Works (excl. History) 4 part 3/5

who indeed arranged to come thither by a land journey, but to return with the maiden by ship, came to bishop Aidan, beseeching him to supplicate the Lord for himself and his company, who were about to undertake so great a journey. He, blessing them and commending them to the Lord, gave also consecrated oil: 'I know,' he said, 'that when you have boarded the ship, a tempest and a contrary wind will come upon you; but do you remember to cast into the sea this oil which I give you; and at once, the winds quieting, a calm of the sea will joyfully attend you, and send you home on the journey you desire.' All which things, as the bishop had foretold, were fulfilled in order;

and indeed at first, the waves of the deep raging, the sailors tried by anchors cast into the sea to hold back the ship, nor by doing this did they avail anything. And when, the waves sweeping in on every side and beginning to fill the ship, they all saw death threatening them, and now already at hand, at last the priest, remembering the words of the bishop, taking the flask, cast some of the oil into the sea, and at once, as had been foretold, it ceased from its raging. And so it came to pass that the man of God, both by the spirit of prophecy foretold the tempest to come, and by the power of the same spirit, though bodily absent, lulled it when it had arisen.

The order of which miracle no doubtful narrator, but a most faithful priest of our church, by name Cynimund, narrated to me, who declared that he had heard this from the very priest Utta, in whom and through whom it was accomplished. Many who could have known it tell another memorable miracle of the same father. For in the time of his bishopric, the hostile army of the Mercians, with Penda as leader, devastating the regions of the Northumbrians far and wide with impious slaughter, came as far as the royal city which is named after Bebba, once queen, and tried to consume it with flames, since he could take it neither by arms nor by siege;

and having pulled down the little villages which he found in the neighbourhood of the city, he conveyed thither a very great heap of beams, of rafters, of wattle walls, and of thatched roofing, and surrounded the city with these to a great height on the side which is adjacent to the land; and when he should perceive a favourable wind, fire being applied, he strove to burn the city. At which time the most reverend bishop Aidan was staying on the island of Farne, which is about two miles distant from the city. For thither he was wont very often to withdraw for the sake of secret prayer and silence; and indeed to this day they are wont to point out the place of his solitary seat on that same island.

When he, with the winds bearing them, beheld globes of fire and smoke raised above the walls of the city, he is said, with eyes and hands lifted up to heaven, to have said with tears: 'See, Lord, how great evils Penda does!' This said, immediately the winds, turned away from the city, drove back the burning flames upon those who had kindled them, so that, some being injured and all terrified, they ceased to assail the city further, which they had recognized to be helped by God. When the day of his death compelled him to go forth from the body, the years of his bishopric being completed at seventeen, he was in a royal vill not far from the city of which we have spoken before. For in this place, having a church and a chamber, he was wont often to turn aside and stay there, and thence to go out round about to preach;

This same thing he was accustomed to do in the king's other estates as well, since he possessed nothing of his own property, save only his church and the small fields adjoining it. So they pitched a tent for him in his sickness on the western side of the church, in such a way that the tent itself leaned against the wall of the church. Whence it came to pass that, leaning upon a buttress that had been set outside the church for its support, he breathed out the last breath of his life. He died in the seventeenth year of his episcopate, on the day before the Kalends of September. His body was soon afterward translated thence to the island of the Lindisfarne folk, and was buried in the cemetery of the brethren.

But after some considerable time, when a larger church had been built there and dedicated in honour of the most blessed prince of the apostles, his bones were translated thither and laid to the right of the altar, with the veneration befitting so great a bishop. He was succeeded in the episcopate by Finan, who was likewise sent for this office from the island and monastery of the Scots at Hii, and remained in the bishopric for no short time. Now it happened, after some years, that Penda, king of the Mercians, coming into these parts with a hostile army, while he destroyed by sword and fire all that he could, that village too, in which the bishop had died, together with the church already mentioned, was consumed by the flames.

But, marvellous to relate, that one buttress alone, against which he had leaned when he died, could not be consumed by the fires that devoured everything around it. This miracle becoming famous, the church was soon restored on the same spot, and this same buttress was set up again on the outside as a support of the wall, as it had been before. And again, when some further time had passed, it came to pass through careless neglect that the same village, and the church together with it, was consumed by fire. Yet not even then was the flame able to touch that buttress; and though, by a great miracle indeed, it entered the very holes by which the buttress had been fastened to the building and ate them away, it was nevertheless in no way permitted to harm the buttress itself.

