Chapter
XII.
1. I
think it best to pass by all the other events which occurred in
the meantime: such as those which happened to the bishops of the
churches, when instead of shepherds of the rational2694
flocks of
Christ, over which they
presided in an
unlawful manner, the
divine judgment, considering them
worthy of such a charge, made them
keepers of
camels,
2695
| 2695 “It was a punishment among the Romans that freemen should be
condemned to take care of the emperor’s horses or camels, and to
perform other personal offices of that kind” (Valesius). For
fuller particulars, see Valesius’ note ad locum. In the
Acts of St. Marcellus (who was bishop of Rome) we are told that
he was set by Maximian to groom his horses in a church which the
emperor had turned into a stable. |
an irrational
beast2696
and very
crooked in the structure of its
body, or
condemned them to have the care of the imperial
horses;—and I pass by also the insults and disgraces and
tortures
they
endured from the imperial overseers and
rulers on account of the
sacred vessels and
treasures of the
Church; and besides these the
lust
of
power on the part of many, the disorderly and
unlawful ordinations,
and the
schisms among the confessors themselves; also the novelties
which were zealously devised against the remnants of the
Church by the
new and factious members, who added innovation after innovation and
forced them in unsparingly among the calamities of the persecution,
heaping misfortune upon misfortune. I
judge it more suitable to
shun
and
avoid the account of these things, as I said at the beginning.
2697
| 2697 Cf. Bk. VIII, chap. 2, §§2 and 3, and the note on that
passage. |
But such things as are sober and
praiseworthy, according to the
sacred word,—“and if there
be any
virtue and
praise,”
2698
—I
consider it most proper to tell and to
record, and to present to
believing hearers in the history of the admirable martyrs. And after
this I think it
best to crown the entire work with an account of the
peace which has appeared unto us from heaven.
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