He was married before his conversion to the faith; and his wife, by whom he had a daughter named Apra, or Abram, was yet living, when he was chosen bishop of Poictiers, about the year 353; but from the time of {141} his ordination he lived in perpetual continency.[7] He omitted no endeavors to escape this promotion: but his humility only made the people the more earnest to see him vested with that dignity; and indeed their expectations were not frustrated in him, for his eminent virtue and capacity shone forth with such a lustre, as soon drew upon him the attention, not only of all Gaul, but of the whole church. Soon after he was raised to the episcopal dignity, he composed, before his exile, elegant comments on the gospel of Saint Matthew, which are still extant. Those on the Psalms he compiled after his banishment.[8] Of these comments on the Psalms, and on St. Matthew, we are chiefly to understand St. Jerom, when he recommends, in a particular manner, the reading of the works of St. Hilary to virgins and devout persons.[9] From that time the Arian controversy chiefly employed his pen. He was an excellent orator and poet. His style is lofty and noble, beautified with rhetorical ornaments and figures, but somewhat studied; and the length of his periods renders him sometimes obscure to the unlearned,[10] as St. Jerom takes notice.[11] It is observed by Dr. Cave, that all his writings breathe an extraordinary vein of piety. Saint Hilary solemnly appeals to God,[12] that he held it as the great work of his life, to employ all his faculties to announce God to the world, and to excite all men to the love of him. He earnestly recommends the practice of beginning every action and discourse by prayer,[13] and some act of divine praise;[14] as also to meditate on {142} the law of God day and night, to pray without ceasing, by performing all our actions with a view to God their ultimate end, and to his glory.[15] He breathes a sincere and ardent desire of martyrdom, and discovers a soul {143} fearless of death and torments. He had the greatest veneration for truth, sparing no pains in its pursuit, and dreading no dangers in its defence. The emperor Constantius, having labored for several years to compel the eastern churches to embrace Arianism, came into the West: and after the overthrow of the tyrant Magnentius, made some stay at Arles, while his Arian bishops held a council there, in which they engaged Saturninus, the impious bishop of that city, in their party, in 353. A bolder Arian council at Milan, in 355, held during the residence of the emperor in that city, required all to sign the condemnation of St. Athanasius. Such as refused to comply were banished; among whom were St. Eusebius of Vercelli, Lucifer of Cagliari, and St. Dionysius of Milan, into whose see Auxentius, the Arian, was intruded. St. Hilary wrote on that occasion his first book to Constantius, in which he mildly entreated him to restore peace to the church. He separated himself from the three Arian bishops in the West, Ursacius, Valens, and Saturninus, and exhibited an accusation against the last in a synod at Beziers. But the emperor, who had information of the matter from Saturninus, sent an order to Julian, then Caesar, and surnamed afterwards the Apostate, who at that time commanded in Gaul, for St. Hilary's immediate banishment into Phrygia, together with St. Rhodanius, bishop of Toulouse. The bishops in Gaul being almost all orthodox, remained in communion with St. Hilary, and would not suffer the intrusion of any one into his see, which in his absence he continued to govern by his priests. The saint went into banishment about the middle of the year 356, with as great alacrity as another would take a journey of pleasure, and never entertained the least disquieting thought of hardships, dangers, or enemies, having a soul above both the smiles and frowns of the world, and fixed only on God. He remained in exile somewhat upwards of three years, which time he employed in composing several learned works. The principal and most esteemed of these is that On the Trinity, against the Arians, in twelve {144} books. In them he proves the consubstantiality of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. He teaches that the church is one, out of which all heresies spring; not that by this she is distinguished, as standing always one, always alone against them all, and confounding them all: whereas they by perpetual divisions tear each other in pieces, and so become the subject of her triumph.[16] He proves that Arianism cannot be the faith of Christ, because not revealed to St. Peter, upon whom the church was built and secured forever; for whose faith Christ prayed, that it might never fail; who received the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whose judiciary sentence on earth is that of heaven:[17] all which arguments he frequently urges.[18] He proves the divinity of Christ by the miracles wrought at the sepulchres of the apostles and martyrs, and by their relics: for the devils themselves confess Christ's godhead, and roar and flee at the presence of the venerable bones of his servants,[19] which he also mentions and urges in his invective against Constantius.[20] In 358, he wrote his book On Synods, or On the Faith of the Orientals, to explain the terms and variation of the eastern Arians in their synods.
In his exile he was informed that his daughter Apra, whom he had left in Gaul, had thoughts of embracing the married state; upon which he implored Christ, with many tears, to bestow on her the precious jewel of virginity. He sent her a letter that is still extant, in which he acquaints her, that if she contemned all earthly things, spouse, sumptuous garments, and riches, Christ had prepared for her, and had shown unto him, at his prayers and tears, an inestimable never-falling diamond, infinitely more precious than she was able to frame to herself an idea of. He conjures her by the God of heaven, and entreats her not to make void his anxiety for her, nor to deprive herself of so incomparable a good. Fortunatus assures us that the original letter was kept with veneration in the church of Poictiers, in the sixth century, when he wrote, and that Apra followed his advice, and died happily at his feet after his return.[21] St. Hilary sent to her with this letter two hymns, composed by himself; one for the evening, which does not seem to have reached our times; the other for the morning, which is the hymn Lucis largitor splendide.
The emperor, by an unjust usurpation in the affairs of the Church, assembled a council of Arians at Seleucia, in Isauria, to undermine the great council of Nice. St. Hilary, who had then passed four years in banishment, in Phrygia, was invited thither by the Semi-Arians, who hoped from his lenity that he would be useful to their party in crushing the staunch Arians, that is, those who adhered strictly to the doctrine of Arius. But no human considerations could daunt his courage. He boldly defended the decrees of Nice, till at last, tired out with hearing the blasphemies of the heretics, he withdrew to Constantinople. The weak emperor was the dupe sometimes of the Arians, and at other times of the Semi-Arians. These last prevailed at Seleucia, in September, 359, as the former did in a council held at Constantinople in the following year, 360, where having the advantage, they procured the banishment of the Semi-Arians, less wicked than themselves. St. Hilary, who had withdrawn from Seleucia to Constantinople, presented to the emperor a request, called his second book to Constantius, begging the liberty of holding a public disputation about religion with {145} Saturninus, the author of his banishment. He presses him to receive the unchangeable apostolic faith, injured by the late innovations, and smartly rallies the fickle humor of the heretics, who were perpetually making new creeds, and condemning their old ones, having made four within the compass of the foregoing year; so that faith was become that of the times, not that of the gospels, and that there were as many faiths as men, as great a variety of doctrine as of manners, as many blasphemies as vices.[22] He complains that they had their yearly and monthly faiths; that they made creeds to condemn and repent of them; and that they formed new ones to anathematize those that adhered to their old ones. He adds, that every one had scripture texts, and the words Apostolic Faith, in their mouths, for no other end than to impose on weak minds: for by attempting to change faith, which is unchangeable, faith is lost; they correct and amend, till weary of all, they condemn all. He therefore exhorts them to return to the haven from which the gusts of their party spirit and prejudice had driven them, as the only means to be delivered out of their tempestuous and perilous confusion. The issue of this challenge was, that the Arians, dreading such a trial, persuaded the emperor to rid the East of a man that never ceased to disturb its peace, by sending him back into Gaul; which he did, but without reversing the sentence of his banishment, in 360.
