ON SAINT PAUL I,
BISHOP OF BRESCIA IN ITALY.
ABOUT THE YEAR 427.
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Paul I, Bishop of Brescia in Italy (St.)
By D. P.
Rampertus, Bishop of Brescia, writing of the Translation of Saint Philastrius, also Bishop of Brescia, to be commemorated on July 18, and enumerating his successors, the name Paulinus which later generations changed into Paul, his own predecessors, "who at the altar dedicated to the name of Blessed Philastrius and placed over his head celebrated the prayers of Masses," etc., names three Pauls, of whom one was the third after Philastrius and the second after Gaudentius; another succeeded Saint Titianus; and the last governed the church of Brescia between Saints Dominator and Paterius. Faynus, who is most diligent in investigating the antiquities of his native land, testifies in his manuscripts that the name Paulinus is nowhere found either in the catalogues of Bishops or in the ancient Missals or Breviaries. He nonetheless says that he has seen four different calendars of the Breviaries of Brescia, all indeed of various times but written before the invention of printing, and all referring to three Pauls and no Paulinus, on different days.
[2] discovered together with his body, After, however, as is recorded in the book of the Proceedings of the city of Brescia, in the year 1497 on February 17, it was resolved in a special council, with no one dissenting, that "those deputed to the statutes, together with the Vicar of the Most Reverend Bishop, should see and inquire whether in the church of Saint Eusebius outside the walls there rests any holy Body of any Bishop of Brescia, and whatever they should find they should report, so that due provision might be made concerning it": not only was some Body found "in the depth of the altar of that most ancient church," says Faynus on March 3; but also on the same occasion it was ascertained that his proper name was "Paulinus," not "Paul," as previously he had been called both by Rampertus and by others. He adds in his manuscripts that it greatly displeases him that the ancient records, both of that Paulinus and of five other Bishops resting in the church of Saint Peter of the Olivetans, were not transcribed by the possessors of that church, the Canons of the Congregation of Saint George in Alga, commonly called the Azurines from the color of their cerulean or violet habit, content with having placed the original parchments with the sacred bodies, likewise to be preserved with them.
[3] dug up in the church of Saint Eusebius in the year 1497, Indeed I do not understand on what foundation it is presumed that anything more could be read on the parchment or tablet found with the body than only the name; since almost only that was wont to be buried with such bodies. Moreover, with the discovery thus deposited, it was decreed in the same year on June 3 that it be "committed to the worshipful Lords Officials, that they should provide that the body of Saint Paulinus Bishop of Brescia, resting in the church of Saint Eusebius outside the walls, be in safekeeping, until it shall be transferred to Saint Peter in Oliveto within the city, as the venerable Canons of the said monastery of Saint Peter request, for the greater veneration of the said Saint, and for security and devotion: and likewise that the aforesaid Lord Officials have made an inventory of the holy Relics existing in the altar of the chapel of Saint Mary Magdalene, in the aforesaid church of Saint Peter of Oliveto."
[4] and translated to Saint Peter of Oliveto in the year 1498: After this, in the year 1498 in a special council, having heard the statement made by the venerable Brothers of Saint Peter in Oliveto, of the Congregation of Saint Gregory in Alega, narrating that "by the good pleasure of this city they intend to transfer the body of Saint Paulinus, formerly Bishop of Brescia, having already rested 900 years in the church of Saint Eusebius outside the walls, and to place and collocate him in the stone ark set up in the same church of Saint Peter in Oliveto; and that a day be fixed on which this Translation should take place"; it was resolved with no one dissenting that "the Translation of these relics should take place on the first Sunday of Lent, and that meanwhile the worshipful citizens elected these days over the monasteries of the Nuns of Brescia, namely Master John de Sabis, Master John Peter de Gaudino, and Master Matthew de Tiberiis, should take care that the said holy Relics should be preserved, until the Translation itself should take place, with the Clergy and with every solemnity." Finally, for the increase of this solemnity, it was decreed on the last day of February, that "ten candles of white wax, of three pounds each, should be bought out of the funds of the community, to be carried lighted in the Translation itself."
[5] on March 4, The year 1498 had Easter on April 15, and thus the first Sunday of Lent on March 4: which day, since it immediately followed the one on which anciently the Tables of the Church of Brescia had noted one of the three Pauls, was most fittingly chosen for this Translation: especially if, on the tablet or parchment found with the body, there had been noted besides the name also the day of veneration, the 3rd of March itself, as often is customary in such cases to be noted. And indeed the people continued to celebrate the annual memory of the Translation on the first Sunday, but the Clergy, to whom the Lenten Sunday did not permit to perform the Office of the Saint, took for the memory of this Translation the 4th day, which they would keep festive whenever the Sunday did not fall on it: and so now Saint Paulinus is inscribed, by others Paul, in several Catalogues and Martyrologies, which Bernardinus Faynus enumerates one by one; adding that on the marble altar of the Chapel which is now called Saint Paulinus, facing the altar of Saint Mary Magdalene, where the body of Saint Silvinus the Bishop rests, these verses are read inscribed:
"The spirit of Paulinus the Bishop has gone into the heavenly courts; Brescia has here the body of the Saint."
