Chapter LIV: Conclusion (3)

Crossing the bridge that leads from the station, and walking along the opposite bank beneath the long arms of the umbrageous plane-trees for five minutes, we turned to the left, and, going up a short street, found ourselves directly beneath the overhanging cliff, which is tapestried with vines and the delicate fronds of the maiden-hair, kept green and fresh by little cascades of clear water that come trickling down the rocks with a pleasant murmur, glittering like the facets of a thousand jewels in the bright morning sun. Here is the Holy Cave, though no longer open on the side of the valley, towards which turn with interest so many hearts from the ends of the earth. We passed beneath the church walls, with its long line of sculptured saints, of rather coarse workmanship in the Renaissance style, but producing a striking effect from the valley below. One more turn to the left up a steep path, and we were on the terrace leading to the entrance. A statue of St. Ignatius is over the door. One always recognizes his striking physiognomy, with the noble dome of solemn thought that crowns it, and we saluted it with reverence and love, as we had done in many a strange land, as a symbol of the paternal kindness we had met with from the order to which he has bequeathed his spirit.

The church consists of a single aisle, with four small chapels on each side, and a latticed gallery above for the inmates of the residence. There is nothing remarkable about it, and, in fact, it was never completed according to the original plan, owing to the suppression of the order in Spain. Seeing an open door on the gospel side of the sanctuary, we went directly towards it and found ourselves in a long, narrow passage lined with portraits of the Jesuit saints, and, at the further end, a doorway secured by a strong iron grating, above which is graven:

SANTA CUEVA.

Finding the grating ajar, we pushed it back, and, descending three stone steps, found ourselves in the Holy Cave. It is long and narrow, being about thirty feet in length, seven in width, and about the same in height. A small octagon window is cut through the wall that closes the original entrance, and there is a feeble lamp hanging before the altar, but neither gives light enough to disperse the gloom, and, as there was no one in the cave, it was as silent and impressive as a tomb. You could only hear the pleasant rippling of the water over the rocks without. The pavement is the solid rock, and the upper part of the cave is in its rough state, but the lower part of the walls is faced with marble, and jasper, and a series of bas-reliefs that tell the history of the saint. An inscription on the wall says:

“In this place, in the year 1522, St. Ignatius composed the book of _Exercises_, the first written in the Society of Jesus, which has been approved by a bull from his Holiness Paul III.”

At the right, as you enter, is a projection, or shelf, in the wall, on which the _Spiritual Exercises_ were written, and there is a cross hollowed in the rock where the saint used to trace the holy sign before beginning to write. One’s first impulse is to kiss the ground where his holy feet once stood, and pray where he so often prayed. St. Ignatius said he learned more in one short hour of prayer in the cave of Manresa than all the doctors in the world could have taught him. Here, like St. Jerome, trembling before the judgments of God, he used to smite his breast with a hard stone. Here he wept over the sufferings of Christ, with whose bodily Presence he was often favored, as well as the presence of the angels and their Queen. “Flow fast, my tears,” wrote he in this very place, “break forth, my heart, in bitter sighs, that I may weep worthily over the sorrows of my Saviour! O Jesus! may I die before I cease to have a horror of sin. God liveth, in whose sight I stand; for while there is breath in me, and the spirit of life in my nostrils, my lips shall not give utterance nor my heart consent to iniquity.”[200]

A phalanx from his right hand is preserved here in a crystal reliquary, set in gold and jewels, on which is graven the Scriptural exclamation of Pope Paul III. after reading the Constitutions of St. Ignatius:

Digitus Dei est hic. Paulus III.

—The finger of God is here!...

Over the altar is a large bas-relief of the saint, kneeling before a cross in the Holy Cave and gazing up at the Virgin, who, enthroned on a cloud, is dictating to him the _Spiritual Exercises_, according to the constant local tradition. This relief is framed in black marble with white mouldings, and on each side are angels of white marble playing on musical instruments. These, as well as the other sculptures, were done by Francisco Grau, a Manresan artist of local celebrity. Among the others is one in which St. Ignatius, arrayed like the Spanish _caballero_ he was, with sword in hand, is keeping his vigil before the altar of Our Lady of Montserrat. In the next he is giving his rich garments to a beggar, coming down from the mount. Beyond is the miracle of the Pozo, of which we shall speak further on, and many such.

There were, at the time of our visit, four Jesuit Fathers in the adjoining _Casa_, and a daily service was held in the Santa Cueva. Many indulgences are attached to the place, on the usual conditions, granted by Pope Gregory XV. and other pontiffs. The cave, of course, was regarded from the time of St. Ignatius as a place singularly favored by Heaven. In his day it belonged to Don Fernando Roviralta, a great friend of the saint. He lived to be over a hundred years of age, and at his death he bequeathed it to his nephew, Don Mauricio Cardona, who sold it January 27, 1602, to the Marquesa de Ailona, who in the following year gave it to the Jesuits. As soon as it fell into their possession means were used to ornament it, and in the course of time a _Casa de retiro_ was built adjoining, with a church intended to be one of the finest in Catalonia. The Countess of Fuentes, a native of Manresa, gave one thousand escudos to ornament the Holy Cave. Don Pedro Osorio, commissary-general of Lombardy, came here on foot from Barcelona when seventy years of age, and presented eight thousand escudos for the same purpose. And finally the crown took it under its protection, and Philip V. gave it a valuable chalice on which were graven the royal arms. Not only Don John of Austria, but several of the kings of Spain, came here to visit a place of historic as well as religious interest, for the mysterious influences that have gone out of this Holy Cave have been a power in the world. The public documents of Manresa show the devotion of the Christian world to have been such that some days in the year 1606 there were more than a thousand visitors, many of whom came from a distance. They used to carry away with them pieces of the Holy Cave, which they preserved as relics. A fragment was sent to Queen Margaret of Austria, who had it set in gold surrounded by rubies and diamonds, and wore it on festivals of great solemnity.

