October XXV

SS. Chrysanthus and Daria, Martyrs

See Jos Assemani, in Cal. Universa, t. 6. p. 193, and Falconius comment. ad tab. Ruthenas Capponianus, p. 79, ad 19 Martij. Their acts in Metaphrastes. Lipomanus, and Surius, are of no authority.

in the third century

Chrysanthus and Daria were strangers, who came from the East to Rome, the first from Alexandria, the second from Athens, as the Greeks tell us in their Mena. They add, that Chrysanthus, after having been espoused to Daria, persuaded her to prefer a state of perpetual virginity to that of marriage, that they might more easily with perfect purity of heart trample the world under their feet, and accomplish the solemn consecration they had made of themselves to Christ in baptism. The zeal with which they professed the faith of Christ distinguished them in the eyes of the idolaters; they were accused; and, after suffering many torments, finished their course by a glorious martyrdom, according to their acts in the reign of Numerian: Baillet thinks rather in the persecution of Valerian, in 237. Several others, who, by the example of their constancy, had been moved to declare themselves Christians, were put to death with them. St. Gregory of Tours says,¹ that a numerous assembly of Christians, who were praying at their tomb soon after their martyrdom, were, by the order of the prefect of Rome, wailed up in the cave, and buried alive. SS. Chrysanthus and Daria were interred on the Salarian Way, with their companions, whose bodies were found with theirs in the reign of Constantine the Great. This part of the catacombs was long known by the name of the cemetery of SS. Chrysanthus and Daria. Their tomb was decorated by pope Damasus, who composed an epitaph in their honor.² Their sacred remains were translated by pope Stephen VI., in 866, part into the Lateran basilic, and part into the church of the twelve apostles.³ This at least is true of the relics of their companions. Those of SS. Chrysanthus and Daria, had been translated to the abbey of Prom in the diocese of Triers, in 842, being a gift of Sergius II. In 844, they were removed to the abbey of St. Avol, or St. Navor, in the diocese of Metz.⁴ The names of SS. Chrysanthus and Daria are famous in the sacramentaries of St. Gelasius and St. Gregory, and in the Martyrologies both of the western and eastern churches. The Greeks honor them on the 19th of March and 17th of October; the Latins on the 25th of October.

SS. Crispin and Crispinian, MM.

See Tillemont, t. 4, p. 461; Bosquet, Hist. Eccl. de France, l. 5, c. 156; Le Moine, Hist. Antiqu. Soissons, Paris, 1771, t. 1, p. 154; the new Paris Breviary, and Baillet from ancient Martyrologies; for the acts of these martyrs are of small authority.

a. d. 287.

The names of these two glorious martyrs are not less famous in France than those of the two former at Rome. They came from Rome to preach the faith in Gaul towards the middle of the third century, together with St. Quintin and others. Fixing their residence at Soissons, in imitation of St. Paul they instructed many in the faith of Christ, which they preached publicly in the day, at seasonable times; and in imitation of St. Paul, worked with their hands in the night, making shoes, though they are said to have been nobly born, and brothers. The infidels listened to their instructions, and were astonished at the example of their lives, especially of their charity, disinterestedness, heavenly piety, and contempt of glory and all earthly things; and the effect was the conversion of many to the Christian faith. The brothers had continued this employment several years when the emperor Maximian Herculeus coming into the Belgic Gaul, a complaint was lodged against them. The emperor, perhaps as much to gratify their accusers as to indulge his own superstition, and give way to his savage cruelty, gave order that they should be convened before Rictius Varus, the most implacable enemy of the Christian name, whom he had first made governor of that part of Gaul, and had then advanced to the dignity of prefect of the prtorium. The martyrs were victorious over his most inhuman judge, by the patience and constancy with which they bore the most cruel torments, and finished their course by the sword about the year 287.^* They are mentioned in the Martyrologies of St. Jerom, Bede, Florus, Ado, Usuard, &c. A great church was built at Soissons in their honor in the sixth century, and St. Eligius richly ornamented their sacred shrine.

