Sainte Marcella
Moniale à Rome, disciple
de Saint Jérôme (+ 410)
Noble dame romaine qui,
la première, n'hésita pas à faire publiquement et "ouvertement profession
de dévotion" (O. Englebert). Belle, riche, cultivée et raffinée, personne
n'osait se moquer d'elle. Son palais sur la colline de l'Aventin fut bientôt le
centre de toutes celles qui, autour de saint
Jérôme, voulaient suivre les conseils évangéliques, secourant les pauvres,
visitant les malades, adoucissant le sort des esclaves. Lorsqu'en 410, les
barbares d'Alaric s'approchèrent de Rome, ses amies s'enfuirent pour aller
rejoindre saint Jérôme en Palestine. Trop âgée, elle avait quatre-vingt-cinq
ans, elle resta à Rome et les soldats goths la battirent durement pour lui
faire avouer où étaient ses richesses. Elle n'en avait plus, les ayant données
aux pauvres. Elle mourut quelques jours plus tard de ses blessures. Les
synaxaires des Églises d'Orient la commémorent également.
À Rome, commémoraison de
sainte Marcelle, veuve, en 410. Comme l’écrit saint Jérôme, elle méprisa
richesses et noblesse et se rendit plus noble par sa pauvreté et son humilité.
Martyrologe romain
SOURCE : http://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/535/Sainte-Marcella.html
Sainte
Marcelle, veuve
Noble dame romaine, née
peu avant 330, qui, la première, n'hésita pas à faire publiquement et
"ouvertement profession de dévotion". Son palais sur la colline de
l'Aventin fut bientôt le centre de toutes celles qui, autour de saint Jérôme
(qu’elle rencontre vers 382, lors de son séjour à Rome), voulaient suivre les
conseils évangéliques, secourant les pauvres, visitant les malades, adoucissant
le sort des esclaves. Lorsqu'en 410, les barbares d'Alaric s'approchèrent de
Rome, ses amies s'enfuirent pour aller rejoindre saint Jérôme en Palestine.
Trop âgée, elle avait quatre-vingt-cinq ans, elle resta à Rome et les soldats
goths la battirent durement pour lui faire avouer où étaient ses richesses.
Elle n'en avait plus, les ayant données aux pauvres. Elle mourut quelques jours
plus tard de ses blessures, au début de l’an 411.
Sainte Marcelle modèle
des veuves
Sainte Marcelle, noble
romaine, était d’une illustre race qui avait donné à la république des
sénateurs, des proconsuls et des préfets. Dans sa première jeunesse et pour
obéir aux ordres de sa mère, elle épousa un praticien, digne en tout point
d’obtenir sa main, mais qui mourut après sept mois de mariage.
L’âge de la jeune veuve,
l’illustration et l’antiquité de sa famille et surtout sa remarquable beauté,
jointe à une pureté de mœurs et à une régularité de vie parfaites, lui
attirèrent de nombreux prétendants. L’un d’eux, le consul Céréalis, nourrissait
le plus d’espoir. Pour faire oublier ses cheveux blancs, il promettait à
Marcelle de la rendre héritière de ses immenses richesses. Albina, mère de la
jeune fille, souhaitait vivement procurer à sa maison l’appui d’un homme si
puissant : « Je suis bien âgé, dit un jour Céréalis, à la jeune
veuve, je veux vous traiter en fille chérie plutôt qu’en épouse. Venez vivre
avec moi et je vous laisserai la succession de tous mes biens.
- Si je n’avais point
résolu de pratiquer la chasteté chrétienne, et si je voulais me marier,
repartit Marcelle, je chercherais un mari, non un héritage. »
Piqué au vif le consul
répondit : « Rappelez-vous qu’un vieillard peut vivre longtemps,
tandis qu’un jeune homme peut mourir à la fleur de l’âge. » Marcelle
supporta patiemment cette allusion à la mort prématurée de son époux, et
répliqua avec une douce ironie : « Il est vrai qu’un jeune homme peut
rencontrer la mort au début de la vie, mais il est aussi certain qu’un
vieillard ne saurait tarder à être frappé par elle. » L’exemple de
Céréalis ainsi éconduit désespéra tous les prétendants, et Marcelle put
librement se consacrer à Dieu dans l’état de viduité.
La société de Rome était
alors composée, en grande partie, de ce qu’il y avait de plus corrompu dans
toutes les nations du monde. Et il était presque impossible à une vierge, à une
veuve, de ne pas voir attaquer sa réputation. Jamais cependant ces hommes, qui
prenaient plaisirs à noircir de leurs médisances les personnes les plus
honorables, n’osèrent rien tenter contre l’honneur de Marcelle.
Elle fut, au jugement des
contemporains, la première qui confondit le paganisme en faisant voir à tout le
monde ce que doit être, dans son costume et ses mœurs, une veuve chrétienne.
Rome avait besoin de ce
spectacle d’éclatante vertu. Les veuves païennes, en effet, aussitôt après la
mort de leur époux, ne songeaient qu’à redoubler de luxe et de mollesse. Au
milieu de ces excès elles feignaient de pleurer leur mari, mais elles
dévoilaient la joie qu’elles éprouvaient d’être délivrées de leur domination,
en en cherchant d’autres qu’elles pourraient assujettir à tous leurs caprices.
Sainte Marcelle fut la
première chrétienne qui osa contrecarrer directement ces mœurs païennes. Elle
se servait de ses vêtements pour se préserver du froid, non pour se parer. Elle
se défendit complètement l’usage de l’or, aimant mieux l’employer à nourrir les
pauvres que l’enfermer dans ses coffres.
Elle était souvent
obligée de recevoir des ecclésiastiques ou des moines, mais jamais elle ne
consentit à les voir sans témoins.
Toutes ses suivantes
étaient des vierges et des veuves de grande vertu, car le monde sait qu’on se
plait en compagnie de ceux qu’on aime, et il juge souvent d’une personne par
celles dont elle est entourée.
En outre, dès les
premiers temps de son veuvage, elle commença à avoir pour la Sainte-Ecriture
cet amour vif et ardent qui sera comme le pivot de sa vie spirituelle. Les
livres Saints étaient l’objet de ses méditations continuelles. Mais son
activité ne pouvait se contenter de réflexions plus ou moins vagues et
infructueuses. Elle s’efforçait de mettre en pratique les préceptes divins,
sachant bien qu’aucune science, si relevée qu’elle soit, ne pourrait nous
empêcher de rougir de honte quand notre conscience nous reproche le peu de
conformité qu’il y a entre notre conduite et nos connaissances. C’est pourquoi
elle s’adonnait avec ardeur à la pratique de toutes les vertus chrétiennes.
Ne pouvant, sans exposer
gravement sa santé, jeûner autant qu’elle l’eut voulu, elle se dédommageait par
l’abstinence complète de toute chair. Elle était d’ailleurs d’une telle
sobriété, qu’elle pouvait s’appliquer à l’oraison et à la lecture après le
repas, sans que l’esprit trouvât un obstacle dans l’appesantissement du corps.
En outre elle paraissait
peu souvent en public et évitait particulièrement de fréquenter les dames de
condition, de peur d’être obligée de voir chez elles ce qu’elle avait méprisé.
Elle visitait souvent les basiliques des Apôtres et des martyrs pour y prier,
mais en secret et au moment où la foule n’y affluait point.
Elle était si soumise
envers sa mère, que, pour lui obéir, elle agissait souvent contre ses propres
désirs. Albina aimait extrêmement ses proches, et se voyant privée elle-même de
postérité, elle reportait toute son affection sur les enfants de son frère et
voulait leur faire part de tous ses biens. Marcelle préférait les pauvres,
mais, pour ne point contredire sa mère, elle donna ses pierreries et une partie
de ses richesses à ses parents. Ceux-ci n’en avaient nul besoin ; la
Sainte aima mieux perdre tout cela que de contrister le cœur de sa mère.
Sainte Marcelle se fait
religieuse
Mais Dieu appelait sainte
Marcelle à une destinée autrement grande et belle, et à laquelle la préparait
cette pratique énergique des vertus les plus humbles. Il avait résolu d’opposer
cette femme, comme une digue infranchissable, aux flots de la corruption
païenne, qui menaçaient de submerger le monde chrétien, même après la chute des
idoles. Sainte Marcelle la première se rangea avec ardeur sous la bannière de
la vie religieuse ; elle y entraîna par son exemple un grand nombre de
nobles patriciennes, qui régénérèrent la société. Elle commença sous
l’inspiration de Dieu, un des plus admirables mouvements de restauration
chrétienne que l’histoire connaisse.
Mais elle reçut la
première impulsion du grand docteur de l’Eglise, saint Athanase, patriarche
d’Alexandrie. Ce défenseur intrépide de la vérité catholique contre les erreurs
ariennes fut trois fois exilé et chassé de son siège par les ennemis de
l’Eglise. Chaque fois il vint à Rome chercher un refuge auprès du Siège
Apostolique.
Dans l’un de ses voyages,
Albina, la mère de sainte Marcelle, eut le bonheur de recevoir cet hôte
illustre. Pour payer une hospitalité si généreusement donnée, Athanase édifiant
les âmes par le récit des merveilles opérées par Dieu dans les déserts de la
Thébaïde.
L’âme ardente de
Marcelle, naturellement portée aux grandes choses, reçut de la vue et des
entretiens du saint Evêque une impression extraordinaire, qui eut sur tout le
reste de sa vie une influence décisive. Son ardeur s’enflammait en attendant
raconter les prodiges de vertu qui éclataient au désert dans les Antoine, les
Pacôme, les Hilarion, et elle résolut de mettre en pratique un genre de vie
dont saint Athanase lui avait révélé l’excellence.
Elle se fit de son palais
du Mont-Aventin une solitude où elle vivait dans la prière, les austérités et
les bonnes œuvres. Elle fit plus, et s’éleva courageusement au-dessus du
préjugé patricien, qui attachait comme une honte à la profession monastique et
à l’habit plébéien et grossier que portaient les hommes consacrés à Dieu, elle
osa, la première de toutes les matrones, prendre cet habit méprisé et imiter la
vie des anachorètes.
On se récria d’abord
contre cette singularité ; on se tut enfin devant cette vertu, et bientôt
son exemple devenant contagieux, lui suscita en foule des imitatrices qui
étonnèrent Rome par leurs exemples de sacrifice et d’austérité.
Parmi celles qui
entrèrent dans cette voie généreuse, les unes continuèrent à rester dans leurs
demeures, comme les vierges et les veuves des premiers siècles ; d’autres
sentirent le besoin de se rapprocher et de se réunir, et commencèrent, sans règle
déterminée, des essais de vie commune ; les couvents naissaient ainsi à
Rome dans les palais des patriciennes. Le centre principal et la grande
excitatrice de tout ce mouvement, c’était Marcelle, qui tenait plus que toute
autre, de sa forte et ardente nature, les qualités qui attirent et entraînent.
De jeunes vierges et des veuves plus avancées en âge vinrent habiter avec elle,
et former au Mont-Aventin une petite communauté dont elle était la mère.
Ce renouvellement de
vertu chrétienne était puissamment encouragé et soutenu par le pieux Pontife
qui occupait alors la chaire de saint Pierre : le pape saint Damase. Le
but principal qu’il proposait à ses efforts était de maintenir parmi les
fidèles le pur esprit du christianisme, et de lutter énergiquement contre l’invasion
des mœurs romaines et païennes dans l’Eglise.
Aussi était-il le
protecteur et l’admirateur le plus déclaré des saintes veuves ; il avait
en outre publié des écrits en prose et des poésies pour exalter la virginité et
y appeler les âmes d’élite.
Saint Jérôme devient le
directeur de ses veuves
Mais saint Damas fit plus
pour elles, il leur donna un directeur. En 382 il convoqua à Rome un concile où
se rendirent plusieurs évêques d’Orient. Parmi eux se trouvait saint Epiphane
de Salamine, qui amena avec lui dans la ville éternelle un homme déjà illustre
par sa grande science sacrée et profane, et sa vie extraordinairement sainte au
désert : c’était saint Jérôme. Ce grand docteur assista au concile dont il
fut secrétaire, puis resta dans la capitale du monde chrétien pour travailler
avec saint Damase à une édition latine de la Bible.
Il ne tarda pas à
remarquer les nobles et pieuses femmes qui pratiquaient au milieu du luxe de la
vie romaine, les plus austères vertus. Marcelle, la mère de tout le petit
cénacle de l’Aventin, avait attiré ses regards. Mais dans sa réserve un peu
farouche il se tenait complètement à l’écart. Les saintes veuves désiraient
ardemment profiter des lumières de ce moine austère, en qui elles pressentaient
un appui nécessaire pour leur genre de vie, déjà si combattu, et un maître
incomparable dans la science et dans la vertu.
Marcelle fit auprès de
Jérôme les premières démarches. Elle les fit avec son ardeur ordinaire. Jérôme
résista longtemps, Marcelle redoubla ses instances ; et enfin le docteur
se décida à venir donner à l’Aventin un commentaire des Saints Livres. La joie
fut grande à cette nouvelle parmi toutes les vierges et les veuves disciples ou
amies de Marcelle. Celles qui n’étaient point à l’Aventin y accoururent, et
Jérôme commença ses leçons devant ce cercle d’élite, s’efforçant d’expliquer le
sens littéral, qui lui servait de fondement pour l’explication mystique et les
ingénieuses applications qu’il en faisait à la vie chrétienne.
Sa grande érudition, sa
vive et impétueuse éloquence, son visage austère amaigri par la pénitence et
bruni par le soleil de l’Orient, son regard animé, son geste brusque, tout
donnait à sa parole un ascendant extraordinaire sur les âmes qu’il dominait et
dirigeait vigoureusement vers Dieu.
Ses disciples le
suivirent ardemment dans cette voie, bien plus elles l’excitaient lui-même à
des études plus approfondies en le pressant chaque jour par des questions
nouvelles : « Ce que je voyais en elles, écrivait-il plus tard,
d’esprit de pénétration, en même temps que de ravissante pureté et de vertu, je
ne saurais le dire. »
La plus ardente à suivre
le maître dans les voies de la science, et de la sainteté solide dont elle est
le fondement, était sans contredit sainte Marcelle. Son esprit et son cœur
perpétuellement en contact avec la Bible, source de toute lumière et de toute
grâce, devinrent comme un temple qui faisait les délices du roi du ciel. Sa
piété était grande, forte et éclairée.
Tout le temps qui n’était
point occupé par l’étude ou la prière, Marcelle l’employait au travail des
mains, afin de fuir l’oisiveté et éviter l’ennui, autant que pour exécuter la
sentence divine notifiée à Adam après son péché, et gagner de quoi faire
l’aumône.
Elle profita à un tel
point des leçons de saint Jérôme, qu’après le départ de Rome du grand docteur,
s’il arrivait des contestations touchant des passages de l’Ecriture, on s’en
remettait à son arbitrage. Mais elle répondait avec tant de modestie aux
questions qu’on lui faisait, qu’elle présentait tout ce qu’elle disait comme
l’ayant appris de Jérôme,.
Cependant elle souffrait
d’être éloignée de celui dont Dieu s’était servi pour l’initier à la
connaissance et à la pratique de sa parole. Elle entreprit de rapprocher les
distances et d’entretenir une correspondance active entre Rome et Bethléem, où
Jérôme s’était retiré pour vaquer en paix à la contemplation et à l’étude des
Livres-Saints.
Saint Jérôme essaye
d’attirer sa disciple à Bethléem
Sur ces entrefaites, vers
386, Albina, la mère de notre Sainte mourut. Marcelle écrivit à Jérôme une
lettre baignée de ses larmes, où elle lui annonçait cette mort si douloureuse.
L’illustre docteur cherchant quel baume il pourrait mettre sur cette blessure,
eut la pensée d’offrir à Marcelle la consolation qu’il estimait la meilleure et
la plus conforme aux aspirations de cette âme forte, la consolation des Saintes
Écritures.
Dans cette pensée il se
remit avec ardeur à son commentaire de l’Épître aux Galates qu’il avait
commencé, et quand il l’eut terminé, il l’envoya à Marcelle. Celle-ci, touchée
de cette attention, remercia saint Jérôme avec effusion, et trouva un remède à
sa douleur dans la méditation de ce travail.
Mais le saint directeur
ne se contenta point de ce résultat, il avait attiré près de lui quelques
disciples de Marcelle, entr’autres sainte Paule ; il se joignit à elles
pour essayer d’enlever notre Sainte au tumulte de Rome, pour la faire venir en
Judée.
En conséquence, Marcelle
reçut bientôt de ses amies une lettre pressante où on l’invitait à faire comme
Abraham, à sortir de sa patrie pour aller dans la terre promise, sanctifiée par
l’attente, la venue, la vie, la passion et la mort du Verbe de Dieu incarné.
Sainte Marcelle n’avait
pas besoin d’être tant pressée. Son cœur était à Bethléem, mais la communauté
qu’elle dirigeait à Rome réclamait impérieusement sa présence, elle dut faire
céder ses désirs personnels devant un bien plus grand, et rester au milieu
d’une ville dont les mœurs corrompues étaient si peu en rapport avec sa vie
austère.
Sainte Marcelle fait
condamner Rufin et l’origénisme
Dieu la fit rester dans
la Ville éternelle pour secourir l’Eglise dans une tempête qui la menaçait.
L’Orient était déjà
depuis longtemps divisé à propos d’Origène et de ses erreurs. Saint Jérôme s’y
montrait le défenseur acharné de la doctrine catholique contre Rufin, qui avait
été longtemps son ami, mais qui soutenait l’origénisme. Celui-ci vaincu en
Orient changea de tactique ; il vint à Rome et y publia une traduction
du Périarchon d’Origène, où le docteur alexandrin avait condensé
toute sa doctrine. Mais le traducteur avait eu soin de supprimer de son travail
les erreurs trop manifestes : il ne laissa subsister que celles qui
étaient plus subtiles et n’avaient pas été directement condamnées dans les
grands Conciles.
Grâce à ce stratagème,
Rufin surprit la simplicité de nombreux chrétiens, et put, de ses pieds tout
bourbeux, selon l’expression de saint Jérôme, remplir de fange la source très
pure de la foi, l’Eglise romaine.
Sainte Marcelle démasqua
toutes ses habiletés, elle écrivit à saint Jérôme pour lui demander la vraie traduction
du Périarchon. L’ayant obtenue, elle se rendit auprès du Pape pour faire
poursuivre et condamner l’hérétique. Elle arriva à son but et fut cause de
nombreuses rétractations.
Prise de Rome – Mort de
sainte Marcelle
Ce fut sa dernière
victoire. Il était temps que les Romains s’unissent dans une seule et même foi,
car beaucoup d’entre eux devaient mourir sous les coups des Barbares.
En 410, Alaric, roi des
Goths, était aux portes de Rome. Il promettait, au prix d’une énorme rançon, la
vie sauve aux habitants. On le crut, et on lui livra toutes les immenses
richesses de la Ville éternelle. Ces prodigieux amas d’or augmentèrent la soif
des barbares au lieu de l’éteindre.
Trois jours après, au
mépris de la foi jurée, les Goths rentrèrent dans la ville pour la livrer au
pillage. Plusieurs d’entre eux pénétrèrent sur le mont Aventin dans le palais
de Marcelle. Ils comptaient trouver de l’or dans cette maison splendide, et,
n’en rencontrant point, ils en demandaient à grands cris. Marcelle se présenta
intrépidement aux barbares. Ses richesses s’étaient écoulées en aumônes ;
mais il lui restait à défendre un trésor autrement précieux : c’était la
jeune patricienne Principia, seule vierge de la communauté qui n’eût point fui
à l’approche des envahisseurs : « Que voulez-vous, demanda la Sainte
aux barbares ? – Donnez-nous tout votre argent, répondirent-ils. »
Et la sainte veuve leur
montrant le vêtement grossier qui la couvrait, répartit : « De
l’argent ? une femme vêtue comme moi n’en a pas. »
Les barbares
s’irritèrent, ils la renversèrent par terre et la frappèrent cruellement :
« Faites de moi, s’écria-t-elle, tout ce que vous voudrez. Prenez
d’ailleurs, tout ici est à vous. » Puis se relevant avec une énergie, et
serrant dans une étreinte désespérée la jeune Principia : « Mais
celle-ci, cria-t-elle aux envahisseurs avec un irrésistible accent de mère,
celle-ci, au nom de Dieu, ne la touchez pas. »
Dans ce grand désastre
que n’avait point conjuré la majesté de la Ville éternelle, une autre majesté
protégeait Rome et en imposait aux Barbares, la majesté des saints Apôtres
Pierre et Paul, dont Rome gardait les tombeaux. Par un respect religieux des
Goths à demi chrétiens, les basiliques des deux Apôtres étaient devenues un
asile qu’Alaric n’osa violer. Marcelle et Principia furent conduites à la
basilique de Saint-Paul par les envahisseurs de leur demeure.
