p. 72Peaceful Progress

Alonso was now restored to comparative health of body, as well as to comparative peace of soul. The busy life of porter only grew more busy as the college developed; but there was no slackening in the onward progress of our Saint’s holiness.

There were new arrivals of Fathers and Scholastics, and there were leave-takings and departures of others. Young men were accepted as Novices, and others were called by God to their reward. Children began their schooling in the class-room of Montesion who were, in after years, to be brethren in Religion with our Saint. And amidst all this little world, which reflected in its changes, its joys and its sorrows, the history of all days, the virtues of the humble porter grew only more beautiful.

Somewhere about this time, the prayers of St. Alonso rescued Father Aguirre from a fresh danger, greater far than that which has been already recorded in these pages.¹1V. pp. 49, 50. The Father, who at the time was in the Jesuit College at Gandia, had fallen into a state of religious melancholy, which bordered on temporary insanity. He had lost all hopes of his salvation. Nor did there appear any chance of his being roused from his intense depression, and it was feared that he would even die without the Sacraments. One day, about this time, Brother Alonso was walking about wrapt up in deep contemplation in a dark passage of the old house, afar from the bustle of the college, where his cell was then situated. Suddenly he heard a distant voice in the air which said to him, “Pray for your friend, Father Aguirre, who is in great danger.” He turned at once to Our Lady and offered through her hands all his acts of penance, his communions, and other works of piety for the poor Father. This he continued to do till he thought he had fulfilled the orders from on high. Some months later, in the spring of 1587, Father Jerome Roca, the Provincial, came on his visit to the college; and Alonso, in giving the usual account of conscience, told him of the mysterious message. The Provincial then informed him of all that had passed, and that he had happened at the very time to have been at Gandia, and that Father Aguirre had perfectly recovered his health; in fact he was able to serve the Society for four years after this.²2Father Aguirre died at Barcelona in 1591.

But before Father Roca’s arrival, the College of Montesion experienced two severe losses. The year of our Saint’s last vows, 1585, Father Fau, who had entered the Society only four years previously and whose life in religion had closely resembled that of our Saint in its recollection and zeal, went to his rest. On April 6th, two years later, died Father John Encontra. He too was a faithful imitator of St. Alonso and so perfect a religious, “that this college,” says the chronicler, “has had few to come near to him.” He was Professor in Montesion and Prefect of the Confraternity or congregation of the college boys, whose lives grew so edifying that they seemed to belong to a well-ordered Ecclesiastical Seminary.³3Litt. Ann. 1587. Cf. Hist., MS., Prov. Arag. S.J., p. 167. Out of these Father Encontra had selected some of the most fervent and formed a sort of inner circle, what he called the “Academia”—a school “of the Humble.” For by it he trained them in the secure way of humility, making them do menial offices, as, for example, sweep out the class-rooms; and used to handle the broom himself to set them an example. He took little care of himself and lived in a cold and exposed room. His health broke down and he died when only 30. “Our Lady!” he exclaimed, while he was being anointed, “for the services which I have done you and have got others to do for you, I beg of you to aid me in this hour.”

Father Roca came, as has been said, on his Visitation in the spring of 1587. He found great delight, during his stay on the island, in the company of St. Alonso, with whom he lived on terms of very close intimacy, and whose marvellous sanctity and wonderful gifts were a subject of grateful wonder to him. On his return to Spain he said, in a public exhortation, without mentioning our Saint’s name, that he had discovered in the Province of Aragon a religious to whom God vouchsafed favours as great as those which had been received by the poor man of Assisi, St. Francis. Father Roca found the community very badly housed, for though a large portion of the church, thanks in great part to Father Coch’s zeal, had been finished as far back as 1581, yet, to use the vigorous expression of the chronicler of the Province,⁴4Tom. III., p. 10. “there was not a trowelful of a new college.”

On the 22nd of July, 1587, the Community of Montesion were gathered in prayer and tears around the death-bed of their venerated Rector, Father Coch.⁵5Cf. Sacchini, Hist. Soc. Jesu., P.V., Lib.V. He had a wonderful power in calming the angry and correcting the bad. For twelve years he preached in Majorca, and was always listened to with pleasure. Litt. Annuæ., 1606–7–8. Maintz. 1618. He had never properly recovered his health, and had been for some time unable to preach, or even to do his ordinary duties as Rector. His first work at Montesion, when a very young religious, was as one of the first masters in the earliest days of the college, and his life seemed bound up with its prosperity and with the spiritual interests of the city. All who visited the sick man’s room during his painful illness had been struck by his patience and love of suffering. The viceroy, Don Lewis Vich y Manrique, and his brother, the Bishop of Majorca, had noticed that in spite of a raging thirst, which his dropsy naturally created, the sufferer never touched a drop of anything unless ordered by the doctor. God made known to the good Rector that his death-day would be the Feast of St. Mary Magdalen.

The last Sacraments were being administered to him, and among the first to come on that occasion to his room had been St. Alonso, who was bound to him by so many ties of affection and duty. But so many were present that he with others was forced to kneel outside at the door, and, when he was least thinking of such a thing, he beheld Heaven opened and he heard a voice say, “It is open for Father Coch.” The vision lasted some seven or eight minutes. Our Saint received at the same time the assurance that a like reception awaited him, but that he must struggle on yet for some years along the path of obedience and of constant mortification. No wonder that in the midst of the grief of all around him on the death of their Superior, Alonso was filled with a joy which must have puzzled his brethren. Majorca owes in great part to Father Coch that Alonso lived so many years and died in the island, for he often used to say what trouble he had been at to prevent his Superiors removing the holy Brother, for they had done all they could to take him with them to Spain to sanctify, as they said, other colleges and other cities. The whole of Palma flocked to Father Coch’s funeral, and the Franciscans celebrated a solemn dirge for him in the Cathedral.

Father Hosta was appointed Vice-Rector on Father Coch’s death. The 8th of December, a day of great festivity at Palma, in 1587,⁶6It was Monsignor Vich y Manrique, 1573–1604, who instituted this solemnity. had come to a close, when a tornado, such as is rarely met with in temperate zones and such as had never been known in Majorca, burst upon the island. The hurricane was accompanied by great storm-clouds charged with electricity and pouring forth torrents of rain. The whirlwind tore up trees by the roots and carried great trunks an incredible distance. It threw down the stone crosses at two of the city gates, Puertas del Campo⁷7This cross was restored, and it still exists. V. Month., Dec., 1888. and de San Antonio. The lightning broke the beautiful Rose-window over the west door of the Cathedral, which was then being completed, and passed out of another at the east, scattering both the magnificent glass and the elaborate and massive tracery of each. Numbers of houses were levelled to the ground and a wall of the College was blown down and crushed the small tenements below it, killing many, and seriously injuring others.

The screams of the wounded and of their friends, the clang of the bells of the city, the constant rolling of the thunder, were enough to terrify the bravest heart. The community had gone to seek help before the Tabernacle, and to beg God to protect the city; but when they heard the crash close by, they rushed out to give some help, but the black darkness prevented them from going to aid, nor could any torch live in the wind and torrents of rain. The house itself was old and unsafe, and any moment it might crumble, as the wall had done, beneath the fury of the storm. Father Hosta had just before begun to pull down some of the outer walls, and thus left the house exposed to this unexpected storm; full of anguish at the cries and moans of the poor people, he met Alonso, who had run out to help the wounded, and said to him, “What are you doing here, Brother? go at once to the Sanctuary and pray God to stay this storm.”