From the example of the saints it appears how foolish the pretences of many Christians are, who imagine the care of a family, the business of a farm or a shop, the attention which they are obliged to give to their worldly profession, are impediments which excuse them from aiming at perfection. Such, indeed, they make them; but this is altogether owing to their own sloth and malice. How many saints have made these very employments the means of their perfection! St. Paul made tents; Saints Crispin and Crispinian were shoemakers; the Blessed Virgin was taken up in the care of her poor cottage; Christ himself worked with his reputed father; and those saints who renounced all commerce with the world to devote themselves totally to the contemplation of heavenly things, made mats, tilled the earth, or copied and bound good books. The secret of the art of their sanctification was, that fulfilling the maxims of Christ, they studied to subdue their passions and die to themselves; they, with much earnestness and application, obtained of God, and improved daily in their souls, a spirit of devotion and prayer; their temporal business they regarded as a duty which they owed to God, and sanctified it by a pure and perfect intention, as Christ on earth directed every thing he did to the glory of his Father. In these very employments, they were careful to improve themselves in humility, meekness, resignation, divine charity, and all other virtues, by the occasions which call them forth at every moment, and in every action. Opportunities of every virtue, and every kind of good work never fail in all circumstances; and the chief means of our sanctification may be practised in every state of life, which are self-denial and assiduous prayer, frequent aspirations, and pious meditation or reflections on spiritual truths, which disengage the affections from earthly things, and deeply imprint in the heart those of piety and religion.

St. Gaudentius of Brescia, B. C.

He seems to have been educated under St. Philastrius, bishop of Brescia, whom he styles his father. His reputation ran very high when he travelled to Jerusalem, partly to shun applause and honors, and partly hoping by his absence to be at last forgotten at home. In this, however, he was mistaken. In a monastery at Csarea in Cappadocia he met with the sisters and nieces of St. Basil, who, as a rich present, bestowed on him certain relics of the forty martyrs, and some other saints, knowing that he would honor those sacred pledges as they had honored them.¹ During his absence St. Philastrius died, and the clergy and people of Brescia, who had been accustomed to receive from him solid instructions, and in his person to see at their head a perfect model of Christian virtue, pitched upon him for their bishop, and fearing obstacles from his humility, bound themselves by oath to receive no other for their pastor. The bishops of the province met, and with St. Ambrose, their metropolitan, confirmed the election. Letters were dispatched to St. Gaudentius, who was then in Cappadocia, to press his speedy return; but he only yielded to the threat of an excommunication if he refused to obey. He was ordained by St. Ambrose, with other bishops of the province, about the year 387; the sermon which he preached on that occasion, expresses the most profound sentiments of humility with which he was penetrated.²

The church of Brescia soon found how great a treasure it possessed in so holy a pastor. He never ceased to break to them the bread of life, and to feed their souls with the important truths of salvation. A certain virtuous nobleman named Benevolus, who had been disgraced by the empress Justina, because he refused to draw up an edict in favor of the Arians, had retired to Brescia, his own country, and was the greatest ornament of that church. This worthy nobleman being hindered by a severe fit of sickness from attending some of the sermons of St. Gaudentius, requested of him that he would commit them to writing for his use.³ By this means we have seventeen of his sermons.⁴ In the second which he made for the Neophites at their coming out of the font, he explaineth to them the mysteries which he could not expound in presence of the catechumens, especially the blessed eucharist of which he says: “The Creator and Lord of nature who bringeth the bread out of the ground, maketh also of bread his own body, because he hath promised, and is able to perform it; and he who made wine of water, converteth wine into his own blood.”⁵ The saint built a new church at Brescia, to the dedication of which he invited many bishops, and in their presence made the seventeenth sermon of those which are extant. In it he says, that he had deposited in this church certain relics of the forty martyrs, of St. John Baptist, St. Andrew, St. Thomas, St. Luke; some of the blood of SS. Gervasius, Protasius, and Nazarius, moulded into a paste, and of the ashes of SS. Sisinnius and Alexander. He affirms that a portion of a martyr’s relics is in virtue and efficacy the same as the whole “Therefore,” says he, “that we may be succored by the patronage of so many saints, let us run and supplicate with an entire confidence, and earnest desire, that by their interceding we may deserve to obtain all things we ask, magnifying Christ our Lord, the giver of so great grace.”⁶ Besides these seventeen sermons of this father, we have three others. The twentieth is a panegyric on St. Philastrins,⁷ wherein our saint mentions that he had made a like panegyric on his holy predecessor every year on his anniversary festival for fourteen years. The saint exhorts Christians to banish all dissolute feastings, accompanied with dancing and music, saying, “Those are wretched houses which resemble theatres. Let the houses of Christians be free from every thing of the train of the devil. Let humility and hospitality be practised therein. Let them be always sanctified by psalms and spiritual songs. Let the word of God, and the sign of Jesus Christ (the cross) be in your hearts, in your mouths, on your countenance, at table, in the bath, when you go out and when you come in, in joy and in sorrow.”⁸ In 405, St. Gaudentius was deputed with some others by the Roman council and by the emperor Honorius into the East to defend the cause of St. Chrysostom before Arcadius; for which commission St. Chrysostom sent him a letter of thanks which is extant, though the deputies were ill received, and imprisoned for some time in Thrace, and afterwards put on board a rotten vessel. St. Gaudentius seems to have died about the year 420; Labbe says, in 427. Rufinus styles him “the glory of the doctors of the age wherein he lives.” He is honored on this day in the Roman Martyrology. See his works printed in the Library of the Fathers, and more correctly at Padua, in 1720, 4to.; also Ceillier, t. 10, p. 517; Cave, Hist. Littr. t. 1, p. 282.

