Agnes the Virgin

ON SAINT AGNES THE VIRGIN, OF THE ORDER OF SAINT DOMINIC, OF MONTEPULCIANO IN ETRURIA.

IN THE YEAR 1317.

Agnes of Montepulciano, of the Order of Saint Dominic, in Etruria (St.)

BY D. P.

[1] Raymond of Capua (whom the Virgin Mother of God chose as master of the spiritual life for Saint Catherine of Siena, and afterwards to assume the Mastership of his whole Order) gave the first experiments of his fitness for the direction of pious souls in that place Life written about the year 1350 where Blessed Agnes the most holy virgin had left a community of religious women gathered by herself under the Rule of Saint Dominic, formed in distinguished manners, when she went to heaven in the year 1317; about which time we believe Raymond himself came into the light. Therefore, with the memory of such outstanding sanctity still recent, "when," he himself says in the Life of Saint Catherine, number 195, "by the obedience of my sacred Order I had been placed as Rector for three years and more in the monastery in which rests the holy body of the same Virgin Agnes, from certain writings which I found there, and from the relation of four Sisters who had been her disciples and were still surviving, I myself composed her Legend in the time of my youth." Namely, about the year of the Lord 1350; for he died in 1399, and was writing these things about the ninetieth year of the century.

[2] This is that Blessed Agnes about whom it was revealed to the aforesaid Saint Catherine, by the same who afterwards wrote about Saint Catherine of Siena that in the kingdom of heaven she was to be placed with the same, and that in the same degree, and to have her as a companion of eternal blessedness, as is said in her Life to be given on April 30, number 325. This is the one who, dead as if living, received her destined companion of glory, stretching out her foot to her about to kiss it, and rained down on her the same heavenly manna with which she had been often sprinkled while she lived. Raymond narrates the matter at length in his already cited Life at the end of part 2, and at the same time he weaves the encomium of Agnes from that Life which he had written as a younger man: in which, lest you wonder that such a distinguished miracle is wanting, I wished you to know, Reader, that it had been written before, and much before this occurred. But though written by a young man, yet if it be compared with the other Life of Saint Catherine composed by the same when old, it will appear that in gravity and maturity of style hardly one yields anything to the other; and only this is the difference, that he treated more fully and abundantly of things seen by himself and of a person intimately known to him, than he could treat of things known only by hearing and reading, and of a person perhaps dead before he himself was born. This Life exists at Montepulciano, written on parchment, whence, when Ambrose Taegius had received it transcribed, and had inserted it in his book 3 On the Distinguished Men of the Order of Preachers, this is given from the manuscript of Taegius Distinction 8, folio 146, omitting for brevity's sake the Prologue: we, being at Milan in the year 1661, took a copy; and seeking the Prologue which was missing from Montepulciano, we obtained it through the care of the Reverend Father Gentile Paganelli, Rector of our College there; and by the benefit of Father Master Nicholas Barberi, from whose pen, besides the Life of Saint Dominic, the Lives of Blessed Guido and Blessed Margaret of Cortona have also issued.

[3] What, besides this ancient Legend, could be desired down to our times, was supplied by the Italian Life of Blessed Agnes, published in the year 1606 by Father Master Laurence Surdini Mariani. He, in the very limen of his work, while recounting the authors and monuments from which he collected this work of his, cites, besides the manuscript Chronicle of the Convent of Montepulciano, the authentic writings of the same convent, Notarial instruments of miracles preserved in the archive under these numbers: 4, 7, 9, 11, 13, 21, 25, 32, 38, 39, 42, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104. Since these contain the original attestation of the miracles described by Raymond, they were also requested by us, wishing to present the notarial instruments themselves entire, as we did for Blessed Ambrose of Siena on March 20. But our pious wish was frustrated by an all too simple obedience. For when the Most Reverend Father Jean Baptiste de Marinis, Master General of the Order of Preachers, by most laudable counsel had decreed that a general Archive should be erected in the principal convent which the Order has at Rome above the Minerva, and had ordered that whatever original monuments of the other Convents should be sent thither, taken to the Roman Archive those in whose hands such things were obeyed so promptly that they did not even take thought for authentically transcribing copies which might be kept in place of the originals. So what ought to have been for the preservation of those writings, was for their ruin and that of many others, while either they perished in the hands of those who did not know how to esteem them sufficiently, or, thrown into heaps of less necessary or useful papers, they so lie hidden that they are said by those who have the care of the Archive not to have been able to be found hitherto.

[4] Thus, when we had read in the Bull of the Canonization of Saint Vincent Ferrer, as appears on April 5, that Pope Calixtus had ordered that all the processes held concerning the miracles of the holy man (which had then come to Rome, namely the Avignon, Vannes, Toulouse, and Naples ones) should be kept in the church of the house of Saint Mary above the Minerva of the city for perpetual memory of the matter, and copies of them be exhibited to those wishing them; likewise when we had read in the Prologue to book 3 of the life that Ranzanus complains that the processes drawn up by the counsel of Nicholas V, who presided over the Church before Calixtus, at Barcelona, Valencia, and in many other places of both Spains, the Gauls and Italy, had not been delivered to the Roman Curia at the opportune time: such things, I say, when we had read them, and had conceived some hope about these, at least those brought afterwards, being found at Rome; about those first-mentioned ones a most certain confidence; and we intended to do about them what we did on April 2 concerning the processes made in the cause of Saint Francis of Paola; we lamented being frustrated in both wishes, receiving a similar response. If the same is answered from the Venetian and Bolognese Convents, there and elsewhere badly kept concerning the information about the sanctity and miracles of Saint Catherine of Siena, taken by Francesco de Malavoltis the Olivetan, and Thomas and Bartholomew Senesi, Dominicans, the Confessors of the Saint herself, whose original instruments of acts are preserved in the Venetian Patriarchate, and authentic copies in the aforesaid convents, as he writes who saw and had them, John Rehac of Saint Mary; no one can indeed complain that we have lacked diligence in seeking from every side what we believed to pertain to the glory of the Saints of this Order. Which however let the Reader not think said for boastfulness; but to stimulate the zeal and diligence of those whose work in digging out and rescuing from destruction or inert neglect such monuments can be useful to us, ready even in a Supplement to bring forth what could now be had less, and what may meanwhile happen to be found and sent.

[5] But let us return to Blessed Agnes. Clement VIII willed her name to be inscribed in the Roman Martyrology in these words: "At Montepulciano, of Saint Agnes the Virgin, famous for miracles": so that there is no need to recall here the fasti of private authors concerning the memorials of Saints. Other writers of the same Life Before Raymond some anonymous had written her Life; after him followed very many writers in the vulgar tongues, whom it would be as tedious as superfluous to enumerate, since they are generally known and often cited in this work, both those who collected the lives of the saints of the Order, and those who composed its chronicles, or treated of women distinguished in sanctity. Of those who wrote about Agnes alone of set purpose, two became known to us through Laurence, not yet seen: namely Andrew of Pisa, and Raphael de Columbis: whose compiled Lives we did not think should be more laboriously sought, since the diligence of the said Laurence abundantly supplies whatever beyond the original instruments could be desired by anyone.

[6] Montepulciano erected into a Bishopric As regards Montepulciano itself, it was situated near the Clania marshes and was once under the diocese of Arezzo, and was so when Blessed Agnes was alive: then, agitated by various waves of Italian troubles, and subject now to the dominion of this or that city, at length it found happy rest under the protection of the Florentines: and with their Medici Dukes distinguishedly favoring it, first exempted from the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Arezzo, it was held of no diocese; and at last in the year 1561 it received the title of city, and began to have its own Bishop. This place, though it has produced distinguished men, many even illustrious in sanctity, of whom below, and one Roman Pontiff, Marcellus Cervinus; yet by no one's name has it become more widely and universally known than by Blessed Agnes, while her holiness, through the most holy Order of Preachers diffused throughout the whole world, is celebrated everywhere with deserved encomiums. Wherefore, that it escaped Ferdinand Ughelli, about to describe the Bishops of this city, to say that among its chief ornaments should be numbered in first place "that flower of sanctity, from the Order of Preachers, the most holy Virgin Margaret," this must rather be pardoned as a straying pen than imputed to a fault of memory: for it is evident that for the name of Agnes the name of Margaret crept in, it is most illustrious through Blessed Agnes which would have been known among the people of Montepulciano only for Saint Margaret the martyr, were it not that within the sixteenth mile from its Mount is situated Cortona, and there the famous Margaret, a penitent of the third Order of Saint Francis, not of Dominic, whose Life we gave on February 22. Among the Margarets whom the Order of Preachers has famous for sanctity, the nearest to Tuscany is Margaret of Città di Castello, whose Life we gave on April 13.

LIFE

By Master Raymond of Capua, first Confessor of the Montepulciano monastery, afterwards 23rd General of the Order of Preachers.

From the Manuscript of Ambrose Taegius of the Milanese Convent.

Agnes of Montepulciano, of the Order of Saint Dominic, in Etruria (St.)

BHL Number: 0155

BY RAYMOND OF CAPUA FROM A MANUSCRIPT

PROLOGUE.

[1] That immaculate and innocent Lamb, who, conceived and born without stain of an immaculate Virgin, resolved to blot out our stains by the immaculate sacrifice of his death, whose delights are with the sons and daughters of men, dwelling with those like himself, Of the heavenly Lamb chose immaculate lambs as Brides for himself from eternity, to be led into his wine-cellar, that there, tasting his sweetness, cleansed from all stains, they should render to us

to us, spotted and base, the word of purity and innocence: and so, as though visibly beholding their cleanness, we might, through those things done before our eyes, perceive by the understanding the invisible fount itself of purity and grace. Wherefore also in our times, that gentle and pious Lamb, not forsaking us anywhere, has shown us the image of his sanctity in a certain bride and virgin of his, in the parts of Tuscany, as wondrously as mercifully.

[2] In which virgin indeed we behold the likeness of the Lamb not only from her virtuous works to be inserted below, the Bride Agnes but indeed we see it most manifestly from the very vocal sound of her name (which is called Agnes). For Agnes is properly derived from agnus (lamb), and in all things, except in one vowel, these two names are proved to agree. What therefore is Agnes, but a female lamb? and what does "a lamb" denote to us, but the bride of the Lamb? For since names are imposed upon things according to their properties, it seemed consonant and fitting to the Lamb to call his bride, united to him by perfection of charity, by a name in some way united to his own name, that the sign might properly agree with what is signified: whence that Prophetic word can rightly be said of her: "According to your name, so is also your praise." Ps. 47:11 The praise, I say, which pure virginity, fervent charity, profound humility, honesty of manners, maturity of modesty, and the radiant lucidity of signs and miracles gloriously and becomingly furnished to her: nor does divine clemency yet cease to come to the aid of those invoking her, as piously as liberally.

[3] rightly to be rejoiced in Let the castle of Montepulciano therefore rejoice, endowed with such happiness: but let all Tuscany also exult, adorned with so noble a treasure. Let the happy Order of Preachers also rejoice, under whose correction and rule, by divine revelation, so bright a star placed itself, as will be shown below. Let also the College of Virgins of the monastery, miraculously founded by this Virgin, rejoice with more eager exultation and more gladly than the rest; and built upon so firm a rock, and strengthened with such an arm, let it trust securely to be secure. Truly, moved by the splendor of so great a light, and unable to resist my own impulse, I, the lowest and most ignorant of the Order of Preachers, am compelled with confidence in her help to compose her Legend above my own wit. and the Life is undertaken to be written: with what good faith? And that credence may be given to what is said, let whatever reader know that whatever shall be brought forward below was either faithfully and perfectly related to me by those who saw her great deeds and heard from her own lips, or I found it in writings, attested by the hands of Imperial Notaries or faithful Religious, with the signing of witnesses. Among those who heard and saw her wondrous deeds, four religious Sisters were relators to me, who still survive, and who had conversed with her from the first beginnings of their youth, and were instructed by her in the admonitions of holy religion.

[4] Receive therefore, O reader, with devout and faithful mind, what you read, lest by the rays of this sun, if you are unfaithful, you be blinded. Then you will see, if you weigh with equal balance the things to be said, not to wonder at her wonderful deeds; but rather to be astonished, if to such sanctity wondrous things had not been present. That you may more easily understand what shall be said, Tripartite distribution of the work know that this book is divided in its parts according to the ternary number, in which, according to faith and also natural science, all perfection is contained. In the first we shall treat of her origin and childhood, her entry into religion, and the wonderful works which she did in the castle of Proceno, the Lord teaching us. In the second we shall narrate her coming or return to the castle of Montepulciano, the building of the aforesaid Monastery, and other wondrous acts, up to her death, divine grace instructing. In the third we shall tell of her praiseworthy passing, and the miracles and prodigies that followed, down to our modern times, with divine light illumining. One thing, most Christian reader, I wish you to know, that I have striven according to my frailty to collect her deeds: nonetheless, both to avoid wearying you, and because many men and women have been taken from this light who knew her life better and more perfectly than the survivors now living, I have been forced to omit many things concerning her virtues and wonders. Wherefore receive now a few from many; and from the savor of these perceive how savory were the things omitted: and give praise and glory and honor to him from whom all savor of goodness is granted, who, three in unity and one in trinity, is blessed forever and ever. Amen.

TITLES OF THE OLD DIVISION

PART ONE.

§ I. On her ancestry, birth, prodigies shown at her birth, her childhood and entry into the monastery.

II. On the prophecy about her made by a certain holy woman, a visitor of the monastery.

III. On her elevation from the earth while praying, and the holy manners of the holy Virgin.

IV. On the vision she had about building a church in honor of the Blessed Virgin.

V. On her going to the castle of Proceno.

VI. On the congregation of Virgins, made by her in the castle of Proceno, and the care of the monastery committed to her in the 15th year of her age.

