The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, Vol. VII

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Title: The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, Vol. VII
Author: Butler, Alban
Language: English
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_Only Complete and Unabridged Edition with nearly 100 pages of
Chronological and General Index, Alphabetical and Centenary Table,
etc._

THE
LIVES
OF
THE FATHERS, MARTYRS,
AND OTHER
PRINCIPAL SAINTS;

COMPILED FROM

ILLUSTRATED WITH THE

REMARKS OF JUDICIOUS MODERN CRITICS AND HISTORIANS.

BY THE REV. ALBAN BUTLER.

_With the approbation of
MOST REV. M. A. CORRIGAN, D.D.,
Archbishop of New York._

VOL. VII.

NEW YORK:
P. J. KENEDY,
PUBLISHER TO THE HOLY SEE,
EXCELSIOR CATHOLIC PUBLISHING HOUSE,
5 BARCLAY STREET.
1908

CONTENTS.

JULY.

St. Rumold, Bishop and Martyr
SS. Julius and Aaron, Martyrs
St. Theobald, Confessor
St. Gal, Bishop
Another St. Gal, Bishop
St. Calais, Abbot
St. Leonorus, Bishop
St. Simeon
St. Thierri, Abbot
St. Cybar, Recluse

The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin
SS. Processus and Martinian, Martyrs
St. Otho, Bishop and Confessor
St. Monegondes, Recluse
St. Oudoceus, Bishop

St. Phocas, Martyr
St. Guthagon, Recluse
St. Gunthiern, Abbot
St. Bertran, Bishop

St. Ulric, Bishop and Confessor
St. Odo, Bishop and Confessor
St. Sisoes, Anchoret
St. Bertha, Widow, Abbess
St. Finbar, Abbot in Ireland
St. Bolcan, Abbot in Ireland

St. Peter, Bishop and Confessor
St. Modwena, Virgin in Ireland
St. Edana, Virgin in Ireland

St. Palladius, Bishop and Confessor, Apostle of the Scots
Account of ancient principal Scottish Saints commemorated in
an ancient Scottish Calendar published by Mr. Robert Keith
St. Julian, Anchoret
St. Sexburgh, Abbess
St. Goar, Priest, Confessor
St. Moninna, Virgin in Ireland

St. Pantænus, Father of the Church
St. Willibald, Bishop and Confessor
St. Hedda, Bishop and Confessor
St. Edelburga, Virgin
St. Felix, Bishop and Confessor
St. Benedict XI., Pope and Confessor

St. Elizabeth, Queen of Portugal
St. Procopius, Martyr
SS. Kilian, Bishop, Colman, Priest, and Totnan, Deacon, Martyrs
St. Withburge, Virgin
B. Theobald, Abbot
St. Grimbald, Abbot

St. Ephrem, Doctor of the Church
Appendix on the Writings of St. Ephrem
SS. Martyrs of Gorcum
St. Everildis, Virgin
St. Veronica Giuliani

10.

The Seven Brothers, and St. Felicitas, their mother, Martyrs
SS. Rufina and Secunda, Virgins, Martyrs

11.

St. James, Bishop and Confessor
His Writings
St. Hidulphus, Bishop
St. Pius I., Pope and Martyr
St. Drostan, Abbot in Scotland

12.

St. John Gualbert, Abbot
SS. Nabor and Felix, Martyrs

13.

St. Eugenius, Bishop, &c., Confessors
St. Anacletus, Pope and Martyr
St. Turiaf, Bishop

14.

St. Bonaventure, Cardinal, Bishop, and Doctor of the Church
Life of B. Giles of Assisio
Lives and Writings of Peter Lombard, surnamed Master of the
Sentences, Bishop of Paris, John Duns Scotus, Professor of
Divinity at Oxford, and William Ockham
St. Camillus de Lellis, Confessor
St. Idus, Bishop in Ireland

15.

St. Henry II., Emperor
Some account of the Territories conferred by Pepin, and
confirmed by Charlemagne, on the Holy See
St. Plechelm, Bishop and Confessor
St. Swithin, Bishop and Confessor

16.

St. Eustathius, Patriarch of Antioch, Confessor
Life and Writings of Eusebius, Bishop of Cæsarea
St. Elier, Hermit and Martyr

17.

St. Alexius, Confessor
St. Speratus, &c., Martyrs
Life and Writings of Tertullian
St. Marcellina, Virgin
St. Ennodius, Bishop and Confessor
St. Leo IV., Pope and Confessor
Some Account of the Slander of Pope Joan
St. Turninus, Confessor, of Ireland

18.

St. Symphorosa and her seven Sons, Martyrs
St. Philastrius, Bishop and Confessor
St. Arnoul, Bishop and Confessor
St. Arnoul, Martyr
St. Frederic, Bishop and Martyr
St. Odulph, Confessor
St. Bruno, Bishop and Confessor

19.

St. Vincent of Paul, Confessor
Some Account of Jansenism
St. Arsenius, Anchoret of Sceté
St. Symmachus, Pope and Confessor
St. Macrina, Virgin

20.

St. Joseph Barsabas, Confessor
St. Margaret, Virgin and Martyr
SS. Justa and Rufina, Martyrs
St. Ceslas, Confessor
St. Aurelius, Bishop and Confessor
St. Ulmar, Abbot
St. Jerom Æmiliani, Confessor

21.

St. Praxedes, Virgin
St. Zoticus, Bishop and Martyr
St. Barhadbesciabas, Martyr
St. Victor, Martyr
Life and Writings of Cassian
Lives and Writings of Hugh and Richard, Canon Regulars of
St. Victor
St. Arbogastus, Bishop and Confessor

22.

St. Mary Magdalen
St. Vandrille, Abbot
St. Joseph of Palestine
St. Meneve, Abbot
St. Dabius, Confessor, of Ireland

23.

St. Apollinaris, Bishop and Martyr
St. Liborius, Bishop and Confessor

24.

St. Lupus, Bishop and Confessor
St. Francis Solano, Confessor
SS. Romanus and David, Martyrs
Some Account of the Russians, their Saints, &c.
St. Christina, Virgin and Martyr
SS. Wulfhad and Ruffin, Martyrs
St. Lewine, Virgin and Martyr
St. Declan, Bishop in Ireland
St. Kinga, Virgin

25.

St. James the Great, Apostle
St. Christopher, Martyr
SS. Thea and Valentine, Virgins, and St. Paul, Martyrs
St. Cucufas, Martyr
St. Nissen, Abbot in Ireland

26.

St. Anne, Mother of the Blessed Virgin
St. Germanus, Bishop and Confessor

27.

St. Pantaleon, Martyr
SS. Maximian, Malchus, Martinian, Dionysius, John, Serapion,
and Constantine, Martyrs
St. Congall, Abbot in Ireland
St. Lucian, Confessor in Ireland

28.

SS. Nazarius and Celsus, Martyrs
St. Victor, Pope and Martyr
St. Innocent I., Pope and Confessor
St. Sampson, Bishop and Confessor

29.

St. Martha, Virgin
SS. Simplicius, Faustinus, and Beatrice, Martyrs
St. Felix, Pope and Martyr
St. William, Bishop and Confessor
St. Olaus, King and Martyr
Another St. Olaus, King and Martyr

30.

SS. Abdon and Sennen, Martyrs
St. Julitta, Martyr

31.

St. Ignatius of Loyola, Confessor
St. John Columbini, Confessor
St. Helen, Martyr

JULY 1.

SAINT RUMOLD, B. M.

PATRON OF MECHLIN.[1]

From the Bollandists. Ward, Act. &c. S. Rumoldi, Lov. 1662,
4to. Sellerii Act. S. Rumoldi, An. 1718, &c.

A. D. 775.

St. Rumold renounced the world in his youth and embraced a state
of voluntary poverty, being convinced that whatever exceeds the
calls of nature is a useless load and a perfect burden to him that
bears it. He was the most declared enemy to voluptuousness; and by
frugality, moderation, and a heart pure and disengaged from all
seducing vanities, and desires of what is superfluous, he tasted
the most solid pleasure which virtue gives in freeing a man from
the tyranny of his passions, when he feels them subjected to him,
and finds himself above them. Victorious over himself, by humility,
meekness, and mortification, he reaped in his soul, without any
obstacles from self-love or inordinate attachments, the sweet and
happy fruits of assiduous prayer and contemplation, whereby he
sanctified his studies, in which he made great progress, and at the
same time advanced daily in Christian perfection. He had faithfully
served God many years in his own country, when an ardent zeal for the
divine honor and the salvation of souls induced him to travel into
Lower Germany to preach the faith to the idolaters. He made a journey
first to Rome to receive his mission from the chief pastor, and
with the apostolic blessing went into Brabant, great part of which
country about Mechlin he converted to the faith. He was ordained a
regionary or missionary bishop without any fixed see. He frequently
interrupted his exterior functions to renew his spirit before God in
holy solitude. In his retirement he was slain on the 24th of June in
775, by two sons of Belial, one of whom he had reproved for adultery.
His body was thrown into a river, but being miraculously discovered,
it was honorably interred by his virtuous friend and protector, count
Ado. A great and sumptuous church was built at Mechlin to receive
his precious relics, which is still possessed of that treasure, and
bears the name of this saint. The city of Mechlin keeps his feast a
solemn holiday, and honors him as its patron and apostle. Janning the
Bollandist gives a long history of his miracles. His great church at
Mechlin was raised to the metropolitical dignity by Paul IV. Ware
says that the feast of St. Rumold was celebrated as a double festival
with an office of nine lessons throughout the province of Dublin
before the reformation. It was extended to the whole kingdom of
Ireland in the year 1741.

* * * * *

It was from the spirit of prayer that the saints derived all their
lights and all their strength. This was the source of all the
blessings which heaven through their intercession showered down
on the world, and the means which they employed to communicate an
angelical purity to their souls. “This spirit,” says a father of the
Church,[2] “is nourished by retreat, which in some manner may be
called the parent of purity.” This admirable transformation of our
souls produced by prayer is to be attributed to God’s glory, which by
prayer he makes to shine in the secret of our hearts. In fine, when
all the avenues of our senses are closed against the creature, and
that God dwells with us, and we with God; when freed from the tumult
and distractions of the world we apply all our attention to interior
things and consider ourselves such as we are, we then become capable
of clearly contemplating the kingdom of God, established in us by
that charity and ardent love which consumes all the rust of earthly
affections. For the kingdom of heaven, or rather the Lord of heaven
itself, is within us, as Jesus Christ himself assures us.

SS. JULIUS AND AARON, MM.

These saints were Britons, and seem to have taken, the one a Roman
and the other a Hebrew name at their baptism. They glorified God by
martyrdom at Caerleon upon Usk in Monmouthshire, in the persecution
of Dioclesian, probably about the year 303. St Gildas,[3] St.
Bede,[4] and others, speak of their triumph as having been most
illustrious. Leland and Bale say, SS. Julius and Aaron had travelled
to Rome, and “there applied themselves to the sacred studies.” Bede
adds, “very many others of both sexes, by unheard-of tortures,
attained to the crown of heavenly glory.” Giraldus Cambrensis informs
us, that their bodies were honored at Caerleon in the year 1200, when
he wrote. Each of these martyrs had a titular church in that city;
that of St. Julius, belonged to a nunnery, and that of St. Aaron
to a monastery of canons. See Godwin De Episc. Landav. Geoffrey of
Monmouth, Giraldus Cambrensis, Leland, and Tanner, Bibl. Britan. p. 1.

ST. THEOBALD OR THIBAULT, C.

He was of the family of the counts palatine of Champagne, and son of
count Arnoul. He was born at Provins in Brie in 1017, and was called
Theobald from the most virtuous archbishop of Vienne, who was his
uncle. In his youth he preserved his heart free from the corruption
of the world amidst its vanities; and the more pains others took
to make him conceive a relish for them, the more diligent he was
in fencing his heart against their dangers, the more perfectly he
discovered their emptiness and secret poison. In reading the lives
of the fathers of the desert he was much affected by the admirable
examples of penance, self-denial, holy contemplation, and Christian
perfection, which were set before his eyes as it were in a glass,
and he earnestly desired to imitate them. The lives of St. John the
Baptist, of St. Paul the hermit, St. Antony, and St. Arsenius in
their wildernesses, charmed him, and he sighed after the like sweet
retirement, in which he might without interruption converse with God
by prayer and contemplation. He often resorted to an holy hermit
named Burchard, who lived in a little island in the Seine; and by
making essays he began to inure himself to fasting, watching, long
prayers, and every rigorous practice of penance. He declined all
the advantageous matches and places at court or in the army which
his father could propose to him. His cousin Eudo, count palatine of
Champagne, and count of Chartres and Blois, upon the death of his
uncle Rodolph, the last king of Burgundy, in 1034, laid claim to that
crown as next heir in blood; but the emperor Conrad the Salic seized
upon it by virtue of the testament of the late king.[5] Hereupon
ensued a war, and count Arnoul ordered his son to lead a body of
troops to the succor of his cousin. But the young general represented
so respectfully to his father the obligation of a vow by which he
had bound himself to quit the world, that he at length extorted his
consent.

Soon after the saint and another young nobleman called Walter, his
intimate friend, each taking one servant, went to the abbey of St.
Remigius in Rheims, and thence having sent back their servants
with their baggage, they set out privately; and in the clothes of
two beggars, in exchange for which they had given their own rich
garments, they travelled barefoot into Germany. Finding the forest
of Petingen in Suabia a convenient solitude for their purpose, they
built themselves there two little cells. Having learned from Burchard
that manual labor is a necessary duty of an ascetic or penitential
life, and not being skilled in the manner of working to make mats
or baskets, they often went into the neighboring villages and there
hired themselves by the day to serve the masons, or to work in the
fields, to carry stones and mortar, to load and unload carriages, to
cleanse the stables under the servants of the farmers, or to blow
the bellows and to make fires for the forges. With their wages they
bought coarse brown bread, which was their whole subsistence. Whilst
they worked with their hands, their hearts were secretly employed in
prayer; and at night retiring again into their forest, they watched
long, singing together the divine praises, and continuing in holy
contemplation. Their carriage and the tenderness of their complexion
discovered that they had not been trained up in manual labor, and
the reputation of their sanctity after some time drew the eyes of
men upon them. To shun which they resolved to forsake a place where
they were no longer able to live in humiliation and obscurity. They
performed barefoot a pilgrimage to Compostella, and returned into
Germany.

Passing through Triers, it happened that Theobald there met his
father count Arnoul; but with his tanned face, and in his ragged
clothes, passing for a beggar, he was not known by him. He was
strongly affected, and was scarcely able to stifle the tender
sentiments with which his heart was quite overcome at the sight of
so dear and affectionate a parent. However, he suppressed them;
but to quit the neighborhood where he might be again exposed to
the like trial, he undertook a pilgrimage to Rome. The two fervent
penitents travelled everywhere barefoot; and after they had visited
all the holy places in Italy, they chose for their retirement a
hideous woody place called Salanigo, near Vicenza, where with the
leave of the lord of the manor they built themselves two cells, near
an old ruinous chapel. Prayer and the exercises of penance were
their constant employment, till after two years God called Walter
to himself. Theobald looked upon this loss as a warning that he had
not long to live, and he exerted his whole strength, redoubling his
pace to run with greater vigor as he drew near the end of his race.
He had lived on oat bread and water, with roots and herbs, but at
length he interdicted himself even the use of bread, taking no other
food but herbs and roots. He always wore a rough hair shirt; his
bed was a board, and for the five last years of his life he took
his rest sitting on a wooden seat. The bishop of Vicenza promoted
him to priest’s orders, and several persons put themselves under
his direction. His lineage and quality being discovered, his aged
parents were no sooner informed that their son was alive, and that
the hermit of Salanigo, the reputation of whose sanctity, prophecies,
and miracles filled all Europe, was that very son whose absence
had been to them the cause of so long a mourning; but they set out
with great joy to see him. His frightful desert, his poor cell, his
tattered clothes, and above all his emaciated body, made so strong
impressions upon their hearts at the first sight that they both
cast themselves at his feet, and for a considerable time were only
able to speak to him by their tears. When they were raised from the
ground, and had recovered from their first surprise, faith overcame
in them the sentiments of nature, and converted their sorrow into
joy. The sight of so moving an example extinguished in their hearts
all love of the world, and they both resolved upon the spot to
dedicate themselves to the divine service. The count was obliged
by his affairs to return into Brie, but Gisla, the saint’s mother,
obtained her husband’s consent to finish her course near the cell of
her son. The saint made her a little hut at some distance from his
own, and took great pains to instruct her in the practice of true
perfection. He was shortly after visited with his last sickness;
his body was covered over with blotches and ulcers, and every limb
afflicted with some painful disorder. The servant of God suffered
this distemper with a most edifying patience and joy. A little before
his death he sent for Peter the abbot of Vangadice, of the order of
Camaldoli, from whose hands he had received the religious habit a
year before. To him he recommended his mother and his disciples: and
having received the viaticum he expired in peace on the last day of
June, 1066, being about thirty-three years old, of which he had spent
twelve at Salanigo and three in Suabia, and in his pilgrimages. His
relics were translated to the church dependent on the abbey of St.
Columba, at Sens, and afterward to a chapel near Auxerre called St.
Thibaud aux Bois. He was canonized by Alexander III. and his name is
in great veneration at Sens, Provins, Paris, Auxerre, Langres, Toul,
Triers, Autun, and Beauvais. See his life faithfully written by a
contemporary author.

SAINT GAL, CALLED THE FIRST.

BISHOP OF CLERMONT, IN AUVERGNE.

He was born about the year 489. His father George was of the first
houses of that province, and his mother Leocadia was descended from
the family of Vettius Apagatus, the celebrated Roman, who suffered
at Lyons for the faith of Christ. They both took special care of
the education of their son; and when he arrived at a proper age,
proposed to have him married to the daughter of a respectable
senator. The saint, who had taken a resolution to consecrate himself
to God, withdrew privately from his father’s house to the monastery
of Cournon, near the city of Auvergne, and earnestly prayed to be
admitted there amongst the monks; and having soon after obtained the
consent of his parents, he with joy renounced all worldly vanities to
embrace religious poverty. Here his eminent virtues distinguished him
in a particular manner, and recommended him to Quintianus, bishop of
Auvergne, who promoted him to holy orders.

The bishop dying in 527, St. Gal was appointed to succeed him; and in
this new character his humility, charity, and zeal were conspicuous;
but, above all, his patience in bearing injuries. Being once struck
on the head by a brutal man, he discovered not the least emotion of
anger or resentment, and by this meekness disarmed the savage of his
rage. At another time Evodius, who from a senator became a priest,
having so far forgot himself as to treat him in the most insulting
manner, the saint, without making the least reply, arose meekly from
his seat and went to visit the churches of the city. Evodius was so
touched by this conduct, that he cast himself at the saint’s feet
in the middle of the street and asked his pardon. From this time
they both lived on terms of the most cordial friendship. St. Gal
was favored with the gift of miracles; and died about the year 553.
He is mentioned this day in the Roman Martyrology. See St. Greg. of
Tours, his nephew, Vit. Patr. c. 6. Hist. Franc. l. 4, c. 5; also the
remarks of Mabillon, sec. 1. Bened. Gall. Christ, Nov. t. 2, p. 237,
and Selier the Bollandist, t. 1, Jul. p. 103.

Another St. Gal, called the Second, is honored at Clermont on the
1st of November. He was bishop of that see in 650. See Gall. Christ.
Nova, t. 2, p. 245.

ST. CALAIS, IN LATIN CARILEPHUS.

FIRST ABBOT OF ANILLE IN MAINE.

He was born in Auvergne, of a family equally virtuous and noble.
He was yet a child when they sent him to the monastery of Menat
in the diocess of Clermont, in order to be early principled in
knowledge and piety. Here he became a religious, and practised all
the prescriptions of the rule with the greatest fervor. After some
time he quitted the monastery with St. Avi, and they both retired
to the abbey of Micy near Orleans. The bishop of this city having
destined them for holy orders, they withdrew themselves from the
abbey, and advancing together as far as Perche, led by their fervor
to the austerities of an eremitical life, they separated. St. Calais
was followed by two persons, who by no means would consent to quit
him, and with these he went to Maine, where he perfectly revived the
rigorous discipline of the ancient eastern hermits. But as he was
constantly visited by numbers who sought to live under his direction,
he at length consented to receive them. King Childebert gave him
land whereon to build a monastery, which was first called Anisole or
Anille, from the river on which it was situated,[6] but it is now,
as well as the little town built round it, called after the saint.
The life of the holy founder was not only extraordinary for penance
and prayer, but he excelled in the exact observance of his rules;
insomuch that he constantly refused the visit of queen Ultrogotha
wife of Childebert, because one of the statutes forbade to enter the
monastery. He died in 542, and his name is mentioned this day in the
Roman Martyrology. A portion of his relics is kept in the abbey of
St. Calais, but the greatest part is in the chapel of the castle of
Blois, which also bears his name. See the life of St. Calais, written
by Siviard, fifth abbot of Anille, with the notes of Mabillon, and
the Bollandist, t. 1, Jul. p. 85, and Martenne Ampl. Coll. t. 1,
præf. p. 4, &c.

SAINT LEONORUS, IN FRENCH LUNAIRE, B.

He was of a noble family in Wales, and educated under the care of St.
Iltut; and passing over into that part of France called the province
of Domnone, he founded a monastery between the rivers of Rancé and
Arguenon, on a piece of ground which was given him by Jona, the lord
of the country. His many extraordinary virtues drew the attention of
king Childebert, who very pressingly invited him to Paris, where he
was received by this prince and his royal consort Ultrogotha with
every possible demonstration of the highest respect. At his return he
had the affliction to hear that his protector Jona was stripped of
his possessions, and murdered by Conomor. Happily however he arrived
time enough to shelter that unfortunate nobleman’s son Judual from
the bloody tyrant’s cruelty, and conveyed him safely to England:
whence Judual afterward returned, and recovered his inheritance. The
saint is styled bishop, though he had no fixed see. For it was then
an established custom in Brittany to honor the principal abbots with
the episcopal dignity. The year in which St. Leonorus died is not
known. His body was translated to a parochial church near St. Malo,
which still retains the name of St. Lunaire: here his tomb is shown,
which is empty, his relics being inclosed in a shrine. The feast of
his translation is on the 13th of October, but he is principally
honored in the several diocesses of Brittany on the 1st of July. He
is patron of many churches. See the Breviary of Leon, of the abbey of
St. Meen, &c. also Lobineau, Vies des SS. de Bretagne, p. 91, and the
Martyrology of Usuard.

ST. SIMEON, SURNAMED SALUS.[7]

He was a native of Egypt, and born about the year 522. Having
performed a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, he retired to a desert near
the Red Sea, where he remained twenty-nine years in the constant
practice of a most austere penitential life. Here he was constantly
revolving in mind that we must love humiliations if we would be truly
humble; that at least we should receive those which God sends us with
resignation, and own them exceedingly less than the measure of our
demerits; that it is even sometimes our advantage to seek them; that
human prudence should not always be our guide in this regard; and
that there are circumstances where we ought to follow the impulse
of the Holy Spirit, though not unless we have an assurance of his
inspiration. The servant of God, animated by an ardent desire to be
contemptible among men, quitted the desert, and at Emesus succeeded
to his wish; for by affecting the manners of those who want sense,
he passed for a fool. He was then sixty years old, and lived six or
seven years in that city, when it was destroyed by an earthquake
in 588. His love for humility was not without reward, God having
bestowed on him extraordinary graces, and even honored him with the
gift of miracles. The year of his death is unknown. Although we are
not obliged in every instance to imitate St. Simeon, and that it
would be rash even to attempt it without a special call; yet his
example ought to make us blush, when we consider with what an ill
will we suffer the least thing that hurts our pride. See Evagrius, a
contemporary writer, l. 4, c. 5; the life of the saint by Leontius,
bishop of Napoli in Cyprus; that of St. John the Almoner; and the
Bollandists, t. 1, Jul. p. 129.

SAINT THIERRI, ABBOT OF MONT-D’HOR, NEAR RHEIMS.

He was born in the district of Rheims. His father Marquard was
abandoned to every infamous disorder. An education formed on the best
Christian principles in the house of such a person would more than
probably be blasted by his bad example; but our saint was happily
removed, and educated in learning and piety, under the edifying
example of the holy bishop Remigius.

He married in complaisance to his relations; but easily persuaded his
wife to embrace the virgin state; and becoming himself a monk, he was
made superior of an abbey founded by St. Remigius on Mont-d’Hor, near
Rheims. Some time after he received holy orders, and became famous
by the many extraordinary conversions he wrought through the zeal
and unction wherewith he exhorted sinners to repentance; among these
was his own father, who persevered to his death under the direction
of his son. He succeeded also, in conjunction with St. Remigius,
in converting an infamous house into a nunnery of pious virgins.
According to the most common opinion he died on the 1st of July, 533.
It is said that king Thierri assisted at his funeral, and esteemed
himself honored in being one of his bearers to the grave. His
relics, lest they should be exposed to the impiety of the Normans,
were hidden under ground, but discovered in 976, and are still
preserved in a silver shrine. He is mentioned on this day in the
Roman Martyrology. See Mabillon, Act. t. 1, p. 614. Bulteau, Hist. de
l’Ordre de St. Ben. t. 1, p. 287; Baillet ad l. Jul. and Gal. Christ.
Nov. t. 9, p. 180.

SAINT CYBAR, A RECLUSE AT ANGOULEME.

Eparcus, commonly called Cybar, quitted the world in spite of his
parents, who would hinder him to follow his vocation; and retiring
to the monastery of Sedaciac in Perigord, he there served God some
time under abbot Martin, and soon became known and admired for his
extraordinary virtues and miracles. Wherefore, in dread of the
seduction of vain-glory, he left his monastery to hide himself
in absolute solitude. It was near Angouleme, with the bishop of
Perigueux’s and his abbot’s leave, he shut himself up in a cell. But
his virtues were too striking for concealment, and the bishop of
Angouleme obliged him to accept the priesthood. Cybar was extremely
austere in his food and apparel, especially during Lent. Although a
recluse, he did not refuse to admit disciples; but he would not allow
them manual labor, as, after his own example, he willed they should
be constantly occupied in prayer. When any of them would complain for
want of necessaries, he would tell them with St. Jerom, that “Faith
never feared hunger.” Nor was he deceived in his trust on Providence,
as he always found abundance for himself and his disciples in the
beneficence of the faithful; insomuch that he was even enabled to
redeem a great number of captives. He died the 1st of July, 581,
having lived about forty years in his cell. His relics were kept in
the abbey church of his name until 1568, when they were burnt by the
Huguenots. See Mabillon, Act. t. 1, p. 267; Bulteau, Histoire de
l’Ordre de St. Benoit, t. 1, p. 235; Gallia Chr. Nov. t. 2, p. 978,
979, &c.

JULY II.

THE VISITATION OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN.

From the example of Christ, his blessed Mother, and the apostles,
St. Thomas shows[8] that state to be in itself the most perfect which
joins together the functions of Martha and Mary, or of the active
and contemplative life. This is endeavored by those persons who so
employ themselves in the service of their neighbor, as amidst their
external employs or conversation often to raise their minds to God,
feeding always on their heavenly invisible food, as the angel did
in Toby’s company on earth. Who also, by the practice and love of
daily recollection and much solitude, fit themselves to appear in
public; and who by having learned the necessary art of silence in
its proper season, and by loving to speak little among men,[9] study
to be in the first place their own friends, and by reflection and
serious consideration to be thoroughly acquainted with themselves,
and to converse often in heaven.[10] Such will be able to acquit
themselves of external employs without prejudice to their own virtue,
when called to them by duty, justice, or charity. They may avoid
the snares of the world, and sanctify their conversation with men.
Of this the Blessed Virgin is to us a perfect model in the visit
paid to her cousin Elizabeth, as St. Francis of Sales takes notice,
who borrowed from this mystery the name which he gave to his Order
of nuns, who, according to the first plan of their institute, were
devoted to visit and attend on the sick.

The angel Gabriel, in the mystery of the Annunciation, informed the
mother of God, that her cousin Elizabeth had miraculously conceived,
and was then in the sixth month of her pregnancy. The Blessed
Virgin, out of humility, concealed the favor she had received and
the wonderful dignity to which she was raised by the incarnation
of the Son of God in her womb; but in the transport of her holy
joy and gratitude, she would go to congratulate the mother of the
Baptist; with which resolution the Holy Ghost inspired her for his
great designs in favor of her Son’s precursor not yet born. _Mary_
therefore _arose_, saith St. Luke, _and with haste went into the
hilly-country into a city of Juda; and entering into the house of
Zachary saluted Elizabeth_. She made this visit to a saint, because
the company of the servants of God is principally to be sought,
from whose example and very silence the heart will always treasure
up something, and the understanding receive some new light and
improvement in charity. As glowing coals increase their flame by
contact, so is the fire of divine love kindled in a fervent soul by
the words and example of those who truly love God. In this journey
what lessons of humility does the holy Virgin give us! She had been
just saluted mother of God, and exalted above all mere creatures,
even the highest seraphim of heaven; yet far from being elated with
the thoughts of her incomprehensible dignity, she appears but the
more humble by it. She prevents the mother of the Baptist in this
office of charity; the mother of God pays a visit to the mother of
her Son’s servant; the Redeemer of the world goes to his precursor.
What a subject of confusion is this to the pride of the children
of the world! who, not content with the rules of respect which the
law of subordination requires, carry their vanity to an excess of
ceremoniousness contrary even to good manners, and to the freedom of
conversation, which they make an art of constraint and of torture
both to themselves and others; and in which they seek not any duty
of piety or improvement in virtue, but loathsome means of foolish
flattery, the gratification of vanity, or that dissipation of mind
which continually entertains it with trifles and idleness, and is an
enemy to serious consideration and virtue.

When the office of charity called upon Mary, she thought of no
dangers or difficulties in so painful and long a journey of above
fourscore miles from Nazareth in Galilee to Hebron, a sacerdotal
city in the mountainous country on the western side of the tribe of
Juda. The inspired writer takes notice, that she went with haste or
with speed and diligence, to express her eagerness to perform this
good office. Charity knows not what sloth is, but always acts with
fervor. She likewise would hasten her steps out of modesty, not
choosing to appear abroad, but as compelled by necessity or charity;
not travelling out of vanity, idleness, or curiosity, but careful in
her journey to shun the dissipation of the world, according to the
remarks of St. Ambrose. Whence we may also gather with what care she
guarded her eyes, and what was the entertainment of her pious soul
with God upon the road. Being arrived at the house of Zachary, she
entered it, and saluted Elizabeth. What a blessing did the presence
of the God-man bring to this house, the first which he honored in
his humanity with his visit! But Mary is the instrument and means by
which he imparts to it his divine benediction; to show us that she is
a channel through which he delights to communicate to us his graces,
and to encourage us to ask them of him through her intercession.
At the voice of the mother of God, but by the power and grace of
her Divine Son, in her womb, Elizabeth was filled with the Holy
Ghost and the infant in her womb was sanctified; and miraculously
anticipating the use of reason, knew by divine inspiration the
mystery of the incarnation, and who it was that came to visit him.
From this knowledge he conceived so great, so extraordinary a joy as
to leap and exult in the womb.[11] If Abraham and all the ancient
prophets exulted only to foresee in spirit that day when it was at
the distance of so many ages, what wonder the little Baptist felt
so great a joy to see it then present! How eagerly did he desire
to take up his office of precursor, and already to announce to men
their Redeemer that he might be known and adored by all! But how do
we think he adored and reverenced him present in his mother’s womb?
and what were the blessings with which he was favored by him? He was
cleansed from original sin, and filled with sanctifying grace, was
made a prophet, and adored the Messiah before he was yet born.

At the same time Elizabeth was likewise filled with the Holy Ghost;
and by his infused light, she understood the great mystery of the
Incarnation which God had wrought in Mary, whom humility prevented
from disclosing it even to a saint, and an intimate friend. In
raptures of astonishment, Elizabeth pronounced her blessed above all
other women, she being made by God the instrument of his blessing to
the world, and of removing the malediction which through Eve had been
entailed on mankind. But the fruit of her womb she called blessed
in a sense still infinitely higher, he being the immense source of
all graces, by whom only Mary herself was blessed. Elizabeth, then
turning her eyes upon herself, cried out--_Whence is this to me that
the mother of my Lord should come to me?_ She herself had conceived
barren and by a miracle; but Mary, a virgin, and by the Holy Ghost;
she conceived one greater than the prophets, but Mary the eternal
Son of God, himself true God. The Baptist, her son, used the like
exclamation to express his confusion and humility when Christ came to
be baptized by his hands. In the like words and profound sentiments
ought we to receive all the visits of God in his graces, especially
in the holy sacraments. Elizabeth styles Mary, Mother of her Lord,
that is, mother of God; and she foretells that all things would
befall her and her Son which had been spoken by the prophets.

Mary hearing her own praise, sunk the lower in the abyss of her
nothingness, and converting all good gifts to the glory of God, whose
gratuitous mercy had bestowed them, in the transport of her humility,
and melting in an ecstasy of love and gratitude, burst into that
admirable canticle called the _Magnificat_. It is the first record in
the New Testament, and both in the noble sentiments which compose it,
and in the majesty of the style, surpasses all those of the ancient
prophets. It is the most perfect model of thanksgiving and praise for
the incarnation of the Son of God, and the most precious monument of
the profound humility of Mary. In it she glorifies God with all the
powers of her soul for his boundless mercies, and gives to him alone
all the glory. In the spiritual gladness of her heart she adores her
Saviour, who had cast his merciful eyes upon her lowliness. Though
all nations will call her blessed, she declares that nothing is her
due but abjection, and that this mystery is the effect of the pure
power and mercy of God; and that he who had dethroned tyrants, fed
the hungry in the wilderness, and wrought so many wonders in favor of
his people, had now vouchsafed himself to visit them, to live among
them, to die for them, and to fulfil all things which he had promised
by his prophets from the beginning. Mary stayed with her cousin
almost three months; after which she returned to Nazareth.

* * * * *

Whilst with the Church we praise God for the mercies and wonders
which he wrought in this mystery, we ought to apply ourselves to the
imitation of the virtues of which Mary sets us a perfect example.
From her we ought particularly to learn the lessons by which we shall
sanctify our visits and conversation; actions which are to so many
Christians the sources of innumerable dangers and sins. We must shun
not only scurrilous and profane discourse, but whatever is idle,
light, airy, or unprofitable; whilst we unbend our mind, we ought
as much as possible to see that conversation which is conducive
to the improvement of our hearts or understandings, and to the
advancement of virtue and solid useful knowledge. If we suffer our
mind to be puffed up with empty wind, it will become itself such as
is the nourishment upon which it feeds. We should shun the vice of
talkativeness, did we but consult that detestable vanity itself which
betrays us into this folly. For nothing is more tyrannical or more
odious and insupportable in company than to usurp a monopoly of the
discourse. Nothing can more degrade us in the opinion of others than
for us to justle, as it were, for the word; to vent all we have in
our hearts, at least a great deal that we ought to conceal there; and
without understanding ourselves, or taking a review of our meaning
or words, to pour out embryos of half-formed conceptions, and speak
of the most noble subjects in an undress of thoughts. What proofs
of our vanity and folly, what disgraces, what perplexities, what
detractions, and other evils and sins should we avoid, if we were but
sparing and reserved in our words! If we find ourselves to swell with
an itch of talking, big with our own thoughts, and impatient to give
them vent, we must by silence curb this dangerous passion, and learn
to be masters of our words.

SS. PROCESSUS AND MARTINIAN, MARTYRS.

By the preaching and miracles of SS. Peter and Paul at Rome, many
were converted to the faith, and among others several servants
and courtiers of the emperor Nero, of whom St. Paul[12] makes
mention.[13] In the year 64 that tyrant first drew his sword against
the Christians, who were in a very short time become very numerous
and remarkable in Rome. A journey which he made into Greece in 67,
seems to have given a short respite to the Church in Rome. He made a
tour through the chief cities of that country, attended by a great
army of singers, pantomimes, and musicians, carrying instead of arms,
instruments of music, masks, and theatrical dresses. He was declared
conqueror at all the public diversions over Greece, particularly at
the Olympian, Isthmian, Pythian, and Nemæan games, and gained there
one thousand eight hundred various sorts of crowns. Yet Greece saw
its nobility murdered, the estates of its rich men confiscated, and
its temples plundered by this progress of Nero. He returned to Rome
only to make the streets of that great city again to stream with
blood. The apostles SS. Peter and Paul, after a long imprisonment,
were crowned with martyrdom. And soon after them their two faithful
disciples Processus and Martinian gained the same crown. Their acts
tell us that they were the keepers of the Mamertine jail during the
imprisonment of SS. Peter and Paul, by whom they were converted and
baptized. St. Gregory the Great preached his thirty-second homily on
their festival, in a church in which their bodies lay, at which, he
says, the sick recovered their health, those that were possessed by
evil spirits were freed, and those who had forsworn themselves were
tormented by the devils. Their ancient church on the Aurelian road
being fallen to decay, pope Paschal I. translated their relics to St.
Peter’s church on the Vatican hill, as Anastasius informs us. Their
names occur in the ancient Martyrologies. See Tillemont, Hist. Eccl.
t. 1, p. 179, and Hist. des Emp. Crevier, &c.

ST. OTHO, BISHOP OF BAMBERG, CONFESSOR.

He was a native of Swabia, in Germany, and being a clergyman eminent
for piety and learning, was chosen by the emperor Henry IV. to attend
his sister Judith in quality of chaplain when she was married to
Boleslas III. duke of Poland, that state remaining deprived of the
royal dignity[14] from the year 1079 till it was restored in 1295,
in favor of Premislas II. After the death of that princess, Otho
returned, and was made by Henry IV. his chancellor. That prince
caused the seals and crosses of every deceased bishop and great
abbot to be delivered to him, and he sold them to whom he pleased.
This notorious simony and oppression of the Church was zealously
condemned by the pope, in opposition to whom the emperor set up the
antipope Guibert. Otho labored to bring his prince to sentiments
of repentance and submission, and refused to approve his schism or
other crimes. Notwithstanding which, so great was the esteem which
the emperor had for his virtue, that, resolving to make choice at
least of one good bishop, he nominated him bishop of Bamberg in 1103.
The saint, notwithstanding the schism, went to Rome and received
his confirmation together with the pall from pope Paschal II. He
labored to extinguish the schism, and to obviate the mischiefs which
it produced; and for this purpose he displayed his eloquence and
abilities in the diet at Ratisbon in 1104. Henry V. succeeding his
father in 1106, continued to foment the schism; yet inherited the
esteem of his predecessor for our saint, though he always adhered
to the holy see, and was in the highest credit with all the popes
of his time; so strongly does virtue command respect even in its
adversaries, and such is the power of meekness in disarming the
fiercest tyrants. St. Otho joined always with the functions of
his charge the exercises of an interior life, in which he was an
admirable proficient. He made many pious foundations, calling them
inns which we erect on our road to eternity.

Boleslas IV. duke of Poland, son of that Boleslas who had married the
sister of Henry IV. having succeeded his elder brother Ladislas II.
and conquered part of Pomerania, entreated St. Otho to undertake a
mission among the idolaters of that country. The good bishop having
settled his own diocess in good order, and obtained of pope Honorius
II. a commission for that purpose, took with him a considerable
number of zealous priests and catechists, and passed through Poland
into Prussia, and thence into eastern Pomerania. He was met by
Uratislas II. duke of Upper Pomerania, who received the sacrament
of baptism with the greatest part of his people in 1124. St. Otho
returned to Bamberg for Easter the following year, having appointed
priests every where to attend the new converts, and finish the work
he had so happily begun. The towns of Stetin and Julin having again
relapsed into idolatry, St. Otho, with a second blessing of pope
Honorius II. returned into Pomerania in 1128, brought those cities
back to the faith, and through innumerable hardships and dangers
carried the light of the gospel into Noim, and other remote barbarous
provinces. He returned again to the care of his own flock, amidst
which he died the death of the saints on the 30th of June, 1139. He
was buried on the 2d of July, on which day he is commemorated in the
Roman Martyrology. He was canonized by Clement III. in 1189. The
rich shrine which contains his sacred remains is preserved in the
electoral treasury at Hanover. See Thesaurus Reliquiarum Electoris
Brunswico-Luneburgensis, folio, printed at Hanover in 1713. See also
the accurate life of this saint in the latter editions of Surius, and
in Acta Sanctorum, by the Bollandists, t. 1, Julii.

ST. MONEGONDES, A RECLUSE AT TOURS.

She was a native of Chartres, and honorably married. She had two
daughters, who were the objects of her happiness and most ardent
desires in this world till God was pleased, in mercy towards her,
to deprive her of them both by death. Her grief for this loss was
at first excessive, and by it she began to be sensible that her
attachment to them had degenerated into immoderate passion; though
she had not till then perceived the disorder of a fondness which had
much weakened in her breast the love of God, and the disposition
of perfect conformity to his holy will above all things and in all
things. A fear of offending God obliged her to overcome this grief,
and she confessed the divine mercy in the cure of her inordinate
affection which stood in need of so severe a remedy. However,
resolving to bid adieu to this transitory treacherous world, she,
with her husband’s consent, built herself a cell at Chartres, in
which she shut herself up, serving God in great austerity and
assiduous prayer. She had no other furniture than a mat strewed
on the floor on which she took her short repose, and she allowed
herself no other sustenance than coarse oat bread with water which
was brought her by a servant. She afterward removed to Tours, where
she continued the same manner of life in a cell which she built near
St. Martin’s. Many fervent women joining her, this cell grew into a
famous nunnery, which has been since changed into a collegiate church
of secular canons. St. Monegondes lived many years a model of perfect
sanctity, and died in 570. She is named in the Roman Martyrology.

* * * * *

The loss of dear friends is a sensible affliction, under which
something may be allowed to the tenderness of nature. Insensibility
is no part of virtue. The bowels of saints are always tender, and
far from that false apathy of which the stoics boasted. “I condemn
not grief for the death of a friend,” says St. Chrysostom,[15] “but
excess of grief. To mourn is a part of nature; but to mourn with
impatience is to injure your departed friend, to offend God, and
to hurt yourself. If you give thanks to God for his mercies and
benefits, you glorify him, honor the deceased, and procure great
advantages for yourself.” Motives of faith must silence the cries of
nature. “How absurd is it to call heaven much better than this earth,
and yet to mourn for those who depart thither in peace,” says the
same father in another place.[16]

ST. OUDOCEUS.

THIRD BISHOP OF LANDAFF, IN ENGLAND.

This saint, dedicated to God from his infancy by his parents, was
reared in Christian principles under the inspection of his uncle
Saint Theliau, bishop of Landaff; and succeeded him in this see
about the year 580.[17] Mauric, king of Glamorgan, held him in the
highest veneration, and assisted him in all his endeavors to promote
the glory of God; being however excommunicated by the saint for
assassinating a prince called Cynedu, he, by his humble submission
and penance, was at length restored to the communion of the Church.
St. Oudoceus dying about the end of the sixth century, is mentioned
in the English Calendars on the 2d of July. See Usher, Antiquit.
Britan. p. 291; Wharton, Anglia Sacra, t. 2, p. 669; Alford, in
Annal. and Lobineau, Vies des SS. de Bretagne, p. 89.

JULY III.

ST. PHOCAS, GARDENER, M.

From his panegyric, written by St. Asterius, and another by
St. Chrysostom, t. 2, ed. Ben. p. 704, Ruinart, p. 627.

A. D. 303.

St. Phocas dwelt near the gate of Sinope, a city of Pontus, and lived
by cultivating a garden, which yielded him a handsome subsistence,
and wherewith plentifully to relieve the indigent. In his humble
profession he imitated the virtue of the most holy anchorets, and
seemed in part restored to the happy condition of our first parents
in Eden. To prune the garden without labor and toil was their sweet
employment and pleasure. Since their sin, the earth yields not its
fruit but by the sweat of our brow. But still, no labor is more
useful or necessary, or more natural to man, and better adapted
to maintain in him vigor of mind or health of body than that of
tillage; nor does any part of the universe rival the innocent charms
which a garden presents to all our senses, by the fragrancy of its
flowers, by the riches of its produce, and the sweetness and variety
of its fruits; by the melodious concert of its musicians, by the
worlds of wonders which every stem, leaf, and fibre exhibit to the
contemplation of the inquisitive philosopher, and by that beauty and
variegated lustre of colors which clothe the numberless tribes of
its smallest inhabitants, and adorn its shining landscapes, vying
with the brightest splendor of the heavens, and in a single lily
surpassing the dazzling lustre with which Solomon was surrounded
on his throne in the midst of all his glory. And what a field for
contemplation does a garden offer to our view in every part, raising
our souls to God in raptures of love and praise, stimulating us
to fervor, by the fruitfulness with which it repays our labor,
and multiplies the seed it receives; and exciting us to tears of
compunction from our insensibility to God by the barrenness with
which it is changed into a frightful desert, unless subdued by
assiduous toil! Our saint joining prayer with his labor, found in his
garden itself an instructive book, and an inexhausted fund of holy
meditation. His house was opened to all strangers and travellers who
had no lodging in the place; and after having for many years most
liberally bestowed the fruit of his labor on the poor, he was found
worthy also to give his life for Christ. Though his profession was
obscure, he was well known over the whole country by the reputation
of his charity and virtue.

When a cruel persecution, probably that of Dioclesian in 303, was
suddenly raised in the Church, Phocas was immediately impeached as a
Christian, and such was the notoriety of his pretended crime, that
the formality of a trial was superseded by the persecutors, and
executioners were despatched with an order to kill him on the spot
wherever they should find him. Arriving near Sinope, they would not
enter the town, but stopping at his house without knowing it, at his
kind invitation they took up their lodging with him. Being charmed
with his courteous entertainment, they at supper disclosed to him
the errand upon which they were sent, and desired him to inform them
where this Phocas could be most easily met with. The servant of
God, without the least surprise, told them he was well acquainted
with the man, and would give them certain intelligence of him next
morning. After they were retired to bed he dug a grave, prepared
everything for his burial, and spent the night in disposing his soul
for his last hour. When it was day he went to his guests, and told
them Phocas was found, and in their power whenever they pleased to
apprehend him. Glad at this news, they inquired where he was. “He is
here present,” said the martyr,--“I myself am the man.” Struck at his
undaunted resolution, and at the composure of his mind, they stood
a considerable time as if they had been motionless, nor could they
at first think of imbruing their hands in the blood of a person in
whom they discovered so heroic a virtue, and by whom they had been
so courteously entertained. He indirectly encouraged them saying,
that as for himself, he looked upon such a death as the greatest of
favors, and his highest advantage. At length, recovering themselves
from their surprise, they struck off his head. The Christians of
that city, after peace was restored to the Church, built a stately
church which bore his name, and was famous over all the East. In it
were deposited the sacred relics, though some portions of them were
dispersed in other churches.

St. Asterius, bishop of Amasea about the year 400, pronounced the
panegyric of this martyr, on his festival, in a church, probably
near Amasea, which possessed a small part of his remains. In this
discourse[18] he says, “that Phocas from the time of his death was
become a pillar and support of the churches on earth: he draws all
men to his house; the highways are filled with persons resorting from
every country to this place of prayer. The magnificent church which
(at Sinope) is possessed of his body, is the comfort and ease of the
afflicted, the health of the sick, the magazine plentifully supplying
the wants of the poor. If in any other place, as in this, some small
portion of his relics be found, it also becomes admirable, and most
desired by all Christians.” He adds, that the head of St. Phocas was
kept in his beautiful church in Rome, and says, “The Romans honor him
by the concourse of the whole people in the same manner they do Peter
and Paul.” He bears testimony that the sailors in the Euxine, Ægean,
and Adriatic seas, and in the ocean, sing hymns in his honor, and
that the martyr has often succored and preserved them; and that the
portion of gain which they in every voyage set apart for the poor is
called Phocas’s part. He mentions that a certain king of barbarians
had sent his royal diadem set with jewels, and his rich helmet a
present to the church of St. Phocas, praying the martyr to offer it
to the Lord in thanksgiving for the kingdom which his divine majesty
had bestowed upon him. St. Chrysostom received a portion of the
relics of Saint Phocas, not at Antioch, as Baronius thought, and as
Fronto le Duc and Baillet doubt, but at Constantinople as Montfaucon
demonstrates.[19] On that solemn occasion the city kept a great
festival two days, and St. Chrysostom preached two sermons, only one
of which is extant.[20] In this he says, that the emperors left their
palaces to reverence these relics, and strove to share with the rest
in the blessings which they procure men. The emperor Phocas built
afterward another great church at Constantinople in honor of this
martyr, and caused a considerable part of his relics to be translated
thither. The Greeks only style Saint Phocas hiero-martyr or sacred
martyr, which epithet they sometimes give to eminent martyrs who were
not bishops, as Ruinart demonstrates against Baronius.

ST. GUTHAGON, RECLUSE.

He was an Irishman of royal blood, who forsaking the world to labor
in securing eternal happiness, led a penitential, contemplative life
at Oosterk, near Bruges, in Flanders, with B. Gillon, an individual
companion. He was famed for his eminent sanctity, attested by
miracles after his death. His shrine is there held in veneration, and
a chapel built in his honor. He is said to have lived in the eighth
century. Gerard, bishop of Tournay, translated the relics of this
saint on the 3d of July, 1059, in the presence of the abbots of Dun,
Oubenbourg, and Ececkout; and on the 1st of October, 1444, they were
visited by Nicholas, suffragan bishop of Tournay. See Colgan in MSS.
and Molanus, p. 136.

SAINT GUNTHIERN, ABBOT IN BRITTANY.

This saint flourished in the sixth century. He was a prince in
Wales, which he left in his youth, and retired into Armorica to live
a recluse. He stopt at the isle of Groie, which is about a league
from the mouth of the Blavet. Grallon was then lord of the isle, and
was so edified at his conversation, that he bestowed on him, for
founding a monastery, the land between the confluence of the river
Isol and Ellé. For which reason even to this day, the abbey is called
Kemperle, which in the old British language signifies the conflux of
Ellé. One year that a prodigious swarm of insects devoured the corn,
Guerech I., count of Vannes, dreading a famine, deputed three persons
of quality to engage the saint’s prayers to God for turning away
the scourge. Gunthiern sent him water which he had blessed, which
he desired to be sprinkled over the fields, and the insects were
destroyed. The count, in gratitude for this extraordinary blessing,
gave him the land near the river Blavet, which was then called
Vernac; but is now known by the name of Hervegnac or Chervegnac.
The saint, it is thought, died at Kemperle. During the incursions
of the Normans, his body was concealed in the isle of Groie. It was
discovered in the eleventh century, and brought to the monastery
of Kemperle,[21] which now belongs to the Benedictine Order. St.
Gunthiern is patron of this abbey as well as of many other churches
and chapels in Brittany. He is mentioned in ancient calendars on the
29th of June, but the moderns place his feast on the 3d of July. See
Lobineau, Vies des SS. de Bretagne, p. 49.

ST. BERTRAN,[22] BISHOP OF MANS.

He seems to have been born in Poitou, and having dedicated himself
to the service of the Church, he received the tonsure in the city
of Tours. St. Germain, bishop of Paris, invited him to his diocess,
formed him to virtue, and, in token of esteem for his merit, made him
his archdeacon. After the death of Baldegisil, an unworthy prelate,
who sought only to enrich himself by the spoils of his church, St.
Bertran was chosen his successor in the diocess of Mans in 586.
At first he met some opposition from the corrupt manners of his
people, but zealous endeavors to restore them to virtue had soon the
deserved success. By his prudence he saved the state from a war which
threatened it from Waroc and Windimacle, princes of Brittany. He was
called to the court of Gontran, king of Orleans and Burgundy, to
negotiate certain interesting matters regarding the Church. He built,
endowed, and repaired a great number of hospitals and churches. His
will, which he made in 615, is an esteemed piece of church-antiquity.
In it are many considerable legacies to churches and monasteries. But
what is singularly remarkable, we see by it, that the holy bishop
enjoyed on every occasion the favor and protection of Fredegonda.
During the troubles occasioned by the civil wars in France, St.
Bertran was three several times banished from his diocess. This
introduced many disorders among his people, which he happily removed
with the assistance of Clotaire, who after long struggles at length
united to his kingdom those of Burgundy and Austrasia. It is believed
that he died the 30th of June, 623. But he is honored on the 3d of
July, being the day on which his relics were translated. See St.
Gregory of Tours, Hist. l. 8, c. 39, and l. 9, c. 18; and the saint’s
will published with excellent notes by Papebroke, 6 Jun. and Baillet,
under the 3d of July.

JULY IV.

ST. ULRIC, BISHOP OF AUSBURG, CONFESSOR.

From his accurate life, written by Gerard of Ausburg, in
Mabillon, sæc. 2, Ben. &c. See the Bollandists.

A. D. 973.

St. Ulric or Udalric was son of count Hucbald, and of Thietberga,
daughter of Burchard, one of the first dukes of Higher Germany. He
was born in 893, and was educated from seven years of age in the
abbey of St. Gal. Guiborate, a holy virgin who lived a recluse near
that monastery, foretold him that he should one day be a bishop,
and should meet with severe trials, but exhorted him to courage and
constancy under them. So delicate and tender was the complexion
of the young nobleman that all who knew him judged he could never
live long. But regularity and temperance preserved a life, and
strengthened a constitution which excessive tenderness of parents,
care of physicians, and all other arts would probably have the sooner
worn out and destroyed: which cardinal Lugo shows to have often
happened by several instances in austere religious Orders.[23] The
recovery of the young count was looked upon as miraculous. As he
grew up, his sprightly genius, his innocence and sincere piety, and
the sweetness of his temper and manners charmed the good monks; and
he had already made a considerable progress in his studies when his
father removed him to Ausburg, where he placed him under the care
of Adalberon, bishop of that city. The prelate, according to the
custom of those times, made him his chamberlain when he was only
sixteen years old, afterward promoted him to the first orders, and
instituted him to a canonry in his cathedral. The young clergyman
was well apprised of the dangers, and instructed in the duties of
his state, which he set himself with all his strength faithfully to
discharge. Prayer and study filled almost all his time, and the poor
had much the greatest share in his revenues. During a pilgrimage
which he made to Rome, this bishop died, and was succeeded by Hiltin.
After his return he continued his former manner of life, advancing
daily in fervor and devotion, and in the practices of humility and
mortification. He was most scrupulously careful to shun as much
as possible the very shadow of danger, especially with regard to
temptations against purity, and it was his usual saying to others:
“Take away the fuel, and you take away the flame.”

Hilton dying in 924, Henry the Fowler, king of Germany, nominated
our saint, who was then thirty-one years of age, to the bishopric
of Ausburg, and he was consecrated on Holy Innocents’ day. The
Hungarians and Sclavonians had lately pillaged that country, murdered
the holy recluse Saint Guiborate, whom the Germans honor as a martyr,
plundered the city of Ausburg, and burnt the cathedral. The new
bishop, not to lose time, built for the present a small church,
in which he assembled the people, who in their universal distress
stood in extreme need of instruction, comfort, and relief; all which
they found so abundantly in Ulric, that every one thought all the
calamities they had suffered sufficiently repaired by the happiness
they enjoyed in possessing such a pastor. He excused himself from
attending the court, knowing of what importance the presence of a
bishop is to his flock, for which he is to give a severe account to
God. The levying and care of his troops, which in quality of prince
of the empire he was obliged to send to the army, he entrusted to
a nephew, devoting himself entirely to his spiritual functions. He
rose every morning at three o’clock to assist with his canons at
matins and lauds: after which he recited the psalter, litany, and
other prayers. At break of day he said in choir the office for the
dead, and prime, and was present at high mass. After tierce and long
private devotions he said mass. He only left the church after none,
and then went to the hospital, where he comforted the sick, and
every day washed the feet of twelve poor people, giving to each of
them a liberal alms. The rest of the day he employed in instructing,
preaching, visiting the sick, and discharging all the duties of a
vigilant pastor. He took his frugal meal only in the evening before
complin. In this the poor always shared with him, for whom and for
strangers meat was served up, except on fast-days, though he never
touched it himself. He allowed himself very little time for sleep,
lay on straw, and never used any linen. In Lent he redoubled his
austerities and devotions. He made every year the visit of his whole
diocess, and held a synod of his clergy twice a year. Upon the death
of Henry I. Otho I. succeeded in the kingdom of Germany, between
whom and his unnatural son Luitolf, a civil war broke out. St. Ulric
strenuously declared himself against the rebels, who on that account
harassed and plundered his diocess. But Arnold, count palatine, being
slain before the walls of Ratisbon, St. Ulric obtained the king’s
pardon for his son and the rest of the rebels.

The saint had fenced the city of Ausburg with strong walls, and
erected several fortresses to secure the people from the inroads of
barbarians. This was a precaution of the utmost importance; for the
Hungarians made a second incursion, and laid siege to Ausburg. The
good pastor continued in prayer, like Moses on the mountain, for
his people, whom he convened in frequent processions and devotions.
His prayers were heard, and the barbarians, being seized with a
sudden panic fear, raised the siege and fled in great confusion.
They were met and cut to pieces by Otho, who, in 962, was crowned
Emperor by the pope. St. Ulric built his cathedral in a stately
manner, and dedicated it again to God in honor of St. Afra, the
celebrated patroness of Ausburg, in which city she received the crown
of martyrdom in the persecution of Dioclesian. She is commemorated
on the 5th of August. The saint earnestly desired to resign his
bishopric, and retired to the monastery of St. Gal, some time before
his death; but met with too great opposition. He made a second
journey of devotion to Rome, and was received with extraordinary
marks of esteem by the pope, and at Ravenna by the emperor and his
pious empress. Otho I. died in May, 973, and from that time the
saint’s health began sensibly to decline. During his last sickness
he redoubled his fervor. In his agony he caused himself to be laid
on ashes blessed and strewed on the floor in the form of a cross,
in which posture he died amidst the prayers of his clergy, on the
4th of July, 973, being about fourscore years old, and having been
bishop fifty years. He was buried in the church of St. Afra, which at
present bears his name. His sanctity was attested by miracles, and he
was canonized by pope John XV. in 993.

* * * * *

The saints living by faith had recourse to God in all their actions,
and by that means drew down his blessing on their undertakings. It
was the saying of a great man, that persons who expose themselves to
many dangers and sins, often meet with temporal miscarriages,[24]
like the Israelites when they were deceived by the Gabaonites,
because they neglect to commend their enterprises to God by fervent
prayer and to consult his will.

SAINT ODO, ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY, C.

He was born in the province of East Angles, of noble Danish parents,
who, about the year 870, had accompanied Inguar and Hubba in their
barbarous expedition, and had acquired a peaceable plentiful
settlement in that part of England. Odo from a child loved the
Christian religion, frequented the churches, and often spoke with
honor of Christ to his parents; for which he was frequently severely
chastised by them, and at length disinherited and turned out of
doors. The young nobleman, rejoicing to see himself naked, and found
worthy to suffer something for God, chose him for his inheritance;
and, fearing lest by sloth he should lose the advantages he had
already gained, resolved to give himself wholly to God, and embrace
an ecclesiastical state. He was enabled to perform his studies by
the liberality of the most noble and virtuous duke Athelm, who seems
to have been son of the ealderman Athelm, who in the reign of king
Ethelwolf, being assisted by the Dorsetshire men, had defeated the
Danes near Portland, in 838. The duke or governor Athelm was one of
the principal noblemen of England in the reign of king Alfred, and
in the Saxon annals, is styled ealderman of Wiltshire. Being a most
religious man, he was much taken with the piety of Odo. In 887 he
made a devout pilgrimage to Rome, and carried thither the alms of
king Alfred and of the West-Saxons, as the Saxon Annals testify. He
had before that time procured Odo to be ordained priest, and made use
of him for his confessarius, as did many others who belonged to the
court. He recited every day the church office with him, as it was
then customary for pious persons among the laity to do. Our saint
accompanied him to Rome in quality of chaplain. On the road, this
nobleman fell sick of a fever which in seven days reduced him almost
to extremity. But Odo, after praying for him, presented him a glass
of wine on which he had made the sign of the cross, bidding him have
an entire confidence in God. Athelm had no sooner drunk the glass,
than he found himself perfectly cured, and able to get on horseback.
Athelm died in 898.

Odo continued to be caressed as much as ever, and was often employed
by the kings Alfred and his son Edward the Elder, who began his reign
in 901. King Alfred had by his wisdom and prowess raised the English
monarchy to the highest pitch of grandeur, and the Danes who, from
the time of the martyrdom of St. Edmund, were possessed of part of
Northumberland, and of the kingdom of the East-Angles, were confined
within those territories, and restrained in the eastern provinces
from making inroads by the famous ditch running from the northern
fens to the river Ouse, and into Suffolk, separating Mercia and the
kingdom of the East-Angles, called at this day, from a town of that
name, Reech-dike, and by the common people Devil’s-dike. This great
ditch, mentioned by the Saxon Annals in the reign of Edward the
Elder, seems made about this time. When the Danes broke the truce,
king Edward entirely subdued them in the country of the East-Angles;
he also defeated the Scots, Cumbrians, and Welch. He built towns
and fortresses in many parts of the kingdom, as Ethelred, earl
of Mercia, and after his death his courageous and virtuous widow
Ethelfleda, daughter to king Alfred, did in the middle counties. But
nothing reflects greater honor on the name of this king, and on his
wise counsellors, than the body or code of laws which he added to
those of his father Alfred,[25] in enacting which the Danish king
of the East-Angles, Guthrun, or rather Guthrun’s successor, Eoric,
concurred. In these laws only pecuniary fines are prescribed for
theft, and most other crimes; for which capital punishments were
not generally instituted before the thirteenth century. Edward the
Elder reigned twenty-four years, and dying in 925 was buried in the
monastery which his father Alfred had founded at Winchester.

Athelstan, his eldest son, reigned fourteen years with great prudence
and valor. His father Edward having extinguished the kingdom of
the Danes among the East-Angles, Athelstan expelled them out of
Northumberland; obliged the Welch to pay him a considerable annual
tribute; and in 938 vanquished also the Scots. For their king,
Constantine, protecting the Danes in Northumberland under their
last king Guthfrith and his son Anlaff, drew on himself the arms of
king Athelstan, who marched with his victorious army to the very
north of Scotland, in 934, as William of Malmesbury relates. In the
same year Constantine invaded England with a great army of Scots,
Danes, and Irish, another Anlaff, king of Dublin and some of the
Western Islands, coming over to his assistance. Athelstan met them at
Brunanburgh, a place at present unknown, near the Humber, and with
his valiant West-Saxons attacking Anlaff, whilst his cousin Turketil,
at the head of the Londoners, fell on the Scots, he gained a most
complete victory, which he ascribed to the intercession of Saint John
of Beverly. Having on the other side driven the Welch out of Exeter
he founded there a noble monastery, which was afterward made the
cathedral when the bishopric was removed from Crediton to that city.
Alfred of Beverly calls Athelstan the first monarch of all England,
though out of modesty he never assumed that title, but left it to
his brother Edred to take. For after the extinction of the Danish
kingdom in Northumberland, and the death of Ethelfleda, countess of
Mercia, there remained no petty sovereign in his dominions, which had
always been the case from Egbert to his time. Athelstan also subdued
the Welch and the Scots, and according to our historians made not
only the former, but likewise the latter tributary, though this the
Scottish writers deny with regard to their country. King Athelstan
was a great lover of peace, piety, and religion: he was devout,
affable to all, learned himself, and a patron of learned men; and
he was as much admired and beloved by his subjects for his humility
and humanity as he was feared by enemies and rebels for his military
skill and invincible courage. He framed many good laws, in which he
inflicted chiefly pecuniary penalties for crimes; for which purpose
he fixed for every offence a value or price according to every one’s
rank and estate. This great king reposed an entire confidence in the
prudence and sanctity of his chaplain, and not content to make use of
his counsels in his most weighty concerns, he carried him with him
in his war, that he might always animate himself to virtue by his
example and holy advice. The kingdom of the West-Saxons was for some
time all comprised under the diocess of Winchester, till in the reign
of king Ina, about the year 705, the see of Shirburne was erected,
and in 905 that of Wilton for Wiltshire, though these two sees were
again united and fixed at Salisbury in 1046. King Athelstan about the
beginning of his reign procured St. Odo to be chosen second bishop of
Wilton, according to Le Neve’s Fasti, though some say of Shirburne.
Nevertheless, the saint was obliged often to attend the king, and
was present at the great battle of Brunanburgh, against the Danes,
Scots, and Irish, in which Athelstan, being attacked by Anlaff, and
almost surrounded by enemies, having also broken or lost his sword,
called aloud for help. St. Odo ran in upon this occasion, and first
discovered to the king a sword hanging by his side, which was thought
to have been sent from heaven, with which, animated by the saint, he
gained one of the most glorious and advantageous victories that ever
was won by the English nation.

Athelstan dying in 941, left the crown to his brother Edmund, at that
time only eighteen years of age. This prince reduced a second time
the Northumbers and Anlaff the Dane, who had again revolted; and
governed by the wise counsels of St. Odo, he enacted many wholesome
laws, especially to prevent family feuds and murders. By one of
these it is ordained that if several thieves combine together, the
eldest shall be hanged, the rest whipped thrice. This seems the
first law by which robbery was punished in England by death. The
king was religious and valiant, and being a judge of men, reposed
an entire confidence in St. Odo, who, in 942, was translated to
the metropolitan see of Canterbury. The saint had consented to his
first promotion with great reluctance. But he opposed the second a
long time with a dread which saints are usually filled with on such
occasions. He alleged first, his unworthiness, secondly, the canons
against translations, and thirdly, that he was no monk. His two
first difficulties were overruled; and as to the third, he at length
consented to receive the Benedictin habit from the hands of the abbot
of Fleuri, now St. Bennet’s on the Loire, a house then famous for
its regularity. The abbot was therefore invited into England for
this purpose, or according to others, St. Odo travelled to Fleuri,
and received the habit from his hands; after which he was installed
archbishop. King Edmund was assassinated by Leof, an outlawed thief,
who had insolently seated himself at the king’s table, in a great
banquet which the king gave on the feast of St. Austin, archbishop of
Canterbury, in 948.

Edmund left two sons very young, Edwy and Edgar, but was succeeded
by his brother Edred, in whose days happened the following miracle,
related by Eadmer in his exact life of our saint; also by William of
Malmesbury, and the Chronicles of the Church of Canterbury, quoted in
Parker’s British Antiquities, and Du Pin.[26] Some of the clergy at
Canterbury being tempted to doubt of the real presence of Christ’s
body in the holy eucharist, St. Odo begged by his prayers that God
would be pleased mercifully to demonstrate to them the truth of this
sacred mystery; and at this petition, whilst he was saying mass in
his cathedral, at the breaking of the host, blood was seen by all the
people distilling from it into the chalice; the saint called up to
the altar those who labored under the temptation before-mentioned,
and others then present, to bear witness to the miracle. Full
of gratitude, they afterward celebrated with their archbishop a
solemn thanksgiving for this wonderful miracle, in which Christ had
manifested himself visible in the flesh to their corporeal eyes. King
Edred died in 955, after a lingering illness, which he sanctified by
the most edifying patience and acts of devotion, having reigned nine
years and a half. He took the title of king of Great Britain, as he
styles himself in a charter which he gave to the abbey of Croyland,
recited by Ingulphus. In another, given to the abbey of Reculver,[27]
he calls himself _Monarch of all England_.

Edwy, the eldest son of king Edmund, succeeded next to the throne,
and was crowned at Kingston by St. Odo. But being a youth abandoned
to excessive lust, after the coronation dinner he left his bishops
and nobles to go to his mistress Ethelgiva, who was his own near
relation. St. Dunstan, then abbot of Glastenbury, reproved him by
order of St. Odo, but was banished by the tyrant, and the monks
turned out of Glastenbury and many other monasteries. St. Odo exerted
his zeal against the adulteress, but the king repaired to Gloucester
when she fled to that city. The enormities of his reign stirred up
the Mercians and Northumbers to take up arms against him, and to
crown his younger brother Edgar. Edwy retained the kingdom of the
West-Saxons till his death, which happened in 959, according to
Florence of Worcester and Laud’s copy of the Saxon annals.

Edgar exceedingly honored St. Odo, recalled St. Dunstan, and advanced
him to the bishopric of Worcester. He reigned about sixteen years in
uninterrupted peace and prosperity, till his death in 975, beloved by
all his subjects, and revered by foreigners. William of Malmesbury
and Florence of Worcester mention his two great fleets, said to have
consisted of three thousand six hundred ships, with which he yearly
scoured the British seas; and he had six or eight petty kings often
to wait on him, namely, Kenneth of the Scots, Malcolm of Cumberland,
Maccus, lord of Man and the Isles, and five princes of Wales, who
all rowed his galley from Chester down the river Dee. These princes
of Wales were the successors of Howel Dha, the wise legislator and
powerful prince of all Wales.[28] King Edgar’s salutary laws are
chiefly to be ascribed to St. Odo and St. Dunstan. This great king,
by the direction of these holy men, set himself earnestly to repair
the damages which the Church and State had received under the tyranny
of his brother.

St. Odo never intermitted the daily instruction of his clergy and
flock, notwithstanding his great age, and strenuously labored to
advance daily in the divine love. He died in 961. His relics, when
his shrine was plundered at the change of religion, seem to have
been deposited under a small tomb which is seen at this day in the
same place where the shrine formerly stood. His name was famous in
our English Martyrologies. For his virtue he was usually styled
whilst living, _Odo se gode_, that is, in the Saxon language, _Odo
the Good_. The Constitutions of St. Odo seem charges delivered by
him to the clergy.[29] The laws of the kings Athelstan, Edmund, and
Edgar, are part laws of the State, part of the Church. They were
enacted in general assemblies or synods, and are for the most part
to be ascribed to St. Odo. See Matthew of Westminster, Florence of
Worcester, and the life of St. Odo, written, not by Osbern the famous
monk of Canterbury, in 1070, as Mabillon conjectured, Sæc. Ben. V.
p. 203, but by Eadmer, the disciple of St. Anselm, in 1121, as Henry
Wharton demonstrates in his Preface, vol. 2, p. 10, Anglia Sacra.
The Life of St. Odo, written by Osbern, and quoted by William of
Malmesbury, seems nowhere to be extant. The History of St. Odo is
compiled by Ericus Pantopidanus in his Gesta Danorum extra Daniam.
Hafniæ. 1740. t. 2, § 2, § 8, p. 157.

ST. SISOES OR SISOY, ANACHORET IN EGYPT.

After the death of St. Antony, St. Sisoes was one of the most shining
lights of the Egyptian deserts. He was an Egyptian by birth. Having
quitted the world from his youth, he retired to the desert of Sceté,
and lived some time under the direction of abbot Hor. The desire of
finding a retreat yet more unfrequented induced him to cross the
Nile and hide himself in the mountain where Saint Antony died some
time before. The memory of that great man’s virtues being still
fresh, wonderfully supported his fervor. He imagined he saw him,
and heard the instructions he was wont to deliver to his disciples;
and he strained every nerve to imitate his most heroic exercises,
the austerity of his penance, the rigor of his silence, the almost
unremitting ardor of his prayer, insomuch that the reputation of his
sanctity became so illustrious as to merit the full confidence of all
the neighboring solitaries. Some even came a great distance to be
guided in the interior ways of perfection; and, in spite of the pains
he took, he was forced to submit his love of silence and retreat
to the greater duty of charity. He often passed two days without
eating, and was so rapt in God that he forgot his food, so that it
was necessary for his disciple Abraham to remind him that it was
time to break his fast. He would sometimes be even surprised at the
notice, and contend that he had already made his meal; so small was
the attention he paid to the wants of his body.[30] His prayer was so
fervent that it often passed into ecstasy. At other times his heart
was so inflamed with divine love, that, scarce able to support its
violence, he only obtained relief from his sighs, which frequently
escaped without his knowledge, and even against his will.[31] It was
a maxim with him, that a solitary ought not to choose the manual
labor which is most pleasing to him.[32] His ordinary work was making
baskets. He was tempted one day as he was selling them, to anger;
instantly he threw the baskets away and ran off. By efforts like
these to command his temper he acquired a meekness which nothing
could disturb. His zeal against vice was without bitterness; and
when his monks fell into faults, far from affecting astonishment
or the language of reproach, he helped them to rise again with a
tenderness truly paternal.[33] When he once recommended patience
and the exact observance of rules, he told the following anecdote:
“Twelve monks, benighted on the road, observed that their guide was
going astray. This, for fear of breaking their rule of silence, they
forbore to notice, thinking within themselves that at daybreak he
would see his mistake and put them in the right road. Accordingly,
the guide discovering his error, with much confusion, was making many
apologies; when the monks being now at liberty to speak, only said,
with the greatest good humor, ‘Friend, we saw very well that you
went out of your road; but we were then bound to silence.’ The man
was struck with astonishment, and very much edified at this answer
expressive of such patience and strictness of observance.”[34]

Some Arians had the impudence to come to his mount, and utter their
heresy before his disciples. The saint, instead of an answer, desired
one of the monks to read St. Athanasius’s treatise against Arianism,
which at once stopped their mouths and confounded them. He then
dismissed them with his usual good temper. St. Sisoes was singularly
devoted to humility; and in all his advices and instructions to
others, held constantly before their eyes this most necessary
virtue. A recluse saying to him one day, “Father, I always place
myself in the presence of God;” he replied, “It would be much more
your advantage to place yourself below every creature, in order to
be securely humble.” Thus, while he never lost sight of the divine
presence, it was ever accompanied with the consciousness of his
own nothingness and misery.[35] “Make yourself little,” said he to
a monk, “renounce all sensual satisfactions, disengage yourself
from the empty cares of the world, and you will find true peace of
mind.”[36] To another, who complained that he had not yet arrived at
the perfection of St. Antony, he said, “Ah! if I had but one only
of that great man’s feelings, I would be all one flame of divine
love.”[37] Notwithstanding his extraordinary mortifications, they
appeared so trifling in his mind, that he called himself a sensual
man, and would have every one else to be of the same opinion.[38]
If charity for strangers sometimes constrained him to anticipate
dinner-hour, at another season, by way of indemnification, he
protracted his fast, as if his body were indebted to so laudable
a condescension.[39] He dreaded praise so much, that in prayer,
as was his custom, with hands lifted up to heaven, when sometimes
he apprehended observation, he would suddenly drop them down. He
was always ready to blame himself, and saw nothing praiseworthy in
others which did not serve him for an occasion to censure his own
lukewarmness.[40] On a visit of three solitaries wanting instruction,
one of them said, “Father, what shall I do to shun hell-fire?” He
made no reply. “And for my part,” added another, “how shall I escape
the gnashing of teeth, and the worm that never dies?” “What also
will become of me,” concluded the third, “for every time I think on
utter darkness I am ready to die with fear?” Then the saint breaking
silence, answered, “I confess that these are subjects which never
employ my thoughts, and as I know that God is merciful, I trust he
will have compassion on me. You are happy,” he added, “and I envy
your virtue. You speak of the torments of hell, and your fears on
this account must be powerful guards against the admission of sin.
Alas! then, it is I should exclaim, What shall become of me? I, who
am so insensible as never even to reflect on the place of torments
destined to punish the wicked after death. Undoubtedly this is the
reason I am guilty of so much sin.” The solitaries retired much
edified with this humble reply.[41] The saint said one time, “I am
now thirty years praying daily that my Lord Jesus may preserve me
from saying an idle word, and yet I am always relapsing.” This could
only be the language which humility dictates; for he was singularly
observant of the times of retirement and silence, and kept his cell
constantly locked to avoid interruption, and always gave his answers
to those who asked his advice in the fewest words.[42] The servant
of God, worn out with sickness and old age, yielded at last to his
disciple Abraham’s advice, and went to reside a while at Clysma,
a town on the border, or at least in the neighborhood of the Red
Sea.[43] Here he received a visit from Ammon, or Amun, abbot of
Raithe, who, observing his affliction for being absent from his
retreat, endeavored to comfort him by representing that his present
ill state of health wanted the remedies which could not be applied in
the desert. “What do you say,” returned the saint, with a countenance
full of grief, “was not the ease of mind I enjoyed there everything
for my comfort?” He was not at ease till he returned to his retreat,
where he finished his holy course. The solitaries of the desert
assisting at his agony, heard him, as Rufinus relates, cry out,
“Behold, abbot Antony, the choir of prophets and the angels come to
take my soul.” At the same time his countenance shone, and being some
time interiorly recollected with God, he cried out anew, “Behold! our
Lord comes for me.” At the instant he expired, his cell was perfumed
with a heavenly odor.[44] He died about the year 429, after a retreat
of at least sixty-two years in St. Antony’s Mount. His feast is
inserted in the Greek Menologies on the 6th of July; and in some
of the Latin Calendars on the 4th of the same month. See Rosweide,
Cotelier, Tillemont, t. 12, p. 453, and the Bollandists ad diem 6
Julii, t. 2, p. 280.

* * * * *

This saint must not be confounded with two other Sisoes, who lived
in the same age. One, surnamed the Theban, lived at Calamon, in
the territory of Arsinoe. Another had his cell at Petra. It is of
Sisoes the Theban that the following passage is related, though some
authors by mistake have ascribed it to St. Sisoes of Sceté. A certain
recluse having received some offence, went to Sisoes to tell him
that he must have revenge. The holy old man conjured him to leave
his revenge to God, to pardon his brother, and forget the injury he
had received. But seeing that his advice had no weight with him,
“At least,” said he, “let us both join in an address to God,” then
standing up, he prayed thus aloud: “Lord, we no longer want your
care of our interests or your protection, since this monk maintains
that we can and ought to be our own avengers.” This extraordinary
petition exceedingly moved the poor recluse, and throwing himself at
the saint’s feet, he begged his pardon, protesting that from that
moment he would forget he had ever been injured.[45] This holy man
loved retirement so much that he delayed not a moment even in the
church after the mass to hasten to his cell. This was not to indulge
self-love or an affected singularity, but to shun the danger of
dissipation, and enjoy in silence and prayer the sweet conversation
of God. For at proper seasons, especially when charity required it,
he was far from being backward in giving himself to the duties of
society. Such was his self-denial that he seldom or ever eat bread.
However, being invited one time by the neighboring solitaries to a
small repast, in condescension, and to show how little he was guided
by self-will, observing that it would be agreeable, “I will eat,”
said he, “bread, or anything you lay before me.”[46] See Bulteau,
Hist. Mon. d’Orient, l. 1, c. 3, n. 7, p. 56. Tillemont, t. 12, and
Pinius, one of the continuators of Bollandus, on the 6th of July.

SAINT BERTHA, WIDOW.

ABBESS OF BLANGY IN ARTOIS.

She was the daughter of count Rigobert and Ursana, related to one
of the kings of Kent in England. In the twentieth year of her age
she was married to Sigefroi, by whom she had five daughters, two of
whom, Gertrude and Deotila, were saints. After her husband’s death,
she put on the veil in the nunnery which she had built at Blangy in
Artois, a little distance from Hesdin. Her daughters Gertrude and
Deotila followed her example. She was persecuted by Roger or Rotgar,
who endeavored to asperse her with king Thierri III. to revenge his
being refused Gertrude in marriage. But this prince, convinced of
the innocence of Bertha, then abbess over her nunnery, gave her a
kind reception, and took her under his protection. On her return to
Blangy, Bertha finished her nunnery, and caused three churches to
be built, one in honor of St. Omer, another she called after St.
Vaast, and the third in honor of St. Martin of Tours. And then, after
establishing a regular observance in her community, she left St.
Deotila abbess in her stead, having shut herself in a cell, to be
employed only in prayer. She died about the year 725. A great part of
her relics are kept at Blangy.[47] See Mabillon, sec. 3, Ben. part.
1, p. 451, Bulteau, Hist. de l’Ordre de St. Benoit, t. 2, l. 4, c.
31, and Baillet on the 4th of July.

ST. FINBAR, ABBOT.

AND FOUNDER OF A FAMOUS MONASTERY IN THE ISLE OF CRIMLEN,
BETWEEN KINSELECH AND DESIES.

See Colgan in MSS. ad 4 Julii. He is not to be confounded with St.
Finbar, the first bishop of Cork, who is honored on the 25th of
September.

ST. BOLCAN, ABBOT.

A Disciple of St. Patrick in Ireland. His relics remain at Kilmore,
_i. e._ Great Cell, where his monastery stood. See Colgan, ib.

JULY V.

ST. PETER OF LUXEMBURG, C.

CARDINAL, BISHOP OF METZ.

From his life, written by John de la Marche, his professor
in laws, the year after his death, with the notes of Pinius
the Bollandist, Julii, t. 1, p. 486. See also the bull
of his beatification in Miræus, and a history of a great
number of miracles wrought by his intercession and relics
in Pinius, ib. His life is compiled by a Celestine monk
from original authentic MSS. kept in the houses of the
Celestines at Avignon, Paris, Nantes, &c., printed at Paris
in 1681.

A. D. 1387.

The most illustrious houses of the dukes and counts of Luxemburg and
St. Pol, not only have held for several centuries the first rank
among the nobility of the Low Countries, but vie with most royal
families in Europe; the former having given five emperors to the
Germans, several kings to Hungary and Bohemia, a queen to France,
and innumerable renowned heroes, whose great actions are famous in
the histories of Europe and the East. But none of their exploits
have reflected so great a lustre on these families as the humility
of our Saint Peter. He was son to Guy of Luxemburg, count of Ligny,
and to Maud, countess of St. Pol; and was born at Ligny, a small town
in Lorrain, in the diocess of Toul, in 1369. He was nearly related
to the emperor Wenceslas, Sigismund, king of Hungary, and Charles
VI., king of France. He lost his pious father at three years of age,
and his most virtuous mother a year after; but his devout aunt, the
countess of Orgieres and countess dowager of St. Pol,[48] took care
of his education, and made a prudent choice of most virtuous persons
whom she placed about him. By the excellent example and precepts of
his masters, and the strong impressions of an early grace, he seemed
formed by nature to perfect virtue. In his tender age the least
sallies of the passions seemed rather prevented than subdued; and his
ardor in the pursuit of virtue so far surpassed the ordinary capacity
of children of his tender age, that it was a matter of astonishment
to all that knew him. His assiduity and fervor in prayer, his secret
self-denials, great abstemiousness, and, above all, his love of
humility in an age when others are usually governed only by the
senses, seemed a miracle of divine grace. He made a private vow of
perpetual chastity before he was seven years of age, and he contrived
by a hundred little artifices that no poor person should ever be
dismissed wherever he was without an alms. At ten years of age he
was sent to Paris, where he studied Latin, philosophy, and the canon
law. In the meantime his eldest brother Valeran, count of St. Pol,
was taken prisoner by the English in a battle in which they defeated
the French and Flemings in Flanders. Upon the news that his brother
was made prisoner and sent to Calais, Peter, in 1381, interrupted
his studies, went over to London, and delivered himself up a hostage
for his brother till his ransom should be paid. The English were
charmed with his extraordinary virtue, and after he had stayed a
year in London, generously gave him his liberty, saying his word was
a sufficient pledge and security for the ransom stipulated. King
Richard II. invited him to his court; but Peter excused himself, and
hastened back to Paris to his studies. His watchings and fasts were
very austere, and he made no visits but such as were indispensable,
or to persons of extraordinary virtue, from whose conversation and
example he might draw great spiritual advantage for the benefit of
his own soul. With this view he often resorted to Philip of Maisiers,
a person eminently endowed with the double spirit of penance and
prayer, who, having been formerly chancellor of the kingdoms of
Jerusalem and Cyprus, led for twenty-five years a retired life in
the convent of the Celestines in Paris, without taking any vows, or
professing that Order. From this devout servant of God our saint
received important instructions and advice, which gave him great
light in the exercises of prayer, and in the paths of interior
spiritual perfection.

In 1383 his brother, the count of St. Pol, obtained for him a canonry
in our Lady’s at Paris; which ecclesiastical preferment was to him a
new motive to increase his fervor in the divine service. His devotion
and assiduity in choir, his charity towards all, his innocence,
his perfect spirit of mortification, and his meekness, edified
exceedingly the whole city; and the modesty with which he endeavored
to conceal his virtues was like a fine transparent veil through which
they shone with redoubled lustre. His humility was most conspicuous,
of which the following instance, among others, is recorded: When a
young clerk refused to carry the cross at a solemn procession, the
new canon took it up, and carried it with so much devotion, that the
whole city was struck with admiration to see him. Peter strove only
to advance in humility and Christian perfection: this was the sole
point which he had in view in all his actions and undertakings; and
he was very far from aspiring to the least ecclesiastical dignity.
But the reputation of his extraordinary sanctity reaching Avignon,
Clement VII., who, in the great schism, was acknowledged by France
for true pope, nominated him archdeacon of Dreux, in the diocess of
Chartres, and soon after, in 1384, bishop of Metz, his great sanctity
and prudence seeming to many a sufficient reason for dispensing with
his want of age. But Peter’s reluctance and remonstrances could only
be overcome by a scruple which was much exaggerated to him, that
by too obstinate a disobedience he would offend God. He made his
public entry at Metz barefoot, and riding on an ass, to imitate the
humility of our Redeemer. He would suffer no other magnificence on
that occasion than the distribution of great arms and largesses among
the poor; nor would he admit any attendants but what might inspire
modesty and piety.

He had no sooner taken possession of his church than with the
suffragan, Bertrand, a Dominican, who was given him for his
assistant, and consecrated bishop of Thessaly, he performed the
visitation of his diocess, in which he everywhere corrected abuses,
and gave astonishing proofs of his zeal, activity, and prudence.
He divided his revenues into three parts, allotting one to his
church, a second to the poor, and reserving a third for himself and
family, though the greatest share of this he added to the portion
of the poor. On fast-days commanded by the Church he took no other
sustenance than bread and water; and he fasted in the same austere
manner all Advent, and all Mondays, Fridays, and Saturdays throughout
the year. When several towns had revolted from him and created for
themselves new magistrates, his brother, the count of St. Pol,
reduced them to their duty by force of arms. The holy bishop was
exceedingly mortified at this accident, and out of his own patrimony
made amends to every one even among the rebels for all losses they
had sustained, which unparalleled charity gained him all their
hearts. Though he was judged, by those who were best acquainted
with his interior, during his whole life never to have stained his
baptismal innocence by any mortal sin, he had so high an idea of
the purity in which a soul ought always to appear in the divine
presence, especially when she approaches the holy mysteries, that
he went every day to confession with extraordinary compunction, and
bewailed the least imperfections with many tears. The very shadow of
the least sloth or failing in any action affrighted him. In the year
1384, Clement VII., soon after he had nominated him bishop, created
him cardinal, under the title of St. George, and in 1386 called him
to Avignon, and obliged him to reside there near his person. Peter
continued all his former austerities in the midst of a court, till
Clement commanded him to mitigate them for the sake of his health,
which seemed to be in a declining condition. His answer was: “Holy
Father, I shall always be an unprofitable servant, but I can at least
obey.” He desired to compensate for what he lost in the practices
of penance by redoubling his alms-deeds. By his excessive charities
his purse was always empty; his table was most frugal, his family
very small, his furniture mean, and his clothes poor, and these he
never changed till they were worn out. It seemed that he could not
increase his alms, yet he found means to do it by distributing his
little furniture and his equipage among the indigent, and selling
for them the episcopal ring which he wore on his finger. Everything
about him breathed an extraordinary spirit of poverty, and published
his affection for the poor. At his death his whole treasure amounted
only to twenty-pence. In all his actions he seemed attentive only to
God; and he fell into raptures sometimes in the street, or whilst he
waited on the pope at court. An ancient picture of the saint is kept
in the collegiate church of our Lady at Autun, in which he is painted
in an ecstasy, and in which are written these words which he was
accustomed frequently to repeat: “Contempt of the world, contempt of
thyself: rejoice in thy own contempt, but despise no other person.”

Ten months after his promotion to the dignity of cardinal, the
saint was seized with a sharp fever, which so much undermined his
constitution that his imperfect recovery was succeeded by a dangerous
slow fever. For his health he was advised to retire to Villeneuve, an
agreeable town situate opposite to Avignon, on the other side of the
Rhone. He was glad by this opportunity to see himself removed from
the noise and hurry of the court. During his last illness he went
to confession twice every day; never passed a day without receiving
the holy communion; and the constant union of his soul with God,
and the tenderness of his devotion, seemed continually to increase
as he drew near his end. His brother Andrew coming to see him, the
saint spoke to him with such energy on the vanity of the world, and
on the advantages of piety, that his words left a deep impression on
his heart during his whole life. This brother afterward taking holy
orders was made bishop of Cambray, and became one of the most holy
prelates of that age. Our saint recommended to him in particular
his sister Jane of Luxemburg, whom he had induced to make a vow of
perpetual chastity, and whose whole life was a perfect pattern of
Christian perfection. Saint Peter sent her by this brother a small
treatise containing certain rules of perfection, which he had drawn
up for her. Finding his strength quite exhausted, he desired and
received the last sacraments; after which he called all his servants,
and as they stood weeping round his bed, he begged their pardon for
not having edified them by his example as he ought to have done.
He then conjured them all to promise to do for his sake one thing
which he was going to ask of them. To this they most readily engaged
themselves. But they were much surprised when he ordered them to
take a discipline which lay under his pillow, and every one to give
him many stripes on his back, in punishment for the faults he had
committed in regard to them, who were, as he said, his brethren in
Christ and his masters. Notwithstanding their extreme unwillingness
they were obliged to comply with his request in order to satisfy
him. After this act of penance and humiliation, he conversed with
God in silent prayer till he gave up his innocent soul into his
hands, on the 2d of July, 1387, being eighteen years old, wanting
eighteen days. Though he had the administration of a diocess, he had
not received priestly orders, but seems to have been deacon, and his
dalmatic is shown at Avignon. He was buried without pomp, according
to his orders, in the church-yard of St. Michael.

On account of many miracles that were wrought both before and after
his interment, the citizens of Avignon built a rich chapel over his
grave. The convent and church of the Celestines have been since
built over that very spot, and in this church is the saint’s body
at present enshrined under a stately mausoleum. The history of the
miracles which have been wrought at his tomb fills whole volumes. A
famous one in 1432, moved the city of Avignon to choose him for its
patron. It is related as follows: A child about twelve years old
fell from a high tower in the palace of Avignon upon a sharp rock,
by which fall his skull was split, his brains dashed out, and his
body terribly bruised. The father of the child, almost distracted at
this accident, ran to the place, and falling on his knees with many
tears, implored the intercession of St. Peter. Then gathering up the
scattered bloody pieces of the child’s skull, he carried them with
the body in a sack, and laid them on the saint’s tomb. The people
and the Celestine monks joined their earnest prayers; and after
some time the child returned to life, and was placed upon the altar
that all might see him thus wonderfully raised from the dead. This
miracle happened on the 5th of July, on which day the festival of
the saint has ever since been celebrated at Avignon. After juridical
informations on his life and miracles, the bull of his beatification
was published by the true pope Clement VII. of the family of Medicis,
in 1527.

St. Peter was a saint from the cradle, because he always strove to
live only for God, and his divine honor. If one spark of that ardent
love of God which inflamed the saints in their actions animated our
breasts, it would give wings to our souls in all we do. We should
devote ourselves every moment to God with our whole strength; and
by our fidelity, and by the purity and fervor of our intention, we
should with the saints make all our actions perfect sacrifices of
our hearts to him. “God considers not how much, but with how ardent
an affection the thing is given,” says St. Cyprian.[49] And, as St.
Ambrose writes,[50] “Thy affection stamps the name and value on thy
action. It is just rated at so much as is the ardor from which it
proceeds. See how just is this judge--He asks thy own soul what value
he is to set on thy work.”

SAINT MODWENA, A NOBLE IRISH VIRGIN.

Having led a religious life several years in her own country, she
came into England in the reign of king Ethelwolf, about the year
840. That pious and great king being acquainted with her sanctity,
committed to her care the education of his daughter Editha, and
founded for her the monastery of Pollesworth, near the forest of
Arden in Warwickshire, which flourished till the dissolution, bearing
usually the name of St. Editha, its patroness and second abbess. St.
Modwena had before established two famous nunneries in Scotland,
one at Stirling, the other in Edinburgh. She made some other pious
foundations in England, but to apply herself more perfectly to
the sanctification of her own soul, she led during seven years in
anachoretical life in an isle in the Trent, which was called Andresey
from the apostle St. Andrew, in whose honor she procured her oratory
to be dedicated. When the great abbey of Burton-upon-Trent was
founded in the year 1004, it was dedicated under the patronage of
the Blessed Virgin and St. Modwena, and was enriched with the relics
of this saint, which were translated thither from Andresey; whence
Leland calls the monastery of Burton Modwenestow. See Pinius the
Bollandist, t. 2, Julij, p. 241. Tanner’s Notitia Mon. &c.

SAINT EDANA, OR EDAENE, IN IRELAND, V.

She is titular saint of the parish of new Tuamia, in the diocess of
Elphin, and another in that of Tuam. A famous holy well bears her
name, much resorted to by the sick. See Colgan, ad 5 Jul.

JULY VI.

SAINT PALLADIUS, B. C.

APOSTLE OF THE SCOTS.[51]

From St. Prosper and other historians, quoted by Usher,
Antiq. Brit. Eccles. c. 16, p. 416, 424; Keith. Cat. Episc.
Scot. p. 233; and the Bollandists 6 Jul. t. 2, Jul. p. 286.

ABOUT THE YEAR 450.

The name of Palladius shows this saint to have been a Roman, and
most authors agree that he was deacon of the church of Rome. At
least St. Prosper in his chronicle informs us, that when Agricola,
a noted Pelagian, had corrupted the churches of Britain with the
insinuation of that pestilential heresy, pope Celestine, at the
instance of Palladius the deacon, in 429, sent thither St. Germanus,
bishop of Auxerre, in quality of his legate, who, having ejected the
heretics, brought back the Britons to the Catholic faith. The concern
of Palladius for these islands stopped not here; for it seems not
to be doubted, but it was the same person of whom St. Prosper again
speaks, when he afterwards says, that in 431 pope Celestine sent
Palladius, the first bishop, to the Scots then believing in Christ.
From the lives of SS. Albeus, Declan, Ibar, and Kiaran Saigir, Usher
shows[52] that these four saints preached separately in different
parts of Ireland, which was their native country before the mission
of St. Patrick. St. Ibar had been converted to the faith in Britain;
the other three had been instructed at Rome, and were directed thence
back into their own country, and according to the histories of their
lives, were all honored with the episcopal character. St. Kiaran
Saigir (who is commemorated on the 5th of March) preceded St. Patrick
in preaching the gospel to the Ossorians, and was seventy-five years
of age on St. Patrick’s arrival in Ireland. Hence it is easy to
understand what is said of St. Palladius, that he was sent bishop to
the Scots believing in Christ: though the number of Christians among
them must have been then very small. St. Prosper, in his book against
the _Author of the conferences_,[53] having commended pope Celestine
for his care in delivering Britain from the Pelagian heresy, adds,
that “he also ordained a bishop for the Scots, and thus, whilst he
endeavored to preserve the Roman island _Catholic_, he likewise
made a barbarous island _Christian_.” Usher observes that this can
be understood only of Ireland; for though part of North-Britain was
never subject to the Romans, and the greatest part of it was then
inhabited by the Picts, yet it never could be called a distinct
island. It is also clear from Tertullian, Eusebius, St. Chrysostom,
and others, that the light of the gospel had penetrated among the
Picts beyond the Roman territories in Britain, near the times of the
apostles. These people, therefore, who had lately begun to receive
some tincture of the faith when our saint undertook his mission, were
doubtless the Scots who were settled in Ireland.

The Irish writers of the lives of St. Patrick say, that Palladius
had preached in Ireland a little before St. Patrick, but that he
was soon banished by the king of Leinster, and returned to North
Britain, where they tell us he had first opened his mission. It
seems not to be doubted but he was sent to the whole nation of the
Scots, several colonies of whom had passed from Ireland into North
Britain, and possessed themselves of part of the country, since
called Scotland.[54] After St. Palladius had left Ireland, he arrived
among the Scots in North Britain, according to St. Prosper, in the
consulate of Bassus and Antiochus, in the year of Christ 431.[55] He
preached there with great zeal, and formed a considerable church.
The Scottish historians tell us, that the faith was planted in North
Britain about the year 200, in the time of king Donald, when Victor
was pope of Rome. But they all acknowledge that Palladius was the
first bishop in that country, and style him their first apostle.[56]
The saint died at Fordun, the capital town of the little county of
Mernis, fifteen miles from Aberdeen to the south, about the year 450.
His relics were preserved with religious respect in the monastery of
Fordun, as Hector Boetius[57] and Camden testify. In the year 1409,
William Scenes, archbishop of St. Andrew’s and primate of Scotland,
enclosed them in a new shrine enriched with gold and precious stones.
His festival is marked on the 6th of July in the Breviary of Aberdeen
and the Scottish Calendars; but in some of the English on the 15th of
December. Scottish writers, and calendars of the middle ages, mention
St. Servanus and St. Ternan as disciples of St. Palladius, and by him
made bishops, the former of Orkney, the latter of the Picts. But from
Usher’s chronology it appears that they both lived later.

* * * * *

It is easy to conceive how painful and laborious the mission of this
saint must have been; but where there is ardent love, labor seems a
pleasure, and either is not felt or is a delight. It is a mark of
sloth and impatience for a man to count his labors, or so much as
to think of pains or sufferings in so glorious an undertaking. St.
Palladius surmounted every obstacle which a fierce nation had opposed
to the establishment of the kingdom of Jesus Christ. Ought not our
hearts to be impressed with the most lively sentiments of love and
gratitude to our merciful God, for having raised up such great and
zealous men, by whose ministry the light of true faith has been
conveyed to us.

ST. JULIAN, ANCHORET.

This saint was carried away captive from some Western country when he
was very young, and sold for a slave in Syria. For some years he much
aggravated the weight of his chains by his impatience under them;
till having the happiness to receive the light of faith he found them
exceedingly lightened by the comfort which religion afforded him. A
right use of his afflictions from that moment contributed much to
the sanctification of his soul. Not long after, he recovered his
liberty by the death of his master, and immediately in the fervor of
his devotion dedicated himself to the service of God in an austere
monastery in Mesopotamia. He frequently resorted to the great St.
Ephrem for advice and instructions in the exercises of virtue; and
that holy man went often to see him, that he might edify himself by
his saintly conversation. This learned doctor of the Syriac church
tells us, that he could not forbear always admiring the sublime
sentiments and spiritual lights with which God favored a man who
appeared in the eyes of the world ignorant and a barbarian. Julian
was of a robust body, inured to labor, but he weakened and emaciated
it by great austerities. He worked with his hands, making sails for
ships; and wept almost continually at the consideration of his past
sins, and of the divine judgments. St. Ephrem tells us that he often
admired to find that in the copies of the holy Bible after Julian had
used them some days, several words were effaced, and others rendered
scarcely legible, though the manuscripts were entire and fair before;
and that the holy man candidly confessed to him when he one day
asked him the reason, that the tears which he shed in reading often
blotted out letters and words. Our saint always looked upon himself
as a criminal, trembling, and expecting every moment the coming of
his judge to call him to an account. It is easy to imagine how remote
such a disposition of mind was from being capable of entertaining
the very thought of amusements. His extreme humility appeared in his
words, dress, and all his actions. He had much to suffer from certain
tepid and slothful monks, but regarded himself as happy to meet with
so favorable opportunities of redeeming his sins, and of exercising
acts of penance, patience, meekness, and charity. Prayer was almost
the uninterrupted employment of his heart. He made in his little cell
a kind of a sepulchre, where he lived retired for greater solitude
whenever his presence was not required at duties of the community. He
assisted at the divine office without ever moving his body, keeping
his whole attention fixed on God, as if he had been standing before
the tribunal of his sovereign judge. Saint Ephrem assures us that God
honored him with the gift of miracles. Sozomen writes[58] that his
life was so austere, that he seemed almost to live without a body.
Thus he spent twenty-five years in his monastery, purifying his soul
by patience, obedience, and the labors of penance. He passed to a
glorious immortality about the year 370. See his life written by his
friend St. Ephrem, Op. t. 3, p. 254, ed. Vatic.

ST. SEXBURGH, ABBESS.

She was daughter of Anna the religious king of the East-Angles, and
his devout queen Hereswide, sister to St. Hilda. A pious education
laid in her the foundation of that eminent sanctity for which she
was most conspicuous during the whole course of her life. She was
given in marriage to Ercombert, king of Kent, a prince of excellent
dispositions, which she contributed exceedingly to improve by her
counsels and example. She had a great share in all his zealous
undertakings for promoting virtue and the happiness of his people,
especially in extirpating the last remains of idolatry in his
dominions, and in enforcing the observance of Lent, and other
precepts of the Church, by wholesome laws. Her virtue commanded the
reverence, and her humility and devotion raised the admiration of
all her subjects; and her goodness and unbounded charity gained her
the love of all, especially the poor. She had a longing desire to
consecrate herself wholly to God in religious retirement, and that
others at least might attend the divine service for her night and
day without impediment, she began in her husband’s lifetime to found
a monastery of holy virgins in the isle of Sheppey, on the coast
of Kent, which she finished after his death in 664, whilst her son
Egbert sat on the throne. Here she assembled seventy-four nuns, but
hearing of the great sanctity of St. Etheldreda at Ely, and being
desirous to live in greater obscurity, and to be more at liberty to
employ all her thoughts on heaven, she left the kingdom of Kent,
and retired to Ely before the year 679, in which she was chosen to
succeed her sister St. Etheldreda, or Audry, in the government of
that house. Sixteen years after she caused the body of that saint to
be taken up, and passed herself to bliss in a good old age, on the
6th of July, toward the end of the seventh century. Her monastery in
Sheppey, called Le Mynstre in Sheppey, was destroyed by the Danes,
but rebuilt in 1130, and consecrated by William, archbishop of
Canterbury, in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Sexburgh; and
it subsisted in the hands of Benedictin nuns till the dissolution of
abbeys. St. Ermenilda, daughter of king Ercombert and St. Sexburgh,
was married to Wulpher, king of Mercia, but after his death retired
to Ely, near her mother and her two aunts St. Audry and St. Withburg,
three daughters of king Anna. St. Wereburgh, daughter of St.
Ermenilda and king Wulpher, was a nun at Hearburgh (which seems to
have been near Stanford or Croyland). Her relics were venerated at
Hearburgh, till in the ninth century they were removed to Leicester.
See the life of St. Sexburgh in Capgrave; also Bede and Narratio de
Sanctis qui in Anglia quiescunt, in Hickes, Diss. Epistol. p. 117.
Thesaur. t. 1, and Monast. Anglic. t. 1, p. 88, et 152. Weever’s
Funeral Monuments, p. 283, and Kalendarium in quo annotantur dies
obitûs Sororum Monasterii de Sheppey. MS. Bibliot. Cotton.

ST. GOAR, PRIEST, C.

Aquitain gave this saint his birth and education; but out of a
desire of serving God entirely unknown to the world, in 519 he
travelled into Germany, and settling in the territory of Triers,
he shut himself in his cell, and arrived at such an eminent degree
of sanctity as to be esteemed the oracle and miracle of the whole
country. He resolutely refused the archbishopric of Triers, and died
in 575. Round his cell arose the town of St. Guver, on the left bank
of the Rhine between Wesel and Boppard. See Brower and Pinius the
Bollandist, t. 2, Julij, p. 328.

ST. MONINNA, VIRGIN.

Of Sliabh-Cuillin, _i. e._ Mount Cullen, where she led a most holy
life in austere penance and heavenly contemplation. She died in 518,
and is much honored in that part of Ireland. See Colgan ad 6 Jul.

JULY VII.

ST. PANTÆNUS.

FATHER OF THE CHURCH.

See St. Jerom, Catal. Clem. Alex. and Eusebius. Also
Ceillier, t. 2, p. 237.

This learned father and apostolic man flourished in the second age.
He was by birth a Sicilian, by profession a stoic philosopher. For
his eloquence he is styled by St. Clement of Alexandria the Sicilian
Bee. His esteem for virtue led him into an acquaintance with the
Christians, and being charmed with the innocence and sanctity of
their conversation he opened his eyes to the truth. He studied the
holy scriptures under the disciples of the apostles, and his thirst
after sacred learning brought him to Alexandria in Egypt, where the
disciples of St. Mark had instituted a celebrated school of the
Christian doctrine. Pantænus sought not to display his talents in
that great mart of literature and commerce; but his great progress
in sacred learning was after some time discovered, and he was drawn
out of that obscurity in which his humility sought to live buried.
Being placed at the head of the Christian school some time before
the year 179, which was the first of Commodus, by his learning and
excellent manner of teaching he raised its reputation above all the
schools of the philosophers, and the lessons which he read, and which
were gathered from the flowers of the prophets and apostles, conveyed
light and knowledge into the minds of all his hearers, as St. Clement
of Alexandria, his eminent scholar, says of him. The Indians who
traded to Alexandria, entreated him to pay their country a visit, in
order to confute their Brachmans. Hereupon he forsook his school, and
was established by Demetrius, who was made bishop of Alexandria in
189, preacher of the gospel to the Eastern nations. Eusebius tells
us that St. Pantænus found some seeds of the faith already sown in
the Indies, and a book of the gospel of St. Matthew in Hebrew, which
St. Bartholomew had carried thither. He brought it back with him to
Alexandria, whither he returned after he had zealously employed some
years in instructing the Indians in the faith. The public school was
at that time governed by St. Clement, but St. Pantænus continued
to teach in private till in the reign of Caracalla, consequently
before the year 216, he closed a noble and excellent life by a happy
death, as Rufinus writes.[59] His name is inserted in all Western
Martyrologies on the 7th of July.

* * * * *

The beauty of the Christian morality, and the sanctity of its
faithful professors, which by their charms converted this true
philosopher, appear nowhere to greater advantage than when they
are compared with the imperfect and often false virtue of the most
famous sages of the heathen world.[60] Into what contradictions and
gross errors did they fall, even about the divinity itself and the
sovereign good! To how many vices did they give the name of virtues!
How many crimes did they canonize! It is true they showed indeed a
zeal for justice, a contempt of riches and pleasures, moderation
in prosperity, patience in adversities, generosity, courage, and
disinterestedness. But these were rather shadows and phantoms than
real virtues, if they sprang from a principle of vanity and pride, or
were infected with the poison of interestedness or any other vitiated
intention, which they often betrayed, nay, sometimes openly avowed,
and made a subject of their vain boasts.

SAINT WILLIBALD, BISHOP OF AICHSTADT, C.

He was son of the holy king St. Richard, and was born about the
year 704 in the kingdom of the West-Saxons, about the place where
Southampton now stands. When he was three years old his life was
despaired of in a violent sickness; but when all natural remedies
proved unsuccessful, his parents carried him and laid him at the
foot of a great cross which was erected in a public place near their
house, according to the custom in Catholic countries to this day.
There they poured forth their prayers with great fervor, and made a
promise to God that in case the child recovered they would consecrate
him to the divine service. God accepted their pious offering, and the
child was immediately restored to his health. St. Richard kept the
child two years longer at home, but only regarded him as a sacred
depositum committed to him by God; and when he was five years old
placed him under the abbot Egbald, and other holy tutors in the
monastery of Waltheim. The young saint, from the first use of his
reason, in all his thoughts and actions seemed to aspire only to
heaven, and his heart seemed full only of God and his holy love. He
left this monastery about the year 721, when he was seventeen years
old, and his brother Winibald nineteen, to accompany his father and
brother in a pilgrimage of devotion to the tombs of the apostles at
Rome, and to the Holy Land. They visited many churches in France on
their road; but St. Richard died at Lucca, where his relics are still
venerated in the church of St. Fridian, and he is commemorated in the
Roman Martyrology on the 7th of February. The two sons went on to
Rome, and there took the monastic habit.

Above two years after this, Winibald having been obliged to return
to England, St. Willibald with two or three young Englishmen set out
to visit the holy places which Christ had sanctified by his sacred
presence on earth. They added most severe mortifications to the
incredible fatigues of their journey, living only on bread and water,
and at land using no other bed than the bare ground. They sailed
first to Cyprus and thence into Syria. At Emesa St. Willibald was
taken by the Saracens for a spy, was loaded with irons, and suffered
much in severe confinement for several months, till certain persons
who were charmed with his wonderful virtue, and moved with compassion
for his disaster, satisfied the caliph of his innocence, and procured
his enlargement. The holy pilgrims expressed their gratitude to
their benefactors, and pursued their journey to the holy places.
They resolved in visiting them to follow our Divine Redeemer in the
course of his mortal life; and therefore they began their devotions
at Nazareth. Our saint passed there some days with his companions in
the continual contemplation of the infinite mercies of God in the
great mystery of the incarnation; and the sight of the place in which
it was wrought drew from his eyes streams of devout tears during
all the time of his stay in that town. From Nazareth he went to
Bethlehem, and thence into Egypt, making no account of the fatigues
and hardships of his journey, and assiduously meditating on what our
Blessed Redeemer had suffered in the same. He returned to Nazareth,
and thence travelled to Cana, Capharnaum, and Jerusalem. In this last
place he made a long stay to satisfy his fervor in adoring Christ in
the places where he wrought so many great mysteries, particularly
on the mountains of Calvary and Olivet, the theatres of his sacred
death and ascension. He likewise visited all the famous monasteries,
lauras, and hermitages in that country, with an ardent desire of
learning and imitating all the most perfect practices of virtue, and
whatever might seem most conducive to the sanctification of his soul.
The tender and lively sentiments of devotion with which his fervent
contemplation on the holy mysteries of our redemption inspired him
at the sight of all those sacred places, filled his devout soul with
heavenly consolations, and made on it strong and lasting impressions.
In his return a severe sickness at Acon exercised his patience and
resignation. After seven years employed in this pilgrimage he arrived
safe with his companions in Italy.

The celebrated monastery of Mount Cassino having been lately repaired
by pope Gregory II. the saint chose that house for his residence,
and his fervent example contributed very much to settle in it the
primitive spirit of its holy institute during the ten years that he
lived there. He was first appointed sacristan, afterward dean or
superior over ten monks, and during the last eight years porter,
which was an office of great trust and importance, and required a
rooted habit of virtue which might suffer no abatement by external
employs and frequent commerce with seculars. It happened that in
738 St. Boniface coming to Rome begged of pope Gregory III. that
Willibald, who was his cousin, might be sent to assist him in his
missions in Germany. The pope desired to see the monk, and was much
delighted with the history of his travels, and edified with his
virtue. In the close of their conversation he acquainted him of
bishop Boniface’s request. Willibald desired to go back at least to
obtain the leave and blessing of his abbot; but the pope told him
his order sufficed, and commanded him to go without more ado into
Germany. The saint replied that he was ready to go wheresoever his
holiness should think fit. Accordingly he set out for Thuringia where
St. Boniface then was, by whom he was ordained priest. His labors in
the country about Aichstadt, in Franconia and Bavaria, were crowned
with incredible success, and he was no less powerful in words than in
works.

In 746 he was consecrated by St. Boniface bishop of Aichstadt.
This dignity gave his humility much to suffer, but it exceedingly
excited his zeal. The cultivation of so rough a vineyard was a
laborious and painful task; but his heroic patience and invincible
meekness overcame all difficulties. His charity was most tender
and compassionate, and he had a singular talent in comforting the
afflicted. He founded a monastery which resembled in discipline
that of Mount Cassino, to which he often retired. But his love of
solitude diminished not his pastoral solicitude for his flock. He was
attentive to all their spiritual necessities, he visited often every
part of his charge, and instructed all his people with indefatigable
zeal and charity. His fasts were most austere, nor did he allow
himself any indulgence in them or in his labors on account of his
great age, till his strength was entirely exhausted. Having labored
almost forty-five years in regulating and sanctifying his diocess, he
died at Aichstadt on the 7th of June, 790, being eighty-seven years
old. He was honored with miracles, and buried in his own cathedral.
Pope Leo VII. canonized him in 938. In 1270 the bishop Hildebrand
built a church in his honor, into which his relics were translated,
and are honorably preserved to this day; but a portion is honored
at Furnes in Flanders. See the three lives of St. Willibald written
by contemporary authors, especially that by a nun of his sister St.
Walburga’s monastery. She gives from the saint’s own relation a
curious and useful description of the Holy Land, as it stood in that
age; which is rendered more curious by the notes of Mabillon, and
those of Basnage in his edition of Canisius’s Lect. Antiquæ. On St.
Willibald, see Solier the Bollandist, t. 2, Julij, p. 485.

