The ancients began the year, some from the autumnal, others from the vernal equinox. The primitive patriarchs from that of autumn, that is, from the month called by the Hebrews Tisri, which coincides with part of our September and October. Hence it seems probable, that the world was created about that season; the earth, as appears from Gen. iii. 2, being then covered with trees, plants, fruits, seeds, and all other things in the state of their natural maturity and perfection. The Jews retained this commencement of the year, as a date for contracts and other civil purposes; as also for their sabbatical year and jubilee. But God commanded them to begin their ecclesiastical year, or that by which their religious festivals were regulated, from the spring equinox, or the Hebrew month Nisan, the same with part of our March and April, Exod. xii. 2. Christian nations commenced the year, some from the 25th of March, the feast of the Annunciation, and bordering upon the spring equinox; others from Christmas; others from its octave day, the first of January, in which our ancestors have often varied their practice. Europe is now agreed in fixing the first of January for this epoch.
The Julian year, so called from Julius Caesar, from whom the Roman
calendar received its last reformation, consisted of 365 days and 6
hours, which exceed the true solar year by 11 minutes, for
astronomers compute the yearly revolution of the sun not to exceed
365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 37 seconds, according to Cassini,
but according to Keil 57 seconds, or almost 49 minutes. This error,
becoming daily more sensible, would have occasioned the autumnal
equinox to have at length fallen on the day reckoned the solstice,
and in process of time, on that held for the vernal equinox. The
Golden number, or Grecian cycle of the lunar years, was likewise
defective. The remedy both which, pope Gregory XIII., in 1585,
established the new style. Scaliger, Tachet, and Cassini have
demonstrated that cycles might be chosen still more exact by some
few seconds: however, this adopted by pope Gregory, besides being
the easiest in the execution, admits of no material error, or
sensible inconveniency. This correction of the style was received by
act of Parliament, in Great Britain, in 1752; for the promoting of
which, great praise is due to the two illustrious ornaments of the
republic of letters, the earls of Chesterfield and Macclesfield.
12. Heb. x. 25.
13. Luke xxi. 36.
14. Exod. v. 25.
THE LIFE OF S. FULGENTIUS, B.C.
Extracted from his works, and from his life, accurately written by a disciple of great abilities, the companion of his exile: and dedicated to Felician, his successor in the see of Ruspa. The author declares himself a monk: consequently was not the deacon Ferrandus, as some critics imagine.
A.D. 533.
FABIUS CLAUDIUS GORDIANUS FULGENTIUS was the descendant of a noble senatorian family of Carthage: but much decayed in its splendor by the invasion of the Vandals. His father Claudius, being unjustly deprived of his house in Carthage, which was made over to the Arian priests, settled at an estate belonging to him at Telepte, the capital city of the province of Byzacena. Our saint was born in 468, about thirty years after the Barbarians had dismembered Africa from the Roman empire. He was educated in sentiments of piety with his younger brother, under the care of his mother Mariana, who was left a young widow. Being, by her particular direction, taught the Greek very young, he spoke it with as proper and exact an accent as if it had been his native language. He also applied himself to Latin, and all the useful parts of human literature, under masters distinguished for consummate abilities: yet he knew how to mingle business with study; for he took upon himself the regulation of the family concerns, in order to ease his mother of the burden. His prudent circumspection in all the affairs he transacted, his virtuous conduct, his mild carriage to all, and more especially his deference for his mother, without whose express orders or approbation he never did any thing, caused him to be beloved and admired wherever his name was known. He was chosen procurator, that is, lieutenant-governor, and general receiver of the taxes of Byzacena. But it was not long before {064} he grew disgusted with the world; and being justly alarmed at its dangers he armed himself against them by pious reading, assiduous prayer, and rigorous fasting. His visits to monasteries were frequent; and happening among other books of spiritual entertainment, to read a sermon of St. Austin on the thirty-sixth psalm, in which that father treats of the world and the short duration of human life, he felt within him strong desires of embracing the monastic state.
Huneric, the Arian king, had driven most of the orthodox bishops from their sees. One of these, named Faustus, had erected a monastery in Byzacena. It was to him that the young nobleman addressed himself for admittance; but Faustus immediately objecting the tenderness of his constitution, discouraged his desires with words of some harshness; "Go," said he, "and first learn to live in the world abstracted from its pleasures. Who can well suppose, that you on a sudden, relinquishing a life of softness and ease, can take up with our coarse diet and clothing and can inure yourself to our watchings and fastings?" The saint, with downcast eyes, modestly replied: "He, who hath inspired me with the will to serve him, can also furnish me with courage and strength." This humble, yet resolute answer, induced Faustus to admit him on trial. The saint was then in the twenty-second year of his age. The news of so unthought of an event both surprised and edified the whole country; many even imitated the example of the governor. But Mariana his mother, in transports of grief, ran to the monastery, crying out at the gates: "Faustus! restore to me my son; to the people, their governor: the church always protects widows; why then rob you me, a desolate widow, of my son?" She persisted several days in the same tears and cries. Nothing that Faustus could urge was sufficient to calm her, or prevail with her to depart without her son. This was certainly as great a trial of Fulgentius's resolution as it could well be put to; but the love of God, having the ascendant in his breast, gave him a complete victory over all the suggestions of nature: Faustus approved his vocation, and accordingly recommended him to the brethren. The saint having now obtained all he wished for in this world, made over his estate to his mother, to be discretionally disposed of by her in favor of his brother, as soon as he should be arrived at a proper age. He totally abstained from oil and every thing savory; from wine also, drinking only water. His mortifications brought on him a dangerous illness; yet after recovery he abated nothing in them. The persecution breaking out anew, Faustus was obliged to withdraw; and our saint, with his consent, repaired to a neighboring monastery, of which Felix, the abbot, would fain resign to him the government. Fulgentius was much startled at the proposal, but at length was prevailed upon to consent that they should jointly execute the functions. It was admirable to observe with what harmony these two holy abbots for six years governed the house. No contradiction ever took place between them; each always contended to comply with the will of his colleague. Felix undertook the management of the temporal concerns; Fulgentius's province was to preach and instruct.
In the year 499, the country being ravaged by an irruption of the Numidians, the two abbots were necessitated to fly to Sicca Veneria, a city of the proconsular province of Africa. Here it was, that an Arian priest ordered them to be apprehended and scourged on account of their preaching the consubstantiality of the Son of God. Felix, seeing the executioners seize first on Fulgentius, cried out: "Spare that poor brother of mine, whose delicate complexion cannot bear torments; let them rather be my portion who am strong of body." They accordingly, at the instigation of this wicked priest, fell on Felix first, and the old man endured their stripes {065} with the greatest alacrity. When it was Fulgentius's turn to experience the same rigorous treatment, he bore the lashes with great patience; but feeling the pain excessive, that he might gain a little respite and recruit his spirits, he requested his judge to give ear to something he had to impart to him. The executioners thereupon being commanded to desist, he began to entertain him with an account of his travels. This savage monster expected nothing more than some overtures to be proposed to him of an intention to yield; but finding himself disappointed, in the utmost rage, ordered his torments to be redoubled. At length having glutted his barbarity, the confessors were dismissed, their clothes rent, their bodies inhumanly torn, and their beards and hair plucked off. The very Arians were ashamed of such cruelty, and their bishop offered to punish the priest, if Fulgentius would but undertake his prosecution. His answer was, that a Christian is never allowed to seek revenge; and for their parts it was incumbent on them not to lose the advantage of patience, and the blessings accruing from the forgiving of injuries. The two abbots, to avoid an additional effort of the fury of these heretics, travelled to Ididi, on the confines of Mauritania. Here Fulgentius went aboard a ship for Alexandria, being desirous, for the sake of greater perfection, to visit the deserts of Egypt, renowned for the sanctity of the solitaries who dwelt there. But the vessel touching at Sicily, St. Eulalius, abbot at Syracuse, diverted him from his intended voyage, on assuring him, that "a perfidious dissension had severed this country from the communion of Peter,"[1] meaning that Egypt was full of heretics, with whom those that dwelt there were obliged either to join in communion, or be deprived of the sacraments. The liberality and hospitality of Fulgentius to the poor, out of the small pittance he received for his particular subsistence, made Eulalius condemn himself of remissness in those virtues, and for the future imitate so laudable an example.