En y arrivant Marcelle
rendit grâces à Dieu de ce qu’il avait sauvegardé la vertu de sa compagne et
qu’il avait elle-même réduite à un tel état de dénûment qu’elle pouvait dire
avec Job : « Je suis sortie nue du sein de ma mère, j’entrerai nue
dans le tombeau. La volonté du Seigneur a été accomplie. Que son saint Nom soit
béni ! »
Peu après, en effet,
épuisée par de si fortes émotions, elle rendait sa grande âme à Dieu, le 30
janvier 410, âgée d’environ quatre-vingts ans.
SOURCE : http://viedessaints.free.fr/vds/marcelle.html
Saint JÉRÖME. VIE DE
SAINTE MARCELLA, VEUVE.
AVANT-PROPOS.
Où il est parlé de la grandeur de la naissance de sainte Marcella.
A LA VIERGE PRINCIPIA.
Vous désirez de moi avec
instance et me demandez sans cesse, ô vierge de Jésus-Christ, illustre
Principia, de renouveler par mes écrits la mémoire d'une femme aussi sainte
qu'était Marcella, et de faire par ce moyen connaître aux autres et leur donner
sujet d'imiter les vertus dont nous avons joui si longtemps, et certes je me
plains de ce que vous m'excitez de la sorte à entrer dans une carrière où je
cours si volontiers de moi-même, et de ce que vous croyez que j'aie besoin en
cela d'être prié, moi qui ne vous cède nullement en l'affection que vous lui
portiez, et qui sais que je recevrai beaucoup plus d'avantage que je n'en
procurerai aux autres en représentant. par ce discours les admirables qualités
de celle dont j'entreprends de parler. Or mon silence de deux ans ne doit pas
être attribué à négligence, comme vous m'en accusez injustement, mais à mon
incroyable affliction, qui m'abattait l'esprit de telle sorte que jusqu'ici
j'ai jugé plus à propos de lue taire que de ne rien dire qui fût digne de son
mérite.
Ayant donc à louer votre
Marcella, ou plutôt la mienne, et, pour parler encore plus véritablement, la
nôtre et celle de tous ceux qui font profession d'être à Dieu, et qui a été un
si grand ornement de Rome, je n'observerai point les règles des orateurs en
représentant la noblesse de sa race, la longue suite de ses aïeux et les
statues de ses ancêtres, qui, de siècle en siècle et jusqu'à notre temps, ont
été honorés des charges de gouverneurs de provinces et de préfets du palais de
l'empereur; mais je louerai seulement en elle ce qui lui est propre, et d'autant
plus admirable qu'ayant méprisé ses richesses et sa noblesse, elle s'est encore
rendue plus illustre par sa pauvreté et par son humilité.
Marcella ayant perdu son
père et étant demeurée veuve sept mois après avoir été mariée, sa jeunesse, la
splendeur de sa maison, la douceur de son esprit, et, ce qui touche d'ordinaire
davantage les hommes, son excellente beauté portèrent Cereal, dont le nom est
si célèbre entre les consuls, à désirer avec ardeur de l'épouser; et, étant
déjà fort vieux, il lui promettait de la rendre héritière de ses grands biens,
voulant par une telle donation la traiter comme si elle eût été sa fille et non
pas sa femme. Albina, sa mère, souhaitait fort un si puissant appui pour sa
maison qui en était alors destituée; mais Marcella dit que, quand elle n'aurait
point résolu de faire un voeu de chasteté, si elle eût voulu se marier elle
aurait cherché un mari et non pas une succession. Sur quoi Cereal lui ayant
mandé que les vieux peuvent vivre longtemps et les jeunes mourir bientôt, elle
répondit de fort bonne grâce: « Il est vrai qu'une jeune personne peut mourir
bientôt, mais un vieillard ne saurait vivre longtemps. » Ainsi, avant eu son
congé, nul autre n'osa plus prétendre de l'épouser.
Nous lisons dans
l'évangile de saint Luc (282) qu'Anne, fille de Phanuel, de la tribu d'Aser,
prophétisait, et était extrêmement âgée ; qu'elle avait vécu sept ans avec son
mari ; qu'elle avait quatre-vingt-quatre ans; qu'elle ne bougeait du temple, et
passait les jours et les nuits en jeûnes et en oraisons, employant ainsi toute
sa vie au service de Dieu; ce qui fait que l'on ne doit pas trouver étrange
qu'elle ait vu son Sauveur, puisqu'elle le cherchait avec tant de soins et tant
de peines. Comparons sept ans avec sept mois : espérer la venue de Jésus-Christ
et le posséder ; le confesser après sa naissance et croire en lui après sa
mort; ne le méconnaître pas étant enfant, et se réjouir de ce qu'étant homme
parfait il règne à jamais dans le ciel
je ne vois pas que l'un
doive faire différence entre ces saintes femmes, ainsi que quelques-uns en
mettent d'ordinaire si mal à propos entre les hommes les plus saints et les
princes mêmes de l'Église. Ce que je dis seulement pour faire connaître
qu'ayant travaillé toutes deux également , elles jouissent maintenant de la
même récompense.
CHAPITRE
II. L'admirable vertu de sainte Marcella la mit au-dessus de la médisance.
Il est fort difficile
dans une ville aussi médisante que Il orne, dont. le peuple était autrefois
composé de toutes les nations du monde et où les vices triomphent, de ne
recevoir pas quelque attaque par les impostures des bruits malicieux inventés
et semés par ces personnes qui prennent plaisir à blâmer les choses les plus
innocentes et la vouloir découvrir des taches en celles qui sont les plus
pures; ce qui fait que le prophète souhaite plutôt qu'il n'estime qu'on puisse
trouver une chose aussi difficile et presque aussi impossible à rencontrer
qu'est celle-ci, lorsqu'il dit : « Bienheureux sont ceux qui marchent
dans la voie du Seigneur, et qui ne rencontrent rien en leur chemin qui leur
puisse imprimer la moindre tache! » Il dit que ceux-là sont sans tache
dans la voie de ce siècle qui n'ont point été infectés de l'air de ces bruits malicieux,
et à qui l'on n'a point fait d'injure. Notre Sauveur dit dans l'Évangile : «
Ayez une opinion favorable de votre adversaire lorsque vous êtes en chemin avec
lui.» Or, qui a jamais entendu publier quelque chose de désavantageux de la
personne dont je parle et y a ajouté créance? ou qui est celui qui l'a cru sans
s'accuser lui-même de malice et de lâcheté? Marcella a été la première qui a
confondu le paganisme en faisant voir à tout le monde quelle doit être cette
vertu d'une veuve chrétienne qu'elle portait dans le coeur, et qui paraissait
en ses habits ; car les veuves païennes ont coutume de se peindre le visage de
blanc et de rouge, d'être très richement vêtues, d'éclater de pierreries, de
tresser leurs cheveux avec de l'or, de porter à leurs oreilles des perles sans
prix, d'être parfumées, et de pleurer de telle sorte la mort de leurs maris
qu'elles ne peuvent ensuite cacher leur joie d'être affranchies de leur
domination, ainsi qu'il parait lorsqu'on les voit en chercher d'autres, non pas
pour leur être assujetties comme Dieu l'ordonne., mais au contraire pour leur
commander; ce qui fait qu'elles en choisissent de pauvres, afin que, portant
seulement le nom de maris, ils souffrent avec patience d'avoir des rivaux, et
soient aussitôt répudiés s'ils osent seulement ouvrir la bouche pour s'en
plaindre. La sainte veuve dont je parle portait des robes pour se défendre
seulement du froid, et non pas pour montrer seulement à découvert une partie de
son corps; elle ne garda rien qui fût d'or, non pas même son cachet, aimant
mieux employer toutes ces superfluités à nourrir les pauvres que de les
enfermer dans ses coffres; elle n'allait jamais sans sa mère. Les diverses
rencontres d'une aussi grande maison qu'était la sienne y faisant quelquefois
venir des ecclésiastiques et des solitaires, elle ne les voyait qu'en
compagnie, et elle avait toujours avec elfe des vierges et des veuves de grande
vertu, sachant qu'on juge souvent des maîtresses par l'humeur trop libre des
filles qui sont à elles, et que chacun se plait en la compagnie des personnes
qui lui ressemblent.
Son amour pour l'Écriture
sainte était incroyable, et elle chantait toujours : «J'ai caché et consacré
vos paroles dans mon cœur, afin de ne vous point offenser; » et cet autre
verset (283) où David, parlant de l'homme parfait, dit : « Il n'a point d'autre
volonté que la loi de son Seigneur, laquelle il médite jour et nuit, »
entendant par cette méditation de la loi, non pas de répéter souvent les
paroles de l'Écriture ainsi que faisaient les pharisiens, mais de les pratiquer
selon ce que l'Apôtre nous l'enseigne lorsqu'il dit: « Soit que vous buviez,
que vous mangiez ou que vous vous occupiez à quelque autre chose, faites toutes
ces actions pour la gloire de Dieu; , à quoi se rapportent ces paroles du Prophète
royal : « L'exécution de vos commandements m'a donné intelligence, pour
témoigner par là qu'il ne pouvait mériter d'entendre l’Ecriture sainte qu'après
qu'il aurait accompli les commandements de Dieu. Nous lisons aussi la même
chose dans les Actes, où il est porté que Jésus « commença à agir et à
enseigner ; » car il n'y a point de doctrine, si relevée qu'elle soit, qui
nous puisse empêcher de rougir de honte lorsque notre propre conscience nous
reproche que nos actions ne sont pas conformes à nos connaissances; et en vain.
celui qui est enflé d'orgueil à cause qu'il est aussi riche qu'un Crésus, et
qui par avarice étant couvert d'un méchant manteau, ne travaille qu'à empêcher
que les vers ne mangent les riches habillements dont ses coffres sont remplis,
prêche aux autres la pauvreté et les exhorte à faire l'aumône.
Les jeûnes de Marcella
étaient modérés. Elle ne mangeait point de chair, et, la faiblesse de son
estomac et ses fréquentes infirmités l'obligeant de prendre un peu de vin, elle
se contentait le plus souvent de le sentir au lieu de le goûter. Elle sortait peu
en public et évitait particulièrement d'aller chez les dames de condition, de
peur d'y voir ce qu'elle avait méprisé. Elle allait en secret faire ses prières
dans les églises des apôtres et des martyrs, et évitait de s'y trouver aux
heures qu'il y avait grande multitude de peuple. Elle était si obéissante à sa
mère que cela la faisait agir quelquefois contre ce qu'elle aurait désiré; car
Albina. aimant extrêmement ses proches et se voyant sans fils et sans
petit-fils, voulait tout donner à ses neveux, et Marcella au contraire eût
beaucoup mieux aimé le donner aux pauvres; mais, ne pouvant se résoudre à la
contredire, elle donna ses pierreries et tous ses meubles à ses parents, qui,
étant fort riches, n'en avaient point besoin; ce qui était comme les dissiper
et les perdre, aimant mieux faire cette perte que de déplaire à sa mère.
Il n'y avait point alors
à Rome de femme de condition qui sût quelle était la vie des solitaires, ni qui
en osât prendre le nom, à cause que cela était si nouveau qu'il passait pour
vil et pour méprisable dans l'esprit des peuples. Marcella apprit premièrement
par des prêtres d'Alexandrie, et puis par l'évêque Athanase, et enfin par
Pierre (qui, fuyant la persécution des hérétiques ariens, étaient venus se
réfugier à Rome comme à un port assuré de la foi catholique) la vie du
bienheureux Antoine, qui n'était lias encore mort, la manière de vivre des
monastères de saint Pacôme en la Thébaïde, et dos vierges et des veuves. Alors
elle n'eut point de liante de faire profession de ce qu'elle connut être
agréable à Jésus-Christ, et plusieurs années après elle fut imitée par
Sophronia et par d'autres. L'admirable Paula eut le bonheur de jouir de son
amitié, et Eustochia, la gloire des vierges, fut nourrie en sa chambre, d'où il
est aisé de juger quelle devait être la maîtresse qui eut de telles disciples.
CHAPITRE
IV. Des louanges des femmes. Sainte Marcella se préparait toujours à la mort.
Quelque lecteur sans
pitié. se rira peut-être de ce que je m'arrête si longtemps à louer des femmes;
mais s'il se souvenait de celles qui ont accompagné notre Sauveur et l'ont
assisté de leur bien, s'il se souvenait de ces trois Maries qui demeurèrent
debout au pied de sa croix, et particulièrement de cette Marie-Madeleine qui, à
cause de sa vigilance et de l'ardeur de sa foi, a été nommée une tour
inébranlable et s'est rendue digne de voir, autant même qu'aucun des apôtres,
Jésus-Christ ressuscité, il s'accuserait plutôt de présomption qu'il iîe
m'accuserait d'extravagance, lorsque je juge des vertus non pas par le sexe,
mais parles qualités de l'âme, et que j'estime qu'il n'y en a point qui
méritent tant de gloire que ceux qui pour l'amour de Dieu méprisent leur
noblesse et leurs richesses; ce qui lit que Jésus-Christ eut une si grande affection
pour saint Jean l'évangéliste, lequel, étant si connu du pontife parce qu'il
était de bonne famille, ne put (284) néanmoins être retenu par la crainte qu'il
avait de la malice des Juifs de faire entrer saint Pierre chez Caïphe, de
demeurer seul de tous les apôtres au pied de la croix, et de prendre pour mère
celle: de notre Sauveur, afin qu'un fils vierge recût une mère-vierge comme la
succession de son maître-vierge.
Marcella passa donc
plusieurs années de telle sorte qu'elle connut plutôt qu'elle vieillissait.
qu'elle ne se souvint d'avoir été jeune, et elle estimait fort cette belle
pensée de Platon, que la philosophie n'est autre chose qu'une méditation de la
mort; ce qui fait aussi dire à l'Apôtre : « Je meurs tous les jours pour votre
salut, » et à notre Seigneur, selon les anciens exemplaires : «Nul ne peut être
mon disciple s'il ne porte tous les jours sa croix et ne me suit. » et
longtemps auparavant à David inspiré du Saint-Esprit: « Nous sommes à
toute heure condamnés à la mort à cause de vous, et traités comme des brebis
destinées à la boucherie ; ,et depuis longtemps l'Ecclésiastique nous apprend
cette belle sentence : « Souviens-toi toujours de l'heure de ta mort, et tu ne
pécheras jamais; » et nous lisons aussi dans un éloquent ,tuteur, qui a écrit
des satires pour l'instruction des moeurs, cet avertissement si utile :
Grave la mort dans la
pensée.
Le temps vole en fuyant
toujours;
Et tu le vois par ce
discours,
Car cette parole est
passée.
Marcella, ainsi que je
commençais de dire, a donc passé sa vie comme croyant toujours mourir, et. a
été vêtue comme ayant toujours son tombeau devant les ceux, s'offrant
continuellement a Dieu comme une hostie vivante, raisonnable, et agréable à sa
divine majesté.
Lorsque les affaires de
l'Église m'obligèrent d'aller à home avec les saints prélats Paulin et
Epiphane, dont l'un était évêque d'Antioche en Syrie, l'autre de Salamine en
Chypre, et que j'évitais par modestie de voir des dames de condition, elle se
conduisit de telle sorte, selon le précepte de l'Apôtre, en me pressant en
toutes rencontres de lui parler, qu'enfin elle surmonta ma retenue par ses
instances et son adresse. Et d'autant que j'étais en quelque réputation
touchant l'intelligence de l'Écriture sainte, elle ne me voyait jamais sans
m'en demander quelque chose, et au lieu de se rendre soudain à ce que je lui
disais, elle me faisait des questions, non pas à dessein de contester, mais
afin d'apprendre par ces doutes les réponses aux difficultés qu'elle savait que
l'on y pouvait former.
J'appréhende de dire ce
que j'ai reconnu de sa vertu, de son esprit, de sa pureté et de sa sainteté, de
peur qu'il ne semble que j'aille au-delà de tout ce que l'on en saurait croire,
et de crainte d'augmenter votre douleur en vous faisant ressouvenir de quel
bien vous êtes privée ; je dirai seulement que, n'ayant écouté que comme en
passant tout ce que j'avais pu acquérir de connaissance de l'Écriture sainte
par une fort longue étude, et qui m'était devenu une autre nature par une méditation
continuelle, elle l'apprit et le posséda de telle sorte que, lorsqu'après filon
départ il arrivait quelque contestation touchant des passages de l'Écriture, on
l'en prenait pour juge. Mais comme elle était extrêmement prudente et savait
parfaitement les règles de ce que les philosophes nomment bienséance, elle
répondait avec tant de modestie aux questions qu'on lui faisait qu'elle
rapportait comme l'ayant appris de moi ou de quelque autre les choses qui
venaient purement d'elle, afin de passer pour disciple en cela même où elle
était une fort grande maîtresse ; car elle savait que l'Épître a dit: « Je ne
permets pas aux femmes d'enseigner, » et elle ne voulait pas qu'il pût sembler
qu'elle fit tort aux hommes et même aux prêtres qui la consultaient quelquefois
sur des choses obscures et douteuses.
Etant retournés en
Bethléem, nous apprîmes aussitôt que vous vous étiez tellement unie avec elle
que vous ne la perdiez jamais de vue, que vous n'aviez qu'une même maison et un
même lit, et que toute la ville savait que vous aviez trouvé une mère et elle
une fille. Le jardin qu'elle avait aux faubourgs vous servit de monastère, et
une maison qu'elle choisit à la campagne de solitude, et vous vécûtes longtemps
de telle sorte que l'imitation de votre vertu ayant été cause de la conversion
de plusieurs personnes, nous nous réjouissions de ce que home était devenue une
autre Jérusalem : on v vit tant de monastères de vierges et un si (285) grand
nombre de solitaires que la multitude de ceux qui servaient Dieu avec une telle
pureté rendit honorable cette sorte de vie, qui était auparavant si méprisée.
Cependant nous nous consolions Marcella et moi dans notre absence en nous
écrivant fort souvent, suppléant ainsi par l'esprit à la présence, et étant
dans une sainte contestation à qui se préviendrait par ses lettres, à qui se
rendrait le plus de devoirs, et à qui manderait le plus soigneusement de ses
nouvelles ; et nos lettres nous rapprochant de la sorte, nous ne sentions pas
tant cet éloignement.
