shone by the radiant innocency of her life, was the daughter of Bertold and Agnes, Marquess and Marchioness of Moravia,' and sister to Gertrude, wife of Andrew, King of Hungary, and mother of the holy Elizabeth of Thuringia. From her earliest childhood she was a very grave child, and had already done with childish things when, at twelve years of age, she was given in marriage by her father and mother to Henry, Grand Prince of Poland. In marriage she kept the bed in all holiness undefiled, and brought up in the fear of God the children that were therein begotten of her. [After the birth of her sixth child,] she was fain to give herself more continually to God, and induced her husband to agree to a mutual vow of separation of bed-fellowship. After his death [in 1238,] by the inspiration of God, Whom she besought in unceasing prayer, she clad herself for godliness' sake in the habit of a Cistercian nun in the monastery [which had been finished] at Trebnitz [in 1219.] She continued absorbed in God. She remained engaged in the Divine Office and hearing Masses from sunrise till noon, and trod mightily under foot the old enemy of man. Fifth Lesson. SHE could not bear to hear talk of worldly things, unless they had to do with the things of God or the saving of souls. She was very wise in business, not doing too much, nor unseasonably, and withal courteous and gentle toward all men. She got a great victory over herself by maltreating her flesh with fasting, watching, and rough clothing. She was an ensample of the higher Christian graces and of a godly nun, by the wisdom of her counsels, and the straightforwardness and peacefulness of her mind. It was her use to rank herself after all others, and cheerfully to undertake lower offices than those of the other nuns. She ministered to the poor even upon her knees, and washed and kissed the feet of lepers, having such command over herself as not to recoil from their sores oozing with matter. HER Sixth Lesson. ER long-suffering and endurance were very marvellous, especially when her son Henry, Duke of Silesia, to whom she bore a mother's love, was killed by the Tartars [in 1241.] His death drew from her rather thanksgiving to God than tears for him. [She died upon the 15th day of October, in the year 1243.] She was famous for miracles. One while, being called on, she restored to life a boy who had fallen into the water, been dashed against the wheels of a mill, and wholly crushed. This and the like being duly proved, Clement IV. numbered her name among those of the Saints, and allowed her Feast-day to be kept in Poland, in which country, being Patroness, she hath most honour, upon the 15th of October; which permission was given to the whole Church by Innocent XI. for the 17th day of the same month. 1 Alban Butler says this is a mere mistake of copyists for Meran. 2 He was Duke of Silesia at the time of the marriage, and only became Grand Prince of Poland in 1233. 3 It was begun in 1203. The Saint never took monastic vows. • Cf. 2 Cor. iv. 10. The meaning in the text is obscure. What became of the Evangelist after the martyrdom of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul is quite uncertain. (See Alban Butler.) The Martyrology says: "He suffered many things for Christ's name's sake, and died in Bithynia, full of the Holy Ghost," which phrases would seem to imply a denial of sus Christ, Thy Son, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen. MATTINS. FIRST NOCTURN. Lessons from Ezek. i. 1 (p. 815.) SECOND NOCTURN. Fourth Lesson. The Lesson is taken from the Book on Ecclesiastical Writers, written by S. Jerome, Priest [at Bethlehem.] LUKE was a physician of Antioch, who, as appeareth from his writings, knew the Greek language. He was a follower of the Apostle Paul, and his fellow-traveller in all his wanderings. He wrote a Gospel, whereof the same Paul saith: "We have sent with him the brother, whose praise is in the Gospel throughout all the Churches" (2 Cor. viii. 18.) Of him, he writeth unto the Colossians, (iv. 14): "Luke, the beloved physician, greeteth you." And again, unto Timothy, (II. iv. 11): 66 Only Luke is with me.' He also published another excellent book intituled "The Acts of the Apostles," wherein the history is brought down to Paul's two-years sojourn at Rome, that is to say, until the fourth year of Nero, from which we gather that it was at Rome that the said book was composed. Fifth Lesson. THE silence of Luke is one of the reasons why we reckon among Apocryphal books "The Acts of Paul and Thekla," and the whole story about the baptism of Leo. For why should the fellow-traveller of the Apostle, who knew other things, be ignorant only of this? At the same time there is against these documents the statement of Tertullian, almost a contemporary writer, that the Apostle John convicted a