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In rank this council stands near to the General Councils; its twenty canons being issued by Pope Martin under anathema upon matters of faith are as binding on the Church now as when they were first published. The creed of this Council is a simple repetition and exhibition of the creed of the Council of Chalcedon, until we come to the addition which at once transfixes the heresy and sets forth the faith. After the words “we believe one and the same only-begotten Son, God, the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ,” the addition runs, “and we believe as Two Natures of the same, united without confusion, so likewise Two Natural Wills, the divine and the human, and Two Natural Operations, the divine and the human, for the perfect and unfailing assurance that He is truly perfect God and perfect Man in very deed, one and the same our Lord and God, Jesus Christ, willing and working divinely and humanly our salvation, as the prophets of old and our Lord Jesus Christ Himself taught us, and the creed of the holy fathers handed down, and in general all the holy universal Councils and the whole band of approved doctors in the Catholic Church. This, in agreement with them all according to their inspired teaching, we one and all confess and define.”

Among the documents read at the Lateran Council was one from the whole African episcopate addressed to Pope Theodorus three years before, in 646, in the following titles: “To our most blessed Lord, seated in the apostolic headship, the Father of Fathers, Theodorus, most holy Pope and Chief Shepherd of all Prelates, Columbus Bishop of the first See of the Byzacene Council, and Reparatus Bishop of the first See of the Mauritanian Council, and with us all the bishops of the three Councils of Africa.” It is to be noted that the Archbishop of Carthage is not mentioned, for Fortunatus was elected somewhat later to take the place of a Monothelite. “No one can question that a great and neverfailing spring of grace wells forth from your Apostolic See, enriching all Christians. Thence in abundance rivulets come forth, irrigating the whole Christian world, whence, O Father of Fathers, in honour of most holy Peter, your Apostolic See has been appointed, by divine decree in a peculiar and unique manner, to search into and to treat the sacred doctrines of the Church, receiving which as truly handed down it is the most necessary function of the high priest of that supreme and apostolic See to certify.” Then the African bishops, by quoting, made their own that famous answer given by Pope Innocent I. to the African bishops in the time of St. Augustine, 230 years before. “This obedience,” they proceed, “we humbly render to your apostolic supremacy, and beseech the Pope to do away with the hateful novelty which has sprung up in the Church of Constantinople.”

This letter has a double interest, being one of the last recorded acts of the ancient African episcopate, which was already in conflict with the Mohammedan assault, and about fifty years later was entirely swept away. It would be difficult to find stronger words than it uses to describe the Papal authority and the special gift which it recognises as belonging to the See of Peter by divine ordinance.

Several of the letters written by Pope Martin after the Lateran Synod testify his zeal to overthrow the Monothelite heresy. Among these is his answer to the just-quoted letter, which he addresses to the Church of Carthage, and all the bishops, clergy, and laity subject to it. He praises them for the synodical letters drawn up by the Church's glorious orator, Augustine, through the Holy Ghost, to his Apostolic See, alluding to that great confession of his Primacy which we have in the letters of the Saint, and which, he says, their words repeat, and so he presents to them the acts of the Lateran Council.

Particularly remarkable is the Pope's letter to the bishops under the Sees of Jerusalem and Antioch, that is, the patriarchates which had fallen under Mohammedan domination. He announces to them that, after due examination, he had condemned “the Exposition of the Emperor Heraclius, and the formula of the present serene emperor,” and he deplores the havoc which heretics had made in the East, irregularly setting up a false bishop at Antioch, the heretic Macedonius, and another, Peter, at Alexandria. The Pope adds that in his anxiety to build up the Church of God, which they were laying waste, he had, according to the power given him by the Lord in the person of blessed Peter, ordered his brother John, Bishop of Philadelphia, to supply his place in all ecclesiastical matters through the East, and to create in all cities episcopally subject to the Sees of Antioch and Jerusalem bishops, priests, and deacons, and he begs them as sons of obedience “to help our Vicar set by Apostolic authority”.

