Eleutherius

CONCERNING ST. ELEUTHERIUS, BISHOP OF TOURNAI IN BELGIUM

Year 531.

Preliminary Commentary.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (St.)

By G. H.

Section I. Tournai, an ancient, royal, and episcopal city. At what time was St. Eleutherius born there, made Bishop, and died?

[1] Tournai is ^a large and ancient city of Belgica Secunda, also called Turnacum, Tornacus, and Turnacus. The river Scheldt, flowing down from Cambrai and Valenciennes, divides it through the middle Tournai, ^a city on the Scheldt and thence washes Ghent, Antwerp, and other towns, and finally empties into the German Ocean by various mouths. This city, together with the Tournaisis, or the Castellany or Bailiwick (as they call it) of Tournai, and Amandopolis (formerly called Elnone), constitutes in ^a sense one province, with its subject territory and diocese annexed to the County of Flanders. But the diocese of Tournai additionally contains the cities of Lille and Courtrai, each with an ample territory; formerly also Ghent (with Oudenaarde), Bruges (with Oudenburg, Sluis, and neighboring towns), now detached and endowed with their own Bishops.

[2] To which ancient people this city and diocese should be ascribed is debated by various scholars. Some, and not unlearned men of our age, write that Tournai belongs to the Nervii. In the twelfth century of Christ, and perhaps first of all, Herimannus, Abbot of the monastery of St. Martin at Tournai, held by some to be the metropolis of the Nervii and Guibert of the Order of Friars Minor, himself also born at Tournai, took this position. The words of the former, somewhat abbreviated, from his manuscript Tournai Chronicle, were published by our Bucherius in Book 8 of Roman Belgium, chapter 13, number 3 -- the same that Guibert recites below in the Life of St. Eleutherius, chapter 1. Both want this city to have been built by the first Kings of Rome and raised to illustrious distinction, and falsely claimed to have been founded by the Kings of Rome giving it the name of New Rome, then Hostilia, and afterward Nervia -- ^a name which, when the earlier ones were abolished by King Turnus, became Turnacus and Tornacum, and has prevailed to this day. They maintain that it was called Nervia after Servius, King of the Romans, the first letter being changed lest it be disfigured by the mark of servitude; and finally, that the Nervii were named from Nervia, their metropolis. But while these fictitious fables, scarcely worthy of old women's lucubrations, are brought forward, the antiquity that is otherwise to be revered is itself obscured by ^a shameful stain.

[3] Philippe Harveng, commonly called "de l'Aumone," second Abbot of the Premonstratensian monastery of Bonne-Esperance near Binche in Hainaut, ^a contemporary and intimate of St. Bernard, by others rather ^a city of the Menapii in his Life of St. Amand, Bishop of Maastricht, composed around the year 1170 and illustrated by us on February 6, asserts in number 13 that "the city of the Menapii is that which by its common name is called Tornacus"; where we in section 3, number 14, in the Preliminary Commentary on the said Life of St. Amand, showed at great length that the people of the city and diocese of Tournai were formerly considered and called Menapii. The same is deduced in learned discussion by Bucherius in his Roman Belgium, published subsequently, especially in Book 8, chapters 11 and following. We have found no mention of Tournai older than the Antonine Itinerary and the Peutinger Tables. named in the Antonine Itinerary In these, the boundary of the Roman Empire is drawn from the shore at Gesoriacum, or Boulogne, through Therouanne, Wervik, Tournai, Bavay, Gembloux, and Tongeren. To these should be added the Acts of St. Piatus the Martyr, if they had had ^a contemporary writer. From these, however, we know that under the pagan Roman Emperors the faith of Christ was planted at Tournai -- indeed, watered by the blood of Martyrs -- the faith of Christ taught by St. Piatus which the Acts of St. Eleutherius below also confirm.

[4] Next comes the List of Provinces and Cities of Gaul, written in the time of Emperor Honorius; indeed, also the List of Dignities of the Empire, published some years after Honorius's death. famous in the 4th century In the former List, under the metropolis of Reims in Belgica Secunda, the "Civitas Turnacensium" or "Turnacus" is established, as is read in an ancient manuscript codex of the Queen of Sweden. In the List of Dignities of the Empire, section 42, among the Procurators of the Imperial Weaving Factories is listed that of Tournai in Belgica

Secunda. From this we infer that the city was of no small reputation in preceding times, but began to be diminished by the various incursions of barbarians. For the Vandals and Alans, in the consulship of Arcadius VI and Probus, in the year of Christ 406, on the day before the Kalends of January, crossed the Rhine and entered Gaul, then devastated by the Vandals according to the Chronicle of Prosper. St. Jerome, in his letter XI to the widow Ageruchia, laments that the most powerful city of the Remi, the Ambiani, Atrebates, Morini, Tournai, and other cities were devastated by these and other barbarians -- which we said occurred chiefly in the year 407 and the following, in the Life of St. Vedastus, Bishop of Arras, on February 6, section 1, number 4. The Frankish Kings followed, the first of whom, Pharamund and Chlodio, had their royal seat at Diesthem in Brabant. and occupied by Chlodio, King of the Franks But Chlodio, entering the Carbonarian forest, as is read in the Deeds of the Kings of the Franks, chapter 4, "seized the city of Tournai, and from there hastened all the way to the city of Cambrai"; for, as Gregory of Tours writes in Book 2 of his History of the Franks, chapter 9, he seized that city after crushing the Romans, and after residing in it for ^a short time, he occupied other places along the river Somme. Merovech was substituted for Chlodio in the year 448, and his son Childeric in 456. St. Eleutherius is born at Tournai under Childeric in the year 456 The chronological indications to be presented below will demonstrate that St. Eleutherius seems to have been born at Tournai in that same year.

[5] Upon Childeric's death in the year 479, and his burial at Tournai (which Audoenus in his Life of St. Eligius, Bishop of Noyon and Tournai, calls ^a royal city), his son Clovis I began to reign. under Clovis, waging war against the Romans As ^a young man keen for military service, he waged his first war against the Romans and their king Syagrius, who had his seat at Soissons and commanded the remnants of the Romans after the death of his father Aegidius. "At that time," says Gregory of Tours, Book 2, chapter 27, "many churches were plundered by the army of Clovis, because he was still entangled in pagan errors." Clovis defeated Syagrius in the fifth year of his reign, the year of Christ 484. While the preparations for this war engendered, as usually happens, many bitter feelings driven into exile, he lives at Blandinium against the enemy of Clovis, Syagrius, and against the Romans who professed the faith of Christ, the Christians were ejected from Tournai -- among them St. Eleutherius with his parents -- and they migrated to Blandinium, ^a village two leagues distant. Not long after this war, Clovis married St. Clotild, daughter of the Burgundian Chilperic, imbued with the Christian faith and also with the most pious morals; with her, ^a greater fervor of religion began to grow for Christians everywhere, and freedom for the exercises of Christian piety was granted. A public church was then erected at Blandinium and dedicated to St. Peter. after Theodore, he is created Bishop Theodore was likewise consecrated Bishop to preside over this Church and to subject the neighboring provinces and places to the yoke of Christ by his holy preaching. But he, after ^a few days had passed, is said in the Acts below to have perished, struck by ^a divine bolt. Authors generally understand some divine retribution here, as we observe below in the notes. In the French Life of St. Eleutherius published by Rene Benoit and Gazaeus, he is much praised. Catullus in his work on Tournai, section 1, page 6, says: "Around the year not in the year 470 470, Theodore or Theodoric was elected Bishop of Tournai by the faithful people; he presided for not very long, but, struck by lightning as is reported, departed this life with no small reputation for holiness. For some relate that he was not struck by lightning but suffered martyrdom." That is Demochares, who makes him ^a companion of St. Chrysolius, killed on February 7 in the year 302, as was then stated.

[6] Bucherius in his Chronological Tables appended to Volume 1 of Chapeaville's work on the Bishops of Tongeren and Maastricht asserts that Bishop Theodore of Tournai died in the year 500, after three years in the see, and that St. Eleutherius was made Bishop of Tournai at the beginning of the year 501, and held the see for ^a full thirty-five years. Buzelinus in Book 1 of the Annals of Gallo-Flanders, Miraeus in the Belgian Chronicle, and others follow Bucherius. nor in the year 501 The same Bucherius assigns the year 501 to the beginning of St. Eleutherius's See in Book 20 of Roman Belgium, chapters 3 and 4, but asserts that Theodore presided only ^a few days before him, and indeed at Blandinium. In the Lessons recited at Matins in the proper Office of St. Eleutherius among the people of Tournai at this time, the beginning of the episcopate of St. Eleutherius is referred to the year of Christ 484, to which year the following is ascribed in some codices of Sigebert's Chronicle: "Theodore, Bishop of Tournai, dies; Eleutherius succeeds him." Meyer in his Annals of Flanders, Locrius in his Belgian Chronicle, and others follow this. nor in the year 484 or 483 The year 483, in which St. Eleutherius is said to have been ordained, has been interpolated into ^a manuscript Tournai codex of his Life, but it is absent from the codex of the best reliability, which, as we shall presently say, was formerly sent to us by Cornelius Duinius of Amsterdam; it is also absent from other manuscripts from which we give the earlier Life. We therefore examine the chronological indications inserted in the Acts themselves, according to which we judge that St. Eleutherius was consecrated Bishop in the year of Christ 487, when he had already completed thirty years of age, but in the year 487, in the time of Pope Felix III and when St. Felix, Pope III, presided over the Roman See -- created on March 8 of the year 483 and deceased on January 30 of the year 492. It is said in Life IV, published from an ancient manuscript Breviary, that he traveled to Rome to the latter and was installed by Apostolic authority, and upon his return was consecrated Bishop. Hence the dates indicated by both Catullus and Bucherius are excluded. The rest will presently be established. His journey to Rome, when he was about to be consecrated Bishop, is also reported in other Acts. Guibert alone says that, his election having been confirmed by the Supreme Pontiff, he was graciously consecrated Bishop of Tournai.

[7] In the following years King Clovis stirred up new wars, first with the Thuringians, or Tongri, and afterward with the Alamanni. He made war upon the former, says Gregory of Tours in Book 2, chapter 27, in the tenth year of his reign, the year of Christ 489, and subjugated them to his dominions. When King Clovis became ^a Christian Against the Alamanni, however, in the fifteenth year of his reign, the year of Christ 494, after ^a most fierce battle, he merited to obtain victory through the invocation of the name of Christ, as the same Gregory relates in Book 2, chapter 30. Then, when the King was reborn through holy baptism at the end of the same year, on the feast of the Nativity of Christ our Redeemer, ^a new light shone upon the churches of Christians under so great ^a monarch, with the darkness of paganism widely dispelled. At this time St. Eleutherius was still dwelling at Blandinium, illustrious for miracles even among the idolaters themselves. he is illustrious for miracles For he both raised from death the daughter of ^a Tribune and converted the Tribune himself and other citizens of Tournai, afflicted by ^a severe pestilence, to the faith. he migrates to Tournai; baptizes 11,000 At length, having spent nine years there, he migrated to Tournai, and in ^a single week washed eleven thousand persons in baptism. That there might be ^a solemn memorial of this work, an anniversary day was instituted for giving thanks to God, on the fifth day before the Kalends of October. And lest the beginning of that solemnity be abolished by any oblivion, it was carefully noted under which Pontiff it occurred. The Acts from the manuscripts of Duinius and Tournai have it thus: "In the tenth year of his ordination, with Pope Anastasius presiding, in the 10th year of his ordination, under Pope Anastasius II he brought back to the faith the people of Tournai, rebellious against all Christians, and in the same week baptized more than eleven thousand." From the earlier Life, published from the same and other manuscripts, the following should be added: "All who had believed established ^a solemn day on which they had been baptized, that is, the fifth day before the Kalends of October." Now Pope Anastasius II was elected on November 28 of the year 496, and died on November 19 of the year 498, not having occupied the see for ^a complete biennium. Hence the tenth year of the ordination of Blessed Eleutherius in the month of September cannot be conjoined with the pontificate of Anastasius before the year 497 -- which is what I wished to point out above in the year of Christ 497 when I said that the beginning of St. Eleutherius's episcopate was wrongly referred by some to the year 483 or the following. But that the beginning assigned by Catullus or Bucherius is even more clearly excluded, no one fails to see. In the proper offices printed in the year 1626, on the fifth day within the octave of St. Eleutherius, in the sixth lesson, three Roman journeys of his are indicated, and the first is said to have been undertaken in the tenth year of his ordination, while Anastasius was governing the Church of Christ. However, these do not sufficiently cohere with the following, related on the first day within the Octave, Lesson 4: "The Christians sent Eleutherius to Rome on account of his supreme integrity of life; having returned thence and been approved by pontifical authority, they had him consecrated with the greatest consent in the year of the Lord 484" -- which we said above is found in the ancient Acts, but with the year of Christ omitted; and we noted earlier that St. Eleutherius is read in the same Acts to have first gone to Rome at that time, though Guibert alone does not mention that journey,

in whom at number 20 the following is found concerning Anastasius: "For indeed in the tenth year of his ordination, with Pope Anastasius presiding, Gelasius already being deceased (who had sat between him and St. Felix III), he brought back the rebels to the faith and the unbelievers to Catholic unity." And at number 16: "That solemn day was celebrated with joy on the fifth day before the Kalends of October, when the people of Tournai were converted from the error of paganism to the Catholic faith by Eleutherius."

[8] The second journey of St. Eleutherius to the Roman Pontiff is indicated in the same Acts in these words: He sets out for Rome in the 14th year of his ordination "In the fourteenth year of his episcopate, seeing the Churches in these parts almost in despair of the mercy of God, he composed ^a discourse on the Divinity of Christ, the only-begotten, our Lord, and afterward brought it to the Roman Pontiff, by whom he was honorably received." Guibert has nearly the same at number 20: "In the fourteenth year of his episcopate... he visited Symmachus, who was then presiding at Rome, and offered his Catholic discourses to him," etc. The same, in the above-cited Lesson VI of the fifth day, concerning the fourteenth year of his ordination and Pope Symmachus, are conjoined, in the year of Christ 501 which perfectly corresponds to the year of Christ 501, when Symmachus had presided over the Church for three years, having succeeded Anastasius, and excellently confirms the chronological epoch established above. In the earlier Acts, near the end of number 17, these words are repeated: "Also in the twenty-fifth year of his pontificate he returned from Rome" -- in the following year he returns to Tournai where an error seems to have crept into the number, and instead of the year 25, the year 15 should be read, in which he returned from Rome, having traveled to Pope Symmachus in the most recently elapsed year, the fourteenth of his ordination; or else another journey to the same Pope Symmachus, undertaken in the year of Christ 512, is indicated.

[9] The last journey, which we judge to be the third, is described in the same Acts at number 18, to Pope Hormisdas, but no chronological indication is added there. he again goes to Rome, to Pope Hormisdas Later writers, not judging this sufficiently fitting, appended the twenty-fifth year of ordination, but this, as we have already said, still pertains to Pope Symmachus; unless another year is substituted, perhaps the thirtieth or later. For when Symmachus died on July 19 of the year 514, Hormisdas succeeded, elected on the seventh day after his death -- therefore in the twenty-seventh year of the ordination of St. Eleutherius. After the death of Hormisdas on August 6 of the year 523, St. John I succeeded, and upon his death on May 27 of the year 526, St. Felix IV. In this same year, or certainly the following, he holds ^a Synod in the year 527 St. Eleutherius seems to have convened ^a Synod, when he had governed the Church of Tournai for thirty-one years and that of Blandinium for nine -- as is stated at number 20 and repeated by Guibert at number 22. Finally, when Pope St. Felix died in the year 530, Boniface II was created Pope, and died the following year, 531, on October 17. In the same year 531, in the time of Pope Boniface, he dies in the year 531 the same Acts indicate in the Tournai manuscript at number 28 that St. Eleutherius departed this life, since they relate that while he was in his last illness he gave ^a commission to Andoneus, or Audoenus, his faithful disciple, to go to Rome as quickly as possible in the time of Pope Boniface II and bring to the Roman Pontiff Boniface the treasure of Christ, that is, the book composed by him. In Guibert also at number 29, Eleutherius commanded Audoenus that after the passing of his Father, his beloved son should hasten to Rome and present to the Supreme Pontiff Boniface the documents of faith that the Saint had composed. Finally, in the Life from the manuscript Breviary, number 17, he dictated ^a profession of the Catholic faith, which he also gave to his disciple Audoenus to be transmitted to Boniface, the Roman Pontiff.

[10] St. Eleutherius is said at Guibert number 24, and in the sixth lesson of the sixth day within the Octave in the proper Office, to have been then in his seventy-sixth year of age -- in the 76th year of age, the 45th of ordination that is, from the year 456 to the year 531. The same Guibert at number 33, and the author of the Life from the manuscript Breviary at number 5, assign forty-five years to his See, which we likewise reckon from the year 487 to the same year 531. The same years are gathered from the other Life from manuscripts, at numbers 20 and 22, where the years of his age and ordination are reported when he convened the Synod, after which he is said to have survived for five years. Three sons of Clovis I, still surviving, then presided over the kingdom of the Franks; in the 22nd year of the reign of Clothar they had succeeded their father, who died on November 27 of the year 509, and were in the twenty-second year of their reign. Of these, Clothar, the first of that name, together with the kingdom of Soissons also possessed Tournai. Hence the conjectures of others collapse, who report that St. Eleutherius died either in the year 529 or 546.

Section II. The chronology of the See of St. Eleutherius confirmed from the succession of St. Medard.

[11] Giles Bucherius, in the cited Book 20 of ancient Belgium, chapters 2 and 4, judges that the dates of St. Eleutherius should be established from the Acts of St. Medard of the Veromandui, In the Life of his successor St. Medard Bishop of Noyon whose See was transferred, and after the death of St. Eleutherius simultaneously Bishop of Tournai. But although we believe the dates of that See to be henceforth established on such solid foundations that from them it may be inferred how many years St. Medard lived afterward, it nevertheless seemed worthwhile to show briefly what should be thought of the Acts of St. Medard. And first, Laurentius Surius at the end of the Life of St. Medard, published by him at June 8, notes published by Surius with this observation that he transcribed this entire Life of the most blessed Medard from ^a certain manuscript codex, without altering the style; but that the anonymous writer in the Life of St. Gildardus, Archbishop of Rouen, testifies that Fortunatus the Priest wrote the Life of St. Medard, and cites certain things from it that agree more or less with another history of St. Medard, much briefer. He did not dare to affirm, however, that it was published by Fortunatus. But whatever that history relates, all of it is contained in what he publishes, with very many things interspersed and added, though worthy of reading, by some other later but not unlearned man, who nevertheless sometimes celebrates the holy man's virtues only from commonplaces. So Surius, who also says in the title that not ^a few things were added later by ^a certain learned man; but one little versed in observing chronological reckoning, which is what we are seeking here. Certainly in chapter 18, having narrated the death of St. Eleutherius, he writes among other things: [he is said to have succeeded upon the death of Eleutherius in the time of Pope Hormisdas and St. Remigius] "The outstanding Pastor took up both the sheepfold of Noyon and that of Tournai by the counsel and authority of the comprovincial Bishops, in the time of Pope Hormisdas, under St. Remigius, then Archbishop of Reims, with the assent of the King and the Courtiers, and the acclamation of both peoples." So that author. But we showed on February 6, in the Life of St. Vedastus, section 3, number 13, that St. Remigius died in the year 530; and Pope St. Hormisdas had already long since died in the year 523, on August 6, as we said. Bucherius in chapter 3, number 9 writes thus: "Fortunatus expressly writes in his Life that Medard presided for fifteen years after the death of Eleutherius." and therefore, after 15 years, would have died in the year 537 or 538 From this one could conclude that St. Eleutherius necessarily died in the year 523, or rather the preceding one, and St. Medard, after fifteen years had then elapsed, in the year 537 or the following.

[12] But these things are far distant from the meaning of the same most learned Bucherius, who had written immediately before: "The Life of St. Medard, Bishop of Tournai immediately after St. Eleutherius, clearly teaches that he died ^a little before the death of Clothar I, the Senior, and yet it is inferred he died in 561 on the eighth of June; and Gregory of Tours, Book 4, chapter 19 -- therefore according to the chronological reckoning established by us, in the year of Christ 561, in which I shall strongly prove Clothar to have died." So he writes there. We shall treat of Gregory of Tours below. What the Life of St. Medard clearly teaches about the death of St. Eleutherius and the succession of St. Medard, we have stated; that St. Medard presided for fifteen years afterward is indicated by these words in chapter 20: "And so, in imitation of the supreme Pastor who, as we read in the Gospel, having other sheep, made one fold of two, the holy Bishop associated that fierce nation of the Flemings with his Church of Noyon and for the space of fifteen years, although they were separated by some distance of journey, he labored unceasingly to bring them to divine worship. For fifteen years he occupied the Chair divinely committed to him, and during that time, not without much labor, he brought the unbelievers and infidels to the Catholic faith... When this span of time had elapsed, it befell the holy Bishop of God to be weighed down by ^a most grave bodily infirmity, and as the disease grew worse, his bodily senses gradually failed from day to day...