St. Hilary returned through Illyricum and Italy to confirm the weak. He was received at Poictiers with the greatest demonstrations of joy and triumph, where his old disciple, St. Martin, rejoined him, to pursue the exercises of piety under his direction. A synod in Gaul, convoked at the instance of St. Hilary, condemned that of Rimini, which, in 359, had omitted the word Consubstantial. Saturninus, proving obstinate, was excommunicated and deposed for his heresy and other crimes. Scandals were removed, discipline, peace, and purity of faith were restored, and piety flourished. The death of Constantius put an end to the Arian persecution. St. Hilary was the mildest of men, full of condescension and affability to all: yet seeing this behavior ineffectual, he composed an invective against Constantius, in which he employed severity, and the harshest terms; and for which undoubtedly he had reasons that are unknown to us. This piece did not appear abroad till after the death of that emperor. Our saint undertook a journey to Milan, in 364, against Auxentius, the Arian usurper of that see, and in a public disputation obliged him to confess Christ to be true God, of the same substance and divinity with the Father. St. Hilary indeed saw through his hypocrisy; but this dissembling heretic imposed so far on the emperor Valentinian, as to pass for orthodox. Our saint died at Poictiers, in the year 368, on the thirteenth of January, or on the first of November, for his name occurs in very ancient Martyrologies on both these days. In the Roman breviary his office is celebrated on the fourteenth of January. The one is probably that of some translation of his relics. The first was made at Poictiers in the reign of Clovis I., on which see Cointe.[23] From St. Gregory of Tours, it appears that before his time some part of St. Hilary's relics was honored in a church in Limousin.[24] Alcuin mentions the veneration of the same at Poictiers;[25] and it is related that his relics were burned by the Huguenots at Poictiers.[26] But this we must understand of some small portion, or of the dust remaining in his tomb. For his remains were translated from Poictiers to the abbey of St. Denys, near Paris, as is proved by the tradition of that abbey, a writer of the abbey of Richenow, in {146} the ninth century,[27] and other monuments.[28] Many miracles performed by St. Hilary are related by Venantius Fortunatus, bishop of Poictiers, and are the subject of a whole book added to his life, which seems to have been written by another Fortunatus. St. Gregory of Tours, Flodoard, and others, have mentioned several wrought at his tomb. Dom Coutant, the most judicious and learned Maurist monk, has given an accurate edition of his works, in one volume in folio, at Paris, in 1693, which was reprinted at Verona by the Marquis Scipio Maffei, in 1730, together with additional comments on several Psalms.
* * * * *
St. Hilary observes, that singleness of heart is the most necessary condition of faith and true virtue, "For Christ teaches that only those who become again as it were little children, and by the simplicity of that age cut off the inordinate affections of vice, can enter the kingdom of heaven. These follow and obey their father, love their mother; are strangers to covetousness, ill-will, hatred, arrogance, and lying, and are inclined easily to believe what they hear. This disposition of affections opens the way to heaven. We must therefore return to the simplicity of little children, in which we shall bear some resemblance to our Lord's humility."[29] This, in the language of the Holy Ghost, is called the foolishness of the cross of Christ,[30] in which consists true wisdom. That prudence of the flesh and worldly wisdom, which is the mother of self-sufficiency, pride, avarice, and vicious curiosity, the source of infidelity, and the declared enemy of the spirit of Christ, is banished by this holy simplicity; and in its stead are obtained true wisdom, which can only be found in a heart freed from the clouds of the passions, perfect prudence, which, as St. Thomas shows, is the fruit of the assemblage of all virtues, and a divine light which grace fails not to infuse. This simplicity, which is the mother of Christian discretion, is a stranger to all artifice, design, and dissimulation, to all views or desires of self-interest, and to all undue respect or consideration of creatures. All its desires and views are reduced to this alone, of attaining to the perfect union with God. Unfeignedly to desire this one thing, to belong to God alone, to arrive at his pure love, and to do his will in all things, is that simplicity or singleness of heart of which we speak, and which banishes all inordinate affections of the heart, from which arise the most dangerous errors of the understanding. This is the essential disposition of every one who sincerely desires to live by the spirit of Christ. That divine spouse of souls, loves to communicate himself to such.[31] His conversation (or as another version has it, his secret) is with the simple.[32] His delight is in those who walk with simplicity.[33] This is the characteristic of all the saints:[34] whence the Holy Ghost cries out, Approach him not with a double heart.[35] That worldly wisdom is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be.[36] Its intoxication blinds men, and shuts their eyes to the light of divine revelation. They arrogate to themselves the exclusive privilege of learning and clear understanding: but the skepticism, the pitiful inconsistencies, and monstrous extravagances, which characterize their writings and discourses, make us blush to see so strong an alliance of ignorance and presumption; and lament that the human mind should be capable of falling into a state of so deplorable degeneracy. Among the fathers of the church we admire men the most learned of their age, the most penetrating and most judicious, and at the same time {147} the most holy and sincere; who, being endowed with true simplicity of heart, discovered in the mysteries of the cross the secrets of infinite wisdom, which they made their study, and the rule of their actions.
Footnotes: 1. L. 2, adv. Julian, c. 8. 2. L. 2, adv. Rufin. p. 415. 3. In Isa. c. 60. 4. S. Hieron. in Catal. 5. L. 1, de Trin. p. 1-10. 6. Exod. iii. 14. 7. The contrary is certainly a mistake in Dr. Cave; for St. Jerom, writing against Jovinian, says, in {} p. 175, that though the church was sometimes obliged to make choice of married men for the priesthood, because virgins, or unmarried, could not always be found, they notwithstanding lived ever after continent. Certe confiteris, non posse esse episcopum qui in episcopatu filios faciat: alioqui si deprehensus fuerit non quasi vir tenebitur, sed quasi adulter condemnabitur, ib. And in his book against Vigilantius, p. 28, he observes, that in the churches of the East, in Egypt, and in the apostolic see of Rome, those only were made clergymen, who were virgins, or single; or if they were married, they ceased to live as husbands. Aut virgines clericos accipiunt, aut contintes; aut si uxores habuerint, mariti esse desinunt, p. 281. 8. S. Hilar. in Ps. 53, n. 8, in Ps. 67, p. 15, and Contant, Armon. in S. Hilar. in Psalmos, p. 165. 9. Ep. ad Laetam. 10. On the interpretation of certain obscure passages of the works of St. Hilary, see Dom Coutant, in an excellent preface to his edition of this father's works; also Witasse de Incarn. t. 2, &c. 11. Ep. 49, ad Paulinum, t. 4, p. 567. 12. Lib. 1, de Trinit. 13. Doubtless his love of prayer, and the assiduous application of his mind to that holy exercise, moved him to make the Psalms a main object of his sacred studies and meditation. His comments are elegant; though in them he dwells much on the literal sense, he neglects not the mystical and allegorical, every thing in these divine oracles being prophetic, as he takes notice, (in Ps. 142, n. 1.) Often he finds the immediate literal sense clear; in other passages, he shows Christ and his Church to be pointed out. The true sense of the holy scriptures he teaches, only to be opened to us by the spirit of assiduous prayer, (in Ps. 125, n. 2, &c.) The fatal and opposite errors, which the overweening spirit and study of a false criticism have produced in every age, justify this general remark of the fathers, that though the succor of reasonable criticism ought by no means to be neglected, a spirit of prayer is the only key which can open to us the sacred treasures of the divine truths, by the light which it obtains of the Holy Ghost, and the spirit of simplicity, piety, and humility, which it infuses. In this disposition, the holy doctors of the Church discovered in the divine oracles that spirit of perfect virtue, which they imbibed and improved from their assiduous meditation. St. Hilary remarks, that the first lesson we are to study in them is, that of humility, in which "Christ has taught, that all the titles and prizes of our faith are comprised:" In humilitate docuit omnia fidei nomina et praemia contineri, (in Ps. 118, l. 20, n. 1, p. 358.) Whence the royal prophet entreats God, to consider nothing in him but his lowliness of heart, (v. 153, ibid.) This holy father sticks not to say, humility is the greatest work of our faith, our best sacrifice to God, (in Ps. 1311, n. 1. p. 442;) but true humility is accompanied with an invincible courage, and a firmness and constancy in virtue, which no fear of worldly powers is ever able to shake, (in Ps. xiv. p. 66.) St. Hilary laments, that even several pastors of the church thought it a part of piety to flatter princes. But true religion teaches us (Matt. x. 28) only to fear things which are justly to be feared, that is, to fear God, to fear sin, or what can hurt our souls: for what threatens only our bodies, this is to be despised, when the interest of God and our souls