At once he obeyed. Another Brother, Alphonsus Magí, well known for his surgical skill and great goodness, who happened to be there, followed him, to join with him in his prayer, and partly, too, out of curiosity to see what he would do. Our Saint knelt before the Blessed Sacrament, and hardly had he time to say the “Hail Mary” three times than the storm ceased, and at once the sky began to grow clear. So sudden was the change that they were able to go forth and, by torchlight, dig out those who had been buried in the ruins. Everyone was amazed at so sudden a change, for these tempests generally last for several days. Few knew the cause of the calm.

Father Hosta had been ill the whole time since the death of Father Coch. So high was the esteem in which he was held by the General of the Society, Father Claudius Acquaviva, that he was, notwithstanding, named Rector of the important College of Barcelona; but before he could undertake this grave responsibility he died of malignant fever, on February 28th, 1588.

Father Matthias Borrasá was finally appointed, for a second time, Rector of Montesion, and entered upon his office the year of Father Hosta’s death. By orders of the Father General, owing no doubt to the report of the late visitor, a wing of the new College was begun in June. It was of three storeys and stood at right angles to the church; while it was connected with the temporary class-rooms, which were then separated from it by a street, by a wooden bridge. At the other extremity from the church a large cistern was constructed under a courtyard,⁸8This was afterwards called the “Patio del Refectorio—the Refectory Quad,” and is still in existence. with a draw-well above.

One day St. Alonso had suspended a water-bottle of clay by a cord, which was fastened at the other end to the middle of a strong stick. He had put the bottle in the cistern in order to keep the water cool for one of the community who was ill. He no doubt had plenty of work of his own, and he felt rather inclined to leave the sick man, who was well enough to do this, to draw up the water for himself; but he put away the thought and went to get the bottle, when the cord slipt off the stick and the vessel went down to the bottom of the cistern. God, however, came to his aid, and, to reward his charity, the bottle rose up of itself to the rim of the well, though it was very heavy, and he was thus able to get hold of it and bring it up.⁹9Memor., n. 30.

Father Borrasá improved the property of the country house, so great a boon for the hard-worked missioners and for the Masters and Brothers of the College. But once, and once only, was it remembered that Alonso ever asked leave to go out to Santa Maria del Monte, as the villa was called, and that was to please a Brother who wanted the walk as an excuse to have the opportunity of talking about God with the holy porter; and when he was sent by obedience, he made a compact with his senses not to touch, much less to taste, or even to look at, the grapes or other fruit. He would not even gather a flower or a blade of grass.

The great struggle between Protestantism and Catholicity which was raging in France and the Low Countries, called for earnest intercession on the part of the faithful; and the General of the Society ordered, in 1590, his religious to seek for fresh fervour and strength in the exercises of St. Ignatius.¹⁰10The annual retreat for all members of the Society was ordered by the 6th General Congregation, 1608.

One can imagine with what dispositions St. Alonso received this grace. One immediate result was to quicken the zeal of all, and missions to town and country were given with immense fruit.

The following year, 1591, the year of St. Aloysius’ death, our Saint attained his 60th year. His health, undermined by constant penance, began to give way, and he was ordered to take his rest at night on a bed. Hitherto he had slept in a chair or on the boards. But many years after this, Brother Mora, who only made his acquaintance in 1601, tells us when he went round the rooms to see that the brothers were in bed, he noticed that the Saint was sitting up in bed, with his head towards the wall; but, just as always, even when he was sitting on a chair, his back was not resting against anything, but—so Brother Mora describes it—was “as if in the air.” Mora tells us that he himself tried the experiment, and, after a quarter of an hour’s endurance, gave it up through sheer fatigue.

Jerome Paul Puigdorfila, a great admirer of the Saint, one of the first nobles of Majorca, set sail for Valencia, on January 8th, 1591, and his wife, Margaret Despuig y Puigdorfila, went in great trouble to implore Alonso to pray for her husband, as it was three months since his departure, and she had had no news about him, because no vessels had come from Spain in the meantime. She was frightened lest he had died or been taken by the Corsairs. “Lady,” answered St. Alonso, “have no fear for your husband, for God has preserved him for other work.” And this prophecy proved true, for the gentleman returned to the island in good health and maintained it up to the time when he gave his evidence for the Saint’s Canonization in 1619-20.

Father John Rico, a native of Cullera, in Valencia, came next year, 1592, on May 1st, to be Rector of the College.¹¹11St. Alonso says of him that Father Roca was careless about his body and very careful of his soul. He wore a hair shirt before entering religion. Raphael Oller came with him. Some three years back, in the June of 1589, during an outbreak of the plague in Barcelona, he had devoted himself to serve the sick and had caught the terrible malady. However, he shook it off, and his Superiors sent him to the comparative quiet of the College of Palma. One father and three brothers died victims of charity; one of these, Francis Morey, was a Majorcan, who had passed some twelve years with St. Alonso, as a lay-Brother, at Montesion. Though deformed, he was a most valuable Brother, being a stonemason by trade. He was much drawn to our Saint, and always sought his side at recreation, to talk with him. Like to him in his love of perfection, in his recollection and spirit of penance, the subjects of their conversation were widely different. Alonso loved to talk of humiliation, of self-contempt, mortification of self in all things. Francis ever talked, in burning words, of God’s love and goodness to us.

Father Rico was singularly like, both in character and in humility, to our holy lay-Brother, for whom he had a profound esteem, and he even asked and took his advice in many matters. One day Father John went, with St. Alonso and his companion, to preach in the church of the Convent de la Mercede.¹²12The Convent de la Mercede, near Montesion, was founded by the Fathers of the Society on their arrival in Majorca, as a house for penitent women. The church is now destroyed, but the good work is carried on in another part of the city. The Brother took the preacher to the pulpit and sat on the steps during the sermon. The subject was forgiveness of enemies, and he treated it with great learning and ardent fervour; but it fell with but small fruit on the large audience. As the Brother was saying the three Hail Maries with the preacher and the people at the close of the discourse, he heard the voice of Our Lord saying to him, “Thy Rector will atone for this sermon in Purgatory.” The reason was soon made clear to Alonso, for as he was walking on his way back to the College in company with Father Rico, it was revealed to our Saint that his Rector had deserved this reproof for having preached in Castilian, the fashionable language of society, and not in the popular Majorcan,¹³13As a dialect of Catalan it differs but little from Valencian, which was the Rector’s native tongue. and was, in consequence, not understood by all, especially by the women of humbler life. Not knowing what to do, the holy Brother told what he had heard to the Minister. This Father naturally did not like to be the bearer of so unpleasant a correction to his Superior, and bade Alonso, as he had received the intimation, to deliver it himself. He accordingly did so, and the good Rector received the warning with all humility, nor did he ever from that day fail, while on the island, to preach in the dialect of the people. In fact, far from taking in bad part the admonition, he ever after held in highest esteem the saintly porter. He sought his advice in all his doubts and difficulties, and kept through his life, as a precious relic, a paper written and signed by St. Alonso. He used to compare the Brother, when hearing Mass, to St. Antony of Padua; and he went so far as to say, that if the rules of the Society were lost, they would be preserved in the life of our Saint. One day, as he opened the tabernacle door to give Holy Communion, he saw a ray of light shoot forth from it and light up the face of St. Alonso, who was kneeling at prayer in a little tribune facing the altar.

Once, in 1592, while saying his beads at a late hour in his room,¹⁴14The Saint notes that the room was afterwards turned into a store for corn, and faced the clock. The site is now occupied by the Chapel and Shrine of St. Alonso. The year is known because he spoke of it to his confessor, in 1604, as having happened 12 years before. The vision forms the subject of a remarkable painting by Zurbaran in the Academy of St. Ferdinand, Madrid. St. Alonso saw Our Blessed Lady and Her Divine Son come down to him, and He entered into his heart. His Blessed Mother bore with her a second heart, and placed it in the right side of the saintly Brother and then entered therein. Nor could he ever forget this, neither did he cease to feel this mysterious presence; but it filled him with fear and shame lest after all it might be but a delusion of the enemy.

