ON ST. MATHURIN, CONFESSOR, AT LARCHANT IN THE GÂTINAIS IN GAUL,
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Mathurin, at Larchant in Gaul. (S.)
BY G. V. H.
§ I. On the Lives and Acts of St. Mathurin.
[The history of St. Mathurin is very obscure; three recent writers have described his life.] The history of St. Mathurin lies wrapped in such great and dense darkness that we despair of restoring it to clear light, since the authors of his Life have not scrupled to disfigure it with insipid fables and feigned genealogies. The first prize for absurdities will beyond doubt go to a certain French priest, J. B. Gillet, titular of the chapel of Larchant *, who in the year 1810 brought to light a “Life of St. Mathurin, priest of Larchant, bishop of Arles, primate of the Gauls, conformed to the chronology of Augustan history, enlarged with anecdotes unknown until that day.” Another Life written in French, not yet committed to print, I received from the Reverend Monsieur Hebert, priest of the town of Nemours in France; its author is unknown. Much older than these is the rhythmic Life of St. Mathurin, in the French idiom, by Jean, priest of Larchant, printed by Jacques Nyverd at Paris, in the Rue de la Juiverie, at the sign of St. Peter, in the year 1489. A single copy of it survived in the Paris Library called the Arsenal; it is found in the Chronicles of St. Mathurin, written in French by Émile Bellier de la Chavignerie in the year 1864. The first Life, written in French like the other two, teems with fables: the second and third follow the manuscript Acts fairly faithfully, yet do not guard against manifest errors.
[2] One of these To the first Life we attribute no authority, nor do we pay piled up absurd fables, the author J. B. Gillet the honor of refutation; for who could patiently bear a historian to linger over the most insipid fictions, which deserve to be called the dreams of a sick man? Of what stamp the man Gillet is, let the reader judge from one specimen. Mathurin, he says, was sprung from an ancient, illustrious, opulent family, an African one, spread after the Punic Wars through the provinces of the Roman Empire, especially through the Gauls on this side of the Alps and beyond. His forebears were named Marinus, Maurus, Maurencius, Macer, Macrianus; for these names seem to have arisen from a common stock and are synonymous. Some were pleased to refer their origin to Isis and Ino or Leucothea, a sea goddess, or to Learchus or Melicertes, the god of ports. Part of them gloried in having Alexander the Great and Chelidonia, a princess of Egyptian blood, as ancestors. This woman, in whose honor Alexander had built the city of Alexandria, sharing his own name, fleeing Ptolemy Lagus after Alexander's death, was carried in a skiff to the shore of Mauretania, where she gave birth to triplets, whom they call the three Mauri or the three Marini, whose progeny, to establish the memory of the fact, founded the city of Tripolis. From these Marini, through portentous fictions of genealogy, one comes at last to Marinus, Mathurin's father, and Euphemia, his mother. From this Marinus the Barons of Montmorency descend. This Marinus built baths at Paris, and gave the city of Paris the emblem of the Ship, which is the symbol of the skiff of Isis, Ino, and Melicertes, and recalls the ship of Chelidonia, the princess, mother of the three Mauri, from whom this Marinus, proconsul of the Gauls, drew his descent. Born of this father, Mathurin is baptized by Polycarp, bishop of Arles, converts his parents, and at length Polycarp, about to set out for Rome with Sebastian, deems Mathurin worthy of the priesthood and entrusts the church of Arles to him. Arriving at Rome, he announces to Pope Eutychian, Mathurin's paternal or maternal uncle, the zeal and successes of the young bishop. On hearing these things the pontiff, his uncle, confirms his dignity, and makes him his legate and vicar of the Apostolic See beyond the Alps. He is the Martin who is read in the diptychs of Arles after the name of Polycarp. At length, through incredible lies, the fable is brought down to the times of Constantine the Great. Mathurin, after ordaining bishops and priests through the Gauls, after healing Theodora, Maximian's stepdaughter, after baptizing Constantius, the father of Constantine the Great, after imbuing Constantine with the Christian faith, after greeting Pope Melchiades, at length, in the time of Silvester, dies at Rome by a most pious death. When the earth had rejected his buried body, it was brought back with solemn pomp to the Gauls and interred at Larchant. The reader certainly has enough with which either to laugh at the absurd writer or indignantly to reject him.
[3] The second and third follow the Acts. The other Life, which we have put in the second place, seems to have been written by a certain pious man in the time of Louis XIV, king of France; for he says that in his time the Rhine was the boundary of France, and the style itself has seemed to suit this age. It follows the manuscript Acts faithfully. The third, rhythmic Life, of the 15th century verging to its end, composed for the pious use of pilgrims flocking to the tomb of St. Mathurin, cleaves to the Acts, as we have said.
[4] [There are two kinds of Acts and they seem fabulous; on them depend the lessons of the breviaries, apart from that of Meaux.] We publish the Acts of St. Mathurin the confessor from many manuscript codices diligently collated with one another. There are two kinds of them, which however seem to have flowed the one from the other. Unless someone contends that from the shorter Life the other, longer one grew by many additions. The longer Life, if you look at the codices, is much older than the shorter ones. A codex of the 10th century has it; and perhaps it is to be attributed to the same century or the ninth. The shorter ones are found in Vincent of Beauvais in the Speculum Historiale, book XIII, chapter 158, in the Sanctuarium of Mombritius, and in a Utrecht codex of the 15th century, together with Peter de Natalibus. Of these the first three transmit the same Life with hardly a word different; Peter made his own compendium for himself. The Acts of St. Mathurin seem fabulous, nor do we have anything by which we could separate the false from the true. And perhaps, apart from the person of Mathurin himself and his holiness, they contain nothing true. According to the Acts, he must be said to have lived in the time of Maximian Herculius, the son of the couple Marinus and Euphemia, baptized by a certain Polycarp, whom du Saussay reported in the canon of the saints as bishop of Sens, as we have said in the omitted saints of this day. Polycarp instructed Mathurin in the faith, and, his parents having been baptized, initiated him into the priesthood at the age of twenty. After the martyrdom of the Theban Legion the Romans are afflicted with a plague, and Maximian's own daughter is possessed by a demon, who, yielding to no incantations, confesses that he cannot go out unless he is cast out by Mathurin. Mathurin is summoned, who, making for Rome with companions, turns aside to the island of Lérins, to venerate the memory of St. Honoratus. At length he reaches Rome, and, received with great honor, he frees the people from various evils and the emperor's daughter from the demon. After a life passed there most holily he dies, and is committed to the tomb; but on the next day the body is found snatched from the tomb and lying on the ground. Then, all marveling, one of the soldiers relates that they had been bound by the sacrament of an oath by Mathurin, when he was about to set out with them for Rome, that if death should come to him outside his homeland, they would carry the dead man's body to the Gauls. So this was done, there remaining near the tomb of the blessed man, now at last at rest in his native land, Antony the deacon and Felix the youth, together with the virgins Anastasia and Gregoria. This is the compendious narrative of the Acts, or rather the web of fables. For, to dismiss the rest, from where did the author know that Maximian's daughter had been possessed by a demon? Whether Fausta, who afterwards married the great Constantine, or Theodora, the daughter of Maximian's wife by a former husband, or another whose name we may not know? How could Mathurin, at the end of the third century or the beginning of the fourth, making for Rome, have turned aside to the island of Lérins for the memory of St. Honoratus, who died in the fifth century? And what is narrated of the holy man's burial and of the body rejected from the tomb smacks of pure and simple fable. Of the two men and two virgins living near the tomb of St. Mathurin we have nothing to affirm, a suitable author being wanting. In the shorter Lives there is no talk of a visit to the island of Lérins, nor of the men and virgins keeping watch near the tomb of St. Mathurin. No doubt later writers saw these as evident fables, and struck them out of the narrative. There are moreover the lessons of the breviaries, a compendium of these Acts: from which the three modern lessons of the Breviary of Meaux are widely different. All of which will follow in their order. Finally comes the office of St. Mathurin, which, transcribed by us from ancient sheets of Larchant preserved in the public archive at Paris, we have collated with another manuscript codex of the same office. This very recent codex, written by the hand of the priest Jolivet, who in the year 1833 administered the parish of Larchant, we received from the Reverend Monsieur Gomard, who serves as parish priest at Larchant.
Annotation* Larchant (Seine-et-Marne).
§ II. On the veneration of St. Mathurin.
