The Bollandists relate that St. Petrock of Cornwall, when in doubt whether to undertake a pilgrimage to the Holy Land or not, was decided by opening his Bible at the passage in Isaiah, “Et erit sepulchrum ejus gloriosum.” A similar story is told of St. Poppo, a Belgian saint of the eleventh century.
The anecdote is well known of King Charles and Lord Falkland consulting the Sortes Virgilianæ in the library at Oxford. The lines they met with and which were so singularly verified afterwards, are marked with their initials in the book, which is still preserved.
Rabelais refers to the Sortes Virgilianæ when he makes Panurge consult them on the subject of his marriage.
Gregory of Tours, sad at heart because of the desolation produced by the ravages of Count Leudaste in and around the city, entered his oratory; “and,” as he tells us himself, “full of trouble, I took up the Psalms of David, in hopes of finding, when I opened the book, some verse which might bring me consolation. And I found this: ‘He brought them out safely, that they should not fear; and overwhelmed their enemies with the sea.’”
Gregory relates another story akin to the subject. Clovis, at the moment when he was marching against Alaric, king of the Visigoths, sent his deputies to the Church of St. Martin, at Tours, saying to them, “Go, and maybe, in the holy temple you will find some presage of victory.” After having given them presents for the sacred place, he added: “O Lord God! if Thou art on my side, if Thou art determined to deliver into my hands this unbelieving nation, hostile to Thy name, grant that I may see Thy favour, or the entry of my servants into the basilica of St. Martin, that I may know if Thou deignest to be favourable to Thy suppliant.”
The envoys having hastened to Tours, entered the cathedral at the moment when the Precentor gave out the Antiphon: “Thou hast girded me with strength unto the battle: thou shalt throw down mine enemies under me. Thou hast made mine enemies also to turn their backs upon me: and I shall destroy them that hate me” (Ps. xviii. 37, 40).
Hearing this, they gave thanks to God, presented their offerings, and returned with joy to announce the omen to their king.
Divination by Scripture has been forbidden by several national councils, probably on account of the superstitious use made of it. The sixteenth canon of the Council of Vannes, held in 465, forbids clerks under pain of excommunication, consulting the Sortes Sacræ. This prohibition was extended to the laity by the forty-second canon of the Council of Agde, in 506. “Aliquanti clerici sive laici student auguriis, et sub nomine fictœ religionis, per eas, quas sanctorum sortes vocant, diviniationis scientiam profitentur, aut quarumcunque scripturorum inspectione futura promittunt.” It was also forbidden by the Council of Orleans in 511; again by that of Auxerre in 595; by that of Selingstadt in 1022; by that of Enham, in 1009; and by a capitulary of Charlemagne, in 789.
Related to Sortes Sacræ are those messages which are supposed to be conveyed by the chance hearing or reading of a passage of Scripture. These are not, however, to be regarded in the light of superstition, and it is quite possible, and indeed probable, that certain texts accidentally met with may influence for good or bad those who are in a disposition of mind to be so affected.
The well-known story of St. Augustine’s conversion is to the point. He relates himself how sitting in a garden-house, in great trouble of mind, he heard a voice say, “Tolle, lege”; whereupon he took up the sacred Scriptures and read, “Not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying; but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. xiii. 13, 14).