When St. Ignatius came to Manresa there were only about a thousand families in the place, it having been reduced by wars and pestilence to one-fourth its former size. It is said that he stopped at the bridge leading to the city to pray at the chapel of Nuestra Señora de la Guia—Our Lady of Guidance—and was there supernaturally directed to the cave. It was then surrounded by shrubs and brambles, and was almost inaccessible. Though so near the city, it seemed retired, for it lay towards the broad valley, and was shaded by thorn-bushes and the cistus, which gave it an aspect of solitude. The pavement was uneven, and it was much smaller than at the present day. The birds of the air made it their home, and water trickled down the walls. The first thing the saint did was to prostrate himself on the ground and kiss it, then, with a sharp stone, trace a cross on the wall, still to be seen.

From the windows of the passage now leading to the Santa Cueva is the same landscape St. Ignatius had before him from the mouth of the cave; only in his day the country was wilder, and therefore more beautiful, if possible, and there were no factories, no railway, in the valley to disturb the peaceful solitude. It is certainly a landscape of surpassing beauty, and we could imagine his exaltation of soul in gazing at it; for St. Ignatius had the soul of a poet and was a great admirer of nature. He loved to walk in the meadows and gardens, to observe the form, color, and odor of flowers; and from time to time, when at Rome, used to go forth on his balcony to look at the starry heavens, as if to refresh his soul.

Directly beneath the cliff is the swift-gliding stream, and, beyond it, a hill crowned with the tower of Santa Catalina, then dark with sombre pines and gigantic oaks, but now descending in gentle terraces covered with the silvery olive. At the left opens the smiling valley of the Llobregat, covered with perpetual verdure, once called the Valle del Paraiso—the Vale of Paradise—and in the distance, against the bluest of heavens, rise the marvellous pinnacles of Montserrat, the sacred mountain of Spain.

Over the present entrance to the Holy Cave is an ancient stone crucifix, once part of the famous Cruz del Tort, at which St. Ignatius so often went to pray. On the eve of his festival, 1627, the Christ was seen, to the astonishment of every one present at Vespers, to exude blood, first from the side, then from the hands and feet, and finally from the thorn-crowned head. We went to visit the cross from which it was removed for preservation. On leaving the Santa Cueva we kept on, up the side of the hill, by a circuitous road the saint must often have trod, then towards the east by an old narrow street. We passed a crucifix in a niche, with red curtains before it, and a hanging lamp. Just beyond came several peasants with scarlet Catalan caps, broad purple sashes, blue trowsers, black velvet jackets, and alpargatas laced with wide blue tape across their white stockings. They were driving mules that looked as gay as their owners, with their heads streaming with bright tassels and alive with tinkling bells. We soon came to a house on which was a fresco representing the Virgin appearing to St. Ignatius. Just opposite this was a terrace on the edge of the hill, where stood the Cruz del Tort, a lofty stone cross with several stone steps around the base. It was on these steps that St. Ignatius, while praying here one day, as he was accustomed to do, and shedding floods of tears, had the mystery of the Holy Trinity made clear to him by some vision which he compares to three keys of a musical instrument. His eyes were opened to a new sense of divine things. His doubts fell off like a garment. His whole nature seemed changed, and he felt ready, if need were, to die for what was here made manifest to him. On the cross is this inscription:

Hic habvit St. Ignativs
Trinitatis visionem, 1522.

While we were saying a prayer at the foot of the cross a peasant woman, who was passing by, stopped to tell us how San Ignacio came here to do penance and had a vision of God. The terrace occupies an opening between the houses which frame an incomparable view over the valley of the Llobregat, with the solemn turrets of Montserrat in full sight. The tall gray cross against that golden sky, with the Vale of Paradise spread out at the foot, is certainly one of the most ravishing views it is possible to conceive. Steps descend from the cross, winding a little way down the side of the cliff, which is covered with ivy, to a pretty fountain fed by clear water bubbling from the rocks.

Turning back from the Cruz del Tort, and passing through the suburbs, we soon came into the city among streets that looked centuries old. We passed San Antonio in a niche, and soon came to a small Plaza with a painting of St. Dominic at the corner, and in the centre a stone obelisk with a long inscription, of which we give a literal translation:

“To Ignatius de Loyola, son of Beltran, a native of Cantabria,
the founder of the Society of Jesus, who, in his thirtieth
year, while valiantly fighting in defence of his country, was
dangerously wounded, but being cured by the special mercy of
God, and inspired with an ardent desire to visit the holy
places at Jerusalem, after making a vow of chastity, set forth
on the way, and, laying aside his military ensigns in the
temple of Mary, the Mother of God, at Montserrat, clothed
himself in sackcloth, and in this state of destitution came to
this place, where with fastings and prayers he wept over his
past offences, and avenged them like a fresh soldier of Christ.
In order to perpetuate the memory of his heroic acts, for the
glory of Christ and the honor of the Society, Juan Bautista
Cardona, a native of Valencia, bishop of Vich, and appointed to
the see of Tortosa, out of great devotion to the said father
and his order, dedicates this stone to him as a most holy man
to whom the whole Christian world is greatly indebted, Sixtus
V. being pope, and Philip II. the great and Catholic king of
Spain.”

