The Acts of Saint Sebastian

He therefore rendered daily and diligent service to Christ, but acted in such a way that this might be hidden from the sacrilegious kings—not terrified by fear of suffering, nor bound by love of his own patrimony, but only for this purpose did he, hidden beneath the cloak of earthly service, act as a soldier of Christ: that he might strengthen the spirits of Christians whom he saw failing amid torments, and might restore to God the souls which the devil was striving to carry off.

At length, after he had snatched away the minds of many martyrs from fear of suffering, and had roused them to the crown of everlasting glory, he himself was revealed for what he was, because light could not lie hidden in darkness. And so, when the most illustrious men Marcellian and Marcus, two twin brothers, had been placed in chains for the name of Christ, he daily brought them comfort; and to both them and also to the servants who had been imprisoned with them, he ministered salutary counsels of faith, by which they might spurn the fleeting flatteries of the world, and not fear the momentary kinds of torments.

The constancy of Marcellian and Marcus is grievously assailed.

When they acquiesced in these most blessed consolations, and passed through the scourges of the executioners with a persevering spirit, they were ordered to undergo the capital sentence: on this condition, namely, that if at the very moment when they were to be beheaded they should consent to sacrifice, they would be restored to their parents, and to their wives and children, and to their possessions. For they were, as we have said, not only men most illustrious by birth, but also enriched with wealth; whose father was named Tranquillinus, and whose mother was called Marcia; who followed them along with their wives and children, being drawn by an excessive affection for their grandchildren. Thus it came about that from Agrestius Chromatius, prefect of the city of Rome, they obtained a delay of thirty days, in the space of which effort would be made with them, that they might consent to burn incense to the idols.

Their friends, therefore, coming to them, began to say: Whence comes to you so hard a mind, so iron a breast, that you suffer your father's gray hairs to be cast aside, and offer new pangs of birth to a mother already decrepit? For she overcame the pains of her childbearing with consolations, since in one travail she bore two sons, and poured out for their father a twin affection of children: but now the pain is incurable, the penalty inconsolable, the torment beyond remedy, the birth-pang without compare, whereby hope and joy are taken away, life is despised, glory is rejected, and, with all the affections of piety held in contempt, the atrocity of death is sought rather than feared. We beg you, dearest friends, put an end at last to these calamities, and remember, even if only when reminded, that you are the fathers of beloved sons.

While the friends were saying these and similar things, the mother arrived, crying out that she was wretched, and, with her hair loosed, displaying the gray hairs of her old age, tore in their sight the garment that covered her breast; and, with all weeping, she showed them her breasts, their skin gone slack, which they had sucked, and, wailing and weeping, she recalled the endearments which she had shown them in their infancy. She said, then, to both: You, my son, always caressed me more; and you were more bashful: in this one I bore my own image, in you I poured out my husband's features; you are more useful to your father, this one more like him. Woe is me, wretched! Incomparable griefs surround me on every side, unheard-of misery and a twofold bereavement, comparable to no tribulations whatsoever.

I say nothing of sons hastening of their own accord to death, whom, if enemies were taking from me, I would follow through the midst of the battle lines of warriors; if violent judgments were shutting them up, I would break into the prison along with them, ready to die. This is a new kind of perishing, in which the executioner is begged to strike, life is desired to perish, death is invited to come. This is a new grief; a new misery, in which the youth of children is voluntarily lost, and the pitiable old age of parents is compelled to go on living.

While the mother went on with these and similar words, the feeble father, already heavy with old age, was led forward by the hands of his little servants, and, scattering dust of the earth upon his swan-white head, uttered to heaven words of this kind: I have come to bid farewell to sons setting out of their own accord to death, so that all the things which I had prepared to be offered by my sons for my burial, I, unhappy man, might now expend in burying my sons. O sons, staff of my old age, and twin light of my inmost being, happily born, and prosperously reared, of most excellent memory, and of singular talent, imbued with skill in all the liberal letters, what is this madness which, sprung up suddenly of your own will, has made you lovers of death?

Never has this pleased the living; never has it induced its love in those about to die; but to whomever it has been able to come, it has been admitted by violence, and has not been received willingly by any living person. If a naked debtor suffers this under a greedy money-lender, he can by no reasoning love it; and it is known not only that he does not love it, but that he fears it. By what reasoning, then, does he who abounds in every good thing, and owes absolutely nothing to anyone, seek it out? Come here, old men, and mourn with me over sons, you who feel that you have fatherly hearts. Come here, young men, and weep over young men perishing of their own will. Approach, fathers, and forbid such things, lest you suffer such things.

Fail in weeping, my eyes, and cover yourselves in darkness, pouring forth rivers of tears; let me not see struck by the sword those whom, when but a light rod touched them, I trembled; when I saw them but slightly saddened, I was afraid.

While, then, the old man went on with these and other words, behold, the wives of both came with their own children, and, presenting their little infants to their sight, poured forth these words wailing: To whom do you leave us to be slaves? To whom do you hand over the affection of our marriage? Who, do you suppose, will be the lords of these infants, and the most greedy invaders of your houses? Who will be the seizers of your household? Or who will divide among themselves the household servants whom you have raised? Alas, with what iron, alas, with what impious kind of cruelty do you despise your parents, spurn your friends, cast off your wives, disown your sons, and offer yourselves willingly to the executioner!

St. Sebastian strengthens those who are wavering.

Meanwhile, while these things were being said and reported, amid the tears of the wives and the sighs of the children, the soldiers of Christ began to soften, and to bend their spirits toward grief. At this spectacle, as we have said above, St. Sebastian was present, a man in every way most Christian, whom the military garb concealed, and whose appearance the cloak overshadowed. But when he saw the athletes of God being wearied by the immense weight of the struggle, casting himself into their midst, he said: O most valiant soldiers of Christ, O most well-trained warriors of the divine battle, by excessive strength of soul you have valiantly arrived at the palm, and now, for the sake of wretched flatteries, do you lay down the everlasting crown? Let the fortitude of Christ's soldiers now learn from you to be armed rather with faith than with iron.

Do not, through the flatteries of women, cast away the insignia of your victories, nor loosen the neck of the conquered enemy, subjected under your feet, for renewed and revived wars—an enemy whose hostility, however savage and most unjust it was against you, becomes fiercer still when its anger is renewed. Raise up, therefore, from earthly affections the glorious trophy of your struggle, and do not lose it through the tears of little children.

These whom you see weeping would rejoice today if they could know what you know; for they think that this life is the only one, and that if it comes to an end, no portion of the living soul, once the body has failed, can remain. For if they knew that there is another life, unacquainted with death, ignorant of sorrow, in which immortality reigns and everlasting joys abide, surely they would hasten with you to attain to it, and, reckoning this life as nothing, would seek that life which abides in exultation and knows not how to be ended at all. For this life is fugitive and so unfaithful that it has not been able to keep faith even with its own lovers. From the beginning of the world it has deceived those who trusted in it, has cheated all who waited upon it, has mocked all who presumed upon it, and has rendered nothing at all certain, so that it is proved to all to have lied.

And would that it were guilty only of the fault of falsehood, and did not compel its lovers to run through every crime. It gives gluttony to the gluttonous, it inflicts drunkenness upon the drunken, it brings shipwreck of modesty to adulterers, it hands over an execrable perversity to the incestuous; it prompts the thief to plunder, the wrathful to rage, the liar to deceive. It sows divorces among spouses, discords among friends, lawsuits among the peaceable, injustice among the just, scandals among brothers. It takes justice from judges, chastity from the chaste, skill from craftsmen; it takes discipline from morals. And, to recall the higher crimes which it heaps upon its lovers: if ever a brother has killed his own brother, if a son has slain his father, if a friend has been done away with by a friend—by whose instigation were these crimes committed, at whose prompting, in whose hope, on whose confidence were these unspeakable deeds done?

Do they not commit these things seduced by love of the present life, and, while they love it more than is just, pursue men with unjust hatred? For why does the pirate slay the sailor, why does the robber destroy the traveler, the rich man oppress the poor, the proud oppress the humble, and every wrongdoer weigh down whatever innocent person he can? They do these evils because they desire to serve this life, and imagine that in the love of it they endure through longer stretches of time. Crimes, therefore, arise for no other cause than that this most unhappy carnal life might be served by carnal men.

It is this life, finally, which commands them crimes, orders wicked deeds, urges injustices; and after it has been glutted with every cruelty and every filthiness, it hands those who serve it over to its own daughter, that is, to perpetual death. For from this very life, and from its womb, eternal death was born, at the time when the first humans served their palate, and their lust, and the delights of their eyes; and so they who had been made for eternal life were cast down here into this region of death: hence they were rolled down again to hell, carrying with them nothing but their sins. This, then, is the life which deceives you, O dearest friends, that with unjust counsel you would recall your friends, going toward eternal life, back again.

The punishments of hell, and the joys of heaven, impressed upon the minds of the martyrs.

It is this life that urges you, O most holy parents, to call back with most foolish lamentations your sons who are setting out for the company of heaven, for incorruptible honor, for the friendship of the eternal Emperor. It is this life which, under the color of piety, has made you, O most chaste wives of the Blessed, deliver impiety into the minds of the martyrs, and bring death under the guise of deliverance. For if they had consented to your recalling, they could indeed have been with you for a little time; but afterward they would have had to be separated, and would have had to be separated from you in such a way that you would never see one another except amid perpetual torments; where the devouring flame consumes the souls of unbelievers, where dragons devour the lips of blasphemers, where serpents feed with their bites upon the breasts of unbelievers. There howling and groaning resound, and confused clamor, which the violence of torments stirs up and the burning of the fire wrings forth.

