Walaric

ON SAINT WALARIC, FIRST ABBOT OF LEUCONAUS,

in the Wimacensian district of Picardy.

ABOUT A.D. 619.

Walaric, Abbot, in the Wimacensian district of Picardy (Saint)

BY G. H.

[1] The Somme, or Sumina or Somena, river of Picardy, takes its origin in the Vermandois, not far from the town of Saint Quentin: and after it has flowed past Péronne, Corbie, Amiens, Abbeville, On the Somme river and the Ocean, and other smaller towns interposed, at length flows into the British Ocean, near the town of Saint-Valery, situated on the left bank of the Somme, in the dominion of Vimeu or Wimeu. Saint Walaric lived, This place, formerly a desert, called Leuconaus, or Leucanaus, and Legonaus, received Saint Walaric, a pilgrim hermit, with some companions, and after a life innocently spent there transcribed him to heaven, and was famed with miracles both of his living and dead. There flourished, and perhaps about the same time, from whom another Saint Walaric, a hermit in Aquitaine, another Saint Walaric, hermit: who, having gone from Lower Germany into Aquitaine, there made the end of his living; and is mentioned by us on the day of his birth, January 10, and in a place called Saint Waulry his body is preserved in a Conventual Priory subject to the church of Saint Martial; moreover he is treated in the Chronicles of Geoffrey Prior of Vosge in Volume 2 of the New Library, published by Philippe Labbé from manuscripts. These things having been premised for the distinction of both hermits, let us proceed to Saint Walaric, who is venerated on this day.

[2] He lived in the sixth and seventh centuries of Christ, and first in his country among the Arverni he led a monastic life, he came to Leuconaus about the year 612. then near the city of Auxerre, afterwards in the monastery of Luxeuil under Saint Columbanus: from whom, before he went into Italy in the year 612, having received leave, he came into Picardy, and retired to Leuconaus, while Clotaire II reigned in Neustria, who shortly after was made Monarch; and under his rule he departed from the living, some years before Saint Attala, after Saint Columbanus Abbot of the monastery of Bobbio, died. When precisely Saint Attala died is not exactly established, as we said on the day of his birth March 10, judging it more likely that he died about the year 626 or the following, which for the already stated year,

or even some earlier year, is confirmed from the Life of Saint Walaric: for a certain span of years is said to be to be interposed between the deaths of each. When Saint Walaric was finishing his life, Saint Blidmund was living at Bobbio with the said Saint Attala, and he was succeeded by the Abbots, Saint Blidmund, previously a disciple of the aforesaid Saint Walaric at Leuconaus: who, after his glory had been revealed to him, returned to Leuconaus, to the tomb of his first master; and there being held as second Abbot, he adorned the place and burial of Saint Walaric, with a church and monastery built. Some of his Acts (for he also after his death was ascribed to the Saints) we have given on January 3. A town grew up at the monastery, and it is sufficiently fortified, with a quite distinguished parish church dedicated to Saint Martin: and in the suburbs there was erected a convent of the Dominican Fathers, who migrated there after the city of Thérouanne was destroyed.

[3] The third Abbot of Leuconaus after Saint Blidmund is commonly reckoned Raimbert, and Raimbert the Life-writer. or Ragimbert, or Rambert; who in the Prologue is said to have composed the Life of Saint Walaric, indeed with the highest zeal, but in speech too prolix and simple; and therefore another published it in a succinct and polished style. That the first author was nearly contemporary with the Saint, the following in number 8 indicates, where his virtues are described, which, he says, "we have heard from truthful men and well ascertained, whom he himself taught and nourished, and some of whom he restored from various sicknesses to health, of whom I will bring one into the midst"; and then in number 9 he adduces Saint Blidmund, freed by his touch from paralysis: so that it seems Ragimbert, at the urging of Blidmund himself, began to write the life, and after his death was elected Abbot.

[4] [This Life was adorned by posterity in the 11th century with a more polished style, given from manuscripts.] We give this Life, published, as we have said, by posterity in the 11th century in more polished speech, from a double Bertinian manuscript, and from another of Böddeken in the diocese of Paderborn, in which the Prologue was lacking, also desired in the manuscript of Laurentius Surius. But this latter confesses that he judged the style of that Life, though so polished, to be rude, and on that account had changed it. We on the contrary would wish to have the earlier Life, composed by Ragimbert in simple speech: in the absence of which we give the same, as it has been rendered more polished in the 11th century of Christ, when Theodinus was abbot there, to whom its polisher inscribed it. In the other Bertinian manuscript the author is called Propius; for which in another manuscript is read Proprius, and it seems to allude to what he had immediately before said, "to my own lord," and so he subjoins, "your own friend"; which John Mabillon also observed, with the history of the body taken away and brought back. in Volume 2 of the Saints of the Benedictine Order, where he published this Life, and most kindly communicated the History of the body taken away and brought back with various miracles: which History, on account of the difference of style, we reckon was written by another somewhat younger author, and this under Theodinus's successor Bernard. The same Life is extant, in the same John Mabillon, in a parchment codex, turned from prose into Heroic verse: whence toward the end we give a few verses. Vincent of Beauvais, in Book 23 of the Speculum Historiale, chapters 21 and the three following, published a notable Epitome of the Life.

[5] What day of death is to be assigned to Saint Walaric is not equally established among authors. Mabillon judges the day of death to be December 12, and repeats it on each page in the margin, whether the day of death is December 12. moved by the authority of Usuard and Ado. But in the Martyrology of Ado published by Jacobus Mosander and Heribert Rosweyde, no mention is made of Saint Walaric on the said December 12, not even in the Appendix. Yet we find those words which Mabillon cites, in the Lobbes manuscript of Ado; and, with the word "Natalis" omitted, in the Centulan manuscript in this way: "In the district of Vimeu, of Saint Walaric the Abbot: who, leading a hermit's life near the river Somme, was also famed for miracles." Whether Usuard inserted him in his Martyrology, or whether this was done by posterity, might be doubted, because in the illustrious parchment Martyrology which we have, brought from Italy, no mention is made of Saint Walaric. Nevertheless his memory in very many and ancient manuscript codices of Usuard, indeed also in printed ones, is added at the end of the day of December 12 in these words: "In the district of Vimeu of Saint Walaric, Priest and Confessor." In some it is said, "of Saint Walaric the Abbot." In the Arras and Tournai manuscripts the deposition of Saint Walaric is mentioned; and in the Laetian manuscript "Bishop" is ineptly added. So far December 12.

[6] In the year 1671 appeared an Ancient Calendar, in Volume 10 of Acherian Spicilegium, written or composed in the year 826, as from the tables added sufficiently appears: in which both on these Kalends of April and on the 2nd day before the Ides of December is noted "The birthday of Saint Walaric," and on the Kalends of April is added "Confessor." or rather this April 1, which is referred to in the more ancient Martyrologies, On these Kalends of April in the copy of the Hieronymian Martyrology of Corbie, printed at Paris, at the end this is read: "At the monastery of Iganau (rather Liganau), the deposition of Blessed Walaric the Confessor": and this is perhaps the most ancient monument of veneration. In another Corbie manuscript (which, by the judgment of the same Achery from whom we have it, was written at least 800 years ago), the same is thus recited: "At the monastery of Liganau, the deposition of Saint Walaric the Confessor": but these had been transferred to April 2. But in the Excerpts sent to us from Corbie, the same are said to be read on the Kalends of April. Another most ancient Martyrology of the Roman-Gallic Church was communicated by the same Achery, also of Ado, in which on the Kalends of April the memory of Saint Walaric the Confessor is celebrated: which also is had in a very ancient codex of Bede On the Ecclesiastical Computus, in the calendar prefixed: as also in the Trier manuscript of Saint Martin, the Utrecht manuscript of Saint Mary, and another written in Lorraine. On the same day Ado, in his Martyrology published by Mosander and Rosweyde, and in very many manuscript exemplars, speaks thus: "In the district of Vimeu of Saint Walaric the Confessor, whose tomb is illustrious with frequent miracles." After Ado's example, as is commonly the case, quite the same things are reported in Notker and the author of the Martyrology published under the name of Bede, and various codices of Usuard, and of the Martyrology printed at Cologne and Lübeck in 1490. In the above-cited most ancient manuscript of Usuard's Martyrology, which we said we have, brought from Italy, this is read on the Kalends of April: "In the district of Vimeu, beyond the sea-crossing, of Blessed Walaric Abbot and Confessor. He in boyhood left his earthly father, and cleaved to the heavenly King whom he would serve as soldier. And when he was old and full of days, loving the hermit life, he finished in the Lord." The same nearly are read in the ancient manuscript of the Church of Prague: but it is said, "over the sea, the passing of Blessed Walaric"; in which way also it is found in the Florentine manuscript of Charles Strozzi and another published by the same in 1486. In the Usuard manuscript of the monastery of Aldersbach this is had: "In the district of Vimeu beyond the sea, of Saint Walaric Abbot and Confessor." But in six other manuscripts which we have inscribed on parchment under the name of Usuard, the aforesaid elogium is added, with the word "transitus" mostly omitted. In a certain old manuscript which had belonged to Antonius Augustinus, Andreas Schott had found this: and the modern Roman "On the same day, the birthday of Saint Walaric the Abbot." Greven in his Auctarium of Usuard, Maurolycus, Felicius, Canisius, Galesinius, also drew their elogia from the preceding or from the Acts themselves. In today's Roman this is read: "At Amiens (for the monastery is in this diocese), of Saint Walaric the Abbot, whose tomb is illustrious with frequent miracles." The Breviaries of Amiens which we have, printed at Paris in 1550 and 1554, with various others. prescribe the feast only on the Kalends of April; in which on December 12 no mention of him is made, nor of any other Saint on whose account he might seem to have been omitted in the Calendar. His Life is related on these Kalends of April by Surius, Lippelous, Gazet, and elsewhere by others. Peter of Natalibus, Book 4 of the Catalogue, chapter 21, Gonon in the Lives of the Fathers of the West, Book 3, page 156, Simon Martin in his Flowers of Solitude, report a long encomium from the Life, and affirm that he rested in Christ on the Kalends of April; on which day also Ignatius of Jesus Mary, in Book 2 of the Ecclesiastical History of Abbeville, chapter 84, writes that he departed from life. The ancient cult of Saint Walaric is confirmed in the Life of Saint Condedus on October 21, who in the church founded by himself about the year 680 established a commemoration of the holy Father Walaric.

[7] He seems to have died either in the year 619 on the First Sunday of April, Concerning the year of death these things seem able to be said. We know from the Acts that he died on a Sunday, and some years before Saint Attala: therefore if he departed from this life on these Kalends of April, the year 619 is to be assigned to his death, because of the concurrence of the said Kalends with a Sunday letter, with Sunday letter G, cycle of the Sun 12: and so from his death to the death of Saint Attala a certain course of years could have flowed, as the Life testifies. If, however, it were established that Saint Walaric died on December 12; it would have to be said that this happened in the year 622, or December 12 in the year 622. with Sunday letter C, cycle of the Sun 15, and then three or four years would have flowed to the day of the death of Saint Attala the Abbot: with whom and with Saint Columbanus Saints Walaric and Blidmund seem to have lived according to the rule of Saint Columbanus. Moreover, the monastery of Saint Walaric was afterwards transferred to a secular congregation of Canons: which being removed, at the procurement of Hugh Capet, Benedictine monks succeeded, receiving successively abbots from the monasteries of Beauvais of Saint Lucian, Arras of Saint Vedast, and Paris of Saint Denis. Hence with the best right the Benedictines reckon Saint Walaric among their Patrons: whom Trithemius in Book 3, with Saints Columbanus, Eustace, Attala, and others, ascribed to the illustrious men of the Order of Saint Benedict, in chapter 78 asserting that he flourished in the year of the Lord 620, and that his feast is venerated on the Kalends of April. Trithemius was followed by Wion, Dorganius, Menardus, Bucelinus: and the Lives of all of them Luke Achery and John Mabillon inserted in Volume 2 of the Benedictine Saints. In the Chronicle of Centulense, or of Saint Richarius, a song about him was composed by Angelrannus. in Volume 4 of Acherian Spicilegium, this is read in chapter 11: "Angelrannus, venerable Abbot of Centula, among the monuments of his great wisdom, in honor of Saint Richarius, although ancient ones abounded, composed certain songs with sweeter melody: also of Saints Walaric the Abbot and Wulfram the Archbishop." His Acts we gave on March 20, those of Saint Richarius to be given on April 26; whose life the same Angelrannus wrote in verse; he died in the year 1045.

