Hymn 7

7. Hymn in Honour of Quirinus the Martyr, Bishop of the Church of Siscia.

A man eminent in merit,

Quirinus, pleasing to God,

the walls of the city of Siscia

cherish in a father’s embrace,

a martyr granted to themselves.

Here, under the commander Galerius,

who then pressed the Illyrian regions

with his dominions,

he is said to have made the catholic faith

illustrious through his death.

No hardness of the sword,

no fires, no wild beasts

slay him with a cruel destruction,

but a whirlpool, with its river-waters,

while it sweeps him off, washes him clean.

It matters nothing whether the passion

dyes the martyr in a glassy expanse

or in a river of blood;

his glory comes forth alike,

wet with whatever wave.

From the top of a steep bridge

the bishop of the holy people

is cast headlong into the river,

bearing, hung from a noose,

the stone of a great mill.

The most gentle eddy of the stream

receives him cast down

and does not suffer him to be sunk,

sustaining the vast weight of the stone

with wondrous swimmings.

From afar, from the ground, the frightened

flocks watch their teacher;

for the thronging people of Christ

had hedged the windings of the banks

with a crowded column.

But Quirinus, when, rising up,

he turned his face about, alas, sees his own

people trembling at his example,

himself nothing mindful of his own

peril amid the waters.

He strengthens the pious hearts,

asking with gentle words

that such things should frighten no one,

nor should steadfast faith waver,

nor reckon it a punishment to die.

As he speaks, the river bears his back

over its restless shallows,

nor does the depth spread beneath

dare of its own accord to gape open

for the stone, the noose, and the man.

The martyr bishop felt

that the now-won palm of death

and of his passing was being snatched from him,

and that his ascent was denied

to the throne of the eternal Father.

“Jesus almighty,” he says,

“by no means is this glory

unwonted or new to you,

to trample the roaring of the sea

and to halt the headlong rivers.

We know that the disciple Peter,

when he dipped his steps,

trembling, with a mortal foot,

by the help of your right hand

set the deep beneath solid ground.

The Jordan too we know,

wandering with twisted eddies,

while it is borne in rapid rush,

fled back to its source

by reversed channels.

These are the miracles of your

power, Lord, so that even now

I am held up, lightly floating

on the river’s topmost current,

though I drag a crag at my neck.

Now the proof of you is full

and the power of your name betrayed,

which heathen stupor dulls:

release, I pray, most kind one,

now the delays of this soul.

What you can do the river’s water proves,

which bears up the flint;

this that yet remains I yield,

than which nothing is more precious,

to die for you, Christ God.”

As he prays, at once breath

and voice and warmth desert him;

his spirit climbs the heights,

the stone becomes a heavy weight,

and the waters receive his body.