May one not see in this vision a forecast of the devotion to the SS. Hearts of Jesus and Mary? The Heart of the Model and Master made one with that of His faithful servant; yet in that breast a place was found for the heart, the love, of the Mother. This was, as the Saint insists, “purely an intellectual vision.” It was a sign and symbol of “that mystical union which exists between a soul and God, and thus with Mary through Jesus, in which consists the highest degree of the contemplative state.”¹⁵15This forms the basis of the answer of the postulator of the cause to the objections raised by the “promoter of the faith,” when the cause was argued before Benedict XIV. Our Saint received this favour on several occasions. On January 24th, 1614, he told Father Torrens that he had a like vision a few days before. V. Memor., n. 7, Cf. Resp. ad animad., p. 71; Boll., p. 624, A. Similar visions are familiar to those who have read the lives of the mystic saints. They find their best defence in the humility with which they were received, and in the love and humility which they fostered.

It was during this mysterious visitation that St. Alonso learned from the lips of Our Lord a prayer, which he ever afterwards constantly employed, “Jesus and Mary, the objects of my tenderest love, may I suffer and die for the love of You.”

Father Bernard Crespin, one of the Fathers of the College, a Majorcan by birth, took St. Alonso with him in 1593 to visit the brother of one of the canons of the Cathedral, called Don Augustin Andreu, who was dying. Both of them knelt down by the bedside and continued praying till he expired. The canon noticed that the holy lay Brother was so absorbed in prayer that he appeared quite ecstatic; and the sweet smile which came over the face of his own brother as his soul passed away was to the canon a proof that the prayer of the Saint had been fully heard.

On the 20th of January, 1594, Father Matthew Reguer, a Catalan, came as Confessor to the College from Valencia with some other Fathers in the ship of the new viceroy of the island, Don Ferdinand Zanoguera. The Father remained at Montesion sixteen years, being made Minister of the House the year after his arrival.

Father Matthew told St. Alonso that he was sorely pained at a difficulty which he met with at Holy Mass. He was not able to pronounce the words, nor could he help noticing the people in church, and he begged the aid of the good Brother’s prayers. The gates of Heaven, however, in this instance, seemed shut against him, and the only relief he got was when Alonso was hearing his mass and interceding for him. But the moment our Saint ceased to pray, all his troubles came back. The difficulty was quite a new one to him, for Father Reguer could till this time say his Mass with a strong voice. At last, Alonso, finding he got no better, suggested to him to examine himself as to whether or no there was some affectation in his way of saying Mass which was the cause of feelings of vain glory and over confidence. Because if it were so, his cure was to be found in humbling himself at the feet of his God.

In 1594, Father Peter de Villar was appointed Provincial of Aragon, and the following year, in May, he crossed over the sea to make his visitation of Montesion. One of the first results of his visit was an order that in the College church the Octave of Corpus Christi should be celebrated with all possible solemnity. His wishes were at once complied with, and the magnificence of this week of fiestas, the music, the sermons, the flowers, the crowds of worshippers, filled with joy the heart of our Saint, all inflamed with love for his Sacramental God.

On January 9th Brother Bartholomew Roca, and on February 19th, 1595, Brother Michael Serra were received as lay-Brother novices.¹⁶16Hist., M.S., Montesion. Michael died in 1665, at the great age of 89, renowned for holiness, and was believed to have worked miracles. They were to spend many years with our Saint. Brother Serra was in low spirits when in his noviciate, and envied St. Alonso’s unchanging cheerfulness. So one day he resolved to test it. Serra was at the time dispenser—in charge of the store-room—and was getting some capers ready for supper. Our Saint told him to give the baker, who had just come, some breakfast; and Michael, as if he were vexed, said to him: “Go away; do you not see what I am doing? Why do you want to bother me?” Alonso answered very meekly: “Dearest Brother, I did not order you to do it; I merely let you know that the baker had come, so that you might give him his breakfast whenever it suited you.”¹⁷17Summar., p. 117.

St. Alonso was associated with the Novice Master in the charge of the lay-Brother novices; and, at the time of which we are speaking, his room was next to that of the probationers. Brother Serra was so moved by the constant sound of the terrible disciplines which the Saint inflicted on himself, that he went to Father Gabriel Bolicher, the Novice Master, hoping that he would stay the hand which was so cruel to himself. A brother of Serra, named James, was a secular priest and a minor canon of the Cathedral. A Franciscan, of the same family, Fray Raphael, a friend of our Saint, was distinguished for his holiness and learning.

One day, when Don James came to see his brother, Don William Dezcallar and some other Majorcan gentlemen of position were standing about the door which leads from the cloister to the sacristy. He noticed that Brother Alonso, whose way lay straight through the door, instead of taking the direct road, made a great circuit in the direction of the well¹⁸18Probably that already described at p. 75. to get to his porter’s lodge. He asked his brother why Alonso made such a round, and the answer was: “It is a custom with us to close the door after us; and, in order not to break his rules as doorkeeper, and at the same time not to disturb those gentlemen, and to pay them proper respect, he went so far out of his way.” It seems that the real reason of this was that a Superior had once said to the obedient Brother, who had happened to leave a door open, “Why do not you shut the door?” and ever after that he never passed through a door without closing it behind him.

Just before his departure from Majorca, Father de Villar, on July 2nd, 1595, received into the Society the future Martyr, James Jerome de Moranta. His father was of the Council Royal of Majorca, while his mother was Praxedes Caldantell, niece of the illustrious Father Jerome Nadal. James had been a disciple of the holy porter while at school, and had learnt from him the first elements of piety. But much more intimately and intensely did he profit by his teaching when he became a Jesuit. Thirst for the sufferings and labours of the American Mission had been the leading motive of his entering the Society, and when yet a novice he petitioned for that work of danger.

The Feast of the Assumption, the patronal feast of the Cathedral, had begun to be celebrated in 1588 with a special pomp in the College of Montesion. That day had ever been one of special blessings to Alonso, and the fresh burst of devotion which this celebration called forth reacted no doubt upon his soul. It was in 1594 or 1595.¹⁹19Janin, l. II., c. xii., n. 94, v. Boll., p. 636. Marimon says it happened “about 1600,” t.II., l. vii., §. 23. The great day had come to a close, and our Saint was in his room in the old house²⁰20This room was existing in 1618. It is apparently the same as that described above, p. 78, note 14. over the dispensary which looked out on the cloister of the chief court of the college—the patio de los confesonarios. His mind was still full of Mary’s happy death and glorious triumph over death. The house was quiet, for the townsfolk were at the solemn procession at the Cathedral, when the image of Our Lady was borne to a resting place in memory of the bearing of her sacred body by the Apostles to Her tomb.²¹21Throughout the old Reino of Aragon, during the Octave of the Assumption, a figure of our Lady is laid on a sumptuous catafalque in most of the churches; and the ceremony of her burial takes place to this day in the Cathedral of Majorca on the Octave day. She deigned to make him, in a still closer manner, share in her triumph by lifting him up in spirit into Heaven, and there unrolling before the eyes of his soul the threefold festivities of Her celestial progress. The first was when, at the moment of Mary’s death, Her Blessed Son, escorted by myriads of rejoicing angels and happy souls, received her spotless soul and bore it up to the gates of its Eternal Home. Then came the entry into Heaven of their triumphant Queen, who was welcomed by the whole celestial court. And the last and most magnificent triumph of all when She, the Mother of the Incarnate God, was throned in Her seat of glory, amidst a burst of harmony, which, as it was celestial, can find no term of comparison with what is of this earth. Our Saint felt as one of the Angelic host, sharing with them in the joy of that triumph, standing with, mixing with them, knowing each, and being known to each with an intimacy which, though so close, in no ways distracted his thoughts from the great object of their attention.