VII. On the austerity of her life and the fervor of her prayer, and of the manna descending upon her, especially on the day of her consecration.

VIII. On the sweet vision in which the Blessed Virgin Mary gave her her son our Lord Jesus Christ; and on the cross which she sent her.

IX. On the Communion which she received for ten continuous Sundays from the hand of an Angel.

X. On the relics of Christ and the Apostles Peter and Paul, miraculously given to her.

XI. On one possessed by a demon, wondrously freed at her entrance.

XII. On various temporal things received and augmented through her prayer.

XIII. On a certain wondrous vision, and the transformation of flesh.

XIV. On the rose coming from heaven into her dish, and a certain sinner converted by her, whose penalties she had seen.

PART TWO

PART THREE.

CHAPTER I.

The infancy and childhood of Agnes illustrated by presages and effects of great sanctity, and the beginnings of her religious life.

[5] The Virgin Agnes, noble in faith and devotion, from parents rich ^a in abundance of temporal things, drew her holy and illustrious origin from Montepulciano. ^b This origin God almighty, unwilling to pass by without the splendor of signs, showed the spiritual light about to proceed from the Virgin in the future, by this presage. Prodigious lights foretell the future sanctity of the newly born child For immediately after her birth, in the chamber where her mother, having given birth with certain midwife-women, had shut herself, many candles appeared, kindled divinely with a wondrous light, which furnished wonder and joy alike to the bystanders. So, having shown for the space of some hour what would be the future of the born girl, at length they disappeared from the sight of all. She, while yet placed in her infantile years, having learned the Lord's Prayer and the Angelic Salutation, with devotion sprouting in the little one which in the adult was to germinate copiously, having dismissed her girlish companions and neglecting girlish games, withdrew secretly to the back part of the house by the wall: and there, with knees bent and hands joined, more devoutly offered what she had devoutly learned. When this was being done for a long time, at a tender age she conceives the purpose of Religion there began to grow in the girl's mind a desire for religious life, and she wished daily more to dedicate herself wholly to divine service. She began to disclose her motive to her parents, attesting with the childish words she knew, that she entirely must become a religious.

[6] When these words were thought trifling by those who heard them, and did not satisfy the holy girl's desire, it happened, by God's wondrous ordering, that when she was about nine years old, and coming from the village called ^c Gratianus the Old, in the district of Montepulciano, to the said castle, when she drew near a certain hill placed near the ^d gate of the castle (where at that time public harlots possessed the habitation of their crime, she is attacked by demons in the form of ravens and now a monastery of Virgins, founded by her in the course of time, is established under the peak of religion), from that very hill certain most black ravens, croaking most furiously, coming out, attacked her and with claws and beaks began to tear her head in slashes. When the women with whom she was going were wondering at this, and considering what the wondrous rage of ravens against so pure a girl meant, she is reported to have given a not immature reply out of her understanding: "For this reason, God permitting, these ravens so cruelly oppose me, because you do not permit me to dedicate myself to divine service under the habit of religion." as she passes a brothel which she would convert into a monastery Which word, though it proceeded from the holy purpose of the girl, and compelled her parents to consent to her will, nevertheless that savageness of the ravens indicated something more wondrous and useful. For those malign spirits, who then pretended the likeness of ravens, foresaw, the Lord revealing it to them for their goad, that the holy girl after some time would drive them from the place of filthiness, and would there found a monastery of holy chastity and religion, as the event of the matter afterwards proved: with what fury of envy they were tortured at this, they showed by furious and bestial acts.

[7] But because, by the just judgment of God, the evils which the ancient enemy strives to set against the elect, she saying that this happened because her purpose was impeded redound to their utility and his own confusion, this very trouble of the ravens, by which the twisted serpent thought to infest the girl, grew to the perfection of her holy purpose. For when the said journey was repeated many times, and the infernal infestation did not cease, and the prudent girl repeated the aforesaid words, her parents and kinsmen were inclined to satisfy her petition; and, seeing the diabolical rage, they began to venerate the girl's words, which before they had contemned as childish. They therefore gave their effort to the matter, solicitously seeking where they might decently and fittingly place her among a congregation of Virgins. By the judgment of God almighty, they placed the holy Virgin Agnes, with no small joy of hers, in the monastery situated in the said castle, in which were Sisters called "^e del Sacco," from the scapular they wore out of humility of ^f sackcloth.

[8] in the 9th year of her age These things done, the Virgin, seeing herself in the flower of her age, namely in the 9th year, dedicated to God, began not slothfully to give herself, all the time she could subtract from human frailty and necessity, to prayer, reading, and obedience wondrously above human measure. And when she had been given into the care and mastery of a certain Sister, by name Margaret, so great was the sweetness of her obedience and humility, that she drew her mistress to herself with sweet love, and led her to wonder at such great virtues. Now at that time, a few days after her entry, it happened that a certain religious woman, venerable for religion and virtues, whom, on account of the height of her sanctity, the diocesan Bishop of Arezzo ^g had set over many Congregations of Virgins, that by her visitation and correction they might live regularly,

a holy visitor of the monastery came to the aforesaid monastery, where Agnes newly entered was dwelling, for the sake of a visit, accompanied by certain religious women. When she had asked about the state of the monastery, it was told her among other things that a certain girl had entered the monastery. After the manner of a pious mother she had her summoned, that she might confirm her, instructed with holy admonitions, in her purpose of religion. When she had seen the virgin girl, inspired by the divine spirit, with prophetic mouth she thus addressed her: "I rejoice in the Lord over you, daughter, let her foretell that she will be the glory of the Order because I believe without doubt that you will be the future glory and crown of our whole Congregation." And turning to Sister Margaret, under whose care she had been committed, she said: "Take solicitous care of this venerable girl: because I tell you by divine revelation, that as Agnes the Virgin and Martyr, whose relics rest at Rome, first placed this name, Saint Agnes, in the mouth of the faithful, so this holy girl will make the same name fruitful in the holy Church."

[9] Which saying the clemency of God almighty has so fulfilled in our modern time by deeds, which the church, usually called by her name, proves that, although she has not yet been inscribed by the supreme Pontiff in the catalogue of the Saints, from the multitude and evidence of the miracles, she is not only called Saint Agnes by the faithful, nay rather, the church founded by her under the title of the perpetual Virgin Mary, ^h the devotion of the faithful today calls by no other name than that of Saint Agnes. And when such a naming has been reproved by many, both on account of the reverence of the glorious Virgin, Mother of God, and also because no church ought to be named under the name of a Virgin not yet inscribed in the catalogue of the Saints, what it means I know not, because those very people who reprove it, in common speech, and all others, call the monastery and church by Saint Agnes's name. In which I see nothing else, though not yet canonized but that the faithful Lord in all his words completes in present deeds the prophetic promise made through his handmaid, because he is holy in all his works.

[10] in prayer she is often elevated from the earth After these wondrous presages and indications of future sanctity, the holy girl began to do what God had variously formerly shown of her. For she was so and so much mentally joined to God by the favor of the spirit, that when in secret, gathering her spirit, she prayed to God, from the said fervor of spirit she was often, while still of girlish age, elevated from the earth to the space of one cubit and without any bodily support to be seen to rise into the air, and to be joined to her Maker. And though this happened very many times, with certain Sisters seeing, who, because of wonder and example, more curiously observed her deeds, yet one thing was seen once by the said ⁱ Sisters, which introduces stupor and love alike to hearers. For when on one occasion the girl devoted to God was praying devoutly before the image of the Crucifix, and once up to the crucifix placed above the altar she was so seized by the love of her Spouse, that, the earth left behind, her most pure body was so high lifted up in the air, that she joined herself in equal position to the very image placed above the altar in an eminent place: where, kissing and embracing, she was seen to lean upon her Beloved; and so that you might manifestly see in the embracing of the corporeal image that mental union by which she was interiorly united to Christ, and perceive the elevation of her mind on high from the miraculous suspension of her body. After she had satisfied the affection of her fervent charity by exterior acts as far as was lawful for her, with the same lightness by which she had ascended on high, she descended to the depths: and it came to pass that the girl, tender in age, hoary in manners, from such great virtues was held in wondrous reverence by all the religious women, both young and old.

[11] In her 14th year she is placed over the cellar For she was gentle in obedience, placid in humility, fervent in prayer, tractable in conversation, cheerful in charity, grave in prudence, and pleasing in the composition of all her manners. Wherefore when before the 14th year of her age, the care of the cellar ^k had been imposed on her by the Prelate of the monastery, that according to the prudence given her she might minister temporal things to the Sisters according to their need, the Lord conferred on her such grace, that, consoling all, cheerfully satisfying all, she in no way relaxed through externals the rigor of her accustomed penance and the fervor of her constant prayer. Which indeed, though to the inexperienced it may seem easy; yet if those are asked who have learned these things by proof, it will appear not only difficult but in a manner almost impossible—though not so to him with whom no word is impossible. All her companions admired Agnes's acts, but she remitted nothing of prayer and penance regulated by charity and prudence; and considering her solicitude, modesty, and wise cheerfulness, all were stupefied beyond what can be believed; and giving thanks to the giver of all gifts, they affectionately seized the Virgin herself in their hearts: so that Agnes alone was commended, Agnes alone was praised, and almost by excellence all virtue was attributed to her; because the rest, as stars, lay hidden under the obscuring of her solar brightness.

[12] Meanwhile a certain presage of future things was shown to her praying, she receives from the Blessed Virgin three little stones which, on account of the subsequent work to be told below, I should not pass over. For when the girl was totally intent on devout prayer and contemplation, she conceived a singular and fervent affection of devotion toward the Mother of God. Wherefore, when she often prayed to her most affectionately, on a certain occasion, while in praying her virginal mind was fervent in love of that Queen of Virgins, the Mother of God herself manifestly appeared to the virgin Agnes; and consoling her and sweetly addressing her, offered three small stones with her venerable hand, saying: "Know, daughter, that before you go out of this mortal body, you are to build a church for my name: as a sign of which matter receive these three little stones, as a pledge of a church to be founded by her and upon the rock of the confession of faith of the most high Trinity let all your building be strengthened." When she had received them with prompt and humble obedience, at once that illustrious vision disappeared from her eyes, and the holy girl remained with no little sweetness of heart; and the pledge of the future foundation, so graciously given her, she reverently and secretly preserved at all times.

NOTES.

CHAPTER II.

Agnes made Abbess among the people of Proceno, is rained upon with heavenly manna: embraces the child Jesus in visible form.

[13] God almighty therefore, unwilling that so burning a lamp be hidden even for a time under the bushel, To the people of Proceno, asking for a founder of a new monastery wonderfully disposed to place her on the candlestick of the Church. Whence it happened that certain people of a certain castle of the county of Orvieto, which is called Proceno ^a, hearing the fame of the holy life of those religious women, among whom the holy Virgin served the Lord, directed solemn messengers solicitously to the castle of Montepulciano, to the house of the Sisters of the Sack. They asked therefore through the said messengers, that they would deign to send one of them, in whose religion and sanctity they trusted, to their castle of Proceno; that there, a monastery being founded, and Sisters gathered, they might by the example of holy life edify the people, and by pious prayers and just merits help the earth-dwellers to God. The handmaids of the Lord, heeding their wish, began to inquire among themselves whom they could grant them as a Sister, who might better without damage to the monastery accomplish that work.

[14] Agnes with her mistress is sent Since no mention was made of the holy girl Agnes, because of her youthful age, and also because they thought the greatest damage would come to the monastery from her absence, at length it was deliberated among them that Sister Margaret, the mistress and instructor of Agnes herself, should be sent there. When they had called her and charitably admonished her to undertake the said labor for the glory of God and the utility of that people, she, moved by the Holy Spirit, answered that she could by no means subject her neck to so great a labor, unless her holy daughter and perfect disciple Agnes were given her as a companion. When they refused this, wholly wishing rather to keep the precious treasure for themselves, at length compelled by the urging of those men and of the Sisters disposed to this, they sent Sister Margaret herself to the said castle of Proceno, and gave the virgin Agnes to her as a companion.

[1] § The two together ran to the work of God, to be accomplished manfully; and promoting the work with great success but Agnes ran more swiftly, that is more perfectly, than Margaret. For when in the castle of Proceno

they solicitously and manfully applied themselves to the Congregation of Sisters and the foundation of a monastery, so great a grace was diffused in the lips of Agnes, that no virgin could resist her sweet admonitions and soft addresses, without running after her in the service of God, in the odor of her holy examples. She began also to draw girls from neighboring castles, and, as the vicar of the true Shepherd, to gather the Lord's sheep into the place of pasture. Praises therefore are given to God by the bystanders, and stupefied by the virtues of so wondrous a girl, those who before preferred Sister Margaret in the holy work, afterwards, the virginal flock having been gathered, determined to set the virgin Agnes, a girl in time, ancient in virtue, venerable in sanctity and manners, over all the Virgins.

[16] Wherefore, by the authority of the supreme ^b Pontiff, obtained through D. Frederick, then Bishop of Ostia ^c, who knew her virtues, she becomes Abbess in the 15th year of her age the fifteen-year-old virgin Agnes, on account of her eminent perfection, was set over that monastery as principal Prelate ^d, and all were placed under her obedience. A burning lamp therefore having been set upon the candlestick of the Church, God almighty began to make her gleam with radiant miracles: she shines with miracles to be faithfully narrated which, as much as I was allowed to hear and read, I shall strive to recite in faithful and truthful speech, though perhaps the order of time of the miracles performed is not fully kept in the order of the recitation. Yet it is enough for me, and for anyone wishing to know her life, if her deeds are faithfully recited, all falsity set aside. And that credence may be more easily given to her wondrous deeds, let us before all else proclaim some of her virtuous works.

