St. Fructueux, Bishop of Tarragona,[[641]] who suffered martyrdom in 259, was seen after his death ascending to heaven with the deacons who had suffered with him; they appeared as if they were still attached to the stakes near which they had been burnt. They were seen by two Christians, who showed them to the wife and daughter of Emilian, who had condemned them. The saint appeared to Emilian himself and to the Christians, who had taken away their ashes, and desired that they might be all collected in one spot. We see similar apparitions[[642]] in the acts of St. James, of St. Marienus, martyrs, and some others who suffered in Numidia in 259. We may observe the like[[643]] in the acts of St. Montanus, St. Lucius, and other African martyrs in 259 or 260, and in those of St. Vincent, a martyr in Spain, in 304, and in the life of St. Theodore, martyr, in 306, of whose sufferings St. Gregory of Nicea has written an account. Everybody knows what happened at Sebastus, in Armenia, in the martyrdom of the famous forty martyrs, of whom St. Basil the Great has written the eulogium. One of the forty, overcome by the excess of cold, which was extreme, threw himself into a hot bath that was prepared just by. Then he who guarded them having perceived some angels who brought crowns to the thirty-nine who had persevered in their sufferings, despoiled himself of his garments, joined himself to the martyrs, and declared himself a Christian.
All these instances invincibly prove that, at least in the first ages of the church, the greatest and most learned bishops, the holy martyrs, and the generality of the faithful, were well persuaded of the possibility and reality of apparitions.
Footnotes:
[[636]] Larrey, Hist. de Louis XIV. year 1698, p. 68.
[[637]] Aug. lib. i. de Origine Animæ.
[[638]] Ibid. p. 97.
[[639]] Aug. lib. i. de Origine Animæ, p. 132.
[[640]] Acta Martyr. Sincera, p. 212. Vita et Passio S. Cypriani, p. 268.
[[641]] Acta Martyr. Sincera, pp. 219, 221.
[[642]] Acta Martyr. Sincera, p. 226.