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 Ro '^n il Breviary : a critcal and historic 
 
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THE 
 
 EOMAN BEEVIAEY. 
 
THE 
 
 ROMAN BREVIARY; 
 
 % Critical anir historical §^bieto, 
 
 COPIOUS CLASSIFIED EXTRACTS, 
 
 CHAELES HASTINGS COLLETTE. 
 
 SECOND EDITION REVISED AND ENLARGED. 
 
 Per ambages et ministeria deorum 
 PrsecipitanduB est liber spiritus. — Petkon. 
 
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 And claims the ministry ot heavenly powers. 
 
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PEEFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 ' I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say." — 1 Cor. x. 15. 
 
 It has long been a matter of considerable surprise to 
 me, that as yet we have not had placed before us in a 
 separate volume, and in a popular and compendious form, 
 an exposure of the astounding marvels and fabulous 
 incidents presented to us in the Roman Breviary. I 
 have attempted this in the following compilation, pre- 
 ceded by an historical and critical sketch. 
 
 The Roman Breviary, the handbook of Roman 
 Priests exclusively for their daily devotions, is the most 
 vulnerable point of attack on the Roman system. It is 
 really indefensible. 
 
 The Church of Rome is solemnly pledged to the 
 absolute truth of every single statement in the Breviary. 
 We have here set before us an authoritive record of 
 the sayings and doings of individuals, while on earth, 
 whom the Church of Rome — arrogantly anticipating 
 the decree and usurping the prerogatives of the Almighty 
 — has taken upon herself to decide to be actually in 
 Heaven, enjoying " the beatific vision," under the tech- 
 nical designation of the " canonised." 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 Previous to canonisation a most scrutinising investi- 
 gation is supposed to have taken place by a duly 
 authorised tribunal. The proofs on which the miracles 
 attributed to the individuals are founded are supposed 
 to be subjected to a most searching examination, just 
 as any other questions of alleged fact advanced in a 
 court of law would be sifted. A " Devil's Advocate," 
 Avvocato del diavolo as he is called, is appointed to pick 
 holes in the evidence. Large sums are expended in the 
 process, in order to obtain the decree of the Pope, and 
 the proceedings protracted in proportion. When the 
 solemn decision is finally issued, the Pope's infallible 
 seal is set on the alleged proofs, the individual be- 
 comes entitled to the designation of " Saint," and may 
 then be legally invoked for his intercession before the 
 Throne of Grace, and his merits may be pleaded on 
 behalf of the sinner on earth. The name of the Saint 
 is then transferred to the Roman Calendar, and a specific 
 date is assigned to him, and on each anniversary day a 
 special service or festival is celebrated in his honour. A 
 summary of the alleged miracles of the chosen few is 
 recorded in certain " Lessons " in the Breviary; and 
 the Breviary, as it now stands, has been endorsed and 
 adopted by special Bulls of Popes as binding on the 
 conscience of the priesthood of the Boman Church. 
 
 The Cardinal and Archbishop Bellarmin has told 
 us that, " in the act of Canonisation his Church is infal- 
 lible ; " and further, that she " cannot err, either in faith 
 or practice, especially in ceremonies and divine wor- 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 ship." She has placed on this book her irrevocable 
 seal of infallibility : — Roma locuta est: causa finita est. 
 
 The Church of Kome, being thus committed to these 
 wonderful narrations as literally true, has no loophole 
 left for escape from the consequences ; and until she can 
 point out to us any other communion to which the 
 emphatic prophecy of St. Paul can be applied, we must 
 conclude that the members of that communion are clearly 
 indicated as those who should "heap to themselves 
 teachers, having itching ears," and that " they shall 
 turn their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto 
 fables," and that the Priests of that communion are 
 equally as clearly indicated as those " whose coming is 
 after the working of Satan with all power and signs and 
 lying wonders " — " Speaking lies in hypocrisy ; having 
 their conscience seared with a hot iron — " 
 
 " BY THEIR WOBDS THEY SHALL BE CONDEMNED." 
 
 C. H. C. 
 
 N.B. — The edition of the Breviary from which I have taken my quota- 
 tions is the genuine authorized tmmutilated edition, Lisbon, 1786 (see 
 p. 9). In examining, however, more modern editions — for example, Dub- 
 lin, 1845 — I find certain startling passages silently withdrawn. To give 
 one example of many such : — In page 56 I have quoted from the " Fourth 
 Lesson " of the Feast of Mary Magdalene de Pazzi (May 27), where we 
 are told that " she learned to pray before she could speak." We in vain 
 look for this passage in modern editions. Need we assign motives P (see 
 p. 9, note). A bitter regret must now be felt that the reformed Breviary 
 of Cardinal Quignon was interdicted by Paul IV. (see p. 6). " Where 
 there is shame, there is yet hope left ! " 
 
PEEFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 On the appearance of the first issue of this translation 
 of Extracts from the Eoman Breviary in a local paper, 
 it was my fate to be abused in Eomish Papers and 
 more particularly in " The Universe" where we read : — 
 "It is with the greatest repugnance that we [The 
 Universe') have brought ourselves to speak of this man 
 at all, and it is only out of respect to a worthy corre- 
 spondent that we have done so. We hope it will 
 content this latter gentleman if we assure him, that 
 by those who know anything either of hagiology or 
 theology, the articles appearing on the Soman Brevi- 
 ary are considered beneath contempt." — "We really 
 hope that we shall not be drawn by this ignorant, fool- 
 ish Attorney into the dreary work of tearing to pieces 
 such antiquated rags and rubbish." — "We hope Mr. 
 Collette will persevere in his intention of reprinting 
 the mass of misrepresentation and falsehood which he 
 is busy heaping together at present. It will do good 
 for the world at large to see what the baleful passion 
 of malevolence can effect in a man." — " But let us 
 remind this interesting agent of a most noble associ- 
 ation that we decline to supply him with corrections 
 of his inimitable press. As the whipping-post and 
 the pillory have unfortunately bee a allowed to fall into 
 disuse we are equally unable to recommend him to any 
 
PREFACE. 12 
 
 corrective that would be in the least efficient — So now 
 let him work away and translate the ' Breviary' and 
 mock at God's Saints. It is his own risk, as he will 
 find one day to his bitter cost." 
 
 Being thus accused of " misrepresentation and false- 
 hood," I forwarded a copy of the first reprint to the 
 Editor. The result was the following, in the leading 
 article of Tlie Universe, which I venture to transcribe : — 
 
 " Mr. Collette and Ourselves." 
 
 " We have been troubled once more with a note from 
 Mr. Collette. He tells us that he considers our treat- 
 ment of him as the 'usual resort of those who lack 
 argument/ but that, nevertheless, he has ' ventured to 
 put in print a revised edition of his letters, which he 
 commits to our merciful consideration.' Now we would 
 wish Mr. Collette thoroughly to understand once for 
 always how the matter lies between us. 
 
 " We never argue with him or with any of his tribe. 
 We content ourselves with denouncing and chastising 
 them. They are long past reasoning with. They 
 belong to the Maria Monk school of controversialists — 
 they patronise the ' raw-head-and-bloody -bones ' class of 
 historians — there is nothing too false for them to stamp 
 as true, nothing too foul for them to serve up as cleanly 
 and fair. 
 
 " Ignoble caricature of what is good and great is 
 the highest achievement possible to this shameless race 
 of literary artists. They would be actors, but in reality 
 prove themselves nothing higher than grimacing buf- 
 foons. Any lout can ' grin through a horse collar,' and 
 the scurviest of pedlars can enact Jack Pudding at a 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 country fair. Let Mr, Collette therefore — ' take heart 
 and grace.' There is always work of a certain sort for 
 those who are indifferent as to dirty hands. But they 
 must accept the terms of such employment, one of 
 which is that we can touch them only with the ' cat ' 
 and the cudgel. 
 
 "For the future, whenever any of the agents of the 
 Protestant Alliance lie more vigorously than usual, we 
 shall probably fix them in our pillory. If, however, they 
 will content themselves with a moderate mendacity, they 
 will hear from us but seldom. We have no stomach 
 for the nauseous task of paddling in the Cloaca maxima 
 of London Protestantism." 
 
 The bolt I have launched has evidently hit hard to 
 produce such a vituperative effusion as the above. I can 
 afford to allow all this personal abuse to pass without 
 comment. But when I am accused of misrepresenta- 
 tion and falsehood, and of turning religion into ridicule, 
 or of indulging in satire and in mockery of Grod's Saints, 
 or that I caricature what is good and great, I may be 
 permitted to say a word in my own defence. 
 
 As to misrepresentation and falsehood, that which I 
 have compiled and translated is, alas ! too true. It 
 makes us blush for Christianity. 
 
 Under the greatest provocation, with so favourable an 
 opportunity as the subject I have in hand presents, I 
 have endeavoured carefully to avoid ridicule or satire, 
 either at the expense of religion or of " Grod's Saints." 
 In the present instance ridicule and satire would be 
 perfectly legitimate weapons. To caricature would be 
 impossible. It was Dean Swift, in defence of his Tale of 
 a Tub, in reply to those who alleged against him that 
 " religion ought not to be ridiculed " — "And they tell 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 us the truth," he said; "yet surely the corruptions in it 
 may ; for we are taught by the tritest maxim in the 
 world, that religion being the best of things, its corrupt- 
 ions are likely to be the worst." While I deny the 
 truth of the charges brought against me, I claim the 
 right to ridicule the fanatical eccentricities and extra- 
 vagant inventions of the Priests of Rome, without being 
 charged with jesting at religion. It was Pascal who 
 said that there is a vast difference between laughing at 
 religion and laughing at those who profane it by their 
 extravagant absurdities, and desire to make people 
 believe that it is unworthy of a Christian to treat error 
 with derision. Just in proportion as Christian truths 
 are worthy of love and respect, the contrary errors must 
 deserve hatred and contempt; there being two things in 
 the truths of our religion — a divine beauty that renders 
 them lovely, and a sacred majesty, that renders them 
 venerable ; and two things also about errors — an impiety 
 that makes them horrible, and an extravagance and 
 boldness that renders them ridiculous. Ridicule judi- 
 ciously administered is in some cases a very appropriate 
 means of reclaiming men from their errors. To deride 
 the errors and extravagances of some men is not inconsist- 
 ant with charity. There are many things which deserve 
 to be held up in this way to ridicule and mockery, lest 
 by a serious refutation we should attach a weight to 
 them which they do not deserve. To treat them seri- 
 ously would be to sanction them. While, however, I have 
 avoided ridicule, if the reader meets with anything that 
 may excite a smile he must ascribe it to the prolific and 
 extravagant inventions of the Roman Priesthood, who 
 have offered them for our sober and serious acceptance 
 
Xll PREFACE. 
 
 as facts. All I have done is to render in plain English 
 what is offered to us in indifferent Latin. 
 
 When there is need to employ a little raillery, the 
 spirit of piety will take care not to employ it against 
 things holy ; whereas the spirit of buffoonery, impiety, 
 and heresy — such as is exhibited in the extravagant 
 narratives now under review — mocks at all that is 
 sacred. I have disclaimed taking any such advantage. 
 Indeed we are in no great danger of falling into that 
 strain of writing in the present instance, so long as we 
 confine ourselves to the extracts I have selected from 
 the Eoman Breviary, for the wild profusion of extra- 
 vagance sufficiently points its own moral, and adorns its 
 its own tale. 
 
 C. H. C. 
 
 P.S. — While these sheets were passing through the 
 press, my attention has been drawn to four remarkable 
 letters addressed to Monsig. Dechamps, Archbishop of 
 Malins, by a Priest of the Eoman Church, A. Gratry, 
 Father of the Oratory, and Member of the Jcademie 
 Franqaise* When the Infallibility doctrine was en- 
 forced by a decree of the Vatican Council, this Priest 
 fearlessly stood in the breach, and proclaimed that all 
 the historical evidence adduced in support of that 
 dogma was based on interpolations, and fraudulent 
 mutilations and forgeries of documents. The principal 
 portions of these, he points out, had been introduced 
 into the Eoman Breviary. More especially does he 
 " denounce the pernicious falsehood of the decretals in 
 the Instructions of the Eoman Breviary," and he also 
 
 * Translated from the French, by the Eev. T. J. Bailey. Messrs. 
 Simpkin and Marshall (without date). 
 
PREFACE. Xlll 
 
 exposes the vain endeavours of Cardinal Manning and 
 others to free the Eoman Church from the scandal that 
 Pope Honorius was condemned as a Heretic by three 
 successive General Councils, and that the mutilated 
 decrees of the Council had been inserted in the Eoman 
 Breviary, but omitting such condemnation. Those 
 who desire to furnish themselves with conclusive 
 evidence on the subject of the condemnation of a Pope 
 as a heretic by a General Council, with a complete 
 refutation of Cardinal Manning's vain endeavour to 
 rid his Church of the scandal, cannSt do better than 
 read those Four Letters. Father Gratry does not 
 hesitate to say that Dr. Manning, by his bold repudia- 
 tion of the authority of a General Council has " incurred 
 excommunication ipso facto or latce sententia enacted in 
 the recent Bull of Pius IX." (i. 8) ; and the mutilation of 
 the decree of the VI. General Council by the compilers of 
 the reformed Breviary as well as other palpable forgeries 
 he designates as "systematic falsifications of the Eoman 
 Breviary" (i. 41). My present object in referring to 
 these Letters, is to note that we have here, at least, an 
 honest and outspoken Priest of the Eoman Church, who 
 does not hesitate to denounce these forgeries and fables 
 in language I care not to use. The forgeries which 
 this Priest brings in accusation against the compilers 
 of the Eoman Breviary, he says are " supported in the 
 present day, by a school of error, founded upon passion, 
 blindness, and hot-headedness — a school seeing nothing 
 and listening to nothing, and to affirm everything on 
 the sense in which it is itself hurried along" (i. 19). 
 He exposes these "barefaced forgeries" as " thoroughly 
 and wilfully perpetrated on a mass of false documents " 
 (i. 27) ; " frauds and mutilations which liars and forgers, 
 
XIV PREFACE. 
 
 our most bitter enemies have been able to introduce 
 amongst us" (i. 33). The expressions as applied to these 
 forgers, and the compilers of the reformed Breviary, 
 whose " ignorance and audacity " he condemns (u. 36), 
 are startling. "Forgers of documents " (i. 13), "sacri- 
 legious forgers" (ii. 13), "liars and cheats" (i. 28, 29,33), 
 " a school of disimulation, deceit and falsehood" (i. 35), 
 their book — " a monstrous imposture " (i. 25), " lying and 
 intolerable " — " lying extracts from Fathers and Coun- 
 cils" (ii. 19), in fact it is "Eomanism gone mad " (ii. 41). 
 Father Gratry does not hesitate to repeat " what," he 
 tells us, " everybody knows — that there are in the Roman 
 Breviary false legends " (iv. 19). "It makes one giddy," 
 he adds, " to see such masses of error built upon the 
 foundation of ancient impostures, and their consequences 
 maintained as if the impostures had not been unmasked " 
 (ii. 42). 
 
 Surely if a Roman Priest can utter such accusations 
 against these "forgers," and so utterly condemn this 
 Book of " Lying wonders " as replete with forgeries and 
 frauds, a member of the Reformed Church is entitled to 
 express his opinions on the same subject without being 
 accused of "insulting God's Saints;" or of indulging 
 in the " baleful passion of malevolence." 
 
 The Marquis of Bute, one of the recent seceders to 
 Rome, has announced the publication of a translation 
 of the Roman Breviary. The task, if faithfully and 
 honestly performed throughout, will be a bold experi- 
 ment. It is said, with some truth, .that Neophytes and 
 the newly converted often display more zeal than 
 discretion. We wait the result with considerable 
 curiosity. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAOE 
 
 History of the Breviary — Origin of the title — Gregory "VTI. first 
 
 abbreviated the Church Services 1 
 
 The Franciscan abbreviation introduced by Nicholas III. . . 2 
 
 Various abbreviations existing previous to the Eeformation . . 2 
 
 Abbe" Gueranger on the gross corruptions of Church Services . . 2 
 
 Which led to the reformation of the Breviary 3 
 
 Gregory XIU's Breviary established by Bull 4 
 
 Ridiculous blunders in that Breviary 4 
 
 The word " Almanac " converted into a Saint 4 
 
 St. Ursula and the 11,000 Virgins were eleven Virgin Martyrs . 4 
 
 Five Soldiers blundered into 5,000 Martyrs 5 
 
 Twelve Soldiers blundered into 12,000 Martyrs .... 5 
 
 Eighty Miles blundered into eighty Martyred Soldiers ... 5 
 
 Clement VII. attempts to reform the Breviary .... 5 
 
 History of the Breviary of Cardinal Quignon 5 
 
 Withdrawn by Paul IV. 6 
 
 The Breviary of Paul IV. 6 
 
 The Breviary of Pius V, Bull Quod a Nobis 7 
 
 The Breviary of Clement VEIL, Bull Cum in Beclesid ... 7 
 
 The Breviary of Urban VIII 8 
 
 Bellarmine's opinion as to Infallibility of the Church in matters of 
 
 Divine Worship 8 
 
 Division of Breviary into Seasons and Daily Portions ... 9 
 
 Daily Portions to be read by Priests under pain of mortal sin . . 10 
 
 Reflections thereon 10 
 
 The Historical value of the Breviary considered . . . .12 
 
 The story of Constantine and Pope Sylvester proved to be a forgery 12 
 
 Decrees of the Roman Synod under Sylvester a forgery ... 12 
 
 That the Pope's legates presided at the Council of Nice a fabrication 13 
 
 The Liber Pontificalis and Acts of Sylvester fabrications . . 13 
 
 The forged Decretals 13 
 
 The divinely inspired stories attributed to Nicholas I. fabrications . 14 
 
 Likewise the Epistle of Marcellus 14 
 
 Council of Sinuessa forged 14 
 
XVI CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Extensive addition of canonised Popes *■* 
 
 Historical blunders in the Breviary of Pius V. .... 15 
 
 Mutilations and Interpolations ■*-" 
 
 The case of Pope Honorius 16 
 
 The Fable of the Apostacy of Pope Marcellinus .... 16 
 
 Quotation from Irenaaus falsified ....... 16 
 
 Breviary corrected, giving the Popes power over bodies as well as 
 
 souls 17 
 
 Satan's words to our Lord in the Temptation applied by our Lord 
 
 to Peter 18 
 
 Analysis of canonised Popes 18 
 
 Spurious works attributed to Ohrysostom 19 
 
 Other spurious works quoted in the Breviary as genuine . . .19, 20 
 
 St. Andrew quoted to prove Transubstantiation .... 20 
 Forged Decretal Epistle attributed to Alexander I., to prove "holy 
 
 water" 20 
 
 Spurious works attributed to Denis the Martyr .... 20 
 
 The alleged finding of the true Cross 21 
 
 Forged History of St. Patrick 22 
 
 Spurious Saints: St. Synoris, " Faith," " Hope," and " Charity "— 
 
 Veronica — Perpetua andFelicitas — Zepherinus andCallistus, 24,26,45 
 
 Miraculous discovery of the Bones of St. Babiana .... 26 
 
 Alleged Miracles of Xavier. 27 
 
 Immorality inculcated in the cases of St. Bose and St. Caecilia . 28 
 Persecutors canonised: Pius V., Canute, Xavier, Ferdinand of 
 
 Castile, and Francis de Sales 28, 29 
 
 Worship of dead bodies 30 
 
 Cases of Chrysologus and Scholastica 30, 31 
 
 The Virgin Mary 31 
 
 Mistranslation of Gen. iii. 15 31 
 
 The Immaculate Conception 32 
 
 The Franciscan Breviary 34 
 
 Spurious writings attributed to Jerome 34 
 
 The like to Gregory I.— Anslem— Presbyters of Achaia— Augustine 
 
 — Bede — Bonaventura 34 
 
 Festival of the Assumption 35 
 
 Festival of the Virgin of Mount Carmel 36 
 
 Story of Peter and Simon Magus .... 3g 
 Special Miracles attributed to St. Blasius and Thomas a, Becket in 
 
 Dominican Breviary oa 
 
 The Te Beum travestied 07 
 
 Festival of the Chair of Peter 07 
 
 Festival of the Chains of Peter 38 
 
CONTENTS. XVll 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Festival of the Santa Gasa of Loretto 38 
 
 Festival of tlie Blessed Rosary 40 
 
 Which commemorates Persecutions 41 
 
 On Saint Worship, established in 1439 43 
 
 Ferraris on Canonisation of Saints 44 
 
 Doubts as to who first celebrated the Canonisation of Saints . . 45 
 
 Saints found to be Heretics 45 
 
 The process of Canonisation a commercial transaction ... 46 
 
 Patron Saints 47 
 
 Peculiar virtues attributed to Saints. 48 
 
 Saintly patrons of various Trades 49 
 
 Veron disclaims the Canonisation of Saints as an Article of 
 
 Faith 51 
 
 Three new Saints proposed for Canonisation 53 
 
 Process of Beatification , . 53 
 
 Special wonders of Saints related . . . . • , • .55 
 
 Infant prodigies , , , . 55—59 
 
 Saints practising macerations of the body ..44 60 — 66 
 
 Their powers of endurance 66—69 
 
 A rare example of vis inertia . . 67 
 
 Various interesting anecdotes 69 — 74 
 
 The story of Scholastica and Father Benedict 70 
 
 Barbara's strange adventure 72 
 
 The descent from Heaven of a Dove on Gregory VII. ... 74 
 
 The acrobatic powers of Saints 74 — 77 
 
 Their Heathen rivals 77 
 
 Xavier's alleged wondrous knowledge of languages .... 79 
 
 His Heathen rivals 80 
 
 Exceptional virtue of Virginity 80 — 81 
 
 Supernatural powers and second-sight, and prophecy . . 81 — 83 
 Liguori and others said to have been in two places at one time . 83 
 Power of healing the sick, restoring sight to the blind, and raising 
 
 the dead, &c 83—86 
 
 Thomas a Becket restores the parts to an emasculated thief . . 85 
 
 Wonders effected by the sign of the Cross 86 
 
 Miraculous escapes, cures, and others wonders 87 
 
 Miracles effected by Peter's chains 88 
 
 Cases of spontaneous vegetation 89 
 
 Sailor Saints and aquatic marvels 90 
 
 The elements — snow and rain — obeying the commands of Saints . 93 
 Decapitated Saints walking and carrying their heads in their hands 94 
 
 Eccentric proceedings of dead bodies 94 — 98 
 
 Rivalled by Heathens . . . . ■ 95 
 
 b 
 
XV1U CONTENTS. 
 
 fAGB 
 
 A witness to a deed of sale of land raised from the dead after three 
 
 years to give evidence of his attestation 95 
 
 The liquifaotion of the blood of Januarius 97 
 
 Supernatural appearances, or apparitions 98 
 
 The Stigmata 101 
 
 The conduct of pious animals — lions, tigers, bears, fishes, horses, 
 
 ravens, eagles, &c 105 
 
 Miracles repudiated by some Roman Priests as shameful impostures 107 
 
 The opinions of Charles Butler, Lingard, and Milner . . . 110 
 Dr., now Cardinal, Newman's unqualified approval of the all the 
 
 Miracles of the Breviary 114 
 
 Concluding Observations 115 
 
INDEX TO THE SAINTS CITED. 
 
 Abdon, 106. 
 Accursius, 68. 
 Agnes, 98. 
 Alexander L, 20, 88. 
 Almachius, 4. 
 Aloysius, 57, 58. 
 Ambrose of Milan, 55. 
 Andrew the Apostle, 20. 
 Andrew of Florence, 56, 60, 81. 
 Anthony, 48, 81. 
 Augustine, 33, 34. 
 Avellini (Andrew), 93, 100. 
 
 Babiana, 26. 
 Barbara, 72, 74, 87. 
 Basil of Cappadocia, 69. 
 Benedict of Nursia, 61, 86. 
 Benedict, Father, 70, 82. 
 Bernard, 68. 
 Blasius, 36, 48. 
 Borromeo, 47 
 Bridget, 59. 
 
 Canute the Dane, 28, 60, 84. 
 Oallistus, 45. 
 CEecilia, Virgin, 28, 68. 
 Catherine of Sienna, 62, 85, 99 
 Catherine of Sweden, 55. 
 Clair of Assisi, 69, 85. 
 Clement, of Borne, 91. 
 Cyprian, 46, 69. 
 Chrysologus, Peter, 30, 87. 
 
 Dami n, Peter, 55, 60. 
 Denis of Prance, 20. 
 
 Dionysius, 94. 
 Dominic, 41. 
 Domingo, 48. 
 
 Elizabeth of Portugal, 64. 
 Emygdius, 85, 86, 91, 94. 
 Eustacius, 107. 
 
 Pelicitas and Perpetua, 26. 
 
 Felicianus, 105. 
 
 Felix, 70. 
 
 Francis dAssisi, 101. 
 
 Francis de Sales, 29, 57, 81, 84, 86, 
 
 94. 
 Francis of Girolamo, 83. 
 Francis of Paula, 81, 90. 
 
 Gelasius I., 99. 
 Gregory VII., 58, 74, 86. 
 Gregory of Neo-Cassarea, 83, 90, 91. 
 Gundisalvus, 56, 106. 
 
 Helena, 87. 
 Hyacinth the Pole, 91. 
 
 Irenasus, 16. 
 
 James the Brother of our Lord, 62. 
 
 Januarius, 69, 97, 106. 
 
 Jerome, 34. 
 
 John of Damascus, 99. 
 
 John of Etruria, 85. 
 
 John Joseph of the Cross, 61, 75, 
 
 83. 
 John of Nepomuci, 57, 96. 
 
XX 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 John of Sahagum, 82, 85, 100. 
 Juliana of Falconeris, 58. 
 Justinia, 69. 
 
 Liguori, 75, 83. 
 Linns, Pope, 86. 
 Lucia, Virgin, 67, 87. 
 
 Maria a Jesu de Agreda, 47. 
 Mary (the Blessed Virgin), 31, &e. 
 Margaret of Lavinia, 82, 84, 95. 
 Martina, a Virgin, 66. 
 Marcellinus, 14. 
 Maroellus, 14. 
 
 Mary Magdalene of Pazzi,56, 66, 94. 
 Mary Magdalene of Florence, 58,64. 
 
 Nicholas, 48, 55, 81, 92. 
 
 Otho, 68. 
 
 Pacificus, 76. 
 
 Patrick, 22, 65, 81. 
 
 Paul the Hermit, 81, 87, 105. 
 
 Perpetua and Felicitas, 26. 
 
 Peter, St., 37, 38. 
 
 Peter of Alcantara, 63, 66, 75, 82, 
 
 83, 87, 89, 91, 93. 
 Peter Armengaud, 76. 
 Peter Nolascus, 55, 81, 98, 100. 
 Philip of Florence, 58, 86. 
 Philip Neri, 64, 66, 75, 82, 85, 100. 
 Pius V., 28. 
 Pius of Lombardy, 82. 
 
 Primus, 105. 
 
 Prisca, a Virgin, 68, 105. 
 
 Eaymond of Barcelona, 48, 90. 
 
 Rita of Umbria, 57, 62, 97. 
 
 Roque, 48. 
 
 Rose of Lima, 58, 64. 
 
 Rose of Viterbo, 28, 58, 68, 82, 86. 
 
 Scholastica, 30, 70. 
 Sebastian, 88. 
 Sennen, 106. 
 Servulus, 95. 
 Sylvester, 12. 
 Stanislaus, 95, 105. 
 Stephen of Hungary, 75. 
 Synoris, 24. 
 
 Theresa, a Virgin, 61, 82, 98. 
 Thomas a Becket, 36, 85. 
 
 Ubald, 97. 
 Ursula, 4. 
 
 Venantius, 86, 100, 105. 
 Veronica, 25, 56, 59. 
 Vinentius of Spain, 68, 91, 105. 
 Vitus, 106. 
 
 Xavier, Francis, 27, 47, 60, 75, 79, 
 84, 106. 
 
 Zephyrinus, 45. 
 
THE ROMAN BREVIARY. 
 
 " The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine ; but 
 after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having 
 itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and 
 shall be turned unto fables." — 2 Tim. iv. 3, 4. 
 
 The Eoman Breviauy ! A wondrous and marvellous 
 book ! But more wondrous and more marvellous is the 
 fact that there should be found in Europe, at this 
 advanced period of the nineteenth century, a dass of 
 educated men who would consent to be bound, under 
 penalty of committing a mortal sin, day by day 
 throughout the year to read the appointed portion. 
 More wondrous and more marvellous still if they 
 believe in the fables which this book contains. 
 
 The Breviary is the handbook of the Boman Priest, 
 bearing the highest credentials that can be awarded to 
 any human production, in the Bomish point of view. 
 "When first compiled, so far back as the eleventh 
 century,* Breviaries were abridgments of the ancient 
 Church offices : hence the name. Gregory VII., about 
 the middle of the eleventh century, we are told,f took 
 upon himself to abbreviate the long services used in 
 the Church. Being overwhelmed with the multiplicity 
 
 * Some persons, according to Goschler, jn his Dictionary mentioned in 
 the note below, attempt to assign the first compilation to the days of 
 Leo I. and Gelasius I., and its enlargement to Gregory I., but these alle- 
 gations are apocryphal. 
 
 f " Dictionnaire de Liturgie," par 1' Abbe Migne. col. 163. 
 
 B 
 
of his official engagements, he found it necessary to 
 abridge these devotional exercises, and accordingly 
 drew up an abridgment, for use in his own chapel 
 at Eome. In 1241 an abbreviation undertaken by 
 the General of the Franciscan Minorites, Haymon, 
 obtained the approval of Pope Gregory IX., and was 
 introduced by Pope Nicholas III., in all the Churches of 
 Eome.* Separate communities in like manner follow- 
 ing this example, established their own abbreviated 
 services, and thus for many years, in fact up to the date 
 of the Eeformation, almost every diocese and monastery 
 had its own Breviary, compiled and arranged according 
 to the particular inclination and judgment of those 
 who drew them up. The eminent Eoman Catholic 
 ritualist, Zaccaria, enumerates more than one hundred 
 and fifty different Breviaries, which were in use in the 
 West prior to the Eeformation. f This ecclesiastical 
 free trade in service-books in the course of time 
 resulted in the introduction of corrupt and superstitious 
 forms and fables — a perfect reflex of the character of 
 the "dark ages" of the Church. The following is an 
 extract from the pen of the Abbe Gueranger, in a work 
 held in high repute, entitled " Institutions Litur- 
 giques," giving a description of the service-books of 
 those days : — 
 
 " These copies were not only corrupted by the ignor- 
 ance and carelessness of their authors, but were filled 
 with a multitude of gross and even superstitious addi- 
 tions. These additions consisted chiefly of apocryphal 
 stories unknown to the preceding ages, and sometimes 
 even rejected by them ; and which were introduced into 
 the lessons, hymns, and anthems. Barbarous formula- 
 ries were inserted, with the view of gratifying a gross- 
 minded populace; votive masses took the place of 
 ordinary masses, and were performed with superstitious 
 
 * GoscMer, " Dictionnaire Encyolop^dique de la Thdologie Catholique. 
 Art. Br^viaire." 
 f Zaccavia, " Biblioth. Bitual." i. pp. 121-134. 
 
3 
 
 riles ; benedictions were pronounced unknown to all 
 antiquity. In a word, in place of being the living rule, 
 the instruction, and the supreme law of a Christian 
 people, the Liturgy was degraded to the office of minis- 
 tering to the popular passions ; and fictions, which were 
 quite in their place in the middle-age mysteries, often 
 invaded the books of the altar and choir. To under- 
 stand the full extent of these abuses it is only necessary 
 to remember the sangfroid with which the clergy gave 
 up the cathedrals to the strange farces of the ' Feast of 
 the Ass ' and of the ' Feast of Fools.' " 
 
 The author concludes this sad description with the 
 remark : — 
 
 " In submitting to such degradation, during the four- 
 teenth and fifteenth centuries, the Liturgy only shared 
 the same fate as the Church itself." * 
 
 Such was the degraded state of the Eoman Church, 
 with regard to her services and manuals of devotion, up 
 to the period of the Reformation. The scandal was so 
 great that she was compelled to take steps to reform the 
 Breviary, which, however, was only partially effected. 
 If the present Breviary is a reformed or purified work, 
 what must have been the character of the previous pro- 
 ductions? Many ludicrous facts have come to light 
 with regard to these service books. 
 