Our saint having laid aside the thoughts of pursuing his voyage to Alexandria, embarked for Rome, to offer up his prayers at the tombs of the apostles. One day passing through a square called Palma Aurea, he saw Theodoric, the king of Italy, seated on an exalted throne, adorned with pompous state, surrounded by the senate, and his court, with all the grandeur of the city displayed in the greatest magnificence: "Ah!" said Fulgentius, "how beautiful must the heavenly Jerusalem be, if earthly Rome be so glorious! What honor, glory, and joy will God bestow on the saints in heaven, since here in this perishable life he clothes with such splendor the lovers and admirers of vanity!" This happened towards the latter part of the year 500, when that king made his first entry into Rome. Fulgentius returned home in a short time after, and was received with incredible joy. He built a spacious monastery in Byzacena, but retired to a cell himself, which was situate on the sea-shore. Here his time was employed in writing, reading, prayer, mortification, and the manual labor of making mats and umbrellas of palm-tree leaves. Faustus, who was his bishop, obliged him to resume the government of his monastery; and many places at the same time sought him for their bishop. King Thrasimund having prohibited by edict the ordination of orthodox bishops, several sees by this means had been long vacant and destitute of pastors. The orthodox prelates resolved to remedy this inconveniency, as they effectually did; but the king receiving intelligence of the matter, caused Victor, the primate of Carthage, to be apprehended. All this time our saint lay concealed, though sought after eagerly by many citizens for their bishop. Thinking the danger over, he appeared again: but Ruspa, now a little town called {066} Alfaques, in the district of Tunis, still remained without a pastor; and by the consent of the primate, while detained in the custody of the king's messengers, Fulgentius was forcibly taken out of his cell, and consecrated bishop in 508.
His new dignity made no alteration in his manners. He never wore the orarium, a kind of stole then used by bishops, nor other clothes than his usual coarse garb, which was the same in winter and summer. He went sometimes barefoot: he never undressed to take rest, and always rose to prayer before the midnight office. His diet chiefly consisted of pulse and herbs, with which he contented himself, without consulting the palate's gratification by borrowed tastes: but in more advanced years, finding his sight impaired by such a regimen, he admitted the use of a little oil. It was only in very considerable bodily indispositions, that he suffered a drop or two of wine to be mingled with the water which he drank; and he never could be prevailed upon in any seeming necessity to use the least quantity of flesh-meat, from the time of his monastic profession till his death. His modesty, meekness, and humility, gained him the affection of all, even of the ambitious deacon Felix, who had opposed his election, and whom the saint received and treated with the most cordial charity. His great love for a recluse life induced him to build a monastery near his own house at Ruspa, which he designed to put under the direction of his ancient friend Felix; but before the building could be completed, or he acquit himself to his wish of his episcopal duties, orders were issued from King Thrasimund, for his banishment to Sardinia, with others to the number of sixty orthodox bishops. Fulgentius, though the youngest of this venerable body, who were transported from Carthage to Sardinia, was notwithstanding their sole oracle in all doubts, and their tongue and pen upon all occasions; and not only of them, but even of the whole church of Africa. What spread a brighter lustre on these amiable qualities, were the humility and modesty with which he always declared his sentiments: he never preferred his counsel to that of another, his opinion he never intruded. Pope Symmachus, out of his pastoral care and charity, sent every year provisions in money and clothes to these champions of Christ.[2] A letter of this pope to them is still extant,[3] in which he encourages and comforts them; and it was at the same time that he sent them certain relics of SS. Nazarius and Romanus, "that the example and patronage,"[4] as he expresses it, "of those generous soldiers of Christ, might animate the confessors to fight valiantly the battles of the Lord." Saint Fulgentius, with some companions, converted his house at Cagliari into a monastery; which immediately became the comfort of all in affliction, the refuge of the poor, and the oracle to which the whole country resorted for deciding their controversies without appeal. In this retirement the saint composed many learned treatises for confirming and instructing the faithful in Africa. King Thrasimund, hearing that he was their principal support, and their invincible advocate, was desirous of seeing him; and having accordingly sent for him, appointed him lodgings in Carthage. The king then drew up a set of objections, to which he required his immediate answer: the saint without hesitation complied with, and discharged the injunction; and this is supposed to be his book, entitled, An Answer to Ten Objections. The king equally admired his humility and learning, and the orthodox triumphed exceedingly in the advantage their cause gained by this piece. To prevent a second time the same effect, the king, when he sent him new objections, ordered them to be only read to him. Fulgentius refused to give an answer in writing, unless he was allowed {067} to take a copy of them. He addressed, however, to the king an ample and modest confutation of Arianism, which we have under the title of his Three Books to King Thrasimund. The prince was pleased with the work, and granted him permission to reside at Carthage; till upon repeated complaints from the Arian bishops of the success of his preaching, which threatened they said, a total extinction of their sect in Carthage, he was sent back to Sardinia in 520. Being ready to go aboard the ship, he said to a catholic, whom he saw weeping: "Grieve not, Juliatus!" for that was his name, "I shall shortly return, and we shall see the true faith of Christ flourish again in this kingdom, with full liberty to profess it; but divulge not this secret to any." The event confirmed the truth of the prediction. His humility concealed the multiplicity of miracles which he wrought, and he was wont to say: "A person may be endowed with the gift of miracles, and yet may lose his soul: miracles ensure not salvation; they may indeed procure esteem and applause; but what will it avail a man to be esteemed on earth, and afterwards be delivered up to hell torments?" If the sick, for whom he prayed, recovered, to avoid being puffed up with vain-glory, he ascribed it wholly to the divine mercy. Being returned to Cagliari, he erected a new monastery near that city, and was exceedingly careful to supply his monks with all necessaries, especially in sickness; but would not suffer them to ask for any thing, alleging, "That we ought to receive all things as from the hand of God, with resignation and gratitude." Thus he was sensible how conducive the unreserved denial of the will is for perfecting ourselves in the paths of virtue.
King Thrasimund died in 523, having nominated Hilderic his successor. Knowing him inclined to favor the orthodox, he exacted from him an oath, that he would never restore their profession. To evade this, Hilderic, before the death of his predecessor, signed an order for the liberty of the orthodox churches, but never had the courage to declare himself of the same belief; his lenity having quite degenerated into softness and indolence. However, the professors of the true faith called home their pastors. The ship which brought them back, was received at Carthage with the greatest demonstrations of joy: the shore echoed far and near with repeated acclamations, more particularly when Fulgentius appeared on the upper deck of the vessel. The confessors went straight to the church of St. Agileus, to return thanks to God, and were accompanied by thousands; but on their way, being surprised with a sudden storm, the people, to show their singular regard for Fulgentius, made a kind of umbrella over his head with their cloaks to defend him from the inclemency of the storm. The saint hastened to his own church, and immediately set about the reformation of the abuses that had crept in during the persecution, which had now continued seventy years; but this reformation was carried on with a sweetness that won, sooner or later, the hearts of the most vicious. In a council held at Junque, in 524, a certain bishop, named Quodvultdeus, disputed the precedency with our saint, who made no reply, though he would not oppose the council, which ordered him to take the first place. The other resented this as an injury offered to the dignity of his see; and St. Fulgentius, in another council soon after, publicly requested that Quodvultdeus might be allowed the precedency. His talents for preaching were singular; and Boniface, the archbishop of Carthage, never heard him without watering, all the time, the ground with his tears, thanking God for having given so great a pastor to his church.[5]
{068}
About a year before his death, he secretly retired from all business into a monastery on the little island, of rock, called Circinia, in order to prepare {069} himself for his passage to eternity, which he did with extraordinary fervor. The necessities and importunities of his flock recalled him to Ruspa a little before his exit. He bore the violent pains of his last illness for seventy days with admirable patience, having this prayer almost always in his mouth:[6] "Lord, grant me patience now, and hereafter mercy and pardon." The physicians advised him the use of baths; to whom he answered "Can baths make a mortal man escape death, when his life is arrived at its final period?" He would abate nothing of his usual austerities without an absolute necessity. In his agony, calling for his clergy and monks, who were all in tears, he begged pardon if he had ever offended any one of them; he comforted them, gave them some short, moving instructions, and calmly breathed forth his pious soul in the year 533, and of his age the 65th, on the 1st of January, on which day his name occurs in many calendars soon after his death, and in the Roman; but in some few on the 16th of May,—perhaps the day on which his relics were translated to Bourges, in France, about the year 714, where they still remain deposited.[7] His disciple relates, that Pontian, a neighboring bishop, was assured in a vision of his glorious immortality. The veneration for his virtues was such, that he was interred within the church, contrary to the law and custom of that age, as is remarked by the author of his life. St. Fulgentius proposed to himself St. Austin for a model; and, as a true disciple, imitated him in his conduct, faithfully expounding his doctrine, and imbibing his spirit.
