Those to whom his noble letter was addressed thanked St Cyprian for it through their leader, Bishop Nemesian. It had, they said, eased the pain of their blows and sufferings, and made them indifferent to the stench and filth of their prison. They tell him that by gloriously confessing his faith in the proconsul’s court, and going before them into banishment, he had animated all the soldiers of God for the conflict. They conclude by begging his prayers, and say, “Let us assist one another by our prayers, that God and Christ and the whole choir of angels may send us help when we shall most want it”. This glorious company is com­memorated on this day in the Roman Martyrology, nine of them being mentioned by name, all bishops; but there also suffered, as St Cyprian tells us, lower clergy and lay-people of all ages and states of life. Some were deliberately put to death, a few survived, but the most part died of exposure, hardship, ill treatment or sickness brought on by their captivity.

The mention of SS. Nemesian, Felix and Companions in the Roman Martyrology on this date seems to be due to a confusion. There was a martyr, Nemesius, who suffered with companions at Alexandria, and he, as the “Hieronymianum” bears witness, belongs to this day, being probably identical with a martyr who in the Syriac breviarium appears as “Menmais”, also on September 10. Dom Quentin has shown that Florus, the mar­tyrologist, has identified this group of martyrs of Alexandria with those to whom St Cyprian’s letter is addressed (see Martyrologes historiques, p. 289). We have no evidence beyond Cyprian’s letter that the bishops to whom it was addressed were honoured subsequently as martyrs. The Carthaginian calendar names a Nemesian on December 23, but this may be a boy martyr of whom St Augustine speaks. The text of St Cyprian, with comments, is quoted in the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. iii.

453

Pulcheria was granddaughter to Theodosius the Great and daughter to the Emperor Arcadius, who died in the year 408. She was born in 399, and had three sisters, Flacilla, who was the eldest but died soon, and Arcadia and Marina, who were younger than Pulcheria. Arcadius left a son, Theodosius II, who was mild, humane and devout, incapable in public affairs, and not sufficiently strong for his position; he was more interested in writing and painting than in the art of government, and was nicknamed “the Calligrapher”. In the year 414 Pulcheria, though only fifteen years of age, was declared, in the name of her young brother, augusta and partner with him, and charged with the care of his instruction.

Under Pulcheria’s control the court was an improvement on what it had been in the days of her mother, who had incurred the wrath of St John Chrysostom. On becoming augusta, Pulcheria made a vow of perpetual virginity and induced her sisters to do the same. Her motive for doing this was probably not even primarily, much less wholly, religious: she was a realistic young woman of affairs, and she did not want her political administration upset and perhaps her brother to lose his throne through the aspirations of ambitious men tp marry her or the princesses her sisters.

But neither was the vow devoid of religion; she had called on God to be her witness and she did not take His name in vain: she kept her vow, even after she was in fact married. But to represent the court at this time as a sort of monastery is an exaggeration: the spectacle of the young princesses spending much time spinning and embroidering and in church was nothing out of the ordinary and if Pulcheria forbade men access to her own and her sisters’ apartments that was a measure of elementary prudence—tongues will wag and Byzantine court officials were not consistently well behaved. We get the impression of a united and busy family, of which the main domestic concern was the education and training of the young Theodosius. Unfortunately, like so many more than ordinarily capable people, Pulcheria was too self-sufficient, and she (perhaps unconsciously at first) took advantage of her brother’s lack of enthusiasm for public affairs: the result was that he grew up virtuous and scholarly but no ruler. As it has been caustically put, “ His incapacity for business was so great that he is hardly accused of having augmented the misfortunes of his reign by his own acts”—or the predominant good fortunes either, which can mostly be put down to St Pulcheria. Both her thoroughness and her brother’s indifference are illustrated by the story that on one occasion, in order to test him, Pulcheria drew up and presented to him a decree of death against herself. He signed it without reading it.

Two years later Theodosius declared Athenais, or Eudokia as she had been christened, augusta. It was inevitable that the Augusta Eudokia should sooner or later attempt to undermine the influence of her sister-in-law, the Augusta Pulcheria, and she worked on her feeble husband till at length Pulcheria was forced into exile at Hebdomon. This lasted for some years. We may well believe that, as Alban Butler says, St Pulcheria “looked upon her retreat as a favour of Heaven and consecrated all her time to God in prayer and good works. She made no complaint of her brother’s ingratitude, of the empress who owed everything to her, or of their unjust ministers”. And no doubt she would have been glad “both to forget the world and to be forgotten by it”, but for the fact that she had responsibilities in respect of that great part of the world whose metro­polis was at Constantinople. For a time things went fairly well, but about the year 441 came the fall of Eudokia. She was accused, probably unjustly, of infidelity with a handsome but gouty officer named Paulinus, +[+t For the fantastic story of the Phrygian apple, see Finlay, loc. cit.] and she was exiled to Jerusalem, under the guise of a pilgrimage. She never came back. There was a general shuffling of offices at court, and Pulcheria was recalled; but not to her old position of control: this was now held by Chrysaphius, an old supporter of Eudokia. Under his administration the Eastern empire went from bad to worse for ten years.