The Bishop of Thessalonica, in the course of 200 years since St. Leo and the succeeding Popes had made him their Vicar for the great province of Eastern Illyricum, had become a prelate of very high rank. Paul was actually bishop, but he favoured the new heresy, and the Pope, after warning him in vain, wrote deposing him, unless he received without the least omission everything which had been synodically ratified and defined at the Council. At the same time he wrote to the people of Thessalonica, enjoining them to have no society, agreement, or connection with such a man.

Thus, in the case of any diocese, whether that of a simple bishop, or a primate, or a patriarch, the Pope does not hesitate to tell their several diocesans that they are set free from all duty of obedience to one condemned by him. No act can show the superior authority of the universal Primate more strongly than this. St. Gregory the Great had said that all bishops were equal when performing their respective work in their own diocese; but if that work is not duly performed, he knows of no bishop who is not subject to the Apostolic See. The power of the Primacy is essentially for edification of the whole Church, and so is exerted whenever the Church and the faith of the Church are anywhere in danger. The acts of St. Martin I. at a crisis of singular danger follow exactly the rule of St. Gregory. If an emperor supports heresy, he condemns his act, though he may be a lawful sovereign; if a patriarch is false to the faith, he sets a vicar of his own to appoint fresh bishops in the patriarchate. If his own vicar sins against the power which appointed him, he dissolves the primary bond according to which the people of that diocese is bound to their own bishop.

But the supreme authority of the Roman See is indicated most plainly in the encyclical letter issued by the Pope. It is addressed “Martin, Servant of the Servants of God, by grace Bishop of God's holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of the Romans, together with the Synod of Bishops here canonically assembled with us for the confirmation of the true dogmas of the Catholic Church, to those who have inherited the like precious faith as we of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, through the laver of regeneration, who sojourn in holiness and justice in every part of His dominion, our brethren the bishops, priests, deacons, heads of monasteries, monks, ascetics, and to the whole sacred plenitude of the Catholic Church”.

I give the main contents of this letter thus addressed to the whole world to announce the decision of the Council by Pope Martin. It expresses in every line, supported by constant quotations of Scripture, the solicitude of the Pope for the maintenance of the doctrine concerning the Person of the Lord which had been held from the beginning. “Our predecessors, the Pontiffs of Catholic memory, have not ceased to admonish the innovators to recede from this their heresy. Bishops from various provinces, and, what is more, general synods, have not only by their own writings called upon them to amend their heresy, but conjure our Apostolic See to exercise its regular authority, and not to suffer to the end this innovation to make a prey of the churches. Meeting, therefore, in this Roman most Christian city, we have confirmed by our sentence the holy Fathers; we have anathematised the heretics with their most depraved doctrines, the impious Ecthesis and the most impious Typus, in order that all you who dwell over the whole earth, recognising that these things have been piously done by us for the safeguard of the Catholic Church, may carry them out together with us.” “The Lord says, every kingdom divided against itself shall not stand, and every sentence, every law divided against itself shall not stand; and if the Typus destroys the Ecthesis, and the Ecthesis destroys the Typus, the one asserting that our Lord has one will and operation, the other denying it, then both are divided; and how shall the heresy stand, being shown to be invalid and empty by itself, rather than destroyed by us?” This, the never-ending refutation of heresy, runs through the whole letter, and against it is set “the manifestation of God through apostles, prophets, doctors, and the five Universal Councils, whose decrees are the law of the Catholic Church”. “Behold the Judge stands before the door joyfully promising crowns to those who suffer for His sake.”