On another side is the following:

“This monument, having been overthrown during a time of
calamity, has been restored and commended to posterity by the
most noble ayuntamiento of the city of Manresa, out of
ineffaceable love, Pius V. being Sovereign Pontiff, Carlos IV.
king, and Ignacio de la Justicia governor of the city. 1799.”

Bishop Cardona, the first to set up this monument, was an able writer of the golden age of Spanish literature, and a man of such vast knowledge that he was employed by Philip II. in the formation of the royal library at the Escorial. He was a great admirer of St. Ignatius, and left an inedited manuscript, now in the National Library, entitled _Laus St. Ignatii_.

While we were standing before this obelisk we were agreeably convinced that, notwithstanding all the ravages of pestilence and the massacres of the French, the good and loyal city was in no danger of being depopulated; for the doors of a large edifice on one side of the square opened, and forth came a swarm of boys that could not have been equalled, it seemed to us, since the famous crusade of children in the thirteenth century. They came from a school in what was once the Jesuits’ college, built out of the ancient hospital of Santa Lucia, where St. Ignatius used to minister to the sick, and sometimes seek shelter himself. This was what we were in search of. Connected with the college is the modern church of St. Ignatius, and from one side of the nave you enter the old church of the hospital, which has been carefully preserved. Here we found the Capilla del Rapto, a small square chapel, opening into the aisle and covered with frescos. It is so called because it was here St. Ignatius lay rapt in ecstasy from the hour of complines on the eve of Passion Sunday till the same hour on the following Saturday. It was during this wonderful withdrawal into the spiritual world that the foundation of the Society of Jesus was revealed to him, as is stated in an inscription on the wall. For more than two centuries a solemn octave has been annually celebrated here in commemoration of this divine ecstasy. Beneath the simple altar lies the saint in effigy, wearing the coarse robe which made the _gamins_ of that day call him _El Saco_, or Old Sackcloth, till they found out he was a saint. Over the altar is a painting of the Rapto, in which, unable to endure the vision of Christ Glorified with mortal eyes, St. Ignatius is mercifully rapt in ecstasy. Angels bend around him, holding the banner of the Holy Name that has become the watchword of the Society. _In hoc vocabitur tibi nomen._ On one side of the chapel he is represented catechising the children, and on the other he stands in his penitential garments, exhorting the patients of the hospital, while some lord, doubtless Don Andrés de Amigant, is kneeling to him in reverence.

The original pavement of stone is covered with a wooden floor to preserve it, but a brass plate, on which is inscribed the name of Jesus, is raised to show the spot where the saint’s head lay in his ecstasy. The stone is worn with kisses, and has been partly cut away by pilgrims. Behind the chapel is the room where he used to teach children the catechism, and there is the same old stone stoup for holy-water that was used in his day. Here, too, is an inscription:

Serviendo en este Hospital
Ignacio a gloria Divina,
Enseñaba la Doctrina
En las piedras de este umbral.

A few months after his arrival at Manresa St. Ignatius fell ill and was taken to this hospital among the poor with whom he now identified himself. But Don Andrés de Amigant, a nobleman of the place, soon had him removed to his own house, where he and his wife nursed him till he recovered. It was a pious custom of theirs to take two patients from the hospital every year, and tend them as if our Saviour in person. For this Don Andrés was styled “Simon the Leper” by the wits of Manresa, and Doña Iñés, his wife, was called Martha. This admirable charity had been practised in the family nearly two hundred years. It appears by a MS. in possession of the Marquis de Palmerola, its present representative, that a remote ancestor of his, Gaspar de Amigant, introduced the practice into his family in 1364, out of devotion. He added two rooms to his house, where he kept two poor patients, providing every remedy and means of subsistence, and, as soon as they recovered, diligently sought out others to supply their places, that, as he said, so religious an exercise might never be wanting in his family. How faithful his descendants were to so holy a practice appears from the statement that Juan de Amigant in 1478, having, “according to his custom,” received a woman named Ignès Buxona into his house, she bequeathed to him when she died, having no relations, the patronage of the benefice of San Francisco in the Seo of Manresa.

Many traditions concerning St. Ignatius have been preserved in this pious family. A cross has been recently discovered on the wall of the chapel of _S. Ignacio enfermo_ during some repairs, similar to that in the Santa Cueva. And there is a curious old family painting commemorating his illness in the house. The convalescent saint is represented sitting up in bed, supported by the left hand of Don Andrés, who with his right offers him a cup of broth. Behind are Doña Angela, his mother, Doña Iñés, his wife, and all the other members of the household, each one with some restoring dish in hand. In front of the bed is the inscription:

Stvs
Ignativs
de Loyola
lang
vens

—that is, St. Ignatius ill.