But when this blessed Bishop was approaching the end of his life, after the death of Chramn it happened that King Clothar, after he had burned his son Chramn together with his wife and daughters, was returning from the region of the Bretons. Having learned of the illness of this Bishop, he humbly hastened to visit him." So that text. In this visit of Clothar all the strength of the argument is placed, since it is said to have occurred after the burning of his son Chramn, which is related by Gregory of Tours in Book 4, chapter 20, and is connected with the death of Childebert, King of Paris, which took place in the year 559 who is known to have died in the year 558. In that year, therefore, or at least the following one, 559, Chramn was killed. For in chapter 21, the fifty-first year of Clothar is reported, which corresponds to the year 560, and the following year the King died. therefore he would have sat for 36 years But with these facts established, nothing else seems able to be inferred except that St. Medard was constituted Bishop of Tournai by SS. Hormisdas and Remigius, therefore at least in the year 523; and afterward lived not merely fifteen years but ^a full thirty-six, or, as Bucherius prefers, thirty-eight years, others say 38 or 41 or finally, according to Baronius, forty-one years, for he refers the death of Chramn and the death of St. Medard to the year of Christ 564. But this rests only on the words reported by Surius in the Life of St. Medard.

[13] Bucherius, chapter 4, number 11, admits that those things are found in the Life of St. Medard, but acknowledges that either Fortunatus, through human inattention, let them slip, or they were interpolated by another; and that it should be said that Medard survived Eleutherius by fifteen years, that Life was not written by Fortunatus and that he governed both sheepfolds together not under Hormisdas or under Remigius, but under the Roman Pontiffs Vigilius, Pelagius, and John III, and under the Reims bishops Mappinus and Aegidius. But these things are not to be stuffed in either, since all of them, together with the death of Chramn, are better absent, having been written by some unskilled person after the year of Christ one thousand. Who in the time of Fortunatus mentioned the Flemings? Who even in the year one thousand called the people of Tournai or all the inhabitants of the diocese of Tournai or of the present County of Flanders "the Flemish nation"? We treated of the small boundaries of Flanders, which around Bruges three hundred years after the death of St. Medard still existed, on February 3 in the Life of St. Anschar, section 5, page 396. It seems that the Life of St. Medard had not yet been written when the anonymous author composed the Life of St. Gildard, his brother, but by an anonymous writer, perhaps after the Life of St. Gildard which Surius declined to publish because it seemed entirely composed from commonplaces. The author confesses that it had lain hidden through the neglect of the ancients, and relates that three men -- the brothers Gildard and Medard, and St. Remigius -- lived as Palatines at the court of the King, and were then ordained Bishops at nearly the same time; and that King Clovis was baptized by St. Remigius, with Blessed Medard receiving him from the sacred font. Hence the author of the Life of St. Medard cited above, in order to accelerate all his deeds, says he was made Bishop of Tournai in the times of Pope Hormisdas and St. Remigius, and, forgetting himself, adds that he departed this life after the death of Chramn -- which he had evidently read in the Deeds of the Kings of the Franks, recklessly compiled by an anonymous author, in which these things are found in chapter 29. And because St. Medard lived fifteen years in the episcopate, he counts them after the death of St. Eleutherius. But many things conflict with this reckoning. St. Remigius was ordained Bishop in the year 457, when those two brothers had not yet been born. Together with Gildardus, Bishop of Rouen, Sophronius, Bishop of the Veromandui, subscribed to the First Council of Orleans in the year 508 or the following; his successor was Allomerus, upon whose death Medard was made Bishop of the Veromandui, afterward called Bishop of Noyon when the See was transferred, and after the death of St. Eleutherius in the year 531, also became Bishop of Tournai.

[14] The aforesaid author of the Life of St. Gildard asserts that Fortunatus Ravennus, ^a Priest, describes in eloquent speech how great and of what quality was the innocence, holiness, and patience of Blessed Medard, What is cited as written by Fortunatus in this work and cites these words of his: "When St. Medard received the passing of his body, at the very moment of that hour the heavens were opened, and before the holy body divine lights flashed in the sight of all; and immediately ^a great deluge flooded the earth, so that warm water rained heavily from the clouds." These words are not found in the Life published by Surius with the style unchanged, they are not found in the Life published by Surius or Boscius nor in the other Life published from ^a Fleury manuscript codex by Jean Boscius the Celestine, which we ourselves also possess in our distinguished manuscript codex and have collated with another parchment manuscript of the Most Serene Queen Christina of Sweden, in which the beginning was lacking. We have another Life

[16] We have hitherto established that the year of the death of St. Eleutherius fell in the five hundred and thirty-first year of Christ; but we here inquire into the day and month. In an ancient manuscript codex of ours, from which we give his earlier Life, the Acts of the Saints of the month of July are recorded, with two days from the month of June prefixed, Did St. Eleutherius die on June 30? so that the beginning of that work is made from the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, who in the prefixed catalogue are referred to the third day before the Kalends of July; and immediately, at the second day before the Kalends of July, the following is read: "Life of Martial the Apostle. Life of Thetbald the Confessor on the same day. Life of Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai, on the same day. On the Kalends of July, the Life of Karilefus the Confessor," etc. And the Acts of each are then recited in that order. To the Life of St. Eleutherius this title is prefixed: "Here begins the Life of St. Eleutherius, whose feast is on the second day before the Kalends of July." And after the end of the Acts, the following words are appended, as if indicated by St. Eleutherius to Canon Henry, of whom we shall treat below: "I, Brother Eleutherius, servant of the servants of God, was deposited in ^a sarcophagus in the church of Blessed Peter at Blandinium on the day before the Kalends of July." And afterward he says, "Commemorate the feast of my deposition on the day before the Kalends of July." The same words are read with the same Life in the Tournai manuscript, which we have relegated to the Annotations. In the other Life, to be given from the manuscripts of Cornelius Duynius and the Tournai manuscript, the following is found at number 30 concerning the day of death: "Thus, with the wave of sacred blood poured forth, the true Martyr and Confessor died in peace on the day before the Kalends of July." The same is read with the Sermon on the Trinity, published in the Library of the Fathers, and the following is added: "These things were done by the heretics on the seventh day before the Kalends of June, and in that same year Blessed Eleutherius fell asleep in peace" — that is, after five weeks, as is said in the Life at number 24. In the notes of our Buzelinus it is said that all these things are repeated in the Life compiled from various works and preserved in the episcopal archive, chapter 28. On the same day, June 30, in the manuscript Florarium of the Saints, his birthday is celebrated with these words: "In the city of Tournai, the birthday of St. Eleutherius, Bishop and Confessor. He, shining with the grace of healing, illuminated many blind persons and performed many other miracles." There is deep silence concerning the day of death in the remaining Acts, whether those written by Guibert or those to be given from the ancient manuscript Breviary.

[17] The Canons of Tournai believe that St. Eleutherius died on the twentieth day of the month of February, whether on February 20 and they celebrate his birthday on that day, as is evident from the Proper Offices of the Cathedral Church. An ancient manuscript Martyrology of the monastery of St. Martin in the city of Tournai begins with this encomium in these words: "On the tenth day before the Kalends of March, in the city of Tournai, the deposition of St. Eleutherius, Bishop and Confessor of that same city." These words, however, appear there interpolated by an old hand, and nearly the same are read in Molanus in the supplement to Usuard. He also inaugurates his eulogy in the Birthdays of the Saints of Belgium thus: "At Blandinium, the birthday of St. Eleutherius, Bishop and Confessor, of whom there is honorable mention in Fortunatus." His name is also ascribed to the Martyrologies of Galesinius, Canisius, Ghinius, Saussaius, and the present Roman Martyrology, the Belgian Fasti of Miraeus, and those of other more recent writers, who generally celebrate his birthday on February 20. In certain manuscript additions from the Carthusian house of Brussels to Usuard, it is stated: "At Tournai, the Translation of St. Eleutherius the Martyr." In the manuscript Florarium we said the deposition is read on June 30, but on February 20 the following is found: "At Tournai, St. Eleutherius, Bishop and Martyr, in the year of salvation 1050." An ancient manuscript Martyrology of Usuard, but subsequently augmented, belonging to the College of the Society of Jesus at Ghent, begins thus: "In the city of Tournai, the restoration of St. Eleutherius, Bishop and Confessor." But on the thirtieth of June, what had been recorded about him has been erased, so that only the first word "Tournai" can be read. We suspect that his death had been recorded there. Moreover, he is regarded by some as ^a Martyr because he died from ^a wound inflicted by heretics. On February 21, the memory of St. Eleutherius is ascribed to the supplement of Usuard by Hermann Greven, or February 21? and by Molanus in the earlier edition; Canisius and Ferrarius followed, likewise Renatus Benedictus in the Lives of the Saints published in French. In ^a certain manuscript treatise on the Elevation of the body of St. Eleutherius, the following is related as if revealed by the Saint himself: "But that feast which you celebrate on the Kalends of March, I neither know nor acknowledge, nor on those Kalends have I heard your voices." On which day we have found no memorial of him in any Fasti up to now; whether the author meant to indicate the tenth day before the Kalends of March, we do not divine. Meanwhile, in the same treatise he says, "I give thanks to immortal God and to you, dearest brothers, who have worthily celebrated the feast of my deposition."

[18] In this cited treatise, the Life of the same Saint is said to have been written from that day on which he was deposited, concerning which the following is perhaps to be understood from number 30 of the fuller Life, below: "For having received the partaking of the Body and Blood, the blessed man, as the history of his Life relates, Life I published by us happily migrated to the Lord." From this history of the Life, the entire account that we give in the first place can have been excerpted, which we take from our manuscript codex that formerly belonged to the Cistercian abbey of Vallicella, from manuscripts and which we acquired by exchange from the distinguished gentleman Balthasar Moretus; and we have collated it with another Tournai manuscript found in the papers of our Johannes Buzelinus, by whose pen the learned commentary on Gallo-Flanders was composed — who judges that this Life was written at least before the incursion of the Northmen, of which below. There exists in the Bruges Breviary printed in the year 1520 an excellent epitome of these Acts, distributed into six lessons, which used to be recited at Matins on February 20.

[19] We give in the second place another Life, much fuller, consisting of four parts as it were: the first contains the same things that we have given in the earlier Life. Life II Hence we do not repeat the first two chapters, having indicated in the Annotations the variant readings that occurred there. The second part comprises the other illustrious deeds that St. Eleutherius performed before his death, the miracles he wrought, and the reproaches and beatings he suffered from heretics — perhaps written together with the earlier Life after his death. The third part explains the elevation of the body, which took place, as we shall presently prove, and the history of the elevation after the devastation by the Northmen, toward the end of the ninth century; various miracles divinely wrought in the following years are added, among which Libertinus, restored to life, related various things to the writer, whose happy death, reported to him by others, the writer also attests at number 40. He was likewise familiar with Bishop Hedilo, written around the year 900 who elevated the body of St. Eleutherius; and therefore at number 41 he says, "I do not think this should be passed over in silence either, which was related to me by Bishop Hedilo." The fourth part, finally, was added afterward, when the body of St. Eleutherius was translated into the city — which part we separate under the title of Appendix. We give these Acts from another codex of ours, an Appendix attached to it; from manuscripts which the distinguished gentleman Cornelius Duynius of Amsterdam purchased in the year 1607 in the city of Hoorn. In that codex are contained various Lives of the Saints, compiled together from different booklets; ^a certain part of these belonged to the Brothers of the Holy Cross at Hoorn, and is said to have been written by Brother Theodoric Poll of Venlo, of the Convent of the Crucifer Fathers. The same Life exists in ^a Tournai manuscript codex, but greatly interpolated by later writers, as we observe below in the Notes. We append to these Acts the history of the revelation made to Henry, ^a Canon of Tournai, in the year 1141, written by an eyewitness. It exists in ^a twofold Tournai manuscript. as does the History of the Revelation

[20] In the third place we give ^a Life written by Guibert of the Order of St. Francis, about whom in the Annals of the Minorites under the year 1257, number 7, Wadding writes the following: "Guibert of Tournai was ^a man of such great renown in the Parisian studium Life III, by Guibert as author that Pope Alexander twice roused him to writing by his own letters." Valerius Andreas in the Bibliotheca Belgica testifies that these two letters, together with Guibert's response, exist in manuscript at Tournai in the monastery of St. Martin, prefixed to the Sermons on Sundays and Feasts composed by the same Guibert. There exists in the Library of the Fathers ^a treatise by the same Guibert on the Office of ^a Bishop and the ceremonies of the Church, addressed to the venerable Lord D. William, Bishop of Orleans, composed in the same method of writing and division of the work into chapters as this Life of St. Eleutherius was published by the same author and dedicated to his kinsman John, Bishop of Tournai. This Life exists in the appendix to the Library of the Fathers, that is, volume 15, from the Library of the Fathers and manuscript published by Andreas Schottus together with the works of St. Eleutherius. It has here been collated with the Tournai manuscript at St. Martin's, which Valerius Andreas mentions. In the Proper Offices of the Church of Tournai, the Lessons concerning St. Eleutherius are said to be "collected from the Life of his by the ancient writer Henry, Canon of Tournai, and from the book of Brother Guibert of Tournai, of the Order of Franciscans, Doctor of Theology, which he here composed by order of John, Bishop of Tournai," etc. One error of this author is that at the beginning of the work he derives the origin of the city of Tournai from the Roman Kings, imitating the chronicle written by Hermann, Abbot of Tournai, in the same century. But they deserve the same indulgence and impunity that we grant to so many illustrious and ancient writers when they derive the origin of the Frankish nation from the Trojans. Consult the prefatory note of Andreas Schottus.

[21] In the last place we give another very brief Life from an ancient Tournai Breviary, Life IV from ^a manuscript Breviary in which this Life is divided into various Lessons that used to be recited during the Octave of the Translation of the body of St. Eleutherius into the city of Tournai. That Breviary exists in the monastery of St. Martin, from which this Life was formerly sent to our Rosweydus from Tournai. There was appended ^a History of the Translation and miracles of St. Eleutherius, but extracted in the same words from the fuller Life, with only the order of the narrated events changed — which we omit. There also exist other manuscript treatises on the passing of St. Eleutherius and on the Elevation of the body, also published by Andreas Schottus, but the second under the title of Translation of the body; from which we note certain things in the Annotations. Finally, we have other briefer Acts from the manuscript of St. Savior at Utrecht, another manuscript Life omitted here which bear this title: "The Martyrdom of St. Eleutherius the Bishop." Whether Canon Henry wrote any Life, and which, is not clear. In the history of the revelation made to him, it is said at number 3 that he began to read cursorily the Life of Blessed Eleutherius Did Canon Henry write any Life? read in ecstasy, and wished to read the whole thing by memory and by heart; and at number 4, in ^a second ecstasy, he read the Elevation of St. Eleutherius, and having returned from the ecstasy, wrote what he had read. But the history of the Elevation had already existed, published by ^a contemporary author. Finally, in ^a third ecstasy, he was reading certain miracles of St. Eleutherius; but nowhere is it stated that these were previously unknown to him. Certain things, as revealed to him by St. Eleutherius, we add in the Notes.

[22] Some Life of St. Eleutherius has been published hitherto by our Buzelinus in Book 1 of the Annals of Gallo-Flanders, by Molanus in the Birthdays of the Saints of Belgium, by Zacharias Lippelous or Cornelius Grasius, by Franciscus Haraeus, Mention of St. Eleutherius among other writers and by Andreas Saussaius in the Gallic Martyrology. But in the French language, more fully by Renatus Benedictus, from the version of Clemens Marchantius, which Guilielmus Gazaeus published almost the same, and Jacobus Dubletius in abridged form, as others did in other languages. The same holy Bishop is treated by Jacobus Mejerus in the Annals of Flanders, by Miraeus and Locrius in the Belgian Chronicle, by Rosweydus in the Ecclesiastical History of Belgium, and passim by other writers on Belgian affairs.

SECTION IV. The Elevation, Translations of the Body of St. Eleutherius. Sermons Written by Him.

[23] Celebrated in the Acts of St. Eleutherius is the memorial of the Elevation of his body, which he himself ordered to be performed. It is commonly ascribed to the year of Christ 881. The year is absent from the Acts, and other chronological markers expressed therein introduce ^a different one. This elevation was performed under Bishop Heidilo, on ^a Sunday, the fourteenth day before the Kalends of October. The elevation of the body of St. Eleutherius performed under Bishop Heidilo Heidilo — called by others Heydilo, Hedilo, or Hetilo in Flodoard, Book 3 of the History of the Church of Reims, chapter 23, where Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, is said to have commended his ordination to Odo, Bishop of Beauvais — therefore before the year 881, when, after Odo's death, Hincmar, together with the Bishops assembled in synod at the martyrium of St. Macra on the fourth day before the Nones of April, Indiction IX, wrote to King Louis III that he should permit ^a free election of ^a new Bishop in the Church of Beauvais. That letter exists in volume 2 of the Works of Hincmar, page 188. Odo of Beauvais was still living in the year 880, when the relics of St. Vedastus were carried from Arras to Beauvais, and indeed as the year was turning toward winter, as we stated after the Life of St. Vedastus on February 6, page 809. But Ragenelmus, the predecessor of Heidilo, Bishop of the Church of Tournai, in the year 876, Indiction IX, in the month of February, subscribed to the Council of Ponthion. Hence it is established that Heidilo was appointed in the intermediate time, and indeed before the year 880, when the Northmen devastated the city of Tournai and all the monasteries on the River Scheldt with fire and sword, killing the inhabitants of the land and taking them captive, as is narrated in these words in the Deeds of the Northmen before Duke Rollo. After the Norman incursion And Guibert writes below at number 34 that the Norman fury raged in Tournai in the time of Heidilo. These things concern the beginning of Heidilo's See. But for how many years he lived as Bishop, we have not yet read. His successor is established as Raubertus, who in the year 909 attended the Council of Trosly — called by others Rambertus and Lambertus, and said by Raissius in the Belgica Christiana to have been appointed in the year 903.

[24] On ^a Sunday, either September 18 In the intermediate period, the fourteenth day before the Kalends of October, that is, September 18, frequently fell on ^a Sunday, which is the other chronological marker of the Elevation. First in the year 880, Solar Cycle XXI, Dominical Letters C B; then in the year 886, Solar Cycle XXVII; next in the year 897, Solar Cycle X; and finally in the year 903, Solar Cycle XVI — with the Dominical Letter always being B, the said September 18 coincided with ^a Sunday. Now this Elevation was performed when that dread fury of the Northmen had departed, and the Bishop had come from Noyon to visit the diocese of Tournai, and with peace restored was living in the neighboring places, and could safely both summon the neighboring Bishops himself and they come to honor that solemnity — especially since the village of Blandinium is only two leagues from the city. In the following years likewise, when Feriolus had come there from Vienne among the other pilgrims, with peace restored, the roads seem to have been safe. Hence the year 880 can by no means be assigned, in which the Northmen held Ghent and then devastated Tournai — in which year also the body of St. Vedastus was carried from Arras to Beauvais and remained there until the year 893, when it was brought back with the greatest veneration and ^a throng of clergy and people by Dodilo, Bishop of Cambrai, as was related at length on February 6, page 809. After this return, when the worship and veneration of the Saints had been restored, it seems that St. Eleutherius wished to renew the piety of his people of Tournai, and then stirred them to ^a worthy elevation of his body, year 897 which we suspect was performed in the year 897, on the Sunday then coinciding with September 18. We are also moved by the fact that in ^a manuscript treatise on the Miracles of St. Eleutherius, it is said that Heidilo, having returned to his own place from this Elevation, and living only ^a few years afterward, died in peace. Consult Annotation A to chapter 7 of Life 2. And these things concern the Elevation, which is said to have occurred on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of October in the fuller Life from the Tournai manuscript; the day is absent in the manuscript of Duynius, as also in Guibert and in the Life from the manuscript Breviary. But in the Proper Offices, the feast of the Elevation is celebrated on July 9 in the simple rite, as they call it, or perhaps July 9 and in the third lesson these words are recited: "In the elevation itself of the sacred body, whose memorial is celebrated on the seventh day before the Ides, many sick and infirm persons, freed from all diseases and maladies, returned to their homes healthy and whole with exultation." If this Elevation occurred on the same day, July 9, it should be referred, for the reasons adduced above, to the following year 898, Solar Cycle XI, Dominical Letter A. Which letter, however, with July 9 also falls on Sundays in the years 881, year 898 887, and 892. To this last year also, and not inappropriately, this Elevation can be assigned: by which the people of Arras, stirred, could be said to have reclaimed and brought back the body of St. Vedastus from Beauvais to their city the following year. or 892

[3] Therefore, after the passion of the most blessed Martyr Piatus, the elders of the people having assembled, the Tribune of the Scaudinians, together with the whole multitude of the pagans, decreed that all devotees of the Christian religion, both noble and ignoble, should be expelled from the city of Tournai and deprived entirely of their possessions. Therefore, all having been cast out beyond the walls, with the Christians expelled from Tournai they established ^a basilica in honor of Blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, in the place which is now called Blandinium. Meanwhile, ^a certain pagan woman, the daughter of the Tribune of the Scaudinians, had secretly loved Blessed Eleutherius from her infancy, and being greatly vexed by ^a demon, she could no longer defer the uncontrollable love of her heart. And so, when the Christians were expelled, he resides at Blandinium Serenus himself, together with his wife Blanda and his only son Eleutherius, was cast out and deprived of his property and all his worldly dignity. And because he was of great nobility and excellence, many of the pagans who followed him deserved to be purified by the divine font and moreover to be imbued with the Catholic faith.

[4] Therefore, the Christians, having built the basilica, had Theodore consecrated as Bishop. He, after ^a few days had passed, was struck by ^a divine bolt and perished. Therefore, the Christians, seeing the sanctity of the most blessed Eleutherius, sent him to Rome, after Theodore, he is made Bishop of the people of Tournai and upon his return with the authority of the Pope, they had him consecrated Bishop. He shone with such great benefits of miracles that it was evident to all that he was ^a true Bishop of Christ and truly ^a defender of the entire Christian religion.

