Seraphina

ON BL. SERAPHINA, WIDOW AND ABBESS OF THE ORDER OF S. CLARE

AT PESARO IN THE MARCH OF ANCONA

In the year MCCCCLXXVIII.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Seraphina, widow and abbess, at Pesaro in the March of Ancona (B.)

BY J. P.

§ I. The memory of the Blessed among Writers, her eulogies, the public and solemn exposition of her body, her immemorial cultus.

[ ] In the city of Pesaro, most famous both for its antiquity and for its extent and elegance, the memory of B. Seraphina Colonna — or, as others write, Seraphina Feltria, in both ways rightly, inasmuch as she drew her origin from each of those most illustrious families, as will appear below, where there will be a proper place for speaking of her distinguished ancestry — is celebrated to this day in the monastery of nuns of the Order of S. Clare, B. Seraphina is mentioned which bears the name of the Body of the Lord. Some few things are to be premised here which pertain to her cultus and public veneration. Arturus announces her at the VIII day of September in the Franciscan Martyrology and also in his Gynæceum in these words: At Pesaro in Picenum, of Blessed Seraphina a Columna, widow: who, sprung of a most illustrious lineage, put on the habit of the Poor Clares, and, being made Abbess, lived and died most holily. Then in both places in the Annotations he adduces the notable eulogy which the Rev. Fr. Francesco Gonzaga wove concerning her life and death, in the second part of the Work which he wrote on the Origin of the Seraphic Religion; and this eulogy I also transfer hither.

[2] Blessed sister Seraphina, drawing her origin from the most noble family of Colonna, and they have adorned her with eulogies was married to a certain Alessandro, formerly temporal lord of Pesaro. And while she rather sharply reproved his infamous and too free life, she incurred his hatred, and after very many dangers to her own life had been overcome she was compelled by him to enter this sacred monastery (of the Body of the Lord): in which, when she had for some time lived in a secular, yet most honorable, habit, putting on at length the habit of religion, she lived in it most holily for XVIII continuous years. Wherefore, departing from this life, she left the greatest longing for herself and the greatest opinion of sanctity to the other sisters. Her body, together with that of the blessed sister Felix, the most illustrious Guidobaldo and his lawful wife Vittoria Farnese, most pious dukes of Urbino, took care to have translated from the sacristy to two marble mausolea skillfully built into an arch on either side of the choir, and finished at their own expense. Thus the praised Gonzaga. We shall more fully explain most of the things contained in that eulogy in the course of this Commentary.

[3] Ferrarius likewise mentions our Blessed at the same day in the Catalogue in this manner: by various authors; but they are too recent for it to be At Pesaro, the death of B. Seraphina, princess of Pesaro. As also does Hueber in the Franciscan Menology, at the XXV day of December: but why he throws her memory back to another day, he alleges no reason. There exist besides distinguished testimonies to our Seraphina in Marcos of Lisbon in the Chronicle of the Friars Minor, part 3, book 6, chap. 39; in Pietro of Tossignano, book 1 of the Histories of the Seraphic Religion; in Ludovico Jacobilli, De SS. Fulginatibus; in Wadding, tome 14 of the Annals; and in not a few others whom Arturus enumerates in the places cited above. And almost all of these distinguish her with the title of Blessed. Nevertheless, that I may openly bring out what is in my mind, unless other testimonies had been added, all these would not have sufficed for me to insert this Blessed into our Work without anxiety, because through them her immemorial cultus would not seem sufficiently established; especially since the praised authors are quite recent, and none of them wrote eighty years before the publication of the Decree of Urban VIII. For Marcos of Lisbon, who is the most ancient of all whom I have cited, published his Work only in the year MDLVI, and he indeed abstained from the title of Blessed. Receive his words translated into the Latin tongue: In the monastery of S. Clare at Pesaro, on the VIII day of September, died sister Seraphina Colonna, illustrious because she was sprung of a most noble stock, but more illustrious on account of her sanctity. She was Abbess in the said monastery.

[4] certainly proved from them that the cultus was immemorial. I confess indeed that Wadding cites in the margin manuscript Legends, but these are neither at hand for us, nor is it ascertained where in the world they now lie hidden: certainly not among the people of Pesaro, who without doubt would have transmitted these also, as formerly other documents, to our Predecessors. Whence it is not sufficiently clear what is the antiquity of the said Legends, or how much authority can be attributed to them; for the praised Wadding cites, along with those Legends, Fr. Agostino Gallucci, whose Work nevertheless saw the light only in the year MDCXXXVII. Yet I shall willingly grant that the Legends which Wadding used are very ancient, and that what is related in them concerning the most piously spent life and the happy death of our Blessed is most true; but is anything besides these reported, from which an immemorial cultus can certainly be drawn out? Assuredly whatever Wadding brings forward concerning the said cultus is adduced also by Gallucci, and he moreover adds testimonies of such a kind as seemed to me in some way necessary, though at the same time sufficient, for us to be secure concerning the immemorial cultus. Nay, such are the testimonies of the praised writer that one may not undeservedly suspect that most of what Wadding writes concerning the cultus was drawn from Gallucci's Work itself, as will become manifest to one who considers those things by which I chiefly undertake to prove the aforesaid cultus.

[5] And so the praised and often to be praised in the course of this work Rev. Fr. Agostino Gallucci of Mondolfo, On the testimony of Agostino Gallucci the bodies of BB. Seraphina and Felix Meda formerly Apostolic commissary general of the Picentine province of the Observant Minors and visitor of the provinces of Bavaria and Tyrol, in the XXXVII year of the century just elapsed published in the Italian idiom a book divided into three parts, of which the first embraces the deeds of B. Felix Meda, foundress of the above-mentioned monastery of the Poor Clares of Pesaro; the second the Life and miracles of B. Seraphina; and the third the posthumous glory of both Blessed in common. And in this last part, certain miracles being premised, in chap. 5 he begins to relate out of the Chronicles (whether of Pesaro or of his own Order, he does not indicate) how from the beginning the bodies of BB. Felix and Seraphina, which, as will afterwards be proved, are preserved incorrupt down to our own times, were laid in wooden chests, and in them shown to the devout people through the lattices of the sacristy. He adds then that the said bodies, set in marble chests and translated to a more honorable place, went on being shown to the people almost to the very time at which he was writing: then at length he proceeds to the narration of those things which happened in his own age, and which I shall presently interpret from the Italian into Latin. For the studious reader must be somewhat forewarned concerning his style. This is exceedingly prolix, and often embraces in a single period so many things, heaped up as it were of set purpose, without observing the punctuation, that it has created for me much annoyance and weariness. Since nevertheless he either saw the things narrated himself, or from an eyewitness

…the author had taken it in, I have adapted the Latin to the Italian manner of expression, so that I might keep the more closely to his sense; and I have preferred that my version be found inelegant and perhaps unpleasing rather than less faithful.

[6] It has been said that the exhibition of these blessed bodies was continued almost down to our own time; in the year 1628, as had formerly been the custom, because some of the preceding Abbesses interrupted it for eighteen years, in order to rouse the people to a desire of it — as in fact happened (perhaps out of fear of some punishment which God was threatening against the world through comets and other extraordinary signs). Mother Sister Maura Giordani, an abbess of much virtue and of great judgment, in the year 1628 urged strongly upon the Father Minister of the March, Friar Marcus Anticus (a man outstanding among those whom our Religious Order has had, both for learning and for governance), that he would deign to grant the faculty of exposing them publicly; and this he himself granted, on condition that the words of the Decree of Our Lord Urban VIII, issued in the congregation of the Holy Office held on the thirteenth day of March 1625, should be weighed and fully observed.

[7] After this, the same mother abbess likewise sought leave from the most illustrious and most reverend lord Malatesta, after mature examination bishop of the city, who at the present time is Apostolic Nuncio to His Imperial Majesty. He, after he had examined and had caused to be examined the said Decree, and had found that there was nothing in it to the contrary, granted the requested leave with no less promptness of will than display of great devotion — so much so, indeed, that, being asked to be present, he was willing to attend this solemnity, which the mother abbess, with the consent of the father confessor of the nuns, Friar Faustinus of Montelboddo, and of all the nuns and of the syndics of the monastery — these were the lords Antonius Pauli, Troianus Mainardi, Stephanus Montanari, and Dominicus de Oddis — appointed for the second day of August, a feast of the Order on account of the Assisian indulgences called those of the Portiuncula.

[8] with solemn preparation, and with the attendance Accordingly, on the appointed day, after a platform had first been erected with the greatest magnificence at the doors of the inner church, and the tabernacle had been removed from the high altar, lest it should block the view through the larger grates, through which the Sisters hear Mass behind the altar and gaze upon the elevated Sacrament of the most holy Eucharist, the sacred bodies were exposed amid a great number of burning candles and amid the sweetest chants, taken up by turns and renewed by the nuns to the accompaniment of musical instruments. They had been clothed by the Sisters in silken garments of ash-grey colour, with black veils upon the head, with a diadem, and with rays. In her right hand Bl. Felix bore a lily, the emblem of virginity; but Blessed Seraphina, who had been joined in marriage, bore a smaller image of Christ crucified; for the larger one, which had spoken to her and consoled her and exhorted her to patience, they had placed between the two of them, close to the head of each.

