1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10. To Innocentius the presbyter, concerning the woman struck seven times. Often, dearest Innocentius, you have asked me not to keep silent about the miracle of that affair which had occurred in our own age. And when I modestly and truthfully—as I now find by experience—declined, distrusting that I could accomplish it (whether because all human speech is inferior to heavenly praise, or because leisure, like a kind of rust upon the wit, had dried up what slender faculty there was of my former eloquence), you on the contrary kept asserting that in the things of God one ought not to consider what is possible, but the will; and that words could not fail him who had believed in the Word. What, then, shall I do? What I cannot fulfill, I dare not refuse.
An untrained passenger, I am set aboard a freight ship; and a man who has not yet handled an oarlock even on a lake is entrusted to the roaring of the Euxine Sea. Now, as the lands vanish from my sight, 'sky on every side and on every side the deep' [Verg. Aen. 3.193]; now the wave grows hideous with darkness, and in the blind night of storm-clouds the foaming billows turn white. You urge me to hoist the swelling sails upon the mast, to unfurl the ropes, to steer the helm. I now obey your command, and—because love can do all things—I shall trust, with the Holy Spirit pursuing my course, having consolation on either side: if the tide drives me to the longed-for harbor, I shall be reckoned a pilot; but if my unpolished speech founders amid the rough windings of the discourse, you may perhaps look for ability, but assuredly you cannot demand the will.
Now then: Vercellae, a city of the Ligurians, situated not far from the foothills of the Alps, once powerful, now half in ruins with few inhabitants. When the consular governor was visiting it, as is the custom, a certain wretched woman was brought before him together with her adulterer—for the husband had laid that charge—and he surrounded her with the penal horror of the prison. And not long after, when the bloody hook was beating his livid flesh and pain was seeking the truth from his furrowed sides, the most unhappy young man, wishing by a quick death to avoid prolonged torments, while lying against his own blood, accused another's; and he alone of all, a wretch, seemed to be struck down deservedly, because he did not leave the innocent woman the means by which she could deny it.
But the woman, stronger than her sex, when the rack stretched her body and the chains bound behind her back her hands, foul with the squalor of the prison, looked up to heaven with the eyes which alone the torturer could not bind, and with tears rolling down her face, said: 'You are my witness, Lord Jesus, to whom nothing is hidden, who are the searcher of the reins and the heart, that it is not for this reason that I am unwilling to deny—lest I perish—but for this reason that I am unwilling to lie—lest I sin. And as for you, most wretched man, if you are hastening to die, why do you destroy two innocent persons? Indeed I too desire to die, I desire to put off this hated body—but not as an adulteress. I offer my throat; undaunted I receive the flashing blade; only my innocence will I bear with me.'
'He does not die, whoever is slain only to live.' Then the consular governor, his eyes feasted with blood like a wild beast which, having once tasted blood, ever thirsts for it, ordered the torments to be doubled; and gnashing savagely with his teeth, he threatened the executioner himself with a like punishment, unless the weaker sex should confess what manly strength had not been able to keep silent. 'Help, Lord Jesus! Against this one human being of yours, how many torments have been devised!' Her hair is bound to a stake, and her whole body being more tightly fastened to the rack, fire is set near her feet; the executioner pierces both her sides, nor is any respite granted even to her breasts: the woman remains unmoved, and, her spirit being separated from the pain of her body, while she enjoys the good of a clear conscience, she forbade the torments to rage around her.
The cruel judge rises up as if defeated; she beseeches the Lord. Her limbs are loosed from their joints; she lifts her eyes to heaven. Concerning the common crime another confesses; she, on behalf of the one confessing, denies it, and, herself in peril, she vindicates another in peril. One single utterance: 'Strike, burn, tear me apart; I did not do it. If credit is not given to my words, there will come a day which will sift this crime diligently; I shall have my own Judge.' Now the weary torturer was sighing into a groan, nor was there room for a new wound; now savagery, conquered, shuddered at the body which it had mangled. Forthwith the consular, roused to anger, said: 'Why do you marvel, bystanders, if the woman would rather be tortured than perish?'
