FRANCESCA had been forty years married to Lorenzo Ponziano; and through her married life, the heart that had been consecrated to God from the first dawn of existence had been faithful in its love to him whom God Himself had appointed to be her chief earthly care: and blessed had been the course of that union; blessed by the tender affection which had reigned between the husband and the wife, and by the exercise of no common virtues, multiplied by the pursuits of one common object. Francesca had led the way; in meekness, in humility, in subjection; but with a single aim and an unwavering purpose. Many and severe trials had been their portion at different epochs of their lives; but the latter part of Lorenzo's existence had been comparatively tranquil. Lorenzo was the first to be called away. God spared him the trial he had probably dreaded. We seldom are called upon to suffer the particular grief that fancy has dwelt upon. His health had been breaking for some years past, and now it utterly failed, and his disease assumed an alarming character. Francesca, though apparently worn out with toil, with abstinence, and mental and bodily labours, found strength for every duty, and energy for every emergency. During Lorenzo's prolonged and painful illness, she was always at his side, nursing him with indefatigable tenderness, and completing the work which her example had wrought. His passage from life to eternity appeared but a journey. The efforts of Satan to disturb him on his death-bed, though often repeated, were each time frustrated. Lorenzo had been a just man, and his death was the death of the righteous. Few men would have shown themselves as worthy as he did of such a wife as Francesca. From the moment of his marriage he had appreciated her virtues, rejoiced in her piety, encouraged her good works, and to a great extent shared in them. No mean feelings of jealousy, no human respect, no worldly sentiment of expediency had influenced him. When he saw her renouncing all the pleasures and vanities of the world, dressing like a poor person, wearing herself out in the zeal of her charity, turning the half of his palace into a hospital, he did not complain, but rather rejoiced that she was one of those "whom fools have for a time in derision, and for a parable of reproach; whose life is esteemed madness, and their end without honour; but who are numbered amongst the children of God, and whose lot is amongst the saints." He had his reward; he had it when his sight failed him and his breath grew short, when he felt that his hour was come. He had it when in his dying ears she whispered words of peace; and Satan, with a cry of despair, for ever fled away from his couch; and when the everlasting portals opened, and the sentence was pronounced at the immediate judgment that follows death. Masses, prayers, fervent communions, and pious suffrages followed him beyond the grave; and when the saint, who had been the model of wives, stood by that grave a widow, her earthly task was, in one sense, done: but work remained; but it was of another sort. From her earliest youth she bad been a nun in spirit; and the heart which had sighed for the cloister in childhood yearned for its shelter in these her latter days. She must go and live in the shade of the tabernacle; she must be alone with her Lord during the few remaining years of life. This must have been foreseen by her children; and yet, like all trials of the kind, however long looked forward to, it came upon them at last as a surprise. When she said, "I must go," there was a loud cry of sorrow in the Ponziano palace. Baptista, the only son of her love, wept aloud. Mobilia threw herself into her arms, and with impetuous grief, protested against her leaving them. "Are you not afraid for me?" she exclaimed, "if you abandon me, you who have taught me to love God and to serve Him I What am I without you? Too much, too tenderly you have loved me. It cannot be that you should forsake me. I cannot endure existence without you." Her grandchildren also, whom she was tenderly attached to, clung to her, weeping. Moved by their tears, but unshaken in her resolution, she gently consoled them; bade them recollect that she was still to inhabit Rome; that her affection for them would be unchanged, and that she would always be at hand to advise and to aid them; but that her vocation must now he fulfilled, and the sacrifice completed. Then turning to Mobilia, as to a dearly-beloved child, she fondly said, "Do not weep, my daughter; you will survive me, and bear witness to my memory." This prediction was fulfilled; for Mobilia was alive at the time that the process for Francesca's canonisation was commenced, and the testimony she gave to her virtues and to her miracles was on that occasion most important, and the most detailed.
After this, Francesca took leave of her family, and went straight to the Tor di Specchi. It was on the 21st of March, the festival of St. Benedict, that she entered its walls, not as the foundress but as a humble suppliant for admission. At the foot of the stairs, having taken off her black gown, her veil, and her shoes, and placed a cord around her neck, she knelt down, kissed the ground, and, shedding an abundance of tears, made her general confession aloud in the presence of all the Oblates; described herself as a miserable sinner, a grievous offender against God, and asked permission to dwell amongst them as the meanest of their servants; and to learn from them to amend her life, and enter upon a holier course. The spiritual daughters of Francesca hastened to raise and to embrace her; and clothing her with their habit, they led the way to the chapel, where they all returned thanks to God. While she remained there engaged in prayer, Agnese de Sellis the superioress, assembled the sisters in the chapter-room, and declared to them, that now that their true mother and foundress had come amongst them, it would be absurd for her to remain in her present office; that Francesca was their guide, their head, and that into her hands she would instantly resign her authority. They all applauded her decision, and gathering around the Saint, announced to her their wishes. As was to be expected, Francesca strenuously refused to accede to this proposal, and pleaded her inability to the duties of a superioress. The Oblates had recourse to Don Giovanni, who began by entreating, and finally commanded her acceptance of the charge. His orders she never resisted; and accordingly, on the 25th of March, she was duly elected to that office.
She was favoured with a vision which strengthened and encouraged her in the new task she had before her. The angel who for twenty-four years had been by her side, defending and assisting her on all occasions, took leave of her now with a benignant smile, and in his place another, more refulgent still, was ordained to stand. By day and by night he was continually weaving a mysterious woof, the threads of which seemed to grow out of the mystical palm which he carried. St. Benedict appeared to Franceses on the day of her election, and explained to her the meaning of those symbols. Gold was the type of the love and charity which was to govern her dealings with her daughters, while the palm implied the triumph she was to obtain over human weakness and human respect. The unceasing labours of the angel was to mark the unwearied efforts she was to use for the right ordering and spiritual welfare of the community intrusted to her care; and truly she laboured with indefatigable zeal in her new vocation. She had ever before her eyes the words of St. Paul to Timothy and to Titus: "Preach the word. Be patient in season and out of season. Entreat, rebuke, in all patience and doctrine. In all things show thyself an example of good works, in doctrine, in integrity, in gravity." Preaching far more by her actions than by her words, she gave an example of the most heroic virtues. It would be difficult to imagine any thing mom perfect than her life in the world; but the new duties, the new privileges of her present vocation added each day new splendour to her virtues. She appointed Agnese de Sellis her coadjutress, and begged her to share her room, and watch over her conduct, entreating her at the same time to warn her of every fault she might commit. Her strictness with her spiritual children, though tempered by love, was extreme. She never left a single imperfection unreproved, and allowed of no infractions, however slight, of the rule. Sometimes, when through shyness or false shame, they concealed some trifling offence which they were bound to confess, she read their hearts, and reminded them not to give Satan a hold upon them by such reserve. She was most careful of their health, and sought to procure them as often as she could some innocent recreation. They used occasionally to go with her to one or other of her vine-gardens without the walls, to take exercise in the pure open air. Francesca's gentle gaiety on these occasions increased their enjoyment; and the labour of gathering wood and grass, of making up faggots, and carrying away their spoil on their heads at night, was a part of their amusement. The conversation that was carried on between them the while was as merry as it was innocent. These young persons, born in palaces and bred in luxury, worked like peasants, with more than a peasant's lightness of heart.
One fine sunny January day—and those who have inhabited Rome well know how fine a January day can be—Francesca and seven or eight of her companions had been since early dawn in the vine-gardens of Porta Portese. They had worked hard for several hours, and then suddenly remembered that they had brought no provision with them. They soon became faint and hungry, and above all very thirsty. Perna, the youngest of all the Oblates, was particularly heated and tired, and approaching the Mother Superior, with a wearied expression of countenance, she asked permission to go and drink some water at a fountain some way off on the public road.
