THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
in Jan., 1811, Martyn reached Shiraz, where he not only finished the Persian New Testament (St. Petersburg, 1815; revision, Calcutta, 1816), but made a Persian version of the Psalms (London, 1824). His learning and skill in disputing with the Mohammedans awakened a sensation in the city and aroused the professor of Mohammedan law to engage in a public dispute with him. The professor followed the discussion up with a tract in defense of Mohammedanism, to which Martyn replied in defense of Christianity. Anxious to present a copy of the New Testament to the Shah of Persia, Martyn directed his steps to Tabriz to secure a letter of introduction from the British minister, Sir Gore Ouseley. On this journey his body was racked with fever and chills, and he barely escaped with his life. In Tabriz he likewise engaged in animated discussion with the Mohammedans, risking his life by the fearless confession of Christ as the Son of God. He failed to put his Testament into the hands of the Persian monarch, but left it with Sir Gore, who did it for him, and afterward saw it through the press. Martyn then turned his horse's head toward Constantinople, fifteen hundred miles away. Fever and ague were racking his system, but with unflagging patience the sufferer pushed on. He got no further than Tokat. His body rests in the Armenian cemetery there. In addition to the translations mentioned above there have appeared: Sermons of Henry Martyn (Calcutta, 1822) ; Controversial Tracts on Mohammedanism and Christianity (Cambridge, 1824); and his Journals and Letters (ed. S. Wilberforce, 2 vols., London, 1837). D. S. Schaff. Bibliography: Lives have been written by J. Sargent (Life and Letters), London, 1819, new ed., 1885; Mary Seeley (in Later Evangelical Fathers), ib. 1879; C. D. Bell, ib. 1880; J. Page, New York, 1890; G. Smith, London, 1892.
MARTYN, WILLIAM CARLOS: Presbyterian; b. in New York City Dec. 15, 1841. He was educated at Union Theological Seminary, from which he was graduated in 1869. He was ordained to the ministry of his denomination in the same year, and held successive pastorates at the Pilgrim Church, St. Louis, Mo. (1869-71), Portsmouth, N. H. (1871- 1876), Thirty-fourth Street Reformed Dutch Church, New York City (1876-83); Bloomingdale Reformed Dutch Church, New York City (1883-90); First Reformed Dutch Church, Newark, N. J. (1890-92); and Sixth Presbyterian Church, Chicago, 111. (1892- 1894) . Since 1894 he has been engaged in literature and lecturing, and from 1897 to 1903 was director of the Abbey Press, New York City. In addition to editing The American Reformers Series (New York, 1890-96), he has written John Milton (New York, 1866); Life of Martin Luther (1866); History of the English Puritans (1867); History of the Huguenots (1868); The Dutch Reformation (1869); The Pilgrim Fathers of New England (1870) ; Wendell Phillips (1890); William E. Dodge (1891); John B. Gough, the Apostle of Cold Water (1893); Christian Citizenship (1897); and Sour Saints and Sweet Sinners (1898).
MARTYRARIUS: The cleric who had charge of a martyrium, that is a church containing the grave of a martyr. Deacons, presbyters, and even abbots have been martyrarii. During the Middle
Ages there were such clerics in various countries; at Rome they were called custodes martyrum; the name martyrarius occurs, as far as is known, only in France. (H. Achelis.)
MARTYRIANS. See Messalians.
MARTYRS AND CONFESSORS: Names applied in the early Church to those who gave up their lives for their Christian faith, or underwent great sufferings short of death for the same cause. The name " martyr " (Gk. martyr, "witness") is applied in the New Testament both to those who were eye-witnesses of the life and resurrection of Jesus and to those who sealed their testimony with their blood (Acts xxii. 20; Rev. ii. 13, xvii. 6, cf. vi. 9, xx. 4). Such witnesses under persecution were never lacking from the time of the stoning of Stephen and the slaying of James; and down to the middle of the third century there was not a decade, scarcely a year, without its martyrs. Throughout the early literature runs the scarlet thread; numerous passages might be cited to show how joyfully the disciples met their death, although it was expressly forbidden to seek it. The full account of the martyrs of Lyons given in Eusebius (Hist, eccl., V., i.-iii.) shows the attitude of the Church. God gives the martyrs strength, suffers in them, and by them overcomes the adversary; in them, the athletes of Christ and of his beauteous bride, is a sweet savor as of ointment. As a proof of their humility it is mentioned that they did not claim the name of martyrs, but called themselves only confessors, still needing the grace of perfection. The right of intercession for sinners is thus early recognized, here and elsewhere (cf. Eusebius, Hist, eccl., V., xviii. 7; Tertullian, Ad martyr es, i.). Tertullian speaks of it as their prerogative to attain glorification immediately after death. The number of the martyrs has been disputed; Dodwell was the first to work out a smaller total than that previously deduced from the legends and the early acts (see Acta Martyrum). By degrees the treatment of those who had fallen away under the fear of torture became an urgent question (see Lapsed), with which was connected that of the intercessory privilege of the confessors; Cyprian's letters (Epist., xv. 22, ii. 23, 27) show how strongly this claim was urged, and he was obliged to oppose the extension of the practise. The origin of the Donatist schism was the uncompromising procedure of Csecilian against the party which exaggerated the duty of suffering martyrdom and the honor paid to the Carthaginian martyrs. Evidences begin to appear of superstitious veneration paid to the martyrs (Optatus, i. 16; Eusebius, Hist eccl., VIIL, vi.); the possession of their relics was a cause of eager rivalry, and these assumed the position almost of tutelary deities in the eyes even of such men as Basil and Gregory Nazianzen. Martyrdom was from the beginning designated as a " baptism of blood," supplying the place of that by water, and even, according to Cyprian (Ad Fortunatum,W.) , " greater in grace, more exalted in power, more precious in honor." On the anniversaries of the martyrs' deaths, considered as their birthdays into a higher life, special oblations were brought as early as Tertullian's day (De corona,