Footnotes:
1. A comumnione Petri perfida dissentio separavit. Vit S. Fulg. c. 12.
2. Anastas. in Symmacho. Bar. ad ann. 504. Fleury, Liv. 31.
3. Inter opera Ennodii. t. 4. Conc. Labb. col. 1300.
4. Patrocinia.
5. S. Fulgentius, in his first letter, to a gentleman whose wife in a
violent sickness had made a vow of continency, proves that a vow of
chastity ought not to be made by a person engaged in a married
state, without the free consent of the husband. In his second, to
Galla, a most virtuous Roman lady, he comforts her upon the death of
her husband, who, he says, was only gone a little before her to
glory; and he sets before her the divine mercy, which by this means
calls her to a more heroic practice of all virtues in the state of
widowhood,—especially continence, plainness in dress, furniture,
and diet, profuse alms-deeds, and holy prayer, the exercise whereof
ought to be her most assiduous employment. Herein he warns her that
vanity and pride are our most dangerous enemies, against which we
must diligently watch and arm ourselves. In his third letter,
addressed to the holy lady Proba, sister to Galla, consecrated to
God by a vow of virginity, he shows the excellency of that virtue,
and recommends, at length, temperance, penance, and perfect
humility, as its essential attendants, without which it cannot
render a soul the spouse of Christ, who chose her poor, and bestowed
on her all she had. In his fourth letter, to the same lady, he again
puts her in mind of the extreme danger of pride and vain-glory, and
lays down excellent precepts concerning the necessity of assiduous
prayer and compunction; in which spirit we are bound to weep
continually before God, imploring his mercy and succor under the
weight of our miseries, and to pay him the constant tribute of
praise and thanksgiving for all his benefits and gratuitous favors.
His letter to the abbot Eugypius, is a commendation of fraternal
charity, a principal fruit of which is, to pray for one another. In
the sixth letter, he congratulates with Theodorus, a senator, upon
his conversion from the world, promising himself that such an
example would have great influence over many: for "those who are
raised above others by their rank in the world, either draw many
with themselves into eternal damnation, or are to many an occasion
of salvation." The saint strenuously exhorts him to the study of the
most profound humility, which is the only greatness of a Christian,
and is always attended with its sister virtue, meekness. The seventh
letter of this father is addressed to the illustrious and venerable
lady Venantia, and contains a strong exhortation to the spirit and
practice of penance, with advice against despair. The sermons and
homilies of S. Fulgentius are usually short: we have near one
hundred extant which bear his name, but some of these belong to S.
Austin. The danger and evil of presumption and pride, are points
which he takes every occasion to inculcate: he teaches that it is
impossible to know God, and his benefits and goodness, unless we
have a true knowledge of ourselves, and our own frailty and
miseries. (Hom. 14, p. 123. Bibl. Patr. Lugdun. T. 9, part 1.) In
his sermons and letters, he frequently enforces the obligation of
alms-deeds. His other works are chiefly polemical, against the
Arians, Pelagians, and Nestorians. In his books against the Sermon
of Fastidiosus, (an Arian priest,) to Felix the Notary; On the
Orthodox Faith, to Donatus, against Fabian; Three Books to King
Thrasimund; Ten Answers to Ten Objections of the Arians, &c., he
explains the trinity of persons in one divine nature, solidly
answers the objections of the Arians, and frequently shows that
prayers which are addressed to the Father, or to the Son, or to the
Holy Ghost, are addressed to the whole Blessed Trinity. (Lib. 9,
contra Fabium, p. 620, &c.) Showing that the Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost are equally to be adored, he distinguishes the worship of
Latria, or adoration, which is due to God alone, and that of
Dulia, which is given to creatures. (Ib. lib. 4, p. 592.) Pinta,
an Arian bishop, having published a treatise against our saint's
books to King Thrasimund, St. Fulgentius answered him by a work
which is lost. For that which we have among his writings, is the
performance of some other Catholic controvertist of the same age, as
the learned agree. This author's style falls short of St.
Fulgentius's: he quotes the Scripture according to the Old Italic
Version; our saint always makes use of the Vulgate. He understood
not the Greek tongue, in which St. Fulgentius was well skilled. And
the author of our saint's life mentions, that in his book against
Pinta he referred to his books to King Thrasimund, which is not
found in this work.
One of the most famous among the writings of St. Fulgentius, is that
entitled, On the Two-fold Predestination, to Monimus, in answer to
certain difficulties proposed to him by a friend of that name. In
the first book he shows, that though God foresees sin, he
predestinates no one to evil, but only to good, or to grace and
glory. In the second book he proves, that the sacrifice of Christ's
body and blood is offered not to the Father alone, as the Arians
pretended, but to the whole Blessed Trinity. In this and the third
book he answers certain other difficulties. In his two books, On the
Remission of Sins, to Euthymius, he proves that sins can never be
forgiven without sincere repentance, or out of the pale of the true
church. When Peter, a deacon, and three other deputies from the
Scythian monks in the East, arrived at Rome, to be informed of the
sentiments of the western churches concerning the late errors
advanced in the East, against the mystery of the Incarnation, and in
the West, by the Semipelagians against the necessity of divine
grace, they consulted the sixty African bishops who were at that
time in banishment, in Sardinia. St. Fulgentius was pitched upon to
send an answer in the name of this venerable company of Confessors.
This produced his book, On the Incarnation and Grace, in the first
part of which he confutes the Nestorians and Eutychians, and in the
second the Semipelagians. His three books, On the Truth of
Predestination and Grace, addressed to John the Archimandrite, and
Venerius, deacon of Constantinople, are another fruit of the leisure
which his exile gave him. In the first part he shows, that grace is
the pure effect of the divine goodness and mercy; in the second,
that it destroys not free-will; and in the third, that the Divine
election both to grace and glory is purely gratuitous. In another
treatise or letter, to the same John and Venerius, who had consulted
the Confessors in Sardinia about the doctrine of Faustus of Riez, he
confutes Semipelagianism. In the treatise, On the Incarnation, to
Scarilas, he explains that mystery, showing that the Son became
man,—not the Father, or the Holy Ghost; and that in God the trinity
destroys not the unity of the nature. Ferrand, the learned deacon of
Carthage, consulted St. Fulgentius about the baptism of a certain
Ethiopian, who had desired that sacrament, but was speechless and
senseless when it was administered to him. Our saint, in a short
treatise on this subject, demonstrates this baptism to have been
both necessary and valid. By another treatise, addressed to this
Ferrand, he answers five questions proposed by him, concerning the
Trinity and Incarnation. Count Reginus consulted him, whether the
body of Christ was corruptible, and begged certain rules for leading
a Christian life in a military state. St. Fulgentius answered the
first point, proving that Christ's mortal body was liable to hunger,
thirst, pain, and corruption. The second part of moral instructions,
which he lived not to finish, was added by Ferrand the deacon. St.