Thus the Lateran Council of 649, presided over by Pope Martin, who directs all the proceedings, who informs the emperor of the condemnation of the Typus, composed by this emperor's own patriarch, and issued by himself as a law, who addresses an encyclical letter to all bishops and their people, summing up its acts, who writes to various provinces, and in particular to the eastern patriarchates of Antioch and Jerusalem, appointing his vicar over them, gives us in full detail a picture of the discipline existing in the Church just at the middle of the seventh century. As to doctrine, the Lateran Council stands precisely on that set forth two hundred years before at the Council of Chalcedon by the great authority of St. Leo. In condemning the Monothelite heresy, espoused by two emperors and three successive patriarchs of Constantinople, it alleges the tradition of the Fathers from the beginning, and the doctrinal decrees of the five Councils, then accepted as General. During these five centuries the East has been agitated almost without ceasing by the efforts of the Eutychean heresy and its last progeny, the Monothelite, to overthrow the true faith concerning the Incarnation, on which the whole economy of human salvation rests. The eastern patriarchates have utterly failed to secure the occupants of the sees of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople, from the prevailing error. Cyrus, patriarch of Alexandria, and Sergius, patriarch of Constantinople, are the chief patrons of this error. After them, Pyrrhus, and then Paul, are using the utmost power of the emperor from their seat in the capital to impose it by force: and the ecumenical patriarch especially is using it as a lever against the Roman Primacy, and in drawing up decrees of doctrine fathered by the imperial power is practically denying the Roman Primacy to be the guardian of the Christian faith, and striving to transfer that guardianship to himself, always under the wing of the emperor. Had the Popes yielded to the Ecthesis or the Typus, both the faith of the Church would have been altered, and its government transferred from Old Rome to Roma Nova. St. Martin, as the first act of his pontificate, plays this most remarkable part of summoning a Council which defeats this double aggression. And the moment at which it is done may be marked as that in which the temporal weakness of Rome touches its lowest point. The subsequent treatment of the Pope, which I have now to mention, is an incontestable proof how entirely he was exposed to the machinations, the violence, and the despotic tyranny of his enemies, especially to the malevolent union of emperor and patriarch. Yet it is to be observed that neither emperor nor patriarch even affects to deny the authority of St. Peter's successor; what they attempt to do is to control and subject him in the exercise of it.

History is silent as to events in Rome from the end of the Council of 649 to 653. What the exarch Olympius, by special command of the emperor Constans II. did while it was being held, has been narrated above. Olympius was dead, but another exarch, Theodore Kalliopas, was sent from Constantinople to execute the work in which Olympius had failed. On the 15th June, 653, Kalliopas came to Rome. Concerning his purpose, Pope Martin himself wrote to his friend Theodorus in these words: “Your charity has desired to know how I was carried away from the See of the Apostle, St. Peter, like a solitary sparrow from the house-top. I am surprised at your question since Our Lord foretold of evil times to His own disciples: for ‘there shall be then great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now; and unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved. But he who perseveres unto the end shall be saved.’ Therefore that you may know how I was removed and carried off from the city of Rome, you shall hear no false report. Through the whole time I knew what was preparing. And taking with me all my clergy, I remained by myself in the church of our Saviour, named after Constantine, which was the first built and endowed in all the world by that emperor of blessed memory, beside the bishop's palace. There we all stayed by ourselves from Saturday, when Kalliopas entered the city with the army of Ravenna, and the chamberlain Theodorus. I sent them some of the clergy to meet him, whom he received in the palace, and thought I was with them. But, finding I was not, he mentioned it to the chief clergy. Because it was our purpose to do him homage, but on the next day, which was Sunday, we would present ourselves and salute him, as on that day we could not. On Sunday he sent men to that church, suspecting that there was a great multitude there, being Sunday, and he reported that, being very tired with his journey, he could not come that day, but we should certainly meet the next day, ‘and we will do homage to your Holiness’. Now I myself had been very sick from October to that 16th of June. On Monday then he sent at dawn his chartular and certain attendants, and said, ‘You have prepared arms and you have armed men inside, and you have heaped up a quantity of stones for resistance. This is not necessary; do not allow any such thing.’ I heard this myself, and to remove their suspicions, thought it necessary to send them all over the episcopal palace, that, if they saw arms or stones, they might themselves give evidence. They went and found nothing, upon which I suggested to them that they had always acted thus, and proceeded against us by intrigue and false accusation, as when, at the coming of the infamous Olympius, they said that I might have repelled him by arms. Now I was lying in my bed before the altar of the church, and scarcely half-an-hour later the army came with them into the church. All were covered, bearing lances and swords, shields, and bows ready bent; and they did things there which are not to be uttered. For, as when the winter wind blows violently, the leaves fall from the trees, the candles of the church were struck down, and resounded in their fall upon the pavement. And the clash of arms sounded like a horrible thunder in the church, together with the vast number of broken candles. Upon this their sudden inroad, order was issued by Kalliopas to the priests and deacons who surrounded me, that I had, in violation of rule and law, taken undue possession of the bishop's office, and was not worthy to be in the Apostolic See, but was by all means to be sent to this imperial city, and a bishop elected in my stead. This has not yet been done, and I trust will never be done; since, in the absence of the pontiff, the archdeacon, the archpriest, and the first notary take his place. I have already told you the acts which had been doing concerning the faith. But, as we were not prepared for resistance, I thought it better to die ten times over than that anyone's blood should be shed in vain. And this was done without risk to anyone, after many evils displeasing to God had been effected. So I gave myself up at once to be taken before the emperor without resistance. I must admit that some of the clergy cried out to me not to do this, but I did not listen, lest murders should instantly take place. But I said to them: Let some of the clergy necessary to me, bishops, priests, and deacons, and, indeed, such as I choose, come with me. Kalliopas answered: By all means let such as will come. We use compulsion on no one. I answered, My clergy are in my own hands. Some of the priests cried out: We live and we die with him. Then Kalliopas himself and these who were with him began saying, Come with us to the palace. I did not refuse, but on that same Monday went out with them to the palace. On Tuesday all the clergy came to me, and many had prepared to sail with me, and had already put their baggage on board; some others also, both clergy and laity, were hastening to join us. On that same night then, preceding Thursday, the 19th June, about the sixth hour, they carried me from the palace, thrusting back all who were with me in the palace, and without even things necessary for my journey and for me when here, and they took me from the city with only six pages and a single drinking vessel. We were put on board a bark, and about four hours after dawn reached Porto. As soon as we left Rome the gates were closed, and kept closed that no one might go out and reach us at Porto before we sailed thence. Thus we were compelled to leave at Porto all the goods of those who had put them on board, and the same day we departed. On the 1st July we came to Miseno, where was the ship, that is, my prison. Now I met with no compassion, not in Miseno only but also in Calabria; nor in Calabria only, which is subject to the great city of the Romans, but in many islands in which we were detained for our sins as long as three months, save only in the island of Naxus, for there we spent a year, I was allowed to take two or three baths, and was a guest in a house. And now for seven and forty days I have not been allowed to wash in warm or cold water. I am sick and cold through and through; for both on board and on land to the present hour my stomach has allowed me no rest. When in my hunger I am about to take something, my whole body is so shaken that I cannot take anything to strengthen nature. I have an utter disgust against what I have. But I believe in the power of God, who beholds all things, for when I am relieved from this present life all my persecutors will be called to account, so that at least they may be drawn to repent, and so converted from their iniquity. God preserve you my very dear son.”

