apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

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The
!36 EPISTLES OF S. IGNATIUS.
pretation of his meaning. In one of his sermons this father writes as
follows ' :
'
Therefore, dearly beloved, give ye glory, and bear Christ meanwhile
in your body, a delightful load, a pleasant weight, a wholesome
burden... That great Ignatius, the scholar of the disciple whom Jesus
loved, our martyr with whose precious reliques our poverty hath been
enriched, saluteth a certain^ Mary in several epistles^ which he wrote
to her, as Christ-hearer. Truly an exceptional title of dignity and a
commendation of exceeding honour. For the carrying of Him,
to be
whose slave is to be a king, is not onerous, but honorable... Happy
the man who shall have so borne Christ as to deserve to be introduced
into the holy city by the Holy One of all.'
'
In Psabii. xc Serni. vii. § 3, 4 (11.
p. 124, Venet. \']i(i) 'Glorificate itaque,
dilectissimi, et portate interim Christum
in corpora vestro, onus delectabile, suave
pondus, sarcinam salutarem.... Magnus ille
Ignatius, discipuli quem diligebat Jesus
auditor, martyr noster, cujus pretiosis
reliquiis nostra ditata est paupertas,
Mariam quandam in pluribus quas ad
eam scripsit epistolis, Christiferam consalutat.
Egregius plane titulus dignitatis
et commendatio hionoris immensi.
Nempe cui servire regnare est, gestare
hunc, non onerari est, sed honorari,...
Felix qui sic tulerit Christum, ut a sancto
sanctorum in sanctam civitatem mereatur
induci. '
word qiiandain was doubtless
omitted by transcribers acquainted with
the letter to the Virgin, but ignorant of
the letter to Mary of Cassobola. To
such the expression would appear out of
place. In some instances qiiidein is substituted
for quandam with the same view,
as in Lattr. xxiii. 20. Internal probability
and external evidence alike show
that quandam is correct. The passage of
S. Bernard sometimes accompanies the
Correspondence in the mss, for the purpose
of recommending it to the reader ;
e.g. Magd. 76, Law. xxiii. 20.
^
The expression 'pluribus Uteris' must
be set down to an error on S. Bernard's
part. He may have got the idea of
'several letters' in either of two ways
—
from a lapse of memory which substituted
a second letter
from Ignatius to Mary of
Cassobola for the letter from Mary of
Cassobola to Ignatius, or from a confusion
which combined the two letters to the
two Maries, each
'
designated Christifera,'
and supposed them both addressed to
Mary of Cassobola. This latter hypothesis
however supposes him to have had
a superficial acquaintance with the letter
to the Virgin, which seems improbable;
and the former therefore is to be preferred.
The extant Clairvaux MS (see
above p. 127), though early, does not
contain the correspondence with the
Virgin and S. John. Can it be that the
'pretiosae reliquiae,' to which S. Bernard
refers, were the literary remains of
Ignatius with which the library had
recently been enriched
If any one doubts whether such a
mistake as I attribute to S. Bernard be
possible, he may be convinced by finding
that it is actually made by the editor of
a standard edition of S. Bernard's works
(Venet. 1726), who maintains that his
author is not speaking of the Virgin,
sed de alia quadam, nempe Cassabolita
'
seu Castabolita, ad quam duae extant
epistolae sancto
Ignatio martyri adscriptae,
in quibus Christifera salutatur.'