Whether this rapture was of the body, or of the soul alone, St. Alonso could not say. But he knew that it lasted for a considerable time.

Up to this time God had given St. Alonso so vivid and detailed a realization of the terrors, the pains, the perils of death, that not only was his soul filled with holy fear, but his conversation reflected this infused knowledge. He was ever talking, as has been mentioned, of the swift shortness of life, and of the peril of losing God Eternal for what is but for to-day. And though this fear did not cast out love, the conviction that there was no time, when death comes, to do penance for the past, armed him against himself to do penance while there was time. But somewhere about this period of his life²²22V. Memor., n. 51, p. 79. The Saint says that, possibly more than ten years before the year in which he was writing, the latter part of 1606, this change occurred. God gave him such an assurance of his salvation that made fear of death or hell impossible to him. It filled him with a fresh love of his Lord, and an ardent wish to shape all his life according to His will. Our Saint compares his state to that of a servant who, when summoned to give an account of his stewardship, his master finds it all quite in order, and master and servant alike are content.

In the month of July, 1596, Father Laurence San Juan arrived at Palma as official Visitor of Montesion for the Provincial, Father Peter de Villar. Antony, a brother of Jerome de Moranta, who, like Jerome, was a spiritual child of St. Alonso, presented himself to the Father Visitor as a candidate for the Society, and was received by him.²³23V. Nonell, p. 295; but the M.S. Hist. Montesion informs us that Antony left for Spain on July 20th, while the Visitor only arrived on August 3rd. Like his brother, Antony obtained leave in after life to devote himself to the missions, and was one of the Jesuits who laboured in the celebrated reductions of Paraguay.

During his stay at Montesion, Father San Juan established a Sodality in the College for men of family and of official position. He took the greatest pains to leave the good work on such a solid foundation as would ensure its lasting for many a year. The Confraternity was under the patronage of the Holy Ghost²⁴24The altar-piece of the Confraternity is now in a side chapel next to the principal entrance of the church of Montesion. and of the Annunciation. While the personal holiness of its members was furthered by a discourse every Sunday, and a general Communion on the third Sunday of each month, charity to their neighbour was practised by visits to the poor, to the sick, and to those in prison. The first Prefect of the Sodality was a noble and valiant knight of Malta, Fray Ramon de Verí, who, besides endowing the College, left a large sum as an annual income to the Confraternity. When, during the next year, 1597, Father Acquaviva, the General of the Society, sent the diploma of aggregation to the Prima Primaria, the central Sodality of Rome, the Confraternity of Montesion counted 120 members, among whom, on the Feast of All Saints, Don Ferdinand de Zanoguera,²⁵25Don Ferdinand succeeded Don Vich y Manrique, in 1595. the Viceroy, was proud to be enrolled, and he frequently attended the meetings and joined in the pious practices of the brotherhood.

The good done by the Sodality among rich and poor alike can hardly be expressed. And no small share had St. Alonso in this, for, by orders of his Superiors, he not unfrequently was present at the meetings; for Father Bolicher and other Fathers who had charge of this Sodality were glad to employ the great gifts of the humble lay Brother. They used to take him with them to the Hall of the Congregation,²⁶26The Public Library of Palma now occupies the Hall of the Congregation of “Gentlemen and Officers,” which was built for this purpose about the year 1600, over the Refectory of the Jesuit College. under the plea of carrying up the box containing the names of the Patron Saints to be drawn by lot each month by the members, and when the Fathers had said their say, they would bid St. Alonso to speak on the same subject. He made all the resistance in his power, till obedience conquered his humility. At once all were silent, and those behind left their seats and crushed forward to catch every word of his inflamed discourse. He seemed like a seraph from Heaven telling them of God’s love for them. Whenever it was rumoured that he was going to speak, not only the gentlemen of the city, but canonists and theologians crowded the room to hear him, to see him, and to get near to one whom they all deemed a saint.

Such was the ardour with which he addressed them that it made his presence always welcome. His words were like fiery darts setting all hearts ablaze with love of God and of their neighbour.

Once when he had given his opinion on a pious question which was being there discussed, a gentleman, one of the oldest and most respected of the Sodality, got up and exclaimed “Yes; these are the very theologians of God!” Needless to say that our Saint’s learning was not acquired from the schools, nor from books, but was drunk in from God Himself in the close union of continual prayer.

Doctor Arbona, a minor Canon of the Cathedral, a native of Soller, consulted St. Alonso on difficult moral questions and got replies such as one might expect only from a professed theologian; and he attested on oath that this had occurred to many others besides himself. So too, a young student of theology, Peter Gilabert, who was sadly puzzled with some difficulty in the Treatise on the Most Blessed Trinity, the subject of the lectures he was then following, went to the humble porter and, without saying a word to him of what was passing in his own mind, St. Alonso began to talk on the very point with a marvellous clearness and perfect knowledge of the subject.²⁷27Arbona finished his studies at Valencia and returned to Majorca about 1591, being then about 25. Gilabert was a much younger man, as he was born about 1592. Supposing him to have been 18 when studying his theology, the conversation just narrated could not have occurred before 1612.

Father Vincent Mas was extremely anxious to meet Brother Alonso, of whose sanctity he had heard so much. For more than 15 or 20 years,²⁸28Father Mas died in 1600; he entered the Charter House in 1571; he probably first heard of St. Alonso a few years later. Father Bolicher was Spiritual Father at Montesion in 1595–6. The event probably occurred about that time. Cf. p. 52. so he told Don John Vivot, a great friend of his,²⁹29V. p. 68. had he wished for this meeting. Vivot accordingly brought our Saint with Father Bolicher and three gentlemen of the neighbourhood to a country house, the property of the Carthusians, and there Father Vincent spent about four hours in private conference with St. Alonso. When evening came and they had bid each other good-bye, Don Vivot lingered behind, and asked Father Vincent, among other things, whether he was pleased at meeting Brother Rodriguez. Vivot stooped to kiss the Father’s hand, and as he did so the Carthusian replied, “There is not a more extraordinary man in the world than he, more wondrous in example, nor more obedient; so that if his Superior ordered him to go to Barcelona, he would cross the sea without a ship, and God would manifest a miracle.” The history of the passage of St. Raymond of Peñafort from Soller to Barcelona upon his cloak was naturally well remembered in Majorca. Though the era of the great Saints of the Catholic Reformation was nearly closed, Blessed John de Ribera was Archbishop at Valencia, St. Francis of Sales was living at Annecy, St. Joseph Calasanz—a Spaniard, and St. Camillus were at Rome, and St. Laurence of Brindisi was well known to the Christian world. The words of Father Vincent meant high praise.

So eloquent did his lively faith and ardent charity make St. Alonso whenever he talked about heavenly things, that, when the Community met on Fridays for Spiritual Conference, the Rector used to bid him to speak on the devotion of the season, and he spoke so wonderfully and with such depth that Fathers and Brothers alike marvelled how one who had never studied Theology could speak with accuracy and erudition on such matters.

Father Laurence San Juan³⁰30Father San Juan was himself a great preacher. People came two hours before sunrise to get places in the Jesuit church at Montesion on occasion of his sermons there. V. Litt. Ann. 1596. was anxious to hear our Saint on spiritual subjects and he bade him one night during supper to go up into the reading-pulpit and address the Community: For half-an-hour he spoke most marvellously on various virtues, till the Visitor made a sign for him to stop and said to him, “Brother Alonso, from the beginning to the end, what you have been saying about the different virtues are mere generalities. Is this what we should expect from one who by his vocation ought to possess them in their perfection? I order you for your sermon to kiss the feet of all the Community.” The Brother accepted this test of his humility right gladly, and performed the penance with deep reverence.

