Louis of Arnstein

ON BL. LOUIS OF ARNSTEIN, CONFESSOR, NOT A BISHOP, AT ARNSTEIN IN THE FORMER DIOCESE OF TRIER,

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Louis of Arnstein, confessor and lay brother of the Premonstratensian Order. (Bl.)

BHL Number: 5016

BY V. D. B.

Prolegomenon on the cult of the saints and blesseds of the Premonstratensians in the Premonstratensian Order.

Although under the most holy institutions of St. Norbert, A certain just and God-fearing man, a true worshipper of God and abiding in his innocence, called Norbert, when by his preaching, as a heavenly pipe and silver trumpet, he had taught many, and, turning them to the Lord, had stirred those divinely inspired to the fruit of a better life, at length in the place called Prémontré he established a peaceful dwelling for his work and that of his disciples. And having taken up the regular habit, in order to soldier for the Lord according to the Rule of blessed Augustine, he made stricter in himself and in his disciples the customary manner of life, which the aforesaid regular canons had up to those times observed more loosely, adding some new institutions and also changing some old ones. For the canons and lay brothers of the Premonstratensian order never eat meat except in sickness. From the feast of the Holy Cross until Easter they fast; they eat two cooked dishes in the refectory in the manner of the Cistercians. They do not wear shirts: they use sheepskins. They sleep clothed in white tunics and shod with leggings. They are clothed in white woollen cappas without any dye. On feast days, in the manner of other canons, they read nine lessons at matins, on other days only three. After the night office they return to the dormitory, to sleep and rest at fixed times; and at definite hours they go out to the labours of their hands. They take on parish churches and the care of secular souls in their own persons.

[2] also to women and in All the monasteries of this institution and religion are contained under the one head of the Premonstratensian many regions having spread, many flourished with the praise of holiness, monastery; to which every year all the abbots of this order assemble for the general chapter. They have, moreover, courts and priories not only of men, but also of women; in which both clerics and lay persons dwell, according as it is enjoined on them by their superiors. From the beginning of the order and the new planting, while they still abounded in the precious treasure of poverty, as if drunk on the new wine of the new religion and burning with that fire which the Lord sent on the earth that it might blaze, they were so kindled that they set on fire, enlightened, and provoked by the example of their way of life not only the neighbouring regions, but remote provinces through almost the whole world. Whence in a short time many of this order and profession, both of clerics and of nuns, everywhere were built

monasteries by the bounty of princes and the alms of the faithful, immensely enlarged and sufficiently enriched with abundant revenues and wide possessions. Although afterwards, through the ageing of things and the failing of human nature, the original fervour was neither always nor everywhere preserved, yet the Premonstratensian canons never suffered so much from the calamity of the times and the corruption of bad examples as to cease being stars in the dark night: which it would be easy to show by the most brilliant testimonies.

[3] [almost no care was taken that they should be granted ecclesiastical cult: not even St. Norbert; whose] The Premonstratensian order therefore abounded greatly, especially in its first times, in holy and distinguished men: but, what may surprise you, even those whose names were held in veneration and whom they privately and publicly called blessed and saints, they honoured with no liturgical honours: which some have ascribed to negligence, others have said was done so that the quiet of the cœnobia and the decorum of the churches might not be disturbed by the concourse of people devoutly and zealously coming to the tombs of the saints. [funeral commemoration was made until the end of the sixteenth century, when, through the promotion of the canons of Park, he received the honours of the heavenly ones.] Whatever that may be, beware of saying that this was their peculiar fault. For the Camaldolese, Carthusians, Cistercians, and other monks of stricter institute were for very many centuries not much more diligent in promoting the cult of their saints. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, then, the Premonstratensians honoured none whatever of their own with the religious veneration of the heavenly ones, not even St. Norbert, although the process of canonization had once been begun. For in our museum there are the Missal of Magdeburg, published at the press of Nuremberg in the year 1503, and the Premonstratensian one, which Jacques Kerver with singular diligence brought to light at Paris in the year 1578; and in neither does any feast of St. Norbert at all appear: indeed, in Kerver's at the 6th of June it is ordered that a commemoration be made of the lord Norbert, first father of the Premonstratensians and archbishop of the church of Magdeburg. And this was carried out with funeral rite every year in all the churches of the Premonstratensians, until in the year 1582, Molanus and Antoine Rhodius of Grasen adding their spurs, and Ambrose Loots, the excellent 28th abbot of Park near Louvain, promoting the work Cfr Miræus, Chronicum Præmonstratense., Gregory XIII granted that his natal day should be celebrated by them with a double, indeed a triple, office with octave Cfr Acta SS. tom. I Junii, p. 810 et seqq.. Hence in the Premonstratensian Breviaries of the years 1598, 1608, and 1621, which we have before us, there comes on the 6th of June the feast of St. Norbert; but nowhere elsewhere that of any other saint of the order.

[4] [Antoine Rhodius, canon of Park, adds spurs so that inquiry may be made into the deeds of the Premonstratensian saints.] The Antoine Rhodius whom I mentioned a little above was a canon of Park, born in the year 1558, professed in the year 1578, ordained presbyter at Pentecost of the year 1584, and shortly afterwards, on the 26th of July, dead. He, young though he was, was wholly occupied in making illustrious the holy men of the Premonstratensian order: as is established from a letter which he addressed in the year 1583 to the abbot of Prémontré, Jean des Pruets, general of the whole order. In which, after he had given thanks in his own name and that of others for the introduction of the ecclesiastical cult of St. Norbert, and had related that he had the Life of St. Norbert prepared for the press and approved by Molanus, he then continues thus: Since it would bring great splendour to our order if the Lives of the other holy men of our order were published, and many by reading them were kindled to a better life, your reverend paternity will certainly render a useful service if you order the individual superiors of the monasteries of our order to bring their treasures forward, so that they may at length be published by someone. For my part, from the time that I consecrated myself to God in the Norbertine order, I began most eagerly to search out the deeds of our fathers, and to note down whatever worthy of memory I found. And whereas previously not one saint came to notice, at length, after St. Norbert, those who shone with miracles came to notice: SS. Evermodus, Isfridus, and Ludolph in Germany; and also St. Joseph of Steinfeld; SS. Frederick and Syard, abbots in the monastery of the Garden of St. Mary, which (alas, tears!) has been changed into secular canons; besides, one abbot of Vicogne, Ralph by name, and in the same house a man famous for his merits, Walter, also abbot; and another, doctor of sacred Theology, Brother Eustace de Lens, who left many records of his erudition: which, although I have not seen them, I understand could usefully be printed. I have learned certain things about other saints also, hoping little by little to know more. If there are memorials of any saints there, we should like to be informed. Certainly the histories of some of the aforesaid saints are so notable that it is unworthy that they should be so unknown, although I have them mutilated. I had also begun to describe the foundations of many monasteries with all the superiors, in which I generally found something notable; but our sagacity cannot advance further than the diligence of the authors has contributed. Wherefore, if your reverend paternity will commend this study, you will have described through all the circaries the foundations, the catalogue of the abbots of each monastery, and whatever else is peculiar there: and also the pastorates of the individual monasteries, with the relics of the saints, if any have particular veneration in some churches; it is unspeakable how much pleasure and usefulness these things, accurately described, will bring to very many. These plans, interrupted by an early death, Jean Lepaige afterwards completed, as we shall say a little below.

[5] Blessed Godfrey is permitted to be venerated. Meanwhile, however, there was added to St. Norbert Blessed Godfrey, formerly count of Cappenberg, founder of three monasteries, and himself a canon: for in the year 1614 the people of Ilbenstadt, whose founder he had been and in whose community he had died, had begged of Pope Paul V the faculty of celebrating his feast Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. I, part. I, col. 869.; which, on account of the octave of the Epiphany concurring on the 13th of January, was thereafter kept on the 16th of January, indulgences being granted by Pope Benedict XIII for this day [Georgius Roggenburgensis, Ephemerides hagiologicæ ordinis Præmonstratensis, p. 19.].

[6] Miræus and Wils praise others, the abbot of Tongerlo meeting the expense. But, although the Premonstratensians were so sparing in venerating their saints, that is no reason why they should not have had many more in this census. Namely, Jean-Baptiste Wils of Antwerp published at Louvain with Jean Masius, under the Green Cross, in the year 1615, and dedicated to his patron Adrian Stalpaerts, abbot of Tongerlo, "Epigrams on men illustrious for holiness of life from the Premonstratensian order, according to those things that have been collected from various authors by the Rev. Dom Aubert Miræus, canon of Antwerp." And indeed Miræus De ordine Præmonstratensi, epist. dedic. p. III. two years before had reckoned among the saints and heaped with due encomiums St. Norbert, founder of the Premonstratensian order, Hugh of Cambrai, blessed Evermodus, bishop of Ratzeburg, blessed Milo of the Morini, blessed Albero of Verdun, blessed Isfrid of Ratzeburg, Blessed Godfrey, count of Cappenberg, likewise the blessed abbots Garembert, Rainer, Gilbert, Ralph, Frederick, Siard, and others, on whom the injury of the times had almost shed darkness. All these Wils celebrated in epigrams, and besides these Gerlach, hermit and guardian of sheep; St. Ludolph, prelate of Ratzeburg and martyr; the divine Hermann; blessed James, novice of Vicogne; St. Roznata, nobleman of Bohemia and martyr; Blessed Walter, around whose bier a copious light shone forth; Blessed Richard, a most celebrated writer; Blessed Arnold of Zwolle, pastor of the monastery of Ninove; Blessed Hayto, from king of Armenia made a Premonstratensian canon; the divine Rabodo, a religious of Park; Blessed Ulric the almoner; Blessed Simon, abbot in the Marian grove; the divine James Lacops and Adrian, martyrs of Gorcum; Blessed Arenistia, sixth superior of the nuns of Herentals; and four others, whom he calls neither divine, nor saints, nor blessed. These things outsiders did, the expense being met by the abbot Adrian Stalpaerts, a great lover of letters.

[7] [The canons of Park and of Ninove publish the Spiritual Tree of the Premonstratensians.] Nor did they wish to rest in other abbeys. Namely, Jean Masius, whom Wichmans Brabantia Mariana, lib. II, cap. IV, pag. 271. calls a man most remote from all fiction and levity in believing, and who in the year 1621 became subprior of Park and in the year 1630 parish priest at Lubbeek, narrates in the manuscript Chronicle of Park that on the 19th of June of the year 1617 he went off to Antwerp, to arrange for some images of the order to be made, among others a Tree of his order, whose prototype he had himself conceived. The following year the image was made by the engraver Charles de Mallery, as is established from the Manual of Abbot Drusius. At about the same time the canons of Ninove wished another Tree to be engraved at their expense by the same engraver; yet so that they changed a few things. Namely, the Ninove Tree springs up out of St. Norbert as from a trunk; whereas in that of Park at the roots stand the chief patrons, St. Mary, St. John the Baptist, and St. Augustine; then in the Ninove one Blessed James of Ninove was substituted for his namesake of Vicogne, and Blessed Louis of Arnstein for Blessed Elizabeth of Herentals. Common to all in both is that they are shown encircled by an aureole, a sign of heavenly glory. But behold the names of the two Trees:

[8] Somewhat later, namely in the year 1633, Jean Le Paige, [Le Paige and Vander Sterre bring out to the light the Lives and Natal Days of the Premonstratensian saints.] a learned and diligent man and syndic of the whole order, brought out the Library of the Premonstratensian order, in which are enclosed not the names of writers (these George Lienhart, abbot of Roggenburg, afterwards collected in the Spiritus literarius Norbertinus), but, after the pattern of the Libraries of Cluny, Cîteaux, Fleury, and others, old writings and other documents which were especially useful to the Premonstratensians. In this work, then, he gave Lives or brief Memorials of more than a hundred Premonstratensians; of whom he called saints Norbert, Garembert, Gilbert, Gerlach, Frederick, the seven martyrs under Saladin, Isfrid, Siard, Ludolph, the English martyrs, and Adrian and James of Gorcum; the rest blessed, and one reverend. Eight years before, namely in the year 1625, Chrysostom Vander Sterre, prior at St. Michael's at Antwerp, whom I shall praise in another place, had brought out the Natal Days of the Saints of the Premonstratensian order; in which he called saints Norbert, Gerlach, Gilbert, and Ludolph; seventy-nine blessed, four of blessed memory, five of holy memory: and what is to be noted, Waltman, the first abbot of St. Michael's, who is only called blessed, is represented on the title page of the book opposite St. Norbert, his head surrounded by rays of heavenly glory, but smaller than those of the founder of the order: by which, however, it may be signified that he already reigns in heaven.

[9] [By the authority of the bishop of Roermond the office is said of Blessed Gerlach; and of many more in Spain by the authority of apostolic and royal judges.] But those who in that census were held among the saints or blesseds, had they been so claimed by the Church that it was permissible to offer the sacrifice of the Mass in their honour and to recite the ecclesiastical office? Henry Cuyck, the most learned bishop of Roermond, believed so, who composed an Office and Mass of Blessed Gerlach, hermit of Valkenburg, who they will have it wore the Premonstratensian habit, and in the year 1604 had them printed at the press of Cologne among the other Offices of Roermond. They believed so

also the Spanish Premonstratensians, altogether separated from the rest of the order (Philip II had brought this about, who tried to pull even our Society apart): for these, namely, had by the year 1620 already enlarged their liturgical calendar with many names and went on enlarging it thereafter. That these things may be the more manifest, I shall set side by side the lists of the saints who were venerated in the years 1620 and 1718 in the Spanish cœnobia of the Premonstratensian institute. The former I have taken from a copy of the Calendar of the special saints of Spain and of the orders, printed at Madrid by Thomas Sunta, royal printer, in the year 1620; the latter from the Order of reciting the divine office and celebrating Masses according to the rite of the Roman Breviary and Missal, revised by the authority of Clement VIII and Urban VIII, with the feasts which are generally celebrated in Spain, for the year of the Lord 1718. Arranged and ordered by Fr. Francisco de Consuegra of the order of St. Jerome, professed in the royal monastery of St. Lawrence (commonly of the Escorial), and master of sacred ceremonies. At Madrid, from the press of the widow of Juan Garcia Infançon, in the year of the Lord 1718. We have two other copies in our museum, one for the year 1641, the other for the year 1647; in which the days of the feasts are somewhat changed in order, but which otherwise agree with the calendar of the year 1718, except that they contain the natal day of St. Dudo, hermit and confessor, who is absent from this last one. And since our predecessors have rather often shaken the authority of these calendars, know that this was done by them because they thought that all these feasts were being celebrated without right. But in the years 1641 and 1646 Antonio Soto Mayor, archbishop of Damascus, who discharged many royal and apostolic offices in Spain, and in the year 1718 Antonio Francisco Ramirez de la Piscina, likewise adorned with many offices, both special and private judges of all those things that pertained to liturgical Offices by virtue of apostolic bulls and royal privileges, judged altogether otherwise; indeed they approved by their authority the Calendars that I have before me. But why do I report these things? Every year for nearly two centuries there came out in one volume, armed with similar authority, calendars of all the dioceses and monasteries of the kingdoms of León and both Castiles: who would call so long-lasting a usage illegitimate? Certainly not Papebroch; who more than once, for example where he treats of Blessed Isfrid, bishop of Ratzeburg Acta SS. tom. II junii, pag. 1090., spurred on the Belgian and French Premonstratensians to venerate the saints of their order, setting before them the example of the far-removed Spaniards. But what was done, not whether it was rightly done, is what we are inquiring into in this place. Let the names of each calendar come forward, then; where are designated C. Confessor; Ep. Bishop; Er. Hermit; A. Abbot; V. Virgin; M. Martyr; D. Double; S. Semidouble; O. Octave.

SPANISH PREMONSTRATENSIAN CALENDAR

[11] [In Belgium there is thought of venerating BB. Frederick, Joseph, Evermodus, Isfrid, etc.] Meanwhile in Belgium too the Premonstratensians seem to have ventured something and to have celebrated the natal days of some men of their order. But it appears that scruples were soon thrown in on account of the decrees of Urban VIII on restraining the new veneration of saints. Certainly in the provincial chapter which the members of the circary of Brabant held from the 11th to the 21st of July of the year 1643, the coadjutor of Tongerlo, Augustine Wichmans, very well known from many writings, proposed this doubt: "Whether on the feasts of the saints of our order who were at one time publicly venerated from of old by the people, as of BB. Frederick, Joseph, Evermodus, Isfrid, etc., at least the Mass of the Trinity may not be read." To which question the members of the chapter answered: Let the Rev. D. Vicar attend to and examine what can be done. The Vicar then was the man I have already named and whom our predecessors were not accustomed to mention without a mark of veneration, John Chrysostom Van der Sterre, most diligent writer of the Natal Days of the Premonstratensian order and other books of this kind. What he accomplished I do not find; but (if one may divine) he wrote to Rome, to seek more certain information from there. And indeed, when in the general chapter which was held in the year 1717 under the presidency of Claude Honoré Lucas, and whose decrees were printed at Paris in the same year Cfr p. 11., in the sixth session, on the 28th of April, the most ample D. of Roth proposed, in the name of the most ample D. abbot of the canonry of Steingaden in Bavaria, 1st, etc., 2nd, etc., 3rd whether it was not permissible to celebrate the feasts of the blesseds of the holy Premonstratensian order, and by what authority this should be done; and the chapter replied that it was permissible to celebrate them, and this according to the letters of the D. procurator general of the Premonstratensian order at the Roman curia; who, having been repeatedly questioned about this, replied that the pontifical bulls brought forward to the contrary did not concern the Premonstratensian order; not that the Premonstratensians were outside the law, but because they had had their own breviary for two hundred years before the bull of Pope St. Pius V; that they were therefore not bound by the Pian decrees and could (as was then the opinion of very many Benedictus XIV, de Canonizatione, t. IV, part. II, cap. 13, num. 6.) according to their ancient liberty add something to their liturgical books and take away. What of the fact that not only those who lawfully used a separate Breviary, but also those who had admitted the corrected Roman Breviary, both bishops and regular superiors, judged it lawful for themselves to approve by their own authority new Offices, which are commonly called Propers, without consulting the holy apostolic see? Very many copies of Propers of this sort are in our Museum. I report these things not as if I wished them to have been done lawfully (for that does not pertain here), but so that it may be understood what was then the opinion of upright and learned men, and on what right that reply rested.

[12] [the office of St. Gilbert is introduced, and then of BB. Godfrey, Frederick, Hermann, Gerlach, Gertrude, and Siard.] Relying on this doctrine, then, the general chapter of the year 1657, in session XIII, decreed that the Office of St. Gilbert was to be inserted in the Breviary [Dion. Albrecht, supprior residentiæ S. Odiliæ, Manuale canonicorum Præmonstratensium, cum facultate superiorum, Argentorati, 1742, p.107, lit. F.]. In the year 1675 the sails were spread more widely. For at the end of the Breviary printed at Paris in that year by the authority of Michel Colbert, superior of the whole order, and of the general chapter, there are, in a continuous series of pages, seven Offices with proper Lessons of the second Nocturn, to be celebrated according to the custom of the provinces in the manner of a greater double, namely of BB. Godfrey, Frederick, Hermann Joseph, Gerlach, Gertrude, Gilbert, and Siard; which Offices, it is indicated in the table of the Breviary published at Antwerp in the same year 1675, could be celebrated with the same rite at will, those seven Offices of the blesseds being added at the end of the Breviary: where it must be noted that the names and Offices of BB. Evermodus, Ludolph, and Isfrid are absent. Nor was the feast of the martyrs of Gorcum, whom Pope Clement X had with solemn rite enrolled in the list of blessed martyrs, celebrated everywhere. For, as is established from the notices prefixed to the Missal of the year 1697, in the year 1686 the general chapter, in session XI, extended to all circaries without exception a decree of a certain provincial chapter on celebrating the feast of the blessed martyrs of Gorcum of the Premonstratensian order, namely Adrian and James, and decreed that this feast should be celebrated every year in the manner of a greater double on the ninth of July, the octave of the Visitation of the Most Blessed Virgin being anticipated on the preceding day.

[13] [The cult of six blesseds is abrogated by Abbot Colbert and the cult of St. Gilbert restricted;] But when on the 19th of October of the year 1691 the Sacred Congregation of Rites had declared, with the approval of Pope Innocent XI, that the Offices of saints to be recited by reason of a body or notable relic must be understood only of saints described in the Roman Martyrology, … but concerning the other saints not described in the aforesaid Martyrology, or to whom this has not been specially granted by the Holy See, they forbade Offices to be recited and Masses to be celebrated, notwithstanding that their bodies or notable relics are preserved in churches; for this reason Michel Colbert, abbot of Prémontré and superior general of the order, forbade that those seven above-mentioned Offices should be recited any longer; granting however that in the Missal of the year 1697, because the feast of St. Gilbert the abbot was celebrated in the whole province of France with solemn cult by all on the 4th of February, on that day his Mass, as it was sung in the said province, should be added in the manner of a double feast according to each one's devotion. How little this agrees, I will not say with the Innocentian decree (for they have disputed over its sense), but with the very command of Colbert, all will understand. And so at the beginning of the Colbertine Breviary, printed in the year 1698, at the end of the general rubrics this notice was added: Hence it is, namely on account of the decree of Pope Innocent, that certain Offices of some blesseds of our order, placed at the end of the last Breviary, to be celebrated according to the custom of the provinces, are now left to be observed not by the whole order, but only by those churches in which devotion to them has flourished from of old and the immemorial custom of celebrating their feasts.

[14] the circary of Brabant takes another way. This ordering did not please everyone, nor did the whole Breviary, which departed too far from the old custom and was published in violation of right; for which reason, since from the 17th of June of the year 1695 it was no longer permitted by the king to import liturgical books into Belgium, and consequently in the year 1698 a new Breviary came out at Antwerp at the press of Muller, by the authority of the abbots of St. Michael's of Antwerp, Park, Heylissem, Averbode, Tongerlo, and Dilighem, the seven Offices of the blesseds were inserted in the body. Colbert took this very gravely; so that, when in the same year he held a visitation of the monastery of Park, he proscribed the Antwerp Breviary under pain of excommunication: which proscription, however, he himself removed before his departure, and with the same hand with which he had inscribed the decree of visitation in the book he deleted it. In order, however, that the Brabantines might gratify the abbot of Prémontré to some extent, they published in the year 1700, at the press of the same Muller, a huge supplement, taken partly from the Paris edition of 1698, partly from that of Antwerp, because, as the editor says in the Preface, these Breviaries differ from each other in many things, and this supplement seemed likely to be useful to those who lacked one or the other edition, or both. But what pertains even more closely to us, the same editor in his General Observations on the divine office: The Offices, he says, of the saints of our order must be celebrated like the rest in the body of the Breviary and not at will; as was concluded and ordered among the most ample lords prelates of this circary, assembled at Brussels on the 11th of November 1699. Nor does the decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, approved by Innocent XI, seem to stand in the way, as some have thought: since it speaks only of saints whose Offices and Masses are celebrated precisely because their bodies or notable relics are preserved in churches: not of those toward whom devotion has flourished from of old and the custom of celebrating their feasts. This observation is read at the front of the same Supplement, reprinted at Brussels in the year 1720. Nevertheless in the Supplement of the Missal, in the year 1718 at Louvain

printed, under the title of Masses of the new saints there come BB. Godfrey and Gerlach, having only a proper collect; Blessed Gilbert, a collect, secret, and postcommunion; Blessed Joseph Hermann, the whole Mass. BB. Frederick, Gertrude, and Siard are omitted.

[15] [in France too there is a departure from the Colbertine ordering. The canons of Étival and Hohenburg obtain from the Holy See the faculty of celebrating the feasts of BB. Evermodus, Isfrid, and Ludolph; and they think of Blessed Louis of Arnstein:] Meanwhile in France itself the Colbertine liturgy was given notice of dismissal, and so in the year 1709, by the authority of Claude Honoré Lucas, superior general of the order, there came out a Premonstratensian Breviary restored to its original integrity; and again at Verdun in the year 1725 by the authority of the general chapter; and it contains, inserted in the body, the seven Offices of the blesseds. But the canons of Étival in Lorraine did not wish to stop there: for they approached the apostolic see, asking that it might be permitted to them and to the canons of Hohenburg to celebrate every year the feast of BB. Evermodus, Isfrid, and Ludolph, bishops of Ratzeburg; indeed they also gave thought to Blessed Louis of Arnstein, as will appear below. We… of Étival, says Hugo, himself abbot of Étival Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. II, col. 601., … celebrate the feasts of SS. Evermodus and Isfrid, and also St. Ludolph … in our church of Étival and in its filial church of Hohenburg, commonly St. Odile, by the concession of our Most Holy Lord Pope Benedict XIII, of the 18th of October 1725. Here we subjoin for you the decree of this concession; which the Rev. Fr. Norbert Mattens (a religious of Tongerlo, president of the Roman college of the Premonstratensian order in the years 1726, 1727, and 1728 Heylen, Historische verhandeling over de Kempen, pag. 203 et seqq, edit. 1837.), procurator general and abbot of St. Andrew's, afterwards obtained to be extended to the whole order: "Our Most Holy Lord Pope Benedict XIII has benignly allowed and granted that in the monastery of Étival and in its filial church of Hohenburg, by the Premonstratensian canons dwelling there, the office with the above-written Lessons of the second Nocturn (the proper Lessons of the second Nocturn, as is the custom, had been set before the decree) of St. Evermodus on his feast may henceforth be recited and the Mass respectively celebrated. The 18th of October, 1725. (Thus signed:) Cardinal Paulucci, president. (And below:) H. M. Tedeschi, archbishop of Apamea, secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites." For the feasts of SS. Isfrid and Ludolph the decrees are altogether the same, only the proper names of the saints being changed.

[16] in the year 1728 that faculty is made common to the whole order. In the year 1728 this licence was made common to the whole order; as is explained in the following diploma: Pope Benedict XIII, for the future memory of the matter. There has lately issued, at the supplication of our beloved son Norbert Mattens, procurator general of the canons regular of the Premonstratensian order, from the Congregation of our venerable brothers the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church set over the sacred rites, a decree of the following tenor, namely: "At the most humble prayers of D. Norbert Mattens, procurator general of the Premonstratensian order, presented to the Sacred Congregation of Rites for the extension of the Offices of the saints Evermodus and Isfrid, bishops, and Ludolph, bishop and martyr, of the same order, to his whole order; and these having been reported; the same Sacred Congregation of Rites, adhering to the concession made on the 18th of October 1725 by our Most Holy Lord BENEDICT XIII to the monastery of Étival and to its filial church of Hohenburg, has benignly allowed and granted that the Offices of the aforesaid saints with proper Lessons of the second Nocturn may henceforth be recited in the whole aforesaid order. The 20th of March 1728. N. Cardinal Coscia. N. M. Tedeschi, archbishop of Apamea, secretary of the Congregation of Sacred Rites. Place † of the seal." But since, as the said Norbert, procurator general, has lately caused to be set before us, he greatly desires that such a decree, that it may stand the more firmly, should be fortified by the protection of our apostolic confirmation, We, wishing to favour the said Norbert, procurator general, with special favours and graces, and by the tenor of these presents absolving him and deeming him absolved from any sentences of excommunication and interdict and other ecclesiastical sentences, censures, and penalties imposed by law or by man, on whatever occasion or cause (if he be in any way bound by them), solely for the purpose of obtaining the effect of these presents, inclined to the supplications humbly presented in his name on this matter, by apostolic authority, by the tenor of these presents, approve and confirm the decree above inserted, and add to it the strength of inviolable apostolic firmness; saving however always in the foregoing the authority of the said Congregation of Cardinals; decreeing that these same present letters are and shall be firm, valid, and efficacious, and shall obtain and have their full and entire effects, and shall most fully avail those whom they concern and shall in time in any way concern, in all things and through all things; and that so in the foregoing it must be judged and defined by any judges ordinary and delegate, even auditors of causes of the Apostolic Palace, and that whatever may happen to be attempted to the contrary on these matters by anyone by whatever authority, knowingly or ignorantly, is void and empty, notwithstanding apostolic constitutions and ordinances and all other things to the contrary. Given at Rome at St. Peter's under the Fisherman's Ring, on the 12th of April 1728, in the fourth year of our pontificate. F. Card. OLIVIERI. This decree Claude Honoré Lucas, abbot of Prémontré and head of the order, ordered on the 23rd of July of the following year to be published together with the new Offices.

