CONCERNING B. IMELDA LAMBERTINA
VIRGIN OF BOLOGNA.
A.D. 1333
CommentaryImelda Lambertina, Virgin of Bologna (B.)
BY THE AUTHOR G. H.
Among the monuments, which concerning B. Imelda hitherto we have seen, stands out an epitaph, by the Lambertini Family erected, which is of this kind.
To God Best Greatest. Blessed Imelda Lambertina, The epitaph in the place of her first burial outside the city. a Virgin sprung of illustrious birth, more illustrious by the precocious holiness of her life. When with divine of the sacred Eucharist kindled desire, on account of her age's weakness (she had scarcely passed her eleventh year) to the most sacred of it table to approach she feared; into pious prayers and tearful poured out, by divine wholly help to be refreshed she merited, a host from heaven sent down; after whose taking happily she expired in the year of the Lord 1333. Her bones, for many years here entombed, to the nuns of the Order of Preachers, who from here into the monastery of St. Mary Magdalene within the city migrated; the demanding and granting Brothers of this house, thither were brought back. In the year of the Lord 1582 on the Kalends of March, the Lambertini Family, for the pious memory of their Family and posterity's example, this stone set. This epitaph published Celsus Falcon a Lateran Canon Regular, in the Historical Memory of the Bologna See, book 4 page 350, Michael Pio of Bologna book 2 on the Illustrious Men of the Order of St. Dominic chapter 18, and others.
[2] Antony Masini in Bologna Surveyed at the day the 16th of June, The body now within it in the monastery of St. Mary Magdalene; on the occasion of the solemnity on account of the dedication of the Church of St. Mary Magdalene, in the Galliera square situated, indicates from the year 1129 it quite small to have belonged to the Benedictine monks; then from the year 1289 to have been a parochial Church, afterwards in the year 1303 to have been given to the Servite Fathers, who in the year 1305 of it received the full possession. Finally, what here especially pertains, in the year 1566, the faculty being given through an Apostolic Brief by Pius V the Pontiff, was made a permutation between the said Servite Fathers and the Dominican Nuns, who at that time dwelt outside the Saragossa gate in Valle-Petra, in the Church of St. Mary Magdalene: and on both sides on the day the 17th of May at the same hour in a public procession migrated the Servite Fathers outside the city, and the nuns into the City, the name of the prior monastery assumed, with the sacred Relics: and so now are kept among the said Nuns the bodies of St. Eugenia Virgin and Martyr, and of B. Imelda of the Lambertini. But the body of St. Eugenia was from Rome in the time of Gregory XV in the year 1622 received, as indicates Masini at the day the 19th of January, on which the feast of the translation is celebrated.
[3] Louis Torelli an Augustinian, by profession of sacred Theology, by various governance, even of the Provincialate, and by several books published celebrated, grants to the Order of Preachers, that the memory it should recall of B. Imelda of the Lambertini, a most noble little Virgin of Bologna, which was first of the Augustinian nuns, because her sacred Relics it possesses. But he asserts B. Imelda in the said monastery to have lived and to have died, when in it dwelt Augustinian Nuns. The whole mystery explains the above-praised Masini page 129 number 18, where he asserts, in the said monastery first to have dwelt Cluniac monks of the Order of St. Benedict, and them their habit left to have assumed another of St. Augustine according to the Brictinian Congregation, and to be extant three Apostolic Briefs to them granted by Innocent IV. Afterwards the monks migrating thence, about the year 1259 to have entered Augustinian Nuns. then of the Dominican nuns. Besides from the Register of the General Bartholomew of Venice, on the 17th of September of the year 1391 signed, to be established them then still there to have resided. But in the year 1505 to have received the rule and habit of Dominican Nuns. These Masini. Torelli the occasion of that monastery in the register being named explains in an epistle to us given, when he says there to be had, that Bartholomew the General, a certain Brother Stephen deprived of the study of the Bologna monastery, because he had associated a certain Bologna student; to the aforesaid monastery, against the ordinances and commands of the same General. Promises moreover Torelli in his fourth volume of centuries, which prepared for the press he has, himself her Life as of an Augustinian about to describe: adds besides the mother of Imelda to have been Castora of the Galluzzi, whom he suspects a german sister to have been of Brother Neapolio, of the Augustinian Order in the aforesaid convent a nursling: to whom John Pope XXII, through a bull given in the year 1324, faculty made of two monasteries to be founded between Bologna and Tuscany: Which suspicion if true is, appears the cause why the girl in this Order's rather, than another's monastery she was placed.