"Be patient, my child," Francesca answered; "the fountain is too distant." She was afraid of these young persons drinking cold water, heated as they were by toil and exposure to the sun. They went on with their work; and withdrawing aside, Francesca knelt down, clasped her hands, and with her eyes raised to heaven, said, "Lord Jesus, I have been thoughtless in bringing my sisters here, and forgetting to provide food for them. Help us in our need."
Perna, who had kept near to the Mother Superior, probably with the intention of urging her request, overheard this prayer, and, a little irritated by the feverish thirst she was enduring, said to herself with some impatience, "It would be more to the purpose to take us home at once."
Francesca read the inward thought, and turning to the discontented girl she said, "My child, you do not trust enough in God. Look up and see." Perna obeyed, and following the direction of Francesca's hand, she saw a vine entwined around a tree, from whose dead and leafless branches were hanging a number of the finest bunches of grapes, of that purple and burnished hue which the fervid sunbeams of August and September impart to that glorious fruit.
"A miracle! a miracle!" exclaimed the enraptured Perna; and the other Oblates assembled round the tree in speechless astonishment, for they had seen all day the bare and withered branches. Twenty times at least they had passed and repassed before it; and at all events the season for grapes had long gone by.
After kneeling to give thanks to God for this gracious prodigy, they spread a cloth on the grass, and gathered the precious fruit. There were exactly as many bundles as persons present; and with smiling faces and joyful hearts Francesca's children fed on the supply which her prayer had obtained for them. Obedience was a virtue of which the Saint herself gave a most perfect example, and which she unremittingly required of others. One of the Oblates having refused one day to comply with an order she had received, Francesca fixed her eyes upon her with an expression of so much severity, that the person in question suddenly fainted away, and remained afterwards speechless and in a state of insensibility. The doctors were sent for, and declared that her life was in imminent danger. This was a severe trial to the Saint; she could not reproach herself for a severity which had been a matter of duty, not of passion, but at the same time she trembled for the soul of one who had apparently lost the use of reason at the very moment she was committing a serious fault. After addressing a fervent prayer to God, and invoking the Blessed Virgin, she went straight to the bed-side of the sister, and taking her by the hand with great solemnity, addressed to her these words: "If it be true that our congregation is approved of God, and has His Holy Mother for its foundress, in the name of Holy Obedience, I command you to speak to me." The Oblate seemed to awake from a long dream, and opening her eyes, she distinctly said, "Mother, what would you have me to do?" From that moment she rallied, and was soon restored to health.
Another time, when an aged member of the congregation was dying, and every moment expected to be her last, Franceses prayed that she might not be allowed to depart in the absence of Don Giovanni, the director of the house. For six days and six nights the sick woman lingered between life and death. On the arrival of her spiritual father she revived, went to confession, and received the last Sacrament Then, as she again sank into insensibility, Francesca bent over her and said, "Sister Catherine, depart in peace, and pray for us;" and in that instant the aged woman expired.
The poverty of the congregration was extreme. The slender means of the first Oblates had been exhausted by the purchase of the house and the erection of a small chapel. Francesca had indeed made over to it her two vineyards of Porta Portese and of St. Paul without the Walls; but the trifling revenue they furnished was wholly inadequate to the support of fifteen persons; and moreover the religions were so endued with the spirit of their foundress, that they never could bring themselves to turn away a beggar from their doors as long as they had a slice of bread to bestow. They often went a whole day without eating, rather than deny themselves the happiness of feeding the poor. Francesca, happy in the virtues of her children, but tenderly anxious for their welfare, was indefatigable in her efforts to procure them the necessaries of life. She used on these occasions to beg of her relations, or even of strangers; and Almighty God allowed her sometimes to provide for them in a miraculous manner.
One day that the sister whose turn it was to attend to the victualling department found herself unable to put upon the table any thing but two or three small fragments of bread, she went to consult the Saint, who immediately proposed to go out with her and beg. According to her invariable custom, she asked Agnese de Sellis, her coadjutoress, for permission so to do. Contrary to her habit on such occasions, Agnese refused, and said, that if it was necessary for any one to beg, she, with another of the sisters, would undertake it. Then Francesca, after a moment's thought, replied, "I think that God will provide for us without any one going out of the house;" and calling the Oblates to the refectory, she asked a blessing on the bread, and distributed it in minute portions amongst them. Each on beginning to eat her share saw it multiply apace; and not only were their wants thus supplied at the moment, but enough remained when they had done to furnish them with food for the next day.
The gift of prophecy she also exercised more frequently than ever at this period. Once, when she was praying in her cell, the nuns heard her exclaim, "O King of Heaven, support and comfort that poor unhappy mother;" and some hours afterwards, they heard that at that very moment a young nobleman, Jacobo Maddaleni, had been thrown from his horse and killed on the spot, to the inexpressible grief of his mother. Lorenzo Altieri was dying, and his wife Palozza overwhelmed with sorrow; she had several young children, and was almost in despair at the idea of losing her husband. The physician had declared his case hopeless; and when she sent for Francesca her heart was breaking. The Saint came up to her, and said compassionately, "Dear sister, give up the love and the vanities of the world, and God will take pity upon you. Lorenzo will yet recover; he will be present at my burial." The prediction was fulfilled, and Lorenzo, restored to health, assisted, as she had said, at the funeral of the Saint; and Palozza, whose heart had been entirely converted at that moment, and who had vowed in case of his death to retire into a convent, whenever her children could spare her, led henceforward, in every respect, the life of a Christian wife and mother.
The Superioress of the Sisters of the third order of St. Francis consulted her one day on the admission of a young girl, who had requested to be admitted among them. Francesca had not seen or known any thing of the candidate, but unhesitatingly answered, that the vocation was not a real one, and she recommended that she should be refused. "She will enter another monastery," she added, "and after remaining in it a short time, will return to the world, and soon after she will die." It happened exactly as the Saint had foretold: Francesca da Fabrica went into the convent of Casa di Cento Finestre, on the shores of the Tiber, gave up the habit before the end of the year, and a sharp fever carried her off soon after her return. Gregorio and Gentilesca Selli had a little girl of four years old, who was paralysed, and up to her waist her frame appeared completely withered. They had often been urged to have recourse to the spells or charms then so much in vogue, but had always refused to seek a blessing through such means. They were carrying the little child to Francesca, full of faith in her prayers, which they were coming to ask, when she exclaimed at the first sight of them: "Happy are you who have not sought your child's recovery in unlawful ways. In three days, my friends, she will be restored to health;" and the prediction was fulfilled to the letter.
It would be useless to multiply such recitals as these. As she advances in years, especially since her retirement at Tor di Specchi, more and more frequent become the exercise of those supernatural gifts with which God had endowed the gentle Saint of Rome. No day elapses that some new prodigy does not call forth the grateful enthusiasm of the warm-hearted and devout Trasteverini. If a child is trodden under foot by a runaway horse, Francesca is sent for, and at the sight of the Saint he revives. If a young boatman, in the prime of youth, is thrown into the Tiber, and curried away by the stream under the arches of the Ponte Rotto, from whence his afflicted mother receives him into her arms without a symptom of life, she calls out to her friends, "Run, ran to the servant of God: go to Francesca dei Ponziano, and bid her pray for the boy." And when they return, the mother is weeping still over her apparently lifeless child; but they shout from a distance, "The servant of God says he will not die;" and in a few instants, Paul Guidolini opens his eyes, and smiles on his mother, who some years later becomes one of the Oblates of Tor di Specchi. If Francesca sits down for a moment to rest on the steps of a church, as she did one Good Friday, after the service at St. Peter's, a paralytic woman kneels at her feet, and obtains that she should lay her hand on her withered limbs, which are instantly restored. There is no illness on record which her prayers, or the touch of her hand, does not dispel and subdue. She restores sight to the blind, the dumb speak, the deaf hear, the lame walk at her bidding; pestilence and madness and fits and wounds and possession itself disappear before the power with which Almighty God has endued her; and she walks this earth of ours dispensing blessings, as the faithful handmaid of Him who went about doing good.
