ON THE HOLY MARTYRS
PAULINUS THE BISHOP, SEVERUS THE PRESBYTER, LUCAS THE DEACON, THEOBALDUS THE SOLDIER, AND THEIR COMPANIONS.
AT LUCCA IN ETRURIA.
UNDER Nero.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Paulinus, Bishop and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Severus, Presbyter and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Lucas, Deacon and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Theobaldus, Soldier and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
The Companion Martyrs, at Lucca in Etruria BHL Number: 6556
BY THE AUTHOR J. P.
§ I. The cult of the Saints; the fatherland, age, elogium of St. Paulinus; whether a disciple of St. Peter?
Lucca, an ancient city of Etruria on the river Auser and the Sarculum, midway between Luna, a city cut down, and Volterra, holds dear with the zeal of most inclined veneration the memory of St. Paulinus; whom it looks up to as the first Apostle of Etruria, The Saints Paulinus, Severus, and Theobaldus venerated at Lucca, the first-fruits of the Etruscan martyrs, its first Bishop, patron, and savior; as will be given to understand more fully from those things which it has seemed good here to preface. And that we may begin from the sacred cult of him and his Companions; as certainly enough as it is established concerning him, so manifest is it that in the ancient Martyrologies he is not expressed, but everywhere as unknown silently passed over. Among the Supplements added to the Usuardine text in the Florentine codices, thus is read: In the parts of Tuscany, in the Lucan city, the birthday of St. Paulinus the Bishop, first of that same city, and confessor, and of Severus and Theobaldus: whose bodies are buried in the Cathedral church of the said city. To the Usuardine codex of Belinus is thus added: In Tuscany, in the Lucan city, of Bl. Paulinus, first Bishop of that same city, who under Nero at the foot of Mount Pisano, after many combats, consummated his martyrdom.
[2] Of that Saint also Greven and Maurolycus made mention; [unknown to the ancient Martyrologists, partly noted in supplements, partly by the more recent ones.] of whom the first badly names him Paul for Paulinus. Galesinius is somewhat fuller, announcing him thus: At Lucca in Etruria, of St. Paulinus, who, son of a man of consular rank, a Tuscan, disciple of the Apostles, converted to the faith of Christ, first Bishop of that city, in the persecution of Nero variously and sharply tortured, at last attained the palm of martyrdom. The modern Roman, finally, consonant with Belinus, thus commemorates St. Paulinus: At Lucca in Tuscany, of St. Paulinus, who, ordained by St. Peter the first Bishop of that same city, under Nero at the foot of Mount Pisano, after many combats consummated his martyrdom with other
companions. The Companions joined to St. Paulinus in the above title, Severus the presbyter, Lucas the deacon, Theobaldus the soldier and companions, are commemorated in the Acts, which we here commit to print. See number 6, number 9; and again from number 17; where many others are said to have been beheaded. Lucas the Deacon is expressed below in the course.
[3] Just as the various and ancient controversy concerning the fatherland of Homer boiled among several cities of Greece, On the fatherland of St. Paulinus; so today concerning the fatherland of St. Paulinus it is not sufficiently established. Marius Florentinius, a noble of Lucca, son of Francis Maria, in the year 1701 published at Lucca the posthumous work of his Parent, entitled, The Origins of Etruscan Piety, in which, among other things which he has concerning St. Paulinus, in chapter 12 he inquires concerning his fatherland, discoursing thus: Some make Paulinus a Tuscan; others an Antiochene; William of Speyer and Peter Galesinius affirm not only that he was Etruscan, but also the son of a consular man, as we saw in Galesinius above, number 2; So also I see recently it pleased Coccinius. Yet I fear lest the first, from whom the rest, confounds Paulinus with Paul Sergius, who, as I have warned elsewhere, is reported to have announced the Gospel to the Lunese, not the Lucchese, by the change of one little letter: and perhaps Galesinius from these more ancient Acts of the holy Bishop extorted him as a native, not an inquiline, of Tuscany; these words of the Acts, number 3, furnishing occasion for that confusion: But about the same time of Nero the Emperor, there was a certain most Christian man in the same province in the Lucan city, by name Paulinus.
[4] whether Lucchese or Antiochene Let us proceed with Florentinius: But while the Acts say that he dwelt at Lucca, and distinguish neither Etruscan nor Lucchese, they affirm neither, and do not embrace even by circumlocution the consulate of the father. Thus the sepulchral title, most ancient, to be placed below, is altogether silent concerning the father and fatherland of the holy Bishop. But the ancient codex of the same basilica several times calls him from Antioch and an Antiochene; and in the first Acts distinguished for the use of ecclesiastical reading he has him led from Antioch to Rome. Then from a fragment which he cites, he judges the matter to be more clearly concluded by these words: But blessed Paulinus, an Antiochene by nation, a man indeed of all prudence, truthful in speech, just in judgment, provident in counsel, faithful in what is entrusted, conspicuous in goodness, illustrious in the whole honesty of morals, full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, he sent to this our city of Lucca [*]; and the same Author adds that it is repeated again in the hymns or sacred songs, which on the solemn day of St. Paulinus were accustomed to be sung beforehand or recited, namely these: Paulinus the Antiochene, disciple of Peter, having followed him obeyed diligently.
[5] is to be reckoned. These things therefore premised, the praised Author thus concludes: Therefore just as I judge it is established from these that the Lucchese church believed the holy Man an Antiochene, so I find that all others, as many chronologists as I have been able to see, and writers on St. Paulinus, established him an Antiochene: for both published and unpublished, both foreigners, Razzi, Ferrarius, Bzovius, Coccinius, Caracciolus; and ours, Franciottus, Civitalis, Trentius, Saminiatius, Tuccius, agree in the same, so that, since it is a tradition of at least three centuries, not a rumor of the crowd, it seems to be established that one must not rashly recede from this opinion, and that Paulinus must altogether be established an Antiochene; it would indeed be established with greater credibility, if that opinion rested on more ancient monuments. For what, pray, is a tradition of three centuries to so long an interval of many centuries, say thirteen or fourteen, of the nascent Church interposed? Judge the same of the fragment of uncertain time, place, author; and of the sacred songs and hymns, concerning which above; which indeed all have with me as much authority as antiquity. This is lacking; the consequence is, that that too be lacking, or at least much waver, and it is not so clearly established concerning the fatherland of the Saint.
[6] Another controversy, but even of lesser moment, here offers itself, Whether in more tender age proposed and discussed by the same Florentinius from page 155; namely whether in more tender age the holy Martyr was consecrated Bishop by the Prince of the Apostles, or rather in a more adult age. To the opinion which judges this to have been done in youthful age, the painters furnished occasion, who, to use the words of Florentinius, paint Paulinus a youth, not to say a stripling, and all the images, as many as are venerated in his basilica and elsewhere, beardless. But all also are not more ancient than the fifteenth century; unless perhaps the wooden effigy which is preserved on the right side of the Paulinian church in the peristyle of the apse surpasses the year fifteen hundred. In this, which is proved to be older than the rest from the manner of the episcopal habit, the holy Martyr, carrying in his hand the small effigy of the city of Lucca, not only appears beardless, but while he presents himself a long-haired youth, a new color superinduced on the face so diminishes the age, that it designates a little boy indeed with less reverence. Which age expressed in the painted tablets, how little it is consonant to truth or probable, is sufficiently concluded even from this, that, as the aforesaid author rightly argues, nowhere in his Acts, of which it has happened to see, besides the said writings, other ancient copies in the private libraries of the Lucchese, is anything muttered concerning the age of Paulinus.
[7] The cause of the pretended younger age raised to the mitre he thinks to have been this: or rather in a more adult age he was consecrated Bishop? he asserts that some indeed were heard by him, who said first, that the Saint at some time appeared to the faithful under a youthful form; then that his sacred bones argue a more tender age; but both, he says, nevertheless I think alien from the truth. It is pleasing to weigh the whole matter briefly with him from the instrument, elsewhere to be exhibited here by us, concerning the finding of the body of St. Paulinus, of which from number 13: Some think the youth of Paulinus was revealed to a certain religious brother James by a divine vision, because "there appeared to him a certain young man" or, as is added below, "a most beautiful and comely young man": Hence indeed I feared the youth of Paulinus; because the holy Bishop appeared to James under a youthful aspect. But besides that nothing is there added concerning the episcopal habit, and God is accustomed to send visions of this kind through angels sometimes appearing mystically in youthful age, those things which follow prove that it was a heavenly messenger, not the Bishop, thus teaching James, the added words convince; which sound thus: For it shall be shown to you by divine showing, where lies the body of Paulinus the glorious Martyr: for blessed Paulinus was most dear and devoted to the glorious Queen of the heavens. These things said he vanished: which certainly no one would say were pronounced by the said Bishop.
[8] For the more tender age nothing from the apparitions; Now indeed those things which are brought forward by the same Pagan, in the miracle in which to a certain one held by robbers, and freed by the prayers of St. Paulinus, a certain young man is said to have appeared, who loosed him from the bonds, as is related among the miracles after the Acts, number 2; do nothing for the youthful age of the holy Bishop: For, as Florentinius rightly subjoins, we frequently read that these things were accustomed to be performed through angels, who are ministering Spirits, and it might rather be permitted to suspect in another miracle, related in the same place, from the religious men who appeared to a farmer venerating less religiously the festivity of St. Paulinus, that the other was the holy Bishop, when it is thus said: On that way there appeared two religious men with white garments. One of these says to him: Do not weep. And below: And that religious man answered: Do not weep: the Lord will heal him. We counsel you, that you never hold in contempt the glorious feast of blessed Paulinus your father; but honor him all the time of your life; and he signed him, and immediately he was healed; and they disappeared. From which the author infers, that here, while a religious man is said, it may be permitted to gather no longer a young man, but one venerable in age: but this gathering is plainly uncertain and supported by mere conjectures; Florentinius himself confessing this very thing, that he does not doubt these things are conjectural and uncertain. This is more certain, that for establishing the episcopate, conferred by St. Peter on our Paulinus in more tender age, from the argument which is drawn from the apparitions nothing can be concluded that merits historical faith: such as neither does the other reason merit, sought from the sacred relics of the Saint.
[9] nothing is concluded from the relics. Indeed that reason is weak, and scarcely worthy of refutation. For, as again Florentinius rightly argues, although from the dimension of the sacred bones it were proved that St. Paulinus was not a man of tall stature, yet to take thence an indication of youth would be a puerile rather than a youthful argument, the increases of the bones ceasing beyond the twentieth year, as even the common people know. Now indeed if Peter set out from Jerusalem or Antioch with Paulinus, in the second year of Claudius, the forty-fourth of Christ, and both attained the palm of martyrdom under the sword of Nero; we know that this could not happen before the sixty-seventh year, and we recognize that Paulinus already dwelt in Italy for twenty and more years. Unless therefore the Prince of the Apostles brought his disciple, to be set over the Lucchese as Bishop, while still a boy, it must not only be said that he exceeded the twentieth year of age, but it is plain that he hastened to glory in an altogether more advanced age. But who would say that, the Eastern churches flourishing, out of the number of many thousands of the faithful, Peter did not select men of mature age to be promoted to episcopal offices, and Italians to be instructed before the rest? Other things which the same Author heaps up, from the decree, as he himself calls it, of the Apostles, and the canons of the Greeks, by the word "presbyter," signifying an old man, by which he proves that the Saint was distinguished with the episcopal mitre in a more advanced age, I willingly pass over; as also other conjectures, sought from the sacred relics of the Martyr, inspected by himself, concerning which in the next paragraph: since these for the present undertaking may seem to be more than enough. What he adds concerning the clerical tonsure against the painters, who form St. Paulinus long-haired, it would be long to relate, and scarcely worth the trouble. The reader will find these things from page 160. Some things brought forward by Florentinius for greater confirmation of the episcopal ordination in a more adult age, you have below at number 21.
[10] It remains that we speak concerning the mission of St. Paulinus into Etruria, [The Saint's mission through St. Peter to the Lucchese, whether and how is it proved?] namely whether that happened under the Apostle Peter, sending our Saint to the Lucchese; and how that mission is proved. That it happened with St. Peter sending, the more recent ones affirm, Cæsar Franciotti, Silvanus Razzi, Ughelli; to whom from Florentinius add Bzovius, Caracciolus, Codinius with Baronius; asserting that this happened in the year of Christ 46. But, as Baronius immediately premises in the same place, who they were who at various times were sent by Peter to establish various churches as disciples, and ordained bishops, although through the poverty of writers it has remained almost obscure: yet some, whom he asserts he found recounted, here we have wished, he says, to enumerate; not ambiguously professing that obscure, doubtful, and uncertain
are the things which are handed down concerning the first missions of this kind. See those things which we give in the annotations to chapter 1 of the Acts, letter d. But where did Baronius find the recounted mission by the Prince of the Apostles? Certainly no monument, if I rightly estimate the matter, can, I think, be brought forward more ancient than the Acts of the Martyr, the finding and the inscription from the codex of the monastery of Cava; whose words will be given at number 46. Concerning the antiquity of the Acts we shall speak afterward; since meanwhile it is certain that Acts have often been accustomed to be obtruded as more ancient than they really are. The finding of the body is of the 13th century. Florentinius in chapter 21, from page 147, weighs the epoch of the coming of St. Paulinus into Etruria, namely with St. Peter living and sending. But what solidly historical would you hope for, where the ancient monuments are lacking? Little firmness also have the things which he heaps up in chapter 13, from page 162, whether indeed our holy Bishop is to be reckoned in the number of the seventy-two disciples. The whole force of his argumentation at last comes to this, that he proves it is not repugnant that he was one out of the said number of disciples: but the question is not what he could have been; but what he is: for which I desire ancient monuments.
Annotation* Lucca
§ II. The elogium of the Saint; the finding of the body; the present state of the relics.
Ughelli in volume 1 of Italia Sacra, from column 841, adorns the Saint with an honorific elogium of this tenor: St. Paulinus the Antiochene, St. Peter the Prince of the Apostles, having instructed and educated him himself, led to Rome in the year of our salvation 46, The elogium of St. Paulinus and consecrated him the first Bishop of Lucca: which city when he had entered in the same year, and had determined with a zeal for piety emulous of his master to disseminate the Gospel, he converted an almost innumerable multitude to Christ; and with his companions and helpers Antonius, Valerius, Severus, Lucas, and Theobaldus, he built seven churches, of which the chief was dedicated to the Holy Trinity; namely that which afterward they honorably consecrated in honor of the same St. Paulinus and of St. Martin. Paulinus therefore was the first who planted at Lucca both the episcopal see and the Christian seat, and wonderfully cultivated it, having endured innumerable labors and dangers, which again he ennobled with his own blood through the palm of martyrdom. Since indeed, after the glorious triumph of the Princes of the Apostles, Nero persecuting, Paulinus, accused before Anolinus the governor of Etruria, who at Pisa pronounced judgment for all Etruria, that he was disseminating the doctrine of Christ at Lucca, commanded by the same to be seized with Severus, Lucas the deacon, and Theobaldus the soldier, is led to Pisa; where, tried by various and most savage torments, when nevertheless he most constantly confessed Christ, at last on the mountain which rises between Pisa and Lucca, and today is called St. Julian's, most savagely beaten, with Severus the presbyter merited the palm of martyrdom; after whose death Lucas the deacon, and Theobaldus the soldier, having been cut off at the head, fell asleep on the XII day of the month of July in the year of the Lord 69.
[11] from Ughelli. The tyrant commanded their sacred bodies to be left unburied, to be devoured by beasts, but the untimely night following, Antoninus, Valerius, Victor, Lucianus, and many others their disciples drew them to Lucca for burial, namely to that place which was formerly called the Little Cell of the Martyrs; because there those who had bravely fallen for the faith of Christ were accustomed to be buried: where afterward they buried the body of Bl. Paulinus in the time of Henry, Bishop of Lucca, in the year 1261; which by divine instinct they found in a marble chest with this inscription incised: which you may see at number 16. Then he proceeds to the translation, concerning which at number 18. Finally, some more recent authors who treat of St. Paulinus having been recounted, he warns that there existed several Saints of the same name in Italy, Bishops of various churches: such as were St. Paulinus of Nola, by far most illustrious in doctrine and holiness of life, whom you have in the Acts on the XXII day of June; Paulinus of Brescia; concerning whom on the IV day of March; of Senigallia, on the IV of May; of Aquileia; on the XI of January: and another Bishop of Campania; than all whom this Paulinus is more ancient, who first brought to Lucca the Gospel drawn from the Apostles, and is held the chief protector of that free city.
[13] By an authentic instrument From the elogium of St. Paulinus we descend to the finding of the body. The same Francis Maria Florentinius who above, in his aforesaid work, having pursued the burial of the Saint, page 198, proceeds to narrate the finding of his sacred body, and also of Severus and Theobaldus, his companions, from Pagan, rector of the church of SS. George and Antony, who consigned the matter to writing; and from the parchment codex of the same church weaves the history, an authentic instrument of the Finding having been afterward printed at the end of the book, embracing the whole series of the matter; with which we have collated the apograph which we here subjoin in print, communicated by the same Florentinius, which is thus: When truth is concealed, we altogether believe that it does not please God, and especially that truth on account of which the men of this world could obtain the salvation of souls: therefore to the praise and glory of the most holy Trinity and of the most blessed glorious Virgin, and of the whole heavenly court, we wish to narrate some things concerning the miracles of the most holy Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca, which miracles were done after the Finding of his glorious body. But before we proceed further, it is worthy that something be told concerning his finding. In the year of the Lord 1261, on the XVII of the Kalends of July, there was a certain religious, whose name was called brother James, in the city of Lucca, a man of the greatest sanctity and honesty, of great conversation and life: to whom the Lord willed to reveal the body of the below-written Bishop in this manner.
[14] This brother James was a man of the greatest abstinence, he is described and by no means ceased from prayer day and night. It happened to him on a certain night, when he was most devoutly insisting on prayer, that he inclined his eyes, and was wonderfully seized by a slumber; in which sleep there appeared to him a certain young man and said to him: Brother James, blessed one, rise quickly, and hasten more speedily to the church of Bl. Antony, as much as you are able, and tell the priest of that church, that he devoutly and solemnly celebrate one Mass to the honor of the blessed glorious Virgin, and be you there with great devotion at that Mass: for Bl. Paulinus was most dear and devoted to the glorious Queen of the heavens. These things said he disappeared. But brother James rose, and announced all things according to the admonition made to him, to the presbyter Pagan, chaplain of the said church, and arranged that Mass should be celebrated. When Mass was being said by the said presbyter Pagan, and the glorious body of Christ was elevated, this brother was in the choir, and quickly cast himself on the ground; and when he had prostrated himself on the ground, it was announced and said to him from his right side: The body of Bl. Paulinus is beside your right shoulder; and there, because it is near by two arms' length, you shall dig, and there you shall find him.
[15] The brother heard the voice, but saw no one. the finding of the body of St. Paulinus with two companions, Mass having been solemnly celebrated, the brother narrated all things to the said presbyter Pagan. But the said priest announced all things to the venerable Bishop Henry with brother James: and license having been received from the Bishop, they fasted for three days with abstinence and devotion, and great prayer. But afterward they dug according to the admonition made to James above-said in the church of St. Antony, the doors being closed; and there were nine, between religious and laymen, to dig. And thus digging they were as it were near Vespers. On account of the exceeding weariness they laid themselves down to sleep. This brother James with great grief went to adore beneath the pillar, where was the body of Bl. Antony, and with the greatest anguish thus said: Lord, we do not find the promised and desired treasure: and thus praying he slept a little. And in that sleep there appeared to him a most beautiful and comely young man; and said to him: Brother James, why do you not dig?
[16] And he answered: Lord, all day we have labored, divinely revealed and we are strongly wearied, and in no way can we find. And that young man said: Rise and dig in the name of Jesus Christ: what you seek, you shall quickly find. Brother James rose, and again narrated the vision to the presbyter Pagan. And again they began to dig, and thus digging and laboring, all who were in the church were refreshed by a most sweet odor, and as it were totally removed and freed from all weariness. But after Vespers, digging, they found a marble monument, and thus written: Here is the body of Bl. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca and disciple of Peter the Apostle; and of the holy Martyrs Severus the presbyter and Theobaldus the soldier. And at such glory granted to them all wonderfully rejoiced: and touching beside the monument a wonderful odor went out through the whole gate of St. Donatus. All ran from the city rejoicing and exulting at such glory granted to them. But the presbyter with the said brother and with the neighbors of the said quarter [*], and with all the nobles of the gate of St. Donatus ran quickly to the Bishop, and narrated with diligence all things which had been done. But the Bishop, counsel having been taken with his canons and with the Preaching and Minorite friars, personally himself with Alaman the Archpriest, and Aldibrand the primicerius, Gualtrottus the canon and Paganellus, and with many others from the canonry of the greater church of St. Martin, and with brother Aldebrandinus de Cavalcantibus, Prior of the Preaching friars of St. Romanus, and of his friars, and with many others came to the aforesaid church, and with hymns, canticles, wax candles and incense opened the glorious monument; and found the glorious and fragrant body of Bl. Paulinus the martyr with his aforesaid companions.
