Evergislus

ON ST. EVERGISLUS, BISHOP OF COLOGNE AND MARTYR,

IN THE LATER FIFTH CENTURY.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Evergislus, martyr and bishop of Cologne (S.)

BY J. V. H.

§ I. The memory of the saint in the sacred calendars; the etymology of his name; his oblation to the Church of Tongres: on which occasion inquiry is made into the oblation of boys.

The memory of St. Evergislus in the sacred calendars, The Roman Martyrology under this day announces the passion of the saint in these words: At Cologne, of St. Evergislus, bishop and Martyr. In his Notes to the same Martyrology Baronius says that a similar eulogy is found in the Adonian. But neither the genuine Usuard nor Ado treat of our saint: in their Additions, however, mention of St. Evergislus occurs. Thus in the Usuard of the Lübeck-Cologne edition, in Sollerius, one reads: At Cologne of Agrippina, the birthday of St. Evergislus, archbishop of the same city and Martyr, slain with arrows at the city of Tongres. By the prayers of Blessed Severinus the archbishop, whose first archdeacon he was, he merited to hear on high the voices of Angels singing psalms. Molanus's edition further adds this little verse: Born at Tongres, he was Martyr and buried. In the Appendix of Ado, containing those Saints who according to the better Codices had to be eliminated, St. Evergislus, bishop and Martyr, is announced Dominic Giorgi, Martyrology of Ado, page 644.. The silence of these martyrologists, however, in no way harms the cult of St. Evergislus, as is sufficiently established from the many Saints whose memory they have passed over: but the cult shown to the saint in the Churches of Cologne and Liège, to which ancient Breviaries also testify Acta SS. volume III, page 711., proclaims his sanctity.

[2] the etymology of his name, As regards the name of Evergislus, it is written variously by various persons. In some, though more rarely, it is found as Evergislus, twisted from the Greek source Εὐεργης. Others say that the name of Ebregisus is the same as Ebergislus or Evergislus, since St. Ebregisus, who sat at Maastricht at the beginning of the sixth century, and whose Acts, which our predecessors had promised that they would give at this day too Ibid. at the place cited., although he is said to have died under the 4th day of November, will be shown below, where it will also come up for examination whether Ebregisus of Maastricht is the same as his namesake of Cologne, whose pontificate falls in the same time, or on the contrary different. Certainly the similarity of the name brings it about that confusion has arisen as to which deeds should be ascribed to each, as we shall find in the course of this Commentary Compare ibid. volume V of October, page 31, number 70.. Gelenius brings forward the name of our saint in still another way, saying Ebuergeselt Admiranda Coloniæ, page 39., which, if rightly written by him, signifies a companion of the Eburones, who occupied the territory of Tongres, in which St. Evergislus is reported to have been born History of Liège, volume I, page 2.. But the name of Evergislus is perhaps more rightly derived from the Teutonic words Eber, boar, and Geissel, which signifies a surety, bail, sponsor, and in ancient times a guest Compare Adelung, Wörterbuch, under Gaissel, and Du Cange, under Gisilis., so that he comes forth as sponsor or better guest of the Eburones or the Boars. We have set these things down because the very name of the saint, being Teutonic, indicates his origin also, whence it also becomes probable that St. Evergislus was, as tradition has it, born at Tongres.

[3] Two sets of Acts. No Acts of St. Evergislus exist, writes the Louvain editor of Butler: which indeed is to be understood of contemporary ones. For they are read in Surius, and other manuscript ones we have found in codices: they seem, however, as our predecessors already judged Acta SS. volume V of October, page 31, number 72., to have been written in the tenth or eleventh century, since they include the translation made by St. Bruno I, who ruled the Church of Cologne from the year 953 to 965 Gallia Christiana, volume III, column 645 and following.. Surius indeed omits the translation,

because, he says, the reader will find it above in the Life of St. Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, chapter 37 (rather 27), on the 11th day of October. But the same translation is reported in other and briefer words in the Life to be published below, and seems to have been written by one and the same writer. These Acts, rather meagre in narrating the deeds done by St. Evergislus, we judge to be genuine to the extent that they contain nothing that conflicts with the history of those times. From the other Life, however, we shall give among the Annotations those things which, though less certain, are yet, as commonly happens in the Legends of the Saints, more celebrated. Similarly we shall give the History of the translation of St. Evergislus from Tongres to Cologne from the Life of St. Bruno, because Cornelius de Bye omitted it at the 11th day of October, as being absent from the codices of better note Acta SS. volume V of October, page 701 and 779..

[4] born at Tongres, The Acts at number 1 relate that St. Evergislus was born of illustrious family at Tongres, then a very flourishing city: his very name, as we have observed above, indicates a German origin. And indeed that Germans occupied this tract Suetonius teaches us in the Tiberius, chapter 9. In the German (war), he says, he brought over forty thousand of the surrendered into Gaul and settled them beside the bank of the Rhine, assigning them dwellings. Eutropius teaches the same in his Breviary of Roman History, Book VII, except that he says that four hundred thousand men were brought across. But I judge that Suetonius, nearer to the events of which he writes, is rather to be believed. However that may be, in this way the German origin of our saint is most conveniently explained, since in the space of three hundred years, the German settlers having multiplied, the surrendered stock could have occupied the whole region, and, the Celtic tongue having been abolished, made the Teutonic the vernacular of all.

[5] he is offered by his parents to the clerical state; His parents, says the biographer to be published below at number 1, devoted St. Evergislus to serve Christ perpetually, and arranged to make him over to the Lord as a Nazarite according to the ecclesiastical rite. For in ancient times parents sometimes offered their children to some church or monastery. The custom of an oblation of this kind is indicated by the Rule of St. Benedict, chapter 59, and its formula is shown by Baluze, formula XXXI Dom Bouquet, volume IV, page 587 and following.; the parents, with the offering, that is with the bread and wine, the matter, as Edmund Martène interprets it Commentary on the Rule of St. Benedict, page 781., of the unbloody Sacrifice, wrapped the boy's hand in the altar cloth, and so offered him, the abbot being present and before witnesses, to remain under the rule, so that from that day it should not be permitted him to shake his neck from under the yoke of the rule. Benedict van Haeften in his Monastic Disquisitions, book IV, treatise I, disquisition 3 Monastic Disquisitions, page 356., brings forward various examples of boys offered by their parents at a very infant age: St. Willibrord, scarcely weaned from the milk, in the monastery of Ripon while still a boy received the clerical tonsure and by pious profession made himself a monk: St. Boniface, afterwards Apostle of Germany, as Willibald testifies, when he was about four or five years old, strove to subject himself to the service of God. These things indeed suffice to show the ancient custom of offering boys.

[6] which oblation bound the children, as some maintain; But from this there grows up another question, which we judge should be elucidated in a few words: namely what obligation boys contracted after they had reached a more mature age. Edmund Martène is of opinion that boys solemnly offered could not return to the world, and he strengthens his judgment from the fact that the rule says that a boy returning to the world perishes; whereas if this had been permitted him, doing it with a safe conscience, he would have incurred no fault, and so no condemnation. Further, parents offering their children were compelled to disinherit them, that in this way the roads to the world might be blocked Commentary, page 788.. To this point is also the fact that parents can give, sell and subject to the yoke of servitude their sons, and accordingly can also submit them to the most gentle yoke of Christ. Similar reasons are brought forward also by the said Haeften, book IV, treatise I, disquisition 5 Haeften, page 359. Compare Mabillon, Vetera Analecta, page 465.. And this opinion is strengthened by canon XLVIII of the fourth Council of Toledo, which Gratian makes his own in canon III, cause XX, question I, namely: Either paternal devotion or one's own devotion makes a monk. Whichever of these it was shall hold him bound. Accordingly we shut off from these the access of returning to the world, and we forbid all egress to the secular life. Similarly Gregory II (others say III Ibid. page at the place cited.) asked by St. Boniface of Mainz concerning little boys offered by their parents, replies Migne, Patrology, volume LXXXIX, column 525.: If a father or mother have delivered a son or daughter within the enclosures of a monastery in the years of infancy under regular discipline, whether it is permitted them, after they have completed the years of puberty, to go out and be joined in matrimony. This we altogether avoid, because it is an impiety that the reins of pleasure should be slackened for sons offered to God by their parents.

