We shall hear more about the persecution in the next chapter. Here I shall only say that Origen was imprisoned and cruelly tortured. He was by this time nearly seventy years old, and was weak in body from the labours which he had gone through in study, and from having hurt his health by hard and scanty living in his youth; so that he was ill able to bear the pains of the torture, and, although he did not die under it, he died of its effects soon after (A.D. 254).
Decius himself was killed in battle (A.D. 251), and his persecution came to an end. And when it was over, the faithful understood that it had been of great use, not only by helping to spread the Gospel, in the way which has been mentioned, but in purifying the Church, and in rousing Christians from the carelessness into which too many of them had fallen during the long time of ease and quiet which they had before enjoyed. For the trials which God sends on His people in this world are like the chastisements of a loving Father; and, if we accept them rightly, they will all be found to turn out to our good.
CHAPTER VIII.
ST. CYPRIAN.
PART I. A.D. 200-253.
About the same time with Origen lived St Cyprian, bishop of Carthage. He was born about the year 200, and had been long famous as a professor of heathen learning, when he was converted at the age of forty-five. He then gave up his calling as a teacher, and, like the first Christians at Jerusalem (Acts iv. 34-5), he sold a fine house and gardens, which he had near the town, and gave the price, with a large part of his other money, to the poor. He became one of the clergy of Carthage, and when the bishop died, about three years after, Cyprian was so much loved and respected that he was chosen in his place (A.D. 248).
Cyprian tried with all his power to do the duties of a good bishop, and to get rid of many wrong things which had grown upon his Church during the long peace which it had enjoyed. But about two years after he was made bishop, the persecution under Decius broke out, when, as was said in the last chapter, the persecutors tried especially to strike at the bishops and clergy, and to force them to deny their faith. Now Cyprian would have been ready and glad to die, if it would have served the good of his people; but he remembered how our Lord had said, "When they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another" (St. Matt. x. 23), and how He Himself withdrew from the rage of His enemies, because His "hour was not yet come" (St. John viii. 20, 59; xi. 54). And it seemed to the good bishop, that for the present it would be best to go out of the way of his persecutors. But he kept a constant watch over all that was done in his church, and he often wrote to his clergy and people from the place where he was hidden.
But in the meanwhile, things went on badly at Carthage. Many had called themselves Christians in the late quiet times who would not have done so if there had been any danger about it. And now, when the danger came, numbers of them ran into the market-place at Carthage, and seemed quite eager to offer sacrifice to the gods of the heathen. Others, who did not sacrifice, bribed some officers of the Government to give them tickets, certifying that they had sacrificed; and yet they contrived to persuade themselves that they had done nothing wrong by their cowardice and deceit! There were, too, some mischievous men among the clergy, who had not wished Cyprian to be bishop, and had borne him a grudge ever since he was chosen. And now these clergymen set on the people who had lapsed (or fallen) in the persecution, to demand that they should be taken back into the Church, and to say that some martyrs had given them letters which entitled them to be admitted at once.
In those days it was usual, when any Christian was known to have been guilty of a heavy sin, that (as is said in our Commination service), he should be "put to open penance" by the Church; that is, that he should be required to show his repentance publicly. Persons who were in this state were not allowed to receive the holy sacrament of the Lord's Supper, as all other Christians then did very often. The worst sinners were obliged to stand outside the church-door, where they begged those who were going in to pray that their sins might be forgiven; and those of the penitents who were let into the church had places in it separate from other Christians. Sometimes penance lasted for years; and always until the penitents had done enough to prove that they were truly grieved for their sins, so that the clergy might hope that they were received to God's mercy for their Redeemer's sake. But as it was counted a great and glorious thing to die for the truth of Christ, and martyrs were highly honoured in the Church, penitents had been in the habit of going to them while they were in prison awaiting death, and of entreating the martyrs to plead with the Church for the shortening of the appointed penance. And it had been usual, out of regard for the holy martyrs, to forgive those to whom they had given letters desiring that the penitents might be gently treated. But now these people at Carthage, instead of showing themselves humble, as true penitents would have been, came forward in an insolent manner, as if they had a right to claim that they might be restored to the Church; and the martyrs' letters (or rather what they called martyrs' letters) were used in a way very different from anything that had ever been allowed. Cyprian had a great deal of trouble with them; but he dealt wisely in the matter, and at length had the comfort of settling it. But, as people are always ready to find fault in one way or another, some blamed him for being too strict with the lapsed, and others for being too easy; and each of these parties went so far as to set up a bishop of its own against him. After a time, however, he got the better of these enemies, although the straiter sect (who were called Novatianists, after Novatian, a presbyter of Rome) lasted for three hundred years or more.