The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints

A >> Alban Butler >> The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints

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"Those three youths, our common functions of vicars-general, the
delightful company of your uncle, and the frequent need I had of drawing
from that source of light, carried me almost every day to the English
college. I could delineate to you, sir, his ordinary course of life in
the inward administration of that house; I could tell you of his
assiduousness at all the exercises; of his constant watchfulness; of the
public and private exhortations he made to his pupils, with that
persuasive eloquence we meet with in his writings; of his pious
solicitude for all their wants; and of their tender attachment to him.
His room was continually filled with them. He never put on the harsh end
threatening magisterial look: he was like a fond mother surrounded by
her children; or he was rather, according to the expression, the eagle
not disdaining to teach her young ones to soar, and carrying {037} them
on her expanded wings, to save them from a fatal fall. But I leave to
his worthy co-operators the satisfaction of detailing to you those
particulars, which I only transiently beheld, and which I never saw
without being affected. How many interesting anecdotes will they have to
acquaint you with!

"Every instant that Mr. Butler did not dedicate to the government of his
college he employed in study; and, when obliged to go abroad, he would
read as he walked along the streets. I have met him with a book under
each arm, and a third in his hands, and have been told that, travelling
one day on horseback, he fell a reading, giving the horse his full
liberty. The creature used it to eat a few ears of corn that grew on the
road-side. The owner came in haste, swearing he would be indemnified.
Mr. Butler, who knew nothing of the damage done, no sooner perceived it,
than, blushing, he said to the countryman, with his usual mildness, that
his demand was just; he then draws out a louis d'or, and gives it to the
fellow, who would have been very well satisfied with a few pence, makes
repeated apologies to him, easily obtains forgiveness, and goes on his
way.

"Notwithstanding such constant application, the extensiveness of his
knowledge was next to a prodigy. Whenever I happened to consult him on
any extraordinary question, upon which the authors most familiar to us
were silent, he would take me to the library of the abbey of St. Bertin,
would ask for old writers, whose names I was scarce acquainted with, and
point out to me, even before I had opened them, the section and chapter
in which I should find my difficulty solved.

"Nor would I have you think, sir, that the ecclesiastical sciences were
the only that he had applied to. A couple of anecdotes I am going to
relate, and which I could hardly have believed had I not been witness to
them, will prove to you that every kind of information was reunited in
his intellect, without the smallest confusion.

"Monsieur de Conzie, after his translation from the bishopric of St.
Omer's to that of Arras, invited him to come and see him there. My
brother vicars and myself sought one day for a question which he should
not be able to answer, and thought we had found one. Accordingly, we
asked him what was the name of a pear called, in French, _bon Chretien_,
before the coming of Christ, and Christianity. _There are_, answered he,
_two systems on that point_; and then quotes as two modern naturalists,
sets forth their opinions, and unfolds to us the authorities with which
they backed them. I had the curiosity to ascertain one of those
quotations, and found it accurate to a tittle.

"A few days after, the bishop of Arras, having his drawing-room filled
with company, Mr. President was announced. The bystanders thinking it to
be the first president of the council d'Artois, opened him a gangway to
come at the prelate; they behold a priest enter, whom, by his bashful
and modest looks, they take for some country curate, and, by a
simultaneous motion, they close up the passage which they had made. The
bishop, who had already descried his dear president of the English
college, perceived also the motion and resolved to put the authors of it
to the blush. He observed in one corner of the room a group of military
men; he goes up to them, and, finding they were conversing upon the
question keenly debated at that time, whether in battle the _thin
order_, observed in our days, be preferable to the _deep_ order of the
ancients; he called to Mr. Butler, and asked him what he thought of it.
I then heard that amazing man talk on the art of war with the modest
tone of a school-boy, and the depth of the most consummate military man.
I observed admiration in the countenance of all those officers; and saw
several of them, who, being too far off, stood up upon chairs to hear
and see him. They altogether put to him questions upon questions, and
each of his answers caused fresh applause.

"His lordship left us to go and join another group, consisting of
magistrates, who were discussing a point of common law; and, in like
manner, called upon his oracle, who, by the sagacity of his reflections,
bore away all suffrages, and united their several opinions.

