Martin Offers His Neck to the Sword

I will also tell what happened in a village of the Aedui. While Martin was pulling down a temple there, a crowd of pagan country people rushed at him in a frenzy of rage. One of them, bolder than the rest, attacked him with a drawn sword. Martin threw back his cloak and offered his bare neck to the attacker. Nor was the pagan slow to strike; but in the very act of raising his right arm he fell flat on his back, and, overwhelmed by the fear of God, he begged for pardon. Not unlike this was another thing that happened to Martin. A certain man had made up his mind to wound him with a knife as he was destroying some idols, but at the very moment of the blow the weapon was knocked out of his hands and vanished. [a]

Very often, too, when the pagans were pleading with him not to overthrow their temples, he so calmed and won over their minds by his holy words that, once the light of truth had been shown them, they overthrew their own temples themselves.