[6] he seems also to have been known to Rampertus, As regards the diversity of the name, between the primitive name, as "Paul," and the diminutive, as "Paulinus," there is so slight a difference, that not rarely we see one taken for the other: so that you do not know whether the writer of Histories, the Archbishop of Florence, should be called "Antoninus" or "Antoninus"; although the latter is in more common usage, drawn from the smallness of his body, as some hold. In copying Rampertus' sermon it was not only easy for an error to creep in by the omission of a single syllable; and for this then to pass over into catalogues and calendars of several centuries later; but in fact that this error was made is persuaded by Rampertus' own context. For when the same Rampertus repeats the same name a second time, he uses particles signifying the repetition of the name. Thus he names Gaudiosus, successor of Silvinus, simply; but coming to him who succeeded Bishop Deus dedit, he says "likewise Gaudiosus" again. This however he does not do in the successor of Saint Titianus, but only in the successor of Saint Dominator, saying "likewise Paul." Therefore this alone is the one in whom he wished to signify that the name of Paul was repeated, and consequently one of the two former, who are now read under the name of Paul, was written as Paulinus, not Paul.
[7] and is to be restored in the place of Paul, not after Saint Gaudentius, But which one? Faynus holds that the successor of Saint Gaudentius was called Paulinus, and that this is the one who is venerated in March: and this from the testimony of a certain parchment fragment, cited by Ottavio Rossi, in which thus was read: "By the inspiring grace of our Savior, to the holy Church of Brescia, in the place of Saint Gaudentius was substituted Blessed Paulinus: who having long sojourned in Africa, labored exceedingly in the vineyard of the Lord": from which foundation the same Ottavio deduces that this is he, who in the Milanese church, under the care of Castus the Deacon, discharged the office of amanuensis, and wrote the Life of Saint Ambrose, wrongly attributed to Saint Paulinus Bishop of Nola: but since by no argument is it proved that the author of that Life later ascended to the Episcopal grade, and the catalogue of which a fragment is cited is not more ancient than the discovery of the Body made under the Canons Regular, after their manner eager to join whomever Saints to their Saint Augustine, and thus to make credible that his Rule long before the beginnings of their Canonical Congregations
was in use among European Clerics; these things, I say, being so, I see no reason why the successor of Saint Gaudentius should be considered to have been called not Paul, but Paulinus.
[8] but after Saint Titianus, On the contrary, however, if, as Faynus writes, together with the name of Paulinus there was found the day March 3, on which Saint Titianus is also venerated by the people of Brescia, it becomes probable that both are venerated on the same day, because they were likewise lifted from the earth and placed beneath altars, the one indeed in the old shrine of Saints Cosmas and Damian, the other in the aforementioned church of Saint Eusebius. with whom he was formerly commonly venerated on March 3. Moreover, no more fitting reason can be thought of for their being lifted together, than that they had contiguous burials to themselves; and hence arises no improbable presumption that both flourished also in contiguous times. But since such presumptions solidly prove nothing, let it suffice simply to have set them forth, in order to justify that, in March, having followed the greater part of the writers of Brescia and Galesinius who cites the ecclesiastical tables, we have made Paulinus the successor of Saint Titianus. The same might be persuaded by the space of 900 years during which the Canons said he lay in the old church of Saint Eusebius; if it were proved that that church is so ancient, and that not long after his death the body of Saint Paulinus was brought beneath the altar, let us say toward the end of the 6th century, since he died about the middle of the same century.