Wherefore, when the church was built there for the third time, they did not, as before, place that buttress on the outside to prop up the building, but set it within the church itself in memory of the miracle, where those who entered should bend the knee and implore the mercy of heaven. And it is well established that from that time many have obtained the grace of healing in that place; nay more, that by chips cut from the buttress itself and put into water, many have gained for themselves and for their own remedies of their sicknesses. Now I have written these things concerning the person and works of the aforesaid man, by no means praising or approving in him this, that he was less perfectly instructed about the observance of Easter; nay, greatly detesting this, as I have most plainly shown in the book which I composed concerning the times;

but as a truthful historian, simply describing those things which were done by him or through him, and praising in his deeds what is worthy of praise, and commending it to the memory of readers for their profit: namely his zeal for peace and charity, for continence and humility; a mind that conquered anger and avarice, and a despiser alike of pride and vainglory; his diligence in both performing and teaching the heavenly commandments, his earnestness in reading and in vigils, an authority worthy of a priest in rebuking the proud and the powerful, and likewise his clemency in consoling the weak and in relieving or defending the poor.

He who—to comprehend many things briefly—as far as we have learned from those who knew him, took care to omit nothing of all that he had recognized ought to be done in the writings of the Gospels, or of the apostles, or of the prophets, but strove to fulfil everything by his works according to his strength. These things in the aforesaid bishop I much embrace and love, because without doubt I do not doubt that they pleased God. But that he did not observe Easter at its proper time, either being ignorant of its canonical season, or, overcome by the authority of his own nation, not following it even when recognized, this I neither approve nor praise. In which, however, I do approve this, that in the celebration of his Easter he held in his heart, venerated, and preached no other thing than we do;

that is, the redemption of the human race through the passion, resurrection, and ascension into the heavens of the Mediator of God and men, the man Jesus Christ. Whence also he kept this feast not, as some falsely suppose, on the fourteenth moon on whatever weekday with the Jews, but always on the Lord's Day, from the fourteenth moon until the twentieth; namely, on account of his faith in the Lord's resurrection, which took place on the first day of the week, and on account of the hope of our own resurrection, which he, together with the holy Church, believed would truly come to pass on that same first day of the week, which is now called the Lord's Day. [18] In these times, over the kingdom of the East Angles, after Eorpwald the successor of Redwald, there ruled Sigberct his brother, a good and religious man;

who long before, while he was an exile in Gaul, fleeing the enmity of Redwald, had received the washing of baptism; and returning to his homeland, when he had gained the kingdom, desiring forthwith to imitate those things which he had seen well ordered in Gaul, established a school in which boys might be instructed in letters, with the help of Bishop Felix, whom he had received from Kent, and who provided them with paedagogues and masters after the manner of the men of Kent. And that king became so great a lover of the heavenly kingdom that at last, leaving the affairs of his earthly kingdom and committing them to his kinsman Ecgric, who already before held a part of that same kingdom, he entered the monastery which he had made for himself, and, having received the tonsure, took care to fight rather for the eternal kingdom.

While he was doing this for a long time, it came to pass that the nation of the Mercians, under the leadership of King Penda, advanced to war against the East Angles; and these, when they saw themselves inferior to the enemy in battle, begged Sigberct to come with them into the fight to strengthen the soldiery. When he was unwilling and refused, they dragged him forth from the monastery against his will and led him into the battle, hoping that the soldiers' courage would tremble less, and that they could less meditate flight, in the presence of one who had once been a most vigorous and distinguished leader. But he, not unmindful of his profession, although he was surrounded by a splendid army, would have nothing in his hand but a staff only; and he was slain together with King Ecgric, and their whole army, as the pagans pressed on, was cut down or scattered.

And the successor of their kingdom became Anna, son of Eni, of royal stock, a most excellent man and the father of most excellent offspring, of whom in what follows, in their proper place, we must speak; who also himself was afterward slain by the same pagan leader of the Mercians by whom his predecessors had been slain. [19] But while Sigberct still held the insignia of the kingdom, there came from Ireland a holy man named Fursey, renowned in word and deeds, and also distinguished by remarkable virtues, desiring for the Lord's sake to lead a pilgrim's life wherever he might find it opportune for himself.

