Felix

ON ST. FELIX, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR

AMONG THE NANTES, IN ARMORICAN BRITTANY.

In the year 582.

A HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Felix, Bishop, among the Nantes in Armorican Brittany (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.

§ I. The sacred cult, age, fatherland, and race of St. Felix.

Of the famous Nantes, otherwise Namnetes, on the Loire, and its ample emporium, Henschenius long since spoke in the Acts, on the twenty-fourth of May concerning the holy Donatian and Rogatian, and again on the sixteenth of June concerning the holy Similinus or Similianus, Although St. Felix has been passed over in the Martyrologies, Bishop of Nantes, so that as to the knowledge of that city, after our manner, nothing is lacking. That nothing certain enough can be defined concerning its first Prelates, you will find observed in the cited places, but for the sixth century, in which from the senatorial order and the stock of illustrious ancestors noble Bishops flourished in Gaul, among whom not the last was the holy Felix, some monuments at least survive for illustrating the deeds of the Prelates of Nantes, as is to be seen in the brothers of Sainte-Marthe. Further, of that Saint, however most illustrious in birth and pre-eminent merits, none of the ancients is known to have written the life or deeds; and unless the poet Fortunatus, Bishop of Poitiers, had followed out his just praises, few things would be to be gathered from St. Gregory of Tours, which would not greatly commend the virtues or sanctity of St. Felix. Nor among the old biographers or Martyrologists does any memory of him exist, and what in this matter I most wonder at, the indefatigable collector of Saints, especially Gallic ones, Claude Castellanus, Canon of Paris, in his Universal Martyrology altogether passed over St. Felix of Nantes, although, as he was a most diligent digger-up of Saints, he could not have been ignorant that he was praised by Saussay, and that his memory was solemnly celebrated with an annual festivity in the city and whole diocese of Nantes.

[2] He is most certainly venerated among the people of Nantes I observe indeed that the elogium of Saussay reported in the Supplement is more meager than usual, in these words: At Nantes, St. Felix, sixteenth Bishop, notable for sanctity, whose praises St. Gregory of Tours celebrated. He would better have named Fortunatus; although in Gregory too there are not lacking things which conduce to the praise of St. Felix, as is shown below at more length. Bolland noted on the eighth of January that St. Felix, Bishop of Nantes, died on that day, but, as is clear from the Breviary of Nantes, is venerated only on the seventh of July. And from that Breviary is to be taken the chief and almost the only ground of the cult, and its certain proof. It exists among us, but mutilated in the first page, so that from the later new Offices it is to be gathered that it was probably published in the year 1623. There the title is: On the feast of St. Felix, Bishop and Confessor of Nantes, a double, at Nantes. His proper prayer is of this kind: O God, who hast adorned the blessed Felix, thy confessor and pontiff, with so great merits and virtues; be present to our pious supplications, and grant that we may be able to ascend to the felicity of eternal glory, himself interceding for us. Through our Lord. Nor would I omit to indicate that some things are referred to the praise of St. Felix in the Acts of St. Martin of Vertou, his disciple, in the first century of the Acts of the Order of St. Benedict, page 372, where he is plainly adorned by the author with the title of Blessed. Thus among other things they have of him: Being approved a fit preacher by these and like pursuits, he is directed by the Blessed Felix, who then possessed the chair of the church of Nantes, and was its pontiff, to convert the people of a certain city.

[3] The lessons of that Breviary are composed in a discourse grave enough, whose lessons of the Breviary here and there to be corrected from what is to be said here. I thought they should be transcribed, as being the chief, as I was already noting, argument of the cult of St. Felix. Felix of Bourges, born of noble race, and kinsman of nearly all the nobles of Aquitaine for the greater part, was consecrated Bishop of Nantes, Justinian being Emperor and Clotaire the first King of the Franks. So great was the amplitude of his dignity and the splendor of his virtues, that Armorica, adorned with so great a Priest, could come into a contest of dignity with Greece itself, and so with the whole East. He was present at the second Council of Tours, in which it was decreed that the Body of the Lord should be composed on the altar, not in an imaginary order, but under the title of the Cross. For in those times the sacred Eucharist was in some places preserved within a silver column. He erected among his own people of Nantes a temple to the most excellent God, in honor of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, whose foundations had been laid by Eumelius, which he adorned with so great gifts and abundance of ornaments, that it excelled the other basilicas not only of all Britain, but also of Gaul. Thus far the fourth lesson, taken chiefly from Fortunatus. As to what is here said concerning the manner, in those ancient centuries, of reposing the sacred Eucharist, whether in a column or in a silver dove, see the notes of Severino Bini, volume 5 of the Labbean Collection, column 866. Behold now the fifth and sixth lessons.

