Florentius

ON ST. FLORENTIUS, PRIEST AND CONFESSOR,

AT MOUNT GLONNA IN GAUL

About the beginning of the V century.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Florentius, priest and Confessor, on Mount Glonna in Gaul (S.)

BHL Number: 3051

BY J. P.

§ I. The place of his death, his memory in the Calendars; his Acts.

[ ] Mount Glonna, to others Gloma and

Glomna, is a place, as we read

in the History of the monastery of St. Florentius

of Saumur, to be often mentioned below,

in Martène,

volume 5 of the Amplissima Collectio,

column 1084, The description of the place, in the farthest parts of Aquitaine, set

not very far from the bank of the Loire; in which place

the most blessed confessor of God Florentius,

serving God for a long

time, and consummating a happy life with a happier

end, most happily passed to Christ.

That place is said to be situated in the farthest parts of Aquitaine,

because this kingdom once extended itself

as far as the Loire, and therefore embraced Mount

Glonna. For a similar reason the place of St. Florentius's death

is placed by others in the district of Poitiers,

because, namely, the province of Poitiers, once a great part

of the kingdom of Aquitaine, likewise had the Loire for its boundary

in the same tract, and comprised Mount Glonna

and other places, at this day belonging

to the duchy of Anjou. And so, speaking

according to the present-day division of dominions, the place of the Saint's death

is situated in the duchy of Anjou. In the course

of time there was erected there a certain noble monastery,

anciently called Mount Glonna

(the words are those of the History just cited), the nurse of a wonderful congregation

and of fair charity, a pattern of religion

and an example of all uprightness. It was consecrated

to the same Saint, and even today is called Old St. Florentius,

that it may be distinguished from the new and

famous monastery of St. Florentius, afterwards built near the town

of Saumur. A more suitable occasion for treating of both

at greater length will be given below.

[2] According to the manner already set forth, Usuard announces the Saint

on this day thus: In the district of Poitiers,

of St. Florentius, priest and confessor. the Saint's memory in the Calendars, but in some This leader

(for in more ancient sacred registers I have not found

our Florentius recorded) was followed by

Bellinus, Galesinius, Baronius in today's Roman Martyrology,

and other more recent writers. In exactly the same words he is mentioned

also in our manuscript Florarium, but the following is subjoined:

He restored to life by his prayers a certain drowned

boy, and wrought many miracles,

and died at the age of a hundred and twenty-three years, in the year of salvation

402. Maurolycus, however, attributes the Saint

to the people of Lyons: At Lyons, he says, of St. Florentius, priest,

who dwelt in a cave on the bank of the Loire, having driven the serpents thence,

in the reign of Constantine. So

he, moved probably by the authority of Peter de Natalibus,

book 8, chapter 107, who says: Florentius, a priest,

flourished in the time of the emperor Constantine …

buried at Lyons, famous for miracles.

[3] Benedict Gonon wrote the same as to the place of burial, in his

Lives of the Fathers of the West, page

154: it is wrongly said that he died at Lyons. and Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology,

having embraced the same opinion, added besides a reason

why the Saint went to Lyons and died

there: At Lyons, he says, of St. Florentius, priest,

a native of Poitiers, whom St. Martin consecrated,

conspicuous for heavenly tokens and miracles:

from whom he turned away, lest he should receive the honor of a dignity

he had taken up unwillingly, and hastening into a place

remote from crowds, came to the shore of the Loire,

where there was a cave full of serpents, which

he put to flight by prayer; and remaining here, fixed upon heaven,

he devoted himself by prayers, fastings, and vigils to the service of Christ.

But when he had restored alive to his grieving mother a boy

drowned in the waters of the river, fearing lest the fame of the deed

should win him esteem while he yet watched, he left his station

and made for Lyons to lie hidden: where, having departed from the racecourse

of death, he was called by the heavenly King to the eternal country which

he sought, worn out indeed with age,

but in merits (as he bore in his very name)

greatly flourishing and adorned. Whence Saussay learned these things,

whence Peter de Natalibus drew his own

in favor of the city of Lyons, I do not discover. However

that may be, just as their authority probably did not seem

sufficient to Théophile Raynaud to grant St. Florentius a place

in his Indiculus of the Saints of Lyons,

so it is not sufficient for us to form a solid doubt

about the truth of the opposite opinion, which is both the common opinion

of almost all, and established on stronger authority.

Add that Saussay himself, at the 2nd day of May,

places the tomb of St. Florentius in the territory of Anjou,

and says that a noble monastery was thereupon built at it;

as I shall show was really done.

[4] Of the Acts of St. Florentius we have the following copies:

the first is noted as taken from a manuscript of André du Chesne

and collated with a manuscript copy

of the church of Roye in Picardy; Acts, of which various copies the second, from a manuscript at Paris,

was sent in the year 1629 by Father Jacques Sirmond, a priest of our

Society; the third stands in a notable

codex of our Museum marked P. Ms. 158; the fourth,

which is properly only an abridgment of the others, was received

from a manuscript of St. Salvator at Utrecht. The du Chesne

and Sirmond copies, after a prologue and a mutilated

list of chapters, are arranged in three books:

the first embraces the captivity of SS. Florentius and Florianus for

the faith, and also the martyrdom of Florianus, of whom more

below, and the miraculous deliverance of Florentius;

the second relates the rest of the latter's deeds;

the third, the miracles after his death, to which finally, by way

of an appendix, is subjoined the account of a miracle of which

the author intimates that he was an eyewitness. But this

account, like the prologue and the list of chapters, and indeed

the third book as well, are wanting in our codex. There was also

lacking, as Bolland notes, the prologue in the Roye copy,

which after the collation was made was probably

sent back to Father Florent de Montmorency,

by whom it had been communicated to our Predecessors.

[5] we have, Those same Predecessors of ours, in volume 1 of May in the Preliminary

Commentary on the Acts of St. Florianus the martyr, page

462, assigned in a few words the copies of the Acts already

enumerated, and at the same time indicated what may be determined about the

age of the author, in these words: We have obtained the Acts of this Saint

(St. Florentius) from four manuscript codices, and

they are said to have been written under the grandsons of Charlemagne, in the ninth

century of Christ. That age is indeed not difficult

to elicit from the appendix or account of the miracle cited

in the preceding number, in which the author affirms that besides the miracles

contained in the third book, many others were afterwards wrought,

but, either from neglect, or rather on account

of ignorance of letters, were not handed down to posterity:

For the liberal arts, he says, were until the times

of the lord emperor Charles so foreign to our

predecessors that in the regions of Gaul

hardly anyone even among the highest prelates,

hindered by negligence, was to be found who by the elegance

of his speech could discharge with grace even synodal

definitions. But since, by the Lord's favor,

and by the insistence of the aforesaid lord emperor,

the moderns have attained what their elders had neglected,

it therefore seems fitting that what we have seen before our

eyes, lest all should perish in the depth of oblivion,

we should commit to the keeping of those now living and of our successors by a literary

inquiry, so far as we are able.

[6] written Nor had he been far removed from those uncultivated

times, as he had also intimated before in the prologue,

writing thus: Since we are placed at the end of the ages and are less

fit for performing such things (for drawing up the Acts of the Saints), inasmuch as

the polished elegance of the art of Rhetoric

has long since withdrawn from the usage of our age, etc.

Besides, since neither in the prologue nor anywhere else does he touch

by so much as a single word upon those things which happened there about the middle of the ninth

century — namely the overthrow

of the monastery of Glonna and the translation of the body of St.

Florentius, to be set forth more fully below — we may rightly

suspect that he wrote before these. There is added

that in the account of a miracle seen by himself he mentions

a bishop as still then living, whom

indeed I cannot more fitly refer to any other than to

that very time: for he has it thus: A certain cleric,

Amelius by name, who had killed his uncle,

was condemned by Artcharius, bishop of the city of Trajectum, etc.

Then, having related the benefit which

that same cleric had obtained in the church of St. Florentius,

he adds that he earnestly begged the monks to transcribe a letter

for the aforesaid bishop, by whom he had been sent

to do penance.

[7] in the ninth century, There are two Trajecta in Belgium, the one lower,

also called Trajectum on the Rhine and Utrecht,

the other upper, otherwise Trajectum on

the Meuse; but in the time of Charlemagne and his successors

there were no bishops here, since the see had been translated

from St. Hubert to Liège; wherefore it seems more probable

to me that the biographer designates the bishop of Trajectum

on the Rhine, or of Utrecht. No

prelate named Artcharius, indeed, occurs in the series of bishops

of this city; nevertheless by a sufficiently probable

conjecture it may be laid down that his name, as very often

happens, was corrupted by the transcribers,

and that he is no other than the one whom John Beka

calls Harmackarus, and whom Buchelius in his Notes

says is written also Hermocarus, Harmacarius, and Harimackarus.

But that bishop lived, according to

the same Buchelius, according to some, down

to the year 808 or 809; according to others, down to

827. But if nevertheless anyone should prefer to understand the bishop

of Liège, whom a writer more remote from the ancient

see might have called of Trejectum or Trajectum,

he will indeed not find an Artcharius here either, but

with the name not much changed he will meet with Hircarius,

who is written to have succeeded bishop Pirardus, who died about the year 840.

And so, whichever be taken,

the opinion about the author's age will be confirmed.

[8] About the author's age, I say — of the prologue at least

and of the aforesaid appendix; afterwards changed in style by various hands because I should not dare to affirm the same

of the rest, on account of the unevenness of the style, which

in the appendix, and especially in the prologue, is convoluted

and obscure, but in the Acts simpler and clearer.

Wherefore I strongly suspect that the Acts themselves were afterwards

changed in style and perhaps interpolated, the prologue

and appendix being left, from which the author's age

is somehow elicited. Certainly that they were thus changed in the

X century is attested by the author of the aforesaid History of the monastery

of Saumur: but it is doubtful whether these are the same

as those we have. He writes thus in volume 5 of the Amplissima

Collectio, column [ ] and the following, in Martène:

This also among the rest is to be impressed upon our pages,

that of the deeds of blessed Florentius nothing else

was reported from Tornacum (rather Tournus) than

what is read on the night of his repose. But that

at fitting times a sufficient reading about him might be had,

a certain Ingilbertus, learned in letters, a monk of the same

Saint, following the tenor of the earlier Life,

pursued another in a more extended style, namely:

Daniel divinæ attestationis, with the

preface: Mirabilem Deum. But Ingilbertus flourished,

as I understand from words a little earlier,

about the year 973. The beginning of our prologue does not

differ much; for it is such: Mirabilem

Deum: but the other words, Daniel divinæ attestationis,

are nowhere found in our Acts. However

that may be, I should think them neither better than ours nor

different in the matters narrated. That it is of no great value

the authors of the Histoire littéraire de la France rightly

conjecture, in volume 6, page 337, thus pronouncing: It may

rightly be doubted whether his work (Ingilbertus's) is worthy

of the public light, since Martène

and Durand, who had seen it and had published so many other things,

did not judge that it should be honored thus.

Certainly, if they are better than ours, there was sufficient reason

for publishing them; since our Predecessors, in the cited volume 1

of May, page 462, had openly indicated that ours were not approved

by them, and consequently that what has been published hitherto

by Vincent of Beauvais, by Mombritius,

and others, likewise displeased them, as being taken from ours or the like,

and laboring under the same difficulties. But that they are

not different in the matters narrated, I judge from this, that Father

Antoine de la Vacquerie of the Order of Minims,

in the Life of St. Florentius published in French at Paris in the year

1637, confesses in chapter 7 that he had read documents

drawn from the archive of the abbey of St. Florentius, and

therefore, beyond doubt, the Work of Ingilbertus before the rest, and yet

does not depart from our Acts in the relation of the deeds.

[9] Jean Maan, canon of the church of Tours,

in the Work and they were probably interpolated. which he entitled Ecclesia Turonensis,

page 18, treating of those who chose St. Martin the bishop

as their master, reckons among them not only Florentius

but also Florianus, thus touching upon their deeds:

Florentius and Florianus, Insubrians,

being delivered from the chains in which they had been bound for Christ at Milan,

fled by the working of an angel to him (St. Martin), by whom Florentius

was presently ordained priest;

both at length were sent to Saumur on

the Loire, that they might be free for God in solitude. Their Life

is in manuscript in the archive of Tours. If that author

drew what has just been recited from the Life which he cites, of the archive

of Tours, it must be confessed that this is other

than our Acts, which make Florianus a martyr

in Germany before Florentius came into Gaul.

But until it is produced, we shall doubt whether

it is equally ancient, and better; for it was known to no one before

Maan, or at least was neglected by all

whom we know to have written about the Saint, ancient and modern —

Marbod, an author of the XI century, Mombritius,

Vincent of Beauvais, Peter de Natalibus, and Gonon, whose

lucubrations, as regards the martyrdom of Florianus, agree with our

Acts. To the same opinion adhered

the aforesaid Antoine de la Vacquerie, and Toussaint

Bridoul of the Society of Jesus, who in the year 1653 published at Liège

greatly increases our doubt — not even the

canons of Tours themselves departed from our Acts in

the Breviary of the distinguished church of St. Martin, printed in the year

1635; since at the XXIII day of September the lessons

of the second Nocturn for the Office of St. Florentius are manifestly extracted

from the same or similar Acts. Let us give place

to conjecture, until we are taught otherwise: probably

the Life of the archive of Tours is no other than

our very Acts, but changed anew, perhaps by a more recent pen,

in that part in which the martyrdom of St.

Florianus is narrated, whence the chief difficulty arises;

although not even thus is it all removed;

for, as Tillemont rightly observes, volume 10, page

784, it is hard to understand on what occasion at Milan,

while St. Martin was sitting at Tours, men

should have been thrown into prison for the name of Christ,

and that in such a way that they had to be delivered by the ministry of an angel.

Now let us consider at what price our often-mentioned

Acts are to be held.

[10] the author had more ancient sources, They were written, according to what has been said before, only in the ninth

century; but that more ancient and more concise ones lay before him

the author indicates in the prologue: What has been handed down to us, he says,

by our forefathers with ancient trustworthiness but far too briefly,

we have determined to set upon parchment with the amplitude of a broader literary treatment, as

we have said above, for the memory of those now present or

of those who shall come after.

A little before he had also said: We have determined to gather into writing the deeds

of the excellent confessor of Christ

Florentius of the monastery of Glomna that are worthy of record. Yet I scarcely doubt

that those more ancient Acts underwent the lot

which other primitive Acts have often undergone when they fell

into the hands of amplifiers — that is, I say, that

by lightly framed conjectures and by the addition of circumstances by no means

accurate, they were both enlarged and corrupted. Moreover,

that we may presently detect the errors lurking in our Acts,

the chief things contained in the first

and second books must be set out in a few words. When Aquilinus the governor,

by the command of the emperors Diocletian and Maximian,

was persecuting the Christians in Noricum Ripense,

Florentius and Florianus of their own accord offered themselves to the officers, and, being brought to the governor, freely

confessed Christ, were tormented, and condemned to be

drowned in the river Anasus or Anisus. While they are being led

thither in bonds, both they and the officers, wearied

by the journey, are overcome by sleep, and an angel appearing

commands Florentius to go into the Gauls,

to be ordained priest by St. Martin of Tours; free

of his chains, and Florianus, who alone underwent martyrdom,

having been secretly warned, he enters on his journey, in which, having

wrought many miracles, he came to Tours, and, being received with joy by the holy

bishop, who had been forewarned by an angel,

after the third day is initiated into the priesthood. But he survived

the martyrdom of St. Florianus by 63 years, and died

in the 123rd year of his age.

[11] but corrupted them; These Acts the first, so far as I know, to attack in published books

were Le Cointe and Henschen; the former at length and

laboriously in volume 4 of the Annales Franci from page 300

to 305, where from a copy agreeing with ours

he transcribed almost the whole of the first and second books;

the latter in volume 1 of May, page 462, where he sets forth better Acts

of St. Florianus, and, having briefly indicated the reasons

for which he disapproves ours, refers them to this day

for more diligent discussion. Both confess,

and prove by cited authority, that St. Florianus truly suffered

under the said governor Aquilinus in Noricum

Ripense, in the reign of Diocletian; but they deny

that he had anything in common with St. Florentius,

not only because in the chief Acts of the same Florianus

there is no mention of St. Florentius, but also

because the times do not agree. And indeed, even if we place

the martyrdom of St. Florianus in the year 304, the penultimate year

of Diocletian's reign, St. Martin was not born by then,

to whom Florentius was being sent, much less

did he hold the bishopric of Tours, having been substituted

for St. Lidorius the bishop, according to some, only in the year 371,

according to others even later; so that Florentius,

even if he arrived at Tours in the earlier years of St. Martin's pontificate,

would have spent about 70 years on the journey —

as many as, according to the biographer himself, he did not survive Florianus;

since after his martyrdom he assigns him only

63 years of life. The anachronism is too clear

to need setting out at greater length: and from it it follows

either that St. Florentius had nothing in common with St.

Florianus, or that he was not initiated into the priesthood

by St. Martin, bishop of Tours. That the first is true

I judge on account of the silence about our Saint in the chief Acts

of St. Florianus, alleged by Le Cointe and

Henschen; and I doubt with Henschen whether

that conjunction of the two Saints proceeded from any other

than our biographer, who, being about to amplify

the Acts of St. Florentius, concisely written, stitched to them

the Acts of St. Florianus, and attributed also to Florentius

what was there narrated of Florianus alone, down to

his departure into the Gauls to St. Martin.

[12] But thus it may have come about that the true deeds

of St. Florentius, nevertheless they will be given here taken from more ancient documents, become

doubtful with posterity, who, detecting the anachronism,

and rightly requiring the author's credit on so grave

a point, assent even to the rest more timidly.

I shall nevertheless give his Acts, however

suspect, but with the whole first book cut away, which I judge

proper to Florianus alone, and which the curious

reader will be able to see in Le Cointe, or not much

differently in us, volume 1 of May, page 462 and following,

provided only that Florentius be joined to Florianus and all their

sayings and doings, down to the sleep and the apparition of the angel

(of which there is no mention here), be set forth

in the plural number. I shall then subjoin the elegant sermon of Marbod,

archdeacon of Angers, upon the same Acts,

recited by the author himself on the feast day of St. Florentius and

probably in a church consecrated to him:

this I gather from its first sentence, which, after this

title, Here begins the sermon of Marbod on the Life of St. Florentius

the confessor, runs thus: On the solemnity of this our holy father

Florentius, although a slender discourse can by no means suffice

to set forth his virtues,

yet it does not befit us to be altogether silent. I shall transcribe

it from a notable manuscript codex of ours on parchment,

of so ancient a character that to our Predecessors,

who praised it and used it several times

in this Work, it rightly seemed either to have been carefully written out

in Marbod's time and perhaps by his care, or

certainly not long after his death.

[13] But that sermon seems to have been delivered by Marbod

when he was archdeacon of Angers, together with the elegant sermon of bishop Marbod. that is,

before the year 1096, in which he held the bishopric of Rennes in Brittany

— both because in the Life

of St. Licinius, bishop of Angers, which is subjoined immediately

to the Sermon that occupies the first place in the codex,

he expressly names himself archdeacon of the church

of Angers; and because in the sermon itself he

signifies not obscurely that he is speaking in that diocese in which

St. Florentius is honored as patron; since

at number 24, urging his hearers to imitate

the examples of the Saints, he thus concludes:

Let us take an example from near at hand: we have before

our eyes a special Patron provided for us by God,

so that it is not necessary for us to borrow something imitable

from a stranger; and although the same things may be found

in others, yet it delights one more to draw waters equally sweet

from a near than from a remote fountain.

Now there are in the diocese of Angers both monasteries

whose chief Patron is our Saint,

namely that of Glonna or Old St. Florentius, and

that of Saumur, or the new one distinguished by the same Saint's name.

For the rest, this author, however learned

and erudite, did not notice our biographer's anachronism;

he joined Florentius to Florianus, and in

the remaining deeds closely followed the same biographer,

to whom at number 2 he refers his hearer for clearer

understanding, saying, Read the little book of his Life

(of our Saint). Hence I hesitated whether

to publish this Sermon along with the Acts, since from

it nothing more certain can be determined than from them.

I judged that it should be published, both because our Predecessors

had promised it, and because it is learned and pious, and

so rare that hitherto, so far as I know, by no one

except by those same Predecessors of ours and

those who followed them has it been mentioned, much less published in print;

although Antoine Beaugendre, a religious of the Order

of St. Benedict, had the Opuscula of the same Marbod,

collected with great pains, printed in the year

1708; and finally because from it too it will appear how great

was the veneration of St. Florentius in the XI century.

§ II. The old monastery of St. Florentius is enriched by the greatest princes; it is burned by the Bretons; it is restored.

[ ] The old monastery of St. Florentius Since the Acts of St. Florentius are such that I scarcely

dare to determine anything from them as certain,

and no more ancient or more trustworthy documents

appear, it would be superfluous to dispute about his

native country, his old age, and the year of his death: this last, however,

I have broadly fixed about the beginning of the 5th century, because by unanimous consent

he is believed to have lived with St. Martin. But that he died

on Mount Glonna, and was buried there, seems sufficiently

certain from what was alleged in the preceding § at number 1 and

following. Nor is it improbable, what some

hand down, namely that companions or disciples were left there

by him, who lived there after his example,

and who afterwards professed the monastic life, whence took

its beginning the monastery of Glonna, or Old St. Florentius.