[17] [Benedict XIII grants to the whole order the faculty of celebrating the feasts of the seven blesseds;] There were therefore then celebrated by the Premonstratensians, besides St. Norbert and the two martyrs of Gorcum, ten blesseds, three by apostolic authority, seven by their own authority. And so that these things might not be overturned anew, as had been done by Abbot Colbert, it was thought good to approach the Holy See, which the Premonstratensians had just experienced as so benign. Hear next the other decree of Pope Benedict XIII: Pope Benedict XIII, for the future memory of the matter. There has lately issued from the Congregation of our venerable brothers the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church set over the sacred rites, at the supplication of our beloved son Norbert Mattens, procurator general of the order of Premonstratensian canons regular, a decree of the following tenor, namely: "Since on the part of Father Norbert Mattens, procurator general of the order of Premonstratensian canons regular, for the continuation henceforth of reciting in his whole order the Offices of the saints or blesseds of the same order, namely of Blessed Godfrey confessor, St. Gilbert abbot, Blessed Frederick abbot, Blessed Hermann Joseph confessor, St. Gerlach hermit and confessor, Blessed Gertrude virgin, and St. Siard confessor, which for a long time have been found inserted, as is asserted, in the common and ancient Breviary of the said order, and also for the healing of all and each of the defects perhaps incurred in the aforesaid insertion, a most humble supplication has been made to our Most Holy Lord Pope Benedict XIII, His Holiness, notwithstanding any constitutions, ordinances, and decrees in any way disposing to the contrary, has benignly assented to the petitioner's requests as asked. The 22nd of January 1728. N. Cardinal Coscia. N. M. Tedeschi, archbishop of Apamea, secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites. Place † of the seal."

[18] which he confirms by a public decree. But since, as the said Norbert has since caused to be set before us, he greatly desires that such a decree, that it may stand the more firmly, should be fortified by the protection of our apostolic confirmation: We, wishing to do a special grace to the said Norbert, and by the tenor of these presents absolving him and deeming him absolved from any sentences of excommunication, suspension, and interdict and other ecclesiastical sentences, censures, and penalties imposed by law or by man, on whatever occasion or cause, if he be in any way bound by them, solely for the purpose of obtaining the effect of these presents, inclined to the supplications humbly presented to Us in his name on this matter, by apostolic authority, by the tenor of these presents, approve and confirm the decree above inserted, and add to it the strength of inviolable apostolic firmness: saving however always in the foregoing the authority of the aforesaid Congregation of Cardinals. Decreeing that these same present letters are and shall always be firm, valid, and efficacious, and shall obtain and have their full and entire effects, and shall most fully avail those whom they concern and shall in time concern; and that so in the foregoing it must be judged and defined by any judges ordinary and delegate, even auditors of causes of the Apostolic Palace, and that whatever may happen to be attempted to the contrary on these matters by anyone by whatever authority, knowingly or ignorantly, is void and empty. Notwithstanding apostolic constitutions and ordinances and all other things to the contrary. Given at Rome at St. Peter's under the Fisherman's Ring, on the 8th of March 1728. In the fourth year of our pontificate. (And there was signed beneath:) "F. Card. Olivieri." At Rome, at the press of the Rev. Apostolic Camera, 1728.

[19] There was, however, no particular confirmation of cult: Where it must be well considered that no judgment took place concerning the antiquity of the cult, nor was the form used which is customarily observed in approving immemorial cult; but that by the former decree it was granted that the Office of SS. Evermodus, Isfrid, and Ludolph could be recited, and by the latter that the same honour could be continued as a favour to the seven other blesseds, whose Offices for a long time (namely from the year 1675) were found inserted (as is asserted) in the common and ancient (namely the first Colbertine) Breviary of the said order. The same Benedict XIII gave similar leave to the Cistercians, as will appear in the Commentary on St. Bernard of Calvo, published in this very volume at the following day; and that this has also been done at times by other pontiffs Pope Benedict XIV shows at length De Canonizatione SS., lib. IV, part. II, cap. V, per totum.. But it must be considered in the second place that divine Offices granted by the authority of the Roman pontiff suffice for the case excepted from the Urbanian decrees, and so have some character of equivalent beatification Ibid., lib. II, cap. XX, num. 13.. In the third place it must be considered that generally, when, the process of approving immemorial cult being omitted, leave is asked for reciting the Office in honour of blesseds who have not hitherto had so great a celebrity, this way has almost always been taken, not because it was manifest that they had been venerated a hundred years before the decrees of Pope Urban VIII, but because there applied to them another exception, also established by Pope Urban and which is said to be by way of the writings of the fathers and holy men Ibid., lib. II, cap. XIX, per totum.: for which to exist, it is necessary, says Cardinal Casanate Ibid., cap. XIX, num. 10 ex mss. card. Casanate., that the fathers should have mentioned the servant of God as a man marked with a special note and glory of sanctity, recounting the heroic virtues of the servant of God and (what is rather the point) his departure in peace, or in the grace of final perseverance; it is by no means necessary, however, that Fathers such as SS. Athanasius, Augustine, Basil, the Gregories, Jerome, John Chrysostom, and Leo should proclaim the servants of God for their virtues; but, as was admitted in the cause of Blessed Agnes of Montepulciano, with the approval of Benedict XIII, testimonies of much lesser authority suffice, such as those of St. Catherine of Siena and St. Antoninus Ibid., num. 5.. And indeed, at the persuasion of Baronius, many things admitted into the Roman Martyrology

are names, not because they had previously been inserted in the sacred diptychs or were celebrated with an annual feast or other sacred rites, but because, as Benedict XIV says Ibid., lib. IV, part. II, cap. XVII, num. 5., a praiseworthy commemoration of them was made by the Fathers, and notably by St. Gregory in the Dialogues. Moreover, if we wish to be fair, we must concede that the documents on which rests the estimation of the holiness of those blesseds whom Clement XI allowed to be publicly honoured by the Cistercians and Benedict XIII by the Premonstratensians, without any process being instituted, are of as much historical authority as the books of St. Catherine of Siena, of St. Antoninus of Florence, the Lives of the Fathers, the Dialogues of St. Gregory the Great, and others like them.

[20] how far the faculty granted extends and what it signifies: Fourthly, finally, these words of both decrees must be considered: Saving however always in the foregoing the authority of the said Congregation of Cardinals. For, as Benedict XIV notes when treating of the cases excepted from the Urbanian decrees Ibid., lib. II, cap. XVII, num. 2., to briefs of this kind … there is always added the clause: "Saving however etc." in order to show that by a new confirmation in the form of a brief nothing has been added pertaining to the substance of the matter; which therefore can always, when new circumstances arise, be recalled by the same Sacred Congregation to a new examination; but that only an external solemnity has been added. And elsewhere, discoursing on the authority of beatifications which are commonly called equivalent: This reservation, he says Ibid., lib. I, cap. XLII, num. 10., of the authority of the Congregation of Sacred Rites seems to show that the same pontiffs in truth recognized that a judgment permitting cult is neither infallible nor pertaining to the faith; since they leave the Sacred Congregation free, the approval by indulgence and permission being no obstacle, to depart from it, should new foundations come forward. In a word, the judgment that takes place in equivalent beatification rests on fame, rests on antiquity, rests for the most part on foundations or indults of cult, made indeed not without great reason, yet the cause not having been judicially tried in law; moreover it is not commanding, but permitting; not final, but as it were conducive to the end. Which words have much greater force when no process has been made by which a case excepted from the Urbanian decrees might be demonstrated. But we must return to Belgium.

[21] what meanwhile was done in the circary of Brabant. That the Brabantine abbots were altogether unwilling to yield to the Colbertine commands I have said above; what they afterwards did, when Claude Honoré Lucas, set at the helm of the whole order, ordered the Colbertine novelties to be dismissed and publicly put forward the pontifical decrees on the Offices of the ten blesseds, may be learned from the printer's notice to the candid reader which is at the head of the book entitled: Offices of the saints or blesseds of the sacred and canonical Premonstratensian order, new and old; likewise three Offices from the newest Breviaries of the order; likewise proper Offices of the circary of Brabant; published with the permission of superiors at Antwerp by Hieronymus Verdussen, 1730. Here is that notice: The printer to the candid reader. From the preamble to the Directories for the years 1727 and 1728 you have seen, kind reader, that the Supplements of the Premonstratensian Breviary which from the year 1700 up to then had been in hand, with their new Offices and new rubrics brought by them into the circary of Brabant, were abrogated, and that the Premonstratensian Breviary was purely and simply restored to its integrity as regards Offices and all rubrics, and was to be observed in the circary of Brabant; and so also, the Breviary being rejected which bears the title of the Most Reverend Lord Michel Colbert, general, of the year 1698, that the Breviary of the present general of the order, the Most Reverend Lord Claude Honoré Lucas, published in the year 1709, was to be retained and followed, which not only conforms to all the ancient Breviaries of the order, but also was reprinted in the year 1725 with the authority of the general chapter held in the year 1717: but because it is inconvenient for you, indeed almost impossible, to carry that great Breviary around on a journey, or perhaps even when turning aside to the neighbouring non-Catholic parts, you have greatly wished that the new Offices inserted in the said Breviary, of SS. Clotilde, Claude, and Leopold, and likewise the three new Offices of SS. Evermodus, Ludolph, and Isfrid, which by mandate of the Most Reverend Lord General, with the assent of the Supreme Pontiff Benedict XIII, came out some months ago, and which are necessary for all for the due reading of the canonical hours, you have wished, I say, that I would be willing to publish the aforesaid Offices in smaller format; and not only this, but you have further desired that for the same reasons mentioned above I would be willing to communicate in print in smaller format also the Office of the Conversion of the Holy Father Augustine, of BB. Adrian and James and their companions, the martyrs of Gorcum, and similarly the Offices of other saints or blesseds of the Premonstratensian order, namely Godfrey, Gilbert, Frederick, Hermann Joseph, Gerlach, Gertrude, and Siard, attending to the fact that His Holiness Benedict XIII has very recently deigned to extend the cult of the aforesaid saints or blesseds and the reading of their Offices to the whole Premonstratensian order. But since from of old the circary of Brabant, piously affected toward the Blessed Virgin Mary, patroness of the order, has specially observed and still observes her four feasts, namely of the Espousals, the Seven Sorrows, the Rosary, and the Patronage; and besides these also the Feast of the Triumph of St. Norbert over the heresy of Tanchelin, hence it is that I have here also joined in the same format to those former Offices the said five Offices, even though they are not altogether of equal obligation with the former; and so you have here also whatever in the above-mentioned bulky supplements has not been abrogated, so that nothing further can be desired for the due and at the same time convenient discharge of the canonical office. Note, moreover, that all the feasts whose Offices you have printed here are inserted in their respective places in the Directory of hours for the use of the circary of Brabant.

[22] The fortunes of the Premonstratensian Breviary in the eighteenth century. By a fixed law, then, those ten names of the blesseds were inscribed in the Premonstratensian calendar; yet a fixed place did not remain for each one. Into the liturgical books some changes were indeed introduced by the abbot of Prémontré and general of the order, Claude Honoré Lucas, but not very serious ones, by which the old rites might be disturbed: as I gather from the Missal which he ordered to be printed in the year 1735, and from the Breviary which was published by the authority of the general chapter of the year 1741, and which then at Brussels, by order of the vicars general through the circaries both of Brabant and Frisia and of Flanders and Floreffe, came out in the year 1768 and is still used by the Belgian Premonstratensians. For, as is clear from the letters prefixed to that Missal, many (if I am not mistaken, Frenchmen), and even nearly all the circaries at that time were already asking with ardent desires that the new edition of the Premonstratensian Breviary should be conformed to the arrangement of the modern Breviaries; but the most prudent Lucas, who had seen with his own eyes how great a stain had been inserted into the unity of the order by the new rites introduced by Colbert, had not allowed changes except for a few and without notable alteration. But when Jean-Baptiste L'Écuy received the abbatial crosier of Prémontré, quite another way was tried, the national chapters of the years 1779 and 1782 consenting; and the business was entrusted to Remacle Lissoir, abbot of Laval-Dieu, commended for his skill in liturgical matters Cfr Literæ L'Écuy ante partem vernam., but a man of little stability of mind, since a little later he published a French epitome of the books of Febronius, and adhered to the French schism to the extent of binding himself by oath to the civil constitution of the clergy, allowing himself to be intruded into the parish of Sedan, and taking part in the conciliabulum of Paris of the year 1796 [Bouillot, Biographie ardennaise, t. II, p. 106, ap. D. Guéranger, Institutions liturgiques, 1841, t. II, p. 382.]. Nevertheless, to use the words of Jean-Baptiste L'Écuy in his preliminary letter, it is not right for us to pass over a certain distinguished man, a prelate of the Roman curia, enrolled in the Congregation of Rites and most devoted to the Premonstratensian order, the most illustrious lord count Castracane, who read through the calendar and rubrics attentively and revised them with a censor's hand; so that at that time the new Gallican rites do not seem to have strongly displeased the members of the Sacred Congregation of Rites. And this also must be conceded, that this new Breviary, arranged chiefly after the model of the Breviary of SS. Vitonus and Hidulphus, does not lack praise, whether you look for piety joined with learning, or symmetry with variety. But it was perfectly clear to those who were promoting this mass that the foreign circaries would never consent to this overturning of all customs; wherefore they had carried this business through in national chapters: by which most imprudent ventures they achieved this, that thereafter in the general chapter nothing further could be treated or defined concerning liturgical matters (about which something had previously almost always been asked); that the French circaries formed a separate body; and that the foreign houses had thereafter each to provide for itself: by which every bond of the order was loosed.

[23] The Calendars of C. H. Lucas and J. B. L'Écuy, generals of the order. But the part of each calendar must be given that pertains to our subject. A. Abbot; C. Confessor; D. Double; D. Ma. Greater double; D. Mi. Lesser double; Ep. Bishop; Er. Hermit; J. Just; M. Martyr; S. Ma. Greater solemn; S. Mi. Lesser solemn; P. Presbyter; Tr. Triple; V. Virgin.

FROM THE CALENDARS

JANUARY.

FEBRUARY.

MARCH.

APRIL.

MAY.

JUNE.

JULY.

AUGUST.

OCTOBER.

NOVEMBER.

[24] [The change of the feast of St. Gilbert; the latest approval of the cult of Blessed Bronislava.] Why the natal day of St. Gilbert was assigned to the 4th of February has been said above in num. 13. The church of Clermont used to celebrate it on the 6th of June, on which the blessed man departed from among the living and at which day our predecessors spoke of him in our Work. Saussay and Christopher Vander Sterre had praised him at the 3rd of October. The monastery of Neuffontaines in the territory of Clermont, on the other hand, where the blessed man had been first abbot, kept his feast on the 24th of October, on which his body was found in the year 1615 and most honourably translated. To remove these variations, the general chapter of the year 1738 decreed in session VIII that the Office of St. Gilbert should be transferred and celebrated henceforth on the 24th of October, on which his sacred remains were elevated: which law the Belgian, German, and Hungarian Premonstratensians still keep; L'Écuy, on the other hand, and the authors of the new Breviary paid no attention to it at all. — To all those heavenly ones, recognized by the apostolic see, there was added in the year 1839 Blessed Bronislava, who on the 29th of August of the year 1259 found perpetual rest in the Cracow convent of the Premonstratensian order, and whose immemorial cult the Sacred Congregation of Rites approved and confirmed in that year, permitting her feast to be kept in the diocese of Cracow and there by the Premonstratensian nuns with a Mass and proper Lessons of the second Nocturn: but other Premonstratensians have not yet asked that this grace be common to them. And this is the origin and growth of the liturgical cult of the saints and blesseds of the Premonstratensian order; which I have collected partly from our own stock

of liturgical books, but chiefly from records which were communicated to me by the venerable J. M. Dillen, librarian of Park and a most diligent investigator of Premonstratensian matters.

* Ludolphi

§ I. That immediately after his death Blessed Louis was reckoned among the heavenly ones.

Blessed Louis is to be reckoned among the Premonstratensian blesseds, From what we have recounted so far, the reader will easily understand in what great difficulties the question is entangled whether those distinguished men who before all memory of men have been called saints or blesseds by the Premonstratensians, but who lack liturgical cult (for this differs from ecclesiastical cult, which extends much more widely), can be judged by us, who are ordered to be diligent and accurate in this matter, equivalently beatified and be called saints or blesseds. It seemed to Papebroch that the answer should be affirmative; otherwise to those who came after him, so that they refused to give a place in our Acts even to those who were venerated by the Spaniards, unless the apostolic see had confirmed their cult. For my part I should think that Papebroch came nearer to the mind of the Roman pontiffs, as far as this can be gathered from the decrees of Clement XI, Benedict XIII, and others; and consequently that all the more ancient and more celebrated can lawfully be called blessed; among whom surely Louis of Arnstein comes. But so that the reader himself may be able to judge whether Count Louis has long since been placed by the judgment of the centuries in the list of saints and blesseds, I shall report in this paragraph what seems to have force on either side.

[26] because his Life was written as that of a holy man, It must be considered first of all that his Life, no differently than that of a holy man, was written down shortly after his death. In the prologue the author professes that he will set out, if not in golden, yet in dark letters, the parents, birth, progress in holy profession, and happy passing in Christ of Count Ludewic, a man virtuous in all things. And where he describes his death: Wholly burning, he says, with desire for heavenly things, bidding farewell to all, on the eighth before the Kalends of November, the angels rejoicing, he sent over to Christ his soul full of happy merits. Read what he then narrates about his burial, so splendid indeed and solemn that those of most saints were not so magnificent. The epilogue also is to be noted: Receive now, reader, says the biographer, this brief and simple page, unequal to the virtues of so great a man… Grant, brothers and lords, grant, I beg, pardon; and watchfully observe what you owe to such great ashes. Do not, I pray, hold the desirable land as nothing, lest, whence you are to receive grace and merit, thence you be bound to bring back penalties and punishments… Let us not, then, be ungrateful for so great a benefit, that his prayer may be a patronage to us. Finally, in the epitaph the venerable man is called a spring rose, which under the wings of the seraphim is full of the majesty of God. But that the Life of Blessed Louis was written in entirely the manner of the others inserted in legendaries or choir books is a thing so manifest that it did not escape the most sagacious Helfrich Bernhard Wenck, a Protestant by profession and historian of the house of Hesse: Louis, he says Katzcnelenbogische Geschichte, pag. 224., died with a great reputation for piety. This, together with the customary veneration of monasteries toward their founders, was the cause that at the beginning of the thirteenth century a religious of Arnstein wrote the Life of the saint: Dieses, und die gewönhliche Ehrfurcht der Klöster gegen ihre Stifter, erweckte im Anfang des dreizehnten Jahrhunderts einen Mönch des nemlichen Klösters, das Leben des Heiligen zu schreiben. No wonder, then, if in another codex of the British Museum it is joined to Lives of saints. Since Gamans seems to have used this, he wrote that he would publish this Life as he had found it in a very ancient manuscript after the Lives of the saints.

[27] although according to German custom this appellation is omitted in the title; In very truth the appellation of blessed is not given to the venerable man in the title of the work: for in that principal codex of Gamans these words were set first: Here begins the prologue of the deeds of Count Louis, our founder. In another copy Blanpin and Kremer found this beginning: Here begins the Little Work or Life of Louis, formerly count in Arnstein and our founder. Prologue… Life of the aforesaid Count Louis in Arnstein… At the end: Epitaph of Louis, count and founder in Arnstein. In the codex which Brower used, however, this was the title: Here begins the Little Work of the deeds of Count Lodewic, founder; and the end: Here ends the little work of the deeds of Count Ludewic, our founder. Finally, the inscription of the manuscript book which Böhmer used was this: Here begins the little work of the deeds of Count Lodewic, our founder. To which add that in a German version of the fifteenth century (as is established for me from a letter of the most illustrious bishop of Limburg) the title of saint is absent, and similarly in the Lives of the saints and of men notable for holiness of the Premonstratensian order, which Antoni Józef Daniel Kraszewski, abbot of Witów, published in Polish at Warsaw in folio in the year 1753 [Zycie SS. y w nadziei zesslych Slug Boskich Zakonu Premonstratenskiego, Pazdziernik, pag. 178 et seqq.]. But it must be noted that in the regions of Germany the praise of sanctity was usually ascribed by the old copyists only to more ancient saints or those solemnly canonized by the Holy See; while to others, although they were plainly held in the number of the saints, this praise was by no means given; indeed in some codices one reads the Life of Oudalricus, etc., although shortly after his death he was placed among the saints by the Roman pontiff by lawful decree. But why do I linger on these things? Run through Pertz's Monumenta Germaniæ, in which the old codices are accurately reproduced: you will find there many Lives of saints of the tenth century and following; rarely will you find them called saints or blesseds.

[28] [but when it was published in the eighteenth century and after, the blessed man was honoured with this appellation.] But since in the seventeenth century customs were altogether different, it was natural that Brower in his Sidera, as he there called St. Meinwerk, bishop of Paderborn, and St. Eigil, fourth abbot of Fulda, of blessed memory and saints (although in the old copies of their Lives these appellations were absent), so also should adorn the venerable Count Louis with the same praises. In the index of what is contained in those Sidera, therefore, he called those three b. m. or of blessed memory; similarly in the separate title of the Life of Blessed Louis, although in a similar place he had called Meinwerk and Eigil plainly, every praise of sanctity being omitted, he wrote the Life and conversion of Count Ludewic B. M.; finally, as in the top margin he wrote S. Meinwerk and S. Eigil, so also S. Count Ludewic of Arnstein. He therefore held all three in the same order and condition; and since at that time the cult of SS. Meinwerk and Eigil was certain, that manner of writing of Brower, a most learned, prudent, and holy man, doubtless favours Blessed Louis in the greatest degree. Not otherwise Jean Lepaige, who in the Library of the Premonstratensian order inscribed as a title to the acts of Blessed Louis: The Life of blessed Ludewic, count of Arnstein, founder of the abbey of Arnstein, of the Premonstratensian order, of the diocese of Trier, and in it a brother (as they call it) convert; and also of blessed Guda, most illustrious wife of blessed Ludewic, in it a nun, and of blessed Godfrey, first abbot of the same cœnobium of Arnstein, drawn out and brought forward from the manuscript codices of the same monastery and order, and from the Sidera of illustrious and holy men of the Rev. Fr. Brower, presbyter of the Society of Jesus; nor was Le Paige content to call Blessed Louis blessed in the title of the Life, but everywhere in the margin he adorned him with the same praise; indeed he also changed the text of the Life in many places so as to call the venerable man blessed Louis. Our Gamans, moreover, who toiled greatly in digging out the deeds of the saints, and who skilfully devoted his labour to elucidating the Life of Blessed Louis, everywhere in his writings called him Blessed Louis; and similarly those of Arnstein who wrote letters to him about their founder always call him blessed Louis. And he had prepared this title for the Life: The conversion and foundation of the blessed Louis the generous and Guda, counts, spouses, converts, and founders of the notable canonical church of the Premonstratensian order at Arenstein, as I found it in a very ancient manuscript after the Lives of the saints, by a certain son of his, his contemporary and of his own age in conversion, or at least converted not long after, who, after the example of his blessed father, wished in humility to remain hidden and to suppress his name: receive this word for word, as follows.

[29] [His Life is prepared so that leave may be obtained to recite an office in his honour.] Charles Louis Hugo, by whom, as I have said, the Life of the blessed count was also published, called it both in the title of the whole book and at the head of the little work itself Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, t. II, p. 34. the Life of blessed Louis, count of Arnstein. Similarly in the Annals of the Premonstratensian order Annales, t. I, p. 202 et seqq. he seven times called the venerable man blessed Louis. But much more to be considered is what is said in the preface about the Life of Blessed Louis by Hugo: The Life, says the editor, of blessed Louis, count of Arnstein, formerly published thinly by our Le Paige * in the Premonstratensian Library, and faulty with blemishes and gaps, we have restored from the autograph, and we publish it furnished with notes, such as Fr. Blanpin had prepared, at the instance of the Most Reverend Lord Norbert Mattens, abbot of Sint-Andries and procurator general of our whole order at the Roman curia, to be offered to Benedict XIII of holy memory, supreme pontiff, so that, the documents being inspected, he might proceed the more safely to the enrolment of the count in the number of the blesseds. From this it is clear that about the beginning of the eighteenth century serious thought was given to obtaining the honours of the heavenly ones for Blessed Louis from apostolic authority: which could be done, as we said above, either by the concession of an office, or by the confirmation of immemorial cult, or by the ordinary process of beatification. But the canons of Étival would doubtless have striven to join the name of Blessed Louis with those of BB. Evermodus, Isfrid, and Ludolph, and, as in their praise, so also in his honour to obtain the power of reciting an office; which way was the shortest of all and at that time, as we have seen, most certainly in use, even if there did not exist at times other indications of cult than that their venerable memory had been religiously propagated to this day through their Lives, written long since. Nevertheless the Life prepared by Blanpin was never sent to Rome, nor did Mattens bring his plans to a conclusion; perhaps because he was quite soon recalled to Belgium.

[30] The most ancient testimonies of veneration. Whatever way they had taken, however, the outcome would not have disappointed hope, since not from the Life only, but also from other records it could be shown that he had always, and much more than a hundred years before the decrees of Pope Urban VIII, been publicly held to reign in heaven. For in the diploma of Gummersheim of the year 1263, which I shall recite in full below, the blessed man is called Count Louis of holy memory; and in the Necrology of the abbey of Arnstein, in which none are written after the year 1426, there are read at the 28th (25th?) day

of October the following Ap. Kremer, Origines Nassavicæ, t. II, p. 411.: In the year of grace 1185 the venerable Lodowic of blessed memory, count and convert, founder of this church in Arnstein, and also of the churches namely of the monastery of Beselich, Enckenbach, and the Valley of St. Mary, happily passed to Christ: where note that no one else there is said to be of blessed memory, venerable, or to have happily passed to Christ. Similarly in the Chronicle of Arnstein, which the canon Luwand began before the death of Blessed Louis, where he comes to the year 1185: Count Ludewic, he says Ap. Bohmer, Fontes rerum Germanicarum, t. III, p. LI., and convert, founder of this church and of others of nuns, happily died; whereas, the word happily being omitted, he writes under the year 1080: Eustace, second abbot, died; and under the year 1196: Abbot Richolf died. Similarly in a diploma of the year 1235 Gudenus, Codex diplomaticus, t. II, p. 69. Count Ludewic of happy memory is read.