is concerned. We indeed study out of charity to give offence to no one, (1 Cor. x. 32, 33;) but desire only to please men for God, not by contemning him, (in Ps. 52, p. 89, 90.) Prayer is the great Christian duty, which this holy doctor was particularly solicitous to inculcate, teaching that it consists in the cry of the heart; not in the lips, as David cried to God in his whole heart, Ps. cxviii. v. 145, (in Ps. cxviii. l. 19, p. 352.) We are to pour forth our souls before God, with earnestness, and with abundance of tears, (in Ps. 41, apud Marten. t. 9, p. 71.) Amidst the dangers and evils of this life, our only comfort ought to be in God, in the assured hope of his promises, and in prayer. (Ib.) That prayer is despised by God, which is slothful and lukewarm, accompanied with distrust, distracted with unprofitable thoughts, weakened by worldly anxiety and desires of earthly goods, or fruitless, for want of the support of good works, (in Ps. liv. p. 104.) All our actions and discourses ought to be begin by prayer, and the divine praise, (in Ps. lxiv. p. 162.) The day among Christians is always begun by prayer, and ended by hymns to God, (ib. n. 12, p. 169.) By this public homage of the church, and of every faithful soul in it, God is particularly honored, and he delights in it. (St. Jerom. in eund. Ps.) St. Hilary takes notice, that the night is of all others the most proper time for prayer; as the example of Christ, David, and other saints, demonstrates, (in Ps. cxviii. l. 8, p. 292.) He observes, that it cannot be doubted, but among all the acts of prayer, that of the divine praise is in general the most noble and most excellent: and that it is for his infinite goodness and mercy, in the first place, that we are bound to praise him, (in Ps. cxxxiv p. 469.) Next to this, he places the duty of thanksgiving. (Ib.) To be silent in the divine praises, he calls the greatest of all punishments; and takes notice, that every one makes what he loves the chiefest object of his joy: as we see in the drunkard, the covetous, or the ambitious man: thus the prophet makes the heavenly Jerusalem the beginning of his joy; always bearing in mind, that this is his eternal country, in which he will be associated with the troops of angels, be received into the kingdom of God, and put in possession of its glory; he therefore finds all other things insipid, and knows no other comfort or joy but in this hope, bearing always in mind, that the glorious inhabitants of that kingdom never cease singing the divine praises, saying, Holy, holy, holy, &c. (in Ps. cxxxvi. n. 11, p. 494.) In another place he tells us, that the prophet bears not the delays of his body, (moras corporis sui non patitur,) sighing with the apostle to be dissolved and clothed with immortality: but earnestly praying, that he may find mercy, and be delivered from falling into the lake of torments, (in Ps. cxlii. n. 8, 9, p. 549.) During this exile to meditate on eternity, and on the divine law and judgments, ought to be our assiduous occupation, (in Ps. cxlii. n. 6, p. 548,) especially in time of tribulations and temptations, (in Ps. cxviii. l. 12, n. 10, p. 313.) The world is to be shunned, at least in spirit; first, because it is filled on every side with snares and dangers, secondly, that our souls may more freely soar above it, always thinking on God; hence, he says, our souls must be, as it were, spiritual birds of heaven, always raised high on the wing; and he cries out, "Thou art instructed in heavenly science: what hast thou to do with anxious worldly cares? Thou hast renounced the world; what hast thou to do with its superfluous concerns? Why dost thou complain if thou art taken in a snare, by wandering in a strange land, who oughtest to restrain thy affections from straying from home? Say rather, Who will give me wings as of a dove, and I will fly, and will be at rest?" Ps. liv. 7, (in Ps. cxviii. l. 14, p. 328.) To build a house for God, that is, to prepare a dwelling for him in our souls, we must begin by banishing sin, and all earthly affections, (in Ps. xxxi. p. 73;) for Christ, who is wisdom, sanctity, and truth, cannot establish his reign in the breast of a fool, hypocrite, or sinner, (in Ps. xli. p. 60, ap. Marten. t. 9.) It is easy for God, by penance, to repair his work, howsoever it may have been defaced by vice, as a potter can restore or improve the form of a vessel, while the clay is yet moist, (in Ps. ii. p. 47:) but he often inculcates that repentance, or the confession of sin, is a solemn profession of sinning no more, (in Ps. cxxxvii. p. 498, in Ps. li. and cxviii. p. 263, &c.) Every thing that is inordinate in the affections must be cut off. "The prophet gave himself entire to God, according to the tenor of his consecration of himself. Whatever lives in him, lives to God. His whole heart, his whole soul is fixed on God alone, and occupied in him, and he never loses sight of him. In all his works and thoughts God is before his eyes." Totum quod vivit, Deo vivit. (Ps. cxviii. l. 14, n. 16, p. 327.) Upon these words, I am thy servant, Ps. cxviii. v. 125, he observes, that every Christian frequently repeats this, but most deny by their actions what they profess in words, "It is the privilege of the prophet to call himself the servant of God in every affection of his heart, in every circumstance and action of his life," &c. (in Ps. cxviii. l. 17, p. 339.) He teaches that the angels, patriarchs, and prophets are as it were mountains protecting the church, (in Ps. cxxiv. n. 6, p. 404;) and that holy angels attend and succor the faithful, (in Ps. cxxxvii. p. 499;) assist them in time of combat against the devils, (in Ps. lxv. p. 178, and in Ps. cxxxiv. p. 475;) carry up their prayers to their heavenly Father with an eager zeal; and looking upon this ministry as an honor, (in Matt. c. 18, p. 699.) That the church of Christ is one, out of which, as out of the ark of Noah, no one man be saved, (in Ps. cxlvi., xiv., lxiv., cxxviii., and cxvvii. in Matt. c. 4, and 7 De Trinit. l. 7, p. 917.) He mentions fast days of precept, the violation of which renders a Christian a slave of the devil, a vessel of death, and fuel of hell, (in Ps. cxviii. l. 18, p. 349.) This crime he joins with pride and fornication, as sins at the sight of which every good Christian ought to pine away with grief and zeal, according to the words of Ps. cxviii. v. 139. Saint Hilary seems to have explained the whole Psalter, though only part is recovered by the editors of his works. To the comments published by Dom Coutant at Paris, in 1693, the marquis Scipio Maffei added some others on several other Psalms, in his edition at Verona, in 1730. Dom Martenne, in 1733, published others on certain other Psalms, which he had discovered in a manuscript at Anchin, in his Amplissima Monumentorum Collectio, t. 9, p. 55. These comments on the Psalms, St. Hilary compiled after his exile, as appears from certain allusions to his books on the Trinity, and from his frequent reflections against the Arians. Nothing of this is found in his commentary on St. Matthew, which Dom Coutant shows to have been the first of his works in the order of time, composed soon after he was raised to the episcopal dignity. He here and there borrows short passages from Origen, but sticks closer to the literal sense, though he sometimes has recourse to the allegorical, for the sake of some moral instruction. St. Hilary is one of the first who published any Latin comments in the holy scriptures. Rheticius, bishop of Autun, and St. Victorinus of Passaw, though the latter wrote in Greek, had opened the way in the West in the beginning of the same century. St. Hilary, in this commentary on St. Matthew, excellently inculcates in few words the maxims of Christian virtue, especially fraternal charity and meekness, by which our souls pass to divine charity and peace, (in Matt. c. 4, v. 18, 19, p. 626:) and the conditions of fasting and prayer, though for the exposition of our Lord's prayer, he refers to that of St. Cyprian; adding that Tertullian has left us also a very suitable work upon it; but that his subsequent error has weakened the authority of his former writings which may deserve approbation, (in c. 5, p. 630.) The road to heaven he shows to be exceeding narrow, because even among Christians very few sincerely despise the world, and labor strenuously to subdue their flesh and all their passions, and to shun all the incentives of vice, (in c. 6, p. 368.) St. Peter he calls the Prince of the College of the Apostles, and the Porter of Heaven, and extols the authority of the keys conferred upon him, (in Matt. c. 7, p. 642, in c. 16, p. 690. Also 1. 