certain Priest in Asia, who was a great admirer of the Apostle Paul, of having written them, and that the said Priest owned that he had been induced to compose them through his admiration for Paul, and that he was deposed in consequence. There are some persons who suspect that when Paul in his Epistles, useth the phrase, "According to my Gospel" (Rom. ii. 16, 2 Tim. ii. 8,) he meaneth the Gospel written by Luke. Sixth Lesson. HOWBEIT, Luke learned his Gospel not from the Apostle Paul only, who had not companied with the Lord in the flesh, but also from other Apostles, as himself declareth at the beginning of his work, where he saith: "They delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eye-witnesses and ministers of the word." (i. 2.) According to what he had heard, therefore, did he write his Gospel. As to the "Acts of the Apostles," he composed them from his own personal knowledge. He was never married. He lived eighty-four years. He is buried at Constantinople, whither his bones were brought from Achaia in the twentieth year of Constantine, together with the reliques of the Apostle Andrew. THIRD NOCTURN. Lessons from Luke x. 1, with the Homily of St. Gregory, (p. 816.) At Second Vespers a Commemoration is made of the following. Prayer from Lauds. OCTOBER 19. St. Peter of Alcántara, Confessor. Double. All from the Common Office for a Confessor not a Bishop, (p. 855,) except the following. MATTINS. The first verse of the Hymn is altered. FIRST NOCTURN. Lessons from Scripture according to the Season. the statement of St. Hippolytus that he was crucified at Elæa in the Peloponnesus. Perhaps the collect means to say that though it is not true that he suffered such a martyrdom physically, yet he suffered a life-long martyrdom in intention and in endurance of hardships, making true of him what St. Paul says of himself in 2 Cor. iv. 10. PETER SECOND NOCTURN. Fourth Lesson. In was born at Alcántara [a small town in the Province of Estramadura] in Spain [in the year of our Lord 1499.] His father, [Alphonso Garavito, was a lawyer and Governor of the town,] and his mother [was] of good extraction. The holiness of his life was foreshadowed from his earliest years. the sixteenth year of his age, he entered the Order of Friars Minors, wherein he showed himself a pattern to all. He undertook the work of preaching in obedience to his Superiors, and thereby brought many to turn away from sin to true repentance. He conceived a great desire to bring back the observance of the Rule of S. Francis to the uttermost straitness of old times, and to that end, supported by God's help, and armed with the approval of the Apostolic See, he founded [in the year 1555] a new stern and poor house near Pedraso, from which the harder way of life, therein happily begun, spread marvellously through divers Provinces of Spain even to the Indies. He was an helper to holy Theresa, with whom he was like-minded, in bringing about the Reformation of the Carmelites. She was taught of God that no one should ask anything in the name of Peter without being heard, and was used to ask him to pray for her, and to call him a Saint while as he was yet alive. fain to run from his cell into the open air to cool himself. Sixth Lesson. was marvellous how his thoughts became altogether rapt in God, so that somewhiles it befell that he neither ate nor drank for the space of several days. He was oftentimes seen to rise into the air, shining with an unearthly glory. He passed dry-shod over torrents. When his brethren were in the last state of need, he fed them with food from heaven. A staff which he fixed in the earth grew presently into a green fig-tree. Once while he was travelling by night in the midst of an heavy snow-storm, and took refuge in a ruined and roofless house, then the falling snow made a roof over him lest he should be overwhelmed. Holy Theresa beareth witness that he had the gift of prophecy and of the discerning of spirits. At length, in the 63rd year of his own age, [and of salvation 1562,] at the hour which he had himself foretold, [upon the 18th day of October,] he passed away to be for ever with the Lord, cheered in his last moments by a wonderful vision and by the presence of Saints. At the instant of his death, blessed Theresa, then afar off, saw him carried to heaven. He appeared to her afterwards, and said: “O what happy penance, to have won for me such glory!" After his death he became famous for very many miracles, and Clement IX. inscribed his name among those of the Saints. THIRD NOCTURN. Lessons from Luke xii. 32, with the Homily of the Venerable Bede, (p. 866.) LAUDS. Prayer throughout the Office. GOD, Who hast been pleased to set before us in Thy blessed Confessor Peter a wondrous ensample of penance and of a mind unfathomably rapt in Thee, let, we beseech Thee, the same Thy servant pray for us, and him do Thou accept, that we may so die unto earthly things, as to take lively hold on heavenly things. Through our Lord JESUS Christ, Thy Son, Who liveth and FEAST-DAYS IN OCTOBER. reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen. Vespers are of the following from the Chapter inclusive. OCTOBER 20. St. John of Kenty, Confessor. SUS Christ Thy Son, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen. A Commemoration is made of St. Peter of Alcántara. Prayer from his Office. THY MATTINS. Hymn. 