Saint Veronica

After witnessing the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, Veronica came to assist him in his sorrows. She testified in his favor before Pilate with the irrefutable witnesses of his miracles: Lazarus, the man born blind, Simon the leper, Jairus, the demoniac, and the bent woman. All together they cried out: "Oh, this man here is a holy prophet!" This is not all: kinship with the allies of Joseph and Mary, and earlier and quite primitive relations with Jesus of the woman who was to receive the most precious of tokens from him, have been admitted by instinct and painted with enthusiasm. Poetry transmits its delightful images from one century to the next. In a Polish poem entitled *The Holy Family*, Joseph and Mary have lost Jesus in Jerusalem; Elizabeth comes to announce to them that he has been found. "It is therefore at the temple or at Veronica's!" the divine mother replies immediately. A few days later, the Holy Family goes down to her cousin's house: "From as far away as he could, Jesus greeted with joy the old Elizabeth, as well as Veronica, Martha, and Salome. There, Joseph said the customary prayer for the blessing of the gifts. Jesus, taking the role of sanctifier, broke the bread and blessed it; and Veronica walked around with the basket, distributing the bread to the guests... All, with full attention, listened to the Child, and eagerly savored his word like heavenly bread, like the food that could appease the hunger of their souls for all eternity." It is even higher up that the evangelical life of our Saint begins, if we put faith in the *Life of Jesus Christ*, the *Life of the Blessed Virgin*, and the *Dolorous Passion of Jesus Christ*, according to the revelations of Catherine Emmerich. These three writings provide a new element that I cannot dismiss. The pious people among whom they are becoming increasingly popular would be astonished by my silence regarding them. Every reader has the right to demand that I expose and verify them in details that appear doubtful and adventurous. This familiar and heartfelt friend of the Blessed Virgin, Catherine Emmerich paints for us as ten or twelve years old, already raised in the temple when Mary came to live there, contracting a close bond with the future Mother of the Savior, and attending her marriage to Joseph. When Jesus escaped for three days from the tenderness of his parents to teach in the midst of the doctors, Veronica gave him food and hospitality in a house near the gate of Bethlehem, where she fed him again during the days that preceded the Passion. She followed him in his apostolic journeys and was among the witnesses of his wonders at Ainoa, Azanoth, Dothan, and Jezrael. She traveled or stopped as he did, sometimes at Hebron, sometimes at Capernaum. While Martha provided for the necessities of the Lord and his disciples, she watched particularly over the needs of the holy women. They all gathered to sew, to work on the clothing intended for the apostolic community, or which was distributed to the poor. No foresight of charity was foreign to them. At the wedding at Cana, Veronica prepared a basket of flowers for the table. But it was above all the glory of the divine Master and the success of his preaching that she cared about. She harassed Mary Magdalene with her visits in order to withdraw her from her disordered life and bring her closer to Jesus. During the triumphal entry of the Savior into Jerusalem, she collected garments from everyone to throw under his feet, and spread on the path the veil with which she was later to wipe his face. So much devotion called for new favors: her role in the Passion of Jesus Christ and her coming to Rome with the holy image she had inherited.

Dès le IIIe siècle, saint Méthode, évêque de Tyr, loué par saint Jérôme pour ses ouvrages et sa science autant que sa sainteté, a retracé l'histoire de Véronique.

Si l'on veut observer maintenant les démarches de Véronique et le prodige qui récompensa sa piété, il faut écouter Catherine Emmerich. Sa narration est pleine de simplicité et d'intérêt ; elle s'adapte merveilleusement à la trame évangélique. On n'a pas de peine à admettre que les choses aient pu se passer ainsi :

« Le cortège entra dans une longue rue qui tournait un peu à gauche et où aboutissaient plusieurs rues transversales. Beaucoup de gens bien vêtus se rendaient au temple et plusieurs s'éloignaient à la vue de Jésus, par une crainte pharisaïque de se souiller, tandis que d'autres marquaient quelque pitié. On avait fait environ deux cents pas depuis que Siméon était venu porter la croix avec le Seigneur, lorsqu'une femme de grande taille et d'un aspect imposant, tenant une jeune fille par la main, sortit d'une belle maison située à gauche et se jeta au-devant du cortège. C'était Séraphis... appelée Véronique Séraphis... appelée Véronique Presumed wife of Zacchaeus/Amator. ... à cause de ce qu'elle fit en ce jour.

