Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 6.djvu/95

 FIACRE

67

FICINO

St. Patrick in Irish, a document of undoubted an- tiquity and of prime importance as the earhest biog- raphy of the saint that has come down to us. A hymn on St. Brigid, "Audite virginis laudes", has been sometimes attributed to him, but on insufficient grounds.

Acta SS., 12 Oct.; Colgan, Trias Thnum. (Louvain, 1647); Ware, The Writers of Ireland (Dublin, 1746), I, II. 7; Laotgan, Eccles. Hist, of Ireland (Dublin. 1S29), I; Healy, Ireland's An- cient Schools and Scholars (Dublin, 1902),- Irish Eccl. Record, March, 1868; Liber Hymnorum (Trinity College. Dublin), ed. Todd (1855-69) and Bernard and Atkinson (1898).

C. MULCAHY.

Fiacre, S.unt, Abbot, b. in Ireland about the end of the sixth century; d. IS August, (370. Having been ordained priest, he retired to a hermitage on the banks of the Nore of which the townland Kilfiachra, or Ivil- fera, Co. Kilkenny, still preserves the memory. Dis- ciples flocked to him. but, desirous of greater solitude, he left his native land and arrived, in 628, at Meaux, where St. Faro then held episcopal sway. He was generously received by Faro, whose kindly feelings were engaged to the Irish monk for blessings which he and his father's house had received from the Irish missionary Columbanus. Faro granted him out of his own patrimony a site at Brogillum (Breuil) surrounded by forests. Here Fiacre built an oratory in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a hospice in which he re- ceived strangers, and a cell in which he himself lived apart. He lived a life of great mortification, in prayer, fast, vigil, and the manual labour of the gar- den. Disciples gathered around him and soon formed a monastery. There is a legend that St. Faro allowed him as much land as he might surround in one day with a furrow; that Fiacre turned up the earth with the point of his crosier, and that an officious woman hastened to tell Faro that he was being beguiled; that Faro coming to the wood recognized that the wonder- worker was a man of God and sought his blessing, and that Fiacre henceforth excluded women, on pain of severe bodily infirmity, from the precincts of his monastery. In reality, the exclusion of women was a common rule in the Irish foundations. His fame for miracles was widespread. He cured all manner of diseases by laying on his hands; blindness, polypus, fevers are mentioned, and especially a tumour or fistula since called "le fie de S. Fiacre".

His remains were interred in his church at Breuil, where his sanctity was soon attested by the numerous cures wrought at his tomb. Many churches and ora- tories have been dedicated to him throughout France. His shrine at Breuil is still a resort for pilgrims with bodily ailments. In 1234 his remains were placed in a shrine by Pierre, Bishop of Meaux, his arm being en- cased in a separate reliquary. In 1479 the relics of Sts. Fiacre and Kilian were placed in a silver shrine, which was removed in 156S to the cathedral church at Meaux for safety from the destructive fanaticism of the Calvinists. In 1617 the Bishop of Meaux gave part of the saint's body to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and in 1637 the shrine was again opened and part of the vertebrse given to Cardinal Richelieu. A mystery play of the fifteenth century celebrates St. Fiacre's life and miracles. St. John of Matha, Louis XIII, and Anne of Austria were among his most famous clients. He is the patron of gardeners. The French cab de- rives its name from him. The Hotel de St-Fiacre, in the Rue .St-Martin, Paris, in the middle of the seven- teenth century first let these coaches on hire. The sign of the inn was an image of the saint, and the coaches in time came to be called by his name. His feast is kept on the 30th of .August.

Acta .S'.S'..30 Aug.; Lanii;an, Ere. Hi.il. of Ireland (Dublin. 1829). II. 446-44S; O'Hanlon, LUvh of the Irish Saints. 30 Aug., VIII, 421; Marlitrologil of Doneijat, 229; Butler, Lives of the Saints, 30 Aug.; I.iTTRE. French Diet., s. v.; Ricard. La vie et lea miracles de S. Fiacre d'apres les Bollandiates avec piices iuetificatives (Paris, 1865).

C. MnLCAHY.

FlClNO

Fiammingo (The Fleming), Dennis. See Cal-

VAERT, DlONYSIUS.

Ficino, Marsilio, philosopher, philologist, phy- sician; b. at Florence, 19 Oct., 1433; d. at Correggio, 1 Oct., 1499. Son of the physician of Cosmo de' Medici, he served the Medicis for three generations and received from them a villa at Monte Vecchio. He studied at Florence and at Bologna; and was spe- cially protected in his early work by Cosmo de' Medici, who chose him to translate the works of Plato into Latin. The Council of Florence (1439) brought to the city a number of Greek scholars, and this fact, com- bined with the founding of the Platonic Academy, of which Ficino was elected president, gave an impetus to the study of Greek and especially to that of Plato. Ficino became an ardent admirer of Plato and a prop- agator of Plato- nism, or rather neo-Platonism, to an unwarranted degree, going so far as to maintain that Plato should be read in the churches, mil claiming Socrai' - and Plato as fi_>ri'- runners of Christ. He taught Plato in the Academ^y of Florence, and it is said he kept a light burning before a bust of Plato in hia room. It is supposed that the works of Savonarola drew Ficino closer to the spirit of the Church. He was ordained priest in 1477 and became a canon of the cathedral of Florence. His disposition was mild, but at times he had to use his knowledge of music to drive away melancholy. His knowledge of medicine was applied very largely to himself, becoming almost a superstition in its detail. As a philologist his worth was recognized, and Reuchlin sent him pupils from Germany. Angelo Poliziano was one of his pupils.

As a translator his work was painstaking and faith- ful, though his acquaintance with Greek and Latin was by no means perfect. He translatetl the "Argo- nautica", the "Orphic Hymns", Homer's "Hymns", and Hesiod's " Theogony " ; his translation of Plato ap- peared before the Greek text of Plato was published. He also translated Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus, lam- blichus, Alcinous, Synesius, Psellus, the " Golden Thoughts " of Pythagoras, and the works of Dionysius the Areopagite. When a young man he wrote an "Introduction to the Philosophy of Plato"; his most important work was "Theologia Platonica de anima- rum immortalitate" (Florence. 1482); a shorter form of this work is found in his " Compendium theologiae Platonic;e". He respects Aristotle and calls St. Thomas the "glory of theology"; yet for him Plato is the philosopher. Christianity, he says, must rest on philosophic grounds; in Plato alone do we find the arguments to support its claims, hence he considers the revival of Plato an intervention of Providence. Plato does not stop at immediate causes, but rises to the highest cause, God, in Whom he sees all things. The philosophy of Plato is a logical outcome of pre- vious thon<;ht, beginning with the Egyptians and ad- vancing .step l)y step till Plato takes up the mysteries of religion and casts them in a form that made it pos- sible for the neoPlatonist to set them forth clearly. The seed is to be found in Plato, its full expression in the neo-Platonists. Ficino follows t liis line of thought in speaking of the human soul, which he considered as the image of the God-head, a part of tlie great chain of existence coming forth from God and leading back