At the same time, more and more ecstatic grew her prayers, more visible to all eyes the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in her soul, more removed from the natural conditions of existence the tenour of her life. At the hours of meals, which she observed in obedience to the rule, her companions notice that she hardly ever eats, but that her face is turned to the window, and her eyes fixed on the sky, while rays of light seem to play around her, and her countenance grows dazzling from the celestial brightness which overspreads it. Longer and longer became her orisons; often in visiting a church she falls into an ecstasy, which lasts till night. The sublimity of her vision, the glimpses of heaven which she enjoys, the sight of angels, and of the Lord of angels, is occasionally exchanged for the terrific apparitions, the renewed assaults of Satan, who attack her at times with redoubled violence, now that her ultimate triumph is at hand, and the crown about to descend on a brow which already shines with the mystic radiance of sanctity. The old frescoes of the original chapel of Tor di Specchi represent some of these mysterious struggles between Francesca and the Evil One; and her cell bears the impress of that strange violence which Satan is permitted to exercise at certain moments, and which is the type of the warfare which is ever waged between him and God's Church. He can shake it at times by the storms he raises; but vain are his attempts to overthrow it. The mark of Satan's fury is stamped on the roof of Franceses's lowly cell; but the relics of the canonised Saint now fill the chamber which, in his impotent rage, the tempter once sought to destroy. But this life of wonders, of trials, and of miracles, was drawing to a close. She who had been the holiest of maidens, of wives, and of widows, had all but finished her course, and many were the intimations she received of her approaching end.
On one of these occasions she selected one of the chapels in Santa Maria Nuova as a place of sepulture for the Oblates, and obtained from the Olivetan Monks that it should be reserved for that purpose. She often spoke of her death to the sisters, and told Rita, one of the companions of her youth, that she would succeed her in the government of the congregation. Don Ippolito, one of her coadjutors in the foundation of the order, had often implored two favours of her, that she would look upon him as her spiritual son, and that she would summon him to her death-bed. She assured him that the prayers of such a worthless sinner as herself were not deserving of a thought; but, moved by his importunities, she promised in the end to comply with his request. Accordingly, towards the end of the year 1439, when he was in Sienna on business, he received a letter from Francesca, in which she reminded him of his desire to be present at her last moments, and in consequence exhorted him to conclude his affairs, and return to Rome as soon as possible, which he accordingly did. On Christmas-day and on the Feast of St. Stephen she had visions of the Blessed Virgin and of the infant Jesus, which she communicated to Don Ippolito in the church of Santa Maria Nuova, where she had gone on her way back from San Lorenzo without the Walls and St. John of Lateran, which she had successively visited. The religious said to her with emotion: "Mother, you will now grant me the favour I have so often asked of you."
"Yes," replied the Saint, who had been all day in a kind of ecstasy, though she moved from one place to another; "yes; I look upon you now as my father, as my brother, and as my son." And so saying she left him, and returned to Tor di Specchi, still absorbed in contemplation.
Don Ippolito followed her with his eyes till she had disappeared from his sight, and joy and sorrow were struggling in his heart; for he felt that the time was come for her great gain and her children's unspeakable loss.
FRANCESCA was fifty-six years old. Her frame, worn out with labour, with fastings, and austerities, was enfeebled also by frequent illnesses; but her activity, her indomitable energy, was still the same. She never flagged, never wearied, never gave way under the pressure of physical or moral sufferings. It was probably a trial of the latter description, one which she had always been keenly alive to, that hurried her end.
A fresh schism broke out in the Church, to the scandal and grief of all the faithful. The refractory bishops assembled at Basle, ventured to decree the deposition of Pope Eugenius, and to elect as anti-pope the aged Amadeus, Duke of Tuscany, who had abdicated in favour of his son, and was living as a hermit on the shores of the Lake of Geneva. The usurper took the name of Felix V., and this unhappy schism lasted ten years. Francesca turned to heaven her weary eyes—she besought her Lord to take her away from this scene of trial: too keenly did she feel the woes of the Church; too deeply did she sorrow over these renewed conflicts, and the consequent dangers to which the souls of Christians were exposed. Perhaps it was given to her in that hour to foresee the fearful storm that was lowering over the Church,—the monster heresy that, in less than a century, was to rise against the Mystical Bride of Christ, and rob her of her children.
On the 3d of March, 1440, Francesca was sent for by her son Baptista, who was laid up with a sharp attack of fever. She instantly obeyed the summons; and, on arriving at the Ponziano palace, found him already much better, and able to leave his bed; but, at the earnest request of the whole family, she agreed to spend the whole day with them, the Oblate Augustina, who had accompanied her, also remaining to return with her at night. Towards evening she grew so weak that she could hardly stand; and Baptista and Mobilia implored her to stay at the palace, or else to let herself be carried in a litter to the convent; but she persisted in setting out on foot. Stopping on her way at the church of Santa Maria in Trastevere, she went in to ask, for the last time, her spiritual father's blessing, and found Don Giovanni in the Chapel of the Angels—that spot where she had so often been favoured with divine revelations. As he was inquiring after Baptista, he was struck with the more than habitual paleness of her face, and the evident exhaustion she was labouring under, and commanded her, as a matter of obedience, instantly to return to the Ponziano Palace, and to spend the night there, This order was a severe trial to Francesca, for she felt at once that if she was not now to return to Tor di Specchi, she would never again enter those hallowed walls; but, faithful to the spirit of perfect obedience, she meekly bowed her head in token of submission, and went back to her son's house.
In the course of the night a virulent fever came on, and in the morning she was as ill as possible. Francesca's first care was to send for her director, and to request him to apprise her spiritual daughters of her illness. Four of them (Agnese, Rita, Catherina, and Anastasia,) hurried to her side; and when they heard her entreat Don Giovanni not to omit any of the necessary precautions for her soul's welfare, they all burst into tears, and seemed at once to understand that their beloved mother was about to leave them. Francesca gently consoled them, and dismissed them towards the evening, only keeping with her Augustina, who watched her during the night, and witnessed the ecstasy during which the following vision was vouchsafed to the sufferer:—Our Lord appeared, surrounded with angels and with saints, and announced to her that in seven days she would die, and receive the crown which was prepared for her in heaven. Sister Augustina saw her face shining with supernatural brightness; a radiant smile playing on her lips, and heard her say with ineffable unction: "Be Thou eternally praised and blessed, O my dear Lord Jesus Christ! Thanks be to Thee for the unmerited favours I have received at Thy hands. To Thee, to Thee alone, do I owe all the blessings I have, and have yet to receive." When Don Giovanni saw her afterwards, he imagined she was rallying; but she related to him her vision, and bade him tell her daughters that her end was approaching. Their tears and their sobs choked their utterance; and the Saint gently reproved that excess of sorrow, and bade them rejoice with her, and bless the Divine goodness for the great mercy that was shown to her. During the next two days she suffered much; but no word or sound of complaint escaped her. Her face was as serene as if her body had been perfectly free from pain; and to those who expressed a hope that she would yet recover, she only answered with a sweet smile, "God be praised, my pilgrimage will end from Wednesday to Thursday next." She asked for the Sacraments, confessed, went to communion, and received Extreme Unction. Ardent ejaculatory prayers, devout aspirations, burning expressions of love, were ever rising from her heart to her lips. Each day she repeated, as if she had been in perfect health, the Office of the Blessed Virgin, the Rosary, and all her usual prayers. The Oblates watched by her in turns, and Mobilia hardly ever left her side; so that the smallest particulars of that wonderful death-bed were carefully recorded. Francesca allowed all those who wished to see her to come in. She had words of advice, of warning, and of consolation for all.
