Then Epiphanius, speaking most harshly, said, “Didst thou sign the writing?” he meant the Lateran Council. Abbot Maximus said, “Yes, I signed”. “And how didst thou dare to sign, and anathematise those who confess and believe as the intellectual Natures and the Catholic Church? In my judgment thou shalt be taken into the city, and be put in chains in the forum, and the actors and actresses, and the women that stand for hire, and all the people shall be brought, that every man and woman may slap thee, and spit in thy face.” Abbot Maximus replied:—“Be it as thou hast said, if we have anathematised those who confess Two Natures of which the Lord is, and the two natural Wills and Operations corresponding to Him who is both God and Man. Read, my Lord, the acts and decree, and if what you have said is found, do all your will. For I, and my fellow-servants, who have subscribed, have anathematised those who, according to Arius and Apollinarius, maintain one Will and Operation, [pg 168] and who do not confess our Lord and God to be intellectual in each of those Natures of which, in which, and which He is: and, therefore, in both of them having Will and Operation of our salvation.”
They said, “If we go on treating with this man, we shall neither eat nor drink. Let us go, and take food, and report what we have heard. For this man has sold himself to the devil. They went in and dined, and made their report, it being the eve of the Exaltation of the life-giving Cross in the year 656.”[82]
The next day, Theodosius, the Consul, came out early to the aforesaid Abbot Maximus, and took away all that he had, and said, in the emperor's name:—“Since thou wilt not have honour, it shall be far from thee. Go to the place thou hast thought thyself worthy of, suffering the judgment of thy disciples, him at Mesembria, and him at Perberi.” The patricians Troilus and Epiphanius had said:—“We will bring the two disciples, him at Mesembria, and him at Perberi, and put them, too, to the proof, and see the result. But learn, Sir Abbot, that, when we get a little relief from this rout of heathens (that is, the Saracens), by the Holy Trinity, we will bring you to terms, and your Pope, who is now lifted up, and all the talkers there, and the rest of your disciples: and we will cook you all, each in his own place, as Martin has been cooked”. And the Consul Theodosius took him and committed him to soldiers, and they took him to Perberis. It is not known how long what is called the second exile of [pg 169] St. Maximus lasted, which ensued after he had thus resisted the offers of the emperor.
At a later time, he was brought from Perberis, with his disciple, Anastasius, back to Constantinople.[83] A Synod, there held, excommunicated them both, as well as Pope St. Martin, St. Sophronius, and all the orthodox.[84] The second Anastasius, who had been a Nuncio, was also brought, and the Synod passed on all three the sentence:—“As the Synod has passed against you its canonical sentence, it only remains that you be subject to the severity of the civil laws for your impiety. And though no punishment could be proportionate to your crimes, we, leaving you to the just Judge in respect of the greater punishment, grant you the indulgence of the present life, modifying the strict severity of the laws. We order that you be delivered to the prefect, and by him taken to the guard: that you be then scourged; that in you, Maximus and Anastasius, and Anastasius, the instrument of your iniquity, the blaspheming tongue be cut out to the roots, and then your right hand, which has served your blaspheming mind, be cut off: that thus deprived of these execrable members, you be carried through the twelve quarters of this imperial city, and then be delivered to perpetual banishment and prison, to lament for the remainder of your errors.”
This sentence was carried out by the prefect. St. [pg 170] Maximus was then transported to Lazika, in Colchis: the other two to different castles. As Maximus, from weakness, could neither ride nor bear a carriage, he was borne on a sort of bed made of branches to the Castle of Schemarum. St. Maximus foretold the day of his death, which took place on the 13th August, 662, when he was eighty-two years old. At that moment the chalif Muawiah had about completed the first year in which he had fixed the seat of the Saracenic empire at Damascus: and the “rout of heathen” from which the Byzantine Consul had anticipated deliverance, held in peril during the whole of Muawiah's reign to 680 the imperial city on the Bosphorous, where “the lord of the world” usually resided.
Chapter IV. Christendom And Islam.
We are now come to the greatest of contrasts and oppositions in human history—to the Church of Christ, the foundress of nations, and to Islam, her counterfeit and opponent; to the law which went forth from Jerusalem and struck its perpetual root in Rome, and to the force which went forth from Mecca, tarried for a while in Damascus and Bagdad, and then encamped in the city of Constantine. Two reigns which never have ceased and never can cease to counterwork each other, the reign of the Word and the reign of the Sword.