Peter Driven Out and Lucius the Arian Brought In

No sooner had they seated Peter on the bishop’s throne than the governor of the province gathered a mob of Greeks and Jews, surrounded the walls of the church, and ordered Peter to come out, threatening him with exile if he refused. His excuse was that he was carrying out the emperor’s wishes by bringing trouble on those who held the opposite opinions. But the truth was that he was carried away by his own impious passion. For he was devoted to the service of the idols, and looked on the storms that beset the church as a season of splendid festival. When the admirable Peter saw this unexpected conflict, he withdrew in secret and boarded a ship bound for Rome. [a]

A few days later Euzoius came from Antioch with Lucius, and handed the churches over to him. This was the same Lucius whose impiety and lawlessness Samosata had already experienced. But the people who had been raised on the teaching of Athanasius saw how different the spiritual food now offered them was, and they kept away from the assemblies of the church. [b] Lucius, who used idol worshipers as his attendants, went on flogging some and imprisoning others. Some he drove to flight, and the homes of others he plundered in a rough and cruel way. But all this is better told in the letter of the admirable Peter. After I have told one example of the impious conduct of Lucius, I will insert the letter in this work.

Certain men in Egypt, who lived the life of angels, fled from the turmoil of public life and chose to live alone in the desert. There they made the sandy and barren soil bear fruit, for the virtue by whose law they lived was a fruit very sweet and lovely to God. Among the many who led the way in this kind of life was the famous Antony, the most excellent master in the school of self-denial, who made the desert a training ground of virtue for his hermits. After all his great and glorious labors he had reached the harbor where the winds of trouble blow no more. Then his followers were persecuted by the wretched and unhappy Lucius. All the leaders of those divine companies, the famous Macarius, his namesake, Isidore, and the rest, were dragged out of their caves and sent off to a certain island. Its people were ungodly, and had never been blessed with any teacher of true religion. When the ship came near the shore of the island, the demon worshiped by its people left the image that had been his home from ancient times, and filled the priest’s daughter with frenzy. In her possessed fury she was driven down to the shore, where the rowers were bringing the ship to land. Using the girl’s tongue as his instrument, the demon shouted through her the words once spoken at Philippi by the woman possessed by a spirit of Python, and everyone, men and women, heard him say: “Alas for your power, you servants of Christ! Everywhere we have been driven out by you, from town and village, from hill and height, from wastelands where no one lives. We had hoped to live on that little island out of reach of your arrows, but our hope was in vain. Your persecutors have sent you here, not to be harmed by them, but to drive us out. We are leaving the island, for we are wounded by the piercing rays of your virtue.” With these and similar words they dashed the girl to the ground, and all fled together. But that divine company prayed over the girl, raised her up, and gave her back to her father healed and in her right mind. [c]

Those who saw the miracle threw themselves at the feet of the newcomers and begged to be allowed to share in the means of salvation. They destroyed the idol’s sacred grove and, enlightened by the bright rays of instruction, received the grace of holy baptism. When these events became known in Alexandria, the whole people gathered together and denounced Lucius. They said that wrath from God would fall on them unless that divine company of saints were set free. Then Lucius, afraid of a riot in the city, let the holy hermits go back to their dens. Let this be enough as a sample of his impious wickedness. The sinful deeds he dared to commit will be shown more clearly by the letter of the admirable Peter. I hesitate to insert it in full, and so I will quote only some extracts from it.