[4] For the dedication of it, on the day before the Kalends of October, the neighboring Bishops being summoned, namely Euphronius the Metropolitan of Tours, these are described. Domnolus of Le Mans, Domitianus of Angers, Fortunatus of Poitiers, and Romacharius of Coutances, together with very great crowds of people, he carried out the most famous rite and ceremony of consecrating churches in the Church. On account of his piety and religion the aforesaid Clotaire committed to him the government of the city of Nantes. Felix therefore, burning with the greatest charity toward his own citizens and colonists, that he might profit them by the opportunity and abundance of waters, made the river Loire navigable near the walls of that same city, whereas before it was distant from the city by the space of a mile. He was admirable for doctrine, for liberality toward the needy, for constancy in guarding his flock against errors, and for the highest integrity and innocence of manners. In his episcopate too they hand down that a certain city of pagans, by name Herbadilla, distant from the city of Nantes by about six miles, filled indeed with much wealth, but growing foul with the manifold filth of idols, existed. Felix therefore, pitying their error, sent Martin his Archdeacon, flourishing in the preaching of the divine word, that he might lead them to the faith of Christ. But when those lost men had repelled the word of God, they straightway felt the divine vengeance. Felix at last, struck with a grave pain of the shins, for the proof of his virtue, in the seventieth year of his age and the thirty-third of his episcopate, happily rested in the Lord, on the sixth of the Ides of January. But the memory of his birthday is celebrated by the Church on the present day, on which his venerable relics, taken up from the tomb, were enclosed in a silver case.

[5] The age of the Saint ill-arranged by the British Legendist. It would have been worthwhile to indicate the year of the Dedication of the temple and of the elevation of the sacred relics, which without doubt the author of the lessons will not know; for the rest, from them the age, fatherland, and race of the Saint appear not obscurely, which are here to be a little more elucidated. That great Albert du Mont-Relaxe, encomiast of the Saints of Lesser Britain, digested many things in his manner very badly from page 262. He establishes there that St. Felix was born in the year 516, initiated in the priesthood in 540, namely his twenty-fourth year being completed, but consecrated Bishop in the year 559. Hence, the Saint's deeds being arranged nearly at his own discretion, he attaches his death to the year 586, of his pontificate, if it please the powers above, the fifty-third; of all which there is not a single reckoning that agrees with the truth, the authority of Gregory of Tours most openly gainsaying. For he in book 6 of the History of the Franks so clearly circumscribed the age of St. Felix, that it is altogether to be wondered at that that Legendary stumbled so basely. In chapter 14 he plainly marks the seventh year of King Childebert, the twenty-first of Chilperic and Gunthram, at which time many portents of nature happened, and there was a plague among the people, falling into which (chapter 15) Felix began to be grievously ill. Here is marked the year of Christ 582, in which Labbe also placed the death of St. Felix, however much Le Cointe and the new French Legendary will have him die in the following year 583, perhaps because they think that all the prodigies mentioned by Gregory preceded in that year 582, and that St. Felix's illness was drawn out through its whole course. I judge that one must cling to the words of the Bishop of Tours, who, since at the end of chapter 15 he asserts that in the 33rd year of his episcopate, at the age of seventy, he ended his life, it follows that he was born in 511, adorned with the sacred fillets in 549; although I am not so averse to deferring all these by one year.

[6] Fortunatus proclaims him sprung of illustrious progeny. I have already said that of his fatherland too and race the aforecited lessons of the Breviary of Nantes make mention distinctly enough, so that no place of doubt is left, that he was born of a most illustrious Aquitanian race, perhaps a grandson of that Felix who with Secundinus held the Roman consulate in the year 511, from which opinion Baronius does not shrink at the aforesaid year 511. Certainly he testifies that Felix, so celebrated a Prelate of Nantes, seems to him to have sprung from the same stock. This is more certainly explored, that by the great celebrity of his wealth and power he was most renowned in his age; whence you may easily gather that he was excellently cultivated in all the more polished literature, eloquence, and the other good arts; but, all glory of the perishing world being despised, that he entered upon the path of Christian perfection, and applied his mind to ecclesiastical offices, whence afterward he deserved to be raised to the fillets of Nantes, invited thither without doubt by the fame of his merits, since he had thus far passed his life far from Armorica. I would rather proclaim these things in the words of Fortunatus than in mine. Thus he here sings of the lineage of St. Felix, book 3, poem 8:

A greatest progeny, adorned with ancient titles, whose lofty glory thunders even from its forefathers. For whoever, powerful, subdued the Aquitanian fields, he stood forth of thy blood, a parent in light. The venerable summit of an ancient stock, in whose praises all honor does its service in the world.

§ II. The doctrine, virtues, and Apostolic labors of St. Felix during his episcopate.

The excellent gifts and solid virtues of St. Felix no one could know more clearly, no one describe more certainly, than the now more than once praised Fortunatus, His other most ample praises in Fortunatus, whose epistle to the Lord holy and most worthy of the apostolic see, the Lord and Father Felix the bishop, exists in Brouwer's edition page 71, to be consulted by the more curious. The Saint had written that he dwelt in the last corner of the world, as it were. To which Fortunatus: Since places, however in the farthest region, are, with thee as citizen, the first; for if a city claims for itself pre-eminence by the merit of a person, by you no place is inferior to that, where whatever is required of praise, Felix the pontiff is the champion by his acts. From the verse subjoined to the epistle, understand the rest:

If the Greek and Latin tongues should come together alike, they cannot for thy merits pay all their due. Beset with praises, thou art held venerable in prayers,

Felix, who in the light of understanding shalt be everlasting.