[17] Therefore the holy Virgin, seeing herself so young placed over all, thought to subject her body wholly to the spirit (and this by parsimony of food and drink and other harshnesses), and her spirit to God through fifteen years she fasts on bread and water, lies on the ground through devout prayer. Whence in the same monastery she fasted for fifteen years on bread and water, and that very strictly: she had no bed, but after the manner of her future father Dominic, she inclined her little body on the bare ground, having as a pillow under her head the hardest stone. Nor would she have set an end to such a life short of death, had not, after the said fifteen years, a grave and long-lasting bodily infirmity coming upon her, by the counsel of physicians and the command of Confessors, she been compelled to change her food and bed. insisting on prayer she is rained with heavenly manna She so fervently and ardently clung to prayer, that if sometimes it happened that a Sister approached her praying for any cause, at once with great cries she expelled her, saying that they were her enemies and cruel foes who in any way impeded her from the conjunction of her Spouse. Wherefore, God almighty, wishing to show how pleasing her prayer was to him, very often while she prayed, lifting her from the earth, filled the whole cloak by which she was covered with manna; and the place where she bent her virginal knees, the place itself strewn with flowers he miraculously scattered with heavenly flowers of unusual odor and highest beauty: some of which were collected by some observers, and have been preserved unharmed to this day.

[18] But as to what has been said of the manna coming from heaven over her praying, the aforesaid four Sisters, her former disciples, thus related to me. For they report that the holy Virgin sometimes after her prayer came out of her little cell, that, visiting her Sisters, she might rouse them lest they grow torpid in the holy work: whom coming the aforesaid Sisters beheld, they saw her cloak whitened in such a manner. And when, drawing near, they investigated whence that whiteness proceeded, this manna had the form of little crosses they saw her as if wholly covered with a certain fine manna like snow, which was divided into many grains, whose figure in all was the same, namely the figure of the saving Cross. They therefore beholding, when one of them simpler than the rest, out of a certain childish simplicity, believing the manna truly to be snow, wished to shake off her cloak, the holy virgin forbade her with modest speech, saying: "Let be, daughter, let be: what is granted to me by divine sweetness I bear sweetly; do not take it from me." Heeding this response, the others, who were of greater prudence and age, and beholding the cloak, because nature is not accustomed to give such a figure either to snow or to any white body, manifestly knew this work to be divine: especially because only when she rose from prayer could they behold her thus whitened.

[19] But though these things had been seen very often, both in the aforesaid castle of Proceno and in the monastery of Montepulciano founded by her (where now her holy Relics rest, to which, for continuation of subject, passing over the order of history, we extend our discourse), one thing however very wondrous happened in the said castle of Proceno, which I do not remember to have read of about any other man or woman. For when the Diocesan ^e Bishop wished with his own hands to consecrate the handmaid of Christ, and by this the temple in which she was to be consecrated is found sprinkled and to impose with blessing the holy veil, as is the custom of religious women, on her head; on the day set for carrying out this office, all things necessary having been done, the Bishop entering with the Clergy the church where the virgin Agnes was to be consecrated, the church was found filled with the aforesaid manna. And when wondering they looked, and solicitously sought among themselves what that was, thus searching they went to the principal altar of that church, and found the whole table placed above it full of the same manna divinely, and stocked in such quantity that in their hands, nimbly filled from it, they showed it to one another with wonder ^f.

[20] with the wonder of the Bishop and others When therefore it was clearly seen by the Bishop and Clergy, especially on account of the figure of the Cross which appeared in its grains, that this had plainly happened by the miracle of God almighty, and he was showing of what merit his handmaid was before him; all began to give praises to the Creator and to venerate him in his handmaid. So therefore with joy and reverence, at the same time the office of consecration is accomplished, and all return home, their breasts full of devotion; and concerning the sanctity of the virgin, all suspicion and doubt removed, they are rendered fully certified. In which unwonted miracle, God almighty willed to manifest openly to all, that his handmaid, whom the Bishop wished to consecrate by certain exterior signs of sanctification, the Holy of Holies had himself previously sanctified inwardly by the gifts of his gratification: and as by those gifts he had made the soul of his handmaid pure inwardly, so on the day of consecration he sent wondrous manna from heaven.

[21] Desirous to see Christ bodily Nor do I think this should be passed over in silence, that God almighty, as a sign of immense love and an increase of our devotion, deigned to grant her. For she was, as we said, a virgin greatly given to prayer, from love and desire of her Spouse: and when the love of Christ abounded more and more in her, her mind began daily to grow fervent with a certain holy appetite, not to be presumed by just anyone, namely of seeing face to face the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, and being able to enjoy his embraces. When she considered that, between creatures and the Creator, especially of those existing in the way, there was excessive distance, she thought to ascend to God by that ladder she has recourse to the Blessed Virgin Mary by which God descended to men, and to draw the Most High by that cord to show his face, who drew him to assume human flesh for us. This ladder is Mary, the advocate of sinners: to this Queen of virgins Agnes the virgin runs with all devotion, more frequently and more fervently beseeching her, that she would deign to show her her son, that thus her joy might be fulfilled: for she asserted that she by no means doubted, that such excellence had been granted to her by her son, that she could show him according to her good pleasure even to wayfarers.

[22] and on the feast of the Assumption she is made possessor of her wish The most clement Queen of virgins, therefore, bound by so fervent a prayer of Agnes, and by the inclination of her accustomed mercy, not able to deny her handmaid's petition, on the night of her Assumption took care to grant her what she had so often asked. For while on the said night the holy virgin prayed, and with all effort of mind had gathered her spirit to pray to the Queen of virgins that on the feast of her Assumption she would deign to grant her this grace, suddenly a light from heaven shone around her, and in the midst of the light appeared the Lady of the world, clothed in light as with a garment, having between her arms her son, of infant age, as it seemed. When the devout virgin was seized with stupor and joy alike by this vision, the Queen of heaven herself, sweetly addressing her, and clearly showing her son, courteously invited her by speech and deed to embrace her Spouse. Noticing which, not forgetting her desire, she received her Creator, the mother giving him: she receives the child Jesus into her arms whom clasping to herself with tightly pressed hands, and drawing him near to herself, she rejoiced with ineffable exultation, and was filled with unspeakable sweetness. Nor is it wondrous, because she had found him whom her soul loved; whom, seeking in the bed of this world and not finding, with great fervor of desire and labor of prayer, with Mary helping, she had merited to find. So therefore Agnes clings almost inseparably to the Lamb: and him to whom she was inwardly joined with bonds of charity, as though to insert within herself, or herself within him, she strove.

[23] And when thus, for the space of some hour, the Queen of heaven had endured the absence of her son for Agnes's consolation, and from his neck at last torn from her at length, wishing to put an end to the vision, she began to ask Agnes that she would not delay to restore her son to her. When Agnes altogether refused, asserting that she could in no way be separated from so most sweet a Spouse, nor could be bent by any endearments or prayers to the restoration of the son to the Mother of the Lord, the very Mother of God, taking her son with her hands, by a certain pious violence strove to draw him to herself. But since Agnes on the other side, as much as she could, was drawing and holding, there was between them a charitable and pious contest. the little cross snatched she retains In this contest when Agnes saw herself failing, because namely the Mother was wholly drawing the son to herself, and the boy Jesus was gradually going out of her hands, a certain small Cross, tied with a small thread at the neck of the boy Jesus, she so strongly seized, that her hands could rather have been torn from her body, than that cross taken from her hand. Wherefore at the touch of the virgin Mary the son indeed was taken away, but the cross itself remained in her fist: and thus so delightful a vision disappeared from her eyes.

[24] From which disappearance and the taking away of her Spouse, such grief stuck to Agnes's heart that after great and dreadful cries she fell to the ground wailing, half-dead. At whose cry the Sisters, roused, running to the usual place of prayer, found her half-alive and as though dead.

And when after some space she had come back to herself, asked by the Sisters what had happened to her beyond the usual, which had caused such novelty in her, as a true bride keeping her secret to herself, she would reveal it to no one at that time: afterwards to a certain Sister Catherine, which is still preserved much loved by her for her religion and sanctity of life, she wished to reveal the series of the event in secret, and showed the cross which the Lord had dispensationally left her. ^g Which cross, reverently placed with the Relics, is preserved to this day, and with the greatest veneration, on the first day of May, after the solemnization of her passing, with the other Relics, is manifestly shown to the people.

NOTES.

CHAPTER III.

Relics received through an Angel; miraculous multiplication of oil, money, bread.

[25] Nor is it permitted me to pass over this, which the merciful God by a singular privilege willed to miraculously confer on her. Persisting on the Lord's Day in prayer For the aforesaid Sisters, ^a my relators and informants, report that they heard from her mouth, reciting of herself as of another, obscurely indeed from her, but clearly from the Sisters who at that time were with her, that when she was in the castle of Proceno, she was sometimes accustomed to descend alone into the garden of her monastery, and there near a certain olive tree to devote herself to prayer. When this had been done for some time, it happened that the holy Virgin on a certain morning of a Sunday also went to the aforesaid place of prayer. She there with knees bent and hands joined, according to her custom, praying, when she was filled with tears, the ardor of her mind and fervor grew so, that she prolonged her prayer from the break of dawn until high day ^b.

[26] She receives the Eucharist brought by an Angel But while, within her prayer, she recollected that it was the Lord's Day, and was not lawful to let such a day pass without hearing the solemnities of Masses; on the other hand, the sweetness of the Spouse urging her, she could not leave the fervor of prayer: placed in agony she prayed more and more fervently. And behold, after a little an Angel was at hand, bearing that venerable Sacrament of the Lord's Body, on account of which all the solemnities of Masses are said and done. Seeing which, the handmaid of the omnipotent Lord devoutly showed humble reverence first to the King of the Angels, then to the Angel; and at last, with him assenting, received sacred Communion from the Angel's hand: and so Agnes the virgin, by the special grace of the Savior, neither laid aside her prayer, nor was deprived of the Sacraments of the Mass; but rather, the Sacraments having been communicated, she was strengthened by the presence of Angels. Nor was it enough for the bountiful Giver of gifts to do this grace once or twice to his bride; through ten continuous occasions but for ten Sundays continuously he repeated the same gift, that namely according to the number of the Decalogue, in which is all perfection of sanctity, holy Agnes, to be further sanctified, might deserve to receive the most holy Body from the hand of a holy Angel.

[27] Still I ought not to be silent about another new and wondrous grace, and, to fulfill her desire of visiting the Holy Land which also in prayer she received from the Lord. For when with great affection the holy virgin desired to visit the places beyond the sea, in which our Savior was conceived, born, lived, and suffered for our salvation; and had for a long time besought the Lord concerning this, that if possible he would grant it her, in a fitting way by which she might know how to go to the aforesaid places; at length, seeing by the Spirit of wisdom given her, that this did not at all fit the Divine disposition, which willed her to fructify in the parts of Etruria, she humbly besought God that he would deign to grant her something of that land and of the things which his majesty had touched. Which petition the most sweet Spouse of virgins, unwilling to deny the holy virgin, thus consoled his bride. For while she prayed, and asked with tears what has been said, she receives a particle of earth sprinkled with Christ's blood suddenly divinely she found her hand full of earthy dust, congealed and hard, and reduced to the manner of stone. When she wondered greatly, thinking what this might be, it was revealed to her by the Lord through an Angel, that this earth had been taken from thence, where the Savior of the world placed on the cross for our iniquities moistened that earth with his blood. The aforesaid Angel also brought her, for her greater consolation, a certain particle of that basin, in which our Savior, placed in tender age, was bathed in the manner of little ones. These gifts the handmaid of Christ, receiving with ready mind, and humbly giving thanks to the Omnipotent, solicitously and devoutly placed in a reverent place, and together with other Relics preserved ^c.

[28] Though our discourse should not yet extend to the works she did after the building of the second monastery, where she returned to Montepulciano, yet for continuation of the history I intend to insert something which the Lord bestowed on her, similar to what we have said, though it happened much later. Now it happened that after the foundation of the second monastery she went to Rome to a certain Legate of the Apostolic See ^d; where when she had visited the thresholds of the Apostles Peter and Paul, and by God had conceived fervor on the journey, and had conceived a desire of having something of their Relics, likewise of the Relics of Saints Peter and Paul she brought herself wholly into the church of the prince of the Apostles to pray, and prayed to the Apostles that they would deign to grant her something of their Relics. Which was also at once fulfilled: for as she was so devoutly praying, suddenly there were found in her bosom two particles of garments, one of which had been divinely cut from the garment of the principal Vicar of Jesus Christ, the other from the vesture of the Doctor of the Gentiles; as was revealed to her by the Lord before she departed thence. Which particles the devout Virgin devoutly receiving, did not delay to render humble and reverent praises to her Creator and to the Prince of the Apostles; and thus she returned home with joy.