CHAPTER II. A Dead Woman Raised by St. Eleutherius. The Conversion of the People of Tournai.

[5] Then the pagan daughter of the Tribune of the Scaudinians, hearing that the most blessed Eleutherius had been raised to such great honor, The Tribune's daughter provokes St. Eleutherius to sin supposing him proud and vain on account of his riches, imprudently approached him and found him at prayer. But the man of God immediately recognized through the Holy Spirit that she was vexed by ^a demon. She, however, advancing, pulled away his cloak, declared her love, and begged him to show her mercy. When Blessed Eleutherius heard this, stricken in mind, he said: "You have heard that Satan tempted the Lord Christ. But He who could in no way be tempted replied: 'Get behind me, Satan; you shall not tempt the Lord your God.'" Matt. 4:10 "By the example therefore of so great ^a miracle, I command you in the name of the holy and undivided Trinity to depart from me, and not presume to attempt this any further." Having said these things, he threw back his cloak, and with his prayer nearly finished, he went out from his prayer in shame. But she, covered by the cloak, is punished by death fell as if into an ecstasy of mind and breathed out her spirit. The man of God, unaware of this event, ordered an ass to be prepared for him and withdrew to ^a place about two leagues distant. and is buried Now the daughter of the Tribune died, and was buried in the field called the Field of Mars, as was the custom of the pagans.

[6] Meanwhile, Blessed Eleutherius, returning and grieving more for the danger of her death than for his own shame, ordered the mourning father of the girl to be summoned; and he promised that if the father would believe in Christ together with all his kindred, she would be raised. Hearing this, the father departed eagerly, and having again called the pagans together, he promised that he would do all things. Then Blessed Eleutherius, by the prayers of St. Eleutherius after he had celebrated the solemnities of the Mass, armed with heavenly weapons together with all his clergy, came to the tomb and struck the earthen mud with his staff. But immediately through the Holy Spirit he recognized the unbelief of the Tribune. Wondrous thing! For suddenly ^a great earthquake occurred. Therefore all, stricken in mind, returned secretly to their homes. But the most blessed Eleutherius, persisting the whole night in prayers, devoting himself to the verses of David, again at dawn returned to the tomb with the Christians and for ^a second time recognized the unbelief of the Tribune. Indeed ^a great earthquake occurred. Likewise, all fled in terror. But on the third day the Tribune came, fell at the feet of the most blessed Eleutherius, and declared himself guilty in all things. Then the man of God, with the father pledging he would become ^a Christian perceiving him stricken with penitence, returned to the tomb and in the sight of all ordered the stone to be removed. Then he called her three times, saying: "From mud you were formed; to ashes you have returned; arise, return to your former state." Following the example of Blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, who raised the dead Tabitha, Acts 9:40 he grasped her hand; she arose in the name of Jesus. Then he prescribed ^a fast of six days for her; she is raised and on the seventh day he baptized her, and Blanda, the mother of the Bishop, received her from the sacred font. She who was formerly ^a pagan was now made ^a Christian in the name of Christ. And the mother of the Bishop, adding her own name to her, called her Blanda. From her, therefore, the place was called Blandinium.

[7] But the Tribune, not yet believing, angrily took his daughter away, and threatened to deprive her of all her possessions and the wealth of the pagans if she would not comply with his wishes. What was she to do? She rejected the riches and possessions of her father; secretly, with humble mind, she besought Christ day and night. Meanwhile ^a deadly pestilence attacked the pagans, In time of pestilence, St. Eleutherius is seized by the pagans so that dead bodies were found in the streets and lanes. Yet no wound appeared, nor did any mark of death threaten. Therefore the pagans, seeing the deaths of their people increasing and the holiness of Blessed Eleutherius growing, entered into counsel in fearful mind and sought what they should do about him. And so, having taken counsel, they decreed that at the twilight of night they should go to Blandinium and present Blessed Eleutherius bound in chains by night to Censorinus Caesar the Tribune. he is beaten thrice with rods Which was done accordingly. For at the twilight of night they went to Blandinium with clubs and spears, seized the Pastor of the Christian people at prayer, and then brought him bound in chains to Censorinus Caesar, who ordered him to be beaten thrice with rods and thrust back into prison. But on that same night an Angel of the Lord appeared, he is freed by an Angel then opened the doors and showed him the way that leads to Blandinium. Therefore, returning, he gave thanks to God.

[8] And while he was celebrating the solemnities of the Mass, he besought divine clemency to recall the Tribune from the superstition of idols and confirm him in the Catholic faith. And so again an Angel of the Lord appeared, and offered him bread, saying: "Behold, Eleutherius, your prayer has been heard. For you shall see him falling at your knees; he prays for the conversion of the Tribune then you shall catechize and baptize him." Therefore, having said these things, the Angel of the Lord, departing from the place, ascended whence he had descended. But the blessed and most unconquered Priest of God again besought divine clemency and of the citizens of Tournai to recall the city from the superstition of idols. And so the pestilence again oppressed the pagans, so that they even abandoned their dwellings and hid themselves in secret places. What, then, were they to do? Their idols were perishing; they even refused to give responses to their worshippers.

[9] Meanwhile, after ^a long time had passed, they decreed to kill the Tribune if he would not consent to Blessed Eleutherius in all things. At length, compelled, he went out from the palace, he admits the Tribune as ^a suppliant and accompanied by all his kindred, he approached Blessed Eleutherius, fell at his feet, and with tears begged to be made ^a catechumen. The blessed Bishop, rejoicing at his prayers, prescribed ^a fast of seven days for all the people. And it came to pass on the eighth day that the Tribune, with all his kindred and all the pagans, he baptizes both powerful and poor, clothed in sackcloth, went out from the city of Tournai, and begged with all the people to be made ^a Christian. Blessed Eleutherius baptized him with the others and opened the Catholic faith in order to him and all the pagans.

[10] Therefore, after these things, Blessed Eleutherius was led into the city with great honor and accompanied by no small multitude of the Christian people. he comes to Tournai Now all who had believed established ^a solemn day on which they had been baptized, that is, the fifth day before the Kalends of October. Blessed Eleutherius, shining with the greatest virtues, was loved by all and so greatly venerated by all he is loved by all that they regarded him as an Angel and acknowledged him as the defender of the entire city of Tournai.

[11] Meanwhile ^a certain blind man was brought to him; he received his sight, believed in Christ, he illuminates ^a blind man and merited the fruit of true repentance.

p. Buzelinus's manuscript: "to the whole city."

CHAPTER III. The Death of St. Eleutherius, and of His Parents and Blanda.

[12] Meanwhile, as it is said of Abraham, "You shall die in ^a good old age," his father Serenus, full of days, together with Blanda his wife, migrated to the Lord. St. Eleutherius buries his parents Them St. Eleutherius buried with the greatest honor before the gate of Blessed Peter at Blandinium. The father rests before the entrance of the church, but the mother was buried further on in the cemetery, on the fifth day before the Ides of January. The daughter of the Tribune remained holy and immaculate, and having benignly completed her course, passed on to the heavenly realm. She was buried on the day before the Ides of June, before the altar of the Prince of the Apostles. and also Blanda, the Tribune's daughter And an inscription was written above the tomb of the virgin, containing the following: "Here is buried the virgin, daughter of the Tribune, by her father, named Blanda, from whom Blandinium was named." But after the wretched plunderers invaded the relics of St. Eleutherius and snatched away his treasure, lest the Saint should be seen by any, they erased the inscription of the maiden and moreover consigned the works of the same Saint to the fire.

[13] Therefore, the end of the days of the most blessed Eleutherius drew near. Summoning his brethren and the devotees of the true religion, he received the Body and Blood of Christ in their presence; and he predicted that in that same week he would pass from the prison of the body. What were they to do? They saw their father longing for heavenly things and wept that he was about to leave the Christians. The Bishop addressed them tenderly, saying: St. Eleutherius, being ill, piously exhorts his flock "About to enter the end of all flesh, about to receive from the Lord the eternal joys promised to me, I exhort you, dearest ones: flee hatreds, sow concord, dispel schisms, pursue virtues, suffer temporal evils for the sake of your Judge, so that you may deserve to offer to Christ the worthy fruit of repentance. For every man is grass, and his flesh is as the straw of the field; in the morning it flourishes green, in the evening it withers, falls, and becomes worthless. Be patient, therefore; remain chaste; fear God; persevere in all good things. For you have heard David saying: 'Man is become like unto vanity.' Ps. 143:4 And so we are dust; in the judgment we shall rise; before the tribunal of Christ, as Scripture attests, we shall all stand." Rom. 14:10

[14] When these things had been said, such great radiance shone upon the town in which he had been born that all who had come for the obsequies of so great ^a Father, as if falling into an ecstasy of mind, saw his spirit being raised up by an Angel in ^a cloud, and penetrating the heavens with the brightness of the cloud, and the radiance flying with him could no longer be seen at all. he is seen being borne to heaven Therefore St. Medard came and found the holy body dead, and weeping for joy, he celebrated the solemnities of the Mass over it and ordered ^a new sepulchre to be prepared in the church of Blessed Mary. he is buried by St. Medard But by common counsel it was decreed that they should bury him in the church of Blessed Peter at Blandinium, since it was there, having been banished from the city with all his kindred, that he had held his bishopric and had wrought miracles of illustrious name — in the reign of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns as God through all ages. Amen.

The following is added in the same manuscripts: "I, Eleutherius, fellow brother of your brethren, who was among you without the greatest honor, exhort you: reflect, and persevere in good works, so that I who was with you bodily may not further abandon you spiritually. Commemorate the feast of my burial on the day before the Kalends of July, so that neither may good sons abandon ^a good Father, nor may ^a good father leave his sons orphans, uncertain of the presence of his body. Again, farewell, all of you, in peace."

And then, without any title, the following was appended:

"In the name of the Lord Jesus, these things were written by divine hand. First Chapter: In the name of Jesus Christ, ^a blind man was illuminated through me, that is, Mantilius. He believed in Christ. Likewise, Second Chapter: In the name of Jesus Christ, ^a lame man received the power of walking; the same lame man refused to believe in Christ. Likewise, Third Chapter: In the name of Jesus Christ, ^a leper was cured of his leprosy, that is, Peritius; he was set free. Likewise, Chapter 4: A great earthquake occurred. Likewise, Chapter 5: Again ^a great earthquake occurred. Likewise, Chapter 6: Thirdly, Blanda was raised from the dead. Likewise, Chapter 7: The temple of Apollo was destroyed, and therefore the Christians established ^a solemn day on which they had been baptized, and because through me the city was delivered. Here begin the tributes of the same Bishop. Chapter 1: All my own sustenance, in the place called Mars, I had for one year, that is, one hundred talents. Likewise, Chapter 2: For the necessities of my transitory garments, in the place where I was born, that is, in the township, and in the adjoining street, sixty talents. Likewise, Chapter 3: In the lane called the street, that is, in the whole lane before the house of the Tribune of the Scaudinians, for the necessities of divine service, eighty talents. Likewise, Chapter 4: For the necessities of my horses, one thousand talents in the lane called Mars. For many wealthy men had established their dwellings in that place, and especially because fodder suitable for horses was available. Likewise, Chapter 28: The sum of my tributes: one thousand two hundred and forty talents. I, Eleutherius, fellow brother of your brethren, who was among you without the greatest honor, exhort you: reflect and persevere in good works, so that I who was with you bodily may not further abandon you spiritually. Commemorate the feast of my burial on the day before the Kalends of July, so that neither may good sons abandon ^a good Father, nor may ^a good father leave his sons orphans, uncertain of the presence of his body. Again, farewell, all of you, in peace."

THE FULLER LIFE, from the manuscripts of Cornelius Duynius and the Tournai manuscript.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (Saint)

BHL Number: 2462, 2465, 2466

By an ancient author, from manuscripts.

CHAPTERS I AND II agree with the first chapters of the Life already related, except for the few things annotated in that place.

CHAPTER III. A Blind Man, ^a Lame Man, and ^a Leper Healed by St. Eleutherius.

[12] In those days ^a certain blind man named Mantilius was brought to the Confessor of Christ on the holy day of the Lord's Nativity, that he might receive something from him. St. Eleutherius is generous toward the poor For nearly all the poor of the entire city had gathered to receive alms. Therefore, when the solemnities of the Mass had been completed, he ordered the abundance of his resources to be brought and distributed nearly everything to the poor. But Mantilius, left behind, having lost his guide, cried out: "O holy Father, look upon ^a blind beggar; raise him up by giving him something, for I have lost my guide on the way, and I have found no one who can lead me from this church." Then certain of his disciples asked him to be silent. But the Confessor of Christ, looking at them, said to them: "The Lord's words are plain, and you do not know them; the Gospels are read every day, Mantilius the blind man and you do not understand. For it is read that when our Lord Jesus Christ was preaching the word of God, ^a blind man sat by the way and cried out: 'Son of David, have mercy on me.' Luke 18:35 But when the disciples rebuked him and said, 'Lord, let him be, for he cries after us,' the Lord Jesus, seeing his faith, called him and illuminated his eyes." Having said these things, the blessed Bishop, looking at Mantilius, said to his followers: he illuminates him with the sign of the Cross "Go and bring the blind man to me." When he had been brought, St. Eleutherius said: "May Jesus Christ our Lord, who opened the eyes of the man born blind, open your eyes." And he impressed the sign of the Cross upon his eyes, saying: "Mantilius, do you believe in the Son of God the Father Almighty?" He answered: "I believe." Then the Bishop answered: "According to His will and your faith, be it done unto you." And immediately his eyes were opened and he saw, and he believed perfectly in God, and departed praising Christ, no longer seeking ^a guide for the way.

[13] I wished also to add the account of how the Bishop of God, while he lived, healed ^a lame man who had been lame from his mother's womb; he heals ^a lame man because, once healed, he refused to believe in God. For what have the unbelieving among the believers; what have good workmen among the evil?

[14] Another man, named Peritius, ^a leper, while all were hastening to baptism — and at the gate of the temple which in those days was called Mantilia, which faces the waters of the Scheldt — lay crying out and saying: "How shall I enter the church? He heals Peritius the leper by baptizing him Hear me, children of God: raise up the poor man from the dust and lead the beggar with you to the bath of regeneration." But no one looked at him; indeed, every person shrank from gazing upon his face. Now it happened that on ^a certain day Blessed Eleutherius was passing by with his entire clergy. When the leper saw him, he cried out, saying: "Holy Father, have pity on me, for I have been waiting for you forty days, so that, with the others, though unworthy, I might obtain the bath of regeneration." Then ^a certain one of his clergy, named Andoneus, said to the Bishop: "Lord, behold ^a leper; let him go, for he cries after you." Then the man of God said to him: "O you of little faith, what do you say? For of such is the kingdom of heaven." Having said these things, he ordered water to be brought, and before all the people he baptized him. And he, leaping up from the water, gave thanks to God. then appointed Abbot And what is marvelous, his skin was so restored that it was like the flesh of ^a fifteen-year-old boy; and persevering in the commandments of God, he was appointed the first Abbot in that same city by St. Medard the Bishop.

[15] At the same time, when he had raised the daughter of the Tribune, and had converted all the pagans of every sort to the faith, and was laboring with equanimity in the towns and neighboring places of the Flemings, when his illustrious name had been heard, He reveals ^a hidden sin to Clovis I King Louis — whom Blessed Remigius had baptized — entered the city. And while he was delighting in the preaching of Blessed Eleutherius, perceiving through the Holy Spirit why the King had come, he said: "I know, my Lord King, for what reason you have not delayed in coming to us." When the King contradicted him (for he had sinned after baptism, which it is not permitted to confess publicly), the Priest of God said: "You have sinned, and you do not dare, Lord King, to confess it." Then the King, weeping, declared that this was true, and asked that he celebrate the solemnities of the Mass for him and implore the clemency of God the Father. The man of God, seeing the faith of the King, did not refuse, and preparing himself for the Lord, he spent the whole night in watchful lamentation. When morning came, while he was celebrating the solemnities of the Mass, prepared to receive the most sacred Body of the Lamb of the world, an Angel of the Lord appeared, and ^a great brightness filled the whole church of the Blessed Virgin Mary for the space of one hour, revealed to him by an Angel and the Angel said: "Eleutherius, servant of God, your prayers have been heard," and showed him ^a writing and gave it to him — what the King had committed, which it is not permitted to speak publicly. Then the King, having been heard, gave thanks to God and to Blessed Eleutherius, and leaving many gifts for the holy Bishop, he happily returned to his own domain.

CHAPTER IV. The Orthodox Faith Defended by St. Eleutherius. His Journeys to Rome. A Synod Held. Beatings Inflicted on Him by Heretics.

[16] In those times, while Blessed Eleutherius presided as the second Bishop over the Church of Tournai, ^a great dispute arose among the clergy of Tournai. For certain heretics were advancing certain novelties of their own heresy and were attempting to destroy the preaching of the truth, Heretics holding false views concerning the mystery of the Incarnation daring to corrupt the mystery of the divine dispensation and denying that the heavenly Paranymph had announced the birth of the Virgin. Other heretics, introducing confusion and falsely composing that there is one nature of the flesh and the divinity, proclaimed by such confusion that the divine nature of the Only-begotten was passible, and shamelessly asserted that he who was born of the most blessed Virgin Mary was ^a mere man. Others opposed the Holy Spirit. But others, devoted and serving God, believed the truth and did not obey falsehood. So great, moreover, was the strife among them and killing the Catholics that the heretics even attacked the Catholic sons of the Church of Tournai and drowned many of them, cut to pieces, in the river called the Scheldt.

[17] But the man of God, Eleutherius, defender of the Catholic faith, most firmly strengthened the spirits of his children in the faith of Christ, exhorting some and preaching to others. In the fourteenth year of his bishopric, seeing that the churches in these regions had nearly despaired of God's mercy, he journeys to Rome frequently he composed ^a sermon on the Divinity of Christ, the Only-begotten, our Lord, and afterward brought it to the Roman Pontiff Symmachus, by whom he was honorably received. Then, returning from Rome, he refuted all the heretics; yet, with God's mercy, he afterward converted them to the faith. Also in the tenth year of his ordination, under Pope Anastasius, he brought the people of Tournai, rebellious against all Christians, back to the faith, and in that same week baptized more than eleven thousand. He also returned from Rome in the twenty-fifth year of his pontificate.

[18] Likewise, when ^a new heresy was sprouting, he wrote ^a sermon on the Incarnation of Christ against the heretics, in which he vanquished them; yet he converted no one to the title of Christianity. Therefore he sought out the Roman Pope Hormisdas, who received him with great honor. When Blessed Eleutherius had requested something from him, he receives relics from Hormisdas the Pope offered relics of Blessed Mary of Egypt and ^a shoulder-bone of Blessed Stephen the Protomartyr, and he carried them with him to Tournai. Therefore, the man of God, having returned from Rome, was received with great exultation by the entire people. The clergy exulted and, clothed in dalmatics, went out to meet their blessed Pastor. But unexpectedly, the joy of all was doubled. For the Bishop himself was bringing the relics of Blessed Mary, who endured so many and such great things for the Lord. When he entered the Nervian gate, at that very place ^a great miracle was manifested by God. For as the joyful people came to meet him, and likewise the ranks of clergy in their vestments, the blessed Bishop, ascending the hill which was called the Hill of the Hidden Treasure, but which is now called the Hill of St. Andrew, when these were displayed, ^a light shone forth showed to all the people the relics of St. Mary of Egypt and the shoulder-bone of St. Stephen the Protomartyr. Suddenly ^a certain brightness appeared, coming from heaven around the relics of the head of St. Mary, which was seen by all until he entered the Church of the Mother of Christ. And above the shoulder-bone of Blessed Stephen, ^a more brilliant brightness in the form of ^a circle, as if of silver, was seen.

[19] When he was entering the church, surrounded by the throng of the entire people, four men and two women were imperiled by ^a great infirmity called the Fire of Gehenna. Then the man, moved by piety, placed the head-relic before the women and the shoulder-bone before the men, the sacred fire is driven away saying: "Let us all pray." And as they fell prostrate and prayed, he said: "St. Stephen, Protomartyr, come to the aid of these men. St. Mary, come to their aid and have mercy on this female sex. For assuredly we shall not rise from prayer until they are made well." At this voice, all were freed, and the flesh that they had lost in that same infirmity was restored in that very hour. A mute man also standing by a mute man speaks spoke, saying: "Behold the relics of Blessed Stephen and St. Mary." Then all were astonished and amazed. In those times the relics of the Saints were placed neither in gold nor in silver. These things took place on the Nones of October.

[20] The blessed Eleutherius had now governed the Church of Tournai for thirty-one years St. Eleutherius now 40 years ^a Bishop and that of Blandinium for nine. Hearing that the children of the Church were disturbed, he was grieved. Then, by the authority of the Roman Pope, he decreed that all heretics should either be expelled from the city or unanimously confess Christ as the Son of God the Father. Therefore, compelled by the Bishop, they chose ^a suitable day he convenes ^a synod on which the Bishop of Christ, Eleutherius, should convoke his synod. The day arrived on which the synod had been convoked. The Catholic sons also came, confounding the sect of the heretics; several of the heretics were present, contradicting them. Then the man of God, Eleutherius, rising and making silence with his hand, said: "All you who confess God the Father and His Son, together with the Holy Spirit, hear."