6. de Trin. p. 891, 903, 9114.) He proves that Christ, in his bloody sweat, grieved more for the danger of his disciples and other causes, than for his own death; because he had in his last supper already consecrated his blood to be poured forth for the remission of sin. Numquid pati ipse nolebat. Atquin superius fundendum in remissionem peccatorum corporis sui sanguinem consecraverat, (S. Hilar. in Matt. c. 31, p. 743.) His twelve books on the Trinity he compiled during his banishment in Phrygia, between the years 356 and 359, as is clear from his own express testimony, and that of St. Jerom. In the first book of this immortal monument of his admirable genius and piety, he beautifully shows that man's felicity is only to be found in God; and that the light of reason suffices to demonstrate this, which he illustrates by an account of his own conversion to the faith. After this he takes notice, that we can learn only by God's revelation, his nature, or what he is, he being the competent witness of himself, who it known only by himself, (n. 18, p. 777.) In the second book he explains the Trinity, which we profess in the form of baptism, and says, that faith alone in believing, and sincerity and devotion in adoring, this mystery ought to suffice without disputing or prying, and laments, that by the blasphemies of the Sabellians and Arians, who perverted the true sense of the scriptures, he was compelled to dispute of things ineffable and incomprehensible which only necessity can excuse, (n. 25.) He then proves the eternal generation of the Son, the procession of the Holy Ghost, and their consubstantiality in one nature, (l. 2 and 3.) He checks their presumption in pretending to fathom the Trinity, by showing that they cannot understand many miracles of Christ or corporeal things, which yet they confess to be most certain, (l. 3, n. 19, 20, 24.) He detects and confutes the subtilties of the Arians, in their various confessions of faith, (l. 4, 5, 6,) also of the Sabellians and Photinians, (l. 7;) and demonstrates the divinity of Christ, from the confession of St. Peter, &c., (l. 6,) and of the very Jews, who were more sincere than the Arians, acknowledging that Christ called himself the natural Son of God. (John x. 31, &c. l. 7, n. 2, 3, p. 931.) The natural unity of the Father and Son, he demonstrates from that text, "I and my Father are one," and others, (l. 8,) and observes that both from the testimony of Christ in the holy scriptures, and from the faith of the church, we believe without doubting the Eucharist to be the true body and blood of Christ, (l. 8, n. 14, p. 955, 956.) He answers several objections from scripture, (l. 9,) and shows there was something in Christ (viz. the divine person, &c.) which did not suffer in his passion, (l. 10.) Other objections he confutes, (l. 11,) and in his last book defends the eternity of the Son of God. Between August in 358, and May in 359, St. Hilary, after he had been three years in banishment, and was still in Asia, published his book On Synods, to inform the Catholics in Gaul, Britain, and Germany, what judgment they ought to form of several synods, held lately in the East, chiefly by the Arians and Semi-Arians: a work of great use in the history of those times, and in which St. Hilary's prudence, humility, modesty, greatness of soul, constancy, invincible meekness, and love of peace, shine forth. In this work he mollifies certain expressions of the Semi-Arians in their councils, because writing before the council of Rimini, he endeavored to gain them by this method, whereas he at other times severely condemned the same; as did also St. Athanasius, in his book on the same subject, and under the same title, which he composed after the council of Rimini; and expressly to show the variations of those heretics. (See Coutant, vit. S. Hilar. p. c. ci. et praef. in S. Hilar. de Synodis, p. 1147.) Fifteen fragments of St. Hilary's history of the councils of Rimini and Seleucia furnish important materials for the history of Arianism, particularly of the council of Rimini. In his first book to the emperor Constantius, which he wrote in 355 or 356, he conjures that prince with tears to restore peace to the church, and leave the decision of ecclesiastical causes to its pastors. The excellent request which he presented to Constantius at Constantinople, in 360, is called his second book to that prince. The third book ought to be styled, with Coutant, Against Constantius: for in it St. Hilary directs it to the Catholics, (n. 2 and 12) though he often uses an apostrophe to Constantius. The saint wrote it five years after the council of Milan, in 355, as he testifies; consequently in 360, after that prince had rejected his second request; but it was only published after the death of that emperor, in the following year, as is clear from St. Jerom: He says Constantius, by artifices and flattery, was a more dangerous persecutor than Nero and Decius: he tells him, "Thou receivest the priests with a kiss, as Christ was betrayed by one: thou bowest thy head to receive their blessing, that thou mayest trample on their faith: thou entertainest them at thy table, as Judas went from table to betray his master." Fleury (l. 14, n. 26) bids us observe, in these words, with what respect emperors then treated bishops. St. Hilary in his elegant book against Auxentius, gives the catholics an account of his conferences with that heretic at Milan in 364. 14. In Ps. 64. 15. In Ps. 1, p. 19, 20. 16. Lib. 7, de Trinit. n. 4, p. 917. 17. Lib. 6, n. 37, 38, p. 904. 18. In Ps. 131, n. 4, p. 447, in cap. 16, Matt. n. 7, p. 690. 19. Lib. 11, de Trinit. n. 3. 20. Lib. 3, adv. Constant. n. 8, p. 1243, Ed. Ben. 21. This letter is commended by the most judicious critics, Baronius, Tillemont, Fleury, and Coutant, a monk of the congregation of St. Maur, in his edition of the works of St. Hilary, and others. The style is not pompous, but adapted to the capacity of a girl of thirteen years of age. 22. Facta est fides temporum, potius quam evangellorum, l. 2, ad Const. p. 1227. Tot nunc fides existere, quot voluntates, ib. Annuas atque menstruas de Deo fides decernimus, decretis poenitimusm poenitentes defendimus, defensos anathematizamus. ib. p. 1228. 23. Cointe Annal. Fr. ad ann. 538, n. 41, 42, 43. 24. L. de Gl. Conf. c. 2. 25. Alcuin, Hom. de S. Willibrodo. 26. Baillet, Vie de S. Hilaire. 27. Ap. Mab. anal. t. 4, p. 644. 28. Aimion. l. 4, c. 17 & 33. Coutant, Vit. S. Hilar. p. cxxiv, cxxv, cxxix. 29. S. Hilar. in Matt. c. 18, v. i. p. 698. 30. 1 Cor. i. 17, & iii. 18. S. Hilar. l. 3, de Trin. n. 24, 25, pp. 822, 823. 31. 1 Par. xxix. 17. 32. Prov. iii. 32. 33. Prov. xi. 20. 34. 2 Cor. i. 12. 35. Eccles. i. 39. 36. Rom. viii. 7.
ST. FELIX OF NOLA, P. AND C.
IT is observed by the judicious Tillemont, with regard to the life of this saint, that we might doubt of its wonderful circumstances, were they not supported by the authority of a Paulinus; but that great miracles ought to be received with the greater veneration, when authorized by incontestable vouchers.
St. Felix was a native of Nola, a Roman colony in Campania, fourteen miles from Naples, where his father Hermias, who was by birth a Syrian, and had served in the army, had purchased an estate and settled himself. He had two sons, Felix and Hermias, to whom at his death he left his patrimony. The younger sought preferment in the world among the lovers of vanity, by following the profession of arms, which at that time was the surest road to riches and honors. Felix, to become in effect what his name in Latin imported, that is, happy, resolved to follow no other standard than that of the king of kings, Jesus Christ. For this purpose, despising all earthly things, lest the love of them might entangle his soul, he distributed the better part of his substance among the poor, and was ordained Reader, Exorcist, and, lastly, Priest, by Maximus, the holy bishop of Nola; who, charmed with his sanctity and prudence, made him his principal support in these times of trouble, and designed him for his successor.[1]
In the year 250, the emperor Decius raised a bloody persecution against the church. Maximus, seeing himself principally aimed at, retired into the deserts, not through the fear of death, which he desired, but rather not to tempt God by seeking it, and to preserve himself for the service of his flock. The persecutors not finding him, seized on Felix, who, in his absence, was very vigilant in the discharge of all his pastoral duties. The governor caused him to be scourged; then loaded with bolts and chains about his neck, hands, and legs, and cast into a dungeon, in which, as St. Prudentius informs us,[2] the floor was spread all over with potsherds and pieces of broken glass, so that there was no place free from them, on which the saint could either stand or lie. One night an angel appearing in great glory, filled the prison with a bright light, and bade St. Felix go and assist his bishop, who was in great distress. The confessor, seeing his chains fall off, and the doors open, followed his guide, and was conducted by heaven to the place where Maximus lay, almost perished with hunger and cold, speechless, and without sense: for, through anxiety for his flock, and the hardships of his solitary retreat, he had suffered more than a martyrdom. Felix, not being able to bring him to himself, had recourse to prayer; and discovering thereupon a bunch of grapes within reach, he squeezed some of the juice into his mouth, which had the desired effect. The good bishop no sooner beheld his friend Felix, but he embraced him, and begged to be conveyed back to his church. The saint, taking him on his shoulders, carried him to his episcopal house in the city, before day appeared, where a pious ancient woman took care of him.[3]
Felix, with the blessing of his pastor, repaired secretly to his own lodgings, and there kept himself concealed, praying for the church without ceasing till peace was restored to it by the death of Decius, in the year 251. {148} He no sooner appeared again in public, but his zeal so exasperated the pagans that they came armed to apprehend him; but though they met him, they knew him not; they even asked him where Felix was, a question he did not think proper to give a direct answer to. The persecutors going a little further, perceived their mistake, and returned; but the saint in the mean time had stepped a little out of the way, and crept through a hole in a ruinous old wall, which was instantly closed up by spiders' webs. His enemies never imagining any thing could have lately passed where they saw so close a spider's web, after a fruitless search elsewhere, returned in the evening without their prey. Felix finding among the ruins, between two houses, an old well half dry, hid himself in it for six months; and received during that time wherewithal to subsist by means of a devout Christian woman. Peace being restored to the church by the death of the emperor, the saint quitted his retreat, and was received in the city as an angel sent from heaven.