This tribulation itself, moreover, which will there receive the unfaithful, is bounded by no term, is enclosed by no end; nor is it even consumed after the burning of the fierce flames, but he who has been burned is restored again for renewed fires.

Therefore permit these men to escape this punishment, and take thought to rescue yourselves also. Permit them meanwhile to attain the crown appointed for them. Do not fear; for they will not be separated from you, but they will go before to prepare for you starry mansions in heaven, in which you may remain together with them and with your children in perpetual joy. But if your houses built of stone delight you, how much more ought the beauty of those houses to invite you where there are dining-halls gleaming with pure gold, which have chambers furnished with gems and pearls? There the purple flower of roses never withers; there flowering groves are ever green with perpetual verdure; there fresh meadows ever flow with rivers of honey; there the grasses are fragrant with saffron-colored flowers, and the breathing fields abound with most pleasant odors. There breezes possessing eternal life breathe a nectar-like fragrance upon the nostrils. There light shines without the sun's ray, and serenity is without cloud, and the eyes enjoy day without nocturnal darkness.

There delights are hindered by no occupation, there security is disturbed by no anxiety at all; bellowing, wailing, groaning, lament and mourning have never there been heard nor named; something foul and deformed, dark, black, horrible, or sordid the eyes of its inhabitants have never at all seen there; but in the beauty of the pleasantness of the groves, in the splendor of the joyous air, and in comeliness and every elegance the open eyes enjoy without cessation; and nothing whatsoever that might disturb the mind is given to the ears. For there the instruments of hymns continually sound, which are sung by angels and archangels to the praise of the King. Bitterness and the harshness of gall have no place there: thunders have never been heard there, lightnings and flashes have never appeared. There shrubs bear cinnamon, and thickets pour forth balsam. The fragrance of the air spreads delight through all the members, and food there produces no excrement.

For just as the ears are fed by good news, and the nostrils by good scent, and the eyes by a good sight, and this refreshment cannot pass over into digestion; so there the refreshment which the mouth receives tastes honey-sweet to each one according to what he has been delighted by. Finally, whatever the soul desires is at once at the service of its desire, and a most ready effect serves all its delights.

For whoever in this mortal life has fought against his desires and against his pleasures, whoever has not spent them here, receives them there whole from his Creator. For He so created man that he should live: and He placed death next to the entrance of pleasure, so that those who wish to escape the fear of death might seek eternal life; and while they have learned that besides this life there is another, they might inquire whether it too can be cut short by old age or ended by death: and when they have recognized that it is immortal, they might inquire whether that very eternity can in turn either confer honor upon the just or bring punishment upon the unjust.

The use of wealth and of pleasures.

And when they have proved that this is specifically so, it remains for them to ask why riches were made by the Creator, if by His law they are to be despised; or why the variety of quadrupeds and birds and creeping things was made by the Creator, if each is to be renounced: why moreover that inborn delight, set deep in the marrow, was founded by the Creator Himself as an incitement to lust in bodies, if its use makes its author not only guilty but even hands him over to perpetual fires. It is asked then: Why were riches given by the Creator, if they are to be despised? We answer: These riches, made by the Creator, address, as it were, their lovers, saying: Love us in such a way that you may never be separated from us. We cannot follow you when you die; but we can go before you while you live, if only you command it.

The greedy money-lender and the covetous farmer—one hands over gold to a man that he may receive it doubled, the other commits various seeds to the earth, so that, if it can be, he may seek to receive a hundredfold what he handed over as a single measure: and the debtor returns gold doubled to his creditor, and the earth returns seed a hundredfold. O the shame of it! A debtor is able to return interest doubled to the money-lender; and the earth is able to restore to its farmer seeds a hundredfold; and can God, if He has received His riches from you, not return them to you increased?

You ask now: Why did He give me riches, if they are to be returned by me to Him? He handed them over to you, that you might know how great is the rest in them, how great the pleasure, how great the luxury, and how great the delights that can be, so that through these, having love together with your riches, you yourself might hand them over to be kept by our Lord Jesus Christ. But if you refuse to entrust them to Him, either the gluttony of the belly will invade them, or luxury, the mother of lusts, will snatch them from you, or without doubt—as you know very well—death, coming suddenly upon you, will so wrest them from you that you will foresee that you can neither have them any longer at all, nor see them.

If you were passing through the midst of barbarian battle-lines, and found a strong man who had always loved you, who had also given you a purse full of money, saying to you: Give me the money I gave you to keep, because these barbarians lie in wait to take it from you, and when they have taken it from you they will tear you apart with their swords—would you not fall at his feet and beg him to take it into his own keeping, being certain that he would return even more than he had received, and would free you yourself from your enemies? It remains now that you may have Christ as guardian of your riches.

Let us come to delights. He who has ears to hear will hear them saying to him: If you are truly our lovers, commend us to Him who will restore us to you whole and undiminished in that region where we may be able to remain with you forever: for in this life, if we should wish to occupy our service for you, since we shall have been already spent here, we shall there altogether deny you the office of our servitude. Allow us meanwhile to serve those who are dying, because for that reason the days of mortals have been shortened, so that we might continually serve the immortal. For it is written: For the sake of the elect the days will be shortened, so that our servitude may not be long. We serve the unjust indeed with hastening course: we serve the impious, the wicked, and the shameful, not of our own will, but on account of Him who subjected us.

Yet we shall be freed from the bondage of corruption, and shall be recalled to the liberty of the glory of the sons of God. Thus every delight, reserved for the future life, is not lost; for a treasure that has been hidden away is not thought by him who hid it in the earth to no longer exist; rather, the more secretly and safely he has placed it, the more securely he trusts that he possesses it.

Let therefore the abundance of all delights be reserved, so that they may not be touched in this life, which passes away: because if they are put to use here, in that life which never passes away they will be lost. Suppose this life were to extend for a hundred years' space—will it not, once the last day is past, immediately seem as though it had never been, and leave behind, like the memory of a guest who stayed with us for one day, mere traces? But that other life remains continually, and perseveres unceasingly, and even as the years pass grows young and flourishes, and takes its beginning of renewal from the very point where its end is received. O truly base and destitute of every good is he who is not seized by love of this so beautiful life!

Who fears to give up this life, which is destined to perish, and to receive that one which knows not at all how to perish, in which delights and pleasures and riches and joys so begin that they know no end; so take their beginning that they can by no means come to an end.

For whoever refuses to be a lover of this so glorious life, not only loses this one and does not attain to that one, but is even, as I have already said, seized and held by perpetual death; in which there is unceasing flame, unremitting affliction, and perpetual punishment; in which savage angels dwell, whose arms are the heads of dragons, whose eyes shoot forth fiery arrows from themselves; whose teeth project like an elephant's, and goad to torment like the tails of scorpions, whose voices sound like the roaring of lions, whose appearance strikes trembling and pain and death alike. And would that death could come upon those set in these anguishes! But what is more bitter, they live for this, that they may be governed by torments, they are restored to wholeness for this, that limbs eaten away by the bites of serpents may again and again, in bites repeated and renewed, be handled.

The happiness and glory of the martyrs.

This is the whole cause of the contest, which teaches that the punishments of martyrdom ought to be borne with patience. Do not, therefore, O friends, do not, O parents, do not, O venerable wives of the saints, call back those whom you love from life to death, lead them from joy to mourning, drag them from light to darkness, and summon them from eternal rest to everlasting punishments. This is to set, as it were, a hook for fish along with the devil, and to invite to a slight sweetness, in which is hidden within a torment of the inward parts, and death wrung out by inward torments. Is this not to prefer fleeting joys over the recompense of eternal delights; and, that they may laugh for a very little while, to hand them over to eternal weeping? This we all condemn in gladiators, who offer themselves of their own accord, who consider the pleasures of a single year, and do not consider what fruit arises from those very pleasures.

And they are tortured by the strokes of swords, or by mutual slaughter, the covering of the belly cut open, and the fat that unwise fattening had provided is brought forth before the eyes of the peoples, to be offered to the devil to devour. By this same counsel of the enemy, by which these men do these things, by this very counsel the Martyrs of God, acknowledged as such, are recalled to eternal life, who, that they may live a life of but a few days, are begged to undergo perpetual torments, and not to fear perpetual death, which is especially to be feared.

To this point you perhaps add this: Why does the Christian not fear torments, and why is he not terrified by the present punishment of the torturer? He is not broken by fear for this reason, he is not led by pain for this reason, because he knows that he buys the joy of perpetual health at the price of a single pain; and through momentary tribulation arrives at perpetual happiness and everlasting gladness. But if this pain is to be feared, the executioner is to be feared, and the new and elaborate cruelty of the torturer is also to be feared; which is more to be feared, which more horrible, which more to be fled from and guarded against—this pain which today boils up and tomorrow vanishes? This which today grows hot and tomorrow grows cold? This which is brought on within an hour and shut off within an hour? Or that pain which is closed by no end, is extinguished at no time, is consumed by no age whatsoever?

For this pain is either light, and can be tolerably endured; or it is heavy, and by a glorious contest offers a swift end; but that pain and torment of burning punishment, which is given to the lovers of this life, since it is more violent than every kind of torment, comes on never to be ended, and rages ever more fiercely than it began, and no limit of raging, no end whatsoever occurs, but having with it every kind of punishment, it is continually renewed that it may rage, is increased that it may torture, is inflamed that it may burn more fiercely.