St. Boniface I., Pope, C.

Boniface was a priest of an unblemished character, well versed in the discipline of the church, and advanced in years when he succeeded Zosimus in the pontificate on the 29th of December, in 418. His election was made much against his will, as the relation of it, which was sent by the clergy and people of Rome, and by the neighboring bishops to the emperor Honorius, who resided at Ravenna, testifies. To it concurred seventy priests, some bishops, and the greatest part of the people; but three bishops and some others chose one Eulalius, an ambitious and intriguing man. Symmachus, prefect of Rome, sent an account of this division or schism to the emperor, who ordered that a synod should be assembled to determine the debate. The council which met desired that a greater number of prelates should be called, and made certain provisional decrees, to which Eulalius refused to submit. Whereupon he was condemned by a sentence of the council, and the election of Boniface ratified. This pope was a lover of peace, and remarkable for his mildness; yet he would not suffer the bishops of Constantinople to extend their patriarchate into Illyricum or the other western provinces which were then subject to the eastern empire but had always belonged to the western patriarchate. He strenuously maintained the rights of Rufus, bishop of Thessalonica, who was his vicar in Thessaly and Greece, and would allow no election of bishops to be made in those countries which were not confirmed by him, according to the ancient discipline. In Gaul he restored certain privileges to the metropolitical sees of Narbonne and Vienne, exempting them from any subjection to the primacy of Arles. This holy pope exerted his zeal against the Pelagians, and testified the highest esteem for the great St. Austin, who addressed to him four books against the Pelagians. St. Boniface, in his third letter to Rufus, says:¹ “The blessed apostle Peter received by our Lord’s sentence and commission the care of the whole church, which was founded upon him.”² St. Boniface died towards the latter end of the year 422, having sat somewhat above three years and nine months, and was buried in the cemetery of St. Felicitas, which he had adorned on the Salarian Way. He had made many rich presents of silver patens chalices, and other holy vessels to the churches in Rome. Bede quotes a book of his miracles, and the Roman Martyrology commemorates his name on this day. See his Epistles in Dom. Coutant’s complete edition of the Decretal Epistles of the Popes, of which he only lived to publish the first volume, in 1721, dying the same year at St. Germain des Prez.^* The epistles of this pope are also printed in the collections of the councils, as in Labbe’s edition, t. 2, p. 1582, and:. 4, p. 1702. See on his life Baronius, and the Pontifica published by Anastasius the Librarian, (ap. Muratori script. Ital., t. 3, p. 116,) with the dissertations of Ciampini, Schelstrate, Biancini, and Vignolius on that Pontifical.

¹ L. de Glor. Mart. c. 38 and 83.

² Damas. Carm. 36.

³ Bosius and Aringhi Roma subterr. l. 3, c. 24, and Anastasius the Librarian, in his authentic relation of this translation.

⁴ See Mabill. Sæc. 4, Ben. p. 611.

