ST. DIONYSIUS of Alexandria wrote to Fabius, bishop of Antioch, a
relation of the persecution raised at Alexandria by the heathen populace
of that city, in the last year of the reign of the emperor Philip. A
certain poet of Alexandria, who pretended to foretell things to come,
stirred up this great city against the Christians on the motive of
religion. The first victim of their rage was a venerable old man, named
Metras, or Metrius, whom they would have compelled to utter impious
words against the worship of {387} the true God: which, when he refused
to do, they beat him with staffs, thrust splinters of reeds into his
eyes, and having dragged him into one of the suburbs, stoned him to
death. The next person they seized was a Christian woman, called Quinta,
whom they carried to one of their temples to pay divine worship to the
idol. She loaded the execrable divinity with many reproaches, which so
exasperated the people that they dragged her by the heels upon the
pavement of sharp pebbles, cruelly scourged her, and put her to the same
death. The rioters, by this time, were in the height of their fury.
Alexandria seemed like a city taken by storm. The Christians mads no
opposition, but betook themselves to flight, and beheld the loss of
their goods with joy; for their hearts had no ties on earth. Their
constancy was equal to their disinterestedness; for of all who fell into
their hands, St. Dionysius knew of none that renounced Christ.
The admirable Apollonia, whom old age and the state of virginity
rendered equally venerable, was seized by them. Their repeated blows on
her jaws beat out all her teeth. At last they made a great fire without
the city, and threatened to cast her into it, if she did not utter
certain impious words. She begged a moment's delay, as if it had been to
deliberate on the proposal; but, to convince her persecutors that her
sacrifice was perfectly voluntary, she no sooner found herself at
liberty, than of her own accord she leaped into the flames. They next
exercised their fury on a holy man called Serapion, and tortured him in
his own house with great cruelty. After bruising his limbs, disjointing
and breaking his bones, they threw him headlong from the top of the
house on the pavement, and so completed his martyrdom. A civil war among
the pagan citizens put an end to their fury this year, but the edict of
Decius renewed it in 250. See the rest of the relation on the 27th of
February. An ancient church in Rome, which is frequented with great
devotion, bears the name of St. Apollonia: under whose patronage we meet
with churches and altars in most parts of the Western church.
* * * * *
The last part of our saint's conduct is not proposed to our imitation,
as self-murder is unjustifiable. If any among the Fathers have commended
it, they presumed, with St. Austin, that it was influenced by a
particular direction of the Holy Ghost, or was the effect of a pious
simplicity, founded in motives of holy zeal and charity. For it can
never be lawful for a person by any action wilfully to concur to, or
hasten his own death, though many martyrs out of an ardent charity, and
desire of laying down their lives for God, and being speedily united to
him, anticipated the executioners in completing their sacrifice. Among
the impious, absurd, and false maxims of the Pagan Greeks and Romans,
scarce any thing was more monstrous than the manner in which they
canonized suicide in distress, as a remedy against temporal miseries,
and a point of heroism. To bear infamy and all kind of sufferings with
unshaken constancy and virtue, is true courage and greatness of soul,
and the test and triumph of virtue: and to sink under misfortunes, is
the most unworthy baseness of soul. But what name can we find for the
pusillanimity of those who are not able so much as to look humiliations,
poverty, or affliction in the face? Our life we hold of God, and he who
destroys it injures God, to whom he owes it. He refuses also to his
friends and to the republic of mankind, the comfort and succors which
they are entitled in justice or charity to receive from him. Moreover,
if to murder another is the greatest temporal injustice a man can commit
against a neighbor, life being of all temporal blessings the greatest
and most noble, suicide is a crime so much more enormous, as the charity
which every one owes to himself, especially to his immortal soul, is
stricter, {388} more noble and of a superior order to that which he owes
to his neighbor.