[29] Among these secret wonders, which were not manifest to all, the Lord began to illustrate his Saint before all. For while she was still in the said castle of Proceno, it happened that in the castle of Acquapendente, close to the same castle ^e, a certain possessed by a demon, doing horrible acts, asked to go to Acquapendente was afflicting all his kin with sadness and anguish alike. Wherefore, many Priests being called together, that by the sacred words of the Gospels and holy prayers they might expel the demon from the body of the possessed, after many things said and done, it was found that the demon had not only not departed, but had taken no care of their words: the Lord so willing, that he might show the glory of his Saint. At length, the kinsmen as it were despairing of his salvation, there was one who said that in the castle of Proceno was a certain most holy woman, by name Agnes, Abbess of a certain monastery, through whom God almighty had shown many miracles. Hearing which, she expels the demon from one possessed when the kinsmen of the said possessed saw that on account of his horrible acts they could not lead him thither, they deliberated to go themselves to her, and with pious and humble prayers to bend her, that she would deign, with her customary charity, to come to the sick man. Which when they had done, and with the most pressing prayers compelled her, the holy virgin, who was subject to no enclosure, moved and constrained by compassion and charity, went to the said castle of Acquapendente together with those asking and other religious women. A wonderful thing and to be stupefied at in our times! At once, when the handmaid of Christ entered the said castle, that proud and turgid demon, who a little before seemed to take no care of any or any one's word, not bearing the force of so great sanctity, by her very entry into the house began to turn that body hither and thither, and to show by new acts the violence done to him by the holy Virgin. When Agnes, drawing nearer to the house, placed her first foot in the threshold of the door entering, immediately the demon cried through the mouth of the possessed, saying: "I cannot stand, because the virgin Agnes has entered." Which said, without any delay he departed. By which departure, at one and the same time, willing and unwilling, he freed the man. All the bystanders began to venerate God in his handmaid, extolling her with gratified praises: but the Virgin of the Lord, though she rejoiced greatly at the praises of her Creator, yet humbly fleeing her own glory, imposing silence on all her praisers with holy and prudent responses and words, with swift pace returned to her monastery. Yet the miracle did not remain so hidden—nay rather, by her humility it was all the more enlarged.

[31] To these miracles I also add those which were so frequently wrought by the holy virgin through the gift of the Omnipotent, as often as there was any need of temporal things in her monastery. An empty oil vessel It happened in the aforesaid monastery and the castle of Proceno that oil was sometimes really and wholly lacking for her Sisters; which, when it had been announced to her by the Sister to whose office it pertained to administer temporal things, the handmaid of the Lord, thinking a little within herself, answered the messenger: "See, daughter, whether any, however little, oil has remained in the vessel." she causes it to be found full When she said that not one drop remained at all, and that she knew this so certainly that it would be vain to look again, the holy Virgin answered: "Believe, daughter, that the vessel is not empty. Return therefore, and see again: for without doubt by the gift of God almighty you will find oil in the vessel." At whose voice the faithful disciple humbly obeying, went to the vessel itself, and found it full of oil to the top. She, at once with cheerfulness and wonder returning to the Holy Abbess, and to suffice for the whole Lent announced the miracle. But she, to whom it was not new that she had obtained from the Lord by her prayers, with holy and wise words put a measure to her cheerfulness, and admonished that what was divinely given should be liberally dispensed. The aforesaid dispenser faithfully obeying and carrying out, at length found, as she herself afterwards recited, that the small vessel of oil, which scarcely for a few days used to suffice for the Sisters' daily use, now, through the whole of Lent, poured out copiously in every need of the monastery, abundantly sufficed.

[32] The same also often happened in the castle of Proceno and in the land of Montepulciano: likewise money in an exhausted purse money being lacking for paying builders or other creditors of her monastery, she namely sending the Sister bursar to the purse to look again, in which the bursar herself from certain knowledge reported nothing to be; and yet, sent by her, looking, she found in it as many denarii as they needed.

[33] Still, similar to this is what the merciful God showed through his handmaid in the said castle of Montepulciano. For when in the monastery, where now her venerable Relics lie, she miraculously multiplies bread; and this once the Sisters, whom she had gathered to the number of twelve, on a certain day were warning her that bread was completely lacking, the handmaid of Christ began to comfort her daughters with sweet words, and charitably to admonish them that they should in no way distrust the abundance of divine bounty, promising that divine help was near. When the Sister, whose office it was to answer those knocking, went to the wheel, she found that a man had brought four small loaves, which could scarcely have sufficed for the food of two Sisters: which, giving thanks to God and to that man, she took and joyfully brought to her and her spiritual companions' spiritual mother, saying: "Behold, Lady, the word which you were just saying, the Lord has begun to fulfill"; and saying this, she showed the loaves brought. When the holy Virgin had seen them, she at once ordered the table to be joyfully set, and the Sisters to sit according to custom. After which, taking those little loaves into her holy hands, giving thanks she blessed and broke them, and graciously distributed them to those sitting. Which done, the said loaves so grew in her hands, that the aforesaid Sisters were satisfied and filled, and there still remained as much as would have satisfied many others.

[34] This miracle of bread multiplied, and also newly found, again the Lord often and frequently showed through his handmaid. For when sometimes little girls, who had entered the monastery in youthful age, after the manner of children beyond the hour of refection asked for bread to eat, and bread was wholly lacking, yet the infants did not desist from asking, but rather with complaining and childish voices insisted more, the holy virgin, hearing their cries, hastily calling to her the aforesaid Sister Catherine, beloved by her, ordered her to bring bread to the girls asking. When she had answered that there was not even a little bread in the monastery, the handmaid of God almighty again ordered that, going to the chest where the loaves were usually placed, she should bring whatever bread she found to those asking, that they might eat. When she, bound by the command, obedient returned to the chest, she found it filled with as many loaves as its capacity could hold: though when, at the complaint of the said girls, opening it she had left it wholly empty. Whence stupefied and joyful, she gave thanks to the Most High, gave the loaves to the little ones, and reserved the rest for the needs of the monastery.

[35] The same Sister Catherine also related to my relators that in the castle of Proceno, and a third time where the relators themselves were then with the holy Virgin, once in the monastery bread being totally lacking, when the hour came at which the Sisters were to take food, the handmaid of Christ ordered the table to be set and all the Sisters to sit, and she herself likewise sat at the table; and while she was exhorting them to patience, and they were disposing themselves to take raw herbs or whatever else the Lord might give, without bread, with thanksgiving; the devout Virgin, compassionate toward her daughters, with maternal affection prayed a little within herself to the Lord: and the prayer being finished, with great cheerfulness looking up and raising her hands, stretching them out as though she wished to receive something, she drew from the air a loaf of bread baked in ashes. Which setting it down upon the table, after thanksgivings she divided it among all: and thus she satisfied the whole collegium, as if the whole table had been full of loaves. Nor is it wondrous: because an Angelic hand had brought that bread, which the Maker of all the crops had liberally sent.

NOTES.

CHAPTER IV.

Agnes's patience in sickness and charity toward her neighbor are honored with divine favors.

[36] The holy virgin therefore having been erected to the summit of virtues, God almighty willed that she appear more wondrous in the night of adversity, showing bright signs, such as he had shown in the day of prosperity. For it happened that the holy virgin in the aforesaid castle of Proceno (where she is said to have stayed seventeen years ^a) after the fifteenth year from the foundation of the monastery and the beginning of her harshest penance spoken of above, incurred a grave and long-lasting infirmity; which that she might more patiently bear, the Spouse of virgins willed, by a certain sweet and glad vision, to anticipate his bride. Refreshed by a glorious vision of the Mother of God The series of which vision is such. For it seemed to the handmaid of Christ that she was raptured in paradise, and there saw the secrets of God, and was rejoicing with wondrous exultation. And while she so exulted, she saw the glorious Virgin Mother of God sitting on the throne of her majesty, and before her a multitude of Angels assisting her: of whom some before her glorious face seemed to raise a breeze with certain most beautiful napkins, as is accustomed to be done to those fervent with excessive heat: others with melodious voices and sweet consonances were sweetly singing that devout Sequence, composed in honor of the same Virgin, which begins: "Vernansrosa, spes humilium ^b praecipua," etc. At whose song while the virgin Agnes exulted indescribably, both because of the joyous vision of the Queen of virgins, and also because of the devout service of the Angels, after such a delay as it pleased the Most High to gladden his handmaid, and putting an end to so great joy, the vision disappeared, and Agnes returned to herself.

[37] In which vision the Creator of all willed to announce a future bodily adversity, and that she was by no means to fall from impatience, his refreshing grace being present: she understands diseases are to come upon her God almighty had as it were said openly: "You will indeed sustain affliction in the body, but by my refreshing and sweetly consoling grace, you will bear all without the weariness of impatience." For we know that the Queen of heaven does not need the refreshment of a breeze, nor has need of the consonance of voices: but all those things are figured for Agnes, to show her refreshment. From which refreshment she received such consolation, that even after she had returned to herself, she could not contain herself from intoning with most loud voice that devout Sequence, and to be relieved by divine consolations which she had heard sung by the Angels; though she had never heard from a man the words or chant of the said Sequence. After this so sweet cheerfulness, the holy virgin began to feel bodily troubles, and to be grieved with no small infirmity the whole time, but especially in the head. When she could not for this be tempered from her fervor, since she laughed at every bodily evil, her sisters and daughters tried to induce her, by the counsel of physicians and the command of her Confessors, to put a limit to the rigor of her penance; and that by changing her food, and

lying on a soft bed, she might provide for the health of her body. But when she most unwillingly grew lukewarm from her accustomed rigor, alleging that one should not sympathize with the treacherous enemy, yet, wholly humble, choosing the sacrifice of obedience above all, lest she should seem pertinacious in her own sense, she submitted her will to the will of those counseling and commanding.

[38] Which as soon as the Sisters perceived, they carefully and solicitously prepared meats, meats set before her for these reasons and brought them before the holy virgin to eat. When she, seeing them, shuddered greatly, because it seemed to her an excessive movement from one extreme to another, namely from the fast of bread and water to the eating of meats an excessively sudden movement, she began to ask the Sisters that they should not lead her to such intemperance, especially at the beginning of her illness; but if they absolutely wished her to change her accustomed foods, at least they should bring her fish or other lenten foods. To the contrary of which when all the Sisters importunately insisted, and urged her by all means to eat the brought food, she, withdrawing a little into herself, and gathering her spirit to pray to the Lord, humbly asked of the Lord, that he would by his power change that food into a fish: which as she asked, so it was done. For suddenly, by prayer she converts them into fish all her daughters seeing and being stupefied at once, the meats were wonderfully transformed into a fish: which the handmaid of God beholding, with thanksgiving alertly received what before, out of the custom of harshness, she had been unwilling to take. ^c

[39] I think it very unworthy and quite unsuitable, if having recited her other virtues, we should not wish to say something of her charity, which is the queen of virtues. And because charity, by which we do good toward our neighbor, is divided into a double member, spiritual and temporal alike, beginning from the temporal, we shall afterwards come to the spiritual, that through the less perfect we may come to the knowledge of the more perfect. For I remember to have read in a certain very brief Legend hitherto composed about her, that while the holy virgin still existed in the castle of Proceno, it happened once in winter time, in the winter month, that certain men of great penance, laudable reputation, and extraordinary sanctity, whose life was to dwell in solitudes and to devote themselves solely to the contemplation of their Creator, Receiving certain religious guests in winter passed through the said castle. When they had turned aside to the monastery, where Agnes presided, on account of her fame, for the sake of charity, the handmaid of God, recognizing by a certain spiritual instinct that they were servants of God almighty, receiving them with wondrous charity and veneration, after she had had holy and edifying conversations with them, compelled them to take food from the alms of her monastery; and she herself likewise sat with them at the table, that they might speak longer, as if about to take food.

[40] When the food had been brought, and before each, with a dish, individual bowls had been placed, a religious meal and conversation while the holy colloquy was taking place at the same time as the taking of food, suddenly, miraculously, a most beautiful rose, of wondrous odor and delightful color, was found in Agnes's bowl, all seeing and wondering. When those holy men beheld this and showed mutual signs of wonder, the holy Virgin, weighing these things, lest they should be imputed to her sanctity, as truly humble at once is said to have uttered this sentence: "Therefore God almighty and merciful, in cold time, a rose sent from heaven is honored willed by his benignity to send us a summer flower, beautiful and fragrant; because you by the fire of your charity have kindled our cold minds, and by the beauty of the holy teachings and the odor of virtuous examples have delightfully strengthened us." They, on the contrary, saying that not to them but to her the rose had been sent by the Lord, since it appeared that the Lord had granted this by her merits, there was a pious contention between them, from which in a wondrous way came the victory of both, and a concord fuller than before. So in this they unanimously agree, that to the wondrous God, as much as they could, thanks and praises are given. After this, those servants of the Lord, wishing to pursue their begun journey, after many holy conversations bidding farewell to the handmaid of God, edified by her wondrously, departed.

[41] At another time there was in the said castle of Proceno a certain castle-dweller, a friend of hers, for 30 years never rightly confessed familiar with the holy Virgin, and a benefactor of her monastery; who when he had often commended himself to her prayers, lest he perish, for whom such acceptable prayers were poured forth to the Lord, this vision of him was shown to her praying. For the handmaid of Christ saw in a certain empty place of hell, demons preparing horrible punishments, kindling fire, placing pots above, and gathering instruments for inflicting torments: which when she asked of the Lord, for whom such horrid punishments were being prepared, answer was given her that they were for that castle-dweller for whom she herself so often besought the Lord. At which reply she, wholly kindled with the fire of charity and compassion, inquired the cause of such a dire punishment, that she might, before he died, by sufficient correction free him from such great dangers. To her again it was replied, that therefore he was deserving such immense punishments, having seen the punishments prepared for him in hell because for thirty continuous years he had never been absolved from the bonds of sins by true confession. When she heard this and diligently noted it, after she had returned to herself, she at once called the said castle-dweller by a swift messenger. When he had come without delay and asked the cause of such haste, she with speech full of charity narrated to him the aforesaid vision, and leading him with sweet words to confession, having summoned a Priest, at once caused him purely and humbly to confess. After which confession, within a brief time the same man, seized by illness, was brought to the extremes. Whose soul the holy virgin, placed in her monastery, saw going out of the body, saved by her merits and by the power of confession from the eternal fires previously shown to her: admonished she frees him from danger which when she announced to the Sisters, they knowing of the illness but wholly ignorant of the death, after a little there came a messenger, who said that at that very hour at which the holy Virgin had said, he had wholly ended his life.

NOTES.

CHAPTER V.

On the mount of Montepulciano, in the place where there had been a public brothel, Agnes builds a monastery of the Order of Preachers, divinely stirred up and helped.