But of this I have found no more ancient

record than in the Life of St. Hermeland,

abbot of Aindre, written by an almost contemporary author,

and published by us in volume 3 of March, page

576, where at page 580 the following is read: On a certain

night, while that same most blessed Ermenland …

was keeping vigil, he saw the soul of the venerable man Maurontius,

abbot from the monastery of St. Florentius which is called

Glomma, thirty thousand paces distant from his own monastery,

loosed from the bond of the body

and borne by angels to the heavenly throne. The author adds

that men were sent by St. Hermeland to inquire

into the matter; but that the brethren from the aforesaid monastery

of St. Florentius forestalled them in this labor, and sent men

to announce that at that very hour St.

Maurontius had died.

[15] Mabillon, part 1 of the 3rd Benedictine Century, page

391, in his notes to the place just cited, after producing

from three ancient Martyrologies the following

announcement: enlarged by Charlemagne On the V Ides of January, on the mountain which is called

Glomna, the deposition of blessed Maurontius, abbot and

confessor, and after noting some things about his cult, says: St. Maurontius

was buried in the church of the Holy

Savior near the tomb of St. Florentius … He is

a less principal patron of the old monastery of St.

Florentius. These things from the manuscript History, skillfully arranged by our John

Huinnes, concerning the new monastery. But St. Hermeland

died, as was said in the cited

volume 3 of March, page 576, about the year 715 or

720; Maurontius or Maurontus, of whom we treated

in volume 1 of January, page 505, toward the end of the seventh century.

Hence the words of the History of the monastery

of Saumur, in Martène,

cited at number 1, are to be understood in an accommodated sense; they run thus, column [ ]: It is reported

indeed that that monastery (of Glonna) was of old built by Charlemagne

the emperor with marble columns in a noble

structure, and ennobled with innumerable estates and many

gifts; and no less by Louis

his offspring, surnamed the Pious, distinguished with excellent

possessions; and by Charles the Bald also, among the

exceptional gifts with which he ennobled the aforesaid monastery,

we read that it was released, together with the whole royal

exaction of customs, from every synodal tax, along with its churches.

And again, column [ ]: That same

monastery, formerly built by Charlemagne,

and nobly exalted by the other kings, we read was afterwards

cruelly burned by Nomenoë, a Breton hateful to God. These things, I say,

are to be understood in an accommodated sense, not of the beginnings

of the said monastery, but of a certain restoration, and of a rule

of stricter discipline perhaps introduced at that time,

which is thus indicated in the same Martène

at the end of the History, in a brief Chronicle of the monastery

of St. Florentius, column [ ]: In the year 799. Here the order

of the monastery is renewed: the brethren promising the rule

under Albald, a holy man.

[16] The munificence of Louis the Pious is made certain by

his own privilege in Mabillon, volume 2 of the Annales

Benedictini, page 739, and by Louis the Pious, and enriched, the beginning of which

I transcribe: In the name of the Lord God and our Savior

Jesus Christ, Louis, by the ordering of divine

providence, emperor augustus. If toward places dedicated to divine

worship we bestow, for the love of God,

and of those who serve Him in those same places, opportune benefits,

we do not doubt that the reward of eternal recompense will be repaid us with God. Therefore

we wish it to be known to all the faithful of God's holy

Church and to our own, present, that is, and

to come, that a certain venerable man, Frotbert,

with his monks, whom we had sent into Italy,

we have caused to return thence, and have granted

them a certain monastery which is situated in the territory

of Poitiers upon the bank of the Loire, which is called

Glonna or St. Florentius, where the same blessed

confessor of Christ rests in body: on this condition,

that there, according to the Rule of the blessed father Benedict, they should lead

the monastic life, etc. He then goes on to set out

how he takes the same monastery under his defense

and protection, and what immunities

and privileges he grants it. To the same purpose

belongs what the biographer of the same Louis reports,

in du Chesne, volume 2 of the Scriptores Francorum, page 293,

in these words: And indeed many monasteries, as has been said,

were repaired by him in his dominion, nay, even built

from the foundations, but chiefly these:

the monastery of holy Mary and holy Peter of

Ferrières … the monastery of holy Florentius … with which,

as with so many lamps, the whole kingdom of Aquitaine

is adorned.

[17] it is burned under Charles the Bald The affection of Charles the Bald toward the same monastery

shone forth chiefly about the middle of the ninth century,

when Nomenoë, duke of the Bretons, a rebel against Charles,

invaded the territory of Anjou, and, because

Dido, abbot of Glonna, faithfully adhered to his prince,

burned the monastery: Hence Charles,

intending to repay the favor, says Mabillon, volume 2

of the Annals, page 679, transcribing the following as from a certain

diploma of his, granted to the monks of Glonna the estate of Miniacum

in the district of Le Mans on the river Sarthe,

and Jean-ville in the district of Anjou, situated not far

from the channel of the Loire,

on the X Kalends of August, in the eleventh Indiction, in the ninth year

of his reign. Done at the estate of Puteata not

far from the city of Clermont. Thus Mabillon at

the year 848. Then at the year 849, page 684, he recites

some things from another diploma of the same Charles,

which, as it was published by Alexis Lobineau, a priest of the Order

of St. Benedict, in volume 2 of the History of Lesser Brittany,

column 51, I transfer here. In the name

of the holy and undivided Trinity, Charles by the grace of God king. When

we were treating of composing the quiet of our kingdom, disturbed

by the plots of certain men, while our brother Louis

was meditating a defection, \ and were desiring*

also to restore the devastated places of certain Saints,

there arose among the rest the often

deplored calamity of the church of our illustrious and beloved

most holy confessor of Christ Florentius, the venerable abbot of that same place,

Radulf, standing by us. For whereas it is established

that that same place was ennobled by Charles of pious memory, our grandfather,

with illustrious buildings and very many possessions, etc., it was

burned by our most cruel rebel

Nomenoë the Breton for hatred of us,

and very many of its possessions invaded, although that impious man himself,

stricken by the same Saint, bestowed much money

toward its restoration; and we, pursuing him

and grieving exceedingly for this cause, have conferred many things

on the same place, namely the abbey of St.

John in the district of Anjou, etc. And desiring to add to these things

by God's prompting, with the consent, nay

rather at the exhortation, of the venerable bishops Dido of Poitiers,

to whose prelacy is subject the district of Mauges, in

which the aforesaid place is situated, and likewise Tiffauges,

and also Actardus, prelate of the church of Nantes,

we release all the churches which appear to belong to the aforesaid place,

throughout their bishoprics, from every synodal

exaction. And because certain of them

were devastated along with that place, we bestow this abridgment of our munificence,

a compensation having been given to those bishops

which they had requested, namely fuller

and free portions of those cities,

as has been designated by us; and that the counts of those

districts presume to exact nothing for their county, or for our

revenue, from any of their dioceses which they seem

rightfully to claim for themselves, etc.

Given in the month of June, on the VI Ides of the same, in the year IX of Charles

the most glorious king. Done in the place which is called

Old Poitiers, in the name of God, happily. Amen.

[18] and restored. Here Mabillon notes that the abbey of St. John

is not to be confounded with Jean-ville,

which in the preceding year had been given to Glonna by Charles;

and in volume 4 of the Annals, page 852, he warns that an error

must be corrected which lurks in the words just recited,

when Dido is called bishop of Poitiers;

for one must read: Dido or Dodo of Angers.

Moreover, since both donations, though made to different

abbots, are noted in the ninth year of king Charles,

the matter is so to be understood that the earlier was made to Dido the abbot

on the XXIII day of August in the year 848, the ninth year of king Charles

having not long begun; the later to Radulf, his

successor, on the VIII day of June in the year 849, the ninth year of the same reign

being not yet complete. But the reason by which

Nemenoë or Nomenoë was impelled to contribute

money for the restoration of the monastery

is also alleged by the author of the History of the overthrow of the monastery

of Old St. Florentius, published by Martène in volume 3 of the Anecdota,

column 844, in these words: He raised himself against Charles

the Bald, and, scorning to serve him, joined the men of Rennes

to those of Nantes, and thus, attacking the monastery

founded and ennobled by Louis (Charles's) father and by his grandfather Charles

the Great,

he burned and devastated it; but being invisibly stricken by the Saint to whom that

place had of old been divinely granted,

he gave no small sum of money and made good, as far as he could, the damage which

he had inflicted on himself. Nevertheless

he always carried with him the sign of his stroke;

for as long as he lived he remained always lame.

[19] What has hitherto been recorded of the monastery of Glonna

from the times of Charlemagne is confirmed and more fully

set forth by a Rhythm, A Rhythm, in which the splendor of the monastery, which I transfer here from volume 2

of Mabillon's Annals, page 753:

Sweet measures and songs

Grant, Thracian lyre \*,

Moved by which the hyperborean

Summits made lament.

Let mountains and rivers together

Now think them those of Orpheus,

And let the songs make answer;

Let the woods sing honey-flowing strains.

Let the deep trumpet give its organ-note;

Let the pipe resound on high;

Let every harmony sing;

Let Philomela give her songs.

Once shining most brightly,

And most famed throughout the lands,

The basilica of the holy father

Florentius, foremost of all,

Felt savage burnings

From a most cruel people,

Truly brutish Brittany —

Lament, all of you, such things.

For when all Gaul

Was then bowed down beseeching

The suffrages of Florentius,

This impious people despised them.

[20] Once the pious king Charles

The Great and most powerful the piety of princes toward the Saint,

Devoutly made this place

For the virtues of the Blessed one.

By fertile lands bestowed \*

He increased its honor more largely,

And bestowed then a magnificent vessel

For the Supper of God.

Through him is often put to flight

Infirmity from the languishing,

And health is straightway granted

To the faithful from this place.

Ruling afterward, Louis,

Son of Charles the Great,

Cherishes that same place more kindly

With pious adornments.

He, shaken by rebellious sons,

By deep floods

And by those disturbing France,

Died and left the kingdom.

Presently, these four parts

Cutting the kingdom for themselves,

Quarreling throughout France,

There was a more horrid war.

[21] With the empire thus disturbed,

The faction of the wicked grows, the wars

And dissension, then rising up,

Confounds all in strife.

One invades his allies,

The evil increase over the good,

Every tyrant rages,

Honors are given to the impious.

There comes a laying waste of many,

A plundering of holy places,

A troubling of all good things,

And with it a confusion of affairs.

There was a certain man at this time,

Nemenoë by name,

Formerly poor in lineage,

Who used to till a field with the plowshare.

But he found a most abundant

Treasure buried in the ground,

And joined to himself the comfort

Of very many rich men.

Thereafter he began by craft to deceive

And presently to grow great,

Until he should mount above all

In the resources of power.

Together with their kings,

Along with the other rebels

He becomes an adversary to Charles.

This Charles with his brothers

Waged war very often,

Nor did he prevail against his enemies,

Being driven back by such great disasters.

Whence the impious man takes confidence,

Nemenoë carries off plunder,

Pressing upon the men of Rennes

And likewise upon those of Nantes.

Then he seeks the district of Mauges,

Belonging to the men of Poitiers,

Who dwell beyond the Loire,

And Glonna, a most beautiful place.

He calls the monastic band,

And gives much money,

And presently bids his own splendid

Statue be fashioned;

Which they should set upon the pinnacle

Open to the East,

That it might be a sign that Charles

He did not fear as lord.

To their king Charles,

Who, hearing of the arrogance,

Wondered at the audacity.

Then he ordered that they should lay out

The whole sum for themselves

In his image carved of white stone,

With a laughing likeness;

Which they should set upon the pinnacle

Open to the East,

That it might be a sign to the impious man

That he must be subjugated to Charles.

Angered at such things,

He seeks the place more swiftly;

He commands his soldiers to plunder:

He straightway kindles fire.

Everywhere the Bretons presently

Bring in flames and savage wrath:

The holy place is burned,

So great an ornament is consumed.

Alas for me! the sorrows of the fatherland,

Alas for me! the honors of the ancient glory

Which the world knew,

Alas for me! now the tears flow.

Saint Florentius is present,

He looked on, while the Bretons

Set his own place aflame.

O how great would the vengeance have been,

Were it not for the permission!

But the impious man was stricken,

His feet made feeble.

He prays for pardon,

That he might be able to return to his country:

Having returned to Brittany

He gives an exceeding great sum.

Dido was a good abbot,

Very near to king Charles,

Who, having called the brethren together,

Goes to the king as quickly as may be.

He sets forth the wrath of the Bretons,

The great crime of those cruel men;

Then the king, grieving in his heart,

Seeks presently to render a recompense.

Hence straightway he seeks the city

Of Angers, most sorrowful:

He gives the abbey of the little place

Of Saint John to be dedicated.

[25] But this seemed too little,

And presently he handed over another

By the name of Saint Gundulf, are described,

Which is in the parts of France.

Great gifts being given,

He becomes diligent about the place,

Restores it more happily,

And adorns it more beautifully.

Rejoice, all of you, in your hearts,

Sing with great voices,

Holy Florentius, we beseech thee,

Be present to us from heaven. Amen.

The same Mabillon, in the cited volume 2 of the Annals, page

679, judges that the Rhythm was published about the same times,

not long, that is, after the monastery had been restored by

Charles the Bald. And indeed, since the author in the last

little verses stirs up the monks of Glonna to joy, and,

having complained before of Nemenoë alone, brings in no mention

of the other overthrow of the monastery, wrought a little

later by the Normans, that opinion seems to me sufficiently

proved.

\ meditantium*

\ read Threïcia*

\ perhaps fœcundius*

§ III. The monastery of Glonna is destroyed a second time;

the monks with the body of St. Florentius flee to the province of Bourges;

then to Tournus in Burgundy.

[ ] The second destruction, of which we have a twofold Not long did the monks of Glonna enjoy the tranquillity

which the aid and liberality of Charles the Bald

had procured them; for scarcely had the fourth year elapsed after the restoration

when the monastery was burned by the Normans,

and they themselves were compelled to flee with the relics of St. Florentius.

This second overthrow the older chroniclers everywhere attach

to the year 853. The author

of the Chronicle of the deeds of the Normans in France,

in du Chesne, volume 2, page 525, reports it thus: In the year

of the Lord 853 the Northmen in the month of July,

leaving the Seine and going to the Loire, laid waste the city

of Nantes and the monastery of saint Florentius and the neighboring

places. In the Chronicle of Aquitaine, in

Labbe, volume 1 of the Bibliotheca Ms., page 292, and in

that of Angoulême in the same, page 324, the month of June

is marked: 853. Luçon is burned in the month of May by

the Normans, and in the month of June the monastery of saint Florentius, etc.

Martène published two Histories belonging here,

from manuscripts of Saumur, about

which, before I pursue further the flight of the monks and the translation

of the relics, it will be useful to have observed some things.

One stands in volume 5 of the Amplissima Collectio

from column [ ]; the other in volume 3 of the Anecdota

from column 843. The first, under this title, History of the monastery

of St. Florentius of Saumur, begins from the overthrow

of the monastery, and is drawn out to nearly the end

of the 13th century; but the editor notes that it had various

writers, who continued the Work begun by one,

and committed to writing the particular things which had happened in their own times;

and he thinks that from the diversity of style and character

and also from other signs he has detected

four, of whom — of the three later ones at least,

although the first may perhaps have stumbled in some places — the accounts

of the deeds of the abbots and of other matters cannot be sufficiently valued.

The other, bearing this title, History

of the overthrow of the monastery of Old St. Florentius by the Bretons

and the Normans, of the translation of the same Saint,

of the foundation and of the abbots of the monastery of Saumur,

is much more compendiously written, and is carried

down to the death of abbot Sigo, which is everywhere attached

to the year 1070.

[27] description, With the same death of Sigo there ends also,

in the editor's judgment, the second writer or first

continuator of the longer History: but he, unless he

fell in with an interpolator, wrote a whole century after

the death of Sigo. For in the cited volume 5 of the Amplissima

Collectio, column [ ], after he has related how

Evenus, a monk, was sent by his abbot Sigo

to the abbey of St. Melanius near the city of Rennes,

and long presided over it as abbot, and afterwards over the diocese of Dol

as archbishop; and how he died and was buried in the same abbey

of St. Melanius, in the year, as will presently be seen,

1081, he continues thus: But after much time,

in the time of William, abbot of venerable memory,

of the same monastery (of St. Melanius), it happened

that the concordant congregation of the brethren dug open his (Evenus's) tomb

for the sake of a revelation: and having rolled back the stone laid over it,

they found a leaden tablet at

his head, inscribed with letters in these

words: “In the year of the Lord's Incarnation 1081,

Gregory VII being Roman Pontiff, Geoffrey being count

of Rennes, and Silvester bishop,

on the VII Kalends of October there died lord Evenus,

archbishop of Dol and abbot of St. Melanius,”

etc. He wrote therefore long after the year 1081, and,

as it appears, some years after the year 1162, in which

William, abbot of St. Melanius, whom he here cites as

deceased, was yet surviving among the living, as is clear

from an instrument of the same abbey in Alexis

Lobineau, volume 2 of the History of Lesser Brittany, column

218. I said some years after 1162, not many;

for the third author, Michael, writing thus of himself,

column 1133, He who saw these things wrote them, and bore witness

to the truth, seems to have continued the Work only

down to the year 1202, in which he was elected abbot of St.

Florentius. For the rest, the first and second authors of the longer

History probably used the shorter one assigned

in the preceding number. For few things indeed are found in this

which are not likewise read in that one, though scattered,

in almost the same words. Probably, I say; for if

anyone should contend that the shorter was extracted from the longer

and reduced to a better order, there is nothing

that I would oppose. Now let us take up the matter we left.

[28] wrought by the Normans; What I began to report at the beginning of this §, the author

of the shorter History narrates in this way: But afterwards

the Normans, while Charles the Bald was still reigning above,

coming up along the Loire, attack Nantes,

lay it waste, take and plunder it;

and again the monastery of St. Florentius, which had already

before been burned by the aforesaid Nomenoë, and

had already been repaired by Charles the Bald, is utterly laid waste, burned,

and destroyed by that savage

Norman people. The monks with the body of St. Florentius

flee into the parts of Burgundy; they seek out the monastery of Tornacum

(so it is written in both Histories for Tornucum or

Trenorchium), where likewise

the monks of St. Philibert, for fear of the aforesaid people, had withdrawn from

the island of Hério with the body of the same Saint.

And thus the place of the monastery of Glonna, reduced to a solitude,

began to be the haunt of wild beasts, which before had been

the dwelling of men. These things are so reported as if the monks had presently

fled from the year 853 to Trenorchium with the relics;

but a longer delay must be interposed, both

on account of what is presently to be said, and because the body of St. Philibert,

of whom we treated at the XX day of August,

was not translated to Trenorchium before the year 875.

[29] The same author, after a few things interposed, explains

the matter more fully: the flight of the monks with the sacred body From the destruction, therefore, he says, of the monastery,

which was made by Nomenoë the Breton, or from the coming

of the Normans, both of which happened while

Charles the Bald was reigning, down to that time

when the body of St. Florentius was brought back from Tornacum

by the monk Absalon and laid up in the castle of Saumur,

what was done concerning the monks who then

were scattered, or whither they went, or how they afterwards

lived, is in every way unknown to us,

except this, which we have found in our charters,

that after the second destruction of this monastery made by

the Normans \, the monks with the body of St.*

Florentius, by the command of the most pious king Charles, withdrew into the parts of France

to the place of St. Gundulf, which the same most excellent

king had long since \ conferred on this place, after*

the burning of this place brought upon it by Nomenoë the Breton;

but how they migrated thence

and went on to Tornacum is altogether unknown.

The same things, differing in no word except those noted here

in the margin, the second author of the longer

History hands down; and thus he likewise explains what

the first author had written more confusedly.

[30] The place to which, according to what has already been related, after the monastery

had been overthrown by the Normans, the monks fled with the sacred remains of St. Florentius,

to the cell of St. Gundulf in the province of Bourges, is situated in the province of Bourges,

and has been until now subject, according to Mabillon,

to the abbey of St. Florentius at Saumur; it is everywhere called the Cell of St.

Gundulf, commonly St. Godon. The grant

of it made earlier to abbot Dido about

the year 848, at the prayers of the monks, who probably

were laying aside hope of restoring the ancient monastery,

the same Charles the Bald renewed in the year 866,

and perhaps enlarged, by a diploma which from the archive

of Glonna Mabillon inserted in volume 2 of the Annals,

page 752, and which, so far as it belongs here, I transcribe:

In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, Charles

by the grace of God king, etc. And so let the diligence of all

the faithful of God's holy Church and of our own, both

present and to come, know that a venerable

and religious man, Hecfred, abbot of the monastery

of blessed Florentius, together with the monks warring for God there,

coming to our sublimity,

set forth to our clemency, in a pitiable hearing and with a tearful representation,

the calamity of the aforesaid monastery, etc. Therefore that venerable

abbot prayed suppliantly that for the refuge of his monks

and for the reception of the most sacred body of blessed Florentius

we would deign to grant him the cell beside the river

Loire in the district of Bourges, which is called Nobiliacus,

even as we are known to have done for his predecessor Dido,

formerly abbot; in which little cell

St. Gundulf is reverently honored, being buried there:

so that, rejoicing that they have escaped from the hands of the aforesaid enemies

of God, they may there at length deserve, Christ being propitious,

to find rest from so great

a persecution, and may be able to breathe again

in praise of the divine mercy. And we, granting kindly assent to the suppliant

prayers of that same abbot Hecfred and of his monks,

have ordered this precept of our highness

to be made, by which we grant and bestow the aforesaid

cell of St. Gundulf, with its household of either sex

and with the fullness of all other things,

to the often-named venerable abbot Hecfred and his monks,

to be held by them, etc.

