Faro

ON ST. FARO, BISHOP OF MEAUX AND CONFESSOR,

IN ALL LIKELIHOOD IN THE YEAR DCLXXII.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY

Faro, confessor and bishop, at Meaux in the Gauls. (S.)

BY J. V. H.

§ I. The site and bounds of the pagus of Brie; the elogium of the Saint in the sacred Calendars; the various authors of the Life.

The pagus of Brie (La Brie), which the monk Jonas, a writer of the seventh century, in the life of St. Eustasius at the 29th day of March Acta SS., vol. III of March, p. 787 calls the forest and pagus of Brie, The site and bounds of the pagus of Brie; is situated toward the east of the city of Paris. Although the same name persisted for the pagus until the end of the century just past, its bounds seem to have been different at different times. It was formerly divided into the Frankish Brie and the Champagne Brie (La Brie Française and La Brie Champenoise). The city of Meaux (Meaux) is generally called the head of the pagus of Brie: yet there are those who say that the pagus of Meaux is to be distinguished from that of Brie. Thus the distinguished Guérard under the civitas of Meaux arranges lesser pagi, those of Meaux or Melcianum, Aliodrensis, Brie and Coved [Essai sur le système des divisions territoriales de la Gaule, p. 147. Cf. Valois, Notitia Gall., p. 96. Cf. Guérard, Le polyptique de l'abbé Irminon, vol. I, p. 97]. There are others however who merge the two pagi into one; so that the pagus of Brie is also called of Meaux. Of this opinion is John Lebeuf, who teaches that there are taken indiscriminately

the pagus of Meaux and that of Brie Dissertat. sur l'hist. de France, vol. I, pp. 94 and 98. Similarly Alban Butler in his Hagiology Vies des saints, St. Faron, 28 October, without however bringing any proof, asserts that the city of Meaux belongs to the pagus of Brie. From what has been said it becomes manifest that the boundary of the pagus of Brie remains doubtful.

[2] in it, for most, is the city of Meaux; Moreover the city of Meaux, today in the department of the Seine and Marne (depart. de Seine-et-Marne), was called Jatinum by Ptolemy and, according to the Theodosian Table, Fixtuinum D'Anville, Notice de l'anc. Gaule, p. 375. It belonged to the kingdom of Austrasia in the sixth century, as Gregory of Tours testifies, History, Book IX, ch. 20 Migne, Patrol. lat., vol. LXXI, col. 498: for in the thirteenth year of the reign of Childebert, king of Metz or Austrasia, that is of Christ 587, Gaul was divided into two parts between Childebert and Guntram, king of Orléans or Burgundy: and in that pact one reads: On equal condition let the lord King Childebert claim for his power from the present day, with their bounds, the cities of Meaux and two portions of Senlis, Tours, Poitiers, Avranches … Adrian Baillet is mistaken, then, when at the 28th day of October he says that the pagus of Brie belonged to Burgundy, inasmuch as it embraced the province of Sens. But the pact cited openly shows that the province of Sens was divided in two between the two kings, for it assigns a third portion of the city of Paris to Guntram, two portions of Senlis to Childebert. It is manifest, then, that the entire province of Sens was assigned to neither king. Moreover these things are also confirmed from the fact that the Saint's father Agneric and his son Faro lived at the court of Theudebert, king of Austrasia.

[3] from which the family of St. Faro arose; From this pagus, whether from Meaux or from its territory, arose the family, no less distinguished for nobility of birth than for holiness of morals, of the Burgundofarones. The head of the family was Agneric or Chagneric or Hagneric, who, on the testimony of Jonas, the contemporary biographer of St. Columban Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 25, was a table-companion of Theudebert, a wise man, welcome in the king's counsels, and fortified with nobility and wisdom. He received Sts. Columban and Eustasius in hospitality and in return received from them a blessing on his children. For by his wife Leudegunda he had four offspring, two male, two female. The sons were Chagnoald, monk of Luxeuil, afterwards bishop of Laon, of whom our predecessors treated at the 6th day of September Ibid., vol. II of Sept., p. 688, and Faro or Burgundofaro, of whom we speak today. The daughters were St. Fara or Burgundofara, whose Acts will be given on the day on which she is venerated, the 7th of December, and Agnetrude, of whose cult nothing is established. But although this family had its dwelling, as we have said, among the Austrasians, yet the name itself shows that it drew its origin from the Burgundians: for among the Burgundians the nobles are called farones. Warnachar, says Fredegar, ch. 44 Migne, Patrol. lat., vol. LXXI, col. 634, the mayor of the palace, with all the pontiffs, and also the Burgundofarones, he ordered to come to him at the villa of Bonneuil. In the law of the Lombards Fara signifies a generation or family: Book III, title 14, a free man is permitted to migrate with his fara. Burgundofaro therefore is the same as a noble of the Burgundian realm: and this is the name by which our holy Faro is indicated.

[4] whose praises are recounted both by the Martyrologies, Among the ancient martyrologists Usuard makes mention of St. Faro, saying: In the city of Meaux, St. Faro, bishop and confessor; which the Roman repeats, only the word city being omitted. With these sings Wandelbert in the metrical Martyrology: Here also along the shores of the Natrona Pharo is venerated. The elogium of the Saint is amplified by the Martyrology of Paris, published by order of Cardinal de Noailles in the year 1727: At Meaux, it writes, St. Faro, bishop, brother of St. Fara, Virgin, who had persuaded his wife to put on the veil of religion, that he himself might be admitted to the clergy, and he sat in the second Council of Sens with Sts. Ouen, Eligius, Amand and several other bishops of the Gauls. Already before Greven in his edition of Usuard had celebrated St. Faro in fuller words. Blessed Pharo, he says, brought to contempt of the world through St. Phara his sister, his wife Blidechild having been consecrated with the sacred veil, himself from count palatine succeeded his brother Walbert (we shall show below that there is an error here) in the pontificate of the Church of Meaux. And when at a certain time, passing before a prison, he had heard the cries of those in chains, Go out, he said, free, because you repent, and at once their chains were loosed. At length, when he had ruled the aforesaid Church for 66 years in much sanctity, he rested in peace. We shall see below that the holy prelate did not preside over the church of Meaux for so long a time.

[5] and by the liturgy of Meaux. The Breviary of Meaux, published in the year 1640 by order of Bishop Dominic Séguier, deliberately omitted whatever about the deeds of the Saint could offer a handle for controversies. We therefore commit to the press the Lessons of the second Nocturn, inasmuch as they present a fairly accurate image of St. Faro. Lesson IV. The noble Faro, begotten of Count Agneric and Leodegunda, was at first dear to Theudebert, king of Austrasia. But after Clothar, having conquered Theudebert and Theuderic, obtained the principate alone, Faro gained so much favour with him that he was first among the king's beloved. Relying on this favour he was accustomed both to exhort the king to the way of salvation and to inflame the faithful to piety, and not rarely to bring unbelievers to the faith of Christ. Lesson V. The bonds of matrimony entered upon with Blidechild, at the persuasion of his sister Fara, he dissolved with the consent of his spouse, and rivalling the sanctity of his pious sister, he said farewell to the world, and bound himself wholly to the service of God. Wherefore, the bishop of Meaux having died, the people themselves demanding, the clergy electing, the king assenting and willing, he was substituted in his place, that the virtues which had previously sparkled as it were in secret, placed on the candlestick of the Church, might illuminate all the faithful with welcome light. Lesson VI. The splendour of this light drew many from distant nations to Meaux; but especially Fiacre, son of the king of Scotia, who was kindly received by Faro, confirmed in his purpose and given a small field in which to live as a solitary. Many other servants of Christ he attended with what services he could. He also contracted friendships with the holy bishops of his age, Eligius of Noyon, Ouen of Rouen and many others. And after he had ruled the church of Meaux for very many years in all sanctity, distinguished for merits and miracles, full of days he rested in the Lord. His body is preserved at Meaux, in the church under his invocation.

[6] There are chiefly three writers of the Life: Our Solier in his observations on Usuard at the 28th day of October says that the Acts were edited under the name of Hildegar by Mabillon, in the second Benedictine century; more briefly by Surius. There exist with us several, both fuller and more contracted, which yet do not altogether agree with the edited ones. The comparison of them all with one another is the matter of the investigations to follow in our Acts. The Life written, as they say, in verse by Fulcuin I have not yet seen. Mabillon indeed in the Acta Sanctorum of the Order of St. Benedict numbers three ancient Lives Sæc. II, p. 607. The first who committed the Life of St. Faro to letters, in Mabillon's judgment, is Hildegar, from a monk of St. Denis near Paris become bishop of Meaux, of whom below. The second is Fulcoius, by birth of Beauvais, by grade subdeacon of Meaux, who at the request of Geoffrey, abbot of the monastery of the Holy Cross or of St. Faro, sang the deeds of the same Saint in heroic verse. The third is an anonymous writer, who reduced the product of Hildegar to a compendium, and augmented it in some places: which anonymous or perhaps some other Surius renders παραφραστικως. So, more or less, Mabillon. In the papers which once belonged to the Bollandian museum, and are today preserved in our royal library under no. 8924, I have a twofold Life, one indeed more contracted from a codex of St. Saviour's of Utrecht, which, whether you regard the order or the diction, agrees very well with the Surian edition, of which Mabillon speaks. The other is fuller, perhaps from the monastery of Anchin, communicated to our predecessors by our Chifflet. To these is attached a codex of Miracles from papers, as it is said, of the Feuillants. It remains, therefore, to select the Life which according to custom we edit after the Commentary.

[7] among whom Hildegar, bishop of Meaux, Mabillon made public the Life written by Hildegar, because, he says, it is to be held as equal to all, as being the more ancient Sæc. II, p. 607. Hildegar, as we have said, from a monk of St. Denis become bishop of Meaux, occupied the see at least from the year 855 to 873 Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1604. And certainly that the Life edited by Mabillon was written in the time of Hildegar, indeed by himself, the words of no. 64 sufficiently manifest Mabill., Act., sæc. II, p. 616; for it has: For from the twentieth order of Blessed Faro up to the present Hildegar, humble bishop, chosen by election from the college of monks dwelling in the monastery of the most illustrious Martyr Denis, and raised by divine gift together with the most outstanding liberality of the renowned King Charles to the summit of so great a government, the order of former prelates has been multiplied down to this one, whom in the sixteenth number the wheel of years turns in rolling. Mabillon rightly observes Ibid., p. 607 that any other author would have mentioned Hildegar more honourably than to call him a humble bishop. The writer also betrays his age when he narrates in ch. 118 Ibid., p. 622 that he had received from the mouth of Lupus of Ferrières a miracle of St. Faro, and in no. 123 Ibid., p. 624 that at that time the devastations of the Normans took place.

[8] the principal and most ancient; yet not This Life, in Mabillon's judgment the most ancient of all, yet written in the middle of the ninth century, as we noted above, is not without its errors, which Charles Le Cointe in his Ecclesiastical Annals enumerates under the year 672 Vol. III, p. 647. First of all it is said in the Life, no. 31 Mabillon, Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 612 (an error repeated also by the Life to be edited by us, no. 14), that St. Faro received from the font of baptism Clothar, the son of Chilperic, who afterwards ruled over all Gaul. Which is certainly false, both because he was received, as Gregory of Tours says, History, Book X, ch. 28 Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXI, col. 559, by Guntram, king of Burgundy, and because when Clothar was born Faro either had not been brought into the light, or at any rate was still in his years of infancy: for Clothar was born in the year of Christ 584. Perhaps (for there may be room for conjecture) those biographers confused Clothar II with his great-great-grandson Clothar III, born in the year 652, at that very time when St. Faro, already celebrated for sanctity, the twenty-sixth year in

the episcopate was passing. No more correct, says Le Cointe, is what is reported at no. 26 about the killing of Chilperic, as if he had been slain by the plots of his queen Fredegund on account of her adultery with Landeric, prince of his palace. Of this machination of Fredegund or of her adultery with Landeric Gregory, just cited, does not treat, although in Book VI, ch. 46 he describes the killing of Chilperic, whom he calls the Nero and Herod of our time Ibid., col. 412. From the silence of Gregory Le Cointe concludes under the year 597, no. 1 Vol. II, Ann., p. 448, that these things were slanderously fastened upon Fredegund, and propagated by certain recent writers. But Gregory is not altogether silent: for in Book VI, ch. 7 and 14 Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXI, cols. 420 and 424 the envoys of Childebert, king of Austrasia, to Guntram, king of Burgundy, openly accuse Fredegund of the killing both of his father Sigebert I and of his paternal uncle Chilperic. And so if it was a slander, it is certainly contemporary. Then Fredegund throws back the killing of Chilperic on Eberulf the chamberlain, because, says Gregory, Book VII, ch. 21 Ibid., col. 427, when asked by Fredegund to remain with her after the king's death, she could not obtain it: and hence vengeance grew into a most atrocious accusation. Finally Fredegund was not placed beyond suspicion of adultery, Gregory himself being witness, Book VI, ch. 50 Ibid., col. 367: since at the villa of Berny a consultation of bishops was held before the king about an accusation of adultery. From all this it is clear enough that the Mabillonian biographer is not to be charged with certain error. Moreover in the Life to be edited by us nothing similar occurs [Cf. Aimoin, Hist. franc., Book III, ch. 37, in Migne, Patrol., vol. CXXXIX, col. 730].

[9] not without various blemishes, which are noted, A third error in the Life edited by Mabillon Le Cointe detects in this, that at nos. 60 and 102 it is said that Waldebert or Walbert was bishop of Meaux, predecessor of St. Faro, and indeed nineteenth from St. Denis, while Faro was twentieth. But the authors of the Gallia Christiana Cf. Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1599 rightly eliminate Walbert from the catalogue of the bishops of Meaux. 1° Walbert did not succeed Gundoald of Meaux, but St. Eustasius in the government of the monastery of Luxeuil: A monastery also, says Jonas in the Life of St. Eustasius, no. 2 Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 117, of Virgins of Christ he builds on the paternal soil between the rivers Morin and Aube, and appoints brethren to have the care of building: he decides that the girl's brother Chagnoald and Walbert, who afterwards succeeded him, shall teach the Rule. 2° The catalogues of the bishops of Meaux all agree in giving Hildevert as successor to St. Faro, who himself succeeded Gundoald. And in this way no place of sitting is left to Walbert among the pontiffs of Meaux. And not without reason: for Walbert succeeded St. Eustasius, abbot of Luxeuil, who held the government for 40 years, as his biographer Adso has it Acta SS., vol. I of May, p. 279: wherefore, made abbot in the year 625, he presided over the monastery up to the year 665. Certainly he was not made abbot from bishop, nor bishop from abbot, as being then over seventy. And hence it is that in the church of Meaux no monument of him exists, no tomb, no Relics, and finally no memory is inscribed in the sacred calendars of that church. This interpolation the author of the Life to be edited by us altogether avoided; for at no. 3 St. Faro is marked after Gundoald as nineteenth from St. Denis, first bishop of Meaux, without touching Walbert by any word. It is true indeed that the author a little below attaches these words: O admirable eternal wisdom! which foreordained that three brothers, poured forth from one womb, should be distinguished with the pontifical dignity under the sacred number of the Trinity. But by these words it is in no way given to understand that the three brothers Faro, Chanoald and Walbert occupied the see of Meaux: indeed a little above, at no. 2, he had already said that Chanoald from a monk of Luxeuil was made prelate of Lugdunum Clavatum, or of Laon (Laon).

[10] and according to historical documents At the 2nd day of May ours gave the Acts of St. Walbert Acta SS., vol. I of May, p. 274, and thinking that Walbert the brother of St. Faro was bishop of Meaux, and that this dignity could not be reconciled with the government of the monastery of Luxeuil, carried on for forty years, they distinguished two men named Walbert, of whom one presided over the church of Meaux, the other over the monastery of Luxeuil Ibid., place cited. But for us to establish a double Walbert, we have no suitable testimony. Indeed, whether there was even any brother of St. Faro of this name is rendered uncertain by the testament of St. Fara, who names only her brothers Faro, Chagnoald and her sister Agnetrude Duplessis, Hist. de l'Eglise de Meaux, vol. II, p. 2. Moreover this duplication has its foundation in the alleged pontificate of Meaux, which we have sufficiently exploded above. Nevertheless in the Life of St. Agilus, which ours at the 30th day of August Acta SS., vol. VI of August, p. 574 call nearly contemporary, and Mabillon in the Acts of the Saints of the Order of St. Benedict Sæc. II, p. 315 somewhat later, one reads, at no. 5, that St. Agilus had as companions in his monastic life under St. Eustasius Agnoald (Chanoald) and Waldebert, sons of his paternal uncle Hagneric, of whom one was ordained bishop at Lugdunum Clavatum, the other of the city of Meaux. Certainly if the writer of the Life of St. Agilus was nearly contemporary or somewhat later, the episcopate of St. Walbert could scarcely be doubted; for he could not be ignorant who were in that age the bishops of Meaux, in whose diocese was situated Rebais, of which St. Agilus was the first abbot. This Life is held to be written by an author somewhat later, both by the Histoire littéraire de la France Hist., vol. III, p. 635 and by ours at the 30th day of August Acta SS., vol. VI of Aug., p. 571: but Mabillon holds it to be more recent than the seventh century Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 315.

[11] are exploded. The discourse would run on too long if we should bring to the balance the opinion brought forward on both sides. Certainly all agree in this, that the Life of St. Agilus is sprinkled with fairly large blemishes, and that the writer not rarely brought forward certain things derived from uncertain rumour: thus when he makes St. Salaberga, twice married and mother of five children, a virgin. Then ours, on inspecting the text itself more closely, admit that it has suffered additions and interpolations, and that in various places. Granted, therefore, that the Life was written in the seventh century, many assertions are uncertain, among which there should rightly, it seems to me, be counted the opinion on the episcopate of St. Walbert, who nowhere, as we have said above, is reckoned among the prelates of Meaux. And these are about the things which we had to say concerning the Life of St. Faro edited by Mabillon, and on its occasion: the other Lives which have been brought to light by anonymous authors have about the same blemishes. Wherefore I bring forward a Life hitherto, so far as I know, unedited: both because it seems to have lesser defects, and because, being hitherto unedited, it can be compared with the Mabillonian work. Which of the two is older, I would not dare to say: certainly nothing occurs in it which indicates a more recent hand. Indeed the Mabillonian one has several commonplaces, suppressed by Mabillon, which are absent from our codex. But since often both exemplars use the same words, we shall complete our exemplar with certain words enclosed in brackets.