'Adultery certainly cannot be committed without two parties; and I think it more credible that a guilty woman on trial should deny the crime than that an innocent young man should confess it.' And so, the same sentence being pronounced against both, the executioner drags off the condemned. The whole people pours out to the spectacle, and—just as if the city were thought to be migrating—the crowd, bursting forth from the crammed gates, presses thick together. And indeed, at the very first stroke, the head of the most wretched young man is cut off by the sword, and his trunk, a corpse, rolls about in its own blood.
After it had come to the woman, and, her knees bent to the ground, the flashing sword was raised over her trembling neck, and the executioner had hurled his practiced right hand with all his might, at the first touch of the body the deadly point came to a stop, and, lightly grazing the skin, it sprinkled the blood of a slight scratch. The striker was terrified at his powerless hand, and, marveling at his conquered right arm, with the sword growing limp, he twists it for a second assault. Again the feeble blade slips down upon the woman, and, as though the iron feared to touch the accused, it lies harmless and numb about her neck.
And so the lictor, raging and panting, his cloak thrown back over his neck, while he gathered all his strength, struck to the ground the clasp that bit the edges of the cloak; and ignorant of what had happened he balanced the sword to the wound. 'Look,' said the woman, 'the gold has fallen from your shoulder. Gather it up, for it was won with much labor, lest it be lost.' I ask, what manner of composure is this? She does not fear approaching death; she rejoices when struck; the executioner turns pale. Her eyes, not seeing the sword, see only the clasp, and—as though it were too little that she did not dread her own destruction—she granted a kindness to the man who raged against her. And now a third blow as well: it had cheated the sacrament of the Trinity.
Now the watchman, terrified and unbelieving, set the point of the sword to her throat, so that he who could not cut might at least, with pressing hand, bury it in her body. O thing unheard of in all the ages! The blade bent back to its hilt, and as though, defeated, it gazed upon its master, it confessed that it could not strike. Come, come hither to me the example of the three young men, who amid the cold globes of flame uttered hymns instead of weeping, about whose trousers and holy hair the harmless fire only played. Hither let the story of blessed Daniel be called back, beside whom the mouths of the lions feared their own prey with fawning tails. Now let Susanna, noble in faith, come into the minds of all—she who, condemned by an unjust judgment, was saved when the Holy Spirit filled the boy.
Behold, the Lord's mercy was not unequal in both cases: she was freed by a judge, that she might not go to the sword; this woman, condemned by a judge, was acquitted by the sword. At last, then, the people armed themselves to vindicate the woman. Every age, every sex put the executioner to flight, and as the throng gathered into a circle, almost each one disbelieved what he saw. The nearby city was thrown into turmoil by such news, and the whole band of lictors swarmed together. From among them, the man in the midst, to whom the charge of the condemned belonged, burst forth, 'fouling his filthy gray hair with strewn dust' (Verg. Aen. 12.611), and said: 'It is my head, O citizens, you seek; give me as her substitute!'
'If you are merciful, if you are clement, if you wish to save the condemned woman, surely I, an innocent man, ought not to perish.' By this weeping the spirit of the crowd was shaken, and a sorrowful numbness crept through them all; and, their will changed in a wondrous manner—since what they had before defended out of piety, it now seemed a kind of piety to let them be slain. A new sword, then, a new executioner is set in place. The victim stands fortified, with only Christ favoring her. Struck once, she is shaken; assailed a second time, she is jolted; wounded a third time, she falls prostrate; and—O majesty of divine power, to be exalted!—she who had before been struck a fourth time yet unharmed, only for that reason seemed for a little while to die, lest an innocent man perish on her account.
The clergy, whose duty it was, wrapped the bloody corpse in a linen cloth, and heaping up the dug earth with stones, prepared a tomb after the custom. With hastened course the sun sought its setting, and night came on, about to conceal the Lord's mercy. Suddenly the woman's breast throbbed, and as her eyes sought the light, her body was quickened to life: now she breathes, now she sees, now she is raised up and speaks, now she can burst forth into that cry: 'The Lord is my helper; I will not fear what man may do to me' (Ps. 117:6). Meanwhile a certain old woman, who was supported by the resources of the Church, rendered up to heaven the spirit she owed, and as if by design, in the running order of things, her body was covered as a substitute in the tomb.