Fulgentius's book, On Faith, to Peter, is concise and most useful.
It was drawn up after the year 523, about the time of his return
from Sardinia. One Peter, designing to go to Jerusalem, requested
the saint to give him in writing a compendious rule of faith, by
studying which he might be put upon his guard against the heresies
of that age. St. Fulgentius executed this in forty articles, some
copies and forty-one. In these he explains, under anathemas, the
chief mysteries of our faith: especially the Trinity. Incarnation,
sacrifice of the altar, (cap. 19. p. 475,) absolute necessity of the
true faith, and of living in the true church, to steadfastness, in
which he strongly and pathetically exhorts all Christians in the
close of the work, (c. 44, 45.) For if we owe fidelity to our
temporal prince, much more to Christ who redeemed our souls, and
whose anger we are bound to fear above all things, nay, as the only
evil truly to be dreaded. The writings of this father discover a
deep penetration and clear conception, with an admirable perspicuity
in the diction; but seeming apprehensive of not having sufficiently
inculcated his matter, he is diffusive, end runs into repetitions.
His reasoning is just and close, corroborated by Scripture and
tradition. The accurate F. Sirmond published part of his writings,
but the most complete edition of them was given at Paris, in 4vo.,
1584.
6. Domine, da mihi modo patientiam, et postea indulgentiam.
7. See Gall. Christ. Nov. T. l, p. 121. and Baillet, p. 16. The written
relation of this translation is a production of the tenth century,
and deserves no regard; but the constant tradition of the church and
country proves the translation to have been made (See Hist. Liter.
de la France, T. 6, p. 265.) The hutch in which these relics are
venerated at Bourget, is called S. Fulgentius's. The saint's head is
in the church of the archbishop's seminary, which was anciently an
abbey, and named Monte-maven.
ST. ODILO, OR OLON, SIXTH ABBOT OF CLUNI
HIS family was that of the lords of Mercteur, one of the most illustrious of Auvergne. Divine grace inclined him from his infancy to devote himself to God with his whole heart. He was very young when he received the monastic habit at Cluni, from the hands of S. Mayeul, by whose appointment he was made his coadjutor in 991, though only twenty-nine years of age, and from the death of S. Mayeul in 994, our saint was charged with the entire government of that great abbey. He labored to subdue his carnal appetites by rigorous fasting, wearing hair-cloth next his skin, and studded iron chains. Notwithstanding those austerities practised on himself, his carriage to others was most mild and humane. It was usual with him to say, that of two extremes, he chose rather to offend by tenderness, than a too rigid severity. In a great famine in 1006, his liberality to the poor was by many censured as profuse; for he melted down the sacred vessels and ornaments, and sold the gold crown S. Henry made a present of to that abbey, to relieve their necessities. He accompanied that prince in his journey to Rome when he was crowned emperor, in 1014. This was his second journey thither; he made a third in 1017, and a fourth in 1022. Out of devotion to S. Bennet he paid a visit to Mount Cassino, where he begged leave, with the greatest earnestness, to kiss the feet of all the monks, which was granted him with great difficulty. Besides the journeys which the reformation he established in many monasteries obliged him to undertake, he made one to Orbe, to wait on the empress Alice. That pious princess burst into tears upon seeing him, and taking hold of his habit, kissed it, and applied it to her eyes, and declared to him she should die in a {070} very short time. This was in 999, and she died on the 16th of December the same year. Massacres and plunders were so common in that age, by the right which every petty lord pretended of revenging his own injuries and quarrels by private wars, that the treaty called the truce of God was set on foot. By this, among other articles, it was agreed, that churches should be sanctuaries to all sorts of persons, except those that violated this truce; and that from Wednesday till Monday morning no one should offer violence to any one, not even by way of satisfaction for any injustice he had received. This truce met with the greatest difficulties among the Neustrians, but was at length received and observed in most provinces of France, through the exhortations and endeavors of St. Odilo, and B. Richard, abbot of St. Vanne's, who were charged with this commission.[1] Prince Casimir, son of Miceslaw, king of Poland, retired to Cluni, where he professed the monastic state, and was ordained deacon. He was afterwards, by a solemn deputation of the nobility, called to the crown. St. Odilo referred the matter to pope Benedict IX., with whose dispensation Casimir mounted the throne in 1041, married, had several children, and reigned till his death in 1058.[2]
St. Odilo being moved by several visions, instituted the annual commemoration of all the faithful departed, to be observed by the members of his community with alms, prayers, and sacrifices, for the relief of the suffering souls in purgatory; and this charitable devotion he often much recommended. He was very devout to the Blessed Virgin; and above all sacred mysteries, that of the divine Incarnation employed his particular attention. As the monks were singing that verse in the church, "thou being to take upon thee to deliver man, didst not abhor the womb of a virgin;" melting away with the tenderest emotions of love, he fell to the ground; the ecstatic agitations of his body bearing evidence to that heavenly fire which glowed in his soul. Most of his sermons and little poems extant, treat of the mysteries of our redemption, or of the Blessed Virgin.[3] He excelled in an eminent spirit of compunction, and contemplation. While he was at prayer, trickling tears often watered his cheeks. Neither importunities nor compulsion could prevail upon him to submit to his being elected archbishop of Lyons in 1031. Having patiently suffered during five years the most painful diseases, he died of the cholic, at Souvigny, a priory in Bourbonnois, while employed in the visitation of his monasteries, January 1, 1049, being then eighty-seven years old, and having been fifty-six years abbot. He would be carried to the church, to assist at the divine office, even in his agony; and having received the viaticum and extreme-unction the day before, he expired on sackcloth strewed with ashes on the ground. See his life, by his disciple Lotsald, as also, by St. Peter Damian, who wrote it soon after the saint's death, at the request of St. Hugh of Cluni, his successor, in Bollandus, and Bibliotheca Cluniacensis by Dom Marrier, and in Andrew Duchesne, fol. Paris, 1614. See likewise certain epistles of St. Odilo, ib., and fourteen Sermons on the festivals of our Lord, the B. Virgin, &c., in Bibl. Patr. Lugdun. an. 1677, T. 17, p. 653.
Footnotes:
1. Glaber, monk of Cluni, in his history which he dedicated to St.
Odilo, l. 4, c. 5, l. 5, c. 1.
2. Mab. Annal. l. 57, n. 45. Solignac, Hist. de Pologne, t. 1.
3. Ceillier demonstrates, (T. 20, p. 258,) against Basnage, (observ. in
vit. Adelaid. T. 3, le t. Canis, p. 71,) that the life of St. Alice
the empress is the work of St. Odilo, no less than the life of St.
Mayeul. We have four letters, some poems, and several sermons of
this saint in the library of Cluni, (p. 370,) and in that of the
Fathers, (T. 17, p. 653.) Two other sermons hear his name in
Martenn{} (Anned. T. 5.)
{071}
ST. ALMACHUS, OR TELEMACHUS, M.
WAS a holy solitary of the East, but being excited by the ardors of a pious zeal in his desert, and pierced with grief that the impious diversion of gladiators should cause the damnation of so many unhappy souls, and involve whole cities and provinces in sin; he travelled to Rome, resolved, as far as in him lay, to put a stop to this crying evil. While the gladiators were massacring each other in the amphitheatre, he ran in among them; but as a recompense for his kind remonstrance, and entreating them to desist, he was beaten down to the ground, and torn in pieces, on the 1st of January, 404. His zeal had its desired success; for the effusion of his blood effected what till that time many emperors had found impracticable. Constantine, Constantius, Julian, and Theodosius the elder, had, to no purpose, published several edicts against those impious scenes of blood. But Honorius took occasion from the martyrdom of this saint, to enforce their entire abolition. His name occurs in the true martyrology of Bede, in the Roman and others. See Theodoret, Hist. l. 5, c. 62, t. 3, p. 740.[1]
Footnotes:
1. The martyrologies of Bede, Ado, Usuard, &c. mention St. Almachus, M.
put to death at Rome, for boldly opposing the heathenish
superstitions on the octave of our Lord's nativity. Ado adds, that
he was slain by the gladiators at the command of Alypius, prefect of
Rome. A prefect of this name is mentioned in the reign of
Theodosius, the father of Honorius. This name, the place, day, and
cause seeming to agree, Baronius, (Annot. In Martyr. Rom.) Bolland,
and Baillet, doubt not but this martyr is the same with St.