At the foot of the bed is another:

Hæc omnia evenervnt 22 Ivlii anno 1522.

—All these things took place July 22, 1522. His illness, by this, appears to have occurred about four months after his arrival at Manresa.

The honor of having St. Ignatius was disputed by many noble families of the place. In the _patio_ of one of the houses he sometimes visited, in the street called Sobreroca, is a picture of him, now indulgenced by the diocesan authority.

The college of St. Ignatius was founded in 1603. The ayuntamiento of Manresa, touched by a discourse during the Lent of 1601 at the Seo, purchased the ancient hospital of Santa Lucia, and established the Jesuits here soon after. The college became a flourishing institution, and they were before long able to build a new church and adorn the precious chapel of the Rapto.

When Carlos III. issued the decree for the expulsion of the Jesuits, April 3, 1767, the residence at Manresa was at first overlooked, and the fathers, as usual, celebrated the octave of the _Maravilloso Rapto_. On the very day it ended, April 11, the eve of Palm Sunday, at the same hour when St. Ignatius awoke from his mysterious trance, crying: “Ay Jesus! Ay Jesus!” the venerable fathers were seized and carried away amid the tears of the citizens to Tarragona, where they were put on a vessel of war, and, with nine hundred from Aragon, were transported to Ajaccio. The island of Corsica had on it at one time three thousand Jesuits who, for no crime, had been barbarously torn from their native land. Among them were the venerable Pignatelli and several who were eminent for letters. But on the 15th of August, 1769, Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio, who proved the scourge of Spain.

The churches of the Jesuits were dismantled and the temporalities sold. The vestments and sacred vessels were given to poor churches of the diocese, but even these were mostly sold afterwards to help to defray the expenses of the war of independence. The chalice of Philip V., given to the Santa Cueva, was, however, saved.

Manresa has the glory of having been the first city in Catalonia to sound the war-cry against Bonaparte, and by the battle of Bruch, in which a handful of men routed the French army, to convince Spain that the Great Captain’s troops were not invincible. After the French had captured Tortosa they came to Manresa, and the house of the Santa Cueva was turned into a barrack and the church into a stable. With the restoration of the Bourbons returned the Jesuits. At Manresa the people rang the bells, and went out to meet them with cries of _Viva la Compañia_! The mules were taken from their carriages, and men drew them to the Seo, where the clergy and people with tears of emotion chanted the _Te Deum_. On July 25, 1816, they were reinstated in their former places, the keys of the Santa Cueva were presented to them in a silver basket, and on the 31st of July the festival of St. Ignatius was celebrated with solemn pomp in the Seo, with a congratulatory discourse on the restoration of the society.

Manresa has always been a religious city, as is to be seen by the number of solidly-built churches and the remains of its monastic institutions. When St. Ignatius quitted the place it is said there was hardly a person left unconverted. And when he was canonized there was a general explosion of joy, exhibited in Spanish fashion by dances, comedies, Moorish fights, illuminations, fireworks, salvos of artillery, triumphal arches and bowers—all of which contrast strangely with the penitential life of the saint in his cave.

There is something very friendly and cordial about the people. Inquiring our way to the Seo of an old woman, she said as she pointed it out: “Go with God; may he preserve you from all ill.”

We went on through the steep, narrow streets, which are often hewn out of the rock. The houses show traces of war and violence, and would be gloomy but for the galleries and hanging gardens with flowers and orange-trees. The women were gossiping from balcony to balcony. The _plazas_ were lively with trade. Everywhere was an interesting picture of Spanish life. In one place we passed a group of women around a well, washing at a huge tank, beating their clothes with wooden paddles, all laughing, all talking, all looking up with a flash of wonderful expression in their brown faces.

The Seo is an immense Gothic edifice, the first stone of which was laid October 9, 1328, but the crypt is several centuries older. The nave is of enormous width, which gives it an air of grandeur, and there are some fine stained windows, though greatly injured by the French. It is gloomy, but, when lighted up for a solemn service, presents an imposing appearance. There are queer Saracens’ heads on the walls of the choir, and steps lead to one of those subterranean churches full of solemn gloom so favorable to meditation and solitary prayer.

Among the notable things to be seen at Manresa is the Pozo di Gallina, where took place what is called the _primer milagro_ of St. Ignatius. Tradition says, as he was crossing the principal street of the city, called Sobreroca, on his way from the Carmen to the hospital of Santa Lucia, he met a child crying for fear of her mother, because the hen she was carrying home had escaped and fallen into an old well close by. Touched by her grief, the saint paused a moment, as if in prayer, and, while he stood, the water in the well rose to the brim, bringing with it the hen, which with a smile he restored to the child and went on his way. An oratory was afterwards built here, and the healing virtues of the water—such is the power of charity—have often been experienced by the people of Manresa, as is testified by the inscription from the pen of the learned Padre Ramon Solá:

Disce, viator, amor quid sit quo Ignatius ardet
Testis aqua est, supplex hanc bibe, doctus abi.

S. Ignacio de Loyola
en el año del Señor de 1522
hizo aqui el primer milagro
sacando viva á flote hasta el
borde una gallina ya ahogada.