[42] I wish you to know, dearest Reader, that while the holy Virgin remained in the said castle of Proceno, Her kinsmen at Montepulciano having been visited and by her virtues showed herself pleasing to her Creator and wondrous and venerable to men, her reputation and fame began to spread around on every side, so much that to the castle of Montepulciano, which is twenty-two miles distant from the said Proceno, great and good rumor of her virtues came. Wherefore, the land-dwellers moved, and especially those bound to her by degree of kinship, going to her personally, strove with humble prayers to compel her, that she should arrange to return to the land of her origin and dwell there, thinking themselves to be enriched with great treasure, if they could have with them so venerable a handmaid of God. But she, who had a leaden foot from the gravity of virtue, unwilling to wander through different places, wholly denied what was asked. When they greatly insisted and drew her with diverse causes, at length they obtained from her that she should at least go to the said castle of Montepulciano for the sake of a visit, to bring joy for a time to her kinsfolk by her presence, and afterwards to return to her monastery.

[43] Since, to fulfill her promise, with a decent and honest company accompanying her, she had gone thither, by a vision of Saints Augustine, Francis, and Dominic and by the Lord's disposition had seen the dispositions of the place, she returned to her monastery with some appetite of condescending to the will of the said petitioners; especially because of the displeasure which, God willing, she had conceived concerning the public dishonesty which was committed on a certain hill placed near the gate of the said castle. After which return, wishing to dispose nothing which did not agree with the divine disposition, she began with diligent and fervent prayer to beseech divine clemency that what she ought to do, what was pleasing to his will, he would mercifully deign to show her by revelation. And because her prayer, as you can gather from the above, could not return empty, therefore God almighty, instructing his handmaid supernaturally, arranged to console her with such a vision. For it seemed to the handmaid of Christ that a certain sea was under her ^b feet, in which she saw three great and beautiful ships: in which she beheld three Patrons and pillars of the Church, namely Augustine, Dominic, and Francis. the last of whom was drawing her to himself When each of them wished to draw the holy virgin to his own ship, and especially Blessed Francis, alleging that the habit which she then wore almost wholly agreed with the habit of his Sisters, after a long contention, the glorious athlete Blessed Dominic said to the other two companions: "It will not be as you say: but she will stand in my ship, because God almighty has so disposed." And extending his hand, he drew her, and led her into his ship: and thus at once both the ships and the Patrons disappeared.

[44] Here however the vision was not finished: she is taught there a church must be founded by her but at once came a messenger of the Lord, who so instructed the holy Virgin: "Do you remember," he said, "when you were still a girl, in the first monastery where you first took the habit of religion, that you received miraculously three stones from the Lady, and that it was told you that you were to build, while still living, a church for her name?" She answered: "I both remember, and give thanks: because this monastery with her help I have built." To her at once by the one speaking it was replied: "This building is not the fulfillment of that promise: but you shall go to the castle of Montepulciano, whence you drew your origin; and there upon the hill, where now the public sinners dwell, and a monastery in the place of the brothel polluting it with their dishonesty, you shall build a church under the title of the perpetual Virgin Mary: where also you shall found a monastery of Virgins, whose collegium you shall gather for the service of God almighty; so that the place"

which the filthiness of lust, by the devil's working, has defiled, by the Lord's illumination and completion of your work, the holiness of chastity and virginal modesty may adorn.

[45] And because the odor of so good a work will be diffused through the neighboring places, under the rule of the Preachers therefore religious men dwelling in those places will greatly desire to have you and your monastery under their care; but because the Friars Preachers do not have a convent in those places, God of great mercy has arranged that you submit yourself and your college to their care, and assume their habit; so that by you, not only in the female sex but also in the male, his service may be augmented with multiplied servers. And this is what in the vision of the three ships and the three Patrons wishing to draw you, with the attraction of one alone, was shown you a little before: namely that under the habit of Blessed Dominic henceforth, with the Sisters of the aforesaid monastery, you should strive to serve God almighty, and according to the institutes of that Order to govern yourself and your monastery. Be strengthened therefore and act manfully; for the Lord will be with you in all your works." These things said, at once both the voice of the speaker and the vision disappeared; and the virgin, returning to herself, did not delay to give immense thanks to God almighty for so clear a vision, so complete information, and so generous a promise of help.

[46] Having been instructed by these so lofty and salutary admonitions, the handmaid of the Lord, and returning to Montepulciano, she exposes her purpose to her kinsmen as a body of spherical figure perfectly disposed to perfect motion, struck by the touch of divine inspiration, every delay laid aside, after she had committed her office to a certain discreet Sister to hold her place in the monastery, she herself together with Sister Catherine, bound to her by singular familiarity, swiftly came to the aforesaid castle of Montepulciano. Where, when she had expressed to her kinsmen and relatives her vow of founding a monastery, they, rejoicing that they would obtain the effect of their petition, began to ask among themselves about a fit and disposed place. Which the holy virgin weighing, thus addressed them: "You need not be solicitous, because now by God's teaching I have found: provided you will stretch out your helping hands to me. My intention is to found on the hill situated near the gate, where now public dishonesty is committed by sinful women, and to gather a college of religion and honesty, the foulness of sin having been expelled from there."

[47] They wondering at her praiseworthy and unusual purpose, the money having been supplied by them asked her what help she would have bestowed on her by them in such a business. To whom she replied: "I require your help in this, that if you have money, you lend it; if you do not have it, be willing to be my sureties with the lender; that I may be able to buy entirely all the appurtenances of that hill: and I firmly hope in the help of God almighty, that the money which you shall have lent, or for which you shall have pledged, in a short time without your expense you will have back." All the kinsmen therefore give their pledge to the Virgin; and with the suretyship given and money received, she buys the place in hope of future divine remuneration, the holy virgin put her hand to strong things: and the hill mentioned above having been entirely and juridically purchased, she expels the devil from its habitation and establishes the house of Christ: and thus night is turned into day, and darkness converted into light, and God, wonderful in his Saints, through his handmaid brings forth great good from great evil, by his unspeakable virtue and power. the prostitutes expelled she establishes nuns All the castle-dwellers and the land-dwellers of that place wondered, both because they saw a religious woman, having nothing, spending so great a quantity of money, namely one thousand two hundred pounds of Siena money; and also because they saw the most foul dishonesty so suddenly changed into such chastity; and to wonder they add praises to the Creator, and from so manly a beginning they begin to venerate the holy virgin.

[48] But she, as a robust warrior, after a strong beginning, pursues more strongly, she builds a church and the house of diabolical foulness being laid low, manfully undertakes the building of the house of God, imploring day and night by diligent and fervent prayers the promised help from the Lord. Her odor of sanctity is diffused, and is daily augmented among those hearing her admirable past and present deeds; and to the fragrance of her charity virgins run from all sides, vowing their virginity to God and humbly submitting themselves to perpetual obedience. But she, as wholly Catholic, unwilling to enter except through the door, went to the Diocesan ^d Bishop, and humbly asked, together with her Sisters, permission she takes up the rule of Saint Augustine to found a church under the title of the perpetual Virgin Mary, to profess the rule of Blessed Augustine, and under the same rule to found a monastery. Which permission, as she had asked, she obtained by divine nod fully and graciously ^e; as also the public ^f duplicated letters, which I have seen many times, manifest to this day. ^g Moreover, after some space of time, first from the same Bishop, then from a certain Cardinal Legate of the Apostolic See, that the divine disposition might be fulfilled, she obtained that the care of her monastery be committed fully and entirely to the Order of Preachers: and the Order of Blessed Dominic in testimony of which matter there exist sealed privileges ^h. That the supreme Pastor through his Vicars might clearly show that Agnes's work was accepted in the sight of his Majesty. ⁱ

[49] Not only through his Vicars, but also through faithful secular persons, did the Lord will to show that Agnes's work was pleasing to him. For, 100 pounds are assigned to this work as I have learned from the narration of a certain most faithful man of the same castle of Montepulciano, before the holy Virgin returned to it, it happened that a certain man of Montepulciano, the end of his life approaching, was about to depart from the body. Before he died he made his testament, and among other things bequeathed to a certain married daughter one hundred Cortona pounds, which for the remedy of his sins he wished her to expend on that work which should be more acceptable to God almighty. After whose death, when the faithful daughter was solicitously seeking to fulfill her father's will, and did not know what work was more acceptable in the sight of God, going humbly to the servants and handmaids of God, she more humbly prayed that they would pray for her, that the Lord would deign to show her how she might expend the said money for the salvation of her father's soul. by testament commanded to be expended where it would be more pleasing to God When among others she had asked a certain poor and sick woman, who in great humility and patience served the Lord; and that she might more bind her, out of her temporal goods had come to her aid in her needs; that one, mindful of her benefactress's prayers, and desiring to satisfy her petition, according to her power gathered her spirit to beseech God, that he would show her dispenser what she wished.

[50] While she was praying, she was brought into ecstasy, and saw on the hill situated near the gate, because of a vision about that place given to the pious woman where the holy Virgin was to build a church and gather a college of Virgins, from the place where now the Sisters are gathered at the canonical hours to produce divine praises, a certain ladder rising up to heaven, which with its summit touched heaven; and Angels ascending and descending by it. When she faithfully related this to the said daughter of the deceased father, she, not able to understand the vision (especially because then public sinners resided there; and in the place whence the ladder was seen to rise, a certain diabolical little old woman, mother of every nefarious crime, gatherer of impudicity, dwelt in her iniquities), again asked the aforesaid poor handmaid of Christ since prostitutes still dwelt there that she would beseech the Lord to show more clearly what he wished. But when she was praying, and the Lord again repeated the same vision ^k, and the said legatee did not understand this; it happened after a brief interval of time that the virgin Agnes came from the castle of Proceno, bought the said hill, expelled the devil with his foulnesses, and began the house of holiness. When that woman beheld this, and saw the vision of that poor woman graciously and wondrously declared, she at once offered the money to the virgin Agnes, saying: "I give thanks to the omnipotent Lord, who has mercifully sent you hither to receive this alms, and to free my father's soul." And when she had related all the above in order, both began to magnify the Most High, and to behold more clearly how much the begun work was pleasing to God.

NOTES.

CHAPTER VI.

Agnes restores sight to a blind woman: she incurs a grave illness; she goes to a bath, and by her virtue and miracles illustrates it.

[51] After the Virgin of Christ saw that she had founded the house of the Lord on the mountains, The number of Sisters having been increased she began daily to act more robustly; and as a true plant which the heavenly Father had planted, to put forth more abundant fruits: wherefore her monastery began to be augmented in number and in merit. Of which augmentation, because with God giving the increase, today the effect better demonstrates than words, for the present I pass over in silence: for I have resolved not to write now the Legend of her Sisters, but of her. Intending therefore to recite her wondrous deeds, I should wish to admonish you, dearest reader, that you have read many wondrous deeds of this holy Virgin which occurred after she founded the second monastery, for continuation of subject in the preceding part, as was foretold you there.

[52] To recite other things which are not written there, I wish you to know that, the number of Sisters being augmented, when one of them was deprived of sight it happened that a certain one of them, named Mita, was grieved by a certain illness of the head, so much that with her sight-power weakened, after some time she wholly lost her sight. Seeing which, those who were her fleshly kin began to inquire if any remedy could be applied to her blindness: and while they inquire, they find through certain (as I think) fabulous reports, that in a certain nearby castle there were nobles of the progeny of a certain Saint, who had the power of giving light to the blind. When they were arranging to lead the said Sister Mita to them, and were pressing the holy virgin with importunate prayers, her kinsfolk wished to bring her out for the sake of a remedy that she would permit her to leave the cloister to go to the said nobles, the handmaid of Christ, addressing them with sweet words, prudently obtained from them a delay of time: within which time she besought the Lord with tearful prayers that he would not permit the Sister to wander.

[53] she herself restores to her the health of her eyes This done, firmly knowing that her Spouse would deny her nothing, and knowing through the spirit that God wished to elicit good from that evil, she had the said virgin Mita summoned; to whom after some words she said: "Mita daughter, if the most clement Lord of his accustomed mercy grants you the grace of the recovery of sight, are you willing, for the times you shall live, to fulfill what I shall enjoin on you?" To which she said: "Lady, Mother, whatever your holiness shall command me, with the help of the Savior, I will strive to fulfill with all my powers." Which said, the holy Mother added: "I wish, my beloved daughter, as long as you shall live, never with these eyes to weep any temporal loss, or over any temporal damage, on the condition that she not weep over temporal damages with them for the love of your most noble Spouse." When she, assenting, promised, the handmaid of God almighty with her immaculate hands made the sign of the holy Cross over her eyes, and immediately restored her to former health: and so, her wandering avoided, and weeping over temporal damages checked, the merciful God adorned his Saint with so great a miracle, that to all, both Sisters and seculars, the truest and clearest knowledge of her virtue and sanctity was given; and to all the faithful thereafter, from her aid, the firmest confidence followed.

[54] Though God almighty had tested his handmaid, as true gold, in the furnace of some tribulation at the castle of Proceno, yet because he wished his bride to ascend from virtue to virtue, that he might make her attain a higher degree of perfection, he arranged to examine her by the fire of harsher and more prolonged bodily languor: so that it might clearly appear that no iniquity was found in her. Which languor, that she might be more prepared to bear, he first showed through his Angel by such a vision. Nine times ordered in vision to drink the cup of Christ For it seemed to the handmaid of Christ, on a certain Sunday in deep dawn, while after her prayer she had somewhat fallen asleep, that an Angel of the Lord stood by her, and led her by pedagogic hand from her little cell up to a certain olive tree, and there offered her a cup with these words: "Drink, bride of Christ, this cup, which the Lord Jesus Christ also drank for you." While, for love of her Spouse, she willingly and eagerly drank, before she could return the exhausted cup, the vision disappeared; and the handmaid of the Lord, returning to herself, found herself in her cell as before. And when she more attentively and often thought what that vision meant, on the following Sunday at the same hour, the same thing happened to her as on the first; and again on the following: to be brief, for nine continuous Sundays, at the same hour, the same vision appeared to the virgin Agnes by the Lord's revelation: at last she is seized with a grave infirmity and not long after followed a grave and long-lasting infirmity, which never departed from her, except when, her pilgrimage finished, she gloriously and triumphantly went to her Spouse.