CHAPITRE
VI. Services rendus à l’Eglise contre les hérétiques par sainte Marcella.
Lorsque nous jouissions
de ce repos et ne pensions qu'à servir Dieu, une tempête excitée par les hérétiques
s'éleva dans ces provinces, laquelle mit tout en trouble. Leur fureur était
portée à un tel point qu'ils ne pardonnaient ni à eux-mêmes ni à un seul de
tout ce qu'il y avait de plus gens de bien ; et, ne se contentant pas d’avoir
tout mis ici sens dessus dessous, ils envoyèrent jusque dans le port de Home un
vaisseau plein de personnes qui vomissaient des blasphèmes contre la vérité. Il
se trouva aussitôt des gens disposés à embrasser leurs erreurs, et leurs pieds
tout bourbeux remplirent de fange la source très pure de la foi de l'Église
romaine. Mais il ne faut pas s'étonner si ce taux prophète abusait les simples,
vu qu'une doctrine si abominable et si empoisonnée a trouvé dans Home des gens
qui s'en sont laissé persuader. Ce fut alors qu'on vit cette infâme traduction
des livres d'Origènes intitulés Périarchon, ou Des principes; ce fut alors
qu'ils eurent pour disciple Macaire, lequel eût été véritablement digne de
porter ce nom, qui signifie : bienheureux, s'il ne fût point tombé entre les
mains d'un tel maître ; ce fut alors que les évêques, qui sont nos maîtres,
s'opposèrent à ce ravage et troublèrent toute l'école des pharisiens; et ce fut
alors que sainte Marcella, après avoir demeuré longtemps dans le silence de
crainte qu'il ne semblât qu'elle ne fit quelque chose par vanité, voyant que
cette foi, si louée par la bouche de l'Apôtre, se corrompait de telle
sorte dans les esprits de la plupart de ses concitoyens que les prêtres même et
quelques solitaires, mais principalement les hommes engagés dans le siècle, se
portaient à embrasser l'erreur et se moquaient de la simplicité du pape, qui
jugeait de l'esprit des autres par le sien, elle s'y opposa publiquement,
aimant beaucoup mieux plaire à Dieu qu'aux hommes.
Notre Sauveur loue dans
l'Évangile ce mauvais maître-d'hôtel qui, ayant agi infidèlement envers son
maître, s'était conduit si prudemment dans ses propres intérêts : les
hérétiques voyant qu'une petite étincelle était capable de produire un très
grand embrasement, que le feu qu'ils avaient allumé était déjà arrivé au comble
de la maison du Seigneur, et que les artifices dont ils avaient usé pour en
surprendre plusieurs ne pouvaient demeurer plus longtemps cachés, ils
demandèrent et obtinrent des lettres ecclésiastiques, afin qu'il parût qu'en
partant de Rouie ils étaient dans la communion de l'Église.
Peu de temps après
Anastase l'ut élevé au Saint-Siège : c'était un homme admirable, et home n'en
jouit pas longtemps, parce qu'il n'y aurait point eu d'apparence que cette
ville impératrice, qui était le chef de tout le monde, fût misérablement ruinée
sous un si grand pape; ou plutôt il fut enlevé d'entre les hommes et porté dans
le ciel, de peur qu'il ne s'efforçât de fléchir par ses prières l'arrêt que
Dieu avait déjà prononcé contre cette malheureuse ville, ainsi qu'il se voit
dans l'Écriture disant à Jérémie : « Ne me prie point pour ce peuple, et
ne tâche point de me fléchir afin que je leur fasse miséricorde ; car quand ils
jeûneraient je n'écouterais pas leurs prières, et quand ils m'offriraient des
sacrifices je ne les recevrais pas; mais je les détruirai par la guerre, par la
famine et par la peste.»
On me dira peut-être :
Quel rapport a tout ceci avec les louanges de Marcella ? Je réponds qu'il y en
a un très grand puisqu'elle l'ut cause de la condamnation de ces hérétiques,
car elle produisit des témoins qui, ayant été instruits par eux, avaient depuis
renoncé à leur erreur; elle fit voir une grande multitude de personnes qu'ils
avaient trompées de la même sorte; elle représenta divers exemplaires de ce
livre impie de Périarchon, corrigé de la propre main de ce dangereux
scorpion qui en faisait (286) glisser le venin dedans les âmes, et elle écrivit
grand nombre de lettres pour presser ces hérétiques de se venir défendre; ce
qu'ils n'osèrent jamais faire, leur conscience les bourrelant de telle sorte
qu'ils aimèrent mieux se laisser condamner en leur absence que d'être
convaincus en se présentant. Marcella a été la première cause d'une si
glorieuse victoire ; et vous, mon Dieu, qui en êtes le chef et la souveraine
origine, vous savez que je ne dis rien que de véritable, et que je ne rapporte
que la moindre partie de ses grandes et admirables actions, de peur d'ennuyer
le lecteur en m'étendant davantage sur ce sujet, et afin qu'il ne semble pas à
mes ennemis que sous prétexte de la louer je veuille me venger d'eux. Mais il
faut venir au reste.
Cette tempête étant
passée d'Occident en Orient, elle menaçait plusieurs personnes d'un grand
naufrage. Ce fut alors qu'on vit accomplir cette parole de l'Écriture : «
Croyez-vous que le lits de l’homme, revenant au monde, trouve de la foi parmi
les hommes? » La charité de la plupart étant refroidie, ce peu qui aimait la
vérité de la foi se joignait à moi : on m attaquait publiquement comme leur
chef, et on les persécutait aussi de telle sorte que Barnabé même, pour user
des termes de saint Paul, se porta dans cette dissimulation, ou plutôt dans un
parricide manifeste qu'il exécuta, sinon d'effet, au moins de volonté. Mais par
le souffle procédant de la bouche de Dieu toute cette tempête fut dissipée; et
alors ou vit l'effet de cette prédiction du prophète . « Vous retirerez d'eux
votre esprit, et aussitôt ils tomberont et retourneront dans la poussière dont
ils ont été formés, et en ce même moment tous leurs desseins
s'évanouiront; » comme aussi de cet autre endroit de l'Évangile : «
Insensé que tu es! je séparerai cette nuit ton âme d'avec ton corps; et qui
possédera alors tous ces grands biens que tu as amassés avec tant de soin?»
CHAPITRE
VII. Rome prise et saccagée par les Goths. Mort de sainte Marcella.
Comme ces choses se
passaient en Jérusalem, on nous apporta d'Occident une épouvantable nouvelle,
que Rome avait été assiégée, et que ses citoyens, s'étant rachetés en donnant
ce qu'ils avaient d'or et d'argent, on les avait encore assiégés de nouveau
afin de leur faire perdre aussi la vie après les avoir dépouillés de leurs
richesses. Ma langue demeure attachée à mon palais et mes sanglots interrompent
mes paroles : cette ville qui avait conquis tout le monde se trouve conquise,
ou pour mieux dire elle périt par la faim avant que de périr par l'épée; et il
n'y resta quasi plus personne que l'on pût réduire en servitude. La rage
qu'inspirait la faim les avait portés jusqu'à manger des viandes abominables;
ils se déchiraient les uns les autres pour se nourrir, et il se trouva des
mères qui ne pardonnèrent pas même aux enfants qui pendaient à leurs mamelles,
faisant ainsi rentrer dans leur sein ceux qu'elles en avaient mis dehors peu de
temps auparavant. Moab fut prise de nuit et ses murailles tombèrent la nuit. «
Seigneur, les nations idolâtres sont entrées dans votre héritage; elles ont
violé la sainteté de votre temple, saccagé Jérusalem, donné les corps morts de
vos saints en pâture aux oiseaux du ciel et leur chair à dévorer aux animaux de
la terre; elles ont répandu leur sang comme de l'eau tout autour de la sainte
cité, et il ne se trouvait personne pour les enterrer.»
Quels cris et quels
sanglots par leur triste langage
Pourraient de cette nuit
raconter le carnage?
Et qui, changeant ses
yeux en des sources de pleurs,
Pourrait de tant de maux
égaler les douleurs?
Cette ville superbe et si
longtemps régnante
Tombe et nomme en tombant
la fortune inconstante;
Elle nage en son sang, et
la rigueur du sort
Y montre en cent façons
l'image de la mort.
En cette horrible
confusion les victorieux, tout couverts de sang, entrèrent aussi dans la maison
de Marcella. Ne me sera-t-il pas permis de dire ici ce que j'ai entendu, ou
plutôt de raconter des choses qui ont été vues par des hommes pleins de
sainteté qui se trouvèrent présents lorsqu'elles se passèrent, et qui
témoignent, ô sage Principia, que, l'accompagnant dans ce péril, vous ne
courûtes pas moins de danger. Ils assurent donc qu'elle reçut sans s'étonner et
d'un visage ferme ces furieux, lesquels lui demandant de l'argent, elle leur
répondit qu'une personne qui portait une aussi méchante robe qu'était la sienne
n'était. pas pour avoir caché des trésors dans la terre. Cette pauvreté volontaire
dont elle faisait profession ne fut pas capable de leur faire ajouter foi à ses
paroles; mais ils la fouettèrent cruellement, et (287) elle, se jetant à leurs
pieds comme si elle eût été insensible à ses douleurs, ne leur demandait autre
grâce sinon qu'ils ne vous séparassent point d'avec elle, tant elle avait peur
que votre jeunesse vous fit recevoir des outrages et des violences qu'elle
n'avait point sujet de craindre pour elle-même à cause de sa vieillesse.
Jésus-Christ amollit la dureté du coeur de ces barbares : la compassion trouva
place entre leurs épées teintes de sang; et vous ayant menées toutes deux dans
l'église de saint Paul, pour vous assurer de votre vie si vous leur donniez de
l'argent ou pour vous y faire trouver un sépulcre, on dit qu'elle fut comblée
d'une telle joie qu'elle commença de rendre grâces à Dieu de ce qu'ayant
conservé votre virginité, il vous réservait à finir votre vie pour son service;
de ce que la captivité l'avait trouvée, mais non pas rendue pauvre; de ce qu'il
n’avait point de jour que, pour être nourrie, elle n'eût besoin qu'on lui fit
quelque charité; de ce qu'étant rassasiée de son Sauveur, elle ne sentait pas
la faim, et de ce que l'état où elle était réduite pouvait, aussi bien que sa
langue, lui faire dire : « Je suis sortie toute nue du ventre de ma mère, et
j'entrerai toute nue dans le tombeau. La volonté de Dieu a été accomplie son
saint nom soit béni! »
Quelques jours après, son
corps étant sain et plein de vigueur, elle s'endormit du sommeil des justes,
vous laissant héritière du peu qu'elle avait dans sa pauvreté, ou, pour mieux
dire, en laissant les pauvres héritiers par vous. Vous lui fermâtes les yeux ;
elle rendit l'esprit entre les baisers que vous lui donniez, et, trempée de vos
larmes, elle souriait, tant était grand le repos que la manière dont elle avait
vécu donnait à sa conscience, et tant elle était contente d'aller jouir des
récompenses qui l'attendaient dans le ciel.
Voilà, bienheureuse
Marcella que je ne saurais trop révérer, voilà, ô Principia, sa chère fille, ce
que j'ai dicté en une nuit pour m'acquitter de ce que je vous dois à toutes
deux. Vous n'y trouverez point de beauté de style, mais une volonté pleine de
reconnaissance envers l'une et envers l'autre, et un désir de plaire à Dieu et
à ceux qui le liront.
SOURCE : http://www.abbaye-saint-benoit.ch/saints/jerome/mystiques/026.htm
Jan Hovaert (1592-1668). Saint Jérôme accompagné des saintes Marcelle, Paule et Eustochium,
circa 1658, 266 x 165, Chiesa di Santa Maria Maddalena, Genua
Profile
Wealthy married imperial
Roman noble woman. Widowed young
after only seven months of marriage.
Declined a wedding proposal
from the consul Cerealis. Organized a group of religious women at her mansion on
the Aventine Hill, one of which was Saint Lea of Rome.
They were under the spiritual direction of Saint Jerome,
though she was never afraid to stand against him in arguments. Marcella spent
most of her time reading, praying, and
visiting the shrines of martyrs. Captured by
the Goths who
looted Rome, Italy in 410, she
was tortured to
give up her treasure, but was released when they realized she had given away
everything to the poor.
She died soon
after from the affects of the abuse.
Born
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MLA
Citation
“Saint Marcella of
Rome“. CatholicSaints.Info. 2 October 2021. Web. 7 December 2024.
<https://catholicsaints.info/saint-marcella/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/saint-marcella/
Article
(Saint) Widow (January
31) (5th
century) Saint Jerome, who was her guest for three years (A.D. 382), styles
her “a model of widowhood and sanctity.” Under his direction she studied the
Scriptures and drew around her a circle of Roman ladies, among whom were Saints
Paula and Eustochium. We have no less than eleven letters addressed to her by
the holy Doctor of the Church. Her mansion was in Rome, and was plundered by
the Goths when the Imperial city was sacked by Alaric and his barbarians (A.D.
409). The Saint herself was savagely scourged for concealing, as the Goths
thought, money and treasures which in reality had been already distributed by
her among the poor. The Saint died from the effects of this ill-treatment about
A.D. 410.
MLA
Citation
Monks of Ramsgate.
“Marcella”. Book of Saints, 1921. CatholicSaints.Info.
18 November 2014. Web. 7 December 2024.
<https://catholicsaints.info/book-of-saints-marcella/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/book-of-saints-marcella/
St. Marcella
Feastday: January 31
Birth: 325
Death: 410
Widowed noblewoman of
Rome, the hostess of St. Jerome and
other dignitaries. She was scourged in the invasion of Rome in
410 by the Visigoths Under
King Alaric who wished to extract knowledge of
her wealth, which had in fact been given away. While she survived the vicious
beating, she died soon after from the severity of her ordeal. Widowed nine
months of marriage, she gave her wealth to the poor and founded a community of
pious noble women.
SOURCE : https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=4457
Marcella was a Roman
matron. She was widowed after nine months of marriage, refused to marry
Cerealis, the consul, and formed a group of noble ladies to live a life of
austerity and asceticism. She was tortured by the Goths looting Rome in
410 to force her to reveal the whereabouts of her wealth, which she had long
since given to the poor, was released, but died shortly after, in August. She
had a correspondence with St. Jerome in
which ahe answered queries she put to him about spiritual matters. Her feast day is January
31st.
SOURCE : https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=725
Marcella of Rome, Widow
(RM)
Died August 410. Saint Marcella met Saint Athanasius when she was a child and
was enthralled by his stories of Egyptian ascetics. She married to please her
mother, but was widowed seven months later. Thereafter, the Roman patrician
refused the marriage proposal of Cerealis, the consul, uncle of Gallus Caesar.
Instead, she turned
herself to works of charity and her palace on the Aventine Hill into a center
of Christian fellowship. Around her formed a group of noble ladies desiring to
live a life of austerity and asceticism. These included her ward Principia;
Marcellina, elder sister of Saint Ambrose and Saint Satyrus; Fabiola; Asella;
Lea; and Paula with her daughters, among others. Marcella served as a fine
example for her spiritual daughters: she abstained from wine and flesh; spent
her time in pious reading, prayer, and visiting the churches of the apostles
and martyrs; and never spoke with any man alone.
Marcella welcomed Saint
Jerome upon his arrival in Rome, and he remained with her for three years
guiding this monastery/school for devout, aristocratic ladies in the study of
the scriptures, prayer, and almsgiving. Marcella was a woman of intellectual
ability, and not afraid to confront the masterful Jerome.
She was tortured by the
Goths under Alaric who looted Rome in 410. They tried to force her to reveal
the location of her wealth, which she had long ago given to the poor. Marcella
withstood her own scourging but begged them to spare her pupil (not her
daughter) Principia from outrage. She was released but died shortly thereafter
in the arms of Principia from the effects of this treatment.
Saint Marcella corresponded
often with her spiritual director, Saint Jerome, who answered her questions
about spiritual matters and referred to her as "the glory of Roman
ladies." Eleven of his letters to Marcella survive (Attwater, Attwater2,
Benedictines, Coulson, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Gill, Husenbeth, Martindale
(1951)).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0131.shtml
January 31
St. Marcella, Widow
SHE is styled by St.
Jerom the glory of the Roman ladies. Having lost her husband in the seventh
month of her marriage, she rejected the suit of Cerealis the consul, uncle of
Gallus Cæsar, and resolved to imitate the lives of the ascetics of the East.
She abstained from wine and flesh, employed all her time in pious reading,
prayer, and visiting the churches of the apostles and martyrs, and never spoke
with any man alone. Her example was followed by many virgins of the first
quality, who put themselves under her direction, and Rome was in a short time
filled with monasteries. We have eleven letters of St. Jerom to her in answer
to her religious queries. The Goths under Alaric plundered Rome in 410. St.
Marcella was scourged by them for the treasures which she had long before
distributed among the poor.
All that time she
trembled only for her dear spiritual pupil, Principia, (not her daughter, as
some have reputed her by mistake,) and falling at the feet of the cruel
soldiers, she begged, with many tears, that they would offer her no insult. God
moved them to compassion. They conducted them both to the church of St. Paul,
to which Alaric had granted the right of sanctuary with that of St. Peter. St.
Marcella, who survived this but a short time, which she spent in tears,
prayers, and thanksgiving, closed her eyes by a happy death, in the arms of St.
Principia, about the end of August, in 410, but her name occurs in the Roman
Martyrology on the 31st of January. See St. Jerom, Ep. 96. ol. 16. ad
Principiam, t. 4. p. 778. Ed. Ben. Baronius ad ann. 410. and Bollandus, t.
2. p. 1105.
Rev. Alban
Butler (1711–73). Volume I: January. The Lives of the
Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/1/314.html
Saint Marcella of
Rome
Saint Marcella of
Rome (325-410), like Saint Hyacintha, began her life as a privileged
member of nobility. She married well, lived in a palace on Aventine Hill in
Rome, and was quite content with her luxurious life. Shortly after her
marriage, however, her husband died quite unexpectedly, leaving her widowed and
alone.
As a child, Marcella had
met Saint Athanasius, and remembered his stories of the Egyptian ascetics
(those who practiced rigorous self-discipline and abstinence from worldly
pleasures so as to better contemplate the holiness of the Lord). Following the
death of her husband, Marcella refused the marriage proposal of a wealthy and
powerful man of government, and instead turned herself to works of charity and
service to the poor of Rome. She distributed her considerable wealth, “preferring
to store her money in the stomachs of the needy rather than hide it in a
purse.” Her palace on the Aventine Hill became a center of Christian fellowship
and activism. She formed a community of women, mostly of nobility, who gave up
their material wealth and possessions to live a life of asceticism and
austerity. Marcella abstained from wine and meat; spent her time in pious
reading, prayer, and visiting the churches of the apostles and martyrs; and never
spoke with any man alone.
Marcella welcomed Saint Jerome
upon his arrival in Rome, and he remained with her for three years guiding this
monastery and school for devout, aristocratic ladies in the study of the
scriptures, prayer, and almsgiving. Marcella was a woman of intellectual
ability, and not afraid to confront the masterful Jerome. After his departure
from Rome, Marcella corresponded often with her spiritual director, who
answered her questions about spiritual matters and referred to her as "the
glory of Roman ladies." Eleven of his letters to Marcella survive, in
which her tortured life is compared to the sufferings of the poor souls in
hell. Marcella wrote in a letter to Saint Jerome: "My sweetest Lord, only
remember that I am a poor creature of Thine! For do with me what pleases Thee,
now and through eternity! I abandon myself into Thy hands, and am ready to
suffer these torments as long as it shall please Thee."
When the Visagoths, led
by the barbarian Alaric, besieged and looted Rome in 410, Marcella and the rest
of the city were starving. Eighty-five years old at the time, she wrote: “By
heaven’s grace, captivity has found me a poor woman, not made me one. Now, I
shall go in want of daily bread, but I shall not feel hunger since I am full of
Christ.” Marcella was captured soon thereafter. She was tortured and scourged,
as her tormentors tried to force her to reveal the location of her hidden
wealth. They did not believe her claims to have given it away to the poor.
Marcella withstood her own scourging but begged them to spare the others in her
community from such treatment. She was released, but died shortly thereafter from
the injuries she sustained.
Saint Marcella lived a
long life, especially long for that time. When her marriage ended, she turned
to the Lord, committing herself wholeheartedly and sincerely to His will. As
Christ instructed, she gave up all she had to the poor, inspiring many others
to do the same. She deprived herself of worldly pleasures, seeking instead,
through prayer and Scripture, to grow closer to Christ. She ministered to those
around her, working tirelessly, even at her advanced age. And she joined her
suffering to Christ, first in life, than in torture, and eventually in death.
Saint Marcella is another example, like Saint Hyacintha, of the power of the
Lord’s call, and the possibility and potential for daily conversion in each of
us. What is the Lord asking you to do today? And more importantly, will you
answer His call?