Hear him singing of St. Felix in poem 8, in which, Brouwer being witness, he writes that so great was the amplitude of the dignity and the splendor of the virtues of Bishop Felix, that Armorica, adorned with so great a citizen, could come into a contest of dignity with Greece itself, and so with the whole East.

The festive day has shone, joys compel me, that what the people could utter, I alone may speak from love. Though Armorica be the last region in the world, by the merits of Felix it is seen to be first. The East and Gaul have sent like lots: the one gleams with the rays of the sun, and the other with thine. For with new splendor each administers his own gifts: thou bearest light to the Ocean, and it to the Red Sea. Finally, if understanding shines forth for a clear lamp, your genius has the likeness of light. Flower of thy race, guardian of thy country, correction of the people, river of eloquence, fountain of salt, eloquent wave. Path of doctrine, law of the cause, boundary of wrath. To whose genius here a new Rome has come. What she could there teach through many, Gaul, content with her own citizen, is pleased.

[8] That he here asserts the East and Gaul to have sent lots, from which it is understood that he shone by notable doctrine. and that to the genius of Felix a new Rome came into Gaul, Brouwer thus interprets, so that he thinks that Rome, the eye of the world, then bloodless with manifold disaster, revived in Gaul by the arts of Felix, or rather that Constantinople, the rival of the former, migrated to Nantes, because St. Felix, instructed also in Greek letters, alone furnished to his citizens of Nantes that which Constantinople, which it was the custom to call new Rome, was wont to do through many. These things chiefly pertain to doctrine. But now the ornaments of the Saint's virtues he gathers even from his name, poem 5:

Faithful safety of thy country, Felix in hope, in name, in heart, order of priests, by whose radiance it gleams. Thou restorest to the lands what the public laws sought, bearing to our times the ancient joys. Voice of the nobles, light of the race, defense of the people, thou preventest shipwreck, here where thou art present as a port. Apostolic author, who conquering the British laws, safe in adversities, by the hope of the cross puttest arms to flight. Live, glory of thy country, light of the faith, author of honor, splendor of pontiffs, and the love of us and of the world.

[9] Endowed with wondrous authority, Those British laws which St. Felix conquered Brouwer explains in his notes page 57, of the dominion of the newcomers from the islands of Britain, who already then had fixed their seats on the Saxon shore and in a part of Armorica. See, if you please, the cited place. Other victories of this kind not only Fortunatus, but also the Bishop of Tours mentioned. A notable specimen of his authority is in book 4 chapter 4, in the new edition column 143, where he mentions the case of the famous Macliavus, snatched from the jaws of death by the patronage of St. Felix. Chanao also, he says, Count of the Britons, killed his three brothers. But wishing still to kill Macliavus, he held him seized and laden with chains in prison: who was freed from death by Felix, Bishop of Nantes: with a truly immense weight of authority, that he could move so impious a tyrant. In book 5, chapter 27, column 237, are noted the Saxons, whom St. Felix tamed to the yoke of Christ. Again in the same book chapter 32, column 240, he repressed an incursion of the Britons around the city of Nantes and Rennes: The Britons that year were very hostile around the city of Nantes and Rennes: who, carrying off immense booty, invade the fields, empty the vineyards of their fruits, and lead away captives. To whom when Bishop Felix had sent an embassy, promising to amend, they would fulfill nothing of their promises. Concerning the ancient peoples and nations of Lesser Britain, and those who afterward landed there, the Britons, Saxons, and others, Brouwer wove a most accurate commentary from page 61, and again pages 77 and 78, which to have here indicated may suffice.

[10] and adorned with all virtues, Many other virtues of St. Felix Fortunatus embraced in few words in the epitaph of Evemerus, or Eumerus, his predecessor in the episcopate. For after he had followed out that man's excellent merits from piety, from sweetness, from tolerance, from gravity, from hospitality, from mercy toward the poor and the sick, from fasting and prayer, and finally from the foundations laid of the church of Nantes; all these the poet transfers to Our Saint:

That Felix departed, he left Felix in his seat; by the merits of his heir the father lives in the world.

But all those glories of St. Felix he enumerates a little more clearly and sings elegantly enough for the taste of his age in the now cited poem 8, book 3, page 77, when in the Saint, besides the nobility of race and doctrine, he praises chastity, liberality toward the needy, constancy in guarding his flock against errors: and finally shows that there was in him the highest integrity and innocence of manners. The poet's words are:

