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 TONGERLOO

776

TONGUES

Tongerloo, Abbey of, near Antwerp, Belgium, founded in 1128 in honour of the Blessed Virgin, by de Giselbert, who not only gave the land, but also him- self became a lay brother in it. The first religious were sent from St. Michael's Abbey, Antwerp, under Henry, who had come with St. Norbert to Antwerp to extirpate the Tanchelmite heresies. The charter of its foundation was signed, amongst others, by St. Bernard of Clairvau.x and by the Blessed Waltraan, first Abbot of Antwerp. The Bishop of Cambrai granted synodal rights to the abbots. From very small beginnings the abbey grew to be in time one of the most important in Belgium, making its spiritual and social influence felt in a large district called Cam- pine, now in north-east Belgium and south Holland, then a wild district in which but scanty provision was found for the spiritual and social needs of its scattered inhabitants. Considering the scarcity of priests and the good done by the religious of Tonger- loo, the bishops of Cambrai, the chap- ters of Liege and Maastricht, and sev- eral landowners con- fided the charge of parishes, with the right of patronage, to the abbey; thus it came to pass that in time the abbey had to provide priests for some forty parishes, or small Norbertine residences, in these parts.

With the erection of new dioceses

(1559-60) in Belgium and Holland, heavy burdens were cast on the abbey, for not only had it to provide the funds, but the new Bishop of Bois- le-Duc was put at its head as abbot. This state of affairs lasted until 1590, when, to obtain its independence, the abbey had to give up much property in support of the new diocese. Mean- while the Calvinists had become very powerful in Hol- land and, in their hatred of the Catholic Church, had put many Catholics to death. Amongst those who received the crown of martyrdom are reckoned three religious of Tongerloo, viz. : Arnold Vessem and Henry Bosch in 1557, and Peter Janssens in 1572. The abbey has always promoted education. Bishop Ophovius says that its religious were educated in omni pietate el doc- trina and Mirjeus, that it was fcecundum pastorum Sem- inarium. It possessed one of the largest libraries, and was able to take up the work of the BoUandists. (See Backx; PrbmonstratensianCvngns, Bollandists.)

Spilbeeck, De Abdy van Tongerloo (Antwerp, 18SS). pp. xii- 652

F. M. Geudens

Tongerloo Abbet, fkom the SotrTH-wEST

he pubhshed in three volumes at Rome in 1861 and at Brussels in 1862. Nine editions appeared diu-ing the next eighteen years, some of them modified by Claude Ramiere. A compendium of the same work and a separate volume on ethics also came from his pen. All his works are still used as text-books for college or seminary. On some of the mooted ques- tions in philosophy the author departed from Scholas- tic traditions, rejecting the Peripatetic theory of matter and form, denying the real distinction between accidents and substance, and claiming that mere resultants of mechanical and chemical forces could produce the life-activity seen in the vegetable world. These doctrines, though not widely accepted, yet stimulated the Scholastics to make better use of the researches carried on in the physical sciences.

SoMMEHVOGEL, Bibl. de la. c. de J., VIII, 96; Hurter, Nomen-

clatoT. John M. Fox.

Tong-king. See Indo-China.

Tongues, Gift of,

or G L O .S S O L A L Y (7Xu£rffoXaXfa), a su- pernatural gift of the class gratia: gratis datcr, designed to aid in the outer devel- opment of the primi- tive Church. The theological bearing of the subject is treated ill the article Cha- . I-MATA (11). The iMi'sent article deals with its exegetical and historic phases. St. Luke relates 1-15) that on the feast of Pentecost the Ascension of Christ info heaven

(Acts, ii, following

one hundred and twenty disciples of Galilean origin were heard speaking "with divers tongues, ac- cording as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak". Devout Jews then dwelling at Jerusalem, the scene of the incident, were quickly drawn together to the number of approximately three thousand. The multitude embraced two religious classes, Jews and proselytes, from fifteen distinct lands so distributed geographically as to represent "every nation under heaven". All were "confounded in mind" because every man heard the disciples speaking the "wonder- ful things of God" in his own tongue, namely, that in which he was born. To many the disciples ap- peared to be in a state of inebriation, wherefore St. Peter undertook to justify the anomaly by explaining it in the light of prophecy as a sign of the last times. The glossolaly thus described was historic, articu- late, and intelligible. Jerusalem was then as now a polyglottal region and could easily have produced one hundred and twenty persons who, in the presence Tongiorgi, Salvator, philosopher, b. at Rome, of a cosmopolitan assemblage, might express them-

Italy, 25 Dec, 1820; d. there, 12 Nov., 1865. At the age of seventeen he entered the Society of Jesus. After the usual noviceship, literary and philosophical studies, a half-decade was spent in teaching rhetoric at Reggio and humanities at Forli. Then four years were passed in the study of theology, under the emi- nent professors Perrone, Passaglia, Ballerini, and Patrizi. Immediately after this, in 18.5,3, the young priest w^as assigned to the chair of philosophy in the Roman College, and there during twelve years dis- tinguished him.self as a teacher and author. Within a few days of his forty-fourth birthday he was ap- pointed assistant to the provincial of the Roman Province; but his health gave way before a year had elapsed. Father Tongiorgi wrote a well-known course of philosophy, "Institutiones philosophica;", which

selves in fifteen different tongues. Since the variety of tongues is attributed to the group and not to in- dividuals, particular disciples may not have used more than their native .\ramaic, though it is difficult to picture any of them historically and socially without at least a smattering of other tongues. The lin- guistic conditions of the country were far more diverse than those of Switzerland to-day. The num- ber of languages spoken equalled the number of those in which the listeners "were born". But for these Greek and Aramaic would suffice with a possible admixture of Latin. The distinction of "tongues" (v. 6, 5i(t\«Tos; V. 11, 7\wiT<ro) was largely one of dialects and the cause of astonishment was that so many of them should be heard simultaneously arid from Galileans whose linguistic capacities were pre-