 While the Christian Church worships one God 
 through Christ, the " one mediator between God and 
 man," the Roman Church has established many media- 
 tors, to whom the people are commanded to pray, and 
 to claim their merits to make up what is wanting in 
 themselves, and are taught to hold the dead bodies of 
 those departed (so called) Saints in high veneration, and 
 to believe that miracles are effected at their tombs. 
 These virtues are principally attributed to martyrs. In 
 compiling, therefore, their " martyrologies " — the stock 
 resource of the present Breviary — if the Bishops of 
 
 * Gueranger, "Institutions Liturgiques," torn. i. pp.359 360; Paris, 
 1840. 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 Borne were infallible in any matter of fact, one would 
 expect them to be so in so important a matter as in 
 composing the list of those of the departed to whom 
 their flocks should look with confidence for aid before 
 the throne of the Almighty, in the faith that their 
 superabundant merits really exist, and are available in 
 the manner asserted by the Church of Eome. To make 
 matters certain, Gregory XIII. employed learned mathe- 
 maticians to reform the Calendar, and antiquarians to 
 reform the Eoman Martyrology, which, when finished, 
 he directed to be published ; and, by Bull, Pope Gregory 
 commanded this reformed Martyrology, and no other, 
 to be used in all churches and chapels, and privately in 
 ecclesiastical hours — such as in the Breviary, &c. By 
 this Bull he further strictly forbade the adding, or 
 changing, or leaving out anything therein contained, 
 under penalty of the indignation of Almighty God, and 
 his Apostles Peter and Paul. Dr. Geddes * who has 
 examined this (what ought to be) infallible production, 
 has detected in it some most ridiculous blunders. The 
 first Saint in this reformed Martyrology is St. Alma- 
 chius, a fictitious individual, who makes his first appear- 
 ance in this edition— the blunder arising from the fact 
 of the compiler taking the word Almanac (before Cal- 
 endar) for the name of a man, and accordingly putting 
 him as the first name on the list because he found the 
 word there ! Various other blunders are detected, 
 names of towns being taken for names of individuals, 
 and converted into martyrs and saints. Again, we 
 have all heard the story of St. Ursula and her 11,000 
 Virgins, which was retained in the Breviary till 1550.f 
 The 11,000 Virgins originated in the blunder of trans- 
 lating XI.MMVV, "nndecim martyres virgines," or 
 eleven virgin martyrs, into " undecim millia virginum," 
 
 * Geddes' Tracts, vol. ii. p. 184 et seq.; London, 1702. Michael 
 Geddes was chancellor of Sarum, and chaplain to the English factory at 
 Lisbon. He died about a.d. 1740. 
 
 f Dollinger's " Papal Fables," p. 74. 
 
or 11,000 virgins.* And, in like manner, five soldiers 
 were blundered into 5,000 martyrs; the contracted 
 word " mil." — milites " — being taken for " milk," or 
 1,000, thus leaving 4,995 imaginary individuals as 
 saints in the Eoman Martyrology, who never had any 
 existence, to whom Eomish devotees offered up their 
 prayers ! And all this phantom supernumerary " rank 
 and file " of 10,989 virgins and 4,995 soldiers was trans- 
 ferred to the Breviary. A similar blunder was made 
 under date 1st October : twelve soldiers were blundered 
 into 12,000. And on the 24th July another ludicrous 
 blunder of the same nature is made. In the earlier list 
 the words stood : " In the city of Amiternum, ' four- 
 score and three miles from the city of Borne. 5 " The 
 contraction of " milliaria " " miles," was blunderingly 
 construed as milites, "soldiers," thus transforming 
 eighty -three miles into as many holy saints and martyrs ; 
 and Baronius, the Boman Annalist, has actually given 
 us in the number a Captain and Lieutenant, and has 
 even recorded their names as Florentinus and Felix. 
 Such, and many more, were the egregious blunders in 
 this reformed regiment of canonized Saints by a would- 
 be infallible Bope. What, then, are we to expect from 
 the reformed Breviary emanating from the same infal- 
 lible authority ? 
 
 The first serious attempt to reform the notorious 
 corruptions of the Church rituals was made by Clement 
 VII., about the year 1530. He entrusted the revision 
 of the Boman Breviary to Cardinal Quignon, General 
 of the Franciscan Order, esteemed a learned and pious 
 man. This task, when completed in 1535, he dedicated 
 to Baul III., the successor of Clement VII.,f and the 
 Breviaries bearing date 1536 and 1542 are authorised 
 by a Special Brief of Baul III. Quignon discarded the 
 Offices to the Virgin, omitted most of the Versicles 
 
 * See Geddes, p. 203. Maitland's " Church in the Catacombs," p. 133. 
 t Under whose pontifical authority he was encouraged to undertake 
 the work. 
 
and Eesponses, and curtailed the Lessons for Saints and 
 Festivals, substituting Lessons from Sacred Scripture. 
 It is stated that on this model our Prayer Book was 
 compiled, parts of the preface being adopted.* By 
 Bull, Paul III. permitted the use of this reformed 
 Breviary to the secular clergy, releasing them from the 
 use of any other Breviary. A second edition appeared 
 in 1536. In spite of opposition from various quarters, 
 this reformed Breviary became popular, meeting the 
 approval of Paul III. and his successor Julius III. 
 Paul IV., however — alas ! for the credit of the Roman 
 Church — withdrew the permission given by Paul III. 
 He is supposed to have been principally actuated by 
 the fact that the English reformed Prayer Book, in its 
 preface, had actually adopted some of the statements 
 put forward by Quignon, and thus the improved Bre- 
 viary would have savoured of heresy. Paul IV. under- 
 took the task to reform the work commenced by 
 Clement VII., but his death in 1552 put an end to 
 that undertaking. Pope Pius IV. sent to the doctors 
 of the Trent Council the unfinished work of his pre- 
 decessor as a basis for a future edition ; but the 
 " Fathers " being occupied on other matters, at the last 
 session, 1563, left the work to be dealt with by the 
 Pope. Pope Pius V. accordingly ordered a number of 
 " learned and able men " to compile the Breviary, and 
 in spite of the opposition of the Spanish and French 
 divines, he commissioned Francis Forero, a Portuguese 
 theologian, Leonardo Marino, Archbishop of Lanciano, 
 and Egidio Forsari, Bishop of Modena, to execute the 
 important undertaking. The opposition the Pope met 
 with in this undertaking was not very complimentary 
 to his Infallibility, as no faith seemed to have been 
 placed in him or in his choice of editors. The Bishop 
 of Lerida, in particular, plainly asserted that those 
 engaged to correct the rituals, ought to have an exact 
 
 * A copy of this edition, 1548, is preserved in the " Mendham Library " 
 .Law Institution, Uhancery Lane. J ' 
 
knowledge of antiquity, and of the customs of nations, 
 which knowledge, he asserted, was not to be found at the 
 Court of Rome.* In this Breviary were restored to their 
 ancient places many of the discarded miracles, and more 
 particularly those attributed to St. Francis and St. 
 Dominic, f 
 
 The first edition of this reformed Breviary was pub- 
 lished in July, 1568, prefaced by the Bull commonly 
 called Quod a Nobis, in which the Pope, after praising 
 the care and accuracy of his correctors — declaring 
 among other things, that they had " discarded every- 
 thing unsuitable and uncertain " — proceeds to forbid 
 Cardinal Quignon's Breviary, and all others which could 
 not plead a prescription of two hundred years, to enforce 
 the use of the reformed one under the usual canonical 
 penalties, and to prohibit all departures from it, under 
 pain of excommunication. This Bull professed to re- 
 store the Breviary which, by length of time, had become 
 corrupt, to its original purity as it was constituted by 
 Gelasius and Gregory I. and reformed by Gregory VIL, 
 and renewed the obligation upon the Priesthood to the 
 daily recitation of the Canonical hours under the estab- 
 lished Penalties, enjoining upon all Orders of the clergy to 
 introduce the use of it in their respective churches to the' 
 exclusion of all others. This edition continued in general 
 use until the time of Clement VIII., who seemed to have 
 discovered that Pius's boast of having " discarded every- 
 thing unsuitable and uncertain," was not quite correct. 
 He therefore, in spite of the penalties denounced by his 
 predecessor against all who should presume to add to, 
 diminish from, or otherwise change his Breviary, set a 
 fresh committee of correctors to work upon it ; but, in 
 order to save appearances, in his Bull Cum in Ecclesid, 
 
 * See Dupin's " Eccl. Hist." Cent. xvi. lib. 4, cap. 21. Mr. Mendham, in 
 his " Life of Pius V.," p. 99, says, that the persons practically concerned 
 in the undertaking, are enumerated by P. A. Zaccaria, in his " Bibliotheca 
 Bitualis," printed at Rome, 1776, and following years, p. 116. 
 
 f For the following outline I am indebted to the " Protestant Guardian," 
 vol. i. p. 7 et seq. ; London, 1828. 
 
dated May, 1602, lie lays all the blame of the gross 
 errors by which it was disfigured upon the poor printers, 
 and asserts, most falsely, that his correctors were only 
 commissioned to restore it to the state of purity in 
 which Pius V. first gave it to the Church. This 
 doubly-refined composition continued in force nearly 
 thirty years ; when Urban VIII., who was an amateur 
 poet himself, and by no means destitute of skill in the 
 mechanical branch of the art, being offended, as every 
 man of taste long had been, with the barbarous hymns 
 used in the ecclesiastical offices, nearly all of which 
 were evidently the work of the darkest ages of the 
 Church, undertook a third revision of the Breviary, the 
 first edition of which was published in 1631. Though 
 the reformation of the poetry was the great object, he 
 occasionally contributed a little towards the amendment 
 of the prose, especially of the Rubrics and Homilies ; 
 and in some few instances undid what Clement VIII. 
 had done by way of improving upon the labours of 
 Pius V. This is the Breviary now generally used by 
 Roman Priests, no alteration having taken place since 
 the days of Urban, except the insertion of additional 
 services for a few Saints who have since been canonised, 
 or have had offices allotted to them. 
 
 Having thus the accumulated wisdom of Popes, the 
 present Breviary comes before us supported by the 
 very highest authority to which a Bomanist can 
 appeal. If infallibility was ever an attribute of the 
 Boman Church, either in its head or in its aggregate 
 members, it surely was exemplified in this book of 
 her divine offices, enforced, as it is, as an obligation, 
 under the severe penalty of mortal sin if its obser- 
 vance is neglected. " The Universal Church," Cardinal 
 Bellarmine informs us — and by this phrase he means the 
 Boman Church spread throughout the world — " cannot 
 err, either in faith or practice, especially in ceremonies 
 and divine worship?' * And this inerrant faculty is now 
 * Bellarmine. De Yerbo Dei. L. iv. c. 9, § 4. 
 
9 
 
 declared to be centred in the Bishop of Eome or 
 Pope, for the time being, personally. It is from this 
 infallibly correct and authorised edition of the Eoman 
 Breviary that my extracts will be taken — .the trans- 
 lations being as literal as they can possibly be rendered. 
 The following is a translation from the title-page : — 
 
 " The Roman Breviary, restored by the decree of the Sacred Council of 
 Trent; published by the command of Pope St. Pius the Fifth, revised by 
 the authority of Popes Clement the Eighth and Urban the Eighth ; and 
 now enlarged with new offices, which, by the Apostolic indult, have been 
 hitherto allowed by all and every the authorities of the most faithful the 
 Kings of Portugal. At Lisbon, in the Royal printing house, in the 
 year 1786. With the faculty of the Royal College of Censors, and by 
 privilege." 
 
 There are numerous other editions of the Breviary 
 which are in the main alike ; * but although most of 
 them have the same title-page as the above, some slight 
 differences are traceable. IJpon what authority these 
 variations are allowed has to be explained, considering 
 the pains and penalties enjoined by Pontifical Bulls, 
 forbidding any such alterations. The Dublin edition 
 is dated 1845, with exactly the same title-page as the 
 Lisbon edition, f 
 
 The strictness with which the Boman Church exacts 
 from the priesthood the daily perusal of the appointed 
 portions, is an evidence of the great value which the 
 Church of Borne sets on this Breviary. It is divided 
 into four parts — Winter, Spring, Summer, and Autumn 
 — and the several parts are subdivided into daily 
 
 * It may not be out of place here to note, that in revising the Bre- 
 viaries the editors have been loth to cast aside some favourite Saints, 
 still the narratives of their exploits were so broad that they needed toning 
 down, and this the Romish historians termed " correcting the Saints' his- 
 tories," which means, when translated into plain English, nothing more 
 than " to put possible falsehoods in the place of impossible ones." When 
 the baseness of this holy Church's current coin becomes too palpable, it is 
 cast anew into the papal crucible, whence it comes forth in due time newly 
 gilt and burnished, and with a somewhat different legend ; in short, quite 
 fit for circulation among those "who believe all that the Church believes." 
 See " Protestant Guardian," vol. i. p. 40, for interesting information on 
 this head. 
 
 t A most rare and curious collection of Breviaries is preserved in the 
 " Mendham Library " of the Incorporated Law Society, Chancery Lane, 
 London. 
 
10 
 
 portions, each taking about one hour and a half to read 
 even in a most hurried manner. 
 
 Whoever enjoys any ecclesiastical revenues, all per- 
 sons of both sexes who have professed in any of the 
 regular orders, all sub-deacons, deacons and priests are 
 bound to repeat, either in public or private, in an audible 
 tone the whole service of the day, out of the Breviary. 
 The omission of any one of the portions of which that 
 service consists is declared to be a mortal sin — that is, a 
 mortal sin, unrepented and unabsolved, would be sufficient 
 to exclude the delinquent from salvation.* The cleric 
 guilty of such an omission loses all legal right to what- 
 ever portion of his clerical emoluments is due for the 
 day or days wherein he neglected that duty, and cannot 
 be absolved until the prescribed penalties are paid. A 
 dispensation from Rome to be freed from this onerous 
 daily task cannot be obtained without the greatest 
 difficulty. The loss of his Breviary is the only valid 
 excuse a Priest can advance. This obligation is im- 
 posed by the Eoman Church, and this point is not dis- 
 puted. It is enforced by a decree, passed in the twenty- 
 first Session of the Council of Basil, which was con- 
 firmed, as we bave seen, by the constitution of Pope 
 Pius V.f The French Jesuit, Val. Beginaldi, states 
 tbat the omission amounts to a mortal sin.| On this 
 subject the Be v. Blanco White, a convert Priest, has 
 justly observed, that a Christian Church cannot employ 
 a more effectual instrument to fashion and mould the 
 
 * The following passage is in the Constitution of Pius V., authorizing 
 the reformed Breviary : " Propositis poenis per Canonicas sanctiones in 
 eos, qui divinum officium quotidie non dixerunt." 
 
 t See Mendham's " Life of Pius V.," p. 101, London, 1832, who refers 
 us for further information to Grancolas, " Comment. Hist, sur le Bre- 
 viaire," Rom. Tom. ii. p. 99 et seq. ; Vasqaes, " de Beneficiis," c. iv. sec. i., 
 to the question, whether those initiated in Holy Orders, from the sub- 
 deacon to the bishop, are bound, in consequence, to the observation of the 
 canonical hours, answers :— " In hac re omnes citati auctores sine contro- 
 versia respondent, quod omnes isti tenentur, ratione ordinis ad horas 
 canonicas." He then quotes two or three decretals of Popes concluding 
 with the Council of Basil (Sess. 21). ' ° 
 
 t " Praxis Fori Poanitentialis," Colon. 1633, see pp. 545-559, and sec. 
 
11 
 
 minds of her members than the form of prayer and 
 worship which she sanctions for daily use for her 
 clergy.* The Breviary must then be reckoned the true 
 standard to which the Roman Church wishes to reduce 
 the minds and hearts of her clergy, from the highest 
 dignitary to the most obscure Priest. This is, as Mr. 
 Mendham has justly observed, a momentous consider- 
 ation, because it renders the Church of Eome inextric- 
 ably and fatally answerable for the fables and impieties 
 contained in what she must acknowledge to be her 
 principal formulary of public and private devotion, un- 
 less she is content to reply, that she considers it justifi- 
 able in a Priest of Grod, in the solemn act of religion, 
 to utter and inculcate what he knows to be falsehood, 
 folly and blasphemy ! 
 
 The fables and extravagant relations and mad freaks 
 of the individuals forming the examples to be followed, 
 as narrated in the Breviary, even as it now stands, must 
 have a depressing and degrading effect on the victims 
 of this system. If, by constant repetition, Priests are led 
 to believe in the truth of the narrations, then indeed 
 must they excite our pity and deep commiseration. If, 
 on the other hand, Priests perform their task and make 
 their rounds like the mill-horse, according to order, or 
 from compulsion, and, as is more probably the case, 
 discard all pretensions to belief in the fables inflicted on 
 their intellectual faculties, our contempt for these 
 miserable slaves to a corrupt system — miscalled a re- 
 ligion — can know no bounds. f That this onerous and 
 repugnant duty (notwithstanding the papal decrees 
 enforcing it under severe penalties), is repudiated by 
 some bold and intelligent Priests, we have the testi- 
 mony of an Ex- Roman Priest, who informs us that — 
 "There are not wanting instances even where the 
 Priest reassumes his inborn rights, and spurns this 
 
 * "Practical and Internal Evidence against Catholicism," p. 153. 
 London, 1825, by the Bev. J. Blanco White. And see Tom. ii. of 
 Gavanti's " Thesaurus Sacrorum Bituum," p. 3 et seq. ; Lugd., 1864 
 
 t See Hobart Seymour's " Mornings with the Jesuits," p. 90. 
 
12 
 
 as well as other burdens of the Popes' laying on — in 
 secret it may be, within the area of his own conscience, 
 and of the no less sanctuary of his house. There at least 
 may he not vindicate the inalienable rights of Nature's 
 freeman?"* These pregnant words have the greater 
 significance coming from one who has had to undergo 
 the degrading 'task imposed on him by his Church. 
 
 Constant repetitions of the Psalms, with a very sparse 
 intermixture of fragments of the Old and New Testa- 
 ment, and numerous idolatrous prayers to so-called 
 Saints, and repeated recommendations of the " vener- 
 ation " of their dead bodies, with narratives of the pre- 
 tended doings and sayings of these " Saints," make up all 
 but the total of this wondrous production. Some editions 
 are richly interspersed with engravings illustrating the 
 texts. I may note, in passing, that in the Antwerp 
 edition, 1614, preceding the office of "All Saints' Day," 
 the Trinity is intended to be represented ; the Almighty 
 as an old man resting his foot on the circle of the globe, 
 and crowned with the Papal tiara or triple crown ! 
 
 To treat this work as being of any historical value is 
 absurd, as the narratives of the lives supposed to be 
 recorded have not one atom of evidence to substantiate 
 their genuineness. Is there a student of Church History 
 who does not know that the entire story of Paul appear- 
 ing to Constantine, the Emperor, in a dream, giving 
 the precise day, 31st of December, telling him that if 
 he would be cured of his leprosy he should send for 
 Sylvester, Bishop of Eome, and that the cure alleged to 
 be effected by Sylvester baptising him, is a forgery ? 
 Indeed, the Eoman Catholic historian, Dupin, declared 
 that " Nothing can be more fabulous than the accounts 
 set down in these acts." — " What forgeries, what fables 
 are here ! " " What inconsistent ravings of madmen!" 
 — " There is no historian speaks of Constantine having 
 a leprosy, or of his being cured of it by baptism."! 
 
 * "Legends from the Eoman Breviary," by a Reformed Priest, 
 Dublin, 1862, p. 4. 
 
 t Dupin's " History of Ecclesiastical Writers." Cent, iv pp 13 14 
 
 London, 1695. ■ vr- > > 
 
13 
 
 So also the decrees of the second Eoman Synod under 
 Pope Sylvester, wherein it is assumed that Photinus was 
 condemned, when it is a well-known fact that Photinus' 
 heresy did not spring up till some years after the death 
 of Sylvester. And the further statement that this same 
 "Sylvester's legates presided at the first General 
 Council of Nice, Constantine also being present," is a 
 base fabrication. The Council was convened by order 
 of the Emperor Constantine, and was presided over by 
 Hosius, the Bishop of Cordova. The same Dupin says 
 that Hosius, " in his own name, and not in the Pope's, 
 presided over the Council, for he nowhere assumes the 
 title of legate of the Eoman See, and none of the ancients 
 say that he presided in this Council in the Pope's name."* 
 
 Though the ancient narrative of Sylvester in the Salis- 
 bury Portiforium, the reformed account in the Breviary 
 of Pius V., and the doubly reformed account in those of 
 Clement and Urban, differ considerably from each other, 
 they agree pretty well in one particular, namely, that 
 almost every word in them is either certainly false, or 
 has no better claim than the bare word of notorious 
 fabricators of falsehoods for being regarded as true. 
 They are, in fact, compiled from two fabulous docu- 
 ments — the Liber Pontificalis, falsely attributed to 
 Damasus, and the Acts of St. Sylvester, both fabricated 
 about the eighth century and both full of falsehoods 
 and impossibilities. Sylvester is said to have been made 
 Bishop of Borne in a.d. 313.f His festival is celebrated 
 on the 31st December. Again, the Roman Breviary 
 quotes a decree prohibiting a layman from accusing a 
 Priest, and exempting the latter from civil jurisdiction, 
 attributing the same to a Council presided over by 
 Sylvester. The canon, however, is forged, and the 
 Council wholly apocryphal. Such powers were never 
 vested in the Priesthood in the days of Sylvester. 
 
 * Ibid. Cent. iv. p 251. 
 
 \ The reader is referred to a learned and interesting Article in the 
 " Protestant Guardian," vol. ii. p. 153 et seq., London, 1828, for a com- 
 plete exposure of these frauds. 
 
14 
 
 Indeed, Meury, Giannone, and many other Eoman 
 Catholic historians of repute, have clearly proved that 
 no such immunities were claimed, or even heard of, 
 before the final subversion of the Western Empire. The 
 alleged original (but forged) canon modestly demands 
 forty-four witnesses to convict a Priest, and seventy-two 
 a Bishop ; adding, " the chief prelate (the Pope) shall be 
 judged by no one, for it is written, ' The disciple is not 
 above his master. ' " The clergy are prohibited from 
 entering a civil court in order to plead any cause ; 
 " because every court takes its name from blood [omnis 
 curia a cruore dicitur], and it is a sacrificing to idols." 
 
 Again, we know that in the service of the 26th of 
 April and that of 31st December, in this Breviary, the 
 stories which Pope Nicholas I. produces as being given 
 by Divine inspiration are forgeries; and, so likewise, 
 the epistle Marcellus is stated to have written (and 
 which the Eoman Breviary orders to be read as a Lesson 
 16th January), addressed to the Bishops of the Antio- 
 chian provinces about the Eoman primacy, and to prove 
 Eome to be the head of all Churches, and that no Synod 
 should be held without the Pope's authority, is an 
 acknowledged forgery. This epistle is admitted by the 
 Jesuit compiler of Councils, Labbe, to be a forgery 
 hashed up out of divers modern authors, and dated 
 after Marcellus' death ! * Indeed, there is much doubt 
 whether there was ever such a Pope as Marcellus. 
 Eusebius' chronicle wholly omits him; and Theodoret 
 certainly knew nothing of him. 
 
 The Council of Sinuessa, which is stated in the 
 Breviary to have received Pope Marcellinus' confession, 
 26th April, never existed. Dupin, the ecclesiastical 
 historian, in his "History of Ecclesiastical Writers," 
 says, "It is notoriously known among all the learned, 
 that the Acts which bear the name of this Council are 
 supposititious, and that the story on which they are 
 grounded is a fable,which has no foundation in antiquity." 
 
 * Tom. i. ool.948; Paris, 1671. 
 
15 
 
 Again, " He who forged these acts * * * * 
 is a modern author unworthy of credit."*,' 
 
 The suppression of works on criticism and Church 
 History, by means of the Prohibitory and Expurgatory 
 Indices, explains how it was that in the new edition of 
 the Breviary a whole series of Popes of the first three 
 centuries is added, with proper Offices and Lections, 
 of whom no one knew anything, and who have left no 
 trace behind them, who are found in none of the ancient 
 martyrologies, and were taken no particular notice of in 
 Borne for 1500 years. f The only ante-Nicene Popes 
 in the ancient unreformed Breviaries were Clement, 
 Urban, Marcus, and Marcellus. But Bellarmine and 
 Baronius introduced into the new Breviary, under 
 Clement VIII., Popes Zephyrinus, Soter, Caius, Pius, 
 Calixtus, Anacletus, Pontianus, and Evaristus, with 
 Lections taken from the pseudo-Isidorian Decretals. 
 The older Lections, taken from the legends, were turned 
 out to make room for the pseudo-Isidorian, and the 
 clergy were obliged to nourish their devotions on the 
 reading of such fables as — that without the Pope no 
 Councils could be held, that he is the sole judge of all 
 Bishops, that no clergyman can be cited before a civil 
 court, and the like. Cardinal Baronius, the author of 
 the " Annals," co-operated in this work, though he had 
 there spoken with indignation of the fraud of the pseudo- 
 Isidore Epistles. The compilers of the Old Breviary 
 of Pius V. were certainly not well posted in English 
 History in their Lessons on the festival of Thomas a, 
 Becket, December 29, for almost every schoolboy knows 
 that the assembly of Clarendon, instead of being, as 
 Pius' correctors ignorantly asserted, a mere synod of 
 provincial Bishops, was a great Council of all the 
 nobility and prelates of the realm ; — and that a Becket 
 instead of being driven into exile, privately left the 
 country of his own accord, much against the King's 
 will. The former of these blunders was rectified by 
 
 * Cent. iv. p. 241 ; London, 1695. 
 
 t See James, "The Pope and the Councils," cap. iii. sec. 31, p. 396 et seq. 
 
16 
 
 Clement's correctors, but the latter remained till the 
 final revision of the Breviary by Urban VIII. This 
 circumstance — that full sixty years were required to find 
 out two such palpable mistakes — will enable the reader 
 to form a tolerable estimate of the rapidity of the march 
 of knowledge at Eome.* 
 
 This new Breviary, moreover, was mutilated as well 
 as interpolated. The name of Pope Honorius was 
 struck out of. the Lection in the passage where his 
 condemnation by the sixth (Ecumenical Council 
 had been related. All the Breviaries of previous 
 date to the reformed Breviary, mention the condem- 
 nation by the Sixth General Council of Pope Hon- 
 orius as a heretic, on the feast of Leo (28th June) ; 
 in the Clement VIII. edition this testimony against 
 the Pope is quietly dropped out of the text. And again, 
 in the feast, officio, pro clero Romano, of Pope Agatho 
 (14th January), which purports to recite the condem- 
 nation by the Sixth General Council, the revisers again 
 quietly drop the name of Honorius from the list of 
 persons condemned. Since the Popes wanted to be 
 infallible, this inconvenient fact ought, at least, to be 
 obliterated from the memory of the clergy.f Even the 
 fable of the Apostasy of Pope Marcellinus and the 
 Synod of Sinuessa was now for the first time incorpo- 
 rated in full into the Breviary, in order to keep 
 constantly before the eyes of Bishops and Priests that 
 darling maxim, in support of which so many fictions 
 had already been invented at Borne, that no Council 
 can judge a Pope. Again in the Lesson in the office for 
 Irenseus (a.d. 180) a quotation is falsified as "bearing 
 a grand and magnificent testimony concerning the 
 Boman Church and the succession of its Bishops, the 
 faithful, perpetual and most certain guardian of divine 
 tradition," and this is effected by dropping out of the 
 
 * " Protestant Guardian," vol. ii. p. 105, London, 1828 
 t The Breviaries which have been compared are a Roman Breviary, 
 flfo e % m - V ~T?- m }$™ '' th , 6 ^W*"* Breviary, printed in Venice in 
 ' 1719 m ' ; and the reformed Edition, printed at Antwerp, 
 
17 
 
 passage purporting to be taken from Irenseus' third book 
 Against Heresies (cap. i.), wherein Irenseus directs those 
 who are located round about (undique) on every side of 
 Eome, to refer to that church on account of its being the 
 more potent principality (propter potentiorem principali- 
 tatetn), being the seat of the Empire. There the quota- 
 tion stops ; whereas Irenseus goes on to state that 
 they were to refer to that Church in which was always pre- 
 served by the faithful throughout the world, the true tra- 
 dition of the Apostles.* Then the word " souls," had to 
 be expunged from the Missal and Breviary in the collect 
 for the feast of St. Peter's chair. It was now held 
 scandalous at Eome that the ancient Roman Church 
 should have restricted Peter's power of binding to 
 " souls " only ; whereas the full right was claimed for 
 the Pope to bind "bodies" also, and put them to 
 death, f One of these enrichments of the Breviary was 
 
 * " In qua semper ab his, qui sunt undique consenata est ea quaa est 
 ab Apostolis traditio." Those who were nearest to Rome would — as being 
 the most potent principality of the neighbourhood — seek to learn the true 
 tradition of the Apostles, which was likewise retained by the faithful 
 throughout the world. We have exactly a parallel passage in the 36th 
 chapter of Tertulliau's " De prascriptione adversus Hasretieos," Paris, 
 1675, p. 216. He bids us " run over the Apostolic Churches, in which we 
 find the chairs of the Apostles, upon which are seated the Bishops who 
 succeeded them. — Is Achia near to thee ? Thou hast Corinth. If thou 
 art not far from Macedonia thou hast Philippi, thou hast Thessalonica. If 
 thou canst go into Asia thou hast Ephesus. Or if thou art adjacent to 
 Italy, thou hast Rome ; whence also to us Africans, there is an authority 
 near at hand." We have also a parallel passage from Gregory of Nazi- 
 anzum : " Constantinople, the eye of the world, the bond between the 
 West and the Bast ; hither from all sides everything great hastens and 
 meets there; from it, too, everything sets out and spreads itself, as it 
 were, from the common emporium of the Faith." (Paris Ed., 1778. Tom. i. 
 p. 755.) But the same Greek Bishop goes further. In his Twenty-first 
 Oration (cap. 7) in Praise of Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, he says 
 that : " He was entrusted with the government of the people (of Alex- 
 andria), which is the same thing as if I should say that he was entrusted 
 with the government of the habitable world." This Gregory is a cano- 
 nised Saint, but we do not find this passage in the Roman Breviary. 
 
 f "-'Deus qui B. Petro * * * * animas ligandi et solvendi pontificium 
 tradidisti." (Jan. 18. Pest. Oath. B. Petr.) Animas is now struck Out. 
 In an old Roman Missal of the 11th century, edited by Azavedo, in 1754, 
 it occurs at p. 188. Bellarmine maintained that the Reformers of the 
 Breviary had mutilated this collect under Divine inspiration. (Resp. ad 
 Ep. de Monit. contr. Venet. Resp. ad 3 prop.) "Fortasse non sine magna 
 Dei providentia." 
 
 C 
 
18 
 
 the putting Satan's words to our Lord in the Tempta- 
 tion, "I. will give thee all the kingdoms of the world" 
 into the mouth of Christ, who is made to address them 
 to Peter.* These forgeries and mutilations in the 
 interest of the Papal system were so astonishing that 
 the Venetian, Marsiglio, thought in course of time no 
 faith would be reposed in any documents at all, and so 
 the Church would be undermined. 
 
 We may note in passing, with reference to the canon- 
 isation of Popes, in examining the printed lists of those 
 who were Bishops of Eome, excluding Peter, we find a 
 roll of 255 Popes. f The first fifty-five, from Linus, 
 a.d. 67, to Felix IV., a.d. 526, are all canonised Saints. 
 Of the next fifty, from Boniface II., a.d. 530, to Leo IV, 
 a.d. 847, we find only nineteen thus honoured. In the 
 next fifty from Benedict III., a.d. 855, to Alexander II., 
 a.d. 1061, we have only two; and so also in the follow- 
 ing fifty, from Gregory VII., a.d. 1073, to Alexander V., 
 a.d. 1409, only two ; and in the next fifty, from John, 
 a.d. 1410, to the predecessor of the present Pope, the 
 roll of Popes is reduced to one single Saint ! and that 
 individual is the cruel persecutor, Pius V., a.d. 1566. 
 The history of the early Popes being so wholly apocry- 
 phal, imagination has had ample scope for its operation 
 among them. Pius V. died 1572. What has become of 
 the thirty infallible Popes who have since passed away? 
 Are none of them blessed ? Pius IX. died. 1878. We 
 hear it mooted already that he is to be put forward for 
 beatification aud ultimate canonisation; accordingly, 
 miracle-mongers are at work collecting evidence of 
 miracles wrought by or through the instrumentality of 
 " His late Holiness," J of which we, as contemporaries, 
 are completely in the dark. 
 
 '* Brev. Rom. Pest. Petr. et Paul. Eesp. ad Lect. 5. 
 f See, for instance, the most recent list given in the "Catholic Di- 
 rectory," 1877, p. 37. 
 