SOURCE : http://365rosaries.blogspot.ca/2010/01/january-31-saint-marcella-of-rome.html
January 31 – The Glory of the Ladies
St. Marcella
(325–410) She
was a Christian ascetic in ancient Rome. Growing up in Rome, she was influenced
by her pious mother, Albina, an educated woman of wealth and benevolence.
Childhood memories centered around piety, and one in particular related to
Athanasius, who lodged in her home during one of his many exiles. He may have
taken special interest in her, thinking back to his own youthful practice of
playing church. Athanasius interacted with his hosts on theological matters and
recounted anecdotes of his own monastic life. His most spellbinding stories,
however, were the miraculous tales of the desert monks. As a parting gift he
left behind the first copy of his biography, The Life of St. Anthony.
Marcella’s wealth and
beauty placed her at the center of fashionable Roman society. She married
young, to a wealthy aristocrat, but less than a year later he died. Her time of
mourning over, young men soon came calling again. After her husband’s early
death, she decided to devote the rest of her life to charity, prayer, and
mortification of the flesh and was convinced that God was directing her to a
life of poverty and service, she shocked her social circle when she left behind
her fashionable dresses for a coarse brown garment and abandoned her usual
extravagant hair styling and makeup. Appearing as a low-class woman, she
started a trend as other young women join her. They formed a community known as
the brown dress society, spending their time praying, singing, reading the
Bible, and serving the needy. Her palatial home was now a refuge for weary
pilgrims and for the poor. After her husband’s early death, she decided to
devote the rest of her life to charity, prayer, and mortification of the flesh.
Summoned by Bishop
Damasus (who arranges lodging at Marcella’s hospitality house), Jerome arrived
in 382. It was an exhilarating time for this woman of letters, who had immersed
herself in both Greek and Hebrew, to be entertaining one of the great minds of
the age. He spent the next three years in what he called her “domestic church,”
translating the Bible into Latin. She learned under his teaching even as she
critiqued his translation. He spoke and wrote of her Christian devotion and
scholarship and commended her influence on Anastasius, bishop of Rome —
particularly in his condemning Origen’s doctrines, which Jerome declared a
“glorious victory.” Indeed, his admiration of Marcella was unbounded, not only
for her intellectual acumen but also for her deference to men who might be
threatened by her vast store of knowledge.
Marcella, however, was
also known for her efforts to restrain Jerome from quarreling with his
opponents — or at least helping him control his legendary temper. Eleven of his
extant letters are addressed to her, and she is mentioned in many of his other
writings. In one of his letters he responded to her query about the truth of
Montanism. Someone was apparently attempting to convert her, and she was deeply
interested in what she is hearing, though suspecting that the claim that they
possess a more authentic spirituality might have been false. Jerome writes a
lengthy point-by-point refutation of the movement and then concludes:
“It was at the home of
Marcella that Jerome first met Paula, a devoted and scholarly woman who would
become his long-time intellectual counterpart. When Jerome returned to the Holy
Land, Paula relocated there as well. They invited Marcella to join them, but
she remained in Rome to oversee her growing house of virgins, where she was
addressed as Mother. But hard times were ahead of her. She was in her late
seventies in 410, when the Goths, led by Alaric, pillaged the city. Soldiers
stormed the residence, demanding she relinquish her hidden jewels and wealth,
which long before had been sold to fund her charitable work. When she had
nothing to give them, they struck her down. She was taken to a church set up as
a sanctuary, but she died the next day.”
Her Aventine Hill palace
became a center of Christian activity. She was an associate of Saint Paula.
Saint Jerome corresponded with her, and he called her “the glory of the ladies
of Cadereyta.” His letter To
Principia is a memoir and biography of her life.
Her feast day 31 January.
SOURCE : http://nobility.org/2013/01/31/st-marcella/
St. Marcella of Rome
On this day we celebrate
the feast of St. Marcella of Rome.
What we know of her comes
from the letters St.
Jerome wrote to her from Bethlehem and the letter he
wrote about her to her friend Principia after her death.
Marcella's palace on the
Aventine Hill was a center where Roman matrons and widows met to discuss the
bible. St. Jerome was their spiritual guide. When he moved to Bethlehem with
St. Paula and St. Eustochium, they tried to convince Marcella to join them there,
but she stayed in Rome.
Marcella died in 410,
after having been brutalized by Visigoths. Two years later Jerome wrote:
"Her father’s death
left her an orphan, and she had been married less than seven months when her
husband was taken from her. Then as she was young, and highborn, as well as
distinguished for her beauty—always an attraction to men—and her self-control,
an illustrious consular named Cerealis paid court to her with great assiduity.
Being an old man he offered to make over to her his fortune so that she might
consider herself less his wife than his daughter. Her mother Albina went out of
her way to secure for the young widow so exalted a protector. But Marcella
answered: 'had I a wish to marry and not rather to dedicate myself to perpetual
chastity, I should look for a husband and not for an inheritance;' and when her
suitor argued that sometimes old men live long while young men die early, she
cleverly retorted: 'a young man may indeed die early, but an old man cannot
live long.' This decided rejection of Cerealis convinced others that they had
no hope of winning her hand."
Jerome went on to
describe the differences between Marcella and other widows at a time and place
when widows had more freedom than other women:
"For women of the
world are wont to paint their faces with rouge and white-lead, to wear robes of
shining silk, to adorn themselves with jewels, to put gold chains round their
necks, to pierce their ears and hang in them the costliest pearls of the Red
Sea, and to scent themselves with musk. While they mourn for the husbands they
have lost they rejoice at their own deliverance and freedom to choose fresh
partners—not, as God wills, to obey these but to rule over them.
"With this object in
view they select for their partners poor men who contented with the mere name
of husbands are the more ready to put up with rivals as they know that, if they
so much as murmur, they will be cast off at once. Our widow’s clothing was
meant to keep out the cold and not to shew her figure. Of gold she would not
wear so much as a seal-ring, choosing to store her money in the stomachs of the
poor rather than to keep it at her own disposal."
Jerome explained how,
when men, including priests, consulted the wise and learned Marcella
"concerning obscure and doubtful points", she avoided transgressing
the rule against women teaching by telling them her own opinion was really
Jerome's.
He described some of the
horrors, including cannibalism, that came with the
third siege of Rome. Marcella was scourged and beaten with cudgels
when the house where she was living with Principia was invaded by Visigoths.
They tortured her, demanding her riches, but more soldiers came, who had
"some reverence for holy things. They escorted the two women to the church
of St. Paul,--one of those which had been named by Alaric as a sanctuary for
all who chose to take advantage of it. Here the venerable Marcella, exhausted
with her fatigues and wounds, died the next day."
--A
Dictionary of Saintly Women, Vol. 2, by Agnes B. C. Dunbar, London,
1905.
The site of St.
Marcella's palace on the Aventine Hill is believed to have been near Santa
Sabina. Click here for
more about the church. "The columns are ancient, and may have been taken
from one of the many buildings on the Aventine that were destroyed by the Goths
in 410." (Maybe some came from Marcella's palace.)
SOURCE : http://ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/day-st-marcella-rome
_-_S._Marcella_08_Interno.JPG)
Chiesa
parrocchiale di Santa Marcella, a Roma, nel quartiere Ostiense, in piazza
Nicoloso da Recco
Saint JEROME, Letter 127, To Principia (412)
This letter is really a
memoir of Marcella (for whom see note on Letter XXIII.) addressed to her
greatest friend. After describing her history, character, and favourite studies,
Jerome goes on to recount her eminent services in the cause of orthodoxy at
a time when, through the efforts of Rufinus, it seemed likely that Origenism
would prevail at Rome (§§9,
10). He briefly relates the fall of the city and the horrors consequent upon it
(§§12, 13) which appear to have been the immediate cause of
Marcella's death (§14). The date of the letter is 412 A.D.
1. You have besought
me often and earnestly, Principia, virgin of Christ,
to dedicate a letter to the memory of that holy woman Marcella,
and to set forth the goodness long enjoyed by us for others to know and
to imitate. I am so anxious myself to do justice to
her merits that it grieves me that you should spur me on and fancy that your
entreaties are needed when I do not yield even to you in love of
her. In putting upon record her signal virtues I
shall receive far more benefit myself than I can possibly confer upon others.
If I have hitherto remained silent and have allowed two years to go over
without making any sign, this has not been owing to a wish to ignore her as you
wrongly suppose, but to an incredible sorrow which so overcame my mind that I
judged it better to remain silent for a while than to praise her virtues in
inadequate language. Neither will I now follow the rules of rhetoric in
eulogizing one so dear to both of us and to all the saints,
Marcella the glory of
her native Rome. I will not set forth her illustrious family and
lofty lineage, nor will I trace her pedigree through a line of consuls and
prætorian prefects. I will praise her for nothing but the virtue which
is her own and which is the more noble, because forsaking both wealth and
rank she has sought the true nobility
of poverty and lowliness.
2. Her father's
death left her an orphan, and she had been married less than seven months when
her husband was taken from her. Then as she was young, and highborn, as well as
distinguished for her beauty— always an attraction to men— and her
self-control, an illustrious consular named Cerealis paid court to her with
great assiduity. Being an old man he offered to make over to her his fortune so
that she might consider herself less his wife than his daughter. Her mother
Albina went out of her way to secure for the young widow so
exalted a protector. But Marcella answered: had I a wish to marry and not
rather to dedicate myself to perpetual chastity,
I should look for a husband and not for an inheritance; and when her suitor
argued that sometimes old men live long while young men die early, she cleverly
retorted: a young man may indeed die early, but an old man cannot live long.
This decided rejection of Cerealis convinced others that they had no hope of
winning her hand.
In the gospel according
to Luke we read the following passage: there was one Anna, a prophetess, the
daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser: she was of great age, and had lived
with an husband seven years from her virginity;
and she was a widow of
about fourscore and four years, which departed not from the temple but served
God with fastings and prayers night
and day. Luke 2:36-37 It
was no marvel that she won the vision of the Saviour,
whom she sought so earnestly. Let us then compare her case with that of
Marcella and we shall see that the latter has every way the advantage. Anna
lived with her husband seven years; Marcella seven months. Anna only hoped for
Christ; Marcella held Him fast. Anna confessed him at His birth; Marcella believed in
Him crucified. Anna did not deny the Child; Marcella rejoiced in the Man as
king. I do not wish to draw distinctions between holy women on
the score of their merits, as some persons have
made it a custom to do as regards holy men
and leaders of churches; the conclusion at which I aim is that, as both have
one task, so both have one reward.
3. In a
slander-loving community such as Rome, filled as it formerly was with people
from all parts and bearing the palm for wickedness of
all kinds, detraction assailed the upright and strove to defile even the pure
and the clean. In such an atmosphere it is hard to escape from the breath
of calumny.
A stainless reputation is
difficult nay almost impossible to attain; the prophet yearns
for it but hardly hopes to win it: Blessed, he says, are the undefiled in the
way who walk in the law of the Lord. The undefiled in the way of this world are
those whose fair fame no breath of scandal has ever sullied, and who have
earned no reproach at the hands of their neighbours. It is this which makes the
Saviour say in the gospel: agree with, or be complaisant to, your adversary
while you are in the way with him. Matthew 5:25 Who
ever heard a slander of
Marcella that deserved the least credit? Or who ever credited such without
making himself guilty of malice and
defamation? No; she put the Gentiles to
confusion by showing them the nature of
that Christian widowhood
which her conscience and
mien alike set forth. For women of
the world are wont to paint their faces with rouge and white-lead, to wear
robes of shining silk, to adorn themselves with jewels, to put gold chains
round their necks, to pierce their ears and hang in them the costliest pearls
of the Red
Sea, and to scent themselves with musk. While they mourn for the husbands
they have lost they rejoice at
their own deliverance and freedom to choose fresh partners— not, as God wills,
to obey these Ephesians 5:22 but
to rule over them.
With this object in view
they select for their partners poor men who contented with the mere name of
husbands are the more ready to put up with rivals as they know that,
if they so much as murmur, they will be cast off at once. Our widow's clothing
was meant to keep out the cold and not to show her figure. Of gold she would
not wear so much as a seal-ring, choosing to store her money in the stomachs of
the poor rather than to keep it at her own disposal. She went nowhere without
her mother, and would never see without witnesses such monks and clergy as
the needs of a large house required her to interview. Her train was always
composed of virgins and widows,
and these women serious
and staid; for, as she well knew,
the levity of the maids speaks ill for the mistress and a woman's character
is shown by her choice of companions.
4. Her delight in
the divine scriptures was incredible. She was for ever singing, Your words have
I hid in mine heart that I might not sin against
you, as well as the words which describe the perfect man, his delight is in the
law of the Lord; and in his law does he meditate day and night. This meditation
in the law she understood not of a review of the written words as among
the Jews the Pharisees think,
but of action according to that saying of the apostle, whether, therefore, you
eat or drink or what soever you do, do all to the glory of God. 1 Corinthians 10:31 She
remembered also the prophet's words,
through your precepts I get understanding, and felt sure that only when she had
fulfilled these would she be permitted to understand the scriptures. In this
sense we read elsewhere that Jesus began both to do and teach. Acts 1:1 For
teaching is put to the blush when a man's conscience rebukes
him; and it is in vain that his tongue preaches poverty or teaches almsgiving if
he is rolling in the riches of Crœsus and if, in spite of his threadbare cloak,
he has silken robes at home to save from the moth.
Marcella practised fasting,
but in moderation. She abstained from eating flesh, and she knew rather
the scent of wine than its taste; touching it only for her stomach's sake and
for her often infirmities. 1 Timothy 5:23 She
seldom appeared in public and took care to avoid the houses of great ladies,
that she might not be forced to look upon what she had once for all renounced.
She frequented the basilicas of apostles and martyrs that
she might escape from the throng and give herself to private prayer.
So obedient was
she to her mother that for her sake she did things of which she herself
disapproved. For example, when her mother, careless of her own offspring, was
for transferring all her property from her children and grandchildren to her
brother's family,
Marcella wished the money to be given to the poor instead, and yet could not
bring herself to thwart her parent. Therefore she made over her ornaments and
other effects to persons already
rich, content to throw away her money rather than to sadden her mother's heart.
5. In those days no
highborn lady at Rome had
made profession of the monastic life, or had ventured— so strange and
ignominious and degrading did it then seem— publicly to call herself a nun.
It was from some priests of
Alexandria, and from pope Athanasius, and subsequently from Peter, who, to
escape the persecution of
the Arian heretics,
had all fled for refuge to Rome as
the safest haven in which they could find communion— it was from these that
Marcella heard of the life of the blessed Antony, then still alive, and of
the monasteries in
the Thebaid founded by Pachomius, and of the discipline laid down for virgins and
for widows.
Nor was she ashamed to profess a life which she had thus learned to be pleasing
to Christ.
Many years after her example was followed first by Sophronia and then by
others, of whom it may be well said in the words of Ennius:
Would that ne'er in
Pelion's woods
Had the axe these
pinetrees felled.
My revered friend Paula was
blessed with Marcella's friendship, and it was in Marcella's cell that Eustochium,
that paragon of virgins,
was gradually trained. Thus it is easy to see of what type the mistress was who
found such pupils.
The unbelieving reader
may perhaps laugh at me for dwelling so long on the praises of mere women;
yet if he will but remember how holy women followed
our Lord and Saviour and ministered to Him of their substance, and how the
three Marys stood before the cross and especially how Mary Magdalen— called the
tower from the earnestness and glow of her faith—
was privileged to see the rising Christ first of all before the very apostles,
he will convict himself of pride sooner
than me of folly. For we judge of people's virtue not
by their sex but by their character, and hold those to be worthy of the
highest glory who
have renounced both rank and wealth.
It was for this reason that Jesus loved
the evangelist John
more than the other disciples.
For John was of noble birth and known to
the high
priest, yet was so little appalled by the plottings of the Jews that
he introduced Peter into his court, and was the only one of the apostles bold
enough to take his stand before the cross. For it was he who took the Saviour's
parent to his own home; John 19:26-27 it
was the virgin son who received the virgin mother as a legacy from the Lord.
6. Marcella then
lived the ascetic life
for many years, and found herself old before she bethought herself that she had
once been young. She often quoted with approval Plato's saying
that philosophy consists
in meditating on death. A truth which
our own apostle endorses when he says: for your salvation I
die daily. Indeed according to the old copies our Lord himself says: whosoever
does not bear His cross daily and come after me cannot be my disciple.
Ages before, the Holy
Spirit had said by the prophet:
for your sake are we killed all the day long: we are counted as sheep for the
slaughter. Many generations afterwards the words were spoken: remember the end
and you shall never do amiss, Sirach 7:36 as
well as that precept of the eloquent satirist: live with death in your mind;
time flies; this say of mine is so much taken from it. Well then, as I was
saying, she passed her days and lived always in the thought that she must die.
Her very clothing was such as to remind her of the tomb, and she presented
herself as a living sacrifice,
reasonable and acceptable, unto God. Romans 12:1
7. When the needs of
the Church at
length brought me to Rome in
company with the reverend pontiffs, Paulinus and Epiphanius— the first of whom
ruled the church of the Syrian Antioch while
the second presided over that of Salamis in Cyprus—I
in my modesty was for avoiding the eyes of highborn ladies, yet she pleaded so
earnestly, both in season and out of season 2 Timothy 4:2 as
the apostle says, that at last her perseverance overcame my reluctance. And, as
in those days my name was held in some renown as that of a student of the
scriptures, she never came to see me that she did not ask me some question
concerning them, nor would she at once acquiesce in my explanations but on the
contrary would dispute them; not, however, for argument's sake but to learn the
answers to those objections which might, as she saw, be made to my statements.
How much virtue and
ability, how much holiness and
purity I found in her I am afraid to say; both lest I may exceed the bounds of
men's belief and lest I may increase your sorrow by reminding you of the
blessings that you have lost. This much only will I say, that whatever in me
was the fruit of long study and as such made by constant meditation a part of
my nature, this she tasted, this she learned and made her own. Consequently
after my departure from Rome,
in case of a dispute arising as to the testimony of scripture on any subject,
recourse was had to her to settle it. And so wise was she and so well did she
understand what philosophers call τό πρέπον,
that is, the becoming, in what she did, that when she answered questions she
gave her own opinion not as her own but as from me or some one else, thus
admitting that what she taught she had herself learned from others. For
she knew that
the apostle had said: I suffer not a woman to
teach, 1 Timothy 2:12 and
she would not seem to inflict a wrong upon the male sex many of whom (including
sometimes priests)
questioned her concerning obscure and doubtful points.
8. I am told that my
place with her was immediately taken by you, that you attached yourself to her,
and that, as the saying goes, you never let even a hair's-breadth come between
her and you. You both lived in the same house and occupied the same room so
that every one in the city knew for
certain that you had found a mother in her and she a daughter in you. In the
suburbs you found for yourselves a monastic seclusion, and chose the country
instead of the town because of its loneliness. For a long time you lived
together, and as many ladies shaped their conduct by your examples, I had
the joy of
seeing Rome transformed into another Jerusalem. Monastic establishments
for virgins became
numerous, and of hermits there were countless numbers. In fact so many were the
servants of God that monasticism which had before been a term of reproach
became subsequently one of honour.
Meantime we consoled each other for our separation by words of mutual
encouragement, and discharged in the spirit the debt which in the flesh we
could not pay. We always went to meet each other's letters, tried to outdo each
other in attentions, and anticipated each other in courteous inquiries. Not
much was lost by a separation thus effectually bridged by a constant
correspondence.
9. While Marcella
was thus serving the Lord in holy tranquillity,
there arose in these provinces a tornado of heresy which
threw everything into confusion; indeed so great was the fury into which it
lashed itself that it spared neither itself nor anything that was good.
And as if it were too little to have disturbed everything here, it introduced a
ship freighted with blasphemies into
the port of Rome itself. The dish soon found itself a cover; and the muddy feet
of heretics fouled
the clear waters Ezekiel 34:18 of
the faith of
Rome. No wonder that in the streets and in the market places a soothsayer can
strike fools on the back or, catching up his cudgel, shatter the teeth of such
as carp at him; when such venomous and filthy teaching as this has found
at Rome dupes
whom it can lead astray. Next came the scandalous version of Origen's book On
First Principles, and that 'fortunate' disciple who
would have been indeed fortunate had he never fallen in with such a master.
