The evidence of Eusebius, on any subject connected with primitive faith
and practice, cannot be looked to without feelings of deep interest. He
flourished about the beginning of the fourth century, and was Bishop of
Caesarea, in Palestine. His testimony has always been appealed to in the
Catholic Church, as an authority not likely to be gainsaid. He was a
voluminous writer, and his writings were very diversified in their
character. {172} Whatever be our previous sentiments we cannot too
carefully examine the remains of this learned man. But in his writings,
historical, biographical, controversial, or by whatever name they may be
called, overflowing as they are with learning, philosophical and
scriptural, I can find no one single passage which countenances the
decrees of the Council of Trent; not one passage which would encourage
me to hope that I prayed as the primitive Church was wont to pray, if by
invocation I requested an angel or a saint to procure me any favour, or
to pray for me. The testimony of Eusebius has a directly contrary
tendency.
Among the authorities quoted by the champions of the invocation of
saints, I can find only three from Eusebius; and I sincerely lament the
observations which truth and justice require me to make here, in
consequence of the manner in which his evidence has been cited. The
first passage to which I refer is quoted by Bellarmin from the history
of Eusebius, to prove that the spirit of a holy one goes direct from
earth to heaven. This passage is not from the pen of Eusebius; and if it
were, it would not bear on our inquiry. The second is quoted by the same
author, from the Evangelica Præparatio, to prove that the primitive
Christians offered prayers to the saints. Neither is this from the pen
of Eusebius. The third Extract, from the account of the martyrdom of
Polycarp, is intended to prove that the martyrs were worshipped. Even
this, one of the most beautiful passages in ancient history, as it is
represented by Bellarmin and others, is interpolated.
The first passage, which follows a description of the {173} martyr
Potamiæna's sufferings, is thus quoted by Bellarmin: "In this manner the
blessed virgin, Potamniæna, emigrated from earth to heaven." [Hoc modo
beata Virgo emigravit e terris ad coelum. Vol. ii. p. 854.] And such,
doubtless, is the passage in the translation of Eusebius, ascribed to
Ruffinus [Basil, 1535. p. 134]; but the original is, "And such a
struggle was thus accomplished by this celebrated virgin;" ([Greek: kai
ho men taes aoidimou koraes toioutos kataegoisisto athlos]; Tale
certamen ab hac percelebri et gloriosa virgine confectum fait.); and
such is the Parisian translation of 1581.
The second misquotation is far more serious. Bellarmin thus quotes
Eusebius: "These things we do daily, who honouring the soldiers of true
religion as the friends of God, approach to their respective monuments,
and make OUR PRAYERS TO THEM, as holy men, by whose intercession to God,
we profess to be not a little aided." [Hæc nos, inquit, quotidie
factitamus qui veras pietatis milites ut Dei amicos honorantes, ad
monumenta quoque eorum accedimus, votaque ipsis facimus tanquam viris
sanctis quorum intercessione ad Deum non parum juvari profitemur.--p.
902. He quotes it as c. 7.]
By one who has not by experience become familiar with these things it
would scarcely be believed, that whilst the readers of Bellarmin have
been taught to regard these as the words of Eusebius, in the original
there is no mention whatever made of the intercession of the saints;
that there is no allusion to prayer to them; that there is no admission
even of any benefit derived from them at all. This quotation Bellarmin
makes from the Latin version, published in Paris in 1581, or from some
common source: it is word for word the same. We must either allow him to
be ignorant of the truth, or to have designedly preferred error. {174}
The copy which I have before me of the "Evangelica Præparatio," in Greek
and Latin, was printed in 1628, and dedicated by Viger Franciscus, a
priest of the order of Jesuits, to the Archbishop of Paris.
Eusebius, marking the resemblance in many points between Plato's
doctrine and the tenets of Christianity, on the reverence which,
according to Plato, ought to be paid to the good departed, makes this
observation: "And this corresponds with what takes place on the death of
those lovers of God, whom you would not be wrong in calling the soldiers
of the true religion. Whence also it is our custom to proceed to their
tombs, and AT THEM [the tombs] to make our prayers, and to honour their
blessed souls, inasmuch as these things are with reason done by us."
[Greek: kai tauta de armozei epi tae ton theophilon teleutae ous
stratiotas taes alaethous eusebeius ouk an hamartois eipon
paralambanesthai othen kai epi tas thaekas auton ethos haemin parienai
kai tas euchas para tautais poieisthai, timan te tas makarias auton
psychas, os eulogos kai touton uph haemon giguomenon.] This translation
agrees to a certain extent with the Latin of Viger's edition ("Quæ
quidem in hominum Deo carissimorum obitus egregie conveniunt, quos veræ
pietatis milites jure appellaris. Nam et eorum sepulchra celebrare et
preces ibi votaque nuncupare et beatas illorum animas venerari
consuevimus, idque a nobis merito fieri statuimus"); though the
translator there has employed words more favourable to the doctrine of
the saints' adoration, than he could in strictness justify.
The celebrated letter from the Church of Smyrna (Euseb. Cantab. 1720.
vol. i. p. 163), relating the martyrdom of Polycarp, one of the most
precious relics of Christian antiquity, has already been examined by us,
when we were inquiring into the recorded {175} sentiments of Polycarp;
and to our reflections in that place we have little to add. The
interpolations to which we have now referred, are intended to take off
the edge of the evidence borne by this passage of Eusebius against the
invocation of saints. First, whereas the Christians of Smyrna are
recorded by Eusebius to have declared, without any limitation or
qualification whatever, that they could never worship any fellow-mortal
however honoured and beloved, the Parisian edition limits and qualifies
their declaration by interpolating the word "as God," implying that they
would offer a secondary worship to a saint. Again, whereas Eusebius in
contrasting the worship paid to Christ, with the feelings of the
Christians towards a martyr, employs only the word "love," Bellarmin,
following Ruffinus, interpolates the word "veneramur" after "diligimus,"
a word which may be innocently used with reference to the holy saints
and servants of God, though it is often in ancient writers employed to
mean the religious worship of man to God. Still how lamentable is it to
attempt by such tampering with ancient documents to maintain a cause,
whatever be our feelings with regard to it!
With two more brief quotations we will close our report of Eusebius.
They occur in the third chapter of the third book of his Demonstratio
Evangelica, and give the same view of the feelings and sentiments of the
primitive Christians towards the holy angels, which we have found Origen
and all the other fathers to have acknowledged.
"In the doctrine of his word we have learned that there exists, after
the most high God, certain powers, {176} in their nature incorporeal and
intellectual, rational and purely virtuous, who ([Greek: choreuousas])
keep their station around the sovereign King,--the greater part of whom,
by certain dispensations of salvation, are sent at the will of the
Father even as far as to men; whom, indeed, we have been taught to know
and to honour, according to the measure of their dignity, rendering to
God alone, the sovereign King, the honour of worship." ([Greek:
gnorizein kai timain kata to metron taes axias edidachthaemen, mono toi
pambasilei Theoi taen sebasmion timaen aponemontes]) Again: "Knowing the
divine, the serving and ministering powers of the sovereign God, and
honouring them to the extent of propriety; but confessing God alone, and
Him alone worshipping." ([Greek: theias men dynameis hypaeretikas tou
pambasileos Theou kai leitourgikas eidotes, kai kata to prosaekon
timontes monon de Theon homologountes, kai monon ekeinon sebontes])
[Demonst. Evang. Paris, 1628. p. 106.; Præpar. Evang. lib. vii. c. 15.
p. 237.]
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