Telemachus, mentioned by Theodoret. Chatelain, canon of the
cathedral at Paris, (Notes sur le Martyr. Rom. p. 8,) and Benedict
XIV., (in Festo Circumcis. T. 10, p. 18.) think they ought to be
distinguished, and that Almachus suffered long before Telemachus.
Wake, (on Enthusiasm,) Geddes, &c. pretend the name to have been a
mistake for Almanachum; but are convicted by Chatelain of several
unpardonable blunders, and of being utterly unacquainted with
ancient MSS. of this kind, and the manner of writing them. Scaliger
and Salmasius tell us that the word Almanach is of Arabic
extraction. La Crosse observes, (Bibl. Univ. T. 11,) that it occurs
in Porphyry, (apud Eus. Praef. Evang. l. 3, c. 4,) who says that
horoscopes are found [Greek: en tois almenichiaxois], where it seems
of Egyptian origin. But whatever be the meaning of that term in
Porphyry, Du Cange, after the strictest search, assures us that the
barbarous word Almanach is never met with in any MS. Calendars or
Ephemerides. Menage (Origine de la Langue Francoise V. Almanach)
shows most probably that the word is originally Persian, with the
Arabic article prefixed. It seems to have been first used by the
Armenians to signify a calendar, ib.
ST. EUGENDUS, IN FRENCH OYEND, A.
AFTER the death of the two brothers, St. Romanus and St. Lupicinus, the holy founders of the abbey of Condate, under whose discipline he had been educated from seven years of age, he was first coadjutor to Minausius, their immediate successor, and soon after, upon his demise, abbot of that famous monastery. His life was most austere, his clothes being sackcloth, and the same in summer as in winter. He took only one small refection in the day, which was usually after sunset. He inured himself to cold and all mortifications; and was so dead to himself, as to seem incapable of betraying the least emotion of anger. His countenance was always cheerful; yet he never laughed. By meekness he overcame all injuries, was well skilled in Greek and Latin, and in the holy scriptures, and a great promoter of the sacred studies in his monastery. No importunities could prevail upon him to consent to be ordained priest. In the lives of the first abbots of Condate, of which a MS. copy is preserved in the Jesuit's library in the college of Clermont, at Paris, enriched with MS. notes by F. Chifflet, it is mentioned, that the monastery which was built by St. Romanus, of timber, being consumed by fire, St. Eugendus rebuilt it of stone; and also near the oratory, which St. Romanus had built, erected a handsome church in honor of SS. Peter, Paul, and Andrew, enriched with precious relics. His prayer was almost continual, and his devotion so tender, that the hearing {072} of a pious word was sufficient visibly to inflame his soil, and to throw him sometimes into raptures even in public, and at table. His ardent sighs to be united with his God, were most vehement during his last illness. Having called the priest among his brethren, to whom he had enjoined the office of anointing the sick, he caused him to anoint his breast according to the custom, says the author of his life, and he breathed forth his happy soul five days after, about the year 510, and of his age sixty-one.[1] The great abbey of Condate, in Franche-comte, seven leagues from Geneva, on mount Jura, or Mont-jou, received from this saint the name of St. Oyend; till in the thirteenth century it exchanged it for that of St. Claude; who having resigned the bishopric of Besanzon, which see he had governed seven years in great sanctity, lived fifty-five years abbot of this house, a perfect copy of the virtues of St. Oyend, and died in 581. He is honored on the 6th of June. His body remains entire to this day; and his shrine is the most celebrated place of resort for pilgrims in all France.[2] See the life of St. Oyend by a disciple, in Bollandus and Mabillon. Add the remarks of Rivet. His. Liter. T. 3, p. 60.
Footnotes:
1. The history of the first Abbots of Condate, compiled, according to
F. Chifflet, in 1252, mentions translation of the relics of St.
Eugendus, when they were enshrined in the same Church of St. Peter,
which had been made with great solemnity, at which this author had
assisted, and of which he testifies that he had already wrote the
history here quoted. F. Chifflet regrets the loss of this piece, and
adds that the girdle of St. Eugendus, made of white leather, two
fingers broad, has been the instrument of miraculous cures, and that
in 1601 Petronilla Birod, a Calvinist woman in that neighborhood,
was converted to the Catholic faith, with her husband and whole
family, having been suddenly freed from imminent danger of death and
child-bearing, and safely delivered by the application of this
relic.
2. The rich abbey of St. Claude gave rise to a considerable town built
about it, which was made an episcopal see by pope Benedict XIV., in
1743: who, secularizing the monastery, converted it into a
cathedral. The canons, to gain admittance, must give proof of their
nobility for sixteen degrees, eight paternal and as many maternal.
St. Romanus was buried at Beaume, St. Lucinius at Leu{}nne, and St.
Oyend at Condate: whence this last place for several ages bore his
name.
S. FANCHEA, OR FAINE, V.
HER feast has been kept for time immemorial in the parish church of Rosairthir, in the diocese of Clogher, in Ulster: and at Kilhaine near mount Bregh, on the borders of Meath, where her relics have been in veneration. She seems to have been an abbess, and is thought to have flourished in the sixth century, when many eminent saints flourished in Ireland. Her name was not known to Bollandus or Sir James Ware. See Chatelain.
S. MOCHUA, OR MONCAIN, ABBOT,
OTHERWISE CALLED CLAUNUS.
HAVING served his prince in the army, he renounced the world, and devoted himself to God in a monastic state, with so much fervor as to become a model of perfection to others. He is said to have founded thirty churches, and one hundred and twenty cells, and passed thirty years at one of these churches, which is called from him Teach Mochua, but died at Dayrinis on the 1st of January, in the ninety-ninth year of his age, about the sixth century. See his life in Bollandus, p. 45.
SAINT MOCHUA OF BELLA,
OTHERWISE CALLED CRONAN,
WAS contemporary to S. Congal, and founded the monastery (now a town) named Balla, in Connaught. He departed to our Lord in the fifty-sixth year of his age. See Bollandus, p. 49.
{073}
JANUARY II.
S. MACARIUS OF ALEXANDRIA,
ANCHORET.
From Palladius, bishop of Helenopolis, who had been his disciple, c. 20.
Rufin, Socrates, and others in Rosweide, D'Andilly, Cotelier, and
Bollandus, p. 85 See Tillemont, t. 8, p. 626. Bulteau, Hist. Mon.
d'Orient, l. 1, c. 9, p. 128.
A.D. 394.