Next followed the confutation set forth by my supporters, which destroyed the
case of the Pharisees and
threw them into confusion. It was then that the holy Marcella,
who had long held back lest she should be thought to act from party motives,
threw herself into the breach. Conscious that the faith of
Rome— once praised by an apostle Romans 1:8 —
was now in danger, and that this new heresy was
drawing to itself not only priests and monks but
also many of the laity besides
imposing on the bishop who
fancied others as guileless as he was himself, she publicly withstood its
teachers choosing to please God rather than men.
10. In the gospel
the Saviour commends the unjust steward
because, although he defrauded his master, he acted wisely for his own
interests. Luke 16:8 The heretics in
this instance pursued the same course; for, seeing how great a matter a little
fire had kindled, James 3:5 and
that the flames applied by them to the foundations had by this time reached the
housetops, and that the deception practised on many could no longer be hid,
they asked for and obtained letters of commendation from the church, so that it
might appear that till the day of their departure they had continued in full
communion with it. Shortly afterwards the distinguished Anastasius succeeded to
the pontificate; but he was soon taken away, for it was not fitting that the
head of the world should be struck off during the episcopate of
one so great. He was removed, no doubt,
that he might not seek to turn away by his prayers the
sentence of God passed once for all. For the words of the Lord to Jeremiah
concerning Israel applied
equally to Rome: pray not
for this people for their good. When they fast I will not hear their cry; and
when they offer burnt-offering and oblation, I will not accept them; but I will
consume them by the sword and by the famine and by the pestilence. Jeremiah 14:11-12 You
will say, what has this to do with the praises of Marcella? I reply, She it was
who originated the condemnation of the heretics.
She it was who furnished witnesses first taught by them and then carried away
by their heretical teaching.
She it was who showed how large a number they had deceived and who brought up
against them the impious books On First Principles, books which were
passing from hand to hand after being 'improved' by the hand of the scorpion.
She it was lastly who called on the heretics in
letter after letter to appear in their own defence. They did not indeed venture
to come, for they were so conscience-stricken that they let the case go against
them by default rather than face their accusers and be convicted by them.
This glorious victory
originated with Marcella, she was the source and cause of
this great blessing. You who shared the honour with
her know that
I speak the truth.
You know too
that out of many incidents I only mention a few, not to tire out the reader by
a wearisome recapitulation. Were I to say more, ill natured persons might
fancy me, under pretext of commending a woman's virtues,
to be giving vent to my own rancour. I will pass now to the remainder of my
story.
11. The whirlwind
passed from the West into the East and threatened in its passage to shipwreck
many a noble craft. Then were the words of Jesus fulfilled:
when the son
of man comes, shall he find faith on
the earth? Luke 18:8 The love of
many waxed cold. Yet the few who still loved the true faith rallied
to my side. Men openly sought to take their lives and every expedient was
employed against them. So hotly indeed did the persecution rage
that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation; nay more he
committed murder,
if not in actual violence at
least in will. Then behold God blew and the tempest passed away; so that the
prediction of the prophet was
fulfilled, you take away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. In
that very day his thoughts perish, as also the gospel-saying, You fool, this
night your soul shall
be required of you: then whose shall those things be, which you have
provided? Luke 12:20
12. Whilst these things
were happening in Jebus a dreadful rumour came from the West. Rome had been
besieged and its citizens had been forced to buy their lives with gold. Then
thus despoiled they had been besieged again so as to lose not their substance
only but their lives. My voice sticks in my throat; and, as I dictate, sobs
choke my utterance. The City which had taken the whole world was itself taken;
nay more famine was beforehand with the sword and but few citizens were left to
be made captives. In their frenzy the starving people had recourse to hideous
food; and tore each other limb from limb that they might have flesh to eat.
Even the mother did not spare the babe at her breast. In the night was Moab
taken, in the night did her wall fall down. Isaiah 15:1 O God,
the heathen have
come into your inheritance; your holy temple
have they defiled; they have made Jerusalem an orchard. The dead bodies of your
servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of
your saints unto
the beasts of the earth. Their blood have they shed like water round about
Jerusalem; and there was none to bury them.
Who can set forth the
carnage of that night?
What tears are equal to
its agony?
Of ancient date a sovran
city falls;
And lifeless in its
streets and houses lie
Unnumbered bodies of its
citizens.
In many a ghastly shape
does death appear.
13. Meantime, as was
natural in a scene of such confusion, one of the bloodstained victors found his
way into Marcella's house. Now be it mine to say what I have heard, to relate
what holy men
have seen; for there were some such present and they say that you too were with
her in the hour of danger. When the soldiers entered she is said to have
received them without any look of alarm; and when they asked her for gold she
pointed to her coarse dress to show them that she had no buried treasure.
However they would not believe in
her self-chosen poverty, but scourged her and beat her with cudgels. She is
said to have felt no pain but to have thrown herself at their feet and to have
pleaded with tears for you, that you might not be taken from her, or owing to
your youth have to endure what she as an old woman had
no occasion to fear.
Christ softened their hard hearts and even among bloodstained swords natural
affection asserted its rights. The barbarians conveyed both you and her to
the basilica of
the apostle Paul,
that you might find there either a place of safety or, if not that, at least a
tomb. Hereupon Marcella is said to have burst into great joy and
to have thanked God for having kept you unharmed in answer to her prayer.
She said she was thankful too that the taking of the city had found her poor,
not made her so, that she was now in want of daily bread, that Christ satisfied
her needs so that she no longer felt hunger, that she was able to say in word
and in deed: naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return
there: the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the
Lord.
14. After a few days
she fell asleep in the Lord; but to the last her powers remained unimpaired.
You she made the heir of her poverty, or rather the poor through you. When she
closed her eyes, it was in your arms; when she breathed her last breath, your
lips received it; you shed tears but she smiled conscious of having led a good
life and hoping for her reward hereafter.
In one short night I have
dictated this letter in honour of
you, revered Marcella, and of you, my daughter Principia; not to show off my
own eloquence but to express my heartfelt gratitude to you both; my one desire
has been to please both God and my readers.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace.
(Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1893.) Revised and edited
for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001127.htm>.
Copyright © 2020 by Kevin
Knight. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
SOURCE : http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001127.htm
LETTERS OF SAINT JEROME
TO MARCELLA
Letter 23
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
Jerome
writes to Marcella to console her for the loss of a friend who, like herself,
was the head of a religious society at Rome. The news of Lea's
death had first reached Marcella when she was engaged with Jerome in the study
of the 73d psalm. Later in the day he writes this letter in which, after
extolling Lea, he contrasts her end with that of the consul-elect, Vettius
Agorius Prætextatus, a man of great ability and integrity, whom he declares to
be now in Tartarus. Written at Rome in 384 A.D.
1. Today, about the third hour, just as I
was beginning to read with you the seventy-second psalm — the first, that is,
of the third book — and to explain that its title belonged partly to the second
book and partly to the third — the previous book, I mean, concluding with the
words the prayers of
David the son of Jesse are ended, and the next commencing with the
words a psalm of Asaph — and just as I had come on the passage in
which the righteous man declares: If I say, I will speak thus; behold I
should offend against the generation of your children, a verse which is
differently rendered in our Latin version: — suddenly the news came that our
most saintly friend Lea had departed from the body. As was only natural, you
turned deadly pale; for there are few persons, if any, who do
not burst into tears when the earthen vessel breaks. 2 Corinthians 4:7 But
if you wept it was not from doubt as to her
future lot, but only because you had not rendered to her the last sad offices
which are due to the dead. Finally, as we were still conversing together, a
second message informed us that her remains had been already conveyed to Ostia.
2. You may ask what is
the use of repeating all this. I will reply in the apostle's words, much
every way. Romans 3:2 First,
it shows that all must hail with joy the release of
a soul which
has trampled Satan under
foot, and won for itself, at last, a crown of tranquillity. Secondly, it gives
me an opportunity of briefly describing her life. Thirdly, it enables me to
assure you that the consul-elect, that detractor of his age, is now in
Tartarus.
Who can sufficiently
eulogize our dear Lea's mode of living? So complete was her conversion to the
Lord that, becoming the head of a monastery, she showed
herself a true mother
to the virgins in
it, wore coarse sackcloth instead of soft raiment, passed sleepless nights
in prayer, and
instructed her companions even more by example than by precept. So great was her
humility that she, who had once been the mistress of many, was accounted the
servant of all; and certainly, the less she was reckoned an earthly mistress
the more she became a servant of Christ. She was careless
of her dress, neglected her hair, and ate only the coarsest food. Still, in all
that she did, she avoided ostentation that she might not have her reward in
this world. Matthew 6:2
3. Now, therefore, in
return for her short toil, Lea enjoys everlasting felicity; she is welcomed
into the choirs of the angels; she is comforted
in Abraham's bosom.
And, as once the beggar Lazarus saw the rich man, for all his purple, lying in
torment, so does Lea see the consul, not now in his triumphal robe but clothed
in mourning, and asking for a drop of water from her little finger. Luke 16:19-24 How
great a change have we here! A few days ago the highest dignitaries of the city
walked before him as he ascended the ramparts of the capitol like a general
celebrating a triumph; the Roman people leapt up to welcome and applaud him,
and at the news of his death the whole city was moved. Now he is desolate and
naked, a prisoner in the foulest darkness, and not, as his unhappy wife falsely asserts,
set in the royal abode of the milky way. On the other hand Lea, who was always
shut up in her one closet, who seemed poor and of little worth, and whose life
was accounted madness, Wisdom 5:4 now
follows Christ and sings, Like as we have heard, so have we seen in the
city of our God.
4. And now for the moral
of all this, which, with tears and groans, I conjure you to remember. While we
run the way of this world, we must not clothe ourselves with two coats, that
is, with a twofold faith,
or burden ourselves with leathern shoes, that is, with dead works; we must not
allow scrips filled with money to weigh us down, or lean upon the staff of
worldly power. Matthew 10:10 We
must not seek to possess both Christ and the world. No; things eternal must take
the place of things transitory; 2 Corinthians 4:18 and
since, physically speaking, we daily anticipate death, if we wish for immortality we must
realize that we are but mortal.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001023.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially
notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001023.htm
Letter 24
To Marcella
Concerning the virgin
Asella. Dedicated to God before her birth, Marcella's sister had been made a
church-virgin at the age of ten. From that time she had lived a life of the
severest asceticism,
first as a member and then as the head of Marcella's community upon the
Aventine. Jerome, who subsequently wrote her a letter (XLV) on his departure
from Rome, now
holds her up as a model to be admired and imitated. Written at Rome A.D. 384.
1. Let no one blame my
letters for the eulogies and censures which are contained in them. To arraign
sinners is to admonish those in like case, and to praise the virtuous is to
quicken the zeal of
those who wish to do right. The day before yesterday I spoke to you concerning
Lea of blessed memory, and I had hardly done so, when I was pricked in my conscience. It would be
wrong for me, I thought, to ignore a virgin after
speaking of one who, as a widow, held a lower
place. Accordingly, in my present letter, I mean to give you a brief sketch of
the life of our dear Asella. Please do not read it to her; for she is sure to
be displeased with eulogies of which she is herself the object. Show it rather
to the young girls of your acquaintance, that they may guide themselves by her
example, and may take her behavior as the pattern of a perfect life.
2. I pass over the facts
that, before her birth, she was blessed while still in her mother's womb, and
that, virgin-like, she was delivered to her father in a dream in a bowl of
shining glass brighter than a mirror. And I say nothing of her consecration to
the blessed life of virginity,
a ceremony which took place when she was hardly more than ten years old, a mere
babe still wrapped in swaddling clothes. For all that comes before works should
be counted of grace; Romans 11:6 although,
doubtless, God foreknew the future when He sanctified Jeremiah as yet
unborn, Jeremiah 1:5 when
He made John to leap in his mother's womb, Luke 1:41 and
when, before the foundation of the world, He set apart Paul to preach the
gospel of His son. Ephesians 1:4
3. I come now to the life
which after her twelfth year she, by her own exertion, chose, laid hold of,
held fast to, entered upon, and fulfilled. Shut up in her narrow cell she
roamed through paradise. Fasting was her recreation and hunger her refreshment.
If she took food it was not from love of eating, but
because of bodily exhaustion; and the bread and salt and cold water
to which she restricted herself sharpened her appetite more than they appeased
it.
But I have almost
forgotten to mention that of which I should have spoken first. When her
resolution was still fresh she took her gold necklace made in the lamprey
pattern (so called because bars of metal are linked together so as to form a
flexible chain), and sold it without her parents' knowledge. Then putting
on a dark dress such as her mother had never been willing that she should wear,
she concluded her pious enterprise
by consecrating herself immediately to the Lord. She thus showed
her relatives that
they need hope to wring no farther concessions from one who, by her very dress,
had condemned the world.
4. To go on with my
story, her ways were quiet and she lived in great privacy. In fact, she rarely
went abroad or spoke to a man. More wonderful
still, much as she loved her virgin sister, she did not care to see her. She
worked with her own hands, for she knew that it was
written: If any will not work neither shall he eat. 2 Thessalonians 3:10 To
the Bridegroom she spoke constantly in prayer and
psalmody. She hurried to the martyrs' shrines
unnoticed. Such visits gave her pleasure, and the more so because she was never
recognized. All the year round she observed a continual fast, remaining without
food for two or three days at a time; but when Lent came she hoisted — if I may
so speak — every stitch of canvas and fasted nearly from week's end to week's
end with a cheerful countenance. Matthew 6:17 What
would perhaps be incredible, were it not that with God all things are
possible, Matthew 19:26 is
that she lived this life until her fiftieth year without weakening her
digestion or bringing on herself the pain of colic. Lying on the dry ground did
not affect her limbs, and the rough sackcloth that she wore failed to make her
skin either foul or rough. With a sound body and a still sounder soul she sought all
her delight in solitude, and found for herself a monkish hermitage
in the centre of busy Rome.
5. You are better
acquainted with all this than I am, and the few details that I have given I
have learned from you. So intimate are you with Asella that you have seen, with
your own eyes, her holy knees
hardened like those of a camel from the frequency of her prayers. I merely set
forth what I can glean from you. She is alike pleasant in her serious moods and
serious in her pleasant ones: her manner, while winning, is always grave, and
while grave is always winning. Her pale face indicates continence but does not
betoken ostentation. Her speech is silent and her silence is speech. Her pace
is neither too fast nor too slow. Her demeanor is always the same. She
disregards refinement and is careless about her dress. When she does attend to
it it is without attending. So entirely consistent has her life been that here
in Rome, the
centre of vain shows, wanton license, and idle pleasure, where to be humble is to be
held spiritless, the good praise her conduct and the bad do not venture to
impugn it. Let widows and virgins imitate
her, let wedded wives make much of her, let sinful women fear her, and
let bishops look
up to her.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001024.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001024.htm
Letter 25
To Marcella
An explanation of the ten
names given to God in
the Hebrew Scriptures. The ten names are El, Elohim, Sabaôth, Eliôn, Asher
yeheyeh Exodus
3:14, Adonai, Jah, the tetragram JHVH, and Shaddai. Written at Rome 384 A.D.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001025.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001025.htm
Letter 26
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
An explanation of certain
Hebrew words which have been left untranslated in the versions. The words
are Alleluia, Amen, Maran atha.
Written at Rome 384
A.D.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001026.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001026.htm
Letter 27
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
In this letter Jerome
defends himself against the charge of having altered the text of Scripture, and
shows that he has merely brought the Latin Version of the N.T. into agreement
with the Greek original. Written at Rome 384 A.D.
1. After I had written my
former letter, containing a few remarks on some Hebrew words, a report suddenly
reached me that certain contemptible creatures were deliberately assailing me
with the charge that I had endeavored to correct passages in the gospels, against the
authority of the ancients and the opinion of the whole world. Now, though I
might — as far as strict right goes — treat these persons with
contempt (it is idle to play the lyre for an ass ), yet, lest they should
follow their usual habit and reproach me with superciliousness, let them take
my answer as follows: I am not so dull-wilted nor so coarsely ignorant (qualities
which they take for holiness,
calling themselves the disciples of
fishermen as if men were made holy by knowing nothing)— I
am not, I repeat, so ignorant as
to suppose that any of the Lord's words is either in need of correction or is
not divinely inspired; but the Latin manuscripts of the Scriptures are proved to be faulty
by the variations which all of them exhibit, and my object has been to restore
them to the form of the Greek original, from which my detractors do not deny
that they have been translated. If they dislike water drawn from the clear
spring, let them drink of the muddy streamlet, and when they come to read
the Scriptures,
let them lay aside the keen eye which they turn on woods frequented by
game-birds and waters abounding in shellfish. Easily satisfied in this instance
alone, let them, if they will, regard the words of Christ as rude sayings,
albeit that over these so many great intellects have labored for so many ages
rather to divine than to expound the meaning of each single word. Let them
charge the great apostle with want of literary skill, although it is said of
him that much learning made him mad. Acts 26:24
2. I know that as you
read these words you will knit your brows, and fear that my
freedom of speech is sowing the seeds of fresh quarrels; and that, if you
could, you would gladly put your finger on my mouth to prevent me from even
speaking of things which others do not blush to do. But, I ask you, wherein
have I used too great license? Have I ever embellished my dinner plates with
engravings of idols?
Have I ever, at a Christian banquet,
set before the eyes of virgins the
polluting spectacle of Satyrs embracing bacchanals? Or have I ever assailed any
one in too bitter terms? Have I ever complained of beggars turned millionaires?
Have I ever censured heirs for the funerals which they have given to their
benefactors? The one thing that I have unfortunately said has been that virgins ought to
live more in the company of women than of men, and by this I have
made the whole city look scandalized and caused every one to point at me the
finger of scorn. They that hate me without
a cause are
more than the hairs of mine head, and I have become a proverb to
them. Do you suppose after this that I will now say anything rash?
3. But when I set
the wheel rolling I began to form a wine flagon; how comes it that a waterpot
is the result? Lest Horace laugh at me I come back to my two-legged asses,
and din into their ears, not the music of the lute, but the blare of the
trumpet. They may say if they will, rejoicing in hope; serving the
time, but we will say rejoicing in hope; serving the Lord. They
may see fit to receive an accusation against a presbyter unconditionally;
but we will say in the words of Scripture, Against an elder receive not an
accusation, but before two or three witnesses. Them that sin rebuke before
all. 1 Timothy 5:19-20 They
may choose to read, It is a man's saying, and worthy of all
acceptation; we are content to err with the
Greeks, that is to say with the apostle himself, who spoke Greek. Our version,
therefore, is, it is a faithful saying, and worthy of all
acceptation. 1 Timothy 1:15 Lastly,
let them take as much pleasure as they please in their
Gallican geldings; we will be satisfied with the
simple ass of Zechariah, loosed from its halter and made ready for
the Saviour's service, which received the Lord on its back, and so fulfilled
Isaiah's prediction: Blessed is he that sows beside all waters, where the
ox and the ass tread under foot.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1893.) Revised
and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001027.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001027.htm
Letter 28
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
An explanation of the
Hebrew word Selah. This word, rendered by the LXX. διάψαλμα and
by Aquila ἀ εί, was as much a crux in Jerome's day as it is in
ours. Some, he writes, make it a 'change of metre,' others 'a
pause for breath,' others 'the beginning of a new subject.' According to yet
others it has something to do with rhythm or marks a burst of instrumental
music. Jerome himself inclines to follow Aquila and Origen, who make the
word mean forever, and suggests that it betokens completion, like
the explicit or feliciter in contemporary Latin
manuscripts. Written at Rome A.D. 384.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001028.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001028.htm
Letter 29
Letter XXIX. To Marcella.
(ROME, 384)
An explanation of the
Hebrew words Ephod bad 1 Samuel 2:18 and Teraphim Judges 17:5.
Written at Rome to
Marcella, also at Rome A.D.