"The prelate, next, taking him by the hand, presented him to the ladies,
seated round the fireplace, and asked him, whether the women in ancient
times wore their head-dresses as high as ours then did. _Fashions_,
answered he, _like the spokes of a wheel turning on its axis, are always
replaced by those very ones which they have set aside_. He then
described to us the dresses, both of the men and women, in the various
ages of our monarchy: _and, to go still further back_, added he, _the
{038} statue of a female Druid has been found, whose head-dress measured
half a yard to height; I have been myself to see it, and have measured
it._

"What astonished me most was, that studies so foreign to the
supernatural objects of piety, shed over his soul neither aridity nor
lukewarmness. He referred all things to God, and his discourse always
concluded by some Christian reflections, which he skilfully drew from
the topic of the conversation. His virtue was neither minute nor
pusillanimous: religion had, in his discourse as well as in his conduct,
that solemn gravity which can alone make it worthy of the Supreme Being.
Ever composed, he feared neither contradictions nor adversities: he
dreaded nothing but praises. He never allowed himself a word that could
injure any one's reputation; his noble generosity was such, that, as
often as I happened to prize in his presence any one of his books, or of
the things belonging to him, I the same day found them in my possession.
In short, I will confess it, to my confusion, that for a long time I
sought to discover a failing in him; and I protest, by all that is most
sacred, that I never knew one in him. These are the facts, sir, you were
desirous of knowing; in the relation of which I have used no
exaggeration, nor have had anything to dissemble. I have often related
these facts to my wondering friends, as a relief to my heart; and
indeed, notwithstanding the distance of time, they recur as fresh to my
remembrance as if just transacted before my eyes.

"I was at a distance from St. Omer's when death robbed me of my
respectable friend. Time has not alleviated the sorrow which the loss of
him fixed deeply in my breast. I have preciously preserved some of his
presents, and carefully concealed them at my leaving France. May I one
day find again those dear pledges of a friendship, the recollection of
which is, in our calamities, the sweetest of my consolations. I have the
honor to be, with the highest regard, sir, your most obedient, &c.

"L'Abbe de la SEPOUZE.

"_At the Hague, December_ 30, 1794."

During our author's stay at St. Omer's, a thesis was printed and
publicly defended, in a neighboring university, which excited his
attention. Mr. Joseph Berington presided at the defensions of it. It
certainly contained many propositions which were offensive to pious
ears; but respectable persons are said to have declared, that it
contained nothing materially contrary to the faith of the Roman Catholic
church; and the editor feels it a duty incumbent on him to add, that one
of the bishops, to whom our author was grand-vicar, mentioned to the
editor, that he thought his vicar had shown too much vivacity on that
occasion.

Footnotes:
1. Sieni aquila provocans ad volandam pullos suos et super eos
volians expandit alas suas--_Deuteron_. cap. 22.

XIV.

Both from our author's letters, and from what is recollected of his
conversations, it appears that he often explicitly declared that, if
powerful measures were not adopted to prevent it, a _revolution in
France_ would take place, both in church and state. He thought
irreligion, and a general corruption of manners, gained ground
everywhere. On the decay of piety in France, he once mentioned in
confidence to the editor a circumstance so shocking, that even after
what has publicly happened, the editor does not think himself
justifiable in mentioning it in this place. He seems to have augured
well on the change of ministry which took place on the expulsion of the
Choiseuls. He was particularly acquainted with the cardinal de Bernis,
and the mareschal de Muy. Of the latter he writes thus in one of his
letters. "Mr. de Muy, who has sometimes called upon me, and often writes
to me, as the most affectionate of friends, is unanimously called the
most virtuous and upright nobleman in the kingdom. The late dauphin's
projects in favor of religion he will endeavor to execute. He is
minister of war. The most heroic piety will be promoted by him by every
method: if I gave you an account of his life, you would be charmed by so
bright a virtue."

XV.