When the news of her illness was spread in Rome, the heart of the great city was stirred to its very depths, and a mournful, anxious, loving multitude beset the palace and the very bed of the dying Saint. Nowise disturbed or annoyed at this oppressive testimony of their affection, she had a smile, or a look, or a kind word for each. No cloud obscured her understanding; no irritability affected her temper. Peace was within and around her, and heaven's own calm on her brow and in her heart. The evil spirits, the arch-enemy himself—who, for her sanctification and the glory of God, had been permitted so often to haunt her path and assault her during life—are banished now, and stand at bay, gazing, no doubt, from afar, with envious rage, on that peace which they may no longer mar. Don Giovanni, who had known so well her former trials, often inquired, during her last illness, if Satan's ministers were molesting her. "No," she wouldd answer, with a smile; "I see them no more. God has conquered; His foes have fled." But the bright archangel, whose task is nearly at an end, is still at his post; he weaves the last threads of the mystic woof, and seems to make haste to finish his work. The halo of light which surrounds him grows brighter and brighter, and Francesca's dying form reflects that splendour.
On the Monday morning she is still in the same state. Glorious visions pass before her; divine forms bend over her, and whisper words of welcome. During Mass, which her confessor says in her room, the Lord Himself appears to her again; and from the consecrated Host He speaks to her entranced soul. The Blessed Virgin and the angels surround her, and the voices of the blest make sweet music in her ears. Late on that day, when her ecstasy was over, the weeping Oblates surround her bed, and with suppliant accents implore her to ask of God yet to leave her upon earth, for the sake of the souls intrusted to her care. It was a hard request: to have had a glimpse of heaven, and to turn back; to have tasted the cup of celestial bliss, and to draw back from its sweetness! Full of love, of pity, of resignation, of holy indifference, she exclaims: "God's will is my will; His good pleasure mine. If He Chooses me to tarry yet on earth, so be it then. I am ready to remain in this miserable world, if He commands it."
But it was not ordained. The next day she grew rapidly worse, and from that time slept not again. "I shall soon rest in God," she replied to those who were urging her to repose. The Oblates once more kneel around her to receive her last instructions: one of them alone, Francesca del Veruli, is kept away by a severe illness, which confines her to her bed. Touching were the last words of the dying mother to her spiritual children; sweet the words of blessing she pronounced on their heads.Love, love, was the burden of her teaching, as it had been that of the beloved disciple. "Love one another (she said), and be faithful unto death. Satan will assault you, as he has assaulted me; but be not afraid. You will overcome him through patience and obedience; and no trial will be too grievous, if you are united to Jesus; if you walk in His ways, He will be with you." Then with earnest accents she thanked Don Giovanni, in her own name and in that of the order, for all he had done to them; and commended the Oblates to his fatherly care.
At that moment her son Baptista entered the room. His mother sat up in the bed, and gazing upon him with an expression of anxious scrutiny, she said: "And can it be that you quarrel with poor shepherds? And do you rob God of His glory by unlawful dealings with hell?" The persons who were standing around the bed looked at each other in surprise, and imagined that Francesca was delirious; but Baptista's countenance and actions soon undeceived them. Tears rushed into his eyes, and with great emotion he publicly acknowledged that he had been guilty of striking, in his anger, some peasants who had injured his fields, and had gone to consult in secret one of the persons who dealt in occult sciences, as to the possibility of his mother's recovery. No one but himself knew of his twofold sin; and the rebuke of the dying Saint came upon him as a direct reproof from God, and an awful warning for the rest of his life. As the day advanced, Francesca grew weaker and weaker; but the flame of love was burning more brightly, as that of life was waning. "What are you saying?" asked Don Giovanni at one moment, on seeing her lips move. "The Vespers of the Blessed Virgin," she answered in a scarcely audible voice. As an infant almost she had begun that practice; and on the eve of her death she had not yet omitted it. On the seventh day of her illness, as she had herself announced, her life came to a close. A sublime expression animated her face; a more ethereal beauty clothed her earthly form. Her confessor for the last time inquires what it is her enraptured eyes behold, and she whispers, "The heavens open! The angels descend! The archangel has finished his task. He stands before me. He beckons to me to follow him." These are the last words that Francesca utters; a smile of indescribable brightness beams from her face. The eyes that have so long been closed to the vanities of life are now closed in death, and her spirit has taken its final leave of earth.
THE body of the Saint remained during a night and a day at the Ponziano palace, the Oblates watching by turns over the beloved remains. Their grief was tempered with joy, for they felt she was in heaven; though the pang of separation was keen, and their home on earth desolate. Don Giovanni, Don Ippolito, and Don Francesco dello Schiano recited the prayers of the Church over the corpse; and though deeply affected themselves, strove to console the bereaved sisterhood, chiefly by extolling the rare merits and the heroic virtues of their departed mother. Almighty God vouchsafed, even during the first night of their loving watch, to give them a proof of that sanctity which was so soon to be triumphantly demonstrated. Sister Margaret, of the third order of St. Frances, had been present at Francesca's death, and remained by her side during the night that followed. Her arm had been paralysed for six months, and to all appearance withered. Inspired with a lively faith, she touched the body of the Saint, and was instantaneously cured. The Oblates all fell on their knees at the sight of this miracle, and blessed God for the earnest He thus gave of the wonders which Francesca's intercession was to accomplish. Each moment they were confirmed in the blessed assurance of her immediate admission into heaven; each moment brought with it a new occasion for joyful exultation. The sweet perfume, the "odour of sanctity," which expression is so often supposed to be simply metaphorical, whereas it often indicates an actual physical and miraculous fact, soon pervaded the room and filled it with fragrance. Francesca's face, which had recently borne the traces of age and of suffering, became as beautiful again as in the days of youth and prosperity; and the astonished bystanders gazed with wonder and awe at that unearthly loveliness. Many of them carried away particles from her clothes, and employed them for the cure of several persons who had been considered beyond the possibility of recovery. In the course of the day, the crowd augmented to a degree which alarmed the inhabitants of the palace, and Baptista took measures to have the body removed at once to the church and a procession of the regular and secular clergy escorted the venerated remains to Santa Maria Nuova, where they were to be interred.
The popular feeling burst forth on the occasion; it was no longer to be restrained: a sort of pious insurrection, which the Church smiles upon, even though it refuses to sanction it; as a mother can scarcely rebuke a somewhat irregular action in one of her children when it springs from a generous feeling, even though she feels herself bound to check it. "Francesca was a saint—Francesca was in heaven." Francesca was invoked by the crowd, and her beloved name was heard in every street, in every piazza, in every corner of the Eternal City. It flew from mouth to mouth; it seemed to float in the air, to be borne aloft by the grateful enthusiasm of a whole people, who had seen her walk to that church by her mother's side in her holy childhood; who had seen her kneel at that altar in the grave beauty of womanhood, in the hour of bereavement, and now in death; carried thither in state, she the gentle, the humble Saint of Rome, the poor woman of the Trastevere, as she was sometimes called at her own desire.