When he had come to the province of the East Angles, he was received honourably by the aforesaid king, and, pursuing his accustomed work of evangelizing, he converted to Christ many who were unbelievers, both by the example of his virtue and by the incitement of his preaching, and confirmed yet more in the faith and love of Christ those who already believed. There, seized by a certain bodily infirmity, he was found worthy to enjoy an angelic vision, in which he was admonished to persist diligently in the ministry of the word he had begun, and to apply himself unwearied to his customary vigils and prayers; because his departure was certain for him, but the hour of that same departure was uncertain and yet to come, as the Lord says: Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

Confirmed by this vision, he took care most speedily to build the place of the monastery, which he had received from the aforesaid King Sigberct, and to establish it in the disciplines of the rule. Now the monastery was pleasant by reason of its nearness to woods and sea, built in a certain stronghold which in the tongue of the Angles is called Cnobheresburg, that is, the city of Cnobher; which afterward Anna, king of that province, and certain nobles adorned with more stately buildings and gifts. Now this man was of the most noble stock of the Scots, but far nobler in mind than in flesh.

From the very time of his boyhood he gave no small care to the sacred readings and likewise to the monastic disciplines, and—what most befits the saints—he took anxious care to do all those things which he had learned ought to be done. Why say more? As time went on, he too built for himself a monastery in which he might more freely have leisure for heavenly studies; where, being seized by infirmity, as the little book written about his life sufficiently teaches, he was caught up out of the body; and from evening until cockcrow, being released from the body, he was found worthy both to behold the sight of the angelic hosts and to hear their blessed praises. He was wont, moreover, to relate that he heard them, among other things, plainly resounding thus: The saints shall go from strength to strength; and again: The God of gods shall be seen in Sion.

Brought back into the body, and on the third day led forth again, he saw not only the greater joys of the blessed, but also the most violent conflicts of the evil spirits, who, wicked with frequent accusations, strove to bar that heavenly journey to him; yet, with the angels protecting him, they accomplished nothing. Of all these things, if anyone wishes to know more fully—that is, with how great cunning of fraud the demons unfolded both his deeds and his idle words, and even his very thoughts, as if written down in a book; what things, whether glad or sad, he learned from the holy angels, and from righteous men appearing to him among the angels—let him read that very little book of his life of which I have spoken, and he will, as I think, receive much spiritual profit from it.

Among which, nevertheless, there is one thing which we too have judged of profit to many to set down in this history. When, therefore, he had been lifted up on high, he was bidden by the angels who were leading him to look back upon the world. And he, bending his eyes downward, saw as it were a dark valley lying beneath him in the depths. He saw also four fires in the air, distant from one another by no great space. And asking the angels what these fires were, he heard that these were the fires which, setting the world ablaze, were to consume it. One was of falsehood, when we in no way fulfil that which in baptism we promised, namely to renounce Satan and all his works; another of covetousness, when we set the riches of the world before the love of heavenly things;

the third of discord, when we do not fear to offend the minds of our neighbours even in superfluous matters; the fourth of impiety, when we count it as nothing to despoil the weaker and to commit fraud against them. The fires, growing little by little, stretched themselves out toward one another, and were united into one immense flame. And when they had drawn near, he, greatly afraid, said to the angel: Lord, behold, the fire draws near to me. But the angel said: What you did not kindle shall not burn in you; for although that pyre seems to be terrible and vast, yet it examines each one according to the merits of his works; for the covetousness of every man shall burn in this fire. For just as one burns in the body through unlawful pleasure, so, loosed from the body, he shall burn through the due punishment.

Then he saw one of the three angels who had been present to him as guides throughout both parts of the vision go before and divide the fires of the flame, while two, flying about on either side, defended him from the peril of the fires. He saw also demons flying through the fire, contriving the conflagrations of wars against the just. There follow against him the accusations of the wicked, the defences of the good spirits, a more abundant vision of the heavenly hosts; and also of holy men of his own nation, whom he had learned by report now spreading abroad had once held the rank of the priesthood not ignobly; from whom he heard not a few things which would be much wholesome either to himself or to all who were willing to hear.

