Front matter (continued 17)

Romuald, in the beginning of his conversion and retreat from the world, was molested with various temptations. The devil sometimes directly solicited him to vice; at other times he represented to him what he had forsaken, and that he had left it to ungrateful relations. He would sometimes suggest that what he did could not be agreeable to God; at other times, that his labors and difficulties were too heavy for man to bear. These and the like attempts of the devil he defeated by watching and prayer, in which he passed the whole night; and the devil strove in vain to divert him from this holy exercise by shaking his whole cell, and threatening to bury him in the ruins. Five years of grievous interior conflicts and buffetings of the enemy, wrought in him a great purity of heart, and prepared him for most extraordinary heavenly communications. The conversion of count Oliver, or Oliban, lord of that territory, added to his spiritual joy. That count, from a voluptuous worldling, and profligate liver, became a sincere penitent, and embraced the order of St. Benedict. He carried great treasures with him to mount Cassino, but left his estate to his son. The example of Romuald had also such an influence on Sergius, his father, that, to make atonement for his past sins and enormities, he had entered the monastery of St. Severus, near Ravenna; but after some time spent there, he yielded so far to the devil's temptations, as to meditate a return into the world. This was a sore affliction to our saint, and determined him to return to Italy, to dissuade his father from leaving his monastery. But the inhabitants of the country where he lived, had such an opinion of his sanctity, that they were resolved not to let him go. They therefore formed a brutish extravagant design to kill him, that they might keep at least his body among them, imagining it would be their protection and safeguard on perilous occasions. The saint being informed of their design, had recourse to David's stratagem, and feigned himself mad upon which the people, losing their high opinion of him, guarded him no longer. Being thus at liberty to execute his design, he set out on his journey to Ravenna, through the south of France. He arrived there in 994, and made use of all the authority his superiority in religion gave him over his father; and by his exhortations, tears, and prayers, brought him to such an extraordinary degree of compunction and sorrow, as to prevail with him to lay aside all thoughts of leaving his monastery, where he spent the remainder of his days in great fervor, and died with the reputation of sanctity.

Romuald, having acquitted himself of his duty towards his father, retired into the marsh of Classis, and lived in a cell, remote from all mankind. The devil pursued him here with his former malice; he sometimes overwhelmed his imagination with melancholy, and once scourged him cruelly in his cell. Romuald at length cried out: "Sweetest Jesus, dearest Jesus, why hast thou forsaken me? hast thou entirely delivered me over to my enemies?" At that sweet name the wicked spirits betook themselves to flight, and such an excess of divine sweetness and compunction filled the breast of Romuald, that he melted into tears, and his heart seemed quite dissolved. {373} He sometimes insulted his spiritual enemies, and cried out: "Are all your forces spent? have you no more engines against a poor despicable servant of God?" Not long after, the monks of Classis chose Romuald for their abbot. The emperor, Otho III. who was then at Ravenna, made use of his authority to engage the saint to accept the charge, and went in person to visit him in his cell, where he passed the night lying on the saint's poor bed. But nothing could make Romuald consent, till a synod of bishops then assembled at Ravenna, compelled him to it by threats of excommunication. The saint's inflexible zeal for the punctual observance of monastic discipline, soon made these monks repent of their choice, which they manifested by their irregular and mutinous behavior. The saint being of a mild disposition, bore with it for some time, in hopes of bringing them to a right sense of their duty. At length, finding all his endeavors to reform them ineffectual, he came to a resolution of leaving them, and went to the emperor, then besieging Tivoli, to acquaint him of it; whom, when he could not prevail upon to accept of his resignation, the saint, in the presence of the archbishop of Ravenna, threw down his crosier at his feet. This interview proved very happy for Tivoli; for the emperor, though he had condemned that city to plunder, the inhabitants having rebelled and killed duke Matholin, their governor, spared it at the intercession of St. Romuald. Otho having also, contrary to his solemn promise upon oath, put one Crescentius, a Roman senator, to death, who had been the leader in the rebellion of Tivoli, and made his widow his concubine; he not only performed a severe public penance enjoined him by the saint, as his confessor, but promised, by St. Romuald's advice, to abdicate his crown and retire into a convent during life; but this he did not live to perform. The saint's remonstrances had a like salutary effect on Thamn, the emperor's favorite, prime minister and accomplice in the treachery before mentioned, who, with several other courtiers, received the religious habit at the hands of St. Romuald, and spent the remainder of his days in retirement and penance. It was a very edifying sight to behold several young princes and noblemen, who a little before had been remarkable for their splendid appearance and sumptuous living, now leading an obscure, solitary, penitential life in humility, penance, fasting, cold, and labor. They prayed, sung psalms, and worked. They all had their several employments: some spun, others knit, others tilled the ground, gaining their poor livelihood by the sweat of their brow. St. Boniface surpassed all the rest in fervor and mortification. He was the emperor's near relation, and so dear to him, that he never called him by any other name than, My soul! he excelled in music, and in all the liberal arts and sciences, and after having spent many years under the discipline of St. Romuald, was ordained bishop, and commissioned by the pope to preach to the infidels of Russia, whose king he converted by his miracles, but was beheaded by the king's brothers, who were themselves afterwards converted on seeing the miracles wrought on occasion of the martyr's death. Several other monks of St. Romuald's monastery met with the same cruel treatment in Sclavonia, whither they were sent by the pope to preach the gospel.

St. Romuald built many other monasteries, and continued three years at one he founded near Parenzo, one year in the community to settle it, and two in a neighboring cell. Here he labored some time under a spiritual dryness, not being able to shed one tear; but he ceased not to continue his devotions with greater fervor. At last being in his cell, at those words of the psalmist; I will give thee understanding, and will instruct thee, he was suddenly visited by God with an extraordinary light and spirit of compunction, which from that time never left him. By a supernatural light, the fruit of prayer, he understood the holy scriptures, and wrote an exposition of the {374} psalms full of admirable unction. He often foretold things to come, and gave directions full of heavenly wisdom to all who came to consult him, especially to his religious, who frequently came to ask his advice how to advance in virtue, and how to resist temptations; he always sent them back to their cells full of an extraordinary cheerfulness. Through his continual weeping he thought others had a like gift, and often said to his monks: "Do not weep too much; for it prejudices the sight and the head." It was his desire, whenever he could conveniently avoid it, not to say mass before a number of people, because he could not refrain from tears in offering that august sacrifice. The contemplation of the Divinity often transported him out of himself; melting in tears, and burning with love, he would cry out: "Dear Jesus! my dear Jesus! my unspeakable desire! my joy! joy of the angels! sweetness of the saints!" and the like, which he was heard to speak with a jubilation which cannot be expressed. To propagate the honor of God, he resolved, by the advice of the bishop of Pola and others, to exchange his remote desert, for one where he could better advance his holy institute. The bishop of Paienzo forbade any boat to carry him off, desiring earnestly to detain him; but the bishop of Pola sent one to fetch him. He miraculously calmed a storm at sea, and landed safe at Capreola. Coming to Bifurcum, he found the monks' cells too magnificent, and would lodge in none but that of one Peter, a man of extraordinary austerity, who never would live in a cell larger than four cubits. This Peter admired the saint's spirit of compunction, and said, that when he recited the psalms alternately with him, the holy man used to go out thirty times in a night as if for some necessity, but he saw it was to abandon himself a few moments to spiritual consolation, with which he overflowed at prayer, or to sighs and tears which he was not able to contain. Romuald sent to the counts of the province of Marino, to beg a little ground whereon to build a monastery. They hearing Romuald's name, offered him with joy whatever mountains, woods, or fields he would choose among them. He found the valley of Castro most proper. Exceeding great was the fruit of the blessed man's endeavors, and many put themselves with great fervor under his direction. Sinners, who did not forsake the world entirely, were by him in great multitudes moved to penance, and to distribute great part of their possessions liberally among the poor. The holy man seemed in the midst of them as a seraph incarnate, burning with heavenly ardors of divine love, and inflaming those who heard him speak. If he travelled, he rode or walked at a distance behind his brethren, reciting psalms, and watering his cheeks almost without ceasing with tears that flowed in great abundance.

The saint had always burned with an ardent desire of martyrdom, which was much increased by the glorious crowns of some of his disciples, especially of St. Boniface. At last, not able to contain the ardor of his charity and desire to give his life for his Redeemer, he obtained the pope's license, and set out to preach the gospel in Hungary, in which mission some of his disciples accompanied him. He had procured two of them to be consecrated archbishops by the pope, declining himself the episcopal dignity; but a violent illness which seized him on his entering Hungary, and returned as often as he attempted to proceed on his intended design, was a plain indication of the will of God in this matter; so he returned home with seven of his associates. The rest, with the two archbishops, went forward, and preached the faith under the holy king, St. Stephen, suffering much for Christ, but none obtained the crown of martyrdom. Romuald in his return built some monasteries in Germany, and labored to reform others; but this drew on him many persecutions. Yet all, even the great ones of the world, trembled in his presence. He refused to accept either water or wood, without {375} paying for it, from Raynerius; marquis of Tuscia, because that prince had married the wife of a relation whom he had killed. Raynerius, though a sovereign, used to say, that neither the emperor nor any mortal on earth could strike him with so much awe as Romuald's presence did. So powerful was the impression which the Holy Ghost, dwelling in his breast, made on the most haughty sinners. Hearing that a certain Venetian had by simony obtained the abbey of Classis, he hastened thither. The unworthy abbot strove to kill him, to preserve his unjust dignity. He often met with the like plots and assaults from several of his own disciples, which procured him the repeated merit, though not the crown, of martyrdom. The pope having called him to Rome, he wrought there several miracles, built some monasteries in its neighborhood, and converted innumerable souls to God. Returning from Rome, he made a long stay at Mount Sitria. A young nobleman addicted to impurity, being exasperated at this saint's severe remonstrances, had the impudence to accuse him of a scandalous crime. The monks, by a surprising levity, believed the calumny, enjoined him a most severe penance, forbid him to say mass, and excommunicated him. He bore all with patience and in silence, as if really he had been guilty, and refrained from going to the altar for six months. In the seventh month he was admonished by God to obey no longer so unjust and irregular a sentence pronounced without any authority and without grounds. He accordingly said mass again, and with such raptures of devotion, as obliged him to continue long absorbed in ecstasy. He passed seven years in Sitria, in his cell, in strict silence, but his example did the office of his tongue and moved many to penance. In bis old age, instead of relaxing, he increased his austerities and fasts. He had three hair-shirts which he now and then changed. He never would admit of the least thing to give a savor to the herbs or meal-gruel on which he supported himself. If any thing was brought him better dressed, he, for the greater self-denial, applied it to his nostrils, and said: "O gluttony, gluttony, thou shalt never taste this; perpetual war is declared against thee." His disciples also were remarkable for their austere lives, went always barefoot, and looked excessive pale with continual fasting. No other drink was known among them but water, except in sickness. St. Romuald wrought in this place many miraculous cures of the sick. At last, having settled his disciples here in a monastery which he had built for them, he departed for Bifurcum.