And that this delegation of our authority may obtain perpetual

force in the name of God, we have confirmed it with our own hand,

and have ordered it to be marked with the impression of our ring. Given on the XVII Kalends of February,

in the XIV Indiction, in the XXVI year of the reign of Charles

the most glorious king. Done in the city of Senlis in

God's name, happily. Amen.

[31] granted to them by the kings, The same grant Carloman, king of Burgundy

and Aquitaine, afterwards also confirmed

by a similar diploma. A fragment of this the aforesaid

Lobineau exhibits in volume 2 of the History of Brittany, column 52.

The beginning is such: In the name of the Lord, etc. Karolomagnus

by the grace of God king. The venerable man Radulf, abbot

of the monastery of St. Florentius, etc. The rest agrees almost

word for word with the recited diploma of Charles the Bald down

to the end, which runs thus: To whose petition etc. I grant

also four ships. Given on the Nones of June, in the

III year of the reign of Karolomagnus, in the XIII Indiction. An error

Mabillon observed here in the chronological notes;

for the XIII Indiction designates the year 880, but the third

year of Carloman's reign the year 881. Until now, therefore,

the abbot and monks were living in the Cell of St. Gundulf with the sacred remains

of their Patron; but how long they remained there,

until, on account of the frequent incursions of the Normans — doubtless into

this region also — they had to flee

into Burgundy and betake themselves to the monastery of Trenorchium,

both the author of the shorter History

and the first continuator of the longer were themselves ignorant, as is clear from

the words cited at number 29, nor could we

be taught it from elsewhere.

[32] and thence to Trenorchium in Burgundy; The manner indeed in which they went thither, and

were received by the men of Trenorchium, the first author of the longer

History described; but I cannot help holding

his account suspect, since the same authors just cited

intimate not obscurely, in these words, that they were ignorant even of the manner itself:

How they migrated thence (from

the cell of St. Gundulf) and went on to Tornacum

is altogether unknown. Yet take his

words: At the time, therefore, of the aforesaid persecution

the monastery of Glonna shone with much opulence of goods,

and was strong also in a copious number of monks

and in a still more copious merit. These most illustrious monks,

having heard of the storm of so great a devastation,

struck with immense terror, prepare flight and the necessaries

of flight, and having taken the precious treasure of the body of the kindly father Florentius,

they suddenly seize upon flight,

and having gone out from their former dwelling of religious life,

silently among strangers — themselves rather exiles

and strangers — they search out a lodging in which to abide.

Then Mount Glonna, once the flowering dwelling of monks,

is left with ineffable grief and groaning to be devastated

by the barbarians laying waste close at hand,

and so great a mourning is made by those departing

as is not reported to have been made after the burning of that place

wrought by Nemenoë the Breton, hateful to God.

And so, as they fled, the monks of St. Philibert

of Bolonnium, dwelling not far from Mount Glonna,

are joined to them in a meeting concourse,

fleeing with a like purpose the rage of the barbarian persecution.

They likewise determined to seek the parts of Burgundy,

and together resolved to abide wherever Christ

should direct them. But the bearers of the illustrious Florentius

sustained with their own provisions the monks of blessed Philibert, their companions, throughout the whole journey; and wherever

they set down the lodging of blessed Florentius, a tent

was fashioned with curtains. At length they came together

to Tornacum, the ancient estate of the monks of St. Philibert,

and there the most reverend monks of St. Florentius,

invited by their fellows, with the aforesaid treasure of that

Saint and with inestimable ornaments,

were received for a long time by the favor of hospitality.

[33] So he, but very confusedly, and not sufficiently consistently

with the reported stay in the cell of St. Gundulf, proved by the diploma,

the account of this flight is confused and less accurate. of which he does not even make

mention, setting out the matter as if the monks had gone

straight into Burgundy even before the overthrow

of the monastery of Glonna — namely while the Normans

were close at hand and threatening. For what else do those

words of his sound: Then Mount Glonna, once the flowering

dwelling of monks, is left with ineffable grief and groaning

to be devastated by the barbarians laying waste close at hand? What of that

conjunction with the monks of St. Philibert dwelling not far from Mount Glonna?

What of all the rest, in which he indicates no other

stay than what seems to have been necessary

for men on a journey, and taking care not to fall

into the hands of enemies? I should think indeed that this author,

relying on tradition alone concerning the flight of the monks with the relics

into Burgundy, and their bringing back into

the duchy of Anjou when the kingdom was pacified, put together

his History and adorned it with circumstances that seemed probable to him,

and that hence it came about that he both confused

the times and did not obtain credit with the very

continuator of the History, who preferred candidly to confess

that it is altogether unknown how they went on to Trenorchium.

[34] To these times belongs the miracle or benefit

which the aforesaid continuator, column [ ], reports

in this manner: A benefit about the same time When for about XXX years

the Norman people had laid waste, by depopulating, certain cities and castles

of Neustria and Aquitaine, and by laying them waste had plundered them,

they came at last to the monastery

of St. Benedict, surnamed Fleury,

which they had cruelly burned some time before. There,

being attacked by the venerable abbot Hugh, with the aid brought him

by the most noble count of Auxerre, Gilbald

by name, they were destroyed even \ to extinction.*

Of that battle scarcely anyone escaped to announce the outcome

of the matter to the rest; in which conflict Ingelgerius,

count of Anjou, son of Fulk the Red, was killed.

The few Normans, therefore, who escaped,

guarding their lives by a garrison, with a store both of captives

and of plunder, were compelled to seek again

their homes across the sea. And when they were departing, never to return, from their station which

they had had on the island lying below this (the monastery of Glonna),

they seize a certain priest

who alone had remained in the service of St. Florentius,

and cast him with them into one

of their ships, bound and fastened with fetters,

and thus departing along the Loire, they make ready to return

to their country.

[35] But the priest, taking it ill to be separated from so great

and so mighty a Patron, obtained by a priest through the Saint's patronage. turning his eyes back over his shoulder,

saw the monastery, empty of human inhabitant

and desolate: then the priest is said to have cried out

in this voice: Alas! thou, holy Florentius, why

dost thou suffer me to be thus severed from thee? Why do

these pagans, hateful to God, thus carry me off? When he had said this, at once

the ship in which he was being carried began to whirl in an eddy,

and to threaten death to all

who were aboard. But the priest, loosed from his bonds by divine power,

trusted himself to the waters of the Loire, and swimming is brought

to the nearer bank. But the river swallowed up all the Normans

who were carrying him captive; and he,

entering a wood named Bivo,

betook himself to the monastery of St. Florentius, who had

delivered him. That slaughter inflicted on the Normans by Hugh, abbot of St. Martin

of Tours, and by count Gilbald or Girbold,

Adelerius also reports, an author of the same

ninth century, in the appendix to the first book on the Miracles

of St. Benedict, and he ascribes it to the latter's

patronage; but he does not mention the prodigy just narrated,

perhaps because it did not belong to his purpose

in writing about St. Benedict.

\ elsewhere is added quod*

\ elsewhere pridie*

\ read & usque*

§ IV. The Saint's body is carried from Trenorchium to Saumur, and laid up in the basilica of the new monastery built there.

[ ] Peace being restored, and the monks of Glonna meditating a return Just as we could not determine above with certainty in what

year the relics of St. Florentius were translated to Trenorchium,

so here also we are not able to assign

how long they remained there, or in precisely what year

they returned to the men of Anjou. The first author of the longer

History thus pursues the account begun in the preceding §:

Throughout the whole time of the persecution, therefore, while the brethren of blessed

Florentius were dwelling there in safety,

at length the clemency of the divine goodness looked upon France,

now almost consumed by the enemy's sword. A threefold

persecution, therefore, is inflicted upon the barbarian persecutors.

For some famine tortures, others the sword cuts down,

others a plague sent from heaven destroys in troops

by a sudden death. And as the barbarians perished now by famine,

now by the sword, now by plague, though some fled back

into their own country, peace returned to the lands, and the tillers returned

to their own. Then every survivor went to his own place,

whoever had lamented and groaned at the fall of his country —

cities, that is, thrown down, towns leveled with the valleys,

churches once famed for divine worship brought to nothing, villages

reduced to solitude. For who could enumerate

how many and how great kinds of torments that most wicked

army of the Normans, fearing neither

God nor reverencing men, had exercised upon our people?

[37] the men of Trenorchium refuse the sacred body, Hearing therefore the name of the peace they had longed for, the aforesaid

brethren of blessed Florentius who were at that time

surviving give thanks with no small joy;

they go to their hosts, devoutly render thanks, entreat

with such an address of prayers, and speak to them more devoutly:

“We render thanks to your kindness, because, as

you ought, you have shown forth your charity to us, exiles:

but now, bidding you a last farewell with gratitude,

we make ready to return home, and desire unanimously,

by God's favor, to see again our hearths

and our deserted fields. Your brotherhood, therefore,

we more earnestly beseech that we may carry back, by your favor,

the consecrated pledges which we entrusted to your charity, namely the treasure

of our father Florentius.”

To whom the monks of St. Philibert

returned this answer: “The chief men and the people of this

region do not grant the treasure you ask:

the kingdom of Burgundy does not allow itself to be deprived

of so great a Patron. We also, enriched with so great a gift by the right of fellowship

and of hospitality, do not suffer you to carry it elsewhere;

therefore let him who wishes to remain with us

as long as life attends him, remain; but he who

does not wish, let him depart wherever he pleases. Return

therefore, if you will, to your country; for you shall not carry back

the most holy burden which you brought.”

So, as they violently and bitterly retained the precious little body of the Saint

with its manifold ornaments, the monks

were scattered here and there with vast grief.

[38] Quiet from the incursions of the Normans was chiefly

obtained about the years 911 and 912, which afterwards one of them when Rollo

their leader, having made peace with Charles the Simple,

obtained a part of Neustria, which was afterwards called Normandy,

and was converted to the Christian faith.

At that time, more probably, or a few years after, may be placed

the departure of the monks of St. Florentius from Burgundy,

and within the said years and 950 the bringing back of the relics,

which the same author goes on to describe:

But blessed Florentius had, he says, before

the flight of his body, a certain young man brought up by him,

Absalon by name, now free of his wardship. He by divine

dispensation had gone to Le Mans, sent by his abbot's

permission, for the sake of visiting his parents;

while therefore all the others were fleeing with the precious clod of the body

of St. Florentius, the rage of the barbarians

threatening, he alone remained at Le Mans

with his parents. For this city remained untouched by the enemy,

while all the rest round about were falling

in the Norman tempest. Nay, that the city of Le Mans

was sacked by the Normans is established by so many testimonies

that a fuller proof might seem superfluous:

let one be heard, the annalist of Saint-Bertin

at the year 866: The Northmen, mingled with Bretons,

about four hundred, having come out from the Loire with their horses,

go to the city of Le Mans. Which being plundered,

on their return they come as far as the place which is called

Brieserta.

[39] I therefore pass over the account of this less accurate writer,

by which he sets out at greater length the remaining course of the affair,

carries off; but I doubt whether it is without fables; and I transcribe what

the author of the shorter History hands down on the same subject.

Now let us pursue what we had begun to say

of Absalon. That Absalon, a monk

of St. Florentius, grieving that the body of his Patron had remained

at Tornacum, whither it had been carried for fear of the Normans

in the time of the Norman persecution,

meditated in his heart how it might be restored

to its own region. And so, going to Tornacum,

that he might the more easily be believed, and that all suspicion of theft

and flight might be taken from him, he feigned himself crippled,

and, being about the place as though devout, strove by many

indications to learn thoroughly the place in

which the bones of the often-named Saint rested; and when he

had learned it, at once, an opportunity being gained,

going thither, he seized all the members, except a certain

part of the head, and, God leading him, came

as far as Saumur; and thus those monks of St. Philibert

lost unwillingly the treasure which they had been unwilling

to give up of their own accord. Nevertheless they retained the precious ornaments

which of old had been carried thither with the body of St. Florentius.

[40] These things therefore being accomplished, a monastery was begun

at Saumur, a monastery is built at Saumur, in which the body by the command and will of Theutbald

the count. And because all rejoiced at the return or reception

of so great a Father, they labored emulously in the building

of the monastery. For that castle

which is called Saumur was not yet there,

but was afterwards built by the aforesaid count for the fortification of the monastery

on account of neighboring enemies. And the monastery being

finished, they came to the

dedication. And when it had been dedicated, that same

venerable count takes the casket in which

the bones of the often-named Saint were kept, and wished

to carry it into the house prepared for him by God, at the bidding of the bishops who

were present. And when he had come to

a certain great rock not far from the door of the monastery,

the weight, which before had been light and pleasant,

was so made heavy as if what was carried had been iron

and lead. And so the count, willing or unwilling, set the casket

with the holy limbs upon the stone,

and anxiously strove to inquire what was needed:

and it was said to him that he ought to grant at present something of his own goods

which seemed to be about that same place, although

he had granted some already, so that that same Saint might both

permit himself to be carried to the appointed place, and might be

a merciful intercessor with the almighty Lord for all

who were present; which also was done.

[41] is laid up For he conferred upon him, in the presence of all

who were there, the possessions which he had as his own

in the territory of Saumur — churches, cultivated lands,

waters, customary dues. Such gifts as these he bestowed on the holy

Confessor; and thus he placed him in his own seat at the appointed place without

any difficulty. From

that time until abbot Frederick the abbey

of the Saint of whom we speak was under the power or

lordship of the counts of Theutbald's line;

but before that, down to the destruction which was made

by the Bretons or by the Normans, they had as their lords no others

whomsoever, but the king of the Franks. That

Confessor certainly had several possessions in various

provinces, which, since he lost them in the time of the aforesaid

Norman or Breton persecution,

has seemed so both to ourselves and to many others, concerning which

only notices and charters remain with us,

which show us how the Saint himself

acquired them, but could not show how he lost them.

The first abbot in that same new monastery was Elias,

who labored much in the building of that monastery

with a certain brother of his named Othbert:

for both were priests, and therefore he deservedly

merited the gift of the abbey, but did not hold it long.

[42] about the year 950 The building of this new monastery the

Sainte-Marthes report in volume 4 of the Gallia Christiana, and

Mabillon in volume 3 of the Annals, at the year 950,

in which they cannot err by much; for according to

the brief Chronicle of Saumur in Martène,

volume 5 of the Amplissima Collectio, column 1142: 956,

Amalbert is made abbot; but Elias, the immediate predecessor

of Amalbert and the first abbot, did not hold

the government long, as we have just seen. Moreover the continuator

of the longer History — for he, in the editor's opinion, wrote the account of the foundation

of the abbey of Saumur — adds a third

who labored at that work beyond the rest: And so,

he says, all things being finished after the custom, those three

who by their labor and industry had raised the fabric

of the monastery, renouncing the world, and changing

their mind with their habit, determined for the remainder of their life to serve God

under a monastic purpose: whose

names, because we have kept them back in silence above,

we judge should be brought out here and nowhere more fittingly:

Othbert of Furres, Elias of Liniacum,

Raginald of Reste. Of these they set Elias over them as abbot,

Raginald as provost of the future congregation,

and Absalon as guardian and servant of their Patron

according to his own will.

[43] on the 2nd day of May. To these things the same continuator had prefixed an account

of the building of the monastery, of the translation of the sacred body

into the basilica, of the prodigy wrought in that same translation,

and of the liberality of Theobald, count of Blois,

in a manner so little different from what I have given from

the shorter History that it is not necessary to set out his

words here; he adds, however, that the rock upon which the body,

prodigiously made heavy, was set, was standing there

still in his own time as a testimony to onlookers,

and he notes the day of the translation as the VI Nones of May,

on which day also, according to Mabillon, volume 3 of the Annals,

page 506, it is noted in the monastery's own Martyrology

in these words: At the castle of Saumur, the reception of the body

of our holy father Florentius, priest and confessor.

In almost the same words, as our Predecessors noted

in the Prætermissi of the 2nd day of the month of May, it is noted in the manuscript

Martyrology of the priory of Daveron, of the Benedictine Order,

in the diocese of Chartres. Our Saint is announced also

at the same day in the manuscript Florarium,

and in the published Additions to Usuard — the Lübeck-Cologne one,

Grevenus's, Bellinus's, Molanus's — in the Martyrologies

of Galesinius, where however he is wrongly

called a bishop, in the German, and in the Gallican; but everywhere,

except the last, without mention of the translation.

[44] The building of the new monastery therefore being completed,

these are the words of the aforesaid continuator, The same monastery is increased in goods and the treasure

of the revered body laid up within with due honor,

the venerable count Theobald brought religious brethren from

the monastery of St. Benedict of Fleury (commonly Fleury or

Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire in the diocese of Orléans),

and set the aforesaid Elias over them,

as we have said, in the place of abbot. But of

the precious ornaments with which the place of Glonna formerly

shone, the monks of Tornacum

(Trenorchium) were compelled by the aforesaid count to give back

certain ones, namely the vessel of the Lord's Supper (formerly

received as a gift from Charlemagne, as is handed down in

the Rhythm above at number 20), a thurible with its chains

wrought by St. Eligius, a certain Missal, a certain

Psalter, in which the holy father Florentius is reported

to have read. But of books, charters, relics,

vestments, and palls they gave back few things and of meaner sort.

Elias being dead, Amalbert was substituted in the year 956,

summoned from the abbey of Fleury, over which afterwards

he presided as abbot together with that of Saumur. And he

adorned the church of Saumur, whose matutinal altar

(so called because the matutinal Mass was performed at it)

had been erected in reverence of the pious father Florentius,

with many ornaments, and increased it with many buildings,

which, described at length by the continuator, may be seen

in the cited volume 5, column [ ].

[45] Nearer to our purpose come the things

handed down by the same author, column [ ], in this manner: and in the number of the monks; the basilica is consecrated. Meanwhile,

as the miracles of the most blessed Florentius flashed forth very often,

and his fame flew abroad into foreign regions, in

a short time very many illustrious men took the habit of religion

there, who, together with countless persons

seeking the Saint's suffrage, made that same place, enriched

with ornaments, an object of wonder.

Some, offering their sons according to either Testament,

most devoutly gave them to the Saint. At length,

the basilica being completed after several years in the manner of certain noble

monasteries, count Theobald,

having taken with him Arduin, bishop of the city of Tours,

and the bishop of Angers, with an infinite multitude

of noble Franks and of kinsfolk of either

sex, together with the lord abbot Amalbert, on the XII

Kalends of June solemnly consecrated the place,

and more solemnly translated the body of blessed Florentius.

[46] And not long after, the venerable abbot Amalbert,

determining to preserve so great a treasure under stronger custody,

The sacred relics, transferred it into a bronze casket, in which it is now

kept enclosed, and locked it. But in that

transfer, to declare of what merit

were the bones that were seen, or to confute the irreverent

boldness of presumptuous men, what was done,

in the presence of the abbot and his monks, I shall relate, though

with an unskilled pen. That monk, Absalon

by name, who brought back the relics of the aforesaid Saint

from the Arvernian parts, from the monastery of saint

Philibert, Tornacum by name (this monastery

at the beginning of the same History is rightly placed in Burgundy;

but that variation is one of the reasons

why the editor thinks this part of the History

was written by another, who confounded Tornacum or Trenorchium

with Turnon, a town of Auvergne),

whither they had been carried in a former time by the disturbance

of the Normans — he, God bringing him aid,

brought them back to their own seat, and placed them for a time

in a certain horn shrine to be kept:

from which, when the said abbot, for the sake of safer

custody, had transferred them into that in which

they are now kept, as we have said, he ordered a blacksmith

to come who should draw them out; for they could not otherwise be opened.

[47] the irreverence of a certain man being punished from heaven, And when he had come, being bidden by the abbot to the mausoleum

(it is sometimes also written mauseolum, and is used

for the bier of some saint), holding pincers in his hands,

he approached boldly, as though to his own anvil,

stretched out the pincers, and bit upon the nail. And because

he attempted to do this showing no reverence to the Saint,

the divine vengeance was straightway at hand, which punished the shameless

smith, as his irreverence deserved, with a manifest

loss of his senses. For a certain divine

force, as though a violent whirlwind, going forth from the little chest of the Saint,

struck him invisibly on the forehead,

and presently, the pincers slipping from his hands, he himself

fell backward stupefied. Yet after a little, having recovered

his senses and regained his strength, he tried to withdraw as

quickly as he could, and confirmed with an oath

that he would not go back there again \. But the abbot,*

weighing that this was not done without

a divine nod, thereupon enjoined a three days' fast

upon the brethren, and admonished them that with unanimous

devotion they should implore the Saint's aid, that he

might suffer that to be done to his most holy members which the abbot

had purposed to do.

