Preface

In the sixty-first volume of their great work, the Bollandists have given, as an introduction to his Life, so complete a Bibliography of Saint Alonso Rodriguez, that little more remains to be done on the subject of the authorities for the biography of our Saint. Father Nonell, by publishing the writings of St. Alonso with full notes and appendices, has opened out access, for the first time, to the original text of the Memorial or Autobiography of the Saint.¹1Obras Espirituales. Three Vols. Barcelona, 1885. This was written by the humble Brother at the express order of his Superiors, and was subjected to a most severe scrutiny during the process of Canonization. Though it was written with care, it is often involved, is full of repetitions, and not unfrequently obscure. Here and there traces of his failing memory are apparent, especially where, as in the first portion, he is speaking of events then a long time past. But, as a record of his interior life, it is simply invaluable.

On the very day of St. Alonso’s death, the thirty-first of October, 1617, Father Michael Julian wrote a short but most interesting notice, in Spanish, of the Saint’s life and death, in the form of a circular letter to the Fathers of the Province of Aragon. He was then Rector of the Jesuit College of Montesion, Palma, Majorca, in which Rodriguez spent so many years. A Latin translation of this is the first of the two Lives published by the Bollandists.

Father Marimon had known St. Alonso from 1575, when, as a boy in his fifteenth year, he began to attend the classes at the College of Montesion, where our Saint held at the time the office of Porter. After his entry into the Society of Jesus in 1580, Marimon came to know him still more intimately, on his return to Majorca, in 1601, as a professor. From that date he was almost always the Saint’s ordinary Confessor, until the death of St. Alonso in 1617.²2V. Boll., Vol. LXI., p. 586, n. 6. Father Marimon, however, says that he was Confessor for only twelve or fourteen years. Pref. to MS. Life. He was besides for three years the Minister, or second in command in the College, and for some time the Spiritual Father or Director of the Community. Very soon after the death of our Saint, he began to write our Saint’s Life. In the following year his appointment as Rector gave him additional facilities in procuring materials. His book was finished within a twelvemonth after the Saint’s decease.

It was read aloud in the Refectory at Montesion, and was sent round to the other Houses of the Province for the same purpose, and those who had known our Saint were invited to suggest any additions or alterations. A number of interesting letters, which still exist at Montesion and have been used in this Biography, were the answer to this request. The Life was also shown by the author, in manuscript, to many friends of our Saint who were not members of his Order. The work, however, was never published. It does not seem to have satisfied the literary requirements of a period which was the age of Cervantes. In fact, Marimon, who was a Majorcan, apologises in his Dedication to Father Vitelleschi, the General of the Society,³3This Dedication is dated 10th November, 1618; which gives us the time when Father Marimon’s Life was completed. for his small acquaintance with the pure Castilian idiom, which was to him almost a foreign tongue. Probably owing to Father Marimon’s Life being in manuscript, little direct use has been made of it, except by Fathers Colin and Bonavenia. It is, however, naturally of the highest value, and has been largely used in the following pages.

In 1627, a curious anonymous Life—Breve Relacion—was printed at Majorca, of which rare tractate a copy is to be found in the British Museum. Father Nieremberg, in his “Claros Varones,” published in 1643,⁴4Ideas de Virtud en algunos claros varones de la Compañia de Jesus. Madrid. 1644. a Life of the Saint somewhat longer than the last. Shortly after this, in 1648, Lewis Janin published a new Life in Latin. He held at the time the important position of Assistant for France to the General of the Society, and, in addition to the Lives already mentioned, he had access to the juridical processes which had been completed in Majorca and in Segovia, on the virtues and miracles of the Saint. His Life has been chosen by the Bollandists, together with that of Father Julian, as the basis of their text.

To one whose name will be frequently mentioned in the latter pages of this work, we owe the most valuable printed Life of our Saint—Father Colin, when a Scholastic of the Society, had known St. Alonso very intimately from 1610 to 1616; and, after a life of labour in the Philippine Isles, he wrote a Life of his old friend, aided greatly by the manuscript Life of Father Marimon, which had been sent to him. The work of Father Colin is now rare, but it is to be found in the choice Library of the London Oratory. A French Translation was made by Father Boissieu, S.J., with some slight additions—facts which he had just received from Majorca. It was published in 1688, when the Cause of Beatification was practically concluded.⁵5The author of this present Life is indebted to the late Edmund Waterton, Esq., so great an authority on literary subjects, for a copy of this interesting and valuable book, from the Library of the Jesuit Fathers in Algiers.

