HE was brother to St. Cedd, bishop of London, and the two holy priests
Celin and Cymbel, and had his education in the monastery of Lindisfarne,
under St. Aidan. For his greater improvement in sacred letters and
divine contemplation he passed into Ireland, and spent a considerable
time in the company of St. Egbert, till he was called back by his
brother St. Cedd to assist him in settling the monastery of Lestingay,
which he had founded in the mountains of the Deiri, that is, the Woulds
of Yorkshire. St. Cedd being made bishop of London, or of the East
Saxons, left to him the entire government of this house. Oswi having
yielded up Bernicia, or the northern part of his kingdom, to his son
Alcfrid, this prince sent St. Wilfrid into France, that he might be
consecrated to the bishopric of the Northumbrian kingdom, or of York;
but he stayed so long abroad that Oswi himself nominated St. Chad to
that dignity, who was ordained by Wini, bishop of Winchester, assisted
by two British prelates, in 666. Bede assures us that he zealously
devoted himself to all the laborious functions of his charge, visiting
his diocese on foot, preaching the gospel, and seeking out the poorest
and most abandoned persons to instruct and comfort, in the meanest
cottages, and in the fields. When St. Theodorus, archbishop of
Canterbury, arrived in England, in his general visitation of all the
English churches, he adjudged the see of York to St. Wilfrid. St. Chad
made him this answer: "If you judge that I have not duly received the
episcopal ordination, I willingly resign this charge, having never
thought myself worthy of it: but which, however unworthy, I submitted to
undertake in obedience." The archbishop was charmed with his candor and
humility, would not admit his abdication, but supplied certain rites
which he judged defective in his ordination: and St. Chad, leaving the
see of York, retired to his monastery of Lestingay, but was not suffered
to bury himself long in that solitude. Jaruman, bishop of the Mercians,
dying, St. Chad was called upon to take upon him the charge of that most
extensive diocese.[1] He was the fifth bishop of the Mercians, and first
fixed that see at Litchfield, so called from a great number of martyrs
slain and buried there under Maximianus Herculeus; the name signifying
the field of carcasses. Hence this city bears for its arms a landscape,
covered with the bodies of martyrs. St. Theodorus considering St. Chad's
old age, and the great extent of his diocese, absolutely forbade him to
make his visitations on foot, as he used to do at York. When the
laborious duties of his charge allowed him to retire, he enjoyed God in
solitude with seven or eight monks, whom he had settled in a place near
his cathedral. Here he gained new strength and fresh graces for the
discharge of his functions; he was so strongly affected with the fear of
the divine judgments, that as often as it thundered he went to the
church and prayed prostrate all the time the storm continued, in
remembrance of the dreadful day in which Christ will come to judge the
world. By the bounty of king Wulfere, he founded a monastery at a place
called Barrow, in the province {498} of Lindsay, (in the northern part
of Lincolnshire,) where the footsteps of the regular life begun by him
remained to the time of Bede. Carte conjectures that the foundation of
the great monastery of Bardney, in the same province, was begun by him.
St. Chad governed his diocese of Litchfield, two years and a half, and
died in the great pestilence on the 2d of March, in 673. Bede gives the
following relation of his passage. "Among the eight monks whom he kept
with him at Litchfield, was one Owini, who came with queen Ethelred,
commonly called St. Audry, from the province of the East Angles, and was
her major-domo, and the first officer of her court, till quitting the
world, clad in a mean garment, and carrying an axe and a hatchet in his
hand, he went to the monastery of Lestingay, signifying that he came to
work, and not to be idle; which he made good by his behavior in the
monastic state. This monk declared, that he one day heard a joyful
melody of some persons sweetly singing, which descended from heaven into
the bishop's oratory, filled the same for about half an hour, then
mounted again to heaven. After this, the bishop opening his window, and
seeing him at his work, bade him call the other seven brethren. When the
eight monks were entered his oratory, he exhorted them to preserve peace
and religiously observe the rules of regular discipline; adding, that
the amiable guest who was wont to visit their brethren, had vouchsafed
to come to him that day, and to call him out of this world. Wherefore he
earnestly recommended his passage to their prayers, and pressed them to
prepare for their own, the hour of which is uncertain, by watching,
prayer, and good works." The bishop fell presently into a languishing
distemper, which daily increased, till, on the seventh day, having
received the body and blood of our Lord, he departed to bliss, to which
he was invited by the happy soul of his brother St. Cedd, and a company
of angels with heavenly music. He was buried in the church of St. Mary,
in Litchfield; but his body was soon after removed to that of St. Peter,
in both places honored by miraculous cures, as Bede mentions. His relics
were afterwards translated into the great church which was built in
1148, under the invocation of the B. Virgin and St. Chad, which is now
the cathedral, and they remained them till the change of religion. See
Bede, l. 3, c. 28, l. 4, c. 2 and 3.
Footnotes:
1. The first bishop of the Mercians was Diuma, a Scot; the second,
Keollach, of the same nation: the third, Trumhere, who had been
abbot of Gethling in the kingdom of the Northumbrians: the fourth
Jaruruan.