Bernard Ptolomei

ON BL. BERNARD PTOLOMEI, FOUNDER OF THE CONGREGATION OF ST. MARY OF MONTE OLIVETO,

AT SIENA IN TUSCANY,

IN THE YEAR 1348.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Bernard Ptolomei, founder of the congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto (Bl.)

BY G. C.

§ I. The immemorial and lawful cultus of this Blessed, declared and extended by the Apostolic See.

The sacred Congregation of Rites approved the immemorial cultus of this Blessed, as is plain from the juridical testimony The sacred Congregation of Rites declared which, after the Italian Life of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, written by Gregorio Lombardelli the Dominican, and published by Bernardino Paccinelli, monk of Monte Oliveto, in our copy at page 143 and the following, runs thus: In the name of the Lord. Amen. I make faith by these presents

I, the undersigned public notary, how that on Saturday the twenty-sixth of November 1644, being appointed in the office of me the undersigned notary, and before me the same notary, Don Carlo Mentale, procurator of the venerable Religion or Congregation of the Olivetans, and of the most reverend father Don Gaspar of Naples, abbot General of the said Olivetan Congregation, with repeated instances, made otherwise in the cause of the canonization of the servant of God Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, founder of the said Religion or Olivetan Congregation, urges again and anew, notwithstanding the oppositions made on the part of the most illustrious and most reverend lord Promoter of the faith, that it be declared that the cause of the said servant of God Bl. Bernard is not comprehended in the decrees of the most holy Inquisition of the Holy Office in the matter of non-cultus or veneration; nay rather, the immemorial cultus of the same servant of God Bl. Bernard standing, that the cause in question is of a case excepted in the decrees, as from the words of those same decrees, namely there: declaring that by the above-written we in no way wished nor intended to prejudice those who are celebrated either by the common consent of the Church, or by an immemorial course of time, or by the writings of the Fathers and of holy men, or by the knowledge and toleration of the aforesaid Apostolic See or of the Ordinary for a very long time.

[2] And therefore, the said immemorial cultus of the said Servant of God standing, supplication is made that a decree be issued the immemorial cultus of this Blessed, that the aforesaid cause is in a case excepted in the aforesaid decrees, and he asks and urges that so it be done and provided, not only in the manner premised, but in every other better manner, etc. Likewise how that on Monday the fifth of December of the same year 1644, being appointed in the same office of the undersigned notary, and before me the same notary, the same Don Carlo Mentale, the aforesaid procurator in the above-said cause, and in order to show the favorable decree issued by the sacred Congregation of Rites in the said cause of the canonization of the said servant of God Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, founder of the said Olivetan congregation, on the XXVI day of November last past, produced the said decree of the said sacred congregation, subscribed by the most eminent and most reverend lord Pietro Paolo Crescenzi, prefect of the said sacred congregation, and secured by the impression of his accustomed seal, and likewise subscribed by the most reverend Father Don Carlo Paolucci, secretary of the said sacred congregation, of the following tenor, namely:

"The most eminent and most reverend Lord Cardinal Franciotti reporting the cause of the servant of God Bernard de' Ptolomei, founder of the monks of the Olivetan Congregation, on the twenty-sixth day of November 1644 the sacred Congregation of Rites judged it to be established that the aforesaid cause is in a case excepted in the decrees of the Holy Roman and universal Inquisition.

P. Card. Crescenzi… In place of ✠ the impressed seal.

Carlo Paolucci, secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites."

In every better manner etc., and otherwise more fully, as in my acts, to which etc. In faith whereof I have subscribed these presents, and signed them with my accustomed notarial sign. At Rome, on this seventh day of the month of December 1644.

In place of ✠ the Notary's sign.

So it is: Clearchus Buschus, Notary of the Sacred Roman Congregation.

In faith etc.

[3] which moreover is confirmed Further, the most illustrious Don Giovanni Battista Rinaldi, in the oration which he delivered before the Pontiff Innocent X to obtain the canonization of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, after enumerating this Blessed's virtues and miracles, demonstrates his immemorial cultus in these words: The fame of these and other prodigies spread abroad Bernard's sanctity. Hence it came about (Most Blessed Father) that with an immemorial cultus hitherto, wherever the knowledge of the blessed Father flourishes, he has been venerated, adored, and called HOLY. Traditions of immemorial time are the greatest testimonies. Time consumes ludicrous fabrications, lying rites, impious sanctions; devouring age entombs them. But those things which rest upon truth neither the winds of persecutions, nor the voracity of the centuries, nor the barbarism of tyrants can overturn and consume. We count three hundred years and more from Bernard's death, and in all this time the communion of the faithful and the devotion of the peoples in the very chief churches of the diocese has not ceased to heap up lamps at his tomb, vows at his altar, incense before his image, votive tablets on the walls, prayers, tears, alms. There has always flourished, both among the Olivetans, the sons of so great a parent, and among the pious assemblies of the faithful, an intense religion and devotion toward Bernard; a city set upon a mountain cannot be hidden; the mountain is the Church militant, set against the thunderbolts of adversaries. The Saints are cities, who from a loftier place impart to the rest the lights of integrity.

[4] The devotion of the pious faithful toward blessed Bernard took increase in a wonderful degree from the testimonies of men from a twofold panegyric oration, shining with the highest probity and with lofty dignity and learning. Those who have made mention of Bernard Ptolomei, who everywhere call him a holy man, a blessed dweller in the desert, the founder of a holy Religion, are twenty-four authors. Let me not pass over certain chief ones. Stefano Coppia the Olivetan, reporting the most ample authority granted to Bernard while living by the general Chapter, testifies that he was three times called HOLY by those holy dwellers in the desert. The book of Annals, which is kept as most sacred at Monte Oliveto, has this concerning him: "That holy Father himself, having received the viaticum of eternal life and all the Sacraments of holy Church, about to render to the Lord his talents doubled, amid the hands of his sons both singing psalms and mourning, and amid the words of prayer, rejoicing and exulting in the Lord, rendered his blessed spirit to his Creator." Pius the Second, Pontiff most good and great, in the eleventh book of his Commentaries praises him thus: "The man's name was Bernard, who, full of God, was the author of a new Religion and the founder of a monastery, whose bones they religiously venerate."

[5] Then that most reverend consistorial advocate, who was afterwards raised to the see of Lucca, one of which was delivered before the Pontiff Innocent X, thus makes his peroration and addresses the supreme Pontiff: Wherefore, most blessed Father, we most humbly beseech thee that thou wouldst enroll so pious a Man in the number of the Saints, and decree for him a Mass and an Office (as is the custom of the holy Roman Church, of which thou art on earth the shining head). This the religious monastery, filled with most holy and most learned men, founded by Bernard; this Bernard's prodigious virtues; this his notable miracles; this his immemorial cultus, approved by the sacred Congregation of Rites delegated by the Apostolic See; this the testimonies of illustrious men concerning his sanctity, demand of thy most upright justice. This the Olivetan Order, the religious offspring of a most holy Parent, falling at thy knees in my name, most humbly ask of thy kindness: namely that thou wouldst adorn with the roll of the Saints him whom Italy and distant shores devoutly venerate, whom the prayers of the pious venerate, whom the most holy patriarch Benedict, and the same Queen of the Saints the Mother of God, invited to heaven, made certain of eternal salvation, and led with them to the enjoyment of the divine glory.

[6] When this peroration had lacked the desired effect, the cause of obtaining the canonization was resumed under the Pontiff Alexander VII, the other was delivered before Alexander VII before whom the most illustrious Don Giulio Cesare Fagnani, consistorial advocate of the sacred court, began his oration in this manner: Now the fourth century runs on, most blessed Father, since, after a laboriously completed life, admirable for its illustrious virtues and the glory of its deeds, the mind of Bernard Ptolomei, founder of the Olivetan family, restored to heaven, enjoys the fellowship of the Blessed. And when will the most longed-for day be at hand, on which we may congratulate the Christian commonwealth and the felicity of our times on this added ornament and heaped-up joy — that to a Man of most conspicuous sanctity heavenly honors and public altars and the solemnities of sacred rites have at last been decreed, so that we may have Bernard to be saluted and venerated with the appellation of SAINT, and with rite and veneration? But doubtless the matter, long agitated in consultations, amid the prayers of peoples and the entreaties of Princes, yet never brought to the wished-for issue, was, I should believe, by the hidden counsel of the Divinity reserved chiefly for thee, most blessed Father, that by the oracle of thy divine voice thy most illustrious and most holy fellow citizen, who has deserved excellently of the Catholic name, being enrolled in the register of the Saints and set forth for the Church's veneration, might by this title also more happily extend the fame of thy most blessed Pontificate into all distant nations and into all the memory of posterity. Concerning whom, as I am about to speak according to custom before thy Holiness in this most ample theater of the world, if I may be permitted to preface a request for indulgence, in place of an elaborate oration finished in all its numbers, it will abundantly suffice that a simple discourse of the greatest matters, unpolished by any ornaments of rhetoricians, should display its own fairer pomp.

[7] to obtain his solemn canonization. At length the eloquent orator, having set forth the chief virtues and miracles of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, concludes his oration in these words: Since these things are so, most blessed Father, and many more and greater than could be commemorated by me briefly and by snatches in speaking — confirmed by the consent of so many years past, so often handed down in public monuments of letters, and here also more than once declaimed and happily repeated by the greatest men with the highest praise of eloquence — again and again there repeat their most humble prayers, and renew their most warm entreaties before thy Holiness, not only the renowned city of Siena, most fruitful parent of so many Saints, not only the most serene grand Duke of Etruria, but all Italy, but all Europe, and the whole universality of the Christian commonwealth, so far as it extends, and the sacred Order of the Olivetans, prostrate at thy most blessed feet; by thy clemency and piety, most blessed Father, it prays and suppliantly beseeches thee that thou wouldst publicly will that the most holy man Bernard Ptolomei, its parent and founder, be at last increased and adorned with his own cultus and titles; that thou wouldst kindle that most shining light upon the golden candlestick of the Church, that it may shine in the splendors of the Saints, and that the Father of eternal light may be glorified, who has set his tabernacle in the sun.

[8] Later Roman Pontiffs Although these prayers have hitherto been fruitless with the Apostolic See, which in matters of this kind is wont to proceed cautiously and severely, nevertheless the testimonies of his notable deeds and miracles, so often repeated, seem to have moved the later Roman Pontiffs to grant to the Olivetan Congregation proper Lessons concerning Bl. Bernard Ptolomei to be recited, and afterwards to extend the cultus of the blessed Man, as is clear from the following decree, which is thus subjoined to the proper Lessons: Father Don Giovanni Francesco Fossati of Milan, abbot and procurator general of the Olivetan congregation, and also procurator of the cause of the canonization of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, abbot of the Order of St. Benedict, on account of the utmost zeal of piety with which the petitioners themselves and the Religious of the same Olivetan congregation pursue that same Bl. Bernard, have made supplication in the name of their whole Religion to the Congregation of Sacred Rites for the extension of the Office and of the celebration of Mass of the same Blessed throughout the whole monastic Order, with the proper lessons formerly granted to the aforesaid Religion on the XIX day of April 1681 to be recited under a double rite. And the sacred Congregation, kindly inclined to the prayers of the petitioners, on the report of the most eminent and most reverend Lord Cardinal de Laurea, judged that the grace sought should be granted; and that in future the Office and Mass of the aforesaid Blessed should be recited by all Religious of both sexes of the whole monastic Order, according to the Rubrics of the Roman Breviary and Missal, under the same double rite, as above, every year, on the XXI day of August, the feast day of that Blessed,

and respectively celebrated, it kindly granted this might be done, if it should please our Most Holy Lord. On the XXIV day of November 1691. And a report of the aforesaid having been made to our Most Holy Lord Pope Innocent XII by me the secretary, his Holiness assented, and commanded the decree to be issued and published, on the XXIX day of the same month of November and of the year 1691.

A. Bishop of Ostia, Cardinal Cybo.

In place of ✠ the seal.

Giuseppe Vallemani, secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites.

[9] For the rest, those proper Lessons, which contain a synopsis of his Life, an Office with proper lessons are recited in this order: Lesson V. Bernard, who in the world was John, born at Siena of the ancient family of the Ptolomei, and brought up by his parents' pious care among the Religious of St. Dominic, his mother, before he was born, seemed to herself to give birth in the likeness of a swan, bearing in its beak a branch plucked from a green olive; which, afterwards torn away from the mother's bosom, with others accompanying it, flew away into heaven: which is believed to have been a presage of the Olivetan Order. As a young man, adding to his knightly rank an excellence of learning, he was distinguished as a professor of philosophy and of jurisprudence. Lesson VI. When on a certain occasion he had set up a famous disputation, he was suddenly deprived of his sight; but, a vow having been made by him to the Mother of God, whom he cherished more earnestly, being restored to the light of his eyes, he mounted the chair, and, instead of a lecture, delivered an eloquent discourse on the vanity of the world; and having straightway renounced all his goods, and distributed them to the poor and to other pious works, he withdrew into the solitude of Accona, whither several noble citizens, moved by his word and example, followed him; and there, as a new man, he began a new kind of anchoritic life, most harsh with continual and voluntary fastings and scourgings and other macerations of the body, but most sweet with meditations upon divine and heavenly things.

[10] Lesson VII. Since the prince of darkness ill bore so great a light, concerning this Blessed they permitted to be recited, over whom the Man of God had many times triumphed by God's help, he tries through wicked men to blacken his fame with false accusations before John XXII, then sitting at Avignon: whom the supreme Pontiff, having summoned him to himself and recognized his innocence and that of the others who had flocked to him from the odor of his sanctity, sent with commendation to Guido, bishop of Arezzo; on whom he conferred the right and faculty of approving the institute under a fixed rule. And the bishop, a three days' fast being proclaimed, bestowed upon the Servant of God and his companions a white habit under the rule of St. Benedict, with the insignia of the Religion which he named the congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto, as had been shown beforehand to that prelate himself in a dream by the Mother of God. Lesson VIII. Bernard, thereupon returning to that place where he had laid the first foundations of the new plantation, builds a house sacred to God under the invocation of the Nativity of the blessed Virgin Mary. Further, so great was the lowliness of mind in him that scarcely at last could he be brought by the wishes of his own to undertake the government of the Religion, and not until after he had submitted to three terms of governance. But the fervor of his charity for his neighbor's salvation shone forth when, a foul pestilence raging at Siena and within the circuit of its dominion, he devoted himself and his own to the safety both of the bodies and of the souls of those suffering from the disease: and, being himself seized by that disease, in the seventy-sixth year of his age, notable for merits and virtues, in the monastery of Siena, refreshed with the saving banquet, exulting amid the hands of those singing psalms and likewise mourning, he rendered his unspotted spirit to God on the thirteenth of the Kalends of September, in the year of restored salvation one thousand three hundred and forty-eight, and was there buried, renowned for miracles.

[11] and they inscribed his name in the Roman Martyrology. To these Lessons is added a proper prayer, which is recited thus: O God, who through blessed Bernard didst will that a new kind of anchoritic life should begin in thy Church; grant, we beseech thee, that, treading in his footsteps, we may deserve to obtain the rewards of eternal life. Through our Lord, etc. This prayer or collect, in the month of April of the year 1692, after examination by the most eminent Cardinal Colloredo, was approved by the sacred Congregation of Rites and by Pope Innocent XII, as is reported in a special decree in the same place. The same Pontiff, unless I am mistaken, ordered the name of this blessed Man to be inserted in the Roman Martyrology, in which we read thus to this day: At Siena in Tuscany, of blessed Bernard Ptolomei, abbot, founder of the Olivetan Congregation. When this Commentary was already prepared for the press, the very Reverend Don Benedetto Campo Sampieri, Olivetan, lecturer in sacred theology, sent us at Rome in the year 1737 a most courteous letter, in which he sets forth from the archive of his congregation the documents which we have already reported above, and subjoins to them at the end a notice hitherto unknown to us, in this manner: At length on the XXI day of March 1705, by a decree of the sacred Congregation approved by Clement XI on the IV day of April of the same year, it was granted that in the whole Congregation the feast of Bl. Bernard should be celebrated under a double rite of the second class with an octave, whose proper lessons were afterwards approved and granted on the IV day of July 1705. Although, therefore, that distinguished Founder of a religious family has not yet been solemnly canonized, nevertheless these certain testimonies of public veneration abundantly suffice for him to have a place in our Work. Now we shall treat of his biographers and his deeds.

§ II. The various writers of the Acts are recorded, and a copious synopsis of the Life is set forth.

After Giovanni Battista of Populonia The first to have written the Life of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei is said to be Fray Giovanni Battista of Populonia, a contemporary writer of the Dominican Order, as Pietro Marcellino Oraffi, abbot of the Olivetan Congregation, presently to be cited, testifies before the Italian Life of the Blessed in his preface to the reader. Nay rather, Gregorio Lombardelli of the Order of Preachers, who composed the Acts of the same Blessed in Italian, in the Appendix to the fifth chapter of the first book affirms that this old and Latin lucubration of his fellow religious was lent to him by the most excellent Don Ludovico Falugi, knight of St. Stephen, at Piombino in Etruria, where he ordered it to be faithfully transcribed from an ancient copy. Lombardelli in the same place adds that Giovanni Battista of Populonia was a friend of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, and had a brother, Guglielmo by name, under the discipline of this blessed Father, from whose mouth he chiefly collected the deeds of the blessed Man. Jacques Échard the Dominican seems to have been ignorant of these things, who not long ago reviewed the writers of his Order, and yet made no mention of Giovanni Battista of Populonia; unless perhaps he cited this writer under another name. Whatever be the case in this matter, would that that authentic document might be found, which probably somewhere is struggling with moths and bookworms! At least the Olivetan Fathers, lately consulted by us at Rome through a friend, answered that they had not been able to find that instrument of antiquity.

