St. Theobald

St. Theolbald or Thibault, [http://books.google.com/books?as_brr=1&q=st.+theobald+%22was+of+the+family+of+the+counts+palatine+of+champagne&btnG=Search+Books] HE was of the family of the counts palatine of Champagne,and son of Count Arnoul. He was born at Provins in Brie in1017, and was called Theobald from the most virtuous archbishopof Vienne, who was his uncle. In his youth he preservedhis heart free from the corruption of the world amidst its vanities; and the more pains others took to make him conceive arelish for them, the more diligent he was in fencing his heartagainst their dangers, and the more perfectly he discovered theiremptiness and secret poison. In reading the lives of the fathersof the desert he was much affected by the admirable examplesof penance, self-denial, holy contemplation, and Christian perfection,which were set before his eyes as it were in a glass,and he earnestly desired to imitate them. The lives of St. Johnthe Baptist, of St. Paul the hermit, St. Anthony, and St. Arsenius in their wildernesses, charmed him, and he sighed afterthe like sweet retirement, in which he might, without interruption,converse with God by prayer and contemplation. He oftenresorted to an holy hermit named Burchard, who lived in alittle island in the Seine; and by making essays he began toinure himself to fasting, watching, long prayers, and everyrigorous practice of penance. He declined all the advantageousmatches and places at court or in the army which his fathercould propose to him. His cousin Eudo, Count Palatine ofChampagne, and Count of Chartres and Blois, upon the death of his uncle Rodolph, the last king of Burgundy, in 1034, laidclaim to that crown as next heir in blood; but the emperorConrad the Salic seized upon it by virtue of the testament ofthe late king. Hereupon ensued a war, and Count Arnoul orderedhis son to lead a body of troops to the succour of hiscousin ; but the young general represented so respectfully to hisfather the obligation of a vow by which he had bound himselfto- quit the world, that he at length extorted his consent.Soon after the saint and another young nobleman called Walter,his intimate friend, each taking one servant, went to theabbey of St. Remigius in Rheims, and thence having sent backtheir servants with their baggage, they set out privately; andin the clothes of two beggars, in exchange for which they hadgiven their own rich garments, they travelled barefoot into Germany.

Finding the forest of Petingen in Suabia a convenientsolitude for their purpose, they built themselves there two littlecells. Having learned from Burchard that manual labour is anecessary duty of an ascetic or penitential life, and not beingskilled in the manner of working to make mats or baskets, theyoften went into the neighbouring villages and there hired themselvesby the day to serve the masons, or to work in the fields,to carry stones and mortar, to load and unload carriages, tocleanse the stables under the servants of the farmers, or to blowthe bellows and to make fires for the forges. With their wagesthey bought coarse brown bread, which was their whole subsistence.Whilst they worked with their hands, their hearts weresecretly employed in prayer ; and at night retiring again intotheir forest, they watched long, singing together the divinepraises, and continuing in holy contemplation.

Their carriageand the tenderness of their complexion discovered that they hadnot been trained up in manual labour, and the reputation oftheir sanctity after some time drew the eyes of men upon them.To shun which they resolved to forsake a place where theywere no longer able to live in humiliation and obscurity. Theyperformed barefoot a pilgrimage to Compostella, and returnedinto Germany.

Passing through Triers, it happened that Theobald there methis father Count Arnoul; but with his tanned face, and in hisragged clothes, passing for a beggar, he was not known by him.He was strongly affected, and was scarcely able to stifle thetender sentiments with which his heart was quite overcome atthe sight of so dear and affectionate a parent. However, hesuppressed them; but to quit the neighbourhood where hemight be again exposed to the like trial, he undertook a pilgrimageto Rome. The two fervent penitents travelled everywherebarefoot; and after they had visited all the holy placein Italy, they chose for their retirement a hideous woody placecalled Salanigo, near Vicenza, where, with the leave of thelord of the manor, they built themselves two cells, near an oldruinous chapel. Prayer and the exercises of penance were theirconstant employment, till after two years God called Walter tohimself. Theobald looked upon this loss as a warning that hebad not long to live, and he exerted his whole strength, redoublinghis pace to run with greater vigour as he drew near the end of his race. He had lived on oat bread and water, withroots and herbs ; but at length he interdicted himself even theuse of bread, taking no other food but herbs and roots. Healways wore a rough hair shirt; his bed was a board, and forthe five last years of his life he took his rest sitting on a woodenseat.

The bishop of Vicenza promoted him to priest's orders,and several persons put themselves under his direction. Hislineage and quality being discovered, his aged parents were nosooner informed that their son was alive, and that the hermit ofSalanigo, the reputation of whose sanctity, prophecies, andmiracles filled all Europe, was that very son whose absence hadbeen to them the cause, of so long a mourning ; but they set outwith great joy to see him. His frightful desert, his poor cell,his tattered clothes, and above all his emaciated body, made sostrong impressions upon their hearts at the first sight that theyboth cast themselves at his feet, and for a considerable time wereonly able to speak to him by their tears. When they were raised from the ground, and had recovered from their first surprise,faith overcame in them the sentiments of nature, andconverted their sorrow into joy. The sight of so moving anexample extinguished in their hearts all love of the world, andthey both resolved upon the spot to dedicate themselves to thedivine service. The count was obliged by his affairs to returninto Brie; but Gisla, the saint's mother, obtained her husband'sconsent to finish her course near the cell of her son. The saintmade her a little hut at some distance from his own, and tookgreat pains to instruct her in the practice of true perfection.He was shortly after visited with his last sickness; his body wascovered over with blotches and ulcers, and every limb afflictedwith some painful disorder. The servant of God suffered thisdistemper with a most edifying patience and joy. A little beforehis death he sent for Peter, the abbot of Vangadice, of the
Order of Camaldoli, from whose hands he had received the religioushabit a year before. To him he recommended his motherand his disciples : and having received the viaticum he expiredin peace on the last day of June, 1066, being about thirty-threeyears old, of which he had spent twelve at Salanigo and threein Suabia, and in his pilgrimages. His relics were translatedto the church dependent on the abbey of St. Columbanus, at Sens, and afterwards to a chapel near Auxerre called St. Thibaudaux Bois. He was canonized by Pope Alexander III.