The causes of the Arian hatred to the Catholics is very obscure. You will find all that is known in Dean Milman's History of Latin Christianity. A simple explanation may be found in the fact that the Catholics considered the Arians, and did not conceal their opinion, as all literally and actually doomed to the torments of everlasting fire; and that, as Gibbon puts it, 'The heroes of the north, who had submitted with some reluctance, to believe that all their ancestors were in hell, were astonished and exasperated to learn, that they themselves had only changed the mode of their eternal condemnation.' The Teutons were (Salvian himself confesses it) trying to serve God devoutly, in chastity, sobriety, and honesty, according to their light. And they were told by the profligates of Africa, that this and no less, was their doom. It is not to be wondered at, again, if they mistook the Catholic creed for the cause of Catholic immorality. That may account for the Vandal custom of re-baptizing the Catholics. It certainly accounts for the fact (if after all it be a fact) which Victor states, that they tortured the nuns to extort from them shameful confessions against the priests. But the history of the African persecution is the history of all persecutions, as confest again and again by the old fathers, as proved by the analogies of later times. The sins of the Church draw down punishment, by making her enemies confound her doctrine and her practice. But in return, the punishment of the Church purifies her, and brings out her nobleness afresh, as the snake casts his skin in pain, and comes out young and fair once more; and in every dark hour of the Church, there flashes out some bright form of human heroism, to be a beacon and a comfort to all future time. Victor, for instance, tells the story of Dionysia, the beautiful widow whom the Vandals tried to torture into denying the Divinity of our Lord.--How when they saw that she was bolder and fairer than all the other matrons, they seized her, and went to strip her: and she cried to them, 'Qualiter libet occidite: verecunda tamen membra nolite nudare,' but in vain. They hung her up by the hands, and scourged her till streams of blood ran down every limb. Her only son, a delicate boy, stood by trembling, knowing that his turn would come next; and she saw it, and called to him in the midst of her shame and agony. 'He had been baptized into the name of the Blessed Trinity; let him die in that name, and not lose the wedding-garment. Let him fear the pain that never ends, and cling to the life that endures for ever.' The boy took heart, and when his turn came, died under the torture; and Dionysia took up the little corpse, and buried it in her own house; and worshipped upon her boy's grave to her dying day. Yes. God had his own left, even among those fallen Africans of Carthage.