the church of St. Martin, in the village of Ostheim. Hither a paralytic nun
(_sanctimonialis quaedam paralytica_) of the name of Ruodlang was brought in
a car by her friends and relatives from a monastery a league off. She spent
the night watching and praying by the bier of the saints; "and health
returning to all her members, on the morrow she went back to her place
whence she came, on her feet, nobody supporting her, or in any way giving
her assistance." (Cap. ii. 19.)
On the second day, the relics were carried to Upper Mulinheim, and finally,
in accordance with the orders of the martyrs, deposited in the church of
that place, which was therefore renamed Seligenstadt. Here, Daniel, a
beggar boy of fifteen, and so bent that "he could not look at the sky
without lying on his back," collapsed and fell down during the celebration
of the Mass. "Thus he lay a long time, as if asleep, and all his limbs
straightening and his flesh strengthening (_recepta firmitate nervorum_),
he arose before our eyes, quite well." (Cap. ii. 20.)
Some time afterwards an old man entered the church on his hands and knees,
being unable to use his limbs properly:-- {385}
He, in presence of all of us, by the power of God and the merits of the
blessed martyrs, in the same hour in which he entered was so perfectly
cured that he walked without so much as a stick. And he said that,
though he had been deaf for five years, his deafness had ceased along
with the palsy. (Cap. iii. 33.)
Eginhard was now obliged to return to the Court at Aix-la-Chapelle, where
his duties kept him through the winter; and he is careful to point out that
the later miracles which he proceeds to speak of are known to him only at
second hand. But, as he naturally observes, having seen such wonderful
events with his own eyes, why should he doubt similar narrations when they
are received from trustworthy sources?
Wonderful stories these are indeed, but as they are, for the most part, of
the same general character as those already recounted, they may be passed
over. There is, however, an account of a possessed maiden which is worth
attention. This is set forth in a memoir, the principal contents of which
are the speeches of a demon who declared himself to possess the singular
appellation of "Wiggo," and revealed himself in the presence of many
witnesses, before the altar, close to the relics of the blessed martyrs. It
is noteworthy that the revelations appear to have been made in the shape of
replies to the questions of the exorcising priest, and there is no means of
judging how far the answers are, really, only the questions to which the
patient replied yes or no.
The possessed girl, about sixteen years of age, was brought by her parents
to the basilica of the martyrs. {386}
When she approached the tomb containing the sacred bodies, the priest,
according to custom, read the formula of exorcism over her head. When
he began to ask how and when the demon had entered her, she answered,
not in the tongue of the barbarians, which alone the girl knew, but in
the Roman tongue. And when the priest was astonished and asked how she
came to know Latin, when her parents, who stood by, were wholly
ignorant of it, "Thou hast never seen my parents," was the reply. To
this the priest, "Whence art thou, then, if these are not thy parents?"
And the demon, by the mouth of the girl, "I am a follower and disciple
of Satan, and for a long time I was gatekeeper (janitor) in hell; but,
for some years, along with eleven companions, I have ravaged the
kingdom of the Franks." (Cap. v. 49.)
He then goes on to tell how they blasted the crops and scattered pestilence
among beasts and men, because of the prevalent wickedness of the
people.[99]
The enumeration of all these iniquities, in oratorical style, takes up a
whole octavo page; and at the end it is stated, "All these things the demon
spoke in Latin by the mouth of the girl."
And when the priest imperatively ordered him to come out, "I shall go,"
said he, "not in obedience to you, but on account of the power of the
saints, who do not allow me to remain any longer." And, having said
this, he threw the girl down on the floor and there compelled her to
lie prostrate for a time, as though she slumbered. After a little
while, however, he going away, the girl, by the power of Christ and the
merits of the blessed martyrs, as it were awaking from sleep, rose up
quite well, to the astonishment of all present; nor after the demon had
gone out was she able to speak Latin: so that it was plain enough that
it was not she who had spoken in that tongue, but the demon by her
mouth. (Cap. v. 51.)