[48] are publicly translated into a new reliquary. And the supplication and fast being performed, they approach

with great contrition of heart, open the casket,

draw out the venerable bones thence, and lay them up in that

one of metal, made of cast work, in which

they are now contained, all the people of the castle

of Saumur looking on. And that it might plainly appear to all

that none of the Saint's members was lacking, but that all had been brought back

by the aforesaid monk from the parts of Auvergne \,*

except a certain small portion of the head, which

remained there by divine disposition, that in those regions also

the Saint's name might be venerated with worthy honor —

for the inhabitants of that place attest that they have seen

miracles wrought by it from heaven — the often-named

abbot, while all heard and saw,

said such things as these: Behold the arm of St. Florentius, behold

the leg, behold the ribs; and so saying through all the members,

and showing everything to all the people, he placed them

in the casket prepared by himself, and closed the little door

with such skill that it could afterwards be opened

by no one.

[49] The count of Blois, munificent toward the Saint, These things therefore I have thought it worthy to hand down

to the memory of letters, which I learned from the account

of truthful and faithful witnesses. Then count Theobald, filled

with divine fervor, at the exhortation of lord Amalbert,

among manifold benefits gave a couch set above the matutinal

altar, and set upon it the case of blessed Florentius containing

the bronze vessel within it, whose front

and sides he covered with fitting sculptures of images.

And behind he painted \ projecting wooden images,*

and set a silver tablet before the Lord's altar,

whose upper margin bore these

verses:

Whoever knows not the honors of those who are venerated at this altar,

Let him look upon Peter and Paul standing beside Christ.

Which tablet count Theobald ordered to be adorned with silver,

And which abbot Amalbert bids to be figured forth.

[50] is said to have experienced his favor even in dying. So the continuator of the History, who, a few things being interposed,

reports the death of the monk Absalon, who had brought back the relics

from Trenorchium, and presently that of Theobald,

count of Blois, in the following words: At the same time

the mirror of nobility and lover of religion,

Theobald, after many benefits which he

conferred on our church, entered upon the way of all flesh;

and how blessed father Florentius delivered his soul

from the malignant spirits, it has pleased us to set down

in such verses as these. Those verses are divided into three parts,

of which the first touches upon some of Theobald's

deeds; the second the history of his soul,

seized by demons after death, and delivered by St. Florentius

appearing; which history the poet says

is established from the account of Harmatenus, then abbot

of the monastery of Figeac, who three days after Theobald's

death had learned it from a certain hermit; the third

and larger part, lastly, is a prolix prayer to

the Saint. But, as the editor observed, abbot Harmatenus

is not read of in the Chronicle of Figeac in

Baluze, nor in the series of abbots of that same monastery

in the Gallia Christiana. Besides, the whole poem

does not appear of such moment that it is necessary

to give it a place here; let the curious reader see the cited volume 5

of the Amplissima Collectio, column [ ] and following. Moreover, what things

after the erection of the monastery of Saumur we have reported as done up to this point

happened between the years 950 and 986,

in which, or in the preceding year, Amalbert himself is handed down to have died,

abbot at once of Saumur and of Fleury. Robert was substituted

for him at Saumur, whose chief deeds and those of his successors,

and the privileges and gifts granted to the monastery and

church of St. Florentius, our continuator goes on to describe:

but these too may be seen in him.

\ perhaps accederet*

\ of Burgundy*

\ read depinxit*

§ V. The restoration of the monastery of Glonna; the destruction

of that of Saumur; the beginnings of the present-day one near Saumur, and the

translation of the relics made here.

[ ] The monastery of Glonna is restored, The new monastery being built and the number of the monks

increasing, thought was taken also for restoring the old

or Glonnese one; Guallo, a monk

distinguished for nobility and religion, was sent thither, took possession of the place,

and, having taken companions to himself, restored it

as best he could, as the continuator of the History relates at greater length,

adding at column 1094: From that time miracles,

God being their author, began, as many attest, to frequent

the place; very many of which are contained

written down, and some passed over are yet to be written;

and while the congregation grew there, adorned with faith and

with morals, there grew also the patronages and the prodigies

of the Saint, because, though absent in body, yet he was present

in his powers. For he himself had chosen this place

in which benefits and divine mysteries should be wrought, of which

we should greatly wish to write very many, if we did not lack

knowledge of every kind. Yet, trusting in God's

help, we shall relate as we may four which many

without doubt saw in that place

after Guallo's departure. Two of these were seen

under abbot Girard; the other two happened under Frederick.

[52] I have not judged it worth while to transcribe

those four prodigies, and there, as is reported, the Saint is famed for miracles. since in none of them is any

express mention made of St. Florentius. The first consists in this,

that a heavenly song was heard by a monk;

the second, that others saw a procession of men clothed

in white, entering the church after the manner of angels,

and, after a genuflection and veneration paid,

going away to the altar of St. Stephen the protomartyr with

sweet-sounding song; the third, that by night

a wonderful light was beheld in the monastery both by others

and by abbot Frederick. The fourth, lastly,

that toward evening an aged man, comely of venerable

aspect, clothed in a white garment, and bearing in his hand

a purple Cross, flew through the air in the sight of the neighbors,

and vanished above the pinnacle of the monastery.

A fifth prodigy the same author adds,

which, because it belonged to the ninth century,

I have given above at number 34. I return to the monastery of Saumur.

[53] Fulk, count of Anjou, The often-mentioned continuator of the History goes on,

as I was saying above toward the end of the preceding §, to relate

the deeds of the successors of abbot Amalbert; but, if

you except the privileges and gifts with which the monastery was enriched,

and the ornaments with which the church was adorned —

whence at least we gather the remarkable veneration of the faithful

toward the Patron of the place — he brings forward nothing here particularly

to be recorded down to the year

1025, in which the abbey again met with misfortunes,

and the monks withdrew thence with the relics of the Saint.

The occasion of these was the war between Fulk, count

of Anjou, and Odo, surnamed the Champenois,

the nephew and heir of the often-praised Theobald,

who had then committed the custody of the castle of Saumur, built by his

forefathers, to Gelduin,

a vigorous warrior. Take the rest from the continuator, column

1115: At the same time Gelduin, a most noble man, presided over the lordship

of Saumur — fierce by nature,

vigorous in arms, comely in form, thronged with a long train of barons

and knights, penetrating with arms the enemies near at hand,

and deterring the distant by his fame alone.

As often as Fulk, count of the Angevins, passed through

his neighborhood, terrified with fear he would say: “Let us flee

the demon of Saumur, for I always seem

to see him before my sight.”

At length, oppressed by his valor, he brought at last

a numerous army against Saumur.

[54] waging war against Odo the Champenois, Then Gelduin sends a messenger to Fulk

that he should make a truce. But Fulk, being crafty and

greedy, interpreting this word fraudulently,

orders the army to halt, and in the place

formerly called Clementiniacum built a castle, which he named Treves,

to repress the power of the men of Saumur.

For from the ancient times of the kings of France,

who freely held Anjou and the Neustrian region, the village of Gegina

bounded the most polished lordship, commonly called the vicariate,

belonging to the castle of Saumur. At that time,

on the summit of Montboyau \, toward the city of Tours, Fulk*

made a very strong castle, which count Odo besieged with

a great army, while Fulk on the other side strove to drive him off;

and forces being gathered on both sides, they appointed a public

battle, to which Gelduin

with the men of Saumur, and the men of Chinon also and the Islanders,

summoned with the Franks, come together.

[55] intercepts Saumur; And when Fulk had already reached the village of Brenolde,

he met a certain man who announced that the Franks

were more manifold and far more numerous.

Then Fulk, reflecting that Saumur was empty and alone,

directs his course back, and, having forded the Loire and the Vienne,

besieging the castle unexpectedly with a heavy army,

took it by force; and from the castle, which was to suffer utter

ruin by fire, he drew forth the revered clod of the father

Florentius. But abbot Frederick

and the monks, considering the heavy army,

and more heavily fearing the burning of the flames,

taking with them the body of their holy Patron and the relics of the Saints,

went out, like Lot from Sodom, or like

Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees, in the year 1025.

Fulk indeed suffered them to go out of the castle, but did not at once

permit them to go farther away. For he had determined in his mind

to carry the sacred relics over to Angers,

and to build a more honorable church for the Saint,

as we clearly understand from the words which, a few things being interposed,

are subjoined.

[56] Meanwhile, says the same continuator, there are said to have been

sixty who in that same tumult, coming out from their filthy hiding places,

brought fire to the town, the count

crying out very often: meditating to carry the Saint's relics to Angers, St. Florentius, permit yourself to be burned,

for I shall build you a better dwelling at Angers.

And when he had adjudged to seek Angers again with his clod,

since his own men could not carry the Saint,

being borne by the monks he straightway leapt

into a certain prow, and thus somehow, from Treves by

the Saint's own right, he came so far, not being about to carry him beyond it.

For in a wonderful manner, when his boatmen were busy at sailing across

the Saint's land, it seemed to them that

where the wave of the river lay deepest, there the raft was held fast

by the sand, though it had passed the harbor. Then,

straining with all their strength, they were in no wise able to depart from the Saint's

borders. But as soon as the duke recognized that he could on no

condition go forward with the relics, and that the Saint

would not be separated from his monastery by his own will, calling him impious

and rustic, and one who wished no good

to be done him, he spurned the heaping up of honor he had vowed at Angers,

and straightway abandoned them, and withdrew

not without wonder. But to the abbot and monks

he said that they should seek again their station at Saumur, as

before: but when they, on account of many straits, resisted,

he assented to their prayer, and asserts that he would come, at an appointed time,

together with his wife, to provide a fit place

for the monastery.

[57] Then the monks, taking up that Blessed one,

brought him back with ineffable joy, is hindered from heaven; the monks, the count decreeing

that no further violence should be done. The brethren therefore,

bowing down and pouring forth prayer, went back against the current of the river more lightly

than the boatmen had before been carried down,

the abundance of their rowing driving them on. Then

they came to the church of St. Hilary at the place upon which the name

of Cryptae has been imposed: where, having laid down

their burden, exceedingly wearied both with fear

and with the journey, they sat down. Then, the community being

sent by ship to Glonna, abbot Frederick and prior Lethard,

with the number of seven brethren together, determined to remain

so long, performing the divine work as they were able,

until they should have begun in a chosen place a receptacle

for the aforesaid burden; for they possessed all the neighboring land in

the Saint's right. And as they searched out a place,

without delay a place chosen beforehand by the Lord was found,

which of old was called Bonali-vadum, beside

the river Thouet at the thorny field; where in the year 1026,

in the month of August, God being their author, they began that magnificent

new monastery, at whose fabric

a number of workmen from outside daily pressed on in various places;

and when all were carefully counted through the day,

there was always found one at work who

nowhere appeared at the payment. To this structure

the countess Hildegard, of remarkable holiness and piety,

brought most excellent aid.

Moreover she had built her own charnel \ behind the crypt of blessed Mary,*

avoiding favors or flatterers:

who, when she was pressed by the harsh yoke of her husband, mitigated

his ferocity by her most wise acts.

Thus far the continuator, whose phrasing here and there is rather obscure,

but probably has been corrupted by the transcribers.

[58] The same things are reported compendiously in the Chronicle

of St. Maixent, the castle of Saumur being burned, they raise another not far thence which is commonly called that of Maillezais, in

Labbe, volume 2 of the Bibliotheca Mss., page 206.

In the year 1025 the castle of Saumur was taken by Fulk,

and Gelduin was put to flight. Then abbot Frederick,

in the fourth year of his ordination, and the brethren who

were with him, snatched from the midst of the fires books and

certain ecclesiastical ornaments, and taking the body

of saint Florentius and the written relics of the rest,

they go to the church of St. Hilary, and there, living for some

years in little huts after the manner of guests,

they began to build that new church. The author

of the shorter History of the overthrow of the old monastery

of St. Florentius, whose text here

is mutilated, also mentions in a few words this overthrow

of the monastery of Saumur: but he hints that it was done

with abbot Frederick not much unwilling, inasmuch as he judged

that a dwelling in such a castle was not suited

to monastic discipline. Take his words also:

From the beginning of his ordination to the time

of the burning and taking, safe … \ it was by Fulk*

count of the Angevins, greater … \ He (Frederick) found*

the monastic Order lukewarm … \*

and almost already fallen, which by both preaching and working

he made fervent and raised up, and changed

into a better state. The dwelling in the castle was

very burdensome to him, and perilous

and hurtful to the souls of the brethren; but they were delivered by the divine

ordinance. For when they saw themselves surrounded by an army,

and hedged in on every side by flames, taking

the body of their Patron and the relics of the Saints,

they went out like Lot from Sodom, or like Abraham

from the fire of the Chaldees, and came to the church

of St. Hilary, and there they remained, performing

the divine work as they were able; and not long after the new monastery

was begun. What was faulty here

I have corrected in the margin from the longer History,

where the same things are read at column [ ].

[59] they raise a monastery, in whose basilica This was the last migration of the monks;

for in the said place, not far from the town of Saumur,

they thereafter remained, and until now their descendants

dwell there in a most famous abbey. Hither,

in the sixth year after the monastery was begun, they translated

the sacred remains of their Patron, as the often-mentioned

continuator of the longer History attests, column

1117: In the year 1030, therefore, on the VI Nones of May, they happily translated

the aforesaid burden into the new monastery,

still unfinished in the right member,

above the altar of St. John the Baptist, where there was gathered

an immense multitude, not only of neighbors,

but also of those set far off. There was present also

Geoffrey Tutides, son of Fulk, with his father

and mother and all the chief men of the Angevins.

The same writer, some things being interposed, takes up

his account in this manner, column [ ]: After

that magnificent edifice of the work was completed, God helping,

abbot Frederick called together

four bishops for the dedication: Arnulf

of Tours, Hubert of Angers, Isembert

of Poitiers, Walter of Nantes; there was present

also Geoffrey, count of the Angevins, with his honorable

mother Hildegard and his wife named

Agnes, and with him many noble men, and also

a people of both sexes of infinite multitude, abbots

and monks and clerics, of whom there is no number.

[60] the relics are solemnly laid up, the church being dedicated, Then the church was dedicated in honor of the holy

Trinity, and in honor of holy Mary ever Virgin,

and in memory of the blessed apostles Peter and

Paul, and of St. Florentius the confessor.

In the year of the Lord's \ Incarnation 1041 that dedication was made.* The same things

in almost the same words the author of the shorter History hands down;

but the chronicler of St. Maixent, cited at number

58, adds the day also, saying: And it was dedicated

by them on the Ides of October. To these the Sainte-Marthes add,

volume 4 of the Gallia Christiana, page 393: Which day

from that time was there most famous; yet

they did not utterly abandon the monastery in the castle of Saumur, in which

they had dwelt, but rebuilding it somewhat,

they had it reconciled by Hubert, bishop of the Angevins,

and inhabited by certain of

themselves. But about twenty years having elapsed,

the monastery of Glonna, or Old St. Florentius,

was dedicated also, namely in the year one thousand

and sixty-one, on the XVIII Kalends of July, by lord

Eusebius, bishop of the Angevins, in honor of the Holy Savior

and of St. Florentius the confessor, as expressly

note the author of the shorter History and the continuator of the longer.

[61] In the following century, in the basilica of the new monastery near

Saumur, there was made once more a translation of the relics

of our Saint, [and they are once again

placed in a new reliquary.] and that, so far as may be gathered from the number of the bishops

who took part, a most solemn one.

The second continuator of the longer History committed it

to writing, namely Michael, who was elected abbot there

about the year 1202, and therefore was very near

to the events. He has it thus, column [ ]:

In the time of this father (abbot Philip) the body of blessed Florentius

was translated into a new case, more carefully

prepared, in which the Saint now rests with due

veneration: to which translation, by

the precept of Pope Adrian (IV) of happy memory,

there came Joscius archbishop of Tours,

Matthew of Angers, Stephen of Rennes,

William of Le Mans, Laurence of Poitiers,

Bernard of Nantes, who all with the highest

honor and reverence, the bones of the venerable confessor

Florentius most reverently translating, in the year from the Lord's

Incarnation 1159, on the VI Nones of May, granted

to all the faithful who at that same term should seek with pious devotion

the suffrages of the most blessed Florentius,

remission and indulgence of their sins every

year. This account of the translation, if you regard

its author, will seem the best attested of all that I have given

hitherto; but if he means that here was translated

either the entire body or the greater part of it,

it will also be the hardest of all to understand, as

the following § will show.

\ elsewhere Budelli*

\* that is, a tomb

\ read Salmuri, quæ facta*

\ read mansit in Salmuro*

\ add & depravatum*

\ elsewhere Dominicæ*

§ VI. The translation of the relics from Saumur to Roye, and from Roye again to Saumur.

[ ] At Roye in Picardy I have followed the various vicissitudes of the monastery of Glonna

and of Saumur down to the XII century, in order that

I might myself learn, and set before my readers, whither and how often the relics

of St. Florentius were translated;

but in that same XII century a very grave difficulty

occurs. For about seven years before

the time at which Michael, cited at number 61, the contemporary continuator

of the Saumur History, attests that the Saint's body was solemnly translated

in the monastery of Saumur from one

case into another, that same body is written to have been translated in like

manner in the collegiate church

of the town of Roye in Picardy, which has honored our Saint

as its chief patron

for several centuries past. The instrument of this translation

was sent from a manuscript of Roye to our Predecessors

in the year 1650; but even before that, namely in 1637,

it had been published in print by Father Antoine de la Vacquerie,

page 222 of the Life of St. Florentius published at Paris, who says he received it

from the Reverend Father du Bois, Prior of the monastery of Saumur,

drawn from the archive of that same monastery,

and transcribed from the original found in the reliquary itself

when it was carried in the year 1480 from Roye

to the said monastery, as I shall set out at greater length

below.

[63] The instrument runs thus: Be it known to all

present and to come, in the 12th century they are laid up in a new reliquary that the sacred body of blessed

Florentius the confessor was translated from the old vessel

and laid up in the present vessel by the sacred hands

of Theodoric of Amiens, and by the sacred hands of Baldwin,

bishop of Noyon, on the fourth Kalends of October.

Done in the presence and with the testimony of the clergy and people

of Roye, in the year from the Lord's Incarnation one thousand

one hundred and fifty-two, Eugenius the third

sitting at Rome, Samson being archbishop at Reims,

Louis (the seventh) reigning as king of the Franks,

son of king Louis (the sixth), Radulf

being count of Vermandois, in the presence of Guarinus

provost of Amiens, and of Hilgot, dean of Roye.

So both in the manuscript and in the printed copy; but in the latter

the following are added: I, master Robert, canon of the same

place and guardian of St. Quentin, wrote this;

the seal of blessed George the martyr; the sign of Hugh

the cleric; the sign of Hugh, chancellor of Noyon.

[64] translated thither from Saumur The same Antoine de la Vacquerie, page 225,

from the same archive of Saumur exhibits a Latin inscription

which in the year 1480 was read on the aforesaid

reliquary, and which indicated whence, in what

manner, and at what time the men of Roye believed the sacred body

had been brought to them. It runs thus: At the foot of the said

case, on either side, the following are written

in azure letters: “In the times of the most glorious

prince Henry, king of the Franks, Hugh, count

of Vermandois, son of the king of the Franks,

translated the body of saint Florentius from near Saumur and

beside the channel of the Loire, then shining

with miracles of every kind, by force of arms to the church of saint George

of Roye, in the year of the Lord one thousand

and thirty-five, on the twenty-fifth day of May.” By

Hugh the author of the inscription wished here to designate

Hugh the Great, son of Henry I, king

of the Franks, who obtained the county of Vermandois

through his wife Adela, daughter of count

Heribert; but the chronological notes do not stand. Henry

the first, king of the Franks, had three sons: Philip,

Hugh, and Robert; of whom the eldest

and heir, Philip, was only seven years old

when his father died in the year 1060; and therefore the said

translation could not have been made by Hugh in the times

of Henry I, much less in the year 1035, in which he was not yet

born.

[65] the Saint's relics, Another instrument, drawn up in French,

Vacquerie produces at page 212, in which before two

royal notaries in the year 1492 master Jacob, canon of Chartres,

attested that when in the year 1475

he was at Roye in the retinue of Louis XI, king of the Gauls,

he saw there, and showed to that same king, who demanded it,

an ancient codex, in which was written the translation

of the relics from the monastery of Saumur to Roye,

made by force of arms by the count of Vermandois;

but neither is the count's name expressed, nor is the year

marked. However that may be, the abbot and monks of Saumur,

both by words and by deeds, sufficiently acknowledged

in the 15th century that the true relics of St. Florentius their patron

had for many centuries been preserved and honored in the church

of Roye, although they had long been ignorant of it and had thought

that all of them had always remained in their own keeping. These things

will appear in the course of the narrative. Now let us try to unravel, at least

by conjecture, the difficulty raised from the translation

made at Roye in the year 1152, and from that made in

the monastery of Saumur in the year 1159.