[31] [The name of Blessed Louis is inscribed in the sacred fasti of the Premonstratensian order and of Cologne.] The way was therefore paved so that, when the Premonstratensians began to inscribe their blesseds on fixed days, a place should be made for the name of Blessed Louis. Moreover, in the menology or Natal Days of the Saints of the most white Premonstratensian order, which John Baptist Van der Sterre, the already praised prior of the abbey of St. Michael, published in the year 1625, one reads at this day: In the cœnobium of Gummerscheym the natal day of Blessed Count Ludwic, convert of the Premonstratensian order and founder of the cœnobium of Arnstein, situated beside the Lahn in the Westerwald. Who, having set the pomps of the world behind the ignominy of the cross of Christ, when he had passed many years in the regular life with notable piety, wholly burning with desire for heavenly things, bidding farewell to all, the angels rejoicing, sent over to Christ his soul full of happy merits. Not otherwise George Lienhart, abbot of Roggenburg in Swabia, who in the year 1764 by capitular decree of the Circary of Swabia brought out the Hagiological Ephemerides of the Premonstratensian order, at the 25th of October pursued the venerable Louis in these words: In the monastery of Arnstein the natal day of Blessed Ludewic, count of Arnstein. To Blessed Otto the deacon, very rich in estates, descended from the noble and generous stock of the Saxons, his near kinsman in blood as in sanctity, Blessed Ludewic ascribes his conversion, and our order gratefully ascribes a new shoot. The principal deeds of Blessed Louis are then related in compendium; namely: Provoked by the example of this man, who for love of Jesus Christ was giving up wide estates and most ample resources and founding the monastery called Gratia Dei, and persuaded by his most powerful exhortations, with generous daring he too consecrates himself to God by the religious life, and his fortress to divine worship. Mindful of the promise made by the Saviour, that he who leaves a wife for his name's sake will receive a hundredfold, he said farewell to his beloved spouse Guda, and hail to religion. That naked he might follow the naked Christ, he cast off the riches of the world and the smoky titles and honours of his ancestors. Having renounced all things and denied himself, out of the highest and truly astonishing humility he chose to be abject in the house of his God, being made a humble convert. In which state, continually intent on reading, prayer, and the contemplation of divine things, on alms and other works of charity, mercy, and compassion toward the poor and widows (to whom he often secretly gave food, and let clothing down from his shoulders as if by stealth), he passed many years. But when, with leave of the abbot, according to his custom, he had carefully visited the churches founded by him, and had come to the cœnobium of virgins of Gummersheim, he fell into a fever. As the disease grew worse and the strength of his body failed, duly fortified in good time with all the sacraments of the dying, wholly burning with desire for heavenly things, bidding farewell to all, the angels rejoicing, he sent over to Christ on this day his soul full of happy merits. Indeed in the Cologne fasti of Gelenius, which in the year 1645 came out in public with the other praises or Greatness of Cologne, at the present day these words come De Coloniæ magnitudine, p. 734.: Of Blessed Lodvic, canon of the Premonstratensian order, of the counts of Arnstein, whose mother was burgravine or castle countess of Odenkirchen, a ministerial of the archbishops of Cologne.

[32] Images of Blessed Louis; whose cult, however, was very sparing at Arnstein, Nor for many centuries has anything been more firm in the Premonstratensian order than to reckon the founder of Arnstein among the blesseds: for which reason his image also appears in the Ninove tree, which I explained before in n. 7, and where he is called blessed and has his head surrounded by glorious rays. On the other hand (for I would hide nothing), in the images of Blessed Louis and his wife Guda which are inserted in the second Idstein codex, the rays and aureole are absent from the heads (as the Illustrious Bishop of Limburg had written back to me). Nevertheless there are also some other things which seem to incline altogether to the other side: namely, when Gamans at the beginning of the year 1672 had written a letter to the abbot of Arnstein, in which among many other things he inquired about the tomb of Blessed Louis, who he knew from the Life had been buried before the altar of St. Nicholas, and about images and other things of that kind, William Priester, professed at Arnstein, replied in the name of his abbot: Carved in stone there appears writing of this kind: In the year of the Lord 1359, at Walburga's day, the lord Abbot William began to rebuild the church. May his soul rest in peace. Amen… William of Staffel, the abbot named before, in the rebuilding of the church changed its form and enlarged the structure in length with two high towers, with the sanctuary from the very foundation. On the north side the tower has an altar, namely of the apostles Peter and Paul. Before this altar the epitaph of the aforesaid Abbot William is seen. Neither of the founder nor of his wife, nor of the first or later abbots is there any other epitaph; no structures, sculptures, paintings, descriptions, inscriptions, no insignia… For the rest we point out in passing that the Rev. Fr. Jacob Masen of the Society of Jesus some three years ago inspected with us in person at Arnstein and noted down whatever was memorable for adorning his history of Trier. Nevertheless he who wrote this letter calls blessed Louis the most pious founder; whence may be seen what we said, that this title adhered to his name among those of Arnstein.

[33] nor does it now flourish on the Rhine. Nevertheless it must be admitted that Masen was by no means led, by what he saw there in person, to give the same praise to Blessed Louis, and so he calls him simply Louis, count of Arenstein Epitome annalium Trevirensium, pag. 396 et 397.; and in the Annals of Trier Lib. XIV, num. 180, tom. I, pag. 81. (for this passage too is Masen's) he likewise abstains from the appellation of saint or blessed, content to praise him magnificently: Among these events, he says, Louis, count of Arenstein, died on the eighth before the Kalends of November, a man to be remembered in heaven and on earth, both for his incredible and supreme piety and religion toward God, and for his excellent love of chastity and of heavenly things, by which, having spurned for the grace of Christ a wife in the flower of her age, wealth, and extraordinary titles of honour, he brought forth for himself eternal glory. These words, however, are equivalent to the appellations of blessed and saint. Next, those who inquired most skilfully into the saints of Trier, Hontheim, author of the Brief history of the cult of the saints of Trier established from domestic records Prodromus Hist. Trevir. part. I, pag. 357 et seqq., and the anonymous presbyter of Trier who in the year 1837 published in the vernacular the Lives and acts of the saints of Trier [Leben und Thaten der Heiligen, deren Andenken besonders im Bisthum Trier gefeiert wird, Trier 1837.], omit altogether the name of Blessed Louis; but since their purpose was only to treat of those saints who were or are venerated with a liturgical office, their silence is not of great moment. Besides, Franz Xaver Remling, parish priest at Hambach, who with extraordinary diligence wrote the history of the monasteries of Rhenish Bavaria, praises Count Louis in many places because he flourished in the fame of holiness Geschichte der Abteien in Rheinbayern, tom. II, p. 105. and died in the odour of sanctity Ibid. pag. 139., but calls him neither blessed nor saint. The venerable J. Marx, lecturer in ecclesiastical history in the seminary of Trier, took the same way; praising Count Louis very highly, yet nowhere calling him saint or blessed Geschichte des Erzstifts Trier, tom. II, part. II, pag. 186.. In addition, that same Hontheim, repeating Brower's edition of the Life of Blessed Louis and omitting only the commonplaces, abstained by design from adorning the most pious man with the praise of sanctity, and at the very head wrote: From the Life of Louis, count and founder in Arnstein, by a nearly contemporary writer of the twelfth century.

[34] [Which however does not prevent the venerable man from being reckoned among the blesseds.] More recent writers, therefore, by no means agree in placing Blessed Louis among the saints or blesseds; but this is commonly observed, that when blesseds or saints are not venerated with a liturgical office, a number of writers abstain from the title of beatitude or sanctity: as frequently occurs in the positions on the approval of immemorial cult, without anything arising thence against the rights of the blesseds, resting on other testimonies: and indeed, if what we have reported here and there in this paragraph is kept in memory, it cannot but be manifest that immediately after his death Blessed Louis was held by his most pious associates to be in the company of the saints; which opinion of his holiness has so persevered up to this day that the excepted case seems to be present, which, as we have explained above, is commonly said to be through the writings of the Fathers, and that it must be judged that nothing stands in the way of the annual recitation of his office being obtained from the Holy See, by the same right as that of the other Premonstratensian blesseds; and much less may we deny a place to this most blessed man in these our Acts of the Saints. There are added public instruments, published before and after the decrees of Urban VIII, by which he is extolled with praises which the Church does not allow to be given except to saints and blesseds. But if anything is nevertheless lacking, after the example of Papebroch, when about to publish among the Acts of the Saints the deeds of Blessed Eberhard, provost of Marchtal Acta SS. tom. II Aprilis, pag. 502., we shall profess that something must be conceded to the supreme and almost excessive modesty of the ancient Premonstratensians in this regard; lest we should take away from those few, whom the tradition received from the forefathers constantly proclaims blessed, the title of blessed. We shall therefore speak of Blessed Louis, after we have reviewed the merits, codices, and editions of his Life, the chief source of his deeds.

* Le Paige

§ II. The Life of Blessed Louis, its codices, editions.

[The Life of Blessed Louis was written not long after his death by a canon of Arnstein, who seems to have been Luwand;] His Life was written not long after his death, that is, between the 1st of February of the year 1198, on which day Walram, count of Nassau, departed from among the living Kremer, Origines Nassavicæ, tom. I, p. 382., and the year 1235, about which his son Rupert likewise migrated to another life Ibid., p. 429.. For this is gathered from chapter I, where these words occur: Rupert, brother of Arnold, was the father of Count

Walram; whose sons are Henry and Rupert, NOW counts. That the writer was a canon of Arnstein all agree, and the character of the whole little work cries it aloud. He did not come to the new cœnobium until after the year 1151, inasmuch as he did not know Abbot Godfrey I, who in the twelfth year after he had been ordained over the Lord's household (and he had been ordained in the year 1148 or 1149), as the affliction of the flesh grew worse, had happily died on the 4th before the Ides of October: for this praise of Godfrey: He was provident in counsel, vigorous in work, sweet-flowing in teaching, and of wonderful humility and abstinence, AS HAS COME TO US BY THE TRUE REPORT OF HIS CONTEMPORARIES, could not be written except by a man somewhat later in time. Some think they have detected his name; and so Frederick Hirsching Stifts- und Klöster-Lexicon, tom. I, p. 170. calls him Lunard; others Cfr Böhmer, Fontes rerum Germanicarum, tom. III, p. LI., on the contrary, Luwand: certainly better. The Nassau councillor Eberhard, namely, in the Marburg Notices Marburgische Anzeigen, 1766, num. 4 – 6. described a codex of Arnstein of the twelfth century containing the Life of Blessed Louis: which codex was written in the same hand as the Annals most certainly composed by the canon Luwand. For at the beginning of these annals there stood these words: In this year from Christ 1171 this book was written by a certain brother of ours, named Luwand. Whoever therefore reads, let him say: May his soul rest in peace. He lived until the year 1215, in which the former hand ceases and another begins to write; so that he must be judged to have died then. His age therefore also agrees, since he could have written for many years: Henry and Rupert NOW counts, and yet not have been a contemporary of Abbot Godfrey. But if the biographer of Blessed Louis and Luwand are said not to have been the same, there must then have been in the one cœnobium of Arnstein two canons who applied themselves to collecting historical matters: which doubtless could have come about; but, as things went in that age, it must by no means be judged likely. And thence it comes about that it is much more probable that the canon Luwand was in fact the author of the Life of Blessed Louis than Joh. Friedrich Böhmer seems to wish Fontes rerum Germanicarum, tom. III, p. LI..

[36] it is faithful and accurate. All agree that the writer, whoever he finally was, was a sagacious and diligent man. The writer of the Life, says Brower in his annotations Sidera Germaniæ, p. 17., nearly contemporary in age, although in scholastic fashion he here and there runs riot in diffuseness, yet completes his narrative with gravity and not unlearnedly, and in places kindles no small light for our little works also. Not otherwise Kremer: He is a contemporary writer, he says Origines Nassavicæ, tom. I, p. 12 et 13., and his narratives are worthy of full belief; and he is to be valued all the more because what he did not know by eyewitness testimony he professes to hand down as it came to him by the true report of contemporaries. His genealogical notices are brief and pertain only to the heads of the houses; so that they need many supplements: they begin from the beginning of the twelfth century and reach to the middle of the following century. Hugo, abbot of Étival, also praises his style: A nearly contemporary author, he says Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, tom. II, præf., num. II., a canon of Arnstein, skilled in a sufficiently pure and sound Latinity, composed this Life. To this judgment I prefer the confession of the writer himself: For they will say, these are his words, that unpolished speech has disfigured so honourable a matter: to whom not I, but the poet replies:

There is some use in going so far, if it is not given to go further.

Yet the sweetness of honey is commonly enclosed in a fragile reed and in an earthen vessel, and fire is found in hard flint; nor does the thickness of clouds, so often spread around and set in the way, detract from the brightness of the waxen sun. He had, however, read the classical books, especially the poets, Horace, Persius, Ovid, Claudian, and others; but he was not one to whom beautiful things were pleasing, but rather one to whom only marvellous and artificial circumlocutions of words had savour: so that he could say nothing simply.

[37] The manuscript codices That a truly autograph codex, or one written by Luwand himself, was described by the councillor Everhard I have already noted; where it now is seems to be unknown Fontes rerum Germanicarum, tom. III, p. LI.; but with very little loss; since it seems to have been the second of those formerly collated as a favour to Gamans, as I shall immediately declare. There is another codex, which seemed to Gamans preferable and was written in the thirteenth century, and was formerly at Arnstein, but is now (if I am not mistaken) preserved in the British Museum under nums. 2801, 233 Potthast, Bibliotheca historica medii ævi, p. 789.; and it has this peculiarity, that the Life of Blessed Louis is inserted there among the Lives of other saints: it is held to be the best of all the codices still existing Archiv der Gesellschaft, tom. VII, p. 80; ap. Böhmer, Fontes, t. III, p. LI.. Gamans employed a third besides, much less good. Two other codices, written in the fifteenth century, are kept at Idstein: of which one contains images of Count Louis and his wife Guda, wrongly held by many to be the autograph and the very source of Kremer's edition. There exists besides in the public library of Trier, marked num. 1396 (1337), a copy written in the seventeenth century; while in the royal library of Brussels, which is commonly called the Burgundian, there is preserved another copy, prepared for the press with the greatest diligence partly by the labour of Gamans, partly by that of William Priester, canon of Arnstein. Namely, Gamans copied out word for word the Life of Blessed Louis from a very ancient manuscript, as he says, after the Lives of the saints, by a certain son of his, his contemporary and of his own age in conversion, or at least converted not long after, who, after the example of his blessed father, wished in humility to remain hidden and to suppress his name; which codex, which I shall call the first Gamansian, is perhaps the same (as I have noted) as that which is now in London in the British Museum. Priester, moreover, with incredible zeal (for that age) collated Gamans's copy with two Arnstein manuscripts; of which the former was truly autograph, as I hinted above; and the other, which approaches sometimes the readings of Kremer, sometimes those of Brower. Nor would I wish to dissent from Gamans, who preferred his principal copy to the autograph; since all of us who write acknowledge as genuine what has been corrected, not what was first thrown onto paper.

[38] and the editions are reviewed. This Life was first published by our Christopher Brower among the Sidera of illustrious and holy men who adorned Germany with their deeds; which Sidera he had printed at Mainz in the year 1616. From there Jean Le Paige, or Lepaige, Premonstratensian canon and syndic of the order, took the same and in the year 1633 had it inserted in the Library of the Premonstratensian order; similarly Charles Louis Hugo, abbot of Étival and bishop of Ptolemais, from the labour of Blanpin, in volume II of the Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, printed in the year 1731 at Saint-Dié: which volume is so rare that many bibliographers suppose that it exists nowhere, but only the former volume, with the title of volume II fraudulently prefixed, and that thus in many libraries the same volume exists twice. This fraud, indicated by Herbert, I have myself at one time seen in a certain copy; but Herbert errs in this, that he wrote that no true copies of volume II have been preserved. After Hugo comes Johann Martin Kremer, who in the year 1779 at Wiesbaden brought out the second, diplomatic part of the Origines Nassoicæ, and in it the Life of Blessed Louis; of which part it is by far the best monument. Finally Johann Friedrich Böhmer, in the excellent collection to which he gave the title Fontes rerum Germanicarum, published the same in print in the year 1853 in volume III. Aided by all these helps, I shall myself prepare a new edition. Namely, I shall use as a foundation the principal codex of Gamans, which seems to have proceeded from the author himself; as an aid the second of Gamans, with which the edition of Böhmer agrees almost everywhere, that of Kremer comes less close, although made from a codex of the fifteenth century, and that of Blanpin much less; and finally the third of Gamans, which you might say Brower sometimes used, unless a corrupted transcript lighted the way for him. But I would not leave this place without noting that in the fifteenth century a German version was prepared and that this was published in the Annals of the historical society of Nassau [Annalen des Nass. hist. Vereins, tom. II, p. 123 et seqq. Cfr Böhmer, Fontes, tom. III, p. L.].

§ III. The fortress of Blessed Louis, his family, wife, jurisdiction, and county before his conversion.

GENERAL GENEALOGICAL TABLE OF THE SALIAN NATION,

WHICH AT THE SAME TIME INDICATES THE FAMILIES SPRUNG FROM THIS NATION, CHIEFLY THE SERIES OF THE COUNTS OF LAURENBURG OR NASSAU UP TO THEIR DIVISION CELEBRATED IN THE YEAR 1255.

Arnstein is described, In the northern part of the former diocese of Trier, which, lying on the right bank of the Rhine and enclosed between the dioceses of Cologne and Mainz, is cut into two parts by the stream Lahn, which runs into the Rhine above Koblenz, and of which the present duchy of Nassau almost consists, there rises on the left of the stream, on a high and leafy mountain, the village of Arnstein; notable first for the fortress which Blessed Louis inhabited, then for the cœnobium of the Premonstratensian order which he himself founded. To the west it looks toward Nassau, to the east toward Dietz, distant on either side a journey of an hour and a half, if you use a boat; and twelve miles from the Rhine. At its foot, through a valley pleasant with meadows on the eastern side, flows the Dursta, a slender stream, but full of fish, which there flows into the Lahn. What the appearance of the fortress was is declared in the Life itself. The monks destroyed it, in order to build a monastery in its place. For some, as is read in the Life, pressed on with breaking the walls of the fortress, others with levelling the courtyards; others hauled beams and the timbers of the buildings; others cut away the prominence of the rock, whose height (as is reported) equalled what is now the summit of the monastery. Nevertheless these things do not seem to be so understood as if the ascetery was built on the very site of the fortress; but rather as if it was built on the excavated rock, the fragments of the walls being used. If you believe Friedrich Hirsching Stifts- und Kloster-Lexicon, p. 172., the fortress stood on the left bank of the Lahn; whose very extensive ruined walls were still surviving in the year 1792, when he was writing; and not far from there an elegant house was erected by the noble family of Stein: but on the topographical maps of this region, drawn in the last century, which we have in our museum, no trace of these ruins is to be seen, although even rustic houses are indicated: which argument, however, I will admit is not of great weight, since useless remains could have been neglected. Most beautiful from a distance is the view of the monastery; for it raises to heaven among rocky mountains and green beeches its wings and the four vast towers of the church. All around lay most highly cultivated fields, vineyards, and very festive gardens. But the glory of these places perished when shortly afterwards the canons regular were expelled from there, whom Blessed Louis had once first brought there.

[40] [where Blessed Louis was born, of Salian stock (as they will have it), that is, of the court.] This castle had formerly come to him by paternal inheritance with a very ample dominion: for his family was noble and powerful. They will have it that he was of the Salian house; which matter is full of darkness. That Salian means the same as courtly, lordly, princely is placed beyond controversy; for documents abound. And where men and women are called Salian, it is also certain that there is talk of the first nobility; since this is the most open testimony of Otto of Freising Chronicum, lib. IV. cap. 32, ap. Tissier, Bibl. Cist., tom. VIII, pag. 58.: The most noble of the Franks, who are called Salian. Many fables are put about concerning the origin; dismissing these, others say with Struve Corpus historiæ Germaniæ, par. III, §. 14, pag. 92.: We rather derive the name Salian from the Salian land, which was part of Teutonic Francia, from which the Emperor Conrad II was called the Salian, which name is also attributed to Pharamond. And although those only were at first called Salian who were born in the Salian land, so that to distinguish them from the other peoples of the Franks they were called Salian Franks, gradually the appellation of Salians was extended to all the Franks; and indeed, after the Franks had subjected the Gauls to themselves and had been intermingled with the Gauls, they were courtiers, and the most noble of the Franks were called Salian. Indeed A. Fr. Gfrörer has decided Pabst Gregorius VII und seine Zeitalter, tom. I, pag. 270 et seqq. that the praise of Salian is worth as much as being of royal blood, at least such that this blood was received through women; and certainly that Conrad the Salian by maternal kinship was of the Carolingian stock and accordingly held to be of the Merovingian house. But this kinship, as Leibniz long ago observed Annales imperii, ad n. 911, num. 21, tom. II, pag. 246., could indeed bring it about that less ill will should attach to his election; but it by no means seems to have been the cause why he was called Salian. This surname was rather given to him to indicate that he was not born in the purple (as the Easterners loved to say), and that therefore he had no right from birth to the royal crown: (for the Franks tempered the rights of succession and election, admitting princes of the same stock, but often neglecting the order of age and degrees.) He would therefore have been called Salian not to the praise of his birth, far inferior to royal, but rather to signify that he had been encircled with the imperial crown, although he was only of courtly nobility, and not of the royal family. Long afterwards the chronographers from this devised a new house, Salian by name, which would be equal to the Merovingian and Carolingian, and from which many shoots or princely families in Germany were held to have sprung. But as in these matters many things are certain, resting on the firmest foundations, so others seem exceedingly doubtful or at least only likely. To pursue all this is not the task of this place: for it will suffice to display the family tree of the Salian nation, as they call it, which Kremer constructed with the most arduous labour and confirmed by the best documents (as far as he could). This alone is our task, to explain what most closely touches Blessed Louis.

[41] The genealogical tree of Blessed Louis His father too was called Louis, who was illustrious, as the biographer says, from the long lineage of his ancestors. Of these there are known another Louis and Arnold: whence the following family tree is altogether certain:

Arnold, count in the Einrich and of Arnstein in the years 1034, 1050, and 1052.

Louis I, count of the district of the Einrich in the year 1067.

Louis II, count of Arnstein in the years 1107 and 1108, husband of Adelheid of Odenkirchen.

Blessed Louis III, count of Arnstein, founder of the monastery of Arnstein, husband of Guda or Judith, daughter of Siegfried II, count of Boyneburg.

[42] from diplomas That Arnold is known first of all from a contract of precarial tenure, entered into in the year 1052 between Eberhard, archbishop of Trier, and Count Waldram of Arlon; which he subscribed in these words Hontheim, Historia Trevirensis diplomatica, t. I, p. 393.: Arnold of Arnstein; so that he had his seat in the fortress of Arnstein, from which he took his surname. And since the long lineage of the ancestors of Louis II was so illustrious that in one county there could not easily be many of the same nobility; and since, further, Nassau and Arnstein almost adjoin each other in the district of the Lahn, the same Arnold cannot but be the same who comes in the charter by which in the year 1034 Azecho, bishop of Worms, granted to his church whatever estate he was seen to have at Nassouwa … situated in the district of Longanehe, in the county of the counts Wigger and Arnold Schannat, Historia Wormatiensis, Probat. n. LV, p. 51.; who, since they had one county together, must be held to be brothers, the paternal inheritance not yet being divided Cfr Kremer, Origines Nassovicæ, tom. I, pag. 288.. Afterwards that county was called Arnold's alone, as appears from the diploma by which the Emperor Henry III in the year 1050, to the church of St. Swibert at Kaiserswerth, at the intervention of the consort of his bed and kingdom, namely Agnes, the august empress, gave one site together with buildings and with one vineyard in the town called Cambo, situated both IN THE COUNTY OF ARNOLD and in the district of Enriche Pez, Thesaurus Anecdotorum. tom, VI, part. I, col. 243.. That this Arnold was the author of the Arnstein family, and so the builder of the fortress of Arnstein, Kremer tries to persuade Origines Nassovicæ, tom. I, pag. 318.; that this is signified by the name Arnstein, since it seems to be the same as Arnold's fortress. But this cannot be taken as if Arnold had been a new man; nor was this ever Kremer's mind, since he contends that he drew his origin from Conrad the Salian; but that a shoot sprung from a most noble nation, no differently from a cutting, planted at Arnstein, became as it were the trunk of a new family, a new name being taken from the new fortress. At first sight the biographer of Blessed Louis thinks otherwise, holding that the fortress which is vulgarly Arinstein (Ariinstein, Arenstein) can be called in the Latin idiom EAGLE'S STONE. This origin, however, can be reconciled with Kremer's to this extent, that in fact the Germans, when they had a name made up of two juxtaposed words, sometimes used only the former in designating a man (thus Cuno for Conrad), and Arn, taken from Arnold, signifies eagle just as much as if it had nothing in common with this name. This opinion is certainly more probable than that of Estor Origines juris publici Hassiæ, pag. 64 et seqq. and Hirsching Stifts-und-Kloster-Lexicon, tom. I, pag. 171., who derive Arnstein from Are or Arde; from which they decide that the name of the whole district of Einrich or Enrich was derived. But that many say the stream Arde flows into the Lahn opposite Arnstein is not correct; it pours its waters into the river some miles higher up.

[43] is demonstrated. The father After the year 1052 the name of Arnold no longer appears in diplomas, because doubtless he died not long afterwards; but Louis I, holding with the title of count the same lands as Arnold, is thereafter met with in a clear place. Namely, in the year 1067 Henry IV, king and afterwards emperor, to the church of St. Swibert, to which his father had already been beneficent, at the intervention of Bertha, the queen, most beloved consort of his kingdom and bed, and also of Anno, archbishop of Cologne, and Siegfried, provost of the same church …, gave in ownership five vineyards in the town of Cambo, in the district of Enriche, situated in the county of Count Louis … Pez, Thesaurus, tom. VI, part. I, p. 253.. This Louis must be different from Louis the father of Blessed Louis, unless you wish to extend his age immensely; as cannot but be manifest to one who calculates. Add that the father of Blessed Louis, on the testimony of the biographer, escaped from this shipwreck of the world as a BRIEF GUEST, or in youthful age; but his mother lived a long time after her son's conversion, or after the year 1139. The father of Blessed Louis must therefore be judged to be he who under the year 1107 is read among the witnesses of the charter of foundation of the abbey of Springiersbach, by Bruno, archbishop of Trier, as Louis of Arenstein Hontheim, Hist. Trevir. diplom., t. I, p. 484.; and in another of the same year, by which Ruthard, archbishop of Mainz, on the 10th of May, substituted monks for canons in the ascetery of St. Disibod, and where again among the witnesses he comes by name, Louis, count of Arnestein [Beyer, Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Regierungsbezirke Coblentz und Trier, t. I, pag. 474.].

[44] and the mother of Blessed Louis; Now the aforesaid count had, I recite the words of the biographer, according to the world, a wife of illustrious and high blood, Udilhild by name, who not only did not disgrace the embraces of so great a man, but also in the brightness of her future offspring brought to daylight whatever of morals, whatever of grace in her forebears the candle of probity had sent ahead for the children. This mother of Blessed Louis seemed to Kremer Origines Nassovicæ, t. I, p. 325. to have been of the house of Odenkirchen in the territory of Cologne; that this house had long flourished, since in the diploma by which the count palatine Ezo or Ehrenfrid in the year 1028 conferred his goods at Lövenich on the monastery of Brauweiler, among the witnesses is designated Count Christian of Huodenkirchen Acta Palatina, t. III, p. 132.; and that her family is sufficiently indicated by the biographer, where, discoursing about her death: But the mother, he says, living a long time after the conversion of her son, when she was bending to the evening the original particle of the earth's world, falling ill on her estate which is called Udenkirchen, closed her last day on the third before the Nones of July, and rests in the greater church of Cologne. But these things are less certain than they may seem: for she could have had the estate of Udenkirchen without having sprung from there; nor is it likely that the seat of a county fell to a woman. What of the fact that the castle of Udenkirchen at this time was in the hands of the archbishops of Cologne? For in the diploma by which in the year 1153, on the 14th of June, King Frederick I declared by judgment of the royal court that it would be permitted to no archbishop of Cologne to give the goods of his table in fief or pledge, and that what had been given by Archbishop Frederick I was to be taken back, and also confirmed to Arnold II what he had recovered: Nevertheless, he says Ennen et Eckertz, Quellen zur Geschichte der Stadt Koln, t. I, p. 542., we decree and confirm in perpetuity that whatever possessions the same archbishop of Cologne has acquired or recovered for the church by giving money, he and his successors shall possess in everlasting peace, namely the castle of Udenkirchen with the ministerials, with the male and female servants and all appurtenances. Nor can it be said that she was of the order of ministerials, since the highest

nobility seems to have been hers. For by maternal kinship (as appears) Blessed Louis was a blood relation of Frederick, duke of Swabia and father of Frederick, afterwards emperor of the Romans; as we have learned from the biographer. Wherefore Gebhardi judges Ap. Kremer, Origines Nassovicæ, t. I, p. 324. that the mother of Blessed Louis was Adelheid, daughter of Duke Frederick I and Hildegard; of which daughter mention is made in a diploma of the year 1094 Schœpflin, Alsatia illustrata, t. I, p. 177., at which time she does not yet seem to have been married.

