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 GUTHLAO

92

GUYON

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Gutenberg's invention spread rapidly after the political catastrophe of 1462 (the conquest of the city of Mainz by Adolf of Nassau). It met in general with a ready, nay an enthusiastic reception in the centres of culture. The names of more than 1000 printers, mostly of German origin, have come down to us from the fifteenth century. In Italy we find well over 100 German printers, in France 30, in Spain 26. Many of the earliest printers outside of Germany had learned their art in Mainz, where they were known as "gold- smiths". Among those who were undeniably pupils of Gutenberg, and who probably were also assistants in the Gutenberg-Fust printing house were (besides Schoffer), Numeister, Keffer, and Ruppel; Mentel in Strasburg (before 1460), Pfister in Bamberg (1461), Sweynheim in Subiaoo and Rome (1464), and Johann von Speyer in Venice (1469).

The invention of Gutenberg should be classed with the greatest events in the history of the world. It caused a revolution in the development of culture, equalled by hardly any other incident in the Christian Era. Facility in disseminating the treasures of the intellect was a necessary condition for the rapid devel- opment of the sciences in modern times. Happening as it did just at the time when science was becoming more secularized and its cultivation no longer resigned almost entirely to the monks, it may be said that the age was pregnant with this invention. Thus not only is Gutenberg's art inseparable from the progress of modern science, but it has also been an indispensable factor in the education of the people at large. Culture and knowledge, until then considered aristocratic priv- ileges peculiar to certain classes, were popularized by typography, although in the process it unfortunately brought about an internal revolution in the intellec- tual world in the direction of what is profane and free from restraint.

Falkenstein, Gesch. der B iu-hdriickerkunst (2nd ed.. Leipzig, 1S56): DE ViNNE, Invention of Printing (London. 1877); \am DER LiNDE, Gesch. der Erfind. der Butrhdruekkunst (Berlin, 1886); H.VRTWIG (etc., etc.), Festschrift zum 600 jiihr. Ge- burtstage v. J. GjUenherg (M.iinz. 1900); also publications of the GUTENBEHQ SOCIETY (Mainz, 1902 — ).

Heinrich Wilhelm Wallau.

Guthlac, Saint, hermit; b. about 67.3; d. at Croyland, England, 11 .4pril, 714. Our authority for the life of St. Guthlac is the monk Felix (of what mon- astery is not known), who in his dedication of the "Life" to King ^thelbald, Guthlac's friend, assures him that whatever he has written, he has derived immediately from old and intimate companions of the .saint. Guthlac was born of noble stock, in the land of the Middle Angles. In his boyhood he showed ex- traordinary signs of piety; after eight or nine years spent in warfare, during which he never quite forgot his early training, he became filled with remorse and determined to enter a monastery. This he did at Repton (in what is now Derbyshire). Here after two years of great penance and earnest application to all the duties of the monastic life, he became fired with enthusiasm to emulate the wonderful penance of the Fathers of the Desert. For this purpose he retired with two companions to Croyland, a lonely island in the dismal fen-lands of modern Lincolnshire. In this solitude he spent fifteen years of the most rigid pen- ance, fasting daily until .sundown and then taking only coarse bread and water. Like St. .\nthony, he was frequently attacked and severely maltreated by the Evil One, and on the other hand was the recipient of extraordinary graces and powers. The birds and the fishes became his familiar friends, while the fame of his sanctity brought throngs of pilgrims to his cell. One of them. Bishop Hedda (of Dorchester or of Lich- field), raised him to the priesthood and consecrated his

humble chapel. .^Ethelbald, nephew of the terrible Penda, spent part of his e.xile with the saint.

Guthlac, after his death, in a vision to .lEthelbald, revealed to him that he should one day become king. The prophecy was verified in 716. During Holy Week of 714, Guthlac sickened and announced that he should die on the seventh day, which he did joyfully. The anniversary (11 April) has always been kept as his feast. Many miracles were wrought at his tomb, which soon became a centre of pilgrimage. His old friend, ^thelljald, on becoming king, proved himself a generous benefactor. Soon a large monastery arose, and through the industry of the monks, the fens of Croyland became one of the richest spots in England. The later history of his shrine may be found in Orderi- cus Vitalis (Historia Ecclesiastica) and in the " Ili.story of Croyland" by the Pseudo-Ingulph. Felix's Latin "Life" was turned into Anglo-Saxon prose by some unknown hand. This version was first published by Goodwin in 1S48. There is also a metrical version attributed to Cynewulf contained in the celebrated Exeter Book (Codex Exoniensis).

Acta SS., XI, 37, contains Felix's chronicle and extracta from Ordericus and the Pseudo-Ingulph: Fulman, eH. Uis- toria Croylandensis in R. S.; Goodwin, Anglo-Saxon Version of the Life of Guthlac (London, 1848) : Thorpe, Codex Exonien- sis {London, lS-i'2); GoLLANCZ, The Exeter Book {London, 189.5); Gale, editiou of Ingulph, though old (1684), is still valuable.

John F. X. Murphy.

GuyOn, jEANNE-MARIE-BoirvlEB DE LaMoTTE-, E

celebrated French mystic of the seventeenth centurj'; h. at Montargis, in the Orleanais, 13 April, 164S; d. at Blois, 9 June, 1717. Her father was Claude Bouvier, a procurator of the tribunal of Montargis. Of a sensi- tive and delicate constitution, she was sickly in her childhood and her education was much neglected. Incessantly going and coming between her home and the convent, and passing from one school to another, she changed her place of abode nine times in ten years. Her parents, who were very religious people, gave her an especially pious training; while .she received and retained profound impressions from her reading of the works of St. Francis de Sales, and her intercourse with certain nvms, her teachers. At one period she desired to become a nun, as one of her elder sisters had, but this desire did not last long. When scarcely sixteen years of age, she accepted the hand of a wealthy gentleman of Montargis, Jacques Guyon, twenty-two years older than herself. After twelve years of a union in which she gave more devotion than it yielded her happiness, Madame Guyon lost in succession two of her children and her husband. Thus, at twenty- eight she was left a widow with three young children. Iter Experiences aw! Theories. — In the meantime Madame Guyon had been initiated into the secrets of the mystical life by Pdre Lacombe, a Barnabite. who very soon acquired a great influence over her. Under his direction she passed through a series of interior experiences which are de.scribed in the "Vie de Maihune Guyon" written by herself. First she at- tained a Uvely sentiment of the presence of (lod, per- ceived as a tangible reahty. Prayer becomes easy to her; in it she is vouchsafed a savour of God which detaches her from creatures. This is what she calls "the union of the powers". She remains in this state for eight years; it is succeeded by another state in which she loses the sense of God's graces and favours, she has no taste for anything spiritual, is powerless to act, and afraid of her own baseness. This was the st.ate of "mystical death" in which she remained for seven years J from this crisis she passes, as it were re- awakened and transformed, into the state of resurrec- tion and new fife. Whereas in the first of the three states she possessed God, in this last state .she is po.s- sessed bv Him: then God was united to the powers of her soul, but now He is united to its substance; it is He who acts in her; she becomes like an automaton in