But it was a great trial for those whose feet he kissed, and who had been so moved by his discourse. Father San Juan himself was not less touched by the joyful self-abasement of the Saint than he had been by his marvellous discourse.

He tested St. Alonso’s obedience and humility on another occasion by sending him up to preach a sermon in Greek, a language which it is hardly necessary to say the good Brother did not know. However, up he went, and in a loud voice he began, “Kyrie eleison—kyrie eleison,” and so continued till the Provincial made a signal for him to come down.

The Visitor was so impressed with our Saint, that he thought, like others who had been before him, that it was his duty to take St. Alonso back with him to Spain, in order that the light of his virtues might shine on the rest of the Province of Aragon; and it was only because of the feeling which his removal would have caused throughout Majorca, and after very strong intercession, that Father San Juan desisted from carrying out his resolution. Our Saint’s age and broken health may have had to do with his change of purpose. The Visitor left in December, taking with him the Rector, Father Rico, whose term of office had come to a close. Father Borrasá was left in charge, and, on the 10th of April in the following year, 1597, was named Rector for the third time.

It was not merely on the occasions just described that the Community of Montesion were privileged to hear the wonderful sermons of the holy porter. On some of the principal feasts of the year, and specially during the Octave of St. Ignatius, the Rector of the College used to bid him to preach in the refectory at meal time. They never gave him more than half an hour to get ready, and very often much less time. But the heart was full, and the mind enlightened by the constant presence of God, and his audience were never wearied with his ardent and inspired words, which were the evident reflection of his interior holiness. Brother Joseph Ramohí tells us:³¹31In a letter to Father Marimon, December 16, 1618. “Once it happened that, though dinner was quite finished, we all stopped and listened to him for almost another quarter of an hour, so full were we of admiration at the fervour and devotion with which he was speaking of the presence of God, Our Lord; and of how sweet, how tender and delightful was that practice.” Four of his sermons have been left to us. Their subjects are “God’s love to man,” “St. Ignatius,” “Self-denial,” “Resignation and confidence in God.” They are cast in the conventional form of a Spanish sermon, with text, introduction, Ave Maria, proofs, conclusions and peroration.³²32Obras Espir., t. II., pp. 233–272. That on St. Ignatius is given in the Appendix.

Brother Bartholomew Roca³³33When Roca was a novice, St. Alonso used to tell him, as a means of advancing in virtue, to fancy that he had to construct an image of his crucified Lord, and to begin with the feet, the hands, and then the head, pondering these over and trying to imitate all the virtues of the Sacred Passion. was one of the many who owed to St. Alonso his vocation, and his entry into the Society. From him we learn this fact: that the Fathers of the College assured him that once a student, opening the door of the chapel of the little sacristy, found St. Alonso, who was serving Mass there, on his knees, but raised above the ground.

By 1597 the new buildings of the College were far advanced. One wing, whose rooms looked out towards the south and over the garden, and an azotea or covered gallery, with a magnificent view over the bay, must have been nearly finished. Another portion, with a temporary library, sacristy and wardrobe, the refectory, with the hall of the gentlemen’s sodality above, and the stairs up to the wing already built, was in progress.

Somewhere about this time, when our Saint was recovering from an attack of illness, Father Clar,³⁴34Father Clar seems to have been Minister in 1597. In 1600 he was appointed Rector at Barcelona, and only returned to the island a few months before our Saint’s death. the Minister, told the Brother he might go back to his post at the door; but should on no account go up the stairs, but send some younger and stronger Brother with any messages. Interpreting the command to the letter, when night came St. Alonso did not go up to his room, nor even take up the keys to the Rector, according to custom, but he sat down on a bench near the Porteria. The Superior, not receiving the keys, went in search of St. Alonso, and, not finding him in his room, at last discovered him down below.

In the May of 1598 the Provincial of the Province of Aragon, Peter Juste, who had been appointed the previous year, came to Montesion, and when his visitation was finished he sailed for Spain. Shortly after, some Moorish galleys were seen off the island with a brigantine in tow, and the report came to Palma that the Father had fallen into the hands of the Corsairs. All the community, save St. Alonso, were in deep grief; but he seemed gayer than usual. Father Borrasá, the Rector, was astonished: “How is this, Brother? You seem the only one who does not feel this terrible calamity which has befallen the Provincial.” “Father Provincial,” was his reply, “is safe and well in the College of Barcelona, with all his companions, and he has had an angel’s journey, with our Lady at the helm.” A letter from the mainland soon confirmed and echoed the Saint’s words—“an angel’s journey,”—though there had been no possibility of the words having reached Spain. All thanked God for the safe and prosperous voyage of their Superior. An incident in the voyage deserves record. One of the sailors on board was given to swearing. Father Juste reproved him several times, but to no avail. When the Provincial was leaving the ship, he told the captain, who was a worthy man, not to keep that sailor among his crew, or they would all be taken by the Corsairs, and would fall into slavery. The captain turned the man away, but he got a berth on another ship, which, with that of the captain, sailed for Majorca. The captain’s vessel reached port in safety, but the other ship with the swearer on board fell a prey to the Moors.

In a very similar case one Michael Geronimo, a worthy Majorcan, had sailed for Valencia, and his sister was seized with a strange foreboding, though without any grounds, that Michael had fallen into the hands of the Moors, and she told St. Alonso her trouble. “Take heart,” was his reply, “for though his ship has been in peril and was attacked by the Corsairs, he is now safe in Valencia.” And so it afterwards proved. But, as we shall see, all journeys had not so prosperous an ending.

Towards the close of 1598, on the eve of the feast of the Immaculate Conception, a priest was received into the Society whose name will often occur in these pages. Father John Torrens, a Majorcan, had won the Doctor’s Cap in the University of Valencia, and had returned home to be made Vicar-General of the Island. He was forty-five at the time of his entrance into religion. His Bishop, who had intended to get him consecrated as his coadjutor,³⁵35Litt. Ann., 1598. Naples, 1607. This year fourteen entered Religion from the Students’ Sodality, two of them becoming Jesuits. said that the loss he had sustained never could be repaired, and that the Society did not know what it had gained. Don Vique y Manrique even offered him a canonry while a novice, but Father Torrens said that he was quite content with his vocation, and would not exchange it even for a mitre, nor for any dignity whatsoever. As soon as his noviceship was ended he threw himself into the Missions of Catalonia, until his health broke down and he was forced to return to Majorca. But there, spite of his constant illnesses, he still continued to give missions. St. Alonso, who later on was entrusted to his spiritual care by the Father Provincial, said that the Society had few such “torrents”³⁶36Referring to the meaning of the Latin word—torrens. as he.

About 1599,³⁷37Don James says in his deposition in 1619, that this happened about 20 years before that date. He afterwards became a priest and got a benefice in the Cathedral of Palma. one Lady Day, James Saqueres, a deacon, some thirty years old, was taken so seriously ill as to be hardly able to move or even to say a word. But as he was Prefect of the Students’ Sodality and was most anxious to be present at the feast which they were keeping, he dragged himself as far as the College. When he got to the Porteria he could hardly stand. He told the saintly porter what was the matter. The Brother said he ought not to have come out, but that he must trust in God and he would be all right the next day. So, after a chat with our Saint, he sat down on a bench and when the service was over he returned home. The next day the Brother’s words proved true, all signs of illness had gone.

