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Crowns of Martyrdom
Prudentius, tr. Thackeray, 1890; selections
Chapter 5
NOW dazzling gleams, O wonder!1
Through the dark chamber wave:
Now burst the stocks asunder,
Yawns wide the dungeon-cave.
At once Vincentius haileth
The prize of hard-won fight;
Bright Hope o’er gloom prevaileth,
’Tis Christ who gives the light.
Sweet flow’rets are enwreathing
Those jagged shards and stones;
Strange nectar scents are breathing
Around that house of groans.
Angels their voices blended
Close to the dying man,
And one in form more splendid
Than all the rest, began.
“Arise, thou glorious Martyr,
All anxious care dismiss,
In Heaven is sealed thy charter,
Come range with us in bliss.
“Thy race is run, and vanished
The trial pangs accurst;
By death triumphant banished,
Torture has done her worst.
“O warrior staunch and peerless,
O bravest of the brave,
The palm to thee, the fearless,
Aghast those torments gave.
“O’er fellow-sufferer bending
The Christ, whose love o’erflows,
With crown of life unending
Indemnifies his woes.
“Come, disenthrallèd spirit,
Leave here this fragile shell,
Come heavenward and inherit
Fit home wherein to dwell.”
Notes
- This short extract contains some of the prettiest lines in the long poem of 575 lines on this subject. Marred though it is, somewhat, as to its literary form and historical value, by the prolix wrangle between the Prefect Datianus and the martyr, it is deserving of study. Vincentius suffered in the same persecution of Diocletian, A.D. 304, as did Eulalia,—a persecution commemorated by a coin with the inscription, NOMINE CHRISTIANORUM DELETO. It is not surprising that Prudentius, as a Spaniard, dwelt at some length on his countryman’s noble example. We can see in this case that he follows very closely in the steps of the anonymous writer in the “Acta,” which account again can be compared with four sermons (274-277) of St. Augustine on the day of the saint (Jan. 22). He alludes to the public reading in church of the details of the martyrdom, “Voluptatem interioribus oculis hausimus, cum beati Vincentii gloriosa Passio legeretur” (Serm. 275).
Vincentius was a deacon to Valerius, Bishop of Zaragoza. The bishop was sent into exile, afterwards to die a martyr. In the description preceding the translation, Vincentius has undergone many horrible tortures. He is lying in a cell strewn with potsherds, with his legs stretched wide apart fixed in the stocks. The following passage from the “Acta” illustrates the lines of Prudentius almost verbatim:
“Carceris illius nox aeternam accipit lucem, flagrant cerei ultra solis fulgorem radiantes, laxatumque ligni robur dissiluit, ac testarum asperitas fit florum redolentium iocunditas et mollities . . . . solitudo horribilis angelorum relevatur frequentia.”
Afterwards he is removed to a bed of down strewn with roses, to strengthen him for future torments. But he frustrates his tormentors by dying there quietly. The poem concludes with a long account of the various indignities in vain offered to his corpse, which is guarded by a raven, and eventually buried at Valencia. For the theological importance of part of this poem, see the Introduction (p. xxxiv), and to what is there said this further quotation from Canon Liddon may be added: “If the dying words of this or that martyr are misreported or exaggerated, or coloured by the phraseology of a later age, the general phenomenon (i.e., their confessing Christ’s Divinity) cannot but be admitted as a fact beyond dispute.”
Vincentius is the patron of Lisbon, of Valencia, of Zaragoza, one of the patrons of Milan, one of the patron saints of Châlons, and many other places in France. Four churches in England are dedicated in his name: Newnham, Hertfordshire; Littlebourne, Kent; Caythorpe, Lincolnshire, and Ashington, Somerset.
In art it is sometimes difficult to distinguish him from St. Laurentius but for his attribute of the raven.