[7] which others deny, To the cited and similar canons Francis Suarez, volume III on Religion, book VI, chapter 3, number 13, replies that the aforesaid laws are to be understood of sons offered in infancy, who after they had reached the years of discretion consented, expressly or tacitly, to the oblation made of them by their parents. Which limitation, Suarez continues, although it is not expressly added in the fourth Council of Toledo, is to be understood from other laws, since that council was assembled after the times of Pope Marcellus. For this pontiff was said to have sanctioned that children offered by their parents, on reaching XV years, should be asked by the prelates whether they wished to remain in the monastery or not. We know indeed that this canon 10, cause XX, question I, does not belong to Pope Marcellus, who, when the persecution of Diocletian was raging, held the Roman see for twenty months, namely at a time when there could be no question of offering those under puberty in a monastery Compare Berardi, Gratiani Canones, volume II, page 135.. Nevertheless Charles Berardi, while he takes this canon from Marcellus, shows nevertheless that the same, as regards the sense, is taken from the second Council of Toledo, the fifth of Orleans, and canon XVIII of St. Basil to Amphilochius Ibid. at the place cited..

[8] 1° relying on the canons And indeed from these and similar ecclesiastical laws it is clear enough that the cited words of the fourth Council of Toledo and of Gregory II must either be softened, or did not create a stable law; for the canons that are opposed also use general words. Thus St. Gaudentius of Brescia, who flourished at the beginning of the fifth century and whose Acts will be given at the 25th day of October, says in sermon VIII: I do not wish the parents or kinsmen of any virgins, whether boys or also girls, to flatter themselves on the aforesaid licence, for we have shown that they cannot lord it over the minds of others. Continence indeed they cannot command, because it is known to be a thing of the will. St. Leo, in the letter to Rusticus of Narbonne, at question XV (canon 8, Cause XX, question I), replies: Girls who, not compelled by the command of parents, but by spontaneous judgment, have taken up the purpose and habit of virginity, if afterwards they choose marriage, prevaricate, even if consecration has not been added; of whose gift they would certainly not be cheated if they remained in the purpose. I shall not conceal, however, that Clement III in his decretal, canon 12 on Regulars (III, 31), interprets St. Leo's words as though it concerned a marriageable girl, and so as not pertaining to those offered in infant age by parents: but Clement himself, while he wishes an oblation of this kind to be ratified, attaches such conditions to it that he must be judged to require a true, though tacit, profession. For she does not seem, he says, to be able to shake off from herself the yoke of monastic profession, since it is not evidently established that she contradicted when she received the blessing, which those who are veiled do not receive except at that age of discretion, especially if by subsequent ratification (even if it should be established that she sometimes contradicted) what had been done before is strengthened. In this sense also speaks canon XIX of the fifth Council of Orleans, celebrated in the year 549 Labbe, volume V of the Councils, column 396.: Whatever girls also, either by their own will seek a monastery, or are offered by parents, let them remain for a year in the very garment in which they entered: but in those monasteries where they are not held perpetually enclosed, let them remain for three years in the garment in which they entered, and afterwards according to the statutes of the monastery itself in which they have chosen to remain let them receive the vestments of religion; and if these afterwards, leaving the sacred places, transgress their holy purpose by the ambition of the world, or those, both girls and widows, who in their own houses are converted by changing their garments, let them be deprived of the communion of the Church together with those to whom they are joined in marriage. Let us observe in passing that there were already then nuns dwelling in their own houses, to be proved for a full three years, before the taking of the monastic habit, which is equivalent to today's profession.

[9] of various regions; The same doctrine is upheld by St. Basil in canon XVIII of his letter to Amphilochius, order CXCXIX, in others II Volume III of the Works, page 292.: Professions, he says, we judge from that time at which the age has the completion of reason. For childish words in these matters ought not to be thought altogether valid, but she who is above sixteen or seventeen years old, and in possession of reason, and has persevered long examined and proved, and strives with prayers to be admitted, then it is fitting that she be entered in the catalogue of sacred virgins, and that her confession be approved, and her defection inexorably punished. For parents and brothers offer many, and certain of those who touch them by kinship, before the age, not stirred of themselves to celibacy, but procuring something secular for themselves, whom one ought not easily to admit, until we have openly searched out their own judgment. So also Charlemagne in the Capitulary of the year 805, chapter XIV Harzheim, volume I of the Councils of Germany, page 388. Compare ibid. page 410., prohibits that girls of infant age be admitted before they know how to choose what they wish: an ordinance which the Laws of the Lombards also have, book III, title I, chapter 6 In Lindenbrog, Codex legum antiquarum, page 666.. From what we have said so far, therefore, to which many other things could be added, it is clear enough that, even if a stricter interpretation be given both to the canon of Toledo and to the letter of Gregory II cited above, there nevertheless was no certain and stable law for the oblation made by parents, when the offered boys themselves did not consent. And so Celestine III, who in chapter XIV on Regulars (III, 31) forbids a son under puberty to be compelled to the monastic life unless he himself has consented, notwithstanding a paternal oblation, was not the first, as some maintain Schmalzgrueber, Jus Canonicum, title On Regulars, number 153., to correct the ancient law.

[10] 2° by the lessening of the power In the present question this must then also be observed, namely that in ancient times, and especially by Roman law, the most ample

indeed almost unlimited, was the paternal power; wherefore it ought not to seem surprising that some older canons borrowed their support in some matters from the civil law, especially the Roman; as is said in chapter 1 on the Denunciation of New Works (V, 32), as the laws do not disdain to imitate the sacred canons, so too the statutes of the sacred canons are helped by the constitutions of princes. Moreover the paternal power was formerly supreme, so that according to law XXXII of the Twelve Tables (or, as others have it, law I of part III) the father of a family had over his son the right of life and death and the power of selling the son three times Rosinus, Antiquitates Romanæ, page 570 and 594.: so that the father of a family held his offspring, as an owner his property, for every use and abuse. Whence Justinian in the Institutes, book I, title 9, could rightly say: The right of power which we have over our children is proper to Roman citizens: for there are no other men who have such power over their children as we have. From which it follows that the exaggerated paternal power among the Romans does not flow from natural law, but is derived from human law. And hence it came about that the severity of paternal power was gradually softened both by manners and by laws: and first indeed by manners, later by laws, whose beginning, however, is uncertain, as Godefroy shows in the Commentary on law 2 on the Liberal Cause, Theodosian Code (book IV, title 8) Theodosian Code, volume I, page 406, Leipzig edition, 1736.: this however is certain to all, that at least under Alexander Severus that abnormal severity against the life of children had been abrogated.