[8] William of Malmesbury, in Book 3 On the Deeds of the Kings of the English, and Henry of Knyghton, who flourished as a canon of Leicester in England at the end of the 14th century, in Book 1 On the Events

of England, treating of William the Conqueror about to depart from Gaul to take the kingdom of England, write various things concerning Saint Walaric, which Henry sets forth more briefly thus: When the body was exposed a prosperous wind is given. "When in the port of Saint-Valery Duke William with his men was detained longer because of an adverse wind, and on this account the populace murmured, asserting that it would be madness to wish to usurp foreign soil, especially with God fighting against them: then Duke William had the body of Saint Walaric immediately carried out, and placed under the open sky for obtaining a wind: and immediately a prosperous breeze filled the sails, and so in the third month from the beginning of Harold's coronation, he landed on English soil." The same we find in the Utrecht manuscript of the Church of Saint Savior, added to the Life of Saint Walaric copied from Vincent of Beauvais: but the year 1063 was inserted, which was 1066.

[9] When there was war between Philip II, King of the French, and Richard I, King of the English and Duke of Normandy, in the year of grace 1197 (as Matthew Paris and Matthew of Westminster report), it was suggested to King Richard, He is carried off into Normandy, that ships from England were accustomed to come to Saint Walaric, to carry provisions to the King of the French and to his other enemies. Therefore having made a raid thither, he burned the town, destroyed (var. dispersed) the monks, and transported the reliquary of Saint Walaric with its Relics into Normandy. In that port, moreover, he found ships from England laden with grain and provisions, whose sailors he ordered to be hanged, and the ships being burnt, distributed the provisions to his soldiers. So they. It seems that then the body was carried into Upper Normandy, to a maritime place between Dieppe and Fécamp, and to have given it the name of Saint Walaric: because even now under that name a town is seen there. But peace being afterward restored, the monks with the sacred body of their Patron returned to Leuconaus, and seem to have possessed it in quiet until the time of the Huguenots. and in the time of the Huguenots it is preserved. Indeed then too, by the singular benefit of God's protection and by the patronage of Saint Walaric, his sacred body was preserved; and the town, occupied in 1568 by the heretic Captain Cocquevilleus, was retaken by the vigilance of Marshal Brissac, with the chief rebels beheaded: which things are related more fully in the cited History of Abbeville.

[10] Various diplomas there. In the 43rd year of this century, in the same monastery the reform of the Congregation of Saint Maur was undertaken: under whose care there are now preserved there thirty-five diplomas of donations, made by various Kings, Archbishops, Bishops, Counts, Viscounts, and other illustrious men, by which their continuous affection for Saint Walaric is demonstrated. That some relics of Saint Walaric were preserved among the Centulans is indicated in their Chronicle. Moreover we subjoin the recognition of the Relics of Saint Walaric and of other Saints, as it was lately made there, from a French manuscript communicated by Lord du Cange; in which other Saints, besides Saints Walaric and Blidmund, are mentioned; namely Saint Sevoldus, to be referred to November 2; Saint Vulganius, to September 16; and Saint Rithbertus, to September 15 of the same month. The history of the Recognition is of this kind.

[11] In the year 1651, on August 16, we Brother Matthew Jonault, Visitor of the Benedictine Congregation of Saint Maur. humble Visitor of the Congregation of Saint Maur in the Province of France, proceeding to visit the monastery of Saint-Valery-sur-Mer, of the same Congregation and province, according to the power given to me in the last general Chapter of the aforesaid Congregation, together with Dom Augustine Jonardait, our Associate and Secretary; in the presence and by the counsel of the Reverend Dom Adrien Blondin, Prior of the Ancient Religious Lords of the said Abbey, and Official in the spiritual jurisdiction of the same; and Dom Alexis de Ponthieu, ancient Religious of the same Abbey; likewise the Reverend Father Dom Martin le Poitenin, Prior, and Dom Maurus le Marier, Cellarer, Religious of the Congregation of Saint Maur, established in the same Abbey; we repaired to the treasury of the said Abbey, clothed in albs and priestly stoles, and with candles shining before us. Where after humbly and devoutly invoking the help of the Holy Spirit, and reverently adoring the Saints accustomed to be honored there, we ordered to be opened the chests of Saints Walaric, Blidmund, Sevoldus, Vulganius, and Rithbertus, with the honorable men Master Claude Lucari and Master Peter Beguin, Master surgeons in this town of Saint Walaric assisting: and we uncovered the sacred Relics contained within, to this end, that we might cleanse them and, if it should be necessary, restore them to a state befitting the sanctity of such precious pledges.

[12] And indeed in the chest of Saint Walaric we found Relics and bones to be now named: he has the chests of Saints Walaric inspected, an entire head with three teeth, one canine and two molars; two bones of the hips; two of the thighs; two of the shins, larger and smaller; the bone of the elbow, with its radius; one shoulder-blade; another elbow, one hip-joint bone, eight vertebrae; two ankle-bones, bones of the metacarpus; twenty-four ribs, both true and spurious; one collar-bone; a great number of little bones, belonging to hands, feet, and other parts of the human body: all which were wrapped in linens, now flaccid and consumed; then covered with a silk cloth, figured and whole. Among the said Relics we found a small piece of parchment paper, with some writing and the appearance of a seal attached; but all so broken and rotted that we could draw no information from it: but there were, beside the said linen and silk coverings, certain other bits of linen and silk cloth, more or less consumed. So, having adored and cleansed the aforesaid holy Relics, we wrapped them in new white linens, sealed with our seal; over which placing the same silk covering that we had found, we restored all, marked with our seal, into the chest of the Saint himself; which we ordered to be closed and placed in its accustomed place.

[13] of Blidmund, Afterwards we ordered the other chests to be unsealed, and the Relics deposited in them to be uncovered. And in the chest of Saint Blidmund we found the entire cranium, except that the upper jaw was lacking: but in the lower jaw seven teeth were still fixed, eye teeth, canines, and molars: we also found four other teeth, plucked out of their place; ten vertebrae, two shoulder-blades; two arm bones; two hollows of the radii, two hip bones, two thigh bones; two shin bones, larger and smaller, and one of the smaller half broken; ankle-bones, and the navicular bones of the feet with two collar-bones; nine ribs; many little bones and fragments of hands and feet. of Sevoldus, In the chest of Saint Sevoldus were found twenty notable bones, with many fragments. In the chest of Saint Vulganius, an entire head, of Vulganius, the mastoid processes being removed; various parts of both the upper and lower jaw; five molar teeth, fixed in a certain portion of the upper jaw; four entire vertebrae, with fragments of four other vertebrae; one part of the scapula; twenty-nine broken ribs, of which four are nearly entire; two hip bones, the same number of thigh bones; one larger shin bone, and two smaller ones; two arm bones; two elbows and the same number of radii; two broken collar-bones; four bones of the fingers, both of hands and of feet; ankle-bones and navicular bones, and other various fragments from various parts of the body; and beside them a linen sack with ashes, and parts of cloth interwoven with gold and silk, in the form of two old vestments belonging to albs. Among the Relics now named we found a scrap of parchment, some words of which we could read but without connection, and among other things the name of Saint Vulganius, the rest being consumed by age.

[14] and of Rithbertus. In the chest of Saint Rithbertus was found the cranium, divided into several parts; eighteen entire vertebrae, four broken; eighteen ribs, both entire and broken; one bone of the hip and hip-joint; part of the sacrum, two thigh bones, two shin bones with their two smaller ones, but broken; a certain portion of the arm bone, ankle-bones, and navicular bones of the feet; four bones both of feet and of hands: besides, a great number of fragments from various members, altered by burning. All which sacred Relics, reverently adored, we cleansed; and deposited and sealed within new linens, with our seal, as above, we caused to be covered with silk cloth: but the individual ones in their own chests, and these well closed, we caused to be restored to their former state and place: but the fragments of the old linen cloth and of silk garments, consumed by excessive age, we ordered to be burned: and we enjoined the Reverend Father Dom Martin le Poitenin, Prior of the Abbey, to enclose the ashes in a painted and ornamented wooden box of glue, together with the ashes found in the chest of Saint Vulganius, and with the little linen and silk cloths which we judged could still be preserved. All which, as has been said, were done and carried out on the said 16th day of the month and the following 17th, before the above-named witnesses.

[15] A body deposited at Turin, about the year 1590, whose is it? These things concerning the body of Saint Walaric having been thus brought down to our own age, we cannot assent to the people of Turin, who persuaded Ferdinando Ughelli, about to write Volume 4 of Italia Sacra, that they have the body of this Saint who is venerated April 1. But he himself says that about the same times in which Henry and Camillus de Gaetanis, one a Cardinal, the other Patriarch of Alexandria and Commendatory Abbot of Sant'Andrea, caused to be built a new and narrower chapel of the Mother of God Consolatrix, which had been found 480 years before; that is, about the year 1590, in the aforesaid church of Sant'Andrea, transferred from the Benedictines to the Cistercians, was deposited the body of Saint Valericus the Abbot: in whose honor the Turinese built a chapel near the same church, in the same form in which the brothers Gaetani had built for the Blessed Virgin; where those sacred relics are honorably venerated. These things will be better understood concerning Saint Valericus the Hermit, buried at Limoges, of whom we have treated in the beginning; and they will be referred to January 10, where we found nothing that we could say about the cult of the saint's body. For it is quite probable that in that common havoc of sacred things which the Huguenots wrought throughout all Gaul, some monk or cleric of Limoges took away with him into Italy the body of the holy Hermit entrusted to his keeping, and being kindly received at Novalesa, left it there; which was afterwards brought to Turin, and is still preserved there.

* or, dispersed,

LIFE

Written first by Ragimbert the Abbot, nearly contemporary, afterwards polished by another monk.

From the Bertinian manuscripts and the edition of Mabillon.

Walaric, Abbot, in the Wimacensian district of Picardy (Saint)

BHL Number: 8762

From the manuscripts

PROLOGUE.

To my lord always my own and to be retained by the indissoluble bond of charity, to Theodinus the Lord and Father and Abbot, and to all your holy Congregation, which with you serves the Lord and rejoices to live under regular care, your own friend and the servant of all Christ-worshipers, perpetual salvation to you in Christ. In the first place, as though prostrated at your footsteps, with humble prayer I beseech that you, standing at the sacred altars, who daily pay diligent and worthy prayers to God, hold me, though an unworthy servant of yours, in the deep memory of your heart,

always deign to have [me]. But as to the rest, as you know, when some days ago, placed in your monastery, Life formerly written, I had begun to speak with you as was arranged; your Fraternity then demanded of our littleness with the highest humility, that I should publish the Life of your Patron Blessed Walaric in succinct and polished speech, which some years before the venerable Ragimbert the Abbot had composed, indeed with the highest zeal, but in too prolix and simple speech. published in a more polished style. And you added this also to me, that our Archbishop Hugh himself had ordered this, that my mediocrity should write the aforesaid Life for you, as it were more openly and luminously: to whose commands, as much as we are able, we ought not to contradict. And thence a double reason urges us, since both your charity delights me, and he who is the highest Pontiff orders this to be done. And therefore we have so tempered our pen, that a short and quite plain speech might augment the understanding of the simpler Brothers, and might not be too rustic and unlearned, lest it afford disgust to the zealous.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER I.

His birth, shepherd's life, then monastic life in various places, chiefly at Luxeuil.

[2] There was a man of venerable life, Walaric by name, of middling family indeed, but most noble in faith. The infancy of this blessed man, as it was inspired by divine inspiration (as afterwards the outcome of events and the fame of his virtues showed), was trained by the Lord with almost monastic disciplines. The boy shepherds the sheep of his father: For since he was born in the Arvernian region, and still a little boy, but yet aged in mind; driving his father's little sheep there through wide pastures, and keeping them through pleasant green places, he heard in the nearby places of his neighbors how it was the custom of noble little ones to attend the schools of the Teachers. Then, moved by such a desire, in the field he learns letters, making himself a tablet, with the highest reverence, with humble prayer he begged of the teacher of the infants, that he should write for him the alphabet, and introduce him to the knowledge of letters. Who soon having received what he had asked, very joyful, returned to the work enjoined on him, from which he had departed. But while these things were being done, a wonderful thing and worthy of memory happened. For when this little boy of good disposition and the Psalter: was keeping his father's flock in the fields; by assiduous meditation, supported by divine help, without the assent of his father, he had not only, as we said, prepared the knowledge of letters, but within a short interval had learned the whole Psalter. Hence he began to frequent the church: and while he attended there with the keenness of his mind to the choirs of those chanting psalms, more and more he was kindled with the fire of the fear of God, and more strongly invigorated by compunction of heart; concerning which fire the Lord says: "I have come to send fire upon the earth, which I will that it be kindled." Luke 12:49. And also that saying of a certain one:

Lightnings strike the highest mountains.