This favored hen naturally became an object of special care, and it seems to have become the ancestress of an illustrious breed which kings did not disdain to have set before them at table.

We can fancy this _gallina resucitada_ laying now and then an egg, as Hawthorne says of the Pyncheon hens, “not for any pleasure of her own, but that the world might not absolutely lose so admirable a breed.” Brillat-Savarin pretended that the redeeming merit of the Jesuits was the discovery and introduction of the turkey into Europe.[201] Had he only known of this race of hens, rendered meet for the palates of princes by their great founder, they might have had an additional title to his approbation. Father Prout, speaking of the Jesuits being accused of having a hand in every political disturbance for the last three hundred years, compares them to Mother Carey’s chickens, which always make their appearance in a storm, and, for this reason, give rise to a belief among sailors that it is the _fowl_ that has raised the tempest! How ominous, then, was this Spanish hen of Manresa! We could not find out whether there are any scions of this time-honored race still living in their ancestral coops, or whether they were all suppressed with the order as dangerous to the state; but we do know that six of the breed—three _pollos_ and three _pollas_—in a line direct from the famous hen, were, in the beginning of the year 1603 (the miracle of the Pozo, it must be remembered, took place in 1522), sent to her Catholic majesty, Queen Margaret of Austria, who received them with as many demonstrations of pleasure as would have been consistent with royal etiquette in Spain.

We trust no supposititious egg was ever smuggled into the nest of this illustrious _gallina_ to deteriorate the breed. Père Vanière, a learned French Jesuit of note in the last century, has described in an able Latin poem, part of which has been translated by Delille, the sorrows of a poor old hen when she found, for instance, that she had hatched a brood of ducks, which became the torment of her life by their inclination for water. As Hood has it:

“The thing was strange—a contradiction
It seemed of nature and her works,
For little chicks beyond conviction
To float without the aid of corks.”

Imagine, then, the woes of this maternal hen, in her new-fledged pride of race, should any Moorish or Guinea fowl taint her ennobled Spanish blood!

There is a hotel at Manresa, called the Chicken, of about the same stamp as the San Domingo, though Mr. Bayard Taylor, whose experience in such matters transcends ours, satisfied himself that, “although the Saint has altogether a better sound than the Chicken, the Chicken is really better than the Saint!”

It was one of St. Ignatius’ favorite devotions, while at Manresa, to visit the sanctuary of Our Lady of Viladordis, on the banks of the Llobregat, about three miles from the city. The last time he went there he gave his hempen girdle of three strands to the tenant of a neighboring farm-house who had often offered him hospitality, and assured him that as long as he and his posterity should continue to aid the poor they would never lack the means of a decent livelihood, and, though they might not attain great wealth, they would never be reduced to absolute poverty; which prophecy has been fulfilled to the present day, for the family still continues to exist. In this rural church a solemn jubilee is celebrated every year on Whitmonday in memory of St. Ignatius. Over the altar is a picture of the saint inscribed: “St. Ignatius, founder of the Jesuits, in the year 1522, the first of his conversion, frequented this church of Our Lady of Viladordis, and here received singular favors from Heaven, in memory of which this devout and grateful parish dedicates this portrait, Feb. 19, 1632.”

In 1860 Queen Isabella II., the great-granddaughter of Carlos III., came to Manresa, and, after visiting the Santa Cueva, expressed a wish to the city authorities that a monument so important in the religious history of Spain, and associated with the chief glory of Manresa, should be carefully preserved. This excited fresh interest. Spontaneous contributions from the _devotos de S. Ignacio_ flowed in for the restoration of the church and the ornamentation of the cave. To the former was transferred the miraculous image of Nuestra Señora de la Guia, before which St. Ignatius often used to pray. Pope Pius IX. conferred new indulgences on the Holy Cave, and its ancient glory had already revived when the revolution of September, 1868, broke out, overthrowing the royal government and compelling the Jesuits once more to take the road of exile. But the bishop of the diocese has watched over the cave, and it continues to be visited by pilgrims from all parts of the world.

A visit to the Santa Cueva marks an era in one’s life; for it is one of those places that produce an ineffaceable impression on the soul. Thank God! there are such places where the claims of a higher life assert themselves with irresistible force. Who that ever made a retreat with the _Spiritual Exercises_ in hand has not turned longingly to the Holy Cave in which they were written? Followed there, they seem to acquire new significance and authority. Wonderful book, that for three hundred years has on the one hand been regarded with admiration and love, and on the other been the object of distortion and abuse! Some have gone so far as to declare it a book of servilism and degradation; others, more happy, look upon it as an inexhaustible mine of wise directions in the practice of virtue. The sons of St. Ignatius have never ceased to meditate on the little volume which embodies the religious experience of their founder. They cherish it the more for giving them so large a draught in the chalice of ignominy, and they carry it with them through the wilderness of this world, as the children of Israel did the ark, to ensure their happy progress in the spiritual life. Pope Paul III., in his bull _Pastoralis Officii_, says: “Out of our apostolic authority and certain knowledge, we approve, we praise, we confirm by this document these teachings and these spiritual exercises, exhorting in the Lord, with all our might, the faithful of both sexes, one and all, to make use of these _Exercises_, so full of piety, and to follow their salutary directions.”

