Palladius

ON ST. PALLADIUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, AT SAINTES IN SECOND AQUITAINE,

Perhaps about the year DC.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Palladius, bishop, confessor, at Saintes in Second Aquitaine. (S.)

BY J. G.

§ I. The Saint's cult established at least from the 11th century; the Lessons of the Breviary of Saintes proper to him: his announcement in certain Martyrologies, and his memory, as truly a saint, in various writers.

That those whom we see held as Saints by the universal, or at any rate by some particular, church, and affected with the honours of the Heaven-dwellers, did not, every one of them, always pass a life so innocent Our Prelate, although at one time, as Gregory of Tours witnesses, he offended, as not to have suffered something human, nay, even, either through perturbation of mind or the onset of a more vehement nature, now and then to have offended rather gravely, has been demonstrated in our Work by more than one mournful example, and Palladius, bishop of Saintes, whom the natives commonly call Saint Pallade and Saint Palais, will show it here by his own. He too, you see, was a man; nor were human things accordingly foreign to him. Which nevertheless are not to be thought to derogate from the true holiness either of him or of other Heaven-dwellers who sometimes fell on earth, whenever sincere penitence received them, and excellent virtues adorned this, and finally a death precious in the sight of the Lord crowned it, as what is to be said below will make plain was done in Palladius. St. Gregory, bishop of Tours, mentions him in various places, and as he did not leave his virtues untouched, so too, as befitted a sincere writer, he by no means dissembled his offences, committed either while he was living or in his presence; although nevertheless, which I may be permitted to say here in advance, some of his deeds, noted by that writer, something of just [ ] I will follow the writer of the History of the Franks and of other Works, as being contemporary with Palladius and an eye-witness of many of the things he relates, so closely as guide that I shall nowhere depart from him, unless certain things, related rather sparingly by him, are to be unfolded more broadly from elsewhere.

[2] I take my beginning from establishing and illustrating the ecclesiastical cult of Palladius, and that chiefly for this reason, at least from the year 1047 and onwards he had public cult, that on account of the silence of very many historians and martyrologists it might seem not certain enough. And first, that Gregory of Tours, praised above, nowhere ascribes the title of Saint to Palladius, nor has one word of his ecclesiastical veneration, can indeed seem strange to no one, since he did not live to survive Palladius, but on the contrary departed from among the living at least two years before him; so that he could not have numbered Palladius among the Saints, much less have mentioned even in passing a cult which is not always rendered to true Saints at once after their death. And as regards the classic martyrologists and the writers of Gallic affairs nearly contemporary with Palladius, there is likewise no reason why we should wonder that he was numbered among the Saints by none of them; since cult, as it seems to me at least, either began to be paid to him much later, or at least was not so solemn in their age that it spread even beyond the limits of the diocese of Saintes and was then worthy of special memory. But that already then, at least from the year 1047, in which the charter of foundation of the very celebrated abbey of St. Mary at Saintes was given, the name of Saint clung to our prelate, and that some canons were appointed for his cult, or, as the words of another charter have in volume 2 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana among the Instruments, column 482, for serving St. Palladius, is altogether manifest from the documents pertaining to the church of Saintes edited there from column 479. Add to these that both in the same and in other instruments printed there now the church of St. Palladius, now the parish of St. Palladius, or other names of the kind occur, from which it becomes indubitable that sacred buildings dedicated to the veneration of our holy Prelate already existed then.

[3] Moreover, since, as Denis de Sainte-Marthe witnesses in the praised volume 2 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, column 1059 and following, as various documents show, old codices of rites, without doubt seen by himself, expressly testify that the casket of relics of our St. Palladius was formerly carried in public supplications to implore rain from heaven, it follows from this too that the holy Prelate had long since enjoyed ecclesiastical cult, although no monuments teach us in what year or century its beginning should be placed. Further, that this ancient cult of St. Palladius suffered no detriments with the lapse of time, but on the contrary rather increased in no common way, the Breviary of the church of Saintes, printed in the year 1542, an excerpted apograph of which from the Saint-Magloire library of the Oratory of Our Lord Jesus Christ at Paris the Reverend Dom Thierry most kindly transmitted to me, shows clearly enough. For not only in the Calendar prefixed to it is an Office of IX Lessons prescribed on the Nones of October for Palladius the bishop; but in the Litanies too, long customarily sung in the same church, St. Palladius is placed in the middle and invoked between St. Troianus, bishop of Saintes, and St. Leontius, namely his immediate successor in the chair of Saintes, no otherwise than St. Jerome and other undoubted Saints, whether foreign or native confessors, whose suffrages the church of Saintes suppliantly asks in those Litanies.

[4] and the very Breviary of the church of Saintes, Finally at folio CXLIX of the same Breviary the Office of nine Lessons prescribed in the Calendar, which was then at least a lesser double, is exhibited entire, which, in so far as it is proper to the Saint, it seemed good to transcribe here. The Antiphon at the Magnificat at Vespers runs thus: O excellent Palladius! O chief confessor! O shining gem of prelates! O and excellent Star. Lovable in all things and praiseworthy in all, be clement to us everywhere, now and at every time. This the Prayer follows, conceived in these words: O God, who didst deign to place the excellent confessor Palladius in the bosom of Abraham Thy servant, grant by his salutary supplication that we may be among the citizens of the heavenly * fatherland. Through our Lord etc. Next is subjoined the Invitatory which was then sung at the Matins Office, sounding thus: Ye hosts of Christ, sing: for the celebrated solemnities of our Father are at hand: Let us therefore rejoice with one mind to our God, who freely chose for Himself the holy Palladius.

[5] from which proper lessons are recited, Then there follow the three Lessons of the second Nocturn which are proper to the Saint, to be discussed below, of which the first, which is the fourth of the whole Office, runs thus: Palladius, a disciple of Eutropius and instructed in the faith by him, received the order of the priesthood. And how most holily he conducted himself his acts demonstrate: for after the death of St. Eutropius he is ordained of the church of Saintes , But Thou etc. And the second of the second Nocturn, equally succinctly, but far more in conformity with the truth than the first, relates the deeds of the Saint in these words: Who, ruling the church excellently, filled, cherished and exhorted the Christians as much with riches as with salutary admonitions and words: and he translated the body of St. Eutropius into the new basilica which he himself had caused to be built. The third finally is conceived in these words: And the same Palladius, learning that Vasius, a youth of Saintes, martyred for the faith of Christ, had been buried by the Christians, consecrated a basilica to the same Vasius: in which he ordained an abbot and monks, that they might serve the divine services day and night. At length Palladius, full of virtues and miracles, fell asleep in the Lord. Thus far the proper Lessons, which leave no doubt concerning the cult long since constantly shown to St. Palladius, and that by no means a common one.

[6] which to no other than our Palladius, But, you will say, the Palladius who is affected with ancient and constant cult by the church of Saintes is asserted in the seventh Responsory at the Lessons, which is also proper to him in the same Breviary, to have always been free from all bitterness of gall, and, which is the chief point, in the fourth Lesson he is set down as the disciple of St. Eutropius, who fell a martyr for the name of Christ in the 3rd century, and, as the words intimate, his immediate successor in the chair; and since these by no means fit our Palladius, who, as St. Gregory witnesses, was now and then not free from the fault of a harsher spirit, and was a prelate only of the sixth century; it becomes necessary to assert that not our Palladius but some other prelate of Saintes of the same name enjoys ecclesiastical cult among the people of Saintes. To these things I answer that, since the church of Saintes in the fifth Lesson of its Office affirms that Palladius translated the body of St. Eutropius into the new basilica which he had caused to be built, which fact it took from St. Gregory of Tours, Book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 56, it shows most openly that it is treating in this place of no other Palladius than him of whom that holy writer had spoken in the cited chapter, which Palladius is in any case altogether ours. It is added that the same church asserts in Lesson VI that a basilica was consecrated by its Palladius to St. Vasius, who was slain under Alaric, king of the Goths, which certainly cannot fit any other than ours.

[7] Finally, since that Palladius whom the church of Saintes places in the middle among its holy prelates Troianus and Leontius is beyond doubt ours, [although there is more than one hallucination in them, are shown to be attributable.] it must undoubtedly be said that it venerates him likewise, and no other, with its ecclesiastical Office; especially since it is not proved that another St. Palladius, likewise bishop of Saintes, as was commonly held, and a disciple of St. Eutropius, existed in the nature of things, as Denis de Sainte-Marthe also relates in volume 2 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, column 1054. Let it have erred

then, the author of the ecclesiastical Office in this, that, following the error of the common people, or the less accurate manner of speaking, he made Palladius a disciple of St. Eutropius; and let him have been also more indulgent than is right to his holy Prelate, when he strove to exempt him even from all fault of a harsher spirit; but not on account of this twofold hallucination of the author must the Palladius, prelate of Saintes, whom that church celebrates on this day with a fairly solemn Office, be called different from ours, to whom alone, as what is to be said will show, all the other things fit which are related in the Lessons of that Office and which exist recorded by various writers.