[21] "Believe in one God, the Father Almighty, and in His only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, he prescribes ^a profession of faith who was born as the Only-begotten Son from God the Father — immense from the immense, immortal from the immortal, invisible from the invisible, everlasting from the everlasting — through whom and with whom the Father made all things that are contained in heaven or on earth or in the sea. I exhort you, therefore, most beloved, believe that Jesus Christ our Lord descended from heaven for the salvation of men and the liberation of the world, was incarnate, and as man suffered under Pontius Pilate the Governor; moreover, that on the third day he rose from the dead, and again ascended into the heavens whence he had descended. These decrees, my dearest sons, you ought to hold and observe; you must devoutly obey them, if you wish to merit the joys of heaven — obeying these dignities and decrees of the ancient Fathers, considering and most clearly perceiving what it means that the Word of God was incarnate and made man. Furthermore, your faith ought to believe that Christ our Lord was made mediator between God and men and reconciler unto peace, offering himself to God the Father for us as ^a fragrance of sweetness. For he spoke through the Prophet: 'Sacrifice and oblation you did not desire; burnt offerings for sin did not please you; but ^a body you have fashioned for me.' Ps. 39:7 and 9 'In the head of the book it is written of me, that I should do your will, O God.' For he offered his own body not for himself but for us as ^a fragrance of sweetness. My brothers, who among you shall any longer doubt that the true and immaculate Lamb was immolated for the salvation of the human race, and crucified by the impious Jews? He it is who redeemed us through the wondrous power and ineffable might of his Divinity, and vanquished the rebellious and proud Jews, and despoiled the prison-houses of hell, leading forth captives from their chains, releasing from the places of darkness those imprisoned, crying out and saying: 'O good Triumpher over the world! O merciful Vanquisher of diabolic fraud! You, most merciful Jesus, our lamentations in these torments of punishment awaited; you, compassionate Christ, the sighs of the weeping in the gloom called upon. Behold, you have come, whom from ancient times we have awaited: free us, whom, while placed on earth, we once devoutly worshipped.' He it is who, after the destruction of the devil and the liberation of the Saints crying from the darkness, rose on the third day, and ascending to the heavenly kingdom, sits at the right hand of God the Father. Confess, therefore, one in substance, three in persons, so that you may deserve to attain the heavenly kingdom and rejoice perpetually in eternal goods, where the Angels rejoice, the Apostles are glad, the glorious throng of Martyrs exults, and the company of Confessors and Virgins applauds — whom the Redeemer of the world crowns with an everlasting laurel, who lives and reigns, God Almighty, invisible, eternal, incorruptible, to whom belong honor, praise, glory, dominion, unfailing power, unfading majesty, perpetual glory, and ineffable virtue, with the Father and the Holy Spirit through infinite ages of ages. Amen. But if anyone shall have spoken against these decrees, let him be anathema from the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit."

[22] When these things had been said, the Blessed Bishop Eleutherius sat down. The Catholic men, received by the Synod who had been convoked to the said synod, raising their voices with joy, glorified God, saying: "We venerate and worship the Trinity in unity; we profess the unity in substance and devoutly adore it." The heretics, on the other hand, were confounded, and then withdrew from the holy synod in confusion. When the synod returned to their homes, St. Eleutherius likewise returned to his hall, which was situated in the township, together with the Catholic men, being now in his seventy-first year. Meanwhile, for the five years that the Bishop survived, the Church of Tournai was most invincibly exalted by the Catholic men.

[23] Meanwhile, however, one faction of the heretics was confounded. What were they to do? They entered into counsel and sought what should be done about him, and they said: "If he thus prevails among us, our way of life will be despised; but if we prevail, we shall have attained the victory of praise." While they were thus conversing on one of those days, behold, the blessed Bishop was going out from the church of Blessed Mary at Tournai together with Athanasius the Deacon and Andoneus his faithful disciple. he is cruelly beaten with clubs by the heretics When the heretics, hiding behind ^a corner, saw him (for they were laying ambushes for him in many ways), they said: "Behold the destroyer of our law; come, let us kill him." Therefore, seizing clubs, they beat him severely, and leaving him half-dead before the church, they secretly departed after inflicting their blows. The disciples likewise fled, abandoning their pastor. When Censorinus Caesar heard of this, he would have nailed them all to the cross of the gibbet, had not the prayer of the man of God prevailed. half-dead, he lies prostrate A tumult of the people arose through the city: the young men cried out, the matrons and virgins mourned, the elders were sprinkled with ashes, all vying to see the Bishop half-dead; he himself lay lifeless.

[24] Then, on ^a bed of haircloth prepared by the citizens of the city, as he himself had requested, he was carried within his house. He lived five more weeks afterward, and in that infirmity he illuminated ^a blind man and healed several sick persons. he illuminates ^a blind man

CHAPTER V. The Final Illness, Death, and Burial of St. Eleutherius.

[25] Therefore, the end of the days of the most blessed Eleutherius drew near. And then he summoned his brethren and the devotees of the true religion, and predicting that in that same week he would pass from the prison of the body, he addressed them tenderly: He exhorts his followers to virtue "Thus, about to enter the end of all flesh, about to receive from the Lord the eternal joys promised to me, I exhort you, dearest ones: flee hatreds, sow concord, dispel schisms, pursue virtues, suffer temporal evils for the sake of your Judge, so that you may deserve to offer to Christ the worthy fruit of repentance. For every man is grass, and his flesh is as the straw of the field; in the morning it flourishes green, in the evening it withers, falls, and becomes worthless. Be patient, with ^a pure mind remain chaste, fear God; persevere in all good things. For you have heard David saying: 'Man is become like unto vanity.' Ps. 143:4 And so we are dust; in the judgment we shall rise, and before the tribunal of Christ, as Scripture attests, we shall all stand." Rom. 14:10

[26] But amid these and such words of the holy man, the anguish of his soul and the oppression of the wounds that the heretics had inflicted upon him pressed hard upon him. What was he to do? He saw that the day of his death was imminent, and he knew that the churches he had built within the walls would fall into ruin. And so, turning to prayer with weeping, he said: "Almighty and most merciful God, who became the author of our resurrection, so that you might open to us the entrance to heaven, and lead captive the dominion of the devil, he prays for the city of Tournai ascending to heaven by your wondrous power, you would lead our captivity captive; who by your death gave life to the dead and healing to the captives. I mercifully invoke you, I compassionately appeal to you, that you may preserve and defend the churches of Tournai, exalted as much as I could in my smallness, and all the habitations of the Saints, from every disturbance of demons; that you may raise and elevate them; that you may guard my few little sheep, both present and those to follow until the last generation, so that they may know that you are the gentle Father of mercy and piety, the Teacher of knowledge and truth. But to those who pursued me, your unworthy servant, even unto death with swords and clubs, and for the enemies by whom he had been beaten graciously grant pardon, and deign to gather me with your Saints into your granary. To those also, most loving God, who shall devoutly honor my memory, bestow faith, grant friendship. Most merciful God, how I have fought for the Catholic faith and for the Christian religion, your clemency is not unaware. All things indeed are naked and open to your eyes: behold, now the time of my dissolution approaches. Eternal God, what shall I do? Send me forth, that I may follow David saying: 'As the hart desires the fountains of water, so my soul desires you, O God.' Ps. 21:2 And again he says: 'My soul has thirsted for the living God; when shall I come and appear before the face of God?' and 3 If it is possible, permit me to be likened to Blessed Job, who says: 'I am compared to mud, and am likened to embers and ashes.' Job 30:19 In you I trust, my God; you I seek; you I desire to see, whom I always worshipped while placed on earth, to whom I devoted myself with all my love: free me, you who are blessed for ever and ever."

[27] When these things had been said, ^a voice like the sound of the wings of an eagle was heard in ^a great brightness, saying: he is invited to eternal joys by ^a heavenly voice "Eleutherius, my servant, your prayer has been heard; it remains for you to accomplish what you have begun, and you who have hitherto most greatly praised the Trinity shall be presented before the sight of the Blessed Trinity; for the laborer is worthy of his hire. Because you have manfully fought for the Catholic faith, you have merited that your prayers be heard, and you have obtained the efficacy of your petition. Complete, complete, my servant, lest after ^a good ending ^a good book be made void. Alas, it will be made void, but it will be restored; alas, it will be cast into the fire, but after these things it will be revealed!" When these things had been said, the voice withdrew with the brightness. The Bishop, however, gladdened, praising God, said: "I give you thanks, Almighty God, who have deigned to console me, who were, and who are, and who will come in judgment." Wishing then to accomplish what he intended, he broke forth again in the praises of God, saying: "The Catholic faith declares him to be the Son, to whom the Father cries through the Prophet: 'You are my Son; today I have begotten you.' And again: 'With you is the beginning in the day of your power, in the splendors of the Saints; from the womb before the morning star I begot you,'" etc. Ps. 2:7 Ps. 109

[28] After these words, compelled by the anguish of his soul, he said: "Behold, my strength fails; behold, the tongue of my mouth is giving way. Who will grant me ^a little while, that I may rest from this infirmity of mine?" And seeing the veins of his body weakening, and that he was being weighed down exceedingly by ^a great infirmity, he said: "My God, I desire to see you, and into your hands I commend my spirit." And summoning Andoneus, he said to him: "Son, do not refuse to obey your father. I ask you, therefore, he sends Andoneus to Rome to go to Rome as quickly as possible and transmit to Boniface, the Roman Pontiff, the treasure of Christ composed by me, so that the head of the heretics may be plunged into the pit of the abyss, and the Church of Christ may grow and be defended throughout all the spaces of the world." The man of God prayed unceasingly and commended his spirit into the hands of Christ.

[29] Now it happened that while he was praying, Satan stood at his left, mocking him. To whom the blessed man said: "Most wicked Satan, have you presumed to enter these places of prayer?" To whom the demon replied: "I wished to destroy your sermon, or at least by the sight of my countenance to disturb your spirit as it departs from the body; he puts the appearing demon to flight with the sign of the Cross for you cause me to be tormented with diverse torments of punishment, since I can denounce nothing evil concerning you to my judge." Then the Confessor of God, with ^a cheerful countenance, said: "Depart hence, Satan; no power against me has been granted to you by Christ." Saying this, he placed the sign of the life-giving Cross between himself and Satan. And he, seeing nothing to be his, leaving behind intolerable traces, withdrew sad and confounded.

[30] For having received the partaking of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the blessed man, as the history of that Life relates, happily migrated to the Lord, invited to the heavenly banquet which he had desired with all his heart and longed for with all his heart, ^a sharer in eternal felicity, crowned with ^a perennial and unfading laurel, while the Angels of God rejoiced. At that very hour, with heavenly light shining around the place such great brightness shone upon the township in which he had been born that all who had come for the obsequies of so great ^a Father, as if falling into an ecstasy of mind, saw his spirit being raised up by an Angel in ^a cloud and penetrating the heavens with the brightness of the cloud, and afterward the radiance flying with him could no longer be seen at all. Thus, with the wave of sacred blood poured forth, the true Martyr and Confessor died in peace on the day before the Kalends of July. he dies

[31] Therefore Blessed Medard came and found the holy body dead, and weeping for joy, he celebrated the solemnities of the Mass, he is buried by St. Medard and ordered ^a new sepulchre to be prepared in the Church of Blessed Mary. But by common counsel it was decreed that they should bury him in the Church of Blessed Peter at Blandinium, since it was there, having been banished from the city with all his kindred, that he had held his bishopric and had wrought miracles of illustrious name — in the reign of our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns as God through all ages of ages. Amen.

[32] The obedient disciple, therefore, following his Master's command, set out, and while going and seeking Pope Boniface, he came to Ravenna, and there, buried in the lane called the Lane of the Lepers, he fell asleep in peace. On the following night, ^a Jew, A Jew, having burned the book of St. Eleutherius at whose house the disciple had been staying, after the burial of the body, found the book, and upon finding written therein how the Virgin Mary bore the Son of God and remained ^a Virgin after giving birth, he was inflamed with the zeal of anger, secretly took ^a sword, cut everything apart with the blade, and then angrily cast it into the fire. But on that same night, the glorious Virgin, wishing to convert the Jew to the faith and to bind him to the sweet yoke of her Son, clothed in the whitest garment, with her face as if torn and the hair of her most holy head as if disheveled, deigned to appear to him as he slept, the Virgin Mother of God appearing and to say to the wondering Jew: "O faithless and unjust one, what did you do yesterday? Behold, he wished to take your soul from you. Who then shall be your refuge and your hope? Is it I? I am the flower of the field, the white lily, and the blooming rose, who merited to bear the Son of God, who remained ^a Virgin after giving birth. Go therefore, my son, and confess what you have done, so that you may deserve to receive the baptism of faith, and having put off the old man, you may be able to put on the new Adam." Having said these things, the blessed Mother vanished. And he, marveling at what he had seen, at that very hour sought the church, he is converted to the faith confessed what he had perpetrated, and then merited to become ^a Christian; and praising the Mother of God, he served her honorably his whole life — she who, with her Son, is filled with everlasting joys, whose dominion endures for ever and ever. Amen.

CHAPTER VI. The Apparition of St. Eleutherius. The Elevation of His Body.

[33] Therefore, on one of those days when Heydilo, ^a prudent and just man, held the bishopric of the Church of Tournai, ^a certain matron named Thecla, noble by birth but nobler still in the dignity of her character, flourishing in virtue, After ^a threefold apparition made to ^a certain Thecla excelling in humility, generous in almsgiving, saw in her dreams ^a man clothed in white standing before her, and she noted his appearance — cheerful in countenance, modest in look, lovable in beauty, and exceedingly gentle in his speech. For Blessed Eleutherius was the guardian of the Church of Tournai, who, looking upon the matron, gently and softly said: "Thecla, go to the place which is now called Blandinium, and there you will find many bodies of Saints resting in Christ; among them you will find, on the right side of the altar of Blessed Peter the Apostle, the body of St. Eleutherius. Then you shall pray, and afterward you shall make known to Bishop Heydilo what you have seen." Having said these things, he vanished from her eyes. Thecla, rising at dawn, began to recollect within herself what she had seen. On the following night, therefore, Blessed Eleutherius again stood before her, and touching her with his pastoral staff, said: "Blessed are you by the Lord. But why have you not done what was commanded you? See that you do not provoke me to anger." Having said these things, he again slipped from her eyes. But on the third night, returning, he spoke the same words, but added ^a little more, saying: "Daughter of the heavenly Jerusalem, why have you not obeyed our commands? Tomorrow at the twilight of day you shall go to Bishop Heydilo, and then you shall make known to his presence all that you have seen." Having said these things, he vanished from her eyes ^a third time.

[34] Thecla, rising at dawn, went to Blandinium; then, having offered her prayer, she came to the Bishop, who was then residing in those places, and made known to his presence what she had seen. On the following Sunday, therefore, Bishop Heydilo, having summoned the Bishops of the neighboring cities, went to Blandinium, the body of St. Eleutherius is elevated by Bishop Heydilo then celebrated the solemnities of the Mass, and having offered his prayer, he approached the sepulchre with trembling. Monks, clergy, and laity offered their prayers; and the Bishops, digging, laid their hands upon the sarcophagus. Therefore, with great trembling, the body of Blessed Eleutherius was elevated by the hands of the holy Bishops.

[35] But at that very hour, Thecla, praying, having received the Body and Blood of Christ from the Bishop, Thecla holily expires breathed her last before the sepulchre in the sight of all. She was buried and rests in the middle of the church; but afterward she was translated to ^a more secluded part of the church, over whose happy soul the choir of Virgins rejoices and the glorious multitude of widows also gives invitation.

[36] On the same day on which the body of Blessed Eleutherius was elevated, ^a widowed woman, crying out that she was wretched, hastened to the church. For her son, while being sent into the field for the purpose of guarding the flock, a boy slain by ^a demon in the form of ^a lion — ^a demon in the likeness of ^a lion rushed roaring from the same forest, devoured the boy, and then returned to the forest at the swiftest run. The shepherds, however, who had seen and fled, told the poor little woman what had happened. Then she, weeping, took refuge in the church and, with all the people, besought Blessed Eleutherius to restore to her her only son. The woman prayed weeping; the Bishops standing by also wept; the vested company of clergy wept; the great multitude of the people groaned. Then the place where the boy lay was shaken, and such great brightness came from heaven and shone around him that no one could even perceive him rising; then the boy rose alive and declared to all how great were the mercy and piety of that same memorable Father. he revives

[37] Also on that day, two blind men received their sight; three paralytics were cured; ^a woman was freed from ^a flow of blood; various sick persons are healed ^a lame man also was restored to his former gait. Many other miracles were wrought in those days which, although unknown to men, are nonetheless manifest to the divine Majesty. The elevation of the body of the most blessed Eleutherius took place on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of October. He is equal to the Martyrs, because he was thrice beaten with scourges; he is the peer of the ranks of Confessors, because he was ^a true Confessor and ^a worker of miracles; he is ^a glorious companion of the Virgins, because he remained ^a Virgin, and therefore he flourishes before God as ^a cedar of Lebanon and ^a flower of lilies.

CHAPTER VII. Miracles Performed After the Elevation of the Body of St. Eleutherius.

[38] In the second year after these events, in the church of Blessed Peter the Apostle, in which the body of Blessed Eleutherius was frequented by the people, the following miracles were performed by God through the merits of the same Bishop. Libertinus, Tribune of Tournai, was dragging ^a certain man condemned to death to execution with the people. Feriolus, unjustly led to the gibbet Meanwhile, ^a certain priest named Feriolus had come from Vienne to Tournai as ^a pilgrim. When he asked the Tribune to show mercy to the condemned man, the Tribune, being of great ferocity, inflamed with serious anger, said to his men: "Go, and seize this sacrilegious priest, and lead him bound in chains to the gibbet." Then he, unjustly bound with heavy fetters, while passing before the church of Blandinium — with the people honoring the memory of the Martyr or Confessor, and with all the clergy persevering in the praises of God — cried out with ^a groan, saying: he implores the aid of St. Eleutherius "O holy Bishop of God, Eleutherius, who have merited to become ^a partaker of heavenly goods, glorious Martyr throughout the world, and by your merits an eminent Confessor, who while you lived, being of wondrous sanctity, remained ^a Virgin: if the things I have heard about your glorious merits are true, hear, gentle one, this harsh man; come to the aid, in your kindness, of one oppressed and unjustly bound in heavy fetters." Having said these things, he slipped from the hands of those following him and took refuge in the church. And when he had come before the sepulchre, suddenly his chains were broken apart he is freed when the chains are broken and the chain was divided on both sides.

[39] But the soldiers, when they saw him standing free with his fetters broken, inflamed with fury, again cast ^a chain around his neck and bound his feet with strong fetters, wishing to cast him out of the church unanimously When he is bound again and invokes St. Eleutherius and then nail him to the gibbet of the cross. But the priest Feriolus, suppliant and trembling, with his eyes raised to the sepulchre, said: "O glorious Bishop of God, Eleutherius, I invoke your clemency again; do not despise the humble prayer of your servant. For through you Jesus Christ, the Son of God, brought back Blanda, the Tribune's daughter, from death to life, and converted the people of Tournai together with the father of the Virgin to the faith; you raised the son of the widowed woman, and to the mute you kindly opened the secrets of speech." At this voice, suddenly the chain, broken apart, sprang forth the Tribune Libertinus is punished by death and struck the Tribune full in the face; he, falling to the ground, was rendered half-dead, and was carried to the city with ^a great outcry of the people. All were terrified by this, and prostrating themselves before the sepulchre, they faithfully begged for forgiveness of their sins. On that very day, Libertinus expired.

[40] Then his wife ordered his lifeless body to be brought to the memorial of the Martyr Eleutherius. While all wept and implored the mercy of the Martyr, ^a great brightness coming from heaven shone around, and ^a voice was heard saying: "Pray to the priest, that he may beseech our Lord Jesus for Libertinus." by the prayer of Feriolus Then all were astonished (for they heard the voice but saw no one) and begged that he would implore the mercy of the Confessor together with them. Which was done accordingly. And when the prayer was finished, he took the relics of the Bishop and cast them upon the dead man. Wondrous thing! and by the touch of the reliquary of St. Eleutherius he is raised For after the eleventh hour he rose alive and praised the great works of his Creator. He himself also used to relate to us how the devil and his angels had come to meet his soul, but the Angel of the Lord, Michael, together with Blessed Eleutherius, had come from the right side and commanded the soul to return to the body. He further related to us how all knowledge of St. Eleutherius would be destroyed, but in the last times it would be made certain through the same Bishop — who afterward, as was related to us, leading ^a happy life, fell asleep in peace and rests in the church of Blessed Mary the Virgin, together with Censorinus Caesar, the Tribune of the Scaudinians. The chain also was carried to Vienne as ^a testimony of the miracle.

[41] I do not think this should be passed over in silence either, which was related to me by Hedilo, Bishop of Tournai. A certain woman, blind and mute, was brought before the altar on the day of his deposition and fell asleep. But behold, together with the blessed Martyrs of Christ, Nicasius and Piatus, and the blessed Confessors of Christ, Amandus and Eligius, Blessed Eleutherius appeared to her and roused her, saying: "What evil do you suffer, daughter? I have obtained divine clemency for you." a blind and mute woman is healed when St. Eleutherius appears with other Saints Having said these things, he impressed the sign of the Cross upon her eyes and cast, as it were, ^a rod of fire into her mouth; then, together with the Saints, he vanished from her. She, however, rejoicing, opened her eyes, and looking at those standing around, said: "Truly you are ^a Bishop of God, Eleutherius!"

"who appeared to me as ^a Martyr together with the Martyrs Nicasius and Piatus. Rightly are you to be honored, O man of God, Eleutherius, who manifested yourself to me as ^a Confessor together with the Confessors of God, Amandus and Eligius." But as she cried out, ^a multitude of both sexes — that is, of men and women — hastened to the scene, and she made known to them all the things she had seen.