Soon after, St. Maximus' dying, all were unanimous for electing Felix bishop; but he persuaded the people to make choice of Quintus, because the older priest of the two, having been ordained seven days before him. Quintus, when bishop, always respected St. Felix as his father, and followed his advice in every particular. The remainder of the saint's estate having been confiscated in the persecution, he was advised to lay claim to it, as others had done, who thereby recovered what had been taken from them. His answer was, that in poverty he should be the more secure of possessing Christ.[4] He could not even be prevailed upon to accept what the rich offered him. He rented a little spot of barren land, not exceeding three acres, which he tilled with his own hands, in such manner as to receive his subsistence from it, and to have something left for alms. Whatever was bestowed on him, he gave it immediately to the poor. If he had two coats, he was sure to give them the better; and often exchanged his only one for the rags of some beggar. He died in a good old age, on the fourteenth of January, on which day the Martyrology, under the name of St. Jerom, and all others of later date mention him. Five churches have been built at, or near the place where he was first interred, which was without the precinct of the city of Nola. His precious remains are at present kept in the cathedral; but certain portions are at Rome, Benevento, and some other places. Pope Damasus, in a pilgrimage which he made from Rome to Nola, to the shrine of this saint, professes, in a short poem which he composed in acknowledgment, that he was miraculously cured of a distemper through his intercession.
St. Paulinus, a Roman senator in the fifth age, forty-six years after the death of St. Damasus, came from Spain to Nola, desirous of being porter in the church of St. Felix. He testifies that crowds of pilgrims came from Rome, from all other parts of Italy, and more distant countries, to visit his sepulchre on his festival: he adds, that all brought some present or other to his church, as wax-candles to burn at his tomb, precious ointments, costly ornaments, and such like; but that for his part, he offered to him the homage of his tongue, and himself, though an unworthy victim. [5] He everywhere expresses his devotion to this saint in the warmest and strongest terms, and believes that all the graces he received from heaven were conferred on him through the intercession of St. Felix. To him he addressed himself in all his necessities; by his prayers he begged grace in this life, and glory after {149} death.[6] He describes at large the holy pictures of the whole history of the Old Testament, which were hung up in the church of St. Felix, and which inflamed all who beheld them, and were as so many books that instructed the ignorant. We may read with pleasure the pious sentiments the sight of each gave St. Paulinus.[7] He relates a great number of miracles that were wrought at his tomb, as of persons cured of various distempers and delivered from dangers by his intercession, to several of which he was an eye-witness. He testifies that he himself had frequently experienced the most sensible effects of his patronage, and, by having recourse to him, had been speedily succored.[8] St. Austin also has given an account of many miracles performed at his shrine.[9] It was not formerly allowed to bury any corpse within the walls of cities. The church of St. Felix, out of the walls of Nola, not being comprised under this prohibition, many devout Christians sought to be buried in it, that their faith and devotion might recommend them after death to the patronage of this holy confessor, upon which head St. Paulinus consulted St. Austin. The holy doctor answered him by his book, On the care for the dead: in which he shows that the faith and devotion of such persons would be available to them after death, as the suffrages and good works of the living in behalf of the faithful departed are profitable to the latter. See the poems of St. Paulinus on his life, confirmed by other authentic ancient records, quoted by Tillemont, t. 4, p. 226, and Ruinart, Acta Sincera, p. 256; Muratori, Anecd. Lat.
Footnotes: 1. S. Paulin. Carm. 19, 20. Seu Natali, 4. 2. De Cor. hymn 5. 3. Paulin. Carm. 19. 4. Dives egebo Deo; nam Christum pauper habebo. Paulin. Carm. 2. Natali S. Felicia 5. 5. ________________ Ego munere linguae, Nudus opum, famulor, de me mea debita solvens Meque ipsum pro me, vilis licet hostia pendam. Natal. 6 6. Nat. 1, 2, &c. 7. Nat. 9, 10. 8. St. Paulin. Ep. 28 & 36. Carm. 13, 18, 21, 22, 23, 29, &c. 9. St. August. Ep. 78, olim 137, lib. De cura pro moritus, c. 16.
SS. ISAIAS, SABBAS,
AND thirty-eight other holy solitaries on mount Sinai, martyred by a troop of Arabians in 273; likewise Paul, the abbot; Moses, who by his preaching and miracles had converted to the faith the Ishmaelites of Pharan; Psaes, a prodigy of austerity, and many other hermits in the desert of Raithe, two days' journey from Sinai, near the Red Sea, were massacred the same year by the Blemmyans, a savage infidel nation of Ethiopia. All these anchorets lived on dates, or other fruits, never tasted bread, worked at making baskets in cells at a considerable distance from each other, and met on Saturdays, in the evening, in one common church, where they watched and said the night office, and on the Sunday received together the holy eucharist. They were remarkable for their assiduity in praying and fasting. See their acts by Ammonius, an eye-witness, published by F. Combefis; also Bulteau, Hist. Mon. d'Orient, l. 2, c. 1, p. 209.
Also, many holy anchorets on mount Sinai, whose lives were faithful copies of Christian perfection, and who met on Sundays to receive the holy eucharist, were martyred by a band of Saracens in the fifth century. A boy of fourteen years of age led among them an ascetic life of great perfection. The Saracens threatened to kill him, if he did not discover where the ancient monks had concealed themselves. He answered, that death did not terrify him, and that he could not ransom his life by a sin in betraying his fathers. They bade him put off his clothes: "After you have killed me," said the modest youth, "take my clothes and welcome: but as I never saw my body naked, have so much compassion and regard for my shamefacedness, as to let me die covered." The barbarians, enraged at this answer, fell on him with all their weapons at once, and the pious youth died by as many martyrdoms as he had executioners. St. Nilus, who had been formerly governor {150} of Constantinople, has left us an account of this massacre in seven narratives: at that time he led an eremitical life in those deserts, and had placed his son Theodulus in this holy company. He was carried away captive, but redeemed after many dangers. See S. Nili, Septem Narrationes; also, Bulteau, Hist. Mon. d'Orient, l. 2, c. 2, p. 220.
S. BARBASCEMINUS,
AND SIXTEEN OF HIS CLERGY, MM.
HE succeeded his brother St. Sadoth in the metropolitical see of Seleucia and Ctesiphon, in 342, which he held six years. Being accused as an enemy to the Persian religion, and as one who spoke against the Persian divinities, Fire and Water, he was apprehended, with sixteen of his clergy, by the orders of king Sapor II. The king seeing his threats lost upon him, confined him almost a year in a loathsome dungeon, in which he was often tormented by the Magians with scourges, clubs, and tortures, besides the continual annoyance of stench, filth, hunger, and thirst. After eleven months the prisoners were again brought before the king. Their bodies were disfigured by their torments, and their faces discolored by a blackish hue which they had contracted. Sapor held out to the bishop a golden cup as a present, in which were a thousand sineas of gold, a coin still in use among the Persians. Besides this he promised him a government, and other great offices, if he would suffer himself to be initiated in the rites of the sun. The saint replied that he could not answer the reproaches of Christ at the last day, if he should prefer gold, or a whole empire, to his holy law; and that he was ready to die. He received his crown by the sword, with his companions, on the 14th of January, in the year 346, and of the reign of king Sapor II. the thirty-seventh, at Ledan, in the province of the Huzites. St. Maruthas, the author of his acts, adds, that Sapor, resolving to extinguish utterly the Christian name in his empire, published a new terrible edict, whereby he commanded every one to be tortured and put to death who should refuse to adore the sun, to worship fire and water, and to feed on the blood of living creatures.[1] The see of Seleucia remained vacant twenty years, and innumerable martyrs watered all the provinces of Persia with their blood. St. Maruthas was not able to recover their names, but has left us a copious panegyric on then heroic deeds, accompanied with the warmest sentiments of devotion, and desires to be speedily united with them in glory. See Acta Mart. Orient. per Steph. Assemani, t. 1, p. 3.
Footnotes:
1. The Christians observed for several ages, especially in the East,
the apostolic temporary precept of abstaining from blood. Acts, xv.
20. See Nat. Alexander Hist. Saec. 1, dissert 9.
{151}
JANUARY XV.