The allusion above concerning the things done as to the faith is explained in a former letter to the same friend, wherein he says: “When I left the Lateran Church, where armed men had shut me in, they cried out in the presence of the exarch, Whoever says or believes that Martin has changed or will change one iota of the faith, let him be anathema. And whoever remain not in their orthodox faith to death, let them be anathema. When Kalliopas heard this he began to excuse himself that there was no other faith than what we held, and that he had no other. And I would have you know, most dear brother, concerning the faith, and likewise those calumnies which they are putting out against the truth, that by the help of your prayers, and those of all faithful Christians who are with you, whether living or dying, I will defend the faith of our salvation, and as St. Paul teaches, ‘to me to live is Christ, and to die gain’. But as to those false accusations which heretics are newly making, casting aside the truth of Christ our God, what truth can they speak to men who resist God's truth? Therefore, I make answer to you, dearest brother, by Him Who will judge this world by fire, and render to every one according to his work, I never sent letters to the Saracens, nor how they should understand a certain tome, nor ever sent money, except some alms to servants of God going thither, to whom we gave a little for their needs, by no means for the Saracens. And as to our Lady, the glorious ever-virgin Mary, who brought forth Jesus Christ our God and Lord, whom all holy and Catholic fathers call the Mother of God, inasmuch as she bore the God-man, unjust men have borne false witness against me – rather against their own souls. Whoever does not honour and worship her who is blessed above every creature and human nature save Him who was born of her, the venerable ever-virgin Mother of our Lord, let him be anathema both in this world and in the next. But men who seek occasion throw up scandals for the offence of many. God preserve you, most loving son.”