[The veneration of St. Mathurin is evident from the martyrologies, and was very celebrated] Since the veneration of St. Mathurin, who is also called Martin, is very ancient, one comes to wonder why his name nowhere occurs in the copies of the Hieronymian Martyrology. Nor perhaps is it found in the pure Ado. Georgi Martyrology of Ado, p. X., however, found one codex among those brought into the Vatican Library by Alexander VIII after the death of Christina, queen of the Swedes, now marked no. 511, which mentions St. Martin (Mathurin). For thus it is read in the same Georgi at the Kalends of November among the variant readings: There follows in codex 511 only, in a more recent hand, “In the district of Guastum, of St. Martin, confessor.” Yet a little after Ado, Usuard brought Mathurin into his martyrology in these words: Kalends of November. In the district of the Gâtinais, of St. Mathurin, confessor. Galesini at the same day gives this brief notice, drawn if I am not mistaken from the narrative of Mombritius or that of Peter: At Rome, of St. Mathurin, presbyter: whose body, carried from there to Sens, shining with the power of miracles, is venerated with pious veneration. Maurolico a little more briefly: In the district of the Vestinum, near Sens, of St. Mathurin, confessor, in the time of Maximian. Baronius in the Roman Martyrology retained Usuard: In the district of the Gâtinais, of St. Mathurin, confessor. Du Saussay in the later part of the Gallican Martyrology, at the Kalends of November, reports the following on Mathurin: On this same day, of St. Mathurin, presbyter and confessor. He, born of a noble lineage in the diocese of Sens, in the village whose name is Larchant, of the parents Marinus and Euphemia, did not have from his birth such aids as would lead him to the practice of piety: since both his parents were affected by ethnic superstition, and his father was so opposed to the worshipers of Christ that he received public power of raging against them from the emperor Galerius Maximian, most hostile to Christians. Yet by divine grace, which was calling the boy to great merits, it came about that Mathurin, on some occasion admonished about the faith by St. Polycarp, archbishop of Sens, a man of apostolic virtue, was instructed by him in secret, lest he should offend his father. From then on he, surpassing his age in morals, for he had scarcely finished the twelfth year of his age, roused in the holy prelate himself admiration for him. For he burned wondrously with love of Christ; intent on fasts and prayers night and day, he prayed constantly for the peace of the Church, the solace of Christians, and the salvation of his parents. The divine mercy favoring his pious entreaty, within a few days his mother first was converted to Christ by his warnings. Then also his father, who, warned through a dream of his son's holiness and foreordination to care for the salvation of souls, rejecting his blind error, opened his eyes to the light of divine truth. And so both parents, with their son as guide and sponsor, were more clearly taught by St. Polycarp and were cleansed with the saving washing. Further, Mathurin himself, when
he was only twenty years old, on account of the brightness of his morals and his bright marks of grace, was ordained presbyter by the most holy hierarch himself. And at once, increased as in the honor of his order so in the beauty of holiness, he began to work signs of divine power, and to shine with supernal force both in curing all kinds of diseases and most of all in driving out demons. By this fame, spread far and wide, he was called to Rome, to free the prince's daughter who was tormented by a demon, and he set out there; where he wonderfully made the name of Christ illustrious by the sudden cure of that girl. Then, having accomplished many other virtues and works of piety, reaching in that same place the goal of this fleeting life, he passed over to eternal joys. His body, brought back to his homeland as he himself had requested, with much splendor of signs performed on the way, was reverently received by the faithful at Sens and entombed. But as the prodigies at his tomb grew more frequent, by the devotion of certain pious persons a basilica very noble in mass and adornment was built in the village of Larchant, in the very place where he had been born. To it his precious pledges were carried from the city of Sens, to be kept with perpetual veneration. This basilica, as it is distinguished by his sacred remains and title, so is famous for the benefits which by his constant loving intervention before God he provides to those devoutly imploring his help, and not only shines with the continual devotion of the inhabitants, but is also frequented by the religious concourse of pilgrims. For in it, by the patronage of the holy confessor, epileptics, lunatics, those possessed by the devil, and those afflicted with other vexation or infirmity receive the solace they desire. And every year on the feast of St. Barnabas the apostle there is a concourse of devout people from every side to this sacred house, who flow together there from very many villages, districts and towns in solemn procession to implore his blessed suffrages: so that one hundred and twenty pious gatherings of rural churches, distinct with their sacred insignia, are numbered. Nor has the devotion of the Catholic people toward the glorious friend of God slackened because the separatists, emissaries of Calvin, in order to destroy the memory of the blessed man together with his bones, undermined in great part the mass of the basilica in which he glows with so many wonders. Rather from this the veneration of him has increased among the champions of ancestral piety; who, the greater the offices of honor they spend on the glorious confessor for love of Christ, the richer the benefits they obtain from day to day by his help, by the gift of Christ himself, who glories in the honor of his saints.
For the rest, the deposition of St. Mathurin is observed at Paris on the sixth day of this month: the cathedral clergy of which royal city has the patronage of the basilica of this saint at Larchant. Nor does it seem that this should be passed over, that when the body of St. Mathurin was being carried from Rome to Sens, it stayed for some time at Lutetia of the Parisians, laid in the place where now is seen the convent of the ascetics of the Order of the Redemption of Captives, named by the title of this blessed confessor: in which place the more august assemblies of the University of Paris are held according to custom. Although the credit of du Saussay is held suspect in many matters, yet no one doubts that in reporting public facts of his own age he is worthy of belief. From this then we learn how great was once the celebrity of the veneration of St. Mathurin.
[6] with many processions: How many times in the year solemn processions at Larchant were instituted in honor of St. Mathurin we learn from A. D. Boyteux, who wrote a Life of St. Mathurin. Since I have not been able to examine his book, I am compelled to rely on the authority of the Chronicles of Larchant praised above, which on p. 117 report the following from Boyteux. In the year 1640, when Boyteux was vicar of the church of St. Mathurin, a solemn procession was made: First, on 8 November, in memory of the holy death of Mathurin, which because of the feast of All Saints was moved from 1 November to the 8th. Second, on 10 May, in memory of the translation of the relics, perhaps made in 1407, on which day plenary indulgences were to be gained by those frequenting the church of St. Mathurin. Third, on the sacred day of the Ascension of the Lord, the people flowed in from every side, up to the fifteenth mile round about, to the number of many thousands. Fourth, on the Sunday after the feast of St. Denis, in memory of the translation made on 18 October 1176. Fifth, on the Tuesday after the feast of St. Barnabas in the month of June, which procession was called the carrying-around of the casket. Stations were made in ten parishes lying around Larchant. After the invasions of the heretics the celebrity of the procession began little by little to diminish; in the year 1605, on 14 June, it was violently disturbed by the brawls and feuds of the participants themselves: as is evident from a public instrument which on the occasion of these disturbances Monsieur Joseph Corneille, notary of the sacred ecclesiastical and metropolitan court of Sens, drew up. Then the canons of Paris, in a chapter session on 1 June of the year 1618, decreed that the casket of relics should be carried only around the town, considering the small attendance both of the said town and of the curates and neighboring inhabitants. At length by the injury of the times the practice of the procession was almost abolished, except when public evils aroused sleeping devotion. There is a celebrated memory of a benefit obtained in the year 1619, on 9 June; when, by excessive drought, the harvests were brought into the utmost danger, an infinite multitude flowed together from many parishes to Larchant, to bring the relics of St. Mathurin with solemn pomp to Beaune, to the spring of St. Pipio; more than 60 banners were numbered, if Monsieur Gillet in his Life of St. Mathurin is to be believed. To them St. Mathurin showed himself so prompt a helper, that a heavy shower, which you would have thought the ruin of the sky, prevented the parish priests from departing to their parishes that day. For the same cause a procession was instituted in the month of June of the year 1703, and on the 22nd of the month of May of the year 1785. At length, in the most unhappy times when religion was laid low throughout France, and the veneration both of God himself and of the saints had lapsed, the town of Larchant itself fell too with the honor of St. Mathurin, and there remain as a monument of its former prosperity the ruin of the church and a few little houses which are the village of Larchant. The rustic people have no honor for their patron; the village itself bears before it so mournful a face that you would say the region had been struck by the thunderbolt of divine malediction.
[7] Now there is almost none; but traces survive and popular traditions. In the year 1878 we went to Larchant and contemplated with our own eyes the rubble, as it were, and the lamentable ruins of such great things. Using the hospitality of the excellent Monsieur Thoison, we fell in, as we piously believe under the direction of St. Mathurin, with that family which could best of all teach us in what state the veneration of St. Mathurin now is. With our host himself as guide we went to the spring which they call St. Mathurin's, which they are so far from honoring with its former honor that they even most foully pollute it. Near the spring my amiable guide and host showed me a footprint, as they say, of St. Mathurin. If that is true, he must have been of gigantic stature. Unless perhaps you say the stone was hollowed wider by the honorific attendance of so many centuries. Over the vault built above the spring there rises an iron cross, inscribed in this manner: The inscription, which he had read in the year 1787, Monsieur Gillet interprets thus:
Maturino. Lyricantus. Præsuli. Constantius. Cæsar. Regeneratus. Gratulatur Vie de S. Mathurin, p. 56.. To Mathurin the bishop, Larchant; Constantius Caesar, regenerated, gives thanks.
He was led to interpret it thus by his opinion, by which he holds that Mathurin, bishop of Arles, administered baptism to Constantius, the father of Constantine the Great. But we think the letters can be interpreted in the sense of the benefit granted in the year 1619: Maturino. Largitori. Pluvia. Concessa. Cives. Recreati. Gratias. [To Mathurin the bestower; rain having been granted, the townsfolk, refreshed, give thanks.] At my host's I heard that it is held by the popular tradition of the people of Larchant that Mathurin, a farmer's son, was put in charge of pasturing his father's flocks. The rocky hills, from whose sides the aforesaid spring gushes, continue in certain huge rocks, which seem wonderfully hollowed and pierced: the people say that the holes once served for tying up Mathurin's cows. I am led to believe that St. Pipio of neighboring Beaune, who when he was a boy lived the life of a shepherd there, gave rise to this popular tradition. There grows in that place a certain plant, whose flowers, when seen from far off, are very like an old man's white beard, grown very long: these the people dwelling there have called Mathurin's beard. Yet an old man's beard is not without cause for wonder, since statues and images of St. Mathurin, even at Larchant, are represented in youthful form. In the year 1876 the ancient devotion toward St. Mathurin began to be restored by the work of the most pious priest of Nemours, Hebert, who after the lapse of a century again led a pious band of processioners from the parish of St. John the Baptist to Larchant. He communicated to me the manuscript Life in French of which I made mention above; he also gave me a copy of a booklet written for the use of pilgrims, in which is a summary of the Life of St. Mathurin, with pious songs and litanies composed in honor of the holy patron.
§ III. On the relics of St. Mathurin.