384.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001029.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001029.htm
Letter 32
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
Jerome writes that he is
busy collating Aquila's Greek version of the Old Testament with
the Hebrew, inquires after Marcella's mother, and forwards the two preceding
letters (XXX., XXXI.). Written at Rome in 384 A.D.
1. There are two reasons
for the shortness of this letter, one that its bearer is impatient to start,
and the other that I am too busy to waste time on trifles. You ask what
business can be so urgent as to stop me from a chat on paper. Let me tell you,
then, that for some time past I have been comparing Aquila's version of
the Old Testament with
the scrolls of the Hebrew, to see if from hatred to Christ
the synagogue has
changed the text; and — to speak frankly to a friend — I have found several
variations which confirm our faith. After having
exactly revised the prophets,
Solomon, the psalter, and the books of Kings, I am now engaged on Exodus
(called by the Jews,
from its opening words, Eleh shemôth ), and when I have finished this I shall
go on to Leviticus. Now you see why I can let no claim for a letter withdraw me
from my work. However, as I do not wish my friend Currentius to run altogether
in vain, I have tacked on to this little talk two letters which I am sending to
your sister Paula,
and to her dear child Eustochium.
Read these, and if you find them instructive or pleasant, take what I have said
to them as meant for you also.
2. I hope that Albina,
your mother and mine, is well. In bodily health, I mean, for I doubt not of her
spiritual welfare. Pray salute her for me, and cherish her with double
affection, both as a Christian and
as a mother.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001032.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001032.htm
Letter 34
Letter XXXIV. To Marcella
(ROME, 384)
In reply to a request
from Marcella for information concerning two phrases in Ps. cxxvii. (bread
of sorrow, Psalm
126:2, and children of the shaken off, A.V. of the
youth, Psalm
126:4). Jerome, after lamenting that Origen's notes on
the psalm are no longer extant, gives the following explanations:
The Hebrew
phrase bread of sorrow is rendered by the LXX. bread of idols; by
Aquila, bread of troubles; by Symmachus, bread of
misery. Theodotion follows the LXX. So does Origen's Fifth
Version. The Sixth renders bread of error. In support
of the LXX. the word used here is in Ps. cxv. 4,
translated idols. Either
the troubles of life are meant or else the tenets of heresy.
With the second phrase he
deals at greater length. After showing that Hilary of Poitiers's view (viz.
that the persons meant
are the apostles,
who were told to shake the dust off their feet, Matthew 10:14) is
untenable and would require shakers off to be substituted
for shaken off, Jerome reverts to the Hebrew as before and declares
that the true rendering
is that of Symmachus and Theodotion, viz. children of youth. He
points out that the LXX. (by whom the Latin translators had been misled) fall
into the same mistake at Neh. iv. 16.
Finally he corrects a slip of Hilary as to Ps. cxxviii. 2,
where, through a misunderstanding of the LXX., the latter had
substituted the labors of your fruits for the labors of your
hands. He speaks throughout with high respect of Hilary, and says that it
was not the bishop's fault
that he was ignorant of
Hebrew. The date of the letter is probably A.D. 384.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001034.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001034.htm
Letter 37
To Marcella (ROME, 384)
Marcella had asked Jerome
to lend her a copy of a commentary by Rhetitius, bishop of
Augustodunum (Autun), on the Song of Songs. He now refuses to do so on the
ground that the work abounds with errors, of which the two
following are samples: (1) Rhetitius identifies Tharshish with Tarsus, and (2)
he supposes that Uphaz (in the phrase gold of Uphaz) is the same as
Cephas. Written at Rome A.D.
384.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001037.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001037.htm
Letter 38
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
Blæsilla, the daughter
of Paula and
sister of Eustochium,
had lost her husband seven months after her marriage. A dangerous illness had
then led to her conversion, and she was now famous throughout Rome for the
length to which she carried her austerities. Many censured her for what they
deemed her fanaticism, and Jerome, as her spiritual adviser, came in for some
of the blame. In the present letter he defends her conduct, and declares
that persons who
cavil at lives like hers have no claim to be considered Christians. Written
at Rome in
385 A.D.
1. When Abraham is tempted
to slay his son the trial only serves to strengthen his faith. Genesis xxii When
Joseph is sold into Egypt,
his sojourn there enables him to support his father and his brothers. When
Hezekiah is panic-stricken at the near approach of death, his tears and prayers obtain for
him a respite of fifteen years. If the faith of the
apostle, Peter, is shaken by his Lord's passion, it is that, weeping bitterly,
he may hear the soothing words: Feed my sheep. If Paul, that ravening
wolf, Genesis 49:27 that
little Benjamin, is blinded in a trance, it is that he may receive his sight,
and may be led, by the sudden horror of surrounding darkness, to call Him Lord
Whom before he persecuted as
man. Acts 9:3-18
2. So is it now, my dear
Marcella, with our beloved Blæsilla. The burning fever from which we have seen
her suffering unceasingly for nearly thirty days has been sent to teach her to
renounce her over-great attention to that body which the worms must shortly
devour. The Lord Jesus has come to her in her sickness, and has taken her by
the hand, and behold, she arises and ministers unto Him. Mark 1:30-31 Formerly
her life savored somewhat of carelessness; and, fast bound in the bands
of wealth, she
lay as one dead in the tomb of the world. But Jesus was moved with indignation,
and was troubled in spirit, and cried aloud and said, Blæsilla, come forth. John 11:38-44 She,
at His call, has arisen and has come forth, and sits at meat with the
Lord. John 12:2 The Jews, if they will, may
threaten her in their wrath;
they may seek to slay her, because Christ has raised her up. John 12:10 It
is enough that the apostles give
God the glory.
Blæsilla knows that
her life is due to Him who has given it back to her. She knows that now she
can clasp the feet of Him whom but a little while ago she dreaded as her
judge. Luke 7:38 Then
life had all but forsaken her body, and the approach of death made her gasp and
shiver. What succour did she obtain in that hour from her kinsfolk? What comfort
was there in their words lighter than smoke? She owes no debt to you, you
unkindly kindred, now that she is dead to the world and alive unto
Christ. Romans 6:11 The Christian must rejoice that it is
so, and he that is vexed must admit that he has no claim to be called a Christian.
3. A widow who
is loosed from the law of her husband Romans 7:2 has,
for her one duty, to continue a widow. But, you will
say, a sombre dress vexes the world. In that case, John the Baptist would vex
it, too; and yet, among those that are born of women, there has not
been a greater than he. Luke 7:28 He
was called an angel;
he baptized the
Lord Himself, and yet he was clothed in raiment of camel's hair, and girded
with a leathern girdle. Matthew 3:4 Is
the world displeased because a widow's food is
coarse? Nothing can be coarser than locusts, and yet these were the food of
John. The women who
ought to scandalize Christians are
those who paint their eyes and lips with rouge and cosmetics; whose chalked
faces, unnaturally white, are like those of idols; upon whose cheeks
every chance tear leaves a furrow; who fail to realize that years make them
old; who heap their heads with hair not their own; who smooth their faces, and
rub out the wrinkles of age; and who, in the presence of their grandsons,
behave like trembling school-girls. A Christian woman should blush
to do violence to
nature, or to stimulate desire by bestowing care upon the flesh. They that
are in the flesh, the apostle tells us, cannot please God. Romans 8:8
4. In days gone by our
dear widow was
extremely fastidious in her dress, and spent whole days before her mirror to
correct its deficiencies. Now she boldly says: We all with unveiled face,
beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord,
are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the
spirit of the Lord. In those days maids arranged her hair, and her head,
which had done no harm, was forced into a waving head-dress. Now she leaves her
hair alone, and her only head-dress is a veil. In those days the softest
feather-bed seemed hard to her, and she could scarcely find rest on a pile of
mattresses. Now she rises eager for prayer, her shrill voice
cries Alleluia before
every other, she is the first to praise her Lord. She kneels upon the bare
ground, and with frequent tears cleanses a face once defiled with white lead.
After prayer comes
the singing of psalms, and it is only when her neck aches and her knees totter,
and her eyes begin to close with weariness, that she gives them leave
reluctantly to rest. As her dress is dark, lying on the ground does not soil
it. Cheap shoes permit her to give to the poor the price of gilded ones. No
gold and jewels adorn her girdle; it is made of wool, plain and scrupulously
clean. It is intended to keep her clothes right, and not to cut her waist in
two. Therefore, if the scorpion looks askance upon her purpose, and with alluring
words tempts her once more to eat of the forbidden tree, she must crush him
beneath her feet with a curse, and say, as he lies dying in his allotted
dust: Genesis 3:14 Get
behind me, Satan. Matthew 16:23 Satan means
adversary, 1 Peter 5:8 and
one who dislikes Christ's commandments, is more than Christ's adversary; he is
anti-christ.
5. But what, I ask you,
have we ever done that men should be offended at us? Have we ever imitated
the apostles? We
are told of the first disciples that
they forsook their boat and their nets, and even their aged father. Matthew 4:18-22 The publican stood up
from the receipt of custom and followed the Saviour once for all. Matthew 9:9 And
when a disciple wished
to return home, that he might take leave of his kinsfolk, the Master's voice
refused consent. Luke 9:61-62 A
son was even forbidden to bury his father, Matthew 8:21 as
if to show that it is sometimes a religious duty to be undutiful for the Lord's
sake. Luke 14:26 With
us it is different. We are held to be monks if we refuse
to dress in silk. We are called sour and severe if we keep sober and refrain
from excessive laughter. The mob salutes us as Greeks and impostors if our
tunics are fresh and clean. They may deal in still severer witticisms if they
please; they may parade every fat paunch they can lay hold of, to turn us into
ridicule. Our Blæsilla will laugh at their efforts, and will bear with patience
the taunts of all such croaking frogs, for she will remember that men called
her Lord, Beelzebub. Matthew 10:25
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry
Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001038.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001038.htm
Letter 40
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
Onasus, of Segesta, the
subject of this letter, was among Jerome's Roman opponents. He is here held up
to ridicule in a manner which reflects little credit on the writer's urbanity.
The date of the letter is 385 A.D.
1. The medical men called
surgeons pass for being cruel, but really deserve pity. For is it not pitiful
to cut away the dead flesh of another man with merciless knives without being
moved by his pangs? Is it not pitiful that the man who is curing the patient is
callous to his sufferings, and has to appear as his enemy? Yet such is the
order of nature. While truth is always
bitter, pleasantness waits upon evil-doing. Isaiah goes naked without blushing
as a type of captivity to come. Isaiah 20:2 Jeremiah
is sent from Jerusalem to the Euphrates (a river in Mesopotamia), and leaves
his girdle to be marred in the Chaldæan camp, among the Assyrians hostile
to his people. Jeremiah 13:6-7 Ezekiel
is told to eat bread made of mingled seeds and sprinkled with the dung of men and
cattle. Ezekiel 4:9-16 He
has to see his wife die without shedding a tear. Ezekiel 24:15-18 Amos
is driven from Samaria. Amos 7:12-13 Why
is he driven from it? Surely in this case as in the others, because he was a
spiritual surgeon, who cut away the parts diseased by sin and urged men
to repentance. The apostle Paul says: Am
I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth? Galatians 4:16 And
so the Saviour Himself found it, from whom many of the disciples went back
because His sayings seemed hard. John 6:60, 66
2. It is not surprising,
then, that by exposing their faults I have offended many. I have arranged to
operate on a cancerous nose; let him who suffers from wens tremble. I wish to
rebuke a chattering daw; let the crow realize that she is offensive. Yet, after
all, is there but one person in Rome
Whose nostrils are
disfigured by a scar?
Is Onasus of Segesta
alone in puffing out his cheeks like bladders and balancing hollow phrases on
his tongue?
I say that certain persons have, by
crime, perjury,
and false pretences, attained to this or that high position. How does it hurt
you who know that
the charge does not touch you? I laugh at a pleader who has no clients, and
sneer at a penny-a-liner's eloquence. What does it matter to you who are such a
refined speaker? It is my whim to inveigh against mercenary priests. You are rich
already, why should you be angry? I wish to shut up
Vulcan and burn him in his own flames. Are you his or his neighbor that you try
to save an idol's shrine from the fire? I choose to make merry over ghosts and
owls and monsters of the Nile; and whatever I say, you take it as aimed at you.
At whatever fault I point my pen, you cry out that you are meant. You collar me
and drag me into court and absurdly charge me with writing satires when I only
write plain prose!
So you really think
yourself a pretty fellow just because you have a lucky name! Why it does not
follow at all. A broke is called a broke just because the light does not break
through it. The Fates are called sparers, just because they never spare.
The Furies are spoken of as gracious, because they show no grace. And in common
speech Ethiopians go
by the name of silverlings. Still, if the showing up of faults always angers
you, I will soothe you now with the words of Persius: May you be a catch
for my lord and lady's daughter! May the pretty ladies scramble for you! May
the ground you walk on turn to a rose-bed!
3. All the same, I will
give you a hint what features to hide if you want to look your best. Show no
nose upon your face and keep your mouth shut. You will then stand some chance
of being counted both handsome and eloquent.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001040.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001040.htm
Letter 41
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
An effort having been
made to convert Marcella to Montanism, Jerome here summarizes for her its
leading doctrines, which he contrasts with those of the Church. Written at Rome in 385 A.D.
1. As regards the
passages brought together from the gospel of John with which a certain votary
of Montanus has
assailed you, passages in which our Saviour promises that He will go to
the Father, and
that He will send the Paraclete — as regards these, the Acts of the Apostles
inform us both for what time the promises were made, and at what time they were
actually fulfilled. Ten days had elapsed, we are told, from the Lord's
ascension and fifty from His resurrection, when
the Holy Spirit came
down, and the tongues of the believers were
cloven, so that each spoke every language. Then it was that, when certain persons of those
who as yet believed not
declared that the disciples were drunk with new
wine, Peter standing in the midst of the apostles, and of all the
concourse said: You men of Judæa and all you that dwell at Jerusalem, be
this known unto
you and hearken to my words: for these are not drunken as you suppose, seeing
it is but the third
hour of the day. But this is that which was spoken of by the prophet Joel. And
it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, I will pour out of
my spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and daughters shall prophesy, and your
young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: and on my
servants, and on my handmaidens I will pour out...of my spirit. Acts 2:14-18
2. If, then, the apostle Peter, upon whom the
Lord has founded the Church, Matthew 16:18 has
expressly said that the prophecy and
promise of the Lord were then and there fulfilled, how can we claim another fulfilment
for ourselves? If the Montanists reply
that Philip's four daughters prophesied Acts 21:9 at
a later date, and that a prophet is
mentioned named Agabus,
and that in the partition of the spirit, prophets are spoken
of as well as apostles,
teachers and others, and that Paul himself
prophesied many things concerning heresies still
future, and the end of the world; we tell them that we do not so much
reject prophecy—
for this is attested by the passion of the Lord — as refuse to receive prophets whose
utterances fail to accord with the Scriptures old and
new.
3. In the first place we
differ from the Montanists regarding
the rule of faith.
We distinguish the Father,
the Son, and
the Holy Spirit as
three persons,
but unite them as one substance. They, on the other hand, following the
doctrine of Sabellius, force the Trinity into the narrow limits of a single
personality. We, while we do not encourage them, yet allow second marriages,
since Paul bids
the younger widows to
marry. 1 Timothy 5:14 They
suppose a repetition of marriage a sin so awful that
he who has committed it is to be regarded as an adulterer. We, according to the
apostolic tradition (in which the whole world is at one with us), fast through
one Lent yearly; whereas they keep three in the year as though three saviours
had suffered. I do not mean, of course, that it is unlawful to fast at other
times through the year — always excepting Pentecost — only that while in Lent
it is a duty of obligation, at other seasons it is a matter of choice. With us,
again, the bishops occupy
the place of the apostles,
but with them a bishop ranks
not first but third. For while they put first the patriarchs of Pepusa in
Phrygia, and place next to these the ministers called stewards, the bishops are
relegated to the third or almost the lowest rank. No doubt their object
is to make their religion more pretentious by putting that last which we put
first. Again they close the doors of the Church to almost
every fault, while we read daily, I desire the repentance of a sinner
rather than his death, Ezekiel 18:23 and Shall
they fall and not arise, says the Lord, Jeremiah 8:4 and
once more Return ye backsliding children and I will heal your
backslidings. Jeremiah 3:22 Their
strictness does not prevent them from themselves committing grave sins, far from it; but
there is this difference between us and them, that, whereas they in their
self-righteousness blush to confess their faults, we do penance for ours,
and so more readily gain pardon for them.
4. I pass over
their sacraments of sin, made up as they are
said to be, of sucking children subjected to a triumphant martyrdom. I prefer, I
say, not to credit these; accusations of blood-shedding may well be false. But
I must confute the open blasphemy of men
who say that God first determined in the Old Testament to
save the world by Moses and
the prophets,
but that finding Himself unable to fulfil His purpose He took to Himself a body
of the Virgin, and preaching under the form of the Son in Christ, underwent death
for our salvation.
Moreover that, when by these two steps He was unable to save the world, He last
of all descended by the Holy Spirit upon Montanus and those
demented women Prisca
and Maximilia; and that thus the mutilated and emasculate Montanus possessed
a fullness of knowledge such
as was never claimed by Paul; for he was content
to say, We know in
part, and we prophesy in part, and again, Now we see through a glass
darkly. 1 Corinthians 13:9, 12
These are statements
which require no refutation. To expose the infidelity of the Montanists is to
triumph over it. Nor is it necessary that in so short a letter as this I should
overthrow the several absurdities which they bring forward. You are well
acquainted with the Scriptures;
and, as I take it, you have written, not because you have been disturbed by
their cavils, but only to learn my opinion about them.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001041.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001041.htm
Letter 42
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
At Marcella's request
Jerome explains to her what is the sin against
the Holy Ghost spoken
of by Christ, and shows Novatian's explanation
of it to be untenable. Written at Rome in 385 A.D.
1. The question you send
is short and the answer is clear. There is this passage in the
gospel: Whosoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it shall be
forgiven him; but whosoever speaks against the Holy Ghost, it shall not
be forgiven him neither in this world nor in the world to come. Matthew 12:32 Now
if Novatian affirms
that none but Christian renegades
can sin against
the Holy Ghost,
it is plain that the Jews who blasphemed Christ
were not guilty of this sin. Yet they were wicked husbandmen,
they had slain the prophets,
they were then compassing the death of the Lord; Matthew 21:33 and
so utterly lost were they that the Son of God told
them that it was they whom he had come to save. Matthew 18:11 It
must be proved to Novatian, therefore,
that the sin which
shall never be forgiven is not the blasphemy of men
disembowelled by torture who in their agony deny their Lord, but is the
captious clamor of those who, while they see that God's works are the fruit
of virtue,
ascribe the virtue to
a demon and
declare the signs wrought to belong not to the divine excellence but to
the devil. And
this is the whole gist of our Saviour's argument, when He teaches that Satan cannot be
cast out by Satan,
and that his kingdom is not divided against itself. Matthew 12:25-26 If
it is the devil's object
to injure God's creation, how can he wish to cure the sick and to expel himself
from the bodies possessed by him? Let Novatian prove that
of those who have been compelled to sacrifice before a
judge's tribunal any has declared of the things written in the gospel that they
were wrought not by the Son of God but
by Beelzebub,
the prince of the devils; Matthew 12:24 and
then he will be able to make good his contention that this is the blasphemy against
the Holy Ghost which
shall never be forgiven.
2. But to put a more
searching question still: let Novatian tell us
how he distinguishes speaking against the Son of Man from blasphemy against
the Holy Ghost.