[11] of parents over children, As time went on the power of selling or giving away children too was taken from fathers: for Diocletian, Code, law 1 on Fathers who Sold their Sons (IV, 43), sanctioned: That children cannot be transferred to another by parents, neither under title of sale nor of gift, nor by right of pledge, nor in any other way, nor under pretext of the ignorance of the receiver, is of most manifest law. By the following law, however, Constantine permits the sale of the newly born Compare ibid. page 491., yet under this precaution, that they may reclaim their free birth, if either the price is paid or a slave substituted in their place. A little later the Teutonic nations, which occupied and cultivated the greatest part of Europe, having other manners, softened the Roman laws more and more. For in place of paternal power the Germans substituted a certain guardianship of sons, which they called Mundium; so that, while sons owed reverence and obedience to their parents, it was the duty of the father to take care that the children should suffer no detriment in person or in property, indeed to promote them to every good: and so a power of this kind over sons was almost extinguished on the arrival of a more mature age, inasmuch as children, now sufficient to themselves for what was necessary, did not need another's guardianship [Compare Eichhorn, Deutsche Staats- und Rechtsgeschichte, §§55, 352 and 371. Troplong, Influence du Christ. sur le droit Rom. chapter V.]. And indeed among the Visigoths, law II, book IV, title II Lindenbrog, Codex legum antiquarum, page 80., it was sanctioned that, when the mother of a family died, the children should remain in the father's power, and that he should possess their property, if he had not taken a stepmother, on condition that he should not presume to sell or dissipate anything of it, or alienate it by any agreement. And elsewhere, law I of the same book, title V Ibid. page 89., parents were prohibited from disinheriting children, except for the gravest faults, which are specifically enumerated: But the power, it says, of flogging and correcting them, as long as they are established in the family, shall remain both to grandfather and grandmother, or to father and mother. The civil law having been softened in such a way, we readily grasp that the canon law was mitigated, if indeed the canons cited above ever obtained such force that they could drive children offered by parents, even unwilling, to the monastic life.

[12] 3° from the distinction which always Nor must it be passed over that from the most ancient times there existed a distinction between veiled and unveiled virgins, so that while the marriages of the former, as was shown in the Commentary on the Acts of SS. Martinian and Saturian, number 11 and following Acta SS. volume VII of October, page 827., were invalid, those of the latter, though illicit, were valid; because, namely, unveiled girls did not seem to have contracted the solemn obligation of chastity. Moreover, although various ages were assigned for veiling, certainly no canon can be shown that permits veiling before the years of puberty or discretion, as is established from canon 12 on regulars (III, 31); indeed the laws require a quite mature age: thus the third council of Carthage, celebrated in the year 397, in canon IV Labbe, volume II of the Councils, column 1167., prohibits virgins from being consecrated before twenty-five years, and the council of Agde of the year 504, canon XIX Labbe, volume IV of the Councils, column 1386., determined: Nuns, however proved their life and manners may be, shall not be veiled before the fortieth year of their age. These things being so, let us see what difference there is between the veiled and the unveiled in the order of contracting marriage, and so of returning to the world. The distinction between virgins of the two vows is clearly set forth by Innocent I in the decretal letter to Victricius of Rouen, chapters XII and XIII Ibid. volume II, column 1252., both of which I shall recite: Those who have spiritually married Christ, and have merited to be veiled by a priest, if afterwards they either publicly marry, or secretly corrupt themselves, are not to be admitted to penance, unless he to whom they joined themselves has departed from the world. For if this rule is guarded concerning all, that whatever woman, while her husband is alive, marries another, be held an adulteress, nor is licence of doing penance granted her, unless one of them has died; how much more is she to be held who had before joined herself to an immortal bridegroom and afterwards have passed over to human nuptials? But those who, not yet covered with the sacred veil, yet had promised to remain always in the virginal purpose, though they have not been veiled; if perhaps they marry, these must do penance for some time, because their promise was held by God. For if among men a contract of good faith is usually in no way dissolved, how much more ought that pledge which a virgin has made with God not to be dissolved without vengeance? For if the Apostle Paul said of those who departed from the purpose of widowhood that they have condemnation, because they have made void their first faith, how much more virgins, who are seen to have broken the faith of their former promise? I Timothy V, 12. This distinction having been laid down between the two orders of virgins, which a little later a Roman council of uncertain year, held however under Innocent, as Philip Labbe conjectures Ibid. volume II of the Councils, column 1316., admitted in canons I and II Ibid. column 1317., it appears to some extent that there was not an inescapable necessity for offered children to remain in the monastery, which the prudent mildness of the Church could relax.

[13] existed, especially in the clerical state, But to return to our St. Evergislus, and to explain more closely his oblation, by which his parents, as the biographer says at number 1, arranged to make him over to the Lord, this also must be observed, that St. Evergislus was devoted not so much to the monastic life as, to keep closely to the words of the biographer, to the clerical: which indeed parents were sometimes wont to do at that age, as is taught by the second Council of Toledo, celebrated in the year 527; whose canon I we adduce the more willingly because in it we see indicated, as in germ, those ecclesiastical colleges, commonly called Seminaries, in which from infant age boys were exercised by degrees in cultivating virtues and sciences as far as the order of the presbyterate. The canon of Toledo runs thus Ibid. volume IV, column 1733.: Concerning those whom the will of their parents has made over to the office of the clerical state from the first years of infancy, we determine that it be observed that, as soon as they have been tonsured or given over to the ministry of the chosen, they ought to be taught in the house of the church, in the bishop's presence, by a superior over them. But when they have completed the eighteenth year of their age, in the sight of the whole clergy and people, their will concerning seeking marriage shall be searched out by the bishop. And those to whom the grace of chastity has been pleasing, God inspiring it, and who have pledged that they will keep the profession of their chastity without conjugal necessity, let these, as seekers of the narrowest road, be subjected to the most gentle yoke of the Lord, and let them first receive the ministry of the subdiaconate in the habit of their probation from the twentieth year. And if they have passed blamelessly and inoffensively the twenty-fifth year of their age, they ought to be promoted to the office of the diaconate, if they are approved by the bishop as able to fulfil it knowingly. Care must be taken, however, by these, lest at any time, unmindful of their pledge, they should return to earthly nuptials or stolen couplings. And if perchance they have done so, let them be condemned as guilty of sacrilege, and be held as strangers by the Church. But to those whom their own will, at the time of the questioning, has persuaded of the desire to marry, the sentence granted by the Apostles we cannot take away: so that when, placed in marriage, they have pledged at full * age by equal consent that they will renounce the works of the flesh, they may aspire to the sacred grades.

[14] between the simple and the solemn vow. Although this canon of Toledo treats, as we have said, of the clerical state rather than the monastic, and St. Evergislus seems to have been enrolled from boyhood in the secular clergy; it will nevertheless be worth our while to mark the words of the canon of Toledo in which the fathers confess that they cannot take away the sentence or licence (of marrying) granted by the Apostles. For if a licence of this kind was granted by the Apostles, it is not perceived how the bare devotion of parents, as canon XLVIII of the fourth Council of Toledo, cited above at number 6, speaks, could have weakened the apostolic licence, whether it is a question of the clerical or the monastic state. Wherefore the opinion of Benedict van Haeften pleases us, who in the Monastic Disquisitions, book IV, treatise I, disquisition V Page 360., after he has weighed the arguments of both opinions, finally concludes in these words: The oblation of parents has a threefold effect in these boys. The first is that they can be received and retained by Religion. The second, that the father can no longer use his paternal power to recall them, because he has now yielded his right, and, as far as lies in him, by gift has given his sons to religion, and she has accepted them. The third is that neither can they themselves go out by their own will before the years of puberty, because in that age they are to be ruled not so much by their own will as by their father's: and the father has transferred his will to Religion, and therefore without the consent of Religion they cannot go out within that age, although before the years of puberty they can for cause be expelled. The same is delivered by Prosper Fagnani on chapter

Cum virum on Regulars, number 2 and following [Commentary on book III of the Decretals, Part II, page 50, Cologne edition, 1676. Compare Benedict XIV, On the Synod, book VI, chapter 3, number 2.].

