A Source Book for Ancient Church HistoryAyer, Joseph Cullen
History
A Source Book for Ancient Church History
Ayer, Joseph Cullen
Church history -- Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600 -- Sources
The day of their victory dawned, and they proceeded from the prison into
the amphitheatre, as if to happiness, joyous and of brilliant
countenances; if, perchance, shrinking, it was with joy and not with fear.
Perpetua followed with placid look, and with step and gait as a matron of
Christ, beloved of God, casting down the lustre of her eyes from the gaze
of all. Likewise Felicitas came, rejoicing that she had safely brought
forth, so that she might fight with the beasts.… And when they were
brought to the gate, and were constrained to put on the clothing—the men
that of the priests of Saturn, and the women that of those who were
consecrated to Ceres—that noble-minded woman resisted even to the end with
constancy. For she said: “We have come thus far of our own accord, that
our liberty might not be restrained. For this reason we have yielded our
minds, that we might not do any such thing as this; we have agreed on this
with you.” Injustice acknowledged the justice; the tribune permitted that
they be brought in simply as they were. Perpetua sang psalms, already
treading under foot the head of the Egyptian [seen in a vision; see
preceding chapters]; Revocatus and Saturninus and Saturus uttered
threatenings against the gazing people about this martyrdom. When they
came within sight of Hilarianus, by gesture and nod they began to say to
Hilarianus: “Thou judgest us, but God will judge thee.” At this the
exasperated people demanded that they should be tormented with scourges as
they passed along the rank of the _venatores_. And they, indeed, rejoiced
that they should have incurred any one of their Lord’s passions.
But He who had said, “Ask and ye shall receive,” gave to them, when they
asked, that death which each one had desired. For when they had been
discoursing among themselves about their wish as to their martyrdom,
Saturninus, indeed, had professed that he wished that he might be thrown
to all the beasts; doubtless that he might wear a more glorious crown.
Therefore, in the beginning of the exhibition he and Revocatus made trial
of the leopard, and, moreover, upon the scaffold they were harassed by the
bear. Saturus, however, held nothing in greater horror than a bear; but he
thought he would be finished by one bite of a leopard. Therefore, when a
wild boar was supplied, it was the huntsman who had supplied that boar,
and not Saturus, who was gored by that same beast and who died the day
after the shows. Saturus only was drawn out; and when he had been bound on
the floor near to a bear, the bear would not come forth from his den. And
so Saturus for the second time was recalled, unhurt.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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