^* SS. Crispin and Crispinian are the patrons and models of the pious confraternity of brother shoemakers, an establishment begun by Henry Michael Buch, commonly called Good Henry. His parents were poor day-laborers at Erlon, in the duchy of Luxemburg. Henry was distinguished from his infancy for his parts and extraordinary piety and prudence. He was put apprentice very young to a shoemaker. With the duties of his calling he joined constant devotion and the exercise of all virtues. Sundays and holidays he spent chiefly in the churches, was a great lover of holy prayer, and studied earnestly to know and contemn himself, to mortify his senses, and to deny his own will. He took SS. Crispin and Crispinian for his models, and, at his work, had them before his eyes, considering often how they worked with a view purely to please God, and to have an opportunity to convert infidels, and to relieve the poor. It was to him a subject of grief to see many in the same or the like trades ill-instructed, slothful in the practice of virtue, and engaged in dangerous or criminal habits; and, by his zealous and prudent exhortations and endeavors, he induced many such to assist diligently at catechism and pious instructions, to shun alehouses and dangerous company, to frequent the sacraments, to pray devoutly; especially to make every evening acts of faith, hope, divine love, and contrition, and to love only virtuous company, and whatever promoted piety and religion. In this manner, he laid himself out with great zeal and success, when, the term of his apprenticeship being expired, he worked as journeyman; and God so abundantly diffused in his heart his holy spirit and charity, and gave such authority and weight to his words, by the character of his sanctity, that he seemed to have established him the father of his family, to hear the complaints, reconcile the differences, inquire into the distresses, comfort the sorrows, and even relieve the wants of many. The servant of God went always very meanly clad, yet often gave to the poor some of the clothes off his back; he retrenched every thing that was superfluous, and often contented himself with bread and water, that he might feed the hungry and clothe the naked. Thus he had lived at his work several years at Luxemburg and Messen, when providence conducted him to Paris, where he continued the same zealous life among the young men of his low rank and profession.

He was forty-five years old when the baron of Renty, whose piety has rendered his name famous, having heard him spoken of, was extremely desirous to see him. The simplicity and most edifying and enlightened discourse of the poor shoemaker surprised and charmed the good baron, who discovered in him an extraordinary prudence and penetration in spiritual things, and an invincible courage to undertake and execute great projects for the honor of God. He was informed that Henry reformed many dissolute apprentices and children, and with great address and piety, reconciled to them their angry masters of parents: that he prescribed to many that were so disposed, excellent rules of a pious life; and that he had an excellent talent at instructing and exhorting poor strangers who had no friends, and seemed destitute of comfort, in the hospital of Saint Gervaise, which he visited every day. But what gave him the highest idea of Henry’s sanctity, was the eminent spirit of prayer and humility, and the supernatural graces, with which he discovered him to be endowed. Thinking him, therefore, a proper instrument for advancing the divine honor, he proposed to him a project of establishing a confraternity to facilitate the heroic exercise of all virtues among persons of his low profession. For this end, he purchased for him the freedom and privilege of a burgess and made him commence master in his trade that he might take apprentices and journeymen who were willing to follow the rules that were prescribed them, and were drawn up by the curate of St. Paul’s, regarding frequent prayer, the use of the sacraments, the constant practice of the divine presence, mutual succors in time of sickness, and affording relief and comfort to the sick and distressed. Seven apprentices and journeymen joined him, and the foundation of his confraternity was laid in 1645. Henry being appointed the first superior. It appeared visibly, by the innocence and sanctity of this company of pious artisans, how much God had chosen to be honored by it: the spirit of the primitive Christians seemed revived among them.