The holy emperor St. Henry II., who had succeeded Otho III., coming into Italy, and being desirous to see the saint, sent an honorable embassy to him to induce him to come to court. At the earnest request of his disciples he complied, but not without great reluctance on his side. The emperor received him with the greatest marks of honor and esteem, and rising out of his chair, said to him: "I wish my soul was like yours." The saint observed a strict silence the whole time the interview lasted, to the great astonishment of the court. The emperor being convinced that this did not proceed from pride or disdain, but from humility and a desire of being despised, was so far from being offended at it, that it occasioned his conceiving a higher esteem and veneration for him. The next day he received from him wholesome advice in his closet. The German noblemen showed him the greatest respect as he passed through the court, and plucked the very hairs out of his garments for relics, at which he was so much grieved, that he would have immediately gone back if he had not been stopped. The emperor gave him a monastery on Mount Amiatus.

The most famous of all his monasteries is that of Camaldoli, near Arezzo, in Tuscany, on the frontiers of the ecclesiastical state, thirty miles east from Florence, founded by him about the year 1009. It lies beyond a mountain, {376} very difficult to pass over, the descent from which, on the opposite side, is almost a direct precipice looking down upon a pleasant large valley, which then belonged to a lord called Maldoli, who gave it the saint, and from him it retained the name Camaldoli.[2] In this place St. Romuald built a monastery, and by the several observances he added to St. Benedict's rule, gave birth to that new order called Camaldoli, in which he united the cenobitic and eremitical life. After seeing in a vision his monks mounting up a ladder to heaven all in white, he changed their habit from black to white. The hermitage is two short miles distant from the monastery. It is a mountain quite overshaded by a dark wood of fir-trees. In it are seven clear springs of water. The very sight of this solitude in the midst of the forest helps to fill the mind with compunction, and a love of heavenly contemplation. On entering it, we meet with a chapel of St. Antony for travellers to pray in before they advance any further. Next are the cells and lodgings for the porters. Somewhat further is the church, which is large, well built, and richly adorned. Over the door is a clock, which strikes so loud that it may be heard all over the desert. On the left side of the church is the cell in which St. Romuald lived, when he first established these hermits. Their cells, built of stone, have each a little garden walled round. A constant fire is allowed to be kept in every cell, on account of the coldness of the air throughout the year: each cell has also a chapel in which they may say mass: they call their superior, major. The whole hermitage is now enclosed with a wall: none are allowed to go out of it; but they may walk in the woods and alleys within the enclosure at discretion. Every thing is sent them from the monastery in the valley: their food is every day brought to each cell; and all are supplied with wood and necessaries, that they may have no dissipation or hinderance in their contemplation. Many hours of the day are allotted to particular exercises; and no rain or snow stops any one from meeting in the church to assist at the divine office. They are obliged to strict silence in all public common places; and everywhere during their Lents, also on Sundays, Holydays, Fridays, and other days of abstinence, and always from Complin till prime the next day.

For a severer solitude, St. Romuald added a third kind of life; that of a recluse. After a holy life in the hermitage, the superior grants leave to any that ask it, and seem called by God, to live forever shut up in their cells, never speaking to any one but to the superior when he visits them, and to the brother who brings them necessaries. Their prayers and austerities are doubled, and their fasts more severe and more frequent. St. Romuald condemned himself to this kind of life for several years; and fervent imitators have never since failed in this solitude.

St. Romuald died in his monastery in the valley of Castro, in the marquisate of Ancona. As he was born about the year 956, he must have died seventy years and some months old, not a hundred and twenty, as the present copies of his life have it. The day of his death was the 19th of June; but his principal feast is appointed by Clement VIII. on the 7th of February, the day of his translation. His body was found entire and uncorrupt five years after his death, and again in 1466. But his tomb being sacrilegiously opened, and his body stolen in 1480, it fell to dust, in which state it was translated to Fabriano, and there deposited in the great church, all but the remains of one arm, sent to Camaldoli. God has honored his relics with many miracles. The order of Camaldoli is now divided into five congregations, under so many generals or majors. The life of the hermits is very severe, though something mitigated since the time of St. Romuald. The {377} Cenobites are more like Benedictines, and perhaps were not directly established by St. Romuald, says F. Helyot.

* * * * *

If we are not called to practise the extraordinary austerities of many saints, we cannot but confess that we lie under an indispensable necessity of leading mortified lives, both in order to fulfil our obligation of doing penance, and to subdue our passions and keep our senses and interior faculties under due command. The appetites of the body are only to be reduced by universal temperance, and assiduous mortification and watchfulness over all the senses. The interior powers of the soul must be restrained, as the imagination, memory, and understanding: their proneness to distraction, and the itching curiosity of the mind, must be curbed, and their repugnance to attend to spiritual things corrected by habits of recollection, holy meditation, and prayer. Above all, the will must be rendered supple and pliant by frequent self-denial, which must reach and keep in subjection all its most trifling sallies and inclinations. If any of these, how insignificant soever they may seem, are not restrained and vanquished, they will prove sufficient often to disturb the quiet of the mind, and betray one into considerable inconveniences, faults, and follies. Great weaknesses are sometimes fed by temptations which seem almost of too little moment to deserve notice. And though these infirmities should not arise to any great height, they always fetter the soul, and are an absolute impediment to her progress towards perfection.

Footnotes: 1. Sanuti tells us, that St. Peter Urseoli, from his cradle, devoted himself with his whole heart to the divine service, and proposed to himself in all his actions the holy will and the greater glory of God. He built in the church of St. Mark a chapel, in which the body of that evangelist was secretly laid, the place being known by very few. Being chosen doge, he refused that dignity for a long time with great obstinacy, but at length suffered himself to be overcome by the importunity of the people. He had held it only two years and eight months, when he retired. Sanuti. Vite de Duchi di Venezia, c. 976. Maramri, Rerum Italicar. Scriptores, t. 22, p. 564. 2. Contracted from Campo Maldoli.

ST. RICHARD, KING AND C.

THIS saint was an English prince, in the kingdom of the West-Saxons, and was perhaps deprived of his inheritance by some revolution in the state or he renounced it to be more at liberty to dedicate himself to the pursuit of Christian perfection. His three children, Winebald, Willibald, and Warburga, are all honored as saints. Taking with him his two sons, he undertook a pilgrimage of penance and devotion, and sailing from Hamble-haven, landed in Neustria on the western coasts of France. He made a considerable stay at Rouen, and made his devotions in the most holy places that lay in his way through France. Being arrived at Lucca in Italy, in his road to Rome, he there died suddenly, about the year 722, and was buried in St. Fridian's church there. His relics are venerated to this day in the same place, and his festival kept at Lucca with singular devotion. St. Richard, when living, obtained by his prayers the recovery of his younger son Willibald, whom he laid at the foot of a great crucifix erected in a public place in England, when the child's life was despaired of in a grievous sickness and since his death, many have experienced the miraculous power of his intercession with God, especially where his relics invite the devotion of the faithful. His festival is kept at Lucca, and his name honored in the Roman Martyrology on the 7th of February. See the Life of St. Willibald by his cousin, a nun of Heidenhelm, to Canisius's Lectiones Antiquae, with the notes of Basnage. Henschenius, Feb. t. 2, p. 70.

ST. THEODORUS OF HERACLEA, M.