Almost no relics of St. Mathurin at Larchant; Of the relics of St. Mathurin scarcely the tiniest particle survives at Larchant, which I venerated in the church of St. Mathurin itself in the year 1878 with the most worthy priest E. Gomard, who governs the very few faithful of Larchant. This particle of the precious treasure from the arm bones, if I am not mistaken, of St. Mathurin is preserved in a wooden casket. This casket the inhabitants of Larchant had built in the year 1826, at a price paid of 304 francs. The relics were given back by the Reverend Monsieur Le Goupil, curate of Nangis in the diocese of Orléans, to Monsieur Jousseaume, parish priest of Larchant, and enclosed in a new casket in 1826. They were authenticated in the year 1828 by Joseph André Pruneau, priest and honorary canon of the church of Meaux, to whom the Reverend Bishop of Meaux, Jean Joseph Marie de Cosnac, had delegated his role by extraordinary commission. Other relics are preserved in a reliquary in the form of a heart. Other relics of St. Mathurin are preserved in the town of Moncontour-de-Bretagne, where St. Mathurin enjoys great veneration. These relics the most pious priest in charge of the parish of St. Mathurin there, Leo Belouino, honorary canon, in a letter given to me on 3 August of the year 1878, suspects were brought there by Anne of Brittany. To the church of St. Mathurin, on the very day of Pentecost, pilgrims hasten with solemn pomp.
[9] Let the reader receive in few words the history of the relics of St. Mathurin, as far as we have been able to gather it, whose history is narrated. The constant affirmation of all the Acts is that Mathurin's body was brought back from Rome to the Gauls. But which place in the Gauls first received it, I hold uncertain. Du Saussay says that it stayed for a while at Paris. That it was brought to Sens both he and Monsieur Morin affirm History of the Gâtinais, p. 362.. At length it was returned to Larchant. That the sacred bones of St. Mathurin were at length deposited at Larchant is most certain: from the 9th century Usuard wrote: In the district of the Gâtinais, of St. Mathurin, confessor. To which notice is read added in some places: whose body is honored and venerated in the territory of the diocese of Sens. The deposition and translation of the relics could have become known to us much more certainly, had not Monsieur Jolivet, parish priest of Larchant, about the year 1836 lost the manuscript documents: we have collected a very few little pages marked in the public archive of Paris, which the author of the French book entitled Chronicle of Larchant saw. From these little charters, therefore, together with the printed chronicles, we describe the fortunes of the relics.
[10] various fortunes and translations. After that first translation from Rome to the Gauls, another is read to have been made in the year 1176; whose authentic instrument, contained with the relics in the casket, was found by Octave de Bellegarde, archbishop of Sens, in the year 1634. This translation,
if the instrument of Octave is to be believed, was made by his predecessor, the archbishop of Sens: wherefore I should like to know why the Chronicles of Larchant attribute it to Odo, bishop of Orléans. In the year 1407 permission was given for a new casket to be made, namely for enclosing the shroud of St. Mathurin together with the relics. In the year 1504 the chapter of Notre-Dame of Paris, to which belonged the lordship of Larchant, supplied a new casket, the old one having collapsed, and Georges, Cardinal d'Amboise, archbishop of Rouen, legate a latere of Alexander VI, made the translation; to whom the chapter gave solemn thanks for the translation made, sending delegates on 8 November. In the year 1536 the canons of Paris, Pelourde and Courchon, translated the relics into a new casket which the chapter had given as a gift. But in the year 1567, on 25 Oct., the knight du Boulay, entering Larchant at the dead of night, plundered the church; he carried off the ornaments, books, precious vessels, and also the casket of St. Mathurin. A certain pious woman snatched part of the relics from the hands of the robbers; part seems to have been collected by Canon Fouquet, on 20 April 1569, whom the chapter of Paris had sent to Larchant for this purpose. To Canon Samed the knight du Boulay had sent back relics of St. Mathurin's arm, which he restored to his college on 6 May in the year 1571. Then in the year 1575, on 27 May, the chapter decreed that the casket should be restored to the people of Larchant, the cantor being charged with communicating the authentic letters of the relics preserved to Canons Richevillain and Clerc, so that, by the drawing up of new authentications, the genuineness of the relics might be proved to posterity.
[11] The prelate of Sens visited the relics of St. Mathurin. At length the citizens of Larchant, having taken common counsel, on 6 June 1577 sent a petition that the casket should be returned by the chapter: the chapter assenting to these prayers on 8 June, on the 14th of the same month Larchant received Mathurin's relics with solemn pomp. In the escort were Canons Fouquet and Fabre, deputed by their chapter. It came about then, as the years slipped by, that a rumor was spread and the opinion grew strong round about that no relics were shut up in the empty casket of St. Mathurin, since they had long since perished. Moved by this rumor, Octave de Bellegarde, archbishop of Sens, when in the year 1634 he was going around his diocese and had come to Larchant, opened the casket and identified the relics, which he found preserved in the casket together with the authentic letters of the process drawn up in the year 1177. The instrument of this identification, subscribed in the hand of the archbishop himself, we append here, which we ourselves received at Paris from the public archives. At length in the year 1684 the canons of the chapter of Paris ordered the opening of a wooden pyx placed in the treasury of their church, in which certain relics of St. Mathurin were believed to be contained. The matter having been diligently examined and the genuineness of the relics recognized, these remains too of their Mathurin were restored to Larchant.
[12] whose letters of visitation are these There follow the public letters of Octave de Bellegarde, archbishop of Sens, given in the year 1634, on 10 September, in which he narrates the visitation made by him of the casket of the relics of St. Mathurin. We found that instrument written in French in the public archives of France, at Paris, in the case marked L 460. We have turned it into the Latin tongue in such a way that the French form may show through: Octave de Bellegarde, by the grace of God and of the holy Apostolic See archbishop of Sens, primate of the Gauls and of Germany, to all the Christian faithful of our diocese, greeting. Among the cares and anxieties which concern the dignity in which we are set, we have always believed the ordering of the devotion of peoples, and the cutting away of the abuses that can be mingled with it, to be one of the chief. For as too great a readiness in giving credence to all things that have a report of some holiness can have pernicious consequences and issue in dangerous superstitions, so it is also of great importance to take care that inconveniences of this kind do not creep into worship and religion, and that, by the multiplicity of things set forth publicly for veneration without sufficient examination, this very often being their spring and origin, nothing may be exposed to it except what has been found truly worthy of it after exact and careful inquiry. Hence it is that we have never wished to fail, in the course of our preceding visitations, especially in places marked by some note of singular holiness, and where access and devotion shine forth more fully, to apply every kind of care and circumspection to this end, whether by the opening of caskets, the inspection of bodies and bones, the examination of the verbal processes enclosed in them (the caskets), or by information and inquiry into miracles, so that, all abuses being removed and the truth known, devotion may consequently be better established. As therefore the order of the visitation in which we are now occupied has brought us to the church of St. Mathurin of Larchant, and notwithstanding the nearly general resort of the whole kingdom to this place, and the great number of miracles and healings performed in it through the invocation of the said saint, a rumor began to be spread that no relics had remained there, nor bones of the said holy body, because it had been totally burned and consumed by the fire of the church of the said Larchant, where it was, which happened in the disturbances of the heretics and the spoliations made by them of the most beautiful temples of our France, we judged it expedient, in order to remove all suspicion and manifest the truth, to visit the casket of the said saint and see what was inside. Accordingly, after visiting the most holy sacrament, celebrating Mass, giving holy communion to the people, and administering the holy sacrament of confirmation, we had the said casket carried from the place where it ordinarily is, behind the high altar, into the sacristy of the said church. There, having made its opening, we found a great number of bones, among others seven or eight fairly long, about half a foot or thereabouts, some smaller, others very small and minute, all wrapped in cloths of fine-woven silk thread (taffetas), and together with these the verbal process of the translation made in the year one thousand one hundred and seventy-six, of the body of St. Mathurin to the place where it now is, by one of our predecessors the archbishops of Sens, there being in attendance some prelates, bishops, abbots, and others set in dignity in our metropolitan church of Sens, named and written down in the same verbal process. And that all things might be more notorious, we went, after the opening and visitation of the said casket, to the high altar of the church, from where we showed the aforesaid bones and relics found in it to all that people, which was nearly some thousands of persons; to whom there was such joy and so great consolation, because the doubt about this truth, which for some years had crept into their souls, had been totally dissipated, that they could not tire of this sight and of giving thanks to God for it. And of all the things aforesaid we caused a verbal process to be made, which we enclosed within the said casket, and to make this truth a matter of public right and to increase the devotion and piety of the peoples in this place, we have given an act of this matter, and these presents signed with our hand. At Larchant, on Sunday, the tenth day of September, in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-four. — O. de Bellegarde, Arch. of Sens. — By the command of our lord. P. Broully. From this instrument we learn that a great concourse of peoples was accustomed at that time to St. Mathurin; the cause of which concourse, revived after its lamentable decline, was perhaps, besides frequent miracles, the signal benefit of the rain obtained after a long drought, in the year 1619.
[13] Frequent miracles, but few handed down in written records. Frequent miracles were indeed performed, but few of them have been set down in writing, or perhaps the reports of them have perished with the other documents. We read three recorded in certain little charters which we found in the public archives of France, at Paris, in case L 461. We have turned them from the French speech into Latin. On the last day of May 1630. A madman restored to health, Jacques Thienard, from the parish of Noastre, in the diocese of Tours, between the third and fourth days of a novena, at the casket of St. Mathurin. — In the month of August 1631, there was restored to health a certain man called Charton, from the parish of Dampainville, on the third day of a novena, from a disturbance of mind which he had retained from a great illness. — In the month of January 1634, Simon Aury, deranged in mind even to fury, from the parish of Chetinville, restored to health at the end of a novena, at the casket of St. Mathurin. — It was signed: Vicar of the place, 11 Sept. 1639. — This vicar is perhaps Monsieur Boyteux; at least in the following year 1640 he was the vicar at Larchant, as is evident from the Chronicles of Larchant, p. 117. Another cause, and not a very absurd one, can be brought forward why most of the miracles of St. Mathurin were not written down in particular, but are indicated only in a general notion. For St. Mathurin has this special gift, that he comes to the aid of the deranged in mind. Now those who have obtained healing from an ill of this kind, because this seems to sprinkle some disgrace on the person, do not gladly see the memory of their disease commended to written records, to live for perpetual ages. Yet so celebrated among the French was this fame of St. Mathurin as bringing remedy to the deranged in mind, that what the ancients used to say: “Sail to Anticyra, to be cured with hellebore,” the French would say: “Offer a candle to St. Mathurin;” or “You owe a candle to St. Mathurin.”