APPENDIX on the Translation of the Body of St. Eleutherius into the City of Tournai.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (Saint)

BHL Number: 2463

By an ancient author, from manuscripts.

[42] Now therefore, dearest ones, lest we cause you weariness, let us return to the miracles that were performed at the restoration of his body. In those days, the citizens of the city, seeing the miracles The body of St. Eleutherius is carried to Tournai that Christ was working through his servant, went to Blandinium and honorably carried the relics of the same Bishop to the church of Blessed Mary. And when they were leaving Blandinium, the inhabitants of that place, attacking the citizens of the city, sent forth arrows; but the arrows, returning, wounded the right hands of those who had sent them. those who resist are injured by their own weapons Indeed, none of the citizens was wounded; but certain of the country folk were wounded, others were made blind, and many were left half-dead on the road. Thus, with great exultation, the glorious body was carried to the church of the Mother of Christ. Joy and exultation increased throughout the entire city; the sadness of the sick was turned to joy.

[43] For paralytics came to meet the relics; the blind sat crying out in the street; all of whom, twenty-five in number, were cured by the touch of the relics. 25 paralytics and 7 blind persons are healed I thought this also should be added: that seven blind persons were illuminated in those days. Nothing, however, was done without faith. Furthermore, long afterward he healed ^a woman who had been crippled.

[45] a crippled woman O imitable man! O praiseworthy Bishop — chaste, good, lovable, adorned with virtues and miracles! O inestimable man, conquered neither by toil nor to be vanquished by death, who neither feared to die nor refused to live! Epilogue O man who raised three dead persons, illuminated the blind, and performed illustrious miracles both after death and before — over whose happy soul the company of Martyrs applauds, the exulting choir of Confessors rejoices, and the glorious multitude of Virgins also invites; whom the heavenly King enriches with an everlasting crown, Jesus our Lord, to whom be praise, honor, and dominion, with the eternal Father and the Holy Spirit, through all ages of ages. Amen.

REVELATION made to Henry, Canon of Tournai, from two Tournai manuscripts.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (Saint)

BHL Number: 2469

By ^a contemporary author, from manuscripts.

[1] A certain young man, our fellow Canon, named Henry, at the Paschal season, on the second day of the week, the eleventh day before the Kalends of May, In the year 1141, April 21 at the evening hour, with night already falling, was by chance passing alone through the new fabric of the Church of Blessed Mary without any fear; and behold, suddenly he heard certain voices, as if of ^a multitude coming terribly with great force, and he also saw ^a fiery brand coming upon him, so that it burned ^a small piece of his tunic and the flesh beneath it on his arm near the fist. Immediately, terrified, he fell to the ground, and straightway, as if rapt in ecstasy, he saw very many persons coming to him and conversing with him, whom he knew to be already dead and whom he had known while living. Afterward it seemed to him a revelation is made to Canon Henry that he was in ^a field filled with the flowers of roses and lilies and with the pleasantness of every sweetness; standing in it and gladdened by the exceeding sweetness — the horror of his former terror having been dispelled — and as if wholly refreshed and renewed, he saw four persons clothed in white garments, with candlesticks and thuribles, coming toward him. These were followed by three honorable men adorned with episcopal vestments, holding pontifical staffs in their hands and also bearing golden mitres on their heads, on which the name of each was inscribed. For on the mitre of him who walked in the middle was written: "ST. ELEUTHERIUS BISHOP"; by SS. Eleutherius, Eligius, and Aicharius on that of him who walked on the right: "BLESSED ELIGIUS BISHOP"; on that of him who stood on the left: "ST. AICHARIUS BISHOP." After them followed Lord Gerard, ^a priest, ^a religious man, clothed in sacerdotal vestments, who had been the faithful steward of the almonry of St. Mary.

[2] The blessed Eleutherius, therefore, approaching the young man, as if gently caressing him, cast his maniple upon him; then he showed him the book of his life, which he carried in his hand, the Life of St. Eleutherius is shown and ordered him to read it before him; and receiving it back from him after it had been read through, he placed it in his bosom and returned to the place where he had previously stood. Afterward, Blessed Eligius approached the young man and offered him the book of his life; and of St. Eligius but the young man, saying that it was well enough known to him, refused to read it. St. Aicharius also showed him an inscription on his right hand: "In the name of the Lord Jesus, through me ^a dead man was raised to life." After these things, they departed in the order in which they had come. and ^a miracle of St. Aicharius

[3] Having seen these things, therefore, the young man, returning from the ecstasy to himself, rose from the ground, and going back to his father's house, lay sick in bed the whole night. When morning came, he asked to be sprinkled with holy water, and thus refreshed, he showed the piece of his garment that had been burned and the flesh beneath it that had been melted, his garment and flesh were scorched and related some of the things he had seen. On the following Friday, having secretly summoned William, the Dean of the Canons, he confessed his sins; and having received absolution from him, with penance enjoined, on the next Sunday he received the Body of the Lord. Having received it — wondrous to tell — he began to recite from memory, before all who were listening, the Life of Blessed Eleutherius, which six days before he had read in ecstasy, as fluently as if it were the Lord's Prayer. he recites from memory the Life of St. Eleutherius Astonished and struck by the novelty of the thing, we came together and began to confer and conjecture much among ourselves about so marvelous ^a vision. For although certain people said that the young man, being skilled in composition and versification, could have composed this Life, we nevertheless, not ignorant of his learning, were uncertain, for he had never been accustomed to this kind of composition — although, even if he had composed it, he could in no way have read the whole of it so fluently, by memory and by heart, without ^a book.

[3] Having therefore taken counsel with religious men — our lord Samson, Archbishop of Reims, and Lord Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, as well as other Bishops and Abbots, who were assembled with the King of France in the city of Sens during the Octave of Pentecost for the purpose of hearing and examining the books of Master Peter Abelard — this matter is examined at the Council of Sens we transmitted this vision in writing. They commanded us to await henceforth the effect of the divine will.

[4] And behold, after ^a few days the aforesaid young man, foreknowing by certain signs that Blessed Eleutherius would again manifest himself to him, early in the morning confessed his sins, heard Mass, and received the Body of the Lord; then he entered the sacristy, in which the reliquary of the holy man had been placed, to pray with ^a few companions, when suddenly it was reported to those standing outside that he had fallen to the ground. in ^a second ecstasy he learns the elevation of the body Very many entered, among whom we also entered. Having entered, we saw him lying on the ground with closed eyes, as if lifeless, and marveling, we awaited the outcome of the matter. And behold, after ^a little while we heard him reading the Elevation of St. Eleutherius; and we marveled that he responded to many things that we asked. Having returned from the ecstasy, he wrote what he had read. On account of this vision, therefore, which we had witnessed, having been made more certain about the first vision, at which no one had been present, we prayed together to the Lord that, if this vision were from him, it might be manifested also ^a third time.

[5] Not yet had forty days passed, and the aforesaid young man, sensing that the third vision would come sooner, on the Friday before the feast of St. Lawrence, again in the morning confessed his sins, in the third he learns the miracles and having heard Mass, strengthened by the reception of the Lord's Body, he entered the aforesaid sacristy to pray with ^a few companions. Without delay, we who were standing outside, hearing that he had fallen, hurried in and saw him, as was customary, lying on the ground with closed eyes as if lifeless. Scarcely ^a quarter of an hour had passed, and behold, we heard him reading certain miracles of St. Eleutherius; and when we questioned him, we were amazed that he responded to many things.

[6] he predicts the separation of the Tournai bishopric Among these things, he publicly predicted that the Church of Tournai within not ^a long time would have its own Bishop and recover its former dignity. He also read in the book of Blessed Eleutherius the first foundation of the city of Tournai, which, retaining it by heart, he handed over to us to be written and read — and it is kept among us, written together with the book of his Life.

LIFE III, by Guibert of the Order of Friars Minor, from the Library of the Fathers and manuscript.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (Saint)

BHL Number: 2467

By Guibert.

PROLOGUE

[1] To the Reverend Father and Lord John, by the grace of God venerable Bishop of Tournai, Guibert, by origin of Tournai, by profession ^a Friar Minor, by merit the least, wishes to be as wisely armed with the spirit of counsel as manfully animated.

You have asked, Reverend Lord, that I should either arrange the deeds and praises of the glorious Confessor of Christ, Eleutherius, or explain them to the present and posterity in ^a more diligent style or better manner of writing. A pious request, The author writes the Life of St. Eleutherius for the instruction of others by which ^a future age may perpetuate, by celebrating, the holiness of so great ^a Pastor, and the present generation, by following in his footsteps, may be more greatly inflamed with the love of God and neighbor. These are the foods which Sacred Scripture declares to be in the newly cultivated fields of the Fathers, when posterity is informed by the examples of the Saints. Prov. 13:23 I know the origin of this request to be derived from the glory of Christ, in which he is glorified in his Saints; from the special grace by which you love more sincerely in Christ the Bishop and Patron of your city; from the pastoral providence by which you provide for your clergy; and from the singular benevolence which one so great shows to me, ^a little man, so small and almost nothing — wherefore you virtually compel me either to prattle with nursery rhymes or rather to play the fool. For when I measure myself inwardly in my head, I am pulled and drawn through uncertain affections. For amid the continual cares of lectures, amid the inextricable labyrinths of questions, the paradigms of sermons, and the axioms of counsels — in which I am daily immersed and absorbed — it is hard for me to write, asked by the Bishop of Tournai, his kinsman but harder to resist the command of so great ^a dignity. For why should I not call your requests ^a command? Not because the powerful man supplicates with drawn sword, but because the familiarity long since established, the identity of citizenship, fatherland, kindred, the proximity of blood and affinity, and other things of this kind — which either win reverence or continue it once won — demand and require that I should judge the desire of your will, and the pleasure of your affection, to be ^a command and precept. But you would more usefully seek this to be done from many persons advanced in age, distinguished in faith, renowned in works, prompt in speech, tenacious in memory, and more richly endowed with the gift of sublime merits, whom you have at hand both from the number of your Canons and from the various colleges of monks in your diocese. For the slenderness of my meager eloquence produces very thin harvests, he excuses the thinness of his talent and does not grow heavy with any fruits of fertile soil for the purpose of expressing the glory of so great ^a Confessor. I, therefore, deprived of time and occupied in mind — for whom humility is more appetizing than the elegance of words, or historical narrative ^a matter of habit — I do what you command, offering the sequence of the life of the holy Bishop; and I send you the office with its appendices, as I was asked on your behalf; and, that the tenor of the text may be more clearly seen, let it be divided, if you please, under certain headings.

Chapter 1: On the origin of the city of Tournai. Chapter 2: On the arrival and preaching of Blessed Piatus at Tournai. Chapter 3: On the remains and seed of Blessed Piatus and the birth of Blessed Eleutherius. Chapter 4: On the good disposition of Blessed Eleutherius. Chapter 5: On the banishment of the faithful and Blessed Eleutherius from Tournai. Chapter 6: On the promotion of Blessed Eleutherius to the Bishopric of Tournai. Chapter 7: On Blanda, who solicited the Bishop, and on her death and resurrection. Chapter 8: On the manner of the conversion of the people of Tournai to the faith through Blessed Eleutherius. Chapter 9: On the miracles performed at that time through Blessed Eleutherius. Chapter 10: On the miracles performed at the showing of the holy Relics, when the Saint had returned from Rome. Chapter 11: On the conflict he had with the heretics. Chapter 12: On the plots and blows inflicted on the Saint by the heretics. Chapter 13: On his last words and exhortations. Chapter 14: On Satan, whom he saw standing by, when placed in extremity. Chapter 15: On the blind and mute woman illuminated and cured through him. Chapter 16: On the restoration of the Episcopal See. Chapter 17: On the revelation of Blessed Eleutherius and the death of Thecla. Chapter 18: On the raising of the widow's son. Chapter 19: On the death of ^a woman and the raising of ^a young man at the same solemnity. Chapter 20: On other miracles performed on the same day. Chapter 21: On the binding of St. Feriolus visiting the Saint's sepulchre. Chapter 22: On his release through Blessed Eleutherius and the death of the Tribune. Chapter 23: On the raising of the Tribune. Chapter 24: On the carrying back of the body from Blandinium to Tournai.

CHAPTER I. The Fabulous Origin of the City of Tournai. The Christian Faith Brought by St. Piatus.

CHAPTER I

[2] Examining more carefully the cosmographies and chronicles of the times, the histories and annals of nations, we read that Tournai is ^a very ancient and well-known city of Gallia Belgica, which claims ^a singular dignity above other neighboring cities in power, nobility, and glory; which, bordering on the sea, watered by sweet rivers, abounding in crops, Tournai is an ancient city is filled with riches and delights. Its fields are extensive in forests, picturesque in meadows, rich in shepherds, and abundant in flocks in its pastures. Its river, called the Scheldt, washing and flowing through it, divides Gaul and Germany — that is, the imperial and the royal power. This city indeed Priscus Tarquinius, the fifth King of the Romans from Romulus, is read to have built through the Romans in the tenth year of his reign, and rising with sumptuous buildings, it was called by the name of Second Rome. For in the one hundred and forty-third year from the founding of the City, the foundations of that same city were laid, it is feigned to have been founded by Tarquinius Priscus, King of the Romans about the time when the most holy Temple of the Lord was burned by the Chaldeans and the holy city of Jerusalem was overthrown by Nebuchadnezzar. In those days Ezekiel was carried into exile, and King Jehoiachin is read to have been taken captive, and Tarquinius, King of the Romans, was slain. He was succeeded by Servius, who exalted Minor Rome, which is now called Tournai, above one hundred and twenty-five cities or towns, by Servius Tullius placed over 125 cities so as to collect from them the census and tributes that he would afterward send to the Romans. But having grown insolent from the multitude of its forces, in the twenty-fourth year of King Servius it ceased to pay the expenses of tributes, and thus for forty years from its establishment the said city rested in peace. But the Romans, sending legions against the rebels, stirred up battle, and after many engagements on both sides, in the thirty-fourth year of Servius, they made peace with the Romans by restoring the former burden of tributes, and reformed it. Nor was it any longer called Second Rome, but it was called the Hostile City. But as time passed, when Artaxerxes was reigning — who destroyed the kingdom of Egypt — afterward destroyed the Hostile City was destroyed, and when Eleazar was ruling over the Jews, in the twenty-sixth year of King Ptolemy, it was rebuilt and called Nervius. First Second Rome for the dignity of its glory; second, the Hostile City from its strength; third, Nervius from Servius, King of the Romans — but with the first letter changed, lest perhaps it should be branded with the reproach of servitude.

[3] When, however, with the passage of time, Julius Caesar was sent to obtain Gaul and, occupied in the exercises of war, tarried for ^a decade — in the time of Julius Caesar

"Whom Gaul held warring for two lustres" —

he at length triumphed over Gaul and exalted barbarous and untamed nations. For

"He subdued the Cappadocians, the fierce Cilicians, and the Taurians; him the conquered Arab knew, and Judea, consecrated to the rites of an uncertain God."

And as that distinguished historiographer says: "After much shedding of blood, Gaul submitted to his dominion":

"the overly rebellious Nervian, and soiled with the blood of slaughtered and scalded men." Lucan

As is read more clearly in the second book of Julius Caesar, which is entitled "The Gallic War Completed by Him." In those same times, Turnus, King of the Nervians, ruled over the people — from whom the city received the name Tournai. it is said to have had Turnus as king For just as Turnus fought bravely against Aeneas, so this one fought bravely against Julius.

CHAPTER II

After the death of Julius Caesar, in the reign of Augustus Caesar, in the forty-second year of his empire, in the five thousand one hundred and ninety-ninth year from the creation of the world, in the seven hundred and fifty-second year from the founding of the City, and in the approximately five hundred and ninety-third year from the first founding of Tournai, the Lord Jesus Christ was born at Bethlehem of the Virgin; and in the second year of Nero (that is, around the fiftieth year from the Incarnation of the Lord), the city of Tournai was restored by the Romans. and restored under Nero

[4] The Apostles ran, as prodigal of life as of labor, to foreign nations; they sowed Christ everywhere throughout the world; the seed once sown produced Catholic and faithful men. And while, according to the Prophet, they filled the face of the earth with seed, the tares of vices were purged away; After the Apostles the crops of morals and the discipline of the faith abounded. Isa. 27:6 After the Apostles, Martyrs and Confessors succeeded at opportune times, illuminating the darkness of the world with the radiant beams of truth. For thus, to illumine the night of the present life, the stars come each with their own powers upon the face of heaven, until in the morning men behold the morning star shining forth. For while the nightly space is illuminated by the courses of stars descending and succeeding one another, it is accomplished with the great beauty of heaven; so, surely, until the true morning star shall appear in the morning of glory, the night of the Church militant, instructed by Doctors succeeding one another, glitters and gleams. followed by Apostolic men In place of the Fathers, therefore, sons were born — that is, Apostolic men, who, suffused with the light of wisdom and kindled with the fervor of faith, were allotted to diverse regions of the world. For just as Thomas was allotted the Parthians, Matthew the Ethiopians, Bartholomew Hither India, Andrew Scythia, John Asia, Peter Pontus and Galatia, and the rest illuminated the remaining provinces, so afterward Dionysius with his companions went to the people of Paris, from among whom St. Piatus announced Christ to the people of Tournai Lucian sought the people of Beauvais, Quintinus the people of Amiens, Crispinus and Crispinianus the people of Soissons; but Piatus went to the people of Tournai. He, being noble in birth but nobler in faith, of Benevento by origin, ^a preacher by office, sweet in eloquence, ^a Martyr by desire but an Apostle by zeal, after much insistence in preaching, converted the untamed and uncultivated peoples to the discipline of the faith. Under the reign of Diocletian and Maximian, after many kinds of torments, he at length merited to obtain the long-desired prize and crown by the severing of his head in that same territory of Tournai, a Martyr under Diocletian leaving after his martyrdom sons and descendants, whom he had begotten through the Gospel in Christ, making them sharers in his glory and Confessors of the Catholic faith.

p. These Apostles of Gaul are venerated: Dionysius on October 9, Lucian on January 8, Quintinus on October 31, Crispinus and Crispinianus on October 25. We have said some things about their arrival in the Life of St. Lucian, section 2.

CHAPTER II. The Birth, Education, Exile, and Episcopate of St. Eleutherius.

CHAPTER III

[5] Therefore, after the departure of this venerable and Blessed Father, as time proceeded but vice succeeded, the population multiplied but joy was not magnified — ^a great part of the people of Tournai returned, like ^a dog to its vomit, and as the teaching of truth failed, unbelief and sin grew violent again. And since sins in no way die with old age, Among the impious, who multiplied nor are crimes overwhelmed by the passage of time, nor is wickedness buried by forgetfulness, the best condition was changed, the faith of very many perished at Tournai, and as it is written, "the people began to go after filth." Hos. 5:11 For every tree that is not planted by the heavenly Father (who alone gives increase to mystical growing things) will be uprooted; therefore, with branches cut off, leaves shaken off, and fruits scattered, the typological tree of Daniel was so cut down that the birds dwelling in the tops of the branches fled. Dan. 4 It was cut down, but not simply torn up by the roots, because the shoot of its roots persevered and sprouted in the earth. For when the city was prostituted to the mockery of idolatry, Hirenaeus lives holily overgrown with the thorns of vices, there was found in it ^a wise man, distinguished in faith, ^a foremost follower of the teaching of Piatus, named Hirenaeus. While he instructed his posterity in the faith, by his wisdom he freed the city from crime. This is that Hirenaeus who, having publicly confessed Christ, having received martyrdom, happily migrated to triumph.

[6] He begot ^a son, in substance and in name, Serenus, who was full of the glory of riches, the power of his parents, the wisdom of truth, and the abundance of piety. His wife was called Blanda, ^a name both true and proper, so that you would think that the serenity of the heart and the sweetness of speech were enriched by ^a certain spiritual marriage. And because ^a good tree produces good fruit from itself, and what the son has seen the father doing, the son likewise does, from whose son Serenus and wife Blanda, St. Eleutherius is born declining somewhat toward the evening of old age, while for the sake of propagating the worship of the faith they devote themselves to the office of the conjugal bond, by divine gift they receive an heir, ^a successor both of their goods and of their piety and faith. They call their son — already reborn in Christ and received from the sacred font — Eleutherius, and by the interpretation of the name, as it were, they presage and designate what he was to be: the ornament of the age. Could not that joy, predicted by the Angel as future, already seem to be renewed, when John was born of just parents, advanced in age — Elizabeth and Zacharias? Luke 1 Therefore, under the reign of the Emperors Valentinian and Marcian, the boy Eleutherius is born at Tournai, in the township.

CHAPTER IV

[7] The boy, handed over to masters to be trained in letters, grew in grace and increased in wisdom: to the Creator he diligently showed the ardor of charity, to himself the beauty of chastity, and to his neighbors the honor of humility; with his studies he drinks in virtue pious in heart, sober in speech, vigorous in works, modest in countenance, mature in bearing, devout in affection, benevolent in conversation, modest in dress, he appeared gracious in all things — demonstrating in himself such ^a form of goodness that in the disposition of the outer man could be read the inner habit of grace and virtue. For thus, in the vestibule of the outer house, the inner goodness that lies hidden within is easily inferred. Hence it is that Medard, who was afterward to be Bishop of Noyon, endowed with the spirit of prophecy, predicted by St. Medard that he will be taken up as Bishop predicted that the same Eleutherius would be the Bishop of Tournai, when that same Eleutherius, placed in the schools, was still passing through boyhood.