[3] Then, as the heat of faith grew greater in his mind, he heard there was not far away a certain monastery, he enters the monastery, named Autumo, where he followed the footsteps of a certain uncle of his. When the aforesaid father bade him come out of the monastery, the blessed boy is said to have answered that he would no longer see his father's house. Then the father, turning to stupor and sorrow of mind, began to seek many arguments, and to turn them over in the exertion of his mind, taking with himself the counsel of the Father of the monastery and indeed of all the Brothers, how they might be able to bring back his mind to themselves, that he might be willing to return to his own. Then the Brothers, together with the consent of the Abbot, agreeing to the prayers of the father, began to urge the blessed little boy to return to his parents, and whenever he wished he might return to the enclosures of the monastery; adding even caresses to terrors, offering kisses, and threatening blows, and imposing on him a fast of two or three days. He cannot be induced either by his father or the monks to depart: But he, urged by a better counsel, as though founded upon a rock, motionless and fearless, persisted in the will of his mind which he had received, not unmindful of that precept: "He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." Matt. 10:37. And of that apostolic saying: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine?" Rom. 8:35. Then the aforesaid Abbot, now conquered by the constancy of the youth's mind, seeing his good and unmoved desire, reflecting these things with himself at last, said to the Brothers: "Let us not cast off this, received, among the Clergy, which we see has been given us by God." Then all unanimously, with good will and spiritual joy, admitted him within the enclosures of the Monastery to the office of a cleric; and within a few days, his father coming frequently, they set him under the regular order. But as his age and grace of God's providence grew, the affection of all toward him grew daily. For he was chaste in body, devout in mind, affable in conversation, he excels in virtues: lovable in appearance, endowed with prudence, famed for temperance, firm with inner fortitude, stable in censure of justice, large in long-suffering, robust in patience, solicitous in charity, full of the grace of good works beyond what his age would permit, stable in morals, so that to his fellow Brothers he was the rule and norm of virtues.

[4] But amid these things his mind, always ascending to higher summits and to nobler endeavors, began to desire pilgrimage, for the love of God, and to leave his country and his parents. Having departed from his country, Then he went to the monastery of the blessed former Prelate Aunacharius, Bishop of Auxerre, he dwells at Auxerre in the monastery: which was built in the suburb of that city in a certain garden: and there by the aforesaid Pontiff he was kindly received. For a very long time therefore with the most austere fasts and prayers and vigils he led there the heavenly life on earth. And when the fame of his virtue spread far and wide through various places; a certain noble man, and full of riches, He wins Bobo, a nobleman, for Christ: Bobo by name, devoutly came to him, for the sake of visiting and of his own instruction; but by the servant of God himself he was more devoutly received. For he had so instructed him with the divine eloquences, and already strengthened him by his prayer; that, with all care for the world set aside, he chose voluntary poverty for God: and no longer returning to his own house, nor looking back, but placing his hand on the plow-staff, together with his master Saint Walaric, with equal fervor of religion he came all the way to Luxeuil. Where the venerable, and quite holy, and he sets out for Luxeuil to Saint Columbanus. cultivator of holy religion, Blessed Columbanus, born in the island of Hibernia, in these places was presiding as Father over a monastery of about two hundred twenty monks, as is reported; among whom no one called anything his own, except daily labors and nightly vigils. To all also all things were common, and there was one will and one not-willing, whose heart was one and whose soul was one in God. And they had nothing of the world with them, except the most sparing and middling food, and the most humble and simple clothing; but yet they possessed all things for themselves in Christ: and content indeed with these delights and with these riches, they then led an angelic life on earth.

[5] But what or how great [men] were then ruled under one Pastor, is not now, as I think, for our littleness to declare, lest a prolix speech or rustic discourse bring weariness to the readers in the composition. Yet lest we seem to have passed over all things, let us very briefly set forth his first virtue, as we have found it in his Acts. For before his mother brought him forth into the breezes of the light, she saw in her bosom the sun pouring its light upon the lands; which the outcome of events afterwards so proved, because like the sun risen from the West, retrograding, a man shining like the sun, so he illumined the scattered parts of Europe by circling through them with his doctrine splendid and clear. But if anyone shall more curiously and fully wish to know what and how great a man this blessed man stood forth in the virtues of miracles, or in the knowledge and doctrine of divine and human scriptures, eminent in knowledge, virtues, and miracles: or in the foreknowledge of things to come, or how many and what peoples he acquired to the faith of Christ, how many monasteries of both sexes he built, what he was in skill of composition or of exposition, he shall most easily be able to find this, if he shall seek out those little works which the learned Jonas, one of his disciples, a great man, full of eloquence and skilled in composition, composed in polished and sufficiently refined speech concerning his life. But while we have briefly and succinctly touched upon who and of what kind was the master and fellow-brother of Blessed Walaric, we have gone a little further from our proposal: but let us return to the history, with the Lord helping and himself interceding.

[6] Cultivating a garden. When this servant of God dwelt in the aforesaid monastery of Luxeuil, in the first place for the sake of humility and by the rite of novices, he began to cultivate a garden, in which the herbs were growing wonderfully and beyond measure. But when it happened, as sometimes is wont, that everywhere the herbs were being devastated by worms; Blessed Columbanus entering the garden, the preservation of the herbs from worms and not only finding there no damage from worms, but rather seeing all things green, pleasant, cheerful, and untouched; the man full of God understood that this was not the outcome of the matter, but the humility and obedience and merit of the faith of Blessed Walaric. But he on the contrary did not attribute this to his own doing; attributes to the merits of the monks: but said that all had been defended by the merits of the Brothers. But after the blessed Father saw in him such great grace; he ordered him to be placed among the worthy and proven monks, whom the Brothers still thought, as a novice, should be judged among the recent ones. Meanwhile, while the aforesaid Father, according to his custom, was urging divine reading for instructing the Brothers, and was sowing among them the seeds of the sacred word with spiritual eloquences, and the Brothers hastening together from all sides to hear the word of God were outrunning one another; when the blessed Walaric entered the vestibule of that house among them, he emits a wondrous fragrance: to his

entrance Blessed Columbanus perceived a wondrous fragrance of great sweetness and marvelous suavity coming to him. And when he had perceived this, and had learned who had just entered in to him; he is reported to have subjoined this speech, as he was full of the Divine Spirit: "You are deservedly Abbot of the monastery and senior, beloved by me."

[7] But afterwards the aforesaid Columbanus with his Brothers was expelled from the aforesaid monastery, with Theodoric persecuting him, at the instigation of the adversary, Saint Columbanus having been expelled, and of his grandmother Brunhild, who at this time held the kingdom of the Burgundians, while his own brother Theodebert ruled the Austrasians; while still the most suitable and pleasing man to God, King Clotaire, claimed for himself only the throne of the kingdom of the Austrasians; whom the aforesaid Blessed Columbanus had admonished with his holy doctrine, and had predicted both the enlargement of his kingdom, and that the aforesaid Kings rebelling against each other, together with their race, by the just judgment of God, would within three years perish entirely from the kingdom wickedly usurped, and that their monarchy would be united under the glorious Clotaire himself. All these things the Priest of God had often predicted by prophecy. He restores the monastery with Saint Eustace: But at the aforesaid Luxeuil, after the departure of the blessed man, some shepherds had come together to remain there; and Blessed Walaric returning from a certain little cell, according to the power of the Lord with the seculars expelled, began to rebuild the holy place itself. Meanwhile Blessed Eustace had been appointed by Blessed Columbanus to rule this same monastery, while still in a certain part of the boundaries of that monastery certain seculars were in possession. When therefore a calumny and quarrel was trying to rise concerning the expulsion of those seculars; then Blessed Eustace, since he himself was also adorned by nobility of birth and morals, together with God's servant Walaric, persuades the secular possessors to depart: so by persuasive and their own mellifluous eloquences, with the Lord helping, removed them from the aforesaid boundaries of the monastery, that no scandal arose among them from the controversy of those seculars. But while a certain one of the Brothers, moved by a light mind, wished impatiently to follow them; the man of the Lord, as he was kind in words, was restraining him not to go. But when that man despised the orders more and more, then the servant of God said to him: "Son, do not follow them, lest perchance you may come back to us marked by a sign." He foretells a punishment to the disobedient monk. And yet when the aforesaid Brother with other companions of his was following them, a contention arose among them, and he was struck on the hand by a stone's blow: whence also he was afflicted with great pain for so long, that according to the servant of God's sentence with a sign, as long as he lived, his fault might appear. For that joint which physicians call the auricular, but the common people call the little finger, from the vehemence of excessive pain so contracted itself, that it even dried up at the root.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER II.

Pilgrimage into Neustria and the dominion of Vimeu. A dead man raised: other miracles.

[8] But a certain one of the Brothers, named Waldolen, kindled with a certain desire, With Waldolen he departs into Neustria: asked of Blessed Columbanus that he might grant him license to preach among the Gentiles, and permit the venerable man Walaric to go with him, for the consolation of fostering religion. To whom the blessed Father is reported to have responded: "Although, Son, you are disposing to hasten for a good purpose; yet know this, that that servant of God is great, whom you seek to take with you. But beware of this, that you bring no trouble upon him, lest through this you incur the contrivances of scandal." And when Blessed Columbanus had permitted him this, as he had requested; the deed followed the word in what came after, as had been foretold by the Saint of God. And when with joint company they had come into Neustria, they approached the most exalted King Clotaire, from whom they asked a remote place for residing. Coming to a certain place of the people of Amiens, they arrived at Walimago, thence into the district of Amiens: where a certain Count, named Sigobardus, according to the custom of the age, was presiding at an assembly which the rustics call a mallum. And when there, as is wont to be present, after evil deeds having been brought forth, a just or unjust sentence was handed down to each one; it happened that a certain man, condemned to death for the merit of his guilt, was now hung on a rack and dead. And when Blessed Walaric had seen him from afar, moved with his inward bowels, as he was full of piety, with swift course he came to the stake: and with the executioners forbidding him that he should in no way touch the body already dead; he, indeed fearless (as a certain one says, "Perfect love casts out fear" 1 John 4:18), cut the bond, and placed the body of the dead man on the ground with his own hands; He raises a hanged and dead man: and over his outstretched limbs, with the highest zeal of love, he prostrated himself with most profuse tears in prayer; so that with his face he imprinted that man's face, and as much as he was more ready in prayer, so much the quicker he obtained from the Lord what he had asked. For with all standing by and indeed amazed, as it were from deep sleep, his limbs gradually warming, he who had been dead immediately revived unhurt.

[9] And he obtains that he not be hanged again. And when so great a miracle had been presented in the assembly of the people, in the presence of the Magistrate; then the man of the Lord began to supplicate, that him whom God's piety had revived, the goodness of that Judge himself would permit to go free wherever he wished. But he, kindled with fierce fury, again orders him to be hung on the gibbet. "But," the servant of God says to him, "Man, it is established that you have already killed him whom the power of God has revived: and unless you hang me together with him, otherwise you will not prevail to take him away from me. And if you despise to hear me, the tiny servant of Christ, there is certainly the Creator of the world, who spurns no one invoking him; and for us contending for his laws, by his accustomed piety, he will now deign to hear us." And when the tyrant had been conquered by these words and prayers, he ordered the guilty man to be released: who lived through many seasons. He wishes to determine nothing about his own burial: Nor do we consider that worthy of memory to be passed over, that the illustrious and devoted to God, the matron Bertila, who had bestowed many good things on him, as she was of sagacious genius, foreseeing things to come, recognizing the man to be altogether holy, with humble prayer asks of him, saying: "This I ask and with the humblest prayer earnestly beg, that if ever, God willing, I most wretched should survive you, I may merit to bury your body as a holy pledge." And he himself is reported to have answered: "This is in God's judgment, that it may come to pass where or as it shall please Him."