[13] Various more recent writers have committed the deeds of our Blessed to writing, various more recent writers, both in Latin and in Italian, as we learn from a manuscript of an anonymous author once sent to us, in which the chief biographers are enumerated thus: First of all, Giovanni of Populonia, master and doctor of the Order of Preachers, transmitted his Life to posterity, who also lived in the time of blessed Bernard, and had a brother Guglielmo under his mastership and discipline; next, a theologian of the same Order and consultor of the holy office of Siena, Gregorio Lombardelli, in a little work arranged in three books. And lest the Olivetan writers be altogether passed over in silence, Antonio da Barga in his history of the Congregation; Don Michelangelo Bonaventi in a Dialogue to the recent Olivetans; the abbot Don Secondo Lancellotti in the first book of the Olivetan History; Don Paolo Carpentiero of Naples in five books; Don Pietro Marcellino Oraffi, abbot of Lodi; and Don Domenico Becoli in a little book composed in Italian.

[14] To these others also might be added, if I wished to review all those have written of the deeds of this Blessed, who have briefly or in passing mentioned Bl. Bernard Ptolomei. Whence Paolo Carpentiero, before the Latin Life of the Blessed which he comprised in five books, thus addresses the reader at the beginning of his preface: The deeds, virtues, and marvels of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei of Siena, parent of the Olivetan cenobites, many weighty men have written, but (to confess the truth) rather by snatches, and more by leaps (if you except very few), than of set purpose. We therefore shall here only furnish the reader with notice of those writers of the Life who left the Acts of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei to posterity of set purpose, as they say. And from these we shall select those which we have at hand, and concerning which we can consequently pass a more certain judgment. We shall also give a reason why we have preferred one to another for the publishing of the Blessed's deeds.

[15] Paolo Carpentiero, abbot of the Olivetan Order, published in Latin at Naples in the year 1642 five books, among whom we chiefly reckon those in which he elegantly and fully pursued the deeds and miracles of his blessed Founder. But this florid writer often wanders off into narrations foreign to our design and to the Acts of the Blessed, as he himself confesses toward the end of his preface in these words: We digress many times, and run out through certain matters worthy of erudition. We have interwoven profane matters (not departing a hair's breadth from the foundation of truth), and very many probable things, such as soliloquies, discourses, precepts, descriptions, following the weightiest authors, who strove both to help and to delight, lest readers should weary even of a very short little work. Wherefore we have by no means thought all these things superfluous. But we judge that those digressions and trappings of words befit a rhetorician rather than a historian, and therefore we have judged that that lucubration, which has already before appeared publicly, ought by no means to be reprinted, although a repeated edition of the same would be very easy for us.

[16] Since Gregorio Lombardelli the Dominican, dying in the city of Siena in the year 1613, had left the Italian Life of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei prepared for the press, Bernardino Paccinelli, an Olivetan monk, afterwards published it in print, whose Works are at hand for us, without any change, as the editor testifies in his preface to the reader. But Lombardelli, after this lucubration of his, in the Appendix to the first chapter of the third book, in our copy at page 130, asserts that he drew everything which he wrote concerning Bl. Bernard Ptolomei from Giovanni Battista of Populonia and from other ancient monuments. But he would have done us a great favor if he had expressed those old documents word for word, or at least had assigned them one by one, as learned critics in this age require; among whom Échard the Dominican, in the Bibliotheca of the Preachers, volume 2, page 385, passes this judgment concerning similar writings of Lombardelli: But I judge that Gregorio is to be praised not a little, as a man assiduous in unrolling historical works, and most deserving in the matter of letters, especially among hagiographers. I do not deny, however, that he seems to me to presume more than enough upon the reader's confidence, when he narrates without any authentic witness produced those things which he indiscriminately took from various sources, even uncertain and doubtful things, as if the credit of the narrator could in no way waver. Hence also, after he has been read even with pleasure, nevertheless the primary documents themselves are still sought and demanded by the skilled, and not without reason. This judgment of Échard concerning his own fellow religious ought by no means to seem suspect.

[17] and out of all we select for the press a certain anonymous author, Moreover Pietro Marcellino Oraffi, abbot of the Olivetan Congregation, published in Italian at Venice in the year 1650 the Acts of his blessed Founder, which

he excerpted chiefly from Lombardelli, as he advises in his proem to the reader. But in the same place he confesses that he inserted into these Acts moral observations, salutary admonitions, and certain digressions, lest that Life should come forth into the light too dry or barren. He also candidly confesses that he enlarged at his own discretion the discourses delivered by Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, and sometimes narrated probable things as true. Nevertheless he publicly testifies that he did this not to display his talent, but to foster and nourish the reader's piety, and that in this matter he imitated various biographers of the Saints. Certainly all too many writers of Lives have used this licence, and have so confounded their own inventions with the documents of the ancients that our labor is assiduously and with difficulty spent in distinguishing the latter from the former. But we leave those amplified exhortations, useful admonitions, and moral annotations to preachers, and search out the truth of the history alone, which we seem to have found more nearly in the shorter and simpler manuscript Acts, concerning which we shall now advise something.

[18] who collected the Acts of the Blessed simply and historically. We once received from the Olivetan Fathers (so we suspect from certain indications) a Life of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei written in more recent characters, and divided into five parts, of which the first represents the Blessed in the world, the second in the desert, the third in the monastery; but in the fourth part his miracles are reported, and in the fifth the praises of the Order founded by him are celebrated. This some anonymous writer, who perhaps out of lowliness of mind suppressed his name, collected from Carpentiero, Lombardelli, and Oraffi, whom again and again he diligently assigns in the margin. This collection of the anonymous writer, on account of the brief and simple narration of the deeds, has seemed to us worthy of the press, and therefore we have preferred it to the diffuse and embellished Acts of Carpentiero. We shall therefore print it after this preliminary Commentary, and shall illustrate it in the customary manner, where anything worthy of note shall occur. And we shall divide that collection into five chapters, and after each shall report in the annotations what the anonymous writer noted in the margin, if it shall be worth the trouble.

[19] After all these biographers, Germanico Ptolomei, vicar general of the most illustrious Celio Piccolomini, archbishop of Siena (who ascended the see of Siena in the year 1671), adorned the deeds of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei with a hundred and two elogia, Germanico Ptolomei adorns him with a hundred and more elogia, as he himself calls them, or pointed inscriptions. This posthumous work Mario Ptolomei, the author's nephew by his brother, at length brought to light at Siena in the year 1710, and commended his uncle's keen wit to posterity. Although that lucubration of Germanico Ptolomei is ingenious, nevertheless it can profit us little, because in that kind of writing too much licence for embellishment is allowed, and the author is sometimes carried away by a certain poetic frenzy, as the editor does not deny in his preface. We shall therefore excerpt from this work only the titles of the elogia or inscriptions, which in the order of time contain a remarkable compendium of his deeds, and illustrate the Blessed's posthumous glory not a little.

[20] Elogium I. Of most noble parents, Mino Ptolomei and Fulvia Tancredi, who were childless, of which we set forth only the titles, the blessed Boy is conceived, the Mother of God seconding their prayers. Elogium II. His mother, while she carried the Boy in her womb, seemed to herself in a dream to have given birth to a white swan, which, having plucked a branch of a green olive, and thronged about by dense swans, mounted heavenward in flight. Elogium III. He is born at Siena in Etruria on the tenth day of May, in the year from the Virgin's childbearing 1272, in an age most disastrous to Italy and to the whole Christian world through the discords of the Guelfs and Ghibellines; and at his birth his native Siena, breathed upon by a sudden joy, exults. Elogium IV. To the newborn his mother Fulvia gives the name John. Elogium V. Marvelous in him, even from tender infancy, is the gravity of his manners and the maturity of his piety. Elogium VI. John, a youth beautiful to a miracle. Elogium VII. The noble Youth is committed to Cristoforo Ptolomei, his most religious kinsman, to be brought up in the monastery of the divine Dominic at Siena. Elogium VIII. In the fifteenth year of his age, with the highest acclamation of his whole country, he is proclaimed doctor of philosophy and of both laws. Elogium IX. He is created an Imperial Knight by the emperor Rudolf. Elogium X. John takes delight in hunting.

[21] Elogium XI. In the sodality of the Virgin Mother of God, which still flourishes most religiously under the hospital of Siena, which contain a copious synopsis of his Life, he sets the first exercises of his sanctity. Elogium XII. Being still under age, elected supreme governor of the Sienese republic, he directs it most holily and most prudently. Elogium XIII. Easily the chief of the learned men of his age, teaching publicly in the academy of his country, he fills all Italy with the glory of his learning. Elogium XIV. Ill swollen with the vain glory of learning, he falls away from piety. Elogium XV. Being smitten from heaven with unforeseen blindness, he comes to his senses. Elogium XVI. Vowing a solitary life, he recovers from the Virgin Mother of God the lost use of his eyes. Elogium XVII. While his disciples were expecting from him new and curious theses, as he had promised before his blindness, being now about to withdraw into the desert, he delivers in the Sienese lyceum a most religious discourse on the vanity of earthly things and contempt of the world. Elogium XVIII. He piously distributes all his goods to the poor. Elogium XIX. He withdraws into the desert of Accona. Elogium XX. As he withdraws into the desert there follow him Ambrogio Piccolomini and Patrizio de' Patrizi, most excellent alike in religion and in blood.

[22] although they narrate briefly Elogium XXI. He changes the name of John into Bernard. Elogium XXII. Half-clad in a torn sack, almost naked, he dwells in the desert. Elogium XXIII. Bernard's little cell, built of trees in the desert, evil demons straightway overthrow. Elogium XXIV. He inhabits a cave dug out by himself. Elogium XXV. The cave which he inhabits is dreadful in the likeness of a burial-place with the remains of human bodies. Elogium XXVI. He takes the archangel Michael as his patron, to whom he vows a perpetual and most severe fast every week. Elogium XXVII. Being never again to taste wine, he cuts down all the vines of Accona. Elogium XXVIII. A perpetual and most severe fast being imposed upon himself, he eats bread only twice in the week. Elogium XXIX. He puts on a rough hair-shirt, and girds himself with an iron chain. Elogium XXX. He weeps abundantly and most bitterly.

[23] the Blessed's various exercises in the desert, Elogium XXXI. Seven times a day he makes himself bloody with a dreadful scourge. Elogium XXXII. What time remains over from religious cares he spends in the cultivation of the earth. Elogium XXXIII. A circumspect guardian of his own chastity, he avoids the sight of all women. Elogium XXXIV. Scarcely two hours being allowed to necessary rest, he passes sleepless nights. Elogium XXXV. Every Friday he spends whole nights, watchful, in fervent meditations on the suffering God. Elogium XXXVI. He most religiously keeps an unbroken silence. Elogium XXXVII. He pursues the Virgin Mother of God with tender love. Elogium XXXVIII. To him, as he gives himself to sacred reading, the Virgin Mother of God often unravels the difficulties of the sacred Scriptures. Elogium XXXIX. Spirits of hell, having taken on the appearance of Ambrogio and Patrizio, and urging Bernard to depart from the desert, are detected by him through God's help and put to flight. Elogium XL. Ambrogio and Patrizio, at the devil's suggestion preparing a departure from the desert, being encompassed with a prodigious mist, and wandering about in vain and finding no way out from Accona, are marvelously detained there by Bernard's prayer.

[24] the temptations of the demons, Elogium XLI. Dishes and cups infected with poison, sent as a gift by the Guelfs with feigned piety, Bernard, the fraud being known by God's revealing, straightway purges visibly of the poison by the sign of the cross. Elogium XLII. Being gravely wounded by an evil demon on the day sacred to the slaughter of the Holy Innocents, he is prodigiously healed and restored by Christ Crucified appearing to him. Elogium XLIII. As he fervently meditates on the torments of the Redeemer, the devil threatens that he will give him as many beatings as Christ Jesus suffered at the column. Elogium XLIV. Satan, having taken on the appearance of a shameless woman, and soliciting Bernard to impure loves, is put to flight by the sign of the cross. Elogium XLV. To repress the motions of concupiscence, he rolls himself among thorns. Elogium XLVI. Bernard's sacred glory draws many from all Italy into the desert. Elogium XLVII. There is shown to Bernard a silver ladder reaching even to heaven, at whose summit are Jesus and the Virgin Mother, with very many in white raiment ascending by it. Elogium XLVIII. Envy barking, he is denounced with his companions to the supreme Pontiff John XXII as suspected of heresy, by whom Bernard and Ambrogio, being summoned to clear themselves of the calumny, set out for Avignon in Gaul. Elogium XLIX. As he sets out for Avignon, angels often meet him as guides on the way. Elogium L. As he hungers on the journey, angels supply him with bread.

[25] his virtues; Elogium LI. Satan, having taken the form of a religious anchorite, meeting Bernard, perfidiously suggests that, despising the commands of the supreme Pontiff, he should return to Accona; and being detected and derided by him, is put to flight. Elogium LII. The supreme Pontiff, having at once perceived Bernard's innocence and admired his sanctity, receives him honorably, loads him with favors, and sends him away into the Etruscan desert. Elogium LIII. Bernard, returning into Italy, is received in hospitality at Turin by a noble man, whose servant, meaning perfidiously at the devil's suggestion to lay upon Bernard a theft committed by himself, hides a silver dish in his wallet; and by that evidence Bernard is arraigned as guilty of manifest theft and consigned to prison, and, pardon having first been obtained for the thieving servant, discloses the thief and the theft, which had been revealed to him from heaven. Elogium LIV. While he was being held in chains, accused of theft, he had angels as comforters in the prison. Elogium LV. Bernard's noble host, bound by this marvelous charity of his and by the marvelous holiness of his life, having distributed all his goods to the poor, follows him into the desert. Elogium LVI. At Vercelli he frees by his look alone a woman possessed by an evil spirit. Elogium LVII. Returning into the desert, he founds the Congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto, the Virgin Mother of God herself furnishing from heaven the white garment and the insignia of the new Congregation, namely three mountains with a purple cross, in the middle between two branches of a green olive. Elogium LVIII. The Virgin Mother of God furnishes Bernard from heaven the rule of the holy Father Benedict, which he is to set before his new Congregation to be observed. Elogium LIX. Refusing with admirable lowliness the supreme headship of his Congregation, at length after a long struggle he is set over it as abbot general, though unwilling. Elogium LX. In Bernard's supreme governance, supreme modesty.

[26] Elogium LXI. Causing by a singular lowliness a weakness of the eyes, revelations, that he may lay down the prelacy committed to him, he cannot obtain this from his loving sons; but is confirmed in it perpetually, as long as he lives. Elogium LXII. Bernard's new Congregation, endowed with frequent monasteries, is straightway propagated throughout all Italy. Elogium LXIII. While Bernard was building the celebrated church and monastery of Monte Oliveto in the desert of Accona, the specters of hell, taking on the form of Ethiopians, and overthrowing by night what had been built by day, are put to flight by the archangel Michael at Bernard's prayers. Elogium LXIV. Stefano da Lugano, a mason, killed by a fatal accident among the ruins of the church, he marvelously recalls to life by the mere touch of his breast. Elogium LXV. A huge quantity of gold, found by a diabolical illusion in the foundations of the new monastery, straightway vanishes when Bernard signs it with the sign of the cross. Elogium LXVI. He is often seen, while praying, rapt in ecstasy and carried into heaven with his whole body. Elogium LXVII. On the Friday of Holy Week, beside an image of Jesus Crucified, more ardently

praying, he was seen, caught up in body, to cling for a long while to the cross. Elogium LXVIII. On the same day Jesus crucified lovingly converses with Bernard. Elogium LXIX. Many hidden and future things are revealed to Bernard by Christ crucified. Elogium LXX. Being enlightened from heaven, he knows the secrets of hearts, and, revealing hidden thoughts, recalls many to the way of salvation.

[27] Elogium LXXI. He is enlightened with the gift of prophecy. Elogium LXXII. miracles, He miraculously heals Brother Marino of Paris, who was lame with an incurable disease. Elogium LXXIII. He prodigiously cures Brother Pacifico, who had been mortally wounded. Elogium LXXIV. Bernard's garments alone marvelously heal those sick with fever. Elogium LXXV. He commands a quartan fever to depart from a Brother whose name was Bono, and straightway the fever leaves him. Elogium LXXVI. Being sent by the supreme Pontiff John XXII to Sutri, to reconcile the minds of the peoples seething with civil discords, he at once calms the tumults. Elogium LXXVII. While Bernard was proceeding to Sutri at the supreme Pontiff's command, he is received in hospitality at Bolsena by a pious woman, who, by the art of an evil demon inflamed with impure love of him, attacked him as he slept at night, and is put to flight by him, who with a wholly chaste stratagem straightway cried out that a thief was upon him. Elogium LXXVIII. The impure woman being put to flight, in order to calm the motions of concupiscence, he makes himself bloody with a dreadful scourge. Elogium LXXIX. At Sutri he straightway frees from blindness a certain Romulus, blind from earliest infancy, the aid of the Mother of God being implored. Elogium LXXX. Spirits of hell, feigning the appearance of noble grandees, meaning to tempt Bernard with ambition and offering him the chief dignities of the world, are straightway recognized by him and derided.