Hence, therefore, let us exhort those whom we love to escape from this destruction; and let us ourselves prepare stoutly to escape it: nor let us fear to bear pain in the body for one hour, we who wish to rejoice forever with Christ; let us permit our soul to go forth from this body with the palm of martyrdom, that we may be able to escape eternal punishments, and to arrive at the starry possessions full of delights. Let us turn our tears into joy: because we ought not to mourn as for those about to die, those whom we believe are to reign with Christ. Let us congratulate the victors over the enemy, his neck trampled underfoot: let us rejoice together with those clothed in the robe of martyrdom, and let us glory that they have been made consuls of heaven. Behold the day on which the tyrant thought he would conquer, who, while he seizes, is seized; while he holds, is bound; while he tortures, is tortured; while he insults, is mocked; while he slaughters, is slain.

Now, therefore, let us also rouse our own affections in love of martyrdom; that we may boldly seize him who wished to win a victory over our captivity, and, as though roused from a heavy sleep, let us open the eyes of our souls, that seeing the pits which the enemy had prepared for our destruction, we ourselves, with God's help, may escape them, and, the devil himself with his satellites falling into the very pit which he had prepared, we may say with the prophet: They have dug a pit before my face, and have themselves fallen into it.

Therefore when the most blessed Sebastian, clothed in his cloak, girded with his belt, was uttering these words from his own mouth, suddenly, for nearly an hour, he was illumined by an exceeding brightness coming from heaven, and under that same brightness he was clothed in a most white robe by seven most radiant Angels, and a young man appeared beside him giving him peace, and saying: You shall be with me always.

Now these things were being done within the house of the Primiscrinius, named Nicostratus, with whom Marcellianus and Marcus were kept in custody. This Nicostratus had a wife, named Zoe: she, six years before, through excess of illness had become mute, yet she had not lost the faculty of hearing and understanding, but rather retained the office of the ears better than she had had before. She, therefore, when she had understood all that Blessed Sebastian had said, and had seen so great a light around him; and when all were held trembling in the stupor of the miracle, she was signalling with her hand to all, as if they were to be reproached who did not believe so evident a testimony, and, cast down at his knees, she began to entreat him by signs of her hands.

But St. Sebastian, when he saw that she could not declare the secrets of her heart by the expression of her tongue, having inquired the reasons of this silence, learned that the fullness of speech had been taken from her by the excessive force of her infirmity. Then Blessed Sebastian said: If I am a true servant of Christ, and if all things which this woman heard from my mouth and believed are true, may my Lord Jesus Christ command that the office of the tongue return to her, and may He who opened the mouth of Zacharias His prophet open her mouth also; and he made the sign of the cross upon her mouth. And at this word of St. Sebastian, the woman cried out with a loud voice, saying: Blessed art thou, and blessed is the word of thy mouth: and blessed are they who through thee believe in Christ the Son of the living God.

For I saw with my own eyes an angel coming to thee from heaven, and holding a book before thine eyes, from the reading of which the whole course of thy speech flowed. Blessed are they who believe in all that thou hast spoken, and cursed are they who shall have doubted even one word of all these things which they have heard: for as the dawn coming on shuts out all the darkness of the night and restores to the eyes of all the light which blind night had denied, so the light of thy words has wiped away all gloom and all the blindness of ignorance, and has restored to the eyes of those rightly believing a serene day after the darkness of night: and from me it has not only shut out the darkness of unbelief, but has also opened the door of my speech, which for six years had been closed.

But Nicostratus, her husband, seeing that so great a virtue of Christ had been celebrated in his wife, began to cast himself at their feet, and to beg forgiveness for having held the Saints of God in bonds by imperial and prefectorial command: and taking off the iron fetters from their hands, embracing their knees, he began to beg that they would deign to depart, saying: O how blessed I should be if I could deserve to be bound for your salvation! Perhaps by the shedding of my blood I might be washed clean, that I might escape that death of eternal punishments, and attain to that life which God has deigned to make manifest to us through the mouth of my lord Sebastian.

And when he was asking Marcellianus and Marcus to depart, they said to him: If thou hast received the glory of faith, which thou never hadst before; how, forsaking the faith which we have always had from infancy, should we give to thee the cup of our passion, which we can offer thee to drink, but not give away? For Christ is rich in all things, and by the abundant overflow of His generosity bestows better things on all who come than is asked of Him. For if, when you were unbelievers, the light was given to you to recognize the truth; how much more, now that you believe, will all things whatsoever you now ask be granted to you? For the divine clemency is always ready to bestow gifts freely upon all of you: and it multiplies to each the gift of its grace in proportion as his mind has received the rule of a higher faith.

Your faith, therefore, took its beginning from teaching, and you have received in the space of one hour all that long years of training scarcely confer. No memory of parents hinders you from believing. No affection nourished from tender age toward your children calls you back. You suddenly despise what you always loved, and seek what you never knew. Having entered by unknown paths, you have suddenly arrived at Christ, and in spirit you have already entered heaven, because on earth you have sought no consolation. O incomparable proclamation of the deed! O how imitable an example of virtue! Not yet has the water of sacred baptism brought you to Christ, not yet through the beginnings of military service have you even taken the soldier's standards; and already for the true King you seize arms, and, loosing His soldiers from the bond of iron, you desire yourselves, undaunted, to be slain instead of those who were to be slain.

When all, hearing these things, showed together with tears repentance of their past persuasion, Marcus said: Learn, dearest parents, and let your conjugal affection, O spouses, learn, to set against the diabolical battle, and against all the arrows of the desires of carnal longing, the shield of the virtues, and, amid the battle-lines of the tyrant's army, not to yield to the enemy, to fight the more fiercely, to hold one's ground, and to come bravely to the King. Let the satellites of demons rise up as much as they will, and rage, and mangle our bodies with whatever punishments they will; they can kill the body, but they cannot conquer the soul that fights for the truth of the faith.

Wounds received for the Emperor make soldiers more glorious: for in this the devil now rages with the fury of his tyranny, in which he foresees that he may be tormented by the trophy of your perseverance: and therefore he inflicts torments, lest his hope perish: he threatens death, that he may terrify; he promises life, that he may snatch away; he pledges security, that he may take it away. This is the whole cunning of the war, this the counsel of fraud, to snatch the body from punishments and to subjugate the soul to vices. Let us, on the contrary, strive not to yield to the enemy, to despise the body, to succor the soul. For why should the bravest commanders turn their backs to the most wretched soldiers, and fail in that war in which they can be victors? Or for what reason should they fear to die, who know that this is the nature of man, not a punishment?

Why, I say, should they fear to die, who believe that this life is false, and that the true life cannot be found, except by him who has cast away from his mind this false and fleeting life, which commands nothing else to its lovers but sins, urges crimes, brings on guilty deeds; and requires nothing else of its lovers, except that they think not at all of eternal life, and despair that the kingdom of God shall be?

Now let us see to what mishaps this handmaid is subject, and to what dangers she is enslaved, so that when we have proved that she cannot even govern herself, taking away our service from her dominion, we may seek another whom it is right to serve. For how many of her lovers has sudden ruin crushed heavily, thunder from heaven struck down, lightning burned, shipwrecks destroyed, the abyss covered, Charybdis swallowed, the sword slain! And these wretched ones, losing this life with sorrows, cannot at all find that other life! For to that life it is not torture that leads, but the cause. In one and the same kind of punishment, indeed, eternal salvation is conferred on the innocent, and punishment is inflicted on the guilty.

Therefore, as Marcus pursued these and similar things, all who were present began to give thanks to God, and all, weeping, showed repentance, because they had preferred the love of the flesh to the charity of God; and because they had dared to call back the minds of the saints from the contest of martyrdom. And when all who had come to deceive the saints believed with one accord in Christ, Nicostratus with his wife pressed himself, saying: I will take neither food nor drink, unless the mystery of the Christian religion be delivered to me. To whom St. Sebastian said: Change thy dignity, and begin to be rather Christ's Primiscrinius than the prefect's. Hear, then, my counsel, and gather into one all whom the prison holds enclosed, whom chains hold, whom the workhouses wear down. When thou hast done this, I will bring in the bishop of the sacrosanct law, that with all who shall be willing to believe thou mayest receive the sacrament of the mystery.

For if the devil has attempted, and attempts, to take his saints away from Christ, how much more ought we, by the proof of piety, to take care of those whom the devil has unjustly gained, and restore them to their Creator? And Nicostratus answered to this, saying: How can holy things be committed to the wicked and the guilty? St. Sebastian said: Our Savior for the sake of sinners deigned to show us His presence, and revealed the mystery through which all sins and crimes are taken away from man, and all the virtues of the Lord are conferred. Therefore, among the beginnings of thy conversion, if thou shalt confer this gift first upon Christ, the reward of His recompense will be ready over thee, the crown of martyrdom, having with it the unfading flowers of all the virtues, profitable for the joys of eternal life.

Hearing this, Nicostratus the Primiscrinius went to Claudius the Commentariensis, and ordered all the persons to be brought to his house, saying: Since at the next session all are to be examined, I wish that, along with those Christians who are with me, they be present, lest any person be lacking to the prefect's examination.

Therefore, when all had been brought and stood at the house of the Primiscrinius, bound with the fastenings of chains, the man of God Sebastian addressed them in this manner: If diabolical crimes yield to divine powers, your guilt is excluded from death, and is called back from fugitive joys. For the unjust enemy had wrought through his satellites, that he might overthrow the minds of Christ's soldiers, raised to the summit of virtues, and, placed at the very pinnacle of perfection, might attempt to plunge them into the mire of hell. For this cause the mind of the enemies grew hot, provoked to battle, that we, taking you, whom the enemy had already won, out of his captivity, might restore you to your Creator. For the devil is known to be neither your lord, nor creator, nor father: but God is proved to be Father and Lord and Founder.

