RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Vincent of Saragossa Vincent Ferrer
Collége des bons enfants. His order soon gained powerful aid in the gift of 45,000 livres from the Count de Gondy (1625), the royal approval bestowed by Louis XIII. (1627), and the papal sanction of Urban VIII. (1631); and in 1631 he received from the canons of St. Victor the house of St. Lazarus in Paris, which became the center of activity. At first the priests were sent chiefly to the country districts, but Vincent did not forget the cities, and some of his priests were detailed to visit the soldiers, the blind, the sick, the poor, and the laborers. In 1635 he established a seminary for his order, based on Jesuit lines. Especially admirable were the exertions of the order during the terrible campaign in Lotharingia, where, within ten years, Vincent was able to send no less than 400,000 thalers. He extended his activity to the shepherds of the Roman Campagna, as well as to the provinces of France, to Tunis, Algiers, Ireland, Genoa, Madagascar, Poland, Corsica, Piedmont, etc. He was also spiritual councilor of state, and in 1634 he established a sisterhood of matrons for the care of the sick in the Hotel Dieu of Paris, and in 1657 founded for the poor of Paris a great hospital which later became the Salpetriére. During the closing years of his life he was an invalid, but he bore his sufferings with the humility and fortitude that characterized his entire life. He was beatified by Benedict XIII. in 1723, and canonized in 1737. By a breve of May 12, 1885, Leo XIII. declared him the patron of all Roman Catholic charitable organizations in any way connected with him throughout the world. (EHucen LACHENMANN.) BrisiiograpHy: The ‘ Letters’’ were issued in 2 vols., Paris, 1882. His life has been a frequent theme for biographers, accounts being written by: L. Abelly, Paris, 1664 and often elsewhere, Germ. transl., Regensburg, 1859 (Abelly’s Vertus de S. Vincent de Paul was issued in a new ed., Paris, 1897); D. Acami, Venice, 1753; P. Collet, new ed., 4 vols., Paris, 1818; M. Orsini, Paris, 1852; H. Bedford, London, 1856; M. U. Maynard, 4 vols., Paris, 1860; F. A. P. Dupanloup, Paris, 1863; G. Rouquette, St. Vincent de Paul et son siecle, Lyons, 1864; J. B. H. R. Capefique, St. Vincent de Paul et les seurs de charité, Paris, 1865; T. S. Preston, New York, 1866; A. J. Ansart, The Spirit of St. Vincent de Paul, New York, 1867; C. A. Jones, London, 1873; R. F. Wilson, Edinburgh, 1873; E. Alcan, 2 vols., Paris, 1879; R. de Chantelauze, St. Vincent de Paul et les Gondi, Paris, 1882; Cavallier, St. Vincent de Paul et sa mission sociale, Montpellier, 1885; J. Morel, Tours, 1888, reissue, 1908; H. Debout, Paris, 1889; J. B. Jeannin, Paris, 1890; H. Simard, Lyons, 1894; J. B. Boudignon, 3d ed., Paris, 1897; E. Bougaud, 3d ed., 2 vols., Paris, 1898, Eng. transl., London and New York, 1908; E. de Broglie, 5th ed., Paris, 1899, Eng. transl. of an earlier ed., London, 1898.
VINCENT FERRER (VINCENTE FERRER), SAINT: Spanish Dominican preacher and leader of the flagellants; b. at Valencia Jan. 23, 1350; d. at Vannes (84 m. n.w. of Nantes) Apr. 5, 1419. He entered the Dominican order Dec. 5, 1374, and’ in
his monastery quickly won recognition
Life asa by asceticism and application to the
Monk. Except for a visit to Toulouse in 1377,
he remained in the cloister at Valencia until 1380, when he went to the universities of Barcelona and Lerida, studying at each two years. A fruit of his studies there was his (unpublished) Tractatus de moderno ecclesie schismate, which was occasioned
study of philosophy and theology. .
by the schism of 1378. In this treatise he took the side of Clement VII., who had been elected at Fondi, and declared Urban VI., who had been chosen at Rome, an apostate and an enemy of the Church. In 1384 Vincent returned to Valencia, where he taught and preached until 1391. Such was his distinction in these duties that he served as councilor to John I. of Aragon and confessor to his queen, Yolanda, until 1395, when he was summoned to Avignon by Benedict XIII. as grand penitentiary and magister sacri palatii, but returned to his monastery at Valencia 1398. His distress at the continuance of the schism was intense, and seems to have been instrumental in leading him to adopt a roving prophetic and apostolic life. This is shown by his apocalyptic treatise De eversione Europe, in which he laments bitterly over the decay of ecclesiastical discipline, order, and morality, and prophesies the speedy coming of Antichrist. While it is not proved that Benedict endeavored to dissuade Vincent from his resolve and offered him various bishoprics and even a cardinalate, it is true that he appointed him apostolic preacher with the title of legatus a latere and gave him full power to loose and bind on his journey.
In 1399 Vincent began the travels which were to occupy the remainder of his life, and within a short time he was accompanied by multitudes who came
to form a regular itinerant community Activity as with their own usages and rules. Their an Itinerant first requirement was the self-castiga-
Preacher. tion in which their leader surpassed
them all, which they performed by scourging themselves on their bared shoulders with thick knotted cords to the accompaniment of such cries as, “‘ God have mercy!” (see FLAGELLATION, FLAGELLANTS). Vincent was accustomed to preach in almost every place which he visited, frequently delivering two and three sermons in a single day, which were transmitted by his hearers, for Vincent himself never committed them to writing. These addresses were ethical rather than dogmatic, although the preacher adhered closely to orthodox Roman Catholicism. He was one of the most successful missionaries to the Jews of his time, particularly in Valencia, Toledo, and Valladolid. The scene of his activity was the Spanish peninsula, northern Italy, and France. Various miracles are recounted in his honor by his earliest biographer and fellow Dominican Pietro Razzano, who wrote about a generation after Vincent’s death.
Vincent frequently took part in the affairs of his time, both ecclesiastical and secular. In 1412 he exercised a decided influence for Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia in the election of a king held in the
Catalonian castle of Daspe. Four
His Clo- years later he was invited to attend sing Years. the Council of Constance, but declined. In the later years of his life he with-
drew from association with the flagellants, although his activity as a preacher suffered no diminution, and in Feb., 1418, he is said to have had some 70,000 auditors in Nantes. The closing months of his life were spent in Brittany. Until the Revolution the anniversary of his burial in the cathedral of Vannes was celebrated on Sept. 6, but since that
Vincent Vinet