[9] [of the clergy, the bishops, and the magistrates; they were exposed to public veneration.] It was Wednesday morning about the thirteenth hour when the most illustrious prelate, with many of his canons and priests, as also the governors of the city, accompanied by a great multitude of the nobility, betook themselves thither to venerate and honour the precious relics, and to pour forth prayers as each one's feeling prompted. After this the bishop celebrated Mass in that same place for the dedication of the church, according to the Office proper to that day in the Order of St. Francis. Then indeed the most illustrious lord Campegius of Bologna — today Apostolic Nuncio to the Catholic King, and who at that time (Duke Francesco Maria II being still alive) governed Urbino and its dominions — came to the said solemnity with a great retinue not only of courtiers but also of his own citizens, and there wished the sacrifice of the Mass to be celebrated by his own priest. So great, moreover, was the concourse of people that no exact account of it can be given; let it suffice to say that throughout that whole day the church was never seen without an immense multitude of men. All to the glory of the divine Majesty, to the honour of the Blessed, and to our salvation. Amen.

[10] Hence the antiquity of the cult If we consider all these things with attentive mind, and weigh the circumstances of the persons who took part in this solemnity, and of the time at which it was held, we shall judge that there is no need to have recourse to further testimonies on behalf of an immemorial cult. For the said solemn exposition and veneration of the blessed bodies took place — and was shortly afterwards committed to writing and to the press by Father Gallucius, who dedicated his Work to that same most illustrious Malatesta — at those times in which, in this matter above all, the greatest caution and prudence were needed: namely at those times in which there had issued from the Pontiff Urban VIII the decrees for removing and cutting off abuses in the cult of Saints or of the Blessed, whether already committed or such as might be committed in the future, and in which the care of observing the said decrees, and a diligent vigilance in investigating abuses of that kind, had been especially entrusted to the ordinaries of places.

[11] is drawn out with no obscurity. Who therefore would dare so much as to suspect that the most illustrious Malatesta Baleoneus — a man, on Ughelli's testimony in the Italia sacra, distinguished in nobility and in character, who with the highest praise for his prudence administered the church of Pesaro from the year 1612 down to the year 1641, and who discharged the office of legate for Urban VIII to His Imperial Majesty — who, I say, would dare to suspect that such a man, at such times, would have permitted not only that with that preparation, with that solemnity, the bodies of BB. Seraphina and Felix should be exposed to public veneration, but would even by his own example have stirred up others to honour and reverence them, unless it had been established, with certainty and without any danger from the decrees mentioned, that the cult was immemorial? Let the same judgment be made concerning so many pious and learned men of Pesaro, of both the ecclesiastical and the secular order. The same concerning the most illustrious Laurentius Campegius, a Bolognese by origin, whom the Supreme Pontiff just mentioned raised first to the see of Cesena, then to that of Senigallia, and whose services, and whose prudence in the handling of affairs, both he himself and his predecessor Paul V employed more than once; as may be seen more fully in the praised Ughelli, tom. 2, col. 880.

§ II. A second public and solemn exposition of the bodies of BB. Seraphina and Felix, and the construction of two windows through which they may always be seen and honoured.

[ ] In the year 1630, in a public calamity Although the things which in the preceding § we have brought forward out of Father Gallucius abundantly prove the legitimate cult of Bl. Seraphina, it is nevertheless useful to add to these the things which in the two following chapters the same praised author records concerning a second exposition of the blessed bodies, made about two years after the first. For thus not only will the things hitherto said be confirmed, but it will also appear more clearly how great is the veneration in the city of Pesaro towards the Blessed, and how great the confidence of men of every rank in their patronage. He begins his narrative at once by describing the various calamities of war, plague, famine, and earthquakes, by which about those times the chief cities and provinces of Italy were pressed; then in order he recounts the remedies employed by the inhabitants to appease God, who was deservedly angry with them; and finally he sets forth how it was that the people of Pesaro, after long prayers to heaven, after public supplications, and after other exercises of piety and penance, judged that they should have recourse to the patronage of BB. Seraphina and Felix. The words in which he narrates the whole course of the affair I here again transcribe, rendered into Latin.

[13] Nor did they (the people of Pesaro) omit to press upon the mother abbess, the bodies are again solemnly exposed. Sister Elizabeth Pucci, and upon the nuns of the convent of the Body of the Lord, that the bodies of BB. Felix and Seraphina should be exposed. With the consent of lord Alexander Pace, vicar general of the bishopric (in the absence of the most illustrious bishop, who was staying at Rome), and of the father custos of their (the nuns') Reform, their superior, Friar Joseph of Pozzuoli, this was proposed by lord Terence Alberti, chancellor of the community. They themselves assented to the requests, and soon satisfied their wishes (with the preparation described before) on the feast day of Saints Peter and Paul. In the year 1630 this fell upon a Saturday: to it the Sunday also was added. For since the lord Vicar in the territory of Pesaro, and the Community in the places and towns subject to its jurisdiction, had taken care that the people should be invited to that solemnity through the parish priests, and since besides, within the city, the parish priests had proclaimed the solemnity with most ardent exhortations, both in the pulpits of the cathedral church and of St. Dominic and also in the other churches, the people flowed together in such numbers that two whole days were necessary.

[14] An innumerable people runs together with the governors of the city, And indeed, if father Sant' Agata, at that time their confessor, had not met the difficulty by his diligence — he who, together with the lords procurators of the monastery, Troianus Mainardi, Troianus Archangeli, Hieronymus Ubaldi, and Domitianus Buffa, had arranged everything in the church in such a manner that all confusion should be avoided — there would have been found some to whom things had not turned out sufficiently to their mind; whereas on the contrary all were most fully satisfied, both because they could conveniently pour out their prayers, and because they were allowed to take in these precious treasures more closely with their eyes. Here, interrupting his narrative, Gallucius inserts the wonderful healing of the above-mentioned father Sant' Agata, which he ascribes to the present help of God and to the patronage of the Blessed. This benefit I shall append, with the other miracles, to the Commentary. At length, when he has repeated some of what was said before, he continues in this manner. On the twenty-ninth day of June, the feast of the holy apostles Peter and Paul, about the twelfth hour, the governors of the city were present; among them were the lords Antonius Pauli, gonfalonier [*], Dominicus de Oddis, Vincentius Cacciamali, and Ascanius Barzanini, accompanied by a great multitude of nobles and citizens. At their coming the veils were removed, and the blessed bodies, with an immense number of wax lights shining round about, were exposed to the view of every one, with such gladness and delight of soul that many could not restrain their tears for tenderness of feeling. After they had duly venerated them, and each had poured forth prayers according to his own judgment, on the point of departing they came nearer to the altar and contemplated the precious treasures. Nor was this done on this occasion only, but on both days, as often as they returned morning and evening.

[15] the whole clergy and the religious Orders. And the same as was done by the governors of the city and by the nobles and citizens who were with them, was performed also by men of every condition and state who ran thither, men and women, natives and strangers, ecclesiastics and laymen. Of the ecclesiastics there was present the vicar general of the bishopric with all the clergy of the city, in the ordered ranks of suppliants, beneath a wooden cross, without pomp, but rather in humility and penance. There was no singing, but with subdued voice, and with great affection of piety, the litanies and psalms customarily used in like cases were recited by the choir. Having entered the sacred building, they all prostrated themselves upon their knees and performed their prayers as each thought fit and in silence. Afterwards, when some versicles with the prayers annexed had been said in the tone which they use in choir, on the point of departing they likewise rejoiced in the same sight. This very thing all the religious Orders did, and the several confraternities separately, and each at the time most convenient to it. And indeed, of the religious Orders, on both days after Vespers there appeared the Dominican Fathers, bringing with them the whole body of the confraternity of the most holy Rosary. And this they recited

alternately, religious and seculars, beginning from their own church and finishing in the church of the Body of the Lord before the bodies of the Blessed. There, further, after the due veneration, prayer, and rendering of honour, he who was filling the place of the superior in governing them, Father Friar Thomas of Camurano, today inquisitor general of the province of Romagna, in a brief but pious discourse in praise of the Blessed, exhorted all to the veneration of them, and encouraged them to implore help from heaven. The very same thing was performed on both days by Father Friar Nicholas of Cattaro, Guardian at St. John's, who betook himself thither with all the brethren of his monastery of the Reformed Observance of the Minors, and with the confraternity of the Third Order.