« Séraphia avait préparé chez elle d'excellent vin aromatisé, avec le pieux désir de le faire boire au Sauveur sur son chemin de douleur. Elle s'avança voilée dans la rue ; un linge était suspendu sur ses épaules ; une petite fille d'environ neuf ans qu'elle avait adoptée se tenait près d'elle, et cacha, à l'approche du cortège, le vase plein de vin. Ceux qui marchaient en avant voulurent la repousser, mais elle se fraya un passage à travers la populace, les soldats et les archers, parvint à Jésus, tomba à genoux et lui présenta le linge qu'elle déploya devant lui en disant : « Permettez-moi d'essuyer la face de mon Seigneur ». Jésus prit le linge, l'appliqua contre son visage ensanglanté et le rendit avec un remerciement. Séraphia le mit sous son manteau après l'avoir baisé et se releva. La jeune fille leva timidement le vase de vin vers Jésus, mais les soldats et les archers ne souffrirent pas qu'il s'y désaltérât. La hardiesse et la promptitude de cette action avaient excité un mouvement dans le peuple, ce qui avait arrêté le cortège pendant près de deux minutes et avait permis à Véronique de présenter le suaire. Les Pharisiens et les archers, irrités de cette pause, et surtout de cet hommage public rendu au Sauveur, se mirent à frapper et à maltraiter Jésus, pendant que Véronique rentrait en hâte dans sa maison.

« À peine était-elle rentrée dans la chambre, qu'elle étendit le suaire sur la table placée devant elle et tomba sans connaissance ; la petite fille s'agenouilla près d'elle en sanglotant. Un ami qui venait la voir la trouva ainsi près d'un linge déployé, où la face de Jésus s'était empreinte d'une façon merveilleuse, mais effrayante. Il fut très-frappé de ce spectacle, la fit revenir à elle et lui montra le suaire, devant lequel elle se mit à genoux en pleurant et en s'écriant : « Maintenant, je veux tout quitter, car le Seigneur m'a donné un souvenir ? ».

The places where this action took place were no less loved or venerated than the person who performed it. The history of Veronica's house thus casts its reflections upon Veronica herself.

Bernard of Breydenbach, Dean of Mainz, asserts that he "traversed, on July 14, 1483, this long path by which Christ was led from the palace of Pilate to the place of the crucifixion, and passed before the house of Saint Veronica, located five hundred and fifty paces from the palace of Pilate."

Adrichomius of Cologne describes the locations with even greater precision: "Veronica's house occupied the corner of a street... From the place where she came to meet him, to the judicial gate where he fell for the second time under his cross, Christ traveled three hundred and thirty-six paces and eleven feet."

One cannot demand, I believe, a more authentic and well-documented description through the ravages of time. Many other pilgrims are just as precise: all are recommended by their scholarship and character. Most of their travels, published at the birth of printing, are illustrated with maps and engravings. They write what they saw, what they gathered in this land, where "the Christians," said Gibbon, so learned and yet so hostile to religion, "fixed by an undoubted tradition the scene of every memorable event." What more is needed in favor of Veronica's house? And yet it has received an honor that eclipses all others: the Church counts it among the holy places.

By a bull of the 16th of the Kalends of August 1561, Pius IV confirmed and ratified the indulgences that one reads on a very fine painting "kept near the most holy sepulcher of Our Lord Jesus Christ." Sixtus V, Benedict XIII, and Gregory XVI successively recognized and published them. Now, on the painting of the holy sepulcher, reproduced by the *Bollaire de la Terre-Sainte*, in the nomenclature of the holy places to which these indulgences are attached, one reads: "In the house of Saint Veronica, there are seven years and as many quarantines." Consequently, this station has been preserved in the exercise known as the Way of the Cross. The Holy See, when questioned on this subject, replied that, under no pretext is it lawful to modify the stations, and the table it published thus determines the sixth: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus.

What, then, is the error of some writers who have claimed that the cult of this pious woman tended to vanish among educated Catholics! What church does not have its Way of the Cross and which, by this practice as popular as it is fundamental, does not present Veronica to all points of Christendom as a model and advocate before the suffering Jesus?

"This holy troop (Mary and the other women, seventeen in number) came to the house of Veronica and entered it because Pilate was returning along that street with his horsemen. The holy women looked weeping at the face of Jesus imprinted on the shroud, and admiring the grace he had shown his faithful friend, they took the vessel of spiced wine that Veronica had not been permitted to give Jesus to drink and headed all together toward the gate of Golgotha. They climbed to Calvary by the western side, where the slope is gentler. The mother of Jesus, his niece Mary, daughter of Cleophas, Salome, and John approached the circular platform; Martha, Mary, Heli, Veronica, Joanna, Chusa, Susanna, and Mary, mother of Mark, stood at some distance, around Magdalene, who was as if beside herself. Further away were seven others of them." With unfailing fidelity, Veronica shared the solicitude of these holy women, "who gave money to a man so that he would buy from the archers the permission to give Jesus (who was being stripped of his garments) the spiced wine." This was refused. She helped them when, at the moment of the opening of the side, "they collected the blood and water in vials, and wiped the wound with linens; when they prepared the linen, the aromatics, the water, the sponges, the vessels," for the embalming of the Savior's body. She was with them when they followed Nicodemus, Joseph, and the other men who carried the body on a stretcher; when, in the night that preceded the resurrection, they withdrew to the cenacle to take their sleep and went out at midnight to go to the tomb; when finally they took part in the apparitions of Jesus Christ to his apostles, at the Ascension, and at the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost.