Our author had _projected many works_ besides those which we have
mentioned. Among them his Treatise on the _Moveable Feasts_ may be
reckoned. He very much lamented that he had not time to complete: what
he had prepared of it, he thought too prolix, and, if he had lived to
revise it, he would have made great alterations in it. Some time after
his decease, it was published under the inspection of Mr. Challoner. He
proposed writing the lives of bishop Fisher and sir Thomas {039} More,
and had made great collections, with a view to such a work: some of them
are in the hands of the editor, and are at the command of any person to
whom they can be of use. He had begun a treatise to explain and
establish the truths of _natural and revealed religion_; he was
dissatisfied with what Bergier had published on those subjects. He
composed many _sermons_, and an immense number of _pious discourses_.
From what remained of the three last articles, _the three volumes of his
discourses_, which have appeared since his decease, were collected. The
editor is happy in this opportunity of mentioning his obligations to the
Rev. Mr. Jones, for revising and superintending the publication of them.
They are acknowledged to possess great merit; the morality of them is
entitled to great praise; the discourse on conversation shows a
considerable knowledge of life and manners. Having mentioned his
sermons, it is proper to add, that as a preacher he almost wholly
failed. His sermons were sometimes interesting and pathetic; but they
were always desultory, and almost always immeasurably long. The editor
has lately published his _Short Life of Sir Toby Matthews_.

He was very communicative of his manuscripts, and consequently many of
them were lost; so that, on an attentive examination of them, after his
decease, none but those we have mentioned were thought fit for the
press.

XVI.

The number of _letters_ written by our author exceeds belief; if they
could be collected, they would be found to contain an immense mass of
interesting matter on many important topics of religion and literature.
He corresponded with many persons of distinction, both among the
communicants with the see of Rome, and the separatists from her. Among
the former may be reckoned the learned and elegant Lambertini, who
afterwards, under the name of Benedict XIV., was honored with the papal
crown: among the latter may be reckoned Dr. Louth, the bishop first of
Oxford, afterwards of London, the celebrated translator of Isaiah. In a
Latin note on Michaelis, our author speaks of that prelate as his
intimate acquaintance, "_necessitate conjunctissimus_."

He had the happiness to enjoy the friendship and esteem of many persons
distinguished by rank, talents, or virtue. The holy bishop of Amiens
spoke of him in the highest terms of admiration and regard. In the life
written in French of that excellent prelate, he is mentioned "as the
most learned man in Europe." He is styled by father Brotier, in his
preface to his edition of Tacitus, "sacra eruditione perceleber." The
late Mr. Philips, in the preface to his life of cardinal Pole,
mentioning the edition of his letters by cardinal Quirini, expresses
himself thus: "They were procured for the author by Mr. Alban Butler, to
whom the public is indebted for the most useful and valuable work which
has appeared in the English language on the Lives of the Saints, and
which has been so much esteemed in France, that it is now translating
into the language of a country celebrated for biography, with large
additions by the author. This gentleman's readiness on all occasions to
assist the author in his undertaking, was answerable to his extensive
knowledge and general acquaintance with whatever has any relation to
erudition." Our author was not satisfied with the French translation of
his work: the writers professed to translate it freely; but he thought
that they abused the privilege of free translation, that they
misrepresented his meaning, that their style was affected, and that the
devotional cast which he had labored to give the original, was wholly
lost in their translation. The editor has heard that a translation of it
was begun in the Spanish and Italian languages, but he has seen no such
translation. Dr. Kennicot spoke loudly of our author's readiness and
disinterested zeal to oblige. Even the stern Mr. Hollis mentions him in
his memoirs with some degree of kindness. No person was more warmly
attached to his friends. With his affectionate and generous disposition,
no one was more sensible of unkindness than he was; but none forgave it
more readily. It was his rule to cultivate those who were inimical to
him by every mark of attention and act of kindness; and rather to seek
than avoid an intercourse with them. His incessant attention to his
studies frequently made him absent in society: this sometimes produced
whimsical incidents.