 % The Bulletin de V Association de St. Francois de Sales mentions 
 among the most recent cures effected by the agency of the late Pope 
 Pius IX. that of a young nun at Paris, who was relieved of a frightlul 
 
19 
 
 The idolatrous sermon attributed to Augustin, Bishop 
 of Hippo, a.d. 430, in praise of the Virgin Mary, set out 
 as a genuine production in this reformed Breviary (9th 
 December), Lection vi., and to be read as such, is proved 
 from internal testimony by the Benedictine editors of 
 Augustin's writings to have been written subsequently 
 to his time, and to be a gross forgery, and is declared 
 to be the production of some blundering botcher.* 
 They do not overlook the fact that this sermon is ascribed 
 to Augustin in the Boman Breviary. A further quota- 
 tion from another admittedly spurious work of Augustin 
 is recorded in the sixth Lesson under date 9th Septem- 
 ber; and also, on the 12th September a quotation is 
 made as from Chrysostom, for which we in vain search 
 in the works of that writer. Again, in the Lessons on 
 the Feast of St. Andrew the Apostle (30th November), 
 we find confidently quoted the pretended epistle of the 
 Presbyters of Achia, on which the authenticity of the 
 narrative of the Apostle's martyrdom rests. It is a 
 spurious document, unknown to any ancient author, 
 vehemently suspected, if not absolutely rejected, by all 
 Boman Catholics who have any pretensions to learning 
 and candour, though inserted in the History of the 
 Saints published by Surius, and quoted as genuine by 
 Bellarmine and Baronius. But the Ecclesiastical his- 
 
 attack of colic by the application to her body of a pair of white silk 
 drawers which had belonged to the late Pope, and happened to be in the 
 possession of the convent; also that of an Augustine nun at Sienna, 
 who was cured of a bad cancer in the face by the application to it of a 
 portrait of Pius IX. ; and that of a medical man at Malaga, who was 
 cured of a number of diseases by touching an old stocking of Pius IX., 
 and who took immediately an oath never to apply to his clients any other 
 means of cure but that which had succeeded so well with himself. In 
 Texas a stillborn child was brought to life by the touch of a cross blessed 
 by Pius IX.; and in the Convent of the Enfant Je'sus at Coire, near 
 Lyons, a nun who had a cancer in the tongue and serious internal disease 
 invoked one night, when suffering acute pains, the aid of the late Pope, 
 and, after being comforted by his apparition, was found completely cured 
 next morning. These cures are cited, among others, to make good the 
 claim of immediate beatification set up for Pius IX. 
 
 * " Opus quippe est imperiti, alicujus consarcinatoris." The Sermon 
 is cited as " Sermo cxciv. de Annunciatione Dominica." 
 
 c 2 
 
20 
 
 torian Dupin, gives sufficient proofs that it could not 
 have been written before the eleventh century.* No 
 Eoman proconsul, referred to in the Lesson in ques- 
 tion, called Aegeas, which is evidently a Greek and not 
 a Latin name, is known to have existed in the days of 
 the Apostles. The compilers of the Breviary were not 
 satisfied with foisting upon us a spurious production, 
 but they must quote it, to establish the dogma of Tran- 
 substantiation as supposed to be admitted by the Apostle 
 Andrew. He is made to say, " i" sacrifice daily the 
 immaculate Lamb upon the altar." On the faith of this 
 version in the Breviary, Roman controversialists have 
 not hesitated to cite St. Andrew as holding this modern 
 conceit. Whereas the true reading of the passage in 
 the pretended Epistle of the Presbyters of Achia, and 
 indeed in the older Breviaries, is, " I sacrifice daily the 
 immaculate Lamb on the altar of the Cross." \ 
 
 On the 3rd of May, the feast of Alexander I., a.d. 115, 
 is appointed. The notoriously spurious Decretal Epistle 
 attributed to this Pope is confidently appealed to as a 
 genuine production for the purpose of giving the autho- 
 rity of antiquity to the superstitious custom that "water 
 blessed by mingling salt in it should always be kept in 
 •the church, and used in bedchambers for chasing away 
 the devil," whereas this was not introduced into the 
 Roman Church till the sixth century, and, even then, 
 was not the same as the so-called " holy water " of the 
 modern Eoman Church. 
 
 The feast of St. Denis, Martyr, &c, is celebrated on 
 the 9th October — the same Denis who is described as 
 having walked two miles with his severed head in his 
 hand. To him many spurious works are in this Bre- 
 viary attributed. Dupin testifies that the books assigned 
 to this individual were never heard of until more than 
 five centuries after his death, and that the fable of his 
 
 * See "Heel. Hist." Cent. i. vol. i. p. 18. • Edit. 1692, London, 
 t See the whole subject worked out in the "Protestant Guardian," 
 vol. i. p. 14, London, 1828. 
 
21 
 
 coming into France was never mentioned until nine 
 hundred years after his death. They are barefaced 
 forgeries.* 
 
 Then again, as to the Finding {Invention is the 
 appropriate word used) of the True Cross, the mother 
 of" Constantine being admonished in the matter in a 
 dream. The alleged fact is celebrated on the 3rd May. 
 On this Dupin remarks : — 
 
 " It is said that she discovered the cross of Jesus 
 Christ, which it is pretended performed many miracles 
 at the time. And yet it is very strange that Eusebius — 
 an eye-witness of these things, who has exactly described 
 all the circumstances of the discovery of Christ's 
 sepulchre, and who never forgets anything that may be 
 to the advantage of religion — should not say one single 
 word either of the cross of Christ or of the miracles 
 which are pretended to have been wrought by it."f 
 
 It is worth a remark in passing, that while the Roman 
 Breviary generally makes the miracle which is alleged 
 to have been effected to consist in giving health to a 
 sick woman, the Paris Breviary of 1736, for the same 
 day, 3rd May, makes it the restoration to life of a dead 
 man ! The total silence of Eusebius, as was well 
 observed by Gibbon, j on this wonderful Invention, 
 satisfied the enquirer, but perplexed the faithful ! There 
 is, however, mention made of the finding of the cross 
 in the "Chronicon" attributed to Eusebius; but the 
 passage has generally been considered as an interpola- 
 tion, and has been rejected by Angelo Mai and Giovanni 
 Zohrab, two Very learned Italian Boman Catholics, in 
 their edition of Eusebius, published in 1818. 
 
 ' * Dupin's " Hist, of Eccl. Writers," p. 32. .London, 1695. The Works 
 are referred to in the Breviary in these words : " Libros scripsit admira- 
 biles, ac plane coalestes, de Divinis Nominibus, de Coelesti et Ecclesiastica 
 Hierarchia, de Mystica Theologia, et alios quosdam." This Denis of 
 France and Dennis the Areopagite, though sought to be confounded in 
 the Breviary, are two different persons. And they further seek to attribute 
 the works of the latter to the former. 
 
 f Dupin, as above. Cent. iv. p. 13. 
 
 % " Decline and Fall of the Boman Empire," c. xxiii. note 64. 
 
22 
 
 There is another important perversion of history 
 which ought not to be omitted. 
 
 On the 17th March the festival of St. Patrick of 
 Ireland is celebrated. It is stated in the Breviary that 
 — " By divine admonition he is called to the salvation 
 of the Irish ; and the liberty of preaching the Gospel 
 being committed to him by St. Celestine the Pope, 
 and being consecrated Bishop, he proceeded to Ireland. 
 He constituted, by the authority of the Boman Pontiff, 
 the See of Armagh the metropolis of the whole Island." 
 
 The story of the alleged consecration of Patrick by 
 Pope Celestine and of sending him to Ireland, is wholly 
 apocryphal. Prosper Aquitanus, who was a notary of 
 the Boman See and friend of Celestine, in his " Annals 
 of the Church," refers to Palladius being sent by 
 Celestine, but that his mission was utterly sterile, in 
 fact a complete failure. But what is very remarkable, 
 Prosper makes no mention whatever of St. Patrick, who 
 went to Ireland the very next year, though alleged to be 
 sent by Celestine ! In the works attributed to Patrick, 
 he neither directly nor indirectly alludes to his supposed 
 connection with Borne, except in one acknowledged 
 spurious work, called " Charta de Antiquitate Avel- 
 lonica,"* which the editor, J. L. Yillanueva, himself a 
 Boman Catholic, admits to be such. Neither is aDy 
 allusion found in the hymn of St. Sechnall (Secundinus), 
 composed in praise of St. Patrick. Neither does it 
 appear to have been known to the Irish writer Murchin 
 Macen Machteri, who wrote the life of St. Patrick, 
 the period being sometimes attributed to the seventh 
 century. Nor in the most ancient of our Church 
 historians, the Venerable Bede, born a.d. 672, and who, 
 in compiling his Ecclesiastical History, was, as he tells 
 us, supplied with materials for it from the archives of 
 Borne. Bede records the mission of Palladius to Ireland, 
 and often refers to the affairs of the Irish Church, but 
 never once mentions in it even the name of St. Patrick. 
 * Edit. Yillanueva, pp. 193 et seq. Dublin, 1835. 
 
23 
 
 Indeed, there are historians who gravely doubt that 
 such a person as St. Patrick ever existed. Gordon, in 
 his "History of Ireland from the Earliest Accounts, 
 &c.,"* says : — 
 
 " The stories related of this apostle, whatever dates 
 are severally affixed to them, are doubtless legendary 
 tales or theological romances, fabricated four centuries 
 after his imaginary existence. He is mentioned in no 
 writing of authentic date anterior to the ninth century, 
 a period replete with forged lives of saints; while, 
 besides the persuasive silence of other documents, he 
 is quite unnoticed by Beda, Cogitosus, Adam an, and 
 Cummian, ecclesiastic writers of the intermediate time, 
 who. could not have omitted the name of so great a 
 missioner if it had ever reached them. The accounts 
 transmitted to us of the acts of Saint Patrick bear all 
 the marks of legendary fiction, and appear no better 
 founded than those of other fabulous champions of 
 the Church, whose tutelage, as patron saints, has been 
 severally adopted, from the customs of the times, by the 
 Christian nations of Europe in the Dark Ages." 
 
 Here the Roman Priest, the victim of this system of 
 falsehood, is compelled, as a religious duty, to repeat 
 what is now universally allowed to be a fiction. All 
 modern Eomish writers of credit admit this to be so. 
 The alleged consecration of Patrick by Pope Celestine 
 is admitted by the three learned Eomish writers, Drs. 
 Lanigan f and Colgan % and O'Connor \ (a Roman 
 Priest), to be wholly apocryphal. O'Halloran, an his- 
 torian of credit, declares, " that no proof whatever can 
 be produced that the Popes nominated to the bishoprics 
 in Ireland." Dr. Lanigan places the date of the first 
 Papal legate ever appointed in Ireland to exercise any 
 spiritual jurisdiction in that country, in the twelfth cen- 
 
 * Vol. i. cap. iii. p. 29. Dublin, 1805. 
 
 + Lanigan's " Eocl. Hist." Bee Vol. i. p. 1-9, and p. 194. 
 
 t " Trias Thanmaturga," p. 253. 
 
 § " Columbanus ad Hibernos," p. 43. Buckingham, 1812. 
 
24 
 
 tury. Again, an unseemly quarrel took place between 
 Peter Talbot, the Eomish Archbishop of Dublin, and 
 Dr. Oliver Plunket, the Eomish Archbishop of Armagh, 
 as to priority ; the latter claiming (as successor of St. 
 Patrick) precedence; the former retorted by declaring 
 the primacy of St. Patrick to be fabulous ; asserting 
 that St. Patrick never was a Primate, nor even Arch- 
 bishop, and adds * — " I have consulted what authorities 
 I could, and I have considered the annals treating of 
 the matter, and I here seriously declare that I have 
 fallen on no author worthy of credit who produces even 
 a probable conjecture that, even at any time, the See of 
 Armagh obtained the Primacy of Ireland from the 
 Apostolic See." It would be a curious inquiry, in 
 what spirit this Eomish Archbishop read this portion of 
 the Breviary for the 1 7th of March in each year ! 
 
 As a specimen of the skill exhibited by Eomanists, 
 as well as the cheap and expeditious manner in which 
 they manufactured their Saints, we may note in addition 
 to that in the Eoman Martyrology, corrected by Gale- 
 sinius and approved by Gregory XIII., among the 
 Saints and Martyrs venerated on the 24th January, is 
 one named St. Synoris, who is alleged to have suffered 
 at Antioch. Though this saint had never been heard 
 of before, Baronius graciously condescended to patronise 
 her ; and in his notes to the first edition of his Martyr- 
 ology, he represents her as being mentioned by Chry- 
 sostom in his fourth Homily on Lazarus. Some scholars, 
 who understood Greek rather better than our two 
 Martyrologists, on examining the passage, found that 
 they had mistaken the word gvvioptSa, which denotes a 
 pair or couple, and which is applied by Chrysostom to 
 the two martyrs, Juventius and Maximus, for a proper 
 name, and thus contrived to fabricate a female saint out 
 of nothing ! She still remains in Galesinius' Martyr- 
 ology, in Baronius 5 first edition, and in the Index of his 
 second. The manufacture of saints from ideal models 
 
 * See Dublin Edition, 1764. 
 
25 
 
 are not exceptions. "We have another instance of 
 " Faith," " Hope," and " Charity," as having been 
 actually martyred as holy virgins under Hadrian.* 
 
 We have further a fabricated saint out of a handker- 
 chief, which a devout woman is said to have offered our 
 Lord as He was bearing His cross, and which is still 
 exhibited at Eome and other places. This handkerchief 
 is supposed to bear the true likeness of Christ, he having 
 wiped with it the sweat off his face. In course of time 
 the " true likeness " — Veronica — which the word im- 
 ports, was converted into a person of flesh and blood, 
 and invoked as a saint.f 
 
 These are a few samples only of deliberate perversion 
 of history in the Roman Breviary, instances of which 
 we might easily multiply. 
 
 * In the " Martyrologium Romanum ad novam Kalendarii rationem, 
 &c, Gregorii XIII. P. M., Jossu Edit," 4to, Romas, 1583, p. 132, we read : 
 " Romse Passio sanctarum virginum Fidei, Spei, et Cbaritatis, et matris 
 earum sapiential, que sub Hadriano prinoipe martyrii coronam adaptaa 
 sunt." 
 
 ■j- Dr. Wiseman, in his Lives of Five Saints, dedicates a whole chapter 
 to the wonderful sayings and doings of this imaginary individual. 
 (London, Dolman, 1864.) Picar, in a note, states the legend thus : " One 
 of the women who followed Christ while carrying the cross, seeing our 
 Lord covered with blood and sweat, took off the linen handkerchief which 
 bound her head and presented it to Jesus, who therewith wiped his face, 
 and as a recompense for her charitable act, left three impressions of his 
 face, the linen having been folded into three. One of these holy repre- 
 sentations is now found in Jerusalem, the other at Rome, and the third 
 in Spain. The woman to whom the handkerchief belonged, and whom 
 tradition has named Veronica, went, as they tell us, to Rome, and cured 
 ■ a very difficult complaint under which the Emperor Tiberius was suffering, 
 by the application of the holy ' face.' This holy piece of Linen fell into the 
 hands of Clement I., but we do not positively know how it was preserved 
 until the time of the Emperor Constantine, who, it is alleged deposited it 
 in the Basilique of St. Peter. Pope John VII., who occupied the Papal 
 Chair a.d. 705, is said to have consecrated a chapel to her honour. Chifflet, 
 in his book of ' Linteis Sepulchralibus,' speaks of the transactions of the 
 relic," and Picar refers the reader to that work. " When this represen- 
 tation is exhibited to the Roman people, they ought, after prostrating 
 before her, implore the mercy of God. The devotees gain on'this occasion 
 very considerable indulgences. We have in France copies of the ' Holy 
 original.' That at Montreuil, and at Cahors, in Gascony, have acquired 
 a great reputation by the miracles achieved by means of, as also for extra- 
 ordinary cures effected by them." — Picar, "Ceremonies Religieuses," 
 Tom. i. pt. ii. p. 85. Edit. 1723. 
 
26 
 
 "We have noted the absurd blunder in the earlier edi- 
 tions of the Breviary in inventing imaginary Saints. 
 The present edition exhibits the same absurdities. 
 Inscriptions on Boman altars and sepulchres in the 
 Pagan Ages are used to support these inventions. All 
 the world knows the history of the celebrated Saints 
 Perpetua and Felicitas, whose qualifications have no 
 other foundation than the words perpetua felicitas, very 
 common on the monuments of that nation. And this 
 inscription found on monuments has been converted into 
 two substantial individuals, and they appear coupled 
 together in the present Eoman saint-roll under date 7th 
 March.* The old bas-reliefs continually exhibit persons 
 with their heads in their hands, to note the death they 
 suffered. There can be no doubt that the fable of St. 
 Denis was borrowed from such representations. 
 
 The reader of the Boman Breviary will be more espe- 
 cially struck with the miraculous discovery of the bones 
 of numerous departed saints many hundreds of years 
 after their death. Take one instance, St. Babiana, 
 Virgin and Martyr (2nd December). They tell us that 
 she was put to death by the command of Julian. 
 After the lapse of 1,300 years, her bones were dis- 
 covered by Urban VIII., who forthwith raised a Church 
 to her honour. We need not, however, consult Protes- 
 tant prejudices to create a doubt as to the authenticity of 
 such discoveries, we have only to consult the deliberate 
 opinion expressed by two French Benedictines — Mabil- 
 lon, in his journey to Italy; and Montfaucon, in his 
 diary. These learned and inquisitive ecclesiastics, have 
 questioned the penetrative powers of the " Sacred Tri- 
 bunal of Belies," in discerning the authenticity of old 
 bones and assigning them to their original owners. 
 They assure us that that sacred tribunal has long been 
 famed for its equally miraculous powers of converting 
 the bones of pagans into relics of saints, and that there 
 
 * See " Eoman Catholicism in Spain." Edinburgh, 1855, p. 191. 
 
27 
 
 is some reason to doubt whether these wholesale reposi- 
 tories of Martyrs were not in reality, the charnel-houses 
 for slaves, gladiators, malefactors, and the lowest of the 
 people. We are thus saved from the charge of heresy 
 if we throw the responsibility of the doubt of the genu- 
 ineness of some of their cherished relics on Romanists 
 themselves, of repute as well for piety as learning. It 
 has been aptly remarked that a dead saint has been 
 much more profitable to the Church of Rome than a 
 living one, and frequently as good as an Archbishop's 
 revenue to the church or monastery that had the luck 
 of possession. Hence the scramble for old bones. 
 
 As to any concurrent historical testimony of the 
 numerous miracles alleged to have been effected, there is 
 literally none. While, on the other hand, where we 
 have evidence to which we can appeal, the negative is 
 clearly established ; and this is remarkably illustrated in 
 the case of Francis Xavier, the illustrious Jesuit mis- 
 sionary among the Indians. His " Letters," written 
 during his missionary work, are extant, but they are 
 ominously silent as to any single one of the numerous 
 miracles attributed to him during his labours, when they 
 were supposed to have been effected. This silence is 
 attributed to his modesty. But after his death the 
 Papal forgers were actively at work with most prolific 
 results. The work was consummated several years 
 after his death ; but not one single document has been 
 produced published during his lifetime, in which one 
 specific miracle, great or small, is attributed to him. 
 One of his biographers artlessly confessed that " many 
 things became known after his death which were not 
 •known during his life." The narrations started with 
 small beginnings. These miracles were at first only 
 modestly .advanced ; in course of time the number filled 
 volumes. The most astonishing miracles are almost 
 invariably the last which come to light.* 
 
 * Those who desire to satisfy themselves on the history of these miracles 
 and the successive steps in their manufacture, will do well to consult a 
 
28 
 
 So much for history. The morality inculcated by the 
 Breviary is not of a very high order. One young lady — ■ 
 St. Rose, of Viterbo (4th September) — the same whom 
 I shall refer to again as having called her aunt to life, 
 was saved from being detected in a pious theft because 
 the stolen bread concealed in her bosom was turned into 
 roses. And Caecilia (22nd November), a Eoman virgin, 
 is praised for having remained a virgin after her mar- 
 riage by a persistent denial to her husband of his marital 
 rights. And, true to her principles, the Roman Church 
 extols in Saints, as a virtue, their persecuting principles, 
 as if the Pagan or Heretic was to be Christianized by 
 compulsion and persecution. On the festival of the 
 persecuting and blaspheming (as witness his anathemas) 
 Pope Pius V., we find the following prayer (5th May): — 
 " 0, God, who wast pleased to raise blessed Pius to the 
 dignity of chief bishop, in order to crush* the enemies 
 of the Church and restore the Divine worship, cause us 
 to be defended by his protection," &c. The zeal of 
 Canute the Dane (12th May), is commended, in that he 
 conquered the barbarians for the purpose of making 
 them Christians. Of Ferdinand of Castile — a canonised 
 Saint — in the Breviary (30th May) we read : " In alli- 
 ance with the cares of government the regal virtues 
 shone in him — magnanimity, clemency, justice, and, 
 above all, zeal for the Catholic faith, and an ardent 
 determination to defend and propagate its worship. 
 This he performed in the first place by persecuting 
 Heretics, to whom he allowed no repose in any part of 
 his kingdom, and for whose execution, when condemned 
 to be burnt, he used to carry the wood with his own 
 hands." And if we turn our attention to the proceed- 
 
 series of able articles in the " Protestant Guardian." London, 1828, vol. i. 
 The writer there quaintly observes that we have seen somewhere an 
 elaborate calculation of the immense progeny which may be raised in a 
 few years from a couple of rabbits. The three miracles vouched for by 
 Melchior Nunhez seem to have proved equally prolific. 
 
 * " Oonterendos," in the English Missal, for crush, is substituted 
 " depress," and the words " cause us to be defended by his protection," 
 are omitted ! 
 
29 
 
 ings of St. Francis Xavier, the great apostle and mis- 
 sionary to the Indians (lib. ii. ep. 5), we find that, so 
 early as a.d. 1548, this "illustrious Saint" wrote to 
 Simon Rodriguez, animadverting in a covert manner on 
 the conduct of the civil magistrates, and expressing a 
 wish that the King of Portugal would punish those' 
 governors who were backward in promoting the work 
 of conversion. He then adds : " If the authority of the 
 king or governor does not second our exertions in pro- 
 moting the Christian faith, our labour is completely 
 lost. You may believe this on my word, as I have had 
 experience of it, more than enough. I know why it 
 happens so ; but it is not necessary that I should tell 
 the reason." This seems to prove that this Saint relied 
 upon the secular arm rather more than on his own 
 power of working miracles. His views on the subject 
 will be still further elucidated by the following tradi- 
 tional testimony of a Spanish Jesuit : — " The Saint 
 (Xavier) was accustomed to say that as long as they were 
 not within reach of fire-arms (literally, under the musket) 
 there was no having any Christian that was good for 
 anything."* To the same effect the Portuguese Jesuit, 
 Tellez, observes : " This was always the opinion which 
 our fathers formed of those matters relating to the 
 Catholic religion, which could not be of any duration in 
 Ethiopia without military support."! He also quotes 
 a letter from Manuel Fernandez to the provincial of the 
 Indies, " asking if it is surprising that they require 
 soldiers for the support of their mission, since, even in 
 Portugal, the prelates could not discharge their duty 
 without the aid of the secular arm? "J "Who, then," 
 
 * Navarette, Tratado. 6, p. 436. For the preceding and the following 
 I am indebted to the " Protestant Guardian," vol. i. p. 205. London, 
 1828. 
 
 f " Histoire de Ethiopie." Lib. iv. c. 3. 
 
 £ The present favourite patron saint in England is St. Francis De 
 Sales. The September number, 1878, of Maamillan's Magazine, has an 
 admirable Article on this Saint, in which are related his vain efforts to 
 convert the inhabitants of cantons in Switzerland, and eventually his 
 appeal to arms to enforce his creed, which were put in force with the 
 
30 
 
 exclaimed the convert priest, Joseph Blanco White, 
 " shall be surprised to find Inquisitors canonised by 
 Rome, or to hear her addressing a daily prayer to the 
 great and merciful Father of mankind, ' That he would 
 be pleased to crush, by the power of his right hand, all 
 'Pagan and Heretical nations ! ' " Such are the words 
 which Borne puts in the mouth of every Spanish priest 
 who celebrates Mass, and inserts their heroes among 
 the list of canonised Saints, and gives them a place in 
 their Breviary. 
 
 The doctrine taught by the Breviary exhibits the 
 most idolatrous phases of the worship of the Roman 
 Church. Dead bodies of those whom the Popes choose 
 to canonise as Saints are venerated for their supposed 
 sanctity and alleged miraculous powers. Many of these 
 bodies they represent as continuing for centuries uncor- 
 rupted. They are not simply held in honour, but have 
 paid to them a religious worship. For instance, we 
 read in the Festival of Peter Chrysologus (4th December) 
 that " his sacred body {sacrum ittius corpus), which was 
 honourably placed near the body of the said St. Cassian 
 with the tears and reverence of the whole city, is even 
 at the present day {religiose colilur) religiously wor- 
 shipped!' Saints and martyrs are represented as having 
 merited eternal salvation and the gracious approval of 
 the Almighty, in proportion to the sufferings they 
 endured by self-inflicted tortures; and their merits 
 before Grod were so great that they had more than 
 sufficient for their own salvation, making it lawful for 
 us to plead their superabundant merits on our own 
 behalf as means of salvation.* 
 
 To take one example of many similar. The prayer 
 
 utmost barbarities. The " sweet resignation " with which this " Servant 
 of God " invited, witnessed and encouraged the perpetration of almost 
 unheard of barbarities on these simple-minded and unoffending Pro- 
 testants for refusing to embrace Bomish idolatries, is admirably exposed 
 in the article mentioned. 
 * Compare Luke xvii. 10. 
 
31 
 
 on the festival of St. Scholastica (10th February) is as 
 follows : — " God, who to recommend to us innocence of 
 life, was pleased to let the soul of thy blessed virgin Scho- 
 lastica ascend to Heaven in the shape of a dove, grant 
 to us by her merits and prayers to live so innocently 
 that we may deserve to arrive at eternal joys — ut ad 
 eeterna mereamur gaudia pervenire". The theory of our 
 deserving eternal joys through another's merits is so 
 startling, that in the English Eoman Missal in this 
 prayer they quietly drop the word mereamur! They 
 place also their dead men and women as our mediators 
 before the throne of God, as if the mediation of Christ 
 were not sufficient for our salvation.* Of course the 
 Virgin Mary takes her place as foremost in the ranks — 
 as the " Queen of Heaven " — " Star of the Sea " — 
 " Mistress and glorious Queen of the World " — " She 
 alone destroys all heresies in the world " — " Through 
 her we have merited to receive the Author of Life " — 
 " She is set between Christ and the Church." And that 
 " there is need of a mediator to the Mediator Christ." 
 Prayers are also addressed direct to her to grant us those 
 graces which God alone can bestow, besides various 
 idolatrous hymns being addressed to her. We have 
 also in the lessons the 24th cap. of Ecclesiasticus 
 (Apocryphal), as also the 8th cap. of the Book of Pro- 
 verbs as applied to the Virgin". 
 
 We find also perpetuated the notorious perversion of 
 the text Gen. iii. 15, adopted from a Latin Vulgate 
 edition, Ipsa conteret caput tuum, — " She shall crush thy 
 head." In the Antwerp edition, 1823, of the Breviary, 
 Pars Verna, March 25th, the feast of the Annunciation, 
 we read: — "She (that is, the Virgin Mary) is the 
 woman promised of old by God, as about to bruise with 
 her foot the head of the old serpent." 
 
 The rendering ipsa — she — is wholly unauthorised, 
 and is a gross corruption. In the Hebrew text the verb 
 contains the masculine prefix Tod, and not the feminine 
 
 * Compare 1 Tim. ii. 5. 
 
32 
 
 prefix Thau. No other Hebrew text is ever pretended 
 to exist. So in the Septuagint version we have avros, 
 " He," and not avrr], " she." That cannot be disputed. 
 It is a fallacy when Bomanists assert that the present 
 Vulgate follows Jerome's edition in giving ipsa for ipse. 
 Jerome's reading was ipse, as may be seen on consulting 
 the Verona edition, 1737, published under the auspices 
 of Dominus Vallarius. In the Clementine edition of 
 the Bible by Du Hamel, published in Paris in 1706, 
 in a note, we are informed that the Hebrew ipsum, it — 
 to wit, the seed of the women — is a true prophecy of 
 Christ. The Septuagint ipse, " he," amounts to the 
 same thing. Pope Leo I. in his sermon, Be Nativit. ii., 
 has ipsum conteret Caput tuum ; and so also Arius Mon- 
 tanus and Pagninus. The alteration of the Vulgate 
 text was made to meet the growing sentiments of 
 honour towards the Virgin Mary. We accordingly find 
 the alteration made in the editions of Srxtus V. and 
 Clement VIII. The Eomish Bishop, Melchior Canus, 
 points out that this perversion of the text manifests 
 the ignorance and unskilfulness — we are uncharitable 
 enough to add the dishonesty — of the translators in 
 giving ipsa instead of ipsum. Dr. Hody mentions a 
 curious instance of attempted forgery in the Bible for 
 the honour of the Virgin. In the Boyal Bible, Ant- 
 werp, 1572, the masculine prefix Tod, of Gen. iii. 15, 
 was changed into the feminine, TJiau, to favour the ipsa 
 of the Vulgate. In the edition of 1 584 the true reading 
 was restored.* 
 
 They celebrate, on the 8th December, the supposed 
 day of the Virgin Mary's conception in her mother's 
 womb. Such a festival was unheard of for twelve 
 centuries, and was founded on a series of absurd fables. 
 One example is sufficient. A spectre is said to have 
 appeared to Anselm (the same Anselm who was after- 
 wards Archbishop of Canterbury), during a storm at 
 
 * "De Bibliorura textibus originalibus versionibns Greecis, et Latina 
 Vulgata. Lib. 111. P. u. c. xv. sec. 99. Folio. Oxon, 1705. 
 
33 
 
 sea, telling him that if he wished to escape the peril, he 
 must vow before God to institute a festival to the Con- 
 ception of the Blessed Virgin, and that he should 
 persuade all to keep it ; it was further revealed to him 
 that the event took place on the 8th day of December. 
 They subsequently added to that event, that she was 
 born Immaculate — that is to say, out of the common 
 course of nature, and without the taint of original sin. 
 St. Bernard in the twelfth century strongly opposed 
 the then nascent error. This theory caused bitter 
 debates and wrangling in the Bornan Church ; and it 
 is within a few years only that the late Pope, Pius IX., 
 in 1854, by virtue of his infallible authority, declared this 
 hitherto debateable subject an ascertained fact. And 
 the Boman Priest must so accept it — it is so repeatedly 
 alluded to in his Breviary, although the theory is 
 directly contrary to the teaching of the early Chri stain 
 writers. For example, Augustine, a canonised Saint 
 said : — " Mary sprang from Adam, and died because of 
 sin ; Adam died because of sin ; and the flesh of our 
 Lord, derived from Mary, died to take away sin."* 
 " Christ alone, being made man, but remaining God, 
 never had any sin ; nor did He take on Him a flesh of 
 sin, though from the flesh of sin of his mother. For 
 what of flesh He thence took, He certainly either puri- 
 fied that it might be taken, or purified in the act of taking 
 it." Again : " Mary, the mother of Christ, from whom 
 He took flesh, was born of the carnal concupiscence of 
 her parents ; not so, however, did she conceive Christ, 
 who was begotten not by man, but of the Holy 
 Ghost." f And Epiphanius most distinctly said that 
 
 * " Maria ex Adam mortua propter peccatum ; Adam mortuus propter 
 peccatum; et caro Domini ex Maria mortua est propter delenda peocata." 
 August. Opera, Ernarr. in Pslm. xxxvii. Serm. ii. Tom. vi. col. 240. 
 Paris, 1691. 
 
 f " Solus ergo Hie etiam homo faetus, manens Deus, peccatum nullum 
 habuit unquam ; nee sumpsit carnem peccati, quamvis de materna came 
 pecoati. Quod enim carnis inde suscepit, id profecto aut suscipiendura 
 mundavit, aut suscipiendo mundavit." — St. Augustini Opera. Tom. x., 
 p. 61, B. Benedict, ed. Paris, 1690. " De Peccatorum Meritis et Eemis- 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 " Mary was a chosen vessel, but was a woman not at 
 all changed in nature," and declared that " she was not 
 born differently from the nature of men."* 
 
 The Franciscan Breviary has an entire service 
 dedicated to this event of the alleged Immaculate 
 Conception of the Virgin Mary in her Mother's womb. 
 In the Collect we read, — 
 
 " Grod, who by the immaculate conception of the 
 Virgin, didst prepare a worthy habitation for thy Son ; 
 we beseech that thou, who, through the death of the 
 same Son, by thee foreseen, didst preserve her from 
 every defilement, wouldst allow us to come to thee, 
 being made pure by her intercession, through the 
 same Lord." 
 