And if, forsaking Him, you went off to that one, who has shown himself so much your enemy as to bring you to the punishments of perpetual death, and to make you come to that deadly end; how much more ought you to return to Him who delivered up His only Son to Passion and death, that He might free us from eternal sufferings and from perpetual death? When St. Sebastian pursued these and similar things, all prostrated themselves with tears, and, bending the knee, began to render the groan of the heart, and to cry out with the voices of penitence that they had sinned and acted impiously. They poured out, then, bitter tears, and with unanimous voices resounded that they wished to believe in Christ. Then Blessed Sebastian ordered them all to be loosed from the bonds of their chains.

After these things St. Sebastian went to Polycarp the priest, where he was hidden by reason of the persecution, and told him all that had been done. When he had heard these things, St. Polycarp gave thanks to God, and came together with him to the house of Nicostratus the Primiscrinius, and, seeing the crowds of believers, greeting them with all joy, he said: Blessed are all you, who have heard the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ saying: Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is sweet, and my burden light.

You, then, our brethren, whom the water of baptism has not yet washed, and made dearest sons to be consecrated to Almighty God, for this—that you attempted to call back from their holy purpose the most blessed soldiers of Christ—penitence would have been needful for you, that through it you might come to indulgence. But now, because you have come to such glory that even to that passion from which you sorrowfully wished to recall others, you now desire gladly to run and willingly to embrace, know that you have arrived both at indulgence and at the reaching of the palm. This is an old craft of Christ's.

For he himself, whom He deigned to make a vessel of His election and willed to give as teacher to the nations, who not only called back the minds of the faithful from the purpose of piety, but even stoned with stones those who wished to depart from Christ—this man the Lord Himself granted to us as an apostle, and gave us Paul from Saul, made an apostle from an apostate, and gave to His Church a teacher from a persecutor. He who had been the author of persecution became a lover of the Passion: and he who before rejoiced in the afflictions of others, afterward rejoiced in his own persecutions. He, therefore, who then exercised that virtue in His apostle, He also now has snatched the captivity of your souls out of that very chamber of hell, and out of the very jaws of the dragons, and has now, as you return from darkness to light, thrown open to you the gates of eternal life.

Since, therefore, all the demons, who are the children of darkness, are grieved, whence also all the holy angels, who are children of light, rejoice; let each one of you come forward, and give his name, that on this present day, the fast running on till evening, the festive sacrament of baptism may find its fitting time. For it is right that, as light departs from the mortal world, it should come to our immortal minds, so that we who in this age have been wallowing in the mire of darkness, washed and cleansed by the water of sanctification, and clothed in sincerity, may go forth eagerly to Christ. As St. Polycarp pursued these and similar things, all rejoiced, and each one hastened to offer his name before he was asked.

Returning therefore to his own house, Nicostratus, before he entered his house, related everything to Claudius the commentariensis, and how St. Sebastian, though he is a friend of the emperors, is a most Christian man, and perfected in divine learning; and how by his exhortation he had called back the souls of Christians, and how he had taught by sufficiently fitting reasoning that this life is fugitive and imaginary, and that thus, while it is thought to be held fast, it is taken away. He related also how a light suddenly coming from heaven had shone about him, and how he had made his wife, who had been mute for six years, speak.

When Nicostratus had related these things to Claudius, Claudius fell down at the feet of Nicostratus, saying: Since my wife's death I have two sons, of whom one is wasted with the disease of dropsy, the other is oppressed with various wounds; I beg that you order them to be visited. For I do not doubt that he who was able to bring it about that after six years your wife should speak, will bring it about, if he wills, that health may return to my sons. And saying this he hurried to his own house, and had his two sons brought by hand, and bringing them into the house where the saints of God were, he threw them down before their feet, saying: No signs of doubt whatsoever remain in my heart; but believing with my whole heart that Christ, whom you worship, is himself the true God, I have brought here to you my two offshoots, believing that through you they could be freed from the peril of death.

And all the saints of God said together: All whom any infirmity holds here today shall be healed as soon as they have been made Christians.

And when Claudius cried out that he believed and desired to become a Christian, St. Polycarp ordered that each should give his name. And so first of all Tranquillinus, father of Marcellianus and Marcus, gave his name. After him their six friends, that is, Ariston, Crescentianus, Eutychianus, Urbanus, Vitalis, and Justus; after these Nicostratus the primiscrinius, and Castorius his brother, and Claudius the commentariensis. After these the sons of Claudius, Felicissimus and Felix. After these Marcia, mother of Marcellianus and Marcus, with their wives and children: and together with them Symphorosa the wife of Claudius, and Zoe the wife of Nicostratus. After these the whole household that was in the house of Nicostratus, thirty-three souls of mixed sex and age, then all who had been bound and had been brought out of the squalor of the prison, sixteen souls.

Therefore all these sixty-eight were baptized by St. Polycarp the priest, and received by St. Sebastian; and Beatrix and Lucina became godmothers of the women. First then the sons of Claudius, one dropsical and the other full of wounds, as soon as he had immersed them in the name of the Holy Trinity; thus they were lifted up sound from the font, so that no sign of any former disease remained in them. After these little ones came Tranquillinus, father of Sts. Marcellianus and Marcus, who had been so constricted by the pain of gout and chiragra that, as was said above, he was scarcely able to be carried in the hands of others. As they were undressing him, and he said that he was tormented by intolerable pain, Polycarp the priest asked him, saying: Tranquillinus, if you believe with your whole heart that the only-begotten Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, can confer salvation upon you and grant pardon for all your sins, declare it with your own mouth.

Tranquillinus answered: I both desire and believe that pardon alone is given to my sins. Moreover, even if after the sanctification of this baptism I should be in pain, I shall no longer be able to doubt concerning the faith of Christ; for I have tested it and, believing with my whole heart, have consented in my mind, that the Son of God is the Lord Jesus Christ, who can grant salvation both to souls and to bodies, and can recall from eternal death to everlasting life. When he had said this in a loud voice, all the saints shed tears for joy, and asked the Lord that the fruit of his faith might be shown.

Then holy Polycarp, confessor and priest, as soon as he had anointed him with the oil of chrism, asked him again whether he believed in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; as soon as he answered, I believe, his hands, which had been knotted, were loosed, and likewise his knees and the soles of his feet were restored so sound that, as if a little boy with renewed feet, he went down into the font crying out and saying: You are the one and true God, whom this wretched world does not know.

When he had been baptized in this order, all in turn, as was fitting, were baptized, and for the ten days* that remained of the delay which they had obtained, persisting in the praises of God, they spent their days and nights in hymns and songs, and, like faithful soldiers, prepared their minds to fight for the name of Christ, about to do battle in martyrdom, so that even in the women and little children the love of martyrdom burned, and they mutually prepared one another for the confession of the holy name against the diabolical battle-lines.

The errors of the Gentiles refuted by Tranquillinus before Chromatius, prefect of the City.

When the days of the granted delay were completed, Agrestius Chromatius, prefect of the city of Rome, ordered Tranquillinus, father of Marcellianus and Marcus, to come to him. When he inquired of him concerning the disposition of his sons, Tranquillinus answered: No speech of my mouth suffices to render thanks for your kindnesses. For unless the reins of your moderation had held back the sentences that were running their course, I would both have lost my sons, and my sons would have had no father. All whom paternal affection holds and the sting of love pierces congratulate me; and I believe that your highness too rejoices with me, when life has been granted to those about to die, and joy restored to the grieving, and security to the anxious.

Then the prefect, thinking that he wished his sons to bend their necks to the idols, said: On the coming day then let your sons render the incense owed to the divinities: through this both may you continue safe for your sons, and may your sons be pardoned for your sake. Hearing this, Tranquillinus said: Most illustrious of men, if you should wish to weigh the balance of your judgment toward me and my sons with an even scale, you will be able to recognize that this name of Christian is of great power. The prefect said: You are mad, Tranquillinus. Tranquillinus answered: I suffered madness, both of soul and of body; but as soon as I believed in Christ, I received health both of soul and of body.

The prefect said: I see, as it seems, that I am known to have granted a delay to your wicked sons for this purpose, that not only would you not draw them from their error, but they would entangle you in their errors. Tranquillinus said: By your glory, examine the very word "error," and see what works are called by the name of error. The prefect said: You tell what works receive the name of error. Tranquillinus said: The first error is to leave the way of life, and to walk gladly by the way of death. The prefect said: And what is the way of death? Tranquillinus said: Does it not seem to you the way of death, to impose the name of Deity upon dead men, and to worship their images made of wood and stone?

The prefect said: Then are the gods we worship not gods? Tranquillinus said: So far are they not gods that it is read in public records how ill-born they were, and what wicked and cruel and criminal parents they had; and how iniquitously and deceitfully and fraudulently they lived; and how miserably they died. Was not God in the heavens before Saturn ruled over the Cretans and ate the flesh of his own sons, or did the island of Crete have a king while the heavens had no God? He greatly errs who thinks that Jupiter, his son, commands the thunderbolts—a mere little man in whom malice and lust reigned. Whom did he not persecute, who did not spare his own father? Or what filth did he not commit, who took his own sister as wife?

In the forum, in the streets, in the houses, and in every place we daily read that the most sordid Juno boasts that she is both sister and wife; and the most base and most incestuous honor of the ravished Ganymede is not denied even by those by whom Jupiter is worshiped. You do not err, then, most exalted sir, who worship such beings as the Roman laws order to be condemned according to the quality of their deeds, and, having forsaken the omnipotent God who reigns in the heavens, say to a stone: You are my God, and to wood: Help me?