[66] probably not all, but the greater part. Let us grant, then, that it is true that the Saint's

relics were, toward the end of the XI century or certainly before the middle

of the following one, taken from the church of Saumur and carried

to Roye: it does not necessarily follow from this

that none at all were left there; or, if all

were carried off, nothing prevents us from believing that some parts

were afterwards restored at the entreaty of the monks,

with the intercession of the bishops and magnates of Anjou,

nay, at the bidding of Adrian IV, the Roman Pontiff,

by whose precept the bishops are said to have come

to Saumur for the translation made with great pomp

in the year 1159, seven years after the men of Roye

had raised either the whole body or the greater part of it and

translated it into a new case. But, you say,

in both instruments the translation is described in such a way

as if the entire body had been in both places. I answer

that scarcely anything is more frequent than that a part

of a body should be called the body. But why did no record survive

among the men of Saumur, down to the XV century, of the relics translated

to Roye? For in the letters

of the year 1496, which I shall give entire below,

the abbot and monks confessed it in this manner:

We being ignorant of all these things, nay rather

believing or supposing that those relics

had of old been and were shut up and laid up in a certain metal case,

covered, that is, in the ancient and

notable silver case which from all time has been with

us. I should think that this was done of set purpose

by the monks of the XII century, who, lest the zeal and

devotion of the people toward the Saint should cool, so translated

the remaining parts of the body, or those restored

by the men of Roye, into a new case, as though they still then possessed the whole,

or almost the whole, body: which opinion

little by little so prevailed that even among the monks themselves,

their descendants, the memory of the relics translated

to Roye perished.

[67] These relics the men of Roye preserved with the greatest veneration

In the 15th century and possessed in quiet down

to the year 1475, in which, or in the following, they were for a time

deprived of them. The occasion was the war then

blazing between king Louis XI and Charles,

duke of Burgundy; for when Louis

had occupied by arms Roye, which had followed Charles's party,

he learned from an ancient codex brought to him that the relics of St.

Florentius had of old been carried thither by force of arms

by the count of Vermandois from the abbey of Saumur.

Whereat being angry, he set out for Amiens, and

asked and obtained from the bishop's vicar the faculty

of removing and carrying the relics to the monastery

of Saumur; and the charge of executing this business

was committed to masters Philibert de Best

and George Robinet, canons of the church of St. Stephen of Bourges,

and to several other ecclesiastics. So

nearly says master Jacob, canon of Chartres, cited at number 65,

in a testimony given before the royal notaries

in the year 1492.

[68] The remaining course of the affair was attested by a similar instrument,

in the same year and before the same notaries, by the just-mentioned

George Robinet, canon of Bourges: they are brought back again to Saumur.

he asserts, then, that having received letters from the king, he went

from Amiens to Roye, but was hindered by the men of Roye

from taking away the relics. When he had reported this

to the king, he was sent thither a second time with master

Philibert de Best, doctor and royal chaplain,

and with many others. But arriving there,

they found neither body nor case; the men of Roye had meanwhile

hidden them in a place not far from the town;

where at length, on the information of certain persons, they were found

and, by the king's command and at his expense, handed over to the men of Saumur

by the said Philibert de Best and others.

The aforesaid witness adds that the king did these things of his own

motion, no one of the men of Saumur soliciting it. This,

however, the men of Roye afterwards denied, when, king Louis being dead,

they brought suit against the men of Saumur before the royal council

of Paris, that the relics taken from them

might be restored. For they contended

that these things were done at the instigation of the monks, and namely

of John du Bellay, once their abbot,

who was then king Louis's almoner;

these things are described at length in the sentence to be mentioned in the following §;

but there is no need to report such things here, just as neither

the injury and violence there set out as inflicted on the men of Roye

to make them disclose the hidden treasure.

[69] The men of Saumur celebrated the translation in the year

1480, and recorded it in writing with a description of the case and of the relics,

the beginning of which Vacquerie exhibits

at page 218, A description of the case, as follows: In the name

of the Lord, Amen. There follows the manner and order

of the translation of the body of the most blessed Florentius the confessor,

which was celebrated in the church of the monastery of that same most blessed

Florentius near Saumur, and

completed in the year of the same Lord one thousand four hundred

and eighty, on the twenty-fifth day

of the month of June, by the precept and will of the most glorious

prince Louis, king of the Franks, etc. Here

the editor stops, not indicating whether he passes over much

or little, and then subjoins these words: Which

case from Roye was of wood, but covered over with silver

throughout with bronze plates, and adorned both round about and above

with these images:

namely on the front \ the image of our Lord*

sitting on a throne and holding a book, with this superscription:

Ego sum Alpha & Omega; on either

side the images of six Apostles in their seats

and canopies, with their names subscribed;

and at the end \ the image of St. Florentius with his name subscribed.*

On the roof of the same were written the following verses,

with pictures belonging to them.

Here Florentius is bidden to go to Martin,

To cross the river, and fears not to do so without an oarsman.

Here a man is with difficulty restrained by many, in his madness \*,

When the holy Man, by prayer, drives out the plague and heals him.

Made a priest, he is held famous for these signs:

By this a woman receives back her son and obtains her sight;

He guards the astonished people from the serpent's mouth;

Whom the present tomb declares to flourish in heaven.

[70] in which they were in the year 1480, The verses recited will receive elucidation

from the Life and miracles to be appended to the Commentary.

But here again the editor indicates that a few lines have been omitted

by him, and thus takes up the account: But in

the aforesaid case which was brought from Roye,

the sacred bones of the most blessed Florentius were found wrapped

in a deerskin most decently, as brother Absalon was able,

when by a pious theft he carried off those same sacred bones from Tornacum \*

and brought them; which bones indeed in

the deerskin shone with wonderful soundness and beauty,

nor were they at all decayed with any age.

In which, moreover, there were found two testimonial

letters concerning the translation of that same sacred

body into that case, made by the sacred hands of Theodoric

of Amiens and of Baldwin of Noyon, bishops

(in the year 1152), with the seals of the chapter of the aforesaid

church of saint George of Roye, bearing the impression

of the image of saint George himself armed and

on horseback, and those of the said bishops, together with

a certain leaden plate of the length of one hand's breadth

and one thumb, and of the width of two fingers,

on which this writing was engraved:

Here rests the body of saint Florentius;

which seals and plate hung from the thongs of that same

deerskin; the tenor of which letters

follows. The letters here referred to I have given

at number 63; and the inscription of the case, from which we gather that

the relics were carried from the church of Saumur to that of Roye

before the middle of the XII century, I recited

at number 64.

[71] while they were transferred into two new ones. Moreover the reason why the inspection and translation

of the often-mentioned relics was celebrated only

in the year 1480, although, as appears, they had already

been brought from Roye to the abbey of Saumur since

the year 1475, was probably the making of two cases,

which the abbot and monks mention

in the authentic letters drawn up in the year 1492. I shall exhibit them

entire in the following §; take meanwhile what

belongs here: The most Christian King himself (Louis

XI), showing forth his devotion of this kind, and as

a sign and perpetual memorial of the foregoing,

made at his own expense one case for the head, and another

in which to lay the body of that same Patron of ours,

gilded with silver and otherwise ennobled;

and giving them to our church, commanded us

that the often-named relics, both those

which he had sent from Roye and those which we already

preserved before, if we had any, we should procure to be laid up

together, with fitting solemnity, in

the aforesaid cases so given by him, to be venerated in our monastery in perpetual

and future times:

which also was done, certain legates, expressly appointed by him for this,

acting and looking on.

\ add habebat*

\ add erat*

\ read vesanus*

\ Trenorchium*

§ VII. The friendly composition of the suit brought by the men of Roye against the abbot and monks of Saumur, and the division of the relics.

[ ] After a sharp suit the cause is adjudged to the men of Roye; Louis XI being dead, and Charles VIII

holding the kingdom in the Gauls, new disturbances arose

on occasion of the same relics. For the dean

and canons of the church of Roye, bearing ill

the absence of the sacred treasure which for about four centuries

they had enjoyed, brought suit against the abbot and

monks of Saumur, contending that it had been unjustly taken

from them, and demanding that it should be

restored. Much and sharply was the matter disputed

at Paris in the court of the masters of requests,

commonly called la chambre des requêtes du Palais;

and at length those judges, by a sentence given on the 2nd day

of April in the year 1491, adjudged the cause to the men of Roye,

enjoining the men of Saumur to restore to them both the case

and the relics. The men of Saumur appealed

to the supreme court, commonly the Parlement,

and meanwhile procured new supports for their cause,

such as were the testimonies of masters Jacob and George

Robinet, canons, cited in the preceding §; but

none the less they lost the cause, and were ordered to restore

the case with the relics. Of this sentence, given

in the year 1494 on the XIV day of August, Vacquerie exhibits only the following

beginning, page 229: Charles by the grace

of God king of the Franks, to all who shall inspect these present letters,

greeting. We make known, etc.

[73] But not even so, as the history has it, according to Vacquerie,

did the men of Saumur acquiesce, but at last, the reasons of both parties being reported, until in the year

1496 — I know not what cause intervened — the suit was composed

by the consent of both parties, and in a truly Christian

manner. Learn this manner from the following instrument.

To all who shall inspect and hear these present letters,

Louis, humble abbot of the monastery of saint

Florentius near Saumur, of the Order of saint Benedict,

of the diocese of Angers, and the convent of the same place;

and also John Carton, dean, Peter

de Biaurains and Noël Desponchaulx, priests

and canons, and proctors of the secular and collegiate church

likewise of blessed Florentius of Roye, of the diocese

of Amiens, everlasting greeting in the Savior of all.

We make known by these presents that a certain controversy

was long agitated between us, the dean,

canons, and chapter of the aforesaid church of

Roye, plaintiffs on the one part, and the abbot and

convent, defendants on the other part. For we

of Roye said that we had been despoiled of the relics of that same

blessed and most holy confessor Florentius, namely of his head

and body, together with the shrine or coffer in

which the head, and the case in which the body, separately

rested, and were preserved in our church, and

were venerated with devout office. From \ which church indeed*

we contended that they had been carried away against justice

to the said monastery of Saumur, concerning the foregoing;

for which reason we asked to be restored in full.

[74] it is composed in a friendly way; But we, the abbot and monks, on the contrary answered

that Louis of happy memory, formerly the eighth \ king*

of the Franks, restored to his dominion the town of the said

Roye, for some time held by his rebels,

and going thither in person, learned from either true

or probable documents that in ancient times a certain

count of Vermandois took away those relics from that same monastery

by an onset of arms and translated them to the church

of Roye. Wherefore, moved by devotion, that same most pious

king determined to restore those sanctuaries to their own place,

and sent them honorably to our monastery,

as appears under letters patent; and he made it publicly known

in oft-repeated words, we being ignorant of all these things,

nay rather believing or supposing that those relics

had of old been and were shut up and laid up in a certain metal

case, covered, that is, in the ancient and notable silver case which

from all time has been with us.

And that the most Christian King himself,

showing forth his devotion of this kind,

and as a sign and perpetual memorial of the foregoing,

made at his own expense one case for the head, and another

in which to lay the body of that same Patron of ours,

gilded with silver and otherwise ennobled;

and giving them to our church,

commanded us that the often-named relics,

both those which he had sent from Roye and

those which we already preserved before, if we had any,

we should procure to be laid up together, with fitting

solemnity, in the aforesaid cases so given by him, to be venerated in our monastery

in perpetual and future times:

which also was done, certain legates, expressly appointed

by him for this, acting and looking on. We said moreover that if perhaps

part or all of the often-named relics rested in

the church of Roye, this was by force, as is set forth above.

Wherefore we concluded that we in that case had been unjustly despoiled

and justly restored; but that those venerable

men of Roye had not been despoiled, nor ought to be restored;

nay, that they should render thanks to the church of Saumur,

of whose most precious things they had had the use.

[75] amicably; Finally, after many altercations, God

being propitious, who is peace and charity, we came to this perpetual

concord: namely, that

those most venerable relics, both of the head and of the body,

should first be drawn from the said new cases in which they were covered,

in the presence of us, the monks,

and of the dean and canons, and should be decently laid uncovered

upon the high altar of the present church:

which also was done with devout

and due solemnity by the reverend fathers in Christ,

the lords and abbots of saint Maur upon

the Loire and of Asnières-Bellay of the diocese of Angers,

with no small attendance of clergy, nobles, and people of various

ranks. Finally, that we,

the abbot and the several monks of the aforesaid convent, should swear

before God and His glorious Mother,

and saint Florentius and the heavenly court, that, so far as

human frailty allows us to know, we reputed

and repute those same relics to be those which

had been carried away from the district of Roye, as is set forth above,

without any guile or fraud done by us or by any

person with our knowledge: which likewise

we swore, and by these presents we swear.

[76] the relics These things being thus accomplished, by express consent

and by a stipulation previously had between us, the abbot and

convent personally, and the chapter and church

of Roye in the person of the dean and canons

aforenamed, proctors of that church,

and in the name of proctors, each of us both

jointly and severally have willed and expressly consented,

and do will and expressly consent

by the tenor of these presents, that the relics both

of the head and of the body of our common patron

the most blessed Florentius, to be named below, be given, assigned,

and in fact handed over to the often-named church

of Roye, to be there preserved in perpetuity to the praise

and glory of almighty God and of that same Patron,

and to the increase of the devotion of the people; and that whatever

others remain over should, for a like cause,

remain in the present monastery from now in perpetuity.

[77] Hence it is that straightway to the said venerable

proctors, are divided; and to each of them assembled together

and receiving in the name of proctors as above, there were divided

and handed over really and in fact, by the said reverend fathers, from the relics which,

as has often been said, had been carried away from Roye:

namely both lower jaws entire,

with their chin naturally cohering with each other,

and nine of their teeth likewise

fastened to them; moreover one of the principal

bones of the neck, which are commonly called the vertebrae or knots

of the neck; also one such from the spine

of the back; three ribs also of the more precious ones; the two larger

bones of one arm, namely the first reaching from

the shoulder blade to the elbow \, and the other stretching from the elbow*

to the hand; moreover the larger and more principal

bone of one hip; likewise the great and single

bone of the other thigh, namely from the hip

to the knee, and the principal bone of one shin, extending from the knee

to the foot. Which relics, indeed,

being at present appointed, were, with all beholding,

reverently and decently laid up by the said reverend fathers,

namely the jaws with the vertebra of the neck in the silver shrine,

and the rest in the case which, as is set forth above, had been carried away

from Roye. But the other parts and limbs, both of the head

and of the body, those same prelates laid up in like

form, each separately, in the cases appointed by lord Louis

the king, as is set forth above, to be preserved in the present

monastery. With all which

we, both monks and proctors, are content,

and we mutually acquit \ one another in perpetuity.*

[78] Moreover, enlarging charity by this peace,

we have contracted a perennial brotherhood and fellowship of both

our churches and of the persons of the same, a fellowship is entered upon, namely in the sharing of prayers,

alms, abstinences, suffrages,

vigils, and the other spiritual goods,

which shall henceforth be performed by us and by those subject to us,

in heads and in members; in temporal necessities also

we shall aid one another: and especially

we the monks shall celebrate a solemn anniversary

on the twenty-third of the month of July in every

year for our deceased and living brethren

of the church of Roye, such as is customary in those

which are performed for our abbots in copes, together

with the feeding of a poor man, as is specially

ordained in certain obits. And they, the lords and brethren,

shall likewise do on the said day for ever for

us and our dead, as they are accustomed to celebrate

in the solemn anniversaries for the deans of their

church.

[79] And that the fellowship or covenant entered upon between those

churches might be of greater strength, and, gifts being given on both sides memory, or firmness,

precious gifts of venerable relics were bestowed on both sides

out of a merely liberal spirit:

namely, on the part of the church of Roye there was given

to our monastery a certain notable relic from the bones

of the most glorious Florianus the martyr, brother of the often-named

Florentius our patron, the confessor, covered under

a silver shrine greatly ennobled, which we

received with thanksgiving: and by reciprocal charity

we promised that we would offer some of ours to the same,

all beholding these things and devoutly rejoicing;

which, the crowd having straightway dispersed, we the monks fulfilled,

yet not as we ought, but as much

as we lawfully could. We gave, namely, to our sister

church of Roye some of the hairs of saint Quentin the martyr,

separately in a little vessel appointed for this; and moreover

we offered to those same proctors several relics

of the holy virgins Petronilla and Genevieve, though mingled

together, so that they might separate what was permitted them,

and order them to be placed in the reliquary offered to them;

whence it came about that, the relics of those virgins

and their quality having been diligently inspected by

those canons, and by some other men

skilled in such matters, they chose, as conveniently

as they could, two bones apiece of each virgin; and, prayer

being completed, kindly took them to be carried away

to their own church.

[80] it is confirmed. These things were done in the often-named monastery

of saint Florentius, with many venerable and notable

persons of every state and condition, as is set forth above,

assisting, and called to witness,

whose names we most earnestly beseech to be noted with their own hands

upon these present letters; even as also

we, the parties written above, set down and note our names,

together with the appending of our seals,

in faith, strength, and testimony of the foregoing,

on this twenty-third of the month of July in the year

of the Lord one thousand four hundred and ninety-six. And below: And I, Louis, abbot of saint Florentius;

and moreover brother Peter Piuam, monk of the above-

said abbey and bearer \, have strengthened*

these letters with the sign of my hand. Piuam. It is added in the French

tongue that the copy of these letters was taken

from the archive of the collegiate church of Roye, and collated

with its original drawn up on parchment, and that by

the mandate of the canons it was subscribed by master

Louis Cadde, royal notary and scribe of the chapter,

in the year 1650, on the XVI day of September.

\ add qua*

\* rather, the eleventh

\ the elbow*

\ we acquit*

\ probably procurator*

§ VIII. The solemn reception of the relics at Roye, the yearly cult there and in other places.

[ ] The men of Roye, From time immemorial, as I have intimated before,

the men of Roye have honored St. Florentius as

the chief patron of their town, and indeed with such

fervor and zeal that the collegiate and

principal church, once consecrated to St. George the martyr,

they little by little came to call by St. Florentius's name, which

name clings to it even today; and they have celebrated his yearly

memory on the XXII day with a solemn Office and proper Mass,

abstaining from all servile work.

That festival continues even to now, a vast multitude of men

flocking to his sacred relics not only on that day, as Vacquerie writes,

but through the whole course of the year. Hence no one

will wonder that so much toil and labor was expended

by the dean and canons of Roye to recover the relics taken away

in the XV century, and that so much joy

was shown both by them and by the people when they had gained

their wish, as the aforesaid Vacquerie describes,

page 233 and following.

[82] First he asserts that several miracles were wrought

both in the places celebrate with festivity the return of the relics, made illustrious by miracles, through which the sacred relics were carried

from the monastery of Saumur as far as Roye, and

particularly here at their arrival. For then, citing

he says that speech was restored to the dumb,

hearing to the deaf, upright walking to the lame. Then from

a tradition received from a noble, honorable, and pious old man, he sets out

the preparation and reception in about this manner.

As soon as the men of Roye were informed of the happy return

of their pious Patron, they emulously took pains to surpass

one another in the showing of honor and in the testifying of their love

toward him. To that end they made ready great

preparations of joy and solemn gladness,

sparing nothing that they might make known to everyone

the delight of their minds.

[83] But in the very carrying out, a great misfortune somewhat disturbed

the festivity. and decree that it is to be celebrated yearly Among the various

triumphal arches erected at the entrance of the town,

a machine had been made, from which a boy,

dressed in the likeness of a genius, was to descend gently and offer the keys of the town

to the reliquary; but this, being not solidly enough

constructed, gave way and fell, with immediate peril

to the boy sitting on it. Seeing which, the crowd of bystanders, stricken,

cried out: St. Florentius, save the boy; St.

Florentius, pray for us: he escaped unhurt,

and by that prodigy the veneration of men toward the Saint increased,

and the confidence which they had placed in

his prayers and merits was confirmed. Finally, according

to the same Vacquerie, in thanksgiving for

the happy return of the relics the men of Roye instituted a festival

to be celebrated yearly in their church with a peculiar Office

on the Sunday within the octave of the Assumption

of the most blessed Virgin Mary into heaven.

[84] To that peculiar Office belong most probably,

or at least once belonged, the lessons with

an antiphon and several responsories, with a peculiar Office: the lessons which, transcribed from a parchment

original of the collegiate church of Roye by the order

of the canons, collated, and furnished with the testimony of the royal notary

Louis Cadde, Father Florent

Montmorency, a priest of the Society of Jesus, communicated to our Predecessors

in the year 1650. This title

is prefixed to them: At the reception of St. Florentius. Lessons.

Then three are subjoined containing as many miracles,

as follows: But as time went on, and the fame

of inexplicable miracles upon diverse kinds

of sicknesses flew abroad through the neighboring towns,

when the people of Paris, Rouen, Beauvais,

Amiens, Arras, Cambrai, Thérouanne,

Laon, Noyon, Péronne,

and folk from distant regions came down in troops to the church of saint

Florentius for the sake of recovering health,

it happened that a certain Alutharius

of Beauvais, who had been most bitterly tormented by a malignant spirit

for the space of eight years,

on which account he had his hands joined \ with iron fetters;*

he, after he had for some days prayed to God and

to saint Florentius, leaving his iron fetters in the church,

returned home sound and unharmed.

But Thou, O Lord, etc.

[85] These things therefore being so, there was a certain man fifty

and seven years old, proper to the Office sprung from the town of Fulieres

near Péronne, who for the space of ten

years was tormented with the greatest pain of elbows, hands, knees,

and feet, so much so that very often he was compelled to lie down,

or else to support his infirm body

with two crutches \: he with great devotion*

went to the church of blessed Florentius, and after he had poured forth prayers

in that same church to God and to saint Florentius, casting away his crutches

and supports, he returned home sound. But

Thou, O Lord, etc.

And not long after, a certain military man fifty-

two years of age, sprung from the town of St.