[8] But this also greatly contributes to his praises: that among the wicked he was ^a boy of good disposition. For just as it is ^a matter of graver fault not to be good among the good, so it is ^a matter of greater commendation to be good even among the wicked. Job 30:29 Hence Job is extolled with great praises because he was "a brother of dragons and ^a companion of ostriches." 2 Pet. 2:8 And it is said of Lot that "in seeing and hearing he was just, dwelling among them he shines as good among the wicked who from day to day tormented the just soul with wicked works." So this Saint, in the midst of ^a depraved and perverse nation, shone like ^a luminary in the world, as it is written in the Canticle of love: "As the lily among thorns, so is my beloved among the daughters." Cant. 2:2 A thorn is among thorns — the restless among the restless; ^a lily among lilies — the peaceful among the disciplined; ^a thorn among lilies — Saul among the Prophets. But with those who hated peace he was peaceable, and thus ^a lily among thorns.

CHAPTER V

[9] Now it came to pass in those days that the Tribune of the Scaudinians, who also presided over the city of Tournai, having assembled the elders of the people, decreed in common with the unbridled multitude of paganism that, without distinction of condition or sex, all devotees of the Christian faith should be driven from the city of Tournai with ignominy and deprived entirely of their possessions. Therefore, Serenus and Blanda and their only son Eleutherius were expelled to the injury of Christ from the city of Tournai, he is expelled from the city with his parents on account of the faith stripped of their own possessions, deprived of their estates and temporal glory. But the exercise of virtue, which had been hidden in prosperity, became more and more known in adversity. For thus perfumes do not know how to give off ^a wider fragrance unless they are stirred; thus spices do not spread their scent unless they are set on fire; thus the power of the mustard seed is in no way known unless the shell is vigorously crushed — uncrushed it is light, but crushed it burns the more and powerfully displays the sharpness of its latent energy. So in persecution the virtue of the soul is revealed; so what lay hidden in the parents and the son is more clearly disclosed. Whence another reading says: Ps. 41:9 "In the daytime the Lord commanded his mercy, and in the night he revealed it." For the gratuitous gift of God, which is poured in during the time of serenity, is revealed in tribulations. Jer. 23:28 "But what are the chaff to the wheat? says the Lord."

[10] Therefore, in order that those who were separated in deeds might also be separated in places, persecution was stirred up like ^a wind. And just as when the whirlwind of storms grows strong, the chaff is winnowed, and the adulterated and empty grains are now cast aside, and after many circlings the solid grains are gathered together so as to make ^a certain inseparable portion of one mass; so the worshippers of Christ and the faithful, expelled from the royal city, he dwells at Blandinium not divided but united, not crushed but roused, gather more vigorously around Eleutherius and his parents; and in the place called Blandinium, they build and construct ^a basilica in honor of Blessed Peter — where many of the Gentiles, flocking to Serenus both for the sake of old friendship and on account of the excellence of his merits, abandoning the error of paganism, reborn in the font of baptism, cast away the filth of idolatry, take up the worship of the Catholic faith, and change their rite.

CHAPTER VI

[11] With the sun now shining forth which had previously been in the cloud, serenity breathed, and the assembly of the faithful was gathered in the Church. The assembly of the orthodox faithful rejoiced: the times of the Prophets seemed to have returned, when under Zerubbabel the temple was being rebuilt. 1 Esd. 3 Indeed, ^a pleasing imagination draws us to consider the times of the Maccabees, when the Maccabees recalled their scattered brethren, raised up fallen laws, renewed ceremonies, cleansed sacred things, redeeming the losses of ^a long desolation with an excellent compendium of virtue. Let us recall the infancy of the nascent Church, the state of Christ's poor; we shall see ^a similar measure of humility, from which the Church of Tournai took its origin and progress. No fat hung from its sides, after Theodore, the first Bishop, had died when no one claimed anything as his own. But lest the humble people, wandering like ^a headless body through the fields of license, or rebellious through foul heresies, should be subjected to dangers, Theodore was confirmed by the few faithful as the first Bishop of Tournai. But he perished, struck by the divine bolt, after ^a brief span of days. Thus through the vice of apostasy the first Angel fell; thus Saul, the first King of the Hebrews, was rejected for the sin of disobedience; thus the first Bishop of Tournai was struck down by divine vengeance, so that, according to the saying of the Wise Man, "when the pestilent one is punished, the little one may be made wiser." 1 Kings 15 Prov. 19:25 For while mercy is granted to the lowly, the mighty shall suffer mighty torments. a successor is chosen But He who overturns the seats of the proud and establishes the humble in their place arranged for Eleutherius to be elected Bishop; and his election having been confirmed by the Supreme Pontiff, he was gratuitously consecrated as Bishop of Tournai after Theodore.

m. In the year 487.

CHAPTER III. A Dead Woman Raised by St. Eleutherius; Blind Men, ^a Lame Man, and ^a Leper Healed; the People of Tournai Converted to the Faith; A Sin Revealed to King Clovis.

CHAPTER VII

[12] Eleutherius, exalted by the pastoral mitre, fulfilled the office of Bishop with good works, whose office he had striven more to merit than to purchase, living in an orderly manner for himself, sociably toward his neighbor, but humbly in the presence of the Creator: composed in morals, fervent in love, gentle in society, steadfast in his promise, he is provoked to sin by the Tribune's daughter strong in patience, inclined to concord, rigid in censure. He was indeed upright in judgments, discreet in commanding, industrious in administration, vigorous in action, solicitous in helping, faithful in counsels, circumspect in responses. While on ^a certain occasion he was refreshing his spirit by prayer, behold, ^a certain frenzied daughter of the Tribune of the Scaudinians, who had secretly loved him, being vexed from of old by the spirit of lust, having found the opportunity of solitude, breaking the seal of modesty, she burst into the secret place and interrupted that divine colloquy. Shameful to say! She confesses her desire, seeks carnal union, and disturbs the sabbath-rest of the Bishop's breast. But behold, another Joseph, who, leaving his cloak, fled and went outside, leaving the woman his garment lest he leave his chastity. But she, covered with the cloak, soon punished by death after the holy Bishop had salutarily admonished and rebuked her, breathed out her spirit.

[13] The Tribune, hearing of his daughter's pitiable death, was stunned. But if he would profess the faith of Christ with ^a true heart, Blessed Eleutherius, trusting in divine mercy, after the father's wavering promised that his daughter would be raised. The father consented, and after the solemnities of the Mass were celebrated as customary, the Saint struck the ground with his pastoral staff; and while he strove to give the father faith concerning his promise, ^a terrible earthquake occurred. What more? The father's unbelief was laid bare by certain signs. Therefore, the Saint, spending the night in prayer, in the morning undertook what he had begun. But with ^a second earthquake the father's unbelief was confirmed. he converts him to the faith and raises her Being moved to compunction, he returned ^a third time, prostrated himself at the Bishop's feet, revealed his guilt, exposed his pretense, and received his daughter, raised in the name of Christ through Blessed Eleutherius. She, catechized in the rudiments of the faith and purified by ^a six-day fast, was regenerated in Christ; Blanda, the venerable mother of the Bishop, received her from the sacred font and imposed upon her the name Blanda. This daughter of the Tribune afterward gave her name to Blandinium. Her father, relapsing into unbelief, afflicted her with many troubles because she was faithful. she afterward died holily But the Virgin, gaining Christ and deeming as nothing the patrimony snatched from her by her father's disowning, persevering in the faith, rested in peace. She was buried in the village of Blandinium on the day before the Kalends of June, before the shrine and altar of Blessed Peter.

CHAPTER VIII

[14] The Lord, however, wishing to beget for himself ^a substantial people, chastised the people of Tournai with the plague of sudden death, by which he struck certain pagans there. The marks of wounds lay hidden; the cause of the effects was unknown; he is captured and cruelly beaten the punishment of death was felt; the remedy sought was ineffectual. For at ^a certain twilight of the night, they went with weapons to Blandinium, found the Saint praying, bound him with chains, presented him to Censorinus Caesar the Tribune, beat him thrice with rods, imprisoned and confined him. But on that same night an Angel visited and attended him, he is freed by an Angel opened the doors of the prison, showed him the way by which he should go to Blandinium, broke his chains, and led the prisoner out.

[15] Once led out, he gave thanks, and afterward devoted the day to the solemnities of the Mass, falling into ecstasy, placed in an excess of mind, he besought God for the Tribune. He importuned God with prayers for the salvation of the people of Tournai. he prays for the conversion of the Tribune and the people of Tournai He was established in that disposition of mind and, having tasted the sweetness of prayer — which utterly transcends human understanding, which neither the sound of the voice, nor the movement of the tongue, nor any utterance of words distinguishes — but which the devout mind, illuminated by the infusion of heavenly light, expresses not in human but in angelic eloquence, and with its senses gathered into one and its affections mortified, pours forth abundantly as if from ^a most copious fountain. While the holy Bishop offers this in the ministry of ^a holocaust, he immediately receives ^a gift as ^a sign of the favor obtained. For he is soon certified by an angelic promise an Angel informs him that his prayer has been heard that his prayer has been heard.

[16] Therefore, because through every scourge Jerusalem is instructed, and through vexation the edge of understanding is sharpened, soon the hand of the Lord, piling plague upon the pagans, was made heavier. They cannot go out in public; the demons are compelled to deny ^a response; finally the Gentiles decree to kill the Tribune he receives the people, humbled by the plague if he will not consent to Eleutherius in all things. Coming to the Saint, with tears poured forth, they prostrate themselves at the feet of the holy Bishop. Isa. 60:14 That prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled: "The children of those who humiliated you shall come to you bent low, and those who detracted from you shall adore the traces of your feet." After this, having prescribed ^a solemn fast of seven days, on the eighth day the Tribune and the people, clothed in sackcloth, go out from Tournai. The Saint enrolls them in the number of the signed and elect by the character of baptism and the sacrament of faith. he baptizes For those wishing to come forth from darkness into the light and to embrace the most sweet law of Christ need to have the first-fruits of their conversion consecrated by the baptismal bath, so that, with the old age of sin laid aside, they may be reborn in the waters of regeneration into ^a new innocence of soul and infancy of life. Therefore, that solemn day was celebrated with joy on the fifth day before the Kalends of October, when through Eleutherius the people of Tournai were converted from the error of paganism to the Catholic faith. This is the day that no forgetfulness ought to obliterate, but rather the voice of praise and the giving of thanks should overflow — when, by indignation as much as by compassion, so great ^a multitude of people was converted in ^a wondrous and amazing manner, as it is written: "In my indignation I struck you, and in my reconciliation I had mercy on you." Isa. 60:10 He moves to Tournai Therefore, the holy Bishop afterward entered the city with glory, and the entire people received him with due reverence as the defender of the fatherland.

CHAPTER IX

[17] The lamp that had long been hidden under ^a bushel, now placed upon ^a lampstand, began to illumine the house more greatly. For while the people rejoiced at the presence of the pious Pastor, the matter for exultation grew even more, because ^a blind man brought to the Bishop was given light, he illuminates two blind men and with the light of faith infused in him, his inner blindness was cleansed. He also illuminated another blind man, named Mantilius, on the day of the Lord's Nativity, who, deprived of temporal sustenance and bereft of ^a guide's help, begged for alms as ^a beggar in the church. He was rebuked by passers-by to be silent; the Saint, compassionating the wretched blind man, setting forth the parable of that Evangelical blind man who, when asked to be silent, cried out the more, impressing the sign of the Cross upon his eyes, restored his sight to him. And on the day when the true Light came into the world to enlighten every man, the Saint, who bore testimony concerning the Light, opened the eyes of the blind man he heals ^a lame man so that outwardly he might lose his blindness and inwardly acknowledge the truth. Luke 18 The Saint also restored to the power of walking ^a man lame from birth.

[18] A certain man named Peritius, struck with leprosy, was despised by all as an abomination. He lay at the gate of the church, which at that time was called Mantilia, awaiting the chosen Bishop of God, that from him he might receive the sacrament of regeneration, and ^a leper for whom he had waited about forty days. by baptizing him The Saint, looking upon him and compassionating him, regenerated him by the wave of baptism and conferred upon his flesh the benefit of complete health. He, shining with the grace of holiness, was afterward appointed the first Abbot of the city by Blessed Medard. Therefore, the fragrance of his good name was spread more and more for the life of the Gentiles; the light of his brightness filled the hemisphere of the Church.

[19] His fame compelled King Louis to enter the city of the Bishop. This is the same Louis, the first King of the Franks, baptized by Blessed Remigius. He was wonderfully delighted to hear Eleutherius preaching, and he retained from memory the sermon seasoned with the salt of wisdom. He reveals ^a sin to King Clovis I He had committed ^a sin after the bath of baptism which shame forbade him to confess. The Saint, seeing this in the spirit, brought it to the King's attention. The King, suffused with shame and tears, immediately acknowledged his guilt, and the King, beseeching that the Saint might become his advocate during the solemnities of the Mass, obtained pardon for him, as the outcome of the matter proved. For in the morning, consecrating the sacrament of the Lord's Body and Blood, ^a brightness of light shone in the church for the space of one hour, during which, through the ministry of an Angel, the Saint received knowledge of the nature of the sin and, as far as pardon was concerned, an assurance of certainty. revealed to him by an Angel Therefore, the King, certified through the writing revealed by the Angel concerning both the sin and the pardon, giving thanks to God and returning to his own domain, gratuitously bestowed many gifts upon the holy man of God. Thus the lamp, placed upon the lampstand, shone with miracles, and afterward shone forth still more with temporal achievements.

CHAPTER IV. The Roman Journeys of St. Eleutherius; A Synod Held; Heretics Opposed; Wounds Inflicted on Him by Them.

CHAPTER X

[20] Since, as the Apostle says, "there must be heresies, so that those who are approved by the Lord may be made manifest to men," heresies arose in those days, destroying the unity of the divine essence, against heretics attacking the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son, and the procession of the Holy Spirit. 1 Cor. 11:19 After quarrels of words, however, blows to bodies followed, so that many Catholics were killed in the River Scheldt through the violence and plots of the heretics. In the tenth year of his ordination indeed, under Pope Anastasius (Gelasius having already died), he brought the rebellious back to the faith and the unbelieving to Catholic union; and because that which is more secretly nourished frequently erupts into ^a serpent, in the fourteenth year of his bishopric, seeing the viperous offspring dividing the bowels of Mother Church and barking with poisoned tongues more shamelessly against the Divinity of the Only-begotten Son of God, he went to Symmachus, now presiding in Rome: he goes to Rome to Pope Symmachus he offered him Catholic sermons, and having been received by him honorably, he returned to his homeland, confounded the heretics, and converted them.

[21] In those days, however, the heresy of the Acephali grew strong; the Bishop of Christ returned to Rome, and in the twenty-fifth year of his bishopric, Symmachus having now died, he found Hormisdas presiding, with whom he conferred kindly concerning the affairs of his Church, again to Hormisdas and the pious Pastor, obtaining from the Pope venerable relics — namely, those of Mary of Egypt, together with the shoulder-bone of Blessed Stephen the Protomartyr — carried these to his homeland; and while he was returning, as the Tournai clergy and people came to meet him with due veneration, he is read to have ascended the hill of St. Andrew, which was then called the Hill of the Hidden Treasure; he displays the sacred Relics and frees six persons from the sacred fire and while he reverently showed the Relics to all the people who were present, an immensity of brightness shone around them; and when two women and four men in the crowd were suffering from the ailment commonly called the "sacred fire," he placed before the men the shoulder-bone of the Protomartyr and before the women the glorious head of the Egyptian Saint.

"All fell prostrate, and with intent faces they kept still" —

and the Saint, rousing the multitude of the people to prayer, besought the Saints to come to their aid, declaring with confidence that the multitude would not cease from prayer until those who suffered were cured. O wondrous and deeply rooted constancy of the man, proceeding from ^a pure heart and ^a good conscience and unfeigned faith! Truly all things are possible to him who believes. Whence, at the efficacy of so great ^a voice, all were commonly freed. Behold, to his voice was given such efficacy of power that the flesh which sickness had corroded, which erysipelas had consumed, was also (wondrous to tell) immediately restored.

CHAPTER XI

[22] The time had now come; the dignity of his merits demanded that, after manifold victory in battle, the veteran soldier should be called to the crown. For thus, by the justice of the civil law, soldiers enrolled by oath, who had faithfully fought for the republic, upon completion of their military exercises, were formerly released with their lawful pay; he fights with the heretics and with estates assigned to them from which to live, they were at length sent to their own homes. Yet God gave him ^a mighty contest, that he might conquer and the end might appear more glorious. He had now labored nearly forty years in the office of pastoral governance. For nine years he had governed the Church of Blandinium, and for thirty-one years the Church of Tournai. The Lord raised up against him persistent adversaries — heretics, enemies of Catholic doctrine and of the name of Christ. But since they were raging to the destruction of souls, the good Pastor, not bearing their restlessness, by decree of the Supreme Pontiff drove from the enclosures and walls of the city those, at least, who were unwilling to return to the bosom of ecclesiastical unity. But lest they should ascribe the punishment of their own iniquity to the cruelty of the authorities, he convenes ^a Synod so that the authority of Scripture might crush their shameless brows, they fixed ^a day for disputing about the Catholic faith; the Bishop convoked ^a synod, so as to overcome and confound the heretics and impose and lay silence upon the confounded. With both parties therefore convoked, rising in the midst and indicating silence with his hand, the good Pastor confessed and publicly expounded the Catholic faith.

[23] He expounded, namely, with what veneration God the Father is spoken of; he expounds the mysteries of the faith by what sacrament Jesus Christ our Lord is held to be His Son; by what perfection His Holy Spirit is named; how the blessed Trinity is one in substance yet personally distinct; what is the birth of the Virgin; what is the nativity of the Word in the flesh; what is the sacrament of the Cross; what is the benefit of the divine descent into hell; what is the glory of the resurrection; and the captivity of souls recalled from hell; what also is the ascension into heaven and the expectation of the Judge who is to come; what is the Church; what are the assemblies of vanity against her; what is the remission of sins; what is the resurrection of the flesh; what is eternal life; what is everlasting perdition. All these things his sermon pursues at greater length. What more? The Catholics unanimously confess the faith; the heretics are confounded; once confounded, they flee he carries away the victory and turn to the stratagems of wickedness. He therefore who had given the boldness to fight and the confidence to conquer gave the victory to the combatant. Thus the shepherd David, with ^a single stroke of ^a stone, laid low the mighty Goliath, armed with terrible weapons and of enormous stature, threw into confusion the camp of the strangers, and put the foreigners to flight. He was now in his seventy-first year when he achieved this triumph.

CHAPTER XII

[24] The foxes of Samson may be read to have diverse faces, but they have their tails tied together. Judg. 15:4 When the sons of eternal damnation saw how the Catholic Church of Tournai flourished, as time progressed, in merits and virtue, and how prosperity smiled upon it from day to day, they gathered ^a council against Eleutherius, plotting how they might seize him by treachery and kill him and he would perish. For they said: the heretics conspire against him "What are we doing, since this man performs many signs? If we let him go on thus, we will be put to shame, despised, and blown away. Come, let us kill him, and when he is dead, our name will be spread abroad." Therefore, the word was spread in those days — whoever heard it, his ears would ring. Men of blood and deceit went out in treachery, and unanimously attacked the minister of the altar, the holy Bishop, the anointed of the Lord, ^a citizen of heaven. Who could pursue the rest with dry eyes? In their hands were the instruments of death; men of hidden mind, concealed behind ^a corner. But Father Eleutherius, soon to be ^a victim of Christ, venerable in years, now aged and at the same time illustrious by the title of his merits (for he was in his seventy-sixth year), together with Athanasius the Deacon and Andoneus his faithful disciple, was going out from the temple of the Blessed Virgin Mary. And behold, the depraved and perverse generation, the seed of Canaan and not of Judah, the offspring of vipers, the satellites of ^a wicked faction, did not shrink from plowing, furrowing, and sweeping with deep wounds that head venerable to the sight of Angels, and disfiguring with foul marks that face fashioned after the image of heavenly beauty. Why, impious parricides, he is wounded why, treacherous assassins, do you remove an eminent man from the Catholic flock — one who, through fervent supplication, was ^a little while before zealously interceding in the temple for you? But they, with blows repeatedly struck and wounds inflicted upon the cultivator in the vineyard, the Bishop before the church, the patron on his own property, the shepherd in his folds, the master in his own estate, and left half-dead departed, leaving him half-dead; and that they might be conformed to the Lord's Passion, the disciples, abandoning their Pastor, fled.

[25] Censorinus, therefore, hearing what had happened, was vehemently inflamed against the malefactors, and proposed to remove them by the most cruel torment of the cross. For it is in the interest of public justice he intercedes against punishing the enemies that those who neither fear God, nor defer to the Church, nor love the Saints, nor reverence the censure of the Canons, should be destroyed by cruel punishment. But — O wondrous and deeply rooted piety of the Father! — imitating the Son of God, he implores the judge for the salvation of the malefactors, who is at length tempered by his prayers and reverence. O what mourning of the faithful! What great lamentations and groans especially of the poor! Men and women of both sexes mourn promiscuously, bewailing the common peril of all and indeed the particular peril of each.

CHAPTER V. The Final Illness, Death, and Miracles of St. Eleutherius.

CHAPTER XIII

[26] Therefore Rachel wept for the son of her womb, and could not be consoled.

"For who but one bereft of sense would forbid her to weep at the death of her child?"