LIFE OF ST. MATHURIN, CONFESSOR.
Mathurin, at Larchant in Gaul. (S.)
BHL Number: 5720
FROM MANUSCRIPTS.
PrefaceThe following codices have supplied the Life of St. Mathurin:
1. A Paris codex, from the national library, parchment, of the smallest folio, of the 10th century, no. 5568, Telleriano-Remensis (no. 263). It belonged to Saint-Amand-en-Pévèle. — 2. A Paris codex, from the national library, parchment, of the largest folio, of the 11th century, no. 15436. — 3. A Paris codex, from the national library, parchment, of lesser folio, partly of the 11th century, partly of the 12th century (the Life of Mathurin is of the 12th century), no. 5343. It belonged to Monsieur de la Mare. — 4. A Douai codex, from the public library, parchment, folio, of the 13th or 14th century. — 5. A Saint-Omer codex, from the public library, parchment, of the largest folio. — 6. A Brussels codex, from the royal library, parchment, of the largest folio, of the 13th century, no. 7460. It formerly belonged to the Vallicella. — 7. A Paris codex, from the national library, parchment, of lesser folio, partly of the 11th century, partly of the 12th century, no. 3283. The Life of Mathurin seems written in a hand of the 12th century; it agrees for the most part with the Brussels codex.
FIRST CHAPTER.
St. Mathurin secretly worships Christ and converts his parents to God. He becomes a priest and is called to Rome by the emperor Maximian.
Prologue. Beginning to write the life of blessed Mathurin, of his indweller (scribendam-ejus) scribere cupio intercedente eodem sancto mihi inerti 2. the Holy Spirit I implore the help, to me omits 2. to be present, with vows i. v. 2. of supplication omits 3, 4., that he who adorned ordinavit 2, 4, 6. him with wonderful works may also, by his merits, adorn me with honorable speech for relating these things in part. For in his hand are both we and our words dirigantur adds 2., that, he himself governing our utterances (e. n.) n. e. 2., the pen of our description may so run down that our speech, seasoned with salt in the grace of God so 2; the others omit., may afford edification to those hearing. For in ourselves we fail through ourselves, but in the confidence of his power we are strengthened
[(in nobis-roboramur) licet in ipsa nostra stultitia admirabilem vitam sancti prædicti proferre titubamus, tamen confisi in orationibus ejus prout possumus eam aggrediamur 2; (in virtutis-roboramur) omits 3.]. May there be present sit 3. to us, then, the power æterna adds 2. and grace of the divine loving-kindness, which qua 4–6. is everywhere wonderful in its saints, and makes wonderful omnes adds 2. its saints; and may it deign by our mouth to bring forth what is useful for the holy omits 2. Church, to the praise of God and of his servant Mathurin.
[2] [St. Mathurin, born of heathen parents, secretly serves Christ and by prayers obtains their conversion from God;] So Mathurin, the servant of Christ, was an inhabitant of the diocese of the city of Sens, which is the noblest of the cities of the Gauls, born in a village whose name is e. v. 2. Larchant a, of parents indeed not ignoble, yet omits 3. still held detentus 2. in gentile rite rite 4.. His father was called Marinus, and his mother Euphemia. Indeed his father was so preeminent in temporal nobility that he was appointed dirigeretur 4; proficisceretur 5. by the emperor Maximian b, that is, the most savage persecutor of the Christians, to lay waste occidendosque adds 4. and to kill omits 4; et occidendos 6. Christians. But St. Mathurin was instructed in sacred letters by a certain most renowned man, the bishop Polycarp c, who was aflame in the things of God in those omits 3. same places, and was thoroughly ab eo 2. imbued with the disciplines of the Christian name. Yet secretly and as it were under a cloak he concealed that he was a soldier m. e. 2. of Christ, lest he should offend his father's countenance and incur danger to his life; for his father, as I have said, was in charge of functions of this kind, so that he dragged away, destroyed et adds 2., and cut the throats of Christians everywhere. And blessed Mathurin M. a. 3., when he was twelve years old, outrunning the tenderness of his omits 3. age by the maturity of his morals, loved Christ the Lord with his whole being, and served him with fasts and supplications by day and by night. And although spiritual joy held his mind menti 2. because of the knowledge agnitionem 5. of his Creator esset 2., yet there was in his heart no small grief (non min.) omits 2. on account of his parents' perdition. Hence, groaning deeply, with knees fixed, he thus entreated the Lord Deum 2, 3. with tearful laments quæstionibus 2, 4–6., saying: Lord God almighty, who according to the voice of the Psalmist made the heavens in understanding, and measured them with the span of your hand, and enclose the earth too in your fist, and who for our deliverance brought forth to human sight your only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, incarnate from the womb of the blessed Virgin Mary, to redeem and save us through the cross of his passion: I beseech your greatness that you hear the voice of the prayer (o. v.) vocem meæ orationis 2; orationem vocemque 3. of your servant Mathurin, entreating that my parents, who serve idols, may be converted to you, the living and true God; and may know you, who are the true light and inestimable sweetness, and unfailing delight suavitatisque 3. and incomprehensible majesty, and qui 2. live and reign et regnas 2, 3. forever and ever. And his prayer completed, worn out with sorrow, he fell asleep for a little; and, his limbs being relaxed in rest, he heard a voice saying to him: Mathurin, my servant, behold, what you have faithfully asked you have effectively obtained. Rising consurgens, 2, 3., as omits 2, 4. he magnificently praised collaudans 2, collaudavit 4. the Lord Deum 2, 3., he said dicens 4.: I bless you in my heart, and with lips of exultation I confess to you, almighty God D. o. 2., that you have deigned to admit the prayers of my lowliness in the sight of your omits 2. loving-kindness.
[3] and he treats with his mother, And behold, prompted now by I know not what quonam 3. divine instinct, his mother came up, saying: O my son, what advantage will there be to the body, or what profit omits 2. will be conferred on omits 2, 3. the salvation salutis 2. of the soul, if we believe crediderimus 2. in Christ, as you frequently ask postulasti 2.? And he said: Great, mother, surely profectum 2. great will be et adds 2. the advantage to both, since both the body will be glorified through the glory of the resurrection, and the soul, which has been polluted with the filth of idolatrous so 4; the others idolatriæ. servitude, having received the sacrament of baptism, will be renewed by the knowledge of truth and, eagerly given over to the precepts of divine service, when it has been released a. f. 2. from the bonds of the body, will be repaid renovabitur 2. with the wage of eternal happiness and will obtain the rewards of perpetual salvation and peace. And his mother said to him: Be silent, son, be silent, for if these things come to your father's knowledge (p. t. n.) n. p. t. 2., I fear that he may perhaps be angry against you, and may kill you, and, bereaved by the death omits 4, 6. of my beloved mei adds 2. and only unicuique 2; morte adds 4. son, I may end the old age of my life in grief. To her he said: Not for my sake only do I seek the divine mercy, but for your sakes, that, leaving the worship of images, you may believe and know God and the Lord, our creator and redeemer. And how shall I be able to look on you set in danger mortis adds 2.? What quam 2. joy could I omits 2. ever have possum 2., while I see videro 4, 5. my dearest parents bending their necks to demons and ignorant of the Creator's power, following the devil to the lower world and not seeking the glory of the heavenly kingdom, or omits 2, 3. shall I be able poterone 2, 3. ever to be without sorrow?
[4] while they are speaking the father comes up, It happened, while they were speaking these things, that his father came and asked what they were discussing together. He, already in 2. forestalled by the grace of divine loving-kindness, understood that they were pondering something quid 2, 3. rather secret about the faith and religion of the Christians. And the mother, now omits 2. wishing to acquiesce in the words sermones 2. of her son, said to her husband, for she understood that something of the gift of heavenly grace was already growing in him (intellexit-inolescere) omits 2, 3.: My lord, consider cautiously and carefully what is being urged upon us by our son. For he has vowed that he will serve with all his strength the God of the Christians, who, he says, is the living and true God; and the idols which we worship, he says, are dedicated dicata 2. to the worship in cultura 2, 3. of demons. He strives to persuade us to leave idols errorem 2. made with hands manufactorum 2. and empty, in whose worship is the perdition of the soul (p. e. a.) e. a. p. 2., and omits 2, 3. to adore and venerate God who dwells in the heavens, who made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, with whom we may be able to have p. h. 2. everlasting life and glory gratiam 4. eternal. And he said: Hear my words, and carefully attend to the vision visionem 2. which I saw this night. For I saw this night, in a night vision, as if quia 4–6. this son of ours had entered a certain sheepfold d, and there had been delivered fuisset 2, 3. to him a flock of a great multitude of sheep. Hearing this, his mother, affected arrepta 3. with exceeding joy, prostrated herself omits 2. at her husband's feet and said: My lord, let us too omits 2. hear the voice of our son and be converted and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, that we may merit to have eternal life.