§ II. The Saint's parents, his life at court; his secular and clerical service; he washes away very grave sins with the help of his wife.

The parents of St. Faro, The parents of St. Faro were, as is said at no. 3, Agneric, Hagneric or Chageneric and Leodegunda. Agneric drew his lineage from the nation of the Burgundians. Taking this occasion the Mabillonian biographer, or he who wrote the Life of St. Faro edited by Mabillon, says, at no. 8, that the Burgundians coalesced into a great nation and took their name from places, because the frequent dwellings established along the frontiers are commonly called Burgi: whence the Burgundians are commonly so called, the name being made from the name of Burgus. The Benedictine writer of Saint-Maur of the History of Burgundy, Urbain Plancher, explodes this etymology, as also others there reported, and admits that he has searched in vain for the origin of the name Hist. de Bourgogne, vol. I, p. 1 and following. Let it suffice, therefore, to have repeated here what we said above at no. 2, that Faro and Burgundofaro (for our Saint is called by both names) indicates a noble of Burgundy. The kinship of our Saint with St. Ouen Baillet holds as mere conjecture, when he says that such kinship is alleged. But this connection between the two Saints is clearly indicated by the Mabillonian biographer, no. 14: Proceeding, he says Sæc. II, Acta SS. Bened., p. 612, from there (from the house of Agneric) the aforesaid Agneric caused Blessed Columban to have passage through the villa which in common knowledge is called Wilciacus, out of love for his kinsman, a most illustrious man, who was famous for just acts and known by the name of Authar, whose wife was called Aia. To these spouses moreover there were two sons, Ado and Dado, whom they offered to the blessing of the holy man. And Dado is none other than St. Ouen, bishop of Rouen.

[13] beneficent toward St. Columban, And these things are to some extent confirmed from the Life of St. Columban, written by the contemporary Jonas, in which at no. 50 Ibid., place cited it is said that Columban was received by Agneric, thence, says Jonas, he came to a certain villa Wltiacum, which is situated above the river Marne. There he was received by a certain man, Authar by name, whose wife was called Aiga: There follows the blessing imparted to the two sons of Authar. That there was a connection between Sts. Faro and Agilus, the first abbot, is reported by the latter's biographer, already cited above, at no. 4, when he says that Agneric was the paternal uncle of St. Agilus. Ibid., p. 318 Which is also confirmed from the Life to be edited below, in which at no. 3 Agnoald, the father of St. Agilus, is the brother of Agneric: although perhaps Agneric would better be called maternal uncle, since the mother of St. Agilus, Deuteria, was, as it has at no. 2 Acta SS., vol. VI of Aug., p. 575, sprung from the distinguished lineage of the Burgundians, and thus was related to Agneric, likewise a Burgundian. The father of St. Agilus, Agnoald, was a native of the territory of Port, of most noble birth. It is not sufficiently established in what place that territory is situated: Mabillon with Chifflet would have it in the county of Burgundy, while ours incline rather to place it in French Champagne, and that it is also called the pagus of Perthes; the reasons brought forward on both sides ours set out in Annotation b of chapter I of the Life of St. Agilus Ibid., place cited. From these things it is clear enough that St. Faro sprang from a family distinguished not only by eminent nobility, but also by the highest sanctity.

[14] into the court of King Theudebert his son, Agneric, says our biographer at no. 8, was raising his beloved son Faro to be trained at the time of his novitiate in the court of Theudebert. The Mabillonian Life has about the same at no. 11: In order, then, that so great and such a lamp of Christ might gradually grow, from the first flower of tender youth he suckled him within the court of King Theudebert, nobly nourishing him with Christian doctrine. These things show to some extent the time at which the saint was born, namely about the year 585. For Theudebert, a king ten years old, began to hold the sceptre of Austrasia in the year 596, and was afterwards killed by Queen Brunhild in the year 612. In that space of time, then, is to be placed the novitiate or flower of tender youth of St. Faro, who, as our author has it at no. 8, as a youth clothed in the military toga, retained among the nobles of the palace a very high place of familiarity with Theudebert. From which words it can rightly be deduced that St. Faro was nearly equal in age to King Theudebert. Among youths friendship and familiarity easily arise; which, in order to remain constant, generally requires an age somewhat more advanced in the subject than in the king. And hence I conjecture that our Saint was twelve years old when Theudebert took up the kingdom of Austrasia. The same is written in the Mabillonian Life at no. 21, except that it reports the fraternal controversy between the two brothers Theudebert and Theuderic, at which time, it says, Blessed Faro, still a recruit, was held a famous soldier in the court of King Theudebert, strong in youthful age. And those fraternal wars, or that fraternal controversy, flared up in the year of Christ 608, when our Saint was still a recruit, yet fit for military service, and so he was then about twenty years old, and thus he seems to have been born about the year 585.

[15] born about the year 585, Moreover this birth-year fits excellently with the rest of the chronological arrangement of the deeds of St. Faro. It is sufficiently established that the Saint spent forty-six years in the episcopate. For the sixty-six years generally ascribed by the ancients cannot stand with the rest of the narration. For it is said in the Life, no. 21, that he ruled the episcopal see from King Clothar up to the times of Childeric, the great-grandson of that Clothar. Now from the year 613 in which Clothar began to reign up to the slaying of Chilperic in the year 673, there are altogether 60 years: if therefore the pontificate of St. Faro comprises 66 years, it must have begun before Clothar or ended after Childeric; which by no means agrees with the text of the Life, no. 21, adduced above. But if 46 years of the episcopate are numbered, then everything flows rightly: for it is by no means necessary to extend the age of the holy prelate to decrepit old age, to the ninety-sixth or -seventh year of his age: for if to 66 years of episcopate there be added an age of 30 years, which is required for anyone at that time to be promoted to this grade, we have a senility of which no biographer says even the smallest word.

[16] led, who at first followed military service Then by a slip of the pen the numeral X could easily be placed after the numeral L, so that in place of XLVI we have LXVI years. For this lesser number our text also contends at no. 8, in which it is said that when Clothar had obtained the monarchy of the three kingdoms (which happened in the year of Christ 613) Blessed Faro was sublimely ennobled by the familiarity of his friendship among the other nobles of the kingdom; it is then added that he obtained the primacy in the king's counsels: whence it follows that he lived for several years at the court of Clothar. All of which confirms again that the pontificate of St. Faro is to be defined within forty-six years. Childeric, the great-grandson of the praised Clothar, was killed in the year 673, in the month of September: therefore at least in the preceding year, St. Faro died in the month of October. But if from that year 672 we go back through the space of [ ] years, we reach the 26th year of the same seventh century, in which, Gundoald having died, St. Faro succeeded. And hence is confirmed what we have said of the time of his birth, namely about the year 585. Since, already fit for military service under Theudebert in the year 612, he was still for fourteen years in the service of Clothar; so that he must have exceeded by some years the age suitable for the episcopate. But these limits may not be extended higher, because then we no longer have under Theudebert a recruit set in the flower of tender youth. To sum up this chronological arrangement, then, we judge that St. Faro was born about the year 585, made bishop in the year 626, died an octogenarian in the year 672.

[17] and having obtained the king's familiarity St. Faro, as we saw above, lived for some time in the royal court with Theudebert and Clothar: and with the former, young himself, probably, he pleased the young man: but with the latter he obtained a principal seat among the royal counsellors; indeed that he was referendary of King Dagobert either before St. Ouen or together with him (for that there were sometimes several referendaries Mabillon says Annal. Ord. S. Bened., vol. I, p. 314) is also shown by a diploma, mutilated in its chronological notes, which Burgundofaro presented Bouquet, Rec., vol. IV, p. 631; because, says the biographer at no. 8, relying on the royal confidence, he often admonished the king himself to trample the vain favours of this life with heavenly desires, to show himself lovable to all, to have all his acts and manners composed. He also most prudently arranged the royal counsels, public and private, with the magnificence of the love of God; so much so that in the descriptions of the Life of Blessed Chillenus, sprung from the Scottish nation, it is found written of him that he took care astutely with the (art) of his counsel to provide in advance, that the commonwealth of the kingdom should not totter from the state of its magnificence and power by any violation of right. The Mabillonian Life has nearly the same word for word at no. 70. Then various examples are adduced, by which it is shown that his ministry was useful and holy both to the king and to the people. Nevertheless, although the acts of St. Faro were praiseworthy on every side, at the urging of St. Fara, his sister, he began to follow a holier life. For, says our biographer at no. 12, God inspiring, her (Fara's) familiar conversation so moved the mind of Blessed Faro that he despised the glory of palatine rule and of royal friendship, and, placed in the flower of youth, restrained lawful wedlock, and joined himself to the ecclesiastical order; and consecrated to God with the sacred veil his wife, Bliderhis by name, not unlike her husband in her desires.

[18] he became a cleric, We saw a little above at no. 16 that St. Faro ascended the see of Meaux about the year 626: yet before that he was trained for some years in the clerical service, and was not suddenly carried over from the royal court to pastoral government. And indeed it pertained to ecclesiastical discipline that no one should come to the highest grade of the priesthood unless proved in the lower. For when Burgundio asked St. Gregory of Tours to be ordained bishop in place of his maternal uncle, Felix, bishop of Nantes, then ill; Gregory answered him, History, Book VI, ch. 15 Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXI, col. 387: We have it written in the canons, son, that no one can come to the episcopate unless he first obtains the ecclesiastical grades in regular order. He therefore exhorts Burgundio to receive the tonsure from him who chose him, and when he has received the honour of the presbyterate, to be assiduous at the church; and when God shall have willed his uncle to depart, then, he says, you will easily ascend to the episcopal grade. That the same was done with St. Faro the discipline itself then in force persuades us. We judge therefore that the Saint, born about fifteen years before the end of the sixth century, in the thirty-fifth year of his age embraced the stricter discipline of the clerics; wherefore our biographer just cited could rightly say that he restrained lawful wedlock while placed in the flower of youth, inasmuch as he was about thirty years old.

[19] his wife Blidechild consenting, Moreover in order to follow the clerical state, St. Faro had to have the consent of his wife Blidechild, whom our biographer calls Bliderhis at no. 12, and Blidehis at no. 17. The Mabillonian Life at no. 91 teaches that he joined to God with the sacred veil his wife, Blidehild by name, not unequal in this holy pleasure: and a little below, at no. 106, it is taught that the holy woman with most zealous cares fought for God, residing in the villa which is commonly called Pinnewindo, by right of her own property. Our Life has the same in nearly the same words at nos. 12 and 17. But these things need some explanation. Blidechild in all likelihood, if we compare her age with the years of her husband, had scarcely reached thirty years when she is said to have received the sacred veil: which indeed seems contrary to the sacred canons, forbidding the veiling of virgins before forty years. The Council of Agde of the year 506, canon 19, has Labbe, vol. IV, Conc., col. 1386: Nuns, however proved their life and morals may be, are not to be veiled before the fortieth year of their age. Hugh Ménard has more about that age in the Notes to the Sacramentary of Gregory the Great, note 612 Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXVIII, col. 429. Yet the age varies at various times and places, as is established from the Decree of Gratian, cause XX, question 1; and that St. Gertrude of Nivelles received the sacred veil from St. Amand within the years of youth we are taught by her Life, written by a contemporary Acta SS., vol. II of March, p. 594. Therefore on this head I would not wish to deny the veiling of Blidechild, especially since St. Amand was a contemporary of St. Faro.

[20] who herself also, yet without the monastic garment, professed chastity: But a graver doubt is raised in me by the fact that veiling properly pertains to virgins, by no means to widows, after whose likeness Blidechild was to be considered. The form of vowing for widows is indicated in the first council of Orange of the year 441, canon 27 Labbe, vol. [ , Conc., col. 1451], which establishes that the profession of widowhood to be kept, made before the bishop in the sacristy, is to be signified by a widow's garment imposed by the bishop: I very much doubt whether Blidechild either put on a widow's garment or was even shorn: for it is certain that nuns at that time in Gaul received the tonsure, as is clear from the example of St. Gertrude, whose mother shore her after the manner of a crown Acta SS., vol. II of March, p. 394. For Blidechild, already bound by a vow of chastity, shore herself, to escape the snares of her husband. It is said at no. 17 that Blidechild cast off the adornment of her garments and shore the hair of her head, and put on a hair-shirt. The Mabillonian text says about the same at no. 106, namely she shore the hair of her head, in which consisted the more beautiful ornament of the body, and put on for ornament a hair-shirt. From these things I deduce that Blidechild, by a vow indeed never to be violated, after the manner of the veiled, bound her chastity to God, yet so that she persevered otherwise in the secular state: and in fact she does not seem to have dwelt in any monastery, but resided in the villa Pinnewindo by right of her own property, that is in free solitude.

[21] St. Faro, then tempted, It will be worth the labour to explain in a brief commentary how St. Faro was tempted to carnal sin, and by what counsel his wife Blidechild overcame the temptation. We bring forward the history from the Mabillonian text, no. 106, with which ours, no. 17, can be compared: Nor is it to be passed over in silence how much his wife Blidechild, worthy of his virtue, made over by the sacred veil, shone forth; according to what we have learned from the public report of very ancient men, who were composed in milk-white hoariness. When she was fighting for God with most zealous cares, residing in the villa which is commonly called Pinnevindo, by right of her own property, the prelate of God Faro desired by a command that she should come into his presence. When she had refused at the first hearing, the bishop of God did not delay to redouble his command. But she joined to this second the first neglect. And when, with a third added to these two commands, he had troubled her violently, pondering that her resolve of mind could not resist, namely that at the sight of Blessed Faro he should no more slip into some delight of titillation, she found within herself a most cunning counsel, and shore all the hair of her head, in which consisted the more beautiful ornament of the body, and having put on a hair-shirt for ornament, at length thus overcome, she stood unkempt in his presence. While he thought to satisfy his mind by seeing the beauty long desired by him, as soon as he brought the windows of his eyes to bear on her, he shuddered in most bitter disgust, and by the sight of her, in loathing of his mind's resolve, vomited up utterly the trace of that former love and of any illicit love to follow. Truly admirable in this deed is this most chaste and sacred woman of God, who by a most sagacious counsel took care to provide for herself and for her bishop, whose wife she once was, against illicit offence to God, according to that saying of the Gospel: "If your eye scandalizes you, pluck it out and cast it from you. Matt. XVIII, 9"

[22] by the industry of his wife he escapes the danger of sinning, It is certain that by three commands St. Faro committed three very grave sins. There is no doubt that Blidechild knew with what intent she was being summoned. In the Life of the Saint, edited by Surius at the 28th day of October, this is openly shown, namely that Faro did not wish a simple conversation, and that the suspicion of crime did not arise from Blidechild alone, but that Faro truly with criminal intent required the presence of his wife. For it says that Blidechild extinguished the temptation of the most blessed man, cast upon him by the treacherous and malignant demon. It then narrates by what art she evaded the snares, when the memory of her love and beauty returned to Blessed Faro: and thus the man, piously deceived, grieved that he had so far yielded to temptation. And so all have it that St. Faro consented to a most shameful temptation: nor is there doubt that by sincere penance he washed away the stain. Of which penance other Saints too have given an example, so that the fall itself thereafter added spurs for pursuing greater sanctity. Thus St. Peter, prince of the Apostles, to whom the keys of the kingdom of heaven had already been promised, abjured his master Christ by a threefold denial, and afterwards blotted out the sin with many tears. Thus Mary, niece of St. Abraham, who after twenty years passed in the highest innocence in the desert practised harlotry, brought back to her former life by her paternal uncle, was also endowed by God with the grace of healings, as her Acts have it, written by St. Ephrem the Syrian, which our predecessors gave at the 16th day of March Acta SS., vol. II of March, p. 442 and following. And indeed St. Augustine, commenting on the words of St. Paul to the Romans VII, 14: For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin, says, Retractations, Book I, ch. 23 Migne, Patrol., vol. XXXII, col. 620, that each holy person can say that he is carnal, that is, exposed to the motions of concupiscence. The saints generally resist, but yet some sometimes are overcome by temptation.

§ III. Created bishop he enriches the Church; he subscribes various diplomas; he founds the monastery of the Holy Cross at Meaux and concurs in the foundation of the monastery of Rebais.

Made bishop of Meaux, he enriches the Church; St. Faro, as we said above at no. 16, was established in the see of Meaux in the year 627. From then on the Church began to flourish more: for, says the Mabillonian biographer at no. 93, the church of the city of Meaux, wasting away in poverty, which adorned with the suffrages of the Protomartyr Blessed Stephen and built in his rosy blood fittingly shines, presenting it with the very rich wealth of villas, he rendered more magnificent and more noble in the eyes of all. To these ornaments the bishop's sister, St. Fara, also added her contribution. Whence there was such abundance of temporal goods that St. Faro was able not only to build an episcopal residence and a monastery, or habitation of canons, but moreover erected titles of churches of Christ, by which I understand parishes, and also liberally received strangers and most magnificently cherished them, as we shall show below. The Life to be edited below has the same, but in fewer words, at no. 13. Yet that this largesse of donations began before the episcopate I am easily persuaded, if what the Mabillonian Life reports at no. 92 is true, namely that St. Faro, having become a cleric, led a poor life. To obtain the more, it says, the grace of Christ and to merit the height of perfection and the summit of divine contemplation, vanishing from the darkness of his former life through the grace of the Gospel preaching, which is Matt. XIX, 21: Go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and come, follow me, and denying the fog of his own will, he most amply enriched with manifold and wealthy possessions of land the ecclesiastical supports, to receive hundredfold fruits of merit. That very large donations, then, were assigned to the Church by St. Faro, up to then a cleric, is manifest from these words.