[8] Nor indeed does the Breviary of Saintes alone, but various ecclesiastical Calendars as well, Then also various writers and ecclesiastical Calendars contrary to what Baillet contends on this day, column 105, number our Palladius among the Saints. This is testified in general by the Benedictines, editors of the Works of St. Gregory the Great, volume 2, column 828, in their Annotations on the forty-ninth Letter of Pope St. Gregory, and by Bouquet, volume 2 of the Writers of Gallic affairs, page 332, likewise in his Annotations on chapter forty-three of book 8 of Gregory of Tours's History of the Franks. And of these ecclesiastical Calendars Denis de Sainte-Marthe, in the cited volume 2 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, column 1059, records by name two which I was not permitted to see, namely old Hagiologies of Limoges and of Saintes, in which our Saint is announced in these words: On the Nones of October, at Saintes, of St. Palladius, bishop and confessor. With these, besides the Gallican Martyrology by Saussay, whose words we shall give below, agrees the Usuardine Martyrology of the church of Bordeaux, which in Du Sollier among the Additions on the 7th day of October records our Palladius thus: In the city of Saintes, of St. Palladius, bishop and confessor; so that the praised Du Sollier, in his Observations on the Additions to Usuard, page 585, deservedly wondered why this Saint was passed over by Chastelain; nor is it less to be wondered at why he was not mentioned in the more recent Martyrology of Paris.

[9] and Saussay more prolixly than the rest, from whom his elogium Let us hear now Saussay's announcement itself, much richer than the former ones, and recording the honourable deeds of the Saint: On the same day (so he speaks on the 7th of October, page 697), in the city of Saintes, of St. Palladius, bishop and confessor, who, succeeding Didymus by the suffrages of his merits, made illustrious by the glory of holiness and learning the chair in which he sat. A lover of the beauty of the house of God and an excellent worshipper of the Heaven-dwellers, he built with wonderful work the basilica of St. Stephen, whose beauties Fortunatus sings. He founded besides a notable church in honour of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and also of the holy Martyrs Lawrence and Pancras, whose relics, having sent the priest Luparicus to St. Gregory the Great, he received from Rome as an Apostolic gift with a commendation of his piety, and placed in the same basilica with all veneration: proper altars being assigned to the pledges of each of these Heaven-dwellers, which he consecrated in their memory. And thus to the nine altars which he established in the same basilica he assigned proper tutelaries with the patronages of each. The pious Prelate was afterwards (nay, far more probably before) exercised with many pressures: God so willing, that he who honoured the merits of the Saints should keep their footsteps, and so obtain their rewards.

[10] is described, Valois likewise, Then he concludes thus: At length, therefore, when by heavenly favour he had found * the Relics of St. Eutropius, the glorious pontiff and martyr, buried by age and by the forgetfulness of men no less than by earth, he himself also at last received the donative of a warfare completed in the service of Christ. Thus far the elogium of our Saint woven by Saussay and expressed in the same form of letters in which he is accustomed to commemorate in his Martyrology undoubted Saints affected with certain cult. For the rest, that, as far as can be done, the ecclesiastical cult long since paid to St. Palladius, no one contradicting, may be placed beyond controversy, and that I may thus render a reason why, by Saussay's example, without any distinction, contrary to what Baillet did, I number him among the undoubted Saints, it will help to have recorded here what Adrien de Valois, volume 2 of Frankish Affairs, page 321, wrote candidly and accurately of Palladius, namely in these words: This man, then, passed the last part of his life so unlike the former, and was eminent with so many and so great virtues (namely when he was more advanced in age), that after death he merited to be numbered among the Saints by the church, and the piety of posterity named for him a church outside the walls of Saintes, and many others in various villages of the territory of Saintes.

[11] and others celebrate him as truly a saint, Of these the Codex of the benefices of the dioceses of Bordeaux, Saintes and others, published in print in the year 1648, exhibits two by name, namely parishes situated in the archpriestship of Bouteville of the diocese of Saintes, of which one is commonly named Saint Pallais des Combes, the other Saint Pallais de Verrieres. Further, the same as Valois is testified in general also by Denis de Sainte-Marthe, praised above, writing thus at column 1059: Very many parish churches of the diocese acknowledge him (our St. Palladius) as patron, which therefore venerate St. Palladius in the accustomed manner of churches with the solemn rite of Patrons. But whether on the 6th day of September, as the praised author subjoins in the same place, our Saint is really venerated in some of these churches, I cannot declare for certain, since he brought forward no surety for his assertion of this day, and does not designate by name even one of these churches which venerate him on the 6th day of September instead of the 7th day of October. However that may be, certainly in his cathedral church St. Palladius had ancient cult on this 7th day of October; so that accordingly we deservedly treat of him on this day.

* That is, heavenly.

* Supply: bishop.

* Perhaps works.

* Read: reperisset.

§ II. The illustrious birth of our Prelate: the epoch of his entering on the episcopate defined fairly closely. He takes part in the synod of Paris in the year 573; and most probably took part in that of Saintes in the year 579: he obeyed more than was fair the orders of Gundobald, raised by some to be king of the Franks.

Our Saint, from the illustrious stock of the rich Palladius, The ecclesiastical cult of our holy Prelate having been established and illustrated, which, as I noted in the former §, number 2, St. Gregory of Tours neither mentioned nor could have mentioned, I now return to him as my guide, as I likewise promised before, to pursue the birth and deeds of Palladius. And first, as regards his family, the praised Gregory of Tours is witness, book On the Glory of the Confessors, in the Ruinart edition which I use, chapter 60, that he descended from the family of the once rich Palladius, and so, as appears, from that stock of the Palladii who, as St. Sidonius Apollinaris witnesses in his illustrious Speech to the Bituriges, volume 1 of Sirmond's Works, column 600, held the chairs either of letters or of altars with the praise of their order; such as were chiefly Palladius the Rhetor in the 4th century; Palladius the poet and philosopher, also called Aemilianus, in the 5th century; and among the prelates of Bourges both Palladii, of whom one flourished in the 4th, the other in the 5th century. That our Prelate was begotten of a father Palladius, formerly count of the Gabali, who, as Gregory of Tours narrates more fully in book 4 of the History of the Franks, chapter 40, terrified by a vain fear lest he should be killed by King Sigibert, pierced himself, wretched no less than wonderfully, with his own sword, Baillet asserts on this day, column 103, by conjecture; but less probably, in my opinion at least.

[13] For since the pitiable death of that Palladius happened in the year 567, as Le Cointe will have it, yet not, as it seems, born of Palladius, count of the Gabali, or in the year 566, as Ruinart has it, and so only a few years before St. Palladius was consecrated bishop of Saintes; it follows that Palladius, formerly count of the Gabali, if he was the father of our Saint, then already 30 years old or more, was at least fifty years old, and that accordingly his mother, who, as St. Gregory witnesses, strove to forestall the death of her son, and then ran as if lifeless to the body of the slain man, was a matron of seventy; which advanced age of the woman, as being altogether memorable in view of the circumstances, Gregory of Tours seems altogether likely to have indicated by a little word; whereas he wrapped it in the deepest silence. I would rather believe, therefore, that our Saint had a parent altogether different from the aforesaid count, sprung from the ancient and illustrious lineage of the Palladii, into whose proper name, as being handed down neither by Gregory of Tours nor by others of the same age whom I have consulted, it did not seem good to inquire more laboriously.

[14] about the year 570 he ascended the chair of Saintes. In what place or at what time St. Palladius was born, nay, in what determinate year he ascended the chair of Saintes, Gregory of Tours is silent, because, namely, he was not writing his Life of set purpose. There is nevertheless something by which the beginning of his episcopate may be defined fairly closely. For since Heraclius, priest of the church of Bordeaux, advanced by Leontius, metropolitan of Bordeaux, after the deposition of Emerius to the chair of Saintes, as is clear from Gregory of Tours, book 4 of the History of the Franks, chapter 26, and from volume 2 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, column 1057, was still living about the year of Christ 566, and St. Concordius and Didymus succeeded him, of whom the former died about the year 568, the latter about the year 570, as is probable enough; it follows that St. Palladius was promoted to the chair of Saintes not sooner than about the same year 570. On the other hand, that the beginning of his episcopate can be placed not later than the year 573, advanced to the 11th day of the month of September, becomes manifest from the fourth council of Paris, celebrated in the same year 573, at which council Palladius, already then bishop of Saintes, took part and subscribed, as may be seen in Labbe, volume 5 of the Councils, column 919 and following. It must be, therefore, that our Saint was raised to the chair of Saintes in the time between the year of Christ 570 and 573.