[28] and some singular deeds, Elogium LXXXI. Being gravely wounded by the devil whom he had despised, he is healed by the archangel Michael. Elogium LXXXII. He is made certain of eternal blessedness by the Virgin Mother of God. Elogium LXXXIII. He foretells the pestilential plague which in the year of the Lord 1348 most disastrously devastated all Italy. Elogium LXXXIV. His country languishing in the common contagion, he hastens from the desert with his companions to bring aid to the languishing sick. Elogium LXXXV. As Bernard had foretold, eighty of his sons, while they aid the sick, fall as victims of charity. Elogium LXXXVI. By the divine Benedict the twentieth day of August is announced beforehand to Bernard as the day of his near death. Elogium LXXXVII. On the day sacred to the Assumption of the glorious Virgin, the triumph of her assumption into heaven is shown to Bernard. Elogium LXXXVIII. While with most fervent charity he helps the sick, he contracts a deadly infection. Elogium LXXXIX. About to die, he exults and smiles most sweetly. Elogium XC. In the seventy-sixth year of his age, on the twentieth day of August, in the year of the Lord 1348, he dies most holily, Christ Jesus, the Virgin Mother, and with the heavenly host the archangel Michael standing by him as he dies.

[29] which are not found in the other Acts. Elogium XCI. About the sacred corpse a heavenly melody was heard, and his most blessed soul was seen crowned by Christ Jesus and the Virgin Mother with a double diadem, and robed in white raiment in the guise of one triumphing, ascending into heaven between the divine Benedict and Bernard with the heavenly host. Elogium XCII. Being dead, he is mourned by all Etruria, and there is a concourse of peoples to his bier. Elogium XCIII. His sacred corpse breathes forth a most sweet fragrance. Elogium XCIV. By the touch of the sacred body very many stricken by the contagious plague are marvelously cured, among whom chiefly the Brothers Girolamo of Naples, Cristoforo of Bologna, Gregorio of Pavia, and Rainerio of Rome. Elogium XCV. The withered hand of Antonio Ghini of Siena is healed by the touch of the sacred body. Elogium XCVI. Giovanna of Buonconvento, possessed, being girded with Bernard's girdle, is freed from the invading spirit. Elogium XCVII. The woman Faustina of Monte San Savino is freed at Bernard's bier from an incurable flow of blood. Elogium XCVIII. Domenica Griffoli of Monterone, suffering from an incurable dropsy, is restored to health at Bernard's bier. Elogium XCIX. Bernard's sacred body has not yet been able to be found, which is believed to have come about because the humble Servant asked this of the Lord as he was dying. Elogium C. By the supreme Pontiff Innocent X, on account of his immemorial cultus, it is decreed that Bernard be venerated as Blessed, in the year of salvation 1644. Elogium CI. By Clement X, supreme Pontiff, he is admitted to the altars and adorned with public cultus in the year 1673. Elogium CII. The author's peroration to blessed Bernard his kinsman, and the conclusion of the work. In these titles of the elogia some things are narrated which will not be found in the Acts to be published below. It is not easy to say how much authority those things have which are expressed here and passed over elsewhere, since Germanico Ptolomei cites no witness for his assertions. The same author subjoins to these elogia seventeen odes, one of which we shall report in the following paragraph.

§ III. Certain matters are discussed which regard the Life, the miracles, and the bodily form of the Blessed.

Among other things the authors dispute, Our Blessed had a father named Mino Ptolomei, as all the biographers agree. Hence Gabriel Bucelin must be corrected, who in the Benedictine Menology at the XXII day of August wrongly writes thus: At Siena in Tuscany, the deposition of St. Bernard Tolomei, abbot and first founder of the monks of the Order of St. Mary Mother of God of Monte Oliveto. Bernard, sprung at Siena from the exceedingly famous and illustrious family of the Tolomei, son of John, grandson of Mino, was himself also first called John at baptism. You see that here Bucelin has erred, and has rashly invented Mino as grandfather from the father of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, whereas on the contrary the Blessed's maternal grandfather was named John, as Gregorio Lombardelli in the Italian Life, book 1, chapter 1, affirms. Carpentiero follows this opinion of Lombardelli, when in book 1 of the Life, chapter 3, page 21, he hands down this concerning his first name: The little infant being born, truly a son of prayer and of vow, is washed with the sacred water of baptism, and cleansed, the Holy Spirit breathing its healthful breeze, from the original stain; and he is first called John: for this name his mother Fulvia prays and obtains for her newborn, from the memory of her own father, already dead. Then this Latin biographer in the same place advises for what cause the Blessed afterwards took the name of Bernard.

[31] But among the authors it is disputed at what time that name of John was changed into another: at what time the Blessed changed his name, for Lancellotti in book 1 of the Olivetan History thinks that the name of Bernard was imposed upon this Blessed by the bishop of Arezzo, when he gave him the white habit and prescribed for him the rule of St. Benedict, as abbot Oraffi in book 1 of the Italian Life, chapter 8, testifies. Nevertheless other writers of the Life contend that this Blessed at the beginning of his conversion took the name of Bernard of his own accord, that he might so much the more fervently imitate St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux. Germanico Ptolomei, praised above, in Elogium XXI ingeniously declares this in these words: Being about to withdraw from the world by which he had been perfidiously received, he shook off not merely dust, but, lighter than dust itself, even his name; being now to be initiated into a new and loftier teaching, he unlearns the very first names of his first years; and, about to speak in a purer idiom, he renews even the elements of his words. Being about to reform himself, he begins with his very name; and, that he may be wholly unleavened, he purges away the old leaven even of the lightest word. The sacred Orpheus of the woods, being about to tune well his harmonious ten-stringed instrument, seeking musical modes, approves not one note from the ill-tuned choir of a discordant age. The name of John, however much it sounds of grace, still sounds ungrateful; either because it echoed the old man in new ears, or because the infant anachoresis of the anchorite of like name struck a holy shame into a man of forty. He puts on Bernard's manners together with the name so completely that you might suspect that the ascetic of Clairvaux had passed by a comely metempsychosis into the ascetic of Accona, were it not that in the new Bernard there is already that which the Gallic anachoresis might envy the Etruscan. Lombardelli, Oraffi, and other writers also think that this change of name was made at the beginning of his conversion or of his anchoritic life.

[32] by whom poison was offered him, Among the biographers there arises another controversy of less moment on the occasion of the poison which was offered to Bl. Bernard Ptolomei when he was already a hermit. Carpentiero in book 2, chapter 5, imputes that crime to the faction of the Ghibellines in this manner: Certain of the followers, or rather of the dire furies, of the Ghibellines, envying Bernard's glory, most celebrated everywhere for the fame of his sanctity, and the new luster of the name of the Ptolomei, contrive to destroy Bernard (nothing being more august than sanctity, nothing more apt for making eternal the memory of a family). And what war does a naked, unarmed man prepare for you? What dread, what terror is to be expected from a dweller in the desert? There was at hand the most joyful day of the rising Godhead, on which our Savior, death being subdued, took up again his triumphal body. On so festal a light of life the Ghibellines, sons of death, determine to bring death upon our Father, thinking that the rest also would leave the desert, Bernard their chief being removed. They appoint a crafty servant, versed in all cunning, to carry poisoned dishes into the desert, etc. But our anonymous collector attributes those wicked snares to the opposite faction of the Guelfs, and therefore had noted in the margin at that narration the following: From Oraffi in the Life of Bl. Bernard, book 1, chapter 14, the Sienese family of the Ptolomei adhered to the party of the Emperor and of the Ghibellines, according to the manner of that most harsh season. Lombardelli supports Oraffi in book 2, chapter 14. Carpentiero is accordingly to be corrected, when he writes that the poison was designed by the Ghibellines and not rather by the Guelfs. But from whatever quarter this deadly poison was brought, it suffices us, for declaring the sanctity of the harmless Man, that it was known and detected by him through God's revealing.

[33] whether he himself went to Avignon It is also disputed among the writers of the Acts whether Bl. Bernard Ptolomei himself departed from Etruria to Avignon, or whether he sent certain of his companions thither in his stead, to refute before the Pontiff John XXII the calumny of heresy laid upon him. Very many judge that the Blessed himself betook himself thither, to set forth his sound doctrine to the Pontiff. Certainly Carpentiero in book 2 of the Life, chapter 10, confidently asserts this in these words: John XXII therefore, the supreme Pontiff, summons our Bernard to Avignon to plead his cause; and he, no delay being interposed, hastens from the desert of Etruria to the feet of the supreme Shepherd, like a most obedient little sheep, having taken to himself from the same desert of Accona, as companion and comrade, Ambrogio Piccolomini. Others, however, with Lancellotti think that the Blessed committed that business to his companions. Lancellotti in this matter was followed by Hippolyte Helyot, when in his French Work on the Religious and Military Orders, volume 6, page 193, he affirms that Bl. Bernard Ptolomei sent two of his companions to Avignon, to make known to the Pontiff the orthodox sentiments of his mind concerning the Catholic faith. Abbot Oraffi in the Italian Life, book 1, chapter 19, says that this erroneous opinion arose from a certain interpolated manuscript which is preserved in the library of Monte Oliveto, and to which no author's name is prefixed.

[34] Whatever be the case with the origin of that opinion, Carpentiero in the place just cited assails it with these arguments: to the Pontiff John XXII, I know that it is affirmed by some that it was not Bernard, but companions sent by him, who went to the supreme Pontiff. We, however, relying on firmer records, assert that Bernard himself without doubt went; and we follow what the most learned and most trustworthy Giovanni Battista of Populonia wrote

of the Order of Preachers, whom Gregorio Lombardelli of the same family followed, master of sacred theology, a most celebrated man and inquisitor of the holy Office in the whole dominion of Siena. But Giovanni Battista of Populonia was a contemporary of blessed Bernard, and a most keen eyewitness, and by the duty of that same holy Office a most searching examiner of our Father's life and manners. There is added that under the same stricter discipline of our Father Bernard was his brother, whose name was Guglielmo.

[35] Nor is it likely that Bernard, being arraigned as the head of a new sect and summoned by the most blessed Father, would have appointed others in his stead, as members of the desert. or whether he sent his companions thither in his stead, Nor is it established that the Man was hindered by any grave concern, or held back by feeble strength, or made unfit for the journey by increasing age. Add that in dispelling the charges brought against him at the Pontifical throne he had no need of another's ministry and labor. But as to what is asserted — that his departure would grieve those who remained in the desert, bereft of so great a Parent; or that, like sheep with the shepherd absent, they would lie more widely open to the snares of the wolves, the demons — why, in the desert there were not lacking men notable both for prudence and for probity, whom Bernard might appoint in his own place. Nor was his departure to be everlasting, so that, his return being despaired of, the desert should be in peril.

[36] These men insist that men wise in every respect and conspicuous for integrity of life were sent by Bernard to Avignon to address the supreme Pontiff. But to what end, if he could perform everything by himself, ought he to have used the labor of others? They will object, lest Accona should be without a governor. But it is plain that the humble and wise Bernard rejected governance, and to be called leader; but he wished that charity alone should be the leader of all. Finally, as we shall say, when the desert had received the rule of St. Benedict from the most blessed Virgin through Guido Pietramala, it is established that the first abbot general was (Bernard refusing that dignity) Patrizio de' Patrizi; and this election was of all the dwellers in the desert or cenobites, from which it clearly appears that blessed Bernard, ever consistent with himself, was unwilling to rule others in the desert. Why therefore should he appoint others for journeys and for the performing of other weighty duties, for those things which by a special right pertained to him, and which also argued the greatest authority? Finally, because our Father performed on this journey to Gaul many things also worthy of much admiration, which are recorded in the same records, by which without doubt we must stand. For the prudent admission of this opinion of Carpentiero the testimony of Giovanni Battista of Populonia alone suffices, if it be evidently established concerning him. Was Lancellotti, then, historian of the Olivetan Order, ignorant of those ancient records? Those, therefore, will be able to decide this dispute who have at hand the genuine lucubration of Giovanni Battista the Dominican.

[37] and on what day he died. Finally, among the biographers and Menologists some difference occurs concerning the day on which Bl. Bernard Ptolomei passed to the heavenly citizens: for Lombardelli, Oraffi, and others assign the twentieth day of August to his death. The Sienese Fasti on that day have this concerning his death: From this victory the heavenly Queen, the Mother of God, announces a triumph decreed in heaven; but the divine lawgiver Benedict proclaims the triumphal day. Therefore, after a short two days' warlike lying-abed, the triumpher flew away into heaven, on the thirteenth of the Kalends of September; so that you might think it fated that on the same day the twin Bernards, of Clairvaux and of Siena, should triumph. These Germanico Ptolomei follows, who in the ninetieth Elogium expresses his day of death expressly and carefully in these words: The day which had snatched away the Gallic Bernard, the same snatches away the Etruscan; lest even death should divide those whom a life so concordant had joined. But from the Acts of St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux, given above, it is clear that he died on the XX day of August. Nevertheless Wion, Menard, Bucelin, and other Benedictine Menologists place the death of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei on the eleventh of the Kalends of September, that is, on the XXII day of August. But it must be that these were ignorant of, or rejected, the prediction of their holy Father Benedict, who, appearing to our Blessed, announced beforehand that he would die on the XX day of August, as the Olivetan writers commonly hand down. But no reason moves us to deny that apparition and prediction of St. Benedict, or to say that it was false in determining the time of his death. Wherefore with the Olivetan biographers and other writers we are of opinion that Bl. Bernard Ptolomei departed from among the living on the XX day of August, although we have deferred his yearly feast, with the decree of the Apostolic See and the Roman Martyrology, to the following day.

[38] A recent miracle or benefit of the Blessed The Acts having been discussed as far as may be, something must be said of the miracles which the Blessed wrought by his intercession after his death. Some of these Carpentiero in book 5, chapter 7 and following, reports from Lombardelli, which same our anonymous collector will briefly narrate in the Life to be published below at number 55. To those older miracles we here add a more recent benefit which Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, being invoked, bestowed upon his kinsman Germanico Ptolomei, who after a fatal fall from a two-wheeled carriage marvelously recovered, and in Ode XII gives thanks for the benefit conferred in these verses:

While of late, swift with flying wheel, I am rolled headlong, thou, holy one, Rulest the mass heavy with ruin, and snatchest The falling man from the pit.

We live through thee. With mighty finger Restraining hurrying Lachesis' weary Threads, thou drawest them out, and soothest The wound with healing olive.

Arbiter of life, and tamer of death, Readily thou refashionest nature's laws: Thou bridlest Styx, and mercifully breakest The brazen stars.

To thee I dedicate these breaths, restored And living again, and the added years. Do thou Preserve, cleansed of stains, the new gifts Of a prolonged light.

[39] is reported from Germanico Ptolomei, That Germanico Ptolomei seems often to have experienced the aid of this same Blessed, or at least to have implored his patronage with great confidence, as is gathered from the following Odes, of which we here set forth only the titles. Ode XIII: A vow to Bl. Bernard by the author suffering from a dire pain in the sides. Ode XIV: A vow to Bl. Bernard by the author almost sinking into consumption from a dire flux of phlegm. Ode XV: A vow of the author suffering from a grave and most troublesome deafness. Ode XVI: A vow of the author to blessed Bernard, while the most eminent lord Cardinal Celio Piccolomini, archbishop of Siena, his most loving lord, lay sick with a long and grave tertian fever. We do not know whether the author was always freed from the aforesaid diseases after the vows were made. Nor has he indicated to us whether the most eminent Celio Piccolomini recovered at once or marvelously from the tertian fever. But everywhere at least he shows that he places great hope in the patronage of this blessed Kinsman of his, and therefore in the last Ode congratulates the most noble youths of the seminary of the Ptolomei, lately erected at Siena, that they have taken Bl. Bernard as their patron.

[40] Finally we shall now briefly examine the bodily form of Bl. Bernard Ptolomei, and his bodily form, from a certain image concerning which Carpentiero in book 4, chapter 9, begins to discourse thus: The likeness of our blessed founder Bernard can be gathered from those older paintings which represent him, as in the cathedral church of Siena, where among the other Saints and patrons of that city the blessed Father is beheld honored with the insignia of sanctity. Likewise in the chief monastery of the Olivetan Order. Likewise in the most ancient precincts or chapels of the divine Bernard at Arezzo, and commonly in other places. There are also very many images of him circulated, struck from types. Our predecessors (we do not know whence) received a twofold image of this Blessed engraved on copper. One represents Bl. Bernard Ptolomei praying in the desert with tearful eyes. But that face does not sufficiently agree with the description of his form which we shall presently report. Wherefore we have preferred to it the other image, in which the Blessed is displayed before the Mother of God and the little child Jesus, holding in his hands a book and the insignia of his Order, and we have ordered our engraver to imitate it. Behold it here.