For I maintain that on his principles men who have denied Christ under persecution have
only spoken against the Son of Man, and have
not blasphemed the Holy Ghost. For when a
man is asked if he is a Christian, and declares
that he is not; obviously in denying Christ, that is the Son of Man, he does no
despite to the Holy
Ghost. But if his denial of Christ involves a denial of the Holy Ghost, this heretic can perhaps
tell us how the Son
of Man can be denied without sinning against the Holy Ghost. If he thinks
that we are here intended by the term Holy Ghost to
understand the Father,
no mention at all of the Father is made by the denier in his denial. When
the apostle Peter, taken aback by a
maid's question, denied the Lord, did he sin against
the Son of Man or
against the Holy
Ghost? If Novatian absurdly
twists Peter's words, I know not the
man, Matthew 26:74 to
mean a denial not of Christ's Messiahship
but of His humanity, he will make the Saviour a liar, for He foretold that He
Himself, that is His divine Sonship, must be denied. Now, when Peter denied
the Son of God,
he wept bitterly and effaced his threefold denial by a threefold
confession. John 21:15-17 His sin, therefore, was not
the sin against
the Holy Ghost which
can never be forgiven. It is obvious, then, that this sin involves blasphemy, calling
one Beelzebub for
his actions, whose virtues prove
him to be God. If Novatian can
bring an instance of a renegade who has called Christ Beelzebub, I will at
once give up my position and admit that after such a fall the denier can win no
forgiveness. To give way under torture and to deny oneself to be a Christian is one
thing, to say that Christ is
the devil is
another. And this you will yourself see if you read the passage attentively.
3. I ought to have
discussed the matter more fully, but some friends have visited my humble abode, and I
cannot refuse to give myself up to them. Still, as it might seem arrogant not
to answer you at once, I have compressed a wide subject into a few words, and
have sent you not a letter but an explanatory note.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001042.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001042.htm
Letter 43
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
Jerome draws a contrast
between his daily life and that of Origen, and sorrowfully
admits his own shortcomings. He then suggests to Marcella the advantages which
life in the country offers over life in town, and hints that he is himself
disposed to make trial of it. Written at Rome in 385 A.D.
1. Ambrose who
supplied Origen, true man of adamant
and of brass, with money, materials and amanuenses to bring out his countless
books — Ambrose, in a letter to his friend from Athens, states that they never
took a meal together without something being read, and never went to bed till
some portion of Scripture had been brought home to them by a brother's voice.
Night and day, in fact, were so ordered that prayer only gave
place to reading and reading to prayer.
2. Have we, brute beasts
that we are, ever done the like? Why, we yawn if we read for over an hour; we
rub our foreheads and vainly try to suppress our languor. And then, after this
great feat, we plunge for relief into worldly business once more.
I say nothing of the
meals with which we dull our faculties, and I would rather not estimate the
time that we spend in paying and receiving visits. Next we fall into
conversation; we waste our words, we attack people behind their backs, we
detail their way of living, we carp at them and are carped at by them in turn.
Such is the fare that engages our attention at dinner and afterwards. Then,
when our guests have retired, we make up our accounts, and these are sure
to cause us
either anger or
anxiety. The first makes us like raging lions, and the second seeks vainly to
make provision for years to come. We do not recollect the words of the Gospel: You fool,
this night your soul shall
be required of you: then whose shall those things be which you have
provided? Luke 12:20 The
clothing which we buy is designed not merely for use but for display. Where
there is a chance of saving money we quicken our pace, speak promptly, and keep
our ears open. If we hear of household losses — such as often occur — our looks
become dejected and gloomy. The gain of a penny fills us with joy; the loss of a
half-penny plunges us into sorrow. One man is of so many minds that the prophet's prayer is: Lord,
in your city scatter their image. For created as we are in the image
of God and
after His likeness, Genesis 1:26 it
is our own wickedness which
makes us assume masks. Just as on the stage the same actor now figures as a
brawny Hercules, now softens into a tender Venus, now shivers in the role of
Cybele; so we — who, if we were not of the world, would be hated by the
world John 15:19 —
for every sin that
we commit have a corresponding mask.
3. Wherefore, seeing that
we have journeyed for much of our life through a troubled sea, and that our
vessel has been in turn shaken by raging blasts and shattered upon treacherous
reefs, let us, as soon as may be, make for the haven of rural quietude. There
such country dainties as milk and household bread, and greens watered by our
own hands, will supply us with coarse but harmless fare. So living, sleep will
not call us away from prayer,
nor satiety from reading. In summer the shade of a tree will afford us privacy.
In autumn the quality of the air and the leaves strewn under foot will invite
us to stop and rest. In springtime the fields will be bright with flowers, and
our psalms will sound the sweeter for the twittering of the birds. When winter
comes with its frost and snow, I shall not have to buy fuel, and, whether I
sleep or keep vigil, shall be warmer than in town. At least, so far as I know, I shall keep off
the cold at less expense. Let Rome keep to itself its noise and bustle, let the
cruel shows of the arena go on, let the crowd rave at the circus, let the
playgoers revel in the theatres and — for I must not altogether pass over
our Christian friends
— let the House of Ladies hold its daily sittings. It is good for us to
cleave to the Lord, and to put our hope in the Lord God, so that when
we have exchanged our present poverty for the kingdom of heaven, we
may be able to exclaim: Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is none
upon earth that I desire beside you. Surely if we can find such
blessedness in heaven we may well grieve to have sought after pleasures poor
and passing here upon earth. Farewell.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001043.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001043.htm
Letter 44
To Marcella (ROME, 385)
Marcella had sent some
small articles as a present (probably to Paula and Eustochium) and Jerome
now writes in their name to thank her for them. He notices the appropriateness
of the gifts, not only to the ladies, but also to himself. Written at Rome in 385 A.D.
When absent in body we
are wont to converse together in spirit. Colossians 2:5 Each
of us does what he or she can. You send us gifts, we send you back letters of
thanks. And as we are virgins who
have taken the veil, it is our duty to show that hidden meanings lurk under
your nice presents. Sackcloth, then, is a token of prayer and fasting, the chairs
remind us that a virgin should
never stir abroad, and the wax tapers that we should look for the bridegroom's coming
with our lights burning. Matthew 25:1 The
cups also warn us to mortify the flesh and always to be ready for martyrdom. How
bright, says the psalmist, is the cup of the Lord, intoxicating them
that drink it! Moreover, when you offer to matrons little fly-flaps to
brush away mosquitoes, it is a charming way of hinting that they should at once
check voluptuous feelings, for dying flies, we are told, spoil
sweet ointment. In such presents, then, as these, virgins can find a
model, and matrons a pattern. To me, too, your gifts convey a lesson, although
one of an opposite kind. For chairs suit idlers, sackcloth does for penitents,
and cups are wanted for the thirsty. And I shall be glad to light your tapers,
if only to banish the terrors of the night and the fears of an evil conscience.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001044.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001044.htm
Letter 46
Paula and Eustochium to
Marcella (BETHLEHEM, 386)
Jerome writes to Marcella
in the name of Paula and Eustochium, describing
the charms of the Holy Land, and urging her to leave Rome and to join her old
companions at Bethlehem.
Much of the letter is devoted to disposing of the objection that since the
Passion of Christ the Holy Land has been under a curse. The date of the letter
is A.D. 386. It is written from Bethlehem, which now becomes
Jerome's home for the remainder of his life.
1. Love cannot be
measured, impatience knows no
bounds, and eagerness can brook no delay. Wherefore we, oblivious of our
weakness, and relying more on our will than our
capacity, desire — pupils though we be — to instruct our mistress. We are like
the sow in the proverb, which sets up to teach the goddess of invention. You
were the first to set our tinder alight; the first, by precept and example, to
urge us to adopt our present life. As a hen gathers her chickens, so did you
take us under your wing. And will you now let us fly about at random with no
mother near us? Will you leave us to dread the swoop of the hawk and the shadow
of each passing bird of prey? Separated from you, we do what we can: we utter
our mournful plaint, and more by sobs than by tears we adjure you to give
back to us the Marcella whom we love. She is mild, she
is suave, she is sweeter than the sweetest honey. She must not, therefore, be
stern and morose to us, whom her winning ways have roused to adopt a life like
her own.
2. Assuming that what we
ask is for the best, our eagerness to obtain it is nothing to be ashamed of.
And if all the Scriptures agree
with our view, we are not too bold in urging you to a course to which you have
yourself often urged us.
What are God's first
words to Abraham? Get
you out of your country and from your kindred unto a land that I will show
you. Genesis 12:1 The
patriarch — the first to receive a promise of Christ — is here told to leave
the Chaldees, to leave the city of confusion and its rehoboth Genesis 10:11 or
broad places; to leave also the plain of Shinar, where the tower of pride had been
raised to heaven. He has to pass through the waves of this world, and to ford
its rivers; those by which the saints sat down and
wept when they remembered Zion, and Chebar's flood, whence Ezekiel was carried
to Jerusalem by the hair of his head. Ezekiel 8:3 All
this Abraham undergoes
that he may dwell in a land of promise watered from above, and not like Egypt, from below, Deuteronomy 11:10 no
producer of herbs for the weak and ailing, Romans 14:2 but
a land that looks for the early and the latter rain from heaven. It is a land
of hills and valleys, Deuteronomy 11:11 and
stands high above the sea. The attractions of the world it entirely wants, but
its spiritual attractions are for this all the greater. Mary, the mother of the
Lord, left the lowlands and made her way to the hill country, when, after
receiving the angel's message,
she realized that she bore within her womb the Son of God. When of old
the Philistines had
been overcome, when their devilish audacity had been smitten, when their
champion had fallen on his face to the earth, 1 Samuel 17:49 it
was from this city that there went forth a procession of jubilant souls, a
harmonious choir to
sing our David's victory over tens of thousands. Here, too, it was that
the angel grasped
his sword, and while he laid waste the whole of the ungodly city, marked out
the temple of the Lord in the threshing floor of Ornan, king of the Jebusites.
Thus early was it made plain that Christ's church would grow up, not in Israel, but among
the Gentiles.
Turn back to Genesis, Genesis 14:18 and
you will find that this was the city over which Melchizedek held
sway, that king of Salem who, as a type of Christ, offered to Abraham bread and
wine, and even then consecrated the mystery which Christians consecrate
in the body and blood of the Saviour.
3. Perhaps you will
tacitly reprove us for deserting the order of Scripture, and letting our
confused account ramble this way and that, as one thing or another strikes us.
If so, we say once more what we said at the outset: love has no logic,
and impatience knows no
rule. In the Song of Songs the precept is given as a hard one: Regulate
your love towards
me. And so we plead that, if we err, we do so not
from ignorance but
from feeling.
Well, then, to bring
forward something still more out of place, we must go back to yet remoter
times. Tradition has it that in this city, nay, more, on this very spot, Adam lived and
died. The place where our Lord was crucified is called Calvary, because the
skull of the primitive man was buried there. So it came to pass that the second
Adam, that is the blood of Christ, as it dropped
from the cross,
washed away the sins of
the buried protoplast, the first Adam, and thus the words of the apostle were
fulfilled: Awake, you that sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ
shall give you light. Ephesians 5:14
It would be tedious to
enumerate all the prophets and holy men who have
been sent forth from this place. All that is strange and mysterious to us is
familiar and natural to this city and country. By its very names, three in
number, it proves the doctrine of the trinity. For it is called first Jebus,
then Salem, then Jerusalem: names of which the first
means down-trodden, the second peace, and the
third vision of peace. For it is only by slow stages that we reach
our goal; it is only after we have been trodden down that we are lifted up to
see the vision of peace. Because of this peace Solomon, the man of peace, was
born there, and in peace was his place made. King of kings, and lord
of lords, his name and that of the city show him to be a type of Christ. Need we speak of
David and his descendants, all of whom reigned here? As Judæa is exalted above
all other provinces, so is this city exalted above all Judæa. To speak more
tersely, the glory of
the province is derived from its capital; and whatever fame the members possess
is in every case due to the head.
4. You have long been
anxious to break forth into speech; the very letters we have formed perceive
it, and our paper already understands the question you are going to put. You
will reply to us by saying: it was so of old, when the Lord loved the
gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob, and when her
foundations were in the holy mountains.
Even these verses, however, are susceptible of a deeper interpretation. But
things are changed since then. The risen Lord has proclaimed in tones of
thunder: Your house is left unto you desolate. With tears He has
prophesied its downfall: O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that killest
the prophets,
and stone them
which are sent unto you; how often would I have gathered your children together
even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and you would not. Behold
your house is left unto you desolate. Matthew 23:37-38 The
veil of the temple has been rent; Matthew 27:51 an
army has encompassed Jerusalem, it has been stained by the blood of the Lord.
Now, therefore, its guardian angels have
forsaken it and the grace of
Christ has been withdrawn. Josephus, himself a
Jewish writer, asserts that at the Lord's crucifixion there broke from the temple
voices of heavenly powers, saying: Let us depart hence. These and
other considerations show that where grace abounded
there did sin much
more abound. Romans 5:20 Again,
when the apostles received
the command: Go and teach all nations, Matthew 28:19 and
when they said themselves: It was necessary that the word of God should
first have been spoken to you, but seeing ye put it from you...lo we turn to
the Gentiles, Acts 13:46 then
all the spiritual importance of Judæa and its old intimacy with God were
transferred by the apostles to
the nations.
5. The difficulty is
strongly stated, and may well puzzle even those proficient in Scripture; but
for all that, it admits of an easy solution. The Lord wept for the fall of
Jerusalem, Luke 19:41 and
He would not have done so if He did not love it. He wept
for Lazarus because He loved him. John 11:35-36 The truth is that it
was the people who sinned and
not the place. The capture of a city is involved in the slaying of its
inhabitants. If Jerusalem was destroyed, it was that its people might be
punished; if the temple was overthrown, it was that its figurative sacrifices might be
abolished. As regards its site, lapse of time has but invested it with fresh
grandeur. The Jews of
old reverenced the Holy of Holies, because of the things contained in it —
the cherubim,
the mercy-seat, the Ark
of the Covenant, the manna, Aaron's rod, and
the golden altar. Hebrews 9:3-5 Does
the Lord's sepulchre seem less worthy of veneration? As often as we enter it we
see the Saviour in His grave clothes, and if we linger we see again the angel sitting at
His feet, and the napkin folded at His head. Long before this sepulchre was
hewn out by Joseph, its glory was foretold
in Isaiah's prediction, his rest shall be glorious, Isaiah 11:10 meaning
that the place of the Lord's burial should be held in universal honor.
6. How, then, you will
say, do we read in the apocalypse written by John: The beast that ascends
out of the bottomless pit shall...kill them [that is, obviously, the prophets], and their
dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is
called Sodom and Egypt, where also their
Lord was crucified? If the great city where the Lord was crucified is
Jerusalem, and if the place of His crucifixion is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt; then as the Lord
was crucified at Jerusalem, Jerusalem must be Sodom and Egypt. Holy Scripture, I reply
first of all, cannot contradict itself. One book cannot invalidate the drift of
the whole. A single verse cannot annul the meaning of a book. Ten lines earlier
in the apocalypse it is written: Rise and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and
them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple leave out
and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles; and the holy city shall
they tread under foot forty and two months. Revelation 11:2 The
apocalypse was written by John long after the Lord's passion, yet in it he
speaks of Jerusalem as the holy city. But if
so, how can he spiritually call it Sodom and Egypt? It is no answer
to say that the Jerusalem which is called holy is the
heavenly one which is to be, while that which is called Sodom is the
earthly one tottering to its downfall. For it is the Jerusalem to come that is
referred to in the description of the beast, which shall ascend out of the
bottomless pit, and shall make war against the
two prophets,
and shall overcome them and kill them, and their dead bodies shall lie in the
street of the great city. Revelation 11:7-8 At
the close of the book it is farther described thus: And the city lies
four-square, and the length of it and the breadth are the same as the height;
and he measured the city with the golden reed twelve thousand furlongs. The
length and the breadth and the height of it are equal. And he measured the walls
thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of
a man, that is,
of the angel.
And the building of the wall of it was of jasper; and the city was pure
gold Revelation 21:16-18 —
and so on. Now where there is a square there can be neither length nor breadth.
And what kind of measurement is that which makes length and breadth equal to
height? And how can there be walls of jasper, or a whole city of pure gold; its
foundations and its streets of precious stones, and its twelve gates each
glowing with pearls?
7. Evidently this
description cannot be taken literally (in fact, it is absurd to suppose a city
the length, breadth and height of which are all twelve thousand furlongs), and
therefore the details of it must be mystically understood.
The great city which Cain first built and called after his son Genesis 4:17 must
be taken to represent this world, which the devil, that accuser of
his brethren, that fratricide who is doomed to perish, has built of vice cemented with
crime, and filled with iniquity. Therefore it is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt. Thus it is
written, Sodom shall
return to her former estate, Ezekiel 16:55 that
is to say, the world must be restored as it has been before. For we
cannot believe that Sodom and Gomorrha, Admah and
Zeboim Deuteronomy 29:23 are
to be built again: they must be left to lie in ashes forever. We never read
of Egypt as
put for Jerusalem: it always stands for this world. To collect from Scripture
the countless proofs of
this would be tedious: I shall adduce but one passage, a passage in which this
world is most clearly called Egypt. The apostle Jude,
the brother of James, writes thus in his catholic epistle: I will,
therefore, put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this how
that Jesus,
having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward
destroyed them that believed not. Jude 5 And,
lest you should fancy Joshua
the Son of Nun to be meant, the passage goes on thus: And
the angels which
kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he has reserved in
everlasting chains, under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day. Jude 6 Moreover,
to convince you that in every place where Egypt, Sodom and Gomorrha are named
together it is not these spots, but the present world, which is meant, he
mentions them immediately in this sense. Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, he
writes, and the cities about them, in like manner giving themselves over
to fornication and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example,
suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Jude 7 But
what need is there to collect more proofs when, after
the passion and the resurrection of the Lord, the evangelist Matthew
tells us: The rocks rent, and the graves were opened; and many bodies of
the saints which
slept arose and came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into
the holy city
and appeared unto many? Matthew 27:51, 53 We
must not interpret this passage straight off, as many people absurdly do, of
the heavenly Jerusalem: the apparition there of the bodies of the saints could be no
sign to men of the Lord's rising. Since, therefore, the evangelists and all
the Scriptures speak
of Jerusalem as the holy city,
and since the psalmist commands us to worship the Lord at his
footstool; allow no one to call it Sodom and Egypt, for by it the
Lord forbids men to swear because it
is the city of the great king. Matthew 5:35
8. The land is accursed,
you say, because it has drunk in the blood of the Lord. On what grounds, then,
do men regard as blessed those spots where Peter and Paul, the leaders of
the Christian host,
have shed their blood for Christ? If the confession of men and servants
is glorious,
must there not be glory likewise
in the confession of their Lord and God? Everywhere we venerate the tombs of
the martyrs; we
apply their holy ashes
to our eyes; we even touch them, if we may, with our lips. And yet some think
that we should neglect the tomb in which the Lord Himself is buried. If we
refuse to believe human testimony,
let us at least credit the devil and his angels. Matthew 25:41 For
when in front of the Holy Sepulchre they are driven out of those bodies which
they have possessed, they moan and tremble as if they stood before Christ's
judgment-seat, and grieve, too late that they have crucified Him in whose
presence they now cower. If — as a wicked theory
maintains — this holy place
has, since the Lord's passion, become an abomination, why was Paul in such haste
to reach Jerusalem to keep Pentecost in it? Acts 20:16 Yet
to those who held him back he said: What mean ye to weep and to break my
heart? For I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem, for
the name of the Lord
Jesus. Acts 21:13 Need
I speak of those other holy and
illustrious men who, after the preaching of Christ, brought their
votive gifts and offerings to the brethren who were at Jerusalem?
9. Time forbids me to
survey the period which has passed since the Lord's ascension, or to recount
the bishops,
the martyrs, the
divines, who have come to Jerusalem from a feeling that their devotion
and knowledge would
be incomplete and their virtue without the
finishing touch, unless they adored Christ in the very spot where the gospel
first flashed from the gibbet. If a famous orator blames a man for having
learned Greek at Lilybæum instead of at Athens, and Latin in Sicily instead of
at Rome (on
the ground, obviously, that each province has its own characteristics), can we
suppose a Christian's education
complete who has not visited the Christian Athens?
