The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1918-07-06
SAINT BENEDICT'S MONASTERY

of God. Then came the mobiles OF
Rome, beseeching him to take care OF
| their children's education. Disciples
seeking to be holy fiocked to put them
| selves under his rule, and soon the
vale of Subiaco became alive again.
Twelve little monasteries We're dot
ted around about, and where of late
had stood the ruined palace of Nero
and the wilderness which had over
taken his gardens of pleasure, there
| were seen, as if by magic-the magic
of Christian life and the influence of
a saint-a busy world of black-robed
monks, houses OF prayer and psalmody,
schools of learning, farms and gardens
"a new civilization, the seed plot of
Christian Europe.
And this occurred seven centuries
before the coming of ST. Francis and
st. Dominic.
Though it was in the monastery of
Monte Casino that st. Benedict wrote
his rule, the hearts of many of his
admirers turn with more tender affec-
ton to the simple, humble "SacrO
Speco" in Subiaco than to the magnifi-
cent monastic city of Monte Casino
on the hill halfway between Rome
and Naples. Naturally, the work and
influence of Monte Casino were felt
first of all over Italy, and later all
over Western Christendom. The monks
of the various mOnaSteries employed
the peasants in agricultural labors or
taught them the most useful methods
of tillage and then their duties to God
and to their neighbors instruction in
reading and writing came afterwards
for those whose state or occupation
required such instruction.
Fruitful History.
The story of such an institution as
this cannot be told in brief summary.
Each century has left its trace in the
history of such an order as the Bene-
Gictine, which saw the last remnants
of pagan worship on the altar of Apol-
10 on Monte Casino, which st. Bene-
dict overthreW; and still endures to
witness the most recent follies of false
religions in the twentieth century.
With the exception of the Papacy it.
self, no other institution has lasted SO
long.
And the arts, which furnish sneh aids
to the instruction and civilization of
men, have been always promoted and
practieed by the BenedictineS. Here
in Subiaco, the "Sacro Speco" shows
on it's walls cut in the living rock fres-
Goes by artists who have left no other
record of their names and works.
Here, on one WALL is what is held to
be portrait from the life of ST. Fran
els of Assist, before he received the
stigmata, that is to say in the first
quarter of the thirteenth century.
In the monastery of st. Scholastica,
sister OF ST. Benedict, two miles dis
tant, in the city of Subiaco, the monks
show the traveller the first book printed
in Italy-a work by Lactantins, in the
new movable type and bearing the
date of 1865.
This monastery, says modern writ
er obtained celebrity in the history
of typography as the first place in Italy
in which the printing press was es-
tablished. This fact proclaims to the
world the love of the monks for the
diffusion of knowledge at a period
when printing was regarded as a
"black art
And if one goes to Monte Casino,
that mountain city of God, he may see
preserved here diplomas and docu-
ments dating from the sixth and sew
enth centuries down through the Mid
die Ages; and in the Visitors Book
he may contemplate the personal sig
natures of most of the celebrities of
last century and of this, as far as it
has gone, from Joachim Pecci (Leo
KID to DR.. j. H. Newman, from
Ernest Renan, the antagonist of Chris
tianity, to w. e. Gladstone, the ia
nous premier of England, and from
the musical signature of List to the
name of Lorenzo Perosi, a student
here.