Visions promise help and a greater crown in prison need
The imprisoned letter writers report the visions of Victor the presbyter and Quartillosia to show God answering their hunger and thirst.
Yet this toil, this lack, this time of need reached to God, dearest brothers. For the One who willed us to be tested Himself showed that we should have encouragement in the very testing. For this was shown to Victor the presbyter, our fellow martyr, who suffered immediately after this same vision. Victor says, "I saw a boy come in here to the prison, whose face shone bright beyond unspeakable splendor. He was leading us through every place so that we could go out, yet we could not leave."
The boy said to Victor, "You still toil a little, because now you are held back. But take courage, for I am with you." He also added, "Tell them: You will have a more glorious crown." He also said, "To his God the spirit hastens, and the soul now close to suffering has sought out its own dwelling." For Victor asked this same Lord where paradise is. The Lord said to him, "It is outside the world." Victor said, "Show it to me." And the Lord said to him, "And where will faith be?" When Victor said this from littleness of human weakness, "What you bid me hold I cannot hold, tell me a sign I may tell them," the Lord answered him and said, "Tell them the sign of Jacob." We must rejoice, dearest brothers, that we can be made equal to the patriarchs, if not in righteousness, at least in toils.
But He who said, "Call on me in the day of hardship, and I will rescue you, and you will glorify me" (Psalm 50:15 (LXX 49:15)), turned toward His own glorification, and after the prayers made to Him He remembered us, first announcing the gift of His mercy. For concerning this He showed it to our sister Quartillosia, who is placed here with us, whose husband and son had suffered three days earlier. She also, remaining here, swiftly followed her kin. She set out what she saw in this way. Quartillosia says, "I saw my son, who suffered, come here to the prison. He sat on the rim of the water basin and said, 'God has seen your hardship and your toil.'"
Quartillosia says that after him a youth of wondrous size came in, carrying two bowls full of milk, one in each hand, and said, "Be of good courage, God has remembered you." From the bowls he carried he gave them all to drink, and the bowls did not run dry. And suddenly the middle stone that divided the window was taken away, and with the middle removed the bright windows admitted the open face of the sky. And that youth set down the bowls he carried, one to the right and the other to the left, and said, "See, you are filled and there is abundance, and a third bowl will still come to you." And he departed.
Greek
VII. Hic autem labor, haec inopia, hoc necessitatis tempus ad deum pertinuit, dilectissimi fratres. nam qui nos temptari voluit, ipse ut adlocutionem in ipsa temptatione haberemus ostendit. nam Victori presbytero commartyri nostro, qui statim post hanc eandem visionem passus est, ostensum est hoc. Videbam, inquit, puerum huc in carcerem introisse, cuius fuit vultus perlucidus super splendorem inenarrabilem. qui nos deducebat per omnia loca ut exiremus; egredi tamen non potuimus, et ait mihi: Adhuc modicum laboratis, quia nunc impedimini. sed confidite quia ego vobiscum sum. et adiecit: Dic illis quia: Gloriosiorem coronam habebitis, nec non: Ad deum suum spiritus properat, et anima iam proxima passioni sedes suas requisivit. nam hunc eundem dominum de paradiso interrogavit ubi esset. cui ille ait: Extra mundum est. Ostende mihi illum, inquit. et ait illi: Et ubi erit fides? eumque hoc per humanam pusillitatem diceret: Quod me mandas tenere non possum, dic signum quod eis dicam, respondit ei dominus et ait: Dic illis signum Iacobi. laetandum est, fratres dilectissimi, ut patriarchis, etsi non iustitia, vel laboribus adaequari possimus. sed qui dixit: Invoca me in die pressurae, et eximam te, et clarificabis me, ad clarificationem sui flexus, post preces ad se habitas commemoratus est nostri, prius miserationis suae denuntians munus. VIII. De hoc enim sorori nostrae Quartillosiae hic nobiscum positae ostendit, cuius mulieris et maritus et filius ante triduum passi erant. ipsa quoque hic residens propinquitatem suam velociter subsecuta est; quae in hunc modum quod vidit exposuit. Vidi, inquit, filium meum, qui passus est, venisse huc ad carcerem; qui sedens super labrum aquarum ait: Vidit deus pressuram vestram et laborem. et post hunc introivit iuvenis mirae magnitudinis portans fialas duas singulis manibus lacte plenas, et ait: Bono animo estote, memoratus est vestri deus. et ex fialis quas ferebat dedit omnibus bibere; quae fialae non deficiebant. et subito ablatus est lapis qui fenestram dividit medius; sed et clarae fenestrae, ipso medio ablato, liberam caeli faciem admiserant. et posuit iuvenis ille quas ferebat fialas, unam ad dexteram, alteram ad sinistram, et ait: Ecce satiati estis et abundat, et tertia adhuc fiala superveniet vobis. et abiit.