AMONG those holy martyrs whom the Greeks honor with the title of Megalomartyrs, (i.e. great martyrs,) as St. George, St. Pantaleon, &c., four are {378} distinguished by them above the rest as principal patrons, namely, St. Theodorus of Heraclea, surnamed Stratilates, (i.e. general of the army,) St. Theodorus of Amasea, surnamed Tyro, St. Procopius, and St. Demetrius. The first was general of the forces of Licinius, and governor of the country of the Mariandyni, who occupied part of Bithynia, Pontus, and Paphlagonia, whose capital at that time was Heraclea of Pontus, though originally a city of Greeks, being founded by a colony from Megara. This was the place of our saint's residence, and here he glorified God by martyrdom, being beheaded for his faith by an order of the emperor Licinius, the 7th of February, on a Saturday, in 319, as the Greek Menaea and Menologies all agree: for the Greek Acts of his martyrdom, under the name of Augarus, are of no authority. It appears from a Novella of the emperor Manuel Comnenus, and from Balsamon's Scholia on the Nomocanon of Photius,[1] that the Greeks kept as semi-festivals, that is, as holydays till noon, both the 7th of February, which was the day of his martyrdom, and that of the translation of his relics, the 8th of June, when they were conveyed soon after his death, according to his own appointment, to Euchaia, or Euchaitae, where was the burial-place of his ancestors, a day's journey from Amasea, the capital of all Pontus. This town became so famous for his shrine, that the name of Theodoropolis was given it; and out of devotion to this saint, pilgrims resorted thither from all parts of the east, as appears from the Spiritual Meadow,[2] Zonaras,[3] and Cedrenus.[4] The two latter historians relate, that the emperor John I., surnamed Zemisces, about the year 970, ascribed a great victory which he gained over the Saracens, to the patronage of this martyr: and in thanksgiving rebuilt in a stately manner the church where his relics were deposited at Euchaitae.[5] The republic of Venice has a singular veneration for the memory of St. Theodorus of Heraclea, who, as Bernard Justiniani proves,[6] was titular patron of the church of St. Mark in that city, before the body of that evangelist was translated into it from another part of the city. A famous statue of this St. Theodorus is placed upon one of the two fine pillars which stand in the square of St. Mark. The relics of this glorious martyr are honored in the magnificent church of St. Saviour at Venice, whither they were brought by Mark Dandolo in 1260, from Constantinople; James Dandolo having sent them to that capital from Mesembria, an archiepiscopal maritime town in Romania, or the coast of Thrace, when in 1256 he scoured the Euxine sea with a fleet of galleys of the republic, as the Venetian historians inform us.[7] See archbishop Falconius, Not. in Tabulis Cappon. and Jos. Assemani in Calend. Univ. on the 8th and 17th of February, and the 8th of June;[8] also Lubin. Not. in Martyr. Rom. p. 283, and the Greek Synaxary.

Footnotes: 1. Tit. 7, c. 1, Thomassin, l. 1, c. 7, n. 3. 2. Prat. Spir. c. 180. 3. Zonar. 3, parte Annal. 4. Ced. in Joanne Zemisce Imp. 5. See Baronius in his notes on the Martyrology, (ad 9 Nov.,) who justly censures those who confound this saint with St. Theodoras Tyro, as Fabricius has since done. (t. 9, Bibl. Graecae, p. 147.) Yet himself falsely places Tyro's shrine at Euchaitae, and ascribes to him these pilgrimages and miracles which certainly belong to St. Theodorus Stratilates, or of Heraclea. 6. De Rebus Venetis, l. 6. 7. Sansovin, l. 13, Hist. &c. 8. The modern Greeks have transferred his feast from the 7th to the 8th of February.

ST. TRESAIN, IN LATIN, TRESANUS, PRIEST, C.

He was a holy Irish priest, who, having left his own country, preached with great zeal in France, and died curate of Mareuil upon the Marne, in the sixth century. His relics are held in great veneration at Avenay in Champagne. See his life in Colgan and Bollandus.

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ST. AUGULUS, B M.

HIS name occurs with the title of bishop in all the manuscript copies of the ancient Western Martyrology, which bears the name of St. Jerom. That of the abbey of Esternach, which is very old, and several others, style him martyr. He probably received that crown soon after St. Alban. All martyrologies place him in Britain, and at Augusta, which name was given to London, as Amm. Marcellinus mentions; never to York, for which Henschenius would have it to be taken in this place, because it was at that time the capital of Britain. In the ancient copy of Bede's martyrology, which was used at St. Agnan's at Orleans, he is called St. Augustus; in some others St. Augurius. The French call him St. Aule. Chatelain thinks him to be the same saint who is famous in some parts of Normandy under the name of St. Ouil.

FEBRUARY VIII.

ST. JOHN OF MATHA,

FOUNDER OF THE ORDER OF THE TRINITARIANS

From several bulls of Innocent III. and the many authors of his life, especially that compiled by Robert Gagnin, the learned general of this Order, in 1490, collected by Baillet, and the Hist. des Ordres Relig. by F. Helyot. See also Annales Ordinis SS. Trinitatis, auctore Bon. Baro, Ord. Minor. Romae. 1684, and Regula et Statuta Ord. SS. Trinitatis, in 12mo. 1570.

A.D. 1213.

ST. JOHN was born of very pious and noble parents, at Faucon, on the borders of Provence, June the 24th, 1169, and was baptized John, in honor of St. John the Baptist. His mother dedicated him to God by a vow from his infancy. His father, Euphemius, sent him to Aix, where he learned grammar, fencing, riding, and other exercises fit for a young nobleman. But his chief attention was to advance in virtue. He gave the poor a considerable part of the money his parents sent him for his own use: he visited the hospital every Friday, assisting the poor sick, dressing and cleansing their sores, and affording them all the comfort in his power.

Being returned home, he begged his father's leave to continue the pious exercises he had begun, and retired to a little hermitage not far from Faucon, with the view of living at a distance from the world, and united to God alone by mortification and prayer. But finding his solitude interrupted by the frequent visits of his friends, he desired his father's consent to go to Paris to study divinity, which he easily obtained. He went through these more sublime studies with extraordinary success, and proceeded doctor of divinity with uncommon applause, though his modesty gave him a reluctancy in that honor. He was soon after ordained priest, and said his first mass in the bishop of Paris's chapel, at which the bishop himself, Maurice de Sully, the abbots of St. Victor and of St. Genevieve. and the rector of the {380} university, assisted; admiring the graces of heaven in him, which appeared in his extraordinary devotion on this occasion, as well as at his ordination.

On the day he said his first mass, by a particular inspiration from God, he came to a resolution of devoting himself to the occupation of ransoming Christian slaves from the captivity they groaned under among the infidels: considering it as one of the highest acts of charity with respect both to their souls and bodies. But before he entered upon so important a work, he thought it needful to spend some time in retirement, prayer, and mortification. And having heard of a holy hermit, St. Felix Valois, living in a great wood near Gandelu, in the diocese of Meux, he repaired to him and begged he would admit him into his solitude, and instruct him in the practice of perfection. Felix soon discovered him to be no novice, and would not treat him as a disciple, but as a companion. It is incredible what progress these two holy solitaries made in the paths of virtue, by perpetual prayer, contemplation, fasting, and watching.

One day, sitting together on the bank of a spring, John disclosed to Felix the design he had conceived on the day on which he said his first mass, to succor the Christians under the Mahometan slavery, and spoke so movingly upon the subject that Felix was convinced that the design was from God, and offered him his joint concurrence to carry it into execution. They took some time to recommend it to God by prayer and fasting, and then set out for Rome in the midst of a severe winter, towards the end of the year 1197, to obtain the pope's benediction. They found Innocent III. promoted to the chair of St. Peter, who being already informed of their sanctity and charitable design by letters of recommendation from the bishop of Paris, his holiness received them as two angels from heaven; lodged them in his own palace, and gave them many long private audiences. After which he assembled the cardinals and some bishops in the palace of St. John Lateran, and asked their advice. After their deliberations he ordered a fast and particular prayers to know the will of heaven. At length, being convinced that these two holy men were led by the spirit of God, and that great advantages would accrue to the church from such an institute, he consented to their erecting a new religious order, and declared St. John the first general minister. The bishop of Paris, and the abbot of St. Victor, were ordered to draw up their rules, which the pope approved by a bull, in 1198. He ordered the religious to wear a white habit, with a red and blue cross on the breast, and to take the name of the order of the Holy Trinity. He confirmed it some time after, adding new privileges by a second bull, dated in 1209.

The two founders having obtained the pope's blessing and certain indults or privileges, returned to France, and presented themselves to the king, Philip Augustus, who authorized the establishment of their Order in his kingdom, and favored it with his liberalities. Gaucher III., lord of Chatillon, gave them land whereon to build a convent. Their number increasing, the same lord, seconded by the king, gave them Cerfroid, the place in which St. John and St. Felix concerted the first plan of their institute. It is situated in Brie, on the confines of Valois. This house of Cerfroid, or De Cervo frigido, is the chief of the order. The two saints founded many other convents in France, and sent several of their religious to accompany the counts of Flanders and Blois, and other lords, to the holy war. Pope Innocent III. wrote to recommend these religious to Miramolin, king of Morocco; and St. John sent thither two of his religions in 1201, who redeemed one hundred and eighty-six Christian slaves the first voyage. The year following, St. John went himself to Tunis, where he purchased the liberty of one hundred and ten more. He returned into Provence, and there received great charities, which he carried into Spain, and redeemed many in captivity {381} under the Moors. On his return he collected large alms among the Christians towards this charitable undertaking. His example produced a second order of Mercy, instituted by St. Peter Nolasco, in 1235.

St. John made a second voyage to Tunis in 1210, in which he suffered much from the infidels, enraged at his zeal and success in exhorting the poor slaves to patience and constancy in their faith. As he was returning with one hundred and twenty slaves he had ransomed, the barbarians took away the helm from his vessel, and tore all its sails, that they might perish in the sea. The saint, full of confidence in God, begged him to be their pilot, and hung up his companions' cloaks for sails, and, with a crucifix in his hands, kneeling on the deck, singing psalms, after a prosperous voyage, they all landed safe at Ostia, in Italy. Felix, by this time, had greatly propagated his order in France, and obtained for it a convent in Paris, in a place where stood before a chapel of St. Mathurin, whence these religious in France are called Mathurins.

St. John lived two years more in Rome, which he employed in exhorting all to penance with great energy and fruit. He died on the 21st of December, in 1213, aged sixty-one. He was buried in his church of St. Thomas, where his monument yet remains, though his body has been translated into Spain. Pope Honorius III. confirmed the rule of this order a second time. By the first rule, they were not permitted to buy any thing for their sustenance except bread, pulse, herbs, oil, eggs, milk, cheese, and fruit; never flesh nor fish: however, they might eat flesh on the principal festivals, on condition it was given them. They were not, in travelling, to ride on any beasts but asses.[1]

* * * * *

St. Chrysostom[2] elegantly and pathetically extols the charity of the widow of Sarepta, whom neither poverty nor children, nor hunger, nor fear of death, withheld from affording relief to the prophet Elias, and he exhorts every one to meditate on her words, and keep her example present to his mind. "How hard or insensible soever we are," says he, "they will make a deep impression upon us, and we shall not be able to refuse relief to the poor, when we have before our eyes the generous charity of this widow. It is true, you will tell me, that if you meet with a prophet in want, you could not refuse doing him all the good offices in your power. But what ought you not to do for Jesus Christ, who is the master of the prophets? He takes whatsoever you do to the poor as done to himself." When we consider the zeal and joy with which the saints sacrificed themselves for their neighbors, how must we blush at, and condemn our insensibility at the spiritual and the corporal calamities of others! The saints regarded affronts, labors, and pains, as nothing for the service of others in Christ: we cannot bear the least word or roughness of temper.

