But Gallus and his associates, having held the rule for not even two full years, were removed out of the way; and Valerian, together with his son, succeeded to the sovereignty.
Again, then, what manner of account Dionysius gives concerning this man also, one may learn from his letter to Hermammon, in which he relates it after this fashion: “And to John likewise it is revealed: ‘And there was given to him,’ he says, ‘a mouth speaking great things and blasphemy, and there was given to him authority and forty and two months.’
Both these things may be marvelled at in the case of Valerian, and of them most of all how his earlier conduct stood: how mild and kindly he was toward the men of God. For no other of the emperors before him was so graciously and favourably disposed toward them—not even those said to have been openly Christians—as he plainly was when he received them at the beginning in the most intimate and friendly manner; and his whole house had been filled with godly persons, and was a church of God.
But the teacher and chief of the synagogue of the magicians from Egypt persuaded him to do away with them, bidding him slay and persecute the pure and holy men, as being adversaries and hinderers of his utterly abominable and detestable enchantments (for indeed they are and were able, by their mere presence and sight, and by merely breathing and uttering words, to scatter the plots of the baneful demons); and proposing that he should perform unhallowed rites and accursed sorceries and ill-omened sacrifices—slaughtering wretched boys, and sacrificing the children of hapless fathers, and dividing the entrails of new-born babes, and cutting up and mangling the handiwork of God—as though by these things they would gain prosperity.
And to these things he adds, saying: “Goodly indeed were the thank-offerings that Macrianus brought to them for the empire of his hopes—he who formerly, while he was said to be over the accounts of the empire as a whole, took no reasonable nor universal view, but fell under the prophetic curse which says: ‘Woe to those who prophesy from their own heart, and see not the whole.’
For he understood not the universal providence, nor did he take heed of the judgment of Him who is before all and through all and over all. Wherefore he became an enemy of His catholic Church, and estranged and alienated himself from the mercy of God, and banished himself as far as possible from his own salvation—in this proving true his own name.”
And again, after other remarks, he says: “For Valerian, having been led on to these things by this man, was given over to insults and reproaches, according to that which was spoken to Isaiah: ‘And these have chosen their own ways and their abominations, in which their soul delighted; and I will choose their mockings, and will recompense to them their sins.’
But this man, madly desiring the imperial power beyond his desert, and unable, with his maimed body, to put on the imperial array, put forward his two sons, who took upon them their father’s sins. For in them was made plain the prediction which God spake: ‘Visiting the sins of fathers upon children, unto the third and fourth generation, of them that hate me.’
For his own evil desires, in which he prospered, he heaped upon the heads of his sons, and so wiped off upon them his own wickedness and his hatred toward God.” So much, then, did Dionysius say concerning Valerian.