Whatever delight he found in his literary pursuits, he never sacrificed
his religious duties to them, or permitted them to trespass on _his
exercises of devotion_. Huet, whom, from his resemblance to our author
in unremitted application to study, the editor has often had occasion to
mention, laments his own contrary conduct in {040} very feeling terms:
"I was entirely carried," says he, (_De Rebus ad eum Pertinentibus_,
174,) "by the pleasure found in learning: the endless variety which it
affords had taken up my thoughts, and seized all the avenues of my mind,
that I was altogether incapable of any sweet and intimate communication
with God. When I withdrew into religious retirement, in order to
recollect my scattered thoughts, and fix them on heavenly things, I
experienced a dryness and insensibility of soul by which the Holy Spirit
seemed to punish this excessive bent to learning." This misfortune our
author never experienced. A considerable portion of his time was devoted
to prayer. When it was in his power, he said mass every day; when he
travelled, he rose at a very early hour, that he might hear it: he never
neglected the prayer of the _Angelus_, and, when he was not in the
company of strangers, he said it on his knees. He recommended a frequent
approach to the sacrament of the altar: some, under his spiritual
direction, communicated almost every day. The _morale severe_ of the
Jansenists he strongly reprobated in discourse, and no person receded
further from it in practice: but he was an admirer of the style of the
gentlemen of Port Royal, and spoke with praise of their general practice
of avoiding the insertion of the pronoun _I_ in their writings. He
thought the Bible should not be read by very young persons, or by those
who were wholly uninformed: even the translation of the whole divine
office of the church he thought should not be given to the faithful
promiscuously. In the printed correspondence of Fenelon, a long letter
by him on frequent communion, and one on reading the Bible, (they
deserve to be translated and generally read,) express exactly our
author's sentiments on those subjects. All singularity in devotion was
offensive to him. He exhorted every one to a perfect discharge of the
ordinary duties of his situation, to a conformity to the divine will,
both in great and little occasions, to good temper and mildness in his
intercourse with his neighbor, to an habitual recollection of the divine
presence, to a scrupulous attachment to truth, to retirement, to extreme
sobriety. These, he used to say, were the virtues of the primitive
Christians, and among them, he said, we should always look for perfect
models of Christian virtue. Fleury's account of them, in his _Manners of
the Christians_, he thought excellent, and frequently recommended the
perusal of it. He exhorted all to devotion to the Mother of God; many,
under his care, said her office every day. The advantage of mental
prayer he warmly inculcated. In the conduct of souls he was all mildness
and patience: motives of love were oftener in his mouth than motives of
fear: "for to him that loves, nothing," he used to say, with the author
of the Imitation of Christ, "is difficult." He often sacrificed his
studies and private devotions to the wants of his neighbor. When it was
in his power he attended the ceremony of the _salut_ at the parish
church; and on festivals particularly solemnized by any community of the
towns in which he resided, he usually assisted at the divine service in
their churches. He was very abstemious in his diet; and considered
systematic sensuality as the ultimate degradation of human nature. He
never was heard to express so much disgust, as at conversations where,
for a great length of time, the pleasures of the table, or the
comparative excellence of dishes, had been the sole topic of
conversation; yet he was very far from being an enemy to rational mirth,
and he always exerted himself to entertain and promote the pleasures of
his friends. In all his proceedings he was most open and unreserved:
from selfishness none could be more free. Dr. Kennicot often said that,
of the many he had employed in his great biblical undertaking, none had
shown more activity or more disinterestedness than our author. He was
zealous in the cause of religion, but his zeal was without bitterness or
animosity: polemic acrimony was unknown to him. He never forgot that in
every heretic he saw a brother Christian; in every infidel he saw a
brother man. He greatly admired _Drouen de Sacramentis_, and _Boranga's
Theology_. _Tournely_ he preferred much to his antagonist _Billouart_.
He thought _Houbigant_ too bold a critic, and objected some novelties to
the _Hebraizing friars of the Rue St. Honore_. He believed the letters
of Ganganelli, with the exception of two or three at most, to be
spurious. Their spuriousness has been since placed beyond controversy by
the _Diatribe Clementine_, polished in 1777. _Caraccioli_, the editor of
them, in his _Remerciement a l'Auteur de l'Annee Litteraire de la part
de l'Editeur des Lettres du Pape Ganganelli_, acknowledges that he filled
sixty pages at least of them with thoughts and insertions of his own
compositions. In the handwriting of a gentleman, remarkable for his
great accuracy, the editor has before him the following {041} account of
our author's sentiments on usury: "Mr. Alban Butler's opinion of
receiving interest for money, in a letter dated the 20th of June, 1735,
but copied anno 1738.--In England, and in some other countries, the laws
allow of five per cent., and even an action at law for the payment of
it. This is often allowable in a trading country; and, as it is the
common practice in England, I shall not blame any one for taking or even
exacting interest-money; therefore will say nothing against it in
general: but, in my own regard, I am persuaded it is not warrantable in
conscience, but in three cases; viz. either for a gain ceasing, as
merchants lend money which they would otherwise employ in trade, _lucrum
cessans_: or, secondly, some detriment the lender suffers by it, _damnum
emergens_: or, thirdly, some hazard in the principal money, by its being
exposed to some more than ordinary danger in being recovered safely.
Some time afterwards the said Alban Butler was convinced there was no
occasion of scruple in receiving interest for money, so that it was at a
moderate or low rate of interest; and that there was reason to believe
the borrower made full the advantage of the money that he paid for it by
the interest."

