The ruin of supernatural gift of the African confessors, who spoke without tongues, will command the assent of those, and of those only, who already believe that their language was pure and orthodox. But the stubborn mind of an infidel is guarded by secret incurable suspicion; and the Arian, or Socinian, who has seriously rejected the doctrine of the Trinity, will not be shaken by the most plausible evidence of an Athanasian miracle. The Vandals and the Ostrogoths persevered in the profession of Arianism till the final ruin of the kingdoms which they had A.D. 500-700 founded in Africa and Italy. The Barbarians of Gaul submitted to the orthodox dominion of the Franks; and Spain was restored to the Catholic church by the voluntary conversion of the Visigoths. Revolt and martyrdom of in Spain A.D. 577-584 This salutary revolution 128 was hastened by the example of a Hermenegild royal martyr, whom our calmer reason may style an ungrateful rebel. Leovigild, the Gothic monarch of Spain, deserved the respect of his enemies, and the love of his subjects: the Catholics enjoyed a free toleration, and his Arian synods attempted, without much success, to reconcile their scruples by abolishing the unpopular rite of a second baptism. His eldest son Hermenegild, who was invested by his father with the royal diadem, and the fair principality of Bætica, contracted an honourable and orthodox alliance with a Merovingian princess, the daughter of Sigibert, king of Austrasia, and of the famous Brunechild. The beauteous Ingundis, who was no more than thirteen years of age, was received, beloved, and persecuted in the Arian court of Toledo; and her religious constancy was alternately assaulted with blandishments and violence by Goisvintha, the Gothic queen, who abused the double claim of maternal authority.129 Incensed by her resistance, Goisvintha seized the Catholic princess by her long hair, inhumanly dashed her against the ground, kicked her till she was covered with blood, and at last gave orders that she should be stripped, and thrown into a bason, or fish-pond. 130 Love and honour might excite Her 128 See the two general historians of Spain, Mariana (Hist. de Rebus Hispaniæ, tom, i. l. v. c. 12-15, p. 182-194) and Ferreras (French translation, tom. ii. p. 206247). Mariana almost forgets that he is a Jesuit, to assume the style and spirit of a Roman classic. Ferreras, an industrious compiler, reviews his facts and rectifies his chronology. 129 Goisvintha successively married two kings of the Visigoths: Athanagild, to whom she bore Brunechild, the mother of Ingundis; and Leovigild, whose two sons, Hermenegild and Recared, were the issue of a former marriage. 130 Iracundiæ furore succensa, adprehensam per comam capitis puellam in terram conlidit, et diu calcibus verberatam, ac sanguine cruentatam, jussit exspoliari, et piscinæ immergi. Greg. Turon. 1. v. c. 39, in tom. ii. p. 255. Gregory is one of our best originals for this portion of history. ut menegild to resent this injurious treatment of his bride; and he y was gradually persuaded that Ingundis suffered for the cause of divine truth. Her tender complaints and the weighty arguments 1. of Leander, archbishop of Seville, accomplished his conversion; ly and the heir of the Gothic monarchy was initiated in the Nicene e faith by the solemn rights of confirmation.131 The rash youth, inflamed by zeal, and perhaps by ambition, was tempted to n violate the duties of a son, and a subject; and the Catholics of d Spain, although they could not complain of persecution, applauded his pious rebellion against an heretical father. The civil war was protracted by the long and obstinate sieges of Merida, Cordova, and Seville, which had strenuously espoused the party of Hermenegild. He invited the orthodox Barbarians, the Suevi, and the Franks, to the destruction of his native land; he solicited the dangerous aid of the Romans, who possessed Africa and a part of the Spanish coast; and his holy ambassador, the archbishop Leander, effectually negotiated in person with the Byzantine court. But the hopes of the Catholics were crushed by the active diligence of a monarch who commanded the troops and treasures of Spain; and the guilty Hermenegild, after his vain attempts to resist or to escape, was compelled to surrender himself into the hands of an incensed father. Leovigild was still mindful of that sacred character; and the rebel, despoiled of the regal ornaments, was still permitted, in a decent exile, to profess the Catholic religion. His repeated and unsuccessful treasons at length provoked the indignation of the Gothic king; and the sentence of death, which he pronounced with apparent reluctance, was privately executed in the tower of Seville. 