ST. MACARIUS the younger, a citizen of Alexandria, followed the business of a confectioner. Desirous to serve God with his whole heart, he forsook the world in the flower of his age, and spent upwards of sixty years in the deserts in the exercise of fervent penance and contemplation. He first retired into Thebais, or Upper Egypt, about the year 335.[1] Having learned the maxims, and being versed in the practice of the most perfect virtue, under masters renowned for their sanctity; still aiming, if possible, at greater perfection, he quitted the Upper Egypt, and came to the Lower, before the year 373. In this part were three deserts almost adjoining to each other; that of Scete, so called from a town of the same name on the borders of Lybia; that of the Cells, contiguous to the former, this name being given to it on account of the multitude of hermit-cells with which it abounded; and a third, which reached to the western branch of the Nile, called, from a great mountain, the desert of Nitria. St. Macarius had a cell in each of these deserts. When he dwelt in that of Nitria, it was his custom to give advice to strangers, but his chief residence was in that of the Cells. Each anchoret had here his separate cell, which he made his continued abode, except on Saturday and Sunday, when all assembled in one church to celebrate the divine mysteries, and partake of the holy communion. If any one was absent, he was concluded to be sick, and was visited by the rest. When a stranger came to live among them, every one offered him his cell, and was ready to build another for himself. Their cells were not within sight of each other. Their manual labor, which was that of making baskets or mats, did not interrupt the prayer of the heart. A profound silence reigned throughout the whole desert. Our saint received here the dignity of priesthood, and shone as a bright sun influencing this holy company, while St. Macarius the elder lived no less eminent in the wilderness of Scete, forty miles distant. Palladius has recorded[2] a memorable instance of the great self-denial professed and observed by these holy hermits. A present was made of a newly-gathered bunch of grapes to St. Macarius: the holy man carried it to a neighboring monk who was sick; he sent it to another: it passed in like manner to all the cells in the desert, and was brought back to Macarius, who was exceedingly rejoiced to perceive the abstinence of his brethren, but would not eat of the grapes himself.
The austerities of all the inhabitants of that desert were extraordinary; but St. Macarius, in this regard, far surpasses the rest. For seven years {074} together he lived only on raw herbs and pulse, and for the three following years contented himself with four or five ounces of bread a day, and consumed only one little vessel of oil in a year; as Palladius assures us. His watchings were not less surprising, as the same author informs us. God had given him a body capable of bearing the greatest rigors; and his fervor was so intense, that whatever spiritual exercise be heard of, or saw practised by others, be resolved to copy the same. The reputation of the monastery of Tabenna, under St. Pachomius, drew him to this place in disguise, some time before the year 349. St. Pachomius told him that he seemed too far advanced in years to begin to accustom himself to their fastings and watchings; but at length admitted him, on condition he would observe all the rules and mortifications of the house. Lent approaching soon after, the monks were assiduous in preparations to pass that holy time in austerities, each according to his strength and fervor; some by fasting one, others two, three, or four days, without any kind of nourishment; some standing all day, others only sitting at their work. Macarius took some palm-tree leaves steeped in water, as materials for his work, and standing in a private corner, passed the whole time without eating, except a few green cabbage leaves on Sundays. His hands were employed in almost continual labor, and his heart conversed with God by prayer. If he left his station on any pressing occasion, he never stayed one moment longer than necessity required. Such a prodigy astonished the monks, who even remonstrated to the abbot at Easter against a singularity of this nature, which, if tolerated, might on several accounts be prejudicial to their community. St. Pachomius entreated God to know who this stranger was; and learning by revelation that he was the great Macarius, embraced him, thanked him for his edifying visit, and desired him to return to his desert, and there offer up his prayers for them.[3] Our saint happened one day inadvertently to kill a gnat that was biting him in his cell; reflecting that he had lost the opportunity of suffering that mortification, he hastened from his cell for the marshes of Scete, which abound with great flies, whose stings pierce even boars. There he continued six months exposed to those ravaging insects; and to such a degree was his whole body disfigured by them with sores and swellings, that when he returned he was only to be known by his voice.[4] Some authors relate[5] that he did this to overcome a temptation of the flesh.
The virtue of this great saint was often exercised with temptations. One was a suggestion to quit his desert and go to Rome, to serve the sick in the hospitals; which, by due reflection, he discovered to be a secret artifice of vain-glory inciting him to attract the eyes and esteem of the world. True humility alone could discover the snare which lurked under the specious gloss of holy charity. Finding this enemy extremely importunate, he threw himself on the ground in his cell, and cried out to the fiends: "Drag me hence if you can by force, for I will not stir." Thus he lay till night, and by this vigorous resistance they were quite disarmed.[6] As soon as he arose they renewed the assault; and he, to stand firm against them, filled two great baskets with sand, and laying them on his shoulders, travelled along the wilderness. A person of his acquaintance meeting him, asked him what he meant, and made an offer of easing him of his burden; but the saint made no other reply than this: "I am tormenting my tormentor." He returned home in the evening, much fatigued in body, but freed from the temptation. Palladius informs us, that St. Macarius, desiring to enjoy more perfectly the sweets of heavenly contemplation, at least for five days without interruption, {075} immured himself within his cell for this purpose, and said to his soul: "Having taken up thy abode in heaven, where thou hast God and the holy angels to converse with, see that thou descend not thence: regard not earthly things." The two first days his heart overflowed with divine delights; but on the third he met with so violent a disturbance from the devil, that he was obliged to stop short of his design, and to return to his usual manner of life. Contemplative souls often desire, in times of heavenly consolation, never to be interrupted in the glorious employment of love and praise: but the functions of Martha, the frailty and necessities of the human frame, and the temptations of the devil, force them, though reluctant, from their beloved object. Nay, God oftentimes withdraws himself, as the saint observed on this occasion, to make them sensible of their own weakness, and that this life is a state of trial. St. Macarius once saw, in a vision, devils closing the eyes of the monks to drowsiness, and tempting them by diverse methods to distractions, during the time of public prayer. Some, as often as they approached, chased them away by a secret supernatural force, while others were in dalliance with their suggestions. The saint burst into sighs and tears; and, when prayer was ended, admonished every one of his distractions, and of the snares of the enemy, with an earnest exhortation to employ, in that sacred duty, a more than ordinary watchfulness against his attacks.[7] St. Jerom[8] and others relate, that a certain anchoret in Nitria, having left one hundred crowns at his death, which he had acquired by weaving cloth, the monks of that desert met to deliberate what should be done with that money. Some were for having it given to the poor, others to the church: but Macarius, Pambo, Isidore, and others, who were called the fathers, ordained that the one hundred crowns should be thrown into the grave and buried with the corpse of the deceased, and that at the same time the following words should be pronounced: "May thy money be with thee to perdition."[9] This example struck such a terror into all the monks, that no one durst lay up any money by him.
Palladius, who, from 391, lived three years under our saint, was eye-witness to several miracles wrought by him. He relates, that a certain priest, whose head, in a manner shocking to behold, was consumed by a cancerous sore, came to his cell, but was refused admittance; nay, the saint at first would not even speak to him. Palladius, by earnest entreaties, strove to prevail upon him to give at least some answer to so great an object of compassion. Macarius, on the contrary, urged that he was unworthy, and that God, to punish him for a sin of the flesh he was addicted to, had afflicted him with this disorder: however, that upon his sincere repentance, and promise never more during his life to presume to celebrate the divine mysteries, he would intercede for his cure. The priest confessed his sin with a promise, pursuant to the ancient canonical discipline, never after to perform any priestly function. The saint thereupon absolved him by the imposition of hands; and a few days after the priest came back perfectly healed, glorifying God, and giving thanks to his servant. Palladius found himself tempted to sadness, on a suggestion from the devil, that he made no progress in virtue, and that it was to no purpose for him to remain in the desert. He consulted his master, who bade him persevere with fervor, never dwell on the temptation, and always answer instantly the fiend: "My love for Jesus Christ will not suffer me to quit my cell, where I am determined to abide in order to please and serve him agreeably to his will."
The two saints of the name of Macarius happened one day to cross the {076} Nile together in a boat, when certain tribunes, or principal officers, who were there with their numerous trains, could not help observing to each other, that those men, from the cheerfulness of their aspect, must be exceeding happy in their poverty. Macarius of Alexandria, alluding to their name, which in Greek signifies happy, made this answer: "You have reason to call us happy, for this is our name. But if we are happy in despising the world, are not you miserable who live slaves to it?" These words, uttered with a tone of voice expressive of an interior conviction of their truth, had such an effect on the tribune who first spoke, that, hastening home, he distributed his fortune among the poor, and embraced an eremitical life. In 375, both these saints were banished for the catholic faith, at the instigation of Lacius, the Arian patriarch of Alexandria. Our saint died in the year 394, as Tillemont shows from Palladius. The Latins commemorate him on the 2d, the Greeks with the elder Macarius, on the 19th of January.