Francesca del Veruli, the Oblate whom illness had detained from the death-bed of her beloved mother, hears from her sick-room the confused hum of voices, the sound of hurrying feet, which indicate the approach of the procession. Full of faith, she starts up, and with clasped hands exclaims, "Oh, my mother! oh, Francesca! I have not seen you die; I have not received your last blessing; obtain for me now that I may visit your remains." With a violent effort, and leaning on one of her sisters, she contrives to rise and to make her way to the bier. The very instant she has touched it, her health and strength return. Meanwhile the crowd augments, and hurries into the church. They press round the precious body; they refuse to let it be buried. As a favour, as a boon of the greatest price, they obtain that the obsequies be put oft to the Saturday; and in the meantime, day and night, there is no limit to the concourse of people that assemble in the chapel. Still the saintly body exhales its perfume; still the sweet features retain their beauty; and to that spot, in an apparently never-ending succession, come the blind, and the lame, and the halt, and the sick, and the suffering; and each of those who touch the bier, or to whom is carried something that has belonged to Francesca, is instantaneously cured. Truly God was wonderful in this His Saint, and wonderful are the details of the miracles wrought during those days; and not only were the ills of the body relieved by contact with the holy corpse, but grace reaches the souls of many who have been hitherto steeled against its entrance.
Amongst others, two young men of dissolute lives and irreligious spirits, on hearing of the miracles at Santa Maria Nuova, begin to jeer and laugh on the subject, and, moved only by curiosity, go to the church, approach the bier with mock demonstrations of respect. But no sooner have they knelt before it, than their hearts are simultaneously touched; a sudden change comes over them. Having come to scoff, they remain to pray,—they rise from their knees only to seek a confessor; and return home that night converted to God, and ever after lead the lives of pious Christians. The miracles wrought before and after Francesca's burial are so multifarious, that it might be tedious (a strange word to use on such an occasion, but nevertheless correct) to attempt to relate them all. Great was the moral effect of this singular outpouring of God's powers through His servant. Faith grew more timid, and hope more strong; charity burned in the hearts of many with an ever-increasing fervour; and the examples which the Saint had given, and which were now dwelt upon with affectionate veneration, induced many to walk in the same path, and look to the same end. It was in Lent that she had died; and from every pulpit in Rome her praises were heard. The most eminent ecclesiastics of the time all foretold her canonisation; and the public voice and the public devotion ratified the burst of popular enthusiasm that had hailed her as a Saint on the very day of her death, and long preceded the formal recognition of her sanctity by the authority of the Church.
A few months after her death, her tomb was opened in order to remove the corpse into a monument which Baptista, Mobilia, and several Roman noblemen had erected in her honour. It was found in a state of perfect preservation, and still exhaling the same fragrance as before. The most exact and detailed examinations were taken in the year of her death, both as to all the particulars of her life, and as to the supernatural and miraculous events which had marked its course, as well as those which had succeeded her death.
From time to time earnest endeavours were made to hasten her formal canonisation. The materials were ample, and the evidence complete; but a variety of circumstances interfered with the conclusion of the process; and though several Popes, namely, Eugenius IV., Nicholas V., Pius II., Innocent VIII., and Julius II., promoted the question, it was not much advanced till the accession of Clement VIII., who had a great devotion to the Saint, and brought the matter nearly to a close; but his death occurring in the meantime, and his successor, Leo XI, only outliving him twenty-seven days, it was Paul V. (Borghese) who decreed the canonisation of Francesca, to the joy of the Oblates of Tor di Specchi, of the monks of Santa Maria Nuova, and of the whole people of Rome. Her festival was appointed to be kept on the 9th of March; and those who have been in Rome on that day can tell how vivid is the devotion that still exists,—the worship that is yet paid to the holy Francesca, the beloved Saint of the Trastevere, the model of Christian matrons; and in the church of Santa Francesca Romana, as the old Santa Maria Nuova is now called, and in the Casa dei Esercizii Pii (the old Ponziano Palace), and in the time-honoured walls of Tor di Specchi, a tribute of love and of devotion is yielded, which touches the heart, and carries the mind back to the days when, amidst the strife of war and the miseries or anarchy, faith, fresh, strong, and pure, asserted its power, and wrought wonders through such feeble instruments as a woman's heart and a woman's works.
On the 29th of May, 1608, in the church of St. Peter, then lately erected, and adorned for the occasion with the utmost magnificence, after a pontifical High Mass, in the presence of the Sacred College, and of an immense affluence of strangers as well as of Romans, the decree was proclaimed which placed Francesca amongst the canonised saints, and sanctioned the worship which a devout people had paid her, with but few interruptions, since the day of her death. Rome was illuminated that night; the fiery cupola of St. Peter, and the sound of innumerable bells, told the neighbouring plains and hills that "God had regarded the lowliness of His handmaiden," and that, in her measure, all generations were to call her Blessed.
In 1633, the tomb of Francesca, which, in consequence of some alterations in the church, had remained out of sight for a great number of years, was, through the pious exertions of the Oblates, assisted by the abbot of Santa Maria Nuova, and the Cardinals Borghese, Barberini, and Altiere, discovered in the spot where it had been placed two centuries before. Her bones were exposed to the veneration of the faithful, and a number of religious processions and services took place on the occasion. Various miracles again gave testimony to the virtues of those holy relics, and a magnificent monument was erected beneath that altar where the Saint had so often prayed. BLESSED LUCY OF NARNI. BLESSED LUCY OF NARNI.
IT was towards the latter end of the 15th century that Lucia Broccoletti was horn in the ancient city of Narni, in Umbria, where her father's house had long held a noble and distinguished rank. Even as a baby in the cradle, there were not wanting signs which marked her as no ordinary child; and if we may credit the account given us by her old biographers, both her nurses and mother were accustomed to see her daily visited by an unknown religious dressed in the Dominican habit, whose majestic appearance seemed something more than human, and who, taking her from her cradle, embraced her tenderly, and gave her her blessing. They watched closely, to see whence this mysterious visitor came and whither she went, but were never able to follow her; and the mother becoming at length alarmed at the daily recurrence of this circumstance, it was revealed to her that her child's unknown visitor was no other than St. Catherine of Sienna, to whom she was given as an adopted daughter.
The accounts that have been preserved of Lucia's childhood have a peculiar interest of their own. Whilst the early biographies of many saints present us with instances of extraordinary graces and favours granted to them in infancy, quite as numerous and remarkable as those bestowed on Blessed Lucy, yet in her case we find them mixed with the details of a characteristic vivacity of temperament, which give them a lifelike reality, and show her to us, in the midst of her supernatural visitations, with all the impetuosity of an imaginative child. When she was only four years old, her mother's brother, Don Simon, came on a visit to his sister's house, and brought with him from Rome various toys and presents for the children. Lucy was given her choice; and whilst the others were loudly clamouring for the dolls and puppets, she selected a little rosary with an image of the Child Jesus; and this being given to her, she took it in her arms, bestowing every name of childish endearment on it, kissing its hands and feet, and calling it her dear Christarello, a name which continued to be given to it ever afterwards. The rest of the day she spent in her own little room, where she arranged a corner for the reception of the Christarello, and was never tired of seeing and caressing her new treasure. Henceforth it was here that she spent the happiest moments of the day. If ever she got into any trouble in the house, it was here she came to pour out all her sorrow; and the innocent simplicity of her devotion was so pleasing to God, that more than once He permitted that the Christarello should wipe away the tears which she shed on these occasions with His little hand, as was several times witnessed by her mother, who watched her through the half-open door. As she grew a little older, she began to accompany her mother to church; and they frequently went to visit the great church of St. Augustine, which was close to the house where they lived. Now it happened that in this church, among other devout images, there was a small has-relief of the Blessed Virgin holding her Divine Son in her arms, which took the child's fancy the first time they entered, so that she stopped to look at it. Her mother observed her as she lingered behind: "Lucy," she said, "do you know who that beautiful lady is whom you see there? She is the Mother of your Christarello; and the little Child whom she carries in her arms is the Christarello also. If you like, we will come here sometimes; and you shall bring the rosary you are so fond of, and say it before her image." Lucy was delighted at the idea; and whenever she could escape from her nurse's hand, she found her way to the church, to admire this new object of her devotion. One day, being thus occupied, the thought came into her head, how much she would like to hold the Christarello for once in her own arms, as she had learnt to hold her little baby brother. She therefore prayed to the Blessed Virgin with great earnestness that her request might be granted, and immediately the marble figure of the little Jesus was extended to her by His Mother, and placed in her arms. Nor was this all: no sooner had she received her precious burden, than she felt the cold marble become a living Child; and, full of delight, she ran home still carrying Him; and though she met many people on the way, who stopped her as she hurried along, and tried to take Him from her, she succeeded in getting safe to her own room at home, where she shut herself up with her treasure, and remained with Him for three days and nights without food or sleep, insensible to all the entreaties and remonstrances of her astonished mother. Conquered at length by fatigue, on the third day she fell asleep; and when she woke she became sensible of the truth that God abides only with those who watch with Him; for, on opening her eyes, the first thing she perceived was that the Christarello was gone. Her cries of distress were heard by her mother, who, to console her, carried her once more to the church; and there they found the marble child restored to the image as before, although for the three previous days its place in the arms of the Virgin's figure had been empty.