ST. PAUL, THE FIRST HERMIT.
From his life, compiled by St. Jerom, in 365. Pope Gelasius I., in his learned Roman council, in 494, commends this authentic history. St. Paul is also mentioned by Cassian, St. Fulgentius, Sulpitius Severus, Sidonius, Paulinus, in the life of St. Ambrose, &c. St. Jerom received this account from two disciples of St. Antony, Amathas and Macariux. St. Athanasius says, that he only wrote what he had heard from St. Antony's own mouth, or from his disciples; and desires others to add what they know concerning his actions. On the various readings and MS. copies of this life, see the disquisition of P. Jem{} de Prato, an oratorian of Verona, in his new edition of the works of Sulpitius Severus, t. l, app. 2, p. 403. The Greek history of St. Paul the hermit, which Bollandus imagines St. Jerom to have followed, is evidently posterior; and borrows from him, as Jos. Assemani shows. Comm. In Calend. Univ. t. 6, p. 92. See Gudij Epistolae, p. 278.
A.D. 342.
ELIAS and St. John the Baptist sanctified the deserts, and Jesus Christ himself was a model of the eremitical state during his forty days' fast in the wilderness; neither is it to be questioned but the Holy Ghost conducted the saint of this day, though young, into the desert, and was to him an instructor there; but it is no less certain, that an entire solitude and total sequestration of one's self from human society, is one of those extraordinary ways by which God leads souls to himself, and is more worthy of our admiration, than calculated for imitation and practice: it is a state which ought only to be embraced by such as are already well experienced in the practices of virtue and contemplation, and who can resist sloth and other temptations, lest, instead of being a help, it prove a snare and stumbling-block in their way to heaven.
This saint was a native of the Lower Thebais, in Egypt, and had lost both his parents when he was but fifteen years of age: nevertheless, he was a great proficient in the Greek and Egyptian learning, was mild and modest, and feared God from his earliest youth. The bloody persecution of Decius disturbed the peace of the church in 250; and what was most dreadful, Satan, by his ministers, sought not so much to kill the bodies, as by subtle artifices and tedious tortures to destroy the souls of men. Two instances are sufficient to show his malice in this respect: A soldier of Christ, who had already triumphed over the racks and tortures, had his whole body rubbed over with honey, and was then laid on his back in the sun, with his hands tied behind him, that the flies and wasps, which are quite intolerable in hot countries, might torment and gall him with their stings. Another was bound with silk cords on a bed of down, in a delightful garden, where a lascivious woman was employed to entice him to sin; the martyr, sensible of his danger, bit off part of his tongue and spit it in her face, that the horror of such an action might put her to flight, and the smart occasioned by it be a means to prevent, in his own heart, any manner of consent to carnal pleasure. During these times of danger, Paul kept himself concealed in the house of another; but finding that a brother-in-law was inclined to betray him, that he might enjoy his estate, he fled into the deserts. There he found many spacious caverns in a rock, which were said to have been the retreat of money-coiners in the days of Cleopatra, queen of Egypt. He chose for his dwelling a cat; in this place, near which were a palm-tree[1] and a clear spring: the former by its leaves furnished him with raiment, and by its fruit with food; and the latter supplied him with water for his drink.
{152}
Paul was twenty-two years old when he entered the desert. His first intention was to enjoy the liberty of serving God till the persecution should cease; but relishing the sweets of heavenly contemplation and penance, and learning the spiritual advantages of holy solitude, he resolved to return no more among men, or concern himself in the least with human affairs, and what passed in the world: it was enough for him to know that there was a world, and to pray that it might be improved in goodness. The saint lived on the fruit of his tree till he was forty-three years of age, and from that time till his death, like Elias, he was miraculously fed with bread brought him every day by a raven. His method of life, and what he did in this place during ninety years, is unknown to us: but God was pleased to make his servant known a little before his death.
The great St. Antony, who was then ninety years of age, was tempted to vanity, as if no one had served God so long in the wilderness as he had done, imagining himself also to be the first example of a life so recluse from human conversation: but the contrary was discovered to him in a dream the night following, and the saint was at the same time commanded, by Almighty God, to set out forthwith in quest of a perfect servant of his, concealed in the more remote parts of those deserts. The holy old man set out the next morning in search of the unknown hermit. St. Jerom relates from his authors, that he met a centaur, or creature not with the nature and properties, but with something of the mixed shape of man and horse,[2] and that this monster, or phantom of the devil, (St. Jerom pretends not to determine which it was,) upon his making the sign of the cross, fled away, after having pointed out the way to the saint. Our author adds, that St. Antony soon after met a satyr,[3] who gave him to understand that he was an inhabitant of those deserts, and one of that sort whom the deluded Gentiles adored for gods. St. Antony, after two days and a night spent in the search, discovered the saint's abode by a light that was in it, which he made up to. Having long begged admittance at the door of his cell, St. Paul at last opened it with a smile: they embraced, called each other by their names, which they knew by divine revelation. St. Paul then inquired whether idolatry still reigned in the world. While they were discoursing together, a raven flew towards them, and dropped a loaf of bread before them. Upon which St. Paul said, "Our good God has sent us a dinner. In this manner have I received half a loaf every day these sixty years past; now you are come to see me, Christ has doubled his provision for his servants." Having given thanks to God they both sat down by the fountain; but a little contest arose between them who should break the bread; St. Antony alleged St. Paul's greater age, and St. Paul pleaded that Antony was the stranger: both agreed at last to take up their parts together. Having refreshed themselves at the spring, they spent the night in prayer. The next morning St. Paul told his guest that the time of his death approached, and that he was sent to bury him; adding, "Go and fetch the cloak given you by St. Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, in which I desire you to wrap my body." This he might say with the intent of being left alone in prayer, while he expected to be called out of this world; as also that he might testify his veneration for St. Athanasius, and his high regard for the faith and communion of the Catholic church, on account of which that holy bishop was then a great sufferer. St. Antony was surprised to hear him mention the cloak, which he could not have known but by divine revelation. Whatever was his motive for desiring to be buried {153} in it, St. Antony acquiesced to what was asked of him: so, after mutual embraces, he hastened to his monastery to comply with St. Paul's request. He told his monks that he, a sinner, falsely bore the name of a servant of God, but that he had seen Elias and John the Baptist in the wilderness, even Paul in Paradise. Having taken the cloak, he returned with it in all haste, fearing lest the holy hermit might be dead, as it happened. While on his road, he saw his happy soul carried up to heaven, attended by choirs of angels, prophets, and apostles. St. Antony, though he rejoiced on St. Paul's account, could not help lamenting on his own, for having lost a treasure so lately discovered. As soon as his sorrow would permit, he arose, pursued his journey, and came to the cave. Going in, he found the body kneeling, and the hands stretched out. Full of joy, and supposing him yet alive, he knelt down to pray with him, but by his silence soon perceived he was dead. Having paid his last respects to the holy corpse, he carried it out of the cave. While he stood perplexed how to dig a grave, two lions came up quietly, and, as it were, mourning; and tearing up the ground, made a hole large enough for the reception of a human body. St. Antony then buried the corpse, singing hymns and psalms, according to what was usual and appointed by the church on that occasion. After this he returned home praising God, and related to his monks what he had seen and done. He always kept as a great treasure, and wore himself on great festivals, the garment of St. Paul, of palm-tree leaves patched together. St. Paul died in the year of our Lord 342, the hundred and thirteenth year of his age, and the ninetieth of his solitude, and is usually called the first hermit, to distinguish him from others of that name. The body of this saint is said to have been conveyed to Constantinople, by the emperor Michael Comnenus, in the twelfth century, and from thence to Venice in 1240.[4] Lewis I., king of Hungary, procured it from that republic, and deposited it at Buda, where a congregation of hermits under his name, which still subsists in Hungary, Poland, and Austria, was instituted by blessed Eusebius of Strigonium, a nobleman, who, having distributed his whole estate among the poor, retired into the forests; and being followed by others, built the monastery of Pisilia, under the rule of the regular canons of St. Austin. He died in that house, January the 20th, 1270.
St. Paul, the hermit, is commemorated in several ancient western Martyrologies on the 10th of January, but in the Roman on the 15th, on which he is honored in the anthologium of the Greeks.