[24] St. Faro was also present at the translation of the holy martyrs Crispin and Crispinian, which St. Ansaric, bishop of Soissons, celebrated on the 4th of the ides (the 10th day) of June of the year 649. Of this translation ours treated widely at the 25th day of October in the Acts of the Holy Martyrs Acta SS., vol. XI of October, p. 509, wherefore it does not help to repeat the same; similarly our predecessors already touched on the same event at the 5th day of September in the Life of St. Ansaric Ibid., vol. II of Sept., p. 546. Let it suffice, then, to have reported here the words written in the Life of St. Ansaric: Behold that great rewarder, who promised to honour those who serve him, confers on him (Ansaric) this grace, that with Sts. Eligius of Noyon, Ouen of Rouen, Faro of Meaux, and other bishops worthy of praise he should merit to translate the most sacred bodies of the blessed brother martyrs Crispin and Crispinian, apostles of Soissons. The same writer testifies that the chief actor in the event was St. Eligius, who made a gold and silver vessel to preserve the bodies. And the translation was carried out on the 4th of the ides of June, which day in the year 649 falls on a Monday, the dominical letter being marked D.

[25] he subscribes the privilege of Emmo of Sens: St. Faro subscribed the privilege which Emmo, bishop of Sens, gave to his monastery of St. Peter. Clarius in the Chronicle of St. Peter says that it was subscribed by the bishops of the province in synod D'Achery, Spicil., vol. II, p. 464, although bishops were present also from other provinces, as St. Ouen of Rouen. The instrument was given at Mansolacum, a royal estate, in the third year of the reign of our lord Clothar Mansi, Suppl. Conc. Labbe, vol. I, col. 507. Peter Delalande in the supplement to the ancient Councils of Gaul P. 70 attaches the third year of Clothar to the year of Christ 662, following namely the Chronology of James Sirmond, who places the death of Dagobert I in the year 644, while it ought rather to be brought back to the year 638. Clothar III, his grandson, began to reign after his father Clovis II in the year 656: the third year of his reign, then, belongs to the year of Christ 658, and cannot in any way be prolonged to the year 662, because St. Eligius, who was present at the synod of Sens, as is clear from the subscriptions, had already died in the year 659. A similar privilege the same Emmo gave to the monastery of St. Columba of Sens, given, as one reads Mansi, Suppl. Conc. Labbe, vol. I, col. 505, on the seventh day of the kalends of September, in the third year of the reign of the lord Clothar, the glorious king. Both privileges St. Faro confirmed with his hand with the other bishops, saying: Burgundofarus, in the name of Christ, even though a sinner, bishop, I have subscribed this privilege.

[26] the charter of Landeric of Paris Already in the 15th year of the reign of Clovis II, that is of Christ 652, on the kalends of July, St. Landeric, bishop of Paris, whose Acts were edited at the 10th day of June Acta SS., vol. II of June, p. 292, at the petition of King Clovis, which, he says, is as it were a command to us, which it is most difficult to resist, grants to the monks of St. Denis immunity from episcopal jurisdiction. The privilege is subscribed with twenty-four other bishops by Bishop Burgundofarus: and Philip Labbe judges that it was given in the year 658, because he attaches the beginning of the reign of Clovis II to the year of Christ 644, while a sounder chronology brings back the death of Dagobert I, and thus the beginning of the reign of his son Clovis, to the year 638. But there was formerly a graver controversy about the sincerity of that diploma, which, as Philip Labbe observes Vol. VI, Conc., col. 489, many have attacked. The praised Labbe declines to settle the dispute, though sufficiently inclined to accept the privilege. And indeed one thing principally stands in the way of its being held authentic: namely the word Circada, which was scarcely in use before the ninth century, for the payment of the dues owed to a bishop or archdeacon visiting a church Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXXVII, col. 300, note d. Most however judge that some privilege was granted to the monks of St. Denis by Landeric of Paris, although they hold that which now exists to be interpolated. And this would be certain to me, if Marculf, the compiler of the Formulas, flourished about the middle of the seventh century. For he has the formula of such a privilege in the chapter of the first book. But there are others who think that Marculf lived about the end of the same century, since he dedicates his work to Landeric, son of Sts. Vincent and Waldetrude, and chorbishop of Meaux or Melle. Let this suffice.

[27] of Berthefrid for the monastery of Corbie, Toussaint Duplessis in the History of the Church of Meaux says Hist. de l'Eglise de Meaux, vol. I, p. 52 that St. Faro subscribed the privilege granted to the monastery of Corbie. A copy of this diploma exists in the Councils of Philip Labbe Vol. II, Conc., col. 527, together with the names of those bishops who approved the writing, but among the sixteen bishops the name of our prelate does not occur, although Berthefrid, bishop of Amiens, directs his letter to him. For he says: To the holy lords, presiding at the summit of the highest eminence from the watchtower of the pontifical chair, brothers in Christ, Nivo, Genesius, Ethoald, Emmo, Audo, Audomar, Audoin, Audebert, Burgundofaro, likewise Audebert, Drauscio, Berthefrid, by the gift of the heavenly bestower bishop of the Church of Amiens… This privilege is written to have been made on the eighth day of the ides of September, in the 7th year of the reign of King Clothar at Captonacum [Cf. Mabillon, De Re diplomat., Book IV, §29, p. 257] in the palace

public. Clothar III began to reign in the year of Christ 656, on the 5th day of September, and thus his seventh year, beginning to run from the same day of September, falls in the year of Christ 662. It will also be worth the labour to notice that the subscribers of the privilege are not the same as those to whom it is addressed. Absent from the subscribers, as we have already noted, are St. Faro and St. Audomar; while on the contrary among the subscribers are reviewed nine bishops of whom no mention is made in the inscription of Berthefrid. Drauscio, bishop of Soissons, whom we saw above as a sharer in the privilege of Corbie, in the 10th year of King Clothar, that is of Christ 665, on the 6th of the kalends of July himself also gave a privilege to the monastery of nuns of St. Mary of Soissons, and directs his letter to the bishops of the province, then, as it seems, absent, for Drauscio the suppliant sends greeting in the Lord. And hence it comes about that, as also in the privilege of Corbie, some are those to whom the privilege is sent, others those who subscribe it. Thus he who is signed in the twelfth place is Burgundo the bishop, or St. Faro, whose episcopate of Meaux belonged to the province of Sens, while the episcopate of Soissons pertained to Reims. That privilege was edited most accurately of all by Michael Germain, Benedictine of Saint-Maur, in the History of the monastery of St. Mary of Soissons Hist. de l'abba. royale de N. D. de Soissons, p. 421, who established, the manuscripts being collated, that it was given not in the 4th or 11th or 14th year of Clothar, but in the 10th year of the same reign.

[28] and perhaps of St. Fara for Évoriac. A nearly similar privilege St. Faro himself is said to have granted to the monastery of Évoriac, which was afterwards called the Monastery of Fara. We think it should be omitted, because it swarms with so many faults that it is rightly relegated among apocryphal writings Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXXVII, col. 1133. First of all, at the time when the charter was drawn up, St. Fara, although she is read as subscribing, seems from the context itself to have died. For at Évoriac she presided over many virgins, served the Lord Jesus Christ for a very long time with pure contrition of heart, and because she spurned the glory of earthly dignity, she merited to receive the reward of eternal happiness, and would not have an earthly bridegroom, that she might be able to have a heavenly one. From which words it altogether appears that St. Fara was then dead: nevertheless she subscribes at the end of the diploma: Sign of Fara, abbess. Then the privilege is said to have been Done and ratified in the church of St. Mary of Évoriac, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation DCX, King Clothar reigning, father of Dagobert, king of France. In the chronological notes there are various errors. For years of Christ do not occur in the diplomas of the seventh century, being scarcely reckoned in the ninth or tenth: there is no suitable reason why it should be added to Clothar II that he was the father of Dagobert I, especially since in the year 610 neither Clothar nor Dagobert held Austrasia, of which Theudebert, son of Childebert, was then king. Among the subscribing bishops, St. Faro in the year 627, as we saw above at no. 16, Childegar of Sens between the years 625 and 640 Gall. Christ., vol. XII, col. 9, Audebert of Paris, after Leudebert, who was present at the council of Sens in the year 625 Ibid., vol. VII, col. 23, took up the episcopate. These things abundantly suffice for us to take the diploma away from St. Faro and from the seventh century Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. I, p. 720.

[29] The Saint, very friendly to the nation of the Angles, St. Faro, in all likelihood from the acquaintance which he had from adolescence with St. Columban, as is clear from no. 1 of the Life, was wonderfully well disposed toward the British nations. With this spirit certainly he received Hadrian, abbot of the monastery of Niridanum, which is not far from Naples in Campania, who had been added by Pope Vitalian as companion to Theodore, ordained archbishop of Canterbury on the 7th of the kalends of April 668. Theodore and Hadrian came from Rome to Marseilles, and when, as Bede says, Book IV, ch. 1 Migne, Patrol., vol. XIV, col. 173, the impending winter had compelled them to remain at rest wherever they could, Theodore was lodged with Agilbert of Paris, while Hadrian went on first to Emmo of Sens and afterwards to Faro of Meaux, bishops, and stayed well with them for quite a long time. The Acts of St. Hadrian ours have given at the 9th day of January Acta SS., vol. I of January, p. 595. Although afterwards, as Bede narrates, leave had been given to Theodore to cross into Britain, nevertheless Ebroin retained Hadrian, since he suspected that he had some embassy from the emperor (of the East) to the kings of Britain. But when he had truly ascertained that he neither had nor had had anything of the sort, he released him, and permitted him to go after Theodore. In such a business, certainly a suspicious one, St. Faro will not have failed in his part, whose authority prevailed greatly in the royal palace.

[30] them into his diocese The praised Bede, Book III, ch. 8 Migne, Patrol., vol. XIV, col. 128, teaches us that at that time, namely when St. Fara was building her monastery, not many monasteries having yet been constructed in the region of the Angles, many from Britain were accustomed for the sake of the monastic life to go to the monasteries of the Franks or of the Gauls; and that they also sent their daughters to be taught in the same and to be joined to the heavenly bridegroom, especially in Brie (namely Évoriac or the monastery of Fara) and in Cale and in the monastery of Andilegum. Chelles (Chelles) and Les Andelys (Les Andelys) are said to have been founded by St. Clotilde, wife of Clovis I. This one indeed, situated six leagues from Rouen, was destroyed in all likelihood by the idolatrous Normans Gall. Christ., vol. XI, col. 131: while that one, situated on the river Marne at the fourth milestone from the city of Paris, persevered until the end of the past century Ibid., vol. VII, col. 558. Moreover at the time when St. Faro was flourishing, there was already a very great multitude of monks in Ireland. Thus, to bring forward one example, already in the middle of the sixth century, and thus a hundred years before, St. Comgall had founded in the eastern tract of Ireland the very populous monastery of Bangor, inasmuch as it comprised three thousand monks Lanigan, Irish Hist., vol. II, p. 67.

[31] he most willingly admitted; We must therefore interpret strictly the words of Bede cited above, namely that monasteries were rare in the region of the Angles. That the Angles preferred to migrate to Gaul rather than to Ireland for the sake of the monastic life arose partly from a closer acquaintance with the Gauls and a greater ease of passage, partly and especially from the similarity of rites, which the Angles had received from St. Augustine and his companions, sent from Rome, and which were common to the Gallican church. It is true indeed that through St. Columban and his Irish disciples the regular life greatly flourished again in the Gauls, and that first of all at Évoriac the pupils of St. Columban had a great part in constructing the monastery, who wished the Irish rite for celebrating the feast of Easter to be stubbornly retained, as is clear enough from letter I which he directed to the supreme Pontiff and from II Migne, vol. LXXX, cols. 239 and 264, which he directed to the bishops of Gaul. The bishops of Gaul tolerated the Irish custom to some extent, yet so that it should not be propagated outside the enclosures of the monasteries: for the bishops of Gaul revered the holiness of the man and the glory of the miracles by which St. Columban had gained the highest fame even among the people Longueval, Hist. de l'Egl. Gallic., vol. V, p. 1. Paris edition, 1825. All this brought it about that the Angles, themselves also accustomed to Roman rites, were inclined rather to the Gauls than to the Irish, and sought Gaul rather than Ireland for the cause of religion.

[32] [indeed that he built for them the monastery of the Holy Cross, and for St. Fiacre a hermitage] Our James Longueval in the History of the Gallican Church, Book IX, says that St. Faro founded near Meaux a monastery which should at the same time be a hospice for Irish strangers Ibid., p. 160, as is insinuated in the Life to be given below, no. 13. The question here is of the monastery of the Holy Cross, which in the course of time was named after St. Faro Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1688. But I altogether doubt whether this was the mind of the holy prelate. For in the Mabillonian Life, no. 98 Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 618, one reads: From the nation of the Irish very many, out of love for him, hastened to this region (of Meaux), and thus by reason of his generous hospitality and that of their father the religion of monks, from the fountain of doctrine and their holiness, came to have its beginning and teaching in the nation of the Franks. So much indeed, out of zeal for loving the angelic life, did he most dutifully cherish those Irish, that he even made them heirs of his own property, and from the Relics of their bodies, as long as the gliding ages roll, by their merits this province will shine the more brightly for our protection. It then narrates how St. Faro received St. Fefrus or Fiacre and gave him the monastery called Broilum, with a very abundant possession. Certainly if the monastery of the Holy Cross had been built for receiving the Irish, the biographer would more opportunely have adduced this foundation in testimony of the inclination by which the holy bishop of Meaux was carried toward the Irish. For what did Fiacre ask for himself, what did Faro grant? In his Life at the 30th day of August one reads at no. 9 Acta SS., vol. VI of August, p. 605: Now therefore, says St. Fiacre, I suppliantly beg your kindly paternity that, if you know of a certain little wooded place in these parts, in which I may apply myself to sacred prayers, you may not delay to grant it to me. On hearing this Blessed Faro, made glad, says to him: I have indeed not far from here a certain wood in my own and hereditary right, which the inhabitants call Prodilum, sufficiently suitable, I believe, for practising the solitary life. The bishop therefore granted the little place, which was also called Brodolium, Brodilum and Broilum, but at the beginning it was a simple hermitage, sufficient for one or two men, which, as Mabillon says Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. II, p. 600, in the course of time grew into a priory, subject to the Faronian monastery, where on account of the pious pilgrimages of the faithful a village, distinguished by the name of the same Saint, grew up.

[33] he gave, having obtained, as is said, The monastery of the Holy Cross, of which we treated a little above, was founded by St. Faro on an estate of his own property, as the Life to be edited has it at no. 21, and the Mabillonian one at no. 109 Ibid., p. 620 calls the same church a most beautiful basilica, a habitation of Angels, which he himself founded with marvellous work on an estate of his own property. This monastery was enriched, says the Mabillonian biographer at no. 23 Ibid., p. 613, by Clothar, who is called in the writings of the privileges the godson of St. Faro. But those diplomas have perished, so that it cannot be determined today whether they belong to Clothar II or to III, as we have already indicated above at no. 8. And hence partly it comes about that the time of this foundation hitherto

is unknown. Le Cointe under the year 642, §63 Ann. Franc., vol. III, p. 161 arranges it. But Toussaint Duplessis duly observes Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. I, p. 635 that this is established by no reason, unless indeed the sincerity of the bull of Pope John IV is admitted, who held the pontificate from the 24th of December 640 to the 11th of October 642. In which case it would no longer have been some Clothar, but Clovis II, king of Neustria, to which from the time of Dagobert I the city of Meaux belonged, who handed over the writings of the privileges. For then certainly the monastery of Meaux would have existed about the year of Christ 640.

[34] the bull of Pope John IV, swarming with many errors; But in the bull of John IV there are various things which show it to be spurious: and 1° indeed the Pope orders that the fellow bishops of the province of the beloved Faro should subscribe in agreement; but at the foot of the diploma we see the corroded names of bishops of different provinces, and thus besides the prelates of the province of Sens there occur bishops from the provinces of Tours, Narbonne, Rouen and Trier. 2° There occur various names of bishops who are omitted in the Catalogues. Thus about Ranniurus of Narbonne there is deep silence in the episcopal list: thus Ragnesilus did not occupy the see of Troyes in the year 642 Gall. Christ., vol. XII, col. 487. Cf. Acta SS., vol. I of January, p. 506. Several other examples could be brought forward. 3° The bull is marked with the 26th year of Constantine and the 8th of Heraclius, emperors: but if there could be any emperors of the East of this name, they are Heraclius Constantine and Heracleonas, who held the sceptre for scarcely one year: and so they could not mark the 26th and 8th years of reign. 4° After the day of the bull's writing, namely the ides of May, and the years of the emperors, there follow the names of the bishops, and finally the same Pontiff John adds another day: Done, he says, at Rome at the Lateran in the apostolic see, on the day of the kalends of March, in the 13th year of the reign of our most beloved son Clothar, king of the Franks, in the 13th indiction, in the year from the Incarnation of the Lord DCLX. Here everything is erroneous. For in the year of Christ 660 Vitalian held the apostolic see: John IV in the year 640 and John V in the year 685 were pontiffs. The 13th year of Clothar II with the year 596, of Clothar III 668. Finally at that period it was not the custom for the year of Christ to be appended to diplomas. These things certainly suffice to show the faultiness of the bull.

[35] similarly to the monastery of Rebais; Before the suburban monastery of the Holy Cross was founded, however, the church of Rebais was built and dedicated by St. Ouen. Rebais, says the Gallia Christiana Vol. VIII, col. 1679, a monastery, so called from the torrent Resbacus gliding past, on which it is set, was founded in the forest of Brie, between the greater and lesser Morin *, by the illustrious Dado (that is, St. Ouen), at that time referendary of King Dagobert … The basilica of this monastery was dedicated in the 15th year of the reign of Dagobert, on the 8th of the kalends of March, in honour of St. Peter the Apostle, by the holy men Faro, bishop of Meaux, and Amand, who afterwards ruled the church of Maastricht. Already in the 14th year of the reign of Dagobert I, that is of Christ 635 or 636, the monastery had been built and in part enriched, as a diploma of Dagobert has it Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. II, p. 3. Set over the monastery was St. Agilus, who, as his Life has it Acta SS., vol. VI of Aug., p. 384, leaving Luxeuil (where he was living as a monk) enters the palace which is called Compiègne, attended by the honour of the pontiffs Amand and Faro, supported by the brilliance of the nobles, the exalted Ouen and Eligius… The venerable Agilus therefore came to the work, a number of twelve brethren being joined to him in college, and by assiduous care he brought the buildings of the church to the perfection of the roof.

