Chapter XXI

The seeds of the Pelagian heresy springing up again, St. Germanus returns to Britain with Severus, and first cures the corporeal lameness of a young man; and then, by converting or proscribing the heretics, heals the spiritual lameness of the people.

Some time after St. Germanus' return to France, he was informed that a few individuals had begun again to disseminate the perverse opinions of Pelagius in the same island: and he was again solicited by the entreaties of all the clergy, to assert the cause of God, which he had before so nobly defended. He hastened to comply with their request, (and taking with him Severus, a person of the most eminent piety, who was the pupil of his former colleague St. Lupus, and had been ordained by him bishop of Treves,) embarked, and sailed over to Britain with a fair wind. In the mean time, the wicked spirits, flying over the whole island, were reluctantly compelled to announce to the inhabitants the arrival of St. Germanus. Upon which Elafius, one of the principal men of the country, hastened to meet the holy men, taking with him his son, who, though in the flower of youth, was afflicted with such debility and lameness, as would have moved anyone to compassion to behold him: for the sinews of his legs were so contracted that he could not walk, nor even put his feet to the ground. An immense number of people followed this Elafius, and assembled round the holy prelates; who, as soon as they landed, gave them their blessing, and began to preach the word of God to them. Then they enquired what doctrine they held, and discovered that the majority of the people continued to profess the same faith which they had before taught them; and that but few had swerved from it. These they detected and convicted.

Then Elafius cast himself at the feet of the Missioners, presenting to them his son, whose distress was sufficiently manifest not to require any description. Every one was grieved to see it, but especially the good bishop and his colleague, who immediately had recourse to the divine mercy in his behalf; and the blessed Germanus ordered the youth to sit down, and, applying his healing hand to the part affected, gently drew it over it, when immediately the contracted sinews were relaxed, and restored to their proper tone, and the young man was presented to his father perfectly cured. The surrounding spectators were all very much astonished at the sight of this miracle, and the Catholic faith, thus attested, was more firmly established in their minds. Then were they exhorted to make satisfaction to God for their prevarication; and the authors of it were condemned, by the general voice of all present, to be banished out of the island, and were delivered to the holy prelates, to be sent into any part of the continent, wherever they should judge it most expedient; that so these heresiarchs might be induced to correct their errors, and Britain might be delivered from the pestilence of their perverse opinions. By these means the true faith was restored, and remained in its purity for a long time in this country. Having thus put every thing in good order, the holy prelates returned as prosperously as they came.

St. Germanus, after this, went to Ravenna, to supplicate the Emperor Valentinian to grant peace to the people of Armorica. He was received by him and his mother Placidia with the greatest respect and veneration, and soon afterwards departed to Christ. His sacred remains were carried with the greatest honours, by a numerous and splendid attendance to his own city, where several miracles established the fame of his sanctity. Not long after this time, Valentinian was assassinated by the adherents of Etius, the Patrician, whom he had put to death, in the sixth year of the reign of Marcian, with whom ended the western empire.

chap 22 missing

Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum:
The History of the Primitive Church of England.
Book One, Chapter Twenty-Three

Translated by Rev. William Hurst, 1814.