[15] and the synod of Paris, the occasion of whose convening is related, Further, what cause there was why Palladius, together with eight bishops renowned for holiness and many other illustrious ones, was summoned to Paris to celebrate a synod, it will not be out of place to record here, partly from the Acts of the council themselves. When a certain priest of the territory of Chartres, named Promotus, who, having left his cell without letters from his bishop, had been ordained bishop illicitly and against canonical discipline, had invaded, as if under the name of a bishopric, a parish of the diocese of Chartres, situated in the fourth Lyonnese province, whose name is Dunum (they now call it Chateau-Dun), and the means of the same parish; Pappolus, bishop of Chartres, had complained to King Chilperic, to whose rule Chartres was subject, of the injury done to himself and to the sacred canons: But since the Castle of Dunum, although a parish of the diocese of Chartres, obeyed King Sigebert, and he had determined to protect Promotus, his subject, a grave scandal could not but arise from this in the church, and dissension break out afresh between the two princes. Guntram, therefore, that pious king of the Burgundians and most loving of peace,

that he might go to meet this evil, with the consent of Chilperic and Sigibert caused a synod to be held at Paris in the basilica of St. Peter, now called St. Genevieve's, in which the controversies arisen between those kings and the complaints of private persons might be settled and composed fairly by the most holy bishops.

[16] in the year 573, in the month of September, he took part with 31 bishops. To this synod, then, with 31 bishops and one priest acting in place of Ricomer, bishop of Orléans, St. Palladius came to Paris in the year 573, not in the month of November, as is read in Longueval, volume 3 of the History of the Gallican Church, page 55, by a typographical error unless I am mistaken, but either before the month of September, or at least before the 3rd day before the Ides of the same month of September; and having heard the most just complaints of Pappolus, he was, together with the other fathers, an author of the issuing of that Constitution of the synod, which you have in Labbe, volume 5 of the Councils, column 919, directed to Aegidius, bishop of Reims; by which Promotus, consecrated bishop rashly by the same Aegidius, canonical severity being omitted, was declared deposed from the dignity of his grade, and by which those who thereafter should either seek the blessing of the same Promotus, or be content to receive it, were to be kept from the fellowship of communion or from the thresholds of the church. St. Palladius was also, with the same fathers, an author of the letter written to King Sigibert, in which, with truly episcopal liberty and gravity, it was enjoined that he should cease to defend the cause of Promotus, lest otherwise the king himself should provoke the divine anger against himself.

[17] And although both the most prudently conceived Constitution of the synod [where too he excellently defended, with the rest, the prescriptions of the canons.] and the Letter written to King Sigibert and signed with the name of all the fathers did not at once have the desired outcome, as is gathered from Gregory of Tours, book 4 of the History of the Franks, chapter 48, and book 7, chapter 17; nay, although those kings, their sins causing it, as the same Gregory of Tours writes in the cited chapter 48, put off hearing the bishops who counselled what was right, not on that account was the zeal of St. Palladius and of the eight other Saints and the rest of the bishops worthy of less praise, by which they strove with every zeal and effort to defend the prescriptions of the sacred canons, to drive scandal far from the Church, and to compose the dissensions arisen between Chilperic and Sigibert. What wars arose after this synod was dissolved, the hatreds of the queens Brunhild and Fredegund, and also of the kings Sigibert and Chilperic, breaking out afresh against one another, whence, as Gregory of Tours nearly speaks in book 4 of the History of the Franks, chapter 48, there was worse groaning in many churches of the Gauls than in the time of the persecution of Diocletian, it is not the business of this place to set before the eyes. Wherefore I now make my step to another assembly of bishops, or priests of the first order, at which St. Palladius most probably took part, and perhaps even presided.

[18] This was held in the very episcopal city of our Saint, he most probably also took part in the synod of Saintes in the year 579, and, as Labbe, cited volume 5 of the Councils, column 965, and Le Cointe, volume 2 of the Ecclesiastical Annals of the Franks, page 159, relate, in the year of Christ 579, namely on the occasion of Nantinus, count of Angoulême, whom Heraclius, not the prelate of Saintes, as Longueval wrongly relates at page 155 of volume 3 of the History of the Gallican Church in the Notes, but of Angoulême, mentioned in the cited volume of Gallia Christiana, column 980, had kept away from the assembly of the faithful on account of injuries done to himself and to one of his clerics, and the means of the church invaded. He, either terrified by the ecclesiastical thunderbolt with which he had been struck, or moved by the atrocity or infamy of his crimes, and either truly penitent of them, or craftily feigning true penitence, induced some bishops, by the civil dignity and authority in which he was strong, and perhaps by prayers and promises of a better life, that he might not only be able to present himself at their assembly which was to be held in the city of Saintes, but also by their entreaty and help be received publicly into the church by his bishop. It is credible that St. Palladius, who in his zeal for souls was busy to lead back Count Nantinus, as a lost sheep, to the fold of the Church, willingly assented to his requests, and, having seen the signs of his penitence, and heard in the very assembly of the bishops the promises by which Nantinus, as St. Gregory of Tours witnesses, book 5 of the History of the Franks, chapter 37, promised that he would restore all the things of the church which he had taken without reason, and would submit himself humbly to his prelate, first of all persuaded Heraclius, bishop of Angoulême, that he too should grant to the suppliant count all the things that were asked of him.

[19] in which Count Nantinus was restored to the communion of the Church. However these things may be, Heraclius granted it, received the count in charity and restored him to the Church; yet so that, although he himself did not exact the penalty of the horrible crime committed by Nantinus, he judged nevertheless that the cause of the priest, wounded by Nantinus with a pike and then cruelly hanged, as the same Gregory witnesses, was to be committed to God. Thus the assembly of Saintes was dissolved, in which whether anything else was done besides what has already been mentioned is undiscovered by me. For the rest, to say it here in passing, even if Palladius and the other prelates merited the praise of episcopal clemency in that matter; yet a little after they groaned that they had been wretchedly deluded in their hope, when Nantinus, returned home, committed anew those crimes for which he was again excluded from the communion of the faithful by his bishop Heraclius, and at last fell by that most wretched death, at which, as Gregory of Tours, already very often praised, observes, let all be astounded, wonder and fear, lest they inflict injuries on priests, because the Lord is the avenger of His servants who hope in Him.

[20] Palladius Gundobald, whose history is related from St. Gregory of Tours, Up to the year 584 St. Palladius, intent solely on feeding his flock, had omitted no part of the office of a true prelate, beloved of God and men, when in the month of November of the same year a certain Gundobald or Gundovald stirred up great disturbances in Gaul, on the occasion of which more than one calamity overflowed upon our unhappy Prelate. The matter is to be fetched from a little further back. That Gundobald, as St. Gregory of Tours nearly narrates in book 6 of the History of the Franks, chapter 24, having been born in the Gauls and brought up with diligent care, as is the custom of those kings, with tresses of hair let down over his back, educated in letters, had been presented by his mother to King Childebert, namely the Elder, the paternal uncle of the Childebert reigning in the year 584, she saying: Behold your nephew, the son of King Chlothachar (or Clotaire I): and because he is held hateful by his father, receive him, because he is your flesh. Childebert the Elder, receiving him because he had no sons of his own, had kept him with him. And when these things had been announced to King Chlothachar, he sent messengers to his brother, by whom he caused the boy to be released and to come to him; and when he had been brought to him he ordered his hair to be cut, denying that he had been begotten by him. But after the death of this king Gundobald was received by King Charibert; but, summoned also by Sigibert, he was again tonsured on the head and sent to Cologne Agrippina; whence, slipping away, his hair let down again, as was the custom of the princes of the Franks, he took refuge with Narses, who then governed Italy, and there, having taken a wife, he begot sons.