The ornaments of the flock, shining with a twin gift, both thy work on this side, thy race on that, honor thee together. But thou who didst shine with earthly nobility, now rulest the Church with a nobler hope. To whose plow, good tiller, thou pressest continually, that now thou mightest give many splendid gifts to God. Thou hast wedded the Church, thou hast joined happy vows, thou who fillest this matron with a mighty dower. In whose embrace thou leadest a life without crime, nor was another woman received in thy heart. Her thou keepest with thy eyes, thy mind, and a chaste heart; whence she wedded thee, thence she remains the chaster. She has borne thee offspring, yet a virgin in body, and, beloved, has poured forth a people into thy bosom. Behold thy sons, taken from thy divine spouse, and now they rejoice in thee, whom the shadow of a father covers. And for the safety of thy flock, shepherd, thou runnest through the crossroads, and, the wolf being shut out, the whole sheep is held. Thou removest the plotting Britons, vigilant in art; no man's arms avail what thy tongue does. Thou also art food to the fasting, thou bread to the needy; what each desires for himself, here he sees his wishes. Thou storest thine own riches in the mouth of the poor, thou layest up ample wealth in the belly of the beggar. At the time when Christ shall come, then this little purse restores all things to you, in the face of the Judge. May safety be fixed and ample for thee through numerous years, perpetually happy, in name, in mind, in faith.

[11] What in the verses of Fortunatus is rough or somewhat obscurely said, he attends vigilantly to his flock. you have explained in Brouwer: we here undertake to set forth not the words but the things themselves. The poem next following in the cited book 3, ninth in order, describes the Paschal festivity, not inelegantly indeed, but there is no need to transfer it here. At its end not a few things are handed down, which excellently demonstrate the notable zeal of St. Felix and his apostolic labors, both in claiming the Saxons for Christ, and in cultivating his own flock with singular diligence.

Holy King, behold, a great part of thy triumph shines, when the sacred lavers bless pure souls. A white army comes forth from the shining waves, and purges the old vice in a new stream. A white garment too marks the shining souls, and the shepherd has joy of a snowy flock. And Felix the priest is added as a sharer in the reward, who wishes to give to his Lord double talents. Drawing to better things those wandering in gentile error, that the beast may not seize them, he fortifies the sheepfold of God. Those whom before the harmful Eve had infected, these he now restores to the Church, fed with breast, milk, and bosom. Cultivating rustic hearts with gentle addresses, by the gift of Felix, a harvest is born from the bramble. The harsh Saxon race, living almost after the manner of beasts, thou healing it, holy one, turns from a wild beast to a sheep. To remain with thee through the age with a hundredfold return, thou fillest the barns with the corn of an abundant harvest. May this immaculate people be quickened in thy arms, and mayest thou bear to God a pure pledge to the stars. May one crown be granted thee from thyself from on high, may another, gained from thy people, bloom.

[12] He is believed to have instituted not a few helpers, That St. Felix alone could not suffice for so many labors is manifest enough; and hence some gather that he instituted a seminary, in which he might form helpers for himself; such as was he whom we mentioned above, St. Martin, called of Vertou, apostle of Herbadilla, whose acts can be seen in the cited place. Among the Saint's pupils is also to be reckoned St. Friardus, of whom Gregory of Tours writes, On the Lives of the Fathers chapter 10; whence we take these things, which do not permit to be doubted in what esteem he held St. Felix. Have the words of Gregory, column 1206: When he for the most part foretold his passing to the brethren, on a certain day, touched by a fever, he says to his own: Go to Bishop Felix, and announce to him my departure, saying: Thy brother Friardus said: Behold, the course of this life being consummated, I am loosed from this world, and that thou mayest be the more certain of this word, on the Lord's Day I receive my passing, and go to the rest which the eternal King, God, promised me: Come, I beseech, and let me see thee before I die. And when he was detained by some occasion or other, he sent a message, saying: I ask, if it can be done, that thou sustain me a little, until, the [*] business of my affairs being dissolved, I may come to thee. But when the messengers returned and said these things, since he was now lying on his little bed, he said: Let us rise therefore and sustain our brother. O man of ineffable sanctity! who, although he hastened to be dissolved and to be with Christ, nevertheless, not forgetting charity, obtained with the Lord to be still in the world, that he might behold his brother with a spiritual gaze. But neither do I think that he was of the lowest merit, by whose coming the Lord deigned to extend the days of this Saint, and, the message of that delay being received, straightway, the fever resting, he rose whole from his bed.

[13] among whom St. Friardus praised by Gregory of Tours. A notable argument indeed of Felician sanctity from St. Gregory. Thus he goes on: But after much time, the Bishop coming, he is seized by a fever, and salutes and kisses him as he entered, saying: Thou makest me great delays from my due journey, O holy Priest! And while they watched, in the night which was the Lord's Day, morning being come, he gave up his spirit, which being sent forth, soon the whole cell, filled with an odor of sweetness, wholly trembled: whence it is undoubted that an angelic power was there present, which, marking the merit of the Saint, made the cell fragrant with divine spices: whose glorious body the Priest, taken up, laid away in a tomb, Christ received the soul in heaven, leaving to earth-born men examples of virtues. Some of these the same Gregory mentioned more briefly in book 4, chapter 37, column 179. At the passing (of St. Friardus), Bishop Felix coming, the whole cell trembled, whence I do not doubt that there was there something angelic, which so caused that place, as he passed, to tremble: whom the Bishop, washing, and wrapping in worthy garments, committed to burial. Whether he had the government of the city of Nantes, committed to him by Clotaire, after the famous slaughter of Chramnus the rebel son, in the year 560, I do not find sufficiently expressed among the ancients, however much the more recent add this too to the merits of St. Felix,

inasmuch as he used that authority for the benefit of his people and to repair the damages which by almost continual wars were inflicted on the territory of Nantes by the Britons.