[16] Here again the praised author inserts some matters, Two windows, through which the bodies of the Blessed at any time in which he commends the care and diligence of the father Sant' Agata, already several times mentioned, and of the nuns, that all things should be carried out with the greatest splendour; and he shows in how great esteem the relics of the Saints have always been held, even from the earliest times of the Church; and at length he resumes his narrative thus: Let us for our part add this concerning the city of Pesaro, that when in the said solemnity it had been granted to enjoy and rejoice in the sight of the blessed bodies, and from this there had arisen a desire of enjoying the same more easily and more frequently, the lords who presided both over the public health and over the government of the city devised a means of obtaining this. (That took place at the end of the same year 1630, namely towards the close of the month of December.) A consultation having been instituted, two noblemen were chosen, lord Pirrus Pucci and lord Camillus Giordani, who in the name of all should treat with the nuns, with the superiors of the Order, with the bishop, and with the others with whom it was necessary, that for the placing of those bodies windows should be constructed on either side of the high altar, with due precaution taken for the security of the cloister and the convenience of the nuns; and further, that so long as the pestilence should continue to rage, two lamps should burn continually before them, and all this at public expense. And the care of announcing this to the abbess and the sisters was laid upon the chancellor of the said community.

[17] To these women it was indeed a pleasure to learn such things; but since it was a matter of graver moment, may be seen and honoured by the people, they replied that it was necessary that it be deliberated upon in their chapter. This was convened on the fifth of January 1631, and there took part in it father Sant' Agata, supplying the place of the Father Custos; Father Friar Cattaro, Guardian at St. John's; Father Friar Julius of Mondolfo, preacher general, who had preached in that house through the days of Christ's Advent; and two professors of sacred Theology. The matter was carried by the votes of all, and this, when the Magistracy learned it, was a great consolation. Upon this leave obtained, those deputed for the purpose immediately treated with lord Alexander Pace, canon and (as was said above) Vicar general. But he, being neither able nor willing to determine any matter of his own accord, wrote repeatedly to the most illustrious bishop, who, having left Rome, had been made governor and prefect of the province of the March, and at that time was residing at Macerata. He on each occasion wrote back that that business, being a weighty one, must be examined with all maturity and prudence; that a congregation of theologians must be established over it, and that a decision must be made according to their judgment.

[18] The congregation was accordingly established twice, and there took part in it the aforesaid Vicar; with the previous consultation and approbation of the Theologians, lord John Baptist Montanus, then archdeacon of Pesaro, now bishop of Oppido in Calabria; the lords Michael Angelus Lepidi and Valerius Zuchelli, each of them a canon of the cathedral church; Father Bartholomew of Sartina, provost of the Clerks Minor at St. Charles's; Father Sant' Agata, the confessor; and others from other religious Orders. All these, in the twofold congregation held within ten days, having examined, weighed, and considered the things that were to be examined, weighed, and considered — and in the first place the Decree which was issued by the sacred congregation of the Holy Office at Rome in the presence of Our Lord Pope Urban VIII on Thursday the 2nd day of October 1625 concerning the veneration of blessed bodies — resolved by common consent that the desire of the city ought to be satisfied, and that the said windows with the lamps ought to be built, through which those venerable bodies might be seen, honoured, and reverenced, and their intercession implored, publicly and privately, in this and in every other case in times to come, according to the ancient custom of times past; and that with all magnificence of lights, of preparation, and of like ornaments, such as befitted blessed bodies; excepting altars, Mass, the divine office, and other things of that kind which may not be rendered to them without the special leave of the Holy Apostolic See.

[19] they are built at the public expense of the city. Upon this leave given there followed the execution: the windows were constructed, and iron gratings on both sides, with double lattices of finely woven brass wire. The chests were fitted and placed in the middle, and upon them at last were laid the venerable bodies on the sixteenth day of May 1632. There were also affixed to them, both on the inner side (where the nuns look in) and on the outer (where the church, that is the people, does), wooden doors, which are closed with keys — the inner with a single key, which the mother Abbess keeps, but the outer with a double one, of which likewise the one is kept with the mother abbess, the other with the Father confessor. Moreover, when these (the outer doors) are unlocked (which is not done without the intervention of the Father confessor, vested in surplice and stole), those (the inner doors) are always kept shut; just as these also remain locked when those are opened; and thus the enclosure suffers no detriment, and the devout are given the opportunity of conveniently exercising their piety, to the glory of God and the good of souls.

[20] From these an argument is drawn for the immemorial cult. Thus far the praised Gallucius, setting forth even the smallest particulars so distinctly and so accurately that, if he was not himself present, he can at least be reckoned to have learned them from the eye-witness Father Sant' Agata, at whose instance and at that of the Nuns — as is clear from the letters prefixed to the book — he committed them to the press preto about four years after they had been performed. But now, besides that these things, as we warned before, wonderfully prove the confidence of the people of Pesaro in the help of BB. Seraphina and Felix, and their veneration towards them, they confirm the immemorial cult in no small degree — nay, do I say they make it certain? For what else do those words of the sentence given by the Vicar general and by the twice-convened theologians portend: And their intercession might be implored publicly and privately, in this and in every other case in times to come, ACCORDING TO THE ANCIENT CUSTOM OF TIMES PAST? I know indeed that there is presently added, excepting altars, Mass, the divine office, etc.; but public cult does not consist in these alone, as the learned know, and as the most eminent Prosper de Lambertinis, formerly archbishop of Bologna, but now throughout the universal Church the Vicar of Christ on earth, beautifully shows in book 2 of his outstanding Work On the beatification of the Servants of God and the canonization of the Blessed, chapter 23, number 9. That exception, therefore, rather confirms the immemorial cult than weakens it. For the said theologians, with the vicar general, are to be reckoned to have made it because it was not established that such cult in particular had been rendered to the blessed bodies in time past; and therefore to have decreed the contrary — namely that, saving the constitution of Urban VIII, the bodies of BB. Seraphina and Felix might be publicly exposed, lights kindled before them, and the other acts of veneration which Gallucius enumerates continued according to the ancient custom of times past, because that immemorial custom had been sufficiently proved to them.

[21] Further, scarcely can anyone with reason doubt that both the nuns and the rest of the people of Pesaro venerated our Seraphina as Blessed The bodies of BB. Seraphina from the very moment of her death, since they had looked up to her in her lifetime as adorned with so many and so great virtues — especially since they had found that her lifeless body, throughout the three days in which it lay unburied, breathed forth a most sweet odour: as those constantly assert who committed her Acts to writing, and of whom there will be occasion to speak in the following §. And this veneration could not but receive the highest increase when that same body of hers, exhumed after many years and found whole in a rotted coffin, began to shine with manifest miracles — which wholeness of hers endures down to our own times, as is gathered from the often-praised Gallucius, and as I now further prove from another eye-witness.

[22] Our Papebroch, in his manuscript Diary of the Roman journey and Felix are preserved incorrupt down to this time. which he undertook together with Father Henschen in the year 1660, notes among not a few other things pertaining to Pesaro the following: We visited (on the twenty-ninth day of December) the monastery of St. Clare, whose square chapel, beneath an elegant panelled ceiling, is clothed all round with paintings and hangings, and is adorned with three altars, elegantly painted as though they were of variegated marble. On either side of the greater altar there is a beautiful monument of plaster, having in the middle a painted little window, beneath it the likeness of a small porphyry tomb, and above, on this side the effigy of Bl. Seraphina, on that of Bl. Felix, who founded that convent, with votive offerings hanging round about. And when these little windows, on which some miracle of theirs was painted, had been unlocked, we saw through the gratings the body of each Blessed, in a silken garment of the Order, the face turned toward the altar, the hands becomingly composed, entire; and their Lives were promised us by the mother abbess. And she indeed stood by her promises, as we shall see in the § next following. As for the rest, the votive offerings which Papebroch here records had been mentioned before him by Gallucius in the praised Work, part 2, at the end of chapter 12, as also by Wadding in the Annals: Many votive gifts and tablets, says this author, are seen there for benefits received.

In Italian, Confaloniere*.

§ III. The veneration of illustrious persons towards the Blessed; by whom the Acts of Bl. Seraphina were written.

[ ] Persons eminent in brightness of birth and in dignity What we noted above concerning the sufficiently proven cult in the first paragraph might with better right be noted here, if the plan of our undertaking required only to show that there is some cult, and to pass over the remaining things which in any way contribute to the increase of its splendour. But since that plan is not confined within limits of this kind, and since it seems fair not to deprive the reader of the knowledge of things which shed no little lustre upon the Blessed or the Saints, I have judged that in this third § also certain things should be brought forward, from which it may be known with how great veneration and piety towards BB. Seraphina and Felix persons most illustrious in the brightness of their birth and the excellence of their dignities were affected; and from the same it will at the same time be gathered that the said veneration and cult did not remain within the bounds of the single city of Pesaro or of its territory, but penetrated also to other chief parts of Italy. Concerning the most illustrious Malatesta Balleoneus, prelate of the people of Pesaro, and Laurentius Campegius, governor of Urbino, we have spoken at numbers 10 and 11; concerning the others the often-praised Gallucius is again to be heard, whose words I render into Latin, some things nevertheless being omitted which would make the narrative longer without profit.