[36] founded by St. Ouen, he cooperates. And now the great solemnity, the day of the dedication of this church, was at hand: and the venerable Ouen, who was building the same (church) in honour of Blessed Peter, prince of the Apostles, greatly desired to dedicate it first on that day on which the blessed Apostle first sat at Antioch, that is, on the eighth of the kalends of March. Therefore the aforenamed pontiffs being summoned, together with Eligius, as ecclesiastical custom holds, they enter to dedicate the church. In the above-reported diploma of Dagobert, it is said to be given on the day of the kalends of October, in the fourteenth of the reign of the same king; and in the year 636, according to Fredegar the Scholastic Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXI, col. 655, Dagobert sat at Clichy in an episcopal synod, and indeed on the kalends of May he set St. Agilus over the monastery of Rebais, as his Life has it, written by a nearly contemporary anonymous Acta SS., vol. VI of August, p. 584. And so the dedication, carried out after the perfection of the roof on the 8th of the kalends of March, is to be attached to the year 637. It is true indeed that Dagobert also sat in the year 635, according to the praised Fredegar, but after the conquest of the Gascons: and thus when the year 635 was already waning: I prefer therefore to put off the election of Blessed Agilus and what follows it by one year. Moreover Toussaint Duplessis thinks that the foundation of Rebais preceded that of the Holy Cross of Meaux, because in the diocesan synods the abbots of Rebais are constantly named before those of Saint-Faron of the Holy Cross: for it was the custom for monasteries of the same institute to be named in order of antiquity; because he who is first in time is stronger in right. Therefore the monastery of the Holy Cross could scarcely have had its beginnings before the year of Christ 640 Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. I, p. 635.

* Le Morin

§ IV. The Saint, by the testament of his sister St. Fara, receives a part of the inheritance; he dies holily; his burial, the translation of his body, the distribution of his Relics.

St. Faro becomes an heir by the testament of his sister the nun, St. Faro together with his brother Chagnulf and his sister Agnetrada or Agnetrude received by testament from his sister, St. Fara, a portion of the villa called Luvra with everything pertaining to it. Certainly when the Saint made her testament, as is plainly established from the instrument itself, Évoriac, or the monastery of nuns of Fara, had already been built: but whether St. Fara was already a nun, we shall investigate below. Meanwhile it will be worth the labour to inspect more closely the testament itself, which in the judgment of all is sincere in every respect. The clergy, if one may so speak, of both sexes was governed in civil matters in the seventh century by the Theodosian law. For each nation used its proper laws, so that for example the Burgundians were bound by the Burgundian law, the Alamans by the Alamannic: so too the clergy, which at the time of the irruption of the barbarians already held Gaul, retained the law in force, namely the Theodosian [Raepsaet, Analyse de droits des Belges, vol. I, p. 202 and following. Ghent edition, 1824]. Now in this code we read the statutes concerning the goods of clerics, namely the sole law, On the goods of clerics (v. 2), it is decreed that if any bishop or presbyter, or deacon, or deaconess, or subdeacon, or cleric of any place (order), or monk, or woman dedicated to the solitary life, shall die with no testament made, and there should exist neither parents of either sex, nor children, nor (perhaps) those joined by right of agnation or cognation, nor a wife, the goods which belonged to him are to be associated entirely with the most sacred church or monastery to which he had been destined… Given on the 18th of the kalends of January, Ariovindus and Aspar being consuls, that is in the year of Christ 434.

[38] which according to the Theodosian law The emperor Justinian inserted the same law in his Code, law 20, On Bishops (I. 3). From that law it becomes altogether manifest that a monk or nun left his or her property to his or her family, unless by a testament made he or she gave it to the monastery. Hence it is clear that the making of a testament was necessary for those who wished to give anything to the monastery which they inhabited. For the Roman law, which, as we have said, those bound over to the monastic life used, pressed them, if they wished to leave anything to the monastery, to draw up a testament, otherwise whoever touched the monk or nun by any connection of agnation or cognation claimed for himself the property previously possessed. Now St. Fara had as natural heirs her siblings Chagnulf, Faro and Agnetrude, to whom the succession from an intestate fell: for her father Agneric had already gone to his death, since in the testament itself Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. II, p. 2 Fara says that her father Agneric, of good memory, had assigned certain things to her by the page of a testament.

[39] even monks had to make; Unless therefore she wished all her patrimonial goods to pass to the family, St. Fara had to make her testament: otherwise the monastery of Évoriac would have been deprived of what the Saint destined for it to have. Wherefore St. Fara herself invokes the Theodosian law, saying Ibid., place cited: In the Theodosian law, as is inserted, I so hand over, in that each one who has not left sons ought to convey of his lay property to his legitimate heirs. Accordingly she gives to her dearest siblings a portion in the villa of Luvra, as we said above. She also employs another formula of Roman jurisprudence, when she says Ibid., p. 1: With priests and secular men present as witnesses, in my presence I have asked that this testament be confirmed, by which in no case, civil or praetorian, may anyone be able to calumniate these things, wishing to claim some right for himself. Praetorian right, according to Charles Du Cange under this word, is absolute right, to which nothing can be added or taken away for the sake of correcting it. The praised Du Cange brings forward various instruments in which praetorian right is invoked for the firmness of the matter: in that sense, therefore, are to be taken the words of St. Fara, that nothing could be added to or taken from her last will.

[40] it is uncertain however whether St. Fara, when she made her testament, Up to now we have treated of St. Fara as if she was a nun at the time when she declared her testament: but whether she truly was must now be investigated. The instrument itself begins with these words: In the fifth year, the lord Dagobert reigning, the most glorious king, on the 7th of the kalends of November. The beginning of the reign of Dagobert can be taken in two ways, either from the year of Christ 622, when under his father Clothar II he began to rule Austrasia, or from the year 628, when, his father having died, he began to rule also Neustria: and so the fifth year will be attached to the year of Christ 626 or 632, according as the beginning is reckoned from the Austrasian or the Neustrian reign. Mabillon in his Annals, Book XII, §30 Vol. I, p. 325, Lucca edition, 1739, teaches that in the fifth year of Dagobert in Neustria, and thus of Christ 632, St. Fara made her testament: but he brings no reason why the fifth year should be referred to Neustria. I for my part should incline rather to the Austrasian beginning, because, St. Faro having been consecrated bishop in the year, as we said above, 627, the sacred virgin would not have been silent about the status of bishop if she had declared her testament in the year 632. That difference of six years is not of great moment to our matter however: but more attention must be

paid to the death-year of the holy virgin, which is generally noted as 655 Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl., p. 399, and Acta SS. Ord. Bened., sæc. II, p. 439: for from this it is rightly deduced that the testament was drawn up 29 or at least 23 years before her death.

[41] was a veiled virgin, Hence it could have happened that the Saint had not yet received the veil of Religion, and thus made her testament before that. For certainly in the Gauls too there flourished the distinction between the solemn vow of chastity or veiling and the simple vow or purpose of virginity. For St. Leo the Great says this clearly in letter CLXVII, otherwise II, to Rusticus of Narbonne, inquiry XV Migne, Patrol., vol. LIV, col. 1208: Girls who, not compelled by the command of parents, but by spontaneous judgment have taken up the purpose and habit of virginity, if afterwards they choose marriage, transgress, even if consecration has not been added; of the gift of which assuredly they would not be defrauded, if they remained in their purpose. It has been shown elsewhere that a simple vow did not formerly render invalid marriages wrongly contracted, although they were liable to penance Acta SS., vol. VII of October, p. 827. Moreover for veiling and consecration (for there are those who distinguish them Binterim, Denkwürd., vol. III, part II, p. 544 a more mature age was required than for the simple purpose of virginity. Thus the council of Agde, canon 19, required for the veiling of nuns the fortieth year, however proved their life and morals might be Labbe, vol. IV, Conc., col. 1386. Yet in the Gauls an age of twenty-five years sufficed Binterim, place cited. Hence it could have happened that St. Fara, when she made her testament, had not yet received the veiling, which is to be regarded as equal to solemn profession, although she had already put on the monastic garment. In which way are conveniently explained the words of the testament which show her to be a nun Duplessis, Hist. de l'Eglise de Meaux, vol. II, p. 1: I in the name of God Burgundofara, having left the malice or dignity of this world, for the love of Christ and the absolution of my sins, am seen to have built the monastery of Évoriac under the name of religion, while I was residing in that monastery, and awaiting the time of my dissolution and the day of judgment, I have wished to write down and confirm under testament each of the places handed over by me to it.

[42] or what was established in the Rule of St. Columban about the vow of poverty. But even if St. Fara was a veiled nun, it must yet be seen what the Rule of St. Columban required. For that St. Fara followed this there is no doubt. The contemporary Jonas, treating of that monastery of girls, expressly teaches Mabillon, Acta SS. Bened., sæc. II, p. 437 that Burgundofara built the monastery according to the Rule of St. Columban. In the Life of St. Eustasius also, likewise written by a contemporary Ibid., p. 117, it is said that St. Columban consecrated the young girl to the Lord, and a little below that the same Eustasius appoints brethren to have the care of building, and decides that the girl's brother Chagnoald and Walbert shall teach the Rule. But in what the vow of poverty consisted, which they were to teach, is not established for us. For the modes of poverty are various, as Francis Suárez widely explains, De Relig., Tract. VII, Book VIII, ch. 6, no. 7: and in the Rule of St. Columban, such as we have it Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXX, nothing occurs by which the question can be elucidated. Certainly in the judgment of St. Gregory the Great, it was not lawful for an abbot to make a testament, or this was not lawful without solemn dispensation Ibid., vol. LXXVII, col. 1344. Mabillon narrates the whole matter Annales, vol. I, p. 243, Annals, Book V, §6. Probus, namely, had passed from layman to religious office, to live as a solitary in a private cell: and he had determined nothing about his substance, inasmuch as he had left his son heir both on intestacy and by testament. Meanwhile unexpectedly he was ordered to enter a monastery and to take up the burden of abbot, no space being left him for making a testament. But since the legal sanction forbids them to arrange anything about their substance after they have entered a monastery; therefore he asks a dispensation, which the Pontiff also grants in a synod. And hence it becomes manifest that the making of a testament was forbidden to monks at the beginning of the seventh century. Let so much be said about the testament of St. Fara.

[43] St. Faro dies, In the Life to be edited below we read, at no. 21, that St. Faro held the helm of the Church of Meaux from King Clothar until the times of Childeric, the great-grandson of that Clothar, and thus ruled the episcopal see for sixty-six years. Le Cointe rightly observes at the year 669, § XVI, that the number of years is exaggerated, and that one should read that St. Faro ruled the Church for forty-six years, and that by a transposition of letters the numeral signs XLVI easily grew to LXVI. For we have it that Gundoald, the predecessor of St. Faro, was present at the synod of Reims, celebrated under Sonnatius in the year 625 Labbe, vol. V, Conc., col. 1689: and if from that synod we number sixty-six years, we arrive at the year 691, when Childeric had already been dead for eighteen years, under whom nevertheless our Saint is said to have died. For between the death of Clothar III, who died in the year 678, in whose reign the Saint began his episcopate, and the death of Childeric, who died in the year 673, under whom he finished the same, there intervene altogether forty-five years. And so we can neither extend the Saint's episcopate further on account of his predecessor Gundoald, nor contract it much more briefly on account of the death of King Childeric Cf. Le Cointe, Annal. Franc., at the year 669, § XVI: whence it must altogether be read that St. Faro ruled the Church of Meaux for forty-six years. From which it further follows that the Saint, who we conjectured above at no. 15 was born about the year 585, closed his life at over eighty years of age.

[44] and in the church of the Holy Cross, founded by him, St. Faro having died, he is given burial in the monastery founded by him. For the anonymous, to be edited by us, has this at no. 21: The holy body, he says, was honourably entombed in the basilica which he himself, building it on an estate of his own property, had consecrated in honour of the saving and life-giving Cross, and also of Blessed John the Baptist and of all the Apostles. The Mabillonian text has the same in nearly the same words at no. 109. And there was a twofold cause why St. Faro should be buried in that monastery. First of all it was a general law, sanctioned also by the sacred canons, that the dead should be buried outside the city. Of this custom it has been treated by us elsewhere Acta SS., vol. VII of October, p. 955. This however I will add, that in keeping those laws, the cities of the Gauls, according to the second council of Braga of the year 563, canon 18, were most tenacious Labbe, vol. V, Conc., col. 843. Nevertheless the council of Tribur of the year 895, canon 17 Labbe, vol. IX, col. 450, permits to be buried in a church the person of a priest or of any just man, who by the merit of his life gained by his living such a place for his dead body. From the last it becomes manifest that the church gradually lay open for burial to all who departed from this life in the peace of Christ: for all the dead of this kind could be called just men. Moreover in the seventh century, in which St. Faro died, the custom altogether flourished that the tombs of the dead should be made outside the cities. Which we see observed also in the burial of our Saint. For the monastery of the Holy Cross or of St. Faro was founded outside the pomerium of the episcopal city on the eastern side; although, the Gallia christiana goes on Vol. VIII, col. 1688, at present from various increases or diminutions of the city it inclines to the north.

[45] he is buried; But there is a second cause why St. Faro was buried in the monastery of the Holy Cross: for he himself was the founder of this monastery; for, building on an estate of his own property, he had consecrated the basilica. Founders also seem then to have had the privilege of obtaining their tomb within the church which they had built. Certainly Gregory of Tours, Book II, ch. 43 Migne, Patrol., vol. LXXI, col. 240, says that King Clovis was buried in the basilica of the holy Apostles, which afterwards received its name from St. Genevieve, which he had built with Queen Clotilde. Similarly in the same Gregory, Book IV, ch. I Ibid., col. 269, one reads: Queen Clotilde, full of days and endowed with good works, died at the city of Tours, in the time of Bishop Injuriosus: and she, carried to Paris with great psalm-singing, was buried in the sanctuary of the basilica of St. Peter, at the side of King Clovis, by her sons, the kings Childebert and Clothar: for she herself had built that basilica, in which also the most holy Genevieve is buried. Chrotehild is St. Clotilde, whose Acts ours gave at the 3rd day of June Acta SS., vol. I of June, p. 292. There is to be noticed in the latter text the proposition, as it is commonly called, causal; for St. Clotilde is entombed in the basilica of St. Peter for this reason, because she had built it. Moreover Psallentium is the ecclesiastical chant, with which the clerics accompanying celebrated the conveyance of the holy queen from Tours to Paris. And sacrarium, of which the same text speaks, has a varied signification: for sometimes it indicates the place nearest the altar, sometimes the whole church itself, and indeed the diaconicon, or what we today call the sacristy. Moreover the same right which contends for royal founders favours also an episcopal founder, such as St. Faro was, and the more so because the ancient canons gave a place of burial to bishops, or, as they say, priests, above all laymen.

[46] in the year 1140 he is translated from the tomb; In the Account of the Miracles, which we make public below, one reads, at no. 1, that the body of St. Faro was visited in secret by Andrew, abbot of the monastery, namely on Holy Saturday: at that hour, says the narrator, in which Mary Magdalene prepared ointments for embalming the Lord's body, the aforesaid abbot, content with only one companion, approached as a pious violator the coffin in which the sacred members were resting. Here comes the question whether from the year 672, in which the Saint died, up to 1140, in which Andrew visited the body, or through a space of 468 years, the sacred members were never moved or visited. If trust is to be given to the Account of the Miracles, about the year 830 some visitation of the sacred body took place: for at no. 1 one reads that Andrew found the shroud in which the body was wrapped as clean as if it had been made the same day, although for three hundred years and more the sacred bones of the bishop had lain there. Mabillon indeed in the Acts of the Saints of the Order of St. Benedict Sæc. II, p. 625 suspects a fault in the numbers, and that in place of three hundred one should read six hundred, certainly by a manifest error; for between the death of the Saint and the visitation of his body by Abbot Andrew only, as we have seen, 468 years intervene. Nor does it much help to change six hundred into four hundred, because such corrections altogether

are arbitrary, invented with this design alone, that historical facts may somehow be fitted to a preconceived opinion. I prefer therefore to retain the reading of the Narrator, and the more so because, when the Life of the Saint to be edited below was written in the ninth century, the cult of St. Faro had already much cooled among the people of Meaux, as the author admits at no. 21, and more manifestly at no. 3 of the Account of the Miracles, where it is said that the treasure of the body of St. Faro was revealed by the Lord, and was thereafter to be publicly made manifest: indeed perhaps the work was composed for this reason, that piety toward the holy patron might be renewed. Then, therefore, the cult of the Saint being as it were renewed, his body could both be visited and wrapped in a clean shroud; and thus the three hundred years would be accurately enough completed.

[47] yet before that by Abbot Majolus, Mabillon in his Annals, Book XVIII, §36 Vol. I, p. 557, reports that Majolus, abbot of the Holy Cross or of St. Faro about the end of the seventh century, with the assent of the bishop of Meaux, raised from the tomb the body of St. Fara, virgin and abbess of Évoriac, and deposited it in a casket. He says that the same was done by him with the body of St. Hildevert, the next successor of St. Faro. It seems strange, then, that Majolus, unless he had previously paid the same honour to Faro, the founder of his monastery, famous for sanctity and miracles, should have shown cult to outsiders, the saint of his own house being neglected: wherefore I judge that by Majolus, or even by his predecessor, cult was paid to our Saint, and thus that his tomb was adorned after the manner of the Saints: for that St. Faro lay in a stone sepulchre until the twelfth century is manifest from the Account of the Miracles. Moreover the things reported by Mabillon are not without their difficulties. First of all it must be inquired who this Majolus was, the author of the translations. The Gallia christiana judges Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1692 that he was the abbot of Cluny, who had Odilo as successor: so that each was ruler of Cluny, each distinguished for sanctity Acta SS., vol. II of May, p. 657, and vol. I of January, p. 65: which is also strengthened from the Faronian Necrology, in which the death of Odilo is marked on the kalends of January, on which very day St. Odilo of Cluny closed his life. But if Majolus is truly of Cluny, the translations of the saints must be relegated to the end of the tenth century; for he died in the year 994: which chronological arrangement by no means agrees with what is narrated in the history of the translation.