ST. HEDDA, B. C.

He was an English Saxon, a monk of the monastery of St. Hilda, and
was made bishop of the West-Saxons in 676. He resided first at
Dorchester near Oxford, but afterward removed his see to Winchester.
King Ceadwal going to Rome to be baptized died there, and was buried
in the church of St. Peter in 688. His kinsman Ina succeeded him in
the throne.[61] In his wise and wholesome laws, the most ancient
extant among those of our English Saxon kings, enacted by him in a
great council of bishops and ealdermen in 693, he declares that in
drawing them up he had been assisted by the counsels of St. Hedda and
St. Erconwald.[62] In these laws theft is ordained to be punished
with cutting off a hand or a foot; robbery on the highway, committed
by a band not under seven in number, with death, unless the criminal
redeem his life according to the estimation of his head. Church dues
are ordered to be paid under a penalty of forty shillings; and if any
master order a servant to do any work on a Sunday, the servant is
made free and the master amerced thirty shillings. St. Hedda governed
his church with great sanctity about thirty years, and departed to
the Lord on the 7th of July, 705. Bede[63] and William of Malmesbury
assure us, that his tomb was illustrated by many miracles. His name
is placed in the Roman Martyrology. See Solier the Bollandist, t. 2,
Julij, p. 482.

ST. EDELBURGA, V.

She was daughter to Anna king of the East Angles, and out of a
desire of attaining to Christian perfection, went into France, and
there consecrated herself to God in the monastery of Faremoutier,
in the forest of Brie, in the government of which she succeeded its
foundress St. Fara. After her death her body remained uncorrupt,
as Bede testifies.[64] She is honored in the Roman, French, and
English Martyrologies on this day.[65] In these latter her niece
St. Earcongota is named with her. She was daughter to Earconbercht
king of Kent, and of St. Sexburga; accompanied St. Edelburga to
Faremoutier, and there taking the veil with her, lived a great
example of all virtues, and was honored after her happy death by many
miracles, as Bede relates. Hereswide, the wife of king Anna, the
mother of many saints, after the death of her husband, retired also
into France, and consecrated herself to God in the famous monastery
of Cale or Chelles, five leagues from Paris, near the marne (founded
by St. Clotilda, but chiefly endowed by St. Bathildes), where she
persevered, advancing daily in holy fervor to her happy death. See
the history of the monastery of Chelles in the sixth tome of the late
history of the diocess of Paris, by Abbé Lebeuf, and Solier on this
day, p. 481, &c.

ST. FELIX, BISHOP OF NANTES, C.

The most illustrious among the bishops of Nantes was saint Felix,
a person of the first rank in Aquitain, some say of Bourges in the
First Aquitain; others more probably think of the Second Aquitain
on the sea-coast and nearer Brittany. In the world he was more
illustrious by his virtue, his eloquence, and learning, than by his
dignities and high birth. The Greek language was as familiar to him
as his own; he was a poet and orator, and seems from Fortunatus’s
expression to have written a panegyric on the queen St. Radegundes
in verse. He had been married when he was called to succeed Evemer,
the holy bishop of Nantes, toward the close of the year 549, in
the 37th year of his age. His zeal for discipline and good order
appeared in the regulations he made for his own diocess, and in the
decrees of the third council of Paris in 557, in the second of Tours
in 566, and the fourth of Paris in 573. His charity to the poor had
no other bounds but those of their necessities, and considering
that the revenues of the Church were the patrimony of the poor, he
reserved to himself only the prudent and troublesome administration
of them for their use. He sold for them and the Church his own
patrimony, and made it his study and earnest endeavor that no one
in his diocess should pass unrelieved in distress. His predecessor
had formed a project of building a cathedral within the walls of the
city of Nantes, which Felix executed in the most magnificent manner.
Fortunatus describes it to have been composed of three naves, of
which the middle was supported by great pillars. A great cupola was
raised in the middle. The church was covered with tin, and within was
only azure, gold, mosaic, paintings, pilasters, foliages, various
figures, and other ornaments. Euphronius archbishop of Tours, and the
bishops of Angers, Mans, Rennes, Poitiers, and Angouleme performed
the dedication; no bishop of the Britons was invited to the ceremony;
for which it appears that their commerce with the French was not
entirely free. The Britons were then possessed of no lands in the
diocess of Nantes except the territory of Croisic, in which was the
palace of Aula Quiriaca or Guerrande, vulgarly Warand, probably so
called from Guerech I. the British count of Vannes, who resided
there. Canao, one of his successors, when Felix was made bishop, had
put to death three of his brothers, and held a fourth named Macliau
in prison. St. Felix by his intercession saved his life, and obtained
his liberty. St. Gregory of Tours complains that bishop Felix had
been prepossessed by false informations against Peter, Gregory’s
brother, and accused him of favoring an unworthy nephew; but in
other places bears testimony to his eminent sanctity, which is much
extolled by Fortunatus and others. Guerech II. count of Vannes,
plundered the diocesses of Rennes and Vannes, and repulsed the troops
which king Chilperic sent against him; but, at the entreaties of St.
Felix, withdrew his forces, and made peace. The holy prelate died on
the 8th of January in 584, the seventieth year of his age, of his
episcopal dignity thirty-three.

He is honored at Nantes, of which he was the sixteenth bishop from
St. Clair, on the 7th of July, the day of the translation of his
relics. See Fortunatus, l. 3, c. 4, 5, 6, 7. St. Gregory of Tours,
l. 5, c. 5. Ceillier, t. 16, p. 562. M. Travers, Histoire abrégée
des Evêques de Nantes, tome 7, part 2, des Mémoires de Littérature
recueillis par P. Desmolets de l’Oratoire. Stilting the Bollandist,
t. 2, Jul. p. 470. Lobineau, Vies des SS. de Bretagne, p. 121.

ST. BENEDICT XI. POPE, C.

His family name was Nicholas Bocasini. He was a native of Treviso,
which city was then an independent commonwealth, but since the year
1336 is subject to that of Venice. He was born in 1240, and studied
first at Treviso, and afterwards at Venice, where, at fourteen years
of age, he took the habit of St. Dominick. He seemed desirous to
set no bounds to his fervor and fidelity in the practice of every
means of improving his soul daily in virtue: and, during fourteen
years, enriched his mind with an uncommon store of sacred learning.
After this term he was appointed professor and preacher at Venice
and Bologna, and with incredible fruit communicated to others
those spiritual riches which he had treasured up in silence and
retirement, being always careful by the same means to preserve and
increase his own stock. He wrote several sermons and comments on the
holy scripture, which are still extant. He was chosen provincial
of Lombardy, and, in 1296, the ninth general of his Order. On that
occasion, by a pathetic circular letter,[66] he exhorted his brethren
to a love of poverty, humility, retirement, prayer, charity, and
obedience. In 1297 he was sent by Boniface VIII. nuncio into France,
to be the mediator of peace between that nation and the English; and
was created cardinal during his residence there in 1298. Nothing
but the strict command of his Holiness could have obliged him to
accept that dignity, which cost him many tears. He was made soon
after bishop of Ostia, and dean of the sacred college; and in 1301
went legate _a latere_ into Hungary, to endeavor to compose the
differences which divided that nation into factions, and had already
laid it waste by a dreadful civil war; in which cardinal Boncasini
succeeded to a miracle. He also abolished in that country several
superstitious practices, and other abuses and scandals. He afterward
exerted his zeal in Austria and at Venice, being successively legate
in both those places.

Boniface VIII. dying on the 11th of October, 1303, the cardinals
entered the conclave on the 21st of the same month, and on the
day following unanimously chose our saint pope. He was seized
with trembling at the news; but being compelled to acquiesce, was
crowned on the following Sunday. He continued his former practices
of humility, mortification, and penance. When his mother came to
his court in rich attire, he refused to see her till she had put on
again her former mean apparel. Rome was at that time torn by civil
divisions, especially by the factions of the Colonnas against the
late pope, but the moderation, meekness, and prudence of our saint
soon restored the whole country to perfect tranquillity. He pardoned
the Colonnas and other rebels, Sciarra Colonna and William of Nogaret
excepted, who remained under the former sentence of proscription.
He pacified Denmark, and other kingdoms of the North, and appeased
the State and Church of France. He reconciled the cities of Venice
and Padua without effusion of blood. He joined his zealous endeavors
with Helena, queen of Servia, in the conversion of her son Orosius.
This good pope died the martyr of peace, to make which reign over
the whole Christian world he seemed only to have lived. Having sat
only eight months and seventeen days, he departed this life at
Perugia, on the 6th of July, in the year of our Lord, 1304, of his
age sixty-three. Some say he died of poison secretly given him by
the contrivance of certain wicked men who were enemies to the public
tranquillity. He was honored by miracles, examined and approved by
the bishop of Perugia, and attested by Platina and other historians.
See Conc. t. 10, also his life collected by Pagi, in his Annals, and
in an express work by the late learned Dominican, F. Peter Thomas
Campana; and Vie de S. Benoit XI. ou Caractère de la Sainteté du B.
Benoit XI. à Toulouse, 1739. See also F. Touron, Hommes Illustres, t.
1, l. 7, p. 655, and Benedict XIV. de Canoniz, t. 4, Append. and in
his new Roman Martyrology on the 7th of July.

JULY VIII.

SAINT ELIZABETH, QUEEN OF PORTUGAL.

From her Authentic Life, written by a Franciscan friar;
Mariana, and other Spanish historians. See Janning the
Bollandist, Julij, t. 2, ad diem 4, p. 169.

A. D. 1336.

St. Elizabeth was daughter of Peter III. king of Arragon, and
grand-daughter of James I. who had been educated under the care of
St. Peter Nolasco, and was surnamed the Saint, and from the taking
of Majorca and Valentia, Expugnator or the Conqueror. Her mother,
Constantia, was daughter of Manfred king of Sicily, and grandchild
to the Emperor Frederic II. Our saint was born in 1271, and received
at the baptismal font by the name of Elizabeth, from her aunt, St.
Elizabeth of Hungary, who had been canonized by Gregory IX. in 1235.
Her birth established a good understanding between her grandfather
James, who was then on the throne, and her father, whose quarrel had
divided the whole kingdom. The former took upon himself the care of
her education, inspired her with an ardor for piety above her age,
though he died in 1276 (having reigned sixty-three years), before she
had completed the sixth year of her age.

Her father succeeded to the crown, and was careful to place most
virtuous persons about his daughter, whose example might be to her
a constant spur to all virtue. The young princess was of a most
sweet and mild disposition, and from her tender years had no relish
for anything but what was conducive to piety and devotion. It was
doing her the most sensible pleasure if any one promised to lead her
to some chapel to say a prayer. At eight years of age she began to
fast on vigils, and to practise great self-denials; nor could she
bear to hear the tenderness of her years and constitution alleged
as a reason that she ought not to fast or macerate her tender body.
Her fervor made her eagerly to desire that she might have a share
in every exercise of virtue which she saw practised by others, and
she had been already taught that the frequent mortification of the
senses, and still more of the will, is to be joined with prayer to
obtain the grace which restrains the passions, and prevents their
revolt. How little is this most important maxim considered by those
parents who excite and fortify the passions of children, by teaching
them a love of vanities, and indulging them in gratifications of
sense! If rigorous fasts suit not their tender age, a submission of
the will, perfect obedience, and humble modesty, are in no time of
life more indispensably to be inculcated; nor is any abstinence more
necessary than that by which children are taught never to drink or
eat out of meals, to bear several little denials in them without
uneasiness, and never eagerly to crave anything. The easy and happy
victory of Elizabeth over herself was owing to this early and perfect
temperance, submissiveness, and sincere humility. Esteeming virtue
her only advantage and delight, she abhorred romances and idle
entertainments, shunned the usual amusements of children, and was an
enemy to all the vanities of the world. She could bear no other songs
than sacred hymns and psalms; and from her childhood said every day
the whole office of the breviary, in which no priest could be more
scrupulously exact. Her tenderness and compassion for the poor made
her, even in that tender age, to be styled their mother.

At twelve years of age she was given in marriage to Dionysius, king
of Portugal. That prince had considered in her, birth, beauty,
riches, and sprightliness of genius, more than virtue; yet he allowed
her an entire liberty in her devotions, and exceedingly esteemed and
admired her extraordinary piety. She found no temptation to pride in
the dazzling splendor of a crown, and could say with Esther, that her
heart never found any delight in the glory, riches, and grandeur with
which she was surrounded. She was sensible that regularity in our
actions is necessary to virtue, this being in itself most agreeable
to God, who shows in all his works how much he is the lover of order;
also a prudent distribution of time fixes the fickleness of the
human mind, hinders frequent omissions of pious exercises, and is a
means to prevent our being ever idle and being governed by humor and
caprice in what we do, by which motives a disguised self-love easily
insinuates itself into our ordinary actions. Our saint therefore
planned for herself a regular distribution of her whole time, and
of her religious exercises, which she never interrupted, unless
extraordinary occasions of duty or charity obliged her to change the
order of her daily practices. She rose very early every morning, and
after a long morning exercise, and a pious meditation, she recited
matins, lauds and prime of the Church office. Then she heard mass,
at which she communicated frequently every week. She said every day
also the little office of our Lady, and that of the dead: and in the
afternoon had other regular devotions after even-song or vespers.
She retired often into her oratory to her pious books, and allotted
certain hours to attend her domestic affairs, public business, or
what she owed to others. All her spare time she employed in pious
reading, or in working for the altar, or the poor, and she made her
ladies of honor do the like. She found no time to spend in vain
sports and recreations, or in idle discourse or entertainments. She
was most abstemious in her diet, mean in her attire, humble, meek,
and affable in conversation, and wholly bent upon the service of
God in all her actions. Admirable was her spirit of compunction,
and of holy prayer; and she poured forth her heart before God with
most feeling sentiments of divine love, and often watered her cheeks
and the very ground with abundant tears of sweet devotion. Frequent
attempts were made to prevail with her to moderate her austerities,
but she always answered that if Christ assures us that his spirit
cannot find place in a life of softness and pleasure, mortification
is nowhere more necessary than on the throne, where the passions
find more dangerous incentives. She fasted three days a week, many
vigils besides those prescribed by the Church; all Advent; a Lent
of devotion, from the feast of St. John Baptist to the feast of the
Assumption; and soon after this she began another Lent, which she
continued to St. Michael’s day. On all Fridays and Saturdays, on the
eves of all festivals of the Blessed Virgin and the apostles, and on
many other days, her fast was on bread and water. She often visited
churches and places of devotion on foot.

Charity to the poor was a distinguishing part of her character.
She gave constant orders to have all pilgrims and poor strangers
provided for with lodging and necessaries. She made it her business
to seek out and secretly relieve persons of good condition who were
reduced to necessity, yet out of shame durst not make known their
wants. She was very liberal in furnishing fortunes to poor young
women, that they might marry according to their condition, and not
be exposed to the danger of losing their virtue. She visited the
sick, served them, and dressed and kissed their most loathsome
sores. She founded in different parts of the kingdom many pious
establishments, particularly an hospital near her own palace at
Coïmbra, a house for penitent women who had been seduced into evil
courses, at Torres-Novas, and an hospital for foundlings, or those
children who, for want of due provision, are exposed to the danger
of perishing by poverty, or the neglect and cruelty of unnatural
parents. She was utterly regardless of her own conveniences, and so
attentive to the poor and afflicted persons of the whole kingdom,
that she seemed almost wholly to belong to them; not that she
neglected any other duties which she owed to her neighbor, for she
made it her principal study to pay to her husband the most dutiful
respect, love, and obedience, and bore his injuries with invincible
meekness and patience. Though king Dionysius was a friend of justice,
and a valiant, bountiful, and compassionate prince, yet he was, in
his youth, a worldly man, and defiled the sanctity of the nuptial
state with abominable lusts. The good queen used all her endeavors
to reclaim him, grieving most sensibly for the offence of God,
and the scandal given to the people; and she never ceased to weep
herself, and to procure the prayers of others for his conversion.
She strove to gain him only by courtesy, and with constant sweetness
and cheerfulness cherished his natural children, and took great care
of their education. By these means she softened the heart of the
king, who, by the succor of a powerful grace, rose out of the filthy
puddle in which he had wallowed for a long time, and kept ever after
the fidelity that was due to his virtuous consort. He instituted the
order of Christ in 1318; founded, with a truly royal magnificence,
the university of Coïmbra, and adorned his kingdom with public
buildings. His extraordinary virtues, particularly his liberality,
justice, and constancy, are highly extolled by the Portuguese,
and after his entire conversion, he was the idol and glory of his
people. A little time before his perfect conversion there happened an
extraordinary accident. The queen had a very pious, faithful page,
whom she employed in the distribution of her secret alms. A wicked
fellow-page envying him on account of this favor, to which his virtue
and services entitled him, treacherously suggested to his majesty
that the queen showed a fondness for that page. The prince, who by
his own sensual heart was easily inclined to judge ill of others,
gave credit to the slander, and resolved to take away the life of
the innocent youth. For this purpose he gave order to a lime-burner,
that if on such a day he sent to him a page with this errand to
inquire, “Whether he had fulfilled the king’s commands?” he should
take him and cast him into the lime-kiln, there to be burnt; for
that death he had justly incurred, and the execution was expedient
for the king’s service. On the day appointed he despatched the page
with this message to the lime-kiln; but the devout youth on the road
passing by a church, heard the bell ring at the elevation at mass,
went in and prayed there devoutly; for it was his pious custom, if
he ever heard the sign given by the bell for the elevation, always
to go thither, and not depart till mass was ended. It happened, on
that occasion, that as the first was not a whole mass, and it was
with him a constant rule to hear mass every day, he stayed in the
church, and heard successively two other masses. In the meantime, the
king, who was impatient to know if his orders had been executed, sent
the informer to the lime-kiln, to inquire whether his commands had
been obeyed; but as soon as he was come to the kiln, and had asked
the question, the man, supposing him to be the messenger meant by
the king’s order, seized him, and threw him into the burning lime,
where he was soon consumed. Thus was the innocent protected by his
devotion, and the slanderer was overtaken by divine justice. The page
who had heard the masses went afterward to the lime-kiln, and having
asked whether his majesty’s commands had been yet executed, brought
him back word that they were. The king was almost out of himself
with surprise when he saw him come back with this message, and being
soon informed of the particulars, he easily discovered the innocence
of the pious youth, adored the divine judgments, and ever after
respected the great virtue and sanctity of his queen.

St. Elizabeth had by the king two children, Alphonsus, who afterward
succeeded his father, and Constantia, who was married to Ferdinand
IV., king of Castille. This son, when grown up, married the infanta
of Castille, and soon after revolting against his own father, put
himself at the head of an army of malecontents. St. Elizabeth had
recourse to weeping, prayer, fasting, and almsdeeds, and exhorted
her son in the strongest terms to return to his duty, conjuring
her husband at the same time to forgive him. Pope John XXII. wrote
to her, commending her religious and prudent conduct; but certain
court flatterers whispering to the king that she was suspected of
favoring her son, he, whom jealousy made credulous, banished her to
the city of Alanquer. The queen received this disgrace with admirable
patience and peace of mind, and made use of the opportunity which
her retirement afforded, to redouble her austerities and devotions.
She never would entertain any correspondence with the malecontents,
nor listen to any suggestions from them. The king himself admired
her goodness, meekness, and humility under her disgrace; and shortly
after called her back to court, and showed her greater love and
respect than ever. In all her troubles she committed herself to the
sweet disposal of divine providence, considering that she was always
under the protection of God, her merciful father.

Being herself of the most sweet and peaceable disposition, she was
always most active and industrious in composing all differences
between neighbors, especially in averting war, with the train of all
the most terrible evils which attend it. She reconciled her husband
and son, when their armies were marching one against the other; and
she reduced all the subjects to duty and obedience. She made peace
between Ferdinand IV., king of Castille, and Alphonsus de la Cerda,
his cousin-german, who disputed the crown: likewise between James
II., king of Arragon, her own brother, and Ferdinand IV., the king
of Castille, her son-in-law. In order to effect this last she took
a journey with her husband into both those kingdoms, and to the
great satisfaction of the Christian world, put a happy period to all
dissensions and debates between those states. After this charitable
work, king Dionysius, having reigned forty-five years, fell sick. St.
Elizabeth gave him most signal testimonies of her love and affection,
scarce ever leaving his chamber during his illness, unless to go to
the church, and taking infinite pains to serve and attend him. But
her main care and solicitude was to secure his eternal happiness, and
to procure that he might depart this life in sentiments of perfect
repentance and piety. For this purpose she gave bountiful alms,
and caused many prayers and masses to be said. During his long and
tedious illness he gave great marks of sincere compunction, and died
at Santaren, on the 6th of January, 1325. As soon as he had expired,
the queen retired into her oratory, commended his soul to God, and
consecrating herself to the divine service, put on the habit of the
third Order of Saint Francis. She attended the funeral procession,
with her husband’s corpse, to Odiveras, where he had chosen his
burying-place in a famous church of Cistercian monks. After a
considerable stay there, she made a pilgrimage to Compostella, and
returning to Odiveras, celebrated there her husband’s anniversary
with great solemnity; after which she retired to a convent of Clares,
which she had begun to rebuild before the death of her husband. She
was desirous to make her religious profession, but was diverted
from that design for some time upon a motive of charity, that she
might continue to support an infinity of poor people by her alms and
protection. She therefore contented herself at first with wearing
the habit of the third Order, living in a house which she built
contiguous to her great nunnery, in which she assembled ninety devout
nuns. She often visited them, and sometimes served them at table,
having for her companion in this practice of charity and humility
her daughter-in-law, Beatrix, the queen then reigning. However, by
authentic historical proofs it is evinced that before her death
she made her religious profession in the aforesaid third Order, as
pope Urban VIII., after mature discussion of those monuments, has
declared.[67]

A war being lighted up between her son Alphonsus IV., surnamed the
brave, king of Portugal, and her grandson, Alphonsus XI., king of
Castille, and armies being set on foot, she was startled at the news,
and resolved to set out to reconcile them, and extinguish the fire
that was kindling. Her servants endeavored to persuade her to defer
her journey, on account of the excessive heats, but she made answer
that she could not better expend her health and her life than by
seeking to prevent the miseries and calamities of a war. The very
news of her journey disposed both parties to peace. She went to
Estremoz, upon the frontiers of Portugal and Castille, where her son
was; but she arrived ill of a violent fever, which she looked upon
as a messenger sent by God to warn her that the time was at hand
wherein he called her to himself. She strongly exhorted her son to
the love of peace and to a holy life; she confessed several times,
received the holy viaticum on her knees at the foot of the altar,
and shortly after extreme unction; from which time she continued in
fervent prayer, often invoking the Blessed Virgin, and repeating
these words: “Mary, mother of grace, mother of mercy, defend us from
the wicked enemy, and receive us at the hour of our death.” She
appeared overflowing with heavenly joy, and with those consolations
of the Holy Ghost which make death so sweet to the saints; and in the
presence of her son, the king, and of her daughter-in-law, she gave
up her happy soul to God on the 4th of July, in the year 1336, of her
age sixty-five. She was buried with royal pomp in the church of her
monastery of poor Clares, at Coïmbra, and honored by miracles. Leo
X. and Paul IV. granted an office on her festival; and in 1612 her
body was taken up and found entire. It is now richly enshrined in
a magnificent chapel, built on purpose. She was canonized by Urban
VIII. in 1625, and the 8th of July appointed for her festival.

* * * * *

The characteristical virtue of St. Elizabeth was a love of peace.
Christ, the prince of peace, declares his spirit to be the spirit of
humility and meekness; consequently the spirit of peace. Variance,
wrath, and strife, are the works of the flesh, of envy, and pride,
which he condemns, and which exclude from the kingdom of heaven.
Bitterness and contention shut out reason, make the soul deaf to the
motives of religion, and open the understanding to nothing but what
is sinful. To find the way of peace we must be meek and patient,
even under the most violent provocations; we must never resent
any wrong, nor return railing for railing, but good for evil; we
must regard passion as the worst of monsters, and must judge it as
unreasonable to hearken to its suggestions as to choose a madman
for our counsellor in matters of concern and difficulty; above all,
we must abhor it not only as a sin, but as leading to a numberless
variety of other grievous sins and spiritual evils. _Blessed are the
peacemakers_, and all who love and cultivate this virtue among men,
_they shall be called the children of God_, whose badge and image
they bear.

ST. PROCOPIUS, M.

He was a native of Jerusalem, but lived at Bethsan, otherwise called
Scythopolis, where he was reader in the church, and also performed
the function of exorcist, and dispossessing demoniacs, and that of
interpreter of the Greek tongue into the Syro-Chaldaic.[68] He was
a divine man, say his acts, and had always lived in the practice of
great austerity and patience, and in perpetual chastity. He took no
other sustenance than bread and water, and usually abstained from
all food for two or three days together. He was well skilled in the
science of the Greeks, but much more in that of the holy scriptures;
the assiduous meditation on which nourished his soul, and seemed also
to give vigor and strength to his emaciated body. He was admirable
in all virtues, particularly in a heavenly meekness and humility.
Dioclesian’s bloody edicts against the Christians reached Palestine
in April, 303, and Procopius was the first person who received the
crown of martyrdom in that country, in the aforesaid persecution.
He was apprehended at Bethsan and led, with several others, bound
to Cæsarea, our city, say the acts, and was hurried straight before
Paulinus, prefect of the province.[69] The judge commanded the martyr
to sacrifice to the gods. The servant of Christ answered he never
could do it; and this he declared with a firmness and resolution
that seemed to wound the heart of the prefect as if it had been
pierced with a dagger. The martyr added, there is no God but one,
who is the author and preserver of the world. The prefect then bade
him sacrifice to the four emperors, namely Dioclesian, Herculius,
Galerius, and Constantius. This the saint again refused to do, and
had scarce returned his answer but the judge passed sentence upon
him, and he was immediately led to execution and beheaded. He is
honored by the Greeks with the title of The Great Martyr. See his
original Chaldaic Acts, published by Steph. Assemani, t. 2, p. 166,
and a less accurate old Latin translation; given by Ruinart, and
by Henry Valois, Not. in Euseb. l. 8. The author of these acts was
Eusebius of Cæsarea, an eye-witness.

SS. KILIAN BISHOP, COLMAN PRIEST, AND TOTNAN DEACON, MM.

Kilian or Kuln was a holy Irish monk, of noble Scottish extraction.
With two zealous companions he travelled to Rome in 686, and obtained
of pope Conon a commission to preach the gospel to the German
idolaters in Franconia; upon which occasion Kilian was invested
with episcopal authority. The missionaries converted and baptized
great numbers at Wurtzburg, and among others Gosbert, the duke of
that name. This prince had taken to wife Geilana, the relict of his
deceased brother; and though he loved her tenderly, being put in mind
by St. Kilian that such a marriage was condemned and void by the law
of the gospel, he promised to dismiss her, saying that we are bound
to love God above father, mother, or wife. Geilana was tormented in
mind beyond measure at this resolution; jealousy and ambition equally
inflamed her breast; and, as the vengeance of a wicked woman has no
bounds, during the absence of the duke in a military expedition, she
sent assassins, who privately murdered the three holy missionaries in
688. The ruffians were themselves pursued by divine vengeance, and
all perished miserably. St. Burchard, who, in the following century,
was placed by St. Boniface in the episcopal see of Wurtzburg,
translated their relics into his cathedral. A portion of those of
St. Kilian, in a rich shrine, was preserved in the treasury of the
elector of Brunswic-Lunenburg in 1713, as appears from the printed
description of that cabinet. See the acts of these martyrs compiled
by Egilward, monk of St. Burchard’s at Wurtzburg, extant imperfect
in the eleventh century, in Surius, t. 4, entire in Canisius, t. 4,
par. 2, p. 628, and t. 3, ed. Basn., p. 174. Also among the Opuscula
of Serrarius, printed at Mentz in 1611, in the collection of the
writers of Wurtzburg published by Ludewig, p. 966, and in Mabillon
and the Bollandists. See also Thesaurus reliquiarum Electoralis
Brunsvico-Luneburgicus. Hanoveræ, 1713, and Solier, t. 2, Julij, p.
600.

ST. WITHBURGE, V.

She was the youngest of the four sisters, all saints, daughters of
Annas the holy king of the East-Angles. In her tender years she
devoted herself to the divine service, and led an austere life in
close solitude for several years at Holkham, an estate of the king
her father, near the sea-coast in Norfolk, where a church, afterward
called Withburgstow, was built. After the death of her father she
changed her dwelling to another estate of the crown called Dereham.
This is at present a considerable market-town in Norfolk, but was
then an obscure retired place. Withburge assembled there many devout
virgins, and laid the foundation of a great church and nunnery, but
did not live to finish the buildings. Her holy death happened on
the 17th of March, 743. Her body was interred in the church-yard of
Dereham, and fifty-five years after, found uncorrupt, and translated
into the church. One hundred and seventy-six years after this, in
974, Brithnoth (the first abbot of Ely, after that house, which had
been destroyed by the Danes, was rebuilt), with the consent of king
Edgar, removed it to Ely, and deposited it near the bodies of her
two sisters. In 1106 the remains of the four saints were translated
into the new church and laid near the high altar. The bodies of SS.
Sexburga and Ermenilda were reduced to dust, except the bones. That
of St. Audry was entire, and that of St. Withburge was not only sound
but also fresh, and the limbs perfectly flexible. Warner, a monk of
Westminster, showed this to all the people, by lifting up and moving
several ways the hands, arms, and feet. Herbert bishop of Thetford,
who in 1094 translated his see to Norwich, and many other persons of
distinction, were eye-witnesses hereof. This is related by Thomas,
monk of Ely, in his history of Ely,[70] which he wrote the year
following, 1107. This author tells us, that in the place where St.
Withburge was first buried, in the church-yard of Dereham, a large
fine spring of most clear water gushes forth.[71] It is to this day
called St. Withburge’s well, was formerly very famous, and is paved,
covered, and inclosed; a stream from it forms another small well
without the church-yard. See her life, and Leland, Collect. vol. iii.
p. 167.

B. THEOBALD, ABBOT.

He was by his virtue the great ornament of the illustrious family
of Montmorency in France. He was born in the castle of Marli. His
father, Bouchard of Montmorency, gave him an education suitable to
his birth, and trained him up to the profession of arms, in which so
many heroes of that family have signalized themselves. But Theobald
manifested from his infancy a strong inclination to a state of
holy retirement, dreading the least shadow of danger which could
threaten his innocence. He spent great part of his time in prayer,
and resorted often to the church of the nunnery called Port-Royal,
which had been founded in 1204 by Matthew of Montmorency, and on
which his father Bouchard had bestowed so many estates that he was
regarded as a second founder. Theobald took the Cistercian habit at
Vaux de Cernay in 1220, and was chosen abbot of that house in 1234.
He lived in the midst of his brethren as the servant of every one,
and surpassed all others in his love of poverty, silence, and holy
prayer. He was highly esteemed by St. Lewis. His happy death happened
in 1247. His shrine in his abbey is visited by a great concourse of
people on the Whitsun-holidays. His solemn festival is there kept on
the 8th, and in some places on the 9th of July, probably the day on
which the first translation of his relics was made. The Bollandists
defer his life to the 8th of December, the day of his death. See Le
Nain, Histoire de Citeaux, t. 9.

SAINT GRIMBALD, NATIVE OF ST. OMER, ABBOT.

He was a monk at St. Bertin’s, and with his abbot entertained king
Alfred in that abbey when that prince was going to Rome. This king,
afterward by the advice of Eldred archbishop of Canterbury, sent
messengers to St. Bertin’s to invite Grimbald over into England,
where he arrived, Hugh being twelfth abbot of that monastery, in
the year 885. Asserius, a monk of Menevia or St. David’s, whom king
Alfred honored with his particular esteem, and who was afterward
bishop of Shireburn, was one of these messengers.

The Oxonian writers tell us that Grimbald was appointed first
professor of divinity at Oxford, when he is said to have founded
that university; and that Asserius, John Erigena, and St. Neot
taught there at the same time. The learned Mr. Hearne says not only
that Grimbald built St. Peter’s church in the East, but also that
the eastern vault of his ancient structure is standing to this day,
of which he gives a plan. Upon the death of Eldred archbishop of
Canterbury, king Alfred pressed Grimbald to accept that dignity; but
was not able to extort his consent, and was obliged to allow him to
retire to the church of Winchester. King Alfred’s son and successor
Edward, in compliance with his father’s will, built the New Minstre
close to the old, in which he placed secular canons, says Tanner,
and appointed St. Grimbald abbot over them; this title being then
given to a superior of secular or regular priests. About sixty years
after, bishop Ethelwolph brought in monks in place of those secular
canons. King Henry I. removed this monastery of New Minstre out of
the walls of the city to the place called Hide, which still continued
sometimes to be called St. Grimbald’s monastery. The body of the
great king Alfred was removed by his son from the Old Minstre, and
that of his queen Alswithe from the nunnery of Nunnaminstre, and
deposited together in the New Minstre, afterward in Hide-Monastery.
Nunnaminstre was founded by king Alfred, or rather by his queen
Alswithe. St. Edburge, a daughter of king Edward, was a nun, and,
according to Leland, abbess there. St. Grimbald in his last sickness,
though extremely feeble, gathered strength when the sacred viaticum
was brought, rose out of bed, and received it prostrate on the
ground. After this he desired to be left alone for three days, which
he spent in close union of his heart with God. On the fourth day the
community was called into his chamber, and amidst their prayers the
saint calmly breathed forth his happy soul on the 8th of July in
the year 903, of his age eighty-three. His body was reposed in this
church, and honored amongst its most precious relics. It was taken up
by St. Elphegus, and exposed in a silver shrine. See his life written
by Goscelin, monk of St. Bertin’s; Capgrave; Leland, Collect. t. 1,
p. 18. John Yperius in Chron. S. Bertini; Molan. in Natal. Sanct.
Belgii; Hearne, Præf. in Lelandi Collect. t. 1, p. 28, t. 2, p. 217,
and Præf. in Thomæ Caii Vindicias Oxon. contra Joan. Caium Cantabrig.
p. 27. Woode Ant. Oxon. t. 1, p. 9.

JULY IX.

ST. EPHREM OF EDESSA, C.

DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH.

From his works in the late Vatican edition; also from St.
Gregory of Nyssa, in his panegyric of St. Ephrem; and
from Palladius, Theodoret, Sozomen, &c. See t. 1, Op. St.
Ephrem, Romæ, An. 1743, or St. Ephrem Syri Opera Omnia
Latine. Venetiis, 1755, 2 tomis.

A. D. 378.

This humble deacon was the most illustrious of all the doctors, who,
by their doctrine and writings, have adorned the Syriac church. He
was born in the territory of Nisibis, a strong city on the banks
of the Tigris, in Mesopotamia. His parents lived in the country,
and earned their bread with the sweat of their brows, but were
ennobled by the blood of martyrs in their family, and had themselves
both confessed Christ before the persecutors under Dioclesian, or
his successors. They consecrated Ephrem to God from his cradle,
like another Samuel, but he was eighteen years old when he was
baptized. Before that time he had committed certain faults which
his enlightened conscience extremely exaggerated to him after his
perfect conversion to God, and he never ceased to bewail, with floods
of tears, his ingratitude towards God, in having ever offended him.
Sozomen[72] says these sins were little sallies of anger, into which
he had sometimes fallen with his playfellows in his childhood. The
saint himself mentions in his confession[73] two crimes (as he styles
them) of this age, which called for his tears during his whole life.
The first was, that in play he had driven a neighbor’s cow among the
mountains, where it happened to be killed by a wild beast; the second
was a doubt which once came into his mind in his childhood, whether
God’s particular providence reached to an immediate superintendency
over all our individual actions. This sin he exceedingly magnifies
in his contrition, though it happened before his baptism, and never
proceeded further than a fluctuating thought from ignorance in
his childhood; and in his Testament he thanks God for having been
always preserved by his mercy since his baptism from any error in
faith. Himself assures us that the divine goodness was pleased in
a wonderful manner to discover to him, after this temptation, the
folly of his error, and the wretched blindness of his soul in having
pretended to fathom the secrets of providence.

Within a month after he had been assaulted by the temptation of the
aforesaid doubt, he happened in travelling through the country to be
benighted, and was forced to take up his quarters with a shepherd who
had lost in the wilderness the flock committed to his charge. The
master of the shepherd suspected him guilty of theft, and pursuing
him, found him and Ephrem together, and cast them both into prison,
upon suspicion that they had stolen his sheep. Ephrem was extremely
afflicted at his misfortune, and in the dungeon found seven other
prisoners, who were all falsely accused or suspected of different
crimes, though really guilty of others. When he had lain seven days
in prison in great anguish of mind, an angel appearing to him in
his sleep told him he was sent to show him the justice and wisdom
of divine providence in governing and directing all human events;
and that this should be manifested to him in the case of those
prisoners who seemed to suffer in his company unjustly. The next day
the judge called the prisoners before him, and put two of them to
the torture, in order to compel them to confess their crimes. While
others were tormented, Ephrem stood by the rack trembling and weeping
for himself, under the apprehension of being every moment put to the
question. The bystanders rallied him for his fears, and said--“Ay,
it is thy turn next; it is to no purpose now to weep: why didst thou
not fear to commit the crime?” However, he was not put on the rack,
but sent back to prison. The other prisoners, though innocent of the
crimes of which they were first arraigned, were all convicted of
other misdemeanors, and each of them received the chastisement due
to his offence. As to Ephrem, the true thief having been discovered,
he was honorably acquitted, after seventy days’ confinement. This
event the saint relates at length in his confession.[74] God was
pleased to give him this sensible proof of the sweetness, justice,
and tender goodness of his holy providence, which we are bound to
adore in resignation and silence; waiting until the curtain shall be
drawn aside, and the whole economy of his loving dispensations to his
elect displayed in its true amiable light, and placed in its full
view before our eyes in the next life. Though, to take a view of the
infinite wisdom, justice, and sanctity which God displayeth in all
the dispensations of his providence, we must take into the prospect
the rewards and punishments of the next world, and all the hidden
springs of this adorable mystery of faith; yet his divine goodness
to excite our confidence in him, was pleased, by this revelation to
his servant, to manifest in this instance his attributes justified in
part, even in this life, of which he hath given us a most illustrious
example with regard to holy Job.

St. Ephrem, from the time of his baptism, which he received soon
after this accident, began to be more deeply penetrated with the
fear of the divine judgment, and he had always present to his mind
the rigorous account he was to give to God of all his actions, the
remembrance of which was to him a source of almost uninterrupted
tears. Hoping more easily to secure his salvation in a state in
which his thoughts would never be diverted from it, soon after he
was baptized he took the monastic habit, and put himself under the
direction of a holy abbot, with whose leave he chose for his abode
a little hermitage in the neighborhood of the monastery. He seemed
to set no bounds to his fervor. He lay on the bare ground, often
fasted whole days without eating, and watched a great part of the
night in prayer. It was a rule observed in all the monasteries of
Mesopotamia and Egypt, that every religious man should perform his
task of manual labor, of which he gave an account to his superior at
the end of every week. The work of these monks was always painful,
that it might be a part of their penance; and it was such as was
compatible with private prayer, and a constant attention of the mind
to God; for they always prayed or meditated at their work; and for
this purpose, the first task which was enjoined a young monk was
to get the psalter by heart. The profits of their labor, above the
little pittance which was necessary for their mean subsistence in
their penitential state, were always given to the poor. St. Ephrem
made sails for ships. Of his poverty he writes thus in his Testament:
“Ephrem hath never possessed purse, staff, or scrip, or any other
temporal estate; my heart hath known no affection for gold or silver,
or any earthly goods.” He was naturally choleric, but so perfectly
did he subdue this passion, that meekness was one of the most
conspicuous virtues in his character, and he was usually styled _The
meek_, or _the peaceable man of God_. He was never known to dispute
or contend with any one; with the most obstinate sinners he used only
tears and entreaties. Once, when he had fasted several days, the
brother who was bringing him a mess of pottage made with a few herbs
for his meal, let fall the pot, and broke it. The saint seeing him
in confusion, said cheerfully,--“As our supper will not come to us,
let us go to it.” And sitting down on the ground by the broken pot,
he picked up his meal as well as he could. Humility made the saint
rejoice in the contempt of himself, and sincerely desire that all men
had such a knowledge and opinion of his baseness and nothingness as
to despise him from their hearts, and to look upon him most unworthy
to hold any rank among creatures. This sincere spirit of profound
humility all his words, actions, and writings breathed in a most
affecting manner.

Honors and commendations served to increase the saint’s humility.
Hearing himself one day praised, he was not able to speak, and
his whole body was covered with a violent sweat, caused by the
inward agony and confusion of his soul at the consideration of the
last day; for he was seized with extreme fear and dread, thinking
that he should be then overwhelmed with shame, when his baseness
and hypocrisy should be proclaimed and made manifest before all
creatures, especially those very persons who here commended him, and
whom he had deceived by his hypocrisy. We may hence easily judge how
much the thought of any elevation or honor affrighted him. When a
certain city sought to choose him bishop, he counterfeited himself
mad.

Compunction of heart is the sister of sincere humility and penance,
and nothing seemed more admirable in our saint than this virtue.
Tears seemed always ready to be called forth in torrents as often
as he raised his heart to God, or remembered the sweetness of his
divine love, the rigor of his judgments, or the spiritual miseries
of our souls. “We cannot call to mind his perpetual tears,” says
St. Gregory of Nyssa, “without melting into tears. To weep seemed
almost as natural to him as it is for other men to breathe. Night
and day his eyes seemed always swimming in tears. No one could meet
him at any time, who did not see them trickling down his cheeks.” He
appeared always drowned in an abyss of compunction. This was always
painted in most striking features on his countenance, the sight of
which was, even in his silence, a moving instruction to all that
beheld him. This spirit of compunction gave a singular energy to all
his words and writings; it never forsakes him, even in panegyrics
or in treating of subjects of spiritual joy. Where he speaks of the
felicity of paradise or the sweetness of divine love in transports
of overflowing hope and joy, he never lost sight of the motives
of compunction, and always returns to his tears. By the continual
remembrance of the last judgment he nourished in his soul this
constant profound spirit of compunction.

St. Gregory of Nyssa writes, that no one can read his discourses on
the last judgment without dissolving into tears, so awful is the
representation, and so strong and lively the image which he paints
of that dreadful day. Almost every object he saw called it afresh
to his mind. The spotless purity of our saint was the fruit of his
sincere humility, and constant watchfulness over himself. He says
that the great St. Antony, out of modesty, would never wash his feet,
or suffer any part of his body, except his face and hands, to be seen
naked by any one.

St. Ephrem spent many years in the desert, collected within himself,
having his mind raised above all earthly things, and living as it
were out of the flesh, and out of the world, to use the expression
of St. Gregory Nazianzen. His zeal drew several severe persecutions
upon him from certain tepid monks, but he found a great support in
the example and advice of St. Julian, whose life he has written. He
lost this comfort by the death of that great servant of God; and
about the same time died in 338 (not 350, as Tillemont mistakes), St.
James, bishop of Nisibis, his spiritual director and patron. Not long
after this, God inspired St. Ephrem to leave his own country, and go
to Edessa, there to venerate the relics of the saints, by which are
probably meant chiefly those of the apostle St. Thomas. He likewise
desired to enjoy the conversation of certain holy anchorets who
inhabited the mountains near that city, which was sometimes reckoned
in Mesopotamia and sometimes in Syria. Under the weak reigns of the
last of the Seleucidæ, kings of Asia, it was erected into a small
kingdom by the princes called Abgars. As the saint was going into
Edessa, a certain courtezan fixed her eyes upon him, which when he
perceived he turned away his face, and said with indignation: “Why
dost thou gaze upon me?” To which she made this smart reply. “Woman
was formed from man; but you ought always to keep your eyes cast down
on the earth, out of which man was framed.” St. Ephrem, whose heart
was always filled with the most profound sentiments of humility,
was much struck and pleased with this reflection, and admired the
providence of God, which sends us admonitions by all sorts of means.
He wrote a book on those words of the courtezan, which the Syrians
anciently esteemed the most useful and the best of all the writings
of this incomparable doctor, but it is now lost. It seems to have
contained maxims of humility.

St. Ephrem lived at Edessa, highly honored by all ranks and orders
of men. Being ordained deacon of that church, he became an apostle
of penance, which he preached with incredible zeal and fruit. He
from time to time returned into his desert, there to renew in his
heart the spirit of compunction and prayer; but always came out of
his wilderness, inflamed with the ardor of a Baptist, to announce
the divine truths to a world buried in spiritual darkness and
insensibility. The saint was educated with great natural talents,
which he had improved by study and contemplation. He was a poet, and
had read something of logic; but had no tincture of the rest of the
Grecian philosophy. This want of the heathenish learning and profane
science was supplied by his good sense and uncommon penetration,
and the diligence with which he cultivated his faculties by more
sublime sacred studies. He learned very accurately the doctrine of
the Catholic faith, was well versed in the holy scriptures, and was
a perfect master of the Syriac tongue, in which he wrote with great
elegance and propriety. He was possessed of an extraordinary faculty
of natural eloquence. Words flowed from him like a torrent, which
yet were too slow for the impetuosity and multitude of thoughts with
which he was overwhelmed in speaking on spiritual subjects. His
conceptions were always clear, his diction pure and agreeable. He
spoke with admirable perspicuity, copiousness, and sententiousness,
in an easy unaffected style; and with so much sweetness, so pathetic
a vehemence, so natural an accent, and so strong emotions of his
own heart, that his words seemed to carry with them an irresistible
power. His writings derive great strength from the genius and natural
bold tropes of the Oriental languages applied by so great a master,
and have a graceful beauty and force which no translation can attain;
though his works are only impetuous effusions of an overflowing
heart, not studied compositions. What recommends them beyond all
other advantages of eloquence, is, they are all the language of
the heart, and a heart penetrated with the most perfect sentiments
of divine love, confidence, compunction, humility, and all other
virtues. They present his ardent, humble, and meek soul such as it
was, and show how ardently he was occupied only on the great truths
of salvation; how much he humbled himself without intermission, under
the almighty hand of God, infinite in sanctity and terrible in his
justice; with what profound awe he trembled in the constant attention
to his adorable presence, and at the remembrance of his dreadful
judgment, and with what fervor he both preached and practised the
most austere penance, laboring continually with all his strength
“to prepare himself a treasure for the last hour,” as he expresses
himself. His words strongly imprint upon the souls of others those
sentiments with which he was penetrated: they carry light and
conviction; they never fail to strike, and pierce to the very bottom
of the soul. Nor is the fire which they kindle in the breast a
passing warmth, but a flame which devours and destroys all earthly
affections, transforms the soul into itself, and continues without
abating, the lasting force of its activity.[75] “Who that is proud,”
says St. Gregory of Nyssa, “would not become the humblest of men by
reading his discourse on humility? Who would not be inflamed with a
divine fire by reading his treatise on charity? Who would not wish to
be chaste in heart and spirit, by reading the praises he has given to
virginity?”

The saint, though most austere to himself, was discreet in the
direction of others, and often repeated this advice, that it is
a dangerous stratagem of the enemy to induce fervent converts to
embrace in the beginning excessive mortifications.[76] Wherefore
it behooves them not to undertake without prudent counsel any
extraordinary practices of penance; but always such in which they
will be able to persevere with constancy and cheerfulness. Who ever
laid on a child a burden of a hundred pounds weight, under which he
is sure to fall?

St. Ephrem brought many idolaters to the faith, and converted great
numbers of Arians, Sabellians, and other heretics. Saint Jerom
commends a book which he wrote against the Macedonians, to prove
the divinity of the Holy Ghost. He established the perfect efficacy
of penance against the Novatians, who, though the boldest and most
insolent of men, seemed like children without strength before this
experienced champion, as St. Gregory of Nyssa assures us. Not less
glorious were his triumphs over the Millenarians, Marcionites,
Manichees, and the disciples of the impious Bardesanes, who denied
the resurrection of the flesh, and had in the foregoing century
spread his errors at Edessa, by songs which the people learned
to sing. St. Ephrem, to minister a proper antidote against this
poison, composed elegant Catholic songs and poems which he taught
the inhabitants both of the city and country with great spiritual
advantage. Apollinaris began openly to broach his heresy a little
before the year 376, denying in Christ a human soul, which he
pretended that the divine person supplied in the humanity: whence
it would have followed that he was not truly man, but only assumed
a human body, not the complete human nature. St. Ephrem was then
very old, but he opposed this new monster with great vigor. Several
heresies he crushed in their birth, and he suffered much from the
fury of the Arians under Constantius, and of the Heathens under
Julian, but in both these persecutions reaped glorious laurels and
trophies.

It was by a divine admonition, as himself assures us,[77] that about
the year 372, he undertook a long journey to pay a visit to Basil.
Being arrived at Cæsarea he went to the great church, where he found
the holy bishop preaching. After the sermon, St. Basil sent for him,
and asked him by an interpreter, if he was not Ephrem the servant of
Christ.[78] “I am that Ephrem,” said he, “who have wandered astray
from the path of heaven.” Then melting into tears, and raising his
voice, he cried out,--“O my father, have pity on a sinful wretch,
and lead me into the narrow path.” St. Basil gave him many rules of
holy life, and after long spiritual conferences dismissed him with
great esteem, having first ordained his companion priest. St. Ephrem
himself never would consent to be promoted to the sacerdotal dignity,
of which he expresses the greatest dread and apprehension, in his
sermon on the priesthood.[79] Being returned to Edessa he retired
to a little solitary cell, where he prepared himself for his last
passage, and composed the latter part of his works. For, not content
to labor for the advantage of one age, or one people, he studied
to promote that of all mankind, and all times to come. The public
distress under a great famine called him again out of his retirement
in order to serve, and procure relief for the poor. He engaged the
rich freely to open their coffers, placed beds for the sick in all
the public porticos, visited them every day, and served them with
his own hands. The public calamity being over, he hastened back to
his solitude, where he shortly after sickened of a fever. He wrote
about that time his seventy-six Paræneses or moving exhortations to
penance, consisting in a great measure of most effective prayers;
several of which are used by the Syrians in their Church office. His
confidence in the precious fruits of the holy sacrament of the altar
raised his hope, and inflamed his love, especially in his passage
to eternity. Thus he expresses himself:[80] “Entering upon so long
and dangerous a journey I have my viaticum, even Thee, O Son of God.
In my extreme spiritual hunger, I will feed on thee, the repairer
of mankind. So it shall be that no fire will dare to approach me;
for it will not be able to bear the sweet saving odor of thy body
and blood.” The circumstances of our saint’s death are edifying and
deserve our notice. For nothing more strongly affects our heart, or
makes on it a more sensible impression, than the behavior and words
of great men in their last moments.

St. Ephrem was always filled with grief, indignation, and confusion
when he perceived others to treat him as a saint, or to express any
regard or esteem for him. In his last sickness he laid this strict
injunction on his disciples and friends:[81] “Sing no funeral hymns
at Ephrem’s burial: suffer no encomiastic oration. Wrap not my
carcase in any costly shroud: erect no monument to my memory. Allow
me only the portion and place of a pilgrim; for I am a pilgrim and
a stranger as all my fathers were on earth.” Seeing that several
persons had prepared rich shrouds for his interment, he was much
afflicted, and he charged all those who had such a design to drop it,
and give the money to the poor, which he in particular obliged a rich
nobleman, who had bought a most sumptuous shroud for that purpose,
to do. St. Ephrem, as long as he was able to speak, continued to
exhort all men to the fervent pursuit of virtue, as his last words
sufficiently show, says St. Gregory of Nyssa, meaning the saint’s
Testament, which is still extant genuine, and the same that was
quoted by St. Gregory, Sozomen, &c. In it he says: “I Ephrem die. Be
it known to you all that I write this Testament to conjure you always
to remember me in your prayers after my decease.”[82] This he often
repeats. He protests that he had always lived in the true faith, to
which he exhorts all most firmly to adhere. Deploring and confessing
aloud the vanity and sinfulness of his life, he adjures all present
that no one would suffer his sinful dust to be laid under the altar,
and that no one would take any of his rags for relics, nor show him
any honor, for he was a sinner and the last of creatures. “But,”
says he, “throw my body hastily on your shoulders, and cast me into
my grave, as the abomination of the universe. Let no one praise me;
for I am full of confusion, and the very abstract of baseness. To
show what I am, rather spit upon me, and cover my body with phlegm.
Did you smell the stench of my actions, you would fly from me, and
leave me unburied, not being able to bear the horrible corruption of
my sins.” He forbids any torches or perfumes, ordering his corpse
to be thrown into the common burying-place among poor strangers.
He expresses most feeling sentiments of compunction, and gives his
blessing to his disciples, with a prediction of divine mercy in
their favor; but excepts two among them, Aruad and Paulonas, both
persons famed for eloquence; yet he foresaw that they would afterward
apostatize from the Catholic faith. The whole city was assembled
before the saint’s door, every one being bathed in tears; and all
strove to get as near to him as possible, and to listen to his last
instructions. A lady of great quality named Lamprotata, falling at
his feet, begged his leave to buy a coffin for his interment; to
which he assented, on condition that it should be a very mean one,
and that the lady would promise to renounce all vanities in a spirit
of penance, and never again to be carried on the shoulders of men,
or in a chair; all which she cheerfully engaged herself to perform.
The saint, having ceased to speak, continued in silent prayer till
he calmly gave up his soul to God. He died in a very advanced age
about the year 378. His festival was kept at Edessa immediately after
his death. On it St. Gregory of Nyssa soon after spoke his panegyric
at the request of one Ephrem, who having been taken captive by the
Ismaelites had recommended himself to this saint his patron, and had
been wonderfully delivered from his chains and from many dangers. St.
Gregory closes his discourse with this address to the saint. “You
are now assisting at the divine altar, and before the prince of life
with the angels, praising the most holy Trinity: remember us all, and
obtain for us the pardon of our sins.” The true Martyrology of Bede
calls the 9th of July the day of his deposition; which agrees with
Palladius, who places his death in harvest-time, though the Latins
have long kept his festival on the 1st of February, and the Greeks on
the 28th of January. His perpetual tears, far from disfiguring his
face, made it appear more serene and beautiful, and his very aspect
raised the veneration of all who beheld him. The Greeks paint him
very tall, bent with old age, of a sweet and beautiful countenance,
with his eyes swimming in tears, and the venerable marks of sanctity
in his looks and habit.

Saint Austin says, that Adam in paradise praised God and did not
sigh; but in our present state, a principal function of our prayer
consists in sighs and compunction. Divine love, as St. Gregory
observes,[83] our banishment from God, our dangers, our past sins,
our daily offences, and the weight of our own spiritual miseries,
and those of the whole world, call upon us continually to weep, at
least spiritually and in the desire of our heart, if we cannot always
with our eyes. Every object round about us suggests many motives to
excite our tears. We ought to mingle them even with our hymns of
praise and love. Can we make an act of divine love without being
pierced with bitter grief and contrition, reflecting that we have
been so base and ungrateful as to have offended our infinitely good
God? Can we presume without trembling to sing his praises with our
impure affections, or to pronounce his adorable name with our defiled
lips? And do we not first endeavor by tears of compunction to wash
away the stains of our souls, begging to be sprinkled and cleansed by
hyssop dipped, not in the blood of sheep or goats, but in the blood
of the spotless lamb who died to take away the sins of the world? If
the most innocent among the saints weeps continually from motives of
holy love, how much more ought the sinner to mourn! “The voice of the
turtle hath been heard in our land.”[84] If the turtle, the emblem
of innocence and fidelity, makes its delight to mourn solitary in
this desert, what ought not the unfaithful soul to do? The penitent
sinner, instead of the sighs of the turtle, ought to pour forth his
grief in loud groans, imitating the doleful cries of the ostrich, and
in torrents of tears, by which the deepest sorrow for having offended
so good a God, forces his broken heart to give it vent.

ON THE WRITINGS OF SAINT EPHREM.

The first volume of the Vatican edition of this father’s
works begins with his sermon On Virtues and Vices. He
expresses in it a surprise to see the full seek food from
him who was empty, and says he is confounded to speak,
seeing every word would accuse and condemn himself.
However, trembling, he recommends to his hearers the fear
of God; charity, by which we are meek, patient, tender to
all, desirous to serve, give to all; hope, and longanimity,
by which we bear all; patience, meekness, sweetness to all;
inviolable love of truth in the smallest things, obedience,
temperance, &c., and speaks against all the contrary vices,
envy, detraction, &c.

His two Confessions or Reprehensions of himself are only
effusions of his heart in these dispositions. The first
he begins as follows: “Have pity on me, all ye that have
bowels of compassion.” Then he earnestly begs their prayers
that he may find mercy with God, though he was from his
infancy an useless abandoned vessel. He laments his
spiritual miseries in the most moving words, declaring that
he trembles lest, as flames from heaven devoured him who
presumed to offer profane fire on the altar, so he should
meet with the same judgment for appearing before God in
prayer without having the fire of his divine love in his
heart. He invites all men to weep and pray for him, making
a public confession of the failings which his pure lights
discovered in his affections; for in these, notwithstanding
his extraordinary progress in the contrary virtues, he
seemed to himself to discern covetousness, jealousy, and
sloth, though he appeared of all men the most remote from
the very shadow of those vices; and by tears of compunction
he studied more and more to purify his heart, that God
might vouchsafe perfectly to reign in it. The second part
of this work is a bitter accusation of his pride; which
sin, as he adds, destroys even the gifts of God in a soul,
blasts all her virtues, and renders them a most filthy
abomination; for all our virtues will be tried at the last
day by a fire which only humility can stand. He laments
how pride infects the whole world; that some, by a strange
frenzy, seek to gratify it in earthly fooleries, and the
most silly vanities, on which the opinion of madmen has
stamped a pretended dignity and imaginary value. He laments
bitterly, that even spiritual men are in danger of sinning,
by taking pride in virtue itself, though this be the pure
gift of God; and when by his mercy we are enriched with it,
we are, nevertheless, base and unprofitable servants.

In his second Reprehension of himself, after having
elegantly demonstrated a particular providence inspecting
and governing the minutest affairs and circumstances, he
grievously accuses himself of having entertained a doubt of
it in his youth, before his conversion to God. He condemns
himself as guilty of vain-glory, sloth, lukewarmness,
immortification, irreverence in the church, talkativeness,
contentiousness, and other sins. He fears lest his
repentance should be like that of Esau, and begs the pity
and prayers of all men for an infamous blind leper. He
weeps to see that some men had conceived an esteem for
him to whom none was due; and he cries out to them--“Take
off my false covering, and you will see in me nothing but
worms, stench, and filth: remove the cloak of hypocrisy,
and you will find me a hideous and nauseous sepulchre.”
He compares himself to the Pharisees, as wearing only
the habit of the prophets and saints, to his heavier
condemnation; for vice, covered with a mask of virtue, is
always more odious and detestable. In another Confession
(t. 3, p. 439), after accusing himself of sloth, pride,
uncharitableness, and other sins, he most movingly entreats
all men to weep for him; wishing they could see the extreme
miseries of his heart, which could not fail most powerfully
to excite their compassion, though they could not be able
to bear the hideous sight of the load of his monstrous
iniquities.

His treatise on the Passions is of the same nature, a
lamentation that from his infancy he had been a contemner
of grace, and slothful to virtue, strengthened daily his
passions, and groaned in the midst of snares which made him
fear to live lest he should go on relapsing into sloth.

He has left us many tracts on Compunction, which indeed all
his writings breathe. In the first which bears this title,
he invites all, rich and poor, old and young, to join him
in weeping, to purchase eternal life and to be delivered
from everlasting death: by weeping and crying to see with
the blind man in the gospel, the soul will be enlightened
to see her miseries. God, the angels, all heaven expect and
invite us earnestly to these tears: God’s terrible judgment
is at hand which he describes, and then adds, to prevent
its justice we must weep not one day only, but all the
days of our life, as David did, in affliction, continual
prayer, austerities, and alms. The narrow gate does not
admit others; the Judge will exclude those who sought their
joy on earth and pampered their flesh. Then it will be
too late to trim our lamps, or seek for the oil of good
works; then no more poor will stand at any door for us to
redeem our sins by alms. He laments our spiritual miseries,
especially his sins and sloth continued all his life now
to the eleventh hour. He awakes his soul by the short time
that remains, and that uncertain too.

In his second he relates, that going out of Edessa early
one morning, accompanied with two brethren, and beholding
the heavens beautifully spangled with bright stars, he
said to himself--“If the lustre of these luminaries be so
dazzling, how will the saints shine when Christ shall come
in glory! But suddenly the thought of that terrible day
struck my mind, and I trembled in all my joints, and was
seized with convulsions, and in an agony of fear, sighing
and overwhelmed with a flood of tears, I cried out in
bitter anguish of mind: ‘How shall I be then found! How
shall I stand before that tribunal! A monster infected with
pride among the humble and the perfect, a goat among the
sheep, and a barren tree without fruit. The martyrs will
show their torment, and the monks their virtues; but thou,
alas! O sinful, vain, and arrogant soul, wilt only bear thy
sloth and negligence.’” His two companions, moved by the
excess of his tears, wept with him.

In his Discourse, that we ought never to laugh with a
worldly joy, but to always weep, he enforces the obligation
of perpetual compunction and tears.

In his ascetic Sermon, he says grief and zeal compel him
to speak, but his unworthiness and his sins persuade him
to be silent, his eyes delight only in tears to bewail
night and day in floods the wounds of his soul, and above
all that pride which conceals them from him. He laments
tepidity and love of earthly things should be found among
monks, and that some interrupt their mortifications,
weeping one day and laughing the next, lying one night on
the ground, the next on a soft bed, whereas all our life
ought to be a course of penance; he extols the humility and
constant mortification of the ancient and all true monks,
like shining diamonds in the world. The rest of this long
discourse is a vehement exhortation of the monks to fervor
and zeal, this life being a time of traffic, and very
short, and a nothing; the recompense immense, and the rigor
of God’s justice terrible to all. He pronounces woes to
himself in the confusion he expected in the last day before
all who esteemed him here. Begs earnestly all pray for
him. One of the principal means to preserve this fervor,
is a strict examen every night and morning. A trader casts
up every day his losses and gains, and is solicitous to
repair any losses; so do you, says he, every morning and
night make up your accounts carefully; examine yourself:
Have I to-day spoken any idle words, despised any, &c.?
Have I this night watched, prayed, &c.? He advises not to
undertake too much in austerities, but such as the soul
will not relax in, than which nothing is more pernicious.

His parænetic Sermon is also addressed to young monks,
whom he advises to the continual presence of God in their
minds most earnestly under temptations. Against sloth,
he observes, this succeeding fervor by fits makes a life
one chain of risings and falling again; building by
mortification and destroying again by relaxing. He bids
them have this inscription in the beginning of their book:
Sloth banished for ever and ever from my soul.

His two sermons on the Fathers deceased, are also to monks,
showing and lamenting their tepidity by the fervor of their
fathers in the deserts. His Hypomnisticon is an exhortatory
epistle to the same.

His treatise on Virtue is to a novice; he tells him
obedience has no merit unless in hard and harsh things, for
even wild beasts grow tame by mild treatment.

Next follows his book in Imitation of Proverbs, in
definitions and strong sentences on all virtues, in which
he teaches tears in prayer are the beginning of a good
life; vain-glory is like a worm in a tree. He speaks
much on humility, presumption, charity, tears out of the
desire of eternal happiness, and weeps to consider his own
wretchedness and poverty.

His treatise for the Correction of those who live wickedly,
is full of zeal, humility, and an extraordinary contempt of
himself, and spirit of compunction.

That on Penance is a pathetic exhortation to sinners
to return by the mercy of God, who expects them before
the dawning of the day of life which is coming on; by
the comfort which the angels will receive, and from the
frightful trial at the last day, against which he prays for
himself.

His discourse On the Fear of Souls, is a lamentation and
prayer for himself at the sight of the heavens, still in
stronger expressions and tears.

His sermon On the Second Coming of Christ, shows the joy
of the blessed, and exaggerates the severity of that trial
from the immensity of God’s benefits to us.

In his Tetrasyllabus he explains how the devil vanquished
by the fervent, always says, I will then go to my friends,
the slothful, where I shall have no labor, nor want
stratagems. I have but to fetter them in the chains with
which they are pleased, and I shall have them always
willing subjects. He exhorts all therefore to constant
fervor. In another place he exhorts all continually to
repeat to themselves against sloth; “Yet a little of thy
journey remains and thou wilt arrive at thy place of rest.
Then take thy rest not now on the road.”

In his book on those words, _Attende Tibi_, to a monk,
he presses the precept of being always fervent, never
relaxing, in every virtue, especially in purity; and adds
the example of St. Anthony, who, as St. Athanasius relates,
notwithstanding his great mortifications, which he never
relaxed from his youth to his old age, would never bathe or
so much as wash his feet, or ever suffered any part of his
body to be seen, except his face and hands, till after his
death.

He has left us an excellent long prayer for a soul to say
in time of any temptation; another for grace and pardon of
sins.

A novice among the monks often had begged of St. Ephrem
some direction. The saint extols his zeal and humility in
desiring advice from a sinner, whose intolerable stench
infects all his works. His first lesson to him is that
he always remember the presence of God, and avoid all
unnecessary words. He recommends then to him, in ninety-six
lessons, perfect obedience, abstinence, silence, solitude,
which frees a man from three dangers, viz., of the eyes,
ears, and tongue; never to have so much compassion for any
novice as to offend God, and so perish with him; if he be
tepid, it is better he should perish alone than you also
by condescension; never to speak to a superior in favor of
an expelled brother, without most evident proofs of his
perfect conversion; for a little spark falling into a barn,
easily destroys all the labors of a whole year: to avoid
frequent long conversations with any young man about piety
or other things, for fear of fond love; never to desire
anything great or public, for God’s honor, but rather
to love to be hid and unknown; many in dens and deserts
were the greatest saints, but without humility the most
glorious virtues and the greatest actions are lost; never
to seek the care of souls, but to employ in it the utmost
diligence, if it be laid upon him: always to walk in the
narrow way of compunction and mourning. His other lessons
conduce to humility and other virtues.

His fifty-five Beatitudes comprise the happiness of all
virtues, as of ever glorifying God, which is to be as the
cherubim and seraphim. He closes them bursting into tears
at the reflection how far he is from any of them by his
sloth under a holy garb, and how distant from the holy
servants of God, who persevered some in sackcloth and
chains, others on pillars, others in enclosure and fasting,
others in obedience, &c. He adds twenty other beatitudes.

His book of one hundred chapters on humility, consists
chiefly of short examples; as, a certain novice always
kept silence. Some said to him, He is silent because he
knows not how to speak. Others said, No, but it is because
he has a devil. He, hearing all this, gave no answer, but
glorified God in his heart.

In the second volume we have the life of St. Abraham;
a long panegyric on the Patriarch Joseph; a sermon on
the Transfiguration; one on the Last Judgment, and on
the necessity and advantage of spending this life in
tears; a treatise of ninety chapters on the right way of
living; fifty paræneses or exhortations to the monks, on
obedience, humility, &c.; a most pathetic sermon on the
second coming of Christ, in which he expresses himself as
follows: “Beloved of Christ, lend a favorable attention to
what I am going to say on the dreadful coming of our Lord.
Remembering that hour, I tremble with an excess of fear.
For who can relate those horrible things? what tongue can
express them? When the King of kings, arising from his
throne of glory, shall descend, and sit the just judge,
calling to an account all the inhabitants of the earth.
At this thought I am ready to swoon away: my limbs quake
for fear, my eyes swim in tears, my voice fails, my lips
shrink, my tongue falters, and my thoughts are wrapt up
in silence. I am obliged to denounce these things to you;
yet fear will not suffer me to speak. A loud thunder now
affrights us; how then shall we stand at the sound of the
last trumpet, louder than any thunder, summoning the dead
to rise! Then the bones of all men in the bowels of the
earth, hearing this voice, shall suddenly run, and seek out
their joints; and, in the twinkling of an eye, we shall see
all men risen and assembled to judgment. The great king
shall command, and instantly the earth quaking, and the
troubled sea shall give up the dead which they possess,
whether devoured by fish, beast, or fowl. All in a moment
shall appear present, and not a hair will be wanting.”
He goes on describing the frightful fire consuming all
things on the earth; the angels separating the sheep and
the goats; the standard of the great king, that cross on
which he was nailed, shining bright, and borne before him;
men standing to meet this tremendous majesty, revolving
their own deeds; the just with joy, the wicked worse
than dead with fear; the angels and cherubim appearing,
singing, Holy, Holy, Holy; the heavens opened, and the
King of kings revealed in such incomparable glory, that
the heavens and the earth will fly from before his face.
“Who then,” says he, “can stand? He places before our eyes
the books opened, and all our actions, thoughts, and words
called to an account!” He then cries out: “What tears
ought we not to shed night and day without intermission,
for that terrible appearance!” Here the venerable old man
was no longer able to break through his sighs and tears,
and stood silent. The auditory cried out--“Tell us what
more terrible things will follow.” He answered, “Then all
mankind will stand with eyes cast down, between life and
death, heaven and damnation, before the tribunal; and all
degrees of men shall be called to a rigorous examination.
Wo to me! I desire to tell you what things will follow,
but my voice fails me through fear, and I am lost in
confusion and anxiety; the very rehearsal of these things
is most dreadful.” The audience repeated again: “Tell us
the rest, for God’s sake, for our advantage and salvation.”
He therefore proceeded, “Then, beloved of Christ, shall
be required in all Christians the seal of baptism, entire
faith, and that beautiful renunciation which they made
before witnesses, saying, I renounce Satan, and all his
works; not one, or two, or five, but all the works of the
devil. In that hour this renunciation will be demanded of
us, and happy is he who shall have kept it faithfully as he
promised.” Here, he stopping in tears, they cried again:
“Tell us also what follows this.” He answered: “I will tell
you in my grief, I will speak through my sighs and tears;
these things cannot be related without tears, for they are
extremely dreadful.” The people entreated again: “O servant
of God, we beseech you to instruct us fully.” The holy man,
again striking his breast, and weeping bitterly, said: “O
my brethren, beloved of Christ, how sorrowful, and how
frightful things do you desire to hear! O terrible hour!
Wo to me, wo to me! Who will dare to relate, or who will
bear to hear this last and horrible rehearsal; all you who
have tears, sigh with me! and you who have not, hear what
will befall you; and let us not neglect our salvation. Then
shall they be separated, without hopes of ever returning to
each other again, bishops from fellow-bishops, priests from
fellow-priests, deacons from fellow-deacons, subdeacons and
lectors from their fellows; those who were kings as the
basest slaves; children from parents; friends from kindred
and intimates. Then princes, philosophers, wise men of the
world, seeing themselves thus parted, shall cry out to the
saints with bitter tears; ‘Farewell eternally, saints and
servants of God; farewell parents, children, relations, and
friends; farewell prophets, apostles, and martyrs; farewell
Lady Mother of God; you prayed much for us that we might
be saved, but we would not. Farewell life-giving cross;
farewell paradise of delights, kingdom without end, the
heavenly Jerusalem. Farewell ye all; we shall never more
behold one of you, hastening to our torment without end or
rest,’” &c.

A Sermon on fraternal Charity, and on the Last Judgment,
in which his tears again hindered him from pursuing his
subject. Nothing can be more terrifying or more moving
than these discourses, or than the next on Antichrist,
or that after on the Cross, or that of Interrogations.
There follow his Testament, his Sermon on the Cross and
on Charity, in which he salutes and honors that holy
instrument of our redemption in the strongest words and
highest epithets, which, as he says, all nations adore, and
which saving sign we mark on our doors, foreheads, eyes,
mouths, breast, and our whole body. His Sermon against
heretics on the precious margarite, to prove the Virgin
Mary mother of God; that on the vice of the tongue; his
Panegyric on St. Basil; his Sermon on the Sinful Woman in
the gospel; on the Forty Martyrs; on Abraham and Isaac; on
Daniel and the three children. Sermons on the eight capital
bad thoughts; gluttony, fornication, avarice, anger,
sadness, sloth, vain-glory, and pride; on perfection, on
patience, and suffering; and many small tracts to monks.
One contains a relation of a holy virgin in a monastery
of three hundred, who was never seen eating, but worked
washing the dishes and cleaning the scullery, feigning
herself a fool, and bearing blows and all insults without
murmuring or answering a word; called by derision, Salla or
Sallop. St. Pityrumus, an anchoret, was admonished by an
angel to go and see in her one who surpassed him and the
others in virtue: having seen all the nuns he found not
her, she being left behind in the kitchen. At his desire,
which all laughed at, she was brought out. The anchoret
immediately fell at her feet, crying, “Bless me, Amma” (_i.
e._ spiritual mother). She also fell at his feet. The nuns
said to him, “Don’t incur such a disgrace; this is Salla.”
“No (said he), you are all Salæ.” Upon this all honored
her, and one confessed, that she had thrown on her the
washings of the dishes; another had struck her; another had
thrust mustard up her nostrils, &c. She not bearing esteem,
retired thence unknown, and was never more heard of.

The third volume contains many Sermons and Discourses,
chiefly on the judgments of God and the last day; on
penance, compunction, prayer, charity, and other virtues;
and on vices and passions. Also the life of St. Julian
the anchoret. Pious poems and several panegyrics of, and
prayers to the Blessed Virgin, whose virginity and dignity
of mother of God he clearly asserts.

The fourth volume consists of his Commentaries on the five
books of Moses, on Joshua, Judges, and the four books of
Kings. St. Gregory of Nyssa says, he studied and meditated
assiduously on the holy scriptures, and expounded them
all from the first book of Genesis to the last in the New
Testament, with an extraordinary light, with which the Holy
Ghost filled him. Many other Oriental writers testify the
same. His exposition is very literal, full, and learned;
nothing escapes him in them.

The fifth volume gives us his Commentaries on Job and
on all the prophets. Eleven sermons on several passages
of holy scripture, in which he exhorts principally to
avoid all occasions of sin, and to perpetual tears and
penance. Thirteen sermons on the birth of Christ; and
fifty-six polemical sermons against heresies, viz. of
the Marcionites, Manicheans, especially their judiciary
astrology; of the Novatians, Messalians, &c. His zeal was
moved seeing these errors spread in his country. He employs
the Church’s authority, scriptures, and reasons to confute
them.

The sixth volume gives us ninety other polemical Discourses
against the Arian and Eunomian heretics or Searchers, as
he calls them, because they attempted to penetrate the
divine mysteries, and the incomprehensible nature of God
himself. They are equally solid and strong; not dry, as
most writings of controversy, but full of unction and of
the greatest sentiments of devotion, and an inexpressible
ardor to ever love and praise our great God and Redeemer.
His sermon against the Jews is no less remarkable.

His Necrosima or eighty-five funeral canons, were written
on Death and God’s judgments, which he had always before
his eyes. He teaches evidently in them the use of
ecclesiastical funeral rites and prayers at burials; that
the souls of the departed immediately are judged by a
particular judgment; the good immediately admitted to the
enjoyment of God; those who die without having expiated
venial sin, suffer in the flames of purgatory till it be
satisfied for, but are relieved by the sacrifices, prayers,
and other pious works of the faithful on earth. Of these
fifty-four are short funeral discourses on the death of
bishops, monks, and persons of all conditions. They are
full of his extreme fear of the divine judgment, and a
great contempt of the vanity of the world. He says in the
eighty-first canon, “Entering on so long and dangerous
a journey, I have my viaticum, thee, O Son of God; when
hungry, I will eat thee, repairer of mankind; so it shall
be, that no fire will dare approach my members, for it
will not be able to bear the sweet saving odor of thy body
and blood,” &c. He uses the same motive of confidence of
immortality, from being fed with the body and blood of
Christ, and employs that endearing divine grace to move God
to have mercy on him. He repeats the same prayer in his
thirteenth Parænesis. Nothing can be clearer than the texts
collected by Ceillier (t. 8, p. 101) from the writings of
St. Ephrem, in favor of the real presence of the sacred
body of Christ in the holy eucharist. See on them the
judicious remarks of an able critic, Mém. de Trev. Jan.
1756, p. 55.

Here follow four sermons on Freewill; also seventy-six
moving Paræneses or exhortations to penance. In the
forty-second, he tells us, that when he lay down to take a
little repose in the night, he reflected on the excessive
and boundless love of God, and instantly rose again to
pay him the tribute of the most fervent praise and thanks
he was able. “But being deterred,” says he, “by the
remembrance of my sins, I began to melt into tears, and
should have been disturbed beyond my strength, had not the
thief, the publican, the sinful woman, the Cananean, the
Samaritan, and other examples of mercy, given me comfort
and courage.” He says that at other times, when he was
going to fall asleep, the remembrance of his sins banished
all thoughts of giving rest to his wearied body, and made
sleep yield to sighs, groans, and floods of tears, to which
he invited himself by the example of the penitent David,
washing his bed with briny torrents; for the silence of
night is the most proper season for our tears. It appears
he composed this work, at least part, a little before his
death; for in the forty-third Parænesis he writes, “I
Ephrem am now dying. I write my last will and testament
to all lovers of truth, who shall rise up after me.
Persevere night and day in prayer. The husbandman reapeth
a great crop by assiduous labor; so will you, if you never
interrupt your devotion. Pray without ceasing.”

His book in fifteen elegant discourses on the Terrestrial
Paradise, explaining its history in Genesis, and comforting
himself with the name and happiness of the good thief on
the cross, makes a transition to the heavenly Paradise,
on the felicity of which he speaks with incredible joy
and pleasure. In his eighth discourse he teaches the soul
cannot perfectly see God before the resurrection; but means
by the perfectly complete enjoyment, for he is very express
(loc. cit. supra) that the blessed behold God immediately
on their death; as Muratori demonstrates against Burnet, in
his dissertation on Paradise, c. 2.

Eighteen very devout sermons on divers subjects close his
works; on Christ’s Nativity and Resurrection; on Prayer,
on Humility, which he teaches is the weapon our Redeemer
conquered hell by, and has put into our hands as our
principal and only armor against our spiritual enemies.

The works of this father demonstrate the uniformity in
faith of the Syriac church in the fourth century, with that
of the universal church of all ages.

Several of St. Ephrem’s works were translated into Latin,
and published at Rome in 1589, by Gerard Vossius or
Volkens, provost of Tongres. A Greek edition of the same
was printed at Oxford in 1709, by the care of Mr. Edward
Thwaites. A more complete edition of this father’s works
was given to the public at Rome in six volumes in folio,
in 1732 and 1743, under the direction of cardinal Querini,
librarian of the Vatican, and Monsignor Joseph Assemani,
first prefect of the same library. In this we have the
original Syriac text of a good part of these works, and the
ancient Greek version of the rest. The Latin translation
is the work partly of Gerard Vossius, partly of F. Peter
Benedetti, a Maronite Jesuit who lived at Rome; and in the
last volumes of Stephen Assemani archbishop of Apamea, who
also published the Chaldaic acts of the Martyrs, and is
nephew of the aforesaid Joseph Assemani. The Greek text in
the last volumes, especially in the sixth, is published
very incorrect. See Mémoires de Trevoux for January, 1756,
p. 146.

THE MARTYRS OF GORCUM.

Nineteen priests and religious men, who were taken by the Calvinists
in Gorcum, after suffering many insults, were hanged on account of
their religion at Bril, on the 9th of July, 1572. Of these, eleven
were Franciscan friars, called Recollects, of the convent of Gorcum,
amongst whom were Nicholas Pick the guardian, and Jerom Werden,
vicar of the same convent. The former was thirty-eight years old,
an eminent preacher, and a man endued with the primitive spirit of
his order, especially the love of holy poverty and mortification. He
feared the least superfluity even in the meanest and most necessary
things, especially in meals; and he would often say: “I fear if
St. Francis were living, he would not approve of this or that.” He
was most zealous to preserve this spirit of poverty and penance in
his house, and he used to call property and superfluity the bane
of a religious state. His constant cheerfulness rendered piety and
penance itself amiable. He often had these words in his mouth:
“We must always serve God with cheerfulness.” He had frequently
expressed an earnest desire to die a martyr, but sincerely confessed
himself altogether unworthy of that honor. The other martyrs were a
Dominican, two Norbertins, one Canon Regular of St. Austin, called
John Oosterwican,[85] three curates, and another secular priest.
The first of these curates was Leonard Vechel, the elder pastor at
Gorcum. He had gained great reputation in his theological studies
at Louvain under the celebrated Ruard Tapper; and in the discharge
of pastoral duties at Gorcum, had joined an uncommon zeal, piety,
eloquence, and learning with such success, that his practice and
conduct in difficult cases was a rule for other curates of the
country, and his decisions were regarded as oracles at the university
itself. For the relief of the poor, especially those that were sick,
he gave his temporal substance with such tenderness and profusion as
to seem desirous, had it been possible, to have given them himself.
He reproved vice without respect to persons; and by his invincible
meekness and patience disarmed and conquered many who had been long
deaf to all his remonstrances, and added only insults to their
obstinacy. Nicholas Poppel was the second pastor at Gorcum, and
though inferior in abilities, was in zeal worthy to be the colleague
of Vechel, and to attain to the same crown with him. The rest of this
happy company had made their lives an apprenticeship to martyrdom.
They were declared martyrs, and beatified by Clement X. in 1674. The
relation of several miracles performed by their intercession and
relics which was sent to Rome in order to their beatification, is
published by the Bollandists.[86] The greatest part of their relics
is kept in the church of the Franciscan friars at Brussels, whither
they were secretly conveyed from Bril. See the accurate history of
their martyrdom written by the learned doctor William Estius, printed
at Douay in 1603. Also Batavia Sacra, part 2, p. 174, and various
memoirs collected by Solier the Bollandist, t. 2, Julij, p. 736.

ST. EVERILDIS, V. IN ENGLAND.

Kinegils, king of the West-Saxons, having been baptized by St.
Berinus in 635, this holy virgin had the happiness of being brought
to the knowledge of Christ. In order to devote herself most perfectly
to the service and love of her heavenly spouse, she fled secretly
from the house of her parents to seek some holy monastery of nuns,
and was joined in the way by two other virgins named Bega and
Wuldreda. St. Wilfrid gave her a spot called before the Bishop’s
Dwelling, but since her time Everildisham, that is, the dwelling
of Everildis. Neither F. Alford nor F. Solier were able to find
the situation of this place. Here she trained up many virgins to
the perfection of divine love, the summit of Christian virtue, by
animating them with the true spirit, and continually encouraging them
in the most fervent and most faithful discharge of all the duties,
and application to all the exercises of their holy profession. She
went to God on the 9th of July, on which day Solier the Bollandist
found her name in an ancient copy of Usuard’s Martyrology. F. Alford
sent to Bollandus a transcript of lessons used formerly in some
church now unknown. Her name does not occur in any English or Irish
Calendar now extant, nor has Alford mentioned her in his annals. See
Solier, t. 2, Julij, p. 713.

ST. VERONICA GIULIANI, V.

The following account is an abridgment of her Life, written
by P. M. Salvatori, the promoter of the Cause in the
process of her Canonization. His work was published in Rome
in 1803, entitled _Vita della B. Veronica Giuliana_.

SUPPLEMENT TO SADLIER’S ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF
BUTLER’S LIVES OF THE SAINTS.

A. D. 1727.

We earnestly beseech the devout reader, whilst he is reading the life
of her whose wonderful history we are about to relate, not to decide
upon its merits, until he shall have carefully considered, not only
the events themselves, but how, in every case, the graces which the
servant of God received, are not only remarkable signs of Divine
favor, but ever produced in her heart deeper humility, more ardent
charity, and a wish to conceal them from the eyes of men;--that
they were particularly communicated to her during prayer;--and
that, to the desire of suffering for the sake of Jesus Christ, she
added the most rigorous mortification of her flesh; all which the
immortal pontiff, Benedict XIV., has laid down as criterions whereby
to determine the reality of such supernatural gifts. In order to
glorify his servant, it pleased God, during her lifetime, to make
known her virtues and the graces which he had conferred upon her,
to many of her companions, and to no less than four bishops of the
city wherein she lived, and thirteen religious men of various orders,
who were her directors, by whom an exact and faithful record of all
her actions has been handed down to us. From their attestations, and
other authentic accounts, the following narrative has been formed of
actions and virtues which many volumes would not be sufficient to
detail.

Saint Veronica Giuliani was born on the Feast of St. John the
Evangelist, in 1660, at Mercatello, in the States of the Church. She
received in baptism the name of Ursula, for God destined her, like
that holy martyr, to be a virgin and the leader of many other virgins
to the kingdom of heaven. In her very infancy her future sanctity
was foreshadowed; for, on Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, which the
Church keeps as days of penance, she would never take nourishment,
save a small quantity in the morning and the evening: and before she
was six months old, seeing a picture representing the most Blessed
Trinity, in whose honor that day was dedicated (12th June, 1661), she
left her mother’s arms of her own accord, and, without any assistance
whatever, walked to it, and with many signs of reverence, remained as
if enchanted before it;[87] and being carried, at the age of a year
and a half, to a shop, by a servant who wanted some soil, in selling
which the shopkeeper used a false measure, her tongue was loosed,
and she cried out, in a clear voice, “Act fairly, for God sees you.”
At the age of three years, these seeds of virtue began to develope
themselves still more. They produced in her those extraordinary
feelings of love and affection towards Our Blessed Saviour and his
Virgin Mother, which have only been communicated to the most favored
souls. When she was about four years of age, her mother fell so
dangerously ill, that the Viaticum was brought to her. The moment the
priest entered the house, Ursula saw such a bright light surrounding
him, that she ran to him, and earnestly begged to receive the blessed
sacrament. To keep her quiet, she was told that there were no more
particles left; but she at once answered, that, he might safely break
a portion off that intended for her mother, because, as the mirror,
when broken, does not cease to reflect the images that it represented
when entire, so is Jesus equally present in the smallest fragment as
well as in the entire host from which it has been separated. As soon
as her mother had communicated, she sprang upon the bed, exclaiming,
“O what sweet things you have had!” And coming near her mouth, she
said, “O what a sweet scent!” Nor could the attendants succeed in
making her leave her mother in peace. Before her death, she called
her five children to her bed-side, and recommended each of them to
one of the five wounds of the passion. To Ursula she gave that in
our Saviour’s side; to which the devotion of her after-life was
directed, and through it she received those many graces of which we
shall afterwards speak. On the night following her mother’s death,
she refused to go to bed, until the servants placed a picture of Our
Lady and Jesus upon the bed, when she immediately lay down and slept
peacefully.

At the age of seven she was admitted to the sacrament of
Confirmation, and, during the ceremony, her godmother saw her
guardian angel by her side. Similar visions, which occurred in the
seventh or eighth year of her age, we have recorded in her own
words:--“I remember,” she says, “that when I was about seven or eight
years old, twice during the Holy Week, Jesus appeared to me covered
with wounds, and telling me to be devout to His most holy passion,
instantly disappeared. I wept bitterly, and every time that I heard
speak of the torments and sufferings of Our Lord, I felt something
at my heart; and everything that I undertook I offered up in honor
of His passion. A desire came into my head of asking my confessor
for some mortification, but I did not yield to it. Still I made
sufferings for myself, but all without my confessor’s leave; such
as the discipline, walking on my bare knees, piercing myself with a
pin, and beating myself with thistles. If I heard of the works of
penance performed by others, I went to the image of my Saviour, and
said, ‘Lord, if I had their instruments of mortification, I would
do the same; but since I have them not, I offer Thee my desire.’ He
has often let me know and remember that He made me (at that age)
affectionate invitations. Thus, for example, when I had determined on
taking some recreation, and could never find time to do so, I heard
Jesus in my interior, asking me, ‘What dost thou seek, what dost thou
desire? I am thy real contentment;’ and I at once replied, ‘Lord, for
Thy sake I will deprive myself of the pleasure which I sought.’ How
these answers were uttered, I know not; but this I know, that I did
make them.... Sometimes, whilst I was gazing at the crucifix, Jesus
spoke to my heart, and said, ‘I will be Thy guide and spouse;’ and I
stretched out my arms, and exclaimed, ‘I will be Thy spouse, and no
one shall move me from it. I promise it with all my heart; grant that
I may never separate myself from Thee.’”

Her father having obtained a lucrative situation at Placentia,
removed thither with his family. In that city, Ursula, who was
about ten years old. made her first communion, on the feast of the
Purification, in 1670. When she had received Our Lord, she felt an
unusual fire burning within her breast, which continued after her
return home; so that thinking it to be an ordinary effect in all
communicants, she, in her innocent way, asked her sisters how long it
generally lasted. But perceiving, from their surprise, that it was a
special grace imparted by her Saviour, she did not again speak of it,
but endeavored to receive the holy sacrament of love as frequently as
possible.

At this time the gift of mental prayer was communicated to her. In
what manner she received it, the following account, which she wrote
afterwards, by the command of her directors, will explain:--“When
I was about twelve years of age, I think, a desire frequently came
into my mind, of placing myself in mental prayer; but I did not know
how to set about it. It seemed mere folly to ask my confessor to
instruct me in it, because he knew my wickedness; and I thought that
none ought to apply to it except the good and those who are really
inclined to virtue; but in myself there was nothing but inconstancy,
and want of perseverance. I went on making my altars, although,
while I was making them, I felt at times an application of my mind
to prayer. As soon as I had finished, I knelt down before them, and
remained on my knees for a long time; but what I did I know not,
for I was, so to speak, out of myself. I felt such pleasure, that I
should not have cared to eat or do anything else. I desired that all
creatures should love and honor God. I ran to ask my sisters to come
and sing with me. They did so, and I felt great comfort therein. As
soon as my father returned home, I led him to my altar, and induced
him to say some prayers with me. When the Nativity drew near, I could
not contain myself for joy; and several times, whilst I was looking
at the representation of Our Lord in the crib, I think I saw Him
surrounded with glory; He drew me to a union with Himself, but I
know not how. Of this I spoke to no one, nor did I derive any profit
therefrom, for I soon returned to my usual childish follies. On the
day of communion, all my delight was to be about my altar. Although
I knew not how to pray mentally, my mind became all recollected in
God. I seemed to feel my Lord in a special manner within my heart. I
placed myself in prayer; and the longer I was employed therein, the
longer I wished to remain. I had a certain interior light that showed
me the inconstancy of worldly things, and I was inclined to abandon
everything. I knew no other good but God. These considerations
strengthened my desire of becoming a religious. The desire of
suffering, I think, I had from my infancy, and afterwards; but, alas!
it profited me in nothing. I had no sooner left the altar, than I set
about annoying some one or other.

“Although I sought amusement in worldly diversions, I felt my mind
wholly turned to God. As well as I can remember, the passion of
my Redeemer moved me very much; at times even to tears. The more
I exercised myself in mental prayer, the more tedious I found the
things of the world. At times, I had some particular insight into
myself; but this I did not mention to my confessor. It is true that
such lights made me advance farther than ever in the way of prayer;
and, in order that I might not be observed, I told the servant
to call me early in the morning; she did so, and I rose at once.
I remained in prayer for several hours, but what I did I cannot
relate. I know that I was out of myself, and felt a willingness and
desire to be employed in all the work of the house, but this was
forbidden, lest it should injure me. I seldom rose up from prayer,
before I had been told by the Lord that I was to be His spouse.
Still I remained steadfast in my desire of entering a religious
order, and this desire increased daily. When a festival occurred, I
felt a flame in my heart, which set my whole soul on fire. I could
not remain quiet, I ran about the house as if I were mad, and made
people laugh at me. Sometimes all my delight was in making altars;
and although, in my uncle’s house, this was not so easy as at home,
I never left off making them. For work I had not much inclination,
but I could do as much in an hour as another in a day. I did not
care to learn anything, but whatever I saw done, I found myself
able to do, and succeeded when I set about it. I was the torment of
everybody, and yet all wished me well, and liked me better than my
sisters. When I thought of this, it surprised me beyond measure. No
one spoke harshly to me; and yet I performed all sorts of naughty
tricks. I was naturally hasty, and whenever I was vexed, I stamped
and beat the ground like a horse; and believe me, I did so through
mere wickedness, for no one ever provoked me to it. At times I took a
thing into my head, and wished it to turn out as I desired. I felt an
internal reproach for not mortifying myself, but I paid no attention
to it. It seemed to me, that whenever I placed myself in prayer,
God gave me to understand what he wished me to do; but I thought
it was a mere fancy of my own, although the same light returned to
my soul. It improved me much in virtue, and I began to accustom
myself to silence, which enabled me to apply better to prayer; and
although I did not mortify myself, I was encouraged to do so. Thus,
by degrees, I became more and more in love with suffering. Oftentimes
I rose during the night, and spent a short time in prayer; I had a
peculiar affection for it, which led to _application_, but not to
_recollections_.[88] In the manner here described I spent the last
two years that I remained in the world, that is, the fourteenth and
fifteenth of my age. Still I gave way to many vanities, and often
felt satisfaction in them; but, at the same time, I felt the internal
reproach, which did not let me rest until I had withdrawn from many
amusements which I was used to seek.”

These were the beginnings of those high gifts of prayer and
contemplation to which she afterwards attained; but it must not be
supposed that the exercise of them was at all times attended with
comfort and delight to her soul; for her writings mention the violent
repugnance of the flesh, the strong temptations, the obscurity of
mind, and dryness of affection, with which she had to contend in the
struggle between the world and grace.

Besides these interior trials, her perseverance and constancy to her
Virgin Spouse were put to the most severe test, in the endeavors made
by her father and other relations to induce her to join in the vain
and idle occupations of others in her state of life, and to yield
to their repeated arguments and even snares, to induce her to enter
the married state. “Our father wished,” she writes, “that I should
be more finely dressed than others, and one day I wore one vanity,
and another day another. He was so fond of me, that, when at home,
he would always have me beside him. All this I complied with. But I
began to perceive that he was not willing that I should become a nun,
and he told me I must marry, and that as long as he lived I must not
leave him. But this news filled me with sorrow, because every time he
spoke in this manner, I felt a stronger desire of being a nun. I told
others so, but no one would believe me, and everybody was against my
intention, especially my father, who even shed tears, and told me
positively that he would never consent; and in order to drive the
thought out of my head, he brought other gentlemen into the house
and then called me. In their presence, he promised me all sorts of
pleasures and amusements, and they did the same. They talked about
the things of the world, in order to persuade me to set my fancy
upon them, but their discourses led me to a contrary desire. At that
moment, worldly things appeared so disgusting, that I could not hear
them mentioned; and more than once I told these persons that they
must not speak again on such subjects, because the more I heard, the
more my soul was withdrawn from them. But all that I said, availed me
nothing; every day my martyrdom was renewed. I had patience for some
time; but at last, I declared in their presence that such discourses
disgusted me, and before them all, I expressed my deep commiseration
for the wretchedness of the unfortunate persons who are attached to
worldly things. I spoke as little as possible, because I knew that my
father took great delight in hearing me talk, and I did everything in
my power to diminish his attachment, by avoiding all those actions in
which he took delight; but all to no purpose; his affections seemed
to increase daily. At times, he said to me, ‘I wish to content you
in everything; the only thing I beg of you is, that you will not
turn nun.’ With these words, he wept through affection. I said to
him, ‘If you wish to content me, I do not want any other favor from
you, except that you would put me in a convent; all my desires are
there. Content me in this, and you will content me in everything
else, and depend upon it, it will be a source of comfort to yourself
afterwards.’”

Her father, finding all his efforts unsuccessful, sent her to live
with her uncle, whom he secretly instructed to use all his influence
and artifice to dissuade her from her design. Here she had an
illness, for which the physicians could discover no remedy; until
some of her attendants, perceiving that she grew sensibly better,
whenever they talked of nuns and convents, informed her father,
who thereupon gave up his opposition to her entreaties, and, as
soon as he had allowed her to choose the convent in which she would
be professed, she rose from her bed, and all symptoms of sickness
immediately disappeared.

She then begged him to allow her to enter the rigorous convent of
capuchine nuns at Città di Castello, and was conducted by her uncle
to the bishop of the diocese, to obtain his permission. He told them
that all the places in the convent were filled up, and they left him,
to return home. But Ursula besought her uncle to return with her to
his presence, where, falling on her knees, she prayed him in such
earnest accents to comfort her by granting her request, that he was
inclined to make an exception in her favor. He put several questions
to her, and asked her amongst the rest, if she knew Latin. Her uncle
at once replied in the negative, but Ursula, full of confidence in
God’s aid, took up the breviary, and read it with the most correct
pronunciation; and although she had never studied Latin, she was
able, during the rest of her life, to quote the texts of Scripture
with perfect aptness and propriety. The bishop accordingly granted
her leave to enter the convent, into which she was admitted on the
17th of July, 1677, and was vested on the Feast of SS. Simon and
Jude, in the same year. The devil sought to weaken her love of her
new state, by representing it as one leading to despair: at one time,
he filled her imagination with the remembrance of the many proposals
of marriage and the young men that she had rejected; at another, he
made the time of prayer tedious and disgusting to her. “It seems,”
she says, “as if all hell were let loose against me, but I heeded it
not. When I felt more than usually agitated by their attacks, I went
alone into my cell, and there poured out my soul in prayer to God,
and represented my necessities to him. Sometimes I offered up acts of
prayer, and besought Him not to desert me; and said to him, full of
faith, ‘My God, Thou knowest that I am Thy spouse, grant, therefore,
that I may never be separated from Thee. Now, for ever, I place
myself in Thy hands; I am ready for whatever Thou shalt command. I am
Thine, I am Thine, that is enough.’” God did not fail to strengthen
her, by saying to her heart, “Fear not, thou art mine. It is my will
that thou shouldst suffer and combat; fear not.” At her reception,
she took the name of Veronica, by which we shall henceforth call her.

We pass over the numerous instances of suffering and obedience which
she gave during her novitiate; at the end of which she was admitted
to make her profession on All Saints’ day, 1678. Her writings contain
many allusions to the joy which she derived from the recurrence
of this day of solemn renunciation of the world and dedication of
herself to her Heavenly Spouse. The first years she passed in the
order were distinguished by the most extraordinary marks of Divine
grace; all of which produced in her, compunction and sorrow for her
sins, and love of mortification, and the cross of Christ. One of
her raptures she thus describes: “The first time that I had these
_recollections_ with a vision, it seemed to me that I saw, on a
sudden, Our Lord with a heavy cross on His shoulders, when He invited
me to take a part in that precious treasure. This invitation was
given by communication rather than by words. At that instant I felt a
strong desire of sufferings, and it seemed that the Lord planted the
cross in my heart, giving me to understand the value of suffering.
This understanding I received in the following manner. It appeared
as if all sorts of torments were represented to me, and, at the same
moment, I saw them transformed into jewels and precious stones, all
of which were made in the figure of the cross. During this time, I
was given to know that God wished pure suffering in me; and then the
vision disappeared. When I came to myself, I felt a violent pain in
my head, which has never since left me, and so eager was my desire
of suffering, that I would willingly have faced every torment that
can be conceived. From that moment I have ever had in my mouth these
words, ‘The cross and sufferings are jewels and joys.’” From this
account it may be collected, that, on this occasion, Jesus impressed
that visible mark of the cross upon her heart, which was seen, after
her death, by several persons, when her body was opened for that
purpose.

Veronica was successively appointed to fill every office of the
community, in all of which she displayed the same wonderful examples
of virtue, and love of obedience and suffering; and many signs of
Divine favor proved to her sisters how pleasing her actions were
to Almighty God. She was appointed Mistress of the Novices, in her
thirty-fourth year, and continued for twenty-two years in that
office, until she was chosen abbess, in 1716; and even then, so
extraordinary had been the efficacy of her prayers, and zeal in the
discharge of it, that her sisters forced her, contrary to the usual
order, to retain it during the eleven years she was abbess. More
than once, to free them from sickness, and other inconveniences,
she obtained of God, that she might suffer in their stead; and some
of them were relieved by her, in their anxiety and trouble of mind,
which had been supernaturally made known to her. On one occasion
was revealed to her the severe judgment which God will make of
superiors and directors of religious communities, by whose fault
any relaxation of fervor creeps amongst those committed to their
care. On the 9th of November, she fell dangerously ill, and during
the agony which succeeded, was carried in spirit before the throne
of the Divine Judge. She beheld Christ, with a severe countenance,
seated on a throne of majesty, surrounded by angels; Our blessed
Lady on one side, and her patron saints on the other. When her
good angel presented her to the awful judgment, she expected to be
condemned to hell,--so severe, she tells us, were the reproaches of
the Judge, and so unprovided was she with good works; but so earnest
were the prayers of Mary, and of her holy advocates, that the divine
countenance of Christ at last grew calm; and, after giving her
various salutary admonitions, He dismissed her.

On the morning after her agony, she called her novices; and, having
obtained leave from her confessor to speak to them respecting their
failings, and her own negligence in correcting them, which had been
revealed to her during her vision of judgment, she whispered to them
with such earnestness, that they burst into a flood of tears, and,
at the end, she said to them, “Do not learn of me, who have been
the scandal of all in all my conduct; for in the observance of the
rules, as well as in obedience, love and charity, I have been ever
proud and devoid of humility.” The nuns interrupted her with tears
and sobs, charging themselves with the fault, in not having followed
her instructions, but she rejoined, “take heed of little things, for,
before God, things are very different from what we suppose.”

We must now pass to the sublime novitiate and preparation of grace,
by which she became, during the last thirty-five years of her life,
an exact image of Our crucified Lord. In the year 1693, she beheld,
in a vision, a mysterious chalice or cup, which she knew to be the
presage of the Divine passion, whereof she was to be a perfect copy.
This vision was repeated in various forms during the following years.
At one time, the chalice appeared upon a bright cloud, surrounded
with glory; at another, without any ornament: sometimes the liquor
contained in it, boiled and ran over in great abundance; at other
times, it issued from it, drop by drop. Her spirit was ready to quaff
it to the bottom, but the flesh shuddered and drew back, as did our
Lord’s in the garden; but she subdued it by severe mortifications.
“I must not be too confident,” she writes, “because I know that,
as yet, it is not dead. The spirit I have always found eager and
desirous of drinking it, and willing to taste of such bitterness, in
order to fulfil the will of God. At times I felt these desires, and I
exclaimed: ‘When will the hour come, O my God, when Thou wilt allow
me to drink of Thy cup? I await Thy will, but Thou alone knowest my
thirst: I thirst, I thirst, but not for comforts, but for bitterness
and sufferings.’ I felt that I could wait no longer. One night,
whilst I was in prayer, being quite out of myself, it seems that Our
Lord appeared to me, and, holding the cup in His hand, said: ‘This
is for thee, and I present it to thee, that thou mayest taste, as
much as I have tasted, for thy sake, but not yet. Prepare thyself,
for thou also shalt taste it.’ He then disappeared, leaving the
remembrance of that chalice so deeply impressed on my mind, that it
has ever since remained there.”

The anxiety and dread inspired by the constant appearance of this cup
before her mind’s eyes, threw her into a violent fever, which was
succeeded by such weakness of body, that her superiors forced her to
submit to the prescriptions and treatment of physicians, which served
only to increase her torments.

But the most sensible torment was, the privation of the light of God.
“All these sufferings were a mere nothing in comparison with what I
experienced in myself, deserted, abandoned in blackest darkness, at
such a distance from God, that I could not even breathe nor sigh to
God.... O, intolerable agony of the soul! to see herself stript of
every support, and utterly separated to a distance from its Sovereign
Good. She sighs, but is not heard; she calls her Spouse, but He comes
not; she seeks Him, but he flies still farther off; she prays to Him,
but he will not hear.... My soul was in such torment, that the agony
of death cannot, I think, be more bitter. I had no relief, save in
seeing the cup approach nearer and nearer.... God be praised! for His
love, all is little. Welcome the naked cross, welcome pure suffering.
I am ready for all things to give delight to my Lord, and to fulfil
His divine will.”

God recompensed her readiness to drink the chalice of sufferings, by
making her a partaker of the torments of His passion. On the fourth
of April, 1694, as near as can be ascertained, He appeared to her,
and presented her with His crown of thorns. In obedience to her
confessor, she thus describes her vision. “On the fourth of April,
whilst I was in prayer during the night, I fell into a recollection,
and in it had an intellectual vision, wherein Our Lord appeared to
me, with a large crown of thorns upon His head. Immediately I cried
out, ‘My spouse, give me a part of these thorns, I deserve them,
not Thou, my Sovereign Good!’ I heard him reply, ‘I am now come to
crown thee, my beloved;’ and then He took the crown off his head, and
placed it upon mine. The pain I suffered, at that instant, was so
excessive, that I have never, as far as I can understand, suffered
anything like it. But it seemed to me that such suffering was a great
joy to me; I felt as if I should die, if I had not some torment to
undergo.”

Finding herself unable to go through her ordinary duties, and being
anxious, at the same time, to conceal these divine favors from her
companions, she prayed to God,--“My God, I beseech Thee, if it be
Thy will, to give me strength to perform the work and other duties
prescribed for me, and let these Thy graces never be manifest, but
always in secret.” We pray the reader to observe how exactly all
the prayers of Veronica, and the effects produced in her soul, are
conformable to the rules whereby Benedict XIV. teaches us to judge of
the truth or falsehood of such supernatural favors as she received.
They are always communicated during prayer; they excite in her a more
ardent desire of undergoing still greater torments for the sake of
God,--they lead above all to humility and anxiety to hide them from
the eyes of the world. Let us now see how another of his criterions
corresponds with the reality of her visions and other graces: we mean
how they inflamed her with burning charity and zeal for the glory
of God, and the conversion of sinners. “This pain (of the crown of
thorns) inspired me with such compassion for sinners, that, offering
to the Eternal Father all the sufferings of Jesus, and all His merits
with those of Our Lady for the conversion of sinners, I prayed more
earnestly than ever for sufferings, begging Him to send me more
torments. At that instant, I felt a fresh renewal of the crown of
thorns, not only round my head, as usual, but all over it; and, for
several hours, I remained rejoicing amid thousands of torments. It is
only a few days since I had this renewal, and it was signified to me,
at the same time, that this was a warning that I was to spend this
Lent in continual suffering. God be praised! Everything is little for
His sake!”

This crowning was renewed several times during the course of her
life. Her directors, being informed that it had taken place,
commissioned Sister Florida Ceoli to observe if there were
any visible marks of it on her head. She deposed, on oath, as
follows:--“I visited her, and saw that she had upon her forehead
something like a circle, tending to a red color. Sometimes I have
observed upon it certain pimples, about the size of a pin-head, in
the form of little buttons. At other times she had her forehead
sprinkled with marks of a purple color all round, like the figure of
thorns which came down towards the eyes; and, in particular, I saw
one of these marks, like thorns, come down towards the right eye, and
even passed quite under it, filling it with tears; and I saw that the
tears were blood, from the veil wherewith she wiped them away; as I
have frequently told her confessors who enjoined me to watch her.”

But not content with these observations made by her companions, and
wishing fully to ascertain if such effects proceeded from natural
or supernatural causes, the bishop of the city caused her to be
placed under the care of physicians and surgeons; but, after they
had exhausted all the resources of their art, and applied remedies
so cruel and so violent that none of the sisterhood would assist at
them, but left Veronica herself to hold the heated instruments for
them, they abandoned the attempt; and the bishop and her directors
were persuaded that He alone, who had imprinted such marks of love
upon His servant, was capable of curing them, and that he had thereby
wished to render her more and more conformable to Himself.

The sacred Scriptures use the word _espousals_ to denote a more
intimate union formed between God and the soul by the most perfect
love. In the book of Canticles the Holy Ghost describes the
correspondence of a soul with grace, under the figure of two spouses,
and in the New Testament, Our Lord speaks of the virgins whom He
admits to His heavenly marriage-feast. This spiritual union with
certain devout souls God has been pleased to make manifest to them by
more sensible signs, accompanied by formalities like those used in
ordinary marriages. Of such we read in the life of the ecstatic St.
Catharine of Siena. To this exalted dignity God was pleased to raise
Veronica, as he revealed to her, during the crowning with thorns, of
which we have already spoken.

One of the commands given to Veronica, after her espousals, was that
she should increase her fasting; and about a year after that event,
she received a direct injunction from God to fast for three whole
years upon nothing but bread and water. But Almighty God, wishing
at the same time to put her obedience to her superiors to the test,
caused them all to refuse her their permission, without which she
could not put the Divine command in practice. And, although He
continued to repeat His command and even to reproach her for not
fulfilling it; and although her stomach rejected every other food
but bread, yet her superiors obstinately refused to accede to her
petition. “I was full of joy,” she says, “because in this way I
suffered much, but I felt that the flesh could bear no more.” At
length, after she had undergone the severest torments, from the
refusal of her superiors, the weakness of her body, and her sorrow of
mind, at not being able to comply with the will of God, from March
to September, God was pleased to support her by milk miraculously
supplied in the same manner as is related by the Bollandists of
the holy virgins, Lidwige, or Lidwina, in Holland, and Geltrude in
Belgium.

The most severe trial to which she was exposed, was from desolation
and sadness of spirit, and from the bitter malice and fierce assaults
of the devil against her purity, during 1696, the year after her
mystic espousals.

Under the 17th of October, we read as follows: “Amongst my other
tribulations came this also. Whilst I was in prayer, there came
upon me such, and so many evil thoughts of impurity and of grievous
sins, and they threw me into such anguish, that at one time they
covered me with perspiration, and at another made me freeze, with
an internal agony, which confused and disturbed my soul. I did not
wish to disquiet myself, nor to give myself trouble and pain, but
I could not help it; I felt myself so oppressed and sunk in these
filthy thoughts, and my mind so completely obscured, that I could do
nothing. The demon tempted me, and I seemed to hear a dreadful voice,
which continually repeated, ‘See, these are the fruits of praying for
sinners. All their sins are crowding upon thy head. Do good now, if
thou canst.’ As he spoke these words, the devil seemed to make merry
and rejoice. O God, what torment it gave me! As well as I could, I
begged of God the salvation of souls, and I said, ‘My sovereign good,
Spouse of my soul, I do not offend Thee in will, and therefore I
detest and abhor every wicked thought; and now and for ever, I tell
Thee, that my will does not wish to entertain them. Rather death,
and a thousand deaths, than that I should ever consent to a single
thought that can offend Thee.’ As I said this, though with great
difficulty, the devil tormented me by suggesting worse thoughts than
ever, and telling me that no hope was left me. I replied, ‘Liar that
thou art, I will not yield to thy falsehoods. Jesus will I love,
Jesus will I serve; I have no other good but Jesus.’ In this struggle
I remained for several hours, always with desolation, dryness, and
temptations. God be blessed for all!” The like temptations and
assaults, both from her flesh and from the devil, are described
under December of the same year, but she repeated with the glorious
martyr St. Cecily, _fiat cor meum et corpus meum immaculatum ut non
confundar_, “Let my heart and body be immaculate, that I may not be
confounded.” On Christmas eve she made an incision upon her heart in
the form of a cross, with a pen-knife. With the blood, which issued
from it, she wrote a fervent protestation of love, and a dedication
of her will to her infant Saviour. Four other writings of the same
kind, made during the course of that and the following year, 1697,
all breathe the same feelings of consecration of her will to Jesus,
and especially of ardent charity and zeal for the salvation of her
neighbors, whose mediatrix she had promised to be. In one of them,
she writes, “I intend at this moment to confirm all the protestations
which I have made with my own blood. Lo! I am ready to give my life
and blood for the conversion of sinners, and the confirmation of the
Holy Faith. O my God! with your heart, with your love, I make this
invitation. O souls redeemed with the blood of Jesus, I speak to you;
O sinners, come all to the heart of Jesus, to the fountain, to the
boundless sea of His love. Come, all of you, men and women, come all!
leave sin; come to Jesus!” Her loving spouse rewarded her constancy
and love.