Footnotes: 1. A mitigation of this rule was approved by pope Clement IV. in 1267, which allows them to use horses, and to buy fish, flesh, and all other necessaries: on which mitigations see Historia prolixior Priorum Grandimont, published by Martenne, Ampliff. Collectio, t. 6, p. 138. This order is possessed of about two hundred and fifty monasteries, divided into thirteen provinces, in France, Spain, Italy, and Portugal. That formerly in England had forty-three houses; that in Scotland nine, and that in Ireland fifty-two. The general of the order is chosen by a general chapter, which is always held at Cerfroid. Each house is governed by a superior who is called minister. Those in the provinces of Champagne, Normandy, and Picardy (which last includes Flanders) are perpetual but to Italy and Spain, triennial. Their rule is that of the canons regular of St. Austin. Their principal exercises are to sing the divine office at the canonical hours, praising and glorifying the adorable Trinity, as angel of the earth; and to gather and carry alms in Barbary for the redemption of slaves, to which work one third of the revenues of each house is applied. A reformation was made in this order in the years 1573 and 1576, which, by degrees, has been introduced into the greater part of the convents, and into that of Cerfroid itself. These never eat meat except on Sundays, sing matins at midnight, and wear no linen. The reformation of the barefooted Trinitarians, still much more severe, was set on foot in Spain, in 1594, by John Baptist of the Conception, who suffered many persecutions in the undertaking, and died in 1613, in great reputation for sanctity and miracles, the examination of which has been commenced in order to his beatification. 2. Hom. de Eila et Vidua Sarept. pp. 33, 338, ed. Montf.

{382}

ST. STEPHEN OF GRANDMONT, ABBOT.

His life was written by Stephen de Liciaco, fourth prior of Grandmont, in 1141: but this work seems now lost. Gerard Ithier, seventh prior, and his abridger, fell into several anachronisms and mistakes, which are to be corrected by the remarks of Dom Martenne, who has given us a new and accurate edition of this life, and other pieces relating to it, Ver. Scriptorum Ampliff. Collectio, t. 6, p. 1043. See also Dom Rivet, Hist. Litter. de la France, t. 10, p. 410. Gallia Christ. Nova, t. 2, p. 646.

A.D. 1124.

ST. STEPHEN was son of the virtuous viscount of Thiers, the first nobleman of Auvergne. From his infancy he gave presages of an uncommon sanctity. Milo, a pious priest, at that time dean of the church of Paris, was appointed his tutor, and being made bishop of Beneventum in 1074, kept the saint with him, continued to instruct him in sacred learning, and in the maxims of Christian perfection, and ordained him deacon. After his death in 1076, Stephen pursued his studies in Rome during four years. All this time he seemed to himself continually solicited by an interior voice to seek a sanctuary for his soul in holy solitude, considering the dangers of the pastoral charge, the obligations of leading a penitential life, and the happiness of the exercises of holy retirement. He desired to imitate the rigorous institute of a certain monastery which he had seen in Calabria, and obtained leave of pope Gregory VII. to embrace an eremitical life. He therefore returned to the castle of Thiers, the seat of his late parents, to settle his affairs. He had always been their favorite child, and regarded by them as the blessing bestowed on their prayers and fasts, by which they had begged him of God. Being both exceeding pious, they had rejoiced to see him so virtuously inclined; but they being now dead, his other friends vehemently opposed his design of renouncing the world. Stephen left them privately, and travelling through many deserts, arrived at Muret, a desolate, barren mountain, in the neighborhood of Limoges, haunted by wild beasts, and of an exceeding cold situation. Here he took up his abode, and, by a vow, consecrated himself to the divine service, in these words: "I, Stephen, renounce the devil and his pomps, and do offer and dedicate myself to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, one God in three Persons." This engagement he wrote and kept always by him with a ring as the symbol. He built himself a hut with the boughs of trees, and in this place passed forty-six years in prayer, and the practice of such austerities as almost surpassed the strength of a human body.[1] He lived at first on wild herbs and roots. In the second summer he was discovered by certain shepherds, who brought him a little coarse bread; which some country people from that time continued to do as long as he lived. He always wore next his skin a hair-cloth with iron plates and hoops studded with sharp spikes, over which his only garment, made of the coarsest stuff, was the same both in summer and winter. When overcome by sleep, he took a short rest on rough boards, laid in the form of a coffin. When he was not employed in manual labor, he lay prostrate on the ground in profound adoration of the majesty of God. The sweetness which he felt in divine contemplation made him often forget to take any refreshment for two or three days together. When sixty years of {383} age, finding his stomach exceeding weak, he suffered a few drops of wine to be mixed with the water which he drank.

Many were desirous to live with him and become his disciples. Though most rigorous to himself, he was mild to those under his direction, and proportioned their mortifications to their strength. But he allowed no indulgence with regard to the essential points of a solitary life, silence, poverty, and the denial of self-will. He often exhorted his disciples to a total disengagement of their hearts from all earthly things, and to a love of holy poverty for that purpose. He used to say to those who desired to be admitted into his community: "This is a prison without either door or hole whereby to return into the world, unless a person makes for himself a breach. And should this misfortune befall you, I could not send after you, none here having any commerce with the world any more than myself." He behaved himself among his disciples as the last of them, always taking the lowest place, never suffering any one to rise up to him; and while they were at table, he would seat himself on the ground in the midst of them, and read to them the lives of the saints. God bestowed on him a divine light, by which he often told others their secret thoughts. The author of his life gives a long history of miracles which he wrought. But the conversions of many obstinate sinners were still more miraculous: it seemed as if no heart could resist the grace which accompanied his words.

Two cardinals coming into France, as legates to the king from the pope, one of whom was afterwards pope Innocent II., paid the saint a visit to his desert. They asked him whether he was a canon, a monk, or a hermit. He said he was none of those. Being pressed to declare what he was: "We are sinners," said he, "whom the mercy of God hath conducted into this wilderness to do penance. The pope himself hath imposed on us these exercises, at our request, for our sins. Our imperfection and frailty deprive us of courage to imitate the fervor of those holy hermits who lived in divine contemplation almost without any thought for their bodies. You see that we neither wear the habit of monks nor of canons. We are still further from usurping those names, which we respect and honor at a distance in the persons of the priests, and in the sanctity of the monks. We are poor, wretched sinners, who, terrified at the rigor of the divine justice, still hope, with trembling, by this means, to find mercy from our Lord Jesus Christ in the day of his judgment." The legates departed exceedingly edified at what they saw and heard. Eight days after the saint was admonished by God of the end of his mortal course, after which he most earnestly sighed. He redoubled his fervor in all his exercises, and falling sick soon after, gave his disciples his last instructions, and exhorted them to a lively confidence in God, to whom he recommended them by a humble prayer. His exhortation was so moving and strong that it dispelled their fears in losing him, and they seemed to enter into his own sentiments. He caused himself to be carried into the chapel, where he heard mass, received extreme unction and the viaticum: and on the 8th day of February, 1124, being fourscore years old, expired in peace, repeating those words: "Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit." He had passed in his desert fifty years, bating two months. His disciples buried him privately, to prevent the crowds of people breaking in. But the news of his death drew incredible numbers to his tomb, which was honored by innumerable miracles. Four months after his death, the priory of Ambazac, dependent on the great Benedictin abbey of St. Austin, to Limoges, put in a claim to the land of Muret. The disciples of the holy man, who had inherited his maxims and spirit, abandoned the ground to them without any contention, and retired to Grandmont, a desert one league distant, carrying with them his precious remains. From this place the order {384} took its name. The saint was canonized by Clement III., in 1189, at the request of king Henry II. of England. See Gallia Christ. Nova, t. 2, p. 646.

APPENDIX

TO

THE LIFE OF ST. STEPHEN OF GRANDMONT.