[17] and honored with solemn pomp. Whence they greatly rejoiced with the whole city of Lucca, and can rejoice at so great and such a patron, who daily prays and supplicates God almighty for the salvation and increase of his sons, [and] they arranged a most solemn procession; where there were more than five hundred between religious and secular clerics; and there were there more than 40 [] standards, and present was the lord Guala, legate of the lord Pope, and the Bishop with all the aforesaid. In truth we can say that they were there with the lord Guiscard of Pietrasanta of Milan, Podestà of the city of Lucca. For the Podestà of the city of Lucca in those days was more than fifty thousand between men and women. For they had heard, as is contained in his Legend, how this venerable Paulinus was the first father, the first Bishop of that city, disciple of Bl. Peter the Apostle, and that he was sent by Bl. Peter the Apostle to that city: and how this one preached, and planted the faith, and faithfully baptized the Lucchese people; and how most sweetly he directed [] that city, and prayed bravely for it, that the Lord might increase the Lucchese people, and preserve [it] in unity without division, and free it from heretical depravity, and defend the city from the hands of enemies forever: whence such a father is to be venerated both on account of the infinite spiritual and temporal benefits,
which we have through him: for he is in heaven the continual defender and advocate of the city of Lucca, and the souls which are saved from that city, he himself daily presents to God, as the fruit of his vineyard, which he planted. The miracles which are placed in our Ms., and, unless I am mistaken, were composed by the same Author, will more opportunely be given, after our manner, after the Acts of the Martyr.
[18] After these things the cult of the Saint was greatly increased These things therefore having been for a while intermitted, let us, with Florentinius as guide, proceed to those things which followed the festive finding of the sacred body, and indeed in his own words from page 201: Wherefore, imitators of God who illustrates the merits of the Martyrs with prodigies, the legate of the Apostolic See, of whom above, and Henry the Bishop, being indulgent, increased as much as was permitted the anniversary celebration of the day; they commanded the church hitherto called of St. Antony to be henceforth distinguished by the name of St. Paulinus; they decreed that the festivity of the same should be renewed every year on the IV Ides of July; that the name should be replaced in the sacred diptychs of the churches, and should be invoked in the litanies by all subject to the diocese of Lucca in the future. Behold for you the diploma of indulgences transcribed from the same author with this title: These are the indulgences made by the Lord Guala, Legate of the Roman Curia, and the Lord Henry, Bishop of Lucca, whose words are these: Henry, by divine mercy Bishop of Lucca, to the beloved sons in Christ, all the Prelates of the churches, exempt and non-exempt, of the city and diocese of Lucca, greeting and blessing. By the counsel of the venerable Father master G [], Legate of the Apostolic See in Tuscany, and of our brothers, as we [] believe it not hidden from you, we have caused the translation to be made of the venerable relics of the holy Martyrs Paulinus, Severus, and Theobaldus at the church which from of old was accustomed to be named of St. Antony, and which today, the ancient name being changed, we have caused to be named of St. Paulinus: ordaining by the counsel and assent of the aforesaid, that the festivity of the aforesaid St. Paulinus and of his companions on the IV Ides of July ought to be solemnly celebrated by all of our city and diocese.
[19] Wherefore we ask you exempt ones, that for the reverence of God and of the aforesaid Martyrs; a public solemnity being appointed each year on the 4th Ides of July, and to the other prelates under pain of excommunication we command, that on our part you publicly in your churches admonish your peoples, that they ought solemnly to celebrate the solemnity of the aforesaid on the aforesaid day, being about to visit with devotion the aforesaid church, that they may become partakers of the benefits and indulgences granted by the aforesaid venerable Father and by us in devotion to the aforesaid Martyrs, at the venerable place named above, celebrating nonetheless the office of the aforesaid solemnly, as the Lord shall give you, writing their birthday in your litanies and Calendars. For on that day up to the octaves, to the praise and glory of the Holy Undivided Trinity, and to the honor of the glorious Virgin Mary, and of Bl. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca, and Martyr, and of many other Saints who are in that Church, the Lord Guala, Legate of the Lord Pope in Tuscany, he being present to this end, that the glorious Martyrs might be venerated and visited, made an indulgence for one year and forty days.
[20] But Henry, Bishop of Lucca, likewise granted and made forty days. and indulgences granted. Concerning this glorious Finding, Laborator the notary, by mandate of the Lord Henry, Bishop of Lucca, made public writings, and before many witnesses, and especially before the aforesaid Bishop, and the Lord Alaman, Archpriest of Lucca, and the Lord Paganellus de Porcari the canon, and the Lord Aldobrand the primicerius, and the Lord Gualtrottus, and brother Ildebrandinus de Cavalcantibus, Prior of the Preaching Friars of St. Romanus, and brother Bencivenne, custodian of the Minorite Friars of the city of Lucca, and the presbyter Pagan, rector of that church, with all his neighbors, to the praise and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ: who lives and reigns world without end. Amen.
[21] The present state of the Relics. Concerning the present state of the Relics no one can inform us better than the often-mentioned Florentinius, an eyewitness inspector of them; who from page 159 hands down the following: It was permitted me, he says, at some time to venerate the relics of the holy Bishop Paulinus, and it happened to behold in the lower jaw especially the incisor teeth still fixed in their sockets, free from all injury of the ages; but on the top edge of the same so worn down by the use of many years, that it cannot be denied that they are the remains of a man already verging toward old age. But because also some molar teeth, not so smoothed by use, as being more solid, can be observed in the gilded shrine which contains the arm of the holy Bishop separately from the body, I conjecture that he received the palm of martyrdom in a grave age indeed, and hastening toward old age, yet not decrepit. Consult paragraph 4, where treatment is made of the last inspection of the burial. And these things thus far. It remains that we commemorate the zeal of most religious veneration, with which the Lucchese pursued their holy Bishop and Patron not without the highest praise of piety.
Annotations* the street.
* al. 11.
* al. loved.
* Guala.
* you.
§ III. A church erected by the Lucchese in honor of the Saint; the ark re-enclosed; a new basilica constructed; the Sarcophagus; posthumous fame.
The Basilicas, erected in honor of St. Paulinus and others; Let us here again step by step follow Florentinius, most abundantly deserving in illustrating the matters of St. Paulinus, relating the most ardent zeal of the Lucchese toward their holy Patron in this manner from page 203: Meanwhile the piety of the Lucchese toward their Apostle daily grew strong, and the church, formerly the cell of the Martyrs, and anciently the cathedral, and the greater temple of the city, seemed either now falling from age, or unsuited to the frequency of the peoples: until, reduced to an ampler form, in the year of the redeemed world 1341 at last it was solemnly consecrated, newly built with four altars by William the Bishop. There still exists in the archive of the Paulinian Basilica an ancient monument of the consecration: in which, since several bodies and relics of saints resting there are commemorated, and every sacred ceremony is described, I have judged it would not be unwelcome to my readers, if from the original I here exhibited it whole: which we also have thought must not here be suppressed:
[23] but named by the name of Paulinus In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. For the future memory of the matter let all know, how in the presence of me the notary and the undersigned witnesses, in the year of the Nativity of the Lord 1341, in the 9th Indiction, on the Monday of Holy Week, the second of the month of April, the reverend Father and Lord in Christ, the Lord Friar William, by the grace of God and of the Apostolic See Bishop of Lucca, at the supplication and instance of the circumspect man the presbyter Donatus the Rector, and of Francis Vinceguerra, a citizen of Lucca, parishioner and workman of the below-written church, for themselves and the said church, and also all and singular the other neighbors and parishioners of the same humbly supplicating, proceeding with devotion to the parochial church of the holy ones Antony and Paulinus, anciently cathedral, and the greater church of Lucca, newly on account of its antiquity necessarily constructed with new buildings and altars; and there clothed in pontifical vestments with a deacon and subdeacon, likewise clothed in their vestments, and a multitude of venerable clerics, assisting him and glorifying in psalms, praises, and proclamations the name of God according to the customary manner, form, and order of the church, the cemetery of that church, the church itself, and the four altars existing in the same church, to the honor of God, and of the glorious Virgin Mary, his Mother, and of SS. Antony and Paulinus, by whose title that church is adorned; and of the blessed Maximus the prefect, and of Anna; and of the whole heavenly court, he blessed, sanctified, and consecrated water mixed with salt, and water mixed with salt, ash, and wine, those water, salt, wine, and ash having first been blessed and consecrated with the customary holy prayers, sprinkling with hyssop through the aforesaid places, and a sign of the cross having been made from the said ash, holding each head at the corner, superscribing upon the pavement of that church itself with the pastoral staff letters and other signs, according to the norm which the canonical sanctions hand down, superscribing also the wall of that church with thirteen figures of the holy XIII Apostles, holding the sign of the Cross in their hand, painted within, and anointing the same altars with sacred chrism and making on them with the said chrism, with his thumb, the signs of the cross, and re-enclosing in the same altars:
[24] Namely in the greater altar consecrated under the honor of Bl. Paulinus, the authentic instrument first Bishop of Lucca, a certain wooden pyx, where there are some of the garments of the blessed glorious Virgin, and of the Relics of the blessed holy Peter and Bartholomew the Apostles; of Stephen, Theodore, George, and Paulinus the aforesaid Bishop, Martyrs, of Antony the confessor, and of Cecilia the virgin, and of the garments of Bl. John the Evangelist, and a certain marble sarcophagus full of the bones of many Blessed ones, beheaded for the name of Christ, concerning whom it is more clearly narrated in the Legend of Bl. Paulinus the aforesaid bishop; all which were before, and were found in the old altar: and in another altar situated toward the north, upon which rests in a certain marble shrine the body of St. Antony the confessor, constructed to his honor, and consecrated by the same Pontiff, a certain pyx, where the Relics of many Saints are enclosed; and in the fourth altar, which is situated in the corner toward the North, upon which is a marble chest of the burial of the body of St. Maximus the Cornicularius prefect, constructed under his honor, then consecrated by the same Lord Bishop, the relics of St. Victor, the glorious Martyr of God, with sacrifice and the solemnities of Masses, and other solemnities, accustomed to be observed according to the form of the Church in consecrating churches of this kind.
[25] Moreover the aforesaid Father the Lord Bishop of Lucca, with indulgences when he was in the solemnities of the Masses, following the counsel of God, which is: Give, and it shall be given to you: forgive, and it shall be forgiven you; and desiring to add good also to so great a good of this consecration, that a greater good might come to be, fully trusting in the mercy and benignity of God, of SS. Peter and Paul, his Apostles, and of Bl. Martin his Patron, granted to all the faithful of Christ, truly penitent and confessed, who shall come to the said church, or shall offer there to God something of their goods according to their ability, a pardon of one year and 40 days on the day of the said consecration and its anniversary, and of 40 days through the Octaves of the same, to endure for perpetual times. In testimony of all which the aforesaid Father commanded the present instrument to be made by me John the below-written notary. Done at Lucca in the said places, in the presence of the venerable men the Lords, Nicholas the archpriest, James de Prato, and John Martroris, Canons of the greater church of Lucca, Sinibald the plebanus of the parish of Pescia of the diocese of Lucca, Vicar of the Lord Bishop himself, and Soffredingus the canon of the church of SS. John and Reparata of Lucca, and Bartholomew the master of the schools of the church of Lucca, and the said presbyter Donatus the Rector, and Francis the Workmen of the aforesaid church, Ser Bernard Bonosi, Ser
Jacopo Morlani of Lucca, and Ser John Galandi, Chancellor of the said Lord Bishop, Notaries, witnesses called and asked to these things; and in the presence of a multitude of noble clergy and people of both sexes gathered for the office of this consecration.
[26] fortified with public authority: I, John Manni of Lucca, by Imperial authority ordinary public judge, was present at the consecration and all and singular the above-said things together with the aforenamed witnesses, and by mandate of the Lord Bishop himself, and at the request of the said Rector and Workman, subscribed and published. I, John Bernardi of Sarzana of the diocese of Lucca, by Imperial authority public Notary and ordinary Judge, and scribe of the aforesaid Lord Bishop, was present at all and singular the aforesaid things done, performed, and held by the said Lord Bishop, while they were being done by him, and received them to be written by his mandate, together with the aforesaid John Notary and me undersigned: and I affixed my customary sign in the year, month, day, Indiction, and before the above-said witnesses.
[27] The re-enclosing of the Paulinian ark: Nor would I pass over the re-enclosing of the Paulinian ark eight years after, that is 1369 (we here again use the words of Florentinius), when Charles IV the Emperor, extorting this from God by the prayers of Paulinus, as it is fitting to believe, restored the Lucchese to their former liberty, the ark of the most holy Bishop is re-opened, the asserter of liberty Charles himself standing by, and this epigraph left under the same marble of goatskin: This is the body of St. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca, which was newly provided for, and the present monument opened, in the time and in the presence of the most serene Prince and Lord, the Lord Charles IV, by the grace of God Emperor of the Romans and King of Bohemia, and of the venerable Father the Lord William Bishop of Lucca, and of the Lords Elders of the commune of Lucca, and of very many neighbors of the said quarter, in the time of the Rector the presbyter Lippus John of the aforesaid church of St. Paulinus, in the year of the Lord 1369, in the 7th Indiction, on the XX day of June.
[28] Now indeed the most inclined will of the Lucchese toward their holy Patron is made most attested by the ample basilica erected and dedicated to his name, concerning which are these things of Florentinius, page 208: a new basilica constructed in the Saint's honor in the year 1511. An ampler basilica then, in the last century, is erected by the piety of the Senate of Lucca. For when in the year of Christ 1511 the bulwarks of the city of Lucca had to be adapted to the manner of more recent siegecraft, and the church of St. Donatus, then outside the walls of the city, had to be removed by the indulgence of the Apostolic See: it pleased them to erect from both an august temple to Paulinus, and to transfer to the same the clerics of the collegiate church of St. Donatus with the dignity of a Prior. Hence from marbles, Baccio da Montelupo, a distinguished architect, exhibiting the model, and being prefect of the work, there began to be raised the distinguished basilica which now exists, in whose greater altar the sacred remains of St. Paulinus and his companions, resting in a stone ark, are venerated, with these letters marked in the apse of the altar: "The bodies of the most holy Martyr Paulinus, Bishop of Lucca, and protector of this liberty, and of Theobaldus, Severus, and Lucas, are covered here."
[29] Concerning the sarcophagus or tomb Florentinius again teaches us in few words on the same page 208, [The marble sarcophagus or tomb is believed not to have been changed, although formerly broken:] The marble sarcophagus in which the sacred bodies lie, although the presbyter Pagan testifies that some fragments were applied by the faithful, when in the year 1261 they were found, to cure various infirmities, I have judged to be the same in which Bl. Antony and other ancient worshipers of Christ laid the relics of the holy Martyrs. For there exists on the same marble the image of a shepherd carrying a sheep on his shoulder, a symbol of most ancient custom, with which Baronius taught that the more ancient sepulchers of the Martyrs at Rome were formerly marked, and which most recently Aringhi exhibits in Subterranean Rome.
[30] The posthumous fame of the holy Bishop is illustrated by the not interrupted, but through the succession of time continued, conspiring agreement of the zeal of the Lucchese people in offering him sacred honors, the public fame illustrated by the continual recourse to the Saint. the most firm confidence in his patronage, and the continual recourse to him in public necessities. Let Florentinius be heard, page 209: To the most holy Apostolic Bishop, therefore, it is no wonder if the Lucchese, poured out in any trepidation of the city, increase their prayers, and lead the sacred pledge, exposed, around through the city. Thus, the plebs tumultuating against the Patricians in the year 1531, on the XXVI day of November, Franciottus relates that it was carried in public supplications. Thus in our time, pestilence raging, fasts and a three-day procession having been appointed in the year 1631, the great marble ark is again re-opened, and the sacred body, becomingly adapted, is carried around with solemn rite. It pleases me to weave in the order of the memorable pomp more minutely from the original, then made by the hand of Bernardinus de Pieronis, the episcopal Chancellor, lest henceforth from obsolete memory, the style being changed, something unbecoming should happen, as I remember happened in another similar pomp, not without indignation of minds, and that all things without altercations, as most befits, indeed becomingly and with the laudable tranquillity of a devout people, may be run through. The next paragraph will weave the narration of the solemn pomp.
§ IV. The posthumous fame of the Saint amplified with new accessions; a proper Office; the last inspection of the burial in the year 1680.
The inspection of the relics in the time of the plague Therefore on the XV day of June of the same year, after in the morning the supreme Magistrate of the republic and the whole Senate had received in the sacristy of the most holy Countenance the sacred synaxis from the hand of Bishop Alexander, the same Bishop at Vespers, the Chief Men from the Clergy of Lucca accompanying, came mitred to the church of St. Paulinus, and blessed a cypress ark fitted within with leaden plates and scarlet all-silk: then he commanded the stone urn in the top altar to be unsealed: It is of the height of one ulna of the Lucchese measure, but of the length of three ulnas with a third. The lid having been removed and the two marble tablets, with which the sacred bones were more closely covered, having been taken away, he inspected the sacred relics. In the right part of the same sarcophagus the bones of the most holy Apostle of the Lucchese, Paulinus, were found in a leaden chest with the goatskin epigraph, which we related above, and which we gave above at number 27; then, placed apart, the bodies of SS. Theobaldus and Severus MM. noted with their proper titles; and in the left part the bones of very many Martyrs placed together were beheld. All which having been venerated after the custom, Alexander the Bishop drew out so great a pledge of the most holy Bishop from the sepulcher into silver vessels prepared, and having more diligently searched the relics, namely among the ashes the portions of bones, teeth, distinguished parts of the skull, he placed back in the prepared cypress urn, propped on every side with gilded bronze bands in the manner of a cross, with keys and a seal and the following goatskin inscription:
[32] exposed to public veneration in the year 1631, In the year 1631 from the birth of Christ, pestilence raging through the city of Lucca and its Dominion, Alexander Guidiccioni Bishop and Imperial Count, the ark being re-opened, carried around the relics of St. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca and Martyr, found there on account of the memory of the year 1369, under Charles the fourth Emperor, and duly recognized, and placed in a little cypress ark, for three continuous days through the city with solemn rite, the most excellent Senate with the Standard-bearer of justice piously accompanying: and then in this same place, with very many vows poured out for driving away the plague, most holily replaced them on the XV day of June. Thus far the inscription. Next follows the narration of the solemn pomp; and of the cult continued through three days.
[33] and through three days in the city of Lucca But on the following day, namely the XVI of the same month, by the command of the Bishop, a general assembly of the whole secular and regular clergy having been appointed in the same basilica of Paulinus, the supreme Magistrate of the republic and the enrolled Fathers piously accompanying, the city is purified with the body of the most holy Bishop, and upon the greatest altar of the temple dedicated to St. Frigidian, for what remained of the day, it is left to the veneration of the pious. The night-watch being spent, in the morning of the succeeding day, the same, as above, assemble, and thence the relics being piously taken up, again with solemn supplication, through the other streets of the city, they are led to the chief church of St. Martin, and consigned to the chapter of Lucca, and through the rest of the course of the day and night are honored. But the third day now dawning, namely the XVIII of June, with the same pomp from the greater church the holy body of St. Paulinus is led back to its own, the streets of the city which remained having been traversed; until, prayers again poured out, in its own seat, on the next succeeding night it was reburied.
[34] But that nothing might be lacking to the veneration of the holy Father even to the farmers, forbidden, the contagion raging, and carried around its circuit. to enter the city, at each solemn supplication through some part of the walls, where by heaped-up earth the military roads are made firm, the relics were carried out, and the country people poured around through the circuit of the city on the edge of the ditch facing the walls, the right arm of the holy Pastor blessing thrice by the hand of the Bishop having been shown, the voices of the supplicants being raised on every side, were relieved with no mean consolation. And with no less motion of minds, at the end of each public supplication, while the Bishop signed the citizens with the threefold veneration of the same arm, amid sighs and tears the voices of sons crying to the father were raised: that they might experience the power, which God made, of their divine Guardian in his arm, the right ulna of St. Paulinus, which is kept separately from the body in a silver shrine, and each year on the feast day is exhibited by a canon to be kissed by all, was carried around before the urn of the sacred body in the same pomp; in whose turned-up hand three whole molar teeth also venerable are exhibited, and on the inner part of the elbow these things are read engraved, which from the Italian I make Latin: This is the arm of the Lord St. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca, made in the time of the presbyter Lippus, Rector of the said church, and of John Mingogi workman of the said church ✠ 1394.