One evening in the October of 1599, as grace after dinner was being said in the temporary refectory, St. Alonso seemed to behold the Community as so many angels. The sight made him ardently desire that they might all persevere and be joined together in Heaven. In swift answer to his wish, a clear revelation came to him that all there present would be saved,³⁸38There were at the time thirteen Fathers, including the Rector and Father Bolicher, five scholastic, and nine or ten lay-Brothers, of whom one was James Ruiz, the holy cook, another Bartholomew Roca, and possibly also Michael Serra. “and, not those only, but all who were in the Society, provided that they persevered in their vocation.”³⁹39Memor., n. 34. Careful as he was to hide the gifts of God, still he tells us that he made use of this revelation to strengthen some fellow religious in whom he might detect some wavering, or to cheer them on in face of difficulties.

At this period of his life St. Alonso used to receive Holy Communion every Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. A full day before his Communion, just about the hour on which he was to receive on the morrow, he begged Our Blessed Lord, upon his knees in presence of the Blessed Sacrament, to grant him leave to get ready to receive Him, and constantly during the eve he made visits to his Hidden Saviour to prepare himself for His coming. This he did by Spiritual Communions, by fervent acts of faith in His Sacred Presence, gazing at His Immensity as the angels do, by means of that faith, and with acts of love, turning with all his heart and his desires towards Jesus Christ, and drawing his Lord to him by his fervour as the magnet does the steel. The sensible presence of Our Lord, which these ardent longings merited for Alonso, served to keep him more than ever watchful to please his Divine Guest.

In the evening,⁴⁰40Father Marimon in one place says St. Alonso went every evening to Confession. This may have been the case towards the close of his life; or it may mean that he always went on the eve of his Communions. The account given above is also from Father Marimon, and therefore possibly refers to a later date. he went to Confession. Sometimes when free from other duties he went as early as half-past three, and stood often for two whole hours waiting patiently and absorbed in prayer at the door of his Confessor’s room, till the Father came in. His Superiors, however, on hearing of this, ordered him to go at the regular time; and this he afterwards did with wonderful punctuality. He accused himself clearly and briefly of his faults; and, though they were but of the lightest and most ordinary character, his contrition was that of a criminal of the deepest dye, and was enough to touch the hardest and dullest heart of anyone that heard his self-accusation.

His immediate preparation for Holy Communion was to aim at the profoundest self-humiliation before God, going down into the depths of the vileness and emptiness of his own nothingness, lowering himself beneath the lowest of men. This sense of his unworthiness made God’s goodness to him seem all the more amazing. To this he added a longing for the greatest spotlessness from any, though the least, stain of sin, begging God, for the sake of His untold Goodness, to let him die rather than offend One Whom he so loved, by even a venial sin. Then our Saint besought Jesus Christ and His Blessed Mother to make ready within his poor breast a resting-place fitted up by Them with the choicest virtues and those most pleasing to his God. He specially begged Mary to accompany Her Son, that his soul might keep festival with the Two he most dearly loved.

When the Mass began, he made afresh his spiritual communion, and again he begged Our Lord to make him ready, though he was so unworthy, and he asked our Blessed Lady and the whole Court of Heaven to clothe the wretched poverty of his soul with deep devotion and with burning love. With a fervent act of lively faith and love, Alonso received his God and then withdrew into a corner of the Sanctuary.⁴¹41The Capilla Mayor, or Sanctuary, was begun in 1599, and the High Altar was up before 1608. He realised the presence of his Lord as if his heart was a chapel wherein Jesus was standing, with Mary, in a chapel of Her own. And then before his Lord, he recited three times the Gloria Patri, sometimes adding to it the Angels’ Song of “Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus.” Then he began the Te Deum as far as the verse, “Pleni sunt cœli et terra—Full are the heavens and the earth of the Majesty of Thy Glory.”

After this our Saint withdrew into his inner soul, and there he gave himself up to praise and thank His Divine Host for the marvellous favour which He had done him to come in person to visit his poor house, and for leaving His Heavenly Throne where He receives the homage of Cherubim and Seraphim. And so he stayed with great fervour and devotion speaking to his Lord, “I thank Thee O Lord and bless Thee infinitely, or at all events, if not as I ought, at least as far as my great feebleness will allow, for the immense grace which Thou hast done me in coming to visit and console me, though most undeserving of such a favour.” With like acts of wondering adoration, and in the clear light of an extraordinary knowledge, St. Alonso conversed in rapturous joy with his Blessed Lord. He felt that Mary was there with countless Angels paying their court to their Sovereign Lord. “The mind is confused and lost when it tries to tell or to understand what high things and divine the soul enjoys,” they are our Saint’s own words, “in the midst of such a multitude of blessed spirits who are there serving, adoring, and praising their God.”⁴²42Marimon, l.VI., §49.

During Father Borrasá’s third term of office, and in an extremely severe winter, St. Alonso used notwithstanding to get up very early to receive communion. The cold affected him so much, that Brother Roca, the Infirmarian, felt bound to tell his Superior, who forbade him to receive except on Sundays and holidays, until the weather had changed and our Saint had recovered. Possibly it was in this illness, or some time, at all events, before the spring of 1604, at night-time, that our Saint, while in bed and suffering great agony, was praying earnestly to God, when, suddenly and quite unlooked-for, Our Blessed Lord and His Holy Mother appeared to him, making the light which was burning in his room look like darkness, in the brightness of their glory. They stood at the foot of his bed. Such was the delight of his soul at this visit, that it flowed out upon his body, and swept away all trace of pain. On another occasion the Brother in charge of him heard the sick man exclaim “Jesus!” under the stress of pain, and he corrected him for doing so. Our Saint not only made no answer, but accepted the reproof, though so unreasonable, with positive gratitude and as a special favour.

God repaid Alonso for the deprivation of His real presence by a special facility for spiritual communion, in which he felt under a sensible sign that marvellous presence within him of Our Blessed Lord and His Most Holy Mother. Though he was soon allowed to resume his Communions, yet he did not give up his spiritual communions, which he repeated many times a day.

He was under orders during his convalescence to communicate at the fourth Mass, so as not to be forced to get up early. One day, when going to receive Our blessed Lord, he thought the Mass which he was hearing was the fourth, as it was the usual hour at which that Mass was said. He was surprised to learn, from the stroke of the bell, that it was only the third Mass, which happened, that day, to have been put at a later time. He was at first troubled as to what he ought to do, but, recognising the enemy in that trouble, he at once resolved to obey to the letter and wait till the fourth Mass for communion. God repaid him by such an outpouring of His bounty as made him feel His holy presence for a long time after.

Another trouble came upon him in the shape of a scruple, when he was ill, as to whether he was to obey his rule which ordered him to hear Mass, or his Superior, who sent word to say he was not to get up. The trouble lasted for some time; till, turning to God in prayer, our Lord showed him it was His will that he should obey absolutely his Superior, and a great peace came over his soul.

The reputation which St. Alonso had gained for sanctity, and its accompanying miraculous power, brought a man, this year, from what seemed to be his death-bed, to seek health at our Saint’s hands. One Christopher Colomer, a friend of his and a penitent of the Fathers of Montesion, must tell his own story as he attested it on oath at the Process of 1619–20. He was very ill in 1600, and had received holy Viaticum from Gabriel Montener, his parish priest of St. Eulalia, who himself was a witness at the Process as to what Colomer asserts. Spite of his burning fever and thirst, Christopher got up and went to the Porteria, and there begged Brother Alonso to give him a drink, as it had been refused him at home. The Saint took him into his little room, “where was a great wooden cross, and the Brother said, ‘kneel down,’ and he, too, knelt, and he told me to say the ‘Hail Mary’ five times. I told him I was not able, and so he got me to do what I could, and we said one ‘Our Father,’ and one ‘Hail Mary,’ while I was on my knees. He then blessed some water and gave it to me.” In an instant Colomer was cured.⁴³43Samm., p. 24, Evidence of Gab. Montener. “Immediately I fell asleep on a log which was there. For a whole fortnight I had not been able to sleep, and I slept for a quarter of an hour, while the Brother stayed there in prayer. When I awoke, I asked if (in the kitchen) they were cooking any pumpkins. He went to see and found they were not; but he told me to go home and he would get one prepared for me.” Colomer did as he was bid, “and a week after,” he goes on to say, “I returned to thank Brother Alonso, and I kissed his hands and habit, though he did not wish me to do so, and tried to prevent me.”