Such was the fervor and sanctity of the first disciples of St. Stephen of Grandmont, that they were the admiration of the world in the age wherein they lived. Peter, the learned and pious abbot of Celles, calls them angels, and testifies that he placed an extraordinary confidence in their prayers. (Petr. Cellens. ep. 8.) John of Salisbury, a contemporary author, represents them as men who, being raised above the necessities of life, had conquered not only sensuality and avarice, but even nature itself. (Joan. Salisb. Poly. l. 7, c. 23.) Stephen, bishop of Tournay, speaks of them in as high strains. (Steph. Tournac. ep. 2.) Trithemius, Yepez, and Miraeus, imagined that St. Stephen made the rule of St. Bennet the basis of his order; and Mabillon at first embraced this opinion, (Mabill. Praef. in part 2, sec. 6, Bened.,) but changed it afterwards, (Annul. Bened. l. 64, n. 37 and 112,) proving that this saint neither followed the rule of Saint Bennet nor that of St. Austin. Dom Martenne has set this in a much fuller light in his preface to the sixth tome of his great collection. (Amplise Collect. t. 6, n. 20, &c.) Baillet, Helyot, and some others, pretend that St. Stephen never wrote any thing himself, and that his rule was compiled by some of his successors from his sayings, and from the discipline which he had established. But some of the very passages to which these critics appeal, suffice to confute them, and St. Stephen declares himself the author of the written rule both in the prologue, and in several other places, (Regula Grandim. c. 9, 11, 14,) as Mabillon, or rather Martenne, (who was author of this addition to his annals,) takes notice. (Annal. t. 6, l. 74, n. 9l.) The rule of this holy founder consists of seventy-five chapters. In a pathetic prologue he puts his disciples in mind, that the rule of rules, and the origin of all monastic rules, is the gospel: they are but streams derived from this source, and in it are all the means of arriving at Christian perfection pointed out. He recommends strict poverty and obedience, as the foundation of a religious life; forbids his religious ever to receive any retributions for their masses, or to open the door of their oratory to secular persons on Sundays or holydays, because on these days they ought to attend their parish churches. He forbids his religious all lawsuits. (Reg. c. 15. See Chatelain, Notes sur le Martyr. p. 378.) He forbids them the use of flesh meat even in time of sickness, and prescribes rigorous fasts, with only one meal a day for a great part of the year. This rule, which was approved by Urban III. in 1186, was mitigated by pope Innocent IV. in 1247, and again by Clement V. in 1309. It is printed at Rouen in 1672. Besides this rule, certain maxims or instructions of St. Stephen are extant, and were collected together by his disciples after his death. They were printed at Paris in Latin and French, in 1704. Baillet published a new translation of them in 1707. In them we admire the beauty and fruitfulness of the author's genius, and still much more the great sentiments of virtue which they contain, especially concerning temptations, vain-glory, ambition, the sweetness of God's service, and his holy commandments; the obligation without bounds which all men have of loving God, the incomprehensible advantages of praising him, the necessity of continually advancing in fervor, and of continually gathering, by the practice of good works, new flowers, of which the garland of our lives ought to be composed. This useful collection might doubtless have been made much more ample by his disciples. Several other holy maxims and short lessons delivered by him, occur in the most ancient of his lives, entitled, Stephani Dicta et Facta, compiled by the care of St. Stephen de Liciaco. (Martenne, t. 6, p. 1046.)

Footnotes: 1. William of Dandina, an accurate writer, in the life of Hugh of Lacerta, the most famous among the first disciples of St. Stephen, published by Martenne, (t. 6, p. 1143,) says, that the saint died in the forty-sixth year after his conversion. His retreat, therefore, cannot be dated before the year 1076, and the foundation of his order, which some place in 1076, must have been posterior to this. Gerard Ithier mistakes when he says that St. Stephen went to Benevento in the twelfth year of his age; and remained there twelve years. He went only then to Paris to Milo, who was bishop only two years. See Martenne, p. 1053.

ST. PAUL, BISHOP OF VERDUN, C.

HAVING lived in the world a perfect pattern of perfection by alms, fasts, assiduous prayer, meekness, and charity, he retired among the hermits of {385} Mount Voge, near Triers, on a hill called from him Paulberg. King Dagobert placed him in the episcopal chair of Verdun, and was his protector in his zealous labors and ample foundations of that church. The saint died in 631. See his authentic anonymous life in Henschenius. Also Calmet, Hist. de Lorraine, t. 1, l. 9, n. 41, p. 402. Bollandus, Feb. t. 2, p. 169.

ST. CUTHMAN, C.

THE spiritual riches of divine grace were the happy portion of this saint, who seemed from his cradle formed to perfect virtue. His name demonstrates him to have been an English-Saxon, not of British extraction, either from Wales or Cornwall, as Bollandus conjectured. He was born in the southern parts of England, and, from the example of his pious parents, inherited the most perfect spirit of Christian piety. From his infancy he never once transgressed their orders in the least article, and when sent by his father to keep his sheep, he never failed coming home exactly at the time appointed. This employment afforded him an opportunity of consecrating his affections to God, by the exercises of holy prayer, which only necessary occasions seemed to interrupt, and which he may be said to have always continued in spirit, according to that of the spouse in the Canticles: I sleep, but my heart watcheth. By the constant union of his soul with God, and application to the functions and exercises of the angels, the affections of his soul were rendered daily more and more pure, and his sentiments and whole conduct more heavenly and angelical. What gave his prayer this wonderful force in correcting and transforming his affections, was the perfect spirit of simplicity, disengagement from creatures, self-denial, meekness, humility, obedience, and piety, in which it was founded. We find so little change in our souls by our devotions, because we neglect the practice of self-denial and mortification, live wedded to the world, and slaves to our senses and to self-love, which is an insuperable obstacle to this principal effect of holy prayer. Cuthman, after the death of his father, employed his whole fortune and all that he gained by the labor of his hands, in supporting his decrepit mother: and afterwards was not ashamed to beg for her subsistence. To furnish her necessaries by the sweat of his brow, and by the charitable succors of others, he removed to several places; nor is it to be expressed what hardships and austerities he voluntarily and cheerfully suffered, which he embraced as part of his penance, increasing their severity in order more perfectly to die to himself and to his senses, and sanctifying them by the most perfect dispositions in which he bore them. Finding, at a place called Steninges, a situation according to his desire, he built there a little cottage to be a shelter from the injuries of the air, in which, with his mother, he might devote himself to the divine service, without distraction. His hut was no sooner finished but he measured out the ground near it for the foundation of a church, which he dug with his own hands. The inhabitants, animated by his piety and zeal, contributed liberally to assist him in completing this work. The holy man worked himself all day, conversing at the same time in his heart with God, and employed a considerable part of the night in prayer. Here he said in his heart: "Whither shall I go from thy spirit, O Lord! this is the place of my rest for ever and ever, in which I will every day render to thee my vows." His name was rendered famous by many miracles, of which God was pleased to make him the instrument, both living and after his death. He flourished about the eighth century, and his relics were honored at Steninges. This place Saint Edward {386} the Confessor bestowed on the great abbey of Fecam in Normandy, which was enriched with a portion of his relics. This donation of Steninges, together with Rye, Berimunster, and other neighboring places, made to the abbey of Fecam, was confirmed to the same by William the Conqueror, and the two first Henries, whose charters are still kept among the archives of that house, and were shown me there. This parish, and that of Rye, were of the exemption of Fecam, that is, were not subject to the jurisdiction of the diocesan, but to this abbey, as twenty-four parishes in Normandy are to this day. For in the enumeration of the parishes which belong to this exemption in the bulls of several popes, in which it is confirmed, Steninges and Rye are always mentioned with this additional clause, that those places are situated in England.[1] St. Cuthman was titular patron of Steninges or Estaninges, and is honored to this day, on the 8th of February, in the great abbeys of Fecam, Jumieges, and others in Normandy: and his name occurs in the old Missal, used by the English Saxons before the Norman conquest, kept in the monastery of Jumieges, in which a proper mass is assigned for his feast on the 8th of February. In the account of the principal shrines of relics of saints, honored anciently in England, published by the most learned Dr. Hickes, mention is made of St. Cuthman's, as follows: "At Steninge, on the river Bramber, among the South-Saxons, rests St. Cuthman." See Narratio de Sanctis qui in Anglia quiescunt, published by Hickes, in his Thesaurus Linguarum veterum Septentr. t. 1, in Dissert. Epistol. p. 121. See also two lives of St. Cuthman, in Bollandus, t. 2, Feb. p. 197, and the more accurate lessons for his festival in the breviary of Fecam. He is honored in most of the Benedictin abbeys in Normandy.

Footnotes: 1. Bollandus had not seen these charters and bulls, or he could not have supposed Steninges to be situated in Normandy, and St. Cuthman to have died in that province. Dom Le Noir, a learned Benedictin monk of the congregation of St. Maur, and library-keeper at Fecam, who is employed in compiling a history of Normandy, gives me the following information by a letter from Fecam: "On tient ici a Feca, pas une espece de tradition que Hastings, port d'Angleterre, sur la Manche, dens le comte de Sossex, et dans le voisinage de Rye, est le Staninges de l'Abbaye de Fecam. Si le nom est un pen different aujourd'hui on voit des noms des lieux qui ont souffert des plus grandes alterations." This pretended tradition is an evident mistake. Hastings was a famous sea-port under the same name, in the ninth century, and Stening is at this day a borough in Sussex, situated under the reins of Bramber castle, not far from the river, which was formerly navigable so high, though at present even Shoreham at its month has no harbor, the sea having made frequent changes on this coast, especially in the twelfth century.

FEBRUARY IX.

ST. APOLLONIA, VIRGIN AND MARTYR.

Her acts are of no authority, and falsely place her triumph at Rome, instead of Alexandria. See Tillemont, t. 3, p. 495. Her authentic history is in the letter of St. Dionysius, then bishop of Alexandria, preserved by Eusebius, l. 6, c. 41, 42, p. 236. Ed. Val.

A.D. 249.

ST. DIONYSIUS of Alexandria wrote to Fabius, bishop of Antioch, a relation of the persecution raised at Alexandria by the heathen populace of that city, in the last year of the reign of the emperor Philip. A certain poet of Alexandria, who pretended to foretell things to come, stirred up this great city against the Christians on the motive of religion. The first victim of their rage was a venerable old man, named Metras, or Metrius, whom they would have compelled to utter impious words against the worship of {387} the true God: which, when he refused to do, they beat him with staffs, thrust splinters of reeds into his eyes, and having dragged him into one of the suburbs, stoned him to death. The next person they seized was a Christian woman, called Quinta, whom they carried to one of their temples to pay divine worship to the idol. She loaded the execrable divinity with many reproaches, which so exasperated the people that they dragged her by the heels upon the pavement of sharp pebbles, cruelly scourged her, and put her to the same death. The rioters, by this time, were in the height of their fury. Alexandria seemed like a city taken by storm. The Christians mads no opposition, but betook themselves to flight, and beheld the loss of their goods with joy; for their hearts had no ties on earth. Their constancy was equal to their disinterestedness; for of all who fell into their hands, St. Dionysius knew of none that renounced Christ.