Manresa may well be proud of her Holy Cave, for it was here the great soul of St. Ignatius was tempered for his vast undertakings. But he did not indulge in any spiritual dalliance. His work once planned, he went boldly forth to achieve it.

“Forth to his task the giant sped;
Earth shook abroad beneath his tread,
And idols were laid low.

“India repaired half Europe’s loss;
O’er a new hemisphere the cross
Shone in the azure sky,
And, from the isles of far Japan
To the broad Andes, won o’er man
A bloodless victory!”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE MIRACLE OF SEPTEMBER 16, 1877.

ABRIDGED FROM THE FRENCH OF M. HENRI LASSERRE.

In the month of August, 1874, Canon Martignon, previously _curé-archiprêtre_ of Algiers, arrived at Lourdes. He was a man of about forty years of age, and while in Africa had been attacked by an affection of the chest which entirely deprived him of the use of his voice; he had therefore crossed the Mediterranean to seek healing in the city of Mary.

At the rocks of Massabielle he prayed, drank of the miraculous font, and bathed in the piscina, but without obtaining the cure he sought.

Not disheartened, he resolved to make a novena. This, too, was unaccompanied by any change for the better.

“Well, then,” he said, “I will make a novena of weeks.” And he took up his abode at Lourdes for sixty-three days.

On the sixty-fourth day, finding himself in absolutely the same state, he left for Pau, to seek a temporary alleviation in the mildness of its climate. But soon reproaching himself for having quitted Lourdes, and regarding his having done so as an act of weakness and a want of faith, and, moreover, possessing in the depth of his heart a conviction that sooner or later the Blessed Virgin would grant his prayer, he returned to the sacred grotto and took up his abode in the town.

An invalid, he constituted himself the guide and guardian of the sick and suffering. Pilgrims who of late years may have spent any time at Lourdes will recollect having seen there a priest, still young, with a long, light beard, a distinguished countenance, with a bright earnestness and sweetness in the expression of the eyes; a tall, slight figure, the chest somewhat narrowed and the shoulders bent by suffering—a priest who led the blind, assisted the lame and infirm, to the piscina, and spent the whisper of his failing voice in cheering and consoling the afflicted. This was the Abbé Martignon.

“If Our Blessed Lady does not cure me this time,” he would say, smiling, “I have made up my mind for a novena of years, then a novena of centuries; and after that I will stop.”

He had the joy of seeing several of the sick of whom he had been the guide and stay miraculously cured; but he himself, though experiencing at times some slight alleviation, did not obtain the complete recovery he sought.

Did he at last feel that there was some secret resistance on the part of the Blessed Virgin to grant the favor he solicited? We do not know; but it seemed to us that, while his faith continued the same and his charity ever on the increase, the virtue of hope was with him gradually turning into that of resignation—or, to speak more accurately, that he was _postponing_ his hope. Happy to remain in this corner of the earth, on which the feet of the Queen of Heaven had rested, and to pray daily at the sacred grotto, he did not begin the novena of years and of centuries of which he had smilingly spoken.

“I stay here,” he would say, “at the disposal of Our Lady of Lourdes, like a person sitting in an ante-chamber waiting for an audience. She will hear me when she pleases. My turn will come; I shall have my hour or minute, and will take care not to let it escape me.”

For this hour and this minute he waited three years. Then, a few months ago, he felt an impulse within him urging him to knock again at the heavenly gate. He resolved to make a novena which should end on the Feast of Our Lady of the Seven Dolors. He had not observed that, this being a movable feast, the first day of the novena would this year (1877) coincide with the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin,[202] and that his prayer would thus go, as it were, from the birth of Mary to the last sigh of Jesus—from the cradle of the Mother to the sepulchre of her Son.

Had the Abbé Martignon been cured he would have returned to Algeria; and we imagine that if at first the Blessed Virgin refused his request, it was because she had no intention of so soon granting leave of departure to such a servant. Neither God nor his priest were losing anything by this refusal. When such and such a temporal blessing—that is to say, the copper coin—is denied to our prayers, it is because the gold and the rich increase are being laid up in store for us, either in this world or the world to come. Besides, a new mission had been imposed on the ardent zeal and charity of the Abbé Martignon: one which flowed naturally from the function to which he devoted himself of consoling the afflicted.

From the commencement of his sojourn at Lourdes he had found a man more suffering than the sick and more tried than the ordinarily afflicted, and to him also he had ministered aid and support. He to whom we allude—the Abbé Peyramale—had had the signal honor of receiving a message from heaven, and of accomplishing, in spite of every obstacle, the divine command. But the Blessed Virgin, doubtless reserving for him a higher place, had said: “I will show him how much he must suffer for love of me”; and the most unlooked-for troubles had been sent to torture his heroic heart.

By a strange contrast he was at the same time on Calvary and on Thabor. While his name was celebrated throughout Christendom, while he was blessed by the people whose beloved father and patriarch he was, he had also, especially during these latter times, the bitter pain of being misjudged, forsaken, and obstinately persecuted in that matter which he had most at heart—in his zeal for the Lord’s house. Like the Cyrenian, he was the man bearing the cross, and his robust shoulders were bruised and bleeding beneath the sacred burden, while around his sufferings, as around those of his Master, many shook their heads, saying: “He has been the instrument of Mary; let her now help and deliver him!”