 We then have texts of Scripture referring to Christ 
 most extravagantly applied to the Virgin, and also a 
 large stock of forged passages attributed to various 
 Fathers. There is a long extract purporting to be " a 
 discourse " by " Jerome the Presbyter," but in fact 
 taken from that senseless composition — the Epistle to 
 Paula and Eustochium on the Virgin's assumption, 
 which has long been condemned as spurious by all 
 Romanists of taste and learning. There are also 
 Lessons from the commentary on Kings, falsely attri- 
 buted to Gregory I., from the treatises of the Conception, 
 falsely attributed to Anselm, and from the counterfeit 
 Acts of the Martyrdom of St. Andrew, under the name 
 of the Presbyters of Achaia. There are also Lessons 
 from St. Augustine, Bede, and Bonaventure, who, though 
 they unanimously assert that the Virgin was subject to 
 original sin, are dragged forward to make a show, and 
 by fraud, to induce people to suppose, that as their 
 names appear in the office of the Immaculate Conception, 
 
 sione." Lib. ii., c. 24, § 38. " Maria, Mater Cliristi, de qua carnem 
 smnpsit, de earn ah concupiscentia parentum nata est; non autem Chris- 
 tum sic ipsa concepit, quem non de virili semine, sed de Spiritu Sanoto 
 prooreayit."— Idem ; Opus imperf. contra Julian. Lib. vi. Tom. x., p. 1334. 
 A. Edition as above. 
 * Epiph. Opera, p. 1064. Paris, 1862. 
 
35 
 
 they were of course believers in the doctrine. If, on 
 documentary evidence, which is accessible to all, the 
 Boman compilers of this their most important book of 
 devotions, deliberately record palpable falsehoods with 
 barefaced effrontery, what are we to expect of their 
 manipulations when they come to deal with the sayings 
 and doings of their alleged Saints, when no records 
 exist to vouch for their truth, even in several instances, 
 when the individual himself had not been heard of some 
 centuries after the time of his supposed existence ? 
 And what are we to think of their miracles, fabricated 
 and vouched for long after their death ! 
 
 The festival of the Immaculate Conception was not 
 publicly received by the Church till after the decree of 
 Sextus IV., a.d. 1476.* The dogma has since been 
 raised to an Article of Faith by the late Pope Pius IX. 
 
 Then again we have the festival of the Assumption 
 — that is, when the Virgin Mary died, her resurrection 
 is placed on the third day. And the 15th August is 
 fixed as being the precise day when that event took 
 place. Although in the Breviary the Assumption is 
 declared to be an " ancient tradition," not one of the 
 Latin or Greek Fathers for the first five centuries ever 
 mention the subject. One of the numerous legends 
 authenticating this event is, that, on her "falling 
 asleep," all the Apostles, on their various missions 
 throughout the world, even in a moment of time were 
 borne aloft, and came together to Jerusalem, and when 
 they were near her, they had a vision of angels, and 
 Divine melody of the highest powers was heard ; and 
 thus with Divine and more than heavenly glory, she 
 delivered her holy soul into the hands of Grod in an 
 unspeakable manner. She was then deposited in a 
 coffin in Grethsemane. In this place the chorus and 
 singing of the angels continued for three whole days. 
 But after three days, on the angelic music ceasing — 
 since one of the Apostles had been absent, and came 
 * See Bellarmine. " De Oultu Sanct." Lib. iii. c. 16. 
 
 D 2 
 
36 
 
 after the third day and wished to adore the body — the 
 Apostles who were present opened the coffin, but lo! 
 the body they could not find. They found only the 
 things in which she had been laid out and placed there, 
 " and were filled with an ineffable fragrancy proceeding 
 from those things. They then shut the coffin." 
 
 But the matter does not end here, for " on the feast of 
 the Virgin of Mount Carmel" [16 July] we are in- 
 formed that " on the sacred day of Pentecost, when the 
 Apostles, inspired from heaven, were speaking divers 
 languages, and by invoking the most august name of 
 Jesus were performing many wonders," many men are 
 said to have embraced the gospel, " and with a certain 
 peculiar devotion began to worship (venerari) the most 
 Blessed Virgin, whose colloquies and familiarity they 
 had the happiness to be able to enjoy." The evidence 
 in support of this alleged fact is wanting ! 
 
 "We have also the fable recorded of the contest 
 between Peter and Simon Magus, a magician (6 July). 
 The story goes that Simon, calling himself Christ, 
 undertook to ascend to the Father, and was actually by 
 his magic art suddenly raised in the air. Whereupon, 
 Peter on his knees praying to the Lord, cut short the 
 magician's flight, brought him down, as if shot, in 
 headlong haste, and he was dashed against a stone on a 
 precipice and broke both his legs. In consequence of 
 this miracle, which was performed before Nero the 
 Emperor, the Emperor ordered Peter and Paul to be 
 put to death. 
 
 "We must not omit to note that there is an 
 edition of the unreformed Breviary of the Dominican 
 Order,* in which we have numerous monstrous blunders 
 as to fictitious Saints, gravely related, and enriched with 
 further marvels. Here we are told that Grod gave to 
 St. Blasius power to cure all who had fish-bones in the 
 throat ; to St. Thomas of Canterbury (Thomas a, Becket) 
 was given the power of performing Miracles after his 
 
 * A copy of this edition is in the Library of the " Protestant Alliance." 
 
37 
 
 death, and even to[ restore those who had been emascu- 
 lated to their former state, " genitalibus privatis con- 
 ferens nova membra." But we note this edition more 
 particularly from the fact that we have that beautiful 
 Hymn which is ascribed to Ambrose and Augustin,* 
 converted into a Hymn to the Virgin thus : — 
 
 "We praise thee, Mother of God : 
 
 We acknowledge the Virgin Mary. 
 All the earth doth worship thee : 
 
 The spouse of the everlasting father.f 
 
 And in like manner the entire Hymn is perverted, 
 substituting the Virgin Mary for God. We may mention 
 in passing, that this Hymn thus travestied, is borrowed 
 from the works of St. Bonaventura, Vatican Edition.^ 
 In the first volume of the same edition it is stated to be 
 his composition, and in the Bull of Canonisation of 
 Bonaventura his works are called " divine writings," and 
 Sextus V, in a decretal letter specially commends the 
 same Vatican Edition of this work ; thus placing the 
 infallible seal of the Boman Church on this awful piece 
 of idolatry. 
 
 We have to note three peculiar festivals dedicated to 
 inanimate objects. The festival of the Chair of Peter 
 at Borne, and the Chains with which Peter is supposed 
 to have been bound when a prisoner, and the Translation 
 of the House of Loretto from Palestine to the Papal 
 States. 
 
 On the 1 8th January is celebrated the festival of the 
 identical chair supposed to have been erected by the 
 Apostle Peter, and in which he sat. Having assumed 
 that Peter was the first Bishop of Borne, a chair was 
 exhibited and used by several Popes as the genuine 
 chair which Peter used. In the year 1662, 
 and for some years previous, this chair was exposed 
 
 * " Oanticum Sant : Ambrosii et Augustini transmutatum in laudem 
 gloriose Virginia Marie." 
 
 f Te matrem Dei Laudamus : te Mariam virginem profitemur. 
 
 Te aeterni Patris sponsam : omnis terra veneratur. 
 t Vol. vi. pp. 501-517. 
 
38 
 
 annually on the 18th January for public adoration. In 
 1662, however, matters took a new turn. While the 
 chair was being cleaned, in order to be set up in some 
 conspicuous place in the Vatican, the twelve labours of 
 Hercules unluckily appeared, carved upon it. Giacomo 
 Bartolini, who was present at the discovery, affirms that 
 their worship was not misplaced, since they paid not 
 the adoration to the wood but to the Prince of Apostles. 
 Unwilling to surrender the worship of the Chair, he 
 attempted to explain the labours of Hercules in a 
 mystical sense — namely, as emblematical of the future 
 exploits of the Popes !* And this is the old heathen 
 piece of furniture which is exposed for Christian adora- 
 tion ! And the present Breviary still perpetuates the 
 deception and idol worship. 
 
 The festival to celebrate the exposition and veneration 
 of the alleged veritable chains in which St. Peter was 
 bound, one in Eome and the other in Jerusalem, which 
 when brought together were miraculously united, is 
 fixed for the 1st of August in each year, and is alleged 
 to work miracles. The Pope mentioned this chain as 
 one of the inducements for the faithful to visit Eome in 
 the year of Jubilee, 1825. 
 
 The other festival, celebrated on the 10th December, 
 is, perhaps, still more disgraceful. Loretto is a little 
 village near Ancona, overlooking the Adriatic. Here 
 pilgrims flock from all parts of the world to visit the 
 " Church of the Holy House " — Santa Casa — which con- 
 tains beneath its dome a building alleged to be the very 
 identical house in which the Angel Gabriel announced to 
 the Virgin Mary the incarnation of our Lord at Naza- 
 reth. If ever the infallibility of the Eoman Church 
 was pledged to any legend or ecclesiastical miracle it is 
 to this Santa Casa and its miraculous transmission 
 across the Mediterranean Sea from Nazareth to Dal- 
 matia. This is said to have taken place on the 10th of 
 May, 1291. Then it took a second flight across the 
 * Bower's " History of the Popes," vol. i. p. 7. London, 1750. 
 
39 
 
 Adriatic gulph from Dalmatia to Italy.* Natalis of 
 Alexandria, reputed to be one of the most learned and 
 sober writers of the Eoman Church, here takes up the 
 narrative, and he tells us that in the first year of the 
 pontificate of Boniface VIII., a.d. 1294, " the Sacred 
 House of the Blessed Virgin was borne by a miracle 
 from Dalmatia into the territory of Picenum, and settled 
 down in a wood near Eecanati, belonging to a pious 
 matron whose name was Lauretta. Moreover, it has 
 been handed down that, by a repetition of the miracle, 
 the house thrice changed its place in the Picenian terri- 
 tory in one year."f The house is supposed to have 
 been borne by the hands of angels a distance of more 
 than 2,000 miles. I will spare the reader Tursellinus' 
 version of the different reasons for these eccentric flights 
 from one spot to another. It so pleased the Blessed 
 Virgin that it should be so — being disappointed at the 
 neglect shown at each station where the " Holy House " 
 alighted — until it found a resting place in its present 
 locality. The " Sacred Congregation of Bites " in 
 August, 1689, sanctioned the entire fable; and Inno- 
 cent XII. appointed proper services to commemorate 
 the occasion, by instituting an anniversary solemnity to 
 be celebrated by a proper Mass or Office, j Benedict 
 XIV. mentions that the Popes Paul II., Julius II., 
 Leo X., Paul III., Paul IV., and Sextus V., each testify 
 by their Apostolic Constitutions that this Sancta Casa, 
 or " Holy House," is the very same house in which the 
 Annunciation took place ; and the late Pope, Pius 
 IX., refers to the same as a fact in his Bull on the 
 " Immaculate Conception." To the utter and perpetual 
 disgrace of the Bomish Church this absurd legend is 
 distinguished by a prominent place in her Breviary, by 
 being set forth in the Lessons, where the members of 
 
 * See Kohrbacher, "Hist. Univ. de l'Eglise Catholique." Tom. xix. 
 p. 321 et seq. Paris, 1851. 
 
 t Nat. Alex. Hist. Ecoles., sec. iii. Tom. xv. p. 79. Paris, 1744. 
 
 j Benedit. XIV., Opus de Testis B.M.Y. Lib. ii. c. xvi. Tom. ix. 
 p. 210. Tenet., 1788. 
 
40 
 
 the Eoman Church are reminded that the identity of 
 the house is warranted by Papal Bulls, and a proper 
 Mass and Service is published by the same authority 
 for the annual commemoration of that event. 
 
 This review of that part of the Breviary dedicated to 
 the Blessed Virgin Mary would not be complete without 
 noting the institution of the Feast of the Blessed 
 Bosary, in the year 1573, and which is directed to be 
 kept on the first Sunday in October in each year. We 
 are favoured with a History of the Origin of the Feast, 
 and the great Victories ascribed to the prayers of the 
 Bosary. Devout Bomanists are furnished with a string 
 of beads — first blessed by a Priest — some ten — some 
 fifteen decades — that is there are 10 or 15 small beads, 
 and then one large one, and so on alternately. For 
 each small bead a prayer is uttered to the Virgin, that is a 
 " Hail Mary," to one " Pater Noster," for each large or 
 " Lord's Brayer " bead. That I may not be charged with 
 exaggeration, I will give a literal translation of the 
 Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Lessons of the Day, which I 
 take from the Lyons edition of the Boman Breviary, 
 1829 : " When the impious Albigensian heresy was lay- 
 ing waste the country of Toulouse, and daily striking 
 deep root, St. Dominic having first founded the Order 
 of Preachers, turned his whole attention to pluck it up, 
 root and branch. That he might attain his end the 
 surer, he had recourse to the protection of the Blessed 
 Virgin, whose dignity that error especially attacked, and 
 whose province it is to overthrow the heresies of the 
 whole world. The Virgin accordingly (so tradition 
 avers), heard his prayer, and signified to him that the 
 most effectual remedy against the heresy would be the 
 recitation of the Bosary ; whereupon he assiduously set 
 to work to execute the charge, and his labours were 
 crowned with astonishing success. Now, the rosarv is 
 a certain formula of prayer, consisting of fifteen "de- 
 cades of Hail Marys, with a Pater Nosier attached to 
 each decade, in which we commemorate and digest 
 
41 
 
 piously in our minds, an equal number of the mysteries 
 of our redemption. From this time this method of 
 prayer, owing to the labours of St. Dominic, became 
 singularly popular. The fact of his being the originator 
 is fully attested by Popes, in their Apostolic Briefs." 
 
 Here let us pause for a moment. The institution of 
 this Festival, and the invention of the Eosary, brings 
 us back to the frightful slaughter of the Albigenses 
 and Waldenses by the ferocious Dominic. The Bull of 
 Innocent III., passed into a law by the Fourth Lateran 
 Council, for the extermination of heretics, was directed 
 specially against the Albigenses. The massacre in cold 
 blood of many thousands of these inoffensive peasants, 
 was the result undertaken by the blood-thirsty Saint 
 Dominic. Does it ever occur to Romanists when they 
 pass their fingers over these holy beads and address 
 their prayers to the ever Blessed Yirgin and to Our 
 Lord, to give one passing thought to the horrors perpe- 
 trated by virtue of this same bauble ? 
 
 The Breviary proceeds : — 
 
 " It would be impossible to recount the benefits 
 acquired by the Christian world from so wholesome an 
 institution. Among others, that famous victory gained 
 by Pope Pius Y. and the Princes of Christendom, at 
 Lepanto, over the Ottoman power ; for in the very day 
 the victory was obtained, the Confraternities of the Most 
 Holy Eosary were assiduously praying the whole day 
 with all their fervour throughout the world ; hence it is 
 only just to refer so great a victory to the effect of their 
 prayers — a fact which Pope Gregory XIII. bears testi- 
 mony to, and in memory of so singular a favour, ordains 
 perpetual thanksgiving to be addressed to the Blessed 
 Virgin of the Eosary, and, in all churches where there 
 is an altar of the Eosary, that an Office should be 
 solemnized with a double rite of the major class ; and 
 other Pontiffs, to reciters of the Eosary, and to its con- 
 fraternities, have granted Indulgences almost innu- 
 merable." 
 
42 
 
 " Lately also Pope Clement XL, being piously 
 persuaded that a signal victory, gained in the year 1716, 
 in Hungary, by Charles VI., Emperor Elect, over the 
 numerous forces of the Turks, should be ascribed to 
 the patronage of the Blessed Virgin, inasmuch as it 
 occurred on the very day of the Feast of the Dedica- 
 tion of St. Mary ' ad Nives,' and about tbe time Confra- 
 ternities of the Most Blessed Bosary were supplicating 
 God for the overthrow of the Turk, and invoking the 
 aid of the Virgin with all fervour with the same view — 
 this victory, therefore, as well as the liberation of 
 Corfu, a little after, from Turkish tyranny, by the 
 power of the Virgin — in order that the memory of such 
 singular favour should never perish, the aforesaid Pope 
 ordains the Feast of the Most Holy Bosary on the 
 same day, and with the same solemnity." 
 
 Here another grave matter suggests itself for the con- 
 sideration of our Bomish brethren. Confraternities of 
 the Bosary still exist, and in great numbers all over 
 Europe. How is it when the Bope's Holy City was 
 attacked and his armies defeated, Bius IX. relied rather 
 on his Irish levies and his Swiss hirelings, than 
 on the miraculous virtues of the Bosary, or on the 
 intervention of the bellicose Saint Dominic ? Perhaps 
 the Confraternities were too frightened to try the experi- 
 ment, but of this we have no record. And as to St. 
 Dominic, their God of War, either he was talking, 
 or was pursuing, or he was on a journey, or perad ven- 
 ture he .was sleeping and must not be awakened ! * 
 However, be this as it may, we are informed : — 
 
 " All this Pope Benedict XIII. ordered to be inserted 
 in the Roman Breviary, with a worship most grateful 
 to Her (the Blessed Virgin) ; therefore we can venerate 
 the most Blessed Mother of God, persuaded that as she 
 has given to the faithful of Christ victory over their 
 earthly enemies, in virtue of the prayers of the Holy 
 
 * 1 Kings, xviii. 27. 
 
43 
 
 Bosary, she will also grant to the same the overthrow 
 of their infernal foes." 
 
 Such then is the History of the Blessed Bosary and 
 Blessed beads. 
 
 On the authority of such like fables is the Boman 
 Priest compelled, on each anniversary, to repeat the 
 appointed office set out in his Breviary, as a reality and 
 well-authenticated historical fact. 
 
 Before I proceed in my task, it will be as well that 
 the theory of the system should be understood. 
 
 The Breviary contains an authorised list of Canonised 
 Saints, who are supposed to be " reigning with Christ," 
 and enjoying " the beatific vision." It was a question 
 among the early Fathers of the Church whether with 
 St. Paul we are to believe that to be " absent from the 
 flesh " is to be " present with the Lord," or whether 
 there is an intermediate period of non-existence, as it 
 were, and a waiting for the day of final resurrection. 
 However that may be, it was not until about the middle 
 of the fifteenth century that the Boman Church gave 
 her infallible decision on the subject. We are informed 
 by Veron, in his " Bule of Catholic Paith,"* that the 
 question had been one of debate, but which had since 
 been decided in the affirmative by the Council of 
 Florence, a.d. 1439 — namely, whether the souls of the 
 blessed are received into Heaven and enjoy the clear 
 vision of Cod before the resurrection and the last day 
 of final judgment — so that, until the fifteenth century, 
 "Invocation of Saints," though practised, was not an 
 acknowledged doctrine of the Boman Church. 
 
 Not content with assuming a temporal supremacy 
 over the world under the authority of a forged Dona- 
 tion from the Emperor Constantine, by virtue of which 
 the Pope took upon himself to depose Kings, relieve 
 their subjects from their oaths of allegiance, and confis- 
 cate their territories — and claiming Spiritual Supre- 
 
 * Waterworth's Translation. Birmingham, 1833, p. 84. 
 
44 
 
 macy over Christendom, a claim derived from the gift of 
 the murderer Phocas, and the result of an ignominious 
 barter — not content, I say, with these exceptional powers, 
 Eome proceeds to dispose of Heaven also, and to name 
 the inhabitants of those blessed mansions. The Pope, in 
 fact, assumes the power of anticipating and superseding 
 the great attribute of the Divinity, in the day of final 
 judgment, by his act of Canonisation. 
 
 Ferraris, in his "Ecclesiastical Encyclopaedia,"* a 
 work deemed of authority, informs us that no one 
 should be venerated as a Saint without the license of 
 the Pope, and that no person is strictly and properly a 
 Saint and worthy of veneration unless duly canonised 
 by the Pope, and his name enrolled in the register of 
 Saints, and it is declared that he may be worshipped by 
 all. He further informs us that some learned doctors 
 held it as an article of faith that the Pope cannot err in 
 the canonisation or beatification of Saints — a theory 
 not admitted by Veron, as after noted. To avoid a 
 gross scandal that was rife, in the indiscriminate invo- 
 cation of the departed, Alexander III., a.d. 1160, 
 ordered that none should from that date be acknow- 
 ledged a Saint unless declared such by the Pope ; f and 
 as Dens very properly observes, if it were otherwise, 
 " the whole Church would be involved in a superstitious 
 worship, should he be invoked as a Saint who is as- 
 sociated with the damned in hell." This precaution 
 seemed necessary, for we are informed by Cassander, the 
 eminent Eomish Eitualist, that " there is another error 
 not uncommon ; that, neglecting in a manner, the 
 ancient and known Saints, the common people worship 
 more ardently and diligently the new and unknown, of 
 whose holiness we have but little assurance, and some 
 of whom are known to us only by a revelation, in- 
 asmuch that of several of them it is justly doubted 
 
 * Bib. Prompt. Francoft. 1781. Vol. vii. sec. i., ii. and xv. 
 f Polydore Vergil. " De Rer. Invent." b. vi. c. 12. fol. cxix. : London, 
 1551. 
 
45 
 
 whether there ever were any such persons in the 
 world."* 
 
 The same Ferraris states that it is not certain who 
 was the first that celebrated the canonisation of a saint, 
 and adds that many believed that it was Leo III., a.d. 
 804.f On the other hand Picard J says that some gave 
 an earlier date tinder Adrian I., and that there are 
 some who gave the glory of this privilege to Alexander 
 III., a.d. 1160. This latter date is more probable, for 
 Dupin, the ecclesiastical historian, states that the two 
 previous acts under Leo III. and Adrian I. are "grounded 
 on supposititious documents." § Considering that the 
 Pope undertakes to anticipate the judgment and decree 
 of the Almighty in the matter of our salvation, he 
 should be at least infallibly certain in his selection, lest 
 — as Peter Dens suggests — he or she "should be invoked 
 as a Saint who is associated with the damned in hell." 
 Nevertheless, his infallibility has been at fault in 
 several well-established instances. Dr. Wordsworth 
 has edited and published a lately discovered and un- 
 doubtedly genuine work by Hippolytus, which has 
 proved that Saint Zephyrinus, who was Bishop of 
 Rome, a.d. 201, and was canonised, and whose festival 
 is appointed for the 26th August ; and Saint Callistus, 
 a.d. 219, his successor, also canonised, and whose 
 festival is appointed for the 14th October, had both 
 lapsed into heresy on a primary article of Christian 
 faith, and which heresy they strenuously maintained. 
 And Douglas, in his " Criterion of Miracles," has given 
 us other similar instances of heretics being canonised. 
 Among others he names Theodotus, an Arian, whose 
 festival is fixed for 2nd November ; || Paphnutius, a 
 
 * Cassander. Consult p. 911 ; Paris, 1616. 
 
 t Ferraris, as above. Sec. xix. 
 
 j " Cfoertionies et Coutumes Beligieuses." Tom. ii. p. 143 ; Amsterdam, 
 
 § " Bccl. Hist." Cent. x. c. vi. p. 193. Vol. ii. Dublin, 1724. 
 (1 For Theodotus' heresy, see Mosbeim's " Eccl. Hist " Cent. ii. P. 2, §xxi. 
 ch, v. sec. xxi. ; and in Newman's " Arians," ch. i. sec. iv. ; Busebius in. 
 
46 
 
 Milesian heretic, 18th September; and Felix a schis- 
 matic, on the 29th July ; and we know that Saint 
 Cyprian, Bishop and martyr, whose festival is cele- 
 brated on the 26th October, held according to Romish 
 notions, heretical views on Baptism, and was declared 
 by Pope Stephen to be a false Christ and false Apostle 
 and Anti-Christ. "We have already had some instances 
 of fictitious Saints arising out of blunders in words : how- 
 many others there may be can only be presumed. 
 
 I cannot pass over the notable fact that in all the 
 old Liturgies we find prayers for the Blessed Virgin 
 Mary. I have utterly failed to discover when the suf- 
 frages of the Church were exercised in her behalf, 
 declaring her to belong to a happier order — in other 
 words canonised ! 
 
 The process of canonisation is a commercial transac- 
 tion, a business of itself, which brings thousands of 
 pounds to the Papal treasury.* The payment is made by 
 the nation or "Order" that desires to have the canonised 
 individual as a patron Saint, or one taken from their 
 ranks. The Eedemptorist Fathers are said to have 
 paid smartly for the honour of their founder, Liguori, 
 being introduced to and numbered among the Choir of 
 Saints in Heaven. 
 
 In looking over the Roman martyrology it is impos- 
 sible not to be struck with the prodigious number of 
 
 his " Eccl. Hist.," v. 28, mentions the excommunication of Theodotus by- 
 Victor. For particulars of Felix II. see Comber in " Gibson's Preser- 
 vative," vol. xv. pp. 193, 195, 203, 231, &c. London, 1850. 
 _ * L. Desanctis (Eoma Papale, Oonclus. ; p. 540) says that a Beatifica- 
 tion costs 40,000 scudi, a canonisation 100,000. A scudo equals about 4s. 
 According to Q-untherode, the Jesuits paid 100,000 gold florins to the 
 Papal Exchequer for the canonisation of Loyola. See Griesenger's 
 " Mysteries of the Vatican." Vol. i. p. 121. London, 1864. The canoni- 
 sation of St. Bernardine of Sienna cost 25,000 ducats of gold; St. 
 Bonaventura, 27,000; that of St. Francis of Paola cost 70,000 scudi; 
 St. Francis of Sales, 31,900 scudi: averaging from £10,000 to £12,000! 
 a prodigious sum in those days. See Seymour's " Evenings with the 
 Bomanists," p. 204. London, 1854. Fabulous sums are stated to have 
 been_ paid yearly by Spain for canonisations. (S. Priest's " Chute des 
 J^suites," p. 356.) 
 
47 
 
 Saints promoted by John XXII. ; and when we con- 
 sider that he publicly taught that there was no beatific 
 vision till after the general resurrection, we may think 
 it extremely preposterous that he should make any 
 Saints at all. But when we learn that twenty-five 
 millions of florins were found in his coffers at his 
 decease we must confess, in that felicitous phrase with 
 which Mr. Charles Butler smooths over the fantastic 
 claims of the Popes to universal monarchy, that worldly 
 wisdom cannot condemn him. The fees of all sorts 
 have been considerably raised since the days of Pope 
 John, and were so exorbitant in the seventeenth century 
 that a relation of Cardinal Borromeo, a Saint of Paul 
 V.'s manufacture, pathetically entreated his children 
 " that they would content themselves with being honest 
 men, and never think of becoming saints ; as the can- 
 onisation of their cousin had proved a most ruinous 
 concern, and his rage for working miracles, instead of 
 being any benefit to his kindred, had well nigh reduced 
 them all to beggary T* 
 
 The proceedings are protracted for years : Dr. Mil- 
 nerf tells us " so far from being precipitate, it employs 
 the Court of Borne whole years to come to a decision 
 on a few cases, respecting each Saint." The process to 
 canonise Xavier took seventy years ; and it took eighty 
 years, and the aggregate wisdom of nine Popes, to 
 arrive at a decision in the case of Maria a Jesu de Agreda. 
 It is somewhat remarkable that in their infallible wis- 
 dom Popes do not arrive at a more speedy decision; 
 but then the officials engaged in the transaction would 
 be mulcted of their fees, hence the necessity of making 
 some show for the money. Salvation is not to be had 
 "without money and without price." 
 
 But these Saints are made practically available in a 
 variety of ways, independent of national patron Saints, 
 
 * Southey's " Vindioias Bccles. Anglicanae." 
 
 f "End of Eeligious Controversy." Letter xxiv. 
 
43 
 
 such as St. George of England, St. Patrick of Ireland, 
 St. Andrew of Scotland, St. Denis of France,* &c, &c 
 
 Under different circumstances different Saints are 
 invoked. Peculiar Saints have, according to Eomanists, 
 to use Dr. Milner's own words, in his "End of Eeligious 
 Controversy," peculiar " virtues and excellences which 
 have been bestowed upon them by Grod." Thus, for 
 instance, St. Anthony the abbot, secures his votaries 
 from fire ; and St. Anthony of Padua, is the refuge 
 of the timid in times of thunder and war \ St. Blase 
 cures disorders of the throat ; St. Genow, the gout ; St. 
 Lucia heals all diseases of the eyes ; St. Nicholas is the 
 patron of young women who desire to be married ; St. 
 Ramon is their powerful protector during pregnancy ; 
 and St. Lazarus assists them when in labour; St. Polonia 
 preserves the teeth ; St. Domingo cures the fever ; and 
 St. Roque is the Saint invoked under apprehensions of 
 the plague. And thus in all diseases, under every 
 pressure of affliction, some Saint is accessible by prayer, 
 whose peculiar province it is, to relieve the object of 
 distress.! 
 
 Romanism has been termed not inaptly " baptised 
 Paganism ; " there is a remarkable similarity between 
 modern Romanism and Paganism. The parallel is to 
 be traced here also with respect to their Dii minores. 
 Pagans assigned to each of their gods the power of 
 curing peculiar diseases ; they prayed to Apollo against 
 the plague ; to Hercules against epilepsy or fits ; to Juno 
 and Lucina in times of pregnancy. 
 
 * It is rather hard on our Gallic neighbours, that they cannot distinctly 
 state who is their Patron Saint, and therefore cannot address their prayers 
 to him with any comfortable certainty. Some boldly claim St. Denys, 
 the Areopagite; others, more modest, are content with Denys, Arch- 
 bishop of Paris ; others roll them both into one. See Mosheim's " Eccl. 
 Hist." Cent. ix. part ii. chap. iii. sec. xii. vol. ii. p. 331. London, 1825. 
 
 f See, for further information, Brand's " Popular Antiquities." Sess. 29. 
 vol. i. pp. 196-7. Ed. 1841. Cramp's " Text Book of Popery," p. 398. 
 London, 1851. " Historia Imaginum," autore Jo. Molano, pp. 532 and 
 504-5. Ed. Lovanii, 1771. Supplement to " Gibson's Preservative," 
 p. 181, vol. viii. London, 1850. 
 
49 
 
 The Christian Father Arnobius (pont. Gent., 1-3) 
 formerly taxed the Pagans for forging themselves gods 
 — the one a carpenter, others drapers, others mariners, 
 fiddlers, cowkeepers ; and to each was assigned a par- 
 ticular occupation. The orators and poets worshipped 
 Apollo, Minerva, and the Muses ; the physicians AEscu- 
 lapius, the soldiers Mars, the blacksmiths Vulcan, the 
 hunters Diana* 
 
 St. Augustine f wrote a whole chapter on the employ- 
 ments men had been pleased to assign their gods, which 
 he thought the most ridiculous thing imaginable. 
 " They cut out," he says, " to every god his task, and 
 following that distribution, they tell you, you must 
 direct your prayers to each of them according to his 
 office ; does not that look more like the buffoonery of 
 a stage than the majesty of God?" Whatever the 
 absurdity be, the Church of Eome has not scrupled to 
 do the like, assigning to every Saint his office ; every 
 one choosing for his patron him whom he believes to 
 preside over his trade or profession, and to whom he 
 flies in times of trouble. The cobbler and the journey- 
 man shoemaker have St. Crispin ; the tanner has St. 
 Clement; the sailor St. Nicholas, and the printer St. 
 John or Daniel, or St. Luke, or St. Jerome, or Si. Augus- 
 tine, according to the quarter of Europe in which he 
 dwells, though Moses is considered most appropriate. 
 St. Andreio and St. Joseph are the patron saints of 
 carpenters ; St. Anthony of swineherds and grocers ; 
 St. Blaise of woolcombers ; St. Catherine of spinners ; 
 St. Cloud of nailsmiths ; St. Eloy of blacksmiths, farriers, 
 and goldsmiths ; St. Euloge (who is probably the same 
 with St. Eloy) of smiths, though some say of jockeys ; 
 St. Florian of mercers; St. Francis of butchers; St. 
 George of clothiers ; St. Ann and St. Goodman of tailors, 
 sometimes called St. Gutman ; St. Gore, also called St. 
 
 * See " Boma Antiqua et Eeoens," by James da Pre - . London, 1850. 
 Cap. viii. p. 181. 
 t ' De Civit. Dei." Lib. i. c. 5. 
 
 E 
 
50 
 
 Goarin, with the devil on his shoulders and a pot in his 
 hand, of potters ; St. Hilary of coopers ; St. John Port 
 Latin of booksellers ; St. Josse and St Urban of plough- 
 men; St. Leodagar of drapers; St. Leonard of lock- 
 smiths as well as captives ; St. Lewis of periwig-makers; 
 St. Martin of master shoemakers ; St. Nicholas of parish 
 clerks, and also of butchers as well as sailors ; St. Peter 
 of fishmongers ; St. Sebastian of pinmakers, on account 
 of being stuck with arrows; St. Severus of fullers; St. 
 Stephen of weavers ; St. Tibba of falconers ; St. Wilfred, 
 St. Hubert, also St. Honor or Honore, of bakers; St. 
 William of hatmakers ; St. Windeline of shepherds ; and 
 St. Gertrude is pleased to condescend so far as to be the 
 friend of ratcatchers. 
 