In those particularly bloody obsequies, to which the soul owes compassion, the eye irrigation, and the judicial hand vengeance, the Bishop was carried in his own blood by the hands of bearers to his own house, to the township we have described above. He ordered ^a bed of haircloth to be prepared for himself, and surviving five weeks, he heals ^a blind man and other sick persons so that his holiness might stand out with surpassing eminence, in that interval of time he illuminated ^a blind man and healed many afflicted and affected with various ailments. And now foreknowing his death in the spirit, when he perceived the imminent dissolution of his body, he indicated to those standing by that his end was approaching and that in that same week he would pass from the prison of the body, from the dungeon of the flesh — as experience proved by evident evidence.

[27] Seeing therefore that he would pass from this world to the Father, since he had loved his own, he loved them unto the end, uttering words at the point of death sweeter than honey and the honeycomb. He admonishes them concerning the unity to be pursued, the penance to be done, dying, he exhorts his followers the chastity to be cherished, the patience to be acquired, the vanity of the world to be despised; and after exhortation on morals, he appends in more extended words ^a useful sermon on the faith concerning the Divinity and the Humanity. Presently, amid the pains of the body and the griefs of the mind, as if placed at ^a certain midpoint, he poured forth groans and tears; and suffering indeed in body within himself, but compassionating the Church in heart, he turned to the Lord and recited his faith in burning words, beseeched God for friends and enemies alike, and recommended the Church of Tournai and those who would especially and devoutly hold him in their memory to the Lord. "You have seen, O Lord," he said, "my struggle; you know my desire. For I am now being poured out, and I enter upon the way of all flesh: he aspires to eternal rest it is time, Lord, that you commend my body to the earth. As the hart desires the water of the spring, the traveler the end of his journey, the servant the reward of his labor, so the Saint desires to enjoy the sight of the Savior." Does he not seem to have said to us in this word, when his agony was prolonged: "I am driven by desire; I am held back by the mass of the body. I have borne this burden ^a long time; long have I kept watch over the people entrusted to me. I would wish to be freed from this obedience, to be stripped of the garment, far too heavy, that I wear, and to be clothed with one more fine. In you, Lord, I trust; you I desire to see; you I seek; you I always worshipped while placed on earth, to whom I devoted myself with all my love. Free me, Lord my God, who are blessed for ever and ever."

[28] And behold, soon ^a sure sign of having been heard — namely, by sight and hearing. For ^a great radiance appeared; he is confirmed by ^a heavenly radiance and voice ^a voice from heaven sounded like the wings of an eagle: "Eleutherius, your prayer has been heard, for the laborer is worthy of his food. You have praised the Trinity in ^a Catholic manner; you have manfully and diligently fought. Now at last you have obtained the efficacy of being heard. Complete what you have begun, my servant, lest after ^a good ending it be brought to nothing. The good book will be made void, but it will be restored; it will be cast into the burning fire, but it is the Lord's will that after these things it be revealed to the Church." When these things had been said, the voice that had been heard and the brightness that had been seen vanished. The Saint, however, immediately broke forth wondrously into thanksgiving. Let whoever desires to see these things diligently read his sermons, which, composed in their proper places, we have omitted for the sake of avoiding prolixity.

CHAPTER XIV

[29] We read that the Saints have always been not sluggish in zeal; and, since the speech of heretics creeps like ^a cancer, they composed many books and sermons lest the rampart of the faith be broken through, either obstinately or secretly; and therefore, through the documents of the Saints, the foundation of the faith stands firm. Hence it is that the blessed Bishop Eleutherius, being at the point of death, summoning Andoneus, commands that after the Father's departure, the beloved son should hasten to Rome and present to the Supreme Pontiff Boniface the defenses of the faith that the Saint had composed. And turning again to the sweetness of prayer, he puts to flight the terrifying demon he saw Satan standing at his left. For Satan wished to interrupt the speech of one praying, or by the terror of his presence to disturb the spirit of one departing; with the sign of the Cross but that deadly villain appeared in vain — to one, at any rate, in whom he would find nothing of his own or deadly. The Saint, rebuking him with words, expelled him in confusion by displaying the sign of the holy Cross. By this we are admonished, brothers, that when the final hour of our due end is imminent, continuous prayer should exercise us. For if we plan to cross in this world to unknown or distant places, now we commend ourselves to the prayers of our neighbors, now at the very moment of departure we drench ourselves with ^a continuous flood of tears, beseeching God that we may hasten with peaceful encounters on our journeys. And if we do this so zealously while still remaining in the world, how much more zealously should we do such things at our end?

[30] Whence the blessed Bishop prayed unceasingly to the Lord, commending his spirit into His hands; having received the holy Eucharist, he dies and having received the sacrament of the Lord's Body and Blood, crowned with an unfading laurel, with an immense light, while all who were present saw and rejoiced, he passed, invited to the banquet of paradise. Thus the precious pearl, once trodden underfoot by men, is now treasured in heaven, honored by Angels, enjoys the presence of the Trinity — worthy of the royal treasure, worthy of the palace, worthy of heaven; no longer confined in ^a dungeon, oppressed by poverty, consigned to exile, but freely contemplating. For this is Blessed Eleutherius — by his Evangelical ministry the proper Apostle of Tournai, ^a Martyr by his own blood. For the cause and the suffering make the Martyr: the cause of his martyrdom was his freedom in the Catholic faith; Martyr the suffering was the bitterness of the passion inflicted. The rigor of abstinence and the vigor of penance likewise rendered him ^a Confessor; Confessor the purity of mind and the integrity of body made him ^a Virgin — Virgin by which he shone graciously, and now indeed flourishes gloriously in his homeland.

[31] His body was committed to burial by the glorious Bishop of Noyon and Confessor of Christ, Medard, he is buried by St. Medard who was to succeed him most directly in the government of the people of Tournai; and with solemn obsequies provided — which are rather the consolation of the living than the aid of the dead — that venerable organ of the Holy Spirit was buried, by common counsel, in the church of Blessed Peter at Blandinium, so that he who as ^a boy held the faith among the infidels, in the church of Blandinium as ^a young man taught the same faith, and as ^a veteran fell in battle for it, might be entombed in the church of him whose faith will endure inviolate forever.

CHAPTER XV

[32] Truly precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints, as was made manifest on the day of the deposition of the Confessor of Christ. For ^a certain woman, blind and mute, while she was led before the altar, once led was dismissed, once dismissed fell into ^a slumber, and once slumbering was cured. Having slumbered briefly, she saw ^a vision that opened her outward ear while it inwardly revealed understanding. What more? The woman recovered the use of speech and sight. appearing with other Saints For the glorious Bishop Eleutherius appeared to the woman together with the Martyrs of Christ, Nicasius and Piatus, and the holy Confessors Eligius and Amandus; he impressed the sign of the Cross upon the woman's eyes, he heals ^a blind and mute woman with the sign of the Cross and as if casting ^a rod of fire into her mouth, he cured the ailments of the sufferer. O Confessor and Martyr of Christ, rightly venerable Eleutherius, who illuminated the Church militant with the twofold privilege of grace, look upon the defects of our frailty with the eye of piety; and by the protection of your patronage, Father, set forth our groans before the presence of the divine Majesty, so that, divested of the burden of the mortal tunic, freed from the restlessness of carnal concupiscence, we may be partakers of your prize and crown, through the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be all honor and glory without end. Amen.

CHAPTER XVI

[33] The venerable Confessor of Christ and Bishop Eleutherius is read to have presided over the government of the Church of Tournai for forty-five years. When his debt to nature was paid and his spirit returned to heaven, he merited to have ^a faithful successor — namely, Blessed Medard, Bishop of Noyon, whom, while he still lived, broken by infirmity and old age, he had had as an assistant for the consecrating of churches and the celebrating of ordinations. he is said to have formerly been aided in governing the bishopric by St. Medard And thus, as ^a longer space of time proceeded, only ^a single Bishop presided at both Noyon and Tournai. For more than six hundred years the city of Tournai is read to have been widowed of its own Pastor. But blessed be the Son of God, who compassionates the losses of souls, gathering the dispersed and raising up the fallen according to the fit manner and order. In the year of the Lord's Incarnation one thousand one hundred and forty-six, under Pope Eugene, with the patronage of Blessed Bernard, its own Bishop was restored to Tournai. For then Anselm, formerly ^a monk of the Church of Blessed Medard at Soissons, distinguished for the merit of his fame and life, the Episcopal See restored to the people of Tournai having already held the office of Abbot for many years in the Church of Blessed Vincent at Laon, was consecrated as Bishop at Rome by Eugene; and after the restoration of the Cathedral government in Tournai, he held the first dignity as ^a mitred Bishop. And thus we believe it was accomplished by divine providence that the dignity of the See of Tournai, lost in Blessed Medard, was restored to the people of Tournai through ^a son of Blessed Medard's house.

CHAPTER VI. The Elevation of the Body of St. Eleutherius. A Dead Man Raised; Sick Persons Healed.

CHAPTER XVII

[34] Therefore, in that interval of flowing time during which the two said dioceses are read to have been united, Heidilo presided — ^a man endowed with much renown, the twenty-sixth from Blessed Eleutherius — in whose time the Norman fury is read to have raged in Tournai. In the times of the said Bishop, the Lord more greatly glorified his Saint: he revealed the Confessor Eleutherius to the faithful of Christ, no longer enduring that so venerable ^a clod of ^a body, so precious ^a treasury, so noble ^a pearl should remain hidden; and he whose spirit, already crowned with glory, shone in the heavens — his body, committed to burial, already breathed upon earth, adorned with ^a singular grace. After ^a threefold revelation made by St. Eleutherius to ^a certain Thecla It happened therefore that ^a certain matron of Tournai, named Thecla, noble by birth but nobler in the dignity of her character, while she was resting with her senses of the heart purified and in mind at peace, and her bodily eyes were asleep, she was caught up in the spirit and fell into an ecstasy. For it seemed to her that she saw, as if in ^a dream, ^a man clothed in white — gentle, lovable, cheerful, and modest. She was secretly admonished by the same to go to Blandinium, where she would find the relics of Blessed Eleutherius among the buried bodies of the Saints. She was likewise admonished to go to Bishop Heidilo and report to him the vision made to her. While she delayed carrying out what was commanded, on the succeeding nights the same vision was presented to her ^a third time:

"Sister Thecla, what dreams terrify you in suspense? What you have seen is not ^a mere dream or ^a phantastic vision; but rather one to be described as an oracle, or more truly as ^a most limpid vision."

"The countenance and words cling, fixed in the breast, and care grants no peaceful rest to the limbs."

[35] What she therefore saw, repeated ^a third time, became to her an assurance of certainty. At dawn, Thecla, rising, undertook the journey, carried out the vision, and revealed the vision to Bishop Heidilo. The Bishops of neighboring cities were summoned; his body is elevated by Bishop Heydilo the solemn votive Masses were celebrated; and with prayer more fervently poured forth, all — of both sexes and different ranks — came with reverential fear to the appointed place. The Bishops indeed, having in their hands suitable implements, as if digging up ^a treasure, rejoiced greatly when they found the sepulchre; and when the body was elevated from the sarcophagus, joy was doubled both in the people and in the clergy.

[36] Thecla, however, receiving the reward of her revelation, praying at that very hour, departing, went to the Lord, Thecla dies holily after she had received from the Bishop the sacrament of the Lord's Body. O happy passing, not perishing, of the matron, at which first of all the army of the Saints, crowned with the laurel, rejoices. From the face of wickedness indeed the just one was gathered and snatched away, lest wickedness should perchance change her understanding.

CHAPTER XVIII

[37] While thus the continuous solemnity proceeded, behold, the matter for joy was renewed. For ^a widowed woman entered, desolate for her dead son. When she had sent him into the field for the purpose of guarding the flock, ^a demon attacked the boy — whose likeness and appearance was that of ^a lion — who, coming forth from the thicket and roaring, attacking and killing, immediately fled and withdrew into the hidden groves. A boy killed by ^a demon in the form of ^a lion The wretched mother, having learned the series of the sad event, dissolving in womanly softness, indulged in groans and tears and wasted away with frequent sighs, so that even if you did not know the mother, you would recognize ^a mother: she manifested the feeling of grief and, in her manner of grieving, the excess of tears; and like Jacob, believing his son to have been devoured by ^a beast, she kept up continual lamentation. Her only boy did not appear, and therefore the woman had no consolation. The solemnity was turned to mourning, the joy to compassion. The clergy and the people poured out their inward grief with tears, and after indulging in sighs for ^a little while, with recovered confidence of hope, they besought Blessed Eleutherius that her son might be raised. Matt. 21:22 The clergy and the people, compassionating, demanded the same with vows and prayers. Truly, according to the Lord's saying: "It is impossible that the prayers of many not be heard." Blessed indeed is the Lord, who after the tempest brings calm, and after mourning introduces consolation; for when the cloud of sadness was driven away, he forthwith introduced the serenity of gladness. he revives through the implored patronage of St. Eleutherius The place of the earth where the boy lay lifeless was shaken, and suddenly an immense brightness from heaven shone around him. The boy was raised; the woman was gladdened; the glorious Bishop and minister of Christ was magnified among the people; and after the resurrection of the one who had been dead, he began to reveal the piety of the blessed Bishop and the power given to him from heaven by the Lord. For what can be objected to the power of one who has the Almighty in agreement with his will in all things? For what wonder if the Saints, already made conformable to Christ in soul, perform wonders concerning corporeal things for the present dispensation, since by His grace they already partake of His Divinity?

CHAPTER XIX

[38] Truly ^a great Prophet appeared, arising on the day of his declaration, who so solemnly raised the widow's son. Was not the spirit of Elisha already being fulfilled in the Saint, when the raised son is read to have been restored to the Shunamite woman? As it is written: "The dead boy was lying on his couch, compared to Elisha and Elisha lay upon the boy and placed his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and bent himself over him, and the flesh of the boy grew warm." 4 Kings 4:34 He applied, as it were, the mouth of gentle propitiation and supplication to God, the eyes of pious compassion, and the hands of efficacious operation; and so the dead boy arose. Thus also the insignia of his Leader were renewed in the soldier, who restored the only dead son to his mother. Therefore, the woman received back her son by the resurrection. The common joy revives, the Saint's patronage is commended, his sanctity, piety, and power are confirmed by manifestly multiplied signs. O wondrous and stupendous goodness, that in the same solemnity ^a young man is raised and ^a matron dies! Deut. 32:39 For it is written of the Lord: "I will kill, and I will make alive; I will strike, and I will heal." But in both cases there is piety: while the young man was recalled to grace, the noble matron, now nubile to Christ her spouse, was called to glory.

[39] What do you observe in these things, Brothers, except that from the dead there arose ^a clear proof that the Saint had passed to the fellowship of Him who holds dominion over life and death? Or certainly, since the faith of the resurrection is proper to the Catholic religion, it was fitting that the faith which the Saint had taught by word should be confirmed by example at his elevation. For if ^a dead man has been raised, we too shall similarly rise. The difference between resuscitation and resurrection The raising of the dead is ^a certain trace of the resurrection, in that in both cases what had been deprived of life is recalled to life. But there is nevertheless ^a difference between resuscitation and resurrection, since the one resuscitated is recalled for ^a time, to depart from life again; but in the resurrection, human life will be perpetuated for eternity, whether in glory or in punishment. Whether anyone says this or something else, we are certain that the young man was raised to the glory of God and to the confirmation of the efficacy of the holy Bishop. Whence also concerning Lazarus, about to be raised, it is read: "This sickness is not unto death, but that through it the Son of Man may be glorified." John 11:4 And if any Saint has asked for something that the Lord does not dispose to do, the Lord in no way permits it to happen. From which it is clearly concluded that if anything is obtained from the Lord by the prayers of the Saints, their efficacy in heaven is thereby declared.

CHAPTER XX

[40] But behold, while we were occupied with the miracles that the holy day of the elevation brought, we have suffered ^a slight digression. For even ^a river, while flowing through its channel, if it encounters ^a hollow valley on the side, immediately diverts the course of its impetus into it and afterward pours itself back into the channel. It also happens to hunters that they desist from the beast they are pursuing if by chance they see another suddenly emerge unexpectedly. Let the river therefore resume the accustomed way of its channel, the hunter the beast he was pursuing, and the pen the subject it had begun. We also plant ^a grove against the law in the temple of the Lord if we insist merely on the leaves of words. For it is certain that whenever the stalks of the crop advance in leaves, the grains swell in the ears with less fullness. Therefore, on that solemn day which we have been pursuing up to this point, the Lord, for the glorification of the holy Bishop, restored sight to two blind men: 2 blind persons are healed joys are continued upon joys, as signs succeed one another in turn. For on that same day three paralytics were cured, 3 paralytics when the passage of the animal spirit to the instruments of the senses was restored, and thus to the numb and insensible members, sense and motion were fully returned. A lame man also, deficient in the power of walking, having had the soles and bases of his feet made firm, a lame man immediately leaping up, walked. A woman also who had long suffered ^a flow of blood one suffering ^a flow of blood is read to have been freed on that very day from her former ailment by the prayers of the holy Confessor. These things, therefore, and others like them — so arduous, so unusual, surpassing the hope and capability of those who marveled — expressly manifest that the reverence being shown to the holy Bishop was pleasing to the Lord, who so declared his Saint that those who were in need might find the consolation of ^a harbor, to whose patronage they might flee as to opportune help.

d. The same: "faith."

CHAPTER VII. Through the Aid of St. Eleutherius, Feriolus is Freed from His Chains; Libertinus is Raised from the Dead.

CHAPTER XXI

[41] The mighty works of Christ grew day by day; the miracles shone more brightly than the light through the merits of the Saint; the throng of peoples flocked in crowds to Blandinium. The good fragrance could not be hidden, but passing from nation to nation, it breathed from kingdom to another people. For in the fragrance of the Saint's ointments, foreign pilgrims visited the territory of Tournai. Therefore, in the second year after his elevation, ^a certain priest named Feriolus had come from Vienne to Tournai as ^a pilgrim. He, being anointed with the oil of piety and outwardly devoted to the works of charity, Feriolus pleads for ^a condemned man's life before Libertinus acted mercifully toward the wretched, upon whom the blessing of one about to perish came. Now in those days there was ^a certain Libertinus, Tribune of the people of Tournai. He was dragging ^a certain man, condemned to the penalty of death, miserably to his torment, attended by ^a multitude of people. Feriolus, seeing him and compassionating the sufferer, devoutly begged the Tribune to show mercy to the condemned man. But the Tribune became fiercer at the warnings and more insolent at the prayers, and he spoke the offense of his spirit without cause or title: his face irrationally inflamed — ^a troubled mouth, ^a trembling body, savage eyes, whitening foam, burning face, monstrous shouting, and sparing no insults — could sufficiently indicate the passion of an angry heart. And turning to his attendants he said: "Go, therefore he is bound and dragged to the gibbet and seize this sacrilegious priest, and lead him bound in chains to the torment of the gibbet." Truly, according to the judge of the people, so also is his minister. Whence, while the impious man was arrogant, the poor man was unjustly bound with heavy fetters. Virtue is always contrary to the vicious; holiness is hateful to the sacrilegious; integrity to the corrupt; frugality to the luxurious; mercy is harsh to the cruel; and piety intolerable to the impious. So judge the impious sitting in the seat of judgment; so innocence is destroyed where tyrannizing cruelty rages.

CHAPTER XXII

[42] God does not forget to have mercy, but liberates the just man in tribulation, when his virtue is proved through patience. Nor does anything that happens to the just man disturb him; but at the approach of the moment of temptation, he turns to the Lord in prayer. Whence Feriolus, awaiting the sentence of death, he implores the aid of St. Eleutherius while passing before the church of Blandinium, where the clergy and people were gathered to celebrate the memory of the holy Confessor Eleutherius, turned to prayer and, rousing the Confessor of Christ with all the affection of his heart, most devoutly besought him; and commemorating the prize of martyrdom, the title of Confessor, and the inviolate commendation of virginity, he sought opportune help: "O holy Bishop Eleutherius," he said, "if the things I have heard about your merits are true, come to the aid of the oppressed; free the captive through the mystery of your piety."

Having said these things, he escaped free from the hands of the attendants and hastened with quickened step to the church; and while he stood before the sepulchre of the blessed Confessor in the church, he is freed from his chains at his sepulchre the chains with which he was bound were loosened by ^a sudden movement and the chain was divided.

[43] "Then the plagues of Erebus, the contagions of crime, the monsters of Hell, citizens of Pluto, nurslings of death, issuing from the Tartarean chaos, poured forth into the world, stirring up ^a foul council, gathered into one."

They, showing neither glory to God again ^a chain is cast around his neck nor reverence to the place, nor mercy to the wretched, nor justice to the innocent — and those who had been in filth, becoming more filthy still — wickedly cast the chain again around his neck, bound his hands, and with scourges and threats roused and drove him to leave the precincts of the church.

"What deeds so cruel are ever reported to have been done by either Sinon with his Punic ship, or Sciron from his deep rock, or Phalaris with his bull, or Sulla with his prison?"

All thirsted for innocent blood; all unanimously wished with equal desire to nail the holy priest of the Lord to the gibbet of the cross.

"What madness? O citizens, what so great license of the sword?"

But Feriolus, standing before the sepulchre of the blessed Confessor, placed between the limits of fear and confidence, invoking St. Eleutherius repeated the praises of the Saint; repeating, he besought; beseeching, he obtained; obtaining, he exulted in freedom and kept sabbath to the Lord from his inmost being. Placed therefore among the ranks of enemies, fearing and trembling, raising his eyes to heaven, he besought the Confessor of the Lord that the prayer of his humility might not be despised. "O glorious Bishop of Christ, Eleutherius," he said, "you raised Blanda, the daughter of the Tribune, by divine favor and your merit; you subjected the father of the Virgin and the people of Tournai to the yoke of the Catholic faith. Through you the widow's son is read to have been wondrously raised; the blind exalt you, the mute exalt you, your works of miracles praise God. Father, I invoke your piety, that I may again feel your helping hand." Wondrous sight: he is freed suddenly the chain is loosened; once loosened, it breaks; once broken, it springs forth; springing forth, it strikes the Tribune full in the face and, having struck, kills him. Libertinus is killed

"Meanwhile the walls are filled with diverse mourning."