[21] raised by some to be king of the Franks, as the legitimate prince Setting out hence to Constantinople, after some stay in that city, being invited thence to come into Gaul, he put in at Marseilles in Provence, where he was received by Theodorus the bishop, and then, having received horsemen from him, he was joined to Mummolus, patrician and duke; in which matter indeed, as Gregory of Tours notes, Theodorus did nothing which had not been commanded him by a letter subscribed by the hand of the great men of King Childebert, and by his lords and seniors. And when he had stayed for some time at Avignon with the aforesaid Mummolus and Duke Desiderius, he set out together with them into the territory of Limoges, and at the village of Briva Curretia (the natives call it Brive la Gaillarde), placed upon a shield, as the same author testifies in book 7 of the History of the Franks, chapter X, he was raised as king; he went then, as the same witnesses, through the cities placed round about, and, as is narrated in chapter 26, in the cities which had been King Sigibert's he received oaths in the name of King Childebert; but in the rest, which had been either Guntchramn's or Chilperic's, they swore in his own name that they would keep faith. Having likewise received the oath at Angoulême, and been admitted at Toulouse, he came at length to Bordeaux, over which city Bertchramn, a kinsman of King Guntchramn on his mother's side, then presided as prelate, by which prelate the same Gundobald was loved in a greater measure.

[22] And while, as Gregory of Tours relates in chapter 31, they were staying in this city, acknowledged, or at least obeyed his orders beyond the ordinance of the Canons: namely Gundobald and his followers, they order the priest Faustianus to be ordained bishop for the city of Aquae (commonly D'Acqs sur l'Adour). For the bishop had lately died in the city of Aquae, and Nicetius, count of that place, the brother of Rusticus, bishop of Vicus Julii, had elicited an order from Chilperic that he should be tonsured and given as bishop to that city. But Gundovald, striving to destroy his decrees, having called together the bishops, ordered him (namely Faustianus) to be blessed. But Bishop Bertchramn (of Bordeaux, mentioned above), who was the metropolitan, guarding against the future, enjoins Palladius of Saintes to bless him. For his eyes too were at that time troubled with a running inflammation. And Orestes, bishop of Bazas, was also at this ordination: but he denied it before the king. Thus far Gregory of Tours; from whom we learn that Gundobald was held and received by Bertchramn, and by his example by our Palladius, as will be still more plain below, and by various other bishops and chief men of the Gauls, as the true son of Chlothachar and their legitimate king, and that his commands too were complied with by them, and indeed, as we shall now say, beyond what the sacred Canons allowed to be complied with for a legitimate king. For since the bishopric of Aquae was not, by the ancient division of the provinces, under the metropolis of Bordeaux, but on the contrary was subject to the metropolis of Eauze; it was neither Bertchramn's to enjoin Palladius to consecrate a bishop subject to another metropolitan; nor was it Palladius's in that matter, the metropolitan of Eauze not consenting, to obey the orders of Bertchramn and Gundobald.

[23] But is there nothing by which this twofold deed of Palladius, yet the former of these two deeds of his can be for the sake of which he had King Guntchramn so hostile to him, and was very ill spoken of among some, can be excused with just merit? As regards the acknowledgement of Gundobald as the legitimate son of Chlothachar and true prince, this opinion is settled with me at least, that if the whole matter, as it was related above from Gregory of Tours, be weighed in a fair balance, nothing of crime was committed here before God by Palladius. And these things, besides others, impel me so to think. First, it is not established from any head that Palladius plotted disturbances or revolution in the Gauls, or that Gundobald was summoned from Constantinople into the Gauls by his counsel or help. Moreover, it appears undoubted

that the same Prelate did not hold Gundobald as the genuine son of Chlothachar and true prince before he had been raised as king by Mummolus, patrician and duke of Chilperic, and likewise by Duke Desiderius, and had been acknowledged as such also by most of the neighbouring regions.

[24] It is added that, although King Guntchramn had contended that the father of that Gundobald be excused before God from all crime, was not King Chlothachar but now a manager of a mill, now a wool-worker, Palladius could easily have been ignorant of these sayings of King Guntchramn, or, if he was not ignorant of them, could deservedly have judged that greater credence was to be had in the mother of Gundovald and wife of Chlothachar, in the kings Childebert the Elder and Charibert, and in many nobles of the Gauls, than in the words of Guntchramn, not sufficiently consistent with themselves in appearance. Finally, since he had undoubtedly heard that the cause of Theodorus, bishop of Marseilles, who had first magnificently received Gundobald, had been examined by King Guntchramn, and that he, as St. Gregory witnesses, book 6 of the History of the Franks, chapter 24, had been found in no crime; Palladius could by most deserved right judge that he too could without any crime receive honourably and acknowledge as the son of Chlothachar him who, as Gregory of Tours witnesses, book 8 of the History of the Franks, chapter 2, testified that he was receiving the whole principate of the Gauls, and whom his own metropolitan himself, although a kinsman of Guntchramn, willingly obeyed. The error of Palladius, therefore, by which, moved by the example and authority of Gundobald's mother, of two kings of the Franks, and of many nobles, he held Gundobald as the genuine son of Chlothachar, was certainly innocent and without guilt before God.

[25] but not so the consecration of Bishop Faustianus made by him. But the same Prelate cannot thus be freed from all fault where by order of the same Gundobald and of Bertchramn he ordained Faustianus bishop of Aquae. For although under Gundobald affairs were greatly disturbed in Novempopulania, in Second Aquitaine and in other neighbouring provinces, and the bishops of another metropolis who were neighbours of the metropolitan of Bordeaux were compelled to obey him; nay, even though he who testified that he was receiving the whole principate of the Gauls, and Bertchramn himself, metropolitan of Bordeaux, had ordered Faustianus to be ordained bishop; nevertheless, since the church of Aquae was by ancient right subject to the metropolis of Eauze, and it was expressly forbidden by the sacred Canons that anyone should presume to consecrate a bishop of another province, its metropolitan being despised, or at least without his consent; Palladius ought to have obeyed this prescription of the sacred Canons rather than the orders of Gundobald and Bertchramn, and accordingly to have undergone all evils rather than ordain Faustianus bishop of Aquae without the canonical consent of Labanis, metropolitan of Eauze. That Palladius, then, although resisting not a little, did the contrary, he certainly did wrongly, although this deed of his too, regard being had to the circumstances of the times and affairs, ought not to be called so grave, much less enormous, especially if, though not indeed spontaneous and plainly canonical, at least some sort of assent of the metropolitan of Eauze was present (for it is not altogether established to the contrary), or a plausible expectation of its being given by him. In whatever way these things may have been, Palladius seems to have laboured here under the fault of error and human frailty rather than the vice of a perverse mind or contempt of the ecclesiastical laws. For the rest, in what manner he paid the penalty of the fault committed there will be its own place for saying below.

§ III. Palladius is bitterly reproached by King Guntchramn: it is shown that he had not perjured himself to him three times. He bears one insult offered him moderately; not so the other. In the Synod of Mâcon he is fined for the ordination of Faustianus: he severely chastises the clerics who disparaged him: he is again harassed unworthily and undeservedly.

Palladius, summoned to Orléans, When in the same year of Christ 585, in which the things just mentioned had happened, King Guntchramn had sent a huge army against Gundobald, and, he being slain near the city of Convenae and the dukes who had adhered to him destroyed, was about to go to Paris, he at once ordered Bertchramn, Palladius and the other bishops who had favoured the wretched Gundobald to be present before prelates and nobles delegated by him, to plead the cause of their deeds. The summoned prelates came together at Orléans, where Guntchramn meanwhile was staying, and there, before all the rest, as St. Gregory of Tours relates, book 8 of the History of the Franks, chapter 2, Bertchramn and our Palladius were examined by the deputed bishops and nobles as to why they had received Gundovald, why they had ordained Faustianus bishop at Aquae at his order, which the judges called most frivolous. What weight of reasons both brought forward in that assembly of bishops and nobles, by which they might wash away the crime first objected to them, the cited Gregory nowhere handed down to memory, either because he believed that the ordering of this suit was not of such importance that it should be recorded in detail in the history of the Franks which he was writing, or because either King Guntchramn or he himself by no means approved that the reasons brought forward by each of those prelates should be spread abroad among the common people. However these things may be, Palladius certainly, as what was said above at numbers 23 and 24 shows, could not have lacked by no means contemptible weights of reasons by which he might make manifest that in receiving Gundobald he had been pure before God of all wickedness.