* probatione habita professionis suæ

* licentiam

* provectæ

§ II. The right of the bishops of Cologne over the Church of Tongres; the diaconate and episcopate of St. Evergislus; whether he is to be called a Martyr.

By St. Severinus of Cologne, The difficulty about the oblation by the parents having been discussed, another occurs: namely in the Acts at number 2 St. Evergislus, as a little boy, is said to have been offered to St. Severinus of Cologne by him who presided at Tongres in dignity and charge. And indeed this word puerulus does not admit a strict interpretation, since in the preceding text he is said to have been given over to instruction, to have sat unwearied at his reading, to have put off his little dinner until evening, though his parents were offended, and finally to have dispensed what remained of the slender food to the poor: all which indicate an age that had passed beyond the truly childish years: for which reason I should prefer to call him a youth, already taught the first elements of letters: especially since without these beginnings of approved literature and sanctity it could scarcely be explained why St. Severinus wished to bring the youth with him to Cologne. But at the same place in the Acts a graver difficulty presents itself, namely how St. Severinus could have had such a solicitude for the Church of Tongres that he came there to treat of the state of the Church, called first the one of the brethren who presided in dignity and charge over the Church itself, and asked about their faith and how they behaved in the divine worship. For these seem to be the duties of the proper bishop.

[16] to whom belonged some The difficulty can be met especially in two ways. First of all canon CXIX of the Code of the African Church Labbe, volume II of the Councils, column 1128. sanctions that a bishop who has converted some place to Catholic unity, and has retained it for three years, no one claiming it, cannot be sued: but if the see has become vacant, no prejudice is to be done to the mother Church, or cathedral Church, but it should be permitted, when the place has received a bishop, which it did not have, to claim it within three years from that very day. It is certainly established from the Life of St. Severinus, given on the preceding day, number 2, that this prelate laboured greatly to extirpate the Arian heresy, which had doubtless infected these regions, and that he was able to rescue neighbouring Tongres from destruction after St. Servatius had ended his life: hence according to the cited African canon he could retain for himself, at least for a time, a part of the episcopate of Tongres, whose chair had already been transferred to Maastricht, and leave it to his successor St. Evergislus: and in such a way it can be explained that our saint visited the city of Tongres by his own authority and by his power corrected the corruptions that were breaking in. Nevertheless I greatly doubt whether the cited African canon was ever received in use in Gaul; since it dealt chiefly with composing the schism of the Donatists, as is manifest enough from the preceding canons Ibid. column 1666.: for in these it is a question of bishops converted from the Donatists to Catholic unity, with whom Catholic bishops holding the same chair had consented to divide their territory. Which state of affairs, since it never existed in Gaul, never required similar canons, which Africa needed.

[17] of the Church of Tongres It is better, therefore, to have recourse to the other means of solving the difficulty, namely to the metropolitan right which the chair of Cologne held over that of Tongres. The power of metropolitans was greater anciently than it is now: it is accurately described by canon IX of the council of Antioch, celebrated in the year 341 Ibid. column 566.: The bishops, it says, who are in each province ought to know that the bishop who presides over the metropolis also undertakes the care of the whole province, because all who have business flock from every side to the metropolis. Whence it has seemed good that he should also take precedence in honour: and that the other bishops should undertake nothing of great moment without him, as the canon of the fathers that has prevailed from the beginning wills: or only those things which pertain to the parish of each and the regions subject to it. For each bishop has power over his parish, and is to administer according to the religion fitting for each and to have care of the whole region which is subject to his city. So that they may also ordain presbyters and deacons and treat each thing with judgment, and undertake to do nothing further without the bishop of the metropolis; nor he without the judgment of the rest. This indeed is notable in this canon, that while it attributes great authority to the metropolitan in arduous matters, it yet leaves to the bishops their own jurisdiction unimpaired in ruling their diocese, indeed while the bishops can act according to their own discretion in their Church, metropolitans nevertheless ought to undertake nothing in the province without the judgment of the other bishops.

[18] according to the prevailing But to metropolitans belonged the right of visiting the Churches of their province. This is clearly shown by canon II of the Council of Turin, celebrated in the year 397 Ibid. column 1156., by which a controversy over the metropolitan right between the bishops of Arles and Vienne is composed: if indeed neither can prove that his city is the metropolis, for the preservation of the bond of peace it is decreed by more useful counsel that, if it pleases the bishops of the said cities, each of them should claim the cities nearer to himself within the province, and visit those Churches that are established to be nearer to their towns. In the same way, in canon LII of the Code of canons of the African Church Ibid. column 1076., the bishops Honoratus and Urbanus complain that the province of Mauretania is not visited by the primate of Carthage, as the laws require: Aurelius of Carthage replies that nothing is to be determined about this province at present, since it borders on the barbarian country; but, he adds, may God grant that we may be able to come to your province, though we do not promise it, over and above; for you ought to reflect, brethren, that the brethren of Tripoli and Arzugis too could have required this for themselves, if reason permitted. Thus too Possidius in the Life of St. Augustine, chapter 8 Migne, Patrology, Works of St. Augustine, volume XXXII, column 39., says that the Church of Hippo was visited by the primate of Numidia, Megalius of Calama, on which occasion, beyond the expectation of all, yet with the consent of the bishop of Carthage, obtained by secret letters, St. Augustine is consecrated bishop.

[19] the canons of that time, The manner of acting of St. Severinus of Cologne could therefore be conveniently explained, in that as metropolitan of the Church of Tongres he visited it by his right and inquired into the doctrine and manners of the clergy, unless another difficulty presented itself, namely the condition of the see of Cologne itself, which, as some maintain, by no means had the metropolitan right in the fourth century. This opinion Joseph Harzheim solidly refuted in a double dissertation: and he showed against the patrons of the contrary opinion, Aegidius Gelenius Pretiosa Hierotheca, page 29., Ignatius Roderique Sacræ Coloniensis Ecclesiæ traditio Vindicata. and Charles of St. Paul Geographia Sacra, page 127. that the metropolitan dignity is derived from St. Maternus. The chief argument seems to me to be that Cologne of Agrippina is held from the most ancient times as the metropolis of Second Germany, as is established from the Notitia of the provinces, composed in the time of Honorius, and so at the end of the fourth or the beginning of the fifth century, or this very time of which we are treating. I confess indeed that these metropolises were civil, and that the metropolitan right over sacred things does not flow from secular power: but nevertheless the Church of God, whose office it is to dispose the spiritual government for the utility of the people, had been accustomed to ordain that the ecclesiastical metropolises should be the same as the civil, the reason for which disposition is expressed in the canon of the Council of Antioch cited above, because, namely, all who have business flock from every side to the metropolis. Now the metropolis of Cologne, among all the others, would have lacked the metropolitan right: for let all the other cities that were heads of provinces in Gaul be recalled, in all we shall find metropolitan sees established even down to late times: for Eauze, the metropolis of Novempopulana, having been utterly destroyed by the Northmen, the metropolitan right was transferred to Auch in the ninth century Gallia Christiana, volume I, column 977..

