ST. RIGOBERT, OR ROBERT.
HE was abbot of Orbais, afterwards bishop of Rheims, was favored with the gift of miracles, and suffered an unjust banishment under Charles Martel. He was recalled by Pepin, but finding Milo in possession of his see, retired to Gernicour, a village four or five leagues from Rheims, where he led a retired life in the exercises of penance and prayer. He died about the year 750, and was buried in the church of St. Peter at Gernicour, which he had built. Hincmar, the fifth bishop from him, translated his relics to the abbey of St. Theodoric, and nine years after, to the church of St. Dionysius at Rheims. Fulco, Hincmar's successor, removed them into the metropolitan church of our lady, in which the greater part is preserved in a rich shrine; but a portion is kept in the church of St. Dionysius there, and another portion in the cathedral of Paris, where a chapel bears his name. See his anonymous life in Bollandus; also Flodoard, l. 2. Hist. Rhemens. &c.
ST. RUMON, B.C.
WILLIAM of Malmesbury informs us, that the history of his life was destroyed by the wars, which has also happened in other parts of England. He was a bishop, though it is not known of what see. His veneration was famous at Tavistock, in Devonshire, where Ordulf, earl of Devonshire, built a church under his invocation, before the year 960. Wilson, upon informations given him by certain persons of that country, inserted his name on this day; in the second edition of his English Martyrology. See Malmesb. l. 2. De gestis Pont. Angl. in Cridiensibus.
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JANUARY V.
ST. SIMEON STYLITES, C.
From the account given of him by Theodoret, one of the most judicious and most learned prelates of the church, who lived in the same country, and often visited him; this account was written sixteen years before the saint's death. Also from St. Simeon's life written by Antony, his disciple, published genuine in Bollandus, and the same in Chaldaic by Cosmas, a priest; all three contemporaries and eye-witnesses. This work of Cosmas has been lately published by Monsignor Stephen Assemani,[1] from a Chaldaic MS, which he proves to have been written in the year 474, fifteen years only after the death of St. Simeon. Also from the ancient lives of SS. Euthyinius, Theodosius, Auxentius, and Daniel Stylites. Evagrius, Theodorus Lector, and other most faithful writers of that and the following age, mention the most wonderful actions of this saint. The severest critics do not object to this history, in which so many contemporary writers, several of them eye-witnesses, agree; persons of undoubted veracity, virtue, and sagacity, who could not have conspired in a falsehood, nor could have imposed upon the world facts, which were of their own nature public and notorious. See Tillemont, T. 14.
A.D. 459.
ST. SIMEON was, in his life and conduct, a subject of astonishment, not only to the whole Roman empire, but also to many barbarous and infidel nations. The Persians, Medes, Saracens, Ethiopians, Iberians, and Scythians, had the highest veneration for him. The kings of Persia thought his benediction a great happiness. The Roman emperors solicited his prayers, and consulted him on matters of the greatest importance. It must, nevertheless, be acknowledged, that his most remarkable actions, how instrumental soever they might be to this universal veneration and regard for him, are a subject of admiration, not of imitation. They may serve, notwithstanding, to our spiritual edification and improvement in virtue; as we cannot well reflect on his fervor, without condemning and being confounded at our own indolence in the service of God.