[45] his wife. Blessed Louis, who alone was born of this marriage, through the mediation, says the biographer, of the counsels of friends and of busy embassies on this matter of the count of Bomneburg, took to wife his daughter, Guda by name, a virgin given with great (as was fitting) display. How noble this marriage was may be learned from the family tree which Kremer drew from Scheid's Origines Guelficæ Origines Guelficæ, tom. IV, pag. 484., but from which I transfer here only a small part.

I have omitted Otto, son and successor of Henry the Fat, and his sister Gertrude, wife of Godfrey, count palatine on the Rhine; and three daughters of Conrad: N. wife of Henry, count of Zutphen; Athela, first wife of Theodoric of Catelenberg, then of Helperic, count of Plötzkau; and Cunigund, wife of Wicbert, son of Wicbert, count of Groitzsch. For a few names inserted in the diagram sufficed. Nor have I set out the most noble marriages of the seven paternal aunts of Blessed Louis, which the biographer has very diligently indicated; I prefer to indicate something about these in the annotations, lest the Commentary should turn into genealogical tables.

[46] He held the patronage of 72 churches, or rather small chapels; With his nobility the authority of Blessed Louis went on equal terms. The count had, says the biographer, the right of patronage in 72 churches; all of which pertained by filial right to the church of Blessed Margaret. Under his jurisdiction also were Boppard, Oberwesel, the Town of St. Goar, both Lahnsteins, Koblenz, and many other towns on the Rhine, and the whole province which is called the Einrich. Note here how great a number seventy-two churches was in a moderate space, as the parish of St. Margaret (for it was the mother church) had once occupied; but, as Hirsching observes Stifts- und-Kloster-Lexicon, tom. I, pag. 170., one must not think of as many parishes; but, as is established from the old titles and charters of the monastery, most were chapels, scattered in the small villages of the district of the Einrich, the right of conferring whose altars was held by the counts of Arnstein. Had Brower observed this, he would perhaps have been less sharp in condemning the origin of this patronage: This was a sort of javelin with a thong, he says Sidera Germaniæ, Vita S. Ludovici, p. 18., for imposing a yoke of servitude on churches, when patronage rested not on the ground of endowment, or new construction, or a similar cause; but was either handed over as a benefice into the hands of dynasts, either by emperors, or by an emperor, or by archbishops, in view of war or service, or was usurped by the same by force and arms or by some other unjust title. Concerning Count Louis I cannot say by what colour of right he obtained so great a mass of patronages. The writer of the Life does not deny that great plunder was formerly driven from the family stronghold, and that the occupants and the count's retainers possessed little of their own and all of what belonged to others. I have observed in the Luxemburgs, the counts of Namur, and the old palatines of the Lotharingians, that the chief foundation of their patrimony arose from the tithes and endowments of churches and monasteries, and from the right of advocacy and patronage.

[47] His jurisdiction to the west was so bounded by the river Rhine, he was imperial prefect in the district of the Einrich and neighbouring places. that the towns and villages situated on the left bank were subject to his authority; for Oberwesel, the town of St. Goar, Boppard, and Koblenz rise on the nearer side of the river. But care must be taken not to confuse this jurisdiction over the Rhenish towns with the dominion or possession, which was almost wholly in the hands of the archbishop of Trier; for, as Hontheim has already noted Hist. diplom. Trevir., tom. I, p. 375., there is to be understood the office of imperial prefect, or provincial advocate, committed to Blessed Louis through the district of the Einrich and the eastern borders of the Wetterau, to which those places were reckoned. But beware similarly of calling the blessed man (as has pleased many) provincial advocate of the whole Wetterau; this is neither related by the biographer, nor does it stand with the truth of things Wenck, Katzenelenbogische Geschichte, p. 502 et seqq.. The office of provincial advocate had gained strength in Germany after in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries the districts had little by little ceased and the functions of the old counts and dukes had become obsolete; and it exceeded the dignity of count. For those who were adorned with it procured peace even by force and arms; nor were they strangers to administering justice, and they had vicars, assessors, and échevins Cfr Bernhard, Antiquitates Wetteraviæ, lib. III, cap. II, p. 229 et seqq.; in a word, they acted in the place of the emperors in managing the administration of supreme dominion: so that they had almost the same power as the former missi dominici, except that the latter's was temporary, theirs perpetual; which also was made hereditary.

[48] What the extent of the district of the Einrich was; The jurisdiction or advocacy of the blessed man extended also over the whole province which is called the Einrich. This was a lesser district, part of the district of the Lahn, as is now agreed among all and is manifest Cfr Wenck, Katzelenbogische Geschichte, p. 26, not. c.. Its name persists, so that many places are said to lie auf den Errich or Herrich on the Errich [Cfr Browerus, Sidera Germaniæ, Vita S. Ludovici, p. 17, et Mappa diœcesis Trevirensis in tomo I Historiæ Lotharingiæ Calmeti.]; about the origin of which name many have preferred to tell fables rather than to confess ignorance. It already occurs in a Prüm diploma of Charlemagne of the year 790 [Beyer, Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Mittelrheinische Territorien, tom. I, p. 39.], and it contained Gambrikero marco Ibid, p. 122., Bruibach Ibid., p. 125., Prichina Ibid., p. 350, 387 et 388., the county of Marivelis Ibid., p. 356 et 366., Walmichi in the county of Berthold Ibid., p. 373., Drinspringen and Dorenbach Ibid., p. 473., Overdieffenbach Ibid., p. 697., a certain village called Urefo Joannis, Rerum Moguntinarum, tomi II, p. 646., and Logenstein Gudenus, Codex diplomaticus, t. I, p. 358.. And from these places, all of which I have collected from the diplomas themselves, it is manifest that the district of the Einrich reached to the west as far as the Rhine: for Walmichi, now Welmich, is a little village of the parish of St-Goars-hausen; Bruibach, now Braubach, lies a little lower on the right bank of the Rhine; Logenstein, now Lahnstein, rises at the confluence of the Lahn and the Rhine; Drinspringen and Dorenbach are farms of the village of Kemel, to the north of the town of Langenschwalbach, on the road by which one goes from Wiesbaden to Koblenz. And indeed Bessel will have it, and Hontheim does not dissent Chronicum Gotwicense, Prodromus, part. III, p. 587. Historia Trevirensis diplomatica, tom. I, p. 73., that Wiesbaden was included in the district of the Einrich; which would have been not much distant from Mainz. Where Bessel learned this he does not indicate; but I would not therefore refuse it, since it is likely that the bounds of the former diocese of Trier and of the district of the Einrich in those parts were the same. Overdieffenbach, now Oberdiffenbach, and the county of Marivelis, now Marienfels, near Nastätten, and Gambrikero marcu, afterwards Gembrica and Gembrighe, and now Gemmerich, to the north-west of Idstein Historische Topographie des Herzogsthums Nassau, p. 92., are almost in the middle of the land that we have so far defined. Where Urefo is I do not know. To the east that same district was stretched beyond the stream Emisa (Ems), since Prichina, which Nieder-Brechen and Ober-Brechen, situated on the road between Frankfurt and Limburg, represent, is situated on the right bank; on which eastern bank below Prichina there appears on Vogler's map of medieval Nassau a village Aendricke; from which the district seems to have received or given its name. However that may be, Wenck assigned narrower bounds to the district of the Einrich Katzenelenbogische Geschichte, p. 27, not. b., when he hinted that its limits to the east were the villages or rural parishes of Kalten-Holzhausen, Hanstätten, Heringen, and Niederneisen (Nazina), on the right bank of the stream Aar or Arde; of which the inhabitants will have it that the district of the Einrich or Hairich consists, taken in a stricter signification: and much less must one agree with Vogler Historische etc. p. 68 et 69; Cfr Mappa Nassaviensis, ibid., to whom it seemed that even that tract should be removed and the district of the Einrich be enclosed within the terms of the deanery or rural chapter at Marienfels, in which before the Lutheran reformation the following parishes were contained [Corden, Dictiones geminæ cum deductione originis etc., archidiaconorum Trevirensium, in specie Dikirchensis; ap. Wenck, Katzenelenbogische etc., p. 149.]: Marienfels the seat, which also seemed to Wenck Katzenelenbogische etc., p. 88 et 89. the head of the district of the Einrich and the seat of the count; Didrot, Weiler, Nieweren, Larscheid, Lipporne, and Waldrode; Braubach, Burnich, and Cube; Lower Diffenbach, Upper Diffenbach, Singhoben, Zurne, Lauffensel, Meilingen, Bachheim, Didrot in the Valley, Holzhausen, Ascherbach, Rettrode, Osterspey, Oberwallmelach, Schweikhausen, Weissel, Robershoven, Oberlanstein, Hynicgoben, Frücht, Diedenthal, Obernhoff, Esten (now Holzappel on the right bank of the Lahn), Habenscheid, Nastätten, Schönau. But to the east it extended much more widely, since it contained both banks of the Emisa. As for the north, Bessel Chronicum Gotwicense, part. III, p. 586 et 587. and Hontheim Historia Trevirensis diplomatica, tom. I, p. 72 et 73. will have it that the district of the Einrich was stretched on the north bank of the river Lahn as far as Dillenburg, and that it thus occupied all that tract which in the last century the Nassaus of Dillenburg, Diez, Katzenelnbogen, and Idstein held; and that it was accordingly not much smaller than the present duchy of Nassau: but in the documents which they adduce or indicate, and all of which I have diligently examined in the sources themselves, nothing of this kind is related; and so it is safer that the district of the Einrich ended to the north approximately at the river Lahn.

[49] and the county of Arnstein. In a much shorter space was contained the county of Arnstein, since it lay in the middle between the neighbouring counties of Nassawen to the north-east and of Catimelibocum or Katzenelenbogen to the south-west; whose chief places are only two geographical miles distant from each other. That these counties already existed in that age the biographer is a witness: He resigned his county, he says, to the lords of Isenburg, which they afterwards sold to the lords of Nassawen and of Catzenellenbogen. Kremer thought [Origines Nassavicæ, tom. I, §72, not. 9 et §87 et 88.] that the dominions of Limburg, Schaumburg, Runkel, and Westerburg pertained to it; that Blessed Louis resigned these to the lords of Isenburg, and that these sold them to the Nassaus and Katzenelenbogens;

but with no likelihood Katzenelenbogische Geschichte, p. 244, not. e.. If it lay on the left bank of the Lahn, it must be said to have contained only Arnstein, Hollerstein, Salscheid, Selbach, and Polseich; if it extended to the right bank, besides these Langenau, Weinder, Winnen, and Dies. For I do not see other places attributed to the county of Arnstein on the Hoffmann and Wenck map of the lower county of Katzenelenbogen.

§ IV. The conversion of Blessed Louis and his wife Guda. The institutions and fortunes of the Premonstratensian lay brothers and nuns.

[Blessed Louis, his wife being sterile, reflecting on his crimes, and moved by the example of a kinsman who had been made a Premonstratensian canon in a monastery founded by himself, and by the holiness of his companions,] Blessed Louis lived in the world easily up to the fortieth year of his age; for when he was urged by the counsel of his ministerials concerning the matrimony of the conjugal bond, he first set his hand to strong deeds; by which it may be understood that his marriage was not hastened. Having taken a wife, and she remaining long sterile and, unfruitful, denying the hope of offspring, they began to implore the mercy of the Lord with all their prayers for a successor to so great an inheritance; which can only be said of a marriage celebrated some years before. This very sterility of his spouse had the greatest force in turning the mind of Blessed Louis to prayer; whereby it came about that little by little he began to deal with God and to reflect on his crimes, chiefly that he had allowed his fortress to become a den of robbers: not, however, by a singular example, as chapter III of the Western History of James of Vitry, on the rapines and exactions of the powerful through themselves and through their henchmen, and on their various crimes, makes manifest. When therefore his heart was prepared for the working of divine grace, there came to his ears the example of Otto, count of Reveninge, also of Crudorp, who at the admonition and prompting of St. Norbert had left the world and had handed over the estates of his inheritance to God and St. Maurice; from which, in a suitable place, the blessed prelate of Magdeburg, beside the river Saale, near the town of Kalbe, four geographical leagues from Magdeburg to the south-east (which place he called Gratia Dei, in honour of Blessed Victor, his former patron, namely at Xanten on the Rhine, whose relics also he had brought from Xanten), had begun to build a monastery Chronicum Magdeburgense, ap. Meibomium, Rerum Germanicarum, t. II, p. 327. in the year 1131 Chronicum Montissereni, ap. Hoffmannum, Rerum Lusaticarum t. IV, p. 35., and that same man, renouncing the world, he had made a canon in the church of which he was the founder, and had promoted to the order of the diaconate lb. pag. cit.. The example was of so much the greater authority with Blessed Louis because, on the testimony of the biographer, he was his blood relation: but neither Leuckfeld, who in a separate book [Historische Nachricht von dem Prämonstratenser Kloster Gottes-Gnade bey Calbe an der Saale, Magdebourg, 1720.] pursued the history of the monastery of Gratia Dei and tried to inquire into the birth of the founder; nor Blanpin, who in the annotations to the Life of Blessed Louis Ap. Hugonem, Antiquitatis sacræ monumenta, t. II, p. 38. did not neglect the same subject; nor Hugo, who discoursed on Gratia Dei better than usual Annales Præmonstratenses, t. I, col. 763 et seqq.; nor finally George Lienhart, who in the Hagiological Ephemerides of the Premonstratensian order praised Otto at the 2nd of August; nor anyone else (that I know of) has found how Otto of Reveninge had community of blood with Blessed Louis. To the example of Otto was added the most chastened life of the first canons of Gratia Dei under the rule of most holy provosts. For the first provost of that church was Emelric; who, inflamed with zeal for liberating the Holy Land, after a short time went across the sea, as the chronographer of Montserein says Ap. Hoffmannum, Rerum Lusaticarum t. IV, p. 35.. After whom, so the same man continues, Evermodus, afterwards bishop of Ratzeburg, is ordained provisor of the place. And this most blessed man, whom the Premonstratensians now venerate with a liturgical office at the 17th of February, was provost of Gratia Dei when Blessed Louis came to love this institution so greatly that he resolved to change his fortress into a canonry and to consecrate himself to God in it.

[51] [he resolves to found a monastery in his fortress of Arnstein; where he himself becomes a lay brother:] This was done in the year 1139. The blessed man, that is, went to Gratia Dei; where he stayed for some time, until a promise was made to him that shortly after his return a whole colony of canons would follow, which according to custom, after the example of the apostolic college, had to consist of an abbot and twelve canons. Soon performance was added to the words, and to the twelve canons were joined as many lay brothers, under the leadership of Godfrey, formerly scholasticus of Magdeburg and brought over to the new religion by St. Norbert himself; whose praises the biographer celebrates sufficiently. Meanwhile Guda, the wife of Blessed Louis, consented to the plans of her husband, who had resolved to seek the habit of the converts and to live for God alone. For although the Premonstratensians in Belgium and elsewhere have long ceased to admit converts, at the beginning they nevertheless used other customs, in imitation of the Camaldolese and other hermits who followed the Rule of St. Benedict, of the Cistercians, the Grandmontines, and other new congregations: and indeed in the middle of the twelfth century there were converts everywhere even in the old monasteries of the Benedictines. On which matter John Benedict Mittarelli has set up an excellent discussion Annales Camaldulenses, t. I, app., p. 336 et seqq.; and I myself attempted something in the Commentary on Blessed Berthold, convert in the Parma convent of St. Alexander Acta SS., t. IX Octobris, p. 410., who perhaps of this class of men first merited the honours of the heavenly ones at the beginning of the twelfth century. And although all these things pertain to monks, they are nevertheless not foreign to canons; and so St. Norbert established his converts after the example of the monks.

[52] Now these were altogether different from the canons, and held rather in the condition of servants than of companions. what things peculiar to this class of men were to be observed; Their clothing was plainly distinct either in form or colour: and indeed their cappas were not white, but grey Le Paige, Bibliotheca Præmonstratensis, p. 219.; the shape of the scapular angular, cut off before and behind in the manner of a shield; besides, the beard was not shaved, as elsewhere with bearded brothers: which things are established from the decree of the general chapter of the year 1306, by which it is decreed that, since on account of the lack of distinction in the white habit and the shaving or tonsure of the converts many scandals had long since arisen through the universal order, they should henceforth, under pain of prison (after due warning, as is fitting), wear scapulars cut angularly in the manner of a shield, before and behind, as far as the belt, and also wear their beards without tonsure and shaving, as is more fully contained in the old statutes of the order; so that a distinction might appear between canons and converts Ibid., p. 23.. Concerning the divine office which they are bound to recite, these things were prescribed in the manuscript statutes of the order, dist. IV, chap. 11 Ibid., p. 226.: The brothers, called converts or lay brothers, shall rise at the same time and come to Matins at the same hour and bow in the same way as the convent. At Matins, the Pater noster, Ave Maria, Credo in Deum, and Credo in Spiritum sanctum having been said, they shall raise themselves saying in silence: Lord, you will open my lips, etc. Then they shall say for Matins twenty-five Pater nosters. On double feasts and Sundays they shall remain until the end of Matins: but on other days they may go out at Lauds, if they wish. At Vespers they shall say fifteen Pater nosters. At all other hours, namely Prime, Terce, Sext, None, and Compline they shall say seven Pater nosters, and after Compline they shall say once the Pater noster, Ave Maria, and both Creeds. Each week, for our brothers, sisters, and benefactors, a hundred Pater nosters. For their own abbot, a canon, or another deceased person for whom three Masses are owed, they shall say within thirty days five times a hundred Pater nosters. And for our relatives, for whom pardon is asked in chapter, they shall say fifty Pater nosters. They are not bound to recite the other hours, whether canonical or of the Blessed Virgin; because, although they are professed and live from the goods of the monastery, they are nevertheless taken on for temporal and bodily exercises, that in the sweat of their face they may eat their bread: therefore it suffices for them daily to say the aforesaid Pater nosters and to hear Mass and Compline, if it can be done and unless great necessity excuses. [But as often as they say the Pater noster for the hours, so often also must they say the Ave Maria.] What I have enclosed in these brackets I judge to have been added later, both because at that time the Angelic Salutation was much less in use than now; and because it would have been written in its own place if it had been inserted from the beginning: certainly the last words were not then said: Holy Mary, etc. Acta SS. tom. VI Octobris, pag. 1108 et seqq.. Afterwards the prayers which the Premonstratensian lay brothers were ordered to recite were not much changed [Cfr Statuta canonici ordinis Præmonstratensis, renovata anno 1630, dist. II, cap. 24, p. 141 et seqq.].

[53] this true servitude was professed Commonly in that age in Benedictine monasteries converts were held in the place of servants, and ate servile food, by Blessed Louis, like a number of other magnates; being everywhere separated from the monks; and so they professed rather servitude for God's sake than the common life. I do not doubt that the same was the condition of the converts among the Premonstratensians, although the formula of profession found in the more recent statutes Ibid. Dist. I, cap. 17, pag. 56. is not different from that of the canons, except that the converts insert a few words, enclosed in brackets: I, Brother N. taken up to the state of the converts offering, hand over myself to the church of N., etc. But I should think that at the beginning there was another formula: and indeed in those same statutes the memory of the former service has been preserved; where the converts are ordered Ibid. Dist. II, cap. 24, pag. 147., when the year of probation has elapsed, to make before a notary and witnesses, and in the presence of the prior and subprior, or of others to be deputed by the prelate, their handing-over and donation, by which they hand over and give themselves and all temporal goods (if they have any) to God and the church of N. FOR PERPETUAL SERVICE and use, renouncing all power of returning to the world and of claiming back their goods, on this condition however, that they be fed by the church to which they hand over themselves and their goods, and receive other necessaries from the same. Blessed Louis disposed of his goods before undertaking this kind of life, otherwise subjecting himself wholly to that voluntary, but perpetual, servitude. A splendid example of humility, penitence, and piety, yet not singular among the Premonstratensians. There are brought forward by Jean Lepaige Bibliotheca Præmonstratensis, pag. 311. Blessed Guy, count of Braine,

son of Blessed Agnes, convert at Prémontré; Godfrey, count of Namur, at Floreffe; Roard, son of the king of Scotland, at Bucilly; Gerard, prince of Ninove and constable, at Ninove; Blessed Folcold, count of Teisterbant, at Berne; Blessed Alderic, prince of France, in the cœnobium of Wossenich; Blessed Henry, count of Arnsberg, in the monastery of Wedinghausen; and finally Beringer, baron of Schusseriet, at Soreth. At that same time similar miracles of divine grace were to be seen everywhere in the cœnobia of the Cistercians. For through the preaching of BB. Norbert and Bernard and their first disciples, or through the mere knowledge of their holiness of life, almost everywhere, among all orders of men, soldiers as well as clerics, the violent rose up to seize the kingdom of heaven. Hermann of Laon [De Miraculis S. Mariæ Laudunensis, lib. III, cap. VII, ap. Dacherium, Opp. Guiberti de Novigento, app. pag. 547; et ap. Migne, Patrologia latina, tom. CLVI, col. 996.], also of Tournai, a contemporary writer, held, with very many in agreement, that no one's way of life after the apostles had produced in holy Church so much fruit in so brief a space of time as St. Norbert's; for although, he continues thus, some say that Dom Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux, at the same time bore no less fruit, yet if anyone attends more carefully, I think he will not deny that Norbert excels. But it is of no use to dispute about the merits of the saints, and it suffices for us to admire both those instruments of heavenly mercy.

[54] he was nevertheless chiefly occupied in administering affairs. Although the profession of converts implied that under the yoke of servitude they should eat their bread in the sweat of their face, yet since the discretion of the Benedictine Rule praised by St. Gregory the Great was never absent from the eyes of superiors, they did not impose on all the same rustic and very heavy services; but they took very great account of former condition and status. To nobles, therefore, and often to others, the administration of goods was entrusted, and also, especially to founders, the opportunity was given to visit monasteries, to have a great part in organizing new houses, to remove external obstacles and difficulties, in a word to do many things which at first sight seem plainly foreign to the lot of converts. It should by no means seem surprising, then, if Blessed Louis after his conversion was in the company of Frederick, duke of Swabia; if he received from him the monastery of Munstre; if he transferred the nuns of Bethlenrode to the Valley of St. Mary; if he went to his allod of Bubenheim; if in the diocese of Mainz at Otternheim he was frequently among the ministerials of St. Stephen of Metz, and there received the town of Gumersheim and founded a cœnobium for women, and did many other things of the same kind; and if finally he was often accustomed, by the abbot's leave, to go round to visit the churches which he had founded and their estates.

[55] [Of the Premonstratensian nuns, whose institutions the venerable Guda, wife of Blessed Louis, embraced,] It was for some time held to be the singular glory of St. Norbert that, as Hermann of Laon says De Miraculis etc., loc. cit., he decreed that with the male sex the female too should be received to conversion; and with such success that shortly after his death more than ten thousand women were believed to be contained in monasteries. And indeed, since through the care of Blessed Louis, not only at Arnstein, where he enclosed his wife Guda, but in other places too, convents of women of the Premonstratensian order were erected, it will be worthwhile to explain this subject also; all the more because at that very time a great change was introduced into that institution. In the beginning, namely, the monasteries had been double, so that in the same precinct, yet in altogether different buildings, men and women lived: which was tried in that age in very many other most chastened cœnobia or new congregations. For with chaste matrons and holy widows and virgins devoted to God, as with precious stones, coming together for the adornment and beauty of so holy and honourable a religion, as from two walls of men and women joined by one cornerstone, a dwelling pleasing to God was constructed, these are the words of James of Vitry, writer of the beginning of the thirteenth century Historia occidentalis, cap. XXII, p. 323 et 324, Duaci, 1596.… For the nuns were held so enclosed within the enclosures of the monastery that no entry to them lay open to any man. And since they did not sing in choir and church, but only gave themselves to prayer in silence, reading their psalters, and saying the canonical hours or those of the Blessed Virgin Mary in secret, with all humility and devotion, there lived separately priests and clerics of the same order, approved and religious men; who, serving them in the divine offices, heard their confessions through windows, and at fixed times were at pains to instruct and form them with the words of the divine Scriptures. With almost the same praises Hermann of Laon pursues the same women, using these words [De Miraculis S. Mariæ Laudunensis, lib. III, cap. VII, post Guiberti Opp. p. 548; ap. Migne, tom. CLVI, col. 996.]: For women, as soon as they are converted, a perpetual law then remains, to be kept always shut up within the precinct of the house; to go no further anywhere; to speak to no man, not only no stranger, but not even a brother or kinsman, except at a window in the church, two converted men sitting with the man outside, and two women with her inside, and hearing whatever is said. At the very beginning of conversion too, as soon as they are received, to cut away all pride and carnal pleasure, even their hair is cut as far as the ears; and that they may please Christ the heavenly spouse the more, they are altogether disfigured for love of him in their fragile and enticing flesh. Thereafter no one is permitted to have a precious garment except of wool or sheepskins, no one a silk veil after the manner of certain nuns, but to wear on the head a very cheap little black cloth. And although they are known to be shut up in such strictness and abasement with silence, yet in a wonderful way, the power of Christ working, we see daily women not only rustic or poor, but rather most noble and rich, both young widows and also little girls, thus by the grace of conversion spurning the pleasures of the world, hastening to the monasteries of that institution.

[56] their fortunes and continuous cessation. Nevertheless from this neighbourhood of canons and canonesses there arose almost from the beginning grave disadvantages; so that Blessed Hugh, first disciple of St. Norbert and successor in governing Prémontré, a very few years after the founder's death, namely in the year 1137, thought it good to bring it about in the general chapter that double monasteries should be forbidden by a firm decree [Cfr. Remling, Geschichte der Abteien und Klöster in Rheinbayern, tom. II, p. 138.], and that according to this, in the year 1141, the nuns immediately subject to him were sent off to Fontenelle, a place one league distant from Prémontré Le Paige, Bibliotheca Præmonstratensis, p. 422.. But this was not done universally, and little by little there grew up in many places too great a facility of conversing. After, then, to bring in James of Vitry narrating again, the windows, through which at the beginning necessary words were exchanged with such modesty and caution, turned into doors, and, the first fervour growing lukewarm, improvident security began to bring in torpor and negligence, while the portress slept in the heat of the day, Ishbosheth was struck in the groin; and, while the enemy pierced the bilge of the ark, the waters entering from below, many of both sexes perished sunk in the mud… Prudently therefore, though late, in general chapter the Premonstratensians unanimously determined that they would henceforth not receive women in their order. Which words Le Paige has rightly decided Ibid. p. 352. are to be so interpreted as if it had been decreed that double monasteries should cease and that nuns should be placed in separate seats far from the company of the canons; and that to these convents their own revenues should be assigned. Correct; but this is certain, that most abbots, especially in France, deterred by the expense of new asceteries, refrained from moving the nuns away, and preferred to admit no new ones, until all should have died and the women's congregation be extinct: so that the capitular decree had the effect of partly wiping out the name of Premonstratensian nuns in France when St. Norbert had not yet been dead a whole century. For of this extinction James of Vitry is an irrefragable witness, since in another place, teaching that in the beginning there were scarcely any Cistercian nuns, and that they afterwards increased greatly in number, he derives that increase from the abolition of the Premonstratensians: After, he says Hist. occidentalis, cap. XV, p. 305., the God-fearing and religious men of the Premonstratensian order, wisely attending and having learned by familiar example how grave and perilous it is to guard the guardians themselves, decreed that they would no longer henceforth receive women in the houses of their order: the religion of the nuns of the Cistercian order was multiplied like the stars of heaven and grew immensely. Beware, however, of believing that Premonstratensian nuns ceased everywhere; the matter was returned to in the year 1270, when in the general chapter Walter de Obbais, abbot of Floreffe, promoted with all his might the suppression of nuns in the whole order and brought about a decree that no more should be admitted to the habit, but that those admitted should be allowed to die in their cœnobia Hugo, Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. I, p. 7.: which decree, however, was not observed everywhere in Belgium, Germany, and other regions. But these things are of a later age. According to the primeval institutions, then, there is prepared, as the biographer of Blessed Louis says, first of all for the lady countess Guda a special dwelling on the left side of the mountain; where, her habit changed, always enclosed, going out nowhere, by the sparingness of stricter food she made up for the delicacies she had enjoyed before and the once numerous dishes: through a small window she frequently listened to the divine offices, intent on psalms and prayers. But the daughters of noble knights of the Einrich, bound over to the service of the Lord by the example of the lady countess Guda, were not permitted under the new statutes to fix their seat there, but (as we shall see in its place) were transferred to the Valley of St. Mary. Wherefore Brower seems to have erred, when he hints that a congregation of nuns existed there for some time Annales Trevir. lib. XIV, num. 34, tom. II, pag. 41.; only Guda's small chapel, built against the church, was there.