[35] But most recently, when popular diseases were raging lethally at Lucca [Recourse renewed to the relics of the Saint in the contagion of diseases in the year 1648.] and in very much of its dominion, namely in the year 1648, again the city of Lucca breaks into prayers to the most holy Bishop. John Baptist the Bishop, among other things by which in an encyclical letter he admonished the flock, a general synaxis, fasts, and other salutary works having been appointed, celebrates a solemn pomp with the body of St. Paulinus through the city on the XI day of September. Then also in the same stone ark of St. Paulinus it was permitted me to observe lying in the left part what above are commemorated as the bones of various Martyrs without name, which, as I do not doubt they are of several bodies, so I would believe without hesitation to be of Lucas the deacon, and of the others, who with Paulinus, companions of the battle, triumphed with a twin victory, since they are shown nowhere else in the same church. The often-mentioned Florentinius in chapter 17 hands down the distinction obtained by the church of Lucca from the apostolate of Paulinus, and the prerogatives of the Bishop of the same church; which we do not here transcribe.
[36] Marius Florentinius, the printing of the said posthumous work of his father Francis Maria having been brought to an end, The manifest patronage of St. Paulinus in protecting the Lucchese concludes with a short appendix, confirming with new increases the name of the Saint transmitted to posterity with veneration. Receive his own words: The inexhaustible beneficence of St. Paulinus for so many centuries, always confirmed by new miracles, enticed my mind to narrate that which happened in the year 1664, and to add it to the end of the said work. This perhaps by my father while still
living would have been accomplished, had he decided to make this little book public. The feast day was being celebrated in the accustomed manner and in the year mentioned, and while the solemn Mass was being performed in his own basilica, and such a celebration was being applauded by the explosion of cannon, it happened that an incautious gunner discharged by chance a piece of artillery loaded with leaden balls, and directed toward the nearby swing-bridge outside St. Donatus, by whose blows the passing farmers and country people returning from the cult of their divine Guardian would have been killed, had not, by an admirable portent, only their garments being torn and their limbs most lightly bruised, without any harm, the little balls prepared for death fallen to the ground before their very feet.
[37] confirmed by a distinguished miracle: This prodigy, first proved in the sacred tablets, aroused the piety of the most Serene Senate, to attest to posterity the not-intermitted protection of St. Paulinus, and his most valid patronage. Wherefore by a public inscription it commanded the illustrious matter to be comprehended and incised on marble, to be placed above the doors of the temple of the same holy Bishop. This task was entrusted to three noble men, Leonello de Nobilibus, Peter Benassai, Francis Maria Florentinius my father; who, various inscriptions having been collected from all sides, took care that that one which is now read engraved above the door of the sacred building, composed partly by Jacob Rossi, rector of the seminary of Lucca, and most learned professor of eloquence, and partly by Francis Maria Florentinius, should be placed. It was also decreed by the Senate, that the city gate of St. Donatus should henceforth be called also of St. Paulinus, and two statues skillfully made of white and shining marble, one to St. Paulinus, the other to St. Donatus, should be placed above the same gate for ornament and guard.
[38] [an inscription drawn up at the doors of the church of St. Paulinus for the perpetual memory of the matter.] The inscription at the doors of the church of St. Paulinus sounds thus: Let his works praise St. Paulinus in the gates: who on the day of his celebration, the 12th of July of the year 1664, outside the gate of St. Donatus, to a thronging people gave as much as the improvident hail discharged from the mural cannon could have snatched away. This struck the passers-by, tore their garments; it would have despoiled them of life, had not the most holy pastor, the artillery balls having been shaken to the ground, forbidden all license of wounding. Patrician piety, mindful not so much of the prodigy as of the benefit, by decree of the Senate, set up this monument of an obsequious mind to its powerful Patron, its most loving father. The inscription already sketched by Francis Maria Florentinius, but not exposed to the eyes of others, is of this tenor: Know, whoever you are that are present, that from the Apostle of the Lucchese equal offices always flow down to their origin. On the fourth Ides of July 1664 a poorly cautious gunner set fire to the mural cannon; and loaded with many missiles against the enemy, it discharged many against its own. Paulinus was unwilling that the day sacred to him be made mournful, and forbade the festive fires in the gate to be deadly to the crowds poured out for the celebration: he stood as guardian before the doors of those in peril, and restraining the bursting balls, permitted the garments to be torn for faith's sake, denied it for wounds. This prodigy, shining forth in the midday sun, the Lucchese Fathers willed to become illustrious by this monument of the first-born light of Etruria. By decree of the Senate.
[39] To these things which have been said thus far, concerning the posthumous fame and public veneration of St. Paulinus, can be added the proper Office, a proper Office extended through the whole diocese of Lucca; extended through the whole diocese of Lucca; concerning which the same appendix of Marius Florentinius thus makes mention: It is pleasing also to add that the most Eminent Cardinal Jerome Bonvisi, elevated to the episcopal see of Lucca, by his prayers for the divine Office to be recited in the whole diocese, obtained the proper Lessons of St. Paulinus, approved by the sacred Congregation of Rites, and that the most Eminent Julius Cardinal Spinula, likewise elected to the same church, moved by the humble petitions of the Clergy of Lucca, obtained from the most Holy Innocent XI, that to the fourth lesson, the integrity and antiquity of the parchment codex in which they were written having first been inspected and weighed, and therefore carried to Rome by Fr. Jerome Florentinius, presbyter of the Congregation of the Mother of God, the following words should be added, namely these: And most dear to the Virgin Mother of God, to whom he was devoted with the highest piety and sincere affection, as is had from the ancient codex etc. In passing it is here to be observed, that the Acts of the Saint, as will be said in the following paragraph, were used for the proper lessons; as is established from the arithmetical numbers added to the margin.
[40] Now, as I had proposed to myself in the title of this paragraph, an inspection of the relics perhaps most recent another inspection, perhaps the most recent, of the burial calls us from the often-mentioned appendix, in which the same Marius thus speaks: Nor have I thought here to pass over in silence the old structure of the monument of St. Paulinus and his Companion Martyrs, which it happened to me diligently to examine, when the most Eminent Cardinal Bishop Julius Spinula, in the year 1680, on the XV day of April, coming to his basilica, in the presence of Flaminius Nobili, Vicar General, and Penitentiary Canon of the Cathedral, Jacob Bernardinius, Prior of the church of St. Paulinus, and other priests and noble men, Francis Siuffarini, Charles Parensi, Jerome Benassai, Hippolytus de Nobilibus, Francis Bernardini, and me also Marius Florentinius, commanded the same marble ark to be unsealed. At first sight there came into view a stone lid of great mass, raised above into an angular figure, in whose higher right part is discerned a royal crown carved with light and rude incision, with these characters ℞ X written beneath; but on the left a cross. This being removed, a marble tablet of about two fingers' thickness, covering the bones of the Saints, appeared: which likewise being removed, in four unequal spaces distinguished by marble walls, the relics of the Saints laid within were beheld. In the first space of the right side, as they say, from the horn of the Gospel, very many rather tall bones of St. Severus are kept. But in the next and middle one is enclosed a cypress little ark, about half an arm long, and a little less broad and high, which most holily guards the ashes and bones of the holy Bishop Paulinus.
[41] This, fortified with gilded bronze bands, and sealed with the seal of the younger Bishop Guidiccioni, Julius Cardinal Spinula the Bishop was unwilling to open. described by Marius Florentinius in the year 1680 as an eyewitness. The third contains the bones of St. Theobaldus, neither many nor large. In the last of the left side, the bones of several holy Martyrs, Companions of St. Paulinus, as it is fitting to believe, are kept. These being drawn out with the relics of the holy ones Severus and Theobaldus, and fitted in new cypress arks, were again reburied in their places in the former marble monument, and covered with a silken veil, and the cloth smeared with wax, sealed with the seal of Cardinal Julius Spinula, that they might obtain the due and accustomed cult of the peoples. On the extreme face of the sarcophagus is seen carved the image, as was already noted by my parent also, of a shepherd carrying a lamb on his shoulder, at whose feet on either side likewise the effigy of a lamb with the figure of a little tree is beheld. The same things my Parent also had observed in the translation of that marble ark from the old to the new altar in the year 1643, on the XXI day of May; but then it was not opened. The front prospect of this monument is magnificently adorned at the expense of the most Serene republic. Two bones of St. Paulinus, which were already kept in the silver arm with the three teeth, placed in a silver shrine of excellent workmanship, on the feast day of the same Saint, are exposed to public veneration on the greatest altar of the temple. And here at last Marius Florentinius puts an end to the said appendix, to the glory of almighty God, wonderful in his Saints, and to the honor of St. Paulinus, Apostle of the Lucchese.
§ V. The Acts; the Author of the Translation; the age of the Legend.
The Acts of St. Paulinus We have seen in the course of this Commentary both the Acts of our holy Martyrs, and the other things which have been transmitted to us in writing concerning them, everywhere distinguished by the name of antiquity, and so exhibited as pure and sincere. Whether truly or falsely, let us examine. Let those who proclaim all things in the Acts sincere and genuine see how much Count Anolinus, concerning whom in the Annot. to chapter 2, letter d, derogates from their sincerity; and the exotic narration, fabulous and plainly incredible, of the bronze heaven, ordered by Nero the Emperor to be fabricated, which is exhibited at number 3, in these words: But after much time he (Nero) caused a bronze heaven to be made upon marble columns ninety in number: and he commanded the heaven to be pierced through with minute holes: it wearies me to review the rest; especially since the whole context can be consulted in the same place.
[42] whether sincere throughout What our Elders thought of this heaven long ago, you will understand from a fragment of a letter of Marius Florentinius to Janning on the second day of January 1708: It was not hidden from me, he says, nor did it formerly escape my father, that those things which are narrated in the Acts of St. Paulinus concerning the wonderful structure of the bronze heaven are not altogether approved by you; but he was unwilling to strike them out, and to separate them from the rest, lest he should break the strength of the same, and make nothing of the ancient tradition in Tuscany: but rather he was devising how it could be strengthened. But detained by other studies, he left the work imperfect; nor have I dared to change anything. And again in another letter given to the same on the second of February 1716: I have now given to light the Origins of Etruscan Piety, the posthumous work of my parent, as I made known to you at another time, and sent it to the most learned Papebroch of eternal memory; in which he had gathered the memorials of St. Paulinus, our first bishop. But because they were not altogether approved by him, he deferred to bring it to light.
[43] Nor does it matter that Nero often contrived wonderful and paradoxical things; and genuine? as Florentinius proves by more than one example in the notes to the Acts of St. Paulinus, which are added to the said posthumous work. Let it suffice us to excerpt thence that one thing which he relates from Tacitus, Annals 15, concerning the wonderful things constructed by Nero, Severus and Celer being the Masters and contrivers: to whom there was genius and audacity, to attempt through art even things which nature had denied, and to make sport of the resources of the Prince. And a few things being interposed, Nero is said to be a desirer of incredible things. What wonder therefore, you will say, if that Emperor, who walked in great and wonderful things above himself, here also attempted certain things which would exceed human powers, comprehension, and belief? But turn and re-turn the whole machine; weigh and ponder all the circumstances; I am deceived, unless you are about to confess it to be a pure and sheer fiction, and unworthy to be admitted by sensible men.
[44] Florentinius on page 217 affirms that, the streamlets being left, he will search the fountains, whence received, and, two Ms. codices being chiefly proposed to himself, he assigns the place whence they proceeded: The first is a great parchment volume, which they call the Passionary, kept in the archive of the Cathedral of Lucca, in which with the histories of many other Saints the deeds of St. Paulinus are contained. The other, a goatskin codex likewise, exists in the sacristy of the Paulinian basilica, which, besides the Acts of the same holy Bishop, perhaps formerly arranged for the use of ecclesiastical psalmody, heaps up also the finding of the sacred body of the same, the translation, the miracles, and the history of Bl. Antony his disciple. Then, instructing us concerning the age of the same codices, the first, he says, from the form of the character is redolent of greater antiquity; the second I would judge to have been written after the year one thousand two hundred and sixty,
both from the size of the letters; and because it contains the translation, which happened about these times, without a change of the characters. The Acts of the former codex, although they differ little from the second, I would judge purer and more sincere: for they contain no addition, as may be noticed in the second; in which, besides a few things added in the margin, some things also separately, pertaining to the history of St. Paulinus, written in a somewhat more recent style, precede, and contain some things collected from chronicles, which from various conjectures I would judge added about the year 1340.
[45] Many things also appear heaped up in confused order in the same volume with others still added in a more recent character, one copy presenting before the other the marks of better quality: which it is plain pertain rather to celebrating the sacred solemnities of the holy Martyr than to weaving history: since indeed they embrace hymns and, as they call them, antiphons. I have preferred to bring forward only the more ancient things and from the ancient codex of the cathedral, in this order nonetheless, that after the same I should add the differences with the mentioned Paulinian codex, and add there the notations which could be dispatched in a brief style, the rest, which would require a more diffuse discussion, being reserved for their proper heads, so that I might arrange them, as pertaining universally to the first Christianity, like the rest.
[46] But the chief thing which, in these Ms. Acts, besides what has been said, Their age and author lie hidden. can be desired, seems to be the name and time of the author. That both lie hidden from him, Florentinius confesses, while he continues in this manner: By what author, therefore, or at what time exactly these Acts of St. Paulinus were written, it happens that I am still ignorant. But although after the year 1000 among us also the memory of St. Paulinus had perished, yet it had not everywhere undergone the same lot. Indeed in a parchment codex entitled Of the Lives of the holy Fathers, written in Lombard characters, and kept in the archive of the monastery of Cava, concerning St. Leo, abbot of Cava, at the end of his life these things are had: "He presided as Abbot in the aforesaid monastery of Cava for 29 years: he died in the year of salvation 1079, on the fourth Ides of July: which day is memorable for the death of St. Paulinus, who was the first Bishop of Lucca, sent there by St. Peter the Apostle." Thus in the same place; to which the same Florentinius subjoins that it is thus had in the Life of the same Leo, authentic with him; but would that it were very ancient. Certainly that this Life is either interpolated by a more recent author, or at least not so ancient, is proved by the word divus for beatus or sanctus, in so small a context of words twice indeed repeated; which to have been formerly unusual in ecclesiastical matters, and not to be read in the Roman Breviary, unless perhaps in the most recent Lessons, I have elsewhere observed in the preliminary Commentary of St. John, Bishop of Bergamo and Martyr, on the XI of this month.
[47] [More certain things can be said concerning the time and author of the finding and translation:] Concerning the time and author of the history of the finding and translation it is more certainly clear, concerning which Florentinius: That the history of the Finding and Translation was composed by Pagan the presbyter, rector of the same Paulinian basilica, and eyewitness of all, about the year of the Lord 1261, can be plainly established for anyone reading it. Then straightway he returns to the Acts; that the relics of the most holy Bishop before this time lay hidden through several centuries is certain; but whether his Acts also lay hidden up to that time, he relates that he will not so affirm; which is as much as to grope in the darkness. Pagan certainly, while he pursues the pomp of the Translation of the same year 1261, under the barbarous name of the Legend not obscurely designates the history of St. Paulinus, when he narrates that the things which he himself contracts into few words became known to an immense multitude of the faithful at the very solemnity of the Translation. For it is necessary that they were either known before the Finding and Translation, or were found at the same time with the sacred body. Which is to say something, lest he say nothing. And this he argues from the following words: In those days more than fifty thousand between men and women had heard; as is contained in his Legend, that this Venerable Paulinus was Bishop of that city. For the credit of the Legend or history he adduces an ancient and now disused codex likewise parchment in the library of the cathedral of Lucca, in which the ancient order of that church and a list of the sacred ceremonies for the several festival days is contained. For hence it is plain that anciently the history of St. Paulinus, as is the custom of the Catholic church, was accustomed to be publicly recited in the divine Offices, and was divided into nine lessons, with numerical marks in the margin: as in the above-said codex of the Basilica of St. Paulinus, which it has pleased to call the Paulinian, can still be seen. But what century does that Codex present? Here again the water sticks.
[48] The antiquity of the aforesaid Acts the same writer confirms, in that they are commemorated in the consecration of the new church of the same divine Guardian under the year 1341, although Florentinius commends the antiquity of the Acts; concerning which above, that there was translated from the old church a marble sarcophagus, full of the bones of many Blessed ones, beheaded for the name of Christ, concerning whom it is more clearly narrated in the Legend of Bl. Paulinus the aforesaid Bishop. He wishes moreover, that the public writings which Laborator the notary, by mandate of the Lord Henry, Bishop of Lucca, made concerning the glorious Finding of the holy Bishop, as is said above at number 20, and which he confesses have lain hidden from him up to now, though diligently seeking them, may at some time come to light. Certainly, just as in the diploma for the indulgences, annexed to the solemnity of the translation, express mention is made of them, so without hesitation they would say whether the history, or the most ancient monument from which it was composed, was found at the same time with the sacred body. Here again we stick in ambiguity; add also that the Acts which especially exist in the great volume of the Cathedral are very ancient, no one who has inspected them would dare to deny; and that from this Baronius received them at least mutilated near the beginning, when in the Notes to the Martyrology he says they thus begin: There were many Kings etc., which words it is plain others follow. In our Ms. is read: Very many Kings of the earth; number 1. Florentinius heaped up for his Acts whatever he could; would that it were enough for full credit! Would not satisfaction be given to all the arguments of Florentinius, if one should say that that Codex is of uncertain antiquity; and perhaps more recent than I would wish: or than he himself could prove, say of the tenth or eleventh century?
[49] Furthermore, just as we have seen that the Legend or history, contained in the Paulinian codex, confirming by a testimony whence he received his Ms., was distributed into lessons, so the Ms. which we here commit to the press is divided into nine Lessons; which is an indication that it was formerly used in the canonical Office: which, as also other things pertaining here, you will learn from the following testimony, written at the end of our said Ms. by the hand of Florentinius, by whom it was sent here: This history of St. Paulinus, first Bishop of Lucca, exists in the same words in two goatskin Ms. codices of the church of Lucca, from which, faithfully excerpted by myself, I, Francis Maria Florentinius, took care to have it here again written out, for the sake of my most esteemed Lord Father John Bolland. One of the codices exists in the archive of the Cathedral of Lucca; the other in the basilica named by the name of the same holy Bishop, and where he rests in body. In this it is divided by Lessons for the use of the ecclesiastical Office, as is indicated in the marginal notes, and abounds above the codex of the Cathedral in these words, which are marked with an underlining. To this, with the history of the Finding and Translation of the holy body, I add notations in a work entitled, The Origins of Etruscan Piety; which soon, if God grant, will see the light.
[50] And these notations indeed will serve to illustrate the Acts. illustrated by him with notations serving our use. The miracles, which I defer to the end of the Acts, reveal their writer in the course by these words: A certain Lady of the quarter of St. Alexander; whose name is said to be the lady Genovese, under the faith of holy Christianity told the Prior of St. Alexander, and me the presbyter Pagan of St. Paulinus, in those days when the body of St. Paulinus was found. By which last particulars you will easily come to the knowledge of the time in which the said Author wrote, namely about the middle of the 13th century, according to those things which we brought forward from number 13, and number 47, concerning the Finding of the body, composed by the same Pagan; as is gathered from this, that he promises he will treat of the miracles wrought after the Finding of the Saint, those things being premised which were done in the Finding of the body. But that he treats of miracles of this kind, he immediately makes plain from the very beginning of the narration, where he thus speaks: If we wish to tell of his miracles; we shall be able to write not even one out of a thousand: but we shall say some things to confirm his glorious finding. And these are the things which it has seemed good to preface concerning St. Paulinus. But since nothing further occurs which may usefully detain us here, it remains that we bring forward his Acts.
ACTS
From our Ms., sent by Francis Maria Florentinius, collated with those printed in his posthumous work, entitled The Origins of Etruscan Piety, chapter 18, from page 222.
Paulinus, Bishop and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Severus, Presbyter and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Lucas, Deacon and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Theobaldus, Soldier and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
The Companion Martyrs, at Lucca in Etruria BHL Number: 6555
FROM THE MSS.
CHAPTER I.
The apostolic labors of St. Paulinus, sent to Lucca by St. Peter the Apostle: he is beaten with clubs with his Companions for Christ.
Lesson I.
The merciful a and compassionate Lord, descending from the highest citadel of heaven into the womb of the Virgin, The persecution swelling deigned by his presence and glorious Incarnation to visit and illuminate the world. But afterward, the magnificent triumpher rising from the lower regions, was exalted into heaven with the substance of our flesh. Very many kings of the earth and Princes there were, who, denying Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to be true God and savior of the world, mocking his Incarnation, the passion and death of the Cross, and his resurrection, and ascension into the heavens, utterly annihilated the faith of the supreme and undivided Trinity. From whose impious and nefarious college, Nero the Emperor, as though coming forth from the quiver of Satan, began wonderfully to torture all the worshipers of God with various punishments and torments, showing them the most diverse kinds of torments, that those whom he could not bend with rewards and persuasions, he might at least overcome by the terrors of punishments.
[2] in the time of Nero Therefore, the same Nero reigning, in the parts of Tuscany, in the city of Pisa, the same commanded a temple of Diana of wonderful magnitude to be made for himself at the entrance of the Latin gate of the city of Pisa, at the head of the bridge of the river Auser b, and adorned it with all beauty; and commanded that the artificers should make from most pure gold and pearls a statue of Diana, which they should adore every single day. Then was made
a statue of Diana of wonderful magnitude, having a countenance and eyes as though living. Which the Emperor commanded to be fixed with great veneration on the front of the temple.
