So, through every succeeding age, were Glimpses afforded of the Supernatural. For example, S. Bernard, perhaps the most illustrious saint of the twelfth century, in the “Life of S. Malachi of Armagh,” records the miraculous cure of the withered hand of a youth, by the dead hand of his holy friend S. Malachi. But nothing can exceed the splendour and publicity of the miracles of S. Bernard himself,—to the reality of which the faithful of France and Switzerland, as well as those of Germany and Italy, bore abundant testimony. Princes and prelates, kings and priests were witnesses of his supernatural power; for, like his Lord and Master, he wrought instantaneous cures on the lame, the halt, and the blind, in the presence of multitudes, and to the great spread and triumph of the Faith. Of those worked at Cologne, Philip, Archdeacon of Liége, who was formally commissioned to inquire and report upon them by Lampeon, Archbishop of Rheims, declared as follows: that “they were not performed in a corner, but the whole city was witness to them. If anyone,” he adds, “doubts or is curious, he may easily satisfy himself on the spot, more especially as some of the miracles were wrought upon persons of no inconsiderable rank and reputation.”[33] Moreover, S. Bernard himself distinctly refers to them in one of his most celebrated treatises, “De Consideratione,” addressed to Pope Eugenius III., and maintains that the evidence of God’s special graces and exceptional blessings thus resting upon him, enabled him to feel sufficient confidence of the Divine aid and benediction to enter upon the grave and laborious task of preaching the Second Crusade.
And if we proceed onward to the sixteenth century, where in some places, and especially amongst the northern nations of Europe, Faith began to wax cold, and Charity was not, we find, from History, that the miracles of Francis Xavier, the saintly apostle of India, may almost vie with those of the great S. Bernard, for they were as numerous and as inherently remarkable; while the testimony as to their truth, reality, and influence[34] was generally acknowledged by the faithful, as well as by Protestants.
In truth, wherever the Catholic religion has been taught and accepted, wherever the Name of Jesus has been loved and venerated, wherever faith in the Unseen has been active and daring, there the Finger of God has sometimes been manifested. And this, of course, was to have been expected. Our Blessed Saviour’s glorious and unfailing promise, that His disciples, with whom He pledged Himself to remain unto the end of the world, should do even “greater works” than He Himself had wrought, was thus, from time to time, as man’s faith merited God Almighty’s intervention, literally and strictly fulfilled.
SPIRITUAL POWERS AND PROPERTIES
OF THE CHURCH.