Clement VIII. decreed that the Jesuit Provincials and Rectors were not to remain in authority for more than three years.⁴⁴44V. Decret. LXIV., Congr. V. Instit. S.J., Rome, 1869, Vol. I., p. 262. Until the abrogation of the decree by Alexander VII. in 1613, this law was so faithfully observed by the Society, that the very day, nay, the very hour, on which the triennium ended, the Rector of the Jesuit houses at once resigned his office, without waiting for the appointment of his successor. Thus it happened that Father Matthias Borrasá’s third term of rectorate ended on May 20th, 1600, and he retired, leaving Father Bolicher as vice-rector in his place. In the following July, Father Melchior de Valpedrosa succeeded Father Juste as Provincial, and he sent Father John Rico in his place as Visitor of the College of Montesion. Father John was, of course, thoroughly acquainted with the house and with the Community, as he had been so recently its Rector, and, when the Visitation was ended, he resumed his old post for a second time on the last day of the year 1600.

The college buildings grew under the new government, and a class of Moral Theology was established there. Father John Forteza, a member of one of the first families of the island, and doctor of law, who, on the death of his wife, had left the world and entered the Society, was the first professor in this new faculty. Father Rico pushed forward the completion of the new church, and at the cost of 2,000 crowns the fine vaulted Sanctuary was so far completed that Monsignor Vich y Manrique said the first Mass there on the Candlemas Day of 1601.

The intimate friend and the close imitator of St. Alonso, Brother James Ruiz, the cook, died on the 1st of June, 1601. The moment he expired, our sainted Brother began to recite the three rosaries ordered by rule for departed brethren. When he had said two of them and was going to say the third, he was rapt in spirit into heaven, where he found himself near to Our Lady, with Brother Ruiz on the other hand. He wished to continue his beads in obedience to his rule, but Our Lady said to him, “There is no need, for James is, as you see, in my company.” Alonso hesitated, out of humility, as to whether he ought to conceal the honour of his friend; but Our Lady assured him that it would be for God’s glory if he told it to a few. So general was the conviction that Brother Ruiz was a saint, that a gentleman of high birth, who had known the humble cook very intimately, begged, as a treasure, for his old and dilapidated “Hours of Our Lady.”

Antony Mora, a young Majorcan of twenty-one, joined the Society this year, 1601, as a lay-Brother postulant. In his evidence on the Saint’s life, he noticed his frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament, and he records how, by order of his Superior, the Saint used to read to the lay-Brothers for half-an-hour a day, the points of meditation and other spiritual reading; and that, out of love of suffering, when on a journey, he always chose the roughest and stoniest roads. He tells, too, how St. Alonso’s words and examples, and his exact observance of rule, filled his heart with love of God, and helped him on in religious life.

Brother Alonso used to wait upon Mora, during his postulancy; and, while he was making the exercises, Antony noticed that every night the saintly Brother, after he had brought him all that he required, used to retire into an empty room, not far off the one he was occupying, and there scourge himself savagely, while the rest of the community were at the first supper.

The ruin which the Turkish and Algerine corsairs brought on the coasts of the Mediterranean and on the mercantile navy of that sea, forced the Spanish Government to take some fresh measures to destroy the Moslem pirates. A great fleet of seventy-seven galleys was gathered together, having a large army aboard, with the intention of taking Algiers; and during the close of August and the beginning of September it assembled in the Bay of Palma. The Dukes of Parma and of Urbino,⁴⁵45Francis Mary della Rovere, the last Duke of Urbino. and Don John Andrew Doria, Prince of Melfi, were the officers of the forces. The intense heat and the crowded decks caused so much illness, the general hospital of Majorca could scarcely contain the multitude of sick soldiers and sailors. Nor were the generous alms of the officers, and of the people of Majorca sufficient to supply the need of the sufferers. All this gave a large field for the charity of the Fathers of Montesion. Four of their number went about the streets with the city magistrates and with the governors of the hospital to beg for food and clothing for the poor sufferers.

All the Community of Montesion gave their services to nurse the sick, and St. Alonso, in spite of his three score years and ten, and his broken health, gladly took his share in the work of love. He was no wise daunted by the contagion, which scared away the strong and healthy, and he not only accompanied the Fathers to the hospital, but consoled the plague-stricken, encouraged them to bear their sickness with patience, and prepared them for a happy death. He procured from some of his wealthy friends large alms, by which he was able to obtain many comforts for the sick. In fact, his Superiors had such confidence in the prudence and charity of our Saint that they not only gave him leave to ask for and to accept such alms, but also to distribute them, both in the hospital, at the homes of the poor, and to those who came to beg at the Porteria. Alonso always dropped a word of good for their souls, and so won them by the bait of charity to the service of God.

The townsfolk flocked out to see the squadron at anchor, and to witness a magnificent review of some eight thousand men; but though the bay could be seen from the azotea or verandah of the house, our Saint never went to look on the martial and attractive sight.

A jubilee was granted to those who took part in the expedition, and the Duke of Parma, Rainutius Farnese,⁴⁶46Son of the great general, Alexander Farnese. the commander-in-chief, with a number of the captains and officers under his authority, came to the Sacraments in the College church, and their example was followed by multitudes of the rank and file. This added largely to the apostolic labours of the Fathers. But if the harvest was wondrously great, they attributed it all to the fervent and continual prayers of the venerable porter. It was his ardent prayers, too, that were credited with the health of the community. For, notwithstanding their fatigues in the hospital, among the galley-slaves, and in the confessionals, not one of the religious was attacked by illness. The presence of the Provincial, Father Melchior de Valpedrosa, who arrived in the January of 1602, with his Socius, Father Gabriel Alvarez, cheered the hearts of his subjects amidst their labours, in which Father Valpedrosa himself took a large share.

Not long after, the fleet sailed on its ill-fated expedition. But it left behind it a large number of invalided sailors and soldiers, who continued to call forth all the devotion of the priests and religious of Palma.

In no small part owing to the earnest words of St. Alonso, the members of the various Congregations established at Montesion threw themselves generously into the charitable work of relief, and even lay students of the College distinguished themselves by their devotion to the sick. One of them, the eldest son of rich and honoured parents, after a month’s work in the hospital, caught the contagion, and died a death so happy, and so much to be envied, that, as the annual letters of this date tell us, he gave “manifest proofs that he went to enjoy Our Lord in eternal happiness.”

Nor did our Saint content himself with merely exhorting others to go to the post of danger, but, as before, gladly faced the peril, and, when others quailed before it, went constantly among the sick.

The Spanish fleet was driven by a furious storm on the African coast, and, after terrible losses, escaped total destruction only by returning to Spain. While one portion of the expedition took refuge in the harbour of Barcelona, the remainder, some forty-six galleys, came back in the early part of October to Palma. Discouraged and worn out, the troops were stricken down by the contagion of the previous year; and the Fathers of the College, who had not recovered from their late fatigues, were unable to bear up against the new labours to which their charity summoned them. The greater part of them fell ill, and nine of them were confined to their rooms. This greatly increased the anxiety and the work of the Brothers who waited upon them. Two of them died the victims of their devotion, Father William Barceló, and the Father Bernard Crespin, who had come to Majorca with St. Alonso.

