Saint Basle

Basle first embraced the profession of arms, where he gave proof of his valor and his zeal for the service of his prince. The nobility of his origin and his courage in war could have led him to aspire to honors and dignities, and his parents already formed the most beautiful hopes for his future; but he, not finding his happiness in the vanity and joys of the world, wished to give himself entirely to his God and to serve Him freely far from the noise and agitations of the century. He heard in the depths of his heart a secret voice calling him to a more perfect way of life. Basle did not resist this command from heaven: it cost him much to distance himself from his parents whom he loved dearly, but God had spoken, the cry of flesh and blood had to be stifled, and Basle made the sacrifice of his affections, said a final farewell to the people and places dearest to his heart, and, with a staff in his hand, he set out in search of the solitude that God destined for him. He directed his steps towar d the Reims Site of the baptism of Clovis. city of Reims, to venerate there the relics of the illustrious Saint Remi. The news of his arrival spread through the city; Archbishop Gilles, who knew the virtues of this pious personage, went to meet him with a great multitude of people and received him with much honor and kindness. The pilgrim, not forgetting the goal of his journey, went to prostrate himself before the tomb of Saint Remi, and there he prayed to the Lord to be pleased to enlighten him. His prayers being answered, he manifested to the archbishop his desire to lead the cenobit ic life; the latte monastère de Verzy Monastery where Saint Basle was a monk before becoming a hermit. r led him to the monastery of Verzy, near Reims. Basle did not hesitate for an instant, it was there that he would fix the place of his rest; he was admitted with joy by the good religious and soon his fervor caused him to be proposed as the model of the community, as the living rule. Basle was not yet satisfied; he believed that God asked of him a more perfect detachment and wished to imitate the holy and mortified life of the solitaries of the East; with this thought and with the permission of his abbot, he left the society of men entirely, retired to the summit of the mountain called today Saint-Basle, and built himself a small cell in a remote spot in the forest. There, under the eye of God alone, he led for forty years a life entirely angelic; dead to the world, the practices of the most rigorous penance, fasts, vigils, prayer, and the recitation of the psalms were his delights. The salvation of his soul did not make him forget that of his brothers; he was often seen leaving his dear retreat and descending into the valley to spread there the riches of heaven that he had drawn from his sublime and ravishing contemplations. God did not delay in showing to the light of day the holiness of his servant.

Not content with providing for the spiritual needs of those he called his dear children, the holy anchorite also came to their aid in their temporal needs. Indeed, as in the time of Elijah, the sky was like brass; God, justly angered, refused the earth its dew and its waters, most of the streams had ceased their flow, and men languished, tormented by the most burning thirst. In such great necessity, the inhabitants of Verzy and the surrounding areas turned to their usual benefactor. At the sight of such misery, Basle was moved with compassion; he beseeched the Lord with tears to come to the aid of his family, and suddenly clear and limpid water gushed from the bosom of a rock, allowing the people to quench their thirst. This fountain received the name Legit ossa, because its waters had the virtue of strengthening the limbs of the body, and several sick people, having drunk from it, recovered their health. Annegisel, blind for twelve years, full of confidence in the merits of the Saint, approached the hermitage and implored the Blessed one to restore his sight. Basle prayed to the Lord to grant his wishes, and the healed blind man was able to see and bless his benefactor. Men were not the only ones to find a powerful protector in this pious anchorite. One day wh en Attila, Count of Champa Attila, comte de Champagne Local nobleman who witnessed a miracle involving a wild boar. gne, was hunting in the vicinity of the hermitage, Basle was in prayer before his cell when suddenly a wild boar of enormous size, setting aside its ferocity, ran to take refuge under his robe and, by a silent prayer, implore his help; the dogs that were pursuing it were, so to speak, nailed to the ground, unable to advance. At this sight, Attila recognized the finger of God and, to testify to his affection and respect for Saint Basle, he gave him a large part of the forest, lands in Bouzy, and the village of Sept-Saulx. But this angel of the earth used his goods only for the relief of the poor.

Basle, ripe for heaven and consumed by suffering, learned with joy the day of his death which the Lord was pleased to reveal to him. He then summoned his nephew Balsème from Limoge Balsème Nephew and successor of Saint Basle. s and declared to him that it was God's will that he should inhabit his cell after his death. Then he gave him his final advice with a gentle and paternal kindness; Balsème knew how to benefit from it, for he subsequently showed himself to be a worthy imitator of his holy uncle's virtues. Basle shut himself up in his cell again, to converse only with God, and lived for some time longer sighing after eternal beatitude, and this soul, so beautiful and so pure, which had been like a brilliant star rising on the horizon of our country to enlighten and protect it, soared into the bosom of the Most High on November 26, 620. It is on this day that his feast is celebrated in the diocese of Reims.