 But of all the Saints, Eegina Maria reigns paramount 
 as " Queen of Heaven." Pope Gregory XVI. the 
 late Pope's predecessor, claimed her as a patroness of 
 peculiar worth. He showed his signal attachment to 
 her in his Encyclical letter addressed to the Prelates of 
 the Romish Church in 183 '2 shortly after his assump- 
 tion of the pontifical dignity. In the beginning of this 
 letter his Holiness observes : — 
 
 '" We select for the date of our letter the most joyful 
 day (August 15), on which we celebrate the solemn 
 festival of the most Blessed Virgin's triumphant 
 assumption in Heaven, that she, who has been through 
 every great calamity our patroness and protectress, may 
 watch over us writing to you, and lead our mind by her 
 heavenly influence to those counsels which may prove 
 most salutary to Christ's flock."* 
 
 The closing paragraph contains the following sen- 
 tence : — 
 
 " But that all may have a successful and happy issue, 
 let us raise our eyes to the most Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 who alone destroys heresies, who is our greatest hope — 
 yea, the entire ground of our hope. May she exert her 
 patronage to draw down an efficacious blessing on our 
 * The Laity' Directory for 1833. 
 
51 
 
 desires, our plans, and our proceedings, in the present 
 straightened condition of the Lord's flock ! " 
 
 It is the sayings and doings of these highly-favoured 
 individuals, I am now about to note as recorded in the 
 Eoman Breviary. 
 
 While, however, Priests themselves are bound hand 
 and foot, and lie prostrate victims at the wheels of this 
 ecclesiastical Eomish Juggernaut — the legends of the 
 Canonised Saints of the Breviary — the Laity appear to 
 have an option left to them of belief, or otherwise, in 
 the canonised, or in their alleged miraculous powers. 
 This theory is maintained by Veron, and other writers, 
 who, when it suits the convenience of times and cir- 
 cumstances, are put forward to soften down or explain 
 away the eccentricities or extravagances of Bomanism 
 proper. Veron in his "Bule of Catholic Faith," 
 says : — * 
 
 [The Italics are as in the Original :] 
 
 " The canonisation of the Saints is no article of faith ; 
 in other words, it is no article of our faith that the Saints 
 whom we invoke — for instance, St. Lawrence, St. Vincent, 
 St. Gervase, St. Blase, St. Chr3 r sostom, Ambrose, 
 Dominic, &c. — are really Saints and in the number of 
 the Messed. There is an exception, of course, to be 
 made to what is here said in favour of those who 
 have been pronounced to have been Saints by the Holy 
 Scriptures — as St. Stephen, who is said in the sacred 
 text to have slept in the Lord. This is proved : — 
 
 "1. — From the silence of. our Creed and of the 
 Council of Trent. 
 
 * " The Rule of Catholic Faith; or the Principles and Doctrines of the 
 Catholic Church, discriminating from the opinions of Schools and from 
 popular errors and misstatements." Translated by Rev. J. Waterwortb, 
 1833 ; pp. 84, 85. The translator, in his preface, states that " the autho- 
 rity of the following treatise of Veron is well known and universally 
 acknowledged." And it was cited by Dr. Murray, in his examination 
 before a Committee of the House of Commons, " On the State of Ireland," 
 as one of the books in which is " found the most authentic exposition of 
 the Catholic Church." 
 
 E 2 
 
52 
 
 " 2. — It is clear that there is no evidence to prove, 
 either from the written or unwritten word of God, 
 that these persons were Saints, as they were all born 
 long after the sacred writings were penned, and the 
 apostolic traditions delivered. 
 
 " 3. — Besides, it is not even an article of our faith 
 that such men were ever in existence, and, therefore, 
 much less are we bound to believe that they really lived 
 saintly lives or were afterwards canonised. All these 
 are undoubtedly mere questions of fact and not of 
 doctrine. 
 
 " 4. — Miracles performed during their lifetime or 
 after their death, of which we find numerous instances 
 recorded in the lives of the Saints, are the chief cause 
 of their canonisation ; but as all these miracles have 
 been performed since the time of the Apostles, as not 
 one of them is recorded in the sacred writings, and 
 consequently not one of them is of faith, how should 
 a canonisation grounded upon them, a judgment of the 
 Church as to their sanctity, be an article of Catholic 
 faith ?" 
 
 Veron continues to tell us : — 
 
 " No Bulls, therefore, of their canonisation, though 
 they generally emanate from the Pope, as they merely 
 contain a question of fact, declaring that such a one is 
 a Saint, are anywise matters of Catholic belief. I may 
 again obsene, that neither the Pope, nor even a General 
 Council is guided infallibly in the canonisation of a 
 Saint. The proof of this may be easily drawn from a 
 principle which I laid down in our general rule of 
 faith ; namely, that all Catholics are agreed that the 
 Pope* even in a General Council may err on mere 
 matters of fact ; which, as such, depend principally if 
 
 * But what appears to be a strange contradiction, Cardinal Bellamine, 
 the great Koman controversial champion, lays it down in his " Church 
 Triumphant," that in the act of canonisation the Pope is infallible.— 
 Vol. li. p. 871. Cologne, 1617. 
 
53 
 
 not wholly on the means of information and the 
 testimony of individuals/' 
 
 Why all this is not applicable to Priests also is 
 difficult to understand, for they are personally bound by 
 their office, whether they believe or not, to read the 
 appointed portions of the Breviary under the penalties 
 already enumerated — a degrading alternative which must 
 make Priests either scoffing infidels or credulous bigots. 
 
 The process of Canonisation is perpetuated even to 
 the present day. We have now three further indi- 
 viduals who are to be presented as candidates for Beati- 
 fication, the first step to Canonisation. In the Univers 
 of the 19th May, 1877 (page 2, col. 4), we read that— 
 
 " The Cardinal Archbishop of Paris has issued a pas- 
 toral letter requesting the faithful of his diocese to 
 forward all writings and documents belonging to or 
 concerning three persons, the process of whose beatifica- 
 tion is now progressing. These three persons are Sister 
 Theresa de Saint Augustine, a Carmelite nun of St.Denis, 
 previously known under the name of Madame Louise de 
 France. She was a daughter of the unfortunate Louis 
 XV. Her death occurred September 25th, 1786. The 
 second candidate for beatification is Father Mary Paul 
 Francis Liberman, founder of the Congregations of the 
 Holy Ghost and of the Sacred Heart of Mary. He died 
 February 2nd, 1852. The third is Madame Madeline 
 Sophia Barat, foundress of the order of Ladies of the 
 Sacred Heart. She departed this life May 25th, 1865. 
 Sister Augustine and Father Liberman are already 
 honoured by the title of Venerable." 
 
 The process of Beatification in the Eomish Church is 
 the act by which the Pope declares a person blessed or 
 happy after death. Beatification differs from Canonisa- 
 tion. In the former the Pope does not act as a judge 
 in determining the state of the beatified, but only grants 
 a privilege to certain persons to honour him by a certain 
 religious worship, without incurring the penalty of 
 superstitious worshippers. In Canonisation, the Pope 
 
54 
 
 professes to speak as a judge, and determines, ex cathedra, 
 the state of the canonised. Beatification is the first 
 step towards Canonisation, or raising any one to the 
 honoured dignity of a Saint. The theory is, that no 
 person can be beatified till fifty years after his or her 
 death. All certificates or attestations of virtues and 
 miracles, the necessary qualifications for saintship, are 
 professed to be critically examined by the Congregation 
 of Eites. This examination continues for several years, 
 after which the Pope decrees the beatification. The 
 corpse and relics of the future Saint are from thenceforth 
 exposed to the veneration of all good Christians, his 
 images are crowned with rays, and a particular office is 
 set apart for him, but his body and relics are not carried 
 in procession : Indulgences likewise and remissions of 
 sins are granted on the day of his beatification, which, 
 though not so pompous as that of canonisation, is, how- 
 ever, very splendid.* 
 
 But let me pass on to the immediate object of this 
 treatise on the Breviary — namely, to review the mira- 
 culous deeds effected by and through the Papal army of 
 Saints, which I propose to classify under different heads. 
 I shall endeavour to avoid all needless comments of my 
 own, and reproduce the narrative by giving a strictly 
 literal translation, which I shall set out in inverted 
 commas. 
 
 It is a sore subject with Bomanists, but that is not 
 our fault. The mill-stone is round their neck, and they 
 cannot shake it off. Their only course is to follow the 
 example of Dr. Newman, and boldly accept the whole 
 on the infallible authority of their Popes. I see no 
 other possible means of escape. 
 
 I have said that the Breviary is divided into four 
 parts or portions — one for each season. My references, 
 at the end of each extract are to the edition above 
 referred to—" Lisbon, 1786." W. will stand for " Win- 
 
 * See Hook's " Church Dictionary," and " Encyclopedia Britannica." 
 
55 
 
 ter " portion ; S. for the " Spring ; " A. for the "Autumn ; " 
 and Sr. for the " Summer " portions ; the figures refer 
 to the pages in that edition where the extracts are 
 found. 
 
 The marginal dates give the periods of celebration of 
 the respective festivals, and will assist the reader to 
 other editions of the Breviary. The absence of a date 
 indicates that that particular Saint has been omitted 
 from more modern editions, probably to make room for 
 more recent or more popular Saints. 
 
 I propose to commence with a few extracts showing 
 that most of these Saints were infant prodigies. And 
 I may mention, by the way, that a very large propor- 
 tion of the Saints are said to have been born of " illus- 
 trious parents." 
 
 6 Dec. — Of Nicholas of Patara, it is said that " his 
 parents obtained from Grod by their prayers, that his 
 sanctity when a man should be exceedingly great. This 
 was already apparent from his cradle, for when an infant, 
 though in other days he was frequent in sucking the 
 milk of his nurse, ne only sucked once on Wednesday 
 and Friday, and that in the evening ; which practice of 
 fasting he always observed for the rest of his life."* 
 W. 487. 
 
 7 Dec. — Ambrose, Bishop of Milan; when an infant, 
 " a swarm of bees settled in his mouth, which circum- 
 stance foreshadowed the Divine eloquence of the man." 
 W. 490. 
 
 31 Jan. — A similar visitation was accorded to Peter 
 Nolascus, " the presage of whose virtue was, that when 
 he was yet an infant crying in his cradle, a swarm of 
 bees flew to him, and built a honeycomb in his right 
 hand." W. 61 5. 
 
 23 Feb. — St. Peter Damian, " when a child, being 
 
 *-This is equalled by the story related in the "Legenda Aurea" (fol. 6, 
 ed. 1498), of St. Catherine of Sweden, who gave an early pledge of her 
 future chastity by refusing, with tears, to suck the breasts of immodest 
 
50 
 
 bereaved of his parents, experienced a severe thraldom 
 under the tutelage of his brother. Even then he gave 
 a most laudable pattern of religion towards God, and 
 piety towards his father. For happening to find a piece 
 of money, instead of laying it out for the relief of his 
 own want and hunger, he bestowed it on a priest to offer 
 'the Divine sacrifice for his father's expiation." 
 
 20 Jan. — Gundisalvus, "the illustrious minor of itine- 
 rant anchorites and preachers, from his very baptism, 
 and while yet a little infant, gave indications of his 
 devotion to the image of Christ, the Mother of God, 
 and the Saints." W. 607. 
 
 27 May. — Mary Magdalene de Pazzi " learned to pray 
 before she could speak." " She abhorred nearly from her 
 birth all kinds of vanity."* S. 742. 
 
 4 Feb. — Andreio of Florence was " dedicated to the 
 blessed Virgin ; but what he should become was shown 
 by Divine presage before his birth; for his mother, 
 when pregnant, thought in a dream that she had 
 brought forth a wolf, which, going to the Church of the 
 Carmelites, was instantly changed into a lamb at the 
 very threshold of the temple." And this lamb became 
 the Saint. When grown up he was elected a Bishop, 
 " of which office esteeming himself unworthy, he con- 
 
 * Of this lady it is related, " that she so hung upon the nod of her 
 superiors, that she would not do even the things commanded her by God 
 in her ecstacies, until she had their consent." We have another case 
 where it is taught that the confessor or superior is to be obeyed even in 
 opposition to God, who is brought to approve of this rebellion. Dr. Wise- 
 man, in his "Lives of St. Alphonsus, Liguori, and other Saints," London 
 1846, pp. 258-9, relates of Veronica, that she received a direct injunction 
 from God to " fast for three whole years on nothing but bread and water- 
 but the Almighty wishing, at the same time, to put her obedience to her 
 superiors to the test, caused them all to refuse her their permission, without 
 which she could not put the Divine command in practice, and although 
 he («°d) continued to repeat his command, and even to reproach her for 
 not fulfilling it, and although her stomach rejected every other food but 
 bread, yet her superiors obstinately refused to accede to her petition 
 ... At length, after she had undergone the severest torments from the 
 refusal of her superiors . . at not being able to comply with the will 
 of God, from March to September, God was pleased to support her by 
 milk, miraculously supplied m the same manner as is related of other 
 holy virgins. UUUJ1 
 
57 
 
 cealed himself for a long time, until at length being 
 wonderfully betrayed by the voice of a child miraculously 
 speaking, and being found outside the city, he under- 
 took the bishopric lest he should oppose the Divine 
 will." W. 628. 
 
 16 May. — "John of Nepomuci, was born of parents 
 advanced in age, not without presage of his future 
 sanctity, flames miraculously shining over the house as 
 he was born into the world. When the infant had 
 fallen into a heavy sickness, by the aid of the blessed 
 Virgin, to whom his parents ascribed their son when 
 they received him, he escaped safe from the danger to 
 his life." S. 720. 
 
 Rita of TJmbria " exhibited illustrious proofs of virtue 
 from her infancy, for rejecting childish amusements and 
 trifling employments, she wonderfully delighted in soli- 
 tude and prayer. She resolved to dedicate to God her 
 virginity for twelve years." She was afterwards married, 
 and notwithstanding was " miraculously brought into a 
 convent, where she was graciously received by the vir- 
 gins, who were moved by the miracle." W. 735. 
 
 21 June. — St. Aloysius of Gonzaga, "at the age of 
 nine vowed perpetual virginity, before the altar of the 
 Blessed Yirgin — and this he kept by the signal favour of 
 God without being tempted in any conflict of mind or 
 body " — but then he so guarded himself, and " his senses, 
 and especially his eyes, he so restrained — that he did not 
 allow them even to look at the face of his mother." 
 
 In the Bull of Canonisation of Francis de Sales we 
 are told, that " as a child he showed none of the traits 
 of childhood," and in his eulogy by Father Morel that 
 " he manifested in the cradle such chaste modesty as to 
 shrink from the caresses of his nurse, and hardly per- 
 mitted her to kiss him." * 
 
 * The " Canonisation de St. Fr. de Sales, en xvi. Discourses." Grenoble, 
 1665. The reader is here referred to an admirable article on this Saint, 
 entitled " Two Sides to a Saint," in the September, 1878, number of 
 Macmillan's Magazine, which will amply repay the perusal. 
 
58 
 
 25 May. — Pope Gregory VII — "When a little boy, 
 not yet taught his letters, he was playing at the feet of 
 a carpenter planing timber ; he is said to have formed 
 by chance, the Lord guiding the hand of the child, 
 from even the shavings thrown aside, those elements of 
 the oracles of David ' He shall have dominion over the 
 sea,' by which it might be signified that his authority 
 would be the greatest in the world." S. 737. 
 
 27 May. — Mary Magdalen of Florence " almost from 
 her cradle entered on the path of perfection. When 
 ten years of age she vowed perpetual virginity, and 
 assuming the habit of the order of Carmelites, in the 
 convent of St. Mary of Angels, she exhibited herself as 
 the example of all virtues. She was so chaste that 
 whatsoever could harm purity she was ignorant of.* 
 When five years of age, at the command of God, she lived 
 upon bread and water only, except on Sundays, on which 
 she lived on Lent bread." S. 743. 
 
 23 Aug. — Philip of Florence, " even from his cradle, 
 gave indication of his future sanctity, for having scarcely 
 entered upon his fifth month, he wonderfully spoke, and 
 exhorted his mother to give alms to the servants of the 
 Mother of God." S. 753. 
 
 30 Aug. — Pose of Lima " from her very cradle shone 
 forth with signs of future sanctity, for the face of the 
 infant being miraculously transfigured into the appear- 
 ance of a rose gave rise to this name." — " She made a 
 vow of perpetual virginity when five years of age. She 
 privately cut off the hair of her head, lest she should be 
 compelled to marriage by her parents." A. 773. 
 
 4 Sept. — Pose of Fiterbo " shone forth with every 
 virtue, having become mistress of perfection when she 
 had scarcely learned to speak. Hating the vanities of 
 
 * We have another example of purity. Juliana of Florence was " so 
 pure La mind, and so free from all, even the slightest blemish, that she 
 never in the whole course of her life lifted her eyes on the face of man." 
 She would have been a fitting wife to St. Aloysius above mentioned, they 
 might have lived together for years and not known each other by sight, 
 such was their modesty. 
 
59 
 
 the world, afflicting her little body with coarse clothing, 
 nakedness of feet, haircloth, fasting and other austeri- 
 ties, she constantly gave herself up to Divine contem- 
 plation. But Grod was pleased that this extraordinary 
 sanctity should be attested by a remarkable miracle, for 
 while yet a little girl she recalled to life her aunt who 
 had been dead." This was the young lady who, stealing 
 bread for the poor, was saved from detection by the 
 bread turning into roses ! " When she had completed 
 her seventh year, burning with a desire for solitude she 
 made choice of a narrow cell of her own house, in which 
 she shut herself up, as in a voluntary prison, and 
 ardently applied herself to prayer, and the castigation 
 of her body, &c. When ten years old, being inspired 
 of God, by her pious exhortations and powerful argu- 
 ments, she brought back many heretics to the faith, and 
 to the obedience of the* Eoman Pontiff." A. 347. 
 
 8 Oct. — But perhaps the most astonishing act of pre- 
 cocity was exhibited in the case of St. Bridget, who, while 
 yet in her mother's womb, saved her from shipwreck ! 
 
 It must require a pretty considerable degree of faith 
 to be an honest Eoman Priest ! 
 
 The reader will possibly put all these down as anti- 
 quated fables narrated by Priests of " the dark ages ;" 
 we may, therefore, with profit, add one of many similar 
 examples of infantile holy precocity from a contem- 
 porary biographer. Dr. Wiseman in his Lives of the 
 Saints* tells of St. Veronica .- " When she was about 
 four years of age .... once when a pilgrim begged 
 alms, not knowing what else to give, she took off one 
 of the new shoes she had just put on, and gave it to 
 him. He told her, it would be of no service to him 
 without the other ; and in the same spirit she gave him 
 that likewise. A two-fold prodigy showed that this act 
 was pleasing to Grod ; for the second shoe having stuck 
 fast on the arch over the doorway, the pilgrim rose to 
 more than human height to reach it ; and Our Lady 
 * London, 1846; p.-227. 
 
60 
 
 appeared soon after to her, with the shoes in her hand, 
 shining with rich jewels, and told her, that in the 
 person of the pilgrim she had received them, and hei 
 divine Son had adorned them in that manner." 
 
 Passing on to Saints of more mature age. A 
 favourite pastime seems to have been to make them- 
 selves as unhappy, uncomfortable — in fact, as miserable 
 as possible, afflicting the body with excruciating tor- 
 tures, leaving us to believe that the Almighty takes 
 pleasure in these macerations of the body, and that his 
 wrath is thereby propitiated. Indeed, from the unctuous 
 way in which the sufferings are related, one must con- 
 clude that it was a favourite and playful pastime of these 
 Saints to torture their bodies in order to propitiate, we 
 must presume, their God ; and a savage delight seems 
 to be exhibited in the narration of their sufferings. 
 
 22 Feb. — Peter JDamian is said to have "promoted 
 the custom of self inflicting of scourgings for the 
 expiation of committed sins." " He excelled in mace- 
 rations of the body as an example of approved holi- 
 ness." 
 
 3 Dec. — Francis Xavier seems "to have earned the 
 great privilege " of being lifted in the air in his ecstatic 
 moments, "by the great torture of his body." "He 
 denied himself the use not only of meat and wine, but 
 also of wheaten bread, being accustomed to live upon 
 the commonest food ; he abstained altogether from 
 every nourishment for two and frequently for three 
 days. He so lashed himself with iron scourges that he 
 was frequently all wet from the copious streams of 
 blood. He allowed himself as little sleep as possible, 
 lying on the ground." As a penance in his missionary 
 work in India, he " traversed innumerable provinces — 
 often barefoot." W. 479. 
 
 19 Feb. — Canute the Bane " punished his body with 
 fastings, haircloths and scourges." W. 570. 
 
 4 Feb. — Andreio of Florence " was worn out by con- 
 
61 
 
 tinual labours and voluntary mortifications of his flesh." 
 W. 629. 
 
 21 Mar. — Benedict of Nursia suffering under " the 
 burning torches of lust which were placed before his 
 eyes by the devil, rolled himself in thorns, until his 
 body being lacerated, the sense of passion was kept down 
 by pain." S. 571. 
 
 15 Oct. — Theresa the Virgin Martyr " in perpetual tears 
 used to weep over the darkness of infidels and heretics ; 
 and to appease the wrath of the Divine vengeance used 
 to dedicate to God for their salvation the voluntary 
 torturings of her body." We are informed in Lesson 
 YI. that " the Lord so liberally enriched her with the 
 Divine Graces, that many a time did she cry out entreat- 
 ing that a limit might be put to the Divine favours 
 towards her ; and that the remembrance of her faults 
 might not be blotted out with so quick a forgiveness." 
 
 We cannot omit to note here a formidable rival, in 
 St. Joseph of the Cross, as narrated by Dr. Wiseman 
 in his Lives of the Saints :f "He made it a rule to 
 look none whomsoever in the face . . . He would not 
 permit himself the liberty of lifting his eyes to the roof 
 of his cell . . . He would not even smell a flower . . . 
 Bare headed in all seasons ; he wore under his rough and 
 heavy habit divers hair shirts and chains, which he was 
 careful to vary to keep the sense of torment ever fresh. 
 Besides he used the discipline [scourge] to a severe degree; 
 and when at the age of forty, his superiors obliged him 
 to wear sandals, he placed between them and his feet a 
 quantity of small nails ; but the most tremendous instru- 
 ment of torture, which he devised against himself, was a 
 cross about a foot in length, set with rows of sharp nails, 
 which he fastened tight over his shoulders, so as to open 
 there a wound which never afterwards closed. Another 
 similar, but smaller cross he wore attached to his breast. 
 But his abridgment of sleep was truly wonderful, and 
 
 * " Lives of St. Alphonsus, Liguori," &o. Dolman, London, 1846 ; 
 p. 147-8. 
 
62 
 
 he never took it save seated on the ground, or cramped 
 up in his little bed, often with his head leaning against 
 a piece of wood jutting from the wall. No less singular 
 was his abstinence. For the last thirty years of bis 
 life, he entirely overcame tbat most insatiable of wants, 
 thirst, absolutely abstaining not merely from wine and 
 water, but from every liquid whatsoever." "When Dr. 
 "Wiseman solemnly recorded all this, did he really believe 
 it to be true ? Or that Grod was pleased or propitiated 
 by such heathenish barbarities ? "We are told in contro- 
 versy that we are not called upon to believe such narra- 
 tives. Did Dr. "Wiseman believe them? Do Priests 
 believe them ? Are they proposed to us as facts or not? 
 
 30 Apr. — Of Catherine of Siena we are informed "her 
 abstinence was extreme, and the austerity of her life 
 wonderful. She was discovered once to have continued 
 the fast from Ash "Wednesday to the Ascension of Our 
 Lord, being content with the communion of the Eucharist 
 alone." That is nearly three months ; and as the wine 
 is not given she must have lived all that time, if we 
 believe the Breviary, without Hquid ! And although "She 
 was tormented very frequently with devils, and harassed 
 by many molestations," yet, as regards, others "she 
 possessed a sway over sicknesses and fevers in the name 
 of Christ, and compelled devils to depart from bodies 
 which were possessed." S. 649. 
 
 1 May. — James, the Lord's Brother* " from his infancy 
 drank neither wine nor strong drinks ; he abstained 
 from flesh, he was never shorn ; he used neither perfume 
 nor bath." "His constancy in praying caused so hard a 
 skin to grow upon his knees, that for hardness it might 
 be compared to the hide of a camel." James must have 
 died in the odour of sanctity ! S. 668. 
 
 Rita of TJmbria, though not a Virgin, was miracu- 
 
 * James, the Lord's brother. This is another son of Mary, the wife of 
 Joseph. We read, as a fact, in the New Testament, that there were other 
 children of this marriage — Matt. i. 25, xiii. 55, 56 ; Mark vi. 3 ■ Gal i. 19. 
 But in the canonisation of " James, the Lord's brother," the theory of 
 Mary being " ever a Virgin," is rather perplexing. 
 
63 
 
 lously brought to a convent, " where, keeping her body- 
 in subjection by watchings, with the haircloth and 
 thorns • which she had woven into her shift, and with 
 constant stripes, she took food once in the day, being 
 content with only bread and water; she exhibited a 
 signal example of obedience, when at the order of 
 Antistia she hesitated not to water dry timber — she was 
 continually engaged in prayer, and she meditated on 
 the passion of Christ from midnight to sunrise, with 
 such ardour of mind, and such profusion of tears, that 
 she seemed to be almost wasted away by reason of her 
 great grief. On a certain day, while she was more earn- 
 estly praying to the image of Christ hanging from the 
 cross, a thorn from the crown of the crucifix was so 
 struck through her forehead, that she suffered an incurable 
 wound till her death, from which, in addition to her 
 keenest sense of pain, a foul corruption issued. From 
 whence, lest it should excite disgust in her sisters, she 
 lived a recluse with God." One would have thought 
 that the moral of this little episode would be — Don't pray 
 to a crucifix again ! We are told, however, notwith- 
 standing the incurable nature of the wound, that " in the 
 secular year, being forbidden by Antistia to go to Rome 
 with the other sisters, on account of the ulcer, she grew 
 well on a sudden, on wiping the wound, which however 
 upon her return broke out again. After some years, 
 being attacked with a heavy sickness, she bore it most 
 patiently for four years, at which time a blooming rose 
 from a small garden, in a very rough winter, and two very 
 fresh figs were brought to her." For all this endurance 
 she was rewarded at her death, when " she heard Christ 
 the Lord, together with the Blessed Yirgin, calling her 
 to the Kingdom of Heaven." S. 735. 
 
 19 Oct. — Peter of Alcantara "brought his body down 
 to obedience by perpetual watchings, fastings, scourg- 
 ings, cold, nakedness, and all kinds of asperities — with 
 which (body) he had made a bargain that he would 
 never give it any rest in this world." 
 
64 
 
 26 May. — "Such was the abstinence" of Philip of 
 Neri " that he often remained three days fasting, intent 
 upon watching and prayer. He was in the habit of 
 passing the whole night in the contemplation of heavenly 
 things at the cemetery of Calixtus." S. 740. 
 
 27 May. — Mary Magdalene of Florence " tortured her 
 body with haircloth, stripes, cold, want, watchings, 
 nakedness, and every kind of punishment. She burned 
 with such fire of Divine love that, unable to bear it, 
 she was compelled to cool her breast by pouring water 
 on it. She was remarkably famous for her charity 
 towards the poor, for she often spent sleepless nights 
 occupied in discharging the offices of the sisters, or in 
 attending the sick, whose ulcers she sometimes healed 
 by licking them." As a reward for these exceptional 
 virtues "her body to this day is preserved uncorrupted." 
 S. 743. 
 
 19 June. — A similar feat was performed by Juliana 
 of Falconeris. "She very often spent whole days in 
 ecstacy; . . . and in attending the sick she used at 
 times to suck with her mouth the corrupt matter and 
 gore oozing from their ulcers, and thus restore them to 
 health. Her body she was accustomed to waste with 
 scourgings, whips of knotted cords, iron girdles, watch- 
 ings, and sleeping on the bare ground."* 
 
 8 July. — Elizabeth, Queen of Portugal, " by kiss- 
 ing the horrible ulcer of a poor woman, suddenly 
 cured it." 
 
 30 Aug. — Pose of Lima, "addicted to fasting beyond 
 
 * A strange story is related of this young lady. She was nearly wasted 
 to death by her austerities, so that she could scarcely retain anything 
 on her stomach, and therefore out of reverence due to the sacrament she 
 absented herself from the Lord's table. She entreated, however, the Priest 
 to bring her " Divine bread," which she could not take with her mouth, 
 and apply it outwardly to her heart. The Priest complied, and wonderful 
 to tell, at the same moment of time the Divine bread vanished, and she 
 expired with a serene and smiling mien. The virgin's body was laid out 
 according to custom, and then upon her left side was found imprinted, as 
 if with a seal, into her flesh, the figure of the host, representing the image 
 of Christ crucified. 
 
65 
 
 human custom, spent entire Lents abstaining from bread, 
 and subsisting on only five little pippins of citron daily." 
 Sr. 773. 
 
 17 Mar. — I refrain from citing more of sucb cases, 
 to note one of a different stamp, and our bero in this 
 instance is St. Patrick of Ireland. The activity of this 
 gentleman in prayer and gymnastic exercises was really 
 miraculous in itself, let alone tbe spiritual treadmill he 
 was always working. " Having been appointed to feed 
 flocks he gave proof of his future sanctity; for being 
 filled with the spirit of faith, and of Divine fear and 
 love, he rose with activity before day — through snow 
 and frost and rain — to pour forth prayers to Grod, being 
 accustomed to pray 100 times through the day and 100 
 times in the night." All this was when a boy. After 
 he was made Bishop of Armagh we are told : — " Be- 
 sides his daily care of the Church" — here we may 
 wonder where he found time to look after the Church — ■ 
 " he never relaxed his unwearied soul from prayer, for 
 they say that he was accustomed to recite daily the whole 
 Psalter, together with the Canticles and hymns, and 
 200 prayers ; that every day he worshipped Grod 300 
 times on bended knees, and in every canonical hour of 
 the day fortified himself 100 times with the sign of the 
 Cross. Distributing the night into three parts, he 
 spent the first part in running over 100 psalms and 200 
 genuflexions ; the second, in going through the remain- 
 ing fifty psalms, immersed in cold water, and with his 
 heart, eyes and hands raised towards Heaven ; but the 
 third part he gave to light slumber stretched upon the 
 bare stone." S. 547. 
 
 What a busy man this must have been, presuming he 
 could cram into four -and -twenty hours all this gab- 
 bling, perpetual motion with knee and arm exercise, and 
 plunging in and out of cold water. Beading the daily 
 appointed portion of the Breviary, compared to St. Pat- 
 rick's performance, sinks into insignificance. We might, 
 if we were curious, count how many words were uttered 
 
66 
 
 in a minute, but we have no time to tarry •. so "we pro- 
 ceed on to our next subject. 
 
 The power of endurance of some of these so-called 
 martyrs is something wonderful. 
 
 26 May. — Philip of Neri is said to have been " so 
 smitten with the love of God, that he continually lan- 
 guished, and his heart boiled with such ardour that, 
 when it could not be contained within its own boun- 
 daries, the Lord wonderfully enlarged his breast by 
 breaking and elevating two of his ribs." S. 740. 
 
 It is related of this unhappy individual that his 
 cJ/arifi/ so used to raise the temperature of his blood, 
 that it obliged him to break out from his cell, and run 
 distracted into the fields ! 
 
 19 Oct. — Philip of Neri's remedy corresponds with 
 that of Peter of Alcantara, of whom we are told that 
 " the love of God and his neighbour was so largely shed 
 abroad in his heart, and at times excited in it such 
 burning, that he used to be compelled to rush out into 
 the open fields, and temper, with the coldness of the air, 
 the scorching heat he felt within." A. 498. 
 
 25 May. — These two have a rival in Mary Magdalene 
 of Pazzi: — " She burned with so great a heat of Divine 
 love, that she would at times exclaim, ' love ! I can 
 bear thee no longer ; ' and she used to be forced to cool 
 her bosom with a copious sprinkling of water." S. 742. 
 
 30 Jan. — Martina, Virgin and Martyr, whose feast is 
 celebrated on the 30th January, is said to have been 
 condemned under the Emperor Alexander, for refusing 
 to worship false gods. "She was scourged again and again, 
 torn with hooks, with iron claws, with pieces of broken 
 pottery ; then cut limb from limb with most sharp 
 knives ; bathed with fat boiling oil, and at length con- 
 demned to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre; from 
 all which coming out by the Divine power unhurt, she 
 is cast into a burning funeral pile ; and from this also 
 she is preserved by Divine favour. At her prayers were 
 now earthquakes, now lightnings shot from the thunder- 
 
67 
 
 ing Heaven, and the temples of the gods fell to the 
 ground, and the idol statues were consumed. At times 
 from her wounds gushed forth milk, mingled with blood; 
 and a brilliancy most resplendent, and an odour most 
 sweet, emanated from her body. At times the court of 
 Heaven, with the dwellers on high, were seen around 
 her seat, singing divine lauds." 
 