While the light was still uncertain, the devil met the lictor, sought the corpse of the slain woman, and demanded that the sepulcher be shown to him; he supposed her to be alive, marveling that she could have died. The fresh turf was shown by the clergy, and the earth lately heaped on was thrown before him as he demanded, with these words: 'Dig up, to be sure, the bones already laid to rest; bring new war to the tomb, and if this is too little, tear apart her limbs to be mangled by birds and beasts; she who has been struck seven times ought to suffer something more than death.' With the executioner thrown into confusion by such shaming, the woman was secretly revived at home; and lest perhaps the physician's frequent visits to the church open a way to suspicion, with her hair cut short she was sent off with certain virgins to a more secluded little villa.
There, gradually, with her dress changed to a man's garb, the wound closed into a scar. And—O truly 'the highest law is the highest malice!' (Ter. Heaut. 796)—after such great miracles the laws still rage. See whither the order of events has dragged me! For now we have come to the name of our Evagrius. If I should think his labor for Christ's sake could be told by me, I would be unwise; if I should wish to be wholly silent, I could not, as my voice bursts forth in joy. For who could be strong enough to sing with worthy praise that Auxentius brooding over Milan was buried by his vigils almost before he was dead, that the Roman bishop, already almost ensnared in the snares of faction, both conquered his adversaries and did no harm to the vanquished?
'But these things I myself, shut out by narrow limits, pass over, and leave to be recorded by others after me' (Verg. G. 4.147-148). I am content only with the conclusion of the present matter: by his industry he approached the emperor, wearied him with prayers, softened him by his merit, won him over by his solicitude, so that the emperor might restore to liberty the one he had restored to life. 2: To Theodosius and the other anchorites dwelling within. How greatly, how greatly I would wish now to be present at your gathering, and to embrace with all exultation that admirable fellowship, though these eyes are not worthy to behold it! I would gaze upon the desert, more delightful than any city; I would see the places forsaken by their inhabitants besieged by the companies of the saints, as if after the likeness of paradise.
But because my sins have brought this about, that a head beset with every crime should not be inserted into the fellowship of the blessed, therefore I beseech you—since I do not doubt that you are able to obtain it—that by your prayer you would free me from the darkness of this world. Both before, when present, I had spoken it, and now through letters I do not cease to declare my vow: that my mind is seized by every desire of zeal toward that end. Now it is yours to bring it about that the effect may follow my will. Mine it is to will; yours, by your supplications, it is that I may both will and be able. I am as a diseased sheep straying from the whole flock. And unless the good shepherd carry me back upon his shoulders to his own folds, my steps will totter, and in the very effort the footsteps of one rising will collapse.
I am that prodigal son who, after squandering all the portion which my father had entrusted to me, have not yet cast myself at my parent's knees, have not yet begun to drive away from me the blandishments of my former luxury. And because I have not so much ceased from my vices as begun to wish to cease, now the devil binds me with new nets; now, setting up new obstacles, he surrounds me on every side with seas and on every side with the deep; now, set in the midst of the element, I neither wish to go back nor am able to go forward. It remains that by your prayer the breath of the Holy Spirit may carry me on and bring me through to the harbor of the longed-for shore. 3: To Rufinus. That God bestows more than is asked, and often grants those things 'which neither eye has seen nor ear heard nor have entered into the heart of man' (1 Cor.
2:9)—though I had learned this before from the teaching of the sacred books, yet in my own case I have now proved it, dearest Rufinus. For I, who thought vows audacious enough if by an exchange of letters we should feign to ourselves an image of presence, hear that you are penetrating the secret places of Egypt, visiting the choirs of monks, and going about the heavenly family on earth. O, if the Lord Jesus Christ would now suddenly grant me a translation like Philip's to the eunuch, or Habakkuk's to Daniel, how I would now press your neck with embraces by my art, how I would fasten upon that mouth—which once either erred with me or grew wise—with my pressed lips!