The prefect said: From the time you began to blaspheme the gods and withdraw from their worship, from that time the Roman world has been oppressed by various disasters. Tranquillinus answered: That is not true. For if you review the decades set forth by the pen of Livy, you will find there that while men were offering incense to Jupiter, twenty-three thousand young men of the Roman army fell in a single day. Nor are you unmindful that the Senonian Gauls even occupied the Capitol and subjected the whole Roman force to their mockeries. Various famines, and untellable plagues, various captivities, various sheddings of blood the Roman world suffered, before men worshiped the one God. But now, from the time the invisible and true God began to be worshiped by believers, the Roman empire exults in increased peace. But what is worse, the God who grants this is not acknowledged; rather, whatever is granted by the Creator is ascribed to his creature.

The prefect said: If he is to be worshiped who provides something for human advantage, none but the sun will be held a god, who by his gaze quickens the bowels of the earth, so that it brings to birth the seeds it has received, and restores in the stalk the grains of its native offspring, and grants to all the benefits of our welfare alike light and renewal and vigor. Tranquillinus answered: And in this there is boundless error. For if today someone should give to his clients through his servant what is asked of him, it would be boundless folly if the one who granted it were neglected, and the servant through whom it was granted were honored instead. And to give some comparison of this saying: when ships bring provisions to the Romans, are thanks rendered rather to the ships than to the kings?

If then men ascribe what is supplied to them not to those who sail but to those who command, how much more should thanks be given to God alone, at whose nod these elements serve all our uses, and the sun itself daily is closed at the end of the day over land and sea alike, and again is opened at the renewal of the day?

The incarnation of the Word explained to the Gentile.

The prefect said: If then he whom you worship is one and invisible, do you not worship Christ, whom the Jews crucified? Tranquillinus said: You would inquire into this rightly, if you resolved to believe. For to unbelievers everything they do not wish seems vain. For once the will of mortals has declined into a headlong course, it desires that everything it disparages should be disparaged, and it wishes that everything it praises should be praised by all. But the wise man strives to bestow, according to its merit, either his disparagement or his praise upon any matter whatsoever. The prefect said: I am asking you about your Christ. For if that is worshiped by you which is not seen by these eyes, do you not worship Christ, who was both seen and heard and questioned, and of whom all things that pertain to human frailty are read as fulfilled in his passion?

Tranquillinus said: Hear a comparison and understand the truth: For example, if today you should see your ring bearing a precious gem lying in a sewer, or wallowing in a dungheap, and you should send your servants to draw it out; but they were unable to free it, but even in trying to snatch it out, defiled themselves in some way; but afterward you yourself, laying aside these silken garments you are wearing, put on a servant's tunic and, going down into the sewer, put your hands into the filth, and with your own hands bring forth both the golden ring and the gem together, you invite all your friends to a feast for joy, and you rejoice over the ring and the gem, that they have been freed from such great filth. The prefect said: To what likeness have you brought forward this proposition? Tranquillinus answered: To show you that we worship one invisible God. The prefect said: And what is the gold? Or what is the gem, which was wallowing in the dungheap?

Tranquillinus answered: The gold is the human body, and the gem is the soul, which is enclosed within that body. The body and the soul together make one man, just as gold and gem are proven to make one ring. But however precious the ring may be to you, man is far more precious a hundredfold, and dear to Christ. You sent your servants to snatch the ring out of the filth, and by no means were they able to draw it out. God also sent his prophets, speaking to them from heaven, that he might snatch the human race out of the filth of this world; and by no means at all, nor by any effort, were they able to accomplish this. You laid aside your golden garments, and, clothed in a servant's garment, went down for thence they were led away for a price, and soon expelled by Camillus.

You sent down into the sewer, and put your hands into the filth, that you might free the ring from the filth: so the majesty of His Divinity also stripped itself of its splendor, yet not forsaking the things above; and it clothed itself with the servile garment of our body, and descending from heaven hither into the sewer of this world, sent forth its hands into the filth of our passions, and taking upon Himself the suffering which was owed to our deserts, restored us to the glory of His own fingers. For we who through unbelief were wallowing in the filth of the world, washed from our defilements through faith, have been restored by divine hands, as that ring of yours was. Could not your servants, who denied you their lord, when they beheld you in servile garb, have been killed as rebels? So too those who deny Christ their Lord, because He emptied Himself of majesty and took the form of a servant, will in no way be able to escape the punishments of eternal fire.

Therefore at last the wave of the eternal fountain comes to the aid of us who believe in Him, that the eternal fire may be conquered by the eternal fountain, and unbelief be overcome by faith.

The prefect said: As I see, you have not proved that you sought a delay in order to draw your sons away from this purpose, but that you might bring to our tribunal these old wives' tales which you had premeditated. Tranquillinus said: The disciples of Christ do not premeditate what they shall say in the sight of judges. For thus He forewarned, saying: When they shall deliver you up to the powers of this world for my name's sake, take no thought how or what you shall speak, for it shall be given you in that hour by divine gift what you shall speak. For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of God, who speaks in you. Therefore not by premeditation but by believing did I find my Creator, and I who was contracted and shaken by the pain of gout and chiragra, as soon as I believed in Christ, received health in all my members like a little child.

It is settled therefore in my mind that He created me who deigned to renew me, and just as He gave restoration to the body, so also He has promised to give it to the soul after this life, provided only I am not broken, doubtful or timid, by the terrors of men; but persevering in the confession of His name, may I keep whole the faith which God made me find.

The prefect said: Do you not know, Tranquillinus, how great a wrath of the most invincible princes rages against the Christians, and therefore, as though secure, you pursue what seems good to you without fear? Tranquillinus said: It is a foolish fear by which human indignation is feared more than the divine. If we should come into the midst of barking dogs, and they in vain fury should begin to worry us with their bites, could they take from our mind this, that we are rational men, while they are dogs, both irrational and mad? So those who are angry with us who believe rightly can indeed rage, and inflict unjust punishments; yet they will never be able to remove from our heart this, that we believe the Lord Jesus Christ to be Creator, and rejoice that He is our redeemer and restorer. Then the prefect ordered him to be received back from the Records-office, saying: I will hear you at the next session.

Chromatius, prefect of the City, is catechized.

After this he sent and ordered him to be brought to him secretly by night, and offering him an unlimited weight of gold, said: Show me the medicine by which you recovered your health. Tranquillinus said to him: Know that a great wrath and fury of God will fall upon those who think His grace either to be sold or bought. Wherefore if you wish to be freed from the pain of gout, believe that Christ is the Son of God, and you shall be freed, and just as you see me today, so shall you be well. Indeed I was scarcely carried by others' hands, and for eleven years, bound by the knots of pains through all the joints of the nerves in my body, my bread was scarcely brought to my mouth by others' hands: as soon as I believed that Christ is the true God, I received the joys of my health, and I am whole, because I have recognized the true God as my savior.

Then the prefect dismissed him saying: Bring to me him who made you a Christian, that if he shall promise me health, I too may be able to become a Christian. And immediately Tranquillinus, coming to St. Polycarp the presbyter, told him all that had been done and said; and leading him secretly into the house, presented him to the prefect's sight. The prefect said to him: Although the grievous punishment of the princes is hostile to Christians, yet in hope of recovering health I will bring to you whatever it is, up to half the goods of my patrimony, if the limbs of my body shall be released from this knottiness of tumors. Then St. Polycarp, smiling, said: The Lord Jesus Christ is able to open the doors of your ignorance, and show you that He Himself is the restorer of your body. For money, whether those who bring it or those who receive it when offered, not only confer no medicine on the suffering, but even take upon themselves an incurable disease.

The prefect said to him: Tell me then what I should do, that I may be able to obtain what I hope for. Polycarp said to him: If you shall believe with your whole heart, as Tranquillinus believed, you shall be saved. The prefect said to him: Explain to me in what order I ought to believe. Then St. Polycarp catechized him, and instructed him to fast for three days. And calling St. Sebastian to himself, he fasted with him three days and three nights: and together with tears they prayed, that the Lord would declare the faith of His name unto the salvation of the one willing to believe.

The idols of Chromatius are broken.

When therefore the third day, which had been appointed, arrived, they came together hastening to the house of the waiting prefect. Entering, they said: Peace to you from God. But he greeted them back most graciously; and invited them to sit beside him, and said: From the mouth of Tranquillinus a reasoning went forth which the testimony of my own eyes confirms. For I see him wholly sound whom I had seen contracted by the pain of gout and chiragra. Inquiring from him what kind of medicine he had been saved by, I received this answer from him: While I placed my faith in idols, I was made weak and contracted by exceeding great infirmity: but when I learned of one God in heaven through the showing of the Christians, I renounced all that I had worshipped without cause, and delivered the faith of my mind to Christ.

Then as soon as I confessed that one true God reigns in the heavens, immediately all the health which I had lost for eleven years returned to me, and all infirmity was at once removed from me. These things I have heard with my ears, proved with my eyes, believed with my heart; it remains that you do for me what you did for Tranquillinus, that I may be able to receive the health of my body.

Polycarp the presbyter said: If the passing pains of the body of man cannot be endured, what will happen concerning those pains to which no end ever comes, no relief at all is given? For these pains bear the image of those pains, and as much as the distance between a living fire and its painted image, so much is the distance between the pains which the body now suffers, and those which the soul is about to suffer, if, ignorant of its Creator, it shall have fulfilled the task of this present life. Come then, be concerned with us first about those pains, and be solicitous about that punishment which has fire ever burning, and a worm ever devouring.