On Good Friday, the 5th of April, 1697, she received those rich
pledges of love which were vouchsafed to the seraphic St. Francis,
St. Catharine, and other saints; for Our Lord, after having
previously foretold these graces, and after displaying his mercies in
other ways, to her, was pleased to imprint upon her hands and feet,
the stigmata or wounds of his most sacred passion. These wounds were
afterwards renewed upon several other occasions, and their reality
was made known to many persons. For the Tribunal of the Holy Office
at Rome, having received information thereof, ordered the bishop of
the city to make an inquiry into the truth of the report. He repaired
to the grate of the convent, with several other ecclesiastics, who
severally saw the wounds which her blessed Spouse had made. Those
in the hands and feet, as Florida Ceoli and other sisters attest,
were on the upper side round, and about the size of a farthing, but
less on the under side, deep and red when open, and covered with a
thin cicatrix or crust, when closed. The wound in the left side,
above the left breast, was between four and five fingers in length,
and about one finger broad in the middle, growing thinner towards
the two extremities, exactly like the wound of a lance. Veronica
was so alarmed at the thought of undergoing these examinations so
dreadful to her virginal modesty, that she told sister Florida Ceoli,
in confidence, she should have died of confusion, if God had not
deprived her of her senses, during them. And her profound humility
suggested to her to beg earnestly of her beloved Saviour to leave her
the pain, but hide the marks of these wounds from the eyes of the
world, as he had done to St. Catharine of Siena, and other saints;
but he ordered her to tell her confessor, that these wounds were
to remain, that by the rigorous investigations of the Congregation
of the Holy Office, it might be known that they had been imprinted
by His divine hand; and that for this purpose, they were to remain
visible for three years. So in effect it happened; for after three
years, on the 5th of April, 1700, the wounds closed, but not until
it had been proved to many that they were indeed the work of divine
love. But, although they were closed to the eyes of others, it is
attested by several witnesses, that the pain still continued, and
that they were renewed after that date upon the greater festivals
of the church, the feasts of St. Francis and of his stigmata, and
as often as her superiors commanded. She herself mentions their
being renewed in 1703, three years after their closing; and her
confessor, Father Ranier Guelfi, as late as holy Saturday, the 19th
of April, 1726, having been informed by her, that Jesus had renewed
her wounds twice upon that same day, commanded her to pray that
they might be renewed for the third time. She obeyed, and after
remaining in ecstasy at his feet for some time, told him that she
had obtained the grace. To his astonishment he beheld the wounds
open, and blood issuing from them. To have additional witnesses, he
pretended to disbelieve her, and ordered her to show them to two
of her companions, who both saw them open and covered with blood,
as they testify in the process. Besides the testimony of these and
the many others, both ecclesiastics and nuns, who saw these wounds,
the reality of their existence was proved by the fact that the most
diligent endeavors of surgeons to cure them served only to inflame
them still more. But the most undoubted proof is, that she was able
in spite of them, to live and perform her duties during a space of
thirty years; especially when we reflect that the physician and
surgeon, who inspected her body, after her death, agreed that the
wound in her left side was enough, at any instant, to have caused her
death, so that they considered her very continuance in life a miracle.

Veronica foretold that twenty-four marks would be found engraven
upon her heart; and, by the order of her confessor, she described
the exact form and disposition of them, by cutting them out in red
and white paper; and after her death, they were found to correspond
in every particular with the account and picture which she had made
of them. They were as follows:--a Latin cross, with a C in the top
of the upright piece; the centre of the transverse an F; in the
right point of the transverse a V; and in the left an O. Above the
cross was, on one side, a crown of thorns; on the left of which was
a banner upon a staff, which passed transversely over the cross, and
the flag of the banner was divided into two tongues, on the upper of
which was a large I, and on the lower an _m_ in running hand. At the
top of the banner was a flame, and, lower down, a hammer, a pair of
pincers, a lance, and a reed with a sponge represented upon the top.
On the right of the cross, beginning from above, was a small garment
to represent the seamless vest of Our Lord, another flame, a chalice,
two wounds, a column, three nails, a scourge, and seven swords; with
the letters P.P.V. on other parts of the heart. All these marks were
exactly described by her upon paper, which being compared with her
heart, soon after death, were found to agree in every particular. Her
confessor attests that the meaning of the above letters and emblems
is:--The seven swords are the seven dolors of Mary; the banner, the
ensign of her victories over the Devil, the world and herself; the
two letters, _I_ (_J_) and _m_, Jesus and Mary; _C_, Charity; _F_,
Faith and Fidelity to God; _O_, Obedience; the two _VV_, Humility
and the Will of God (_U_miltà, and Volontà di Dio), _P P_, Patience
and Suffering (_P_atire); the two flames, the love of God and her
neighbor.

But we have now reached the point towards which all her aspirations
were directed; the happy moment when she was to be united to that
Spouse, towards whom her soul had hastened, as the thirsty hart
flieth to the fountains of living waters. She endured, as she had
foretold, in this her last stage of more than mortal agony and
bitterness, a three-fold purgatory; first, in the persecutions and
harshness of men, on the part of her physicians, and those who
attended her, then on the part of the devil, who tempted her to
despair; and, lastly, from holy obedience; for, although she had so
fervently longed for the moment wherein she was to be dissolved, and
to be with Christ, it had been made known to her that she was not to
die, without the command of her confessor; that so the obedience,
which had been so perfect in life, might be crowned even on earth,
by opening for her the gate of heavenly bliss. And, as in her
burning charity, and her eager desire and incomparable endurance of
suffering, as well as in the pains of His blessed passion, she had
so closely copied our Lord, so it pleased Him to make the days of
her last illness of the same number as the years of His sojourn in
this vale of tears; and on the thirty-third day, to close her life by
an agony of three hours, like to his own upon the cross. As she lay
motionless and tranquil, her confessor, perceiving that her life was
drawing near its term, said, “Be glad of heart, sister Veronica, what
you have so much longed for, is near at hand.” As she heard these
words, she gave a sign of her unspeakable joy, and then turned and
fastened her eyes upon him. He began to recite the “Recommendation
of a Departing Soul,” and suggest acts of virtue and resignation,
without being able to understand why she looked at him with so fixed
an eye. At length, enlightened by Almighty God, he recollected that
she had told him that she would not wish to die, save with the leave
of her superiors, and through holy obedience, which permission she
now craved by the fixed and earnest eye wherewith she regarded him.
Animated, therefore, with a lively faith in God, he approached her
and said, “Sister Veronica, since it is the will of God that you
should now go to enjoy Him, and since it is the pleasure of His
Divine Majesty, that for your departure, the leave of His minister
should also be granted,--I now give it to you.” Scarcely were these
words uttered, than she bent her eyes in token of submission; then
turning towards her spiritual daughters, as if to give them her last
blessing, she bowed her head, and yielded up her soul, in the peace
of the Lord, on Friday, the 9th of July, 1727, in the sixty-seventh
year of her age, and the fiftieth of her religious profession.

Of her perfection in the discharge of all the duties of her state
of life,--of her faith, hope, and love of God and her neighbor,--of
her meekness and humility, which she practised in the most heroic
degree,--it is unnecessary here to say more, than that in them she
was an exact copy of that virtue which her loving Spouse displayed
in His life amongst men. Even upon earth, her sanctity was made
manifest by the accomplishment of the events which she had foretold,
and by the miracles that she performed; and since her death, the
most wonderful favors have been obtained by her intercession. From
the many that are recorded in the acts of her beatification, we
select only two. The first is that of her confidential companion and
friend, sister Mary Magdalen Boscaini, who, in the course of the
years 1729-30, was attacked by such a complication of disorders, that
she could neither taste food, nor lie down, without considerable
difficulty; she was subject to frequent fainting-fits and vomitings,
and remained in this state for eleven months, being declared by her
physicians to have reached an advanced stage of consumption. At
last, on the vigil of St. Matthias, in 1730, eleven months since the
beginning of her illness, her confessor exhorted her to place a firm
reliance upon Veronica, under whom she had passed her novitiate; and
when he had excited her confidence and hope, he gave her to drink
some water, in which a relic of the saint had been. She drank it,
and instantly sprang out of bed, and ran to see one of her sisters,
who was also sick; and afterwards to meet the physician at the door,
who was coming to make his usual visit. He carefully examined her;
and, after feeling her pulse, pronounced it to be a miracle, as the
effect proved, for she lived twelve years longer,--when a second
illness attacked her, from which she recovered, in like manner, by
the intercession of Veronica; and so lived for twenty-two years more,
dying in 1765. The second miracle was the sudden and perfect cure
of Maria Pacciarini, of an arthritic rheumatism of long duration;
from which she instantaneously and perfectly recovered, by the
intercession of Veronica.

Veronica was beatified by Pius VII., in 1804, the Cardinal Duke of
York being the reporter of the Cause to the Congregation of Rites.
She was solemnly canonized by Gregory XVI., on Trinity Sunday, 26th
May, 1839.

“There are often found, in the lives of those who enjoy a reputation
for sanctity, certain extraordinary marks, which the profane rashly
and foolishly scoff at, as empty and dreamy visions: and the
inexperienced multitude, on the other hand, receives as irrefragable
proofs of virtue: nor are those wanting, who, misled by a deceitful
semblance of prudence and caution, blindly pronounce them the result
of artifice and cunning. The prudent man avoids all these extremes;
and, whilst he silently admires things beyond the reach of ordinary
understandings, inquires into their causes; but, still, not from
such effects does he decide upon the virtues of those in whom they
are conspicuous, but looks chiefly to the conduct and actions they
have produced in them, that from the fruits, as our Divine Master
teacheth, the quality of the tree may be known.”[89]

JULY X.

THE SEVEN BROTHERS, MARTYRS, AND ST. FELICITAS THEIR MOTHER.

From their genuine acts in Ruinart, and Tillemont, t. 2.
See the remarks of Pinius the Bollandist, t. 3, Julij, p. 5.

IN THE SECOND CENTURY.

The illustrious martyrdom of these saints has been justly celebrated
by the holy fathers. It happened at Rome under the emperor Antoninus,
that is, according to several ancient copies of the acts, Antoninus
Pius.[90] The seven brothers were the sons of St. Felicitas, a noble
pious Christian widow in Rome, who brought them up in the most
perfect sentiments and practice of heroic virtue. After the death of
her husband she served God in a state of continency[91] and employed
herself wholly in prayer, fasting, and works of charity. By the
public and edifying example of this lady and her whole family, many
idolators were moved to renounce the worship of their false gods,
and to embrace the faith of Christ, which Christians were likewise
encouraged by so illustrious a pattern openly to profess. This
raised the spleen of the heathenish priests, who complained to the
emperor Antoninus that the boldness with which Felicitas publicly
practised the Christian religion, drew many from the worship of the
immortal gods who were the guardians and protectors of the empire,
and that it was a continual insult on them; who, on that account,
were extremely offended and angry with the city and whole state. They
added, that in order to appease them, it was necessary to compel
this lady and her children to sacrifice to them. Antoninus being
himself superstitious was prevailed upon by this remonstrance to
send an order to Publius the prefect of Rome, to take care that the
priests should be satisfied, and the gods appeased in this matter.
Publius caused the mother and her sons to be apprehended and brought
before him. When this was done he took Felicitas aside, and used the
strongest inducements to bring her freely to sacrifice to the gods,
that he might not be obliged to proceed with severity against her and
her sons; but she returned him this answer: “Do not think to frighten
me by threats, or to win me by fair speeches. The spirit of God
within me will not suffer me to be overcome by Satan, and will make
me victorious over all your assaults.” Publius said in a great rage:
“Unhappy woman, is it possible you should think death so desirable
as not to permit even your children to live, but force me to destroy
them by the most cruel torments?” “My children,” said she, “will live
eternally with Christ if they are faithful to him; but must expect
eternal death if they sacrifice to idols.” The next day the prefect,
sitting in the square of Mars before his temple, sent for Felicitas
and her sons, and addressing his speech to her, said: “Take pity
of your children, Felicitas; they are in the bloom of youth, and
may aspire to the greatest honors and preferments.” The holy mother
answered: “Your pity is really impiety, and the compassion to which
you exhort me would make me the most cruel of mothers.” Then turning
herself towards her children, she said to them, “My sons, look up to
heaven where Jesus Christ with his saints expects you. Be faithful
in his love, and fight courageously for your souls.” Publius being
exasperated at this behavior, commanded her to be cruelly buffeted,
saying: “You are insolent indeed, to give them such advice as this in
my presence, in contempt of the orders of our princes.”

The judge then called the children to him one after another, and
used many artful speeches, mingling promises with threats to induce
them to adore the gods. Januarius, the eldest, experienced his
assaults the first, but resolutely answered him: “You advise me to
do a thing that is very foolish, and contrary to all reason; but I
confide in my Lord Jesus Christ, that he will preserve me from such
an impiety.” Publius ordered him to be stripped and cruelly scourged,
after which he sent him back to prison. Felix, the second brother,
was called next, and commanded to sacrifice. But the generous youth
replied, “There is one only God. To him we offer the sacrifice of our
hearts. We will never forsake the love which we owe to Jesus Christ.
Employ all your artifices; exhaust all inventions of cruelty; you
will never be able to overcome our faith.” The other brothers made
their answers separately, that they feared not a passing death, but
everlasting torments; and that having before their eyes the immortal
recompenses of the just, they despised the threats of men. Martialis,
who spoke last, said: “All who do not confess Christ to be the true
God, shall be cast into eternal flames.”[92] The brothers, after
being whipped, were remanded to prison, and the prefect, despairing
to be able ever to overcome their resolution, laid the whole process
before the emperor. Antoninus having read the interrogatory, gave an
order that they should be sent to different judges, and be condemned
to different deaths. Januarius was scourged to death with whips
loaded with plummets of lead. The two next, Felix and Philip, were
beaten with clubs till they expired. Sylvanus, the fourth, was thrown
headlong down a steep precipice. The three youngest, Alexander,
Vitalis, and Martialis, were beheaded, and the same sentence was
executed upon the mother four months after. St. Felicitas is
commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on the 23d of November; the
sons on the 10th of July, on which day their festival is marked in
the old Roman Calendar, published by Bucherius.[93]

* * * * *

St. Gregory the Great delivered his third homily on the Gospels, on
the festival of St. Felicitas, in the church built over her tomb on
the Salarian road. In this discourse he says, that this saint “having
seven children was as much afraid of leaving them behind her on
earth, as other mothers are of surviving theirs. She was more than a
martyr, for seeing her seven dear children martyred before her eyes,
she was in some sort a martyr in each of them. She was the eighth in
the order of time, but was from the first to the last in pain, and
began her martyrdom in the eldest, which she only finished in her
own death. She received a crown not only for herself, but likewise
for all her children. Seeing them in torments she remained constant,
feeling their pains by nature as their mother, but rejoicing for them
in her heart by hope.” The same father takes notice how weak faith
is in us: in her it was victorious over flesh and blood; but in us
is not able to check the sallies of our passions, or wean our hearts
from a wicked and deceitful world. “Let us be covered with shame and
confusion,” says he, “that we should fall so far short of the virtue
of this martyr, and should suffer our passions still to triumph
over faith in our hearts. Often one word spoken against us disturbs
our minds; at the least blast of contradiction we are discouraged
or provoked; but neither torments nor death were able to shake her
courageous soul. We weep without ceasing when God requires of us the
children he hath lent us; and she bewailed her children when they
did not die for Christ, and rejoiced when she saw them die.” What
afflictions do parents daily meet with from the disorders into which
their children fall through their own bad example or neglect! Let
them imitate the earnestness of St. Felicitas in forming to perfect
virtue the tender souls which God hath committed to their charge, and
with this saint they will have the greatest of all comforts in them;
and will by his grace count as many saints in their family as they
are blessed with children.

SAINTS RUFINA AND SECUNDA, VIRGINS, MM.

They were sisters, and the daughters of one Asterius, a man of a
senatorian family in Rome. Their father promised them in marriage,
the first to Armentarius, and the second to Verinus, who were then
both Christians, but afterward apostatized from the faith when the
storm raised by Valerian and Gallien in 257, fell upon the Church.
The two virgins resisted their solicitations to imitate their
impiety, and fled out of Rome; but were overtaken, brought back, and
after other torments condemned by Junius Donatus, prefect of Rome,
to lose their heads. They were conducted twelve miles out of Rome,
executed in a forest on the Aurelian Way, and buried in the same
place. It was then called the Black Forest, Sylva Nigra, but from
these martyrs this name was changed into that of Sylva Candia or the
White Forest. A chapel was built over their tomb, which pope Damasus
demolished, erecting a large church in its room. A town rose in the
same place, which was called Sylva Candia, and made an episcopal see.
But the city being destroyed by barbarians in the twelfth century,
the bishopric was united by Calixtus II. to that of Porto, and the
relics of the saints were translated at the same time, in the year
1120, to the Lateran basilic, where they are kept near the baptistery
of Constantine. See their Acts abridged by Tillemont, t. 4, p. 5.
Also the remarks of Pinius the Bollandist, t. 3, Julij, p. 28, and
Laderchius Diss. de Basilicis SS. Marcellini et Petri, c. 2, p. 6.

JULY XI.

ST. JAMES, BISHOP OF NISIBIS, C.

From Theodoret, Phil. c. 1, et Aist. l. 1, c. 7. Gennadius,
c. 1. Tillemont, t. 7, p. 263. Ceillier, t. 4. Assemani,
Bibl. Orient. t. 1, p. 186. Cuper the Bollandist, and the
saint’s works, published in Armenian and Latin, by Nic.
Antonelli, at Rome, in 1755; add the accounts given of
this saint in the Menology of the Armenians at Venice,
on the seventh day of the month Caghozi, the 15th of
our December; in the Synaxary of the Egyptians on the
eighteenth of Tobi, our 12th of January, by St. Gregory of
Nariegha, an Armenian bishop, in 980, author of many devout
Armenian orations and prayers. (Orat. 99, in St. Jacob.
in libro Precum edito Constantinopoli, An. 1700.) Also by
Moyses Cheronensis, Histor. Armenæ l. 3, art. 7, though
this author flourished not in the fifth century (as the
Whistons imagine with those who confound him with Moyses
the grammarian, who translated the Bible from the Greek and
Syriac into the Armenian tongue, in the reign of Theodosius
the Younger, as Galanus mentions), but after the year 727,
in which arose the great schism of which this historian
speaks, and of which the patriarch John IV. of Oznium was
author. See James Villotte, the Jesuit, in Diction. Armen.
in Serie Patriarcharum.

A. D. 350.

This eminent saint, and glorious doctor of the Syriac church, was a
native of Nisibis, in Mesopotamia, which country was then subject
to the eastern empire.[94] He had a genius rich by nature, which he
cultivated with indefatigable application; though after laying a
foundation of the sciences, he confined himself to sacred studies. In
his youth entering the world, he became soon apprised of its dangers.
He saw that in it only ambition, vanity, and voluptuousness reign;
that men here usually live in a hurry and a crowd, without finding
leisure to look into themselves, or to study that great science which
ought to be their only affair. He trembled at the sight of its vices,
and the slippery path of its pleasures, which, though they seem
agreeable at first, yet when tasted are nothing but bitterness and
mortal poison, and whilst they flatter the senses, destroy the soul;
and he thought it the safer part to conquer by flight, or at least,
with the Baptist, to prepare and strengthen himself in retirement,
that he might afterward be the better able to stand his ground in
the field. He accordingly chose the highest mountains for his abode,
sheltering himself in a cave in the winter, and the rest of the year
living in the woods, continually exposed to the open air; and knowing
that our greatest conquest is to subdue ourselves, in order to
facilitate this important victory, he joined to assiduous prayer the
practice of great austerities. He lived only on wild roots and herbs,
which he ate raw, and had no other garments than a tunic and cloak,
both made of goat’s hair very coarse. Notwithstanding his desire to
live unknown to men, yet he was discovered, and many were not afraid
to climb the rugged rocks that they might recommend themselves to
his prayers, and receive the comfort of his spiritual advice. He
was favored with the gifts of prophecy and miracles in an uncommon
measure, of which he gave several proofs in a journey he took into
Persia to visit the new churches that were planting there, and
strengthen the young converts laboring under grievous persecutions.
His presence fortified them in their good resolutions, and inspired
them with that spirit of martyrdom which afterwards showed itself in
their glorious triumphs. He converted many idolaters, and wrought
several miracles in that country. He suffered torments for the faith
in the persecution continued by Maximinus II. for Gennadius places
him in the number of confessors under that tyrant; and Nicephorus
names him among the holy bishops in the council of Nice, who bore the
glorious marks of their sufferings for Christ. His personal merit and
great reputation occasioned his promotion to the see of Nisibis; but
here he still followed the same course of life he had inured himself
to on the mountains, to his fasts and austerities adding the care
of the poor, the correction of sinners, and all the other toils and
hardships of episcopacy. Such was his charity for the poor, that he
seemed to possess nothing but for their relief. In the acts of St.
Miles and his companions, Persian martyrs, it is related that St.
James built at Nisibis a very stately church. St. Miles coming to
that city was astonished at the majesty of the edifice, and having
made some stay there with St. James, returned to Adiab, whence he
sent the holy bishop a present of a great quantity of silk for the
ornaments of his church.

Theodoret relates[95] of him that one day as he was travelling, he
was accosted by a gang of beggars who had concerted a plot whereby
to impose upon the servant of God, with the view of extorting money
from him on pretence to bury their companion, who lay stretched on
the ground as if he had been dead. The holy man gave them what they
asked, and “offering up supplications to God as for a soul departed,
he prayed that his divine majesty would pardon him the sins he had
committed whilst he lived, and that he would admit him into the
company of the saints,” says Theodoret. As soon as the saint was gone
by, his companions calling upon him to rise and take his share of the
booty, were strangely surprised to find him really dead. Seized with
sudden fear and grief, they shrieked in the utmost consternation,
and immediately ran after the man of God, cast themselves at his
feet, confessed the cheat, begged forgiveness, and by entreaties and
mournful looks pleaded for pity, and besought him by his prayers to
restore their unhappy companion to life, which the saint performed,
as this grave author assures us. When the heresy of Arius was set
abroach, and began to infect many churches, St. James strenuously
exerted himself in defending his church from the contagion, and
labored to crush the growing evil. He assisted at the council of Nice
in 325, as Theodoret and Gennadius testify; likewise at the council
of Antioch held under St. Eustathius, about the year 326. Being at
Constantinople in 336, when Constantine commanded St. Alexander, the
holy bishop of that city, to leave his see in case he persisted to
refuse admitting to communion Arius, who had imposed on that prince
by an hypocritical confession of faith; St. James exhorted the people
to have recourse to God by fasting and prayer during seven days; and
on the eighth day, which was the very Sunday on which Arius was to
have been admitted, the unhappy man was found dead in a privy into
which he had stepped to ease nature.[96]

The most famous miracle of our Thaumaturgus was that by which he
protected the city of Nisibis from the barbarians, as is related
by Theodoret both in his religious and ecclesiastical history; by
Theophanes, the Alexandrian Chronicle, and even by Philostorgius
himself,[97] who was a rank Arian, cannot be suspected of being too
favorable to St. James. Sapor II. the haughty king of Persia, twice
besieged Nisibis with the whole strength of his empire, whilst our
saint was bishop; and the city was every time miraculously protected
by the prayers of St. James. Of these sieges the first was laid
soon after the death of Constantine the Great, which happened on
the 22nd of May, in 337, after that prince had reigned thirty-nine
years, nine months, and twenty-seven days. His valor had kept the
barbarians in awe. But upon his demise Sapor came, and in 338
sat down before Nisibis with a prodigious army of foot, horse,
elephants, and all sorts of warlike engines. But after continuing
the siege sixty-three days, he was compelled shamefully to raise
it, and return into Persia; and his army, harassed by the enemy in
its march, and exhausted by fatigues, was at length destroyed by
famine and epidemical diseases.[98] The emperor Constantius, when
the Persians again invaded the territories of the Romans in 348, by
his pusillanimity and misconduct gave them a great superiority in
the field. And Cosroës, elated with success, and enriched by the
plunder of many provinces, ventured a second time with an army still
much stronger than before to lay siege to Nisibis in 350. His troops
having seized all the avenues, and made their approaches with a fury
beyond example, he first endeavored to make a breach in the walls by
battering rams and mines, but all to no purpose. At length, after
seventy days’ labor, he caused a dam to be raised at a considerable
distance from the city, thereby to stop the river Mygdon, which ran
through it; this he ordered to be broken down when the water was at
its full height; so that the violence with which it beat against
the wall of the city made a wide breach in it. At this the Persians
rent the air with loud shouts of joy, but deferred the assault till
the next day, that the waters might be first carried off, they not
being able to make their approaches by reason of the inundation.
When they came up to the breach they were strangely surprised to
find another wall which the inhabitants had raised behind the former
with an astonishing expedition, being encouraged by St. James, who
remained himself all the time in the church at his prayers, by which
he conquered, like Moses on the mountain. Sapor marching up to the
breach in person, fancied he saw a man in royal apparel on the wall,
whose purple and diadem cast an uncommon brightness. This person
he believed was the Roman emperor Constantius, and threatened to
put to death those who had told him the emperor was at Antioch. But
upon their giving him fresh assurances that Constantius was really
there, and convinced that heaven fought for the Romans, he threw up a
javelin into the air, out of impotent revenge because heaven seemed
to take part against him. Then St. Ephrem, deacon of Edessa and St.
James’s disciple, being present, entreated him to go upon the walls
to take a view of the Persians, and pray to God that he would defeat
the infidel army. The bishop would not pray for the destruction of
any one, but he implored the divine mercy that the city might be
delivered from the calamities of so long a siege. Afterwards, going
to the top of a high tower, and turning his face towards the enemy,
and seeing the prodigious multitude of men and beasts which covered
the whole country, he said: “Lord, thou art able by the weakest means
to humble the pride of thy enemies; defeat these multitudes by an
army of gnats.” God heard the humble prayers of his servant, as he
had done that of Moses against the Egyptians, and as he had by the
like means vanquished the enemies of his people when he conducted
them out of Egypt.[99] For scarce had the saint spoken these words,
when whole clouds of gnats and flies came pouring down upon the
Persians, got into the elephants’ trunks, and the horses’ ears and
nostrils, which made them chafe and foam, throw their riders, and
put the whole army into confusion and disorder.[100] A famine and
pestilence which followed, carried off a great part of the army; and
Sapor, after lying above three months before the place, set fire to
all his own engines of war, and was forced to abandon the siege and
return home with the loss of twenty thousand men. Sapor received a
third foil under the walls of Nisibis, in 359, upon which he turned
his arms against Amidus, took that strong city, and put the garrison
and the greatest part of the inhabitants to the sword.[101] The
citizens of Nisibis attributed their preservation to the intercession
of their glorious patron, St. James, though he seems to have been
translated to glory before this last siege. Gennadius says he died
in the reign of Constantius, whose death happened in 361.[102]
That of St. James is placed by most moderns in 350, soon after the
second siege of Nisibis. Gennadius informs us, that out of a pious
confidence that the saint’s earthly remains would be a pledge of
his intercession with God for the protection of the city against
the barbarians, by an order of the emperor Constantius, though an
Arian, pursuant to an express injunction of his father Constantine
the Great, notwithstanding the severe laws to the contrary then in
force, the body of St. James was buried within the walls of the city.
Julian, the Apostate, in 361, envying the saint this distinguished
privilege, commanded these sacred remains to be removed without
the city. Soon after, upon his death the emperor Jovian, in 363,
in order to purchase peace of the Persians, was obliged to yield
up to them Nisibis, with the five Roman provinces situated on the
Tigris, and great part of Mesopotamia. But the inhabitants of Nisibis
who were compelled by Jovian to remove before he delivered up the
city, carried with them the sacred relics of this saint, which,
according to the Menology of the Armenians at Venice, were brought
to Constantinople about the year 970. His name is famous both in the
Eastern and Western Martyrologies. His festival is kept by the Latins
on the 15th of July, by the Greeks on the 13th of January and the
31st of October, by the Syrians on the 18th of January, and by the
Armenians on a Saturday in the month of December. The last honor him
with no less solemnity than the Assyrians, and observe before his
feast a fast of five days with the same severity with that of Lent.
In his office they sing the long devout Armenian hymns, which were
compiled in his honor by Saint Nierses, patriarch of Armenia, the
fourth of that name, surnamed of Ghelaia, who strenuously defended
the union with the Latin church against the Greek emperor, Michael
Commenus, in the twelfth century, and is honored by the orthodox
Armenians among the saints.[104]

St. James’s learning and writings have procured him a rank next to
St. Ephrem among the doctors of the Syriac church; and the Armenians
honor him as one of the principal doctors of their national church.
For though St. James was a Syrian, he wrote excellent treatises in
the Armenian language for their instruction,[105] at the request of
a holy bishop of that nation called Gregory, whose letter to our
saint is still extant. In it he promises himself the happiness of
paying St. James a visit, and passing some time with him, in order
to improve himself more perfectly by his lessons in the knowledge
and practice of true virtue: in the mean time he earnestly conjures
him to favor him with some short instructions, and teach him what
is the true foundation of a spiritual life of faith, by what means
the edifice is to be raised in our souls, and by what good works,
by what virtue it is to be finished and brought to perfection. St.
James complied with his desire in eighteen excellent discourses still
extant.[106] They are published at Rome in one volume, folio, in
1756, in Armenian and Latin, by M. Nicholas Antonelli, canon of the
Lateran basilic.

* * * * *

The visible protection with which God watches over his servants ought
to excite our confidence in him. He assures us that his tenderness
for them surpasses the bowels of the most affectionate mother, and he
styles himself their protector and their safeguard.[107] This made
St. Chrysostom cry out,[108] “Behold, I testify and proclaim to all
men with a loud voice, and would raise it, were it possible, louder
than any trumpet, that no man on earth can hurt a good Christian, nor
even the tyrant the devil. _If God be for us, who is against us?_
says the apostle.” How far otherwise is it with the wicked! They are
cast off by their God; they are not his people; not fed or watched
over by that special tender providence which he affords his servants:
they are a forsaken, abandoned vineyard.[109] He is their enemy, and
hath set his eyes upon them for evil, not for good.[110] What rest
or comfort can the sinner enjoy who knows he hath an almighty arm
continually stretched out against him?

ST. HIDULPHUS, BISHOP AND ABBOT.

From Richerius, in his Chronicle of Senones, t. 3,
Spicileg. and the saint’s three imperfect lives, with the
remarks of Solier the Bollandist, t. 3, Jul. p. 205. See
also Calmet, Hist. de Lorraine, l. 10, p. 445, &c.

A. D. 707.

St. Hidulph, or Hildulph, was born at Ratisbon in Bavaria, of one
of the most illustrious families in the country, and renounced
great temporal possessions in his youth to consecrate himself to
God in an ecclesiastical state, which he embraced with his brother
St. Erard, who was advanced to the episcopal see at Ratisbon, was
buried in Moyen-Moutier, and is honored among the saints on the 8th
of January.[111] Hidulph was consecrated archbishop of Triers, and
discharged for some time all the duties of a vigilant and zealous
pastor. The monastery of St. Maximin had been founded in the fourth
century, and doubtless observed the discipline of the oriental monks.
Hidulph introduced into it the Benedictin Order about the year 665,
and so much augmented it in revenues and settled in it so perfect a
spirit of monastic virtue, that it was the admiration of that age,
and is to this day one of the most flourishing abbeys in Germany.

Hidulph was much taken with the charms of holy retirement, with the
happy security and liberty of that state, its exercises of humility,
penance, and prayer, and the liberty which it affords of living
disengaged from worldly attachments and distractions, in a continual
application to heavenly things. He was also strongly affected by the
example and conversation of many divine men who then adorned the
Church, and maintained in it the true spirit of Christ, by the odor
of sanctity which their angelic minds and deportment spread, and who
were raised to this heroic virtue by the exercises of a monastic
life. The obligations of his own charge (which he could not abandon
unless his reasons for resigning it were such as to be approved of by
a superior authority, as that of a primate, and rather of the pope
as patriarch of the West) withheld him some time, but at length he
found means to resign his see to St. Veomade, abbot of St. Maximin’s,
and hid himself in that monastery.[112] But finding it impossible
to live in the obscurity which he sought, in the midst of his own
diocess, he retired secretly amidst the mountains of Voge, on the
confines of Lorrain, and settled in a small hermitage on the spot
which the monks of Senones and Estival gave him, and on which he soon
after, about the year 676, built the monastery of Moyen-Moutier.
This name was given it from its situation between the abbeys of
Senones to the east, of Estival to the west, of Bodon-Moutier to the
north, and to the south that of Jointures, now the collegiate church
of canons, and the town of St. Die. Three hundred monks served God
under his direction; for, besides those who composed the monastery
of Moyen-Moutier, at the request of his friend St. Die, upon his
death-bed, and of his community, he took upon him also the charge
of that abbey, and many lived under his conduct in separate cells.
St. Hidulph governed his own monastery above thirty years, though
for some time, whilst he was obliged to reside at St. Die’s, he
appointed a vicar in his room at Moyen-Moutier. He returned thither
before his death, which happened in 707, or, according to others, in
713. His relics are kept in a silver shrine in this monastery, which
at present bears his name, and in union with that of St. Vannes,
began the reformation of the Benedictin Order, which is so famous in
Lorrain, and in France. Saint Hidulph’s name is not inserted in the
Roman Martyrology, but is famous in German, French, and Benedictin
Calendars.

* * * * *

The sanctity of those ancient monks who, by the exercises of humility
and holy solitude, attained to so wonderful a victory over their
passions, so sublime a degree of virtue, and so heavenly a temper
as to have seemed rather angels than men, was the admiration even
of infidels, and the edification of all those who had the happiness
of enjoying their conversation. “For my part,” said Saint Sulpicius
Severus, or his friend Posthumianus,[113] “so long as I shall keep
alive and in my senses, I shall ever celebrate the monks of Egypt,
praise the anchorets, and admire the hermits.” Of the same another
ancient eye-witness says,[114] “There have I seen many fathers
leading an angelic life, and walking after the example of Jesus.” The
more happy and the more perfect a religious state is, the greater
ought to be the watchfulness and the fervor of those who are engaged
in it not to fall short of their obligations, and lose the precious
graces of their vocation.

Persons in the world are usually inclined to show no indulgence for
the least failings which they observe in religious persons. How
much soever the reformation and perfect sanctification of the more
illustrious portion of the flock of Christ be to be desired and
prayed for by all, and promoted by the chief pastors, these severe
censors would better employ their zeal in looking into, and reforming
their own hearts. They must never forget that all Christians, by
their baptismal engagements and the sacred law of the gospel which
they profess, are bound to sanctify their souls, and to serve God
in the perfect sentiments and practice of all virtues. If in this
degenerate age many religious establishments stand in need of a spur
or some reformation, we may believe an enemy “that there is no class
or condition of Christians in general which does not want it still
much more.”

ST. PIUS I. POPE, M.

According to the pontificals, he was the son of one Rufinus, and a
native of Aquileia. He had served the Church among the clergy at Rome
many years under Adrian and Antoninus Pius,[115] when, according to
Tillemont, in the fourth year of the reign of the latter he succeeded
St. Hyginus in the papacy in 142. He condemned the heresiarch
Valentinus, and rejected Marcion, who came from Pontus to Rome after
the death of Hyginus, as we have related elsewhere. The conflicts
which St. Pius sustained obtained him the title of martyr, which is
given him not only in Usuard’s Martyrology, but also in many others
more ancient; though Fontanini, a most judicious and learned critic,
strenuously maintains, against Tillemont, that he died by the sword.
He passed to a better life in 157, and was buried at the foot of the
Vatican hill on the 11th of July. See Tillemont, t. 2, p. 312, and
especially Fontanini, who discusses at length all things relating to
this pope, in his Historia Literaria Aquileiensis, l. 2, c. 3 and 4.

ST. DROSTAN, ABBOT.

Was a prince of royal blood in Scotland, educated under the
discipline of the great Saint Columba. He was afterward abbot of
Dalcongaile; but in his old age lived a recluse in a forest. He died
about the year 809. His sacred remains were deposited in a stone
coffin at Aberdeen. See Colgan, ad 11 Jul.

JULY XII.

ST. JOHN GUALBERT, ABBOT.

FOUNDER OF THE RELIGIOUS ORDER OF VALLIS UMBROSA.

From his exact life compiled by Blaise Melanisius, general
of his Order, with the long notes of Cuper the Bollandist.
See also two other lives of the saint with a long history
of his miracles, ib., t. 3, Julij, p. 311.

A. D. 1073.

St. John Gualbert was born at Florence of rich and noble parents,
and in his youth was carefully instructed in the Christian doctrine
and in the elements of the sciences; but afterward, by conversing
with the world, he imbibed a relish for its vanities and follies.
While a thirst of worldly pleasure kept possession of his desires,
and seemed to him innocent, and while he thought a certain degree
of worldly pride the privilege of his birth, he was a stranger to
the gospel maxims of penance, meekness, and lowliness of heart;
and all arguments of virtue lost their force upon him. But God was
pleased by a remarkable accident to open his eyes, and to discover
to him his errors, and the extent of his obligations. Hugo, his only
brother, was murdered by a gentleman of the country; and our young
nobleman determined to revenge the crime by the death of him who had
perpetrated it, and who seemed out of the reach of the laws. Under
the influence of his resentment, which was much heightened by the
invectives and persuasion of his own father Gualbert, he neither
listened to the voice of reason nor of religion. The motive of
revenge is criminal if it creeps into the breast even in demanding
the just punishment of a delinquent; much more if it push men to
vindicate their own cause themselves by returning injury for injury,
and wreaking wrongs on those that inflicted them. But passion stifled
remorse, and John was falsely persuaded that his honor in the world
required that he should not suffer so flagrant an outrage to pass
unpunished. It happened that riding with his man home to Florence
on Good Friday, he met his enemy in so narrow a passage that it
was impossible for either of them to avoid the other. John seeing
the murderer, drew his sword, and was going to despatch him. But
the other, alighting from his horse, fell upon his knees, and with
his arms across, besought him by the passion of Jesus Christ, who
suffered on that day, to spare his life. The remembrance of Christ,
who prayed for his murderers on the cross, exceedingly affected the
young nobleman; and meekly raising the supplicant from the ground
with his hand, he said, “I can refuse nothing that is asked of me
for the sake of Jesus Christ. I not only give you your life, but
also my friendship for ever. Pray for me that God may pardon me my
sin.” After embracing each other they parted, and John went forward
on his road till he came to the monastery of St. Minias,[116] of
the holy Order of St. Bennet. Going into the church, he offered up
his prayers before a great crucifix, begging with many tears and
extraordinary fervor that God would mercifully grant him the pardon
of his sins. Whilst he continued his prayer the crucifix miraculously
bowed its head to him, as it were to give him a token how acceptable
the sacrifice of his resentment, and his sincere repentance were.
The divine grace made such deep impressions on his heart, that
rising from his devotions he cast himself at the feet of the abbot,
earnestly begging to be admitted to the religious habit. The abbot
was apprehensive of his father’s displeasure; but at length was
prevailed upon with much ado to allow him to live in the community in
his secular habit. After a few days John cut off his hair himself,
and put on a habit which he borrowed. His father, at this news of the
step his son had taken, hastened to the monastery, and stormed and
complained dreadfully; till after some time seeing the steadiness of
his son’s resolution, and hearing his reasons and motives, he was so
well satisfied, that he gave him his blessing, and exhorted him to
persevere in his good purposes.

St. John devoted himself to the exercises of his new state in the
most perfect dispositions of a true penitent. He was most exact in
every religious observance. He subdued his body with much fasting
and watching; never gave way to idleness, but kept himself day and
night employed almost in continual prayer. His corporeal austerities
he animated with a perfect interior spirit of penance, or desire
of punishing sin in himself, the more powerfully to move God to
compassion and mercy towards him; and he endeavored by them to
facilitate the subjection of his passions, which victory he completed
by a watchfulness over the motions of his own heart, and heroic acts
of all virtues, especially meekness and humility. But assiduous and
humble prayer and meditation were the principal means by which this
wonderful change was effected in all the affections of his soul, so
that he became entirely a new man. Nothing can have so prevalent a
power to still the agitation of passion in the breast, nothing is
so fit to induce a smooth and easy flow, and a constant evenness
of temper, as a frequent application to the throne of grace. This
presence of the mind with the Lord is an absence from the body, or
from the tumult of carnal passions. The pure and serene tranquillity
that springs up in the soul by an intercourse with heaven, shows that
here she is nearest the centre of her true happiness, where earthly
things lose all their power of attraction. The very preparation of
the heart to wait upon God in this solemn exercise is of admirable
use to remove that corruption which inflames the passions. Especially
a lively sense of God’s infinite greatness, and of our littleness and
infirmities, powerfully impressed on our minds by assiduous prayer,
soon brings us to a conviction that pride is the root of all our
disorders; and enables us to discover its disguises, and to banish it
out of our souls. By fidelity and perseverance St. John obtained the
victory over himself, and became most eminent in meekness, humility,
silence, obedience, modesty, and patience.

When the abbot died our saint was earnestly entreated by the greatest
part of the monks to accept that dignity; but his consent could by
no means be extorted. Not long after, he left this house with one
companion, and went in quest of a closer solitude. He paid a visit
to the hermitage of Camaldoli; and having edified himself with the
example of its fervent inhabitants, he proceeded further to an
agreeable shady valley covered with willow trees, commonly called
Vallis Umbrosa, in the diocess of Fiesoli, half a day’s journey from
Florence, in Tuscany. He found in that place two devout hermits, with
whom he and his companion concerted a project to build themselves
a small monastery of timber and mud-walls, and to form together a
little community, serving God according to the primitive austere
rule and spirit of the Order of St. Bennet. The abbess of St. Hilary
gave them the ground on which they desired to build, and when the
monastery was finished, the bishop of Paderborn, who attended the
emperor Henry III. into Italy, consecrated the chapel. Pope Alexander
II. in 1070 approved this new Order, together with the rule in which
the saint added certain particular constitutions to the original rule
of St. Bennet. From this confirmation is dated the foundation of the
Order of Vallis-Umbrosa. St. John was chosen the first abbot, nor was
he able to decline that dignity. He gave his monks a habit of an ash
color; and settled among them retirement, silence, disengagement of
their hearts from all earthly things, the most austere practice of
penance, profound humility, and the most universal charity.

Though most humble and mild, he severely reproved the least tepidity
or sloth in others. For the virtue of meekness is not further removed
from intemperate anger which clouds or dethrones reason, than from
a vicious defect or tameness and stupidity which beholds vice with
indifference. God has committed to every man a kind of trust and
guardianship of virtue, whose rights we are obliged to maintain in
proportion to our power not only by example, but also by advice,
exhortation, and reproof, as often as it is reasonable. And he who
regards the sins of others with a careless unconcernedness, makes
himself accountable for them, when it is in his power to prevent
them. Superiors especially lie under the most grievous obligations to
check and chastise the irregularities and faults of those under their
immediate care and inspection. Our saint feared no less the danger of
too great lenity and forbearance than that of harshness; and was a
true imitator both of the mildness and zeal of the Jewish legislator,
whom the Holy Ghost calls “the meekest of all men upon the face of
the earth.” St. John was himself a perfect model of all virtues,
and tender and compassionate towards all, especially the sick. This
compassion for them he learned by his own perpetual infirmities,
and weakness of stomach. Such was his humility that he would never
be promoted even to Minor Orders, never presumed to approach nearer
the altar than was necessary to receive the holy communion, and
never would open the church door, but always prayed one in Minor
Orders to open it for him. He was very zealous for holy poverty, and
would not allow any monasteries to be built in a costly or sumptuous
manner, thinking such edifices not agreeable to a spirit of poverty.
He founded the monastery of St. Salvi, that of Moscetta, that of
Passignano, another at Rozzuolo, and another at Monte Salario. He
reformed some other monasteries, and left about twelve houses of his
Order at his death. Besides monks he received lay-brothers, who were
exempt from choir and silence, and employed in external offices.
This is said to be the first example of such a distinction; but it
was soon imitated by other Orders. The saint’s charity to the poor
was not less active than his love for holy poverty. He would have no
poor person sent from his door without an alms, and often emptied
all the granaries and stores of his monasteries in relieving them.
In a great dearth he supplied, sometimes by miracle, the multitudes
of poor people that flocked to his monastery of Rozzuolo. The saint
was endowed with the spirit of prophecy, and by his prayers restored
many sick persons to perfect health. The holy pope Leo IX. went to
Passignano on purpose to see and converse with this holy man. Stephen
IX. and Alexander II. had the greatest esteem for him. This latter
testifies that the whole country where he lived owed to his zeal the
entire extinction of simony. The holy man at length fell sick of a
sharp fever at Passignano. He called for all the abbots and superiors
of his Order, and telling them he was soon to leave them, strongly
exhorted them to watch vigilantly over the most exact observance
of their rule, and to maintain peace and fraternal charity. After
this, having most devoutly received the last sacraments, he died
happily on the 12th of July in 1073, being seventy-four years old.
Pope Celestine III. having caused juridical informations to be taken
concerning his virtues and miracles, solemnly enrolled him among the
saints in the year 1193.

The eminent degree of penance and sanctity to which the divine grace
raised this saint, was the fruit of his mildness in forgiving an
injury. Christ not only commands us to pardon all offences, but
has recommended this precept to us with his expiring breath, with
his head crowned with thorns and his hands stretched out for us.
We renounce the glorious title of being his disciples if, whilst
we behold him hanging on the cross, and hear his last prayers, we
trample on his sacred law, and harbor malice in our hearts against
a brother whom our dying Redeemer commands us to forgive for his
sake. Can we be angry with him who is by so many sacred ties our
brother, the living son and member of our common Redeemer and Father,
and whom we expect to be the associate of our happiness for all
eternity? We owe infinitely more to Christ than any brother can owe
to us: the least venial sin is an immense debt. Our Divine Master
not only conjures us to forgive our brother for His sake, but also
makes it our own infinite interest so to do, promising to pardon us
our immense debts in the same manner as we pardon others. Shall we
base worms who have nothing to boast of before men only our having
concealed from them our baseness and ignominy; and to whom the
most cruel outrages from creatures would be too mild a treatment,
considering our sins; shall we, I say, complain of injuries which
we ought to receive with patience and joy as the easy means of
cancelling our own sins, and procuring for ourselves the greatest
graces and mercy.

SS. NABOR AND FELIX, MM.

They suffered at Milan under Maximian Herculeus about the year 304.
Their bodies were first interred without the walls of the city,
but afterward brought into it, and deposited in the place where a
church was built over their tomb, to which great multitudes of people
resorted with wonderful devotion, as Paulinus testifies in his life
of St. Ambrose. In the same church St. Ambrose discovered the relics
of SS. Gervasius and Protasius, as himself relates in his letter to
his sister Marcellina. The people continued to venerate the relics
of SS. Nabor and Felix with the same ardor of devotion, as that holy
doctor assures us.[117] They are still honored in the same church,
which at present bears the name of St. Francis. See Solier the
Bollandist, t. 3, Julij, p. 280.

JULY XIII.

SAINT EUGENIUS, BISHOP OF CARTHAGE, AND HIS COMPANIONS, CC.

From Victor Vitensis, Hist. Persec. Vandal. l. 2 and 3. See
Tillemont, t. 16, Ceillier, t. 15, p. 206, Rivet, Hist.
Lit. de la Fr. t. p. 38, Ruinart, &c.

A. D. 505.

The Roman provinces in Africa were for a long time one of the richest
and most noble portions of the empire. The Carthaginian barbarism
and perfidy had given place to the most flourishing reign of the
sciences, arts, and religion. The nobles of this country were all
princes, and for riches and state, seemed to vie with kings; its
peace seemed on every side secure. But the strongest cities and
empires are often nearest a fall; they are founded, to be again
sooner or later torn to pieces. Every state has even within itself
the seeds of its own destruction; these will occasion the dissolution
of every body politic no less certainly than the internal weakness
of the animal body must bring it to a fatal period. This was the
condition of the Roman empire in its decline, when its rulers, to
preserve Italy which they regarded as its heart or head, abandoned
its extremities to the Goths and Vandals. At a time when Africa
thought of no danger, in the reign of the emperor Valentinian III.
in 428, Genseric, king of the Vandals and Alans, having lately
made a settlement in part of Spain,[118] passed into this country,
and in a short time became master of those fertile provinces. This
politic barbarian king kept great armies perpetually prepared for
any expedition, by which he prevented the vigilance of his enemies,
and astonished all the world with the rapidity of his enterprises.
The Vandals, who were mostly Christians, but infected with the Arian
heresy, laid the whole country waste by fire and sword, plundered all
places, even churches and monasteries; burned alive two bishops, and
tortured others to extort from them the treasures of their churches;
razed the public buildings at Carthage, and banished Quodvultdeus,
bishop of that city, with many others. But in 454, at the request of
the emperor Valentinian, Genseric allowed the Catholics to choose a
bishop of Carthage, and St. Deogratias was raised to that dignity,
who died soon after Genseric was returned from the plunder of Rome.
The persecution growing hotter, many suffered torments for the
faith, and several received the crown of martyrdom. The Arians, by a
sacrilege never before heard of, made themselves shirts and breeches
of the altar-cloths, and at Tinuzuda spilt and scattered the body and
blood of Christ on the pavement.[119] Catholics being by an edict
disqualified for bearing any office in the government, Armogastes,
a nobleman who held an honorable post in the household of Theodoric
the king’s son, was condemned by the tyrant to keep cattle. Genseric
dying after a reign of thirty-seven years, was succeeded by his son
Huneric, a more barbarous persecutor than his father had ever been.

The episcopal see of Carthage had remained vacant twenty-four years,
when in 481, Huneric permitted the Catholics on certain conditions
to choose one who should fill it. The people, impatient to enjoy the
comfort of a pastor, pitched upon Eugenius, a citizen of Carthage,
eminent for his learning, zeal, piety, and prudence; and such was
his deportment in this dignity, that he was venerable to the very
heretics, and so dear to the Catholics that every one of them would
have thought it a happiness to lay down his life for him. His
charities to the distressed were excessive, especially considering
his poverty. But he always found resources for their necessities in
the hearts of his people; and he refused himself everything that he
might give all to the poor. When others put him in mind that he ought
to reserve something for his own necessaries, his answer was: “If the
good pastor must lay down his life for his flock, can it be excusable
for me to be solicitous for the necessities of my body?” He fasted
every day, and often allowed himself only a most slender evening
refection of bread and water. His virtue gained him the respect and
esteem even of the Arians; but at length envy and blind zeal got the
ascendant in their breasts, and the king sent him an order never to
sit in the episcopal throne, preach to the people, or admit into
his chapel any Vandals among whom several were Catholics. The saint
boldly answered the messenger, that the laws of God commanded him
not to shut the door of his church to any that desired to serve him
in it. Huneric, enraged at this answer, persecuted the Catholics
many ways, especially the Vandals who had embraced the faith. He
commanded guards to be placed at the doors of the Catholic churches,
who when they saw any man or woman going in clothed in the habit
of the Vandals, struck them on the head with short staffs jagged
and indented, which being twisted into their hair, and drawn back
with great violence, tore off the hair and skin together. Some lost
their eyes by this means, and others died with the extreme pain;
but many lived a long time after. Women with their heads flayed in
this manner, were publicly led through the streets, with a crier
going before them to show them to the people. But this barbarous
usage did not cause any one to forsake the true religion. Next, the
tyrant deprived the Catholics who were at court of their pensions,
and sent them to work in the country. He also ordered that none
should be admitted to bear any office in his palace, or any public
charge, who was not an Arian. He afterward turned them out of their
houses, stripped them of all their wealth, and sent them to Sicily,
or Sardinia. After this, his persecution fell on all Catholics. One
edict followed another against them, and the cloud thickened every
day over their heads. Many nuns were so cruelly tortured that several
died on the rack. Great numbers of bishops, priests, deacons, and
eminent Catholic laymen were banished to the number of four thousand
nine hundred and seventy-six, all of whom the tyrant sent into a
desert, where they were fed with barley like horses. This desert
was filled with scorpions and venomous serpents; but they did not
destroy any of the servants of God. The people followed their bishops
and priests with lighted tapers in their hands, and mothers carried
their little babes in their arms, and laid them at the feet of the
confessors, all crying out with tears,--“Going yourselves to your
crowns, to whom do you leave us? Who will baptize our children? Who
will impart to us the benefit of penance, and discharge us from the
bonds of sins by the favor of reconciliation and pardon? Who will
bury us with solemn supplications at our death? By whom will divine
sacrifices be made?”[120]

The bishop Eugenius was spared in the first storm, probably that the
inhabitants of the capital might seem to be somewhat considered. But
in May, 483, the king sent him a summons requiring the Catholics,
whom he called Homoousians, to hold a conference or disputation with
his Arian bishops at Carthage on the 1st day of February ensuing.
Eugenius answered the terms were not equal, seeing their enemies were
to be judges; and that as it was the common cause of all churches,
other foreign churches ought to be invited and consulted, “especially
the church of Rome, which is the head of all churches.”[121] About
that time one Felix, who had been long blind, addressed himself to
St. Eugenius desiring him to pray that he might recover his sight,
saying he had been admonished by a vision so to do. The bishop showed
great reluctance and confusion, alleging that he was a base sinner;
but at length, after blessing the font for the solemn administration
of baptism on the Epiphany, he said to the blind man,--“I have told
you that I am a sinner, and the last of all men; but I pray God
that he show you mercy according to your faith, and restore to you
your sight.” Then he made the sign of the cross on his eyes, and
the blind man saw; the whole city was witness to the triumph of
the faith. The king sent for Felix, and examined himself all the
circumstances of the miracle, which he found too evident to be called
in question. However, the Arian bishops told him that Eugenius had
performed it by recourse to art magic. The Catholics made choice of
ten disputants for the conference, which was opened on the 5th of
February. Cyrila, patriarch of the Arians, was seated on a throne;
the Catholics who were standing, asked who were the commissaries to
take down in writing what should pass in the disputation; and were
answered that Cyrila would perform that office. The Catholics asked
by what authority he claimed the jurisdiction and rank of patriarch.
The Arians not being able to produce any sufficient warrant for his
usurpation, filled the hall with noise and tumult and obtained an
order that every lay Catholic there present should receive a hundred
bastinadoes. Cyrila sought various pretences to defer the conference.
The Catholics, however, presented a written confession of their
faith. This takes up the whole third book of Victor’s history, though
he has only inserted the first part, in which the consubstantiality
of God the Son is proved from the scriptures. The second part, which
confirmed the same from the writings of the fathers, is lost. This
confession seems to have been drawn up by St. Eugenius, to whom
Gennadius ascribes a confession of faith against the Arians.[122]

When this was read the Arians quarrelled that the orthodox took
the name of Catholics, though this was given them by the whole
world, even by the heretics themselves, as St. Austin observed a
little before this time in that very country. Upon this, however,
the Arians abruptly broke up the conference, and the king, on the
25th of February in 484, published a severe edict for a general
persecution, which he had already prepared for that purpose. By this
all the Catholic clergy were banished out of towns, and forbidden
to perform any functions even in the country; all Catholics were
declared incapable of inheriting, or disposing of any estates real or
personal, with other such articles. Executioners were despatched to
all parts of the kingdom, and many Catholics were put to barbarous
deaths, and many more inhumanly tormented. One Dionysia, after having
been herself cruelly scourged, seeing her son Majoricus, a tender
youth, tremble at the sign of the torments prepared for him, she
looked on him with a stern countenance, and said,--“Remember, son,
we were baptized in the name of the Trinity, and in the bosom of
our mother the Church.” The young man, encouraged by these words,
suffered martyrdom with undaunted resolution, and his mother buried
him within her own house, that she might every day offer to the holy
Trinity her prayers over his grave, in the lively hope of a glorious
resurrection with him at the last day. Her cousin Emilius, her sister
Dativa, and innumerable others in different parts of Africa, received
the like crowns. At Typasus, in Mauritania Cæsariensis, certain
Catholics who had assisted at the celebration of the divine mysteries
in a private house, were informed against; and by the king’s order
had their tongues plucked out, and their right hands cut off; yet
they spoke as well as ever, as St. Victor Vitensis, an eye-witness,
assures us.[123] He says, Reparatus, a subdeacon, one of this number,
was entertained when he wrote, in the court of the emperor Zena at
Constantinople, and was there highly honored, especially by the
empress; and that though entirely deprived of his tongue, he spoke
gracefully, and without the least defect or imperfection. Æneas of
Gaza, a Platonic philosopher, who was then at Constantinople, and
wrote in 533,[124] says, he himself had seen them in that city, and
had heard them speak distinctly; and not being able to believe his
own ears, he had examined their mouths, and seen that their tongues
were plucked out to the very roots, so that he wondered they could
have survived so cruel a torment. Procopius, who wrote soon after,
says also[125] that he had seen these persons at Constantinople,
and had heard them speak freely, without feeling anything of their
punishment; but that two of them, by falling into a grievous sin of
the flesh, lost the use of their speech, which they had till then
enjoyed.

The tyrant wreaked his impotent vengeance on many others, especially
on Vandals who had been converted to the Catholic faith; but was not
able to overcome their heroic constancy. The streets of Carthage were
filled with spectacles of his cruelty; and one was there meeting
continually some without hands, others without eyes, nose, or ears,
others whose heads appeared sunk in between their shoulders by having
been hung up by the hands on the tops of houses for sights to the
people. Above four hundred and sixty bishops were brought to Carthage
in order to be sent into banishment: of this number eighty-eight died
under great hardships at Carthage, some few made their escape, and
the rest were banished. St. Eugenius after having long encouraged
others to the conflict was himself at length on a sudden carried
into exile, without being allowed to take leave of his friends. He
found means, however, to write a letter to his flock, which St.
Gregory of Tours has preserved.[126] In it he says,--“I with tears
beg, exhort, and conjure you by the dreadful day of judgment, and the
awful light of the coming of Christ, that you hold fast the Catholic
faith. Preserve the grace of the holy baptism, and the unction of
the chrism. Let no man born again of water return to the water.”
This he mentions, because the Arians in Africa, like the Donatists,
rebaptized those that came over to their sect. St. Eugenius protests
to his flock that if they remain constant, no distance nor death
could separate him from them in spirit; but that he was innocent of
the blood of those that should perish, and that this his letter would
be read before the tribunal of Christ at the last day for severer
condemnation of such base apostates. “If I return to Carthage,” says
he, “I shall see you in this life; if not, I shall meet you in the
other. Pray for us, and fast; fasting and alms have never failed to
move God to mercy. Above all things remember that we are not to fear
those who can only kill the body.”

We have a catalogue of all the bishops of the provinces of Africa
who came to the conference, and were sent into banishment;[127]
namely, fifty-four of the proconsular province, one hundred and
twenty-five of Numidia, one hundred and seven of the province of
Byzacena, one hundred and twenty of the province of Mauritania
Cæsariensis, forty-four from the province of Sitifi, five from that
of Tripolis, besides ten from Sardinia and other places; in all
four hundred and sixty-four bishops, of which number eighty-eight
died at Carthage before their departure into exile, forty-six were
banished to Corsica, three hundred and three to other places, and
twenty-eight made their escape. St. Eugenius was carried into the
uninhabited desert country in the province of Tripolis, and committed
to the guard of Antony, an inhuman Arian bishop, who treated him with
the utmost barbarity. The saint added to his sufferings voluntary
austerities, wore a rough hair-shirt, lay on the ground, and passed
great part of the night in prayer and tears. When he was afflicted
with a palsy, Antony, because vinegar was contrary to his distemper,
obliged him to drink it in large quantities. Yet God was pleased to
restore his servant to his health. It is observed by our historian,
that the Arian bishops were all cruel persecutors, and went through
the cities and provinces, filling all places with scenes of horror,
rebaptizing persons by force and violence, scourging, mangling,
torturing, and banishing even women and children. The fifth book
of the history of this persecution is filled with examples. The
apostates signalized themselves above others by the cruelties which
they exercised upon the orthodox. Elpidophorus, one of this number,
was appointed judge at Carthage to condemn the more zealous to be
tortured. Muritta, the deacon who had assisted when he was baptized
in the bosom of the Catholic Church, being brought before him, took
with him the chrismale or white garment, with which at the time he
received the apostate coming out of the font he had clothed him, as
an emblem of that innocence which he engaged himself to preserve
always unspotted; and producing it before the whole assembly, he
says,--“This robe will accuse you when the judge shall appear in
majesty at the last day. It will bear testimony against you to your
condemnation.”[128] This relation is gathered from Saint Victor,
bishop of Vita, in the province of Byzacena; who being banished by
king Huneric for the faith in 487, retired to Constantinople, and
wrote (probably in that city) in five books, the history of the
Vandalic persecution.[129]

St. Victor relates that Huneric, the great persecutor of the Church,
died miserably, being devoured by worms, in December, 484, having
reigned almost eight years. Nor was he succeeded, as he had earnestly
desired, by his son Hilderic, but by Gontamund, a nephew, whom the
maturity of his age rendered better able to bear the burden of the
state. This prince, in the year 488, which was the fourth of his
reign, recalled St. Eugenius to Carthage, and at his request opened
the churches of the Catholics, and permitted the exiled priests also
to return. Gontamund died in 496, and his brother Thrasimund was
called to the crown, of whom mention hath been made in the life of
St. Fulgentius. Though this king often affected a show of moderation,
he sometimes used the sword and every other violent measure to
depress the cause of truth, which at other times he pretended to
seek after. But his inconstancy betrayed his want of sincerity. True
virtue is steady, but the fool changeth like the moon; he who is
governed by his passions, is everything by fits, and if he one day
pretends to condemn his vices, he by relapses soon repents again
of this very repentance, which frequently springs rather from a
disgust of sin, than from any principle of true virtue. Thrasimund
by this levity or hypocrisy never deserved to arrive at the light
of the true faith, and often persecuted its most holy champions,
of which among many others the sufferings of St. Eugenius are an
instance. St. Gregory of Tours relates[130] that by his authority
the judges condemned our saint, one Longinus, and St. Vindemial,
bishop of Capsa, in Africa, to be beheaded. St. Vindemial died by the
sword; but the tyrant commanded St. Eugenius to be led to the place
of execution, and though he protested under the axe that he would
rather lose his life than depart from the Catholic faith, he was
again brought back to Carthage, and banished into Languedoc, which
country was then subject to Alaric, king of the Visigoths, who was
also an Arian. He died in his exile in a monastery which he built and
governed at Viance (since called St. Amaranth’s from the tomb of that
martyr), about a mile from Albi. He passed to a better life in 505,
on the 13th of July. King Hilderic afterward recalled the surviving
exiled prelates; but peace was not perfectly restored to that church
before the year 534, when Belisarius, a general who was master of
all the maxims of the first Romans with regard to the art of war,
vanquished Gelimer, the last Vandal king in Africa, and sent him
prisoner to Constantinople.[131]

* * * * *

The saints chose to suffer every temporal loss, torment, or death
with which the world could threaten them rather than lose the holy
treasure of faith. This gift is a light which shineth upon us[132]
from God, to direct us amidst our darkness in the path to eternal
life, as the pillar of fire conducted the Israelites through the
wilderness. It is the seed, or rather the root of a spiritual life,
and of every virtue that is meritorious of everlasting glory. “Faith
is the solid foundation of all virtues,” says St. Ambrose.[133]
And in another place he cries out:[134] “O faith, richer than all
treasures! more healing and sovereign than all medicines!” Our faith
if true must have three conditions or qualities. 1. It must be
firm, admitting no doubt or wavering; ready to brave all dangers,
torments, and death; thus it filled the martyrs with joy under the
most affrighting trials, and made them triumph over fires and the
sword.[135] 2. It must be entire; for the least wilful obstinate
error concerning one article destroys the whole fabric of faith,
by rejecting its motive which is everywhere the same testimony of
divine revelation. “You who believe what you please, and reject what
you please, believe yourselves or your own fancy, rather than the
gospel,” as St. Austin says. 3. Faith must be active, animated by
charity, fruitful in good works. A dead or a barren faith is compared
by St. James to a carcass without a soul, and to the faith of the
devils who believe and tremble. How active and animated was faith in
the souls of all the saints! the eminent virtues which we admire in
them were all the fruit of their faith, and sprang from this root.
With what care ought we to nourish and improve this holy seed in our
breasts? Gardeners cultivate most diligently those seeds which are
most precious.

ST. ANACLETUS, POPE, M.

He governed the Church after St. Clement nine years three months,
according to the Liberian pontifical, and according to another
very old Vatican manuscript register; but according to some later
pontificals, twelve years and three months. He perhaps sat three
years as vicar to St. Clement during his banishment, says Berti.[136]
Trajan raised the third persecution against the Church whilst he was
in the East in 107. In those difficult times St. Anacletus suffered
much, and is styled a martyr in very ancient Martyrologies.

SAINT TURIAF, BISHOP OF DOL, IN BRITTANY.

CALLED OFTEN TURIAVE, SOMETIMES THIVISIAU.

Was born in the diocess of Vannes, in the neighborhood of the abbey
of Ballon, near which Charles the Bald was defeated by the Britons
in 845; in which war this monastery seems to have been destroyed.
Turiaf went young to Dol, was instructed in piety and learning, and
promoted to holy orders by St. Thiarmail, abbot of St. Samson’s
and bishop of Dol. This prelate afterward appointed him his vicar
and chorepiscopus, and at his death, probably in 733, our saint
was placed in that episcopal chair. Admirable was the austerity of
his life, his zeal, his charity, his watchfulness, his fervor in
prayer, and his firmness in maintaining discipline. A powerful lord
named Rivallon having committed many acts of violence, the bishop
went to his castle at Lanncafrut, and by his strong remonstrances
made him sensible of the enormity of his crimes. By the bishop’s
injunction he underwent a canonical penance during seven years, and
repaired all injustices and oppressions by a sevenfold satisfaction.
St. Turiaf died on the 13th of July, probably about the year 749,
though even the age is not certain. In the wars of the Normans his
relics were brought to Paris, and are still kept in the abbey of St.
Germain-des-Prez. The new Paris breviary mentions that dreadful fires
have been sometimes miraculously extinguished by them. The life of
St. Turiaf, written in the tenth century, is a confused eulogium, in
which prodigies take place of facts. The notes of the Bollandists
are incomparably more valuable than the text, ad 13 Jul. p. 614. See
Barrali, Chronic. Lirin. t. 2, p. 186. Lobineau, Vies des SS. de
Bret. p. 177.

JULY XIV.

ST. BONAVENTURE, CARDINAL.

BISHOP AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH.

From his works, Wadding’s Annals of the Friar Minors, the
discourse of Octavian de Marinis for his canonization,
and from his Life, written by Peter Galesini, by order
of Sixtus V. See also Boule, Raynaud de Colonia, and the
Bollandists.

A. D. 1274.

St. Bonaventure, the great light and ornament of the holy Order of
St. Francis, for his extraordinary devotion, ardent charity, and
eminent skill in sacred learning, is surnamed the Seraphic Doctor.
He was born at Bagnarea in Tuscany, in the year 1221, of pious
parents, named John of Fidenza and Mary Ritelli. He was christened
by the name of John; but afterward received that of Bonaventure on
the following occasion. In the fourth year of his age he fell so
dangerously sick that his life was despaired of by the physicians.
The mother in excessive grief had recourse to the Almighty physician
by earnest prayer, and going into Umbria cast herself at the feet of
St. Francis of Assisium, with many tears begging his intercession
with God for the life of her son. Would Christians address themselves
to God with an humble confidence in all their corporal necessities,
their afflictions would never fail to be turned into divine
blessings. But their neglect of this duty deserves to be chastised
by spiritual misfortunes, and often also by temporal disappointments
without comfort or remedy. St. Francis was moved to compassion by
the tears of the mother, and at his prayer the child recovered so
perfect a state of health that he was never known to be sick from
that time till the illness of which he died.[137] The glorious
saint, at whose petition God granted this favor, saw himself near
the end of his mortal course, and foretelling the graces which the
divine goodness prepared for this child, cried out in prophetic
rapture; _O buona ventura_, that is, in Italian, _Good luck_. Whence
the name of Bonaventura was given our saint. The devout mother in
gratitude consecrated her son to God by a vow, and was careful to
inspire into him from the cradle the most ardent sentiments of piety,
and to inure him betimes to assiduous practices of self-denial,
humility, obedience, and devotion. Bonaventure from his infancy
entered upon a religious course, and appeared inflamed with the
love of God as soon as he was capable of knowing him. His progress
in his studies surprised his masters, but that which he made in the
science of the saints, and in the practice of every virtue was far
more extraordinary. It was his highest pleasure and joy to hear by
how many titles he belonged to God, and he made it his most earnest
study and endeavor to devote his heart with his whole strength to the
divine service.

In 1243, being twenty-two years of age, he entered into the Order
of St. Francis, and received the habit in the province of Rome from
the hands of Haymo, an Englishman, at that time general of the
Order.[138] St. Bonaventure mentions in his prologue to the life of
Saint Francis, that he entered this state, and made his vows with
extraordinary sentiments of gratitude for the preservation of his
life through the intercession of St. Francis, resolving with the
greatest ardor to serve God with his whole heart. Shortly after,
he was sent to Paris to complete his studies under the celebrated
Alexander of Hales, surnamed the Irrefragable Doctor.[139] After
his death in 1245, St. Bonaventure continued his course under his
successor, John of Rochelle. His penetrating genius was poised by
the most exquisite judgment, by which, while he easily dived to the
bottom of every subtle inquiry, he cut off whatever was superfluous,
dwelling only on that knowledge which is useful and solid, or at
least was then necessary to unravel the false principles and artful
sophistry of the adversaries of truth. Thus he became a masterly
proficient in the scholastic philosophy, and in the most sublime
parts of theology. Whilst he referred all his studies to the divine
honor and his own sanctification he was most careful not to lose
the end in the means, and suffer his application to degenerate into
a dissipation of mind and a vicious idle curiosity. This opens an
avenue into the heart for self-conceit, jealousy, envy, and a total
extinction of the spirit of prayer, with a numberless train of other
spiritual evils, which lay waste the affections of the soul, and
banish thence the precious fruits of the Holy Ghost. To shun those
rocks often fatal to piety, he seemed never to turn his attention
from God, and by the earnest invocation of the divine light in
the beginning of every action, and holy aspirations with which he
accompanied all his studies, he may be said to have made them a
continued prayer. When he turned his eyes to his book, they were
swimming with tears of love and devotion excited by his assiduous
meditation on the wounds of Christ, and his heart still continued to
inflame its affections from that its beloved object, which he seemed
to read in every line. St. Thomas Aquinas coming one day to pay a
visit to our saint, asked him in what books he had learned his sacred
science. St. Bonaventure, pointing to his crucifix before him, said,
“This is the source of all my knowledge. I study only Jesus Christ,
and him crucified.”

Not content to make his studies in some sort a continuation of
prayer, he devoted entirely to that heavenly exercise the greater
part of his time, knowing this to be the key of divine graces and of
a spiritual life. For only the Spirit of God, as St. Paul teaches,
can lead us into the secrets and designs of God, and engrave his holy
maxims on our hearts. He alone can make himself known, as no other
light can discover the sun to us but its own; and it is in prayer
that God communicates himself to us. He here enlightens the souls of
his servants, and is their interior instructor. But as St. Austin
says, honey cannot be poured into a vessel that is full of wormwood:
neither can this excellent grace or gift of prayer find place in a
soul which is not first prepared to receive the sensible presence of
the Holy Ghost by holy compunction, and by the practice of penance,
humility, and self-denial. These virtues fitted the soul of our saint
to be admitted to the chaste embraces of the heavenly bridegroom.
Such was the innocence and purity in which he lived, and so perfect
a mastery he had obtained over his passions, that Alexander of Hales
used to say to him, that he seemed not to have sinned in Adam. An
eminent spirit of penance was the principal guardian of this grace
of innocence. The austerities of Saint Bonaventure were excessive,
yet amidst his penitential tears a remarkable cheerfulness appeared
always in his countenance, which resulted from the inward peace of
his soul. Himself lays down this maxim:[140] “A spiritual joy is the
greatest sign of the divine grace dwelling in a soul.”

To his mortifications he added the practice of the greatest
humiliations. In attending the sick he was particularly ambitious
to serve them in the lowest and most humbling offices. In this
charitable duty he seemed prodigal of his own life and health, and
chose always to be about those whose distempers were most loathsome
or contagious and dangerous. He had no eyes to see anything in
himself but faults and imperfections, and wonderful was the care
with which he endeavored to conceal from others his extraordinary
practices of virtue. When their rays broke through the veil of his
humility, and shone forth to others, the saint in order to cast a
shade over them before men, or at least to strengthen his own heart
against the danger, and to indulge his love of abjection, embraced
the greatest humiliations. He always regarded himself as the most
ungrateful and the basest of sinners, unworthy to walk upon the
earth, or to breathe the air; and these humble sentiments were
accompanied with the deepest compunction, and abundant tears. This
humility sometimes withheld him from the holy table notwithstanding
the burning desires of his soul to be united daily afresh to the
object of his love, and to approach the fountain of grace. But God
was pleased by a miracle to overcome his fears, and to recompense
his humility. “Several days had passed,” say the acts of his
canonization, “nor durst he yet presume to present himself at the
heavenly banquet. But whilst he was hearing mass, and meditating
on the passion of Jesus Christ, our Saviour, to crown his humility
and love, put into his mouth, by the ministry of an angel, part of
the consecrated host, taken from the hand of the priest.” By this
precious favor his soul was drowned in a torrent of pure delights;
and from that time he was encouraged to approach with an humble
confidence to the bread of angels which gives life and strength.

From this time his communions were accompanied with overflowing
sweetness and consolations, and with raptures of divine joy and
love. If in our communions we seem to receive, instead of torrents,
scarce a small portion of heavenly grace, the reason is, because
our hearts are too narrow. The vessel which we bring is too small.
If we dilated our souls by humility, burning desires, and love, we
should receive, like the saints, an abundant supply of these living
waters. St. Bonaventure prepared himself to receive the holy order
of priesthood by long fasts, humiliations, and fervent prayer, that
he might obtain in it an abundant measure of graces proportioned
to so high a function. He considered that sacred dignity with fear
and trembling, and the higher and more incomprehensible it appeared
to him, so much the more did he humble himself when he saw himself
invested with it. As often as he approached the altar, the profound
annihilation of himself, and the tender love with which he offered,
beheld in his hands, and received into his breast, the Lamb without
spot, appeared by his tears, and his whole exterior. A devout prayer
which he composed for his own use after Mass, beginning with these
words, _Transfige dulcissime domine_, is recommended by the Church to
all priests on that most solemn occasion.

Bonaventure looked upon himself as called by the obligations of his
priestly character to labor for the salvation of his neighbor, and
to this he devoted himself with extraordinary zeal. He announced the
word of God to the people with an energy and unction which kindled
a flame in the hearts of those that heard him; everything was
inflamed that came from his mouth. For an assistance to himself in
this function he compiled his treatise called Pharetra, consisting
of animated sentiments gathered from the writings of the fathers.
In the meantime, he was employed in teaching privately in his own
convent, till he succeeded his late master, John of Rochelle, in a
public chair of the university. The age required by the statutes
for this professorship was thirty-five, whereas the saint was only
thirty-three years old; but his abilities amply supplied that defect,
and on this literary theatre he soon displayed them to the admiration
of the whole Church. He continued always to study at the foot of the
crucifix. The disagreement between the university and the regulars
being terminated by pope Alexander IV. in 1256, Saint Thomas and
St. Bonaventure were invited to take the doctor’s cap together. As
others contend for precedence, the two saints had a vehement contest
of humility, each endeavoring to yield the first place to the other.
They knew no pretexts of the interest of their Orders, nor were they
sensible of any prerogatives but those of humility. St. Bonaventure
prayed and entreated him with so much earnestness, that at length
St. Thomas acquiesced to receive the degree first, and our saint
triumphed over both his friend and himself.

The holy king of St. Lewis honored St. Bonaventure with his
particular esteem, invited him often to his own table, and consulted
him in his most intricate concerns, placing an entire confidence in
his advice. He engaged him to compile an office of the passion of
Christ for his use. St. Bonaventure drew up a rule for St. Isabella,
the king’s sister, and for her nunnery of mitigated Clares at
Long-Champs. His book On the Government of the Soul, his Meditations
for every day in the week, and most of his other lesser tracts were
written to satisfy the requests of several devout persons of the
court. The unction which every word breathes in the writings of this
holy doctor pierces the heart, and his concise expression is an
abyss, or rather a treasure of most profound sentiments of humility,
compunction, love, and devotion, the riches of which a pious heart
finds everywhere boundless. Especially his tender sentiments of
the love of God, and on the sacred passion of Christ, exceedingly
recommend to all devout persons his meditations on this latter
subject, and express the burning affections with which his pure soul
glowed towards that stupendous mystery of infinite love, goodness,
and mercy, that perfect model of all virtue and sanctity, and source
of all our good.

The celebrated Gerson, the most learned and devout chancellor of
Paris, writes of the works of St. Bonaventure.[141] “Among all the
Catholic doctors, Eustachius (for so we may translate his name of
Bonaventure) seems to me the most proper for conveying light to the
understanding, and at the same time warming the heart. In particular
his Brevioloquium and Itinerarium are written with so much force,
art, and conciseness, that nothing can be beyond them.” In another
book he says:[142] “St. Bonaventure’s works seem to me the most
proper for the instruction of the faithful. They are solid, safe,
pious, and devout; and he keeps as far as he can from niceties; not
meddling with logical or physical questions which are foreign to the
matter in hand. Nor is there any doctrine more sublime, more divine,
or more conducive to piety.” Trithemius recommends this doctor’s
writings in the following words: “His expressions are full of fire,
they no less warm with divine love the hearts of those who read them,
than they fill their understanding with the most holy light. His
works surpass those of all the doctors of his time, if we consider
the spirit of divine love and of Christian devotion that speaks in
him. He is profound in few words, penetrating without curiosity,
eloquent without vanity; his discourse is inflamed without being
bloated. Whoever would be both learned and devout, let him read the
works of St. Bonaventure.”[143]

This is chiefly to be understood of his spiritual tracts. In these
the author discovers everywhere a most profound spirit of humility
and holy poverty, with a heart perfectly disengaged from all earthly
things, and full of the most ardent love of God, and the most tender
devotion to the sacred passion of our Divine Redeemer. The eternal
joys of heaven were the frequent entertainment of his pious soul, and
he seems never to have interrupted his ardent sighs after them. He
endeavored by his writings to excite in all others the same fervent
desires of our heavenly country. He writes[144] that “God himself,
all the glorious spirits, and the whole family of the eternal King
wait for us, and desire that we should be associated to them; and
shall not we pant above all things to be admitted into their happy
company? He would appear amongst them with great confusion, who had
not in this valley of tears continually raised his soul above all
things visible to become already, in ardent desire, an inhabitant
of those blessed regions.” He clearly shows that he was not able
to express the transports of holy joy that overflowed his soul, as
often as he contemplated its future union with God in immortal bliss
and uninterrupted love and praise. He revolved in mind the raptures
of gratitude and joy in which the blessed spirits behold themselves
in the state of security for ever, whilst they see so many souls on
earth every day overthrown by their spiritual enemies, and so many
others lost in hell. He was strongly affected with the thought of the
glorious company of millions of angels and saints, all most holy,
loving, and glorious, adorned each with their distinguishing trophies
and graces; in which every one will possess in others every gift
which he hath not, and all those gifts which himself hath, doubled so
many times as he hath partners in bliss. For loving every companion
as himself he will rejoice for the felicity of each no less than for
his own. Whereupon, with St. Anselm, he often asked his own heart,
here so poor, so weak, and overwhelmed with miseries, if then it
would be able, without being strengthened and raised above itself by
an extraordinary grace, to contain its joy for its own felicity; how
it could be able to contain so many and such excess of joys. But this
saint’s sublime sentiments of piety and devotion are best learned
from his own works. His love of an interior life did not hinder his
application to promote the divine honor in others by various exterior
employments; but these he animated and sanctified by a constant
spirit of recollection and prayer.

Whilst he continued to teach at Paris he was chosen general of his
Order in a chapter held in the convent called Ara-Cœli, at Rome,
in 1256. The saint was only thirty-five years old. Nevertheless
pope Alexander IV. confirmed the election. St. Bonaventure was
thunderstruck at this news, and prostrating himself on the ground, he
with many tears implored the divine light and direction. After which
he set out immediately for Rome. The Franciscan Order was at that
time divided by intestine dissensions, some of the friars being for
an inflexible severity, others demanding certain mitigations of the
letter of the rule. The young general no sooner appeared among them,
but by the force of his exhortations which he tempered with mildness
and charity, he restored a perfect calm; and all the brethren marched
under this new Josue with one heart, in the same spirit, and in the
same path. William of Saint-Amour, a member of the university of
Paris, having published a bitter invective against the Mendicant
Orders, entitled, “On the Dangers of the Latter Times,” St. Thomas
answered it. St. Bonaventure also confuted it by a book, which he
called, “On the Poverty of the Lord Jesus,” in which his mildness in
handling the controversy against a most virulent adversary reflected
a double advantage on his victory.

Our saint, in his return to the schools at Paris, visited several of
his convents in the way, in which he showed everywhere that he was
only become superior to be the most humble, the most charitable, and
the most compassionate of all his brethren, and the servant of his
whole Order. Notwithstanding his great employments, he never omitted
his usual exercises of devotion, but laid out his time and regulated
his functions with such wonderful prudence as to find leisure for
everything. He composed several works at Paris, but often retired to
Mante for greater solitude. A stone, which he used for his pillow, is
shown to this day in that convent. In 1260 the saint held a general
chapter at Narbonne, and in concert with the definitors, gave a new
form to the old Constitutions, added certain new rules, and reduced
them all into twelve chapters. At the request of the friars assembled
in this chapter, he undertook to write the life of St. Francis; but
went first from Narbonne to Mount Alverno, and there assisted at the
dedication of a great church. In a little oratory, built upon the
very place where Saint Francis had received the miraculous marks of
the wounds of our Saviour, St. Bonaventure continued a long while
abstracted, and in an ecstasy, in holy meditation. He there wrote
his incomparable treatise, called Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, or the
Way of the Soul to God, showing that all her comfort and riches are
to be found in God alone, and tracing out the sure way that leads to
him. Whilst he was in Italy he gathered the most authentic memoirs
for the life of St. Francis, which he compiled with the spirit which
shows him to have been filled with all the heroic virtues of his
founder, whose life he wrote. St. Thomas Aquinas coming one day to
pay him a visit whilst he was employed in this work, saw him through
the door of his cell, raised in contemplation above the ground, and
going away, said: “Let us leave a saint to write for a saint.” In
1230 St. Bonaventure assisted at the translation of the relics of
St. Antony, which was performed at Padua. From that city he went to
hold a general chapter at Pisa, in which, by words and example, he
exhorted his brethren to a great love of holy solitude. He gave on
that and every other occasion proofs of his tender devotion to the
Blessed Virgin. When he was first made general he put his Order under
her special patronage. He regulated many pious exercises of devotion
to her, composed his Mirror of the Virgin, setting forth her graces,
virtues, and prerogatives, with many prayers, which are tender and
respectful effusions of the heart, to implore her intercession. He
wrote a pathetic paraphrase in verse of the anthem Salve Regina.[145]
He published the praises of the Mother out of devotion to the Son,
and to extend His glory. To propagate his honor and saving faith he
sent, by the pope’s authority, preachers into many barbarous nations,
and lamented his situation that he could not go himself, and expose
his life among the infidels.

The venerable brother Giles, the third companion of St. Francis at
Assisio,[146] said one day to St. Bonaventure: “Father, God has shown
us great mercy and bestowed on us many graces. But we who are poor
and ignorant idiots, what can we do to correspond to his immense
goodness, and to be saved?” St. Bonaventure answered; “If God were
to bestow on any one no other talents besides the grace of loving
him, this alone suffices, and is every spiritual treasure,” B. Giles
said,--“Can a dull idiot love God as perfectly as a great scholar?”
St. Bonaventure replied: “A poor old woman may love him more than the
most learned master and doctor in theology.” At this brother Giles,
in a sudden fervor and jubilation of spirit, went into a garden, and
standing at a gate toward the city (of Rome) he looked that way, and
cried out with a loud voice,--“Come, the poorest, most simple, and
most illiterate old woman, love the Lord our God, and you may attain
to a higher degree of eminence and happiness than brother Bonaventure
with all his learning.” After this he fell into an ecstasy, in which
he continued in sweet contemplation without motion for the space of
three hours.[147]

Pope Clement IV. in 1265, nominated St. Bonaventure archbishop of
York, being assured how agreeable he would be to that church, to the
king of England, and his whole kingdom. But St. Bonaventure having
first by earnest prayer, begged that God would preserve him from so
great a danger, went and cast himself at the feet of his holiness,
and by tears and entreaties extorted from him a discharge from that
burden. He held a general chapter at Paris in 1266; and in the next,
which he assembled at Assisium, he ordered the triple salutation of
the Blessed Virgin called the Angelus Domini to be recited every
evening at six o’clock, to honor the incomprehensible mystery of the
Incarnation, which ought to be the object of our perpetual praises
and thanksgiving.

In 1272, Theobald, the holy archdeacon of Liege, a native of
Placentia, then absent in the Holy Land, was chosen pope, and took
the name of Gregory X., a person of such eminent sanctity that a
process has been set on foot for his canonization; and Benedict XIV.,
in 1745, ordered his name to be inserted in the Roman Martyrology.
He was a man of an extraordinary reputation throughout all his
life, for prudence in the conduct of his affairs; for courage,
greatness of mind, and contempt of money; for devotion, clemency,
and charity to the poor. He died on the 10th of January, 1276, on
his return from the council at Abruzzo in Tuscany, of which city he
is the titular patron. Miracles have rendered his name illustrious.
Bonaventure fearing this holy pope would compel him to accept of
some ecclesiastical dignity, left Italy and went to Paris, where he
wrote his Hexaëmeron or pious exposition of the creation, or work of
six days. He had scarce finished it, when at Whitsuntide he received
from the pope a brief by which he was nominated cardinal, and bishop
of Albano, one of the six suffragans of Rome. His holiness added a
precept to him to accept that double charge without alleging any
pretext against it, and immediately to repair to Rome. He sent two
nuncios to meet him on the road with the hat and other ensigns of his
dignities. They found the saint reposing on his journey in a convent
of his Order at Migel, four leagues from Florence, and employed in
washing the dishes. He desired them to hang the cardinal’s hat on
the bough of a tree, because he could not decently take it in his
hands, and left them to walk in the garden till he had finished his
work. Then taking up the hat he went to the nuncios, and paid them
the respect due to their character. Gregory X. came from Orvietto
to Florence, and there meeting Bonaventure ordained him bishop with
his own hands; then ordered him to prepare himself to speak in the
general council which he had called to meet at Lyons for the reunion
of the Greeks.

The emperor Michael Palæologus had made proposals to pope Clement
IV. for a union. Pope Gregory X. zealously pursued this affair.
Joseph, patriarch of Constantinople, made a violent opposition, but
was obliged by the emperor to retire into a monastery. To bring
this affair to a happy conclusion, Gregory X. invited the Greeks to
come to the general council which he assembled at Lyons for this
very purpose, and also to concert measures for pushing on a war for
the recovery of the Holy Land, which the pope promoted with all his
might. This was the fourteenth general council and the second of
Lyons. At it were present five hundred bishops, seventy abbots, James
king of Arragon, and the ambassadors of the emperor Michael and of
other Christian princes. St. Thomas of Aquin died on the road to this
synod. St. Bonaventure accompanied the pope through Milan to it, and
arrived at Lyons in November, though the council was only opened
on the 7th of May, 1274.[148] Bonaventure sat on the pope’s right
hand, and first harangued the assembly. Between the second and third
sessions he held his last general chapter of his Order, in which he
abdicated the office of general. He found leisure to preach, and he
established at Lyons a pious confraternity called Del Gonfalone,
which he had formerly instituted at Rome. In it pious persons
associated themselves in certain daily devotions, under the patronage
of the mother of God. The deputies of the Greeks being arrived at
Lyons, St. Bonaventure was ordered by the pope to confer with them.
They were charmed with his sweetness, and convinced by his reasoning,
and they acquiesced in every point. In thanksgiving the pope sung
mass on the feast of SS. Peter and Paul, and the gospel was sung
first in Latin, then in Greek. After this St. Bonaventure preached
on the unity of faith. Then the creed was sung first in Latin, then
in Greek, and as a seal of the reunion of the two Churches, those
words were thrice repeated: “Who proceedeth from the Father and the
Son.” In memory of this solemn function two crosses are placed on
the high altar of the metropolitan church of St. John at Lyons.[149]
St. Bonaventure was taken ill after this session; nevertheless he
assisted at the fourth, in which the Logothete or high chancellor
of Constantinople abjured the schism. But the next day the saint’s
strength began entirely to fail him, insomuch that he was no longer
able to attend business. From that time he gave himself up entirely
to his private devotions, and the constant amiable serenity of his
countenance demonstrated the holy peace and joy of his soul in those
most awful moments. The pope himself gave him extreme unction, as
is attested by an inscription which hath been preserved in the same
chamber in which he died, to our times. The saint kept his eyes
constantly fixed on a crucifix, and expired in great tranquillity on
the 14th of July, in the year 1274, of his age the fifty-third. The
pope and the whole council solemnized his obsequies on the same day
in the church of the Franciscans at Lyons. Peter of Tarentaise, a
Dominican friar, cardinal and bishop of Ostia, afterward pope under
the name of Innocent V., preached his funeral panegyric, in which he
said,--“No one ever beheld him who did not conceive a great esteem
and affection for him; and even strangers, by hearing him speak,
were desirous to follow his counsel and advice; for he was gentle,
affable, humble, pleasing to all, compassionate, prudent, chaste, and
adorned with all virtues.”

The body of St. Bonaventure was translated into the new church of the
Franciscans on the 14th of March, 1434. King Charles VIII. founded
their new convent at Lyons, at the foot of the castle of Pierre
Incise, in 1494, with a rich chapel in which the saint’s remains were
enshrined, except a part of the lower jaw, which that king caused
to be conveyed to Fontainbleau, and it is now in the church of the
Cordeliers in Paris: the bones of an arm are kept at Bagnarea, and a
little bone at Venice. In 1562 the Calvinists plundered his shrine,
burned his relics in the market-place, and scattered the ashes in
the river Saone, as is related by the learned Jesuit Possevinus,
who was then at Lyons.[150] They stabbed to death the guardian with
a Catholic captain whom they had made prisoner; they burned the
archives of the library and set fire to the convent. The saint’s
head and some other relics escaped the fury of the rebels by having
been concealed. St. Bonaventure was canonized by Sixtus IV. in 1482.
Sixtus V. enrolled his name among the doctors of the Church, in the
same manner as Pius V. had done that of St. Thomas Aquinas. The
acts of his canonization record several approved miracles wrought
by his intercession. The city of Lyons, in 1628, being grievously
afflicted with the plague, the raging distemper began to cease from
the time in which certain relics of our saint were devoutly carried
in procession. That and other cities have experienced the divine
mercy in like manner, in several other public calamities, by invoking
St. Bonaventure’s intercession. Charles of Orleans, father of Louis
XII. king of France, was taken prisoner by the English in the battle
of Agincourt, in 1425. During his captivity he fell ill of a fever,
under which no human remedies gave him any relief. The more desperate
his situation appeared, with the more earnestness he set himself to
implore the patronage of St. Bonaventure, and a perfect recovery
was the recompense of his devotion. In gratitude, as soon as he was
set at liberty, he went to Lyons to offer up his thanksgivings and
prayers at the tomb of the saint, on which he bestowed magnificent
presents.[151]

St. Bonaventure, this great master of a spiritual life, places
not the perfection of Christian virtue so much in the more heroic
exercises of a religious state as in the performing well our ordinary
actions. “The best perfection of a religious man,” says he, “is to do
common things in a perfect manner.[152] A constant fidelity in small
things is a great and heroic virtue.” It is a continual crucifixion
of self-love and all the passions; a complete sacrifice of all our
actions, moments, and affections, and the entire reign of God’s grace
throughout our whole lives. Quintilian lays it down for the great
rule in forming an orator, that he accustom himself never to write
or speak carelessly even on the most trifling subject or in common
conversation, but that he study always to express himself in the most
proper manner possible; with far greater diligence ought every one
to strive to perform all even the meanest of his actions in the most
perfect manner, and to improve every grace, every moment of time to
advance in virtue.

ST. CAMILLUS DE LELLIS, C.

He was born in 1550 at Bacchianico in Abruzzo, in the kingdom of
Naples. He lost his mother in his infancy, and six years after his
father, who was a gentleman, and had been an officer, first in the
Neapolitan and afterward in the French troops in Italy. Camillus
having learned only to read and write, entered himself young in
the army, and served first in the Venetian, and afterward in the
Neapolitan troops, till, in 1574, his company was disbanded. He
had contracted so violent a passion for cards and gaming, that he
sometimes lost even necessaries. All playing at lawful games for
exorbitant sums, and absolutely all games of hazard for considerable
sums are forbidden by the law of nature, by the imperial or civil
law,[153] by the severest laws of all Christian or civilized nations,
and by the canons of the Church.[154] No contract is justifiable
in which neither reason nor proportion is observed. Nor can it be
consistent with the natural law of justice for a plan to stake any
sum on blind chance, or to expose, without a reasonable equivalent
or necessity, so much of his own or antagonist’s money, that the
loss would notably distress himself or any other person. Also many
other sins are inseparable from a spirit of gaming, which springs
from avarice, is so hardened as to rejoice in the loss of others,
and is the source and immediate occasion of many other vices. The
best remedy for this vice is, that those who are infected with it be
obliged, or at least exhorted, to give whatever they have won to the
poor.

Camillus was insensible of the evils attending gaming, till necessity
compelled him to open his eyes; for he at length was reduced to
such straits, that for a subsistence he was obliged to drive two
asses, and to work at a building which belonged to the Capuchin
friars. The divine mercy had not abandoned him through all his
wanderings, but had often visited him with strong interior calls to
penance. A moving exhortation which the guardian of the Capuchins
one day made him, completed his conversion. Ruminating on it as he
rode from him upon his business, he at length alighted, fell on
his knees, and vehemently striking his breast, with many tears and
loud groans deplored his past unthinking sinful life, and cried to
heaven for mercy. This happened in February in the year 1575, the
twenty-fifth of his age; and from that time to his last breath he
never interrupted his penitential course. He made an essay of a
novitiate both among the Capuchins and the Grey Friars, but could
not be admitted to his religious profession among either on account
of a running sore in one of his legs, which was judged incurable.
Therefore leaving his own country he went to Rome, and there served
the sick in St. James’s hospital of incurables four years with great
fervor. He wore a knotty hair shirt, and a rough brass girdle next
his skin; watched night and day about the sick, especially those that
were dying, with the most scrupulous attention. He was most zealous
to suggest to them devout acts of virtue and to procure them every
spiritual help. Fervent humble prayer was the assiduous exercise
of his soul, and he received the holy communion every Sunday and
holiday, making use of St. Philip Neri for his confessarius. The
provisors or administrators having been witnesses to his charity,
prudence, and piety, after some time appointed him director of the
hospital.

Camillus grieving to see the sloth of hired servants in attending
the sick, formed a project of associating certain pious persons for
that office who should be desirous to devote themselves to it out of
a motive of fervent charity. He found proper persons so disposed,
but met with great obstacles in the execution of his design. With a
view of rendering himself more useful in spiritually assisting the
sick, he took a resolution to prepare himself to receive holy orders.
For this purpose he went through a course of studies with incredible
alacrity and ardor, and received all his orders from Thomas Goldwell,
bishop of St. Asaph’s, suffragan to cardinal Savelli, the bishop
vicegerent in Rome, under pope Gregory XIII. A certain gentleman of
Rome named Firmo Calmo, gave the saint six hundred Roman sequines of
gold (about two hundred and fifty pounds sterling), which he put out
for an annuity of thirty-six sequines a year during his life; this
amounting to a competent patrimony for the title of his ordination,
required by the council of Trent and the laws of the diocess. The
same pious gentleman, besides frequent great benefactions during his
life, bequeathed his whole estate real and personal on Camillus’s
hospital at his death. The saint was ordained priest at Whitsuntide
in 1584, and being nominated to serve a little chapel called our
Lady’s _ad miracula_, he quitted the direction of the hospital.
Before the close of the same year he laid the foundation of his
congregation for serving the sick, giving to those who were admitted
into it a long black garment with a black cloth for their habit. The
saint prescribed them certain short rules, and they went every day to
the great hospital of the Holy Ghost, where they served the sick with
so much affection, piety, and diligence, that it was visible to all
who saw them, that they considered Christ himself as lying sick or
wounded in his members.

They made the beds of the patients, paid them every office of
charity, and by their short pathetic exhortations disposed them for
the last sacraments, and a happy death. The founder had powerful
adversaries and great difficulties to struggle with; but by
confidence in God he conquered them all. In 1585 his friends hired
for him a large house, and the success of his undertaking encouraged
him to extend further his pious views; for he ordained that the
members of his congregation should bind themselves by the obligation
of their institute, to serve persons infected with the plague,
prisoners, and those who lie dying in private houses.

Sickness is often the most severe and grievous of all trials, whence
the devil made it his last assault in tempting Job.[155] It is a
time in which a Christian stands in need of the greatest constancy
and fortitude; yet through the weakness of nature, is generally
the least able to keep his heart united with God, and usually
never stands more in need of spiritual comfort and assistance. The
state of sickness is always a visitation of God, who by it knocks
at the door of our heart, and puts us in mind of death; it is
the touchstone of patience, and the school or rather the harvest
of penance, resignation, divine love, and every virtue. Yet by a
most fatal abuse is this mercy often lost and perverted by sloth,
impatience, sensuality, and forwardness. Those who in time of health
were backward in exercising fervent acts of faith, hope, charity,
contrition, &c., in sickness are still more indisposed for practices
with which they are unacquainted; and to their grievous misfortune
sometimes pastors cannot sufficiently attend them, or have not a
suitable address which will give them the key of their hearts, or
teach them the art of insinuating into the souls of penitents the
heroic sentiments and an interior relish of those essential virtues.

This consideration moved Camillus to make it the chief end of his new
establishment, to afford or procure the sick all spiritual succor,
discreetly to suggest to them short pathetic acts of compunction and
other virtues, to read by them, and to pray for them. For this end
he furnished his priests with proper books of devotion, especially
on penance and on the sufferings of Christ; and he taught them to
have always at hand the most suitable ejaculations extracted from
the psalms and other devotions.[156] But dying persons were the
principal object of our saint’s pious zeal and charity. A man’s
last moments are the most precious of his whole life; and are of
infinite importance; as on them depends his eternal lot. Then the
devil useth his utmost efforts to ruin a soul, and _cometh down,
having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time_.[157] The
saint therefore redoubled his earnestness to afford every spiritual
help to persons who seemed in danger of death. He put them early in
mind to settle their temporal concerns, that their thoughts might
be afterward employed entirely on the affair of their soul. He
advised those friends not to approach them too much, whose sight or
immoderate grief could only disturb or afflict them. He disposed
them to receive the last sacraments by the most perfect acts of
compunction, resignation, faith, hope, and divine love; and he taught
them to make death a voluntary sacrifice of themselves to the divine
will, and in satisfaction for sin; of which it is the punishment.
He instructed them to conjure their blessed Redeemer by the bitter
anguish which his divine heart felt in the garden and on the cross,
and by his prayer with a loud voice and tears, in which he deserved
to be heard for his reverence, that he would show them mercy, and
give them the grace to offer up their death in union with his most
precious death, and to receive their soul as he with his last breath
recommended his own divine soul into the hands of his heavenly
Father, and with it those of all his elect to the end of the world.
He instituted prayers for all persons in their agony, or who were
near their death.

Every one was charmed at so perfect a project of charity, and all
admired that such noble views and so great an undertaking should
have been reserved to an obscure illiterate person. Pope Sixtus V.
confirmed this congregation in 1586, and ordered that it should be
governed by a triennial superior. Camillus was the first, and Roger,
an Englishman, was one of his first companions. The church of St.
Mary Magdalen was bestowed on him for the use of his congregation.
In 1588 he was invited to Naples, and with twelve companions founded
there a new house. Certain galleys having the plague on board were
forbid to enter the harbor. Wherefore these pious _Servants of the
sick_ (for that was the name they took) went on board, and attended
them; on which occasion two of their number died of the pestilence,
and were the first martyrs of charity in this holy institute. St.
Camillus showed a like charity in Rome when a pestilential fever
swept off great numbers, and again when that city was visited by a
violent famine. In 1591 Gregory XV. erected this congregation into
a religious Order, with all the privileges of the mendicant Order,
and under the obligation of the four vows of poverty, chastity,
obedience, and perpetually serving the sick, even those infected
with the plague; he forbade these religious men to pass to any other
Order except that of the Carthusians. Pope Clement VIII. in 1592
and 1600 again confirmed this Order with additional privileges.
Indeed the very end of this institution engaged all men to favor
it; especially those who considered how many thousands die, even
in the midst of priests, without sufficient help in preparing
themselves for that dreadful hour which decides their eternity; what
superficial confessions, what neglect in acts of contrition, charity,
restitution, and other essential duties, are often to be feared;
which grievous evils might be frequently remedied by the assiduity of
well qualified ministers.

Among many abuses and dangerous evils which the zeal of St. Camillus
prevented, his attention to every circumstance relating to the care
of dying persons soon made him discover that in hospitals many are
buried alive, of which Cicatello relates several examples,[158]
particularly of one buried in a vault, who was found walking about in
it when the next corpse was brought to be there interred. Hence the
saint ordered his religious to continue the prayers for souls yet in
their agony for a quarter of an hour after they seem to have drawn
their last breath, and not to suffer their faces to be covered so
soon as is usual, by which means those that are not dead are stifled.
This precaution is most necessary in cases of drowning, apoplexies,
and such accidents and distempers which arise from mere obstructions
or some sudden revolution of humors.[159] St. Camillus showed still
a far greater solicitude to provide all comforts and assistance
for the souls of those that are sick, suggesting frequent short
pathetic aspirations, showing them a crucifix, examining their past
confessions and present dispositions, and making them exhortations
with such unction and fervor that his voice seemed like a shrill
trumpet, and pierced the hearts of all who heard him. He encouraged
his disciples to these duties with words of fire. He did not love to
hear anything spoken unless divine charity made part of the subject;
and if he had a sermon in which it was not mentioned, he would call
the discourse a gold ring without a stone.

He was himself afflicted with many corporal infirmities, as a sore
in his leg for forty-six years; a rupture for thirty-eight years
which he got by serving the sick; two callous sores in the sole
of one of his feet, which gave him great pain; violent nephritic
colics, and for a long time before he died, a loss of appetite.
Under this complication of diseases he would not suffer any one to
wait on him, but sent all his brethren to serve poor sick persons.
When he was not able to stand he would creep out of his bed, even
in the night, by the sides of the beds, and crawl from one patient
to another to exhort them to acts of virtue, and see if they wanted
anything. He slept very little, spending great part of the night
in prayer and in serving the sick. He used often to repeat with
St. Francis: “So great is the happiness which I hope for, that all
pain and suffering is a pleasure.” His friars are not obliged to
recite the Church office unless they are in holy Orders; but confess
and communicate every Sunday and great holiday, have every day one
hour’s meditation, hear mass, and say the litany, beads, and other
devotions. The holy founder was most scrupulously exact in every word
and ceremony of the holy mass, and of the divine office. He despised
himself to a degree that astonished all who knew him. He laid down
the generalship in 1607, that he might be more at leisure to serve
the poor. He founded religious houses at Bologna, Milan, Genoa,
Florence, Ferrara, Messina, Palermo, Mantua, Viterbo, Bocchiano,
Theate, Burgonono, Sinuessa, and other places. He had sent several
of his friars into Hungary, and to all other places which in his
time were afflicted with the plague. When Nola was visited with that
calamity in 1600, the bishop constituted Camillus his vicar general,
and it is incredible what succors the sick received from him and
his companions, of whom five died of that distemper. God testified
his approbation of the saint’s zeal by the spirit of prophecy and
the gift of miracles, on several occasions, and by many heavenly
communications and favors.

He assisted at the fifth general chapter of his Order in Rome in
1613, and after it, with the new general, visited the houses in
Lombardy, giving them his last exhortations, which were everywhere
received with tears. At Genoa he was extremely ill, but being a
little better, duke Doria Tursi sent him in his rich galley to Civita
Vecchia, whence he was conveyed in a litter to Rome. He recovered so
as to be able to finish the visitation of his hospitals, but soon
relapsed, and his life was despaired of by the physicians. Hearing
this, he said,--_I rejoice in what hath been told me: We shall go
into the house of the Lord._ He received the viaticum from the hands
of cardinal Ginnasio, protector of his Order, and said with many
tears,--“O Lord, I confess I am the most wretched of sinners, most
undeserving of thy favor; but save me by thy infinite goodness. My
hope is placed in thy divine mercy through thy precious blood.”
Though he had lived in the greatest purity of conscience ever since
his conversion, he had been accustomed to go every day to confession
with great compunction and many tears. When he received the extreme
unction he made a moving exhortation to his religious brethren, and
having foretold that he should die that evening, he expired on the
14th of July, 1614, being sixty-five years one month and twenty days
old. He was buried near the high altar in St. Mary Magdalen’s church;
but upon the miracles which were authentically approved, his remains
were taken up and laid under the altar; they were enshrined after
he was beatified in 1742, and in 1746 he was solemnly canonized by
Benedict XIV. See the life of St. Camillus by Cicatello his disciple,
and the acts of his canonization with those of SS. Fidelis of
Sigmaringa, Peter Regalati, Joseph of Leonissa, and St. Catharine de
Ricci, printed at Rome in 1749, p. 10, 65, and 529, and Bullar. Rom.
t. 16, p. 88. Heylot, Hist. des Ordres Relig. t. 4, p. 263.

ST. IDUS, BISHOP OF ATH-FADHA IN LEINSTER.

Was a worthy disciple of St. Patrick, by whom he was baptized. He is
often invoked in the old Irish prayer in verse which bears the name
of St. Moling. See Colgan in MSS.

JULY XV.

ST. HENRY II. EMPEROR.

From his authentic life, published by Surius and D’Andilly,
and from the historians Sigebert, Glaber, Dithmar, Lambert
of Aschaffenburg, Leo Urbevetanus in his double chronicle
of the popes and emperors, in Deliciæ Eruditor. t. 1 and 2.
Aventin’s Annals of Bavaria, &c.

A. D. 1024.

St. Henry, surnamed the Pious and the Lame, was son of Henry, duke
of Bavaria, and of Gisella, daughter of Conrad, king of Burgundy,
and was born in 972. He was descended from Henry, Duke of Bavaria,
son of the emperor Henry the Fowler, and brother of Otho the Great,
consequently our saint was near akin to the three first Emperors
who bore the name of Otho. St. Wolfgang, the Bishop of Ratisbon,
being a prelate the most eminent in all Germany for learning,
piety, and zeal, our young prince was put under his tuition, and
by his excellent instructions and example he made from his infancy
wonderful progress in learning and in the most perfect practice of
Christian virtue. The death of his dear master and spiritual guide,
which happened in 994, was to him a most sensible affliction. In
the following year he succeeded his father in the duchy of Bavaria,
and in 1002, upon the death of his cousin Otho III. he was chosen
emperor.[160] He was the same year crowned king of Germany at Mentz,
by the archbishop of that city. He had always before his eyes the
extreme dangers to which they are exposed who move on the precipice
of power, and that all human things are like edifices of sand, which
every breath of time threatens to overturn or deface; he studied
the extent and importance of the obligations which attended his
dignity; and by the assiduous practice of humiliations, prayer, and
pious meditation, he maintained in his heart the necessary spirit
of humility and holy fear, and was enabled to bear the tide of
prosperity and honor with a constant evenness of temper. Sensible of
the end for which alone he was exalted by God to the highest temporal
dignity, he exerted his most strenuous endeavors to promote in all
things the divine honor, the exaltation of the Church, and the peace
and happiness of his people.

Soon after his accession to the throne he resigned the dukedom of
Bavaria, which he bestowed on his brother-in-law Henry, surnamed
Senior. He procured a national council of the bishops of all his
dominions, which was assembled at Dortmund, in Westphalia, in 1005,
in order to regulate many points of discipline; and to enforce a
strict observance of the holy canons. It was owing to his zeal that
many provincial synods were also held for the same purpose in several
parts of the empire. He was himself present at that of Frankfort
in 1006, and at another of Bamberg in 1011. The protection he owed
his subjects engaged him sometimes in wars, in all which he was
successful. By his prudence, courage, and clemency, he stifled a
rebellion at home in the beginning of his reign, and without striking
a stroke compelled the malecontents to lay down their arms at his
feet, which when they had done he received them into favor. Two
years after he quelled another rebellion in Italy, when Ardovinus
or Hardwic, a Lombard lord, had caused himself to be crowned king
at Milan. This nobleman, after his defeat, made his submission, and
obtained his pardon. When he had afterward revolted a second time,
the emperor marched again into Italy, vanquished him in battle, and
deprived him of his territories, but did not take away his life,
and Ardovinus became a monk. After this second victory, St. Henry
went in triumph to Rome, where, in 1014, he was crowned emperor
with great solemnity by pope Benedict VIII. On that occasion, to
give a proof of his devotion to the holy see, he confirmed to it,
by an ample diploma, the donation made by several former emperors,
of the sovereignty of Rome and the exarchate of Ravenna:[161] and
after a short stay at Rome, took leave of the pope, and in his
return to Germany kept the Easter holydays at Pavia; then he visited
the monastery of Cluni, on which he bestowed the imperial globe of
gold which the pope had given him, and a gold crown enriched with
precious stones. He paid his devotions in other monasteries on the
road, leaving in every one of them some rich monument of his piety
and liberality. But the most acceptable offering which he made to
God was the fervor and purity of affection with which he renewed
the consecration of his soul to God in all places where he came,
especially at the foot of the altars. Travelling through Liege and
Tries he arrived at Bamberg, in which city he had lately founded a
rich episcopal see, and had built a most stately cathedral in honor
of St. Peter, which pope John XVIII. took a journey into Germany
to consecrate in 1019. The emperor obtained of this pope, by an
honorable embassy, the confirmation of this and all his other pious
foundations. For he built and endowed other churches with the two
monasteries at Bamberg, and made the like foundations in several
other places; thus extending his zealous views to promote the divine
honor and the relief of the poor to the end of time. Bruno, bishop
of Ausburg, the emperor’s brother, Henry, duke of Bavaria, and
other relations of the saint complained loudly that he employed his
patrimony on such religious foundations, and the duke of Bavaria and
some others took up arms against him in 1010; but he defeated them
in the field; then pardoned the princes engaged in the revolt, and
restored to them Bavaria and their other territories which he had
seized.

The idolatrous inhabitants of Poland and Sclavonia had some time
before laid waste the diocess of Meersburg, and destroyed that and
several other churches. St. Henry marched against those barbarous
nations, and having put his army under the protection of the holy
martyrs St. Laurence, St. George, and St. Adrian, who are said to
have been seen in the battle fighting before him, he defeated the
infidels. He had made a vow to re-establish the see of Meersburg
in case he obtained the victory, and he caused all his army to
communicate the day before the battle which was fought near that
city. The barbarians were seized with a panic fear in the beginning
of the action, and submitted at discretion. The princes of Bohemia
rebelled, but were easily brought back to their duty. The victorious
emperor munificently repaired and restored the episcopal sees of
Hildesheim, Magdeburg, Strasburg, Misnia, and Meersburg, and made all
Poland, Bohemia, and Moravia tributary to the empire. He procured
holy preachers to be sent to instruct the Bohemians and Polanders
in the faith. Those have been mistaken who pretend that St. Henry
converted St. Stephen, king of Hungary; for that prince was born of
Christian parents. But our saint promoted his zealous endeavors, and
had a great share in his apostolic undertakings for the conversion of
his people.

The protection of Christendom, and especially of the holy see,
obliged St. Henry to lead an army to the extremity of Italy,[162]
where he vanquished the conquering Saracens, with their allies
the Greeks, and drove them out of Italy, left a governor in the
provinces which he had recovered, and suffered the Normans to enjoy
the territories which they had then wrested from the infidels, but
restrained them from turning their arms towards Naples or Benevento.
He came back by Mount Cassino, and was honorably received at Rome;
but during his stay in that city, by a painful contraction of the
sinews in his thigh, became lame and continued so till his death.
He passed by Cluni, and in the duchy of Luxemburg had an interview
with Robert, king of France, son and successor of Hugh Capet.[163]
It had been agreed that, to avoid all disputes of pre-eminence,
the two princes should hold their conference in boats on the river
Meuse, which as Glaber writes, was at that time the boundary that
parted their dominions. But Henry, impatient to embrace and cement
a friendship with that great and virtuous king, paid the first
visit to Robert in his tent, and afterward received him in his
own. A war had broken out between these two princes in 1006, and
Henry gave the French a great overthrow; but being desirous only to
govern his dominions in peace, he entered into negotiations which
produced a lasting peace. In this interview, which was held in 1023,
the conference of the two princes turned on the most important
affairs of Church and State, and on the best means of advancing
piety, religion, and the welfare of their subjects. After the most
cordial demonstrations of sincere friendship they took leave of each
other, and St. Henry proceeded to Verdun and Metz. He made frequent
progresses through his dominions only to promote piety, enrich all
the churches, relieve the poor, make a strict inquiry into all public
disorders and abuses, and prevent unjust usurpations and oppressions.
He desired to have no other heir on earth but Christ in his members,
and wherever he went he spread the odor of his piety, and his
liberalities on the poor.

