From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   On our own Weakness and the Trials of This Life  [IV]   
      
      How can we love life, when it holds so much bitterness, and is   
   subject to so many sorrows and calamities? How, indeed, can that be   
   called life, which breeds death and pain in such full measure? Yet it   
   is loved, and many find great delight in it. The world is often blamed   
   for its falseness and vanity, but it is not readily abandoned: the   
   desires of the body exercise too strong a hold. Some things cause us   
   to love the world, others to hate it. The desires of the body, the   
   desires of the eyes, and the pride of life (1 John 2:16) all draw us   
   to love the world; but the pains and sorrows that justly ensue cause   
   us to hate and weary of it.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Bk 3, Ch 20   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   September 10th - St. Salvius, Bishop of Albi   
      
   HE was the 7th bishop of Albi, which see had been founded by St.   
   Clarus, who is said to have suffered martyrdom in the third age, and   
   who is honoured on the 1st of July. Before this he had been employed   
   in the first offices of magistracy in the province; but his love for   
   retirement, and the desire of being wholly freed from the distractions   
   which impede a constant union with God, induced him to embrace the   
   monastic state, in which he exhibited an example of piety to his   
   brethren, who afterwards chose him for their abbot. He chiefly   
   confined himself to a cell at a distance from the rest. Here, being   
   seized by a violent fever, he grew so ill, that he lay for dead in the   
   opinion of all about him. Indeed, the saint himself was always   
   persuaded that he really died, and was restored to life by a miracle;   
   be that as it will, he was soon after taken from his retreat, and   
   placed in the see of Albi. He lived as austere as ever, and constantly   
   refused the presents that were made him; but, if any thing were forced   
   upon him, he on the spot distributed the whole among the poor.   
      
    The patrician Mommolus having taken a great number of prisoners at   
   Albi, the saint followed and redeemed them all. Salvius flourished in   
   the reigns of Gontran, Childebert, and Chilperic: he withdrew the last   
   of these princes from an error he had fallen into concerning the   
   Trinity. In the 18 year of his episcopacy, an epidemic disorder made   
   great havoc among his flock: at this season of peril, it was in vain   
   his friends advised him to be careful of his health; animated with a   
   zeal, unwearied as it was undaunted, he flew every where he thought   
   his presence necessary. He visited the sick, comforted them, and   
   exhorted them to prepare for eternity by the practice of such good   
   works as their condition admitted. Perceiving that his last hour was   
   near, he ordered his coffin to be made, changed his clothes, and   
   prepared himself with a most edifying fervour to appear before God. He   
   did not long survive the synod of Brennac, at which he assisted in   
   580. [1]   
      
    See the Roman Martyrology, St. Greg. of Tours, and the Gallia Christ.   
   Nova, t. 1, p. 5.   
      
   Note 1. The following extract is taken from a MS. of Count de   
   Boullain-villiers, which his family carefully preserves in the castle   
   of St. Saire: “The titles of the metropolitan of Rouen prove that   
   about the year 800, and near a century after, there was a place in the   
   forest of Bray, consecrated to the memory and honour of St. Salvius,   
   who had been a solitary there. Whether this saint was bishop of Albi   
   or Amiens, or even whether he was any more than a hermit, whose   
   penitential life God hath glorified by divers miracles, is what must   
   remain undecided; the memory of these facts being entirely lost. There   
   remain, however, formal proofs of St. Salvius being a Solitary, in an   
   ancient MS. from 500 to 600, which contains the office of his feast.   
   He is also represented in a pane of glass in an ancient subterraneous   
   chapel in the dress of a hermit, on his knees, praying with his hands   
   extended. The devotion of the people who visited the church or chapel   
   which was built where his hermitage stood, was supported by miracles   
   and extraordinary cures, which the divine power wrought there,   
   insomuch that the reputation of it went very far. Some houses were   
   built in the neighbourhood for the convenience of pilgrims; but the   
   nature of the country rendered it inaccessible, and the horror of the   
   marshes, augmented by the woods which covered them, hindered the   
   progress of the establishment, which the piety of particulars might   
   have otherwise founded. The canons of Rouen were at the expense of   
   clearing some of the more accessible lands for the subsistence of the   
   priests, who there performed the divine office; and this is the first   
   origin of the parish of St. Saire, and the foundation of the lordship,   
   which the chapter of Rouen possesses there.” This village is about a   
   league and a half from the little town of Neuchatel in Bray.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   Virtues are formed by prayer. Prayer preserves temperance. Prayer   
   suppresses anger. Prayer prevents emotions of pride and envy. Prayer   
   draws into the soul the Holy Spirit, and raises man to Heaven.   
   --Saint Ephraem of Syria   
      
   Bible Quote:   
    It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop   
   than in a mansion with a quarrelsome wife.  Proverbs 25:24   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   Prayer   
   "Lord Jesus, you are the fulfillment of all our hopes and desires.   
   Your Holy Spirit brings us grace, truth, life, and freedom. Fill me   
   with the joy of the Gospel and inflame my heart with love and zeal for   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)