[41] Now let the curious reader judge whether this figure does not come near enough to the graphic portrayal of the Blessed and by the pen of his biographer Carpentiero is represented. which Carpentiero, after the words just reported, describes in this manner: He was of tall and well-knit stature, of a comely and large face, and, in proportion, somewhat oblong, and wrinkled from old age, of a somewhat dark pale color, the skin clinging to the bone. He had a forehead adorned with baldness, a broad brow, a somewhat long nose, black eyes and almost always tearful, a moderate mouth, lips somewhat drawn, a broad neck. The Sienese Fasti agree with this description, and from the form of his body at the same time delineate the Blessed's mind in these words: It is well in the last place to paint with the pen the appearance of the body, namely the image of the mind. His stature was tall, and, like his mind, erect toward heaven; compact also and firm, such as might shadow forth the firmness of virtue. His countenance moreover large, and oblong toward a manly gravity, showing a dusky pallor from his afflictions. His brow, against the snares of fortune, bald and broad — equal, that is, to vast affairs — and wrinkled with pious cares. His eyes dark, and more prudently tearful than Heraclitus's. His nose comely drawn out as a mark of judgment, and his mouth moderately narrow toward a sparingness of words. Thus even in the outermost lineaments the inmost sanctity was read. It now only remains that in the following paragraph we give notice of the Olivetan Order, which our Blessed founded.

§ IV. The origin, progress, and privileges of the Olivetan Congregation.

Bonanni briefly sets forth the beginning of the Olivetan Congregation; Our Filippo Bonanni, in the Catalogue of the Religious Orders, chapter 126, furnishes a brief notice of the Olivetan Order in these words: Blessed Bernard, before called John, born at Siena of the noble family of the Ptolomei, from his earliest age given to studies, applied himself to the laws, which, being made a doctor, he publicly expounded. But when he had fallen into a grave sickness of the eyes, he prayed the most holy Virgin that she would deign to restore health to him, promising that, leaving the world, he would devote himself perpetually to her service. Having obtained his wish, mindful of his promise, having delivered a public discourse on the vanity of the world, and clothed in a rough garment, he betook himself to Monte Oliveto near Montalcino, whom Patrizio of the Patrizi family and Ambrogio Piccolomini, both noble Sienese, followed. There he laid the foundations of the Order, his resources being dedicated to it, and, leading a harsh life, he saw a ladder reaching to heaven, by which angels were leading monks clothed in white color to Christ and the blessed Virgin.

[43] But when John XXI (others reckon him the XXII of that name), the supreme Pontiff, living at Avignon, had learned the manner of their life, he commanded Guido, bishop of Arezzo, to prescribe them a rule and approve the fellowship. Then there appeared to Guido in a dream the blessed Virgin clothed in white garments, and commended that congregation; for which cause he clothed them amid the solemnities of Mass in the white habit of monks on the XXI day of May (Carpentiero in book 2, chapter 15, and the Acts to be published below at number 22 hand down that this happened on the seventh day before the Kalends of April) in the year 1319, and gave them the rule of St. Benedict to be observed, imposing the name of the congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto. This Gregory XI in the year 1371 approved by Apostolic authority, and thereafter, monasteries having been built in various places,

it was propagated. At Rome it has a monastery at the basilica called St. Mary the New in the Forum Boarium, in which the body of St. Frances of Rome rests. The garment is white, with a hood gathered above the shoulders.

[44] The praised Bonanni, in the second part of the same Work, but he confesses that he does not know the time which contains the virgins dedicated to God, in chapter 80 makes brief mention thus of the nuns of the Olivetan Congregation: Constitutions conformable to the rule of St. Benedict are observed both by the men and by the virgins ascribed to the same Olivetan Congregation, and they are clothed in a like white garment as the monks. But at what time their first convent was erected I have not been able to find in any author. Father Secondo Lancellotti, in the Olivetan History, book 2, chapter 25, narrates that Bl. Jordanus, abbot General, about the year 1359 built two monasteries at Padua, namely of virgins and of monks, joined together; nor does he record an older one built. These nuns use a white cowl, as also a tunic: they adorn their head with a double veil, like the rest.

[45] Hippolyte Helyot, in his Work on the Religious and Military Orders, volume 6, page 203, observes on these words of Bonanni at which nuns were first joined to the Order. that among the abbots general of the Olivetan Order the name of Jordanus is not found, but that in the year 1359 Silvius of Florence presided over this Congregation for twelve years until the year 1369, when Rainerius of Siena succeeded him. Further, he asserts that the first nun of this Order was the venerable Francesca Lephanta of Palermo, who had previously lived under the rule of St. Clare. And when in the year 1515 she had built a monastery, she passed over with certain companions to the Olivetan institute, licence having been obtained from Pope Leo X, who created her perpetual abbess of that same monastery, where she died in the repute of sanctity. Our anonymous collector of the Acts makes mention of this venerable Francesca, and below at number 67 surnames her Leophanta. But at whatever time the nuns of the Olivetan Order first arose — concerning which we cannot pass a certain judgment — a monastery of theirs exists at Bitonto in the kingdom of Naples, as the praised Helyot affirms in the same place. Now we shall confirm by authentic documents or diplomas the first institution, progress, and prerogatives of the Olivetan monks, which our Bonanni set forth in passing.

[46] In order of time the first diploma concerning the Olivetan Congregation occurs in Ughelli's Italia sacra, of the latest Venetian edition, volume 1, columns 425 and 426, Guido Pietramala, where Vido or Guido, prelate of Arezzo, surnamed Pietramala, has the following: Guido, by divine mercy bishop of Arezzo, to the noble and discreet men Bernard, son of the late Lord Mino de' Ptolomei, and Patrizio, son of the late Francesco de' Patrizi of Siena, beloved by us, everlasting salvation in the Lord. The power of God, proceeding from on high, illumines the hearts of those whom he has chosen, and heavenly grace, leading their minds to works of charity, daily raises them up in virtues; and that the elect may the more quietly persist in the contemplation of him who has chosen them, they dedicate themselves to God, and set forth and offer their goods to the service of Jesus Christ, so that upon these things thus set forth and bestowed churches may be built, the divine mysteries celebrated, and the very Body of Christ, delivered to the passion for the redemption of the human race, may be offered by Catholic priests at the altar with the appointed prayers.

[47] bishop of Arezzo, We have indeed learned, Bernard and Patrizio \, our beloved, that you have hitherto so toiled in works of charity, so laudably persisted in a purpose of penance, that, inflamed by divine grace, you have in our presence and before the Chapter of the cathedral church of Arezzo bestowed your estates of Accona and Melanino upon God and the glorious Virgin \, in whose honor a monastery may be built at Accona under the rule of blessed Benedict and with monastic observance, and in it the divine mysteries celebrated to their praise, and for the salvation and profit of your souls and of the Christian faithful; humbly requesting that we should commit our office to certain discreet men concerning the dedication of your persons and of your companions, which you have this day resolved to make to God and to blessed Mary his Mother under the aforesaid rule in the above-said monastery, and concerning the blessing of the white garments which you intend to wear, and concerning the clothing of you in them according to the accustomed manner of monks, and also concerning the viewing and appointing at Accona of the place more suitable for the monastery to be built there, and concerning the fixing of a cross in it, the pronouncing of a blessing or prayer, and the laying of the foundation stone to be blessed by us: moreover, that we should deign to grant the exemptions of that monastery and the other things contained in your petition by our privilege with the assent of our Chapter.

[48] to Bl. Bernard Ptolomei and his companions; But we, considering the merits of your uprightness, and that from your past works you carry off worthily the marks of praise; considering that from your dedication and the erection of the monastery the Church of God will be exalted, divine worship will be increased, and Christ himself and his Mother will be praised manifoldly on the strings and instruments of very many, have of certain knowledge judged that your petition should be admitted, and, with the consent of the aforesaid Chapter here present, we approve as fully as may avail the things contained in that petition, and by the present privilege we grant and bestow them. And that the things sought by you and contained in your petition may continually be more fully made plain to the faithful, and that our grant and bestowal of the things sought may be more clearly known to all, we command that they be described in this present privilege: for we commit our office and authority to the religious and discreet man Don Giovanni, monk of the abbey of Sasso of our diocese, now residing in our cathedral church at the altar built in that church by Cione …, that he receive in our stead the dedication which you aforesaid Bernard, Patrizio, and Ambrogio wish to make to God and to blessed Mary of Oliveto at Accona, in the monastery to be built there under the rule of blessed Benedict, and in the monastic habit and observance, and that he bless the white garments which you wish to wear, and clothe you in them. Likewise we commit our office and authority to the discreet man, the priest Restauro, chaplain of the church of Morello, and now dwelling at the house of the fraternity of the most holy Trinity of Arezzo, that he go to the estate of Accona, and mark out in it the place more suitable for the monastery to be built, fix a cross there, bless it with the prayer customary in these matters, and lay there the foundation stone to be blessed.

[49] he assigns the first site of the monastery, We grant moreover by the authority of this privilege, and bestow with the assent of the above-said Chapter, that in the aforesaid place of Accona of our diocese, situated in the county of Siena, in the parish of St. Angelo de Luco, in the pleban district \ of the plebs of Salto of the above-said diocese, a monastery be erected with a bell-tower and bells in honor of the glorious Virgin under the rule of blessed Benedict and monastic observance, and that it be called the monastery of St. Mary of Oliveto at Accona, as was requested. Likewise that the place or the monastery itself be ruled and governed by an abbot only in perpetuity, and never by laymen or secular clerics, but always by abbots and monks who shall remain there under the rule of blessed Benedict. Let it be kept, and let monastic observance flourish therein. Likewise, that the abbot, monks, Conversi, and other members of the household who shall be there from time to time may the more freely and quietly serve the Lord in that monastery, we make that monastery free and exempt from all payment of tithes, from cathedraticum, from taxes, levies, imposts \, and other occurring burdens and services whatsoever, and from all law of jurisdiction and of the diocesan; decreeing and commanding that they, or that monastery, be in no way at any time molested in the aforesaid matters or in any of them; the confirmation of the abbots of the said monastery, the visitation and confirmation of it and of those dwelling in it, being reserved to us alone and to our Catholic successors.

[50] Likewise, that at that monastery there be and may be a cemetery, and grants various privileges, where and in which may be buried the abbots, monks, Conversi, and all the household of the above-said monastery. Likewise, for the enlargement of the liberty of that monastery, that the abbot now to be elected in it, and whoever shall be there from time to time, by himself or by another to whom he shall commit his office, may and may be permitted to hear the confessions of the monks, Conversi, and all the household of the said monastery, and to impose upon them for their offenses a salutary penance, to correct and absolve them all and singular, as shall be fitting. Likewise, that the abbot and monks of the aforesaid monastery may make in it constitutions in those matters which pertain to that monastery, such as they shall provide to be useful and exempt for it. Likewise, that the abbot who shall be from time to time in the above-said monastery may and may be permitted to confess to whatever priest he shall wish, and to receive all the Sacraments and absolution from him: and orders from a Catholic bishop whom he shall judge fit to choose for this — that is, let it be lawful, and let the monks, Conversi, and household who shall be there from time to time be able to do so, yet by licence of the abbot of the above-said monastery.

[51] But the aforesaid things granted and bestowed by us, and each of them, we wish to be valid and to hold without prejudice to another's right: without prejudice to another's right, for by them we neither wish nor intend that prejudice be created for anyone; adding that the abbot, monks, Conversi, and household of the aforesaid monastery may not and ought not to receive the parishioners of other churches to divine offices, or to confer ecclesiastical things upon them, without the express licence of the rector of that church of which they were parishioners who should wish to hear the aforesaid things or to receive them from the same. In testimony whereof we have commanded the present privilege to be written by Guadagno, scribe of our chamber, and to be marked with the security of our pendent seal. Given and done in the city of Arezzo in the hall of the episcopal palace, in the year of the Lord from the Nativity 1319, in the second Indiction, in the time of our most holy Lord John XXII, on Monday of the month of March, in the presence of Bertoldo Masci of Pietramala. I, Guadagno, etc.

[52] which John XXII confirmed, Then the Pontiff John XXII in the year of Christ 1324 took the Olivetan Congregation into the clientage of the Apostolic See, as is clear from his special Constitution, which in Laerzio Cherubini, in the Appendix to volume three of the Roman Bullarium, page 14 and the following, runs thus: John, bishop, servant of the servants of God. To our beloved sons the abbot and Convent of the monastery of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto at Accona, of the Order of St. Benedict, of the diocese of Arezzo, greeting and Apostolic benediction. When there is asked of us that which is just and honorable, both the force of equity and the order of reason requires that it be brought to its due effect by the solicitude of our office. Wherefore, beloved sons in the Lord, concurring with grateful assent in your just requests, your persons and the place in which you are devoted to the divine service, with all the goods which at present you reasonably possess, or in the future by just means, the Lord granting, you may be able

to acquire, we take under the protection of blessed Peter and our own; and especially the tithes, granges, courts, lands, vineyards, houses, meadows, woods, possessions, and your other goods, just as you justly and peacefully possess them all, we confirm by Apostolic authority to you and through you to your monastery, and fortify them with the patronage of the present writing, saving in the aforesaid tithes the moderation of the general council. Let it therefore be lawful to no man at all to infringe this page of our protection and confirmation, or with rash daring to go against it. But if anyone shall presume to attempt this, let him know that he will incur the indignation of almighty God and of his blessed Apostles Peter and Paul. Given at Avignon on the XVI of the Kalends of June, in the eighth year of our Pontificate.

[53] and Clement VI increased, Further, the Pontiff Clement VI in the year of Christ 1344 permitted that same Congregation to be increased, and granted it various privileges, as is plain from that Pontiff's constitution, which in volume 1 of the cited Roman Bullarium, pages 212 and 213, we read in this manner: Clement, bishop, servant of the servants of God. To our beloved sons the abbot and Convent of the monastery of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto at Accona, of the Order of St. Benedict, of the diocese of Arezzo, greeting and Apostolic benediction. The office of pastoral solicitude, which over all the churches and monasteries of the world we bear, though unworthy, by divine disposition, urges and stirs our mind that we should attend to the advantages of all the faithful, and especially of regular persons, who, worldly enticements being banished, have perpetually surrendered themselves to divine service under the observance of a stricter life; and that in those things which concern divine worship, the salvation of souls, and the increase of religion we should cherish them with the protection of Apostolic favor.

[54] who permitted this Congregation to be endowed with new monasteries A petition lately presented to us by you contained that certain of Christ's faithful, bearing a special affection of devotion toward your monastery, and desiring that that monastery be enlarged to the praise of the divine name, for the salvation of their souls have with provident liberality given to you and to your monastery certain houses, lands, possessions, places, and other goods belonging to them, and have bestowed them with this intention: that in the same houses, lands, possessions, and places Priories and Oratories with the necessary offices be built and newly founded for the use of the persons of the said monastery, and that these, when built and founded, be subject to your said monastery as members to a head, and that in them, so built and founded, Priors, monks, Conversi, and household be appointed, placed, and deputed by thee, son abbot, and by thy successors, the abbots who shall be from time to time, of the above-said monastery; and that very many others of Christ's faithful would willingly make like donations and grants to you for like uses, as you believe, if you had from the Apostolic See authority, licence, and faculty in these matters. Wherefore you have humbly supplicated us that we would deign to visit you in this part with the prerogative of the Apostolic See's accustomed clemency in bestowing grace.

[55] We therefore, who are professors of the Order of the kindly confessor Benedict, and possessions, desiring that that Order be extended to the praise and glory of God, and to the celebrated memory of that Confessor, and that the worship of the divine name be increased, and the salvation of souls also procured, and therefore wishing to cherish with Apostolic favors such pious desires of the devout, being inclined to your supplications, of special grace by the tenor of these presents we grant you and the same Priors and monks of such Priories and places, without prejudice to parish churches and to any other right of another, by Apostolic authority free licence and faculty: of receiving such houses, lands, possessions, places, and all the aforesaid goods already granted and given to you, and also those which shall in the future be given and granted to you for the aforesaid uses; and in the same houses, lands, possessions, and places given and granted, and to be given and granted, according as the size or quantity of such houses, lands, possessions, and places, and also their resources shall require, of building and founding Priories of your Order and oratories with the necessary offices, in the parts of Italy only, and of appointing in them Priors, monks, Conversi, and household according to the requirement of the said resources, who according to the rule of the same blessed Benedict and the institutes of your said monastery may render devout service perpetually to the Most High: and that it be lawful for the same Priors, monks, and Conversi to have in the same Priories and oratories altars, bell-towers with bells, cemeteries for the burial of the persons dwelling in them, and to celebrate Masses and other divine offices in those oratories; and that the Prior of any place so to be built may hear the confessions of the monks and Conversi of his Priory or place, and absolve them, and enjoin upon them a salutary penance for their offenses, provided they be not such as for which the Apostolic See ought deservedly to be consulted;

[56] and also to administer to them all the ecclesiastical Sacraments, as later Roman Pontiffs also did. and that in those Priories and oratories you may freely be able to receive the erection and consecration of altars, and the blessing of cemeteries, from whatever Catholic prelate you shall prefer who has the grace and communion of the Apostolic See (if the diocesans of those Priories and places shall be unwilling to grant them to you and to those Priors and monks freely and without corruption). Let it therefore be lawful to no one, etc. Given at Avignon on the XII of the Kalends of February, in the second year of our Pontificate. Laerzio Cherubini, in the preliminary observation on that diploma of Clement VI, assigns other later Pontiffs who pursued this Congregation with Apostolic favors. Finally, the curious reader will also learn the discipline and praises of the Olivetan Order from the fifth chapter of the Acts, which we now submit to the press.

