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| Chapter XLV.
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Chapter XLV.
Thus, then, the Arians,
with their affairs in a very flourishing condition, and everything
turning out according to their wishes, go in a body to Constantinople
where the emperor was. There they found the deputies from the Synod of
Seleucia, and compel them by an exercise of the royal power to follow
the example of the Westerns, and accept that heretical confession of
faith. Numbers who refused were tortured with painful imprisonment and
hunger, so that at length they yielded their conscience captive. But
many who resisted more courageously, being deprived of their
bishoprics, were driven into exile, and others substituted in their
place. Thus, the best priests being either terrified by threats, or
driven into exile, all gave way before the unfaithfulness of a few.
Hilarius was there at the time, having followed the deputies from
Seleucia; and as no certain orders had been given regarding him, he was
waiting on the will of the emperor to see whether perchance he should
be ordered to return into banishment. When he perceived the extreme
danger into which the faith had been brought, inasmuch as the Westerns
had been beguiled, and the Easterns were being overcome by means of
wickedness, he, in three papers publicly presented, begged an audience
of the king, in order that he might debate on points of faith in the
presence of his adversaries. But the Arians opposed that to the utmost
extent of their ability. Finally, Hilarius was ordered to return to
Gaul, as being a sower383
| 383
“seminarium”: lit. seed-plot. | of discord,
and a troubler of the East, while the sentence of exile against him
remained uncanceled. But when he had wandered over almost the whole
earth which was infected
with the evil of unfaithfulness,
his mind was full of doubt and deeply agitated with the mighty burden
of cares which pressed upon it. Perceiving that it seemed good to many
not to enter into communion with those who had acknowledged the Synod
of Ariminum, he thought the best thing he could do was to bring back
all to repentance and reformation. In frequent councils within Gaul,
and while almost all the bishops publicly owned the error that had been
committed, he condemns the proceedings at Ariminum, and frames anew the
faith of the churches after its pristine form. Saturninus, however,
bishop of Arles, who was, in truth, a very bad man, of an evil and
corrupt character, resisted these sound measures. He was, in fact, a
man who, besides the infamy of being a heretic, was convicted of many
unspeakable crimes, and cast out of the Church. Thus, having lost its
leader, the strength of the party opposed to Hilarius was broken.
Paternus also of Petrocorii,384
| 384 The modern
Perigueux. | equally
infatuated, and not shrinking from openly professing unfaithfulness,
was expelled from the priesthood: pardon was extended to the others.
This fact is admitted by all, that our regions of Gaul were set free
from the guilt of heresy through the kind efforts of Hilarius alone.
But Lucifer, who was then at Antioch held a very different opinion. For
he condemned those who assembled at Ariminum to such an extent, that he
even separated himself from the communion of those who had received
them as friends, after they had made satisfaction or exhibited
penitence. Whether this resolution of his was right or wrong, I will
not take upon me to say. Paulinus and Rhodanius died in Phrygia;
Hilarius died in his native country in the sixth year after his
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