his own country, and pursued his lectures and preaching with extraordinary reputation and success. One of his biographers remarks, “His heart was always fixed on God, and he made his studies, labour, and all his other actions, a continued prayer." The advice he gives to students, in his Treatise on a Spiritual Life, is agreeable to his own practice, and is well worthy of attention: "Do you desire to study to advantage? Let devotion accompany all your studies. Consult God more than your books, and ask him with humility, to make you understand what you read. Study fatigues and drains the mind and heart. Go, from time to time, to refresh them at the feet of Jesus. Interrupt your application by short, but fervent and ejaculatory prayers. Never begin nor end your study, but by prayer. Science is a gift of the Father of Lights; therefore, do not consider it merely as the work of your own mind or industry."

Vincent had now resided six years at Valencia, assiduously pursuing his pious labours, when Cardinal Peter de Luna, being appointed legate of Clement VII. to Charles VI. king of France, obliged him to accompany him. In 1394, on the death of Clement, the Cardinal was chosen pope, by the French and Spaniards, and took the name of Benedict XIII. Vincent was then commanded to repair to Avignon, where he was raised to the dignity of master of the sacred palace; but, at his own earnest and frequently repeated request, was appointed apostolical missionary, and entered upon that office before the end of the year 1398, and for about twenty years, laboured with indefatigable zeal, in various parts of Europe. He visited Spain, France, the Netherlands, Germany, and Italy. Henry IV. invited him to England, sent one of his ships to fetch him from the coast of France, and received him with the greatest honours. After preaching in the chief towns of England, Scotland, and Ireland, he returned, and pursued his missionary labours, in the difVOL. II

K

rerent parts of France, Italy, and Spain. The ordinary subjects of his sermons, which were delivered with unusual energy, were sin, death, judgment, hell, and eternity. Numerous Jews and Mohammedans are said to have been converted by his ministry; and multitudes of immoral characters to have been reclaimed. The two last years of his life were spent in Brittany and Normandy, whither he had gone at the desire of Henry V. He died in the city of Vannes, in 1419, at the age of sixty-two; or according to others, at sixty-seven. He was canonized, by Pope Calixtus III. in 1455."

15

In the list of his writings, Nic. Antonio mentions the following Biblical work: "BIBLIA, seu PROMPTUARIUM, Sc. locorum sacræ Scripturæ singulis diebus, sive de tempore, sive de sanctis usurpandorum." At the beginning of the copy to which Antonio refers, a note is prefixed, intimating that it had been bequeathed as a legacy, by the author: "Hanc Bibliam inspirante Domino mihi Fr. Antonio de aurea mihi reliquit beatissimus Fr. Vincentius." The chief of his other works are, A Treatise on a Spiritual Life; Commentary, or Sermons, on the Lord's Prayer, printed at Lyons, 1523, 4to. and again 1573, 8vo.; and Epistles."

16

BONIFACIO, OF BONIFACE FERRER, was the brother of Vincent. Intending to engage in secular concerns, he married; but, after the death of his wife, was persuaded, by his brother, to enter the Carthusian monastery of Portaceli, near Valencia. His industry and attention to every part of the severe discipline of his order, gained him universal approbation, so that, in the short period of four years, he became Prior General, an office which he executed with the utmost fidelity. But having been elected

15) Butler's Lives of the Saints, V. p. 44.

Antonii Bibliotheca Hispana Vetus, II, p. 136. Romæ, 1696, fol, (16) Antonii Bibl. Hisp. Vet. II. p. 137.

(17) Butler, ubi sup.

Le Long, Biblioth, Sacra, II, p. 723, edit. Paris, 1723,

during the schism in the papacy, and the council of Pisa, held in 1409, having deposed the schismatical popes, and chosen Cardinal Peter Philargi, pope, who styled himself Alexander V. he requested, and obtained permission to surrender up his dignity; and Stephen de Sævis succeeded to the office. Butler, (Lives of the Saints, vol. IV.) however, says, he was general of the Carthusians at the time of his death.

In the year 1412, the states of Arragon, Catalonia, and Valencia, being divided about a successor to the crown of Arragon, they agreed to choose nine commissaries, three for each kingdom; when Boniface, his brother Vincent, and Don Peter Bertrand, were chosen for the kingdom of Valencia. They met at the castle of Caspé, in Arragon. Ferdinand of Castile was unanimously declared to be the lawful heir; and Vincent Ferrer, haranguing the foreign ambassadors and people present, the decision was received with acclamation. Boniface died April 29th, 1419.18

The exact period when Boniface's translation of the Bible was made, cannot perhaps be ascertained, but as Vincent was recalled to Valencia by King John II. in 1410, by whose command the version is by some said to have been made, and as he continued there about two years, it was probably commenced, if not completed, at that time.