When, at the time of the apparitions, now nearly twenty years ago, he had asked Our Lady to make roses bloom in the time of snow, she, who was in that same place to work so many miracles, refused this one, and to the priest whom she had chosen replied by the austere word, “_Penance_.” The illustrious Abbé Peyramale, the priest of the Immaculate Conception, had thus been condemned to suffer. It was he of whom, for some years, the Abbé Martignon was the filial comforter and the friend of every hour.

It is not our purpose here to dwell on the sorrows beneath the weight of which sank the venerable curé of Lourdes; we would only call to mind that, when the basilica of the grotto was completed and enriched with the gifts of all the world—the basilica which was to be the point of arrival for the processions commanded by Our Lady—he undertook to rebuild the parish church, which ought to be their point of departure.

He died at his work, without having been able to complete it, and having more than once announced his death as a sort of necessity—a last sacrifice on his part in the interest of the house of God.

The unfinished church had stopped at the height of the arches. Aid on which he had been led to rely had failed him, and his efforts had been impeded by inconceivable hostilities.

“I shall not enter the promised land,” he would say; “I shall only see it afar off. _I must die to repair the ruin._ When I am here no more, all difficulties will be smoothed. My death will pay all”—sorrowful words, which brought tears to his eyes and to the eyes of those who loved him! We ourselves had the sad consolation of being present at his departure. God chose the Feast of the Nativity of Our Blessed Lady to open the gates of eternity to her faithful servant.

Around the death-bed of Mgr. Peyramale were his brother and other relations, his _vicaires_, friends, and those of his flock who had been able to penetrate into his room. Among this tearful family was the Abbé Martignon, broken down with grief, and scarcely thinking of himself, his malady, or his cure, or yet of his novena to Our Lady of the Seven Dolors, which, by a curious coincidence, was to begin that same day.

Mgr. Peyramale, after a long agony, had just rendered his last sigh to earth and his immortal soul to God. In that hour of grief and desolation his friend, while raising his heart to her who is the _Consolatrix Afflictorum_, recollected his promised novena.

What was passing in his mind? Kneeling by that bed and holding in his the lifeless hands of the curé of Lourdes, he remained for some time bowed down in silence. Then, rising, he said to some of those present: “I have just said the first prayer of my novena to Our Lady of Sorrows, and made my request for a cure, in presence of these holy remains; and I conjure Our Lady of Lourdes to permit that in her own name, and _on the ninth day_, our friend may himself transmit to me the answer”; adding: “The choice God has made of the 8th of September to call to himself the Priest of the Apparitions sufficiently authorizes me to associate his first remembrance (_souvenir_) with my humble supplication.”

Side by side with a great sorrow a great hope from this moment entered in and possessed the heart of the sick priest. The thought of recovery did not, assuredly, lessen his grief for the loss of his friend; but seeing himself henceforth alone in France, it was a happiness to him to know that his protector was in heaven, and that it would be doubtless owing to the intervention of that friend, next to that of God and Our Blessed Lady, that he should receive the favor so long solicited.

He spoke of this with conviction. It seemed to him that, with such an intercessor, the Blessed Virgin would, _on the ninth day_, put herself in some sort at the disposal of his prayer. He even wrote to Paris, to the Rev. Père Picard of the Assumption, to tell him of his hope. Already he spoke of what he would do when he was cured, and how he would employ himself in furthering the unfinished work of the curé of Lourdes. He prayed with fervor; friends joined him in his novena; and thus the time went on until Saturday, the 15th of September—the eve of _the ninth day_.

On this Saturday, in the morning, he received a telegram to tell him that M. and Mme. Guerrier were on their way to Lourdes, and to ask if he would kindly meet them at the station with a carriage.

M. and Mme. Guerrier were utterly unknown to him. A letter only, which he had received from the curé of St. Gobain twenty-four hours before the telegram, informed him that Mme. Guerrier had for several years been suffering from a very serious illness, and was starting for Lourdes to seek a cure, full of faith that it would be granted. This lady and her husband were earnestly recommended to the Abbé Martignon, as this was their first visit to the city of the Blessed Virgin.

The canon gladly undertook this act of charity, and went to the station in good time to meet the three o’clock train. Leaving him for a time occupied with his Breviary in the waiting-room, we will relate by what series of circumstances M. and Mme. Guerrier were brought to Lourdes on that day.

M. Edouard Guerrier, judge of the peace at Beaune, married, about fifteen years ago, Mlle. Justine Biver, a religious and excellent lady. Her father was a distinguished physician, and her two brothers occupied high commercial positions, one being general director of the Company of St. Gobain, and the other director of the celebrated glass manufactories of St. Gobain and Chauny.

God had blessed this union with three children, healthy and intelligent, to whose training and education their mother devoted herself, bringing them up especially in the love of God and of the poor.

Thus passed eleven years of unbroken happiness. In 1874, however, a dark cloud suddenly over-shadowed this clear sky. The health of Mme. Guerrier broke down rapidly, and violent headaches, frequent faintings, and increasing weakness were succeeded by a general state of paralysis, which seized successively several important organs of the frame. The spine and lower limbs became powerless, and the sight dim and enfeebled. The sufferer was unable to sit up in bed, and obliged to remain always lying down. Finally the lower limbs became not only incapable of movement but insensible to pain, so that, if pinched or pricked, they remained without feeling. During the long fits of fainting it often seemed as if life must become extinct. Death was knocking at the door, and mourning had already entered the home lately so bright with happiness.