[24] princes and dukes That author begins the ninth and last chapter of the third part more or less thus: As regards devotion, we have said that the princes of this city

have always been most devoted to them (the Blessed). Among these the most serene Lady, the Lady Claudia de' Medici, archduchess of Austria, … during the time in which she was princess of Urbino and lady of Pesaro, never ceased to show herself particularly devoted towards them… The most serene Grand Duke of Etruria, Cosimo II, her own brother, … on his return from the journey to Loreto, where he had visited the sacred house, passing through Pesaro was received by the aforesaid Duchess with every display of honour and congratulation, and out of an affection of devotion wished not only to behold but also to reverence those blessed bodies; and to that end, with great delight of the whole city and with a singular proof of piety, he betook himself to the monastery.

[25] Cardinals and bishops The most eminent lord Cardinal Sacchetti, bishop of Fano, on the fourth day of October 1632, the feast of the seraphic father St. Francis, betook himself to Pesaro, and, with the most illustrious Mathei, vice-legate of the most eminent Barberini, and with all the household of both courts, and with a number of noblemen no less than of citizens who accompanied him, went to the monastery, was present there at Mass, and, when it was ended, the little windows being unlocked, contemplated these precious treasures with the utmost devotion, consolation of soul, and reverence. The most eminent lord Cardinal Colonna, setting out for his archbishopric of Bologna, when he had reached Pesaro on the seventh day of March 1635, could not restrain himself from going to venerate those sacred relics; and perhaps he had joined to his devotion a desire of seeing his kinswoman (Bl. Seraphina). In that very year, on the 2nd day of the same month, the most illustrious lord Cencius, bishop of Iesi, likewise hastened thither to venerate and to see them, the most illustrious lord Mathei, the vice-legate, being always present — which was no slight indication of his exceptional piety and devotion towards the Blessed.

[26] The bodies of the Blessed, adorned with marble mausoleums This very same thing was done by other eminent persons and great prelates, the recounting of whom would be too long and perhaps tedious; nevertheless I do not wish to pass over here without returning to the lady Vittoria Farnese and her consort Duke Guidobaldo, who out of an affection of burning devotion chose a burial-place there for themselves and for their daughters. These are they who, as we saw from Francesco Gonzaga at number 2, took care that the bodies of BB. Seraphina and Felix should be translated from the sacristy to either side of the choir, and laid up in marble mausoleums. The same is also related by Gallucius in chapter 5 of part 3, where he praises in the highest degree both these princes and the most eminent lord Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte, and the whole most illustrious families of the latter and of the former, for their exceptional and constant veneration and piety towards the Blessed — the proofs of which, he asserts, are the votive gifts and various ornaments with which they once adorned the said mausoleums. But in precisely what year these mausoleums were erected, or in what year the bodies of the Blessed were laid in them, I nowhere find.

[27] Nevertheless not a few reasons, sufficiently probable, persuade me adorned about the middle of the sixteenth century, to think that these things were not done before the middle of the sixteenth century. For Guidobaldo della Rovere, of whom the discourse here is, succeeded his father Francesco Maria della Rovere, duke of Urbino, about the year 1538, on the testimony of Vincenzo Cimarelli in chapter 2 of book 2 of the History of the people of Urbino; and, his first wife Giulia Varana, daughter of the duke of Camerino, having died, passing to a second marriage, as Moreri relates and the praised Cimarelli suggests, about the year 1547, he married the aforementioned Vittoria Farnese, niece of the Pontiff Paul III; and at length, according to the same writers, he yielded to fate in the year 1574. Francesco Sansovino, in the Work which he composed on the Origins of the illustrious families of Italy, set the death of Guidobaldo four years later. Receive, studious reader, his words rendered into Latin from the Italian tongue: He (Guidobaldo) died at Pesaro in 1578, on the twenty-ninth of September, and was buried in the monastery of the Body of Christ. It matters little to the present matter which of the two noted the year of his death more correctly; I should nevertheless prefer to adhere to Sansovino, a contemporary writer, inasmuch as he had finished his Work in the year 1582, as is clear from the dedicatory Epistle prefixed to the book; and therefore while Vittoria Farnese, the wife of Guidobaldo, was still living. For although it is unknown to us in what year she died, it is nevertheless established from Gallucius that she prolonged her life certainly down to the year 1598, when, having contracted severe pains from a fall, she is said to have been freed by the benefit of Bl. Seraphina, as we shall see when we come to the miracles.

[28] Finally, the praised Gallucius, concluding his narrative concerning the illustrious persons particularly devoted to these blessed Poor Clares, venerate them with singular piety. says that such is the veneration of the men of Pesaro of every state or condition towards them, and so universal, that they have been wont, by an antonomastic expression, to be called by the people of Pesaro the Blessed. Further, the studious reader doubtless observes that many, nay most, of the things hitherto brought forward on behalf of the cult of Bl. Seraphina pertain also to establishing the cult of Bl. Felix, whose Acts will come to be illustrated on the thirtieth day of this month; for here all things are so common to both that he who writes of the cult of the one is by a kind of necessity compelled to treat at the same time of that of the other. Now we proceed to other matters.

[29] We said at number 22 that the mother abbess of the Poor Clares of Pesaro, A manuscript compendium of the Life sent to us from Pesaro who in the year 1660 had promised Father Papebroch that she would see to it that the Lives of BB. Seraphina and Felix should be transmitted to us, faithfully stood by her promises. This she performed in the very next year, when she sent the said Lives to the most illustrious John Lucidus Palumbara, prelate of Pesaro, then residing at Rome; and this most obliging prelate, who by procuring other things also pertaining to our Work deserved exceedingly well of our studies, delivered them into the hands of Papebroch himself, as I gather from his manuscript diary, which he left us concerning his stay in the City. In the afternoon, he says on the twenty-fourth day of March 1661, we went to the most reverend bishop of Pesaro, who had had it signified to us that he had received the writings we desired, among which were the Lives of BB. Seraphina and Felix with the authentic attestation of the abbess. These two Manuscripts I have in my keeping.

[30] and Acts, published by Wadding and Gallucius As regards the Life of our Blessed, it is a compendium embracing almost all the deeds which you may find set down in other writers; but very few things concerning her miracles and posthumous glory, and for a fuller knowledge of these he who compiled the said compendium refers the reader to the praised Annals of the Minors, and to the Life written in Italian by Father Gallucius; but from what documents he himself drew his own material he does not disclose. They agree well enough, however, if you except a few points, with what Wadding inserted in his Annals concerning our Blessed out of older manuscript Legends, as he notes in the margin; nor do they differ much from the Life by the praised Gallucius, of which we have a double copy — one, another manuscript, communicated to us by the most illustrious Palumbara, but the other printed with the types of Ingolstadt and sent as a gift to our Elders by lord Salvator Salvatorius of Pesaro, doctor of both laws, likewise well deserving of our Work.

[31] agreeing in almost all things, Father Gallucius likewise does not adduce the documents from which he drew the chief deeds of our Blessed; it seems to me nevertheless most probable that he was by no means without them; for Wadding, who followed him in almost everything, bears this testimony concerning his book: Augustinus Gallucius … wrote exactly the Lives of both, of BB. Seraphina and Felix; if exactly, then assuredly in conformity with the manuscript Legends and the other older documents which Wadding himself professes to have had, and where these now lie hidden we have mentioned above to be unknown to us. Nevertheless it has seemed good not to reprint the Life of our Blessed as compiled by the labour either of Wadding or of Gallucius; for the former stands available in not a few libraries of the learned, and can easily be consulted; while the latter has embraced that manner of writing which savours of the ascetic orator rather than of the historian. Into his narrative he not seldom mixes exhortations, descriptions of vices and virtues, and not only texts of sacred Scripture and of the fathers, but also good long sentences of pagan writers, and other rhetorical ornaments of that kind.

[32] it is to be published here. Whence, as I have already warned, I shall readily believe that he was not without the older instruments, and that from them he took the deeds which he narrates faithfully and exactly, so far as the substance of the matters goes; but very many of the circumstances I judge to be the offspring of his own wit, aiming thus to rouse the minds of the nuns, for whom he writes above all, to imitate the footsteps of the Blessed; and this he himself, at page 41, in the epistle to the reader, sufficiently plainly suggests. This consideration, then, has moved me to refrain from reprinting him, and to commit to the press the Compendious Life of our Blessed, of which mention was made at number 30; the things in it which, by reason of its brevity, are the more obscure I shall supply in the following § and in the Annotations out of the praised writers. But the miracles, both those proper to Bl. Seraphina and those common to her and to Bl. Felix, which the author of the Compendium does not have, I shall append, translated into Latin from the said Italian Work of Gallucius, part 2, chapter 13, and part 3, chapter 1. Those miracles, moreover, are quite recent, so that, if perhaps you except the first, to which no year is added, there is none which occurred before the sixteenth century.