However, people continued to come to Veronica's house to adore the precious souvenir she possessed.

"A few hours after the crucifixion," and how many times thereafter, "several friends and disciples of Jesus contemplated the shroud of Veronica, where the face of the Lord, with all his wounds and his bloodied beard, was reproduced in lines of thick, yet very distinct, blood."

The miraculous veil imprinted with the features of the suffering Savior was not meant to remain private property. It was a gift from Jesus Christ to His Church, a relic destined for the center of catholicity. Veronica therefore brought it to Rome: this fact has already been stated, but by reason of its importance, its occasion, and its incidents, it demands special study.

Here is how Philip of Bergamo recounts it:

"Veronica, a woman of Jerusalem, a disciple of Christ, of great holiness and purity, was called at that time from Jerusalem to Rome with the shroud of Jesus Christ, b y order of T Tibère-César Roman emperor healed by the Holy Face brought by Veronica. iberius Caesar, and through the care of Volusianus, a valiant soldier and familiar of the court. The emperor was confined to his bed by a great illness. As soon as he had received this most holy woman and touched the image of Christ, he found himself completely healed. As a result of this miracle, Veronica was held in great veneration by this prince."

Regarding this miracle, also reported by Ferrari in the *Catalogue of the Saints of Italy*, Catherine Emmerich provides the following description:

"In the third year following the ascension of Christ, I saw the Roman emperor send someone to Jerusalem to gather reports regarding the death and resurrection of Jesus. This man took with him to Rome Nicodemus, Seraphia (Veronica), and the disciple Epaphras, a relative of Joanna Chusa. The latter, who had been attached to the service of the temple, had seen the risen Jesus in the Cenacle and elsewhere. I saw Veronica at the emperor's; he was ill; his bed was raised on two steps; the room was square, not very large, there were no windows, but the light came from above. Veronica had with her, besides the shroud, one of the linens of Jesus, and she unfolded the shroud before the emperor who was all alone. The face of Jesus was imprinted on it only with His blood. This imprint was larger than a portrait, because the linen had been applied all around the face. On the other cloth was the imprint of the scourged body of Jesus. I did not see the emperor touch these linens, but he was healed by the sight of them."

The miraculous healing of Tiberius would explain what Eusebius, Paul Orosius, and several other historians recount regarding the conduct of this emperor toward Jesus Christ and His religion. Informed by Pilate of the death, resurrection, and miracles of this extraordinary man, he wished to have him admitted among the gods. The senate, irritated at not having been consulted first, rejected the proposal and decreed the extermination of the Christians. Tiberius avenged himself by threatening with the ultimate punishment anyone who would denounce them, and by striking with death or exile all the senators, save for two. He limited himself to erecting a statue of the Savior in his palace.

As for the emperor's envoy, whom Catherine Emmerich does not name, the author of the *Flowers of the Saints*, like Philip of Bergamo, calls him Volusianus, and the Ambrosian prefaces add that he too found in the contact with the shroud the healing of an infirmity from which he suffered. "Very ancient memory is made of him," says Luzidi, "in the church of Milan, on the occasion of Saint Veronica, whose feast is solemnized there on February 4th... Not only was memory made of Veronica and Volusianus there during the canonical hours, but also at Mass, which had a special preface with a simple mention of Volusianus... He is still represented today in paintings, albeit quite modern ones, in the crypt of the Basilica of Saint Peter, and he is spoken of in two ancient books in the Vatican Library. In the first, written in the time of Alexander III, in 1160, it is recounted that Volusianus was a friend of Tiberius, and that, sent by him to Jerusalem, he had, with Veronica, brought the shroud from there..."

Whatever the ambassador may be, he has only a secondary role in this translation attributed to Saint Veronica by mystics such as Lanspergius and Mallonius, by theologians such as Gerber and Suarez, by historians such as Stengel and Paléati, and by hagiographers or archaeologists such as Galesinius, Gervais, and Biondo. Calcaginus, cited by Sandini and reproduced by Archdeacon Pamelius, supports this opinion with these words: "The image of Christ, which tradition says was given to Veronica on the shroud," still exists, and in such great veneration, that not only the miracles, but even the sight "of this image itself no longer allow for any doubt regarding it." Molanus reports this citation of the sentiment of Abbric who, in his dictionary of the year 1350, holds the same language: "There is in the Vatican Library," adds the Belgian doctor, "a history of the translation of this image to Rome under Tiberius, of a serious composition and a very ancient script. The famous English theologian Thomas Stapleton reported to me having read it in its entirety." Baronius confirms the existence of this precious manuscript. "In the church of Saint Mary of the Martyrs, at the altar of the Crucifix, the worm-eaten remains of a wooden chest that served for the transport of the holy relic are kept preciously." The learned canon Barbier de Montault copied in this diaconia the inscription that attests how, through the hands of Saint Veronica, the holy shroud came from Palestine to Rome. This is why the Bollandists, struck by such general agreement, formulate these two conclusions: "What concerns the shroud given to Saint Veronica is beyond doubt for orthodox Christians; that Saint Veronica brought this holy image to Rome is the unanimous opinion of all writers."