Lesson II.
[3] But after much time he caused a bronze heaven to be made upon marble columns ninety in number. a temple of Diana is constructed: And he commanded the heaven to be pierced through with minute holes. And the height of the heaven was a hundred feet, and water was poured out from above, so that it seemed like rain falling on the earth; and then he commanded lamps to be made in the morning in the manner of the sun, and to be drawn through the heaven, that they might shine in the day upon the people who were under the bronze heaven, and coming to the west they were extinguished. And again at the eleventh hour in the evening they likewise made a most subtle mirror shining with gems, exceedingly bright in the manner of the moon. And before the appointed hour it fell and was broken: so that not even its fragments were found. And thus by night he commanded a four-horse chariot to be drawn through the heaven, as if thundering c. Then the Lord sent a strong wind, and cast the chariot into the river Auser, and it appeared nowhere. But on another day the Emperor, sitting for the tribunal and not knowing what had been done, said to the people: Let all know that Diana the mother of the gods is great, through whom I too have shown these powers. And he sent an edict through all the provinces, that whosoever should worship Christ, or name him, unless they placed incense to the great goddess Diana, should be subject to various terrors of punishments and torments.
Lesson III.
[4] But about the same time there was a certain most Christian man in the same province in the city of Lucca, by St. Peter the Apostle by name Paulinus, who had been ordained Bishop by St. Peter the Apostle [and led from Antioch to Rome, and, as is found in certain chronicles, consecrated by St. Peter the Apostle himself in the same city of Rome with four other Bishops; namely St. Apollinaris, St. Martial, St. Fronto, and St. Maximinus. Whom our venerable father Paulinus the Bishop the aforesaid glorious Apostle of Christ directed to Lucca with these words, saying: Paulinus, servant of God, go to Lucca, and announce the words of God, that you may preside there over all the Bishops.] d But he himself, day and night, being free for vigils and prayers, daily showed to Christ a diligent service.
[5] He, the affairs of this wretched life being despised, most constantly preaching in the same city, St. Paulinus is sent to Lucca: illuminated the souls of many, and whomsoever he could, daily recalled from the worship of idols to the knowledge of the supreme, true, and eternal God, and of our Lord Jesus Christ. What more? The Lord conferred on him such grace, that through his preaching a very great multitude of men and women of the Lucchese people, entangled in the filth of demons, believed in Jesus Christ the Lord, and in the name of the Lord received the baptism of salvation. In that very city also, with the blessed presbyters Severus and Antonius whom indeed the blessed Bishop himself had consecrated priests, e he dedicated seven churches to the Lord, and in the same most holily ordained presbyters and clerics, lest the flock of the faithful newly converted to Christ should faint for the bread of the heavenly word.
Lesson IV.
[6] Hearing which, Nero the most cruel Emperor sent officers to the city of Lucca, that they might find Bl. Paulinus the Bishop: where intent on Apostolic labors, who, when they had come to the aforesaid city, found the most blessed Paulinus the Bishop with his fellow-soldiers, namely St. Severus the presbyter, and Lucas the deacon, and Theobaldus the soldier, and many others believing in Christ, insisting on hymns and praises in a certain cell of the Christians, which the same holy Bishop had dedicated to the honor of the holy and undivided Trinity, and of the holy and life-giving cross, and to the honor of the inviolate Virgin Mary, Mother of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of St. Stephen the protomartyr. Who when they had been seized, and were being led before the sight of the most impious Caesar, Bl. Paulinus the Bishop said: I give thee thanks, Lord Jesus Christ, who hast deigned to number me with thy holy martyrs. And he said to his own: Brothers and fellow-soldiers of mine, already partakers of eternal life: be manful, and the threats and terrors of the impious, which are for a time, do not dread, but magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together; let us seek the Lord, and from all the tribulations of this world he will rescue us.
Lesson V.
[7] Who when they had been led before the sight of Nero Caesar; he said to them: then led to Caesar Nero, and rebuked by him in vain, What is this your madness and folly, that you worship a dead and crucified man? That you may empty the worship of the most invincible gods, by whom our Republic is daily increased and grows? St. Paulinus answered: It is not madness, but sound doctrine, to renounce idols made by hand, deaf and dumb, without sense and sight, who can help neither themselves nor others, and to adore one living and true God, maker of heaven and earth: who, mercifully descending from the heavens to the earth into the womb of the Virgin, born from her true man, deigned for us to be scourged, crucified, and to die, that by his death he might lead us to eternal life and glory, which has no end.
[8] he refuses to sacrifice to idols. But the most cruel Emperor, angered, said: Do not now bring me more circumlocutions: but quickly sacrifice to the great goddess Diana, that those who through you believed in your Christ may offer pleasing libations to the gods. To whom St. Paulinus answered: I do not sacrifice to a demon, who will have you and your worshipers perish in eternal destruction; but I sacrifice myself an immaculate victim to the Lord my God, Jesus Christ, whom my soul serves in spirit, who bestows eternal life on those who believe in him, and everlasting glory.
Lesson VI.
[9] Then the most cruel Emperor commanded them to be afflicted with clubs and blows so long, therefore he is beaten with clubs with his companions: until they should consent to the idols, or breathe out their spirit. Who, when they were being most cruelly beaten for a long time, their blood flowed down to the earth. And looking to heaven, the blessed martyrs of Christ, Paulinus the Bishop, and Severus the presbyter with Lucas the deacon and Theobaldus the soldier, said: Lord God almighty, father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hast made us come to the knowledge of thy name, we bless thee, Lord: because thou hast made us worthy of thy glory, that we may receive a part with thy holy Martyrs in Christ the savior in the resurrection and eternal life [and] the incorruption of soul and body. For thou art the true Lord; and therefore we praise thee through our Lord Jesus Christ, thy beloved Son; who lives and reigns world without end.
ANNOTATIONS.
CHAPTER II.
The beasts, to which the Saint is condemned, are tamed; his death foretold by an Angel, and constantly met.
Then the most impious Caesar commanded the blessed Martyrs to be thrust into the depth of the prison, nor anything of food or drink to be shown to them, unless they first consented to the idols. They rejoice to suffer for Christ. The blessed Martyrs of Christ therefore, persisting in hymns and prayers, rejoicing and exulting, sang psalms to the Lord and said to one another: On account of this my heart is dilated and my tongue has exulted; moreover my flesh shall rest in hope. Because the Lord will not leave our souls in hell, nor give his holy ones to see corruption.
Lesson VII.
[11] But after the third day the Emperor, sitting for the tribunal, commanded the blessed Martyrs of Christ to stand before his sight, They are condemned to the beasts, and said to them: What have you thought concerning your salvation? Bl. Paulinus the Bishop answered, saying: Our salvation is Christ; who has recalled us from darkness to light, from death to life: whom with the whole intention of the mind we love, and we cease not daily to venerate and confess. Hearing these things, the most cruel Emperor, filled with exceeding fury, said: By the salvation of the gods, unless you immediately sacrifice to the great goddess Diana, I will hand you over to the most cruel beasts to be devoured. To whom St. Paulinus answered: Most foolish of beings, why do you believe you can recall us from the worship of the true God and our savior Jesus Christ? Now do not bring threats, which we do not fear; but exercise whatever torments you will: for our body is prepared for every punishment. Then the Emperor commanded most monstrous bears and leopards, greatly tortured with hunger, to be sent upon the holy ones of God.
[12] When the holy Martyrs of Christ had seen them, filled with all ferocity and cruelty, the sign of the Cross having been made, looking to heaven, which, their ferocity laid aside, grow mild. they said: Do not deliver to the beasts, Lord, the souls that confess to thee, and forget not to the end the souls of thy poor. And immediately the aforesaid beasts, all ferocity being laid aside, and made gentle like lambs, came and placed themselves at the feet of the Saints, licking their hands and feet.
Lesson VIII.
Then the most monstrous Caesar, filled with exceeding fury, said to the Saints: What are these evil arts, that beasts so most cruel are turned into lambs by I know not what your charms? To whom Bl. Paulinus answered: These things which you see are not evil arts, but are benefits of almighty God, in whom if you rightly believe, and purely offer him repentance for the blood of the Saints which you have shed, you will still be able to obtain everlasting life. For the winds and the sea obey him. The beasts, as you see, the name of Christ having been invoked, are tamed. How much more, Emperor, does it befit [you] to know your creator, and to adore him alone.
[13] While they were condemned to death, to St. Paulinus praying Hearing which, the Emperor, moved with exceeding grief, immediately leaped forth from his throne, sending them to Anolinus the Count, saying: These evil-doers and enemies of our gods
without a hearing cause to perish by various torments. After the Count received the imperial command, he ordered them to be thrust into a deadly prison, until he should devise with what punishment to afflict them. That same night blessed Paulinus the Bishop gave a prayer to the Lord, saying: Lord God almighty, who gatherest the scattered, and preservest the gathered, increase the faith of those who believe in thee, that the Lucchese people, who through me believed in thy holy name, may be increased and grow, and that the Churches which I have dedicated to thy praise and glory may stand with stable strength and firmness; through thee, Jesus Christ, Savior of the world, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit art coeternal, and livest and reignest world without end. Amen a.
Lesson IX.
[14] And when he had completed this prayer, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in the prison itself, an angel appears, and foretells to him his death. gleaming with exceeding splendor, and said: Paulinus, beloved of God, your prayer has been heard: For tomorrow through the palm of martyrdom you shall render your soul to our immortal King. But your body shall be buried in the city of Lucca in the church of the holy Trinity b, which you consecrated with your own hands. Through you indeed the people of the city of Lucca shall be increased c, and, you being there as Patron, that city shall at no time be destroyed by hostile hands. And immediately the Angel departed from him. Then the most blessed Paulinus the Bishop gave thanks to the almighty Lord, saying: I give thee thanks, merciful Lord, Jesus Christ, who hast deigned to visit me through thy Angel, and to hear me, and to make me certain of thy glory.
[15] The holy Martyrs are set before Count Anolinus But when morning came, the most iniquitous Count Anolinus commanded the blessed Martyrs of Christ to be brought before his sight: and sitting for the tribunal he said to them: Sacrifice to the immortal gods, lest you perish ill. The holy Martyrs of Christ answered, saying: They are not gods, but demons, who will have you and your prince perish in eternal destruction. Then the Count, hearing these things, filled with exceeding fury, commanded them to be beaten with clubs without ceasing. But the holy martyrs of Christ said to the Count: Most wretched and senseless one, and seducer of souls, since you believe that through your torments we recede from the worship of our God! For we have Jesus Christ the Son of God, who bestows on us virtue.
[16] Then the most iniquitous Count caused the torments to be tripled upon him. by whose command they are tortured and slain: Then the most blessed martyr of Christ Paulinus the Bishop gave a prayer amid the torments themselves to Christ the Lord, saying: Lord God almighty, creator of all things visible and invisible: who hast made me come to the knowledge of thy truth; I beseech thee, holy father, receive my spirit now; for it is time that thou bid me forsake this world, and come to thy mercy. When the most blessed martyr of Christ Paulinus the Bishop said these things together with blessed Severus the presbyter, they rendered their spirit to God their creator. Seeing this, the most iniquitous Count Anolinus, moved with grief, at the same hour commanded the blessed martyr of Christ Theobaldus the soldier there with many others to undergo capital sentence, and their bodies to be left unburied.
[17] But afterward the same Anolinus, sent to Milan, commanded the glorious martyrs of Christ Nazarius and Celsus and Gervasius and Protasius, afflicted with many torments, to be beheaded d. where SS. Lucas, Danianus, and Theobaldus the soldier underwent death. But the place where the glorious martyrs of Christ Lucas the Deacon and Theobaldus the soldier and many others were beheaded is not far distant from the place which is called the side of the History of the lions e. Hearing this, the glorious Confessor and presbyter of Christ, the old man Antonius, [who then was leading a solitary life in the mountains which are between Lucca and Pisa,] f came by night with blessed Valerius and Victor, Lucianus, and many other Christians, and snatched away the precious bodies of the Saints, and with hymns and praises buried them by night.
[18] But the bodies of the holy martyrs Paulinus and Severus and Theobaldus were secretly and wonderfully buried in clean and new sarcophagi in the city of Lucca in the Church of the holy Trinity on the south in the part toward the east. The place of burial. But the others were buried not far from that place in which they were beheaded. But not after much time they were translated to the Church of the holy Trinity, and there wonderfully placed. The most glorious martyrs of Christ were martyred at the foot of Mount Pisano by Anolinus the Count under the Emperor Nero on the fourth Ides of July. But the translation of the Saints is on the day of the Kalends of April. Our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor and glory, virtue and dominion world without end. Amen g.
ANNOTATIONS.
MIRACLES
From the Ms. of Francis Maria Florentinius, collated with those published by the same in the posthumous work, entitled The Origins of Etruscan Piety.
Paulinus, Bishop and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Severus, Presbyter and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Lucas, Deacon and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
Theobaldus, Soldier and Martyr, at Lucca in Etruria (S.)
The Companion Martyrs, at Lucca in Etruria BHL Number: 6557
FROM THE MSS.
A great multitude healed by the help of St. Paulinus. Concerning the Author who wrote these miracles, we prefaced some things in the preliminary Commentary, as also concerning the time in which they were written. It remains therefore that we subjoin the things which were deferred here: If we wish to tell of his miracles (that is, of St. Paulinus), we shall be able to write not even one out of a thousand: but we shall say some things to confirm his glorious finding. On the day of his procession, as they themselves related to us, in the virtue of God more than 60 [] sick were healed of various infirmities: for they were placed at the balconies a, and immediately, when they saw the glorious body with the procession, they were healed. Among whom was a certain lady Maria, who had a paralytic son for three years. She placed him at the balcony: and immediately the boy himself [], healed, rose. A certain other, the procession returning (for she was blind for three years), washed herself with the water where the arm of St. Paulinus had been placed, and immediately saw. O how many blind, O how many paralytics were healed! To speak the truth, in the virtue of God, in that year more than five hundred bodies were healed of all infirmities. Taking of the marble where the body of Bl. Paulinus had lain, immediately they were healed.
[2] Two captives freed. Likewise two brothers were placed in one prison in Lombardy, and captured, commended themselves to Bl. Paulinus with tears and devotion. Night coming, they found the prison open and went out. Likewise a certain other from Garfagnana was coming from Lombardy: for he was captured by highwaymen: they bound his hands and feet, and demanded money from him. But he commended himself to Bl. Paulinus with great devotion. There were six of them who guarded him. As it pleased God, they all fell asleep. And a certain young man came, and loosed him from the bonds, and he was freed.
[3] An inflamed leg; Likewise a certain man of the parish of St. Stephen had his leg strongly inflamed. A physician struck him with iron: at that stroke he vowed himself to Bl. Paulinus, and promised to fill all the lamps of his church with his own oil. The physician after the stroke bandaged him. But on another day he wished to cure him again: he found him whole and having no sign of the incision, where he had been cut.
[4] A certain lady had a very great infirmity in her eyes for many days. a woman suffering in her eyes; She came with great devotion to the church of St. Paulinus, and washed her eyes with the water where the arm of St. Paulinus had been placed: and immediately she was healed. Blessed be God!
[5] There was a certain man, who was called James, of the place which is called Allemura. the broken foot of an ox is cured. The festivity of Bl. Paulinus being despised, on the day of St. Paulinus he yoked his oxen, and went to labor. While he was going along a good and level way, one of those oxen wrenched its right foot, and, as if broken, the ox held its foot from the ground, and in no way could set it on the ground. That rustic, when he saw it, weeping cried out and said: O God! and why [] and how has the ox [] lost its foot? I know not how. O God! I am dead: for he had almost nothing else. And all of his household ran to lament with him, and thus lamenting, on that way there appeared two religious men with white garments. One of these said to him: Brother, why do you weep so? And he answered: Do you not see, that I have lost the foot of my ox? And I know not how. And that religious man answered: Do not weep, the Lord will heal it. We counsel you, that you never hold in contempt the glorious feast of Bl. Paulinus your father; but honor him all the time of your life: and he signed it: and immediately it was healed. And they disappeared, and they saw them no more.
[6] A certain Lady of the quarter b of St. Alexander, whose name is said to be Genovese, An only son, first sick, then dead, under the faith of holy Christianity told the Prior of St. Alexander, and me c the presbyter Pagan of St. Paulinus: In those days, when the body of Bl. Paulinus was found, I had an only son, who was most dear to me. It happened that he fell sick, and was weighed down to death by a most grievous infirmity. I watched over him more than a month. But on a certain night I, sad and fearful, was awaiting that he should expire: and I, suddenly inspired by God; after matins in the dawn of day it was thus said to me in spirit: Take your son, and carry him to that glorious body of Bl. Paulinus: the Lord will render him to you. And immediately
I took him naked, and placed him in my bosom: for I was without sense; and without a cloak I carried him to the church of Bl. Paulinus. When I was in the courtyard of Bl. Alexander, I saw him ended, breathed out, and dead. And I stood a little there; and truly I found him dead and breathed out. And I said within myself: What shall I do? And as if without sense I took him: and suddenly, breathed out, I carried him to the church of St. Paulinus.
[7] The priest was not in the church at that hour. There was in the church one boy; to the mother praying at the body of St. Paulinus for the safety of her son and I said to him: Where is the body of Bl. Paulinus? And he indicated it to me: and I took my son naked and dead. And I placed him upon that pillar where the body of Bl. Paulinus was: and I let go of him, and cast myself with hair loose prostrate on the ground [*]; and most bitterly I wept: I struck my breast and said: O God! thou canst well render my son to me, if thou wilt, for the love of that glorious Martyr. Never will I raise myself from here: here will I die, unless thou render him to me. Thus saying and weeping, I stood, and did not depart, nor did I touch my son. While I so stood, I took him, and placed him in my bosom. And again he was dead.
[8] he is restored alive. But I wept most bitterly and placed myself beside the altar to sit with my son in my bosom, and weeping said: Never will I raise myself from here: here will I die, unless thou render me my son, O glorious Martyr: and thus standing and weeping, I saw his face, which was pale, becoming ruddy. I strongly [*] cried out: O Bl. Paulinus, render me my son. He immediately opened his eyes and revived. But I put my breast into his mouth, and he took it: and I glorified God and the glorious Martyr: who did such grace for me: for on that very day he went through the quarter, for it was the sixth feria, as if he had had no evil. And all these things, questioned several times, she affirmed under the faith of the Holy Trinity.
[9] Another, a vow being made, A certain noble lady Philippa, of the quarter of St. Paulinus, came with great devotion to the aforesaid church, and called the presbyter Pagan, rector of that church, and said to him: I promise to God and to our blessed Patron Paulinus, and I make a vow in your hands; that if the Lord, by the merits of St. Paulinus, shall render me my son Lazarius, who is held at Siena in bonds, then I, all the time of my life, will keep the feast every year. First I will fast the vigil of his feast; secondly I will celebrate the feast day: and I will refresh four priests, solemnly refreshing them on the very festivity of our blessed Father Paulinus. And likewise I will cause one lamp to burn before his glorious sepulcher: and thus with tears, the vow being made, she departed. But He who knows the devotions of hearts fulfilled her desire, and before the feast of Bl. Paulinus came, miraculously freed the said Lazarius her son from prison.
[10] For when he was in prison with many, he alone went out through a little door d; he is freed from prison. the guards guarding the prison, none saw him, nor gave impediment. And with joy returned to the city of Lucca, in the church of Bl. Paulinus he rendered many thanks with his said mother, and many other of his kinsmen, to God and to Bl. Paulinus. And the said Lady fulfilled her vow to the praise and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ: who lives and reigns forever.
ANNOTATIONS.
* al. 9.
* al. of himself.
* al. and when he lost.
* al. my ox.
* al. prostrate on the ground.
* al. strongly.
* with.
ON THE HOLY MARTYRS
NABOR AND FELIX
AT MILAN AND COLOGNE.
In the year 303 or 304.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Nabor, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
Felix, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
§ I. The diversity of these Martyrs from other synonymous ones, and their most ancient memory in the Martyrologies.
It was said above on the X day of July, that various more recent writers after Ado and Notker everywhere deflect to this, that they think these two Martyrs of Milan were Moors by race, and suffered in Africa, and were thence translated to Milan; The confusion of these Saints with African ones which although Tillemont seems somewhat obscurely to insinuate, volume 5, from page 267, yet in the notes, page 692, he rather admits that they suffered at Milan or Lodi, and were therefore different from the Africans, since St. Ambrose calls them our Martyrs. To the opposite part inclines Castellanus in his universal Martyrology, in a note appended to this announcement of the Roman: At Milan, of the holy Martyrs Nabor and Felix, who suffered in the persecution of Maximian; and this others seem tacitly to intimate, when they refer to these two alone all the things which we apply to different classes. Let the words of Castellanus be heard, rendered from the French into Latin: Are they the same who are honored on the 10th? There is here only their translation according to Ado and Notker; who in two places asserts that their bodies were brought from Africa, and believes them to be the very same, of whom treatment was made on the 10th: and this seems to be confirmed from the Acts of St. Victor of Milan, a Moor by race, who calls them fellow-citizens. Meanwhile their Acts in Mombritius, which consequently ought to have been composed after the times of Notker, place their martyrdom at Lodi, which must have preceded the passion of St. Victor, from those things which we are here bidden to say, who died in the year 304, on the 8th of May. And indeed their names are found mingled with others in the Hieronymian Mss. on the 12th and 24th of April.
