escape.
This horrid butchery was not confined merely to the city of Paris.
The like orders were issued from court to the governors of all the provinces in
France, so that in a week's time about 100,000 Protestants were cut to pieces in
different parts of the kingdom.
Two or three governors only refused to obey the king's orders.
One of these, named Montmoren, governor of Auvergne, wrote the king the
following letter, which deserves to be transmitted to the latest posterity.
Sire, I have received an order under your majesty's seal to put to death all the
Protestants in my province.
I have too much respect for your majesty not to believe the letter of forgery,
but if, which God forbid, the order should be genuine, I have too much respect for
your majesty to obey it.
At Rome the horrid joy was so great that they appointed a day of high festival and
a jubilee, with great indulgence to all who kept it and showed every expression of
gladness they could devise, and the man who first carried the news received one
thousand crowns of the cardinal of Lorraine for his ungodly message.
The king also commanded the day to be kept with every demonstration of joy,
concluding now that the whole race of Huguenots was extinct.
Many who gave great sums of money for their ransom were immediately after slain,
and several towns which were under the king's promise of protection and safety
were cut off as soon as they delivered themselves up on those promises to his
generals or captains.
At Bordeaux, at the instigation of a villainous monk who used to urge the
papists to slaughter in his sermons, two hundred and sixty-four were cruelly
murdered, some of them senators.
Another of the same pious fraternity produced a similar slaughter at Agendicum
in Maine, where the populace at the Holy Inquisitor's satanical suggestion ran upon
the Protestants, slew them, plundered their houses, and pulled down their
church.
The Duke of Guise, entering into Bois, suffered his soldiers to fly upon the
spoil and slay or drown all the Protestants they could find.
In this they spared neither age nor sex, defiling the women and then murdering
them, from whence he went to Mer, and committed the same outrages for many
days together.
Here they found a minister named Casabonius, and threw him into the river.
At Anjou they slew Albaicus, a minister, and many women were defiled and murdered
there, among whom were two sisters, abused before their father, whom the
assassins bound to a wall to see them, and then slew them and him.
The President of Turin, after giving a large sum for his life, was cruelly beaten
with clubs, stripped of his clothes, and hung feet upwards with his head and
breast in the river.
Before he was dead they opened his belly, plucked out his entrails, and threw them
into the river, and then carried his heart about the city upon a spear.
At Bar, great cruelty was used even to young children, whom they cut open,
pulled out their entrails, which through very rage they gnawed with their teeth.
Those who had fled to the castle, when they yielded, were almost hanged.
Thus they did at the city of Matiscon, counting it sport to cut off their arms
and legs, and afterward kill them, and for the entertainment of their
visitors they often threw the Protestants from a high bridge into the river,
saying, Did you ever see men leap so well?
At Penna, after promising them safety, three hundred were inhumanely butchered,
and five and forty at Albia on the Lord's Day.
At None, though it yielded on conditions of safeguard, the most horrid spectacles
were exhibited.
Persons of both sexes and conditions were indiscriminately murdered, the streets
ringing with doleful cries and flowing with blood, and the houses flaming with
fire, which the abandoned soldiers had thrown in.
One woman, being dragged from her hiding-place with her husband,
was first abused by the brutal soldiers, and then, with a sword which they
commanded her to draw, they forced it while in her hands into the bowels of her
husband.
At Samarubriva they murdered above one hundred Protestants after promising them
peace, and at Ansidor one hundred were killed and cast part into a jakes and part
into a river, one hundred put into a prison at Orléans were destroyed by the
furious multitude.
The Protestants at Rochelle, who were such as had miraculously escaped the rage of
hell and fled there, seeing how ill they fared who submitted to those holy devils,
stood for their lives, and some other cities encouraged thereby did the like.
Against Rochelle the king sent almost the whole power of France, which besieged it
seven months.
By their assaults they did very little execution on the inhabitants, yet by
famine they destroyed eighteen thousand out of two and twenty.
The dead, being too numerous for the living to bury, became food for vermin and
carnivorous birds.
Many took their coffins into the churchyard, laid down in them,
and breathed their last.
