Peter's Rock in Mohammed's Flood, from St. Gregory the Great to St. Leo III

by T. W. Allies

Chapter V. Old Rome And New Rome.

The seizure of Pope St. Martin in his Lateran Church by the exarch of Ravenna, Kalliopas, under order from the Emperor Constans II., his secret deportation to Constantinople, his trial before the Senate as guilty of high treason, his condemnation to death, and subsequent death in the Crimea from hardship or starvation, with the election of Pope Eugenius during his lifetime by the Roman clergy through dread of a Monothelite being forced upon them by the Byzantine; all this marks probably the lowest point of civil depression and helplessness to which the Papacy was ever reduced in those momentous three centuries which run from Genseric to Aistulf, from 455 to 755. The emperor who committed acts so mean, perfidious, and cruel was reigning over an empire already cut in two by the sword of Mohammed's chalif. How little he had heeded the chastisement we learn from an incident in the trial of the great eastern confessor, St. Maximus, which I have already recorded, but to which I recur that I may exhibit the full insolence of the eastern despot, as well as his blindness. Theodosius, the consul, coming straight out from the emperor's [pg 227] cabinet, with the condemnation of Maximus in his hand, addressed him in these words:[111] “Learn, Sir Abbot, that when we get a little relief from this rout of heathens (that is, of the Saracens who had stripped Constans of Syria, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and North Africa as far as Kairowan), 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”.

These words were spoken on the 14th December, 656.[112] The Pope Eugenius was the Pope alluded to in them, and it is inferred from them that he rejected those terms of union which the emperor was seeking to impose and which the nuntios were willing to accept. The martyrdom of St. Martin had taken place on the 16th September of the preceding year, 655.

It was the providence of God that the chalif himself never allowed the sworn protector of the Church who sat on the eastern throne to execute this threat. Rather he was all through this century in dread lest the Mohammedan, having fixed his throne at Damascus, should advance it to Constantinople. It was again the providence of God that Constantinople itself should not fall during this time of its utmost weakness, and so open [pg 228] the whole of northern Europe to Mohammedan domination. The city of Constantine was then the material rampart which stopped the impetuous current of Saracen invasion to the north. The chalif Muawiah, who reigned over the immense Saracen empire from 661 to 680, was strong enough continually to beat the Emperor, to ravage his Asiatic territory, to advance towards his capital, but he was never able to take it. The advance of the seat of the Saracenic empire from the remote Medina to the near and beautiful Damascus, the paradise of eastern cities, dwelling in its perpetual garden among ever-flowing waters of Abana and Pharpar, was itself a sign how the empire had fallen. A religion founded on the denial of the Christian faith, of which it was, moreover, the special rival, had full possession of the once Roman and Christian East. Muawiah became chalif on the death of Ali in 661. He had conducted the civil war against Ali, which distracted for five years the Saracen power, with the forces of Syria, as its governor; and when he became supreme made it the capital of his empire.

Constans II., having crowned with martyrdom the greatest confessor of the West, Pope Martin, and the greatest confessor of the East, St. Maximus, resolved in the year 662, to visit the West. The tyranny of Constans in regard to the Pope was not completed even by his treatment of St Martin. When he had condemned this Pope, but before he had caused his death he is supposed to have compelled the Roman clergy to elect another Pope. This was Eugenius, who [pg 229] was recognised in the year 654 for Pope, while St. Martin was yet alive.[113] Whether the urgency and threats of the imperial ministers overcame at length the constancy of the clergy, or whether, as is more probable, they feared to see some heretic sent by the emperor to occupy the throne of St. Peter, they elected Eugenius, by birth a Roman, a person of great goodness and holy life, who held the See two years and eight months. The synodical letter of Peter, the fourth Monothelite patriarch of Constantinople in succession was sent to him, but being obscure in its expressions about our Lord, was sent back with indignity.[114] It would seem that the exceeding danger of the time caused the election and consecration of Pope Eugenius in the lifetime of St. Martin, to pass for legitimate. Eugenius died in 657, and was succeeded by Pope Vitalian, after a vacancy of a month and 29 days.

Pope Eugenius had not acknowledged either of the patriarchs Paulus or Peter by writing to them, but Vitalian sent his nuntios to Constans to announce his accession to the papacy by his synodical letter. Constans received them graciously, acknowledged the privileges of the Roman Church, and sent by them to St. Peter at Rome a copy of the gospels bound in golden covers and studded with diamonds. Vitalian, says Anastasius, preserved in all respects the ecclesiastical rule and vigour.

Constans had a brother named Theodosius, whom he [pg 230] forced to become a deacon, and he had repeatedly received from his hands the chalice of the Lord's Blood. Afterwards he caused him to be murdered. He was said to have often dreamt of his victim, offering him a chalice full of blood, with the words: “Brother, drink”. The stings of conscience and the hatred of the people for his cruelty and his protection of heresy, were supposed to drive him from his capital.

The book of the Popes under its notice of the life of Vitalian says:[115] “In his time the emperor came from the royal city by coast to Athens, thence to Tarentum, Beneventum, and Naples. At Rome he arrived on the 5th July. The Apostolical went out with his clergy to the sixth milestone from the city to receive him. The same day the emperor went to pray at St. Peter's, and offered his gift. On Saturday he went to St. Mary's and also offered his gift. On Sunday he went in procession with his army to St. Peter's. All went out with wax candles to meet him, and he offered on the altar a golden woven pall, and Mass was celebrated. Again on Saturday the emperor came to the Lateran, took a bath, and dined in the Julian basilica. On Sunday there was a station at St. Peter's, and after celebration of Mass the emperor and the pontiff took leave of each other. Twelve days he remained in the Roman city. Every bronze statue which ornamented the city he took down, nay, and he unroofed of its brazen tiles the Church of Blessed Mary at the Martyrs, and sent all things which he had taken to the royal city. Then on Monday he [pg 231] left Rome and returned to Naples. Then he went by land to Rhegium and entered Sicily. He lived in the city of Syracuse, and caused much affliction to the people, the inhabitants or proprietors of Calabria, Sicily, Africa, and Sardinia, by his exactions during many years such as had never been.[116] He separated even wives from their husbands, and sons from their fathers, and they suffered many other unheard of things, so that a man had not hope of life. They took even the sacred vessels and ornaments of God's holy churches, and left nothing.”

The visit of Constans to Rome casts a strong light upon the condition of things in a century concerning which we are singularly destitute of detailed information.