[5] [And at length both parents are baptized by Polycarp, who makes Mathurin a presbyter.] St. Mathurin announced these things to Bishop Polycarp, and pressed him to come in haste v. f. 4–6., to initiate them in the sacraments of Christ. He, hurrying in haste, catechized them, and, imbuing them with the sacraments of the faith, within a few days baptized Marinus together omits 2. with his wife Euphemia and the whole household of their home. And he was with them, teaching them and confirming them in the holy religion, until St. Mathurin's twentieth year. For at this in hac 2. age e he ordained him presbyter for confecting the mysteries of the body and blood of Christ, and for fittingly preaching the sacraments of the divine word [(sacramenta-prædicanda) sacramentorum Christi idoneum eum constituit prædicatorem 2.]. For the tenderness of his age did not prejudice prædicavit 2. the gifts donum 2, dono 3. of virtue, since quia 2, quod 3. the desires of the wanton body were broken by the maturity of a mind accustomed assuete 2. to continual continuus 2. fasts and vigils. With him as helper adjutor fuit Policarpi episcopi 2. in the preaching prædicationem 3. of the divine word, or rather as forerunner prædecessore 3, successore 4, effectus est ei prædecessor 2., that same unde 2. blessed man omits 2, id est adds 3. Polycarp, rejoicing, departed from him, about to set out for the Roman Romam 2, 4, 5. city. On which journey, at the monastery f of the holy martyrs Maurice and his companions sociorumque 4., about to receive the rewards of his sanctorum 2. labors abavorum 4–6., he happily passed to Christ. And blessed Mathurin, vigorously carrying out the office enjoined on him, rejoiced most of all in the salvation of his parents s. p. 2.. They urged him persuasively eum adds 4. not to cease from omits 2. prayers, that they might be held worthy of the gifts divinely conferred on them, and a 2. that, cleansed from worldly errors, they might be made sharers of eternal life; and together with him they continued permanerent 2, 3. in the things of God precibus 2. and in thanksgiving.
[6] [After the victory of the martyrs of Agaunum the Romans are afflicted and Maximian's daughter is possessed by a demon;] There is an autem adds 4. opinion that, after the consummated martyrdom of the aforesaid martyrs of Agaunum, Maurice and his companions, not many times having passed, the people of the city of Rome were affected with various calamities and et 2. vexed by demonic a dæmonum 2. spirits, so that even omits 2. the daughter of the emperor omits 2. Maximian was driven by an unclean spirit omits 2.. He quam 2., being a pagan, began to act omits 2, agi 3. by magical arts coarctare adds 2., to free his daughter eam 2. from the demon. But the more que 2. anxiously these were applied, the ei 2. greater the torments with which she was afflicted. And by no remedy could poterat 2. she be helped subvenire 3. omits 2.. Then the demon, under compulsion, began to cry out through the girl's mouth: O emperor, why do you labor in vain?
Your sorceries will fail deficiant 4–6. (o imperator-tua) omits 2., your divinations and incantations will vanish evanescant 4, 5, evanescunt 6., until from a 2. the parts of Gaul a servant of Christ, Mathurin by name omits 2., having been summoned omits 2., comes veniet 2., who by his merits and ex 2. prayers, we being cast out, et adds 2. will restore restituat 3. your daughter and your people to health. Are we saying omits 2., brothers, that for the blessed apostles and holy vel sanctis 2. martyrs g, by whose merits that same city is preeminent permanet 2, 3., and omits 2, 4. through divine grace, it was impossible by their prayers to apply a remedy remedia 3. to the people omits 2, 3. of that city populo adds 3, a populo adds 2. and drive out the plague? But the divine loving-kindness, which is omits 2. incomprehensible in its works and wonderful in its saints, when it shows the force of its power in lesser ones, discloses what it can do in greater ones. For, though he is great in the great, yet he works wonders mirabilior 3. more gloriously in the least. But I believe indeed et quidem 3., I believe in every way, that by their intercession the merits omits 3, sua adds 5. of this blessed omits 4. man too were being shown monstrabatur 3.. For so great is the abundance of charity a. c. 2. in the saints that they proclaim one another's omits 2. merits, and one gladly prefers another to himself in the display of signs, to the praise and glory of God and of their Lord, whose is, and from whom they take, all the good that (cujus est-quod) conditoris a quo sunt omnia bona quæ 2. they have. But let us return to our purpose.
[7] to save whom Mathurin is called to Rome, Then the name of the blessed man and the rumor which a adds 2. had been spread by the demonic dæmoniaco 3. mouth ran, with flying report, through the mouths aures 2. of all, namely that they were to be saved by the coming of Mathurin. Hence they kept crying clamabant 3. to the emperor with tearful voices, saying: O emperor, why do you weave delays innecteris 1, inectere 2.? Hasten as quickly as possible ad adds 2. to send an embassy into Gaul, which, going through every region, may diligently search out where it can find this man, and bring ducere 2. him to you, that he may help both your daughter and us set in tribulations nostris adds 2. and griefs. For perhaps through him God omits 2. will show with us omits 4. his mercy dominus Jesus Christus 2, nobiscum adds 4.. At once therefore the emperor, summoning soldiers, ordered them to go swiftly to the parts of Gaul, and to seek most diligently here and there the blessed man Mathurin, and, when found, to bring him to him with all honor. Carrying out his orders, when they reached attigissent 2. the borders of Gaul, they divided themselves into three parties, that, every region having been gone around, they might gain the effect effectum 2. of their wish as quickly as possible. One of these parties (h. p.) omits 2. of soldiers, Christ being their guide, came by a direct path to the place where the holy man omits 2. Mathurin had resolved devoverat 4. to serve the Lord with constant, indeed continual fasts and prayers and with all spiritual continence. For they had already come to know cognoverunt 2., by common report volante 2., both his fame and the name and omits 2. site præscitum 2. of the place in which the servant of God domini 3. was staying. And standing before the door of the house in which he was erant 3., they said: O Mathurin, servant of Christ, deign to speak with us (s. C. d. l. n.) d. s. C. n. 1. 2.. Now the day before they came, he had learned by revelation that an embassy of this kind would come to him, and he was divinely commanded so 5, imperatum est 2, 4, imperat the others. to go with them without hesitation, an angel saying to him: Mathurin, my most faithful one, act manfully and be strengthened, and when I have sent to you the soldiers of Maximian Maximiniani 3., go with them, hesitating in nothing, because I have sent them. I will be vero 2. your guide, and I will direct all your works.
[8] He kindly receives the soldier-envoys. When therefore he had learned that the soldiers were present, he went out to them (cum-eos) omits 2.. And they, seeing him, prostrated on the ground, humbly uttered a word of greeting, saying: Hail, Mathurin Maturini 3., most beloved of Christ, the emperor Maximian greets you. For enim. 2, omits 3. it has been revealed to him that you are to be summoned accersire 2, 3. to the city of Rome, that at your coming his daughter may be freed from the demon by which she is vexed, and the people from the plague by which they are being depopulated populatur 2.. And he, humbly returning their greeting, said: The will tua adds 3. of the Lord Domine 3. be done. And he received them in hospitality. And with knees fixed he prayed very long in private. And rising consurgens 2. from prayer he said: I give you thanks t. a. 4, 5., Lord God, almighty Father o. p. 2., through Jesus Christ your Son, our God and Lord, who have deigned omits 2. to minister monstrare 4. your mercy to me, and to show your clemency in omits 2. the conversion of my parents. I ask therefore, Lord, that you make them persevere in the fide adds 2, 3. confession of your name, by which they may be able to reach venire 2. eternal life. As therefore you have mercifully helped them, so also bestow the grace of your loving-kindness on these to whom I am called, that in all tribulation and necessity which they suffer they may obtain the grace of your consolation. And having received the soldiers, he said to them: O little sons, you must take food together with me, that, our strength restored, we may go in haste where the divine will calls us. For the command of the Lord Dei 3–6. must not be est omits 2, est e. 3. neglected est adds 2., but his commands must be eagerly fulfilled. Because cursed is the man who does the work of the Lord f. o. d. 4. negligently, and cursed are they who decline from his commands. Then the soldiers, not moderately glad, said: We give you thanks, O Lord, who quia 3. have deigned to make manifest to us your mercy and your faithful servant Mathurin: whom we have sought quærebamus 2. most ardently ardentissimo corde 2. and have merited to find. And taking cum eo adds 2, 3. food, they stayed there. Rising early mane 2., they began to wish to set out p. v. c. 2.. To at 1. them blessed Mathurin said: Behold, he said, by divine command divisio 2., which quam 2. I cannot refuse resistere 4., being about to set out with you sum 2., I wish that you give me a pledge confirmed firmam 2. by faith and oaths, that if the time of my falling asleep should come in those regions il. in 2. vestris adds 2., and the Lord should command ut adds 2. my soul to go out from this de h. d. 2. little body to receive the grace of his loving-kindness, you will bring my little body back to this place to be buried in the earth terræ 2.. They most willingly assented, and confirmed the faith of their pledge fide et 2. by the invocation of the name of Christ the codices add in, except 3., and, bidding farewell to his parents, he undertook that journey undaunted.
ANNOTATIONS.
SECOND CHAPTER.
St. Mathurin, having freed the emperor's daughter from a demon, gains many for Christ, staying three years at Rome. He dies there and his body is carried back to Gaul.
Having set out with the envoys he turns aside to the island of Lérins, And as they were making the journey ut adds 2, 3., using uteretur 2, 3, omits 4. the opportunity of the route ut adds 2., they made for peterent 2. the maritime places, and, hastening not far from the island of Lérins, the same ibidem 3–6. blessed man omits 2. learned from the inhabitants that the memorial of St. Honoratus a was celebrated omits 3. in that place. And so blessed Mathurin resolved to turn aside there for the sake of prayer. Committing his will to God in prayers, he is said to have prayed thus: God, who through your saints claro videlicet adds 2, clara videlicet adds 3., by the light lumina 3–6. of the word omits 2., have enlightened the darkness of the world, and gave to your servant Honoratus the power to expel a multitude of serpents from the island of Lérins, and to make there a place of habitation for the servants of God and a house of prayer, grant me the means of going there, and of entreating your mercy t. m. 4. with the merits of blessed Honoratus, that, protected by the defense of your power, I may be able to cast out the multitude of demons from that place to which I am setting out by your command. And let not my frailty be spurned by them; but let your power be glorified by (eis-ab) omits 3. all hominibus 3–6., and let them know that you are God, who alone do wonders, that believers may be strengthened in the faith through your grace, and unbelievers be converted to you, the true and living God viv. e. ver. 2., who in the unity of the Trinity and in omits 2. the Trinity of unity live and reign forever and ever. Amen. This prayer finished, they at length reached the port. And having found a little boat inventamque naviculam 2., they went into it. As they sailed, the man of God was overcome by a heavy sleep. And a storm arising, the little boat was tossed here and there on the billowing waves. And the sailors, afraid, roused him, saying: O man of God, rise and call upon your God, if perhaps he may give thought to us, that we may not perish. He, awakened, understood that the storm had been poured upon them esse adds 2, 4–6. by the wickedness of diabolical diabolica 3. fraud. And lifting his eyes to heaven, he groaned and said: Lead me, Lord, in your way, and I will walk in your truth.