§ V. The foundation of the abbey of Arnstein.

The foundation and endowment of the monastery of Arnstein After we have thus explained the institutions, as far as seemed sufficient, we must now come to the monasteries, in the founding of which Blessed Louis had the greatest part. In the first place comes Arnstein, whose beginnings are assigned by the biographer to the year 1139; and at this same time the father in Christ, the aforesaid Godfrey, by the venerable Adalbero, archbishop of Trier and from the year 1135 Browerus, Annales Trevirenses, tom. II, p. 33. legate of the apostolic see in the Teutonic kingdom, that is, through the provinces or dioceses of Trier, Mainz, Cologne, Salzburg, Bremen, and Magdeburg Ibid., pag. cit., was solemnly ordained provost in a general synod, or of the whole diocese of Trier. For at that time abbots were more rarely called

the prelates of the Premonstratensians Le Paige, Bibliotheca Præmonstratensis, p. 547.. This synod seems to have been celebrated on the feast of Pentecost of the year 1140. Certainly Brower or Masen, who had in hand besides the Life of Blessed Louis other Arnstein writings, assigned the foundation of the new monastery to one year, the blessing of Godfrey to another: in fact he attaches the former to the year 1138, the latter to the following year Annales Trevirenses, tom. II, p. 41.; but these things slipped from an imprudent pen. For it is manifestly established from the biographer that Blessed Louis handed over himself and his goods into the hands of Godfrey in the year 1139; and in the Conspectus of the synods of Germany Prospectus, Supplementum Conciliorum Germaniæ, p. 8., which Binterim and Floss were planning to bring out in the year 1851, no synod of Trier is seen under the year 1139, but only under the following year. Brower seems to have known something of its acts Annales Trevirenses, t. II, p. 41., since he narrates that to this assembly came both princes of both orders and men outstanding in religion and learning, and that in it there was action on cutting back vices, already very strong and almost full-grown and breaking out everywhere. It is very likely that on the same occasion (for in other synods he granted diplomas of this kind) the venerable lord Albero, archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see, to the count and brothers of Arinstein, for the salvation of his soul and those of his successors, handed over by perpetual donation and confirmed by privileges all those things which Blessed Louis and his wife Guda had given for the endowment of the new ascetery. But no one up to this day has published this diploma, which nevertheless certainly existed, both from that place of the biographer and from the letters of Pope Innocent II, given in the year 1142. Receive these more solemn letters, already communicated to the public by Hugo Annales Præmonstr., tom. I, prol., col. CXIX., by Hontheim Hist. Trevir. diplom., tom. I, p. 548., Kremer Origines Nassavicæ, tom. II, p. 164., and more recently from the autograph copy by Beyer Urkundenbuch zur Mittelrheinischen Territorien, tom. I, p. 581..

[58] confirmed by Pope Innocent II Innocent, bishop, servant of the servants of God, to his beloved sons Godfrey, abbot of Arnstein, and his brothers, both present and those regularly to be substituted in the future, in perpetuity. To this end the care of the universal Church has been committed to us by God, the provider of all good things, that we may love religious persons, and be zealous in every way to propagate the religious life well-pleasing to God. For service rendered to God is never pleasing unless, proceeding from the root of charity, it is preserved by purity of religion. It behoves all lovers of the Christian faith, therefore, to love religion, and to cherish more attentively venerable places together with the persons themselves bound to the divine office, that they may be disturbed by no molestations of wicked men, or wearied by importunate exactions. Therefore, beloved sons in the Lord, we mercifully assent to your just requests, and we take under the protection of Blessed Peter and our own the Arnstein church of the Blessed Mother of God and ever-virgin Mary and of the glorious confessor of Christ Nicholas, in which you are bound to divine service, and we fortify it with the privilege of the present writing: decreeing first of all that the canonical order according to the Rule of Blessed Augustine and the institution of the Premonstratensian brothers be inviolably preserved there for all time. Let none of the brothers after making profession, at the prompting of any levity or on the pretext of a stricter religious life, dare to depart from the same cloister without the permission of the abbot and of the whole congregation. And let no one of the abbots or bishops, no one of the monks or clerics, receive one who departs without the security of common letters. Moreover, whatever possessions, whatever goods you at present justly and canonically possess, as much by the gift or concession of the illustrious man Lodewic and of his wife Goda as of others of God's faithful, or may in the future, God being propitious, be able to obtain by concession of pontiffs, bounty of kings or princes, offering of the faithful, or by other just means, shall remain firm and undiminished for you and your successors in perpetuity. Among which we have thought good to express these by their proper names: the church of St. Margaret with the tithe; the church of Kirechdorp with the tithe and its other appurtenances, as it is known to have been reasonably granted to you by our brother Albero, archbishop of Trier; Selebach with all its possession, as it has been granted to you by the aforesaid archbishop; Hatenhusen; Welterodhe; Gozemerodhe; Holdenroich; with all their appurtenances; the vineyards and woods at Neven; and Brunme with all right and dominion, as the aforesaid Lodewic is known to have granted to you; Bovenheim with the church and all its possessions; Wize and Becherheim. Let no cleric or lay person at all presume to exact tithes from you of your labours, which you cultivate with your own hands or at your own expense, or from the feeding of your animals. When you, the present abbot of the same place, or any of your successors, shall die, let no one be set over it by any cunning of surreptition or violence; but let it be permitted to you by common counsel, or the part of sounder counsel, according to the fear of God and the Rule of Blessed Augustine, without anyone's contradiction, to elect an abbot. Further, let no one presume to invade or usurp the advocacy of your place, except him whom the abbot and brothers shall see fit to elect according to God and the use of the place itself. We decree therefore … may they find the rewards of eternal peace. Amen. Amen. Amen. Farewell. I, Innocent, bishop of the Catholic Church. I, Conrad, bishop of Sabina. I, Stephen, bishop of Palestrina. I, Stantius, cardinal presbyter of the title of St. Sabina. I, Guido, cardinal presbyter of the title of St. Chrysogonus. I, Rainer, cardinal presbyter of the title of St. Prisca. I, Gregory, cardinal deacon of SS. Sergius and Bacchus. I, Otto, cardinal deacon of St. George in Velabro. I, Guido, cardinal deacon of SS. Cosmas and Damian. I, Peter, cardinal deacon of St. Mary in Porticu. Given at the Lateran by the hand of Gerard, cardinal presbyter and librarian of the Holy Roman Church. On the 2nd before the Kalends of October. In the 6th indiction. In the year of the Lord's incarnation 1142. And in the 13th year of the pontificate of the lord Pope Innocent II.

[59] and by King Conrad. That these things might be the firmer, Blessed Louis and Guda wished that they should also be confirmed by King Conrad; as is manifest from the following diploma, solemnly given at Speyer in the year 1146 and already brought to light by Blanpin or Hugo [Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, tom. II, p. 44; Annales Præmonstr., tom. I, prol., col. CXXI.], by Hontheim Hist. Trev. diplom., tom. I, p. 552., Gudenus Codex diplomaticus, tom. II, p. 10., Kremer Origines Nassovicæ, tom. II, p. 167., and also Beyer Urkundenbuch, tom. I, p. 599.. Since this also pertains particularly to the deeds of Blessed Louis, it did not seem right to omit it. I. N. S. E. I. T. Conrad the Second, by the favour of divine clemency king of the Romans. Let it be known to all the faithful of God, both future and present, that Count Ludewic of Arenstein and Countess Guda his wife, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, working in a wonderful way where he wills, offered their free estates, hereditarily possessed by them, to St. Peter in the church of Trier: on this right only, that the abbot whom they have set over the cœnobium established from their possessions for the remedy of their souls in honour of St. Mary and St. Nicholas and St. Margaret shall obtain his place and dignity in the synod of Trier; and that the convent of his brothers shall have free election of abbots; and shall appoint for itself whatever advocate it wishes. They also decreed that from their castle named Arenstein there should be established a tabernacle of the warfare of God, with brothers there serving God continually in imitation of the Premonstratensian canons under the Rule of Blessed Augustine; and that their remaining estates, both trackless and passable, both wooded and level, meadows, pastures, and water-courses, forest glades, fisheries, huntings, should pertain to this cœnobium, and that the people of the same place, belonging to the same court, should pay, namely a man 4 denarii, women 2. And these are the names of the places pertaining by their right to the church of the aforesaid cell: Selbach, Kirchtorf, namely the church with all the tithe, Gozmirod and Kebirlo, Weltrod, Hattinhusen, Salscheit, Holdenrucke, three hides of Syngobin, Brunenbach, two hides of Pissenhophen, Neiven with vineyards and woods, Wezhe, Bubinheim with the church and all the people of the same town, one hide of another town also named Bubinheim, which pays 10 solidi every year. We therefore, consenting to their will, have satisfied their petition, and have confirmed by our authority the disposition and statute concerning all their possessions with the aforesaid royal right; of which confirmation we have called in as witnesses those written below. Siegfried, bishop of the church of Speyer; Bucco, bishop of Worms; Wolnand, abbot of Lorsch; Benedict, abbot of Hirsau; Duke Frederick, Hermann, count palatine; Eberhard, Emicho, Eckbert, Ulric, Henry of Catzinelenbogin, Bobbo of Hennenberch, Adalbert of Lewinstein, all counts; Ulric of Thurningen, Godfrey of Spaneim, Gerlach of Isinburch, and many others of the same condition. Sign of the lord Conrad the Second, king of the Romans. I, Arnold, chancellor, in place of Henry, archbishop of Mainz and archchancellor, have certified it. Done in the year of the Lord's incarnation 1146, in the 7th indiction, in the reign of Conrad the Second, king of the Romans, and in the 7th year of his reign. Given at Speyer. Happily. Amen.

[60] The advocacy, first free, then granted to the archbishops of Trier, Those of Arnstein have up to now considered it in the place of a singular benefit that no count or prince was their advocate by hereditary right or fixed law, and that they had the faculty of electing whom they wished. But this at the beginning had been the condition of almost all monasteries; but since at that time it was in the morals and (so to speak) the nature of men that all offices should be converted into benefices and become hereditary, there was the danger that Arnstein too should get its hereditary advocates: which plague was generally very great. For, so far from many protecting churches and the servants of God in accordance with the name of their office, they gaped at their goods like harpies, first generally demanding payment, then whatever they pleased, or seizing it by force; nor did any diocese suffer more from this pest than that of Trier [Cfr Würdtwein, De advocatis monasteriorum meditationes diplomaticæ, in tomo IV Monastici Palatini.]. That Arnstein, therefore, might be free from this tyranny, it was prudently decided to confer the advocacy on the archbishop of Trier alone, on whom the monastery otherwise depended, as not yet being exempted from the diocesan law; and it was also given to the prelate of Trier from the beginning on this principle, that direct dominion should be in his hands, and only useful dominion in the hands of the canons. Afterwards, however, these strove to free themselves from those hindrances, contending that the monastery had regard immediately to the empire, enjoying the full right of the sword Hugo, Annales Præmonstrat., tom. I, p. 202.; but to this the archbishops of Trier did not consent: whence a long-lasting lawsuit arose. To this in the year 1756 an end was put by an amicable composition, by which

those of Arnstein acknowledged that they were subject to the supreme electoral authority Marx, Geschichte des Erzstifts Trier, part. II, tom. II, p. 187, not. 3.. And this was evidently their original condition, as was already to be seen in other letters, but much more clearly in those of Hillin, successor of Adalbero in the see of Trier. Although these have already been published by Blanpin and Hugo [Annales Præmonstr., tom. I, prob. CXXII; Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, tom. II, p. 46.], Hontheim Hist. Trevir. diplom., tom. I, p. 572., Gudenus Cod. diplom., tom. II, p. 12., Kremer Orig. Nassov., tom. II, p. 176., and Beyer Urkundenbuch etc., tom. I, p. 653., we give them here too, since nowhere are the origins of Arnstein placed in greater light.

[61] as is clear from the letters of Archbishop Hillin. I. N. S. E. I. T. Hillin, archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see. If in the most holy books of the Gospels the widow woman, putting two mites into the treasury, was praised by the Lord more than the others, because she kept nothing for herself, those others, although they offered greater things, yet not offering all their own; much more ought we to honour and love those who, leaving themselves and their goods with faithful devotion, have bound themselves in all things to divine service, and out of the office of pontificate and legation divinely enjoined on us to maintain them; and to defend and fortify them as far as we can against all incursions of injurious persons; that we also, cooperating with their good works by our zeal, may be able to share with them in the eternal recompense. Wherefore we make known to those future as well as present, that the illustrious Count Lodewic together with his distinguished spouse Guda, in the times of our predecessor of venerable memory the lord Albero, renouncing for love of the heavenly kingdom their fortress which is called Arenstein together with all their allod, offered it with ready will to Blessed Mary, Mother of God, and to St. Nicholas, and arranged that the canonical life according to the Rule of Blessed Augustine and the order of the house of Prémontré should be preserved there in perpetuity. And in process of time, brothers having now been established there, at the exhortation of the same predecessor of ours they handed over the place itself with all its appurtenances to the church of Blessed Peter, over which we by God's authorship preside, without any payment of rent, and received from him, in recompense for so great a devotion, certain goods, which Lodewic himself had previously held in fief from the archbishopric of Trier, to be possessed in perpetuity by right of ownership. We therefore, assenting to their just petitions, take under our protection and the defence of the apostolic see, which by grace of the legation we serve in the Teutonic kingdom, the same place with all estates and possessions or any goods whatever hitherto handed over to it or hereafter to be handed over by just means, to be defended. These possessions, therefore, of the aforesaid church in Arenstein we fortify by the authority of our privilege: namely Bovenheim, which is in the district of Worms, with the church, tithes, and people, and all its revenues, so that it is subject to no secular power; in the archbishopric of Mainz, in the town of Wisze, 30 manses, and the cloister at Gomersheim, with all its appendages; likewise in our archbishopric, in the town of Hattenhusen, 8 manses; at Weltrode, 4 manses; and the town of Gozmerode with all right except two manses; at Brunenbach one manse; and the court of Holdenrucke with all right; and Salscheid with all the tithe; at Singoven three manses; in the town of Neve and at Breme vineyards, fields, woods, and the tithe of selected land; at Campe a court and vineyards; likewise he handed over by lawful donation the church of St. Margaret at Arenstein. Moreover, the court of Selebach, and the church of Kirchtorph, which our aforesaid predecessor Albero of pious memory conferred on the same church in Arenstein, we also, for the remission of our sins and those of all our successors, the archbishops, hand over for the uses of the brothers serving God there, with all right and entirety, namely with the people and all the tithes pertaining to the church of Kirchtorph; and we wholly emancipate that church, as also that of Blessed Margaret at Arenstein, from synodal right, and from every service to archbishop, archdeacon, or dean; and we grant entirely all the tithe of both parishes; even as we know it to have been granted by our predecessor. If it should happen that any goods of the brothers are transferred from place to place within our bishopric, we decree that they are free from every burden of toll or tax. This also we confirm, that no advocate shall at any time be set over the aforesaid goods; but that they shall stand safe solely under the fortification of our protection or that of our successors. For the rest we decree that no abbot shall ever be established there, except him whom the convent of the brothers shall in common by free consent elect. If anyone therefore (which God forbid!) shall attempt with rash daring to go against the page of this our constitution, let him feel the most severe vengeance of divine indignation, and let him lie under the sentence of the anathema to be feared, until he comes to his senses by worthy satisfaction. But to the preservers of this our confirmation may life, health, peace, and joy remain without end. Amen. The witnesses of this matter are: Godfrey, provost of the cathedral and archdeacon. Rudolf, dean and archdeacon. Alexander, archdeacon. Bruno, archdeacon and provost of St. Florin at Koblenz. John, archdeacon. Conrad, provost of St. Paulinus. Baldric, scholasticus of the cathedral and provost of St. Simeon. Bovo, provost of St. Castor at Koblenz. Robert, provost of Pfalzel. Eustace, abbot of Arenstein. Siger, abbot of St. Maximin. Bertolf, abbot of St. Eucharius. Lodewic, abbot of Old St. Mary's. Godfrey, abbot of St. Martin. Richard, abbot of Springiersbach. Wichmann, abbot of Luneche. Wolfram, abbot of Wadgassen. Henry, abbot of Rumerstorph. Hildelin, abbot of Schönau. Wichmann, abbot of Grunowe. Henry, count of Luxemburg. Albert, count of Chiny. Siegfried, count of Vianden. Arnold of Sierck. Cuno of Malberg. William the Marshal. Gerhard of Hasch. Hermann of Palacium. Frederick of Marceto. Frederick Aureus. These things were done at Trier, on the 4th before the Kalends of November, in the year of the Lord's incarnation 1156. In the fourth indiction. Epact 7. Concurrent 7. In the 4th year of the pontificate of the venerable lord Hillin, archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see. Happily. Amen.

[62] [The abbot of Arnstein and Blessed Louis sell goods to the sisters of Insula, and receive the allod of Offerdieffenbach and other things.] In the year 1160, as Hillin in a diploma testifies [Gunther, Cod. dipl. Rheno-Mosellanus, tom. I, p. 370; Beyer, Urkundenbuch etc., tom. I, p. 681.], at Koblenz some change was made in the goods of Arnstein; namely, Abbot Richard of Springiersbach came to meet the abbot of Harnestein and his chapter and acquired the allod of Neive and of Bremme from him and from Brother Lodvic, formerly count, who conferred the same allod on the church of Harnestein, and from the whole chapter, by just and lawful purchase, for the use of the sisters of Insula, namely at the price of eighty marks in our presence, says Hillin; where it is notable that Blessed Louis, although he had long since given these estates, comes forward as seller: but this was done for the sake of propriety rather than of necessity. Eighty marks weighed (since Cologne weights were in use there) 18,704 grammes, and were worth as much as 57,973 francs; whose purchasing power today would be as great as that of 347,838 francs. The convent of Insula must be distinguished from the one of the same name at Trier and at Koblenz. This one is situated in the diocese of Mainz near Breimpta, afterwards called the cœnobium of Stuben, and begun by Blessed Gisela according to the canonical institutions of St. Augustine under the care of Richard, abbot of Springiersbach Zunggo, Hist. ord. canon. regular. prodromus, tom. II, p. 600 et 601.. Three years later, namely in the year 1163, Hartrad of Merenberck and his wife Ermengard, with the consent of their children and heirs, conferred on the church of Arenstein for the salvation of their souls the allod of Overdieffenbach in the Eynricha, with the church and the men pertaining to the church, with the entirety of the tithe of the same town and all the appurtenances pertaining to it, both in fields and in meadows, and the whole tithe of Bettendorf and half of the tithe of Schara, and a certain forest (which is called Kamervorst) which pertains to the same town, and the whole wood which is called Burstenbach, except for the fifth tree, which pertains to Kazeneleboge, and, for the greater firmness of the deed, resigned all the aforesaid into the hands of Archbishop Hillin; namely on this tenor, that no advocate of the aforesaid town should thereafter be set up other than the archbishop of Trier [Hontheim, Hist. dipl. Trev., tom. I, p. 599; Beyer, Urkundenbuch, tom. I, p. 697.]. To this gift was added the church of Beslich in the parish of Dietkirchen, with the obligation of paying every year to the archbishops of Trier one gold piece, or twelve silver pieces of Koblenz. Hontheim will have it Ibid., loc. cit., and others before him [Nachricht von der Commende Schiffenberg in der Merenbergischen Geslechtstafel; Fischer, Isenburg-Wiedische Geslechtsregister, p. 44 et seqq. App., p. 28, not. b.], that Irmengard was the paternal aunt of Blessed Louis, and so that community of blood and affinity had some force toward this donation; but this kinship rests on divination rather than on any argument Cfr Kremer, Origines Nassavicæ, tom. II, p. 327..

[63] What those of Arnstein already possessed in the time of Innocent II. If we gather these things up, it is altogether manifest that all those goods which the biographer lists were not given from the beginning to the ascetery of Arnstein, but accrued little by little; moreover, that when he was writing, some of them had already come into other hands. In the diploma of Innocent II there comes as a gift of Blessed Louis first of all the church of St. Margaret with the tithe, which stands at the foot of the hill on which the cœnobium of Arnstein rises, and which now for some years, by the folly of the Nassau government, has been falling into ruin: then at Hatenhusen, now Attenhausen, near Dietz in the district of Nassau, eight manses; third at Welterodhe, Welteroid, Weltrod, not far from Schönau in the duchy of Nassau, four manses; fourth the town of Gozemerode, Gozmirod, Gesmerod, commonly Roth or Grosroth, near Kirdorf, in the district of Nassau, with all right except two manses [Diploma Hillini.] and [with the court or rustic estate of Keberlo, Kebirlo, Köberle, likewise near Kirdorf Diploma Conradi et biographus.]; fifth the court of Holdenrike, Holdenroich, Holdenrucke, now the town or estate of Hollerich, near Selbach in the district of Nassau; sixth fields, vineyards, and woods and some tithe at Neive, Neven, now Neef, on the Moselle between Cochem and Zell, and not Neithof near Arnstein, as Wenck will have it Katzenelenbogische Geschichte, p. 111, not. b.; seventh likewise at Brunme, Breme, Bremme, likewise on the Moselle, a little below Neef, closer to Cochem: both of which possessions in the year 1160 came into the hands of the sisters of Insula at the price (as we saw) of 80 marks; eighth Bovenheim, Bubenheim, Boumhain, Bubinheim, near Kirberg in the duchy of Nassau and in the former

district of Worms, with the church, tithes, people, and revenues; ninth in the town of Wizze, Witzen, Wisze, Weshe, now Ober and Nieder Wiesen, in the archbishopric of Mainz beyond the Rhine, thirty manses; tenth Becherheim, which occurs in one diploma of Innocent II. These are from the donation of Blessed Louis. To which were added by gift of Archbishop Adalbero the church of Kirechdorp, Kirchtorff, or Kirdorf in the duchy of Nassau, not far from Arnstein and Runkel. In the diploma of King Conrad there comes, four years later, Salschheit, an estate near Selbach, with all the tithe; three hides or manses of Syngobin, Singhovin, Singoven, now Singhoven, near Nassau; one manse at Brunenbach, now Hof zum Haus, in the tract of Nassau; two hides of Pissenhoven, Pissinhophen, now Pissighoven, near Nastätten, which afterwards no longer reappear; at Campe on the Rhine a court and vineyards: which village we saw reckoned earlier to the county of Arnold and Louis; and finally one hide of another town also named Bubinheim, which pays 10 solidi every year: which I have met with nowhere else. The allod of Overdiefenbach, which by gift of Hartard of Merenberg came to those of Arnstein in the year 1163, was situated near Nastätten (as we have already noted elsewhere); similarly Bettendorf, whose tithe the same man gave. Schura or Scura, now Scheuern, half of whose tithe Hartard also conferred, is in the duchy of Nassau; the forest of Kamervorst likewise near Nastätten; nor far from there the wood of Brustenbach, except that the fifth tree (the biographer has eight trees) pertained to Kazenelenboge near Nastätten. To this review these words of Brower Sidera Germaniæ, Vita B. M. Ludwici Arnsteinii, p. 28 et 29. seem worth adding: Those expert in such matters advise me that in the tract of the Lahn each manse, combining old with new, comprises thirty jugera of tilled land or arable soil, besides fishponds, pastures, and woods, which are usually included in manses; the yield, however, varies with the nature of the place and time. Albert Krantz in book IV of the Wandalia, chapters XXV and XXIX, weighs out as the measure of each manse of the Holstein dominion eight modii (or maldra) of rye and as many of oats; elsewhere they take only ten of rye or wheat. The juger, very different in Germany according to places, contains about 40,000 ares or square feet; the maldrum, no less various, is nearly equivalent to two hectolitres. Most manses, however, are judged to have consisted of twenty hectares. And that formerly from leased lands not much more than one per cent of the purchase price was received I have demonstrated elsewhere Acta SS., tom. IX Octobris, p. 217..

§ VI. The foundations of the monasteries at the Dreisa, of the Valley of St. Mary, and of Enkenbach.

What part Blessed Louis had in the foundation or ordering of Münster-Dreisen, In the diploma of King Conrad there is also listed, but under a wholly different name, the cloister of Gomersheim with all its appendages; and in the other of Hillin the church of Beslich in the parish of Dietkirchen; in both of which Blessed Louis had Premonstratensian nuns placed. This calls us back to the foundations of other monasteries, in which the venerable man had a notable part, and which I shall now try to explain in chronological order. There comes, then, in the first place a cœnobium of men, situated not far from Bolanden by Mons Jovis or the Mount of Thunder (Donnersberg), at the stream Primma (Primmbach) in the district of Nachgowe, whose common name is Münster-Dreisen or Münster-Treisen [Cfr Würdtwein, Monasticum Palatinum, tom. V, p. 441; Remling, Abteien in Rheinbayern, tom. II, p. 103.]. It had originally been founded in the year 863 by Count Nantharius and his wife Cunegund under the patronage of St. Saturninus the martyr, and they had prescribed the observance of the Rule of St. Benedict; it had been inhabited by nuns, until the Hungarians burst into these parts and, polluting everything with slaughter and rapine, drove the spouses of Christ to flight Remling, t. II, p. 104.. The place had afterwards a second time been assigned to the divine service, both to nuns and to men canons, namely regular ones, as is reported by the biographer; but it had utterly fallen away from all discipline, so that hunting dogs ran about in the sanctuary of the church. The witness of this was, in the year 1144, Frederick of Hohenstaufen, duke of Swabia and Alsace, brother of Conrad III and father of Frederick Barbarossa, emperors of the Romans; who, since he held the advocacy of that tract or was provincial count (which office afterwards came into the hands of Theodoric, count of Lower Alsace), moved by pity, in accordance with that conjunction and confusion of spiritual and civil authority which then flourished, asked Blessed Louis, his blood relation, whom he had in his retinue, to set in order there the observance of monastic religion; and when he had assented, he handed over to his beloved count and convert that same place with all ownership of its goods: as the biographer relates. There also contributed their labour the son of the new founder, Frederick Barbarossa, and also the provost Anselm, who resided there, so that the endowment of the restored ascetery might grow somewhat. By their persuasion, then, Beatrice and Matilda, countesses or marchionesses of Tuscany, gave as a gift, besides other goods at Waleswilre, eighteen manses, together with the tithes and church of Stetten Ibid., p. 105.; whose patronage the canons of Worms ceded in the year 1231 Schannat, Hist. Wormatiensis, tom. I, p. 52..