In the desert of Nitria there subsists at this day a monastery which bears the name of St. Macarius. The monastic rule called St. Macarius's, in the code of rules, is ascribed to this of Alexandria. St. Jerom seems to have copied some things from it in his letter to Rusticus. The concord, or collection of rules, gives us another, under the names of the two SS. Macariuses; Serapion (of Arsinoe, or the other of Nitria;) Paphnutius (of Becbale, priest of Scete;) and thirty-four other abbots.[10] It was probably collected from their discipline, or regulations and example. According to this latter, the monks fasted the whole year, except on Sundays, and the time from Easter to Whitsuntide; they observed the strictest poverty, and divided the day between manual labor and hours of prayer; hospitality was much recommended in this rule, but, for the sake of recollection, it was strictly forbid for any monk, except one who was deputed to entertain guests, ever to speak to any stranger without particular leave.[11] The definition of a monk or anchoret, given by the abbot Rance of la Trappe, is a lively portraiture of the great Macarius in the desert when, says he, a soul relishes God in solitude, she thinks no more of any thing but heaven, and forgets the earth, which has nothing in it that can now please her; she burns with the fire of divine love, and sighs only after God, regarding death as her greatest advantage; nevertheless they will find themselves much mistaken, who, leaving the world, imagine they shall go to God by straight paths, by roads sown with lilies and roses, in which they will have no difficulties to conquer, but that the hand of God will turn aside whatever could raise any in their way, or disturb the tranquillity of their retreat: on the contrary, they must be persuaded that temptations will everywhere follow them, that there is neither state nor place in which they can be exempt, that the peace which God promises is procured amidst tribulations, as the rose-bud amidst thorns; God has not promised his servants that they shall not meet with trials, but that with the temptation, he will give them grace to be able to bear it:[12] heaven is offered to us on no other conditions; it is a kingdom of conquest, the prize of victory—but, O God, what a prize!
Footnotes: 1. Some confound our saint with Macarius of Pisper, or the disciple of Saint Antony. But the best critics distinguish them. The latter, with his fellow-disciple Amathas, buried St. Antony, who left him his staff, as Cronius, the Priest of Nitria, related to Palladius. To this Macarius of Pisper St. Antony committed the government of almost five thousand monks as appears from the life of saint Posthumias. 2. Hist. Lausiac, c. 20. 3. Pallad. Laus. c. 20. 4. Ib. 5. Rosweide b. 8, c. 20, p. 722. 6. Pallad. Laus. c. 20. 7. Rosweide, Vit. Patr. l. 2, c. 29, p. 481. 8. S. Hier. ep. 18 (ol. 22) ad. Eustoch. T. 4, par. 2, p. 44, ed. Ben. et Rosw. Vit. Patr. l. 3, c. 319 9. Acts viii. 20. 10. Concordia Regularum, autore S. Benedicto Ananiae Abbate, edita ab Hugone Menardo, O.S.B. in 4to Parisiis, 1638. Item, Codex Regularum collectus a S. Benedicto Ananiae, auctus a Luca Holstenio, two vols. 4to. Romae, 1661. 11. C. 60, p. 809 edit. Mena{}. 12. 1 Cor. x. 13.
On the same day
Are commemorated many holy martyrs throughout the provinces of the Roman empire; who, when Dioclesian, in 303, commanded the holy scriptures, {077} wherever found, to be burnt, chose rather to suffer torments and death than to be accessary {sic.} to their being destroyed by surrendering them into the hands of the professed enemies of their Author.[1]
Footnotes:
1. See Baron. n. annal. et annot. in Martyr. Rom. Eus. l. 8, c. 2. H.
Vales. not. ib. p. 163. Ruinart, in Acta SS Saturn &c. and S.
Felicis. Fleury. Moeurs des Chret. p. 45. Tillem. Pers. de. Dicol.
art. 10, t. 5. Lactant. de mort. Pers. c. 15 et 18, cum not. Baluz.
&c.
Also, ST. CONCORDIUS, M.
A HOLY subdeacon, who in the reign of Marcus Antoninus, was apprehended in a desert, and brought before Torquatus, governor of Umbria, then residing at Spoletto, about the year 178. The martyr, paying no regard to his promises or threats, in the first interrogatory was beaten with clubs, and in the second was hung on the rack, but in the height of his torments he cheerfully sang: "Glory be to thee, Lord Jesus!" Three days after, two soldiers were sent by Torquatus, to behead him in the dungeon, unless he would offer sacrifice to an idol, which a priest who accompanied them carried with him for this purpose. The saint showed his indignation by spitting upon the idol, upon which one of the soldiers struck off his head. In the Roman Martyrology his name occurs on the 1st, in some others on the 2d of January. See his genuine acts in Bollandus, p. 9, and Tillemont, t. 2, p. 439.
Also, ST. ADALARD, OR ADALARD. A.C.
Pronounced ALARD.[1]
THE birth of this holy monk was most illustrious, his father Bernard being son of Charles Martel, and brother of king Pepin, so that Adalard was cousin-german to Charlemagne, by whom he was called in his youth to the court, and created count of his palace. A fear of offending God made him tremble at the sight of the dangers of forfeiting his grace, with which he was surrounded, and of the disorders which reigned in the world. Lest he should be engaged to entangle his conscience, by seeming to approve of things which he thought would endanger his salvation, he determined to forsake at once both the court and the world. His sacrifice was the more perfect and edifying, as he was endowed with the greatest personal accomplishments of mind and body for the world, and in the flower of his age; for he was only twenty years old, when, in 773, he took the monastic habit at Corbie in Picardy, a monastery that had been founded by queen Bathildes, in 662. After he had passed a year in the fervent exercises of his novitiate, he made his vows; the first employment assigned him in the monastery was that of gardener, in which, while his hands were employed in the business of his calling, his thoughts were on God and heavenly things. Out of humility, and a desire of closer retirement, he obtained leave to be removed to mount Cassino, where he hoped he should be concealed from the world; but his eminent qualifications, and the great example of his virtue, betrayed and defeated all the projects of his humility, and did not suffer him to live long unknown; he was brought back to Corbie, and some years after chosen abbot. Being obliged by Charlemagne often to attend at court, he appeared there as the first among the king's counsellors, as he is styled by Hincmar,[2] who had seen him there in 796. He was compelled by Charlemagne {078} entirely to quit his monastery, and take upon him the charge of chief minister to that prince's eldest son Pepin, who, at his death at Milan in 810, appointed the saint tutor to his son Bernard, then but twelve years of age. In this exalted and distracting station, Adalard appeared even in council recollected and attentive to God, and from his employments would hasten to his chamber, or the chapel, there to plunge his heart in the centre of its happiness. During the time of his prayers, tears usually flowed from his eyes in great abundance, especially on considering his own miseries, and his distance from God. The emperor recalled him from Milan, and deputed him to pope Leo III. to assist at the discussion of certain difficulties started relating to the clause inserted in the creed, concerning the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son. Charlemagne died in 814, on the 28th of January, having associated his son, Lewis le Debonnaire, in the empire in the foregoing September. While our saint lived in his monastery, dead to the world, intent only on heavenly things, instructing the ignorant, and feeding the poor, on whom he always exhausted his whole revenue, Lewis declared his son, Lothaire, his partner and successor in the empire, in 817: Bernard, who looked upon that dignity as his right, his father Pepin having been eldest brother to Lewis, rebelled, but lost both his kingdom and his life. Lewis was prevailed upon, by certain flatterers, to suspect our saint to have been no enemy to Bernard's pretensions, and banished him to a monastery, situated in the little island Heri, called afterwards Hermoutier, and St. Philebert's, on the coast of Aquitain. The saint's brother Wala (one of the greatest men of that age, as appears from his curious life, published by Mabillon) he obliged to become a monk at Lerins. His sister Gondrada he confined in the monastery of the Holy Cross, at Poitiers; and left only his other sister Theodrada, who was a nun, at liberty in her convent at Soissons. This exile St. Adalard regarded as his gain, and in it his tranquillity and gladness of soul met with no interruptions. The emperor at length was made sensible of his innocence, and, after five years' banishment, called him to his court towards the