She was accustomed from time to time to pay a visit to the uncle before mentioned, and when about seven years old she went as usual to spend some time with him at his country house. She remembered, on the occasion of a former visit, to have seen a room in some part of the house where there were some little angels painted on the walls, as it seemed to her, holding their hands and dancing; and the first morning after her arrival, she determined to set out on a diligent search after the dancing angels. The room in which they were painted was in a wing of the house which had fallen out of repair, and was no longer used by the family; a staircase had led to the upper story, but this was now fallen and in ruins; and though Lucy, as she stood at the bottom, could see the little angels on the wall above her head, all her efforts were unavailing to climb the broken staircase and reach the object of her search. She had recourse to her usual expedient, prayer to the Christarello, and instantly found herself in the empty room, without well knowing how she came there. But her thoughts were soon busy with the angels. There they were; little winged children, their heads garlanded with flowers, their mantles floating as it seemed in the air; and they danced with such an air of enjoyment and superhuman grace, that Lucy sat on the ground before them, absorbed in admiration. As she sat thus, she heard her own name called from the window. She turned round, expecting to see her uncle or some of the servants of the house; but a very different spectacle met her eye. A glorious company of saints and angels stood round the Person of Jesus Himself. On His right was His Virgin Mother; on His left, St. Catherine and the great Patriarch St. Dominic, with many others. Then those mystic espousals were celebrated which we read of in so many other tales of the Saints of God: the Divine Spouse receiving the hand of the delighted child from His Blessed Mother, placed a ring on her finger, which she preserved to the hour of her death; after which He assigned her to the special guardianship of St. Dominic and St. Catherine, whom from that day she always was used to call her "father and mother." "And have you nothing to give Me?" He then asked of His little Spouse; "will you not give Me that silk mantle and pretty necklace?" Lucy was dressed in the rich fashion of the day, with a crimson damask mantle over her other garments, and a necklace of gold and coral beads about her neck; but at these words of her Spouse, she hastily stripped them off, and lay them at His feet. He did not fail, however, to give her a richer dress in their place; for she had no sooner taken off the silk mantle, than St. Dominic clothed her with the scapular of his order, which she continued to wear during the rest of her life under her other clothes. When the vision had disappeared, Lucy found herself full of a new and inexpressible joy. She turned to the little angels on the wall, the only companions left her after the last of the heavenly train had faded from her eyes, and with the simplicity of her childish glee, she spoke to them as though they were alive. "You dear little angels," she said, "are you not glad at what our Lord has done?" Then the angels seemed to move from the wall, and to become, indeed, full of life; and they spoke to her in reply, and said they were very glad to have her for their queen and lady, as the Spouse of their dear Lord. And they invited her to join in their dance of joy, and sang so sweet and harmonious a music, and held out their hands so kindly and graciously, that Lucy would have been well content never to have left her happy place of retreat; nor would she have done so, if she had not been found by her uncle, and carried against her will back to the house.
The death of her father, left her whilst still young, to the guardianship of her uncle. All her own wishes were fixed on a life of religion, but her uncle had different views for her; and after long resistance on her part, he succeeded in inducing her to accept as her husband Count Pietro of Milan, a young nobleman of considerable worth and abilities. The marriage was accordingly celebrated; but not until, in answer to earnest prayers, Lucy had received a divine revelation that a life so contrary to all her own wishes and intentions was indeed God's will regarding her.
Doubtless it is one of those cases in which it is not easy for us to follow the ways of Divine Providence. The marriage was followed by much suffering to both parties; yet, if we be willing to take the Saints' lives as they are given us, without seeking to reduce the supernatural elements we find in them to the level of our own understanding, we shall not he disposed to doubt the truth of the revelation which commanded it, or to fancy things would have been much better if Blessed Lucy had never been placed in a position so little in harmony with her own wishes. On the contrary, we must admire the grace of God, which would perhaps never have been so amply manifested in His servant, had she been called to a more congenial way of life. We are accustomed to admire the wonderful variety of examples which are presented to us in the lives of the Saints: that of Blessed Lucy offers us one of a soul with all her sympathies and desires fixed on the higher life of religion, yet fulfilling with perfect exactitude the minutest duties of a different vocation. She sanctified herself in the will of God, though that will was manifested to her in a position which the world is used to call the hardest of all to bear—an ill-assorted marriage. She found means to practise the humiliation of the cloister, without laying aside the duties, or even the becoming dignity, of her station.
Her first care, on finding herself the young mistress of a house full of servants, was with them, whom she ever looked on less as menials than as a cherished portion of her family. And in the beautiful account given us of her intercourse with them, we must remember that at the period in which she lived, it was considered nothing uncommon or unbecoming for ladies of the highest rank to join in the household occupations, and take their part in the day's employment, working with their servants, and presiding amongst them with an affectionate familiarity, which, without rendering them less a mistress, gave them at the same time almost the position of a mother. Blessed Lucy delighted in the opportunities, which the simple manners of the day thus afforded her, of laying aside her rich dress and ornaments, and assisting in her own kitchen, where she always chose the meanest and most tiresome offices. What was with others only done in compliance with the ordinary habit of the day, was with her made the occasion of secret humiliations. One of her servants, a woman of very holy life and disposition, she took into her confidence, submitting herself to her direction, and obeying her as a religious superior. On Holy Thursday, she washed the feet of all her domestics; and that with so touching a devotion as to draw tears from the eyes of the rudest and most indifferent among them. So perfect was the discipline she succeeded in introducing among them, that, far from presenting the spectacle of disorder so common in households filled with a crowd of feudal retainers of all kinds, her palace had the quietude and serenity of a monastery. Never was an oath or licentious word heard among them; the name of God was honoured; and habits of devotion became cherished and familiar, where before they had been too often an occasion of mockery. All the family dined at the same table; and during the repast the Lives of the Saints, or the Holy Scriptures, were read aloud. If any fault were committed by any of the household, Blessed Lucy knew how to punish it so rigorously as to prevent a repetition of the offence; and in this she was often assisted by the gift of prophecy, which she enjoyed in a remarkable degree. We read an amusing account of two of her maidens, who took the opportunity of their mistress's absence at church to kill two fine capons, which they resolved to dress privately for their own eating. The birds were already on the spit, when their mistress was heard entering the house. Fearful of discovery, they took the half-roasted capons from the fire, and hid them under a bed. Blessed Lucy, however, knew all that had happened. "Where are the capons," she said, "that were in the court this morning?" "They have flown away," said the two women, in great confusion: "we have been looking for them every where." "Do not try to deceive God, my children," replied Blessed Lucy: "they are both under your bed; if you will follow me, I will show them to you." The servants followed her in silent dismay; but their astonishment was still more increased, when not only did she lead them to the very place where they had hidden their spoils, hut calling the birds to come out, they flew out alive, and began to crow lustily.