The admirable Apollonia, whom old age and the state of virginity rendered equally venerable, was seized by them. Their repeated blows on her jaws beat out all her teeth. At last they made a great fire without the city, and threatened to cast her into it, if she did not utter certain impious words. She begged a moment's delay, as if it had been to deliberate on the proposal; but, to convince her persecutors that her sacrifice was perfectly voluntary, she no sooner found herself at liberty, than of her own accord she leaped into the flames. They next exercised their fury on a holy man called Serapion, and tortured him in his own house with great cruelty. After bruising his limbs, disjointing and breaking his bones, they threw him headlong from the top of the house on the pavement, and so completed his martyrdom. A civil war among the pagan citizens put an end to their fury this year, but the edict of Decius renewed it in 250. See the rest of the relation on the 27th of February. An ancient church in Rome, which is frequented with great devotion, bears the name of St. Apollonia: under whose patronage we meet with churches and altars in most parts of the Western church.

* * * * *

The last part of our saint's conduct is not proposed to our imitation, as self-murder is unjustifiable. If any among the Fathers have commended it, they presumed, with St. Austin, that it was influenced by a particular direction of the Holy Ghost, or was the effect of a pious simplicity, founded in motives of holy zeal and charity. For it can never be lawful for a person by any action wilfully to concur to, or hasten his own death, though many martyrs out of an ardent charity, and desire of laying down their lives for God, and being speedily united to him, anticipated the executioners in completing their sacrifice. Among the impious, absurd, and false maxims of the Pagan Greeks and Romans, scarce any thing was more monstrous than the manner in which they canonized suicide in distress, as a remedy against temporal miseries, and a point of heroism. To bear infamy and all kind of sufferings with unshaken constancy and virtue, is true courage and greatness of soul, and the test and triumph of virtue: and to sink under misfortunes, is the most unworthy baseness of soul. But what name can we find for the pusillanimity of those who are not able so much as to look humiliations, poverty, or affliction in the face? Our life we hold of God, and he who destroys it injures God, to whom he owes it. He refuses also to his friends and to the republic of mankind, the comfort and succors which they are entitled in justice or charity to receive from him. Moreover, if to murder another is the greatest temporal injustice a man can commit against a neighbor, life being of all temporal blessings the greatest and most noble, suicide is a crime so much more enormous, as the charity which every one owes to himself, especially to his immortal soul, is stricter, {388} more noble and of a superior order to that which he owes to his neighbor.

SAINT NICEPHORUS, M.

From his genuine Acts in Ruinart, p. 244. Tillemont, t. 4, p. 16.

THERE dwelt in Antioch a priest called Sapricius, and a layman, named Nicephorus, who had been linked together for many years by the strictest friendship. But the enemy of mankind sowing between them the seeds of discord, this their friendship was succeeded by the most implacable hatred, and they declined meeting each other in the streets. Thus it continued a considerable time. At length, Nicephorus, entering into himself, and reflecting on the grievousness of the sin of hatred, resolved on seeking a reconciliation. He accordingly deputed some friends to go to Sapricius to beg his pardon, promising him all reasonable satisfaction for the injury done him. But the priest refused to forgive him. Nicephorus sent other friends to him on the same errand, but though they pressed and entreated him to be reconciled, Sapricius was inflexible. Nicephorus sent a third time, but to no purpose; Sapricius having shut his ears not to men only, but to Christ himself, who commands us to forgive as we ourselves hope to be forgiven. Nicephorus, finding him deaf to the remonstrances of their common friends, went in person to his house, and casting himself at his feet, owned his fault, and begged pardon for Christ's sake; but all in vain.

The persecution suddenly began to rage under Valerian and Gallien in the year 260. Sapricius was apprehended and brought before the governor, who asked him his name. "It is Sapricius," answered he. Governor. "Of what profession are you?" Sapricius. "I am a Christian." Governor. "Are you of the clergy?" Sapricius. "I have the honor to be a priest." He added: "We Christians acknowledge one Lord and Master Jesus Christ, who is God; the only and true God, who created heaven and earth. The gods of nations are devils." The president, exasperated at his answer, gave orders for him to be put into an engine, like a screw-press, which the tyrants had invented to torment the faithful. The excessive pain of this torture did not shake Sapricius's constancy, and he said to the judges: "My body is in your power; but my soul you cannot touch. Only my Saviour Jesus Christ is master of this." The president seeing him so resolute, pronounced this sentence: "Sapricius, priest of the Christians, who is ridiculously persuaded that he shall rise again, shall be delivered over to the executioner of public justice to have his head severed from his body, because he has contemned the edict of the emperors."

Sapricius seemed to receive the sentence with great cheerfulness, and was to haste to arrive at the place of execution in hopes of his crown. Nicephorus ran out to meet him, and casting himself at his feet, said: "Martyr of Jesus Christ, forgive me my offence." But Sapricius made him no answer. Nicephorus waited for him in another street which he was to pass through, and as soon as he saw him coming up, broke through the crowd, and falling again at his feet, conjured him to pardon the fault he had committed against him, through frailty rather than design. This he begged by the glorious confession he had made of the divinity of Jesus Christ. Sapricius's heart was more and more hardened, and now he would not so much as look on him. The soldiers laughed at Nicephorus, saying: "A greater fool than thou was never seen, in being so solicitous for a man's {389} pardon who is upon the point of being executed." Being arrived at the place of execution, Nicephorus redoubled his humble entreaties and supplications: but all in vain; for Sapricius continued as obstinate as ever, in refusing to forgive. The executioners said to Sapricius: "Kneel down that we may cut off your head." Sapricius said. "Upon what account?" They answered: "Because you will not sacrifice to the gods, nor obey the emperor's orders, for the love of that man that is called Christ." The unfortunate Sapricius cried out: "Stop, my friends; do not put me to death: I will do what you desire: I am ready to sacrifice." Nicephorus, sensibly afflicted at his apostacy, cried aloud to him: "Brother, what are you doing? renounce not Jesus Christ our good master. Forfeit not a crown you have already gained by tortures and sufferings." But Sapricius would give no manner of attention to what he said. Whereupon, Nicephorus, with tears of bitter anguish for the fall of Sapricius, said to the executioner: "I am a Christian, and believe in Jesus Christ, whom this wretch has renounced; behold me here ready to die in his stead." All present were astonished at such an unexpected declaration. The officers of justice being under an uncertainty how to proceed, dispatched a lictor or beadle to the governor, with this message: "Sapricius promiseth to sacrifice, but here is another desirous to die for the same Christ, saying: I am a Christian, and refuse to sacrifice to your gods, and comply with the edicts of the emperors." The governor, on hearing this, dictated the following sentence: "If this man persist in refusing to sacrifice to the immortal gods, let him die by the sword:" which was accordingly put in execution. Thus Nicephorus received three immortal crowns, namely, of faith, humility, and charity, triumphs which Sapricius had made himself unworthy of. The Greek and the Roman Martyrologies mention him on this day.

SAINT THELIAU, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR.

HE was born in the same province with St. Samson at Eccluis-Guenwa{}, near Monmouth. His sister Anaumed went over to Armorica in 490, and upon her arrival was married to Budic, king of the Armorican Britons. Before she left her own country she promised St. Theliau to consecrate her first child in a particular manner to God. Our saint was educated under the holy discipline of St. Dubritius, and soon after the year 500, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem with his schoolfellows St. David and St. Paternus. In their return St. David stopped at Dole, with Sampson the elder, who had been bishop of York, but being expelled by the Saxons, fled into Armorica and was made bishop of Dole. This prelate and St. Theliau planted a great avenue, three miles long, from Dole to Cai, which for several ages was known by their names. The people of Dole, with the bishop and king Budic, pressed our saint to accept of that bishopric; but in vain. After his return into the island, St. Dubritius being removed from the see of Landaff to that of Caerleon, in 495, Theliau was compelled to succeed him in Landaff, of which church he has always been esteemed the principal patron. His great learning, piety, and pastoral zeal, especially in the choice and instruction of his clergy, have procured him a high reputation which no age can ever obliterate, says Leland.[1] His authority alone decided whatever controversies arose in his time. When the yellow plague depopulated Wales, he exerted his courage and charity with an heroic intrepidity. Providence preserved his life for the sake of others, and he died {390} about the year 580, in a happy old age, in solitude, where he had for some time prepared himself for his passage. The place where he departed to our Lord was called from him Llan deilo-vaur, that is, the church of the great Theliau: it was situated on the bank of the river Tovy in Caermarthenshire. The Landaff register names among the most eminent of his disciples his nephew St. Oudoceus, who succeeded him in the see of Landaff, St. Ismael, whom he consecrated bishop, St. Tyfhei, martyr, who reposeth in Pennalun, &c. See Capgrave, Harpsfield, Wharton, Brown-Willis, D. Morice, Hist. de Bretagne, t. 1, p. 22, and the notes, pp. 785 and 819. Bolland. Feb. t. 2, p. 303.

Footnotes: 1. De Script. Brit. c. 30.

ST. ANSBERT, ARCHBISHOP OF ROUEN, C. IN 695.

HE had been chancellor to king Clotaire III., in which station he had united the mortification and recollection of a monk with the duties of wedlock, and of a statesman. Quitting the court, he put on the monastic habit at Fontenelle, under St. Wandregisile, and when that holy founder's immediate successor, St. Lantbert, was made bishop of Lyons, Ansbert was appointed abbot of that famous monastery. He was confessor to king Theodoric III., and with his consent was chosen archbishop of Rouen, upon the death of St. Owen in 683. By his care, good order, learning, and piety flourished in his diocese; nevertheless Pepin, mayor of the palace, banished him, upon a false accusation, to the monastery of Aumont, upon the Sambre in Hainault, where he died in the year 698. See Mab. Saec. 2, Ben. and Annal. l. 18.. Rivet, Hist. Litter. t. 4, p. 33, and t. 3, p. 646. Henschenius, Feb. t. 2, p. 342.

