XLIX. The year 814 (A.D. 502-3). On the region of Mesopotamia also, in which we dwell, great calamities weighed heavily in this year, so that the things which Christ our Lord decreed in His Gospel against Jerusalem, and actually brought to pass, and the things too which have been spoken regarding the end of this world, would be well fitting to those which happened us at this time. For after there had been earthquakes in various places, as I have written unto you, and famines and pestilences, and alarms and terrors, and after great signs had been shown from heaven, nation arose against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and we fell by the edge of the sword, and were led away captive into every region, and our land was trampled under foot by strange nations; so that, had it not been for the words of our Lord, who has said, "When you hear of wars and tumults, do not be afraid, for these things must needs first come to pass, but the end is not yet come," we would have dared to say that the end of the world was come, because many thought and said thus. But we ourselves reflected that this war did not extend over the whole world; and besides we remembered too the words of S. Paul, wherewith he warned the Thessalonians concerning the coming of our Lord, saying that they should not be astonished either by word, or by spirit, or by beguiling epistle, as if it were from him, declaring the day of the Lord to be now come; and (how) he showed that it is not possible that the end should be until the false Christ is revealed. From these words then of our Lord and of His Apostle we understood that these things did not happen to us because it was the latter time, but that they took place for our chastisement, because our sins were great.