[20] and the necessity of the Churches, The patrons of the adverse opinion indeed object that Capua, the civil metropolis of Campania, remained in ecclesiastical matters a bare episcopate until the tenth century, when it was raised to the dignity of an archiepiscopate Ughelli, Italia Sacra, volume VI, column 321.: and that thus a civil metropolis did not immediately bring in an ecclesiastical one. Which indeed we also confess: for the Roman See, inasmuch as it is metropolitan, exercised its jurisdiction over various provinces and hence metropolises too, as James Sirmond On the Suburbicarian Churches, volume IV of the Works, column 37., Peter de Marca On the Concord of Priesthood and Empire, volume I, page 25. and Peter Cantel Metropolitanarum Urbium Historia, page 389. show. For this reason the example alleged of Capua seems to me ineffective, especially in the Gauls, where, as we have said, every civil metropolis was at the same time an ecclesiastical one. Another difficulty is caused by letter XIV of Pope Zachary to Boniface Migne, Patrology, volume LXXXIX, column 954., by which the Church of Mainz is confirmed in perpetual times to Boniface and his successors as a metropolis, having under it these five cities, that is Tongres, Cologne, Worms, Speyer and Trectis (Maastricht). But first of all this pontifical mandate, if it ever had execution, was shortly abolished; since, as even the adversaries confess, the bishop of Cologne contemporary with St. Boniface, whether he was Agilolf, as Gelenius maintains Pretiosa Hierotheca, page 29., or Raginfred, as the Gallia Christiana has it Volume III, column 630., possessed the metropolitan right. Further, in the time of St. Boniface it was a question of reforming the state of the German Church, disturbed through manifold vicissitudes: for some years before, as letter X of Zachary has it Migne, Patrology, volume LXXXIX, column 942., it was a question of giving the metropolis of Cologne to Boniface, which plan indeed did not obtain its effect, because the Franks did not persevere in the word they had promised, for which reason St. Boniface stayed in the city of Mainz Ibid. column 947.. All which show that at that time the metropolitan see had not been established, without its following from this that in the fourth and fifth centuries SS. Severinus and Evergislus did not exercise the metropolitan right.

[21] care, But if the metropolitan dignity of the bishops of Cologne should waver in anyone's mind, let us recall that the pontificate of SS. Severinus and Evergislus fell in those times in which each to the best of his power succoured the Church in her labour, and, setting aside for a little the rigour of the canons, put in his sickle even there where the harvest seemed another's. Clear examples are afforded by the history of the fourth century. I shall bring forward one from Theodoret, book V, chapter 4 Works of Theodoret, volume III, page 1020, Halle edition, 1769.. The great Eusebius, he says, (of Samosata, bishop in the province of Euphratensis under the metropolis of Hierapolis), having returned from exile, ordained as bishop Acacius, whose fame is celebrated, at Beroea (in the province of First Syria Oriens Christianus, volume II, column 782.); at Hierapolis Theodotus, whose religious way of life is even now on the lips of all; moreover at Chalcis Eusebius and at our own Cyrus (for Theodoret was bishop of Cyrus) Isidore, both admirable and with divine

zeal conspicuous: and that Eulogius too, who strenuously fought for the apostolic doctrine, … they report to have been ordained pastor by the same man at Edessa, after the death of the divine Barses. And when he wished also to place Maris on Doliche, a chair of the province of Euphratensis, he finished the end of his life by a tile thrown at his head by an Arian woman. Thus Theodoret reports. It was certainly contrary to the canons for a simple bishop, in no way distinguished by metropolitan dignity, to establish bishops through various places, not only of his own province, but of another's also. For Beroea, today Aleppo, belonged to First Syria under the metropolis of Seleucia Pieria Ibid. column 777 and 782.. To a manner of acting of this kind he was driven by the safety of the Catholic Church, which in every commonwealth is the supreme law. But something similar could have happened in the Church of Tongres: we know indeed that the succession of the bishops of Tongres or Maastricht was not greatly interrupted: but no history teaches us what they did, and so whether they did not need another's hand in sustaining the burden, especially when, on account of the tumults of wars and of the barbarian peoples succeeding one another, the episcopal see being vacant, the Church of Tongres was widowed of its pastor. Whence from the labour undertaken by St. Severinus for that Church it does not follow, as Tillemont maintains Mém. pour serv. à l'Hist. Ecclés. volume X, page 818., that the biographer of St. Evergislus held Tongres as if it had belonged to the episcopate of Cologne. What we have unfolded so far shows sufficiently that on another ground too SS. Severinus and Evergislus could have undertaken the care of the Church of Tongres, without their having on that account to be called the proper bishop of the place.

[22] St. Evergislus is promoted to Orders, St. Evergislus, having set out with St. Severinus for Cologne, was promoted by degrees, as the biographer has it at number 2, to the office of the diaconate, and finally raised to the dignity of the archdiaconate. Which dignity was second to the bishop, as one which, as St. Isidore teaches in letter I to Bishop Leudefred Migne, Patrology, Works of Isidore, volume LXXXIII, column 896., ought to command subdeacons and Levites. The solicitude for parishioners too and their ordering and quarrels pertain to the care of the archdeacon, for repairing the diocesan basilicas he himself makes suggestion to the priest; he inquires into the parishes by order of the bishop, and into the ornaments or property of the parochial basilicas, and he likewise brings to the bishop the acts of ecclesiastical liberties. He himself receives the money collected from the communion and himself brings it to the bishop, and he himself distributes to the clerics their proper parts. Thus St. Isidore of Seville, by which he shows that the power of archdeacons was ample, which, as time went on, grew so much Compare chapter I, Of the Office of Archdeacon (I, 23). that it was an impediment to the right government of the bishops; for which reason a great part of the archidiaconal right was, by the discretion of the bishops, transferred to the vicars of the bishops, commonly called generals; who, since they can be removed at the nod of the prelate and die with the bishop, leave to the bishop free power of governing his Church. If, however, a scruple should move anyone, that what we have reported of the dignity of the archdeacon pertains to the seventh century, in which St. Isidore wrote, and so does not fit immediately with the archdeaconship of St. Evergislus: we reply that St. Isidore in his letter indicates what had been observed in the Church from of old, and introduced nothing new: and if we could give complete credit to the Arabic canons of the council of Nicaea, it would be certain to us that already then the archdeacon and the chorbishop were the two hands of the bishop, as chapter 58 says Labbe, volume II of the Councils, column 309., yet so that the chief honour is attributed to the archdeacon.

[23] by which means, made over to the clergy of Cologne, St. Evergislus, although born in the city of Tongres, was raised by degrees to the order of the diaconate by St. Severinus of Cologne. And the discipline of that age required that a man should belong to the bishop by whom he had been promoted and to his Church: and so in conferring Orders on anyone regard was had not to the place of birth, origin or domicile, but only to the ordainer and his Church. It is true indeed that canons exist by which laymen are forbidden to be ordained without the knowledge of their own bishop; but in the Gauls they do not seem to have obtained the force of law. In the first council of Carthage of the year 348, canon V Ibid. column 715.: Privatus, bishop of Vegesela, said: I suggest to your holiness that you determine that it is not permitted for another's cleric to be received by anyone without the letters of his bishop, nor to retain him with himself, nor to appropriate to himself a layman from another's people, so as to ordain him without the knowledge of the bishop from whose people he is. Bishop Gratus said: This observance has guarded peace. For I remember too that in the most holy council of Sardica it was determined that no one should appropriate a man of another people: but, if perchance he should be necessary, let him ask of his colleague and have him by consent. For Gratus, president of the council of Carthage, who had also been present at the synod of Sardica Ibid. column 650 and 679., recalls canon XIX (in the Greek copy XV), by which it is determined that whoever from another parish wishes to ordain another's minister without the consent and without the will of the bishop himself, his ordination shall not be valid. Nevertheless that discipline did not obtain in the Gauls. We have a contemporary example in St. Paulinus, who, baptized at Bordeaux, was ordained presbyter by Lampius, bishop of Barcelona Migne, Patrology, Works of Paulinus, volume LXI, column 163., yet on condition that he should not be bound to the Church of Barcelona itself, nor be dedicated to the place of the Church Ibid. column 159.. In the first council of Orange of the year 441 there is a skilful distinction between a cleric and a layman to be ordained; for canon VIII Labbe, volume III of the Councils, column 1449. orders that no one presume to ordain a cleric living elsewhere, not without consultation of the bishop with whom he formerly lived … But in the following canon, in which it is no longer a question of a cleric, but of another's citizen, the council sanctions Ibid. at the place cited. that he should either recall him to himself, or obtain for him the favour of those with whom they live. From what has been said, therefore, it is clear that St. Evergislus, a layman, could have been taken up by St. Severinus, and by ordination enrolled in the Church of Cologne.

