HUNERIC, the Arian king of the Vandals in Africa, succeeded his father
Genseric in 477. He behaved himself at first with moderation towards the
Catholics, so that they began to hold their assemblies in those places
where they had been prohibited by Genseric: but in 480, he began a
grievous persecution of the clergy and holy virgins, which, in 484,
became general, and occasioned vast numbers of the Catholics to be put
to death. Victorian, a citizen of Adrumetum, one of the principal lords
of the kingdom, had been made by him governor of Carthage with the Roman
title of proconsul. He was the wealthiest subject the king had, who
placed great confidence in him, and he had ever behaved with an
inviolable fidelity. The king, after he had published his cruel edicts,
sent a message to the proconsul in the most obliging terms, promising,
if he would conform to his religion, and execute his orders, to heap on
him the greatest wealth and the highest honors which it was in the power
of a prince to bestow. The proconsul, who amidst the glittering pomp of
the world perfectly understood its emptiness, made on the spot this
generous answer: "Tell the king that I trust in Christ. If his majesty
pleases, he may condemn me to the flames, or to wild beasts, or to any
torments: but I shall never consent to renounce the Catholic church in
which I have been baptized. Even if, there were no other life after
this, I would never be ungrateful and perfidious to God, who hath
granted me the {650} happiness of knowing him, and who hath bestowed on
me his most precious graces." The tyrant became furious at this answer:
nor can the tortures be imagined which he caused the saint to endure.
Victorian suffered them with joy, and amidst them finished his glorious
martyrdom. The Roman Martyrology joins with him on this day four others
who were crowned in the same persecution. Two brothers of the city of
Aquae-regiae, in the province of Byzacena, were apprehended for the faith,
and conducted to Tabaia in the same province. They had promised each
other, if possible, to die together; and they begged it of God, as a
favor, that they might both suffer the same torments. The persecutors
hung them in the air with great weights at their feet. One of them,
under the excess of pain, begged to be taken down for a little ease. His
brother, fearing this desire of ease might by degrees move him to deny
his faith, cried out from the rack on which he was hanging: "God forbid,
dear brother, that you should ask such a thing. Is this what we promised
to Jesus Christ? Should not I accuse you at his terrible tribunal? Have
you forgotten what we have sworn upon his body and blood, to suffer
death together for his holy name?" By these words the other was so
wonderfully encouraged that he cried out: "No, no; I ask not to be
released: on the contrary, add new weights, if you please, increase my
tortures, exert all your cruelties till they are exhausted upon me."
They were then burnt with red-hot plates of iron, and tormented so long,
and by so many new engines of torture, that the executioners at last
left them, saying: "Everybody follows their example, no one now embraces
our religion." This they said, chiefly because, notwithstanding they had
been so long and so grievously tormented, there were no scars or bruises
to be seen upon them. Two merchants of Carthage, who both bore the name
of Frumentius, suffered martyrdom about the same time, and are joined
with St. Victorian in the martyrologies. Among many glorious confessors
at that time, one Liberatus, an eminent physician, was sent into
banishment with his wife. He only grieved to see his infant children
torn from him. His wife checked his tears by these generous words:
"Think no more of them, Jesus Christ himself will have care of them, and
protect their souls." While in prison, she was told by the heretics that
her husband had conformed: accordingly, when she met him at the bar
before the judge she upbraided him in open court for having basely
abandoned God: but discovered by his answer that a cheat had been put
upon her, to deceive her into her ruin. Twelve young children, when
dragged away by the persecutors, held their companions by the knees till
they were torn away by violence. They were most cruelly beaten and
scourged every day for a long time; yet by God's grace every one of them
persevered to the end of the persecution firm in the faith. See St.
Victor, De Persec. Vandal. l. 5, n. 4.