* or of the pleas.

§ III. Other notable works of the Saint, his pious death, and the veneration of his relics.

The highest vigilance of St. Felix and his zeal for propagating the faith Fortunatus has now abundantly demonstrated, but besides the care of his own church, The highest zeal for reforming the clergy, the most skillful Pastor labored no less in the reformation of others, when he wished to be present at various synods, instituted for restoring ecclesiastical discipline. His name is read subscribed to the third Council of Paris about the year of Christ 557, with fifteen other Bishops, of whom not a few, equally with Our Saint, are named in the epistle to St. Radegund in Gregory of Tours book 9, chapter 39. He subscribed likewise to the fourth Council of Paris in the year 573. Between these was the middle second Council of Tours in the year 567, which St. Felix also confirmed with his own signature, most observant of those decrees which had there been salubriously sanctioned; both in extirpating the relics of paganism, and in guarding his own and the clergy's chastity, and in nourishing the poor, toward whom that our Saint was most inclined, the so often praised Fortunatus has already sufficiently proclaimed, and in all the rest which had been most wisely established for the splendor and adornment of the Church, for whose necessary execution that the highest authority of the Saint was needed, by which he pre-eminently prevailed over his flock, no one will deny. That the Prelate prevailed so far Fortunatus says, that, just as he knew how to bridle the rapid torrents, so to bend the uncertain movements of men seemed in a manner proper to him. All which we shall by no means wonder to have concurred in him, if we notice that St. Felix was such that he expended not only himself and his powers, but also all his fortunes, upon the glory of God.

[15] Certainly that he burned wonderfully with zeal for the house of God, and loved its adornment exceedingly, even if the rest were lacking, as also the house of God, by building a magnificent basilica, this one thing would most clearly show, that he poured out all his treasures, even those, I think, which he had received from a rich, ample, and well-gotten inheritance, with a most lavish hand upon building a most proud basilica, whose first traces Evemarus his predecessor had laid. The adornment and magnificence of the huge work, erected in honor of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, Fortunatus thus described in book 3, poem 7, so that nothing can be added by us. Hear the poet singing:

Starry mountains, beautiful summits of Sion, twin cedars from Lebanon, with blooming flower. Gates of the heavens, two lights of the wide world; with his mouth Paul thunders, from the citadel Peter flashes. Among the Apostolic crowns, with radiant light, this one more learned in counsel, that one loftier in rank. Through this one the hearts of men are unlocked, and the stars through that one; those whom the one teaches with his pen, the other receives in heaven. This one opens the way of heaven by doctrine, the other by the keys; Paul is the way, Peter the faithful door. This one, remaining a firm rock, that one is held the architect. In these rises a temple, in which the altar pleases God. Watering with a single fountain the healing streams alike, they quench the eager thirst with sweet liquid. Whoever, waging strong wars, desires to hold the stars, the King gave these princes to be the leaders of the soldier. Gaul, applaud gladly, Rome sends thee greeting; the apostolic splendor visits the Allobroges. Against the hostile face two bulwarks stand, whom the city, head of the world, has as towers of the faith. These shine as eyes in the precious body of Christ, who by their own light rule the other members. By the gift of Felix, receive, O Gaul, the fruits of heaven, and cherish the blessed vows of thy pontiff. Whose chaste love gave this house in supernal honor, an everlasting dower to the wedded Church. With lofty summit the church's form appears threefold, sanctified to God by the apostolic name. As much as merit among the Saints towers above the rest, so much loftier a summit have these summits. In the midst the towered peak stretches above the heights, and, raising a squared crest, rounds the work. That thou mayest wonder the higher, the citadel ascending through arches, the point of the church has the likeness of a mountain. There thou wouldst think the limbs, set out in living colors, that the paintings live, art breathing again. As the wandering sun gives color through the tin-covered roofs, a milky light rebounds, when a blush strikes thence; thou seest the figures go and return, with the ray shimmering, and the coffered ceiling does what the wave of the sea is wont. The roofs imitate with metal the gleam of the stars, and by their own splendor the summits have a star. As often as the moon shines with crowned rising, another radiance rises from the sacred church to the stars. If a traveler by night look upon it as he passes by, he believes the earth too to have its own stars. The whole, with eyes of open windows, catches the rays, and what thou wouldst marvel at here outside, thou hast within. At the time when the shadows return, be it lawful for me to say, the world has night, the church detains the day. The right part of the temple shines with the merits of Hilary, Martin as his companion associating his rank. Thus while Gaul pours forth everywhere her own patrons, those whom the earth here covers, the world has as lights. The other part is equal, of Ferreolus, who by the wound of iron, by the gift of martyrdom, shines a proud gem. These Felix offered, that he himself might be the more a priest, O Christ, thy temple, who gave temples to thee.