[10] From King Clotaire he obtains Leuconaus: Then the aforesaid King, together with the consent of the Pontiff of Amiens, according to their petition, by royal precept granted them a place secret, and quite suitable for a more remote life and habitation of monks, which was called Leucanaus by the ancient name. But in the same place the aforesaid Prelate of Amiens, the blessed Bercundus, on the days of Lent used to be present retired for divine contemplation. There, moreover, Blessed Walaric shut himself up in a certain cell separated from the Brothers; that with all care of the world set aside, in his accustomed manner he might persist only in divine meditation: but the other Brothers, building a cell for themselves, He shuts himself in a cell: seemed to have their substance from the King's almsgiving. But the situation of that place is very fitting. For on one side it is pleasant by the nearness of the sea, and on the other side the torrid river of fish-bearing Somme runs by, and the part which is raised over rocks and huge stones from the lowest to the highest and most lofty, offers the fabric of halls or buildings to the high summits of the air, and a great and wondrous spectacle to the world or the neighboring region. Nor less is that third region, which excels the others in clods, rich and fruitful, and thick on every side with apple-bearing and most beautiful trees, girded about with a great circuit of woods. In this same place therefore Blessed Walaric wished to hide himself from the tumult of the surrounding people: but the happy fame of his virtues and the examples of his good works everywhere rendered him most famous and distinguished, according to that saying of the Lord: "A city cannot be hid that is set upon a mountain; neither do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house: so let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven." Matt. 5:14ff. This Priest therefore, according to the Prophet, in the temple of God is called a living stone in the building of God, who rightly, as I hear, is compared to the precious stone of the adamant, whose nature is such that whatever it sees, even iron itself, it draws to itself. Indeed also to this servant of God, the grace He excels in virtues and in the grace of miracles: which shone in his countenance and words, was associating many to him in his work. But his life or the virtues which the Lord worked through him and daily works, can scarcely now be enumerated by us: but those only in this little page we have described in the briefest and most concise and plain style, which we have heard from truthful and well-ascertained men, whom he himself taught and nourished, and restored some of them from various illnesses to health; one of whom we shall now bring forth into the midst.

[11] For a certain one of them was born along the bed of the Iser, named Blidmund or Gogus, who had been struck by the ancient adversary, Saint Blidmund a paralytic he heals by his touch: and was so dissolved in the joints of all his members, that he was by no means able to rise up. And when he had been brought and presented to the servant of God, looking on him he said: "This work, O enemy, is yours": and led him segregated into his own oratory. And when he had placed his hand upon him, and raised his eyes to heaven

(as afterwards he himself who had been disabled reported) immediately a huge pain began to spread itself, wherever that servant of God had placed his hand; and as though through certain channels, with that infirmity everywhere cast out from his body, with the Lord helping immediately so far withdrew, that in that very same hour, with the nerves loosened which had dried up, with his own hand extended, he raised him to his own proper state, and restored to him full health by the Lord's aid. Then those who were present at the doors, struck with excessive fear and stupor, began together to venerate the priest of God with the highest honor, and return worthy praises and thanks to God. But also him of whom we have spoken above, Blidmund, he so fully instructed afterwards with his holy doctrine and nourished, that he merited to succeed as the second and worthy Abbot in his place to rule and build up that holy place itself.

[12] He predicts that the flour requested must be brought back: But Waldolen, of whom we made mention above, having received for himself a supply of grain and provisions which had been granted them by royal gift, it happened, with some necessity intervening, that the Brothers of Waldolen himself asked of Blessed Walaric a portion of flour. But he, as was customary for one to whom nothing was lacking, swiftly commanded with a kindly mind the things requested to be given to those asking, according to that Gospel saying, "Give to every one who asks of thee," and "To every one that hath shall be given and he shall have abundance"; and that of the Psalmist, "But those that hope in the Lord shall not lack any good thing." Luke 6:30, Matt. 13:12, Ps. 33:11 But as those were carrying it, in answer he added this: "You will indeed carry off what has been asked of us, but believe me, they will not be received." And when the carriers had presented the requested flour to their Superior, they found it as the man of God had foretold that it was to be refused. For very swiftly it was commanded them, that they should bring this very thing back with the highest speed to whence it had come. From possessed bodies he cast out many demons, among whom was one groaning, sewn in leather. And when they had cast him at his feet; after fasting and prayer being accomplished, He casts out demons. he restored him to his former health. Moreover, whenever such were brought to him, he segregated them in a cell separately; and afflicted with fasting and prayer, thus with the Lord's favor he restored them to full health. But there were more to whom he sent blessings. But those who were presented to him cried out with great terror of voice and said: "Alas, alas! now that adversary of ours torments us, now Walaric burns us."

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER III.

The prophetic Spirit of Saint Walaric: the gift of cures: an idol cast down at his command.

[13] He knows hidden and absent things: Nor is this to be passed over, that among his other virtues he is recognized to have shone no less in the spirit of prophecy. For the deeds and secrets, or the faults, of absent ones he frequently rebuked in public; so that he made them so much more cautious and abashed concerning the rest of their faults, as it was established that nothing was hidden from him, if they had done anything contrary to the will of God in his absence. But by this miracle being found by very many, disciples and hearers of the word were compelled, when questioned by him, to hide nothing of their faults from him; but being unable to hide this from him forthwith, they themselves reported all things to him in public. Among these things there were two brothers, who had come to him on the feast of Saint Martin: to whom, rebuking, he says: "I wonder why before the solemnities of the Masses you presumed to drink." Who confessing what they had done, ask pardon, and promise that they will amend themselves concerning the rest. Another, coming to him on a Sunday, he admonished saying: "Son, you ought not to have done what you did today. He rebukes those whom he knew to have drunk before Mass. Did you not, while still in your own house clothing yourself in your garments according to custom, look upon your wife, and she, according to your will, handed you a full half-pint, and you incontinent and incautious before Mass presumed to drink?" But he asking pardon, repented before him that which he had illicitly committed.

[14] He reproves a boy for keeping back part of the alms: Nor less wonderful is this deed. When a certain illustrious matron had sent him blessings at the hour of dinner, that is, bread and flasks, through a certain boy; the aforesaid boy, surrounded by greediness of food and drink, kept back a part for himself, and presented the other part to God's servant. Who when he had known this deed by divine inspiration, said: "For what has now been brought us, we give God thanks: but you, son, beware, do not incautiously take anything from that bread or that flask, which you have wished to hide for yourself in a certain place: because even a serpent is in that little vessel, and in that bread is also held a deadly poison." Then the boy, stupefied, immediately stiffened with terror, and soon returning, as God's servant had foretold, so he found. For when he had opened that little vessel, and had seen a snake coming out from it, he did not dare in any way to touch that bread: but trembling and confused, concerning what he had done, returning to God's servant, he did penance for the deed.

[15] But this miracle is also to be added. A certain man came to him, He foretells punishment to one distrustful of receiving health: having that poisonous and deadly sickness near the eye, which they call a pustule. And when he had placed the sign of God upon him, he ordered him to depart, and to exercise his own proper work. But still to one doubting in faith he says: "Indeed, as I see, I know that you trust less in your health. And I add this, foretelling these future things to you: But when you come to your house, your wife will hand you broth to be taken; but by no means receive it, and see that you seek no other medicaments for this infirmity besides this sign. Which if you do, you will indeed now escape from it: but as long as you live, you will have a certain sign from it." Which things the outcome proved to be as he had said. For with his wife offering it to him, he took the broth; and still sought for a horn, or some kind of drawing out the poison, whatever he could find. And although according to the sentence of God's servant he then escaped death, yet he indeed lost his eye, and lived one-eyed through the seasons. But concerning the aforesaid infirmity, how and how many the Lord cured through him, because it is too lengthy to run through each, and, as I think, not necessary to relate all to you; but yet we will take care to make known this: that whoever came to God's servant with it, with only the sign of the Cross impressed and smeared with the saliva of his mouth, he immediately rendered them whole; and in that very same hour commanded them to exercise the work which they wished.

[16] But we disclose to you another miracle. When he was returning from a certain prince, by a pedestrian journey as was his custom, to his cell; he came to the place which is called Austa, near the river Auva: for on account of humility he was accustomed to ride on a little ass on the journey; but still more often, for the sake of taking on greater labor, he walked on foot. And near the bank of that river there was a great stake, figured with diverse images, and there driven into the earth with great force, which with exceeding worship, after the manner of the Gentiles, was venerated by the peasants. And when the Confessor of the Lord had seen this, immediately kindled with zeal for God, he said to the boy: "My son, push this over into ruin." Who hesitating nothing nor delaying, He has a trunk held as an idol cast down by a boy, with his hand alone touched it; and the immense weight, which scarcely a multitude of men with great force could tear out or cut down with axes, at the touch of one obedient monk, as if soaked and rotten, with great crash and mighty force suddenly fell to the earth, and appeared entirely broken into itself. And this indeed offered no small grief as well as amazement to the peasants inhabiting the place. And he converts the rustics prepared to avenge it. But with them running up from all sides eagerly with arms and clubs, taking it ill among themselves, as if to avenge the injury of their god, when they had unanimously rushed against him with great fury, and with stretched arms had held their blows and strokes in the air; he, as he was always intrepid in mind and robust, is said to have said this to them: "If the Lord permits this, none will be able to resist him." But they on the contrary terrified, restrained immediately by divine will from the intention of their mind, withdrew from him. But these being thus dismissed, the Priest, inspired by the divine spirit, began to instruct them, that with the idols left behind they should serve the Omnipotent God. And in that same place afterwards in honor of Blessed Walaric they built a basilica, near a certain fountain, in which he is said to have washed himself; where very many benefits are granted by the Lord to those asking with right faith.

[17] Nor is this to be passed over by us, what he did concerning a certain little boy Ursinus, who had been of quite lofty lineage, brother of a certain most noble Mauront, who was himself among the chief of the nobles of the palace and the dignities of the royal court, at that time excelling all by his genius; but yet he attained to greater things than these, when he left behind a most beautiful bride for Christ, and with all the dignity of the world set aside followed the footsteps of the heavenly Lord. By his touch he heals a man full of ulcers, But concerning the aforesaid Ursinus

let us continue what he did: to whom when a wound had grown beside the buttock, now a great danger of death was threatening him. But his father had a rather hard and incredulous mind for believing; but his kinsfolk yet took care, whose mind was then sounder and whose faith was more robust, to present that little boy before the presence of the aforesaid blessed man. And when he had touched that wound with his own hands, immediately that infirmity departed from him. But a certain nobleman came to him, supplicating of him that he might heal his son, named Audobertus (who, afflicted with the sickness of dysentery long now with weariness, was held rather by unhappy suffering than by life, awaiting only his last and longed-for hour), and if perhaps he should not be willing, and a dysentery sufferer. that at least he might deserve this, that he might be buried by him. But the Blessed said: "He who raised that four-day-dead one, already stinking, from the tomb, is surely able to restore health to this one, whose vital spirit is yet gasping in the top of his little breast." And when he had touched him with his sacred hands; then he himself, who was present half-alive, and for a long while before had taken no nourishment of flesh, is reported to have cried out and asked his father, that he might take food as soon as possible. And with no long delay intervening, he who had been brought by his parents' hands to God's servant, now joyful together with his father, with divine healing intervening, was riding on horseback to his own people; who afterwards is said to have led a long and religious life through the seasons.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER IV.

Those who mocked him punished. Virtues, form of body, death, burial.