[APPENDIX: CULT AND RELICS.]

Saint Basle was buried by Saint Balsème on the summit of the mountain that bears his name. The numerous miracles that occurred through the intercession of this glorious confessor prom pted Saint N saint Nivard Archbishop of Reims and mentor to Berchaire. ivard, Archbishop of Reims, to rebuild the monastery of Verzy over the Saint's tomb, and this was the first time he was honored with a public cult. Around t he year Hincmar Archbishop of Reims, a central figure in theological and political debates. 879, Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, opened the tomb of Saint Basle and placed his body in a silver reliquary to expose it to the veneration of the people.

During the Hungarian invasion, under Charles the Simple, in 926, the inhabitants of Verzy, to avoid death, sought to take refuge in Reims, and they did not forget their most precious treasure, the reliquary of the Blessed one. They had already arrived halfway when they stopped to implore the Saint to drive away the enemies. From that moment, the reliquary became so attached to the ground that it was impossible for them to move any further. The night was spent in prayer, and the next day, full of confidence in the intercession of their protector, they resumed the path to the monastery, and soon after, it was learned that the barbarians had retreated. During a new incursion of Hungarians in 926, one of them dared to lay a sacrilegious hand on the altar where, only the day before, the body of the Saint had rested; but it remained so strongly attached to it that he could not withdraw it; they were forced to cut into the stone, and this wretch carried the stone, so to speak, embedded in his hand for the rest of his life.

Countless miracles occurred at the tomb of the holy hermit, and the people had great veneration for his relics. Each year, the reliquary of the Blessed one was carried in procession, to the singing of canticles, to the gates of Reims. There, the archbishop, all the dignitaries of the church, the clergy, and a multitude of the faithful came to receive the reliquary and carried it in triumph into the church of Notre-Dame. It happened once that, while following the procession, a freethinker of the time disparaged the virtues of Saint Basle and mocked those who invoked him. But, struck by a just punishment from heaven, he was suddenly paralyzed in all his limbs, until finally, overcome by the illness and the grace of God, he had himself carried to the feet of the abbot of Verzy, confessing his fault and asking for his healing; which he indeed obtained through the powerful intercession of the one he had despised.

When the furies of the Revolution were seen to descend even upon the smallest village, the inhabitants of Verzy understood well that the venerated remains of their patron saint would not be respected. Four of them, filled with religion and armed with holy courage, climbed the mountain on April 8, 1791, and removed the precious relics; but in 1793, as even the most obscure hiding places no longer offered protection from wicked searches, it became necessary to entrust to the earth the sacred bones that the rage of the impious sought to deliver to the flames. The reliquary was exhumed on April 4, 179 5, and on June 28, 1823 Mgr le cardinal Gousset Archbishop of Reims who presided over the translation of 1823. , His Eminence Cardinal Gousset, Archbishop of Reims, at the request of Father Misset, Dean of Verzy, proceeded with the fourth solemn translation of the relics of our Saint, in the midst of an innumerable multitude of the faithful who had flocked from all sides to this imposing ceremony. They comprise almost the entire body; they rest in a magnificent tomb-shaped reliquary. On the sides are depicted the principal features of the life of Saint Basle, in eight different scenes, and the lid bears, in very well-sculpted relief, one of those trees so remarkable and so well known by the name of Saint-Basle Faux.

The monastery of Verzy, four leagues from Reims, dates back to a very high antiquity; the author of the Life of Saint Basle fixes its origin at the end of the persecutions, and according to Dom Mariot, it would yield to no monastery in the diocese in this respect. Saint Columbanus introduced his Rule there; later that of Saint Benedict, with the constitutions of Citeaux, prevailed. This abbey possessed a school of great reputation; Saint Basle himself made great progress there under Comart. Subsequently, Saint Nivard transferred this famous monastery to the mountain, where several councils were held, among others the one where the learned Gerbert, later pope under th Gerbert, plus tard pape sous le nom de Sylvestre II Tutor of Giraud and future pope. e name of Sylvester II, was raised to the see of Reims.

After many vicissitudes, the Benedictines still possessed it when it fell under the blows of revolutionary vandalism. Time and the owner finished what the turmoil of '93 had spared. Thus, two sections of wall, one of the library, the other of the great tower, were the only ones left standing, the rest was buried under the rubble, when in 1860 excavations were made, and soon what remained of these immense materials went to serve the constructions of the camp of Châlons. Today, not one stone remains upon another.

A cross, known by the name of the Hermitage Cross, still indicates today the location of the cell of Saint Basle, at a small distance from that of the monastery. It was renewed in 1852.

To compose this biography, we have made use of Flodoard, Do m Mariot Flodouré Historian of the Church of Reims and hagiographical source. , Soret, and [notes] provided through the kindness of Abbé Philiémon Denis, of the diocese of Reims.