It is incredible how attentive he was to the smallest affairs amidst
the multiplicity of business which attends the government of the
state; nothing seemed to escape him; and whilst he was most active
and vigilant in every duty which he owed to the public, he did not
forget that the care of his own soul and the regulation of his
interior was his first and most essential obligation. He was sensible
that pride and vain-glory are the most dangerous of all vices, and
that they are the most difficult to be discovered, and the last that
are vanquished in the spiritual warfare; that humility is the very
foundation of all true virtue, and our progress in it the measure of
our advancement in Christian perfection. Therefore the higher he was
exalted in worldly honors the more did he study to humble himself,
and it is said of him, that never was greater humility seen under a
diadem. He loved those persons best who most freely put him in mind
of his mistakes, and these he was always most ready to confess, and
to make for them the most ample reparation. Through misinformations,
he for some time harbored coldness toward Saint Herebert archbishop
of Cologne; but discovering the innocence and sanctity of that
prelate, he fell at his feet, and would not rise till he had received
his absolution and pardon. He banished flatterers from his presence,
calling them the greatest pests of courts; for none can put such
as affront on a man’s judgment and modesty, as to praise him to
his face, but the base and most wicked of interested and designing
men, who make use of this artifice to insinuate themselves into the
favor of a prince, to abuse his weakness and credulity, and to make
him the dupe of their injustices. He who listens to them exposes
himself to many misfortunes and crimes, to the danger of the most
foolish pride and vain-glory, and to the ridicule and scorn of his
flatterers themselves; for a vanity that can publicly hear its
own praises, openly unmasks itself to its confusion. The emperor
Sigismund giving a flatterer a blow on the face, called his fulsome
praise the greatest insult that had ever been offered him. St. Henry
was raised by religion and humility above this abjectness of soul
which reason itself teaches us to abhor and despise. By the assiduous
mortification of the senses he kept his passions in subjection. For
pleasure, unless we are guarded against its assaults, steals upon us
by insensible degrees, smooths its passage to the heart by a gentle
and insinuating address, and softens and disarms the soul of all its
strength. Nor is it possible for us to triumph over unlawful sensual
delights, unless we moderate and practise frequent self-denials with
regard to lawful gratifications. The love of the world is a no less
dangerous enemy, especially amidst honors and affluence; and created
objects have this quality that they first seduce the heart, and then
blind the understanding. By conversing always in heaven, St. Henry
raised his affections so much above the earth as to escape this snare.

Prayer seemed the chief delight and support of his soul; especially
the public office of the Church. Assisting one day at this holy
function at Strasburg, he so earnestly desired to remain always there
to sing the divine praises among the devout canons of that Church,
that, finding this impossible, he founded there a new canonry for
one who should always perform that sacred duty in his name. In this
spirit of devotion it has been established that the kings of France
are canons of Strasburg, Lyons, and some other places; as in the
former place the emperors, in the latter the dukes of Burgundy,
were before them. The holy sacrament of the altar and sacrifice of
the mass were the object of St. Henry’s most tender devotion. The
blessed Mother of God he honored as his chief patroness, and among
other exercises by which he recommended himself to her intercession,
it was his custom, upon coming to any town, to spend a great part of
the first night in watching and prayer in some church dedicated to
God under her name, as at Rome in St. Mary Major. He had a singular
devotion to the good angels and to all the saints. Though he lived
in the world so as to be perfectly disengaged from it in heart
and affection, it was his earnest desire entirely to renounce it
long before his death, and he intended to pitch upon the abbey of
St. Vanne, at Verdun, for the place of his retirement. But he was
diverted from carrying this project into execution, by the advice
of Richard the holy abbot of that house.[164] He had married St.
Cunegonda, but lived with her in perpetual chastity, to which they
had mutually bound themselves by vow. It happened that the empress
was falsely accused of incontinency, and St. Henry was somewhat
moved by the slander; but she cleared herself by her oath, and by
the ordeal trials, walking over twelve red hot plough-shares without
hurt. Her husband severely condemned himself for his credulity,
and made her the most ample satisfaction. In his last illness he
recommended her to her relations and friends, declaring that he left
her an untouched virgin. His health decayed some years before his
death, which happened at the castle of Grone, near Halberstadt, in
1024, on the 14th of July, toward the end of the fifty-second year of
his life; he having reigned twenty-two years from his election, and
ten years and five months from his coronation at Rome. His body was
interred in the cathedral at Bamberg with the greatest pomp, and with
the unfeigned tears of all his subjects. The great number of miracles
by which God was pleased to declare his glory in heaven, procured
his canonization, which was performed by Eugenius III., in 1152. His
festival is kept on the day following that of his death.[165]

* * * * *

Those who by honors, dignities, riches, or talents are raised by
God in the world above the level of their fellow-creatures, have a
great stewardship, and a most rigorous account to give at the bar of
divine justice, their very example having a most powerful influence
over others. This St. Fulgentius observed, writing to Theodorus, a
pious Roman senator,[166]--“Though,” said he, “Christ died for all
men, yet the perfect conversion of the great ones of the world brings
great acquisitions to the kingdom of Christ. And they who are placed
in high stations must necessarily be to very many an occasion of
eternal perdition or of salvation. And as they cannot go alone, so
either a high degree of glory or an extraordinary punishment will be
their everlasting portion.”

ST. PLECHELM, B. C. APOSTLE OF GUELDERLAND.

He was by birth a noble English Saxon, but born in the southern
part of Scotland; for Lothian and the rest of the Lowlands as far
as Edinburgh Frith belonged for several ages to the Northumbrian
English. Having received holy orders in his own country he made
a pilgrimage to Rome, whence he returned home enriched with holy
relics. Some time after, in company with the holy bishop St. Wiro,
and St. Otger a deacon, he passed into those parts of Lower Germany
which had not then received the light of faith. Having obtained the
protection of Pepin, mayor of the palace in Austrasia, he converted
the country now called Guelderland, Cleves, Juliers, and several
neighboring provinces lying chiefly between the Rhine, the Wahal, and
the Meuse. When he had planted the gospel there with great success
he retired to St. Peter’s Mount near Ruremund, but continued to
make frequent missions among the remaining infidels. Prince Pepin,
who though he had formerly fallen into adultery, led afterward a
penitential and Christian holy life, went every year from his castle
of Herstal to confess his sins to his holy pastor after the death
of St. Wiro, which the author of St. Plechelm’s life relates in the
following words.[167] “Pepin, the king of the French (that is, mayor
with royal authority), had him in great veneration, and every year,
in the beginning of Lent, having laid aside his purple, went from his
palace barefoot to the said mount of Peter where the saint lived,
and took his advice how he ought to govern his kingdom according to
the holy will and law of God, and by what means he might promote the
faith of Christ and every advantage of virtue. There also having
made the confession of his sins to the high priest of the Lord, and
received penance, he washed away with his tears the offences which
through human frailty he had contracted.” F. Bosch, the Bollandist,
observes, this prince must have been Pepin, surnamed of Herstal, or
the Fat, who, though he never enjoyed the title of king, reigned
in Austrasia with regal power, and with equal piety and valor. He
died in 714, in the castle of Jopil on the Meuse, near Liege, which
was his paternal estate, St. Pepin of Landen his grandfather being
son of Carloman, the first mayor of his family, grandson of Charles
count of Hesbay near Liege, the descendant of Ferreol, formerly
præfectus-prætorio of the Gauls. St. Plechelm survived Pepin of
Herstel seventeen years, is called by Bollandus bishop of Oldenzel
and Ruremund, and died on the 15th of July, 732. He was buried in
our lady’s chapel in the church, on the mountain of St. Peter, now
called of St. Odilia, near Ruremund. His relics were honored with
many miracles. The principal portion of them is now possessed by the
collegiate church of Oldenzel, in the province of Over-Yssel, part at
Ruremund. His name is famous in the Belgic and other Martyrologies.
His ancient life testifies that he was ordained bishop in his own
country before he undertook a missionary life. Bede, in the year
731, mentions Pechthelm, who having been formerly a disciple of St.
Aldhelm, in the kingdom of the West-Saxons, returning to his own
country was ordained bishop to preach the gospel with more authority.
He afterward fixed his see at Candida Casa, now a parliamentary town
of Galloway in Scotland, called Whitehorn. The Bollandists in several
parts of their work contend this Pechthelm to have been a different
person from St. Plechelm, whom Stilting demonstrates to have been at
Mount St. Peter, whilst the other, somewhat elder according to Bede,
was in North-Britain at Candida Casa; though Antony Pagi[168] and the
author of Batavia Sacra endeavor to prove him, against F. Bosch and
his colleagues, to have been the same. See his authentic life with
the remarks of Bollandus and his colleagues, Julij, t. 4, p. 58, and
Batavia Sacra, p. 50.[169]

ST. SWITHIN OR SWITHUN, C.

BISHOP AND PATRON OF WINCHESTER.

This city had been famous in the time of the Romans and a station
of their troops, being called by Ptolemy and Antoninus, Venta. It
became afterwards the chief seat of the West-Saxon kings. Among
these, Kynegils, having received the faith about the year 635,
gave to St. Birinus the city of Dorcester for his episcopal see,
but founded a church at Winchester, which was dedicated by St.
Birinus to St. Peter, according to the Saxon Chronicle, or to the
Holy Trinity, according to Thomas Rudburn. Wini, the third bishop
of the West-Saxons, fixed his see at Winchester, and this church
became one of the most flourishing cathedrals of all Britain. St.
Swithun, called in the original Saxon language Swithum, received in
this church the clerical tonsure, and put on the monastic habit in
the Old Monastery, which had been founded by king Kynegils. He was
of noble parentage, passed his youth in innocent simplicity, and in
the study of grammar, philosophy, and the holy scriptures. He was an
accomplished model of all virtues when he was promoted to holy orders
by Helinstan or Helmstan, bishop of Winchester.

Being ordained priest, he was made provost or dean of the Old
Monastery. His learning, piety, and prudence, moved Egbert, king
of the West-Saxons, to make him his priest, under which title the
saint subscribed a charter granted to the abbey of Croyland in 833.
That great prince committed to his care the education of his son
Ethelwolf, and made use of his counsels in the government of his
kingdom. A degeneracy of manners had crept into the courts of the
Merceians and Northumbrians, and their government was weakened by
intestine divisions and several revolutions. Egbert having first
vanquished Swithred, king of the East-Saxons, and added his kingdom
to his own, upon several provocations, invaded Mercia, and conquered
it in 823, but soon after restored Withlaf, whom he had expelled, to
the throne of that kingdom on condition he should hold the crown of
him, and pay him an annual tribute. He treated in the same manner
Eandred, the last king of the Northumbers, and made him tributary,
after he had with a great army laid waste that province. The kingdom
of the East Angles submitted to him about the same time with Mercia,
with which it had been long engaged in war and was thereby reduced to
extreme poverty. Kent being at that time tributary to Mercia, it fell
also to the share of the conqueror. After this, Egbert assembled all
the great men of his kingdom, both clergy and laity, in a council at
Winchester, in which he enacted that this kingdom should ever after
be called England, and all his subjects Englishmen. At the same time
he was again crowned, and from that year, 829, was styled king of
England. Thus were the names of Saxons and Jutes abolished among us,
and an end was put to the heptarchy, or division of this nation into
seven kingdoms, which began to be formed by Hengist in 457, when he
took the title of king, seven years after his arrival in this island,
in 449. Towards the latter end of Egbert’s reign the Danes first
began to infest England. This general name historians give to those
shoals of pirates which were composed not only of Danes, but also of
Norwegians, Goths, Sweones or Swedes, and Vandals, as Eginhard, Henry
of Huntingdon, and others assure us.[170]

King Egbert reigned thirty-seven years over the West Saxons, and
nine years over all England, dying in the year 838, or according to
others in 837. Ethelwolf, his only surviving son, had been educated
in piety and learning under the care of St. Swithin, then provost of
the Old Monastery in Winchester,[171] and had been ordained subdeacon
by bishop Helmstan, as Rudburn, Huntingdon, and others relate. But
upon the death of his elder brother, whose name is not known, he
was dispensed with by pope Leo to marry, and returning again to a
secular life, helped his father in his wars, and after his death was
advanced to the throne. He married Osberge, a lady of remarkable
piety, and had four sons by her, Ethelbald, Ethelbright, Ethelred,
and Alfred. He governed his kingdom by the prudent advice of Alstan,
bishop of Shirborne, in temporal affairs; and by that of St. Swithin
in ecclesiastical matters, especially those which concerned his
own soul. And though the king was of a slow disposition, yet by
the assistance of these worthy counsellors, he reigned prudently
and happily; the Danes were often repulsed, and many noble designs
for the good of the Church and state were begun, and prosperously
executed. Bearing always the greatest reverence to St. Swithin, whom
he called his master and teacher, he procured him, upon the death
of Helmstan, to be chosen bishop of Winchester, to which see he was
consecrated by Ceolnoth, archbishop of Canterbury, in 852. Herne has
given us the profession of faith which he made on that occasion,
according to custom, in the hands of the archbishop.[172]

William of Malmesbury says, that though this good bishop was a
rich treasure of all virtues, those in which he took most delight
were humility and charity to the poor; and in the discharge of his
episcopal functions he omitted nothing belonging to a true pastor.
He built divers churches, and repaired others; and made his journeys
on foot, accompanied with his clerks, and often by night to avoid
ostentation. Being to dedicate any church, he with all humility used
to go barefoot to the place. His feasting was not with the rich, but
with the needy and the poor. His mouth was always open to invite
sinners to repentance, and to admonish those that stood to beware of
falling. He was most severe to himself, and abstemious in his diet,
never eating to satisfy his appetite, but barely to sustain nature;
and as to sleep, he admitted no more than what after long watching
and much labor was absolutely necessary. He was always delighted with
psalms and spiritual canticles, and in conversation would bear no
discourse but what tended to edification.

By his counsel and advice king Ethelwolf, in a Mycel synod or great
council of the nation in 854, enacted a new law by which he gave
the tithes or tenth part of his land throughout the kingdom to the
Church, exempt and free from all taxations and burthens, with an
obligation of prayers in all churches for ever for his own soul, on
every Wednesday, &c. This charter, to give it a more sacred sanction,
he offered on the altar of St. Peter at Rome in the pilgrimage which
he made to that city in 855. He likewise procured it to be confirmed
by the pope.[173] He carried with him to Rome his youngest and best
beloved son Alfred, rebuilt there the school for the English, and
ordered to be sent every year to Rome one hundred mancuses[174] for
the pope, one hundred for the church of St. Peter, and as much for
that of St. Paul, to furnish them with lights on Easter Eve. He
extended the Romescot or Peter-pence to his whole kingdom. He reigned
two years after his return from Rome, and died in 857. He ordained,
that throughout all his own hereditary lands, every ten families
shall maintain one poor person with meat, drink, and apparel; from
whence came the Corrodies which still remain in divers places. St.
Swithin departed to eternal bliss, which he had always thirsted
after, on the 2d of July, 862, in the reign of king Ethelbert. His
body was buried, according to his order, in the church-yard, where
his grave might be trodden on by passengers.

About one hundred years after, in the days of king Edgar, his
relics were taken up by St. Ethelwold, then bishop of Winchester,
and translated into the church in 964. On which occasion Malmesbury
affirms that such a number of miraculous cures of all kinds were
wrought, as was never to the memory of man known to have been in
any other place. Lanfrid, in the original Saxon Lantfred, called
by Leland all illustrious doctor, being then a monk at Winchester,
wrote, in 980, a history of this translation, and of the miraculous
cures of a blind man, and many others through the intercession of
this saint; which history has never been printed; though we have
two beautiful fair manuscript copies of it, the one in the Cotton,
the other in the king’s library in the enclosure of Westminster
Abbey.[175] In the reign of William the Conqueror, Walkelyn, bishop
of Winchester, a Norman, and the king’s relation, laid the foundation
of the new church in 1079, which he lived to finish with the abbey,
so that in 1093, the monks, in the presence of almost all the bishops
and abbots of England, came in great joy from the old to the new
monastery, and on the feast of St. Swithin, the shrine of this saint
was in another solemn procession translated from the old to the new
church; and on the next day the bishop’s men began to demolish the
old abbey. William of Wickham, the celebrated chancellor of England
in the reign of Edward III. and founder of a great college in Oxford,
in 1379, added the nave and west front to this cathedral which is now
standing. This church was first dedicated to the Holy Trinity under
the patronage of St. Peter; afterward by St. Ethelwold, in presence
of king Etheldred, St. Dunstan, and eight other bishops, to St.
Swithin, as Rudburn relates, in 980.[176] King Henry VIII. in 1540,
commanded this cathedral to be called no longer St. Swithin’s, but of
the Holy Trinity.[177]

St. Swithin is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on the 2d of
July, which was the day of his death; but his chief festival in
England was on the 15th of the same month, the day of the translation
of his relics. See the calendar prefixed to the chronicle entitled
Scala Mundi in a fair MS. in folio in the library of the English
college at Douay; also the Sarum Breviary and Missal. An arm of St.
Swithin was kept in the abbey of Peterborough, as is mentioned by
Hugh Candidus or White, in his accurate history of that monastery,
published by Mr. Spark, p. 1723. The abbey of Hyde was first built
within the precincts of the cathedral by king Edward the Elder, in
pursuance of his father Alfred’s will, for secular canons, over whom
St. Grimbald was intended to preside, had not his death prevented it.
These canons, after sixty years’ continuance, yielded this church to
the monks whom, in 964, St. Ethelwold brought in; from which time
this abbey was called Newminster till it was translated by king Henry
I. and the bishop William Giffard, to a place near the walls of the
city called Hyde. Of this magnificent abbey not so much as the walls
are left standing, though in it lay the remains of king Edward, his
son Alfred, his daughter St. Eadburga, &c. Its church was dedicated
to the Holy Trinity, St. Peter, and St. Grimbald. See the short life
of St. Swithin, written by Wolstan, a monk of Winchester, dedicated
to St. Elphege, then bishop of that city, in 1001, but translated to
Canterbury in 1006. It is published by Mabillon, sæc. 5, Ben. p. 628.
See also Malmesbury, t. 2, de Pontif. Robert of Glocester’s Chronicle
in verse, published by Mr. Herne. Thomas Rudburn, Historia Major
Wintoniensis, published by Wharton, t. 1, p. 200. Lord Clarendon,
and Sam. Gale, On the Antiquities of Winchester, and Pinius the
Bollandist, t. 1, Julij, ad diem 2, p. 321. Also S. Swithuni vita et
miracula per Lamfridum monachum Winton. MSS. in Bibl. Regia Londini,
xv. c. vii. 1.

JULY XVI.

ST. EUSTATHIUS, CONFESSOR.

PATRIARCH OF ANTIOCH.

From St. Athanasius, Sozomen, Theodoret, l. 1, Hist. c.
6, St. Jerom, in Catal. c. 85. See Tillem. t. 7, p. 21,
Ceillier, t. 4, and the Bollandists, Bosch in his Life, t.
4, Jul. p. 130, and Solier in Hist. Chron. Patr. Antioch,
ante, t. 4, Jul. p. 35.

A. D. 338.

St. Eustathius was a native of Sida in Pamphylia, and with heroic
constancy confessed the faith of Christ before the pagan persecutors,
as St. Athanasius assures us,[178] though it does not appear whether
this happened under Dioclesian or Licinius. He was learned, eloquent,
and eminently endowed with all virtue, especially an ardent zeal for
the purity of our holy faith. Being made bishop of Beræa in Syria
he began in that obscure see to be highly considered in the Church,
insomuch that St. Alexander of Alexandria wrote to him in particular
against Arius and his impious writings, in 323. St. Philogonius,
bishop of Antioch, a prelate illustrious for his confession of the
faith, in the persecution of Licinius, died in 323. One Paulinus
succeeded him, but seems a man not equal to the functions of that
high station; for, during the short time he governed that church,
tares began to grow up among the good seed. To root these out, when
that dignity became again vacant, in 324, the zeal and abilities of
St. Eustathius were called for, and he was accordingly translated
to this see, in dignity the next to Alexandria, and the third in
the world. He vigorously opposed the motion, but was compelled to
acquiesce. Indeed, translations of bishops, if made without cogent
reasons of necessity, become, to many, dangerous temptations of
ambition and avarice, and open a door to those fatal vices into
the sanctuary. To put a bar to this evil, St. Eustathius, in the
same year, assisting at the general council of Nice, zealously
concurred with his fellow bishops to forbid for the time to come all
removals of bishops from one see to another.[179] The new patriarch
distinguished himself in that venerable assembly by his zeal against
Arianism. Soon after his return to Antioch he held a council there
to unite his church, which he found divided by factions. He was very
strict and severe in examining into the characters of those whom he
admitted into the clergy, and he constantly rejected all those whose
principles, faith, or manners appeared suspected: among whom were
several who became afterward ringleaders of Arianism. Amidst his
external employs for the service of others, he did not forget that
charity must always begin at home, and he labored in the first place
to sanctify his own soul; but after watering his own garden he did
not confine the stream there, but let it flow abroad to enrich the
neighboring soil, and to dispense plenty and fruitfulness all around.
He sent into other diocesses that were subject to his patriarchate,
men capable of instructing and encouraging the faithful. Eusebius,
archbishop of Cæsarea, in Palestine (which church was, in some
measure, subject to Antioch), favored the new heresy in such a manner
as to alarm the zeal of our saint.[180] This raised a violent storm
against him.

Eusebius of Nicomedia laid a deep plot with his Arian friends to
remove St. Eustathius from Antioch, who had attacked Eusebius of
Cæsarea, and accused him of altering the Nicene Creed. Hereupon,
Eusebius of Nicomedia, pretending a great desire to see the city of
Jerusalem, set out in great state, taking with him his confidant,
Theognis of Nice. At Jerusalem they met Eusebius of Cæsarea,
Patrophilus of Scythopolis, Aëtius of Lydda, Theodotus of Laodicea,
and several others, all of the Arian faction; who returned with them
to Antioch. There they assembled together, as in a Synod, in 331, and
a debauched woman, whom the Arians had suborned, coming in, showed
a child which she suckled at her breast, and declared that she had
it by Eustathius. The saint protested his innocence, and alleged
that the apostle forbids a priest to be condemned unless convicted
by two or more witnesses. This woman, before her death, after a
long illness, called in a great number of the clergy, and publicly
declared to them the innocence of the holy bishop, and confessed
that the Arians had given her money for this action, pretending
that no perjury was implied in her oath, upon the frivolous and
foolish plea that she had the child by a brazier of the city called
Eustathius.[181] The Arians accused him also of Sabellianism, as
Socrates and others testify; this being their general charge and
slander against all who professed the orthodox faith.

The Catholic bishops who were present with Eustathius, cried out
loudly against the injustice of these proceedings, but could not be
heard, and the Arians pronounced a sentence of deposition against
the saint; and Eusebius of Nicomedia and Theognis hastened to inform
the emperor Constantine of these proceedings. The Arian bishops
invited Eusebius of Cæsarea to exchange his see for the patriarchal
chair of Antioch, but he alleged the prohibition of the canons; and
the emperor Constantine commended his modesty by a letter which
Eusebius has inserted in his life of that prince.[182] We should have
been more edified with his humility had this circumstance been only
recorded by others.[183] This happened, not in 340, as Baronius and
Petavius imagine, but in 330 or 331, as is manifest not only from
the testimony of Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, and Philostorgius,
but also from several circumstances of the affair.[184] The people
of Antioch raised a great sedition on this occasion, but the emperor
Constantine, being prepossessed by the slanders of the two bishops,
ordered St. Eustathius to repair to Constantinople, and thence sent
him into banishment. The holy pastor assembled the people before
his departure from Antioch, and exhorted them to remain steadfast
in the true doctrine: which exhortations were of great weight in
preserving many in the Catholic faith. St. Eustathius was banished
with several priests and deacons first into Thrace, as St. Jerome
and St. Chrysostom testify, and from thence into Illyricum, as
Theodoret adds. Socrates and Sozomen confound him with a priest of
Constantinople of the same name, when they tell us he was recalled
by Jovian, and survived till the year 370: for St. Eustathius
died thirty years before St. Meletius was advanced to the see of
Antioch in 360, as Theodoret testifies. Nor was he mentioned in
the council of Sardica, or in any of the disputes that followed;
and our best critics and historians conclude him to have been dead
in 337. Philippi, in Macedon, which, in the division of the empire
into diocesses, was comprised in that of Illyricum, was the place
of his death,[185] but his body was interred at Trajanopolis, in
Thrace, from which city Calandion, one of his successors, caused it
to be translated to Antioch, about the year 482, as Theodorus Lector
informs us.[186]

* * * * *

St. Eustathius bore his exile with patience and perfect submission,
and was under its disgraces and hardships greater and more glorious
than whilst his zeal and other virtues shone with the brightest
lustre on the patriarchal throne. We may please ourselves in those
actions in which we seem to be something; into which, however,
self-love, under a thousand forms, easily insinuates itself. But the
maxims of our Divine Redeemer teach us that no circumstances are so
happy for the exercise of the most heroic virtue as humiliations and
distresses when sent by Providence. These put our love to the test,
apply the remedy to the very root of our spiritual disorders, employ
the most perfect virtues of meekness, forgiveness, and patience, and
call forth our resignation, humility, and reliance on Providence; in
these trials we learn most perfectly to die to our passions, to know
ourselves, to feel our own nothingness and miseries, and with St.
Paul to take pleasure in our infirmities. Here all virtue is more
pure and perfect. A Christian suffering with patience and joy, bears
in spirit the nearest resemblance to his crucified Master, and enters
deepest into his most perfect sentiments of humility, meekness, and
love; for Jesus on his cross is the model by which his disciples are
bound to form themselves, which they nowhere can do with greater
advantage than when they are in a like state of desolation and
suffering.

ST. ELIER OR HELIER, HERMIT, M.

In the isle of Jersey and on the coasts of Normandy the name of
this servant of God has been in singular veneration from the time
of his happy death. He was converted to the faith by St. Marcou, a
holy abbot in Armorica, and being inflamed with an ardent desire
of serving God in the practice of perfect virtue; retired into the
isle of Jersey, and choosing for his abode a cave on the summit of a
rock of difficult access, there led an eremitical life in rigorous
fasting and assiduous prayer. In this lonely retreat he was murdered
by robbers or infidel barbarians. The chief town in the island, which
is situate seven leagues from Cotentin, bears his name. The dean of
the island is still invited to all diocesan synods of Coutances, the
island having been formerly subject to the spiritual jurisdiction of
that see. See the new Martyrology of Evreux; Piganiol, Descrip. de
la France, t. 9, p. 557. The acts of S. Helier, in the Bollandists,
16 Julij, and of S. Marcou, 1 Maij. Also Trigan, Hist. de Normandie,
l. 3, p. 91, l. 4, p. 124. The Breviaries of Coutances and Rennes,
and that of the Cistercian abbey of Beaubec, in the diocess of Rouen,
which is possessed of his relics.

JULY XVII.

ST. ALEXIUS, CONFESSOR.

From Joseph the Younger, in a poem of the ninth age,
divided into Odes, an anonymous writer of his Life in the
tenth century, noted by the Bollandists, a homily of St.
Adalbert, bishop of Prague, and martyr, of the same age,
and from other monuments, free from later interpolations;
on all which see Pinius the Bollandist, t. 4, Julij, p.
239, who confutes at large the groundless and inconsistent
surmises of Baillet. Above all, see Nerinio, abbot of the
Hieronymites at Rome, who has fully vindicated the memory
of St. Alexius in his Dissertation De Templo et Cœnobio,
SS. Bonifacii et Alexii, in 4to. Romæ, 1752. On his
Chaldaic Acts, see Jos. Assemani, ad 17 Martii, in Calend.
Univ. t. 6, p. 187, 189; and Bibl. Orient. t. 1, p. 401.

IN THE FIFTH CENTURY.

St. Alexius or Alexis is a perfect model of the most generous
contempt of the world. He was the only son of a rich senator of Rome,
born and educated in that capital, in the fifth century. From the
charitable example of his pious parents he learned, from his tender
years, that the riches which are given away to the poor, remain
with us for ever; and that alms-deeds are a treasure transferred to
heaven, with the interest of an immense reward. And whilst yet a
child, not content to give all he could, he left nothing unattempted
to compass or solicit the relief of all whom he saw in distress.
But the manner in which he dealt about his liberal alms was still a
greater proof of the noble sentiments of virtue with which his soul
was fired; for by this he showed that he thought himself most obliged
to those who received his charity, and regarded them as his greatest
benefactors. The more he enlarged his views of eternity, and raised
his thoughts and desires to the bright scene of immortal bliss, the
more did he daily despise all earthly toys; for, when once the soul
is thus upon the wing, and soars upwards, how does the glory of this
world lessen in her eye! and how does she contemn the empty pageantry
of all that worldlings call great!

Fearing lest the fascination, or at least the distraction of
temporal honors might at length divide or draw his heart too much
from those only noble and great objects, he entertained thoughts of
renouncing the advantages of his birth, and retiring from the more
dangerous part of the world. Having, in compliance with the will of
his parents, married a rich and virtuous lady, he on the very day
of the nuptials, making use of the liberty which the laws of God
and his Church give a person before the marriage be consummated, of
preferring a more perfect state, secretly withdrew, in order to break
all the ties which held him in the world. In disguise he travelled
into a distant country, embraced extreme poverty, and resided in a
hut adjoining to a church dedicated to the Mother of God. Being,
after some time there, discovered to be a stranger of distinction,
he returned home, and being received as a poor pilgrim, lived some
time unknown in his father’s house, bearing the contumely and ill
treatment of the servants with invincible patience and silence. A
little before he died, he by a letter discovered himself to his
parents. He flourished in the reign of the emperor Honorius, Innocent
the first being bishop of Rome; and is honored in the calendars of
the Latins, Greeks, Syrians, Maronites, and Armenians. His interment
was celebrated with the greatest pomp by the whole city of Rome, on
the Aventin hill. His body was found there in 1216, in the ancient
church of St. Boniface, whilst Honorius III. sat in St. Peter’s
chair, and at this day is the most precious treasure of a sumptuous
church on the same spot, which bears his name jointly with that of
St. Boniface, gives title to a cardinal, and is in the hands of the
Hieronymites.

* * * * *

The extraordinary paths in which the Holy Ghost is pleased sometimes
to conduct certain privileged souls are rather to be admired
than imitated. If it cost them so much to seek humiliations, how
diligently ought we to make a good use of those at least which
providence sends us! It is only by humbling ourselves on all
occasions that we can walk in the path of true humility, and root out
of our hearts all secret pride. The poison of this vice infects all
states and conditions: it often lurks undiscovered in the foldings
of the heart even after a man has got the mastery over all his other
passions. Pride always remains even for the most perfect principally
to fight against; and unless we watch continually against it, nothing
will remain sound or untainted in our lives; this vice will creep
even into our best actions, infect the whole circle of our lives, and
become a main spring of all the motions of our heart; and what is the
height of our misfortune, the deeper its wounds are, the more is the
soul stupified by its venom, and the less capable is she of feeling
her most grievous disease and spiritual death. St. John Climacus
writes,[187] that when a young novice was rebuked for his pride, he
said: “Pardon me, father, I am not proud.” To whom the experienced
director replied: “And how could you give me a surer proof of your
pride than by not seeing it yourself?”

SAINTS SPERATUS AND HIS COMPANIONS.

COMMONLY CALLED THE SCILLITAN MARTYRS.

When the emperor Severus returned victorious from having vanquished
the kings who had taken part with Nigar against him, he published
his cruel edicts against the Christians in the year of Christ 202,
the tenth of his reign. But the general laws of the empire against
foreign religions, and the former edicts of several emperors against
the Christians, were a sufficient warrant to many governors to
draw the sword against them before that time; and we find that the
persecution was very hot in Africa two years before, under the
proconsul Saturninus, in the eighth year of Severus and two hundredth
of Christ. The first who suffered at Carthage were twelve persons,
commonly called the Scillitan Martyrs, probably because they were
of Scillita, a town of the proconsular Africa. They were brought
prisoners to Carthage, and on the 16th of July were presented to the
proconsul whilst he was seated on his tribunal. The six principal
among them were Speratus, Narzalis, and Cittinus; and three women,
Donata, Secunda, and Vestina. The proconsul offered them the
emperor’s pardon if they would worship the gods of the Romans.
Speratus answered in the name of all: “We have never committed any
crime, we have injured no one; so far from it, we have always thanked
God for the evil treatment we have received; wherefore we declare
to you that we worship no other God but the true one, who is the
lord and master of all things; we pray for those who persecute us
unjustly, according to the law we have received.” The proconsul urged
them to swear by the emperor’s genius. Speratus said, “I know not the
genius of the emperor of this world, but I serve the God of heaven,
whom no mortal man hath ever seen or can see. I never committed any
crime punishable by the laws of the state. I pay the public duties
for whatever I buy, acknowledging the emperor for my temporal lord;
but I adore none but my God, who is the King of kings, and sovereign
Lord over all the nations in the world. I have been guilty of no
crime, and therefore cannot have incurred punishment.” Hereupon the
proconsul said, “Let them be carried to prison, and put in the wooden
stocks till to-morrow.”

On the day following, the proconsul being seated on his tribunal,
ordered them all to be brought before him, and said to the women,
“Honor our prince, and offer sacrifice to the gods.” Donata replied,
“We give to Cæsar the honor that is due to Cæsar; but we adore and
offer sacrifice to God alone.” Vestina said, “I also am a Christian.”
Secunda said, “I also believe in my God, and will continue faithful
to him. As for your gods we will neither serve nor adore them.”
The proconsul then ordered them into custody, and having called up
the men, he said to Speratus, “Art thou still resolved to remain
a Christian?” Speratus replied, “Yes, I am, be it known to all, I
am a Christian.” All that had been apprehended with him cried out,
“We also are Christians.” The proconsul said, “Will you not then so
much as deliberate upon the matter, or have any favor shown you?”
Speratus replied, “Do what you please; we die with joy for the sake
of Jesus Christ.” The proconsul asked, “What books are those which
you read and have in reverence?” Speratus answered, “The four gospels
of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; the epistles of the apostle
St. Paul, and the rest of the scriptures, revealed by God.”[188] The
proconsul said, “I give you three days to repent in.” Upon which
Speratus made answer, “We will never depart from the faith of our
Saviour Jesus Christ, therefore take what course you think fit.” The
proconsul seeing their constancy and resolution, pronounced sentence
against them in these terms: “Speratus, Narzalis, Cittinus, Veturius,
Felix, Acyllinus, Lætantius, Januaria, Generosa, Vestina, Donata,
and Secunda, having acknowledged themselves Christians, and having
refused to pay due honor and respect to the emperor, I condemn them
to be beheaded.” This sentence being read, Speratus, and all those
who were with him, said, “We give God thanks for vouchsafing to
receive us this day as martyrs in heaven, for confessing his name.”
Having said this, they were led to the place of execution, where they
all fell on their knees, and once more gave thanks to Jesus Christ.
Whilst they continued in prayer, their heads were struck off. The
faithful who transcribed their acts out of the public registers,
add:[189] “The martyrs of Christ finished their conflict in the month
of July, and they intercede for us to our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom
be given honor and glory with the Father and the Holy Ghost through
all ages.”

Tertullian,[190] soon after their martyrdom, addressed his excellent
apologetic discourse for the Christian religion to the governors
of the provinces, but without success. He testifies[191] that
Saturninus, who first drew the sword against the Christians in
Africa, soon after lost his eyes. As to the emperor Severus, after
carrying on the persecution ten years, whilst he was making war in
Britain, being on his march with his army, his eldest son Bassianus,
surnamed Antonius Caracalla, who marched after him, stopped his
horse, and drew his sword to stab him, but was prevented by others.
Severus only reproached him for it, but died soon after at York, of
grief for his son’s treachery, rather than of the gout, on the 4th of
February in the year 211, having lived sixty-five years, and reigned
seventeen and eight months. His two sons, Antoninus Caracalla and
Geta, succeeded him; but the elder caused the latter to be stabbed in
his mother’s bosom, who was sprinkled with his blood. See the acts
of the Scillitan martyrs, copied from the court registers by three
different Christians, who added short notes, published by Baronius,
ad an. by Tillemont, t. 3, Ceillier, t. 2, p. 211, Cuper the
Bollandist, t. 4, Julij, p. 202, by Ruinart, p. 75, and by Mabillon,
t. 3, Analect. p. 153, and abridged 204.

ST. MARCELLINA, V.

She was the eldest sister to St. Ambrose and Satyrus, and after the
death of her father, who was prefect of the Gauls, removed to Rome
with her pious mother and brothers. She was discreet beyond her
years, and from her cradle sought with her whole heart the only thing
for which she was created and sent into the world. Being charged
at Rome with the education of her two brothers, she inspired them,
by words and example, with an ardent thirst of virtue. She taught
them that nobleness of blood cannot enhance merit, nor make men
more illustrious unless they despise it; and that learning is an
unpardonable crime and folly, if by it a man should desire to know
everything that is in heaven and earth but himself; for with the
true knowledge of ourselves are all our studies to begin and end, if
we desire to render them in any degree advantageous to ourselves.
She kindled in their tender breasts a vehement desire, not of the
show of virtue, but to become truly virtuous. In her whole conduct
all her view was only the glory of God. The better to pursue this
great end she resolved to renounce the world; and on Christmas-day,
in 352, she put on the religious habit, and received the veil from
the hands of pope Liberius, in St. Peter’s church, in presence of
an incredible multitude of people. The pope, in a short discourse
on that occasion, exhorted her frequently to love only our Lord
Jesus Christ, the chaste spouse of her soul, to live in continual
abstinence, mortification, silence, and prayer, and always to behave
herself in the church with the utmost respect and awe. He mentioned
to her the page of Alexander the Great, who, for fear of disturbing
the solemnity of a heathenish sacrifice by shaking off his hand a
piece of melted wax that was fallen upon it, let it burn him to the
bone.

Marcellina in her practice went beyond the most perfect lessons.
She fasted every day till evening; and sometimes passed whole days
without eating. She never touched any fare but what was of the
coarsest kinds, and drank only water. She never laid herself down
to rest till quite overcome with sleep. The greatest part both of
the day and night she devoted to prayer, pious reading, and tears of
divine love and compunction. St. Ambrose advised her in the decline
of her life to moderate her austerities, but always to redouble her
fervor in tears and holy prayer, especially in reciting often the
psalms, the Lord’s prayer, and likewise the creed, which he calls the
seal of a Christian, and the guard of our hearts. She continued at
Rome after the death of her mother, living not in a nunnery but in a
private house with one fervent virgin, the faithful companion of all
her holy exercises. St. Ambrose died in 397. She survived him, though
it is uncertain how long. Her name is mentioned in the Roman and
other Martyrologies on the 17th of July. See St. Ambrose, l. 3, de
Virgin. c. 1, 2, 3, 4, t. 2, p. 1741, and Ep. 20 et 22, ed. Ben. and
Cuper the Bollandist, t. 4, Julij, p. 231.

SAINT ENNODIUS, BISHOP OF PAVIA, C.

Magnus Felix Ennodius was descended of an illustrious family, settled
in Gaul, and was a kinsman to the greatest lords of his time; as, to
Faustus, Boëtius, Avienus, Olybrius, &c. He seems to call Arles the
place of his birth;[192] but he passed his first years in Italy, and
had his education at Milan under the care of an aunt, after whose
death he took to wife a rich and noble lady. Eloquence and poetry
were the favorite studies of his youth, and he had the misfortune to
be drawn astray into the wide path of the world. But he was struck
with remorse, and listening to the voice of divine grace, changed
his life and wept bitterly for his past disorders. Out of gratitude
to the divine mercy for his call, he entered into orders with the
consent of his wife, who at the same time devoted herself to God in
a state of perpetual continency. Having a particular confidence in
the powerful intercession of St. Victor, the martyr at Milan, he
earnestly implored through it the grace to lead a holy life as he
informs us.[193]

Being ordained deacon, yet young, by St. Epiphanius of Pavia, he
from that time despised profane studies, to give himself up entirely
to those that are sacred. He wrote an apology for pope Symmachus
and his council against the schism formed in favor of Laurence. He
was pitched upon to make a panegyric upon Theodoric, king of Italy,
whom he commends only for his victories and temporal success. He
wrote the life of St. Epiphanius of Pavia, who died in 497, and was
succeeded by Maximus; likewise that of St. Antony of Lerins, who is
mentioned in the Roman Martyrology on the 26th of December, besides
several letters and other works, both in prose and verse. He assures
us, that under a violent fever, in which he was given over by the
physicians, he had recourse to the heavenly physician through the
intercession of his patron St. Victor, and that in a moment he found
himself restored to perfect health.[194] To perpetuate his gratitude
for this benefit, he wrote a work which he called Eucharisticon,
or Thanksgiving; in which he gives a short account of his life,
especially of his conversion from the world, and how, through the
intercession of St. Victor, he obtained the grace for his wife that
she freely entered into his views in their making, by joint consent,
mutual vows of perpetual continency. After the death of Maximus he
was advanced to the episcopal see of Pavia about the year 510, not
in 490, as Labbe mistakes; for, in his Eucharisticon, he says he was
only sixteen years old when Theodoric came into Italy in 489. He
governed his church with a zeal and authority worthy a true disciple
of St. Epiphanius.

Ennodius was made choice of by pope Hormisdas to endeavor the
reunion of the Eastern to the Western Church. The emperor Anastasius
fomented the division by favoring the Eutychian heresy, by banishing
many orthodox prelates, and by protecting schismatical bishops of
Constantinople; and in dissembling (the basest character of a prince)
he was a second Herod or Tiberius, whose artifices could not leave
them even in things where their interest was not concerned. Upon this
errand Ennodius made two journeys to Constantinople, the first in
the year 515, with Fortunatus, bishop of Catana, and the second in
517, with Peregrinus, bishop of Misenum. The points upon which he was
ordered to insist were, that the faith of the council of Chalcedon
and the letters of pope Leo against Nestorius, Eutyches, Dioscorus,
and their followers, Timothy Elurus and Peter the Fuller, should be
received; the anathema, pronounced against Acacius of Constantinople
and Peter of Antioch, subscribed; and that the emperor should recall
the bishops whom he had banished for adhering to the orthodox
faith and communion. The emperor, whose conduct in all he did was
equivocal, sent back the legates with a letter, wherein he declared
that he condemned Nestorius and Eutyches, and received the council
of Chalcedon. Other things he promised to conclude by ambassadors
whom he would send to Rome; but his only aim was to gain time, and
even whilst Ennodius was at Constantinople he condemned to banishment
four bishops of Illyricum for the Catholic cause, namely, Laurence
of Lignida, Alcyson of Nicopolis, Gaianus of Naïssum, and Evangelus
of Paulitala. He deferred sending his ambassadors till the middle of
the next year, and then, instead of bishops as he had promised, sent
only two laymen, Theopompus, Comes Domesticorum or captain of his
guards, and Severianus, Comes Consistorii or counsellor of state, and
their instructions were confined to general protestations of laboring
for the peace of the Church. The pope answered that, far from having
any need of being entreated on that head, he threw himself at the
emperor’s feet to implore his protection for the peace and welfare of
God’s Church.

Ennodius’s second legation into the East proved as unsuccessful as
the former; for Anastasius rejected the formulary which the pope had
drawn up for the union, and endeavored to bribe the legates with
money. But finding them proof against all temptations, he caused them
to be sent out of his palace through a back door, and put on board a
ship with two prefects and several Magisterians,[195] who had orders
not to suffer them to enter into any city. Notwithstanding this, the
legates found an opportunity of dispersing their protestations in
all cities; but the bishops who received them, from the dread they
were under of being accused, sent them all to Constantinople. Upon
this, Anastasius being very much exasperated, dismissed about two
hundred bishops who were already come to a council which was to have
been held at Heraclea to compose the distracted state of the Oriental
church. Such was the conclusion of the promise this emperor had given
of concurring to restore union between the churches. The people and
the senate reproached him with the breach of the oath he had made
to that purpose; but he impiously said that there was a law which
commanded an emperor to forswear himself and to tell a lie in cases
of necessity. This confirmed the people in their general suspicion,
that he had imbibed the opinions of the Manichees.

St. Ennodius was obliged to put to sea in an old rotten vessel,
and all persons were forbidden to suffer him to land in any port
of the eastern empire, whereby he was exposed to manifest danger.
Nevertheless, he arrived safe in Italy and returned to Pavia. The
glory of suffering for the faith, which his zeal and constancy had
procured him, far from serving to make him slothful or remiss in
the discharge of his pastoral duties, was on the contrary a spur to
him in the more earnest pursuit of virtue, lest by sluggishness he
should deprive himself of the advantages which he might seem to have
begun to attain. He exerted his zeal in the conversion of souls,
his liberality in relieving the poor, and in building and adorning
churches, and his piety and devotion in composing sacred poems on the
Blessed Virgin, St. Cyprian, St. Stephen, St. Dionysius of Milan,
St. Ambrose, St. Euphemia, St. Nazarius, St. Martin, &c., on the
mysteries of Pentecost and on the Ascension, on a baptistery adorned
with the pictures of several martyrs whose relics were deposited
in it. He wrote two new forms of blessing the paschal candle, in
which the divine protection on the faithful is implored against
winds, storms, and all dangers through the malice of our invisible
enemies.[196] St. Ennodius died on the 1st of August, 521, being only
forty-eight years old. He is styled a great and glorious confessor
by the popes Nicholas I. and John VIII., and is honored in the Roman
Martyrology on the 17th of July. His works were published by two
Jesuits, F. Andrew Scot at Tournay in 1610, and by F. James Sirmond,
with notes, at Paris, in 1611, and most completely among the works
of F. Sirmond, at Paris in 1696, t. 1. See his works, the letters of
pope Hormisdas, the Pontifical and F. Sirmond’s collections. Also
Solier the Bollandist, t. 4, Julij, p. 271.

ST. LEO IV. POPE, C.

He was son of a Roman nobleman, had been educated in the monastery
of St. Martin without the walls, and was made by Sergius II.
priest of the four crowned martyrs. He was chosen pope after the
death of Sergius II. in 847, and governed the Church eight years,
three months, and some days. The Saracens from Calabria had lately
plundered St. Peter’s church on the Vatican, and were still hovering
about Rome. Leo made it his first care to repair the ornamental
part of this church, especially the Confession or burying-place of
St. Peter with the altar which stood upon it. To prevent a second
plundering of that holy place, he, with the approbation and liberal
contributions of the emperor Lothaire, enclosed it and the whole
Vatican hill with a wall, and built there a new _rione_ or quarter of
the city, which from him is called Leonina. He rebuilt or repaired
the walls of the city, fortified with fifteen towers. Whilst he was
putting Rome in a posture of defence, the Saracens marched towards
Porto in order to plunder that town. The Neapolitans sent an army to
the assistance of the Romans: the pope met these troops at Ostia,
gave them his blessing, and all the soldiers received the holy
communion at his hands. After the pope’s departure, a bloody battle
ensued, and the Saracens were all slain, taken, or dispersed. The
good pope considered the sins of the people as the chief source
of public disasters; and being inflamed with a holy zeal, he most
vigorously exerted his authority for the reformation of manners
and of the discipline of the Church. For this purpose he held at
Rome a council of sixty-seven bishops; and, among other instances,
he deposed and excommunicated Anastasius, cardinal priest of St.
Marcellus’s church, because he had neglected to reside in his parish.
He received honorably Ethelwolph, king of England, who, in 854, made
a pilgrimage to Rome.

Pope Leo directed to all bishops and pastors a Homily on the Pastoral
Care, published by Labbe from the Vatican manuscripts, and also
extant in the Roman Pontifical. In it all the chief functions of the
pastoral charge are regulated, and every duty enforced with no less
learning than piety. Among other miracles performed by this holy
pope, it is recorded that by the sign of the cross he extinguished
a great fire in the city, which threatened the church of the prince
of the apostles. He died on the 17th of July, 855, and Bennet III.,
priest of the church of St. Calixtus, was immediately chosen pope
in his room.[197] He, with many tears, begged that so formidable a
burden might not be laid on his shoulders, but could not prevail.
Anastasius, the deposed priest, set up for pope, and procured the
protection of the emperor Louis II.; but the steady unanimity of the
people in the election of Bennet III., overcame this opposition, and
he was consecrated on the 1st day of September in the same year, 855,
as is related by Anastasius, who was then living, and shortly after
(before the year 870) Bibliothecarian of the church of Rome, the most
learned man and the most shining ornament of that age, as Dr. Cave
allows him to have been. See Solier the Bollandist, t. 4, Jul. p. 302.

ST. TURNINUS, C.

Was a holy Irish priest and monk, who, coming with St. Foilan into
the Netherlands, labored with unwearied zeal in bringing souls to the
perfect practice of Christian virtue. The territory about Antwerp
reaped the chief fruit of his apostolic mission. He died there about
the close of the eighth century. His relics were translated into the
principality of Liege, and are honorably enshrined in a monastery
situated on the Sambre. See Colgan MSS. ad 17 Jul.

JULY XVIII.

ST. SYMPHOROSA.

AND HER SEVEN SONS, MARTYRS.

From their genuine Acts in Ruinart, c. 18. Some manuscripts
attribute them to the celebrated Julius Africanus, who
wrote a chronology from the beginning of the world to the
reign of Heliogabalus, now lost, but commended by Eusebius
as an exact and finished work. See Ceillier, t. 1, p. 668.

A. D. 120.

Trajan’s persecution in some degree continued during the first year
of Adrian’s reign, whence Sulpicius Severus places the fourth general
persecution under this emperor. However, he put a stop to it about
the year 124, moved probably both by the apologies of Quadratus
and Aristides, and by a letter which Serenius Granianus, proconsul
of Asia, had written to him in favor of the Christians.[198] Nay,
he had Christ in veneration, not as the Saviour of the world, but
as a wonder or novelty, and kept his image together with that
of Apollonius Tyanæus. This God was pleased to permit, that his
afflicted church might enjoy some respite. It was, however, again
involved in the disgrace which the Jews (with whom the Pagans at
these times in some degree confounded the Christians) drew upon
themselves by their rebellion, which gave occasion to the last entire
destruction of Jerusalem in 134. Then, as St. Paulinus informs
us,[199] Adrian caused a statue of Jupiter to be erected on the place
where Christ rose from the dead, and a marble Venus on the place
of his crucifixion; and at Bethlehem,[200] a grotto consecrated in
honor of Adonis or Thammuz, to whom he also dedicated the cave where
Christ was born. This prince, towards the end of his reign, abandoned
himself more than ever to acts of cruelty, and being awaked by a
fit of superstition, he again drew his sword against the innocent
flock of Christ. He built a magnificent country palace at Tibur, now
Tivoli, sixteen miles from Rome, upon the most agreeable banks of
the river Anio, now called Teverone. Here he placed whatever could
be procured most curious out of all the provinces. Having finished
the building, he intended to dedicate it by heathenish ceremonies,
which he began by offering sacrifices, in order to induce the idols
to deliver their oracles. The demons answered: “The widow Symphorosa
and her seven sons daily torment us by invoking their God; if they
sacrifice, we promise to be favorable to your vows.”

This lady lived with her seven sons upon a plentiful estate which
they enjoyed at Tivoli, and she liberally expended her treasures
in assisting the poor, especially in relieving the Christians that
suffered for the faith. She was widow of St. Getulius or Zoticus, who
had been crowned with martyrdom with his brother Amantius. They were
both tribunes of legions or colonels in the army, and are honored
among the martyrs on the 10th of June. Symphorosa had buried their
bodies in her own farm, and sighing to see her sons and herself
united with them in immortal bliss, she prepared herself to follow
them by the most fervent exercise of all good works.

Adrian, whose superstition was alarmed at this answer of his gods or
their priests, ordered her and her sons to be seized, and brought
before him. She came with joy in her countenance, praying all the
way for herself and her children, that God would grant them the
grace to confess his holy name with constancy. The emperor exhorted
them at first in mild terms to sacrifice. Symphorosa answered: “My
husband, Getulius, and his brother Amantius, being your tribunes,
have suffered divers torments for the name of Jesus Christ rather
than sacrifice to idols; and they have vanquished your demons by
their death, choosing to be beheaded rather than to be overcome. The
death they suffered drew upon them ignominy among men, but glory
among the angels; and they now enjoy eternal life in heaven.” The
emperor changing his voice, said to her in an angry tone: “Either
sacrifice to the most powerful gods, with thy sons, or thou thyself
shalt be offered up as a sacrifice together with them.” Symphorosa
answered: “Your gods cannot receive me as a sacrifice; but if I
am burnt for the name of Jesus Christ, my death will increase the
torment which your devils endure in their flames. But can I hope for
so great a happiness as to be offered with my children a sacrifice to
the true and living God?” Adrian said: “Either sacrifice to my gods,
or you shall all miserably perish.” Symphorosa said “Do not imagine
that fear will make me change; I am desirous to be at rest with my
husband, whom you put to death for the name of Jesus Christ.” The
emperor then ordered her to be carried to the temple of Hercules,
where she was first buffeted on the cheeks, and afterward hung up
by the hair of her head. When no torments were able to shake her
invincible soul, the emperor gave orders that she should be thrown
into the river with a great stone fastened about her neck. Her
brother Eugenius, who was one of the chief of the council of Tibur,
took up her body, and buried it on the road near that town.

The next day the emperor sent for her seven sons all together, and
exhorted them to sacrifice and not imitate the obstinacy of their
mother. He added the severest threats, but finding all to be in vain,
he ordered seven stakes with engines and pulleys to be planted round
the temple of Hercules, and the pious youths to be bound upon them;
their limbs were in this posture tortured and stretched in such
manner that the bones were disjointed in all parts of their bodies.
The young noblemen, far from yielding under the violence of their
tortures, were encouraged by each other’s example, and seemed more
eager to suffer than the executioners were to torment. At length the
emperor commanded them to be put to death, in the same place where
they were, different ways. The eldest called Crescens had his throat
cut; the second called Julian was stabbed in the breast; Nemesius the
third was pierced with a lance in his heart; Primativius received
his wound in the belly, Justin in the back, Stacteus on his sides,
and Eugenius the youngest died by his body being cleft asunder into
two parts across his breast from the head down wards. The emperor
came the next day to the temple of Hercules, and gave orders for a
deep hole to be dug, and all the bodies of these martyrs to be thrown
into it. The place was called by the heathen priest, _The seven
Biothanati_; which word signifieth in Greek and in the style of art
magic, such as die by a violent death, particularly such as were
put to the torture. After this, a stop was put to the persecution
for about eighteen months.[201] During which interval of peace the
Christians took up the remains of these martyrs, and interred them
with honor on the Tiburtin road, in the midway between Tivoli and
Rome, where still are seen some remains of a church erected in memory
of them in a place called to this day, _The seven Brothers_.[202]
Their bodies were translated by a pope called Stephen, into the
church of the Holy Angel in the fish-market in Rome, where they were
found in the pontificate of Pius IV., with an inscription on a plate,
which mentioned this translation.[203]

* * * * *

St. Symphorosa set not before the eyes of her children the advantages
of their riches and birth, or of their father’s honorable employments
and great exploits; but those of his piety and the triumph of his
martyrdom. She continually entertained them on the glory of heaven,
and the happiness of treading in the steps of our Divine Redeemer, by
the practice of humility, patience, resignation, and charity, which
virtues are best learned in the path of humiliations and sufferings.
In these a Christian finds this solid treasure, and his unalterable
peace and joy both in life and death. The honors, riches, applause,
and pleasures with which the worldly sinner is sometimes surrounded,
can never satiate his desires; often they do not even reach his
heart, which under this gorgeous show bleeds as it were inwardly,
while silent grief, like a worm at the core, preys upon his vitals.
Death at least always draws aside the curtain, and shows them to have
been no better than mere dreams and shadows which passed in a moment,
but have left a cruel sting behind them, which fills the mind with
horror, dread, remorse, and despair, and racks the whole soul with
confusion, perplexities, and alarms.

ST. PHILASTRIUS, BISHOP OF BRESCIA, C.

We know nothing of this saint’s country, only that he quitted it and
the house and inheritance of his ancestors, like Abraham, the more
perfectly to disengage himself from the ties of the world. He lived
in perfect continency, and often passed whole nights in meditating on
the holy scriptures. Being ordained priest he travelled through many
provinces to oppose the infidels and heretics, especially the Arians,
whose fury was at that time formidable over the whole Church. His
zeal and lively faith gave him courage to rejoice with the apostles
in suffering for the truth, and to bear in his body the marks of the
stripes which he received by a severe scourging which he underwent
for Jesus Christ. At Milan he vigorously opposed the endeavors of
Auxentius, the impious Arian wolf, who labored to destroy the flock
of Christ there; and our saint was its strenuous guardian before St.
Ambrose was made bishop of that city. He afterward went to Brescia,
and finding the inhabitants of that place savage and barbarous,
almost entirely ignorant in spiritual things, yet desirous to learn,
he took much pains to instruct them, and had the comfort to see his
labors crowned with incredible success. He rooted out the tares of
many errors, and cultivated this wild soil with such assiduity that
it became fruitful in good works. Being chosen the seventh bishop of
this see, he exerted himself in the discharge of all his pastoral
functions with such vigor as even to outdo himself; and the authority
of his high dignity added the greater weight to his endeavors. He
was not equal in learning to the Ambroses and Austins of that age;
but what was wanting in that respect was abundantly made up by the
example of his life, his spirit of perfect humility and piety, and
his unwearied application to every pastoral duty; and he is an
instance of what eminent service moderate abilities may be capable of
in the Church, when they are joined with an heroic degree of virtue.

To caution his flock against the danger of errors in faith, he wrote
his Catalogue of Heresies, in which he does not take that word in
its strict sense and according to the theological definition; but
sometimes puts in the number of heresies certain opinions which
he rejects only as less probable, and which are problematically
disputed; as that the witch of Endor evoked the very soul of
Samuel.[204] He everywhere breathes an ardent zeal for the Catholic
faith. St. Gaudentius extols his profound humility, his meekness,
and sweetness towards all men, which was such that it seemed natural
to him to repay injuries only with kindness and favors, and he never
discovered the least emotions of anger. By his charity and patience
he gained the hearts of all men. In all he did he sought no interest
but that of Jesus Christ; and sovereignly contemning all earthly
things he pursued and valued only those that are eternal. Being
most mortified and sparing in his diet and apparel, he seemed to
know no other use of money than to employ it in relieving the poor;
and he extended his liberality, not only to all that were reduced
to beggary, but also to tradesmen and all others, whom he often
generously enabled to carry on, or when expedient to enlarge their
business. Though he communicated himself with surprising charity and
goodness to all sorts of persons of every age, sex, and condition,
he seemed always to receive the poor with particular affection. He
trained up many pious and eminent disciples, among whom are named St.
Gaudentius, and one Benevolus, who in his life was a true imitator
of the apostles; and being afterward preferred to an honorable post
in the emperor Valentinian’s court, chose rather to lay it down than
to promulgate a rescript of the empress Justina in favor of the
Arians. St. Austin saw St. Philastrius at Milan with St. Ambrose,
in the year 384.[205] He died soon after, and before St. Ambrose,
his metropolitan, who after his death placed St. Gaudentius in the
see of Brescia. This saint solemnized every year with his people
the day on which his master St. Philastrius passed to glory, and
always honored it with a panegyric; but of these discourses only the
fourteenth is extant. See the life or encomium of St. Philastrius by
St. Gaudentius, published by Surius. Also the accurate history of the
church of Brescia, entitled Pontificum Brixianorum series commentario
historico illustrata, opera J. H. Gradonici. C. R. Brixie, 1755, t. 1.

ST. ARNOUL, BISHOP OF METZ, C.

Among the illustrious saints who adorned the court of king Clotaire
the Great, none is more famous than St. Arnoul. He was a Frenchman,
born of rich and noble parents; and, having been educated in learning
and piety, was called to the court of king Theodebert, in which
he held the second place among the great officers of state, being
next to Gondulph, mayor of the palace. Though young, he was equally
admired for prudence in the council and for valor in the field. By
assiduous prayer, fasting, and excessive alms-deeds, he joined the
virtues of a perfect Christian with the duties of a courtier. Having
married a noble lady called Doda, he had by her two sons, Clodulf and
Ansegisus; by the latter the Carlovingian race of kings of France
descended from St. Arnoul. Fearing the danger of entangling his soul
in many affairs which passed through his hands, he desired to retire
to the monastery of Lerins; but being crossed in the execution of his
project, passed to the court of king Clotaire. That great monarch,
the first year in which he reigned over all France, assented to the
unanimous request of the clergy and people of Metz, demanding Arnoul
for their bishop. Our saint did all that could be done to change the
measures taken, but in vain. He was consecrated bishop in 614, and
his wife Doda took the religious veil at Triers. The king obliged
Arnoul still to assist at his councils, and to fill the first place
at his court. The saint always wore a hair shirt under his garments;
he sometimes passed three days without eating, and his usual food
was only barley and water. He seemed to regard whatever he possessed
as the patrimony of the poor, and his alms seemed to exceed all
bounds. His benevolence took in all the objects of charity, but
his discretion singled out those more particularly whose greater
necessities called more pressingly upon his bounty.

In 622 Clotaire II. divided his dominions, and making his son
Dagobert king of Austrasia, appointed St. Arnoul duke of Austrasia
and chief counsellor and Pepin of Landen mayor of his palace. The
reign of this prince was virtuous, prosperous, and glorious, so long
as Arnoul remained at the helm; but the saint anxiously desiring
to retire from all business, that he might more seriously study to
secure his own salvation before he should be called hence, never
ceased to solicit the king for leave to quit the court. Dagobert
long refused his consent, but at length, out of a scruple lest he
should oppose the call of heaven, granted it, though with the utmost
reluctance. St. Arnoul resigned also his bishopric, and retired into
the deserts of Vosge, near the monastery of Remiremont, on the top
of a high mountain, where a hermitage is at this day standing. Here
the saint labored daily with fresh fervor to advance in the path of
Christian perfection; for the greater progress a person has already
made in virtue, the more does the prospect enlarge upon him, and the
more perfectly does he see how much is yet wanting in him, and how
great a scope is left for exerting his endeavors still more. Who will
pretend to have made equal advances with St. Paul towards perfection?
yet he was far from ever thinking that he had finished his work, or
that he might remit anything in his endeavors. On the contrary, we
find him imitating the alacrity of those who run in a race who do not
so much consider what ground they have already cleared, as how much
still remains to call forth their utmost eagerness and strength. Nor
can there be a more certain sign that a person has not yet arrived at
the lowest and first degree of virtue, than that he should think he
does not need to aim higher. In this vigorous pursuit St. Arnoul died
on the 16th of August in 640. His remains were brought to Metz, and
enrich the great abbey which bears his name. The Roman Martyrology
mentions him on the 18th of July, on which day the translation of his
relics was performed; the Gallican on the 16th of August. See his
life, faithfully compiled by his successor, in Mabillon, Act. Bened.
t. 2, p. 150. Also Calmet, Hist. de Lorraine, t. 1, l. 9, n. 10, &c.
p. 378, 381, &c. Bosch the Bollandist, t. 5, Jul. p. 423; and D.
Cajot, Benedictin monk of St. Arnoul’s Les Antiquités de Metz, an.
1761.

ST. ARNOUL, M.

He preached the faith among the Franks after St. Remigius had
baptized king Clovis. He suffered much in his apostolic labors,
and was at length martyred in the Aquilin forest between Paris and
Chartres, about the year 534. His name is highly reverenced at Paris,
Rheims, and over all France. See Cuper the Bollandist, Julij, t. 4,
p. 396.

SAINT FREDERIC, BISHOP OF UTRECHT, M.

He was descended of a most illustrious family among the Frisons, and
according to the author of his life, was great-grandson to Radbod,
king of that country, before it was conquered by the French. He was
trained up in piety and sacred literature among the clergy of the
church of Utrecht. His fasts and other austerities were excessive,
and his watchings in fervent prayer were not less inimitable. Being
ordained priest, he was charged by bishop Ricfrid with the care of
instructing the catechumens, and that good prelate dying in 820, he
was chosen the eighth bishop of Utrecht from St. Willibrord.[206]
The holy man, with many tears, before the clergy and people,
declared, in moving terms, his incapacity and unworthiness, but
by the authority of the emperor Louis Debonnaire was compelled to
submit. He therefore repaired to his metropolitan, the archbishop
of Mentz, and at Aix-la-Chapelle received the investiture by the
ring and crosier, and was consecrated by the bishops in presence of
the emperor, who zealously recommended to him the extirpation of
the remains of idolatry in Friesland. The new bishop was met by the
clergy and others of his church, and by them honorably conducted from
the Rhine to Utrecht. He immediately applied himself to establish
everywhere the best order, and sent zealous and virtuous laborers
into the northern parts, to root out the relics of idolatry which
still subsisted there.

Charlemagne, by treating with severity the conquered Frisons and
Saxons, had alienated their minds from his empire; but upon his
death in 814, Louis his son, whom he had made in his own life-time
king of Aquitain, came to the empire, by excluding his little nephew
Bernard, king of Italy, grandson of Pepin, elder brother to this
Louis, whom their father made king of Italy, but who died in 810,
leaving that kingdom to his son and grandson both named Bernard.
Louis upon his accession to the throne eased the Saxons of their
heavy taxes, and showed them so much lenity that he gained their
hearts to the empire for ever, and from his courtesy and from this
and other actions of clemency was surnamed _The Debonnaire_, or the
Gracious. He lost his queen Irmingarde, who died at Angiers in 818,
by whom he had three sons, Lothaire, Pepin, and Louis. The first he
made king of Italy,[207] the second king of Aquitain, and Louis king
of Bavaria; reserving to himself the rest of Bavaria and France. In
819 he married Judith, daughter of Guelph, count of Aldorff, by whom
he had Charles _the Bald_, afterward emperor and king of France.
She was an ambitious and wanton woman; her adulteries gave great
scandal to the people, and her overbearing insolence and continual
intrigues embroiled the state, and drove the three eldest sons into
open rebellion against their father.[208] Nothing can excuse the
methods to which these unnatural princes had recourse, under pretence
of remedying the public disorders, which sprang from the weakness
of their father, and the malice of a hated mother-in-law. But the
scandals of her lewdness stirred up the zeal of our holy pastor to
act the part of a second John the Baptist. The contemporary author
of the life of Wala, abbot of Lorbie, who was deeply concerned in
the secret transactions of that court, confidently charges her with
incest and adultery with her relation and favorite minister, Bernard
count of Barcelona. The author of the life of St. Frederic says, her
marriage with Louis was incestuous, and within the forbidden degrees
of affinity; but this circumstance could not have escaped the censure
of her enemies; and from their silence is rejected by Mabillon and
others as fabulous.

Whatever the scandals of her gallantries were, St. Frederic, the
neighborhood of whose see gave him free access to the court, then
chiefly kept at Aix-la-Chapelle, admonished her of them with an
apostolic freedom and charity, but without any other effect than that
of drawing upon himself the fury and resentment of a second Jezebel,
if we may believe the historians of that age. Our saint suffered
also another persecution. The inhabitants of Wallacria, now called
Walcheren, one of the principal islands of Zealand, belonging to the
Netherlands, were of all others the most barbarous, and most averse
to the maxims of the gospel. On which account St. Frederic, when he
sent priests into the northern uncultivated provinces of his diocess,
took this most dangerous and difficult part chiefly to himself; and
nothing here gave him more trouble than the incestuous marriages
contracted within the forbidden degrees, and the separation of the
parties. To extirpate this inveterate evil he employed assiduous
exhortations, tears, watching, prayer, and fasting; summoned an
assembly of the principal persons of the island, and earnestly
recommended the means to banish this abuse from among them, broke
many such pretended marriages, and reconciled many persons that had
done sincere penance to God and his Church. He composed a prayer
to the Blessed Trinity with an exposition of that adorable mystery
against heresies, which for many ages was used in the Netherlands
with great devotion. The reputation of his sanctity made him to be
considered as one of the most illustrious prelates of the Church, as
appears from a poem of Rabanus Maurus, his contemporary, in praise of
his virtue, published with notes among his poetical works, together
with those of Fortunatus by F. Brower, S. J.[209]

Whilst this holy pastor was intent only upon the duties of his
charge, one day when he came from the altar having said mass, as he
was going to kneel down in the chapel of St. John Baptist to perform
his thanksgiving and other private devotions, he was stabbed in
the bowels by two assassins. He expired in a few minutes, reciting
that verse of the hundred and fourteenth psalm,--_I will please
the Lord in the land of the living_. The author of his life says
these assassins were employed by the empress Judith, who could not
pardon the liberty he had taken to reprove her incest. William of
Malmesbury[210] and other historians assert the same; and this seems
clearly to have been the true cause and manner of his martyrdom;
William Heda,[211] Beka,[212] Emmius,[213] and many others confirm
the same. Baronius in his annals, Mabillon, Le Cointe, and Baillet
think these assassins were rather sent by some of the incestuous
inhabitants of Wallacria, but this opinion is destitute of the
authority of ancient historians. The martyr’s body was buried in the
same church of St. Saviour, called Oude-Munster, at Utrecht. His
death happened on the 17th of July, 838, as Mabillon has proved. See
the life of St. Frederic with the notes of Cuper the Bollandist,
Julij, t. 4, p. 452, and Batavia Sacra, p. 99. Also Heda’s History of
the Bishops of Utrecht, Beka and Emmius.

ST. ODULPH, CANON OF UTRECHT, C.

He was born of noble French parents, and distinguished in his youth
by the innocence of his manners, and his remarkable progress in
learning and piety. Being ordained priest, he was made curate of
Oresscoth in Brabant. St. Frederic afterward, by urgent entreaties,
engaged him, for the greater glory of God, to be his strenuous
assistant in reforming the manners of the fierce Frisons; in which
undertaking it is incredible what fatigues he underwent, and what
proofs he gave of heroic patience, meekness, zeal, and charity.
Contemplation and prayer were the support and refreshment of his
soul under his continual labors and austerities. Several wonderful
predictions of things which happened long after his death, are
recorded in his life. In his old age he resided at Utrecht, and
died canon of the cathedral. To his last moments he allowed himself
no indulgence, and never relaxed his fervor in labor; but rather
redoubled his pace the nearer he saw his end approach, knowing this
to be the condition of the Christian’s hire, and fearing to lose by
sloth and for want of perseverance the crown for which he fought.
His fasts, his watchings, his assiduity in prayer, his almsdeeds,
his zeal in instructing the people, and exhorting all men to the
divine love and the contempt of all earthly things, seemed to gather
strength with his years. Being seized with a fever, he with joy
foretold his last moment, and earnestly exhorting his brethren to
fervor, and commending himself to their prayers, he promised, by the
divine mercy, never to forget them before God, and happily departed
this life in the ninth age, on the 12th of June, on which day his
festival was kept with great solemnity at Utrecht and Staveren.
Several churches and chapels bear his name; but the chapel at the New
Bridge in Amsterdam, called Olofs-Kapel, was erected by the Danish
sailors in memory of St. Olaus, king of Norway and Martyr, not of
St. Odulph, as the Bollandists and some others have mistaken. See
the life of St. Odulph in the Bollandists, Junij, t. 2, and Batavia
Sacra, p. 106.

ST. BRUNO, BISHOP OF SEGNI, C.

He was of the illustrious family of the lords of Asti in Piemont
and born near that city. From his cradle he considered, that man’s
happiness is only to be found in loving God; and to please him in
all his actions was his only and his most ardent desire. He made his
studies in the monastery of St. Perpetuus in the diocess of Asti.
Bosch proves that he never was canon of Asti, but enjoyed some years
a canonry at Sienna, as he himself informs us. In the Roman council
in 1079, he defended the doctrine of the Catholic Church concerning
the blessed eucharist against Berengarius; and pope Gregory VII.
nominated him bishop of Segni in the ecclesiastical state in 1081.
Bruno, who had been compelled to submit, after a long and strenuous
resistance, served his flock, and on many important occasions the
universal Church, with unwearied zeal. Gregory VII. who died in 1085,
Victor III. formerly abbot of mount Cassino, who died in 1087, and
Urban II. who had been scholar to St. Bruno (afterward institutor
of the Carthusians) at Rheims, then a monk at Cluni, and afterward
bishop of Ostia, had the greatest esteem for our saint. He attended
Urban II. into France in 1095, and assisted at the council of Tours
in 1096. After his return into Italy he continued to labor for the
sanctification of his soul and that of his flock, till not being able
any longer to resist his inclination for solitude and retirement,
he withdrew to mount Cassino, and put on the monastic habit. The
people of Segni demanded him back; but Oderisus, abbot of mount
Cassino, and several Cardinals, whose mediation the saint employed,
prevailed upon the pope to allow his retreat. The abbot Oderisus
was succeeded by Otho in 1105, and this latter dying in 1107, the
monks chose bishop Bruno abbot. He was often employed by the pope
in important commissions, and by his writings labored to support
ecclesiastical discipline[214] and to extirpate simony. This vice
he looked upon as the source of all the disorders which excited the
tears of all zealous pastors in the Church, by filling the sanctuary
with hirelings, whose worldly spirit raises an insuperable opposition
to that of the gospel. What would this saint have said had he
seen the collation of benefices, and the frequent translations of
bishops in some parts, which serve to feed and inflame avarice and
ambition in those in whom, above all others, a perfect disengagement
from earthly things and crucifixion of the passions ought to lay a
foundation of the gospel temper and spirit? Paschal II. formerly a
monk of Cluni, succeeded Urban II. in the pontificate in 1099. By his
order St. Bruno having been abbot of mount Cassino about four years,
returned to his bishopric, having resigned his abbacy, and left his
abbatial crosier on the altar. He continued faithfully to discharge
the episcopal functions to his death, which happened at Segni on the
31st of August in 1125. He was canonized by Lucius III. in 1183, and
his feast is kept in Italy on the 18th of July. See his anonymous
authentic life, and Leo of Ostia and Peter the deacon in their
chronicle of mount Cassino, with the notes of Solier the Bollandist,
t. 4, Julij, p. 471. Also Dom. Maur Marchesi, dean of mount Cassino,
in his apparatus (prefixed to the works of this saint) printed at
Venice in 1651; Mabillon, Annal. Bened. l. 70, Ceillier, t. 21, p.
101.

JULY XIX.

ST. VINCENT OF PAUL, C.

FOUNDER OF THE LAZARITES, OR FATHERS OF THE MISSION.

From his edifying life written by Abelly, bishop of Rodez,
and again by the celebrated continuator of Tournely’s
Theological Lectures, Dr. Peter Collet, in two volumes,
quarto, Nancy, 1748. See also Perrault, Hommes Illustr.
Helyot, Hist. des Ord. Relig. t. 8, p. 64, and the bull of
his canonization published by Clement XII. in 1737, apud
Bened. XIV. de canoniz., t. 4, Append. p. 363.

A. D. 1660.

Even in the most degenerate ages, when the true maxims of the
gospel seem almost obliterated among the generality of those who
profess it, God fails not, for the glory of his holy name, to raise
to himself faithful ministers to revive the same in the hearts of
many. Having, by the perfect crucifixion of the old man in their
hearts, and the gift of prayer, prepared them to become vessels
of his grace, he replenishes them with the spirit of his apostles
that they may be qualified to conduct others in the paths of heroic
virtue, in which the Holy Ghost was himself their interior Master.
One of these instruments of the divine mercy was St. Vincent of
Paul. He was a native of Poul, a village near Acqs in Gascony, not
far from the Pyrenæan mountains. His parents, William of Paul and
Bertranda of Morass, occupied a very small farm of which they were
the proprietors, and upon the produce of which they brought up a
family of four sons and two daughters. The children were brought up
in innocence, and inured from their infancy to the most laborious
part of country labor. But Vincent, the third son, gave extraordinary
proofs of his wit and capacity, and from his infancy showed a
seriousness and an affection for holy prayer far beyond his age. He
spent great part of his time in that exercise when he was employed in
the fields to keep the cattle. That he might give to Christ in the
persons of the poor all that was in his power, he deprived himself
of his own little conveniences and necessaries for that purpose
in whatever it was possible for him to retrench from his own use.
This early fervent consecration of himself to God, and these little
sacrifices which may be compared to the widow’s two mites in the
gospel, were indications of the sincere ardor with which he began to
seek God from the first opening of his reason to know and love him;
and were doubtless a means to draw down upon him from the author of
these graces other greater blessings. His father was determined by
the strong inclinations of the child to learning and piety, and the
quickness of his parts, to procure him a school education. He placed
him first under the care of the Cordeliers or Franciscan friars at
Acqs, paying for his board and lodging the small pension of sixty
French livres, that is, not six pounds English, a year.

Vincent had been four years at the schools when Mr. Commet, a
gentleman of that town, being much taken with his virtue and
prudence, chose him sub-preceptor to his children, and enabled him
to continue his studies without being any longer a burden to his
parents. At twenty years of age, in 1596, he was qualified to go to
the university of Toulouse, where he spent seven years in the study
of divinity, and commenced bachelor in that faculty. In that city
he was promoted to the holy orders of subdeacon and deacon in 1598,
and of priesthood in 1600, having received the tonsure and minor
orders a few days before he left Acqs. He seemed already endowed
with all those virtues which make up the character of a worthy and
zealous minister of the altar; yet he knew not the full extent of
heroic entire self-denial, by which a man becomes dead and crucified
to all inordinate self-will; upon which perfect self-denial are
engrafted the total sacrifice of the heart to God, perfect humility,
and that purity and ardor of divine charity which constitute the
saint. Vincent was a good proficient in theology and other sciences
of the schools, and had diligently applied himself to the study of
the maxims of Christian virtue in the gospel, in the lives of the
saints, and in the doctrine of the greatest masters of a spiritual
life. But there remained a new science for him to learn, which was
to cost him much more than bare study and labor. This consists in
perfect experimental and feeling sentiments of humility, patience,
meekness, and charity; which science is only to be learned by the
good use of severe interior and exterior trials. This is the mystery
of the cross, unknown to those whom the Holy Ghost has not led into
this important secret of his conduct in preparing souls for the great
works of his grace. The prosperity of the wicked will appear at the
last day to have often been the most dreadful judgment, and a state
in which they were goaded on in the pursuit of their evil courses;
whilst, on the contrary, it will then be manifested to all men that
the afflictions of the saints have been the greatest effects of
divine mercy. Thus, by a chain of temporal disasters, did God lay in
the soul of Vincent the solid foundation of that high virtue to which
by his grace he afterward raised him.

The saint went to Marseilles in 1605, to receive a legacy of five
hundred crowns which had been left him by a friend who died in that
city. Intending to return to Toulouse, he set out in a felucca or
large boat from Marseilles to Narbonne, but was met in the way
by three brigantines of African pirates. The infidels seeing the
Christians refuse to strike their flag, charged them with great fury,
and on the first onset killed three of their men, and wounded every
one of the rest; Vincent received a shot of an arrow. The Christians
were soon obliged to surrender. The first thing the Mahometans did
was to cut the captain in pieces because he had not struck at the
first summons, and in combat had killed one of their men and four
or five slaves. The rest they put in chains; and continued seven or
eight days longer on that coast, committing several other piracies,
but sparing the lives of those that made no resistance. When they
had got a sufficient booty they sailed for Barbary. Upon landing
they drew up an act of their seizure, in which they falsely declared
that Vincent and his companions had been taken on board of a Spanish
vessel, that the French consul might not challenge them. Then they
gave to every slave a pair of loose breeches, a linen jerkin, and a
bonnet. In this garb they were led five or six times through the city
of Tunis to be shown; after which they were brought back to their
vessel, where the merchants came to see them, as men do at the sale
of a horse or an ox. They examined who could eat well, felt their
sides, looked at their teeth to see who were of scorbutic habits of
body, consequently unlikely for very long life; they probed their
wounds, and made them walk and run in all paces, lift up burdens,
and wrestle, to judge of their strength. Vincent was bought by a
fisherman, who, finding that he could not bear the sea, soon sold
him again to an old physician, a great chemist and extractor of
essences, who had spent fifty years in search of the pretended
philosopher’s stone. He was humane, and loved Vincent exceedingly;
but gave him long lectures on his alchemy, and on the Mahometan law,
to which he used his utmost efforts to bring him over; promising,
on that condition, to leave him all his riches, and to communicate
to him, what he valued much more than his estate, all the secrets
of his pretended science. Vincent feared the danger of his soul
much more than all the hardships of his slavery, and most earnestly
implored the divine assistance against it, recommending himself
particularly to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, to which he
ever after attributed his victory over this temptation. He lived
with this old man from September 1605 to August 1606, when, by this
physician’s death, he fell to the share of a nephew of his master,
a true man-hater. By resignation to the divine will, and confidence
in providence, he enjoyed a sweet repose in his own heart under all
accidents, hardships, and dangers; and by assiduous devout meditation
on the sufferings of Christ, learned to bear all his afflictions with
comfort and joy, uniting himself in spirit with his Divine Redeemer,
and studying to copy in himself his lessons of perfect meekness,
patience, silence, and charity. This new master sold him in a short
time to a renegado Christian who came from Nice in Savoy. This man
sent him to his temat or farm situate on a hot desert mountain. This
apostate had three wives, of which one, who was a Turkish woman, went
often to the field where Vincent was digging, and out of curiosity
would ask him to sing the praises of God. He used to sing to her,
with tears in his eyes, the psalm _Upon the rivers of Babylon_, &c.
the Salve Regina, and such like prayers. She was so much taken with
our holy faith, and doubtless with the saintly deportment of the holy
slave, that she never ceased repeating to her husband, that he had
basely abandoned the only true religion, till like another Caiphas
or ass of Balaam, without opening her own eyes to the faith, she
made him enter into himself. Sincerely repenting of his apostasy,
he agrees with Vincent to make their escape together. They crossed
the Mediterranean sea in a small light boat which the least squall
of wind would overset; and they landed safe at Aigues-Mortes,
near Marseilles, on the 28th of June, 1607, and thence proceeded
to Avignon. The apostate made his abjuration in the hands of the
vice-legate, and the year following went with Vincent to Rome, and
there entered himself a penitent in the austere convent of the
Fate-Ben-Fratelli, who served the hospitals according to the rule of
St. John of God.

Vincent received great comfort at the sight of a place most venerable
for its pre-eminence in the church, which has been watered with the
blood of so many martyrs, and is honored with the tombs of the two
great apostles SS. Peter and Paul and many other saints. He was moved
to tears at the remembrance of their zeal, fortitude, humility,
and charity, and often devoutly visited their monuments, praying
earnestly that he might be so happy as to walk in their steps, and
imitate their virtues. After a short stay at Rome, to satisfy his
devotion, he returned to Paris, and took up his quarters in the
suburb of St. Germain’s. There lodged in the same house a gentleman,
the judge of a village near Bourdeaux, who happened to be robbed of
four hundred crowns. He charged Vincent with the theft, thinking it
could be nobody else; and in this persuasion he spoke against him
with the greatest virulence among all his friends, and wherever he
went. Vincent calmly denied the fact, saying, “God knows the truth.”
He bore this slander six years, without making any other defence,
or using harsh words or complaints, till the true thief being taken
up at Bourdeaux on another account, to appease his own conscience
and clear the innocent he sent for this judge, and confessed to
him the crime. St. Vincent related this in a spiritual conference
with his priests, but as of a third person; to show that patience,
humble silence, and resignation are generally the best defence of our
innocence, and always the happiest means of sanctifying our souls
under slanders and persecution; and we may be assured that providence
will in its proper time justify us, if expedient.

At Paris Vincent became acquainted with the holy priest Monsieur de
Berulle, who was afterward cardinal, and at that time was taken up
in founding the Congregation of the French Oratory. A saint readily
discovers a soul in which the spirit of God reigns. Berulle conceived
a great esteem for St. Vincent from his first conversation with
him; and to engage him in the service of his neighbor, he prevailed
with him first to serve as curate of the parish of Clichi, a small
village near Paris; and soon after to quit that employ to take
upon him the charge of preceptor to the children of Emmanuel de
Gondy, count of Joigny, general of the galleys of France. His lady,
Frances of Silly, a person of singular piety, was so taken with the
sanctity of Vincent, that she chose him for her spiritual director
and confessor. In the year 1616, whilst the countess of Joigny was
at a country seat at Folleville, in the diocess of Amiens, Vincent
was sent for to the village of Gannes, two leagues from Folleville,
to hear the confession of a countryman who lay dangerously ill.
The zealous priest, by carefully examining his penitent, found it
necessary to advise him to make a general confession, with which
the other joyfully complied. The penitent by this means discovered
that all his former confessions had been sacrilegious for want of a
due examination of his conscience; and afterward, bathed in tears,
he declared aloud, in transports of joy before many persons and the
countess of Joigny herself, that he should have been eternally lost
if he had not spoken to Vincent. The pious lady was struck with dread
and horror to hear of such past sacrileges, and to consider the
imminent danger of being damned in which that poor soul had been;
and she trembled lest some others among her vassals might have the
misfortune to be in the like case. Far from the criminal illusion
of pride by which some masters and mistresses seem persuaded that
they owe no care, attention, or provision to those whose whole life
is employed only to give them the fruit of their sweat and labors;
she was sensible from the principles both of nature and religion,
that masters or lords lie under strict ties of justice and charity
towards all committed to their care; and that they are bound in the
first place, as far as it lies in their power, to see them provided
with the necessary spiritual helps for their salvation. But to wave
the obligation, what Christian heart can pretend to the bowels of
charity, and be insensible at the dangers of such persons? The
virtuous countess felt in her own breast the strongest alarms for
so many poor souls, which she called her own by many titles. She
therefore entreated Vincent to preach in the church of Folleville,
on the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, in 1617, and fully to
instruct the people in the great duty of repentance and confession
of sins. He did so; and such crowds flocked to him to make general
confessions that he was obliged to call in the Jesuits of Amiens
to his assistance. The Congregation of the mission dates its first
institution from this time, and in thanksgiving for it, keeps the
25th of January with great solemnity.

By the advice of Monsieur de Berulle, St. Vincent left the house of
the countess in 1617, to employ his talents among the common people
in the villages of Bresse, where he heard they stood in great need
of instruction. He prevailed upon five other zealous priests to bear
him company, and with them formed a little community in the parish
of Chatillon in that province. He there converted by his sermons the
count of Rougemont and many others from their scandalous unchristian
lives to a state of eminent penance and fervor, and in a short time
changed the whole face of the country.[215] The good countess his
patroness was infinitely pleased with his success, and gave him
sixteen thousand livres to found a perpetual mission among the common
people in the place and manner he should think fit. But she could not
be easy herself whilst she was deprived of his direction and advice;
she therefore employed Monsieur de Berulle, and her brother-in-law
cardinal de Retz, to prevail with him to come to her, and extorted
from him a promise that he would never abandon the direction of her
conscience so long as she lived, and that he would assist her at her
death. But being extremely desirous that others, especially those
who were particularly entitled to her care and attention, should
want nothing that could contribute to their sanctification and
salvation, she induced her husband to concur with her in establishing
a company of able and zealous missionaries who should be employed in
assisting their vassals and farmers. This project they proposed to
their brother, John Francis of Gondi, the first archbishop of Paris,
and he gave the college of Bons Enfans for the reception of the new
community. All things being agreed on St. Vincent took possession of
this house in April 1625. The count and countess gave forty thousand
French livres to begin the foundation.

St. Vincent attended the countess till her pious death, which
happened on the 23d of June the same year; after which he joined
his Congregation. He drew up for it certain rules or constitutions
which were approved by pope Urban VIII., in 1632. King Louis XIII.
confirmed the establishment by letters patent, which he granted in
May the same year; and, in 1633, the regular canons of St. Victor
gave to this new institute the priory of St. Lazarus, which being
a spacious building was made the chief house of the Congregation,
and from it the Fathers of the Mission were often called Lazarites
or Lazarians. They are not religious men, but a Congregation of
secular priests, who after two years’ probation make four simple
vows, of poverty, chastity, obedience, and stability. They devote
themselves to labor, in the first place, in sanctifying their own
souls by the particular holy exercises prescribed in their institute;
secondly, in the conversion of sinners to God; and thirdly, in
training up clergymen for the ministry of the altar and the care
of souls. To attain the first end, their rule prescribes them an
hour’s meditation every morning, self-examination thrice every day,
spiritual conferences every week, a yearly retreat of eight days,
and silence except in the hours allowed for conversation. To comply
with the second obligation, they are employed eight months every year
in missions among the country people, staying three or four weeks
in each place which they visit, every day giving catechism, making
familiar sermons, hearing confessions, reconciling differences, and
performing all other works of charity. To correspond with the third
end which St. Vincent proposed to himself, some of this Congregation
undertake the direction of seminaries, and admit ecclesiastics or
others to make retreats of eight or ten days with them, to whom they
prescribe suitable exercises; and for these purposes excellent rules
are laid down by the founder. Pope Alexander VII., in 1662, enjoined
by a brief, that all persons who receive holy orders in Rome, or in
the six suffragan bishoprics, shall first make a retreat of ten days
under the direction of the fathers of this Congregation, under pain
of suspension. St. Vincent settled his institute also in the seminary
of St. Charles in Paris, and lived to see twenty-five houses of it
founded in France, Piedmont, Poland, and other places.

This foundation, though so extensive and beneficial, could not
satisfy the zeal of this apostolic man. He by every other means
studied to procure the relief of others under all necessities,
whether spiritual or corporal. For this purpose he established many
other confraternities, as that called Of Charity, to attend all poor
sick persons in each parish; which institution he began in Bresse,
and propagated in other places where he made any missions; one
called Of the Dames of the Cross, for the education of young girls;
another of Dames to serve the sick in great hospitals, as in that
of Hotel Dieu in Paris. He procured and directed the foundation of
several great hospitals, as in Paris that of foundlings, or those
children who, for want of such a provision, are exposed to the utmost
distress, or to the barbarity of unnatural parents; also that of poor
old men; at Marseilles the stately hospital for the galley-slaves,
who, when sick, are there abundantly furnished with every help both
corporal and spiritual. All these establishments he settled under
excellent regulations, and supplied with large sums of money to
defray all necessary expenses. He instituted a particular plan of
spiritual exercises for those that are about to receive holy orders;
and others for those who desire to make general confessions, or to
deliberate upon the choice of a state of life. He also appointed
regular ecclesiastical conferences on the duties of the clerical
state, &c. It must appear almost incredible that so many and so great
things could have been effected by one man, and a man who had no
advantage from birth, fortune, or any shining qualities which the
world admires and esteems. But our surprise would be much greater
if we could enter into a detail of his wonderful actions, and the
infinite advantages which he procured others. During the wars in
Lorrain, being informed of the miseries to which those provinces
were reduced, he collected charities among pious persons at Paris,
which were sent thither, to the amount of fifteen or sixteen thousand
livres, says Abelly; nay, as Collet proves from authentic vouchers,
of two millions, that is, according to the value of money at that
time, considerably above one hundred thousand pounds sterling; and he
did the like on other occasions. He assisted King Louis XIII. at his
death, and by his holy advice and exhortations that monarch expired
in perfect sentiments of piety and resignation. Our saint was in the
highest favor with the queen regent, Anne of Austria, who nominated
him a member of the young king’s Council of Conscience, and consulted
him in all ecclesiastical affairs, and in the collation of benefices;
which office he discharged ten years.

Amidst so many and so great employs his soul seemed always united
to God; in the most distracting affairs it kept, as it were, an eye
always open to him, in order to converse continually with him. This
constant attention to him he often renewed, and always when the
clock struck, by making the sign of the cross (at least secretly
with his thumb upon his breast) with an act of divine love. Under
all crosses, disappointments, and slanders, he always preserved a
perfect serenity and evenness of mind, which it did not seem in the
power of the whole world to disturb; for he considered all events
only with a view to the divine will, and with an entire resignation
to it, having no other desire but that God should be glorified in
all things. Whether this was to be done by his own disgrace and
sufferings, or by whatever other means it pleased the divine majesty,
he equally rejoiced. Not that he fell into the pretended apathy or
insensibility of the proud Stoics, or into the impious indifference
of the false Mystics, afterwards called Quietists, than which nothing
is more contrary to true piety, which is always tender, affectionate,
and most sensible to all the interests of charity and religion. This
was the character of our saint, who regarded the afflictions of
all others as his own, sighed continually with St. Paul after that
state of glory in which he should be united inseparably to his God,
and poured forth his soul before him with tears over his own and
others’ spiritual miseries. Having his hope fixed as a firm anchor
in God, by an humble reliance on the divine mercy and goodness, he
seemed raised above the reach of the malice of creatures, or the
frowns of the world; and he enjoyed a tranquillity within his breast
which no storms were able to ruffle or disturb. So perfect was the
mastery which he had gained over his passions, that his meekness and
patience seemed unalterable, whatever provocations he met with. He
was never moved by affronts, unless to rejoice secretly under them,
because he was sure to find in them a hidden treasure of grace, and
an opportunity of vanquishing himself. This is the fruit of the
victory which perfect virtue gains over self-love; and it is a more
perfect sacrifice to God, a surer test of sincere virtue, a more
heroic victory, and a more glorious triumph of the soul to bear a
slander, an injurious suspicion, or an unjust insult, in silence and
patience, than the most shining exterior act of virtue; a language
often repeated, but little understood or practised among Christians.
Perfect self-denial, the most profound humility, and an eminent
spirit of prayer were the means by which St. Vincent attained to
this degree of perfection; and he most earnestly recommended the
same to his disciples. Humility he would have them to make the basis
of his Congregation, and it was the lesson which he never ceased to
repeat to them, that they ought to study sincerely to conceal even
their natural talents. When two persons of extraordinary learning
and abilities once presented themselves, desiring to be admitted
into his Congregation, he gave them both a repulse, telling them,
“Your abilities raise you above our low state. Your talents may be of
good service in some other place. As for us, our highest ambition is
to instruct the ignorant, to bring sinners to a spirit of penance,
and to plant the gospel-spirit of charity, humility, meekness, and
simplicity in the hearts of all Christians.” He laid it down also as
a rule of humility, that, if possible, a man ought never to speak
of himself or his own concerns, such discourse usually proceeding
from, and nourishing in the heart, pride and self-love. This indeed
is a rule prescribed by Confucius, Aristotle, Cato, Pliny, and other
philosophers; because, say they, for any one to boast of himself is
always the most intolerable and barefaced pride, and modesty in such
discourse will be suspected of secret vanity. Egotism, or the itch
of speaking always of a man’s self, shows he is intoxicated with the
poison of self-love, refers everything to himself, and is his own
centre, than which scarce anything can be more odious and offensive
to others. But Christian humility carries this maxim higher, teaching
us to love a hidden life, and to lie concealed and buried, as being
in ourselves nothingness and sin.

St. Vincent exerted his zeal against the novelties concerning
the article of divine grace which sprang up in his time. Michael
Baius, doctor and professor of divinity at Louvain, advanced a new
doctrine concerning the grace conferred on man in the two states
before and after Adam’s fall, and some other speculative points;
and pope Pius V. in 1567, condemned seventy-six propositions under
his name. Some of these, Baius confessed he had taught, and these
he solemnly revoked and sincerely condemned with all the rest in
1580, in presence of F. Francis Toletus, afterward cardinal, whom
Gregory XIII. had sent for that very purpose to Louvain. Cornelius
Jansenius and John Verger, commonly called Abbé de St. Cyran,
contracted a close friendship together during their studies first
at Louvain, afterward at Paris, and concerted a plan of a new
system of doctrine concerning divine grace, founded, in part, upon
some of the condemned errors of Baius. This system Jansenius, by
his friend’s advice, endeavored to establish in a book, which from
St. Austin, the great doctor of grace, he entitled, Augustinus.
After having been bishop of Ipres from 1635 to 1638, he died of the
pestilence, having never published his book, in the close of which
he inserted a declaration that he submitted his work to the judgment
of the Church.[216] Fromond, another Louvanian divine, and abler
scholar, and a more polite writer, polished the style of this book,
and put it in the press.[217] Verger became director of the nuns
of Port-Royal, had read some ancient writers on books of devotion,
and wrote with ease.[218] But his very works on subjects of piety,
however neatly written, betray the author’s excessive presumption and
forbidding self-sufficiency. He became the most strenuous advocate
for Jansenism, and was detained ten years prisoner in the castle of
Vincennes. He died soon after he had recovered his liberty, in 1643.
This man had by his reputation gained the esteem of St. Vincent; but
the saint hearing him one day advance his errors, and add that the
Church had failed for five or six hundred years past, he was struck
with horror, and from that moment renounced the friendship of so
dangerous a person. When these errors were afterward more publicly
spread abroad, he strenuously exerted himself against them; on which
account Gerberon, the Jansenistical historian, makes him the butt
of his rancor and spleen. But general and vague invectives of the
enemies to truth are the commendation of his piety and zeal.[219] Our
saint’s efforts to destroy that heresy, says Abelly, never made him
approve a loose morality, which on all occasions he no less avoided
and abhorred than the errors of the Jansenists. He was particularly
careful in insisting on all the conditions of true repentance to
render it sincere and perfect; for want of which he used to say with
St. Ambrose, that some pretended penitents are rendered more criminal
by their sacrilegious hypocrisy in the abuse of so great a sacrament,
than they were by all their former sins.

In the year 1658 St. Vincent assembled the members of his
Congregation at St. Lazarus, and gave to every one a small book of
rules which he had compiled. At the same time he made a pathetic
exhortation, to enforce the most exact and religious observance of
them. This Congregation was again approved and confirmed by Alexander
VII., and Clement X. St. Vincent was chosen by St. Francis of Sales
director of his nuns of the Visitation that were established at
Paris. The robust constitution of the zealous servant of God was
impaired by his uninterrupted fatigues and austerities. In the
eightieth year of his age he was seized with a periodical fever,
with violent night sweats. After passing the night almost without
sleep, and in an agony of pain, he never failed to rise at four in
the morning, to spend three hours in prayer, to say mass every day
(except on the three first days of his annual retreat, according
to the custom he had established), and to exert, as usual, his
indefatigable zeal in the exercises of charity and religion. He
even redoubled his diligence in giving his last instructions to his
spiritual children; and recited every day after mass the prayers of
the Church for persons in their agony, with the recommendation of
the soul, and other preparatory acts for his last hour. Alexander
VII. in consideration of the extreme weakness to which his health
was reduced, sent him a brief to dispense him from reciting his
breviary; but before it arrived the servant of God had finished the
course of his labors. Having received the last sacraments and given
his last advice, he calmly expired in his chair, on the 27th of
September 1660, being fourscore and five years old. He was buried in
the church of St. Lazarus in Paris, with an extraordinary concourse
and pomp. An account of several predictions of this servant of
God, and some miraculous cures performed by him whilst alive, may
be read in his life written by Collet,[220] with a great number of
miracles wrought through his intercession after his death at Paris,
Angiers, Sens, in Italy, &c. Mr. Bonnet, superior of the seminary at
Chartres, afterward general of the Congregation, by imploring this
saint’s intercession, was healed instantaneously of an inveterate
entire rupture, called by the physicians _entero-epiplo-celle_,[221]
which had been declared by the ablest surgeons absolutely incurable;
this miracle was approved by cardinal Noailles. Several like cures
of fevers, hemorrhages, palsies, dysenteries, and other distempers
were juridically proved. A girl eight years old, both dumb and lame,
was cured by a second Novena or nine days’ devotion performed for
her by her mother in honor of St. Vincent. His body was visited by
cardinal Noailles in presence of many witnesses, in 1712, and found
entire and fresh, and the linen cloths in the same condition as if
they were new. The tomb was then shut up again. This ceremony is
usually performed before the beatification of a servant of God,
though the incorruption of the body by itself is not regarded as a
miraculous proof at Rome or elsewhere, as Collet remarks.[222] After
the ordinary rigorous examinations of the conduct, heroic virtues,
and miracles of this saint at Rome, pope Benedict XIII. performed
with great solemnity the ceremony of his beatification, in 1729. Upon
the publication of the brief thereof, the archbishop of Paris caused
the grave to be again opened. The lady marechale of Noailles, the
marshal her son, and many other persons were present; but the flesh
on the legs and head appeared corrupted, which alteration from the
state in which it was found twenty-seven years before, was attributed
to a flood of water which twelve years before this had overflowed
that vault. Miracles continued frequently to be wrought by the
relics and invocation of St. Vincent. A Benedictin nun at Montmirel,
afflicted with a violent fever, retention of urine, ulcers, and other
disorders, her body being swelled to an enormous size, and having
been a long time paralytic, was perfectly cured all at once by a
relic of St. Vincent applied to her by Monseigneur Joseph Languet,
then bishop of Soissons. Francis Richer, in Paris, was healed in a no
less miraculous manner. Miss Louisa Elizabeth Sackville, an English
young lady at Paris, was cured of a palsy by performing a novena at
the tomb of St. Vincent; which miracle was attested in the strongest
manner, among others, by Mrs. Hayes, a protestant gentlewoman with
whom she lodged. Miss Sackville became afterward a nun in the French
abbey called of the Holy Sacrament, in Paris, lived ten years without
any return of her former disorder, and died in 1742. St. Vincent was
canonized in 1737 by pope Clement XII.

* * * * *

This saint could not display his zeal more to the advantage of his
neighbor than by awaking Christians from the spiritual lethargy in
which so many live. He set before their eyes the grievous disorder
of lukewarmness in the divine service, and explained to them, like
another Baptist, the necessity and obligations of sincere repentance;
for those certainly can never be entitled to the divine favor who
live in an ambiguous, divided, and distracted state of sinning
and repenting; of being heathens and Christians by turns. Still
more dreadful is the state of those who live in habitual sin, yet
are insensible of their danger, and frightful miseries! Into what
extravagance, folly, spiritual blindness, and sometimes incredulity,
do men’s passions often plunge them! To what a degree of madness and
stupidity do men of the finest natural parts sink, when abandoned by
God! or rather when they themselves abandon God, and that light which
he has set up in the world! Let us by tears and prayers implore the
divine mercy in favor of all blind sinners.

ST. ARSENIUS, ANCHORET.

He was a Roman by birth, and was related to senators. He had been
trained up in learning and piety, was sincerely virtuous, and well
skilled, not only in the holy scriptures, but also in the profane
sciences, and in the Latin and Greek languages and literature. He was
in deacon’s orders, and led a retired life at home with his sister,
in Rome, when the emperor Theodosius the Great wanted a person to
whom he might intrust the care of his children, and desired the
emperor Gratian to apply for that purpose to the bishop of Rome,
who recommended Arsenius. Gratian sent him to Constantinople, where
he was kindly received by Theodosius, who advanced him to the rank
of a senator, with orders that he should be respected as the father
of his children, whose tutor and preceptor he appointed him. No one
in the court at that time wore richer apparel, had more sumptuous
furniture, or was attended by a more numerous train of servants than
Arsenius; he was attended by no fewer than a thousand, all richly
clad. Theodosius coming one day to see his children at their studies,
found them sitting, whilst Arsenius talked to them standing. Being
displeased thereat, he took from them for some time the marks of
their dignity, and caused Arsenius to sit, and them to listen to him
standing.

Arsenius had always a great inclination to a retired life, which the
care of his employment and the incumbrances of a great fortune made
him desire the more ardently; for titles and honors were burthensome
to him. At length, about the year 390, an opportunity offered itself.
Arcadius having committed a considerable fault, Arsenius whipped
him for it. The young prince, resenting the chastisement, grew the
more obstinate. Arsenius laid hold of this occasion to execute the
project he had long before formed of forsaking the world. The Lives
of the Fathers, both in Rosweide and Cotelier, make no mention of
this resentment of Arcadius, which circumstance is only related
by Metaphrastes; on which account it is omitted by Tillemont and
others. It is most certain that retirement had long been the object
of the saint’s most earnest wishes and desires; but before he left
the court, he for a long time begged by earnest prayer to know the
will of God; and one day making this request with great fervor, he
heard a voice, saying, “Arsenius, flee the company of men, and thou
shalt be saved.” He obeyed the call of heaven without delay, and
going on board a vessel, sailed to Alexandria, and thence proceeded
to the desert of Sceté, where he embraced an anachoretical life.
This happened about the year 394, he being in the fortieth year
of his age, and having lived eleven years at the court. There he
renewed his prayers to God, begging to be instructed in the way of
salvation, having no other desire than to make it his only study
to please God in all things. Whilst he prayed thus, he again heard
a voice which said, “Arsenius, flee, hold thy peace, and be quiet;
these are the principles of salvation,”[223] that is, the main things
to be observed in order to be saved. Pursuant to the repeated advice
or injunction of fleeing and avoiding human conversation, he made
choice of a very remote cell, and admitted very few visits even from
his own brethren. When he went to the church, upwards of thirty
miles distance from his habitation, he would place himself behind
one of the pillars, the better to prevent his seeing or being seen
by any one. Theodosius, in great affliction for the loss of him,
caused search to be made for him both by sea and land; but being
soon after called into the West to revenge the death of Valentinian
II., and to extinguish the rebellion of Arbogastus his murderer,
and Eugenius, died of a dropsy at Milan in 395. Arcadius being left
emperor of the East, advanced Rufin, who was the prefectus-prætorio,
and had been his flattering governor, to the rank of prime minister,
committing to him the direction not only of his armies, but also
of the whole empire. He at the same time earnestly desired to call
back to court his holy master Arsenius, that he might be assisted
by his wise and faithful counsels. Being informed that he was in
the desert of Sceté, he wrote to him, recommending himself to his
prayers, begging his forgiveness, and offering him the disposal of
all the tribute of Egypt, that he might make a provision for the
monasteries and the poor at his discretion; but the saint had no
other ambition on earth than to be allowed the liberty of enjoying
his solitude, that he might employ his time in bewailing his sins,
and in preparing his soul for eternity. He therefore answered the
emperor’s message only by word of mouth, saying, “God grant as all
the pardon of our sins; as to the distribution of the money, I am not
capable of such a charge, being already dead to the world.” When he
first presented himself to the ancients or superiors of the monks of
Sceté, and begged to be allowed to serve God under their direction,
they recommended him to the care of St. John the Dwarf, who, when the
rest in the evening sat down to take their repast, took his place
among them, and left Arsenius standing in the middle without taking
notice of him. Such a reception was a severe trial to a courtier;
but was followed by another much rougher; for, in the middle of the
repast, St. John took a loaf or portion of bread, and threw it on the
ground before him, bidding him, with an air of indifference, eat if
he would. Arsenius cheerfully fell on the ground, and in that posture
took his meal. St. John was so satisfied with his behavior in this
single instance, that he required no further trial for his admission,
and said to his brethren: “Return to your cells with the blessing of
the Lord. Pray for us. This person is fit for a religious life.”

Arsenius, after his retreat, only distinguished himself among the
anchorets by his greater humility and fervor. At first he used,
without perceiving it, to do certain things which he had practised in
the world, which seemed to savor of levity or immortification, as,
for instance, to sit cross-legged, or laying one knee over another.
The seniors were unwilling, through the great respect they bore him,
to tell him of this in a public assembly in which they were met to
hold a spiritual conference together; but abbot Pemen or Pastor made
use of this stratagem: He agreed with another that he should put
himself in that posture; and then he rebuked him for his immodesty;
nor did the other offer any excuse. Arsenius perceived that the
reproof was meant for him, and corrected himself of that custom.
In other respects he appeared from the beginning an accomplished
master in every exercise of virtue in that venerable company of
saints. To punish himself for his seeming vanity at court, because
he had there gone more richly habited than others, his garments were
always the meanest of all the monks in Sceté. He employed himself
on working-days till noon in making mats of palm-tree leaves; and
he always worked with a handkerchief in his bosom, to wipe off the
tears which continually fell from his eyes. He never changed the
water in which he moistened his palm-tree leaves, but only poured in
fresh water upon it as it wasted. When some asked him one day why he
did not cast away the corrupted water, he answered, “I ought to be
punished by this ill smell for the sensuality with which I formerly
used perfumes when I lived in the world.” To satisfy for former
superfluities he lived in the most universal poverty, so that in a
violent fit of illness having occasion for a small sum to procure
him some little necessaries, he was obliged to receive it in alms,
whereupon he gave God thanks for being made worthy to be thus reduced
to the necessity of asking alms in his name. The distemper continued
so long upon him that the priest of this desert of Sceté caused him
to be carried to his apartment contiguous to the church, and laid
him on a little bed made of the skins of beasts, with a pillow under
his head. One of the monks coming to see him, was much scandalized
at his lying so easy, and said, “Is this the abbot Arsenius?” The
priest took him aside, and asked him what his employment had been
in the village before he was a monk? The old man answered, “I was a
shepherd, and lived with much pains and difficulty.” Then the priest
said, “Do you see this abbot Arsenius? when he was in the world he
was the father of the emperors: he had a thousand slaves clothed in
silk, with bracelets and girdles of gold, and he slept on the softest
and richest beds. You who was a shepherd, did not find in the world
the ease which you now enjoy.” The old man, moved by these words,
fell down, and said, “Pardon me, father, I have sinned; he is in
the true way of humiliation;” and he went away exceedingly edified.
Arsenius in his sickness wanting a linen garment, accepted something
given him in charity, to buy one, saying, “I return thanks to thee,
O Lord, for thy grace and mercy, in permitting me to receive alms in
thy name.” One of the emperor’s officers, at another time, brought
him the will of a senator, his relation, who was lately dead and had
left him his heir. The saint took the will, and would have torn it to
pieces, but the officer threw himself at his feet, and begged him not
to tear it, saying, such an accident would expose him to be tried for
his life. St. Arsenius, however, refused the estate, saying, “I died
before him, and cannot be made his heir.”

Though no one knew the saint’s fasts, they must have been excessive,
as the measure of corn, called thallin,[224] sent him for the year,
was exceeding small; this, however, he managed so well as not only
to make it suffice for himself, but also to impart some of it to his
disciples when they came to visit him. When new fruit was brought
him he just tasted it, and gave thanks to God; but he took so little
as to show he did it only to avoid the vanity of singularity. Great
abstinence makes little sleep to suffice nature. Accordingly St.
Arsenius often passed the whole night in watching and prayer, as we
learn from his disciple Daniel. At other times, having watched a
considerable part of the night, when nature could hold out no longer,
he would allow himself a short repose, which he took sitting, after
which he resumed his wonted exercises. On Saturday evenings, as the
same disciple relates, it was his custom to go to prayers at sun-set,
and continue in that exercise with his hands lifted up to heaven till
the sun beat on his face the next morning. His affection for the holy
exercise of prayer, and his dread of the danger of vain-glory, gave
him the strongest love of retirement. He had two disciples who lived
near him, and did all his necessary business abroad. Their names were
Alexander and Zoilus; he afterward admitted a third, called Daniel.
All three were famous for their sanctity and discretion, and frequent
mention is made of them in the histories of the fathers of the
deserts of Egypt. St. Arsenius would seldom see strangers who came to
visit him, saying, he would only use his eyes to behold the heavens.

Theophilus, the patriarch of Alexandria, came one day in company
with a certain great officer and others to visit him, and begged he
would entertain them on some spiritual subject for the good of their
souls. The saint asked them whether they were disposed to comply with
his directions; and being answered in the affirmative, he replied;
“I entreat you, then, that wherever you are informed of Arsenius’s
abode, you would leave him to himself, and spare yourselves the
trouble of coming after him.” On another occasion, when the same
patriarch sent to know if he would open his door to him if he came,
St. Arsenius returned for answer, that if he came alone he would;
but that if he brought others with him he would seek out some other
place, and would stay there no longer. Melania, a noble Roman lady,
travelled as far as Egypt only to see Arsenius, and by means of
Theophilus, contrived to meet him as he was coming out of his cell.
She threw herself at his feet. The saint said to her, “A woman ought
not to leave her house. You have crossed these great seas that you
may be able to say at Rome that you have seen Arsenius, and raise in
others a curiosity to come and see me.” Not daring to lift up her
eyes, as she lay on the ground, she begged he would always remember
her and pray for her. He answered, “I pray that the remembrance of
you be blotted out of my mind.” Melania returned to Alexandria in
great grief at this answer: but Theophilus comforted her, saying, “He
only prayed that he might forget your person on account of your sex;
but as for your soul, doubt not but he will pray for you.”

