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J4.8 THE MIDDLE AGES.
Goth, founded a hospital to which Christians and Jews,
slaves and freemen found admittance, and he ordered
that half of the gifts received by the Church" should be
given to this institution. He ordered the doctors who
were appointed to it, to go round about the town and
invite the sick to let themselves be taken to this establishment.
The Hotel-Djeu at Lyons was founded in 542 A.D.
by CHILDEBERT I. and was under the supervision of
laymen.*
The Church pronounced the care of the sick to be a
work pleasing to God. The faithful strove earnestly with
one another in this matter how best to help the afflicted
and did not shrink from performing the meanest and most
disagreeable tasks. FABIOLA carried the sick to their
beds in her arms and washed out wounds which others
scarcely dared to look upon.t The Empress PLACILLA
AUGUSTA undertook the duties of a maid-servant in the
hospitals.!" The Christians displayed a self-sacrificing
activity in great epidemics such as at that period afflicted
the human race. When in the third and fourth centuries
contagious pestilences raged in Alexandria and Carthage
the Christians took charge of the sick without distinction
of creed, nursed them, and buried the dead.§ Many were
consequently attacked by the disease and succumbed to it.
The heroic spirit of love shown by the Christians on such
occasions, filled with astonishment and wonder people of
other faiths. Even JULIAN, the most zealous antagonist of
Christianity recognized thus their charitable work, he wrote:
" We see what it is that makes the enemies of the gods
powerful; it is their kindness to strangers and the poor,
their care for the dead, and their holiness of life—even if
assumed.'"'|| He felt himself induced to copy the example
* C. F. HENsiNGERin the Janus i, S. 772 et seq.
t HIERONYMUS: Ep. 84.
X THEODORET : Hist. Eccles. v, 19.
§ EUSEBIUS: Hist. Eccles. vii, 22. ix, 8.—SOZOMENOS: Hist. Eccles. v, 16.
|| JULIAN : Epist. 49.