Herb Robert. _Geranium Robertianum._
Dedicated to _St. Robert_.
~April 30.~
_St. Catharine_ of Sienna, A. D. 1380. _St. Maximus_, A. D. 250. _Sts.
James, Marian, &c._ Martyrs in Numidia, A. D. 259. _St. Erkonwald_, B.
of London, 7th Cent. _St. Ajutre_ or _Adjutor_, A. D. 1131.
_St. Catharine_ of Sienna.
St. Catharine often saw the devil. According to Ribadeneira, at six
years old she knew the lives of the holy fathers and hermits by
revelation, practised abstinence, and shut herself up with other
children in a room, where they whipped themselves. At seven she offered
herself to the Virgin as a spouse for her son. When marriageable, she
refused the importunity of her parents to wed, and having cut off her
hair to keep her vow, they made her a kitchen-maid; but her father, one
day as he was praying in a corner, seeing the Holy Ghost sitting upon
her head in the shape of a dove, she was released from drudgery, and was
favoured with a revelation from St. Dominick. She eat no meat, drank
only water, and at last left off bread, sustaining herself by herbs
alone, and her grace before meals was, “Let us go take the punishment
due to this miserable sinner.” She so mastered sleep, that she scarcely
took any rest, and her bed was only boards. She wore around her body
next to the skin a chain of iron, which sunk into her flesh. Three times
a day, and for an hour and a half each time, she flogged herself with
another iron chain, till great streams of blood ran down; and when she
took the black and white habit of the order of St. Dominick she
increased her mortification. For three years she never spoke, except at
confession; never stirred out of her cell but to go to the church; and
sat up all night watching--taking rest in the quire at matins only, and
then lying upon the floor with a piece of wood under her head for a
bolster. She was tempted by devils in a strange manner described by
Ribadeneira: but to drive them away, she disciplined her body with the
iron chain so much the more. When the fiend perceived he could make no
impression on her virginal heart, he changed his battery. She had
undertaken to cure an old woman who had a cancer in her breast so
loathsome, that no one would go near her, but by the devil’s
instigation, the old woman gave out that Catharine was not as good as
she should be, and stuck to her point. Catharine, knowing the devil’s
tricks, would not desist; and, to do her honour, Christ appeared, and
offered to her the choice of two crowns--one of pure gold, the other of
thorns; she took the crown of thorns, pressed it so close upon her head,
that it gave her great pain; and Christ commanded her to continue her
attendance upon the woman, who, in consequence of a vision, confessed
her calumny, to the great confusion of the devil. Ribadeneira says that
after this, Christ appeared to her, “opened to her the wound in his
side, and made her drink till she was so ravished, that her soul was
deprived of its functions.” Her love and affection to Christ were so
intense, that she was almost always languishing and sick; at last it
took away her life, and she was dead for four hours, in which time she
saw strange things concerning heaven, hell, and purgatory. On a certain
day he appeared to her, with his mother and other saints, and espoused
her in a marvellous and singular manner; visited her almost continually
with the greatest familiarity and affection, sometimes in their company,
though ordinarily he came alone, and entertained her by reciting and
singing psalms with her. Once as she was coming home from church, he
appeared to her in the disguise of a pilgrim, and begged a coat of her;
she returned to the church, and secretly taking off her petticoat,
brought it to him, not knowing who he was. He asked her for a shirt; she
bade him follow her home, and she gave him her shift. Not content with
this, he requested more clothes of her, as well for himself as a
companion; but as she had nothing else left, and was much afflicted, in
the night, he appeared to her as the pilgrim, and showing her what she
had bestowed upon him in the garb he had assumed, promised to give her
an invisible garment, which should keep her from all cold both of body
and soul. One time she prayed to him to take from her her heart of
flesh, and it seemed to her that he came, and opening her side, took out
her heart, and carried it away with him. It appeared almost incredible
to her confessor when she told him she had no heart; “Yet,” says
Ribadeneira, “that which happened afterwards was a certain argument of
the truth; for, in a few days, Christ appeared to her in great
brightness, holding in his hand a ruddy heart, most beautiful to behold,
and coming to her, put it into her left side, and said, ‘My daughter
Catharine, now thou hast my heart instead of thy own;’ and having said
this, he closed up her side again, in proof whereof a scar remained in
her side, which she often showed.” By her influence with heaven, she
obtained forgiveness for numbers that were ready to fall into hell. Two
hardened and impenitent thieves, being led to execution, and tied and
tortured on a cart, were attended by a multitude of devils. Catharine
begged the favour of going with them in the cart to the city gates, and
there by her prayers and intercession, Christ showed himself to the
thieves, all bloody and full of wounds, invited them to penance, and
promised them pardon if they would repent, which they accordingly did.
Through her intercession, her mother, who died without confession, was
raised to life again, and lived till she was fourscore and nine years
old. She had the gift of prophecy, healed the sick at the last gasp,
cast out devils, and worked miracles. Once making bread of tainted
flour, the “queen of angels” came to help her to knead it, and it proved
to be most excellent bread, white and savoury. She drew also very good
wine out of an empty hogshead. Her numerous victories over the devil
enraged him so much, that he tormented her till she was nothing but skin
and bones. Sometimes he amused himself with throwing her into the fire,
and the marks and prints of the wounds he gave her, appeared all over
her body. “At length,” says Ribadeneira, “when she was three and thirty
years old, she entered into an agony, fought the devil valiantly, and
triumphed over him at her death, which happened at Rome on the 29th of
April, 1380, her ghost appearing to Father Raymundus, her confessor, at
Genoa, on the same day, and her body working so many miracles, that for
the multitude of people resorting thither, it could not be buried for
three days.” All this may be seen in Ribadeneira’s “Lives of the
Saints,” with more, which, from regard to the reader’s feelings, is not
even adverted to. It should be added, that the present particulars are
from the “Miraculous Host,” a pamphlet published in 1821, in
illustration of a story, said to have been used in converting two ladies
belonging to the family of Mr. Loveday of Hammersmith.