[65] [this being entrusted to him by Frederick of Hohenstaufen at the intervention of the Emperor Conrad:] And all these things the Emperor Conrad confirmed by a diploma; which, since it contributes somewhat to the praise of Blessed Louis, it has seemed right to print in this place Acta academiæ Palatinæ, t. I, pag. 297.. In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, Conrad the Second, by the favour of divine clemency king of the Romans. It belongs to royal liberality, whose honour loves judgment, to lend the ear of piety to the petitions of religious persons, and to promote with the highest zeal of benevolence what pertains to the worship of God. Whence we trust that a worthy repayment of good reward in eternal life, and glory in the administration of the temporal kingdom, will accrue to us. Therefore let the diligence of all, both future and present, know that the illustrious man Frederick, our brother, duke of Swabia and Alsace, approaching our highness, asked that a certain church, built by Nantharius, formerly duke, and his wife Chunigunt in honour of God and our Lord Jesus Christ and St. Saturninus the martyr, and ordered with fitting disciplines of nuns and women devoted to God, but now for a long time back destitute of all divine worship and of the attendance of those serving God, and at length devolved to the power of his dominion and of the provincial count Theoderic, we should by our royal authority call back to the former strength of its dignity and religion. Therefore, at his petition and with his consent, we have committed the same church of St. Saturninus, situated then in the district of Worms, now in the bishopric of Mainz, to be ruled and ordered to Luodewic, count of Arnestein, and to the brothers at Arnestein, who are gathered under the canonical Rule of Blessed Augustine and the Premonstratensian order: on this principle, that they shall henceforth provide for the aforesaid place in every care and ordering without contradiction from any person. The possessions and estates, which the aforesaid Nantharius and his wife handed over to the aforesaid venerable place, for the use and sustenance of those serving God there, we by the authority of the present page restore with all entirety to the aforenamed church and its provisors, and confirm with perpetual stability: namely in the town and in the mark called Dreisa, 18 manses with all buildings and slaves of both sexes; in the town of Albesheim 2 manses; in the town of Dakenheim 3 manses; in the town of Bizzrihesheim whatever they possessed; in the town of Elmuotesheim 2 manses; in the town of Enslitheim 3 manses; in the town of Munnesheim 1 manse; in the town of St. Alban paying 10 solidi; in the town of Muterstat 1 manse; in the town of Munzenheim 1 manse; similarly in the town of Seleza a lordly court with all buildings and slaves, and 20 manses; also the town of Gibinezbach with slaves of both sexes; and the monastery which is in the city of Mainz, with all its appendages which are written below, 22 manses, and vineyards for 30 cartloads of wine; similarly the town of Neutriswilre and the grove of the same town; and Tilentkiriche with all its appendages; at Alsenzbrunne 2 manses; those goods also, which Beatrice and Matilda, marchionesses of Tuscany, for their souls and those of their husbands Godfrey and Boniface, at the admonition of Count Frederick our nephew and of Anselm, provost of the aforesaid church, conferred on the same monastery. We also, at the petition and with the consent of the oft-mentioned duke, restore and confirm to the same place all things, namely, which the aforesaid most noble women possessed; in the place called Steten, namely, 15 manses, paying every year 5 solidi less than 4 pounds, and three lordly manses; besides the church and all the tithe, namely the household of both sexes, revenues, and taxes, and the grain which is paid from the wood, with all its justice and composition, and all those things which they had in the place of Waleswilre, as much in wood and meadows and cart; what is paid from the mountains as in all appurtenances. All these things, which were conferred and handed over by the aforenamed persons to the oft-mentioned venerable monastery, we confirm in renewal under this firm principle, that the same possessions shall be free from every dominion and power both of our aforesaid brother Duke Frederick and of Theodoric, provincial count of the lower part of Alsace, and of other powers, namely counts and viscounts and advocates, and immune from all exaction or vexation, paying the sum of the due rent and being subject in every composition of law only to those who for the time shall preside over the monastery itself in canonical order. We grant, moreover, that both the possessions written above and those which in the future the brothers serving God there shall acquire by just means shall obtain the proper right of their liberty: no one forbidding them to use and enjoy what has been gained and is to be acquired, roads and trackless places, pastures, woods, waters and water-courses, fisheries, huntings, mills, and every fruit which can be taken from the same possessions for all time, both future and present. But if anyone (which God forbid!) shall attempt to infringe this our confirmation, let him compound a hundred pounds of purest gold: half of which let him pay to our chamber, and the rest to the aforesaid church of Münster. And that this page, which we have ordered to be written according to the tenor of the privilege of King Louis the Second, who in the times of Duke Nantharius had reigned in eastern Francia for 32 years, may remain firm and unshaken for all time thereafter, we have ordered it to be marked with the impression of our seal; corroborating it with our own hand, as is seen below. Those who were present as witnesses we have caused to be noted beneath. Whose names are these: Frederick, archbishop of Magdeburg; Bucco, bishop of Worms; Siegfried, bishop of Speyer; Imbrico, bishop of Würzburg; Egilbert, bishop of Bamberg; Henry, bishop of Merseburg; Udo, bishop of Zeitz; Otto, bishop of Freising; Wigger, bishop of Brandenburg; Henry, bishop of Regensburg; abbot

of Stavelot; Conrad, provost of the most serene king; Adalbert, margrave of Saxony; Margrave Conrad of Wettin; Margrave Diepold of Bavaria; Godfrey, provincial count of Thuringia; Rapoto, count of Abenberg; Boppo, count of Laufen; Adolf, count of Berg, and his son Eberhard; Otto, count of Rieneck; Otto, count palatine of Wittelsbach; and others, both clerics and lay persons, who were present. Sign of the lord Conrad the Second, king of the Romans. I, Arnold, chancellor, in place of Henry, archbishop of Mainz and archchancellor, have certified it. In the year of the Lord's incarnation 1144, in the 6th indiction, in the reign of Conrad the Second, king of the Romans, and in the 7th year of his reign, given at Bamberg, happily in Christ.

[66] the fortunes of that monastery. Provost Anselm, therefore, was removed; and although the deeds of Blessed Louis had been approved by the canons of Arnstein, it did not seem good to lead out all the new colonists from Arnstein: for this very house was rather recent. Having therefore held counsel with his brothers, the blessed man went again to Saxony and chose six canons of Gratia Dei of approved way of life; to whom Father Godfrey joined other suitable persons, setting over them Marquard, the count's chaplain, who with his former master was striving toward the summit of virtues. Thence was brought together the proper number of canons, namely twelve with the abbot; and they were brought in in the year 1145. Marquard was succeeded by Burchard, who fortified the most holy man in the convent of Gummersheim with the last sacraments for the agony of death. That abbey existed, subject by filial right to that of Arnstein, up to the year 1553. Two years before, namely, Pope Julius III had given Frederick II, count palatine, the power of suppressing twelve religious houses and of assigning their goods to the university of Heidelberg and to the increase of divine worship in the castle chapel; among which was Münsterdreisen [Vide instrumentum ap. Remling, Klöster in Rhein-Bayern, tom. I, p. 319. Cfr. Acta Academiæ Palatinæ, tom. I, p. 387 et 388.]. This was carried into execution on the 6th of September of the year 1553, the keys being handed over by the cellarer Valentine Weissbrod into the hands of the rector John Wagenmann and of the dean of the Holy Spirit, Wendelin Sprenger. But shortly afterwards Frederick III gave the religious house and its goods to his brother, George von Simmeren, who then granted them in fief to ministerials. In the Thirty Years' War those of Arnstein tried to recover the Monastery; but in a vain attempt. Afterwards the princes of Nassau bought it, who also possessed it at the end of the last century but one Remling, tom. II, p. 111 et 112..

[67] The blessed man sets in order the convent The monastery founded at the Dreisa was shortly followed by other foundations: one of which has as it were a manifold aspect. And the nuns, says the biographer, who were dwelling first at Bethlenrode, then at Steden, in whose college were daughters of noble knights of the Eynrich, bound over to the service of the Lord by the example of the lady countess Guda, he transferred to the Valley of St. Mary; from whom afterwards he transplanted the cœnobium of ladies which is called Enckenbach. In which words is contained the foundation of two cœnobia: of which one was established first at Betlenrode, then at Steden, and finally in the Valley of St. Mary; but the other, a colony of the former, stood from the beginning at Enckenbach. Let us explain these things a little more fully. When Blessed Louis was wholly converted to God, wonderful movements of minds were stirred up; so that many of his ministerials, who previously had been living in the manner of brigands, followed his example. No less force had the change of Guda, his wife, among the female sex; and many resolved to embrace the same way of life. But since double monasteries (as has been declared above) had been forbidden by decree of the Premonstratensian chapter, it was not permitted to admit them at Arnstein; for which reason they were gathered at Betlenrode, which must be called the first seat of the Vallis Mariæ or Marienthal cœnobium, and which Remling wrote was situated in the district of the Einrich Klöster von Rhein-Bayern, tom. II, p. 165., since in this college were daughters of noble knights of the Eynrich; but there is no place there (that I know of) whose name agrees to any extent with Betlenrode: nevertheless one must not depart from this opinion, since Steten, now Steden, the second seat of this convent, is in those parts. For Steden, as is established for me from the most accurate topographical maps of this region, lies in the duchy of Nassau on the right bank of the river Lahn, a little below Runkel Cfr Vogel, Historische Topographie des Herzogthums Nassau, p. 227., some leagues from Limburg to the south-east; hence in Hugo's Premonstratensian Annals Tom. II, p. 1033. Steden is called a town of the county of Runkel. Remling errs greatly in transferring the farmstead of Steten to the neighbourhood of Kircheim-Bolanden, into the former diocese of Worms, because those of Marienthal had many goods there.

[68] of the Valley of St. Mary; whose fortunes are indicated: There is no doubt, further, that in both places a provost from Arnstein administered the spiritual and temporal affairs of the nuns. But Blessed Louis changed this rule when he transferred the convent into the neighbourhood of the Monastery at the Dreisa and called it by a new name, Valley of St. Mary. For from this time provosts were taken from the Monastery at the Dreisa. This Remling relates Klöster von Rhein-Bayern, tom. II, p. 165. to have been done already about the year 1145, on what surety I do not know; Hugo Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. I, ad fin. Præf. Circaria Vadegotiæ., however, relying doubtless on the catalogues of the circaries, binds its beginnings to the year 1140, since he reckons them from the first seat. But whatever it may be, it appears that those nuns stayed a very short time at Betlenrode and Steden. Of the third seat, or the Valley of St. Mary, there survives only the very beautiful church of Blessed Mary, completed in the year 1478 (if the inscription of the choir is rightly read). It lies on the north side of the Mount of Thunder, below the sources of the stream Appelbach, in the midst of hills and at the meeting, so to speak, of three valleys. The cœnobium was subject to the archbishop of Mainz, in whose diocese it lay, and to the counts of Sponheim, who in the fourteenth century had obtained the office of advocates by maternal inheritance: which advocacy they gave in fief to the counts of Dhaun by reason of the county of Falkenstein, of which it was at the same time a part. And after it had flourished at the beginning, it then little by little lost its goods, until in the sixteenth century, heresy prevailing, in the Peasants' War, the nuns who remained fled away. On the 7th of September of the year 1553 the university of Heidelberg occupied the parish church, since by the diploma of Julius III it had succeeded to the rights of the Monastery at the Dreisa. Hence arose a suit between the Palatine or the university, relying on the pontifical letters, and the count of Falkenstein, alleging the rights of advocacy; which was settled on the 14th of January by the authority of the Emperor Charles V, on this condition, that the house of Falkenstein might enter into possession of the cœnobium and all its goods on payment of six hundred florins to the opposite party: and from that time the Falkensteins have been enriched by this booty Remling, tom. II, p. 164 et seqq..

[69] similarly that of Enkenbach; From the nuns of the Valley of St. Mary Blessed Louis afterwards transplanted the cœnobium of ladies which is called Eynkenbach, as is reported by the biographer; that is, from the congregation of the Valley of St. Mary he selected nuns, whom he destined for Enckenbach, when he established a cœnobium of ladies there. Nor were the Valley of St. Mary and Enkenbach much distant from each other, since this place also is situated at the foot of the Mount of Thunder, in the Lower Palatinate, in the diocese of Mainz; and indeed in the neighbourhood of the Monastery at the Dreisa, from which it received its provost and all spiritual aid; two leagues from Lutra Cæsarea or Kaiserslautern to the north-east; in a valley surrounded by sandy, but fertile, hills Ibid. tom. II, pag. 138; Hugo, Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. I, col. 647.. Its foundation is assigned to the year 1148 by Hugo, the Premonstratensian annalist Tom. I, col. cit.; which matter he could easily have learned from the catalogues of the Circaries. The chief endowment was given by a certain illustrious man named Hunfrid; who, having raised a great building, conferred the place with the surrounding fields on the Monastery at the Dreisa, on this condition, that Premonstratensian nuns should be established there. Blessed Louis therefore arranged that they should be brought in there from the Valley of St. Mary, canons being summoned from the monastery of the Dreisa to administer their spiritual and temporal affairs Historia episcopatus Wormatiensis, tom. I, pag. 163.. He is said to have wished that only nobles should be admitted; whence it is called a cœnobium of ladies.

[70] on account of which disputes were stirred up, But not long afterwards disputes arose between the people of Otterberg, who, under Abbot Stephen, an excellent man and most acceptable to all, observed the institutions of the Cistercians, and those of Enckelbach, who followed the laws of St. Norbert. Whose origin is easily learned from the following narrative of Stephen himself. I desire it to be known, he says Würdtwein, Monasticum Palatinum, tom. I, pag. 254., to all the faithful, how the lord Degenhard, ministerial of the emperor, son of my paternal aunt, gave to our church the estate at Erlenbach left to him by his parents by hereditary right. He therefore, being made a monk with us, gave himself and the same estate to St. Mary and to us by lawful conveyance, and remained in the same will and work for five years; but afterwards, following the instability of his mind and abhorring the rigour of regular discipline, he departed from us and betook himself to Enckenbach: the estate, which was now not his but ours, he handed over to that second place. He had formerly a brother, Arnold by name; who, led astray by Brunicho, his uncle, handed over the aforesaid estate to them in exchange for that. And when on such an occasion he was striving to claim our estate for himself, we were forced to call for justice concerning it; and both he himself and the lord Cuno of Genther, his son-in-law, were cast out by anathema from ecclesiastical communion. But afterwards the suit was so settled that Arnold should receive ten talents of silver; Cuno of Genther and Eckbert of Lutra, his sons-in-law, ten solidi; his son John as much; Wernher, another son, a horse; and those of Otterberg should recover the estate.

[71] [settled only after the death of the blessed man, and the remaining fortunes are briefly declared;] While this suit was being carried on, the nobles went over to different sides. And indeed, since Hunfrid, whom Remling without any hesitation designates by the surname of Falkenstein Klöster in Rhein-Bayern, tom. II, pag. 139. (relying perhaps on a diploma of the year 1185 on establishing the boundaries of Otterberg Würdtwein, Monasticum Palatinum, tom. I, pag. 257., where among the witnesses comes Hunfrid of Falkenstein), but since Hunfrid favoured those of Otterberg, he took the cœnobium of Enckenbach away from those of the Monastery and transferred it to those of Otterberg. By which Degenhard was forced to depart or to be subject to the authority of those of Otterberg. But when the dispute over the estate of Erlenbach had ceased, Hunfrid, with the common counsel and assent of his relatives, amicably removed the possession from Odderburg through the recompense of another donation, and conferred it by lawful donation on those of the Monastery; who then kept that property for five years in quiet possession. But when Blessed Louis had gone the way of all flesh, it seemed opportune

to those of Otterberg to claim the convent of Enckenbach for themselves anew. Hence a suit arose between the abbots of the two communities; which finally in the year 1190 Conrad II, prelate of Worms, appointed for this purpose as supreme judge by King Henry, called the parties before him; where in the presence of the clergy of Worms and the burgesses, the number of lawful witnesses being determined by sentence, proving sufficiently what we have just adduced, they prevailed in the cause, as is read in the public letters of Bishop Conrad, addressed to Dudo, venerable abbot of the Monastery and of Enkenbach Schannat, Historia episc. Wormat. Probat. num. XCIII, pag. 87.. And so it came about that this foundation of Blessed Louis did not perish while he himself was still alive. But although it afterwards received many goods, it nevertheless contended almost always with debt and poverty, until in the year 1557 the provost Michael Reyhold, a man infected with the dogmas of Luther and of abandoned morals, for a fixed sum of money assigned to himself, surrendered the monastery and all its rights into the power of the palatine. After him, however, came another provost, named John; who in the year 1564 was forced to leave the provostship, no differently from the nuns who remained from the convent, the elector Frederick III claiming all the goods for himself. No traces of this ascetery now survive, except the very ancient church of the cœnobium.

§ VII. The foundations and fortunes of the monasteries at Gummersheim and Beselich.

The foundation of the convent of Gummersheim After this follows the foundation of the convent of Gummersheim, which in the Index of circaries and Premonstratensian monasteries, prefixed by Hugo to his Annals, I see referred to the year 1148. The biographer explains this business clearly enough. The blessed man had formerly had in the district of Worms the town of Bubenheim with its church, tithes, people, and other rights: which he had given as a gift to Arnstein. But, as we have once already noted from the biographer, he was often accustomed, by the abbot's leave, to go round to visit the churches which he had founded and their estates. When therefore he was making his way across to his allod of Bubenheim, he had frequently turned aside to Oternheim, in the diocese of Mainz, in the Palatinate, to the east of Landau, to the house of certain ministerials of the church of Blessed Stephen of Metz, by whom he was held celebrated in fame and most worthy in way of life. These, therefore, moved to divine things and good works by the piety and religion of the most holy count, offered with liberal vows to the oft-mentioned count houses, fields, and meadows in the neighbouring town of Gummersheim, to the praise of God, for the remission of their sins. And he, not abusing their benevolence to the praise of the Lord, built there on the little stream Selsa, in honour of the Mother of God and Blessed John the Evangelist, an oratory, nuns being gathered together. The diploma of foundation has not yet come to light, nor have the names of the founders met me in the books I use. What of the fact that in a diploma of the year 1263 Blessed Louis is said to have founded the church on ground of his own property? But, although this is a blemish, this diploma nevertheless contains in part the names of the first benefactors, and is a testimony that eighty years after his death Blessed Louis was held in such esteem that he was called Count Louis of holy memory in public instruments. Wherefore it has seemed right to recall it again to light in this place Würdtwein, Monasticum Palatinum, t. V, p. 203 et seqq..

[73] and the diploma in which Blessed Louis is said to be of holy memory. In the name of the Lord. Amen. Philip and Werner, brothers, called of Falkenstein, to all the faithful of Christ who shall inspect these letters, everlasting greeting in the Lord. Whereas Werner of Bolanden, our grandfather of pious memory, steward of the imperial court, and Philip of Falkenstein, our father, have with liberal clemency released the church of the holy Mother of God and Virgin Mary and of St. John the Evangelist at Gummersheim, which Count Ludewic of holy memory, afterwards a convert at Arnstein, had once founded on ground of his own property, that church itself and all its courts and estates, which were situated under their jurisdiction, from every exaction, request, or any ingenious molestation, which are situated in the small towns written above: attending to the indulgence of their clemency, and accounting it unworthy to degenerate in any degree from our forebears, holding as ratified and accepted, for our part and that of all our successors, that same favour of theirs which they granted to the aforesaid church, we release it from all molestation of requests or exactions, by the attestation of the present page, by unanimous consent, by free and liberal will, for the love of God and the remedy of our souls, with their possessions established in our district, and we protest it released in perpetuity by the tenor of these presents and the suffrage of the living voice; there being added on this matter the consent and favour of Philip, our most beloved father. And these are the towns in which those possessions are situated, which we decree to be released from exactions or requests: Gummersheim, Vreimersheim, Dalheim, and Gimmenheim. That no one of our successors, therefore, may be able in any degree to violate this page of our largesse, we have decreed that it be strengthened with the seal of Philip of Falkenstein our father and with the fortification of our seals. Done and given at Valckinova in the year of the Lord 1263. A similar diploma was given by their first cousin Werner of Bolanden, steward of the imperial court; except that in place of the town of Vreimersheim he wrote Winoldesheim.

[74] the fortunes of this ascetery. Not without joy did Blessed Louis also learn that Henry, abbot of Lorsch, in the year 1166 gave the land of his church in the village of Frenckenveldt, situated in the boundary of the town of Gernesheim, for the support of the handmaids of Christ dwelling at Gomersheim, under an annual rent of five ounces, to be paid to the cellarer of Lorsch Würdtwein, Monasterium Palatinum, t. V, p. 400 et seqq.. This convent also obtained other goods thereafter, which flourished under the abbot of Arnstein until the year 1565. For in a manuscript codex which Würdtwein had in his possession Ib., p. 441., these words were read: This monastery was occupied in the year 1565 by the Palatine. In the same year the abbess Apollonia of Bibelheim, the prioress Margaret of Rheskeim *, two conventuals Elizabeth of Hohenstein and Anna Jettia of Montzenberg ceded all the goods of the monastery; and each year for the days of their life they received some florins, and some ohms of wine, and some maltra of rye. Hugo agrees Annales Præmonstratenses, t. I, col. 107. that it was still occupied by the Elector Palatine in the middle of the eighteenth century. Whence I do not know what George Christian Joannis, continuator of the Rerum Moguntinarum of our Serarius, means, who in the section on Anselm Casimir relates these things Rerum Moguntinarum t. I, lib. V, p. 955.: Of the convent of Gummersheim, situated near the town of Odernheim, Anselm Casimir, archbishop of Mainz, took account in this same year (1644). For when the superior of the cœnobium of Worms, commonly called Marien-Münster and bound to the Cistercian rule, had set forth at length in how ruinous a state were the affairs of that cloister, she pointed out that, unless it were attributed to some other monastery, its possessions would come to be converted to profane uses against the pious will of the founders. That this might not come about, he judged that it must be guarded against without delay, and to the said convent of Marien-Münster, by documents drawn up on the 13th day of August, with the addition of every revenue, he united it in perpetuity. Similar things were related by Oliver Legipont Monasticum Moguntiacum, p. 45.. But perhaps both meant that the goods of the cœnobium of Gummersheim which had not been occupied by the heretics were granted to those of Marien-Münster by Anselm Casimir. A great part certainly was held back by those: for, says Blanpin in Hugo [Sacræ antiquitatis monumenta, t. II, p. 49; Annales Præmonstratenses, t. I, col. 789 et 790.], from the year 1574 the resources of the convent of Gummersheim had been converted to profane uses and wholly swallowed up by a voracious heretic. Indeed to this day there sits there a certain curator, who every year renders an account of the revenues of the monastery to the president of religion at Creuznach. What of the fact that the Acts of the Palatine Academy agree altogether with Würdtwein, testifying that the last abbess of the cœnobium, the rights of religion being violated, with her conventuals left it in the hands of the elector Frederick III Acta Academiæ Palatinæ, t. I, p. 26.?

[75] The foundation and fortunes of the convent at Beselich; The fifth foundation of Blessed Louis, finally, which is the third of nuns, was made at Beselich after the death of Godfrey, the first abbot; which abbot departed from among the living on the 12th of October of the year 1151 Hugo, Annales Præmonstratenses, t. I, col. 203.: made on the other hand before the end of the year 1163, in which Hillin, archbishop of Trier, gave a diploma confirming it. Moreover, from this diploma, which we indicated above in num. 62, and from the biographer, the origins of this ascetery can easily be investigated. In the parish of Dietkirchen, namely, which rises on the right of the river Lahn, a little above Limburg, and not far from Hadamar to the south-east, a certain presbyter, named Godfrey, had built a church called Beselich. When he had witnessed the piety and holiness of the new canons and nuns, he thought of transferring this building of his to those of Arnstein, on this condition, that a convent of nuns should be established there, with a provostship of canons, who should preside over spiritual and temporal affairs. But, as was to be seen elsewhere too, the Premonstratensians loved liberty. Alexander, archdeacon of Trier, in whose archdeaconry the aforesaid church had been built, was therefore asked to cede all his rights; which were as great as those of a vicar general now, except that they did not depend on the decision of the bishop. Archdeacon Alexander allowed himself to be prevailed upon. The right of advocacy, how grievous this generally was we have already said, was enjoyed by the lords of Katzenelebogen: and these renounced this right. The church therefore, freed from every right, by the right by which Godfrey possessed it, with all the tithe of the whole court, both of animals and of the other fruits existing within the court, he conferred with the consent of the lord Archdeacon Alexander on the church at Arenstein. Then at the request and petition of Louis, count in Arenstein, who built the church of the same place from the foundation and transferred himself from the enticements of this world to the same church to serve the living God, as is read at the end of the diploma, Archbishop Hillin confirmed all these things: but we have already given the instrument in part above in num. 62. At the beginning of the fifteenth century the convent suffered so much damage from a hostile hand that only two nuns survived among the ruins and old walls. But, God favouring, other virgins came and the ascetery flourished again, until the princes of Nassau adhered to the doctrines of the Protestants. Those of Katzenelenbogen and Diez therefore occupied the goods in the year 1612, and those of Runkel attempted the same with those fields which lay in their district. Whence arose a suit, which was settled in the year 1615, but boiled up again in the year 1624. While this was being carried on, and when a hospital had been erected in the former buildings, there came from the Emperor Ferdinand II an edict by which that division was made void and the goods were ordered to be restored to those of Arnstein. This was accomplished in the year 1628. What then followed it pleases me to explain a little more fully, since grave and long-lasting enmities thence arose against our Society.

[76] [whose goods, after the conversion of the prince of Nassau-Hadamar and of his dominion, accomplished by men of the Society of Jesus,] In the following year, then, John Louis of Nassau, prince of Hadamar, who, well armed (as it seemed to him) with the false arguments and captious little snares of the Calvinists, so trusted in himself and his cause that he feared the encounter of no Catholic in disputation, nevertheless, when he was at Vienna, having formed an acquaintance with our men and been drawn by them into disputation, surrendered to the truth, to such great congratulation of the princes and especially of the Emperor Ferdinand, that the emperor himself offered him, bound by the sacrament to the Church, to Cardinal Klesl, bishop of the city, to be fortified and confirmed with the sacred chrism, and with his own hands veiled his forehead, duly anointed (as custom has it), with a band, in the presence of the imperial children and the prince of Neuburg Cordara, Historiæ Societatis Jesu pars sexta, tom. II, pag. 291.. In order to drive the pestilent plague from his people as well, he came by design from the city of Vienna to Hadamar. Then another aspect of things was brought into the town, in which for eighty years only heresy had been admitted. The prince brought with him two fathers taken from the college of Koblenz. When he had arrived, he addressed the magistrates and notables who had been called, in an excellent speech. He for his part, he said, by the supreme benefit of God Almighty and Most Great, had at length vomited up the deadly poison of Calvin which he had wretchedly swallowed as a boy. Let them see for themselves what they would do. If, however, they wished to be saved, let them hereafter hear these fathers, true heralds of the divine word, and let them refer to them whatever doubt should arise. This would be most pleasing to him, nor was there anything else that he himself would rather wish from his dearest people. As he spoke thus all vehemently assented. For he was most acceptable to the people on account of his singular prudence and humanity. And after this, sermons began to be held by the fathers and frequented by the citizens. They spoke in the principal church of the city; and, finding their hearers readier than expected, they sowed the seeds of the future harvest, which afterwards grew up into the most beautiful crops. The townsfolk were moved especially by this, that they saw the deeds of the preachers correspond to their words. Then, comparing the thrift and frugality of the Catholic ministers with the avarice and gluttony of the others, their solicitude in helping the sick, the needy, and the afflicted with the pride and sloth of the latter, they concluded that there was indeed a great difference between true shepherds and hirelings. Wherefore they earnestly asked the prince that, the ministers of the Calvinist sect being removed, he should set Jesuits over all the parishes. He, who wished nothing better, had two other fathers sent to him and established a stable seat for them in the city. As soon as these began to administer the parishes, there was no delay in the rest being accomplished as desired. Immediately the townsfolk in crowds, and the country folk, returned to the authority of the Church. Silence was imposed on the trumpeters of novelty in the churches and schools. Altars, chapels, and sacred buildings, the squalor and mould being wiped away, were repaired Ibid. pag. 375.. Everywhere one could see people who had never put off their love of the Catholic religion bringing out of corners and hiding places sacred vestments, chalices, ornaments, and the rest of the equipment, which their parents had hidden eighty years before, hoping that a time would one day come when, the Catholic religion being restored to the joy of all, these things would again be in use Rhein. Antiquar. tom. II..