Quentin, who over long intervals of time

had, from a lasting infirmity, a body so lifeless and

weak that for three days, from excessive

sickness, he had been able to taste no food:

he, when he had arrived at St. Florentius's and had made

his prayer, took up again his former strength, and magnificently praised God

and saint Florentius. But

Thou, O Lord, etc.

[86] and the Responsories are here recited, One antiphon is added: Rejoice thou, Bavaria,

for the great glory of Florentius; but let the church of Roye

rather delight in his presence, whom

the insignia of his virtues adorn. Here Bavaria is bidden

to rejoice, according to that opinion

by which the Saint is held to be a Bavarian by race. The responsories

run thus, the first: After the circles of very many years,

by the nod of God who rules the ages, he was translated to

the town of Roye. ℣ At which time he shone forth,

working very many miracles. The second: O wondrous thing! Snatched

from the circuit of Roye, he ceases from the working of signs, which

he took up again at his return. ℣ Now returned by divine

permission, he shines with the effect of wonders. The third:

War \ once drew this flower away from the mourning people of the town*

of Roye, whom it received back with great

jubilation. ℣ For the age to come, with the shining ray

of a new light for those to come. The fourth: The greatness

of the divine signs here shows that St. Florentius

is to remain by God's will. ℣ He deserves it, who turns the mourning

of the men of Roye into great joy.

[87] as also the commemoration which is made of him as Patron. The often-praised Vacquerie, page 245, gives from

the Breviary of Roye a commemoration of St. Florentius:

that one, without doubt, which at stated times among the common

commemorations or suffrages of the Saints

was customarily said of him at the end of vespers and lauds

as of the Patron: it runs thus:

Protect us now, Father, with thy pious aid,

Florentius, flowering in a flowering reward.

Thou with Christ enjoyest the gladness of life,

While we are tossed on the sea of this world;

Stretch forth now thy right hand from on high,

Redeeming this company from evil,

Which with devout heart gives thanks in thy praise.

May the mercy of the light of our homeland restore us,

And the sacred providence here present.

℣. Pray for us, holy father Florentius.

℞. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

Let us pray. O God, who didst adorn blessed Florentius,

Thy confessor, on earth with a praiseworthy life

and didst exalt him in heaven with eternal glory: grant, we beseech Thee,

that by the suffrage of his merits our life may be commended

before Thee. Through Christ our Lord.

[88] The Saint's cult among the men of Saumur and others; The same Vacquerie also gives Litanies proper

to our Saint; but he does not signify whence

they were received: in them he is called the Flower of the Church and Patron

of most Christian France; almost all the rest

agrees with the Acts. There is no doubt that

both in the monasteries of Glonna and of Saumur his memory is

commemorated yearly with the greatest solemnity, since

both are dedicated to him as Patron, and

in the latter at least his notable relics are honored.

I judge the very same of the many Priories which, situated in

various bishoprics of Gaul, are subject to the abbey

of Saumur, and some of which are marked with the name of St.

Florentius, as may be seen in the General Index

(Pouillé général) of the benefices of the archbishopric

of Tours, etc., from page 260. But in the

distinguished church of St. Martin of Tours, so far as

I understand from the Breviary of the year 1635, with an Office of nine

lessons he is honored on the XXIII day of September, because the preceding day

is taken up by the feast of SS. Maurice and his Companions.

He is there called Confessor Abbot, which title,

as it is understood today, does not befit him:

but the whole Office is of a confessor not a pontiff,

except the prayer recited in the preceding number,

and the lessons of the second Nocturn taken from his

Acts.

[89] Toussaint Bridoul, a priest of the Society of Jesus, at

the end of the French Life of St. Florentius, and also in Belgium, on account of relics, published at Liège in the year

1653, assigned also in our Belgium a place

where he has from time immemorial obtained a notable cult.

It is a village in Artois, elegant and spacious,

and stretching to the bank of the river Lys at the second

milestone from the town of Béthune, which is itself called after St. Florentius,

commonly Saint-Floris, and has a church

built under his patronage, on account of the

notable relics — namely the skull or part of the skull,

and other parts of the crown of the head, and also one arm —

deposited there. To their veneration

there flock not only the inhabitants but also the neighbors in their

calamities and evils. Whence or when those relics were

carried thither, the aforesaid author confesses cannot be said

with certainty; yet he says it is believed by constant tradition

that they have been honored there for more than five

centuries past; nay, that that tradition is confirmed

by ancient manuscripts of the same church, in which the Life of our Saint,

his miracles, Office, lessons, and proper Mass

are contained, framed in almost the same words

in which they are read in the collegiate church of Roye.

To these he subjoins the opinion of a certain modern writer, whom

he does not name, and who seems to have judged that this village

was enriched with those relics by Pepin, father of Charlemagne;

but I should think that opinion rested on conjecture alone,

because the said Pepin dwelt much in those

parts. But the Saint is there chiefly invoked

by those suffering from fever and

from headache. Finally, relics of the same Saint

are possessed also by the college of the Society of Jesus at Mons

in Hainaut, which the Father Florent Montmorency, mentioned several times,

deposited there in the last century —

namely certain bones from the vertebrae of the neck received as a gift from

the canons of Roye, and a notable bone of the arm from the parish priest

of the village of St. Florentius just named.

\ perhaps vinctas*

\* that is, with props under the armpits

\ war*

ACTS OF DOUBTFUL CREDIT

Written by an anonymous author in the ninth century,

from four manuscripts.

Florentius, priest and Confessor, on Mount Glonna in Gaul (S.)

BHL Number: 3047, 3049

By an anonymous author.

PROLOGUE

The author alleges the reasons, It befits mortals to extol God, wonderful in the glorification of

His sanctified Saints, with apostolic praises of proclamation,

not only because before the ages of the world He endowed them

with the grace of foreknowledge and of predestination alike,

and brought them forth into this world and exalted them by the suffrages

of His cooperating grace, but for this reason also, that,

their spirits having been graciously borne into heaven, He deigns to honor

their bodies still upon earth with wonderful prodigies

of remarkable signs. To fulfill these proclamations, therefore,

although we are very often exhorted by the assiduity of the divine

Pages, we are chiefly invited at last by the admonition

of David's Psalms, which in manifold ways

forewarn us by their sayings to bring devotion to works of this kind.

Out of which, as the sons of holy Church chant fitly to God

in daily use, we are bidden, as it were in a certain clause, to praise

the Lord in His Saints; to praise Him no less

in His powers, both those wrought first by His own might

through Himself and from Himself, and then those

wrought by the merits of His servants, by the liberality of His preceding and

following help.

[2] why the Acts And it seems fitting that we should so busy ourselves in these things

not with the intention of the heart alone, nor only

with a worthy pronouncing of the voice, but also by the truthful assertion

of a writer's pen, so that the works of the Saints,

worthy to be recounted in narrative, through the times

of the successive courses of years,

learned both by report of hearing and

inspected, as it is said, by the knowledge of ocular

faith, may, gathered by the fullest devotion of a writer

in the drawing up of pages, be handed on into the knowledge

of the present or of a future generation.

That every man is a debtor to this work — that man, at least,

who is able to fulfill it — is perceived from this,

that, since all things were created for man's sake,

he himself is known to have been made, along with the heavenly hosts, for this,

that with the ceaseless vicissitudes of the times

he should speak the praise of the Lord, and should bless

His holy name: for, as one of the heathen says, while the other animals

look downward upon the earth,

the Lord gave man a lofty countenance, and bade him

behold the heavens, and lift up his upraised face to the sky ^a;

so that, mindful of his ancient condition,

and of Him to whom all the rest of creation defers, he might serve Him

with the homage of a reasonable service.

[3] of St. Florentius, though he is truly unskilled, But since we are placed at the end of the ages and

are less fit for performing such things, inasmuch as

the polished elegance of the art of rhetoric has long since withdrawn

from the usage of our age \*, and men of well-rounded eloquence,

cultivators of the aforesaid art at least in our own

idiom, have utterly passed away from this work —

yet not altogether, though duller in genius,

do we judge ourselves idle in these matters: especially since

we are taught by the pages of ancient History that among the precious

gifts of gold and silver of old, the little offerings even of goats' hair

were by no means displeasing.

There may be joined to this example the devotion of that woman

of the Gospel, who, being preferred to the manifold offerings

of the rich, did not return unpraised by the testimonies

of the Lord Jesus. Wherefore,

although, as we said in our foretaste, the charm of graceful

eloquence is wanting to us, although those torrential

streams of ecclesiastical men are dried up — of Hilary,

that is, and of Jerome flowing with the milky fount

of eloquence, of Ambrose, of Gregory, and of those to be extolled with

incomparable praises, certain of whom by a careful pen

wrought out the illustrious deeds of the Saints of their own times

for the memory of those who came after —

we too, a poor rag ^b of the utmost meanness,

according to the capacity of our insipid wit, have determined

to gather into writing the deeds worthy of record

of the excellent confessor of Christ Florentius of the monastery of Glonna;

so that, though the wings of the dove in the tabernacle of the rich

be silvered over, and her hinder parts glitter in the paleness

of gold, the mean devotion of our devotion may,

by the intercession of that same Saint, shine forth at least a little.

[4] he resolves to describe more fully. For, overwhelmed by the excessive greatness of our sins,

having no covering, it befits us to embrace

the stones: because, as the Psalmist says, “Blessed are they whose

iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins

are covered.” For to embrace the stones is, as

blessed Gregory allegorizes ^c, for each of those

who sin, confessing himself, to seek the suffrages of the Saints,

and, so far as the strength of his ability suffices,

to follow their footsteps. For in this way

we shall truly deserve to eat the flesh of the true Lamb,

if, formed by the examples of the Fathers who went before,

and our feet shod with them, and then following the middle

of the royal road, with our body as the little ass on which

the Lord sits, we hasten to the walls of the heavenly Jerusalem

not with bodily steps. From the number of those

Fathers, therefore, setting before ourselves for imitation the aforesaid

blessed Florentius, we have determined to set upon parchment,

for the memory of those now present or of those who shall come after —

both what was done in his life and at his departure, whether the signs

of miracles, to God's praise, or the deeds of his good acts,

for emulation, which have been handed down to us by our forefathers

with ancient trustworthiness but far too briefly —

with the amplitude of a broader literary treatment, as we have said

above. At length, therefore, the proem of our tasteless verbosity

being unfolded, let us gird ourselves, the Lord being propitious,

to enter upon the course of the text we have

purposed ^d.

ANNOTATIONS.

d. In

the manuscripts of du Chesne and Sirmond alone is the prologue found, with a mutilated list of chapters;

but this, as altogether useless, I omit. I likewise omit the whole

first book, in which the martyrdom of St. Florianus is narrated, and I begin with the second,

for the reason set out in the Commentary at number 12. Note meanwhile,

first, that no mention is made of St. Florianus in the prologue, and none in

the title which is prefixed to it in these words: Here begins the prologue on the Life of St. Florentius; secondly, how great is the diversity of style between the prologue and the first part, which follows here.

\ Sirmond Ms. secundi*

PART I.

The Saint's coming into the Gauls; his approach to St. Martin; his priesthood, miracles, death.

He crosses the Rhone miraculously; he frees a possessed man; Now it came to pass, after the departure of blessed Florianus ^{a b}

the martyr, when blessed Florentius,

admonished by the revelation of an angel,

was going into the parts of the Gauls, that he came to the river Rhone at

the port which is called Lyons, and found there

a ship without a helmsman; for it was broken up on every side.

Wishing therefore, as a Man full of holiness, to hasten as quickly as possible

to Mass — for it was the Lord's day —

he entered into it, and, having made the sign of the Cross, said:

Lord, lead me in Thy will: and presently without

a helmsman he crossed over that river; for an angel

of the Lord kept him. And when he had come to the bank

of the river, he found a man vexed by a demon,

whom for that reason others held bound.

Seeing which, blessed Florentius,

touched with brotherly grief, on bended knee in

the sight of the Lord, besought with all his strength the mercy of the Lord

that He would drive out the demon and restore him

to health; and the sign of the Cross being made over him, he was made

whole. Many other miracles indeed

the Lord showed through him on that same journey.

[2] he comes to St. Martin, At that time, then, blessed Martin the bishop, most gloriously

triumphing, held the see of mother church in the city

of Tours. To him, therefore, the angel

by whose guidance blessed Florentius made his journey revealed in a vision

that such a Man, a stranger, was coming to him,

and commanded him, showing him his face,

that he should establish him in the priestly order. Meanwhile

blessed Florentius came to the city of Tours, as

had been commanded him by a divine announcement, and entered

into the temple in which blessed Martin

sat warring for the Lord, and, casting himself upon the ground,

prayed. Then rising from prayer, he came before blessed

Martin, and asked his blessing.

And when blessed Martin had looked upon him, at once

he knew that he was the one whom the angel of the Lord had shown him

in the vision. And the blessed man received him with

joy, and presently led him into the sacristy, mindful

of the Lord's word in which He says: “My house

shall be called a house of prayer.” And the glorious bishop began

to ask him whence he was, and the cause

of his journey, and also the disposition of his will: and blessed Florentius

told him all that had been done concerning

him, and what he had in mind.

[3] he is ordained priest; And when blessed Martin had learned that he was a Man

of holy devotion, and was coming to him by a divine announcement,

he loved him greatly, and kept him with the utmost

reverence. It was indeed the third day before

the ordination, and behold, on the day of ordination, the office

being performed as is customary, he ordained him priest

^c. Living in which order, he besought the Lord with his whole mind

and with assiduous prayers that He would show him,

as He had revealed through His angel, the place where he should dwell.

On a certain night, therefore, before he rose for the matins

office, the Lord showed him

the place of his dwelling. There is a certain place

near the channel of the Loire, about half

a mile away, and in it a cave, where there were many serpents,

great and small, and its name is Glomna.

Having learned, therefore, by divine revelation the place of his

dwelling, he goes along the bank of the Loire until

he comes to it.

[4] he goes to Mount Glonna, from which he casts out the serpents; Then, seeing the mountain, he knew that this

was the place which the angel of the Lord had deigned to show him

in a vision. And presently, approaching the mountain,

he found there many serpents, and on bended knee

he besought the Lord, saying: Lord, who

hast brought me out of the land of my nativity, and hast shown

me the place in which I should dwell according to

Thy will: make this place quiet for me

from the devil, and from his power, and from the serpents

which dwell here, that they may henceforth have power

to harm no one. And straightway, leaving the mountain,

the serpents fled.

[5] he builds an oratory, and is famed for miracles. But after, by the assent of the divine clemency,

he had cleansed that place from diabolical uncleanness,

the holy Man made there an oratory in honor

of blessed Peter the apostle and of the other Apostles,

and of very many Saints. In which place, through the prayers

of that same blessed Florentius, the Lord deigned to work many

wonders to the praise and glory

of His name; for He gave light to the blind, cured

the possessed, and the mercy of the Lord healed very many infirmities through the prayers of the most holy

Man. For devoutly

and with his whole intention lifting his mind to the Lord,

he passed his life in vigils with the prayers of psalms and Masses.

[6] Going to visit St. Martin, That same holy Man had also this custom,

that every year he came to the city of Tours for the sake

of prayer. On a certain occasion, therefore, when

he was going thither for prayer according to his custom, he came

to a place which is commonly called Murus [d],

situated above the river Loire, where a great crowd of people

met him, saying: O holy Man, here there is

a great serpent, which devours both men and cattle; and

with all their might they asked him to implore the mercy of the Lord,

that He might deliver them from that devil.

But blessed Florentius answered and said:

And now indeed, brethren, I am going to our pastor lord

Martin, to whom I shall first make known these things which you ask of me,

and shall report back to you what that holy Man

shall thereupon command.

[7] Making his journey, he came to the river Vienne,

to the place on the journey which is called Condate ^e, where he wished

to cross the river, and he found in the harbor a blind woman

sitting and weeping. And he asked

her what ailed her, and for what reason she wept so

bitterly. But she said: And who art thou, Lord,

who askest me? The holy Man said to her: I am

Florentius. And she, when she heard that he was blessed Florentius,

ran to his feet, saying: Lord,

I had an only son, who, since I am blind,

used to show me the way; and now it is the third day

since he was drowned in this water, and no one

has been able to find him, to give him back to me for burial.

[8] Then blessed Florentius, on bended knee, besought

God, he obtains life for the drowned boy and sight for the blind woman: saying: Lord, have mercy on this

poor woman, for she is worn down with much grief.

Restore to her, Lord, her son, at least for burial.

And as blessed Florentius was praying with a prayer

of this kind, an angel of the Lord said to him: Florentius, he of whom

thou askest is not dead, but lives: and presently he showed

him the place where he was. Then blessed

Florentius, calling the fishermen, commanded them to cast their nets

in that part where the angel of the Lord had foretold that the poor woman's

son was. The fishermen therefore, casting

their nets, at once found him. Taking him, therefore,

blessed Florentius, giving thanks to the Lord,

gave him back to his mother. And the poor woman herself,

through the prayer of blessed Florentius, deserved in that same

place to receive her sight.

[9] And blessed Florentius, completing the journey he had begun,

came to Tours to blessed Martin, St. Martin being consulted,

and told him how in a certain place some men had met

him, entreating that he would deliver them from a huge

and most wicked serpent. Then blessed Martin

said to him: Brother, let us ask our Lord

Jesus Christ that He may deliver them, for His great

clemency, from so harmful a beast. But returning

to the place of thy dwelling, go where it lodges,

and command it in the name of our Lord Jesus

Christ that it depart thence, and have no power

any more to harm any Christian. And as blessed

Florentius returned to his place, the people, who

were awaiting him and desiring his coming, met

him: and seeing him, they ran to him, saying:

Lord, help us.

[10] Then blessed Florentius, kneeling in prayer,

besought the Lord, he puts an enormous serpent to flight; saying: Lord

God almighty, who didst create heaven and earth,

and the things that are in them, and, forming man after Thy likeness,

didst put all things under him, and who didst deliver the three children

untouched from the furnace of burning fire: deliver this people

from the serpent that presses upon them and from the power of the devil,

for Thou art blessed for ever and ever.

And coming to the place where that serpent was, having made

the sign of the Cross before him, he said: I command thee

in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit:

depart hence and go into the depth of the abyss. And

straightway the serpent, roaring like a lion, departed.

[11] famed for wonders, he dies. Which being done, the holy Man, coming to his cell,

took pains by assiduous prayers without intermission

to serve the Lord, being illustrious for many wonders

which the Lord deigned to show through him.

For many held by various infirmities

came to him, and through his most holy

prayers received health. Now the years

of the life of this most holy Man were 123; but

after he was separated from blessed Florianus he lived

63 years ^f, happily passing his days in peace. Therefore

at length, while he was leading his life in holy

old age, on the X Kalends of October, entering upon the way of all flesh,

he passed from this world. Then many

flocked from every side to the service of his

funeral. For straightway there was present a multitude of priests and clerics,

very many laymen, a choir of virgins,

and a throng of women. As these, then, mourned for the time,

but exulted for the glory of so great a Man,

he was buried with great diligence in the place

which he had prepared for himself, our Lord

Jesus Christ granting it, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit

lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

c. Much

could be discussed here about that sudden ordination of a layman, made

by St. Martin on the third day after his arrival, without any mention

of a preceding diaconate or of other Orders and intervals; but since

it is alleged by an author of untrustworthy credit, this and other things of the kind ought

not to detain us.

PART II.

Miracles and benefits after death.

Miracles at the Saint's tomb; After blessed Florentius's departure from this light

the Lord wrought many wonders through him in the place

of his repose. For many sick people afterwards

deserved to receive health from all their infirmities through his

glorious merits. They themselves,

and very many others, enriched that same holy place

from their goods, by the assent of divine favor.

But since it would be very long to set forth everything,

we shall relate certain things briefly

and succinctly, with full faith, for the veneration of the great Man,

to those who shall read and hear.

[13] a blind boy There was, then, in those days a certain man in the parts

of Spain, in the city which is called Pamplona

^a; for he was very rich, and his name

was Simerus Lupus, and his wife's Birgilla:

and they had one only son,

whom both they themselves and all their household

loved greatly. And it came to pass that, while in summertime

at the midday hours he was sleeping in his little bed, his eyes

were blinded. Wherefore his father and mother and

all the household of their domain were smitten with the greatest

grief. Many physicians indeed came to him,

thinking to bring him the help of sight by their medicines;

but the boy felt nothing amiss in his eyes,

except that he had utterly lost his sight. His parents

therefore knew that this had befallen their son

by the divine will. And so they offer him at many

places of the Saints, vowing that

the Lord should restore his sight to him; but not even

so did he receive sight. But on a certain night, while

the mother was sleeping together with her husband, having with them

their only son, there came to her in a vision one

in the guise of a cleric, saying: Woman, send thy son,

whom thou lovest as thine only one, to the basilica of the blessed

man Florentius, which is above the channel of the Loire,

and there he shall receive sight within the space of 40 days.

[14] She therefore, after she was awakened from sleep,

told this same thing to her husband, the parent being thrice admonished from heaven, who said to

her: This dream has come to thee out of thy own thinking;

let the will of the Lord be done. For this vision admonished

the boy's mother even a third time, saying: Until

thy son goes thither where I have said, he shall not see

the light of heaven. Which the woman again reported to her

husband; and he said: I have never heard where the place

might be. Then she said: If we knew how to find this place

even beyond the seas, we would duly send our son

thither, if perchance the mercy of the Lord

might come upon him; and she added: Hast thou not heard

how Naaman, prince of Syria, dealt with Elisha

the prophet — how he told him to wash

in the Jordan, and he received health? So the Lord

is able to give sight to our son also.