[18] Nor is this to be passed over by us, what heavenly and divine vengeance wrought for him, still dwelling in this mortal life: so that by this it may be patently given us to understand, that he who provokes Christ's servants, not only provokes them, but also the Lord their indweller, to wrath, who says: "He who hears you hears me, and he who despises you despises me" Luke 10:16; and again says: "He that abideth in me, and I in him." John 15:5 And therefore the wrath of the just is to be feared just so far, as we know the Omnipotent Judge and Lord already present in them. For when the aforesaid friend of God was returning in wintertime from a certain place called Caldis to the enclosures of the monastery; He rebukes a Priest and a Judge for speaking shamelessly in his presence. it happened that on account of the excessive severity of the cold, he turned aside into the house of a certain Priest with his companions, to warm himself. But they, who ought indeed to have venerated such and so great a guest with extraordinary honor, that they might deserve to be instructed by his sacred speech (as was his custom); began rather boldly and contumaciously to speak with God's servant base and dishonest, indeed lascivious and effeminate words, together with the Judge of that place. But he on the contrary, as was his wont, to the putrid and corrupted scars of men always applied the salutary medicines of the Divine Word: for he said to them: "Sons, have you not heard that in the Gospel, 'Of every idle word we shall give account in the day of judgment'?" Matt. 12:36 But they, despising his precept, more and more bubbled with incongruous and most shameless speeches, as is that saying: "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." Matt. 12:34 But he subjoining says: "I wished indeed, on account of the severity of the cold, to warm my poor body a little at the fire, but I am prevented by your most wicked words; indeed now also I am compelled to go out from you without being warmed." And when he went out of that house, he did not forget that precept, he shook off the dust there from his feet, and directed his journey to the appointed place. But those unhappy ones and bold in words, whom we have often mentioned, divine vengeance soon follows. For that Priest, who had neglected to provide rightly for himself or others, suddenly lost the light of his eyes; and the aforesaid Judge of that place's manhood immediately withered. And he refuses to heal those divinely punished. And when they had perceived this, that they were now smitten by the judgment of God, though led by late repentance, with the highest humility with pleading words they entreated that again the servant of God might wish to enter that house. But he assented to none of their prayers: for one remained in his blindness; but the other, with his body contracted and his genitals rotting, there departed from this fleeting world.

[19] Deservedly therefore did he excel in so great and such virtues, whose life also we have found to have been full of divine grace, as in the fifth little page of this little book we have touched briefly in the briefest relation and computation. For from his mother's womb he remained a virgin in body: He was chaste, humble, but his humility and benignity exceeded beyond human measure. For he was so filled with divine grace and compunction, that as many times as he had spent the talent of divine understanding committed to him into the ears of his disciples, and as often as, chanting psalms in spirit, he had looked at heaven in mind, devoted to prayer and tears, or prostrate on the ground directed his prayer, so many times also he wept. Who can number the vigils spent through the night, the profuse and furtive prayers which amid thick thornbushes and through the hollows of valleys he greatly loved? What shall I say of those peculiar and very profuse prayers, which for this reason, shut in his chamber, meditating on God alone, he frequently exceeded in? Austere in bed and clothing: Whose little bed, woven from rods, was covered with a quite cheap little coverlet; using only a tunic with a hood, and not requiring linen garments. The course of prayer, both monastic and Gallican, he celebrated unceasingly with great zeal: and when he had performed this twice over, then indeed at length he relaxed his weak members to a little sleep. But the intention of his mind was such, that for no time was he at leisure, a hater of idleness, when he was not urging either reading or prayer or the works of his hands. And when he was altogether generous and kindly to all, yet he exercised this more toward the poor and needy and toward the household of the faith, to such an extent that he gave them his garment from his own shoulders. But also the food and other substance of the Brothers, liberal to others: thinking nothing of the morrow, he gave to everyone who asked: and so that the Brothers should not be saddened thereby, he comforted them with kindly and consoling words, saying: "Sons, follow this, and know for certain and hold as proved, that whoever with a cheerful mind has given necessary things to those asking, whatever he himself shall have asked as necessary, he will more quickly obtain from the Lord." But this also not only by words, but also by deeds he confirmed: for to the aforesaid Brothers, with the Lord abundantly administering, and himself praying, all things were brought to them from all sides.

[20] But so great was the gentleness of divine mercy in him, He even feeds wild birds that come to him: that little birds frequently took food from his hand without fear, and he stroked them with his fingers whenever he wished, as though forgetful of their wildness and domesticated. And when the Brothers coming to him took fright, and the birds flitting all around were present; he said to them: "Sons, let us not do them injury, but let us permit them to be satisfied a little with the crumbs." And when the Brothers at the Father's command went back, those birds hastening from all sides with winged flight came to take the provision brought for them from the hand of God's servant in their customary manner again and again. Toward the Brothers themselves so kindly piety was in him, that if he had ordered any of the juniors to be scourged for any faults (and he often commanded this very thing, that it should not be done frequently), having called him to himself gently and mildly he admonished him, gentle toward his subjects: saying: "Son, beware of this, and now attend to yourself. What and how great injury could you now have endured? but now for amending this may the shame alone suffice you, so that you may not further admit this vice." And by his mellifluous doctrine in this way he restrained many more from crime than the dire beatings of others being angry restrained. And since he was of cheerful countenance, composed in speech, of excellent stature, tall and slender, his palms thin and extended, of lovable bodily and facial form: with most slender and long fingers, with most beautiful eyes and delightful appearance, his face was very pale and worn with leanness: because frequently in a whole week, except on Sunday, he took nothing of food; not using wine, not strong drink, nor any other thing that can inebriate; though at the arrival of guests, in the love of charity, he would first taste of all these cups: and thus with the wasting of his body he fed his soul, yet omitting nothing of the office committed to him. But when through him the Lord was giving the grace of cures to various illnesses, or was foretelling things future and hidden; then with a rosy color the cheeks of his face flashed with excessive brightness, a wondrous sight; that by this it might openly be given to all to understand, that those things which we say were done or spoken through him, were done with the Lord helping and the Holy Spirit cooperating. And these things being so done, he was now prosperously hastening to a blessed and happy end.

[21] But on a certain day, when Saint Walaric, coming from a certain cell, He designates the place of his burial: had entered the cloisters of his monastery on a Sunday; going to the top of the mountain to a certain tree, which was everywhere surrounded by thorns, where the man full of God was accustomed, retired, to engage in those furtive and worthy prayers to God of which we have often spoken; and when certain Brothers were standing there before him; having fixed in the ground before them two little stakes, he marked out a measure capable of holding one stature, and said to them: "When from this present life at length, God willing, I shall have migrated from you, take care to bury me in this place." And as had been said by him, so it quickly came to pass. For on the next Sunday, He dies: immediately following the one we have mentioned, with the burden of the flesh laid down, he migrated with victory to the heavenly realms. So beside that tree which we have mentioned, on which the Blessed Bishop Berchundus, as he himself reported, was accustomed to hang the Relics of the Saints (which was unknown to this servant of God, unless it had been told him by the divine Spirit), in that same place, as he himself had foretold and designated, his holy and happy members are there deposited with the highest honor. And from this it is openly given us to understand, that his own death, he is buried: and indeed also the place which was already consecrated with Apostolic Relics, had been revealed to him by divine will some days before.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER V.

Miracles worked after his death: The church with monastery built.

[22] But these things being so done, what or what kind of signs of miracles the divine power, after his departure from this life, wrought through him (lest we seem to have passed over all things), let us relate a few from many in the briefest relation, as we have proposed, to those who wish to know: not those which are told fabulously by many, but those which we have learned to be proved by truthful witnesses; He is famed for miracles: and especially those which we have found written by the venerable man Raimbert, the learned Abbot, with pious zeal and religious labor and prolix speech, but yet in a sufficiently simple and unpolished composition. Now a certain girl, for about three courses of years, had been deprived of the light of her eyes; the blind sees: whom her parents took care to lead to the aforesaid place of the servant of God. But when she had approached its borders, she said to them: "What is this, that I see shining thus from afar brighter than light?" But they answered: "It is the oratory of Lord Walaric." And so giving praises and thanks to God, she received the clear light.

[23] But let us also relate this miracle to those still thirsting, which was done in a certain place, named Austa, where the stake of that idol (as we said above) had been broken at the command of the man of God, and the inhabitants of that place had already built a basilica there in God's name to the aforesaid servant of God. speaking contemptuously of the Saint, Beside which while on a certain day certain women were going on a journey, one of them went ahead of the others, and having profited herself with prayer, exhorting her companions who were following, said: "Come down from your vehicles in this holy place, and ask with prayer for our sins; and your strength a little recovered, then drink from your cups; and so at length with joy, with the Lord helping, let us proceed to the destined places." But she who seemed to be the first of them, despising to devote herself there to prayer, riding in the vehicles, together with her daughter, was hastening without delay to the place to which they had been destined. And while they were conversing among themselves, then the daughter with indignation begins to speak thus to her mother: "O most sweet mother, O my only hope always, are the inhabitants in that place trying to venerate him whom we used to see years ago sitting on a little ass in despicable habit?" To whom she answering said: "Yes, my daughter, the rustics wish, as you say, to make a memorial for this man, whose works to us seemed vile and worthy of contempt." Then amid these foolish and vain conversations the legs of the daughter began, she is punished with paralysis: as it were in the manner of paralysis, to be constricted with the rigor of excessive pain: and when saddened she had made this known to her mother, she stood stupefied; asking what this was, or what it meant. Then they reflected together within themselves, and revolved in their mind mutually, what they had done concerning the aforesaid prayer for the holy man on that same day, or what they had said. asking pardon for the committed offense, she is healed. Then first, though compelled, yet with great humility, indeed also struck with excessive terror, they now with the highest haste returned to the aforesaid oratory of the man of God; and there, laying aside their elation and the neck of their pride, they lay so long prostrate in weeping and wailing, asking pardon for what they had committed; until with the Lord's favor, who is near to all who call upon Him, the aforesaid daughter received full health.

[24] But after his, as we said, blessed departure from this light, so much did the condition of human importunity submerge the holy monastery, that the necessity which is wont to profit pious minds was urging those monks to go from there, as is that saying: "Those who wish to live piously in Christ must endure tribulations." 2 Tim. 3:12 Therefore, for a time leaving the place, following also that Gospel saying: "If they persecute you in one city, flee into another" Matt. 10:23; when that place had been reduced to a solitude, the Blessed Pontiff Berchundus, prompted by divine love, was trying to bring that holy deposit with great triumph to his own city: but when having made prayer he had ordered the holy body to be dug up, Those attempting to translate the body, are unable to lift it. they could not succeed. Then the aforesaid Pontiff said: "Let us pray to the Lord; for I fear lest the impossibility of the work is coming upon us in some way." And when they had devoted themselves more earnestly to prayer, and both twice and thrice had attempted the effort of lifting, yet they made no progress. For just as he loved the wilderness when alive in the body, so also as dead he loved the same place.

[25] There also his disciple Blidmund had deposited him, whom the servant of God (as we said above) had cured of his infirmity. Who then at that time, when he was in Bobbio under the obedience of Blessed Attala the Abbot, whose deeds have been written, frequently humbly asked of him, Saint Blidmund dwells at Bobbio with Saint Attala. that he might grant him to depart to that place in Francia, where Blessed Walaric is buried in the desert there, for the sake of dwelling or visiting. Which he did not obtain from him then at that time: but with him persevering in prayers, Blessed Attala, after a certain course of years had been accomplished, afflicted with a certain infirmity, lay sick. Thence when on a certain day Blessed Attala was going to the church, that aforesaid monk supported his weak limbs, who had often asked him to visit the cell of Saint Walaric. And he reported this, that as they were walking together, and after the glory of Saint Walaric had been revealed to him, it seemed to him that not only his mind, but even those limbs supported by him were suspended for a little space from the earth, as if three feet in the air with him. Then he said to him: "My son, what you had before asked of us, now have license to walk and to visit." And when he, immediately understanding this less, had said: "My lord, where do you order me to go?" Saint Attala subjoined: "To the place of Saint Walaric, which you have often asked for, take now from us, God willing, license to proceed. For I see him in exceeding brightness, and it has happened to me to ask this very thing, that I also may merit to enter into such great glory." And by this it is openly given to understand that while he himself was still living in the body, another placed in eternal glory was being seen. And with the conversation of words accomplished, after a little interval he migrated to the Lord.

[26] Then the aforesaid monk, whom the blessed Walaric had taught, came to the aforesaid place Leuconau, as he had been admonished by the holy man; in which for nearly the space of a year he led a hermit and sterile life. Then the aforesaid man Blidmund asked, both of the glorious King Clotaire, and of the Pontiff who was then of Amiens, he comes to this man's tomb, that he would give such a precept and license, that he might build a monastery there. Then with the idols destroyed and the rites of the Gentiles, the man of the Lord Blidmund, who was the second Abbot in the same place, with the Almighty Lord helping and the assistance of the neighboring Christians, took care to build there both a monastery and a church of wonderful size, adorned with exceeding embellishment. Therefore with peoples gathering from all sides, asking with right faith, his merits there shine forth with great virtues, and founds a monastery. by the granting of our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Eternal God the Father and with the Holy Spirit lives and reigns God, through infinite ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

ACCOUNT OF THE BODY, AND MIRACLES.

From manuscripts communicated by Dom John Mabillon.