[48] who seems But Toussaint Duplessis in the History of the Church other than the one of Cluny, of Meaux defends another opinion, namely that Majolus, the Faronian abbot, is different from the one of Cluny Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. I, p. 643 and following. To this end he adduces first of all the tradition of the monastery of Évoriac or Faremoutiers, which has it that Abbot Majolus translated the body of St. Fara. And indeed in the Proper of Faremoutiers one reads that after forty years Majolus, abbot of the Holy Cross, raised the body of St. Fara from the earth. Mabillon cites the same text Acta SS. Ord. S. Bened., sæc. I, p. 449 and in his Annals, Book XVIII, §36 Vol. I, p. 557, teaches that about the year 994 the body of St. Fara was elevated by Majolus. The Proper of Meaux, published in the year 1640 by order of Bishop Dominic Séguier, has at the 7th day of December that after some years (which certainly no one will interpret of three solid centuries) Majolus, abbot of the Holy Cross, with the assent of the bishop of Meaux, raised the body from the earth. Certainly if this tradition were constant and ancient, there would be no doubt at all that Majolus was abbot in either the seventh or the eighth century. But, so far as I know, the tradition is strengthened by no ancient document, and in the eighteenth century it went off into a contrary opinion. For the more recent Proper of Faremoutiers, published namely in the year 1716, at which time in the Gauls most Offices of the Saints were being renewed, throws back the elevation of the body of St. Fara as far as the eleventh century Vol. I, p. 557; in which century, especially in the pontificate of Alexander II, who gained the Roman chair in the year 1061, we do not even have Majolus of Cluny, who died in the year 994. Moreover in the eleventh century, as was shown in volume XI of October in the Commentary on the Life of St. Bernward at the 26th day of October, no. 106 Acta SS., vol. IX of October, p. 993, it was no longer open to bishops to elevate the bodies of the Saints, inasmuch as it was equivalent to solemn canonization, reserved to the Roman Pontiff alone. This innovation of the more recent Proper, therefore, excludes the Majolus admitted by all, and contradicts the customs of that eleventh century. Let it suffice to have said these things in passing, which can be examined more deeply at the 7th day of December, when the future commentator will elucidate the Acts of St. Fara.

[49] had more probably already been elevated And when, says the Narrator of the Miracles further at no. 3, the lord abbot was asked by the brethren to manifest publicly also the treasure revealed to him by the Lord, with the consent of the prelate of Meaux he fixed the day on which this should be done. At that time the see of Meaux was occupied by Manasses II, from the year 1134 to 1158 Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1613, with whose consent Abbot Andrew, taking the sacred bones from the tomb, deposited them in a silver casket Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. I, p. 61. But if this translation was celebrated in the same year in which the finding took place, the silver casket could not have been very magnificent. For according to a very ancient tradition, continued every year by a solemn procession, the Saint's body was translated on the Sunday after the octave of Easter, which in the year 1140 was on the 7th day of April; and thus on Holy Saturday, or the 6th of April, the sacred body was found: so that between the finding and the translation fifteen days passed; in which interval of time no magnificent casket could have been made. Let it have been, then, a simple silver vessel, but one which was afterwards more preciously adorned. For in an instrument taken from the archive of the monastery of St. Faro, given on the 26th of April 1648, the monks declare that their predecessors made, to enclose both the bones and the head of the Saint, two most precious caskets, decorated with pearls and jewels, on which the deeds of the most holy founder were engraved. But that treasure was plundered when the Calvinist war raged through the Gauls Ibid., vol. II, p. 372.

[50] in the year 1562 was preserved from the plundering of the Calvinists For in the year 1562, as heresy raged through all the Gauls, the Calvinists, who were commonly called Huguenots, formed a plan to occupy the city of Meaux by force or guile. And so on the 25th day of June at earliest morning they burst into the cathedral church: the canons, who had come together to sing matins and lauds, they compel to leave their houses and to hand them over to those of their sect whom they wished. The canons carry out what was ordered. Then the Calvinists break the altars, crosses, images, trample with their feet the Relics of the Saints, tear apart the priestly vestments; in short they bring such ruin on the sacred place that in the following month of December the damage was estimated at three hundred thousand livres. On the same day the Faronian monastery underwent a similar or even greater calamity. For besides the furnishings, both ecclesiastical and domestic, plundered from every side, the archive, in which the rights and privileges of the monastery were preserved, together with the library they tear apart and give to the fire to be burned, they expel the monks, who were then fugitives for three whole months; they establish a garrison of forty men, to carry off elsewhere what remained of the grain Ibid., vol. I, p. 357 and following. Moreover the profanation which the Calvinists brought on the territory of Meaux they did likewise as often as they occupied any city of Gaul. Let the Histories of the individual cities under the year 1562 be inspected, and it will become manifest to each that this calamity raged through the whole kingdom. The historian Sismonde de Sismondi in his History of the French disguises these slaughters and ruins with the help of some very subtle distinction, as if, namely, by far the greatest part of the Calvinists were in no way sharers in those excesses; but only some mob of iconoclasts had brought about so great a destruction Hist. des Français, vol. XI, p. 205. But no one will admit the subtle distinction, since it is established that no one of the Calvinists of that age ever disapproved of the matter.

[51] the body of the holy bishop Already before that calamity the Faronian monks, fearing the destruction of their monastery, had placed the Relics of their holy patron Faro in safety. For some scoundrels had played a prelude to the despoiling, when on the 17th of February 1555 they carried off by theft smaller parts of the body, enclosed in small caskets. Accordingly the monks before the evil rushed upon them, opening the larger casket, leaving the pearls and jewels, hid the body of the Saint: so that the heretics could plunder the gold, silver and precious stones, but did not touch the Relics, which were to be preserved for better times. For on the 4th day of July 1612 the monks of St. Fiacre, which is a priory dependent on the monastery of St. Faro, asked Anselm Rolle and Columban Regnier, visitors of the Congregation of St. Maur, that certain particles of the body of St. Faro should be granted them, to be exposed in their church. The visitors assented and with due solemnity drew from the sepulchre a bone of the length of one palm. This the monks of St. Fiacre enclosed in a silver image. In the year 1633 also, on the 10th day of June, the ascetics of Saint-Faron, by mandate of the general chapter of the Congregation of St. Maur, opening the casket of St. Faro, granted a whole joint of the hand to John de Belleau, bishop of Meaux Hist. des Français, vol. II, p. 341 and following. But this part of the body was not found afterwards. The relics of the holy prelate his predecessor were spread more and more by Dominic Séguier, bishop of Meaux, and first of all he drew from the sepulchre the hip bone, which on the 30th day of October 1658 with other Relics of the Saints he enclosed in a gilded silver casket, presented by him to the cathedral church of Meaux, as is established from the Archive of Meaux Duplessis, Hist. de l'Egl. de Meaux, vol. II, p. 385. No other notable part of the sacred body seems to have been ever separated before the seventeenth century (for slight particles, as we have said, were carried off). Yet by the monks themselves the head had already before this been separated from the rest of the body. For in an instrument drawn up in the year 1648, on the 26th day of April, the second Sunday after Easter, on which there was a celebrated and solemn procession, in which the head of St. Faro was carried about, the monks testify that their predecessors laid the body of their patron in a double casket, each of gilded silver and most preciously adorned, and in the one indeed, distinguished by carved images showing the deeds of the Saint, deposited the body, and in the other the head, carried every year about the fields. These treasures the Calvinists plundered. But the monks partly repaired the damage by the making of a new silver herm, which was first exposed on the 2nd day of May of the year 1677 in a solemn procession, together with the herms of Sts. Fara, Fiacre and Leodegar Ibid., vol. I, p. 359 and following. The larger casket, however, which held the rest of the body, was simply of gilded wood, at least until the year 1730, in which Toussaint Duplessis, himself of the Order,

a pupil of St. Benedict, was writing the History of the Church of Meaux Ibid..

[52] and heaped with new honours by Dominic Séguier. Dominic Séguier, who renewed the cult of St. Faro, was not only illustrious by birth, but distinguished by the splendour of all the pastoral virtues. A man of the first rank, he diligently and constantly fulfilled all the parts of episcopal care. He repaired the ruins of earlier times, corrected the morals of the people, infected with many corruptions, applied all his labour to the education of his clergy, restored the liturgical books, that is, the Missal, Ritual and Breviary, to the form, as he himself says at the front of the books, of the most sacred Council of Trent, and either extinguished or repressed the heresies of the Calvinists and Jansenists raging through the diocese. An excellent venerator of the Saints, he renewed their images, and exalted their Relics, which he enclosed in precious caskets made at his own cost, and had exposed to the veneration of the Christian people. Finally, great labours having been undergone for the Church of God, he holily finished his busy life, in the 67th year of his age, on the 16th day of May 1659, after he had occupied the see of Meaux for 22 full years Gall. Christ., vol. VIII, col. 1653. Bishop Dominic Séguier was of the kind of those men who in the seventeenth century restored the ecclesiastical discipline that had collapsed through nearly the whole Catholic world, reformed the Church according to the mind of the Council of Trent, and both magnificently founded and laboriously propagated holy institutions for the amendment of the people, for the instruction of youth, for the relief of the poor and of wretched persons. There exists for France a very curious book, which explains in two volumes the promotion which, during the seventeenth century, the Church gave to pious institutions [Picot, Essai historique de l'influence de la Religion en France pendant le dix-septième siècle]: and I do not doubt that the same could be said and written of other provinces of the Catholic Church: for the same works, the same institutions at the same period shine forth there.

[53] In the year 1789 a part of the Relics of St. Faro is assigned From the pontificate of Séguier until the end of the eighteenth century the Relics of St. Faro do not seem to have been moved. But in the year 1789 the rural parish of Robora (Rouvres), then indeed in the diocese of Meaux, but now in the department of the Oise (département de l'Oise), and thus today in the diocese of Beauvais, in the district of Senlis, asked for some particle of the Relics, inasmuch as the church was dedicated under the name of St. Faro. The monks of Saint-Faron assented, and gave the following instrument, which I render from French into Latin. In the year 1789, on the 4th day of the month of June, at the sixth hour of the evening, under the pontificate of the most holy lord Pope Pius VI and the reign of Louis XVI, king of France and Navarre, there appeared in the sacristy of the royal abbey of St. Faro of Meaux, of the order of St. Benedict, of the Congregation of St. Maur, before James Checin, royal and apostolic notary in the city and diocese of Meaux, residing in the said city, undersigned, the witnesses to be named below being present, the reverend father, Dom Blaise Joseph Lavie, priest, prior of the said abbey. Who at the prayers of Dom Peter Joseph Le Roux, parish priest of St. Faro of Rouvres of the same diocese, and of his parishioners, has given by this present instrument to the said parish of Rouvres a certain bone of the glorious St. Faro, bishop of Meaux, which Dom Christopher Olliver, substitute of the first royal surgeon, an inhabitant of this city, summoned by us and present, has recognised to be a vertebra of the neck; which Relics have been given that they may be perpetually exposed in the said church of Rouvres, yet the licence of the most reverend bishop of Meaux being first obtained, to the veneration of the faithful.

[54] to the parish of Rouvres, as is established The said reverend father Dom Lavie notes, 1° that the said Relics have just been drawn from a wooden casket of black colour, surrounded with a gilded border on the upper part, and made in the form of a tomb, eighteen inches long, eight or nine wide. This casket, containing the precious relics of St. Faro, was enclosed in a larger one, itself also of wood, carved and gilded, deposited in the sacristy mentioned above. All of which was done by the reverend Dom Benedict Francis Guignod, official and vicar general of the most illustrious and most reverend Lord Camille Louis Apollinaire de Polignac, bishop of Meaux, counsellor of the king, and first almoner of the queen, as is established from the instrument drawn up by him. 2° The said bone, drawn from the said casket, was carefully wrapped in a white silk ribbon, and with the said instrument placed in a fir box of oval form, of a length of about six inches, covered on the outside with green paper, and on the inside with red, green and white silk, which was closed with a white silk ribbon, and sealed in various parts with the seal of the most illustrious Lord bishop of Meaux and with both the old and the present seal of the said abbey of St. Faro. Finally the said box was deposited in the above-mentioned casket, until the above-mentioned bone is enclosed in a reliquary and transferred to Rouvres. 3° The said extraction was made in the presence of several monks of this abbey; and a like instrument was drawn up by the said Dom Guignod, in the margin of which were placed the above-mentioned seals of the Lord bishop and of the monastery: which instrument was deposited in the above-mentioned lesser casket, itself sealed at the borders with the above-mentioned seals, and placed back in the larger casket from which it had been drawn. This donation was made in the presence and with the consent of Dom Louis Dominic Tresnel, subprior and librarian of the said abbey, Dom Laurent, Dom Amand Fidelis Boncamp, Dom Louis Gabriel Lefevre, Dom Louis John Baptist Vallon, professed monks of the said abbey. The said Reverend Father Dom Lavie, prior, asked for an instrument of all the acts, and obtained it from the notary written below, that it may hold good, as far as is needed, and that two copies be made on parchment, of which one is to be placed in the larger casket, the other in the box of Rouvres; which transcripts are to be made at the expense of the parish of Rouvres. Done and transacted at Meaux in the sacristy of the abbey of St. Faro, in the presence of Louis Le Prince, formerly royal and apostolic notary, Peter Decalogne, ironsmith, inhabitants of this city, witnesses required for this, etc. It was signed: Checin.

[55] from various sincere instruments: There then follow two other instruments, signed by the same vicar general Guignod: of which the former, given on the 7th of July 1789, recognises the Relics of Rouvres and permits them to be exposed; the latter, given on the 24th of October of the same year, grants licence to the parish priest of Rouvres Leroux to transfer the Relics into a new reliquary; which translation, by an instrument signed by himself on the 27th of the following October, the parish priest testifies that he has performed, adding that the vertebra is one and a half inches long. But as the whirlwind of the last accursed decade of the eighteenth century came on, the praised parish priest Leroux wrote another instrument on the 23rd day of December of the year 1795, in which he explains how the Relics of St. Faro were preserved for the people of Rouvres. For when the parish church was being laid waste, they were thrown on the ground. These, together with the above-cited papers, the sacristan of the said church collected, and faithfully restored them to the parish priest Leroux, who preserved them for better times. And indeed, peace having been restored to the Church, there were recognised in the diocese of Meaux the Relics of the Saints saved from the shipwreck, by Louis Mathias de Barral, bishop of Meaux from the year 1802 to 1804, when he was created archbishop of Tours. Then in the year 1832, on the 28th day of April, the Relics of Rouvres were again visited by Bishop Romain Frédéric Gallard: on which occasion there arose a question, as if new, namely that the vertebra of Rouvres was not of the neck, but the first of the back, as testified by the doctor of medicine Paimparex; but the error is excused first of all because the likeness is quite great in the two vertebrae, so that the surgeon Olliver, named above at no. 53, from some haste indicated one for the other; unless indeed the error arose from the yawning inattention of the writer of the instrument himself. Because therefore with that dorsal vertebra there are present all the instruments of the papers, and the substitution of one bone for another does not seem likely, the bishop declares that the Relics are the same as those which were given in the year 1789 to the parish of Rouvres: wherefore wrapping them in a green silk ribbon, he fortifies them at each end of the border with his episcopal seal, that they may be exposed thereafter to the veneration of the faithful.

[56] finally, the monastery being destroyed, Now the often-praised parish priest Leroux obtained also other Relics of St. Faro: for, as he himself testifies in an instrument drawn up by himself, he obtained a bone of the arm of our saint, which was formerly preserved in the church of St. Fiacre, from the monks of St. Faro, to whose care the priory of St. Fiacre was committed. That is, the Benedictines of Saint-Faron, when in Lent of the year 1790 they had been compelled to hand over the silver reliquary in which that bone was enclosed, with the other precious furnishings, to the public minters, drew it out and placed it in a wooden reliquary, which by the hands of the parish priest of St. Fiacre they gave to be kept by the parish priest Leroux. On his death the inheritance, and thus also the holy Relics, passed to his sister Suzanne Leroux, a nun of St. Benedict, on whose death they came to her nephew, Simon Arsène Blavot; whose widow, as she herself testifies in her autograph of the 15th of April 1839, set the Relics aside and preserved them intact. There existed likewise at La Ferté-sous-Jouarre (La Ferte-sous-Jouarre) some Relics of St. Faro, namely, as it seems, a bone of the metacarpus, which Galand, administrator of the district of Meaux, drew on the 25th day of March 1794 from a precious reliquary, to be handed over to the museum of Paris. The said bone, kept with other Relics of the Saints under the civic seal, was recognised by the Reverend Dom Bernard Joseph Pruneau, honorary canon, on the 2nd day of September 1829, and thereafter exposed to the veneration of the faithful in the church of La Ferté.

[57] The Saint's body is translated to the cathedral church; Up to now we have treated as it were of particles of the body of St. Faro. About the end of the century just past the monastery of Saint-Faron underwent the calamity common with the other ecclesiastical institutions, that, all their goods being scattered, even the buildings themselves were not rarely destroyed to the foundations. This unhappy lot befell the monastery of St. Faro: for today, the dwelling of the monks having first been overthrown, about the beginning of the present century, the church itself also fell; so that only the abbot's house remains. In that place stands the city hospital, whose oratory under the name of St. Faro and of Vincent de Paul was given solemn blessing by the most worthy bishop of Meaux, Augustus Allou, on the 29th day of October 1845. In that oratory are some particles of Relics, and an image of the saint is painted in encaustic in a window. While this vast calamity was impending over the monastery of Saint-Faron, the casket of St. Faro was opened, which, as being very precious, was left as booty to the despoilers, and the bones, deposited in the month of November 1793 in a special place of the cemetery of the canons of Meaux, by the care of Peter Thuin, schismatic bishop of the department of the Seine and Marne (depart. de Seine-et-Marne), on the 27th day of December 1795 were again shown to the veneration of the faithful. All of which Louis Mathias de Barral testifies by his decree of the 20th of August 1803, and confirms by another decree of the 20th of December 1820, and at the same time declares that he has the said Relics, as also those of other Saints, collected from churches either destroyed

or destined to profane uses, enclosed in three distinct reliquaries, to be preserved perpetually in his cathedral church.