From that moment, the precious relic became the heritage of Saint Peter, Saint Clement, and their successors. The Popes instituted feasts, ostensions, and processions in its honor. Their ceremonials and bulls, from Celestine II to Clement VI, VII, VIII, and Gregory XIII, attest to a cult that only grew and always presupposed the existence of the woman to whom the Savior gave this singular testimony of his love. A book entitled: *Summa of the Churches of Rome*, was published by order of Sixtus V. One reads there that: "At the extremity of the church of Saint Peter, towards the Holy Door, is the chapel and altar of the Holy Shroud, in very beautiful mosaic, consecrated by John VII to the blessed Virgin, and on this altar, in a marble tabernacle, the most holy shroud of Christ , called Saint Veronica's, très-saint suaire du Christ Cloth bearing the miraculous imprint of the face of Christ. upon which the most pious woman, while wiping the face of the Savior when he was led to death, received his imprinted image. There this veil is kept, and on fixed days the canons show it to the peoples who crowd there in multitudes". Then, in the catalogue of the relics of the same basilica, the shroud given to Veronica is mentioned. Benedict XIV brings to this subject his particular character of science and criticism: "In the Vatican basilica, besides the iron of the lance, one preserves with great veneration the shroud which has perfectly kept and still keeps the features of the face of Our Lord Jesus Christ, sprinkled with sweat and blood". At the voice of its pontiffs, the people flocked from all points of Christendom. In times of jubilee, on the privileged days of the exposition of the venerable Face, an immense crowd would fill the church of Saint Peter, and sing the liturgical hymn and prayer: "Holy, holy Face of our Redeemer, upon which shines the brightness of divine splendor; imprinted on a veil of snow-white whiteness as a sign of love. O God! who after having marked us with the light of your face, have willed, at the request of the blessed Veronica, to leave us this souvenir in your image imprinted on the shroud, grant us by your holy Cross and your glorious Passion, after having seen you on earth, adored through the mirror and the symbol, to merit seeing you, joyful and freed from all fear, in the heavens". Pilgrims, after having adored the Holy Face, took images of it with them. The Dauphin of Vienne, Humbert II, around 1333, provided himself with them, as well as many other objects of piety, which he bought while traveling through the churches of Rome. In the 17th century, Jean de Dumen was the official painter at the court of Rome charged with supplying these Veronicas to Christendom. Today, they are still sold printed on canvas with an engraving that dates from about a century ago, and authenticated by the signature and seal of a canon. Saint Bridget reproached, on behalf of Jesus Christ, several of her contemporaries for their doubts about his Holy Face. Dante, translating the belief of his era, met Veronica in paradise and exclaimed: "O my Lord Jesus Christ, true God! is this then how one was able to preserve your Holy Face!" Jean Dorat, another poet, celebrated it "as the most admirable of all paintings, because it was traced on the veil of Veronica, not by the hand of man, but by the very face of a God".

This devotion applied to its double object has lost nothing of its vivacity. Rome still sees the same concourse. A remarkable monument bears witness to it. In the basilica of Saint Peter, in this first temple of the world where everything is Catholic and significant, a statue of Saint Veronica, holding the holy face, fifteen feet high and due to the chisel of Mochi, an Italian sculptor of the 17th century, occupies one of the four lower niches of the dome's pillars. It shares this honor with Saint Helena who carries a large cross, with Saint Longinus who holds a lance, and with the apostle Saint Andrew. Tabernacles surmounted by ciboriums in marble from Jerusalem and placed above the statues, enclosed particles of the true cross, the iron of the holy lance, and the holy face.

This conquest cannot be compromised by the confusion into which some authors have thrown the various images of Jesus Christ known under the name of acheiropoieta or images not made by human hands. The Orient gloried in possessing a face of Christ that the Savior himself supposedly sent imprinted on a cloth to Abgar, king of Edessa. One finds it twice in the *Menologion of the Greeks*: first on August 16, held by an angel with spread wings, with this indication: *Memory of the image of Christ which was not made by human hand*; then on October 11: *Memory of the holy Synod, the seventh of Nicaea*, in 787, against the Iconoclasts, presented by two Fathers of the council, before the throne of Constantine and Irene, as proof of the veneration due to images. This face, whose history Nicephorus, Evagrius, and Procopius have written, transported from Constantinople to Rome, would be, according to Cariceti, the same one that the church of Saint Sylvester possesses today. Constantine Porphyrogenitus remarks on the unanimity of writers regarding its origin: "In what is essential on this point, all have the same sentiment and confess that the face of the Lord was miraculously imprinted on the cloth, some disagreements of circumstances and time do not affect in any way the foundation of the truth..."