\ read Patriti*

\ perhaps Virgini*

\ perhaps plebanatu*

\ that is, impositionibus*

THE LIFE

By an anonymous collector,

which has been excerpted from the Acts both Latin and Italian.

Bernard Ptolomei, founder of the congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto (Bl.)

FROM A MANUSCRIPT.

CHAPTER I.

The deeds of the Blessed in the secular state, and his withdrawal into the desert.

By the singular patronage of the Mother of God Agreeing in nobility and in piety, but without the fruit of matrimony, and with the hope of children and posterity removed, that excellent couple Mino Ptolomei and Fulvia Tancredi were passing sorrowful years in the city of Siena: long do they pour out most tender tears and prayers, that they may obtain from the Bestower of all good things the offspring they desired. They implore the patronage of the Virgin Mother, and promise her a child devoted to her service and worship; if they should obtain it, they would render back the gift which they received. God kindly heard them as they prayed, and made them possessors of their wish — God, who is never unconquerable, save when he is asked from the heart. Her womb being now made fruitful, Fulvia feels the child, and, a pleasant vision being presented to her in a dream, she seems to have brought forth not a boy but a swan bearing in its beak a little branch of olive, most white in its plumage, to which lesser swans, flying about in a crowded band, gave applause. Shaking off sleep, she tells the vision to Mino ^a, knowing the dream, but not knowing the prodigy. And indeed the event afterwards plainly showed that the vision had been sent from heaven. For he whom she afterwards bore, Bernard, most shining in manners and in habit, the fortunate parent of many other swans, taught them to seek the things above, a family being founded whose device is formed by olive-bearing mountains on this side and that set beneath a purple cross.

[2] that Blessed is born at Siena in Tuscany, Fulvia bears the little infant at Siena in Tuscany in the year from the Virgin's childbearing 1272, on the sixth of the Ides of May, and he is called John at baptism, though afterwards Bernard, since he himself sought the name of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, when, putting on the monastic garments, he set before himself the footsteps of so great a hero to be imitated. Further, by the beneficent providence of the Godhead it came to pass that in that sorrowful age there was granted to Italy an infant who should be the Father of a new offspring, a support of the Benedictine Order, and a notable restorer of the almost fallen monastic discipline. And indeed the supreme Pontiffs testify in more than one diploma that for this very end many sacred houses were granted to the Olivetans (namely, that they might restore to the cloisters the regular discipline which had collapsed).

[3] and, piously brought up in boyhood, Bernard, thus born, had scarcely passed the bounds of infancy when, snatched from his mother's arms, he is handed over to be educated by his kinsman Cristoforo Ptolomei of the Order of St. Dominic, worthy in learning and probity, so that afterwards he was adorned with the episcopal mitre ^b. Under the mastership of so great a man he went from virtue to virtue (for he had ordered ascents in his heart), assiduous in nocturnal and daily psalmody, frequent in meditations, a tender sheep obeying in all things the voice of his ruler. Meanwhile he devoted labor to the study of letters. He first learns the precepts of rhetoric, and afterwards is imbued with the philosophical disciplines with such praise for his progress that he excited admiration not only in his fellow beginners but also in the very veterans of a long-served warfare; which he doubled by an almost singular humility, as often as in disputations or gatherings he was bidden to set forth his opinion. Being taken with love for the institute of St. Dominic, he wished to be numbered among its pupils. But Mino, being informed, takes care by his command to recall to the paternal home his only son, the hope of his posterity. Perhaps the vow had slipped from his memory which he had once conceived amid sighs and prayers, of consecrating his son to God. But the frail purpose of the father yielded to the unconquerable decree of the most loving Godhead.

[4] Bernard therefore returns to his father's house, though clinging in mind to the sacred cloisters he learns and teaches various sciences. where he had been nourished with the milk of the virtues. And that among seculars he might sail as far as he could from the rocks of the world, he wished to be enrolled in the sodality of St. Ansanus ^c, where the young men of the chosen nobility of Siena were exercised, as in a wrestling-school, in all the duties of piety. In this school how much he himself profited, and how much others profited by his example, is marvelous. He did not on that account abstain from his accustomed studies. By no means content with the philosophical disciplines, he applies his industry to the mathematical: nay, he masters both laws ^d. Nor does he altogether pass over theology — that theology of the Blessed for which he always panted, by which the fountainhead of all the sciences is revealed with a clearer light. Whereby he showed himself worthy that, girt with the doctoral laurel, with natives and visitors applauding, he should be appointed to unravel the more difficult knots in the school of his native city.

[5] Nevertheless his father Mino, thinking it too little that Bernard should be gowned and famous for the loftiness of the whole encyclopedia, While moreover, with knightly obtains from the emperor Rudolf that he be enrolled among the knights of his Imperial majesty. And behold the glassy inconstancy of the human mind. Bernard shone on every side not only with the rays of letters but with those of the virtues. The wretched man, amid the most empty clashings of arms, is broken by military luxury. He now serves the world, is a slave to a woman, and almost forgets the pious sodality, the virtues, his studies, and himself. Yet he did not tarry long in that madness and levity. For he had not so extinguished the old fire that God did not preserve some spark beneath the badges of Mars and the weight of arms, which the breath of the Holy Spirit stirred up, so that he recognized the lying image of this world, laid aside his sorrowful arms, and put on the armor of light. So indeed it came to pass; and Bernard, a new soldier, more sharply renews the battle against the deceits of the world; and, being enrolled among the confraternity of the hospital of Siena which they call della Scala, he gives himself more earnestly to divine worship and to the exercises of all the virtues. The languishing, the needy, those held by sickness, hunger, or prison, he pursued with every office of charity

He restrained his body with fastings and scourgings, kindly toward the rest, but harsh toward himself: since indeed he had appointed himself the avenger of his past vanity.

[6] Now Bernard's name was in the mouth of all, now his probity joined with learning was carried about in the discourses of all. and shines with civil dignity, Wherefore the nobles and citizens of Siena, after more notable offices had been conferred upon him, at length by votes by no means discordant appoint him Captain of the People, which was the chief dignity of the republic. Then did the republic feel itself happy, when Bernard, green indeed in years, but hoary in judgment and mature in gravity of manners, held the supreme helm. It can scarcely be told how many ordinances came forth under his governance, by which provision was made for reverence toward the churches, for the peace of his country, for the increase of letters, for the safety of all. And it was the least thing to make laws, unless he confirmed them by his own example. He himself would aid the needy with money and with help, would frequently visit the sick and those shut up in prison, would rescue girls from the peril of chastity by holy marriages. Therefore he was everywhere celebrated as the patron of the wretched, the parent of his country, useful to all, illustrious in the eyes of every man, hostile to vices alone.

[7] he is carried away by vainglory; The king of shadows, impatient of so clear a light, let loose the wind of elation, that it might wither the flowers of his more illustrious virtues. At its blast that colossus totters, whom all revered as nearest to heaven in wisdom and in manners. In fact an empty lust of glory seized Bernard. Hence he began to take holiday from his accustomed pursuits of piety, to be present at the sacred sodality only coldly or rarely, to incline in mind toward worldly delights. It seemed a small thing that he should be honored by others as most wise, unless he himself made light of others as less wise. Nevertheless it is believed to have happened by divine counsel that Bernard should fail; so far as that, being conscious of his frailty and folly, and seriously detesting deceitful glory, he might pant solely after the true glory which would never fail him in heaven. And the event proved this not long after. For when, to display his talent, he was preparing to propose a difficult disputation in the public academy of Siena, a day having first been appointed, so that many should hasten from places far and wide to hear him, by a marvelous portent he suddenly becomes blind, and, deprived of both eyes, gropes at the darkness with his hand.

[8] but, being smitten with blindness, Rumor carries the blindness about through the whole city. The citizens weep over the misfortune, the visitors grieve, all are astounded. He meanwhile, opening the eyes of his mind, acknowledges the beneficent providence of the Godhead which had blinded him, calls to mind his past blindness, groans, and knows that he had never seen better than when deprived of the use of his eyes. Most humbly he invokes the Mother of God as his patroness, to whom he had been made over by his parents by a vow uttered: prayers and tears being poured out, he promises a better use of his eyes, if it be granted him to use them — flight from the world, a new kind of anchoritic life. Nor were his prayers vain. Without delay he recovers the lost light, by a new miracle, by the benefit of his Protectress. Those who had flocked together to hear the announced disputation come to the house of the Ptolomei. They congratulate both him and one another, asking that he discharge his promise.

[9] and healed by the aid of the Mother of God, he withdraws into the desert. Bernard, meditating in the school of humility not that earthly wisdom which is foolishness before God, but the heavenly, confirms his promise. Wherefore, the nobles, citizens, and strangers having been summoned from all sides, on the appointed day, mounting the chair, beyond the expectation of all, in place of a profane debate he recites a sacred discourse on contempt of the world ^e. This being finished, he bids farewell to his friends and kinsmen, who marvel and mourn; and, having trodden with firm foot upon the enticements of his native place, together with two companions, Ambrogio Piccolomini and Patrizio de' Patrizi ^f, illustrious in nobility and rivals in virtue, he hastens into the desert.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER II.

The Blessed's pious exercises in the desert, and his various temptations.

The Blessed in a rugged solitude Before Bernard went out from his house and from his kindred, he sold all that he had and distributed it to the poor, keeping for himself one field only, whose name is Accona, fifteen thousand paces distant from the city of Siena, and about four thousand from the Roman road. A land utterly deserted, pathless, and waterless, which deep valleys hedge in on every side, pale woods, dreadful windings, broken crags. There is one approach to it, and that a very narrow one, over a hanging bridge. Into this solitude, into these recesses secure from all popular noise and from the company of men, Bernard and his companions betake themselves in the year from the birth of Christ 1313, freed from worldly hindrances, that they may live more freely for God.

[11] But who could set forth how strict a manner of living was established? leads an austere life, But Bernard, the leader and chief of the rest, surpassed them in the roughness of his clothing and the hardness of his life. His garment was a pricking hair-shirt, girt with a knotted rope; his food the roots of herbs, wild vegetables, and sometimes unseasoned pulse; his drink rainwater collected in cisterns; poverty and want his inseparable companions; the contemplation of heavenly things his continual delight; the labors of his hands, sacred prayers, the reading of divine Scripture or of the holy Fathers his amusements; his chamber a hidden cave dug out with his own hands, which you would rather have called a burial-ground, or the sepulchre of a living man, where the magnificent furnishing was dry bones and the remains of the dead. The dwellers in the desert had built of clay an oratory, where now is the chapel dedicated to the virgin Scholastica, sister of the divine Benedict, and thither they used to come to recite the hourly prayers. But Bernard seven times a day added to his religious psalmody a bloody scourging; and lest nocturnal sleep should snatch time from pious exercises, he had prepared for himself a hard stone for a pillow and a cheap mat upon the ground, lying on which he caught so brief a rest that he seemed rather to be propping up his penance than refreshing his body.

[12] and the fame of his virtues draws various men thither; God by no means permitted so great a light to lie hidden under a bushel: for the fame of his admirable holiness, spreading everywhere, drew many not only from the neighboring but also from distant shores to the caves of Accona. Some were stirred by the desire of seeing Bernard, whom they looked up to as a new Baptist, a marvel of penance in the desert: others flocked to be instructed with salutary teachings, others to pass their life with him in a happy fellowship. And Bernard received all most courteously, and sent none away otherwise than glad and bound to God and to himself. But those whom he knew would make progress in the divine service and in the sterner disciplines he took as companions.

[13] but the envious demon Meanwhile the envious demon, blazing up against the servant of God, contrives snares and deceits; for he hoped that the wars which were being prepared against him in the desert would have an end, the Leader being overcome. In that iron age the discords of the Ghibellines and the Guelfs were boiling over. From these ^a therefore he goads on certain men to send deadly viands to Ptolomei. A crafty servant presents himself in the desert, and, prostrate at Bernard's feet, says that he brings a frugal alms, the gift of pious men, for the joyful solemnity of the rising Godhead, which was now at hand. But Bernard, a humble sigh being first uttered, said: "It is not hidden from me what the fraud of the gifts is, and of those who send the gifts. I forgive you, and I beseech that God likewise may forgive"; and, the sign of the cross being made over the chest, the blackening meats and the seething wine straightway disclose the poison. Then the bearer of the gifts, confounded and astonished, asks pardon of the holy Father, and departs.

[14] contrives various snares and temptations for him, By other arts Satan devises destruction for Bernard. He sends two from the seat of the lower world, who, falsely assuming the eremitical habit, under the twofold appearance of Ambrogio Piccolomini and Patrizio de' Patrizi, the chief men of the desert, approach Ptolomei. They set themselves at his feet, testifying that they had been warned by God to leave the solitude and return to the world, where a wider field lies open for visiting hospitals and prisons, for helping the needy, widows, orphans, and for very many other offices of charity. Then, turning to the rest of the dwellers in the desert, the signal for departure being given, with raised voice they cry: "O inhabitants of Accona, if your salvation and blessedness are at heart with you, forsake these idle caves: a richer harvest of merits awaits you in your native land. God calls you back; depart." Having heard their words, and having cast his eyes upon them, Bernard perceives the deceit, reproaches their envy, and, the all-powerful sign of the cross being made, compels them to withdraw howling amid sulphurous flames. But God willed to heal by a miraculous stroke certain dwellers in the desert who were already girded for departure. For first, being suddenly blinded, they by no means find the way out; afterwards, at the holy Father's prayer, together with pardon they receive their sight, and are confirmed in the institute they had undertaken.

[15] Nor was this the end of the stratagems. Wanton thoughts and foul phantasms, which, being manfully overcome, which the evil spirit frequently stirred up, Bernard, never unconquered, drove off with scourges, fastings, and the tears of penance. Nevertheless, as he was entering his little cell one day to pray, behold, a demon meets him under the appearance of a most beautiful maiden, and assails Ptolomei with embraces, blandishments, broken sighs, and the other womanly weapons; she pretends that she is one who, while he was living at Siena, had loved him too ardently, and, driven by the flames of love, had flown thither through shadows, through rough places, through crags, and even through the very jaws of death. The holy Father stood still for a while, astounded;

but, enlightened by a heavenly light, he recognizes the fiction, gathers his strength, and amid the dread names of Jesus wards off and puts to flight the counterfeit woman: then at last, to restrain utterly the rising motions of foul lust, he rolls his innocent limbs among thorns.

[16] But because the Lord kills and makes alive, leads down to the lower world and brings back, and because he rules his beloved by a fatherly providence, he willed most mercifully to reward with a heavenly favor the triumph which Bernard had won over the flesh and over Satan. he is refreshed with a heavenly vision. The specter being driven off, the blessed Father was more humbly asking the Lord, with eyes and hands raised to the stars, that he would deign to hold acceptable his own service and that of his companions. When behold, as he looked up at midday, a silver ladder presented itself, reaching from earth even to heaven, at whose summit stood Christ on the right, the Virgin Mother on the left, adorned with most shining robes. The Virgin's breast glittered with a star. Along the steps angels came down in troops, and, kindly helping monks clothed in snowy garments, led them to the summit, where they were made partakers of immortal glory. Amid admiration and joy the holy Father, desiring his fellow soldiers to share so delightful \* a sight — whom he judges to be giving themselves to prayer not far off — hastily calls them. They run up, lift their eyes, and, refreshed for a short time by that divine spectacle, pour out sweet tears together with him, render abundant thanks to the Father of lights, and, with Ptolomei's urging, are disposed to sustain more strongly hereafter the conflicts with the world, the flesh, and Satan. Meanwhile no one attained to the interpretation of the mystery; but the Queen of the heavenly ones herself disclosed it some years later, when she ordered the dwellers in the desert to be clothed under her auspices in white cowls.

[17] The blessed Father, furnished with new strength of divine grace, is again challenged into the arena. Being accused of heresy, he sets out for Avignon, Before John XXII, the supreme hierarch of the Church, then sitting at Avignon, he is arraigned for heresy, or for some pernicious contrivance. "There lie hidden," the accuser warned, "dwellers in the desert in a valley hedged about by no particular rule: Ptolomei alone is both teacher and standard-bearer: the age is too dangerous: heresies are at first cheap sparks, but, unless they be quickly extinguished, the parents of great conflagrations: these feigned penitents must be cast out from the cave before the enclosed flame spreads more widely." The Pontiff did not at once give credence to the informer, but summons Bernard, that he may plead his cause at Avignon before him. The most obedient little sheep determines to obey the supreme Shepherd's voice without delay. Wherefore, after the kiss of peace, he commends his companions to God and to the Virgin Mother, and to those companions charity, concord, perseverance; then, having taken Ambrogio Piccolomini to himself as companion, with bare feet in winter time he undertakes the distant pilgrimage ^b, shrinks not from dangers, bears many and grave inconveniences with an even mind, and everywhere shows examples of innocence and piety.