Under pressure from this man, and with a fine disregard for theological con­sistency seeing that he had formerly favoured Nestorius, Theodosius gave support to Eutyches and the monophysite heresy. In 449 Pope St Leo the Great appealed to St Pulcheria and to the emperor to reject Monophysism, and the answer of Theodosius was to approve the acts of the “Robber Synod” of Ephesus, and to drive St Flavian from the see of Constantinople. Puicheria was firmly orthodox, but her influence with her brother had been weakened. The pope wrote again, and the archdeacon of Rome, Hilarus, wrote, and the Western emperor, Valentinian III, with Eudoxia his wife (Theodosius’s daughter) and Galla Placidia, his mother—and amid all these appeals Theodosius suddenly died, killed by a fall from his horse while hunting.

St Pulcheria, now fifty-one years old, nominated as emperor a veteran general of humble origin, seven years older than herself. His name was Marcian; he was a native of Thrace, and a widower. Pulcheria, judging it would be of advantage to the state and secure his title to the purple, proposed to marry him, on condition she should be at liberty to keep her vow of virginity. Marcian agreed, and these two governed together like two friends who had in all things the same views and sentiments, which centred in the advancement of religion and the public weal.

They welcomed the legates sent by St Leo to Constantinople, and their zeal for the Catholic faith earned the highest commendations of that pope and of the Council of Chalcedon which, under their protection, condemned the monophysite heresy in 451. They did their utmost to have the decrees of this synod executed over all the East, but failed lamentably in Egypt and Syria. St Pulcheria wrote herself two letters, one to certain monks, another to an abbess of nuns in Palestine, to convince them that the Council of Chalcedon did not (as was averred) revive Nestorianism, but condemned that error together with the opposite heresy of Eutyches.

Twice already, in 414 and 443, Pulcheria had been responsible for remissions of arrears of unpaid taxes, covering a period of sixty years, and she and her husband followed a policy of low taxation and as little warfare as possible. The admirable spirit in which they undertook their duties was expressed by Marcian in his dictum, “It is our business to provide for the care of the human race”. But the excellent partnership lasted only three years, for in July 453 St Pulcheria died.

This great empress built many churches, and among them three in honour of the all-holy Mother of God, namely, those of Blakhernae, Khalkopratia and the Hodegetria, that were among the most famous Marian churches of Christendom. In the last she placed a famous picture of the Blessed Virgin, which had been sent from Jerusalem as the reputed work of St Luke the Evangelist.

She and Theo­dosius were the first rulers of Constantinople who were Greek rather than Latin she encouraged the establishment of a university there, with an emphasis on Greek literature and the recognition of Greek as an official language, which her brother carried out; and she gauged the needs of rulers and people for fixed principles of law which were met by the Code of Theodosius. If we consider her actions and virtues we shall see that the commendations which St Proclus, in his panegyric on her, Pope St Leo, and the Council of Chalcedon, bestowed on this empress were, so far from being compliments or mere eloquence, thoroughly well deserved. St Pulcheria is named on this day in the Roman Martyrology, having been inserted by Cardinal Baronius, a happier and more worthy addition than some that we owe to that venerable and learned scholar; her feast is kept by the Greeks, and at one time she had a certain cultus in the West, her feast being observed, e.g. throughout Portugal and the kingdom of Naples.

Moville was and continued to be one of the great schools of Ireland, and some of its chief influence was through St Colmcille, who was a disciple of St Finnian. The incident of the dispute between the saints concerning the copy made by Colmcille of Finnian’s psalter is referred to under St Columba on June 9; but, as Father John Ryan puts it, “There is something about all this tale that smacks of the inventor’s art”.

Finnian found that the observance of his community was considerably hampered by the long distance from the monastery of the mill in which many worked. He therefore built another mill nearer at hand, and, as there was no stream to work it, prayed beside a stream on a nearby hill which altered its course so as to make a convenient mill-race. Such a miracle is easily “rationalized “, but is of interest because of its resemblance to the story told in the Dialogues of St Gregory of the diverting of the course of the river Serchio by St Frigidian (Frediano) of Lucca.

This saint has often been identified with St Finnian of Moville—and still is in Ireland and in the breviary of the Canons Regular of the Lateran—but it is difficult to reconcile what is known of the lives of either of them. Finnian’s death took place about the year 579. The Breviary of Aberdeen says that he founded a monastery and set up a cross of St Brigid at Holywood in Dumfries, and he is supposed to have changed the course of a river in Scotland as well, namely, the Garnock. In Ireland the feast of St Finnian of Moville is not observed separately from that of St Frigidian in March.