* * * * *
An eminent contemplative draws the following portraiture of this great model of an eremitical life:[5] St. Paul, the hermit, not being called by God to the external duties of an active life, remained alone, conversing only with God, in a vast wilderness, for the space of near a hundred years, ignorant of all that passed in the world, both the progress of sciences, the establishment of religion, and the revolutions of states and empires; indifferent even as to those things without which he could not live, as the air which he breathed, the water he drank, and the miraculous bread with which he supported life. What did he do? say the inhabitants of this busy world, who think they could not live without being in a perpetual hurry of restless projects; what was his employment all this while? Alas! ought we not rather to put this question to them; what are you doing while you are not taken up in doing the will of God, which occupies the heavens and the earth in all their motions? Do you call that doing nothing which is the great end God {154} proposed to himself in giving us a being, that is, to be employed in contemplating, adoring, and praising him? Is it to be idle and useless in the world to be entirely taken up in that which is the eternal occupation of God himself, and of the blessed inhabitants of heaven? What employment is better, more just, more sublime, or more advantageous than this, when done in suitable circumstances? To be employed in any thing else, how great or noble soever it may appear in the eyes of men, unless it be referred to God, and be the accomplishment of his holy will, who in all our actions demands our heart more than our hand, what is it, but to turn ourselves away from our end, to lose our time, and voluntarily to return again to that state of nothing out of which we were formed, or rather into a far worse state?
Footnotes:
1. Pliny recounts thirty-nine different sorts of palm-trees, and says
that the best grow in Egypt, which are ever green, have leaves thick
enough to make ropes and a fruit which serves in some places to make
bread.
2. Pliny, l. 7, c. 3, and others, assure us that such monsters have
been seen. Consult the note of Rosweide.
3. The heathens might feign their gods of the woods, from certain
monsters sometimes seen. Plutarch, in his life of Sylla, says, that
a satyr was brought to that general at Athens; and St. Jerom tells
us, that one was shown alive at Alexandria, and after its death was
salted and embalmed, and sent to Antioch that Constantine the Great
might see it.
4. See the whole history of this translation, published from an
original MS. by F. Gamans, a Jesuit, inserted by Bollandus in his
collection.
5. F. Ambrose de Lombez, Capucin, Tr. de la Paix Interieure, (Paris,
1758,) p. 372.
ST. MAURUS, ABBOT
AMONG the several noblemen who placed their sons under the care of St. Benedict, to be brought up in piety and learning, Equitius, one of that rank, left with him his son Maurus, then but twelve years old, in 522. The youth surpassed all his fellow monks in the discharge of monastic duties, and when he was grown up, St. Benedict made him his coadjutor in the government of Sublaco. Maurus, by his singleness of heart and profound humility, was a model of perfection to all the brethren, and was favored by God with the gift of miracles. St. Placidus, a fellow monk, the son of the senator Tertullus, going one day to fetch water, fell into the lake, and was carried the distance of a bow-shot from the bank. St. Benedict saw this in spirit in his cell, and bid Maurus run and draw him out. Maurus obeyed, walked upon the waters without perceiving it, and dragged out Placidus by the hair, without sinking in the least himself. He attributed the miracle to the prayers of St. Benedict; but the holy abbot, to the obedience of the disciple. Soon after that holy patriarch had retired to Cassino, he called St. Maurus thither, in the year 528. Thus far St. Gregory, Dial. l. 2, c. 3, 4, 6.
St. Maurus coming to France in 543, founded, by the liberality of king Theodebert, the great abbey of Glanfeuil, now called St. Maur-sur-Loire, which he governed several years. In 581 he resigned the abbacy to Bertulf, and passed the remainder of his life in close solitude, in the uninterrupted contemplation of heavenly things, in order to prepare himself for his passage to eternity. After two years thus employed, he fell sick of a fever, with a pain in his side: he received the sacraments of the church, lying on sackcloth before the altar of St. Martin, and in the same posture expired on the 15th of January, in the year 584. He was buried on the right side of the altar in the same church,[1] and on a roll of parchment laid in his tomb was inscribed this epitaph: "Maurus, a monk and deacon, who came into France in the days of king Theodebert, and died the eighteenth day before the month of February."[2] St. Maurus is named in the ancient French litany composed by Alcuin, and in the Martyrologies of Florus, Usuard, and others. {155} For fear of the Normans, in the ninth century, his body was translated to several places; lastly, in 868, to St. Peter's des Fusses, then a Benedictin abbey, near Paris,[3] where it was received with great solemnity by AEneas, bishop of Paris. A history of this translation, written by Eudo, at that time abbot of St. Peter's des Fusses, is still extant. This abbey des Fusses was founded by Blidegisilus, deacon of the church of Paris, in the time of king Clovis II. and of Audebert, bishop of Paris: St. Babolen was the first abbot. This monastery was reformed by St. Mayeul, abbot of Cluni, in 988: in 1533 it was secularized by Clement VII. at the request of Francis I., and the deanery united to the bishopric of Paris; but the church and village have for several ages borne the name of St. Maur. The abbey of Glanfeuil, now called St. Maur-sur-Loire, was subjected to this des Fosses from the reign of Charles the Bald to the year 1096, in which Urban II., at the solicitation of the count of Anjou, re-established its primitive independence. Our ancestors had a particular veneration for St. Maurus, under the Norman kings; and the noble family of Seymour (from the French Saint Maur) borrow from him its name, as Camden observes in his Remains. The church of St. Peter's des Fusses, two leagues from Paris, now called St. Maurus's, was secularized, and made a collegiate, in 1533; and the canons removed to St. Louis, formerly called St. Thomas of Canterbury's, at the Louvre in Paris, in 1750. The same year the relics of St. Maurus were translated thence to the abbey of St. Germain-des-Prez, where they are preserved in a rich shrine.[4] An arm of this saint was with great devotion translated to mount Cassino, in the eleventh century,[5] and by its touch a demoniac was afterwards delivered, as is related by Desiderius at that time abbot of mount Cassino,[6] who was afterwards pope, under the name of Victor III. See Mabill. Annal. Bened. t. 1, l. 3 and 4; and the genuine history of the translation of the body of St. Maurus to the monastery des Fosses, by Endo, at that time abbot of this house. The life of St. Maurus, and history of his translation, under the pretended name of Faustus, is demonstrated by Cointe and others to be a notorious forgery, with several instruments belonging to the same.[7]
Footnotes:
1. Mab. Annal. Ben. t. 1, l. 7, ad annos 581, 584.
2. All writers, at least from the ninth century, are unanimous in
affirming with Amalarius, that St. Maurus of Anjou, the French
abbot, was the same Maurus that was the disciple of St. Benedict;
which is also proved against certain modern critics, by Dom Ruinart
in his Apologia Missionis St. Mauri, in append. 1. annal. Bened. per
Mabill. t. 1, p. 630. The arguments which are alleged by some for
distinguishing them, may be seen in Chatelain's notes on the
Martyrol. p. 253. In imitation of the congregation of SS. Vane and
Hydulphus, then lately established in Lorraine, certain French
Benedictin monks instituted a like reformation of their order, under
the title of the congregation of St. Maurus, in 1621, which was
approved of by Gregory XV. and Urban VIII. It is divided into six
provinces, under its own general, who usually resides at St.
Germain-des-Prez, at Paris. These monks live in strict retirement,
and constantly abstain from flesh meat, except in the infirmary.
Their chief houses are, St. Maur-sur-Loire, St. Germain-des Prez,
Fleury, or St. Benoit-sur-Loire, Marmoutier at Tours, Vendome, St.
Remigius at Rheims, St. Peter of Corbie, Fecan &c.
3. Ib. l. 15, p. 465, l. 36, p. 82. See Dom Beaunier, Recueil
Historique des Evech. et Abbayes, t. 1, p. 17.
4. Dom Vaissette, Geographie Histor. t. 6, p. 515, and Le Beuf, Hist.
du Diocese de Paris, t. 5, p. 17. Piganiol, Descrip. of Paris, t. 8,
p. 165, t. 3, p. 114, t. 7, p. 79.
5. S. Odilo in vita S. Majoli; et Leo Ostiens in chron. Casin. l. 2, c.
55.
6. Victor III. Dial. l. 2. Ruinart, Apol. Miss. S. Mauri, p. 632.
Mabill. Annal. Bened. l. 56, c. 73.
7. Dom Freville, the Maurist monk, and curate of St. Symphorian's, at
the abbey of St. Germain-des-Prez, has nevertheless made use of
these pieces in a MS. history of the life and translations of this
saint, which he has compiled, and of which he allowed me the
perusal. When the relics of St. Maurus were translated to St.
