But then the difficulty of acquiring a higher seat! Even in Mr. Alban Butler's volumes, pruned, and trimmed, and qualified, and softened down, and varnished, as every legend is in passing through his hands, we read of Saints who resorted to such refrigerants as the ice bath and the bed of snow. St. Benedict and the Seraphic St. Francis, personages of the highest order in the hagiarchy, found it necessary to prescribe for themselves a roll among the briars,

a book that ought to be printed, because it had been inspected and reinspected by Angels, and approved by God, (ja visto e revisto pellos Anjos, e aprovado por Dios,) was not the fabrication of a dark age, nor was it brought forth in a corner. Veronica was born in 1445, and died at Milan, in 1497, where, only twenty years after her death, upon the ground of this legend, Leo X., by a Bull, permitted her to be honoured, venerated, and adored, at the special request of Francis I. On the part of Francis this was a profligate device for making himself popular at Milan,... on the part of the Pope, a profligate subserviency to the views of the French King. The legend had been dedicated to Francis and his Queen by F. Isidorus de Isolanis, who had probably no small share in fabricating it. The dedication, which is dated on Michaelmas day, 1517, alludes to the French King's victories in Italy, and concludes thus: accipite igitur Regis Christiana Reipublice lumina diva Virginea gesta, Veronicamque virginem incognitæ mortalibus sanctitudinis, numinibus vestris tutelaribus annumerate. Francis lost no time in applying to Rome through his ambassador the Bishop of St. Malo, and on the fifteenth of December, the obsequious Pope expedited his bull sub annulo Piscatoris.

which was successful in both cases, and in that of the latter produced the most miraculous and splendid consequences. St. Arduin* obtained the desired effect by rolling in full undress among the nettles. The Cherubic St. Dominic, finding himself unable to support a single combat, retired into a wood, stript, lay down, and called upon the ants and the wasps for aid; and even against these auxiliaries the flesh maintained a three hours contest before he came off victorious; † after which he not only became, for the rest of his life, as "chaste as ice," but physically also fire-proof. The holy Equitius,+ and the equally holy Helias, § and the not less holy Methodius,|| had that operation performed upon them by Angels in a dream which Origen and Ambrosio Morales, in the ardour of their zeal, performed upon themselves. The like favour was conferred upon the holy Abbot Serenus, who became more serene in consequence; and the miracle was wrought upon

* Bulzius. Lararium Poeticum, pars ii. 112.

p.

† Vida de S. Domingo, por el M. R. P. Fr. Francisco de Possadas, l. ii. c. iv. §§ 9-14. Possadas gives a full description of the combat.

S. Gregory's Dialogues, book i. chap. iv.

§ Zuinger. Theatrum Humanæ Vitæ, p. 2252, 2256. Il Ibid, 2254.

him in a manner inexplicable* to anatomists. Raynald, Dean of Orleans, and afterwards a disciple of Dominic, was twice anointed by the Virgin Mary's own hand (the second time in the presence of Dominic and of another Religioner) with an unguent,† which saved him from any after-temptation to sin against one of his vows. The great St. Thomas (not the Apostle, who is a very insignificant person among the Romanists, compared to the angelical Doctor of Aquino) was girt by two Angels with that girdle wherewith St. Peter Damian

* Adveniens ad eum Angelus in visione nocturná, ejusque velut aperiens uterum, quandam ignitam carnis strumam de ejus visceribus avellens, ac projiciens, suisque omnia, ut fuerant, locis intestina restituens, Ecce, inquit, incentiva carnis tuæ abscissa sunt, et obtinuisse te noveris hodierná die perpetuam corporis puritatem, quam fideliter poposcisti.-Cassian. Collat, col, vii. c. ii, p. 310.

† Acta SS. Aug. t. i. p. 582. I wish it were possible for every reader to examine the authorities which I refer to. Without such proof, any conception which they can form of the impiety and wickedness of this prodigious system of imposture must fall short of the reality.

