EXAMPLE OF A SACRED IMPERIAL EDICT OF HONORIUS, SENT TO THE PRINCE OF THE EAST, ARCADIUS.
A Although, regarding the matter of the woman’s image, which was carried about the provinces as a novel spectacle and spread through the whole world by the gossip of our detractors, I have already given warning in other letters so that remorse for such an act might cool the envious rumor, and the public tongue might have nothing left to attack in the conduct of others; and although we have also expressed with pious affection our sense of pain over the ruin of the expiring Illyricum, and why you would not acknowledge these losses to the state, and why they were reported by the testimony of others rather than by the letters of your own piety: nevertheless, it is not right that we should hide from your serenity what has recently occurred in divine matters, not without fear of public danger, which the ever-ready rumor—that herald of evils—has not kept silent. And, as the nature of men, which is always excited to slander by new events, usually behaves, when the opportunity for disparagement was offered, it exercised its malice in this season of cruel loquacity.
For it has recently been reported that at Constantinople, on the most sacred day of venerable Easter, when religious practice had gathered almost all the people of the neighboring cities into the same place to be celebrated under the stricter presence of the princes, the Catholic churches were suddenly closed, and the priests were thrust into confinement; so that at that very time, when by the prince’s indulgence the dreary dungeons of criminals are unbarred, a cruel prison might enclose the ministers of the holy law and peace. And, with all the mysteries thrown into confusion in the manner of war, some were even killed in the very sanctuaries of the church, and such violence raged around the altars that even venerable bishops were led into exile, and human blood—which it is sinful to even mention—defiled the heavenly sacraments B.
Upon suddenly discovering these things, I confess that I was troubled. For who, in a crime so bloody, would not fear the offense of God Almighty? Or in what way could anyone think that this was outside the extreme danger that faces the Roman world and all mortals? Since the very author of our Empire, and the Almighty God who is the Governor of the State which He has entrusted to us, is believed to be angered by such deadly and detestable crimes—you, holy brother and lord, C and venerable grandson of Augustus—since even if anything were being discussed among the prelates regarding a cause of religion, it ought to have been an episcopal judgment; for to them pertains the interpretation of divine matters, and to us pertains the observation of religion. But be that as it may, if a more sovereign concern has presumed to arrogate to itself some authority over mystical and Catholic questions, did the aroused indignation have to proceed even to the exile of priests, even to the slaughter of men, so that where pure prayers, where sincere vows, where unblemished sacrifices are offered, there the sword—which should not easily be brandished even against the throats of criminals—would draw itself?
By events themselves, finally, it is taught what the Divine Majesty felt regarding these matters. This was, first of all, a judgment of the present warning—and would that it were the only one. For human trepidation, conscious of so great a crime committed, makes us fear that something even graver—which may God Almighty avert!—might follow the experience of such a terrible punishment. I hear that the most holy Church, exposed to the resources of so many Emperors and noble with precious adornments, has burned, along with the most august prayer of the suppliant Princes; and that unique light of the Church of the city of Constantinople has, while God did not veil it, crumbled into ashes. For it seems that He abhorred the defiled mysteries and turned His eyes away from that place which blood had already stained, so that no one could beseech the heavenly piety under bloodstained altars. Buildings also, noble with no less splendor, were consumed by the excitement of the raging fire as the flame spread wide; and the ornaments which had been fashioned to decorate the public face of the city by our ancestors were burned up, as if in the funeral of the world. Therefore, although, having been frequently harassed by injuries, I ought to have remained silent and not so faithfully advised my most close brother and partner in the kingdom; nevertheless, preferring before the stimulus of silent pain the bond of blood, I exhort and urge that these things, if it be possible, be corrected by the amendment of conduct in the future, and that the divine wrath, as far as it is revealed, be appeased by the zeal of our prayers.
Receive from me the highest token of simplicity. For this reason I thought it necessary to insinuate this to your clemency, lest my very silence should make me suspected by anyone as if I were in secret agreement, or lest anyone should believe that I grant consent to such deeds; and so that, since I frequently warned that they should not happen, I might not grieve after they have been committed. For who could remain devoid of pain who remembers himself to be a Christian, seeing such great turbulence suddenly introduced into religion, such that the entire state of the Catholic faith must necessarily fluctuate? There was a cause among the bishops which, having been collated and brought to a council, ought to have been resolved; with legates sent on both sides to the priests of the eternal city and of Italy, the sentence was expected by the authority of all, to formulate the rule of discipline.