In addition to these letters of the Pope himself, we also possess from the hand of a contemporary “a narration of the deeds done cruelly and without respect of God by the adversaries of truth to the apostolic confessor and martyr Martin, Pope of Rome”. Concerning this the writer says: “Some incidents I learnt from others; of very many I was an eye-witness”. He speaks with horror of the swords drawn against the Pope as he lay sick on his couch in the Lateran Basilica; how the preacher of truth was torn from his apostolic throne by the powerful of this world who were worthy of such a ministry; how he was carried off secretly in a small vessel; how, as his ship touched at various places, the bishops and faithful brought him gifts, which the brutal guards laid their hands upon, abusing those who brought them, and saying: If you love him you are enemies of the State. “When at last that blessed man reached Byzantium on the 17th September, the guards left him from morning until the tenth hour lying in his couch on the ship, a spectacle to angels and men. For a number of men came to him – wolfish from their manners I should call them – as I conjecture hired to do against the holy Pope things which should not be mentioned to Christians. Now I remained on the shore walking up and down the whole day, mourning over him whom I saw in such a state; and hearing what some heathens said against him, I was ready to expire with grief. About sunset a certain scribe named Sadoleva came with many warders. They took him from the ship and carried him in a portable chair to the guardhouse, Prandiaria, and shut him up under strict charge that no one in the city should know that he was kept in guard. Thus the holy apostolical remained without exchanging a word with anyone for ninety-three days. On the ninety-third day they took him early out of guard and put him in the fiscal's cell. They had summoned the whole Senate to meet. They had him brought in upon his chair, for he was ill from what he had suffered on board and the long imprisonment. The fiscal, who presided with the other chief persons, eyed him from a distance, and bade him rise from his couch. Some attendant said he could not stand. The fiscal called out in a fury, and some one of the warders, Let him stand up, though he be supported on both sides. This was done. Then the fiscal said: Speak, wretch, what harm has the emperor done thee? Has he taken anything? Has he oppressed thee? But he held his peace. Then the fiscal said to him with imperious voice: Answerest thou nothing? Now shall thy accusers come in. Then many accusers were brought in against him. But they were all sons of falsehood, and disciples of those who killed our Lord Jesus Christ. But they contradicted the holy man, as they had been told; for their words were arranged and prepared. Now some of them tried to speak the truth, but those who directed this conflict got disturbed, and began to threaten them violently until they were induced to say what told for the death of this just man. When the Pope looked at them as they entered to bear witness, he said with a smile: Are these the witnesses? That is the rule. Some of these had been with Olympius. They were sworn on the Gospels, and so bore witness. The first of all the accusers was Dorotheus, patrician of Sicily. He swore that if Martin had fifty heads he ought not to live, since he alone subverted and destroyed all the West, and was in fact in the counsel of Olympius, and an enemy who slew the emperor and the Roman civilisation. When that just man saw them coming in and swearing unsparingly, out of compassion to their souls he said to those who presided: For God sake do not make them swear, but let them say what they please on their simple word; and yourselves, do what pleases you. Why should they lose their souls by swearing? One witness came in and said that the Pope had conspired with Olympius, and tampered with soldiers to make them take an oath. When he was asked if this was true, he answered: If you will hear the truth, I will tell you. And he began to speak: ‘When the Typus was made and sent to Rome by the emperor – ’ At these words he was stopped, and Troilus cried out: Do not introduce before us matters of faith; you are now on trial for treason, since we are both Romans, and Christian, and orthodox. Would to God, said the Pope; but on that day of tremendous judgment you will find me a witness in this also. As the witnesses were accusing, Troilus, the prefect, said to him: What a man art thou to have seen and heard the attempts of Olympius against the emperor, yet not to have forbidden him, but to have consented with him. To whom the Pope instantly replied: Lord Troilus, tell us when George, as you know and we have heard, who had been a monk, and was become a magistrate, entered into this city from the camp, and said and did such and such things, where were you and those with you to offer no resistance, though he harangued you and banished from the palace such as he chose? And again, when Valentine, at the emperor's command, put on the purple and sat by his side, where had you gone? Were you not here? Why did you not forbid him to meddle with things not belonging to him? Did you not all take part with him? How was I to stand against such a man who wielded the whole force of Italy? Did I make him exarch? I entreat you by the Lord to do quickly what is your pleasure to do with me. For God knows that you bestow on me the greatest of gifts by whatever death you kill me. The fiscal enquired of one of the officers, Sagoleva: Are there many more witnesses? There are many, my lord, he said. But the presidents, being foiled by the holy man standing before them, because the Holy Spirit supported him, said it was sufficient. A certain Innocentius was turning into Greek the Pope's words, and the fiscal, feeling them like fiery darts shot upon them, turned to Innocentius in a fury: Why do you translate his words? Repeat them not. And rising with his assessors he went in to report to the emperor what he chose. But they led the holy apostolic man, seated in his chair, away from the cell of judgment – I should rather say from the hall of Caiphas – and put him in the middle of a court opposite the imperial stable, where all the people used to meet and await the entry of the fiscal. The guards surrounded him, and it was a sight striking awe into the crowd. Presently they placed him in the open, that the emperor might look at him from his dining-couch, and see what followed. Now there was a great multitude of people crowded together as far as the hippodrome. So they placed the most reverend man in the middle of that open space in presence of the whole Senate, propped up on both sides. Suddenly there was a great press, and the fiscal issuing from the emperor, with the doors of the dining-room opened, ordered all the people to make way for him. And, coming up to the holy Martin, the Apostolicus said to him: See how God has led thee and delivered thee into our hands. What hope hadst thou in struggling against the emperor? Thou hast deserted God, and God has deserted thee. And the fiscal calling on one of the warders standing by ordered him instantly to take away the mantle of the chief pastor of all Christians, who had confirmed the orthodox confession of the holy Fathers and Councils, that is, the Faith, and had canonically and in council put under anathema the authors of the new error, the new heretics, with their impious doctrines. So when the warder had torn away his mantle and the straps of his sandals, the fiscal delivered him over to the prefect of the city, saying: Take him, my lord prefect, and immediately cut him in pieces. At the same time he bade all who were present anathematise him, which they did, but only about twenty souls. But all who saw this deed, and knew that there is a God in heaven who beheld what was being done, went away disturbed, with eyes cast down and in great sorrow.