When they had ended their words, and they too with the angelic spirits were returning to the heavens, there remained with the blessed Fursey the three angels of whom we have spoken, who were to carry him back to the body. And when they drew near to the aforesaid greatest fire, the angel divided the fire of the flame, as before. But when the man of God had come to the gate that lay open amid the flames, the unclean spirits, seizing one of those whom they were roasting in the fires, hurled him against him, and, touching his shoulder and his jaw, burned them; and he recognized the man, and recalled to memory that he had received this man's garment when he was dying. The holy angel, at once laying hold of him, cast him back into the fire. And the malignant enemy said: Do not drive away him whom before you received;

for as you received the goods of this sinner, so you ought also to be partakers of his punishments. The angel, contradicting him, said: He did not receive them out of avarice, but for the saving of his soul; and the fire ceased. And the angel, turning to him, said: What you kindled, this burned in you. For if you had not received the money of this man who died in his sins, neither would his punishment burn in you. And, speaking further, he taught by a wholesome discourse what ought to be done concerning the salvation of those who repent at death. He, afterward restored to the body, for all the time of his life bore visible to all on his shoulder and jaw the mark of the burning which he had suffered in his soul;

and, marvellous to relate, what the soul had suffered in secret, the flesh openly displayed. Moreover, he always took care, as he had been wont to do before as well, to show to all the work of the virtues both by his examples, and to preach it by his words. But the order of his visions he wished to expound only to those who, out of a desire for compunction, questioned him about it. There still survives a certain senior brother of our monastery, who is wont to relate that a certain very truthful and religious man told him that he himself had seen Fursey in the province of the East Angles, and had heard those visions from his own mouth;

adding that the time was a most bitter winter and bound fast with ice, when the man, sitting in a thin garment while he spoke, by reason of the greatness of the fear or sweetness he had related, sweated as if in the heat of midsummer. When therefore—to return to higher matters—after announcing the word of God to all for many years in Ireland, he could not easily bear the tumults of the crowds that pressed upon him, he left all that he seemed to possess, and departed from his very native island; and with a few brethren he came through the Britons into the province of the Angles, and there, preaching the word, as we have said, he built a noble monastery. When these things had been duly accomplished, desiring to estrange himself from all the concerns of this world

and also from the affairs of the monastery itself, left the care of the monastery and of souls to his brother Fullan, and to the presbyters Gobban and Dicul, and himself, free from all worldly things, resolved to end his life in the anchoretic mode of conversion. He had another brother named Ultan, who from a long probation in the monastery had attained to the hermit's life. Seeking him alone, therefore, he lived a whole year with him in continence and prayers, in the daily labours of his hands.

Then, seeing the province troubled by the incursion of the heathen, and foreseeing that peril threatened the monasteries also, he set all things in order and sailed to Gaul, and there, being received honourably by Clovis, king of the Franks, and by the patrician Erchinwald, he built a monastery in a place called Lagny; and not long after, being seized by infirmity, he closed his last day. His body the same patrician Erchinwald received and kept in a certain porch of a church which he was building on his estate, named Péronne, until that church should be dedicated. When this had been done after twenty-seven days, and the body itself, taken from the porch, was about to be reburied near the altar, it was found so uninjured as if he had departed from this light in that very hour.

But also, after four years, when a more elegant little house had been built for the reception of the same body, to the east of the altar, it was found still without spot of corruption, and was translated thither with fitting honour; where it is well established that his merits have often shone forth, God working, by many miracles. These things too concerning the incorruption of his body we have briefly touched upon, that the greatness of the man's sublimity might be more clearly known to readers. All which things anyone who reads will find more fully set out in his little book, and also concerning others of his fellow-soldiers. [20] Meanwhile, when Felix, bishop of the East Angles, had died after seventeen years of his received episcopate, Honorius ordained in his place his deacon Thomas, of the province of the Gyrwe;

and this man, after five years of his episcopate, being taken from this life, he set in his place Berhtgisl, surnamed Boniface, of the province of the men of Kent. And Honorius himself too, after he had completed the bounds of his course, departed from this light in the year from the Lord's incarnation 653, on the day before the Kalends of October; and the episcopate being vacant for a year and six months, there was elected as the sixth archbishop of the see of Canterbury, Deusdedit, of the nation of the West Saxons; to ordain whom there came thither Ithamar, bishop of the church of Rochester. Now he was ordained on the seventh day before the Kalends of April, and ruled the church nine years, four months, and two days;

and he himself, when Ithamar had died, consecrated in his stead Damian, who was sprung from the nation of the South Saxons. [21] In these times the Middle Angles, that is, the inland Angles, under their prince Peada, son of King Penda, received the faith and the sacraments of the truth. He, since he was a most excellent youth, and most worthy of the name and person of a king, was preferred by his father over the kingdom of that nation; and he came to Oswiu, king of the Northumbrians, asking that his daughter Alhflaed be given to him as wife. Nor could he otherwise obtain what he sought, unless he should receive the faith of Christ and baptism together with the nation over which he ruled.

