Baring-Gould’s sources: Roman Martyrology on Aug. 1, Dec. 15 and 16. His festival fixed by Benedict XIII. for Dec. 15. In ancient kalendars on Aug. 1. Authorities: — Hieron. Script. The letters of S. Ambrose, of Liberius, Sulpicius Severus. Hilar. Orat 2. The letters of S. Athanasius, and of Lucifer, &c.] Eusebius, bishop of Vercelli, in Northern Italy, was a native of Sardinia, which may account for the attachment he afterwards felt for Lucifer of Cagliari. He was ordained lector at Rome, and then went to Vercelli, where he was elected to the bishopric; and he is the first bishop of that see whose name has come down to us. He was the first prelate of the West who united the monastic to the clerical life; he lived as a monk himself, and made the clergy of his city adopt the monastic life of the desert. Liberius wrote to him at a time of emergency. Constantius was bent on Arianizing the Church. Liberius wrote to Constantius, inviting him to summon a council at Aquileja; but the emperor caused it to assemble at Arles, where the bishop, Satuminus, was an Arian. The first thing insisted on by the Arians at the council was, that the bishops should 1 Milan, Hist, of Georgian Church.

…renounce the communion of Athanasius. Vincent of Capua, who had represented Pope Sylvester at Nicaea, unhappily yielded, in the vain hope of obtaining peace by sacrificing one man. Liberius wrote to Hosius of Cordova: “ I had hoped much from Vincent. Yet he has not only gained nothing, but has himself been led into dissimulation/1 There was then at Rome the Sardinian bishop, Lucifer of Cagliari, a man of extreme sturdiness and vehemence, who, at his own request, was sent to ask the emperor for another council which should proceed on the basis of the Nicene faith. Liberius recommended him to the good offices of Eusebius of Vercelli, a man whom he knew to be “ kindled with the Spirit of God.” He wrote Eusebius [Eusebius of Caesarea (d. c. 339), the first historian of the Church] a second letter after the departure of Lucifer, to urge him most earnestly to contend for the faith, and for the absent Athanasius, whom the Arians [followers of Arius, who taught that the Son is a created being, not fully God] were bent upon condemning against all law. Eusebius received Lucifer with great cordiality, and wrote a reply to Liberius, which drew forth from the Pope a third letter to encourage him in demanding the assembling of a new council. The council was summoned, and met early in 355 a* Milan, where Dionysius the metropolitan [the archbishop who heads a group of dioceses] and his people were Catholic. About three hundred Western bishops were present; of Easterns only a small number. The emperor Constantius was present, to awe the assembly into submission. Foreseeing how the council would end, Eusebius of Vercelli hesitated to attend, and the council deputed two bishops with a letter to him, requesting his presence, and recommending him to place confidence in the assembly, and to keep the bond of unity unbroken. But this exhortation was saddled with the threat that if he did not yield he should be judged by them. Athanasius was designated in this letter, not as a heretic, but as sacrilegious. This epistle was signed by thirty bishops, amongst whom were Valens of Mursa, Ursacius of Singidon, EpicS. Eusebius.

tetus of Centumcellae, Leontius of Antioch, Acacius of Caesarea, and Patrophilus of Scythopolis, all declared Arians. The emperor also wrote to Eusebius, describing affairs as settled by the council, and needing only his subscription. Lucifer and the two other papal legates, Pancratius and Hilary, also wrote to Eusebius, bidding him resist the artifices of the Arians.

Eusebius went to Milan, but found himself for ten days denied entrance to the church where the council was sitting. He was admitted only when the Arian prelates thought their plan ripe for execution. A condemnation of S. Athanasius [bishop of Alexandria (d. 373), great defender of the Nicene faith] was produced, and his subscription was demanded. Eusebius refused. He declared that he was not satisfied that all present were sound in the faith, and qualified to sit as judges, and he said that he would not sign till all had solemnly signed the Nicene symbol. Dionysius of Milan at once prepared to attach his name to the creed, but Valens of Mursa snatched the pen from his hand. A tumult arose, in which the people of Milan took part, and the Arian bishops, fearing the rabble, passed from the church to the palace. Constantius took his place as president in a hall of his palace, which was surrounded by his guards. He declared that he had received a command in a vision to declare the faith and appease the strife, and he produced a document which was couched in the form of an Arian symbol of faith. This document was carried by the bishops to the church and read aloud to the people; they roared forth their disapproval of its statements. It was not pressed further, but every nerve was strained to obtain the condemnation of Athanasius. “ I am the accuser of Athanasius," said the emperor; u believe on my word that the accusations made against him are well founded." Eusebius and Lucifer replied that Athanasius could not be condemned without hearing his exculpation.

[Dec. x£ The emperor was angry; he insisted on their communicating with the Arian bishops. “ That,” said they, “ is against the rule of the Church.”

“ My will is the rule,” said Constantius. “ Obey, or I will exile you.” Lucifer, Dionysius, and Eusebius raised their hands to heaven and boldly declared that the empire belonged not to him but to God, Who could deprive him of it when He willed. And they entreated him not to corrupt the discipline of the Church by introducing the element of imperial force into its decisions. Constantius drew his sword on the daring prelates, and ordered them to execution. But changing his mind, he commuted their sentence to banishment But before the bishops were removed, the deacon Hilary, legate [an official representative sent by the pope] of the Pope, was stripped and scourged before their feces.