Two years after this, certain pious tailors who were charmed with the heavenly life of these shoemakers, whom they heard often singing devoutly the divine praises at their work, and saw employing, in penance and good works, that time which many throw away in idleness and sin, begged of good Henry a copy of these rules, and, with the assistance of the same curate, formed a like confraternity of their profession, in 1647. Both these confraternities are propagated in several parts of France and Italy, and are settled in Rome. The principal rules are, that all the members rise at five o’clock every morning, meet together to pray before they go to work; that, as often as the clock strikes, the superior recites aloud some suitable prayer, at some hours a De Profundis, at others some devotion to honor the passion of our Redeemer, or for the conversion of sinners, &c.; that all hear mass every day at an appointed hour; at their work to say certain prayers, as the beads; and sometimes sing a devout hymn, at other times work mostly in silence; make a meditation before dinner; hear pious reading at table; make every year a retreat for a few days; on Sundays and holydays assist at sermons, and at the whole divine office; visit hospitals and prisons, or poor sick persons in their private houses; make an examination of their consciences, say night-prayers together, and retire to their rooms at nine o’clock. It would require a volume to give a true idea of the great virtues and edifying deportment of the pious institutor of this religious establishment. After three years’ sickness he died at Paris, of an ulcer in his lungs, on the 9th of June, in 1666, and was buried in the churchyard at St. Gervaise’s. See Le Vachet, L’Artisan Chrétien, ou la Vie du Bon Henri; and Helyot, Hist. des Ordr. Rel., t. 8, p. 175. An enterprise which the pious baron of Renty had extremely at heart, was to engage persons in the world, of all professions, especially artisans and the poor, to instruct themselves in, and faithfully to practise, all the means of Christian perfection, of which his own life was a model.

Gaston John Baptist, baron of Renty, son of Charles, baron of Renty, of an ancient noble family of Artois, was born at the castle of Beni, in the diocese of Bayeux in Normandy, in 1611. He was placed very young in the college of Navarre at Paris, and afterwards in the college of the Jesuits at Caën with a clergyman for his preceptor, and a secular governor. At seventeen, he was sent to the academy at Paris, and gained great reputation by his progress in learning, and his address in all his exercises, especially riding and fencing. Piety from the cradle was his favorite inclination, which was much strengthened by his reading the Imitation of Christ. His desire of becoming a Carthusian was overruled by his parents and, in the twenty-second year of his age, he married Elizabeth of Balzac, of the family of Entragues, daughter to the count of Graville, by whom he left two sons and two daughters. His great abilities, modesty, and prudence, rendered him conspicuous in the world, especially in the states at Rouen wherein he assisted as deputy of the nobility of the Bailiwic of Vire, and in the army, in which he served in Lorraine, being captain of a select company of six-score men, of whom sixty were gentlemen of good families. His valor, watchful and tender care of all under his charge, regular and fervent devotion attention to every duty, excessive charity, humility, penance, and the exercise of all virtues, cannot be recounted in this place. He was much esteemed by king Lewis XIII., but it was his greatest happiness, that in the midst of the world his heart appeared as perfectly disengaged from it, and raised above it, as the Pauls, Antonies, and Arseniuses were in their deserts. In the twenty-seventh year of his age, the sermons of a certain Oratorian who preached a mission about seven leagues from Paris, made so strong an impression upon his soul, that, after making a general confession to that pious priest, by his advice he entered upon a new course of life, resolving to break all his connections with the court, resign all public business, and lay aside superfluous visits that he might give his whole heart to God in prayer, and to works of duty and charity. He chose for his director F. Condren, general of the Oratorians, a most holy and experienced master in an interior life, as his pious writings and the history of his life show. As the whole secret of a Christian consists in destroying what is vicious in our affections that grace may reign in us, and in making the old man die that Christ alone may live in our hearts, the baron, by the counsels of his director, redoubled his application to subdue his passions, and regulate all the Interior and exterior motions of his heart and senses. By vigorously thwarting the inclinations of nature and the senses, he brought them into subjection; and wherever he discovered any symptom of the least irregularity, he strongly counteracted the inclination by doing the contrary. He made every day two examinations of conscience, at noon and at night; went to confessior twice, and to communion three or four times a week; rose at midnight to say matins with an hour’s meditation; had regular hours in the day for meditation, mass, and other devotions, and all family duties. His fasts and abstinence were most rigorous and continual; his clothes plain; the interior peace and screnity of his mind demonstrated the submission of his passions to reason and the divine will, and that he very little desired or feared any thing temporal, considering God alone whether in prosperity or adversity. His retrenchment of every superfluity showed his love of poverty. He looked upon himself as the most unworthy and the basest of all creatures; In his letters took the title of sinner, or the most grievous sinner, and lived in a total annihilation of himself before God and all creatures; when he spoke of God, he humbled himself to the very centre of the earth, and he would feelingly say, that so base a creature ought with trembling to adore God in silence, without presuming to pronounce his name. In a sincere love for a hidden and unknown life, he shunned and dreaded esteem and honor, insomuch that it would have been a pleasure to him to be banished from all hearts, and forgotten by all men. He earnestly conjured his devout friends to sigh to God for him, that the spirit of his divine Son might be his life, or that he might live in him and for him alone. It was his custom to consecrate frequently to God, in the most solemn manner, his whole being, his body, soul, wife, children, estate, and whatever could concern him, earnestly praying that with the utmost purity, simplicity, and innocency, he might do all things purely for God, without the least secret spark of self-love, and without feeling joy or sorrow, or any other sentiment which he did not totally refer to Him. His devotion to the blessed sacrament was such that he usually spent several hours in the day on his knees before it; and when others wondered he could abide so long together on his knees, he said it was this that gave him vigor and strength, and revived his soul. He often served at mass himself. He rebuilt the church at Beni, and out of devotion to the holy sacrament, he furnished a great number of poor parish-churched with neat silver chalices and ciboriums. It would be too long here to mention his care of his family, and of all his tenants, but especially of his children; frequent attendance upon the sick in hospitals, and in their cottages; and his incredible and perpetual charities, not only among his own vassals and in neighboring places, but also among the distant hospitals, the slaves at Marseilles, the Christian slaves in Barbary, the missions in the Indies, several English and Irish Catholic exiles, &c. After the death of F. Condren, he chose for his director a devout father of the society of Jesus, and, for some time before his death, communicated usually every day. Prayer being the great channel through which the divine gifts are chiefly communicated to our souls, in imitation of all the saints he made this his ordinary employment, and his whole life might be called a continued prayer. His eminent spirit of prayer was founded in the most profound humility, and constant mortification. The soul must die before she can live by the true life; she must be crucified to herself and the world before she is capable of uniting herself intimately to God, in which consists her perfection. This faithful servant of God was dead to the love of riches and the goods of the world; to its amusements, pleasures, and honors; to the esteem and applause of men, and also to their contempt; to the inordinate affections or inclinations of self-love, so that his heart seemed to be withheld by no ties, but totally possessed by God and his pure love. In these dispositions he was prepared for the company of the heavenly spirits. The latter years of his life he spent partly at Paris, and partly at his country-seat or castle at his manor of Citri, in the diocese of Soissons. It was at Paris that he fell ill of his last sickness, in which he suffered great pains without giving the least sign of complaint. Having most devoutly received all the sacraments, he calmly expired on the 24th of April, in the year 1649, of his age the thirty-seventh. He was buried at Citri; his body was taken upon the 15th of September in 1658, by an order of the bishop, to be removed to a more honorable place; and was found as fresh and entire as if he had been but just dead. See his life by F. St. Jure, a Jesuit of singular piety and learning.