10. In speaking thus we
do not mean to deny that the kingdom of God is within us, Luke 17:21 or
to say that there are no holy men elsewhere;
we merely assert in the strongest manner that those who stand first throughout
the world are here gathered side by side. We ourselves are among the last, not
the first; yet we have come hither to see the first of all nations. Of all the
ornaments of the Church our
company of monks and virgins is one of
the finest; it is like a fair flower or a priceless gem. Every man of note
in Gaul hastens
hither. The Briton, sundered from our world, no sooner makes progress
in religion than he leaves the setting sun in quest of a spot of which he knows only through
Scripture and common report. Need we recall the Armenians, the Persians, the peoples of
India and Arabia? Or those of our neighbor, Egypt, so rich in monks; of Pontus and
Cappadocia; of Cæle-Syria and
Mesopotamia and the teeming east? In fulfilment of the Saviour's
words, Wherever the body is, there will the eagles be gathered
together, Luke 17:37 they
all assemble here and exhibit in this one city the most varied virtues. Differing in
speech, they are one in religion, and almost every nation has a choir of its own.
Yet amid this great concourse there is no arrogance, no disdain of
self-restraint; all strive after humility, that greatest of Christian virtues. Whosoever is
last is here regarded as first. Matthew 19:30 Their
dress neither provokes remark nor calls for admiration. In whatever guise a man
shows himself he is neither censured nor flattered. Long fasts help no one
here. Starvation wins no deference, and the taking of food in moderation is not
condemned. To his own master each one stands or falls. Romans 14:4 No
man judges another lest he be judged of the Lord. Matthew 7:1 Backbiting,
so common in other parts, is wholly unknown here. Sensuality and excess are far
removed from us. And in the city there are so many places of prayer that a day
would not be sufficient to go round them all.
11. But, as every one
praises most what is within his reach, let us pass now to the cottage-inn which
sheltered Christ and Mary. Luke 2:7 With
what expressions and what language can we set before you the cave of the
Saviour? The stall where he cried as a babe can be best honored by silence;
for words are inadequate to speak its praise. Where are the spacious porticoes?
Where are the gilded ceilings? Where are the mansions furnished by the
miserable toil of doomed wretches? Where are the costly halls raised by
untitled opulence for man's vile body to walk in? Where are the roofs that
intercept the sky, as if anything could be finer than the expanse of heaven?
Behold, in this poor crevice of the earth the Creator of the heavens was born;
here He was wrapped in swaddling clothes; here He was seen by the shepherds;
here He was pointed out by the star; here He was adored by the wise men. This
spot is holier, me-thinks, than that Tarpeian rock which has shown itself
displeasing to God by the frequency with which it has been struck by lightning.
12. Read the apocalypse
of John, and consider what is sung therein of the woman arrayed in
purple, and of the blasphemy written
upon her brow, of the seven mountains, of the many waters, and of the end
of Babylon. Come
out of her, my people, so the Lord says, that you be not partakers of
her sins, and
that you receive not of her plagues. Revelation 18:4 Turn
back also to Jeremiah and pay heed to what he has written of like
import: Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver
every man his soul. Jeremiah 51:6 For Babylon the great
is fallen, is fallen, and has become the habitation of devils, and the hold of
every foul spirit. Revelation 18:2 It
is true that
Rome has a holy church,
trophies of apostles and martyrs, a true confession
of Christ.
The faith has
been preached there by an apostle, heathenism has been
trodden down, the name of Christian is daily
exalted higher and higher. But the display, power, and size of the city, the
seeing and the being seen, the paying and the receiving of visits, the
alternate flattery and detraction, talking and listening, as well as the necessity of facing
so great a throng even when one is least in the mood to do so — all these
things are alike foreign to the principles and fatal to the repose of the
monastic life. For when people come in our way we either see them coming and
are compelled to speak, or we do not see them and lay ourselves open to the
charge of haughtiness. Sometimes, also, in returning visits we are obliged to pass
through proud portals
and gilded doors and to face the clamor of carping lackeys. But, as we have
said above, in the cottage of Christ all is simple and rustic: and except for
the chanting of psalms there is complete silence. Wherever one turns the
laborer at his plough sings alleluia, the toiling mower cheers himself with
psalms, and the vine-dresser while he prunes his vine sings one of the lays of
David. These are the songs of the country; these, in popular phrase, its love ditties: these
the shepherd whistles; these the tiller uses to aid his toil.
13. But what are we
doing? Forgetting what is required of us, we are taken up with what we wish.
Will the time never come when a breathless messenger shall bring the news that
our dear Marcella has reached the shores of Palestine, and when every band
of monks and
every troop of virgins shall
unite in a song of welcome? In our excitement we are already hurrying to meet
you: without waiting for a vehicle, we hasten off at once on foot. We shall
clasp you by the hand, we shall look upon your face; and when, after long
waiting, we at last embrace you, we shall find it hard to tear ourselves away.
Will the day never come when we shall together enter the Saviour's cave, and
together weep in the sepulchre of the Lord with His sister and with His
mother? John 19:25 Then
shall we touch with our lips the wood of the cross, and rise in prayer and resolve
upon the Mount of
Olives with the ascending Lord. Acts 1:9, 12 We
shall see Lazarus come forth bound with grave clothes, John 11:43-44 we
shall look upon the waters of Jordan purified for the washing of the
Lord. Matthew 3:13 Thence
we shall pass to the folds of the shepherds, Luke 2:8 we
shall pray together
in the mausoleum of David. 1 Kings 2:10 We
shall see the prophet,
Amos, upon his crag blowing his shepherd's horn. We shall hasten, if not to the
tents, to the monuments of Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob, and of their three illustrious wives. We shall see the fountain in which
the eunuch was immersed by Philip. Acts 8:36 We
shall make a pilgrimage to Samaria, and side by
side venerate the ashes of John the Baptist, of Elisha, 2 Kings 13:21 and
of Obadiah. We shall enter the very caves where in the time of persecution and
famine the companies of the prophets were fed. 1 Kings 18:3-4 If
only you will come, we shall go to see Nazareth, as its name
denotes, the flower of Galilee. Not far
off Cana will
be visible, where the water was turned into wine. John 2:1-11 We
shall make our way to Tabor, Matthew 17:1-9 and
see the tabernacles there which the Saviour shares, not, as Peter once wished,
with Moses and
Elijah, but with the Father and with the Holy Ghost. Thence we
shall come to the Sea of Gennesaret, and when there we shall see the spots
where the five thousand were filled with five loaves, and the four thousand
with seven. The town of Nain will meet our eyes, at the gate of which the widow's son was
raised to life. Hermon too will be visible, and the torrent of Endor, at which
Sisera was vanquished. Our eyes will look also on Capernaum, the scene of so
many of our Lord's signs — yes, and on all Galilee besides.
And when, accompanied by Christ, we shall have made our way back to our cave
through Shiloh and Bethel, and those other places where churches are set up
like standards to commemorate the Lord's victories, then we shall sing
heartily, we shall weep copiously, we shall pray unceasingly.
Wounded with the Saviour's shaft, we shall say one to another: I have
found Him whom my soul loves;
I will hold Him and will not let Him go.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001046.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
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SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001046.htm
Letter 59
To Marcella
An answer to five
questions put to Jerome by Marcella in a letter not preserved. The questions
are as follows.
(1) What are the things
which eye has not seen nor ear heard 1 Corinthians 2:9?
Jerome answers that they are spiritual things which as such can only be
spiritually discerned.
(2) Is it not a mistake
to identify the sheep and the goats of Christ's parable Matthew 25:31 sqq. with Christians and heathens? Are they not
rather the good and the bad? For an answer to this question Jerome refers
Marcella to his treatise against Jovinian (II. §§18-23).
(3) Paul says that some
shall be alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord; and that they
shall be caught up to meet the Lord in the air 1 Thessalonians
4:15-17. Are we to suppose this assumption to be corporeal and that those
assumed will escape death? Yes, Jerome answers, but their bodies will be glorified.
(4) How is Joh. xx. 17, touch
me not, to be reconciled with Matt. xxviii. 9, they
came and held him by the feet? In the one case, Jerome replies, Mary Magdalen
failed to recognize the divinity of Jesus; in the other the women recognized
it. Accordingly they were admitted to a privilege which was denied to her.
(5) Was the risen Christ
before His ascension present only with the disciples, or was He in
heaven and elsewhere as well? The latter according to Jerome is the true doctrine. The
Divine Nature, he writes, exists everywhere in its entirety. Christ, therefore, was
at one and the same time with the apostles and with
the angels; in
the Father and in the uttermost parts of the sea. So afterwards he was with
Thomas in India, with Peter at Rome, with Paul in Illyricum, with Titus in
Crete, with Andrew in Achaia. The date of the letter is A.D. 395 or A.D.
396.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001059.htm>.
Contact information. The
editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001059.htm
Letter 97
To Pammachius and
Marcella
With this letter Jerome
sends to Pammachius and Marcella a translation of the paschal letter issued by
Theophilus for the year 402 A.D. together with the Greek original. He takes the
precaution of sending this latter because in the preceding year complaints have
been made that his translation was not accurate. Written in 402 A.D.
1. Once more with the
return of spring I enrich you with the wares of the east and send the treasures
of Alexandria to Rome:
as it is written, God shall
come from the south and the Holy One from Mount Paran, even a thick
shadow. (Hence in the Song of Songs the joyous cry of the bride: I
sat down under his shadow with great delight and his fruit was sweet to my
taste. Song of Songs 2:3)
Now truly is
Isaiah's prophecy fulfilled: In
that day shall there be an altar to the Lord in the land of Egypt. Isaiah 19:19 Where sin has
abounded, grace does
much more abound. Romans 5:20 They
who fostered the infant Christ now with glowing faith defend Him in
His manhood; and they who once saved Him from the hands of Herod are ready to
save Him again from this blasphemer and heretic. Demetrius
expelled Origen from
the city of Alexander; but he is now thanks to Theophilus outlawed from the
whole world. Like him to whom Luke has dedicated the Acts of the
Apostles Acts 1:1 this bishop derives his
name from his love to God. Where now is the
wriggling serpent? In what plight does the venomous viper find himself? His is
A human face with
wolfish body joined.
Where now is that heresy which
crawled hissing through the world and boasted that both the bishop Theophilus
and I were partisans of its errors? Where now is the
yelping of those shameless hounds who, to win over the simple minded, falsely proclaimed
our adherence to their cause? Crushed by the authority
and eloquence of Theophilus they are now like demon-spirits only able to mutter
and that from out of the earth. 1 Samuel 28:13 For
they know nothing
of Him who, as He comes from above, John 8:23 speaks
only of the things that are above.
2. Would that this
generation of vipers Matthew 3:7 would
either honestly accept our doctrines, or else consistently defend its own; that
we might know whom
we are to esteem and whom we are to shun. As it is they have invented a new
kind of penitence, hating us as enemies though they dare not deny our faith. What, I ask, is
this chagrin of theirs which neither time nor reason seems able to cure? When
swords flash in battle and men fall and blood flows in streams, hostile hands
are often clasped in amity and the fury of war is exchanged
for an unexpected peace. The partisans of this heresy alone can
make no terms with churchmen; for they repudiate mentally the verbal assent
that is extorted from them. When their open blasphemy is made
plain to the public ear, and when they perceive their hearers clamouring
against them; then they assume an air of simplicity, declaring that they hear
such doctrines for the first time and that they have no previous knowledge of them
as taught by their master. And when you hold their writings in your hand, they
deny with their lips what their hands have written. Why, sirs, need you beset
the Propontis, shift your abode, wander through different countries, and rend
with foaming mouths a distinguished prelate of Christ and his followers? If
your recantations are sincere, you should replace your former zeal for error with an
equal zeal for
the faith. Why
do you patch together from this quarter and from that these rags of cursing?
And why do you rail at the lives of men whose faith you cannot
resist? Do you cease to be heretics because
according to you sundry persons believe us to be
sinners? And does impiety cease to disfigure your lips because you can point to
scars on our ears? So long as you have a leopard's spots and an Ethiopian's skin, Jeremiah 13:23 how
can it help your perfidy to know that I too am
marked by moles? See, Pope Theophilus is freely allowed to prove Origen a heretic; and the disciples do not
defend the master's words. They merely pretend that they have been altered
by heretics and
tampered with, like the works of many other writers. Thus they seek to maintain
his cause not
by their own belief but by other people's errors. So much I would
say against heretics who
in the fury of their unjust hostility
to us betray the secret feelings of their minds and prove the incurable nature
of the wound that rankles in their breasts.
3. But you are Christians and the
lights of the senate: accept therefore from me the letter which I append. This
year I send it both in Greek and Latin that the heretics may not
again lyingly assert that I have made many changes in and additions to the
original. I have laboured hard, I must confess, to preserve the charm of the
diction by a like elegance in my version: and keeping within fixed lines and
never allowing myself to deviate from these I have done my best to maintain the
smooth flow of the writer's eloquence and to render his remarks in the tone in
which they are made. Whether I have succeeded in these two objects or not I
must leave to your judgement to determine. As for the letter itself you are
to know that
it is divided into four parts. In the first Theophilus exhorts believers to
celebrate the Lord's passover; in the second he slays Apollinarius; in the
third he demolishes Origen;
while in the fourth and last he exhorts the heretics to
penitence. If the polemic against Origen should seem
to you to be inadequate, you are to remember that Origenism was fully treated
in last year's letter; and that this which I have just translated, as it aims
at brevity, was not bound to dwell farther upon the subject. Besides, its terse
and clear confession of faith directed
against Apollinarius is not lacking in dialectical subtlety. Theophilus first
wrests the dagger from his opponent's hand, and then stabs him to the heart.
4. Entreat the Lord,
therefore, that a composition which has won favour in Greek may not fail to win
it also in Latin, and that what the whole East admires and praises Rome may
gladly take to her heart. And may the chair of the apostle Peter by its
preaching confirm the preaching of the chair of the evangelist Mark.
Popular rumour, indeed, has it that the blessed pope Anastasius is of
like zeal and
spirit with Theophilus and that he has pursued the heretics even to
the dens in which they lurk. Moreover his own letters inform us that he
condemns in the West what is already condemned in the East. May he live for
many years so that the reviving sprouts of heresy may in
course of time by
his efforts be made to wither and to die.
About this page
Source. Translated
by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff
and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing
Co., 1893.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin
Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001097.htm>.
Contact informat
ion. The editor of
New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org.
(To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I
can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback —
especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001097.htm
Santa Marcella di Roma Vedova
Appartiene ad una delle
piú illustri famiglie romane: quella dei Marcelli. Nata verso il 330, rimane
orfana del padre. Sposatasi da giovane dopo sette mesi rimane vedova e lo
spirito ascetico la conquista e rifiuta le seconde nozze. Il suo palazzo diventa
un luogo dove ove confluiscono altre nobili romane come Sofronia, Asella,
Principia, Marcellina, Lea. Lo stesso vescovo di Alessandria, Pietro, nel 373 è
suo ospite. E proprio dopo il 373 la casa di Marcella diventa un centro di
propaganda monastica. Riservatezza, penitenza, digiuno, preghiera, studio,
vesti dimesse caratterizzano la vita quotidiana come risulta dalle lettere di
san Girolamo, divenuto dal 382 il direttore spirituale del gruppo ascetico.
Nella domus di Marcella entravano vergini e vedove, preti e monaci per
intrattenersi in conversazioni sulla Sacra Scrittura. Verso la fine del IV sec.
si trasferisce in un luogo isolato vicino a Roma dove fa ritorno nel 410 per
timore dell'invasione gota. Muore nello stesso anno. (Avvenire)
Etimologia: Marcella,
diminutivo di Marco = nato in marzo, sacro a Marte, dal latino
Martirologio
Romano: A Roma, commemorazione di santa Marcella, vedova, che, come
attesta san Girolamo, dopo avere disprezzato ricchezze e nobiltà, divenne ancor
più nobile per povertà e umiltà.
Alcune lettere di s. Girolamo, in particolar modo l'Ep. 127, alla vergine Principia, discepola di Marcella, costituiscono le fonti principali per la vita della santa.
Appartenne ad una delle piú illustri famiglie romane: quella dei Marcelli (secondo altri dei Claudi). Nacque verso il 330, ma non ebbe la giovinezza felice, essendo ben presto rimasta orfana del padre. Contratto matrimonio in giovane età fu nuovamente colpita da un gravissimo lutto per la morte del marito avvenuta sette mesi dopo la celebrazione delle nozze. Questi luttuosi avvenimenti fecero maggiormente riflettere Marcella sulla caducità delle cose terrene tanto piú che nella fanciullezza era rimasta assai affascinata dalle mirabili attività del grande anacoreta Antonio, narrate nella sua casa dal vescovo Atanasio (340-343).
Lo spirito ascetico propugnato dal monachesimo, consistente nell'abbandono di ogni bene mondano, andò sempre piú conquistando l'animo della giovane vedova. Quando perciò le furono offerte vantaggiose seconde nozze col console Cereale (358), nonostante le premurose pressioni della madre Albina, oppose al ventilato matrimonio un netto rifiuto, motivato dal desiderio di dedicarsi interamente ad una vita ritirata facendo professione di perfetta castità.
Cosí Marcella, secondo s. Girolamo, fu la prima matrona romana che sviluppò fra le famiglie nobili i principi del monachesimo. Il suo maestoso palazzo dell'Aventino andò trasformandosi in un asceterio ove confluirono altre nobili romane come Sofronia, Asella, Principia, Marcellina, Lea; la stessa madre Albina si associò a questa nuova forma d i vita.
Piú che di vita monastica in senso stretto può parlarsi di gruppi ascetici senza precise regole, ma ispirati ai principi di austerità e di disprezzo del mondo, propri della scuola egiziana, assai conosciuti attraverso la vita di s. Antonio e le frequenti visite di monaci orientali. Lo stesso vescovo di Alessandria, Pietro, fu nel 373 ospite della casa Marcella e narrò la vita e le regole dei monaci egiziani.
Porse proprio dopo il 373 la casa di Marcella divenne un vero centro di propaganda monastica. Riservatezza, penitenza, digiuno, preghiera, studio, vesti dimesse, esclusione di vane conversazioni furono il quadro della vita quotidiana quale risulta dalle lettere di s. Girolamo, divenuto dal 382 il direttore spirituale del gruppo ascetico dell'Aventino. Nella domus di Marcella entravano vergini e vedove, preti e monaci per intrattenersi in conversazioni basate specialmente sulla S. Scrittura. Il sacro testo, specie il Salterio, non fu studiato solo superficialmente: per meglio comprenderne il significato Marcella imparò l'ebraico e sottopose al dotto Girolamo molte questioni esegetiche, come ne fanno fede varie lettere a lei dirette. Fra Girolamo e Marcella si strinse una profonda spirituale amicizia, continuata anche dopo la partenza del monaco per la Palestina.
Tuttavia questa donna fu di spirito piú moderato tanto da non condividere pienamente le violente diatribe e le acerbe polemiche del dotto esegeta. Simile moderazione dimostrò nelle pratiche ascetiche; pur amando e professando la povertà non alienò in favore della Chiesa e dei poveri tutti i suoi beni patrimoniali, anche per non recare dispiacere alla madre. Né volle trasferirsi a Betlemme, nonostante una pressante lettera delle amiche Paola ed Eustochio. Preferí invece continuare la diffusione della vita ascetica e penitente in Roma; per molti anni infatti la sua domus dell'Aventino rimase un cenacolo ascetico specie fra le vergini e le vedove della nobiltà.
Verso la fine del IV sec. si trasferí in un luogo piú isolato nelle vicinanze di Roma, forse un suo ager suburbanus, nel quale visse con la vergine Principia come madre e figlia. Rientrò in Roma nel 410 sotto il timore dell'invasione gota; in tale occasione Marcella subí percosse e maltrattamenti e a stento riuscí a salvare Principia dalle mani dei barbari, rifugiandosi nella basilica di S. Paolo.
Morí nello stesso anno e la sua festa è celebrata il 31 gennaio.
Autore: Gian Domenico Gordini
SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/39200
Voir aussi : http://orthodoxievco.net/ecrits/vies/synaxair/janvier/marcelle.pdf
http://apostle.com/st.-marcella-patron-of-noblewomen
https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/dinner_party/place_settings/marcella