Unable to continue the education of her children, the poor mother could only assist them in their religious duties. Night and morning they knelt at her bedside, adding to their prayers an earnest petition for her recovery.

In this state Mme. Guerrier had continued about two years, when Alice, her eldest girl, was about to make her First Communion, on April 2, 1876. This great day constantly occupied the thoughts of this Christian mother. She thought of it for her child, and also a little for herself. It seemed to her as if, in coming to take possession of this young heart, the compassionate Saviour would surely bring some relief to her own great needs, and leave in the house some royal token of his visit and sojourn there. Had he not, on entering the house of Simon Peter, healed the sick mother-in-law, enabling her to rise and serve him?

“I am certain of it,” she said. “On that day I shall get up and walk.”

Alice made her First Communion on the appointed day; and in the evening the priest who had prepared her, and a few members of the family, were assembled at dinner. No change, however, had taken place in the state of the sick lady, and her place was remaining empty, as for so many months past, when, at the moment the party were about to sit down to table, suddenly recovering her lost powers, she rose, dressed, and came to take her place amid her family circle. Her sight was clear, the spine had recovered its strength, and she walked and moved with the same ease as before her illness.

The priest intoned a hymn of thanksgiving, all present answering. Every one felt that He who that morning had given himself in the divine Banquet was invisibly present at the family feast. During the night Mme. Guerrier’s sleep was calm and profound; but in the morning, when she attempted to rise, her limbs refused their service, having fallen back into their helpless state. Was it, then, a dream or an illusion? Was it an effect of the nerves, the imagination, or the will?

The day of her daughter’s First Communion He would not disappoint the mother’s hope and faith.... But afterwards he willed her to understand that, for purposes known to him alone, she was still to bear the weight of her trial. The intolerable headaches returned no more, the faintings ceased, and the sight remained clear and distinct. From this day the resignation of Mme. Guerrier, already very great, became greater still. Her soul as well as her body had received grace from on high. The dimness of vision which had hidden from her the faces of her husband and children had disappeared before the breath of Heaven, and, although she remained infirm and always stretched upon her bed, she was filled with thankfulness and joy. From the beginning of her illness she had never seen her aged parents. She lived at Beaune, in the Côte d’Or, and they at St. Gobain, in the department of Aisne, one hundred and forty leagues away, and, Dr. Biver being then in his eighty-second year, any journey was a difficulty to him. His daughter longed to see him once more, and from April to September this longing continued to increase. In vain the exceeding risk as well as difficulty of travelling in her state was represented to her; she at last persuaded her husband to consent to the imprudent undertaking upon which she had set her heart.

As the physicians had foreseen, the journey very seriously aggravated Mme. Guerrier’s sufferings, which increased to such a degree that, even after some weeks of repose, it was impossible for her to attempt to return to Beaune. The slightest movement often brought on an alarming crisis.

The consequence of such a state, under existing circumstances, was nothing less than the breaking up of the family. The husband, on account of his duties as judge of the peace, was compelled to reside at Beaune, while the condition of his wife rendered it impossible for her to quit St. Gobain. She had asked to have her children with her, and thus, between every two audiences, when possible, M. Guerrier took a journey of one hundred and forty leagues and back, in order to spend a few days with those who made all the happiness of his life.

Nearly a year passed in this way. A moment of improvement was constantly watched for which might permit Mme. Guerrier to travel; but this moment was waited for in vain. On the contrary, the paralysis was beginning to affect the left arm, and the thought of her journey thither made that of the homeward one very alarming.

Last August, M. Guerrier being at St. Gobain in the same painful state of hope deferred, his wife astonished him by saying: “My dear, I wish to make a pilgrimage to Lourdes. I shall be cured there. You must take me.”

M. Guerrier, seriously alarmed at this proposal, energetically withstood an idea which he believed could not be acted upon without a fatal result.

“My dear wife, you are asking impossibilities,” he said. “Think what it has cost us for having, eleven months ago, yielded to your wishes by attempting the journey from Beaune to St. Gobain! Remember that from that time you have not even been able to bear being carried into the garden or drawn a few paces in a sofa-chair. And yet you would venture to travel across France, to a part of the country where we are utter strangers, with the pleasant prospect of being unable to get away again! Do not think of it, dearest! It would be tempting God and running a risk that would be simply madness.”

“I am certain that I shall be cured at Lourdes,” was the answer, “and I wish to go thither.”

It was a struggle of reason against faith and hope, and, both parties being resolute, the struggle lasted for some days. Mme. Guerrier’s faith, however, communicated itself to her two brothers; they advised her husband to grant her wish, and he, weary of contention, at last gave a reluctant consent. Provided with a medical certificate as to the state of his wife’s health, he requested of the minister a few weeks’ leave of absence, in order to take her to the Pyrenees.

It was on Saturday, the 8th of September, Feast of the Nativity, that the journey was resolved upon.

M. Guerrier felt, however, no small anxiety at the prospect (in case his worst fears should be realized) of finding himself in a place where, knowing no one, he could expect no aid or support beyond the services to be had at hotels.