Their diet had long been what the minds of those in plenty shudder at, even human
flesh, entrails, dung, and the most loathsome things became at last the only
food of those champions for that truth and liberty of which the world was not worthy.
At every attack the besiegers met with such an intrepid reception that they left
one hundred and thirty-two captains, with a proportionate number of men,
dead in the field.
The siege at last was broken up at the request of the duke of Anjou, the king's
brother, who was proclaimed king of Poland, and the king, being wearied out,
easily complied, whereupon honourable conditions were granted them.
It is a remarkable interference of providence that in all this dreadful
massacre not more than two ministers of the gospel were involved in it.
The tragical sufferings of the Protestants are too numerous to detail, but the
treatment of Philippe de Deux will give an idea of the rest.
After the miscreants had slain this martyr in his bed, they went to his wife,
who was then attended by the midwife, expecting every moment to be delivered.
The midwife entreated them to stay the murder, at least till the child,
which was the twentieth, should be born.
Notwithstanding this, they thrust a dagger up to the hilt into the poor woman.
Anxious to be delivered, she ran into a corn-loft, but hither they pursued her,
stabbed her in the belly, and then threw her into the street.
By the fall, the child came from the dying mother, and being caught up by one of the
Catholic ruffians, he stabbed the infant and then threw it into the river.
From the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes to the French Revolution in 1789 The
persecutions occasioned by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes took place under
Louis XIV.
This edict was made by Henry the Great of France in 1598 and secured to the
Protestants an equal right in every respect, whether civil or religious,
with the other subjects of the realm.
All those privileges Louis XIV confirmed to the Protestants by another statute,
called the Edict of Nîmes, and kept them inviolably to the end of his reign.
On the accession of Louis XIV, the kingdom was almost ruined by civil
wars.
At this critical juncture, the Protestants, heedless of our Lord's
admonition, they that take the sword shall perish with the sword, took such an active
part in favour of the King that he was constrained to acknowledge himself
indebted to their arms for his establishment on the throne.
Instead of cherishing and rewarding that party who had fought for him, he reasoned
that the same power which had protected could overturn him, and, listening to the
Popish machinations, he began to issue our proscriptions and restrictions indicative
of his final determination.
Rochelle was presently fettered with an incredible number of denunciations.
Montauban and Millau were sacked by soldiers.
Popish commissioners were appointed to preside over the affairs of the
Protestants, and there was no appeal from their ordinance except to the King's
Council.
This struck at the root of their civil and religious exercises, and prevented them,
being Protestants, from suing a Catholic in any court of law.
This was followed by another injunction to make an inquiry in all parishes into
whatever the Protestants had said or done for twenty years past.
This filled the prisons with innocent victims, and condemned others to the
galleys or banishment.
Protestants were expelled from all offices, trades, privileges, and
employees, thereby depriving them of the means of getting their bread, and they
proceeded to such excess in this brutality that they would not suffer even the
midwives to officiate, but compelled their women to submit themselves in that crisis
of nature to their enemies, the brutal Catholics.
Their children were taken from them to be educated by the Catholics, and at seven
years of age made to embrace popery.
The reformed were prohibited from relieving their own sick or poor from all
private worship, and divine service was to be performed in the presence of a Popish
priest.
To prevent the unfortunate victims from leaving the Kingdom, all the passages on
the frontiers were strictly guarded.
Yet by the good hand of God, about a hundred and fifty thousand escaped their
vigilance and emigrated to different countries to relate the dismal narrative.
All that has been related hitherto were only infringements on their established
charter, the Edict of Nantes.
At length, a diabolical revocation of that edict passed on the 18th of October,
1685, and was registered the 22nd, contrary to all form of law.
Instantly, the dragoons were quartered upon the Protestants throughout the realm,
and filled all France with the like news that the King would no longer suffer any
Huguenots in his Kingdom, and therefore they must resolve to change their
religion.
Hereupon the intendants in every parish, which were Popish governors and spies set
over the Protestants, assembled the reformed inhabitants and told them they
must without delay turn Catholics, either freely or by force.
The Protestants replied that they were ready to sacrifice their lives and estates
to the King, but their consciences, being gods, they could not so dispose of them.