Patient, prayerful, prudent, a great lover of penance, and full of zeal for souls, Father Bernard had many points of resemblance with the saintly Brother, and the two had made a holy compact which was found among the writings of Alonso. “The rosaries I am to say are as follows: each week for Father Crespin a rosary; and he has to say a mass for me. And if he dies before me, I am to say all my life one rosary a week; besides, if he dies before me, I am to say fifty rosaries in addition to the aforesaid. He has to say for me each month a mass. And if I die before him, he has to say twenty for me, and each month one mass for the whole of his life.”

Shortly before Father Bernard’s last illness, Antoinette Sastre y Saqueres, a cousin of James Saqueres, was suffering from very high fever and was delirious. Father Bernard Crespin came with St. Alonso to visit her, and the poor patient was so violent that the Father asked the Brother what he thought of her. “Praise God,” he answered, “to-morrow she will be quite well,” and so they went away. From that moment she began to grow calmer, and became more herself; and when the doctor, who had given her up, called next day and found that she had no fever, he exclaimed: “What has become of the fever, where has it gone to? This is positively alarming.” “I had now no doubt, and have never since doubted,” such was Don James’ declaration on oath, “that my niece owed this her recovery to the prayers of Alonso.”

Doña Margaret Despuig, the wife of Paul Puigdorfila, the royal bailiff, and a great friend of our Saint, being seriously ill, Father Rico took St. Alonso with him one day to visit her, as he had done frequently during her illness. Already the Community of Montesion had made earnest intercession for the lady’s recovery, and to these prayers the holy Brother had added communions, fasts, and disciplines for the same object. Just then the lady fell into a deep swoon. Father Rico bade all present, and especially Alonso, to pray with fresh fervour that she might be spared, for the sake of her home and children. Our Saint received an answer from on high, “Ask what you will, it shall be done; but know that never again will she be as ready for death as she is at this moment.” Alonso bowed his head and said: “Do, O Lord, according to Thy will.” At once she fell into her agony; but God gave her such resignation, such detachment from all things of earth, that Margaret even consoled and encouraged her weeping friends; and she died with marvellous peace and joy. Father Rico told her sister, Doña Frances Ruig, the revelation made to St. Alonso, in order to console her at her loss.

Salvator Custerer was a young man of a good family, who had made his studies at Montesion, and had just completed his philosophy. Not only was he of an excellent character, and of brilliant talents, but he had turned to full account his spiritual and moral gifts. As he was constantly in the company of some of the students, who were known to be desirous to enter the Society, both these young men and his professors very naturally—the wish was perhaps the father to the thought—imagined that he too was thinking of becoming a religious; all the more as he seemed eminently fitted for such a life. They begged St. Alonso to pray for Salvator. Our Saint at first gave them no answer; but when they again begged him most earnestly, he promised to do what they requested, provided they would offer Masses and prayers for the object they desired to obtain.

When at last he felt that Heaven had granted what he had asked by penance and petition, he said to the young man’s professors: “Throw him in my way, for I want to speak to him.” They did as he desired, and took an opportunity to bring him across the holy porter. Alonso, in a few, but powerful words, spoke to him of God’s claim to our service and to our gratitude; and so they parted good friends. But the words had gone home. Young Custerer felt that God was calling him, and a few days afterwards asked the Father Provincial to be admitted into the Society, and that so earnestly as almost to force an entrance. Through all his life he continued to thank Heaven for so sudden and unexpected a favour. He proved a most fervent novice, and as fervent a scholastic. Salvator died a holy death while studying his theology. St. Alonso loved to call him “filius orationis”—a child of prayer.⁴⁷47Our Saint records this in his Memorial of May, 1604. The last Visitation by a Provincial previous to this date was that of Father Valpedrosa, in 1602. We may therefore suppose that it was during his stay on the island that Custerer was received into the Society. Another of the same name, and probably of the same family, Peter Antony Custerer, who had known St. Alonso from 1605, when a boy of fifteen or so, was in the Society at 1617, was present at the Saint’s death, and was, in 1627, one of the witnesses in the Process of his Canonization.

On November the 3rd, the royal fleet sailed for Barcelona. The Father Provincial and his companion availed themselves of the opportunity, and left by it for Spain. The Algerine corsairs, emboldened by the failure of the Christians before Algiers, had renewed their depredations, and a Majorcan merchantman, on its way from Barcelona to Palma, had been taken by them on the 5th of July with all the crew and passengers, one of whom was a lay-Brother, Dominic Matera, summoned by his Superior to Montesion.

The Provincial had taken Father Rico with him, as his health had broken down, in hopes that change might restore him, and he left Father Borrasá in charge as Vice-Rector.

The disaster to the Spanish arms was a terrible grief to our Saint, who had built great hopes upon the expedition as a step to the overthrow of the Moslem power, and so to the deliverance of the Christians from slavery, and of the Moors from error. God tempered his sorrow by a magnificent but mysterious vision. As St. Alonso was poorly, his Superiors desired him to take a walk in the country. His companion took him out by the Puerta del Campo, the nearest gate to the College, to a little eminence not far off, and close to the shore, which commands a glorious view over the wide bay, the distant headlands, the far-reaching plain, and the lofty range of mountains beyond it. So bright and fresh is the spot that it is called Salaverde—the green hill.⁴⁸48The gas-works have somewhat robbed the place of its charms. As, lost in thoughts of God, St. Alonso gazed out on the bright expanse of waters, “he saw on it,” these are the Saint’s own words,⁴⁹49Memor., n. 49. “a great armada, and without a thought of such a thing, or heeding it. And that moment he saw, too, that Jesus came in the van, while the fleet was filled with an army of angels, and that last of all was Our Lady. Our Lord and His Blessed Mother were as the van guard and the rear guard. The meaning of this vision came to him, that el Rey—the King, with the assistance of the heavenly host, was to go in person at the head of a great army to drive back and conquer the Moors, and their country would then without difficulty be converted to Christianity.”⁵⁰50This was recorded by our Saint in 1606.

Spite of all his efforts to banish the memory of that vision and of the prophecy from his mind, our Saint never could persuade himself but that all would one day be verified to the full; and that his sovereign would achieve a victory, such as no Christian monarch had ever done before, with great glory to God and good of souls. The death of Father Crespin recalls another prophecy which St. Alonso made about this time, which, with its fulfilment, is told in a letter from the Father’s nephew, Jerome, to Father Marimon, on January 6th, 1619, of which the following is an extract: “When your Reverence’s brother was my tutor and he was living in my mother’s house, and used to walk out with my younger brother and myself, as we three were going through the Fathers’ Porteria of the college, I happened to be the last to pass.”

“Rodriguez, who then held the keys, stretched out his hand over my head, and said to me, ‘You are to enter the Society in place of your uncle.’ He was then dead, and I was ten years old. I looked up in the Brother’s face, and laughingly said to him, ‘Your Reverence must commend me to God.’ And with that I ran on, for my tutor was by that time a good way off, nor did I ever think any more about what the holy Brother Rodriguez said to me, until God did me the signal favour of calling me to the Society; and when I was determined to enter, then I remembered what the Brother had said to me. And what most astonished me was this: When I was waiting in the Porteria for Father Torrens, who was then Vice-Rector, to come down, that I might ask him to admit me into the Society, I was turning over the pages of the work of Father Piatti (Platus), ‘On the Excellence of Religious Life.’”

“As I was studying the book, Brother Rodriguez passed by, and coming up behind me, he said to me, ‘Does it not seem to you, sir, that you are planning a higher state than that of your brothers?’ It was impossible for him to have known this, because I had not then told it to anyone. It must have been six years from the time he first told me that I should enter the Society till the date when I made up my mind.”⁵¹51Father Torrens was Vice-Rector from Jan. 26, 1606, until Feb. 4, 1607, and Jerome Crespin was admitted into the Society April 7, 1607, being then 18 years old. So that the prophecy must have been made about 1602, immediately after the death of his uncle, Father Bernard.