[2] it seems to have arisen from Ado, The scruple is, as I say again, from the homonymy of the names, which if it ought to be taken more rigidly, a hundred times in our Acts the Martyrs endowed with the same appellation will have to be confounded. For not one is the Nabor recorded in the Hieronymian codices, to say nothing of the more celebrated one with Cyrinus and Basilides, of whom on the 12th of June; but the Felixes are almost innumerable. The present ones Henschenius did not recognize on the 14th of May, volume 3, page 284: for there in the Hieronymian codices nowhere is Nabor but Namor or Nemor, joined with other companions, namely Victor, Felix, Rusticus,
and perhaps others, as you will find explained there, Notker again and the addition of Ado being rejected. Nor does it help to recur to the days cited by Castellanus, or to enumerate several others; where synonymous Martyrs, whether joined together, or mingled with larger classes, are commemorated, since it is sufficiently plain that they are as remote as possible from the present ones of Milan or Lodi, as here also Florentinius shows, treating more fully of these Martyrs, and refuting those things which Ado and Notker had woven on about the pretended translation: and then also correcting certain inverted texts of the Hieronymian copies, according to the right norm of the most ancient Epternach codex, as we shall presently say. Thus therefore the praised Florentinius has it:
[3] well refuted by Florentinius But Nabor and Felix crowned in Africa cannot be the same as the Martyrs of that name, who in their Acts in Mombritius and Peter de Natalibus, outside the city of Lodi, near the river Celera, or rather the Silarus, after many torments beheaded, were there buried on the IV Ides of July; for the ruins of the bridge and of the old gate of Laus Pompeia, sprinkled, as is believed, with the little drops of the blood of those Martyrs, still testify, and ancient tradition, renewed with a new epigraph, teaches in the seventh Italian dissertation on the city of Lodi by Defendente Lodi, page 351, that Nabor and Felix the soldiers, who are venerated at Milan, are not those who accomplished their combat in Africa. That the bodies of the same Saints lay at Milan from ancient time, Paulinus teaches in the life of St. Ambrose, and testifies that before the finding of Gervasius and Protasius they were especially known and venerated. I pass over the rest, with which Florentinius weighs the rather tangled words of Maurolycus, doubting whether the present Martyrs are to be assigned to Milan or to Africa. Certainly that Martyrologist excludes them from Sicily, with St. Agatha of Catania, who, for I know not what reason, is found placed on this day in some of the Hieronymian codices.
[4] That in Bede, Florus, and Rabanus no memory of SS. Nabor and Felix of Milan, from the most ancient Hieronymian codex, nor of the African ones, is found, we have already said enough; the whole progeny of the Little Roman stops at the African ones on the X day of this month, no mention being made in the genuine copies of Usuard of the present ones: the supplements in great number are abundantly described in our edition, with an elogium drawn from the Acts, whence flowed the briefer expression of Baronius in the modern Roman. The supplements of Bede, edited by our Elders, were received from the Hieronymian codices, which we now undertake to weigh. In the most ancient Epternach or Antwerp codex it is distinctly read: On the IV Ides of July, at Milan, of Nabor and Felix. At Rome, of Primitivus. And this I think is the true announcement, which in the other codices is altogether disturbed. The Corbie codex reads: In Sicily, the birthday of Nabor, Felix, Primitivus, Julius. Almost worse the Lucca one: In Sicily, the birthday of Agatha the virgin, of Nabor and Felix. At Milan, of Namor and Primitivus; nor is the reading of the Blume codex better, so that plainly that must be admitted which we gave from the most ancient codex, and which is excellently confirmed from the more contracted copies.
[5] Rare in those minor codices is so unanimous a consensus: to which the minor codices are conformable, for in the same terms is the announcement expressed in the Rheinau and Reichenau codices: At Milan, of Nabor, Felix. In the Augsburg one they are placed in the third place, At Milan, of Nabor, Felix, these words preceding: In Sicily, of Agatha the virgin, concerning whom enough has already been said. The Labbe one likewise in the third place: At Milan, of Nabor, Felix. The codex of the Queen of Sweden badly placed it on the III Ides, which pertains to this day: At Milan, the birthday of the holy Namor, Felix. There is an addition in the Barberini one: At Milan, of Nabor, Felix, and Primitivus. Thus far our manuscripts edited in volume VI of June, to which are added others in the newest Benedictine collection, or Thesaurus of anecdota, volume 3, where the Auxerre and Murbach ones are plainly conformable to the Labbe one: At Milan, of Nabor, Felix. In another, of the church of Tours, Fortunatus is set before our Martyrs, without a location or place of martyrdom: Of Fortunatus, Nabor, Felix.
[6] And let these things suffice to prove, both the most ancient cult of the present Saints from the adduced Martyrologies, that it is sufficiently established that they suffered at Milan. and their most manifest diversity from all other synonymous ones. Concerning their translation, made, as is reported, in the year 310, and accustomed to be honored with a double Office on the XVIII of May, our Elders treated in the life of St. Savina on the XXX of January, page 1030, and again in the list of the Passed-Over in volume IV of May, page 136; but what this Office is, I confess I do not know. In the Proper of Milan I find no memory of the holy ones Nabor and Felix except on this XII of July, under a double rite, with a double proper lesson; to be related presently, of which this is the beginning, "Nabor and Felix, Moors," which must have been devised in later centuries, since concerning the race or fatherland of the holy Martyrs there is not a word in their Acts, but on the contrary St. Ambrose, praised above, sufficiently insinuates that they were natives and probably of Milanese origin, among whom, as inquilines, they were always in the highest esteem and veneration, as we must now demonstrate a little more fully.
§ II. The ancient cult of SS. Nabor and Felix at Milan.
Praised by St. Ambrose as natives, That the great Father St. Ambrose was a singular worshiper of the holy Martyrs, all antiquity of old proclaims; and that these our Saints are praised by him, has already been shown from Florentinius. His letter to his sister Marcellina is related by various writers, and among them Surius and Puricelli on the Ambrosian basilica, page 2. The words which pertain to the Saints are these: The clergy also being afraid, I ordered the earth to be cleared away in that place which is before the rails of the holy ones Felix and Nabor. Paulinus in the life of St. Ambrose himself, in Surius on the IV of April, number 6, commemorates the matter a little more copiously: At the same time the holy Martyrs Protasius and Gervasius revealed themselves to the priest: for they were placed in the basilica in which today are the bodies of Nabor and Felix the martyrs: but the holy martyrs Nabor and Felix were most celebratedly frequented; but of Protasius and Gervasius the martyrs, as the names, so also the sepulchers were unknown; to such a degree that over their sepulchers walked all who wished to come to the rails, by which the sepulchers of the holy martyrs Nabor and Felix were defended from injury. What more manifestly can be said, that we may understand that even in the age of St. Ambrose the precious remains of the holy ones Nabor and Felix were in the highest veneration among the faithful. Hear again Ambrose himself on Luke chapter 13, where treating of the grain of Mustard; The grain of Mustard, he says, is our Martyrs; Felix, Nabor, and Victor; they had the odor of faith but it lay hidden, the persecution came, they laid down their arms, bent their necks, beaten with the sword, scattered the grace of their mystery through all the bounds of the world.
[8] gradually they were taken for Moors, then for the Morigii: Similar things the Milanese writers everywhere commemorate, among whom it may be observed, that there gradually grew that itch inborn in the nation, of dragging back or reducing any Saints whatever to the present families, which more than once elsewhere we have been forced to impugn. In a word I noted above, the mention inserted into the Proper of Milan, as if the holy Nabor and Felix had been Moors by race, which certainly could not be drawn from the Acts; nor from the Ambrosian Missal, where in the preface of their Mass it is only insinuated (with what faith I know not), that they were exiles at Milan from other bounds of the earth. Ripamonti, Ecclesiastical History of Milan, book 2, page 103, wrote somewhat obscurely: Nabor and Felix, of Moorish race, indicating, I suppose, that they were joined by race or nation to St. Victor the Moor, which by what reasoning it can be explained, we have said above, where treatment was made of the synonymous African Martyrs. For the rest, whether the present Saints too were Moors or not, is a matter of indifference to me; but indeed, be it said with good leave, this seems most ridiculous, that Paul Morigia dared to write in his Sanctuary of Milan, that our Saints were of the house of Morigi, or of his own Morigian family; and this I find speciously appended in the sacred Diary of the same city in the year 1668 on this day XII of July: SS. Nabor and Felix of the Morigi.
[9] Away with trifles. Ripamonti proceeds to weave a brief elogium of the holy Martyrs from the Acts; Ripamonti calls them Moors; for where he has premised several others, crowned for Christ; there follow, he says, after these (Carpophorus and Felix) Nabor and Felix, of Moorish race, soldiers by profession of life, nor of unlike end. For being held at Milan in the same camps, they are accused of the same crime, and after they had been gravely tortured on the rack and with the other torments, they persevered with unconquered faith, and are thence carried off to Laus Pompeia. There the axe having been struck to the neck, the martyrdom was completed. The sacred bodies Savina, a noble matron, no less in piety toward God than in the brightness of her race, carried back to Milan. They are placed in the old cemetery of the Martyrs, where afterward the name and honor of St. Francis occupied the church dedicated to them. In the same church are kept buried the bones of Savina herself, which woman died about that time with a distinguished end. For, wholly turned toward the divine Martyrs, whether by visiting and helping those in peril, or by burying those already dead, when she had performed that office for Nabor and Felix, lying by chance one day at their sepulcher, with hands raised to heaven she expired.
[10] It is not necessary to collect more elogia of that kind, or more prolix ones, But Ferrarius confounds them more shamefully. since from the same source, not sufficiently limpid, all have flowed. Most recent is that which Ferrarius inserted among his Italian Saints, citing the Acts in Mombritius, concerning which below. His annotation deserves to be observed in passing, conceived in these words: That their bodies were translated to Cologne Agrippina, together with the bodies of the three Magi, about the year of salvation 764, Sigebert in the Chronicle at that year is the author, and Surius in the mentioned place. Ferrarius did not consult Sigebert when he wrote these things, and for that reason is deservedly beaten by the Milanese, the words of Sigebert the chronographer at that year being: Bishop Chrodegang translated the bodies of the martyrs Gorgonius, Nabor, and Nazarius from Rome into Gaul, and Gorgonius indeed at Gorze, but Nabor in the monastery of Hilariacum, but Nazarius he placed in the monastery of Lorsch: all which are distant by whole centuries and in names from the translation of the three Kings and SS. Nabor and Felix from Milan to Cologne; concerning which below. Whence also you may restore those things in which on this day Saussay erred in his famous Gallican Martyrology. But I forbear to speak of those things here, lest I do what has been done; let the history of the Sigebertine translation be seen, explained by Henschenius on the XII of June, page 514. Concerning the controversy over the possession of the present sacred bodies it will be disputed below. Behold now the things which pertain more closely to the Milanese cult.
[11] The Ambrosian Missal, of which a very rare copy exists among us, What things are proper to them according to its own rite on this day thus honors the festivity of the Saints: On the feast of the holy martyrs Nabor and Felix, the Ingressa. But the salvation of the just is from the Lord. Over the people. Bless, we beseech thee, Lord, thy people,
and trusting in the prayers of thy most blessed martyrs Nabor and Felix, (or is it not "trusting"?) may it obtain the grace of thy protection. Through. There follows the epistle to the Ephesians chapter 2; Brethren, you who were once far off etc. Verse. You who were once far off, are made near in the blood of the lamb. The Gospel according to Luke chapter 9. At that time the Lord Jesus took Peter and James and John etc. After the Gospel: The savagery of the perfidious could not overcome their inestimable faith, because Christ was joyful in them, who fought and conquered with such servants: the protector of the faith gives palms to the victors. Over the shroud. May the venerable prayer of thy most blessed martyrs Nabor and Felix protect thy Church, O God: and of whom their frequenting spends devotion, may it demand the effect of perpetual redemption. Offertory: I questioned the angel, saying; who is this who gave a crown to his holy ones! and he said to me: It is the Son of God, whom they have confessed for ages. Verse. In the sight of the lamb they stood before the throne, and palms in their hands; they cried with a great voice, saying: It is the Son of God. Over the offerings. Be present, Lord, to our supplications, and grant us confidently to obtain, by the intercessions of thy most blessed martyrs Nabor and Felix, what thou hast given us to hope for. Through.
[12] in the Ambrosian Office, Preface. Through Christ our Lord: who so kindles the hearts of his faithful with fire-bearing love, that both they despise the fleeting glory of the world, and through torments approach the fellowship of the citizens above. For this reason also the most learned soldiers of Christ Nabor and Felix, having departed from the utmost bounds of the earth, gave themselves as exiles to this land; not that they might be subject to the bloody rule of Cæsar, but that they might proceed more easily unhindered to the court of the ethereal King. They preferred to lie hidden longer under the cloak of earthly warfare, awaiting from above the call of the heavenly empire. Who also, the shield of hope having been constantly received; the breastplate and helmet of faith having been taken up, march secure into the battle-line of the enemy. They conquer the most savage torments of punishments, the prison and blows, the rack, fire, and claws: they subject their necks to the gratings of chains; they are dragged bound by noxious hands. At last, the sword having shed their blood, adorned with triumphal glory, they came to the citizens above with the palm of victory. Postcommunion. Receiving the pledge of eternal life, we suppliants beseech thy majesty, almighty God, that, supported by the patronages of the holy ones Nabor and Felix, what we have touched in image, we may take by manifest perception. Through.
[13] and afterward in the Roman. To the Roman rite are accommodated two lessons, of which we have already mentioned in passing, which in the present Proper of Milan thus have it: Lesson IV: Nabor and Felix, Moors, at the time when Maximian the Emperor stayed at Milan, accused before him of the Christian religion, for some days are shut up in prison: where, when they could by no persuasions be driven to the worship of idols, first both are beaten together with clubs: then Nabor alone, Felix looking on, tortured on the rack, afterward half-burnt with glowing plates, then torn with iron claws. Which torture having been bravely overcome, he and Felix likewise placed in the fire, thence divinely snatched, escaped unharmed. Lesson V. Again thrust into prison, thence bound with chains they are led to Laus Pompeia, where their constancy being again tried, when they most constantly persevered in the confession of the faith, struck with the axe, they gave a distinguished testimony to Christ the Lord. Their bodies were translated to Milan by Savina, a matron of Lodi. The little book was printed at Milan in the year 1642, under the title; Proper and Common Lessons, approved by the Holy Apostolic See, for the second and third Nocturn of the Saints of the church of Milan, for the use of those who in it use the Roman rite. Thus far concerning the cult among the Milanese, with which the Cologne one must be compared.
§ III. On the cult of the same Saints at Cologne Agrippina.
That the sacred pledges of their Saints were always in the highest veneration among the people of Cologne, after they are judged to have been brought there in the 12th century, At Cologne also with a proper Office can be no more certainly proved from any other source than from the Breviaries of the most celebrated church, of which ancient copies exist among us, and one especially printed at Venice, by the art of John Herszog the German, monarch of printers, in the year of the nativity of Christ after the thousandth and four times hundredth ninety-eighth, on the day before the Kalends of October. There the holy Nabor and Felix are adorned with a proper and singular ecclesiastical Office, which exists also in other editions; but here let it suffice us to draw from the older one those things which may abundantly testify to the exceptional veneration of the people of Cologne toward the Saints. Thus the beginnings of the same Office have it: Of Felix and Nabor, at the first Vespers, above the ferial psalms. Antiphon 1. The Saints through faith… Antiphon 2. The scourges of the executioners… as in the present Common. The third differs: The Saints of God had a great combat; they passed through fire and water, and were made safe, and received crowns from the Lord God. Antiphon 4. Round about thee, Lord, is a light which will never fail, where thou hast set the most luminous mansions, there rest the souls of the Saints. Antiphon 5. They rejoice in the heavens etc.
[15] There follows the hymn at Vespers in this manner: O Christ, glory of the ethereal citadel, they have rejoiced for many centuries; distinguishing to each his measure of labor, propitiously assent to our vows. Behold the throng, purpled with blood, now sure of its reward, free from grief, flourishes joyful with a clear triumph. From this college they blaze in heaven, truly citizens of happy men, Nabor and Felix, pledges of light. These, driven through horrific pressures, exchange the present things by the sword, the scaffold: at last the parched ground receives their limbs. By their merits, King Jesus, grant to thy servants, that, the stain of thy suppliants being driven away, thou mayest grant them to be blessed in a happy seat. To the Trinity be glory, honor and virtue, praise to the inseparable Unity, a harmonious dominion through all ages. Amen. At the Magnificat, Antiphon. For theirs is etc. Collect. We beseech, almighty God, that a twin joy of the present festivity may receive us, which proceeds from the glorification of thy blessed martyrs Felix and Nabor, whom the same faith and passion truly made to be brothers. At Compline, over the Nunc dimittis, is placed this Antiphon. Almighty God, who hast conferred on the Martyrs the glorious wars of the combat unto the triumph of immortality; give to our hearts a joy worthy of their commemoration, that we, whose bodies here we embrace with pious love, may be helped by their prayers.
[16] from which some proper things, At Matins, the Invitatory; Let us adore Christ the King, with the saints who under the throne of God cry out in white robes. Lesson I. The impious Maximian reigning as Emperor, when by his edict a grievous persecution had raged against the Christian people, there were in the city of Milan two certain men, illustrious in military matters, most well known to the Emperor himself, of whom one was called Nabor, the other Felix. Responsory. These are two men of mercy; as of SS. John and Paul. Lesson II. When these were secretly devoted to the Christian religion, it was suggested to the Emperor Maximian by his executors staying in the aforesaid city. Lord, they say, most clement Emperor, Nabor and Felix have been made Christians, and blaspheme our Gods, and say that they are demons. Responsory. The Saints shall exult in glory etc. as in the Common of holy Martyrs. Lesson III. Then the Emperor commanded them to be seized and led to him; to whom he said one by one: Nabor, our soldier, what did you judge to be lacking to you, that you should make yourself a Christian? Nabor answered: I was not lately made a Christian, but from the beginning of my age. Responsory. This is true brotherhood, as of the holy ones aforesaid John and Paul. Thus far the lessons of the first Nocturn.
[17] and the lessons are described. At the second Nocturn, Lesson IV. Maximian answered: Therefore, as you assert, you are manifestly a Christian? Nabor answered: I am manifestly a Christian, and Christ Jesus, the Son of the living God, born of the Virgin Mary through the Holy Spirit, I adore and believe in my heart, and cease not with my mouth to praise. Responsory. The just shall shine like the lily, and shall flourish like the roses in Jericho before the Lord. The rest from the Common. Lesson V. Then Maximian the Emperor, filled with wrath, commanded him to be sent to prison, and Felix having been summoned, said to him: What seems to you, Felix; do you not wish foolishly to perish with Nabor your companion? Sacrifice to the gods, and be our friend: for if you do not sacrifice, various torments await you. Responsory. These are the Saints who follow the lamb, who conquered the devil by his blood, and the word of his testimony, and loved not their souls unto death. These are they who came etc. Lesson VI. Felix answered: For your torments are nothing; know that I in no way deny the true Son of God the Lord Jesus Christ, but rather offer myself to him in sacrifice. Maximian the Emperor, angered, commanded him to be sent into the same prison, where he had shut up blessed Nabor, saying to them; Certainly I will make you breathe out your spirit with various torments. The lessons of the III Nocturn, and the rest which are added, deviate not much from the Common.
[18] An elogium by Erhard Winheim, Other most manifest indications of religious cult and most constant veneration are, that these holy martyrs Nabor and Felix were joined with the three most celebrated Magi, as Fr. Erhard Winheim the Carthusian testifies in his Sanctuary of Agrippina, edited at Cologne in the year 1607, where on page 28, describing the most august sepulcher of the holy Magi; But if you desire it to be sketched to the life for you together with the relics contained, he says, know that the three holy Magi are contained in the lower tomb, of copper indeed, but wrought with mosaic work so artfully and sumptuously, that so shining and so unusual an industry not only carries into astonishment whatever goldsmiths there are, but rather compels them to declare that something divine rather than human is beheld there. But this sarcophagus is closed by another tomb, in which, in between, the holy Felix and Nabor, citizens of Milan, who suffered martyrdom under Maximian on the XII of July, rest. Again on page 38, after he has commemorated that the bodies of the holy Magi were translated to Cologne by Rainald the Archbishop together with the bodies of the holy Felix and Nabor, he thus subjoins: And that the Martyrs also might be associated with the three Magi in equal number, and the triple cord of Saints be doubled, by the work of Bruno, the first of that name, but the 25th bishop of Cologne, it divinely came about that to those two a third was added, Gregory of Spoleto.