Walaric, Abbot, in the Wimacensian district of Picardy (Saint)

BHL Number: 8763, 8764

FROM MANUSCRIPTS

CHAPTER I.

The body brought to the monastery of Saint Bertin.

In the year nine hundred eighty-one from the incarnation of the Son of God, the body of the holy Confessor Walaric was brought back into the district of Vimeu, into the place which is called Legonaus; where he himself in life led a regular life: and it was brought back from the district of Thérouanne, namely from the monastery of Saint Bertin; in which for a long time it had lain. But how it had been translated there, and from there brought back to the place Legonaus, we take care to hand down to the memory of those to come… A certain Cleric, Arnulf Count of Flanders taking counsel with Herchembald the Cleric, Herchembald by name, was ruling the monastery of Saint Walaric, situated on the sea in the district of Vimeu: who when he ought by canonical institution to have ascended from virtue to virtue, and to have provoked his subjects to heavenly desires; wounded in heart by the diabolic sword, began to turn over in his mind, how he might deprive the district of Vimeu and the place Legonaus of the body of the holy Father Walaric. He went therefore to Arnulf, the most wealthy Prince of the Flemish region: to whom he disclosed the conception of his deceitful mind, that he might fulfill the vow of such wickedness. To whom the aforesaid Prince said: "Though I abound in many riches of this world, O Herchembald, there is one thing I desire, to be enriched with the bodies of the Saints, that they may be enriched by me with honors bestowed, and I by their holy intercessions may merit to be joined to the citizens of heaven. And when I am turning over these secrets of my heart, I desire to have the most sacred body of Blessed Walaric, if the help of your skill is present to the purpose of our will." To whom the Cleric responded: "Behold, I will be counselor, and I will offer aid." And the Prince said: "You will satisfy my desire sufficiently, if you will fulfill what I wish. Know therefore that I will exhibit to him very many services, and that he will be enriched by me with no small treasure." and having been offered gifts by this man, But he: "If you seek to have this pearl, with what treasures shall I be endowed by you?" "No one," said the Prince, "in the region committed to me shall precede you in the abundance of wealth, and of gold too and of silver in innumerable gift." But he: "Fulfill what you promise, and I will deliver to you the body of the Saint." And so it came to pass, that what the humility of the Prince desired, the cupidity of the Cleric accomplished.

[2] In those days indeed the aforesaid Prince had no small quarrel with the King. For surrounded by bands of soldiers, and relying, as he was rich, on the help of his own, he besieged the fortress of Montreuil, which

is situated near his borders, taking it from the King, he usurped for himself. Therefore, after the capture of Montreuil, as we mentioned, having received the money from the Count, the aforesaid traitor hastens to fulfill what he had promised to do: and taking with himself the army of the Prince, he came with him secretly to the monastery of Saint Walaric. And so with the castle overthrown, the people plundered, many men with women killed, They bring the body of Saint Walaric to the monastery of Saint Bertin. they carried the body of Saint Walaric into the place which is called Sithiu, where rests the venerable body of Blessed Bertin. And so the district of Vimeu and the place Legonau, with the sins of the people hindering, was deprived of so great a pledge, namely the body of its blessed Father Walaric.

[3] These things being so done, there arose a doubtful question among the Brothers concerning the body of the aforesaid Confessor; whether it was himself, or the bones of a secular man had been brought there. Then by the counsel of the Abbot and monks, the shrine in which Blessed Walaric lay was brought into the Chapter. Therefore the reading of the Rule being completed, and the sermon finished by the Father of the monastery, which Angels carry from the Chapter to the altar, he says "Benedicite," and by the Brothers "Dominus" is answered. Then the Abbot subjoins: "It is said by you, Brothers, that the body of Saint Walaric rests here: whether this is true is to be known by us. Let the little casket be opened, and if the body is there, let us see." What is said by the Abbot is praised by the Brothers. And when they wished to complete this work, and to open the little casket: suddenly it was taken away from their eyes, and carried off by Angelic hands, and placed upon the altar. This being done, the Brothers astonished with stupor, having gone out from the Chapter, and entered the oratory, saw upon the altar the little casket in which the body of Saint Walaric lay: and with tears poured forth, they began to sing "Te Deum Laudamus" with loud voices. What wonder if the Lord took away the bones of His servant from the midst of those doubting, who withdrew manna from the people of Israel wavering in faith, as Elijah was translated into paradise. and translated Elijah from the midst of a sinning world by a whirlwind in a fiery chariot into heaven? But God willed to do this in the presence of Elisha, lest perhaps his mind, pierced by the point of ambiguous infidelity, should be occupied with withered depraved thoughts. Elijah is carried by a whirlwind in a fiery chariot into heaven; Walaric is carried through the serene air upon an altar consecrated to the Lord. Elisha cries out: "My father, the chariot of Israel and its horseman!"; the monks sing in praise of the most high God "Te Deum Laudamus." Elisha weeps the absence of Elijah; the monks rejoice in the presence of so distinguished a pearl: and there for many courses of years the body of Blessed Walaric is guarded, and venerated by the faithful peoples.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER II.

The body of Saint Walaric brought back by Hugh Capet to his own monastery.

[4] How the body of Blessed Walaric was brought back to its own place, let the assembly of the faithful people hear: for it is proper to God to have mercy on sinners, and to lend the ears of His piety to their cry. Certainly He judges with piety, and after sadness makes joyful those whom He rebukes and chastises. Therefore He remembered His people, and had mercy on the people of Vimeu, grieving so heavily over the absence of their Father. At that time then, King Louis being dead, King Lothair was raised up on the throne of paternal dignity, in no way inferior to his father: under whose rule the renowned Duke Hugh was strenuously governing part of the French fatherland, devout in divine worship, most humble cultivator of God and the Saints. Hugh Capet, then Duke, admonished by Saint Walaric appearing. When he was staying in Paris, the city of the Parisians, on a certain night when he was weighed down with sleep, Blessed Walaric addressed him in a dream with these words: "What are you doing?" Looking at whom the Duke, trembling and very frightened, responded: "I am awake: but who you are I am altogether ignorant." Then Saint Walaric: "I address you in kind speech, and earnestly entreat, that you retain my name, and fulfill what I shall ask. Indeed, I am Abbot Walaric, formerly alive and afterwards dead, dwelling on the seashore: now also with my homeland changed in another land, with the holy Priest Richarius, I am held captive. But now, with God consenting, the time has come that we return to our own seats and dearest offspring. It is fitting that the people, once committed to us, should rejoice in our return, who for so long a time have been saddened by our departure. And when you lead me back to my own church, cast from it the filth of the clerics, and assemble in it a regular band. For you know that the fortress of Montreuil has been violently snatched and withdrawn from the dominion of the Franks by the Count of Flanders. And that you may know that I have spoken true things, I foretell that you will go there, and the fortress is to be received without capital damage or detriment of any death. Hasten our petition: for through our prayers you shall be made King of Gaul, and afterwards your heirs, until the seventh generation, shall possess the helms of the whole kingdom." Then the Duke, awakened, He recovers Montreuil: and certain of the vision, gathered a great army, heading for the fortress of Montreuil: and as had been foretold by the Saint, so all things are shown to have been carried out. But he who had been left to guard the fortress by Arnulf, shamefully fleeing, yielded the place with victory to the Duke and his men. These things being done, the Duke joyful, and rendered more certain of the vision, began to think how he might bring back the Saints of God to their own places. So having taken counsel from religious men and his nobles, he sent legates to Arnulf the Count of Flanders, and most humbly requested that he give back the bodies of the Saints. To whom Arnulf responded: "I did not tear them from their seats, or bring them here; but before the monarchy came to me, they were translated into this land by my grandfather, in which they are now venerated and honored and worshipped. And he seeks back the bodies of Saints Walaric and Richarius. The messengers hearing these things returned with quickest step; and report to the Duke in the same words the commands they had heard from Arnulf. Immediately the Duke, having gathered a multitude of his army, took the road toward the borders of the Flemish fatherland. But when he had come into the borders of that region, and Count Arnulf had heard this, with tearful voice he said to his chief men: "Woe is me, wretched, about to lose the precious bodies of two Saints!" Immediately having summoned messengers, he sends pleading words, commanding to the Duke: "Let the Duke not come further, let him harm none of us. I will return the bodies of the Saints: I am not worthy of their presence, who while I live shall grieve over their absence." Then the Duke consented to the prayers of the Count. Hence the same Count ordered to be made from the purest silver a little casket, in which he placed the little body of Blessed Walaric: and there were written on the head of the shrine these two little verses:

Within, Saint Walaric here takes his rest: Arnulf most powerful, taking heavenly things by price.

[5] Therefore this work being finished, taking the bodies of the Saints, with exceeding grief, he ran most quickly to meet the aforesaid Duke. The Duke seeing Arnulf coming with the bodies of the Saints, He receives them from Arnulf the Younger; with tears poured forth, with bent knees, with all his soldiers, gave thanks to the Lord, that he had merited to receive the bodies of the Saints. Hence peacefully the Duke and Count being separated from one another, Arnulf returned to the Flemish, the Duke carried off the bodies of the Saints to be restored to their own seats. The men of Vimeu and of Ponthieu render thanks to the supreme Father, joyfully receiving the Fathers of whose presence they had for many courses of years been deprived: The Flemish retire sad, and with Saint Richarius left in Ponthieu, deprived of such splendid pearls. And when the aforesaid Duke had come into the district of Ponthieu, with bands chanting psalms, with troops preceding and following on every side, the blessed Prince himself said to his men: "Hasten, O you good soldiers, step by step with Blessed Richarius: and I, though unworthy, will lead Saint Walaric back to his own place; but returning thence, will restore Saint Richarius to his pristine state." Hence placing the body of Saint Walaric on his own shoulders, surrounded on every side by an innumerable multitude of people (who had come not only from the borders of the city of Amiens, but also from villages and towns situated along the seashore, and from the whole district of Rouen), he came not far from Legonau. He strives to enter the sandy bed of the Somme, which at all times twice a day, because it is nearby, is covered by the sea. And when he wished to enter the ford, The body of Saint Walaric. the bands preceding and following behold the sea approaching, as was its custom, with great crash; and with waves swelling filling the ford, and giving a mighty sound. The crowds cry out, "Do not enter, unconquered soldiers; lest the swelling sea bring you the danger of death." Then two noble men, namely Burgard Count of Paris and Orland Viscount of Vimeu, said to each other: "Behold, we shall see, if we have Saint Walaric here." Taking therefore the little casket in which the holy body lay, with the tunics of faith girded, the swelling sea ceasing, he carries it to Legonau, in the manner of Peter going to God over the sea, they confidently entered the waves of the swelling sea. Soon the swelling sea was seen to stand on the right and on the left, until the Duke with the body of Saint Walaric, and with the band of those following, could pass. Truly wondrous is God in his Saints! Therefore by the merits of this holy Confessor he renewed the miracle of the ancient age: for as the Children of Israel were going out of Egypt, carrying with themselves the body of Joseph, who had snatched them from the lack of famine; when Moses cried to God, as though for a wall the sea stood, and offered a passage to the people of God. For what does Saint Walaric signify, but Joseph; and what the Duke, but Moses; and what the people of Vimeu, but the people of Israel? After the crossing of the sea, they saw the Egyptians pursuing them dead, these see the Flemish returning to their own in confusion. Miriam with the women sang, "Let us sing to the Lord": the Duke, with the monks and clerics and all the people, rendered immense thanks to the most high God.

ANNOTATIONS.

and as we have corrected at the beginning, where by the error of the copyists the year 935 had been placed.

CHAPTER III.

Miracles worked under four Abbots.

