Such was the fervor and sanctity of the first disciples of St. Stephen
of Grandmont, that they were the admiration of the world in the age
wherein they lived. Peter, the learned and pious abbot of Celles, calls
them angels, and testifies that he placed an extraordinary confidence in
their prayers. (Petr. Cellens. ep. 8.) John of Salisbury, a contemporary
author, represents them as men who, being raised above the necessities
of life, had conquered not only sensuality and avarice, but even nature
itself. (Joan. Salisb. Poly. l. 7, c. 23.) Stephen, bishop of Tournay,
speaks of them in as high strains. (Steph. Tournac. ep. 2.) Trithemius,
Yepez, and Miraeus, imagined that St. Stephen made the rule of St. Bennet
the basis of his order; and Mabillon at first embraced this opinion,
(Mabill. Praef. in part 2, sec. 6, Bened.,) but changed it afterwards,
(Annul. Bened. l. 64, n. 37 and 112,) proving that this saint neither
followed the rule of Saint Bennet nor that of St. Austin. Dom Martenne
has set this in a much fuller light in his preface to the sixth tome of
his great collection. (Amplise Collect. t. 6, n. 20, &c.) Baillet,
Helyot, and some others, pretend that St. Stephen never wrote any thing
himself, and that his rule was compiled by some of his successors from
his sayings, and from the discipline which he had established. But some
of the very passages to which these critics appeal, suffice to confute
them, and St. Stephen declares himself the author of the written rule
both in the prologue, and in several other places, (Regula Grandim. c.
9, 11, 14,) as Mabillon, or rather Martenne, (who was author of this
addition to his annals,) takes notice. (Annal. t. 6, l. 74, n. 9l.) The
rule of this holy founder consists of seventy-five chapters. In a
pathetic prologue he puts his disciples in mind, that the rule of rules,
and the origin of all monastic rules, is the gospel: they are but
streams derived from this source, and in it are all the means of
arriving at Christian perfection pointed out. He recommends strict
poverty and obedience, as the foundation of a religious life; forbids
his religious ever to receive any retributions for their masses, or to
open the door of their oratory to secular persons on Sundays or
holydays, because on these days they ought to attend their parish
churches. He forbids his religious all lawsuits. (Reg. c. 15. See
Chatelain, Notes sur le Martyr. p. 378.) He forbids them the use of
flesh meat even in time of sickness, and prescribes rigorous fasts, with
only one meal a day for a great part of the year. This rule, which was
approved by Urban III. in 1186, was mitigated by pope Innocent IV. in
1247, and again by Clement V. in 1309. It is printed at Rouen in 1672.
Besides this rule, certain maxims or instructions of St. Stephen are
extant, and were collected together by his disciples after his death.
They were printed at Paris in Latin and French, in 1704. Baillet
published a new translation of them in 1707. In them we admire the
beauty and fruitfulness of the author's genius, and still much more the
great sentiments of virtue which they contain, especially concerning
temptations, vain-glory, ambition, the sweetness of God's service, and
his holy commandments; the obligation without bounds which all men have
of loving God, the incomprehensible advantages of praising him, the
necessity of continually advancing in fervor, and of continually
gathering, by the practice of good works, new flowers, of which the
garland of our lives ought to be composed. This useful collection might
doubtless have been made much more ample by his disciples. Several other
holy maxims and short lessons delivered by him, occur in the most
ancient of his lives, entitled, Stephani Dicta et Facta, compiled by the
care of St. Stephen de Liciaco. (Martenne, t. 6, p. 1046.)
Footnotes:
1. William of Dandina, an accurate writer, in the life of Hugh of
Lacerta, the most famous among the first disciples of St. Stephen,
published by Martenne, (t. 6, p. 1143,) says, that the saint died in
the forty-sixth year after his conversion. His retreat, therefore,
cannot be dated before the year 1076, and the foundation of his
order, which some place in 1076, must have been posterior to this.
Gerard Ithier mistakes when he says that St. Stephen went to
Benevento in the twelfth year of his age; and remained there twelve
years. He went only then to Paris to Milo, who was bishop only two
years. See Martenne, p. 1053.