Chapter Four
Objection based on the divine assurance given to both S. Paul and S. Peter, and their martyrdom in spite of it.
Let us look at what was said to Paul, "The Lord spoke to Paul in the night by a vision, Be not afraid, but speak, for I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee" (Acts xviii. 9-10). And yet no sooner was he seized in Rome than this fine fellow, who said that we should judge angels, had his head cut off.1 And Peter again, who received authority to feed the lambs, was nailed to a cross and impaled on it.2 And countless others, who held opinions like theirs, were either burnt, or put to death by receiving some kind of punishment or maltreatment. This is not worthy of the will of God, nor even of a godly man, that a multitude of men should be cruelly punished through their relation to His own grace and faith, while the expected resurrection and coming remains unknown.
Chapter Fourteen
Answer to the objection based on the divine assurance given to both S. Paul and S. Peter, and their martyrdom in spite of it.
[In each case the martyrdom came after the struggle of life was over, and the great work of bringing souls to Christ in many lands had been fulfilled.
Such an end to their life meant a higher fame. The highest honour is for soldiers who defend their country against the enemy to the death. So, after having marshalled the faithful all over the world into Christ's army, and stayed the fierceness of the enemy from the rest, they won an unfading crown, and encouraged many to win it likewise. A violent death was a seal upon their life, and proved the greatness of their zeal.3
During their work both Peter and Paul were many times protected by their Lord from the plots of the Jews, but when the seeds of their faith had taken root, He granted them the final glory of martyrdom. In thus treating His soldiers, God acted as a wise general, for many were hostile, and might have ascribed their works to magic had they died an ordinary death, or vanished from before tribunals.4 To conquer torments by enduring to the end was their best answer to these.
Some paltry critics are prepared to find fault with the saints in either case. If they are protected from death, these would assert that they would never have endured to the end. If they face it to the end, they would say that it proved they were not really righteous men. And so God, in His love for His saints, sometimes rescues them from death, as in the case of Daniel and the three children, and sometimes lets them witness by their death that they are neither cowards nor hypocrites, as in the case of Peter and Paul.]
Footnotes:
1He thus echoes the Christian tradition that S. Paul was beheaded at Rome, but he shows the same desire to put his martyrdom at an impossibly early moment as in the case of S. Peter.
2In iii. 22 he uses similar language about S. Peter's crucifixion, which he strangely places within a few months of his being charged to feed the lambs.
3He adds that they also beat thereby the seed of the dragon, for by being beheaded Paul lured the serpent to greediness for blood and milk, while Peter beat him with his cross. For the legend of milk flowing from S. Paul's wound, see Introd., p. xxvi.
4Apollonius of Tyana is here intended. He was mentioned by name, and this same incident referred to, in iii. 8. See also below, in the next objection.