[4] Another difficulty is that it be explained how she, who on account of age by the judgment of the Confessors abstained from the taking of the most sacred Eucharist, Imelda whether truly she was religious is doubted. by the same could be esteemed fit, for the monastic religion even in the grade and order of a Novice. She could the habit have assumed by the will or even vow of her parents, and in the said monastery (which even now is done) among the nuns to have lived, that afterwards there, when by age it should be lawful, her probation she might begin: in that manner namely, in which Eugenius IV concerning St. Nicholas of Tolentino in the Bull of Canonization says, in the order of the Augustinians from boyhood to have been educated, and in the Process is read the habit of the Order scarcely ten years old to have taken. By this moreover example tries Torelli to prove, B. Imelda then as a Nun the habit to have taken, when not yet by the Church was prescribed a certain time, for the religious habit's taking as much for men as for women.
[5] The year of death in the Epitaph is assigned the one thousand three hundred thirty-third. her death in the year 1333 on the day the 12th of May. To this the above-cited Celsus Falcon adds the day the 12th of May and the feast of the Lord's Ascension. But because in the said year the Dominical letter being C Easter fell on the day the 4th of April and the feast of the Ascension on the 13th of May, we reckon to be read the Eve of the Lord's Ascension: especially because Masini and the rest with the same Falcon constantly the day of death assert to be the 12th of May. Laher in the Menology of Virgins referred it to the Kalends of March, on which day the Epitaph by the Lambertini was set. The Life of B. Imelda, in Italian by Celsus of Sassoferrato a monk written, The Life written, into Latin and Flemish rendered and published at Antwerp about the year 1638 the noble Lord John Baptist Lambertini, from the Bologna Lambertini sprung, to us once very well known, as also his son of the same with his father name a Senator of this city of Antwerp. This Life to the reader we set forth, from the already given observations easily about to understand, what in it through the ignorance of antiquity is amiss, what from liberal and probable conjecture expressed, what finally from certain and constant tradition received ought to be esteemed.
[6] Imelda, although sprung of illustrious parents, namely from the very ancient and Senatorial lineage of the Lambertini among the first of the Bologna dominion (from which family, Of a noble progeny born as from a most fruitful stock of ancestral nobility, the highest continuously men came forth; whose lofty minds and excellent virtue in peace and war it was permitted to discern: as those who new always as much for themselves as for their city ornaments produced) that splendor however and nobility, which by her virtue and toward God religion she for herself procured, and to the world made plain, doubtless every light, from the most illustrious otherwise ancestors sprung and propagated, and dignity from the same drawn far excels: which in the female although sex, beyond what can be believed, her stock she exalted. Whence no common, of this so excellent Virgin's birth, the illustrious lineage praise for itself claims, and before the rest Imelda's very parent, who so noble offspring received and into light brought. For if true is, what is most true (as from the mouth of Christ sprung) By their fruits you shall know them, who with a worthy proclamation the fertile of this illustrious fruit root would embrace? Matth. 7, 16 Certainly if it were lawful the sincere of the sacred pages sense somewhat to bend, and to another woman to ascribe, what B. Elizabeth to the eternal of the Heavens Queen attributes, to say I would not be afraid: Blessed thou among women, and blessed the fruit of thy womb. Since with a better right could this mother, than that Spartan woman once, her little daughter shown, glory and say: Of this kind ought to be of an honest woman the works, and of these to boast herself. But of all Queens the glory this our mother surpasses, who of daughters born to them in beauty and modesty of comeliness, and for the nuptials of Kings fit could glory: for has this mother a daughter, with all indeed, which nature is wont to bestow, ornaments comely furnished, and of heaven and earth likewise the Monarch's bridal chamber associated. Born therefore Imelda of Egano Lambertini more and more daily profited in wisdom and age and grace with God and men; from infancy to virtue given, and scarcely cut as yet with her tender tongue she lisped speech, but continually, I know not what above human she displayed, and that disposition betrayed, even now with virtue imbued: so much with the milk of her nurse piety she had sucked. But now what future harvest dost thou think, where so early the seeds of graces and virtues their roots driven deep break forth? Nothing in her of insolence, nothing of levity, nothing of immature immodesty an appearance afforded: but a rare certain in an infant (who would believe) maturity, all deservedly into admiration carried. From weeping not of old-wifish fables, but of spiritual things narration, and pious documents she suffered herself to be called away. When the years of infancy a little she had exceeded, an oratory for herself by herself built, prayer-beads, the Davidic verses, and other little books of pious prayers, in the place of boyish rattles she had: and concerning these and other such, when discourse fell, not a little girl, but as if a grave and religious woman acting thou wouldst have heard.