In another story of her life, we find her represented with her women washing the linen of the house by the side of a river that flowed by the castle. Whilst so engaged, one of them fell into the river and sank to the bottom; but Blessed Lucy made the sign of the cross over the water, and immediately the drowning woman appeared on the surface safe and sound, close to the river's bank.
And in the midst of these simple and homely occupations, the supernatural life of prayer, and ecstacy, and communion with God, was never for a moment interrupted. Strange and beautiful sights were seen by many of those who were present in the church when she communicated: sometimes a column of fire rested on her head; sometimes her face itself shone and sparkled like the sun. Once two little children, whom she had adopted as her own, saw, as they knelt behind her, two angels come and crown their mother with a garland, of exquisite roses. But the children began to weep; for they said one to another, "Certainly our mother cannot have long to live, for the angels are even now crowning her with flowers."
The beauty of her face, and its extraordinary brilliancy at these times, had a singular power in controlling those who beheld it. Even Count Pietro himself was tamed and conquered by a glance from her eye, when it shone with this more than human splendour.
This mention of Count Pietro's name reminds us that it is tune we should say something of him, and of his share in a story which has in some parts, as we read it, the character of a romance. He was not a bad man; he seems indeed to have had many good qualities, and to have been possessed in some respects of a degree of refinement beyond what was common at the time. He was sincerely attached to his saintly wife; but he could not understand her. They were beings of different worlds; and the very qualities which extorted his respect and admiration often sadly perplexed and worried him. Her very affection for himself was above his comprehension; his own feelings were too much made up of the ordinary selfishness of the world, for him to know how to measure the love of one whose love was in God. He felt her power over himself; and whilst he yielded to it, it irritated him, and not the less because there was nothing of which he could complain. This irritation showed itself in a morose jealousy, sometimes varied by fits of passionate violence; in which he went so far as to confine his wife to her room, and once even to threaten her life.
All this, and the yet more wearing trial of their daily intercourse, was borne by Blessed Lucy with unvarying sweetness and gentleness. But though she accommodated herself in every thing to his sullen temper, and even showed him a true and loyal obedience, the desire after those heavenly espousals to which she had been promised whilst still a child never left her heart; and as time went on, she began to look about for some opportunity of carrying her wishes into effect. In those days it was no uncommon spectacle to see a wife or a husband, in obedience to the interior call of heaven, abandon every tie of flesh and blood for the retirement of the cloister; nor was the propriety of such a step ever questioned. Society, as a body, in the ages of faith, acknowledged the principle, that one whom Christ calls should leave all and follow Him. When, therefore, we hear that Blessed Lucy at length resolved to leave her husband's house, and take the habit of religion in the Order of St. Dominic, we must remember that she was no more acting contrary to the custom of the age, than when she worked with her servants in the kitchen. It is not an easy matter at any time for us to judge of the vocation or conscience of another; but when we have to carry back our investigation four hundred years, we can hardly hope that the whole history of a resolution of this nature,—why it was carried out now, and why it was not carried out before her marriage,—should be laid open before us like the pages of a book. Of one thing only we cannot doubt,—God's will had been very clearly and sufficiently declared; both at first, when she consented to give up her own wishes, and now, when the time was come for them to be granted. She contented herself at first with receiving the habit of the third order, and remaining in her mother's house for a year; during which time she had to endure much from the indignation of her husband, who expressed his own disapproval of her step in a very summary way, by burning down the monastery of the prior who had given her the habit. But her uncles at length took the case into their own hands; and after considering the very extraordinary signs of a divine call which had been made manifest in her life, they decided that she should be suffered to follow it without further molestation, and placed her in the monastery of St. Catherine of Sienna at Rome.
Within a year from her entrance there, the fame of her sanctity had become so universal, that Father Joachim Turriano, the General of the Order, being about to found a new convent of nuns at Viterbo, selected her as the prioress of the new foundation; on which office she accordingly entered in the year 1496, being then exactly twenty years of age. So great was the reputation she enjoyed, that though the number of religious sent with her to Viterbo by the general was only five, the crowds that applied for admission as soon as her presence was known was so great that the convent had to be enlarged; and she soon saw herself at the head of a numerous and flourishing community.
Meanwhile, her unhappy husband had not abandoned all hopes of inducing her even yet to return to the world. He had followed her to Rome, and made vain efforts to see and speak with her: he now followed her also to Viterbo; and though unsuccessful in his attempts to obtain the slightest answer to his continual applications and appeals, he continued to linger about the convent, in the restless mood of one who would not give up his design as hopeless. Every tongue around him was busy with the fame of Lucy's saintliness; from one he heard of her almost continual prayer, from another, of the glory which was seen to hover over her face in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament: but soon, in the February following her removal to Viterbo, the interest of all was absorbed in a new report,—that she had received the sacred stigmata; and that in so remarkable a manner as to put all doubt on the subject out of the question. For it was hi the choir, with the other religious, that, being engaged in profound meditation on the Passion, she was observed by one of the sisters to look pale and as if suffering acute pain. The sister went up to her to support her, and was struck with the appearance of her hands, the bones of which seemed dislocated, and the nerves torn. "Mother of God!" she exclaimed, "what is the matter with your hands?" "Nothing," was the faint reply; "they are only gone to sleep." But within a few moments the agony she was enduring and endeavouring to conceal overpowered her, and she became perfectly senseless. They carried her from the choir and restored her to consciousness, so that she was able to return within an hour and receive Holy Communion; but the same sister who had first observed her, being convinced something very extraordinary had happened, continued to watch her, and followed her to her cell. She then remarked that her hands were livid, and the skin raised and much inflamed; and by the end of the week the wounds became large and open, and shed so great an abundance of blood that it could no longer be concealed. The excitement which followed, when these circumstances became generally known, can hardly be described. A minute investigation was first made by the Bishop of Viterbo; after which three successive commissions of inquiry were appointed by the command of the Pope to examine the affair, and each of these inquiries terminated in the declaration that the truth of the miracle was beyond all dispute. Multitudes flocked to the convent to see and touch the sacred wounds, and came back full of the wonders which their own eyes had witnessed. Duke Hercules of Este, the Pope's nephew, made earnest applications to his uncle to suffer her to be removed to his own city of Ferrara; and whilst all these things were going on, Count Pietro still remained in Viterbo.
The world about him was echoing with his wife's renown, but none knew his own connection with her. Each marvel that he heard did but seem to widen the gulf between them; yet still he stayed and lingered within sight of the walls that shut her from him for ever: now bitterly accusing himself for the blindness of his own conduct towards her; now striving to keep alive a kind of despairing hope that, could he but once gain admittance to her presence, he might even yet regain possession of a treasure which, when it was his, he knew not how to value. At length his desires were granted. A sudden inspiration induced Lucy to consent to an interview: it was the first that had taken place since she had fled from his house, and it was the last they ever had in this life.
It must have been a singular meeting: the two years of their separation had altered both. As to the Count, his restless despair had worn him to an old man. He had never seen Narni since the day of her departure for Rome, whither he had followed her; and had spent the long days of those two years hanging about the convent-gates like some miserable beggar. And the same two years had placed Lucy far beyond his reach, as it were in a supernatural world above him. When she stood before him at the grate, and he beheld her marked with those sacred and mysterious wounds, and bearing in her whole appearance the air of one whose sympathies were for ever removed from the affections of humanity, his heart failed him. He had thought to speak to her of her home, and the claims which should recall her to the world; he saw before him something a little lower than the angels; and falling on his knees, he bent his eyes to the ground, and remained silent. Then she spoke; and heaven seemed to speak to him by her voice. The mists of earthly passion rolled away from his heart as he listened; the world and its hopes died in him at that moment; an extraordinary struggle tore his very soul, then passed away, and left it in a profound calm. For the first time he caught a glimpse of that reality which till now he had treated as a dream; the world and its unquiet joys were now themselves the dream, and heaven opened on him as the reality. All life fell away from him in that hour; and when his wife ceased speaking, she had won his soul to God. He dragged himself to her feet, and bathed them in his tears; he conjured her pardon for all the persecutions and violence of the past, and renounced every right or claim over her obedience for ever. Then, leaving her without another word, he obeyed the voice which had so powerfully spoken to his heart; for within a few weeks he took the habit of the Friars Minor of the strict observance; and persevering in it for many years, died a little before his wife, with the reputation of sanctity.