But because I do not deserve it, and frequent illnesses have broken my poor little body even while it is whole, I send these letters as my representatives to meet you, that they may lead you, bound by the bond of love, all the way to me. The first happiness, of unexpected joy, was announced by Heliodorus. I did not believe to be certain what I longed to be certain, especially since he too said he had heard it from another, and the novelty of the matter took away faith in the report. Again, a certain Alexandrian monk—who had been sent with the pious devotion of the people to the Egyptian confessors and martyrs already in will—as a clear authority drove my mind, suspended and wavering in its vow, to belief in the news. I confess that in this too my judgment had wavered.
For since he knew neither your homeland nor your name, in this alone he seemed to bring greater weight: that he asserted the same things which another had already indicated. At last the full weight of truth burst forth; for a frequent crowd of those coming and going reported that Rufinus was at Nitria and had gone on to the blessed Macarius. At this point indeed I loosed all the reins of my belief, and then truly I grieved that I was ill. And had not the weakened strength of my body hindered me as with a certain shackle, neither the heat of midsummer nor the sea—ever uncertain for sailors—could have prevailed to resist me as I made my way with pious haste.
Believe me, I pray, brother: not so does the sailor tossed by storm look out for harbor, not so do the thirsty fields long for showers, not so does the anxious mother, sitting on the curving shore, await her son. After a sudden whirlwind swept me away from your side, after impious separation tore me away as I clung with the glue of love, 'then a dark-blue rain-cloud stood over my head' (Verg. Aen. 3.194), then 'seas on every side and on every side the sky' (Verg. Aen. 5.9). At last, as I wandered in the uncertainty of my pilgrimage, when Thrace, Pontus, and Bithynia, and the whole journey through Galatia or Cappadocia, and the land of the Cilicians had broken me with their burning heat, Syria met me like a most faithful harbor meeting a shipwrecked man.
There, having experienced whatever there could be of diseases, I lost one of my two eyes; for a sudden burning of fevers carried off Innocentius, part of my own soul. Now I enjoy our Evagrius, my one and entire light, to whom I, ever feeble, came as a certain heap added to his toil. There was with us also Hylas, the servant of holy Melania, who by the purity of his manners had washed away the stain of servitude; and he too tore open the scar not yet healed over. But because by the apostle's voice we are forbidden to grieve over those who sleep (cf. 1 Thess. 4:12), and the excessive force of mourning has been tempered by joyful news supervening, we make known to you—that, if you do not know, you may learn; if you knew before, that we may rejoice together.
Your Bonosus, nay rather mine, and—to speak more truly—ours, already climbs the ladder foretold to Jacob in his dream: he carries his cross, takes no thought for the morrow, and does not look back behind him. He sows in tears, that he may reap in joy, and, after the sacrament of Moses, lifts up the serpent in the desert. Let the miracles fabricated with lies, whether in Greek or Roman style, yield to this truth. Behold, a boy trained with us in the world's honorable arts, to whom wealth abounded, whose rank was foremost among his peers—having despised his mother, his sisters, and the brother most dear to him—has settled, like some new colonist of paradise, on a shipwreck-causing island with the deep resounding around it, where rough crags and bare rocks and solitude are a terror.
There no farmer, no monk, not even the little Onesimus whom you knew—whom he enjoyed as a younger brother—clings to his side as a companion in such great desolation. Alone there—nay, now not alone, with Christ accompanying him—he sees the glory of God, which the apostles saw only in the desert. He does not indeed behold towered cities, but in the register of the new city he has given his name. His limbs bristle with the deforming sackcloth, but so he will the better be caught up to meet Christ in the clouds. He enjoys no pleasantness of channeled waters, but from the Lord's side he drinks the water of life. Set before your eyes, sweetest friend, and turn yourself wholly in soul and mind to the presence of the matter; then you will be able to praise the victory, when you have recognized the toil of the one fighting.
