Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 2.djvu/868

 BBINDLE

BRISACIER

died to about 20,000. The harbour gradually filled up, which hindered navigation. The Italian Gov- ernment made great attempts to remedy thi.'^, but on account of an error of judgment the beneficial re- sults anticipated were not permanent.

According to a local legend, the first Bishop of Brindisi was St. Leucius, about 165, who later under- went martyrdom. However, taking into considera- tion the geographical position of this city, the be- ginnings of Christianity in Brindisi must date back to the first century. There is no historical proof for this except the account given by Arnobius of the fall of Simon Magus, who according to him withdrew to Brindisi and cast himself from a high rock into the sea. The Diocese of Brindisi at first embraced the terri- tory comprised within the present Diocese of Oria. In the tenth century, after Brindisi had been de- stroyed by the Saracens, the bishops took up their abode at Oria, on account of its greater security. In 1591, after the death of Bishop Bernardino di Figucroa, Oria was made the seat of a new diocese. In the reorganization of the dioceses of the Kingdom of Naples in 1818 Brindisi was combined with the Diocese of Ostuni, formerly its suffragan. Brindisi has been an archiepiscopal see since the tenth century. The ancient cathedral was located outside the city, but in 1140 Roger II, King of Sicily and Naples, buUt the present cathedral in the centre of the city.

The bishops of Brindisi worthy of mention are: St. Aproculus (Proculus), who died in 352 at Ardea, when returning from Rome, and was buried at Anzio; St. Cj'prian, who died in 364; .\ndrea, murdered by the Saracens in 979; Eustachio (1060), the first to bear the title of archbishop; GugUelmo (1173), author of a life of St. Leucius; Girolamo Aleandro (1524), a learned humanist, and papal nuncio in Germany in connexion with Luther's Reformation, and later Car- dinal; Pietro Caraffa, Bishop of Chieti, and afterwards Pope Paul IV, for some time the Apostolic adminis- trator of this diocese; Francesco Aleandro (1542); G. Bovio, from Bologna, who translated the works of St. Gregory of Nyssa, and was prominent in the Coun- cil of Trent; Paolo de Vilanaperlas (1716), founder of the seminary; Andrea Maddalena (1724), who re- stored the cathedral after it had been damaged by the earthquake of 1743.

In this diocese is the shrine of Mater Domini, near Mesagne. A beautiful church was erected there in 1605 to replace the ancient rustic chapel. The dio- cese has a population of 119,907, with 23 parishes, 89 churches and chapels, 181 secular and 15 regular clerg}-, and 64 seminarians.

Cappelletti. Le chiese d'lialia (Venice, 18441, XXI, 113- 122; GuERRiERi, Sui vescovi delta chiesa metropolitans di Brindisi (Naples, 1846); Annuario Eccl. (Rome, 1907), 346- 348.

U. Bexigni.

Brlndle, Robert. See Nottingham, Diocese op.

Brinkley, Stephen, Confessor of the Faith, im- prisoned and tortured as manager of a secret press for the publication of devotional and controversial works in the reign of Queen Elizabeth; b. about 1550, and lost to view after 1585. He was a member of a Catholic association of unmarried gentlemen of

Eroperty, organized by George Gilbert, and solemnly lessed by Ciregory !>lIII, 1580. Their purpose was to raise funds for the support of priests, to prepare Protestants for the Faith, and, at a time when priests travelled in disguise, without papers of identification, to arrange for introductions which would guard both priests and laity against betrayal. The members undertook to content themselves with the bare neces- saries of their state of life, to spend the remainder of their goods in the cause of the Church, and to devote themselves wholly to the salvation of souls and the conversion of heretics. \l this time the Jesuit Fa- thers Rot)ert Parsons and (Blessed) Edmund Campion

were preparing for a vigorous propaganda through the press. With the assistance of several of the old Marian priests and of one Brooks, Parsons pro- cured from the elder Brooks, owner of a large house called Greenstreet, at East Ham in Essex, five miles from London, permission for certain gentlemen to lodge there. To this house, chiefly with the assist- ance of Brinkley, Parsons conveyed a printing press and materials. Brinkley's seven workmen appeared in public with fine clothes and horses, to avert suspicion. The parson and churchwardens urged the newly arrived gentlemen to attend services; an incautious purchase of paper almost gave a clue to the discovery of the press, and a servant of Brink- ley's was caught and racked.

Their first book, however, which was very proba- bly a work of devotion or of encouragement to Cath- olics, was successfully issued. Brinkley then moved the press to Henley Park, to the house of Francis Browne, brother of Viscount Montague. Parsons issued, 1581, "A brief Censure upon two Books wTitten in answer to M. Edmund Campion's Offer of Disputation." Campion's challenge was then circu- lating in manuscript. Extreme caution was re- quired in the management of Brinkley's press. Gov- ernment experts, like Norton, reported that the Brinkley books, in spite of the Douai imprint, had been produced in England; the landlord Brooks was suspicious; information as to the press was also asked of Father Briant upon the rack. After a second removal, Brinkley printed, at a lodge belonging tcv Dame Cecilia Stonor's house, near Henley, Campion's "Decern Rationes". .\t Oxford, on Commemoration Day, 27 June, 1581, the benches of St. Mary's Church were found strewn with copies of this ringing chal- lenge to the universities. The capture of Campion near Oxford Sunday evening, 16 July, was followed in a few weeks by that of Brinkley and his printers. Brinkley, though tortured in the Tower, escaped the fate of his fellow prisoner, William Carter, a Catholic printer, wlio was executed at Tyburn. Brinkley was discharged in June, 1583. He accompanied Father Parsons first to Rome, where we find his name in the Pilgrim Book of the English (College in the fol- lowing September, and thence in the following year to Rouen. Here, with George Flinton, Brinkley printed a second edition of a work which Flinton had brought out in 1581, "The Christian Directory". After Flinton's death about 1585, Brinkley con- tinued to issue Catholic books. The date of his death is unknown. Gillow mentions a work trans- lated from the Italian (Paris, 1579), entitled "The Exercise of a Christian Life . . . newly perused and corrected by the tran.slatour" (James Sancer). Sancer, or Sanker, is known to have been the pseu- donym of Brinkley. This work, perhaps, is one of the early issues of Brinkley's own press.

Gillow, Bibl. Diet, of English Catholics; Morris, Troubles of Our Catholie Forefathers, second series; Simpson, Life of Edmund Campion (London, 1867); Law, Historical Sketch of the Jesuits and Seculars in the Reign of Elizabeth (London, 19(X)).

J. Vincent Crowne.

Brisacier, Jacques-Charles de, orator and ecclesiastical ^^Titer, b. at Bourges in 1641; d. at- Paris, 23 March, 1736. At the age of twenty-five- he entered the Society of the Foreign Missions at Paris, and devoted seventy years of his life to this great work. The scion of a rich and distinguished family, son of the collector-general for the Province of Berry, endowed with a remarkable talent for preaching, chaplain in ordinarj- to Queen Marie- Therese, wife of Louis XIV, he" might have aspired to high ecclesiastical honours. Many bishoprics, w-ere offered to him. He refused them all, however, in order to remain in the Society of the Foreign Missions of which he was elected superior in 1681. He filled this office for eight terms, but as the rule;