This Petrus Peccator, as he calls himself in the superscription, begins a letter to Pope Nicolas II, thus: Nuper habens cum nonnullis Episcopis ex vestræ majestatis auctoritate colloquium, sanctis eorum femoribus volui seras apponere. Tentavi genitalibus Sacerdotum (ut ita loquar) continentia fibulas adhibere. Bernino inserts the epistle in his history (t. iii. p. 71.) as testimonianza pur troppo autentica della malvaggità de que'

wished to constringe all the clergy. St. Thomas had prayed that he might thus be delivered

tempi. The letter indeed shows how strongly the secular clergy opposed the obligation of celibacy to which the Papal Court, instigated by the Monks, was determined upon subjecting them.

* He had run away from his family that he might become a Friar; and his brothers, having caught him, are said to have tried a most unworthy expedient for reconciling him to a secular life: "Nam miserunt ad ipsum solum existentem in camerâ in quá dormiebat, puellam pulcherrimam, cultu meritricio perornatam, quæ ipsum alliceret ad peccandum. Quam cum vidisset pugil invictus, qui sibi jam Dei sapientiam sponsam acceperat, cujus amore flagrabat; et sentiret in se carnis insurgere stimulum, quem semper tenuerat sub ratione subjectum, (hoc permittente Providentia Divina consilio, ut gloriosior de certamine sibi triumphus exurgeret,) accepto de camino in spiritu titione, juvenculam cum indignatione de camerá expulit, et accedens in spiritus fervore ad angulum cameræ, signum crucis in pariete cum summitate titionis impressit, et prostratus ad terram, cum lacrymis a Deo petivit orando perpetuæ virginitatis cingulum, quod sercare sibi in pugná concesserat incorruptum. Qui cum hæc orando cum lacrymis subito obdormisset, ecce ad eum duo Angeli cœlitus missi sunt ; qui asserentes eum à Deo exauditum, et de pugnâ tam difficili obtinuisse triumphum, stringentes ipsum hinc inde in renibus, dixerunt: Ecce ex parte Dei te cingimus, quod petivisti, cingulo castitatis, quod nullâ poterit de cetero impugnatione dissolvi ; et quod humanæ virtutis haberi non potest ex merito, tibi conceditur divinæ largitatis ex dono. Unde ex tunc mulierum aspectum semper abhorruit, et earum consessum, colloquium, et convictum toto posse vitavit. Consueverat autem ex hoc admirari quam plurimum, et homines divinis speculationibus deditos assuetus erat arguere, quod diutius possent con

from temptation. But holy Abbess Sara, one of the stars of the Egyptian galaxy, made it her prayer that she might perpetually be so tempted* and always resist the temptation. Accordingly she continued in it during thirteen years: at the end of that long trial she was only saved from succumbing by calling upon heaven for immediate aid. The Devil then, being aware that

sedendo mulieribus tempus longis locutionibus perdere, nisi aliquod negotium nimis utile causâ necessitatis occurreret, vel de Deo, aut de divinis locutio immineret. In quá constrictione Angelici tactus cum dolorem sensibilem percepisset, excitatus est cum clamore; et quærentibus ad quid clamasset, revelare noluit donum divinitùs sibi datum; sed manifestandum usque ad suum obitum conservavit occultum. Quod tamen suo socio Raynaldo revelavit, qui ad laudem Dei et revelationem Sancti, pluribus revelavit ad exemplum. -Acta SS. Mart. t. i. p. 661.

* Sara, in partibus Thebaidis Abbatissa, cum cogitationes ejus ad libidinem Diabolus incitare soleret, nunquam ut recederet tentatio, oravit; sed ut et ille assiduè oppugnaret, et ipsa semper vinceret. In hoc carnalis lascivia bello per annos tredecim fortiter contendit. Sed tandem, aliquantò acrius impugnata quàm ut sustinere posset, clamavit ad Dominum Jesum Christum, et superavit inimicum, ita ut oranti apparens dæmon diceret, Vicisti me, Sara, vicisti! At illa nihil sibi ex hoc laudis vindicans, Non ego, inquit, vici te, sed Dominus meus Jesus.-Marul. 1. v. c. vii. & Sab. I. x. c. iii. Zuinger. Theatr. p. 2255.

Even if I had not been censured for withholding my authorities, I should set down the original in this and other such cases, that the reader may see how faithfully I have represented them.