Then Chromatius, prefect of the city of Rome, together with his only son Tiburtius, gave his name, saying: In this matter it is fitting that you be assured of my faith, in which I desire that my son also become a Christian with me. St. Sebastian said: See that you do not hope to become a Christian led by the mere recovery of your body, but rather, by hope of eternal life, make your mind pure to see the reason of the truth. For unless you shall recognize who is your Creator, you will not be able to find the salvation you seek. Chromatius said: Do we not see then that rustics and the simplest of men are Christians, so that among a thousand men you would scarcely find one who could attain even the discipline of speech? Have all these been able to attain to this inquiry while becoming Christians? St. Sebastian said: This answer of yours confirms the assertion of our side.

For from the beginning of the world God had dealings with tillers of the soil and shepherds of sheep, and coming near the end of the world He chose not grammarians and orators, but fishermen and simple men, and to them He delivered the knowledge of Himself.

Chromatius said: Why then do you say that I ought first to know who my creator is, whom unless I recognize I cannot find salvation? St. Sebastian said: Because you have worshipped many gods and many goddesses. Unless therefore you exclude these from your heart, and break their images, and come to know the one and true God, you will not be able to find life and salvation. Chromatius said: Show me then who is the one and true God. St. Sebastian answered: If you send your servant to draw water, when he comes to the fountain, he first looks whether any filth lies hidden within the jar, and does not dare to put water in the vessel unless he sees it cleansed of filth; how shall we be able to deliver to you the fountain of truth, unless you first make yourself a stranger to all the filth and squalor of idols? Chromatius said: In what manner can I become estranged from these?

St. Sebastian said: Give us power that we may break in pieces whatever stone idols we find in your house, burn the wooden ones, melt down the gold, silver, or bronze ones, and distribute their value to the needy. Chromatius said: And when you have done this, what benefit will come to me? St. Sebastian said: You will at once obtain health of all your sinews, by whose knottiness you are now bound; and as one who has never suffered pain, so will you begin to run on your feet, and to recognize that you have loved gods who are enemies of your salvation; but that this is your true parent, who, as soon as you find knowledge and worship of Him, restores and saves you.

Chromatius said: Do not lower yourselves to this indignity; but I will command my servants, and they will break everything. St. Sebastian said: If weak, timid, and unbelieving men break them, the devil will find, through some negligence of theirs, an occasion to harm them, and as soon as they are harmed, the unbelievers will say that they were harmed because they broke the idols. For unless one has a breastplate, one is not saved from the blows of arrows. A skilled hand in battle uses helmet and shield and spear, that from the protection of arms and the force of striking it may take courage, and not turn its back. Likewise the soldiers of God, who are fortified with the shield of faith, and protected by the breastplate of Christ's covering, having the helmet of faith and salvation, it is safe for them to enter the contest.

For they fight most fiercely and conquer bravely, because against the invisible enemy they battle untiringly day and night; and they are covered in all their members, armed with faith rather than with iron. Chromatius said: Let the will of God and yours be done. Then St. Polycarp the presbyter, and blessed Sebastian, girding themselves, prayed; and after prayer, breaking more than two hundred images of idols, they began to give thanks to their God.

After this they came to Chromatius, saying to him: When we had broken the idols, you ought to have received health, unless perhaps some signs of unbelief still remain in your mind. For we hold this as certain among us, that either there is something which has not yet been broken; or if all has been broken, then whatever you bear in your mind, make it more clearly manifest to us. Then he said: I have a chamber wholly of glass, in which the whole discipline of the stars and mechanical astrology has been constructed with art, in the making of which my father Tarquinius is known to have spent more than two hundred pounds of gold. St. Sebastian said to him: If you wish to keep this intact, you break yourself. Chromatius said: Why so? Are astrology and the ephemeris cultivated by any use of sacrifices, seeing that by them only the course of months and years is marked out by a fixed number through spaces of hours?

And is the fullness or waning of the lunar globe foreseen by the movement of the fingers, by the mastery of reason, and by the computation of reckoning? St. Polycarp the presbyter said: There are the signs of Leo, and Capricorn, and Sagittarius, and Scorpio, and Taurus; there the moon is in Aries, the hour in Cancer; the star in Jupiter, the tropic in Mercury, Mars in Venus, and in all these monstrous demons an art hostile to God is recognized. Christians refuse these things so utterly, that not only do they themselves not possess, worship, believe, or hold them; but they do not even have any regard for those minds which occupy their breast with trifles of this kind? For all these things are false and instruments of deception: in them is the likeness of truth, not truth itself.

Chromatius said to him: What of this, that sometimes they foretell future things? St. Sebastian said: We have learned, by Christ's revealing, that all these things are utterly vain and false; which we shall now more clearly disclose to you. Bid the teacher of astrology come to you today, to whom you may say that at such a time you labored under harsh mishaps, and inquire through which stars this evil befell you; his answers will without doubt be such as these: that your time was undertaken under malicious Mars, or that Saturn was apocatastic, or that your year was taken from the diametric point, or that the climacteric points were born in the center for you, or that it was joined with an evil star, or invisible, or in a certain configuration, or that the course among the stars stood immovable about you. When he has said these and similar things, he strives to assign and prove to you something with a semblance of reason.

Come now, ask another astrologer, to whom you say that at those very hours and that very time good fortunes abounded for you; you will straightway see him bring forward for you innumerable reasonable configurations, by which he proves that at those very times good things ought to have befallen you. For he holds a circle gathered together from every side, in which he takes up diverse and varied causes, and from which he seizes occasion to say whatever he wishes.

For since they cannot at all foresee future things thoroughly, they call them climacteric points, that is, the uncertain refuges of an unclear matter. For persons born at different times perished in one shipwreck, and those arising in one hour of the day or night—one is brought down to beggary, the other rises to a kingdom: and in one battle a countless multitude is laid low, and on one day, nay in one moment, in one house, two women—one becomes most chaste, the other becomes unchaste: if the merit of each is conferred by the stars, then the harlot is not to be blamed, nor the chaste woman to be praised. Certainly lawgivers and princes punish those who transgress their sacred statutes, and therefore there is a forum, therefore a judge, therefore laws, so that the just may be rightly praised, and the unjust deservedly punished. And I do not wish you to consider this an idle matter, that you see yourself not yet saved.

For if you were to cast off from yourself entirely the ceremonies of the enemy of the human race, you would have learned in yourself what is true.

Hearing these things, Chromatius said: True is that God who is proved to have such worshippers as you. For all your speech so overflows with reasonings that it inclines even the minds of beasts to true reason. Whence also, as to this very thing which I seemed to have kept for the adornment of the house, let it not hinder my salvation—let its preservation be dissolved. For I believe, and this is my faith, that if I separate myself entirely from all these things which the law of Christianity abominates and forbids, I shall merit to obtain both present and future salvation.

Hearing this, his son Tiburtius said: I will suffer by no means that this precious and outstanding and incomparable work be cast down. But lest I seem to come as an adversary to my father's salvation, let two furnaces be brought and set burning before the door of the chamber, so that when it has been destroyed by them, if my father has not received health, both of them may be plunged into the burning furnaces, each into his own. Hearing this, his father forbade it to be done. But the saints not only did not fear the destruction promised, but even steadfastly urged that the furnaces be prepared.

Then they went up to all the idols of crystal and glasswork, and to that whole mechanical piece: and suddenly, while it was being broken by the hands of the saints, a young man appeared before the eyes of Chromatius, whose face shone with a fiery aspect, and he said to him: My Lord Jesus Christ, in whom you have believed, has sent me, that you may receive the health of all your members. At this voice, restored to full health, he began to run after the young man, to kiss his feet. But he said to him: See that you do not touch me, for the sanctification of baptism has not yet washed you from the filth of idols. Seeing this, his son Tiburtius fell down at the feet of St. Polycarp. And Chromatius the prefect himself clasped the soles of St. Sebastian's feet, and both cried out with one voice: True God is Christ, true and almighty the only-begotten Son of God, whom you, His good ministers, preach.

The baptism of Chromatius and Tiburtius.

Then blessed Sebastian said to Chromatius: As you yourself know, I hold command of the first cohort, but whether this is fitting warfare for a man, I resolved long ago I did not know, nor would I wish. For this alone did I wish to hide beneath the soldier's cloak, that I might instruct the minds of the wavering, and make the doubtful steadfast, lest those whom faith had made warriors should yield to the pains of suffering. But you, bearing the summit of the highest power, cannot withdraw yourself either from the public spectacles, nor absent yourself from judging affairs. Therefore, feigning sickness, request for yourself a successor, so that you may be free from the occupations of the world and receive the first elements of the future life, that being born again in a second birth you may be made offspring to eternal parents. So on that same day he sent to his friends placed in the palace, through whom, having received testimonial writings, he obtained the recruitment into the divine army before he was baptized.

What shall I recount, of how full a faith he was, and how sharp a wit he showed against the assertions of unbelievers? The following account makes it plain. For at the very beginning, in how he was bathed by the wave of the sacred font, the faith of his mind clearly shone forth. Asked if he believed, he said: I believe. Asked again whether he renounced all idols, he answered: I renounce. The priest's questioning went on, whether he renounced all sins; but he said: You ought to have inquired of these things before I entered these halls of the King of Heaven.

But now let me clothe myself again, unbaptized, so that first I may grant pardon to all with whom I am angry; that I may restore the bonds to all my debtors; that if I have violently taken anything from anyone, I may order it restored in full: I have two concubines since the death of my wife, and to these I will give a dowry and hand them over to husbands; from every bond of servitude, whether free-born, private, or public, of my acts I will release myself: and thus at last I will promise that I shall renounce all the devil's sins and the pleasures of the world.

Polycarp the priest said to him: A more blessed man will the heavenly wave bathe you, when you have fulfilled with all haste those things which by your own judgment you say you will do: for the season of Lent is enjoined upon those to be baptized for this reason, that in so many days they themselves may learn that they are to renounce all the arts of the enemy and dealings with the world, if they truly wish to become Christians.