The saint never visited his brethren, contenting himself with meeting
them at spiritual conferences. The abbot Mark asked him one day in
the name of the hermits, why he so much shunned their conversation?
The saint answered: “God knoweth how dearly I love you all; but I
find I cannot be both with God and with men at the same time; nor
can I think of leaving God to converse with men.” This disposition,
however, did not hinder him from giving short lessons of virtue to
his brethren, and several of his apophthegms are recorded among those
of the ancient fathers. He said often, “I have always something
to repent of after having conversed with men; but have never been
sorry for having been silent.” He had frequently in his mouth those
words which St. Euthymius and St. Bernard used also to repeat to
themselves, to renew their fervor in the discharge of the obligations
of their profession: “Arsenius, why hast thou forsaken the world, and
wherefore art thou come hither?” Being asked one day why he, being
so well versed in the sciences, sought the instruction and advice of
a certain monk who was an utter stranger to all human literature? he
replied, “I am not unacquainted with the learning of the Greeks and
Romans; but I have not yet learned the alphabet of the science of the
saints, whereof this seemingly ignorant person is master.”

Though the saint was excellently versed in sacred learning, and in
the maxims and practice of perfect Christian virtue, he never would
discourse on any point of scripture, and chose rather to hear than to
instruct or speak, making it the first part of his study to divest
his mind of all secret opinion of himself, or confidence in his own
abilities or learning; and this he justly called the foundation
of humility and all Christian virtue. Evagrius of Pontus, who had
distinguished himself at Constantinople by his learning, and had
retired to Jerusalem, and thence into the deserts of Nitria in 385,
expressed his surprise to our saint, that many very learned men
made no progress in virtue, whilst many Egyptians who knew not the
very letters of the alphabet arrived at a high degree of sublime
contemplation. To whom Arsenius made this answer: “We make no
progress in virtue, because we dwell in that exterior learning which
puffs up the mind; but these illiterate Egyptians have a true sense
of their own weakness, blindness, and insufficiency; by which they
are qualified to labor successfully in the pursuit of virtue.” This
saint used often to cry out to God with tears, in the most profound
sentiment of humility, “O Lord, forsake me not; I have done nothing
that can be acceptable in thy sight; but for the sake of thy infinite
mercy enable and assist me that I may now begin to serve thee
faithfully.”

Nothing is so remarkable or so much spoken of by the ancients
concerning our saint, as the perpetual tears which flowed from his
eyes almost without intermission. The source from which they sprung
was the ardor with which he sighed after the glorious light of
eternity, and the spirit of compunction with which he never ceased to
bewail the sins of his life past, and the daily imperfections into
which he fell. But nothing was more amiable or sweet than these tears
of devotion, as appeared in the venerable and majestic serenity of
his countenance. His example was a proof of what the saints assure
us concerning the sweetness of the tears of divine love. “When you
hear tears named,” says St. Chrysostom,[225] “do not represent to
yourselves any thing grievous or terrible. They are sweeter than
any carnal delights which the world can enjoy.” St. Austin says to
the same purpose:[226] “The tears of devotion are sweeter than the
joys of theatres.” St. John Climacus unfolds to us at large the
incomparable advantages and holy pleasure of pious tears, and among
other things writes thus:[227] “I am astonished when I consider the
happiness of holy compunction; and I wonder how carnal men can think
it affliction. It contains in it a pleasure and spiritual joy as
wax does honey. God in an invisible manner visits and comforts the
heart that is broken with this holy sorrow.” Saint Arsenius being
asked by a certain person what he must do to deliver himself from
a troublesome temptation of impure thoughts, the saint gave him
this answer,--“What did the Midianites do? They decked and adorned
their daughters, and led them to the Israelites, though they used no
violence upon them. Those among the servants of God that treated them
with severity, and revenged their treachery and criminal designs with
their blood, put a stop to their lewdness. Behave in the same manner
with regard to your evil thoughts. Repulse them vigorously, and
punish yourself for this attempt made in yourself towards a revolt.”

This great saint lived in a continual remembrance and apprehension
of death and the divine judgment. This made Theophilus, the busy
patriarch of Alexandria, cry out when he lay on his death-bed in 312:
“Happy Arsenius! who has had this moment always before his eyes.”
His tears did not disfigure his countenance, which, from the inward
peace and joy of his soul, mixed with sweet compunction; and from his
assiduous conversation with God, appeared to have something angelical
or heavenly; being equally venerable for a certain shining beauty,
and an inexpressible air of majesty and meekness, in a fair and
vigorous old age. The great and experienced master in a contemplative
life, St. John Climacus, proposes St. Arsenius as an accomplished
model, and calls him a man equal to the angels,[228] saying that he
shunned so rigorously the conversation of men, only that he might
not lose something more precious, which was God, who always filled
his soul. Our saint called it a capital and indispensable duty of
a monk never to intermeddle in any temporal concerns, and never to
listen to any news of the world. He was tall and comely, but stooped
a little in his old age; had a graceful mien, his hair was all white,
and his beard reached down to his girdle; but the tears which he
shed continually had worn away his eyelashes. He was forty years old
when he quitted the court, and he lived in the same austere manner
from that time to the age of ninety-five; he spent forty years in
the desert of Sceté, except that about the year 395, he was obliged
to leave it for a short time, on account of an irruption of the
Mazici, a barbarous people of Lybia; but the plunderers were no
sooner returned home but he hastened back to his former solitude,
where he remained till a second inroad of the same barbarians, in
which they massacred several hermits, compelled him entirely to
forsake this abode about the year 434. He retired weeping to the
rock of Troë, called also Petra, over against Memphis, and ten years
after, to Canopus near Alexandria; but not being able to bear the
neighborhood of that great city, he stayed here only three years;
then returned to Troë, where he died two years after. Knowing that
his end was drawing near he said to his disciples,--“One only thing
I beg of your charity, that when I am dead I may be remembered in
the holy sacrifice. If in my life I have done any thing that is
accepted by God, through his mercy, that I shall now find again.”
They were much grieved to hear him speak as if they were going soon
to lose him. Upon which he said, “My hour is not yet come. I will
acquaint you of it; but you shall answer at the tribunal of Christ,
if you suffer any thing belonging to me to be kept as a relic.” They
said with tears (being solicitous for a funeral procession), “What
shall we do alone, father? for we know not how to bury the dead.”
The saint answered, “Tie a cord to my feet, and drag my carcass to
the top of the mountain, and there leave it.” His brethren seeing
him weep in his agony, said to him, “Father, why do you weep? are
you like others, afraid to die?” The saint answered, “I am seized
with great fear: nor has this dread ever forsaken me from the time I
first came into these deserts.” The saints all serve God in fear and
trembling, in the constant remembrance of his judgment; but this is
always accompanied with a sweet confidence in his infinite love and
mercies. The Holy Ghost indeed so diversifies his gifts and graces
as to make these dispositions more sensible in some than in others.
Notwithstanding this fear, St. Arsenius expired in great peace,
full of faith, and of that humble confidence which perfect charity
inspires, about the year 449. He was ninety-five years old, of which
he had spent fifty-five in the desert. Abbot Pemen having seen him
expire, said with tears, “Happy Arsenius! who have wept for yourself
so much here on earth! Those who weep not here shall weep eternally
hereafter.” This saint was looked upon by the most eminent monks of
succeeding ages as a most illustrious pattern of their state. The
great St. Euthymius endeavored in all his exercises to form himself
upon the model of his life, and to copy in himself his humility,
his meekness and constant evenness of mind, his abstinences and
watching, his compunction and tears, his love of retirement, his
charity, discretion, fervor, assiduous application to prayer, and
that greatness of soul which appeared with so much lustre in all his
actions. The name of St. Arsenius occurs in the Roman Martyrology on
the 19th of July. See his life written by St. Theodore the Studite;
and another in Metaphrastes; also the Lives of the Fathers of the
Desert, in Rosweide and D’Andilly, t. 2, p. 183, collated with a very
fair ancient MS. probably of Saint Edmund’s-bury, more ample than
that published by Rosweide, in the hands of Mr. Martin, attorney at
law in Palgrave, in Suffolk. See likewise the Apophthegms of the
Fathers in Cotelier’s Monumenta Ecclesiæ Græcæ; the collections and
remarks of Pinius the Bollandist, Jul. t. 4, p. 605, and F. Marian,
Vies des Pères des Déserts d’Orient, t. 3, p. 284 ad 339.

ST. SYMMACHUS, POPE, C.

He was a native of Sardinia, and archdeacon of the Roman church
under pope Anastasius, and succeeded him in the holy see in 498.
Festus, the patrician, had been gained by Anastasius, emperor of
Constantinople, and a protector of the Eutychians, to endeavor to
procure from pope Anastasius a confirmation of the Henoticon of Zeno,
an imperial edict in favor of those heretics, as Theophanes relates.
That pope dying, Festus, by bribes, gained several voices to raise
Laurence, archpriest of St. Praxedes, to the pontificate. They were
both ordained the same day; Symmachus in the basilic of Constantine,
and Laurence in that of our lady. Theodoric, king of Italy, though an
Arian, ordered that election should take place which was first, and
made by the greater number. By this rule Symmachus was acknowledged
lawful pope. He called a council at Rome of seventy-three bishops,
and sixty-seven priests, which, to prevent cabals and factions in
the elections of popes, ordained that if any one promised his vote
to another, or deliberated in any assembly upon that subject, whilst
the pope is living, he should be deposed and excommunicated; and that
after the pope’s death that person should be duly elected who had
a majority of the voices of the clergy. Laurence subscribed these
decrees the first among the priests,[229] and was afterward made
bishop of Nocera. Soon after, some of the clergy and senators, by the
contrivance of Festus and Probinus, privately recalled Laurence to
Rome, and renewed the schism, which is by many historians reckoned
the first that happened in that church, though Novatian had attempted
to form one. The schismatics accused Symmachus of many crimes, and
king Theodoric commanded a synod should be held at Rome upon that
occasion. The bishops of Liguria, Emilia, and Venetia took Ravenna
in their way to Rome, and strongly represented to the king, that
the pope himself ought to call the council, which right he enjoyed
both by the primacy of his see, derived from St. Peter, and by the
authority of councils; also, that there never had been an instance
of his being subjected to the judgment of his inferiors.[230] The
king showed them the pope’s letters by which he agreed to, and
summoned the council. Indeed the pontifical says, that Symmachus
assembled this council.[231] The synod met at Rome in September,
501, and declared pope Symmachus acquitted of the accusations
entered against him, condemning to be punished as schismatics any
who should celebrate mass without his consent; but pardoning those
who had raised the schism, provided they gave satisfaction to the
pope.[232] When this decree was carried into Gaul, all the bishops
were alarmed at it; and they charged Saint Avitus, bishop of Vienne,
to write about it in the name of them all. He addressed his letter
to Faustus and Symmachus, two patricians who had both been consuls,
complaining, that when the Pope had been accused before the prince,
the bishops, instead of opposing such an injustice, had taken upon
them to judge him: “For,” says he, “it is not easy to apprehend how
the superior can be judged by his inferiors, especially the head of
the Church.” However, he commends the council for bearing testimony
to his innocence, and earnestly entreats the senate to maintain the
honor of the Church, and not to suffer the flocks to rise up against
their pastors. The famous deacon Paschasius, a man eminent for his
great alms-deeds and other good works, had the misfortune blindly to
abet this schism to the latter end of his life; for which St. Gregory
the Great relates, upon the authority of a certain revelation,[233]
that he was detained in purgatory after his death, but delivered by
the prayers of St. Germanus, bishop of Capua. Ceillier thinks that he
repented only in his last moments;[234] or, that simplicity of heart
extenuated his sin. Paschasius wrote a learned book on the Divinity
of the Holy Ghost, though the two books on that subject which now
bear his name, are the work of Faustus of Riez.

Pope Symmachus wrote to the emperor Anastasius declaring that he
could not hold communion with him so long as he maintained that
of Acacius. That prince expected such a menace from the zeal
of the pope, and therefore he had not written to him upon his
promotion, according to custom. He also accused him of Manicheism,
though Symmachus had banished the Manichees out of Rome; and he
did not cease to thwart the pope, dreading his known zeal against
his favorite sect of the Acephali. Symmachus composed an apology
against this emperor, in which he shows the dignity of the Christian
priesthood.[235] He wrote to the Oriental bishops, exhorting them
to suffer banishment and all persecutions rather than to betray the
divine truth.[236] King Thrasimund having banished many Catholic
African bishops into Sardinia, pope Symmachus sent them annually
both clothes and money; and there is still extant among the works
of Ennodius a letter which this pope sent to comfort them. He
accompanied it with some relics of the martyrs SS. Nazarius and
Romanus. He redeemed many captives; and gave one hundred and
seventy-nine pounds of silver in ornaments to several churches in
Rome; and to the chapel of the holy cross, a gold cross of ten
pound weight, in which he inclosed a piece of the true cross. On a
ciborium, that is, in the language of that time, a tabernacle, which
he gave to St. Paul’s church, he caused to be engraved the figures of
our Saviour and the twelve apostles. He instituted that the hymn of
divine praise called the Gloria in Excelsis should be sung on every
Sunday, and on the festivals of martyrs, as the pontifical testifies.
He filled the papal chair fifteen years and eight months; and died on
the 19th of July, 514. See his letters, the councils, and Anastasius
Bibl. Also F. Amort’s Diss. on the cause of pope Symmachus, printed
at Bologna in 1758.

ST. MACRINA, VIRGIN.

She was the eldest of all the ten children of St. Basil the elder,
and St. Emmelia; and being trained up in excellent sentiments of
piety, after the death of her father, consecrated her virginity by
vow to God, and was a great assistant to her mother in educating
her younger brothers and sisters. St. Basil the Great, St. Peter of
Sebaste, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and the rest, learned from her their
early contempt of the world, dread of its dangers, and application
to prayer and the word of God. When they were sent abroad for their
improvement, Macrina induced her mother to concur with her in
founding two monasteries, one for men, the other for women, at a
little distance from each other, on their own estate, near Ibora in
Pontus. That of men was first governed by St. Basil, afterward by
St. Peter. Macrina drew up the rules for the nunnery with admirable
prudence and piety, and established in it the love and spirit of
the most universal poverty, and disengagement from the world,
mortification, humility, assiduous prayer, and singing of psalms.
God was pleased to afflict her with a most painful cancer: which at
length her mother cured by making, at her request, the sign of the
cross upon the sore; only a black spot remained ever after upon the
part that had been affected.

After the death of St. Emmelia, Macrina disposed of all that was
left of their estate in favor of the poor, and lived herself, like
the rest of the nuns, on what she earned by the labor of her hands.
Her brother Basil died in the beginning of the year 379, and she
herself fell ill eleven months after. St. Gregory of Nyssa, making
her a visit, after eight years’ absence, found her sick of a raging
fever, lying on two boards, one of which served for her bed, and
the other for her pillow. He was exceedingly comforted by her pious
discourses, and animated by the fervor and ardent sighs of divine
love and penance, by which she prepared herself for her last hour.
She calmly expired, after having armed herself with the sign of the
cross. Such was the poverty of the house that nothing was found to
cover her corpse when it was carried to the grave, but her old hood
and coarse veil; but St. Gregory threw over it his episcopal cloak.
She had worn about her neck a fillet, on which hung an iron cross and
a ring. St. Gregory gave the cross to a nun named Vestiana, but kept
himself the ring, in which the metal was hollow, and contained in it
a particle of the true cross. Araxus, bishop of the place, and St.
Gregory led up the funeral procession, which consisted of the clergy,
the monks, and nuns, in two separate choirs. The whole company walked
singing psalms, with torches in their hands. The holy remains were
conveyed to the church of the Forty Martyrs, a mile distant from the
monastery, and were deposited in the same vault with the saint’s
mother. Prayers were offered up for them both. St. Macrina died in
December, 379; but is commemorated both by the Latins and Greeks on
the 19th of July. This account is given us by St. Gregory of Nyssa,
in the funeral discourse he made upon her, t. 2, p. 149. Add the
remarks of F. Bosch, the Bollandist, t. 4, Julij, p. 589.

JULY XX.

ST. JOSEPH BARSABAS, C.

He was one of the seventy-two disciples of our Lord, and was put
in competition with St. Matthias to succeed the traitor Judas in
the apostleship.[237] St. Chrysostom[238] remarks that St. Joseph
was not displeased, but rejoiced in the Lord to see the preference
given to St. Matthias. After the dispersion of the disciples he
preached the gospel to many nations; and among other miracles, drank
poison without receiving any hurt, as Papias, and from him Eusebius,
testify.[239] This saint, from his extraordinary piety, was surnamed
the Just.

The lives of the apostles and primitive Christians were a miracle
in morals, and a sensible effect of almighty grace. Burning with
holy zeal, they had no interest on earth but that of the divine
honor, which they sought in all things; and being warmed with the
expectation of an eternal kingdom, they were continually discoursing
of it, and comforting one another with the hopes of possessing it;
and they did little else but prepare to die. Thus by example, still
more than by words, they subdued their very enemies to the faith,
and brought them to a like spirit and practice. Their converts, by a
wonderful change of manners, became in a moment new creatures. Those
who had been the most bitter enemies, long bent to lust and passion,
became the most loving, forgiving, and chaste persons in the world.
Has grace wrought in us so perfect a conversion? Do our lives glorify
God’s name in this manner, by a spirit and practice agreeable to the
principles of our divine faith?

ST. MARGARET, V. M.

According to the ancient Martyrologies, she suffered at Antioch in
Pisidia, in the last general persecution. She is said to have been
instructed in the faith by a Christian nurse, to have been persecuted
by her own father, a priest of the idols; and after many torments,
to have gloriously finished her martyrdom by the sword. Her name
occurs in the Litany inserted in the old Roman order, and in the
most ancient calendars of the Greeks. From the east her veneration
was exceedingly propagated in England, France, and Germany, in the
eleventh century, during the holy wars. Her body is now kept at
Monte-Fiascone in Tuscany. Vida, the glory of the Christian muses,
has honored St. Margaret who is one of the tutelar saints of Cremona,
his native city, with two hymns; begging of God through her prayers,
not long life, riches, or honors, but the grace of a happy death
and a holy life, that he might be admitted, with a devout and pious
heart, to praise God in the choir of his holy servants. See his
hymns, and Pinius the Bollandist, Julij, t. 5, p. 28.

SS. JUSTA AND RUFINA, MM.

These holy martyrs were two Christian women at Seville in Spain,
who maintained both themselves and many poor persons by selling
earthenware. A fervent soul finds in the most ordinary course of
life occasions of exercising many heroic acts of virtue, and makes
every ordinary action a perfect holocaust by performing it with a
most ardent desire of pleasing God with the entire sacrifice of
itself. Such were the lives of these two faithful servants of God
in the world. So perfect a virtue deserved to be honored with the
crown of martyrdom. Though these saints gave all their substance to
the poor, and were desirous to serve every one for the edification
of their souls, yet no motives could draw them into any criminal
condescension. Not to concur to the idolatrous superstitions, they
refused to sell vessels for the use of heathenish sacrifices. The
Pagans, offended at their religious scruple, when Dioclesian’s
edicts renewed the persecution, broke all the ware in their shop,
and impeached them for their faith before the governor. The prefect,
after they had boldly confessed Christ, commanded them to be
stretched on the rack, and their sides in the meantime to be torn
with iron hooks. An idol was placed near the rack with incense, that
if they would offer sacrifice, they should be that moment released;
but their fidelity was not to be shaken. Justa expired on the rack:
which, when the judge saw, he ordered Rufina to be strangled, and
their bodies to be burnt. They suffered in the year 304. See their
acts published by Maldonat; also Ado, Usuard, &c.

ST. CESLAS C. OF THE ORDER OF ST. DOMINIC.

He was of the house of the counts of Odrovans, and brother to St.
Hyacinth, and lived near Cracow in Poland. Having devoted himself
to God in an ecclesiastical state, he became eminent for piety,
learning, and the innocence of his manners. He was first instituted
to a canonry at Cracow, but afterward promoted to be conservator
of Sendomir. His riches he employed on the poor, leading himself a
most abstemious penitential life. Happening to accompany his uncle
Yvo Konski, chancellor of Poland, into Italy, he received at Rome,
together with St. Hyacinth, the habit of St. Dominic from the hands
of that holy founder in 1218. Returning into Germany and Poland, he
preached penance with wonderful fruit. In 1222 he founded at Prague
a convent of one hundred and twenty-six friars, in which Andrew, the
bishop of Prague, took the religious habit, having first, with the
consent of pope Honorius III. resigned his see. St. Ceslas built in
the same city a nunnery of the same order, in which, soon after his
death, queen Margaret, daughter of Leopold, archduke of Austria,
and widow of Henry, king of the Romans, professed herself, out of
humility, a lay-sister. The saint sent Adrian with twenty-six other
friars of his order to preach the faith in Bosnia, where they all
received the crown of martyrdom. St. Ceslas himself preached in
Silesia, and resided long at Breslaw. He directed St. Hedwiges in the
paths of Christian perfection, was endowed with the gifts of prophecy
and miracles, and filled the northern kingdoms with many eminent
servants of God.

In 1240 the Tartars, marching from Asia with an army of five hundred
thousand men, fell like a torrent on the West, and spread universal
desolation over Russia, Bulgaria, Sclavonia, Poland, and Hungary,
to the borders of Germany. They slew Henry II., surnamed the Pious,
duke of Silesia, in a great battle at Wolstadt in 1241, and marched
against Breslaw, his capital. The inhabitants burned or hid their
most precious effects, and, abandoning the city to the enemy, shut
themselves up in the citadel. St. Ceslas bore them company to assist
and comfort them, and never ceased with tears to implore the divine
protection. God was pleased to hear his prayers. When the barbarians
had made a breach, and were preparing to scale the walls, the saint
coming from offering the divine mysteries appeared upon the walls,
and at the same time a globe of fire fell from the heavens upon the
camp of the infidels, which it filled with confusion and terror. In
the meantime the Christians made a sally, and the numberless troops
of the barbarians perceiving that heaven visibly fought against
them, whilst many were perishing by the flame, betook themselves to
flight, and abandoned their enterprise. Thus they who had overturned
so many thrones, and trampled to the ground so many powerful armies,
saw themselves tumbled down from their victories and pride by the
prayer of one humble servant of God, who renewed on this occasion the
miracles of Elias and Eliseus. The circumstances of this wonderful
deliverance are authentically attested by ancient records, still
preserved among the public archives of the city of Breslaw, and are
related by Martin Cromer, bishop of Heilsberg or Warmia, in his
history of Poland, Longinus, and other historians of the northern
kingdoms. St. Ceslas died in July, the following year, 1242. His
relics are preserved in a stately chapel at Breslaw. The immemorial
veneration of his name was approved by Clement XI. in 1713. See
Touron, Vie de St. Dominique, p. 622; Bzovius, t. 13; Longinus
in Hist. Poloniæ; Matthias de Miacovia, in Chronicis Poloniæ, et
Benedict XIV. de Canoniz. l. 2, c. 34, p. 264.

SAINT AURELIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF CARTHAGE, C.

He was archdeacon of Carthage, when, in 388, he was promoted to
the archiepiscopal dignity of that see, to which was annexed a
jurisdiction little inferior to that of a patriarch over all the
metropolitans of the different provinces of Africa. He cultivated a
strict friendship with St. Austin, held several councils against the
Donatists, and was the first that condemned Celestius the Pelagian
in a council held in 412, and Pelagius himself in another council
in 416. He anathematized their heresy before St. Austin entered the
lists against it. St. Aurelius died in 423. He is highly extolled
by St. Fulgentius,[240] and is mentioned in the African Calendar of
the fifth age on the 20th of July. See the Acts of the Councils of
Carthage, Baronius, Baillet, &c.

SAINT ULMAR, OR WULMAR, ABBOT OF SAMER.

THREE MILES FROM BOULOGNE.

He was nobly born at Sylviaco in the territory of Boulogne in
Picardy. Renouncing the world in his youth, he entered himself a
brother in the abbey of Hautmont in Haynault, where it was his
employment to keep the cattle, and to hew wood for the community.
He was distinguished for his eminent spirit of prayer, and being
compelled by obedience to receive holy orders, was promoted to the
priesthood. He after this obtained leave to live alone in a hermitage
near mount Cassel, and afterward in 688 founded in a wood upon his
father’s estate in Sylviaco in the Boulognois, the abbey of Samer,
corruptly so called for St. Ulmar’s, at present of the Congregation
of St. Maur. St. Ulmar founded a nunnery at Vileria, now Wiere
aux bois, a mile from his own monastery, in which he placed his
niece Bertana abbess. Ceadwalla, king of the West-Saxons, passing
that way in his journey to Rome to receive baptism, conferred on
St. Ulmar a notable largess toward carrying on his foundation. In
close retirement in his hermitage near mount Cassel, the saint
preserved himself always free from worldly passions by flying from
the occasions which chiefly excite them, and by withdrawing from
the great scene of earthly business, envy, avarice, and strife.
Here shutting out the busy swarm of vain images which besets us in
the world, he inured his mind to happy recollection and heavenly
contemplation. In this sweet repose he daily advanced in fervor and
divine charity till he was called to the joys of his Lord on the
20th of July, 710. He was glorified by miracles, and is named in the
Roman and other Martyrologies on the 20th of July. On the 17th of
June his relics were conveyed to Boulogne for fear of the plunder of
the Normans; and from thence to the abbey of St. Peter’s at Ghent,
where they were burnt by the fury of the Calvinists in the sixteenth
century. See his life written soon after his death in Mabillon, Act.
Bened. t. 3, p. 237; and more full, with new remarks, by Cuper the
Bollandist, Jul. t. 5, p. 81.

ST. JEROM ÆMILIANI, C.

FOUNDER OF THE CONGREGATION OF REGULAR CLERGY OF SOMASCHA.

He was born at Venice of a patrician family; and, in the most
troublesome times of the republic, served in the troops from his
childhood. Whilst he was governor of the new castle in the mountains
of Tarviso, he was taken prisoner, cast into a dungeon, and loaded
with chains. His sufferings he sanctified by penance and prayer;
and being delivered by the miraculous protection of the mother of
God, arriving at Tarviso, he hung up his chains before an altar
consecrated to God under the invocation of the Blessed Virgin, and,
returning to Venice, devoted himself to the exercises of prayer and
all virtues. At that time a famine and a contagious distemper having
reduced many families to the greatest distress, he laid himself out
in relieving all, but was particularly moved with compassion for
abandoned orphans. These he gathered in a house which he hired,
clothed and fed them at his own expense, and instructed them himself
with unwearied zeal in the Christian doctrine and in all virtue. By
the advice of St. Cajetan and others, he passed to the continent and
erected like hospitals for orphans at Brescia, Bergamo, and other
places; and others for the reception of penitent women. At Somascha,
on the frontiers of the Venetian dominions, between Bergamo and
Milan, he founded a house which he destined for the exercises of
those whom he received into his Congregation, and in which he long
resided. From this house it took its name; though it was sometimes
called St. Mayeul’s, titular of a college at Pavia, which St. Charles
Borromeo put under his direction.

The instruction of youth and young clergymen became also an object
of his zeal in his foundations, and continues still to be in his
institute. The brothers, during the life of the founder, were all
laymen, and it was only approved as a pious Congregation. The
holy founder died at Somascha on the 8th of February, 1537, of a
contagious distemper which he had caught by attending the sick. He
was beatified by Benedict XIV.; and canonized by Clement XIII. An
office in his honor was appointed for the 20th of July, by a decree
of the holy see published in 1769. Three years after his death, in
1540, his Congregation was declared a religious Order by Paul III.,
and confirmed under the rule of St. Augustine by St. Pius V. in 1571,
and again by Sixtus V. in 1586. It has no houses out of Italy and
the Catholic Swiss Cantons. It is divided into three provinces, of
Lombardy, Venice, and Rome. The general is chosen every three years
out of each province in its turn. See his life written in Latin by
Aug. Turtura, Milan, 1620, 8vo., and Helyot, Histoire des Ord. Rel.
t. 4, c. 33.

JULY XXI.

ST. PRAXEDES, VIRGIN.

She was daughter of Pudens, a Roman senator, and sister to St.
Pudentiana, and in the days of pope Pius I. and the emperor Antoninus
Pius, edified the church of Rome, by the bright lustre of her
virtues. All her great riches she employed in relieving the poor and
the necessities of the Church. By the comfort and succors which she
afforded the martyrs she endeavored to make herself partaker of their
crowns, and she lived in the assiduous exercise of prayer, watching,
and fasting. She died in peace and was buried near her sister on the
Salarian road. Bede and other martyrologists style her a virgin. An
old _title_ or parish church in Rome bearing her name is mentioned in
the life of pope Symmachus. It was repaired by Adrian I. and Paschal
I., and lastly by St. Charles Borromeo, who took from it his title of
cardinal.

* * * * *

The primitive Christians lived only for heaven, and in every step
looked up to God, regardless of all lower pursuits or meaner
advantages that could interfere with their great design of knowing
and loving him. This constant attention to God awed them in their
retirements; this gave life and wings to their devotion, and animated
them to fervor in all their actions; this carried them through the
greatest difficulties and temptations, and supported them under all
troubles and afflictions.

ST. ZOTICUS, M.

BISHOP OF COMANA IN CAPPADOCIA.

He first detected, zealously confuted, and condemned the errors
and impostures of the Cataphryges or Montanists with their false
prophecies, as Eusebius mentions. To this triumph over heresy and
imposture he added the crown of martyrdom, which he received in the
persecution of Severus, about the year 204. See Eusebius, b. 5, c.
16, and the ancient martyrologies.

ST. BARHADBESCIABAS, DEACON, M.

In the fifteenth year of the great persecution raised in Persia
by king Sapor II., by the command of Sapor Tamsapor governor of
Adiabene, Barhadbesciabas, the zealous deacon of the city of Arbela,
was apprehended and put on the rack. Whilst he was tormented, the
officers continually cried out to him, “Worship water and fire,
and eat the blood of beasts, and you shall be immediately set at
liberty.” But the blessed deacon Barhadbesciabas showed, by the
cheerfulness of his countenance, that the interior joy of his happy
soul overcame the torments he felt in his body. He often said to
the judge, “Neither you nor your king, nor any manner of torments
shall ever be able to separate me from the love of Jesus: Him alone
have I served from my infancy to this old age.” The tyrant at length
condemned him to be beheaded, and commanded Aghæus, an apostate
Christian nobleman, to be his executioner. The holy deacon stood
bound waiting with joy for the happy moment which was to associate
him to the angels; but Aghæus trembled so as not to be able to give
the blow. He struck, however, seven times at the martyr’s neck, and
not being able to sever his head from his body, ran his sword into
his bowels; of which wound the holy deacon expired soon after. The
judge set guards to watch the blessed corpse; but two clerks carried
it off in the night, and buried it after the Roman fashion. He
suffered on the 20th day of the month of July, in the year 354, of
Sapor II. 45. See his genuine Chaldaic acts in Assemani, t. 1, p. 129.

ST. VICTOR OF MARSEILLES, M.

The emperor Maximian, reeking with the blood of the Thebæan legion,
and many other martyrs whom he had massacred in different parts of
Gaul, arrived at Marseilles, the most numerous and flourishing church
in those provinces. The tyrant breathed here nothing but slaughter
and fury, and his coming filled the Christians with fear and alarms.
In this general consternation, Victor, a Christian officer in the
troops, went about in the night time from house to house visiting
the faithful, and inspiring them with contempt of a temporal death
and the love of eternal life. He was surprised in this action, so
worthy a soldier of Jesus Christ, and brought before the prefects
Asterius and Eutychius, who exhorted him not to lose the fruit of
all his services and the favor of his prince for the worship of a
dead man; so they called Jesus Christ. He answered, that he renounced
those recompenses if he could not enjoy them without being unfaithful
to Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, who vouchsafed to become
man for our salvation, but who raised himself from the dead, and
reigns with the Father, being God equally with him. The whole court
heard him with tumultuous shouts of indignation and rage. However,
the prisoner being a person of distinction, the prefects sent him
to Maximian himself. The incensed countenance of an emperor did not
daunt the champion of Christ; and the tyrant seeing his threats to
have no effect upon him, commanded him to be bound hands and feet and
dragged through all the streets of the city, exposed to the blows
and insults of the populace. Every one of the heathens seemed to
think it a crime not to testify their false zeal, by offering some
indignity or other to the martyr. Their design was to intimidate the
Christians, but the example of the martyr’s resolution served to
encourage them.

Victor was brought back bruised and bloody to the tribunal of the
prefects, who thinking his resolution must have been weakened by his
sufferings, began to blaspheme our holy religion, and pressed him
again to adore their gods. But the martyr filled with the Holy Ghost,
and encouraged by his presence in his soul, expressed his respect
for the emperor and his contempt of their gods, adding, “I despise
your deities, and confess Jesus Christ: inflict upon me what torments
you please.” The two prefects only disagreed about the choice of
the tortures. After a warm contest Eutychius withdrew, and left the
prisoner to Asterius, who commanded him to be hoisted on the rack,
and most cruelly tortured a long time. The martyr, lifting up his
eyes to heaven, asked patience and constancy of God, whose gift he
knew it to be. Jesus Christ appeared to him on the rack, holding a
cross in his hands, gave him his peace, and told him that he suffered
in his servants, and crowned them after their victory. These words
dispelled both his pains and his grief; and the tormentors being at
last weary, the prefect ordered him to be taken down, and thrown into
a dark dungeon. At midnight God visited him by his angels; the prison
was filled with a light brighter than that of the sun, and the martyr
sung with the angels the praises of God. Three soldiers who guarded
the prison, seeing this light, were surprised at the miracle, and
casting themselves at the martyr’s feet asked his pardon, and desired
baptism. Their names were Alexander, Longinus, and Felician. The
martyr instructed them as well as time would permit, sent for priests
the same night, and going with them to the sea-side he led them out
of the water, that is, was their godfather, and returned with them
again to his prison.

The next morning Maximian was informed of the conversion of the
guards, and, in a transport of rage, sent officers to bring them all
four before him in the middle of the market-place. The mob loaded
Victor with injuries, and would fain have compelled him to bring
back his converts to the worship of their gods; but he said, “I
cannot undo what is well done.” And turning to them he encouraged
them saying, “You are still soldiers; behave with courage, God
will give you victory. You belong to Jesus Christ, be faithful. An
immortal crown is prepared for you.” The three soldiers persevered
in the confession of Jesus Christ, and by the emperor’s orders were
forthwith beheaded. Victor prayed in the mean time with tears that he
might, by being united with them in their happy death, be presented
in their glorious company before God; but after having been exposed
to the insults of the whole city as an immovable rock lashed with
the waves, and been beaten with clubs and scourged with leather
thongs, he was carried back to prison, where he continued three days,
recommending to God his martyrdom with many tears. After that term
the emperor called him again before his tribunal, and having caused
a statue of Jupiter, with an altar and incense, to be placed by him,
he commanded the martyr to offer incense to the idol. Victor went up
to the profane altar, and by a stroke of his foot threw it down. The
emperor ordered the foot to be forthwith chopped off; which the saint
suffered with great joy, offering to God these first fruits of his
body. A few moments after, the emperor condemned him to be put under
the grindstone of a handmill, and crushed to death. The executioners
turned the wheel, and when part of his body was bruised and crushed,
the mill broke down. The saint still breathed a little; but his head
was immediately ordered to be cut off. His and the other three bodies
were thrown into the sea, but being cast ashore were buried by the
Christians in a grotto hewn out of a rock. The author of the acts
adds, “They are honored to this day with many miracles, and many
benefits are conferred by God and our Lord Jesus Christ on those who
ask them through their merits.”

In the fifth century Cassian[241] built a great monastery near the
tomb of this saint, which afterward received the rule of St. Bennet,
but was afterward secularized by Benedict XIV. The relics of St.
Victor remain in that church, the most ancient in all France, full of
illustrious monuments of primitive saints. Some part of the relics of
St. Victor was conveyed to Paris and laid in a chapel built in his
honor, which soon after, in the reign of Louis VI., was enlarged,
and the royal monastery of regular canons founded there, which bears
the name of this saint, its glorious patron.[242] This institute
and abbey were commenced by William of Champeaux, archdeacon of
Paris, a man of eminent piety and learning, who having taught for
many years rhetoric and theology, with extraordinary reputation,
in the cloister of the cathedral, retired to this little chapel
of St. Victor, then in the skirts of the town. There with certain
fervent clergymen he lived in close solitude, assiduous prayer,
and great austerity, allowing no other food to be served in his
community but herbs, pulse, and roots, with bread and salt. By the
pressing importunities of the bishop of Paris and other persons of
distinction, he was obliged to resume his theological lectures, which
he seems to have continued at St. Victor’s as F. Gourdan shows.
Whence Rollin calls this monastery the cradle of the university of
Paris. In favor of this holy institute king Louis VI. founded and
built there a magnificent abbey, which still subsists in a most
flourishing condition. Gilduin, a most holy man, was appointed first
abbot, whilst William of Champeaux taught there, who in 1113 was
consecrated bishop of Chalons on the Saone. Dying in 1121, according
to his desire he was buried at Clairvaux, by St. Bernard, who had
received at his hands the abbatial benediction.[243] See St. Victor’s
genuine acts, which are not unworthy the pen of Cassian, to whom
some ascribe them; but without grounds. They are published and much
commended by Bosquet in the fourth tome of his History of the Church
of France, p. 202. See also Tillemont, t. 4, Ceillier, t. 3, p. 366.
Fleury, l. 8, n. 20. Rivet, Hist. Littér. t. 2, p. 231, and Cuper the
Bollandist, t. 5, Jul. p. 135. F. Gourdan has compiled at length the
life of St. Victor, with an account of many miracles wrought through
his intercession, and a collection of many devout hymns and prayers
in his honor, and other various memorials relating to this saint, in
the seventh tome of his MS. history of the eminent men of the royal
abbey of St. Victor at Paris. See also Oudin, t. 2. De Script. Eccl.,
p. 1138.

ST. ARBOGASTUS, BISHOP OF STRASBURG, C.

The Irish challenge this saint as a native of their island. The
Scots also lay claim to him, and are supported by Richer’s Chronicle
of Sens, written in the thirteenth century, and by the life of St.
Florentius, his successor, though his acts say he was of a noble
family in Aquitain. Travelling into Alsace he led an anachoretical
life in the Sacred Forest (for this is the interpretation of the
Teutonic name Heiligesforst), about the year 630. He was often called
to the court of king Dagobert II., and by his interest promoted to
the episcopal see of Strasburg. His acts relate, that not long after
his exaltation he raised to life Dagobert’s son, killed by a fall
from a horse; these acts call this prince Sigebert; his name is not
recorded by the historians. Many other miracles are ascribed to
this saint; who, assisted by the liberality of this king, enriched
the Church of Strasburg with several large estates. King Dagobert
bestowed on it, for his sake, the manor and town of Rufach, with an
extensive country situated on both sides the river Alse or Elle,
together with the old royal palace of Isenburg, residing himself
at Kirchem near Molsheim. St. Arbogastus also founded, or at least
endowed, several monasteries, the principal among which were
Surburg and Shutteran: some say also Ebersheimunster; but the chief
founder of this last was duke Athico, the father of St. Odilia, by
the direction of St. Deodatus, bishop of Nevers. St. Arbogastus
died, according to Bosch the Bollandist, in 678, the year before
Dagobert offered the bishopric of Strasburg to St. Wilfrid, who was
then on his journey to Rome. Upon his declining that dignity, it
was conferred on St. Florentius. All writers on St. Arbogastus’s
life mention that, in his last will, he ordered his body should be
interred on the mountain which was the burial-place of malefactors.
His will was complied with; but the church of St. Michael was
afterward built upon the spot, and surrounded by a village called
Strateburg. Near it was founded the abbey of St. Arbogastus, to which
his body was translated with honor by his successor St. Florentius.
See the life of St. Arbogastus which seems to have been written in
the tenth age, published with remarks by F. Bosch, t. 5, Julij, p.
168.

JULY XXII.

ST. MARY MAGDALEN.

The illustrious penitent woman mentioned by St. Luke,[244] was, by
her perfect conversion, an encouraging example and model of penitence
to all succeeding ages. She is called the Sinner,[245] to express
her pre-eminence in guilt. This epithet seems to imply that she led
a lewd and disorderly life. The scandal of her debaucheries had
rendered her name infamous throughout the whole city. Naim, Tiberias,
or some neighboring place in Galilee, seems to have been the chief
theatre of her disorders, at least at the time of her conversion.
They took their rise from small beginnings; for no one becomes a
great proficient in vice all at once. The fences of virtue are
weakened by degrees before they are entirely broken down.

The steps by which young persons, like this sinner, are led into
evil courses, are pointed out to us by our Divine Redeemer in the
parable of the prodigal son. The source of all his misfortunes is
a love of independence and of his own will. He is full of his own
wisdom, and of a certain self-sufficiency; is an enemy to advice, the
means to find out truth and to discover dangers. All who contradict
his passions, or tell him the truth, are odious to him; the counsels
of tender parents he calls interested; those of God’s anointed too
severe and scrupulous; those of the old and experienced, cowardly
and mean-spirited. Young persons, above all others, are in an age
in which the devil prepares innumerable snares, the world lays many
stratagems, and passions easily eclipse reason; and it behoves them
infinitely to be strongly persuaded that their safety consists
altogether in most sincere dispositions of humility, obedience, and
docility. Tractableness and dutifulness towards superiors is the most
essential virtue of that age, next to the obligation of religion,
which we owe to God. Those companions, whose discourse and behavior
tend to inspire a contempt of parents and other superiors, are of all
pests the most dangerous to youth.

The prodigal son, blinded by his passions, thought himself prudent
and strong enough to be his own governor and master, and flattered
himself that his love of liberty and pleasure was not very criminal
or unjust; but from this root all vices have sprouted up, and are not
to be restrained by him who opens to them such a door by shaking off
the happy yoke of subjection, which is the divine ordinance. Such is
the strange disorder of that mischievous passion, that though the
prodigal son lived in dignity and plenty, and enjoyed all temporal
blessings and all the comforts of life without feeling its troubles
or knowing its miseries, yet he was not content. His subjection to a
good father was true freedom; he was the object of all his parent’s
cares, and he reaped the fruit of all his labors. But so distempered
was his soul, that the constraint of this tender guardian’s watchful
eye seemed to embitter all his pleasures, and such an obedience
appeared to him an insupportable burden and slavery, which therefore
he would shake off to have no other law but his own will. This was
his capital enemy, though he would not be so persuaded; and by
indulging it he fostered a young tiger in his own bosom, which soon
grew too strong for him and tore him to pieces. We are astonished
at the quick progress which the passions make when once the bridle
is let loose. The prodigal youth, seeing himself possessed of that
dangerous liberty which he had so passionately desired, full of false
joy at the prospect of imaginary happiness, went into a foreign
country, to be at a greater distance from all troublesome advisers.
His passions being so far yielded to, had no longer any bounds, and
he denied his heart nothing of its irregular desires, being no longer
master of himself. Unthinking and blinded he soon squandered away his
fortune, without keeping any accounts, or knowing how it was spent;
he was surprised to find his hands empty, and himself starving, and
that he had not yet found those enjoyments which he had promised
himself; instead of which he had met with nothing but shadows and
miseries. Nevertheless, cleaving still to so treacherous a world, and
yet entertaining desperate foolish hopes of finding happiness in it,
he went on in the pursuit of his passions; and losing himself daily
more and more in the mazes of sin, he was at length reduced to have
no other company but that of the most filthy of beasts, and almost to
perish with hunger at the heels of the hogs which he was condemned to
serve and fatten.

This is a true picture of the sinner who has thrown off the holy
yoke of God, and has enslaved himself to his passions. How earnestly
ought every Christian to pray that God may always so strengthen his
resolution with his grace, that he may never receive any other than
his sweet and holy law? What completes the misfortune of the habitual
sinner is, that few who have fallen into that gulf ever sincerely
rise again. The very afflictions which converted the prodigal son
throw thousands into despair. God’s powerful graces are weakened
after having been long contemned; and habits grow stronger than
reason. When the poison of sin has sunk deep into the heart, it is
not expelled by an ordinary grace. Of such a sinner that curse is
pronounced, that even in his old age, if he ever arrive at it, his
bones shall be filled with the vices of his youth, and they shall
descend with him into the grave, and shall sleep with him in the
dust.[246] Christ indeed came from heaven to save all such; in his
tender compassion for their miseries he invites them to return to
him, and for their encouragement has shown a remarkable example
of his mercy in our saint. Having considered in the image of the
prodigal son, the unhappy steps by which she fell, we shall, with
greater edification, take a view of the circumstances which have
given so great a lustre to her repentance.

Jesus, not long after he had raised to life the son of a widow at
Naim, a town in Galilee, was invited to dinner by a certain Pharisee
called Simon, who seems to have lived in the same town, or some
neighboring city, as Calmet shows. Our Lord was pleased to accept his
invitation, chiefly that he might confound the pride of the Pharisees
by manifesting the power of his grace in the wonderful conversion
of this abandoned sinner. His bowels had yearned over her spiritual
miseries, and he spread upon her soul a beam of his divine light
which penetrated her understanding and her heart so effectually,
that, listening to the interior voice of his grace, she saw the
abominable filth and miseries in which she was plunged, was filled
with confusion and horror, and conceived the most sincere detestation
of her ingratitude and baseness. Our Lord went to the banquet in
great joy to wait for this soul, which he himself had secretly
wounded with his holy love, and which he was pleased to draw to him
in the midst of a great assembly, that by her public repentance
she might repair the scandal she had given, and he might give to
all succeeding ages an illustrious instance of his mercy towards
all repenting sinners. She began her conversion by entering into
herself. As her fall was owing to inconsideration, so doubtless her
first step towards repentance was serious reflection on the misery
of her present condition, the happiness she had forfeited, and the
punishment she was to expect. From these considerations she raised
her thoughts to others higher and more noble, those of divine love,
reflecting who He is whom she had so grievously offended, and how
excessive and incomprehensible his goodness is, which she had so long
and so basely slighted. This motive of love, to which Christ ascribed
her conversion, drew from her eyes a torrent of tears, and made her
cry out with the prodigal son, that she had sinned against heaven.
That model of true penitents forgot his corporeal miseries and all
other circumstances of his fall, being full of this reflection
alone, how he could be capable of offending so good a parent. He
acknowledged himself unworthy to be again called a child; yet he
deferred not a moment to restore his heart to him to whom he owed
it, and, confiding in his indulgence, threw himself upon his mercy,
hoping by his goodness to be admitted among his hired servants.

In the like dispositions does our penitent raise her heart to God.
She hearkens not to the suggestions of worldly prudence which
might seem to require some time for deliberation, for settling her
concerns, or for taking proper measures about her conversion itself;
the least delay appears to her a new crime, a fresh aggravation of
her misfortune. She was informed that our Divine Redeemer was at
table in the house of the Pharisee. She did not so much as think
of the disgrace to which she exposed herself by appearing before a
numerous and honorable assembly, of the reproaches and disdain she
was to expect from the Pharisee, or the fear of moving Christ himself
to indignation by an unseasonable importunate address. One moment’s
delay in seeking her physician seemed too much, because her heart
was now wounded with divine love. Sinners who, in returning to God,
think too nicely that they have temporal interests to provide for,
friends to please, and opportunities to wait for, are far from the
dispositions of this happy penitent. She found mercy because she
sought it before all things. Had she dallied with grace, it would
have been justly withdrawn; had she been for compounding with her
passions, they would have again enslaved her more strongly than ever.
She found all difficulties vanish in a moment, because her conversion
was sincere and perfect; by one steady resolution the work is done.
What further deliberation can one that has sinned require than that
the gate of mercy is yet open to him? Let him at all rates make
haste to find it, though for this he should sacrifice every thing
else. So insupportable to this holy penitent was the stench of her
own filth, and the load of her guilt, that she could not defer the
remedy an hour longer to wait for a better opportunity, or to inquire
if our Lord was at leisure to hear her; and a firm confidence in his
boundless mercy was her encouragement, and her strong assurance that
he would not reject her tears.

When the prodigal son said to himself, _I will arise, and will go to
my Father_, we might have asked him, says St. Peter Chrysologus, what
he trusted to for his pardon? upon what he grounded his confidence?
upon what hope or assurance he presumed to appear in the presence
of him whom he had so heinously offended? His answer would have
been, “This is the assured ground of my confidence, that he is my
Father. I have forfeited all title to the name or rank of his son;
but he hath not lost the quality or affection of a parent. I want no
stranger to intercede with a father. The tender affection of his own
breast pleads powerfully within him, and is sure to incline him in
my favor. His paternal bowels are moved, and yearn to restore to a
son by pardon that life which he formerly gave him by birth.”[247]
In like sentiments this penitent woman seeks her Almighty Physician,
professing herself altogether undeserving and unworthy of mercy,
and therefore alleges nothing on her side to recommend her to his
compassion, except only that she was the work of his hands, though
an unnatural and rebellious child, in whom that title was only a
grievous exaggeration of her guilt; but she confidently appeals to
his infinite goodness and mercy, and begs that for his own sake
he will save her, in whom he still discovers, though frightfully
disfigured, the traces of his divine image which his own omnipotent
hand had formed, and which it is in his power easily to repair and
perfect.

In these dispositions she bolted into the chamber where Jesus was
at dinner with the Pharisee, and, regardless of what others thought
or said of her past life or of her present boldness,[248] she made
up to her Redeemer and Physician. She durst not appear before his
face, and therefore went behind him; and the nearer she approached
his sacred person streams gushed more abundantly from her eyes. She
reflected how basely she had defiled and sought to destroy her own
soul, and how impiously she had robbed Christ of many other souls
whilst he was come from heaven, and was ready to sacrifice himself on
the cross for her and them; and at this and other like considerations
she was not able to moderate her grief. The inward confusion she
felt at the sight of her sins and baseness made her despise all the
confusion which she could receive before men, or rather rejoice in it
to meet that contempt which she acknowledged herself most justly to
deserve from all creatures. Attentive only on Christ, from whom she
sought her health and salvation, standing at his feet, she watered
them with her tears, wiped them with her hair, most respectfully
kissed them, and anointed them with rich perfumes and sweet-scented
essences which she had brought in an alabaster box. She now defaces
or consecrates to penance whatever had formerly been an instrument
of sin; her eyes, which had been full of dangerous charms, are now
converted into fountains of tears to cleanse the stains of her soul;
and her hair, once dressed in tresses and curls to ensnare souls,
now hangs loose and dishevelled, and serves for a towel to wipe
our Lord’s feet, which she kisses with her lips, and scents with
her perfumes, formerly the incentives of vice. The penitent must
consecrate his riches to Christ in the poor which are his feet; must
employ his eyes in tears, and his lips in supplications for mercy,
and must make all that serve to charity and mortification which
before served self-love. These exterior offerings must be accompanied
with the interior sacrifice of the heart, by humble confidence in the
divine mercy, by lively faith and ardent love, with which the soul
of a sinner approaches to Jesus, and is reconciled to him. Our holy
penitent prepared as it were an altar at the feet of our Lord, on
which she offered to him the true sacrifice of a contrite and humble
heart. There losing the use of her speech whilst grief intercepted
her words, she spoke only by her tears; but before Him to whom the
secrets of her heart were open, these sighs, and this silence itself,
was a louder cry than that of any words could have been. Thus she
earnestly begged of God’s pure mercy, that pardon which she confessed
herself most unworthy to obtain.

Jesus, who had himself inspired her with these dispositions, cast on
her a favorable eye of mercy. He was come to the Pharisee’s banquet
exulting with holy joy, which sprung from his foreknowledge of the
conversion of this soul; the mainspring of all he did and suffered
on earth being that insatiable thirst for the salvation of sinners
which brought him from heaven, and which was not to be satisfied but
by his sufferings on the cross, and by the last drop of his blood
poured out for them upon it. In these sentiments he had testified
that it was his delight to converse with sinners, out of compassion
for their miseries, being desirous to draw them out of that gulf
into which they had blindly plunged themselves. This he expressed by
many moving parables, especially that of the prodigal son, where he
paints his mercy in the strongest coloring by the manner in which he
represents the good old father receiving him upon his return. From
the time of his going astray the tender parent never allowed himself
any respite in his tears, inquiries, and search: at length, from an
eminence in which he looked about on every side, still hoping he
should one day see him return, he descried him at a distance. He saw
only a disfigured, languishing, and frightful spectre; the wretched
remains of a debauchee and rake worn out by riots and revellings: his
features horrid and defaced, his body resembling a walking skeleton,
but half covered with a few filthy rags. Yet, under this disguise,
his eye, directed by love, discovered him at a great distance, and
before any other could see him, knew that it was his son. Far from
being disgusted at such a spectacle, he ran to meet him, affection
giving vigor to his enfeebled age. He remembered no longer his past
behavior, but rushing to his embraces, kissed him, and bathed his
head and face with floods of tears which joy drew from his eyes, and
which he mingled with the tears of sincere grief and affection which
the penitent son abundantly poured forth. The good father wiped them
off his face, prevented his confusion, restored him to his former
rank, called for, and gave him the best robe; a ring upon his finger
(a symbol of dignity), and shoes on his feet. He, moreover, ordered a
fatted calf to be forthwith killed, and gave a splendid entertainment
with music, inviting all to rejoice with him and make merry, because
his son whom he lamented as dead was come to life again, and he that
had been lost was found. If the birth of this son, when he was first
brought to life, had been to him a subject of great joy, how much
more reason had he to rejoice seeing him now restored by a second
birth, so much the more joyful, as it wiped away his tears, and
changed his grievous sorrow into comfort? Thus doth our loving God
and Redeemer receive the penitent sinner; thus is there joy in heaven
upon one sinner that doth penance. The Holy Ghost clothes him with
the robe of sanctifying grace, puts a ring on his hand, the emblem of
his divine gifts, and gives shoes to his feet, that is, fortifies him
with strength to tread on the venomous aspick and basilisk, and to
trample upon the raging lion and dragon.

The Pharisee who had invited Jesus to his table, was shocked to see
an infamous sinner well known in that city, admitted by our Lord to
stand at his feet, and secretly said within himself that He could not
be a prophet, or know that she was a scandalous person. To inculcate
our strict obligation of shunning bad company, God commanded all
intimacy with public sinners to be avoided, lest the sound should
be infected by the contagion of their vices. The haughty Pharisees
construed this law according to the false maxims of their pride,
as if it were a part of virtue to despise sinners, and as if that
respect and charity which we owe to all men, were not due to such;
but the humble man, whilst he shuns the snare of wicked company,
places himself below the worst of sinners, as the most ungrateful of
all creatures; discharges all offices of charity, and spares neither
tears nor pains to reclaim those that are gone astray. The contempt
of any one is always the height of pride, which degrades a man in
the sight of God beneath that sinner whom he undervalues. This was
the case of the Pharisee; and such was the disorder of his pride
that it betrayed him into a rash judgment by which he condemned a
penitent who was then a saint; and, arraigning the goodness and mercy
of God, blasphemously censured the sanctity of our Redeemer. Nothing
is more wonderful in the conduct of the Son of God on earth, than
the patience and meekness with which he bore the contradictions,
murmurings, and blasphemies of men in most unjustly condemning his
charity itself. We cannot form any idea unless we have experienced
it, what force such injurious treatment has to make men abandon the
good which they have begun, and cease bestowing favors on those that
murmur against them. Christ has encouraged us by his example to this
heroic practice of virtue, teaching us that the most effectual means
of confounding slanderers is to instruct them by silence, meekness,
perseverance in good works, and a constant return of sincere kind
offices; he shows how we must still persevere steadfastly to regulate
our intentions and actions according to the maxims of piety, and give
ourselves no trouble about what men will say of us.

Christ sought indirectly by a parable, to cure the pride and rash
judgment of this Pharisee, and convince him that she to whom much
had been forgiven, then loved God the more; consequently was more
acceptable to him. Some interpreters understand his words, that much
was forgiven this penitent, because her love and sorrow were great
and sincere; others take the meaning to be, that gratitude would
make her after this mercy more fervent in love. Each interpretation
is undoubtedly true; but, as A. Lapide shows, the first seems most
agreeable to the context. The conversion of sinners is usually begun
by motives of fear, but is always perfected by those of love; and
the fervor of their love will be the measure of the grace which they
will receive. By the love of vanity the soul falls from Christ; and
by his divine love she returns to him. How fervent was this love
in our devout penitent! By it she is become at once insensible of
the reproaches and judgment of men; she defers not her sacrifice a
single moment, and allows not herself the least mitigation in it;
she cuts off all her engagements, extirpating them to the very root
both in her heart and actions; she renounces for ever all dangerous
occasions of her disorders. With what courage and resolution does she
embrace all the most heroic practices of penance? confessing publicly
her crimes: looking upon the utmost humiliation as her due and her
gain, and as falling far short of what she deserves; chastising sin
in herself without mercy, in order to excite the divine compassion;
making the number and enormity of her sins the measure of her
penance, or rather desiring to set no bounds to it, as the malice of
her offences went beyond all bounds; and devoting the remainder of
her life to tears, prayer, and every exercise of virtue and divine
love. She is the first to confess Jesus Christ publicly before
men, and in the presence of his enemies. By these dispositions she
deserved that her Lord should take upon him her defence, and declare
himself her protector. Happy are those sinners who by the sincerity
and fervor of their repentance will have at the last day their Judge,
Redeemer, and God, for their advocate and patron! The first and
most important grace which the Church teaches us in her litany most
earnestly to ask of God is, that He vouchsafe, in his mercy, to bring
us to this true penance.

Mercy is the property and the favorite attribute of our divine
Redeemer; and tinder is not so soon kindled by fire when applied to
it, as the divine mercy blots out all sin when it is implored with
a heart full of confusion and truly penitent. Hence Christ assured
this humble sinner that her offences were cancelled, and that her
lively faith, animated by ardent charity, which drew from her eyes
tears of repentance, had saved her; and he insured to her that solid
and happy peace which is the fruit of such a repentance. The pious
cardinal Berulle admires the happy intercourse between the heart
of this holy penitent and that of Jesus; the first employed in the
most perfect sentiments of compunction, love, and entire sacrifice;
the second, in the tender motions of mercy, love, and goodness: the
penitent offers floods of tears; these Jesus repays with treasures of
graces and mercy, by which he makes her soul a heaven on earth, as
bright and pure as the angels, and the throne of the whole blessed
Trinity. The hearts of the penitent and of Jesus are two sources
which perpetually answer each other; the more the penitent pours
forth her heart in contrition, the more abundantly does Jesus in
return bestow on her his infinite graces. It is at the feet of Jesus
that these wonders are wrought; witness this example, and that of the
sister of Lazarus, in the house of Simon the Leper in Bethania. It is
good for us to make this our dwelling in spirit. The adorable feet of
Jesus so often wearied in seeking sinners, and at last bored on the
cross for their salvation, are the source of all blessings. Here this
true penitent consecrates to him her heart, her mind, her actions,
her perfumes, all she is or has; and here he cleanses her soul, and
kindles in her his love, which the rebel angel lost in heaven. All
his attention is taken up on her, he entertains her alone, forgetting
the master of the feast, and others that were seated with him at
table. He even gave the Pharisee sensible proofs how much her fervor
and penance surpassed in the sight of God his pretended justice and
charity, though it were presumed real. Perseverance in this fervor
completed her happiness. Gratitude to God for so great a mercy, and
so distinguished a grace, was to her a fresh spur to advance every
day in this love with greater ardor and fidelity. Thus the greater
the debts were which had been forgiven her, the more earnestly she
strove with all her powers to love him who vouchsafed to accept her
humble sacrifice. This same motive of gratitude ought to have no less
weight with those who, by God’s singular grace, have always preserved
their innocence; for, whether God shows mercy by pardoning sins or by
preventing them in us, we are totally indebted to Him for the grace
which we receive. Upon this great principle, St. Austin addresses the
Pharisee who despised our holy penitent, in the following words:[249]
“O Pharisee! to say you are less indebted to the divine mercy,
because less was forgiven you, is a capital ingratitude and pride.
For by whom were you preserved from those crimes which you did not
commit? One who hath sinned much, stands indebted for the gracious
pardon of exceeding great debts. Another who hath sinned less, owes
to God the benefit, that he hath not defiled himself with grievous
sins. You have not fallen into adultery; but God saith to you, it
is owing to me who governed and protected you. If no tempter ever
enticed you, this was the effect of my special care and providence
in your favor. If you escaped the occasions of dangers from time and
place, this likewise was ordained by me. Perhaps a temptation and
an opportunity of sinning occurred; yet I withheld you by wholesome
fear, that you did not consent to the evil. You are indebted to me
for your preservation from all the crimes which you did not commit;
for there is no sin that one committeth, which another person might
not commit if he were not preserved by him who made man.” We cannot
sufficiently admire and praise the excess of the divine goodness
towards men who were born children of wrath, and vessels of weakness
and corruption. Wonderful is his mercy in those whom he preserves
from the contagion of vice and mortal sin; but its influence appears
with the greatest lustre in sinners whom by repentance it not only
cleanses from their guilt, but exalts to the highest places in his
favor. Of this our fervent penitent is an instance, who, after her
conversion, surpassed others in the ardor of her charity, with which
she gave herself up entirely to the service of her Redeemer.

St. Clement of Alexandria, St. Gregory the Great, and many other
writers both ancient and modern, doubt not but this penitent was
Mary Magdalen, of whom St. Luke makes first mention in the following
chapter. This surname seems to have been given her from Magdala, a
town mentioned by Josephus, or rather from Magdalum, both situated
in Galilee.[250] She was by extraction a Galilæan, and is reckoned
among the devout women who followed Christ from Galilee. St. Luke,
after speaking of the conversion of her that had been a sinner,
says[251] that certain women who had been cured of wicked spirits
and infirmities followed Christ in his travels through Galilee, and
up to Jerusalem, and assisted him with their substance; and our Lord
receives such good offices from them, to give them an occasion of
exercising a gratitude and charity with which he was well pleased.
Among these, the evangelist names Mary Magdalen, out of whom our Lord
had cast seven devils, Joanna the wife of Chusa Herod’s steward, and
one Susanna. St. Gregory the Great, Lightfoot, and some others, by
these seven devils understand seven capital vices of which Magdalen
was cured by her conversion; but Maldonat, Grotius, and others doubt
not but she had been literally possessed by seven evil spirits, by
whom she might be agitated at intervals, and which were cast forth
at her conversion. Gratitude and devotion having attached her to our
Divine Redeemer after so great a benefit, she followed him almost
wherever he went, that she might have an opportunity of listening
to all his sacred instructions, and of exercising her charity in
ministering to him her substance.[252] She attended him in his
sacred passion, and stood under the cross on Mount Calvary. For her
to arrive at the summit of divine love, it was necessary she should
pass through the sharpest trials. “No one,” says Thomas à Kempis,
“was highly rapt whose fidelity was not sooner or later put to the
test; for he is not worthy of the high contemplation of God who hath
not, for God’s sake, been exercised with some tribulation; and the
trial going before is usually a sign of ensuing consolation.” A great
mystery is contained in those words of the evangelist,--_There stood
near the cross of Jesus, Mary his mother, and his mother’s sister
Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen_. Happy association! happy state
and situation near Jesus on his cross! cries out the devout cardinal
Berulle. This is a new order of souls which consists in the spirit,
in the interior, and is invisible to men, but visible and glorious
to the eyes of God and the angels. An order of souls crucified with
Jesus, and through Jesus, which takes its birth from his cross.
The order, at the same time, both of the cross and of heaven; the
order and school of love by the martyrdom of the heart; which by
learning to die to the world and inordinate self-love, lives to God
and his pure love. This happiness we attain to, by being united in
spirit to Jesus crucified, as Magdalen was at the foot of his cross.
She suffered by love what he suffered in his body by the hands of
the Jews. The same cross crucified Jesus and Magdalen in him and
with him. The thorns pierced her heart with his head, and her soul
was bathed in all his sorrows; but the crucifixion was in both a
martyrdom of love; and that love which triumphed over Jesus by making
him die on the cross, crucified her heart to all inordinate love
of creatures, thenceforward to reign and triumph alone in all her
affections, so that she could say in a twofold sense; “My love is
crucified.” Mary Magdalen forsook not her Redeemer after his death;
but remained by his sacred body, was present at its interment, left
it only to obey the law of observing the festival, and having rested
on the sabbath from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday, as soon
as the festival was over went to buy spices in order to embalm our
Lord’s body. Having made all things ready, in company with other
devout women, she set out very early the next morning with the
spices, before it was light, and arrived at the sepulchre just when
the sun was risen.[253] As they went they were anxious how they
should get the heavy stone which shut up the door of the monument,
taken away; but upon their arrival found it removed to their hands.
God never fails to be with his servants in what they undertake for
his honor; and the difficulties, whether real or imaginary, with the
apprehension of which the devil attempts to discourage them, are
banished by confidence and resolution, and vanish as shadows in the
execution. The pious women looked into the sepulchre, and finding
the body not there, Mary Magdalen ran to inform Peter and the other
disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken away
the Lord out of the sepulchre, and I know not where they have laid
him.” SS. Peter and John, the two most fervent in love among the
apostles, ran immediately to the sepulchre, and were there assured
by the holy women who were at the door of the monument, that going
in they had seen two angels clad in white shining apparel, and that
one of them who sat at the right hand of the place where the body had
lain, bid them not to fear, but to acquaint the apostles that Jesus
was risen, showing them at the same time the place where his body
had been laid. Peter and John having narrowly viewed the sepulchre,
doubted no longer of what was told them, and in great astonishment
returned to Jerusalem to the other disciples. Mary Magdalen, who had
brought them to the sepulchre of her Lord, made the throne of divine
love, would not return with them, or be drawn from the sacred place
where the true ark of the testament, the body of her Redeemer, had
rested three days, and continued at the monument bemoaning herself
for not being able to see her Redeemer, either dead or alive. Not
being able to assuage the violence of her grief and of her desire to
see her Lord, she stood weeping without the door of the sepulchre.
The entrance being low and narrow she stooped down to look into it
again and again, and beheld the two angels in white, one of them
sitting at the place where Jesus’s head lay, and the other at the
feet, who thus accosted her, “Woman, why weepest thou?” She replied,
“Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they
have laid him.” Neither the surprise of this apparition nor the
brightness and glory of these heavenly messengers could touch her
heart, or divert her thoughts from him whom she loved, and whom
alone she sought, and we suffer so many foolish objects to distract
us, and carry away our affections. In her answer to the angels she
called him _My Lord_, to express the share which by love she had in
him, and her title to him as her God, Lord, and Redeemer. Afterward
to the apostles she calls him _The Lord_, to excite them to duty
and love to the common Lord of all creatures. But why did not these
angels inform her that he whom she so earnestly sought was risen in
glory? Doubtless, because the Lord of angels would reserve it to
himself to give her that comfort. Blessed be thy name for ever, O
adorable Jesus, who so tenderly wipest away the tears of thy servants
with thy own hand, and sweet voice, and convertest their sorrow into
transports of inexpressible joy. Jesus first manifested himself to
the Magdalen in disguise to make a trial himself of her love; but his
tenderness could not suffer a delay, and he soon discovered himself
openly to her; for, as soon as she had returned the answer above
mentioned to the angels, she turned about, and saw Jesus himself
standing by her, but took him for the gardener. He asked her why
she wept, and whom she sought. She said to him, “Sir, if thou hast
taken him hence tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him
away.” According to the remark of St. Bernard and St. Thomas of Villa
Nova, love made her not to name him, because being full of Him alone,
she imagined every body else must be so too, and that this stranger
must understand of whom she spoke. Love also made her forget her own
weakness, and think herself able to carry a heavy corpse, provided
she could be so happy any way as to serve her beloved; for to ardent
love nothing seems impossible or difficult. Jesus, infinitely pleased
with her earnestness and love, manifested himself to her, saying with
his sweet and amiable voice; _Mary!_ He at first mentioned her tears,
and the object which she so earnestly sought, to excite her love. All
this while she knew him not, though he was present, and conversing
with her, because these words carried not with them the ray of light
to discover him; but her name was no sooner pronounced by him, but
his voice excited in her a rapture of light and love, and gave her
the most sublime and full knowledge, and the sweetest enjoyment of
the most desirable of objects, of him risen in glory who was the life
of the world, and her life. Hearing him sweetly call her by her name,
and thus knowing him, she turning said, _Rabboni_, that is, Master.
And casting herself at his feet in transports of devotion she would
have embraced them. But Jesus said to her, “Do not touch me; for I
have not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren, and tell
them, that I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your
God.” That is, my Father by nature, yours by grace, says St. Austin.
He bade her make haste to carry his message to his beloved disciples
for their speedy comfort, and not lose time in giving demonstrations
of her reverence and love. St. Leo explains these words of our Lord
as follows,[254] “It is not a time to demonstrate your affection
for me in such a manner as if I were in a mortal state; I am with
you but for a short time, to strengthen your faith. When I shall
have ascended to my Father, then you shall again possess me for
eternity.” Thus Mary Magdalen, out of whom Jesus had cast seven evil
spirits, was the first that saw Him after his rising from the dead.
This pre-eminence of grace, this distinguishing favor and love of
Jesus was the recompense of her ardent love, by which she attended
last his body in the sepulchre, from which she was only drawn by the
duty of the Sabbath; and she was the first who returned thither: she
sought him dead, and found him living. In obedience to his commands
she immediately departed to acquaint the apostles with the joyful
message.[255] Jesus, who suffered her so long at his feet to satisfy
her ardent love and compunction when he received her to mercy, here
allows her, after her long search, scarce to remain a few moments
in the state of enjoyment; but he separates himself from her to
return into the secret of inaccessible light, invisible to mortal
eye. Why does not he who is Life itself allow her to live in his
happy presence? Why does not he allow her at least as many hours of
enjoyment as she had spent in her search of him? But this separation
itself is an effect of his greatest love, this life being a state
of action, of conflict, and of trials for the exercise of virtue;
and Magdalen in this separation itself which was from him, by his
appointment, and for her greater advancement in his love, found by
obedience, zeal, and resignation to his will, her comfort, life, and
great increase of his love and all graces. The other devout women who
had seen the angels at the sepulchre, in their return to Jerusalem,
were also favored with an apparition of our Lord. He having met and
saluted them, they prostrated themselves at his feet, and embraced
them worshipping him, though they were greatly afraid.[256] Jesus bid
them not fear, but go and tell his brethren that he would go before
them into Galilee, where they should see him.[257]

It is an ancient popular tradition of the inhabitants of Provence
in France, that St. Mary Magdalen, or perhaps, Mary the sister of
Lazarus, St. Martha, and St. Lazarus, with some other disciples of
our Lord, after his ascension, being expelled by the Jews, put to
sea, and landed safe at Marseilles, of which church they were the
founders, St. Lazarus being made the first bishop of that city.[259]
The relics of these saints were discovered in Provence in the
thirteenth century, those of St. Mary Magdalen at a place now called
St. Maximin’s, those of St. Martha at Tarascon upon the Rhone,
and others in St. Victor’s at Marseilles. They were authentically
proved genuine by many monuments found with them in these several
places. Charles I., king of Naples and brother of St. Louis, was at
that time sovereign count of Provence; but he being then in Naples
engaged in war with the house of Arragon, his son Charles of Anjou,
prince of Salerno, governed Provence. This prince was beaten at sea
by the fleet of the king of Arragon in 1284, and taken prisoner;
and though his father died the year following, he could not recover
his liberty before the year 1288. He ascribed his deliverance to
the intercession of our saint, the discovery of whose relics had
excited his devotion to her; he had already founded the church of
St. Maximin’s upon the spot where they were discovered, and assisted
at the solemn translation of them in 1279. He committed this royal
foundation to the Dominican friars, and the prior, who is nominated
by the king, is exempt from the ordinary jurisdiction both of the
archbishop of Aix, and of the immediate superiors of his Order.
The chief part of the relics of this saint was translated from the
subterraneous chapel in the middle of this church, and being put in
a porphyry urn, the present of pope Urban VIII. was placed over the
high altar. King Louis XIV., and the principal noblemen of his court,
were present at this translation, which was performed with great pomp
in 1660. The saint’s head, with many other relics, remains in the
subterraneous chapel; it is set in a gold case enchased with large
diamonds, and surmounted with the royal crown of Charles II. styled
king of Sicily or Naples. Before it is a curious statue of queen Anne
of Brittany, on her knees, made of enamelled gold. Three leagues from
St. Maximin’s, towards Marseilles, is a famous solitary convent of
Dominicans, situated on a very high rock, encompassed on every side
with wild deserts and mountains. It is called La Ste. Baume; which
in the Provençal language signifies Holy Cave. It was anciently a
celebrated hermitage, and is a place now resorted to by pilgrims,
out of devotion to this glorious saint. Both Latins and Greeks keep
the festival of St. Mary Magdalen on the 22d of July; it is in some
places a holiday of precept, and was such formerly in England, as
appears from the council of Oxford in 1222.

* * * * *

The pious cardinal Berulle was most tenderly devoted to this great
saint, whom he called his principal patroness; and nothing can be
more affecting in sentiments of compunction and divine love than
the discourses which he has left us in her honor.[260] She is the
excellent model of penitents. If we have sinned, why do not we by
her example speedily lay hold of the sovereign remedy of penance? If
violent temptations and terrible enemies seem to stand in our way, if
the world allures us, if the devil fights fiercely against us, and
unbridled passions are rebellious and clamorous, other penitents have
courageously surmounted greater obstacles than we can meet with. God
incites us no less than he did them, and he is no less ready to fight
in us and for us. Jesus holds out the crown to encourage us, and has
already prepared the banquet of spiritual joy and sweetness for us at
our return. If we arise in earnest he will come, and will make his
solemn supper in our soul; and there will be exultation and a voice
resounding praise through the whole heavenly court; but we must never
think our penance accomplished, must never put a stop to our tears
so long as we remember that we have sinned: God prolongs our life
that we may continue to weep for our ingratitude in having offended
him. If our conversion be sincere, to make amends for past losses and
offences, we must consecrate to the divine service with the utmost
fervor all our time, and all that we are to do. The Magdalen, after
Jesus Christ had rendered himself master of her soul, had neither
heart nor liberty but to give herself entirely to her deliverer.

SAINT VANDRILLE OR WANDRE GISILUS.

ABBOT OF FONTENELLES IN NORMANDY.

He was nearly related to Pepin of Landen and Erchinoald, the two
first lords in the kingdom of Austrasia; and in his youth was made
count of the palace under Dagobert I. He was humble on the highest
pinnacle of honors, and mortified amidst pleasures. To retrieve
himself from the dissipation and other ill effects, of which hurry
and much conversation with the world are dangerous occasions, he
frequently retired into his closet, and there conversed much with
God by devout prayer, and with himself by serious consideration on
his own duties, condition, and spiritual miseries. In compliance
with the will of his parents he took to wife a virtuous and noble
lady; but, on the very day of his marriage, obtained her consent
that they should both consecrate their virginity to God; which they
did by a mutual vow on the same day. Vandrille in 629 took the
monastic habit at Montfaucon in Champagne, an abbey then lately
founded by St. Baudri. He afterward built a monastery upon his own
estate, called Elisang. In order to perfect himself in the most
approved rules and exercises of an ascetic or monastic life, he
took a journey to Bobio and to Rome. After his return into France
he spent ten years in the monastery of Romans, on the Isere. After
which term, with the blessing of his abbot, he repaired to St. Oüen,
archbishop of Rouen, by whom he was some time after ordained priest.
In 648 the saint founded the famous monastery of Fontenelles, five
leagues below Rouen, in the territory of Caux, in which he in a short
time saw himself at the head of three hundred monks. His life was
always most austere; he slept little, was clad in sackcloth, and
was most scrupulously exact in all the exercises of the monastic
rule, in which, he was well assured, the sanctification of his state
consisted. He went to receive the recompense of his labors on the
22d of July in 666, being ninety-six years old. He was buried in the
church of St. Paul, now in ruins: his body was translated by St.
Bainus into that of St. Peter’s, still standing; and in 944 to Ghent.
It was lost in the persecution of the Calvinists in 1578; but an arm
had been restored to Fontenelles, and the other arm been given to
the abbey of Brone; where these relics are still preserved. See his
two lives of the same age in Mabillon, and in Bosch the Bollandist,
Julij, t. 5, p. 253. Also Gallia Christ. Nova, t. 11, p. 155, 166,
and the history of the translation of his relics to the abbey of
Blandine, now St. Peter’s at Ghent, and a history of his miracles,
with F. Bosch’s notes, t. 5, p. 281; also F. Toussaint-du-Plessis,
Descript. Geogr. Hist. de la Haute Normandie.

SAINT JOSEPH OF PALESTINE.

COMMONLY CALLED COUNT JOSEPH.

The Jews, after the destruction of Jerusalem, erected two academies,
the one at Babylon, the other at Tiberias, a city on the lake of
Genesareth, rebuilt by Herod, in honor of the emperor Tiberias.
Both these schools flourished till the Saracen empire overran those
countries. That of Tiberias produced the Massoretes or Massoretic
doctors, so famous for the invention of the vowel points in the
Hebrew tongue, and their care in preserving the genuine text of the
holy bible. Though the Jews then retained no sort of jurisdiction or
form of government, yet they chose one among their chief doctors to
whom they gave the title of patriarch or prince of the captivity.
The most celebrated person who ever bore this honor among them was
Hillel, whose name is still in great veneration with the Jews, and
who was their most learned oracle, and the principal founder and
ornament of their academy at Tiberias. This Hillel, a few days before
his death, sent for a Christian bishop in the neighborhood under the
character of a physician, who ordered a bath to be prepared in his
chamber, as if it had been for his health, and baptized him in it.
Hillel received the divine mysteries, and died.

Joseph, one of his assistants, called Apostoli, whose life we are
writing, was witness to this secret transaction, and having always
been the confident of Hillel, had the care of his son Judas who
succeeded him in the dignity of patriarch of the Jews. He found the
holy gospels in Hillel’s treasure, and read them with incredible
pleasure. The young patriarch fell into evil courses, and employed
magical arts to seduce a Christian woman; but the sign of the cross
made his charms of no effect. Joseph was surprised to hear this
prodigy. He seemed in a dream one night to see Christ, and to hear
from his mouth these words, “I am Jesus whom thy fathers crucified;
believe in me.” He relished our holy faith more than ever, and going
into Cilicia to collect the tenths for the patriarch, he borrowed
again the holy gospels. The Jews, already dissatisfied with his
conduct, finding him with this holy book, dragged him to their
synagogue, and cruelly scourged him. They were preparing worse
treatment for him when the bishop rescued him out of their hands.
Joseph having already begun to suffer for Christ, was soon disposed
to receive baptism.

Constantine the Great became master of the East in 323. He gave
Joseph the title and rank of count, with authority to build churches
over Palestine, wherever he should judge proper. Joseph began to
raise one at Tiberias. The Jews employed many artifices to hinder
the work, and stopped his lime-kilns from burning by enchantments,
but he, making the sign of the cross upon a vessel of water, and
invoking the name of Jesus, poured it on the kilns, and the fire
instantly burst forth and burned with great activity. Count Joseph
showed no less zeal against the Arians than against the Jews, and
both conspired together to persecute him; but he was protected by his
dignity of count, which gave him a superior command and authority.
Joseph, however, when the emperor Constantius persecuted the orthodox
prelates, retired from Tiberias to the neighboring city Scythopolis,
where, in 355, he lodged St. Eusebius of Vercelli, banished by the
Arians. His was the only Catholic house in that town. He harbored
many other illustrious servants of God, and among the rest St.
Epiphanius, who had from his own mouth the particulars here related.
Joseph was then seventy years of age. He died soon after, about
the year 356. The Greeks and Latins both mention his name in their
martyrologies. See St. Epiphanius, hær. 30, c. 4. Tillemont, t. 7.
Fleury, l. 11, n. 35. Dom Gervaise in his life of St. Epiphanius, c.
18, 19, 20, and Pinius the Bollandist, t. 5, Julij, p. 238.

ST. MENEVE, ABBOT.

He was born in Anjou of a family allied to the emperor Charlemagne.
From his infancy it was his only ambition to serve Christ with his
whole heart. When he was of an age to be settled in the world, his
parents obliged him to accept a ring sent him by a great lord of the
country named Baronte, as a token that he would marry his daughter;
but to prevent this engagement, he fled into Auvergne, and there
received the monastic habit at the hands of St. Chaffre or Theofrede,
who was then œconome of the monastery of Carmery or Cormeri, so
called from its founder Carmen, duke of that country, since called
St. Theofrede’s or Chaffre’s monastery in Auvergne, four leagues from
Puy in Velay, whom he had met at Menat, and followed to this abbey.
Here he lived seven years under the holy abbot Eudo; then returned to
Menat seven leagues from Clermont; this monastery he built in such a
manner as to have borne the name of its founder. He governed it for
many years with great sanctity, and died in 720. He is honored with
singular veneration in Auvergne and Anjou, and mentioned by Usuard
on the 22d of July. See Mabillon, Sec. 3, Ben., part 1, Labbe, t.
2, Bibl. Novæ, p. 591. Branche, Vies des SS. d’Auvergne et Velay.
Baillet, &c.

ST. DABIUS OR DAVIUS, C.

A zealous Irish priest who preached with wonderful fruit in his own
country and in Albany in Scotland; is titular saint of the parish of
Domnach Cluana in the county of Down, and of Kippau in the Highlands,
where a famous church is dedicated to God under his invocation by the
name of Movean. See Colgan in MSS.

JULY XXIII.

SAINT APOLLINARIS, MARTYR.

BISHOP OF RAVENNA.

See Pinius in the Acts of the Saints, Julij, t. 5, p. 329,
and Farlat, Illyrici Sacra, t. 1, p. 259.

St. Apollinaris was the first bishop of Ravenna. Bede, in his true
Martyrology, says that he sat twenty years, and was crowned with
martyrdom in the reign of Vespasian. His acts say that he was a
disciple of St. Peter, and made by him bishop of Ravenna. Though
their authority deserves little regard, this circumstance must
be allowed, being agreeable to the time, and supported by other
authorities. St. Peter Chrysologus, the most illustrious among his
successors, has left us a sermon in honor of our saint,[261] in which
he often styles him a martyr; but adds, that though he frequently
spilt portions of his blood for the faith, and ardently desired to
lay down his life for Christ, yet God preserved him a long time to
his Church, and did not suffer the persecutors to take away his life.
So he seems to have only been a martyr by the torments he endured
for Christ, which he survived at least some days. His body lay
first at Classis, four miles from Ravenna, still a kind of suburb
to that city, and its sea-port, till it was choked up by the sands.
In the year 549 his relics were removed into a more secret vault in
the same church, as an inscription still extant there testifies.
See Mabillon.[262] St. Fortunatus exhorted his friends to make
pilgrimages to his tomb, and St. Gregory the Great ordered parties
in doubtful suits at law to be sworn before it. Pope Honorius built
a church under his name in Rome about the year 630. It occurs in all
Martyrologies, and the high veneration which the Church paid early
to his memory is a sufficient testimony of his eminent sanctity and
apostolic spirit.

The virtue of the saints was true and heroic, because humble, and
proof against all trials. That of the heathen philosophers was lame,
and generally false and counterfeit, whence Tertullian calls the
latter, Traders in fame. “Where is now the similitude,” says he,
“between a philosopher and a Christian? a disciple of Greece and of
heaven? a trader in fame, and a saver of souls?[263] between a man
of words, and a man of works?” And St. Jerom writes, “A philosopher
is an animal of fame, one who basely drudges for the breath of the
people.”[264] Lactantius severely rallies Cicero, because, though he
was very sensible of the vanity of the worship then established, yet
he would not have that truth told the people for fear of unhinging
the religion of the state. “Now what is to be done with a man,”
says our Christian philosopher, “who knows himself in an error, yet
wilfully dashes upon a rock, that the people may do so too? who makes
no use of his wisdom for the regulation of his life, but entangles
himself to ensnare others, whom, as the wiser person, he was obliged
to rescue from error? But O Cicero, if you have any regard for
virtue, attempt rather to deliver the people out of ignorance. It is
a noble enterprise, and worthy all your powers of eloquence. Never
fear but your oratory will hold out in so good a cause, which never
failed you in the defence of so many bad ones. But Socrates’s prison
is the thing you dread; and therefore truth must want a patron; but
certainly, as a wise man, you ought to despise death in competition
with truth; and you had fallen much more honorably by speaking well
of truth, than for speaking ill of Antony; nor will you ever rise to
that height of glory by your Philippics, as you would have done by
laboring to undeceive the world, and dispute the people into their
senses.”[265] The philosophers did not love truth well enough to
suffer for it. Plato dissembled, for fear of Socrates’s hemlock; but
the Christian religion raised its professors above all considerations
present, for the joy that was set before them.

ST. LIBORIUS, BISHOP OF MANS, C.

He was descended of a noble Gaulish family, and by his innocence and
sanctity of life was recommended to the priesthood in the church of
Mans. He loved retirement and prayer, never conversed with seculars
but on spiritual accounts, and linked himself only with those among
the clergy whose actions and words were such as might inspire him
more and more with the spirit of his state. His distinguished
learning and virtue fixed all eyes upon him, and in 348 he was
chosen fourth bishop of Mans. Indefatigable in all the functions of
his charge, he prayed and fasted much, and was most attentive in
succoring the necessities of the poor, by that means to draw down the
blessing of God upon himself and his flock. He built and endowed many
new churches in his diocess, and having governed it forty-nine years,
died about the year 397. His remains were translated to Paderborn in
836, and he is honored as patron of that city. See Tillemont, t. 10,
p. 307. Fleury, l. 28, n. 61, p. 495.

JULY XXIV.

ST. LUPUS, BISHOP OF TROYES, C.

From his ancient accurate life, extant in Surius, and
illustrated with notes by F. Bosch the Bollandist, Julij,
t. 7, p. 19. See also Ceillier, t. 15, p. 40. Tillemont,
t. 16, p. 127. Rivet, Hist. Littér. t. 2, p. 486. Calmet,
Hist. de Lorraine, t. 1, l. 6, n. 44, p. 274, and Camuzat,
Catal. Episc. Trecens. p. 153, et Antiquitates Tricassinæ,
&c., 8vo., 1610.

A. D. 478.

St. Lupus, called in French St. Leu, was born of a noble family at
Toul, and being learned and eloquent, pleaded at the bar for some
years with great reputation. He married Pimeniola, a virtuous sister
of St. Hilary of Arles. After six years spent in holy wedlock,
fired with an ardent desire of serving God with greater perfection,
they parted by mutual consent, and made a mutual vow of perpetual
continency. Lupus betook himself to the famous abbey of Lerins, then
governed by St. Honoratus. He lived there a year, and added many
austerities to those prescribed by the rule, yet always regulated
his fervor by the advice of St. Honoratus. He sold great part of his
estate for the benefit of the poor, when he renounced the world.
After the first year, when St. Honoratus was made bishop of Arles, he
went to Macon in Burgundy to dispose of an estate he had left there,
in charitable uses. He was preparing to return to Lerins when he was
met by the deputies of the church of Troyes, which, upon the death of
St. Ursus, in 426, had chosen him bishop, the eighth from St. Amator,
founder of this see. His resistance was to no purpose, and he was
consecrated by the prelates of the province of Sens. In this dignity
he continued the same practices of humility, mortification, and as
much as possible even of poverty. He never wore any other garments
than a sackcloth and a single tunic, lay upon boards, and allotted
every second night entire to watching in prayer. He often passed
three days without taking any nourishment, and after so rigorous a
fast allowed himself nothing but a little barley bread. Thus he lived
above twenty years; laboring at the same time in all his pastoral
functions with a zeal worthy an apostle.

About the latter end of the fourth century, Pelagius, a British
monk, and Celestius a Scot, broached their heresy in Africa, Italy,
and the East, denying the corruption of human nature by original
sin, and the necessity of divine grace. One Agricola, a disciple of
these heresiarchs, had spread this poison in Britain. The Catholics
addressed themselves to their neighbors the bishops of Gaul, begging
their assistance to check the growing evil. An assembly of bishops,
probably held at Arles in 429, deputed St. Germanus of Auxerre and
St. Lupus of Troyes, to go over into our island to oppose this
mischief. The two holy pastors, burning with zeal for the glory of
Christ, accepted the commission the more willingly as it seemed
laborious and painful. They came over and entirely banished the
heresy by their prayers, preaching, and miracles. St. Lupus, after
his return, set himself with fresh vigor to reform the manners of his
own flock. In this he displayed so great prudence and piety, that St.
Sidonius Apollinaris calls him, “The father of fathers and bishop of
bishops, the chief of the Gallican prelates, the rule of manners, the
pillar of truth, the friend of God, and the intercessor to him for
men.”[266] He spared no pains to save one lost sheep, and his labors
were often crowned with a success which seemed miraculous. Among
other instances it is recorded that a certain person of his diocess,
named Gallus, had forsaken his wife and withdrawn to Clermont. St.
Lupus could not see this soul perish, but wrote to St. Sidonius,
then bishop of Clermont, a strong letter so prudently tempered
with sweetness, that Gallus by reading it was at once terrified
and persuaded, and immediately set out to return to his wife. Upon
which St. Sidonius cried out, “What is more wonderful than a single
reprimand, which both affrights a sinner into compunction, and makes
him love his censor!” This letter of St. Lupus and several others
are lost; but we have one by which he congratulated Sidonius upon
his promotion to his see, having passed from a secular prefecture or
government to the episcopacy, which charge he shows to be laborious,
difficult and dangerous. He strongly exhorts him, above all things,
to humility. This letter was written in 471, and is given us by
D’Achery.[267]

God at that time afflicted the western empire with grievous
calamities, and Attila with a numberless army of Huns overran
Gaul, calling himself “The Scourge of God,” to punish the sins of
the people. Rheims, Cambray, Besançon, Auxerre, and Langres had
already felt the effects of his fury, and Troyes was the next place
threatened. The holy bishop had recourse to God in behalf of his
people by fervent prayer, which he continued for many days, prostrate
on the ground, fasting and weeping without intermission. At length,
putting on his bishop’s attire, full of confidence in God, he went
out to meet the barbarian at the head of his army. Attila, though an
infidel, seeing him, was moved to reverence the man of God, who came
up to him boldly, followed by his clergy in procession, with a cross
carried before them. He spoke to the king first, and asked him who
he was? “I am,” said Attila, “the scourge of God.” “Let us respect
whatever comes to us from God,” replied the bishop; “but if you are
the scourge with which heaven chastises us, remember you are to do
nothing but what that almighty hand, which governs and moves you,
permits.” Attila, struck with these words, promised the prelate to
spare the city. Thus the saint’s prayer was a better defence than
the most impregnable ramparts. It protected a city which had neither
arms, nor garrison, nor walls, against an army of at least four
hundred thousand men, which, after plundering Thrace, Illyricum, and
Greece, crossing the Rhine, had filled with blood and desolation the
most flourishing countries of France. Attila, turning with his army
from Troyes, was met on the plains of Chalons by Aëtius, the brave
Roman general, and there defeated. In his retreat he sent for St.
Lupus, and caused him to accompany him as far as the Rhine, imagining
that the presence of so great a servant of God would be a safeguard
to himself and his army; and sending him back, he recommended himself
to his prayers. This action of the good bishop was misconstrued by
the Roman generals, as if he had favored the escape of the barbarian,
and he was obliged to leave Troyes for two years. He spent that
time in religious retirement, in great austerity and continual
contemplation. When his charity and patience had at length overcome
the envy and malice of men, he went back to his church, which he
governed fifty-two years, dying in the year 479. The chief part of
his body is kept in a rich silver shrine; his skull and principal
part of his head in another far more precious, in the figure of a
bishop, formed of silver, adorned with jewels and diamonds said by
some to be the richest in France. Both are in the abbatial church of
regular canons of St. Austin, which bears the name of St. Lupus. He
was first buried in the church of St. Martin in Areis, of the same
Order, then out of the walls, though long since within them. Many
churches in England bear his name. The family name of Sentlow among
us is derived from St. Leu, as Camden remarks.

It was by omnipotent prayer that the saints performed such great
wonders. By it Moses could ward off the destruction of many
thousands, and by a kind of holy violence disarm the divine
vengeance.[268] By it Elias called down fire and rain from heaven. By
it Manasses in chains found mercy, and recovered his throne; Ezechias
saw his health restored, and life prolonged; the Ninevites were
preserved from destruction; Daniel was delivered from the lions, St.
Peter from his chains, and St. Thecla from the fire. By it Judith and
Esther saved God’s people. By the same have the servants of God so
often commanded nature, defeated armies, removed mountains, cast out
devils, cured the sick, raised the dead, drawn down divine blessings,
and averted the most dreadful judgments from the world, which, as an
ancient father says, subsists by the prayers of the saints.[269]

ST. FRANCIS SOLANO, C.

This saint was born at Montilia in Andalusia to 1549, performed his
studies in the schools of the Jesuits, and in 1569 made his religious
profession amongst the Franciscans in the place of his nativity. An
extraordinary humility and contempt of himself and of worldly vanity
and applause; self-denial, obedience, meekness, patience, and the
love of silence, recollection, and prayer mental and vocal, formed
his character. Whole nights he frequently passed without sleep on the
steps of the altar, before the Blessed Sacrament, in meditation and
devout prayer, with wonderful interior delight and devotion. Burning
with holy zeal and charity, and an ardent desire of the salvation of
souls, after he was promoted to the priesthood, he divided his time
between silent retirement and the ministry of preaching. His sermons,
though destitute of the ornaments of studied eloquence, powerfully
withdrew men from vice, and kindled in their breasts an ardent desire
of virtue. The saint was appointed master of novices, first in the
convent of Arizava, two miles from Cordova, afterward in that of
Monte. Then he was made guardian in the province of Granada. His
whole life, says Alvarez de Paz, may be called a holy uninterrupted
course of zealous action, yet was at the same time a continued
most fervent prayer, abounding with heavenly illuminations and
consolations. A perfect spirit of poverty emptied his heart of the
love of all created things, that Christ alone might occupy and fill
it; and he rejoiced in his nakedness and privation of earthly goods,
that he might barely use them to serve the necessities of nature,
without suffering them to enslave his heart, or to find any place
in his affections, which he reserved pure and entire for spiritual
goods. Interior humility and self-denial perfected the disengagement
of his heart, and the extraordinary austerities of his penitential
life subjected his senses, and rendered the liberty which his soul
enjoyed complete; by which he was prepared for the spirit of prayer
and the pure love of heavenly things. Earthly comforts used with
moderation, and as supports of our weakness, may be sanctified by a
good intention; but whilst they bolster up our weakness, they keep it
alive and strengthen it; and if they are sought after, or made use
of with eagerness and attachment, immoderately or frequently, they
strongly nourish self love and sensuality, and produce a distrust of
the solid food of devotion and divine love.

The mortified lives of all the saints who arrived at a familiarity
with God in holy prayer, are but a comment upon, or sensible examples
of, the indispensable gospel precept of dying to ourselves. By no
other steps could St. Francis Solano have arrived at the perfection
of spiritual life. A pestilence which raged at Granada afforded
him an opportunity of exerting his heroic virtue in attending the
infected; but a more noble theatre of action was opened to him by the
mission into America, upon which he was sent. Peru and Tucuman were
the countries in which he reaped the principal harvest; and the five
last years of his life he preached chiefly at Lima, and induced the
inhabitants of that great city, by sincere repentance, to appease the
divine anger, which they had provoked by their sins. The reputation
of his wonderful sanctity was enhanced by many miracles. Yet by
humility he looked upon himself as the least among men, and he never
appeared in public but when called abroad by zeal for the salvation
of souls. Before his death he was purified by a lingering illness,
and in his last moments repeated those words of the psalmist: _I have
rejoiced in those things which have been said to me: We will go into
the house of the Lord_. He departed this life on the 14th of June
in 1610, the sixty-second of his age, and fortieth of his religious
profession. F. Alvarez de Paz, an eye-witness, describes the stately
and religious pomp of his funeral, at which the viceroy of Peru and
the archbishop of Lima assisted, with extraordinary devotion. The
saint was beatified by Clement X. and canonized by Benedict XIII. in
1726, and his principal festival was appointed on the 24th of July.
See his life compiled by Didacus of Cordova; also by Alphonsus of
Mondietta. See likewise the History of the Provinces of Peru, and the
edifying account of our saint given by the pious and learned Jesuit
F. Alvarez de Paz, l. 5, c. 14, t. 2, Op. p. 1752 and 1753; and
Benedict XIV., De Canoniz. t. 1, Append. Also the Lives of Saints,
published in High Dutch, by F. Maximilian Rasler, S. J.; and F.
Charlevoix, Hist. de Paraguay, t. 1, l. 3, and 4.

SS. ROMANUS AND DAVID, MM.

PATRONS OF MUSCOVY.[270]

The history of the conversion of the Russians (now called Muscovites)
to the faith of Christ, has been perplexed by the mistakes of many
who have treated this point of history. The learned Jesuit F.
Antony Possevin was betrayed into many falsities concerning this
people.[271] And upon his authority some have pretended that the
Muscovites received the faith from the Greek schismatics, and at the
same time adhered to their schism; than which, nothing can be more
notoriously false, as Henschenius and Papebrochius[272] show. F.
Stilting, another learned Bollandist, has demonstrated by an express
dissertation,[273] that the Muscovites were at first Catholics,
and that even in the time of the Council of Florence the Catholics
and schismatics in Russia made two equal halves. The Greek schism
was formed by Cerularius several years after the conversion of the
Russians. The schism indeed of Phocius was a short prelude to it.

Cedrenus, Zonaras, and some others relate, that an army of Russians
besieged Constantinople in the time of the emperor Michael III.,
when Photius held that see; and that being obliged to raise the
siege, they obtained certain Greek priests from Constantinople, who
instructed them in the Christian faith. This first mission Baronius
places in 853, Pagi in 861; but this must either be understood of
some tribe of Russians in Bohemia, where St. Cyril then preached; or
these authors must have confounded together things which happened
at different times; for the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenetta,
who lived near that time, and could not but be acquainted with this
transaction, says both in his life of his grandfather, Basil the
Macedonian, and in his book, On administering the Empire, that the
Russians besieged the city in the time of Photius, but that they
were converted to the faith by priests sent at their request from
Constantinople in the time of Basil the Macedonian and the patriarch
St. Ignatius, whom that prince restored upon his ascending the throne
in 867; which also appears from Zonarus.

The first plant of the faith in this nation was the holy queen Helen,
called before her baptism Olga. She was wife to the duke Ihor or
Igor, who undertook an expedition against the city of Constantinople,
as Simeon Metaphrastes, the monk George, Cedrenus, Zonaras, and
Curopalates relate. Having been repulsed by the generals of the
emperors Romanus and Constantine, he was slain by the Dreulans in
his return. His widow, Olga, with great valor and conduct, revenged
his death, vanquished the Dreulans, and governed the state several
years with uncommon prudence and courage. When she was almost seventy
years old, she resigned the government to her son Suatoslas, and
going to Constantinople, was there baptized, taking the name of
Helen.[274] Many place this event in 952, which date seems most
agreeable to the Greek historians; but Kulcinius and Stilting infer
from the chronology of the dukes of Russia, that she seems to have
been baptized in 945. We are expressly assured by Constantine
Porphyrogenetta that it happened in 946. She returned into her own
country, and by her zealous endeavors brought many to the faith; but
was never able to compass the conversion of her son, who was probably
withheld by reasons of state. She died in 970 or 978. Her grandson,
Uladimir, who succeeded Suatoslas, asked by a solemn embassy, and
obtained in marriage, Anne, sister to the two emperors Basil and his
colleague and brother Constantine. Nicholas Crysoberga, the orthodox
patriarch of Constantinople, a person always zealous in maintaining
the communion of the see of Rome, at that prince’s request, sent into
Muscovy one Michael with other preachers, who baptized Uladimir,
and married him to the princess about the year 988.[275] This duke
founded near Kiow the great monastery of the Cryptæ in favor of the
abbot St. Antony, and died, according to Kulcinius, in 1008. His two
sons SS. Boris and Hliba or Cliba, called in Latin Romanus and David,
were murdered by the usurper Suatopelch, their impious brother, in
1010. It was their zeal for the faith of Christ which gave occasion
to their death. Jaroslas, another brother, defeated the usurper, and
obtained the principality; his daughter Anne was married to Henry
I., king of France, in 1044, and became the foundress of the church
of St. Vincent at Senlis. Romanus and David are honored in Muscovy
on the 24th of July. Their remains were translated into a church
which was built in their honor at Vislegorod in 1072, the ceremony
being performed with great pomp, by George the fifth archbishop of
Kiow, and several other bishops, in presence of Izazlas, Suatoslas,
and Usevolod, princes of Russia, and a great train of noblemen. The
synod of Zamoski, in 1720, which was approved by the Congregation
de Propagandâ Fide, and confirmed by pope Benedict XIII., reckons
among the holidays of precept which are kept by the Catholic Russians
in Lithuania and other provinces, the feast of these two martyrs,
celebrated on the 24th of July; and that of the translation of their
relics on the 2d of May.[276] The Catholic Russians in Lithuania and
Poland keep no festival of any other Muscovite saints except of these
two martyrs.[277] But the Muscovites honor several other saints of
their own country; several among whom flourished, and doubtless were
placed by them in their Calendar before their schism, as Papebroke
and Jos. Assemani observe. Such are the queen Helen or Olga, on the
11th of July, who died, according to Kulcinius, in 978. Uladimir,
her grandson, duke of the Russians, and son of Suatoslas on the 15th
of July, who was baptized in 990, died in 1014, and was buried in
our Lady’s church at Kiow.[278] Antony, abbot, a native of Russia,
who embraced the monastic state upon Mount Athos, and returning to
Kiow, became the patriarch of that Order in his own country, and on
a mountain half a mile from the town founded, about the year 1020,
the great Russian monastery of Pieczari or the Cryptæ, in which the
archimandrite of all the Russian monks resides, and the archbishop
of Kiow has an apartment. Antony died in 1073, on the 10th of July,
on which his festival is kept in Muscovy.[279] This monastery is
famous for the Cryptæ or vaults, in which the bodies of many saints
and monks who lived above six hundred years ago, remain uncorrupted
and fresh. Agapetus, disciple of Antony, at the Cryptæ, famous for
miracles, honored on the 1st of June. Athanasius, monk at the Cryptæ,
on the 2d of December; he was a native of Trapesond, who, by the
liberality and protection of the emperor Nicephorus Phocas, founded
the great monastery on Mount Athos in Macedonia. He is honored by the
Greeks and Muscovites on the 5th of July.[280] The lives of these and
several other ancient monks of this house were written by Polycarp,
who died in 1182. The grand duke Alexander, surnamed Newski, who died
in 1262, and is honored on the 30th of April. Sergius, an abbot, is
honored by the Muscovites on the 25th of September. He died in 1292,
and was never involved in the schism, as Papebroke, Kulcinius, and
Jos. Assemani show. This Sergius was born at Roslow, founded the
monastery of the Holy Trinity at Rudosno (sixty Italian miles from
Moscow), the richest and most numerous in Muscovy, in which are
sometimes two or three hundred monks. The body of Sergius is kept
there incorrupt, and is much visited out of devotion from Moscow,
sometimes by the czars. These and several others who are named in the
Muscovite Calendar with the most eminent saints of the eastern and
western churches, lived either before or when this nation was not
engaged in the Greek schism. But to these saints the Muscovites add
some few who died since their separation from the catholic communion,
as Photius, archbishop of Kiow, whose principal merit consisted in
the obstinacy with which he maintained the schism. See Kulcinius,
Specimen Ecclesiæ Ruthenicæ; Papebroke in the beginning of May, Comm.
in Ephem. Jos. Assemani, in Calend. Univ. ad 25 Sept. t. 5, p. 254,
&c.

ST. CHRISTINA, V. M.

She suffered many torments, and a cruel death, for the faith in the
persecution of Dioclesian, at Tyro, a city which stood formerly in
an island in the lake of Bolsero in Tuscany, but has been long since
swallowed up by the waters. Her relics are now at Palermo in Sicily.
She is much honored both in the Latin and Greek church, and is named
in the Martyrologies which bear the name of St. Jerom, that of Bede
augmented by Florus, and others. See Ughelli, Italia Sacra, t. 5, and
Pinius the Bollandist, t. 5, Julij, p. 495.

SS. WULFHAD AND RUFFIN, MM.

They were two brothers, the sons of Wulfere, the king of Mercia,
second brother and successor of Peada. Having been privately baptized
by St. Chad, bishop of Litchfield, about the year 670, they were
both slain whilst they were at their prayers by their father’s
order, who, out of political views, at that time favored idolatry,
though he afterward did remarkable penance for this crime. His
father Penda had persecuted the Christians, but his elder brother
Peada had begun to establish the faith in his dominions. Florence of
Worcester says, Wulfere was only baptized a little before his death,
in 675, consequently after this murder; but Bede testifies that he
was godfather to Edelwalch, king of the West Saxons, almost twenty
years before. But either he relapsed (at least so far as to be for
some time favorable to idolatry), or this murder was contrived by
some Pagan courtiers, without his privity, as Bradshaw relates it.
The queen Emmelinda, mother of the two young princes, caused their
bodies to be buried at Stone, which place took its name from a great
heap of stones which was raised over their tomb, according to the
Saxon custom. She afterward employed these stones in building a
church upon the spot, which became very famous for bearing the names
of these martyrs who were patrons of the town, and of a priory of
regular canons there. The procurator of this house, in a journey to
Rome, prevailed on the pope to enrol these two royal martyrs among
the saints, and left the head of St. Wulfhad, which he had carried
with him, in the church of St. Laurence at Viterbo. (Leland, Collect.
t. 1, p. 1, 2.) After this, Wulfere and his brother and successor
Ethelred, abolished idols over all Mercia. See the acts of these
royal martyrs in the History of Peterborough abbey, and Leland’s
Itinerary, and Collect. t. 1, p. 1. Also Cuper the Bollandist, t. 5,
Julij, p. 571.

ST. LEWINE.

Was a British virgin who suffered martyrdom under the Saxons before
their conversion to the faith. Her body was honorably kept at Seaford
near Lewes, in Sussex, till, in 1058, her remains, with those of St.
Idaberga, virgin, and part of those of St. Oswald, were conveyed
into Flanders, and are now deposited in St. Winock’s abbey at Berg.
They have been honored by many miracles, especially at the time of
this translation, as even the century-writers of Magdeburg mention.
A history of these miracles written by Drogo, an eye-witness to
several, is published by Solier the Bollandist, p. 608, t. 5, Jul.
See also Alford in Annal. ad an. 687, n. 21.

ST. DECLAN.

FIRST BISHOP OF ARDMORE IN IRELAND.

Was baptized by St. Colman, and preached the faith in that country a
little before the arrival of St. Patrick, who confirmed the episcopal
see of Ardmore, in a synod at Cashel in 448.[281] Many miracles
are ascribed to St. Declan, and he has ever been much honored in
the viscounty of Dessee, anciently Nandesi. See Usher; Bosch the
Bollandist, p. 590, and Colgan in MSS. ad 24 Julij.

ST. KINGA, OR CUNEGUNDES, V.

She was daughter of Bela IV. king of Hungary, and Mary, daughter
to Theodorus Lascharis, emperor of Constantinople: was married
1239 to Boleslas the Chaste, sovereign of Lesser Poland, or of the
palatinates of Cracow, Sandomire, and Lublin; but by mutual consent
lived in perpetual chastity. Prayer, mortification, alms, and daily
attendance on the poor in the hospitals, employed her time. Boleslas
dying in 1279, she took the veil in the great monastery of Sandecz,
which she had lately built for nuns of the Order of St. Clare. She
died on the 24th of July in 1292. She was venerated with singular
piety in the diocess of Cracow and several other parts of Poland, and
her name was solemnly inscribed among the saints by Alexander VIII.
in 1690. See her life by John Longinus commonly called Dlugos, with
remarks by Bosch the Bollandist, t. 5, Julij, p. 661.

JULY XXV.

ST. JAMES THE GREAT, APOSTLE.

St. James, the brother of St. John Evangelist, son of Zebedee
and Salome and nearly related to Christ, was called the Great to
distinguish him from the other apostle of the same name who was
bishop of Jerusalem, and is surnamed the Less, perhaps because he was
lower in stature, or more probably because he was the younger. St.
James the Great seems to have been born about twelve years before
Christ, and was many years older than his brother St. John. Salome is
otherwise called Mary, and was sister to the Blessed Virgin, which
some take in the strict sense of the word; others understand by it
only cousin-german, according to the Hebrew phrase, and think that
the Blessed Virgin was an only daughter.

St. James was by birth a Galilean, and by profession a fisherman
with his father and brother, living probably at Bethsaida, where
St. Peter also dwelt at that time. Jesus walking by the lake of
Genesareth saw St. Peter and St. Andrew fishing, and he called them
to come after him, promising to make them fishers of men. Going on
a little farther on the shore, he saw two other brothers, James and
John, in a ship, with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and
he also called them; who forthwith left their nets and their father
and followed him.[282] Probably by conversing with St. Peter their
townsman, and by other means, they had before this call an entire
conviction that Jesus was the Christ; and no sooner did they hear
his invitation, and saw the marks of his divine will directing them
to what was eminently conducive to his honor, but the same moment
they quitted all things to comply with this summons. They held no
consultation, made no demur, started no difficulties, thought of
no consequences or dangers; and their sacrifice was most perfect
and entire. Like Abraham, they preferred obedience to the divine
command, before all the endearments of their nearest relations,
and forsook all they had, and all their hopes and prospects in
the world, to become the disciples of Jesus. Zebedee their father
seems to have approved of their resolution, and their mother Salome
devoted herself heartily to the service of our Lord, as the gospels
frequently mention. All fervent souls ought to be in the like
dispositions of perfect sacrifice with these apostles, without the
least inordinate attachment to any thing on earth, being most ready
to renounce everything if God’s greater glory should require it. With
what boundless liberality does the Divine Spirit shower down his
choicest treasures upon souls which thus perfectly open themselves
to him! This the apostles, of whom we speak, happily experienced in
themselves. But they for some time so followed Christ, and listened
to his divine instructions, as still to return from time to time to
their fishing trade for a maintenance. It was in the same first year
of Christ’s preaching that Peter and Andrew, at the command of their
divine Master, took a prodigious shoal of fishes by a miraculous
draught. James and John were their partners, though in another boat,
and were called in to assist in hauling up the nets. Astonished at
this manifestation of Christ’s power, they entirely quitted their
business, the more perfectly to attach themselves to him.[283]

In the year 31 St. James was present with his brothers St. John
and St. Peter at the cure of St. Peter’s mother-in-law, and at the
raising of the daughter of Jairus from the dead. This same year Jesus
formed the college of his apostles, into which he adopted St. James
and his brother St. John. He gave these two the surname of Boanerges,
or Sons of Thunder, probably to denote their active zeal. When a town
of the Samaritans refused to entertain Christ, they suggested that
he should call down fire from heaven to consume it; but our Blessed
Redeemer gave them to understand that meekness and patience were the
arms by which they were to conquer.[284] Christ distinguished St.
Peter, St. James, and St. John by many special favors above the rest
of the apostles. They alone were admitted to be spectators first of
his glorious transfiguration, and afterward of his agony and bloody
sweat in the garden. The instructions and example of the Son of God
had not fully enlightened the understandings of these apostles, nor
purified their hearts, before the Holy Ghost had shed his beams
upon them; and their virtue was still imperfect, as appeared in the
following instance;--Mary Salome, the mother of James and John,
relying upon their merit, and her relation to Christ, and imagining
that he was going to erect a temporal monarchy, according to the
notion of the carnal Jews concerning the Messias, presented to him a
request that her two sons might sit, the one on his right hand and
the other on his left, in his kingdom. By this example we are put in
mind how often the fondness of parents renders them the spiritual
murderers of their own children, and makes them blindly excuse,
flatter, and encourage their secret vices and passions. At the same
time we are taught how formidable an enemy ambition is, which could
find admittance in the breasts of two apostles (though yet novices)
before the descent of the Holy Ghost. They doubtless disguised their
vice under the cloak of a reasonable desire, and a virtuous emulation
of preferment, with a design of serving their Master by it. Only the
children of light discover the deceit and snare of this enemy; only
profound humility discerns and condemns the specious pretences of
subtle pride and covetousness. The two sons of Zebedee seem to have
spoken by the mouth of their mother; wherefore Christ directed his
answer to them, telling them, they knew not what they asked; for in
his kingdom preferments are attainable, not by the most forward and
ambitious, but by the most humble, and most laborious, and the most
patient. He therefore asked them if they were able to drink of his
cup of suffering. The two apostles understanding the condition under
which Christ offered them his kingdom, and glowing with ardor and
courage to suffer, answered peremptorily they were able to do it. Our
Lord told them, they should indeed have their portions of suffering;
but for the honors of his kingdom, he could make no other disposal of
them than according to his decrees in conjunction with his Father, in
proportion to every one’s charity and patience in suffering.

