# Matins Nocturn 2 reading for the Forty Holy Martyrs of Sebaste (Mar
# 10) — SanctiM/03-10.txt inherits the whole day (`@Sancti/03-10`)
# with no Nocturn 2/3 override, so this feast's own proper content is
# sourced from the Tridentine track exactly as for a pre-1955 saint
# (see memory vu-matins-pre1955-saints, vu-matins-sanctim-saints).
# web/www/horas/Latin/Sancti/03-10.txt, English/Sancti/03-10.txt.
# Lectio4-6 combined into one reading, one continuous account, no
# genuine source break. Lectio7-9 fall back to Common of Several
# Martyrs (`Commune/C3`), not proper text, so not authored here. No
# responsory given in the source for Lectio4-6.
id: forty-holy-martyrs
readings:
  - nocturn: 2
    isGospel: false
    text:
      la: >-
        Licinio imperatore, et Agricolao præside, ad Sebasten Armeniæ urbem, quadraginta militum
        fides in Jesum Christum, et fortitudo in cruciatibus perferendis enituit. Qui sæpius in
        horribilem carcerem detrusi, vinculisque constricti, cum ora ipsorum lapidibus contusa
        fuíssent, hiemis tempore frigidissimo nudi sub aperto aëre supra stagnum rigens pernoctare
        jussi sunt, ut frigore congelati necarentur. Una autem erat omnium oratio: Quadraginta in
        stadium ingressi sumus, quadraginta item Domine corona donemur, ne una quidem huic numero
        desit. Est in honore hic numerus, quem tu quadraginta dierum jejunio decorasti, per quem
        divina lex ingressa est in orbem terrarum. Elias quadraginta dierum jejunio Deum quærens,
        ejus visionem consecutus est. Et hæc quidem illorum erat oratio.


        Ceteris autem custodibus somno deditis, solus vigilabat janitor, qui et illos orantes, et
        luce circumfusos, et quosdam e cælo descendentes Angelos tamquam a Rege missos, qui
        coronas triginta novem militibus distribuerent intuens ita secum loquebatur: Quadraginta
        hi sunt: quadragesimi corona ubi est? Quæ dum cogitaret, unus ex illo numero, cui animus ad
        frigus ferendum defecerat in proximum tepefactum balneum desiliens, sanctos illos summo
        dolore affecit. Verum Deus illorum preces irritas esse non est passus: nam rei eventum
        admiratus janitor, mox custodibus e somno excitatis, detractisque sibi vestibus, ac se
        Christianum esse clara voce professus, Martyribus se adjunxit. Cum vero præsidis satellites
        janitorem quoque Christianum esse cognovissent bacillis comminuta omnium eorum crura
        fregerunt.


        In eo supplicio mortui sunt omnes, præter Melithonem natu minimum. Quem cum præsens mater
        ejus, fractis cruribus, adhuc viventem vidisset, sic cohortata est: Fili, paulisper
        sustine; ecce Christus ad januam stat adjuvans te. Cum vero reliquorum corpora plaustris
        imponi cerneret, ut in rogum inférrentur, ac filium suum relinqui, quod speraret impia
        turba puerum, si vixisset, ad idolorum cultum revocari posse; ipso in humeros sublato,
        sancta mater vehicula Mártyrum corporibus onusta strenue prosequebatur: in cujus amplexu
        Melithon spiritum Deo reddidit, ejusque corpus in eumdem illum ceterorum Mártyrum rogum
        pia mater injecit: ut qui fide et virtute conjunctissimi fuerant, funeris étiam societate
        copulati, una in cælum pervenirent. Combustis illis, eorum reliquiæ projectæ in
        profluentem, cum mirabiliter in unum confluxissent locum, salvæ et integræ repertæ,
        honorifico sepulchro conditæ sunt.
      en: >-
        While Licinius was Emperor and Agricolaus President, forty soldiers at Sebaste, a city of
        Armenia, gave a singular instance of faith in Jesus Christ, and bravery under suffering.
        After being often remanded to an horrid prison-house, bound in fetters, and their mouths
        bruised with stones, they were ordered out in the depth of winter, stripped naked, and put
        upon a frozen pool, to die of cold during the night. The prayer of them all was the same: O
        Lord, forty of us have begun to run in the race, grant that all forty may receive the
        crown, let not one be wanting at the last. Behold, is it not an honourable number in thy
        sight, Who didst bless the fast of forty days, and at the end thy Divine Law came forth to
        the earth? When also Elias sought thee, Thou, O God, didst reveal thyself unto him when he
        had fasted for forty days. Even so was their petition.


        When the keepers were all asleep and the watchman only was awake, he heard them praying
        and saw a light shining round about them, and Angels coming down from heaven, as the
        messengers of the King, bearing nine-and-thirty crowns, and distributing them to the
        soldiers. Then he said within himself: Are not forty here? Where is the crown of the
        fortieth? And as he looked he saw one of them whose courage could not bear the cold, come
        and leap into a warm bath that stood by; and the Saints were grievously afflicted.
        Nevertheless God suffered not that their prayer should return unto them void; for the
        watchman wondered, and called the keepers, and stripped himself of his clothes; and, when
        with a loud voice he had confessed himself a Christian, he joined the Martyrs. When the
        servants of the President knew that the watchman also was a Christian, they brake the legs
        of them all with staves.


        Under this torment died they all, saving Melithon, who was the youngest. Now, his mother
        stood by, and when she saw that his legs were broken, but that he was yet alive, she cried,
        and said: My son, have patience but a little longer. Behold how Christ standeth at the door
        to help thee. When she saw the bodies of all the others put upon carts and taken away to
        be burned, and that her son was left behind, because the multitude wickedly hoped that
        being but a lad, if he lived, he might yet be drawn to commit idolatry, the holy mother
        took him on her own shoulders and bravely followed behind the carts laden with the bodies
        of the Martyrs. In her arms Melithon gave up his soul to God, and the mother who loved him
        so well laid his body with her own hands upon the pile, with those of the other Martyrs,
        that, as they had all been one in faith and strength, in death they might not be divided,
        and might enter heaven together. After the burning, what remained of them was thrown into
        a running stream, but the ashes were all washed together into one place, and being found
        and rescued, they were laid in an honourable sepulchre.
    status: { la: verified, en: verified }