[27] But as regards the cause of the ordination of Faustianus, [he pleads the cause of his deeds; but by the reasons alleged he does not placate Guntchramn,] this… Palladius the bishop (the words again are St. Gregory of Tours's), taking it from Bertchramn his metropolitan, rolled upon himself, saying: The eyes of my metropolitan were greatly straitened with pains, and I, despoiled and despised, was brought unwillingly by him (namely by Gundobald, as Valois explains, Frankish affairs, book 13, page 252) to that place. I could do nothing else but what he commanded who testified that he was receiving the whole principate of the Gauls. But although Palladius had been brought unwillingly by Gundobald to Aquae Tarbellicae, he was not on that account, as we also said above, to be held free from all fault in ordaining Faustianus beyond the prescription of the Canons; nor were the reasons which he had produced in defence of this cause such as might extinguish the mind of the king inflamed against him. Hence, as the cited Gregory again witnesses in chapter 2, it is no wonder that Guntchramn, holy prince though he was, on learning Palladius's answer, was much moved, so that (you hear Gregory again) it could scarcely be obtained that he should invite them (namely Palladius and Bertchramn) to the banquet with the other bishops of the Gauls who were at Orléans. But, rendered a little milder either by the entreaty of St. Gregory of Tours alone, who had very great influence with the king, or by the patronage and exhortation of other bishops and nobles as well, who strove especially to excuse the error of Bertchramn and Palladius, Guntchramn at length allowed both prelates to come into his sight and to be present at the banquet.

[28] [so that on the contrary he is admitted to his table only with difficulty, and after bitter reproach from the king,] Yet before he admitted them to his table, he addressed Bertchramn, as St. Gregory of Tours witnesses in the same place, with these ironic words: We give thanks that you have so kept faith with your kindred. For you ought to have known, most beloved father, that you were a parent (or kinsman) of ours through our mother, and you ought not to have brought a foreign pestilence (so he calls Gundobald) upon your own people. And when Bertchramn had heard such things and things like these, as the same Gregory witnesses, the king, turning to Palladius, said: Nor are too many thanks to be rendered to you, O Palladius the bishop. For three times you have perjured yourself to me, which is unjust to be said of a bishop, sending little notes full of deceit: you were excusing yourself to me (or, as other codices have, and you excused yourself) by letters, and with other writings you were inviting my brother (I do not know whether Gundobald is designated here ironically or King Chilperic sincerely). For God has judged my cause, since I always strove to call upon you as fathers of the Church, and you always acted deceitfully toward me. And to the bishops Nicasius and Antidius, namely of Angoulême and Agen, who had followed Bertchramn, he said: What have you, O most holy fathers, treated for the advantage of the region or the safety of our kingdom? declare it. And they too being silent, the king, having washed his hands and received the blessing from the bishops, sat down at table with joyful countenance and cheerful face, as if he had said nothing about the contempt shown him.

[29] [there, having first wished the king well, he prays God for the safety of his kingdom;] Thus far Gregory of Tours, already often praised; from whose chapters 3 and 4 we also learn not only that King Guntchramn received the priestly blessing from all the bishops, and therefore from Palladius too, before he reclined at table, but also that, after a Responsorial Psalm had been sung by them at his command, he commended Childebert, his adopted son, to their prayers, namely in these and other words which exist in the same Gregory, cited chapter 4: One thing only I beseech you, priests of the Lord, that you entreat the mercy of the Lord for my son Childebert… Whence, if your prayer follows him, he will be able, the Lord granting, to reign. The king saying these things, St. Gregory of Tours, who was present at the same time, is witness that all the bishops who were present, and therefore Palladius also, poured forth prayer to the Lord before the king that the divine mercy would preserve both kings. The mind of King Guntchramn so quickly turned, and his so notable affability toward the prelates reclining with him, and their ready goodwill toward him and the prayers poured forth for the safety of his kingdom, give no slight indication that our Palladius and the bishops who had adhered to Gundobald had indeed at some time been accused before the king, or in some way suspected, of perfidy or perjury, but had by no means been truly bound by either crime.

[30] And assuredly, although Guntchramn at first persuaded himself [from which thing, as also from other indications, it is proved that he had not in fact perjured himself three times to the king.] that Palladius, at the time when he was sending him notes or letters for the sake of excusing himself, was at the same time inviting his brother to him by other letters or messengers, and so used guile and frauds; he seems to have been deluded in this by his flatterers and the enemies of the prelates no less than when he believed them that St. Theodorus, bishop of Marseilles, had been the cause of the murder of Chilperic his brother, whereas that prelate was outside all guilt. Moreover, since in the council of Mâcon, of which below, the cause of Palladius was to be discussed, and was truly discussed as well, and yet he was not found implicated in any other misdeed than the illegitimate ordination of Faustianus; it seems altogether to be said that in reality he had not perjured himself to the king three times, contrary to what Guntchramn, sometimes credulous more than was fair and moved in mind, bitterly reproached him with before the banquet. Finally, in the judgment of Gregory of Tours, book 8, chapter 20 of the History of the Franks, divine providence itself seemed to protect the innocence of the bishops who were hateful to that king on account of having received Gundobald without sin of their own, or for other causes of the kind, when, at the time at which he was thinking of punishing many of them with exile, it sent upon him a most grievous illness, which altogether prevented him from harming the bishops with whom he was angry. And let these things said suffice, so that no one, that our Palladius was in fact perjured even three times,

on account of the sayings of a king who was holy indeed, but then too credulous and moved in mind, should suffer it to be brought into his mind.

[31] Now let us return whence we digressed somewhat. King Guntchramn had so acted at the time of the banquet with Palladius and the other bishops A little after he again experiences the king most hostile there, who had received Gundobald, that it could be said that he judged they had all offended in nothing, if you except the ordination of Faustianus, before God and against himself, or, if anything had been committed against him, that it was worthy of pardon: when on the following Sunday, circumvented, as is credible, by the false speeches of some courtier hostile to Palladius, he again blazed up against Palladius, as if he had in reality been bound by the crimes objected and were to be held among his chief enemies. St. Gregory of Tours narrates the matter in these words, cited book 8, chapter 7: When Sunday came too, the king went to the church to behold the solemnities of the Masses: and the brothers and fellow-bishops who were present gave place to Bishop Palladius to perform the feast. When he began the Prophecy, the king asks who it was. And when they had declared that Bishop Palladius had begun, the king, at once moved, said: He who has always been unfaithful and perfidious to me, shall he now preach the sacred words? I will go out altogether from this church, lest I hear my enemy preaching. And saying this, he began to go out of the church.

[32] Then the bishops, troubled at the humiliation of their Brother, said to the king: but he bears the insult offered him moderately; but not so For we saw him present at your banquet, and you receiving the blessing from his hand; and why does the king now spurn him? For had we known that he was hateful to you, we would surely have turned to another, who should have performed these things. Now, if you permit, let him celebrate what he has begun: and hereafter, if you object anything, let it be finished by the censure of canonical sanction. For Bishop Palladius had already withdrawn into the sacristy with great humility. Then the king ordered him to be called back, and so he accomplished what he had begun to do. Palladius, you see, by bearing so great an insult moderately, soon bore this reward of his excellent virtue, that, until his cause should be discussed in some synod, he was meanwhile held as a prelate innocent, as it were, of all the crimes objected to him, and worthy to celebrate before the king. And would that, when either on the same day or on the following he was again invited to the king's banquet, he had received with equal equanimity and humility certain insulting words which Bertchramn, metropolitan of Bordeaux, heaped upon him. But Palladius here again felt himself a man, and, where it was fair to be silent if only on account of the king's presence, he thought he should hurl back reproaches upon him who was the head and origin of all his evils; so that he contended, not that he himself was not guilty of the adultery, fornication and perjury of which he was accused by Bertchramn, but that Bertchramn himself was guilty of all these. For that the words of Gregory of Tours are to be interpreted thus is persuaded both by the otherwise pious life of Palladius, and by the doubtful reputation of that metropolitan, and by what will soon be said in the following numbers.