The virtue of the most fervent novices in the service of God is very
imperfect, so long as entire self-denial, and a great assiduity and
spirit of prayer have not yet prepared their souls for, and called
down upon them a plentiful effusion of the Holy Ghost, who fills
their understanding with a clear and new heavenly light, and by
the ardor of his charity consumes the rust of the affections, and
fills them with his fervor. In this state even the moral virtues
acquire an heroic and infused degree of perfection. Humility now
gives the soul a much more clear and feeling knowledge of her
own infirmities, baseness, and imperfections, with much stronger
sentiments of a just contempt of herself; and the like is to be said
of divine and fraternal charity, and all other virtues; so that she
seems to herself translated into a region of new light, in which by
continual heroic acts of these virtues, and especially of prayer
and contemplation, she makes daily and wonderful advances. This
perfection the apostles received in a more miraculous manner by the
descent of the Holy Ghost upon them, when he not only engraved the
law of love deeply in their hearts, but also bestowed on them the
external graces and gifts of prophecy and miracles, and qualified
them for the execution of the great commission they had received from
Christ.

How St. James was employed in preaching and promoting the gospel
after Christ’s ascension, we have no account from the writers of
the first ages of Christianity. It appears that he left Judæa some
time after the persecution that was raised at the martyrdom of St.
Stephen in the year 30, and was returned again ten years after when
he suffered martyrdom. The addition to St. Jerom’s catalogue of
illustrious men tells us, that he preached the gospel to the twelve
tribes of the Jews, in their dispersion up and down the world. Though
the apostles, during the first twelve years, preached generally in
the neighborhood of Judea, yet St. James might in that interval
make a voyage to Spain, and preach some time in that country, as
Baronius observes. F. Cuper adds, that his martyrdom happened above
a year after the dispersion of the apostles, in which space he had
the fairest opportunity of visiting Spain. That he preached there is
constantly affirmed by the tradition of that church, mentioned by
St. Isidore, the Breviary of Toledo, the Arabic books of Anastasius
patriarch of Antioch, concerning the Passions of the martyrs and
others. Cuper the Bollandist[285] traces this tradition very high,
and confirms it from St. Jerom,[286] St. Isidore, the ancient
Spanish office, &c., and from many corroborating circumstances. St.
Epiphanius says, that St. James always lived a bachelor, in much
temperance and mortification, never eating flesh nor fish; that he
wore only one coat, and a linen cloak, and that he was holy and
exemplary in all manner of conversation. He was the first among the
apostles who had the honor to follow his divine master by martyrdom,
which he suffered at Jerusalem, whither he was returned, in the
eleventh year after our Lord’s ascension.

Agrippa, the grandson of Herod, by Aristobulus, was author of this
persecution. Being brought up at Rome in the reign of Tiberius, he,
basely flattering Caligula in his passions, gained the confidence
of that monster, who was no sooner placed on the imperial throne
than he gave Agrippa the title of king, with the tetrarchies of
Philip and Lysanias, which were then vacant.[287] Claudius, in the
year 41, enlarged his dominions, giving him also Jerusalem and all
the rest of Judæa, Samaria, and whatever other provinces had been
possessed by his grandfather Herod. He gave also to his younger
brother Herod the little kingdom of Chalcis in Syria, near mount
Labinus. Agrippa reigned with great state and magnificence. Being
very fond of pleasing the Jewish nation, when he came from Cæsarea to
Jerusalem to keep the Passover in the year 43, he began to persecute
the Christians; and the first who fell a victim to his popular
zeal was St. James the Great, whom he caused to be apprehended
and beheaded there a little before Easter, in the year 43, about
fourteen years after the death of Christ. Clement of Alexandria,
and from him Eusebius,[288] relate that his accuser, observing the
great courage and constancy of mind wherewith the apostle underwent
his trial, was so affected with it, that he repented of what he had
done, declared himself publicly a Christian, and was condemned to be
beheaded with St. James. As they were both led together to execution,
he begged pardon of the apostle by the way for having apprehended
him. St. James, after pausing a little, turned to him, and embraced
him, saying, _Peace be with you_. He then kissed him, and they were
both beheaded together.[289] The body of the apostle was interred
at Jerusalem; but not long after carried by his disciples into
Spain, and deposited at Iria Flavia, now called El Padron, upon the
borders of Gallicia. The sacred relics were discovered there in the
beginning of the ninth century, in the reign of Alphonsus the Chaste,
king of Leon. By the order of that prince they were translated
to Compostella, four miles distant, to which place pope Leo III.
transferred the episcopal see from Iria Flavia. This place was first
called Ad S. Jacobum Apostolum, or Giacomo Postolo, which words have
been contracted into the present name, Compostella. It is famous
for the extraordinary concourse of pilgrims that resort thither to
visit the body of St. James, which is kept with great respect in the
stately cathedral. F. Cuper the Bollandist proves the truth of the
tradition of the Spanish church concerning the body of St. James
having been translated to Compostella, and gives authentic histories
of many miracles wrought through his intercession, and of several
apparitions by which he visibly protected the armies of a Christian
against the Moors in that kingdom.[290] The military order of St.
James, surnamed the Noble, was instituted by Ferdinand II. in 1175.

* * * * *

The Church, by the martyrdom of St. James, lost in her infancy one
of her main pillars; but God was pleased that his name should be
glorified by so illustrious a testimony, and that it should appear
he was the immediate supporter and defender of his Church. For when
it was deprived of its chief members and pastors, it remained no
less firm than before; and even grew and gathered strength from the
most violent persecutions. The apostle with confidence committed
his tender flock to God, and commended to them his own work, whilst
he rejoiced to go to his Redeemer, and to give his life for him. We
all meet with trials. But can we fear or hesitate to drink a cup
presented to us by the hand of God, and which our Lord and Captain,
by free choice, and out of pure love, was pleased himself to drink
first for our sake? He asks us whether we can drink of his cup, he
encourages us by setting before our eyes the glory of heaven, and
he invites us by his own divine example. Let us humbly implore his
grace, without which we can do nothing, and take with joy this cup of
salvation, which he presents us with his divine hand.

ST. CHRISTOPHER, M.

He suffered martyrdom under Decius in Lycia, and is honored on
this day in the Martyrology which bears the name of St. Jerom, and
in other western Calendars, but is commemorated by the Greeks and
other Oriental nations on the 9th of May. The Mosarabic Breviary,
attributed to St. Isidore, mentions the translation of his relics
to Toledo, whence they were brought into France, and are at present
shown enshrined at the abbey of St. Denys near Paris. He seems to
have taken the name of Christopher upon the like motive that St.
Ignatius would be called Theophorus, to express his ardent love for
his Redeemer, by which he always carried him in his breast as his
great and only good, his inestimable treasure, and the object of
all his affections and desires. There seem to be no other grounds
than this name for the vulgar notion of his great stature, the
origin of which seems to have been merely allegorical, as Baronius
observes, and as Vida has beautifully expressed in an epigram on
this saint.[291] The enormous statues of St. Christopher, still to
be seen in many Gothic cathedrals, expressed his allegorical wading
through the sea of tribulations, by which the faithful meant to
signify the many sufferings through which he arrived at eternal life.
They are monuments of the devotion of our ancestors to this saint,
whose intercession they implored especially against pestilential
distempers. Saint Gregory the Great mentions a monastery in Sicily
which bore the name of St. Christopher. See Pinius the Bollandist, t.
6, p. 125.

SAINTS THEA AND VALENTINA, VIRGINS, AND ST. PAUL, MM.

In the year 308 there were at the same time six emperors, successors
of Dioclesian, namely, in the East Galerius, Lucinius, and Maximinus;
in the West, Constantine, Maxentius, and his father, Maximian
Herculeus, who had reassumed the purple. Firmilian, the successor of
Urbanus in the government of Palestine, under Maximinus II., carried
on the persecution with great cruelty. When fourscore and seventeen
confessors, men, women, and children, out of an innumerable multitude
of Christians who were banished a long while before to the porphyry
quarries in Thebais, were brought before him, he commanded the sinews
of the joint of their left feet to be burnt with a hot iron; and
their right eyes to be put out, and the eye holes burnt with a hot
iron to the very bottom of the orb. In this condition he sent them to
work at the mines in Palestine about mount Libanus. Many others were
brought before this inhuman judge from different towns of Palestine,
and were tormented various ways.

Among the Christians taken at Gaza, whilst they were assembled to
hear the holy scriptures read, was a holy virgin named Thea, whom
the judge threatened with the prostitution of her chastity in the
public stews. She, to whom her virtue was most dear, reproached him
for such infamous injustices. Firmilian, enraged at her liberty of
speech, caused her to be inhumanly scourged, then stretched on the
rack, and her sides torn with iron hooks till the bare ribs appeared.
Valentina, a pious Christian virgin of Cæsarea, who had also by vow
consecrated her chastity to God, being present at this spectacle,
cried out to the judge from the midst of the crowd, “How long will
you thus torment my sister?” She was immediately apprehended, and
being dragged by force to the altar, she threw herself upon it, and
overturned it with her feet, together with the fire and sacrifice
which stood ready upon it. Firmilian, provoked beyond bounds,
commanded her sides to be more cruelly torn than any others. Being at
length wearied with tormenting her, he ordered the two virgins to be
tied together and burnt. This was executed on the 25th of July, 308.
One Paul, an illustrious confessor, was beheaded for the faith on the
same day, by an order of this judge. The fervor with which he prayed
at the place of execution for the emperor, the judge who condemned
him, and his executioner, drew tears from all that were present.
Soon after, one hundred and thirty Egyptian confessors, by an order
of Maximinus, had one eye pulled out, and one foot maimed, and were
sent, some to the mines in Palestine, others to those in Cilicia. See
Eusebius de Martyr. Palestinæ, c. 8; Tillemont, t. 5; Fleury, l. ix.;
Orsi, t. 4.

ST. CUCUFAS, M. IN SPAIN.

At Barcelona he is called St. Cougat, at Ruel, near Paris, St.
Quiquenfat, in some other parts of France St. Guinefort. He was a
native of Scillite in Africa, and one of the first families of that
country. To escape the persecution raised by Dioclesian, he retired
with St. Felix into Mauritania, and afterward into Spain. He was no
sooner landed at Barcelona but he was apprehended, and confessing his
faith before Dacian, the cruel governor, was condemned by him, after
suffering many torments, to lose his head, in 304. His companion,
Felix, received a like crown soon after him in Gironne. The relics
of St. Cucufas were brought into France in 777, and deposited in the
abbey of St. Denys, near Paris, in 835, where they still remain with
due honor. See Prudentius, hymn 4, the new Paris Breviary on this
day, the Roman Martyrology, and Bosch the Bollandist, t. 6, Jul. p.
169. See also Chatelain, Notes sur le Martyr. Fevr. 16, p. 656.

ST. NISSEN, ABBOT.

Whom St. Patrick baptized, ordained deacon, and appointed abbot of
Montgairt or Mountgarret, in the county of Wexford, on the borders of
Kilkenny, of which place he is titular saint. See Colgan in MSS. ad
25 Julij.

JULY XXVI.

SAINT ANNE, MOTHER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN.

See Cuper the Bollandist, t. 6, Julij, p. 233.

The Hebrew word Anne signifies gracious. St. Joachim and St. Anne,
the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary, are justly honored in the
Church, and their virtue is highly extolled by St. John Damascen.
The emperor Justinian I. built a church at Constantinople in honor
of St. Anne, about the year 550.[292] Codinus mentions another built
by Justinian II. in 705. Her body was brought from Palestine to
Constantinople in 710, whence some portions of her relics have been
dispersed in the West. F. Cuper the Bollandist has collected a great
number of miracles wrought through her intercession.[293]

God has been pleased by sensible effects to testify how much he
is honored by the devotion of the faithful to this saint, who was
the great model of virtue to all engaged in the married state, and
charged with the education of children. It was a sublime dignity and
a great honor for this saint to give to a lost world the advocate
of mercy, and to be parent of the mother of God. But it was a far
greater happiness to be, under God, the greatest instrument of her
virtue, and to be spiritually her mother by a holy education in
perfect innocence and sanctity. St. Anne, being herself a vessel of
grace, not by name only, but by the possession of that rich treasure,
was chosen by God to form his most beloved spouse to perfect virtue;
and her pious care of this illustrious daughter was the greatest
means of her own sanctification and her glory in the church of God to
the end of ages. It is a lesson to all parents whose principal duty
is the holy education of their children. By this they glorify their
Creator, perpetuate his honor on earth to future ages, and sanctify
their own souls. St. Paul says, that it is by the education of their
children that parents are to be saved.[294] Nor will he allow any
one who has had children, ever to be admitted to serve the altar,
whose sons do not, by their holy conduct, give proofs of a virtuous
education. Nevertheless, we see parents solicitous about the corporal
qualifications of their children, and earnest to procure them an
establishment in the world; yet supinely careless in purchasing them
virtue, in which alone their true happiness consists. This reflection
drew tears from Crates, a heathen philosopher, who desired to mount
on the highest place in his city and cry out, with all his strength:
“Citizens, what is it you think of? You employ all your time in
heaping up riches to leave to your children; yet take no care to
cultivate their souls with virtue, as if an estate were more precious
than themselves.”[295]

SAINT GERMANUS, BISHOP OF AUXERRE, C.

He was born at Auxerre about the year 380, of noble parents. Having
laid the foundation of sound literature at home, he studied eloquence
and the civil law at Rome, and pleaded with great reputation in the
court of the Præfectus-prætorio. He married a lady of great quality
named Eustachia, and being taken notice of by the emperor Honorius,
was raised by him to several honorable employments, and at last to
that of duke in his own province, which dignity gave him the command
over all the troops in that country. Germanus being returned to
Auxerre, was careful to shun gross vices, but his religion seemed
confined to principles of integrity, and his virtues were merely
human; for he was unacquainted with the true spirit of mortification,
humility, and prayer. The young duke had a passion for hunting, and
hung up the heads of the wild beasts which he killed on a great tree
in the middle of the city, as trophies of his diversion. No one
could presume to show him the meanness and folly of this favorite
petty vanity, by which he seemed to authorize the superstitious
custom of the Pagans who did the like to honor their gods. St.
Amator, who was at that time the zealous bishop of Auxerre, made him
strong remonstrances on the danger of countenancing such remains
of idolatry, but without effect. At last, watching an opportunity,
he caused this tree to be cut down while Germanus was absent, who,
upon hearing this news, grievously threatened the bishop. St. Amator
withdrew for a while to Autun; where he learned by a revelation
that Germanus was designed by God to be his successor. He therefore
procured privately the consent of Julius, the prefect of Gaul, that
he might give the tonsure to Germanus; for, by the laws, no officer
could quit his employment without such a permission. Julius giving
leave, St. Amator returned to Auxerre, and causing the church doors
to be shut when Germanus was come in, he gave him the tonsure, and
ordained him deacon. By this instance, it appears, that immediately
after the general persecutions, clerks were distinguished by the
tonsure. This proof is the stronger, as the priest Constantius wrote
this life in the same age. Germanus durst not make any opposition for
fear of resisting the will of God. St. Amator died soon after on the
1st of May in 418, and St. Germanus was unanimously chosen by the
clergy and people to succeed him, and consecrated by the bishops of
the province on the 7th of July, notwithstanding the great reluctance
he discovered.

Full of a deep sense of the obligations of his new dignity, he
became at once another man. He renounced all the pomps and vanities
of the world, lived with his wife no otherwise than if she had been
his sister, distributed all his possessions to the poor and to the
Church, and embraced a life of poverty and austerity. From the day he
was ordained bishop to his death, that is, for thirty years together,
he never touched wheaten bread, wine, vinegar, oil, pulse, or salt.
He began every meal by putting a few ashes in his mouth to renew
in his soul a spirit of penance, and took no other sustenance than
barley bread, which grain he had threshed and ground himself, that he
might, as a true penitent, live by his own labor. He never ate but
in the evening, sometimes about the middle of the week, often only
on the seventh day. His dress was the same in winter and summer, and
consisted of a cowl and tunic which he never changed till they were
worn to pieces. He always wore a hair-cloth next his skin. His bed
was enclosed with two boards, strewed with ashes, without a bolster,
and covered with a sack-cloth and one blanket. He always carried
about him some relics of saints in a little box, tied to a leather
string. He extended his hospitality to all sorts of persons, washed
the feet of the poor, and served them with his own hands, at the
same time that he himself fasted. He built a monastery over against
Auxerre, on the other side of the river Yone, in honor of SS. Cosmas
and Damian, which now goes by the name of St. Marian’s, from one
of its first abbots. He found the sepulchres of several martyrs,
particularly of a great multitude who had been put to death in the
persecution of Aurelian, with St. Priscus, otherwise called St. Bry,
in a place called Coucy, where their bodies had been thrown into a
cistern or pit out of which he took them, and built in their honor
a church and monastery, called at this day _de Saints en Puy saye_.
St. Germanus gave all his landed estates to the Church, consisting of
several agreeable and spacious manors, lying all contiguous to one
another.[296] Seven of these he gave to the cathedral church, namely
Appoigny, where his father and mother had been buried in St. John’s
church; little Varsy, where stood a palace; great Varsy, Toucy,
Poeilly, Marcigny, and Perigni. Three he settled on the monastery of
St. Cosmas, namely, Monceaux, Fontenay, and Merilles. He bestowed
three others, called Garchy, Concou, and Molins, on the church which
he built in honor of St. Maurice, which at this day bears the name
of St. Germanus himself. In this manner he reduced himself to great
poverty, and to perpetuate the divine honor, and the relief of the
indigent, enriched the church of Auxerre which he found very poor. By
many like examples, it appears, that the great endowments of several
churches were originally owing to the liberality of their bishops, as
Fleury observes.

Pelagius began to dispute against the necessity of divine grace at
Rome, about the year 405. Being himself by birth a Briton, it is not
to be wondered that he should have disciples in Britain. Among these
one Agricola, the son of Severinus, who, after the birth of this son,
was chosen bishop and became a Pelagian, spread the poison of this
heresy in our island. The deacon Pelladius, whom pope Celestine had
sent to the places infected with this heresy, and whom he afterward
ordained bishop, and commissioned to go into Scotland, moved him to
provide for the preservation of so many souls; and other Catholics
in Britain had sent a deputation to the bishops in Gaul, entreating
them to send over some able person to defend the faith and oppose the
growing evil. Pope Celestine nominated St. Germanus of Auxerre to
go thither in quality of his vicar in the year 429, as St. Prosper
assures us.[297] The bishops of Gaul assembled in a numerous council
for the same purpose, and agreed to entreat St. Lupus, who had then
been only two years bishop of Troyes, to accompany St. Germanus in
this important mission.[298] These two holy prelates, proceeding on
their journey, came to Nanterre near Paris, where St. Germanus gave
his blessing and good counsel to St. Genevieve, and foretold her
future sanctity. She being at that time about fifteen years old,
and desirous to consecrate herself a virgin to God, St. Germanus,
after many solemn prayers in the church, received there her vow, and
confirmed it by laying his right hand upon her head.[299]

St. Germanus and St. Lupus embarking in the winter season, were
overtaken with a furious tempest, which St. Germanus appeased
by casting some drops of blessed oil, according to Constantius,
but according to Bede, of holy-water, into the sea, having first
invoked the adorable Trinity. Being arrived in Britain they were
met by a great multitude of people and the fame of their sanctity,
doctrine, and miracles soon filled the whole country. They confirmed
the Catholics in all parts, and converted the heretics, preaching
often in the highways and fields where the churches were not able
to contain the crowd that flocked to them. The Pelagians everywhere
shunned them; but being at length ashamed thus to condemn themselves
by their flight and silence, accepted a conference. The disputation
was held at Verulam before an incredible number of people. The
heretics, who made their appearance with a great train and in rich
apparel, spoke first. When they had talked a long time, the bishops
answered them with great eloquence, and so invincibly supported their
arguments with quotations from scripture, that their adversaries were
fairly reduced to silence. The people applauded their victory with
joyful acclamations. Before the assembly broke up, a certain tribune
and his wife presented their little daughter of ten years of age,
who was blind, to the two holy bishops; and they bid them take her
to the Pelagians. But the latter joined the parents in begging the
saints to pray for her. The two bishops made a short prayer; then
Germanus called upon the Blessed Trinity; and taking from his neck
the little box of relics which he wore, laid it upon the eyes of the
girl before the whole assembly, who immediately recovered her sight,
to the great joy of her parents and of all the people. From that day
no one opposed the doctrine of the holy bishops. The saints went from
this conference to return thanks to God at the tomb of St. Alban, the
most illustrious martyr in Britain. St. Germanus caused his sepulchre
to be opened, and deposited in it his box of relics of apostles and
martyrs, taking from the same place a little of the dust which still
retained some marks of the blood of St. Alban. This he carried away
with him, and, at his return, built at Auxerre a church in his honor,
where he placed these relics.[300]

The Saxons from Germany on one side, and on the other the Picts, at
that time harassed the Britons. Paul the deacon tells us, that an
army of Picts and Scots invaded their territories whilst the two
bishops were in the island; and bishop Usher takes notice, that the
Saxons and English who inhabited Sleswic, and all the German coast
from Denmark to the Rhine, made descents upon Britain from time to
time before the arrival of Hengist and Horsa in 449. The Britons
having assembled an army against these plunderers, invited the
two holy bishops into their camp, hoping to be protected by their
prayers and presence. The saints complied with their request, but
employed their time in bringing the idolaters to the faith, and the
Christians to a reformation of their manners. Many of the former
demanded baptism, and the saints prepared them to receive it at
Easter, for it was then Lent. They erected a church in the camp of
green boughs twisted together, in which the catechumens received the
sacrament of regeneration; and the whole army celebrated the festival
with great devotion. After Easter, St. Germanus had recourse to a
stratagem, by which, without bloodshed, he rescued his dear converts
and the country out of the danger with which they were threatened.
The enemy approaching, he put himself at the head of the Christians
with so much skill and address as showed he had not forgotten his old
profession of a general. He led his little army into a vale between
two high mountains, and ordered his troops to send forth the same
shout for which he would give them a sign. When the Saxon pirates
came near them, he cried out thrice, _Alleluiah_, which was followed
by the whole British army; and the sound was often repeated by the
echo from the hills with as dreadful a noise as if the rocks had
been rent asunder. The barbarians, in a sudden fright, judging from
the shout that they were falling upon the swords of a mighty army,
flung down their arms and ran away, leaving behind them all their
baggage and a great booty. Many of them were drowned in crossing a
river, by missing the fords.[301] Bishop Usher[302] says, this battle
seems to have been fought near a town in Flintshire, called in the
British tongue, Guid-cruc, but in English, Mould. The place retains
to this day the name of Maes Garmon, or German’s field. The two holy
bishops, after so many victories, returned home to their respective
dioceses.[303]

St. Germanus found his people loaded with extraordinary imposts,
and undertook a journey to Arles, to solicit Auxiliaris, prefect of
Gaul, in their behalf. On the road, the people everywhere met him in
crowds, with the women and children, to receive his blessing. When
he drew near to Arles, the prefect Auxiliaris himself, contrary to
custom, was come a good way to meet him, and conducted him to the
capital. He admired his gracefulness, and the charity and authority
which his countenance and conversation displayed, and found him to
exceed his reputation. He made him great presents, and entreated
him to cure his wife who had been long ill of a quartan ague. He
obtained his request, and granted to St. Germanus the discharge
from the taxes which he had asked for his people. The saint being
returned home, applied himself earnestly to reform their manners;
but used to retire from time to time to his monastery of SS. Cosmas
and Damian. In 446 he was called again into Britain, to assist that
church against the Pelagian heresy, which began a second time to
raise its head there. He took for his companion St. Severus, who
had been lately promoted to the archbishopric of Triers, and had
formerly been a disciple of St. Lupus of Troyes. In Britain he
sought out those who had been seduced by the heretics, and converted
many of them; so that the obstinate sowers of those errors found no
longer any retreat here, and quitted the island. A principal man
of the country, called Elaphius, brought to him his son who was
in the flower of his age, and had one ham contracted, and his leg
withered. St. Germanus made him sit down, and touching his ham and
leg, healed him in the presence of Many. St. Germanus considering
that ignorance could not be banished, nor the reformation which he
had established maintain its ground, without regular schools for the
instruction of the clergy, instituted schools of learning, by which
means, “These churches continued afterward pure in the faith, and
free from heresy,” as Bede observes.[304] In South-Wales, having
ordained St. Iltutus priest, and St. Dubricius archbishop of Landaff,
he charged them with the care of several schools, which soon grew
very famous for the numbers, learning, and eminent sanctity of
those that were there educated. Two of these, under the immediate
direction of the latter, were seated at Hentlan and Moch-ros,
places lying on the river Wye, where he had one thousand scholars,
for years together. The names of the most eminent among them are
mentioned in the life of St. Dubricius, written (as some maintain)
by St. Thelian’s own hand in the ancient Landaff register.[305] The
schools of St. Iltutus at Llan-Iltut (now Lantwit) near Boverton,
and at Llan-elty near Neath in Glamorganshire, were in like repute,
and equally filled with the sons of the nobility from all parts of
the island. Among his disciples we find St. Gildas, St. Leonorius
bishop and confessor, St. Samson, St. Magloire, St. Malo, St. Paul
afterward bishop of Leon, and Daniel, whom St. Dubricius made bishop
of Bangor, where he likewise instituted a seminary for the Britons.
Paulinus, another disciple of St. Germanus, did the like at Whiteland
in Caermarthenshire, where St. David and St. Theliau studied. The
seminaries of Llancarvan near Cowbridge, and the famous school of
Bencor in Flintshire, were also noble monuments of St. Germanus’s
zeal. This saint was on his road back when he met a deputation from
the inhabitants of Armorica or Brittany who besought him to be
their protector; for to punish them for a revolt, Aëtius, the Roman
general in Gaul, had sent Eocarich, a Pagan and barbarous king of the
Alemanni, to subdue them. St. Germanus boldly accosted the barbarian,
stopping his horse by the bridle, at the head of his army. The
German at first refused to hear him, but at length listened to his
discourse, and by it was so much softened as to call off his troops,
and agree not to ravage the province, on condition that he should
obtain the pardon of the people from the emperor, or from his general
Aëtius. In order to procure this the saint undertook a journey to
Ravenna, where the emperor Valentinian III. then resided.

He wrought several miracles on the way, and at Milan delivered a
man who was possessed by the devil. He entered the city of Ravenna
by night to avoid honors and pomp; but the people being aware of
his precaution, a great crowd waited for him, and saluted him with
acclamations. He was received with great joy by the bishop St.
Peter Chrysologus; by the young emperor Valentinian, and his mother
Placidia. She sent to his house a great silver vessel filled with
dainties, without any flesh, which she knew he would never touch.
The saint sent her in return a barley loaf upon a wooden dish. The
empress received it graciously, ordered the dish to be enchased
with gold, and kept the loaf by which several miraculous cures were
performed. The emperor confirmed his request; but the restless
people by raising new disturbances destroyed the effect of the
imperial clemency. The saint was continually attended at Ravenna by
six bishops, and wrought there many miracles. The son of Volusian,
chancellor or secretary to the patrician Sigisvultus, being dead and
cold, the saint was called, and having put all the company out of
the chamber, he prostrated himself near the corpse and prayed with
tears. After some time the dead man began to stir, opened his eyes,
and moved his fingers. St. Germanus raised him, he sat up, and, by
degrees, was restored to perfect health. One day after matins, as the
saint was talking with the bishops of religious matters, he said to
them, “My brethren, I recommend my passage to your prayers. Methought
I saw this night our Saviour, who gave me provision for a journey,
and told me it was to go into my native country, and to receive
eternal rest.” A few days after, he fell sick. All the city was
alarmed. The empress went to see him, and he desired the favor of her
to send back his corpse into his own country; to which she assented,
though very unwillingly. He died at Ravenna on the seventh day of
his illness, which was the last of July in 448, having held his see
thirty years and twenty-five days. The empress Placidia took his
reliquary, St. Peter Chrysologus his cowl and hair shirt, and the six
other bishops divided his clothes among them. The eunuch Acholius,
prefect of the emperor’s chamber, one of whose servants, when sick,
the saint had cured, had his corpse embalmed; the empress clothed
it with a rich habit and gave a coffin of cypress wood; the emperor
furnished the carriages, the expense of the journey, and the officers
to attend it. The funeral pomp was most magnificent; the number of
lights was so great, that they shone as broad day. Everywhere as it
passed, the people came to meet it, showing all manner of honors.
Some levelled the ways and repaired the bridges, others bore the
corpse, or at least sung psalms. The clergy of Auxerre went as far
as the Alps to meet it. The sacred treasure was brought to that city
fifty days after the saint’s death, and after having been exposed
six days, was interred on the 1st of October in the oratory of St.
Maurice, which he had founded, where stands at present the famous
abbey which bears his name. His principal festival is kept on the
31st of this month. St. Germanus was the titular saint of many
churches in England, and of the great abbey of Selby in Yorkshire,
the abbot whereof was a parliamentary baron. A chapel near Verulam,
in which St. Germanus had preached, was a place of great devotion
to him among our ancestors, and was afterward dedicated under his
name. From him the parliamentary borough of St. German’s in Cornwall
is called. See his life written by the priest Constantius, who was
nearly his contemporary, and is commended by St. Sidonius Apollinaris
in the same age: also Bede, and Nennius the British historian, who
wrote in 620. All these relate the miracles mentioned above. See also
Leland’s Itinerary, Brown-Willis, Usher, Fleury, Tillemont, t. 15,
Rivet, Hist. Littér., t. 2, p. 256, and Recueil des Lettres sur la
Vérification des Reliques de St. Germain d’Auxerre, 1753, in 8vo.

JULY XXVII.

ST. PANTALEON, MARTYR.

See the Collections of F. Bosch the Bollandist, t. 6,
Julij, p. 397.

A. D. 303.

He was physician to the emperor Galerius Maximianus, and a Christian,
but fell by a temptation which is sometimes more dangerous than the
severest trials of the fiercest torments; for bad example, if not
shunned, insensibly weakens, and at length destroys the strongest
virtue. Pantaleon being perpetually obsessed by it in an impious
idolatrous court, and deceived by often hearing the false maxims of
the world applauded, was unhappily seduced into an apostasy. But
a zealous Christian called Hermolaus, by his prudent admonitions
awakened his conscience to a sense of his guilt, and brought him
again into the fold of the Church. The penitent ardently wished
to expiate his crime by martyrdom; and to prepare himself for the
conflict, when Dioclesian’s bloody persecution broke out at Nicomedia
in 303, he distributed all his possessions among the poor. Not
long after this action he was taken up, and in his house were also
apprehended Hermolaus, Hermippus, and Hermocrates. After suffering
many torments they were all condemned to lose their heads. St.
Pantaleon suffered the day after the rest. He is ranked by the Greeks
amongst the great martyrs. Procopius mentions a church in his honor
at Constantinople, which being decayed was repaired by Justinian. His
relics were translated to Constantinople, and there kept with great
honor as St. John Damascen informs us.[306] The greatest part of them
are now shown in the abbey of St. Denys near Paris, but his head at
Lyons.

* * * * *

Physicians honor St. Pantaleon as their chief patron after St. Luke.
Happy are they in that profession, who improve their study chiefly
to glorify the supreme Creator, whose infinite power and wisdom are
displayed in all his works; and who by the opportunities of charity
which their art continually offers them, rejoice to afford comfort,
and corporal, if not often also spiritual succor, to the most
suffering and distressed part of their species, especially among the
poor. All the healing powers of medicine are a gift of God;[307] and
he himself who could have restored Ezechias to health by the least
act of his omnipotent will, directed Isaiah to apply dry figs to the
abscess into which his fever was terminating; than which poultice,
no better remedy could have been used to promote suppuration.[308]
St. Ambrose,[309] St. Basil,[310] and St. Bernard,[311] inveigh
severely against too nice and anxious a care of health, as a mark
of inordinate self-love and immortification; nor is anything
generally more hurtful to it. But as man is not master of his own
life or health, he is bound to take a moderate reasonable care not
to throw them away.[312] To neglect the more simple and ordinary
succors of medicine when absolutely necessary, is to transgress that
law of charity which every one owes to himself.[313] The saints
who condemned as contrary to their penitential state, far-sought
or exquisite means, with St. Charles Borromæo, were scrupulously
attentive to essential prescriptions of physicians in simple and
ordinary remedies. But let the Christian in sickness seek in the
first place the health of his soul by penance, and the exercise
of all virtues. Let him also consider God as his chief physician,
begging him, if it may be conducive to his divine honor, to restore
the frame he created, and entreating our Redeemer to stretch out
that hand upon him, with which in his mortal state he restored
so many sick to their health. He who trusts more in the art of
physicians than in the Lord, will deserve the reproach of Asa,
king of Juda.[314] So hidden are often the causes of distempers,
so precarious the power of remedies, and so uncertain the skill of
the ablest physicians, that their endeavors frequently check nature
instead of seconding its efforts, and thus hasten death. The divine
blessing alone is the Christian’s sheet-anchor, perfect resignation
to the divine will is the secure repose of his soul; and the fervent
exercise of penance, patience, and devotion, is his gain in the time
of sickness.

SS. MAXIMIAN, MALCHUS, MARTINIAN, DIONYSIUS, JOHN, SERAPION,
AND CONSTANTINE, MM.

COMMONLY CALLED THE SEVEN SLEEPERS.

Having confessed the faith before the proconsul at Ephesus under
Decius in 250, they were walled up together in a cave in which they
had hid themselves, and there slept in the Lord. Some moderns,
mistaking this expression, have imagined that they only lay asleep,
till they were found in 479, under Theodosius the younger. The truth
seems to be, that their relics were then discovered. They are much
honored by the Greeks, Syrians, and all the Oriental nations. Their
relics were conveyed to Marseilles in a large stone coffin, which is
still shown there in St. Victor’s church. In the Musæum Victorium at
Rome is a factitious plaster or stone (made of sulphur melted with
fire and mortar), formed in imitation of a large precious stone,
in which is cut a group of figures representing the Seven Sleepers
with their names, and near Constantine and John are exhibited two
clubs; near Maximian a knotty club; near Malchus and Martinian two
axes; near Serapion a burning torch, and near Danesius (whom others
call Dionysius) a great nail. That large nails (_clavi trabales_, or
such as were used in joining great rafters or beams in buildings)
were made use of as instruments of torture is evident from St.
Paulinus[315] and Horace.[316] From this ancient monument some infer
that these martyrs were put to death by various torments, and that
their bodies were only buried in the aforesaid cave. In this group
of figures, these martyrs are represented all as very young, and
without beards. In ancient Martyrologies and other writings, they
are frequently called boys.[317] The cave in which their bodies were
found became a place famous for devout pilgrimages, and is still
shown to travellers, as James Spon testifies.[318] See St. Gregory of
Tours, l. 1, de Glor. Mart. c. 95, and Cuper the Bollandist, Julij,
t. 6, p. 375. Also, Dissertatio de Sanctis Septem Dormientibus, Romæ,
1741 in 4to. in which the above said group of figures is explained,
c. 5, &c.

SAINT CONGALL, ABBOT OF IABHNALLIVIN.

On the upper part of the lake Erne, of which parish he is titular
patron. Before his death he committed the government of his monastery
to his beloved disciple St. Fegnarnach. In that territory his
festival is a holiday of precept, as Colgan assures us, on this 27th
of July.

ST. LUICAN, C.

Is titular saint of the parish called Kill-luicain in Ireland.

JULY XXVIII.

SS. NAZARIUS AND CELSUS, MM.

From two sermons delivered on their festival, the one
by St. Ennodius, the other passes under the name of St.
Ambrose, and was written soon after his time, perhaps by
St. Gaudentius of Brescia; also from Paulinus the deacon,
in his life of St. Ambrose. See Tillemont, t. 2, and Pinius
the Bollandist, t. 6, Julij, p. 503.

ABOUT THE YEAR 68.

St. Nazarius’s father was a heathen, and enjoyed a considerable post
in the Roman army. His mother Perpetua was a zealous Christian, and
was instructed by St. Peter, or his disciples, in the most perfect
maxims of our holy faith. Nazarius embraced it with so much ardor,
that he copied in his life all the great virtues he saw in his
teachers; and out of zeal for the salvation of others left Rome, his
native city, and preached the faith in many places with a fervor and
disinterestedness becoming a disciple of the apostles. Arriving at
Milan he was there beheaded for the faith, together with Celsus, a
youth whom he carried with him to assist him in his travels. These
martyrs suffered soon after Nero had raised the first persecution.
Their bodies were buried separately in a garden without the city,
where they were discovered and taken up by St. Ambrose in 395. In
the tomb of St. Nazarius a vial of the saint’s blood was found as
fresh and red as if it had been spilt that day. The faithful stained
handkerchiefs with some drops, and also formed a certain paste with
it; a portion of which St. Ambrose sent to St. Gaudentius bishop of
Brescia. St. Ambrose conveyed the bodies of the two martyrs into the
new church of the apostles, which he had just built. A woman was
delivered of an evil spirit in their presence. St. Ambrose sent some
of these relics to St. Paulinus of Nola, who received them with great
respect, as a most valuable present, as he testifies.[319]

The martyrs died as the outcasts of the world, but are crowned by God
with immortal honor. The glory of the world is false and transitory,
and an empty bubble or shadow; but that of virtue is true, solid, and
permanent, even in the eyes of men; for, to use the comparison of St.
Basil,[320] as the more we look upon the sun the more we admire it,
and by reviewing it never find it less bright or less beautiful; so
the memory of the martyrs which we celebrate, after so many years,
is only more fresh in our minds, and will be more flourishing in all
ages to come.

ST. VICTOR, POPE, M.

He was a native of Africa, and succeeded St. Eleutherius in the
pontificate, in the year 192, the nineteenth of Commodus. The
practice of those virtues which had prepared him for that dignity,
rendered him a true successor of the apostles. He vigorously
opposed the rising heresies of that age. Theodotus of Byzantium,
a tanner, having apostatized from the faith to save his life in
a late persecution, afterward, to extenuate his guilt, pretended
that he had denied only a man, not God; teaching that Christ was
nothing more than a mere man, as the Socinians teach at this day;
whereas the Arians allowed him to have been before the world,
though himself a creature. Theodotus going to Rome, there drew
many into his blasphemous error; for he was well versed in polite
literature; but Victor checked his progress by excommunicating him
with Ebion, Artemon, and another Theodotus who had taught the same
blasphemy.[321] This other Theodotus, called Trapezita, or the
banker, was author of the Melchisedecian heresy, pretending that
Melchisedec was greater than Christ.

Montanus, a new convert in Mysia, near Phrygia, out of an unbounded
desire of invading the first dignities of the Church, and filled
with rage to see himself disappointed, began to preach against the
Church; and having by pride and ambition given entrance to the
devil, commenced false prophet, and sometimes losing his senses,
began in an enthusiastic strain to utter extraordinary expressions.
Prisca, or Priscilla, and Maximilla, two women of quality, but of
debauched lives, left their husbands, and being filled with the same
spirit, spoke like Montanus, void of sense, and after an extravagant
and unusual manner, pretending they succeeded the prophets among
the disciples of the apostles. Montanus placed himself above the
apostles, saying, that he had received the Paraclete, or the Holy
Ghost promised by Christ, to perfect his law. He denied that the
Church had power to forgive the sins of idolatry, murder, and
impurity, and hardly received any sinners on repentance. St. Paul had
allowed second marriages, but Montanus forbade them as inconsistent
with the perfect law of chastity; and he forbade Christians to
flee in time of persecution. The Montanists were also called from
their country Cataphryges, and Pepuzeni from Pepuzium, a little
town in Phrygia, which was their capital, and which they called
Jerusalem.[322] They boasted of their martyrs, as the Marcionites
also did; which other heretics seldom pretend to, as St. Irenæus
and Origen take notice; nor could these have any great number.
Apollonius, a Catholic writer quoted by Eusebius, confounding the
hypocrisy of the Montanists, reproached their pretended prophetesses
with infamous debaucheries, and with receiving presents, saying,
“Does a prophet color his hair, paint his eye-brows, play at dice,
or lend out money on usury? I will demonstrate that they are guilty
of these things.” The Catholics met to examine their pretended
new prophecies, and convicted them of falsehood, because the true
prophets were not beside themselves when they spoke; also the
Montanists had lied in their predictions, and opposed the doctrine
of the Church. Asterius Urbanus, a learned priest (for he calls St.
Zoticus fellow-priest), confounded them by these arguments, in a
great conference held at Ancyra about the year 188. Their prophecies
and errors being condemned as impious, the followers of Montanus were
driven out of the Church, and excommunicated. It was reported for
certain, that Montanus and Maximilla, led away by the spirit that
possessed them, afterward hanged themselves. These particulars are
related by Eusebius.

Tertullian, who fell into this heresy about the time of the death
of Pope Victor, says,[323] that this pope at first admitted to the
communion of the Church these pretended prophets. And it was easy
to be deceived in a matter of fact concerning persons at such a
distance, and who appeared under the garb of hypocrisy. But he had
no sooner answered their letters, in which he acknowledged them
brethren, but Praxeas coming from the East, brought him an ample
account of their tenets and practice: and Victor immediately recalled
his letters of communion, and condemned these innovators. This
Praxeas was a Phrygian, and being puffed up because he had suffered
imprisonment for the faith, began to sow a new heresy at Rome,
maintaining but one person in God, and attributing crucifixion to
the Father as well as to the Son; whence his followers were called
Patripassians. His errors being brought to light, he was also cut off
from the communion of the Church.

About the same time Tatian fell from the Church. He was a Syrian, a
Platonic philosopher, and a disciple of St. Justin, martyr, after
whose death he taught some time at Rome. Afterward, returning
into Syria in 171, he there broached his errors, which he durst
not advance at Rome. He borrowed several of them from Marcion,
Valentinus, and Saturninus, teaching two principles, and that
the Creator is the evil principle or God. He added several new
errors, as that Adam was damned. He condemned marriage as no less
criminal than adultery, whence his followers were called Encratitæ,
or the continent. They were likewise called Hydroparastatæ, or
Aquarii, because, in consecrating the eucharist, they used only
water, for they condemned all use of wine, and likewise the use of
flesh-meat.[324] The ancients observe that Tatian’s fall was owing to
pride, which often attends an opinion of knowledge;[325] and of this
there cannot be a more dangerous symptom in a scholar than a fondness
for novelty and singularity, especially if joined with obstinacy and
opiniativeness.

St. Victor was watchful to cut off these scandals in their root, and
every where to maintain the purity of the faith with unity. Up an
this motive, he exerted his zeal in the dispute about the time of
celebrating Easter. The churches of Lesser Asia kept it with the Jews
on the fourteenth day of the first moon after the vernal equinox, on
whatever day of the week it fell. The Roman church, and all the rest
of the world, kept Easter always on a Sunday immediately following
that fourteenth day. Pope Anicetus permitted these Asiatics to keep
their own custom, even at Rome; but Pope Soter, his successor,
obliged them to conform to the custom of places where they should
be. Several councils held at Rome, in Palestine, in Pontus, in Gaul,
at Corinth, and other places, unanimously determined the point
according to the Roman custom. Yet Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus,
wrote strenuously in defence of the Asiatic custom, which he said
was derived from St. Philip who died at Hierapolis, from St. John
Evangelist, St. Polycarp, bishop and martyr, Sagaris, bishop and
martyr, who died at Laodicea, and others. Victor seeing the Asiatics
fixed in their resolution, threatened to cut them off from the
communion of the Church; from the words of Eusebius[326] some moderns
infer with Baronius, Constant, and De Marca, that he excommunicated
them in a letter, but immediately suspended or recalled the sentence:
others with Thomassin, Natalis Alexander, and Graveson, think that
he only threatened it; which opinion best agrees with the sequel.
To reconcile the different passages of authors, F. John Philip
Monti[327] thinks pope Victor, upon receiving the refractory answer
of Polycrates, drew up a sentence of excommunication, but never sent
or published the same, being overcome by the advice of St. Irenæus.
The schism which Blastus, a priest, had lately formed at Rome, upon
the difference of this rite, for which he had been degraded by pope
Eleutherius, probably made St. Victor more severe in extirpating
a practice which became daily more dangerous to the unity of the
Church; but prudence and charity recommended a toleration some time
longer, which he was prevailed upon to grant, by a letter of St.
Irenæus, who wrote to him on that subject in his own name, and in
that of his brethren in Gaul. St. Victor died soon after this, in the
year 201, the ninth of Severus, after he had sat ten years. He is
styled a martyr by some writers of the fifth age, and in an ancient
pontifical written in 530. Though Severus only published the edicts
for his persecution in 202, several Christians had suffered in his
reign before that time, as Tillemont remarks.[328] F. Pagi thinks St.
Victor did not die by the sword, because in some Martyrologies he is
called only confessor, though his dignity and zeal exposed him to
continual persecutions, for which alone he might deserve the title of
martyr. See Eusebius Hist. l. 5, c. 23. Orsi, Berti Diss. Hist. t. 2,
p. 88.

SAINT INNOCENT I., POPE AND CONFESSOR.

He was a native of Albano, near Rome; and, upon the death of pope
Anastasius in 402, was unanimously chosen to fill the pontifical
chair. He ascended it by compulsion, and considering himself in it
with trembling, he never ceased to beg of God the spirit of his
holy wisdom and prudence, which he stood the more in need of, as
the times in which he lived were more difficult. Alaric the Goth,
with an army of barbarians, threatened to carry desolation over all
Italy. The pope exhorted the faithful to receive the scourges of
heaven with submission and humility, and undertook several journeys
to negotiate a reconciliation between the emperor Honorius and
Alaric, but in vain. The Goths received a great overthrow from the
Roman army commanded by Stilico, in 403. But Alaric led them a second
time to attempt the plunder of Rome; and because Honorius refused
to make him general of the imperial army, he took that city on the
24th of August, 410, and abandoned it to the fury of his soldiers,
excepting the church of SS. Peter and Paul, to which he granted the
privilege of a sanctuary. Pope Innocent was at that time absent with
the emperor at Ravenna. The year following, Alaric being dead, his
brother-in-law and successor Atulphus again plundered Rome.

After the departure of the barbarians, the good pope hastened
thither, and by his presence brought comfort and joy to that
afflicted people. He taught them to draw an advantage from their
sufferings by making a good use of them, and so much were the
Heathens edified at the patience, resignation, and virtue with
which the Christians suffered the loss of their goods and whatever
was dear, without any murmuring or complaint, that they came in
crowds desiring to be instructed in the faith and baptized. The pope
labored incessantly to form them a holy people, always occupied in
good works. His letters, especially those to Exuperius, the most
holy bishop of Toulouse, and Decentius, bishop of Gubbio, in answer
to their several queries, contain many useful rules, and judicious
decisions. In the former, he says, that communion or absolution is
never to be denied to dying penitents, that we may not imitate the
hardness of the Novatians. In that to Decentius he says, that only
bishops, who have the sovereignty of the priesthood, can confer the
Holy Ghost in confirmation, by anointing the foreheads of persons
baptized; and that he cannot recite the words of the form for fear
of discovering the mysteries or sacraments to the infidels. He uses
the same precaution in speaking of the sacrifice; so inviolable was
the secret with which, out of respect, the primitive Christians
treated the sacraments. In the same epistle, this pope mentioning
the extreme unction which is given to the sick, he says, it cannot
be administered to penitents before their reconciliation, because it
is a sacrament; and all sacraments are refused them in that state.
This evinces that it was held to be no less properly a sacrament
than the eucharist. He indeed allows the custom that then prevailed
for the laity to use the holy oils out of devotion, but without
the sacramental words, and not as a sacrament; for being consulted
whether bishops could give that sacrament, which was usually
administered by priests, he proves that bishops can do it, because
priests can; consequently, he supposes as undoubted, that only
priests, not laymen, can minister this holy sacrament.

When, in 416, the councils of Carthage and Milevum had condemned the
Pelagian errors, and wrote to the pope against them, the synodal
letters of both these councils having been drawn up by St. Austin,
St. Innocent, in his answer to the bishops of the council of Milevum,
says, that “all ecclesiastical matters throughout the world are, by
divine right, to be referred to the apostolic see, that is, to St.
Peter, the author of its name and honor.” He commends the bishops
of this council for so doing: “Following,” says he, “the ancient
rule which you know with me, has been always observed by the whole
world.”[329] The confirmation given by pope Innocent to these two
African councils being brought to Africa, St. Austin said,[330]
“The decisions of the two councils have been already sent to the
apostolic see; the rescripts are also come from thence. The cause is
now finished; would to God that the error may at last be at end.” St.
Innocent closed his life with exerting his zeal in defence of divine
grace, dying in 417, having been pope fifteen years. See his letters,
and the councils, Ceillier, t. 10, p. 104, and Cuper the Bollandist,
t. 6, Jul. p. 548.

ST. SAMPSON, B. C.

He was a child of prayer, and was born about the year 496, of
noble parentage, in that part of South Wales which is now called
Glamorganshire, then in the country of the Demetes, upon the borders
of the Wenetes, who inhabited the province called by the Britons
Guent, now Monmouthshire. At seven years of age he was put under
the care of St. Iltutus, a very learned abbot in Glamorganshire,
and having made great progress in learning and virtue, was ordained
priest by Saint Dubritius, bishop of Caërleon. In 512 he passed
into a neighboring island; where he led an eremitical life, as did
several others, under the direction of St. Piro, a holy priest. By
an order of SS. Dubritius and Iltutus he paid a visit to his aged
father who lay dangerously ill. The saint restored him by his prayers
to his health, and converted him, and his whole numerous family,
including his uncles, cousins, and brothers, whom he placed in
several monasteries, but his father and an uncle in his own community
of hermits. In 516 he made a voyage into Ireland, to animate himself
to fervor by the example and instructions of many illustrious saints
who flourished there, and after his return shut himself up in a
cave in a wilderness. In 520 St. Dubritius called him to a synod at
Caërleon, and in it ordained him bishop without being fixed in any
particular see. St. Sampson continued his former austere manner of
life, abstaining wholly from flesh, sometimes eating only once in two
or three days, and often passing the whole night in prayer standing,
though sometimes when he watched the night, he took a little rest,
leaning his head against a wall. To gain souls to God by the exercise
of the ministry with which he saw himself intrusted, he passed
over into Brittany in France, with his father and his cousin St.
Magloire, and was followed by St. Maclou or Malo, another cousin. St.
Sampson there converted many idolaters, raised a dead man to life,
and wrought many other miracles. He founded a great abbey, which he
called Dole,[331] and fixed there the episcopal see which was before
subject to Quidalet, now St. Malo’s. This see of Dole long enjoyed a
metropolitical jurisdiction over all the bishops of Brittany.[332]
He subscribed to the second council of Paris, held in 557, in the
manner following, “I Sampson, a sinner, bishop, have consented and
subscribed.” He used to have a cross carried before him, as is the
custom of archbishops at present. He died about the year 564. A
considerable part of his relics was translated to Paris, with those
of St. Magliore and St. Maclou, in the tenth century, for fear of the
inroads of the Normans. See his life in Mabillon, Act. Bened. t. 1,
p. 176, and Solier the Bollandist, t. 6, Jul. p. 568.

JULY XXIX.

ST. MARTHA, V.

She was sister to Mary and Lazarus, and lived with them at Bethania,
a small town two miles distant from Jerusalem, a little beyond mount
Olivet. Our Blessed Redeemer had made his residence usually in
Galilee, till in the third year of his public ministry he preached
chiefly in Judæa, during which interval he frequented the house of
these three holy disciples. Martha seems to have been the eldest, and
to have had the chief care and direction of the household. It appears
from the history of the resurrection of Lazarus that their family was
of principal note in the country. In the first visit, as it seems,
with which Jesus honored them,[333] St. Luke tells us[334] that St.
Martha showed great solicitude to entertain and serve him. She forgot
the privilege of her rank and riches, and would not leave so great
an honor to servants only, but was herself very busy in preparing
everything for so great a guest and his holy company. Mary sat all
the while at our Saviour’s feet, feeding her soul with his heavenly
doctrine. In this she found such inexpressible sweetness, and so
great spiritual advantage, that she forgot and contemned the whole
world, and would suffer nothing to draw her from her entertainment
with her God, or make her lose any one of those precious moments. At
his sacred discourses her heart was inflamed, her pure soul seemed to
melt in holy love, and in a total forgetfulness of all other things
she said to herself, with the spouse in the Canticles, _My beloved to
me, and I to him, who feedeth among the lilies_;[335] that is with
chaste souls, or among the flowers of virtues. St. Austin observes
that this house represents to us the whole family of God on earth. In
it no one is idle, but his servants have their different employments,
some in the contemplative life, as recluses; others in the active;
as, first, those who labor for the salvation of souls in the exterior
functions of the pastoral charge; secondly, those who, upon pure
motives of charity, serve the poor or the sick; and, lastly, all
who look upon their lawful profession in the world as the place for
which God has destined them, and the employment which he has given
them; and who faithfully pursue its occupations with a view purely
to accomplish the divine will, and acquit themselves of every duty
in the order in which God has placed them in this world. He is the
greater saint, whatever his state of life may be, whose love of God
and his neighbor is more pure, more ardent, and more perfect; for
charity is the soul and form of Christian perfection.

But it has been disputed whether the contemplative or the active life
be in itself the more perfect. St. Thomas answers this question,[336]
proving from the example of Christ and his apostles, that the mixed
life, which is made up of both, is the most excellent. This is
the apostolic life, with the care of souls, if in it the external
functions of instructing, assisting, and comforting others, which
is the most noble object of charity, be supported by a constant
perfect spirit of prayer and contemplation. In order to this, a long
and fervent religious retirement ought to be the preparation which
alone can form the perfect spirit of this state; and the same must
be constantly nourished and improved by a vehement love and frequent
practice of holy retirement, and a continued recollection, as Christ
during his ministry often retired to the mountains to pray; for that
pastor who suffers the spirit of prayer to languish in his soul,
carries about a dead soul in a living body, to use the expression of
St. Bonaventure.[337] The like interior must animate; and some degree
of assiduity in the like exercises, as circumstances will allow,
must support those who are engaged in worldly employs, and those
who devote themselves to serve Christ’s most tender and afflicted
members, the poor and the sick, as Martha served Christ himself.

With so great love and fervor did Martha wait on our Redeemer, that,
as we cannot doubt, she thought that if the whole world were occupied
in attending so great a guest, all would be too little. She wished
that all men would employ their hands, feet, and hearts, all their
faculties and senses, with their whole strength, in serving with
her their gracious Creator, made for us our brother. Therefore,
sweetly complaining to him, she desired him to bid her sister Mary
to rise up and help her. Our meek and loving Lord was well pleased
with the solicitude and earnestness, full of affection and devotion,
wherewith Martha waited on him; yet he commended more the quiet
repose with which Mary attended only to that which is of the greatest
importance, the spiritual improvement of her soul. _Martha, Martha,_
said he, _thou art careful and troubled about many things; but one
thing is necessary._ If precipitation or too great eagerness had any
share in her service, this would have been an imperfection; which,
nevertheless, does not appear. Christ only puts Martha in mind that
though corporal duties ought not to be neglected, and if sanctified
by a perfect intention of charity are most excellent virtues, yet
spiritual functions, when they come in competition, are to be
preferred. The former, indeed, become spiritual, when animated by
a perfect spirit and recollection; but this is often much impaired
by the distraction of the mind, and in the course of action. In our
external employments, which we direct with a pure intention to fulfil
the divine will, we imitate the angels when they are employed by God
in being our guardians, or in other external functions with which
God hath charged them; but as these blessed spirits in such employs
never lose sight of God, so ought we in all our actions to continue,
at least virtually, to adore and praise his holy name; but herein the
eye of the soul is often carried off, or its attention much weakened,
whereas, in heavenly contemplation, the heart is wholly taken up in
God, and more perfectly united to him by adoration and love. This is
the novitiate of heaven, where it is the uninterrupted occupation of
the blessed. In this sense Christ so highly commends the choice of
Mary, affirming that her happy employment would never be taken from
her. He added, “_One thing is necessary_;” which words some explain
as if he had said, “A little is enough, one dish suffices;” but the
word _necessary_ determines the sense rather to be, as St. Austin,
St. Bernard, Maldonatus, Grotius, and others, expound it, eternal
salvation is our only affair.

Another instance which shows how dear this devout family was to our
divine Saviour, is the raising of Lazarus to life. When he fell
sick, the pious sisters sent to inform Christ, who was then absent
in Galilee. They said no more in their message than this: _He whom
thou lovest is sick._ They knew very well that this was enough; and
that his tender bowels would be moved to compassion by the bare
representation of their calamity. It was not to remove our corporal
miseries that Christ came from heaven, and died and suffered so much;
this was not the object which drew down this Almighty Physician
among us. If, in his mortal life on earth, he healed the sick and
raised the dead, by these miracles he would manifest, as by sensible
tokens, the spiritual cures which he desired to work in our souls.
We groan under the weight of innumerable and the most dreadful
spiritual miseries. Our tender Redeemer knows their horrible depth
and endless extent; but he would have us to conceive a just sense
of them, to acknowledge them, and earnestly to implore his aid; for
this he sheds the rays of his light upon our blind souls, and rouses
us by his repeated graces. The first step towards a deliverance is,
that we confess, with a feeling sense, our extreme baseness and
ingratitude, and our weakness and total incapacity of doing anything
of ourselves towards our recovery; but we have a physician infinitely
tender and powerful. To him then we must continually lay open our
distress, and with deep compunction display our miseries before his
holy eyes, earnestly striving by this dumb eloquence to move him to
pity; exposing to him that we whom he loveth still as the work of
his hands, as the price of his blood, lie ingulfed in unspeakable
miseries. Thus we must entreat him, with tears and loud cries of our
hearts, to look down on his image in our souls, now disfigured and
sullied with sin; on his kingdom left desolate by the tyranny of the
devil and our passions: on the vineyard which himself had planted,
adorned, and fenced, but which is laid waste by merciless robbers and
enemies; and that he would stretch out his almighty hand to repair
these breaches, and save us. So long as life lasts we can never be
sure that we shall find mercy, or rest secure of the issue of our
great trial upon which our eternity depends; so long, therefore,
we ought never to cease, with most earnest cries, to implore the
clemency of our Judge, laying open our spiritual miseries to him
in these words of the two sisters,--“Behold he, whom thou lovest,
is sinking under the weight of his evils,” and beg him to remember
his ancient love and mercies towards us. We ought also in corporal
distempers to address ourselves to God with the like words, begging
with Martha our own or our brother’s corporal health, if this may be
expedient to our souls, and conducive to the divine honor.

In all these petitions we ought to implore the joint supplications
of the saints, as at the entreaties of the sisters Christ raised
Lazarus. Having received their message, he wanted no other prompter
than that of his own compassion and affection; an emblem of the
paternal mercy with which he draws to himself, and receives penitent
sinners. Had the prodigal son offered any plea of merits or deserts,
he had never deserved to find favor; but he knew the goodness and
tenderness of his father, who had with restless nights waited with
impatience to see him return. The tender parent wanted no motives
drawn from other objects or things without himself. The paternal
affection within his own breast pleaded in favor of his disobedient
child. By this his very bowels yearned to embrace him again, and
raise him from spiritual death to life. This same tenderness and
compassion in Christ was the grounds of the sisters’ confidence.
Jesus, however, deferred setting out two or three days, that his
glory might be more manifested by the greater evidence of the
miracle, and by the trial of the virtue and confidence of the two
holy sisters. When he arrived at Bethania, Martha went first out to
meet and welcome him; and then called her sister Mary. The presence
of Jesus brings every blessing and comfort; and, by it, the sisters
had the joy to see their brother again restored to life when he had
been four days in the grave.

Christ was again at Bethania, at the house of Simon the Leper, six
days before his passion. Lazarus was one of the guests. Martha waited
at table; and Mary poured a box of costly ointments on our Lord’s
feet, which she wiped with the hair of her head.[338] Judas Iscariot
complained of this waste, saying that the ointment might have been
sold, and the price given to the poor. Not that he had any regard
for the poor, but, bearing the common purse, he converted things
sometimes to his own use, being a thief. How imperceptible a vice is
covetousness, and how subtle in excuses to deceive itself! Charity
interprets the actions of others in the best part; but passion
hurries men into rash judgments. Judas condemned the most heroic
virtue and devotion of a saint; but Jesus undertook her defence. He
was pleased not with the ointment, but with the love and devotion of
his fervent servant, which he suffered her to satisfy by that action,
which he received as performed for the embalming of his body, his
death being then at hand. He, moreover, declared that this good work
which Judas condemned, should be commended to the edification of his
servants over the whole world wherever his gospel should be preached.

St. Martha seems to have been one of those holy women who attended
Christ during his passion, and stood under his cross. After his
ascension, she came to Marseilles, and ended her life in Provence,
where her body was found at Tarascon, soon after the discovery of
that of St. Mary Magdalen. It lies in a magnificent subterraneous
chapel of the stately collegiate church at Tarascon, which is
dedicated to God in her honor. King Louis XI. gave a rich bust of
gold, in which the head of the saint is kept.

* * * * *

We have all, like St. Martha, one only necessary affair; that for
which alone God created and redeemed us; for which he has wrought so
many wonderful mysteries in our favor, and upon which the dreadful
alternative of sovereign and everlasting happiness or misery depends.
This is, that we refer even all our worldly employments and all
that we do, to glorify God, to fulfil his will, and to save our
souls. In this, all our thoughts, desires, and enterprises, ought
to centre: this is the circle in which we must shut ourselves up,
and never think of moving out of. Every one ought sincerely to say
with an ancient writer, “I have but one only affair; and I care for
nothing else only lest any other thing should take off any part of my
attention from this my only business.”[339] What account will they
be able to give to themselves or to their Judge at the last day, who
make vanity, pastimes, and idle employments, the sole business of
their life? or they who toil and slave much in bustling through the
world, seeming to neglect nothing but their only affair.

SS. SIMPLICIUS AND FAUSTINUS, BROTHERS,
AND BEATRICE, THEIR SISTER, MM.

The two brothers were cruelly tormented, and at length beheaded at
Rome in the persecution of Diocletian, in the year 303. Their sister
Beatrice took up their bodies out of the Tiber, and gave them burial.
She lay herself concealed seven months in the house of a virtuous
widow called Lucina, with whom she spent her time, night and day,
in fervent prayer, and in the exercise of other good works. She
was discovered and impeached by a pagan kinsman, who designed to
possess himself of her estate, which was contiguous to his own; she
resolutely protested to the judge that she would never adore gods of
wood and stone, and was strangled by his order in prison the night
following. Lucina buried her body near her brothers on the side of
the highway to Porto, in the cemetery called Ad Ursum Pileatum. Pope
Leo translated their relics into a church which he built to their
honor in the city: they now lie in that of St. Mary Major.

With them is commemorated St. Felix, pope and martyr, whose name is
found in the Martyrologies on this day.

ST. WILLIAM, BISHOP OF S. BRIEUC IN BRITTANY, C.

St. William Pinchon, of an illustrious family in Brittany, was, by
the innocence of his manners, his admirable meekness, humility,
chastity, mortification, charity, and devotion, an accomplished model
of all virtues. He received the tonsure, and some years after the
holy orders of deacon and priest, at the hands of Josselin, bishop
of S. Brieuc, served that church under his two successors, Peter
and Sylvester, and succeeded the latter in the episcopal dignity
about the year 1220. The poor were his treasurers, and not content
to exhaust on them whatever he possessed, he often borrowed great
stores of corn and other necessary provisions for their relief. The
bare boards were usually his bed; for his domestics discovered that
he never made use of the soft bed which they prepared for him. The
assiduous application to all the functions of his charge was no
hindrance to his nourishing within himself the spirit of recollection
and holy prayer. He died about the year 1234, on the 29th of July,
on which his name occurs in the Roman Martyrology. His body was
deposited in his cathedral, and taken up incorrupt in 1248. He
was canonized by Innocent IV. in 1253, according to Baronius. See
Lobineau, Vies des SS. de Bretagne, p. 235.

ST. OLAUS OR OLAVE, KING OF NORWAY, M.

He was son of Herald Grenscius, prince of Westfold in Norway, by
his wife Asta, daughter of Gulbrand Kuta, governor of Gulbrand’s
Dale or Valley. He delivered his country from the tyranny under
which the Swedes and Danes had for some time held it, whilst Norway
was divided between Sweno, king of Denmark, Olave Scot-Konung, son
of Eric, king of Sweden, and Eric, son of Hacon earl of Norway. In
1013, he sailed to England, and successfully assisted king Ethelred
against the Danes after the death of Sueno or Swayn their king. He
afterward waged war against Olaus Scot-Konung, king of Sweden, till,
making an advantageous peace, he took to wife the daughter of that
king.[340] These two princes about that time introduced the Romescot,
a small annual tribute yearly to be paid to the apostolic see.[341]
St. Olave brought over from England several pious and learned
priests and monks, one of whom, named Grimkele, was chosen bishop of
Drontheim, his capital. The holy king did nothing without the advice
of this prelate, and by his counsels published many wholesome laws,
and abolished such ancient laws and customs as were contrary to
the Gospel; which he did not only in Norway, but also in the isles
of Orkney and of Iceland; though the entire conquest of Orkney was
reserved to his son Magnus, who also subdued the isle of Man, as
Camden relates from the ancient Chronicle of Man.

Our religious king having settled his dominions in peace, set himself
to extirpate out of them the abominable superstitions of idolatry. He
travelled in person from town to town, exhorting his subjects to open
the eyes of their souls to the bright light of faith. A company of
zealous preachers attended him, and he demolished in many places the
idolatrous temples. The heathens rebelled, and with the assistance
of Canutus the Great, defeated and expelled him. St. Olave fled into
Russia, whence he soon after returned, and raised an army in order
to recover his kingdom, but was slain by his rebellious and infidel
subjects in a battle fought at Stichstadt, north of Drontheim, on
the 29th of July, 1030, having reigned sixteen years. These rebels
seem to have been in the interest of Canute the Great, who arrived
from England in Norway, took possession of that kingdom, and left
his nephew Hackin viceroy, but he being soon after drowned at sea,
Canute made his son Sweno viceroy of Norway. Saint Olave’s body was
honorably buried at Drontheim, and the year following bishop Grimkele
commanded him to be honored in that church among the saints with
the title of martyr. His son Magnus was called home from Russia in
1035, and restored to the throne. Sweno, who saw himself entirely
abandoned, fled into Sweden. Magnus exceedingly promoted the devotion
of the people to the memory of his father, the martyr, who was chosen
titular saint of the cathedral of Drontheim. This church was rebuilt
with such splendor and magnificence, as to have been the glory and
pride of all the North. Munster has given us a minute description of
it, after Lutheranism was introduced; but it was soon after burnt by
lightning. The body of St. Olave was found incorrupt in 1098; and
again when the Lutherans, in 1541, plundered the shrine, which was
adorned with gold and jewels of an immense value, a treasure nowhere
equalled in the North. The ship which carried the greatest part of
this sacrilegious booty perished at sea in the road to Denmark;
the rest was robbed at land, so that nothing of it came into the
king of Denmark’s hands. The Lutherans treated the saint’s body
with respect, and left it in the same place where the shrine had
stood, in the inner wooden case, till in 1568 they decently buried
it in the same cathedral. A shirt or inner garment of St. Olave’s
is shown at St. Victor’s in Paris. His shrine became famous by many
miracles, and he was honored with extraordinary devotion throughout
all the northern kingdoms, and was titular saint of several churches
in England and Scotland. He was called by our ancestors St. Olave,
and more frequently St. Tooley; but in the Norway Chronicles Olaf
Haraldson, and Olaf Helge or the Holy. See Saxo-Grammaticus, Hist.
Dan. l. 10, fol. 94, 95, 96. Adam Brem, Hist. Eccl. l. 2, c. 43. And
the Iceland historians whom Mallet regards as far more accurate,
especially Torfæus, in the last century, in his Series regum Daniæ;
Snorro Sturleson, &c. See also Bosch the Bollandist, t. 7, Jul. p.
87. Mallet, Hist. de Dannemarc, &c.

ST. OLAUS, KING OF SWEDEN.

Was converted to the faith by St. Anscharius, and for his zeal in
propagating the same, and because in the time of a great famine he
could not be compelled to offer sacrifice to the idols of Upsal,
was sacrificed to them by the rebellious inhabitants of Birca, at
that time the usual residence of the kings of Sweden. From the ruins
of Birca, Stockholm took its rise, though built at a considerable
distance from it. See Puffendorf’s History of Sweden, t. 1, p. 70.

JULY XXX.

SS. ABDON AND SENNEN, MM.

They were Persians, but coming to Rome, courageously confessed the
faith of Christ in the persecution of Decius in 250. They were
cruelly tormented, but the more their bodies were mangled and
covered with ghastly wounds, the more were their souls adorned and
beautified with divine grace, and rendered glorious in the sight of
heaven. The Christians at Rome did not treat them as strangers, but
as brethren united to them in the hope of the same blessed country;
and after their death carefully deposited their bodies in the house
of a subdeacon called Quirinus. In the reign of Constantine the
Great, their relics were removed into the ancient burying place of
Pontian, so called from some rich man who built it: called also,
from some sign, Ad Ursum Pileatum. It afterward received its name
from SS. Abdon and Sennen. It was situated near the Tiber, on the
road to Porto near the gates of Rome. The images of these martyrs
with Persian bonnets and crowns on their heads, and their names, are
to be seen there at this day in ancient sculpture.[342] SS. Abdon
and Sennen are mentioned in the ancient Liberian Calendar, and in
other Martyrologies; though their modern acts deserve no notice, as
cardinal Noris has demonstrated.[343]

The martyrs preferred torments and death to sin, because the love
of God above all things reigned in their breasts. “We say we are
Christians,” says Tertullian;[344] “we proclaim it to the whole
world, even under the hands of the executioner, and in the midst of
all the torments you inflict upon us to compel us to unsay it. Torn
and mangled, and weltering in our blood, we cry out as loud as we are
able to cry, That we are worshippers of God through Christ.” Upon
which Mr. Reeves observes, that no other religion ever produced any
considerable number of martyrs except the true one. Do we ever read
of any generation of men so greedy of martyrdom, who thought it long
till they were upon the rack, and were so patient, so cheerful and
steadfast under the most intolerable torments? Socrates was the only
philosopher that can be said to have died for his doctrine; and what
a restless posture of mind does he betray, who was esteemed the best
and the wisest of the heathens! With what misgivings, and fits of
hope and fear, does he deliver himself in that most famous discourse,
supposed to have been made by him a little before his death, about
a future state![345] And neither Phædo, Cebes, Crito, Simmias, nor
any other of his greatest friends who were present at his death,
durst maintain either his innocence, or that doctrine for which he
died, in the Areopagus. With what reserve did Plato himself dogmatize
concerning the gods whom he worshipped in public, but denied in
private! How did he dodge about, disguise himself, and say and unsay
the same excellent truths! Only the Christians suffered at this rate,
and they held on suffering for several hundred years together, till
they had subdued the world by dying for their religion. What could
engage such a number of men in such a religion, and support them in
it, in defiance of death in the most shocking forms, but evident
truth, and a superior grace and strength from above?

ST. JULITTA, M.

The emperor Dioclesian, by the first edicts which he issued out
against the Christians in 303, declared them infamous, and debarred
from all protection of the laws, and from all the privileges of
citizens. By thus putting arms into the hands of every one against
them, the tyrant hoped to see their very name extinguished; but
he was not sensible that this divine religion then triumphs when
its professors seem to be overcome by death, and that by it human
weakness is made victorious over the power of the world and hell.
Of this St. Julitta is an instance. She was a rich lady of Cæsarea
in Cappadocia, and was possessed of many farms, cattles, goods, and
slaves. A powerful man of the town, by open violence, got possession
of a considerable part of her estate; and when he could not otherwise
maintain his suit before the pretor, charged her with being a
Christian. The judge caused fire and incense to be immediately
brought into the court, and commanded her to offer sacrifice to the
idols; but she courageously made him this answer, “May my estates
perish, or be disposed of to strangers; may I also lose my life,
and may this my body be cut in pieces rather than that by the least
impious word I should offend God that made me. If you take from me a
little portion of this earth, I shall gain heaven for it.” The judge
was extremely exasperated at the undaunted resolution with which she
spoke, and without more ado confirmed to the usurper the estates to
which he unjustly laid claim, and condemned the servant of Christ to
the flames. Upon hearing this sentence, a kind of heavenly joy and
most amiable cheerfulness flushed her countenance, which she could
not refrain from expressing by continual thanksgiving to God to her
last breath. She exhorted the Christians in the most moving manner
to constancy and fervor. The Pagans were amazed to see a lady of her
rank, age, and fortune, possessed of all the advantages necessary to
please the world, and yet in a condition to enjoy all that is in it
most flattering, to contemn all this, and life itself with such an
heroic constancy.

When all things were ready for the execution, Julitta laid herself
cheerfully upon the pile, and there expired, being, as it seems,
stifled by the smoke; for the flame, rising in an arched vault round
her body, did not touch it, and the Christians took it up entire. It
was afterward interred in the porch of the principal church in the
city; and St. Basil, speaking of this treasure about the year 375,
wrote as follows: “It enriches with blessings both the place and
those who come to it.” He assures us that “the earth which received
the body of this blessed woman sent forth a spring of most pleasant
water, whereas all the neighboring waters are brackish and salt. This
water preserves health, and relieves the sick.” Both the Greeks and
Latins honor St. Julitta on this day. See St. Basil’s homily on St.
Julitta, t. 2, p. 33, hom. 5: also in Ruinart’s collection, p. 515.

JULY XXXI.

ST. IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA, C.

FOUNDER OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS.

His life was written by F. Lewis Gonzales or Gonzalvo, who
was a long time the saint’s confessor, and died at Lisbon
in 1575; and again by Ribadeneira, who had intimately
conversed with the saint, and died at Madrid in 1611. It is
elegantly compiled in Latin by Maffei, who died at Tivoli
in 1603; in Italian by Bartoli, at Rome about 1650; and in
French by Bouhours, one of the ablest and most judicious of
the modern French critics in polite literature, who died
at Paris in 1704. Pinius the Bollandist gives the original
lives, Julij, t. 7, p. 409, and adds the history of many
miracles wrought by the intercession of this saint; also,
Baillet.

A. D. 1556.

The conversion of many barbarous nations, several heretofore unknown
to us, both in the most remote eastern and western hemisphere; the
education of youth in learning and piety, the instruction of the
ignorant, the improvement of all the sciences, and the reformation of
the manners of a great part of Christendom, is the wonderful fruit of
the zeal with which this glorious saint devoted himself to labor in
exalting the glory of God, and in spreading over the whole world that
fire which Christ himself came to kindle on earth. St. Ignatius was
born in 1491, in the castle of Loyola, in Guipuscoa, a part of Biscay
that reaches to the Pyrenean mountains. His father, Don Bertram,
was lord of Ognez and Loyola, head of one of the most ancient and
noble families of that country. His mother, Mary Saez de Balde, was
not less illustrious by her extraction. They had three daughters
and eight sons. The youngest of all these was Inigo or Ignatius; he
was well shaped, and in his childhood gave proofs of a pregnant wit
and discretion above his years; was affable and obliging, but of a
warm or choleric disposition, and had an ardent passion for glory.
He was bred in the court of Ferdinand V. in quality of page to the
king, under the care and protection of Antony Manriquez, duke of
Najara, grandee of Spain, who was his kinsman and patron; and who,
perceiving his inclinations, led him to the army, took care to have
him taught all the exercises proper to make him an accomplished
officer. The love of glory and the example of his elder brothers who
had signalized themselves in the wars of Naples, made him impatient
till he entered the service. He behaved with great valor and conduct
in the army, especially at the taking of Najara, a small town on the
frontiers of Biscay; yet he generously declined taking any part of
the booty in which he might have challenged the greatest share. He
hated gaming as an offspring of avarice, and a source of quarrels and
other evils; was dexterous in the management of affairs, and had an
excellent talent in making up differences among the soldiers. He was
generous, even towards enemies, but addicted to gallantry, and full
of the maxims of worldly honor, vanity, and pleasures. Though he had
no tincture of learning, he made tolerably good verses in Spanish,
having a natural genius for poetry. A poem which he composed in
praise of St. Peter was much commended.

Charles V., who had succeeded king Ferdinand, was chosen emperor, and
obliged to go into Germany. Francis I., king of France, a martial
prince, having been his competitor for the empire, resented his
disappointment, and became an implacable enemy to the emperor and
the house of Austria. He declared war against Charles, with a view
to recover Navarre, of which Ferdinand had lately dispossessed John
of Albert, and which Charles still held, contrary to the treaty
of Noyon, by which he was obliged to restore it in six months.
Francis, therefore, in 1521, sent a great army into Spain, under the
command of Andrew de Foix, younger brother of the famous Lautrec,
who, passing the Pyrenees, laid siege to Pampeluna, the capital of
Navarre. Ignatius had been left there by the viceroy, not to command,
but to encourage the garrison. He did all that lay in his power to
persuade them to defend the city, but in vain. However, when he saw
them open the gates to the enemy, to save his own honor, he retired
into the citadel with one only soldier who had the heart to follow
him. The garrison of this fortress deliberated likewise whether
they should surrender, but Ignatius encouraged them to stand their
ground. The French attacked the place with great fury, and with their
artillery made a wide breach in the wall, and attempted to take
it by assault. Ignatius appeared upon the breach, at the head of
the bravest part of the garrison, and, with his sword in his hand,
endeavored to drive back the enemy; but, in the heat of the combat, a
shot from a cannon broke from the wall a bit of stone, which struck
and bruised his left leg; and the ball itself in the rebound broke
and shivered his right leg. The garrison seeing him fall, surrendered
at discretion.

The French used their victory with moderation, and treated the
prisoners well, especially Ignatius, in consideration of his quality
and valor. They carried him to the general’s quarters, and soon after
sent him, in a litter carried by two men, to the castle of Loyola,
which was not far from Pampeluna. Being arrived there he felt great
pain; for the bones had been ill set, as is often the case in the
hurry after a battle. The surgeons therefore judged it necessary to
break his leg again, which he suffered without any concern. But a
violent fever followed the second setting, which was attended with
dangerous symptoms, and reduced him to an extreme degree of weakness,
so that the physicians declared that he could not live many days.
He received the sacraments on the eve of the feast of SS. Peter
and Paul, and it was believed he could not hold out till the next
morning. Nevertheless God, who had great designs of mercy upon him,
was pleased to restore him to his health in the following manner:
Ignatius always had a singular devotion to St. Peter, and implored
his intercession in his present distress with great confidence. In
the night, he thought he saw in a dream that apostle touch him, and
cure him. When he awaked he found himself out of danger; his pains
left him, and his strength began to return, so that he ever after
looked upon this recovery as miraculous; yet he still retained the
spirit of the world. After the second setting of his leg, the end
of a bone stuck out under his knee, which was a visible deformity.
Though the surgeons told him the operation would be very painful,
this protuberance he caused to be cut off, merely that his boot and
stockings might sit handsomely; and he would neither be bound nor
held, and scarce ever changed countenance whilst the bone was partly
sawed and partly cut off, though the pain must have been excessive.
Because his right leg remained shorter than the left, he would be for
many days together put upon a kind of rack, and with an iron engine
he violently stretched and drew out that leg; but all to little
purpose, for he remained lame his whole life after.

During the cure of his knee he was confined to his bed, though
otherwise in perfect health, and finding the time tedious, he called
for some book of romances, for he had been always much delighted
with fabulous histories of knight-errantry. None such being then
found in the castle of Loyola, a book of the lives of our Saviour,
and of the saints, was brought him. He read them first, only to
pass away the time, but afterward began to relish them and to spend
whole days in reading them. He chiefly admired in the saints their
love of solitude and of the cross. He considered among the anchorets
many persons of quality who buried themselves alive in caves and
dens, pale with fasting, and covered with haircloth; and he said to
himself, “These men were of the same frame I am of; why then should
not I do what they have done?” In the fervor of his good resolutions
he thought of visiting the Holy Land, and becoming a hermit. But
these pious notions soon vanished; and his passion for glory, and
a secret inclination for a rich lady in Castile, with a view to
marriage, again filled his mind with thoughts of the world; till
returning to the lives of the saints, he perceived in his own heart
the emptiness of all worldly glory, and that only God could content
the soul. This vicissitude and fluctuation of mind continued some
time; but he observed this difference, that the thoughts which were
from God filled his soul with consolation, peace, and tranquillity;
whereas the others brought indeed some sensible delight, but left a
certain bitterness and heaviness in the heart. This mark he lays down
in his book of Spiritual Exercises, as the ground of the rules for
the discernment of the Spirit of God and the world in all the motions
of the soul; as does cardinal Bona, and all other writers who treat
of the discernment of spirits in the interior life. Taking at last
a firm resolution to imitate the saints in their heroic practice of
virtue, he began to treat his body with all the rigor it was able to
bear; he rose at midnight, and spent his retired hours in weeping for
his sins.

One night being prostrate before an image of the Blessed Virgin, in
extraordinary sentiments of fervor, he consecrated himself to the
service of his Redeemer under her patronage, and vowed an inviolable
fidelity. When he had ended his prayer he heard a great noise; the
house shook, the windows of his chamber were broken, and a rent was
made in the wall which remains to this day, says the latest writer
of his life. God might by this sign testify his acceptance of his
sacrifice; as a like sign happened in the place where the faithful
were assembled after Christ’s ascension,[346] and in the prison of
Paul and Silas;[347] or this might be an effect of the rage of the
devil. Another night, Ignatius saw the Mother of God environed with
light, holding the infant Jesus in her arms; this vision replenished
his soul with spiritual delight, and made all sensual pleasure
and worldly objects insipid to him ever after. The saint’s eldest
brother, who was then, by the death of their father, lord of Loyola,
endeavored to detain him in the world, and to persuade him not to
throw away the great advantages of the honor and reputation which
his valor had gained him. But Ignatius being cured of his wounds,
under pretence of paying a visit to the duke of Najara, who had
often come to see him during his illness, and who lived at Navarret,
turned another way, and sending his two servants back from Navarret
to Loyola, went to Montserrat. This was a great abbey of near three
hundred Benedictin monks, of a reformed austere institute, situate on
a mountain of difficult access, about four leagues in circumference
and two leagues high, in the diocess of Barcelona. The monastery was
first founded for nuns by the sovereign counts of Barcelona about the
year 880, but was given to monks in 990. It has been much augmented
by several kings of Spain, and is very famous for a miraculous image
of the Blessed Virgin, and a great resort of pilgrims.

There lived at that time in this monastery a monk of great sanctity,
named John Chanones, a Frenchman, who being formerly vicar-general to
the bishop of Mirepoix, in the thirty-first year of his age, resigned
his ecclesiastical preferments, and took the monastic habit in this
place. He lived to the age of eighty-eight years, never eating any
flesh, watching great part of the night in prayer, dividing his
whole time between heavenly contemplation and the service of his
neighbor; and giving to all Spain an example of the most perfect
obedience, humility, charity, devotion, and all other virtues. To
this experienced director, Ignatius addressed himself, and after his
preparation, was three days in making to him a general confession,
which he often interrupted by the abundance of his tears. He made a
vow of perpetual chastity, and dedicated himself with great fervor to
the divine service. At his first coming to this place he had bought,
at the village of Montserrat, a long coat of coarse cloth, a girdle,
a pair of sandals, a wallet, and a pilgrim’s staff, intending,
after he had finished his devotions there, to make a pilgrimage to
Jerusalem. Disguised in this habit, he remained at the abbey. He
communicated to his director a plan of the austerities he proposed
to practise, and was confirmed by him in his good resolutions. He
received the blessed eucharist early in the morning on the feast
of the Annunciation of our Lady in 1522; and on the same day left
Montserrat for fear of being discovered, having given his horse to
the monastery, and hung up his sword on a pillar near the altar
in testimony of his renouncing the secular warfare, and entering
himself in that of Christ. He travelled with his staff in his hand,
a scrip by his side, bare-headed, and with one foot bare, the other
being covered because it was yet tender and swelled. He went away
infinitely pleased that he had cast off the livery of the world, and
put on that of Jesus Christ. He had bestowed his rich clothes on a
beggar at his coming out of Montserrat; but the poor man was thrown
into prison on suspicion of theft. Ignatius being sent after by the
magistrates, and brought back, told the truth to release him, but
would not discover his own name.

Three leagues from Montserrat is a large village called Manresa,
with a convent of Dominicans, and a hospital without the walls for
pilgrims and sick persons. Ignatius went to this hospital, and
rejoicing to see himself received in it unknown and among the poor,
began to fast on water and the bread (which he begged) the whole
week, except Sundays, when he ate a few boiled herbs, but sprinkled
over with ashes. He wore an iron girdle and a hair shirt; disciplined
himself thrice a day, slept little, and lay on the ground. He was
every day present at the whole divine office, spent seven hours on
his knees at prayer, and received the sacraments every Sunday. To add
humiliation to his bodily austerities, he affected a clownishness
in his behavior, and went begging about the streets with his face
covered with dirt, his hair rough, and his beard and nails grown
out to a frightful length. The children threw stones at him, and
followed him with scornful shouts in the streets. Ignatius suffered
these insults without saying one word, rejoicing secretly in his
heart to share in the reproaches of the cross. The more mortifying
the noisomeness of the hospital and the company of beggars were,
the more violence he offered to himself that he might bear them
cheerfully. The story of the fine suit of clothes given to the beggar
at Montserrat, and the patience and devotion of the holy man, made
him soon to be reverenced as some fervent penitent in disguise. To
shun this danger, he privately hid himself in a dark deep cave in a
solitary valley, called The Vale of Paradise, covered with briars,
half a mile from the town. Here he much increased his mortifications
till he was accidentally found half dead, and carried back to Manresa
and lodged in the hospital.

After enjoying peace of mind and heavenly consolations from the
time of his conversion, he was here visited with the most terrible
trial of fears and scruples. He found no comfort in prayer, no
relief in fasting, no remedy in disciplines, no consolation from
the sacraments, and his soul was overwhelmed with bitter sadness.
The Dominicans, out of compassion, took him out of the hospital
into their convent; but his melancholy only increased upon him. He
apprehended some sin in every step he took, and seemed often on the
very brink of despair; but he was in the hands of him whose trials
are favors. He most earnestly implored the divine assistance, and
took no sustenance for seven days, till his confessor obliged him
to eat. Soon after this, his tranquillity of mind was perfectly
restored, and his soul overflowed with spiritual joy. From this
experience he acquired a particular talent for curing scrupulous
consciences, and a singular light to discern them. His prayer was
accompanied with many heavenly raptures, and he received from God a
supernatural knowledge and sense of sublime divine mysteries: yet
he concealed all from the eyes of men, only disclosing himself to
his two confessors, the pious monk of Montserrat, and the Dominican
of Manresa; however, the people began to reverence him as a living
saint, which they particularly testified during a violent fever into
which his austerities cast him three times.

Too nice a worldly prudence may condemn the voluntary humiliations
which this saint sometimes made choice of; but the wisdom of God
is above that of the world; and the Holy Ghost sometimes inspires
certain heroic souls to seek perfectly to die to themselves by
certain practices which are extraordinary, and which would not be
advisable to others; and if affected or undertaken with obstinacy
and against advice, would be pernicious and criminal. Ignatius, by
perfect compunction, humility, self-denial, contempt of the world,
severe interior trials, and assiduous meditation, was prepared,
by the divine grace, to be raised to an extraordinary gift of
supernatural prayer. He afterward assured F. Lainez that he had
learned more of divine mysteries by prayer in one hour at Manresa,
than all the doctors of the schools could ever have taught him.
He was there favored with many raptures, and divine illustrations
concerning the Trinity, of which he afterward spoke with so much
light and unction, that the most learned admired him, and the
ignorant were instructed. In like manner, in various wonderful
ecstasies, he was enlightened concerning the beauty and order of the
creation, the excess of divine love which shines forth to man in
the sacrament of the altar, and many other mysteries. So imperfect
was his knowledge of his duties when he first renounced the world,
that hearing a certain Moresco or Mahometan speak injuriously of
the holy mother of God, when he set out from Loyola to Montserrat,
he deliberated whether, being an officer, he ought not to kill him,
though the divine protection preserved him from so criminal an
action. But at Manresa he made so good a progress in the school of
virtue, as to become qualified already to be a guide to others. He
stayed there almost a year, during which time he governed himself
by the advice of the holy monk of Montserrat, whom he visited every
week, and that of his Dominican director.

Spain, in that and the foregoing age, abounded with many learned and
experienced persons in that way, endowed with an eminent spirit,
and a perfect experimental knowledge of Christian piety; witness
the works of St. Peter of Alcantara, John of Avila, St. Teresa,
Bartholomew de Martyribus, Louis of Granada, and others. Our saint
had the happiness to fall into the hands of prudent and able guides,
and giving his heart to God without reserve, became himself in a
short time an accomplished master; and whereas he at first only
proposed to himself his own perfection, he afterward burned with
an ardent desire of contributing to the salvation of others; and
commiserating the blindness of sinners, and considering how much the
glory of God shines in the sanctification of souls purchased with
the blood of his Son, he said to himself, “It is not enough that I
serve the Lord; all hearts ought to love him, and all tongues ought
to praise him.” With this view, in order to be admitted more freely
to converse with persons in the world, he chose a dress which, being
more decent than the penitential garments which he at first wore,
might not be disagreeable to others; and he moderated his excessive
austerities.

He began then to exhort many to the love of virtue, and he there
wrote his Spiritual Exercises, which he afterward revised, and
published at Rome in 1548.[348] Though the saint was at that time
unacquainted with learning any further than barely to read and write,
yet this book is so full of excellent maxims and instructions in the
highest points of a spiritual life, that it is most clear that the
Holy Ghost supplied abundantly what was yet wanting in him of human
learning and study. The spirit which reigns in this book was that of
all the saints. Frequent religious retirement had been practised by
pious persons, in imitation of Christ and all the saints from the
beginning; likewise the use and method of holy meditation were always
known; but the excellent order of these meditations, prescribed by
Ignatius, was new: and, though the principal rules and maxims are
found in the lessons and lives of the ancient fathers of the desert,
they are here judiciously chosen, methodically digested, and clearly
explained. One of these is, that a person must not abridge the
time, or desist from meditating, on account of spiritual dryness;
another, that no one make any vow in sudden sentiments of fervor, but
wait some time, and first ask advice. St. Ignatius establishes in
this book the practice of a daily particular examination against a
person’s predominant passion, or on the best means and endeavors to
acquire some particular virtue, besides the daily general examination
of conscience. He lays down this excellent maxim;[349] “When God hath
appointed out a way, we must faithfully follow it, and never think of
another, under pretence that it is more easy and safe. It is one of
the devil’s artifices to set before a soul some state, holy indeed,
but impossible to her, or at least different from hers; that by this
love of novelty, she may dislike or be slack in her present state, in
which God hath placed her, and which is best for her. In like manner
he represents to her other actions as more holy and profitable to
make her conceive a disgust of her present employment.” When some
pretended to find fault with this book of St. Ignatius’s Spiritual
Exercises, pope Paul III. at the request of St. Francis Borgia, by a
brief in 1548, approved it, as full of the Spirit of God, and very
useful for the edification and spiritual profit of the faithful.

The pestilence which raged in Italy having ceased, Ignatius, after
a stay of ten months at Manresa, left that place for Barcelona,
neither regarding the tears of those who sought to detain him, nor
admitting any to bear him company, nor consenting to accept any money
for the expenses of his journey. He took shipping at Barcelona, and
in five days landed at Gaeta, whence he travelled on foot to Rome,
Padua, and Venice, through villages, the towns being shut for fear
of the plague. He spent the Easter at Rome, and sailed from Venice
on board the admiral’s vessel, which was carrying the governor to
Cyprus. The sailors were a profligate crew, and seemed entirely to
neglect prayer and all duties of religion, and their discourse was
often lewd and profane. Ignatius having reproved them for their
licentiousness, his zeal made them conspire to leave him ashore in
a desert island; but a gust of wind from the land hindered the ship
from touching upon it. He arrived at Cyprus, and found in the port a
vessel full of pilgrims, just ready to hoist sail. Going immediately
on board, he made a good voyage, and landed at Jaffa, the ancient
Joppa, on the last day of August, 1523, forty days after he had left
Venice. He went on foot from thence to Jerusalem in four days. The
sight of the holy places filled his soul with joy and the most ardent
sentiments of devotion and compunction, and he desired to stay there
to labor in the conversion of the Mahometans. The provincial of the
Franciscans, by virtue of his authority from the holy see over the
pilgrims, commanded him to leave Palestine. Ignatius obeyed, but
slipt privately back to satisfy his devotion again in visiting twice
more the print of our Saviour’s feet on mount Olivet.

He returned to Europe in winter, in extreme cold weather, poorly
clad, and came to Venice at the end of January, in 1524; from whence
he continued his journey by Genoa to Barcelona. Desiring to qualify
himself for the functions of the altar, and for assisting spiritually
his neighbor, he began at Barcelona to study grammar, and addressed
himself to a famous master named Jerom Ardebal, being assisted in
the meantime in his maintenance by the charities of a pious lady of
that city, called Isabel Rosella. He was then thirty-three years
old; and it is not hard to conceive what difficulties he must go
through in learning the rudiments of grammar at that age. Moreover,
he seemed, by his military employments, and after his retreat by his
contemplative life, very unfit for such an undertaking. At first, his
mind was so fixed only on God, that he forgot everything he read,
and conjugating _amo_, for example, could only repeat to himself,
“I love God; I am loved by God,” and the like; but resisting this
as a temptation, he began to make some progress, still joining
contemplation and extraordinary austerities with his studies. He bore
the jeers and taunts of the little boys, his schoolfellows, with joy.
Hearing that a poor man called Lasano had hanged himself on a beam
in his chamber, he ran to him, cut the rope, and prayed by him till
the man returned to himself, though he had before seemed perfectly
dead to all the bystanders. Lasano made his confession, received the
sacraments, and soon after expired. This fact was regarded in the
city as miraculous.

Some persons persuaded Ignatius to read Erasmus’s Christian Soldier,
an elegant book written by that master of style, at the request of
an officer’s pious lady, for the use of her husband, a man of loose
morals. The saint always found his heart dry after reading this or
any other of that author’s works; which made him afterward caution
those of his society against reading them, at least very much. Though
in that writer’s paraphrase on the Lord’s prayer and other such
treatises of piety, we find very pious sentiments collected from
great authors, and elegantly and concisely expressed, yet a devout
reader finds the language of the heart wanting. On the other side, it
is well known how much St. Ignatius read daily, and recommended to
all others the incomparable book, Of the Imitation of Christ, which
he made frequent use of to nourish and increase the fervor of his
soul. He lodged at the house of one Agnes Pascal, a devout woman. Her
son, John Pascal, a pious youth, would sometimes rise in the night
to observe what Ignatius did in his chamber, and saw him sometimes
on his knees, sometimes prostrate on the ground, his countenance on
fire, and often in tears, repeating such words as these: “O God, my
love, and the delight of my soul, if men knew thee they could never
offend thee! My God, how good art thou to bear with such a sinner as
I am!”

The saint, after studying two years at Barcelona, went to the
university of Alcala, which had been lately founded by cardinal
Ximenes, where he attended at the same time to lectures in logic,
physics, and divinity; by which multiplicity he only confounded
his ideas, and learned nothing at all, though he studied night
and day. He lodged in a chamber of an hospital, lived by begging
a small subsistence, and wore a coarse grey habit, in which he
was imitated by four companions. He catechised children, held
assemblies of devotion in the hospital, and by his mild reprehensions
converted many loose livers, and, among others, one of the richest
prelates in Spain. Some accused him of sorcery, and of the heresy
of certain visionaries lately condemned in Spain under the name of
the Illuminati, or Men of New Light: but, upon examination, he was
justified by the inquisitors. After this, for teaching the catechism,
being a man without learning or authority, he was accused to the
bishop’s grand vicar, who confined him to close prison two-and-forty
days, but declared him innocent of any fault by a public sentence on
the 1st day of June, 1527; yet forbidding him and his companions to
wear any singular habit, or to give any instructions in religious
matters, being illiterate persons. Ignatius rejoiced in his jail that
he suffered, though innocent, but spoke with such piety that many
called him another St. Paul in prison. Being enlarged, he went about
the streets with a public officer to beg money to buy a scholar’s
dress, in which action he rejoiced at the insults and affronts
which he met with. However, he went himself to the archbishop of
Toledo, Alphonsus de Fonseca, who was much pleased with him, but
advised him to leave Alcala, and go to Salamanca, promising him his
protection. Ignatius, in this latter place, began to draw many to
virtue, and was followed by great numbers, which exposed him again to
suspicions of introducing dangerous practices, and the grand-vicar of
Salamanca imprisoned him; but, after two-and-twenty days, declared
him innocent, and a person of sincere virtue. Ignatius looked upon
prisons, sufferings, and ignominy, as the height of his ambition;
and God was pleased to purge and sanctify his soul by these trials.
Recovering his liberty again, he resolved to leave Spain.

He from that time began to wear shoes, and received money sent him by
his friends, but in the middle of winter travelled on foot to Paris,
where he arrived in the beginning of February, 1528. He spent two
years in perfecting himself in the Latin tongue; then went through
a course of philosophy. He lived first in Montaigue college; but,
being robbed of his money, was obliged to lodge in the hospital of
St. James, to beg his bread from day to day, and in the vacation time
to go into Flanders, and once into England, to procure charities from
the Spanish merchants settled there, from whom and from some friends
at Barcelona he received abundant supplies. He studied his philosophy
three years and a half in the college of St. Barbara. He had induced
many of his schoolfellows to spend the Sundays and holydays in
prayer, and to apply themselves more fervently to the practice of
good works. Pegna, his master, thought he hindered their studies, and
finding him not corrected by his admonitions, prepossessed Govea,
principal of the college of St. Barbara, against him, so that he was
ordered by him to undergo the greatest punishment then in use in that
university, called _The Hall_, which was a public whipping; that this
infamy might deter others from following him. The regents came all
into the hall with rods in their hands, ready to lash the seditious
student. Ignatius offered himself joyfully to suffer all things;
yet, apprehending lest the scandal of this disgrace should make
those whom he had reclaimed fall back, when they saw him condemned
as a corrupter of youth, went to the principal in his chamber, and
modestly laid open to him the sentiments of his soul, and the reasons
of his conduct; and offered himself as much as concerned his own
person, that any sacrifice should be made of his body and fame,
but begged of him to consider the scandal some might receive, who
were yet young and tender in virtue. Govea made him no answer, but
taking him by the hand led him into the hall, where, at the ringing
of the bell, the whole college stood ready assembled. When all saw
the principal enter, and expected the sign for the punishment, he
threw himself at the feet of Ignatius, begging his pardon for having
too lightly believed such false reports; then rising, he publicly
declared that Ignatius was a living saint, and had no other aim or
desire than the salvation of souls, and was ready to suffer joyfully
any infamous punishment. Such a reparation of honor gave the saint
the highest reputation, and even the ancient and experienced doctors
asked his advice in spiritual matters. Pegna himself was ever after
his great admirer and friend, and appointed another scholar, who was
more advanced in his studies, and a young man of great virtue and
quick parts, to assist him in his exercises. This was Peter Faber,
a Savoyard, a native of the diocess of Geneva, by whose help he
finished his philosophy, and took the degree of master of arts with
great applause, after a course of three years and a half, according
to the custom of the times. After this, Ignatius began his divinity
at the Dominicans.

Peter Faber had from his childhood made a vow of chastity, which
he had always most faithfully kept, yet was troubled with violent
temptations, from which the most rigorous fasts did not deliver him.
He was also tempted to vain-glory, and labored under great anxiety
and scruples about these temptations, which he at length disclosed
to Ignatius his holy pupil, whose skilful and heavenly advice was
a healing balsam to his soul. The saint at last prescribed him a
course of his spiritual exercises, and taught him the practices
of meditation, of the particular examination, and other means of
perfection, conducting him through all the paths of an interior life.
St. Francis Xavier, a young master of philosophy, full of the vanity
of the schools, was his next conquest. St. Ignatius made him sensible
that all mortal glory is emptiness; only that which is eternal
deserving our regard. He converted many abandoned sinners. When a
young man, engaged in a criminal commerce with a woman of the city,
was proof against his exhortations, Ignatius stood in a frozen pond
by the way side up to the neck, and as he passed by in the night,
cried out to him, “Whither are you going? Do not you hear the thunder
of divine justice over your head, ready to break upon you? Go then;
satisfy your brutish passion; here I will suffer for you, to appease
heaven.” The lewd young man, at first affrighted, then confounded,
returned back, and changed his life. By the like pious stratagems the
saint recovered many other souls from the abysses into which they
were fallen. He often served the sick in the hospitals; and one day
finding a repugnance to touch the ulcers of one sick of a contagious
distemper, to overcome himself he not only dressed his sores, but put
his hand from them to his mouth, saying, “Since thou art afraid for
one part, thy whole body shall take its share.” From that time he
felt no natural repugnance in such actions.

James Laynez, of Almazan, twenty-one years of age; Alphonsus
Salmeron, only eighteen; and Nicholas Alphonso, surnamed Bobadilla,
from the place of his birth, near Valencia, all Spaniards of great
parts, at that time students in divinity at Paris, associated
themselves to the saint in his pious exercises. Simon Rodriguez,
a Portuguese, joined them. These fervent students, moved by the
pressing instances and exhortations of Ignatius, made all together a
vow to renounce the world, to go to preach the gospel in Palestine,
or if they could not go thither within a year after they had finished
their studies, to offer themselves to his holiness to be employed in
the service of God in what manner he should judge best. They fixed
for the end of all their studies the 25th day of January in 1537,
and pronounced this vow aloud, in the holy subterraneous chapel at
Montmartre, after they had all received the holy communion from
Peter Faber, who had been lately ordained priest. This was done on
the feast of the Assumption of our Lady, in 1534. Ignatius continued
frequent conferences, and joint exercises, to animate his companions
in their good purposes; but soon after was ordered by the physicians
to try his native air, for the cure of a lingering indisposition. He
left Paris in the beginning of the year 1535, and was most honorably
and joyfully received in Guipuscoa by his eldest brother Garcias,
and his nephews, and by all the clergy in processions. He refused to
go to the castle of Loyola, taking up his quarters in the hospital
of Azpetia. The sight of the places where he had led a worldly
life excited in him the deepest sentiments of compunction, and he
chastised his body with a rough hair shirt, iron chains, disciplines,
watching and prayer. He recovered his health in a short time, and
catechised and instructed the poor with incredible fruit. Ignatius,
in his childhood, had with some companions robbed an orchard, for
which another man had been condemned to pay the damages. In the
first discourse he made he accused himself publicly of this fact,
and calling the poor man, who was present, declared that he had been
falsely accused, and for reparation gave him two farms which belonged
to him, begging his pardon before all the people, adding that this
was one of the reasons of his journey thither.

In the meantime, three others, all doctors in divinity, by the
exhortations of Faber, joined the saint’s companions in Paris.
Claudius le Jay, a Savoyard, John Codure, a native of Dauphiné, and
Pasquier Brouet, of Picardy; so that with Ignatius they were now ten
in number. The holy founder, after a tedious and dangerous journey
both by sea and land, arrived at Venice about the end of the year
1536, and his nine companions from Paris met him there on the 8th of
January, 1537; they employed themselves in the hospitals, but all
except Ignatius went to Rome, where pope Paul III. received them
graciously, and granted them an indult, that those who were not
priests might receive holy orders from what bishop they pleased. They
were accordingly ordained at Venice by the bishop of Arbe. Ignatius
was one of this number. After their ordination they retired into a
cottage near Vicenza, to prepare themselves in solitude by fasting
and prayer for the holy ministry of the altar. The rest said their
first masses in September and October, but Ignatius deferred his from
month to month till Christmas day, overflowing in his retirement with
heavenly consolations, and in danger of losing his sight through the
abundance of his tears. Thus he employed a whole year in preparing
himself to offer that adorable sacrifice. After this they dispersed
themselves into several places about Verona and Vicenza, preaching
penance to the people, and living on a little bread which they
begged. The emperor and the Venetians having declared war against the
Turks, their pilgrimage into Palestine was rendered impracticable.
The year therefore being elapsed, Ignatius, Faber, and Laynez
went to Rome, threw themselves at his Holiness’s feet and offered
themselves to whatever work he should judge best to employ them in.
St. Ignatius told his companions at Vicenza, that if any one asked
what their institute was, they might answer, “the Society of Jesus;”
because they were united to fight against heresies and vice under
the standard of Christ. In his road from Vicenza to Rome, praying in
a little chapel between Sienna and Rome, he, in an ecstasy, seemed
to see the eternal Father, who affectionately commended him to his
Son. Jesus Christ appeared at the same time also shining with an
unspeakable light, but loaded with a heavy cross, and sweetly said
to Ignatius,--“I will be favorable to you at Rome.”[350] This St.
Ignatius disclosed to F. Laynez, in a transport when he came out of
the chapel; and F. Laynez, when he was general, related it to all the
fathers in Rome in a domestic conference, at which F. Ribadeneira,
who records it, was present. The same was attested by others to
whom the saint had discovered this signal favor. Pope Paul III.
accordingly received them graciously; and appointed Faber, called
in French Le Fevre, to teach in the Sapienza at Rome scholastic
divinity, and Laynez to explain the holy scripture; whilst Ignatius
labored, by means of his spiritual exercises and instructions, to
reform the manners of the people.

The holy founder, with a view to perpetuate the work of God,
called to Rome all his companions, and proposed to them his design
and motives of forming themselves into a religious Order. After
recommending the matter to God by fasting and prayer, all agreed in
the proposal, and resolved, first, besides the vows of poverty and
chastity already made by them, to add a third of perpetual obedience,
the more perfectly to conform themselves to the Son of God who was
obedient even to death; and to establish a general whom all, by
their vow, should be bound to obey, who should be perpetual, and his
authority absolute, subject entirely to the pope, but not liable
to be restrained by chapters. He likewise determined to prescribe
a fourth vow of going wherever the pope should send them for the
salvation of souls, and even without money, if it should so please
him; also that the professed Jesuits should possess no real estates
or revenues, either in particular, or in common; but that colleges
might enjoy revenues and rents for the maintenance of students of
the Order. In the meanwhile Govea, principal of the college of St.
Barbara at Paris, had recommended the Jesuits to the king of Portugal
as proper missionaries for the conversion of the Indies, and that
prince asked of Ignatius six laborers for that purpose. The founder
having only ten, could send him no more than two, Simon Rodriguez,
who remained in Portugal, and Xavier, afterward the apostle of the
Indies. The three cardinals appointed by the pope to examine the
affair of this new Order, at first opposed it, thinking religious
Orders already too much multiplied, but changed their opinions on
a sudden, and pope Paul III. approved it under the title of “The
Society of Jesus,” by a bull, dated the 27th of September, 1540.
Ignatius was chosen the first general, but only acquiesced in
obedience to his confessor. He entered upon his office on Easter-day,
1541, and the members all made their religious vows, according to the
bull of their institution.

Ignatius then set himself to write constitutions or rules for his
Society, in which he lays down its end to be, in the first place,
the sanctification of their own souls by joining together the active
and the contemplative life; for nothing so much qualifies a minister
of God to save others as the sanctification of his own soul in the
first place; secondly, to labor for the salvation and perfection of
their neighbor, and this, first, by catechising the ignorant (which
work is the basis and ground of religion and virtue, and though
mean and humble, is the most necessary and indispensable duty of
every pastor), secondly, by the instruction of youth[351] in piety
and learning (upon which the reformation of the world principally
depends); and thirdly, by the direction of consciences, missions, and
the like.[352]

St. Ignatius would have the office of general to be perpetual or
for life, being persuaded this would better command the respect of
inferiors, and more easily enable him to undertake and carry on
great enterprises for the glory of God, which require a considerable
time to have them well executed. Nevertheless, he often strenuously
endeavored to resign that dignity, but was never able to compass
it; and at length the pope forbade him any more to attempt it. He
had no sooner taken that charge upon him than he went into the
kitchen, and served as a scullion under the cook, and he continued
for forty-six days to catechise poor children in the church of the
Society. By preaching he gained such an ascendant over the hearts of
the people as produced many wonderful conversions. Among the pious
establishments which he made at Rome, he founded a house for the
reception of Jews who should be converted, during the time of their
instruction, and another for the reception and maintenance of lewd
women who should be desirous to enter upon virtuous courses, yet were
not called to a religious state among the Magdalens or penitents.
When one told him that the conversion of such sinners is seldom
sincere, he answered: “To prevent only one sin would be a great
happiness, though it cost me ever so great pains.” He procured two
houses to be erected at Rome for the relief of poor orphans of both
sexes, and another for the maintenance of young women whose poverty
might expose their virtue to danger. The heart of this blessed man so
burned with charity, that he was continually thinking and speaking
of what might most contribute to promote the divine honor and the
sanctification of souls; and he did wonders by the zealous fathers
of his Society in all parts of the globe. He was entreated by many
princes and cities of Italy, Spain, Germany, and the Low-Countries
to afford them some of his laborers. Under the auspicious protection
of John III. king of Portugal, he sent St. Francis Xavier into the
East-Indies, where he gained a new world to the faith of Christ. He
sent John Nugnez and Lewis Gonzales into the kingdoms of Fez and
Morocco to instruct and assist the Christian slaves; in 1547, four
others to Congo in Africa; in 1555, thirteen into Abyssinia, among
whom John Nugnez was nominated by pope Julius III. patriarch of
Ethiopia, and two others, bishops; lastly, others into the Portuguese
settlements in South America.

Pope Paul III. commissioned the fathers James Laynez and Alphonsus
Salmeron to assist, in quality of his theologians, at the council
of Trent. Before their departure, St. Ignatius, among other
instructions, gave them a charge in all disputations to be careful
above all things, to preserve modesty and humility, and to shun
all confidence, contentiousness, or empty display of learning.
F. Claudius Le Jay appeared in the same council as theologian of
cardinal Otho, bishop of Ausberg. Many of the first disciples of
St. Ignatius distinguished themselves in divers kingdoms of Europe,
but none with greater reputation, both for learning and piety, than
Peter Canisius, who was a native of Nimeguen, in the Low Countries,
and having with wonderful success employed his zealous labors at
Ingolstadt and in several other parts of Germany, and in Bohemia,
died in the odor of sanctity, at Fribourg, in 1597, seventy-seven
years old.[353] Whilst F. Claudius Le Jay was at Trent, Ferdinand,
king of the Romans, nominated him bishop of Trieste. The good father
seemed ready to die of grief at this news, and wrote to St. Ignatius,
humbly requesting him to put some bar to this promotion. The holy
founder was himself alarmed, and by a pressing letter to the king,
prevailed upon him not to do what would be an irreparable prejudice
to his young Society. He urged to the pope and sacred college many
reasons why he desired that all the fathers of his Society should be
excluded from all ecclesiastical dignities, alleging that this would
be a means more easily to preserve among them a spirit of humility
and poverty, which is the very soul and perfection of their state;
and that, being missionaries, it was more advantageous to the Church
that they should remain such, always ready to fly from pole to pole,
as the public necessities should require. The pope being satisfied
with his reasons, the saint obliged all professed Jesuits to bind
themselves by a simple vow never to seek prelatures, and to refuse
them when offered, unless compelled by a precept of the pope to
accept them.