“Then the executioners taking him, stripped off the pallium of the sacerdotal stole, and rending the sides of his garment, which was woven from the top throughout, put iron chains upon his holy neck, and dragging his whole body violently, did not allow him to rest a moment and recover himself, but led him from the palace, making a show of him and dishonouring him through the midst of the city to the pretorium. And the sword was borne before him. Now, that blessed one was in great and unspeakable pain. He was utterly worn out and without strength, ready to expire from the pressure of sufferings and his emaciation. Nevertheless, rejoicing in hope, he was comforted in the Lord, and the greater the affliction and violence with which he was dragged along, the more that Just One followed with serene countenance and unbroken spirit. He had but one garment, which was rent from top to bottom, and no girdle; but he was girded with faith and the grace of the Lord. You might see a man so full of God subject to such disgrace that his flesh might be seen naked. When the people saw many things which happened they groaned and sobbed. But a few of those ministers of Satan rejoiced and mocked, and shaking their heads, as is written, they said, Where is his God, and where is his faith, and where is his teaching? And when he had come to the pretorium in this dishonour, and surrounded by the executioners with drawn swords, they cast him into a prison with murderers, and about an hour later carried him thence to the guard-house of Diomedes, in the court of the prefect. But they drew him in his fetters with such haste and force that his legs and thighs were torn, and blood shed in ascending the stairs of the guard-house, which were very ragged, rough and steep. Now the blessed one was very nigh to escape the tortures of the present life by expiring before the sword came when he had no strength to mount the steps with the men dragging him. When at last they got him somehow into the guard-house, after many falls and risings again, they put him on a bench clothed in fetters. For when he was delivered by Caiphas, that is, the prefect, to Pilate to be crucified, immediately when the executioners were stripping him, he suffered greatly from the cold, for it was a bitter season. They put on him the heaviest iron fetters, and there was no man of his own to help him, save one young cleric, who stayed with him in custody, and stood weeping over his master, like Peter. The chief warder also was fastened to him, it being the custom that a criminal condemned to the sword should be bound to the chief warder.