Let the shadows of death vanish, and let the withdrawn adducta 2, obducta 3. tranquillity of light be poured back omits 2. refundatur adds 2.. In the same hour the savage storm ceased, and clear calm was restored. And then postquam 2. sailing prosperously they gained the port of longed-for rest.
[10] and he goes to the thresholds of St. Honoratus. St. Mathurin, going out from the ship, hastened quickly to the thresholds of blessed p. b. 2, 3. Honoratus. Two men in omits 3. monastic habit met him and said: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And turning to him: Come, they say, lord, and with all confidence, prayers having been offered to the Lord, go where you are going, since you will always have him as helper whom you have as guide of your journey (habebis-itineris) omits 3. (quem-ductorem) omits 2.. And he accompanies you by his grace, both going before and following after. When this had been said, they did not omits 2. appear incomparuerunt 2.. These we believe without doubt to have been either angels or some of the saints. And St. Mathurin, coming to the desired place, committed himself s. d. 3. with all tanta 3. devotion to the Lord with the merits of blessed Honoratus; about to accomplish peragere 2. eagerly with his companions the stretches that remained of the journey begun cœpit 2.. Then the soldiers, sending forerunners ahead of them omits 2., announced to the emperor and the city that the soldier of Christ was at hand, by the visit of whose presence they hoped they would omits 2. obtain salvation.
[11] Coming to Rome, received with the greatest rejoicing, he heals the sick, And now as he drew near, the whole city rushed out to meet him, rejoicing and acclaiming him illumque 2.: Come, servant of Christ Mathurin, and, the name of your God being invoked, relieve our sicknesses and cure our wounds, since through you, as has been revealed to us, salvation and joy will be divinely diviti 3. ministered to this city. To them the blessed man answered: Here flourish the merits of the blessed apostles m. b. 2., here are fragrant the triumphs beatorum adds 2. of the holy omits 2, s. m. 3. martyrs, by whose prayers I believe both that my frailty is to be helped and that relief is to be brought to you. Yet since the divine loving-kindness has brought me here, invoking their merits in common let us entreat the clemency e. d. c. 4. of the Lord, that what he has decreed is to be done fieri 2. by me in your necessities he may deign by the grace of his loving-kindness to fulfill and perfect. And as all omits 3. prayed omits 2., the blessed man Mathurin said: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, who said: Ask and omits 3. you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened to you, and whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you will receive, and it will be done fiet 3. for you; and who therefore omits 2–6. enlightened the blind, healed the paralytics, cleansed the lepers l. m. p. s. 3., raised the dead, walked on the sea with your feet, deign through the merits of the saints to manifest your power, that through the invocation of your holy name every plague and every infirmity by which this people is worn down may be driven out, that those who see may glorify sanctificent 3. your holy name s. t. 2., who live and reign forever and ever. And when they answered Amen, all who had been brought in, laboring with various infirmities, were restored to their former health by the grace of God and the prayers of the blessed man Maturini 3.. And there was omits 2. great joy in that city.
[12] [and he frees the emperor's daughter from a demon; at length he dies his last day.] Then by swift velocitas 2. report famæ 2. it was carried perlata 2, delatum 3. to the emperor what quia 2. the man of God had done fuisset 2. on entering the city, and whom quasve sanitates 2. he had restored reddidisset 2. to health omits 2.. Then sending noble men from a 4–6. his side, he ordered that he should be brought duceretur 2. before him with honor. When qui 2, 3. he had entered ingressus 2, 3. the palace aulam adds 2., the emperor, meeting obvians 2. him, said: Hail, priest of God, Mathurin. And he said i. d. 3–6.: The Lord be with you. And Maximianus 3. the emperor said dixit 3. to him illi 2, omits 3.: If you can free liberari 1. my daughter Maximiana so 3; the others Maximiam. b from the demon, I will give you much money. The holy man answered: Not in me, but in God is the power of her omits 2, 3. health. As for the money that you promise, do what you will, because tua vero filia 2. by divine grace d. g. 4–6. she will be healed. For he will restore her to health who raised from death to life a girl of twelve years, namely the daughter of the ruler of the synagogue. And blessing oil, he poured it into the girl's mouth with the invocation of the name of Christ cum i. n. C. in os p. 2., and omits 2, quæ 4. at once, vomiting out the demon dæmonem 2., she was restored to health. At de 2, supra 3. this matter the emperor marveled omits 2., and omits 2. offered him a not moderate quantity modicæ quantitatis 2. of money pecuniam 2.. But he, knowing that the Lord had commanded, Freely you have received, freely give, refused such commerce. And after resisting long and much, at length with difficulty, the emperor urging him, he accepted what was offered for the sake of the poor, and what he accepted he paid out to the poor p. e. 4.. And those whom he brought up educens 2. he baptized, and made them most faithful in the faith of Christ's name, and he arranged that they should provide for themselves what was necessary from that same money p. e. 2.. And he dwelt habitavit igitur 2. there three years triennium 2., unceasingly frequenting the thresholds of the holy apostles and martyrs, ever pressing on in fasts, alms and supplications, helping the sick and infirm with compassion, casting out demons, and accomplishing very many plurima 3, 5, 6, quam plurima 2, 4. other things with the Lord's cooperation. He, knowing that the time omits 3. of his withdrawal was at hand, turning himself convertens 2–4. wholly to spiritual work, committed tradidit 5. himself to the will voluntate se 2. and power potestati 2. of the Lord. And when for some days aliquos 2. he had labored bitterly alacriter 2. from the force vim 2. of fevers, at length on the very day of the Kalends of November novembris 2. he joyfully gave back his holy omits 2, 3. spirit to the Lord cœlo 2, omits 3. and happily passed to Christ. And the emperor ordered i. e. 2. him to be buried with all honor and diligence.
[13] His body, honorably buried, is cast out of the tomb and carried to Gaul, Then tum 2. there came the priests et adds 4. of Christ, the ministers m. C. 4. too omits 4; ejus adds 2. and the people populi 4., mourning his death but rejoicing in the glory of his reward, because quem 2. they did not doubt that he had been repaid by the Lord n. d. a d. r. 2., and they committed tradiderunt 2. his body to the honor of burial cum h. c. e. s. 2.. When qui 2. they had left it reliquerunt 2. buried in the earth terræ corpus 2. omits 2, cum t. h. 4., and cum adds 2. had returned in the morning to pay due praises to the Lord in his memory memoriam 2., they found his body thrown out upon the ground. At this, astounded and held in suspense by exceeding amazement, they did not know what to do. Then one of those soldiers who had brought adduxerant 2, 3. him away from the parts of Gaul, recalling the deed and his pledge, by which they had been bound by him, for he was present there omnibus adds 2., said to them eos 2.: Hear me, I pray, brothers, and lend intendite 3. an ear gladly omits 2. to my words. For the cause is clear why the body ejus adds 2. buried in this earth cannot be held by it (ab ea) omits 2.. For when he had fuisset perfectum 2. been omits 2. approached by us by imperial authority, that iste vir adds 2. by the will of his God he should come here, he himself bound us by this sacrament of promise that we should bring him back, either living or dead, to his place and omits 2. his homeland patriæ suæ 2.. For this reason his body cannot be held by the tomb omits 3. of this land. Hearing this, made more eager, they announced it to the emperor. He, having collected no small band of Christians, and omits 2. having mixed in noble men from his army, who should be the leaders and directors of the obsequies along the whole way horum adds 2, harum adds 3., ordered that, the body being embalmed with spices and these funeral rites being honored with worthy execution exercitione 2, exercitatione 3., they should carry him back to his place, and when et 2, 3. he had been buried eo adds 2. they should return.
[14] where he rests in his native soil; They carrying out these orders, he was nobly brought back to his region and homeland s. p. 2., and buried est adds 2. honorably in the place where now his body, resting requiescit corpus ejus 2., awaits the day of the great judgment, when, to be glorified by a blessed resurrection, he will rise in glory, to be crowned with a double clarification with all the saints. And when the ministers of his obsequies returned to their homes, there remained there the vir adds 2. venerable Antony Antoninus 2, 6. the deacon, who had followed omits 2. him illum 2, 3, omits 1. with this vow, that all the days of his life he would diligently serve the Lord at the tomb of the blessed man. And also a certain youth a. q. 2., Felix by name, whom the same blessed man had baptized eumque de sacro fonte susceperat adds 2., and also two girls, virgins omits 2., one of whom was called Anastasia, the other Gregoria G. e. v. 3., who followed his body with the same vow omits 2., so that et 2., for love of the blessed man, they preferred to die abroad (per. mori) peregrino more illic remanere 2. rather than return to their own land. There therefore four from that crowd, remaining, vowed that they would serve at the tomb of blessed Mathurin, that by his merits and prayers they might be able to attain the rewards pr. pos. 4. of the heavenly kingdom. Remaining in this purpose until their death, they gave back their bodies to the earth, and their souls to heaven in peace. And their bodies were buried in the same place, and with hope of rejoicing they await the day of their glorification.
