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26 THE INDIAN ADVOCATE. when he was given to see an image of the whole world in a ray of the Divine Majesty. Like unto the greatest of the prophets of old, he seems having seen God face to face, what wonder then that like the great law-giver of God's chosen people, Benedict should have been directly inspired to write his holy rule, so full of superhuman wisdom, so permeated with the sweetness of the spirit of the Gospel, so apt to make saints! Benedict showed himself in possession of the apostolic spirit in preaching to those shepherds who discovered him at Subiaco, in speaking with such apos tolic freedom to those Barbarians in vading Italy, and in converting the rustic heathens of Monte Cassino. On coming thither he had found the devils in possession of the high places, with a temple and consecrated groves. Benedict enlightens the poor deluded people, sets fire to the groves, overturns the idols, and builds two chapels, one under the invocation of St. John the Baptist, the other under that of the great St. Martin of Tours. In fact, St. Benedict seems to have, in the latter part of his life, led the life more of a missionary than of a recluse, a busy, active, zealous kind of life; thus setting an example so faithfully adhered to afterwards by his children; viz: to lay in the silence of the cloister the founda tion of a robust sanctity, and then come forth, at the call of charity, to face the world and the devil, to fight the fight of the Lord. The spirit of the martyrs was in him, who was to be the father of such a glorious phalanx of martyrs, the first amongst whom was his beloved child, Placidus. Divinely enlightened, Bene dict sent Maurus to rescue him from a premature death to save him for the more glorious death of a martyr. And as the Bl. Virgin Mary is the Queen of Martyrs, although without effusion of blood, so in a measure can St. Benedict lay claims to the glory of martyrdom ii. the long line of his children. And besides, did he not follow Christ and Him crucified from his very in fancy? . . . dead and crucified to the world and to self, addicted to the most rigorous practices of austerity? In him, also, we find the spirit of the angelic purity of the virgins, who know no sex, but live in a body even as tho angels of God, without a body. With a truly virginal instinct, Benedict, yet but a boy, takes alarm at the vices of his young companions in Rome, and as purity and devotion to the Immaculate Mother of God go hand in hand, tra dition informs us that he used to say his beads by tens of Hail Marys even as wo do now, and that he received his voca tion to religious life, when thus praying before an image of the Bl. Virgin. Man may flr from the society of cor rupted men, but he cannot flee from tho society of his own senses, nor is he always preserved from the temptations of the evil one. Thus, when at Subiaco the holy youth Benedict found himself one day assailed by a violent temptation of the flesh, he rises from his prayers, he rushes out of his cave. Where is he thus running? Will he leave his holy solitude and retnrn to a wicked, corrupted world? Ah no! In a thicket full of briars aiid thorns, that is where he betakes himself; there he strips himself and rolls his innocent body into it, until covered with blood, all torn and lacerated, he feels he has conquered his enemy and regained tho mastei'3r over his senses. Thus did Benedict deserve to be tho law-giver and the model of that illus trious choir of holy virgins, some of whom are the brightest ornaments of his order: Hildegard, Mechtildis, Gertrude, Cunegundis, Walburga, Brigitta, Lut gardis, Christina, Hedwigis, and Bl. Ida, are but a few of them. But the sweetest of them all is his holy sister St. Scholastica, who could