They send the boy therefore by their servants, saying:

Search out the place where blessed Florentius

rests, which is above the river Loire.

[15] And the servants, going, went about all

that region being brought thither, is given sight. until they came to the city of Tours,

which is situated on the shore of the Loire. And diligently

inquiring for the place in which blessed Florentius

rests, they find that it is not far from there,

and rejoicing, they quickly come to that same place,

and, making their vow for the boy, commend him to the prayers of the holy Man,

beseeching with most devout prayers that

the divine mercy might deign, through the prayer of that same Saint,

to give him back his sight. It came about, therefore,

that according to the aforesaid vision he received sight within the space of 40

days: and thus, returning whole,

he came back into his own country. Seeing which, the father and

mother and all their household, exulting, glorified

the Lord, who is able to work wonders

in heaven and on earth, in the sea and in all

the deeps.

[16] Likewise in the district of Coutances ^b there was a certain count

named Genatius, A girl is delivered from a grave infirmity. and his wife named Bertina;

and they had but one daughter, very comely,

who was herself betrothed. But suddenly

the enemy of the human race, who, always plotting the destruction of men,

seeks whom he may ruin, tempted her.

For which reason her parents and all their kindred

were afflicted with many griefs. But hearing

that the almighty Lord wrought many miracles for the honor of blessed

Florentius His servant, they took

that same maiden and led her to his oratory,

beseeching the mercy of the Lord that through

his prayers He would restore her whole health;

and within 40 days she was restored to health. And so the parents

of that girl, enriching the church of God in that same place

from their goods for the veneration of the holy Man,

remained faithful always, so long as they had life.

[17] One hostile to the Saint's worshipers is punished with death. Now in the district of Le Mans [c] there was a certain

man named Burgolenus, living in most wicked

ways; for he neither feared God nor

revered man. He was a robber, a murderer, an adulterer,

and a lover of all evils. And so on a certain

occasion, when the people were going to the basilica

of blessed Florentius for the sake of prayer, that

cruel man came to meet them. Then he began to ask whither

they wished to go. And they said: We are going to the basilica of blessed

Florentius, that through his prayer

we may deserve to obtain pardon of our sins.

Presently that man of dire cruelty ordered them to be stripped.

But they cried out: Blessed Florentius, have mercy

on us. And behold, the horse on which he sat, taking fright,

threw him upon the ground, and he was all broken

in pieces, and foaming and roaring in the manner of a wild beast,

he died. Many other wonders indeed

on the roads and in the streets, through the merits of blessed Florentius,

the Lord deigned to show, which no one

is able to enumerate. These we have touched upon for the present,

that, venerating the blessed Man by them, we may with our whole mind love

the Lord whom he faithfully served,

to whom is power and dominion through the infinite ages

of ages. Amen.

[18] Many miracles being omitted, an eyewitness relates one. Many [d] signs, moreover, of divine miracles,

in the course of many succeeding years,

were wrought through that same most precious confessor of the Lord,

holy Florentius, which for this reason are by no means

declared in the course of the reading, that they became cheap by their very

frequency, or were passed over by the sloth of those who beheld them, or —

what is rather to be believed — that there were lacking men who could

adorn them elegantly with the charm of speech.

For the liberal arts were until the times

of the lord emperor Charles so foreign to our

predecessors that in the regions of Gaul

hardly anyone even among the highest prelates, hindered by negligence,

was to be found who by the elegance

of his speech could discharge with grace even synodal

definitions. But since, by the Lord's favor,

and by the insistence of the aforesaid lord emperor,

the moderns have attained what their elders had neglected,

it therefore seems fitting that what we have seen before our

eyes, lest all should perish in the depth of oblivion,

we should commit to the keeping of those now living and of our successors by a literary

inquiry, so far as we are able.

[19] Of a parricide, By ancient custom, therefore, a usage has grown up in the parts of inner

France down to this day, that whoever

has cut the throat of a kinsman near to him with a sword,

and afterwards, led by penitence, has brought

the crime of the deed committed to the bishop, then, by the decree of the bishop himself,

iron bonds are made out of that same sword,

and the sinner's neck, belly,

and arms are bound tightly with those iron

fetters; and thus he is driven from his own country and from his father's

soil: and meanwhile, until the divine mercy

command those same bonds to be loosed, he is compelled to journey abroad,

first to Rome, then through various places of the Saints,

imploring pardon for his crime. By this

sentence, in short, a certain cleric named Amelius,

who had killed his uncle, was condemned by Artcharius,

bishop of the city of Trajectum ^e;

and now for a long time continuing in that same penance,

he had wandered visiting various monasteries of the Saints,

tearfully imploring the most kindly mercy of the almighty Lord,

that by their intercessions pardon might now

be obtained for him.

[20] the iron bonds fall off of their own accord At length, therefore, he came, admonished by a divine

revelation, to the monastery where the body of the highest

pontiff ^f and holy priest Florentius

lies venerably buried. And there the kindness of hospitality was shown him

by the monks who serve the Lord diligently

there. But on the very night

on which he had come, while the brethren after their wonted manner

were performing the nocturnal office, and he was standing behind

beside the chancel screens, he had given himself a little to sleep:

and behold, suddenly there appeared to him in a vision a most white

bird, coming forth from the tomb of the Saint, and it settled

upon his arms, and struck those iron bonds as it were

with great force. He, being at once awakened,

sent forth most hideous cries of shouting, so that he even interrupted

the choir of those singing psalms, and made all

the bystanders astounded with exceeding terror. For as soon

as he opened his eyes, weighed down with light sleep, the aforesaid

bird nowhere appeared; but those iron bonds,

at its invisible touch, cracked apart with so great and

so strong a force that, springing far off, they could scarcely

be found on the morrow. And the penitent himself,

released with incredible terror, and unable at all to stand

with tottering steps, suddenly fell to the ground,

and thus prostrate on the earth he remained as though out of his mind

until all the office there was completed.

[21] But on the morrow, while the monks and all

wondered at this praiseworthy deed, at the Saint's tomb. he set forth to all in order

the causes of his guilt and of his binding:

and because the abbot was not then present, he earnestly

entreated the brethren that in the name of the abbot

and of themselves they would write out a letter of entreaty to the aforesaid

bishop, by whom he had been sent to do penance,

that he might mercifully receive him

into his own parish; inasmuch as, since the divine kindness

and the merit of St. Florentius had shown him spiritually absolved

in the loosing of the visible bonds, the bishop too

might by his pontifical authority decree him to be

absolved in every way. Having obtained this at length,

rendering immense thanks to God and to St. Florentius,

and bidding the brethren farewell, he returned home

with joy.

ANNOTATIONS.

d. Here

begins the appendix, of a style different from the rest, and perhaps

older than they, but certainly more trustworthy. See the Commentary at numbers 5 and following.

SERMON

On the Life of St. Florentius

By Marbod, bishop of Rennes.

From a most ancient manuscript codex on parchment.

Florentius, priest and Confessor, on Mount Glonna in Gaul (S.)

BHL Number: 3050

By Marbod, bishop.

PART I.

St. Florentius, a martyr by desire, and an outstanding confessor in every exercise of the virtues.

The reason for praising St. Florentius On the solemnity of this our holy father Florentius,

although a slender discourse can by no means suffice

to set forth his virtues, yet it does not

altogether befit us to be silent; lest, fearing to be reproved

for presumption, we be more justly judged for diffidence or

negligence: for our God, to whose

praise is referred whatever praiseworthy is proclaimed in His

Saints, is pleased not so much by variety of speech

as by truth of things, and more welcome to Him are

the pure minds of the speakers than the many-colored purples

of seemly words. Therefore, to the praise

of Him who is glorious in His Saints, and to the edification

of those who read, let us attempt to say something of this Saint's merits

in simple speech, but with manifold

devotion. For thus it will come about that we both pay the homage due

to our Patron on the day of his festival,

and stir up the minds of the faithful to God's praise;

and that we ourselves may have set before us

a pattern of virtues, which if we wish to imitate —

and we ought to wish it — we shall without doubt walk by a straight road

into heaven, whither, as we undoubtingly believe,

he came whom we set before ourselves to follow.

Steep indeed is the way and difficult the ascent;

but to those who strive on the road to God divine help

cannot be lacking, that same blessed Man interceding,

whose help was from Thee, O Lord,

who also set ascents in his heart, in the valley of tears,

in the place which He appointed. Following his

footsteps, therefore, we shall go from virtue to virtue, ourselves also

to see the God of gods in Zion.

[2] and the manifold matter: he was a Martyr Wherefore, desiring to take counsel for our own salvation and that of others,

we take courage out of charity, undertaking a discourse

about him of whom we can neither speak worthily

nor ought to be altogether silent.

For such and so great is he that he alone suffices for the praises of many,

whereas no one's praises suffice for him alone.

Since he alone is, so to speak, a multitude,

in whose person is found the perfection of many.

For if you seek a martyr — not of any ordinary patience,

but so filled from the illustrious cup of a certain impatient

boldness and of a certain intoxicated virtue

that he seems, as though he would not feel them, to provoke

injuries — behold Florentius offering himself unbidden to torments,

seeking penalties, betraying himself to the officers,

thrusting himself upon tribunals, and finally following death with as great

an eagerness as others are wont to flee it.

Read the little book of his Life, how gladly

he runs to Lorch ^a, the name of that place where Aquilinus

the governor, cruel benefactor, dispensed the victorious

laurel. And what will you see in Florentius but

the choirs of camps? For with such alacrity, with such

constancy was he borne upon the enemy's swords, that he could be believed

not one soldier but a whole army. Whence

it came about that his burning desire of martyrdom was reckoned

to him for martyrdom, and that he was judged by God most worthy

of a long life, who diligently sought a swift

death.

[3] And so, being reserved for the profit of many, loosed from his bonds

by angelic ministry, by desire, when he offered himself unbidden to death, he was withdrawn from suffering

by the oracle of the divine command, being a little

straitened and in doubt, inasmuch as for his own sake

he desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ, but understood

that to remain in the flesh was necessary for others.

Yet what increased his desire of a glorious death was the companionship

of his most delightful colleague and brother in Christ Florianus,

with whom he had both lived in one mind and

desired magnanimously to die. He thought how great

a happiness presently awaited his brother Florianus, whom

he saw about to be received on that very same day with the palm of triumph

into the heavenly court; that for himself there remained very many labors,

not a few perils to be undergone,

and that from the refreshment which he had already conceived in mind

he must be suspended by the martyrdom of a longer life.

And on this account, if it could be done, he would have wished to receive and drink

the cup of salvation with his brother, that through the sadness

of the cup he might pass swiftly with him to the joy

of eternal salvation. Oh, what a colloquy that was — long

for the shortness of the time, and for the greatness

of their love far too brief — when, the officers being lulled to sleep,

Florentius, roused by the angel,

had roused Florianus and had disclosed to him the command

of the divine will [b]!

[4] Great was the affection of mutual love that breathed forth in those words,

nor did he abandon the palm save at an angel's command. but greater was the worship and reverence toward God

discerned in both. Each would have wished to live or to die

with the other, yet in such a way

that he would wish to offend God in neither. Florentius would therefore

have suffered willingly, had not the living God preferred him

to live.

But since he had denied himself, living neither

for himself nor about to die for himself, after he perceived that his

Emperor, upon whose words he had sworn, willed this,

not daring to fight against the enemy contrary to the command,

yet not unwillingly he obeyed the order, as one who

well knew that a swollen transgressor of the command must be punished

with no lesser penalty than a timid deserter

of the emperor. He was none the less certain of the crown

of justice laid up for him, which the Lord, the just Judge,

will render to him. Already indeed the crown of justice has been rendered

to his holy soul; but it is to be rendered one day to his body also,

in which, while he lived, he bore the cuts of the saws and the scars

of wounds, the stigmata, that is, of Jesus. For not yet,

as we believe, are all the household of that valiant woman

by whom the Church seems to be signified

clothed with double garments; but single white robes

have been given them, and it has been said to them that they should rest

yet a little time, until their fellow servants

be fulfilled, so that those who singly are clothed with fine linen

in their soul may all together be clothed also

with purple in their bodies. Then, therefore, we do not doubt that the martyr's

unimpaired reward will be rendered to him by the just Judge,

with whom a perfect will to a work is as it were

the work of a perfect will. Thus far concerning the Martyr.

[5] But if it please you to look upon the Confessor,

dispensing the offices of tranquil peace, Of an outstanding confessor counseling

the anxious, protecting the accused, sustaining the weak,

caring for the sick, rejoicing with those who rejoice,

weeping with those who weep, you have the same Florentius,

as one turned from the camp to the forum, as it were from a man in armor

to a man in the toga, showing no less skill in the leisure of peace

than he displayed daring in the business

of war. For who is found more frequent in the aforesaid works

of mercy? For

after he was bidden to go out from his land and from his kindred

and to come into this land, he went into exile of his own will:

for he had not here an abiding city,

but sought one to come. After, therefore — the reward of his preceding

labor being saved — he was as it were

translated from warfare to husbandry, he ceased not to labor in the Lord's

vineyard as much as he could, a most skilled pruner

of vices, a propagator of virtues, suggesting by words

what should be done, and commending by works what he had suggested.

[6] he fulfilled Plainly there seems to fit this blessed soul

that joyful exhortation of the heavenly Spouse, who after the winter

of unfaithfulness and the rain of persecution invites His beloved at

the time of the pruning of the vines:

Arise, He says, my love, my fair one, and come:

show me thy face; let thy voice sound in my ears:

for thy voice is sweet, and thy face

is comely. Arise, He says, friend Florentius, thy persecution

has gone and departed, martyrdom has not been granted

thee; and come into the land which I shall show

thee, namely into the parts of the Gauls, where

I shall show thee the place of thy dwelling; there also

do thou show me — that is, my own — thy face,

that is, thy works: for what a man does to one of my least ones,

that he does to me. Let the voice of thy preaching

sound in the ears of mine; for thy voice is sweet

and thy works comely. After the time of planting

there comes the time of pruning. For all things have their time,

and all things pass in their own seasons under

heaven. Martin has planted me a vineyard, of which

I have chosen thee the pruner. Be joined to Martin in a share of the labor,

that with him thou mayest deserve to share the reward.

[7] every number of virtues, From these things, therefore, we think it manifest that he

of whom we speak is to be numbered also among the holy

confessors, to whom, since daring to contend for the assertion

of the truth even unto death was not lacking,

the divine will granted a bloodless victory

over the enemy. And that you may not doubt what place of dignity

he holds even among the confessors, behold Martin,

the gem of the prelates of his time, to whom,

when he is directed by divine revelation, he is surely proved

most worthy of the fellowship of so great a man. What of this, that

a forerunning angel reveals in a vision to that same Martin the Saint's coming,

and, that he might easily be recognized when present,

represents the image of his face while absent;

and bids him promote the Man, long since priestly,

into the order of priests? Does not all

this avail to establish the blessed Man's dignity

as a confessor? It avails indeed. For if the testimony of approved

men is wont in doubtful matters to have

the weight of unshaken authority, much more does a threefold

authority concur in the commendation

of this Priest: first the divine, then the angelic,

thirdly the human. For he is chosen by God, presented by an angel,

consecrated by Martin.

[8] compassionate with his neighbor's ills, rejoicing in his prosperity, Rightly, therefore, he alone has been called a multitude, in whom

alone the dignity of martyr and of confessor is found:

and moreover, who bore in himself by compassion as many

persons of the wretched as human life has

miseries. For that most just Man strove to fulfill the law of Christ,

who Himself bore our infirmities and Himself carried our sins

in His body upon the tree, paying then

what He had not taken away, mindful of the exhorting

Apostle: Bear ye one another's

burdens, and so shall you fulfill the law of Christ.

Nor was he only pressed down by others' burdens,

but also rejoiced with them in their honors; nor was he more

saddened in his neighbors' adversities than he rejoiced together with them

in their prosperity. In short, if it be lawful to say so, he was more indulgent to others

than to himself; as he loved God

more than his neighbor, so he loved his neighbor even more than himself.

[9] For he who was easily broken by others' misfortunes

bore his own with such evenness of mind firm in both his own, and gathering from each as those bear

others' with evenness of mind who are easily broken by their own.

Thus he who spent a mother's affection upon others was in a manner

a stepmother to himself as regards the body.

Not otherwise, he so rejoiced also in the prosperity of others,

while he counted his own of little worth, as those are wont to rejoice

in their own who count others' of little worth; save that

such men refer their joy to temporal

pleasure, whereas he directed both joy and sorrow

to spiritual profit. In a certain

way, therefore, he loved himself more austerely than his neighbor.

In himself indeed he was so constant and firm,

and unmoved by every wind, that he could neither be bent

by the terrifying north winds of persecutions,

nor melted by the soothing south winds of flatteries; but

rather, making every fortune matter for his virtues —

firm in adversity, cautious and humble in prosperity —

like a certain aromatic tree, nay rather like

a garden of delights, at every impulse of the breezes

he scattered more widely the fragrance of sweetness, receiving with even mind

both good and evil from the Lord's hand, by whom

he knew that both were sent upon the Saints for their own glory.

For the Lord commands the winds and they obey

Him. Arise, He says, O north wind, and come, O south wind;

blow through my garden, and let its spices flow forth.

[10] These, then, are the spices of the virtues, which we

ought to gather from this garden, gathering virtues; whence for us, as from a garden, fruits and with which as with some most

delightful food or spiced draught we ought to be delighted;

since the Lord Himself, glorying that He is refreshed by these

as by varieties of foods

and drinks, exhorts His own friends

to eat and drink these same even to drunkenness.

For He says thus in the Song of Songs: I am come into

my garden, my sister, my spouse; I have gathered my myrrh

with my spices; I have eaten the honeycomb with

my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk.

Eat, O friends, and drink, and be inebriated, my dearly beloved.

Which same thing indeed He might have said more plainly thus:

I have visited a Man fruitful in good virtues, in whom

I found — and which I accepted — the precious myrrh of chastity,

by which the bodies of those who are dead to the world

and live to God are preserved unharmed

from the corruption of lust; I found there also other spices

of the virtues, and the discretion of his teaching pleased me,

who, while he hid the spiritual understanding in the letter —

that is, the honey in the wax — knew how, according to each man's capacity,

to give wine to the strong and milk to the weak.

Imitate these good things, you also, whoever

wish to belong to my friendship. If you wish

to be most dear to me, drink these things and be inebriated;

be inebriated from the abundance of my house. For it is

the same both house and garden, but a garden of spices

and a house of ivory, itself also fragrant with divers

spices. For myrrh and aloes and cassia

breathe forth from houses of ivory. Being invited, therefore, to

such joyful banquets, and invited by no other

but by the Lord Himself, let us recline with thanks.

[11] From this table set before us, as though filled with the most delicate

varieties of foods and drinks, and from a sumptuous table it is permitted us to pluck food.

plucking whatever is most pleasing, let us eat and drink,

and, taking pains not sluggishly to obey the divine

exhortation which we have heard, let us eat

to fullness, let us drink to inebriation. Let us hear

and believe; let us love and work; otherwise

the word heard avails nothing if not mixed with faith;

and faith without works is dead. But

if it is difficult — and it is in truth difficult —

that any one man at this time should imitate all

the virtues of this blessed Man, let him choose for himself some out of them all,

as each is delighted with particular ones. For each man

has his own gift from God, one thus, another

thus. But we have been invited so copiously and

magnificently that nothing can be lacking to anyone which he may choose;

since rather all may be in doubt what to choose. But

whether better things be chosen out of good ones, or

best out of better, in none is fullness harmful, since

in all there is manifest wholesomeness. Not as in fleshly

banquets, which make fullness suspect,

lest fullness bring forth infirmity.

ANNOTATIONS.

b. These things

Marbod, a man famed for the repute of his learning and piety, pronounced

according to the credit of the Life just given, which — or certainly another very like it — that he had is persuaded by the deeds of St. Florentius which he inserted in his Sermon. Consult, if you please, the Commentary at numbers 10 and following down to the end of §1.

\ read hortus*

PART II.

The Saint most richly adorned with the Cardinal virtues and with the rest that flow from them.

His prudence Indeed it is sufficiently established that to this Man of God

of whom we speak none of the virtues was lacking, by which

he might overcome contrary vices not only in himself

but also in others. But because it would be long to go through each,

we shall show that those four principal ones,

which all the rest attend as handmaids, were

in him — namely prudence, temperance,

fortitude, justice — so that from these it may manifestly

appear that he who retained the whole abounded

in the parts. And we shall show what we have promised

in this manner. For if prudence is the knowledge of things

good and evil alike, who is found more watchful in

this discernment than he? For of the four ways

in which the imprudent are wont to be deceived — when they think

either that what is good is evil, or that what is evil

is good; again, that what is neither good nor

evil is either evil or good; or that what is evil

or good is neither evil nor good —

of these four ways, I say, or

rather mischances, the prudent Man erred in none.

The pleasure of earthly goods, which men think

good, he judged evil;

but the happiness of things to come, which, because they are not seen,

are by some even heard with impatience, he judged best.