[55] The storm of bodily trouble therefore rushing on, the holy Virgin, who had built her house upon the rock, in nothing changed, in no way abandoning or neglecting the begun work, led all to wonder by her great constancy. She was, though weak in body, solicitous in mind, laborious in spirit, and about all, with charity working, very fruitful; which most patiently bearing she fulfills her office entirely so that Agnes seemed to be one person who suffered the most grievous and almost unheard-of infirmity, and another who performed acts of charity toward her daughters and all who came to her. And truly so it was: for the spirit was working, and the flesh was suffering. But because, useful to many, she was loved affectionately by many, a great love began to press the holy virgin very diligently, that she should seek some bodily remedy for her infirmity. When she, as a true bride conscious of her Spouse's will, wholly resisted; yet they nonetheless entirely insisted, lest in the sight of those asking pride should appear to arise (since it was happening by divine revelation); with humble voice, placid countenance, and moderate speech, She permits herself to be led to a bath for the sake of a cure she gave them her assent, and wholly submitted herself to the will of another. This done, by the diligent aforesaid remedies were sought from all sides, that Agnes's infirmity might be perfectly cured: and while they inquired, there was one who said that a certain bath very useful for that infirmity was near the gate at three miles' distance, near a certain castle called Clanciano: to which if the holy Virgin could be led, in a brief time she would be restored to former health. Hearing which, the holy Mother's daughters began to urge her, that without delay she should arrange to go thither.

[56] The necessities having been prepared, the handmaid of God almighty went to the aforesaid bath, together with brother Meus, the Rector of her monastery, a man of much religion, and also accompanied by honest ladies, her daughters' prayer impelling her. Nor did the merciful God permit the journey of his handmaid to pass unfruitfully, but through her in the bath, which he knew she did not need, he wondrously wrought the healing of many. For divine goodness did this, that, with the order of nature changed, so that after the touch of the holy body that which profited only bodily infirmities, through the virgin Agnes, not needing a bath, should become, wondrous things being seen, also salutary to souls. For when the pure Virgin first entered the said bath in the evening, about to wash her most pure body, the bath did not wash her, but she adorned the bath with a divine miracle. For at once after her entry, the bath began gradually to be filled with manna from heaven, so much that through the whole night, the manna gushing forth divinely, on the following morning by those entering the whole bath was found covered with it. These entering, while they were vehemently wondering it is covered with heavenly manna whence snow in summer time had entered the bath, especially with the surrounding parts dry, examining more subtly from wonder, they found that what they thought was snow was heavenly manna, whose grains all figured in the manner of a Cross, clearly showed that it was the effect of no natural cause.

[57] Those wondering at it therefore, and inquiring whence so great a miracle could proceed, there was one who said that a certain religious woman of the castle of Montepulciano had come the preceding day: and it is increased by a new welling of water at whose entry that manna began to appear flowering, and so through the whole night had miraculously grown. At which voice, when the bystanders could not cease wondering, all began to collect this manna through the whole bath, that they might show the sign of so great a miracle to those absent: and while they gathered it, they found that in the place where the virgin Agnes had bathed, the underground water, by which the bath itself by certain channels welling is filled, had caused a certain welling newly and miraculously, through which it supplied water more abundantly and copiously than usual to those wishing to bathe: which water up to the present, on account of the greatness of the miracle, is called by all the bath of Saint Agnes.

[58] When therefore it was learned that the handmaid of Christ, through whom the manna had descended, had there bathed herself, faith having been conceived from the preceding miracle, which is called the Bath of Saint Agnes they began to bathe many sick in that water: and at once they were restored to former health. Wherefore also those carrying some of the same water to absent sick obtained a similar effect. Whence, these miracles seen, they began so to revere that welling, that, as has been said, to this day it is publicly called the bath of Saint Agnes. ^c Nor were praises omitted to the Creator at that time, but were rendered by all who heard or saw; and the opinion of Agnes grew in the minds of all men with wondrous veneration. In the same bath she did other wondrous things, which because I ought not to omit, I am therefore compelled to write. Before the signs or miracles however I set forth one more distinguished indication of her patience, according to Blessed Gregory, who thinks the virtue of patience greater than signs and miracles.

[59] and from her coming out some had derided her When the holy Virgin, wearing the monastic habit, on one occasion entered the said bath, certain unruly and vain-speaking youths, standing before the entrance of the said bath, and by scurrilous words provoking themselves to empty laughter, beholding the handmaid of God coming out of the bath clothed in religious habit, began to cry after her with certain derisory words, and calling her "nun" in their vernacular, with cachinnation and ignominy to reproach her. Whose words and acts, when they had moved the bystanders, and especially Brother Meus and a certain Oblate ^d of the monastery, out of zeal of justice to anger, the holy Virgin, in nothing changed, restraining her zealots, returning with all mildness to the place where she was lodging, at once ordered a few chickens which she had brought from the monastery on account of her infirmity to be killed, and when killed, to be cooked, and when cooked, to those who had mocked her

to be borne with all charity. she orders the chickens prepared for herself to be given to them When Brother Meus, indignant, tried to prevent this, she, chiding him altogether with sweet words, affirming that according to the Savior's sentence one must do good to those who do evil, sent the gift, as she had arranged, to the said mockers, and on behalf of the Sister who had been mocked had it presented to them gratefully and liberally. Wherefore those mockers, overcome by the holy Virgin's liberality and inwardly compunct, and kindly receives those asking pardon at once came to the handmaid of the Lord, humbly prostrated themselves on bended knees at her feet, and with their belts around their necks asked pardon for their committed fault, promising not to loose their tongue to such things any more. She, receiving them with the most kindly charity with which she was full, and raising them swiftly from the ground, said that she was greatly obliged to them, because they had provided her with material for spiritual gain and an exercise of patience.

NOTES.

CHAPTER VII.

Various miracles performed at Agnes's prayers; her prophetic spirit.

[60] The sign of spiritual virtue having been related, let our discourse pass to the virtues Wine lacking wrought by the virgin Agnes in bodies. Wherefore I wish you to know, dearest reader, that a certain lady of Montepulciano, a Sister of the penance of Blessed Dominic, is still alive, a woman of very honest life and truthful testimony; who faithfully related to me certain wondrous deeds wrought by the holy Virgin in the said bath before her own eyes, which I do not wish to pass over in silence. For she reports that she, then tender in age and small in body, together with her mother, had labored in the service of the aforesaid Virgin at the bath often mentioned for the space of several days: within which time, while they were at table taking food with the handmaid of the Lord, she orders water to be brought it happened that wine was lacking on the table, and there was no place nearby where wine could be found. When the virgin Agnes saw this, moved with compassion for her companions, she ordered the said relator of mine to bring water from a nearby fountain. When she had fulfilled the command, on her return she handed the vessel full of water to the holy Virgin: which she, receiving with maturity and raising her eyes to heaven, and praying a little within herself, made the sign of the holy Cross over the vessel, and soon graciously handed it to those sitting to drink.

[61] which between her hands is converted into excellent wine When they, thinking it water, had poured it into glass vessels, tasting the color of wine and at the same time the flavor in the wine, and finding the incredible and unusual savor of the wine, they began to ask among themselves whence they had found such good wine. But finding from the aforesaid girl, my relator, now gray-haired, that the water which she had brought, between the hands of the virgin Agnes, through the sign of the Cross made, had been wondrously converted into that wine, stupefied beyond what can be said, they began to render immense praises to God almighty; and called all who had come to the said bath, that all might taste the wine made from water, and praise the power of the Creator and the sanctity of Agnes. Which the handmaid of Christ wholly impeding, she restrained her praisers as far as she could, lest the miracle be defamed. But though she, forbidding, did not accomplish all she wished, yet more than she wished, compelled by the miracle, they were forced to do. Wherefore the fame of the miracle came to all: and so the virgin Agnes, as imitator of the Savior's first miracle and his true disciple, is commended by all.

[62] The already mentioned relator told me that at that time on a certain day, while the virgin Agnes, together with her mother and certain others, was sitting at the table at the hour of refection, grievously wounded in the knees by a knife the relator herself, then a girl, wishing to cut bread, placed it, after the manner of children, upon her knees, and seizing a little knife, as, cutting, she pressed, not only the bread and the garments touching the knee, but also the flesh and nerve of her knee being cut through, her bones were exposed by an excessive cut: which when, from fear of blows, she wished to hide, the excessive effusion of blood and the pallor of her face showed the bystanders what the girl wanted to conceal. And when her mother, the knee uncovered, from the enormity of her daughter's wound weeping and wailing sought opportune remedies, the holy Virgin at once taking the girl by the hand said to the bystanders: "Let her come with me; and with the help of God almighty, I will bring her back to you whole."

[63] Which said, she led her to the said bath, and in the water which, by her merits, a few days before had miraculously appeared, washing in her bath she heals she bathed her. When the bystanders forbade this, saying that any water was harmful to wounds, the handmaid of the Lord, who knew she worked above nature by divine power, not caring for the forbidding words, washed the said girl at her good pleasure; and at last bringing her out thence, restored her whole to her mother, saying: "See whether your daughter has been made whole, and give thanks to God almighty." She indeed, beholding her daughter's wound perfectly cured and even closed, and seeing no other sign of the wound save a small scar as a sign of the miracle, breaking forth into voices of praise, drew all the bystanders with her cries to behold the spectacle of the miracles. Wherefore each stupefied at the girl's so sudden healing, since the water rather should have hurt her, they give praises with one voice to God almighty, who through his handmaid wrought wondrous things so frequently: and the opinion of Agnes grew daily more in the minds of men.

[64] Yet one thing I am compelled to insert a boy drowned in the same bath which will provide more evident testimony to the above wonders of her sanctity. For while the holy Virgin was staying at the said bath, it happened that a certain boy incautiously entered the water of the bath, and by his smallness was overcome by the waters of the bath, and so with no one helping, in the waters he was submerged, and wholly suffocated. Which when it had been announced to his mother, distant by some space, running hastily to the bath, and finding her son drowned, she drew all the neighbors with her weeping and wailing. When the body of the extinct son was drawn out of the water, she began still more to tear herself wholly, and to utter plaintive and painful voices. At which voices the holy Virgin, she restores to life who with other ladies had gathered to condole with the mother, moved with great piety, and from excessive compassion unable to bear so great anguish of a bereaved mother, before all, taking the little body of the boy in her arms, took herself to another place, where there was not such a multitude. There therefore with bent knees she gave herself to prayer, that she might return the son to his grieving mother. A wondrous thing, and in our times most stupendous! For when the virgin Agnes put an end to her prayer, and signed the little body devoutly with the sign of the Cross, at once, as though waking from sleep, the boy arose, and showed all the signs of life. Whom the holy Virgin, raising with her own hand, restored whole and living to the weeping mother. When she beheld this, and stupefied for joy wondered, with the great wonder of all after a little returning to herself, she began to turn her lamenting voices into joyful cries, and to call the bystanders to the sight of her joy. All are stupefied, and are filled with wonder beyond what can be said, when they behold alive and safe in so brief an interval of time the boy (whom a little before they had beheld wholly dead and lifeless). Wherefore with loud voice they universally render immense thanks to the wondrous God, and extol his handmaid with many praises among themselves, and with many words proclaim her sanctity to those absent: and so it came to pass that one and the same raising of the boy brought thanksgivings to God almighty, indescribable consolation to the mother, wondrous devotion to the bystanders, laudable edification to those absent, and great commendation to the virgin Agnes.

[65] Although the things narrated in the preceding paragraphs were done toward the end of the holy Virgin Agnes, because, however, we seek not so much the order as the truth of her life, I add one thing on this which happened before she went to the said bath. For when the handmaid of the Lord had founded the second monastery with the arm of the Lord, The little cross received from the neck of the child Jesus and had gathered about eighteen Virgins for the Lord, and had arranged in mind there to await the end of her mortal life, she ordered the Sisters of the first monastery to elect for themselves a Prelate from among themselves, ^b because they could not have her any more; and asked that they should not delay to send her that cross which she had received from the Lord as a great gift, which was preserved among them among the Relics. When they altogether refused to do this, alleging that since they were deprived of the consolation of so great a Mother, it was fitting they should wholly have something of her wonders, that at least from the memory of her sanctity they might receive consolation, she again and again ordered, saying: "Unless you send me what I ask, I will do so that it will be taken from you against your will." And when those Sisters, while the Proceno women refused to give it back could not be bent by threats or prayers to sending the said cross, the holy Virgin wholly gave herself to praying to the Lord, that the gift once given her by him, but taken by those Sisters, he would mercifully by his omnipotence deign to restore to her.

[66] she, having poured out prayers, receives it through an Angel Whose humble prayer so overcame the Invincible (to speak in Bernard's manner) and bound the Omnipotent, that at once an Angel of the Lord, taking the said cross from the place where it was placed, wonderfully brought it to the virgin Agnes, still praying, and imperceptibly placed it within her hands. When she saw it, giving immense thanks to the Giver of all gifts, she placed the cross itself secretly and reverently in the place arranged for it. These things done, she again sent a messenger to the said Sisters to ask if they had that holy cross, so often denied. When they had done so and found it nowhere, and stupefied wondered who could have taken it from a place so secret and secured with locks without their knowledge, the messenger, informed by the holy Virgin, added: "Sister Agnes says this: I asked you for the gift given me divinely again and again, and you wholly refused: I asked my Lord only once, and by his kindness

at once he restored to me what he had given before, and what I was now asking for. Learn therefore never to contradict the will of the Lord." Hearing these things they, at once repenting of their pertinacity and magnifying the Lord, sent word back to the holy Mother through the same messenger, that since her prayers obtained from the Lord whatever she wished, she should not forget to pour forth those prayers for their salvation to the Lord; adding that they firmly and without doubt hoped they would be saved by the Lord's mercy, if such acceptable prayers were poured for them to Christ. And so the handmaid of Christ by her prayers also obtained what she wanted, and modestly correcting her daughters, confirmed also their minds in divine trust.