[58] and his cult, once most celebrated, is renewed. Finally we should not omit what contributes not a little to the cult of our Saint Faro, namely that there exist common medals which bear his image. For it is quite customary that those who have undertaken a sacred pilgrimage to the tomb of some Saint should bring home some medal, though struck from cheaper metal, as a witness and memorial of their journey. Thus in a more recent work, in which are described storied leads found in the river Seine, there occurs a square medal of the fourteenth century [Arthur Forgeais, Collection des Plombs historiés trouvés dans la Seine, vol. II, p. 126 and following], which in rough work shows St. Faro standing in pontifical habit, he holds a pastoral staff in his left hand, and stretches out his right to a woman likewise standing and carrying a distaff under her arm; on the left is a cowled and nimbed man, holding a book in his right hand and in his left a mattock. In the margin there are read in Gothic capital letters S. Fiagri. Houpde. Faron. St. Fiacre. Houpde. Faro. The name Houpdee seems in this place to signify a harlot and talkative woman. From the Life of St. Fiacre we have it that the Saint was assailed by very grave calumnies by a certain woman named Bacnanda, of whom ours treat in a few words in the Acts of St. Fiacre at the 30th day of August Acta SS., vol. VI of August, p. 607. But whether that Houpdee is the same as Bacnanda, there is no one to decide. What we have said thus far about the present state both of the monastery and of the Relics of St. Faro we owe first of all to the labours of the Reverend Bernard Joseph Andrew Pruneau, formerly vicar general of the most illustrious bishop of Meaux, excellently deserving of the hagiology of Meaux, who on the 27th day of November 1863 piously fell asleep in the Lord: and his observations on St. Faro were communicated to us by the Reverend D. F. A. Denis, who himself also published the elogium of the late D. Pruneau. We take a step to the Life itself of St. Faro, of which we treated in this Commentary at no. 11: and at the end we add the Account of the miracles of the same St. Faro.

LIFE OF ST. FARO, BISHOP OF MEAUX, CONFESSOR, BY AN ANONYMOUS AUTHOR

drawn from the Accinctine manuscript (Aquicinctine?) and preserved in the royal library of Brussels under no. 8924.

Faro, confessor and bishop, at Meaux in the Gauls. (S.)

BHL Number: 2826

FROM MANUSCRIPTS

CHAPTER ONE

The Saint's family, father, brothers, sister.

The father and brothers of St. Faro Being about to describe the life of the most blessed Faro, imitating the custom of the ancient writers, we think we should first declare from what distinguished parents he was begotten; and how, by the probity of their life and in secular dignity, their manner of living was to be imitated. For the father of this holy man, Hagneric by name, drew his lineage from the nation of the Burgundians: and in the court of King Theudebert ^b he shone not moderately among the first men and nobles. For he was known in the royal counsels, and fortified with the nobility of wisdom, given to hospitality, and a most devoted receiver of holy men, in whose minds he recognised Christ by the perspicacious inspection of his eyes and mind. For he obtained a wife not unequal to his family, Leodegunda by name, by whom he had three children, Faro, a most holy man, Walbert ^c, and Chalnoald ^d, and a daughter of wondrous probity, Fara ^e by name. Chalnoald, handed over by his father to Blessed Columban to be taught, was his devoted minister, while he stayed in the solitude of the vast desert.

[2] of whom Chanoald attached himself to St. Columban, Him once a beast obeyed at the command of his master Columban. For when that blessed man was there subduing his body by fasts, and in that solitude was taking for food nothing but apples of the countryside, a bear, a wild beast of constant voracity, came, and began to lick up the necessary food, and to pull it away here and there with its mouth. And when it was the hour of refreshment, he sent Chalnoald, brother of the most pious Faro, his attendant, to bring the customary measure of apples; who obediently going forth saw the bear wandering among the thickets and brambles of the countryside and plucking the apples by licking. Hastening back, he informs Father Columban: he orders the brother to go, and to leave a part of the fruits for food to the bear, and to keep another for himself. Wonderful obedience in the bear! It in no way dared to take food from the part forbidden it, but sought pasture only in the part of the fruits set apart and permitted it, as long as the man of God stayed in that place. This Chalnoald, brother of Blessed Faro, afterwards flourished as a noble prelate in the city of Lugdunum Clavatum, as is found in the Life of Blessed Eustasius.

[3] as also Walbert Blessed Walbert, however, was committed by St. Columban in the monastery of Luxeuil with his brother Chalnoald, and Blessed Agilus, son of Agnoald ^f, brother of the above-mentioned Agneric, to be taught by Eustasius, a man of great learning, with many others, who afterwards became famous as excellent prelates of the Churches of God. For this renowned man Walbert was first established with his brother Chanoald as builder of the monastery which is called Évoriac, and is now called Faremoutiers, Gundoald being prelate of the city of Meaux ^g. This place their father prepared on soil of hereditary right to him, at the admonition of St. Eustasius, between the Aube and the Morin, to be most excellently furnished with rich gifts ^h. Sagaciously pressing on with this work, he brought the structure of the building to * the perfection of the work, Blessed Faro increasing the beauty of the ecclesiastical ornaments and the resources of villas. This holy man, the merits of his life growing famous, succeeded after Gundoald, nineteenth from St. Denis, first of the bishops of Meaux, as an excellent pontiff ⁱ. Truly admirable eternal wisdom! which foreordained that three brothers, poured forth from one womb, should be distinguished with the pontifical dignity under the sacred number of the Trinity ^k. With how great merits of life their sister gained the urgency of imitating their acts, we have thought it fitting to note briefly.

[4] and his sister St. Fara, who When at the villa of Pipimisium ^l the worshipper of God Eustasius ^m, most dutifully received by the father of the aforenamed brothers, was staying, and had learned that their sister Fara, consecrated by the blessing of Blessed Columban, was afflicted with a grave blindness of the eyes, which she had contracted from the grief of constant weeping, because she was being arranged by her father to serve the work of marriage and the recently resolved vows of holiness were being frustrated, he rebukes the father with harshness of words, saying: that this was his doing, that the virgin was afflicted with so great a crisis of danger. At this indeed the father with feigned words said that he set aside his daughter's nuptial union; only that he might merit to rejoice in her bodily health. And so the man of God, believing these words, went to the bed on which the sick girl was lying, and inquires whether she wished to live in the habit of a nun; if, the godhead being propitious, she should merit to recover the light of her eyes. And she, drawing deep sighs from the bottom of her heart, burst out in a voice *, saying that she never wished to keep the decreed betrothal, but rather desired chastity, companion of the Angels, and longed more desirably for the heavenly bridegroom than to cling lamentably to an earthly one.

[5] that she might decline worldly nuptials, And when the morning hour came, there seemed to stand by her a man of reverent spirit, with a countenance and burning eyes, piercing beyond the power of men, who addresses her thus: Be assured, handmaid of God, and firm in my promises, that today there comes to you a man who will restore you to health. This vision being completed, when shortly afterwards Blessed Eustasius came in to her, the virgin Fara narrated the course of the vision, and that she believed him to be the one through whom she had heard that sight would be restored to her. Then Eustasius said: It is for me, he says, to approve your opinion in this matter, and to hope for myself to be without glory in this matter. But if you feel this healing coming to you, God being propitious, it is a wonder to me that what I have heard from you should be fulfilled through me. And so the holy man by the work of prayer and the firmness of faith joyfully bestowed on the virgin the divinely promised help, health quickly following. For the fire of the fevers is extinguished in her virgin members, her eyes flash with shining light. The father, seeing this attainment of health brought about in his daughter, opens by deeds the will of his heart, summons the bridegroom, confirms the betrothal, fixes the time of the nuptials, and turns all the cares of his mind to this.

[6] she took to flight Meanwhile the virgin Fara takes to flight, a young girl accompanying her, and at a trembling run entering the church of Blessed Peter, prince of the Apostles, and prostrate on the ground, she beat her tender breast with her fists, and abundantly watering the earth with tears, prayed in these words: O Peter, who unlock the heavenly kingdoms to the just and lock them to the unjust, I have fled here to your threshold, wishing to be your little virgin. And you, O Christ, who are ever moved by the prayers of the humble; forgiving my stains, preserve my virginity offered to you through eternal ages. When her father learned of this, he at once sends servants, commanding that she be killed in that place. But the servants with provident counsel delay somewhat in going, that by that very space of delay the father's savagery might be mitigated. For when he came, raging fiercely, the attendants craftily threatened her with death. To them she said: Such gifts, she says, are not owed by a father to a daughter; but it is more pleasing to me to meet a beautiful death than to lose the flower of youth. But let my father know this most certainly, that I shall never consent in this life to be subjected to the nuptial bond. When the servants reported this to their master, he was unwilling to mitigate the fury of his mind without harm to his daughter: but assigning her to custody, he kept her for what he was arranging to do.

[7] and at length, through the action of St. Eustasius, she became a nun. And while these things were being done, by the favour of God's mercy it happened that Blessed Eustasius returned by way of that same Agneric from the completion of an embassy of King Clothar. Who, learning that the father's so dreadful punishment was raging irrevocably against his daughter, strove to pierce the savagery of his mind with the hard goads of words and to prick him to repentance. Nor did he go back from there until he had both adorned the girl with the desired habit of a nun through Gundoald, bishop of Meaux ⁿ, and that the same honourable man Agneric should build a monastery on his own soil, suitable for the habitation of handmaids of God ^o. But since we have briefly recalled the brothers of Blessed Faro, let us set out what his deeds are.

ANNOTATIONS.

ad*?

vocem*?

CHAPTER TWO.

Having lived for some time in the court of Theudebert, whose familiar he was, he leaves the world at the urging of his sister St. Fara; he enriches the Church of Meaux with his wealth; he directs St. Chillenus the Irishman to the Atrebates.

Brought up in the court of King Theudebert, The most excellent Agneric was raising his beloved son Faro at the time of his novitiate to be trained in the court of King Theudebert ^a, that he might succeed there to holding the dignity of honour which he himself retained in the palace. Which we know to have been so done, by the favour of the omnipotence of the godhead. For as long as Theudebert was exalted with royal honour, Faro, the holy youth, clothed in the military toga, retained among the nobles of the palace a very high place of familiarity with him: and afterwards, Theudebert and Theuderic having been conquered by Clothar, when Clothar had obtained the monarchy of the three kingdoms ^b, he sublimely ennobled Blessed Faro among the other nobles of the kingdom with the familiarity of his friendship. Relying on this confidence, he often admonished the king himself to trample the vain favours of this life with heavenly desires, to show himself lovable to all, to have all his acts and manners composed. He also most prudently arranged the royal counsels, public and private, with the munificence of the love of God; so much so that in the descriptions of the Life of Blessed Chilenus ^c, sprung from the Scottish nation, it is found written of him that he took care astutely * of his counsel to provide in advance, that the commonwealth of the kingdom should not totter from the state of its magnificence and power by any violation of right.

[9] St. Faro instructs King Berthoald in the Christian Religion, For when at that time Berthoald, king of the Saxons ^d, rebelled against Clothar, trusting in the strength of his army, he sent messengers to irritate and provoke him to battle. And when these messengers had come, and had brought into the king's ears the irritating words of their master; he, exceedingly enraged with anger, gave capital sentence against them . But the princes opposing the promulgation of his sentence, the holy Faro, not moderate among the king's chief men, astutely assented for the present to obey the king's words: and he asked the king to permit this to be done on the morrow, that thus the matter, being put off , might become the cause of their liberation. While this was settled in the minds of all, night coming on, the Saxons are assigned to the custody of soldiers , and secretly Faro, the soldier of Christ, going in to them, addresses them, persuading them to come to their own help by receiving the baptism of the Christian faith, and to save themselves from a twofold death, namely the present and the eternal. Inclined in spirit to this, they allowed themselves to be washed by the wave of sacred baptism, and from the number of idolaters were changed to the number of Christians.

[10] and frees them from impending death: When morning came, therefore, when the assembly of princes had gathered in the royal palace to confer among themselves what would be more useful to do about the words of the envoys sent from the nation of the Saxons, Faro, the soldier of Christ, placed among them, solving the complaints of their doubt, said: It is certain that these envoys are not of the nation of the Saxons, but have been made sharers with the Christians: for today, on coming to the king's court, I saw them clothed in the white garments of the baptized. All being turned to amazement, those who were treating of their death at once determine to confirm them with very great gifts, as fellow citizens of the Christians. For this new planting of the nation of the Saxons, cultivated by the word of Christ, Faro, the soldier of Christ, sent back to their native land, portending already the office of future shepherd. After this deed was spread by swift report through the ears of many, it became the more known to all by a rustic poem, which was sung in a sweet song. And how very celebrated he was held by all, both the present and the following narration declares.

[11] likewise a man weighed down by accusations, and a poor woman. A certain guilty man, brought to the king's judgment, was found so liable for the crime charged that all the resources of his property would not be enough for satisfaction. And on this account his estates and all his furnishings were taken from him, and subjected to the power of the king ^e. Touched over him by the spirit of mercy, Faro, most elect of God, set himself in his place in paying the debt: he became guilty for him and a debtor for a stranger. The king, therefore, pricked by the power of this charity, restored the guilty man to liberty, and what by law they keep for their man, he gave to the man in mercy. Let us show also a third example of the holy man's mercy. A certain poor woman was following the king with the outcry of her unhappiness: and the king, as he was hastening to set out for the hunt, the keenness of the dogs being prepared, sitting on his horse, was putting aside the crying little woman. Faro, the soldier of Christ, riding with him, approaches him thus: Do not turn away your ear, O king, from the cry of the poor, lest when you cry to God, you be not heard. To this the king says: Every day such complaints stir my ears, and it is very difficult to be continually wearied in such matters. Saying this, at a swift run he hid himself in the dense shades of the woods: and when he was sharpening the barking of the dogs, the horn sounding, and was gathering those wandering through the haunts of the woods, and thus the same follower of the dogs was sitting on his horse, he suddenly fell, and bound fast by a grievous pain in the foot he wasted away. At length coming to himself, remembering the words of Blessed Faro, returning home, he relieved the hardships of the poor little woman with liberal largesse.

[12] At the urging of St. Fara he renounces the world, After some time he learned that Fara, his most holy sister, was grievously afflicted with desire of seeing him; especially because in reliance on his coming buildings were being founded to preserve

the veils of the monastery. When the venerable brother had come to her, and was surveying with curious eye his sister's acts, greatly amazed he rejoiced greatly in the secrets of his heart; and with sweet admonition he admonished her that, by daily bettering her own acts, by the exercises of holy virgins, by the imitation of whom she might distinguish the celibacy of her purpose with the gift of God. And so much, God inspiring, did her familiar conversation move the mind of Blessed Faro, that he despised the glory of palatine rule and of royal friendship, and, placed in the flower of youth, restrained lawful wedlock; and joined himself to the ecclesiastical order; and consecrated to God with the sacred veil his wife, Bliderhis by name, not unlike her husband in her desires ^f, and those supports which he seemed to possess in many and wealthy possessions of lands he most amply gave over to ecclesiastical administrations to the praise of his merits.

[13] he heaps the church of Meaux with wealth; Great poverty indeed oppressed the church of Meaux, which it is established shines with the memory of the Blessed Protomartyr Stephen ^g, and which he presented with the very rich wealth of villas, and rendered more magnificent and more noble in the eyes of all. And the place of the virgin Fara too was magnificently raised up by him in supplement and enrichment of possessions; as to this day the dwellings of the houses and the showy structures of the buildings testify. And the holy man nourished from the revenues of his resources not only fellow citizens of his own region, but also pilgrims and exiles, whom the maritime islands drew to his fragrant fame; which, diffused far and wide, resounded. Wherefore the nation of the Angles, caught in the net of love for him, each made over their virgins through him to fight for God in the two monasteries, namely of Cale ^h and of Fara. Similarly many from the nation of the Irish, out of love for that religion, hastened to come to this region, although out of love for him and for his father and for the largesse of their hospitality the religion of monks had its beginning in the nation of the Franks. Toward these Irish indeed he was so most dutiful, out of love for their religious life, that he even made them heirs of his own property; as we have learned that Blessed Festus ⁱ was honourably received by him in a very abundant possession, Broilum by name ^k; in which he built a monastery, and leading a commendable life in holy morals, he rested there and illuminates this province of Meaux with very many miracles.

[14] and he sends St. Chillenus the Irishman to the Atrebates The same excellent Faro also sent a man full of the grace of God, sprung from the nation of the Irish, Chillenus by name, stirred by frequent exhortations, to the province of Arras, which he won for Christ by sound doctrine and drew to him by bright miracles. Nor do we think that the miracle should be passed over in silence which divine grace wrought through him in his monastery, Blessed Faro staying there at that time. One day when the same St. Chillenus was taking bodily refreshment with the most holy Faro, a glass vessel, with which wine was being drunk, the cup-bearer holding it, fell by chance and was broken. And Blessed Chillenus, seeing the attendant's face turned pale, secretly beckoned him to the fragments of the bright broken cup: over which, prayer being made, suddenly the glass vessel was made whole: and thus an evident miracle was shown to the eyes of those reclining, which filled the heart of Blessed Faro with the greatest gladness, recalling that he had directed to that place a man who both shone in holiness of life and flashed with miracles. Meanwhile it came about after the falling asleep of Waldebert, bishop of this city, who was the nineteenth ^l pontiff from St. Denis, that Faro, the elect of God, was sought to be raised to the pontificate. And so an embassy concerning him was sent by the most religious men of this province to King Clothar, who had been received from the sacred font by Blessed Faro ^m, that by his assent he should establish him to be promoted as pontiff in the same city. He with great alacrity of heart not only commanded it to be done, but also adjudged that it should be done without any scruple.

ANNOTATIONS.

arte*?

eos*?

dilata*?

milites*?

Idololatrarum*

CHAPTER THREE.

As bishop he restores sight to a blind boy by the Sacrament of Confirmation; vehemently tempted he is healed by the piety of his wife; he then works various miracles; he dies holily.

Made bishop, he frees those in chains, After he was exalted in the chair of the pontificate, how wondrous works of holiness shone forth in him is testified by the mighty works which Christ deigned to perform to declare his merit. It was the Paschal solemnity, to be celebrated by all throughout the world, on which, when Blessed Faro was sanctifying very many by the imposition of hands, and a multitude of both sexes, as usually happens, was pressing together, a certain boy was brought among the others for confirmation, deprived of the light of his eyes. When the man full of God anointed his forehead with visible oil, the boy merited to receive both the gift of the Holy Spirit and the light of his eyes; because Christ willed to declare through the pouring of oil of how great merit his servant was above his fellows. When the holy bishop, passing through the city, was bestowing on those to whom it was fitting the kindness of a visit, it happened that he passed before the prison of those in chains: and when those in chains learned that he was present, they began to ask pardon for their crimes and release from their chains. To them the man of God said: Go out, free, because you repent: and at once the chains were loosed, not able to hold those whom the holy man's sentence released.