About the year 1450, Alphonsus V. king of Arragon, is supposed to have translated the PROVERBS OF SOLOMON, into his native tongue. He is also said to have read the whole Bible fourteen times, with glosses and commentaries; and to have become so expert in the Scriptures, as not only to relate the substance of them, but to repeat many parts of them correctly, from memory."

It is, nevertheless, to be deplored, that the study of

(18) Antonii Biblioth. Hisp. Vet. II. lib. x. cap, iii. p. 140.

Butler, V, ubi sup.

(19) Usserii Hist, Dogmat. p. 172.

the Scriptures was far from being general; and that the most profound ignorance reigned amongst the major part, even of the clergy. Few of them, comparatively, were acquainted with the Latin, though constantly used in the offices of the church; whilst feasting, and debauchery, are declared to have been their ordinary occupations. This occasioned the councils of Madrid and Arenda, in 1473; and various decrees were passed in them, designed to remedy the disorders and ignorance of the ecclesiastics of all ranks. The bishops were forbidden to ordain or promote those who were ignorant of Latin; the Scriptures were ordered to be daily read at the tables of the prelates themselves; the clergy, in general, were forbidden to wear gay apparel, to be clothed in silk, to walk in white sandals, or red or green buskins, or to put on mourning; they were also commanded not to play at dice, or fight duels; and those who died of the wounds received in a duel, were ordered to be deprived of ecclesiastical burial. Other canons were framed against simony, clandestine marriages, ecclesiastical concubinage, dramatic exhibitions in churches, &c.20

But these injunctions were not succeeded by the reformation so necessary to the religious welfare of the church; for in 1499, Pope Alexander VI. found it requisite to send an epistle to the Spanish bishops, respecting the ignorance of the clergy; urging them to adopt measures for the promotion of study and discipline among them."1

Some attempts, however, were made, notwithstanding the almost universal depravity and ignorance which prevailed, to communicate a knowledge of the Sacred Writings, to those who were acquainted only with their mother tongue. Le Long mentions a version of the Bible,

(20) D' Aguirre, Collectio Maxima Concil. Hisp. III. pp. 672-677. Romæ, 1693-94 fol.

Dictionnaire Portatif des Conciles, pp. 39. 302, 479.

(21) D' Aguirre, ut sup. III. p. 689.

22

23

in the dialect of Catalonia, written in the year 1407, of which an imperfect copy was preserved in the Colbertine Library; he also notices an edition of the PSALTER, in the dialect of Castile, printed, as he supposed, before A. D. 1500. Fred. Furius, who wrote a Treatise on the Sacred Scriptures, printed in 1556, says, that at the close of the fifteenth century, the Scriptures had not only been translated into his native dialect of Valencia, but into almost all the other dialects of Spain. These translations were prevented from being circulated, by the establishment and influence of the inquisition, and the edict of Ferdinand and Isabella, (called also Elizabeth,) which enacted, that "No one should translate the Scriptures into the vulgar tongue, or have them in their possession, under pain of the severest punishment." Fred. Furius adds, that “this prohibition extended only to those who were originally Jews, and not to others." He further remarks, that the Lessons from the GOSPELS, read in the churches, during the whole year, had been faithfully and elegantly translated, and permitted to be printed; and that he had seen and read the EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL, translated into Spanish verse, in the dialects of both Castile and Valencia. Conrad Gesner, another author who flourished in the sixteenth century, notices these vernacular versions, but remarks, that, in his day, nearly all the copies of them had been burnt.26 In January, 1492, the Spaniards took Granada, and extinguished the empire of the Moors in Spain, where they had been settled more than 700 years. Ferdinand de Talavéra, a man of great learning, and exemplary piety, was nominated archbishop of Granada. His disposition was mild, pa(22) Le Long, Biblioth. Sacra, I. pp. 362. 369. edit. 1723.

(23) Ibid. I. p. 362.

(24) Le Long, ut sup. p. 361.

Usserii Hist. Dogmat. p. 175.

(25) Simon's Crit. Hist. of the Versions of the N. T. pt. ii. ch. ii, p. 18; Usserius, ut sup;

and ch. xli. p. 344.

(26) Le Long, I, p. 362,