close of the year 821; and, by the greatest honors and favors, endeavored to make amends for the injustice he had done him. Adalard (whose soul, fixed wholly on God, was raised above all earthly things) was the same person in prosperity and adversity, in the palace as in the cell, and in every station: the distinguishing parts of his character were, an extraordinary gift of compunction and tears, the most tender charity for all men, and an undaunted zeal for the relief and protection of all the distressed. In 823, he obtained leave to return to the government of his abbey of Corbie, where he with joy frequently took upon himself the most humbling and mortifying employments of the house. By his solicitude, earnest endeavors, and powerful example, his spiritual children grew daily in fervor and divine love; and such was his zeal for their continual advancement, that he passed no week without speaking to every one of them in particular, and no day without exhorting them all in general, by pathetic and instructive discourses. The inhabitants of the country round his monastery had also a share in his pious labors, and he exhausted on the poor the revenue of his monastery, and whatever other temporal goods came to his hands, with a profusion which many condemned as excessive, but which heaven, on urgent occasions, sometimes approved by sensible miracles. The good old man would receive advice from the meanest of his monks, with an astonishing humility; when entreated by any to moderate his austerities, he frequently answered, "I will take care of your servant, that he may serve you the longer;" meaning himself. Several hospitals were erected by him. During his banishment, another Adalard, who governed the monastery by his appointment, began, upon our saint's project, to {079} prepare the foundation of the monastery of New Corbie, vulgarly called Corwey, in the diocese of Paderborn, nine leagues from that city, upon the Weser, that it might be a nursery of evangelical laborers, to the conversion and instruction of the northern nations. St. Adalard, after his return to Corbie, completed this great undertaking in 822, for which he went twice thither, and made a long stay, to settle the discipline of his colony. Corwey is an imperial abbey; its territory reaches from the bishopric of Paderborn to the duchy of Brunswick, and the abbot is one of the eleven abbots, who sit with twenty-one bishops, in the imperial diet at Ratisbon: but the chief glory of this house is derived from the learning and zeal of St. Anscharius, and many others, who erected illustrious trophies of religion in many barbarous countries. To perpetuate the regularity which he established in his two monasteries, he compiled a book of statutes for their use, of which considerable fragments are extant:[3] for the direction of courtiers in their whole conduct, he wrote an excellent book, On the Order of the Court; of which work we have only the large extracts, which Hincmar has inserted in his Instructions of king Carloman, the master-piece of that prelate's writings, for which he is indebted to our saint. A treatise on the Paschal Moon, and other works of St. Adalard, are lost. By those which we have, also by his disciples, St. Paschasius Radbertus, St. Anscharius, and others, and by the testimony of the former in his life, it is clear that our saint was an elegant and zealous promoter of literature in his monasteries: the same author assures us, that he was well skilled, and instructed the people not only in the Latin, but also in the Tudesque and vulgar French languages.[4] St. Adalard, for his eminent learning, and extraordinary spirit of prayer and compunction, was styled the Austin, the Antony, and the Jeremy of his age. Alcuin, in a letter addressed to him under the name of Antony, calls him his son;[5] whence many infer that he had been scholar to that great man. St. Adalard was returned out of Germany to Old Corbie, when he fell sick three days before Christmas: he received extreme unction some days after, which was administered by Hildemar, bishop of Beauvais, who had formerly been his disciple; the viaticum he received on the day after the feast of our Lord's circumcision, about seven o'clock in the morning, and expired the same day about three in the afternoon, in the year 827, of his age seventy-three. Upon proof of several miracles, by virtue of a commission granted by pope John XIX. (called by some XX.) the body of the saint was enshrined, and translated with great solemnity in 1040; of which ceremony we have a particular history written by St. Gerard, who also composed an office in his honor, in gratitude for having been cured of a violent headache through his intercession: the same author relates seven other miracles performed by the same means.[6] The relics of St. Adalard, except a small portion given to the abbey of Chelles, are still preserved at Corbie, in a rich shrine and two smaller cases. His name has never been inserted in the Roman Martyrology, though he is honored as principal patron in many parish churches, and by several towns on the banks of the Rhine and in the Low Countries. See his life, compiled with accuracy, in a very florid pathetic style, by way of panegyric, by his disciple Paschasius Radbertus, {080} extant in Bollandus, and more correctly in Mabillon, (Act. Ben. t. 5, p. 306, also the same abridged in a more historical style, by St. Gerard, first monk of Corbie, afterwards first abbot of Seauve-majeur in Guienne, founder by William, duke of Aquitain and count of Poitiers, in 1080. The history of the translation of the saint's body, with an account of eight miracles by the same St. Gerard, is also given us by Bollandus.)
Footnotes:
1. It was usual among the ancient French, to add to certain words,
syllables, or letters which they did not pronounce; as Chrodobert,
or Rigobert, for Robert: Cloves for Louis; Clothaire for Lotharie,
&c.
2. Hinc. l. Inst. Regis, c. 12.
3. Published by D'Achery, Spicil. tom. 4, p. 1, 20.
4. From this testimony it is clear, that the French language, used by
the common people, had then so much deviated from the Latin as to be
esteemed a different tongue; which is also evident from Nithard, an
officer in the army of Lewis le Debonnaire, who, in his history of
the divisions between the sons of Lewis le Debonnaire, (published
among the French historians by du Chesne,) gives us the original act
of the agreement between the two brothers, Charles the Bald, and
Lewis of Germany, at Strasburg, in 842.
5. Alcuin, Ep. 107.
6. St. Gerard, of Seauve-majeur, died on the 5th of April, 1095, and
was canonized by C[oe]lestine III. in 1197. See his life, with an
account of the foundation of his monastery, in Mabillon, Acts,
Sanctorum ad S. Benedict. t. 9, p. 841.
JANUARY III.
ST. PETER BALSAM, M.
From his valuable acts in Ruinart, p. 501. Bollandus, p. 128. See
Tillemont, T. 5. Assemani, Act Mart. Occid. T. 2, p. 106.
A.D. 311.
PETER BALSAM, a native of the territory of Eleutheropolis, in Palestine, was apprehended at Aulane, in the persecution of Maximinus. Being brought before Severus, governor of the province, the interrogatory began by asking him his name. Peter answered: "Balsam is the name of my family, but I received that of Peter in baptism." SEVERUS. "Of what family, and of what country are you?" PETER. "I am a Christian." SEVERUS. "What is your employ?" PETER. "What employ can I have more honorable, or what better thing can I do in the world, than to live a Christian?" SEVERUS. "Do you know the imperial edicts?" PETER. "I know the laws of God, the sovereign of the universe." SEVERUS. "You shall quickly know that there is an edict of the most clement emperors, commanding all to sacrifice to the gods, or be put to death." PETER. "You will also know one day that there is a law of the eternal king, proclaiming that every one shall perish, who offers sacrifice to devils: which do you counsel me to obey, and which, do you think, should be my option; to die by your sword, or to be condemned to everlasting misery, by the sentence of the great king, the true God?" SEVERUS. "Seeing you ask my advice, it is then that you obey the edict, and sacrifice to the gods." PETER. "I can never be prevailed upon to sacrifice to gods of wood and stone, as those are which you adore." SEVERUS. "I would have you know, that it is in my power to revenge these affronts by your death." PETER. "I had no intention to affront you. I only expressed what is written in the divine law." SEVERUS. "Have compassion on yourself, and sacrifice." PETER. "If I am truly compassionate to myself, I ought not to sacrifice." SEVERUS. "My desire is to use lenity; I therefore still do allow you time to consider with yourself, that you may save your life." PETER. "This delay will be to no purpose, for I shall not alter my mind; do now what you will be obliged to do soon, and complete the work, which the devil, your father, has begun; for I will never do what Jesus Christ forbids me."