e saint
knew the all-powerful efficacy of the prayers of the saints, and feared
lest they should obtain of God his deliverance from death. He therefore
besought St. Polycarp and others at Smyrna, to join their prayers with
his, that the cruelty of the wild beasts might quickly rid the world of
him, that he might be presented before Jesus Christ. With this view he
wrote to the faithful at Rome, to beg that they would not endeavor to
obtain of God that the beasts might spare him, as they had several other
martyrs; which might induce the people to release him, and so disappoint
him of his crown.

The ardor of divine love which the saint breathes throughout this
letter, is as inflamed as the subject is extraordinary. In it he writes:
"I fear your charity, lest it prejudice me: for it is easy for you to do
what you please; but it will be difficult for me to attain unto God if
you spare me. I shall never have such an opportunity of enjoying God:
nor can you, if ye shall now be silent, ever be entitled to the honor of
a better work. For if ye be silent in my behalf, I shall be made
partaker of God; but if ye love my body, I shall have my course to run
again. Therefore, a greater kindness you cannot do me, than to suffer me
to be sacrificed unto God, while the altar is now ready; that so
becoming a choir in love, in your hymns ye may give thanks to the Father
by Jesus Christ, that God has vouchsafed to bring me, the bishop of
Syria, from the East unto the West, to pass out of the world unto God,
that I may rise again unto him. Ye have never envied any one. Ye have
taught others. I desire, therefore, that you will firmly observe that
which in your instructions you have prescribed to others. Only pray for
me, that God would give me both inward and outward strength, that I may
not only say, but do: that I may not only be called a Christian, {329}
but be found one: for if I shall be found a Christian, I may then
deservedly be called one; and be thought faithful, when I shall no
longer appear to the world. Nothing is good that is seen. A Christian is
not a work of opinion, but of greatness, when he is hated by the world.
I write to the churches, and signify to them all, that I am willing to
die for God, unless you hinder me. I beseech you that you show not an
unseasonable good-will towards me. Suffer me to be the food of wild
beasts, whereby I may attain unto God: I am the wheat of God, and I am
to be ground by the teeth of the wild