[16] whose dedication also Fortunatus celebrates, Further, the dedication or consecration of the notable basilica, which Le Cointe judges was made in the year 568, and that in the following Easter the Saxons were baptized in it, Fortunatus celebrated with no less elegance in poem 6 in these words:

When Solomon kept the dedication of the noble temple, he made the men of Israel to be present. Levites, nobles, boys, and young men and old, from every side the royal pomp draws in eager rivalry. Calves are slain, bulls are slaughtered at the altars, and to the vows of the people the joys of slaughter belonged. But now there rises, about to please by the blessed rite, the time being run out, an altar more just to God. The prosperous feasts which Felix now furnishes to the peoples surpass by new deeds the former things. He summons the excellent Fathers to the solemn festivities, where the true safety stands and the old shadow flees. Taught by the key of Peter to open the heavens to him who seeks, and by the merits of Paul to know the closed things of heaven. That the wolf may not enter the sheep, nor disease wound the lambs, hence are guardians, thence the healing of the flock. Whose voice, flowing back to the people from the fountain of salvation, that it may drink before faith, offers salt with the mouth. Among these physicians, the priest of Martin's see, Euphronius shines, the sacred metropolitan; applauding in the holy meeting crown of brethren, and seeing his own members, the summit stands the stronger. The head is thence the more glad, because his own inward parts are with him, the honor of the Church grows, the body being joined. Domitianus, likewise Victorius, both pillars, hope remaining in both for the help of the region. Domnulus here shines with merits; Maracharius there, each by the right of the priesthood a worshiper of God. Behold, he beholds it come, the day now to be remembered through the age, full of pious vows, shines in the world. On which the shepherd deserved to behold his own joys, and by the sacred office to render vows to God. He who through a long time hung upon that coming, despising all else, this was his whole love. Fearing all things safe, on the suspected path of life, lest he should go the journey before he gave these to God. Often concealing it, he drew weary sighs, that the Lord would grant to hasten this glory. Anxious, laboring under the uncertain burden of cares, while he beholds his vow, the times were weights. But now the feast is at hand, let the burden of care be loosed, let the heap of gladness drive away the sad load. Giving prosperous things to the peoples and ample joys through the city, Felix, with thy happy flock, act the shepherd. Here pontiffs surround thee, there ministers; the whole encircles thee, here honor, there favor. Behold, the clergy resounds with choirs, the people thence with flute-players; each sings thy vow, by what art he can. Slow were they for thee, because there is always delay for the lover, for a lofty thing comes slow, but ample. Now amid thy trumpets sing the praises of the Lord, and let the threefold structure sound the help of the Trinity. Add rich holocausts in the temples, priest, whereby thou mayest long gleam, a pure victim to God.

[17] You have notable monuments from which you may perceive the veneration of St. Felix toward God and the Saints; behold now the things which he laboriously conferred not only on the spiritual but also on the temporal profit of his flock, as also another huge work designed by the Saint. when, that he might benefit his colonists and citizens by the opportunity and abundance of waters, or that provisions might more easily be conveyed into the city, having undertaken an immense work, he turned aside and bent whither he willed a river which flowed with a rather headlong course: for, a mountain being dug through, he made a channel in that place where before a hill rose; and thence, filling up the former channel, he so fitted it for cultivation, that where ships were before carried, there now wagons with their loads should pass. The greatness of the works and of the art, and the very mention of the naval matter, nearly persuaded Brouwer that all these things could be understood of the Loire itself, which was an opinion, as Lobineau noted page 12, plainly received in the fifteenth century; but others think it was the Celer, commonly le Ciel, which I see is also called Cariacus. For the rest, whether it was truly the Loire itself which he compelled to convey its waters to the city walls, or the Celer, or another river, since Fortunatus did not express it clearly enough, there is no ground whereby one may certainly discern, unless there be referred hither the words of book 5 poem 10, the beautiful field of Cariacus sloping down to the river. The bold design of the whole work, and its no less happy issue, I shall now make you understand from poem 10:

Let the ancient poets yield whatever they remembered; the old deeds are surpassed by new things. If Homer had then beheld rivers enclosed, thence rather would he have filled his own sweet work. All would now read Felix, none Achilles, under whose name the honor of art would grow. Thou who, honest in genius, changing with a better turning, makest the ancient rivers run by a new law. An embankment being composed, removing the fall in the whirlpool, where nature denies, thou compellest it to have a way. Here thou raisest a valley, setting a mountain beneath the hollows, and, the turn being reversed, this swells, that lies low. The one has migrated into the form of the other's image: the mountain sits in the valley, the valley rises to the heights. Where the water was fleeting, the earth grew with a sluggish barrier, and where the prow was before, here now the wagons pass. Over opposing hills thou carriest up the bent waters, and the docile river, the mountain forbidding, thou drawest. Where the swift stream would flow, the coming Celer clung, and suddenly, a hill being born, twisted back its course. The waters which before, headlong, watered as if without fruit, now serve for the food of the people. Another harvest, sprung of men, is measured from the river, when through thee the wave brings forth food for the people.

How thou knowest to bend the uncertain movements of men, thou who rulest the rapid guilty currents by thy reins. May a pious life stand for thee without stain through the age, Felix, at whose command the wave changed its place.