 But a peculiarity in the case of many of these mar- 
 tyrs is, that they survive most frightful tortures which 
 would dispatch a heretic, but which fail of their effect 
 on these martyrs, who, strange to say, are easily put to 
 death by simple means. Of Lucia, a virgin of Syracuse 
 (13 Dec), the same lady who was commanded by Pasch- 
 asius — remark, the Breviary is always precise in giving 
 a name, but without a date-—" to be dragged to a brothel 
 to be violated, when it was divinely contrived that she 
 should remain so fixed that she could in no way 
 be stirred." The old Roman Breviaries are a little 
 more elaborate. We were in these informed that : 
 — " The Holy Spirit fixed her with such a weight, 
 that when a multitude of persons endeavoured to 
 thrust her forward, they could not so much as stir 
 her. They then tied ropes to her hands and her feet, 
 and strove to draw her by pulling all together, but she 
 remained as immovable as a mountain. Then the 
 magicians and soothsayers tried their skill upon her, 
 but all in vain. After this, they brought a great many 
 pairs of oxen, which, with all their drawing, were, 
 unable to make her stir." Were the correctors of the 
 old Breviary staggered at this notable instance of vis 
 inertia, that they considered the fact too holy to be 
 handed down ? They simply record as a fact that " no 
 violence could remove her from the place." We are then 
 told that " the Prefect commanded a fire to be kindled 
 around her after she had been besmeared with pitch, 
 rosin and boiling oil; but when the flames did not 
 even hurt her, her throat was pierced through with 
 a sword, after she had been excruciated with many 
 
 V % 
 
torments." That simple process at once dispatched 
 her. 
 
 Otho, Bernard, Peter, Accwsius, and others were 
 " dragged with ropes, and their bodies thrown into a 
 fire, but the fire spared them." "W. 557. 
 
 18 Jan. — Prisca, a Roman Virgin, aged thirteen, who 
 was spared by a pions Hon, " after being tortured without 
 food for three days in a dungeon, is suspended on the 
 rack, and her flesh being torn from her bones with iron 
 hoops, she is thrown into a funeral pile, from whence 
 she also wonderfully escaped unhurt." She did not, 
 however, escape death, for finally her head was cut off. 
 W. 567. 
 
 2:2 Jan. — Vincent ins of Spain was placed upon a grid- 
 iron with burning coals put under it, and his flesh torn 
 off with iron spikes, and burned with red-hot plates of 
 iron." Far, however, from these tortures killing this 
 Saint, we are told that " he is again thrown into a prison 
 strewn over with potsherds, that his naked body — 
 oppressed with sleep — might also be tortured by the 
 sharp points of the broken pots which were under him ; 
 but when he was shut up in the dark ward, the brightest 
 splendour breaking forth illuminated the whole prison 
 with light." W. 583. 
 
 4 Sept. — Rose of Viterbo " ascended the burning funeral 
 pile, and remained on it unhurt for three hours. She 
 conquered the obstinacy of a certain heretic woman, 
 and converted her, with others, to the faith." A. 347. 
 
 22 Xov. — Ccecilia, a Roman Virgin, though married, 
 " so raised the fury of her husband, that he ordered her 
 to be brought into his own house and burned to death 
 in a bath ; in which place, when she had so remained a 
 night and day, that the flame did not touch her, the 
 executioner was sent thither, who left her half dead, 
 when he could not cut off her head, though she was 
 three times struck with the axe. On the third day she 
 flew to Heaven, adorned with the double palm of Vir- 
 ginity and Martyrdom." Sr. 599. 
 
69 
 
 19 Sept. — Januarius "after his constancy had been 
 variously tried, being cast into a burning furnace, escaped 
 so unhurt that the flames did not injure his clothes, nor 
 even his hair." A. 401. 
 
 26 Sept. — This miraculous power of resisting the 
 natural effects of fire is further illustrated in the case of 
 Cyprian and Justinia. Cyprian was a heathen magician, 
 Justinia was a Christian virgin. The former tried to 
 exercise his Satanic influence over the virgin to place 
 her under the power of a young man, when the Devil 
 candidly confessed that he had no influence over Chris- 
 tians. Cyprian, therefore, was converted. They were 
 both accused before the Eoman judge, and accordingly 
 they were fried together in a cauldron of melted pitch, 
 fat, and wax ; but this boiling compound had no effect 
 on either, they survived to be carried to Nicomedia, 
 where they perished under the more merciful weapon, 
 the axe. 
 
 By way of relief we will indulge in a few stray anec- 
 dotes, with which the Breviary is replete. 
 
 14 June. — A curious incident is related of Basil of 
 Cappadocia, who so enraged the Emperor Valens by his 
 miracles, that he wished to pass a decree for his banish- 
 ment, but failed; "for even the chair of Valens on 
 which he intended to sit when about to make the decree 
 for banishing Basil from the State, fell to pieces, and 
 though he tried three pens to write the decree for the 
 exile of Basil, none of them let down the ink — his right 
 hand all shook, the nerves becoming paralysed," and his 
 " wife was tortured with inward pains, and his only son 
 fell into a heavy sickness." Sr. 480. 
 
 12 Aug. — Clare of Assisi, " when the oil had totally 
 failed in the convent, took a pitcher and washed it, but 
 it was found filled with oil by the favour of Divine 
 bounty. She so multiplied half a loaf that it satisfied 
 fifty sisters." The town being besieged by the Sara- 
 cens she was, though sick, brought to the gate with the 
 
70 
 
 holy Sacrament; whereupon, "the Saracens took to 
 flight, some who had scaled the wall, being struck 
 blind, fell down headlong." Sr. 708. 
 
 30 Aug. — Felix " being apprehended for embracing 
 the Christian religion, was led to the temple of Serapis, 
 to whom when he was commanded to sacrifice, he spat 
 upon the face of the image, which being done the 
 brazen statue fell down." Sr. 775. 
 
 I now have to translate a touching domestic incident 
 which took place between a spiritual Abelard and Helo'ise 
 — said, however, to be brother and sister. 
 
 10 Feb. — Scholastica, "dedicated to Almighty God 
 from the very period of her infancy, had been accus- 
 tomed to come to Father Benedict once a year, to whom 
 the man of God descended, not far without the gate 
 belonging to the monastery. On a certain day she 
 came, according to custom, and the venerable brother 
 descended to her, with his disciples, who, passing the 
 whole day in the praises of (rod and holy conversation, 
 when the darkness of night impended, took food 
 together ; and while they sat at table, and amidst their 
 sacred conferences — it was growing rather late — the 
 same holy virgin, his sister, asked him, saying, ' I pray 
 thee that thou wilt not leave me to-night, that we may 
 talk till morning of the joys of the heavenly life; ' to 
 whom he replied, ' What is it you say, sister ? I can by 
 no means remain out of my cell.' So great at that 
 moment was the serenity of Heaven that not a cloud could 
 be seen in the firmament ; but the holy virgin, when she 
 heard the refusal of her brother, laid her folded hands 
 on the table and leaned her head on her hands to make 
 request to Almighty God. And when she raised her 
 head from the table so great a storm of thunder and light- 
 ning, and so great a torrent of rain broke out, that neither 
 the venerable Benedict, nor the brethren who were with 
 him, could stir beyond the threshold of the place where 
 they sat. For the holy virgin leaning her head on her 
 
71 
 
 hands had poured forth a river of tears, by which she 
 attracted the serenity of the sky to rain." 
 
 Here then we have illustrated cause and effect! 
 Copious tears brought down torrents of rain, thunder, 
 and lightning ! However, to continue : — 
 
 " Not very long after her prayer that deluge followed ; 
 but such was the coincidence of the prayer and the 
 deluge, that she raised her head from the table with the 
 sound of thunder, so that the lifting up her head, and 
 the pouring down of the rain were at the same moment. 
 Then the man of God, amidst the lightnings and thun- 
 derings and deluge of excessive rains, seeing that he 
 could not return to his monastery, being very sad, 
 began to complain, saying, ' Almighty God forgive 
 thee, sister ; what is this thou hast done ? ' To whom 
 she replied, ' Lo ! I asked thee, and thou wert unwilling 
 to hear me; I asked my God, and he heard me ; even 
 now, then, if you can, go forth, and sending me away, 
 retire to your monastery ? ' But not being able to go 
 beyond the shelter, he, who would not willingly remain 
 in the place remained unwillingly ; and so it happened 
 that they passed the whole night awake, and in the 
 sacred conferences of the spiritual life they sated them- 
 selves with alternate discourse." S. 493. 
 
 Did ever any one read such childish wicked trash, 
 invented for the spiritual edification of the Roman 
 priesthood, let alone introducing the Almighty as par- 
 ticipating in the absurdly imaginary incident ? What 
 moral lesson are we to derive from the tale ? Is there 
 a single Priest who believes in it ? However, Benedict 
 had his reward, for when they parted — " Lo ! after the 
 space of three days, when in his cell, with his eyes 
 raised towards Heaven, he saw the soul of his sister, 
 having departed from her body, enter the recess of' 
 Heaven in the form of a dove ! " 
 
 The whole story, I should state, is attributed to Pope 
 Gregory I., being taken from " The Dialogues," a book 
 now generally admitted to be a forgery. Nevertheless, 
 
n 
 
 the important event is celebrated on the 10th of Febru- 
 ary in each year. 
 
 4 Dec. — Another touching scene is related of Barbara, 
 " a virgin, daughter of a nobleman of Mcomedia ; but 
 addicted to superstitions, she easily passed through 
 those things which are visible to those which are invis- 
 able, Divine grace assisting." We presume, therefore, 
 according to the Eoman code of mystical theology, 
 superstition ceases when it enters on the invisible! 
 However, having entered into that phase, Barbara began 
 to give herself up to Grod alone and to Divine things. 
 Her father, desirous of guarding her against any ap- 
 proach of man, as one remarkable for the beauty of her 
 form, shut her up in a tower, where the pious virgin 
 devoted herself to meditations and prayers — studied to 
 please Grod alone, whom she had chosen as her husband. 
 She firmly disdained marriages with noblemen, often 
 proposed to her by her father; but her father, ex- 
 pecting that the mind of his daughter would be more 
 easily wrought upon by his absence, ordered beforehand 
 a bath to be built, least she should want any con- 
 venience, and then went abroad to foreign countries." 
 Passing over the apparently contradictory conduct of 
 the father as to the " approach of men," we are told 
 that " when her father was gone she ordered that a 
 third window should be added to the two which were 
 in the tower, in honour of the Divine Trinity, and the 
 edge of the bath to be defended with the sign of the 
 Holy Cross, which when her father — upon his return — 
 saw, he became so exasperated against his daughter 
 that, drawing his sword and pursuing her, he nearly 
 succeeded in horribly running her through ; but Gfod 
 was at hand ; for as Barbara fled, a large rock opening 
 itself, made a passage by which she was enabled to 
 reach the top of the mountain and hide in a cave ; but 
 when discovered by her wicked father,* he kicked her 
 
 * In the ancient Breviary and by Eibandeneyra, we are informed that 
 the father was turned into a marble statue, and all his sheep into locusts. 
 
73 
 
 in the sides, and beat her on the back, and dragging 
 her by the hair over rugged places, gave her over to 
 Maricanus, the President, to be punished." W. 483. 
 
 Could any reasonable person suppose that such child- 
 ish trashy nonsense should be made the subject of 
 spiritual contemplation ? But this is not the end of 
 the lady's sufferings. The " act of accusation " placed 
 before the President is not given, but we are favoured 
 with the verdict, according to the Nicomedian law, 1 
 suppose, for the narrative in the Breviary thus pro- 
 ceeds : — " Wherefore, when she had been tried by him- 
 self [i.e. the President] in every way, but in vain, he 
 ordered her to be stripped naked and beaten with 
 lashes of gut; that the wounds she had received 
 should be torn with potsherds, and that afterwards 
 she should be dragged to prison, where Christ appear- 
 ing to her, encompassed with great light, strength- 
 ened her and wonderfully supported her in the endur- 
 ance of her sufferings ; which Juliana, the matron, 
 perceiving, is converted to the faith and is made a 
 partaker of the same victory. At length the limbs of 
 Barbara are torn with iron spikes, her sides are burnt 
 with torches, and her head is battered with mallets ; in 
 which torments she consoled her fellow sufferer, and 
 exhorted her to struggle with constancy to the end. At 
 length, the breasts of both are cut off; and being drawn, 
 naked, by the head through the public places, they are 
 scourged ; and that most wicked father himself, devoid 
 of humanity, cut off the head of his daughter with his 
 own hand. But his savage cruelty did not long pass 
 unrevenged, for immediately he was struck dead with a 
 thunderbolt on the very spot." Moral of the tale and 
 the reward : " The head of this most blessed martyr is 
 honourably preserved in the oratory — in the holy of 
 holies." 
 
 Some say there is a paucity of invention in the com- 
 
 This was rather too strong, so the " Golden Legend " does not hesitate to 
 designate this part of the story as apocryphal. 
 
n 
 
 pilers of the Breviary stories. At all events, in this 
 domestic tale there is plenty of incident.* 
 
 25 May. — Gregory VII. "Whilst he was performing 
 the solemn offices of Mass, a dove was seen by pious 
 men to have descended from heaven, and perching on 
 his right shoulder, to cover his head with its outspread 
 wings, by which it was signified that in the govern- 
 ment of the Church he was guided by the inspiration 
 of the Holy Spirit, not by considerations of human 
 prudence." S. 737. 
 
 These Saints of old seem to have been endowed with 
 peculiar gifts ; one in particular, the acrobatic power of 
 rising into the air during their ecstasies — a proceeding 
 apparent to all, in broad daylight — not like our modern 
 conjurors, who prefer a dark seance in which to exhibit 
 •this marvel. 
 
 * There is some mystery and misgivings about this Saint. Her name • 
 is quietly dropped from some more modern Breviaries, and some variations 
 are discovered in the different legends attributed to her. (" Longobardica 
 historia, quaa a pluresque Aurea legenda sanctorum appellatur, sive 
 Passionale sanctorum." 1510. Legend, 199.) The learned Tillemont 
 does not hesitate to declare that there was no such person ! (" Histoire 
 des Empereurs." Tom. iii. pp. 808-10. Brux. 1732.) Nevertheless we 
 find in the " Cambray Missal," printed by Henry Stephens, 1507, a 
 hymn in her honour, and there is this prayer: "0 God, who hast 
 promised forgiveness of sins to those who celebrate the memory 
 of the Blessed Barbara, Virgin, and Thy martyr, and hast declared by 
 the voice of an Angel, that no mention of their negligences shall be made 
 for punishment in the day of Thy judgment : grant, we beseech thee, 
 that by her merits and intercession, we may be delivered from everlasting 
 and sudden death, and from all dangers of the soul and body. Through, 
 &c." While, therefore, in the old services her legend was read, in the 
 reformed Breviary she was merely enumerated, and her name has been 
 expunged from modern Missals, with one exception however, and this 
 perhaps by an accident, for the name occurs in the " Litany for the 
 faithful departed," in the " Golden Manual," approved by late Dr. and 
 Cardinal Wiseman, 1850, p. 682, where, among other saints addressed, 
 occurs • " St. Barbara, pray for the souls of the faithful departed." In 
 this state of uncertainty, a devout Romanist must feel some perplexity 
 to whom at times on the appointed day, for instance, the 4th of December, 
 he can safely direct his prayers, and to best advantage. There are at 
 least three distinct bodies of Barbara, all alleged to be equally genuine ; 
 one at Placentia,_ one at Venice, and a third in Egypt. There is no trace 
 of such an individual as this Barbara in any history or document 
 whatever for six hundred years after her supposed martyrdom. 
 
75 
 
 19 Oct. — Peter of Alcantara "being frequently lifted 
 into the air, appeared to shine with wonderful bright- 
 ness." A. 498. 
 
 3 Dec. — Francis Xavier, we are told, " being intently- 
 fixed on the contemplation of Divine things, was 
 sometimes lifted up into the air from the earth, wbich 
 happened to him as often as he did sacrifice before the 
 congregation of the people. Tbese ecstasies of his 
 soul he earned by the great tortures of his body." 
 W. 498. 
 
 26 May. — Philip of Neri " while performing Mass, or 
 praying with much fervency, at times being lifted into 
 the air appeared to them with a wonderful light all 
 around him." S. 740. 
 
 This gentleman is Cardinal Newman's patron Saint. 
 We do not hear of like acrobatic gifts being bestowed 
 on the client and pupil ! 
 
 Stephen of Hungary, "from his love of praying passed 
 almost entire nights without sleep, and fixed in the 
 contemplation of Heavenly things. Sometimes ravished 
 beyond his senses, he appeared to be borne in the 
 air." Sr. 799. 
 
 2 May. — In modern Breviaries, under this date, we 
 have it related of the fashionable modern Saint, Alfonso 
 de Liguori, that he was frequently seen so transported 
 with his subject, as to be raised in ecstasy from the 
 earth. 
 
 These Saints, however, also had their rivals. Dr. 
 Wiseman, in his edition of the lives of five leading 
 Saints, Liguori and others,* tells us of St. John Joseph 
 of the Cross .- — " During prayer a halo of light often 
 encircled his head; and during mass a supernatural 
 brightness overspread his countenance. He was known 
 to declare, in a moment of transport, that our Blessed 
 Lady had appeared to him, and had spoken with him. 
 And on Christmas night, and other times besides, the 
 Infant Jesus descended into his arms, prolonging his 
 
 * London, 1846. 
 
76 
 
 stay for several hours. His frequent ravishment from 
 the earth, and suspension in the air, was a well-known 
 occurrence, visible to many who beheld him at mass, 
 and, in a remarkable manner, happened during a pro- 
 cession" (p. 150). And of St. Pacificus he tells us: — ■ 
 "Many saw him raised several inches above the sur- 
 face of the altar-steps. He remained in this posture, 
 shaking with extraordinary trembling, for the space of 
 a credo, and even of several hours, as the processes of 
 his beatification record. He was often seen raised, as 
 before related, several inches above the ground during 
 the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice ; and on one occasion 
 he remained elevated . . . for more than four hours. 
 But the fact most surprising to the beholders, as 
 mentioned in the Processes, was, that while he was 
 offering up the Tremendous Mysteries his countenance 
 not only changed from a pale to a florid hue, but shone 
 with such supernatural brightness that, upon the oppo- 
 site wall, rays darting an unusual light were seen, 
 which . . . could radiate from no other source than his 
 face, because the sun was at the time hid with clouds, 
 and concealed from sight" (p. 213). The authority 
 appealed to for the truth of all this, being the evidence 
 produced in the Process of Beatification, ought to 
 remove all doubt from sceptical minds ! 
 
 27 April. — But all these anti-gravitatiou propensities 
 are eclipsed by the feat performed by Peter Armengaud. 
 On his visit to Barbary, for the liberation of Christian 
 captives, he became bail for some boys whose faith began 
 to waver, and whom he ransomed. Not having the 
 money, he gave up his body as a pledge for the payment. 
 The money not being forthcoming in time, he was hanged 
 by the Moors. The distress of Father Williams was 
 great on hearing of the fate of the Saint. The benevo- 
 lent Moors consented to let him have the body. The 
 body of a martyr was a precious gift. Peter had been 
 already hanging by the neck three days. Notwithstand- 
 ing, Peter in this elevated position addressed them as 
 
77 
 
 soon as they were within hearing. The Virgin Mary, 
 he informed them, had, since his execution, supported 
 the weight of his body, and was still holding it up at that 
 moment. He was cut down alive ! He referred to this 
 little episode in his life with pleasurable emotion and 
 raptures, although he escaped nevertheless with a wry 
 neck, and a habitual paleness for life, which the blessed 
 Virgin graciously allowed him to keep in remembrance 
 of her assistance. Omitting, however, the rope and the 
 gibbet, the scene of suspension was often repeated ; for 
 the Breviary informs us — and therefore it must be true 
 — that he was frequently seen raised in the air, uttering 
 the sweetest words in answer to questions which the 
 bystanders did not hear, but conjectured proceeded from 
 the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 With regard to this gymnastic feat, like most of the 
 other Romish so-called miracles, the idea is not original. 
 It was for a long time confined to the East, and does 
 not appear to have been insisted on or appealed to as 
 any mark of sanctity in the Western Churches for many 
 centuries. Eunapius, a Platonic philosopher, a.d. 380, 
 in his history of the lives of Porphyrius and Jamblichus, 
 relates that the latter was often raised ten cubits into 
 the air, and was surrounded with a bright light. Eomish 
 Saints are not, as we have seen, to be outdone in this 
 extraordinary phenomenon. Alban Butler, however, in 
 a note in his life of Philip Neri, recording a like feat by 
 that favoured individual, apparently jealous of being 
 anticipated by heathens, relates the above, but coolly 
 turns upon this " Platonic philosopher," and throws dis- 
 credit on his testimony for recording a similar miracle, 
 by declaring that " in credulity and malice Eunapius 
 surpassed Porphyrius and Jamblichus themselves, and 
 that his testimony in relating such idle dreams can have 
 no weight with any reader."* The Eoman Church will 
 not brook opposition even in the narration of fables or idle 
 dreams I Why should we not give as much credence to 
 * " Lives of the Saints," vol. v. p. 335. London, 1815. 
 
78 
 
 Eunapius as to the compilers of the Breviary, who narrated 
 the like phenomena as claimed for their Saints ? One is 
 just as credible as the other ! The motive power, as a 
 fact, in a heathen ought not to be denied ; for the same 
 Breviary informs us that Simon Magus, the sorcerer, 
 by his own will and power lifted himself into the air, 
 and was brought down headlong by the prayer of St. 
 Peter. This notorious falsehood is proposed for our 
 belief by Eomanists, in a festival appointed for 6th 
 July in each year, in order to magnify Peter ; but they 
 deny the other opposition example, because it does not 
 suit their purpose to find an equal accomplishment in 
 heathens : the latter are therefore called by Butler 
 " Impostures." We, however, not being bound by the 
 Vatican miracle mint, can with consistency brand both 
 parties equally as impostors. To charge heathens with 
 " credulity and malice " against Christians is rather a 
 hazardous game, for Bomish credulity must be stretched 
 to the highest pitch to take in all these and other still 
 more extravagant "old wives' fables ;" and as to malice, 
 one would have thought that the inventors of the Bre- 
 viary narratives were themselves turning Christianity 
 into ridicule. The greatest enemies of the Boman 
 Church were the concoctors of these Bomish fables, who 
 thereby brought a still greater discredit on Christianity. 
 This anti-gravitation faculty seemed to have been more 
 common since the eleventh and twelfth centuries, but the 
 condemnation of Molinos, Madame Guion, and Fenelon 
 inflicted a deadly blow on the system by their ridicule ; 
 so that the holy art of being elevated from the ground 
 fell into discredit, and for the last century Bomish Saints 
 have been contented to remain on the surface of the 
 earth, like other ordinary mortals, when celebrating their 
 offices. 
 
 To what end or purpose this agility is displayed does 
 not appear. But I pass on to a useful gift worth 
 having at the present day. 3 Dec. — Xavier, the great 
 
79 
 
 missionary, went among the Indians, and is said to 
 have converted " many hundred thousand men. He 
 cleansed in the sacred font great princes and many 
 kings." To enable him to carry out his mission among 
 the savage tribes, " so soon as he arrived among them 
 he appeared divinely instructed in the most difficult 
 and various languages of various nations. Moreover, 
 when he sometimes addressed the inhabitants of the 
 different nations in but one idiom, each heard him 
 speaking in his own tongue." W. 479. 
 
 Xavier himself was painfully unconscious of pos- 
 sessing this gift, and deplores that in the presence of 
 the natives he was "no better than a mute statue."* 
 And in another place he says : — •" They who should 
 repeat my address to the people do not understand me, 
 nor I them. I ought to be an adept in dumb show." f 
 Not only in India, but in China and Japan he describes 
 himself as dependent on the services of an interpreter, 
 though in Japan he spent more than two years in 
 attempting to learn the language. | 
 
 As for miracles, Joseph Acosta, a Jesuit missionary, 
 writing thirty-seven years after the death of Xavier, 
 accounts for the general failure of missionary efforts up 
 to that time by the confession that, " not being able to 
 excite the admiration or the fear of the barbarians by 
 the majesty of miracles, they were consequently despised 
 by reason of their mean appearance." § The same 
 Acosta, treating professedly of the most efficacious 
 means of converting the Indians, speaks of Xavier, 
 whom he frequently holds up as a model missionary — 
 in the following terms : — "I do not think that Father 
 Francis Xavier converted so many thousands to Christ 
 
 * Letters, lib. iii. c. 5. Edit. Mogunt., 1600. See Douglas' " Criterion 
 of Miracles," p. 45. n. London, 1815. 
 
 f Letters I. 32. See Venn's " Missionary Life of Xavier," en. ii. p. 37. 
 
 j Letters I. 33, iv. 2, 3. Venn, n.s. ch. iii. p. 89, ch. iv. pp. 194-208, 
 ch. viii. p. 239. 
 
 § " De Procuranda, Indorum Salute," Edit. 1589, 1. ii. e. 8. Douglas, 
 n.s. pp. 43, 44. 
 
80 
 
 by means of his eloquence, for he is represented by our 
 people as not being very eloquent even in bis own 
 mother tongue, much less in a strange language, and as 
 painfully stammering the barbarous words rather than 
 pronouncing them ; but ratber by his most fervent 
 prayers, ardent tears, groans, and deep sighs."* Not- 
 withstanding this, it is said by Borcharis, one of Xavier's 
 biographers, that on children being presented to him by 
 their parents, on his missions, " this man of Grod called 
 every one of them by their proper names as if he had 
 already been of their acquaintance and were not a 
 stranger newly come on shore." Here this saint is not 
 only rivalled by an ancient pagan-heroine, but actually 
 outdone. What were Xavier's exploits compared with 
 those of the Erythraean Sibyl Erophile, who, as the 
 scholiast on Plato's Phsedrus assures us, not only 
 addressed everybody by their right names, but spouted 
 extemporary verses the very day that she was born. 
 Later Jesuits, indeed, with the modesty and veracity 
 characteristic of their society, affirm that Xavier bap- 
 tised, on an average, 329 persons a day during his ten 
 years' mission."! But of these 1,200,000 converts 
 Xavier was uncomfortably ignorant, the general com- 
 plexion of his letters being disappointment at the 
 almost utter sterility of his labours ; in so much that 
 in a despatch to his patron, the King of Portugal, he 
 proposes that the conversion of the natives should be 
 transferred from the missionaries to the civil magis- 
 trates. | It is indeed marvellous that Romanists in 
 their zeal to extol their saints should hazard such pal- 
 pable and impudent falsehoods ! 
 
 It is a remarkable fact that virginity and chastity 
 are much dwelt upon as virtues: is it because they were 
 rare among the priesthood? For instance, 6 Dec. — 
 
 * " De Procuranda Indorum Salute," lib. x. c. 16. Ed. 1589. 
 t Massey, " Secret History of Eomanism," ch. 2, p. 12. 
 j Letter II. 18. Yerm, u.s. pp. 157-163. 
 
81 
 
 Nicholas of Patara, afterwards created Bishop, " con- 
 stantly manifested in his episcopacy, chastity." W. 
 487. 31 Jan. — Peter Nolascus "having made the vow 
 of celibacy, always preserved his chastity undefiled." 
 W. 615. 
 
 These Saints of old were, if we believe the Breviary, 
 endowed with many rich and rare graces, such as the 
 greatest Saint among the Romish priesthood of the 
 present day, from the Pope downwards, does not even 
 pretend to. Those wonder-working Saints were en- 
 dowed with the supernatural power of second sight and 
 prophecy. 
 
 3 Dec. — St. Francis, "being everywhere inspired 
 with the spirit of prophecy, foretold many things 
 which were most distant both as to time and place." 
 "W. 479. 
 
 6 Dec. — Nicholas, on a sea voyage " foretold to the 
 sailors a dreadful storm, and when it presently arose, 
 while they were all in the most imminent danger, he 
 wonderfully stilled it by his prayers." W. 407. 
 
 15 Jan. — On the death of Paul the Hermit, his visitor 
 Anthony, who together with him had been fed with 
 double rations by a raven, " saw the soul of Paul 
 ascending to Heaven, amongst choirs of angels, and 
 in the assemblies of prophets and apostles." W. 553. 
 
 31 Jan. — We are told that Peter Nolascus, " being 
 illustrious by the gift of prophecy, foretold things to 
 come, amongst which is chiefly celebrated that King 
 James took by storm Valencia, occupied by the Moors, 
 having first received from him a certainty of obtaining 
 the victory." W. 615. 
 
 4 Feb. — Andrew of Florence " became renowned for 
 a prophetic spirit." W. 629. 
 
 17 Mar. — fit. Patrick "was adorned by God with 
 heavenly visions, with the gift of prophecy, with great 
 signs and wonders." W. 547. 
 
 2 Apr. — Francis of Paula, in Calabria, " also by a 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 prophetic spirit, foretold many things which would 
 happen." S. 611. 
 
 Margaret of Lavinia, in Tuscany, "by that celestial 
 light with which she was encompassed, discovered with 
 grief and tears, the secrets and hearts, the conscience of 
 men, and even their sins and transgressions against 
 Grod, in regions although remote, and, turning with the 
 greatest love to God and her neighbour, reaped a great 
 harvest of souls." W. 666. 
 
 10 Feb. — The Venerable Father Benedict, the next 
 day after an interview with the Holy Virgin Scholastica, 
 already related, on her " retiring to her own cell, he 
 returned to the monastery, when lo ! after the space of 
 three days, being in his cell with his eyes towards 
 heaven, he saw the soul of his sister, having departed 
 from her body, enter the recess of Heaven in the form 
 of a dove." S. 493. 
 
 26 Mar. — Philip of Neri, was also " illustrious for 
 the gift of prophecy, and was wonderfully famous for 
 penetrating the thoughts of the heart. He always 
 preserved his virginity inviolate." " He knew those 
 who practiced purity from their sweet smell, but those 
 who acted otherwise from their ill savour." He also 
 predicted the hour of his own death. S. 740. 
 
 It was customary " for John of Sahagum to look into 
 the secrets of the heart, and to foretel what would 
 happen of rare occurrence. He foretold the day of his 
 own death." S. 756. 
 
 1 1 July. — Pius of Lombardy, with regard to a victory 
 over the Turks, "was apprised of it the very hour it was 
 obtained; -Grod revealed it to him, and he communicated 
 it to his friends." Sr. 160. 
 
 4 Sep. — Pose of Viterbo "by a prophetic spirit foretold 
 the death of Frederick, and the peace of the Church." 
 A. 347. 
 
 15 Oct.—" St. Theresa testified that Peter of Alcantara 
 was imbued with the gifts of prophecy and discerning 
 of spirits." Sr. 498. 
 
83 
 
 17 Nov.- -Gregory of Neo-Casarea, "by a prophetic 
 spirit, also, could foretel future events." Sr. 563. 
 
 19 Oct. — And St. Peter of Alcantara "was likewise 
 imbued with the gifts of prophecy and discerning of 
 spirits." A. 498. 
 
 2 Aug. — Of IAguori, who was only recently canonised 
 (a,d. 1839), we are not only told that "he was singularly 
 honored with the gifts of prophecy " and " the search- 
 ing of hearts ;" but also informed of the bilocational 
 attribute of " making himself present in different places 
 at the same time." And now that this wonderful attri- 
 bute is mentioned, we may add that Dr. Wiseman in 
 his Lives of the Saints does not scruple to record the 
 events as credible facts. Of this same IAguori he tells 
 us that " it was reported in the city that he heard con- 
 fessions at home at the same time that he was preaching 
 in the Church." And of St. Francis Girolamo, that 
 "that wonderful gift also, which authentic testimony 
 proves several Saints to have possessed, namely, the 
 power of being present in more than one place at times 
 between which no physical interval is perceptible, 
 was not denied to our Saint." And of St. John Joseph 
 of the Cross : — " Nor was that singular prerogative de- 
 nied him, which God's Saints have sometimes possessed, 
 of appearing in two places at once, or of passing with 
 the velocity of blessed spirits from one to another."* 
 
 This gift of prophecy and second sight appears to 
 have been lost to the Church. But these Saints of by- 
 gone days were endowed with far greater powers, which 
 have equally faded away — namely, the power of healing 
 the sick and raising the dead. Is the glory of Eome 
 departed, or will the wondrous arts of her sainted child- 
 ren be revealed to the faithful some 500 or 600 years 
 hence ? It takes some time to forge a miracle. The 
 " Devil's advocate " appointed by the Eoman Church 
 
 * Dr. Wiseman's "Lives of the Saints." Dolman, London, 1846, 
 pp. 26, 102, 150. 
 
 a 2 
 
84 
 
 has but small chance to get up his evidence to prove 
 a negative in the face of a positive assertion of an 
 infallible Pope ! However that may be, we are posi- 
 tively informed, on the authority of the Boman Brevi- 
 ary — and my readers will please bear in mind that I am 
 reproducing a literal translation of the words of that 
 wonderful Book, that — 
 
 3 Dec. — Francis Xavier " restored sight to a blind 
 man." 
 
 " He restored many dead persons to life, amongst 
 whom he raised one who had been buried the day 
 before, after he had ordered him to be dug up from the 
 grave ; and two others whilst they were carrying out, 
 having taken them by the hand, he restored alive to 
 their parents from the bier." W. 479. 
 