[9] He who is venerated on April 29 is Paul, not Paulinus, The manuscript Brescian Martyrology indeed calls him who is venerated on March 4 "Paul"; but gives the name of Paulinus to the other, to be venerated on this April 29; but we think by some slip of the pen, and we recognize a similar lapse in Galesinius, whom Baronius too lightly followed; for no one has recognized two Bishops of Brescia named Paulinus, and that he who is venerated on this day should be called Paul, Faynus proves in his manuscripts from the fact that in the year 1435 there were discovered, in the Abbey of Leno within the borders of Brescia, some of his Relics, with this chirograph: "III Kalends of May. Relics of Saint Paul Bishop of Brescia." And the Canons of Saint Peter of Oliveto think this to be the one whose body had long lain in their church with the bodies of Saints Euasius, Cyprian, Deusdedit the Bishops, and who now, more honorably placed with the same, rests there, according to the decree of the year 1453, which we set forth above, treating of Saint Cyprian. in the same church with three others lifted, Again, after almost 90 years, the coffin of the same Saint Paul was opened, and his head taken from it, and honorably carried around the city; the history of which, a hundred years ago transcribed by Alexander Totto the Servite from a certain manuscript of the monastery of Saint Peter, exists in the manuscript Collectanea of Bernardinus Faynus to this effect.
[10] "In the year of our Lord 1542, on the day before the Nones of August, for the future memory of the matter. At Brescia in the church of Saint Peter in Oliveto, with the Reverend Father Master Leo de Bugattis of Brescia assisting, Rector General of the Congregation of Saint George in Alga, by mandate of the said Reverend Father, the sarcophagi of the holy Bishops Euasius Martyr, Cyprian, Paul and Deusdedit were opened, whose bodies are stored away in the high altar; and the sepulchre of Saint Silvinus the Bishop, who lies in the altar of Saint Mary Magdalene in the chapel called Saint Paulinus: with the head set apart for veneration, and from these sacred bodies were lifted the undersigned relics of the above Saints, namely the entire head of Saint Paul with all its teeth; and the heads of Saints Deusdedit and Silvinus were in several pieces. Whose heads indeed, of these Saints, were in procession carried back into the sacristy of the said church, and there deposited, until and as long as should have been fabricated little boxes or precious tabernacles, in which with due honor the said Relics would be enclosed. At whose venerable Translation were present the undersigned Priests, namely first Reverend Father Master Leo de Bugattis Rector General, Reverend Father Master Pacificus of Brescia Prior of the monastery, Master Magnus of Brescia, Master Timothy of Homis, Master Hadrian of Brescia, Master Cyprian Maurus de Gaudino, Master Luke of Goliono, Master John Peter of Cignano, Master Chrysanthus of Provaleo, Master Evangelista of Calvazesio, Master Thaddeus of Brescia, Master Maximian of Brescia, Master Albert of Dello, with several laypeople of both sexes: of all of whom an instrument exists, asked for by the excellent man Master Francis the Notary, called "il Gambara," on the day and year above written."
[11] he is distinct from another of the same name in the Cathedral, Another Paul, who is venerated on February 7, and is erroneously said by Ferrarius to be buried in this same church, rests in the Cathedral church below the altar of the Body of Christ; his head being placed in a silver bust for public veneration. But this later, namely in the year 1633, when John Mary Fenarolus the Archpriest extracted his head and the heads of three other holy Bishops from the ark, and for the use of the church placed them in noble silver boxes, as Faynus has it in his manuscripts. But how his body, with the bodies of Saints Dominator, Anastasius, and Dominicus, was first in the year 1581 transferred by Saint Charles Borromeo from the old cathedral dedicated to Saint Andrew into the church of Saint Stephen; then, when this temple was to be destroyed, to the new Cathedral of Saint Mary, commonly called Rotunda, in the year 1604, we shall say on May 20, when the solemnity of Saint Anastasius recurs.
[12] Which of the two Pauls was first, and which later, is difficult to discern. Ferrarius in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, and Faynus on this day, hold that the first is he who is venerated today: and he seems to be the first, and this opinion seems to be favored, both because the City itself, in the decrees of the year 1453, names Paul before Cyprian and Deusdedit, as the more ancient and nearer in age to Saint Euasius the Martyr; and because the Bishops buried together in the old cathedral, Dominator, Anastasius, Dominicus, lived toward the end of the sixth century and the beginning of the seventh, among whom Paul, when found, can be reckoned of the same time, and be believed to be the one whom Rampertus names after Saint Dominator; but the latter is the second. passing over Berticanus, whom most hold to have sat among them, and whose name Rampertus omits; undoubtedly because he had not been inscribed in the ecclesiastical diptychs, inasmuch as he was an impious man, of whom Gregory the Great relates in his Dialogues that he perished by a sudden death, because, corrupted by money, he had defiled the church of Saints Faustinus and Jovita with the burial of a most wicked man. And these things concerning the three Pauls of Brescia, one of whom should be called Paulinus, we have thought it good to collect here, both to supplement, correct, or confirm what was said in February and March, and to bear witness more clearly how much we owe to Bernardinus Faynus for having collected the monuments that bring some light into such great darkness; nevertheless preserving the liberty of sometimes feeling differently from him, concerning what seemed to him from a less probable argument.