'HY body with long fastings worn; Thy flesh with cruel scourgings torn; 'Twas thine to live, O blessed Saint, A most unspotted penitent. Oh, may we follow after thee, Thou to the poor in winter's snow O thou, who nothing didst deny FIRST NOCTURN. Lessons from Scripture according to the Season. SECOND NOCTURN. Fourth Lesson. THIS John was the son of godly and respectable parents named Stanislaus and Anne, and was born [in the year of our LORD 1397,] in the town of Kenty, a place in the diocese of Crakow in Poland, from which he took the Latin name of Cantius. By his gentleness, innocency, and seriousness he gave great hopes even from his childhood. He studied Philosophy and Theology in the University of Crakow, wherein he rose step by step to be a Professor and teacher of those sciences wherein he lectured many years, not only enlightening the minds of his hearers, but stirring up in them all godliness, instructing them by ensample as well as by word. Having taken Priests' orders, he ceased not to busy 1 Translation by the late Rev. E. Caswall. THE PROPER OFFICE OF THE SAINTS. himself with letters, but added thereto Priest at Ilkusi, but after a while gave WHA Fifth Lesson. [AT time was left him over from his work, he gave up partly to the profit of his neighbour, more especially in preaching, and partly to prayer, wherein he is said sometimes to have had heavenly visions and messages. The sufferings of Christ took such hold upon him, that he sometimes passed whole nights without sleep in thinking thereon, and that he might more keenly realize them, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. There he was seized with such a passionate longing to be a martyr, that he preached Christ crucified even to the Turks. He went four times to Rome to the thresholds of the Apostles, on foot, and laden with a wallet, partly to do honour to the Apostolic See, for which he had a great reverence, and partly (to use his own expression) that he might clear off the pains of his own purgatory by use of the Pardons for sin which are there daily offered. In one of these journeys he was set upon by highway robbers, who plundered him, and having asked him if he had any more, whereto he answered, Nay, left him and fled. Then he remembered that he had some gold pieces sewn up in his clothes. So he ran after the robbers with shouts, and offered them these also, but they were amazed at the simplicity and charity of the holy man, that they gave him back even that which they had already taken. To hinder scandal-mongering, he wrote up upon the walls, after the ensample of holy Austin, certain texts, to be an unceasing warning to himself and others. He gave his own bread to the hungry, and clothed the naked, not with bought raiment only, but by stripping himself of his own garments and 80 shoes, himself meanwhile letting down his own cloak to trail upon the ground, lest any should see that he returned home barefoot. Sixth Lesson. HE slept very little, and that upon the ground; his clothing was enough only to clothe his nakedness, and his food to keep him alive. He kept his virgin purity guarded like a lily among thorns by rough hair-cloth, scourging, and fasting. For about thirtyfive years before his death he never tasted flesh-meat. At length, when he was full of days and good works, he felt that death was near, and made himself ready to meet it by a long and careful preparation, and to be the freer, he gave to the poor everything that was left in his house. Strengthened by the Sacraments of the Church, and "having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ," he took flight to heaven upon the 24th day of December, [in the year of our Lord 1473.] He was famous for miracles both before and after his death. His body was carried into the University Church of St. Anne, hard by his dwelling, and there honourably buried. The popular reverence and the crowds around his sepulchre grew greater day by day, till he hath come to be held in honour as one of the chiefest holy defenders of Poland and Lithuania. At the glory of more wonders, Pope Clement XIII., upon the 16th day of July, in the year 1767, with solemn pomp, enrolled his name among those of the Saints. THIRD NOCTURN. Lessons from Luke xii. 35, with the 1 Translation by the late Rev. E. Caswall. |