[18] The last elogium of Fortunatus. Let us add the last elogium of St. Felix from Fortunatus, book 5, poem 10.

I feel, most high Father, a light venerable to all, sweet head of the world, to me a lovable name, Felix, whom, embracing, I bear in my heart in the arms of piety, my sweet weight, nor does that burden weigh upon the lover. Why, most high, dost thou call me lowly to visit with gentle words the places which hold thee dear, that I might make music with thee in them, where the cold Loire washes thy fields with its glassy wave, the beautiful field of Cariacus sloping down to the river, here where the stream refreshes with waters, there the vine with shades, and the crackling North Wind lashes so many leafy meadows, a rich soil indeed, beautiful with a fishy shore. But thy face makes Fortunatus glad.

[19] So many glorious glories of St. Felix, so many ornaments of excellent virtues, so many Apostolic labors, St. Gregory of Tours not favoring Felix, could be crowned only by a most happy end, of which, since Fortunatus wrote nothing, the things are to be taken from St. Gregory, which exist in book 6, chapter 15, where the Historiographer, though most holy, does not commend the deeds and death of St. Felix enough according to his merit, inasmuch as that he had some quarrels with him he by no means dissembles, book 5 chapter 5, and again chapter 50. Of these we shall treat in passing in the following paragraph; now let us exhibit that whole fifteenth chapter, in which that the effort of Burgundio, nephew of St. Felix, to be ordained successor to his uncle, and the things which for that purpose the Saint himself had done through neighboring fellow-bishops, displeased Gregory, and, chiefly by his agency, had no success, though I observe none, will most easily be understood from the narration itself. We said above that St. Gregory in the immediately preceding chapter mentioned at length various portents and prodigies which had been seen in many places, as also that terrible groin-plague, a most present evil, so that there was no interval when a man had been seized by it. Thus now Gregory connects the chapters.

[20] But Felix, Bishop of the city of Nantes, falling into this sickness, he overthrows the effort of his nephew. began to be grievously ill. Then, the Bishops who were near being called to him, he entreats that they would confirm by their subscriptions the consent which he had made in favor of Burgundio his nephew. Which being done, they direct him to me. Burgundio was at that time about twenty-five years old. Who, coming, asks that, going up to Nantes, I should tonsure and consecrate him Bishop, in the place of his uncle, who was still surviving. Which I refused, because I knew it did not agree with the canons. Yet I gave counsel, saying: We have it written in the canons, son, that no one can come to the episcopate, unless he first regularly obtain the ecclesiastical grades. Do thou therefore, most beloved, return thither, and ask that he himself who chooses thee should tonsure thee. And when thou hast received the honor of the presbyterate, be assiduous at the church, and when the Lord shall have willed him to pass away, then thou wilt easily ascend the episcopal grade. But he, returning, dissembled to fulfill the counsel received, because Bishop Felix seemed to be recovering more lightly from his ailment. But after the fever departed, his shins sent forth pustules from the humor. Then, placing a poultice of cantharides too strong, his shins rotting, in the thirty-third year of his episcopate, at the age of seventy, he ended his life. Whom Nonnichius his kinsman, the King ordaining, succeeded. The things which follow concerning Pappolenus and the niece of St. Felix do not pertain here.

[21] The overthrow of the most magnificent temple founded by St. Felix the authors everywhere ascribe to those savage marauders through Gaul, the Normans; The death, relics, and dear case of St. Felix. the year of that destruction I have not found marked distinctly, nor indeed is it needful to investigate it more diligently; I would rather that Albert had inquired at what time chiefly, and by whom, the relics of our Saint were raised from the earth, and so exposed to the veneration of the people by legitimate authority, which indeed I wonder was not handed down to memory. He noted the day as this seventh of July, which the lessons also attest: whence also that day, consecrated to the Saint's festivity, perseveres to this day. The aforesaid Albert suggests to us that the sacred remains were enclosed in a silver case, of the weight of two thousand nine hundred groschen: which if those groschen, to whose multiplication he has recourse, be taken for an eighth part of an ounce, it follows that the whole thing consists of about three hundred and sixty-two ounces, or a little more than forty-five marks. That St. Felix is famous for miracles and is invoked in various infirmities, I do not indeed doubt, but the tables of Nantes hand down to us not even one separately. Albert says moreover that the sacred skull and some teeth, enclosed in a special case, are exposed to the veneration of the people and kept in the sacred treasury. And these things indeed all fittingly and probably enough; there is one thing by which Albert vehemently strikes his readers, when he says that an inscription in the Syriac language was affixed, which he himself translated into French. For what, I beseech, does a Syriac inscription in praise of St. Felix profit the people of Nantes, in a language altogether unknown to the inhabitants? Lastly he notes that a chapel was erected to our Saint in the present-day cathedral, opposite another which is dedicated to St. Clarus. Now again St. Gregory is to be heard.

§ IV. On the complaints of St. Gregory of Tours against St. Felix.