[67] Though many other miracles were wrought by the Lord through the virgin Agnes, after the foundation of the second monastery, she frees many possessed yet the rest being omitted, I shall relate, God granting, some in summary in the present paragraph, so that at length passing to her death, we may put an end to this part. For my aforesaid relators tell me that this holy Virgin had from God wondrous power over unclean spirits. For many demoniacs while she was still alive were led to her: among whom were some who for many years bound by demons could scarcely be held: for all of whom the handmaid of God, commanding the demons, obtained full health by her merits. On a certain occasion a certain one among the rest was led to her monastery: who, scarcely bound, coming with a multitude of men, tore with nails and teeth everyone who approached. exercising absolute command over demons When, placed within the monastery, before the virgin Agnes descended to him, he had broken all his bonds in unspeakable insanity, running through the cloister, finding by chance a certain small girl and furiously seizing her, he was hastening towards a certain well placed there, that he might cast her into the depth of the waters to be suffocated. But before the holy Virgin, descending, could meet him in his extreme haste, she restrained him with such speech, saying: "On behalf of God almighty I command you, most savage demon, that at once you set down this girl without injury." Which said, immediately the unclean spirit so obeyed Agnes's precept, as though he could exercise the power conceded him only according to Agnes's will. At once the holy Virgin, approaching him, and impressing the sign of the Cross on his forehead, and devoutly reciting the Catholic faith through that canticle "Whosoever will," etc., expelled that raging demon from the man by divine power, and restored him whole to his conductors.

[68] They also recite that very often, after the Sisters began to sleep, against these she fortifies her daughters the handmaid of Christ, placed in her cell, watching in prayer, felt a demon entering the dormitory to molest the sacred virgins. She at once rousing all of them and calling them to her cell, admonished all that they should humbly seek pardon by accusing themselves for things committed or omitted, in the manner in which Religious men or women are wont to accuse themselves in chapters before their Prelates; lest the ancient enemy, who had entered the dormitory, could have any power over them. When they had done this humbly and devoutly, sending them back purified to their beds, "Go," she said, "daughters, sleep with secure mind; because our protector God almighty, who will guard us, will not slumber nor sleep."

[69] she perceives their thoughts They also report that this Virgin had the spirit of prophecy, even concerning the hidden thoughts of hearts, which cannot be had except by divine virtue and grace. For they say that they and their other companions were often rebuked by her for certain girlish thoughts, which she recounted to them in order as if she herself had thought them, not they: whence it came to pass that all her daughters, not only in acting and speaking, but also in thinking what was not good, utterly took care, out of fear of the spiritual Mother, whom they saw to be present in all. She also foretold many future things to various persons, which came to pass directly as she had predicted: among which I narrate one, of which, if they were alive, there would be as many witnesses as there were Sisters then in her monastery: among whom were these four relators of mine, who still survive. For it happened in that time, when the holy Virgin still was living in the body, she foretells future things that in the aforesaid castle of Montepulciano a great dissension arose among the land-dwellers, and especially among certain nobles: from which dissension, when it threatened the destruction of the whole land, certain timorous men, zealots of the commonwealth, went to the handmaid of God, earnestly entreating her that she should not cease to pour out prayers to the Lord for the safety of their land. Which she not neglecting, gathered all her daughters solicitously, and together with them before a certain image of the Blessed Virgin, began more fervently to beseech for the impending danger of the land.

[70] While the Sisters were praying humbly and devoutly, the Queen of Virgins, wishing to show her Virgins and namely civil dissensions in Tuscany how much she labored, so to say, in bearing with the crimes of that people, suddenly the face of the said Virgin in the image began to turn pale, to multiply wrinkles, to send out drops of sweat, and as though laboring in bearing a heavy weight, to draw breath frequently. When the Sisters saw this, and were observing what their holy Mother was doing, the Virgin devoted to God, turning to her Sisters with tears and lamentation, said: "Pray, Sisters, and beseech as frequently and as fervently as you can, because I clearly see many tribulations about to come upon this land. foreshadowed by the miraculous sweat of the Marian image For the Lord, because of their sins, will permit dissensions to arise among the land-dwellers, and especially among magnates and rulers: from which will come scandals and no small wars, so that not only will this castle in some way be desolated, but all Tuscany from this beginning will be troubled. But because most clement is our God and our merciful Lord, let us pray daily and not cease: because he is able to give fair weather after clouds and to turn all our evils into good." After which words so punctually the things she had foretold followed to the letter, that there is no need to confirm with any testimony those things which all Tuscany was forced to know by the pressing wars, the said dissensions having arisen. ^c Many indeed and other signs Jesus did through the virgin Agnes his bride while she was still living, which are not written in this book: but these are written that you may believe, and by believing may implore her help before the Lord.

NOTES.

CHAPTER VIII.

Agnes's last illness, and the signs that accompanied her death itself, of the glory she attained.

[71] With the illness growing heavier After the course of this corruptible life had been consummated by this bright star, after a wondrous rising, praiseworthy ascent, and commendable progress, the Lord of all her Spouse arranged, a pledge having been made here through the golden ring of charity and patience, to perfect with his bride the matrimonial nuptials in the palace of heaven: the Just Lord and Judge judging it just and fitting that after such labor rest, after so many holy works reward, after so many battles peace and victory, after so many virtues honor and glory should follow. For when from the said bath, after some time, she had returned to the monastery, she began to be grieved daily more in bodily infirmity; and falling into bed heavier than usual, to show evident signs of approaching bodily sickness. she comforts her own When her spiritual daughters saw this, wounded alike with grief and fear, they all surround the bed of the pious reclining Mother, and bewail their loss with plaintive voices and sobbing weeping. When she modestly rebuked them, saying that if they loved her, they ought rather to rejoice, because she was entering the glory of her Spouse; and they answering that they indeed rejoiced with her, but for themselves grieved over the loss of such a useful Mother, she answered: "Let no fear or grief disturb you over my departure: and she promises fuller help after her death for if until now by the gift of God I have been useful to you in temporal and spiritual things, trusting in a still greater gift, I boldly and faithfully promise you, on behalf of God almighty, that I will show myself more useful to you hereafter, and will endow you with a more generous gift: so that you may know that I have not left you, but rather taken you up more closely."

[72] O wondrous and sweet promise, through which, imitating her Father Blessed Dominic, and faithfully consoling her daughters, she showed how much she could with God. But O faithful fulfillment of the promise! by which her monastery at present is seen, compared with what it was when these things were said, so augmented, strengthened, and established in religion, and freed from great dangers, and so wondrously sustained in the necessities of temporal things, that it cannot be denied that in these Agnes works supernaturally, and consoles her daughters more than when she was alive. she piously dies on April 20, 1317 After these words her bodily strength began suddenly to fail her, and to hasten to the near exit. And thus after humble and devout prayer, and faithful commendation of her spirit, with the Sisters placed around and praying, in the year of the Lord 1317, Indiction 15, on the 20th day of the month of April, in the middle of the night preceding the fourth feria, as joyfully as innocently she had lived here, that holy soul was loosed from the flesh. ^a Whose exit certain wondrous things accompanied, which I by no means judge ought to be passed over.

[73] For at once when the Saint departed from this mortal body, little children in their cradles, crying out, make it known little children, who were in beds with their parents, suddenly divinely awakened, began with mouth of milk and infantine to complete the praise of the holy Virgin, saying thus to their parents: "Sister Agnes, Prioress of the monastery of Saint Maria Novella, who is a Saint, has now migrated from the body." At which words all wondered, hearing such things from the said children, who, different ones through different houses, often repeated the aforesaid words; nor at that time, on account of the incompetent hour, could they be certified that what they said was true. At length when the Sisters made her death known, they found with certainty that at the same hour the holy Virgin had departed from the body at which the said infants had with prophetic mouth uttered those words: and it came to pass that the pure and holy going out of the pure Virgin, through the pure truth uttered from the mouths of children, was made manifest to the ignorant; so that purity might deservedly commend purity, and childish innocence first proclaim sacred virginity.

[74] By another testimony of purity her sanctity was at that time shown, which ought not to be kept in silence.

The Virgins collect wax for the burial For after it began to be made known among the land-dwellers that the holy Prioress Agnes had died, virgin girls, who were not yet of marriageable age, hearing this, suddenly, with none but God calling them, gathering together, collected money among themselves, with which candles could be bought for carrying out the obsequies of the virgin Agnes; nor did they wish to accept the contribution of any corrupted woman, but, at the instigation of the Spirit of God, only by the virginal gift of uncorrupted girls was wax bought for burying the body of the Virgin. ^b Yet, as will appear below, her body needed no burial: but that wax, for her honor and glory, was consumed by the burning fire. I think, however, because the holy Virgin foresaw that wax and candles were to be brought to her by the land-dwellers, as is done even now, therefore she wished that the wax first offered to her be virginal, for continence and testimony of most excellent purity.

[75] Yet another miracle I relate, which after her death first began to show her sanctity. She shows herself to be seen by a sick woman There was in the castle of Montepulciano at that time a certain woman, who had sustained for much time a certain infirmity in her arm, so troublesome and grave that she had wholly lost the use of that arm. At the hour of the holy Virgin's passing, placed in her bed, and unable to sleep for pain, she saw suddenly the virgin Agnes coming to her, like morning stars, glowing with wondrous light, accompanied by many Angelic spirits, and thus addressing her: "Do you know me?" Who, considering her figure, said: "It seems that you are like Sister Agnes, Prioress of the Monastery of Saint Maria Novella"; she answered: "I am, and now at this hour, leaving my earthly habitation, I ascend to the heavenly home with the glory which you behold. But you, after day has dawned, shall go to my monastery, and there having touched my Relics you shall receive full health of your arm"; and these things said she disappeared. When therefore the day came, and orders her to go to her body for health the said woman, rising from bed, came solicitously to Agnes's monastery, and knocked at the wheel; and when the Sisters were called, for the love of God almighty she humbly asked that, admitting her within the monastery, they would grant her to touch the holy body of the virgin Agnes, that she might receive the health of her arm.

[76] But they (because they had so arranged to conceal her death until the arrival of the Brothers whom they were expecting from Orvieto, lest such a treasure should be taken from them) answering the woman said: "May God almighty pardon you, dearest sister, what is this you say? For our Prioress, though she lies grievously in bed, has not yet migrated from the body." ^c To whom she, conscious of the clear vision, without hesitation responded: "Why do you wish to hide from me, my Sisters, and when admitted there she immediately recovers what the holy Virgin herself openly showed me? For the holy Virgin appeared to me openly about midnight, like a most brilliant star, and said that at that same hour she had left this life; and she ordered me that coming hither, I should touch her sacred relics, and so I was to receive the health of this arm wholly." Then the Sisters, hearing these things, unwilling to go against the divine nod, led her in, and brought her to the body of the holy Virgin, and all gathered alike to see the miracle. An astonishing thing, and especially not seen in our days! For as soon as she drew near the sacred body, at the touch of the holy Relics, in that very instant, she recovered whole and perfect health: and at once bursting into praises of the Savior, though at the prayers of the Sisters she restrained herself until the arrival of the Brothers, yet when they had arrived she proclaimed the miracle with loud and open voice.

[77] To a certain matron dwelling in the same castle, likewise admonished, another joined to her in life by familiarity, who had several sons afflicted with various infirmities, appearing in vision, she thus addressed her: "Do you know me, so-and-so?"—calling her by her own name. When she said no, she answered: "I am Sister Agnes, once bound to you by the bond of friendships, and I have appeared to you that you may receive consolation from my glory and the health of your sons. Go therefore as quickly as possible to my monastery, and take with you your sick sons; and when there you shall have shown reverence to God almighty and to my Relics, for reverence and honor of him, she brings her sick sons and leads them back whole with them, know that they are all continually to be freed from all languor." The words being ended, the vision ended: the matron waking, faithfully believing without doubt the vision of the Saint, the same day faithfully obeyed the command of the virgin Agnes, and merited to have the perfect fulfillment of the faithful promise. Whence together with her sick sons she visited the sacred Relics with due reverence and devout prayer; and at once all languor left all her children, by the power of the sacred Relics.

NOTES.

CHAPTER IX.

Miracles performed at the invocation of the deceased Agnes.

[78] After the happy passing of this kind Virgin, the daughters standing around the bereaved Mother's bed and bewailing their losses, From the Saint's rosary heavenly odor is perceived one of them, from devout recollection of the Mother, inserted on the thread her "Pater noster" (rosary bead), so to say, taking it into her hands and devoutly ^a kissing it, suddenly felt such odor that at once mourning and grief were turned into wonder and joy. And when she held out the Pater noster to her other Sisters, that they might see if they felt the same odor, all perceived the same fragrance. While they still wondered and spoke, such an odor suddenly filled the cell where the sacred body lay, that you would have thought not a dead body but a vessel of all aromatics placed there. likewise from her body and linens Nor only from the virginal body did that odor come, but from all things which in life or in death had touched the body. For the cloths on which she had spat, while she was still sick, gave off such an odor, that they seemed not defiled by spittles, but to have lain among kinds of aromatics.