The authenticity of this image does not follow that of the shroud of Veronica. Their features are perfectly distinct as is their history. M. Éméric David, who studied them from an artistic point of view, recognizes that the second is "the one of all where the head of Jesus Christ has the most dignity". M. Raoul-Rochette, who does not want to go back further, admits at least that it dates from the 7th century, "and that since the beginning of the 8th, when it was placed by John VII in the Vatican basilica, it has never ceased to excite the veneration of the Christian world".

Among several famous holy faces, two especially have shared this cult: one in Milan, the other in Jaen in Spain. Their value was supported by this opinion professed by some writers and, among others, in a *History of Christ written in Peru*:

"Veronica folded her veil in three to wipe the blessed face of the Savior, and when she unfolded it she found his true image imprinted on each part". It is for these churches to justify and defend their possession. If Veronica is not a woman of the Gospel, like Martha and Magdalene, because her name does not appear there, she is at least the woman of the most constant and venerable tradition. The service she rendered to the Savior, the shroud she inherited and carried to Rome, the healing of Tiberius, these are facts acquired to our cause.

But did she die in Rome? Ferrari seems to indicate so. If Veronica died in Rome, how is it that neither her body nor her tomb is shown there? The Basilica of Saint Peter preserves everything of hers: her statue erected in the most prominent place; her altar, her ciborium, her history written and painted, her shroud above all, and would it have allowed the loss of the body and the tomb of which it had received the deposit? Would it have allowed every trace of the place they occupied to be erased? Rome, so jealous of the glory of its Saints, Rome which preserves as its richest jewels the slightest memories of its Martins and its Agneses, would it have allowed time to steal away, without taking note of it, the body of a woman glorified by a striking miracle, showered with honor by Tiberius; of a woman whose intimate relations with the Savior made her so dear and so venerable to the primitive Church?

This supposition is inadmissible. Veronica did not die in Rome. Did she die in Jerusalem? Catherine Emmerich claims and recounts it thus: "Tiberius wanted to keep her in Rome and give her a house and slaves, but she asked for permission to return to Jerusalem, to die in the place where Jesus had died. She did indeed return there, and during the persecution against the Christians, which reduced Lazarus and his sisters to misery and exile, she fled with a few other women. But she was taken and locked in a prison where she died of hunger for the name of Jesus to whom she had so often given earthly food." If this account were true, Jerusalem, which still shows the house of the holy woman, would have preserved many other memories of her. Her prison would not be unknown there, her burial in oblivion, while her name is so vivid there. No, Veronica did not die in Jerusalem any more than in Rome. A secular tradition attests to us that she came to die in Gaul.

Veronica's arrival in Gaul is attested first by a man of high historical reputation, Bernard de la Guionie, a Dominican, Bishop of Lodève. After having assigned the mission of Saint Martial to the year 47 of our era , he adds: "F saint Martial First apostle of Aquitaine and disciple of the Lord. rom several ancient chronicles it is also concluded and held that the same Saint Martial, coming to the country of Aquitaine, carried with him precious and generous blood of the blessed protomartyr Stephen, and had in his company a man of God called Amateur, and his spouse by the nam e of Ve Amateur Hermit of Quercy identified with the biblical Zacchaeus. ronica who had been a familiar friend and friend of the heart of the blessed Virgin, Mother of God. These two spouses, Amateur and Veronica, by a particular disposition of God, carried with them milk, hair, and shoes of the blessed and blessed Virgin Mary... When Saint Martial had consecrated in honor of the protomartyr Stephen the first church of Bordeaux where Saint Seurin was later buried, and at the moment when he was preparing to dedicate a larger one to Saint Peter, the blessed apostle appeared to him and said: Learn that my brother Andrew has been raised today on the cross for Jesus Christ; hasten to erect this church in his honor. This is what Saint Martial did."

"As for Amateur, of a particular predilection for solitude, he remained for a long time in the rock which took from him the name of Roc-Amadour. The blessed Martial consecrated an altar there in honor of the Virgin, Mother of God..., and there Saint Amateur, in a body that one still sees exempt from corruption, awaits the holy resurrection.

