for a deer. And when this is also devoured, his hunger at last compelleth him to tear his own flesh with his teeth, and by consuming himself in this horrible manner, to finish his days most miserably.

[SECTION II.

Sacrilege among Heathens after the Christian era.] DIOCLESIAN and Maximianus having divided the empire between them, this enjoying the west, and the other the east, they united themselves again in raising the greatest persecution that ever was against the Christians, putting priests and people to death, seventeen thousand persons by sundry torments, in thirty days, confiscating their goods, burning the books of holy Scripture, razing and utterly subverting their churches, altars, and places of prayer and divine worship. Having continued in this fury about twelve years, they grew at last to be troubled in mind; and in one day, Maximianus at Milan, in the west, and Dioclesian at Nicomedia, in the east, of their own accord renounced the empire, and betook themselves to a private life: Dioclesian choosing Galerius for his successor, and Maximianus, Constantius' for his. But Maximian afterwards repenting,2 endeavoured with his son Maxentius to re-assume the government, and was therefore by the com

9 EUSEB. viii. 1, seq.

1 CARION. Chron. p. 194 (ed. 1580).

2 OROSIUS. vii. 25.

mandment of Constantine put to death; and Dioclesian, after long discontentment, slew himself. Yet for a further revenge of the horrible persecution and sacrilege, God sent a grievous plague and famine (as Eusebius reporteth) over all the world.

3

Certain Arians, (A.D. 356) by an edict of Constantius the emperor, attempt to expel Athanasius from the bishoprick of Alexandria: and in rifling the church, a young man laboureth to pull down the bishop's seat, when suddenly a piece thereof falling upon him, rent out his bowels, that he died the next day Another, bereaved of his sight and sense for the present, was carried forth, and recovering about a day after, remembered nothing of what he had done or suffered. But these accidents stayed the rest from proceeding farther.*

save one.

Julianus, (A.D. 362) president of the east part of the empire, and uncle to Julian the emperor (both apostates), with Felix the treasurer, and Elpidius, keeper of the privy purse, all persons of high dignity, come to Antioch, by commission from the emperor, to carry from thence the sacred vessels to the emperor's treasury. They enter that goodly church, and Julian going to the holy Communion-table, defileth it; and because Euzoius offered to hinder him, he gives him a box on the ear, saying, "That God regarded not the things of Christians." Felix also, beholding the magnificence of the sacred vessels,

3 ix. 8.

4 S. ATHANAS. ad Monach. 848 D. (ed. Paris. 1627).

(for Constantine and Constantius had caused them to be sumptuously made), "Lo, (quoth he) in what state the Son of Mary is served!" Presently the bowels of Julian rotted in his body, and the dung which formerly went downwards, now passeth upwards through his blasphemous mouth, and so ended his life. Felix is stricken suddenly with a whip from heaven, casteth his blood day and night from all parts of his body out at his mouth, and for want of blood so dieth presently."

6

Chrysostom saith that Julian burst asunder in the midst; and Ammianus, that Felix died suddenly (profluvio sanguinis) of a gushing out of blood.

What became of Elpidius, Theodoret doth not mention; but Nicephorus reporteth, that though the third blasphemer was not so suddenly punished, yet being at length apprehended amongst them that aspired to the government (tyrannidem), he was stripped of all he had, and suffering much misery in prison, died loathsomely, accounted as a cursed and detested person.*

A.D. 433. Divers bondmen of a great person, not enduring the severity of their master, fly into the church at Constantinople, and with their swords do keep the altar, refusing to depart from it, and do thereby hinder the Divine service divers days together: but having killed one of the clerks, and wounded

5 THEOD. Eccl Hist. lib. iii. cap. 11, 12. "Lib xxxiii.

8 BARON. ann. 362, 110.

7 Lib. x. cap. 29.

another, they at last killed themselves.' This happened a little before the Council of Ephesus, where Nestorius was condemned, and was a præludium to those evils, as it is said in Socrates, that then followed in the church:

Nam sæpè signa talia dari solent,

Cùm sacra fœdum templa polluit scelus.

SOCR. vii. 33. NICEPH. xiv. 34, 35. EVAG. 3, 45.

[CHAPTER III.

Sacrilege among Christians.

SECTION 1.]

IN the time of Childebertus, king of Paris, and son of Clodover the first, his brother Theodoricus besiegeth Montclere, the chief city of Avernia, which Childebertus, his brother, had taken from him. A knight then hearing that divers citizens had carried their goods into the church of S. Julian, leaveth the siege, and, with his followers, breaking open the doors, taketh all away. But God, the just Revenger of sacrilege, struck them all incontinently with madness; where he admonisheth soldiers, by this example, to take heed of sacrilege; and thereupon addeth another example.

Siginaldus, (saith he) governor of the Avernians, found this to be true; for, puffed up with a desire of enlarging his patrimony and dominion, after he had wrung many things from the inhabitants, he took also from the church of S. Julian, the town of Bulgrate, which Tetradius had given unto it; and being presently stricken mad, recovered not his

1 GAGUINUS, Rer. Gallic. Ann. 1. 5, 6.