[79] Nor is it wondrous: because a soul had inhabited the body so full of the good odor of Christ's virtues, that in the odor of its unguents it had drawn a multitude of young women while she lived: among which young women were those virgin Sisters who then felt that wondrous and delightful odor. Which Sisters, hence many flow to kiss her feet from that delight having conceived fervor, breaking out into great voices and praising cries, roused very many castle-dwellers with their rumors. Some of whom, hearing the miracle, honestly entering the monastery, and humbly bending their knees before the sacred body, while they reverently kissed her feet, sensibly perceived the wondrous sweetness ^b. Doubled praises therefore are given to the most high Lord, and the surrounding peoples run from every side to such a wonderful beginning of miracles; nor can a lamp be hidden under a bushel; but as in life she had drawn the faithful by spiritual light, so also after death she attracted them by bodily odor.

[80] All therefore being stupefied at such a sign, God almighty began to complete the miraculous beginning with a wondrous continuation. For that all might know that the virgin Agnes was able to grant health to all languishing who came to her Relics, in diverse places the Virgin herself appeared with clear visions to diverse sick persons, while messengers are sent for balsam to preserve the body admonishing that they should visit her sacred Relics, so that they might be freed from their languors: among whom were two women, of whom it was said above. Since therefore the Most High was working these and other wonders through his bride, the land-dwellers thought to keep her sacred Relics unburied, that they might be shown to the devotion of the faithful and in testimony of her sanctity. But doubting lest her body, after the manner of other bodies, should rot from corruption, they sent messengers as far as the city of Genoa, to inquire diligently if they could find balsam at whatever price, that the sacred body of the virgin Agnes, thus preserved with balsam, might be kept longer without corruption. But God almighty, who is wondrous in his Saints, and in his wondrous deeds needs no creature, by one and the same wondrous sign, at one and the same time, showed that Agnes's relics did not need balsam for incorruption, and that from themselves, without exchange of gold, they were able to give, not merely balsam, but a yet more precious liquor, to those seeking balsam. For at once after the sending of the said messengers, the body of the holy Virgin began to sweat around the extremities of her hands and feet, it of itself exudes a salutary liquor and to emit frequent drops of precious liquor, filling the cloths placed under it with that liquor; so that it was clearly given to understand that her body did not need balsam, which from itself produced a liquor more precious than balsam. Which the Sisters weighing, place vessels beneath, call the Brothers, show the miracle; and the land-dwellers gathering at the grate, all behold the wonders of Agnes without ambiguity. To these run the surrounding peoples; young men and virgins, married and unmarried, old and little ones, rush in crowds to see so astonishing a miracle. Sick men and women run, and devoutly ask to be anointed with the sacred liquor: and as many as are anointed, at once without delay are freed.

[81] This fame therefore goes forth into all Tuscany, and they began, the sick run from every side, and partly on the way from far and remote parts, to gather to Agnes's church; and all brought back the benefits of perfect health. Among which sick, who (as I think) had greater faith in her sanctity, as soon as they reached a certain bridge near the church, before they entered the church, they felt complete deliverance from their languors: some are healed in the church but some who (as I think) had less faith, and were carried in a vehicle, entering the church, soon received full health: and some, staying in their own homes, a vow being made to visit Agnes's Relics, are freed from grave diseases. For all which you would have seen these, from the bridge towards the church, with cries and exultations coming; and those within the church uttering high-sounding voices; others faithfully reporting to Notaries and witnesses under oath the graces received in their own lands, some even at their own home receive the desired graces and you would have heard all magnificently praising the omnipotent Lord in the virgin Agnes. Moreover, to the clearer showing of the miracles, in all the cures of bones and nerves there was a wondrous sound and open rumor heard in Agnes's church; so that it could not be denied that those members had been contracted, which now manifestly showed the effect of their extension. These wonders therefore being recited in general, it is clearly shown that God, wondrous in his Saints, could always preserve the body of his bride, through which he wrought miracles, without the condiment of balsam, as he wished. Which the aforesaid land-dwellers noting, the messengers having returned (who by God's nod could not find balsam), they thought no more of embalming the sacred body, and left its preservation to the work of their Creator. ^f

[82] Though many wonders of this most sacred Virgin have been mentioned above, Hastening to kill his enemy lest I should seem to wish to pass over her great sanctity with swift foot, I shall narrate certain miracles performed by the Virgin herself after her death. A certain devout woman, and, on account of the astonishing miracles she had seen, full of sweet wonder, while she was returning from the castle of Montepulciano and going to a nearby castle called Monticello, met a certain neighbor of hers, who furious and wholly armed was hastening to take vengeance on his enemy. He, asking the said woman whence she came, she answered that she had been at Montepulciano, where in those days a certain holy Sister, called Agnes, had died, through whom God almighty was working infinite miracles. At whose words and the expression of the holy name of this kind Virgin, suddenly he, hearing Agnes's name he falls who appeared so terrible and cruel, fell to the ground; so stunned and weakened that it was necessary for workers called from nearby to carry him to the castle.

[83] Where, when no human remedy could profit such a divine stroke, the wretch, feeling himself consumed, it came to his mind to implore the help of her by whose powerful virtue he had been prostrated to the ground. Wherefore, while he revolved these things in his heart, behold, this happy Virgin, and promising better things to her appearing to him shining with wondrous light, appeared to him, and with her a most brilliant Angel. When the wretch suddenly beheld her, and with desirous affection asked her salutary help, it seemed that the holy Agnes, turning her back, would wholly not grant him any grace. But he persevering with great insistence, the Angel who accompanied her, answering, said: "Therefore the holy Virgin will not hear your petitions, because you still have the purpose of killing your enemy, on account of which yesterday by her power you were miraculously humbled to the ground. Whence if through her intercession you wish to be restored to former health, faithfully promise her that you will lay aside all hatred, he is healed and restores peace to his enemy and will make perfect peace with your enemy." At once the vision disappeared, and that unhappy sick man returned to himself: and, such a vow being sent forth, his lost strength returned, so that on the same day he went on foot to his enemy, who was distant from the place by thirty-two miles. Coming to him and prostrating himself on the ground, throwing down his arms and kissing him with a sweet embrace, he narrated the divine miracle of this sacred Virgin: and all injury being forgiven, they established perpetual peace between themselves.

[84] A certain woman, when she was in the bath, of which mention was made above, with a certain small nephew of hers, a boy submerged in the bath withdrawing a little from the said bath, the aforesaid boy incautiously descending into the waters of the bath, was submerged. When the afflicted woman learned this, since the admirable virtues of this kind Virgin came to her memory, at once devoutly and with faithful heart she commended her nephew to her, a vow being made, that if she restored him to the lost life, she would lead the boy to her monastery, and make manifest to all the miracle performed. O wondrous piety of this sacred Virgin! The vow sent forth, the boy rose alive, and the woman joyfully receiving him alive and whole, he is raised to life the vow completed, before a public Notary and suitable witnesses ^h, faithfully made known the obtained miracle.

NOTES.

CHAPTER X.

Miraculous cures obtained through Saint Agnes. Those freed from demon or chains.

[85] A certain young man, by name Meus, from a castle ^a called Asciano in the county of Siena, when he had climbed upon a ladder, incautiously leaned against a weak branch of a certain pear tree, that he might gather fruit, and had come to the topmost steps of the ladder; ^b Fallen from a high tree the branch being broken, not able to bear so much weight, he suddenly fell to the ground; and struck by the ladder and the aforesaid branch, he lay as if lifeless on the ground. His mother, who was a widow and to whom this only son was thus presented, was oppressed with such grief that with her loudest cries and most intense weeping she moved the bystanders to groans and tears. After her tears poured out, very weakened and afflicted, reclining her head near a close wall and resting a little, suddenly this sacred Virgin appeared to her, and after most pious words admonished her that she should faithfully commend her son to her. At which vision the grieving mother waking, devoutly commending her son at once to the holy Virgin, and commended by his mother to Agnes a vow being made that together with him she would visit her Relics with a decent oblation, suddenly he, who deprived of motion and sense had lain before his mother, not without the great joy and wonder of the bystanders, rose by himself from the ground, and every wound and bone fracture, without any natural remedy intervening, were so consolidated and healed, he rises whole from every wound that within four days he returned whole and safe to his accustomed occupations.

[86] Something similar happened in a certain castle of the county of Siena, called Castiglione: for a boy, falling to earth from a certain bridge sixteen cubits high, was brought half-dead to his mother: likewise one boy from a bridge who, a vow being made that, together with her son, barefoot, she would visit the sacred Relics of Blessed Agnes, and would surround the altar with a silver thread, and would offer an image of her son, in a short space of time received him fully healed from every blow, whole. In a village of the county of Montepulciano, called Graziano-Vetus, a certain boy named Guido, ^e while returning home on an ass, fell so gravely from the ass that, brought home and reduced to extremes, they lit a candle for him according to custom, another thrown from an ass awaiting his passing. When his mother ^f saw this and feared her son's death, she vowed herself to visit the sacred Relics of the virgin Agnes together with the boy, if she obtained life from the Lord. This done, the boy suddenly recovered, and received full health at the convent.

[87] A certain Gratinus of Siena, a head wound and rupture of a vein gravely struck on the head by a certain enemy of his, when by the physician who had undertaken his cure a certain bone was incautiously extracted from his head, the vein of the head was opened. Which, because of the copious flowing blood, he was unable to heal by his art, and despairing of his life, was left by the same physician. Seeing which, his parents, who sad and mourning stood around the sick man, persuaded the sick one that with unwavering faith he should have recourse to the holy virgin Agnes, through whom the Omnipotent was working wonders. At whose words the sick man, compunct, with faithful heart commending himself to this kind Virgin, promised to visit her sacred body and to offer a waxen image, if from the Lord he obtained the life almost lost. it is healed Suddenly, to him falling asleep a little, the holy Virgin appeared, and consoling him promised that in a short time he would escape whole; and so with the vision retreating, the blood restrained itself, and the wound wondrously healed by itself, in a short space of time he was most perfectly freed. This miracle he attested with an oath, before a Notary and witnesses. ^g

[89] A grave fire is extinguished In a certain village of the county of Perugia, commonly ^h called Cugliano, through the carelessness of some a fire was kindled so that, human help failing, all the inhabitants of the whole village awaited the final consumption. Seeing this, certain timorous men, with humble prayer implored the help of Blessed Agnes, promising to visit her Relics. This done, the fire so restrained its force, that all clearly perceived that a certain divine power had opposed itself to that conflagration. Whence the inhabitants of the aforesaid village, seeing that in a short time the fire had been extinguished, recognizing the miracle, gave immense thanks alike to God and to Blessed Agnes.

[90] Very many other miracles, of which there exist public instruments subscribed by the hand of Notaries, three blind women and two blind men are given light we shall narrate in brief summary, to avoid tedious prolixity. A certain woman, who for eighteen years had been deprived of the light of her left eye, coming to the church of Blessed Agnes, devoutly touching the sick eye with a veil which had touched the sacred Relics, was suddenly given light. A similar benefit

was granted by her to another woman, who had been blind for six months. Similar things befell a third woman, and likewise two men who had lost the use of their eyes. Very many other miracles were performed at the invocation of the holy Virgin: among which we refer many in brief compendium, for the brevity of readers.

A certain woman, after a cesarean delivery, having been reduced to extreme weakness and despairing of life, was returned to health by the merits of Blessed Agnes. A certain man, who for many years had suffered from a grievous tumor in the throat, was freed by her. Various others, tormented by fevers, ulcers, paralysis, or other grave illnesses, obtained health through her intercession. Some whose limbs had been maimed or contorted received the use of them again. Children who had died, or seemed to have died, were restored to life and given back to their weeping mothers. Those oppressed by demons were freed, those bound in chains were released, those in danger of shipwreck or captivity were rescued through her prayers.

A certain religious man, of the Order of Preachers, vexed by continual headaches for many years, invoked Blessed Agnes, and was at once made whole. Another, afflicted with a grievous wound from which he could not be cured by any human art, upon making a vow to visit her tomb, received sudden healing. A woman suffering from a flow of blood, to whom physicians had said they could give no remedy, bathed her affliction with the oil from Agnes's lamp, and was immediately restored to health. Many other men and women, of diverse conditions, ages, and countries, received benefits through the intercession of this holy Virgin: whose deeds, if they should all be written, would require a most ample volume.

[91] In the county of Siena, in a certain place, a woman was delivered, after a long and difficult labor, by the invocation of Agnes. In Cortona, a boy who had fallen from a high window was found unhurt after his mother commended him to Agnes. In Perugia, one possessed by a demon was freed at the tomb of the Saint. In Arezzo, a man who had lost the use of his feet through paralysis, walked whole after the Saint appeared to him in a dream.

[92] Many also in their own lands, not able to come to Agnes's tomb, vowed to visit her church, and were at once liberated from their afflictions: and fulfilling their vows, gave public testimony to her sanctity. Some who were in prison, bound with chains, heard a voice bidding them to commend themselves to Agnes, and were set free. Others in tempests at sea, calling upon her name, saw the winds calm and the waves grow still. Fishermen and farmers, merchants and soldiers, nobles and commoners alike received graces from her hand, and filled the whole of Tuscany and the neighboring regions with her praises.

[93] Innumerable are the miracles which God almighty has worked and still works daily through this Blessed Virgin, for the confusion of unbelievers, for the consolation of the faithful, and for the manifestation of her own sanctity. We have related these few, lest we weary the reader: but those who wish more may consult the public records preserved in the archive of her monastery, where they will find not only these but many more attested by the hand of Notaries. Let us therefore praise God almighty, who is wondrous in his Saints, and let us invoke through the intercession of this Virgin his mercy upon us; so that we, who have heard her wondrous deeds, may imitate her holy manners, and may deserve to attain with her the eternal rewards, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns God, forever and ever. Amen.

NOTES.