For any connected life of Finnian we have to turn to such unreliable sources as Capgrave and the Aberdeen Breviary. But there are several passages which refer to him in such books as Gougaud, Christianity in Celtic Lands, and J. Ryan, Irish Monasticism. All admit the confusion between the legends which attach to this Finnian and those belonging to other holy men who bear this and similar names. In the Félire of Oengus under this day, September 10, we read “A kingpost of red gold and purity, over the swelling sea he came with law, a sage for whom Ireland is sad, Findbarr of Mag Bile.” This seems to endorse the idea of foreign travel and the bringing of some important text from beyond the seas. Most probably it is this Finnian who was credited with the authorship of the Paenitentiale Vinniani; see Esposito, Latin Learning, vol. i, pp. 236—240. Under the name “Wynnin” in KSS. there is (p. 465) an interesting note by Dr Reeves who also identifies Finnian of Moville with Frigidian of Lucca.

He lived as austerely as ever; if anything were forced upon him, he on the spot distributed the whole among the poor. The patrician Mommolus having taken a great number of prisoners at Albi, Salvius followed him and ransomed them all. The king of Soissons, Chilperic, fancied himself as a theologian and was responsible for an unorthodox treatise; Salvius, together with his friend St Gregory of Tours, succeeded in bringing the monarch back to orthodoxy. In the year 584 an epidemic made great havoc among his flock. It was in vain his friends advised him to be careful of his health; animated, unwearied, undaunted, he went everywhere he thought his presence necessary. He visited the sick, comforted them, and exhorted them to prepare for eternity by such good works as their condition admitted. When he knew that his own hour was near, he ordered his coffin to be made, changed his clothes, and prepared himself to appear before God, to whom he was called on September to, 584.

The church was dedicated in 709, in honour of St Michael for those in peril on the sea, and it was entrusted to a chapter of canons. These in later ages were replaced by Benedictines. On October i6, the traditional anniversary of the dedication of the church, a feast of St Michael in Monte Tumba is kept in the diocese of Coutances and at St Michael’s Abbey, Farnborough.

Father Ambrose’s principal headquarters was at Morleys Hall in the parish of Leigh, “where”, wrote Mr Knaresborough at the beginning of the next century, “his memory is held in great esteem to this day by the Catholics of that county, for his great zeal in the conversion of souls and the exemplary piety of his life and conversation.”

His stipend at this mission-centre was £8 a year, of which three-quarters went in board and lodging, though his duties called him away for three months in the year.

He was so “mild, witty, and cheerful in his conversation, that of all men that ever I knew he seemed to me the most likely to represent the spirit of Sir Thomas More... Neither did I ever see him moved at all upon occasions of wrongs, slanders, or threats which were frequently raised against him:  but as one insensible of wrong, or free from choler, he entertained them with a jest, and passed over them with a smile and a nod.”

The writer gives a vivid description of Father Ambrose celebrating Mass of Christmas at Morleys, in a venerable vestment “that came out on great days” at a poor, clean altar, whereon great candles he had himself helped to make. And afterwards they sang carols round a “fair coal fire”. Bishop Challoner from other sources gives a similar account of the work, emphasizing his piety, humility, and temperance at table and in company. “He always abstained from wine, and being asked why he did so, he alleged the saying of the wise man: ‘Wine and women make the wise apostatize.’”

In 1628, according to Challoner, Father Ambrose ministered the last sacraments in prison to Bd Edmund Arrowsmith, who after his martyrdom appeared in sleep to Father Ambrose (who knew not he was dead) and said to him, “I have suffered and now you will be to suffer. Say little, for they will endeavour to take hold of your words.” And so the monk laboured on for thirteen years in daily expectation of his hour. Four times he was in prison and four times released, till in March 1641 the House of Commons bullied King Charles I into ordering that all priests should leave the realm or incur the penalties of traitors. Six weeks later, the vicar of Leigh, a Mr Gatley, celebrated Easter by leading his congregation, armed with weapons of offence, to Morleys Hall, where they seized Ambrose Barlow while he was preaching to his flock after Mass. They carried him off to a justice of the peace, who committed him to Lancaster Castle. After four months imprisonment he was brought for trial before Sir Robert Heath, and at once acknowledged he was a priest.

On September 8 he was con­demned in the usual form. Five days before a general chapter of the English Benedictine Congregation in session at Douay had accepted the resignation by Father Rudesind Barlow of the titular cathedral-priorship of Coventry, and elected his brother, Father Ambrose, in his place. On that day week, a Friday, Bd Ambrose Barlow, monk of St Benedict and prior of Coventry, was drawn on a hurdle from Lancaster Castle to his place of execution, where, after pacing three times round the gallows saying the psalm Miserere, he was hanged, disembowelled and quartered.

The mortuary notice of Bd Ambrose sent round to his brethren contained the request that instead of requiem Masses and prayers for the dead they should offer Masses of the Holy Trinity, Te Deum, and other prayers of thanksgiving. At Wardley Hall, which must have been familiar to the martyr and is now the episcopal residence of the diocese of Salford, is preserved a skull said to be his, and his left hand is at Stanbrook Abbey in Worcestershire.