{387}
If the _Historia Translationis_ contained nothing more than has been, at
present, laid before the reader, disbelief in the miracles of which it
gives so precise and full a record might well be regarded as
hyper-scepticism. It might fairly be said, Here you have a man, whose high
character, acute intelligence, and large instruction are certified by
eminent contemporaries; a man who stood high in the confidence of one of
the greatest rulers of any age, and whose other works prove him to be an
accurate and judicious narrator of ordinary events. This man tells you, in
language which bears the stamp of sincerity, of things which happened
within his own knowledge, or within that of persons in whose veracity he
has entire confidence, while he appeals to his sovereign and the court as
witnesses of others; what possible ground can there be for disbelieving
him?
Well, it is hard upon Eginhard to say so, but it is exactly the honesty and
sincerity of the man which are his undoing as a witness to the miraculous.
He himself makes it quite obvious that when his profound piety comes on the
stage, his good sense and even his perception of right and wrong make their
exit. Let us go back to the point at which we left him, secretly perusing
the letter of Deacon Deusdona. As he tells us, its contents were
that he [the deacon] had many relics of saints at home, and that he
would give them to me if I would furnish him with the means of
returning to Rome; he had observed that I had two mules, and if I would
let him have one of them and would despatch with him a confidential
servant to take charge of the {388} relics, he would at once send them
to me. This plausibly expressed proposition pleased me, and I made up
my mind to test the value of the somewhat ambiguous promise at
once;[100] so giving him the mule and money for his journey I ordered
my notary Ratleig (who already desired to go to Rome to offer his
devotions there) to go with him. Therefore, having left Aix-la-Chapelle
(where the Emperor and his Court resided at the time) they came to
Soissons. Here they spoke with Hildoin, abbot of the monastery of St.
Medardus, because the said deacon had assured him that he had the means
of placing in his possession the body of the blessed Tiburtius the
Martyr. Attracted by which promises he (Hildoin) sent with them a
certain priest, Hunus by name, a sharp man (_hominem callidum_), whom
he ordered to receive and bring back the body of the martyr in
question. And so, resuming their journey, they proceeded to Rome as
fast as they could. (Cap. i. 3.)
Unfortunately, a servant of the notary, one Reginbald, fell ill of a
tertian fever, and impeded the progress of the party. However, this piece
of adversity had its sweet uses; for three days before they reached Rome,
Reginbald had a vision. Somebody habited as a deacon appeared to him and
asked why his master was in such a hurry to get to Rome; and when Reginbald
explained their business, this visionary deacon, who seems to have taken
the measure of his brother in the flesh with some accuracy, told him not by
any means to expect that Deusdona would fulfil his promises. Moreover,
taking the servant by the hand, he led him to the top of a high mountain
and, showing him Rome (where the man had never been), pointed {389} out a
church, adding "Tell Ratleig the thing he wants is hidden there; let him
get it as quickly as he can and go back to his master;" and, by way of a
sign that the order was authoritative, the servant was promised that from
that time forth his fever should disappear. And as the fever did vanish to
return no more, the faith of Eginhard's people in Deacon Deusdona naturally
vanished with it (_et fidem diaconi promissis non haberent_). Nevertheless,
they put up at the deacon's house near St. Peter ad Vincula. But time went
on and no relics made their appearance, while the notary and the priest
were put off with all sorts of excuses--the brother to whom the relics had
been confided was gone to Beneventum and not expected back for some time,
and so on--until Ratleig and Hunus began to despair, and were minded to
return, _infecto negotio_.
But my notary, calling to mind his servant's dream, proposed to his
companion that they should go to the cemetery which their host had
talked about without him. So, having found and hired a guide, they went
in the first place to the basilica of the blessed Tiburtius in the Via
Labicana, about three thousand paces from the town, and cautiously and
carefully inspected the tomb of that martyr, in order to discover
whether it could be opened without any one being the wiser. Then they
descended into the adjoining crypt, in which the bodies of the blessed
martyrs of Christ, Marcellinus and Petrus were buried; and, having made
out the nature of their tomb, they went away thinking their host would
not know what they had been about. But things fell out differently from
what they had imagined. (Cap. i. 7.)