ST. ATTRACTA, OR TARAHATA, AN IRISH VIRGIN.

SHE received the veil from St. Patrick, and lived at a place called from her Kill-Attracta to this day, in Connaught. Her acts in Colgan are of no authority.

ST. ERHARD, ABBOT, C.

CALLED BY MERSAEUS AND OTHER GERMANS, EBERHARDUS.

HE was a Scotchman by birth, and being well instructed in the scriptures, went into Germany to preach the gospel, with two brothers. He taught the sacred sciences at Triers, when St. Hydulphus was bishop of that city, whom Welser and some others take for a Scot, and one of our saint's brothers. When St. Hydulphus resigned his bishopric to end his days in retirement in 753, St. Erhard withdrew to Ratisbon, where he founded a small monastery, and is said to have been honored with miracles, both living and after his death, which happened to that city. He was commemorated on this day in Scotland, but in Germany on the 8th of January. See Peter Merssaeus, Catal. Archiep. Trevirens. M. Welserus, l. 5. Rerum B{}iocar, ad ab, 753. Pantaleon, Prosopographiae, part 1.

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FEBRUARY X.

ST. SCHOLASTICA, VIRGIN.

From St. Gregory the Great, Dial. l. 2, c. 33 and 34. About the year 543.

THIS saint was sister to the great St. Benedict. She consecrated herself to God from her earliest youth, as St. Gregory testifies. Where her first monastery was situated is not mentioned; but after her brother removed to Mount Cassino, she chose her retreat at Plombariola, in that neighborhood, where she founded and governed a nunnery about five miles distant to the south from St. Benedict's monastery.[1] St. Bertharius, who was abbot of Cassino three hundred years after, says, that she instructed in virtue several of her own sex. And whereas St. Gregory informs us, that St. Benedict governed nuns as well as monks, his sister must have been their abbess under his rule and direction. She visited her holy brother once a year, and as she was not allowed to enter his monastery, he went out with some of his monks to meet her at a house at some small distance. They spent these visits in the praises of God, and in conferring together on spiritual matters, St. Gregory relates a remarkable circumstance of the last of these visits. Scholastica having passed the day as usual in singing psalms, and pious discourse, they sat down in the evening to take their refection. After it was over, Scholastica, perhaps foreknowing it would be their last interview in this world, or at least desirous of some further spiritual improvement, was very urgent with her brother to delay his return till the next day, that they might entertain themselves till morning upon the happiness of the other life. St. Benedict, unwilling to transgress his rule, told her he could not pass a night out of his monastery: so desired her not to insist upon such a breach of monastic discipline. Scholastica, finding him resolved on going home, laying her hands joined upon the table and her head upon them, with many tears begged of Almighty God to interpose in her behalf. Her prayer was scarce ended, when there happened such a storm of rain, thunder, and lightning, that neither St. Benedict nor any of his companions could set a foot out of doors. He complained to his sister, saying: "God forgive you, sister; what have you done?" She answered: "I asked you a favor, and you refused it me: I asked it of Almighty God, and he has granted it me." St. Benedict was therefore obliged to comply with her request, and they spent the night in conferences on pious subjects, chiefly on the felicity of the blessed, to which both most ardently aspired, and which she was shortly to enjoy. The nest morning they parted, and three days after St. Scholastica died in her solitude. St. Benedict was then alone in contemplation on Mount Cassino, and lifting up his eyes to heaven, he saw the soul of his sister ascending thither in the shape of a dove. Filled with joy at her happy passage, he gave thanks for it to God, and declared her death to his brethren; some of whom he sent to bring her corpse to his monastery, where {392} he caused it to be laid in the tomb which he had prepared for himself. She must have died about the year 543. Her relics are said to have been translated into France, together with those of St. Bennet, in the seventh century, according to the relation given by the monk Adrevald.[2] They are said to have been deposited at Mans, and kept in the collegiate church of St. Peter in that city in a rich silver shrine.[3] In 1562 this shrine was preserved from being plundered by the Huguenots, as is related by Chatelain. Her principal festival at Mans is kept a holyday on the 11th of July, the day of the translation of her relics. She was honored in some places with an office of three lessons, in the time of St. Louis, as appears from a calendar of Longchamp, written in his reign.

Lewis of Granada, treating on the perfection of the love of God, mentions the miraculous storm obtained by St. Scholastica, to show with what excess of goodness God is always ready to hear the petitions and desires of his servants. This pious soul must have received strong pledges and most sensible tokens of his love, seeing she depended on receiving so readily what she asked of him. No child could address himself with so great confidence to his most tender parent. The love which God bears us, and his readiness to succor and comfort us, if we humbly confess and lay before him our wants, infinitely surpasses all that can be found in creatures. Nor can we be surprised that he so easily heard the prayer of this holy virgin, since at the command of Joshua he stopped the heavens, God obeying the voice of man. He hears the most secret desires of those that fear and love him, and does their will: if he sometimes seem deaf to their cries, it is to grant their main desire by doing what is most expedient for them, as St. Austin frequently observes. The short prayer by which St. Scholastica gained this remarkable victory over her brother, who was one of the greatest saints on earth, was doubtless no more than a single act of her pure desires, which she continually turned towards, and fixed on her beloved. It was enough for her to cast her eye interiorly upon him with whom she was closely and inseparably united in mind and affections, to move him so suddenly to change the course of the elements in order to satisfy her pious desire. By placing herself, as a docile scholar, continually at the feet of the Divine Majesty, who filled all the powers of her soul with the sweetness of his heavenly communications, she learned that sublime science of perfection in which she became a mistress to so many other chaste souls by this divine exercise. Her life in her retirement, to that happy moment which closed her mortal pilgrimage, was a continued uniform contemplation, by which all her powers were united to, and transformed into God.

Footnotes: 1. This nunnery underwent the same fate with the abbey of Mount Cassino, both being burnt to the ground by the Lombards. When Rachim, king of that nation, having been converted to the Catholic faith by the exhortations of pope Zachary, re-established that abbey, and taking the monastic habit, ended his life there, his queen Tasai and his daughter Ratruda rebuilt and richly endowed the nunnery of Plombariola, in which they lived with great regularity to their deaths, as is related by Leo of Ostia in his Chronicle of Mount Cassino, ad an. 750. It has been since destroyed, so that at present the land is only a farm belonging to the monastery of Mount Cassino. See Dom Mege, Vie de St. Benoit, p. 412. Chatelain, Notes, p. 605. Murarori, Antichita, &c. t. 3. p. 400. Diss. 66, del Monasteri delle Monache. 2. See Paul the deacon, Hist. Longob. and Dom Mege, Vie de St. Benoit, p. 48. 3. That the relics of St. Bennet were privately carried off from Mount Cassino, in 660, soon after the monastery was destroyed, and brought to Fleury on the Loire by Algiulph the monk, and those of St. Scholastica, by certain persons of Mans to that city, is maintained by Mabillon, Menard, and Bosche. But that the relics of both these saints still remain at Mount Cassino, is strenuously affirmed by Loretus Angelus de Nuce, and Marchiarelli, the late learned monk of the Order of Camaldoli: and this assertion Benedict XIV. looks upon as certain, (de Canoniz. l. 4, part 2, c. 24, t, 4, p. 245.) For pope Zachary in his bull assures us, that he devoutly honored the relics of SS. Benedict and Scholastica, at Mount Cassino, in 746. Leo Ostiensis and Peter the deacon visited them and found them untouched in 1071, as Alexander II. affirms in the bull he published when he consecrated the new church there. By careful visitations made by authority, in 1486 and 1545, the same is proved. Yet Angelus de Nuce allows some portions of both saints to be at Mans and Fleury, on the Loire. Against the supposed translation of the whole shrines of St. Benedict and St. Scholastica into France, see Muratori, Antichita, &c., dissert. 58, t. 3, p. 244.

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ST. SOTERIS, VIRGIN AND MARTYR.

From St. Ambrose, Exhort. Virginit, c. 12, and l. 3. de Virgin. c. 6 Tillemont, t. 5, p. 259.

FOURTH AGE.

ST. AMBROSE boasts of this saint as the greatest honor of his family. St. Soteris was descended from a long series of consuls and prefects: but her greatest glory was her despising, for the sake of Christ, birth, riches, great beauty, and all that the world prizes as valuable. She consecrated her virginity to God, and to avoid the dangers her beauty exposed her to, neglected it entirely, and trampled under her feet all the vain ornaments that might set it off. Her virtue prepared her to make a glorious confession of her faith before the persecutors, after the publication of the cruel edicts of Dioclesian and Maximian against the Christians. The impious judge commanded her face to be buffeted. She rejoiced to be treated as her divine Saviour had been, and to have her face all wounded and disfigured by the merciless blows of the executioners. The judge ordered her to be tortured many other ways, but without being able to draw from her one sigh or tear. At length, overcome by her constancy and patience, he commanded her head to be struck off. The ancient martyrologies mention her.

ST. WILLIAM OF MALEVAL, H.

AND INSTITUTER OF THE ORDER OF GULIELMITES.

From l'Hist des Ordres Relig., t. 6, p. 155, by F. Helyot.