Around the whole island the mad sea roars, and the deep, dashed against the winding mountains of crags, cries back; no grass makes the land green; no shady bowers thicken the field with their spring growth; the broken cliffs shut him in as in a certain prison of horror. He, secure, undaunted, and wholly armed from the apostle, now hears God, when he reads the divine writings; now speaks with God, when he prays to the Lord; and perhaps, after the example of John, he sees something while he dwells on the island. What snares do you think the devil now weaves, what ambushes do you suppose he prepares? Perhaps, mindful of his ancient fraud, he will try to urge hunger. But the answer has already been given him: that man does not live by bread alone. Perhaps he will set forth wealth and glory, but it will be said to him:
'Those who desire to become rich fall into a snare and into temptations' (1 Tim. 6:9), and: 'For me, all glorying is in Christ' (Gal. 6:14). He will shake limbs wearied with fasting and burdened with disease, but he will be struck back by the apostle's saying: 'When I am weak, then I am stronger' (2 Cor. 12:10), and: 'Virtue is made perfect in weakness' (2 Cor. 12:9). He will threaten death, but he will hear: 'I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ' (Phil. 1:23). He will brandish fiery darts, but they will be caught upon the shield of faith. And, in short, Satan will assail, but Christ will protect. Thanks be to you, Lord Jesus, that in your day I have one who can pray to you for me.
You yourself know—for the breasts of each lie open to you, who search out the secrets of the heart, who see the prophet shut up in the belly of so great a beast in the depths—how he and I together grew from tender infancy up to flourishing youth; how the same nurses' bosoms cherished us, the same embraces of those who bore us; and how, after our Roman studies, on the half-barbarous banks of the Rhine, enjoying the same food and a common lodging, I was the first to begin to wish to revere you. Remember, I pray, that this warrior of yours was once a raw recruit along with me. I hold the promise of your Majesty: 'He who has taught and not done shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who has done and taught, this one shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven' (Matt. 5:19).
Let him enjoy the crown of virtue and, robed for his daily martyrdoms, follow the Lamb for me—'there are many mansions with the Father' (John 14:2), and 'star differs from star in brightness' (1 Cor. 15:41)—grant me only that among the heels of the saints I may be able to lift up my head; that, when I have wished, he may have accomplished; pardon me, because I could not fulfill it; bestow on him the reward which he deserves. Perhaps I have drawn out with long discourse more than the brevity of a letter allowed—which has ever been wont to happen to me whenever something is to be said in praise of our Bonosus. But, to return to the point from which I departed, I beseech you not to lose, along with your eyes, your mind for a friend who is long sought, scarcely found, and hard to keep.
Let anyone gleam with gold and let the metals flash, glittering from the burdens of ostentatious litters: love cannot be purchased; affection has no price; friendship that can come to an end was never true. 4: To Florentinus, on the rise of friendship. How great a report of your blessedness has filled the various mouths of peoples, you can estimate from this: that I begin to love you before I know you. For as the apostle says: 'The sins of some men are manifest, going before to judgment' (1 Tim. 5:24), so, on the contrary, the fame of your charity is spread abroad, so that not so much is he to be praised who loves you, as he is thought to commit a crime who does not love you.
I pass over the innumerable instances in which you have sustained, fed, clothed, and visited Christ: the necessity of brother Heliodorus, relieved by you, can loosen even the mouths of the dumb. With what thanks, with what proclamation of the hardships of his pilgrimage cherished by you he used to recount it!—so that I, that slowest of men, since an intolerable languor afflicts me, with winged feet, as they say, have greeted you by a letter of love and by my vow, and have already embraced you! I therefore congratulate you and pray that the Lord may deign to bind in covenant our nascent friendship.
And because brother Rufinus, who is said to have come with holy Melania from Egypt to Jerusalem, is bound to me by an undivided love of brotherhood, I ask that you would not find it burdensome to deliver to him my letter, joined to this letter of yours. Do not estimate us by his virtues. In him you will behold the expressed marks of sanctity; I am ash and a portion of the vilest mud and now a cinder, and while I am alive I count it enough if the weakness of my eyes can endure to bear the splendor of his character. He has just now washed, is clean, and whitened like snow; I, stained with all the filth of sins, await day and night with trembling to pay back the last farthing. But nevertheless, because 'the Lord looses the fettered' (Ps.