[18] the demon vainly dissuading him from the journey, He was about three days' journey distant from Avignon; and behold, a man heavy with age, of respectable appearance, in the habit of a hermit: he addresses Ptolomei with flattering words, and urges him to go no further, asserting that for him, though innocent, flames avenging a falsely alleged crime are being prepared, once he should approach the Pontiff; and that he had learned this from heaven. At first Bernard hesitated at this; but, relying on the Pontiff's equity and wisdom, and secure concerning his own faith and manners and those of his companions, turning to the speaker he said: "But who art thou?" — and meanwhile he brings forth the dreaded sign of the cross. Then the place of the counterfeit old man is taken by a vapor so foul that it cast Bernard to the ground.

[19] and clears himself of the false accusation before the Pope, At length Ptolomei reaches Avignon, and, leave being given, sets himself at the Pontiff's feet, ragged in dress, humble in appearance, modest in gait, yet cheerful in mind. Being questioned, he discoursed with such constancy and order concerning his conversion, concerning the faith and manners both of his companions and his own, that he filled the pontifical court with admiration. Therefore the supreme Hierarch, finding Bernard to be a man full of God, praises the pious discipline of the dwellers in the desert, and, letters being given to the prelate of Arezzo, to whose jurisdiction the valleys of Accona belonged — afterwards added to the diocese of Pienza ^c — commands that he take up the care of the desert, bestow patronage on Ptolomei and his companions, and also subject them to some regular and approved institute, so that they may advance with a safer step on the way of salvation. Guido Pietramala then governed the city of Arezzo with sacred and human power alike. To him Bernard displays the pontifical letter. The bishop reads it, and rejoices at the supreme Shepherd's so kindly love toward his sheep. Then, signifying the command, "This is a most weighty matter," he says, "and full of business. Return to your fellow soldiers, and in my words proclaim a three days' fast with public supplications. To yours I shall humbly add my own. Doubtless light and help must be awaited from the Father of lights, that the outcome of the matter may be favorable."

[20] by whom he is sent to the bishop of Arezzo, And so Ptolomei with Ambrogio restores himself to Accona, and, thanks being rendered to God most good and great, relates in full what had befallen him first at Avignon, then at Arezzo; with what kindness he had been received by the supreme Pontiff; what commands he had brought back from him for living under some fixed rule, and what commands from the prelate of Arezzo for imploring the light of the divine Spirit, so that it might become clear what should be done, and that with God as author it might be happily carried through. The whole assembly receives him on his return with vast delight and listens. They vie in eagerness to fulfill the commands, and, fasting and afflicting the flesh throughout those three days, fill them with most fervent prayers. On the last night, as Pietramala was resting in deepest silence, the Queen of heaven is at hand, fairer than the moon, brighter than the sun, with a great attendant band of blessed spirits, shining round about most amply on every side. The bishop's mind being gently touched, she thus addresses him with friendly words: "The desert of Accona is sacred to me; under my auspices a new family rises. It pleases therefore by divine decree that the Congregation be called by my name, of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto; let it keep the Rule of Benedict, and use white garments and these insignia." And meanwhile she holds out with virgin hand three white little mountains gathered into one, with a shoot of olive rising on this side and that; and on the middle mountain a purple cross fixed.

[21] The Prelate, on waking, revolves in mind what he had seen in sleep, is astounded, who prescribed for the Blessed and his companions and does not doubt that the business is divine; whence he conceived a loftier esteem of the dwellers in the desert, and especially of their Chief. On the next day, when Bernard arrived with his companions Ambrogio and Patrizio, Pietramala presents himself to meet him, rushes into his embrace, rejoices at God's so solicitous providence and at the Mother of God's love toward them, announcing point by point what the Virgin had shown, what commands she had left; and a day is appointed for carrying them out.

[22] Wherefore on the seventh day before the Kalends of April, the rule of St. Benedict with white garments, the second of the week, in the year of restored salvation one thousand three hundred and nineteen, the sixth from Bernard's conversion, in the church of the Most Holy Trinity at Arezzo ^d, the mitred prelate, the unbloody Sacrifice having been performed with solemn rite, through his suffragan ^e places the white cowl upon the three dwellers in the desert. He exhorts them to strive by their own manners to restore the discipline of the Benedictine Order, almost destroyed in Italy by the common calamity of those times; that the brightness of their mind should answer to their snowy garments, and to the name of the Congregation — namely of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto — a particular worship toward that same Virgin Mother; and that in the three-peaked olive-bearing mountain with the red cross, enclosed by green olives, as in a mirror, they should continually contemplate the passion of Jesus the Savior, and his bloody death to be emulated. Meanwhile minds were astounded, and, from an unwonted sweetness, eyes dissolved in tears — not only of the new offspring, but of the clergy and nearly the whole people, whom the fame of so great a prodigy had stirred up.

[23] These things being done, Guido the bishop adorns Bernard and his companions, now clothed with white cowls, in the pontifical name with many privileges. and endowed this new congregation with privileges. Namely he grants the faculty of erecting a church and a monastery, of establishing monastic observance under the banners of the divine Benedict, of receiving others hereafter into the Monteolivetan family: moreover he bestows immunity from the secular court, from taxes, tithes, and all levies, and very many other benefits, which are inserted into the Olivetan History, Guido's own writing being reported word for word ^f. Lastly he grants them leave to depart, and gives them his blessing.

ANNOTATIONS.

\ perhaps jucundi*

CHAPTER III.

The Blessed's cenobitic life after receiving the rule of St. Benedict.

The religious Olivetan congregation being established, Bernard therefore returns in a white garment, whiter in mind, and rich in heavenly favors, to the crags of Accona — let us now say to Monte Oliveto: for this name, as we saw before, the Virgin Mother gave it. Who could set forth the gladness of the Brethren? Gathering them in the little chapel, he makes them privy to each of the things that had happened, clothes them with the cenobitic habit, setting forth meanwhile the divine mysteries for their consideration; he displays the rule of Benedict, the great parent of monks, at once inflaming them to observance, and at once setting before them innumerable

examples of heroes who, warring under so great a leader, obtained the palm promised to the victors. But since a president was needed, to whose will each might conform his own, the concern of all was directed uniquely toward Bernard, whom they had both as father and as master. But he could by no means be bent by their prayers, most humbly repeating that he was unequal to the burden and unworthy of the honor.

[25] Patrizio is elected abbot, Wherefore, at his own urging, there is proclaimed abbot by common votes first Patrizio de' Patrizi, then Ambrogio Piccolomini, each a companion of Ptolomei in the world, each a follower in the desert. Both spend a year in the government, with great increase of the new assembly. At length, praises of chastity and penance being heaped up, they were enrolled in the heavenly Jerusalem. In place of Ambrogio there is substituted Simone da Tura of Siena, of most conspicuous virtue, who, a year having been gloriously completed, lays down his charge. Meanwhile the fame of what was being done in the sacred desert resounded round about. It spread abroad their most chaste manners, their diligent meditations, their studious silence save in singing the divine praises, their most sweet peace, the delights of a mind made over to God; so that no one doubted that among those crags the discipline of the ancient monks was reviving. Wherefore many, and those men conspicuous in the world, their deceitful fortunes being cast aside, came together from every side to the olive-bearing mountain, so that it now seemed not a solitude, but a happy city of those warring for the supreme Godhead.

[26] Bernard spent all those three years in the contemplation of divine things; and after others the Blessed himself is compelled to discharge that office, but when Simone da Tura had put off mortality, and the filling of the supreme seat was in question, being at length overcome and compelled by his own, in the year of restored salvation 1322 he undertakes the administration of the Order; from which, although every year, according to that rite of the Congregation, he strives to resign, nevertheless until the twenty-seventh year — that is, until the end of his life — his companions by no means acquiescing, he is confirmed. In the year 1327 he asks them more earnestly to release him from the office: for he suffered so much in his eyes that he was not even fit for attaining the priesthood: namely, the continual consideration of God's benefits and of his past life, just as it drew tears abundantly, so had gradually brought on a weakness. Nor is he heard even then.

[27] There are consulted on this matter both John, Cardinal Deacon of St. Theodore, then legate of the Apostolic See in Etruria, and the jurists distinguished at that time, Paolo de Azzariis, doctor of decrees, Andrea de Guantariis, and Dino, archbishop of Pisa. The answer of all these was the same: that Bernard was which he vainly attempts to lay down. fit for governing, since indeed the probity of his merits supplied the defect of his eyes ^a. Indeed whatever could be sought in the best of prelates shone forth marvelously in him alone. He himself, most zealous toward the heavenly ones and toward his neighbor, was present at the divine offices day and night, brought help to the weak and languishing, raised up the fallen, refreshed the sorrowful, kindled the cold, roused the torpid, made all things to all men, was everywhere present, never unwatchful, unable to be wearied, adding incitements to virtue to all men by example sooner than by word. Hence his sacred fellow soldiers, emulating their leader, vied in making progress, and, panting after the summit of sanctity, climbed higher and higher day by day.

[28] Now, allured by the most sweet fragrance of so complete a religion, not only the neighboring peoples, Although the Olivetan monastery, against the demons but princes also and the prelates of cities, demand Olivetans from Bernard; now they furnish means and places for building monasteries. Now the bounds of Accona were too narrow for the number of the cenobites. Now on Monte Oliveto, by the pious liberality of those flocking thither and by the hands of the monks, there rises a church sacred to the Mother of God, patroness of the Order — namely a most fortified bulwark against the gates of hell, which shall by no means prevail. Meanwhile the enemy of Christian charity perceives it, and, stirred with fury, contrives everything to render the religious labors vain. In fact, what the pious masons build by day, the specters of the pit destroy by night. In the morning are seen roofs torn down, beams scattered, walls overthrown. The flock of cenobites laments their efforts spent in vain, the cause being unascertained.

[29] Bernard, thinking most abjectly of himself, casts it upon his own faults, was defended by St. Michael, weeps, and beseeches God to deign to remove his avenging hand, and to look upon the piety of his sorrowing companions. He deferred some days, but at length the divine goodness healed the grief-stricken man by a marvelous portent. For while he was praying more fervently, the Man of God being seized with ecstasy, there appeared beside the heaps of ruins a young man of military appearance, tall of stature, comely of face, going round the church, brandishing a drawn sword this way and that, and laying low and putting to flight the disturbing demons; and he knew from above that this was Michael, prince of the heavenly host, the avenger of the place, and its guardian for the future. Now Bernard is raised up in mind by the friendly spectacle, and is flooded with sweetness. And the Brethren, being informed, both apply themselves more eagerly to the building of the church, and there erect an altar to the tutelary Archangel.

[30] and the congregation, adorned with privileges of the Apostolic See, might grow, The holy Man, therefore, seeing the increase of the religion he had founded, which the heavenly ones had declared acceptable by repeated prodigies, takes care that it be confirmed also by the supreme authority of the Pope on earth. And this he first obtains in the year of the Christian epoch 1324 from John XXII ^b, some monks being sent to Avignon; then from Clement VI, in the year 1344 ^c, on the very feast of the virgin Agnes, which accordingly to this day is solemn for the Monteolivetans and is especially celebrated with sacred pomp. Namely each Pontiff, equally most loving of the Olivetan Order, both approves it with a beneficence not unlike, and, ratifying the privileges which Guido Pietramala had granted, adds very many others, and those most ample.

[31] nevertheless the blessed Founder is in various ways While the good Prelate was occupied with these and other cares of protecting and increasing the assembly committed to him, the Stygian serpent lies in wait for him in a twofold way. Now he tempts him with avarice, now solicits him to ambition. Bernard sometimes turned over in his mind by what means the monastery he had begun might be advanced, since many necessary things were lacking, and likewise the very money by which they might be procured. Satan, seizing the occasion, and counterfeiting the habit and likeness of Ambrogio Piccolomini, approaches the anxious Man of God and leads him to where a treasure of vast price, as if freshly dug up, presented itself to view. It would have been a small thing to urge him to convert it into the building; he goads him to carry it off, and, an end being at last put to the straits of his present condition, to betake himself together with him to the city, to a more cheerful state. That very goading, as being at variance with piety and with his profession, warned Bernard of the fraud. Wherefore, the sign of the cross being brought forth after his manner, he said: "Away, thou persuader to gold and to the city. Neither does gold hold me, nor the city. Away, impostor." And as he cried thus, straightway both the tempter and the feigned riches forsook him.

[32] tempted by the demon; On another day the same demon, so often pressing, never victor, feigns himself a noble courier sent in the Pontiff's name, to announce to Bernard that the church of Avignon, its Pastor being dead, had been destined for him, a cenobite of illustrious name. He approaches him with a retinue of servants, and honors him with words and gestures exceedingly humble — composed, that is, for deception — extols him with praises, and finally, a diploma being held out to be read, entices him gladly to obey the Pope's command. The Man of God, wavering between obedience and modesty, asks for light from above. Nor is there delay: by God's help he perceives the deceiver's stratagems; whence, the name of Jesus being invoked, he cries out as with a threat: "Go, Satan; darest thou still to be against the servants of God?" Then a marvelous thing showed what sort of messenger he was. For he himself and his companions took on the figure of huge serpents, then by a sudden change, raising themselves into savage giants, they beat him so bitterly that he lay almost lifeless. But by the help of the archangel Michael, the desert's avenger, who anointed his battered limbs with a heavenly balsam, he marvelously recovers.

[33] Bernard, moreover, turning his mind to the most careful providence of God, but after the victory whereby those whom he loves he presses but does not destroy — nay, according to the Apostle's judgment, makes a way of escape with the temptation — poured out most dutiful tears. And since he was, from the greatness of his love, transformed into God, he desired to be dissolved and to be with him, and endured long ecstasies, even with his companions looking on, in which, hanging above the air, with arms outstretched, with eyes fixed on heaven, with smiling face, he sweetly tasted the angels, the Saints, and the very King of Saints. Of such ecstasies, which many record, we shall touch upon the more famous.

[34] As the solemn day of the Virgin's Assumption dawned, the pious Man was meditating upon the mystery with all effort of mind, the Mother of God makes him certain of eternal salvation, and likewise with an equal straining of affection toward the Mother of God, desiring meanwhile to know whether the services he was rendering were acceptable to her and to her Son, and what should become of his soul after his departure. After a lengthy prayer, at the very rising of the sun the most blessed Virgin appeared to him more splendid than it, and, as to one bereft of tongue and sense, addresses him unbidden with these words: "Bernard, complete the course thou hast begun; thou shalt receive among the elect the prize prepared for thee from the foundation of the world." And these things being uttered, a most white cloud took her from his sight. And he, secure concerning the reward, both manfully — more than before — pursues his course, and afterwards tastes death with a delight scarcely to be set forth.

[35] On the Friday of Holy Week he was pining away in contemplating the Lord crucified for him, before his most sacred image. Christ teaches him many things afterwards to come to pass But how greatly that swoon of a lover and at the same time of a fellow sufferer pleased him, Christ himself willed to attest with his own divine mouth. For, addressing his little Servant, he cast in no slight hope concerning the reward of his labors. He moreover signified beforehand many future things: the advancement of the Olivetan family, the bringing back of the Apostolic See from Avignon to Rome, a universal plague, and slaughters of war in Italy, heresies, and other calamities of the church in Europe; all of which the Man of God received with reverence, and never disclosed, except when his death was at hand.

[36] Likewise on the festal day of the rising Savior, after the sacred banquet of the Lord's own Body, being seized with ecstasy in a twofold ecstasy or colloquy, and standing in the air, he was seen by many to embrace the image of his crucified Lord, and to converse sweetly with him, although none of the bystanders perceived the words that were spoken. But when some time afterwards he learned that the Brethren had been spectators of the ecstasy, being suffused with blushing he straightway withdrew into his little cell, where, shut up for three days, he neither ate nor drank, being indeed filled with heavenly delights.

[37] In the year of restored salvation 1348, on the twenty-first day of March, and St. Benedict, appearing, forewarns him of the day of his death. which is sacred to the divine Benedict, a most foul plague raging, Bernard with poured-out tears and fervent prayers was striving to bend the angered Godhead to restrain the sword of his fury, and not to make of Italy, otherwise a most flourishing region, a desolation by heaped-up afflictions. As he thus prayed, the kindly Patriarch of monks was present, encompassed with a clear light, and said to his Client: "Bernard, my son, it is time that thou and thy Brethren give yourselves more earnestly to prayer, since God has determined to exact worthy penalties for the crimes of Italy. Death shall rage even against the bodies of the just, because of the impious. And indeed thou thyself shalt breathe out thy soul on the twentieth day ^d of August: but Bernard of Clairvaux, whom thou especially honorest, shall be thy patron and thy guide to heaven, where thou shalt obtain the abundant fruit of thy merits." After which the vision vanished into thin air. But the surviving son followed the departing august Father with his eyes and his affection. Happy the foretold

day of his passing he sighs for, and applies his labor and all his industry to fulfilling the admonitions.