Abjection, poverty, insults,

which deceived mortals think must most of all be shunned,

he not only did not shun, but even willingly embraced

in place of praise, of riches, of glory,

choosing rather to be afflicted with the people of God

than to have the pleasure of temporal sin. For he looked

to the recompense, he looked to

Jesus, the Author and Finisher of faith, who for the joy set before Him

endured the Cross, despising

the shame.

[13] in discerning things; He understood that he is foolish who leans upon a staff

of reed; no less foolish

he who builds upon the sand; because that staff pierces

the hand of him who leans on it, and that house, shaken by winds

and floods, most often involves the builder in a like

ruin. And therefore the prudent Man built his house

upon the rock, and the rock was Christ; and

he leaned upon the wood, and the wood was that of the Cross.

Whence the peoples tell of his wisdom, and

the Church proclaims his praise. Moreover in those things of a middle

kind, which are neither good nor evil,

the judgment of him could not be deceived who retained a full

knowledge of good and evil. For if he knew what was

good, he assuredly knew what was not. For if

anyone knows what a man is, he certainly knows how to distinguish from man's

nature, when he sees something other than

man. Nor is the case otherwise in the knowledge of good and evil.

From which it may not unfittingly be gathered that prudence was

perfect in him in whom no portion of imprudence

is found. Nor was temperance less in the same,

by which he might repel the evils, when they flattered, which by prudence he distinguished

from goods; might restrain them when they were stirred up, and might steady them when unstable.

[14] For temperance is the firm and moderate dominion of reason

over lust and the other depraved impulses of the mind.

temperance in restraining depraved motions This dominion over vices he exercised so

widely and forcefully that, all unlawful things having first been extinguished

in himself, in others also he pursued cupidity and

the other unrighteous motions, put them in

chains, choked them, proscribed them, and banished them for ever.

For who, having heard his disputation against the vices —

which disputation, while it showed the truth,

in no way made a show of itself; having heard his discourses

more useful than witty, upright rather than

complaisant — who, I say, having heard these things, would not straightway

conceive some love of virtue,

and thereby learn consequently to bridle his own vices,

to rout them when bridled, and utterly to destroy them when routed —

especially when he saw the Teacher's life in no way discordant

from sound doctrine? And thus he transferred his own

temperance into certain others,

namely into those who, hearing and keeping the word,

brought forth fruit in patience. Nor did he bridle others' vices only

by the discourse of exhortation to the people, but also by the power

of prayer to God.

By these two ways, therefore, he carried the standards of victorious temperance

far and wide.

[15] Fortitude follows temperance in its own order.

For as by temperance we abstain from flattering evils,

fortitude, so by fortitude we do not fear things that strike terror.

And in these two the whole company of evils

is contained. Flattering things beget cupidity;

terrible things, fear. Fear or cupidity

bring forth every sin. Whence the psalmist says:

“Burned with fire and dug under” — by dug under signifying fear,

by burned signifying cupidity. Temperance is therefore necessary

against cupidity, fortitude against fear.

This fortitude, then, which

is also called magnanimity, one may rather ask

how great the holy Man had, than whether he had it:

nay, it cannot be doubted that he had it

in the greatest measure. Both of which we think indubitable and

evident, most of all from this, that he was so great a despiser

of dangers and labors, as we have touched upon above,

that he could not be called back by the fear of death

from bearing witness in public to the truth.

For whence should he fear who had long since cut away from himself all

causes of fear? For nothing makes the mind timid but the consciousness

of a reprehensible life.

But the wise Man could not fear the death of the body;

for it is foolish to fear what cannot be

avoided. In short, he dies secure who has sacrificed his vices

before himself. So far, then, was he from fearing death that

he thrust himself unbidden upon his executioner, and gladly heard

the cruel sentence of death pronounced against him.

[16] which is the mean between timidity and rashness. Here perhaps someone may speak in this manner:

If he was magnanimous, he would neither seek dangers as a rash man,

nor dread them as a timid one: for surely fortitude dwells

between rashness and timidity;

would anyone rightly call him who, from excessive contempt of death,

willingly casts himself into a rushing stream,

brave or magnanimous, and not rather foolish

and rash? So indeed, I say, if a man casts himself down

inconsiderately: such a one is rash and not

brave: for fortitude is the considered undertaking of dangers

and the enduring of labors. But he who, for the assertion

of the truth, not only undertakes and bears

dangers and labors, but even anticipates and embraces them,

is to be called not brave but bravest of all.

For the diversity of causes makes a diverse judgment

upon effects. Wherefore, even if the rash man and the brave man

are consummated by the same kind of death,

we believe and confess this one worthy of praise, that one

of blame. That this Saint therefore wished to seize upon death

for the law of his God is not to be ascribed

to rashness, but to most fervent charity. Let us therefore praise

the bravest of Men, nay his fortitude also,

and let us refer the praise to the Lord: for his fortitude

and his praise is the Lord, who has become for him

salvation.

[17] justice It remains that we should show him also to have been just,

whom we reckon to have been briefly shown

to have had the other virtues. But we place justice last in the order

of the virtues because it seems to be

the perfection of the other three. For justice is the virtue

that renders to each his own dignity. If perchance

anyone lacks this, even though he prudently distinguish good from evil,

though he resist flattering and harsh things bravely and

temperately, yet, as one plowing in brackish soil, or as one

cleansing seed of barren sand, he shall not eat the fruit

of the labors of his hands. For since

he is unjust, unjustly attributing to himself what is God's,

although he has nothing which he has not received, he will so

glory as though he had not received. Moreover in his own sins,

turned to making excuses for his excuses in words

of malice, by accusing the infirmity of nature he will dare

to pour back his fault upon the Author. But this is

the first justice of man: to impute to divine grace whatever

good he has, and to his own vice whatever evil.

[18] and the things which proceed from it And justice indeed brings forth humility, while injustice

begets pride. But pride is

a certain bitter root, which is wont to sprout even in the hearts

of Saints; it is a certain most wicked beast

wont to devour even some who are perfect; for

whereas the other vices arise only from vices, this monster alone

sometimes draws its origin from virtues, as it were

from an unlike stock. This most wicked beast the patriarch

Jacob knew, when he said:

A most wicked beast has devoured my son Joseph. But humility

is a most efficacious remedy both

for guarding and for restoring the soul's health.

For it both preserves the Saints in goodness and

undoubtedly justifies sinners: for surely

the humble and modest confession of sin is not far distant from innocence.

Justice, therefore, by humility overthrows the iniquities

which injustice heaps up by pride.

Justice by humility consummates the virtues

which injustice by pride destroys.

[19] the remaining virtues; Wherefore this Saint of ours must have had justice along with the other

virtues, lest he should seem to have built a body

without a head, or a house without a roof: but who could doubt

that he was just, who has learned what has been recorded

of him above? For to show

due reverence to the Creator with service is no small

part of justice. To keep the fellowship of the human race

in such a way that to all and to each a worthy affection is paid

seems to belong to the other part. And he so bore himself

toward God and men that neither for religion's sake did he become

inhuman, nor for humanity's sake irreligious.

But in the very diversities of men, which

sex, or age, or condition makes, he so preserved the dignity

of justice that he showed observance to his elders,

indulgence to his juniors, kindness to his equals, mercy

to the weaker, and fairness to all.

[20] Finally he lived soberly and justly and piously in this

world, bodily and spiritual sobriety, of which he observed the first toward himself, the second toward men,

the third toward God. And by sobriety

in this place we must understand not only that

by which the appetite for bodily food or drink is checked short of surfeit

and drunkenness, but most of all that

which spiritually restrains the mind from all the enticements

of unlawful things. For he then at last lived

soberly, if he preserved the integrity of sobriety. For some

eat sins as bread, and drink

iniquity as wine. And that is the worst

and most to be shunned kind of drunkenness, when

the mind, made frantic by lust, or avarice, or pride, or some

poisoned cup of this kind, can neither

discern the true with the eye of reason, nor plant the foot of works

in the way of God's commandments; but

in a manner dissolved and enervated and tottering, complains

that something or other is always lacking to its restless

and wretched pleasure. This drunkenness is followed by

eternal damnation, as the angel who spoke to blessed John

revealed to him: Come, he says, I will show

thee the damnation of the great harlot — that

is, of the harlot nation — which sits upon many waters,

while it takes its rest in things fleeting and transitory:

with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and they

who inhabit the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her prostitution.

And a little after: Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen —

that is, has fallen twice, namely in body and in soul;

she is crushed with a double crushing, and is clothed

as with a double cloak with her own confusion. Because the blessed Man

knew that this damnation was prepared for the luxurious in

the time to come, in every way he lived soberly in this world;

so that he neither tasted the wine of vice, nor in tasting the wine of the vine

exceeded moderation.

[21] But toward men he kept that justice

which Christ sent upon the earth, love of neighbor consummating

and abridging the word in equity: What you

would not have done to you, do not to another. For this, if it be fittingly

understood, shows a consummated love of neighbor,

since it not only calls one back from inflicting

injury, but even urges to the conferring of

benefits. For this too, although the words do not say so,

is established from the aforesaid sentence: that what

you wish to be done to you, you should not withhold from another. For if you withhold it,

you certainly do already what you would not have done to you; for no one

wishes help to be withheld from himself in his need.

But further, if anyone should be so perverse

that either he does not wish some good to be done to him, or even wishes something

base to be done to him, let him not on that account judge himself

forbidden by this commandment to do good to others, or

commanded to do evil to others: nay rather

let him know that this commandment, which was given to men,

has nothing to do with him, since he does not belong

to the lot of men; inasmuch as by his own vice

he has degenerated into an irrational nature, while in seeking

and shunning he follows a bestial judgment, if it may be so called.

Woe to that man, since he calls good

evil and evil good, puts darkness for light

and light for darkness; out of his mind no less than

if, hastening on a journey, he should raise his feet to heaven, with his head fixed

in the earth, or should think himself advancing

when he goes backward. But this commandment was sent to those

who wish nothing for themselves but holiness, who

wish nothing away but iniquity, so composed in themselves

that they ought now to be extended toward others, who by sobriety

deserve this, that they should attain justice also.

Such without doubt was the Saint of whom we speak;

and therefore he rightly kept the commandment toward others,

so that he neither wished to inflict any evil on his neighbor,

nor to deny him any good.

[22] and piety fulfilled not in words only He lived also piously; for it was for piety's sake that he lived soberly

and justly: for he kept two for the sake of the third,

while for the love of God he loved himself and his neighbor.

He lived, therefore, soberly and justly and piously in this world. Whence

secure, he partly awaits, and has partly already attained,

the blessed hope and the coming of the glory of the great

God, standing without stain before the eternal throne,

and one of the harpers harping on their harps.

For he did not, as very many do, speak well

and live ill; which is nothing else than to harp

on another's strings. Of such harpers today all places

are full, whose life answers with nothing worthy to be heard;

yet they do not cease to dictate about another's.

In this man, they say, this and that is blameworthy;

in this, this man and that transgress badly. Preposterous

and insipid men, who, while they know not how to harp on their own,

presume to harp on another's harp,

destined surely to have as great a damnation

as the good harper has reward — or certainly the greater,

the more they add presumption to wickedness. Such men

the Lord marks in the Gospel, who lay unbearable burdens

on men's shoulders, but will not touch them

with their own finger; or who, carrying a beam

in their own eye, reprove their brother's eye for a mote,

and, though themselves utterly blind, do not fear to presume

upon the leading of the blind.

[23] but completed in works. Not thus did the Saints of God merit the eternal

fellowship of the kingdom, nor did blessed Florentius —

to say nothing of others — leave us such an example. By living

rather than by speaking he corrected the erring, and dictated

what should be done not so much by discourse as by work. Yet

he was not wanting in discourse for the instruction of others; but in its own

order he applied both, so that he might first do and

so teach. The just Man rebuked sinners indeed;

but so that that rebuke breathed sweetness, not bitterness;

mercy, not envy; goodwill,

not hatred. Thus he tempered chiding with blandishments,

and blandishments with chiding, so that neither should the latter

soften nor the former sadden. Which the wicked and inconsiderate,

while they falsely desire to imitate it, laboring to glue together what nature

has set apart — good, I mean,

and evil — make monsters of themselves, pouring forth from the same

fountain of their own heart a good word and an evil work,

that is, sweet water and bitter, which nature does not

allow; and being themselves worthless figs,

pretending to a fruitfulness of grapes.

PART III.

The imitation of the Saint is a remedy against all sins.

From the imitation of the virtues of St. Florentius But we, brethren, imitating the wisdom of this our blessed

Father, let us flee the folly of such men;

or if any of us are such, let us flee

ourselves, lest, if we do not flee ourselves, others rightly

flee us. Let us learn either not to commit blameworthy things

ourselves, or not to reprove the things committed by others.

For to reprove and to be able to be reproved is

to be a physician and to be sick. Let us imitate our Patron in this

as in other good things, if we wish

to celebrate a pleasing and solemn service to him. For to

this most of all are the virtues of the Saints recalled,

that hearers may be stirred by a good example.

Let us take an example from near at hand: we have before our eyes

a special Patron provided for us by God,

so that it is not necessary for us to borrow something imitable

from a stranger. And although the same things may be found

in others, yet it delights one more to draw waters equally sweet

from a near than from a remote fountain, especially

when its vein, unfailing and without loss to itself —

nay, to its own increase — suffices to refresh

all. And the waters of this fountain are so wholesome

that they can quench the heats and fevers of sick souls

of whatever diversity.

[25] If anyone, unhappy at another's happiness, lean

at another's fatness, as from a fountain, grows pale with envy, so that he thinks

whatever is bestowed on others is taken from him, let him take from this

fountain of ours a full cup of brotherly charity;

straightway he will escape not only this plague, but also

another consequent upon it — and although diverse,

no less deadly — namely, that he should think bestowed on himself

whatever is taken from others. But what fruit

will he gain from the health received? Namely, that reckoning all things of others

as his own, he may turn even the losses of others

into gain for himself. For to grieve and to rejoice with a neighbor's gain

and loss have both an equal recompense

with God. Is someone maddened with wrath, foaming out his frenzy? Let him

come hither and drink patience; he will straightway put off the savage

countenance along with the mind, and returning to his senses, will wonder that he has strayed

so far, will be ashamed of his madness, and the remembrance

of the strange disease will give matter for caution.

[26] He who sows discord among brethren, as though

he should sprinkle wormwood into honey — after he has drunk

peace from this fountain, he will unite what he had scattered;

he will root up what he had sown. He too will repent

of his past error, and hereafter will reckon the losses

of his fruitless labor by the compensation of a more useful

exercise. In some who labor not from want of substance but of sense,

so great a flame of greed lays waste

their marrow that the more they take, the more they crave.

Which befalls them for this reason, that they take not

remedies of satiety but incitements of cupidity;

for he who wishes to allay avarice with money

tries to quench a kindled pyre with oil. Let these too therefore

drink a full cup of the bounty of sufficiency, lest they abide

in that eternal want which they flee. For he is

equally needy who does not have what is enough,

and he for whom what he has is not enough.

[27] There is another kind of disease also, and indeed frequent enough in our

times, a remedy is drawn namely of those who

weigh their own faults lightly and others' heavily; and

conversely, esteeming their own greatly, count

others' virtues of little worth. These indeed do in virtues

what treacherous traders do in wares; but

in vices these do the contrary of those, yet with

God both these and those are abominable. For a weight

and a weight, a balance and a balance — both

are abominable with God. Would that at least they erred rather

on the other side! — that is, that they should esteem others' evils

lighter than their own, and their own goods of less

weight than others'. For the latter is as it were excusable on account of humility,

while the former is truly damnable on account of pride.

Yet both this and that are blameworthy;

because unbending justice requires this, that things existing of the same

weight, whether others' or our own, we should weigh in the same

scale of judgment. These too can easily escape the contrary

sickness, if from this

fountain of ours they draw equity with the water jar of imitation.

Hence let the proud draw humility, and the prodigal

frugality; the lascivious chastity, the luxurious abstinence.

But who could enumerate all the kinds

of spiritual sicknesses? Let it suffice to have truly said this much to the praise

of our present Patron: that there is no kind of vice

to which he did not himself have the opposite virtue.

Which although they are not all read of singly, yet

from some the others are gathered. For from the parts we weigh the whole,

from the greater the lesser, from the plain the obscure.

And although he was himself a concealer of his own

virtues, as others are of their vices, yet so many

and so great are read of that there is no need to desire

more or greater.

[28] Very many miracles make plain his merit with God Finally, how great his merit is with God, the frequent

showing of signs makes manifest. For, to pass over those

which by their multitude and

greatness require neither a brief space of time nor a modern

writer's wit — I mean those

which after his blessed passage to heaven he wrought wonderfully at various times

and places — who could match by the worth of his telling even those

miracles which he wrought while still weighed down with mortal flesh? And, to touch

briefly, for example's sake, on a few out of many and small out of great,

the Rhone, when questioned, answers to his power,

the river Vienne bears witness, the Loire,

his own familiar, proclaims it. For the most rapid waves

of the Rhone and its dreaded eddies he crossed in an old

and broken ship, with faith alone for oar,

by a greater miracle perhaps than if the apostolic Traveler

had crossed the fierce river treading

the waters with bold foot. For then he alone would have been saved

in the miracle; but now the broken age of the little ship,

which was likewise saved, seems to double the wonder. For

the ship did not carry him, but he carried the ship.

And, that he might make illustrious the banks also of that most famous river

with the gifts of the wonders customary to him,

meeting presently, in the very issue of the fresh miracle,

a man possessed by a demon, showing his madness by his fetters,

being touched with mercy he cleansed him,

loosed from his spiritual and bodily bonds.

Swiftly and in passing he joined these two miracles together,

as one who on the Lord's day was hastening to Lyons for the solemnities

of the Masses.

[29] very many, For these things were done, and many others besides these,

on that pilgrimage in which, having left his native soil,

admonished by a divine voice, he was coming to our place.

Nor did the Vienne feel a miracle far divided from these,

although wrought at a far different time, itself also marked

with a twofold wonder in its channel and on its banks.

For when on a certain occasion the holy Man, having now dwelt

for some while in the place of his habitation,

went to see blessed Martin again after his yearly custom,

he obtained from God the son of a poor blind woman,

who sat weeping on the bank, and who some days before had been swallowed by the aforesaid river,

and gave back to the twice-bereaved woman, along with her son,

the sight she had lost. On the banks of the Loire also he raised a twofold

trophy: in the one place, which he himself inhabited,

by the expulsion of a multitude of serpents;

in the other, which anciently was called Murus,

by the expulsion of a single one — not of many, but of one which by its very

size stood for a multitude. Besides, those who flocked

to him, as sick men to a physician — the blind,

the lame, the possessed, and those beset by various sicknesses —

he enlightened, raised up, cleansed, healed. For

every such kind of person eagerly frequented the place which he had believed

would be a fitting hiding place for his contemplation,

his holiness being soon known.

[30] and a long constancy in good. Finally, if the power of miracles is looked for,

what is more worthy of admiration than, amid so great an inconstancy

of mortal life, to keep a stable constancy of mind?

This is plainly to be set in the fire and not burn,

or to be plunged in the river and not be overwhelmed. He lived 123

years; how great a variety of events, do we think, beat upon him

in so long an interval of time, when

human life scarcely endures for a single day in the same state?

But so had the blessed Man prepared himself for all things,

so had he provided in peace the things needful for war, that

no variety of fortune found him unprepared.

He had brought his mind to omit no good, even if

it were costly, even if dangerous, even if laborious;

and on the other hand to admit no evil,

even if it were to bring gain, or pleasure,

or security. So the good Man, perfect, complete,

whom no force, no necessity could make do evil,

like the most approved gold, or some precious

pearl, worthy to be laid up for ever in the Lord's treasury,

was translated to heaven and reckoned among the sons

of God, an inhabitant of that blessed city, the structure

of whose wall is of precious stone, and the city itself of pure

gold, and it needs neither sun nor moon; for the brightness

of God has enlightened it, and the Lamb is its lamp.

[31] We also therefore, brethren, if we wish to be

partakers of that brightness — and who is so mad as not to wish it? — Let us imitate him, that we may be partakers of his glory.

let us cast off the works of darkness; if we love peace and

eternal rest, let us renounce the wretched and turbulent

cares of the world. For many — which

is worse — the more they are free from business in body,

the more troublesomely they do business in mind; and the leisure they ought

to spend on good pursuits they waste in vain

upon the desires of business. Let us cast away

whatever stirs up tumult in the soul, whatever shakes tranquillity

from the mind, whatever tears the distracted heart

into many pieces; which, if they could not be expelled otherwise —

as Seneca says — the heart itself would have to be torn out with

them. What we promise by our outward habit, let us hold in the inward

man. For to veil an irreligious mind with a religious countenance or habit

is to be a sheep outwardly

and to carry a wolf within; which indeed

is far worse than if you displayed a wolf outwardly

and hid a sheep within. Let us cleanse our conscience

from dead works, let us square ourselves with the aforesaid

virtues. For no stone, unless living and

squared, shall enter the building of that holy city,

which itself also is set foursquare, whose length

and breadth and height are equal; which

is nothing else than to be solid and square.

Let us therefore be made solid and squared to this most blessed

Father of ours, whose yearly solemnity

we keep, that we too, as living stones, squared stones,

may deserve to be built together into a heavenly dwelling place

of God in the Holy Spirit. Amen.