"As for his spouse Veronica, faithful to follow the blessed Martial everywhere in his preachings and to listen to him with as much piety as devotion, finally overwhelmed by old age, she retired near the seashore in the Bordeaux territory. There the holy man of God, Martial, raised and consecrated in honor of the Virgin, Mother of God, a chapel which bears the name of Soulac, because the milk of the Virgin, Mother of God, was the only relic that was placed there, the others of the Blessed Virgin that Saint Martial possessed having been distributed in various places."

The account of Bernard de la Guionie will henceforth be repeated as the expression of a general belief. In 1425, Pope Martin V, declaring that the church of Roc-Amadour dates back to the foundation of Christianity, recognizes that Saint Amateur is none other than Zacchaeus, disciple of Christ, and tha t he h Zachée Hermit of Quercy identified with the biblical Zacchaeus. ad Veronica as his spouse. — In the 18th century, the breviaries of Limoges, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Cahors, Carcassonne, Tulle, Agen, Angoulême, and Périgueux all preserved the substance of the ancient legends. The office approved in 1852 by the Congregation of Rites for the diocese of Cahors, in honor of Saint Amateur, was inspired by these old titles.

But, one will say, there is an immense gap between Bernard de la Guionie and the 19th century! This gap is filled by the legend of Saint Martial, whose antiquity and authenticity have been sheltered from any dispute. Now, according to this legend, Saint Amateur and Saint Veronica were the cooperators of Saint Martial in the preaching of the Gospel.

Let us say a word about Soulac, the destination of Saint Veronica's pilgri mage and the relic of the milk of t relique du lait de la sainte Vierge Relic brought by Veronica to Soulac, originating from Bethlehem. he Blessed Virgin, whose presence is said to have given this locality its name of Soulac. What should be understood by the milk of the Blessed Virgin? Let us first let Catherine Emmerich speak. The Magi, she recounts, had just departed; the Holy Family, pursued by Herod's emissaries, left the manger and took refuge in a cave near the tomb of Maraba. But at a moment when she thought she was surprised, Joseph fled with the Child. "I then saw the Blessed Virgin," continues Catherine, "given over to her anxieties, remaining alone in the cave without the Child Jesus for the space of half a day. When the hour came when she should have been called to nurse the Child, she did what careful mothers do when they have been violently agitated by some fright or some vivid emotion. Before giving the Child to drink, she expressed from her breast the milk that her anguish might have altered, into a small cavity of the white stone layer that was in the cave. She spoke of the precaution she had taken to one of the shepherds, a pious and grave man who had come to find her (probably to lead her to the Child). This man, deeply convinced of the holiness of the Mother of the Redeemer, later collected with care the virginal milk that had remained in the small cavity of the stone, and carried it with a simplicity full of faith to his wife who had an infant she could neither satisfy nor calm. This woman took this sacred food with respectful confidence, and her faith was rewarded, for her milk immediately became very abundant. Since this event, the white stone of this cave received a similar virtue, and I have seen that even in our days, even infidel Mahometans make use of it, as a remedy, in this case and in several others. Since that time, this earth mixed with water and pressed into small molds has been spread throughout Christendom as an object of devotion; it is from them that the relics called the milk of the most holy Virgin are composed."

Mgr Mislin, noting the persistence of these memories to our day, links them to their origin by citing several intermediate writers: "A few minutes from the convent (of Bethlehem), towards the South, is the Milk Grotto, Crypto lactea; it bears this name, according to a local tradition, because the Blessed Virgin, frightened by the threats of Herod, had lost her milk, and had only recovered it by taking refuge in this cave which offered her an asylum even more hidden than the grotto of the Nativity. According to another tradition (there are a quantity of them here, everyone has their own), the Blessed Virgin would have often come to this place to nurse her divine Child; a drop of her milk, in falling on this stone, would have given it this white color and at the same time the gift of being useful to nursing mothers. Be that as it may, what is certain is that all the women of the surroundings, Jewish, Christian, and Mahometan, have such a devotion for this cave that there are always some who come to offer their prayers there. The rock in which the cave is found is an extremely white and friable chalk; it is easily reduced to powder and small loaves are made from it which are sent to all countries."

Is it true milk of the Blessed Virgin or one of these small chalk loaves that was possessed at Soulac? We cannot decide. Be that as it may, a few years ago, in the ground near the new church of Soulac, a reliquary was discovered which bore this inscription: Milk of the Blessed Virgin. Inside was embedded a white stone, similar to alabaster: was this not one of those small stones extracted from the grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem?

Numerous titles, which it is impossible for us even to name, trace the foundation of the primitive church of Notre-Dame de Soulac or of the Fin-des-Terres back to Saint Martial and Saint Veronica. The situation of Soulac, at the mouth of the Garonne, is decisive in favor of the progress of Christianity, which would have taken it as a starting point on the coasts of Guyenne, for, in all eras, political, military, and commercial movement has ended there.