§ IV. The Blessed's illustrious parents, her native place, birth, marriage, and withdrawal into the monastery.

[ ] [The Blessed's father, Guido Antonio, count of Montefeltro and Urbino; her mother, Catharine Colonna.] Bl. Seraphina had for her father Guido, or Guido Antonio — there are those who write Guidantonio — count of Montefeltro and Urbino, and lord of Gubbio, whose bravery in war, prudence in the conduct of affairs, and other remarkable virtues have been excellently commended in their writings by Sansovino in the Work mentioned above, page 213 verso; Leander Alberti in the Description of Italy; Guarnerius Bernius in the Chronicle of Gubbio, which stands in Muratori, volume 21 of the Writers of Italian affairs, col. 924; and not a few others. Gallucius, moreover, praises him most of all for the piety and religion by which he far surpassed the other endowments of his soul. He had married, in his first marriage, in the year 1397, Ringarda, daughter of Galeotto Malatesta; and when after some years death had taken her from him, no offspring, at least male, being left, he entered upon a second marriage in the year 1421 with Catharine Colonna, niece by his brother of Martin V, at that time Supreme Pontiff: so, more or less, the authors just cited.

[34] That our Blessed was born to him of this most choice wife is asserted by Wadding and by the author of our manuscript Compendium; Although concerning the rest of Guido Antonio's offspring as also by Gallucius, but he assigns to them, besides Seraphina, a twofold offspring still — namely Frederick, afterwards duke of Urbino, and a daughter Agnesina, who while young embraced the religious state. Nevertheless, if he wished the whole offspring of this most illustrious marriage to be set down here, he did not perform that accurately enough. For according to the authors nearer to those times — such as Guarnerius Bernius doubtless was, who dedicated the mentioned Chronicle to this same Frederick, then his prince — it is established that there was born to Guido Antonio of that same wife (in the year, says Sansovino,

1424) a son by the name of Oddo Antonio; and he indeed succeeded his father as heir when he died, and governed his state for about two years. Hear Guarnerius, who at col. 981 addresses Frederick thus: On the twentieth day of February of the said year (1442) there died the most illustrious lord count Guido, your father, leaving Oddo Antonio, lord count, duke of Urbino after him; and at col. [ ]: In the year 1444, on the twenty-second day of July, there died at Urbino Oddo Antonius, duke of Urbino, and lord Frederick his brother … was without any opposition proclaimed lord of Urbino by all the orders of the people.

[35] Add to these that it is, to say the least, doubtful the opinion of writers varies; whether Frederick himself had Guido and Catharine for his parents; for Leander Alberti writes thus concerning him: He (Guido) had by his wife, of the noble Colonna stock, one son only; but already before that he had begun so vehemently to love Frederick, the son of Bernardino Ubaldini, on account of his remarkable disposition and the highest endowments of soul, that he had him brought up as though he were his own son. Others say that Guido, when he saw that no hope remained of obtaining an heir, adopted Frederick. But Sansovino says that he ordained by testament that, if Oddo Antonio should fail, Frederick should obtain the dominions of Urbino and of the other places — as in fact happened. And thus it is easily understood in what sense Guido Antonio was called the father, and Oddo the brother, of Frederick by Bernius. More on this matter is discussed by Sansovino, cited in the last place, whom the curious reader may consult. He will nevertheless find in him, or in the praised Leander and Bernius, no mention of our Seraphina or of her sister Agnesina. The cause of this silence I do not grasp, unless perhaps it be that the knowledge of the two, who died in a monastery, did not reach those writers.

[36] concerning our Blessed, however, from a document For besides that Wadding and the author of the manuscript Compendium, as I had just said, expressly assert that Seraphina was the daughter of Guido Antonio and of Catharine Colonna, the praised Gallucius proves this, at least concerning her father, from a twofold very ancient instrument, which he appends to the Acts of our Blessed. The first of these contains the acts of a purchase of certain goods made by the Poor Clares of Pesaro for their monastery, and begins thus. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. In the year one thousand four hundred and seventy from the nativity of the same Lord, in the third Indiction, in the time of the most holy Father in Christ, our Lord Paul II by divine providence Pope, on the fifth day of the month of October, etc. Then the names of the witnesses are set out, and other things not pertaining to the matter here; and at length all the nuns, and among them Seraphina, with the name of her father added, are recounted in order. Receive again the words: In which chapter and assembly, and in the said chapter-house, there were present, namely: I. The venerable lady sister Paulina, daughter of John de Loppis of Pesaro, Abbess of the Monastery. II. Sister Margarita, daughter of John of Milan, Vicaress. III. Lady sister Seraphina, daughter of the late illustrious lord Guido Antonio, once count of Urbino. IV. Sister Francisca of Fano, etc. The whole instrument closes with this formula: And I, Sepulcrus, son of the late Peter of Borgo San Sepolcro, citizen and inhabitant of Pesaro, notary public by Imperial authority, was present at all and each of the aforesaid things, and, being requested to write them, wrote and published them, and affixed my sign.

[37] twofold The other instrument was drawn up by the notary Sepulcrus on the 2nd day of October of the next following year, in the fourth Indiction, under the Pontiff Sixtus IV. By this, moreover, Alexander Sforza grants to Seraphina, formerly his wife, the faculty of treating, in her own name or in that of the monastery, with Frederick, count of Urbino, concerning her dowry and other goods owed to Alexander by reason of the marriage, but to Seraphina by hereditary right: as is gathered from the fragment of it which I subjoin. The most illustrious prince and lord Alexander Sforza, count of Cotignola, lord of Pesaro, and grand constable of the kingdom of Sicily, in every better mode, way, right, and form by which more and better it could and can be done by law, of certain knowledge, and not through any error of law or of fact, gave leave, mandate, and free power to the venerable sister Seraphina, born of the late most illustrious lord Guido Antonio, count of Montefeltro, and to any procurators of hers whatsoever, absent as though present, and to me Sepulcrus, the undersigned notary, stipulating and receiving on behalf of the aforesaid sister Seraphina and her procurators, and of any others whomsoever whose interest it is or might be — to seek all and singular goods, both paternal and maternal; and to seek and exact every sum for the dowries owed to her, or to the aforesaid illustrious lord Alexander on behalf of the same sister Seraphina, whether from the paternal, maternal, and fraternal succession, or from the succession of her sister, the late lady Agnesina, or from any other cause whatsoever, from the illustrious lord, the lord Frederick, count of Montefeltro and of Durante, etc.

[38] After some things of the same tenor, he continues in this manner: it is established with certainty. With full and free power and administration, general and special, of doing each of the things which the aforesaid illustrious lord Alexander could do if he were present; to all and singular of which things, to be transacted by the said venerable sister Seraphina, or by her procurators, as well in her own name as in the name of the monastery, convent, and church in which she dwells, with the aforesaid illustrious lord count of Urbino, or with his procurator and mandatary, he gave from now, as from then, his free consent, and approved and confirmed all and singular of them; giving also every kind of free power and assent to the same sister Seraphina to cede under any title whatsoever, and to transfer to the aforesaid illustrious count, all and singular the rights belonging to her and to the aforesaid lord Alexander jointly and severally from the aforesaid causes and grounds, etc. Such a faculty, moreover, as appears from the whole context, Seraphina obtained from her former husband so that she might the more securely serve God, and might cut off the root of every annoyance which might in the future be created for Frederick — her brother at least by adoption — either by Alexander himself or by his heirs. However the matter may stand, at least the things which we have argued concerning the Blessed's stock and family follow, with no obscurity, from the words of the instrument brought forward.

[39] Wadding in the Annals of the Minors, the author of the compendious Life, She was born at Urbino and Gallucius designate as the native place of our Blessed the city of Urbino, most celebrated in Italy within the Ecclesiastical State, an archiepiscopal city and the metropolis of the duchy of the same name; the year of her birth they do not note; nor is there elsewhere any means by which we may determine it strictly; there is a means of determining it more broadly. For the praised biographers write that she was bereft of her parents while still of tender age, and was carried to Rome into the house of her Colonna kinsmen, and was brought up there until she was conducted to Pesaro for the celebration of her marriage with Alexander Sforza. Whence, if by "tender age" you understand seven years, she came into the light about the year 1434; since her mother Catharine Colonna ceased to live, on Sansovino's testimony, on the ninth of October of the year 1438, and her father Guido Antonio in the year 1442, on the twentieth day of February according to Guarnerius Bernius, whose words we gave at number 34, and to whom Sansovino also assents; Gallucius, however, says that death came upon Guido Antonio in the year 1443, on the twenty-first day of February. For my part in this matter I should prefer to adhere to Guarnerius, a contemporary writer.