In fact, Deacon Deusdona, who doubtless kept an eye on his guests, knew all
about their manoeuvres and made haste to offer his services, in order that
{390} "with the help of God" (_si Deus votis eorum favere dignaretur_),
they should all work together. The deacon was evidently alarmed lest they
should succeed without _his_ help.
So, by way of preparation for the contemplated _vol avec effraction_ they
fasted three days; and then, at night, without being seen, they betook
themselves to the basilica of St. Tiburtius, and tried to break open the
altar erected over his remains. But the marble proving too solid, they
descended to the crypt, and "having evoked our Lord Jesus Christ and adored
the holy martyrs," they proceeded to prise off the stone which covered the
tomb, and thereby exposed the body of the most sacred martyr Marcellinus,
"whose head rested on a marble tablet on which his name was inscribed." The
body was taken up with the greatest veneration, wrapped in a rich covering,
and given over to the keeping of the deacon and his brother, Lunison, while
the stone was replaced with such care that no sign of the theft remained.
As sacrilegious proceedings of this kind were punishable with death by the
Roman law, it seems not unnatural that Deacon Deusdona should have become
uneasy, and have urged Ratleig to be satisfied with what he had got and be
off with his spoils. But the notary having thus cleverly captured the
blessed Marcellinus, thought it a pity he should be parted from the blessed
Petrus, side by side with whom he had rested for five hundred years and
more in the same sepulchre (as Eginhard pathetically {391} observes); and
the pious man could neither eat, drink, nor sleep, until he had compassed
his desire to re-unite the saintly colleagues. This time, apparently in
consequence of Deusdona's opposition to any further resurrectionist doings,
he took counsel with a Greek monk, one Basil, and, accompanied by Hunus,
but saying nothing to Deusdona, they committed another sacrilegious
burglary, securing this time, not only the body of the blessed Petrus, but
a quantity of dust, which they agreed the priest should take, and tell his
employer that it was the remains of the blessed Tiburtius. How Deusdona was
"squared," and what he got for his not very valuable complicity in these
transactions, does not appear. But at last the relics were sent off in
charge of Lunison, the brother of Deusdona, and the priest Hunus, as far as
Pavia, while Ratleig stopped behind for a week to see if the robbery was
discovered, and, presumably, to act as a blind if any hue and cry was
raised. But, as everything remained quiet, the notary betook himself to
Pavia, where he found Lunison and Hunus awaiting his arrival. The notary's
opinion of the character of his worthy colleagues, however, may be gathered
from the fact that, having persuaded them to set out in advance along a
road which he told them he was about to take, he immediately adopted
another route, and, travelling by way of St. Maurice and the Lake of
Geneva, eventually reached Soleure.
Eginhard tells all this story with the most naive air of unconsciousness
that there is anything remarkable about an abbot, and a high officer of
state to {392} boot, being an accessory, both before and after the fact, to
a most gross and scandalous act of sacrilegious and burglarious robbery.
And an amusing sequel to the story proves that, where relics were
concerned, his friend Hildoin, another high ecclesiastical dignitary, was
even less scrupulous than himself.
On going to the palace early one morning, after the saints were safely
bestowed at Seligenstadt, he found Hildoin waiting for an audience in the
Emperor's antechamber, and began to talk to him about the miracle of the
bloody exudation. In the course of conversation, Eginhard happened to
allude to the remarkable fineness of the garment of the blessed
Marcellinus. Whereupon Abbot Hildoin observed (to Eginhard's stupefaction)
that his observation was quite correct. Much astonished at this remark from
a person who was supposed not to have seen the relics, Eginhard asked him
how he knew that? Upon this, Hildoin saw that he had better make a clean
breast of it, and he told the following story, which he had received from
his priestly agent, Hunus. While Hunus and Lunison were at Pavia, waiting
for Eginhard's notary, Hunus (according to his own account) had robbed the
robbers. The relics were placed in a church and a number of laymen and
clerics, of whom Hunus was one, undertook to keep watch over them. One
night, however, all the watchers, save the wide-awake Hunus, went to sleep;
and then, according to the story which this "sharp" ecclesiastic foisted
upon his patron, {393}
it was borne in upon his mind that there must be some great reason why
all the people, except himself, had suddenly become somnolent; and,
determining to avail himself of the opportunity thus offered (_oblata
occasione utendum_), he rose and, having lighted a candle, silently
approached the chests. Then, having burnt through the threads of the
seals with the flame of the candle, he quickly opened the chests, which
had no locks;[101] and, taking out portions of each of the bodies which
were thus exposed, he closed the chests and connected the burnt ends of
the threads with the seals again, so that they appeared not to have
been touched; and, no one having seen him, he returned to his place.