[33] the false reproach of various crimes made against him by Bertchramn. Now let us hear Gregory himself, cited chapter 7: When Palladius and Bertchramn had been invited again to the king's banquet, moved against one another, they reproached each other with many things concerning adulteries and fornication, and some also concerning perjuries. At which things many laughed, but some, who were of keener knowledge, lamented that among the priests of the Lord the tares of the devil should thus sprout. Departing, therefore, from the king's presence, they gave securities and sureties that they would come together to a synod on the tenth day before the Kalends of the ninth month, namely to undergo the judgment of their fellow-bishops. At the appointed time Bertchramn, Palladius and very many other prelates of the kingdom of Guntchramn, or their legates, were present at Mâcon, by whom the cause of Palladius was canonically discussed. But so far was he from being declared guilty of the threefold perjury of which he had been accused by Guntchramn, or of the adultery and fornication of which he had been accused by Bertchramn, that on the contrary he was found worthy of reprehension only in this, that he had consecrated Faustianus bishop of Aquae by order of Gundobald, as we said above. And what was further defined by the Fathers in this cause it pleases me to recite from St. Gregory of Tours, cited book, chapter 20. Meanwhile, he says, the day of the agreement came, and the bishops by order of King Guntchramn were gathered at the city of Mâcon. And Faustianus, who had been ordained bishop of the city of Aquae by order of Gundovald, is removed on this condition, that Bertchramn and Orestes, or Palladius, who had blessed him, should feed him in turns, and supply him with a hundred gold pieces each year.

[34] [From the synod of Mâcon, where he had been fined for the ordination of Faustianus,] There is no doubt that Palladius paid this fine imposed on him by the synod of Mâcon with the submission of mind and the exactness which befitted a pious and penitent bishop, that he to whom, the see of Aquae being taken away, the honour had been preserved with the name of bishop might be maintained honourably, that is, without any disgrace to the episcopate. But whether Bertchramn too, metropolitan of Bordeaux and the author of the illegitimate ordination, ever paid the same fine imposed on him may not undeservedly be doubted from this, that, as St. Gregory of Tours witnesses, long before the year had elapsed, that is, as soon as he had returned from the synod of Mâcon, he was seized with fever, and after a few days breathed out his spirit, now to render account to the supreme Judge of the things in which he had offended both against Guntchramn and against Palladius. For the rest, the things which in this synod of Mâcon, held in the year of Christ 585, as Sirmond shows, were wisely and usefully defined and sanctioned by Palladius equally with the other 61 bishops and fifteen legates of bishops, and the things which followed it, it is not the business of this place to record. Wherefore let the curious reader see these in volume 5 of Labbe's Councils from column 979, and in the cited book 8 of the History of the Franks from chapter 20. There is one thing, however, which, as pertaining to Palladius individually, it did not seem good to pass over untouched in this place.

[35] When our Prelate had returned from the synod of Mâcon into his diocese, [returned to his diocese, he severely chastises certain clerics who disparaged him.] and already before had found out that many of his clerics, corrupted by Bertchramn of Bordeaux, had written certain things on account of which he had incurred no small insult; he judged, Bertchramn, his enemy and the keen defender of those clerics, being now dead, that fair penalties should be exacted for the sin committed against him by his clerics. Wherefore he ordered them not only to be seized, but also, as the praised Gregory witnesses, chapter 22, to be grievously beaten and despoiled. There is one who contends that in that matter he took a penalty not equal to the offence, that is, exceeded the measure of just punishment, and he cites Gregory of Tours as surety of this his opinion. But although the author of the History of the Franks just cited affirms that those clerics, the accusers of our Prelate, were grievously beaten and even despoiled; yet it does not on that account at once follow that they were affected by Palladius with injury and insults, and with punishments beyond what they had offended; so that he should rather be said to have chastised ungrateful and rebellious sons according to their deserts than to have raged more cruelly against them for the sake of avenging an injury.

[36] This was not the end of the crimes fastened upon our Prelate while living. Accused again of breaking faith with the king, For about a year and a half after he had returned to Mediolanum Santonum, and was devoting himself wholly to the cultivation of virtues, the care of sacred things, and the observance of the decrees of the synod of Mâcon in his diocese, a lying report was spread through the Gauls, and especially in the kingdom of Guntchramn, not only that Queen Fredegund, hateful and hostile to Guntchramn, had sent secret messengers into Spain to King Leuvigild, the enemy of the same Guntchramn, but that Palladius, having received those envoys secretly under his roof, had sent them on thence into Spain. Therefore Antestius, who, sent by Guntchramn to Angers, had assigned to the fisc the goods of Bobolenus, or Beppolenus, referendary of Fredegund, and then had harassed Nonnichius, bishop of Nantes, as a sharer in the murder of Domnola, hastened to Saintes to seize Palladius as guilty again of broken faith. And it was at that time the days of holy Lent, as Gregory, often praised above, writes, book 8 of the History of the Franks, chapter 43, and the Bishop (St. Palladius) had withdrawn to an island of the sea (say Oléron or Ré) for the sake of prayer. And according to custom, while he was returning to his church for the feast of the Lord's Supper, the people awaiting him, he is hemmed in on the road by Antestius. Who *, the truth of the matter not even discussed, said: You shall not enter the city, but shall be condemned to exile, because you received the messengers of the enemy of our lord the king.

[37] But he said: I do not know what you are saying. Yet, because the holy days are at hand, he is unworthily and unjustly harassed by a courtier of the king: let us go to the city, and when the feasts of the holy solemnities are run through, afterwards object whatever you will, you will receive an account from me: because what you suppose is nothing. But he said: By no means, but you shall not touch the thresholds of your church, because you have appeared unfaithful to our lord the king. What more? The Bishop is held on the road, the house of the church is inventoried, and its goods are plundered. The citizens cannot obtain with the man * that the matter be discussed at least after the Paschal solemnity has been celebrated. And as they made supplication and he resisted, at length he lays open the wound which lay hidden in his breast. If, he said, he will make subject to my dominion, by a sale made, the house which he is known to have within the boundary of the territory of Bourges, I do what you demand: otherwise he shall not escape my hands, unless he is thrust into exile. The bishop feared to refuse: he wrote, and subscribed, and handed over the field: and so, sureties being given for his presence before the king, he was permitted to enter the city. The holy days being past, then, he goes to the king: Antestius too was present, but could prove nothing of the things which he objected against the Bishop. The Bishop is ordered to return to the city, and is put off until the future synod, in case perhaps some of the things objected might be recognized more evidently.

[38] on which matter some things are observed here. Thus far Gregory of Tours, already often praised, who, since he nowhere reveals that anything was found or recognized by which the crime objected to Palladius could have been proved, signifies not obscurely that he was by no means guilty of broken faith; and this the Acts of the synods convened in the Gauls at the end of the 6th century, in which likewise no mention is made of this crime of his having been proved, confirm not a little. What? That even from the narration of Gregory of Tours just recited you may not undeservedly gather that there were among the courtiers of King Guntchramn men of that kind who feign themselves most devoted to equity and to their prince with no other design than to charge the ministers of the Church with broken faith to the king or other misdeeds, so that they may get an occasion of invading the goods assigned to churches, or at least divert some part of them to themselves as a reward for notable service rendered. For the rest, that this new calumny prepared against our Prelate is not, contrary to what Denis de Sainte-Marthe, volume 2 of Gallia Christiana, column 1059,

contends, to be tied to about the year 597, is clearly evident from this, that St. Gregory of Tours, in this matter certainly a witness greater than all exception, ties this fact to the twelfth year of King Childebert, which coincides with the year of Christ 587, as may be seen at the beginning of the aforesaid chapter 43. Wrongly, therefore, the same Sainte-Marthe at the cited place soon subjoins that these things happened at about the same time at which St. Palladius sent Leuperculus, or rather Leuparicus, priest of his church, to Pope St. Gregory, to ask relics of him, and was made master of his wish. For that this happened only in the year 596 will become manifest, in the following §, in which we shall pursue the last part of Palladius's life, far unlike that passed two years before, from the very letter of Pope St. Gregory to be cited below.

* Elsewhere: To whom.

* That is, namely from the man Antestius.

§ IV. The Saint spends the remaining time of his life in works of excellent piety: he builds various churches: he translates relics of the saints with honour. St. Gregory the Great commends to him St. Augustine, sent into England. The time of his death is nowhere precisely defined.

St. Palladius now gave himself wholly to works of piety, Palladius, having already before returned to his own people from the synod of Mâcon, withdrew, not only in the Lenten time, as we have seen from Gregory of Tours praised at number 36, for the sake of prayer, but also, as can scarcely be doubted, often at other times as well, for the sake of doing penance for the faults committed, either to a neighbouring island of the sea, or to another place separated from all intercourse of men, to be free for himself and God. Nor content with these, he spent anxiously as well as indefatigably what remained to him of the time of his life in enlarging the cult of God and the Heaven-dwellers, building sacred houses, placing the relics of the Saints honourably, and other works of excellent piety. These things are partly taught us by Gregory of Tours, already very often praised, Venantius Fortunatus, St. Gregory, Pope I, and the Lessons of the church of Saintes proper to St. Palladius. And indeed, as regards the increase of divine cult and the erection of sacred houses, the same St. Gregory of Tours, book 4 On the Miracles of St. Martin, bishop of Tours, chapter 8, column 1120, is witness that Palladius in the fourteenth year of King Childebert, or the year of Christ 589, built a basilica to the divine name at Saintes in honour of St. Martin of Tours, and, that it might be enriched with the relics of the same Saint, pressed with prayers among the people of Tours, this his so pious and holy endeavour being by no means vain, as can be gathered from Gregory of Tours.

