delatum, deinde a Luitprando, Longobardorum rege, magno pretio redemptum, Ticinum translatum est, ibique honorifice conditum.

having lived seventy-six years, and thirty-six as bishop. His body was first of all taken to Sardinia, afterwards Luitprand, king of the Lombards, translated it to Pavia, where it was honourably entombed.

What a death was thine, O Augustine, receiving on thy humble couch nought but news of disasters and ruin! Thy Africa was perishing at the hands of the barbarians, in punishment of those nameless crimes of the ancient world, in which she had so large a share. Together with Genseric, Arius triumphed over that land, which nevertheless, thanks to thee, was to produce, for yet a hundred years, admirable martyrs for the Consubstantiality of the Word. When Belisarius restored her to the Roman world, God seemed to be offering her, for the martyrs' sake, an opportunity of returning to her former prosperity; but the inexperienced Byzantines, preoccupied with their theological quarrels and political intrigues, knew not how to raise her up, nor to protect her against an invasion more terrible than the first; and the torrent of Mussulman infidelity soon swept all before it.

At length, after twelve centuries, the Cross reappeared in those places, where the very names of so many flourishing churches had perished. May the nation on which thy country is now dependent, show that it is proud of this honour, and understand its consequent obligations !

During all that long night which overhung thy native land, thy influence did not cease. Throughout the entire world, thy immortal works were enlightening the minds of men and arousing their love. In the basilicas served by thy sons and imitators, the splendour of divine worship, the pomp of the ceremonies, the perfection of the sacred melodies, kept

up in the hearts of the people the same supernatural enthusiasm which took possession of thine own, when, for the first time in our West, St. Ambrose instituted the alternate chanting of the Psalms and sacred Hymns. Throughout all ages the perfect life, in its many different ways of exercising the double precept of charity, draws from the waters of thy fountains. Continue to illumine the Church with thine incomparable light. Bless the numerous religious families which claim thine illustrious patronage. Assist us all, by obtaining for us the spirit of love and of penance, of confidence and of humility, which befits the redeemed soul. Give us to know the weakness of our nature and its unworthiness since the Fall, and at the same time the boundless goodness of our God, the superabundance of his Redemption, the all-powerfulness of his grace. May we all, like thee, not only recognise the truth, but be able loyally and practically to say to God: "Thou hast "made us for thyself, and our heart is ill at ease till "it rest in thee."2

According to the most ancient monuments of the Roman Church,3 another Saint has always been honoured on this same day, viz: Hermes, a Roman magistrate, who bore witness to Christ under Trajan. The crypt constructed, less than half a century after the death of the Apostles, to receive this martyr's relics, is remarkable for its majestic and ample proportions not usually found in the subterranean cemeteries. It was his sister Theodora, who received from Balbina, daughter of the tribune Quirinus, the venrable chains of St. Peter.

PRAYER.

Deus, qui beatum Her

O God, who didst strengthen metem, Martyrem tuum, blessed Hermes, thy martyr,

1 AUG. confess. ix.

• Ibid. i. 3 Calendarium BUCHERII.

AUGUST 29.

THE DECOLLATION OF SAINT JOHN

THE BAPTIST.

"AT that time, Herod sent and apprehended John, "and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, "the wife of Philip his brother, because he had "married her. For John said to Herod, It is not "lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife. Now "Herodias laid snares for him, and was desirous to "put him to death, and could not. For Herod "feared John, knowing him to be a just and holy man, and kept him, and when he heard him did many things; and he heard him willingly. And "when a convenient day was come, Herod made a "supper for his birthday, for the princes, and tri"bunes, and chief men of Galilee. And when the

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daughter of the same Herodias had come in, and "had danced, and pleased Herod, and them that were "at table with him, the king said to the damsel, Ask "of me what thou wilt, and I will give it thee. And "he swore to her, Whatsoever thou shalt ask, I will "give thee; though it be the half of my kingdom.

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Who, when she was gone out, said to her mother, "What shall I ask? But she said, the head of John "the Baptist. And when she was come in immediately with haste to the king, she asked, saying, "I will that forthwith thou give me in a dish the "head of John the Baptist. And the king was "struck sad; yet because of his oath, and because of "them that were with him at table, he would not

"displease her; but sending an executioner he com"manded that his head should be brought in a dish. "And he beheaded him in the prison, and brought "his head in a dish, and gave it to the damsel, and "the damsel gave it to her mother. Which his "his disciples hearing, came, and took his body, and "laid it in a tomb."

Thus died the greatest of them that are born of women without witnesses, the prisoner of a petty tyrant, the victim of the vilest of passions, the wages of a dancing girl! Rather than keep silence in the presence of crime, although there were no hope of converting the sinner, or give up his liberty, even when in chains: the herald of the Word made flesh was ready to die. How beautiful, as St. John Chrysostom remarks, is this liberty of speech, when it is truly the liberty of God's Word, when it is an echo of heaven's language! Then, indeed, it is a stumbling-block to tyranny, the safe-guard of the world, and of God's rights, the bulwark of a nation's honour as well as of its temporal and eternal interests. Death has no power over it. To the weak murderer of John the Baptist, and to all who would imitate him to the end of time, a thousand tongues, instead of one, repeat in all languages and in all places: It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife.

"O great and admirable mystery!" cries out St. Augustine. "He must increase, but I must decrease, "said John, said the Voice which personified all the "voices that had gone before announcing the Fa"ther's Word Incarnate in his Christ. Every word, "in that it signifies something, in that it is an idea, "an internal word, is independent of the number of "syllables, of the various letters and sounds; it "remains unchangeable in the heart that conceives 1 Gospel of the feast, St Mark. vi. 17-29.