Arles. He was born of noble parents in the year 401, and was a relative of Honoratus, abbot of Lerins. Honoratus left his retirement to seek his kinsman Hilary and draw him to embrace the monastic life; but all his persuasion was at first in vain. "What floods of tears," says Hilary, "did this true friend shed to soften my hard heart! How often did he embrace me with the most tender and compassionate affection, to wring from me a resolve that I would consider the salvation of my soul. Yet I resisted."
"Well, then," said Honoratus, "I will obtain from God what you refuse." And he left him. Three days later Hilary had changed his mind, and went to Lerins to place himself under the discipline of Honoratus. In 428 S. Hilary was elected Archbishop of Arles. He was a man of a very impetuous and wilful character, and got sadly embroiled with Pope Leo the Great, whom he defied on behalf of the liberties of the Gallican Church, speaking out to him, as his contemporary biographer asserts, "words that no layman would dare to utter, no ecclesiastic would endure to hear." He had after this to escape from Rome, where assassination was to be feared—by knife or poison—and hurried back to Arles. Leo retorted by writing a letter to the bishops of the province of Vienne denouncing the audacity of Hilary in daring to set himself up against his authority, and releasing them from all allegiance to the see of Arles.
Soon after this a fresh quarrel broke out. A bishop Projectus complained that when he was ill, Hilary had rushed into his diocese without inquiring whether he were yet dead, and Without calling on the clergy and people to elect a successor, had consecrated another