132 The inflexible constancy with which he refused to accept the Arian communion, as the price of his safety, may excuse the honours that have been paid to the memory of St. Hermenegild. His wife and infant son were detained by the Romans in ignominious captivity; and this domestic misfortune tarnished the glories of Leovigild, and embittered the last moments of his life. of Recared His son and successor, Recared, the first Catholic king of Conversion Spain, had imbibed the faith of his unfortunate brother, which and the Visigoths of 131 The Catholics who admitted the baptism of heretics repeated the rite, or, as 586-589 it was afterwards styled, the sacrament, of confirmation, to which they ascribed many mystic and marvellous prerogatives, both visible and invisible. See Chardon, Hist. des Sacrémens, tom. i. p. 405-552. 132 [Hermenigild was besieged in Seville, captured in Cordova, and executed in Tarragona; see John of Biclarum, ed. Mommsen, Chron. Min. ii. p. 217; and one Ms. of Isidore, ib., p. 287.] he supported with more prudence and success. Instead of revolting against his father, Recared patiently expected the hour of his death. Instead of condemning his memory, he piously supposed that the dying monarch had abjured the errors of Arianism and recommended to his son the conversion of the Gothic nation. To accomplish that salutary end, Recared convened an assembly of the Arian clergy and nobles, declared himself a Catholic, and exhorted them to imitate the example of their prince. The laborious interpretation of doubtful texts, or the curious pursuit of metaphysical arguments, would have excited an endless controversy; and the monarch discreetly proposed to his illiterate audience two substantial and visible arguments, the testimony of Earth and of Heaven. The Earth had submitted to the Nicene synod: the Romans, the Barbarians, and the inhabitants of Spain, unanimously professed the same orthodox creed; and the Visigoths resisted, almost alone, the consent of the Christian world. A superstitious age was prepared to reverence, as the testimony of Heaven, the preternatural cures, which were performed by the skill or virtue of the Catholic clergy; the baptismal fonts of Osset in Bætica,133 which were spontaneously replenished each year on the vigil of Easter; 134 and the miraculous shrine of St. Martin of Tours, which had already converted the Suevic prince and people of Gallicia.135 The Catholic king encountered some difficulties on this important change of the national religion. A conspiracy, secretly fomented by the queen-dowager, was formed against his life; and two counts excited a dangerous revolt in the Narbonnese Gaul. But Recared disarmed the conspirators, defeated the rebels, and executed severe justice; which the Arians, in their turn, might brand with the reproach of persecution. Eight bishops, whose names betray their Barbaric origin, abjured their errors; and all the books of Arian theology were reduced to ashes, with the 133 Osset, or Julia Constantia, was opposite to Seville, on the northern side of the Bætis (Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 3); and the authentic reference of Gregory of Tours (Hist. Francor. 1. vi. c. 43, p. 288) deserves more credit than the name of Lusitania (de Gloriâ Martyr. c. 24) which has been eagerly embraced by the vain and superstitious Portuguese (Ferreras, Hist. d'Espagne, tom. ii. p. 166). 134 This miracle was skilfully performed. An Arian king sealed the doors, and dug a deep trench round the church, without being able to intercept the Easter supply of baptismal water. 135 Ferreras (tom. ii. p. 168-175, A.D. 550) has illustrated the difficulties which regard the time and circumstances of the conversion of the Suevi. They had been recently united by Leovigild to the Gothic monarchy of Spain. [F. Görres, Kirche und Staat im spanischen Suevenreiche, in Zeitsch. f. Wiss. Theologie, 36, 2, 1893, P. 542 sqq.] The whole house in which they had been purposely collected. of the Lom A.D. 600, &c. The same Gregory, the spiritual conqueror of Britain, en- Conversion couraged the pious Theodelinda, queen of the Lombards, to bards of Italy. propagate the Nicene faith among the victorious savages, whose recent Christianity was polluted by the Arian heresy. Her devout labours still