inclined to virtue, and his parents bestowed on him an admirable
education. He opposed the heretics called Monothothelites, who were
patronized by the emperor Heraclius. Martin was condemned at
Constantinople, where he was exposed in the most public places to the
ridicule of the people, divested of all episcopal marks of distinction,
and treated with the greatest scorn and severity. After lying some
months in prison, Martin was sent to an island at some distance, and
there cut to pieces, A. D. 655.

John, bishop of Bergamo, in Lombardy, was a learned man, and a good
christian. He did his utmost endeavours to clear the church from the
errors of Arianism, and joining in this holy work with John, bishop of
Milan, he was very successful against the heretics, on which account he
was assassinated on July 11, A. D. 683.

Killien was born in Ireland, and received from his parents a pious and
christian education. He obtained the Roman pontiff's license to preach
to the pagans in Franconia, in Germany. At Wurtzburg he converted
Gozbert, the governor, whose example was followed by the greater part of
the people in two years after. Persuading Gozbert that his marriage with
his brother's widow was sinful, the latter had him beheaded, A. D. 689.

_Persecutions from the early part of the Eighth, to near the Conclusion
of the Tenth Century._

Boniface, archbishop of Mentz, and father of the German church, was an
Englishmen, and is, in ecclesiastical history, looked upon as one of the
brightest ornaments of this nation. Originally, his name was Winfred, or
Winfrith, and he was born at Kirton, in Devonshire, then part of the
West-Saxon kingdom. When he was only about six years of age, he began to
discover a propensity to reflection, and seemed solicitous to gain
information on religious subjects. Wolfrad, the abbot, finding that he
possessed a bright genius, as well as a strong inclination to study, had
him removed to Nutscelle, a seminary of learning in the diocese of
Winchester, where he would have a much greater opportunity of attaining
improvement than at Exeter.

After due study, the abbot seeing him qualified for the priesthood,
obliged him to receive that holy order when he was about thirty years
old. From which time he began to preach and labour for the salvation of
his fellow-creatures; he was released to attend a synod of bishops in
the kingdom of West-Saxons. He afterwards, in 719, went to Rome, where
Gregory II. who