¹ Gaudent. Serm. 17.

² Gaudent. Serm. 16.

³ St. Gaudent. pref.

⁴ Bibl. Patr., t. 5, p. 765.

⁵ Ib. p. 947.

⁶ Ib. p. 970.

⁷ Extant in Surius ad 18 Julii.

⁸ Serm. 8

¹ Decretal., epist. t. 1, p. 1039, ed. Coutant.

² Matt. 16 and 18.

^* In the preliminary dissertation on the pope’s authority, Dom. Coutant demonstrates by the testimonies of St. Cyprian, St. Optatus, St. Jerom, &c., what St. Boniface affirms, that the church always acknowledged the primacy of the Roman see to be derived from Christ, (who conferred the supreme authority on St. Peter,) not from the emperors, as Photius pretended in order to establish his schism. The same author shows, that all the popes to the beginning of the sixth century, except Liberius, (who rose after his fall with so much zeal and piety that St. Ambrose speaks of his virtue in strains of admiration,) are enrolled by the church among the saints. The name pope (or father) was anciently common to all bishops; but as the style with regard to titles changed, this became reserved to the bishop of Rome. St. Gelasius, St. Leo, St. Gregory, Symmachus, Hormisdas, Vigilius, and other popes, frequently styled themselves Vicars of St. Peter. That the title of Vicar of Christ was also anciently given sometimes to the popes, is manifest from the fifteenth letter of St. Cyprian to Cornellus; and from the testimony of the bishops and priests who after pope Gelasius had absolved the bishop Misenus, unanimously cried out, that they acknowledged in his person the Vicar of Jesus Christ.

 Butler, A., The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs and Other Principal Saints (New York 1903) IV, 285-291.