Don Furio y Sastre published, in 1851, at Palma, Majorca, a Life of Brother Alonso, which is rich in topographical and historical facts, in connection with that island. The remainder of the Lives mentioned in the Bollandists, though numerous, are simply compilations from those of the preceding authors. Father Bonavenia, on the occasion of the Canonization of St. Alonso, wrote a Life in Italian,⁶6Vita di S. Alfonso Rodriguez. P. Giuseppe Bonavenia. Roma. 1888. which embodies, as has been said, much of the unpublished work of Father Marimon. It gives in detail the two miracles approved in the later Processes, and is written with much charm and clearness.

The standard work, however, upon the Life of the Saint, will henceforth be that of Father Nonell, to whom the author owes, in very large part, the chronological order of this work.⁷7Vida de San Alonso Rodriguez. P. Jaime Nonell, S.J. Barcelona. 1888. Father Nonell, besides all his other qualifications, by the very fact of being the publisher of the Saint’s spiritual works, was eminently fitted to be his biographer.

In addition to other original sources, a manuscript of the Province, S.J. of Aragon and four most interesting manuscript Histories of the Jesuit Colleges of Montesion, Segovia, Valencia, and Barcelona, have largely aided Father Nonell in fixing the various dates in his Life, and have been of extraordinary assistance to the author of the present work. The early life of the Saint at Segovia demands a much more serious study in situ than it has as yet received, or than the author of this biography was able to give to it; but what local research a brief visit to that interesting city and the aid of kind friends, especially of the Father Fita, S.J., and Colonel Loriga, R.S.A., could furnish, are embodied in this volume.

Last, but by no means least, in common with all the writers of the Life of St. Alonso, from Father Janin downwards, the depositions of the witnesses in the various Processes of the Beatification and Canonization have been of the greatest possible use in this essay at biography. Unfortunately, unlike Father Janin and the writers of his time, the author has not had the advantage of consulting the full manuscript depositions, which either do not exist or are practically lost. But he has had before him the Elenchus Summarii, which contains the sum of many and most interesting passages of the Processes. The British Museum contains two distinct printed Summarium de Miraculis, while the Bibliothèque Nationale of Paris possess the valuable Summarium de virtutibus, which, however, is much more brief and less rich in facts than the Elenchus.

Montesion possesses, besides the manuscript of Father Marimon, many other valuable documents; which with the Archives of the Cathedral Chapter, and those of the City and Province of Majorca, and the City archives of Segovia, have, by the extreme kindness of their archivists, been put under contribution for this work.

The Spanish form of the Saint’s Christian name, Alonso, that which he used as his signature, that which he gave in baptism to one of his children, has been adopted to obviate any confusion, not only with the Doctor of the Church, the saintly Bishop of Sant’ Agata, but also with the well-known spiritual writer, the author of “Christian Perfection.” With that single exception, the Christian names throughout the work have been given in their English form.

The author finds it impossible to enumerate the large circle of friends who have kindly assisted him in this labour of love. But he cannot avoid mentioning the name of Father Nonell, who, by his constant help, has been the chief contributor to this work. To his name he joins those of Father Cros, S.J., and Mr. Henry Wilson, late of the British Museum, who have aided him by their topographical and archæological research, Fathers Fita and Velez, S.J., of Madrid, and Don José Maria Quadrado, the well-known writer upon Spain, and now the courteous Archivist of Majorca.

To know thoroughly the soul of St. Alonso, one should read his spiritual works, which often throw more than an indirect light on his life. In the history of a soul so united with God, supernatural events meet us at every turn, and any attempt to explain them fully, much less to defend them against hostile objections and attack would swell this volume, which is already sufficiently large, beyond all compass. It appears enough to say, once for all, that these events formed the subject of careful investigation during the long process of Canonization, and that, to a Catholic, the judgment in their favour by the tribunal of the Congregation of Rites is all that he can require.

31, Farm Street, Berkeley Square, W.
Feast of the Ascension, 1889.