Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/707

 out of the anxiety of Marcellinus for his friend Volusianus, who, notwithstanding the efforts of his mother to induce him to become a Christian, was swayed in a contrary direction by the worldly society in which he lived. In 413 occurred the revolt of Heraclian, suppressed by Marinus, count of Africa, who, bribed by the Donatists, as Orosius insinuates, arrested and imprisoned Marcellinus and Apringius. Several African bishops joined in a letter of intercession on behalf of the prisoners, whose prayer Caecilianus affected to support, and he even paid an express visit to Augustine, giving him the strongest hope that they would be released, with solemn asseverations of absence of hostility on his own part. But on the following day, Sept. 15 or 16, they were both put to death. Augustine mentions their edifying behaviour in prison. See Dr. Sparrow Simpson's ''S. Aug. and Afr. Ch. Divisions'' (1910), pp. 102–126.

[H.W.P.]

Marcellus (3), bp. of Rome probably from May 24, 307, to Jan. 15, 309, the see having been vacant after the death of Marcellinus, 2 years, 6 months, and 27 days (Lipsius, Chronologie der röm. Bischöf.).

This pope appears as a martyr in the Roman Martyrology, and in the later recensions of the Liber Pontificalis, a story being told that he was beaten, and afterwards condemned to tend the imperial horses as a slave. No trace of this legend, or indeed of his being a martyr at all, appears in the earlier recensions of the Pontifical, including the Felician. But a light is thrown on the circumstances which probably led to his title of “Confessor” by the monumental inscriptions to him and his successor Eusebius, placed on their tombs by pope Damasus. That to Marcellus (Pagi, Critic. in Baron. ad ann. 309; in Actis S. Januar.; De Rossi, Rom. Sotter. vi. p. 204) reads:

“Veridicus rector lapsis quia crimina flere Praedixit, miseris fuit omnibus hostis amarus. Hinc furor, hinc odium sequitur, discordia lites, Seditio, caedes; solvuntur foedera pacis. Crimen ob alterius, Christum qui in pace negavit, Finibus expulsus patriae est feritate tyranni. Haec breviter Damasus voluit comperta referre Marcelli ut populus meritum cognoscere posset.”

It would appear from these lines, together with those on Eusebius [ (1) ], that when persecution ceased at Rome conflicts arose in the Christian community as to the terms of readmission of the lapsi to communion; that Marcellus after his election had required a period of penance before absolution; that this stern discipline evoked violent opposition, the subjects of it being doubtless numerous and influential; that the church had been split into parties in consequence, and riots, anarchy, and even bloodshed, had ensued; that “the tyrant” Maxentius had interposed in the interests of peace and banished the pope as the author of the discord. He was not really so, the inscription implies, but “another,” for whose “crime” he suffered, i.e. the leader and instigator of the opposition, who had “denied Christ in time of peace” by condoning apostasy and subverting discipline after persecution had ceased. But Marcellus was made the victim, and thus was a “confessor” (or, in the wider sense of the word, a “martyr”), if not strictly for the faith, at any rate for canonical discipline and the honour of Christ. The “other” referred to was probably the Heraclius spoken of in the inscription on Eusebius as having “forbidden the lapsi to mourn for their sins,” and who was banished in the next episcopate by “the tyrant" as well as the pope—“Extemplo pariter pulsi feritate tyranni.” As Marcellus, unlike Eusebius, is not said in the Damasine inscription to have died in exile, and as hewas certainly buried at Rome, like his predecessor in the cemetery of Priscilla on the Salarian Way (Catal. Felic.), he may have been allowed to return to his see.

[J.B.—Y.]

Marcellus (4), bp. of Ancyra, believed to have been present at the synod held there in 315; but nothing can be proved from subscriptions doubtful in themselves. St. Athanasius, writing in 358 (Hist. ad Mon. 76), calls him an old man then; so that his age could have been no bar to his being bishop 315. He was certainly present, 325, at the Nicene council, where he obtained a good report, as pope Julius tells the Eusebians (Mansi, ii. 1215), for having contended earnestly for the Catholic faith against the Arians. Later, in refuting the heterodox writings of Asterius, he was accused of falling into doctrines combining the errors of Sabellius and Paul of Samosata, but his attachment to St. Athanasius and the orthodox cause may have subjected his book to unfair criticism. Anyhow the Eusebians, piqued at his absence from the synod of Tyre and afterwards the festivities at Jerusalem, A.D. 335, in honour of the dedication of the church of the Holy Sepulchre, called upon him to render account of the opinions advanced in it, and to recant them, and, according to Socrates, extorted a promise that he would burn the offending book. For not having at once done this, he was deposed in the synod held, by command of the emperor, at Constantinople by the chiefs of that party, in Feb. 336, when Eusebius of Nicomedia presided, and Eusebius of Caesarea was charged by the assembled bishops with the task of refuting the work of Marcellus. Basil the semi-Arian was appointed to the see vacated by him (Socr. i. 36). Condemned at Constantinople, Marcellus betook himself to Rome, apparently without loss of time. It must have been almost the first act of Julius, after his election (Feb. 6, 337), to receive Marcellus into communion. Marcellus could have scarcely left Rome when the Eusebian deputies, Macarius and two deacons, arrived ( 339), hoping to persuade Julius to join them in unseating St. Athanasius who had returned from exile without being synodically restored. This led to Athanasius coming to Rome about Easter 340, and to a synod of more than 50 bishops assembled at Rome by pope Julius in Nov. 341.

Marcellus was at Rome then, having been admitted by Julius to communion on a previous visit; and Julius followed the precedent suggested by Marcellus at his previous visit, and adopted in his case, viz. that of sending presbyters to the Eusebians with the object of bringing them to Rome to confront an opponent already there. Neither Julius nor his bishops ventured to restore Marcellus or St. Athanasius to their respective sees. They