Dionysius of Milan, Lucifer of Cagliari, Eusebius of Vercelli, Paulinus of Trbves, Exuperantius of Tortona, Maximus of Naples, and a bishop named Rufinian, stood firm, but many were cowed into submission.

Dionysius was banished into Cappadocia [a region of central Turkey], Rufinian was compelled by the young Arian prelate, Epicetus of Centumcellae, to run before his chariot, until he died by bursting a blood-vessel. Lucifer was kept in a dark dungeon at Germanicia; and Eusebius was sent to Scythopolis, the see of Patrophilus [a bishop’s “see” is his diocese, named from his seat (Latin sedes)], an old Arian. In the council Dionysius had been sufficiently weak to concede the point of condemning Athanasius, but he would not join in communion with the Arians. He had attached his signature to the condemnation, when Eusebius, with dexterity, smudged it out At Scythopolis Eusebius was visited by the deacon Syrus and the exorcist Victorinus, bringing him letters and presents from his church. This so enraged the Arians, that they removed him with brutal violence to another prison, drawing him, half naked, along the ground by the feet He was dragged up and down a stair, bruising him. The bishop forbade admission to him. This drew forth a written remonstrance from Eusebius, which he found means of passing out of his prison. He implored the person who found his protest not to destroy it, but to give it circulation. After Patrophilus had kept him shut up four days without food, he sent him back to his former prison, from which he had no authority for removing him. The Catholics hastened to give him food and money. The latter he distributed among the poor. After twenty-five days the Arian bishop sent his men, they broke into his cell, armed with cudgels, beat him, and carried him off to the house of a priest named Tegrinus, where he was locked up, along with some priests and deacons who had been with him. * These latter Patrophilus banished on his own authority, and he gave up their houses to the rabble to be pillaged. In the house of Tegrinus, Eusebius was kept for six days without food, and only given something to eat when near his last gasp. The deacon Syrus had not been arrested with the rest, as he had gone on to the holy places to visit them. On his return, Eusebius committed to him a letter describing the persecutions he endured. Eusebius was afterwards placed in the house of the count Joseph, a converted Jew (July 22), and was there visited by S. Epiphanius. He was after a while removed into Cappadocia, and then to the Thebaid [the desert region of Upper (southern) Egypt]. When the purple fell on the shoulders of Julian, the exiled bishops were recalled, and then Eusebius was permitted to go back to his church, a.d. 362. But on his way he remained at Alexandria to attend a council summoned to settle a schism that was troubling Antioch, and the reconciliation of the bishops who had signed the decrees of the council of Rimini, and repented of having done so. And, lastly, the synod was assembled to meet a new heresy which threatened, on the nature of the Incarnation. The council drew up a synodal letter, which Eusebius, Athanasius, and fourteen African bishops signed. Eusebius added to his signature the statement, that “ the Son of God assumed all (our nature) except sin.”

Eusebius was commissioned to carry this letter to Antioch. But before the decree could reach Antioch, Lucifer had taken, in conjunction with two other bishops, the unhappy step of consecrating Paulinus to that see, in order to gratify his strong sympathy with the Eustatians. An account of the miserable schism has already been given (S. Meletius, February*! 2), and need not be gone into at any length here. Eusebius, finding that the precipitate action of Lucifer had made the schism worse instead of healing it, remonstrated with Lucifer, who with that violence and impatience which characterized the man throughout his career, and made him, in spite of his real goodness, a source of mischief, at once broke off communion with Eusebius, with the Alexandrian Church, and with all who counselled moderation. Hence arose the sect of the Luciferians, headed after the death of Lucifer by that Hilary who had been a delegate of liberius at Milan, and reproducing in great measure the hard austerity of the Novatians and the Donatists.

The counsels of Alexandria were adopted by the vast majority of the faithful. Eusebius visited various Eastehi churches before he returned to Italy, and in Italy he found S. Hilary of Poitiers ready to co-operate with him. Rufinus says that he played the part of a healer of strife and of a priest, and that he and S. Hilary were as glorious lights irradiating Illyricum, Italy, and Gaul [roughly modern France and Belgium].

In 364, the emperor Valentinian came to Milan. S. Hilary of Poitiers and S. Eusebius of Vercelli were still there, upholding the Catholic cause against Auxentius, the bishop, who was suspected of Arianism, and keeping the faithful Dec. is.] 6*. Valerian [Roman emperor 253–260, who persecuted bishops and clergy].

apart from his communion. The emperor, who was a Catholic, was also naturally impatient of religious dissensions, and did not choose to worship in a conventicle, while the actual bishop professed himself to be really orthodox. He therefore put forth an edict that no one should disturb the Church of Milan. This, as Hilary said, was indeed to disturb it; and he denounced Auxentius as, in fact, an Arian. Valentinian ordered a trial; Auxendus professed his belief in Christ’s true consubstantial Godhead. Being ordered to make a written statement, he obeyed, and insisted on the authority of the council of Rimini, accused Hilary and Eusebius as contendous men who had been deposed, and spoke of the Son in words which might either mean that He was “a true Son,” or “a true God.” Valentinian was satisfied; Hilary protested that Auxendus was a trickster, but the emperor, weary of the controversy, ordered him to leave Milan.

Nothing further is heard of S. Eusebius. He most likely retired to Vercelli, which had certainly been deprived of his episcopal supervision for some time; and there he probably died, about 374.