[40] I set before you this author himself narrating this fact. and he erects a church to St. Martin, Bishop, and enriches it with his relics; But in the present year (Gregory of Tours speaks here of the fourteenth year of King Childebert, as is clear from chapter 6) Palladius, bishop of the city of Saintes, asked for relics of this holy confessor (St. Martin). For he had built a basilica in his honour, which he consecrated with these pledges, and merited to receive there miracles, which his own city (Tours) has more often experienced. For after the course of two or three months I received his letter, in which he indicated that three paralytics with contracted feet had come (namely to Mediolanum Santonum), who, as soon as they entered the basilica (erected by St. Palladius) and poured forth prayer, their steps being straightened, were restored to health. Two blind men merited to receive light in that place, prayer having been made, and more than twelve, held by shivering fever, the trembling being driven away, recovered. So he, from the letter given to him by our Palladius, in which he, while he rendered due thanks for the relics of St. Martin the bishop transmitted to the people of Saintes, thought it honourable to reveal and confess the works of God done at them.

[41] at about that time he built the basilica to St. Stephen, M. That the basilica of St. Stephen at Saintes was built by our Palladius at about the same time, or at least after the synod of Mâcon, whatever Saussay may seem to think to the contrary, I think the more probable for this reason, that from the beginning of his episcopate, and especially under Gundobald and in the nearly two years following, the state either of Gallic affairs or of Palladius's own was too turbulent for him to apply his effort securely to building basilicas. However it may be concerning the very year in which the basilica of St. Stephen was built; the fact itself Venantius Fortunatus, a contemporary of our Saint, makes certain in Book 1, Poem 3, in which he also celebrates at the same time the praises of the holy Protomartyr, in these verses:

Lofty glory surrounds the Lord's dutiful friends, Whose honour, spread abroad, lives in the world. This Martyr suffered for Christ in the region of the East; Behold, the Blessed one has temples beneath the West. Founded by the power of God, triumphing over death, He received the stones, he whose rock was Christ. Fierce Jewish race, Stephen, whom you think you destroy, Though he die in the flesh, yet knows not how to die in honour. He holds the palm for his merits, you the punishment for your crime; He possesses the heavens, you rather seek the depths. Palladius set up these sacred temples of the Levite, That thence there may stand for him a house that shall not perish.

[42] which seems to be different from that which bore the name of St. Eutropius: Further, Sainte-Marthe, praised above, cited volume 2, column 1093, judges this church of St. Stephen to be the same as that which was situated in the suburb of Saintes, into which the sacred body of St. Eutropius, first bishop of Saintes and martyr, of whom it has been treated by us on the 30th day of April from page 733, was translated, and which afterwards obtained the name of St. Eutropius, and was then converted into a monastery of the Order of St. Benedict. But are all these things right? To establish indeed the first assertion, and that which bears on the matter here, the cited writer praises Gregory of Tours, book On the Glory of the Confessors, chapter 56; but wrongly; since in that book and chapter there is the deepest silence of Gregory concerning the church of St. Eutropius and of St. Stephen. Perhaps Sainte-Marthe wished to cite Gregory's chapter 56 On the Glory of the Martyrs, where he treats of set purpose of the martyrdom of St. Eutropius and of the church erected in his honour. But neither there does Gregory indicate anything from which you might in any way conjecture that the church of St. Stephen in the suburb of Saintes was built by Palladius, or that it was the same as the basilica of St. Stephen. It is added that St. Gregory, cited chapter 56 On the Glory of the Martyrs, expressly relates that the church into which the body of St. Eutropius was carried from the obscure place in which it had lain hidden was built not in honour of St. Stephen but of St. Eutropius himself; and finally that in chapter 34, treating of the Glory of St. Stephen, he brings in no mention of a basilica erected in his honour. So that I do not know whether it may not be determined with much greater right that that church which Venantius Fortunatus celebrates as built by our Palladius is altogether different from the basilica of which Gregory treats, soon to be partly described.

[43] he learns this St. Eutropius's kind of death, causes his body to be translated; Let us now recite from the cited chapter 56 On the Glory of the Martyrs the very words of Gregory of Tours, in which he narrates both that the kind of death of St. Eutropius became known to Palladius, and that his sacred body was honourably translated by him into the basilica built at Saintes in his honour. Because, he says, at that time (namely when St. Eutropius fell a martyr), persecution pressing, he was neither buried in a worthy place nor venerated by the Christians with due honour, it was very much given over to oblivion that he (St. Eutropius) was a martyr: which is related to have been revealed in this order. After many spaces of years (namely from the time he had undergone martyrdom) a basilica was built in his honour, and the work being completed, Palladius, who then ruled the chair of the priestly Order, having called together the abbots, was zealous that the sacred ashes should be translated to the place which he had prepared. And when this had been done, two of the abbots, the lid being unlocked, look upon the holy body, and contemplate the scar of the head, in which part the edge of the axe had been fixed. But lest the present sight should be brought to nothing, this spiritual teaching also admonished them, namely, when on the following night the priests had laid their limbs to rest; he appeared in a vision to these two, saying: The scar which you have contemplated in my head, know that by it I consummated martyrdom: and from this it became known to the peoples that he was a martyr, because there was no History of his passion. So Gregory, already often praised, from whom, to say it here in passing, we understand that the church of St. Eutropius, into which, the work being completed, Palladius caused the body of this holy martyr to be carried, and into the place prepared by himself for that purpose, is altogether different from that which Leontius of Bordeaux, as Venantius Fortunatus witnesses, book 1, Poem XIII, renewed at Bordeaux.

[44] Let us now proceed to other proofs of St. Palladius's piety. [He places the sepulchre of St. Martin the abbot in a more becoming place, not without a prodigy.] St. Martin, abbot of the city of Saintes (I use nearly the words of St. Gregory of Tours, book On the Glory of the Confessors, chapter 57), a disciple, as they say, of St. Martin, bishop of Tours, had long enough rested in peace at a village of the city of Saintes in the monastery which he himself had built after the teachings of his master; and already one man, bringing contracted hands to his tomb, had carried them back sound; another, who, his sinews burned by fever and his hams twisted, had been without the power of walking, as he lay prostrate at the holy sepulchre, taking new strength, the dryness being removed, had been carried back unharmed. To Palladius, then, weighing these and perhaps other such benefits obtained, it seemed not to be borne any longer that the sepulchre of so glorious an abbot should remain in an old place, less honourable to him. Wherefore the pious Prelate decided to translate it into a more becoming place, having called together very many men eminent in dignity to accomplish it with him or to be present at the solemn procession. But God at first opposed the undertaking; for what cause is uncertain. At length, however, as the praised Gregory subjoins, Bishop Palladius, when he had not been able with many, moved his sepulchre with five abbots, the help of the confessor (St. Martin the abbot) assisting, and placed it where he wished.

[45] That something similar happened to our Prelate at about the same time, [The tomb of two who died holily, which he strove to put back in a more honourable place,] the same Gregory of Tours testifies in the same book, chapter 60, from which again it is given to understand how much Palladius loved the beauty of the house of God and the increase of the cult of the Saints. I record the whole matter in the words of the same writer. Not far from the house of this confessor (namely St. Troianus, bishop of Saintes, of whom he had treated in the preceding chapter) there was a very small oratory, and in the corner from which the arch rose there was a great sarcophagus, in which it was said two were buried, namely a bridegroom and a bride (different from those who are called by us on the 25th day of May the SS. Two Lovers), who, placed in white after baptism, had departed from the world: antiquity also affirmed that these were of the family of St. Hilary of Poitiers. This sepulchre, then, situated in such a place, not only obstructed the passage of those entering, but also, how the wall which from

the dripping of the eaves had been soaked might be repaired, because it was contiguous, it hindered. For which cause Palladius, Pontiff of the city, who had descended from the family of the once rich Palladius, strove with the utmost zeal to remove it from the place, so that, more than three hundred men being joined together, he tried to draw it with ropes and push it with levers, stones being already placed upon which this sarcophagus should be set.