[7] At length as soon as she attained the tenth year of age (O how wonderful is God in His Saints!) continually something greatest in her mind she agitated. See plainly precocious, ten years old in a monastery she dwells: most certain however and most sweet of virtues fruits. Scarcely the world's ornaments and her paternal house's splendor the little girl beheld, when from them herself to remove she resolved; all by a mature and firm counsel notable, by which to be eminent she could, as fleeting, as vile, as of herself less worthy despising, and below herself all human things judging, voluntary poverty, chastity and obedience to embrace, and so into a religious family to pass she decreed. And when with many prayers and tears it she pursued, often the Heads-of-monasteries through herself through others a suppliant being made, at length sometime by all's vote into the most holy of the Religious of St. Dominic family she was admitted, which at that time not far from the city of Bologna, in a celebrated place dwelt: which place now to most holy Joseph sacred by the Servite Fathers is inhabited. To this new warfare enrolled, just as strenuously the religious discipline's exercises she used, what of body austerities she applied, with how great zeal in the inner affections' restraint she was bent, how greatly with the zeal of praying she was hindered, how generously the rest of duties both unaccustomed and harsh she underwent, it cannot be said. This certain and attested, that she to others, both in years and in exercise to her superior, a torch always bore before.
[8] The venerable Eucharist with chief religion to observe nothing she had more anciently. pious toward the Eucharist, Never at the Mass was she present (which on each day happened) but the most profound of this mystery secrets with a most attentive mind
she would revolve, and with tears her love she would indicate, and of her desire indices groans she would breathe out. Then indeed even most was she tortured in mind, when the rest with the heavenly food refreshed, she herself on account of age was compelled to abstain: from taking it prohibited, so it had seemed good to those who to her in Confessions were, her virtue, piety, modesty, wisdom, not as in this virgin they were, but the fewness of her years weighing. But not long of his vows is deprived, who God with most ardent love follows. For He by a far more equitable balance, not of time but of virtues the reckoning being drawn, Imelda made equal to the rest, nay rather even before the rest worthy, beyond all hope, by a manifest prodigy declared. The Religious therefore all on the appointed day to the sacred Synaxis approaching, to Imelda the approach was prohibited: who however by grief, prayers, tears, and groans most greatly for it panted. And behold for thee straightway from heaven slipped down the most august of the Sacrament host, the sacred host slipped down from heaven in the mid air sticking, was seen over the Virgin's head to hang. What then to the Virgin was the mind, what the sighs, what the colloquies, what other things from others she repeated, there is no need here with more to commemorate. Consider, Reader, of what kind those were, which the Son of God longer to be absent by no means suffered. Her fellow Virgins, by the matter's unwontedness struck, stuck, to their eyes faith scarcely giving. At length to the Priest, who over them presided, they announce it. He comes, sees, in a paten the holy Host receives, that to Imelda (since God's nod and pleasure that to be he saw) it might be imparted. she takes it, Perceived now Imelda from her vow and desire by the Heavenly food herself to be refreshed (this joy with words who would embrace?) she was refreshed: and so much to the former joy was added, that to be borne more it was not. Her eyes therefore sweetly closed, as if to sleep indulging, her spirit to Christ her spouse she rendered; and continually she dies; who by a mortal body enclosed so great delights to bear longer she could not. Of this prodigy the fame, through all mouths far and wide wandered, most celebrated made the Virgin's name: who in an illustrious tomb laid in that monastery for so long rested, until of those Religious women the seat hence two hundred thirty-three years ago to St. Mary Magdalene's, where also now they dwell, was translated; The body translated into the city and always like a Saint with the highest veneration held, God Best Greatest very many in this most holy Virgin's name on mortals gifts imparting. Afterwards together with the Religious women elsewhere migrating, also the Virgin's bones into a new monastery were translated; she shines with miracles. where with continued hitherto favor God (whose hand is not shortened) Imelda even now with innumerable signs to shine makes.
[9] There had been Dom John Baptist Lambertini, in the year 1625 of the city and territory of Hal in Belgium, from a miraculous of the Mother of God image a most celebrated place, the third from Brussels league situated, the supreme Magistrate: who when for the cause of the sacred Jubilee to Rome having set out, on the same occasion his kinsmen the Lambertini at Bologna having saluted, to the Sacred of B. Imelda memory to be venerated was led. To him returning therefore to his Hal people to congratulate wishing the nurslings of the Gymnasium, which our Society there has, an argument from the seen and adored sacred those ashes took the Poets: the whole then of the Blessed history having divided in various meter and verse even Greek, one a Genethliacon of Imelda composed, another the desire of the religious life to be entered expressed, a third her now to Christ betrothed an epithalamium sang. There was who her to the sacred Communion aspiring tears, and not in sleep lulled desires, and the burning in her tender heart love in verses bound. There was who the miracle of the saving Host over her head appearing, and the happy of Imelda herself death, and the festive among the virginal choirs reception variously celebrated. And these all things, as within one were written little book, so we have had, and restored to the heir of the paternal name and virtues, among the family's monuments to be preserved.
May, vol. III: the 13th of May.