[24] he is elected bishop of this Church, That on the death of St. Severinus our saint succeeded is established among all, without, however, his promotion to the episcopate being able to be bound to any certain year; both because, as we saw on the preceding day in the commentary on the Acts of St. Severinus, number 10, the year in which St. Severinus died is uncertain, and because his promotion fell in those times in which, the ecclesiastical and civil commonwealth being disturbed, the election of a successor was not easy. Our Henschen in the Exegesis on the episcopate of Tongres and Maastricht, which Joseph Ghesquière reprinted, illustrated with annotations, in the Acts of the Saints of Belgium Volume I, page 221., says that about the year CCCC St. Evergislus, by fatherland of Tongres, bishop of Cologne, made an excursion to Tongres to eliminate the filth of idolatry Ibid. page 223.: by which words he sufficiently indicates that the time at which St. Evergislus succeeded St. Severinus is uncertain to him. Gelenius, relying on the authority of a manuscript Catalogue, whose age he does not indicate, says Admiranda Coloniæ, page 39. that St. Evergislus began his pontificate in the year 408. There is no reason for us to oppose this greatly, but neither does anything occur by which we could constantly affirm it, except that when the fifth century had already begun our saint undertook the administration of the Church of Cologne.

[25] at an uncertain time. The said Gelenius Ibid. at the place cited. teaches us that St. Evergislus sat, according to some, XV years, according to others L. The Louvain Addition to Butler attributes to the saint fifteen years of pontificate, and binds his death to the year 418, whence it would follow that the beginning of his episcopate coincides with the year 403: therefore the Louvain editor in a special Annotation judged it better to prolong the life of our saint to the year 434, inasmuch as that year fits more conveniently with the succession of the bishops of Cologne: but a reason of this kind seems not to be admissible, since the Gallia Christiana testifies Volume III, column 624. that between St. Evergislus and his successor, St. Aquilinus, there existed a fairly long interpontificate, to which difficulty it must be added that the same Aquilinus comes in others under the name of Solinus or Solanus Ibid. at the place cited., so that on account of the diversity of the name perhaps another bishop is to be interpolated in the Catalogue. It is established therefore that the succession of the bishops of Cologne is in no way disturbed, if we fix the death of St. Evergislus in any year below the middle of the fifth century. For the rest, in what great perplexities the chronology of those times is involved is shown also by the error of Joseph Ghesquière in the Acts of the Saints of Belgium: for when, treating of St. Servatius, he had said that St. Evergislus was the author of the ordination of St. Agricolaus, the successor of St. Servatius, who died about the year 420 Acta SS. Belgii, volume I, page 190., nevertheless when he was writing on the Belgian Saints of the fifth century it seemed to him more probable that St. Agricolaus held the episcopate before the year 400, and so before the episcopate of St. Evergislus Ibid. page 439. Compare Foullon, History of Liège, volume I, page 61.. These things being so, we judge it better to refrain from the useless labour of ordering the chronology; for which reason we also record the death of our saint loosely in the later fifth century: with which time Cornelius De Bye concurs, when he thinks it certain that St. Evergislus did not prolong his life as far as the year 450 Acta SS. volume V of October, page 31, number 70..

[26] He found the body of St. Mallosus, To our St. Evergislus the said Cornelius De Bye attributes the finding of the body of St. Mallosus, a Theban Martyr, and a healing by dust taken from the Relics of SS. Gereon and his Companions: and he himself indeed shows by a rather long commentary that both histories, reported by Gregory of Tours in the book on the Glory of the Martyrs, chapters 62 and 63 Migne, Patrology, Works of Gregory of Tours, volume LXXI, column 761., pertain to our saint, by no means to Ebregisilus, who flourished as bishop of Cologne about the end of the sixth century Gallia Christiana, volume III, column 625.. His chief reason is that Gregory, who held the episcopate for about twenty years and died in the year 495, was certainly contemporary with this Ebregisilus, and hence in weaving his narrative would not have said of a contemporary bishop, who was then prelate of this city, but rather, who is now prelate, which indeed would have been both truer and more effective: truer, because he would have rightly indicated the time of the episcopate of that Ebregesilus; more effective too, because credit is generally given to a miracle narrated all the more, the more present the witness produced. I should not wish to conceal, however, that the authors of the Gallia Christiana ascribe to one and the same Ebregesilus, living about the end of the sixth century, the embassy to the nunnery of Poitiers, which was disturbed in the year 590, and the miracles wrought around the Relics of the Martyrs of Cologne, without those writers bringing any reason for their opinion Volume III, column 625..

[27] and having set out for Tongres, St. Evergislus, says the Life to be published below at number 4, for the sake of casting away the foulness of idolatry, concerned with pastoral care, to Tongres, whence he had drawn

his illustrious origin, went on. We have already shown above at number 6 the reasons for which St. Severinus could have put his hand to the rudder of the Church of Tongres; the same can hold here too for our saint, who, the Surian Acts say, the pastoral care and solicitude pressing him, but the love of his native soil spurring him on, inflamed with the fervour of faith, set out for Tongres to eliminate the filth of idolatry. That idolatry persisted long enough among the people of Tongres is shown by our Henschen in his Exegesis on the episcopate of Tongres, prefixed to volume VI of May, since in the time of St. Cunibert, who undertook the episcopate about the year 625 Ibid. column 626., traces of idolatry still remained: and indeed the frequent incursions of the northern peoples revived dying paganism, new superstitions being added and the natives being destroyed or reduced to harsh servitude. And hence I think it came about that in various regions we see a second and sometimes a third conversion celebrated.

[28] he is slain by robbers. That St. Evergislus is called a Martyr flows from the fact that formerly this title was attributed also to those men who, leading a most holy life, were put to an unjust death. Thus St. Meinrad, slain in the Swiss Hermitage by robbers who were gaping after his scanty furnishings, is called a Martyr without circumlocution Compare Acta SS. volume II of January, page 384 and following.. Wherefore Cajetan Moroni observes in his Historical-ecclesiastical Lexicon, under Martire, that in the VIIth, VIIIth and IXth centuries the title was usually given also to those who had been put to death unjustly and without cause by their enemies Moroni, Dizion. di erudiz. Storico-Ecclesiastica, volume XLIII, page 185.. Nevertheless Prosper Lambertini, in Book III on the Canonization of the Servants of God, chapter II, number I, teaches that martyrdom is the voluntary suffering or endurance of death for the faith of Christ or another act of virtue referred to God, which opinion is commonly approved by theologians and in particular by St. Thomas, 22, question CXXIV, article 5. From which it is deduced that St. Evergislus is not properly a Martyr, since the robbers killed him not indeed for the faith of Christ or another act of virtue referred to God, but, as our biographer says at number 4 and the Surian Acts confirm, on account of the great gain that they hoped had come to them in him: but when besides his garment they found nothing on him … they fled away sad, carrying with them nothing but their sins. These words most clearly indicate that the robbers perpetrated their crime not so much from hatred of the faith or of any supernatural virtue, as from desire of another's property. What remains concerning the cult of St. Evergislus we shall set forth in the Annotations.