[16] and he drives away famine: At a certain time also, when the gathering of the harvest was at hand, a multitude of poor rustics came to him; lamenting that they were grievously afflicted by the want of hunger, and dreaded still more the barrenness not only of the present but also of the following year; since they saw the seed cast in the furrows of the fields rising in few shoots of ears. Their need the man of God then, as was fitting, munificently relieved, and admonished them to trust in the mercy of God, promising that the barrenness of crops which was feared the kindness of almighty God would multiply into the greatest abundance of fruits, if they persisted in stable faith and believed that God is the maker of things. Returning to their own, they marvel at new crops, suddenly sprung up in their furrows, and that the earth, which previously lay empty, was now heavy with crops. Nor is it strange if the man of God, full of faith, obtained this miracle, who was a believer in the promise of the master who says Matt. XVII, 19: If you have as a grain of mustard seed, whatever you ask shall be done for you.

[17] but overcome by diabolical temptation, he is corrected by his wife: Nor is it to be passed over in silence with what virtue of mind his wife, Blidechild by name, made over to the sacred veil, repelled the holy pontiff's temptations against her, by the injected malice of the ancient enemy. When this nun was serving the pursuits of holiness, residing by right of her own property in a villa which they commonly call Pinnevindo, the prelate Faro, recalling her love and at the same time her beauty, went so far as to command that she should come to him. When the handmaid of God at the first hearing had refused to do this, the bishop of God did not delay to redouble his command: but she joined to this second the first neglect: and when he had added a third to these two commands, she, understanding his stubborn mind, thought out an ingenious plan by which she might draw the pontiff from his purpose, and preserve her own charity. For throwing off the adornment of her garments, she shore the hair of her head and, clothed in a hair-shirt, offered herself to be looked at. And when he gazed at her, he shuddered vehemently that he had resolved in his mind an illicit crime, and marvelled that he had been drawn from the planned deed by the sagacious counsel of the prudent woman, by which she cast from herself the scandal of her beauty, lest through the eyes of the body there should be captured a minister prepared for God and a temple sanctified by the Holy Spirit. According to that saying: Since the eyes are the first weapons of lust and the mind is captured through the eyes. Truly blessed this woman, consecrated to God, who chose to be disfigured in body, lest the servant of God should fall in mind; and gave herself to the contempt of men, that the pontiff might be preserved irreproachable in pontifical honour ^a. Surely she is to be compared in merits to St. Cecilia, blessed virgin, since as she drew her own husband from the filth of idolatry, so she too the pontiff from the foul baseness of uncleanness: the one showed St. Urban in an angelic countenance; and the other preserved Bishop Faro distinguished and clean for the people: the one adorned her virginity with martyrdom, the other ennobled her chastity with an example admirable and astounding to all.

[18] he frees the shipwrecked, But since we have heard of the cedar of paradise shaken, not levelled, and have heard in the acts of this holy man what each of us should follow, or what flee, let there be added to this fearful narration a signal miracle, by which there may become known to all both the power of his holiness and the greatness of his unconquered faith, that joyful things set beneath the sad may reform the hearer attentive to the holy man's acts in devout veneration of him. Conspicuous in every virtue, Faro, bishop of Meaux, one day went out of the city for the sake of praying to an oratory dedicated in honour of St. Remigius, Apostle of the Franks ^b. There, when he had applied himself to prayer more than usual, and after he believed he had satisfied himself, as he rose from prayer, suddenly a tearful cry is heard and the groaning of mourners and of men redoubling Alas. The Saint asks what that lamentation of tears was, and sent to inquire what ill had happened. It is reported that a boat full of a great crowd of people had been sunk in the midst of the waters. When it was gliding through the placid streams, where the deep rises deeply and where it runs quiet quietly, a wave rises and surges; and so the trembling stern, long shaken, entangled itself to the very bottom in the sands. When the saint heard this, he groaned, his cold limbs trembled: He went therefore where the sad throng was heard: the whole city ran to meet him as he came. When he came to the weeping shores, the bishop, having gone up on the bridge, bowed himself to the cold ground, and cast down his humble face to the cold earth: and thus he calls on Christ with such a voice: Why, O Christ, merciful redeemer, does this light wave so destroy and slay those whom your rosy blood has washed? Whither shall I go? What shall I do when, while I look on, your redeemed thus perish? Now come to the help of and have mercy on your redeemed: remember that through you your mercy has redeemed us. Scarcely had he prayed half an hour, and he touches the river with the staff which his right hand held. Wonderful to tell! Behold you might see the sunken boat glide back to the top of the flood, no rope creaking, nor oars cutting, and all those who had gone down carried back to the top of the shore, a long line being formed, the element of the river obeying the holy pontiff. Then one voice of all, standing round on the shore, rises to heaven: Glory to you, Christ the Redeemer, who alone are life, the help of those hoping in you, who, alone a strong helper, come to the aid of your own, to you be glory for ever.

[19] he prodigiously restores the broken altar stone; No less was the holy pontiff famous for another miracle. When Blessed Ouen had built on his own land, in the forest of Brie, a monastery on the torrent which the old inhabitants named Resbax, and had resolved to dedicate the oratory in honour of Blessed Peter, prince of the Apostles, the same most holy Faro was present at this dedication, since the same monastery was being built in his diocese, and Blessed Ouen had arranged that the whole ordering of the same place should be carried out with his counsel ^c. On the very day of the dedication of the same oratory, when the assembled pontiffs, blessing a most fittingly polished Parian marble, wished to place it upon the altar itself, suddenly slipping from their hands it fell to the ground and was broken through the middle as straight as if someone had cut it with iron. Seeing this, the pontiffs, blessed Faro and St. Amand with the nobles Ouen and Eligius, from whose hands the same stone had slipped, cast themselves on the ground, pouring out to God the groan of prayer. Rising from prayer, as soon as they signed the stone with the sign of the cross, it was rejoined solidly, as if it had not been broken at all ^d. Then for the sake of the miracle shown, blessed Faro, embracing that place with the greatest love of heart, endowed it with a most liberal privilege, which he wished to be strengthened by apostolic and royal authority: giving with liberal munificence what indeed is at hand for those who wish to know.

[20] distinguished in virtues, Meanwhile if our speech should run through all the signal deeds which divine grace willed to work through him, the length will seem to breed disgust in the minds of the hearers, especially since his life, imitable to all, was such that in his times he was inferior to none of those whom we have been able to know. And this too we can add, by the leave of the Saints, that he can not undeservedly be equalled in holy works with the fathers of the Old and New Testaments, if their works and his are weighed in the balance by worthy comparison. For in the reproof of the king, Elijah; in his compassion for the little woman, Job; in that he offered himself as guilty and debtor for the guilty man, Jeremiah; in the threefold gift given to a poor person, namely the sight of the eyes, the sanctification of chrism, the largesse of a stipend, Remigius of Reims; in the blessing of the crops, Elisha; in the rescue of the shipwrecked, Paul; in the anointing of the stone, Donatus, bishop of Spira; of the spirit of all of whom he is not undeservedly believed to have been full.

[21] he dies holily and is buried. But now it is time to put an end to the narration, lest the excess of words should seem to burden the attention of the hearers. For if all the mighty works were reviewed which the divine majesty deigned to perform while he was in the body, the present day could have an end sooner than the page. Yet it seems that there should be shown by the succession of the kings, in whose reigns the same holy man remained alive in the body: namely from King Clothar, the godson of that bishop, until the times of Childeric, the great-grandson of that Clothar, that he ruled the episcopal see for a long space of time, namely sixty-six years, in which he both happily completed the struggle of the contest, and the way of all

flesh he entered upon ^e. His blessed soul too, the earth mourning, heaven rejoicing, was set by exulting Angels in a heavenly seat and joined to the companies of the saints. But the holy body was honourably entombed in the basilica which he himself, building it on an estate of his own property, had consecrated in honour of the saving and life-giving Cross, and also of Blessed John the Baptist and of all the Apostles. For there days are made equal with nights by angelic watches. They guard it undefiled from all dangers, and in it the prayers of suppliants obtain the effect of their desire, and the weakness of bodies obtains the desired healing: through all of which he who shines on earth by many examples is known to live in heaven by his merits alone. And although miracles are by no means seen to be done at his tomb in this time with such frequency as is reported of the deeds of ancient time, this is not to be ascribed to any impossibility of his merits; but rather to the hindrance of the enormity of our crimes, which like a very dense cloud, set between us and God, does not suffer our prayer to pass through to him; but the more frequently we are shaken by afflictions, so much the more urgently let us look for the help of our most pious patron, at whose watches we very often serve, with the help of Christ our Lord, to whom with the Father is equal honour, glory and power through the infinite ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

ACCOUNT OF THE MIRACLES OF ST. FARO

Drawn from the Papers of the Feuillant Fathers and preserved in the royal library of Brussels under no. 8924.

Faro, confessor and bishop, at Meaux in the Gauls. (S.)

BHL Number: 2830

FROM MANUSCRIPTS

SOLE CHAPTER.

Andrew, abbot of the monastery, visits and elevates the body of the Saint: various sick persons are cured, and calamities are driven away.

In the year 1140 the body of St. Faro is visited: In the year from the Incarnation of the Lord one thousand one hundred and forty, Louis the Younger reigning, king of the Franks, by the inspiration of divine clemency, as the outcome of the matter afterwards taught, it came into the mind of Lord Andrew, who at that time was ruling the monastery of the blessed confessor of Christ Faro, to revisit the members of the same most sacred prelate ^a. The Lenten fast being completed, therefore, on the very most holy Saturday of Easter ^b, at that hour, namely, at which Mary Magdalene prepared ointments for embalming the Lord's body, the aforesaid abbot, content with only one companion, approached as a pious violator the coffin in which the sacred members were resting. And the little coffin being opened at the head, he found the precious body, wrapped in a very clean shroud: in which this signal thing appeared, that the same shroud ^c was found as uncorrupted as if it had been made the same day, although for three hundred years and more the bones of the sacred bishop had lain there.

[2] on which occasion a demoniac is freed When this was known, the mighty works of Christ are proclaimed by the brethren, thanks are given in common to the Lord. The devil, then, seeing so great a treasure revealed against him, in order at least to sadden the brethren with some trouble, seized a certain boy from among * the monks and began to vex him in the presence of the others: the boy gnashed his teeth, and was twisted with excessive torments, and showed by innumerable motions what kind of guest he had in him. Seeing this, the brethren, affected with excessive grief, betake themselves to entreat the mercy of the Lord and the clemency of the most pious Faro for the vexed one. And because it was the Paschal solemnity, they go to perform the nightly synaxis to the Lord; but they leave two of the brethren, to have care of the sick one; of whom one taking a cross, the other carrying the right hand of the most blessed prelate, they place them on the head of the raging one. He, gnashing still more manifoldly, began to utter words full of blasphemy. The monks nonetheless carried and thrust the very hand of the often-mentioned bishop on his mouth ^d. And the devil, seeing himself hemmed in by the merits of the excellent pontiff, cried out that he wished indeed to go out, but that with the brethren standing round no way lay open to him. The brethren giving him room to go out, by the mercy of the Lord and the intervention of the excellent Confessor, the monk was purged of the devil besieging him.

[3] he heals a wounded hand, And when the lord abbot was asked by the brethren to manifest publicly also the treasure revealed to him by the Lord, with the consent of the prelate of Meaux he fixed the day on which this should be done ^e. On the day appointed, therefore, there came together not only the people of Meaux but also very many from outside. Among them was present a certain man, whose hand a thorn stuck in had made so livid and swollen that he could not move it for any uses, and the creeping evil had already taken up almost his whole arm. A sermon being given by the archdeacon to the people, when at his instigation all bent the knee out of reverence for the holy Confessor, among the others the aforesaid sick man also bent the knee. And when as one subject to it he begged the mercy of the Lord through the intercession of blessed Faro, that he might have pity on him, at once the thorn, which could be pulled out by no art of physicians, was divinely expelled with the pus; the man, restored to health, proclaimed the mighty works of the Lord and the merits of blessed Faro.

[4] he frees an unbeliever from evil, There was at the same time at Fontaines a distinguished monastery of handmaids of God ^f, in which a certain lay brother ^g, who was burning with very strong fevers, hearing the report of the miracles which the Lord was working through the merits of blessed Faro, desired to come to his sacred monastery, for the sake of recovering health. A certain rustic, being of the household of the holy prelate, withstood him, saying thus: Do not think that you can straightway obtain the health which you could not obtain from the Lord here: for those things are frivolous which run through the mouths of the crowd, having no weight of truth in them. Having said this, when in the following night he had given himself to sleep, blessed Faro stood by him, with a threatening countenance, wearing the priestly infulae, and vehemently rebuking him, why he had presumed to detract from him, with the curved staff which he carried in his hand he beat his sides fiercely, and left him almost lifeless: and thus he knew in himself as a sick man the power of the Confessor whom he had detracted from when healthy. When morning came, therefore, he calls a priest, and tells him the course and cause of the matter: and inquires what must be done in this affair. The priest advises that the anger of the holy Confessor must be appeased, and that the monks be begged to pray for him. Why say more? The sick man is carried by his relatives to the monastery of the holy bishop, and is prostrated before his tomb begging pardon, and the brethren praying for him, on that day he was restored to health: and he who had been carried by the hands of others returned to his house on his own feet.

[5] a demoniac woman From that day a multitude of the languishing began to frequent the monastery of the holy pontiff. For those vexed with various troubles obtained health by his merits. Among them came a certain woman, an inhabitant of the territory of Meaux, who was most gravely vexed by a demon. Entering, then, the door of the church, she began to cry out terribly, and to disturb with her cries the voices of the brethren chanting psalms: for the devil, feeling that he could no longer possess her, raged the more vehemently. So the guardians of the church come up, and thrust the right hand of the holy pontiff on the mouth of the raging woman. The demon began to gnash manifoldly, and to vex more fiercely the woman possessed. But the pious Confessor did not long suffer the devil to linger within the precinct of his monastery: for about the ninth hour of the day the woman began to be better, and gradually to rest from the furious cries which she had previously been uttering. Remaining then for a few days in the monastery, she was wholly cured of the demon, and restored to perfect health by the merits of the excellent Confessor she returned safely to her own.

[6] and a man who had given himself to a demon, No less at the same time did the distinguished, excellent prelate become famous in a like deed. There was in a certain villa, which belonged to his possession, a certain man, himself also of the household of the holy bishop. He, then, while he was returning to his house from the wood which was near the aforesaid villa, there appeared to him two demons, having assumed human form, who seizing him from all sides were leading him off captive with them. He inquired who they were and why they were doing this. They, professing themselves to be demons, said that they had come for this, that they might subject him to their power. He, terrified, wished to imprint on himself the sign of the holy cross. To him they said: Do not seek other help, you can in no way go away from here, unless, your faith being given, you promise that you will be present here on the vigil of St. John the Baptist ^h. For we too will be here ready, and we will lead you to our master. So that man, compelled, promised under the oath of faith that he would fulfil as the demons demanded. And they, showing a thorn-bush and an oak: Under one, they say, of these trees wait for us. And when these things were done, soon from his eyes, like smoke,

they vanished. But he, returning home, began to be ill, and at times to utter words full of madness. Whence his relatives, astounded, and not knowing what they should do, summon a priest, and consult what must be done in this matter. Earnestly adjured by him, the sick man lays open the course of the matter, and that he could by no means rejoice until he should return to his lords. From that hour he raged more vehemently, and wished to tear with his teeth all those who met him, he broke all the chains by which he was bound, no one dared to come nearer to him.

[7] he snatches him from his servitude; On the day, therefore, on which he had promised, his faith being given, to return to the demons, he is led by his parents and the priest to the church of God. There nonetheless he leapt upon the altar itself, and cried out that he wished to go to his lords through the windows. Then the priest with his clerics goes to the place at which the demons had said they would be present; and sprinkles blessed water all around: and returning from there to the church, he placed his stole around the neck of the raging man, and so sending him off, said: Into the hands of God, and of St. Faro I commend you. The demoniac went by a straight path to the place appointed for him. But when he had come to where the sanctified water had been sprinkled, being unable to approach further, he cried out terribly: O priest, you have surrounded me with such a guard that I cannot go to my lords; but the faith which I promised them, I swear that today either alive or dead I shall be their companion. Hearing this, his parents who were present, although with grievous labour, bind him again in chains; and placing him on a four-horse cart they were taking him to the church of the often-mentioned bishop. And when, part of the journey being accomplished, he had come near a certain villa, Mait ⁱ by name, suddenly a very dense cloud descended upon them with a horrendous crash, so that the mountain on which the villa was set, with the villa itself, was thought by them to have come together into the abyss. And the sick man, with what motions he could being bound, leaping in the cart, and crying out terribly: Behold, he says, my lords come, with whom you will all go with me. When behold, the cloud being scattered, two persons appeared to him, of whom one, in a woman's habit, wearing a golden crown on her head, said she was Bellaria, and the other, adorned with pontifical infulae, carrying a pastoral staff in his hand, said he was St. Faro. Healed by the sight of them, the sick man calls the priest, and laying open the course of the vision, asks to be released from his chains. He thought that the sick man was deceiving after the usual manner of the raving. But when he heard him urgently praying to be loosed, and most truly professing the faith of Christ, summoning the people who were following him, he sets out what he had heard from the sick man, and, all giving thanks to God, he releases him from the chains. Loosed, he goes on to the church of the often-mentioned bishop, giving thanks to God and to his holy Mother and also to the most blessed Confessor for the health restored to him.