[77] passed to the Society of Jesus, There, then, the lord of the place, John Louis of Nassau, supported from his own means a station of a few persons, and he assisted the undertakings of the fathers not only with money, but (what is more) with his effort and example. He was present at all the offices of religion with equal assiduity and modesty; the sacred discourses which were often given to the people he not only listened to, but procured a hearing for them by his authority and command. If churches had to be restored, if altars adorned, if instruments of divine worship procured, he himself bore the chief expense, and contributed much furniture and vessels. Nor did he reap a small or too late fruit of such zeal for religion. In this year (1631) he saw received into the bosom of the Church from the surrounding villages up to three thousand persons: chapels which the fury of the heretics had thrown down or defiled recalled to their former splendour, twenty-three: altars newly erected, thirty-eight Reiffenberg, pag. 477.. These things, taken from the History of our whole Society, agree altogether with what Masen relates somewhat more explicitly Annales Trevirenses, tom. II, pag. 497 et 498., and also with the diploma of the prince of Hadamar on founding a residence there of the fathers of our Society: By whose unwearied labour, he says himself Ap. de Hontheim, Historia Trevirensis diplomatica, tom. III, pag 685., it has come about that within a brief space, partly by preaching, partly by catechizing, they have imbued nearly all our subjects with the rudiments of the orthodox faith and have driven out the contrary sects from our whole dominion. This consisted of the town of Hadamar and fifteen parishes.

[78] with the consent of the emperor and of the Roman pontiff; In order, then, to preserve this wonderful change in the midst of the enemies of the faith, the prince had resolved to raise a college with an attached seminary, from which at the proper time suitable pastors might be drawn for the Lord's flock. But since his principality was contained within very narrow bounds (for his father had divided his dominion into six small parts, that each of his sons might have the means to live), no other way was open than that he should give up the ecclesiastical goods which his predecessors had once wrongfully occupied, and spend them on the establishment of schools. On the 26th of August of the year 1630 the Emperor Ferdinand consented, giving an imperial diploma, and on the 12th of April of the following year Pope Urban VIII. Among these goods was the monastery of Beselich; but the greatest part lay in non-Catholic parts; which were not given back through the peace of Westphalia Cfr ap. de Hontheim, diploma Joannis Ludovici Nassavii.: the rest was attributed to the Society on the 12th of February in the year 1637; a new pontifical confirmation being added on the 4th of August Marx, Geschichte des Erzstifts Trier, part. II, tom. II, pag. 203.. But since there were not the means to sustain the masters of the college and the students of the seminary, possession being taken on the 3rd of July of the year 1638, only a residence of the fathers was erected, who should perform the sacred ministries and teach the young humane letters. These made a farmstead in the superfluous buildings; which in the year 1656 they ceded to Prince Maurice Henry of Nassau-Hadamar for an annual rent of 325 thalers Vogler, Historische Topographie, des Herzogsthums Nassau, 197 et 198.. All this pleased none of the religious at all, who vied in reclaiming what had formerly been their orders'. This suit also pertained to the college of Siegen, which, also by the authority of the emperor and the Roman pontiff, John of Nassau, brother of John Louis and prince of Siegen, converted to the faith by our men in Belgium some years before, had founded out of similar goods. No one, however, declared war more sharply on the new institutions than the canons of Arnstein; but they plainly lost their case in the Roman curia on the 29th of May 1651. They did not lose heart for that reason, caring not a straw for this sentence. Whence Hugo, treating of Beselich: On this invasion, he says Annales Præmonstrat. tom. I, col. 308., the suit was still pending in the Roman curia in the year 1665. It was pending also in the year 1754, when he was writing his Annals; and indeed it continued pending until in the year 1773 our Society was suppressed Marx, Geschichte des Erfstifts Trier, part. II, tom. II, pag. 204. and the goods were adjudged to the establishment of a Catholic college of Hadamar. What may surprise you, although this last change was made without pontifical leave, the adversaries then at last became quiet.

[79] whence a long-lasting suit followed. These in fact never had anything to adduce which rested on any appearance of truth, except that the Emperor Ferdinand, not sufficiently consistent with himself, on the 18th of September of the year 1630, not a full month after granting the diploma, had written Ibid. pag. 203.: This has always been our opinion, and we have already then laid down by repeated decrees, that to each one his own must be rendered by the precept of justice; and that the last wishes of founders must not rashly be changed, even with colours sought out, especially where there survive religious of the same profession, who may succeed at once to the inheritances and the works: as we understand that by our authority Premonstratensian fathers already then inhabit it, who do a worthwhile work in the Church of God; and he had advised his legate at the Roman curia to take care that the abbey of Beselich should not perish Ibid. pag. cit.. But since the matter was above all ecclesiastical and dependent on the decision of the Roman pontiff, these imperial rescripts were of little help, especially after the first diploma, which was quite different: for the benefit of princes ought to endure. Wherefore this obstinacy of the canons had no effect except that huge expenses were incurred on both sides, the advocates aiming at this one thing, that the suit should last for ever. Nor was it less manifest that it was much more useful that in the midst of the enemies of the faith there should be a station of those same workmen who had brought the small region back to the faith, and a little band of masters who should teach humane letters to young men to whom otherwise no other schools than those of heretics would have been open, than that some pious nuns, under the guidance of a provost of Arnstein, should live within cloisters, occupied with themselves. This appeared especially when, the Catholic heirs failing, the principality of Hadamar again obtained heretical lords. For in a short time the former faith had put down such deep roots that it was not shaken by this change. But as useful as the transfer of the abbey of Beselich to our men was to the people of Hadamar and the neighbours, so detrimental was it to our Society itself; which in Germany was too much heaped with this kind of gift. For however great the authority of the emperor and of the Roman pontiff, and however weighty the reasons that drove the changing of a number of foundations, the sense of justice of the peoples was nevertheless offended, to whom it seemed strange that things should be transferred from some to others by the supreme power [Cfr Reiffenberg, Hist. provinc. Societ. Jesu ad Rhenum inferiorem, tom. I, pag. 614.]. Much more bitter, however, was the hostility of the monks, even when the deserted monasteries of whose goods disposition had been made were isolated and of no congregation that might rest on hereditary right: so that pardon for this matter was never given and complaints were still heard a century and a half later, when our Society was removed from the scene. That whole business could have been undertaken and carried out by another method: but in the Thirty Years' War many ecclesiastical affairs were conducted almost in the manner of war.

* Zeiskeim?

§ VIII. The last labours of Blessed Louis. The construction of the church of Arnstein. His solemn obsequies. His tomb.

[To the end of his life Blessed Louis promotes the temporal affairs of his monastery.] To the end of his life Blessed Louis laboured both to propagate the Premonstratensian order and to provide the cœnobium of Arnstein with necessary things. Of which a testimony is a diploma which was issued about five months before his death, and which, like the others, it seems right to recite here Gudenus, Codex diplomaticus, tom. II, p. 20.: In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. I, Richolf, third abbot in Arenstein, though unworthy, what things done in my

times, I transcribe for my posterity, so that they may not receive falsehood for truth. The land which Count Lodewic had possessed by hereditary right at Holdenrucke he handed over to the church in Arenstein. But because the count general of Thuringia, Ludewic by name, whatever land remained, namely the Little Mountain itself and whatever land lies around it, the meadows and whatever descends from the High Mountain into the Lahn on either side of the stream, also the Mountain itself as it descends to the Lahn, with its surface as far as the stream which flows at the end of the Mountain among the fields of Nassowen, and one juger beyond the Lahn; all of which he possessed by hereditary right: being admonished by Abbot Richolf and Count Lodewic, he handed it over to St. Mary and St. Nicholas in Arenstein for the remedy of his soul and that of his father and his heirs in perpetuity. And we, receiving it from his hand, at his request made it firm to the aforesaid church by the bond of anathema. These things were done at Mainz on the vigil of the Ascension, in the year of the Lord's incarnation 1185, in the 3rd indiction, epact 17, concurrent 1. And that we may omit nothing, it pleases me to add that in the year 1235 Charles, a knight of Sinsinbach, since he possessed certain goods from his forebears by right of fief from Count Ludewic of happy memory, founder of the aforesaid cœnobium, namely two parts of the tithe at Gudinackir, and within the court of Keberlo around the same; also whatever right he had at Bethelintrod; nevertheless all the jurisdiction, with those things which he possessed there by title of fief, he exchanged with the said church, receiving in benefice the court at Ketiche Gudenus, Codex diplomaticus, p. 69.: at what time the blessed man granted this fief appears nowhere, probably somewhat before his conversion, or when he handed himself over to the cœnobium of Arnstein; but we have placed it here because we did not know the time.

[81] The church of Arnstein is constructed and completed. While Blessed Louis was managing the temporal affairs of the monastery of Arnstein with the greatest diligence, there was meanwhile aglow (the words are the biographer's), in the building of the house of the Lord, by the daily exercises and labours of the brothers of Arenstein, a social and blessed communion, and in the work of the hands, which all in general and each in particular promoted… Some pressed on with breaking the walls of the fortress, others with levelling the courtyards, others hauled beams and the timbers of the buildings, others cut away the prominence of the rock, whose height (as is reported) equalled what * is now the summit of the monastery. And at that time among the Premonstratensians not only the lay brothers, but also the canons, who were mostly of the nobility, celebrated the offices of the choir, and could not altogether neglect the study of letters, were occupied in their free time with bodily labours, often very heavy. This matter is explained by Le Paige Bibliotheca Præmonstratensis, p. 230. and is represented much more clearly by the present example. But although the building went on with such zeal, yet since a very large church had been designed, it could not be completed before the death of Blessed Louis; but, as is read in an old instrument [Consecratio ecclesiæ in Arnstein, ap. Hugonem, S. Antiq. Monum. tom. II, p. 51 et 52.], in the year of the Word incarnate one thousand two hundred and eight, in the 11th indiction, concurrent 2, epact 12, this basilica was dedicated by the venerable John, archbishop of Trier, in honour of Mary, perpetual virgin, and of the pious pontiff Nicholas, on the fifteenth before the Kalends of October. There are then listed the relics inserted in the altar: among which there comes in the first place the sacrament of the Lord's Body, in the last some of the oil of St. Catherine, virgin, of Ursula, virgin, of the Eleven Thousand Virgins; of Irmina and Mauria, virgins: that is, some of the oil taken from the lamps burning before their altar or relics. How this church was entirely renovated in the year 1352 I have said above in num. 32.

[82] Blessed Louis dies and is buried most honourably. But when the first church was finished, the most holy founder had already gone away twenty-three years before to those above: whose death the biographer narrates very accurately. According to his custom he was visiting the estates and cœnobia which were of Arnstein's jurisdiction, and was staying at Gummersheim when he felt his strength failing with the onset of a fever. There hastened to him Burchard, abbot of the Monastery at the Dreisa; there hastened Werenbold, provost of the monastery or regular canonry of St. Augustine, which was under the title of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Flonheim Cfr Serrarius et Joannis, Rerum Moguntinarum, t. I, p. 765., in Rhenish Hesse; there had hastened many priests from the neighbourhood; present above all was Godfrey, prior of Gummersheim: and all these, according to the custom of that age Cfr Martene, De antiquis ecclesiæ ritibus, lib. I, cap. VII, art. III, num. 3., anointed him with the oil of the sick; he also received the Body of the Lord as viaticum: all of which the biographer signifies by saying that he was imbued by those priests with the sacraments of the Church. He then died most piously on the 25th of October of the year 1185. In a wonderful manner were his funeral rites solemn; the corpse was kept for two days at Gummersheim, and for two nights the Office of the dead was celebrated with Mass for the deceased; from there it was carried to Eberbach or Eversbach, which is represented (unless I am mistaken) by the town of Erbach, on the right bank of the Main, two leagues from Mainz, toward the west. There was there a cœnobium of the Cistercian order; whose abbots see listed in Gallia Christiana Tom. V, col. 654 et seqq.. There presided at that time Arnold, a nursling of Clairvaux, commended for the holiness of his life; who wished that in his church also God should be propitiated with much perfume of prayers, with the solemnities of Masses. From there they went to Kirdorf, the situation of which place we have already indicated, when we showed that this church had been given as a gift by Blessed Louis to those of Arnstein; and here too the funeral of the blessed man was celebrated; which office was carried out also on the fifth night in the parish church of St. Margaret, at the foot of Arnstein. On the sixth day there were present the counts of Nassau: by which seem to be understood Rupert the Warlike and his brother Henry Kremer, Origines Nassavicæ, t. I, §100.; the counts of Katzenelenbogen, probably Berthold I and Dieter I Wenck, Katzenelenbogische Geschichte, p. 252 et seqq.; the counts of Dietz, that is, Henry II, Gerard I, and Henry III Ibid., p. 584.; and the lords of Isenburg, Gerlach and Reimbold II [Kremer, t. I, §88. Cfr Hontheim, Hist. diplom. Trevir., t. I, index personarum, comites, Isenburg.]: who, putting their shoulders under the bier, carried the venerable body into the church of Arnstein; where on the 2nd of November it was committed to the earth before the altar of St. Nicholas the patron.

[83] His epitaph and tomb. On the tomb was inscribed (as is established from old parchments) the following epitaph:

MESSVIT HVNC FLOREM NON MORS, SED VITA. DOLOREM

PERFERT * TVMBA BREVIS; SPEM VITÆ, NON GLEBA QVÆVIS;

SED ROSA VERNALIS, SERAPHIN QVÆ PLENA SVB ALIS

MAIESTATE DEI TENET ECCE LOCVM REQVIEI

ANNVS VT M CVM C ROTAT OCTOGINTAQVE V *.

VITA MAGNIFICVS METIT ASTRA COMES LVDOVICVS.

[Not death but life has reaped this flower. Grief is borne by the brief tomb; hope of life not by any clod; but the spring rose, which, full of the majesty of God under the wings of the seraphim, behold, holds a place of rest. As the year turns M with C and eighty and V , Count Louis, magnificent in life, reaps the stars.]

That is: Not death but life has reaped this flower; since Blessed Louis now lives in heaven. The tomb is a cause of grief; nor has every corpse the hope of a glorious resurrection, but this one only, which as a spring rose, full of the majesty of God under the wings of the Seraphim, obtains a place of rest. In the year 1185 Count Louis, distinguished in virtues, departed to heaven. In the middle of the seventeenth century, when Masen most diligently visited Arnstein, already then the place of burial had either been worn away by the forgetfulness of men and times, or buried by new works of construction Annales Trevirenses, t. II, p. 81.; on which matter see above, num. 32. But in the hands of God the name of the venerable man was written; which name, however, Brower had at that time already for some years recalled to the memory of men. It remains that we should bring his Life to light again, explained by a few annotations, according to the copies listed above in num. 38. I shall use these sigla: 1, 2, 3 are the principal or [ ]tographus codex, the second and the third of Gamans; Br. the edition of Brower; Bl. the edition of Blanpin or Hugo; K. the edition of Kremer; Bo. the edition of Böhmer; Bol. readings collected by our predecessors from an unknown codex; ad. adds or add; om. omits or omit; al. codices indefinitely designated by others.

* quæ

* Præfert Bl. K.

* read quinque

LIFE OF BLESSED LOUIS OF ARNSTEIN, PREMONSTRATENSIAN CONVERT,

From three manuscript codices and four editions.

Louis of Arnstein, confessor and lay brother of the Premonstratensian Order. (Bl.)

BHL Number: 5033

BY, AS IT SEEMS, LUWAND.

CHAPTER ONE.

Prologue. The fortress of Blessed Louis, his family, power, wealth, and life in the world.

The author excuses his lack of skill. Here begins the prologue Opusculum Bo. 3. of the deeds of Count Lodewic Opusculum seu Vita L. quondam c. in Arnstein et K., our founder. Among the diverse varieties of worldly Mundanarum Br. things and the curious pursuits of many-sided talent, by which human need is carried around on the uncertain steps of its life, nothing is more precious Om. Bl. than time; which, once elapsed by whatever process or order, can be recovered neither at the price of silver or of gold, nor by any industry. Weighing this, very many men of past times, subtle in talent, strong in knowledge, sublime in life and morals Moribus quoque 3., have brought the deeds of illustrious men into our ages in light-flowing discourse, leaving the monuments of their teaching to the memories of posterity, as a kind of special mirror. With this confidence I, I say, abject in life, nothing in grace, uncultivated in speech, poor in talent, will set out, if not in golden, yet in dark letters, the parents, birth, progress in holy profession, and happy passing in Christ of our Count Ludewic Lodewici Bo. Ludowici 2. Ludovici 3. Viri Bo. Br. 3., virtuous in all things. Not caring for the darts of detractors, because

Happy he whom no stork has pecked Pinxit Bl. from behind ^a.

For they will say that unpolished speech has disfigured so honourable a matter. To whom not I, but the poet replies:

There is some use in going so far Quodam Bol. Bl. K., if it is not given to go further ^b.

Yet the sweetness of honey is commonly enclosed in a fragile reed and in an earthen vessel, and fire is found in hard flint, nor does the thickness of clouds, so often spread around Circumferri solita 3. and set in the way, detract from the brightness of the waxen sun.

[2] In the fortress which, called Arinstein Arenstein Bl. from ancient times, Louis, father of Blessed Louis, lord of the fortress of Arnstein, still today keeps that name, there was a certain count named Lodewic; who, as he was illustrious from the long lineage of his ancestors, so Et ad Bl. he stood forth glorious with the titles of probity and virtues. He had seven sisters, virgins gracious with elegance of countenance, in whom, as in a kind of mirror, every aptitude of good manners was reflected. The same place is distant three Om. K. miles Milliaribus 2, 3, Böh. Bl. from the Rhine toward the east Occidentem Bl. K., on the river Lahn in

set upon a certain brow of a mountain, surrounded on all sides by steep and arduous mountains, having on the other side the little river Dursta, quite full of fish, and assigned by a kind of adoptive gift to mills and other uses. Now Vero Bol. Bl. K. the said place was at that time so inaccessible and fortified that from one side of the mountain only a single and very narrow road offered difficult access, and this was closed, as occasion required, with iron bars.

[3] he places his seven sisters in most honourable marriages; The aforesaid count therefore, circumspect and prudent in the business of affairs, above all solicitous Solliciter K. 2. Sollicite Bl. for the honour of his sisters and the succession of his posterity, burned to marry the brightness of the generous lamp and the grace of maidenly form in a union becoming their birth. To his honourable desires the divine goodness breathed a salutary effect. For two of them were joined Vinctæ Bl. to two renowned barons of the Hungarians, betrothed no less solemnly than nobly. The third passed into the embraces of the count palatine of Thuyngin ^c C. t. i. a. d. T. Bol. Thuyngen Br. Thuwingia 2., whom her brother honourably presented to the count himself at St. Goar, and he ambitiously received her Eam Br. illam Bl. with two hundred knights and very great display. The fourth, betrothed at Nassauwen Nassowen Bol. Nassawen 2. ^d, bore Rubert Rupertum Br. Bl. and Arnold and a daughter Demudis Demoidem Bl. K.. Count Arnold was the father of Count Rubert Ruperti Br. Bl., a warlike man, who in the expedition of the Emperor Frederick died a pilgrim in the regions beyond the sea ^e. Rubert Rupertus Br. Bl., brother of Arnold, was the father of Count Walram Valerami Bol. Valeriani 3. Walmerani Bl., whose sons are Fuerunt 3. Henry and Rubert Rupertus Br. Bl. K., now counts, whose mother was by name Om. Bl. Cunegund Cunigundis 3. ^f. Demudis Demoides Bl. K. their sister married Embrico, who was the father of Count Henry, father of Gerhard Eberhardi 3 et Br., count of Dithse Diethse Bol. Dieze Bl. ^g. The fifth was betrothed to the count of Loufo Loyse Br. ^h, mother of Count Boppo and of his sister Adelheid, from whom Quibus Bol. Berthold and Dieter, counts of Catzennellenbogen, descended. The sixth gave birth to the Ysinburg Isinburgensem 2, 3, Bl. lineage ⁱ. The seventh passed into the county of Sutphen Sutpheniensem 1, 2, Bl. ^k.

[4] [he had a wife, Udilhild, and a son Louis, excellently brought up in infancy. The death of both parents.] The aforesaid count had, according to the world, a wife of illustrious and high blood, Udilhild by name ^l. Who not only did not disgrace the embraces of so great a man, but also in the brightness of her future offspring brought to daylight whatever of morals, whatever of grace in her forebears the candle Primogenitoribus Br. of inborn probity had promised Hæres Bl.. What more? There is born to them a son of elegant form, and he by divine providence an only son, on whom both the name of the father and the inheritance of the whole county might be poured back ^m. For what Christ before the ages had foreseen Providerat Br. Böh. for the unity of those serving him could not now be cut into parts. The little one is therefore handed over to a nurse to be reared, and as a heavenly pearl is the more attentively commended, and he who was to be a vessel of election was increased by daily successes. The nurse too, very Om. Bl. solicitous, applied all diligence. But in infancy first he drank in virtue with his milk, and, to run through it briefly, a certain image of future probity adorned his tender years, so that it could already easily be noted what he promised in manly age who so Ita Br. played in the flower of boyhood. Meanwhile, as the days rolled on, when he was now entering the years of adolescence, because the end came, the end of all flesh came. His father, the days of his life being completed, on the fifth before the Kalends of June, accommodating dust to dust, escaped from this shipwreck of the world as a brief guest, and was buried in the church of Blessed Margaret, virgin ⁿ. But his mother, living a long time after the conversion of her son, when she was bending to the evening the original particle C. ad o. terram partiendam mundi curvaretur 3. terræ Br. of the earth's world, falling ill on her estate which is called Udinkirchin Udenkirchen Br., closed her last day on the third before the Nones of July, and rests in the greater church of Cologne.

[5] [Blessed Louis is made a knight and exercised in tournaments, before he enters into marriage with Guda of Boinenburg;] The son Lodewic, therefore, successor and heir Habens Br. of such great parents, enters upon the care of the domestic affairs r. d. Bl. as a new steward, and putting on the man in mind, he measures with the reason of his mind intus 3. what is to be done and ordered, sagacious in talent, bland in address, generous in benefaction, lavish in the example of honour, he drew to himself the affection of all, and especially of his own people. He so loved his ministerials as companions, by whose counsel consiliis 3. he is urged Perurgeretur Bl. concerning the matrimony of the conjugal bond, because the utility of the matter so demanded. But he first Primus Bl. set his hand to strong deeds, and at great expense of his friends and with honour was girded Deest 1, 2. with the military belt ^o, and with the accustomed tirocinia [p] of secular men he anticipated the approach of the lawful union. After this, through the mediation of the counsels of friends, and of busy embassies on this matter of the count of Bomneburch Bonneburg Br. Bl. Bonneberga 3., he took to wife his daughter, Guda Guedam 2. K. by name [q], a virgin given with great display, as was fitting.

[6] whose sterility gave place to better thoughts. And when she remained long sterile, and, unfruitful, denied the hope of offspring, they began to grieve with most ardent contrition oratione 3. of spirit, and to implore the mercy of the Lord with all their prayers for a successor to so great an inheritance. But to their infinite desires divine providence had long since been opposed; as he who was disposing to come through his servants by the right of kinship. But what? Were they cheated of their desire? By no means! How not? Hear: "Rejoice, O barren one who do not bear, break forth and cry out, you who do not give birth, because Quoniam Br. ex Is. C. LX. your sons will certainly come from afar, and your daughters will rise from your side. Lift up your eyes round about and see: all these are gathered together, they have come to you." The days will come in which, the mother of such great sons, you will joyfully sing: "Behold I and my children, whom God has given me!"

ANNOTATIONS.

It is a verse of Persius, sat. I, v. 58, somewhat changed; for in the copy is read:

O jane, a tergo quem nulla ciconia pinsit. O Janus, whom no stork has pecked from behind.

The understanding of which is made very easy by these words of St. Jerome in the Prologue to Zephaniah: To curve the hand into a stork behind another's back; and these others in letter IV to the monk Rusticus: If you suddenly look round, you will either catch the necks of storks being curved behind you, or the ass's ears being wagged with the hand, or the panting tongue of a dog being stuck out. For it is, as Forcellini says under Ciconia, a kind of mockery which is done with the fingers pressed together in the manner of a stork's beak, curved and repeatedly moved at someone; which the Italians still use, but under another name, namely dare il pepe to give the pepper. It meant as much as this reproach: You are stupid as a stork. Blanpin's pinxit certainly does not hold. But whether pinsit is good is doubtful. Priscian Lib. I, p. 370, Putsch. was in doubt whether pisat or pisit should be read. Pinsere and pinsare were bakers' words; used, however, to indicate every kind of pounding Cfr Forcellini, V° Pinso..

p. Tirocinia in this place are tournaments, in which new knights, called tirones, were accustomed to the exercise and handling of arms and acquired a ready and brisk use of them. The blessed man seems to have devoted himself to this for some years, before he wished to take a wife.

q. On the family of the wife of Blessed Louis it has been said in the Preliminary Commentary, n. 45.

CHAPTER II.

The conversion of Blessed Louis and the foundation of Arnstein.

Before the conversion of Blessed Louis Arnstein was a robbers' fortress; Thus far, O Muses, who have used sluggish breezes,

Breathe, I pray, on the sails Om. Bl. as they enter the sea,

so that on the foundation, which has been laid in whatever manner Quodcumque Bol., the structure of the following edifice may stand in full noon, and the ever-to-be-proclaimed effect Affectus Br. 3. of so celebrated a matter may gild the pen of an uncultivated writer. The fortress ^a of the aforesaid count, which is vulgarly Vulgo Bl. Arinstein Arenstein Bl. 3, Br. Arynstein 2., and which can be called in the Latin idiom Eagle's Stone, a place of horror and vast solitude, apt for plunder, suitable for rapine, was to its inhabitants Suis ad. Bl. K. a stone of offence and a rock of scandal. Since they, by no means content with their wages, possessed all of what was others', little of their own ^b; for whose wretched need the poor Parvus 3. and helpless man toils on land and sea, and

The tireless merchant runs to the farthest Indies.

To this place, then, the soldiers of the true Pharaoh brought together both the price of the river route and the spoil of the whole province. Truly, according to the letter: "The rock is a refuge for hedgehogs;" for they were beset and bristling with the spines of sins Horridis Bl.. And as the weakness of the head runs down into the limbs; so doubtless the filth and vices of the members often disturb the strength of the head. For the count, although he had no need of spoils of this kind, was nevertheless made guilty by consent, and the anger of the severe Veri Bl. avenger, though he bore it with equanimity, the one by keeping silent, the others by oppressing the poor, gravely Om. Br. 3. offended. But to what end? "The word of the Lord to you, O prince. If you are exalted like the eagle and set your nest above the stars of heaven; thence will I bring you down, says the Lord." When? The grace of the Holy Spirit knows no slow efforts ^c.