But, of all the monuments of antiquity found at Soulac, none speaks with as much authority as its marvelous basilica which is currently shaking off the shroud of sand under which time had buried it. This Lazarus of stone brought back to life by His Eminence Cardinal Donnet, who made himself heard on this beach abandoned to the new pilgrims who flocked in crowds; this dead man of eight centuries standing in his grandiose forms to which return, with worship, with frequent pilgrimages, with a newly instituted parish priest, with bathers, the brilliance, the movement, and the life; this witness of the 14th century tells what preceded it... Of its three main apses, the one on the right is dedicated to Veronica.

A second altar erected in her honor in the opposite side aisle faced the magnificent Romanesque door that has just emerged from its tomb of sand and which had been opened, in large proportions, to the access of the people. It was on this second altar, specially prepared for her devotion, that oaths were sworn to which the greatest respect and solemnity were attached. At her feet flowed a fountain called Saint Veronica's, to which the sick came to drink and rub their eyes. Its waters were received for this purpose in a trough that bore the name of Saint Veronica's Holy Water Font. Her statue, which even recently some of the last old men remembered having seen, stood next to the holy water font placed near the much more modern East door. After making the sign of the cross, it was customary to address a greeting to Lady Veronica. Is it of her that one thought when drawing a veiled woman's head in the center of an ogive?

This sculpture, which one notices among the debris, collected today with care, of the high altar raised by the venerable Pierre Berland to the most holy Virgin, does not suit the Mother of God, but could belong to our Saint. And must we not apply to this head the word of Father Bonaventure, in 1680: "There is still a pillar behind the altar of Soulac, where she [Veronica] is represented?" It is she who must be recognized among the characters of an altar of Saint John the Baptist, in 18th-century carved wood, which passed from the old to the new Soulac. Opposite Saint John, patron of the altar, is Saint Benedict, the patron of the religious who served it. At the end of the altarpiece, on the Gospel side, the man in Jewish costume, without any of the attributes that distinguish the apostles, is he not Zacchaeus? On the Epistle side, the woman holding a pebble in her hand, is she not Veronica carrying to Soulac the blood-stained pebble picked up near the martyr Saint Stephen and counted among the relics that were kept there since the highest antiquity? Finally, as a trace of a cult deeply engraved in the ideas of the people, a formula of conjuration by Zacchaeus and by Veronica has been preserved to our day among the sorcerers who are known to have been common in Médoc.

One has no trouble admitting these traditions and the beginnings as well as the progress of Notre-Dame de la Fin-des-Terres, when one compares them to the beginnings and progress of Notre-Dame de la Mer, in Provence. Veronica lands at the mouth of the Gironde; Magdalene, Martha, the Marys Jacobé and Salomé at the mouth of the Rhône. On the shore of Aquitaine, Veronica builds an oratory, an altar, a cell of kneaded earth and sees a miraculous and blessed spring gush forth; thus Martha and her holy companions, on the shore of Provence. In both places, the oratory was dedicated to the Mother of God by Saint Martial, here visiting Veronica alone, there Martha, with Saint Maximin and other disciples of the Lord. Near these two oratories equally worthy of being called the first of all the maritime churches of their region, died and were buried, on one hand Veronica, on the other the Marys. Just as Baronius erred in assigning Jerusalem as the origin of the cult of the sisters Salomé because he did not know the place of their death, so one was mistaken in placing that of Veronica in Jerusalem or in Rome, because one did not know her tomb. As from time immemorial, May 25th saw the birth of the feast of the two sisters in the Camargue, in Arles, in Bordeaux where they had their altar at the cathedral, so that of the solitary of Soulac was born from the celebrity of her burial. At the same moments, Notre-Dame de la Barque and Notre-Dame de la Fin-des-Terres were expanding in Romanesque constructions, in forests, meadows and other dependencies, in monasteries where religious provided the necessary help for the double pilgrimage in honor of the Blessed Virgin and the Saints who had, by dedicating their lives to her, forever placed themselves near her after their death. Does such a great analogy between the people, the monuments, the way of proceeding, not indicate a common origin? If the mission and the end of Veronica resemble so much the mission of Martha and the Marys, is it not because they had carried away from the same hearth similar instructions, memories, and relics?

The history of Saint Veronica after her death, or the history of her tomb and relics, is even more convincing proof of what she did during her life. "She died," says Father Bonaventure, "in the year 70 of Our Lord and was buried in Soulac. However, either because of wars or other desolations of the country, her body was transported to Bordeaux and rests in the churc h of Sai Bordeaux City and diocese of which Amand was bishop. nt-Seurin."