A.D. 1157

WE know nothing of the birth or quality of this saint: he seems to have been a Frenchman, and is on this account honored in the new Paris Missal and Breviary. He is thought to have passed his youth in the army, and to have given into a licentious manner of living, too common among persons of that profession. The first accounts we have of him represent him as a holy penitent, filled with the greatest sentiments of compunction and fervor, and making a pilgrimage to the tombs of the apostles at Rome. Here he begged pope Eugenius III. to put him into a course of penance, who enjoined him a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the year 1145. In performing this, with great devotion, the saint spent eight years. Returning into Tuscany, in 1153, he retired into a desert. He was prevailed upon to undertake the government of a monastery in the isle of Lupocavio, in the territory of Pisa, but not being able to bear with the tepidity and irregularity of his monks, he withdrew, and settled on Mount Pruno, till, finding disciples there no less indocile to the severity of his discipline than the former, he was determined to pursue himself that rigorous plan of life which he had hitherto unsuccessfully proposed to others. He pitched upon a desolate valley for this purpose, the very sight of which was sufficient to strike the most resolute with horror. It was then called the Stable of Rhodes, but since, Maleval; and is situated in the territory of Sienna, in the diocese of Grosseto. He entered this frightful solitude in September, 1155, and had no other lodging than a cave in the ground, till being discovered some months after, the lord of Buriano built him a cell. During the first four months, he had no other company than that of wild beasts eating only the herbs on which they fed. {394} On the feast of the Epiphany, in the beginning of the year 1156, he was joined by a disciple or companion, called Albert, who lived with him to his death, which happened thirteen months after, and who has recorded the last circumstances of his life. The saint, discoursing with others, always treated himself as the most infamous of criminals, and deserving the worst of deaths; and that these were his real sentiments, appeared from that extreme severity which he exercised upon himself. He lay on the bare ground: though he fed on the coarsest fare, and drank nothing but water, he was very sparing in the use of each; saying, sensuality was to be feared even in the most ordinary food. Prayer, divine contemplation, and manual labor, employed his whole time. It was at his work that he instructed his disciple in his maxims of penance and perfection, which he taught him the most effectually by his own example, though in many respects so much raised above the common, that it was fitter to be admired than imitated. He had the gift of miracles, and that of prophecy. Seeing his end draw near, he received the sacraments from a priest of the neighboring town of Chatillon, and died on the 10th of February, in 1157, on which day he is named in the Roman and other martyrologies.

* * * * *

Divine Providence moved one Renauld, a physician, to join Albert, a little before the death of the saint. They buried St. William's body in his little garden, and studied to live according to his maxims and example. Some time after, their number increasing, they built a chapel over their founder's grave, with a little hermitage. This was the origin of the Gulielmites, or Hermits of St. William, spread in the next age over Italy, France, Flanders, and Germany. They went barefoot, and their fasts were almost continual: but pope Gregory IX. mitigated their austerities, and gave them the rule of St. Benedict, which they still observe. The order is now become a congregation united to the hermits of St. Austin, except twelve houses to the Low Countries, which still retain the rule of the Gulielmites, which is that of St. Benedict, with a white habit like that of the Cistercians.

The feast of St. William is kept at Paris in the Abbey of Blancs-Manteaux, so called from certain religious men for whom it was founded, who wore white cloaks, and were of a mendicant Order, called of the Servants of the Virgin Mary: founded at Marseilles, and approved by Alexander IV., in 1257. This order being extinguished, by virtue of the decree of the second council of Lyons, in 1274, by which all mendicants, except the four great Orders of Dominicans, Franciscans, Carmelites, and Austin friars, were abolished, this monastery was bestowed on the Gulielmites, who removed hither from Montrouge, near Paris, in 1297. The prior and monks embraced the order of St. Bennet, and the reformation of the Congregation of St. Vanne of Verdun, soon after called in France, of St. Maur, in 1618, and this is in order the fifth house of that Congregation in France, before the abbeys of St. Germany-des-Prez, and St. Denys.[1]

Footnotes: 1. Villefore confounds this saint with St. William, founder of the hermits of Monte Virgine in the kingdom of Naples, who lived in great repute with king Roger, and is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology, June 25. Others confound him with St. William, duke of Aquitaine, a monk of Gellone. He was a great general, and often vanquished the Saracens who invaded Languedoc. In recompense, Charlemagne made him duke or governor of Aquitaine, and appointed Toulouse for his residence. Some years after, in 806, having obtained the consent of his duchess, (who also renounced the world,) and or Charlemagne, though with great difficulty, he made his monastic profession at Gellone, a monastery which he had founded in a valley of that name, a league distant from Aniane, in the diocese of Lodeve. St. William received the habit at the hands of St. Benedict of Aniane, was directed by him in the exercises of a religious life, and sanctified himself with great fervor, embracing the most humbling and laborious employments, and practising extraordinary austerities, till his happy death in 812, on the 28th of May, on which day his festival is kept in the monastery of Gellone, (now called St. Guillem de Desert, founded by this saint in 804,) and in the neighboring churches. See, on him, Mabillon, Saec. Ben. 4, p. 88. Henschenius, diss, p. 488. Bultea p. 367. and Hist. Gen. du Languedoc par deux Benedictins, l. 9. Many have also confounded our saint with William, the last duke of Guienne, who, after a licentious youth, and having been an abettor of the anti-pope, Peter Leonis, was wonderfully converted by St. Bernard, sent to him by pope Innocent II., in the year 1135. The year following he renounced his estates, which his eldest daughter brought in marriage to Louis the Young, king of France; and clothed with hair-cloth next his skin, end in a tattered garment expressive of the sincerity of his repentance and contrition, undertook a pilgrimage to Compostella, and died in that journey, in 1137. See Ordericus Vitalis, Hist. Norman. et Armoldus Bonae-Vallis, in vita Bernardi; with the Historical Dissert. of Henschenius on the 10th of February; and Abrege Chronol. des Grands Fiefs, p. 223.

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SAINT ERLULPH, BISHOP AND MARTYR.

SEVERAL Scottish missionaries passed into the northwestern parts of Germany, to sow there the seeds of the faith, at the time when Charlemagne subdued the Saxons. In imitation of these apostolic men, St. Erlulph, a holy Scotchman, went thither, and after employing many years with great success in that arduous mission, was chosen the tenth bishop of Verdun. His zeal in propagating the faith enraged the barbarous infidels, and he was slain by them at a place called Eppokstorp, in 830. See Krantzius, l. 3. Metrop. c. 30. Democh. Gatal. episc. Verd. Pantaleon, &c.[1]

Footnotes: 1. This saint must not be confounded with Ernulph, a most holy man, the apostle of Iceland, who flourished in the year 890; on whom see Jonas, Histor. Islandiae.

FEBRUARY XI.

SS. SATURNINUS, DATIVUS,

AND MANY OTHER MARTYRS, OF AFRICA.

From their contemporary acts, received as authentic by St. Austin, Brevic. Coll. die 3, c. 17. The Donatists added a preface to them and a few glosses, in which condition they are published by Baluzius, t. 2. But Bollandus and Ruinart give them genuine.

A.D. 304

THE emperor Dioclesian had commanded all Christians, under pain of death, to deliver up the holy scriptures to be burnt. This persecution had raged a whole year in Africa; some had betrayed the cause of religion, but many more had defended it with their blood, when these saints were apprehended. Abitina, a city of the proconsular province of Africa, was the theatre of their triumph. Saturninus, priest of that city, celebrated the divine mysteries on a Sunday, in the house of Octavius Felix. The magistrates having notice of it, came with a troop of soldiers, and seized forty-nine persons of both sexes. The principal among them were the priest Saturninus, with his four children, viz.: young Saturninus and Felix, both Lectors, Mary, who had consecrated her virginity to God, and Hilarianus, yet a child; also, Dativus, a noble senator, Ampelius, Rogatianus, and Victoria. Dativus, the ornament of the senate of Abitina, whom God destined to be one of the principal senators of heaven, marched at the head of this holy troop. Saturninus walked by his side, surrounded by his illustrious family. The others followed in silence. Being brought before the magistrates, they confessed Jesus Christ so resolutely, that their very judges applauded their courage, which repaired the infamous sacrilege committed there a little before by Fundanus, the bishop of Abitina, who in that same place had given up to the magistrates the sacred books to be burnt: but a violent shower suddenly falling, put out the fire, and a prodigious hail ravaged the whole country.

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The confessors were shackled and sent to Carthage, the residence of the proconsul. They rejoiced to see themselves in chains for Christ, and sung hymns and canticles during their whole journey to Carthage, praising and thanking God. The proconsul, Anulinus, addressing himself first to Dativus, asked him of what condition he was, and if he had assisted at the collect or assembly of the Christians. He answered, that he was a Christian, and had been present at it. The proconsul bid him discover who presided, and in whose house those religious assemblies were held: but without waiting for his answer, commanded him to be put on the rack and torn with iron hooks, to oblige him to a discovery. They underwent severally the tortures of the rack, iron hooks, and cudgels. The weaker sex fought no less gloriously, particularly the illustrious Victoria; who, being converted to Christ in her tender years, had signified a desire of leading a single life, which her pagan parents would not agree to, having promised her in marriage to a rich young nobleman. Victoria, on the day appointed for the wedding, full of confidence in the protection of Him, whom she had chosen for the only spouse of her soul, leaped out of a window, and was miraculously preserved from hurt. Having made her escape, she took shelter in a church; after which she consecrated her virginity to God, with the ceremonies then used on such occasions at Carthage, in Italy, Gaul, and all over the West.[1] To the crown of virginity, she earnestly desired to join that of martyrdom. The proconsul, on account of her quality, and for the sake of her brother, a pagan, tried all means to prevail with her to renounce her faith. He inquired what was her religion. Her answer was: "I am a Christian." Her brother, Fortunatianus, undertook her defence, and endeavored to prove her lunatic. The saint, fearing his plea might be the means of her losing the crown of martyrdom, made it appear by her wise confutations of it, that she was in her perfect senses, and protested that she had not been brought over to Christianity against her will. The proconsul asked her if she would return with her brother? She said: "She could not, being a Christian, and acknowledging none as brethren but those who kept the law of God." The proconsul then laid aside the quality of judge to become her humble suppliant, and entreated her not to throw away her life. But she rejected his entreaties with disdain, and said to him: "I have already told you my mind. I am a Christian, and I assisted at the collect." Anulinus, provoked at this constancy, reassumed his rage, and ordered her to prison with the rest, to wait the sentence of death which he not long after pronounced upon them all.