[8] the blessed man, suddenly changed, God Dominus Br. therefore sent the spirit Cor. Br. of his Son into his heart, and suddenly changed into another man, he cast his thought upon the Lord, saying with the psalmist: "Who will give me wings like a dove, and I will fly and be at rest. Behold, I have gone far off, fleeing;" and he was made like an eagle by the wonderful gift of God, who "calls those things which are not as though they were." Now provoking his young to fly, by word as well Præit 3. as by example, so that he who by consenting to evils was the odour of death unto death, might also Et 3. be the odour of life unto life. He was thinking of making a house of prayer there, where "ostriches formerly dwelt and S. h. p. e. om. Bl. K. 1, 2. the hairy ones formerly danced, and sirens answered in the shrines of pleasures." But because the assent of his bedfellow Conthoralis 2, 3. had to be sought on this matter, according to Solomon he ran about, he hastened, he roused up his friend; that as they were two in one flesh, so one spirit might unite them in God. "Who shall find a valiant woman? Far off and from the farthest coasts is her price." She resists and protests, and stops her ears to salutary counsels like the asp. But because through a faithful husband the unbelieving wife is generally sanctified, and vice versa Contra al., at length, overcome by frequent admonitions, she offered herself with most ready will to the prize of the heavenly calling. Truly Hæc mutatio dexteræ Excelsi; vere Bl.:

Divine power plays in human affairs.

[9] he turned over salutary counsels in his mind, Giving thanks therefore to God, from whom is every best gift and every perfect gift, he gave his heart to watching at daybreak, that the Lord might place the anchor of his hope in a safe station, lest either the instability of the human heart should alter the still tender first-fruits, or the poisoned cunning of the ancient serpent should weaken them. For he feared this, which the prophet once lamented, saying: "His enemies," he says, "have become the head." And Solomon: "Son, when you come to the service of God, prepare your soul for temptation." When you come, he says, because the craft of the tempter stands in the way of beginnings, and always sets itself against the head of the warriors. While at this turning point of affairs, placed between hope and fear, the new athlete of the Lord wavered, he who founds Sion on sapphires, who knows all things before they come to be, what he had foreknown from eternity, at the time when Quando 3. he willed, he brought to fulfilment the grace of his Spirit.

[10] [when he learned that Otto, his blood relation, had founded Gratia Dei and was living there according to the most holy laws of St. Norbert:] There was at that time a certain Otto ^d, by order a deacon, very rich in estates, descended D. p. Bl. from the noble and generous stock of the Saxons, a blood relation of the said count, who himself also, for love of Jesus Christ, giving up wide estates and most ample resources, had in these days founded the church which is called Gratia Dei ^e according to the Rule of Blessed Augustine and of the primitive Church ^f, and the form and habit of the lord Norbert, archbishop of Magdeburg. And since the memory of him has come up, making a digression, we shall insert Inserimus 3. in the present little work what we have seen Indicavimus 3. to be necessary. In the year of the Lord 1119 VIII K. ^g Norbert of blessed memory, thirteenth archbishop Episcopus Bl. of Magdeburg, came to Prémontré, and the habit ^h which Qualem K. he received not from man nor through man, confirmed by apostolic sanctions, he handed over to the brothers to be observed, as it is uniformly kept in the churches of the same profession. In which he himself also living irreproachably in the seat of his pontificate, in the year of grace 1130 Quarto ad. Bl. sexto Br. ⁱ, certain of the crown of justice, happily completed the course of his life, and, buried with due honour, rests in the church of Blessed Mary at Magdeburg Magdeburgensis 3. ^k. Now let us return to what we began. The aforesaid Otto, because he was very rich, enlarged the church of the blessed martyr Victor of the Theban legion, which he had built on the river Saale, with such great endowments that, both for the ample abundance of those things that are owed to the uses of the brothers, and also for the gracious pleasantness of the place, you would worthily say that that church is called Gratia Dei ^l.

[11] he goes there, and is so well disposed that he begs for a colony, Having heard reports of this kind about Otto, the count, as if admonished by a kind of divine oracle, setting out to him without delay, is honourably received, and bares the treasure of his heart Sui ad. 3. to his friend, to be led to Arnstein. and reveals the whole secret of his breast. Nor without fruit. For he promises that, to carry out what he had conceived in his mind Ante 3., he will send young plants of his congregation. With how great reverence Cum ad. Bl., when he stayed with them, or with how great diligence he was treated, let the pen be silent, where the whole workshop of mental Mortalis 3. affection speaks. There follow on the heels of his return twelve canons of Gratia Dei and brothers

converts, as many, gone forth from the spiritual loins of the holy profession, to lay foundations on Christ Jesus himself, the chief cornerstone, carrying with them in chariots and wagons a library and ecclesiastical books ^m and no small furnishings. There come, I say, fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God, bearing peace, and illuminating the homeland with a kind of angelic adornment, they displayed in their habit the candour of their mind. There was among them Eodem tempore 3. Godfrey of revered memory, scholasticus of the church of Blessed Maurice at Magdeburg, a man of singular grace and merit, whom Quemque Br. the other brothers followed as a kind of heavenly ray. Now the will and purpose of the count beloved of God is spread abroad in celebrated talk, now the storehouse of the Holy Spirit, which had been shut up till then, breathed upon the nostrils of all, and the alabaster jar of the broken breast embalmed the whole neighbourhood, so that many said: "Draw me after you, we will run in the odour Odorem Bo. K. 1, 2. of your ointments!"

In the year of the Lord's Incarnation 1139 Count Lodewic, with his venerable spouse Guda Gueda Bl. K., handed over by free will his fortress of Arinstein, situated in the diocese of Trier, to the praise of God the Almighty Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, in honour of the glorious and immaculate Virgin Mary and of the magnificent confessor Nicholas, into the hands of the lord Om. Br. Godfrey the scholasticus and the brothers of Gratia Dei, and himself and all his goods. Marquard also, his chaplain and notary, Swiker Schwykerus Bl. too the steward, and five other knights, renouncing the world, put on with him the habit of the holy profession. Whose father in Christ, the aforesaid Dominus Br. Godfrey, at that time was solemnly ordained Ordinatur 3. ⁿ by the venerable Domino ad. 3. Adalbero, archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see in the Teutonic kingdom, in a general synod. Happy day, which brought in both joy for the angels of God over sinners converted, and for men so imitable an example of contempt of the world! Happy, I say, and endowed with much happiness is that day, which dawns as often as, by their example, a sinner takes fire with heavenly desires, while he shines outwardly in the work which the anointing of the Holy Spirit teaches in the heart. "Unless you are converted, says the Saviour, and become as little children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven." He requires little ones not in stature but in humility, to whom the Son of God, a little one and humble in our nature, promised the kingdom of heaven.

[13] the venerable Guda enclosed beside the church. There is prepared first of all for the lady countess Guda a special dwelling on the left side of the mountain, where, her habit changed, always enclosed, going out nowhere, by the sparingness of stricter food she made up for the delicacies she had enjoyed before and the once Om. Bl. numerous dishes. Through a small window ^o she frequently listened to the divine offices, intent on psalms and prayers. And so, the wheel of her birth having happily rolled out, on the 16th before the Kalends of September she departed from the world, and before the altar of Blessed Nicholas [p] in the sanctuary of the basilica she was venerably buried.

[14] [He gives his goods partly to Arnstein, and distributes them partly among his kinsmen.] The count had the right of patronage in 72 churches [q], all of which pertained by filial right to the church of Blessed Margaret. Under his jurisdiction [r] also enim Br. were Boppard, Wesel, the Town of St. Goar, both Loginsteins Logenstein Bl., Koblenz, and many other towns on the Rhine, and the whole province which is called the Einrich [s]. All of which reckoning as Quædam ad. Bo. dung, he chose beforehand a better substance in heaven. He resigned his county to the lords of Ysenburg Isenburg Bl., which they afterwards sold to the lords of Nassawen and of Catzenellenbogen Choigen Bo. [t]. And these are the allods which he assigned to the uses of the brothers serving God: Bubenheim, which is in the district of Worms, with its church, tithes, and people, and its other Certisque Bl. Bo. 2. Cunctis Br. revenues, with every kind of entire liberty. In the town of Wizzen Witzen K. Bo. Bl. 2. beyond the Rhine thirty manses. In the town of Hattinhusen Nattenhausen Bl. Br. Hattinhusen, 2, Bo. K. Hattinhausen 3. eight manses. At Weltrod Weltroid K. Bo. 2 four manses. The town of Gozmerod Gosmerod Bl. Gesmerod K. Bo. 2. with all right, and the court of Keberlo Keberloe Bl.. At Bruninbach Brunbach Bl. one manse. The court of Holdenruke Holdericke Bl. Holdenricke K. Bo. 2. with all right. Salseid Saelscheidt Bl. Salscheid 2 Bo. K. also with all the tithe. At Singovin Gingoben Bl. Singoben 2, Bo. K. three manses. At Neve and Breme vineyards, fields, and woods with the tithes. At Campe a court and vineyards. At Loginstein a court and vineyards In L. c. e. v. J. C. c. e. v. Bl.. The church of St. Margaret. Moreover the court Curiam Br. of Selebach Selbach Bl. and the church of Kirchtorph Kirchtorff 2, Bo. K., with all right and entirety, namely Videlicet Br. Facultatibus 3. with the people and all the tithes. Which the venerable lord Albero, archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see, handed over Tradidit 3. to the count and brothers of In Bl. Arinstein by perpetual donation for the salvation of his soul and those of his successors, and confirmed by privileges. Also the church in Oberen Diffenbach in the Einrich Aeynriche, Bl., which Hartrad Hartardus Bl. Bertrandus 3. of Merinberg Mermberc 3. and his wife Irmengard, with the consent of their children and heirs Suarum Bl., assigned in perpetuity to the church of Blessed Nicholas in Arinstein in hope of eternal life, with the people and the whole tithe of the town and all appendages, both in fields and in meadows, also the whole tithe at Bettendorf Battendorpff 3., and half of the tithe at Schura, and the forest which is called Kamerforst Kamforst 3., and the whole wood which is called Brustingesbach Brustenbach Bl., except for eight trees. All of which are more fully expressed in the privileges of the church.

[15] The archbishop of Trier becomes advocate, lay persons being excluded. In the aforesaid churches, namely of Blessed Margaret, Kirchtorf, and Diffenbach, no ecclesiastical person, but only the abbot of In Bl. Arinstein shall hold the spiritual Spiritualia Bl. rights, and shall preside over the synod when he wishes, and as it shall seem good to him. No advocate or secular person shall obtain any right; but whoever shall be archbishop of the church of Trier shall defend them with perpetual protection from the molestation of injurious persons for the salvation of his soul Suæ ad. Br.. In the aforesaid archbishopric, whatever movable things shall happen to be transferred from place to place for the uses of the brothers shall be free Liberrima 3. from every exaction of tax and every payment [u].

ANNOTATIONS.

that the Most Holy Virgin Mary had a part in showing the garment seems to be a tradition more recent than the age of the holy founder.

p. St. Nicholas, whose cult had gained strength in the West from the middle of the [ ] century, was the principal patron; and so the principal altar seems to be designated: which is also indicated by the words in the sanctuary of the basilica.

q. Most were small chapels, scattered through the district of the Einrich, and not proper parishes.

r. This jurisdiction was the provincial advocacy, which came very close to the authority of present-day governors, who preside over provinces in the name of the king or emperor. On this office see the Preliminary Commentary, num. 47.

s. On this district see the Preliminary Commentary, num. 48.

t. Some have vehemently attacked this place; but Kremer has defended it excellently Origines Nassavicæ, tom. I, p. 334 et seqq., except that he has made a county out of the district of the Einrich. Moreover, it must first of all be kept in mind that Nassau was in the county of Arnold or of the house of Arnstein in the eleventh century, as we demonstrated above in num. 42; next, it must be considered that Rembold of Isenburg occupied that county, as is most manifest from the diploma of the year 1158 which Hontheim published Hist. diplomatica Trevirensis, tom. I, p. 587.: Know that it was done through two free men … by the judgment of their peers in the county itself in which the same fortress (Nassauwa) is situated, with the mediation also of Rembold of Isenburch, who at that time held the same county: by which things the assertions of the biographer are fully confirmed. Kremer also writes that it is beyond controversy that the dominion of Limburg, which up to the fifteenth century was in the hands of the Isenburgs, was formerly of the county of Arnstein; similarly the dominion of Runkel, except however for some parts which came to it from that of Dietz, and also that the dominions of Westerburg and Schaumburg came from Blessed Louis to the Isenburgs. Kremer therefore judges that Blessed Louis ceded his county to Rembold I; that he divided his dominion among three sons, so that Gerlach received the tract of Limburg, Rembold II the county in the Einrich, or rather that of Arnstein, and Siegfried Runkel, Schaumburg, and Westerburg with the surrounding neighbourhood; and that finally Rembold II sold his part to the counts of Nassau and Catzenelenbogen; and that from this time the county of the Einrich, or rather the district, which had previously been a fief of the empire, was made a fief of the Elector Palatine: but I would not examine these things, since they pertain less to the deeds of Blessed Louis.

u. All the donations listed up to here we have explained in the Preliminary Commentary, § V.

CHAPTER III.

The foundations at Munster-Dreisen, Bethlenrode, Enkenbach, Gummersheim, and Beselich. The building of the monastery at Arnstein.

[Blessed Louis, increased in virtues, sets in order the ascetery of Munster-Dreisen;] The venerable father Godfrey kept watch assiduously with dutiful charity over the guardianship of the Lord's flock, striving to bring back the talent entrusted to him, at the return of the father of the household, doubled with interest: on the one hand, on the foundation which is Christ, building up Ædificans Bl. gold, silver, and precious stones, on the other Maxime ad 3., in the structure of the material building, enlarging the entrance of the house and the atrium, he raised the lofty walls of the church. For he was provident in counsel, vigorous in work, sweet-flowing in teaching, and of wonderful humility and abstinence, as has come to us by the true report A. n. r. devenit veracissima 3. of his contemporaries. While he stood unmoved on this watchtower of perfection, it happened that Frederick, duke of Swabia, father of Frederick, afterwards emperor of the Romans, was passing at a certain time with his men beside the church called Munstre Munster Br. 3., next to the little stream Primma. In whose company was also Count Lodewic, because he was a blood relation Erat ad Br. of the duke himself and a very close friend. And the aforesaid duke, seeing the place, which, assigned Deputatur K. a second time now both to nuns and to men canons, namely regular ones, for divine service Officium Br., had utterly fallen away from all discipline, so that hunting dogs ran about in the sanctuary of the church, and according to the prophet who says: "Because of Mount Sion, because it has perished, foxes," that is, deceitful persons, "have walked Ambularunt Bl. K. in it," was moved from the depth of his heart, and, on fire with the zeal of the love of God, handed over to his beloved count and convert that same place with ownership of all its goods, beseeching and likewise solemnly charging him, that there, in hope of the heavenly rewards Bonorum Bl., he should set in order the observance of monastic religion. He, receiving it gratefully and with all eagerness, having held counsel with his brothers, chose six canons of Gratia Dei of approved way of life, adding other suitable persons, whom Father Godfrey assigned for this work, setting over them Marquard, the count's chaplain, who had already gone up from the valley of tears Om. Bl., and, relying in the house of the Lord on advances Et gradibus ad. Br. Profectionibus K. in virtues, sounded forth the canticles of the steps with the jubilation of his mind. He in the year of grace 1145 III Br. came Ad ad. Bo. K. 2. to the monastery with the brothers delegated to cultivate the vineyard of the Lord of Sabaoth ^a. What kind of branch he was on the vine Vitis Br. 3. in Christ, and how fruitful, and how in Om. Bl. his days he lived both for himself and for the Lord's household, lest varied discourse should unclasp our matter, let us leave Relinquimus Bl. to be extolled in the praises of his successors.

[17] he founds convents at Bethlentrode and Enkenbach; In the following time the memorable count, who now lived wholly in Christ, according to the apostle forgetting Obliviscens Bl. what is behind, stretched himself forward through the steps of the virtues to the gifts of the divine promise, and the nuns, who were dwelling first at Bethlentrode, then at Steden, in whose college were daughters of noble knights of the Einrich, bound over to the service of the Lord by the example of the lady countess Guda, he transferred to the Valley of St. Mary, from whom afterwards Postea Br. he transplanted the cœnobium of ladies which is called Einkenbach D. Enkenbach. Bl. Nuhrenbach Br. ^b.

[18] likewise the convent of Gummersheim: After the circle of these days, because all things work together for good for those who love God, in the diocese of Mainz at Oternheim Odernheim Bo. Br. 2, 3. certain Quod Bl. ministerials of the church of Blessed Stephen of Metz Moguntinensis 3. ^c offered with liberal vows to the oft-mentioned count houses, fields, and meadows in the town of Gummirscheim Gommerscheim. 3., to the praise of God, for the remission of their sins, because, frequently making his way across among them to his allod of Bubenheim, he was held celebrated in fame and most worthy in way of life. And he, not abusing their Cura ad. 2, Bo; benevolentia ad laudem Domini non 3. reverence toward God, built there on the little stream Selsa Salsam fluviolum Bl., in honour of the Mother of God and Blessed John the Evangelist, an oratory, nuns being gathered together. And let whoever reads this little work know that the same place is entirely emancipated from every secular advocate and from every right of the parish of In Bl. Oternheim, except for the tithe which it is bound to pay to the lords of Metz Moguntinensibus 3..

[19] [The canons of Arnstein themselves with the greatest labour build their monastery. The death of the first provost or abbot.] Meanwhile there was aglow, in the building of the house of the Lord, by the daily exercises and labours of the brothers of Arinstein, a social and blessed communion, and in the work of the hands ^d, which all in general and each in particular promoted, it could very easily be conjectured what was the discipline of concord of minds. No one there was sluggish in idleness, no one pretended labour in a precept, because the end of the precept held together by the bond of mutual charity. Truly their Nostrum Br. heart was humbled in labours, for whom there was a daily martyrdom, both humility of mind and affliction of the flesh in the frequent endurance of poverty. Some pressed on with breaking the walls of the fortress, others with levelling the courtyards, others hauled beams and the timbers of the buildings, others cut away Præscindebant Br. the prominence of the rock, whose height (as is reported Fertur Br.) equalled what Quæ 3. is now the summit of the monastery. Who can suffice to think out the labours of so many servants of God? Who to estimate their sweat? He alone knows, the repayer of rewards, who has rewarded very many of them, to whom now the Spirit has said Dedit K. that they should rest from their labours. At that time Father Godfrey of living memory, in the twelfth year after he had been ordained over the Lord's household, as the affliction of the flesh grew worse, on the 4th before the Ides of October, on the journey to Prémontré, happily died ^e, and was buried at Wadegozin Wadegodiam 3. ^f. Whose bones were afterwards honourably carried into his church Arnstein ad. Bl., and placed before the altar of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul with due honour [g].

[20] [Eustace being provost, Blessed Louis procures the foundation and liberty of the convent at Beselich.] After his passing there succeeded to the office of prelate Eustace, himself also a man of singular virtue and grace, so that deservedly Tuto 3. there was entrusted concr. 3. to him both the care of the Lord's Domini Bl. sheepfold and the government of temporal affairs. In his His. K. times a certain priest named Godfrey the church which is called Besleich Beselich Bl. 3., which he had built in the parish of Diet-Kirchen with the consent of the lord Alexander, archdeacon of Trier, with all its appurtenances, namely of animals and fruits established within Intra Br. the court, conferred on the brothers of Arinstein in hope of eternal salvation, that the same brothers should for ever provide the solemnities of Masses there. And they also, directing a convent of nuns there at once, dedicated to the Lord of Sabaoth the first-fruits of the increase of good works. The lords of Catzenellenbogen Cazenelenbogen Bl. were at that time advocates of the same place; but renouncing that advocacy entirely with all right, for love of Jesus Christ and of his immaculate mother, they handed it over Contrad. 3. into the hands of the aforesaid brothers and of the convert count Ludovici ad. Bl. with the entirety of all things existing within Intra Bl. the court in perpetual liberty. Which place Hillin, at that time Tunc temporis 3. archbishop of Trier and legate of the apostolic see, under his protection and that of his

Que om. K. successors received with special grace to be defended, the aforesaid Archdeacon Alexander wholly resigning his right in it Re ad. Br.. And for the greater and Ac Bl. perpetual firmness of this deed it was decreed and confirmed by privileges, that the said church should be bound to pay annually to the archbishop of the church of Trier a gold denarius, or twelve silver denarii of the Koblenz coinage ^h.

ANNOTATIONS.

His epitaph was given by Hugo Annales Præmonstratenses, tom. I, col. 203.; which I also found in the adversaria of our Gamans, conceived in these words:

See where is the flower, the flower that Saxony sent:

Not a man, but a star, Father Godfrey rests here.

Whom the trumpet of nectareous life, of the cloistral idea,

For twice six years set over the reins of the temple.

Amen. May he rest.

CHAPTER IV.

The virtues of Blessed Louis, his death and obsequies.

The merits of Blessed Louis, as count, as founder, as convert; But now let us return to himself, for Per quem. whom the whole matter took its beginning Exordium 3., discharging what we promised the reader about his way of life and passing. You have heard, reader, in the above, if it has not fallen from your memory Exiderit memoria 3., a few things about the man's forebears, his entry and likewise his progress. Hear now and marvel with us, that we may at least marvel at those things which we cannot imitate. For we do not yet have turned hands, nor yet hands full of jacinths Hyacinthis Bl., so that they may be stretched out Porrigere K. to almsgiving with the example of light, and in the manner of a lathe Tomi Bl. be most ready Voluntatis ad. al. for works, however fine, to be done for love of the Lord. Hear the count, hear the founder, hear likewise the convert. I marvel that these three Tam diversa ad. 3. adjectival names have come together in one man. "Certainly," according to Solomon, "a threefold cord is hard to break." When you hear of the count, do not attend to the lineage, because God has chosen the foolish and ignoble things of the world, but marvel at the triumphant Triumphantem 3. despiser of temporal things.

[22] his contempt of worldly things and his religion; For he despised name and family, the riches and honours of the world, that naked he might follow the naked Christ; in order to escape the punishments of the rich man in purple, he denied after all things, what is most difficult, himself. Did he not leave more for Christ? Yes indeed. But what? In the body of a wife, a soft thigh Quanta non reliquit? ad. 3.. "He who leaves," says the Saviour, "among other things wife and children, will receive a hundredfold." Now this hundredfold rises Surget Bl. 3. to infinity, because the infinity of rewards rises and grows. But perhaps someone will say Dicat 3.: that this could not stand in the way Q. h. o. n. p. Bl. of salvation. Let him hear what the excuser in the Gospel said: "I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come." When you hear of the founder, consider the provider of future goods, where Christ, standing by Exsistens Br. Bo. 3. as high priest, once entered into the holy place through his own blood. He who sleeps in summer will beg in winter. He provided, therefore, for the future Constituens ex suis præsentibus bonis 3., as long as it is called today, the office of divine worship; he provided for the same worshippers the support of the present life. He provided, therefore, for the future, because he left as many hostages of his salvation as he will have future heirs of his patrimony. He founded himself, or rather made himself fruitful, by the zeal of holy profession. He founded others by the example of virtue Virtutum 3., and therefore he deserved to be built up on the foundation of the Church.

[23] his humility, charity, and poverty; When you hear of the convert, understand a follower of good works. For to the bridegroom who is in heaven he preferred to be applied Computari 3. with enduring mind, in act and habit, no longer conformed to this world, but reformed in the spirit of his mind. For converted and Est Br. made as At Br. a little one, he chose to be abject in the house of God, going before as standard-bearer and forerunner by the way of humility, because, as someone says:

The world is ordered

After the example of the king;

and one is better taught by life than by word Docet 3, K.. What shall I say of charity, what of the compassion of the man, who always wholly abounded in the bowels of mercy? He often went in icy cold stripped of furs and tunics T. que Bl. [a], by which the freezing limbs of widows were warmed. These things Hanc charitatem 3. Hoc K. Bo. are testified by the voices of the poor, which often Spiritus Bl. reached the ears of the Uncircumscribed One, to whom he often secretly gave food, and let clothing down from his shoulders by stealth ^b: not inferior in Om. Br. this virtue S. ad. Br. to Martin, who gave half his cloak, while this man frequently gave his whole garment.

[24] the death of Abbot Eustace and of Blessed Louis; At this time ^c Abbot Eustace of happy memory, having soldiered vigorously for twenty-nine years in the camp of the Lord, loosed from the prison-house of the flesh, gave back Tradidit Br. his soul to God, with whom the spirits of the dead live Requiescunt Br., and he was succeeded by Ricolf, of whom many marks of probity are found in the management of the house of God. In the sixth year of his abbacy the venerable count and convert, as he was often accustomed, by the abbot's leave, was going round to visit the churches which he had founded and their estates. And when he had come to the cœnobium of ladies at Gummersheim, deprived of bodily strength, he felt the crisis of death to be at hand, and secure of the reward he desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ. For some Autem Br. days therefore being in fever, he was solemnly Om. El. imbued with the sacraments Cælestibus et ad. Br. of the Church by the abbot of the Monastery, Burchard, and the provost of Flanheim, Werembold, and the prior of the aforesaid place, Godfrey ^d, and many priests who had flocked together. And wholly burning with desire for heavenly things, bidding farewell to all, on the 8th before the Kalends of November, the angels rejoicing, he sent over to Christ his soul full of happy merits.

[25] his solemn obsequies. To his obsequies the whole Fere ad. Br. neighbourhood flocked: they wept Flens K. Bo. 2. for the man they had known, no less asking to be commended by him before the Lord,

than striving to commend to God himself Q. f. s. D. i. s. c. Om. Bl. his happy spirit Ipsius K. Bo. 2.. Placed therefore Est Br. for the time for two nights at Gummersheim, the third at Everbach, the fourth at the church of Kirtorff, the fifth at the church of Blessed Margaret, having been repropitiated to the Father of spirits with much perfume of prayers, with the solemnities of Masses, on the sixth day at last, the counts of Nassauwe Nassawe Bl., of Catzenellenbogen, of Dithse, and the lords of Ysenburg carrying the bier, he is laid down at his church of Arinstein with the greatest wailing ^e. How many tears Quanta lamenta 3. there, how many sighs, and how great was the concourse of both sexes, will be far more easily estimated than written. He was buried before the altar of the blessed pontiff Nicholas, patron of the same church, on the day of the commemoration of all the faithful souls, in the year of grace 1185, and in the 47th year from the foundation of the said church, under Abbot Ricolf.

[26] Receive now, reader, the brief and simple page which I have written, unequal to the virtues of so great a man, Exhortation to those of Arnstein to live holily. which, my conscience being witness, no vice of boasting has leavened Fermentant K., but only neglect of a buried matter has drawn forth to what is seen. Let those who wish Volunt Bl. renew and correct it out of charity D. c.Om. Bl.; for he will not Etiam Br. protest Reclamabunt Bl. at the file, who is already Om. Bl. waiting Expectant Bl. for the pen of a more learned talent. Grant Peccatori ad. 3., brothers and lords, grant, I beg, pardon, and watchfully observe what is owed to such great ashes, lest, I pray, you hold the desirable land as nothing, lest, whence you are to receive grace and merit, thence you be bound to bring back penalties and punishments. There follows you and pursues you, and enters through all the narrow places, the eye of the pious pontiff Nicholas, it penetrates hidden things Adita Bl., it searches Ruminat. secret things Oculo videt et considerat., it sees, even if it does not wish to be seen by you. Let us not, then, be ungrateful for the Tanto ad 3. benefit, that his prayer may be a patronage to us, but let us all together hear the end of speaking: "Fear God and keep his commandments, this is every man" [Timeamus e. m. e. observemus, simusque perfecti ut Pater noster in cælis perfectus est. Bl.]. This, that is, through this; is, that is, will be; every man, understand perfect H. i. e. p. h. e. i. e. e. o. h. s. p. Om. 2, Bo. Bl.. To this perfection and crown of the kingdom may he who has invited us bring us after the death of the flesh, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen ^f.

ANNOTATIONS.