[6] Then the aforesaid Duke, with great solicitude attending to the place of Saint Walaric, cast out from it the secular congregation of Canons, and assembled in it the regular order of monks: and sending to the monastery of Saint Lucian at Beauvais, he brought from there a certain monk named Restold, whom he appointed Abbot and spiritual Father in the monastery of Saint Walaric. For he was not unmindful of the promise of Saint Walaric, Abbot Restold is instituted: namely, that if he restored him to his own place, he should become King of the Franks, and his son with progeny to be born should succeed in the same royal dignity. Soon, as we have written, the Duke with the body of the holy Confessor and his soldiers, having crossed the sea, came to the place which is called Firmitas; and there he rested a little, and after resting said to his men: "Let us go, and restore the Saint of God to his place." And behold, a certain man, Hildegarius the cripple is healed. named Hildegarius, who for many years had been a cripple, so much so that he could not otherwise walk except by helping himself with little stools, dragging his whole body along the ground; there with great labor, the Duke now hastening with the holy body, he arrived: and with great voice began to cry out, "O holy Father Walaric, why do you leave me here, who sought you with such debility, and hither, creeping my whole body on the ground, have arrived? Are you not Walaric, who are said to be mighty and a friend of God? I have heard in the reading of the Gospel, 'all things are possible to the believer.' Mark 9:22 I believe you to be mighty to heal me: but you go on, and leave me wretched alone here. If you wish a reward for obtaining my health, I hand myself over into the service of your servitude." Immediately the grace of health followed the voice of such a great promise. He rises whole; he goes with the others joyful; the devout people sing the praises of God on high. And the same cripple, now made whole, carried the holy body in his arms to the monastery, and as long as he lived remained in the service of the Brothers: for after the space of years having died, he was buried beside the oratory of Blessed Walaric.

[7] The Lord indeed did many miracles by the merits of Saint Walaric, Under Abbot Fulcrad miracles are done: in the time of the Lord Abbot Restold: at whose death succeeded Fulcrad, a monk of the same place: in whose time God showed many miracles, which through carelessness have been neglected: but some were so distinguished, that they could not slip from memory. For the blind and the lame, the deaf and those feverish, made whole, are without number, whom he raised by the help of his assistance. He also powerfully commanded demons: and as when alive, so also dead he freed the possessed and the vexed: those whom they wished to harm he mercifully protected. But from many let us take one example.

It was the equinox, namely the vigil of Saint Benedict on which he had migrated from human things; and the firmament began to roar, thunders to resound, lightnings to dart, the earth to tremble; but the airy powers, omitting all other things, dared to attack the monastery of Saint Walaric with flaming javelins, so that none could take themselves thither. A wondrous storm is repelled. As it happened, Abbot Fulcrad was lying in the choir, and was calling upon Christ for his own sins and those of others. Suddenly a thunderstone fell beside him, so that licking his frock it scarcely burned it, nor did it harm him or others in any way. But a certain religious woman was praying in the temple, who, if it is lawful to believe Religion, truly affirmed that she saw three candlesticks, which stood on the steps, to rise as it were with flaming candles, and to drive back the fire coming from heaven by engaging it. These things she asserted to us, and it seems probable from what followed, even if she herself did not see. For stones, as though from a rubble wall, fell together; from where they came, no traces ever appeared in the temple: but such stoning, like many dangers in the times of the same Abbot, was driven off by the merit of Saint Walaric.

[8] And this having passed from the world, there succeeded Adhelelmus, a monk of Saint Vedast; under Abbot Adhelelmus in whose time there was a certain woman, named Bertha, who through weakness of her limbs, because she was so contracted that her heels clung to her buttocks, had been deserted by her husband. She, led by the hands of her kinsfolk, came to the holy tomb; and persisting there for a long time, she awaited from God by the merits of the holy man to receive her health. And when she could no longer wait, she decided the next day to depart without having obtained health; and sad went to the basilica, and with her prayer finished, with a loud voice said: "O Saint Walaric, I thought you powerful in restoring health; now, because there is no concern to you, the cripple is healed: I shall go, as I came, crippled." A certain handmaid of God, hearing this, who was joined in marriage to a certain honorable man, began to console her, saying that she ought to wait for the mercy of God and the virtue of the Saint. She when she heard this, in prayer offered herself to God: and when she was imploring the help of God, there appeared to her in a white garment a certain most beautiful boy, gently stroking her limbs: and soon raising herself, feeling no pain, she received health in all her limbs: and afterwards took the sacred veil, and entered upon a pilgrim's journey.

[9] In the time of the same, namely Abbot Adhelelmus, a certain old woman came from the village of Melnac, so contracted and bent, likewise another old woman contracted and bent, that she could not at all look upwards, nor walk except by the artifice of little stools: who tarrying there for some time, and seeing her health deferred, on a certain day addressed the Saint of God with such a voice: "What kind," she said, "of Saint of God are you, who have no mercy on me? or how are you called Saint by all, who do not regard me crying to you by days and nights? or how are you called wonderful Saint, who do not look at me weak and sick?… Or are you making yourself deaf, because you are unwilling to grant what has been granted freely? Why do you martyr me so long, you who evangelize the gifts of Christ? Why do you hate me so much, you who have the grace of God? Do you wish to have the gift alone, you who are called good by all?… Why do you show yourself ungrateful so long, when all proclaim you grateful to all? after a long expostulation. Is it a joke to you about an old woman, who in your service continues diligent? or because the words of my prayer are pleasing, for that reason do you defer the right hand of redemption? And if the vigilant servants chant in the choir, do not I also humbly pray? and if you hear the humility of the monks, why do you not hear my poverty? and if you overlook their sin, why do you not now receive my weeping? and if you see their chastity, why do you not behold my old age? For now I fail, because I cannot cry out. Let my tongue cleave to my throat, if you make me whole, if I do not set forth for you the songs of the law." With the old woman saying these and other things, the Brothers began Vesper service; and it came to pass that the nerves of the woman were so marvelously extended, that groaning she troubled the Brothers chanting psalms. And so whole and erect, she who had before been bent and bruised, she rises who had rebuked, praising God with a clear voice; she rises who had been sad, blessing God with sweet hymns: and taking a candle she began to run to the holy tomb, and with the candle placed gave herself to prayer. The Brothers marvel, ignorant what had happened: for they recognize as whole, her whom they had before seen sick; they recognize as straight, her whom they had before seen bent. For being asked who she was, she said: "Why do you marvel? for I am the old woman, whom your hands nourished: I am the little wretch, whom the ampulla of your charity refreshed. For it is not wonderful if Saint Walaric made me whole, who always cherishes your band: nor is it wondrous that he made me straight, who cuts the bridle of your faults." Therefore the Brothers render thanks to God, and also exalting a hymn to Saint Walaric.

[10] Therefore the aforesaid Abbot Adhelelmus having died, there succeeded Abbot Theodinus, a monk of the monastery of Saint Denis, in whose time a certain citizen, named Warner, of Breton nationality, had a brother named Hildinus. under Abbot Theodinus Who going to Rome and returning thence, came to a river, named Taronium: and when they wished to cross, Warner wrapped in the waves died; Hildinus barely escaped with what he was carrying: and wailing over his brother's death, came within the boundaries of the monastery of Corbie; where despoiled by robbers, with what he had lost, he came as far as Beauvais. Going out from there, and wishing to come to the borders of Saint Walaric, as the necessity of the journey compelled him, when he had crossed the Somme and after the crossing was clothing himself; behold, suddenly a certain black bird struck him on the head with its wings. Who immediately seized by a demon, began to run through the hollows of valleys and through the precipices of mountains without discretion, and coming to a river wished to drown himself: but detained by the people, he is led bound to the oratory of Saint Walaric. A possessed man is freed: Who before he entered, began to cry out with loud voices: "Why do you lead me to Walaric? for if I come to him, I shall be compelled to depart from the dwelling place of this man." And when he had been led before the doors of the monastery, a certain one of the monks, named Peter, asked him: "By what name are you reckoned?" He answered: "I am called Runcinellus." Then the monk, not ignorant of the etymology of this name, asked again: "Why are you so called?" He answered: "I lead the souls of sinners through brambles and thorns." Again asked by the monk why he did not open his eyes, he answered: "I love darkness and hate the light." Then he is compelled by the monk

and by the surrounding people to enter the monastery: but with the strength he was able, he was resisting, lest he enter. At length led into the church, with prayer made by the Brothers, he is sprinkled with holy water; and crying with great voices, with a stinking stench left behind, the demon went out from him: and he who had been possessed by a demon, prostrated on the ground, seemed as if dead. After the space of one hour, having come to himself, he began to cry out, "Saint Walaric, help me: now I am snatched from the demon." Who serving for some time, whole returned to his own. Then the Brothers filled with excessive joy return thanks to God, singing "Te Deum laudamus."

[11] There was in the time of the same Abbot Theodinus a certain man, named Berenger, Frankish by birth, who for the sake of pilgrimage and of poverty going out from his own borders, was hastening to come to our monastery. Who while he was approaching, going alone, there came to meet him two black men, riding most terrible horses; who asking him where he was going, he answered, "To the monastery of Saint Walaric." Who said: "You are not going by the right path." Immediately on each side giving him slaps, And another, made deaf and mute by devils, he was laid on the ground half alive. Then one of them took a little stick, and folded into two pushed it into his ears. This being done, they vanished: but he himself remained deaf and mute. Who yet rising, began to complete the journey he had begun: and coming to the village, was led to the monastery of Saint Walaric; and assigned among the almsmen, began to receive alms. Not long after there grew in his ears the foulest and hairiest worms, filled with worms and scabies. and on his head scabies so great, that with his brow ulcerous and nostrils he appeared so deformed, that no one could look at him. Thus lying wretched, he could receive neither food nor drink. But on a certain day his host, grieving with him, said: "Here is a little well, which Saint Walaric dug with his own hands; if you could hasten to it, that you might wash your head from its water, I believe that by the merits of our Saint it would be better for you." Who rising, as he was able, hastened there: and so having washed his head, he began to hear something. But when he heard the matutinal bell, at daybreak he asks to be led into the oratory. Who being led, when he wished to invoke the name of the Saint twice, he could not; but scarcely brought forth the first syllable of the word. But meanwhile sending forth great globules of blood from his ears and nostrils and mouth, he cried in a loud voice: "Saint Walaric, help me." He is healed. Who rendered whole and entire, for some time remained there. And when he pondered in his heart to return to his country and parents, on a certain night, while he was going to the solemnities of Matins, the devil met him on the way: who said to him, "Where are you going?" He answered, "To the church." And the devil, "And I likewise. But come after me and I will lead you." Who following him, came to the bank of a river, and entered the water up to his loins, and knowing himself to be deceived by the devil, fortified himself with the sign of the holy Cross: and then the enemy vanished. And returning with the quickest course, as he was wet with water, he came to the church, and narrated the event to the Brothers. Who, on their asking what he wished to do, he answered: "My will was to return to my country: but I see that Saint Walaric does not will it, and I shall be his servant in perpetuity."

ANNOTATIONS.

SUPPLEMENT.

From Book III of the metrical Life Ms.

How the defect of the earlier history is to be supplied. Whoever shall have seen the connection of this last miracle, concerning the freed Berenger, from the preceding one about Werner, conceived in these words, "There was in the time of the same Abbot Theodinus," will scarcely be able to doubt but that all things follow each other aptly; unless he has also seen these same Acts, rendered from prose into verse, where after the liberation of Warner is placed the history of the temple overthrown under Theodinus; the succession of Bernard who restored it; and of the miracles again shining forth under the same Abbot (namely Bernard), the single specimen, Berenger, freed from a demon; whom we are compelled to believe was in the same order in the prose text of the whole poem, rendering word for word nearly; and therefore the name of Theodinus, placed in a place not its own, is the gloss of a bold scribe; who when about to copy a more ancient codex, finding it either defective with a page torn out (as often happens), or hastening to finish the writing, with the intermediate passages omitted, presumed thus to join the cures of Werner and Berenger. But the writer had ended his narrative about Werner, when at the hour of the monastic supper rising hungry; and looking toward the temple, in which the others were perhaps engaged in Vespertine Psalmody; he saw certain ruins; and from this took occasion to continue his poem, relating how the damage had happened and been repaired.

That, since we cannot hear it in the words of the first author, let us hear from the Poetic Paraphraser, thus dismissing Werner:

Here I dismissed the one telling such things to the people, And fixed my pen. He narrated I know not how much. With Bacchus and Ceres a war began to be within me. I rose: I began to run through the temple with my eye. I was perceiving fragments scattered with many ruins. I was marveling alone: The temple struck by diabolical effort, suddenly when taught such things.

