of the Jews, who also watched us when we would take the body from the fire.  This they did, not knowing that we can never either leave Christ, who suffered for the salvation of all who will be saved in all the world, or worship any other.” [The Paris translation adds “ut Deum.”] “For him being the Son of God we worship [Greek:  proskunumen], but the martyrs, as disciples and imitators of our Lord, we worthily love[32], because of their pre-eminent [Greek:  anuperblaeton] good-will towards their {94} own king and teacher, with whom may we become partakers and fellow-disciples.”

    [Footnote 32:  [Greek:  axios agapomen].  Ruffinus translates it by
    “diligimus et veneramur,” and it is so quoted by Bellarmin.]

“The centurion, seeing the determination of the Jews, placed him in the midst, and burnt him as their manner is.  And thus we collecting his bones, more valuable than precious stones, and more esteemed than gold, we deposited them where it was meet.  There, as we are able, collecting ourselves together in rejoicing and gladness, the Lord will grant to us to observe the birth-day of his martyrdom, for the remembrance of those who have before undergone the conflict, and for exercise and preparation of those who are to come.” [Greek:  hos dunaton haemin sunagomenois en agalliasei kai chara parexei ho Kurios epitelein taen tou martyriou autou haemeran genethlion, eis te ton proaethlaekoton mnaemaen, kai ton mellonton askaesin te kai hetoimasian.]

In this relic of primitive antiquity, we have the prayer of a holy martyr, at his last hour, offered to God alone, through Christ alone.  Here we find no allusion to any other intercessor; no commending of the dying Christian’s soul to saint or angel.  Here also we find an explicit declaration, that Christians offered religious worship to no one but Christ, whilst they loved the martyrs, and kept their names in grateful remembrance, and honoured even their ashes when the spirit had fled.  Polycarp pleads no other merits; he seeks no intercession; he prays for no aid, save only his Redeemer’s.  Here too we find, that the place of a martyr’s burial was the place which the early Christians loved to frequent; but then we are expressly told with what intent they met there,—­not, as in later times, to invoke the departed spirit of the martyr, but to call to mind, in grateful remembrance, the sufferings of those who had already endured the awful struggle; and by {95} their example to encourage and prepare other soldiers of the cross thereafter to fight the good fight of faith; assured that they would be more than conquerors through Him who loved them.

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