But though we have reached the term of Hilary’s
life, there remains one topic on which something must be said, his
relation to St. Martin of Tours. Martin, born in Pannonia, the
country of Valens and Ursacius, but converted from paganism under
Catholic influences, was attracted by Hilary, already a bishop, and
spent some years in his society before the outbreak of the Arian strife
in Gaul. Hilary, we are told, wished to ordain him a priest, but
at his urgent wish refrained, and admitted him instead to the humble
rank of an exorcist. At an uncertain date, which cannot have long
preceded Hilary’s exile, he felt himself moved to return to his
native province in order to convert his parents, who were still
pagans. He succeeded in the case of his mother and of many of his
countrymen. But he was soon compelled to abandon his labours, for
he had, as a true disciple of Hilary, regarded it as his duty to oppose
the Arianism dominant in the
province. Opposition to the bishops on the part of a man holding
so low a station in the Church was a civil as well as an ecclesiastical
offence, and Martin can have expected no other treatment than that
which he received, of scourging and expulsion from the province.
Hilary was by this time in exile, and Martin turned to Milan, where the
heresy of the intruder Auxentius called forth his protests, which were
silenced by another expulsion. He next retired to a small island
off the Italian coast, where he lived in seclusion till he heard of
Hilary’s return. He hastened to Rome, so Fortunatus tells
us, to meet his friend, but missed him on the way; and followed him at
once to Poitiers. There Hilary gave him a site near the city, on
which he founded the first monastery in that region, over which he
presided for the rest of Hilary’s life and for four years after
his death. In the year 371 he was consecrated bishop of Tours,
and so continued till his death twenty-five years later. It is
clear that Martin was never able to exert any influence over the mind
or action of Hilary, whose interests were in an intellectual sphere
above his reach. But the courage and tenacity with which Martin
held and preached the Faith was certainly inspired to some considerable
extent by admiration of Hilary and confidence in his teaching.
And the joy which Hilary expresses, as we have seen, in his later
Homilies on the Psalms over the rapid spread of Christianity in
Gaul, was no doubt occasioned by the earlier triumphs of Martin among
the peasantry. The two men were formed each to be the complement
of the other. It was the work of Hilary to prove with cogent
clearness to educated Christians, that reason as well as piety dictated
an acceptance of the Catholic Faith; the mission of Martin was to those
who were neither educated nor Christian, and his success in bringing
the Faith home to the lives and consciences of the pagan masses marks
him out as one of the greatest among the preachers of the Gospel.
Both of them actively opposed Arianism, and both suffered in the
conflict. But the confessorship of neither had any perceptible
share in promoting the final victory of truth. Their true glory
is that they were fellow-labourers equally successful in widely
separate parts of the same field; and Hilary is entitled, beyond the
honour due to his own achievements, to a share in that of St. Martin,
whose merits he discovered and fostered.