[19] Ægidius Gelenius in Cologne the Suppliant, edited in the year 1639, likewise by Ægidius Gelenius, confirms the aforesaid: But there are enclosed, he says, in a plainly sumptuous twin shrine, of which the upper gable contains the bodies of the holy martyrs Felix, Nabor, and Gregory of Spoleto, brought at the same time with the three Magi: but the lower sarcophagus encloses those holy three Kings, of whom I was speaking, visible through the texture of most minute lattices, by the aid of a perpetual light. Furthermore the same distinguished man in his greater work On the greatness of Cologne Agrippina, book 3, Syntagma I, on the metropolitan church, page 233, adds, that not only the bodies of the holy Magi
are enclosed in a most precious tomb, but also that the tomb itself is enclosed in a magnificent little shrine, with this inscription:
This coffer holds the bodies of the holy Magi, And nothing from thence has been taken away or placed elsewhere, Joined to these are Felix, Nabor, Gregory.
That which is asserted in the second verse, that nothing has been taken away from thence, nothing placed elsewhere, that this is to be understood of the bodies of the holy Magi alone, is manifestly plain from Gelenius himself.
[20] For he, after he has briefly described the martyrdom of the holy Nabor and Felix, which is explained. their translation with the holy Magi made by Reynold being also commemorated, says that two arms of Felix and Nabor were given to Bl. Hildegund countess of Meer, and foundress of the same monastery. Then, the history having been narrated by which St. Gregory of Spoleto was added to those two, he notes that the several sacred heads of these three martyrs, Felix and Nabor and Gregory of Spoleto, separated from the bodies, are enclosed in several silver busts, that they may be exposed apart for the cult. Finally in the pious Fasti of this month the praised Gelenius thus announces on the IV Ides: In the metropolitan basilica of Cologne, of the holy martyrs Felix and Nabor. There is besides noted on the XXIII of July the Translation of the holy Kings, of SS. the Maccabees, Felix, Nabor, Apollinaris etc. from Italy. But whether it is honored with any celebration, I do not find expressed: nor is it sufficiently established for me, whether the relics of our Saints are exposed elsewhere except in Masini's Bologna, whither how they came, I do not care to divine; let it suffice to have here related in what veneration they are held at Cologne, to whose more recent Offices we proceed.
[21] In the newest edition of the Proper of Cologne of the year 1718, at Henry Rommerskirchen, I observe that those things which we have already given from the older ones are still in use today, A more recent Breviary of Cologne except that in the first nocturn they are taken from the occurring Scripture, the ancient responsories being nonetheless kept. The chief change occurs in the second Nocturn, in which the Lessons are described in this order and manner. Lesson IV. Nabor and Felix, celebrated at Milan for skill in military matters, were accused before Maximian, of worshiping Christ and detesting the gods. Whom, when the Emperor, having had them brought to him and questioned about the faith, had certainly learned to be Christians, he commands to venerate the gods; and if they should refuse this, threatens tortures and dire punishments. But when these had in no way terrified them, he sent them into prison, and wearied them for twelve days with a lack of food and drink: on the thirteenth he orders them to be set before him, and asks what they have determined, an option being given, whether they prefer to sacrifice to the gods and live, or, remaining in their opinion, to die.
[22] it exhibits other lessons. Lesson V. But they with equal constancy affirm that they are prepared to die for the faith of Christ. Nay even Nabor: That death, which you threaten us with, is our life. Wherefore, the various kinds of torments, of clubs, the rack, lamps, claws, fire, having been overcome by the virtue of Christ, the Emperor leads them, bound with chains, to the city of Lodi, for the terror of the Christians. There again beaten with clubs, outside the gate at the river Schelere, on the fourth Ides of July, they subjected their necks to the sword. Lesson VI. Whose bodies, taken up by night, and sprinkled with spices, a Christian matron, Sabina by name, first buried on her own estate, then took care to have them carried to Milan: where great honor was for some time paid to them, even in the time of St. Ambrose, as Paulinus testifies in his life. At length, Milan having been stormed by the arms of the Emperor Frederick, Reinold Archbishop of Cologne obtained them from the Emperor in place of a gift, and translated them at the same time with the bodies of the holy three Kings from Milan to Cologne, where even now a magnificent chapel of the metropolitan basilica religiously keeps them, with the highest veneration of the people.
[23] A sharp controversy concerning the possession of the sacred pledges. And here opens the arena of a thorny controversy between two illustrious cities, namely this of Cologne and that of Milan, most difficult to compose, as long as each party more zealously claims for itself the entire bodies of both Saints; where it is plain that an unheard-of prodigy cannot be feigned, that for their sake doubled bodies of SS. Nabor and Felix should be admitted. The learned know the manifold contentions, which have also been discussed in our Acts, concerning the presence of sacred bodies of this kind, which I do not judge it worth the trouble to commemorate here more fully. More recent is the memory of a lawsuit, plainly akin to this, concerning the bodies of SS. Gervasius and Protasius, concerning whom Papebroch had set forth his mind on the XIX of June, volume 3, §9, from page 837; but afterward, the apologetic dissertation of Joseph Anthony Saxi having been seen and weighed, before his death he wished, through us, to retract in volume 6 of June, from page 209, the things which he had asserted for the people of Breisach. I here will candidly confess, that I do not wish to be an arbiter, nor a settler of this new controversy. I shall have satisfied both parties, if I collect all the arguments on both sides, from which the readers may be able to pass judgment. I begin from the possession of the people of Cologne, so constant through four centuries, that even the Milanese writers held it for undoubted. I shall then subjoin the things which more recently, or after the finding, as they report, made by St. Charles Borromeo, I have found opposed by the same Milanese not so long ago, and as it were by right of postliminium.
§ IV. The testimonies of the Milanese writers are related in favor of the Cologne possession.
Concerning the ancient presence of the sacred bodies among the Milanese, of which enough has been said above, The possession of the people of Cologne we do not here inquire; the hinge of the whole controversy turns on this, whether Reynold, or Reynald, Archbishop of Cologne, just as the bodies of the holy three Kings, (which is today admitted by all) so also translated from Milan to Cologne the bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix in the year 1162, in which happened the destruction of Milan by Frederick Barbarossa, or as others note 1164, or some year nearby, concerning which difference we do not wish to dispute; the head of the contention is, whether in that century the Milanese were deprived of this sacred treasure, which from that time the people of Cologne have constantly possessed to this very day and continue to possess, as our Hermann Crombach endeavored to demonstrate at length in the history of the three Magi Kings of the Gospel, volume 3, book 2, in various chapters to be cited below: our chief care will be to embrace the whole matter briefly, succinctly, and with what clarity we can, using rather arguments ad hominem, as they say, than heaping up many authorities of foreigners.
[25] I will confess indeed, that the Milanese writers, who candidly admit the loss of their Saints Nabor and Felix, the Milanese writers acknowledged, and who among them are strong with deserved authority, are not older than the 15th century, for of Galvano Fiamma, who lived in the 14th century, I have judged no account here should be taken. That they were so few, he will marvel the less who understands from the preface of Tristano Calco, that the things which pertained to Milanese affairs were commemorated most sparingly and most ignorantly, and that George Merula, Calco's master, for want of monuments, for twelve whole years elaborated commentaries of no great moment, which his disciple was forced to recall to the anvil. The first to have edited a history of his fatherland before Tristano seems to be Bernardino Corio, whose contemporary was Donato Bossi, author of a Chronicle from the beginning of the world and of some treatise on the Bishops of Milan, as Vossius testifies On the Latin Historians, book 3, page 620, whose writings are not at hand, and so must be cited on the faith of others. These are followed by the just-praised Tristano Calco, who must have written either toward the end of the 15th century, or toward the beginning of the sixteenth, although the edition which exists among us was made only in the year 1628. Behold now the words of the writers:
[26] Bernardino Corio, in the history of Milan, edited in the vulgar tongue, part 1, page especially 52, thus narrates: Bernardino Corio At last the most hostile Emperor, on the very solemn day of the Olive (I suppose Palm Sunday), not imitating our Savior (who at Jerusalem, while "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord" was being sung, was gloriously received), deserted the city overthrown by him, amid infinite execrations, and returned to Pavia, transferring with him the glorious bodies of the three Magi, which St. Eustorgius, soldier and vicar of the Emperor Constantius, near the end of his episcopate took care to have brought to Milan; but the aforesaid Cæsar had given them to him as a gift in the year of Christ 311. The Milanese, for fear of the most savage Emperor, had hidden those sacred bodies in the tower of the temple dedicated to St. George, called "in the palace." Besides, he also commanded to be brought to him the bodies of the holy Gervasius and Protasius, Nabor and Felix, and thence transported them into Germany. Thus far the own words of Corio, who, a knight of Milan, writing at Milan, a most excellent orator, must altogether have known what was the opinion in his fatherland in his time concerning those sacred bodies.
[27] alleging a writing which he calls authentic: He proceeds furthermore; and adds: In faith of which matter, we shall here place the text of an authentic writing, transmitted to me from Germany, which thus has it: Frederick the first, Emperor of the Romans, son of Herman, the noble Duke of Swabia, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation one thousand one hundred and fifty (elsewhere he added "second") reigned thirty-six years. In the tenth year of his reign he destroyed Milan, in which destruction the sister of a certain viscount, who was in the power of Frederick, for the liberation of her brother, went to the Reverend Father, by name Rudolph, and Lord Archbishop of Cologne, and showed the bodies of the three Magi, namely Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, the bodies of the holy Gervasius and Protasius, and the bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix, whence the aforesaid Rudolph placed the bodies of the holy Gervasius and Protasius in the town of Breisach beside the Rhine… etc. which do not pertain here, since for the intent of the people of Cologne it is enough that the holy Nabor and Felix were brought to them with the holy three Magi, and from that time honored in their Metropolitan church, as the letter of Reynold himself (in Corio, of Rudolph), to be recited below, so expressly testifies; here we adduce only the native Milanese historians.
[28] then Donato Bossi, What are the own and genuine words of Donato Bossi, I have already confessed I do not know, but since he is adduced and impugned by Puricelli and Saxi, it is sufficiently plain that he favored the possession of the people of Cologne. Nor did Crombach himself see him, for he cites, in chapter 43, Melchior Inchofer relying on the authority of Bossi: In the same year the bodies of the holy Martyrs Nabor and Felix were also translated into Germany, as the same Bossi observes. Nor indeed is it necessary to seek more from him, since Puricelli on the Ambrosian basilica, page 812, clearly confesses that the holy Nabor and Felix, as well as the three Kings, are ascribed to the people of Cologne, not only by foreign writers; but he commemorates also his own natives: of our own countrymen, he says, we number before all others (whom indeed we have hitherto read) Donato Bossi, in the year one thousand one hundred and sixty-five, and Tristano Calco, whose words we have already recited above, and here exhibit from the source itself.
[29] Tristano Calco, The praised author, toward the end of book 1 of the history of his fatherland, page 24, enumerating various holy Martyrs; Likewise, he says, Nabor and Felix, soldiers most well known to the Emperor, suffered at Laus Pompeia, and Firmus at Verona, [and] Bergamo
the wealthiest, being brought from Milan, are beheaded. Then in his book XI, page 227, he thus speaks: The loss of a sacred thing, by far the most eminent of all, increased the calamity of the times. There were the bodies of the three Magi, who adored Christ God newly born, enclosed in the suburban church of St. Eustorgius, in a very great sepulcher, which still exists. Rainald the Bishop, admonished of their excellence, took them up on the fourth Ides of June, together with the bones of Nabor and Felix, and translated them to the metropolis of his diocese, where still they are venerated with the highest veneration of the peoples. Tristano could not set forth his mind more distinctly, whence when he lastly names these Saints, book 13, page 282, he indeed refers to the church still distinguished by their names, but concerning the presence of the sacred bodies he in no way makes mention. At this time also, he says, there were received into the city the followers of St. Francis, whom we call the Minorite Friars, and to them, not far from the Ambrosian, was granted the church of Nabor and Felix.
[30] The Milanese, I suppose, will not refuse another witness sufficiently close, and Jacobus Philippus of Bergamo: and a native by nation, Jacobus Philippus of Bergamo, cited among others by Crombach, chapter 25, from the Supplement of the Chronicles, book 12, at the year 1162. But it must not be dissembled, that from the Brescia edition of the year 1485 those things are absent which were afterward inserted, and are had in other editions, at least in the Parisian one of the year 1535. And indeed the testimony for the translation of the Kings is everywhere most plain: But Milan, the metropolis and royal city of all Cisalpine Gaul, this year, after a siege of seven years, stormed and captured by the Emperor Frederick… now for the eighth time is leveled utterly to the ground… Rudolph Archbishop of Cologne, present and assisting at this overthrow, snatched away, himself too, on the eleventh of July, the bodies of the three Magi, which St. Eustorgius Bishop of Milan had long ago translated from Constantinople to Milan, which had long lain hidden in the bell-tower of St. George, and translated them with joy with himself into Germany into his own city. But in the third year after, the Germans also took away the bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix from Milan, and translated them into Germany.
[31] These last words, which we said are lacking in the older edition, by which also, against the Bishop of Novara, can be called into doubt, as not altogether conformable to the opinion of other writers: for most, who write that Nabor and Felix were taken away, insinuate that this was done not in the third year after the Kings, but at the same time; although there are not lacking those who connect the whole matter, at least the translation, not with the year 1162, but with 1164; which can be so understood, that in the destruction of Milan all were snatched away, but were only after two years brought to Cologne, concerning which matter see Crombach disputing, chapter 41. But whatever of this be the case, the opinion of all the older Milanese writers appears sufficiently constant, concerning the certain loss of the sacred bodies, before Charles (formerly John Francis) of St. Peter's basilica, Bishop of Novara, in his brief history of the church of Milan, where he treats of St. Maternus the Bishop, page 48, began to bring forward the finding and translation of the holy Nabor and Felix made at Milan in the year 1571 by St. Charles Borromeo, on which relation Puricelli and Saxi chiefly rely. But these things must be reserved for §6, where with the same candor with which here the arguments of the Milanese for their possession will be proposed.
[32] For the rest, that finding or translation of the aforesaid Saints at Milan, of whatever kind, Ripamonti was added. did not deter Ripamonti, a most praised writer of the 17th century, from treading in the footsteps of the older historiographers of his fatherland, as his words show from the second decade of the histories of the church of Milan, which it is wonderful is not found in our Museum. But even him Puricelli and Saxi sufficiently confess adverse to themselves. His words Crombach relates in the already-mentioned chapter 25. The bodies, he says, of the three Magi, and likewise the bodies of Gervasius and Protasius, Nabor and Felix, were beyond the common injury; but that he might take away for himself, not that he might leave to us those supports, the barbarian, namely Frederick the Emperor, the overthrower of Milan. Ripamonti therefore did not recognize a sufficient identity between the bodies found by St. Charles Borromeo and those of the holy Nabor and Felix, so as to recede from the opinions of his elders. Nor does Besuzzi seem to dissent, when in the Pontifical history of Milan, page 164, he confesses that not only the three Magi were taken away by Reynold, but also other holy relics, those namely of which we shall presently hear the aforesaid Bishop speaking in his letter. And thus far the Milanese writers for the most part, bearing testimony against their fatherland for the people of Cologne. So many are the foreign witnesses, that if all were conformable, it would seem that the truth of the matter could hardly be doubted. Here now at least the chief ones are to be heard.
Annotation* years
§ V. Other arguments for the same possession.
For the people of Cologne there makes especially The people of Cologne judge that first and almost decisive argument, which is from the very letters of Reynold their Bishop, and procurator of the most precious treasure, written when the matter was most present and most recent, which Puricelli did not dare to call into doubt; but Saxi seemed so to approve them, that from those very ones, related at number 61, he argues against the people of Breisach, that the bodies of the holy Gervasius and Protasius were not deposited with them, since in that whole epistle Reynold does not mention them even by a word. But by what reasoning the praised Saxi tries to elude the force of the argument from the most express expression of the holy Nabor and Felix, will presently be plain. From this letter of Reynold, furthermore, it is necessary that great weight be added to the opinion of the people of Cologne, established for so many centuries, unless, using the common evasion, the Milanese confess that that Bishop was perspicacious in unearthing the bodies of the holy Magi, but in the others, of which we here treat, contend that he was altogether deluded, which is nearly the solution of Saxi. But wholly abstaining from the zeal of parties, we do not settle the suit, but proceed to bring into the midst the monuments produced on both sides. The already-mentioned letters of Reynold Crombach published, volume 3, book 2, chapter 28, and after him, from a most ancient Ms. codex of the monastery of Siegburg, among the epistles of Pope Alexander III, our Philip Labbe related in volume 10 of the Councils. Have here the text from Crombach:
[34] The letter of Reynold Bishop of Cologne Reynold, by the grace of God Bishop-elect of the holy church of Cologne, and Archchancellor of Italy, to the most beloved sons and friends in Christ, Herman Provost of the church of Cologne, Philip the Dean, and all the Priors and the whole clergy, and all the beneficed and ministerial men of St. Peter, and of the holy church of Cologne; and to all the burghers also of the kindly city of Cologne, greeting and affectionate service, with the fullness of intimate love. We intimate to your most beloved company, that from the wish of our most ardent desire we have now, by the grace of God, attained a happy beginning. For the leave of our most serene Lord the Emperor (Frederick) having been kindly received, with the fullness of his grace and love, dismissed by him joyfully, we have been honored with distinguished and so great gifts, of which there can be no more excellent estimation on earth: for among the other benefits of his liberality, which he most abundantly conferred on us, he gave us three most precious gifts; namely the distinguished bodies of the most blessed three Magi and Kings, who, the first-fruits of the Gentiles, in a type and presage of the future Church of the Gentiles, offered precious gifts to Christ still lying in the manger; whose most noble bodies namely, and most worthy of all veneration, at Milan in the church of Bl. Eustorgius confessor and pontiff, were solemnly and gloriously laid up.
[35] Moreover also, God going before, we bring to you the bodies of the holy martyrs Nabor and Felix, testifying that he sends those sacred bodies. that with this inestimable and incomparable treasure, to be loved above gold and every precious stone, the most sacred church and city of Cologne may be most happily enriched and perpetually adorned. We indeed, because the way through your enemies and ours is suspect to us, have disposed our journey through Burgundy and Gaul even to you, and have sent the present messenger before us from the city of Vercelli on the second Ides of June, on that day proceeding most swiftly toward Turin and toward the Alps of Mount Cenis, with the aforesaid and venerable relics: and therefore we intimately ask your most sincere love, and admonish in the Lord, that for the worthy reception of such gifts you prepare yourselves with that devotion and solemnity which you know, and which we trust of you. And beseech the Lord God also as affectionately as possible for us without ceasing, that together with them, to the glory and honor of his name, and to the perpetual salvation of all of you and of the whole fatherland, he may deign to send us back to you safe, unharmed, and unhurt. Thus far the epistle of Reynold.
[36] The writer next in age to Reynold, who mentioned in express terms not only the three Magi, There are added Ægidius of Orval, but also the sacred bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix translated to Cologne, is Ægidius, monk of Orval, who flourished in the year of the Lord 1230, in the Deeds of the Pontiffs of Liège, of the Chapeauville edition, chapter 45, page 116, where among other things pertaining to the present matter he thus has it: Afterward in the year of the Lord 1164, when Frederick the Emperor of the Romans had subjugated the Milanese, rebellious to him, and the city was in his power, Henry Bishop of Liège having died in those parts, as we said above, to whom the Emperor had conferred the bodies of the three Magi, Raynald Archbishop of Cologne asked and obtained that the often-mentioned blessed Kings be given to him. He took away thence also two most precious Martyrs, Felix and Naborius, who had suffered for Christ in the same city of Milan. He proceeds to describe the triumph of the people of Cologne in the reception of so great a treasure; then the feast of the translation instituted by the same Reynold in the diocese of Cologne; likewise a chest of wonderful beauty fashioned from gold and precious gems, in which their bodies were placed, the Kings indeed below, the aforesaid Martyrs above. Finally he testifies that these sacred bodies, when raised, gave forth a wonderful fragrance, so that they could deservedly say that Apostolic saying, We are the good odor of Christ in every place.