[38] The plague coming on, he exhorts his companions to the aid of their neighbor, And so, all the days that remained of the month of March he filled with prayer and contemplation and other religious exercises. Afterwards, having gathered the cenobites into one, he stirs them with a sweet and strong discourse to hasten to help the plague-stricken. "My most beloved Brethren," he said, "my crown, let not the most sorrowful condition of these times be hidden from you. A most foul plague rushes upon the cities, upon the towns, attacks everyone it meets, passes by no one unharmed. Who could reckon how many are wretchedly in peril, either in body or in spirit, or in both? Charity invites us to help, compassion persuades us. We are members of Christ: let us emulate our head, the Lord himself, who, going about cities and villages, neither feared difficulties nor spared labors; nay, of his own accord underwent death itself, that he might rescue men from death. My Brethren, go two by two, and succor the plague-stricken with every humble and pious service. I warn you, however, that on the day before the vigil of the Mother of God assumed you assemble in our monastery of Siena: for my faith is pledged that you shall be kept unharmed meanwhile. There I shall await you; with my heart I follow you." But that his words might not lack an example, he himself first of all, a companion being joined to him, hastily and eagerly goes off to Siena, where the struggle of the pestilence was fiercer. What he did there, what he endured, how many proofs of fortitude, of piety, of a humble mind he gave, can scarcely be told. He himself served those seized by the plague, applied medicines, handled sores, brought comfort and help with friendly counsels and wholesome exhortations. Indeed neither do inconveniences chill Bernard's charity, nor do dangers terrify it, nor does the most bloody sight of death delay it.

[39] and himself first giving an example of this charity, On the thirteenth day of August the Brethren betook themselves to Siena, to the monastery of St. Benedict, which was subject to Bernard. They congratulate one another on the safety which he had foretold, and confess it a gift of the divine beneficence, a weight of thanks being paid. On the following day, the Man of God, having called them together, announces both his own death and that of many of them: For so, he said, the condition of these times demands, so God commands. He strenuously exhorts them to the love of the Godhead, to mutual charity among themselves, to the keeping of the laws of the holy father Benedict, to contempt of the world. Then, asking with most humble words the pardon of each for his faults, he beseeches them to commend [him] to God and to the tutelary Virgin, and especially, the feast of the Assumption being at hand, that they should all together apply themselves to prayers. And amid these things, mingling sighs, he drew tears from all by the tenderness of his affection.

[40] in that service he piously dies, On the sixteenth day the plague fell upon the monks, some of whom died before, others after the death of blessed Bernard, according to his prediction. But he himself, knowing that his last hours were at hand, lays himself down on a most mean and poor little bed, where, on bent knees, he is strengthened with the Sacraments of the Church, and, frequently kissing his crucified Lord, says: "Behold, the most longed-for day approaches. Do thou, O Jesus, my sweetest love, receive me into these thy bowels." Finally, after the first hour, having addressed the monks in a last discourse, he instructs them with pious admonitions, again and again commits himself to their prayers; and, looking up to the stars and showing a heavenly cheerfulness on his face, rich in merits, worn out with labors, a victim of charity, he poured forth his most pure soul on the eleventh of the Kalends of September ^e, in the 76th year of his age, the 35th of his conversion, the 29th from the reception of the rule and of the white garment, the 27th of his abbacy, not yet completed, in the year of Christ's birth 1348. Of his departure Arnold Wion in the Tree of Life, book two, reports thus: "On the eleventh of the Kalends of September. At Siena in Tuscany, the deposition of St. Bernard Ptolomei, abbot and first founder of the monks of the Order of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto, who, amid the hands of his sons both singing psalms and mourning, and amid the words of prayer, rejoicing and exulting in the Lord, rendered his blessed spirit to his Creator."

[41] At the same hour, namely the third, at which the Blessed Bernard departed from life, and his glory being revealed in divers ways, five monks illustrious for austerity of life — Pio Tancredi of Siena, Alessandro of Messina, Silvano the German, Girolamo of Naples, and Cristoforo of Bologna — from different places saw Christ descending between the Virgin his Mother and the archangel Michael, accompanied by St. Benedict and St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux, and by other blessed spirits, receiving the soul of the departing man and crowning it with a double diadem. Brother Alfonso Ptolomei, a Dominican, when he was suffering from the common disease of the plague and was now about to close his day, asserted to the religious of his Order standing about that he beheld the soul of Bernard Ptolomei making for the heights with vast light and majesty. Likewise blessed ^f Ginocchia, of the same surname and blood of the Ptolomei, whose life Gregorio Lombardelli wrote, being warned during prayer by a heavenly sound to lift her eyes, beheld Bernard's spirit setting out toward the stars, with almost those same words striking her ears for a moment which were heard at the passing of the patriarch Benedict: "This is the way by which Bernard ascends into heaven."

[42] The death of the Abbot of Monte Oliveto being made public, the city of Siena is troubled, he is honored with a tomb, whose place now lies hidden. all are saddened that the light of their country is extinguished, and that to the other calamities this calamity has newly been added. The sorrowing sons carry the corpse of their departed Parent into the church of St. Benedict, and there entomb it, with men and women of every condition, who had flocked together, groaning and venerating. Today, however, there is no monument of the tomb. The cause of the loss they refer to the desolation which the savage pestilence brought at that time, so much so that of the Olivetans it carried off eighty-two. Pius the Second, supreme Pontiff, indeed, in his Commentaries, book ten, mentioning Bernard Ptolomei, writes: "The man's name was Bernard, whose bones they religiously venerate." But perhaps he meant to allude to the sepulchral church, which is not in doubt, and not to the particular place of the tomb, which is still unknown.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER IV.

The chief virtues which the Blessed practiced, and the various miracles by which he was renowned in life and after death.

In the Blessed, a profound lowliness of mind, Christ, the wisdom of the eternal Father, teaching us the proofs of a just man, set forth two things to be considered. By their works, he says, you shall know them. Behold the duties of the virtues; and These signs shall follow them that believe, namely the gifts of prodigies which he himself indicates. Of the virtues of blessed Bernard Ptolomei it is permitted to gather much from what has been said; we shall add a few things, though very many could be said. And in the first place there were almost as many examples of his humility as there were deeds. He himself, conspicuous in nobility, powerful in learning, excelling in sanctity, kept calling himself the lowest of all, a most wretched sinner, an unprofitable servant in the Lord's vineyard. Earnestly asked by his companions to lay down laws and to preside over the rest, he refused with all his might; nor, save under compulsion, did he acquiesce after three years — in this indeed the more modest, that he undertook the government of his own lest he should not be overcome by his own. He himself was first of all in carrying burdens, digging the earth, and in other lowly exercises; in ministering to the sick and helping the plague-stricken, second to none. These are the specimens of solid humility which Bernard displayed.

[44] Fasting, the food of spirits destined for heaven, he cultivated earnestly: an austere fast, for in the time of Lent he took food only four times in the week, namely twice on Sunday, once on Tuesday, and once on Thursday; and on the remaining days, as also on the vigils of the Saints and on the four seasons of the year, he abstained utterly from all food. On Friday he consecrated his fasting to Christ the Savior, and on Saturday to the Virgin Mother. He tasted the very least wine, and very rarely, perhaps admonished by those words of the Apostle: It is good not to eat flesh, and not to drink wine. And that he might lead his companions to the keeping of this religious purpose, and remove the danger of ever breaking it, he ordered the vines to be cut about and the casks to be carried away from the monastery. But when the cenobites, drinking cold water, grew weak in the stomach, and nearly all took to their beds, he judged it better afterwards to permit wine, but well diluted with water — on which reckoning the Doctor of the Gentiles also enjoined it upon Timothy, writing: Do not still drink water; but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake.

[45] Penance and austerity were Bernard's constant companion in life. various affliction of the body, To beat his flesh with bundles of nettles, to tear it with scourges even to a copious shedding of blood, to weary it with vigils and want of food, to pass sleepless nights weeping within the narrow bounds of his cave — these were the offices of this virtue which Bernard practiced. Especially through the whole night before Friday, watching in mind with Christ, harassed by mockeries and stripes, he indulged in no rest whatever. With a rough hair-shirt and a heavy chain he weighed down his shoulders and girded his loins; and, lest he be defiled with the stain of hypocrisy, he used ordinary coverings outwardly.

[46] The reading of divine Scripture and the meditation of heavenly things were the most delightful pleasures of his mind. meditation upon divine things, When he did not attain the sense of the sacred reading, he interposed prayer and fasting; whence more than once he obtained that the Mother of God and the archangel Michael should by heavenly teaching unlock for him many secrets of both Testaments. These delights of Bernard drew hostile Satan into the utmost envy. Once, when he was weighing with all the intentness of his affection the slaughter of the Innocents, on the very day on which the Church celebrates their most blessed memory, a huge demon presented himself, threatening in mouth, eyes, and hands, terrifying in every part; and, rushing upon Bernard with a scourge, he struck him with blows so violent and so frequent that from the force of it he fell and could not rise, befouled with blood and half dead. But as he lay thus, the Restorer of the human race, fixed to the Cross, presented himself to his sight, showing his face defiled with spittle, his whole body covered with the purple garment of blood, and his limbs so torn with scourges that the several bones could be distinguished. Then Bernard acknowledged that truly Jesus alone is the man of sorrows, and that his own wounds are altogether shadowy when compared with so great an exemplar. Accordingly he poured out abundant tears and most tender words. And from this vision he felt himself wholly unharmed and confirmed in strength, so that thereafter he applied himself steadfastly to the contemplation of heavenly things, and rendered the Stygian contrivances vain.

[47] He was most zealous for guarding chastity. Of which virtue indeed we have more than one indication in the course of his life described thus far. great care for chastity, But let us add another.

At Bolsena, which is an inland town of Etruria, he was lodging on his journey with a devout man. A shameless woman enters the chamber by night, and makes for the bed appointed for the stranger, burning with lust, preparing kisses and embraces; but she finds it empty. Through the darkness she seeks Bernard, and stumbles upon him keeping watch. With many entreaties, and in whatever way harlot's art can devise, she tries again and again, but in vain. For the Man of God, after he had rebuked her and cast her out with the sign of the cross, marveling at the wanton woman's impudence, seizes a staff and brandishes it, crying out at the same time after the example of Bernard of Clairvaux: "Ho there, run quickly; seize the bold thief who assails my riches!" At which uproar the woman, terrified, withdraws from the chamber; and those who were sleeping near, hastening up and finding no one but their guest, believe that they had been dreaming. Meanwhile Bernard came off victor, who rightly called his riches that chastity which had been purchased with vigils, fasting, maceration of the flesh, and the price of so many labors.

[48] Charity toward the Godhead, which, on the Apostle's testimony, surpasses the other gifts of the virtues, was in Bernard most fervent. love toward God Borne aloft by this fire, he continually pondered in mind the things that were God's; he referred his deeds and acts to God; he desired to be dissolved, that he might enjoy God; whence those long ecstasies, and those heavenly, as it were, ravings. From this most pure fountain flowed the other streamlets of the virtues. Hence his ardor for the Catholic religion, hence his zeal for the salvation of souls, hence his zeal for the divine glory. Turning from God to his neighbor with a most chaste love, he feared not to undergo hardships as much for strangers as for his own, provided he might relieve others, and to expose himself and his own to dangers, that he might rescue others.

[49] and toward his neighbor especially shone forth. Relying on this piety, the supreme prelate John XXII did not hesitate to appoint Bernard before others to Sutri, an ancient city of Tuscany, that he might compose that people, tumultuous with civil discords and hastening by fury and arms to its own destruction. And indeed the most obedient Son discharged the task enjoined upon him with such success that he could quickly extinguish quarrels, put hatreds to flight, and command the minds of all — and that alone, and by the mere reverence for his look and name. Other princes and rulers, having proved this same charity of the blessed Man, frequently consulted him in arduous matters, whom he profited at least by letters ^a, by counsels and exhortations. Finally, that notable example was of such exceptional charity, that for the good of his neighbors and the glory of God he exposed his own life and that of his own.

[50] The Blessed was also endowed To so many and so great virtues of his Servant the most merciful God added the gift of penetrating the secrets of another's heart. While he was returning from Avignon with Ambrogio Piccolomini, at Turin a distinguished and pious man received them in hospitality. A wicked servant, having found the opportunity, steals silver vessels from his master; one of many he hides among the Hermits' bundles, and presently, informing his master that a precious piece of furniture is missing, transfers the theft to the strangers. Then the angry master, sending officers, seizes the dwellers in the desert on the road, and orders them, brought back, to be thrust into prison, where they are held for three days. Meanwhile he charges them with the crime, with hypocrisy, with the vice of an ungrateful mind. The Man of God on the contrary bore the reproaches with an even mind, with serene countenance, humbly affirming that neither he nor his companion was guilty of theft. At length he says to the master: "I know the thief, and the place where he laid up thy furniture; I will disclose both, if thou wilt pledge pardon." He therefore consenting, Bernard asks that the accuser be set before him; and as soon as he saw him he distinctly reproached him with the matter, the time, and the place of the theft, urging him to ask the divine goodness for forgiveness. The confounded servant did not in the least hesitate to confess with tears his fabrication and his guilt. But the master, venerating Bernard's virtue and probity, not long after, the world being cast aside, betook himself to the desert of Accona, where he passed the cenobitic life in the white garment laudably until his last day, being called Brother Basilio of Turin.

[51] with an intimate knowledge of hidden things Placidus, a monk, a Sarmatian by nation, who for some months had been assailed by the demon and almost overcome, so as to send a farewell to the desert, the blessed Father rebukes before two companions, and brings back to a better mind. Brother Damiano of Venice, wavering amid base thoughts, he calls to himself, and, having rebuked him with weighty words, exhorts him to sustain the battle manfully against such phantasms with prayer, fasting, the scourge — these, I say, being the weapons. Meanwhile each cenobite was astounded that the thoughts of his mind, which he had reckoned known to God alone, were so well perceived by Bernard.

[52] To Caterina de' Ptolomei, a kinswoman of the blessed Man, who was commending to his prayers a noble woman harassed by adverse fortune, or a seeing into hearts, he answered: "The woman whom thou commendest vowed from her youth celibacy within religious cloisters; nevertheless she took to herself an earthly bridegroom, and broke her vow: this breaking of it was for her the fountainhead of her misfortunes. Her husband will very soon die: but let her abstain from the new marriage which she is turning over in her mind, otherwise she will perish by a violent fate." In fact the woman a short time after survived her husband as a widow; whence, both conscious of her vow and terrified by the prediction, she dedicated herself to the immortal Bridegroom by sacred wedlock.

[53] Two men, one a noble from Milan, the other from Lucignano, a little town of Tuscany, by name Agostino, as is proved by certain examples, with suppliant words separately begged of blessed Bernard the monastic garment, alleging contempt of the world and religious worship of the Godhead; whereas nevertheless the one had come thither as an agent of the Guelf party to spy out the manners of the desert, the other as one liable to secular vengeance, that he might avoid it. The holy Man detected the deceits of both, casting in their teeth what they were revolving in their hearts, and dismissed them alike suffused with blushes, and marveling that he had seen into the hidden things of the heart.

[54] God willed the sanctity of his Servant, illustrious while he yet lived, and by various miracles, and his glory after his blessed departure, to be perpetually attested by the signs of miracles. Pacifico, a dweller in the desert, in cutting wood had received so grave a wound from an axe that from the violent spasm ^b he lay all but dying. An affection of compassion touched Bernard's mind, and, the sign of the cross being given, he straightway removed the pain, the wound, and every trace of the wound. A woman possessed by a demon and dreadfully harassed, who presented herself to him at Vercelli, he straightway freed, a blessing being kindly bestowed. For indeed in his blessing there was a certain salutary power, by which he marvelously drove off diseases and weaknesses. Brother Bono, long held by a quartan fever, lay in his bed, failing in strength and unfit for labors. When the Man of God desired his help, the sign of the cross being applied, he said: "Rise, in the name of Jesus, who is our salvation, life, and resurrection." Further, it was not easier for Bernard to utter these words than for the man lying there to recover wholly, and manfully to set his hands to the work assigned.

[55] By his intercession also both the blind and the lame and those wretchedly suffering from other diseases obtained from the Lord the right condition of the body both in his life, and the natural functions of their limbs. While he was discharging the legation of the supreme Pontiff at Sutri, a certain man, Romulus by name, is led to his feet, deprived of his eyes, and demanding through his prayers the light he wished. Bernard, looking upon him, urged him to have recourse to the Virgin Mother of God, by whose aid he himself once had recovered the use of his eyes. But that he might not leave the request empty, he prayed so long until sight was restored to the petitioner, who became a publisher both of the wonders of God and of Bernard's holiness. Likewise by prayer he healed the crookedness and drove off the pain of Marino of Paris, a cenobite, who was bitterly tormented, being unsteady and lame in one foot. But among other portents that famous one is recorded: that in the building of the church of Monte Oliveto, when Stefano, a mason from the valley of Lucignano, driven headlong by the envy and art of the demons, had found at once his death and his tomb among the ruins, blessed Bernard, after fervent prayers, using those words of Christ the Lord, "He is not dead here, but sleepeth," recalled the dead man to the breath of this light.

[56] and after his death he was renowned, Most illustrious signs also after Bernard's death attested the blessedness of his soul, with God as author. Antonio de Chino of Siena, long since withered in his right hand, scarcely had he humbly kissed the garments of the blessed Father who was presently to be entombed, when with joy and admiration he beheld his hand growing green again. Giovanna di Pietro of Buonconvento, a village of Etruria, being girded with the girdle which the holy Father used, suddenly escapes from the demon by which she had for a long time been possessed and likewise harassed. Faustina of Monte San Savino, who had endured a flow of blood for four years, physicians striving in vain; and Domenica Griffoli of Monterone, a country place of the Sienese dominion, suffering from dropsy — with great faith pray beside his corpse, and obtain health with no delay interposed. Four Monteolivetan cenobites, Girolamo of Naples, Cristoforo of Bologna, Gregorio of Pavia, and Rainerio of Rome, likewise wasted with the plague and near their end, vehemently grieving at the Prelate's death, by kissing his hands laid out on the bier, as soon as they render the last services to the dead man, are so confirmed in their former health that only after many years did they close their days in the Lord. By these and other prodigies God, ever wonderful in his Saints, willed the glory of Bernard Ptolomei to be illustrious and manifest, so that on that account with an immemorial cultus hitherto, wherever the knowledge of him flourishes, he has been venerated and called a Saint.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER V.