PASSION OF ST. EVERGISLUS, BISHOP, BY AN ANONYMOUS AUTHOR

From the Utrecht manuscript of St. Saviour's,

Collated with the Cologne edition of the year 1483 and the Surian of the year 1618.

Evergislus, martyr and bishop of Cologne (S.)

BHL Number: 2368

BY AN ANONYMOUS AUTHOR.

St. Evergislus, Evergislus, sprung of a noble stock of parents in the city of Tongres, at that time the greatest of cities ^a. When after baptism, beautiful of form, he displayed in himself, according to the measure of his age, the marks of grace and virtue, his parents devoted him to serve Christ perpetually, and arranged to make him over to the Lord as a Nazarite according to the ecclesiastical rite ^b. Now of his diligence in learning and the wonderful adornment of his manners there is no need to speak, since no pen would avail to set them forth. For, given over to instruction, sitting unwearied at his reading, he put off his little dinner until evening, to the offence of his parents ^c, and, content with little, he accustomed himself rather to sustain his little body than to feed it; what he withdrew from himself he dispensed to the poor.

[2] piously educated by St. Severinus, Meanwhile Blessed Severinus, archbishop of the people of Cologne, extirpating the Arian heresy through his whole province ^d, came to Tongres, where the perfidious Euphrates had oversown tares upon the wheat ^e: and being about to treat of the state of the Church, he at once summoned the first of the brethren, who presided in dignity and charge over the Church itself ^f, and asked about their faith and how they behaved in the divine worship. And the priest, replying fittingly to him, among other things faithfully urged also the wonderful first fruits of the sacred little boy. The archbishop, hearing it, filled with joy, commanded him to be presented to him, and in his sound replies found beyond hope the mystery of sanctity. And thereafter, taking him as his son with the most ardent affection of love, amid embraces and kisses he admonished him to go along with him: and as time went on the archbishop promoted him, adorned with good manners, by degrees as far as the office of the diaconate ^g. Now it is incredible how he showed himself in the observance of God's commandments, keeping watch day and night in the tabernacle of God: and of how great merit he also was appears in this, that when at a certain time, on a Sunday, according to custom, for the sake of prayer, he was going round the holy places with the archbishop at a secret hour of the night, he alone with him merited to hear, at the passing of Blessed Martin of Tours, the heavenly host, a sweet melody in heaven ^h.

[3] he is made bishop of Cologne: Meanwhile the blessed pontiff Severinus, now an old man, passed to the Lord. Without delay Evergislus, his great sanctity requiring it, although unwilling, was elected archbishop by the clergy and people of Cologne of Agrippina ⁱ. From then on, advancing from virtue to virtue from day to day, he daily increased the state of the Church for the better. But when, growing heavy now with old age, he was much taken with pain in the head, going round the places of the Saints to pray as usual, he entered the church of the holy Martyrs Gereon and his companions, and immediately in the memorial of the Saints, beginning to chant the customary verse “The saints shall exult in glory,” on bended knee he received the divine response, “They shall rejoice in their beds”: which divine oracle, revealed to the man of God through the spirit, taught him that it would be the day of that feast on which the holy Martyrs gave back to the Creator what could not die in them. Whence down to this day he caused the joys of that day to be so worthily celebrated yearly by the inhabitants, that the intercession of the Saints is made continually for all. And the holy pontiff, placing on his languishing head dust from the hidden places of the Saints with the sign of the cross, withdrew healed, as if now growing a boy again ^k.

[4] preaching at Tongres, Afterwards the blessed man, for the sake of casting away the foulness of idolatry, concerned with pastoral care, went on to Tongres, whence he had drawn his illustrious origin. There indeed, preaching with all authority, he reformed manners for the better. Meanwhile, when the Lord wished worthily to crown him, it happened that he rose at a certain midnight; and went alone, according to custom, to the monastery of the Holy Mother of God to pray ^l; always fulfilling that saying of the psalmist “At midnight I rose to give praise to thee.” Psalm CXVIII, 62. And indeed while he made his way chanting psalms: “But thou, O Lord, art my protector, my glory and the lifter up of my head,” there were at hand robbers, who had risen by night to cut men's throats, hoping that great gain had come to them in him, and one of them with one stroke of a weapon pierced him, by which he happily consummated the course of his life on the ninth day before the kalends of November. And when they had found nothing on him besides a simple garment, carrying him to a more secret place and covering him with twigs which they had chanced to gather on the road, they fled away sad, carrying with them nothing but their sins ^m.

[5] he is slain by robbers, When morning came, the ill-omened report flying, the whole city, filled with sadness and fear, wept bitterly. The whole clergy and people, coming to the place where so holy a body lay, carried it to the oratory of the Holy Mother of God, which at that time was very celebrated; and the celebration of Masses and funeral rites having been duly carried out by the bishop of the place ⁿ and all the clergy, they laid the holy body in a more secret place of the said church with all honour of burial, fearing lest the people of Cologne should perhaps carry it off for themselves, if they found it negligently placed. And so great mighty works did the Lord perform through the merits of Blessed Evergislus in the same place from that time, that the inhabitants even said that he kept for them in the heavens such faith as he was said to have had for them when living on earth. For whatever was asked of his patronage with faithful affection was fulfilled by his pious effect: and not only where he was venerated present, but nowhere did he fail when absent. Indeed by his intercession the blind were given light, the lame restored, paralytics cured, lepers cleansed, which deeds, if anyone wished to signify them in writing, he will seem to inflict weariness on the reader.