(Cap. iii. 23.)
Hildoin went on to tell Eginhard that Hunus at first declared to him that
these purloined relics belonged to St. Tiburtius; but afterwards confessed,
as a great secret, how he had come by them, and he wound up his discourse
thus:
They have a place of honour beside St. Medardus, where they are
worshipped with great veneration by all the people; but whether we may
keep them or not is for your judgment. (Cap. iii. 23.)
Poor Eginhard was thrown into a state of great perturbation of mind by this
revelation. An acquaintance of his had recently told him of a rumour that
was spread about that Hunus had contrived to abstract _all_ the remains of
SS. Marcellinus and Petrus while Eginhard's agents were in a drunken sleep;
and that, while the real relics were in Abbot Hildoin's hands at St.
Medardus, the shrine at Seligenstadt contained nothing but a little dust.
Though greatly annoyed by this "execrable rumour, spread {394} everywhere
by the subtlety of the devil," Eginhard had doubtless comforted himself by
his supposed knowledge of its falsity, and he only now discovered how
considerable a foundation there was for the scandal. There was nothing for
it but to insist upon the return of the stolen treasures. One would have
thought that the holy man, who had admitted himself to be knowingly a
receiver of stolen goods, would have made instant restitution and begged
only for absolution. But Eginhard intimates that he had very great
difficulty in getting his brother abbot to see that even restitution was
necessary.
Hildoin's proceedings were not of such a nature as to lead any one to place
implicit confidence in anything he might say; still less had his agent,
priest Hunus, established much claim to confidence; and it is not
surprising that Eginhard should have lost no time in summoning his notary
and Lunison to his presence, in order that he might hear what they had to
say about the business. They, however, at once protested that priest
Hunus's story was a parcel of lies, and that after the relics left Rome no
one had any opportunity of meddling with them. Moreover, Lunison, throwing
himself at Eginhard's feet, confessed with many tears what actually took
place. It will be remembered that after the body of St. Marcellinus was
abstracted from its tomb, Ratleig deposited it in the house of Deusdona, in
charge of the latter's brother, Lunison. But Hunus, being very much
disappointed that he could not get hold of the body of St. Tiburtius, and
afraid to go back to his {395} abbot empty-handed, bribed Lunison with four
pieces of gold and five of silver to give him access to the chest. This
Lunison did, and Hunus helped himself to as much as would fill a gallon
measure (_vas sextarii mensuram_) of the sacred remains. Eginhard's
indignation at the "rapine" of this "nequissimus nebulo" is exquisitely
droll. It would appear that the adage about the receiver being as bad as
the thief was not current in the ninth century.
Let us now briefly sum up the history of the acquisition of the relics.
Eginhard makes a contract with Deusdona for the delivery of certain relics
which the latter says he possesses. Eginhard makes no inquiry how he came
by them; otherwise, the transaction is innocent enough.
Deusdona turns out to be a swindler, and has no relics. Thereupon
Eginhard's agent, after due fasting and prayer, breaks open the tombs and
helps himself.
Eginhard discovers by the self-betrayal of his brother abbot, Hildoin, that
portions of his relics have been stolen and conveyed to the latter. With
much ado he succeeds in getting them back.
Hildoin's agent, Hunus, in delivering these stolen goods to him, at first
declared they were the relics of St. Tiburtius, which Hildoin desired him
to obtain; but afterwards invented a story of their being the product of a
theft, which the providential drowsiness of his companions enabled him to
perpetrate, from the relics which Hildoin well knew were the property of
his friend. {396}
Lunison, on the contrary, swears that all this story is false, and that he
himself was bribed by Hunus to allow him to steal what he pleased from the
property confided to his own and his brother's care by their guest Ratleig.