145:7) and rests his words upon the humble and trembling, perhaps to me also, lying in the sepulcher of my crimes, he will say: 'Jerome, come forth.' The holy presbyter Evagrius greets you very much; and we greet brother Martianus with joined obedience—whom, desiring to see, I am held fast by the chain of weakness. 5: To Florentinus. While I was dwelling in that part of the desert which, beside Syria, is joined to the Saracens, the writings of your charity were brought to me; on reading them my mind was so rekindled to set out for Jerusalem that what profited charity almost harmed my resolve. Now therefore, as best I can, I present to you a letter on my behalf.
Though absent in body, I come in love and in spirit, earnestly demanding that neither the magnitude of time nor of places tear apart our nascent friendships, which have cohered with the glue of Christ. Rather let us bind them together with reciprocal letters; let them run between us, let them meet each other, let them speak with us. Charity will lose not much, if it converses with itself in such discourse. But brother Rufinus, as you write, has not yet come; and if he comes, it will not much profit my desire, since I shall no longer be going to see him. For he too is separated from me by so long an interval that he cannot hasten hither, and I am hemmed in by the bounds of the solitude I have seized, so that what I did not wish has now begun to be no longer permitted me.
For this reason I too beseech, and I most earnestly ask that you petition, that there be granted to you for copying the commentaries of the blessed Reticius, bishop of Autun, in which he expounded the Song of Songs with sublime eloquence. A certain Paul, an old man from the homeland of the aforesaid brother Rufinus, also wrote to me that his copy of Tertullian was with him, which he has vehemently demanded back. And concerning this I ask that you order those books, which a short list appended will inform you that I do not have, to be written out by a copyist's hand on paper. I likewise ask that you transcribe for me the interpretation of the Davidic psalms and the very lengthy book on the synods by holy Hilary, which I myself had copied out for him with my own hand at Trier.
You know that this is the nourishment of the Christian soul, if it meditates on the law of the Lord day and night. Others you receive with hospitality, cherish with comfort, aid with means; for me, if you provide what I have asked, you will have bestowed much. And since, by the Lord's bestowal, we abound in many codices of the sacred library, command in turn: whatever you wish, I will send. Nor think it burdensome to me if you command: I have pupils who serve the copyist's art. But truly I do not promise a favor for that which I request. Brother Heliodorus indicated to me that you seek many things from the Scriptures and do not so find them; or, if you have all, charity will begin to claim for itself the right to ask more.
But the tutor of your boy, about whom you deigned to write back—who is without doubt his kidnapper—the presbyter Evagrius often rebuked in my presence, while I was still at Antioch. To him that man replied: 'I fear nothing.' He says he was dismissed by his master, and, if it pleases you, here he is; send him wherever you wish. I judge that I do not sin if I do not allow a vagrant man to flee farther. Wherefore, since I, set in this solitude, cannot do what you have commanded, I have asked Evagrius, most dear to me, that for your sake as well as mine he pursue the business insistently. 6: To Julian the deacon of Aquileia. There is an ancient saying: 'Liars bring it about that not even those telling the truth are believed';
which I see has happened to me, rebuked by you concerning my silence in letters. Shall I say: 'I wrote often, but it was the carelessness of the letter-carriers'? You will reply: 'That is the old excuse of all who do not write.' Shall I say: 'I found no one to carry the letters'? You will say that very many went from here to there. Shall I contend that I even gave them to these men? But they, because they did not deliver them, will deny it, and between absent parties the knowledge will be uncertain. What then shall I do? Without guilt I will ask pardon, thinking it more right to seek peace by yielding ground than to stir up strife on equal footing; although both the constant illness of my body and the sickness of my soul have so consumed me that, with death looming, I was scarcely even mindful of myself.