[15] and many of his miracles are made manifest. At the tomb of this ejus 2, 3. blessed man too very many
have been shown and declared [miracula jubente Deo, qui vivit et regnat Deus per secula seculorum amen adds 2, the others omit.], and daily are manifested, miracles; but by the carelessness and ignorance of the rulers of that place r. i. l. 4., because they have not been declared alligata 3. in letters, they have until now been abolished by eternal oblivion. May he then, who by his merits and prayers looses the bonds of various infirmities, loose, we pray omits 3., the chains of our sins per eum, qui vivit et regnat Deus per s. s. adds 3, the others omit., and in the day of the great judgment, when heaven and earth are burning with the last fire, may he snatch us with him to eternal joys, love of whom has compelled us to write his deeds, by the gift prosperante 6. of our Lord Jesus Christ, our loving Savior and redeemer, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns through infinite ages of ages. Amen.
ANNOTATIONS.
SHORT LIFE OF ST. MATHURIN
from a parchment codex, of lesser folio, of the Library of the University of Utrecht, no. 22, formerly of the Charterhouse of Utrecht, no. 248.
Mathurin, at Larchant in Gaul. (S.)
BHL Number: 5721
FROM MANUSCRIPTS.
St. Mathurin was an inhabitant of the diocese of Sens, whose father Marinus persecuted the Christians by the order of Maximian. But the son, a secret Christian from boyhood, grieving over the perdition of his parents, entreated God for their conversion, and he heard in sleep a voice saying to him: Mathurin, my servant, behold, what you have faithfully asked you have effectively obtained. He rose and gave thanks; and his mother, prompted by a divine instinct, came up, saying: O son, what advantage will there be for us, if, as you frequently ask, I believe in Christ? Great, he said, since both the body will be renewed by the glory of the resurrection, and the soul through baptism by the knowledge of truth. And when she had reported that pious suggestion of their son to her husband, he said: I too saw this night in a vision that this son of ours had entered a certain sheepfold, and a flock of a multitude of sheep had been delivered to him. So both received baptism from a certain bishop Polycarp, by whom Mathurin himself too, in his twentieth year, was ordained presbyter. He, when on account of the martyrdom of blessed Maurice and his companions the Roman people were afflicted with various calamities, and Maximian's daughter too was driven by an unclean spirit, and her father was acting by magical arts to free her, the demon crying through the girl's mouth: O emperor, your sorceries will fail, until from the parts of Gaul Mathurin, servant of Christ, comes, who by his prayers will restore the people and your daughter to health, summoned by the emperor, he went on to Rome with the soldiers, having first received an oath from them that, if it should happen that he departed in those regions, they would bring his body back to his place to be buried in the earth. So reaching Rome, received with glory by a crowd coming to meet him, he freed the emperor's daughter from the demon, and cured all the other sick brought to him. And at length on the very day of the Kalends of November he joyfully gave back his spirit to the Lord. When they had buried his body embalmed with spices and left it interred, returning in the morning they found it thrown out upon the ground. And astounded, they did not know what to do. Then one of the soldiers who had brought him from Gaul, recalling their pact, reported the cause. And the body was brought back with honor to his place at the emperor's order. There at his tomb God declared many miracles.
COMPENDIUM OF THE LIFE OF ST. MATHURIN
from Peter de Natalibus, book X, chapter 6.
Mathurin, at Larchant in Gaul. (S.)
FROM MANUSCRIPTS.
Mathurin the confessor flourished at the city of Sens in the time of the emperor Maximian. He was begotten of a father Marinus, a noble and gentile of the same city, who persecuted the Christians by the order of Maximian: he himself, being secretly a Christian in spirit only, entreated the Lord for the salvation of his parents. And he heard from the Lord that what he had asked would be given him. And after a few days his mother was converted to Christ, and while she was urging the same conversion on the father, he answered her that in the preceding night he had received by a vision that a multitude of sheep had been given into the keeping of his son. Hence Marinus himself with his wife and son Mathurin, twenty years old, were baptized by the holy bishop Polycarp. And when the devil had oppressed the daughter of the emperor Maximian, and was crying through the girl's mouth that he was to be cast out by no man except Mathurin of Sens, and that the Roman people too were to be freed by his merits from the calamity of the epidemic they had incurred, the emperor sent to the city of Sens and summoned Mathurin to him. He, brought to Rome with much honor, first received an oath from his companions that, if it should happen that he died at Rome or on the way, they would carry his body back to his own homeland. So Mathurin, coming to Rome, freed the emperor's daughter from the demon, and by his prayers obtained for the people too deliverance from the pestilence. And after these things he rested in peace in that place on the Kalends of November. When they had placed his body in a certain tomb, on the following day they found it exhumed. Remembering the promise and oath, they carried the body from Rome to Gaul, and there by the emperor's order buried it with worthy honor at the city of Sens, where too it is renowned for miracles.
Liturgical texts of St. Mathurin.
Mathurin, at Larchant in Gaul. (S.)
FROM MANUSCRIPTS.
OFFICE ON THE FEAST OF ST. MATHURIN
from case L 460, 461 of the Paris archive and the codex of Monsieur Jolivet.
At First Vespers. Hymn.
Now Mathurin, glad on this day, calls all his fellow citizens, that they may fill heaven with sacred prayers, while he makes for the blessed dwellings.
Therefore, suppliant Larchant, be present, raise your rejoicing strains on high, when the feasts of your holy foster-son return through the world.
He, a youth flashing with the faith of Christ, sorrowfully asks of God that the false error of the gods be called back from the impious heart of his parents.
Christ assenting to the boy's request, his mother ran the more quickly to her son, and afterwards his father; so the son becomes begetter to both his parents.
And to those begotten in the bath of the sacred font he dispenses with his mouth and hands the holy body and word, shining in the sacred order of Christ.
Let us sing the glory of the Holy Trinity, by which Mathurin took the citadel of heaven, and by whose merits we all pray to be joined to him.
At the Magnificat. Ant. The day of highest joy is at hand, on which the man of the Lord Mathurin merited to be joined to the citizens of the heavenly homeland.
At Matins.
Invitatory. Let us venerate Christ, truly wonderful in his saints, * who has granted power and a crown to blessed Mathurin.
Hymn.
While he adorns his homeland with wonders, the fame of the saint flies from there through the world, and he is called to Rome, by the cautious informing of a demon.
A messenger seeks him, he is found praying; but his father refuses to give up his son, unless the king's minister give him his pledge to give back the son.
Then he takes the road; the huge sea swells, dreadful to the sailors; lest all perish, they rouse the saint: at his prayer the deep is made level.
He rises at Ostia; this flies through the city; a crowd of the sick runs quickly from there to meet the saint; it asks to be restored to health.
When he sees, marveling, the griefs of the people, he prays, and, overcome by the highest pity, asks that heaven at once restore health to the sick.
Glory of the holy… In the First Nocturn.
Ant. The confessor of the Lord Mathurin, despising from his first youth the delights of this world, meditates on the law of the Lord day and night.
Ant. For, despising the nobility of his parents, he submitted himself wholly to him alone, to serve whom is to reign.
Ant. With his voice he cried to the Lord for the conversion of his parents, and the Lord heard him from his holy mountain.
After Lesson I. ℞. Blessed Mathurin, sprung from freeborn parents, but still gentiles, * from his very boyhood began to be a disciple of Christ. ℣. Yet secretly and as it were under a cloak the excellent boy longed for the Lord. From his very.
After Lesson II. ℞. He fed the aged years of his parents with the word of life, and, turn being turned about, those who begot him for the world he begot for heaven, * and those whose heir he could be, he made his coheirs in Christ. ℣. Thus taught, abandoning idolatry, with their son going before, they followed in the footsteps of Christ. And those whose.
After Lesson III. ℞. A boy in age, he began to grow old in morals, * and amid the delights of the world he despised their blandishments. ℣. O happy boy, whose life afforded an example to old men, and who, to strengthen the spirit, was the most savage persecutor of his flesh. And amid. Glory be. And amid.
In the Second Nocturn.
Ant. How long, my parents, heavy of heart, why do you love vanity and seek after lying?
Ant. Let all who hope in you, O Lord, rejoice; they will exult forever, and you will dwell in them.
Ant. Out of the mouth of infants you have perfected praise because of your enemies, that you may destroy the enemy and the avenger.
After Lesson IV. ℞. It happened meanwhile at Rome that the demon that had invaded Maximian's daughter answered: * that it could be expelled by no one, unless a certain Mathurin came from the parts of Gaul. ℣. O wonderful power of God; for the enemy of all holiness could not conceal the holiness of the blessed man, but said. That it could be.
After Lesson V. ℞. When Maximian heard that his daughter was to be freed from the demon by the prayers of Mathurin, he sent certain men most faithful to him into the Gauls, * who, with the fame of his holiness as guide, found the saint at Larchant. ℣. He, already instructed by an angelic oracle, kindly received their petition. Who, with the holiness.
After Lesson VI. ℞. So the envoys having given their pledge that, living or dead, he would be returned to his parents, * he eagerly took the road with them. ℣. As they marveled at his holiness, with the Lord's cooperation he shone forth with many miracles. Eagerly. Glory be. Eagerly.
In the Third Nocturn.
Ant. In the sight of Mathurin the malignant one was brought to nothing, for he feared the Lord and glorified him.
Ant. Lord, you have gone before your saint with blessings of sweetness; his right hand against those who hate you.
Ant. Servant of Christ Mathurin, relieve our sicknesses and cure our wounds.
After Lesson VII. ℞. And to moderate for themselves the difficulty of the journey, they made for the maritime places; where, when they had turned aside to a certain island, a most grievous storm arising, * they began to cry out to St. Mathurin. ℣. When he was roused from sleep and prayed, the winds and the sea were quieted. To St.