[40] Nor can the birth of our Blessed be placed much later, more probably about the year 1434. as may be gathered from this, that, if Gallucius notes rightly, she set out from Rome to Pesaro for the sake of her marriage in the year 1448, when she had probably reached the thirteenth or fourteenth year of her age. If, however, it should please anyone to place her birth earlier, I for my part shall not object; but this too should be done moderately, lest the meaning of the words "of tender age" be stretched too far — the age at which, after the death of her parents, that is certainly not before the year 1442, she is said to have been conducted to Rome, and there to have remained down to the year 1448. Wadding, Gallucius, and the author of the manuscript Compendium here note that that stay of our Blessed from her tender years in the City among her Colonna kinsmen gave occasion for the error of many, who supposed that she was born of a Colonna father and in the city of Rome itself; and indeed by few is Seraphina called Feltria or of Montefeltro, while by most she is distinguished by the surname Colonna. The words of some we gave in the first §; to these I join one, Petrus Tossinianus, who in addition calls her a Roman, in book 1 of the Histories of the Seraphic religious order: Bl. Seraphina, he says, a Colonna, a Roman, illustrious at Pesaro in the monastery of the Body of Christ. The first error, concerning the Colonna father, presently vanishes from the instruments of which we gave fragments at number 37 and following. But that the second error, concerning her native place, flowed from the first, it is easy to gather; and accordingly I see nothing to hinder us from believing that she was born at Urbino, since Wadding and the other writers named in the first place affirm it so unhesitatingly.

[41] Her marriage with Alexander Sforza, lord of Pesaro Besides these things, nothing occurs to be observed concerning the Blessed's deeds down to the time of her marriage; concerning which Wadding writes thus: Being absent, she was betrothed to Alexander Sforza, count of Cotignola, lord of Pesaro, grand constable of the kingdom of Sicily, who by his first wife Constantia Varana, daughter of Gentile, prince of Camerino, had two sons surviving, Galeazzo and Constantius. Things agreeing with these the author of the manuscript Compendium has; as also Gallucius, who in part 2, chapter 2, describing the same marriage in a lengthier discourse, asserts that it was entered upon in the year 1448, and that he has this from the records extant at Pesaro. Alexander had lost his former wife in the immediately preceding year, as Laurentius Bonincontrius relates, a contemporary author, whose Annals Muratori published in volume 21 of the Writers of Italian affairs: In the same year (1447, says the praised Bonincontrius) Constantinus Sforza is born of his father Alexander and Constantia of Verona his consort, on the fifth day of July about sunset, at Pesaro. His mother, thirteen days later in the same month, died of that childbirth.

That the earlier years of Seraphina's marriage with Alexander flowed happily enough I gather from the biographers, whose narrative I here express in summary. Alexander, about to set out for the war, placed Seraphina with supreme authority over affairs not only domestic and private but also external and public; for he greatly looked up to his Wife's prudence and singular endowments of soul, above all her piety towards God and her love of justice, and he trusted that, with her governing, everything at Pesaro would be transacted securely and quietly; nor did his opinion deceive him, for he afterwards experienced with how great love the subjects attended their Lady, and with how great affection Galeazzo and Constantius, his sons and her stepsons, loved her no otherwise than their own mother. That government she exercised most prudently — the words are those of the often-named Compendiator — from the year 1456 down to the year 1462. The same Wadding asserts.

[43] But, Alexander being taken with love of another woman For my part I do not well perceive in what sense they wished this to be understood. That for so long, in her husband's absence, she governed alone? Neither the words themselves nor the whole context of the account carry

on their face. But assuredly they thus conflict with themselves: for in the first place the praised Wadding, whom Gallucius had preceded in part 2, chapter 5, expressly affirms that Alexander, having returned from the war to Pesaro and being taken with love of a certain woman whose name was Pacifica, began to loathe Seraphina his lawful wife, to treat her in unworthy ways, and to plot against her life; and when he had accomplished nothing either by poison or by the noose with which he had attempted to strangle her, at last, having dragged her by the hair and beaten her with many blows, he cast her out of the house, and compelled her to withdraw into the monastery of the Poor Clares in the year 1460. Receive his words: In the year 1460, the twelfth of her unhappy marriage (that is, from the year 1448), she entered the cloister of the monastery of the Body of Christ. These things assuredly cannot stand together: Seraphina governed, her husband being absent, down to the year 1462, and, the same Seraphina, driven by many injuries from her husband after he had returned home, entered the monastery in the year 1460.

[44] Nor can that difficulty be resolved by saying that perhaps in the same year 1460, in the year 1460 he thrusts her into the monastery. the dissensions between the spouses having been settled, the Blessed returned home from the monastery, resumed the government, and prolonged it to the year 1462, in which Alexander, again estranged from his wife, forced her to return to the monastery. For besides that no mention of this is anywhere made, nor does it appear in any way probable that this was done, Wadding himself again stands in the way, our compendiator stands in the way, and with these Gallucius and others, whose opinion is unanimous — that the Blessed flew away to the world above in the year 1478, after eighteen years most holily spent in religion, which years cannot be found unless she remained constantly in the monastery from the year 1460. I know indeed that she did not immediately upon her entrance into the monastery embrace the regular life, but there for some time — the words are those of Francesco Gonzaga, praised at number 2 — lived in secular habit, most decent nevertheless. But who would believe that to her, while she was in the monastery for two years, the supreme authority of administering the city and all its affairs was left by her raging husband? Especially since Wadding himself, where he related her going to the monastery, adds that three guards were placed at its doors, who were to prevent Seraphina's return, any conversation with those who came, and letters from anyone. And let it suffice to have discussed these things, which were less clear; the other matters which might here be added — for instance, how perfectly and piously our Blessed lived in the monastery, with how great prudence and for how long she governed it as abbess, how holily and in what year she met her death, and things like these — the reader will be able to learn from the compendium of the Life and the annotations appended to it.

COMPENDIUM OF THE LIFE

by an anonymous author,

transmitted to us from the monastery of the Body of the Lord of the Poor Clares of Pesaro.

Seraphina, widow and abbess, at Pesaro in the March of Ancona (B.)

By an Anonymous author.

The Blessed's birth and marriage. Seraphina sprang from a most illustrious birth at Urbino, for she was the daughter of Guido Antonio, count of Montefeltro ^a, and of Catharine Colonna, niece by his brother of Martin ^b the Fifth. At baptism she was named Sueva by her parents. Bereft of her parents while still of tender age, she was carried to Rome into the house of the Colonna, and was brought up there. From this upbringing those took occasion for their error who assert that Seraphina was born at Rome of the Colonna family. Grown up, she was joined in marriage to Alexander Sforza ^c, lord of Pesaro, who by his first wife Constantia Varana, daughter of the prince of Camerino, had two sons surviving, Galeazzo and Constantius, whom Sueva loved as though born of herself.

[2] She is compelled by her husband to enter the monastery, Afterwards Alexander, about to depart for Milan in order to bring aid to Francesco Sforza ^d, his own brother, duke of Milan, committed to Sueva the sceptre of the whole government, which she exercised most prudently from the year 1456 down to the year 1462 ^e. Alexander, returned from war, fell into the war of love; and, taken with love of a certain woman of Pesaro named Pacifica, he began to despise Sueva, as one who was not of tall stature but small, nor of comely face — rendering evil for good. As the fires of love towards Pacifica grew in Alexander, his hatred towards Sueva increased. Whence the prince, no longer able to withstand the onsets of the shameless woman, broke out into these excesses: that he twice tried in vain to destroy Sueva by poison ^f, once to strangle her ^g, and at last, having dragged her by the hair into the outer hall, the public lodging of the servants, and loaded her with blows, in a fury bade her leave the house and pass over to the company of the Poor Clares. Which she also humbly carried out ^h.

[3] and she is burdened with infamy. Her Roman kinsmen cry out against these outrages. Alexander, to defend himself honourably, sets forth that he did this for honour's sake, because he found her an adulteress, and promises a confession of the offence from her own mouth. The kinsmen go ⁱ together with Alexander to the monastery, and with them a notary, that he may take down the calumny in juridical form and iniquitously make it truth. They call Sueva to the grate. Alexander questions his wife about the crime, and the place and time at which it was perpetrated. Sueva does not answer ^k, and by the notary her silence is set down for a confession. The prince departs a victor; but the kinsmen depart conquered by grief.

[4] Christ consoles her in her grief Sueva bends her knees before the image of the Crucified, weeps bitterly, and grieves that in so great a calumny she has been forsaken by him without help. Christ from the cross ^l speaks kindly to her, and bids her bear those light burdens with an even mind for the love of him who innocently endured blows and insulting words and calumnies, together with a most shameful death: with this food of consolation she was refreshed. The notary was punished by divine power, whose hand, which had framed the calumny on paper, was subjected to the bites of a little ass, which never left off biting until the notary confessed that this was for the guilt of his offence ^m.