[8] one disabled in limbs and tongue A certain soldier also was held by so troublesome an affliction that he could neither add a word, nor perform the office of any limb. But when he had been brought to the often-mentioned monastery, within a short time by the merits of the excellent Confessor he recovered perfect health. To so great and fragrant a fame of miracles, therefore, not only neighbouring peoples but also those far removed flowed together. Among them a certain woman is brought, whom for eight years and more a most wicked demon had possessed, and as often as it seized her, she uttered horrible-sounding cries to the sorrow of those hearing. And if perhaps fire or water met her in her raging, as if she were setting herself on most pleasant meadows, she went forward doubting nothing. The unclean spirit so drove her that she neither feared the danger of death, nor avoided anything deadly that came to meet her. She then, as we have said, brought to the basilica of Blessed Faro, and staying there a few days, the demon being expelled, was restored to health.

[9] he cures one despaired of, About the same time a soldier, an inhabitant of the territory of Meaux, was tortured by a very vehement pain of the head, and now despairing of health, concerned only for his last things, was carried by his relatives to the monastery of the most blessed Faro: where, keeping vigil before his most sacred tomb, he entreats the clemency of the Lord to have mercy on him through the intercession of the pious prelate: and summoning the brethren, he admits that the cause of his sickness is that he had often unjustly usurped for himself from the possessions of St. Faro. He begs pardon for his crimes, and asks that they intercede for him. Why say much? Night coming on, carried to his bed, he relaxed his limbs in placid rest, when behold the most pious pontiff of the Lord Faro, venerable with snowy hoariness, with a most serene countenance, adorned in episcopal garment, stood before the bed of the man lying there, and with a gentle touch going over all the limbs of the sick man, sooner than said restored him to his former health. Awakened when morning came, he summons the abbot and brethren, and lays open to them the whole course of the vision. Then, a space of three days intervening, made perfectly healthy, he returns rejoicing to his own, praising the mighty works of the kind Creator, who constantly does not cease to glorify his Saints.

[10] an invader of his monastery, At another time again the lord of the village which is called Oratorium ^k, Gilbert by name, with 60 soldiers coming unexpectedly on the territory of Meaux, runs about on every side, and in the manner of a whirlwind lays low all he meets, cuts down, lays waste, puts the farmers to flight, carries off booty, and at the same time involves the oxen of Blessed Faro in his plunder. When this had become known to the aforesaid abbot, with certain monks and servants, mounting horses, he pursues the plunderers, and at once mixing with their company, suppliantly addresses the prince, and in a humble voice begs that the booty of the blessed Confessor be returned to him, saying that up to then from times past the Saint's property had always remained untouched, that no one had ever harmed his servants with impunity, and that he would also greatly consult for his own safety if he quickly came to his senses from such great presumption. Then the tyrant raged against the servant of God, and thundered that he would not only not return what had been taken, but would plunder all that he had left, unless he went away as quickly as possible. Hearing this, the abbot, greatly indignant, forbids them in the name of blessed Faro to carry off the booty further, and calling down dreadful misfortunes on them, goes away sad.

[11] though powerfully armed, As he was returning, a certain prince of the people of Meaux, Ansold by name, meets him with thirty soldiers, and inquiring the cause of his sadness, learns it, and abominating the horrendous and unheard-of crime, inquires whither the robbers are going; and most boldly promises that he will be the avenger of so great an injury, if the blessed Confessor should deign to be with him. The abbot promises him victory by the power of blessed Faro; only let him commit himself to the divine and most powerful aid of the Confessor; and he suggests that it is not difficult for God to save in few or in many, who once granted victory to Gideon, fighting for his people with 300 against innumerable thousands of foreigners [l]. Encouraged by these words, the aforesaid hero, the abbot accompanying, pursues the wicked men with his own: who, turning at the noise of those following, despise their fewness and, condemning them as rash, arrange to take them alive. But these, relying on divine help and encouraged by the presence of the abbot, as if of blessed Faro, like lions without hesitation rush upon them, and astounded by the divine will cut them down, put them to flight, lay them low. Why say more? His sons being captured, and his dearest lost, the tyrant slips away in flight with a few, leaving the rest to the plundering of the enemy. And the victors, some being cut down, a great many put to flight, throw nearly all the captives into chains, thrust them into prison at Meaux, and restore in full his booty to blessed Faro, by whose power they knew they were victors.

[12] by his power This therefore has been held among us or is to be held in the place of no small miracle, but rather to be compared in all respects with the ancient victories of the holy Maccabees ^m. For there among the other victories three thousand Jews slew a hundred thousand of the nations, as one reads, in one day. Here, though with a smaller number, yet with equal power the divine might cast down the most monstrous enemies by the entreaty of St. Faro. Let us recite another miracle also; in which though in a different, yet in no less power he appeared to be feared. The clients of a certain soldier Ebrard of Jouarre found the pigs of Blessed Faro on the public road, and purposely drove them into the field of their lord, which was near. Having found, then, as it seemed to them, a fit occasion, because they had found them in their lord's field, they began to carry them off, and when the swineherds resisted and protested that the swine belonged to Blessed Faro, they replied rather with abusive terms. When this was known, the abbot asked for a conversation with Ebrard; he complains that the swine were unjustly carried off, asking that what had been taken by malice be restored to him by kindness; supplicating and asking he is not heard by Ebrard, offering sureties for lawfully restoring the damage, if there was any: he is altogether rejected, and despised by his intolerable pride he returns.

[13] he strikes, and heals him when he returns to better ways; He having returned, Ebrard did not fear to kill the pigs, did not shudder to eat them, and did not dread to be condemned by the abbot's excommunication. But the renowned Confessor, condescending to the oppression of his own, one night terribly appeared to the oppressor, inquiring why he had presumed to plunder the substance of his monastery, had spurned his abbot, had moreover with rash audacity ordered the swine to be killed, and had not dreaded to devour them with his wicked mouth. By whose terrible voice and at the same time blow the wretch, turned to madness, fills the house with cries, grinds his teeth, rages with his nails, and tears and rends his covering or whatever is seized by his hands; the household is shaken from sleep, all come together disturbed and terrified. Asked why he was raving, he answered that he was being tortured by blessed St. Faro. All persuade him that satisfaction should be made to the most sacred Confessor and his monks: believing at length the saving persuasions, he sends ahead his horse to the monks as if for a beginning of satisfaction, intending, health being restored, to amend by himself whatever he had offended. O kindly justice of the pious Confessor! O just kindness of a truly just lord and most pious father, the servant and son punishes justly the sinner as a servant, kindly cherishes the penitent as a son. For a week having passed, he who offending had gone mad was restored to health as a penitent, and presenting himself in person to blessed Faro, he amended whatever he had offended, and thus joyful and eager returned to his own.

[14] he frees a captive from chains. Let there be set down also another signal indication of his piety and power, that it may be manifest how pious a hearer he is of those who call on him, and how powerful and very ready a deliverer of the oppressed. At the castrum of Coucy ⁿ the only son of a widowed mother had been placed in captivity, and was held fettered in iron chains. And the mother, grieving that she was bereft of the solace of her only son, day and night begged the divine aid, imploring with continual groans the deliverance of her offspring. Meanwhile there shone forth the annual festival of Blessed Faro, on which, freed from bodily chains, he departed to the heavenly kingdoms. On the whole vigil preceding the solemn day, therefore, the woman with poured-out tears calls on the most mighty bishop, to hear the prayers of a wretched mother and to come to the aid of her captive son, to restore her offspring to the desolate woman, to give back to the mother's little household its governor. Roused by whose lament the most clement Confessor appeared, surrounded with splendid light, to the son also praying in prison, and ordered him as he lay there to rise and go away, saying that he was Faro, whom he had so often called on as helper. He at once rising found himself loosed from all his chains, and going out began to depart. The guards seize him, and though he put forward the name of Blessed Faro, they bind him with stronger bonds and thrust him back into prison; and having barred

the doors, they lay their limbs on their beds. Not long afterwards the kindly pontiff returns to the fettered man, and inquires why he was staying there, why he had not gone away as he had ordered. He reports to him what misfortune had befallen him, how the guards had seized him as he went out, had bound him again when captured, and when bound had consigned him to prison. Now, he says, go out, because no obstacle will now be placed in the way of your liberty. He rose therefore, and taking the fetters in which he had been entangled, no one hindering, he went to the monastery of the holy Confessor. And there before all, celebrating the festival, he set out the history of his liberation. Then indeed praises are rendered in common to the Saviour, and the true piety of his most pious and most powerful Confessor, the power of the father of orphans and judge of widows shone forth in him: who because he was pious, did not forget the cry of the poor, because powerful he loosed the fettered, raises up the crushed, and will save the humble in spirit.

ANNOTATIONS.

l. Judges VII, 5 and 6.

e*?

THE CONVERSION OF OGIER THE KNIGHT

how, renouncing the world, he fought for God in the monastic habit.

From a manuscript of the royal library of Brussels under no. 8924: partly collated with Mabillon in the Acta SS. Ord. S. Benedicti, sæc. IV, Part I.

Faro, confessor and bishop, at Meaux in the Gauls. (S.)

BHL Number: 2831

FROM MANUSCRIPTS

Ogier, one of the chief war-leaders of Charlemagne, It is fitting to add beneath the venerable Life of Faro, most holy and most glorious pontiff of Meaux, how to the monastery which the same pontiff with the zeal of pious devotion founded near the city, and dedicated most devoutly in honour of the Holy Cross and of Blessed John the Baptist, and of St. Peter and all the Apostles, and nobly honoured with most ample possessions, Ogier, a man of illustrious family, so strenuous in battles that on account of his frequent and victorious vanquishing of adversaries he alone among warriors at that time was called by a special surname, even by the warriors themselves, the strong warrior and fighter ^b, came ^c in order to promise there perseverance in the monastic life. To none of the wise or of those having knowledge of just love is it doubtful that, as misery to glory, sadness adverse to gladness, so good things to evils and vices to virtues are by nature contrary. Since therefore many very wicked men, who rejoice when they have done evil, and exult in most wicked things Prov. II, 14, overflow abundantly with temporal goods: while the just, ever devoting their labour to the virtues, awaiting with happy hope the gladness that will remain, seem to be afflicted by many miseries and very many straits, those ignorant of the hidden judgments of God and of the providence of his dispensation wonder with erroneous reconsideration how it can happen that prosperity with the wicked, adversity with the good, because they are contrary, should so agree with one another as to be able to be associated. But since there is a great distance between time and eternity, the goods or evils of time happen indifferently to the just and to the unjust. But eternity's goods are owed only to the good, and perpetual evils only to the wicked. In those things, then, which are temporal, the just ought neither to glory vainly in prosperity, nor foolishly be disturbed by adversity, for they are transitory; but rather to rejoice in tribulation, that they may possess their souls in patience: for the strait of tribulation for those bearing it patiently is the fire of purgation and of proof; because like gold in the furnace the Lord has proved the elect and as a holocaust of sacrifice has received them in an odour of sweetness Wis. III, 6.

[2] weary of the world, The aforesaid Ogier, then, a man most illustrious in generous nobility, and by God's permission most victorious in the frequent exercise of battles, and for that reason in the time of the most glorious emperor, namely Charlemagne, so exalted in glory and honour among the princes of the Franks that after him he was second in the empire and dominion of the realm, while he was most gloriously strong in the world, began with the industry of a sound mind to reconsider that the glory and secular elevation by which his heart was pompously lifted up among men, and the riches which in the present world he possessed in common with any unjust men and evildoers, because they were transitory and empty; these, divinely inspired, he resolved to leave, that in eternal beatitude he might merit to possess perpetual ones with the Saints. For he had been moved and refreshed by this sentence, which he had heard from the mouth of truth: That everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled, and he who humbles himself shall be exalted Matt. XXIII, 12. From that throne of the kingdom, then, in which he gloried as second from the king, as has been said, he arranged that he should be humbled, that he might merit to be exalted, and should be stripped of the riches of false beatitude, that after this toilsome life he might be enriched with the glory of true beatitude, to live perpetually before God with the Angels.

[3] he goes through various monasteries, Knowing therefore that one must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God Acts XIV, 21, and that the sufferings of the present life are not worthy of comparison with the future glory which will be revealed in the Saints Rom. VIII, 18; after the example of the Lord, who being God emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, made obedient even to death Philipp. II, 5, after the many battles which he had manfully fought, after the glory of famous praise which he had propagated for himself by strenuous works, he left all that was his, to follow Jesus Christ, and with the Apostle Paul he did not shudder to crucify himself to this world, and the world to himself Gal. VI. And thus he humbly obeyed the words of the Lord, which he had heard attentively in the Gospel: Who wishes to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me Matt. XVI, 24. Taking up, then, the insignia of pilgrimage ^d, he set out as a pilgrim to explore the monasteries of monks; so that, namely, in which regular discipline

he should see the custody observed, in that he might promise the conversion of his morals, and confirm the perseverance of his life according to the Rule of St. Benedict, to serve the Lord as long as he lived under the rule of an abbot, his own wills being renounced ^e. On the staff which he had taken up to be carried as a sign of pilgrimage he hung several straps of thong, and at the tips of those straps he fixed little spheres of iron, and he threw it with a violent impulse on the pavement of each monastery into which he entered to pray; shrewdly and diligently attending to whether the monks perhaps lightly turned themselves at the noise of the staff from vanity of mind.

[4] at length in the monastery of Meaux He therefore, having gone through several monasteries, and, as has been said, explored them, found in none of them such continence from vanity as in the most religious congregation of St. Faro. For there, when he violently drove the aforesaid staff with its appendages on the pavement, and the staff in its striking gave back the noise of a confused sound, of the monks standing by none was moved to look back, or to remove his mind from the attention of his devotion, except one of those who were kept under custody, a boy. Him one of the guardians at once struck with the rod of discipline, and thus compelled him to turn his eyes back from vanity to that on which he should be attending ^f. Whence he clearly understood that there were most devoutly observed both the rule of the monastic religion and the discipline of the religious institution. From which he at once proposed to himself to take up there, the pomp of the world being spurned, the habit of the monks too. Using prudent counsel, therefore, he returned from there to King Charles, to ask of him that it might be permitted him by his leave to take up the habit of holy religion ^g. At which Charles, pricked, for his heart was moved concerning him, poured himself out in tearful weeping, and permitted him with good grace to have the licence which he devoutly asked. At which the elders of the palace, the middle and lowest persons turned to amazement, blessing the Lord, who in so great a man so wondrously magnified the change of his right hand.

[5] together with his companion Benedict he makes profession, Then with devout exhortations he admonished Benedict, whom he had had as companion in many battles, that he should come with him to the monastery of St. Faro to be a monk, that they who together had committed many crimes in homicide might together in the monastery penitently bewail their sins ^h. Acquiescing in his admonitions and prayers, Benedict (for he was mindful of their past companionship) joined himself to him again: and both together, like athletes of Christ manfully armed with faith, returned to the monastery of St. Faro. There, leaving with votive heart for the name of Jesus Christ the arms of war and everything which they had had in the world, as long as they lived they remained in holy religion. In the same year in which they were made monks, Ogier, now knowing the monastic customs, returned to Charles, admonishing and humbly asking that he who was accustomed to do good to other monasteries should not except the monastery of St. Faro from his benefactions, but extending his alms should mercifully come to the help of the stipends of the brethren serving God there with some increases. Charles, as is the way of nobles, remembering his military service and strenuousness, and also piously rejoicing in his conversion and devotion, lest the servant of God should return disappointed from him, for love of him gave to St. Faro a certain abbey from his demesne, dedicated in honour of St. Mary and of Peter the Apostle, in the place which is called Reda ⁱ, which place is distant from the city of Meaux and from the monastery a space of eighty stadia. Another, which he himself had once held in the suburb of Vercelli, he of his spontaneous kindness restored to him for the use of the same brethren, which abbey afterwards remained under the lordship of the abbot and brethren of St. Faro as long as the king of the Franks held Italy under his rule ^k. That of Reda remains until the present day in the possession of the aforesaid monastery.

[6] and many benefits being conferred, he dies holily. Afterwards the aforesaid Ogier, living for several years in the monastery under the rule of the abbot, chastising his body with the dryness of dreadful thirst, and cruelly wasting it with the horror of dreadful hunger, in vigils and prayers remembering his sins with tearful groans. Whose true conversion and holiness of life the Lord Jesus Christ afterwards declared by many miracles; as clearly demonstrates that there is joy to the Angels of God over one sinner doing penance, more than over ninety-nine just who need no penance [l]. To him alone, who mercifully waits for sinners to do penance, and clemently justifies the penitent from their sins, be glory and dominion with the Father and the Holy Spirit through infinite ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

the end of life they should do penance. Thus in the second council of Limoges, of the year 1031 Labbe, vol. IX, Conc., col. 909, we read that a Gascon soldier, by order of Viscount Sancho, slayer of his lord, is sent away by his bishop to the Pope, who, having heard the bishops, compelled him to the monastic life Cf. Laplace, Monographie de N. D. de Lescar, p. 35 and following. I should readily believe that by such a motive Ogier and his companion Benedict were brought to the more austere life.

There formerly stood in the monastery of Saint-Faron a distinguished sepulchral monument of Ogier and Benedict, of which Mabillon has preserved an engraving for us in his work on the Acts of the Saints of the Order of St. Benedict, sæc. IV, part I. About the middle of the eighteenth century that tomb was standing: for D. Bouquet in his Monuments of French History, printed in the year 1744 Rec. des Hist., vol. V, p. 468 n., speaks as if it still existed then. But before the devastation carried out at the end of the same century, the monument had already disappeared. By way of a finishing touch we append the epitaph published by Fulcoius Mabillon, Acta SS., sæc. IV, part I, p. 664:

How ill he discerns what he loves, or what things he spurns, Who is pleased by the breeze of earth, displeased by the breeze of heaven.

An exile in a foreign land, far from the region above, Taken with love of the road, he remembers not his homeland.

The conversion of the knight Ogier, worthy to be looked on, Suffices as a mirror, on which you may set your eye.

He was a weight of the law, wealthy, second from the king, Noble and wise, strenuous and patient.

Fenced with these flowers, having gained a pre-eminent summit, He set all things aside, and gave himself to God.

He calls forth Benedict, unconquered companion of his affairs: That, equal in military service, he may share in the pardon.

The Cross is taken together, and this place of the Cross is entered: Caesar is both put off, and Caesar is put on.

Go, equal souls, first through whatever hosts, Brave men of Caesar, brave members of God.

Brave athletes, fare well through all the ages, Equal is your form of the cross, equal too will be your rest.

O how fair a pair, equal in living, and an equal tomb: Equal was your burial too, equal will be your title.