 Shortly after the death of Xavier we have his bio- 
 graphy ; it is a strange fact, but not one of these 
 miracles is to be found there recorded. The alleged 
 miracles of Xavier were concocted long after his death.* 
 
 19 Jan. — "Many who were afflicted with various 
 ailments obtained at the tomb of Canute IV., King of 
 the Danes, relief and recovery." W. 570. 
 
 Margaret of Lavinia, in Tuscany, " obtained health for 
 the sick who came to her, and deliverance for those who 
 were possessed by the devil. A boy, who had died, she 
 restored to life. She calmed by her constant prayer the 
 impending tumults of war." W. 666. 
 
 * The present fashionable Saint in England is St. Francis de Sales. 
 The miracles of this Saint are boldly compared to those of the Saviour 
 of mankind, and under the one head of raising the dead are declared to 
 be fully equal to those of the Divine model. The original Life of Francis, 
 published by his nephew, Augustin, about ten years after the death of 
 Francis, concludes thus : " It is that son and nephew that Francis loved 
 that testifieth of these things, and he knoweth that his witness is true. 
 And many other things did Francis de Sales, which are not written in 
 this book, which, if they were written, I believe that the world would 
 not contain them." But, like the alleged miracles of Xavier, no one 
 of those miracles — with the exception of casting out devils — is men- 
 tioned or alluded to by Francis himself, though there is preserved a 
 mass of his correspondence. — See Macmillan's Magazine, September, 
 1878, p. 389. 
 
85 
 
 Emygdius of Treves is said to have " healed by baptism 
 the daughter of his host, declining for five years under 
 a disease hitherto incurable." " He opened the eyes of 
 the blind, and restored to health a great number of sick 
 persons, in vain imploring the aid of the idol." S. 574. 
 
 30 April. — Catherine of Siena "possessed a great 
 sway over sickness and fevers, and compelled devils to 
 depart from bodies which were possessed." S. 649. 
 
 26 May. — Philip of Neri " restored to health many 
 who were sick and nigh unto death. He also recalled 
 to life a dead person." S. 740. 
 
 John of Sahagum " raised the daughter of his brother, 
 who had been dead seven years." S. 756. 
 
 27 May. — John of Etruria " restored to sight a blind 
 man." «. 744. 
 
 Dec. 29. — St. Thomas a Becket was peculiarly gifted, 
 which the correctors of Pius V.'s Breviary deemed im- 
 portant to retain, and it was to be found in the Domi- 
 nican and other Breviaries, but is quietly dropped in 
 some more modern editions. St. Thomas's exploit is 
 thus recorded — 
 
 Novis fulget Thomas miraculis; 
 Membris donat castratos masoulis. 
 
 This miraculous cure is said to have been wrought on a 
 drunken thief named Edwardus, who, being sentenced 
 to mutilation for housebreaking, was made whole again 
 by praying to St. Thomas a Becket. This filthy false- 
 hood is perpetuated by the biographers of this rebel 
 bishop, even by Alban Butler.* 
 
 12 Aug.— " The power of the sanctity" of Clare 
 " shone forth by many and various miracles. To one 
 of the sisters of her own convent she restored speech, 
 of which she had been deprived ; for another she opened 
 her ear, which was deaf; she delivered one labouring 
 under a fever ; one swelling with dropsy ; one afflicted 
 with fistula ; and others oppressed with different sick- 
 
 * Vol. xii. p. 382, note d. col. 1. Edit. 1813. 
 
nesses. She cured a brother of the Order of Minors of 
 the disorder of insanity." Sr. 708. 
 
 Philip of Florence " cast a cloak over a naked leper ; 
 clothed with which he was immediately cleansed from 
 leprosy ; " " he obtained by his prayers the power of 
 curing diseases ; at his tomb tbe blind received sight, 
 the lame walked, the dead became alive; resplendant 
 with these, and other wonders, Clement X. enrolled 
 him amongst the Saints." Sr. 753. 
 
 4 Sept. — Hose of Viterbo "gave sight to a woman 
 blind from her birth ; while yet a little girl she recalled 
 to life her aunt who had been dead." A. 347. 
 
 23 Sept. — Pope Linus, " whose faith and sanctity were 
 so great that he not only cast out devils, but also recalled 
 the dead." Sr. 412. 
 
 "Wonders were also effected by the sign of the cross. 
 
 S Dec. — Francis, by the sign, " turned as much salt 
 water into fresh as for a long time supplied 500 sailors, 
 who were at death's door from thirst ; which having 
 also been carried into various countries many such were 
 instantly cured by it." W. 470. 
 
 Emygdius of Treves " opened the eyes of a blind man 
 in the presence of the people by the sign of the cross." 
 S. 574. 
 
 21 Mar. — Poison being handed to Benedict of Nursi 
 "in a cup, the vessel broke at the sign of the cross." 
 S. 571. 
 
 18 Mar. — Venantius the Cumertian: " upon the sign of 
 the cross, water flowed for soldiers burning with thirst, 
 from the stone on which he had been cast headlong 
 from a rock, and in which he even left the mark of his 
 knees." S. 726. 
 
 25 May. — Pope Gregory VII., " when he was fiercely 
 besieged in Eome by the army of the unjust Henry, 
 with the sign of the cross extinguished the fire lighted 
 by the enemy." 
 
87 
 
 We have also as confidently recorded, a series of 
 miraculous escapes, miraculous cures, and. other won- 
 ders. 
 
 4 Dec. — Barbara, a virgin, being pursued by Dios- 
 corus, her father, with a drawn sword, effected her 
 escape by " a large rock opening itself and making a 
 passage by which she was enabled to reach the top of a 
 mountain." W. 483. 
 
 13 Dec. — Another interposition of Providence is re- 
 corded in favour of Lucia, a virgin of Syracuse. The 
 Prefect of the town ordered the virgin martyr to be 
 dragged by force to a place of infamy to be debauched ; 
 " but it was divinely contrived that the virgin should 
 remain so firmly fixed, that in no way could she be 
 removed from the place." W. 570. 
 
 15 Jan. — Paul the Hermit, in his 130th year, was 
 visited by Anthony, who was in his 90th year. On 
 meeting, it is recorded that they saluted each other by 
 their respective names, though they were not acquainted 
 with each other." That was not a very wonderful feat; 
 but by Divine interposition " a raven which had always 
 before brought Paul his food by halves, brought it whole. 
 After the departure of the raven, ' Well,' said Paul, ' the 
 Lord, truly bounteous, truly merciful, has sent us our 
 dinner. These sixty years I have daily received an 
 allowance of half a loaf; now, at thy coming, Christ 
 has doubled His rations to his soldiers.' ' W. 553. 
 
 19 Oct. — Peter of Alcantara " fed his brethren in ex- 
 treme poverty with food brought down from Heaven." 
 A. 498. 
 
 4 Dec. — Of Peter Chrysologus it is said, " a golden cup 
 and silver paten laid by him on the altar, which was 
 open, proved to cure the bite of a mad dog and fever, 
 by water poured out of the cup." W. 485. 
 
 3 May. — Helena, the mother of Constantine, is related 
 to have found the true cross at Jerusalem. Three 
 crosses were dug up, and the question was which of the 
 three was the true cross ; this was, we are told, dis- 
 
88 
 
 covered by a miraculous cure. " St. Macarius, Bishop 
 of Jerusalem, having offered up prayers to God, applied 
 each of the crosses to a certain woman labouring under 
 a heavy disease ; to whom, when the other crosses_ were 
 of no use, the third cross being applied, immediately 
 cured her." S. 678. 
 
 3 May. — Pope Alexander, we are told, " decreed that 
 the Holy Water, salt being mixed with it, should be 
 constantly preserved in the church, and used in bed- 
 chambers to chase away the devil." S. 681. 
 
 20 Jan. — Sebastian, " by prayer, recovered the voice 
 of one Zoe, which she had lost." W. 573. 
 
 1 Aug. — I will now translate the incident attached 
 to the chains which we are told bound Peter when a 
 prisoner of Herod, and of Nero, respectively; a relic 
 much prized and venerated at the present day at Eome. 
 The story is not very instructive. It however holds a 
 prominent place in the Breviary on the "feast of St. 
 Peter at the chains " — In festo S. Petri ad vinculaf It 
 was during the reign of Theodosius the younger, when 
 Eudocia, his wife, came to Jerusalem, for the purpose 
 of discharging a vow. She was there presented with 
 many gifts ; more especially she received a remarkable 
 present of "an iron chain adorned with (/old and gems, 
 which they affirmed was that with which Peter the 
 Apostle was bound by Herod." This was rather ex- 
 travagant of Herod, to bind a fisherman with such a 
 costly article ! It is barely possible that those who 
 found the chain so prized it as to add the gems in 
 honour of Peter, but on this important part of the in- 
 teresting tale the Breviary is silent. " Eudocia having 
 piously worshipped the chain (caienam pie venerata) 
 afterwards sent it to Eome to her daughter Eudoxia, 
 who brought it to the Pope, and he in his turn showed 
 her another chain, with which, when Nero was Emperor, 
 the same Apostle had been bound. When, therefore, 
 the Pope compared the Eoman chain with that which 
 had been brought from Jerusalem, it came to pass that 
 
89 
 
 they so united together, that it seemed not to be two, 
 but one chain, made by the same artist. By which 
 miracle these sacred chains began to be held in such 
 great honour, that on that account a Church was dedi- 
 cated by the name of St. Peter at the Chains." 
 
 But the marvel does not stop here ; for from " this 
 time, the honour which it was customary to give to the 
 profane solemnities of the Gentiles on that day began 
 to be transferred to the chains of Peter, which being 
 touched healed the sick and cast out devils." In the year 
 969, we are told that a certain Count of the household 
 of the Emperor Otho, " being possessed of an unclean 
 spirit, tore himself with his teeth ; whereupon by com- 
 mand of the Emperor, he is brought to John the Pope, 
 who had no sooner touched the Count's neck with the 
 sacred chains than the evil spirit, breaking forth, left 
 the man free, and thenceforth the worship of the holy 
 chains was established in the city." Sr. 654. 
 
 It is a remarkable fact, that it took more than 900 
 years to bring to the knowledge of devout Christians 
 the miraculous powers of the chains, so that thenceforth 
 their worship should be established. A priest who 
 believes in the healing powers of these chains must be 
 somewhat puzzled at the fact that the late "benevolent" 
 Pope did not make use of these chains for similar pur- 
 poses as of old. Did it ever occur to "His Holiness " 
 to try on himself the healing effects of the " chains "? 
 "Physician, heal thyself !"* As I cannot account for 
 this extraordinary oversight, I must proceed with my 
 examination of this wondrous book so replete with " old 
 wives' fables !" 
 
 "We have two cases recorded of wonderful spontaneous 
 vegetation. 
 
 19 Oct. — Peter of Alcantara "stuck his staff into the 
 ground, which presently shot forth into a green fig 
 tree." A. 498. 
 
 * The Pope mentioned this chain as one of the inducements for the 
 faithful to visit Kome in the year of Jubilee, 1825. 
 
90 
 
 The other case, that of Gregory, Bishop of Neo- 
 Csesarea, is given below. 
 
 We cannot pass over the wonderful feats of sailor 
 Saints, and other aquatic sports. 
 
 23 Jan. — St. Raymond of Barcelona is said to have 
 " performed many miracles, amongst which the most 
 celebrated was that when he was about to return from 
 the Balearic island, Majorca, to Barcelona : having laid 
 his cloak upon the waters, he accomplished one hundred 
 and sixty miles in six hours, and entered his monastery 
 — the gates being shut." That is nearly twenty-seven 
 miles au hour ! W. 496. 
 
 In prior editions of the Breviary, following the Bull 
 of Canonisation, the story is more circumstantial. Bay- 
 mond is there stated to have made a mast of his staff, 
 and used his cloak for a sail, and thus proceeded merrily 
 on his way, navigating the sea, sitting we suppose, on 
 the surface of the water. Why the miracle should be 
 curtailed of this interesting incident is not explained. 
 They need not have been ashamed of the extravagance 
 of the position. Twenty -seven miles an hour ! 
 
 2 April. — A similar feat was performed by Francis of 
 Paula, in Calabria. We are told that "(rod was pleased 
 to attest the sanctity of his servant by many miracles, 
 of which the most celebrated was, that being refused 
 a passage by sailors, he crossed the Straits of Sicily 
 with his companions, on his cloak spread upon the 
 waves."* S. 611 
 
 Francis of Paula was born in the year 1416, and died 
 1507. The period is important, for confirmatory evi- 
 dence ought not to be wanting. f 
 
 * The voyage of Francis of Paula on his cloak in the Straits of Sicily, 
 evidently originated in a traditionary remembrance of that of Arion on 
 a dolphin's back in the same neighbourhood— as related by Herodotus, 
 (i. 23, 24.) Hyacinth's history is manifestly borrowed from Eliiah and 
 Blisha. J 
 
 f It is worthy of remark that Alban Butler omits from his Life of this 
 Saint this and other remarkable miracles attributed to Francis, which 
 
91 
 
 6 Aug. — And once again, of Hyacinth the Pole, we 
 are told that " God adorned the zeal of the most holy 
 man towards the salvation of his neighbours with very- 
 great miracles; amongst which was that remarkable 
 one, that, making use of no boat he crossed the river 
 Yistula, near Warsaw, during a great flood, bringing 
 over his companions also on his cloak spread upon the 
 waters." S. 737. 
 
 19 Oct. — Peter of Alcantara "crossed rapid rivers 
 dryshod." Sr. 498. 
 
 17 Nov. — Gregory Bishop of Neo- Caesar ea, "stayed 
 the course of the river Lycus, destructively inundating 
 the fields, so that it afterwards did not overflow the 
 channel, by fixing in the bank the staff on which he 
 leaned, which immediately sprang up into a flourishing 
 tree." A. 585. 
 
 The same Gregory " by prayer, removed to another 
 place a mountain which impeded the building of a 
 Church, and he likewise dried up a lake, the cause of 
 discord between brothers." Emygdius "baptised 1,060 
 people, a great supply of water having been drawn by 
 him from a rock by a great miracle." S. 574. 
 
 22 Jan. — " The dead body of Vincentius of Spain 
 having been miraculously preserved by a raven from 
 the birds and a wolf, his persecutors ordered it to be 
 sunk in the depth of the sea ; " but we are told, that by 
 " Divine interposition " the body was " thence thrown 
 up, the Christians burying it." W. 583. 
 
 23 Nov. — This refusal by the sea to desecrate the 
 body of martyrs is further illustrated by another inci- 
 dent related, of Clement of Rome. The Emperor Trajan 
 ordered that " those who were to cast Clement into the 
 deep, should tie an anchor to his neck ; which being 
 done, as the Christians prayed at the shore, the sea 
 
 would pass current at Bome or Madrid, but are scarcely suited to the more 
 intellectual meridian of Edinburgh or London. The Bollandists have 
 not, however, been at all sparing in their narratives of the doings of this 
 individual ; the indecency of some of these exceeds almost their extrava- 
 gance. Bee " Act. Sanct." Tom. i. p. 115, c. 5, s. 35. April. 
 
92 
 
 receded three miles, and they, approaching the spot, 
 discovered a marble edifice, in the form of a temple, and 
 within it a stone chest, where the body of the martyr 
 was laid, and near it the anchor with which he had 
 been drowned ; by which miracle the inhabitants being 
 wrought upon received the faith of Christ." Sr. 604. 
 
 Clement had to undergo this ordeal in consequence 
 of a miracle he is alleged to have wrought. He had 
 been banished by the Emperor Trajan " beyond the 
 Pontic sea to the desert of the city Chersona. There 
 he found 2,000 Christians, who had been banished 
 thither by the same Trajan. When there digging and 
 cutting in the marble quarries, they laboured under a 
 want of water ; Clement having prayed, went up to the 
 neighbouring hill, where they saw a lamb touching 
 with its right foot a well of fresh water, which was 
 springing up there. There they all quenched their 
 thirst; and many believers being converted by this 
 miracle to the faith of Christ, began also to venerate 
 the sanctity of Clement." This so provoked Trajan 
 that he sent his officers with orders to bind an anchor 
 round Clement's neck, and we have the miraculous 
 result recorded above. 
 
 Conceive if you can, " gentle reader," the gross blas- 
 phemy of these Priests, who tell us a notorious lie, and 
 state that many received the faith of Christ on the 
 credit of that lie ! 
 
 6 Dec. — St. Nicholas, " having embarked on ship- 
 board during the pilgrimage, when the sky was serene 
 and the sea tranquil, he foretold the sailors that there 
 would be a horrible tempest, which having shortly 
 arisen, and all being in great danger, it was miracu- 
 lously appeased by his prayers." W. 487. This story 
 is omitted from some modern Breviaries, but it is to be 
 found in the edition I am quoting from, and in that of 
 Pius V.* 
 
 * When a Bomish saint is put on board ship, we are sure imme- 
 diately to hear of a storm, which arises for the express purpose, it 
 
93 
 
 Two very curious cases are also recorded of snow 
 and rain and light wonderfully obeying the orders or 
 convenience of Saints in their troubles and labours : — 
 
 19 Nov. — Peter of Alcantara, " when by night he 
 was on a journey, and snow falling thickly, entered a 
 house in ruins without a roof, and the snow suspended 
 over him became a roof, lest by its quantity he should 
 be smothered." S. 498. 
 
 10 Nov. — And of Andrew Avettini it is related, that 
 " his wonderful piety and prudence shone forth in hear- 
 ing confessions. In his evangelical labours he fre- 
 quently travelled round the villages and towns which 
 bordered upon Naples, to the great gain of souls ; which 
 ardent charity of the Saint towards his neighbour the 
 Lord also evidenced by proofs ; for when he was return- 
 ing home on a tempestuous night, after having heard 
 the confession of a sick man, and the violence of the 
 rain and storm had put out the torch that burnt before 
 him, not only were he and his companions not wet 
 under the heaviest rain, but by an unusual light 
 wonderfully shining from his body, he showed the way 
 to his companions through the thickest darkness." 
 Sr. 563. 
 
 But we have yet to note perhaps the most marvellous 
 
 would seem, of allowing him to distinguish himself by putting it down. 
 The compilers of the Breviary have spoilt the story in the Lesson, by 
 omitting to inform us how Nicholas was enabled to foresee this tempest. 
 " He saw," says his biographer, " the devil come into the ship with a 
 furious aspect, and a drawn sword in his hand," and, of course, rightly 
 concluded that some mischief would speedily ensue. The fable is, how- 
 ever, carefully preserved by the Jesuit Eibadeneyva. This incident is 
 just as likely to have occurred as others repeated in the Breviary, and 
 we do not see why the respective saints should not " have the benefit 
 of the doubt," if any exist, of any particular incident of interest attributed 
 to them. The omission now and then of some such incidents, at least 
 betrays a doubt, and probably a just suspicion, that they might encroach 
 a little too dangerously on the credulity of their votaries. Hence we 
 frequently find a softening down system at work, commencing from the 
 days of the Reformation until we come to the last biographer, Alban 
 Butler, who has passed many of these narratives through a sieve, as it 
 were, and served up a diluted system of miracle-working among the 
 Romish Saints. 
 
94 
 
 story. King Charles I. is said to have walked and 
 talked two years after his head was cut off; but this we 
 know is a little playful juggle on the use of a period. 
 But here we have downright realities, no play upon 
 words, no shifting of periods. Except that in these 
 cases the period is so remote that we lose sight of the 
 truth in the distance of time. 
 
 " Polymnius, driven to fury," by a miracle wrought 
 by Emygdius, the latter having baptised 1,066 heathens 
 by a miraculous supply of water, " cut off the head of 
 the holy Bishop, which being done, the headless body 
 being marvellously raised, taking up its own head, which 
 had been thrown on the ground, carried it in bis hands 
 to the oratory, a distance of 300 paces." S. 574. 
 
 9 Oct. — And Bionysius, or St. Dennis, we are told, 
 " having arrived at about his hundredth year, is be- 
 headed, of whom it is remarked that he took up his 
 own head after it was cut off, and proceeded two miles, 
 carrying it in his own hands."* A. 466. 
 
 This leads us on to the consideration of another class 
 of miracles — namely, the eccentric proceedings of dead 
 bodies. 
 
 25 May. — Of Mary Magdalene, of Pazzi, it is said 
 after her death " there flowed from her legs a long-last- 
 ing and wondrously fragrant liquor, salutary for curing 
 diseases." S. 743. 
 
 3 Dec. — St. Francis's " dead body twice covered over 
 with hot lime during many months, but altogether 
 uncorrupted, issued perfume and blood ; and when it 
 was brought to Malacca, it immediately destroyed a 
 most destructive plague." W. 479. 
 
 * See Hislop's "Two Babylons," &c, 1862, p. 178 et seq., for some 
 interesting matters as to the pagan origin of the fable. The old bas- 
 reliefs representing men with their heads in their hands were merely 
 a commemoration of the nature of their death. The hint was taken and 
 improved upon ; as Eome's modern saints are not to be outdone by their 
 Pagan ancestors, so we are favoured with the addition of the miracle as 
 above recorded. 
 
95 
 
 It is again common to find " when the soul is released 
 from the flesh" of a martyr, " that so great fragrance 
 of perfume was shed abroad in the place that all present 
 were filled with an inconceivable sweetness," as in the 
 case of Servulus. And of Margaret of Lavinia, in 
 Tuscany, we are told that " her body, to this day fresh, 
 uncorrupted, unhurt, and smelling sweetly, is venerated 
 with the greatest devotion." * W. 666. 
 
 7 May. — We are informed of a man who was raised 
 from the dead to prove the title of the purchaser of a 
 piece of land. Stanislaus had bought a piece of land 
 for the Church. He had displeased Boleslaus, King of 
 Poland, who required the title to be proved, " which 
 when Stanislaus could not prove by written deeds, and 
 the witnesses feared to tell the truth, the Bishop under- 
 took to bring up to the judgment seat within three days 
 Peter, the seller of the land, who had died three years 
 before. The condition having been accepted with 
 laughter, the man of God applied himself to fasting 
 and praying three whole days. Upon the day promised, 
 
 * How closely does Romanism follow on the steps of Paganism. 
 Quintus Curtius informs ns, that when Alexander's body had lain neg- 
 lected seven days, owing to the intrigues and sqnables of his officers, it 
 did not manifest the least mark of putrefaction, or even discoloration. On 
 the strength of this, as also of the aromatic fragrance of his body while 
 living — in which he seems to have had the advantage of St. Francis — and 
 of his great achievements of all sorts, the pagans made a saint or demi-god 
 of him, after their fashion. His body was translated first to Memphis and 
 then to Alexandria, where the Emperor Augustus devoutly venerated it 
 and adorned it with garlands. He appeared to many people in visions, 
 and gave them important advice ; and Trebellius Poliio informs us that 
 the family of the Macriani made him their tutelar saint, and were fully 
 persuaded that while they carried about them a golden or silver image 
 of Alexander they would infallibly be assisted by it in all their under- 
 takings. Again, we are assured by Ammianus Marcellinus, that when 
 Sapor, King of Persia, had taken the City of Amida by assault, and, 
 some time after was desirous of paying funeral honours to such of his 
 own soldiers as were slain, the bodies of the Persians were distinguished 
 from those of the Roman garrison by being uncorrupted, while the latter 
 were quite putrid. "We have many other such pagan stories. Whilst 
 they were about it the compilers of the legends of Romish Saints might 
 have struck out into something original in favour of their Christian 
 Saints, as in the case of the decapitated above quoted; but we have 
 often heard it said that ultra-Romanism was but Baptised Paganism. 
 
1)8 
 
 after offering up the sacrifice of the Mass, he com- 
 manded Peter to rise from the tomh, who immediately 
 returning to life, followed the Bishop as he went to the 
 royal tribunal, and there— the king and the rest being 
 struck dumb with astonishment — he gave his testimony 
 respecting the land sold by him and the price duly paid 
 by the Bishop, and again slept in the Lord." S. 629. 
 
 Stanislaus we are told was born in the year 1030,, and 
 died 1079. The period is sufficiently remote to presume 
 that all the documents attesting these facts have been 
 destroyed or otherwise disposed of. This particular 
 miracle, with many others in Lesson VI., are stated 
 " to have been wrought by Grod in attestation of the 
 Saint's holiness ! ! " thus attributing to the Almighty 
 the above palpable, and may we not -add, deliberate 
 falsehood ; and " for these considerations," we are fur- 
 ther informed, " Pope Innocent IV. was induced to 
 insert his name in the Catalogue of Saints," — thus anti- 
 cipating Cod's judgment ; — " and Clement VIII. to 
 transfer his festival to the Roman Breviary, and order 
 the memory of so glorious a Martyr to be solemnised 
 with a double rite." What Bomanist dare doubt the 
 truth of Peter's apparition ! 
 
 I have promised to avoid as much as possible per- 
 sonal remarks on these anecdotes, but I must be allowed 
 to state that such accommodating witnesses, on ques- 
 tions of title, in the present day would be very conve- 
 nient; but of course it is only for the benefit of the 
 Church that such convincing proofs are at hand. 
 
 When we read of such fables, our first astonishment is 
 that the Church of Bome should hazard her reputation 
 on them, or dare to presume on the credulity of man- 
 kind ; but that is eclipsed by the marvel that there 
 should be found any person to believe in them. 
 
 16 May. — When the lifeless body of John of Nepo- 
 muceno " began to be carried down the stream, burning 
 torches appeared floating on the water and shooting in 
 all directions. After more than 300 years, in the legal 
 
97 
 
 identifying of his body, which had lain so long under- 
 ground, his tongue was found uncorrupted and alive, 
 and being exhibited in the sixth year after to judges 
 delegated by the Apostolic See, by a strange prodigy it 
 suddenly swelled up, and changed its dark redness into 
 a purple." S. 720. 
 
 16 May. — And so also of Ubald it is stated, that " his 
 virtues chiefly shone forth in chasing away unclean 
 spirits, but his body — uncorrupted for so many ages — 
 is worshipped with the greatest veneration by the faith- 
 ful." S. 724. 
 
 The body of Rita of Umbria is stated to be " to this 
 day uncorrupted, fragrant with the sweetest odour," and 
 "is piously venerated." S. 735. 
 
 4 Sept. — The body of Rose of Viterbo, " adorned with 
 wonderful splendour, and filled with a sweet odour, was 
 buried in the temple of St. Mary, the ground having 
 been dug up and heaped upon it, until — about 
 thirty months after — being dug up, it was found 
 uncorrupted, and even to this day it is preserved 
 entire and flexible, to the very great admiration of 
 the whole world, and always shines with new miracles." 
 A. 347. 
 
 19 Sept. — The body ofJanuarius was buried (a.d. 103), 
 and is stated " to shine with many miracles — but it is 
 especially to be related that it extinguished balls of fire 
 once breaking forth from Mount Vesuvius, causing 
 terror not only to the neighbourhood, but also to remote 
 regions. It is also a very wonderful thing that his 
 blood, which is preserved in a coagulated state in a glass 
 phial, is seen, even to the present day, when it is placed 
 before the head of the same martyr, in a wonderful 
 manner, to dissolve and boil up, just as if it was newly 
 poured out." S. 401. 
 
 If this tale be true, the blood of Januarius has been 
 preserved in a glass bottle from the days of Diocletian, 
 since the very beginning of the second century, and yet 
 
 H 
 
98 
 
 no one ever heard of this miracle-working wonder until 
 many centuries after.* 
 
 15 Oct.— St. Teresa, " while dying, Jesus Christ was 
 seen to be present with her amid troops of angels ; and 
 a withered tree that was near her cell instantly shot 
 forth into bloom. Her body, which remains undecayed 
 to this day, being surrounded with an odoriferous fluid, 
 is worshipped with pious veneration." It was the same 
 St. Teresa " who being in a far distant place saw St. 
 Peter of Alcantara carried into heaven, and he himself 
 afterwards appeard to her exclaiming ' 0, blessed pen- 
 ance, which has merited for me so great glory.' " 
 
 This, then, again leads us from the natural to the 
 supernatural — namely, apparitions. And in this the 
 Saints were especially favoured, for apparitions appear, 
 according to the Breviary, to have been of very frequent 
 occurrence. 
 
 Gundisalvus " knew by Divine revelation that death 
 was impending over him," and was " refreshed with a 
 vision of the Virgin Mother of God." "W. 607. 
 
 21 Jan. — St. Agnes appeared to her parents watching 
 at her tomb. W. 609. 
 
 31 Jan. — The Blessed Virgin appeared to Peter 
 Nolascus, " and suggested to him that it would be most 
 acceptable to her son and herself if a religious order 
 were instituted to her honour." Indeed, "he was 
 refreshed by the frequent appearance to him of his 
 
 * Dr. (Humming has publicly performed the so-called miracle by a 
 chemical preparation. We may note, by the way, a curious incident 
 referring to this miracle, recorded by Courcelle's " Dictionary of French 
 Generals — Article, Estr6e." The Duke d'Estree, in the year 1702, when 
 he lay before Naples to support Philip V. against Austrian intrigue, 
 having heard that the blood of St. Januarius refused to flow, despatched 
 a message in all haste to the priest in charge of the blood, to the effect, 
 that if it did not bubble in one horn; he should hang by the neck in two 
 hours. It need scarcely be added that the time specified by the admiral 
 was rigidly kept; and by the divine interposition of the Saint the priest's 
 neck was saved. Thus Romish miracles have their political as well as 
 religious significance. 
 
99 
 
 guardian angel and the "Virgin Mother of God." W. 
 615. 
 
 30 April. — Catherine of Siena, when " rapt into an 
 ecstasy, saw her crucified Lord approaching with a 
 great light, and rays descending from the five scars of 
 his wounds to five places of her body ; and thus per- 
 ceiving the mystery, having besought the Lord that 
 the scars should not appear, immediately the rays 
 changed their bloody into a shining colour, and reached 
 her hands, and feet, and heart, in the form of pure 
 light, and so great was the pain which she sensibly 
 suffered, that if Grod had not diminished it she believed 
 she would have died. The most loving Lord increased 
 this grace with a new grace, that she should feel the 
 pain by the illapse of the violence of the wounds by a 
 force gliding in upon her, and that the bloody wounds 
 should not appear. And when this handmaid of Gfod 
 related to her confessor that it had taken place in such 
 a manner as even to be visible to the eye, the pious 
 care of the faithful expressed, by painted colours, the 
 rays extended to the said five places in the picture of 
 St. Catherine." S. 649. 
 
 8 May. — Michael the Archangel is said to have 
 " frequently appeared to men." " When Gelasius I. 
 was Pope, there was an illustrious appearance of the 
 Archangel Michael in Apulia, at the top of Mount 
 Gfarganus," now known as Monte de San Angelo. 
 This is alleged to have taken place a.d. 493. S. 699. 
 
 13 May. — The Virgin Mary is represented as having 
 superintended a surgical operation. John of Damascus, 
 fell into the hands of Leo, of Isauria, who " impiously 
 raged against the sacred images and their worshippers." 
 John had his right hand cut off. " However, the Virgin 
 Mother of Grod, the prompt vindicator of innocence, was 
 present, before whose image John pleaded his own and 
 her cause, not so much by his words as by his tears. 
 As he lay asleep, he thought he was admonished by her, 
 on account of his hand which was restored, piously to 
 
 h 2 
 
100 
 
 contend in defence of the sacred images. On awaking, 
 he beheld it again joined to his arm, with no other 
 gluten than that of the oozing blood." S. 710. 
 
 Venantius was also famed. Being condemned " to be 
 beaten with scourges and to be bound in chains, but 
 being loosened from them miraculously by an angel, 
 he is afterwards burnt with torches, and is suspended 
 with his mouth turned down over smoke placed under 
 him ;" — he was " a second time liberated by the angel 
 walking over the smoke in a white garment." He was 
 again brought before the Prefect ; " all his teeth were 
 broken and his jawbones fractured, and thus maimed, 
 he is thrown out upon a dung-hill, but from thence also 
 was he delivered by the angel." And after this he lived 
 to preach Christ ! S. 726. 
 
 John of Sahagum " was accustomed to behold Christ 
 the Lord present with him while he performed Mass, 
 and to drink celestial mysteries from the very fountain." 
 S. 756. 
 