In 1546 the Jesuits first opened their schools in Europe, in the
college which St. Francis Borgia had erected for them at Gandia, with
the privileges of an university.[354] The seminary of Goa in Asia,
which had been erected some years before for the Indian missions,
was committed to the Jesuits, under the direction of St. Francis
Xavier, the preceding year. King John also founded for them, in 1546,
a noble college at Coïmbra, the second which they had in Europe.
F. Simon Rodriguez directed this establishment, and many others
in Portugal, Spain, and Brazil, and died at Lisbon in the highest
reputation for sanctity and learning in 1579. Among the rules which
St. Ignatius gave to the masters, he principally inculcated the
lessons of humility, modesty, and devotion; he prescribed that all
their scholars should hear mass every day, go to confession every
month, and always begin their studies by prayer; that their masters
should take every fit occasion to inspire them with the love of
heavenly things; and that by daily meditation, self-examinations,
pious reading, retreat, and the constant exercise of the divine
presence, they should nourish in their own souls a fervent spirit of
prayer, which without the utmost care is extinguished by a dry course
of studies and school disputations; and with it is destroyed the very
soul of a religious or spiritual life. He recommended nothing more
earnestly, both to professors and scholars, than that they should
dedicate all their labors, with the greatest fervor, to the greater
glory of God, which intention will make studies equal to prayer. He
treated very harshly all those whom learning rendered self-conceited
or less devout; and removed all those masters who discovered any
fondness for singular opinions. It is incredible with what attention
and industry he promoted emulation and every means that could be a
spur to scholars. He required that copies of some of the principal
literary performances should be sent from all the colleges to Rome,
where he had them examined before him, that he might better judge of
the progress both of masters and scholars.

He encouraged every branch of the sciences, and would have the
fathers in his Society applied to those functions, whether in
teaching, preaching, or the missions, for which God seemed chiefly
to qualify and destine them by their genius, talents, and particular
graces; yet so that no one should neglect the duties either of
assiduous prayer and an interior life, or of instructing and
catechising others. He recommended to them all, especially to the
masters of novices, &c., to read diligently the conferences, lives,
and writings of the fathers of the desert, and other pious ascetics,
in order to learn their spirit. With what success many among them did
this, appears from the Practice of Christian Perfection, compiled
by F. Alphonsus Rodrigues, one of the most eminent persons whom
our saint had admitted into his Society. In this excellent work he
gathered and digested, in a clear and easy method, the most admirable
maxims and lessons of the ancient monks; and having many years
trained up, according to them, the novices of his Order in Spain,
died holily in the year 1616, the ninetieth of his age.[355] We
have other eminent instances of this holy spirit and science among
the primitive disciples of St. Ignatius, in the works of F. Lewis
de Ponte or Puente, who died in 1624, and whose canonization has
been often desired by the kings of Spain; in those of F. Alvarez de
Paz, who died in Peru in 1620; and in the writings and life of F.
Baltassar Alvarez, who died in Spain in 1580, in the odor of sanctity.

St. Francis Borgia, in 1551, gave a considerable sum towards building
the Roman college for the Jesuits. Pope Julius III. contributed
largely to it; Paul IV., in 1555, founded it for perpetuity with
great munificence; afterward Gregory XIII. much augmented its
buildings and revenues. St. Ignatius, intending to make this the
model of all his other colleges, neglected nothing to render it
complete, and took care that it should be supplied with the ablest
masters in all the sciences, and with all possible helps for the
advancement of literature. He made it a strict rule in the Society,
that every one should study to speak correctly the language of the
country where he lives;[356] for, without being perfect in the
vulgar tongue, no one can be qualified to preach or perform many
other functions with profit. On this account he established in the
Roman college daily lessons in the Italian tongue, and he carefully
studied that language, and appointed others to put him in mind of
all the faults which he should commit in speaking. St. Ignatius also
directed the foundation of the German college in Rome made by Julius
III. but afterwards finished by Gregory XIII. He often met with
violent persecutions, but overcame them by meekness and patience.
When the French king Henry II. gave the Society letters patent to
settle in France, the parliament of Paris made the most outrageous
remonstrances, and the faculty of Sorbon, though not without
opposition, passed a virulent decree against it. The other fathers at
Rome thought it necessary to answer these censures; but St. Ignatius
would have nothing printed or written in their defence, saying, that
it was better to commit their cause to God, and that the slanders
raised against them would fall of themselves; and so it happened.
Indeed the storm was too violent to last. Upon other occasions the
saint modestly defended his institute against slanderers.

The prudence and charity of the saint in his conduct towards his
religious, won him all their hearts. His commands seemed rather
entreaties. The address with which he accommodated himself to every
one’s particular genius, and the mildness with which he tempered his
reproofs, gave to his reprehensions a sweetness which gained the
affections whilst it corrected a fault. Thus chiding one for his
too little guard over his eyes, he said to him, with tenderness: “I
have often admired the modesty of your deportment, yet observe that
unguarded glances often escape you.” When another had fixed his eye
steadfastly upon him a long time, the saint enjoined him to make the
government of his eye the subject of his particular examination, and
to say every day a short prayer for fifteen months. He extremely
recommended a strict modesty in the whole exterior as the index of
the interior, and a means absolutely necessary for the regulating of
it, and the government of the senses and passions. He always showed
the affection of the most tender parent towards all his brethren,
especially towards the sick, for whom he was solicitous to procure
every spiritual and even temporal succor and comfort, which it was
his great delight to give them himself. The most perfect obedience
and self-denial were the two first lessons which he inculcated to
his novices, whom he told at the door as they entered, that they
must leave behind them all self-will and private judgment. In his
famous letter to the Portuguese Jesuits, On the Virtue of Obedience,
he says, this alone bringeth forth and nourisheth all other virtues;
and calls it the peculiar virtue, and distinguishing mark and
characteristic of his Society, in which, if any member suffer himself
to be outdone by those of other Orders in fasting or watching, that
he must yield to none in obedience. He adds, true obedience must
reach the understanding as well as the will, and never suffer a
person even secretly to complain of, or censure the precept of a
superior, whom he must always consider as vested with the authority
of Jesus Christ over him. He says, it is not a less fault to break
the laws of obedience in watching than in sleeping, in laboring than
in doing nothing.

When F. Araos, whose spiritual labors were very successful in the
court of Spain, seemed to seek the conversation of the great ones
of the world, upon pretence of conciliating their favor to his
ministry, St. Ignatius sent him a sharp reprimand, telling him that
the necessary authority for the ministers of the word of God, is to
be gained only by a spirit of recollection, and the exercises of
Christian humility; for the loss of everything is to be feared in an
intercourse with the great ones of the world. He used to say, that
prosperity caused in him more fear than joy, that when persecution
ceased he should be in apprehension lest the Society should somewhat
relax in the observance of its regular discipline; that good fortune
is never to be trusted, and that we have most to fear when things
go according to our desires. He made a most severe regulation, that
in the Society no one should ever visit women, even of the highest
quality, alone; and that when they discoursed with them, or heard
their confessions, this should be so ordered, that the companion
might see all that passed, without hearing what ought to be secret,
this being a means to prevent the possibility of evil suspicions or
slanders. In the assigning the employments of those under his charge,
he had usually a regard to their inclinations, though he always
required that, on their parts, they should be wholly indifferent and
disposed cheerfully to accept and discharge any.

Notwithstanding the fatigue and constant application which the
establishment of his Order in all parts of the world, and so many
other great enterprises undertaken to promote the glory of God,
required, he was all on fire with an excess of charity, and a
restless desire of gaining souls to God, and wearied himself out in
the service of his neighbor, always laboring to extirpate vice, and
to promote virtue in all, and set on foot several practices which
might conduce to the divine service and the salvation of men. It is
not to be believed how many and how great affairs this blessed man
was able to go through, and with what courage and spirit he bore so
continual a burden, and this with so weak health and infirm body. But
he was assisted by the powerful hand of our Lord, that furnished him
with strength for all his labors; so that he then appeared strongest
and most courageous, when he was weary, sickly, and unprovided of
human and natural helps; for, in his infirmity, the power of God
manifested itself, and the saint seemed to support the weakness
of his body with the vigor of his soul. This interior strength he
chiefly maintained by an eminent spirit of prayer, and the constant
and closest union of his soul with God. For he was favored with an
extraordinary grace of devotion, which he, out of humility, thought
God had given him out of compassion for his weakness and misery,
which he said was greater than that of any other. In saying the holy
mass, and reciting the divine office, the abundance of heavenly
delights which God poured into his soul, was often so great, and
made such showers of tears stream from his eyes, that he was obliged
to stop in a manner at every word, sometimes to make a considerable
interruption whilst he gave vent to his tears. It was once feared,
lest his continual effusion of tears should hurt his eye-sight.
At other times, though his eyes were dry at his devotion, and the
sluices of his tears were shut up, yet their influence and effect was
not wanting; for his spirit was still watered with heavenly dew, and
the divine illustrations ceased not to flow copiously into his soul.

In matters of concern, though reasons were ever so convincing and
evident, he never took any resolution before he had consulted God
by prayer. He let not an hour pass in the day without recollecting
himself interiorly, and examining his conscience, for this purpose
banishing for a while all other thoughts. He never applied his mind
so much to exterior affairs as to lose the sweet relish of interior
devotion. He had God always and in all things present to his mind.
Every object served him for a book, wherein he read the divine
perfections, and by that means raised his heart to his Creator.
He recommended this manner of prayer to every one, especially to
those who are employed in spiritual functions for the help of their
neighbor. Before he betook himself to public or private prayer, he
prepared his soul with great fervor, and entering into the oratory
of his heart, enkindled his affections, so that this appeared in
his countenance, and he seemed to be all on fire, as we ourselves
frequently observed, says Ribadeneira. The saint being once asked by
F. Lainez what manner of prayer he used, gave this answer, that in
matters concerning Almighty God he behaved himself rather passively
than actively. He prayed sometimes standing, and profoundly adored
the majesty of God present to his soul; he often bowed his body low,
and most frequently prayed on his knees. No sooner had he recollected
his mind in God, but his countenance put on an air which appeared
altogether heavenly, and often streams of tears fell sweetly from his
eyes.

He prescribed to the priests of his Order to be about half an
hour at the altar in saying mass, to avoid on one side the least
appearance of indecent hurry and precipitation in that tremendous
sacrifice; and, on the other, not to be tedious to the people by
unseasonably indulging their private devotion. Nevertheless, he was
himself about an hour in saying mass, to excuse which he alleged the
plea of necessity, being often obliged to make pauses through an
irresistible tenderness of devotion. After mass he spent two hours
in private prayer, during which time no one was admitted to speak to
him except on some pressing necessity. F. Louis Gonzales, who for
some time governed the college under him, says, “As often as I went
to him at that time, which necessity frequently obliged me to do,
I always saw his face shining with an air so bright and heavenly,
that, quite forgetting myself, I stood astonished in contemplating
him. Nor was his countenance like that of many devout men in whom I
have admired a wonderful serenity at their prayers, but it breathed
something quite unusual, and, as it were, divine.” On other occasions
the like was remarked in him; on which account F. Lainez compared
him to Moses when he came from conversing with God. Nicholas Lanoy
testified, that he one day saw a fire flame on his head whilst he was
saying mass. Saint Philip Neri, who often visited St. Ignatius, used
to assure his friends that he had seen his face shining with bright
rays of light. As F. Antony Galloni, his disciple and confidant in
all his concerns, and Marcellus Vitelleschi declared they had often
heard from his own mouth; of which cardinal Taurusius, archbishop
of Sienna, published an authentic certificate.[357] John Petronius,
a famous physician in Rome, declared publicly that, when sick, he
once saw his own chamber, which was then very dark, by reason of
the windows being shut, filled with a dazzling light from such rays
upon the blessed man’s coming into it. Isabel Rosella, John Pascal,
and several other persons testified, that they had sometimes beheld
his countenance at prayer sparkling with radiant beams of light, the
abundant consolations which replenished his soul redounding on his
body. John Pascal added, that he had seen him in prayer raised more
than a foot above the ground, and heard him say at the same time,
“O my God! O my Lord! O that men knew thee!” The saint was often
favored, amid the tears and fervor of his devotion, with wonderful
raptures, visions, and revelations; and some of these visions and
other supernatural favors St. Ignatius mentioned himself in short
notes which he wrote, and which were found in his own hand after his
death, some of which notes are published by F. Bartoli.[358] Others
are mentioned by Ribadeneira, who inserted in the saint’s life, as he
declares, only what himself had seen, or had heard from his mouth, or
from persons of unquestionable authority, and whose life of his holy
founder, by the order of Saint Francis Borgia, was carefully examined
and approved by the principal persons then living who had frequently
conversed with the saint, as Salmeron, Bobadilla, Polancus, who had
been the saint’s secretary, Natalis, &c.

If the spirit of prayer was that virtue by which our saint was
admitted to the familiar intercourse with God, was the key which
unlocked to him the treasure of all other virtues and graces, and
was the continual comfort, support, and light of his soul, and
the constant advancement of its supernatural life in his mortal
pilgrimage, this spirit was itself founded in the most perfect
self-denial. The Holy Ghost never communicates himself, by the
infusion of this grace, but to a heart that is entirely dead to
itself and its passions, and crucified to the world. This St.
Ignatius understood so well, that hearing another once say, that
a certain person was endowed with a great gift of contemplation,
and was eminently a man of prayer, he corrected the expression,
saying, “call him rather a man of the most perfect self-denial;”
because the spirit of grace and prayer requires a perfect purity and
disengagement from all inordinate affections, and a heart empty of
itself. This victory over himself the saint obtained by an habitual
practice of the exterior mortification of his senses; and by that
perfect patience, resignation, and confidence in God, and constancy
with which he bore the most severe interior and exterior trials.
To complete the most essential interior mortification of his will
and passions, he added the practice of an unlimited obedience to
his directors and superiors, and of the most profound and sincere
humility. Even when broken with age and infirmities, he said, that
should his Holiness command it, he would with joy go on board the
first ship he could find; and if he were so ordered, though it had
neither sails nor rudder, and without any warning, would immediately
set out for any part of the globe. It was his perpetual lesson to his
novices,--“Sacrifice your will and judgment by obedience. Whatever
you do without the consent of your spiritual guide will be imputed to
wilfulness, not to virtue, though you were to exhaust your bodies by
labors or austerities.”

Humility is the sister virtue of obedience, the foundation of a
spiritual life, and the distinguishing mark or characteristic of all
the saints. This virtue St. Ignatius embraced with the utmost ardor,
from his first entering upon a spiritual course of life. He went a
long time in old tattered rags, and lived in hospitals, despised,
affronted, and persecuted; this he desired, and in it he found his
great joy and satisfaction. He ever retained this affection for
humiliations, out of a sincere contempt of himself; for acknowledging
himself a sinner, he was thoroughly persuaded that contempt and
injuries from all creatures, as instruments of the divine justice,
were his due, and that he was most unworthy of all comforts, favor,
or regard. Nothing but charity and zeal to procure his neighbor’s
good restrained him from doing ridiculous things on purpose to be
laughed at by all; and he always practised such humiliations as
were consistent with prudence and his other duties. All his actions
and whatever belonged to him, breathed an air of sincere humility.
His apparel was poor, though clean; his bed was very mean, and his
diet coarse, and so temperate, that it was a perpetual abstinence.
He employed himself often most cheerfully in the meanest offices
about the house, as in making beds, and in cleansing the chambers
of the sick. It was his great study to conceal his virtues, and
nothing was more admirable in his life than the address with which he
covered his most heroic actions under the veil of humility. Though
he was superior, he frequently submitted to inferiors with wonderful
meekness and humility, when he could do it without prejudice to
his authority. In things of which he was not certain, he readily
acquiesced in the judgment of others; and was a great enemy to
all positiveness, and to the use of superlatives in discourse. He
received rebukes from any one with cheerfulness and thanks. If in
his presence anything was said that redounded to his praise, he
showed an extreme confusion, which was usually accompanied with many
tears. He was seldom heard to speak of himself, and never but on
very pressing occasions. Though visions, revelations, and the like
favors were frequently vouchsafed him, he scarce ever mentioned such
things; but all his discourse was of humility, charity, patience,
divine zeal, prayer, mortification, and other such virtues, of which
we are to make the greatest account, and by which alone men become
saints and friends of God. Ribadeneira heard him say, that every one
in the house was to him an example of virtue, and that he was not
scandalized at any one besides himself. It was his usual saying,
that he did not think there was a man in the world, that on one side
received from God so great and continual favors, and yet on the other
side was so ungrateful, and so slothful in his service as himself.
It was his desire that, after his death, his body might be thrown
upon some dunghill, in punishment of the sins he had committed by
pampering it. The chief reasons why he would have his Order called
The Society of Jesus, were lest his name should be given it, and
that his followers might be known by their love and zeal for their
Redeemer. As often as he spoke of his Order, he called it, This least
Society; for he would have his children to look upon themselves as
the last and least of all persons in the Church.

From the perfect mortification of all his passions and inordinate
affections resulted an admirable peace and evenness of mind which
nothing seemed able ever to disturb or ruffle. His contempt of the
world appeared by the disinterestedness with which he rejected
legacies and presents whenever they might give occasion to
complaints. When he looked up towards the heavens, he used feelingly
to repeat, “How contemptible doth earth appear when I behold the
heavens!” Charity, or the most ardent and pure love of God, was
the most conspicuous, and the crown of all his other virtues. He
had often in his mouth these words, which he took for his motto or
device, “To the greater glory of God,” referring to this end, with
all his strength, himself, his Society, and all his actions, in which
he always chose that which appeared to him the most perfect. He often
said to God, “Lord, what do I desire, or what can I desire besides
thee?” True love is never idle; and always to labor, to promote God’s
honor, or to suffer for his sake, was this saint’s greatest pleasure.
He said, that no created thing can bring to a soul such solid joy
and comfort as to suffer for Christ. Being asked what was the most
certain and the shortest way to perfection, he answered, “To endure
for the love of Christ many and grievous afflictions. Ask this grace
of our Lord: on whomsoever he bestoweth it, he does him many other
signal favors, that always attend this grace.” Out of this burning
love of God, he most ardently desired the separation of his soul
from his mortal body, when it should be God’s will; and, when he
thought of death, he could not refrain from tears of joy, because he
should then see his loving Redeemer; and, beholding God face to face,
should love and praise him eternally, without let, abatement, or
intermission.

From this same love of God sprang his ardent thirst for the salvation
of men, for which he undertook so many and so great things, and to
which he devoted his watchings, prayers, tears, and labors. When he
dismissed any missionaries to preach the word of God, he usually
said to them, “Go, brethren, inflame the world, spread about that
fire which Jesus Christ came to kindle on earth.” To gain others to
Christ he, with admirable address, made himself all to all, going in
at _their_ door, and coming out at _his own_. He received sincere
penitents with the greatest sweetness and condescension, so as often
to take upon himself part of their penance. When a brother, growing
weary of the yoke of Christ, had determined to leave the Society,
St. Ignatius by his remonstrances made such an impression upon
his heart, that falling at the feet of the general, he offered to
undergo whatever punishment he would impose upon him. To which the
saint replied, “One part of your penance shall be, that you never
repent more of having served God. For the other part, I take it
upon myself, and will discharge it for you.” He endeavored to bring
all his penitents to make, without reserve, the perfect sacrifice
of themselves to God, telling them, that it is not to be expressed
what precious treasures God reserves for, and with what effusion
he communicates himself to, those who give themselves to him with
their whole heart. He proposed to them for their model this prayer,
which he used often to recite,--“Receive, O Lord, all my liberty, my
memory, my understanding, and my whole will. You have given me all
that I have, all that I possess, and I surrender all to your divine
will, that you dispose of me. Give me only your love, and your grace.
With this I am rich enough, and I have no more to ask.”

St. Ignatius was general of the Society fifteen years, three months,
and nine days; but was in the end so worn out with infirmities, that
he procured that the Society should choose him an assistant in that
office. This was F. Jerom Nadal. After which, the saint reserved to
himself only the care of the sick, and spent his time in continual
prayer, and in preparing himself for death. By way of his last
will and testament, he dictated certain holy maxims concerning the
obligation and conditions of religious obedience, which he bequeathed
to his brethren of the Society. The saint, on the day before he
died, charged F. Polancus to beg his Holiness’s blessing for him at
the article of death, though others at that time did not think it
so near. The next morning having lifted up his eyes and hands to
heaven, and pronouncing, both with his tongue and heart, the sweet
name of Jesus with a serene countenance, he calmly gave up his happy
soul into the hands of his Creator on the last day of July, in the
year 1556, the sixty-fifth of his age, the thirty-fifth after his
conversion, and the sixteenth after his confirmation of the Society.
The people esteemed him a saint both living and after his death; and
the opinion of his sanctity was confirmed by many miracles.[359] He
saw his Society in very few years divided into twelve provinces,
with above one hundred colleges, and spread over almost the whole
world. In 1626, it contained thirty-six provinces, and in them eight
hundred houses, and fifteen thousand Jesuits, since which time it is
much increased. St. Ignatius’s body was buried first in the little
church of the Jesuits, dedicated in honor of the blessed Virgin in
Rome. When cardinal Alexander Farnesius had built the stately church
of the professed house called Il Giesu, it was translated thither
in 1587; and, in 1637, was laid under the altar of the chapel,
which bears his name. This church is one of the most magnificent
piles of building in the world next to the Vatican, and is not less
admired for the elegance of the architecture than for its riches,
consisting in costly beautiful ornaments of gold, silver, jewels,
exquisite paintings, statues, and carving, and a great profusion
of fine marble. Among the many chapels which it contains, those of
the Blessed Virgin, of the Angels, of SS. Abundius and Abundantius,
martyrs, of St. Francis Borgia, and of St. Ignatius, are the
admiration of travellers, especially the last; in which the remains
of the holy founder lie, in a rich silver shrine under the altar,
exposed to view. The other glittering rich ornaments of this place
seem almost to lose their lustre when the statue of the saint is
uncovered. It is somewhat bigger than the life, because raised high.
Its bright shining gold, silver, and sparkling diamonds, especially
in the crown of glory over the head, dazzle the eye. In the professed
house are shown the pictures of St. Ignatius and St. Philip Neri,
taken from the life. St. Ignatius’s chamber is now a chapel, his
study is another, in which prelates, and sometimes popes, come to
say mass on the saint’s festival. He was beatified by Paul V. in
1609, and canonized by Gregory XV. in 1622, though the bull was only
published the year following by Urban VIII.

The example of the saints evinces that to disengage our affections
from earthly things, and to converse much in heaven by the constant
union of our hearts to God, is the short road to Christian
perfection. Those who are employed in the active life, ought to learn
the art of accompanying all their actions with a lively attention
to the divine presence, as our guardian angels are faithful in
discharging every duty of that external ministry which God hath
committed to them, yet so as never to intermit their contemplation
of the Godhead, and their incessant homages of praise and love,
which are the uninterrupted employment of their happy state. Without
this precaution, by the hurry of dry studies, and even the discharge
of the sacred ministry itself, the spirit of piety and devotion is
extinguished in the heart, and the more sacred functions are easily
profaned.

ST. JOHN COLUMBINI, C.

FOUNDER OF THE ORDER OF THE JESUATI.

He was descended of one of the most ancient and noble families of
Sienna; and being chosen first magistrate of that commonwealth,
acquitted himself of all the duties of that charge with integrity
and honor, and to the great satisfaction of his countrymen; but he
was passionate, and his heart was strongly wedded to the world,
and buried under the weight and hurry of its business, vanity, and
ambition, so that he scarce seemed able to find leisure to breathe,
or to think of eternity. One day, after being taken up the whole
morning in deciding causes in his court, he came home, much fatigued,
and not finding dinner ready, flew into a violent passion. His wife
put a book of the Saints’ Lives into his hands; but he threw it on
the ground. The next moment, being ashamed of his passion, he took it
up again, and sitting down to read, fell on the life of St. Mary of
Egypt. He read it with so much pleasure that he thought no more of
his dinner; and insensibly found his heart pierced with compunction
and remorse for his past sins and unthinking conduct, and entirely
weaned from the world.

From that moment he resolved to begin a new life; and, to expiate
his offences, he embraced the most austere practices of penance.
Resigning his public employs, he consecrated the greatest part of his
estates to alms-deeds; and being sensible that the first sacrifice
which God requires of a sinner is that of a contrite and humble
heart, without which no other can be acceptable to him, he spent
his time chiefly in prayers and tears. He sold his rich clothes
and furniture, giving the money to the poor, that they might be
intercessors in his behalf at the throne of mercy; he lay on two
boards, watching great part of the night in prayer, and his house
seemed converted into a hospital, so great was the number of the poor
and sick that he caused to be brought thither, and attended. The
whole country was astonished at so great a change, and so exemplary
a penance. Francis Vincent joined him in this manner of life. They
both ran the same course, and with equal paces. One day seeing a
leper lying at the door of the great church, covered with blotches
and ulcers, the saint carried him on his back through the public
market-place; attending him both as his servant and physician,
tenderly kissing his running sores one after another, till he had
perfectly overcome the abhorrence which nature inspires in such
actions, and continued his care of this patient till he was perfectly
cured.

St. John had one son and one daughter. The former God called to
himself by death, and the latter consecrated herself to his divine
service in a nunnery. St. John had before this, with his wife’s
consent, made a vow of chastity; and after their children were
thus disposed of, he sold his estate, and gave one-third of it to
a hospital, and the other two-thirds to different churches and the
poor. Having thus reduced himself to a state of poverty like that of
the apostles, he gave himself up to serve the poor in the hospitals,
and to the exercises of devotion and the most rigorous penance.
Several others, moved by his example, became his faithful imitators
and companions. They were solicitous to exhort the sick and poor to
the sincere dispositions of repentance, and to fervor in the divine
service; and the charity and disinterestedness with which they
ministered to them corporal relief and comfort, gave great force to
their zealous instructions. Out of their ardent love of our Redeemer,
whom they considered and served in his afflicted members, they had
his holy name so often, and with so great devotion and respect in
their mouths, that the people gave them the name of Jesuats. That
adorable name is repeated fifteen hundred times in the few letters
which St. John wrote. The number of his disciples being increased to
about seventy, he formed them into a religious Order, under the rule
of St. Austin, and took St. Jerom for their patron.[360] He addressed
himself to pope Urban V. at Viterbo, who approved and confirmed his
institute in 1367, and granted to it most ample privileges. Such was
the fervor of the first disciples of our saint, that almost all their
names have been placed among the blessed. The holy founder fell sick
soon after the approbation of his Order; and, having received the
last sacraments, commending his soul into the hands of his Creator
through the death of Christ, and in union with his recommendation of
his divine soul to his Father on the cross, he happily expired on the
31st of July, in the year 1367, the twelfth after his conversion,
only thirty-seven days after his Order had been confirmed by Pope
Urban V. See F. Cuper, the Bollandist, Julij, t. 7, p. 333, and
Helyot, Hist. des Ord. Rel. t. 3, p. 410.

SAINT HELEN OF SKOFDE IN SWEDEN, M.

She was a lady of quality in Westrogothia, whom Saint Sigfrid,
apostle of that province in Sweden, who died in 1045, converted to
the faith. She made a pilgrimage to Rome, and upon her return was
martyred by her own relations about the year 1160, at her own estate
of Skofde or Scœude, in Westrogothia in Sweden. She was honored on
the 31st of July, with extraordinary devotion in that country, and in
the isle of Seland in Denmark, especially in the church which bears
her name, where her body was kept in a rich shrine, eight miles from
Copenhagen, near the sea, in which place there is a famous miraculous
well still resorted to by the Lutherans, and called to this day St.
Lene Kild, or St. Helen’s well. She was canonized by Alexander III.
in 1164, and her feast fixed on the 31st of July. See the Bollandists
ad 31 Julii.

FOOTNOTES

[1] The place of St. Rumold’s death is contested. According
to certain Belgic and other Martyrologies, he was
of the blood royal of Scotland (as Ireland was then
called) and bishop of Dublin. This opinion is ably
supported by F. Hu. Ward, an Irish Franciscan, a man
well skilled in the antiquities of his country, in a
work entitled Dissertatio Historica de Vita et Patria
S. Rumoldi, Archiepiscopi Dubliniensis, published at
Louvain in 1662, in 4to. The learned pope Benedict XIV.
seems to adjudge St. Rumold to Ireland, in his letter
to the prelates of that kingdom dated the 1st of
August, 1741, wherein are the following words: “Quod
si recensere voluerimus sanctissimos viros Columbanum,
Kilianum, Virgilium, Rumoldum, Gallum, aliosque plures
qui ex Hibernia in alias provincias catholicam fidem
invexerunt, aut illam per martyrium effuso sanguine
collustrarunt.” (Hib. Dom. Suppl. p. 831.) On the other
hand, Janning the Bollandist undertakes to prove that
St. Rumold was an English Saxon. See Janning and J. B.
Sellerii Acta S. Rumoldi, Antverp, 1718; also F. Ward,
and Ware’s bishops, p. 305.

[2] St. John Damascen. Serm. de Transfig. Dom.

[3] Gildas, c. 8.

[4] Bede, Hist l. 1. c. 7.

[5] The second kingdom of Burgundy was begun in 890, by
Ralph, nephew to Bozon, whom the emperor Charles the
Bald, king of France, had made king of Arles in 876,
giving him Provence and part of Dauphiné. This second
kingdom of Burgundy comprised Provence, Savoy, the
Viennois, and the county of Burgundy. The duchy of
Burgundy had its duke at the same time.

[6] It is nine leagues from Mans. Childebert in the charter
says that the land had been already given to the saint
by Clovis his father. (Marten. Amp. Coll. tom. 1, p. 1.)
This is also attested by Nicholas, Ep. ad Episc. Gall.
and is likewise insinuated by Siviard in his life of
St. Calais.

[7] Salus in the Syriac signifies foolish.

[8] St. Tho. 2, 2.

[9] Imit. of Chr. b. 1, c. 20.

[10] Phil. iii. 29.

[11] From the word joy used by the evangelist on this
occasion, and from the unanimous consent of the fathers,
it is manifest that the holy infant anticipated the use
of reason, and that this was not a mere natural motion,
as some protestants have imagined, but the result of
reason, and the effect of holy joy and devotion.

[12] Phil. iv. 20.

[13] Nero reigned the first five years with so much clemency,
that once when he was to sign an order for the death of
a condemned person, he said: “I wish I could not write.”
But his master Seneca and Burrhus the prefect of the
prætorium, to whom this his moderation was owing, even
then discovered in him a bent to cruelty, to correct
which they strove to give his passion another turn.
With this view Seneca wrote and inscribed to him
a treatise On Clemency, which we still have. But
both Seneca and Burrhus connived at an adulterous
intrigue in which he was engaged in his youth: so very
defective was the virtue of the best among the heathen
philosophers. If the tutors imagined that by giving up
a part, they might save the rest, and by indulging him
in the softer passions they might check those which
seemed more fatal to the commonwealth, the event
showed how much they were deceived by this false human
prudence, and how much more glorious it would have been
to have preferred death to the least moral evil, could
paganism have produced any true martyrs of virtue.
The passions are not to be stilled by being soothed:
whatever is allowed them is but an allurement to go
farther, and soon makes their tyranny uncontrollable.
Of this Nero is an instance. For, availing himself
of this indulgence, he soon gave an entire loose to
all his desires, especially when he began to feel
the dangerous pleasure of being master of his own
person and actions. He plunged himself publicly, and
without shame or constraint, into the most infamous
debaucheries, in which such was the perversity of his
heart, that, as Suetonius tells us, he believed nobody
to be less voluptuous and abandoned than himself,
though he said they were more private in their crimes,
and greater hypocrites: notwithstanding, at that very
time, Rome abounded with most perfect examples of
virtue and chastity among the Christians.

There is a degree of folly inseparable from vice. But
this in Nero seemed by superlative malice to degenerate
into downright phrenzy. All his projects consisted
in the extravagances of a madman; and nothing so much
flattered his pride as to undertake things that seemed
impossible. He forgot all common rules of decency,
order, or justice. It was his greatest ambition to sing
or perform the part of an actor on the stage, to play
on musical instruments in the theatre, or to drive a
chariot in the circus. And whoever did not applaud all
his performances, or had not the complaisance to let
him carry the prize at every race or public diversion,
his throat was sure to be cut, or he was reserved
for some more barbarous death. For cruelty was the
vice which above all others has rendered his name
detestable. At the instigation of Poppæa, a most
infamous adulteress, he caused his mother Agrippina to
be slain in the year 58, and from that time it seemed
to be his chief delight to glut his savage mind with
the slaughter of the bravest, the most virtuous, and
the most noble persons of the universe, especially of
those that were nearest to him. He put to death his
wife Octavia after many years ill usage, and he cut off
almost all the most illustrious heads of the empire.

[14] On account of the murder of St. Stanislas, slain by
Boleslas II.

[15] Serm. v. de Laz. t. 1, p. 765.

[16] St. Chrys. l. 1, ad Vid. Junior. t. 1, p. 341.

[17] According to the Registers of Landaff, quoted by Usher,
St. Oudoceus was son of Budic II. prince of Cornwall,
in Armorica; and was committed to the care of St.
Theliau, when he removed to Armorica. But Usher is
mistaken, as he dates this fact at 596. For we learn
from St. Gregory of Tours that Thierri, son of Budic,
was made prince of Cornwall in 577, and that his father
was dead a long time before.

[18] P. 178, ed. Combefis.

[19] Not. ib. t. 2, p. 704, Op. St. Chrys.

[20] T. 2, ed. Ben. p. 704.

[21] The abbey of Kemperle is three leagues from Port-Louis
and eight from Quimper.

[22] In Latin Berti Cramnus, Bertrannus: not Bertrandus.

[23] Lugo in Decal. See Less. l. de Valetud.

[24] Jos. ix. 14.

[25] See these laws in Spelman, Conc. t. 1, and Wilkins,
Conc. Brit. t. 1.

[26] Cent. 10.

[27] Extant in Monast. Anglic. App., vol. 1.

[28] The Welch laws of Howel Dha, that is, Howel the Good,
are published by Dr. Wotton, in folio, 1735.

[29] See Inett, History of the Church of England, t. 1.

[30] Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 5, lib. 4, n. 38.

[31] Ibid. l. 6, lib. 2, n. 14.

[32] Cotelier, Monum. Gr. p. 675.

[33] Cotelier, ib. p. 670, Rosweide, l. 3, p. 103.

[34] Cotelier, ib. p. 672.

[35] Rosweide, Vid. Patr. l. 5, lib. 15, n. 47.

[36] Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 5, lib. 1, n. 17.

[37] Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 5, lib. 15, n. 44.

[38] Ibid. n. 46.

[39] Ibid. l. 5, lib. 8, n. 15.

[40] Ibid. l. 6, lib. 9, n. 5.

[41] Cotelier, ibid. p. 669.

[42] Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 5, lib. 4, n. 39, et l. 6,
lib. 3, n. 6.

[43] Cotelier, p. 671.

[44] Rufin. ap. Rosw. l. 3, n. 162.

[45] Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 5, lib. 16, n. 10.

[46] Cotelier, t. 1, p. 678.

[47] The monastery of Blangy was founded in 686. Having
been destroyed during the incursions of the Normans,
it was rebuilt in the eleventh century, and given to
the religious of the Order of St. Benedict. It is still
in being.

[48] She was widow of Guy of Chatillon, count of St. Pol,
brother to Maud.

[49] St. Cypr. l. de Oper. et Eleem.

[50] L. 1, de Offic. c. 30.

[51] The abbé Ma-Geoghegan, in his history of Ireland,
published in Paris in 1758, asserts that the Scots
were originally Scythians, or properly Celto-Scythians,
of Spanish original. Foreign writers of repute bear
witness to this extraction: the native historians of
Ireland have at all times been unanimous in recording
it, and have adduced testimonies in support of it,
which cannot be easily overthrown, as some moderns, who
made the attempt, have experienced. The ancient Fileas
of Ireland have indeed (like the old poets of all other
European nations) shrouded real facts in a veil of
pompous fables. Thus they pretended the leaders of this
Spanish colony were the descendants of a celebrated
Breogan, and that a grandson of this Breogan was
married to an Egyptian heroine named Scota, from whom
the Irish took the name of Kinea-Scuit or Scots, as
they took the appellation of Clan-Breogan or Brigantes,
from the former. But such inventions, acceptable to
the credulity and flattering to the pride of nations,
cannot discredit any fact otherwise well attested.
The British Brigantes were probably descendants of the
Irish Brigantes, as the Scots of Britain were certainly
descendants from those of Ireland. Tacitus, in the
first age of the Christian era, has thought from the
difference of complexion and frame of body observable
among the British tribes of his time, that some were of
Spanish original; and an earlier writer, Seneca, in his
satire on the emperor Claudius, makes mention of the
Scuta-Brigantes, which Scaliger, by needless correction,
makes Scoto-Brigantes, as the Irish wrote Scuit and
Scoit indifferently. This testimony of Seneca is a
proof that the name Scots or Scuits, was known to
some Roman writers so early as the first century; and
the Irish appellations of Kinea-Scuit and Clan-Breogan
plainly point out the proper country of those
Scuta-Brigantes in the time of the emperor Nero.

Mr. Geoghegan looks upon the Irish to be a mother
tongue; and it may justly be so denominated,
notwithstanding the adoption of some foreign terms,
and some variations of construction introduced by time
in all languages, before they arrive at their classical
standard. Some writings of the fifth century show
that this language was at its full perfection before
the introduction of the gospel by Roman missionaries
in the fourth and fifth centuries. The notion that
this language is a dialect of the modern Biscayan is
undoubtedly groundless. The latter tongue owes its
original to some nation of those barbarians who settled
in Guipuscoa and other parts of the Pyrenean regions,
on the decline of the Roman empire, nor are the few
words common in the Basque and Irish tongues any
proof that the one is descended from the other. This
observation will hold good relatively to the Welsh and
Irish languages. They differ entirely in syntax, and
show that the two nations speaking those tongues have
different Celtic originals.

Bollandus says that St. Patrick taught the first
alphabet to the Irish: he means the Roman alphabet,
and should not forget that it was taught very near an
age before, by earlier missionaries in the parts of
Ireland which they converted to the faith. In the
antecedent times the Fileas or ancient Irish writers,
inscribed their ideas on tablets of wood, by the means
of seventeen cyphers, of which their ancestors learned
the use before their arrival in Ireland; nor is this
fact obscured, but is rather enlightened by a fable of
the Fileas, setting forth that some of those ancestors
were instructed in letters by a celebrated Phenius,
famous for literary knowledge in the East. Through this
poetical veil we plainly discern the Phenicians, who
first instructed the Europeans (the Greeks, Lybians,
Italians, and Spaniards particularly) in the use of
letters and other arts. Spain, according to Strabo,
had the use of letters in a very early period; and
that a colony from that country should import into,
and cultivate also, those elements of knowledge in
Ireland, is not improbable: the perfection of the Irish
language before the introduction of Christianity is an
incontrovertible proof of the fact.

* * * * *

The Scots are represented as a rude and barbarous
people in the fourth and fifth ages, even by some
eminent ecclesiastical writers. But these as well as
other foreign historians have not, if at all, been
resident long enough in Ireland to pronounce the
natives barbarous, if those writers took that epithet
in the worst sense it can bear. St. Jerom avers that
when an adolescentulus, he saw a Scot in Gaul feeding
upon human flesh, but the child, in this case, might
impose upon the man, or if otherwise, a nation is not
to be characterised from the barbarity of an individual,
or even of a single tribe in an extensive country. That
some barbarous customs prevailed in Ireland during the
ages mentioned, cannot be denied; and that some prevail
at this day in most of the modern states of Europe,
called enlightened, is a matter of fatal experience. In
the documents still preserved in the native language of
the ancient Irish, we learn that after the reform made
of the order of Fileas in the first century, houses
and ample landed endowments were set apart for those
philosophers, who, in the midst of the most furious
civil wars, were by common consent to be left
undisturbed; that they were to be exempt from every
employment but that of improving themselves in abstract
knowledge, and cultivating the principal youths of the
nation in their several colleges; that in the course
of their researches they discovered and exposed the
corrupt doctrines of the Druids; and that an enlightened
monarch called Cormac O’Quin took the lead among the
Fileas in the attack upon that order of priests, and
declared publicly for the unity of the Godhead against
Polytheism, and for the adoration of one supreme,
omnipotent, and merciful Creator of heaven and earth.
The example of that monarch, and the disquisitions of
the Fileas relating to religion and morality, paved
the way for the reception of the gospel; and as the
doctrines of our Saviour made the quickest progress
among civilized nations, the conversion of Ireland
in a shorter compass of time than we read of in the
conversion of any other European country, brings a
proof that the natives were not the rude barbarians
some ancient authors have represented them to be.

[52] Antiq. Brit. Eccl. c. 16, p. 408, 412.

[53] Prosp. Contra Collat. c. 44.

[54] See the note on the life of St. Patrick in this work;
also Ware’s Antiq. by Harris, with his remarks on
Dempster, c. 1, p. 4.

[55] Usher, p. 418.

[56] Certain ancient principal Scottish saints are
commemorated in an ancient Scottish calendar published
by Mr. Robert Keith, as follows:

January
8. St. Nethalan, B. C. An. 452.
21. St. Vimin, B. An. 715.
29. St. Macwoloc, B. An. 720.
30. Saint Macglastian, B. An. 814.

February
7. St. Ronan, B. C. An. 603.

March
1. St. Minan, archdeacon, C. An. 879.
Also St. Marnan, B. An. 655.
4. St. Adrian, B. of St. Andrew’s, M. He was
slain by the Danes in 874, and buried in
the isle of Man.
6. St. Fredoline, C. An. 500.
11. St. Constantine, king of Scotland, a monk
and M. An. 556.
17. St. Kyrinus or Kyrstinus, surnamed Boniface,
B. of Ross, An. 660.

April
1. St. Gilbert, B. of Caithness, An. 1140.
12. St. Ternan, archbishop of the Picts, ordained
by Saint Palladius, about the year 450.
16. St. Manus or Mans, M. in Orkney, An. 1104.
19. Translation of St. Margaret’s body to
Dunfermline.

July
6. St. Palladius, apostle of Scotland.

August
10. St. Blanc, B. C.
27. St. Malrube, hermit, martyred by the Danes,
in Scotland, in 1040.

September
16. St. Minian, B. C. in 450, or according to
some, a whole century later.
22. St. Lolan, B. of Whithern or Galloway.

October
25. St. Marnoc, B. C. died at Kilmarnock in the
fourth or fifth century.

November
2. Saint Maure, from whom Kilmaures is named,
An. 899.
12. St. Macar, B. of Murray, M. 887.

St. Germanus, B. C. said to have been appointed bishop
of the isles by St. Patrick. Under his invocation the
cathedral of the isle of Man is dedicated. St. Macull
or Mauchold, in Latin Macallius, bishop in the same
place from 494 to 518. In his honor many churches are
dedicated in Scotland, and one in the isle of Man. He
is honored on the 25th of April. St. Brendan, from whom
a church in the isle of Man is called Kirk-Bradan, was
bishop of the isles in the ninth century.

N. B. The isle of Man has had its own bishop from the
time it came into the hands of the English in the days
of Edward I. of England, and David II. of Scotland. It
was anciently subject to the bishop of the Isles, who
always resided at Hy-columbkill till the extinction
of episcopacy in Scotland, in 1688. The bishops both
of the isles and of Man took the title of Episcopus
Sodorensis; which Mr. Keith (p. 175) derives (not from
any towns), but from the Greek word Soter or Saviour,
because the cathedral of Hy-columbkill is dedicated to
our Saviour. See Mr. Robert Keith, in his new Catalogue
of bishops in Scotland, printed at Edinburgh, in 4to.
An. 1755.

Le Neve supposes with Spotiswood that the isle of Man
had its bishops after Amphibalus, who lived in the
fourth age, that they were called bishops of Soder
from a village of that name in the island, and that the
title was transferred to the island of Hy-columbkill
in the eighth age, when the two sees were united into
one. But the succession of bishops in the isle of Man
is not sufficiently clear.

Matthew Paris says that Wycomb was first bishop of Man,
in the twelfth age, and that he was consecrated by the
archbishop of York. See Le Neve. Fasti Anglic.

[57] Hect. Boet. l. 7, fol. 128.

[58] Sozom. l. 3, c. 14.

[59] Rufin. b. 5, c. 10.

[60] Socrates, in all things he said, used to add this form
of speech, “By my Dæmon’s leave.” And just upon the
point of expiring, he ordered a cock to be sacrificed
to Esculapius (Plato’s Phædo sub finem). And in his
trial we read one article of his impeachment to have
been a charge of unnatural lust. Thales, the prince
of naturalists, being asked by Crœsus what God was,
put off that prince from time to time, saying, “I
will consider on it.” But the meanest mechanic among
the Christians can explain himself intelligibly on
the Creator of the universe. Diogenes could not be
contented in his tub without gratifying his passions.
And when with his dirty feet he trod upon Plato’s
costly carpets, crying that he trampled upon the pride
of Plato, he did this, as Plato answered him, with
greater pride. Pythagoras affected tyranny at Thurium,
and Zeno at Pyrene. Lycurgus made away with himself
because he was unable to bear the thought of the
Lacedæmonians correcting the severity of his laws.
Anaxagoras had not fidelity enough to restore to
strangers the goods which they had committed to his
trust. Aristotle could not sit easy till he proudly
made his friend Hermias sit below him; and he was as
gross a flatterer of Alexander for the sake of vanity,
as Plato was of Dionysius for his belly. From Plato
and Socrates the stoics derived their proud maxim, “The
wise man is self-sufficient.” Epictetus himself allows
“to be proud of the conquest of any vice.” Aristotle
(Ethic. ad Nicom. l. 10, c. 7) and Cicero patronize
revenge. See B. Cumberland of the Laws of Nature, c. 9,
p. 346. Abbé Batteux demonstrates the impiety and vices
of Epicurus mingled with some virtues and great moral
truths. (La Morale d’Epicure, à Paris, 1758.) The like
blemishes may be found in the doctrine and lives of
all the other boasted philosophers of paganism. See
Theodoret. De curandis Græcor. affectibus, &c.

[61] King Ina ruled the West-Saxons thirty-seven years
with great glory, from the abdication of Ceadwalla
who died at Rome. Ina vanquished the Welsh, several
domestic rebels, and foreign enemies; made many pious
foundations, and rebuilt in a sumptuous manner the
abbey of Glastenbury. Ralph or Ranulph Higden in
his Polychronicon, and others say this king first
established the Rome-scot or Peter-pence, which was a
collection of a penny from every house in his kingdom
paid yearly to the see of Rome. By considering the
vanities of the world and moved by the frequent
exhortations of the queen his wife, he renounced the
world in 728 in the highest pitch of human felicity,
and leaving his kingdom to Ethelheard his kinsman,
travelled to Rome, was there shorn a monk, and grew old
in that mean habit. His wife accompanied him thither,
confirmed him in that course, and imitated his example:
so that living not far from each other in mutual love,
and in the constant exercises of penance and devotion,
they departed this life at Rome not without doing
divers miracles, as William of Malmesbury and H.
Huntingdon write. In 696 Sebbi, the pious king of the
East-Saxons, preferred also a private life to a crown,
took the monastic habit with the blessing of bishop
Whaldere, successor to St. Erkenwald in the see of
London, after bestowing a great sum of money in charity,
and soon after departed this life in the odor of
sanctity. See Bede b. 4, c. 11.

[62] Spelman Conc. Brit. t. 1.

[63] B. 5, ch. 19.

[64] Bede, p. 3, c. 6.

[65] On St. Edelburga see Solier the Bollandist, ad diem
7 Julij, t. 2, p. 481. She is called in French St.
Aubierge. See on her also Du Plessis, Hist. de Meaux.

[66] Published by Dom. Martenne, Anecdot. t. 4.

[67] Urban VIII. Constit. 58. _Cum sicut._ An. 1626, Bullar.
Roman. t. 5, p. 120.

[68] Grotius and others demonstrate the Greek language to
have been, in the first ages of Christianity, common
in Palestine; but this cannot be extended to all
the country people, as this passage and other proofs
clearly show. Hence Eusebius wrote his Acts of the
Martyrs of Palestine in Syro-Chaldaic, but abridged the
same in Greek, in the eighth book of his Church History.

[69] The old Latin Acts write his name Flavian, and some
Fabian, by mistaking the Syriac name, which is written
without vowels.

[70] Anglia Sacra, t. 1, p. 613, published by Wharton.

[71] Ibid. p. 606.

[72] Sozom. l. 3, c. 16.

[73] T. 3, p. 23.

[74] On this genuine work see Assemani, Op. t. 1, p. 119,
ib. Proleg, c. 1, et t. 2, p. 37. Item Biblioth. Orient.
t. 1, p. 141. The disciples of St. Ephrem committed
to writing this same history, as they had often heard
it from his mouth. Hence we have so many relations
of it. One formerly published by Gerard Vossius, is
republished by Assemani (t. 3, p. 23). But the most
complete account is that given us in the saint’s
confession, extant in the new Vatican edition.

[75] See Appendix on St. Ephrem’s Works, at the end of the
life.

[76] Serm. Ascetic. 1, p. 4.

[77] In encomio Basilij, t. 2.

[78] From his conversing with St. Basil by an interpreter
it is clear that St. Ephrem never understood the Greek
language. The old vicious translation of the life of
St. Basil, under the name of St. Amphilochius, pretends
that St. Basil obtained for him miraculously the
knowledge of the Greek tongue, and ordained him priest.
But this is a double mistake, though the latter was
admitted by Baillet. Saint Jerom, Palladius, and other
ancients always style him deacon, never priest. Nor
does Pseudo Amphilochius say, that St. Basil raised
St. Ephrem, but only his disciple and companion to the
priesthood, as the new translation of this piece, and an
attentive inspection of the original text, demonstrate.

[79] T. 4, b. 1, ed. Vaticanæ.

[80] Necrosima, can. 81, p. 335, t. 6.

[81] St. Ephrem in Testam. p. 286, 395, and St. Greg. Nyss.
p. 12.

[82] Testam. t. 2, p. 230, &c.

[83] Greg. M. Moral. l. 23, c. 21.

[84] Cant. ii. 12.

[85] John Oosterwican was director to a convent of nuns of
the same order in Gorcum; he was then very old, and
often prayed that God would honor him with the crown of
martyrdom.

The names of the eleven Franciscans were Nicholas
Pick, Jerom, a native of Werden, in the county of
Horn, Theodoric of Embden, native of Amorfort, Nicaise
Johnson, native of Heze, Wilhade, native of Denmark,
Godfrey of Merveille, Antony of the town of Werden,
Antony of Hornaire, a village near Gorcum, Francis
Rodes, native of Brussels. These were priests and
preachers. The other two were lay-brothers, namely,
Peter of Asca, a village in Brabant, and Cornelius of
Dorestate, a village now called Wick, in the territory
of Utrecht.--The three curates were Leonand Vechel,
Nicholas Poppel, and Godfrey Dunen. This last was
a native of Gorcum, who having been rector of the
university of Paris, where he had studied and taught,
was some time curate in Holland near the French
territories, but resigned his curacy and lived at
Gorcum.

The other martyrs were John Oosterwican mentioned
above; John, a Dominican of the province of Cologne,
curate of Hornaire; Adrian Hilvarenbeck, a Norbertin of
Middleburge, who served a parish at Munster, a village
near the mouth of the Meuse; James Lacop of the same
order and monastery, an assistant in a neighboring
parish to Munster; and Andrew Walter, a secular priest,
curate of Heinort, near Dort.

[86] Julij, t. 2, p. 823.

[87] De Canoniz. lib. iii. cap. 12.

[88] The reader will observe that this word is used in the
Saints’ writings in the sense of elevated, and almost
ecstatic, union with God, in prayer and contemplation.

[89] Pius VI. Decree approving the virtues of the Ven.
Veronica Giuliani. April, 1796.

[90] Ceillier and some others think this emperor to have been
M. Aurelius Antoninus Philosophus, who was a persecutor,
and reigned with Lucius Verus; the latter was absent
from Rome in the Parthian war from 162 to 166; on which
account, say these authors, he did not appear in this
trial. See Tillemont, t. 2, p. 326. But that these
martyrs suffered under Antoninus Pius, in the thirteenth
year of his reign, of Christ 150, we are assured by an
old inscription in several ancient MS. copies of their
acts mentioned by Ruinart. That this emperor put several
Christians to death whilst he was governor of Asia
before his accession to the empire, Tertullian testifies
(ad Scapul.). And that towards the end of his reign,
notwithstanding his former mildness towards them, he
again exercised the sword and torments on them, we
have an undoubted proof in the genuine epitaph of
St. Alexander, martyr, produced by Aringhi, Diss. 2,
l. 3, c. See Berti in Sæc. 2.

[91] Quæ in viduitate permanens Deo suam voverat castitatem.
Ruin. Act. Sincer. p. 21.

[92] Omnes qui non confitentur Christum verum esse Deum, in
ignem æternum mittentur. Ruin. p. 23.

[93] In Cyclum Pasch. p. 268.

[94] Nisibis was the Assyrian name of this city, which was
called by the Greeks Antiochia Mygdoniæ, from the river
Mygdon, on which it was situated, which gave name to the
territory. The ancient name of this city was Achar or
Achad, one of the seats of the empire of Nimrod. “He
reigned in Arach, that is, Edessa, and in Achad, now
called Nisibis,” says St. Jerom. (qu. in Gen. c. 10,
n. 10). St. Ephrem had made the same observation before
him. “He reigned in Arach, which is Edessa, and in Achar,
which is Nisibis, and in Calanne, which is Ctesiphon,
and in Rehebot, which is Adiab.” St. Ephrem, Comm. in
Gen. See Sim. Assemani, Bibl. Orient. t. 2, Diss. de
Monophysitis.

[95] Philoth. seu Hist. Relig. c. 1, p. 767.

[96] F. Cuper thinks the account of this event in Theodoret’s
Religious History to be an addition inserted from
other places, t. 4. Jul. in Comment. prævio ad Vitam,
S. Jacobi, n. 12 et 17.

[97] Philost. Hist. l. 3, c. 23.

[98] Chron. Alex. p. 287, S. Hieron. In Chron. and Theophan.
p. 28. See Le Beau, Hist. du Bas Empire, l. 6, n. 11,
t. 2, p. 22.

[99] Wisdom xvi. 9.

[100] Theodoret, Hist. Relig. in vit. S. Jacobi, et in Hist.
Eccl. l. 2. c. 30. Philost. l. 3, c. 32. Theophan. p. 33.
Chron. Alex. Zozim. l. 3. Zonar. t. 2, p. 44. Le Reau,
l. 7, p. 127, t. 2.

[101] Tillemont, Hist. des. Emp. t. 4, p. 674, places the
second siege of Nisibis to 346, and the third in 350.
But the dates above mentioned are more agreeable to
history, and adopted by the suffrage of most modern
critics.

[102] The two elder Assemani place the death of St. James in
338, soon after the first siege of Nisibis, of which
they understand the circumstances which are usually
ascribed to the second siege; for Theodoret confounds
them together, as Garnier, (in hunc Theodoreti locum),
Petau, (in Or. l. Juliani) Henricus Valesius, (in
Hist. Eccl.). Theodoret, Ammian. Marcell. l. 18. Pagi,
Tillemont, and others observe. Simon Assemani confirms
this chronology by the express testimony of the authors
of two Syriac Chronicles, that of Dionysius, patriarch
of the Jacobits, and that of Edessa. See Simon Assemani,
Biblio. Orient. t. 1, c. 5, p. 17, and Stephen Evodius
Assemani in Op. S. Ephrem, t. 1. But neither of
these Chronicles seems of sufficient authority to
counterbalance the testimony of the Greek historians,
and the circumstances that persuade us that St. James
survived the second siege of Nisibis, upon which
Tillemont, Ceillier, &c., place the death of St. James
in 350; and Cuper the Bollandist between the years 350
and 361, in which Constantius died.

[103] Ammian. Marcelli. l. 18, c. 7. Zonaras, t. 2, p. 20.
Monsignor Antonelli in vit. St. Jacobi, p. 26.

[104] See on him Galanus in parte 1. Historiali Concil.
Armen. cum Roman. p. 239, and F. James Villotte, S. J.
in serie Chronol. Patriarcharum Armeniæ, printed in
the end of his Latin-Armenian Dictionary.

[105] These are extant, addressed not to St. Gregory the
apostle of Armenia, surnamed the Illuminator, as some
copies have mistaken, but probably to his nephew,
another St. Gregory, who, being consecrated bishop
preached the faith in Albania, a province of Greater
Armenia, near the Caspian sea, where he was crowned
with martyrdom among the infidel barbarians in the
very country where Baronius places the Martyrdom of
the apostle St. Bartholomew. See Galanus, Hist. Eccl.
Armenorum, c. 5, et Not. ib. Also Antonelli, not. in
ep. S. Gregorii ad S. Jacobum Misib. p. 1.

[106] These eighteen discourses of St. James are mentioned by
Gennadius, who gives their titles, (t. 2, p. 901, Op.
S. Hier. Veron. an. 1735,) commended by St. Athanasius
(who calls them monuments of the simplicity and candor
of an apostolic mind. Ep. encyclic. ad episcopos
Egypti et Lybiæ) and by the Armenian writers quoted
by Antonelli, who demonstrates from the discourses
themselves that they are a work of the fourth century.

St. James, in the first, On Faith, demonstrates this
to be the foundation of our spiritual edifice, which
is raised upon it by hope and love, which render
the Christian soul the house and temple of God, the
ornaments of which are all good works, as fasting,
prayer, chastity, and all the fruits of the Holy Ghost.
He commends faith from the divine authority of Christ,
who everywhere requires it, from its indispensable
necessity, from the heroic virtues which it produces,
the eminent saints it has formed, and the miracles it
has wrought. The subject of his second discourse is
Charity, or the Love of God and our Neighbor, in which
the whole law of Christ is comprised, and which is the
most excellent of all virtues, and the perfection of
all sanctity, admirably taught by Christ both by word
and example; the end of all his doctrine, mysteries,
and sufferings being to plant his charity in our hearts.
In the third discourse he treats on fasting, universal
temperance, and self-denial, by which we subdue and
govern our senses and passions, die to ourselves, and
obtain all blessings of God, and the protection of the
angels, who are moved to assist and fight for us, as he
proves from examples and passages of holy writ (pp. 60,
61, 62). In his fourth he speaks on Prayer, on which he
delivers admirable maxims, teaching that its excellence
is derived from the purity, sanctity, and fervor of the
heart, upon which the fire descends from heaven, and
which glorifies God even by its silence. “But none,”
says he, “will be cleansed unless they have been washed
in the laver of baptism, and have received the body
and blood of Christ. For the blood is expiated by this
Blood, and the body cleansed by this Body. Be assiduous
in holy prayer, and in the beginning of all prayer
place that which our Lord hath taught us. When you pray,
always remember your friends, and me a sinner, &c.”

His fifth discourse, On War, is chiefly an invective
against pride, in vanquishing which consists our
main spiritual conflict. The sixth discourse is most
remarkable. The title is, On Devout Persons, that is,
Ascetes. The Armenian word _Ugdavor_ signifies one
who by vow has consecrated himself to God. From this
discourse it is manifest that some of these Ascetes
had devoted themselves to God in a state of continency
by vow, others only by a resolution. The saint most
pathetically exhorts them to fervor and watchfulness,
and excellently inculcates the obligation which every
Christian lies under of becoming a spiritual man formed
upon the image of Christ, the second Adam, in order
to rise with him to glory. He inveighs against some
Ascetes who kept under the same roof a woman Ascete
to serve them: a practice no less severely condemned
by St. Gregory Nazianzen (Carm. 3, p. 56, and Or. 43,
p. 701). St. Basil (Ep. 55, p. 149). St. Chrysostom,
the council of Nice, that of Ancyra, &c. St. James was
himself an Ascete from his youth, St. Gregory, to whom
he sends these discourses, was also one, and it is
clear from many passages in St. Gregory Nazianzen,
St. Basil, and others, that they were very numerous
in Cappadocia, Pontus, and Armenia before St. Basil
founded there the monastic life. See Antonelli’s note,
ib. p. 203. Saint James, in his seventh discourse, On
Penance, strongly exhorts sinners to confess speedily
their crimes; to conceal which through shame is final
impenitence. He adds, the priests cannot disclose
such a confession (p. 237). The infidels and several
heretics in the first ages of the Church denying the
general resurrection of bodies, St. James proves that
mystery in his eighth discourse, On the Resurrection
of the Dead. His ninth, On Humility, is an excellent
eulogium of that virtue, by which men are made the
children of God, and brethren of Christ; and it is
but justice in man, who is but dust. Its fruits are
innocence, simplicity, meekness, sweetness, charity,
patience, prudence, mercy, sincerity, compunction, and
peace. For he who loves humility is always blessed,
and enjoys constant peace; God, who dwelleth in the
meek and humble, abiding in him.

The tenth discourse, On Pastors, contains excellent
advice to a pastor of souls, especially on his
obligation of watching over and feeding his flock.
In the eleventh, On Circumcision, and in the twelfth,
On the Sabbath, he shows against the Jews, that those
laws no longer oblige, and that the Egyptians learned
circumcision from the Jews. In the thirteenth, On the
Choice of Meats, he proves none are unlawful of their
own nature. In the fourteenth, On the Passover, that
the Paschal solemnity of Christ’s resurrection has
abolished that Jewish festival: he adds that the
Christian, in honor of Christ’s crucifixion, keeps
every Friday, and also, at Nisibis, the fourteenth
day of every month. In the fifteenth he proves the
Reprobation of the Jews. In the sixteenth the Divinity
of the Son of God. In the seventeenth the Virtue of
holy Virginity, which both the Ascetes and the clergy
professed, and which he defends against the Jews
only; for he wrote before the heretics in the fourth
age calumniated the sanctity of that state. In the
eighteenth he confutes the Jews, who pretended that
their temple and synagogue would be again restored at
Jerusalem.

The long letter to the priests of Seleucia and
Ctesiphon against schisms, and dissensions, when Papas,
the haughty bishop of those cities, had raised there
a fatal schism, is in some MSS. ascribed to St. James;
but was certainly a synodal letter sent by a council
held on that occasion, nine years after the council of
Nice: on which see the life of St. Miles, and the notes
of the archbishop of Apamea, Evodius Assemani, ib.
Act. Mart. Orient. t. 1, p. 72, and Jos. Assemani Bibl.
Orient. t. 1, p. 86, &c.

Among the oriental liturgies, one in Chaldaic, formerly
in use among the Syrians, bears the name of St. James
of Nisibis. Gennadius mentions twenty-six books written
by this holy doctor in the Syriac tongue, all on pious
subjects, or on the Persian persecution. They were
never translated into Greek.

The letters of St. James and St. Gregory are published
by Assemani, Bibl. Orient. t. 1, p. 552, 632.

[107] Ps. xxxiii. 16, Prov. iii. 23, Zach. ii. 8, Gen. xv. 1,
Lev. xxxvi. 3.

[108] S. Chrys. Hom. 51, in Act. Hom. 15, in Rom. et 91, in
Matt.

[109] Ose. i. 2, Zach. xi. 9, Isa. v. 5.

[110] Amos ix. 4.

[111] Molanus in Auctario Martytol. Menard, in Martyr. Bened.
Bucelin, &c.

[112] Some have imagined that St. Hidulph was only
chorepiscopus or vicar, probably with episcopal orders,
for the administration of part of the diocess. But the
most judicious critics agree with the original writers
of his life, that he was himself archbishop of Triers.

[113] Sulpic. Sever. Dial. 1, c. 26, ol. 18, p. 94, ed. nov.
Veron. an. 1741.

[114] Heraclides ap. Cotel. Monum. Eccl. Gr. t. 3, p. 172.
See St. Chrys. contra oppugn. vitæ monast. t. 1. S. Gr.
Naz. St. Basil, &c.

[115] Among the heathen emperors of Rome, Titus, the two
Antonines, and Alexander deserved the best of their
subjects, and the three last gained a great reputation
for moral virtue. The Antonines were eminent for
their learning, and devoted themselves to the Stoic
philosophy. Arrius Antoninus, who had distinguished
himself by his moderation and love of justice in
several magistracies, was adopted by the emperor Adrian
in 138, and upon his death in the same year ascended
the imperial throne. He was truly the father of his
people during a reign of twenty-two years, and died
in 161, being seventy-seven years old. He obtained the
surname of Pius, according to some, by his gratitude to
Adrian; but, according to others, by his clemency and
goodness. He had often in his mouth the celebrated
saying of Scipio Africanus, that he would rather save
the life of one citizen than destroy one thousand
enemies. He engaged in no wars, except that by his
lieutenants he restrained the Daci, Alani, and Mauri,
and by the conduct of Lollius Urbicus quieted the
Britons, confining the Caledonians to their mountains
and forests by a new wall. Yet the pagan virtues of
this prince were mixed with an alloy of superstition,
vice, and weakness. When the senate refused to enrol
Adrian among the gods, out of a just detestation of
his cruelty and other vices, Antoninus, by tears and
entreaties, extorted from it a decree by which divine
honors were granted that infamous prince, and he
appointed priests and a temple for his worship. He
likewise caused his wife Faustina to be honored after
her death as a goddess, and was reproached for the most
dissolute life of his daughter Faustina the younger,
whom he gave in marriage to his adopted son, Marcus
Aurelius Antoninus.

Xiphilin writes that the Christians shared in the
mildness of his government. Yet though he did not raise
by fresh edicts any new persecution, it is a notorious
mistake of Dodwell and some others, who pretend that
no Christians suffered death for the faith during his
reign, at least by his order. Tertullian informs us
(l. ad Scapul. c. 4), that Arrius Antoninus, when he
was only proconsul of Asia, put in execution the old
unjust rescript of Trajan; and having punished some
Christians with death, dismissed the rest, crying out
to them, “O wretches, if you want to die, have you
not halters and precipices to end your lives by?” St.
Justin, in his first apology, which he addressed to
Antoninus Pius, who was then emperor, testifies that
Christians were tortured with the most barbarous
cruelty without having been convicted of any crime.
Also St. Irenæus (l. 3, c. 3), Eusebius (l. 4, c. 10),
and the author of an ancient poem which is published
among the works of Tertullian, are incontestible
vouchers that this emperor, whom Capitolinus calls a
most zealous worshipper of the gods, often shed the
blood of saints. By the acts of St. Felicitas and her
sons, it appears what artifices the pagan priests made
use of to stir up the emperors and magistrates against
the Christians. At length, however, Antoninus Pius,
in the fifteenth year of his reign, of Christ 152,
according to Tillemont, wrote to the states of Asia,
commanding that all persons who should be impeached
merely for believing in Christ, should be discharged,
and their accusers punished according to the laws
against informers, adding, “You do but harden them in
their opinion, for you cannot oblige them more than by
making them die for their religion. Thus they triumph
over you by choosing rather to die than to comply with
your will.” See Eusebius, l. 4, c. 26, where he also
mentions a like former rescript of Adrian to Minutius
Fundanus. Nevertheless, it is proved by Aringhi (Roma
Subterran. l. 3, c. 22), that some were crowned with
martyrdom in this reign after the aforesaid rescript,
the pusillanimous prince not having courage always to
protect these innocent subjects from the fury of the
populace or the malice of some governors.

[116] St. Minias was a Roman soldier who suffered martyrdom
at Florence under Decius. See Mart. Rom., 13 Oct.

[117] In Luc. l. 7, c. 13.

[118] Though Pliny and Procopius pretend that the Vandals
were of the same extraction with the Goths, the
contrary is demonstrated by the learned F. Daniel
Farlati (Illyrici Sacri, t. 2, p. 1308, Venetiis 1753),
and by Jos. Assemani (in Calend. de Orig. Slavor.
par. 2, c. 5, t. 1, p. 297). And their language,
manners, and religion, were entirely different. The
same arguments show that they differed also from the
Slavi, Huns, and original Winidi or Venedi, this last
being a Sarmatian, and the two others Scythian nations.
The Vandals are placed by Jornandes and Dio (l. 55)
on the German coast of the Baltic sea, in the present
Prussia and Pomerania; they thence extended themselves
to the sources of the Elbe, in the mountains of Silesia.
They were afterward removed near the Danube, in the
neighborhood of the Marcomanni, in the reigns of
Antoninus, Aurelian, and Probus. In the fifth century
they made an excursion into Gaul; and being there
repulsed, crossed the Pyrenæan mountains with the
Alani, who were the original Massagetæ from mount
Caucasus, and beyond the Tanais, as Ammianus
Marcellinus testifies. About the year 400, in the reign
of Honorius, the Alani settled themselves in Lusitania,
and the Vandals under king Gunderic, in Gallicia
(which then comprised both the present Gallicia and
Old Castile), and in Bætica, which from them was called
Vandalitia, and corruptly Andalusia. (See St. Isidore
and Idatius, in their chronicles, Salvian, l. 7,
p. 137, St. August. ep. 3, ad Victor.) The Vandals
were baptized in the Catholic faith about the time when
they crossed the Rhine; but were afterward drawn into
Arianism, probably by some alliance with the Arian
Goths, and out of hatred to the Romans. Idatius says,
that common fame attributed the Arian perversion of
the Vandals to king Genseric, who succeeded his brother
Gunderic in 428, and was a man experienced in all the
arts of policy and war. Count Boniface, lieutenant of
Africa, seeing his life threatened by Aëtius (who, with
the title of Magister Militiæ, governed the empire for
the empress Placidia, regent for her son Valentinian),
invited the Vandals out of Spain to his assistance.
Genseric, with a powerful army, passed the strait which
divides Africa from Spain, in May, 429, and though
Boniface was then returned to his duty, the barbarian
everywhere defeated the Romans, besieged Hippo during
fourteen months; and though he was obliged by a famine
to retire, he returned soon after and took that strong
fortress. The emperor Valentinian, in 435, by treaty
yielded up to him all his conquests in Africa. Genseric
soon broke the truce, and in 439 took Carthage, and
drove the Romans out of all Africa. In 455, being
invited by the Empress Eudoxia to revenge the murder
of Valentinian on Maximus, he plundered Rome during
fifteen days. Though that city had been ravaged by
Alaric the Goth in 400, whilst Honorius was emperor,
the Vandal found and carried off an immense booty;
and among other things, the gold and brass with which
the capitol was inlaid, and the vessels of the Jewish
temple at Jerusalem, which Titus had brought to Rome.
These Justinian, when he had recovered Africa, caused
to be brought to Constantinople, whence he caused
them to be removed and placed in certain churches at
Jerusalem, as Procopius relates. Rome was again twice
plundered by Totila, in 546 and 549. The Vandals, by
their transmigrations into Spain and Africa, soon after
ceased to be a nation in Germany, as Jornandes and
Procopius testify. Euricus, king of the Visigoths, in
Languedoc, in 468, invading Spain, conquered most of
the territories which the Romans still possessed there,
and all the provinces which the Vandals had seized.
So that by the extinction of the empire of the Vandals
in Africa under Justinian, the name of that potent and
furious nation was lost: though Frederic, the first
king of Prussia, in 1701, was for some time very
desirous rather to take the title of king of the
Vandals. The cavalry of the ancient Vandals fought
chiefly with the sword and lance, and were unpractised
in the distant combat. Their bowmen were undisciplined,
and fought on foot like the Gothic. See Procopius.

[119] Tinuzudæ tempore quo sacramenta Dei populo
porrigebantur, introeuntes cum furore (Ariani) Corpus
Christi et Sanguinem pavimento sparserunt, et illud
pollutis pedibus calcaverunt. St. Vict. Vitensis,
l. 1, p. 17.

[120] Qui nobis pœnitentiæ munus collaturi sunt, et
reconciliationis indulgentiâ obstrictos peccatorum
vinculis soluturi? A quibus divinis sacrificiis
ritus est exhibendus consuetus? Vobiscum et nos libeat
pergere, si liceret. S. Victor Vit. l. 2, p. 33.

[121] Scribam ego fratribus meis ut veniant coëpiscopi mei,
qui vobis nobiscum fidem communem nostram valeant
demonstrare, et præcipue ecclesia Romana, quæ caput
est omnium ecclesiarum. Victor Vit. l. 2, p. 38.

[122] In it the Catholics appealed to the tradition of the
universal Church. “Hæc est fides nostra; evangelicis
et apostolicis traditionibus atque auctoritate firmata,
et omnium quæ in mundo sunt Catholicarum ecclesiarum
societate fundata, in qua nos per gratiam Dei
omnipotentis permanere usque ad finem vitæ hujus
confidimus.” Victor Vit. l. 3, p. 62.

[123] L. 5, p. 76.

[124] Æneas, Gaz. Dial. de Animarum Immortaliiate et Corporis
Resurrectione, p. 415.

[125] Procop. de Bello Vandal. l. 1, c. 8.

[126] Hist. Franc. l. 2, p. 46.

[127] Ruin. Hist. Persec. Vandal. part. 2, c. 8, Notit. Afric.

[128] Hæc sunt linteamina quæ te accusabunt cum majestas
venerit judicantis. Vict. Vit. l. 5, c. 78.

[129] He closes this work by the following supplication to
the angels and saints: “Succor us, O angels of my God;
look down on Africa, once flourishing in its numerous
churches, but now left desolate and cast away.
Intercede, O patriarchs; pray, O holy prophets; succor
us, O apostles, who are our advocates. You, especially,
O blessed Peter, why are you silent in the necessities
of your flock? You, O blessed apostle Paul, behold
what the Arian Vandals do, and how your sons groan in
captivity. O all you holy apostles, petition for us.
Pray for us though wicked; Christ prayed even for his
persecutors,” &c. Adeste angeli Dei mei, et videte
Africam totam dudum tantarum ecclesiarum cuneis
fultam, nunc ab omnibus desolatam, sedentem viduam et
abjectam--Deprecamini patriarchæ; orate sancti prophetæ;
estote apostoli suffragatores ejus. Præcipue tu Petre,
quare siles pro ovibus tuis?--Tu S. Paule, gentium
magister, cognosce quid Vandali faciunt Ariani, et
filii tui gemunt lugendo captivi. Victor Vit. Hist.
Pers. Vandal. sub finem. The history of St. Victor
is written with spirit and correctness, in a plain
affecting style, intermixed with an entertaining
poignancy of satire, and edifying heroic sentiments
and examples of piety. The author is honored in the
Roman Martyrology among the holy confessors on the 23d
of August, though the time and place of his death are
uncertain. He flourished in the middle of the fifth
century. His history of the Vandalic persecution has
run through several editions: that of Beatus Rhenanus
at Basil in 1535, is the first: Peter Chifflet gave one
at Dijon in 1664: but that of Dom. Ruinart at Paris, in
1694, is the most complete. It was published in English
in 1605. The best French translation is that of Arnau
d’Andilly.

[130] L. de. Glor. Conf. c. 13.

[131] The Roman provinces, in Africa, soon after sunk again
into barbarism and infidelity, being overrun in 668
by the Saracens from Arabia and Syria, who in 669 took
also Syracusa, and established a kingdom in Sicily and
part of Italy. They planted themselves in Spain in 707.
Muhavia, a general of the Sultan Omar, having routed
Hormisdas Jesdegird, king of Persia, in 632, translated
that monarchy from the line of Artaxerxes to the
Saracens. This Omar conquered Egypt in 635. He was
second caliph after Mahomet, and successor of Abubeker;
and from his time the caliphs of Bagdat or Babylon
were masters of Syria, Persia, and Egypt, till the
two latter revolted; but notwithstanding various
revolutions, all those countries still retain the
Mahometan superstition. The Mahometans in Egypt shook
off the yoke of the caliphs of Bagdat, and set up
their own caliphs at Cairo in 870, to whom the Moors in
Africa adhered till the Turks became masters of Egypt.

[132] 2 Peter i. 9.

[133] S. Ambros. in Ps. 40.

[134] L. 3, de Virgin. See S. Aug. Serm., 38. de Temp.

[135] Hebr. x. 34, xi. 37.

[136] The exact number of years that some of the popes sat
before Victor in the year 200, cannot be determined with
any degree of certainty, partly on account of faults of
copies and the disagreement of later pontificals. (See
Pagi, the Bollandists, Tillemont, Orsi, Berti, &c.)
St. Peter sat twenty-five years; St. Linus seems
to have held the see about eleven years, St. Cletus
twelve years, St. Clement about eleven years, and St.
Anacletus nine, dying about the year 109. The tradition
and registers of the Roman church show Anacletus and
Cletus to have been two distinct popes, as is manifest
from the Liberian Calendar and several very ancient
lists of the first popes quoted by Schelstrate (Diss. 2,
Ant. Eccl. c. 2.) and the Bollandists (ad 26 Apr.) from
the old poem among the works of Tertullian, written
about the time that he lived; from the very ancient
Antiphonaries of the Vatican church, published by
cardinal Joseph Thomasius, and the old Martyrology
which bore the name of St. Jerom, and was printed at
Lucca by the care of Francis-Maria-Florentinius, a
gentleman of that city; which original authorities
were followed by Ado, Usuard, &c. The pontificals
call Cletus a Roman by birth, Anacletus a Grecian,
and native of Athens.

[137] Baillet in S. Bonav. Wadding, &c.

[138] Haymo, who had taught divinity at Paris, and been sent
by Gregory IX. nuncio to Constantinople, was employed
by the same pope in revising the Roman breviary and
its rubrics. He is not to be confounded with Haymo,
the disciple of Rabanus Maurus, afterward bishop of
Halberstadt, in the ninth age, whose Homilies, Comments
on the Scriptures, and Abridgment of Ecclesiastical
History are extant. His works are chiefly Centos,
compiled of scraps of fathers and other authors patched
and joined together; a manner of writing used by many
from the seventh to the twelfth age, but calculated to
propagate stupidity and dullness, and to contract, not
to enlarge or improve the genius, which is opened by
invention, elegance, and imitation; but fettered by
mechanical toils, as centos, acrostics, &c.

[139] Alexander of Hales, a native of Hales in
Gloucestershire, after having gone through the course
of his studies in England, went to Paris, and there
followed divinity and the canon law, and gained in them
an extraordinary reputation. He entered into the Order
of Friars Minors, and died at Paris in 1245. His works
discover a most subtle penetrating genius; of which the
principal is a Summ or Commentary upon the four Books
of the Master of the Sentences, written by order of
Innocent IV. and a Vumm of Virtues.

[140] Specul. Discipi. p. 1, c. 3.

[141] Gerson, Tr. De libris quos religiosi legere debent.

[142] Gerson, l. de Examine Doctrinar.

[143] See Du Pin, Biblioth. Cent. 13, p. 249, t. 14.

[144] Soliloqu. Exercit. 4, c. 1, 2.

[145] The psalter of the Blessed Virgin is falsely to scribed
to St. Bonaventure, and unworthy to bear his name. (see
Fabricius in Biblioth. med. ætat. Bellarmin and Labbe
de Script. Eccl. Nat. Alexander, Hist. Eccl. Sæc. 13.)
The Vatican edition of the works of St. Bonaventure was
begun by an order of Sixtus V. and completed in 1588.
It consists of eight volumes in folio. The two first
contain his commentaries on the holy scriptures: the
third his sermons and panegyrics: the fourth and fifth
his comments on the Master of the Sentences: the sixth,
seventh, and eighth, his lesser treatises, of which
some are doctrinal, others regard the duties of a
religious state, others general subjects of piety,
especially the mysteries of Christ and the Blessed
Virgin. Most of these have run through several separate
editions. All his works have been reprinted at Mentz
and Lyons; and in 4to. in fourteen volumes at Venice,
in 1751.

[146] B. Giles was a native of Assisio, and became the third
companion of St. Francis in 1209. He attended him
in the Marche of Ancona, and made a pilgrimage to
Jerusalem, whither he was sent by St. Francis to preach
to the Saracens; but upon their threats of raising a
persecution he was sent back to Italy by the Christians
of that country. He afterward lived some time at Rome,
some time at Reati, and some time at Fabriano; but the
chief part of the remainder of his life he spent at
Perugia, where he died in the night between the 22d
and the 23d of April, in the year 1272, not in 1262, as
Papebroke proves against the erroneous computation of
certain authors. (p. 220, t. 3, Apr.) Wading and others
relate many revelations, prophecies, and miracles of
this eminent servant of God; his tomb has been had in
public veneration at Perugia from the time of his death,
and he was for some time solemnly honored as a saint
in the church of his order in that city, as Papebroke
shows; who regrets that this devotion has been for
some time much abated, probably because not judged
sufficiently authorized by the holy see. The public
veneration at his tomb and the adjoining altar
continues, and the mass is sung, on account of his
ancient festival, with great solemnity, but of St.
George, without any solemn commemoration of this
servant of God. Nevertheless, from proofs of former
solemn veneration, Papebroke honors him with the title
of Blessed.

None among the first disciples of St. Francis seems to
have been more perfectly replenished with his spirit
of perfect charity, humility, meekness, and simplicity,
as appears from the golden maxims and lessons of piety
which he gave to others. Of these Papebroke has given
us a large and excellent collection from manuscripts:
some of which were before printed by Wading and others.
A few will suffice to show us his spirit.

B. Giles always lived by the labor of his hands. When
the cardinal bishop of Tusculum desired him always
to receive his bread as a poor man an alms, from his
table, B. Giles excused himself, using the words of the
psalmist: _Blessed art thou, and it shall be well with
thee, because thou shalt eat by the labor of thy hands._
Ps. cxxvii. “So brother Francis taught his brethren to
be faithful and diligent in laboring, and to take for
their wages not money, but necessary subsistence.”
(Papebroke, p. 224.) If any one discoursed with him
on the glory of God, the sweetness of his love, or
Paradise, he would be ravished in spirit, and remain so
great part of the day unmoved. Shepherds and children
who had learned this from others, sometimes for
diversion or out of curiosity, cried out after him,
Paradise, Paradise; upon hearing which, he through
joy fell into an ecstasy. His religious brethren in
conversing with him took care never to name the word
Paradise or Heaven for fear of losing his company by
his being ravished out of himself. (ib., p. 226, and
Wading.)

An extraordinary spiritual joy and cheerfulness
appeared always painted on his countenance; and if any
one spoke to him of God, he answered in great interior
jubilation of soul. Once returning to his brethren out
of close retirement, he praised God with wonderful joy
and fervor, and sung,--“Neither tongue can utter, nor
words express, nor mortal hearts conceive how great the
good is which God hath prepared for those who desire to
love him.”

Pope Gregory IX., who kept his court at Perugia from
1234 to autumn in 1236, sent one day for the holy man,
who, in answer to his holiness’s first question about
his state of life, said,--“I cheerfully take upon me
the yoke of the commandments of the Lord.” The pope
replied,--“Your answer is just; but your yoke is
sweet and your burthen light.” At these words B. Giles
withdrew a little from him, and, being ravished in
spirit, remained speechless and without motion till
very late in the night, to the great astonishment of
his holiness, who spoke of it to his cardinals and
others with great surprise.

This pope on a certain occasion pressed the holy man
to say something to him on his own duty; Giles after
having long endeavored to excuse himself said, “You
have two eyes, both a right and a left one, always
open; with the right eye you must contemplate the
things which are above you; and with the left eye you
must administer and dispense things which are below.”

On humility, the following maxims are recorded among
his sayings: “No man can attain to the knowledge of God
but by humility. The way to mount high is to descend;
for all dangers and all great falls which ever happened
in the world, were caused by pride, as is evident
in the angel in heaven, in Adam in Paradise, in the
Pharisee mentioned in the gospel; and all spiritual
advantages arose from humility, as we see in the
Blessed Virgin, the good thief, &c. Would to God some
great weight laid upon us obliged us always to hold
down our heads.” When a certain brother asked him;
“How can we fly this cursed pride?” he answered; “If we
consider the benefits of God, we must humble ourselves,
and bow down our heads. And if we consider our sins, we
must likewise humble ourselves, and bow down our heads.
Wo to him who seeks honor from his own confusion and
sin. The degrees of humility in a man are, that he know
that whatever is of his own growth is opposite to his
good. A branch of this humility is, that he give to
others what is theirs, and never appropriate to himself
what belongs to another; that is, that he ascribe to
God all his good and all advantages which he enjoys;
and acknowledge that all his evil is of his own growth.
Blessed is he who accounts himself as mean and base
before men as he is before God. Blessed is he who walks
faithfully in obedience to another. He who desires to
enjoy inward peace, must look upon every man as his
superior, and as better and greater before God. Blessed
is he who knows how to keep and conceal the favors
of God. Humility knows not how to speak, and patience
dares not speak, for fear of losing the crown of
suffering by complaints, in a firm conviction that a
person is always treated above his deserts. Humility
dispels all evil, is an enemy to all sin, and makes a
man nothing in his own eyes. By humility a man finds
grace before God, and peace with men. God bestows the
treasures of his grace on the humble, not on the proud.
A man ought always to fear from pride, lest it cast him
down headlong. Always fear and watch over yourself. A
man who deserves death, and who is in prison, how comes
it that he does not always tremble? A man is of himself
poverty and indigence; rich only by the divine gifts;
these then he must love, and despise himself. What is
greater than for a man to be sensible what he owes to
God, and to cover himself with confusion, self-reproach,
and self-reprehension for his own evils? I wish we
could have studied this lesson from the beginning of
the world to the end. How much do we stand indebted
to him who desires to deliver us from all evil, and to
confer upon us all good.” Against vain-glory he used to
say;--“If a person was sunk in extreme poverty, covered
all over with wounds, half-clad in tattered rags, and
without shoes; and men should come to him, and saluting
him with honor say: ‘All admire you, my lord; you are
wonderfully rich, handsome, and beautiful; and your
clothes are splendid and handsome;’ must not he have
lost his senses, who should be pleased with such a
compliment, or think himself such, knowing that he is
the very reverse?”

The servant of God was remarkable for his meekness and
charity, and he used to say, “We can appropriate to
ourselves our neighbor’s good, and make it also our own;
for the more a person rejoices at his neighbor’s good,
the more does he share in it. If therefore you desire
to share in the advantages of all others, rejoice more
for them all; and grieve for every one’s misfortunes.
This is the path of salvation, to rejoice in every
advantage and to grieve for every misfortune of
your neighbor; to see and acknowledge your evils and
miseries, and to believe only good of others; to honor
others, and despise yourself. We pray, fast, and labor;
yet lose all this if we do not bear injuries with
charity and patience. If we take so much pains to
attain to virtue, why do not we learn to do what is
so easy? you must bear the burdens of all, because
you have no just reason of complaint against any one,
seeing you deserve to be chastised and treated ill by
all creatures. You desire to escape reproaches and
condemnation in the next world, yet would be honored
in this. You refuse to labor or bear anything here, yet
desire to enjoy rest hereafter. Strive more earnestly
to vanquish your passions, and bear tribulations and
humiliations. It is necessary to overcome yourself,
whatever you do. It avails your soul little to draw
others to God unless you die to yourself.”

On prayer, which this servant of God made his constant
occupation and delight, he used to say,--“Prayer
is the beginning and the consummation of all good.
Every sinner must pray that God may make him know his
miseries and sins, and the divine benefits. He who
knows not how to pray, knows not God. All who are to
be saved, if they have attained the use of reason, must
set themselves to pray. Though a woman were ever so
bashful and simple, if she saw her only son taken from
her by the king’s orders for some crime, she would tear
her breasts, and implore his mercy. Her love and her
son’s extreme danger and miseries would make her never
want words to entreat him.”

The fruits and graces of perfect prayer he summed up
as follows: 1. “By it a man is enlightened in his
understanding. 2. He is strengthened in faith and in
the love of all good. 3. He learns to know and feel
his own miseries. 4. He is penetrated with holy fear,
is humble and contemptible in his own eyes. 5. His
heart is pierced with compunction. 6. Sweet tears
flow in abundance. 7. His heart is cleansed. 8. His
conscience purged. 9. He learns obedience. 10. Attains
to the perfect spirit of that virtue. 11. To spiritual
science. 12. To spiritual understanding. 13. Invincible
fortitude. 14. Patience. 15. Spiritual wisdom. 16. The
knowledge of God, who manifests himself to those who
adore him in spirit and truth. Hence love is kindled in
the soul, she runs in the odor of his sweet perfumes,
is drowned in the torrent of his sweetness, enjoys
perfect interior peace, and is brought to immortal
glory.”

[147] Vita B. Ægidii apud Papebroke, t. 3, Aprilis ad diem 23,
p. 236.

[148] Conc. t. 11, p. 237.

[149] The emperor Michael dying in 1283, his son Andronicus
renewed the schism, and restored the deposed patriarch
Joseph.

[150] Possevin. Apparatus sacer, t. 1, p. 245.

[151] Gerson calls St. Bonaventure both a cherub and a seraph,
because his writings both enlighten and inflame. His
order makes his doctrine the standard of their schools,
according to a decree of pope Pius V. To the works of
St. Bonaventure these divines add the double comments
of Scotius on Aristotle and the Master of the Sentences.

Peter Lombard, a native of Novara in Lombardy, was
recommended by St. Bernard (ep. 366) to Gilduin, first
abbot of the regular canons of St. Victor’s at Paris,
performed there his studies, professed that order, and
was one of those who, by an order of abbot Suger, king
Louis VII. and pope Eugenius III. in 1147, were sent
from St. Victor’s to St. Genevieve’s in place of the
secular canons. Eudes or Odo, one of this number, was
chosen first regular abbot of St. Genevieve’s, on whose
eminent virtues see the pious F. Gourdan, in his MS.
history of the eminent men of St. Victor’s, in 7 vols.
folio, t. 2, p. 281. Peter Lombard taught theology at
St. Genevieve’s, till in 1159 he was made bishop of
Paris. Gourdan, ib. t. 2, p. 79 and 80. He died, bishop
of that city, in 1164. He compiled a body of divinity,
collected from the writings of the fathers, into four
books, called Of the Sentences, from which he was
surnamed The Master of the Sentences. This work he is
said by some to have copied chiefly from the writings
of Blandinus his master, and others. (See James
Thomasius De Plagio literario, from sect. 493 to 502.)
Though it be not exempt from inaccuracies, the method
appeared so well adapted to the purposes of the
schoolmen that they followed the same and for their
lectures gave comments on these four books of the
Sentences. Among these, St. Thomas Aquinas stands
foremost. The divines of the Franciscan Order take
for their guides St. Bonaventure and John Duns Scotus.
This latter was born in Northumberland, and entered
young into the Order of St. Francis at Newcastle. He
performed his studies, and afterward taught divinity at
Oxford, where he wrote his Commentaries on the Master
of the Sentences, which were thence called his Oxonian
Commentaries. He was called to Paris about the year
1304, and in 1307 was appointed by his Order, Regent of
their theological schools in that University, where he
published his Reportata in Sententias, called his Paris
Commentaries, which are called by Dr. Cave a rough or
unfinished abstract of his Oxford Commentaries. For
the subtilty and quickness of his understanding, and
his penetrating genius, he was regarded as a prodigy.
Being sent by his Order to Cologne in 1308, he was
received by the whole city in procession, but died
on the 8th of November the same year, of an apoplexy,
being forty-three, or as others say, only thirty-four
years old. The fable of his being buried alive is
clearly confuted by Luke Wading, the learned Irish
Franciscan, who published his work, with notes,
in twelve tomes, printed at Lyons in 1636. Natalis
Alexander, a most impartial inquirer into this dispute,
and others, have also demonstrated that story to have
been a most groundless fiction. Wading, Colgan, &c.,
say that Duns Scotus was an Irishman, and born at Down
in Ulster. John Major, Dempster, and Trithemius say he
was a Scotchman, born at Duns, eight miles from England.
But Leland, Wharton, Cave, and Tanner, prove that
he was an Englishman and a native of Dunstone, by
contraction Duns, a village in Northumberland, in the
parish of Emildun, then belonging to Merton-hall in
Oxford, of which hall he was afterward a member. This
is attested in the end of several manuscript copies of
his Comments on the Sentences, written soon after the
time when he lived, and still shown at Oxford in the
colleges of Baliol and Merton. That he was a Scotchman
or an Irishman, no author seems to have asserted before
the sixteenth century, as Mr. Wharton observes. (See
Cave, t. 2, Append. p. 4. Wood, Athen. Oxon. Sir James
Ware de Script. Hibern. c. 10, p. 64. Tanner de Script.
Brit. V. Duns. Wading, in the life of Scotus, prefixed
to his works.)

William Ockham, a native of Surrey, also a Grey Friar,
a scholar of Duns Scotus at Paris, disagreeing from his
master in opinions, raised hot disputes in the schools,
and became the head or leader of the Nominals, a sect
among the schoolmen who in philosophy explain things
chiefly by the properties of terms; and maintain that
words, not things, are the object of dialectic, in
opposition to the others called Realists. Ockham
was provincial of his Order in England in 1322, and
according to Wood (Hist. et Ant. l. 2, p. 87) wrote
a book On the Poverty of Christ, and other treatises
against Pope John XXII., by whom he was excommunicated.
He became a warm abettor of the schism of Louis of
Bavaria, and his antipope, Peter Corbarius, and died
at Munich in 1347. He is said also to have favored
the heresy of the Fratricelli, introduced by certain
Grey Friars in the marquisate of Ancona, who made all
perfection to consist in a seeming poverty, rebelled
against the Church, and railed at the pope and the
other pastors. Flying into Germany, they were favored
by Louis of Bavaria, and in return supported his schism.
They at length rejected the sacraments as useless. Akin
to these were the Beguards and Beguines, an heretical
sect formed by several poor laymen and women, who, some
by an ill-governed devotion and a love of a lazy life,
others out of a spirit of libertinism, would needs
imitate the poverty of the Friars Mendicants, without
being tied to obedience, or living under superiors.
They at length fell into many extravagant errors, and
became a society of various notions and opinions, which
had nothing common but the hatred they bore to the pope
and other prelates, and the affectation of a voluntary
poverty, under which they covered an infinite number
of disorders and crimes. Such are the baneful fruits
of self-conceit.

[152] St. Bonav. Specul. Novit. p. 2, c. 2.

[153] Tit. de Aleatoribus tam in Digesto quam in Codice.

[154] See St. Bonav. in 4, dis. 14. St. Raymund. St. Antonin.
Comitolus, l. 3, 7, 9, p. 348, &c. Aristotle (l. 4,
Ethic. c. 1.) places gamesters in the same class with
highwaymen and plunderers. St. Bernardin of Sienna
(Serm. 33, Domin. 5, Quadrag. t. 4), says they are
worse then robbers, because more treacherous, and
covering their rapine under seducing glosses.

[155] Job ii. 4.

[156] On the methods of varying every day these acts, see
Polancus, De modo juvandi morientes; Joan. a S. Thoma.
Card. Bona. &c.

[157] Apoc. xii. 12.

[158] Cicat. l. 2, c. 1, p. 446.

[159] This observation of St. Camillus has been since
confirmed by many instances of persons who were found
to have been buried alive, or to have recovered long
after they had appeared to have been dead. Accounts of
several such examples are found in many modern medical
and philosophical memoirs of literature which have
appeared during this century, especially in France and
Germany; and experience evinces the case to have been
frequent. Boerhaave (Not. in Instit. Medic.) and some
other men whose names stand among the foremost in
the list of philosophers, have demonstrated by many
undoubted examples, that where the person is not dead,
an entire cessation of breathing and of the circulation
of the blood may happen for some time, by a total
obstruction in the organical movements of the springs
and fluids of the whole body, which obstruction
may sometimes be afterwards removed, and the vital
functions restored. Whence the soul is not to be
presumed to leave the body in the act of dying, but
at the moment in which some organ or part of the body
_absolutely_ essential to life is _irreparably_ decayed
or destroyed. Nor can any certain mark be given
that a person is dead till some evident symptom of
putrefaction commenced appears sensible.

Duran and some other eminent surgeons in France, in
memorials addressed, some to the French king, others to
the public, complain that two customs call for redress,
first, that of burying multitudes in the churches, by
which experience shows that the air is often extremely
infected; the second is that of which we speak. To
prevent the danger of this latter, these authors insist
that no corpse should be allowed to be buried, or
its face close covered, before some certain proof of
putrefaction, for which they assign as usually one of
the first marks, if the lower jaw being stirred does
not restore itself, the spring of the muscles being
lost by putrefaction. See Doctor Bruhier, Mémoire
présenté au Roi, sur la Nécessité d’un Règlement
Général au Sujet des Enterments et Embaumements, in
1745; also Dissertation sur l’Incertitude des Signes
de la Mort, in 1749, 2 vols. in 12mo.; and Dr. Louis,
Lettres sur la Certitude des Signes de la Mort, contre
Bruhier, in 1752, in 12mo.

The Romans usually kept the bodies of the dead eight
days, and practised a ceremony of often calling upon
them by their names, of which certain traces remain in
many places from the old ceremonial for the burial of
kings and princes. Servabantur cadavera octo diebus,
et calida abluebantur, et post ultimam conclamationem
abluebantur. Servius in Virgilii Æneidon, l. 8,
ver. 2, 8. The corpse was washed whilst warm, and again
after the last call addressed to the deceased person,
which was the close of the ceremony before the corpse
was burnt or interred; and to be deprived of it was
esteemed a great misfortune. Corpora nondum conclamata
jacent, Lucan. l. 2, ver. 22. Jam defletus et
conclamatus es. Apuleius, l. 1, Metam. et l. 11, ib.
Desine, jam conclamatum est. Terent. Eunuch. 2, 3,
ver. 56. St. Zeno of Verona, describing a wife who
immoderately laments her deceased husband, says:
Cadaver amplectitur conclamatum. St. Zeno, l. 1,
Trac. 16, p. 126, nov. ed. Veron. This ceremony,
trivial in itself, was of importance to ascertain
publicly the death of the person.

[160] The empire of the West, which had been extinguished
in Augustulus, was restored in the year 800, in the
person of Charlemagne, king of France, who extended
his conquests into part of Spain, almost all Italy, all
Flanders and Germany, and part of Hungary. The imperial
crown continued some time in the different branches of
his family, sometimes in France, sometimes in Germany,
and sometimes in both united under the same monarch.
Louis IV. the eighth hereditary emperor of the Franks,
was a weak prince, and died in the twentieth year of
his age, in 912, without leaving any issue. These
emperors, in imitation of the Lombards, had created
several petty sovereigns in their states, who grew
very powerful. These princes declared that by the death
of Louis IV. the imperial dignity was devolved on the
Germanic people; and excluding Charles the Simple, king
of France, the next heir in blood of the Carlovingian
race, elected Conrad I. duke of Franconi: and after him
Henry I. surnamed the Fowler, duke of Saxony, who was
succeeded by three Othos of the same family of Saxony.
After St. Henry II. several emperors (the following
Henries, and two Frederics in particular) were of the
Franconian family. Rodolph I. of the house of Austria
was chosen in 1273. There have been four dukes of
Bavaria emperors, five of the house of Luxemburg,
three of the old Bohemian royal house, &c. But in 1438,
Albert II. duke of Austria and marquis of Moravia, was
raised to that supreme dignity, which from that time
has remained chiefly in that family. The ancient ducal
house of Saxony was descended from Wittekind the Great,
the last elected king of the Saxons, who afterwards
sustained a long obstinate war against Pepin and
Charlemagne, submitted to the latter, and being
baptized by St. Lullus in 785, was created by
Charlemagne, first duke of Saxony. St. Henry II. was
the fifth Emperor of the Saxon race, descended from
Wittekind the Great.

[161] On the authenticity of this diploma of Henry II. and
also of those of Pepin, Charlemagne, and Otho I. see
the Dissertation of the Abbé Cenni, entitled, Esame de
Diploma d’Ottone è S. Arrigo, printed at Rome in 1754.

That the see of Rome was possessed of great riches,
even during the rage of the first persecutions, is
clear from the acts of universal charity performed
by the popes, mentioned by St. Dionysius of Corinth,
and after the persecutions by St. Basil and St. John
Climacus. From the reign of Constantine the Great, many
large possessions were bestowed on the popes for the
service of the Church. Conni (Esame di Diploma di
Ludovico Pio) shows in detail from St. Gregory the
Great’s epistles, that the Roman see, in his time,
enjoyed very large estates, with a very ample civil
jurisdiction, and a power of punishing delinquents in
them by deputy judges, in Sicily, Calabria, Apulia,
Campania, Ravenna, Sabina, Dalmatia, Illyricum,
Sardinia, Corsica, Liguria, the Alpes Cottiæ, and a
small estate in Gaul. Some of these estates comprised
several bishoprics, as appears from St. Gregory, l. 7,
ep. 39, Indict. ii.

The Alpes Cottiæ that belonged to the popes included
Genoa and the sea-coast from that town to the Alps,
the boundaries of Gaul, as Thomassin (l. 1, de Discipl.
Eccl. c. 27, n. 17.) takes notice, and as Baronius (ad
an. 712, p. 9.) proves from the testimony of Oldradus,
bishop of Milan. And Paul the deacon writes, that
the Lombards seized the Alpes Cottiæ, which were the
estates of the Roman see. “Patrimonium Alpium Cottiarum
quæ quondam ad jus pertinuerant apostolicæ sedis,
sed a Longobardis multo tempore fuerant ablatæ.” (Paul.
Diac. l. 6, c. 43.) Father Cajetan, in his Isagoge ad
Historiam Siculam, points out at length the different
estates which the Roman see formerly possessed in
Sicily. The popes were charged with a great share of
the care of the city and civil government of Rome. St.
Gregory the Great mentions that it was part of their
duty to provide that the city was supplied with corn,
(l. 5, ep. 40, alias l. 4, ep. 31, ad Maurit.) and that
he was obliged to watch against the stratagems of the
enemies, and the treachery of the Roman generals and
governors. (l. 5, ep. 42, alias l. 4, ep. 35.) And
he appointed Constantius a tribune to be governor of
Naples. (l. 2, ep. 11, alias ep. 7.) Anastasius the
Librarian testifies that the popes Sisinnius and
Gregory II. both repaired the walls of Rome and put
the city in a posture of defence.

From these and other facts Thomassin observes that the
popes had then the chief administration of the city
of Rome and of the exarchate, made treaties of peace,
averted wars, defended and recovered cities, and
repulsed the enemies. (Thomass. da Benefic. 3, part.
l. 1, c. 29, n. 6.) When the Lombards ravaged and
conquered the country, the emperors continued to
oppress the people with exorbitant taxes, yet being
busy at home against the Saracens, refused to protect
the Romans against the barbarians. Whereupon the people
of Italy, in the time of Gregory II. in 715, chose
themselves in many places leaders and princes, though
that pope exhorted them every where to remain in their
obedience and fidelity to the empire, as Anastasius the
Librarian assures us: “Ne desisterent ab amore et fide
Romani imperii admonebat.”

Leo the Isaurian, and his son Constantine Copronymus
persecuted the Catholics; yet Zachary and Stephen II.
paid them all due obedience and respect in matters
relating to the civil government. Leo threatened to
destroy the holy images and profane the relics of the
apostles at Rome. At which news the people of Rome were
not to be restrained, but having before received with
honor the images of that emperor, according to custom,
they, in a fit of sudden fury, pulled them down.
Pope Stephen II. exhorted the emperor to forbear such
sacrileges and persecutions, and at the same time
gave him to understand the danger of exasperating the
populace, though he did what in him lay to prevent
by entreaties both the profanations threatened by
the emperor, and also the revolt of the people: “Tunc
projecta laureata tua conculcarunt--Aisque: Romam
mittam, et imaginem S. Petri confringam.--Quòd si
quospiam miseris, protestamur, tibi, innocentes sumus
a sanguine quem fusuri sunt.” On the sacrileges and
cruelties exercised by the Iconoclasts in the East, see
the Bollandists, August ix. To prevent the like at Rome,
some of the Greek historians say that pope Gregory II.
withdrew himself and all Italy from the obedience of
the emperor. But Theophanes and the other Greeks were
in this particular certainly mistaken, as Thomassin
takes notice. And Natalis Alexander says: (Diss. 1,
sæc. 8.) “This most learned pope was not ignorant
of the tradition of the fathers from which he never
deviated. For the fathers always taught that subjects
are bound to obey their princes, though infidels or
heretics, in those things which belong to the rights
of the commonwealth.”

The case was, that when the emperors refused to protect
Italy from the barbarians, the popes in the name of
the people, who looked upon them as their fathers and
guardians, and as the head of the commonwealth, sought
protection from the French, as Thomassin observes
(p. 3, de Benef. l. 1, c. 29.) The continuator of
Fredegarius seems to say, that Gregory III. and the
Roman people created Charles Martel Patrician of Rome,
by which title was meant the protection of the Church
and poor, as De Marca (De Concordiâ, l. 3, c. 11,
n. 6.) and Pagi explain it from Paul the deacon. At
last pope Stephen II. going into France to invite Pepin
into Italy, conferred on him the title of Patrician,
but had not recourse to this expedient till the Eastern
empire had absolutely abandoned Italy to the swords of
the Lombards. Pope Zachary made a peace with Luitprand,
king of the Lombards, and afterward a truce with king
Rachis for twenty years. But that prince putting on the
Benedictin habit, his brother and successor Astulphus
broke the treaty. Stephen II. who succeeded Zachary in
752, sent great presents to Astulphus, begging he would
give peace to the exarchate; but could not be heard, as
Anastasius testifies. Whereupon Stephen went to Paris,
and implored the protection of king Pepin, who sent
ambassadors into Lombardy, requiring that Astulphus
would restore what he had taken from the church of
Rome, and repair the damages he had done the Romans.
Astulphus refusing to comply with these conditions,
Pepin led an army into Italy, defeated the Lombards,
and besieged, and took Astulphus in Pavia; but
generously restored him his kingdom on condition he
should live in amity with the pope. But immediately
after Pepin’s departure he perfidiously took up arms,
and in revenge put every thing to fire and sword in the
territories of Rome. This obliged Pepin to return into
Italy, and Astulphus was again beaten and made prisoner
in Pavia. Pepin once more restored him his kingdom, but
threatened him with death if he ever again took up arms
against the pope; and he took from him the exarchate of
Ravenna, of which the Lombard had made himself master,
and he gave it to the holy see in 755, as Eginhard
relates: “Redditam sibi Ravennam et Pentapolim, et
omnem exarchatum ad Ravennam pertinentem, ad S. Petrum
tradidit.” Eginhard, ib. Thomassin observes very justly
that Pepin could not give away dominions which belonged
to the emperors of Constantinople; but that they had
lost all right to them after they had suffered them to
be conquered by the Lombards, without sending succors
during so many years to defend and protect them. These
countries therefore either by the right of conquest
in a just war belonged to Pepin and Charlemagne, who
bestowed them on the popes; or the people became free,
and being abandoned to barbarians had a right to form
themselves into a new government. See Thomassin (p. 3,
de Beneficiis, l. 1, c. 29, n. 9).

It is a principle laid down by Puffendorf, Grotius,
Fontanini, and others, demonstrated by the unanimous
consent of all ancients and moderns, and founded upon
the law of nations, that he who conquers a country in
a just war, nowise untaken for the former possessors,
nor in alliance with them, is not bound to restore
to them what they would not or could not protect and
defend: “Illud extra controversiam est, si jus gentium
respiciamus, quæ hostibus per nos erepta sunt, ea
non posse vindicari ab his qui ante hostes nostros
ea possederant et amiserant.” (Grotius, l. 3, de Jure
belli et pacis, c. 6, 38.) The Greeks had by their
sloth lost the exarchate of Ravenna. If Pepin had
conquered the Goths in Italy, or the Vandals in Africa
before Justinian had recovered those dominions, who
will pretend that he would have been obliged to restore
them to the emperors? Or, if the Britons had repulsed
the Saxons after the Romans had abandoned them to their
fury, might they not have declared themselves a free
people? Or, had not the popes and the Roman people
a right, when the Greeks refused them protection, to
seek it from others? They had long in vain demanded
it of the emperors of Constantinople, before they had
recourse to the French. Thus Anastasius testifies that
pope Stephen II. had often in vain implored the succors
of Leo against Astulphus. “Ut juxta quod ei sæpius
scripserat, cum exercitu ad tuendas has Italiæ partes
modis omnibus adveniret.” The same Anastasius relates,
that when the ambassadors of the Greek emperor demanded
of Pepin the restitution of the countries he had
conquered from the Lombards, that prince answered,
that as he had exposed himself to the dangers of war
merely for the protection of St. Peter’s see, not in
favor of any other person, he never would suffer the
apostolic Church to be deprived of what he had bestowed
on it. Pepin gave to the holy see the city of Rome
and its Campagna; also the exarchate of Ravenna and
Pentapolis, comprising Rimini, Pesaro, Fano, Senigallia,
Ancona, Gubbio, &c. He retained the office of protector
and defender of the Roman church under the title of
Patrician. When Desiderius, king of the Lombards, again
ravaged the lands of the church of Rome, Charlemagne
marched into Italy, defeated his forces, and after a
long siege took Pavia, and extinguished the kingdom
of the Lombards in 773, on which occasion he caused
himself to be crowned king of Italy, with an iron crown,
such as the Goths and Lombards in that country had used,
perhaps as an emblem of strength. Charlemagne confirmed
to pope Adrian I. at Rome, the donation of his father
Pepin. The emperor Charles the Bald and others ratified
and extended the same. Charlemagne having been crowned
emperor of the West at Rome, by pope Leo III. in
800, Irene, who was then empress of Constantinople,
acknowledged him Augustus in 802; as did her successor
the emperor Nicephorus III. The Greeks at the same time
ratified the partition made of the Italian dominions.
This point of history has been so much misrepresented
by some moderns, that this note seemed necessary in
order to set it in a true light. See Cenni’s Monumenta
Dominationis Pontificiæ, in 4to. Romæ, 1760. Also
Orsi’s Dissertation on this subject; Cenni’s Esame di
Diploma, &c. and Jos. Assemani, Hist. Ital. Scriptores,
t. 3, c. 5.

[162] In the partition of the empire between Charlemagne and
Irene, empress of Constantinople, Apulia and Calabria
were assigned to the Eastern empire, and the rest of
Naples to Charlemagne and his successors. Long before
this, in the unhappy reign of the Monothelite emperor
Constans, about the year 660, the Saracens began to
infest Sicily, and soon after became masters of that
island, and also of Calabria and some other parts of
Italy. Otho I. surnamed the Great, drove them out of
Italy, and laid claim to Calabria and Apulia by right
of conquest. The Greeks soon after yielded up their
pretensions to those provinces by the marriage of
Otho II. to Theophania, daughter of Romanus, emperor of
the East, who brought him Apulia and Calabria for her
dowry. Yet the treacherous Greeks joined the Saracens
in those provinces, and again expelled the Germans. But
in 1008, Tancred, a noble Norman, lord of Hauteville,
with his twelve sons, and a gallant army of adventurers,
went from Normandy into Apulia, and had great success
against the Saracens and their confederates the Greeks.
From this time the Normans became dukes of Calabria,
and counts and dukes of Apulia. Robert Guiscard, the
most valiant Norman duke of Apulia, augmented his power
by the conquest of Sicily, Naples, and all the lands
which lie between that city and Latium or the territory
of Rome. In 1130, Roger the Norman was saluted by the
pope, king of both Sicilies.

[163] This Robert loved the Church, and was a wise,
courageous, and learned prince. He wrote sacred hymns,
and among others that which begins “O Constantia
Martyrum;” also, as some say the “Veni Sancte
Spiritus, Et emitte cœlitus” &c., sung in the mass
for Whitsuntide.

[164] At the entry of the cloister of St. Vanne at Verdun,
is hung a picture in which the emperor Saint Henry is
represented laying down his sceptre and crown, and
asking the monastic habit of the holy abbot Richard.
The abbot required of him a promise of obedience, then
commanded him to resume the government of the empire,
upon which a distich was made, in which it is said:
The emperor came hither to live in obedience; and he
practises this lesson by ruling.

[165] Baronius and some others call St. Henry the first
emperor of that name, because Henry I. or the Fowler,
was never crowned by the pope at Rome; without which
ceremony some Italians style an emperor only king of
Germany or emperor elect; though Charles V. was the
last that was so crowned at Rome. St. Henry on his
death-bed recommended to the princes Conrad the Salic,
duke of Franconia, who was accordingly chosen emperor,
was crowned at Rome in 1027, reigned with great piety
and glory, and was buried in the cathedral church at
Spire, which he had built near his own palace. He was
succeeded by his son Henry the Black or III.

[166] S. Fulgent, ep. 6.

[167] N. 11, p. 69.

[168] Critic. Hist. Chron. ad an. 734, n. 4.

[169] Our saint’s colleague St. Wiro (in Irish Bearaidhe) is
honored on the 8th of May. By the Four Masters he is
styled abbot of Dublin; but with the Irish annalists,
bishop and abbot are generally synonymous terms. He
died in 650. See Ware.