[13] The veteran winter was spreading its own hoary hairs, The nostrils were flowing, the eyes with rainy tears: This is the custom of winter: it was in the month of November. A war to the demons, arisen from some matter I know not, Is turned against the temple of the Saint and the band of monks. Soon the thunder resounds, soon the world sees lightnings: The absent sun had covered all things with a foul veil. The excellent temple is split by a lightning bolt sent down: Stones fall scattered, the panelings lay low the monks. All are laid low, but few perish, Defended by the merit of the venerable Confessor. One has three wounds: in the fourth death clings to the wound. The temple is full of demons, without, within. Within, stones crash: outside, without avenger they reign Among themselves: who having mightily torn up a heap from the building, Through sea, through lands, they cast for themselves, through the woods too: Which afterwards with many, with Phoebus serving, being found, In whose hands they had been, they show the tracks. Such a night passed, and the golden sun returned. Theodinus the Abbot in the morning, with counsel found, Carries around the holy Walaric with the Relics. What the demon broke, a threefold blessing consecrated. The wicked one wished to have completed a horrific ruin, To destroy the temple: but he fell by his own art. For, Theodinus a little after released from the flesh, Abbot Bernard, to none second in goodness, Succeeded as shepherd, lover of the true shepherd, Beloved of all, It is restored by Abbot Bernard. lover of religion: Who the temple from its foundation, overthrown by the devil's art, Beginning he built up; he adorned with ornaments. The fruits of the church he busily increased everywhere: Lands and ornaments and treasures, quite all things Which without sin he could acquire for the Saint. The place itself shows itself a lordly witness to all: Famous is the excellent Confessor, in whose time, Diffused by his merits. Clemency was manifest to many. To many: but briefly let my poor eloquence come on.

[14] Then follows the liberation of Berenger expressed in verses: in which the Poet, making an end of the miracles to be narrated, with the repeated commemoration of Abbot Bernard, and a synopsis of multiple miracles, Various healings bestowed on the lame and mute. thus brings the story of Berenger to an end:

He goes out of the river: hastens to reach the temple: Narrates what has been done; but his voice clings in his throat, And by whose hands he is able to show himself fallen. Hence he is shut for three days alone without judge in the temple: Whom pitying, the clemency of the true Shepherd restores whole, Whose virtue shines without time; Magnificent virtue, magnified by Bernard In famous times, whose mention now shines; Nor would it not shine, were not death permitted.

[15] Finally, if voices were mine, as many as there are hairs on the head, They would hardly flow; I could scarcely equal The virtues by which famed Walaric was manifest by merits. He surpasses the writer, in how great burning fires He extinguished, to how many blind he opened their lights, How many lame the step, how many the sense with the demon conquered, How many seized by fevers he rendered relieved. Various miracles occur. No steward incurred damage for him, by taking on one Evil, to whom it was not repaid hundredfold Before the day of death: to him which most worthy testimony The late confession of men brought into the midst. They were broken in the neck: many died most miserably. One broken in foot: to another a hollowed eye hangs: To another a disease closes the jaw, greatly hated, By which he inflicted no damage to the affairs of the Saint.

[16] With such and so many rich endowments the Saint shone, The Confessor by merits, which his chaste life Earned him, while he lived the toil of the world. For to all the ranks of Saints he is to be equated, How splendidly in heaven he shows himself with kindly virtues.

Then the author proceeds to compare Walaric with the individual orders of the heavenly citizens, which comparison being expressed here at length, lest weariness be generated to the reader; behold here the subjoined titles of the individual Chapters: for the whole work is distinguished by titles, which themselves are also conceived in verses:

That he is rightly to be equated with the sacred Patriarchs. That by their arts he merited the rewards of the Prophets. Saint Walaric is compared with other Saints. That he is to be associated as companion with the number twelve. That he is worthy of martyrdom, without blood shed. Here stands the Confessor, he brings gain with interest. He does not lose the rewards of virginity with the chaste. With the rest he rejoices, to whose virtues he clings.

[17] At last he concludes, that first to all Christians, then to Abbot Bernard, and finally to himself the Poet, as patron

imploring Saint Walaric. And for his Abbot, sometime to appear before the tribunal of the supreme Judge, he thus prays:

He is invoked for Abbot Bernard Extend your right hand to Bernard; and present, remember, How he himself bringing gifts to your temple, On one hand saves souls from the wicked, on the other cures bodies, And looks to you as his sole Patron without avenger.

Bernard the Abbot therefore was still living when these things were being written: accordingly there can be no doubt, The successor of Theodinus. under such testimony of a contemporary author, but that he succeeded Theodinus the Abbot immediately. Meanwhile the Sainte-Marthe brothers, following I know not what catalogue, perhaps recently compiled in this century, substitute for Theodinus Walo (of whom here in the Annotations), for him Severinus and Guatto, who was present at the anointing of King Philip I in the year 1059, after whom succeeded Bernard, who took care to have the chest of Saint Walaric made, but without a note of the time, which is more certainly drawn out from this author, and it is shown that Bernard is to be substituted for Theodinus, with no one intervening.

[18] Then follows in the same codex the formula of the oath of fidelity, as it used to be taken by the Advocates of Saint Walaric, and indeed was taken in the year 1321 by Robert Count of Dreux, as is clear in the collection of charters, charter B 14. Then follows in Latin and French, but in Latin it runs thus: Oath of fidelity. "You swear by God and by all the Saints, whose Relics are here and elsewhere, that you, from this hour and henceforth, will have and bear good will and fidelity to this church of Saint Walaric and to all its members; and also all the possessions and all the rights of this church you will in good faith help, in defending and guarding from any injury or violence against all, according to your ability, whenever on these matters you shall be requested." Let the Abbot conclude: "So help you the Lord."

ANNOTATIONS.

The new chest of relics. Abbot Bernard, supported by the gift of piety, Built this little casket, adorned with gems and gold: In which he placed the blessed bones of Father Walaric, To the praise of Christ's name enduring through the ages.

To this Bernard seems to have succeeded Wazo or Walo, who is reported to have been present at the elevation of Saint Bertin in 1052, and who is much praised in the History of the miracles of Saint Ursmar, April 18, number 23, still living after the year 1058.

APPENDIX.

The possession of the Fulchere estate is vindicated by miracles, when the body of Saint Walaric had been brought in.

One seizing the possession of Saint Walaric In the earliest times, a certain soldier, Gislebert by name, of Druisencurt, unjustly and violently took to his own dominion a certain possession of our aforesaid Father Walaric, situated in the territory of Fulchere; and with the Brothers of the church of the aforesaid Walaric protesting, he contumaciously usurped the same possession for himself and his own. Which the blessed and God-beloved Walaric in no wise enduring, afflicted the aforesaid Gislebert with a grave illness. Moreover the same Gislebert, punished by a grave disease, providing for himself less cautiously in this part, prolonged the aforesaid possession for himself. But the illness augmented a greater suffering from the prolonged possession. Which the aforesaid soldier, being in the last extremity of pain, recognizing his offense against the holy Walaric of God, appoints restitution. calls together the Brothers of the church of the aforesaid Father, humbly asks that they have mercy on him and his own, yet so that with all seeing he renounced the aforesaid possession. Therefore the aforetaxed Brothers, entering their Chapter, use common counsel on this matter, that by sentential decree it may be determined what is to be deliberated on this.

[20] The Prior therefore and all together with one and equal vote consent in this, That with solemn procession the body of Saint Walaric be carried forth that the body of their Patron Walaric, should be translated to take possession of the aforesaid Fulchere territory. Everywhere in the places of the same province this rumor penetrates, one assent of all, one and the same cry of all beats the air, namely, that blessed Walaric should be translated to the aforesaid territory. At that time a certain Advocate of the church of Blessed Walaric, Rainald by name, having received the aforesaid rumor, the Advocate impedes, altogether forbade that the translation of Blessed Walaric be celebrated. For because his counsel had not preceded, taking it ill enough and indignantly, he was busy to impede its being done. But the Brothers of the monastery so much the more aspired to do this, as it seemed more troublesome to the aforesaid Rainald. For since that Abbey had emerged from the royal fisc, they were asserting the aforesaid calumny of Rainald to be less discreet. On this account Rainald calling together his familiars, "Hasten," he said, "admonish all the Brothers of the whole cloister, that in this matter they may not dissent from my will: it does not become monks to perpetrate anything illicit, and less discreetly to remove their patron from his own seat." On the contrary the monks were asserting that it was in no way theirs to impede their simple utility. In this way the controversy seemed on this side and that. At length with the monks remaining in their proposal, Rainald summons his men: "Go," he says, "shut the gates of the whole town: the keys, hide in my castle: to prevent Saint Walaric or his monks from going out from there." Meanwhile the day of the translation is at hand, the whole region flocks together, the whole province on this side and that is summoned. Part of the people was within the town, part outside pressing. And he has the gates shut. Those shut out were forbidden to enter, those shut in to go out: yet to all one heart, one will, the same voice sounded, that Blessed Walaric ought to go out: it was in no way becoming that so holy a Father had summoned so great a multitude of peoples, and had vexed an infinite people in vain. Meanwhile both the Prior and the monks hesitating about the end of this matter, run to the common Chapter, on this side and that are gravely anxious. On the one hand the people were pressing that they should stand by their proposal: on the other hand they feared the tyranny of the Advocate. The people cried out to them, guilty of ambition, for the sake of offerings: but the Advocate accused them of presumption and negligence. What more? At last, intoxicated with the cup of confusion, they yield to the Advocate, deny the Saint to the people.

[21] While these things are thus being done, two youths, of whom one was called John, the other Gualterius, indignantly going out of the Chapter, enter the church, Two younger men, and not without murmuring. Whom a certain older monk, lame in foot, Evrard by name, Treasurer of the same church, observing very much moved: "What," he says, "is the edict, what is the counsel of the Chapter on this matter?" But they: "All the monks desist from the proposal; they reverence man more than God, they follow the Advocate more than the nobility of the place." Hearing this the Treasurer, drawing sighs from his depths, "All ours," he says, "being younger, strangers from the custom of Saint Walaric, by the counsel of the old Treasurer, propose new things. For just as the ass on crossing a bridge is beaten, so our Patron, in performing a miracle, is accustomed to be beaten." Then those youths, "What therefore," they say, "what, good Father, do you decide on this? Is it your will that we expose our Patron?" "By all means," says the old man, "satisfy our will; and fulfill in works the obedience which you owe me as your senior. But by the Our Father I swear, unless that old Patron of ours shall have proved the gates of the town to be his own, he will sit shamefully in the shamble of slaughter": and trembling with his hand together with his staff, "he shall," he says, "here with this staff be severely thrashed." The aforesaid youths hearing the command of obedience, They expose Saint Walaric: take the holy Walaric: they begin that Responsory, "Saint Walaric"; and near the altar expose the Saint to the people. So the people possess their desire; they take the Saint, they hasten to the gates of the town. But the aforesaid good Treasurer, leaning on his staff, cheerfully follows: and with his staff raised behind the Saint, "Beware," he says, "beware yourself, Walaric, unless today you shall show your dominion in this town, you will lie beneath this staff to be beaten." This having been heard, immediately the convent bursts forth before the doors, follows its own Patron, hastening to the gates. And at prayers and threats, Therefore with the space of the town traversed, they come to the gates. Shut, they deny the Saint exit. Then at last the aforesaid Evrard: "What," he says, "what now do you do, Walaric, aged in days? I swear to you, by the Our Father, unless by miracle and by your dominion the gates are opened to us, this staff shall be torment to you, and to your disgrace you shall be handled dishonorably and foully." He had scarcely finished his speech, wonderful to say, with us seeing, the iron bolts spring back; and the gate of the town, opened by one impetus, did not deny egress to all who were present. And not only that gate, all the gates of their own accord are opened: but all the gates of the whole town at the same moment stood open. All therefore standing by, both monks and clerics, singing "Te Deum laudamus" on high, with the highest exultation leave the town with the humble people. And when they had reached the grove near the town, the familiars of the aforesaid Advocate call upon the monks; first humbly they ask that they be unwilling to continue in the undertaking; but when they saw the monks inflexible, they immediately prepare violence; The opposing retainers being overcome are converted, they rush upon the Saint of God: they boldly assert that no further progress is to be made. In this way therefore such great sedition arose, that the holy bier nearly slipped between the hands of those contending. At length therefore the monks, prevailing in the strength of both rectitude and might, with the retainers foully repelled, gloriously complete the journey undertaken: but the retainers, led by repentance, humbly follow the Saint of God. And when they were approaching the Fulchere territory, and the procession is accomplished. with bare feet, carrying rods in their hands, prostrated on the ground, they ask pardon: they promise that they will never hereafter dare anything such against the Saint of God: and holy Walaric, with his own possession vindicated, after the famous sentence of excommunication, that no one should alienate the same possession from the church, with common joy returns to his own seat: with our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom honor and glory through all ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.