And the honest notary himself seems to have no hesitation about lying and
stealing to any extent, where the acquisition of relics is the object in
view.
For a parallel to these transactions one must read a police report of the
doings of a "long firm" or of a set of horse-coupers; yet Eginhard seems to
be aware of nothing, but that he has been rather badly used by his friend
Hildoin, and the "nequissimus nebulo" Hunus.
It is not easy for a modern Protestant, still less for any one who has the
least tincture of scientific culture, whether physical or historical, to
picture to himself the state of mind of a man of the ninth century, however
cultivated, enlightened, and sincere he may have been. His deepest
convictions, his most cherished hopes, were bound up with the belief in the
miraculous. Life was a constant battle between saints and demons for the
possession of the souls of men. The most superstitious among our modern
countrymen turn to supernatural agencies only when natural causes seem
insufficient; to Eginhard and his friends the supernatural was the rule,
and the sufficiency of natural causes was allowed only when there was
nothing to suggest others.
Moreover, it must be recollected that the possession of miracle-working
relics was greatly coveted, {397} not only on high, but on very low
grounds. To a man like Eginhard, the mere satisfaction of the religious
sentiment was obviously a powerful attraction. But, more than this, the
possession of such a treasure was an immense practical advantage. If the
saints were duly flattered and worshipped, there was no telling what
benefits might result from their interposition on your behalf. For physical
evils, access to the shrine was like the grant of the use of a universal
pill and ointment manufactory; and pilgrimages thereto might suffice to
cleanse the performers from any amount of sin. A letter to Lupus,
subsequently Abbot of Ferrara, written while Eginhard was smarting under
the grief caused by the loss of his much-loved wife Imma, affords a
striking insight into the current view of the relation between the
glorified saints and their worshippers. The writer shows that he is
anything but satisfied with the way in which he has been treated by the
blessed martyrs whose remains he has taken such pains to "convey" to
Seligenstadt, and to honour there as they would never have been honoured in
their Roman obscurity.
It is an aggravation of my grief and a reopening of my wound, that our
vows have been of no avail, and that the faith which we placed in the
merits and intervention of the martyrs has been utterly disappointed.
We may admit, then, without impeachment of Eginhard's sincerity, or of his
honour under all ordinary circumstances, that when piety, self-interest,
the glory of the Church in general, and that of the church at Seligenstadt
in particular, all pulled one way, {398} even the workaday principles of
morality were disregarded; and, _a fortiori_, anything like proper
investigation of the reality of alleged miracles was thrown to the winds.
And if this was the condition of mind of such a man as Eginhard, what is it
not legitimate to suppose may have been that of Deacon Deusdona, Lunison,
Hunus, and Company, thieves and cheats by their own confession, or of the
probably hysterical nun, or of the professional beggars, for whose
incapacity to walk and straighten themselves there is no guarantee but
their own? Who is to make sure that the exorcist of the demon Wiggo was not
just such another priest as Hunus; and is it not at least possible, when
Eginhard's servants dreamed, night after night, in such a curiously
coincident fashion, that a careful inquirer might have found they were very
anxious to please their master?
Quite apart from deliberate and conscious fraud (which is a rarer thing
than is often supposed), people, whose mythopoeic faculty is once stirred,
are capable of saying the thing that is not, and of acting as they should
not, to an extent which is hardly imaginable by persons who are not so
easily affected by the contagion of blind faith. There is no falsity so
gross that honest men and, still more, virtuous women, anxious to promote a
good cause, will not lend themselves to it without any clear consciousness
of the moral bearings of what they are doing.
The cases of miraculously-effected cures of which Eginhard is ocular
witness appear to belong to classes {399} of disease in which malingering
is possible or hysteria presumable. Without modern means of diagnosis, the
names given to them are quite worthless. One "miracle," however, in which
the patient, a woman, was cured by the mere sight of the church in which
the relics of the blessed martyrs lay, is an unmistakable case of
dislocation of the lower jaw; and it is obvious that, as not unfrequently
happens in such accidents in weakly subjects, the jaw slipped suddenly back
into place, perhaps in consequence of a jolt, as the woman rode towards the
church. (Cap. v. 53.)[102]