Gregory sharper against St. Felix, The most constant cult of St. Felix, and his highest veneration, now for so many centuries, among his people of Nantes, and the so expressed and often repeated encomia of Fortunatus, his contemporary, have long since rendered learned men uncertain what at last they ought to think of those sharper and harsh expressions with which St. Gregory of Tours inveighs against St. Felix, and which some pronounce should be disallowed to the holy Historian of France, ascribing all those criminations to interpolators, that they thrust a sickle here and there into the works of Gregory being more commonly known than that it should here be undertaken to be proved by me. And that the whole fifth chapter of the fifth book is absent from many exemplars, the last editor of St. Gregory, Thierry Ruinart, plainly asserts, whom see in the preface number 104, reconciling the matter nearly in the way in which we here now do. That we may not be in ambiguity, or the matter of which we treat not be clear enough, I premise that harsher text of Gregory from the cited book 5 chapter 5. At that time, he says, Felix, Bishop of the city of Nantes, wrote me letters full of reproaches, writing also that my brother was killed for this, that he himself, desirous of the episcopate, had killed the Bishop. But that he might write these things, he coveted an estate of the church. Which when I would not give, he vomited upon me, as I said, full of fury, a thousand reproaches. To whom at one time I answered: Remember the prophetic saying: Woe to them who join house to house, and couple field to field: shall they alone dwell in the earth? O if Marseilles had had thee as its priest; never would ships have brought oil or the other wares, but only paper, that thou mightest have the greater opportunity of writing, to defame good men. But the scarcity of paper puts an end to verbosity: for he was of immense cupidity and boastfulness.

[23] how it can be explained; A sharp and fierce reprehension indeed, which, however you turn it, you must accuse either St. Felix of too great pride and greed, or St. Gregory of some calumny. Let us say ingenuously that both suffered something humanly, and, however holy, were not without their own blemishes, of the kind that are not avoided in this life even by men famous for eminence, and adorned otherwise with great perfection of manners, as Brouwer observes, adducing thereto a not dissimilar error of the blessed Anno, most famous for sanctity, Prelate of Cologne, of which he was in a wonderful manner admonished, as you have in Surius on the fourth of December, in the last edition page 150. Most well known are the not only disagreements but also bitter prophecies of the holy Chrysostom and Epiphanius; so that it is not so much to be wondered at, if between two most illustrious Prelates some causes of dissension fell out. What if that happened to St. Felix which they relate happened to Scipio Africanus, for whom, as virtue had procured glory, so glory soon procured rivals, and Gregory committed to letters the public report of this matter? Besides that with the best end he could covet the village or estate, which he judged owed to his church by right; to be applied not to luxury or vanity, but to sustaining the needy or adorning his temple. How much authority the Saint procured for himself by the splendor of his race and the protection of his birth, we have already abundantly indicated above; whether Gregory took this for boastfulness and ostentation, there is no need to inquire at length, or to winnow the odious chaff any longer.

[24] Another cause of offense they will have St. Felix to have given to St. Gregory, when he received Riculf, as also the cause of offense. rival and enemy of the Bishop of Tours, to himself, and perhaps even suggested to him a way of escaping. This they gather from the words of the holy Historiographer book 5 chapter 50: And when he (Riculf) was there (in the monastery) more strictly confined, by the intercession of the messengers of Bishop Felix, who had been a favorer of the mentioned cause, the Abbot being circumvented by perjuries, he slips away by flight, and comes up to Bishop Felix, and that man gathers him ambitiously, whom he ought to have execrated. I read here indeed Bishop Felix, but I do not yet so manifestly detect that these things are altogether to be referred to our Nantes one, that they cannot plainly be ascribed to some other Bishop Felix, for example to Felix of Bourges. Toward our Saint the opinion commonly received among all more readily wrested them, because that he did not greatly favor St. Gregory, was established from elsewhere, as is manifestly gathered from what has been said. However the matter be, the Historian of Tours seems here to plead for his own house, in which case it is not so much to be wondered that a little bitterness flowed from his pen, which the fire of charity thereafter consumed.

[25] Elsewhere he was fairer to him. I will say in a word, whatever authority you make of St. Gregory, which I do not presume here, as some freely do, to lower; I judge it most certain that it can bring no detriment at all to the sanctity of our Felix and to his cult long since established. And let these things suffice to have been said in vindication of St. Felix. Nor is it so greatly to be turned to his fault, that he tried to designate his nephew Burgundio as his successor, as we reported above, since we know that this in that age was neither new nor unusual. In few words I conclude: Either Gregory did not always think the same of St. Felix, or at least did not everywhere speak consistently enough. He himself furnished me an argument in the book On the Lives of the Fathers chapter 10, recited above for this part, where he is compelled to confess that St. Felix was not of the lowest merit, by whose coming the Lord deigned to extend the days of this holy man (Friardus). In what order Gregory published his works, the preface of Ruinart from number 72 does not sufficiently show. Certainly at the time when Gregory wrote these things, it is probable that the little fires of discord among the Saints were lulled; by which is not a little confirmed the opinion of those who think that the Saints,

equally with other prudent men, according to the diversity of matters and times, thought and wrote different things, and were affected in different ways, not without reason judge.