Then Tiburtius, a most wise youth, said: Father, if you ask time for yourself to renounce your affairs, I, who was still about to undertake the business of the forum, renounce the very intention of undertaking it: and I, who was to be an advocate to plead the causes of mortal men, will take up Christianity, to conduct angelic actions, since I shall begin to be one of the number of those who receive eternal life, and become advocates of holiness. Then blessed Sebastian embraced him: and when St. Polycarp had baptized him, Sebastian himself became the father of his reception.

So when but a few days had passed, all the affairs of the world having been duly renounced by Chromatius, he received the newness of holy baptism; and together with him, of his household, of both sexes, one thousand four hundred souls, all of whom he first released from the bond of servitude by the grace of manumission, and furnished with the best gifts, saying this: Those who begin to have God as Father ought not to be servants of man.

Chromatius, having resigned the prefecture of the City, feeds Christians in the time of persecution.

Now the pope of the city of Rome was named Caius, a man of great prudence and great virtue, in the reign of Carinus, Diocletian, and Maximian. But Diocletian was in the City with Maximian: Carinus, however, was with the whole army stationed in the parts of Gaul: and on his account the persecution of Diocletian against the Christians had begun to be slack; because Carinus had certain friends whom the profession of this title adorned.

Therefore, when Carinus had been slain in the city of Mainz, in the consulship of Maximian and Aquilinus, such a persecution arose that no one might buy or sell anything unless, at the little statues set up in the place where one had come for purchasing, he had offered the incense of frankincense. Around the islands, around the districts, around the fountains too were placed collectors, who would give neither the opportunity of buying, nor grant the very power of drawing water, except to those who had made libation to the idols.

Then, counsel having been taken with St. Caius the bishop, Chromatius, a distinguished man, received all the Christians into his house, and cherished them all in such a way that none at all succumbed to the necessity of sacrificing. But because the force of the persecution had grown so great that the very report of his Christianity could not be concealed, Chromatius obtained by sacred rescript that, for the sake of a cure, he might dwell on the Campanian shore, where he was lord of a broad estate, and he gave the opportunity to every Christian willing to go, to go with him, in order to avoid the persecutor's rage. Then a contention arose between St. Polycarp and blessed Sebastian, as to which of the two should remain in the City, and which should go with Chromatius, who had received so great a Christian people. While they contended, the venerable pope Caius said: While both of you seek the crown of martyrdom, you leave desolate the people gained for the Lord.

Wherefore it seems to me, brother Polycarp, that since you hold the right course of the priesthood, and are filled with the knowledge of God, you should go together to strengthen the minds of the believers and to edify their wavering souls. Hearing this, he grew quiet and bore the pope's gentle command with equanimity. So the Lord's Day came, on which Caius the bishop, doing within the house of Chromatius the things that are of God, addressed them all with this voice: Our Lord Jesus Christ, foreknowing human frailty, established two degrees for those who believe in Him, namely of confession and of martyrdom, so that those who despair of being able to bear the weight of martyrdom may hold the grace of confession, and, giving support to those fighting, may carry concern for the soldiers of Christ, who are to fight for His name. Let those, then, go who wish, together with our sons Chromatius and Tiburtius, and let those who wish remain with me in this city.

For no distances of lands shall separate those whom the charity of Christ binds together, nor do our eyes feel your absence, since we behold you with the gaze of the inner man.

While pope Caius was saying these and similar things, Tiburtius, a most illustrious man, cried out, saying: I beseech you, father and bishop of bishops, do not allow me to give my back to the persecutors. For it is greatly pleasing and desirable to me, if I could be slain a thousand times for the true God, only that I might find the dignity of that life which no successor may snatch from me, which no times set an end to. Then St. Caius, rejoicing together at his faith, shed tears, praying that all who had remained might come forth victors in the contest, taking the triumph of martyrdom.

The illustrious deeds of Saints Sebastian, Tiburtius, and others in the City.

Now there remained with the venerable pope Caius these: Marcellianus and Marcus, together also with their father, the most illustrious man Tranquillinus; likewise blessed Sebastian, and that most beautiful youth, but more beautiful in mind, St. Tiburtius, and Nicostratus of the chief registry office with his brother Castorius, and with his wife, named Zoe; likewise Claudius with his brother Victorinus and with his son Symphorianus, who had been freed from the disease of dropsy. These alone, while all the rest set out with Chromatius, remained with bishop Caius: Mark and Marcellianus he sanctified with the honor of the diaconate, and Tranquillinus, their father, he made a priest. But St. Sebastian, who for the profit of many lay hidden under the guise of soldiery, he appointed defender of the Church, and the others he made subdeacons.

But because no safe place could be found for keeping a hiding place, they all lodged with a certain Castulus, a Christian in charge of the tapestry room of the palace: this Castulus dwelt there in the palace, in an upper and very high place. This lodging was found suitable for this reason, that Castulus himself with all his household was most Christian; and while the law given concerning sacrifices raged everywhere with its fervor, it was hidden as regards those attached to the palace, because no suspicion could fall upon them. There were, then, as we have said, all these staying with the holy pope Caius at Castulus's tapestry room, in the very upper parts of the palace, occupied day and night with groans and weeping, and with fastings and prayers, beseeching the Lord that they be counted worthy, through the endurance of confession of Him, to be joined to the number of the holy martyrs.

Now religious men and religious women would come up to them secretly, and obtain from the Saints various graces of healing for themselves. For, strengthened by the firmness of the true faith and the solid foundation of virtues, the grace of healing attended them. For the eyes of the blind were enlightened by their prayers, and the sick were healed, and demons were driven out of possessed bodies.

Meanwhile, while these things were going on, blessed Tiburtius, passing by, came upon a man who had fallen from a height, and had shattered his head and all his limbs, so that those by whom he was recognized as a son were arranging only for his burial. Then he said to them as they wept: Let me pray a charm over him; perhaps he will recover health. And when all had given him space, he came near to him, and, saying over his wounds slowly the Lord's Prayer and the Creed, his bones were so knit together, and his head and all his inward parts, that, as if nothing had befallen him, he was made whole.

When he had done these things, he began to go. But his parents held him back, saying: Come and have him as a servant, and we hand over to you all our goods together with him, because you have restored alive to us the only son we had, who was already given back to us dead. He says to them: If you do what I shall tell you, I shall reckon the reward of this healing to be great. His parents say to him: If you deign to have us ourselves as servants, we cannot refuse; nay rather we desire it, if you yourself judge us worthy. Then, taking their hands, he separated them from the crowds, and made known to them the power of the name of Christ. And seeing their mind firmly fixed in the fear of the Lord, he brought them to Pope Caius and said: Venerable Pope and priest of the divine law, behold those whom Christ has today gained through me, in whom my faith, like a young sapling, has first burst forth into fruit.

Then St. Caius the bishop baptized them, that is, the young man together with his parents, giving thanks to God.

The slaying of Sts. Zoe, Tranquillinus, and others.

But since it would be a great deal if we wished to pursue in full what and how great things Christ did through them, let us set forth only how each one came to the palm of martyrdom. The most blessed Zoe, on the birthday of the Apostles, while praying at the Confession of Peter the apostle, is seized by pagans lying in wait, and is led to the patron of the district, Naumachia, and is compelled to burn drops of incense before the little statue of Mars that stood there. Then she answered: You compel a woman to sacrifice to Mars, so as to show that your Mars delights in women. But he was able to take away the modesty of most shameless Venus, yet he will not be able to prevail against me, who bear the trophy of faith upon my brow. For I do not wrestle against him by my own strength; but trusting in the power of my Lord Jesus Christ, I mock and despise both you and him alike.

Then the patron of the district sent her into a most dark prison, and for five days made her neither see light nor receive food or drink. Only the voice of him who had shut her in there was heard, saying: There you will die of hunger, and thirst, and blindness, unless you promise to make libation to the gods.

But when six days had passed, they made a suggestion about her to the raging prefect; who ordered her to be hung by the neck and hair from a tall tree, and smoke from a dunghill to be applied beneath her. And as soon as she was hung up, she gave up her spirit in the confession of the Lord. Then, taking away her body, they bound it to a stone and plunged it into the channel of the Tiber, saying: Lest the Christians take her body and make her their goddess.

Therefore, her martyrdom having been accomplished, she came in sleep to Blessed Sebastian, and told him how she had undergone the Lord's martyrdom. When Saint Sebastian had related this, Saint Tranquillinus burst forth, saying: The women go before us to the crown; why then do we live? He too, going down on the eighth day of the birthday of the Apostles, approached the Confession of Blessed Paul; nonetheless he also, having suffered ambush, was seized, and was stoned to death by the people, and his body was consigned to the whirling Tiber.

Likewise Nicostratus and Claudius, together with Castorius and Victorinus and Symphorianus, while seeking the bodies of the Saints along the mouths of the Tiber, were seized by the persecutors, and brought before the prefect of the City. The judge was Fabianus, who exhorted them to sacrifice, and for ten days, working upon them by threats and blandishments, was able to move them in nothing at all. Then he made a report of them to the emperors, who ordered them to be tortured three times likewise. And when by no means driven by torments would they yield, he ordered them to be cast headlong into the midst of the sea. Weighted therefore with immense weights, they were given to the waves of the deep, and in a clean place amid the waters celebrated the crown of martyrdom. Thus the unbelievers lay in wait for the faithful, and, tormented by unjust fury, could not bear even to hear the name of Christian.

The martyrdom of St. Tiburtius.