[46] it is divinely transferred. Finally the whole strength of those drawing is spent, but they cannot mutilate * the sepulchre: every brow is drenched with sweat, but the strong work is not accomplished: the voices are given of those exhorting and saying: Ho, come, pull the rope; but the sepulchre is not moved at all. What more? All are wearied in the work, and, night intervening, all ask to be given rest. Forthwith, when the darkness of night was past and a new morning shone, the Bishop (St. Palladius), anxious in thought, asks his men to go forth again to the oratory, himself anticipating all; and entering, he finds it resting with all firmness upon the very stones which he had arranged. And wondering, he glorifies the Lord, who by mighty power accomplished what the human hand could not. Their names, however, were revealed to no one. Thus far Gregory of Tours, on whose last words Ruinart notes that there is no memory of these at Saintes, and that the site of the oratory is also unknown, as also of the church of St. Troianus, of which no trace survives. But at least it is well that St. Gregory committed to letters this proof too of St. Palladius's piety, more lasting than any of the firmest buildings.

[47] He erects a notable church with 13 altars, While the pious Prelate was pressing on indefatigably in these and other holy works, there came upon his mind the desire of building a notable church in the city of Saintes in honour of SS. Peter and Paul and also of the martyrs Lawrence and Pancras, and of placing in it thirteen altars, which, according to the custom of the church already ancient even then, should contain relics of the Saints, or serve them in place of sepulchres. Therefore, as we understand from the Letter of St. Gregory the Great given to St. Palladius in the year of Christ 596, the Prelate of Saintes directed to Rome Leuparicus, priest of his church, to ask from the same supreme Pontiff in his name relics of the aforesaid four Saints, to be inserted in the altars to be dedicated to God in their honour. St. Gregory the Great assented to these pious wishes of Palladius and gave the same Leuparicus a letter to carry to him, which I do not think it will be out of place to insert entire in this place.

[48] In which he places relics of the Saints; It is conceived in these words, volume 5 of Labbe's Councils, column 1240: Gregory to Palladius, bishop of Saintes. The bearer of these presents, the priest Leuparicus, coming, has intimated to us that your fraternity has built a church in honour of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and also of the martyrs Lawrence and Pancras, and has placed thirteen altars there, of which we have learned that four have remained not yet dedicated, for this reason, that you are disposing, God granting, to place there the relics of the above-said Saints. And because we have furnished with veneration relics of the holy Peter and Paul and also of the martyrs Lawrence and Pancras, we exhort that you ought, the Lord helping, to receive them with reverence and place them; being about to provide before all things that the aid of sustenance may not be lacking to those serving there. A letter of the same argument, to be carried by the same Leuparicus to Brunhild, queen of the Franks, Gregory the Great wrote, given, as Le Cointe at the year of Christ 596 and the Benedictine editors, volume 2 of the Works of St. Gregory the Great, column 828, rightly teach, in the fourteenth Constantinopolitan Indiction, and so in the year of Christ 596, not yet advanced to the month of September.

[49] At about that time Palladius produced another work not unequal to these works of excellent piety, he builds a church and monastery in honour of St. Vasius. as the sixth Lesson of his Office and the Acts of St. Vasius the Martyr, edited in volume 2 of April, page 424, affirm. That holy martyr, whom Henschen, cited volume, page 424, notes is also called Vasio, Vassius, Wassius and Bassius, had been slain about the year of Christ 500 by his kinsmen, who took it ill that he was distributing his goods to the poor, bloody ministers having been suborned; and when his body could not be burned with fire by Naumancius his enemy, it had been laid in a tomb by a certain Franco, a noble and religious man, near the river Charente, which washes the city of Saintes, beside the public road. And when it had lain there for nearly a whole century, and St. Palladius held it for ascertained that in the course of that time many miracles had been wrought at his tomb, having taken counsel with the people of Saintes, he passed a whole night in the praises of God at his sepulchre; and lest the body of the holy martyr should lie hidden any longer in a less worthy place, he consecrated to the supreme Godhead in honour of the same St. Vasius a basilica built, again with his own money, as his rich inheritance and most munificent liberality make credible; and that the divine praises might be sung there day and night, he joined to this church a monastery to be inhabited by an abbot and monks, which in the time of Denis de Sainte-Marthe was a priory of the abbey of Celles of the diocese of Poitiers, which the cited Henschen, page 425, noted is situated not far from Taillebourg on the right bank of the river Charente.

[50] Without doubt the so pious and so manifold illustrious works of St. Palladius, St. Gregory the Great wrote him a letter, and the fame of holiness already won not only in the Gauls but also in Italy, brought it about that St. Gregory the Great judged that St. Augustine, the apostle of the English, sent by him with companions into England, should be commended to this our bishop of Saintes. You see, although the Pontiff knew that St. Augustine perhaps would not pass through the diocese of Saintes, yet because he judged that Palladius either had much influence with King Theodoric, residing at Chalon, or could be of very great profit by counsel or help to the apostolic men directed by him into England, and would in fact be of profit, he gave him, as Le Cointe rightly teaches at the year 696, number 14, page 443, that letter, which in the cited place, and in Du Chesne, volume 1 of the Writers, page 895, in Labbe, cited volume of the Councils, column 1241, and in the Douai edition of the Works of St. Gregory, volume 4, column 186, is conceived in these words: Gregory to Palladius, bishop of Saintes, Pelagius of Tours and Serenus of Marseilles, bishops of the Gauls, in like terms.

[51] Although with priests who have charity pleasing to God religious men need no commendation; yet because a fit time for writing has offered itself, we have taken care to send our writing to your fraternity, intimating that the bearer of these presents, Augustine, by which he commended St. Augustine, directed into England, the servant of God, of whose zeal we are certain, we have directed thither with other servants of God for the profit of souls, the Lord helping. Whom it is necessary that your holiness hasten to assist with priestly zeal and to furnish with your consolations. To whom also, that you may be more ready to give support, we have enjoined him to indicate the cause to you minutely, knowing that, it being known, you will lend yourselves with entire devotion for God's sake to consoling him, since the matter requires it. Besides, we commend in all things to your charity Candidus the priest, our common son, whom we have sent for the governance of the patrimonial * of our church.

[52] on which letter some things are observed. And although in the Manuscript codices which the Benedictine editors of the Works of St. Gregory the Great followed the name of our Palladius does not appear; yet it by no means follows on that account that this letter was not written to him by St. Gregory the Great, since other Manuscript codices and the editions praised above expressly record Palladius, and it is more probable that in the Manuscript codices which the Parisian Benedictines used the name of Palladius was omitted through the unskilfulness or carelessness of copyists than that Palladius was wrongly and of set purpose intruded by various others into the inscription of the letter. It remains that I set out the cause why in the inscription of the letter it is said to be written a paribus. That it cannot be said to be written a paribus for this reason, that St. Gregory kept a copy of it with himself, lest perhaps, as a certain ancient contends, volume 2 of the Works of St. Gregory, Paris edition, column 508, his letter should be quashed or corrupted on the journey, is clear from this, that, if this reason stood, absolutely all the letters of St. Gregory the Great would have to be said to be written a partibus; whereas only very few of his letters are noted as written a paribus. Wherefore, as Du Cange in the Glossary, at the word Appar, nearly judges, I would think that by these words it is indicated that three letters were written in like tenor, or after the same exemplar, and that one was sent by the same Gregory the Great to each of those bishops, our Palladius, Pelagius of Tours and Serenus of Marseilles, to whom others are inscribed in general in the Register of the letters of St. Gregory; so that the letter which is said to be written a paribus can be said to differ scarcely, or not even scarcely, from present-day encyclicals.

[53] [It is uncertain for exactly how many years after the year 596 St. Palladius was living.] For the rest, how long after the year of Christ 596 St. Palladius continued to rule his church excellently, or at what time at last, after he had cherished his flock as much with his riches as with salutary admonitions and words, and was now full not only of virtues but also, if credence is to be had in the sixth Lesson of Saintes, of miracles, he fell asleep in the Lord, no old monuments, at least that I have seen, define; nay, they do not even indicate anything from which the end of his episcopate could be drawn out fairly closely, or by plausible conjecture. Hence I noted above in the margin, in a broader manner, his passing to those above as perhaps about the year 600, uncertain whether before the end of the sixth century, or indeed not before the tenth, and perhaps the twentieth, year of the seventh, he rendered into the hands of his Creator his soul, now cleansed of every blemish by the tears of penitence and many works of piety.

* Should it not perhaps be read movere move?

* Elsewhere: patrimonioli the little patrimony.