left room for the industry and success of future missionaries; and many cities of Italy were still disputed by hostile bishops. But the cause of Arianism was gradually suppressed by the weight of truth, of interest, and of example; and the controversy, which Egypt had derived from the Platonic school, was terminated, after a war of three hundred years, by the final conversion of the Lombards of Italy.138 of the Jews The first missionaries who preached the gospel to the Barbari- Persecution ans appealed to the evidence of reason, and claimed the benefit in Spain. A.D. of toleration.139 But no sooner had they established their 136 This addition to the Nicene, or rather the Constantinopolitan, creed was first made in the eighth council of Toledo, A.D. 653; but it was expressive of the popular doctrine (Gerard Vossius, tom. xi. p. 527, de tribus Symbolis). 137 See Gregor. Magn. 1. vii. epist. 126, apud Baronium, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 599, No. 25, 26, ix. 122 [vol. ii. p. 1031, ed. Bened.]. 138 Paul Warnefrid (de Gestis Langobard. 1. iv. c. 44, p. 853, edit. Grot.) allows that Arianism still prevailed under the reign of Rotharis (A.D. 636-652). The pious Deacon does not attempt to mark the precise æra of the national conversion, which was accomplished, however, before the end of the seventh century. 139 Quorum fidei et conversioni ita congratulatus esse rex perhibetur, ut nullum tamen cogeret ad Christianismum. . . . Didicerat enim a doctoribus auctoribusque suæ salutis, servitium Christi voluntarium non coactitium esse debere. Bedæ Hist. Ecclesiastic. 1. i. c. 26, p. 62, edit. Smith. 612-712 spiritual dominion than they exhorted the Christian kings to extirpate, without mercy, the remains of Roman or Barbaric superstition. The successors of Clovis inflicted one hundred lashes on the peasants who refused to destroy their idols; the crime of sacrificing to the dæmons was punished by the AngloSaxon laws with the heavier penalties of imprisonment and confiscation; and even the wise Alfred adopted, as an indispensable duty, the extreme rigour of the Mosaic institutions. 140 But the punishment, and the crime, were gradually abolished among a Christian people; the theological disputes of the schools were suspended by propitious ignorance; and the intolerant spirit, which could find neither idolaters nor heretics, was reduced to the persecution of the Jews. That exiled nation had founded some synagogues in the cities of Gaul; but Spain, since the time of Hadrian, was filled with their numerous colonies.141 The wealth which they accumulated by trade, and the management of the finances, invited the pious avarice of their masters; and they might be oppressed without danger, as they had lost the use, and even the remembrance, of arms. Sisebut, a Gothic king, who reigned in the beginning of the seventh century, proceeded at once to the last extremes of persecution.142 Ninety thousand Jews were compelled to receive the sacrament of baptism; the fortunes of the obstinate infidels were confiscated, their bodies were tortured; and it seems doubtful whether they were permitted to abandon their native country. The excessive zeal of the Catholic king was moderated, even by the clergy of Spain, who solemnly pronounced an inconsistent sentence: that the sacraments should not be forcibly imposed; but that the Jews who had been baptized should be constrained, for the honour of the church, to persevere in the external practice of a religion which they disbelieved and detested. Their frequent relapses provoked one of the successors of Sisebut to banish the 140 See the Historians of France, tom. iv. p. 114; and Wilkins, Leges AngloSaxonicæ, p. 11, 31. Siquis sacrificium immolaverit præter Deo soli morte moriatur. 141 The Jews pretend that they were introduced into Spain by the fleets of Solomon and the arms of Nebuchadnezzar; that Hadrian transported forty thousand families of the tribe of Judah, and ten thousand of the tribe of Benjamin, &c. Basnage, Hist. des Juifs, tom. vii. c. 9, p. 240-256. 142 Isidore, at that time archbishop of Seville, mentions, disapproves, and congratulates the zeal of Sisebut (Chron. Goth. p. 728 [c. 61; p. 291, in Chron. Min., vol. ii.]). Baronius (A.D. 614, No. 41) assigns the number on the evidence of Aimoin (1. iv. c. 22); but the evidence is weak, and I have not been able to verify the quotation (Historians of France, tom. iii. p. 127 [p. 110]). [The passage in Aimoin concerns the persecution of Gaul, not of Spain.] |