Our author's love of learning continued with him to the last. Literary
topics were frequently the subject of his familiar conversation. He was
a great admirer of what is called the simple style of writing; and once
mentioned that, if he could acquire a style by wishing for it, he should
wish for that of Herodotus. He thought the orator appeared too much in
Cicero's philosophical works, except his Offices; that work he
considered to be one of the most perfect models of writing which have
come down to us from antiquity. He professed to discover the man of high
breeding and elegant society in the commentaries of Caesar; and to find
expressions in the writings of Cicero which showed a person accustomed
to address a mob, the _foex Romani populi_. He believed the works of
Plato had been much interpolated; and once mentioned, without blame,
father Hardouin's opinion that they were wholly a fabrication of the
middle age. Of the modern Latin poets, he most admired Wallius, and in
an illness desired his poems to be read to him. He himself sometimes
composed Latin poetry. He preferred the _Paradisus Animae_ to its rival
prayer-book, the _Coeleste Palmetum_. Of the last he spoke with great
contempt. The little rhyming offices, which fill a great part of it, are
not very interesting; but the explanation in it of the psalms in our
Lady's office, of the psalms in the office for the dead, of the gradual
and seven penitential psalms, and of the psalms sung at vespers and
complin, is excellent. A person would deserve well of the English
Catholics who should translate it into English. The Coeleste Palmetum
was the favorite prayer-book of the Low Countries. By Foppen's
_Bibliotheca Belgica_, it appears that the first edition of it was
printed at Cologne, in 1660, and that, during the first eight years
after its publication, more than 14,000 copies of it were sold. Most
readers will be surprised, when they are informed that our author
preferred the sermons of Bossuet to those of Bourdaloue but in this he
has not been absolutely singular; the celebrated cardinal de Maury has
avowed the same opinion; and, what is still more extraordinary, it has
also been avowed by father Neuville. Bossuet's Discourse upon Universal
History may be ranked among the noblest efforts of human genius that
ever issued from the press. In the chronological part of it, the scenes
pass rapidly but distinctly; almost every word is a sentence, and every
sentence presents an idea, or excites a sentiment of the sublimest kind.
The third part of it, containing his reflections on the events which
produced the rise and fall of the ancient empires of the earth, is not
inferior to the celebrated work of Montesquieu on the greatness and fall
of the Roman empire; but, in the second part, the genius of Bossuet
appears in its full strength. He does not lead his reader through a maze
of argumentation; he never appears in a stretch of exertion; but, with a
continued splendor of imagery, magnificence of language, and vehemence
of argument, which nothing can withstand, he announces the sublime
truths of the Christian religion, and the sublime evidence that supports
them, with a grandeur and force that overpower and disarm resistance.
Something of this is to be found in many passages of his sermons; but,
in general, both the language and the arguments of them are forced and
unnatural. His letters to the nuns are very interesting. Let those who
affect to talk slightingly of the devotions of the religious, recollect
that the sublime Bossuet bestowed a considerable portion of his time
upon them. The same pen that wrote the discourse on universal history,
the funeral oration of the prince of Conde, and the History of the
Variations, was at the command of every religious who requested {042}
from Bossuet a letter of advice or consolation. "Was he at Versailles,
was he engaged on any literary work of importance, was he employed on a
pastoral visit of his diocese, still," say the Benedictine editors of
his works, "he always found time to write to his correspondents on
spiritual concerns." In this he had a faithful imitator in our author.
No religious community addressed themselves to him who did not find in
him a zealous director, an affectionate and steady friend. For several
among the religious he had the highest personal esteem. Those who
remember him during his residence at St. Omer's, will recollect his
singular respect for Mrs. More, the superior of the English convent of
Austins at Bruges. He was, in general, an enemy to the private pensions
of nuns; (see Boudon's Letter _Sur le Relachement qui s'est introduit
dans l'Observation du Voeu de Pauvrete_, Lettres de Boudon, vol. 1, p.
500;) but in this, as in every other instance, he wished the reform,
when determined upon, to proceed gently and gradually.