After Lesson VIII. ℞. And while he was going out from the ship, two men met him, who had not been seen there before, * nor did they appear afterward.
℣. Whose greeting was this: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Nor.
After Lesson IX. ℞. And when he had come to Rome, he restored to their former health no small multitude of citizens oppressed by various sicknesses, * and freed Maximian's daughter from a demon. ℣. But he, attributing nothing to himself but all to the Lord, said: This has been done by the Lord. And. Glory be. And.
At Lauds.
Ant. Mathurin, as he had been forewarned by an angel, set out for Rome with the envoys.
Ant. Whose citizens, oppressed by various sicknesses, he cured in the name of Christ, and freed Maximian's daughter from a demon.
Ant. Having stayed three years at Rome, that he might frequent the thresholds of the blessed martyrs, dissolved by fevers he passed to the Lord.
Ant. When the emperor heard that the saint's body could not be held in the tomb, he sent it back to his homeland with an honorable escort.
Ant. And there, by his intercession and God's cooperation, many more miracles have been shown than are contained on the page.
Hymn.
Rome then, rejoicing, asks that the king's child be no longer tortured by a wicked spirit; and by his prayers he gives her back healed to her parent Maximian.
When the loving man has stayed three years at Rome, his spirit flies up to the blessed; but the earth cannot retain the holy body when buried.
At this event the peoples remain astounded, and the whole court, seeing it, is astounded with the emperor; and he hears that the saint wished to be carried to his begetter.
He commands that many men (bringing great honor to the body) accompany it all the way to his homeland, where now he rests, triumphing in the world.
O too happy, Larchant, in this citizen, who lives for you so much through love, that he desires to remain with you for all time.
Glory… At the Benedictus. Ant. This saint did not lay away in a napkin the talent entrusted to him, but as a faithful and prudent servant brought it back multiplied to his Lord.
Prayer.
God, who have crowned with glory and honor your faithful servant, blessed Mathurin the confessor, among your chosen fellow citizens, grant, we beseech you, that by his merits and prayers we may be able to glory perpetually in the eternal vision of you. Through the Lord.
At Second Vespers. Hymn.
Sing, O tongue, the praises And the proclamations of Mathurin; With a pure heart let us celebrate His solemn feast, By whose life and teaching The Church shines.
Mathurin, a man mature, Himself subdues the vices, From the first flower of his age Spurning the joys of this world. He calls his parents from error By the grace of God.
Caesar, provoked, sends for him At the demon's disclosure; But on the sea a tempest arises Through the hatred of the Malignant One. Roused, he delivered The sailors from shipwreck.
That the shining lamp might not long Lie hidden under a bushel, The daughter of Maximian Was troubled by a demon; Rome is freed from disaster By his intercession.
While he went round the places Of the saints for three years, The saint departs to the blessed, To receive his reward. The earth cannot hold him back, Now a sharer of the heavenly ones.
Whereat the emperor, astounded, Orders that into Gaul The body be brought back with honor, And into his homeland. May his prayers lead us To the glory of the saints.
Glory and honor be to God, Power and dominion, To the One, threefold in Persons, Creator of all things, By whose gift Mathurin Received the prize of life. Amen.
At the Magnificat. Ant. O glorious confessor of the Lord, Mathurin, hear the voices of those who make supplication to you, and lead to the palace of heaven those who in your praises venerate Christ.
OFFICE ON THE TRANSLATION OF ST. MATHURIN
from the same cases.
At the Magnificat. Ant. Blessed confessor Mathurin, who expel demons, calm plague, and turn aside storms by the gift and power of God: come as our helper, alleluia, alleluia.
At Matins.
After Lesson I. ℞. This is the lover of the brothers, * this is he who prays much for the people and for all his city, Mathurin, confessor of the Lord, Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia. ℣. This man appeared most gentle among the people and most loving of his homeland. This is.
Lesson II. Mathurin having died at Rome on the Kalends of November, the Christians committed him to burial there according to their custom. But since God does not allow oaths taken in the name of Christ often to be void, on the day after the body had been buried, it was found thrown out from the ground. For the Romans who had brought him from Larchant to Rome had bound themselves by an oath, invoking the name of Christ, to bring him back to his homeland living or dead. When therefore they were making little of their oath or not remembering it, God recalled it to their memory by this miracle.
℞. O great charity of the saint, whose love for his homeland was so great, * since neither living nor dead did he ever depart from it, Alleluia. ℣. You have granted him the desire of his soul, O Lord, and you have not cheated him of the wish of his lips. Since neither living.
Lesson III. As all then were astounded and running together to the miracle, the event was marveled at, but the cause was unknown, when one of those who had sworn stood by and said that he wished to be buried not at Rome but at Larchant. When the prince who had called him to Rome, whose daughter had been freed from a demon, had heard this, he sent the body back to his homeland with an honorable escort. When it had arrived there, the faithful who had accompanied it, many of whom had vowed to sing the praises of God at his tomb for their whole life, laid it honorably in a tomb with the inhabitants of the place. Afterward, when a celebrated church had been built there, where the relics of St. Mathurin are venerated with great veneration, in that same church the day of his deposition, the sixth of the Ides of May, is celebrated with anniversary devotion and a huge concourse of peoples.
℞. Happy soul, you who glow with God forever, * whose body brought great amazement to the peoples, because when buried in the ground it could not be retained, Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia. ℣. When the emperor heard of the miracle that had happened, he sent the saint back to his homeland with a worthy escort. Whose body. Glory be. Whose body.
At Mass.
Prayer. God, who have granted us this honorable day in the translation of blessed Mathurin your confessor, grant, we beseech you, joy to your Church in this celebration, and may she be raised up in the heavens by the intercessions of him whose members she venerates on earth with loving affection. Through the Lord.
Secret. Receive with kindly gaze, we beseech you, merciful God, the gifts offered to your majesty, that they may be made saving for us by the prayers of him whose relics we venerate in this basilica. Through the Lord.
Postcommunion. Partaking of the divine mysteries, we beseech you, O Lord, that the intercession of blessed Mathurin may everywhere protect us, in whose sacred pledges we here glory. Through the Lord.
LESSONS FROM A MANUSCRIPT CODEX OF THE OFFICE OF ST. MATHURIN COPIED IN THE HAND OF J. B. JOLIVET, PARISH PRIEST OF LARCHANT.
Lesson IV. Mathurin is born in the district of Sens, in the village whose name is Larchant, of Marinus and Euphemia, noble parents, but still held in the error of the gentiles: so that his father received public power of raging against the Christians. He, however, instructed by St. Polycarp, archbishop of Sens, in secret, lest he should offend his father, when he was twelve years old, surpassing his age in morals, loved Christ with his whole being: and serving him with fasts and prayers night and day, prayed constantly for the salvation of his parents.
Lesson V. And so, divine grace cooperating, he converted first his mother, then his father, who had been divinely warned through a dream of his son's piety, and he had them baptized by St. Polycarp. And he was the same man, their carnal son and spiritual father, since he merited to regenerate through the word those who had begotten him. At that time, when he was twenty years old, on account of the gravity of his morals he is ordained presbyter by St. Polycarp.
Lesson VI. Then, called to Rome to free the prince's daughter who was possessed by a demon, he set out there, and, many works of piety having been accomplished, and many benefits shown toward the sick and those possessed by the devil, he at length received there the fruit of his good works. His body, as he himself had requested, brought back to his homeland, with much devotion of the inhabitants and a huge … of signs…
OTHER LESSONS FROM THE PARIS ARCHIVE.
Lesson IV. Mathurin, sprung from Roman stock, was most outstanding in piety. To the people of the Gâtinais, within whose borders he dwelt, he afforded a most splendid example of all virtues. His festival is observed there with the highest veneration at Larchant in the diocese of Sens, on the third day of November; the first day of that month, on which he died, being consecrated to the celebration of All Saints. In that town, which has belonged wholly to the canons of Paris from the year one thousand and five, there stands a most ample church under his invocation, behind whose altar is seen the raised case of his sacred bones. This, each year when the feast day of the Lord's Ascension recurs, is carried to the neighboring churches in a long line of processing peoples.
Lesson V. Vows useful above all for restoring health of mind are pronounced to St. Mathurin in very many places of France. The first parish of the city of Luçon has been given his glorious name; and the church of La Rochelle celebrates his feast with semidouble rite. At Paris too the sacred house of the Religious of the Most Holy Trinity of the Redemption of Captives was dedicated in honor of blessed Mathurin. The church of Paris gave it to the brothers of this Order in the year of salvation one thousand two hundred and twenty-eight, for which gift two years later they gave thanks in letters written in the name of the general chapter held at Cerfroid on the Tuesday after Trinity. Among them, as also in the church of Paris, his festival is observed on the fifth of the Ides of November, on which day of the year only a double allowance is distributed to each of the canons.
Lessons from the Proper of Meaux.
Lesson I. Mathurin, according to the common tradition, was born at the town named Larchant, formerly of the diocese of Sens, now of Meaux, of noble but heathen parents. While still a youth he embraced the Christian faith, and he is said to have brought forth his parents themselves to Christ by constant entreaties to God and pious exhortations.
Lesson II. He shone with such virtue and integrity of morals that he was ordained priest by the bishop of Sens. And when he had faithfully fulfilled the functions of his ministry, loaded with every kind of virtue he exchanged the toils of this life for eternal happiness on the very day of the Kalends of November; hence his feast has been transferred to another day.
Lesson III. At Larchant there stands a most ample church under his invocation, where nearly his whole body was preserved before it was consumed by fire in the 16th century amid the impious furies of the Calvinists. Until the unspeakable calamities of the waning 18th century, the case in which the relics were deposited was carried around to the neighboring churches every year in a long line of processing peoples. To the basilica of Larchant frequent pilgrimages were made, that health of mind might be obtained for the sick by the intercession of blessed Mathurin.