 26 May. — Philip of Neri, "whilst at night he brought 
 bread to the hungry, having fallen into a pit, was at 
 the same time delivered by an angel ; he was frequently 
 honoured by the appearances of celestial spirits, and of 
 the Virgin Mother of God herself, and he saw the souls 
 of many ascend up to Heaven surrounded with splen- 
 dour. He sometimes appeared to be absent, and brought 
 assistance to them when in danger." S. 740. 
 
 10 Nov. — Andrew Avellini " merited to converse with 
 angels, whom he solemnly declared to have heard chant- 
 ing with him before his face." 
 
 31 Jan. — Peter Nolascus, " eminent for his piety, con- 
 tinually revolving in his mind by what means he might 
 assist the distressed Christians living under the cap- 
 tivity of the Moors, the most Blessed Virgin appeared 
 to him herself in person, with serene countenance, and 
 said it would be most acceptable to her and to her only 
 begotten Son, if a religious order were there instituted 
 to her honour — on whom should rest the task of rescu- 
 
101 
 
 ing captives from the tyranny of the Turks." And we 
 are further told that " the same most Blessed Virgin 
 appeared to St. Raymond, and to James, King of Arra- 
 gon, admonishing them of the same matter concerning 
 the religious orders." Sr. 416. 
 
 17 Sept. — The most complicated apparition seems to 
 have been granted to Francis a" Assisi, the founder of 
 the Franciscan order of Monks, of whom it is related 
 that Jesus Christ himself stamped on his body his own 
 five wounds, technically called the Stigmata. The case 
 of St. Francis appears to have been most notable : it 
 was indeed a matter so wonderful and so well-attested 
 " that Pope Benedict XI. lauded the event with peculiar 
 praises and favours in his Bull, and decreed that the 
 fact should be celebrated by an anniversary solemnity 
 by the monks of his order." Sr. 423. St. Francis died 
 a.d. 1224. 
 
 The festival is celebrated on the 17th September, and 
 the laity participate in the commemoration of this most 
 — what shall I call it? — most palpable imposture, by 
 reciting the following prayer in their Missal — 
 
 " Lord Jesus ! who, for the inflaming of our cold 
 souls with the fire of love, wast pleased to renew, the 
 sacred marks of Thy passion in the flesh of blessed 
 Francis, mercifully grant that we, by His merits and 
 prayers, may always bear Thy cross and bring forth 
 fruit worthy of penance." 
 
 The entire apparition is something so complicated, 
 that my readers might suppose that I draw on my 
 imagination, but I am giving a literal translation from 
 the Lessons of the Breviary. " Whilst, therefore, he 
 (Francis) was drawn upwards to God by the seraphic 
 ardour of his desires, and was transformed, by the 
 compassionate tenderness of his feelings, before Him 
 who was pleased of His great love to be crucified, on a 
 certain morning, near the feast of the Exaltation of the 
 Holy Cross, while praying on the brow of the mountain, 
 he saw as it were the appearance of one of the Seraphims 
 
102 
 
 having six shining wings like as of fire, descend from 
 the height of heaven ; who with rapid flight, coming 
 to a part of the air near the man of God, appeared not 
 only winged, but also crucified, having his hands 
 and indeed feet extended and fastened to a cross, but 
 the wings in a wonderful manner so disposed on both 
 sides, that he raised two above his head, and expanded 
 two to fly, and with the other two veiled his whole body 
 by wrapping them round him. Seeing this, he was 
 greatly amazed, and his mind partook of joy mixed 
 with grief: whilst as in the gracious aspect of Him so 
 miraculously as well as familiarly appearing to him, he 
 conceived a certain overflowing joy, so the dreadful 
 affliction of the cross which he beheld pierced his soul 
 with the sword of sympathising pain. . . . He under- 
 stood by the teaching inwardly of Him who appeared 
 to him outwardly, that although the infirmity of 
 suffering by no means consorted with the immortality 
 of the seraphic spirit, nevertheless a vision of this kind 
 had been presented to his own view for the very purpose 
 that himself, the friend of Christ, might foreknow that 
 he was to be wholly transformed into the express image 
 of Jesus Christ crucified, not by the martyrdom of the 
 flesh but by the fire of the spirit. Wherefore, the 
 vision disappearing after, secret and familiar converse 
 inflamed his mind inwardly with seraphic ardour ; but 
 it marked his flesh outwardly with a figure like Him 
 who was crucified, as though a certain impression by a 
 seal followed the previous liquefying powers of fire ; for 
 immediately the marks of the nails began to be seen in 
 his hands, and on the upper part of his feet, and their 
 points projecting on the opposite side.* His right 
 
 * Alban Butler, in his *' Lives of the Saints " (ii. 582, edit. 1815), says 
 that the points " were turned back as if they had been clenched with a 
 hammer ; " and that in order to conceal his wounds, " he wore shoes and 
 the feet of stockings on his feet : " adding, in a note—" "Wadding saw in 
 the Convent of Poor Clares at Assisium a pair of shoe half-stockinga, 
 made by St. Clare for St. Francis, with the parts raised above and below 
 for the heads of the nails. Blood from his side is kept in the Cathedral 
 of Recanati." Such is the credulity of Romanists ! 
 
103 
 
 side also, as pierced with a spear, was marked with a 
 red scar, which frequently pouring forth sacred blood, 
 besprinkled his coat and his breeches. . . . Afterwards, 
 therefore, Francis shone forth a new man by a new and 
 wonderful miracle ; he appeared renowned by a singular 
 privilege, not conceded to past ages^-namely, being 
 adorned with sacred stigmas, he descended from the 
 mountain bringing with him the image of Him who 
 was crucified, graven not in tables of stone by the hand 
 of an artist, but written by the finger of the living 
 God on fleshly members. Forasmuch as the seraphic 
 man well knew that it was a good thing to conceal the 
 sacrament of the King, conscious of the royal secret, 
 he bid those sacred impressions as much as he could. 
 But, because it is Grod's property to reveal for His glory 
 those great things which the Lord himself does, who 
 had impressed privately those little marks, he openly 
 showed certain miracles, that the secret and wondrous 
 virtue of those stigmas might appear manifest by the 
 distinctness of the miracles. Moreover, Pope Benedict 
 XL determined that a matter so wonderful and so well 
 attested, and lauded with peculiar praises and favours in 
 the Bulls of Popes, should be celebrated by an anni- 
 versary solemnity, which afterwards Paul V. extended 
 to the Universal Church, that the hearts of the faithful 
 might be inflamed to the love of Christ crucified." 
 A. 423. 
 
 The Franciscans have not been backward in attribut- 
 ing to their founder numerous other extravagances, 
 which . are set forth with all seriousness in the Liber 
 Conformitatum, a book written in 1389 by Brother 
 Bartholomew de Pisa, in which a parallel is instituted, 
 and a kind of equality sought to be established, between 
 Francis and Our Lord ! But, alas ! the jealousy of a 
 rival order, the Dominicans, has sought to strip this 
 Saint of their rivals of his glory. The Alcoranus Fran- 
 ciscanarum mentions a tradition among the Domini- 
 cans, which if true gives a very different origin to the 
 
104 
 
 Holy Wounds of St. Francis. A quarrel having arisen 
 between the two Saints, St. Dominic — a burly, hot 
 headed man — pursued the weaker Brother, who fled, and 
 sought refuge from his wrath under a bed. There were 
 inflicted by the infuriate Spaniard, with the sharp end 
 of a spit— the Italian in vain calling for mercy — those 
 bloody marks which, to the pious fantasy of holy 
 Francis and his Brethren, appeared the impression of the 
 crucifixion. How true is it that there is but one step 
 between the sublime and the ridiculous.* 
 
 We have had in these latter days some enthusiasts 
 who have given credence to modern imitators of Francis, 
 who have pretended to be in like manner favoured by 
 the appearance of the " Stigmata ;"f bat the whole 
 affair being a wicked cheat, we must look upon the 
 Church that sanctions such fearful imposture as being 
 a radically corrupt system. 
 
 Passing on from these painfully fabulous elements 
 
 * Those who wish to pursue the subject of the history and eccen- 
 tricities of this so-called Saint, may, with amusement if not profit to 
 themselves, consult Massy's " Secret History of Eomanism," 153-4, 2nd 
 edit. 1853. In Bayle's " Dictionnaire Critique et Hist. — Art. Francois 
 d'Assises," note N., we find some excellent material, showing the kind of 
 Sermons to which the substitution of the Breviary for the Bible gave 
 rise. It will astonish those who have met with nothing of the kind before. 
 Another disgraceful consequence of the divine honour paid to Francis 
 dAssisi, we find in the " Apology for Lollard Doctrines," attributed to 
 Wicliffe, edited by J. H. Todd, p. 126; note in p. 12, c. 24. The indecent 
 miracle connected with it is often recorded among passages in Massy's 
 " Secret History of Eomanism," cap. iii. The indulgences led to sixty- 
 thousand visitors to the Church in one day, many of whom were crushed 
 to death. The most curious account of the Indulgences of the Postiancule 
 is to be found in the " Chaise. Lett, sur les Jubiles," xxiv. p. 60b' ; and 
 see Thiers' " Traite' des Superstitions," torn. iii. ch. xvii. p. 259. For 
 observations on the " Conformity of St. Francis with Christ," see 
 Boucher's " Histoire des Jesuites," p. 22, Paris, 1845; and "Boman 
 Catholicism in Spain," p. 192. 
 
 f A minute account of a rival imposture of the Dominicans, in inflict- 
 ing the five stigmata on the body of their unfortunate dupe, Jetser, may 
 be seen in Bishop Burnet's " Travels in Switzerland," &c, pp. 33-44; and 
 abridged in Mosheim's " Eccl. Hist.," cent. xvi. sec. 1, par. xii. vol 4, 
 pp. 18-22, n. [k], London, 1825 ; and still more compressed in Gibson's 
 " Preservative," vol. xv. p. 268-9. An exposure of a similar imposture 
 is described in the case of So. Patrocinio, contained in "Boman Catho- 
 licism in Spain," p. 196 et seq. 
 
105 
 
 which pervade the Roman system, embodying the 
 fictitious miracles of their so-called saints — a raking 
 together of the myths and crudities of bygone ages — 
 we finally have to note a few cases of pious animals. 
 
 15 Jan. — It is recorded tbat when Anthony revisited 
 Paul the Hermit in a cave in the desert, he found him 
 dead — " and when he had not an implement to dig the 
 ground, two Lions speeded with rapid course from the 
 innermost parts of the desert to the body of the blessed 
 old man, in such a manner that it was readily understood 
 that they expressed their sorrow in the best way they 
 could : these, eagerly tearing up the ground with their 
 paws, made a hole which would conveniently hold the 
 man." W. 553 
 
 18 May. — Prisca, " a noble Roman virgin, aged 
 thirteen years," was imprisoned. " After three days, 
 being brought out into the amphitheatre, she is exposed 
 to a lion, who forgetting his natural ferocity cast 
 himself at her feet." S. 567. 
 
 Venantius, the Camertian, was also " thrown to the lions, 
 who laying aside their natural ferocity cast themselves 
 at his feet." S. 726. 
 
 22 Jan. — When the body of the martyr Vincentius of 
 Spain, after suffering cruel tortures, " was cast out 
 unburied; a raven miraculously defended it from the 
 birds and wolves, with claws, beak, and wings." W. 583. 
 
 The body of Stanislaus was also " cut to pieces, limb 
 from limb, and cast about the fields ; but the eagles 
 miraculously defended it from the wild beasts." The 
 Canons of Cracow " collected the scattered limbs, by 
 guidance of a light from Heaven, and properly set them 
 in order in their own places, when on a sudden they 
 were so joined together that no traces of the wounds 
 remained." S. 692. 
 
 10 June. — Still further instances are recorded in the 
 cases of SS. Primus and Felicianus, who were cast into 
 the theatre, and two lions were let loose on them. 
 The noble animals not only prostrated themselves at 
 
106 
 
 their knees, but fawned upon them with their heads 
 and tails. 
 
 15 June. — A similar story is related of SS. Vitus, 
 Modestus and Crescentia, who were also cast to a lion, 
 the animal prostrated itself and licked their feet.* 
 
 30 July. — We have a slight variation in the cases of 
 88. Abdon and Senne/i, who, having been cast to the 
 bears and lions, in the name of the Emperor Decius, 
 for spitting on the images, the wild beasts were afraid 
 to touch them ; whereupon the never-failing axe or 
 sword was successfully resorted to, in spite of the pious 
 animals' forbearance. I am wrong in saying "never- 
 failing," for in the case of St. Cacilia (22nd November) 
 it appears that even three blows of the axe failed of 
 effect, for she survived three days after that operation. 
 
 19 Sept. — Januarius was "exposed in the amphi- 
 theatre to the wild beasts, which, forgetting their natural 
 ferocity, lay down at his feet." Timothy, the Prefect 
 of Campania, " attributing that to the magic incantation, 
 after he had pronounced sentence of death upon, the 
 martyrs of Christ, becoming suddenly blind, presently 
 upon the prayer of St. Januarius he received his sight j 
 at which miracle nearly 5,000 men embraced the faith 
 of Christ." A. 401. 
 
 Pious fishes also obeyed the call of Saints. " When 
 Gundisalvus was occupied in building a stone bridge" 
 over " the dangerous river Tagus, in a place indeed 
 impassable, but pointed out to him by an angel," be- 
 sides " frequently giving the workmen to drink of 
 copious streams of wine drawn from the rock, he very 
 often called the fishes to the bank, as many as would 
 suffice for their support, and he took them obedient to 
 his hand."f W. 607. 
 
 * Boucharis, one of St. Xavier's biographers, relates an incident in this 
 Saint's Life, that he dispersed a herd of tigers which had ravaged the 
 country round, by throwing holy water upon them, commanding them 
 to go back, which command they obeyed, and never returned. The com- 
 pilers of the Breviary have omitted this and many other wonders said to 
 have been done by Xavier. 
 
 f I cannot trace this Saint in more modern Breviaries. 
 
107 
 
 We must not pass over the story of the sagacious and 
 pious horse. When a nobleman at Corinth had lent his 
 horse to the Pope, " which being gentle his wife had been 
 accustomed to use, it came to pass that the horse, when 
 it was afterwards returned to its master, became so fierce, 
 that by neighing, and by the unceasing working of its 
 whole body, it always threw its mistress, as if it were 
 indignant to carry a woman from the time the Vicar of 
 Jesus Christ had sat upon it. Wherefore they gave the 
 horse to the Pontiff." S. 744. 
 
 Eustacius, " when he once went to take exercise in 
 hunting, and was pursuing in the chase a stag of 
 wonderful size, saw on a sudden the image of Christ our 
 Lord, high and shining between the horns of the wild 
 beast as he stood still." Sr. 404. *C 
 
 Such then are some of the childish, senseless, wicked 
 fables, the invention of some crack-brained monks — 
 indeed impostors — of an ignorant and superstitious age, 
 and of a grossly corrupted Church, chronicled in this 
 book of " lying wonders," which Dr. Newman does not 
 hesitate to characterize as the "most wonderful and 
 most attractive monument of the devotions of the 
 Saints,"* and which are enforced on the Priesthood by 
 the will and decrees of the Popes. What has not the 
 Roman Church to answer for, if she, as some of their 
 own writers admit, substitute fables for facts, and forge- 
 ries for religious truths,! an d enforce them with pains 
 and penalties on their authorized teachers of the people. 
 Michael Greddes has collected some of these protests in 
 his "Miscellaneous Tracts": — " Carolus Gruyetus, a 
 Jesuit, in his 3rd Book Be Festis, saith, . . . ' Antiently 
 
 * " Apologia pro Vita Sua," p. 154. London, 1864. 
 f Hi narrata ferunt alio : mensuraque ficti 
 Oresoit ; et auditis aliquid novus adjioit auctor. 
 
 Ovid. " Metam." xii. 57. 
 
 Some tell what they have heard, or tales devise ; 
 Bach fiction still improved with added lies. 
 
108 
 
 not a few of the offices in most Churches were filled 
 with apocryphal stories, . . . and which may, for any- 
 thing that I know, be used in some Churches still.' 
 And in the 5th chapter of the same book, . . . ' I do 
 not deny but that there be many things found in most 
 of the Saints' legends, as they call them, which are 
 ludicrous and absurd, and, what is more, are palpably 
 false,' " &c. Again, " Melchior Canus, the learned Bishop 
 of the Canaries, in his 11th Book Be Locis Theohgicis, 
 makes the following heavy complaint of the miracles 
 which are reported to be wrought in the Boman Church : 
 . . . ' I say this with sorrow, rather than contumeli- 
 ously, that the lives of the philosophers are written by 
 Laertius with more strictness than the lives of the 
 Saints are by Christians ; and the histories of the 
 Caesars are set forth by Suetonius with more integrity 
 and incorruption than the histories, I do not say of 
 Emperors, but of Martyrs, Virgins, and Confessors, are 
 published by Catholics.' " And " Wicelus, in his sermon 
 on ' Believe not every Spirit ':...' Here I cannot but 
 testifie with tears, that the heathens were anciently 
 more cautious in these matters than we are ; for at this 
 time we do presently receive all miracles, and so oracles 
 likewise, if they promise us any gain.' '' Once more : 
 " Lyranus, on the 14th chapter of Daniel, saith, . . . 
 ' So likewise in the Church, the people are sometimes 
 very much deceived by miracles which are forged by the 
 priests, or by their adherents, for worldly lucre.' "* 
 
 Here, then, we have it acknowledged by Bomanists 
 themselves, that in most Churches the Offices were filled 
 with apocryphal stories ; that there are many things in 
 most of the Saints' legends which are not only ludi- 
 crous and absurd, but palpably false ; that the lives of 
 philosophers and emperors were written by heathens 
 with a greater regard to truth than the lives of the 
 Martys, &c, by Bomanists ; and that in the [Boman] 
 Church the people are sometimes much deceived by 
 
 * See Geddes' Trant., ii. 55-57, London, 1702 ; and see vol. iii. 
 
109 
 
 miracles which are forged by the priests for lucre. 
 Surely, surely, if Eomanists thus think of their miracles, 
 they cannot blame Protestants for not treating them 
 with any great reverence.* 
 
 Despite their better judgment, the unhappy priests 
 are compelled to do violence to common sense, to com- 
 mon decency, and common honesty. They dare not 
 give utterance to their secret and inward convictions. 
 They must go grinding on day by day in the same mill, 
 like the hoodwinked mill -horse, perpetually driving 
 round in the same well-worn rut, year after year, as 
 each season comes and goes. To what end ? It is 
 necessary, at any sacrifice, to insist on the truth and 
 reality of these extravagant fables, in order to maintain 
 the vital dogma of the Church's infallibility. What 
 would not many an otherwise conscientious priest give 
 to be relieved of this degrading burden ! He must 
 know that the narratives are utterly untrue. What are 
 we to say to the Church that sanctions and endorses 
 these "lying wonders," and confirms them with her 
 infallible seal? Conceive for a moment a professed 
 Christian community, whose head — Christ — is the 
 essence of truth itself, teaching that He is to be ap- 
 proached or appeased by falsehood or fraud ; and that 
 the daily repetition of such a mass of absurdity can be 
 pleasing to Him ! 
 
 The question that naturally suggests itself is — Do 
 the Priests put any faith in these miserably absurd 
 inventions ? Of course they are bound to say they do. 
 If, however, a lay Romanist questions a Priest on this 
 wild profusion of miracles, his ready answer is, " You 
 are not required to accept them, as they are not pro- 
 posed by the Church as points of faith." But that is 
 a cowardly evasion. The rejoinder is obvious : " These 
 alleged miracles being attested by the highest authority 
 
 * See Darwell's " The Church of England a True Branch of the Holy- 
 Catholic Church," 1853, p. 101. To whom I am indebted for the above 
 extracts. 
 
110 
 
 of the Eoman Church, and made an essential and com- 
 pulsory portion of the daily devotions of her Priests, 
 and a neglect to recite the appointed daily portions de- 
 clared to be a mortal sin, do you personally give any 
 credence to them ? " That is the question. If a Priest 
 is compelled to believe in them, why is a Layman 
 exempt from the same obligation ? In fact a conscien- 
 tious Priest is heartily ashamed of his task, and will 
 never give a direct answer when questioned on the 
 subject. There are some who, when these fables are 
 quoted against them, writhe under the infliction. For 
 instance, Mr. Charles Butler, the author of " The Book 
 of the Boman Catholic Church," * exclaims : — " May I 
 ask if it be either just or generous to harass the present 
 Catholics with the weakness of the ancient writers of 
 their communion, and to attempt to render their re- 
 ligion and themselves odious by these unceasing and 
 offensive repetitions ? " Weakness is a mild expression. 
 We do not accuse Bomanists of the " weakness of the 
 ancient writers of their communion ; " it is the acknow- 
 ledged system of the present day we expose, as a decep- 
 tion amounting to blasphemy. 
 
 Mr. Butler's repudiation is worth recording here. 
 "Without qualihcation (he says) no miracles, except 
 those which are related in the Old or the New Testa- 
 ment, are Articles of Faith — a person may disbelieve 
 every other miracle, and may even disbelieve the exist- 
 ance of the persons through whose intercession they are 
 related to have been wrought, without ceasing to be a 
 Boman Catholic." This he declared to be "agreeable 
 to religion and common sense." This licence to exercise 
 our private judgment extends, of course, to the whole 
 of the Boman Breviary. To support his views, Mr. 
 Butler called in aid Dr. Lingard and Dr. Milner, but 
 who by no means take the same liberal view of a 
 Bomanist's obligation in respect to authorised cano- 
 nisations and alleged authenticated miracles. Both 
 * London, 1825. See pp. 46, 47, 48. 
 
Ill 
 
 being sealed by tbe solemn attestation and confirmation 
 of Papal Bulls, issued in a most solemn and ex-cathedrd 
 form, thus become part of the constitution of the Eoman 
 Church — to be rigorously "observed," and cannot be 
 cast aside at the option of any individual according to 
 the dictation of his own private judgment. An Article 
 in the Eoman Creed, binding on every member of that 
 Church at the present day, exacts the following submis- 
 sion : " I firmly admit and embrace all constitutions and 
 observances of the same Church." It may be at times 
 very convenient to repudiate that which " religion " and 
 " common sense " may suggest to be as absurd as it is 
 untruthful, but it is not for a Bomanist to indulge 
 in such liberties, since he is bound by the express direc- 
 tion of his Creed to implicitly believe in all the ordi- 
 nances and constitutions of his Church as firmly as in 
 the doctrinal portions defined by his Creed. The appeal 
 to Dr. Lingard will scarcely support Mr Butler in the 
 sweeping repudiation he charitably permits. Dr. Lin- 
 gard advances his opinion with considerable caution and 
 reservation. He admits that there are many miracles 
 which must shrink from the frown of criticism ; some 
 which may have been the effect of accident or imagina- 
 tion ; * some that are calculated to excite the smile rather 
 than the wonder of the reader ; and some which, on what- 
 ever ground they were originally admitted, depend, at the 
 present, on the distant testimony of writers not remark- 
 able for sagacity or discrimination. This, at least, is 
 letting down the concoctors of Eomish legends very 
 easy ! " It was their misfortune," adds Dr. Lingard, 
 " that the knowledge of these writers of miracles was 
 not equal to their piety." Piety indeed. lieu pietas ! 
 Heu pisca fides ! If piety could dictate such extravagant 
 falsehoods, we may bid farewell to " common sense " in 
 the transaction. But as to piety, Dr. Lingard cannot 
 
 * Quaere peregrinum, vicinia rauca reclamat. — Horace, Ep. 
 
 The crowd replies, 
 
 Go seek a stranger to believe thy lies. — Creech. 
 
112 
 
 allow objectors to pass without a sly back-hit. Of the 
 " censors " of these miracles, he says, " their piety was 
 not equal to their knowledge." So that it would appear 
 with Dr. Lingard, that in the estimation of the truth 
 or falsehood of any particular miracle " common sense " 
 and " religion " do not always go hand in hand. 
 " Common sense " may lead us to repudiate these fables 
 at the expense of " piety " which dictated them ! The 
 appeal to Dr. Milner is, however, less happy ; for while 
 Dr. Milner repudiates the legends of Roman Saints 
 recorded in the " Legenda Aurea " of Jacobus de 
 Voragine, the " Speculum " of Vicentius Belluacensis, 
 the " Saints' Lives " of the Patrician Metaphrastes, and 
 scores of similar legends, stuffed, as they are, with rela- 
 tions of miracles of every description,* some of whose 
 writings, by the way, have been condemned by his 
 Church, he, nevertheless, dedicates an entire chapter 
 (Letter xxiii.) to a vindication of the miracles of his 
 Church, which he maintains have been attested and pub- 
 lished by the authorities at Eome. " The examiners at 
 Eome (he tells us) are unquestionably men of character, 
 talents, and learning, who, nevertheless, are not per- 
 mitted to pronounce upon any cure or other effect in 
 nature till they have received a regular report of physi- 
 cians and naturalists upon it. So far from being pre- 
 cipitate, it employs them whole years to come to a 
 decision on a few cures respecting each Saint — in short, 
 so strict is the examination, that, according to an 
 Italian proverb, It is next to a miracle to get a miracle 
 
 * See Letter xxiv. In his " End of Religious Controversy." Dr. Mil- 
 ner may find it convenient, in controversy with Protestants, to repu- 
 diate these works of his co-religionists ; but we must not forget that 
 notwithstanding the existence of her Indices, Prohibitory and Ex- 
 purgatory, and the jealous watch over the press which his Church 
 exercises, she has never repudiated them nor censured their extrava- 
 gances. The fables thus condemned by wholesale, are all equally the 
 invention and compilation of Roman Priests, and put forth with the 
 same approved object — a "Divine attestation of the sanctity of the 
 Roman Church." Dr. Milner, however, does not venture to repudiate 
 that great storehouse of " holy fables" found in the exhaustive labours 
 and inventive genius of the Bollandists. 
 
113 
 
 proved at Rome." Dr. Milner is evidently proof against 
 satire. In his defence he embraces the whole scope of 
 the Breviary, as containing in every respect a true 
 record of the miracles wrought by canonised Saints and 
 others, as " a Divine attestation of the sanctity of the 
 Eoman Church," and in " express confirmation of the 
 Catholic doctrine, which the performers of these miracles 
 defended ! " He goes so far as to assert that the 
 Eoman Church does pretend to miraculous powers even 
 at the present day, and cites, as authentic, among 
 many others, the case of a cripple cured in 1814, who 
 was " brought to the spot where the hand of a Priest 
 who suffered death at Lancaster for the exercise of his 
 religion, in the reign of Charles I., is preserved, and 
 has often caused wonderful cures. The cripple procured 
 himself to be conveyed to the altar rails of the chapel, 
 and there to be signed, on his back, with the sign of the 
 cross, by the hand," from which " he felt a peculiar 
 sensation and local change," and was of course instan- 
 taneously cured ! He also relates as facts modern cures 
 at Holy Wells, &c, &c. It is strange, to say the least 
 of it, that we hear of no further manifestations of this 
 miracle-working hand, or of the divinities who are sup- 
 posed to preside over these favoured spots. Have these 
 miraculous powers ceased to operate ? Perhaps the 
 presiding genius is " talking, or is pursuing, or he is 
 on a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth and must be 
 awaked." Dr. Milner may have been very pious, but 
 when he endorses and records such absurdities, we 
 must believe that either he or his credulous readers 
 have parted with " common sense." Mr. Butler, at 
 least, has not been very happy in his selection of 
 authorities, to shield his Church from the ridicule he so 
 much dreaded. 
 
 But to come down to the present day, we have 
 another class who go in boldly for the entire system of 
 these forged miracles, and proclaim them as authentic 
 as the miracles recorded in the Bible.V Of this class is 
 
114 
 
 Dr. Newman. He takes a bold stand, and openly pro- 
 fesses his belief in every single so-called Ecclesiastical 
 miracle, not only those recorded in the Breviary, which 
 he enumerates one after the other, even to crossing seas 
 on cloaks, multiplying grain and bread, raising the 
 dead, " curing incurable diseases, stopping the operation 
 of the laws of the universe in a multitude of ways," but 
 also in winking Madonnas, &c* 
 
 In the Lecture above quoted, Dr. Newman adds : 
 " I firmly believe that the relics of the Saints are doing 
 innumerable miracles and graces daily, and that it needs 
 only for a Catholic to show devotion to any Saint in 
 order to receive special benefits from his intercession. 
 I firmly believe that Saints in their lifetime have before 
 now raised the dead to life, crossed the sea without 
 vessels, multiplied grain and bread, cured incurable 
 diseases, and stopped the operation of the laws of the 
 universe in a multitude of ways, "f " Many men," he 
 says, " when they hear an educated man so speak, will 
 at once impute the avowal to insanity, or to idiosyn- 
 crasy, or to imbecility of mind, or to decrepitude, or to 
 fanaticism, or to hypocrisy." For himself, he brazens it 
 all out !* "As to the Catholic religion in England (he 
 says) at the present day, this only will I observe — that 
 the truest expedient is to answer right out when you 
 are asked ; that the wisest economy is to have no 
 managements ; that the best prudence is not to be a 
 coward ; that the most damaging folly is to be found 
 out shuffling, and that the first of virtues is to ' tell the 
 truth and shame the devil.' " J 
 
 In fact, what he means is, that a Eomanist must 
 accept the entire system as he finds it. He goes 
 further; he says, that in the "accounts of Mediaeval 
 
 * Lecture " On the present position of Catholics in England." Bir- 
 mingham. No date. " Apologia." Appendix 5, p. 284. 
 
 t This startling passage is omitted from the "Apologia" (see Ap- 
 pendix, p. 57), in which Dr. Newman has requoted his Lecture. 
 
 X " Apologia pro Vita Sua." London, 1864, p. 71, Appendix, 
 
115 
 
 miracles there is no extravagance in their general 
 character." * 
 
 But, then, how does he justify his credence in these 
 fables ? He coolly tells us that if we believe in Scrip- 
 ture miracles, why not in Ecclesiastical miracles ? And 
 he carries out the same system with all the novel 
 dogmas of his Church. He says : you believe in the 
 Trinity, why not believe in Transubstantiation ? One 
 is not a bit more difficult of belief than the other. Such 
 a line of argument we may expect from freethinkers — ■ 
 a Tom Paine for instance. The questions stand on a 
 different footing. Push tne argument. Christ was in- 
 fallibly true; the Pope claims to be his Vicar, and* 
 therefore,, he must be also infallible. The Apostles' 
 wrote under inspiration — therefore the compilers of the 
 Breviary, who claim to be successors of the Apostles, 
 must likewise write under the same inspiration. Let 
 us put the point practically. Christ healed the sick and 
 raised the dead. Let Dr. Newman, Dr. Manning, or 
 even the Pope, try the same ! Of course I am address- 
 ing Christians, not freethinkers, who discard Scripture 
 miracles. 
 
 But in making this bold acknowledgment, is Dr. 
 Newman really telling the truth ? When a professed 
 minister in the Church of England, he denounced 
 Bomanism as a system of fraud and imposture. He 
 afterwards, however, declared that in doing so he was 
 not speaking his own sentiments, but was conforming 
 himself to a system. " He was not (he says) speaking 
 his own words, but was only following almost a con- 
 sensus of Divines of his (then) Church," assigning as a 
 reason for this deception, that " such views were neces- 
 sary for his position " while in our Church. That is, 
 he admits he was acting under a mask, and that " it 
 went against his feelings," and that he was in fact driv- 
 ing along the rut. "What guarantee have we that he 
 is not now actually acting a part, and writing merely 
 
 f Ibid, p. 42. The Italics are as in original, 
 
116 
 
 to approve himself to his present Eomish superiors, 
 and that " such views are necessary for his (present) 
 position ? " 
 
 We would remind this class of devotees that " the 
 spirit speaketh expressly that in the latter times some 
 shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits 
 and doctrine of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy." 
 
 We are warned not to be deceived by any means, for 
 the man of sin was to be revealed, " who exalteth him- 
 self above all that is called God, or that worshipped 
 so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, show- 
 ing himself that he is God." This " wicked one," we 
 are told, shall be revealed by unmistakeable signs, 
 " whose coming is after the working of Satan with all 
 power, and signs, and lying wonders." And that " the 
 time will come when they will not endure sound doc- 
 trine ; but after their own lusts shall they heap to 
 themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they 
 shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be 
 turned unto fables." — 
 
 " BY THY WORDS THOU SHALT BE CONDEMNED." 
 
 There may, however, be some in the Eoman system, 
 who are sincere in their belief in this system. " My 
 heart's desire and prayer to God for them is, that they 
 may be saved. For I bear them record that they have 
 a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For 
 they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going 
 about to establish their own righteousness, have not 
 submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. 
 For CHEIST is the end of the law for righteousness 
 to every one that believeth." (Bom. x. 2, 3.) 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Woodfall & Kinder, Printers, Milford Lane, Strand, London, W.C. 
 
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