[6] and his body is translated to Cologne. As time went on, when Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, his brother reigning, the twenty-second successor of St. Evergislus ^o, was making a journey to the west for the sake of holding a conference on the state of the kingdom among the princes of that region [p], by chance on his return, the kingdom being at peace, he came to the town where the body of St. Evergislus lay [q]: for long antiquity and the tempest of wars had utterly destroyed the city with its name, and novelty had transferred the episcopal see elsewhere. And when the archbishop was spending the night there, St. Evergislus appeared, as if cloaked in a torn chasuble, who gave him such words: Do you see how my vestments are neglected and consumed by the moth? Since thou shalt light my lamp, enlighten my darkness, for I shall be snatched from here, and in my God I shall go over a wall. When morning came, he understood with his secretaries, to whom he had told the vision, that St. Evergislus wished to revisit his own see. Without delay the bishop [r] with his people went on to the place where the holy body lay, and behind a certain altar he raised it from a certain structure, now consumed by age: and while many inhabitants wept, he carried it back with his people to Cologne: and all the clergy and people coming to meet it, he honourably placed it in the church of St. Cecilia, Virgin and Martyr, on the fifth day before the kalends of April [s]. And there the Lord has deigned through his saint to confer so many daily gifts of salvation on the faithful, that each one believes him present by the more abundant benefits.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. The year of the conference held by St. Bruno being established, it will be easy to establish the year in which St. Evergislus was translated from Tongres to Cologne. Our Cornelius De Bye, in the Preliminary Commentary on the Acts of St. Bruno at the 11th day of October, number 240 Acta SS. volume V of October, page 758., binds that conference to the year 959. And indeed, although St. Bruno, inasmuch as he was not only archbishop of Cologne, but also duke, set over Lotharingia by his brother Otto, came quite frequently into France, and so to the west, to hold conferences on the administration of the kingdom, yet no year seems more suitable for this translation. For, as the contemporary Flodoard testifies in his Annals Migne, Patrology, Works of Flodoard, volume CXXXV, column 484., in the year DCCCCLIX Bruno came again into France, and at Compiègne held a conference with the queen his sister and his nephews, who were at variance over certain fortresses which King Lothair had recovered from Burgundy, and, hostages being given, made peace between them until a future assembly. King Lothair with the queen his mother set out for Cologne in the days of Easter, to stay for this festival with his uncle Bruno: and security being given him concerning the kingdom of Lotharingia, and certain gifts received from his uncle, he returned to Laon. In this narrative all things are found that our biographer notes about the French journey, on the occasion of which the translation took place, namely the treating of the affairs of the kingdom and the peace concluded; the time of the year also is to the point, for, as the biographer says a little below, the sacred body of Evergislus was brought to Cologne on the fifth day before the kalends of April (the 28th of March); and so St. Bruno himself was on his return about these days, which fits in every respect with the narrative of Flodoard, saying that Lothair, king of France, with his mother Gerberga, sister of St. Bruno, set out for Cologne and there celebrated the paschal festival, which in the year 959 fell on the 3rd of April. All these things agree so fitly with one another that there can scarcely be doubt of the year 959, in which the translation was celebrated.

q. After the Life of St. Evergislus published by Surius it is said: At this place there follows in the manuscript codices the translation of his sacred body: but the reader will find it above in the Life of St. Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, on the 11th day of October: and in fact Surius at number XXVII shows the history of the translation: which, however, our De Bye judges to be absent from the genuine codices, especially because Leibniz Scriptores Brunsvicenses, volume I, page 283., in the Life of St. Bruno brought out from the Wolfenbüttel library, a text for the rest less fitting, did not find that description Acta SS. volume V of October, page 701.. We subjoin both narratives; for they pertain to the history of our saint. Moreover the Leibniz text, after reporting that St. Bruno collected very many bodies and Relics of the Saints, adds: Concerning the translation of Blessed Evergislus, third archbishop of the same see, what was done by the dispensation of this pious provider is known to very many: who, laid up in the church of Blessed Cecilia, virgin, with hymns and the celebration of divine praise, the religious people so venerate and honour that you would believe him present, exchanging daily services for more abundant benefits [Scriptores Brunsvicenses, volume I, page 283. Compare Pertz, Monumenta Germaniæ, volume IV, page 279.]. But these same things are unfolded more abundantly by the Surian text, which, as will be plain to one who compares them, our biographer used. Surius therefore has these words: The most pious St. Bruno, the twenty-second successor of St. Evergislus, made a mirror of all good manners; a beautiful spikenard gave forth its fragrance: truly a leader of the people and a solicitous pastor of the Lord's flock. When, for the sake of holding a conference on the state of the kingdom among the princes of that region, he was making a journey to the west, by chance on his return, the kingdom being at peace, he came to the town of the Tungri, which has preserved the venerable ashes of the Relics of St. Evergislus. For, our sins requiring it, long antiquity and the tempest of wars had utterly destroyed the whole city with its name, and novelty had transferred the episcopal see elsewhere. And when the supreme prelate was spending the night there, and this greatly moved his mind, that so sacred a place was now coming as it were to nothing, on that very night St. Evergislus appeared to him, as if cloaked in a torn chasuble, who gave him such words: “Do you see how my vestments are neglected and consumed by the moth? Since thou shalt light my lamp, enlighten my darkness: for I shall be snatched from here and in my God I shall go over a wall.” Psalm XVII, 29. Without delay the bishop, released from sleep, turned the thing over in silence. When morning came, he ordered Folcmar of good memory, the steward, whom he had been accustomed to hold most closely joined to him in all business, to come to him, and told him the matter in order, and asked him to give counsel for the common good. He immediately said at the first response that St. Evergislus ought to revisit his own see. The bishop, rejoicing, announced to all his people that by his imperial power he wished to restore the Relics of so sacred a body to its own see. They, hearing this, proclaimed that this would be desirable to them, and almost all wept for joy. Without delay, with all devotion, the bishop with his people went on to the place where the holy body lay, and behind a certain altar he raised it with all veneration from a certain structure, now consumed by age, and while the inhabitants wept much, with his people to Cologne

he carried it back. When they had come to the most holy see, there was an enormous concourse of the people, the clergy with the nuns assembled, both sexes flocked together, the whole city exulted with new joys, and so with every celebration of divine praise on the fifth day before the kalends of April it was honourably laid up in the church of St. Cecilia, virgin. And there the Lord has deigned through his saint to confer so many daily gifts of his salvation on the sons of his sacred Church, that each one believes him to be present by the more abundant benefits. There follows in the Surian Life of St. Bruno the translation of St. Patroclus, martyr of Troyes, which Bolland reported in his Acts at the 21st day of January Acta SS. volume II of January, page 241.. It will seem surprising to the reader that no mention is made of the bishop of Liège, under whose jurisdiction the city of the Tungri was. This was Baldric, who died in the same year 959, either on the twelfth day before the kalends of May or on the fifteenth before the kalends of November Foullon, History of Liège, volume I, page 180.: and so the translation took place in his lifetime, and, as John Foullon says, with his assent Ibid. page 181.. Let us observe, however, that St. Bruno proceeded in that affair not so much from his metropolitan authority, which would have been powerless, as from imperial power, as the said writer says, to which Baldric had to yield even unwillingly, if indeed he was aware of this deed. But this is a question of less moment; it is of much greater moment to find out whether St. Bruno took from Tongres the body of St. Evergislus of Cologne, or from Trutmonia that of St. Ebregisus of Maastricht. See this question declared in the forthcoming Commentary on St. Ebregisus.

r. The Utrecht text has cum suis episcopis perrexit etc.; I have corrected the fault by writing: cum suis episcopus perrexit, since in the fuller narrative, from which our biographer drew his, one reads: Cum suis episcopus.

s. The church of St. Cecilia, into which the Relics of St. Evergislus were brought, was a monastery of nuns, which already in the tenth century was called the Old, indeed is held by Gelenius to be the first cathedral [Admiranda Coloniæ, page 357. Gallia Christiana, volume III, column 773. Compare however Binterim, die Erzdiözese Köln, volume I, page 65.]. Bruno enriched the nunnery not only with the saint's body, but also with estates, as is clear from a diploma which Gelenius and Baron de Mering Admiranda Coloniæ, page 357. have published Die Peters Kirche etc. page 79, edition of 1836.. The Gallia Christiana maintains Volume III, column 773. that this monastery of St. Cecilia was formerly of Benedictine virgins: in the course of time changed into a secular chapter, it was in the year 1474 reformed anew as regular under the Rule of St. Augustine Gelenius, Admiranda Coloniæ, page 358.. Which persisted down to the year 1802, when it perished with the rest of the monasteries Mering, Die Peters Kirche, page 83.: but today, the monastery having been changed into a hospital, the church serves the piety of the sick [Ibid. page 92, and Historische Beschreibung des Hohen Erz-Domkirche zu Köln, von A. E. d'K *, page 5 and following.]. See other things in the Commentary on St. Ebregisus of Maastricht.