E05151: Gregory of Tours, in his Miracles of Julian (10), describes how a man who tried to drag from the church of *Julian (martyr of Brioude, S00035) in Brioude (central Gaul) a man who had struck him, lost his sight, but recovered it after praying at Julian's tomb and forgiving his aggressor. Written in Latin in Clermont and Tours (central and north-west Gaul), 570/587.

Gregory of Tours, Miracles of Julian (Liber de passione et virtutibus sancti Iuliani martyris) 10

Quidam dum in seditione, quam commoverat, cum oculum amisisset, hominem qui ictum intulerat de basilica conabatur extrahere; quod dum agit, non modo amissi oculi non recepit lumen, verum etiam sentit, alium, quem sanum habuerat, obcaecari. Porro, cum peccata sua confiteretur, dicens: 'Merito mihi evenit iudicium sine misericordia, qui non feci misericordiam', prostratus coram sancto sepulchro cum populo, qui tunc ad festivitatem advenerant, indulgens laedenti, et visum recepit et gratiam. Sicque factum est, ut is qui sancti auxilium expetierat tutaretur, et ille vero qui io non credebat argueretur; et sic uterque laetus emendatusque discessit.

'After a man lost an eye during a brawl that he had initiated, he tried to drag from the church the man who had struck him. While he was doing this, not only did he not recover his sight in the eye he had lost, but he also realized that his other eye that he thought was intact was going blind. So he confessed his sins and said: 'Because I showed no compassion, I have deservedly and without compassion suffered this penalty.' Along with the people who had arrived for [Julian’s] festival this man knelt before the holy tomb; after he apologized to the man who had struck him, he received his sight back as well as the support [of Julian]. And so it happened that the man who had requested the saint’s assistance received protection, and the man who did not believe was censured. Both men then departed, chastised but happy.'

Text: Krusch 1969, 119. Translation: Van Dam 1993, 170-171.