[37] Contemporary with Ægidius was another monk at St. Pantaleon's in the city of Cologne itself, by name Godfrey, called in his monastery the Pantaleonite, who wove most diligent annals from the year of the Lord 1162 up to the year 1237, The Pantaleonite Monk, which in the collection of Freher thus have it, page 242, at the year 1164: Meanwhile the Lord Reinold Bishop-elect of Cologne, staying with the Emperor in Italy, faithful and devoted above all the Princes who were present served him,… leave having been obtained from the Emperor, he returned with the entireness of his grace, having received from him most precious gifts, namely the bodies of the three Magi, who venerated the infancy of the Lord with mystic gifts, and the two martyrs Felix and Nabor, who with the aforesaid Magi had been venerably laid up at Milan. And so with the aforesaid and most illustrious gifts, having entered Cologne on the vigil of Bl. James, he is received gloriously and magnificently, especially for the relics, which to the perpetual glory of Germany he brought into Cologne. These things, with
the letter of Reynold himself just related, wonderfully agree: for if on the second Ides, or the XII of June, he set out from Vercelli toward Mount Cenis, by a direct route through Burgundy, he could easily have arrived at his see of Cologne on the XXIV of July, on the vigil of St. James; which not in vain did Godfrey so expressly note, so much the more worthy of faith, because he wrote at Cologne, the memory of the deeds being still recent.
[38] and very many others. I forbear to relate the texts of several other writers, since six hundred other authors, following these former ones, can add nothing much of authority: nor indeed are the Milanese moved by so numerous witnesses, judging themselves sufficiently safe almost by the single finding of St. Charles Borromeo. Saxi willingly admits and cites Gothard Hagen in the German Rhythm on the wars of Cologne for the year 1260. It would be easy to collect a cloud of other more recent witnesses after the Chronicle of Cologne, the Deeds of the abbots of St. Lawrence, the great Belgian Chronicle, and the manuscript books on the Bishops of Liège in Crombach, in the volume and book cited above, chapter 46; but neither would these confer anything of moment, as about to prove no more than the sources whence they drew their own. Concerning the lessons of the Breviary of Cologne, enough has already been abundantly said above. To contract the whole matter into few words; from those things which have been deduced in these two paragraphs, the people of Cologne judge that they most rightly conclude, that the sacred remains of the holy Nabor and Felix, received from Milan with the bodies of the holy Magi through their Archbishop Reynold, have been deposited with them since the 12th century, always held in the highest honor, most religiously venerated with the singular veneration of all, and surviving there to this very day, as being those which it is established have not been removed from their place.
§ VI. Authorities for the possession of the Milanese.
The arguments of the Milanese Joseph Anthony Saxi, praised more than once, where in his Apologetic Dissertation, number 38, he has related some authors cited above: who not only made sad mention of the remains of the holy Kings carried away from the city of Milan, but added a new loss, affirming that together with those there were also translated from Milan to Cologne the bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix: that this was falsely asserted, he says, is strongly proved by Puricelli from the translation of the same, solemnly performed at Milan by Charles Borromeo, Archbishop of most holy memory: and he cites this writer's Monuments of the Ambrosian basilica, number 461, whence we shall presently give the things which are adduced for the constant and uninterrupted possession of the Milanese, of whose validity the judgment shall be the readers'. On this the whole matter is chiefly founded, as we lately said, which was first handed down by Charles of St. Peter's basilica, Bishop of Novara, also cited above, in the brief history of the church of Milan, edited at Novara in 1615, treating cursorily of the same matter in the life of St. Charles Borromeo himself, book 3, chapter 6, page 182. That we may come to the source, an epitome of the martyrdom of the holy Nabor and Felix having been premised in the said history, at the title of St. Maternus, the seventh Bishop of Milan, that writer thus proceeds, page 48:
[40] Then their holy bodies are reported to have been carried a little after to Milan by the pious and holy matron Savina: they rely chiefly on the authority that certainly in the time of St. Ambrose they were venerated within certain rails with the highest celebration, Ambrose himself in his epistles, and Paulinus in his life, commemorate; in the basilica which is now Franciscan, but formerly was called by the name of these Martyrs, in which even today they are kept. But it must not be passed over in silence, that they were taken away from us, as was said of Gervasius and Protasius, as our Corio testifies: in which matter, as in some others, it is necessary to confess that he wrote not considerately enough. In the additions also to the Martyrology of Usuard there is mention of their translation, made together with the Magi: but in him they are said to be placed at Breisach, but in these at Cologne: so that even from this variety it may appear what faith is to be had in them, besides that concerning these too I have inquired, since I commemorated above that I inquired concerning St. Gervasius and Protasius at Breisach. But neither does Crantz, when he speaks of the Magi taken away, name these, nor does anyone say that their feast is celebrated in Germany.
[41] Some things here displease, and especially this, that he accuses Corio of inconsiderateness, of the Bishop of Novara, asserting, as though he alone of the natives wrote what for so many centuries was admitted even at Milan, as we said §4. But this displeases especially, that he falsely charges the same Corio, as if he had said that the bodies of SS. Nabor and Felix were deposited at Breisach; which I did not find in him, as is made manifest in the cited place. The silence of Crantz proves nothing at all; he could have added that Dodechinus, Neubrigensis, Siffridus, and others made mention of the bodies of the holy Kings translated, the other relics being omitted, which nevertheless that they were taken away at the same time, is sufficiently proved by the opinion expressed in the plain words of the writers cited by us. The learned know when, in what place, and how far the force of a negative argument extends. But what he lastly says, that no one says that the feast of these (SS. Nabor and Felix) is celebrated in Germany; it is certainly a wonder that this could be asserted by such a man, since the solemn cult accustomed to be paid to these Saints, as well as to the three Magi, at least at Cologne, was for many centuries before most widely known, most clearly related in the very ancient Breviaries themselves. The whole authority of this man would certainly have to fall, if the things which follow in him did not subsist on firmer grounds, in these words:
[42] But, which is the chief thing, when Charles the Archbishop, in the year 1571, on the XIV of September, was re-enclosing the relics of that basilica (namely the Franciscan, the bodies found by St. Charles in 1571; formerly of SS. Nabor and Felix), he recognized also the bodies of these Martyrs, and translated them from the place where the greater altar was before, before those friars drew the choir back from the bosom of the basilica into the hinder part to the new greater altar which was then constituted. But he found them in a chest of flint dug down into the earth, the covering being bound to the chest with iron plates, and in it, besides the bodies, he found certain glass vessels, which seemed to have contained a certain liquor, then dried up. There were found also staves and fragments of green paper exhibiting the appearance of palm leaves. That by certain staves and paper they wished to represent those ancient palms of the Martyrs, there is no doubt. Thus far the praised Bishop of Novara, adding other things which do not pertain here, yet rightly observing above, that that finding and translation, made by St. Charles Borromeo, is the Chief thing, on which almost alone can at last rely the possession, of which we here speak, of the bodies of SS. Nabor and Felix among the Milanese, which he would have established a little more firmly, if he had commemorated the names of the Saints inscribed somewhere, and those found by St. Charles; for the rest, the whole relation of the deeds was long ago published by us on the XI of June, concerning the relics of St. Barnabas, pages 454 and 455. Whether anything is wanting for evidence, let others observe.
[43] to which Puricelli added other things, But indeed, we have wished it to be only ours, faithfully to relate the arguments of both parties. Those things therefore being cited, which here we have related from the source itself, Puricelli thus subjoins in the already-mentioned number 461, page 817: And these things indeed, he says, Charles of St. Peter's basilica relates as done in his time, and consonant to the public documents, which the most prudent Archbishop then commanded to be made: of which mention is made also by Gaspar Trissino, chapter eleven. Which Trissino indeed most truly in the same place to such words of Charles, recited by himself likewise from the life of St. Maternus, subjoins these: But the heads of the Martyrs, placed apart, the holy bishop Charles was unwilling to have brought into the new tomb which he had prepared under the greatest altar, but enclosed in silver shrines (that is, two silver heads, breathing indeed much of antiquity) to be kept in the reliquary; and these we see publicly exposed in the temple only on fixed days. Furthermore Puricelli refutes Trissino, because he badly cited Genebrard for Sigebert, who did not say that SS. Nabor and Felix were translated into Gaul, but another St. Nabor, as we also noted above in its place. Then Ferrarius is beaten, having fallen into nearly the same error, concerning which more is not here to be said.
[44] impugning the translation itself And thus far concerning the finding and translation of the year 1571. Puricelli brings forward another argument, here to be subjoined by us. But indeed, he says, that those (the bodies of the holy Nabor and Felix) were not translated to Cologne even in the year 1164 of the twelfth century; let us prove this again by certain verses, which in the same Franciscan basilica a marble tablet offers us, set in the wall under the organ: on which indeed they were engraved by the command of friar Gabriel de Barlessina, from another far older one, which had once been placed on the cloister doors of the same basilica; and not much after the Franciscan friars had begun to dwell here. For with bare feet even then, according to the rigor of the primitive discipline, they walked, and were therefore then called BAREFOOT, who are now called conventuals. But here they began to dwell in the year of the Lord 1233, as also Tristano Calco affirms at that year. But by verses of this kind we shall also at the same time show, how on each Monday the frequent people would come here to the sermon, after they had poured out pious prayers in the Ambrosian church, as we mentioned at number 450. That tablet, furthermore, has it altogether in this manner, except that we have kept the rules of orthography a little more accurately.
Verses, written in most ancient characters, before the cloister doors of the church of the Minorite Friars of Milan.
[45] The kindly hall shines, renewed by pious worshipers: from verses not so ancient Which in a short time the Minorite Friars established. This place was once a garden and the house of Philip, laying up the bodies of the martyrs who suffered for Christ: A garden fruitful, whence by the said house the whole world generally is filled with immense fruits. Ancient writings report Barnabas translated hither, fame relates, his burnt ashes and leaden tomb. Here Nabor, here Felix, here Fortunatus is held, and with Maternus Caius, and the said Philip, and also the venerable body of holy Savina. To Paul, seeking heaven hence with his mind for Ambrose, he reveals Protasius with Gervasius by disclosing them. This whole place, consecrated with the blood of the Saints, is made most powerful to blot out the sins of the people: And the sacristy of this church holds one of the holy boys, whom the dire ambition of Herod slew for Christ, wherein this whole fatherland rejoices. How well the barefoot ones keep these most holy places, worthy to behold hierarchical things with Moses and Joshua. By a perpetual rite, on the returning Monday, the people, first seeking the merit and temple of Ambrose, come hither: and, filled with the words of the Lord, departing, joyful praise God, endowed with such patrons. Friar Gabriel de Barlassina, Provincial Minister of the Holy Land, caused it to be made. In the year one thousand four hundred and sixty-four.
[46] In these consists the whole second argument of Puricelli for
the possession of the Milanese, and by a certain Ambrosian Calendar. namely, that at the time when those verses were composed, that is in the year 1464, there persevered there among the Minorites a tradition of the existence of the bodies of SS. Nabor and Felix, in that place where they had first been laid. He adds lastly, that there exists with him an Ambrosian Calendar on parchment, Ms., of the year of the Lord 1381; in which everywhere are named the churches in which the feasts of the Saints were celebrated, or even their bodies buried rested. But in it, under the XII of July, thus is read: Of SS. the martyrs Nabor and Felix. They lie at St. Francis. And with these things we have discharged the faith given, of proposing faithfully on both sides the authorities by which both the people of Cologne and the Milanese contend for the sacred bodies deposited with them; by which the better right, we do not decide: let them possess as they possess; let them continue to venerate the Saints, as they have venerated; which, of the holy Gervasius and Protasius, in a like controversy, we said in volume VI of June, page 215, numbers 136 and 137, here may plainly have its place; that neither is the presence of the Saints proved by miracles, nor are the pious contentions among Catholics about these matters useless, as there you will find more fully demonstrated, and here to what has been disputed will easily apply.
Annotation* Or "of the said"?
§ VII. The Acts of the passion in Mombritius and in our Mss. not altogether conformable, nor sufficiently sincere.
The Acts of the martyrdom in Mombritius The Acts of the present holy Martyrs Mombritius first published, which same Baronius testifies he had in Mss., and which are a little longer, and here and there more verbose, than I have found them in our Ms. sheets, procured formerly by our Fr. John Gamans, so often praised in this work for his excellently rendered service; copied from a very ancient Passional of the monastery of Böddeken of the Order of St. Augustine, of the diocese of Paderborn, elsewhere also often cited. Two apographs of them exist here in Ms., differing in so few things, that I do not at all doubt they were received from the same codex. Whether furthermore these are truly more ancient, which were afterward embellished by some interpolator, as Mombritius has them, or whether rather someone contracted the Mombritian ones, is not so easy to define: although for the shorter ones stands a presumption, the more founded, because those things which in that longer passion deserve to be carped at, concerning the word "Jovis" used for "Jupiter," this has no place in the Böddeken Ms.; since he is expressly called Jupiter by Anulinus the governor, who contemptuously by the smiling St. Felix the martyr is called "Jove," so that, if the rest were absent, these shorter Acts would not so far deviate from genuine sincerity.
[48] they are sprinkled with several blemishes: There is besides objected the word "pagans," where the holy Martyrs in the Mombritian Acts, number 4, expressly say, We do not sacrifice to the gods of the pagans; as is also read in the Acts of St. Victor on the 8th of May, page 289, number 3. To which words Henschenius rightly observed, in the preliminary Commentary, number 10, page 288, that a similar manner of speaking was not usual in the time of Maximian; inasmuch as Jacob Gothofredus, on book 16 of the Theodosian codex, title 10 On the pagans etc., refers the most ancient mention of such a name, which he could hitherto find, to the beginnings of Valentinian and Valens, or the year of Christ 365: not doubting at all that that phrase had its origin from the Christians, who began so contemptuously to call the Idolaters, after their superstition, proscribed by the Christian Emperors, went out from the cities to the villages (pagi): which the reader will be able to see erudite discussed by him. To me many words do not seem necessary to prove that which the very name as it were speaks of itself; and by other examples in the same place, against the Acts of St. Victor, Henschenius shows it. But this difficulty too vanishes in the Böddeken Acts, since the gods of the pagans are there nowhere named; so that consequently a somewhat greater sincerity of these can be affirmed, if indeed they were so first written.
[49] But Tillemont brands other blemishes, in the volume 5 cited above, page 681. nor are the Böddeken ones void of like things: And first indeed, he judges it not probable enough, what is had also in the Böddeken ones, number 7, where after St. Felix had reproached Anulinus with the crimes of Jove, his minister is said to have torn his tunic. Another thing pleases neither him nor me; namely that long oration by which the same Saint narrates the whole life of Christ, not accurately enough according to the sense of the Gospel, before the judge, which that Anulinus bore patiently, is rendered not probable enough, although the discourse of the holy Martyr is much shorter in the Böddeken codex than in the edition of Mombritius. Nor does the praised writer easily allow this; that the other things which pertain to the passion are described fully enough, but the greatest prodigy which ought to have happened in it is so cursorily touched, as if it were a daily matter and by no means unusual. And immediately the holy Martyrs cast into the fire remained unharmed, and having no sign of burning, were again sent into prison. Tillemont namely would wish these things, for the sake of producing faith, expressed a little more distinctly and vigorously, according to the norm of the older Acts, in which wonders of that kind are not so drily and perfunctorily commemorated.
[50] He judges therefore, nor do I much dissent from him, that that whole history of the martyrdom, so that these too were written later, sprinkled with the barbarism of later times, was composed not a few centuries after the passion of the Saints, that it might be read beforehand at their festivity, or recited for the sermon, when it was solemnly frequented with a more celebrated veneration by the faithful people: which not of this Legend alone, but of almost innumerable passions of the holy Martyrs must be admitted, no one is ignorant who is not a stranger in dealing with these, so that I judge it altogether superfluous to demonstrate this in this place by more arguments: from the last number it is not obscurely understood, that there was some herald, who somewhere discoursed on the praises of our holy Martyrs. For the rest, one ought to recognize in them some gravity and a simplicity void of paint, which nevertheless do not approach the elegance, candor, and energy of the consular Acts. But that history of the passion, which we shall give in the first place from the praised Böddeken codex, seems to surpass the other longer one, as already said, on this title, that it is obnoxious to fewer blemishes.
[51] There remains a question not easily soluble, whether from the Acts of St. Victor related on the VIII of May the passion of these SS. Nabor and Felix was received, received perhaps from the Legend of St. Victor; or on the contrary; or rather on the contrary, from this Legend the Victorian one was composed. That one or the other happened is sufficiently plain; for if they be accurately collated, it will manifestly appear that not only the exordium was mutually borrowed, but that in many other things so great a conformity occurs, that there is no doubt but that the one in great part shone before the other. From a few specimens gather the rest. Thus begin the Acts of St. Victor: The impious Maximian reigning as Emperor, in the city of Milan there was a great persecution of the Christians. But there was there a certain soldier, a Moor by race, by name Victor, most well known to the Emperor. Then the ministers announced to the Emperor, saying: Most clement Lord. And so on through the whole number 1. But in the following: Then Maximian the Emperor, filled with wrath, ordered clubs to be brought, and him to be stretched out and beaten in his sight, and three sets of three to pass by and to cry to him: Sacrifice to the gods etc. Number 3; Then Maximian the Emperor, angered, ordered him to be sent again into prison at the gate which is called Roman; and there to be guarded by soldiers. And when he had been there three days, he ordered him to be led out of prison, and the Emperor said to him: Victor, sacrifice to those gods, whom the true divinity has proved to be gods. St. Victor answered: I do not sacrifice to the gods of the pagans. Lest I stick here longer, both these and the rest can be collated by the curious.
[52] the antiquity of this one was long ago overthrown. The antiquity of the aforesaid Legend of St. Victor, falsely believed on the authority of a writer lying that he was an eyewitness, Henschenius long ago overthrew, in the place cited above, so that from such a mark of antiquity nothing of moment accrues to them. Furthermore, that the holy Nabor and Felix were crowned with martyrdom before Victor, the Acts of the latter prove, if they contain anything of truth. What wonder therefore if their deeds were first consigned to writing in an epitome, from which some Legendist composed the history of St. Victor, referring to one alone the things which there are disputed by two against the same Emperor and the same judge, other things being added, which from the long tradition of the Milanese he had received as proper to St. Victor, or feigned that he had received. Which you prefer, matters not much: that Notker saw some Legend of St. Victor, he himself sufficiently indicates, but that he was ignorant of the deeds of the holy Nabor and Felix, we judge manifest from the confusion discussed above. The Acts of St. Victor Henschenius judged neither ancient nor sincere, nor would I dare to assert that others are endowed with those marks, especially as they are edited by Mombritius: the things which we shall give in the first place from the praised Böddeken codex will seem more tolerable, when we shall have said a few things concerning the time of the martyrdom.
[53] At what time the holy Martyrs suffered, The Acts of the passion of St. Victor suffer a difficulty from the clause or prophecy inserted by the author, concerning the death of Maximian to follow in the same year. The words are at number 5 toward the end: And when St. Victor was being led, he said to the soldiers who were leading him: Tell the Emperor Maximian, that this year he shall die, and when he is dead, no burial shall receive him, unless his shins be broken: which Henschenius shows to be false, and from other circumstances argues the writer, because in that very year 310, in which the tyrant perished ill, he was by no means in that place, so as to have much desire to think of persecuting the Christians; so that consequently he judges the martyrdom of St. Victor is to be connected not with the year 310, but rather 303. Which if it were true, to the preceding year would have to be referred the things which are commemorated of our Martyrs. But for that Henschenius does not so greatly contend; ready to concede that they be removed to the other year, and that it can even be said, that SS. Nabor and Felix, if they truly suffered on the XII of July, and St. Victor on the VIII of May; in the year 303 having obtained the crown, this one in the following 304 consummated his passion. If perhaps you should contend that the martyrdoms of laymen were rarer in that year 303; I shall answer, that our Saints could have suffered toward the beginning of the year 304, or at least a little before St. Victor, but that on this day some translation is honored, which I shall easily admit, provided they be not said to have been carried from Africa. Behold now the Acts themselves, such as we have already sufficiently described, from the Böddeken Codex and Mombritius: for the other more contracted ones, which exist in our Ms. codex marked with the letter P 19, and in which is commemorated the translation of the sacred bodies made to Cologne, are not of such moment as to deserve to occupy a place here.
[54] and what we would wish to be absent from the Böddeken passion. I would have the readers forewarned of this, that to me more
the aforesaid Böddeken Acts would have pleased, if at number 8 they ended at these words: "and there with worthy veneration buried them"; the whole clause being omitted; "These are the soldiers of Christ etc.," by which it seems to be indicated that that whole passion was compiled to celebrate the solemnity of the Saints, as was insinuated above in a word: unless perhaps that epilogue alone should be judged more recent, sewn on by some preacher, who otherwise recited the Acts as he had found them in more ancient monuments. Nor indeed would anyone sufficiently understand what the last words nearly mean; But the holy Martyrs of Christ suffered on the IV Ides of July under Maximian the Emperor; but the commemoration of their celebration is held on the second Ides of June in the city of Milan. I am greatly deceived, if these were written by a Milanese, since there they are not known to be venerated on any day other than the 12th of this month. Perhaps he found some confused Martyrology, such as were related on the XII of June, on the occasion of another St. Nabor, whence he took occasion for erring. In the Mombritian Acts there is also its own conclusion, not a little different from this, but there concerning the cult for the XII of June is deep silence. But now receive the Acts themselves.
