Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 8.djvu/552

 JOHN

484

JOHNSTON

GiLLOW, Bibt. Diet. Eng. Cath., a. v. Rochester, John; Chauncy, Hist, aliquot Martyrum Anglorum. . . Cartusiano- TUm (Montreuil and London. ISSS); Morris, The Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers (Ist series, London, 1872); Pollard in Diet. Nat. Biog., s. v. Rochester, Sir Robert.

C. F. Wemtss Bkown.

John Rugg, Blessed. See Hugh Faeingdon,

Blessed.

John Sarkander, Blessed, martyr of the seal of confession, b. at Skotschau in Austrian Silesia, 20 Dec., 1576; d. at Olmiitz, 17 March, 1620. In 1603 he merited the title of master of philosophy at Prague, and after four years' study of theology was ordained priest at Graz. He exercised his sacred functions in several places in the Diocese of Olmtitz, and was made parish priest (1613) of Boskowitz, and (1616) of Hol- leschau in Moravia. Since the fifteenth century the sects of the Hussites and of the Bohemian (or United) Brethren had spread rapidly and taken possession of the churches and institutions of the Catholics, but when (1604) Ladislaus Poppel of Lobkowitz bought the estates of HoUeschau, he gave the church to the Catholics, and made a Jesuit college out of the house occupied by the Bohemian Brethren. With the aid of the Jfesuits, John Sarkander converted two hvmdred and fifty of the strayed sheep, but thereby drew upon himself the hatred of the neighbouring landlord, Bitow.sky of Bistritz. In 161 S the Protestants took control of Moravia, and John left HoUeschau, made a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady at Czentoschau and passed a few weeks of retreat with the Minims, who had a house there. He spent some months at Krakow and (1619) returned to HoUeschau. In February of the following year the Polish auxiliary troops sent to the emperor by King Sigismund, passe'd through Mora- via and committed many depredations on the lands of the Protestants, but spared HoUeschau when John met them with the Blessed Sacrament in his hands. Bitowsky threw suspicion upon John Sarkander as if he, in conspiracy with Lobkowitz, had brought the enemy into the territory. John was taken prisoner and brought to OlmiJtz. The commission appointed for the trial was made up entirely of Protestants, but the Catholic city judge Johann Scintilla was forced to attend. He made a report- of the whole transaction to the bishop, Franz Cardinal von Dietrichstein (1625). The questions put were: who had called the troops into the country; what underhand dealings John had practised in Poland; what had been confided to him by Lobkowitz, whose confessor he was, and whose secret plans he therefore knew. Because Jolm would not violate the secrets of the holy tribunal the rack was used on 13, 17 and 18 February. On each of the latter days the torture lasted for two and three hours, lighted candles and feathers soaked in oil, pitch, and sulphur were strewn over his body and ignited. He lingered from the effects for a month and died in prison. The people immediately began to venerate John Sarkander and to ask for his beatification. The process was opened under Benetlict XIV but was inter- rupted. It was brought to a close by Pius IX, who pronounced the solemn beatification 6 May, 1S60. The relics are in an altar dedicated to his name in the cathedral of Olmiitz.

BlRKOWBKl (Krakow, 1628) ; Positio super vmrtyrio etc. (Rome, 1825); LiVERANi, Delia vita e passione del Yen. Servo di Dio, Giov. Sarcander (Rome. 1855): Ldksch in Kirchenlex., s. v. .Sarkander; Hist, polit. BliUter, XXXI, 239.

Francis Mershman.

John Scholasticus {i> SxoXaffTi/(6s), also called John OP Antiocii, Patri;irch of Constantinople (John III, 56.')-77), the author of an important collection of ecclesiastical laws; b. at Sirimis ncur Antioch; d. 577. Of his life there is little to say. He had been a lawyer before his ordination. Ho then became a priest in the Antiochenc patriarchate; he was sent by his patriarch

as legate {apocrisarius) to Constantinople in the reign of Justinian I (527-65). In 565 Eutychius I of Con- stantinople was deposed, and John succeeded him. When John died in 577, Eutychius was restored. Be- fore his elevation to the patriarchate John had already made a collection of canons. There were such collec- tions in use before his time ; at first the decrees of the more important synods had been put together in loose collections, such as the " C!odex canonum " used by the Council of Chalcedon (451). Since the fifth century these collections had increased, and at last attempts were made to replace the merely chronological order by a systematic one. Of such systematic arrange- ments that of John Scholasticus was, if not absolutely the first, at any rate the first of any importance. Be- tween the years 540 and 560 he made what he called ^vmyuyri Kavbvuv. Pope Nicholas I (858-67), writing toPhotius, alludes to it as "Concordia canonum". The work contained fifty titles, each with the canons con- cerning the subject of the title. For instance, the first title is: "Of the honour towards patriarchs or- dained by the Canons". This is established by canons vii and vi of Nicsa, ii of Constantinople I, viii of Ephesus. Altogether the compiler quotes the Apostolic canons, those of ten s}Tiods, and sixty-eight canons from St. Basil's second and thirfl letters to Amphilochius. It is the first attempt to collect canons from the letters of Fathers. 'The first edi- tion contains 377 canons, arranged under fifty titles. After he became patriarch, John III enlarged his col- lection to sixty titles, and added to it eighty-seven chapters from the " Novella; " of Justinian. Towards the end of the sixth century another author added twenty-five more chapters taken from both the Codex and the "Novella;", concerning civil laws that affect Church matters. So the collection grew till it was finally enlarged into the "Nomocanon" {TionoKivuv) of Photius.

VoELLUS AND JusTELLCS, Bibliotheca iuris canonici veteris, II (Paris. 1661), 499-602, contains the text of the Concordia canonum; Heimbach, ^AveK&ora, II (Leipzig, 1840), 202-34, re-edits the text with variants and additions; Pitra, Juris eccles. GrcBcorum historia, II (Rome, 1868), 368 sqq.; Hergen- ROTHER. Das griechische Kirchenrecht in Archiv fur kathol- isches Kirchenrecht, XXIII (1870), 208 sqq.; Idem, Photius. Ill (Ratisbon, 1869), 92-9; Lequien, Oriens Christianus, I (Paris, 1740), 225.

Adrian Fortescue. John Scotus Eriugena. See Eriugena, John

SCOTUS.

John Shert, Blessed. See Thomas Ford, Blessed.

Johnson, William A. See Westminster, Arch- diocese OF.

Johnston, Richard Malcolm, educator, author, b. 8 March, 1822, at Powellton, Georgia, U. S. A.; d. at Baltimore, Maryland, 23 September, 1898. His father was a Baptist minister, and his early education was received at a country school and finished at Mercer College. After graduating there he spent a year teach- ing and then took up the study of law and was admitted to the Bar in 1843. In 1857, he accepted an appointment to the chair of belles-lettres in the State University of Georgia, retaining it until the opening of the Civil War, when he began a school for boys on his farm near Sparta. This he kept going tluring the war, serving also for a time on the staff of General J. E. Brown, and helping to organize the state militia. At the close of the war he mox'ed to Maryland, where he opened the Penn Luc.\- School for l)oys near Baltimore. One of his teaching staff here was the poet Sidney Lanier, who persuaded him to begin to write for publi- cation, although he was then over fifty years old. His first stories were sent to the "Southern Ahigazine"; others to "The Century" followed, and became im- mediately popular. He had the knack of story-telling that depicted the homely children of the soil, quaint characters that filled the memories of his youth, and