CHAPTER XXIII

[44] But the Tribune's wife was especially tormented by the chance event, and by her diligence the body of the dead man was carried to Blandinium, placed before the sepulchre of the most blessed Confessor — ^a sad expiation for his own people, ^a shameful spectacle for strangers. They humbly beseech St. Eleutherius and rouse and invite him with devout prayers for the raising of the dead man. But the charity of the Saint never fails, because, now joined to God, even if he has cast off the symptoms of frailty, he has not cast off the bowels of charity. For having been changed into ^a certain divine affection, what could he savor, what could he bestow upon the wretched, but what is pious? For if God is charity, the more closely one is joined to God, the more fully he is proved to be filled with charity. When therefore, weeping as one, they implored the mercy of the Confessor for the Tribune, he is raised an immense brightness shone from above, and moreover ^a voice was heard from heaven: "Pray," it said, "to the priest, that he may pray to the Lord Jesus Christ for Libertinus." Those standing by saw no one, but they nonetheless heard the voice. Persisting therefore in prayer, Feriolus repeatedly placed the relics of the Confessor upon the body of the dead man, and after the eleventh hour, he who had been dead arose.

[45] "All fell silent and with intent faces they listened" when they heard the things the dead man had seen. He related to them the encounters with demons, the diversity of punishments — which surpassed human understanding not only according to the prophetic word but also according to the poetic verse. he relates what he had seen Whence that distinguished Mantuan, greatest of poets, says:

"Not if I had ^a hundred tongues, ^a hundred mouths, ^a voice of iron, could I comprehend all forms of crime or run through all the names of punishment." Aeneid 6

The same Tribune frequently related the sad and fearful departure of his soul, and the throng of demons eagerly awaiting it. When they had hastened to meet the trembling soul, they were prevented both by the Archangel Michael and by Eleutherius the Confessor. Thus the demons were frustrated, because the soul was sent to revisit and return to its own body.

[46] The same Tribune Libertinus also used to recount, among other things, that the knowledge of the glorious Confessor would become, over the spaces of many ages, as it were obliterated and erased; but in the last times, when the world would be declining toward old age, he predicts that the veneration of St. Eleutherius will diminish his memory would reflower in ^a new youth. Which we now see in part fulfilled in our times and grieve. Indeed, if it is ^a fitting utterance for one receiving ^a benefit to profess himself obliged to make ^a return, even if we can render nothing worthy to the Confessor of Christ, who established the city of Tournai and its borders in the faith, we ought nevertheless, in copious acts of thanksgiving, to seal his memory in the inner chambers of our hearts. If we do not do this, I fear that we may adore either the statue of irreverence or the idol of ingratitude. This is the ill-fated offspring of prodigies, of which the first is shapeless, the second infamous; both are without praise, neither is without stain. For the obscurity of irreverence and the obscenity of ingratitude bury past benefits, corrupt present ones, and repel future ones. It was by their neglect that the Saint was not held in due honor for ^a long time in his own homeland.

[47] The Tribune Libertinus, however, at length having paid his debt to nature, in holy confession, in the Catholic faith, in common hope, in unfeigned charity, commended his spirit into the hand of the Lord; he dies piously and he rests with Censorinus Caesar, the Tribune of the Scaudinians, in the church of the Blessed Virgin Mary. And that all fiction may cease and human invention vanish, the chain, of which we spoke above, was carried to Vienne as an efficacious proof of ^a wondrous and memorable event.

CHAPTER VIII. The Translation of the Body of St. Eleutherius into the City of Tournai.

CHAPTER XXIV

[48] It came to pass in those days ^a miracle that no antiquity of time should efface. The merits of the Confessor grew clearer and clearer; in him the mighty works of the Creator were praised. The citizens of Tournai, therefore, no longer able to endure the absence of the holy body, hastened to Blandinium, entered the church, found the holy Relics, The body of St. Eleutherius is carried to Tournai took the found relics, and carried what they had taken so as to expose them more magnificently in the church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and repose them there. For thus we believe it was ordained by divine justice, that he who had lain hidden at Blandinium when persecution was raging should there receive, as it were, ^a hidden place of burial; and that he who had afterward administered the care of the bishopric in the open should, with his merits growing bright, be placed more illustriously at Tournai. Therefore, the aforesaid citizens, carrying with them the Relics of the holy body, were returning to the city with gladness, those who resist are injured by their own weapons as victors are accustomed to exult with captured spoils.

[49] But the inhabitants of that territory, seeing the people of Tournai carrying the relics with force,

"they themselves advance to the contests of battle, and send their souls into open dangers. They bend their keen bows and hurl their javelins. Behold, the ground is strewn with missiles; fierce battle arises. Therefore the arrow flies, ^a herald of death, and impetuously seeks the enemy — which, propelled with all their strength,"

by ^a reverse motion returned upon itself with ^a wound to the one who had launched the arrow.

"The rustics, pierced by their own weapons, are thrown into confusion; the blade, fixed in its sheath, grows sluggish, nor easily comes forth, resting in long torpor; deranged, it denies its service in various blows."

Wondrous thing! Some of the pursuers were wounded, some also struck with blindness, and some were left half-dead on the road. And because none of the citizens received ^a wound, they offered acts of thanksgiving to God, and thus returning to their own:

"They roar with gladness and raise their spirits to the stars."

[50] And so, with the joy of the entire city, the body of the most glorious Confessor was placed in the church of Mary, the Mother of God. Those suffering from paralysis came to meet the holy relics; 25 paralytics are healed those sitting in the street cried out; who, by the touch of the relics, twenty-five in number, obtained full health. Miracles were extended day by day through the merits of the Saint. 7 blind persons Whence also in those days seven blind persons obtained the gift of sight, through the Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

LIFE IV. From the Tournai Manuscript Breviary.

Eleutherius, Bishop of Tournai in Belgium (Saint)

BHL Number: 2468

From the Manuscript Breviary.

CHAPTER I. The Birth, Education, Age, and Acts of St. Eleutherius at Blandinium.

[1] After the most cruel persecution of Diocletian and Maximian at Tournai, The faith at Tournai is planted by St. Piatus and other Martyrs the Blessed Martyr Piatus suffered, together with many of the faithful, among whom was Hirenaeus, ^a man powerful in riches and lineage; and an Episcopal See was founded there (over which the Bishop named Superior, who is next after him and is counted among the Fathers of the Council of Agrippina, presided). When subsequently, as the superstition of the Gentiles grew strong, the Lord's flock was scattered and the form of the Church was disturbed, many returned to idols and suffered scandal; yet the posterity of the said Hirenaeus remained firm and steadfast in the orthodox faith they had received. From Hirenaeus's great-grandson Serenus and Blanda, St. Eleutherius is born Among them, Serenus his great-grandson, himself also ^a man illustrious in wealth and religion, and Blanda his wife, when they were already declining toward old age, under the Emperors Valentinian and Marcian, by divine gift received ^a son at Tournai, whom, regenerated at the sacred font, they named Eleutherius.

[2] Handed over to masters to be trained in letters, he joined all virtues to the great progress he made in them, he advances in letters and virtue and while still ^a boy he gave signs of future holiness and zeal against every kind of impiety so conspicuous that his companion St. Medard — who was then himself also ^a boy at the same school and was joined to him by ^a closer friendship — destined to be Bishop by St. Medard's prediction affirmed, with ^a spirit undoubtedly prophetic, that he would one day be Bishop of Tournai. And just as divine providence ensured that this prediction would not lack fulfillment, so the event itself proved how fruitful it would be for the Church.

[3] For when, through the agency of the enemy of the human race, the fury of the Tribune Censorinus of the Scaudinians — who then presided over Tournai, while he was still ^a pagan — had so burned against the Christians that unless they returned to the idols, he would strip them of their fortunes, harass them with every cruelty, and punish them with exile and death; he is expelled from Tournai with his parents on account of the faith it came about that Serenus, expelled from the city with his wife and son, and other Christians, migrated to Blandinium, ^a village near the city, and having consecrated Theodore as their Bishop, built ^a basilica there in honor of St. Peter, Prince of the Apostles. While they devoted themselves to sacred works there, they also achieved this: that partly on this occasion, partly in Serenus's favor — on account of old familiarity and the man's distinguished merit — many flocking there abandoned the error of paganism and either received the faith of Christ anew or resumed what they had abandoned.

[4] There, while Eleutherius flourished with the fame of preaching, and being powerful in word and example, he converts many by his preaching by the solidity of his doctrine, his eloquence in speaking, and the holiness of his life, he drew many of the Gentiles from the city to the faith of Christ. He also merited this: that when the Bishop died after ^a brief life, he was sought by his Christian fellow citizens as successor on account of the excellence of his virtue, and was sent to Rome, he is sent to Rome recommended for this purpose, to Pope Felix II. Approved and admitted by him for the excellence of his merit, and instituted with Apostolic authority, he at last returned to his people, he is consecrated Bishop received with great rejoicing by all, and was consecrated Bishop of Tournai.

[5] While he administered this office throughout the full forty-five years during which he presided over this See, with great variety of times, watching over his flock and feeding it by word and example, it is marvelous with what labors, fighting against the twofold impiety — both pagan and heretical — and with what astonishing signs and merits, he illuminated Christian and orthodox piety. Such as this was above all: that the Tribune's only daughter, who, long since inflamed by ^a secret fire of love for him, having seized upon an opportunity of solitude, he repels the Tribune's daughter who plotted against his chastity had secretly approached him while praying and dared to tempt his modesty — casting off the cloak she had grasped, severely chastising her with words, and rebuking the demon, he repelled her from himself with ^a vehement spirit, so that both he himself went far away from her, leaving his own house, and she, falling into an ecstasy, immediately died. soon punished by death She was buried in the Field of Mars according to the rite of the pagans.

[6] Pitying her lot, but much more that of his homeland, while he zealously sought ways to save both, he did not miss this opportunity that presented itself: hearing the father's grief at her death, in order to bring the father to the faith which he bore with excessive weakness, armed with full faith in God, he summoned him and pledged to return her to him alive if, casting off the worship of demons, he would believe in Christ with all his household. When the father assented and pledged — but falsely and mendaciously — after the Saint had twice gone with the clergy to the tomb after the solemnities of the Mass, long resisting perfidiously and each time had returned with the matter unaccomplished, on account of the unbelief and hardness of the Tribune — which the Saint himself perceived in the spirit and which the earthquake (then immense and stupendous, with all fleeing in terror) betrayed — when at length the Tribune was moved to compunction (to which even the insensible element had pointed the way), and falling at the Saint's feet acknowledged his guilt, he raises her from the dead returning ^a third time to that place after prayers poured out the whole night, he called the girl three times, grasped her hand, and, to the astonishment of all, raised her alive from the tomb.

[7] After ^a six-day fast, he baptized her, and from the name of his mother — who received her from the sacred font — and consecrates her to God he called her Blanda (whence the name of the village of Blandinium) and consecrated the virgin to God. But when the Tribune again broke faith — addicted to his superstition and offended by the Virgin's resolution, who afterward died holily he strove to drag her downward by the removal of her feminine adornments and the deprivation of her patrimony — since she stood firm and despised the delights of the world in preference to the love of Christ alone, not long after it came to pass that the maiden, having died in the Lord (she was buried before the altar of St. Peter in the said basilica), flew up to heaven to the rewards of her faith and constancy.

[8] At that time, when ^a grave pestilence had arisen at Tournai, by which bodies were struck down without any visible wound, the Saint is accused of being the author of the pestilence it came about that the Saint was called to blame, as if the author of so great an evil on account of the offense to the idols — and this especially because, while the citizens were dying, he himself with his people was immune from this plague and remained secure while they trembled and mourned. he is seized and beaten with rods As the fury of the Gentiles increased to such ^a point that they sent armed men to him, who found him praying in the evening, they brought him bound at that very hour to the city to the Tribune, and by the order of this ungrateful man he was beaten with scourges and thrown into prison.

[9] Snatched from there by an Angel, he is freed by an Angel who that very night opened the doors of the prison and broke his chains, he prays for the conversion of the people of Tournai and brought back by him to his people at Blandinium, while unmindful of the injury he did not cease praying day and night for the Tribune and the entire people, and offered the solemnities of the Mass, an Angel was again sent to him to announce that he had been heard and to promise the return of himself and his people to the city. Therefore, by the will of God, the plague raged in the city more fiercely than before, and the idols, invoked in vain, were compelled to deny their response. Thus it came about that, while the common people attributed the cause of the entire evil to the Tribune and his injuries against the Bishop, [he catechizes the Tribune, terrified by the citizens on account of the raging plague] and, having now changed their minds, threatened to kill him unless he obeyed the Bishop's counsel — he was so terrified that, leaving the palace, he went of his own accord with all his kindred to the Saint, and prostrating himself at his feet, begged with tears streaming to be enrolled among the catechumens and taught the Christian faith.

[10] The Bishop, joyfully embracing him, full of gladness, having prescribed ^a seven-day fast for the people, on the eighth day baptized him, instructed in the faith, together with all his kindred he baptizes him with his followers and ^a numerous multitude of people of both sexes. What had long been his desire, and what he had not obtained by miracle — namely, to find entry into the city to save the people and his own — he is received into the city with great joy he now obtained when the city was thus chastised, so that, with the plague ceasing along with the impiety, the dispeller of both evils, and truly the father of his country, surrounded by ^a great retinue of those rejoicing on both sides, entered the city. With such great exultation and congratulation of all that it seemed fitting to celebrate with ^a solemn festival that day — which was both the beginning of salvation for the Gentiles and the end of exile for the Christians, and which, as it gave heaven to the neophytes, so it gave peace to the Saints — on which he himself truly deserved to be called the liberator of his country and the begetter of it for Christ — which was the fifth day before the Kalends of October.

CHAPTER II. The Acts of St. Eleutherius at Tournai During His Life; His Death; The Elevation and Translation of His Body.

[11] When this was accomplished according to his heart's desire, and succeeding miracles confirmed the neophytes and drew others, after he had destroyed the temple of Apollo and thrown down the profane altars, and had restored sight to the blind — among whom was one named Mantilius — and walking to the lame, He baptizes eleven thousand he so advanced by preaching that he is recorded to have baptized more than eleven thousand in ^a single week. Whence the darkness of paganism was so dispelled by him through the Evangelical torch that already then the sun seemed to have risen in the city for the first time. He cleanses Pericius the leper To these was added ^a certain man, cleansed by him after the fortieth day from both forms of leprosy, in the sight of all, through baptism — named Pericius — who was afterward, on account of the holiness of his life, appointed by St. Medard, his successor, as the first Abbot in the city. All these things advanced more abundantly because of the holiness of the Bishop's life, shining on all sides with fasts, prayers, and almsgiving; and because he did not have enough to preach at Tournai alone, he also visited neighboring cities and administered to them the seeds of the faith.

[12] Thus pagan impiety was suppressed, when, with Satan raging on that account, ^a new storm — first through the heresy of the Arians and then through that of the Acephali (the former denying the divine nature in Christ; the latter confusing it with the human; the former indeed overturning the mystery of the Holy Trinity, the latter that of the Lord's Incarnation) — fell upon them. he is attacked by the Arians and the Acephali When the former arose in the ninth year of his ordination and the latter in the twenty-eighth, the citizens were so set against one another that by mutual slaughter, with many thrown into the River Scheldt, both clergy and laity — but the sectarians especially against the orthodox — raged. Against whom, while he spared neither vigils nor labors in preaching, writing, exhorting, and beseeching he refutes them and converts many (as witness the sermons on the Trinity and the Incarnation published by him), he did this with such abundant fruit that in the thirteenth year of his episcopate, under Pope Anastasius, he is recorded to have brought back to the faith all the Arians there were.

[13] When this plague at length revived, and afterward the other — that of the Acephali — arose, since he shrank from no kind of labor against either, as before, he also did not omit this: that he might suppress them with greater weight, he flew to Rome in succession on account of each sect, to confer with the Apostolic See — he goes to Rome again first to Symmachus, to whom he also offered his Catholic sermons on account of the Arians, then to Hormisdas on account of the Acephali. By them he was honorably received, and from the latter he was also presented with the shoulder-bone of the holy Protomartyr he is presented with Relics by the Pope and the head of St. Mary of Egypt. With these he also adorned his church, not without great miracles performed at their arrival for their veneration.

[14] For as he was returning from Rome, when they had reached the hill near Tournai, which is now called St. Andrew's but was then called the Hill of the Hidden Treasure, and the holy Father was reverently showing the sacred relics to the Tournai clergy and people who came to meet him there, it happened that, with an immense brightness shining around from them and the multitude prostrated, while the Bishop prayed to the Saints, when these were displayed, he frees six persons from the sacred fire four men and two women in that crowd, suffering from the sacred fire, were healed when the holy shoulder-bone was placed before the men he heals ^a mute person and the holy head before the women; and the use of the tongue was restored to ^a mute man.

[15] So great ^a fame of his name was aroused everywhere in those times that King Clovis, moved by it, came to Tournai he learns Clovis's secret sin from an Angel and obtains pardon for the purpose of hearing and meeting him. By him the King was admonished about the secret sin which he was ashamed to confess and which the Saint had learned from an Angel; and through him, with the same Angel revealing, he was reconciled to God; and having bestowed gifts upon the Saint and his church, he returned cheerfully to the interior of the kingdom.

[16] But when the Acephalian sect, so often suppressed by Apostolic authority and the Bishop's diligence, sprouted anew, after he had received ^a decree from the Pontiff on this matter and convoked ^a synod, he convokes ^a Synod and there confounded the heretics, and excluded from the walls the obstinate and rebellious lest they infect others, he expels the heretics from the city the mad fury of the impious did not cease against him until, five years after that synod, having laid an ambush, armed with swords and clubs, they attacked the venerable Father as he was returning with Athanasius the Deacon and Andoneus the disciple from the temple of the Blessed Mary. he is gravely wounded by them Pierced with many wounds in the head and sides — from which he died five weeks later — they left him bloody, disfigured, and half-dead.

[17] he performs various miracles while sick During the whole time of his infirmity, reclining on ^a bed of haircloth, where he dictated ^a profession of the Catholic faith — which he also gave to his disciple Andoneus to be transmitted to Boniface, the Roman Pontiff — though languishing himself, he healed the ailments of many, restored sight to ^a blind man, exempted from punishment the assassins whom the Tribune Censorinus had demanded for the surest noose, he intercedes for the life of the assassins and predicted the day of his death.

[18] As the pain of his wounds grew worse, refreshed with the sacred Body of Christ, he did not cease to praise God, pray for his enemies, commend the Church of Tournai to God, and exhort all to constancy in the faith. Having seen and put to flight the enemy of the human race, refreshed by ^a heavenly voice, and with an immense radiance immediately filling the house — with which he himself was visibly seen ascending to heaven in ^a bright cloud — at his death he is seen ascending to heaven; he is buried by St. Medard in the seventy-sixth year of his life, he flew to the threefold crown of Virgin, Confessor, and Martyr. He was buried at Blandinium in that very basilica of St. Peter which he had loved so greatly, where St. Medard — his companion from boyhood, his helper in old age, and his successor in the episcopate — had carried him with tears.

[19] How the Pastor, once solicitous for his flock, continues to be so in heaven, and how he shows himself as ^a wall for his people against an angry God, After ^a threefold apparition he taught by the remarkable vision in which he appeared three times to Thecla, ^a noble and holy matron, concerning the elevation of his body to appease the wrath of God — which, on account of several villages that had relapsed into idolatry, was threatening the entire region — and by the miracles that occurred on the very day of the elevation, then on the anniversary, and two years later under Bishop Heidilo, The body is elevated and which were committed by him to memory. From which it came about that in the year of the Lord one thousand and sixty-four, under Bishop Baldwin, when it seemed good to himself and the entire clergy of Tournai to honor the relics of so great ^a Father — which were in ^a place neither worthy nor sufficiently safe — it is translated into the city by translating them into the city and the greater church in ^a more worthy receptacle, it was decided to establish ^a day on which, with the Bishop leading the way with the clergy, all people of every rank should assemble in solemn procession and festival, with hymns and canticles.

[20] When all girded themselves for this work with great eagerness, and this pious burden was borne on the shoulders of the citizens, how pleasing this was to God was shown by ^a miracle remarkable beyond the memory of men. For when the inhabitants of the village and the neighboring region were aggrieved at being deprived of that treasure, Those who resist the Translation fall by their own weapons and when certain of them, who had bolder brows, dared to attack in ^a body the bearers of that holy bier and assail them with ^a shower of arrows, so astonishing an event occurred that, with the javelins rebounding with great force upon the perpetrators of the crime, they were wounded and laid low, pierced by their own weapons, and compelled to desist from this impiety and believe in God. Moreover, twenty-five are healed of paralysis, seven of blindness at the touch of the sacred casket, twenty-five paralytics were healed and seven blind persons illuminated. But how fruitful this Translation was — not only for the city but also for the entire surrounding region — although it is deservedly celebrated with an octave of solemnity, the frequent aids sent from heaven from that time when the holy body rests in ^a more worthy place and is honored as is fitting, whatever necessity may arise, have long since taught and still attest and teach to this day.