Were this a romande, the story of Blessed Lucy might well end here. But her life was yet scarcely begun. Shortly after the interview with her husband just spoken of, Duke Hercules obtained the Pope's orders for her removal to Ferrara. This was only done by stealth; for the people of Viterbo having got intelligence of the design, guarded the city night and day; so that, in order to gain possession of the Saint, the duke was reduced to the expedient of loading several mules with large baskets, as if full of goods; and in one of these Blessed Lucy was concealed and carried off, under the guardianship of a strong body of armed men. Being arrived at Ferrara, the duke received her with extraordinary honours, and built a magnificent convent for her reception, to which Pope Alexander VI. granted singular privileges, by a brief wherein he declared her to have "followed the footsteps of St. Catherine of Sienna in all things." In this convent she gave the habit to her own mother, as well as to many noble ladies of Ferrara.
It were too long to tell of all the signs of Divine favour which were granted to her during the first years of her new government; of the miracles wrought by her hands, the visions of marvellous beauty that were given to her gaze; and the familiarity with which she seemed to live among the saints and angels. Thus one day, passing into the dormitory, she was met by the figure of a religious, whom she knew to be St. Catherine of Sienna. Prostrating herself at her feet, she prayed her to bless the new monastery, which was dedicated in her name. The saint willingly complied, and they went through the house together; Blessed Lucy carrying the holy water, whilst St. Catherine sprinkled the cells, as the manner is in blessing a house. Whilst they went along, they sang together the hymnAce Maris Stella; and having finished, St. Catherine left her staff with Blessed Lucy, and took her leave. And another time they saw in the same dormitory a great company of angels, and the form of one of surpassing beauty, and clad in an azure robe in the midst of them, standing among them as their queen. Then she sent them hither and thither, like soldiers to their posts, and bid them guard the various offices of the monastery; "for," she said, "we must take possession of this house."
One lingers over this period of her story, unwilling to pass on to the sorrowful conclusion. God, who had elevated her so highly in the sight of the world, was about to set upon her life the seal of a profound humiliation. Hitherto she had been placed before the eyes of man as an object of enthusiastic veneration: her convent gates were crowded by peisons of all ranks, who thronged only to see her for a moment. Duke Hercules of Este applied to her for counsel in all difficulties of state. The Pope had issued extraordinary briefs to enable the religious of other convents and orders to pass under her government, and even to leave the second order to join her community, which belonged to the third,—a privilege we shall scarcely find granted in any other case. But now these triumphs and distinctions were about to have an end. Blessed Lucy was about twenty-nine years of age. The honour in which she was held, and the public celebrity she enjoyed, were a continual source of sorrow and humiliation to her; and with the desire to escape from something of the popular applause which followed her, she ceased not earnestly to implore her Divine Spouse to remove from her the visible marks of the sacred stigmata, which were the chief cause of the veneration which was paid her by the world. Her request was in part granted, the wounds in her hands and feet closed; but that of the side, which was concealed from the eyes of others, remained open to the hour of her death. Whether the withdrawal of these visible tokens of the Divine favour was the cause of the change in the sentiments of her subjects, we are not told; but we find shortly after, that some among them, disgusted at her refusal to allow the community to become incorporated with the second order, rose in rebellion, and even attempted her life. The scandal of this crime was concealed through the exertions of Lucy herself; but on the death of her great protector, Duke Hercules, in 1505, the discontented members of the community recommenced their plots against her authority and reputation. Then—designs were laid with consummate art; and at length they publicly accused her of having been seen in her cell endeavouring to re-open the wounds of her hands and feet with a knife, in order to impose on the public. Their evidence was so ably concocted, that they succeeded in gaining over the heads of the order to their side. Hasty and violent measures were at once adopted; every apostolic privilege granted by Pope Alexander was revoked; she was degraded from her office of prioress, deprived of every right and voice in the community, and placed below the youngest novice in the house. She was, moreover, forbidden to speak to any one except the confessor, kept in a strict imprisonment, and treated in every way as if proved guilty of an infamous imposture. Nor was this disgrace confined within the enclosure of her own monastery; it spread as far as her reputation had extended. All Italy was moved with a transport of indignation against her; the storm of invective which was raised reached her even in her prison; her name became a proverb of reproach through Europe; and the nuns whonad been professed at her hands made their professions over again to the new prioress, as if their vows formerly made to her had been invalid.
One can hardly picture a state of desolation equal to that in which Blessed Lucy now found herself. It was as if this token of deep abjection and humiliation were required as a confirmation of her saintliness. If any such proof were indeed needed, it was furnished by the conduct which she exhibited under this extraordinary trial. During the whole remaining period of her life, a space of eight-and-thirty years, she bore her heavy cross without a murmur. Perhaps its hardest suffering was, to live thus among those whom she had gathered, together with her own hands, and had sought to lead to the highest paths of religion, compelled now to be a silent witness of their wickedness. Her life was a long prayer for her persecutors, and we are assured that no sorrow or regret ever seemed to shadow the deep tranquillity of her soul. So far as it touched herself, she took it as a more precious token of her Spouse's love than all the graces and favours He had ever heaped on her before. But it is no part of saintliness to be indifferent to the sins of others; and we can scarcely fathom the anguish which must hourly have pierced her heart, at the ingratitude and malignity of her unworthy children.
And so closed the life which had opened in such a joyous and beautiful childhood. God indeed knew how to comfort one whom the world had utterly cast out; and though cut off from the least communication with any human being, she could scarcely be pitied whilst her neglected and solitary cell was the resort of celestial visitants and friends. The reader is possibly a little tired of such tales; yet we ask his indulgence whilst referring to one of these last incidents in the life of Blessed Lucy, which we can scarcely omit. There lived at the same time, at Caramagna in Savoy, another beatified saint of the same illustrious order, Blessed Catherine of Raconigi. She had never seen Blessed Lucy; but had heard of her saintly fame, and the lustre of her life and miracles, and then also of her sufferings and disgrace. But the saints of God judge not as the world judges; and Catherine knew by the light of divine illumination the falsehood of the charges brought against her sister. She had ever longed to see and speak with her; and now more than ever, when the glitter of the world's applause was exchanged for its contumely and persecution. The thought of her sister, never seen with mortal eye, yet so dearly loved in God, never left her mind; and she prayed earnestly to their common Lord and Spouse, that He would comfort and support her, and, if such were His blessed will, satisfy in some way her own intense desire to hold some kind of intercourse with her even in this life. One night, as she was thus praying in her cell at Caramagna, her desires were heard and granted. The same evening Lucy was also alone and in prayer; and to her in like manner God had revealed the sanctity of Catherine, kindling in her heart a loving sympathy with one who, though a stranger in the world's language, had been brought very near to her heart in the mysteries of the Heart of Jesus. We cannot say how and in what way it was, but they spent that night together; but when morning came, and found her again alone as before, Lucy had received such strength and consolation from her sister's visit, that, as her biographer says, "she desired new affronts and persecutions for the glory of that Lord who knew so well how to comfort and suppoit her in them."