Meanwhile, while a certain man had joined himself to Bishop Caius with feigned faith, saying that he was a Christian; but this man had in fact been an apostate and was fraudulent in every word, and cunning in every act. Why say more? While he was frequently rebuked by Blessed Tiburtius, a most learned and noble and holy man, for arranging his hair over the top of his forehead with the barber's art, and for feeding himself continually and dining while playing, and for giving himself over rather licentiously to the gazes of women, and for withdrawing himself from fasts and prayers, and for being given to sleep and not being present, watchful, amid the hymns to God that lead through the nights; while, as we have said, he was more sharply rebuked for these things by Blessed Tiburtius, he pretended to take the admonition with equanimity, and contrived by cunning that the unbelievers should seize Saint Tiburtius while praying.

In this seizure he had himself also taken, and at the same time brought to the secret chamber of the raging judge. But when they were brought in, Fabianus the prefect said to him who had betrayed himself by cunning: What are you called? He answered: Torquatus. Fabianus said: What do you profess? Torquatus said: I am a Christian. Fabianus said: Do you not know what the most unconquered princes have ordered, that whoever refuses to sacrifice to the gods should be tormented with various punishments? Torquatus said: This man is my teacher, and he himself has always taught me: whatever I see him do, I must do it too.

Fabianus, turning to Saint Tiburtius, said: Have you heard what Torquatus asserts? What do you answer to this? Saint Tiburtius said: Torquatus has long lied about being a Christian; for the power of that holy name bears heavily and grievously that its own name be usurped by those who do not love it. For indeed, most illustrious man, this word "Christian" belongs to divine power, namely of the followers of Christ, who have truly practiced philosophy, who are truly called Christians, who have fought bravely to crush their lusts. Do you believe, most illustrious man, that this man is a Christian, who in contriving his own pandering arranges the fringes of his hair, who loves the barber, who softly moves his shoulders, who with wanton effort affects a flowing gait, who behaves carelessly toward men, and gazes more attentively at women? Never has Christ deigned to have such servants. But since he has claimed that I would imitate him, here in your presence he shall prove that he has lied.

For he will now clearly show what sort of man he has always been.

Fabianus said: You will act more wisely if you look to your own safety, and do not despise the decrees of the princes. Saint Tiburtius said: I look to my own safety no better than by despising your gods and goddesses, and confessing the one Lord Jesus Christ to be my God. Torquatus said: Not only is this Christian himself cruel, but he also persuades many, and deceives them, and teaches all that the gods are demons; he himself, moreover, with his companions, with whom he practices magic arts, is occupied day and night with incantations. Saint Tiburtius said: A false witness shall not go unpunished. And he said to the judge: This man whom you see, most illustrious sir, seething with the cares of his own malice, has attached himself to Christians for no other reason than that he might consider how he might show himself to us as a Christian, how he might falsely claim to others to be most faithful.

Yet I used to rebuke in him a Cyclopean gluttony, and a modesty drowned in wine, and the holiness of the divine name buried. Drunk, he suffered thirst, and vomiting suffered hunger; not as a Christian, but as a certain "Antonian" guest he ate, drank, vomited, and now accuses Christians, charges Christians, incites a mild judge against us, hands the sword to a willing judge, and urges that we bow our necks to demons. We see your vow, we see your bloody counsels; and we perceive, through the wicked art of your words, the poisons of your breast. Gird yourself now, most cruel one: exercise the office of executioner: claim for yourself even the judge's own voice; apply the goads, hang up Christians, condemn, strike, burn, employ every torment—you have received us well. If you threaten exile, this whole world is exile for those who practice philosophy; if punishment, we escape the prison of the world; if fires, we conquer greater fires than these in our desires.

Decree whatever you please: every penalty is cheap to us where a pure conscience is our companion.

Fabianus the prefect said: Restore yourself to your family, and be what nature has dictated you should be. For, nobly born, you have fallen to such filth that you wish to undergo punishment and infamy and death together. Saint Tiburtius said: O most prudent of men, and judge appointed for the Romans! Because I refuse to worship the whorish Venus, and incestuous Jupiter, and deceitful Mercury, and Saturn the slayer of his sons, I incur the infamy of my noble birth; and because I adore and venerate the one true God who reigns in the heavens, you threaten that I am to be tormented with punishments. We do not assent to your persuasion; we do not deny that Christ the Son of God came down from heaven to earth for this purpose, that from earth man might be able to ascend to heaven; therefore, trampling underfoot all these vain phantoms which you worship without cause, I have subjected myself to Almighty God.

Then Fabianus ordered burning coals to be poured out before his feet, and said to him: Choose for yourself one of two things: either cast incense upon these coals, or walk upon them with bare feet. Then Blessed Tiburtius, making the sign of the cross, walked steadfastly upon them with bare sole, and began to say to the prefect: Lay aside your unbelief and learn that this alone is the God whom we confess to have dominion over all creatures. Send you, if you can, your hands into hot water in the name of Jupiter your god; and if your Jupiter is able, let him make you not feel the burning heat. For to me, in the name of my Lord Jesus Christ, it seems that I walk upon roses, because the creature serves at the command of its Creator.

Fabianus said: Who does not know that your Christ taught you magic? Saint Tiburtius said: Be silent, wretched man, and do not do this injury to my ears, that I should hear you, barking with rabid mouth, name his honey-sweet and holy name. Then Fabianus, angered, pronounced sentence, saying: Let the blasphemer of the gods, guilty of atrocious injuries, be put to the sword. And he was led out by the Via Lavicana, three miles from the City, and, pouring out prayer to the Lord, he departed struck with one blow of the sword. And he was buried in the same place by a certain Christian kinsman: in which place Christ has always granted many benefits to the praise of his name even to the present day.

The slaying of Sts. Castulus, Marcellianus, and Marcus.

After this, Torquatus brought it about that Castulus, an officer of the palace, host of the Saints, was seized: who, when he had been put to torture, and had been three times suspended, three times examined, persevering in the confession of the Lord, was cast into a pit, and a mass of sand was poured down upon him, and he himself, with the palm of martyrdom, passed to the Lord.

After this Marcellianus and Marcus were seized; and both, bound to a stake, received sharp nails in their feet; to whom the most insane Fabianus said: You shall stand thus with fixed soles, until you render to the gods the duty owed them. Then both brothers, fastened to one piece of wood, sang psalms, saying: Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity. Fabianus says to them: Unhappy and wretched men, lay aside your madness, and free yourselves from the torments impending over you. Both, answering, said: Never have we feasted so well: only now have we begun to be fixed in the love of Christ. Would that you would permit us to be thus as we are for as long as we are covered by the garment of this body.

And when one day and one night had passed, and they persevered in psalms and hymns, he ordered both of them, where they stood, to be pierced through the sides with lances: and thus, through the glory of martyrdom, they passed to the starry kingdoms. They too were likewise buried on the Via Appia, at the second milestone from the City, in a place which is called "At the Sandpits," because there were crypts of sand there, from which the walls of the City were built.

The glorious combat of St. Sebastian.

These things having thus taken place, Blessed Sebastian was set upon by those lying in wait; and because, as we have said, he seemed to lie hidden beneath his soldier's cloak, though he was a most worthy soldier of Christ, the prefect made a report of him to the Emperor Diocletian. Diocletian, calling him to himself, said: I have always held you among the first of my palace. And you, to my harm, have until now lain hidden in injury to the gods. Saint Sebastian said: For your welfare I have always worshiped Christ, and for the estate of the Roman world I have always adored him who is in the heavens, considering it the mark of an insane and empty head to seek help from stones. Then Diocletian, angered, ordered him to be led into the middle of a field, and bound as if a target for an arrow, and ordered the archers to pierce him.

Then the soldiers set him in the middle of the field, and from every side so filled him with arrows, that he was as bristling with the strokes of the arrows as a hedgehog.

But thinking that he was dead, they departed. Then a widow of the martyr Castulus, keeper of the chamber, named Irene, went by night to take up his body and bury it. And finding him alive, she brought him to her own house on the high stair where she dwelt near the palace, and there within a few days he recovered perfect health in all his limbs.

And when all the Christians gathered to him, they urged him to withdraw. But he, having made prayer, went down, and standing upon the steps of the temple of Heliogabalus, said to the emperors as they came: The priests of the temples beset the minds of your empire with wicked intrigues, suggesting false slanders about the Christians, saying that they are enemies of the State; whereas by their prayers the State itself is bettered and grows; who do not cease to pray for your empire and for the safety of the Roman army. While he was saying these and like things, Diocletian said: Art thou Sebastian, whom we lately ordered to be slain with arrows? St. Sebastian said: For this has my Lord Jesus Christ deigned to raise me up again, that I might come and bear witness before you in the presence of all the people, that your persecution has broken out against the servants of Christ by an unjust judgment.

Then he ordered him to be led into the hippodrome of the palace, and to be beaten with clubs so long until he breathed forth his spirit. Then they took his body by night and cast it into the Cloaca Maxima, saying: lest perchance the Christians make him a martyr for themselves. Then blessed Sebastian appeared in a dream to a certain most religious matron, St. Lucina, saying: In that sewer which is beside the circus, thou shalt find my body hanging upon a hook.

This, when thou hast lifted up, thou shalt carry to the catacombs and bury at the entrance of the crypt near the footsteps of the Apostles.

Then blessed Lucina herself, in person, with her servants, went at midnight, and lifting him up placed him upon her litter, and brought him to the place where he himself had commanded, and buried him with all diligence. And holy Lucina herself did not depart from that holy place for thirty days.

But after some years peace was restored to the Church: and as soon as the Church received the glory of peace, she made her house a church. To this church, leaving all her wealth for the repose of the Christians, she made it heir in Christ, who with God the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, equal in the unity of power, world without end. Amen.