The Blessed's posthumous glory from the religious Order which he founded.

Pius the Second, who governed the Pontificate near the middle of the fifteenth Christian century, The anonymous collector of the Acts, from Pope Pius II, recording the Olivetan religion, speaks thus in the tenth book of his Commentaries: "A small foundation at the beginning, increased by the devotion of men, it had happy successes, and was propagated through nearly all Italy." But how many and how great churches and monasteries have been added since that time? Within the bounds of Italy and of adjacent Sicily one may count eighty-two, of which not a few display a sacred splendor and majesty joined with regular modesty. They have as prelates as many abbots with the right of the mitre and of pontificals. The Archmonastery of Monte Oliveto Maggiore, as they call it, formerly of the diocese of Arezzo, now of Pienza, in Tuscany, the seat of the abbot General, is the origin and head of the whole Order. In cloisters, offices, chambers, and other buildings it extends so amply that it has had as guests Charles the Fifth, august emperor, with a great retinue of princes and knights to the number of two thousand men; and moreover two Pontiffs, Paul the Third and Pius the Second, who had come to that place to venerate its piety and religion.

[58] The same Pope Pius in his Itinerary describes the monastery brilliantly in these words: describes the situation of the Olivetan monastery; "We came to the monastery to which they gave the name of Monte Oliveto, which lies not far from the little town of Chiusure. The situation of the monastery is in this manner. There is a lofty hill looking toward the West, compacted of tufa and chalk, one stadium or thereabouts in length, much less in breadth. If you ask its shape, of a chestnut

leaf it is the likeness. On all sides rocks and most deep chasms run down, into which it is a horror to look. Where the hill is joined to the rest of the land, by a moderate ridge, a brick tower has been raised, by which it prevents every unfriendly approach; and a ditch has been drawn, which sends its waters into either chasm: this is joined by a bridge, and when that is raised, no approach lies open to anyone toward the monastery. The hill slopes, and in the middle a noble church has been built, and beside it the monks' dining halls, walks, porticoes, and all kinds of offices which the Religious deem necessary. Nothing that is not excellent, nothing that is not bright, and that you would not eagerly gaze upon." Then, a few things being interposed ^a: "Their religion is nearly the same as that of the monks of St. Benedict, who observe his Rule. In the habit you may find a difference: those use a dark garment, these a white and most clean one. The use of meats is alike forbidden to both, unless sickness require it. In ceremonies you will find very many things different; in substance the norm of living is almost one. And these indeed to this time lead their life without ill repute. The mountain itself, planted with domestic trees, has very many olives, whence the name of Oliveto arose. There are figs and almonds, many kinds of pears and apples; there are cypresses, little groves in which in summer one may catch pleasant shades; vineyards too and vine-leafed arbors, and gardens of vegetables, baths, and a perennial spring, and cisterns, and wells. Among the very rocks are oak woods and the juniper tree. Many walks, which hold two men, go round the hill on every side and cut through the middle of it, planted on this side and that with rose-beds, or vines, or rosemary. Pleasant solaces for the monks, more pleasant for those who, after they have seen them, are free to go away." Thus far the Pontiff.

[59] The increases of the Olivetan assembly, which Pius indicates, and reports from other witnesses, and those no less fortunate which came to pass in later times, the sanctity of its monks, and above all of its most highly commended Founder, brought forth. For, this fragrance being spread everywhere, first the prelates and nobles of the neighboring parts of Etruria, and then also of distant cities, vied in offering churches to the Monteolivetans, namely that the discipline of the Benedictine Order, languishing at that time and all but prostrate, might flourish again through their manners and glorious deeds. The diplomas bear witness, out of which we report these things. Ranuccio, bishop of Volterra ^b, addresses blessed Bernard and his companions thus in his letter: "And because we know by experience that you, the Abbot, Brethren, and monks, the Chapter and Convent of the said Monastery (of Monte Oliveto), are religious men of holy conversation and life, through whom the people may be instructed in the virtues, and the Clergy animated to holiness, and increased alike by word and example, and better reformed through you; nor are there at present other Religious of the same (of the divine Benedict) or of another Order, nor could any be found by us, through whom it could in any way be repaired and ruled and more wholesomely governed, an inquiry having been made upon these matters, etc." And therefore he shows himself to burn with desire that someone should set out thither from the aforesaid cenobites.

[60] how this Congregation was propagated on account of integrity of life, The supreme hierarch Urban the Fifth in his diploma calls the Olivetans "the mirror and example of regular observance and life." Gregory the Twelfth, most zealous for the same Congregation, in order to revive in the most ancient and most celebrated monastery of St. Justina of Padua the form of monastic life that had died out, assigns Olivetans to that seat. So declares a diploma given at Lucca on the X of the Kalends of June, in the second year of his Pontificate, in these words: "We therefore, from the duty of the pastoral office enjoined upon us, aiming with fatherly affections at the reformation of the said monastery (of St. Justina) in spiritual and temporal things, of our own motion and to you all (Olivetans) from henceforth by Apostolic authority liberally grant, etc." In the year of Christ 1408 the Monteolivetans come as reformers, and completely fulfill the Pontiff's wishes. But some years afterwards the monks of St. Justina — whom the Italians call both Cassinese and black, from their dark garment — fenced about with the power of the Venetians, promising specimens of a stricter life, which they also performed, returned under the leadership of Ludovico Barbo ^c.

[61] to which the Roman Pontiffs Taken with this same holiness of manners, the supreme Pontiffs and prelates, kindly and likewise beneficent toward the Olivetan family, enriched it with copious privileges. Some of these are seen inserted in its Chronicles, very many collected into one separate volume and published in print. Gregory the Eleventh, supreme Pontiff, exempts the Monteolivetan monks, and their monasteries and places both present and future, from any visitation, reformation, correction, right, and power of bishops, archbishops, and patriarchs. But he, before he ascended to the Pontifical summit, being called Pietro de Beaufort, Cardinal Deacon, had obtained from Clement the Sixth for the Olivetan Order the church of St. Mary the New, his own title, where now the Roman monastery stands, a petition being presented to that end, in which he set forth this above all as the cause of so zealous a request: "Because, like a new plantation from a watering from above, both in the head and in the members it advances with continual spiritual and special increases, from the fragrant merits of the exemplary life of those monks and from their regular disciplines, which notorious fame published abroad."

[62] granted various privileges, John XXII and Julius II grant that the persons, places, and all the goods of the Congregation be understood to be received under the protection of blessed Peter and of the Apostolic See. The same Julius ordains that the Monteolivetan Prelates enjoy the same benefits and discharge their offices just as if they were Benedictines. Pius II and likewise Julius II ordain that those who vow to enter another religion (that of the Carthusians excepted) may be received into the Olivetan. Urban the Sixth, Gregory XI, Boniface the Ninth, and the aforesaid Julius ordain that the confessor whom any monk shall choose at the point of death may by Apostolic authority impart a plenary remission of all sins. Pius the Fourth, by a diploma given on the XXIII day of February 1560, approves the privilege, or the peaceful and quiet possession, of freely choosing a Cardinal protector of the Order, and adds to it the strength of Pontifical confirmation. But, very many others being passed over, long before this Pius the Second had expressly bestowed also upon the monks and monasteries of the Congregation of St. Mary of Monte Oliveto all the privileges, immunities, and exemptions which had been granted by Eugene the Fourth and other predecessor Pontiffs to the monks and monasteries of the Cassinese Congregation, otherwise of St. Justina of Padua of the Order of St. Benedict.

[63] Sigismund, emperor of the Romans, pursued the Olivetans with such singular benevolence and which Christian princes protected. that, while in Italy he was most religiously bestowing his labor upon the redeeming of the Church's unity from that famous schism of three Pontiffs, he gladly and frequently made use of their company. At Siena, in the church of the divine Benedict, he held it a mark of honor to clothe a young man with the monastic garment with his own hands. Thereafter he enriched the monks, summoned into Hungary, with two monasteries of his own accord, and most liberally heaped upon them many other gifts. Charles the Fifth, Cæsar, whom we noted above as having lodged in the chief monastery for the sake of piety, by letters given at Villefranche near Nice on the XVII day of June in the year of the Lord 1538, takes the persons, places, and household of the Congregation under the protection, defense, and safeguard of the holy Roman Empire. It is altogether unworthy to pass over in silence the glory of Siena, the divine Catherine, since she attested her zeal and devotion toward the Monteolivetan family by illustrious tokens: nor do those things speak obscurely which survive committed to type, among her letters written to several cenobites of the aforesaid Order.

[64] But what the manners of blessed Bernard's disciples were, After the testimony of Antonio da Barga, and what the severity of their life, it is permitted to conjecture from what a venerable man of the same Religion, joined by intimacy and familiarity to the divine Bernardino of Siena ^d, published in his history about the hundredth year after the Founder's death — Antonio da Barga. "Now indeed at present" (they are the historian's words) "although not in equal measure as our Fathers, nevertheless Regular observance is strictly kept. For from the Ides of September until the Lord's Resurrection we fast daily, violating no day at all, save only the day of the Lord's Nativity, on which, out of reverence for so great a solemnity, it is by no means fitting to abstain. Further, if any of the visitors, or the abbot General, should wish to dispense someone for cause of necessity, or of recreation, or even of the arrival of pilgrim brethren, this would be lawful to them alone; yet it is rarely done. For at the time of the vintage it has hitherto been customary to dispense, where it is needful to gather the vintage. But apart from those days, not even the Prior can dispense the Convent without the licence of the abbot General or of the visitors, which is not lightly granted. From Easter until Pentecost we fast not a single day, according to the precept of the rule. But from Pentecost until the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross the Brethren fast on the fourth and sixth days of the week, by no means violating this norm, unless too great a fervor of summer heat has grown hot. In the Advent of the Lord, in Lent, on the vigils appointed by the Church, and on every Friday we allow neither milk-foods nor eggs. Meats we never eat, unless the necessity of grave infirmity has intervened; and as soon as the sick man perceives himself to be better, he wholly gives them up, and returns to the usage of his own Convent.

[65] "What shall I say of garments? For we are not to be compared with the ancient Fathers, who used scanty and few clothes; yet neither do we believe ourselves to be conformed to wanderers. who sets forth the regular observance of the ancient Olivetans For a little tunic we keep by no means without evident necessity, namely of infirmity. But we wear a shirt neither of linen nor of wool, but only a simple tunic upon the bare flesh. Each of us has for use three tunics with a cowl and a scapular. To each also are given the necessary footwear and little caps: for hose are granted with difficulty, and to those only whom infirmity or old age presses, or some other most urgent cause demands. Furs no one of us uses at all, however old or infirm he may be. But the use of baths is allowed in necessity by the abbot or by the visitors. No monk can eat or drink without the licence of his Prior, and such licence is not granted them for a year, but for a day and an hour; and if anyone shall have done otherwise, eating or drinking without licence, he cannot at all be absolved by his Prior, but is reserved to the abbot. But whoever shall have done anything against decency even in the least act, namely with an unchaste mind, is subject to the same punishment. The nocturnal assembly, indeed, according to the decree of the Rule, we celebrate carefully both in summer and in winter time; nor can anyone sleep after matins, save with the licence of his superior. Whence a certain abbot caused two holes to be made in each door of the cells, which are still seen closed up in certain monasteries, so that the senior appointed might be able to see who were watching and who sleeping. The vows, accordingly, which those profess who have turned their backs upon worldly cares, are excellently and commonly observed in our Order to this day.

[66] and their austere manner of living, "What are we to say of obedience, in which the strength and foundation of the whole Religion consists? Every year the households are made anew by the abbot and the visitors, and the Brethren are changed from place to place, that they may better know

what befits the salvation of each one's soul; they send notes to each convent, in which the changes are contained, which both Prelates and subjects obey as though it were the Gospel. But to those passing over from one place to another for obedience' sake, there is given by the Prior of the monastery from which they depart the money necessary for their food while they are journeying. We live indeed in common, according to the laws of the most blessed Fathers, nor does anyone dare to say that anything is his own. There is made indeed by the visitors at fitting times a great inquiry into private property: for after the three days' term imposed by them, as it is the custom to grant, if anyone possessing little or much against the will of his superiors shall not of his own accord disclose his offense, he is straightway excommunicated. Moreover the visitors, before they depart from the monastery which they have visited, carefully search the cells of the Brethren, lest anyone lie unknown in so grave and abominable an offense. And thus the Brethren keep the discipline of regular exercise as of old. But the nocturnal and daily office of the divine work is celebrated with great diligence, both by chanting and by reading. In very many monasteries Matins is chanted through the whole winter, especially in the monastery of Monte Oliveto, in which both in winter and in summer the Brethren chant almost the whole Office, some of whom, both on account of the length of the chant, and on account of the exercise which is drawn out at too great length, and on account of fasting and vigils, being wearied, have several times fallen to the ground while chanting or reading." Thus far the old historian, a man of the highest repute.

[67] Nor yet did the Olivetan assembly shine by uprightness of rites and manners alone, our anonymous author reviews the persons distinguished by learning but also by erudition. Wherefore it reckons among its own both various writers and very many bishops and archbishops of divers sees: moreover two Commendatories set over the hospital of the Holy Spirit at Rome, namely Benedetto of Siena, who also presided over the abbey of St. Gregory in the City, and Don Evangelista Torniolo of Perugia, bishop of Città di Castello: likewise two Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, George Martinuzzi the Croat, and Pietro Tartaro the Roman. To these is added Ardicino della Porta of Novara, who resigned from the sacred college of the Purpled, that he might put on the white garments among the Monteolivetans. But that some ascribe Pietro Tartaro to the Cassinese ought to be far from causing wonder. For indeed, when Andrea, abbot of that place, desired to see the monastic observance, prostrate in the monastery of Monte Cassino, raised up and restored, leave having been given him by the Roman Pontiff, in the year one thousand three hundred and seventy he asked of Rainerio, abbot General of the Congregation of Monte Oliveto, some helpers from among his own. Certain ones refusing, others crossed over, among whom two are read to have discharged the office of abbot in that monastery, easily the chief of the rest: Andrea of Faenza in the year 1372, and that Tartaro, who before had been Olivetan Prior of St. Mary the New in the City, and thereafter was taken into the number of the Cardinals by Gregory XI. Accordingly you may without ill will call Tartaro both an Olivetan and a Cassinese.

[68] Lastly — which is the chief point — lest its renown be confined within these most narrow bounds, and by holiness of life, the Olivetan Religion has sent many saints to heaven, where, like stars of that mystical firmament, they will shine unto perpetual eternities. Besides Bernard Ptolomei, the parent of all, and Ambrogio Piccolomini and Patrizio de' Patrizi, nearest to him in sanctity, it venerates ^e St. Frances of Rome, most celebrated throughout the whole world. Blessed Bernard of Vercelli, who most religiously presided over the Monteolivetans in Hungary, founded in the City a house of Oblates of the Order of the divine Benedict of the Congregation of Monte Oliveto, under the leadership of Brother Antonio, who at that time presided over St. Mary the New, a man of upright mind and of great religion — for which cause, on the authority of Pius the Second, supreme Prelate, in his Commentaries, his bones are reverently guarded; blessed Girolamo of Mantua, and blessed Girolamo of Corsica, a Converse; Antonio da Barga, abbot in Hungary, praised hitherto; Francesca Leophanta, a nun of Palermo; Giacomo da Carpi, whom Gabriel Bucelin mentions among the Benedictine saints in his Menology; Daniele of Foligno, and Francesco of Verona, both Converses; these, I say, are all sons of a family never sufficiently commended, and both before and after their death shone with the repute of holiness ^f.

[69] Nor these only, but others more in number, and most illustrious both in learning from that Congregation. and in uprightness of manners; so that on that account Andrea of Volterra, another writer of the same Congregation, who between the middle and the end of the fifteenth Christian century composed the life of blessed Girolamo of Corsica, in his Prologue addresses the monk Giuliano thus: "Long since thou didst ask me, most dear Brother Giuliano, that I should put into Latin the life of blessed Girolamo, thy countryman and our monk, so that some monument of so great a man might survive for the instruction of posterity — hating that custom grown old in our Religion in past centuries, whereby the virtues suffered a great loss; since of the most illustrious men, who in this our Olivetan Religion have been almost innumerable, no one committed the memory to writing." Nor is it to be omitted that the again and again mentioned man of Barga, in his History of Olivetan Affairs, closes his preface with these words: "For what we have written we have taken partly from the archives of Monte Oliveto, partly we have heard from ancient Fathers, other things we have beheld with our own eyes; and indeed, if life shall be our companion, in another book we shall relate the illustrious men whom our Order has quickened, and the miracles wrought by them, and the books which they wisely published." Since these things are so, seeing that divine Scripture says, A wise son is the glory of his father, it will have to be inferred with the divine Maximus how great is the glory of Bernard Ptolomei, who rejoices in the wisdom and devotion of so many sons.

ANNOTATIONS.