St. Plechelm’s other fellow-missionary, St. Otger,
is honored on the 10th of September; he is always
styled deacon, by which it appears that he was never
promoted to the priesthood. From his name and other
circumstances it is thought he was an English-Saxon,
though from the North, probably the southern parts
of Scotland anciently subject to the kings of the
Northumbers. Being desirous to accompany SS. Wiro and
Plechelm to Rome, and in their apostolic missions into
Germany, when Pepin gave the Mount of St. Peter or
of St. Odilia to St. Wiro, the three saints settled
there together and ended their days in that monastery.
Whether St. Otger outlived St. Plechelm is uncertain.
All three were buried in the monastery of Berg, or
of Mount St. Peter or St. Odilia; and their bodies
remained there till, in 858, that monastery was given
by king Lothaire to Hunger, bishop of Utrecht, when the
greatest part of these relics was translated to Utrecht.
Part still remained in the church of Berg, till with
the chapter of canons it was removed to Ruremund. These
relics were hid some time in the civil wars for fear
of the Calvinists, but discovered in 1594, and placed
again above the high altar. The portion at Utrecht
was also hid for a time for fear of the Normans; but
found and exposed to public veneration again by bishop
Baldric. See the life of Saint Otger, with notes by
Bollandus, and the additional disquisitions of Stilting
ad 10 Sept., t. 2, p. 612.

[170] The barbarians who inhabited the northern coasts of
the Baltic were called by one general name Normans;
and the Sclavi, Vandals, and divers other nations were
settled on the southern coast, as Eginhard, Helmold,
and others testify.

[171] The authorities produced by Tho. Rudburn, a monk of
the Old Monastery in Winchester, in 1450, to prove
St. Swithin to have been some time public professor
of divinity at Cambridge, are generally esteemed
suppositions. See Rudburn, l. 3, c. 2, Hist. Maj.
Wintoniensis, apud Wharton, Anglia Sacra, and the
History of the University of Cambridge.

[172] Hearne, Teat. Roffens, p. 269.

[173] See Ingulph. Asser. Redborne.

[174] The value of a mancuse is not known; it is thought to
have been about the same with that of a mark.

[175] Caslen and B. Nicholson falsely call this the life of
St. Swithin, and it appears from Leland that Lantfred
never wrote his life, which himself sufficiently
declares in the history of his miracles. The contrary
seems a mistake in Pits, Bale, and Thomas Rudburn,
p. 223. Rudburn manifestly confounds Wolstan with
Lantfred.

[176] Hist. Major Winton. p. 223. Vita metrice S. Swithuni
per Wolstanum monachum Winton. ib. 2.

[177] At the east end of this cathedral is the place which
in ancient times was esteemed most sacred, underneath
which was the cemetery or resting-place of many saints
and kings who were interred there with great honor.
At present behind the high altar there is a transverse
wall, against which we see the marks where several of
their statues, being very small, were placed with their
names under each pedestal in a row; “Kinglisus Rex. S.
Birinus Ep. Kingwald Rex. Egbertus R. Adulphus (_i. e._
Ethelwolphus) R. Elured R. filius ejus. Edwardus R.
junior Adhelstanus R. filius ejus (Sta. Maria D. Jesus
in the middle). Edredus R. Edgarus R. Alwynus Ep.
Ethelred R. Cnutus R. Hardecanutus R. filius ejus,” &c.
Underneath, upon a fillet were written these verses:

“Corpora Sanctorum hic sunt in pace sepulta;
Ex Meritis quorum fulgent miracula multa.”

At the foot of these, a little eastwards, is a large
flat grave-stone, which had the effigies of a bishop
in brass, said to be that of St. Swithin. See Lord
Clarendon, and Samuel Gale, On the Antiquities of
Winchester, p. 29, 30.

[178] Hist. Arian. ad Monachos, p. 346.

[179] Conc. Nicæn. Can. 15.

[180] That prelate had been educated at Cæsarea, where he
studied with St. Pamphilus the martyr, whose name he
afterward added to his own. He suffered imprisonment
with him for the faith about the year 309, but
recovered his liberty without undergoing any severer
trial, and was chosen archbishop of Cæsarea in 314.
When Arius, in 320, retired from Alexandria into
Palestine, having been deposed from the priesthood
by St. Alexander the year before, Eusebius of Cæsarea
and some other bishops were imposed upon by him,
and received him favorably. Hereupon Arius wrote to
Eusebius of Nicomedia, whom he calls brother to the
other Eusebius of Cæsarea. Eusebius of Nicomedia was
at that time of an advanced age, and had great interest
with Constantine, who after the defeat of Licinius kept
his court some time at Nicomedia as other emperors had
done before him since Dioclesian had begun to reside
in the East. This prelate was crafty and ambitious;
his removal, procured by his intrigues, from his
first see of Berytus to Nicomedia seems to have given
occasion to the canon of the Nicene council, by which
such translations were forbidden. Notwithstanding
which, in defiance of so sacred a law, he afterwards
procured himself to be again translated to the see
of Constantinople, in 338, in the beginning of the
reign of Constantius. The Council of Sardica, in 347,
confirmed the above-mentioned Nicene canon under pain
of the parties being deprived even of lay communion
at their death; but this arch-heretic died in 342.
He openly defended not only the person, but also the
errors of Arius; subscribed the definitions of the
Nicene council for fear of banishment: but three months
after, being the author of new tumults, he was banished
by Constantine, and after three years recalled, upon
giving a confession of faith in which he declared
himself penitent, and professed that he adhered to
the Nicene faith, as Theodoret relates. By this act
of dissimulation he imposed upon the emperor, but he
continued by every base art to support his heresy, and
endeavored to subvert the truth. Eusebius of Cæsarea
held that see from 314 till his death in 339. He was
always closely linked with the ringleaders of the
heresy. Nevertheless, the learned Henry Valois, in
his Prolegomena to his translation of this author’s
Ecclesiastical History, pretends to excuse him from
its errors, though he often boggled at the word
Consubstantial. He certainly was so far imposed upon by
Arius, as to believe that heretic admitted the eternity
of the Divine Word; and in his writings many passages
occur which prove the divinity, and, as to the sense,
the consubstantiality of the Son, whatever difficulties
he formed as to the word. On which account Ceillier
and many others affect to speak favorably, or at least
tenderly of Eusebius in this respect, and are willing
to believe that he did not at least constantly adhere
to that capital error. Yet it appears very difficult
entirely to clear him from it, though he may seem to
have attempted to steer a course between the tradition
of the Church and the novelties of his friends. See
Baronius ad an. 380, Witasse Nat. Alexander, and the
late Treatise in folio, against the Arian heresy,
complied by a Maurist Benedictin monk. Photius, in a
certain work given us by Montfaucon (in Bibl. Coisliana,
p. 358), roundly charges Eusebius with Arianism and
Origenism.

Eusebius, whose conduct was so unconstant and equivocal,
shines to most advantage in his works, especially those
which he composed in defence of Christianity before
the Arian contest arose. The first of these is his
book against Hierocles, who, under Dioclesian, was a
prosecuting judge at Nicomedia, and afterward rewarded
for his cruelty against the Christians with the
government of Egypt. In a book he wrote he made
Apollonius Tyanæus superior to Christ. But Eusebius
demonstrates the history of this magician, written
by Philostratus, when he taught rhetoric at Rome, one
hundred years after the death of that magician, to be
false and contradictory in most of its points, doubtful
in others, and trifling in all. About the time he was
made bishop he conceived a design of two works, which
showed as much the greatness of his genius, as the
execution did the extent of his knowledge. The first
of these he called The Preparation, the other The
Demonstration of the Gospel. In the first he, with
great erudition, confutes idolatry, in fifteen books,
showing that the Greeks borrowed the sciences and many
of their gods from the Egyptians, whose true history
agrees with that of Moses; but the fictions of their
theology are monstrous, impious, and condemned by their
own learned men; that their oracles, which were only
a chain of impostures and frauds, or the responses of
devils, never attained to any infallible knowledge of
contingencies, and were silenced by a power which they
acknowledged superior. He also shows the Unity of God,
and the truth of his revealed religion as ancient as
the world. In his Demonstration of the Gospel, in ten
books, he shows that the Jewish law in every point
clearly points out Christ and the gospel. These books
of Evangelical Preparation and Demonstration furnish
more proofs, testimonies and arguments for the truth
of the Christian religion than any other work of the
ancients on that subject.

Eusebius’s two books against Marcellus of Ancyra, and
three On Ecclesiastical Theology, are a confutation
of Sabellianism. His topography or alphabetical
explication of the places mentioned in the Old
Testament, is most exact and useful. It was translated
into Latin, and augmented by St. Jerom. Eusebius’s
useful comments on the Psalms were published by
Montfaucon (Collect. Nova Script. Græc. Paris, 1706).
His fourteen Discourses, or Opuscula, published by
F. Sirmond (Op. Sirmond, t. 1), are esteemed genuine,
though not mentioned by the ancients. His discourse
on the Dedication of the Church at Tyre, rebuilt after
the persecution in 315, contains a curious description
of that ceremony and of the structure. By his letter
to his Church of Cæsarea, after the conclusion of
the council of Nice, he recommended to his flock the
definitions and creed of that assembly. His panegyric
of Constantine was delivered at Constantinople in
presence of that prince, who then celebrated the
thirtieth year of his reign by public games. The
praises are chiefly drawn from the destruction of
idolatry; but study reigns in this composition more
than nature, and renders the discourse tedious, though
the author took some pains to polish the style. His
four books of the life of Constantine were written in
338, the year after that emperor’s death. The style
is diffusive, and the more disagreeable by being more
labored. Phocius reproaches the author for dissembling
or suppressing the chief circumstances relating to
Arius, and his condemnation in the council of Nice.

The Chronicle of Eusebius was a work of immense
labor, in two parts; the first, called his Chronology,
contained the distinct successions of the kings and
rulers of the principal nations from the beginning of
the world; the second part, called the Chronicle or the
Rule of Times, may be called the table of the first,
and unites all the particular chronologies of different
nations in one. The second part was translated into
Latin, and augmented by St. Jerom. The first part
was lost when Joseph Scaliger gathered the scattered
fragments from George Syncellus, Cedrenus, and the
Alexandrian chronicle; but Scaliger ought to have
pointed out his sources; and has inserted many things
which certainly belong not to Eusebius.

Our author’s name has been rendered most famous by his
ten books of Church History, which he brings down to
the defeat of Licinius, in 323, when he first wrote it,
though he revised it again in 326. He collected the
Acts of the martyrs of Palestine, an abstract of which
he added to the eighth book of his History. Rufinus
elegantly translated this work into Latin, reduced to
nine books, to which he added two others, wherein he
brings down his history to the death of Theodosius.
Eusebius copied very much Julius Africanus in his
chronicle; and in his History, St. Hegesippos (who had
compiled a History from Christ to 170) and others. This
invaluable work is not exempt from some mistakes and
capital omissions; nor was the author much acquainted
with the affairs of the Western Church. See Ceillier,
t. 4, p. 258, &c. Christophorson, bishop of Chichester,
elegantly translated this History into Latin, but
changed the manner of dividing the chapters. The
translation of the learned Henry Valesius is most
accurate. Eusebius was one of the most learned prelates
of antiquity, and a man of universal reading; but he
did not much study to polish his discourses, which is
the common fault of those that make learning and
knowledge their chief business.

[181] Theodoret, l. 1, c. 20, 21. S. Hier., l. 3, in Rufin.,
&c.

[182] Eus., l. 4, de Vit. Constant., c. 61, p. 518.

[183] Sozom., l. 2, c. 19, p. 469.

[184] See Tillemont, Ceillier, Cave, Hist. Littér., p. 187,
t. 1, and Solier, the Bollandist, Hist. Patr. Ant.
c. 24, p. 36.

[185] Theodoret, l. 1, c. 20. Theodorus Lector, l. 2, c. 1,
p. 547. Theophanes, p. 114. See Tillem, note 4, p. 653.

[186] St. Jerom (ep. 126, p. 38) calls St. Eustathius a
loud sounding trumpet, and says he was the first who
employed his pen against the Arians. The same father
admires the extent of his knowledge, saying that it
was consummate both in sacred and profane learning
(ep. 84, p. 327). His just praises are set forth by
St. Chrysostom in an entire panegyric; and Sozomen
assures us (l. 1, c. 2) that he was universally admired
both for the sanctity of his life, and the eloquence
of his discourses. The elegant works which he composed
against the Arians were famous in the fifth century,
but have not reached us. But we have still his Treatise
on the Pythonissa or Witch of Endor, published by Leo
Allatius, with a curious Dissertation, and reprinted in
the eighth tome of the Critici Sacri. In it the author
undertakes to prove against Origen that this witch
neither did nor could call up the soul of Samuel,
but only a spectre or devil representing Samuel, in
order to deceive Saul. He clearly teaches that before
the coming of Christ the souls of the just rested
in Abraham’s bosom; and that none could enter heaven
before Christ had opened it; but that Christians enjoy
an advantage above the patriarchs and prophets, in
being united with Christ immediately after their death
if they have lived well. This treatise is well written,
and justifies the commendations which the ancients
give to this great prelate and eloquent orator. Sozomen
justly calls his writings admirable, as well for the
purity of his style as for the sublimity of thought,
the beauty of the expression, or the curious choice
of the matter. Nothing more enhances his virtue, than
the invincible constancy and patience with which he
suffered the most reproachful accusation with which
his enemies charged him, and the unjust deposition and
banishment which were inflicted on him.

[187] Gr. 22, p. 548.

[188] “Qui sunt libri quos adoratis, legentes? Speratus
respondit: Quatuor evangelia Domini nostri Jesu Christi,
et epistolas S. Pauli apostoli, et omnem divinitus
inspiratam scripturam.” Acta apud Ruinart, p. 78, et
Baron. ad an. 202.

[189] “Consummati sunt Christi martyres mense Julio, et
intercedunt pro nobis ad Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum,
cui honor et gloria cum Patre et Spiritu Sancto in
sæcula sæculorum.” Acta apud Baronium, ad an. 202.

[190] Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus is commonly
known by the last name. His father was a centurion in
the proconsular troops of Africa, and he was born at
Carthage about the year 160. He confesses that before
his conversion to the Christian faith he, in his merry
fits, pointed his keenest satire against it (Apol.,
c. 18), had been an adulterer (De Resur. c. 59), had
taken a cruel pleasure in the bloody entertainments
of the amphitheatre (De Spectac. c. 19), attained to
a distinguishing eminency in vice (De Pœnit. c. 4),
“Ego præstantiam in delictis meam agnosco,” and was
an accomplished sinner in all respects, (ib. c. 12.
“Peccator omnium notarum cum sim,”) yet having his
head marvellously well turned for science, he applied
himself from his cradle to the study of every branch of
good literature, poetry, philosophy, geometry, physic,
and oratory; he dived into the principles of each
sect, and both into the fabulous and into the real or
historical part of mythology. His comprehensive genius
led him through the whole circle of profane sciences;
above the rest, as Eusebius tells us, he was profoundly
versed in the Roman laws. He had a surprising vivacity
and keenness of wit, and an uncommon stock of natural
fire which rendered him exceeding hot and impatient,
as himself complains (l. de Patient. in init.) His
other passions he restrained after his conversion to
Christianity; but this vehemence of temper he seems
never to have sufficiently checked. The motives which
engaged him to embrace the gospel seem those upon
which he most triumphantly insists in his works; as the
antiquity of the Mosaic writings, the mighty works and
wisdom of the divine lawgiver, the continued chain of
prophecy and wonders conducting the attentive inquirer
to Christ, the evidence of the miracles of Christ and
his apostles, the excellency of the law of the gospel,
and its amazing influence upon the lives of men;
the power which every Christian then exercised over
evil spirits, and the testimony of the very devils
themselves whom the infidels worshipped for gods, and
who turned preachers of Christ, howling, and confessing
themselves devils in the presence of their own votaries,
(Apol. c. 19, 20, 23, &c. &c.) also the constancy and
patience of the martyrs (l. ad Scapul. c. ult.) &c.

Being by his lively and comprehensive genius
excellently formed for controversy, he immediately
set himself to write in defence of religion, which was
then attacked by the Heathens and Jews on one side,
and on the other corrupted by heretics. He successfully
employed his pen against all these enemies to truth,
and first against the Pagans. The persecution which
began to rage gave occasion to his Apologetic, which
is not only his masterpiece, but indisputably one of
the best among all the works of Christian antiquity.
This piece was not addressed to the Roman senate,
as Baronius and several others thought, but to the
proconsul and other magistrates of Africa, and perhaps
to all the governors of provinces and magistrates
of the empire, among whom he might also comprise the
Roman senators; for the title of Presidents only,
agreed to these provincial governors, and he names the
proconsuls; (ch. 45) speaks of Rome as at a distance:
(c. 9, 21, 24, 35, 45) says they practised at home (at
Carthage), the bloody religious rites of the Scythians;
(c. 9) and by those words, “in ipso fere vertice
civitatis præsidentes,” he seems to mean the _Byrsa_
of Carthage; certainly not Rome, which he always calls
_Urbs_, not _civitas_.

In the first part of this work he clears Christians
from the calumnies of incest and murder thrown upon
them, and demonstrates the injustice of punishing
them merely for a name, and exposes the absurdity
of Trajan’s order commanding them to be punished if
impeached, yet not to be sought after. He mentions
that Tiberius, and after his miraculous victory, Marcus
Aurelius, were favorable to the Christian religion.
He then proceeds to confute idolatry; asks, if Bacchus
was made a god for planting vines, why did not Lucullus
attain to the same honor, because he first brought
cherry-trees from Pontus to Rome? Why Aristides the
Just, Socrates, Crœsus, Demosthenes, and so many others
who had been most eminent, were not admitted to share
divine honors with Jupiter, Venus, &c.? He explains
the chief articles of our faith, and speaking of the
origin and false worship of the demons he inserts
the most daring challenge, which Saint Cyprian (ep.
ad Demetrianum), Lactantius (De Just. l. 5, c. 21)
and other primitive fathers repeat with the same
assurance,--“Let a demoniac be brought into court,”
says Tertullian, “and the evil spirit that possesses
him be commanded by any Christian to declare what he is,
he shall confess himself as truly to be a devil as he
did falsely before declare himself a god. In like manner
let them bring any of those who are thought to be
inspired by some god, as Æsculapius, &c. If all these
do not declare themselves in court to be devils, not
daring to lie to a Christian, do you instantly put that
rash Christian to death.”

The apologist mentions the submission of Christians to
the emperors, their love of their enemies, and their
mutual charity, horror of all vice, and constancy in
suffering death and all manner of torments for the
sake of virtue. The heathens called them in derision
Sarmentitians and Semaxians, because they were fastened
to trunks of trees, and stuck about with faggots to
be set on fire. But Tertullian answers them: “Thus
dressed about with fire, we are in our most illustrious
apparel. These are our triumphal robes embroidered
with palm-branches in token of victory (such the Roman
generals wore in their solemn triumphs), and mounted
upon the pile we look upon ourselves as in our
triumphal chariot. Who ever looked well into our
religion but he came over to it? and who ever came over
to it but was ready to suffer for it? We thank you for
condemning us, because there is such a blessed discord
between the divine and human judgment, that when you
condemn us upon earth, God absolveth us in heaven.”

Tertullian wrote about the same time his two books
Against the Gentiles, in the first confuting their
slanders, in the second attacking their false gods.
An accidental disputation of a Christian with a Jewish
proselyte engaged him to show the triumph of the
faith over that obstinate race, who seemed deaf to all
arguments. His book Against the Jews is just, solid,
and well supported, a model of theological controversy,
which wants but a little clearness of diction to be a
very finished piece. Hermogenes, a Stoic philosopher,
and a Christian, broached a new heresy in Africa,
teaching matter to be eternal. Tertullian shows it to
have been created by God with the world, and unravels
the sophistry of that heresiarch in its book Against
Hermogenes. That Against the Valentinians is rather a
satire and raillery, than a serious confutation of the
extravagant sentiments of those heretics. His excellent
book Of Prescription against Heretics was certainly
written before his fall; for in it he lays great stress
on his communion with all the apostolic churches,
especially that of Rome, and confutes by general
principles all heresies that can arise.

His design in this little treatise is to show, that
the appeal to scripture is very unjust in heretics,
who have no claim or title to the scriptures. These
were carefully committed in trust by the apostles
to their successors, and he proves, that to whom the
scriptures were intrusted, to them also was committed
the interpretation of scripture. He promises that
heresies are the very pest and destruction of faith,
but no just cause of scandal or wonder, any more than
fevers which consume the human body; for they were
predicted by Christ, and the necessary consequence
of criminal passions. He says, as if it had been to
anticipate or remove the offence which he afterward
gave by his fall: “What if a bishop, a deacon, a widow,
a virgin, a teacher, or even a martyr, shall fall from
the faith;--Do we judge of the faith by the persons or
of persons by their faith? No man is wise who holds not
the faith.” (c. 3.) He says: “We have no need of a nice
inquiry after we have found Christ, or of any curious
search after we have learned the gospel. If we believe
we desire nothing further than to be believers.”
(c. 7.) He adds, some heretics inculcate as a good
reason for eternal scruple and searching, that it is
written: _Seek and ye shall find_. But he takes notice
those words only belonged to those Jews who had not yet
found Christ, and cannot mean, that we must for ever
seek on. But if we are to seek, it must not be from
heretics who are estranged from the truth, who have
no power to instruct, no inclination but to destroy,
and whose very light is darkness. Christ laid down a
rule of faith, about which there can be no cavils,
no disputes but what are raised by heretics; and an
obstinate opposition to this rule is what constitutes
a heretic.

He inveighs against too curious searches in faith, as
the source of heresies. Then coming close to the point,
he will not have heretics admitted to dispute about the
scriptures, to which they have no claim; and in such a
scriptural disputation, the victory is precarious and
very liable to uncertainty. All then is to be resolved
into what the apostles have taught; which apostolical
tradition is the demonstration of the truth, and the
confutation of all error and heretical innovation. Our
perfect agreement, and general consent and harmony with
the apostolic churches which live in the unity of the
same faith, is the most convincing proof of the truth,
against which no just objection can possibly be formed.
(c. 21, 22.) He urges that Marcion, Apelles, Valentinus,
and Hermogenes were of too modern a date, and proved
by their separation and pretended claim of what was
ancient, that the Church was before them; they ought
therefore to say, that Christ came down again from
heaven and taught again upon earth, before they can
commence apostles. “But,” says he, “if any of these
heretics have the confidence to put in their claim
to apostolic antiquity, let them show us the original
of their churches, the order and succession of their
bishops, so as to ascend up to an apostle,” &c. He is
for having the heretics prove their mission by miracles,
like the apostles. (c. 35.) He writes: “To these men
the Church might thus fitly address herself: Who are
ye? When, and from whence came ye? What do ye in my
pastures, who are none of mine? By what authority do
you, Marcion, break in upon my enclosures? Whence,
O Apelles, is your power to remove my land-marks?
This field is mine of right, why then do you at your
pleasure sow and feed therein? It is my possession; I
held it in times past; I first had it in my hands; my
title to it is firm and indisputable, and derived from
those persons whose it was, and to whom it properly
belonged; I am the heir of the apostles; as they
provided in their testament, as they committed and
delivered to my trust, as they charged and ordered me,
so I hold.” (c. 37.) He takes notice that in the Pagan
superstitions the devil had imitated many ceremonies
both of the Jewish and Christian religion; and
that heretics in like manner were bad copies of the
true Church. (c. 40.) He appeals to the manners and
conversation of the heretics which are vain, earthly,
without weight, without discipline, in every respect
suitable to the faith they profess. (c. 41, 43.) “I
am very much mistaken,” says he, “if they are governed
by any rules, even of their own making, since every
one models and adopts the doctrine he has received
according to his fancy, as the first founder framed
them to his, and to serve his own turn. The progress of
every heresy was formed upon the footsteps of its first
introducers; and the same liberty that was assumed
by Valentinus and Marcion, was generally made use of
by their followers. If you search into all sorts of
heresies, you will find that they differ in many things
from the first authors of their own sect. They have few
of them in any Church; but without mother, without see,
without the faith, they wander up and down like exiled
men, entirely devoid of house and home.” (c. 42.)

Among his other works, the most useful is the book On
Penance, the best polished of all his writings; in the
first part, he treats of repentance at baptism; in the
second, on that for sins committed after baptism. He
teaches here that the Church hath power to remit even
fornication, which he denied when a Montanist. He
insists much on the laborious exercises of this penance
after baptism.

A book On Prayer, explaining in the first part the
Lord’s Prayer; in the second, several ceremonies often
used at prayer. An exhortation to Patience, in which
the motives are displayed with great eloquence. An
exhortation to Martyrdom, than which nothing can be
more pathetic.

He wrote a book On Baptism, proving in the first part,
its obligation and necessity; in the second, treating
on several points of discipline relating to that
sacrament.

As to his other works, in his first book to his Wife,
written probably before he was priest (see Ceillier,
p. 375, and 391), he exhorts her not to marry again,
if she should survive him; and mentions several in the
Church living in perpetual continency. In the second,
he allows second marriages lawful, but if the woman be
determined to engage a second time in the married state,
insists that it is unlawful to marry an infidel. He
alleges the impossibility of rising to prayer at night,
giving suitable alms, visiting the martyrs, &c. with
a pagan husband: “Can you conceal yourself from him,”
says he, “when you make the sign of the cross upon your
bed or your body?--Will he not know what you receive
in secret, before you take any food?” that is, the
eucharist, (l. 2, c. 5.) He concludes with an amiable
description of a Christian holy marriage: “The Church,”
saith he, “approves the contract, the oblation ratifies
it, the blessing is the seal of it, and the angels
carry it to the heavenly Father who confirms it. Two
bear together the same yoke, and are but one flesh, and
one mind: they pray together, fast together, mutually
exhort each other, go together to the church, and
to the table of the Lord. They conceal nothing from
each other, visit the sick, collect alms without
restraint, assist at the offices of the Church without
interruption, sing psalms and hymns together, and
encourage each other to praise God.”

In his treatise On the Shows, he represents them as
occasions of idolatry, impurity, vanity, and other
vices, and mentions a woman who, going to the theatre,
returned back possessed with a devil: when the exorcist
reproached the evil spirit for daring to attack one of
the faithful, it boldly answered: “I found her in my
own house.” In his book On Idolatry, he determines
many cases of conscience, relating to idolatry, as
that it is not lawful to make idols, &c., but he says,
a Christian servant may attend his master to a temple:
any friend may assist at an idolater’s marriage, &c.
In two books On the Ornaments or Dress of Women, he
zealously recommends modesty in attire, and condemns
their use of paint. In that On veiling Virgins, he
undertakes to prove that young women ought to cover
their faces at church, contrary to the custom of his
country, where only married women were veiled. In that
On the Testimony of the Soul, he proves that there is
only one God from the natural testimony of every one’s
soul. In his Scorpiace, written against the poison
of the Scorpions, that is, Gnostics, especially a
branch of those heretics named Cainites, he proves
the necessity of martyrdom, which they denied. In his
Exhortation to Chastity, he dissuades a certain widow
from a second marriage, which he allows to be lawful,
though hardly so; and the harshness of his expressions
show that he then leaned toward Montanism.

Tertullian was a priest, and continued in the Church
till the middle of his life, that is, to forty or
upwards, when he miserably fell. Montanus, an eunuch
in Phrygia, set up for a prophet, and was wonderfully
agitated by an evil spirit, and pretended to raptures
in which he lost his senses, and spoke incoherently,
not like St. Quadratus and other true prophets. He
was joined by Prisca, or Priscilla, and Maximilla,
two women of quality, and rich, but of most debauched
lives. These had the like pretended raptures, and many
were deceived by them. Montanus, about the year 171,
pretended that he had received the Holy Ghost to
complete the law of the gospel, and was called by
his followers the Paraclete. Affecting a severity of
doctrine, to which his manners did not correspond, he
condemned second marriages, and flight in persecution,
and ordered extraordinary fasts. The Montanists said
that, beside the fast of Lent observed by the Catholics,
there were other fasts imposed by the Divine Spirit.
They kept three Lents in the year, each of two weeks,
and upon dry meats, as necessary injunctions of the
Spirit by the new revelations made to Montanus, which
they preferred to the writings of the apostles; and
they said these laws were to be observed for ever.
(See Tert. de Jejun. c. 15, also St. Jerom, ep. 54,
ad Marcellam, et in Aggæ, c. 1), which is the reason
why the Montanists, even in the time of Sozomen, kept
their Antepaschal fast confined to two weeks, which the
Catholics at that time certainly observed of forty days.
For, as bishop Hooper (of Lent, p. 65), remarks, those
great fasters would hardly have been left behind, had
they not been restrained by the pretended institution
of the Spirit, to which they punctually kept; and
this circumstance rendered these facts superstitious.
Pepuzium, a town in Phrygia, was the metropolis of
these heretics, who called it Jerusalem. The bishops
of Asia having examined their prophecies and errors,
condemned them. It is said, that Montanus and Maximilla
going mad, hanged themselves. See Eusebius.

Tertullian’s harsh, severe disposition fell in with
this rigidness. His vehement temper was for no medium
in any thing; and failing first by pride, he resented
some affronts which he imagined he had received from
the clergy of Rome, as Saint Jerom testifies; and in
this passion deserted the Church, forgetting the maxims
by which he had confuted all heresies. Solomon’s fall
did not prejudice his former inspired writings. Nor
does the misfortune of Tertullian destroy at least the
justness of the reasoning in what he had written in
defence of the truth, any more than if a man lost his
senses, this unlucky accident could annul what he had
formerly done for the advancement of learning.

Tertullian is the most ancient of all ecclesiastical
writers among the Latins. St. Vincent of Lerins, who is
far from shading the blemishes of this great man, says,
“He was among the Latins what Origen was among the
Greeks--that is, the first man of his age. Every word
seems a sentence, and almost every sentence a new
victory. Yet with all these advantages, he did not
continue in the ancient and universal faith. His error,
as the blessed confessor Hilary observes, has taken
away that authority from his writings which they
would have otherwise deserved.” St. Jerom in his book
against Helvidius, when his authority was objected,
coolly answered, “That he is not of the Church,”
“Ecclesiæ hominem non esse.” Yet he sometimes speaks
advantageously of his learning. Lactantius calls his
style uncouth, rugged, and dark, but admires his depth
of sense; and he who breaks the shell will not repent
his pains for the kernel. Balsac ingeniously compares
his eloquence to ebony, which is bright and pleasing
in its black light. The great master of eloquence,
St. Cyprian, found such hidden stores under his dark
language, that he is reported never to have passed a
day without reading him; and when he called for his
book, he used to say, “Give me my master.”

We find this once great man, who expressed in his
Apologetic (cap. 39) the most just and fearful
apprehension of excommunication, which he there called,
The anticipation of the future judgment, afterward
proud, arrogant, and at open defiance with the censures
of the Church. And this great genius seems even to lose
common sense when he writes in favor of his errors and
enthusiasm, as when, upon the authority of the dreams
of Priscilla and Maximilla, he seriously disputes on
the shape and color of a human soul, &c. He lived to a
very advanced age, and leaving the Montanists, became
the author of a new sect called from him Tertullianists,
who had a church at Carthage till St. Austin’s time,
when they were all reconciled to the Catholic faith.
Tertullian died towards the year 245.

The works which he wrote after his fall are, a book
On the Soul, pretending it to have a human figure, &c.
Another On the Flesh of Christ, proving that he took
upon him human flesh in reality, not in appearance
only. One on the Resurrection of the Flesh, proving
that great mystery. Five books Against Marcion, who
maintained that there were two principles or gods, the
one good the other evil; that the latter was worshipped
by the Jews, and was author of their law; but that the
good god sent Christ to destroy his works. Against this
heresiarch, Tertullian proves the unity of God, and
the sanctity of the Old Law and Testament. In his book
Against Praxeas he proves excellently the Trinity of
Persons, and uses the very word Trinity (c. 2), but
he impiously condemns Praxeas, because coming from the
East to Rome he had informed pope Victor of the errors
and hypocrisy of Montanus; on which account he says,
he had banished the Paraclete (Montanus) and crucified
the Father. “Paracletum fugavit, Patrem crucifixit,”
(c. 1.) For Praxeas, puffed up with the title of
confessor, broached the heresy of the Patripassians,
confounding the three Persons, and pretending that
the Father in the Son became man, and was crucified
for us. His apology for the Philosophers’ Cloak, which
he continued to wear rather than the Toga, for its
conveniency, and as an emblem of a severer life, seems
only writ to display his wit. His apology to Scapula,
proconsul of Africa in 211, is an exhortation to put a
stop to the persecution, alleging that “a Christian is
no man’s enemy, much less the emperor’s.” In his book
On Monogamy he maintains against the Psychici (so he
calls the Catholics) that second marriages are unlawful,
which was one point of his heresy. One of his arguments
is, the duty of a widow always to pray for the soul of
her deceased husband. (c. 10.)

He writ his book on Fasts, to defend the extraordinary
fasts commanded by the Montanists; but shows that
certain obligatory fasts were observed by the Catholics,
as that before Easter, since called Lent, in which
they fasted every day till vespers or evening-service:
that those of Wednesday and Friday till three o’clock,
called stations, were devotional. Some added to these
Xerophagia or the use only of dried meats, abstaining
from all vinous and juicy fruits; and some confined
themselves to bread and water. The Montanists kept
three Lents a year, and other fasts always till night,
and with the Xerophagia.

Tertullian wrote also his book On Chastity, against the
Catholics, because they gave absolution to penitents
who had been guilty of adultery or fornication. For the
Montanists denied that the Church could pardon sins of
impurity, murder, or idolatry. In this book he mentions
twice, that on the sacred chalices was painted the
image of the good shepherd bringing home the lost sheep
on his shoulders. Scoffing at a decree made by the
bishop of Rome at that time, he writes, “I am informed
that they have made a decree, and even a peremptory one;
the chief priest, that is, the bishop of bishops, saith;
I remit the sins of adultery and fornication to those
who have done penance.” (c. 1.) He calls him apostolic
bishop, c. 19, and blessed pope, c. 13, ib. His book
On the Crown was written in 235, the first year of
Maximinus, to defend the action of a Christian soldier
who refused to put on his head a garland, like the rest,
when he went to receive a donative. Tertullian says
these garlands were reputed sacred to some false god or
other. He alleges that by tradition alone we practise
many things, as the ceremonies used at baptism, yearly
oblations (or sacrifices) for the dead, and for the
festivals of martyrs, standing at prayer on the Lord’s
day, and from Easter to Whitsuntide, and the sign of
the cross “which we make,” says he, “upon our foreheads
at every action, and in all our motions at coming in or
going out of doors, in dressing or bathing ourselves;
when we are at table or in bed; when we sit down or
light a lamp, or whatever else we do.” (De Corona, c. 3
and 4.) His book On Flight, was written about the same
time to pretend to prove against the Catholics that it
is a crime to fly in time of persecution.

The most correct edition of Tertullian’s works is that
of Rigaltius, even that of Pamelius being ill pointed,
and abounding with faults; though Rigaltius’s notes on
this and some other fathers want much amendment.

[191] Tert. l. ad Scapul. c. 3.

[192] L. 7, Ep. 8.

[193] Euchar.

[194] Ennod. l. 8, Ep. 24, ad Faust.

[195] Magisteriani were officers under the Magister
Officiorum, who held one of the first dignities in
the imperial court, and had a superintendency over the
Palatines, inferior officers of the court, the schools
or academies of the court, and certain governors. See
Du Cange, Glossar.

[196] This ceremony was much more ancient. Alcuin and
Amalarius ascribe its institution to pope Zosimus; but
others make it of older date. At Rome the archdeacon on
Holy Saturday blessed wax mingled with oil, particles
of which having a figure of a lamb formed upon them
were distributed among the people. Hence was derived
the custom of Agnus Deis made of wax sometimes mixed
with relics of martyrs, which the popes blessed in
a solemn manner. See Saint Gregory of Tours, de Vit.
Patr. c. 8. The Rom. Order, Alcuin, Sirmond, Not. In
Ennod., &c.

[197] That a pretended woman called Joan interrupted
the series of the succession between Leo IV. and
Bennet III., is a most notorious forgery. Lupus
Ferrariensis, ep. 103, to Bennet III. Ado in his
Chronicle, Rhegino in his Chronicle, the annals of
St. Bertin, Hincmar ep. 26, pope Nicholas I. the
successor of Bennet III. ep. 46, even the calumniators
of the holy see, Photius l. De Process. Spir. Sti. and
Metrophanes of Smyrna, l. de Divinitate Spiritus Sancti,
who all lived at that very time, expressly testify,
that Bennet III. succeeded immediately Leo IV. Whence
Blondel, a violent Calvinist, has by an express
dissertation demonstrated the falsity of this fable.
Marianus Scotus, at Mentz, wrote two hundred years
after, in 1083, a chronicle in which mention is first
made of this fiction; from whence it was inserted in
the chronicle of Martinus Polonus, a Dominican, in 1277,
though it is wanting in the true MS. copy kept in the
Vatican library, as Leo Allatius assures us, and in
other old MS. copies, as Burnet (Nouvelles de la Rep.
des Lettres, Mars, 1687), Casleu (Catal. Bibl. reg.
Londin, p. 102), &c., testify. Lambecius, the most
learned keeper of the imperial library at Vienna,
in his excellent catalogue of that library, vol. ii.
p. 860, has demonstrated this of the oldest and best
manuscript copies of this chronicle; also of Marianus
Scotus. Her name was foisted into Sigebert’s Chronicle,
written in 1112; for it is not found in the original MS.
copy at Gemblours, authentically published by Miræus.
Platina, and the other late copies of Martinus Polonus
and Sigebert, borrow it from the first forger in the
copy of Marianus Scotus, probably falsified; certainly
of no authority and inconsistent; for there it is said
that she sat two years five months, and that she had
studied at Athens, where no schools remained long
before this time.

As to the porphyry stool shown in a repository
belonging to the Lateran church, which is said to have
been made use of on account of this fable, it is an
idle dream. There were two such stools; one is now
shown to travellers. It is certainly of old Roman
antiquity, finely polished, and might perhaps be used
at the baths or at some superstitious ceremonies.
The art of cutting or working in porphyry marble
was certainly lost long before the ninth age, and not
restored before the time of Cosmus the Great of Medicis;
this work is still exceeding slow and expensive. On
this idle fable see Lambecius, Blondel, Leo Allatius,
Nat. Alexander, Boerhave, &c.

[198] The emperor Adrian, nobly born at Italica, near Seville,
in Spain, was cousin-german to Trajan; and having been
adopted by him, upon his death ascended the imperial
throne in 117. He was extremely inquisitive, and fond
of whatever was surprising or singular, well skilled
in all curious arts, mathematics, judiciary astrology,
physic, and music. But this, says Lord Bacon, was an
error in his mind, that he desired to comprehend all
things, yet neglected the most useful branches of
knowledge. He was light and fickle; and so monstrous
was his vanity, that he caused all to be slain who
pretended in any art or science to rival him; and
it was accounted great prudence in a certain person
that he would not dispute his best with him, alleging
afterward that it was reasonable to yield to him
who commanded thirty legions. The beginning of this
prince’s reign was bloody; yet he is commended in it
for two things: the first is mentioned by Spartian,
that when he came to the empire he laid aside all
former enmities, and forgot past injuries: insomuch
that, being made emperor, he said to one who had been
his capital enemy: “Thou hast now escaped.” The other
is, that, when a woman cried to him as he was passing
by: “Hear me, Cæsar;” and he answered, “I have not
leisure.” The woman replied: “Then cease to reign.”
“Noli ergo imperare.” Whereupon he stopped and heard
her complaint.

[199] St. Paulin. ep. 11. ad Sever.

[200] St. Hieron. ep. 13. ad Paul.

[201] Adrian became more cruel than ever towards the end
of his life, and without any just cause put to death
several persons of distinction. At last he fell sick
of a dropsy at his house at Tibur. Finding that no
medicines gave him any relief, he grew most impatient
and fretful under his lingering illness, and wished
for death, often asking for poison or a sword, which
no one would give him, though he offered them money
and impunity. His physician slew himself that he might
not be compelled to give him poison. A slave named
Mastor, a barbarian noted for his strength and boldness,
whom the emperor had employed in hunting, was, partly
by threats, partly by promises, prevailed upon to
undertake it; but instead of complying, was seized with
fear, and durst not strike him, and fled. The unhappy
tyrant lamented day and night, that death refused to
obey and deliver him who had caused the death of so
many others. He at length hastened his death by eating
and drinking things contrary to his health in his
distemper, and expired with these words in his month,
“The multitude of physicians hath killed the emperor.”
“Turba medicorum Cæsarem perdidit.” (See Dio et
Spartian in Adr.) He died in 138, being sixty-two
years old, and having reigned twenty-one years.

[202] _A sette Frate_, in the villa of Mafiei, nine miles
from Rome. See Aringhi, Roma Subter. l. 3, c. 14.

[203] Ado, Usuard; Mart. Rom. cum notis Baronii et Lubin.

[204] The best editions of St. Philastrius’s book De
Hæresibus, are that printed in Hamburg in 1721, by the
care of Fabricius, who has illustrated it with notes;
and that procured by Cardinal Quirini at Brescia in
1738 together with the works of St. Gaudentius.

[205] St. Aug. Pref. l. de hæres.

[206] Utrecht was an archbishopric in the time of St.
Willibrord, but from his death remained a bishopric
subject first to Mentz, afterward to Cologne, till,
in the reign of Philip II. Paul IV. in 1559, restored
the archbishoprics of Utrecht and Cambray, and erected
Mechlin a third with the dignity of primate. To Utrecht
he subjected the new bishoprics of Haerlem, Middleburg,
Deventer, Lewarden, and Groeningen; to Mechlin, those
of Antwerp, Ghent, Bruges, Ipres, Bois-le-Duc and
Ruremond; to Cambray, those of Arras and Tournay,
with two new ones, St. Omer and Namur.

[207] He also gave him Austrasia, great part of which from
that age has been called Lorrain, either from this
Lothaire or rather his younger son of the same name,
whom he left king of that country.

[208] Louis left to her the management of all affairs, made
her elder brother Rodolph Guelph, governor of Bavaria,
and her younger brother, Conrad, governor of Italy,
and destined the best part of the kingdoms of Germany
and France to Charles _the Bald_, the son which she
bore him; to which dominions the sons by the first
wife thought they had a prior claim. They, by an
unjustifiable breach of their duty, twice took up arms
against their father; first in 830, when the empress
Judith was banished to a nunnery in Gascony, and the
emperor imprisoned; but he was soon released by the
Germans, and recalled Judith and her two brothers. In
the second rebellion, in 833, Lothaire, the eldest son,
banished Judith to Verona in Italy, and shut up her
son Charles in the abbey of Pruim, near Triers, and the
weak emperor himself in the abbey of St. Medard’s at
Soissons, after he had in an assembly of the states at
Compeigne, basely confessed himself justly deposed from
the empire, and guilty of the crimes which were laid
to his charge. He was afterward sent to the abbey of
St. Denys near Paris, and there clothed with the habit
of a monk; but soon after delivered by his two younger
sons, Pepin and Louis, and restored to his throne.
Judith after all these disturbances so dexterously
managed him that, at his death in 840, he left to her
son Charles the monarchy of France.

[209] P. 204.

[210] L. 1, de gestis Pontif. Angl. p. 197.

[211] Hist. Episcop. Ultraj.

[212] Chron.

[213] Ubbo Emmius, Rerum Frisic. l. 3, p. 74.

[214] The works of St. Bruno of Segni, or of Asti, with a
preliminary dissertation of Dom. Maur Marchesi were
printed at Venice in 1651, in two vols. folio, and in
the Bibl. Patr. at Lyons in 1677, t. 20. They consist
of comments on several parts of scripture, one hundred
and forty-five sermons, several dogmatical treatises,
and letters; and a life of St. Leo IX. and another
of St. Peter, bishop of Anagnia, whom Paschal II.
canonized. This latter the Bollandists have published
on the 3d of April.

[215] Collet, t. 1, b. 1, p. 66, 71.

[216] This book of Jansenius was condemned by Urban VIII.
in 1641, and in 1653 Innocent X. censured five
propositions to which the errors contained in this
book were principally reduced. Alexander VII. in 1656
confirmed these decrees, and in 1665 approved the
formulary proposed by the French clergy for the manner
of receiving and subscribing them. Paschasius Quenel,
a French oratorian, published in 1671 his book of
Moral Reflections on the Gospels, which he afterward
augmented, and added like reflections on the rest of
the New Testament, which work he printed complete in
1693 and 1694. In it he craftily insinuated the errors
of Jansenius, and a contempt of the censures of the
Church. Clement XI. condemned this book, in 1708; and
in 1713 by the Constitution Unigenitus, censured one
hundred and one propositions extracted out of it. These
decrees were all received and promulgated by the clergy
of France, and registered in the parliament of that
kingdom that they might receive the force of a law of
the state; and they are adopted by the whole Catholic
Church, as cardinal Bissy, Languet, and other French
prelates have clearly demonstrated.

The Jansenian heresy is downright Predestinationism,
than which no doctrine can be imagined more monstrous
and absurd. The principal errors couched in the
doctrine of Jansenists are, that God sometimes refuses,
even to the just, sufficient grace to comply with his
precepts; that the grace which God affords man since
the fall of Adam, is such that if concupiscence be
stronger, it cannot produce its effect; but if the
grace be more powerful than the opposite concupiscence
in the soul, or relatively to it victorious by a
_necessitating_ influence, that then it cannot be
resisted, rejected, or hindered; and that Christ
by his death paid indeed a price sufficient for the
redemption of all men, and offered it to purchase some
weak insufficient graces for reprobate souls, but not
to procure them means truly applicable, and sufficient
for their salvation; which is really to confine the
death of Christ to the elect, and to deprive the
reprobate of sufficient means to attain to salvation.
The main-spring or hinge of this system is that the
grace which inclines man’s will to supernatural virtue,
since the fall of Adam, consists in a moral pleasurable
motion or a delectation infused into the soul inclining
her to virtue, as concupiscence carries her to vice;
and that the power of delectation, whether of virtue
or vice, which is stronger, draws the will by an
inevitable necessity as it were by its own weight.

The equivocations by which some advocates for these
erroneous principles have endeavored to disguise or
soften their harshness, only discover their fear of the
light. A certain modern philosopher is more daring who,
in spite not only of revelation, which he disclaims,
but also of reason and experience, openly denies all
free-will or election in human actions, pretending to
apply this system of a two-fold delectation to every
natural operation of the will. (See Hume’s Essay on
Free-Will.) Those who obstinately oppose the decrees
of the Church in these disputes, without adopting any
heretical principle condemned as such by the Church,
but found their unjust exceptions in some points of
discipline, or any other weak pretences, cannot be
charged with heresy: nevertheless, only invincible
ignorance can exempt them from the guilt of
disobedience though they should not proceed to a
schismatical separation in communion.

[217] See F. Honoré Addit. sur les Observ. p. 241, &c.
Languet ep. Pastor, &c.

[218] Honoré, ibid. p. 245, 253, &c.

[219] See Collet’s life of St. Vincent, l. 3, t. 1, p. 260,
and Abelly, l. 2, ch. 12.

[220] L. 9.

[221] This consists in a prolapse both of the gut and the
omentum or caul together.

[222] T. 2, p. 546.

[223] “Fuge, tace, quiesce; hæc sunt principia salutis,”
Rosweide, Cotelier, et Saint Theod. Stud. Vit. S.
Arcen., c. 1, n. 7.

[224] A small Egyptian measure of vegetables made of
palm-tree leaves, as the word implies. See Cotelier,
Mon. Gr. t. 4, not. p. 748, and Du Cange, Gloss. Græc.
v. θάλλιν.

[225] St. Chrys. l. de Virginit. t. 1, p. 321, ed. Ben.

[226] St. Aug. in Ps. 128.

[227] St. John Clim. Grad. 7, p. 427.

[228] Gr. 27, n. 65.

[229] Conc. t. 4, p. 1286.

[230] Ennod. Apol. p. 342, ed. Sirmond. Item, l. 1, ep. 5.
Cassidor. in Chron. et Anast. in Pontific.

[231] Conc. t. 4, p. 1287.

[232] Ib. p. 1223.

[233] Dial. l. 4, c. 40. See Baron. ad an. 498, et Benedict
XIV. l. de Canoniz. Sanctor.

[234] T. 15, ch. 23, p. 352, Vie de Paschase.

[235] Symmach. Apol. t. 4, Conc. p. 1298.

[236] Ib. p. 1301.

[237] Act. i. 20.

[238] Hom. 3, in Act.

[239] Eus. Hist. l. 3, c. 39.

[240] L. 2, de Prædest.

[241] John Cassian, priest and abbot of the great monastery
of St. Victor’s at Marseilles, was a native of Lesser
Scythia, then comprised under Thrace. He inured himself
from his youth to the exercises of an ascetic life in
the monastery of Bethlehem. The great reputation of
many holy anchorets in the deserts of Egypt induced
him and one Germanus, about the year 390, to pay them
a visit. Being much edified with the great examples of
virtue they saw in those solitudes, especially in the
wilderness of Sceté, they spent there and in Thebais
several years. They lived like the monks of that
country, went bare-foot, and so meanly clad that their
friends would have been ashamed to meet them, and they
gained their subsistence by their work, as all the rest
did. (Col. 4, c. 10.) Their life was most austere,
and they scarce ate two loaves a day each of six
ounces. (Col. 19, c. 17.) In 403 they both went to
Constantinople, where they listened to the spiritual
instructions of St. Chrysostom, who ordained Cassian
deacon, and employed him in his church. After the
banishment of that holy prelate, Cassian and Germanus
travelled to Rome with letters from the clergy of
Constantinople to defend their injured pastor as
Palladius informs us. Cassian was promoted to the order
of priesthood in the West, and retiring to Marseilles,
there founded two monasteries, one for men, and another
for virgins, and wrote his spiritual Conferences and
other works. He died in odor of sanctity soon after
the year 433. His very ancient picture is shown in St.
Victor’s at Marseilles, where his head and right arm
are exposed in shrines on the altar, by the permission
of pope Urban V., the remainder of his body lies in a
marble tomb which is shown in a subterraneous chapel.
That abbey, by a special grant, celebrates an office
in his honor on the 23d of July.

His works consist, first of a book On the Incarnation,
against Nestorius, written at the request of St. Leo,
then archdeacon of Rome. Secondly, Of Institutions of a
Monastical Life, in twelve books. In the four first he
describes the habit that was worn, and the exercises
and way of living that were followed by the monks of
Egypt, to serve as a pattern for the monastic state in
the West. He says, their habit was mean, merely serving
to cover their nakedness; having short sleeves which
reached no further than their elbows; they wore a
girdle and a cowl upon their heads, but used no shoes,
only a kind of sandals which they put off when they
approached the altar; and they all used a walking-staff,
as an emblem that they were pilgrims on earth. He
observes that the monks forsook all things, labored
with their hands, and lived in obedience; he describes
the canonical hours of the divine office consisting of
psalms and lessons. He mentions that whoever desires to
be admitted into a monastery, must give proofs of his
patience, humility, and contempt of the world, and be
tried with denials and affronts; that no postulant was
allowed to give his estate to the monastery in which he
settled; that the first lesson which is taught a monk
is, to subdue his passions, to deny his own will, and
to practise blind obedience to his superior. Thus he is
to empty himself of all prevalence in his own abilities,
learning, or whatever can feed any secret pride or
presumption. Cassian observes, that young monks were
allowed no other food than boiled herbs, with a little
salt; but that the extraordinary austerities of the
Oriental monks in eating are not practicable in the
west. In the eight last books of this work he treats
of eight capital vices, prescribing the remedies and
motives against them, and explaining the contrary
virtues. He shows (l. 6, Inst. c. 5, 6), that chastity
is a virtue which is not to be obtained but by a
special grace of God; which must be implored by earnest
prayer, seconded by watchfulness and fasting. He
everywhere advises moderate fasts, but continual,
(l. 5, p. 107, &c.). He observes (l. 11, c. 4), that
vain-glory is the last vice that is subdued, and that
it takes occasion even from the victory itself to
renew its assaults. This seems the best and most
useful of Cassian’s writings, though the reading of
his Conferences has been strongly recommended to monks
by St. Bennet, St. John Climacus, St. Gregory, St.
Dominic, St. Thomas, and others.

In the book of his Conferences he has collected the
spiritual maxims of the wisest and most experienced
monks with whom he had conversed in Egypt. This
work consists of three parts; the first contains
ten Conferences, and was written in 423; the second
comprises seven Conferences, and was compiled two years
later; the third was finished in 428, and contains
seven other Conferences. Cassian, in this work, teaches
that the end to which a monk consecrates all his labors
and for which he has renounced the world, is, the more
easily to attain the most perfect purity or singleness
of heart, without which no one can see God in his glory,
or enjoy his presence by his special grace in this life.
For this he must forsake the world, or its goods and
riches; he must renounce or die to himself, divesting
himself of all vices and irregular inclinations; and
thirdly, he must withdraw his heart from earthly or
visible things to apply it to those that are spiritual
and divine. (Collat. 1 and 3.) He says, that the
veil of the passions being once removed, the eyes
of the mind will begin, as it were naturally to
contemplate the mysteries of God, which remain always
unintelligible and obscure to those who have only eyes
of flesh, or whose hearts are unclean, and their eyes
overclouded with sin and the world. (Coll. 5.) This
purgation of the heart is made by the exercises of
compunction, mortification, and self-denial; and the
unshaken foundation of the most profound humility must
be laid, which may bear a tower reaching to the heavens;
for, upon it is to be raised the superstructure of all
spiritual virtues. (Coll. 9.)

To gain a victory over vices he strenuously inculcates
the advantages of discovering all temptations to our
superior, for when detected, they lose their force;
the filthy serpent being by confession drawn out of
his dark hole into the light and in a manner exposed,
withdraws himself. His suggestions prevail so long as
they are concealed in the heart. (Coll. 2, c. 10, 11,
and Instit. l, 9, c. 39.) This he confirms by the
example of Serapion, cured of an inveterate habit of
stealing bread above his allowance in the community, by
confessing the fault. (Coll. 2, c. 11.) But he teaches
that these exercises are but preparations; for the
end and perfection of the monastic state consists in
continual and uninterrupted perseverance in prayer,
as far as human frailty will permit. This is the
conjunction of the heart with God. But this spirit of
prayer cannot be obtained without mighty contrition,
the purgation of the heart from all earthly corruption
and the dregs of passion, and the illumination of the
Holy Ghost, whose purest rays cannot enter an unclean
heart. He compares the soul to a light feather which
by its own levity is raised on high by the help of a
gentle breath; but if wet by the accession of moisture,
is depressed down to the very earth. The mind can only
ascend to God when it is disburdened of the weight of
earthly solicitude and corruption. (Coll. 9.)

He inculcates the use of frequent aspirations,
recommending that of the Church, “Deus, in adjutorium
meum intende,” &c.; and says, the end of the perfection
of the monastic state is, that the mind be refined from
all carnal dust, and elevated to spiritual things, till
by daily progress in this habit all its conversation
may be virtually one continual prayer, and all the
soul’s love, desire, and study, may be terminated
in God. In this her union with him by perpetual and
inseparable charity, she possesses an image of future
bliss, and a foretaste or earnest of the conversation
of the blessed. Inveighing against lukewarmness in
devotion he makes this remark (Coll. 4, c. 19): “We
have often seen souls converted to perfection from a
state of coldness, that is, from among worldlings and
heathens; but have never seen any from among tepid
Christians. These are moreover so hateful to God,
that by the prophet he bids his teachers not to direct
any exhortations to them, but to abandon them as a
fruitless barren land, and to sow the divine word on
new hearts, among sinners and heathens: ‘Break up the
new or fallow ground, and sow not upon land that is
overrun with thorns.’” (Jer. iv. 3.) He exceedingly
extols the unspeakable peace and happiness which souls
enjoy in seeking only God, and the great and wonderful
works which he performs in the hearts of his saints,
which cannot be truly known to any man except to
those who have experience of them. (Coll. 12, c. 12,
and Coll. 14, c. 14.) Cassian, in the thirteenth
Conference, under the name of the abbot Cheremon,
favors the principles of the Semipelagians, though that
error was not then condemned, it being first proscribed
in the second council of Orange in 529. Whence St.
Prosper himself, in his book against this discourse,
never names him, but styles him a catholic doctor.
(l. contra Collatorem, p. 828.) Cassian’s style, though
neither pure nor elegant, is plain, affecting, and
persuasive. His works were published with comments by
Alard Gazæus or Gazet, a Benedictin monk of St. Vaast’s
at Arras, first at Douay in 1616; and afterward with
more ample notes at Arras in 1618. They have been
since reprinted at Lyons, Paris, and Francfort. See
Dom. Rivet, Hist. Lit. t. 2, p. 215, and Cuper the
Bollandist, ad 23 Julij, t. 5, p. 458, ad 482.

[242] See the most edifying history of the eminent and holy
men of this monastery of St. Victor’s at Paris compiled
by F. Simon Gourdan, in seven volumes folio, kept in
MSS. in the curious public library of that house, t. 1,
p. 128, &c.

[243] Among the great men which this abbey produced in its
infancy, the most famous are Hugh and Richard of St.
Victor. Hugh, a native of the territory of Ypres in
Flanders, became a canon regular in this monastery
in 1115, was made prior, and taught divinity there
from the year 1130 to his death in 1142. His works are
printed in three vols. folio. In the first we have his
literal and historical notes on the scripture; also
mystical and allegorical notes on the same by some
later author of this house. In the second tome are
contained his spiritual works; the soliloquy of the
soul, the praise of charity, a discourse on the method
of praying, a discourse on love between the Beloved and
the Spouse, four books on the vanity of the world, one
hundred sermons, &c. The third tome presents us his
theological treatises, of which the principal are his
two books on the sacraments. He was called a second
Augustin, or the tongue of that great doctor, whose
spirit, sentiments, and style he closely follows. His
notes on the rule of St. Austin, in the second tome,
are excellent: also those on the Decalogue. The book
De claustro animæ is very useful for religious persons,
and shows the austere abstinence and discipline then
observed in monasteries; but is the work of Hugh Foliet,
a most pious and learned canon of this order, who was
chosen abbot of St. Dionysius’s at Rheims, though he
earnestly declined that dignity, in 1149. See Mabillon,
Analecta, t. 1, p. 133, and Annal. l, 77, p. 141.
Ceillier, t. 22, pp. 200, 224. Martenne, t. 5. Anecdot.
p. 887.

Richard of St. Victor, a Scotsman, regular canon of
St. Victor’s at Paris, scholar of Hugh, chosen prior of
that abbey in 1164, died in 1173. His works have been
often reprinted in two vols. folio; the best edition
is that given at Rouen in 1650. His comments on the
scripture are too diffusive: his theological tracts
are accurate, his writings on contemplation and
Christian virtues, though the style is plain, are
full of the most sublime rules of an interior life.
The collection of spiritual maxims of these holy men
which F. Gourdan has compiled from their writings and
sayings, demonstrates their heavenly wisdom, lights
and experience in spiritual things, and in the perfect
spirit of all virtues to which they attained by an
admirable purity of heart, and spirit of penance,
prayer, and divine love.

[244] Luke vii.

[245] Mention is made in the gospels of a woman who was a
sinner (Luke vii.), of Mary of Bethania, the sister
of Lazarus (John xi. 2, xii. 1, Mark xiv. 3, Mat.
xxvi. 6.), and of Mary Magdalen, who followed Jesus
from Galilee, and ministered to him. Many grave authors
think all this belongs to one and the same person; that
she fell into certain disorders in her youth, and in
chastisement was delivered over to be possessed by
seven devils; that she addressed herself to Jesus in
the house of Simon the pharisee, and by her compunction
deserved to hear from him that her sins were forgiven
her; and in consequence was delivered from the seven
devils: that with her brother Lazarus, and her sister
Martha, she left Galilee and settled at Bethania, where
Jesus frequently honored their house with his presence.
(See Pezron, Hist. Evang. t. 2, p. 350.) St. Clement of
Alexandria, (l. 2, Pædag. c. 8.) Ammonius, (Harmon. 4,
Evang.) St. Gregory the Great, (hom. 25 and 33, in
Evang.) and from his time the greater part of the
Latins down to the sixteenth century adopt this opinion;
though St. Ambrose, (lib. de Virgin. et l. 6, in Luc.)
St. Jerom, (in Mat. xxvi. l. 2, contr. Jovin. c. 16,
Præf. in Osee et ep. 150.) St. Austin, (tr. 49, in Joan.
n. 3.) Albertus Magnus, and St. Thomas Aquinas leave
the question undetermined. The two last say the Latins
in their time generally presumed that they were the
same person, but that the Greeks distinguished them.
Baronius, Jansenius of Ghent, Maldonat, Natalis
Alexander, (in Hist. Eccl. Sæc. 1, Diss. 17.) Lami,
(Harmon. Evang. et epist. Gallicâ.) Mauduit, (Analyse
des Evang. t. 2.) Pezron, Trevet, and strenuously
Solier the Bollandist, t. 5, Julij, p. 187, and others
have written in defence of the opinion of St. Gregory
the Great.

Others think these were distinct persons. This
sentiment is adopted by the Apostolic Constitutions,
(l. 3, c. 6.) St. Theophilus of Antioch, (in 4 Evang.)
St. Irenæus, (l. 3, c. 4.) Origen, (hom. 35, in Mat.
et hom. 1, or 2, Cant.) St. Chrysostom, (hom. 81, in
Mat. 26, et hom. 61, in Joan.) St. Macanus, (hom. 12,)
and by almost all the Greeks. Among the modern critics
Casaubon, (Exercit. 14, in Baron.) Estius, (Or. 14,)
three Jesuits, viz., Bulanger, (Diatrab. 3, p. 15,)
Turrian, (in Consens. l. 3, c. 6,) and Salmeron,
(t. 9, tr. 49,) also Zagers, a learned Franciscan,
(in Joan. 11.) Mauconduit, Anquetin, Tillemont, (t. 2,
p. 30, et 512.) Hammond, and many others, strenuously
assert these to have been three distinct women.

Some, whose sentiment appears most plausible to Toinard
and Calmet, distinguish the sister of Lazarus and
Magdalen; for this latter attended Christ the last
year of his life, and seems to have followed him from
Galilee to Jerusalem, when he came up to the Passover,
(see Mat. xxvii. 56, 57, Mark xv. 40, 41, Luke xxiii.
49,) at which time the sister of Lazarus was with her
brother and Martha at Bethania, (John xi. 1.) Moreover,
these two women seem distinctly characterized, the
one being called Magdalen, and being ranked among the
women that followed Jesus from Galilee, the other being
everywhere called the sister of Lazarus; and though
she might have possessed an estate at Magdalum in
Galilee, and have come originally from that country,
this constant distinction of epithets naturally leads
us to imagine them different persons; but St. Irenæus,
Origen, St. Chrysostom, &c., nowhere distinguish the
penitent and Magdalen: and St. Luke having mentioned
the conversion of the sinful woman (at Naim) in the
next chapter, subjoins, that certain women who had been
delivered by him from evil spirits and infirmities,
followed him; and among these he names Mary Magdalen,
out of whom he had cast seven devils; whence it may
seem reasonable to conclude that the penitent and
Magdalen are the same person.

This disputation, however, seems one of those
debateable questions which are without end, nothing
appearing demonstrative from the sacred text, or from
the authority of the ancients. In the Roman Breviary
the Penitent is honored on this day under the name of
Mary Magdalen, and for our edification the history of
all these examples of virtue is placed in one point of
view, as if they belonged to one person, conformably
to the sentiment of St. Gregory and others; but the
offices are distinct in the Breviaries of Paris,
Orleans, Vienne, Cluni, and some others.

[246] Job xx. 11.

[247] “Quâ spe? quâ fiduciâ? quâ confidentiâ? Quâ spe? illâ
quâ Pater est. Ego perdidi quod erat filii: ille quod
Patris est non amisit. Apud patrem non intercedit
extraneus: intus est in Patris pectore qui intervenit
et exorat, affectus. Urgentur Patris viscera iterum
genitura per veniam,” &c. St. Peter Chrysolog. Serm. II.

[248] The ancient Jews did not sit down on carpets spread
on the floor to eat, as the Arabs, Turks, and other
inhabitants of the countries about Palestine do at
this day. Their tables were raised above the ground.
Exod. xxv. 24, Jud. l. 7, Mat. xv. 27, Luke xvi. 21.
Neither Hebrews, Greeks, nor Romans used napkins or
table-cloths. Their ancient custom was to sit at table,
as we do now. Prov. xxiii. 1. But after Solomon’s time
the Jews leaned or lay down on couches round the table.
Amos, (iv. 7.) Toby, (xi. 3.) and Ezekiel (xxiii. 41.)
speak of eating on beds or couches; but this custom
was not general. It was become very frequent in our
Saviour’s time, who ate in this manner not only on
the present occasion, but also when Magdalen anointed
his feet, Mat. xxvi. 7, and at his last supper,
John xiii. 23, so that it seems to have then been the
ordinary custom of that country. The Jews seem to have
learned it from the Persians, Esth. i. 6, vii. 8. They
took two meals a day from the times of the primitive
patriarchs; but never ate before noon, Eccles. x. 16,
Isa. v. 11, Acts ii. 15. And their dinner was usually
rather a small refreshment than a meal; on fast-days
the Jews never ate or drank till evening. See Calmet,
Dissert. sur le Manger des Hebreux. Fleury, Mœurs des
Israelites et Mœurs des Chrétiens. Also Alnay, sur la
Vie Privée des Romains.

[249] S. Aug. Serm. 99, c. 6, ed. Ben. olim 23, ex. 50.

[250] Ferrarius, Daniel, Sanson, Calmet, and Monsieur Robert
agree in placing the castle of Magdalum near the Lake
of Genesareth, called the sea of Galilee.

[251] Luke viii. 2

[252] Some take Mary Magdalen to be the sister of Martha and
Lazarus, of whom mention is made in the life of St.
Martha. When Jesus, six days before his passion,
supped in the house of Simon surnamed the Leper, whilst
Martha waited on him, and Lazarus sat at table, Mary
anointed his feet and head with precious ointment which
she had brought in an alabaster box. The Greeks and
Romans practised the same custom of using sweet scented
ointments at banquets. Judas Iscariot murmured at this
action out of covetousness, pretending the price of the
ointment had better been given to the poor; but Jesus
commended Mary’s devotion, said that her action would
be a subject of admiration and edification wherever his
gospel should be preached, and declared that she had by
it advanced the ceremony of embalming his body for his
burial. Though Christ has substituted the poor in his
stead, to be succored by us in them; yet he is well
pleased when charity consecrates some part of our
riches to his external worship, to whom we owe all that
we possess. But nothing can be more odious than for
ministers of the altar, with Judas, to cover avarice
under a cloak of zeal. See John xii. 1, 2, 3, Mat.
xxvi. 6, Mark xiv. 3.

[253] Mark xvi. 2, Luke xxiv. 1, John xx. 1.

[254] St. Leo Serm. 2, de Ascens.

[255] John xx. Calmet, Vie de. J. C, ch. 37.

[256] Mat. xxvii. 9, Luke xxiv. 10.

[257] Certain Greeks, writers who lived in the seventh or
later ages, tell us, that after the ascension of our
Lord, St. Mary Magdalen accompanied the Blessed Virgin
and St. John to Ephesus, and died and was buried in
that city. This is affirmed by Modestus, patriarch of
Jerusalem in 920,[258] and by St. Gregory of Tours.
St. Willibald, in the account of his pilgrimage to
Jerusalem, says, that her tomb was shown him at Ephesus.
Simeon Logotheta mentions that the emperor Leo the
Wise caused her relics to be translated from Ephesus to
Constantinople, and laid in the church of St. Lazarus,
about the year 890. But these modern Greeks might
perhaps confound Mary the sister of the Blessed Virgin,
or the sister of Lazarus, or some other Mary among
those that are mentioned in the gospel with Mary
Magdalen. The relics shown in the monastery at Vezelay
in Burgundy, ten leagues from Auxerre in the diocess
of Autun, may be a portion of the body of St. Mary
Magdalen, or of some other Mary mentioned in the
gospel. This famous ancient monastery of Vezelay was
secularized in 1537; and the church, which is longer
than that of our Lady at Paris, is now served only by
ten canons.

[258] Hom. in Marias Unguenta ferentes.

[259] See Nat. Alex., sæc. 1, and Solier the Bollandist,
Julij, t. 5, who confirms the tradition of the
inhabitants of Provence, p. 213, § 14, and rejects
that of Vezelay in Burgundy, whither some pretend
that her body was translated out of Provence, ib.
§ 11, 12, 13, p. 207.

[260] These are the fruit of his pious meditations in the
chapel of the Magdalen, the favorite retired place of
his devotions, in which an excellent marble statue of
this great man on his knees, is erected in the church
of his Carmelite nuns at Paris. See his Works, p. 369
to p. 405.

[261] Serm. 128.

[262] Mab. Iter. Italic. p. 41.

[263] Famæ negociator, et vitæ. Tertul. Apol. c. 46.

[264] Philosophus gloriæ animal, et popularis auræ vile
mancipium. S. Hieron. ep. ad Julian.

[265] Lactant. l. de Origine Erroris, § 3.

[266] B. 6, ep. 1.

[267] Spicileg. t. 5, p. 579.

[268] Exod. xxxii. 10.

[269] Sanctorum precibus stat mundus. Ruffin. Præf. in Vitas
Patrum.

[270] Some derive the pedigree and names of the Muscovites
from Mosoch, the son of Japhet, who, with his brothers
Magog, Thubal, and Gomer, and their children peopled
the northern kingdoms. (Ezech. xxxviii. 6, &c.) These
are reputed the patriarchs of the Cappadocians, Tartars,
Scythians, Sarmatians, &c. See Bochart, Phaleg. l. 3,
c. 12, and Calmot. It seems not to be doubted, that
the Moschi, mentioned by Strabo and Mela, and situated
between Colchis and Armenia, near the Moschici Montes,
were the descendants of Mosoch. As the Scythians from
the coasts of the Euxine and Caspian seas afterward
penetrated more northwards in Asia and Europe, and as
the Cimmerii, who were the sons of Gomer, afterward
settled about the Bosphorus and Mœotis, so some
authors pretend that the Moschi passed into Europe,
and settled near them on the borders of the Scythians
and Sarmatians. But the Muscovites evidently take their
name from the city of Moscow, built about the year 1149,
so called from a monastery named Moskoi (from Mus or
Musik, men, _q. d._ the Seat of Men), not from the
river Moscow, which was anciently called Smorodina.
(See J. S. Bayei, Orig. Russiæ, t. 8, Acad. Petrop.
p. 390.) For the name of Muscovites was not given to
this tribe of Russians before the beginning of the
fourteenth century. It was assumed on the following
occasion: In 1319, Gedimidius, great duke of Lithuania,
having vanquished the Russian duke of Kiow, the
archbishop Peter removed his see to Moscow, and from
that town these Russians began then to be called
Muscovites; for the duke John, son of Daniel, soon
followed the archbishop, and transferred thither
the seat of his principality from Uladimiria: though
the archbishop of Kiow continued to take the title
of Metropolitan of all Russia. See Herbersteinus
(Chorographia Principatus Ducis Moscoviæ; also, in
Rerum Muscovitarum Commentar.) and more accurately
Ignatius Kulczynski, in Latin Kulcinius, a Basilian
monk at Rome. (Specimen Ecclesiæ Ruthenicæ, printed at
Rome in 1733, also Catalog. archiepisc. Kioviensium;
and Series Chronol. Magn. Russiæ seu Moscoviæ Ducum.)
Hence the name of Muscovites first occurs in
Chalcocondylus and other Greek historians about
that time. We are informed by these authors, and by
Herbersteinius, that these Russians were tributary to
the Tartar king of Agora in Asia from 1125 to 1506. But
since they shook off that yoke they have subdued the
Russians of Novogorod and other places in Europe, and
have extended their dominions almost to the extremity
of Asia in Great Tartary. See Bayer, Diss. de Russorum
primâ expedit. Constantinopolitana, t. 6, Comm. Acad.
Petrop. et Orig. Russiæ, ib. t. 8. Also Jos. Assemani,
De Kalend. Univ. t. 1, par. 2, c. 4, p. 275.

The name, Russi or Rossi, seems not to be older than
the ninth century. Cedrenus and Zonarus speak of them
as a Scythian nation inhabiting the northern side of
Mount Taurus, a southern region of Asiatic Scythia, now
Great Tartary. They are a nation entirely distinct from
the Roxolani, the ancient Sarmatians near the Tanais,
though these Russians afterward became masters of
that country, and took their name either from that
of Roxolani abridged, or from Rosseia, which in their
language signifies an assemblage of people. Constantine
Porphyrogenetta tells us, that the language of the
Russians and Sclavonians was quite different; and the
monk Nestor, in the close of the eleventh century,
the most ancient historian of Russia, in his chronicle
assures us, that the Russians and Sclavonians are
two different nations; but the great affinity of the
present Russian language with the Sclavonian shows that
the Russians, mixing with the Sclavonians, learned in a
great measure their language.

It is well known that, anciently, the southern parts
of Muscovy were inhabited by Goths, whom the Huns
or ancient Tartars from Asia, expelled in the fourth
century. Also that the northern part was peopled by
Scythians, whom the Muscovites still call by the same
name Tscudi, _i. e._ Scythians, and the lake Peipus,
Tschudzhoi. We learn from Constantine Porphyrogenetta
(l. De administ. Imper. c. 9,) that the name of Russia
was given in the tenth century to the country of
which Kiow was the capital, and which comprised also
Czernigov, Novogorod, &c. Snorro Sturleson (Hist. regn.
Septentr. t. 1, p. 6) says these people called their
ancient capital, situated towards the gulf of Finland,
Aldeiguborg or Old-Town, in opposition to which
Novogorod or New-Town, took its name. The Waregians,
invited by the Russians to defend them against the
Khosares, who lived near the Black or the Euxine Sea,
crossing the Baltic, settled among the Russians, it
is uncertain in what age. See T. S. Bayer de Varegis,
t. 4, Comment. Acad. Scient. Petrop. p. 275. Er.
Jul. Biæner, Sched. Hist. Geogr. de Varegis heroibus
Scandinianis et primis Russiæ Dynasts at Stockholm,
1743. Arvid. Mulleris De Varegia, 1731. Algol. Scarinus
de Originibus priscæ gentis Varegorum, 1743.

We know not in what age the Sclavonians obtained
settlements in the northern parts of Russia. They are
first named in Procopius and Jornandes, were part of
the Venedi, and with them from Sarmatia travelled into
Germany; where they settled for some time on the coast
of the Baltic, afterward in the centre of Germany
near Thuringia, and in Beheim or Bohemia, where they
long ruled and left their language. In the reign of
Justinian they crossed the Danube, and conquered part
of Pannonia and Illyricum, where a small territory,
fifty German miles long, of which Peter-waradin is
the most considerable place, between the Danube, the
Drave, and the Save, is still called Sclavonia: it was
conquered by the kings of Hungary, and is still subject
to the house of Austria. The Slavi fell everywhere
into so miserable a servitude, that from them are
derived the names of Slavery and Slaves. The Sclavonian
language is used in the divine office in Illyricum, &c.
according to the Latin rite; in Muscovy, &c. according
to the Greek rite. (See on SS. Cyril and Methodius,
22 Dec.) The Muscovites have no Russian Bibles; but
with very little study can understand the Sclavonian,
says Brusching.

In the year 892, Rurik, Simeus, and Tyuwor, three
brothers from the Warengi on the other side of the
Baltic, came by invitation into Russia, and ruled the
Sclavonians and Russians united into one nation. Rurik
survived his brothers, and became sole sovereign. The
Runic inscriptions in the northern Antiquities are not
of an older date.

Rurik fixed his seat near the lake Ladoga. His son
Igor transferred his court from Novogorod to Kiow.
His widow Olga received the faith, and was baptized at
Constantinople. Their son Suatoslas died an idolater;
but his son Wladimir the Great married Anne, a Grecian
princess, received baptism, and was imitated by his
subjects. He built the city which from him is called
Wladimiria, which under his grandson, Andrew Bogolikski,
became the ducal residence. Wladimir I. is honored
in the Muscovite Calendar. Kiow still has its dukes.
Jaroslas, son of Wladimir, was succeeded there by
his son Wsevolod I. in 1078, in whose reign Ephrem,
metropolitan of Kiow, established in Russia, pursuant
to the bull of Urban II. the feast of the translation
of the relics of St. Nicholas to Bari, on the 9th of
May, never known in the Greek church; which shows their
obedience to the pope, and their connection with the
Latin church. The Greeks also were then Catholics.
George duke of Russia at Wladimiria recovered Kiow,
and in 1156 built the city of Moscow. Jaroslas II.
succeeded his brother George II. in the great dukedom
of Russia in 1238, and resided in Wladimiria. In his
reign in 1244, the Russians were reunited to the see
of Rome, part having been a little before drawn into
the Greek schism. His son Alexander, in his father’s
life-time prince of Novogorod, with his brother Feodor
or Theodor, gained great victories over the Tartars,
who had long oppressed the Russians, and succeeded to
the great dukedom in 1246. He is surnamed Newski or of
Newa, from a great victory which he gained in 1241 on
the banks of the Newa, over the Poles and the Teutonic
knights in Livonia. Those knights, who by victories
over the idolaters had made themselves masters of
Livonia, had their own high master at Riga, who
soon made himself independent of the grand-master
of the same order in Prussia. This order, which was
dismembered from the Knights Hospitallers, or of
Jerusalem (afterward of Rhodes and Malta), to defend
the Christians in Germany against the inroads of the
barbarous northern infidel nations, long produced many
incomparably great heroes, and models of all virtues.
But enriched by great conquests, their successors,
by pride, luxury, and continual intestine wars, gave
occasion to several scandals. At length, Albert,
marquis of Brandenburg, grand-master in Prussia, turned
Lutheran, and received from the king of Poland the
investiture of ducal Prussia. The knights expelled
by him retired to Mariandhal in Franconia, and there
chose a new grand-master. He is chosen by the twelve
provincial commanders. William of Furstenburg,
Heer-meister of Livonia, also declared himself a
Lutheran, and in 1559 resigned his dignity to his
coadjutor Gotthard Kettler. He also being a Lutheran,
ceded part of Livonia to the Danes, and the chief part
to the Poles, receiving from the latter the investiture
of Courland and Samogitia as secular dukedoms; Livonia
fell under the power of Charles XI. of Sweden, but was
added to the empire of Muscovy by Peter the Great.

To return to the grand duke Alexander Newski, he
received an embassy from the pope in 1262, the contents
of which are not recorded. He died crowned with glory
at Gorodes near Nischui-Novogorod in 1262, on the 30th
of April, on which day his festival is kept in Muscovy,
and he is honored as one of the principal saints of the
country. The tczar Peter the Great built, in his honor,
a magnificent convent of Basilian monks on the banks
of the Newa in Livonia, not far from his new city of
Petersburg, the archbishop of which city resides in it.
The empress Catharine instituted, in 1725, the second
Order of Knighthood in Russia under his name. Their
daughter the empress Elizabeth caused his bones to
be put in a rich shrine covered with thick plates of
silver, placed at the foot of a magnificent mausoleum
in this monastery. The Muscovites relate wonderful
things of his eminent virtues, and miracles wrought
at his tomb. Pope Benedict XIV. proves that, upon due
authority, all this may be admitted even of one who had
died in a material schism, or with inculpable ignorance.
But this prince lived and died in communion with the
see of Rome, though he has never been placed in the
Calendars of the Catholic Church.

Daniel, fourth son of Alexander, left by his father
duke of Moscow, after the death of an uncle and three
brothers became Grand Duke; and from his reign in 1304,
Moscow became the ducal residence, till Peter I. gave a
share in that honor to his new city of St. Petersburg.

In the reign of Basil or Vasili II. in 1415, Photius,
metropolitan of Russia, residing at Kiow, having
espoused the Greek schism, was deposed by the council
of Novogrodek, under the protection of Alexander
Vithold, grandduke of Lithuania. Retiring into Great
Russia he there exceedingly promoted the schism.
Gregory, who succeeded him at Kiow, assisted at the
council of Constance. Iwan or John IV. is the first
who took the title of Tczar in 1552. This word in
the Russian language signifies king. In the Russian
Chronicles that title is given to the Greek emperors.
In their Bibles it is used for king, both in the
Russian and Sclavonian language.

In Feodor or Theodore ended, in 1598, the race of Rurik.
After two others who had been chief ministers and two
false Demetriuses, in 1613, Michael, of the family of
Romanow, allied to that of the preceding tczars was
chosen great duke. The third of this family was Peter
the Great, founder of the Russian empire.

[271] Possev. L. De Rebus Moscoviticis.

[272] Præf. ad Ephemer. Græco-Moschas, n. 11, p. 3.

[273] Dissert. de Russorum Conversione et Fide apud Acta
Sanctor. t. 41, seu vol. 2, Septembris.

[274] Constantine Porphyrogenetta succeeded Leo the Wise in
the empire in 911; in 919 he associated in the throne
his Drungar or admiral Romanus Lecapenus, whose
daughter Helena he had married. Romanus reigned in the
year 944; from which time his covetous daughter Helena
had a great share in governing the empire. Constantine
was buried in his studies, and dying in 959, fifty-four
years old, left the empire to his impious son Romanus
II., who is said to have poisoned him, and who died
in 963, leaving the empire to Nicephorus Phocas, his
valiant general, who had often defeated the Russians
and Saracens. His daughter Anne was married to Wladimir,
duke of Russia. Constantine Porphyrogenetta (l. de Cœm.
Aulæ Byzant. l. 2, c. 15) relates, that on Wednesday,
the 9th of September, 946, Olga, princess of Russia,
was received with great pomp at Constantinople by
Constantine (himself) and Romanus, emperors; and
describes her different receptions at their court,
the banquets which they prepared for her, the presents
in money which they made to her uncle of thirty
miliaretia (each of which contained two ceratia, each
ceratium twelve folles, of which five hundred made a
pound of silver), eight to her priest Gregory and to
each of her friends, to herself five hundred miliaretia
in a gold dish studded with diamonds and precious
stones. At each other entertainment like presents were
distributed. The dessert of sweetmeats was served on a
little gold table, in dishes made of or studded with
precious stones.

[275] See the Annals of the Russians in Hebersteinius, in
Rerum Muscovit. Comment. and Jos. Assemani, in Calend.
Univ. t. 2, p. 265, and t. 3.

[276] Syn. Zamosciania, tit. de Jejun. et Fest. p. 121. Jos.
Assemani, de Calend. Univ. t. 4, p. 65, t. 6, p. 497.

[277] The United Russians, who, renouncing the schism,
embraced the communion of the Roman Church, are chiefly
subject to Poland, and ever since Clement VIII. have a
metropolitan of Kiow (since Kiow was conquered by the
Muscovites these have established there their schism
with a metropolitan of their communion), an archbishop
of Plosco, and bishops of Kelma, Presmilia, Liceoria,
and Leopold, with several convents of Basilian monks,
who all follow the Greek rites; though several Russians
in the Polish dominions still adhere to the Greek
schism. See Urban Cerri’s (secretary to the Propaganda)
Relation, p. 56, and Mamachi, Orig. et Antiquit. Christ.
l. 2, c. 17, t. 2, p. 180. Papebroke, Not. in Ephemer.
Græc. Mosch. t. 1, Maij Bollandiani, p. 54, &c.

The metropolitan of Moscow was declared patriarch of
all the Russian schismatics by Jeremy, patriarch of
Constantinople in 1588, and was acknowledged in that
character by the other Oriental patriarchs. But the
czar Peter I. having learned from the experience of
above a hundred years that the patriarchs made use
of their great influence and authority in matters of
state, after that dignity had been vacant nineteen
years, caused it to be abolished, and an archbishop of
Moscow to be chosen in 1719. For the government of the
church of Muscovy, and receiving appeals, he appointed
a council of eleven bishops and other clergymen, the
president of which the czar nominates. See John Von
Strahlenburg (Historical and Geographical Description
of Russia and Siberia, an. 1738) and Le Quien. (Oriens
Christianus, t. 1, p. 1296.) Some Catholics enjoy the
exercise of their religion in several parts of Muscovy.
Kulcinius observes that many saints have flourished
in this nation since it has been engaged in schism.
Possevinus and Papebroke take notice that the Greeks
since their schism have been reunited to the Latin
church fourteen times. The latter of these learned
authors also remarks, that even when the archbishops
were most turbulent schismatics, no one will say that
all the people were involved in the same guilt; even
ignorance might excuse many, as Baronius answered,
with regard to monks who lived under a schismatical
abbot (ad an. 1036). As for Polish Russia, F. Kulesza,
a learned Polish Jesuit, in a book entitled, Fides
Orthodoxa, printed at Vilna, assures us, that all the
archbishops of Kiow have been Catholics, except two,
Photius and Jonas II., till in 1686 it was given up to
the Muscovites. By the intrigues of this Photius, in
the middle of the fifteenth century, the Greek schism
was propagated through all Muscovy.

[278] See Jos. Assemani in Calend. t. 6, p. 480, on the 15th
of July, et t. 4, p. 34, to 52.

[279] See Jos. Assemani in Calend. p. 471, t. 6, ad 10 Julij.

[280] Id. ad 5 Julij, p. 462, et t. 1, p. 21, 29.

[281] Ardmore (so called from its situation on an eminence)
stands on the sea-coast, not far from the mouth of the
river now called Broad-water or Black-water. The see
was united to that of Lismore after the arrival of the
English in Ireland; and this again to Waterford. See
St. Carthag’s life, 14 May.

[282] Mat. iv. 22.

[283] Luke v. 11.

[284] Luke ix.

[285] Julij, t. 6, p. 69. See on the same the learned F.
Flores, in his España Sagrada, t. 3, c. 3, de la
Predicacion de San Jago in España, p. 39, and his
answers to F. Mamachi, the Roman Dominican, prefixed
to his sixth tome. The mission of St. James in Spain
is defended at large by the learned Jesuit F. Farlat,
Illyrici Sacri Prolegom. part 3, t. 1, p. 252. See also
Card. d’Aguirre, t. 1, Conc. Hisp. p. 140, upon the
words of St. Jerom in Isaiæ c. 34, p. 279, t. 3.

[286] Diss. de Divisione Apost. ante t. 4, Julij, et in vita
S. Jacobi, t. 6, p. 71.

[287] Agrippa the Elder was a worldly man, addicted to
pleasures, yet attached to the Jewish religion. Of
this he gave a remarkable proof when the emperor
Caligula ordered a statue of Jupiter to be set up in
the temple of Jerusalem. The Jews opposed the attempt
with tears and remonstrances, and throwing themselves
prostrate on the ground at the feet of the Roman
governor, protested they were ready rather to suffer
death. But the murderers of the Son of God were
unworthy to die in so good a cause. Agrippa exposed
himself to the danger of losing the tyrant’s favor,
and by a strong letter, which he wrote to him on that
occasion, obtained that the order should be superseded
at that time. When that emperor was attempting to renew
it his death delivered the Jews from the danger.

[288] Eus. Hist. l. 2, c. 9.

[289] Agrippa was the first prince that persecuted the Church.
After having put to death St. James, he imprisoned St.
Peter, but God delivered him out of the persecutor’s
hands. Nor was it long before this king felt the
effects of divine vengeance. After the feast of the
passover he returned to Cæsarea to exhibit there public
games in honor of Claudius Cæsar, and was attended
thither with a numerous train of the must considerable
persons, both of his own and of the neighboring nations.
He appeared early on the second morning of the shows
at the theatre, in a costly robe of silver tissue,
artfully wrought, and so bright that the sunbeams which
darted upon it were reflected with such an uncommon
lustre, as to dazzle the eyes of the spectators who
beheld him with a kind of divine respect. He addressed
himself in an elegant speech, to the deputies of the
Tyrians and Sidonians, who were come to beg his pardon
for some offence for which they had been some time in
disgrace with him. Whilst he spoke, the ambassadors and
some court sycophants gave a great shout, crying out
that it was the voice of a god and not of a man. The
king, too sensible of the people’s praise, and elated
with pride, seemed to forget himself, and to approve,
instead of checking the impious flattery. But at that
instant the angel of the Lord smote him with a dreadful
disease, and he felt himself seized with a violent pain
in his bowels. Perceiving his distemper to be mortal,
he rejected the flattery of his sycophants, telling
them that he whom they called immortal was dying. Yet
still full of false ideas of human grandeur, though
he saw death inevitable, he comforted himself with
the remembrance of the splendor in which he had lived.
So true it is that a man dies such as he lives. After
lingering five days in exquisite torments, under which
no remedy gave him any ease, being eaten up by worms,
he expired in all the miseries that can be expressed or
imagined. This account is given us by Josephus (Antiq.
l. 19, c. 7), and by St. Luke (Acts xii. 23). He died
in the fifty-fourth year of his age, and the seventh of
his reign. The most learned Mr. Stukely in his medallic
history of Carausius, t. 2, c. 1, p. 72, will have it
that Agrippa was smitten four days after he celebrated
the Roman festival, in which the people made vows for
the emperor’s health and safety, marked in the ancient
Roman Calendar which he has published on the 4th of
January. It was, indeed, the festival of the emperor
Claudius, but after the passover, which happened that
year on the 10th of April, the equinoctial new moon
falling on the 28th of March. Herod Agrippa left a son
of his own name, who was then at Rome with Claudius,
only seventeen years old. The emperor would willingly
have given him his father’s dominions; but his freemen
and counsellors represented to him that an extensive
kingdom was too great a burden for so young a prince to
bear. Whereupon Judæa was again reduced into the form
of a Roman province, and Cuspius Fadus appointed the
first prefect or governor.

[290] See on the Translation of the body of St. James to
Compostella, F. Flores, the learned and inquisitive
Austin friar, rector of the royal college at Alcala,
in his curious work entitled España Sagrada (of which
the first volume was printed in 1747), t. 3, App.
p. 50 and 56.

[291]

“Christophore, infixum quòd cum usque in corde gerebas,
Pictores Christum dant tibi ferre humeris,” &c.

_Vida_, Hym. 26, t. 2, p. 150.

[292] Procop. de Ædif. Justin. l. 1, c. 2.

[293] Julij, t. 6, p. 250.

[294] 2 Tim ii. 5. 1 Tim. v. 4.

[295] Plutarch l. de Educand. liberis.

[296] Hist. Episc. Antisiodor. See Messieurs De Ste. Marthe,
in Gallia Christiana.

[297] Prosp. in Chron. et l. contra Collat. c. 21.

[298] Bede Hist l. 1, c. 17, Constant. in vita S. Germani.

[299] Vita S. Genevevæ.

[300] Hist. Episcop. Antisiod.

[301] Bede, Hist. l. 1, c. 1. Gildas ep. p. 17, 18.
Constantius in vitâ S. Germani. Carte, p. 184, 185.

[302] Antiq. Brit. c. 11, p. 179, 180. Carte, t. 1, p. 288.

[303] Carte, p. 184, 186, thinks the Alleluiah victory
gained over the Picts and the Saxons, and the other
transactions of St. Germanus in Wales, happened in his
second mission. For SS. Dubricius and Iltutus, whom he
ordained bishops, lived beyond the year 512, according
to some until 527 or even 540. Sir Henry Spelman and
Wilkins (Conc. Brit. t. 1, p. 1), on this account place
the synod of Verulam held by St. Germanus against the
Pelagians in 446.

[304] Bede, Hist. l. 1, c. 21. Bollandus and Henschenius in
vitâ S. Theliau ad 9 Februarij, &c.

[305] Stillingfleet, Orig. Britan. p. 349.

[306] Or. 3, de Imag.

[307] Ecclus. xxxviii. 1, 2.

[308] 4 Kings xx. 7. See Syn. Critic. and Mead, De Morbis
Biblicis, c. 5.

[309] Serm. 22, in Ps. 118.

[310] Regul. fus. explic.

[311] Ep. 345, ol. 321, p. 316, et in Cant.

[312] See Estius in Eccli. xxxviii.

[313] Ephes. v. 29, Aug. ep. 130, ol. 121, ad Probam.

[314] 2 Paral. xv. 12.

[315] Paulin. Nat. 9, or Carm. 24.

[316] Horat. l. 1, od. 3.

[317] _Pueri._ See Diss. de SS. 7, Dormient. c. 18, p. 65,
et c. 6, p. 11. The Menology of the emperor Basil,
printed at Rome in 1727, &c.

[318] Spon, Voyage d’Italie et du Levant, t. 1, l. 3, p. 327.

[319] St. Paulin. Carm. 24, and ep. 12. On the relics of St.
Nazarius at Milan, see the life of St. Charles Borromeo,
by Guissiano, in the new Latin edition, l. 5, c. 9.
p. 435, and the notes of Oltrocci, ibid.

[320] S. Bas. hom. de S. Gordio.

[321] S. Epiph. Hær. 54. Eus. l. 5, c. 28. Conc. t. 1.
Theodoret, Hæret. Fabul. l. 2, c. 5.

[322] Eus. l. 5, c. 17. St. Hier. ep. 54, ad Marcel. Tert.
l. de Fugâ, de Pudic., &c.

[323] Tert. l. adv. Praxeam.

[324] S. Epiph. Hær. 46. S. Iren. l. 1, c. 31. Clem. Alex.
Strom. l. 3, p. 465.

[325] Tatian’s Oration against the Greeks is extant. In it he
displays much profane erudition, showing that Moses was
older than the Gentile philosophers, who borrowed the
sciences from the patriarchs. He wrote this piece after
the death of Saint Justin, but before his separation
from the Church: for in it he proves one God the
Creator of all things, and seems to approve the state
of matrimony. It wants method; but the style is elegant
enough, though exuberant, and not very elaborate. This
piece is often published at the end of the works of St.
Justin. We have an accurate separate edition, printed
at Oxford in 1700, with notes and dissertations, by
the care of Mr. William Worth, archdeacon of Worcester.
P. Travasa in his learned history of heresiarchs,
demonstrates against Massuet, &c., that Tatian’s
Oration against the Gentiles is not orthodox; and that
in it the author teaches that the human soul is of its
own nature mortal. See Travasa Storia Critica delle
vite degli eresiarchi, t. 2, at Venice, 1760.

[326] Ἀκοενωνησίαν ἑπέϛειλεν.

[327] Monti, Cler. Reg. S. Pauli, S. Th. Prof. Mediolani,
Dissertationes Theologico-historicæ tres, quarum prima
propugnat gratiam per se efficacem; Secunda agit de
Canonibus vulgò apostolicis; Tertia versatur super
dissidio de opportuno Paschatis celebrandi tempore.
Papiæ, 1760.

[328] Mem. Eccles. t. 3, p. 112.

[329] From this example, it is manifest, that the African
bishops referred greater causes, at least those of
faith to the holy see, and in them always allowed
appeals to it; though at that time they carried on a
contest with the popes Innocent, Zosimus, and Celestine,
against appeals being made in lesser causes of personal
facts, which it is often difficult to carry on in
remote courts, and which, if too easy and frequent,
are a bar to the speedy execution of justice. Yet such
appeals or revisions of causes are sometimes necessary
to hinder crying injustices and oppressions. Whence
the regulation of the manner of restraining appeals in
smaller ecclesiastical causes is a point of discipline;
but the general council of Sardica, which was an
appendix of the council of Nice, declared, that appeals
must be allowed from the whole world to the bishops of
Rome; and in this discipline the Africans soon after
acquiesced.

[330] St. Aug. Serm. 131, n. 10.

[331] _Dole_ in the old British language signifies a low
fruitful plain.

[332] Tours, which was the metropolis of the province of
Armorica under the Romans, enjoyed, from the time of
St. Martin, the metropolitical jurisdiction over Mans,
Angers, and the nine bishoprics of Brittany. Sampson
the elder, bishop of York, being expelled by the Saxons,
came into Armorica, and founded the see of Dole, in
which he exercised a metropolitical jurisdiction, which
king Howel or Rioval obliged him to assert, because
these Britons were an independent people, separate from
the Gauls. Sampson’s two successors, St. Turiave and
St. Sampson, enjoyed the same. The contest between
Tours and Dole was not finished till Innocent III.
In 1199, declared Dole and all the other bishoprics
of Brittany subject to the archbishop of Tours. See
D. Morice, Hist. de Bretagne, p. 17, &c.

[333] Luke x. 38.

[334] Ibid.

[335] Cant. ii.

[336] 3, p. 9, 40, a. l. ad 2 et 3. Item 2, 2dæ. q. 182,
art. 1 et 2, in corp.

[337] L. de Perfect. Religios.

[338] Mat. xxvi.; John xii.

[339] Unicum mihi negotium est; aliud non curo quam ne
curem. Tert. l. de Pallio, c. 5.

[340] See the Chronicle of Norway by Snorro Sturleson, first
magistrate in the republic of Iceland in 1240.

[341] _Scot_ and _lot_ are originally Swedish or Teutonic
words, signifying tax. Romescot is a tax for Rome, and
Scot-Konung, the king’s tax. See baron Holberg, and
Mess. Scondia illustrata, t. 1.

[342] Aringhi Roma Subterranea, l. 1, c. 25.

[343] Noris, Diss. 3, de Epochis Syro-Macedonum.

[344] Apol. c. 21.

[345] Plato in Phædo.

[346] Act. ii.

[347] Act. xvi. 26.

[348] Constantine Cajetan, a Benedictin of the Congregation
of Mount Cassino, pretends this book to have been first
written by Gracias Cisneros or Swan, a Benedictin abbot
of Montserrat. But the work of that pious and learned
abbot is a very different piece, as is evident to every
one that will compare the two books, and as Pinius
demonstrates. That of Cisneros is indeed full of
unction and spiritual knowledge; but compiled in
a scholastic method, and runs into superfluous
subdivisions. The meditations of St. Ignatius are
altogether new, and written upon a different plan.
He appoints, for the foundation of these exercises, a
moving meditation on the end for which we are created,
that we fully convince ourselves that nothing is
otherwise to be valued, sought, or enjoyed, than
as it conduces to the honor and service of God. The
meditations on the fall of the angels and of man, on
the future punishments of sin, and on the last things,
show us the general effects of sin. To point out the
particular disorders of our passions, and to purge our
hearts of them, he represents to us the two standards
of Christ and the devil, and all men ranging themselves
under the one or the other, that we may be moved
ardently to make our choice with the generous souls
that follow Christ. Then he proposes what this
resolution requires, and how we are to express in
ourselves the perfect image of our Saviour, by the
three degrees of humility, by meditating on the
mysteries of Christ’s life, and by choosing a state
of life, and regulating our employments in it. By
meditating on Christ’s sufferings, he will have us
learn the heroic virtues of meekness and charity, &c.,
he taught us by them to fortify our souls against
contradictions; and by those on his glorious mysteries,
and on the happiness of divine love, he teaches us to
unite our hearts closely to God. See Bartoli, l. 1, &c.

[349] Exerc. Spir. Max. 2, 3.

[350] Ego vobis Romæ propitius ero. See F. Bouhours, b. 3.

[351] There is another religious Order, very famous in Italy,
established for the education of youth, called the
Regular Clergy of the _Schola Pia_. The founder was
F. Joseph Cazalana, a nobleman of Arragon. He took
priestly orders in 1582, and, going to Rome, devoted
himself with great fervor to the heroic practice of all
good works, especially to the catechising and teaching
of children. To propagate this design, he instituted a
congregation of priests, approved by Paul V. in 1617,
and declared a religious Order with ample privileges,
by Gregory XV. in 1621. These religious men bind
themselves by a fourth vow, to labor in instructing
children, especially the poor. The holy founder died in
1648, on the 25th of August.

[352] He appointed no other habit than that used by the
clergy in his time, the more decently and courteously
to converse with all ranks of people, and because he
instituted an order only of regular clerks. He would
not have his religious to keep choir, because he
destined their time to evangelical functions. He
ordered all, before they are admitted, to employ a
month for a general confession and a spiritual exercise.
After this, two years in a novitiate; then to take the
simple vows of scholars, binding themselves to poverty,
chastity, and obedience, which vows make them strictly
religious men; for by them a person in this Order
irrevocably consecrates himself to God on his side,
though the Order does not bind itself absolutely to
him, and the general has power to dismiss him; by
which discharge he is freed from all obligation to the
Society, his first vows being made under this condition.
These simple vows are only made in the presence of
domestics. The professed Jesuits make these same vows
again (commonly after all their studies) but publicly,
and without the former condition; so that these second
are solemn vows, absolutely binding on both sides:
wherefore a professed Jesuit can be no more dismissed by
his Order, so as to be discharged from his obligations
by which he is tied to it. In these last is added a
fourth vow of undertaking any missions, whether among
the faithful or infidels, if enjoined them by the pope.
There is a class of Jesuits who take the other vows,
without this last relating to the missions; and these
are called spiritual coadjutors. So this Order consists
of four sorts of persons; scholars or Jesuits of the
first vows; professed Jesuits or of the last or four
vows; spiritual coadjutors, and temporal coadjutors.

No particular bodily mortifications are prescribed by
the rule of the Society; but two most perfect practices
of interior mortification are rigorously enjoined, on
account of which Suarez (t. 3, de Relig.) who treats at
length of the obligations of their Order, calls it the
most rigorous of religious Orders; the first is, the
rule of Manifestation, by which every one is bound to
discover his interior inclinations to his superior; the
second is, that every Jesuit renounces his right to his
own reputation with his superior, giving leave to every
brother to inform immediately his superior of all his
faults he knows, without observing the law of private
correction first, which is a precept of fraternal
charity, unless where a person has given up his right.

The general nominates the provincial and rectors;
but he has five assistants nominated by the general
congregation, who prepare all matters to his hands,
each for the province of his assistency; and these have
authority to call a general congregation to depose the
general if he should evidently transgress the rules of
the Society. Every provincial is obliged to write to
the general once every month, and once in three years
transmit to him an account of all the Jesuits in his
province. The perfect form of government which is
established, the wisdom, the unction, the zeal, and the
consummate knowledge of men, which appear throughout
all these constitutions, will be a perpetual manifest
monument of the saint’s admirable penetration, judgment,
and piety. He wrote his constitutions in Spanish, but
they were done into Latin by his secretary, father
John Polancus. It is peculiar to the Society, that the
religious, after their first vows, retain some time
the dominion or property of their patrimony, without
the administration (for this later condition is now
essential to a religious vow of poverty), till they
make their renunciation.

St. Ignatius forbade the fathers of his Society to
undertake the direction of nunneries on the following
occasion. In 1545, Isabel Rozella, a noble Spanish
widow, and two others, with the approbation of pope
Paul III. put themselves under St. Ignatius’s direction,
to live according to his rule; but he soon repented
and procured from his Holiness, in 1547, the abovesaid
prohibition, saying, that such a task took up all that
time which he desired to dedicate to a more general
good in serving many. When certain women in Flanders
and Piedmont afterward assembled in houses under vows
and this rule, and called themselves Jesuitesses, their
institute was abolished by Urban VIII. in 1631, the
end and exercises of this society not suiting that sex.

[353] See his edifying life by Raderus and Sacchini.

[354] Bouhours, l. 4. Orlandin. Hist. Soc. l. 7, c. 25.

[355] The value of this treasure is enhanced by the elegant
dress by which it is set off in the French translation
of the abbé Regnier des Marais, three volumes in 4to.
four in 8vo. and six in 12mo. The devout abbé Tricalet
gave a good abridgment of this excellent work, printed
in 1760. The translation of Rodrigues made by the
gentlemen of Port-Royal is faulty in several places,
particularly, Tr. 1, c. 10.

[356] Orland. Hist. Soc. l. 16.

[357] Extant to Bartoli, l. 4, p. 372.

[358] L. 4, n. 29, 355.

[359] Bayle makes exceptions to the miracles of St. Ignatius
because Ribadeneira, in the first life of this saint,
which he wrote in 1572, inquires why his sanctity was
not equally attested by wonderful miracles as that of
the founders of some other Orders. “Quamobrem illius
sanctitas minus est testata miraculis,” &c. But in this
very edition, in the last chapter, p. 209, he writes:
“Mihi tantum abest ut ad vitam Ignatii illustrandam
miracula deesse videantur, ut multa eaque præstantissima
judicem in mediâ luce versari.” He then recapitulates
some facts which he had before related, and which he
esteems miraculous, as a rapture in which the saint
continued for eight days; so many wonderful, heavenly
illuminations and revelations; the restoration of
F. Simon, who lay dangerously sick, to his health,
pursuant to his prediction; the wonderful deliverance
of a demoniac; the cures of several sick persons; the
foretelling many particular things to private persons,
&c. The author republished this life in 1587, with some
additions. He afterwards wrote a Latin abstract of this
first life, in which he inserted many miracles. This
he calls “Alteram breviorem vitam, sed multis ac novas
miraculis auctam.” In this he tells us, that he had
before been more cautious in relating miracles, because
they had not yet been examined and approved; but that
he chose some which were esteemed miraculous, not in
the opinion of the common people, but in the judgment
of prudent persons. See this remark also in the Spanish
abstract of this life, published in 1604; and in the
Latin abstract reprinted at Ipres in 1612. In his
Spanish life of St. Ignatius, among his lives of saints,
printed in 1604, he writes thus: “Though, when I first
printed his life in 1572, I knew of some miracles of
the holy father, I did not look upon them to be so
verified (averiguados) as to think that I ought to
publish them, which afterward, by the authentical
informations taken for his canonization, were proved
true by credible witnesses; and the Lord, who is
pleased to exalt him, and make him glorious on earth,
works daily such miracles on his account as oblige me
to relate part of them here, taken from the original
juridical informations which several bishops have made,
and from the depositions made upon oath by the persons
on whom the miracles were wrought,” &c. Ribad. Spanish
lives, p. 1124. Moreover, Ribadeneira mentions in his
first and second edition of this life, prophecies,
revelations, visions, and the like miraculous favors,
and he expressly distinguishes these from the gift of
miracles, by which he means miraculous cures and the
like, though the former may be justly placed in the
general class of miracles. If the works of Ribadeneira
on this subject be all carefully perused, it will be
easy to discern the scrupulous accuracy of the author
in this point; and the candid reader will be convinced
how much some have misrepresented his testimony. Nor
was he allowed to publish miracles before they had been
approved, as the Council of Trent severely ordained.
(Sess. 25, de Inv. Sanct.) See on it Julius Nigronius
(Disp. Hist. de SS. Ignatio et Cajetano, n. 57) and
Pinius the Bollandist in his confutation of this
slander.

In the relation made in the secret consistory before
Gregory XV. of miracles which had been examined and
approved by the cardinal à Monte and other commissaries,
are mentioned the supernatural light shining on his
face at prayer, upon the testimony of St. Philip Neri
and F. Oliver Manerius. That St. Ignatius, by his
blessing and prayer, cured one Bastida of the falling
sickness, and the hand of a cook miserably burnt;
delivered Pontanus from most violent temptations with
which he had been grievously molested for two years,
&c.: but the miracles which are chiefly attended to
in a canonization, are those which have been performed
after the person’s death. Of such, many manifest ones
were approved, first by the Auditors of the Rota, and
afterward by the Congregation of Rites. Among these
are mentioned the following: Isabel Rabelles, a nun of
Barcelona, sixty-seven years old, in 1601, had broken
her thigh-bone; and being attended by a physician and
surgeon during forty days, and under grievous pains and
a violent fever, was expected to die that night, and
given over as to all natural remedies; when by applying
a relic of St. Ignatius, and saying the Lord’s Prayer
and Hail Mary, with an invocation of this saint, the
swelling of the thigh and leg went down, she found
herself able to stir both, and without any pain; and
calling for her clothes she got up, walked perfectly,
and with ease, and felt no more of her complaint,
not even at new moons or in the dampest seasons. Anne
Barozellona, at Valladolid, almost sixty years old, was
cured of a desperate palsy by invoking St. Ignatius,
with a vow to perform a novena. A widow who had
lost her sight in both her eyes, recovered it by
recommending herself to the prayers of Saint Ignatius,
and touching her eyes with a relic, &c. F. Jos. Juvency
(Hist. Soc. Jesu, l. 15, part 5, § 9) has selected and
related many like miracles of St. Ignatius. F. Daniel
Bartoli, in his life of this saint, has given a history
of a hundred such miracles (l. 5). See also the great
collection made by F. Pinius, the continuation of
Bollandus.

Though cardinal Pole thought circumstances did not
allow him to make any settlement for Jesuits in England,
as the author of the Monastic History of Ireland and
others take notice, that great and holy man highly
esteemed St. Ignatius and his Institute. See a letter
of Saint Ignatius to cardinal Pole dated at Rome, 24th
of January, 1555, and that cardinal’s answer to him
from Richmond, 8th of May; and another from London,
15th of December the same year; also his letter of
condolence to F. Lainez upon the death of St. Ignatius,
dated at London, 15th of November, 1556, published
among the letters of cardinal Pole collected by cardinal
Querini at Brescia, t. 5, p. 117, 118, 119, 120, 121.

[360] The Jesuats of St. Jerom were at first all lay brothers,
and practised pharmacy; but, in 1606, obtained leave
of Paul V. to study and take holy orders. The houses
of the friars being reduced, they were suppressed by
Clement IX. in 1668; but some nunneries of this Order
still subsist in Italy. See the life of this saint,
and those of other illustrious persons of this Order,
written by Moriggia, a pious general of the same, who
died in 1604. Also the Bollandists and Helyot.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

The following corrections have been made in the text:

Day: 1, section: Table of Contents
- ‘Rumbold’ replaced with ‘Rumold’
(St. Rumold, Bishop and Martyr)

Day: 1, section: SS. JULIUS AND AARON
- ‘Caerlton’ replaced with ‘Caerleon’
(at Caerleon in the year 1200,)

Day: 1, section: SS. JULIUS AND AARON
- ‘Canbrensis’ replaced with ‘Cambrensis’
(Giraldus Cambrensis,)

Day: 3, section: SAINT GUNTHIERN
- ‘Guereck’ replaced with ‘Guerech’
(Guerech I., count of Vannes,)

Day: 4, section: SAINT ODO
- ‘Ethelwulf’ replaced with ‘Ethelwolf’
(who in the reign of king Ethelwolf)

Day: 4, section: ST. SISOES
- ‘Scete’ replaced with ‘Sceté’
(retired to the desert of Sceté,)

Day: 6, section: ST. MONINNA
- ‘Calgan’ replaced with ‘Colgan’
(See Colgan ad 6 Jul.)

Day: 9, section: ST. VERONICA
- ‘sead’ replaced with ‘send’
(begging Him to send me more torments.)

Day: 16, section: ST. EUSTATHIUS
- ‘Ceilier’ replaced with ‘Ceillier’
(Ceillier, t. 4,)

Day: 17, section: ST. LEO IV.
- ‘355’ replaced with ‘855’
(September in the same year, 855,)

Day: 18, section: ST. FREDERIC
- ‘Lewis’ replaced with ‘Louis’
(her marriage with Louis)

Day: 19, section: ST. SYMMACHUS
- ‘intsance’ replaced with ‘instance’
(never had been an instance of )

Day: 22, section: SAINT JOSEPH OF PALESTINE
- ‘month’ replaced with ‘mouth’
(from his own mouth the particulars )

Day: 25, section: SAINTS THEA AND VALENTINA
- ‘Firmillian’ replaced with ‘Firmilian’
(Firmilian, the successor of Urbanus)

Footnote 55
- ‘Ushur’ replaced with ‘Usher’
(Usher, p. 418.)

Footnote 56
- ‘Kilmrures’ replaced with ‘Kilmaures’
(from whom Kilmaures is named,)

Footnote 90
- ‘Arringhi’ replaced with ‘Aringhi’
(produced by Aringhi, Diss. 2, l. 3, c.)

Footnote 102
- ‘suffiicient’ replaced with ‘sufficient’
(seems of sufficient authority)

Footnote 103
- Footnote anchor missing in text.

Footnote 104
- ‘Villote’ replaced with ‘Villotte’
(and F. James Villotte,)

Footnote 139
- Omitted footnote symbol inserted in text.

Footnote 161
- ‘Charlemage’ replaced with ‘Charlemagne’
(Charlemagne marched into Italy,)

Footnote 171
- ‘supposititions’ replaced with ‘suppositions’
(are generally esteemed suppositions.)

Footnote 270
- ‘Russicœ’ replaced with ‘Russiæ’
(Orig. Russiæ, t. 8,)

Footnote 346
- Omitted footnote symbol inserted in text.

*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, Vol. VII" ***

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