Germain-des-Prez, those of St. Babolen, who died about the year 671,
and is honored is the Paris breviary on the 28th of June, and
several others which had enriched the monastery des Fosses were
conveyed to the church of St. Louis, at the Louvre.
ST. MAIN, ABBOT
THIS saint was a British bishop, who, passing into Little Britain in
France, there founded an abbey in which he ended his days.
ST. JOHN CALYBITE, RECLUSE.
HE was the son of Eutropius, a rich nobleman in Constantinople. He secretly left home to become a monk among the Acaemetes.[1] After six {156} years he returned disguised in the rags of a beggar, and subsisted by the charity of his parents, as a stranger, in a little hut near their house; hence he was called the Calybite.[2] He sanctified his soul by wonderful patience, meekness, humility, mortification, and prayer. He discovered himself to his mother, in his agony, in the year 450, and, according to his request, was buried under his hut; but his parents built over his tomb a stately church, as the author of his life mentions. Cedrenus, who says it stood in the western quarter of the city, calls it the church of poor John;[3] Zonaras, the church of St. John Calybite.[4] An old church standing near the bridge of the isle of the Tiber in Rome, which bore his name, according to an inscription there, was built by pope Formosus, (who died in 896,) together with an hospital. From which circumstance Du Cange[5] infers that the body of our saint, which is preserved in this church, was conveyed from Constantinople to Rome, before the broaching of the Iconoclast heresy under Leo the Isarian, in 706: but his head remained at Constantinople till after that city fell into the hands of the Latins, in 1204; soon after which it was brought to Besanzon in Burgundy, where it is kept in St. Stephen's church, with a Greek inscription round the case. The church which bears the name of Saint John Calybite, at Rome, with the hospital, is now in the hands of religious men of the order of St. John of God. According to a MS. life, commended by Baronius, St. John Calybite flourished under Theodosius the Younger, who died in 450: Nicephorus says, under Leo, who was proclaimed emperor in 457; so that both accounts may be true. On his genuine Greek acts, see Lambecius, Bibl. Vind. t. 8, pp. 228, 395; Bollandus, p. 1035, gives his Latin acts the same which we find in Greek at St. Germain-des-Prez. See Montfaucon, Bibl. Coislianae, p. 196. Bollandus adds other Latin acts, to which he gives the preference. See also Papebroch, Comm. ad Januarium Graecum metricum, t. 1. Maij. Jos. Assemani, in Calendaria Univ. ad 15 Jan. t. 6, p. 76. Chatelain, p. 283, &c.
Footnotes:
1. Papebroch supposes St. John Calybite to have made a long voyage at
sea; but this circumstance seems to have no other foundation than
the mistake of those who place his birth at Rome, forgetting that
Constantinople was then called New Rome. No mention is made of any
long voyage in his genuine Greek acts, nor in the interpolated
Latin. He sailed only threescore furlongs from Constantinople to the
place called [Greek: Gomon], and from the peaceful abode of the
Acaemetes' monk, ([Greek: Eirenaion], or dwelling of peace,) opposite
to Sosthenium on the Thrancian shore, where the monastery of the
Acaemetes stood.
2. From [Greek: kalube], a cottage, a hut.
3. Cedr. ad an. 461.
4. Zonaras, p. 41.
5. Du Cange, Constantinop. Christiana, l. 4, c. 6, n. 51.
ST. ISIDORE, PRIEST AND HOSPITALLER,
OF ALEXANDRIA.[1]
HE was taken from his cell where he had passed many years in the deserts, ordained Priest, and placed in the dignity of hospitaller, by St. Athanasius. He lived in that great city a perfect model of meekness, patience, mortification, and prayer. He frequently burst into tears at table, saying: "I who am a rational creature, and made to enjoy God, eat the food of brutes, instead of feeding on the bread of angels." Palladius, afterwards bishop of Helenopolis, on going to Egypt to embrace an ascetic life, addressed himself first to our saint for advice: the skilful director bade him go and exercise himself for some time in mortification and self-denial, and then return for further instructions. St. Isidore suffered many persecutions, first from Lucius the Arian intruder, and afterwards from Theophilus, who unjustly accused him of Origenism.[2] He publicly condemned that heresy at {157} Constantinople, where he died in 403, under the protection of St. Chrysostom. See Palladius in Lausiac, c. 1 and 2. Socrates, l. 6, c. 9. Sozomen, c. 3 and 12. St. Jerom, Ep. 61, c. 15, ad Princip. Theodoret. l. 4, c. 21. Pallad. de Vita S. Chrys. Bulteau, Hist. Mon. d'Orient. l. 1, c. 15
Footnotes:
1. A hospitaller is one residing in an hospital, in order to receive
the poor and strangers.
2. St. Jerom's zeal against the Origenists was very serviceable to the
church; yet his translation of Theophilus's book against the memory
of St. Chrysostom, (ap. Fac. herm. l. 6, c. 4,) is a proof that it
sometimes carried him too far. This weakens his charge against the
holy hospitaller of Alexandria, whom Theophilus expelled Egypt, with
the four long brothers, (Dioscorus, Ammonias, Eusebius, and
Euthymius,) and about three hundred other monks. Some accuse
Theophilus of proceeding against them out of mere jealousy. It is at
least certain, that St. Isidore and the four long brothers
anathematized Origenism at Constantinople, before St. Chrysostom
received them to his communion, and that Theophilus himself was
reconciled to them at Chalcedon, in the council at the Oak, without
requiring of them any confession of faith, or making mention of
Origen. (Sozom. l. 8, c. 17.) Many take the St. Isidore, mentioned
in the Roman Martyrology, for the hospitaller; but Bulteau observes,
that St. Isidore of Scete is rather meant; at least the former is
honored by the Greeks.
ST. ISIDORE, P.H.
HE was priest of Scete, and hermit in that vast desert. He excelled in an unparalleled gift of meekness, continency, prayer, and recollection. Once perceiving in himself some motions of anger to rise, he that instant threw down certain baskets he was carrying to market, and ran away to avoid the occasion.[1] When, in his old age, others persuaded him to abate something in his labor, he answered: "If we consider what the Son of God hath done for us, we can never allow ourselves any indulgence in sloth. Were my body burnt, and my ashes scattered in the air, it would be nothing."[2] Whenever the enemy tempted him to despair, he said, "Were I to be damned, thou wouldest yet be below me in hell; nor would I cease to labor in the service of God, though assured that this was to be my lot." If he was tempted to vain-glory, he reproached and confounded himself with the thought, how far even in his exterior exercises he fell short of the servants of God, Antony, Pambo, and others.[3] Being asked the reason of his abundant tears, he answered: "I weep for my sins: if we had only once offended God, we could never sufficiently bewail this misfortune." He died a little before the year 391. His name stands in the Roman Martyrology, on the fifteenth of January. See Cassian. coll. 18, c. 15 and 16. Tillem. t. 8, p. 440.
Footnotes:
1. Cotellier, Mon. Gr. t. 1, p. 487. 2. Ib. p. 686. Rosweide, l. 5, c. 7 3. Cotel. ib. t. 2, p. 48. Rosweide, l. 3, c. 101, l. 7, c. 11.
SAINT BONITUS, BISHOP OF AUVERGNE, C.
(COMMONLY, IN AUVERGNE, BONET; AT PARIS, BONT.)
ST. BONET was referendary or chancellor, to Sigebert III., the holy king of Austrasia; and by his zeal, religion, and justice, flourished in that kingdom under four kings. After the death of Dagobert II., Thierry III. made him governor of Marseilles and all Provence, in 680. His elder brother St. Avitus II., bishop of Clermont, in Auvergne, having recommended him for his successor, died in 689, and Bonet was consecrated. But after having governed that see ten years, with the most exemplary piety, he had a scruple whether his election had been perfectly canonical; and having consulted St. Tilo, or Theau, then leading an eremitical life at Solignac, resigned his dignity, led for four years a most penitential life in the abbey of Manlieu, now of the order of St. Bennet, and after having made a pilgrimage to Rome, died of the gout at Lyons on the fifteenth of January in 710, being eighty-six years old. His relics were enshrined in the cathedral at Clermont; but some small portions are kept at Paris, in the churches of St. Germain l'Auxerrois, and St. Bont, near that of St. Merry. See his life, {158} written by a monk of Sommon in Auvergne, in the same century, published by Bollandus, also le Cointe, an. 699. Gallia Christiana Nova, &c.