But he, having heard the preaching of the truth and the promise of the heavenly kingdom and the hope of resurrection and future immortality, gladly confessed that he was willing to become a Christian, even if he should not receive the maiden; being persuaded chiefly to receive the faith by the son of King Oswiu, named Alhfrith, who was his kinsman and friend, having his sister to wife, Cyneburg by name, daughter of King Penda. He was therefore baptized by Bishop Finan, together with all the companions, attendants, and all their servants, who had come with him, in the king's famous village which is called At the Wall.

And having received four presbyters, who in both learning and life seemed fit to teach and baptize that nation, he returned with much joy. Now the presbyters were Cedd, and Adda, and Betti, and Diuma, of whom the last was a Scot by nation, the rest being of the Angles. Adda, moreover, was the brother of Utta, a distinguished presbyter and abbot of the monastery which is called At the Goat's Head, whom we mentioned above. So the aforesaid priests, coming with the prince into the province, preached the word, and were gladly heard; and many, both of the nobles and of the common folk, renouncing the filth of idolatry, were washed daily in the font of the faith.

Nor did King Penda forbid the word to be preached even in his own nation, that is, of the Mercians, to any who wished to hear. Nay rather, he held in hatred and despised those whom, when imbued with the faith of Christ, he found not to have the works of faith, saying that they were to be despised and were wretched, who refused to obey their God in whom they believed. These things were begun two years before the death of King Penda. But when he himself was slain, and the Christian king Oswiu received his kingdom, as we shall tell in what follows, Diuma, one of the aforesaid four priests, was made bishop of the Middle Angles and likewise of the Mercians, ordained by Bishop Finan. For the scarcity of priests compelled one bishop to be set over two peoples.

When in a short time he had acquired no small people for the Lord, he died among the Middle Angles in the region which is called Infeppingum. And Ceollach received the episcopate in his stead, he too of the nation of the Scots, who not long after, leaving the episcopate, returned to the island of Hii, where the Scots had the head and citadel of very many monasteries; Trumhere succeeding him in the episcopate, a religious man and trained in the monastic life, of the nation of the Angles indeed, but ordained bishop by the Scots. This was done in the times of King Wulfhere, of whom we shall speak in what follows. [22] At that time also the East Saxons received the faith which they had once cast off when Bishop Mellitus was expelled, at the instance of King Oswiu.

For the king of that same nation was Sigberct, who reigned after Sigberct surnamed the Little, a friend of that same King Oswiu, who, when he came frequently to him in the province of the Northumbrians, was wont to exhort him to understand that those could not be gods which had been made by the hands of men; that wood or stone could not be material for creating a god, since the off-cuttings of these were either consumed by fire, or shaped into vessels of whatever human use, or else, held in contempt, were thrown outside and, trampled by feet, were turned into the earth.

Rather ought God to be understood as incomprehensible in majesty, invisible to human eyes, almighty, eternal, who had created heaven and earth and the human race, and rules them, and would judge the world in equity; whose eternal throne must be believed to be not in vile and perishable metal, but in the heavens; and that it must be rightly understood that all who should learn and do the will of him by whom they were created, would receive from him eternal rewards.

When King Oswiu had often instilled these and many such things into King Sigberct by friendly and as it were brotherly counsel, at length, with the help of the consent of his friends, he believed; and, having taken counsel with his own people, with their exhortation, all favouring and assenting to the faith, he was baptized with them by Bishop Finan in the royal village of which we made mention above, which is surnamed At the Wall. For it is near the wall with which the Romans once girt the island of Britain, set apart twelve miles' distance from the eastern sea. Therefore King Sigberct, now made a citizen of the eternal kingdom, returned to the seat of his temporal kingdom, asking King Oswiu to give him some teachers who might convert his nation to the faith of Christ, and wash them in the saving font.

And he, sending to the province of the Middle Angles, called to himself the man of God Cedd, and, having given him another presbyter for a companion, sent him to preach the word to the nation of the East Saxons. There, when, traversing the whole region, they had gathered a great church for the Lord, it happened at a certain time that the same Cedd returned home, and came to the church of Lindisfarne for conference with Bishop Finan. And he, when he learned that the work of the Gospel had prospered for him, made him bishop over the nation of the East Saxons, having called to himself for the ministry of ordination two other bishops.