PASSION
From the Ms. codex of the monastery of Böddeken, Collated with another apograph, in a few things mutilated.
Nabor, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
Felix, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
BHL Number: 6028
FROM THE MSS.
The impious Maximian reigning as Emperor, when in the city of Milan there was a great persecution of the Christians, Accused before Maximian, there were there certain soldiers Nabor and Felix, most well known to the Emperor. Then the ministers announced to the Emperor, saying: Most clement Lord Emperor, behold Nabor and Felix have been made Christians, they blaspheme our Gods, saying that they are demons. Which having been heard, the Emperor commanded them to be presented to him, and addressing them one by one, said to Nabor: Nabor, our soldier, what was lacking to you, that you should make yourself a Christian? Nabor answered: I was not lately made a Christian, but almost from the beginning of my age. The Emperor said: Therefore you are manifestly a Christian? Nabor answered: I manifestly adore Christ the Son of God, and believe that he was born of the Virgin Mary through the Holy Spirit. The Emperor therefore, filled with wrath, commanded him to be sent to prison, and Felix having been summoned, said to him: What seems to you: Do you too desire to perish with Nabor your companion? Sacrifice to the gods and be our friend. But if you do not sacrifice, I will slay you with various punishments. Felix answered: I fear not your torments, but believing the Lord Jesus Christ to be the true Son of God, I offer myself a sacrifice to him.
[2] Then the Emperor commanded him to be sent to his companion Nabor in prison, they spurn threats and blandishments; saying: Go, deliberate among yourselves, how you may escape the torments which strongly are ready to tear you apart. When therefore they had remained twelve days in prison, so that neither bread was given to them nor water, on the thirteenth day the Emperor commanded a tribunal to be prepared for him in the Hippodrome of the circus, and the holy ones of God Nabor and Felix having been brought, said to them: What have you deliberated concerning your salvation, my friends? Nabor answered: He who does not fear to have his God an enemy, that man will be able to have you, Emperor, a friend; whose friendships, by how much they are more bitter to me, by so much the enmities are sweeter. The Emperor said: You Felix b, what do you say? Felix answered: What Nabor said I too say, for one life and faith are ours. The Emperor said: Therefore this pleases you, that despising my commands, you die? Nabor answered: The death which you threaten to bring upon us is our life, and therefore we do not fear your wrath, through which an everlasting crown is prepared for us.
[3] as also the torments Hearing these things, the Emperor commanded Anulinus his consular c, that on the following day he should vex them with various punishments in his secretary's chamber, if they refused to sacrifice; but if they consented, that he should exalt them with great gifts and honors. Obeying whose commands, Anulinus, when he had shown both blandishments and various torments to the soldiers of Christ many times, and could not recall them from their intention, reported this to the Emperor; who commanded them to be sent again to prison, beside the gate which is called Roman, and more closely guarded by soldiers. But after five days, having again led them out of the custody of the prison, the Emperor addresses them in these words: Sacrifice to our Gods, whom the true divinity has shown manifest. To these things the holy Martyrs with one voice said: We will never sacrifice to demons, nor before a corruptible man will we begin to lose that which in the sanctification of baptism we received; Whence what you are about to do, do quickly, for he who fights for us will repay a worthy reward for our labors.
[4] by which they are tortured by Anulinus. The Emperor therefore and Anulinus his consular commanded them to be stretched out, and five sets of three d with clubs to pass over them and to say: sacrifice to the gods whom the Emperor adores: but when not even in this way could the minds of the soldiers of Christ be bent, Anulinus commanded Nabor to be suspended on the rack and scraped with claws e. But Nabor said to the Emperor: Did I not tell you, that your enmities exalt me, and make me acquire ampler grace in the sight of my King? Only devise you the torments; you can tear the flesh, but the soul struggling for the truth you avail not to conquer. To these things Anulinus: Since, he says, I see this one rather to choose the torments than to fear them, remove him, and bring in his colleague.
[5] The oration of St. Felix To whom, immediately brought in, Anulinus said: Tell me, Felix, what is the cause of the hardness of your brother, that, handled with such scourges f, he in no way wishes to consent to the commands of our Emperor? Felix answered: Because these torments have an end, but those which are prepared for those who sacrifice to idols have no end at all. Anulinus said: whence know you this? Felix answered: The true Master taught me. And he, In what order, he says, did he teach you? Felix said: Christ the Son of God, that he might help men, took on a man, whom the Blessed Virgin conceiving, remained a virgin in the birth, and after the birth. Him placed in the cradle, the angels descending from heaven showed to the shepherds of sheep, who immediately adoring him, indicated simply to their acquaintances what they had seen and heard done about them. Then the Magi, summoned by the sign of a brighter star, came from the east, and offering him in their vessels gold, frankincense, and myrrh, suppliantly adored him: which when King Herod heard, he commanded all the two-year-old g infants who were in Bethlehem and in all its borders to be slain; because he feared him as the successor of his kingdom, whose kingdom and power has no end.
[6] After these things, when through the increases of times our Lord and Master had grown, concerning the life and miracles of Christ. he began to preach to the people of the Jews that the souls going out of bodies, if they had been Idolaters [h], or polluted with human blood, are given over to eternal fires, but if they had been clean, enjoy eternal delights. To him preaching such things the Jews said: Whence can you prove these things? And he: Bring, he says, to me your blind ones; Who as soon as they were brought, he enlightened them; likewise to the deaf he restored hearing, to the lame gait, to paralytics health; he commanded the winds, walked upon the sea with dry feet, and, which is greater than all these, raised the dead. But although by these and other unheard-of wonders he showed the power of his divinity, yet impious Judea not only was unwilling to believe in him, but also, crucifying him, condemned him to death. But he on the third day rose again, and preaching for forty days to his Disciples the same things as before his passion, while they beheld, ascended into heaven, whence he will come at the end of the world, to judge the living and the dead and the world by fire. This is our faith, which is neither conquered by torments, nor burnt by flames, nor overcome by the sword of the raging enemy.
[7] Anulinus therefore, patiently hearing all these things, Unharmed amid the flames, said: As I see, my God Jupiter is the true God: for your God, by your own testimony, was crucified; but Jupiter never laid down his omnipotence, but rather amplified it in his dominions. To these things Felix, smiling, said: Your God Jove i lived after a barbaric manner, was an adulterer and parricide, and moreover violated his own sister: if you shall believe this one to be God, you shall be burnt with perpetual fires. Then the minister of Anulinus, tearing his tunic, cried out and said: Deservedly will our gods be angry with us, if these are not burnt up with fires; and immediately the holy Martyrs cast into the fire remained unharmed, and having no sign of burning, were again sent into prison.
[8] But after some little k time, proceeding into the city of Lodi, at last they are beheaded. he commanded the soldiers of Christ, bound with chains as an example to the Christians, to be led with him, where when they had remained three days, on the third day he commanded a seat to be prepared for him outside the city, and the Martyrs of Christ having been brought, said to them: At least now leave your magic art, and lest you be an example to all, bring libations to our gods. The holy Martyrs answered: We know not the magic art, but Jesus Christ the Son of the living God we adore and venerate, and your threats we fear not at all. Then the Emperor, vehemently angered, commanded them to be beaten with clubs, and thus finally in the same place to be beheaded. And when they had been beheaded, beside the gate of the city, and lay near the river which is called Exelera l, a certain religious woman, a matron of the same city, having secretly taken them up and placed them on a vehicle, led them to Milan, and there with worthy veneration buried them.
[9] Epilogue. These are m the soldiers of Christ who, fortified with invincible arms, clothed with the breastplate of faith and the helmet of salvation, were surrounded with heavenly protection, nor could be stormed by any threats of persecutors. Let us therefore celebrate their day, whose merit shone through the world like the splendor of the firmament; and the odor of sweetness emanated into the whole world through the tokens of miracles. But the holy Martyrs of Christ suffered on the IV Ides of July under Maximian the Emperor, but the commemoration of their celebration is held on the second Ides of June in the city of Milan, to the glory and praise of our Lord Jesus Christ, reigning world without end. Amen.
ANNOTATIONS.
h. He means idolaters.
ACTS
A little fuller.
From the edition of Mombritius.
Nabor, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
Felix, Martyr, at Milan and Cologne (S.)
BHL Number: 6029
FROM THE MSS.
The Saints brought to him The impious Maximian reigning as Emperor in the city of Milan, there was a persecution of the Christians. But there were there certain soldiers Nabor and Felix, most well known to the Emperor. Then the ministers announced to the Emperor, saying: Most clement Lord Emperor, Nabor and Felix have been made Christians, and blaspheme our Gods: and say that they are demons. Then the Emperor, indignant, commanded them to be seized, and led to him. To whom he said one by one: Nabor, our soldier, what did you judge to be lacking to you, that you should make yourself a Christian? Nabor answered: I was not lately made a Christian: but almost from the beginning of my age. Maximian the Emperor said: Therefore, as you assert, you have been made a Christian? Nabor answered: I am manifestly a Christian, and Christ the Son of the living God, born of the Virgin Mary through the Holy Spirit, I adore and believe, and with my mouth cease not to praise. Then Maximian the Emperor, filled with wrath, commanded him to be sent to prison, and Felix having been summoned, said to him: What seems to you? Do you too, foolish one, desire to perish with Nabor your companion? Sacrifice to the gods, and be our friend. For if you too do not sacrifice, various torments await you.
[2] Felix answered: Your torments in no way terrify me, with threats and promises for know that I in no way deny the Son of the true God the Lord Jesus Christ; but especially offer him a sacrifice to the true God. Maximian the Emperor, angered, commanded him to be sent into the same prison where he had sent blessed Nabor, saying: Certainly I will make you breathe out your spirit with various torments. He was led into the same prison beside the circus, for those going to the Ticinese gate: and he commanded them to be diligently guarded, saying: Go and deliberate among yourselves, how you may escape the horrid torments, which will strongly tear you, if you refuse to sacrifice. Sent therefore into prison, they spent twelve days; and he commanded that neither bread nor water be given to them. But on the thirteenth day Maximian the Emperor commanded a tribunal to be prepared for him on high in the hippodrome of the circus, and commanded the holy Nabor and Felix to be brought, and said to them: What have you deliberated, my friends, concerning your salvation? St. Nabor said: He ought to become your friend who does not fear to have his Lord an enemy; for by how much your friendships are bitter to me, by so much your enmities are sweeter to me.
[3] Maximian said: You Felix, what do you say? Felix said: Maximian tries in vain: what Nabor said, I too say, for one life and faith is ours. Maximian said: Therefore this pleases you, that despising my commands you die by death? To whom Nabor: The death which you threaten to bring upon us is our life; and therefore we fear not your wrath, because from it is our perpetual life and crown and eternal palm. Then Maximian, angered, said to Anolinus his counselor: Tomorrow morning in your secretary's chamber; let them be vexed with various punishments, if they scorn to sacrifice; but if they consent, both join them to your love, and present them to my friendships. Anolinus therefore the counselor said: Why do you not sacrifice to the gods whom the Emperor adores, and to whom he bends his neck? But the holy Martyrs answered: We do not receive the rewards promised by you, nor fear your punishments, but from our Lord daily we receive fortitude.
[4] Then Anolinus announced to Maximian the Emperor; and the Emperor commanded them to be sent to prison at the gate which is called Roman, nor do the torments avail more, and there to be guarded by soldiers. And when they had been there shut up for five days, he commanded them on the fifth day to be led out of prison, and the Emperor said to them: Sacrifice to those gods, whom the true divinity has shown. The holy Martyrs said: We do not sacrifice to the gods of the Pagans a, and it is base for us, that what in the sanctification of baptism we received, we should humble to a corruptible man placed in every necessity: we do not do it; do what you are about to do, for stronger than you is he who fights for us. Then Maximian the Emperor and Anolinus his counselor commanded clubs to be brought, and them to be stretched out, and five sets of three to pass by, and to cry to them; Sacrifice to the gods whom the Emperor and all adore. Nabor said: Our Lord the eternal and true King said: Everyone who sacrifices to idols shall be rooted out.
[5] inflicted by Anulinus on each separately. Anolinus said: Let him be hung on the rack. And when blessed Nabor had been hung, and was being burnt with lamps, and scraped with claws, he said: Did I not tell you, that your enmities exalt me, and make me acquire ampler glory in the sight of my King? Meanwhile devise you harsher torments; for you can tear the flesh, but the soul you cannot conquer, striving in faith and truth. Anolinus the counselor said: Since I see him with a rebellious mind rather mock the blows and torments than fear them, remove him, and bring in his colleague. Felix therefore was brought in, and Anolinus said: Tell me, Felix, what is the cause of the hardness of your brother, that, dried out with such blows and the rack, and burnt with flames, and dug out with claws, he in no way wished to consent, to fulfill the commands of the most sacred Emperor? Felix said: Because these torments have an end, but those torments which are prepared for those who sacrifice to idols have no end at all.
[6] Anolinus said: Whence know you these things? Felix said: By St. Felix, the life of Christ, Christ the Son of God, that he might help men, took on a man, whom the Virgin conceived, a virgin brought forth, and remained a virgin after the birth. Him, first of all born and placed in the cradle, the angels descending from heaven, praising and adoring, showed to the shepherds of sheep. Likewise the shepherds of sheep, adoring him, indicated simply to their acquaintances what they had seen and heard done about them. Likewise the Magi, summoned by the sign of a great star, coming from the East, offering gold, frankincense, and myrrh in their vessels, adored him. These things c when King Herod sought among the infants and did not find, he caused all the two-year-old infants who were in the city of Bethlehem to be slain. Him his Father, who reigns in the heavens, opening the heavens, manifested, saying: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. He, overcoming all the temptations of the devil, ascended a mountain, and calling to him his disciples, began to show them the eternal beatitudes, and by what works they can be acquired.
[7] the miracles, the passion, But after these things he began to say to the people of the Jews, that the souls going out of bodies, if they were idolaters, or polluted with human blood, are given over to eternal fires: but those which had been clean of these crimes or of other iniquitous works, free from punishments, shall enjoy eternal delights. Then the Jews said: Whence can you prove these things? The Lord says to them: Bring to me the blind; who when they had been brought to him, he enlightened them. Likewise also to the deaf he restored hearing, to the lame gait, to paralytics he restored health, healed all infirmities; cast out demons from men, restrained tempests by his command, commanded the winds, walked upon the waves of the sea with dry feet. He so raised the dead, that he recalled even a four-days-dead stinking man in the sepulcher to life.
[8] the resurrection and ascension into heaven are explained. When he did these things, and delivered this power also to his disciples, he said to the Jews; If you believe not the words, at least believe the works. But they not only did not believe, but even crucified him, and for forty days meeting with his disciples, he took food before them: he commanded also that he be handled; and repeated all the things which he had spoken to them before the passion. But after forty days, while his eleven disciples beheld, he ascended the heavens. To whom, looking at the heaven, angels appeared, saying: Why do you stand gazing into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you, as you see him going to the heavens, so shall he come. This is our faith, which is in Christ, is not conquered by torments, is not burnt by flames, is not overcome by the sword.
[9] Then Anolinus the counselor said, As I see, my God Jove d, Unhurt amid the flames, is the true God. For your God, whom you yourself have named, was crucified; but Jove never laid down his omnipotence, but rather amplified it in his dominions. Then Felix, smiling, said: Your Jove lived after a barbaric manner: an adulterer of wives: a defiler of boys, and a parricide: moreover he also usurped his own sister as wife. If you shall believe this one to be God, with him you shall be burnt with perpetual fires. Then the minister of the counselor, tearing his tunic, cried out: The gods will be angry with us, if these are not burnt up with fires. Then Anolinus the counselor commanded them to be consumed with fires. Who when they had been cast into the fire, remained unharmed. Then again he commanded them to be sent to prison.
[10] Who when after some days he had proceeded into the city of Lodi, by beheading they complete their martyrdom. the Emperor commanded the Saints, bound with chains as an example to the Christians, to be led with him, and after the third day commanded a seat to be prepared for him outside the city. When they had been led to the middle, Maximian the Emperor said: Now lay aside your pride, and leave the magic art; for you shall be an example to all. The most blessed martyrs Nabor and Felix answered: We know not the magic art, but we have the Lord Jesus Christ the Son of the living God, in whom we believe, for your threats we fear not. Then Maximian, angered, commanded them to be beaten with clubs, and to undergo capital sentence; who were beheaded beside the gate of the city of Lodi, near the river by name Scilera. And they, although they gave themselves to the earth e, yet our earth merited to receive and lay up their relics in its bosom: and as of old the maternal womb brought them forth into this light, so also the belly of our earth will lead them, about to rise again, to the perpetual palm f. These a pious and religious woman, a certain one by name Savina, a matron of Lodi, having by theft taken up from the city, and placed on her own
vehicle, led to Milan with full affection of religion, and gave to our city. She was worthy of the fellowship of that holy widow Anna, to whom she is compared in religion and equal likeness.
[11] The writer's epilogue. And g as the stars placed in heaven cannot lie hidden from human sight, so the merit of the Saints shone out through the world, and the odor of the Lord's sweetness through the passion of Christ was diffused into the whole world. These are the good soldiers of Christ, who are fortified with their proper arms, who are protected by the breastplate of faith, and the helmet of salvation, and the heavenly and spiritual shield. Let us therefore celebrate their day, that we may follow the examples or imitation of them, as undefiled and immaculate lambs of Jesus Christ our Lord. The Martyrs Nabor and Felix suffered on the fourth of the Ides of July under Maximian the Emperor, our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor and glory world without end. Amen.
ANNOTATIONS.
The things which were observed on the former Acts ought to be referred here also.
ON ST. PRIMITIVUS, MARTYR,
AT ROME.
From the Hieronymian codices.
CommentaryPrimitivus, Martyr, at Rome (S.)
J. B. S.
That the little tablets of the Hieronymian codices on this day ought to be recognized as dislocated, has already been said in more than one place: here treatment is made of St. Primitivus the martyr, in the Blume and Lucca ones badly joined to the Martyrs of Milan, Nabor and Felix; worse, banished by the Corbie one into Sicily, with some companion Julius, who, whence they came there I know not: In Sicily, the birthday of Nabor, Felix, Primitivus, Julius. Those various transpositions of the codices, whether major or minor, being omitted, the most ancient Epternach copy distinguished the matter more clearly; rightly ascribing Nabor and Felix to Milan: At Milan, of Nabor and Felix. Then indeed: At Rome, of Primitivus; for which the Blume one wrongly reads Privitivus. The authority of the purer codex alone sufficiently vindicates the name and location; nor need one recur to the supplements of Bede or Usuard, in which either the same or a greater confusion of the whole little tablet will be found.
ON THE HOLY MARTYRS
DIVUS OR DIUS, CORNIUS OR CORNINSIUS, AND LAVENTIUS
AT CÆSAREA IN CAPPADOCIA.
From the Martyrologies.
CommentaryDivus or Dius, Martyr, at Cæsarea in Cappadocia (S.)
Cornius or Corninsius, Martyr, at Cæsarea in Cappadocia (S.)
Laventius, Martyr, at Cæsarea in Cappadocia (S.)
J. B. S.
The names of these three Martyrs, variously formed in the Hieronymian codices and other Martyrologies, and expressed in a different number, it has seemed good to relate thus, that none should be omitted, although not all are found in the several codices. Sufficiently unusual are the announcements of the Lucca and Corbie ones, when they write; At Cæsarea, of St. Divus, so that you would almost doubt whether "Sanctus" (holy) be not a proper name as well as "Divus," since the appellation "sanctus" in the Hieronymian codices is rarer. In the formation of the second Martyr they differ, for in the Lucca one it is Cornilisi, in the Corbie one Corninsi, in which way also the Blume one writes, from which the contracted Hieronymian ones do not much differ, the Augsburg one by Cornenci and the Labbe one by Corninse; so that I have kept Corninsii, with a separation from Cornii, which the Epternach one retains; At Cæsarea of Cappadocia, of Divus, Cornus, Lavensus: but Cornelius being rejected, from the codex of the Queen of Sweden, in which nevertheless the location is rightly marked, as in the Epternach one, Cæsarea of Cappadocia. Furthermore in this codex alone is found the one who is placed in the third place, Laventius. Thus far those older copies, in which I constantly read the name Divus, nowhere Dius, so that you would not easily divine what guide Ado had (for Bede, Florus, and the Little Roman keep deep silence about Dius) that first among the Martyrologists of the 9th century, the companion or companions being omitted, he simply wrote: At Cæsarea, of St. Dius, whom I marvel to have been neglected by Notker: Usuard certainly expressly wrote; At Cæsarea, of St. Dius. Why in the Roman it has no place, I said in the Observations on Usuard. Greven snatched the palm of martyrdom from St. Divus or Dius, when he thus announced: At Cæsarea, of blessed Dius the confessor. Nor is it a wonder or a novelty, that by the carelessness of the copyists variations are introduced into the Martyrologies.