Thenceforth Mechitar appeared openly as a Roman
Catholic. To escape from the animosity of his countrj'- men he still found it necessary to remove in disguise to Smyrna, and finally he settled at Modon, in the INIorea, uncler the protection of the Venetian government, to whom it then belonged. As early as Sept. 8, 1701, he had founded at Constantinople a new religious commu- nity, in which ten other persons joined with him ; at Modon, on Sept. 8, 1703, he took possession of an estate given him by the Venetians, to build a convent of the new order, which was called after his own name. The war between the Turks and the Venetians drove ^lechi- tar in 1715 to Venice, where he remained imtil after the conquest of the INIorea by the Mussulman. His petition for a place instead of ISIodon found a willing ear at the Venetian Senate in 1717, and he was presented with the little island of San Lazaro, near the Lido, and there Mechitar built the convent which still attracts the at- tention of every visitor to Venice. It was opened on the day of the Virgin IMary's birth, Sept. 8. Thenceforth Mechitar labored assiduously for the good of the Church of Rome and the elevation of his countrymen. He is acknowledged even by his opponents of the Armenian Church to have revived the high literary attainments of his country in former days. He not only contributed to this by his own efforts as a voluminous writer, but in a still more important degree by establishing l)rinting- presses. He died April 27, 1749. His own productions are, besides many hymns, which are still sung in the Ar- menian churches, because they were written before his apostasy, a translation of Thomas a Kempis's Imitation of Christ, and of Thomas Aquinas's TheoliKjy, and many philological works of value. The fullest aexmiit of Mechitar, of his work, and of his followers, in Iji^lish, is to be found in Brief Account of llic Mifhiltiri.-:lkaii Society, by Alexander Gorde (Venice, 1835). See Me-
CHITAKISTS. (J. H. W.)
Mechitarists, a congregation of Armenian Chris- tians, who reside on the island of San Lazaro at Venice, but who have also obtained a footing in France and Austria. They derive their name from Mechitar da Petro (q. v.), who in the year 1701 founded this re- ligious society for the purpose of diffusing a knowledge of the old Armenian language and literature. The Jle- chitarists, like their founder and instructor, acknowledge the supremacy of the Roman pontiff, and seek to spread the faith and practices of the Church of Rome in the East. The rules of the Mechitarists are modelled after those of the Benedictines, but every member must be of the Armenian nation, and promise an active devotion to the cidtivation of the Armenian language and literature. The result, as we have said above, has been the forma- tion not only of a convent but of an academy ; and, in fact, the best schools for the study of Armenian are in the houses of the order. A division was provoked in 1773, and some of the Mechitarists settled at Trieste, and there founded an institution like that at San Lazaro. In 1810 these seceders removed to Vienna, the Austrian capital, and there they still remain, busy mainly in the publication of Armenian classical productions and in- structing young Armenians. A third societj- has re- cently been founded at Paris, and efforts are making for the establishment of a fourth at Constantinople. Sev- eral hundred volumes have already been published by the Mechitarists. Of these the theological portion has a Roman Catholic circulation only, but the others have been welcomed by the Armenians generallj'. They pub- lish a periodical like the English Penny Magazine.^ See Boze, De Convent de St. Lazare a Venise, ou Histoire succincte de rOrdre des Mechitaristes A i-rneniens (Paris, 1837). (J.H.W.)
Mechthildis, St., a younger sister of St. Gertrude (q. v.), of the ancient and renowned family of ILacke- born, was born at Eislcben in the early i)art of the 13th century. She early manifested a decided taste for re- ligious exercises, and at the age of seven, liaving gone one day with her mother to visit the Convent of Ro-
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denjdorf, occupied bv Benedictine nuns, she was so much I delighted with it that she insisted on reraainin^f in it. | .She wa.s allowed to become a novice, and fultilled all the duties imfxjsed upon her in that position with great zeal, bhowiiig herself particularly serviceable in taking care of the {xx^r and the afflicted. At the end of her ' noviciate she twjk the veil, and remained in the convent ' until 1-'.J8, when, together with the other nuns, she re- ' moved to that of Heljjede, where she died shortly after. | Inclining from youth to mysticism, she, like her sister I (jertrude, claimed to have had visions, but she stead- , fastly declined writing them down; this was, however, | done against her will by one of her friends, under the title Jieri-lfjtiones selectie S. Mathildig, together with a | short biogra[)hical notice. These mystic pieces are not only full of elevated thoughts and aspirations, but give ! evidence of a thorough ac<{uaintance with Scripture. The be«t edition is that publi.-hed, together with a (jer- man translation, in the Bibliothtca mystka et ascetiia (Cologne. 1«.>1, pt X). I