[5] She puts on the habit of the Poor Clares. Alexander pursues his shameless loves ⁿ; Sueva is called by God to the religious life ^o; hence, the prince's consent being obtained (for it is a fable that Alexander married Pacifica, since she was the wife of a certain physician, and in this all the writers err, as is clear from the documents [p] which are preserved with lord John Baptist de Almericis, a nobleman of Pesaro), she put on the habit of the Poor Clares, and was called Seraphina. A little afterwards Alexander began to weary of the woman's company, and to afflict Pacifica with blows and hard words, whence she, shortly coming to herself [q], departed this life two years later.

[6] Her husband repents of the injury done her. The prince meanwhile, touched with grief of heart, turns to better things, and he who before was a ravening wolf is thereupon turned into a lamb. He loves his wife, now called to the cloister, exercises himself in pious works, confers many benefits upon the monastery, and after all these things piously done, in the ninth year of his conversion, on the third day of April 1473, he yielded to fate and left his son Constantius heir of the principality. Seraphina, taking thought for the soul of her beloved husband, offered many suffrages; afterwards she gave herself wholly to the duties of piety, and cultivated her soul with many virtues.

[7] She was distinguished for humility, she shone forth in charity towards the sick, Adorned with every kind of virtue she is elected abbess, and dies holily. she made provision for the poor. She performed the mean tasks of the monastery, afflicted her body with wonderful penance, and was assiduous in prayer. By the votes of all, because she was most pleasing to all, she is elected Abbess after thirteen years of monastic life, and so ruled that house that she not only restored it materially, but strengthened it with a wonderful regular observance [r]. At length, adorned with such great merits and virtues, after eighteen years most holily spent in religion, she fell asleep in the Lord, and merited to be born in heaven on that day on which the Blessed Virgin was born on earth [s], in the year 1478.

[8] For three days she lay unburied, during which time she constantly gave forth a most sweet odour, Her body smells sweetly and is preserved incorrupt. and after many years, being exhumed and found whole in a rotted coffin, she began to shine with manifest miracles, which are read in full in the Annals of the Minors, volume 7, at the year 1478, and in Father Gallutius in the Life of Bl. Seraphina written in Italian, chapter 13. Her body is today preserved whole [t] in a marble chest to the right of the high altar, and is there honoured with pious veneration. He who desires more, let him consult the Annals in the place cited, where fine things are noted [u].

ANNOTATIONS.

the author.

p. By this testimony are confirmed the things which I observed at letter [n].

q. Gallucius and Wadding write that, after performing worthy penance for her fault, she died piously.

r. Concerning our Blessed's virtues, concerning the benefits conferred upon the monastery both by her and by Alexander, and concerning the other things here enumerated, there is much in Gallucius, part 2, chapters 11 and 12; these I have not judged should be transferred hither, on account of what I said in the Commentary at number 32.

s. Wadding expresses the day of her death thus: She merited to be born in heaven on that day on which God deigned to be born on earth of the blessed Virgin. But since the writers praised in the Commentary at number 1 and following constantly assign the 8th of September, I should readily believe that this error slipped from Wadding as he transposed the phrase of the older authors without sufficient attention; and that from this it also came about that Hueber, following Wadding, announced Bl. Seraphina on the 25th day of December.

t. See the Commentary, numbers 21 and 22.

u. At the foot of the manuscript the mother abbess affixed her seal, and with her own hand added the following testimony, which I render from Italian into Latin: I, sister Clelia Thieni, at present abbess of the monastery of the Body of the Lord, assert that whatever is here written concerning our Blessed is true and solid. Since these things are said of all universally, they afford a foundation for prudently judging, at least, that the compendium of the Life, although composed not long before it was sent to us, was nevertheless drawn and put together out of ancient and authentic records; and this becomes the more probable to me from this: first, that the author of the Compendium at number 8, for knowledge of those things which are more recent — for instance, miracles and the like — refers the reader to Wadding and Gallucius. Secondly, that at number 5, where he departs from the opinion of the other writers as to the alleged marriage of Alexander with Pacifica, he presently alleges an instrument by which he makes that error manifest.

MIRACLES

Taken from the Italian book of Father Augustinus Gallucius, and rendered into Latin.

Seraphina, widow and abbess, at Pesaro in the March of Ancona (B.)

By Fr. Augustinus Gallucius.

[The Blessed appears to a noble kinswoman, and, striking her with a blow, gravely rebukes her for an unjust judgment.] As God showed himself the guardian and protector of the Blessed while she lived, so after her death he showed himself her defender and patron. This he did especially when two noble women, kinswomen of hers, passing through Pesaro on a journey, had visited the monastery of the Body of Christ, one of whom, when the nuns were discoursing of the prudence, patience, and holiness of the Servant of God, said: It seems to me that Sueva proceeded rightly in all things, except in that she endured the injury branded upon her reputation by her husband, which she ought to have avenged. For however innocent she may have been, not all will judge her to have been such. Whence through her this mark of infamy has been left to her family, and there will always remain talk about it. When both those noble ladies had returned to their lodging, on the following night Bl. Seraphina appeared to her who had censured her, and, having inflicted upon her a heavy blow, said: He who seeks honours in this world does not obtain paradise. Perhaps I should not now be enjoying eternal blessedness if I had made my innocence known, and had proved my husband to be a liar; and having said this she disappeared. This lady, having risen very early, returned to the monastery, and asked the abbess to bid all the nuns assemble in that place where the body of the Blessed is kept in its case; and when this was done, she tied a rope about her neck, and casting herself upon her knees before her, said: I condemn my very self, blessed and glorious sister Seraphina, in that I said yesterday that it had not been rightly done by thee, in that thou didst not avenge against thy husband the injury done to thy honour. I take back what I said, and I pray thee to pardon me. She afterwards told others the thing as it had happened to her; and they were thereby affected with immense consolation, magnifying and praising the Lord, because in this way he had not only confirmed the integrity of his Servant, but had also particularly taught that the forgiveness of injuries and offences is most pleasing to him.

[2] A finger rotting and shortly to be amputated, In the year 1580 a piece of meat was sent to the said monastery in alms, the bone of which penetrated between the nail and the flesh of the finger of the nun who had to divide it into portions, with such pain and danger that, after the labour of many days, the physicians, no other remedy being found, decided that it must be cut off. On hearing this she implored the help of Bl. Seraphina, and made a vow that she would offer her a silver finger if she were healed; then she took some of the dust which lay upon her body, applied it to the afflicted finger, and, invoking her help, was suddenly healed, to the wonder of all.

[3] Likewise for lord Nicholas Saianus of Pesaro, the father of the said nun, likewise a shattered leg are suddenly healed: one leg had been so shattered by a blow, when he had struck it against a marble stone, that the physicians judged it must be amputated. But he, seeing himself set in so great a calamity, with the help of his daughter, now freed from her ailment, fled with his whole heart to Bl. Seraphina; and by that same dust which she had used, and which still clung to her wound, he presently found himself sound, to the astonishment of the physicians, the surgeons, and all who had known his ailment; nor did he omit to give thanks to God and to his Preserver.

[4] In the year 1595 another Nun of the said monastery was afflicted, from an ailing hand, with pain so immoderate of a nun's most grievously afflicted hand, that she suffered convulsions. When she had commended herself to the Blessed, and had applied a little of the above-mentioned dust, she was perfectly healed, and gave thanks to the divine goodness, and to her through whom she had obtained soundness.

[5] In the year 1598 the most serene lady Vittoria Farnese ^b, an illustrious matron of pain in the hip, duchess of Urbino, staying in the palace at Pesaro, incautiously fell in her chamber, and that so unhappily that, oppressed with a most grievous torment of the hip, there seemed to remain no remedy to relieve her, nor was any rest granted to ease it. Wherefore, invoking with confidence the help of Bl. Seraphina, to whom she was and always had been most devoted, she was presently found worthy to obtain the favour.

[6] A certain lady named Liberata, a Hebrew by origin, and another nun of a grave temptation, had been converted to the Christian faith from the fifth year of her age, and, by the care of the most illustrious Simonetta ^c, at that time bishop of Pesaro, was brought up in the aforesaid monastery. She, being now of riper age, took the habit of the seraphic Religious Order, and lived in it piously and devoutly. But the infernal

enemy, envying her virtues and plotting against her salvation, sent into her mind a most shameful thought, and occupied her with it so persistently that she could not be freed from it, however much violence she did to herself or diligence she employed; this happened in the year 1599. It came about on a certain night, about the fourth or fifth hour, that, urged on by her devotion towards the Blessed and by God's inspiration, she betook herself to the church and prostrated herself upon her knees before the case in which her sacred body was enclosed; and while she was praying that by her merits she might be freed from this temptation, she fell into a very light sleep, during which time it seemed to her that the case was opened, and that Bl. Seraphina, putting forth her arm, touched her, saying: Why dost thou doubt? Awaking, she felt herself free, nor did she thereafter ever experience any trouble; to this she publicly testified, giving thanks to God and to his Servant.