This venerable body itself is much more precious and eloquent than the tomb that served as its dwelling for a long time. The appearance of the bones indicates great antiquity. The small number of fragments that are missing corresponds to the following indications: "During the consecration of the Chartreuse church, the Bishop of Condom, consecrating the altars of Saint John the Baptist and Saint Louis, placed in one the relics of Saint Fort and Saint Veronica, and in the other the relics of Saint Amand and Saint Benedicta." On October 10, 1659, in the inventory of the relics contained in the crypt of Saint-Fort below the church of Saint-Seurin, the chapter of Bordeaux gave to the parish priest of Saint-Eustache in Paris the upper femur bone, one of those missing today, for there was in Saint-Eustache in Paris a famous confraternity established under the name of Saint Veronica.

The bones of Saint Veronica provide, above all, a truly providential solution to the capital objection that dominates her entire mission and would destroy it, if it were not itself destroyed by a decisive fact. "Is it possible," we are told, "that the Veronica of Jerusalem and Rome is the same as the one of Soulac? How can we admit that this woman who attended the marriage of the Blessed Virgin with Saint Joseph and was then five years older than her; who, at the time of the Passion and when she received the veil imprinted with the features of the Savior, was over fifty, undertook in 48 of the Christian era, that is to say at the age of sixty-four or sixty-five, the long journey, the arduous mission of the Gauls, to die there in 70, consequently aged about eighty-seven?"

Well! Accept all these dates and come read them inscribed on the venerable forehead of the Saint, with Doctor Oré, member of the commission of inquiry, who points out to you "a very important point to notice, given that it allows to a certain extent the determination of the age of the subject; it is the complete ossification of the joints uniting the parietals to the frontal." And again: "It is easy to observe at its upper extremity (of the left femur) a rarefaction of the bone tissue indicating a great age."

Like Soulac and Bordeaux, Roc-Amadour preserves, in its underground church of Romanesque construction, irrefutable memories of Saint Veronica. She shines there with the colors that a recent restoration has returned to the ancient paintings. One sees her first with Saint Martial and Saint Amateur at the feet of the most holy Virgin, carrying the Holy Face, while her husband presents to Mary the oratory he erected in her honor. Then she reappears in a series of paintings devoted to the legend of Zacchaeus and accompanied by similar inscriptions.

Two modern stained glass windows in the church of Saint-Seurin in Bordeaux, one above the sacristy door, the other above the entrance to the apse, recount in brilliant language the pious and poetic legend of Veronica.

First medallion, on the left, above the sacristy. — She whom a host of authors have called the familiar friend and heart-friend of the Holy Virgin, is standing at the threshold of the temple of Jerusalem, and receives Mary there, aged three, at the time of her presentation.

Second medallion. — Veronica, in rich costume of her station, receives in a silver vase the precious blood of John the Baptist, in the prison of Machaerus.

Third medallion. — Pilate, seated on his throne, discusses the fate of Jesus. Veronica and Zacchaeus, called as defense witnesses, speak in favor of the innocence of the Redeemer of men.

Fourth medallion. — Veronica wipes the Face of the Savior.

The fifth medallion shows Veronica attending the burial of the Lord.

In the sixth medallion, the Holy Virgin performs the pious pilgrimage of the Way of the Cross, accompanied by Martial, Amateur, Veronica, etc.

At the top of the rose window, the lobes contain an apotheosis of Saint Veronica, displaying the Holy Face which two angels in flight are incensing. It is the cult of the Holy Face in its origin and in its perpetuity.

In the crown of the rose window, the events relating to the journey to Rome and the healing of Tiberius unfold (Nos. 1, 2, and 3).

Further on (No. 4), standing in a boat without oars, Veronica lands at Soulac.

No. 6 leads us from Soulac to Bazas, where Saint Veronica deposits the famous conch containing the blood of the Forerunner.

The last medallion offers us Saint Veronica dying at Soulac (Year 70 of Jesus Christ). The mission of Saint Veronica is completed by the last subjects of the opposite window. The eighth medallion of this window represents Veronica religiously carrying the vase that contains the milk of the blessed Virgin Mary, and preparing to enter the church of Notre-Dame de Soulac.

Elsewhere, one sees the translation of the body of the Saint to Saint-Seurin, around the 12th century.

In Rouen, in Valenciennes, throughout the north of France and in Belgium, Saint Veronica, under the name of Venice, was invoked by women in their illnesses. In Paris and Liège, she was the patron saint of laundresses.

The life of Saint Veronica is a novelty in collections of our kind; and it is not the only one. We have let the word novelty fall from our pen to obey a remnant of prejudice bequeathed to us by the previous century, for before the 18th century, the legend of Saint Veronica was accepted by the Church of France, and it was only before the breath of Jansenist or Gallican incredulity that it paled for an instant. We have analyzed and most often reproduced chapter 2 of the remarkable work by M. Cirot de la Ville, entitled: *Origines chrétiennes de Bordeaux*. In this chapter, devoted to the appearance of Saint Veronica in the Médoc, the learned professor of theology of Bordeaux seems to us to have established in an invincible manner the thesis of the existence and mission of Saint Veronica.