BISHOP ST. SWITHIN (A.D. 867).
Matthew of Westminster says that St. Swithin, Bishop of Winchester, died in 867, a pattern of clemency and humility. Once he was sitting on Winchester bridge encouraging his workmen, when a woman came along bringing her eggs to market and the men most wantonly sprang at her and broke her eggs. At this the woman’s lamentations were so piercing that, on learning of the loss, the good bishop, moved with pity, made the sign of the cross, and repaired the fractures. The great humility of the bishop was shown in his conduct when consecrating a new church. However great the distance, he would walk all the way on foot, refusing the use of horse or carriage; and lest this singularity should excite ridicule, he took care to travel by night. When he was near his end, he enjoined his domestics to bury his corpse outside his church, where it might be exposed to the feet of the passers-by and to the raindrops that fell from the roof.
KING ALFRED ENTERTAINING JOHN SCOTUS (A.D. 884).
Simeon of Durham says that, in 884, when Alfred was king, there came to England John Scotus, a Scot by birth, a man of clear intellect and much eloquence, who, leaving his country some time before, had gone over to France to Charles the Bald. Alfred received him with great respect, and John soon became an inseparable companion, both at table and in the King’s retirement, owing to his ready wit and pleasantry. One day at dinner John was sitting at table opposite King Charles, who, while the cups were going round, with a gay face had chid John for some want of politeness, and ended by asking what difference there was between a Scot and a sot. John at once cleverly replied, “Only this table.” On another occasion, when a servant had handed to the King at table a dish which contained two very large fishes and one very small, the King gave it to John to divide with two clerics seated beside him. The clerics were both of gigantic stature, while John was very little. John very gravely kept the two large fishes to himself, and gave the little fish to the two giants. The King at once challenged this as a most unfair division; but John had this ready excuse: “Nay, I have done well and fairly. Here is one small one,” pointing to himself, “and there are two large ones,” pointing to the fishes. And then looking at the two clerics, “There also are two large ones, and,” pointing to the fish, “there is a little one.” John had translated some Greek authors at the request of King Charles, and therein made observations concerning the ranks or orders of celestial beings which the Pope urged on Charles as flat heresy, whereon John grew disgusted with France, and went to England, allured by the munificence of King Alfred, and settled at Malmesbury; but his pupils there greatly worried him and made his life a burden. He was highly esteemed, however, after his death.
KING ALFRED INVENTS A LANTERN FOR PIOUS USES (A.D. 890).
Asser, the biographer, after stating that King Alfred was anxious to give up to God the half of his service, bodily and mental, by night and by day, and was at a loss how to count the hours, continues thus: “After long reflection on these things, Alfred at length, by a useful and shrewd invention, commanded his chaplains to provide wax in a sufficient quantity, and he caused it to be weighed in such a manner that, when there was so much of it in the scale as would equal the weight of seventy-two pence, he caused his chaplains to make six candles out of it of equal length, so that each candle might have twelve divisions marked longitudinally upon it. By this plan, therefore, those six candles burned for twenty-four hours, a night and a day exactly, before the sacred relics of God’s elect, which always accompanied the King wherever he went. But sometimes when they would not continue burning a whole day and night till the same hour that they were lighted the preceding evening, owing to the violence of the wind which blew day and night without intermission through the doors and windows of the churches, the fissures of the partitions, the plankings of the wall, and the thin canvas of the tents, they then unavoidably burnt out, and finished their course before the appointed time. The King therefore considered by what means he could shut out the wind, and so by a useful and cunning invention he ordered a lantern to be beautifully constructed of wood and white ox-horn, which, when skilfully planed till it is thin, is no less transparent than a vessel of glass. This lantern, therefore, was wonderfully made of wood and horn, as we before said, and by night a candle was put into it, which shone as brightly without as within, and was not extinguished by the wind. By this contrivance six candles lighted in succession lasted twenty-four hours, neither more nor less; and the King gave up to God the half of his daily service as he had vowed.”
KING ALFRED’S LOVE OF READING (A.D. 890).
Asser, the monk, biographer, and friend of King Alfred, was born in Wales, and says: “The King had sent for me to visit and take up my residence with him. I was honourably received by him, and remained that time at court eight months, during which I read to him whatever books he liked and such as he had at hand, for this was his most usual custom night and day in the midst of his many other occupations of mind and body, either himself to read books or to listen whilst others read them. And when I frequently asked his leave to depart, and could in no way obtain it, at length, when I had made up my mind by all means to demand it, he called me to him at twilight on Christmas Eve, and gave me two letters, in which was a long list of all the things which were in two monasteries, called in the Saxon tongue Ambresbury and Banwell, and on that same day he delivered to me those two monasteries, with all the things that were in them, and a silken pall of great value, and a load for a strong man of incense, adding these words: that he did not give me these trifling presents because he was unwilling hereafter to give me greater; for in the course of time he unexpectedly gave me Exeter, with all the diocese that belonged to him in Saxony and in Cornwall, besides gifts every day without number in every kind of worldly wealth, which it would be too long to enumerate here, lest they should make my reader tired. But let no one suppose that I have mentioned these presents in this place for the sake of glory or flattery, or that I may obtain greater honour. I merely certify to those who are ignorant of it how liberal the King was in giving.”
BISHOPS AT THE HEAD OF TROOPS (A.D. 955).
Bishops in the ninth century occupied so influential a position that they were expected to take the field, as Bishop Fulbert took the command of the besieged troops when the Hungarians attacked the city of Cambray. In 955, when the Hungarians threatened the fortified town of Augsburg, the bishop mounted on horseback in his priestly robes, without shield or buckler, sat unmoved amid flights of javelins and stones, and directed the mode of defence and the erection of fortifications until nightfall, after which he spent the night mostly in prayer. After matins he distributed the Holy Supper to the combatants before they returned to continue the fight, and exhorted them to put their trust in the Lord, who would be with them, so that they had nothing to fear even in the shadow of death. So, in 1200, Bernard, Bishop of Hildesheim, led the defence of his people against the incursions of the Normans. It is true that Damiani protested against this double function, saying, “With what face can the priest, as his duty requires, undertake to reconcile contending parties with each other, when he himself strives to return evil for evil? Our Saviour taught people only to excel in love and patience: why should priests grasp the sword for the temporal and perishable things of earth?” A band of unarmed monks dressed in monkish habits had once struck knights and their followers with such awe, that they dismounted and fled panic-stricken.