[7] In the same year 1599 a growth of flesh formed on the throat of a nun of the same monastery, and a third is freed from the danger of a growth of flesh in the throat. so that she could swallow nothing without danger of suffocation, and the said flesh grew continually, with slight hope of recovery. Wherefore she, turning to St. Blaise and blessed Seraphina, and commending herself to their merits, obtained health, and gave thanks to the Lord.

ANNOTATIONS.

OTHER MIRACLES, COMMON

to Bl. Seraphina with Bl. Felix Meda, translated into Latin from the same Gallucius.

Seraphina, widow and abbess, at Pesaro in the March of Ancona (B.)

By Fr. Augustinus Gallucius.

Appearing with St. Terentius, the Blessed protect Pesaro against enemies, At the time when ^a Francesco Maria, duke of Urbino, the first of that name, had been driven from his possession, there were grievous and tumultuous wars in all the cities of the duchy. At Pesaro in particular continual watches were kept, not only by soldiers and foreign captains, but also by the inhabitants, the citizens, and by the noblemen themselves. Some of these on a certain night, keeping a watch greater than usual because a danger heavier than ordinary was threatening, and being intent upon their duty, saw two nuns of St. Clare, with an unknown soldier, walking about the walls of the city after the manner of sentinels; at which they wondered exceedingly. And since they believed them to be from the monastery of the Body of Christ, they went thither very early in the morning, and, having bidden the mother abbess be called, asked her why (contrary to their profession) she had permitted her sisters to go out. The abbess was astounded at this question, and, knowing that none of the nuns had set foot outside, or indeed could have done so, wished testimony of this matter to be given by her Officials and by all the nuns. From which, as also from the effect that then followed for their own security, it was evidently ascertained that the soldier had been St. Terentius ^b, martyr, patron of the city; and that the two nuns had been the blessed Felix and Seraphina, the most diligent guardians and protectresses of the people dear to them.

[2] they free a matron from the straits of childbirth, In the year 1555 the lady Maria Hondedea had been brought almost to her last extremity by the straits of childbirth; but, commending herself from her heart to the divine majesty, to the most holy Virgin, and to these two Blessed, she merited to obtain the favour through their intercession. They appeared to her in the morning about dawn, and Bl. Seraphina said to her: Maria, God has heard thy prayers. Be assured that within three days thou shalt bear male offspring, and shalt recover thy health. All these things so came about, to the highest consolation of the dying woman and of all her household; wherefore all with one accord rendered thanks to the Lord, to his glorious Mother, and to the Blessed.

[3] In the year 1587 in the same city of Pesaro a nobleman named Julius Mancinus, labouring under a troublesome infirmity for which no remedy was found, from time to time invoked the demon out of desperation and impatience. they bring back a despairing man to confidence But because he had always been, and even then was, most devoted towards the Blessed, at such a time they appeared to him and, exhorting him to patience and rousing him to receive all calamities from the divine hand, added, for his greater consolation: We are the sisters Felix and Seraphina, devoted to thee; and, that he might give credit to their words, they asked him to have it signified to two nuns of their monastery, Deodata and Magdalena, that within a short time certain troubles would come upon them; and that accordingly they should prepare themselves for constancy and for God's good pleasure. Having said which, they disappeared. The nobleman at that same instant of time felt true contrition poured into him, and, returning to amendment, gave thanks to the Lord for the benefit conferred upon him through the intercession of his Servants, whereby he had been snatched from the hands of the enemy. He recovered, and survived a long time, a good Christian and most devoted towards his Deliverers.

[4] But before he was restored to health, namely on the same day and they foretell to two nuns the tribulations hanging over them, on which he had rejoiced in that vision, he bade the nuns' confessor be called to his bed; to him he set forth in order whatever had befallen him, and asked that he would inform the two sisters of the things which had been foretold him by the two Blessed. The confessor presently performed what had been enjoined upon him; and no long time afterwards mother sister Magdalena was afflicted with the greatest tribulations, which, mindful of the prediction, she bore patiently; but mother sister Deodata fell into a grave illness, in which, perfectly acquiescing in the divine will, and continually giving thanks to the Blessed, who had taken care that a matter of such moment should be foretold to her, she fell asleep in the Lord.

[5] In the year 1598 a poor mason, who had often bestowed his labour upon the monastery, they snatch a man from present danger of death, going through the city on business of his craft, fell to the ground, and was so suddenly crushed by a heavily laden cart that all thought him dead. But he, having straightway implored the help of the Blessed, came off unharmed to such a degree that, as soon as the cart had passed over him, he rose of his own accord to his feet, gave many thanks to God and to his Handmaids, and pursued his way.

[6] In the same year, when new cases were being made of wood for laying up the venerable bodies of the Blessed, another from a pain in the head one of the carpenter's servants, on account of a continual pain in the head by which he was not a little tormented, felt himself unequal to going there to work; he went, nevertheless, kindled by his devotion, and, girding himself to the work, implored their help, and promised them in alms half the price of his labour; which said, he found himself free from pain, and fulfilled what he had promised.

[7] Many are the miracles which God has worked through the merits of his Servants; and they free Father Gallucius himself from a two years' fever. wherefore the city of Pesaro deservedly glories in such precious gems. Let it be allowed to me also here to bear testimony concerning myself. In the year 1613, in the month of July, returning from Mantua into the March, at Rimini ^c — whither I had gone to greet Father Sant' Agata, then commissary of the Reformed Observance of the Minors in the province of Bologna, now Vicar General of the whole Observance — (this happened when I was secretary to Father Rotundus in the province of St. Anthony) I was seized by a fever, which clung to me for a little less than two years with so great a failure of my strength that I was believed to have fallen into consumption. When a dwelling had been assigned to me at Pesaro, and there was occasion for writing certain things pertaining to the Blessed, I commended myself to their intercession with God, and a little afterwards obtained perfect health. Wherefore, as I profess myself exceedingly bound to them, so I neither cease, nor shall I hereafter cease, to reverence them with a particular affection.

ANNOTATIONS.

APPENDIX.

Seraphina, widow and abbess, at Pesaro in the March of Ancona (B.)

BY J. P.

[ ] Captive among the Moors, by the patronage of the Blessed, Besides the benefits brought forward above, Father Gallucius relates two others obtained by the patronage of the same Blessed: but in a style so exceedingly prolix that I have judged it superfluous to translate them. For where he narrates the first, he mixes in so many things in no way pertaining to the present matter that he fills up two whole chapters with them tis; wherefore, the useless parts being cut away, receive the rest contracted into a summary. Philip Terzi, a nobleman of Pesaro, had formerly, by the care of the dukes of Urbino and of Francesco Maria del Monte, Cardinal of the holy Roman Church, bestowed labour and industry upon the building and adorning of the mausoleums mausolies of BB. Felix and Seraphina. Consult the Commentary, number 26. But afterwards, about the year 1578, having followed the standards of Sebastian, king of Portugal, against the African Moors, and having received a wound in battle, he was captured and sold to the Jews.

[2] he escapes by flight. At length, the price for his liberty having been paid, he was preparing for his return into Portugal; but ai a second time he fell into the hands of the Moors, and, being delivered to close custody, seemed to be destitute of all hope of ever recovering his liberty. And so with two slaves he secretly planned flight; but when the day appointed for flight had dawned, he began to be wretchedly distressed, the love of liberty urging him on the one hand, and on the other a certain and bloody death deterring him should the matter turn out badly. As he was thus agitated, BB. Seraphina and Felix appeared and said: Accomplish what thou hadst conceived in thy mind; now at last thou shalt receive the reward of the benefit formerly rendered to the monastery of Pesaro. Encouraged by these words, he committed himself with his companions to flight, and, having happily overcome several dangers, reached Portugal. The letter in which he himself set forth the whole course of the matter to the abbess and nuns of Pesaro stands in Gallucius, whom the curious reader may consult.

[3] Another, gravely wounded, is suddenly healed. In the year 1630, on the vigil of SS. Peter and Paul, the several times mentioned Father Sant' Agata had laboured energetically in adorning the church of the Poor Clares of Pesaro, and in arranging the rest for the solemnity of the following day, on which, as we said in the Commentary at number 13, the bodies of BB. Felix and Seraphina were to be exposed to public veneration. But as he was returning to his monastery, when he tried to close the doors of the window, weighing about forty pounds, they were suddenly torn from their posts and inflicted a huge wound, from which, of blood,

he lost a great quantity. A surgeon was presently summoned, and after he had inspected the wound and applied a remedy, he ordered him to look to himself; for it would come about that a fever would set in. But he, commending himself to God and to the Blessed Seraphina and Felix, went on the following day to the church of the nuns, abstained from no labor, celebrated the holy sacrifice of the Mass, heard confessions, distributed the most holy Eucharist to the devout people, and, when the solemnity was ended, found himself entirely healed.