SAINT MARGARET OF SCOTLAND.

All who served, both feared and loved her. Her own demeanour was calm and thoughtful: in all she said and did she seemed to breathe the air of heaven. She was the mother of a numerous family-six scns and two daughters. The decisive Saxonising of Scotland that took place under Margaret is strongly marked by the fact that not one of these eight children was named after any of the ancient kings or queens of Albany. She was very earnest about their upbringing. She bade their instructor restrain and chastise them as often as he saw in them any levity of conduct, and not spare the rod. So they grew up in love and kindness to each other, the younger showing deference to the elder. When they went to the solemn service of the mass, the children used to walk behind their parents in the order of their age. aside and tell them of Christ, and of faith in Him, Often she would take them according as their age could receive it. She would press on them the fear of Him, saying, "Fear the Lord, O my sons! for there shall be no want to them that fear Him. If you love Him, O my darlings! He will give you welfare in this present life, and everlasting felicity with all His saints." her fervent desires, her counsels, her prayers for Such were them night and day. And on the whole they proved not unworthy of such a mother. Three of the sons were kings of Scotland in succession-the amiable Edgar, the fierce Alexander, and the pious David. Of the two daughters the eldest, Maud, as Queen of England, walked in her mother's ways, and the inscription on her monument at Winchester showed the affection with which the Saxons remembered "Mold the god quen." The second daughter, Mary, was married to Eustace, that Count of Boulogne who, with his still more famous brother Godfrey, was among the chiefs of the first Crusade.

Amid cares for her family and household, cares for the kingdom which she shared with her husband, and earnest desire for the reform of the Church, she never neglected her own private study of the Scriptures. Turgot tells how she would often put searching questions about its meaning to the most learned men she could find. He naively avers that he himself was often puzzled by them, and wearied with seeking to find fitting answers. profound insight, and clear power of expressing it, As she herself had the teachers often left her wiser than they came.

All this anxious study was not only that she might save her own soul, but also the souls of others. Especially, she was earnest about her husband. He probably knew and cared little for these things at the time when they were married. But he seemed to have been a man of open and noble nature, and unbounded in love and reverence for his saintly queen. There is a story of him, not told by Turgot, but preserved by local tradition. When Malcolm's tower at Dunfermline first became Margaret's home, it was no doubt small and confined enough, and she would often go forth from it and seek retirement in a cave of the glen hard by. Malcolm noticed this, but did not know the reason. So, one day following

[Good Words, Aug. 1, 1967.

her, unobserved, he watched to see how she was
engaged. Some dark suspicion no doubt haunted
vengeance. When, however, looking in, he saw
him, and he was prepared, if he found it true, to take
her engaged in prayer, all his thought was changed.
Returning quite overjoyed, he straightway made the
chiselling are still visible on its freestone sides, and
cave be fitted up for the queen's oratory. Marks of
persons not long dead had heard of a stone table
having been seen there with what seemed a crucifix
graven on it.

him, for she drew him, says Turgot, God's Spirit
helping, to the practice of righteousness, mercy, alms-
Her influence was, and well might be, great with
giving, and other good works. From her he learned
to pray in earnest, and to spend the night watches
says Turgot, "I have often admired the wonderful
in pouring out his heart before God.
goodness of God, when I have seen such fervour of
"I confess,"
prayer in a king, such earnest penitence in a lay-
place which love for Margaret had made gentle and
man." Within his rougher heart there was a central
pure like herself. What she disliked he learned to dis-
she used in prayer and the books she read, these
like, what she loved he learned to love. The missals
he, though he could not read, would turn over, and
look on lovingly. If any one book was specially dear
to her, he would gaze on it, and press it, and kiss it.
Sometimes he would by stealth carry off such a book
to the goldsmith, and bring it back to her adorned
with gold and gems.

court, and caused both the king and those about him
to be much more costlily appareled. She encouraged
She greatly increased the splendour of Malcolm's
merchants to bring from abroad wares of price,
especially garments of divers colours.
increased the pomp of his public appearances. All
made the king and his nobles wear, and so greatly
the dishes in which the king and his nobles were
These she
served at table, she caused to be either of gold and
silver, or gilt and plated.
she herself was splendidly attired, not for the sake
of show, but because it was becoming in a queen.
When she went abroad,
In herself, says her biographer, she was full of
humility, and felt herself to be, under the gold and
that our life here is as a vapour, and that at the end
jewels, but dust and ashes. She kept ever before her
often ask Turgot to tell her when he saw in her any
of it there remains the great account.
fault, in word or deed. When he did this seldom,
she would tell him that he neglected her real good.
She would
"Let the just man reprove me kindly," she would say.
The reproofs which most would resent as affronts,
she desired for her soul's welfare.

teristic was her crusade against the corruptions of
Of all her outward works by far the most charac-
the old Scottish Church. What these were we have
seen in part, and shall see it yet more.
though Turgot evidently is, some deduction may be
allowed for his view of a Church, alien, and in semu
things opposed, to his own. But when this has been
Honest
made, the fact seems to remain that the Culdee

brotherhood were by this time sunk in lethargy and corruption. To awaken this dead Church, she called together from time to time councils of the native clergy. One of these councils is especially eminent, in which for three days alone, or with very few of her own way of thinking, she contended against the defenders of old abuses with the word of God, which is the sword of the Spirit. Where this council was held is not stated, but it probably took place either at Dunfermline or at St. Andrews, then the chief Culdee establishment in Scotland. Wherever it was held, Malcolm came with her and stood by her side, and, as he could speak both English and Celtic, he acted as interpreter between them. The points at issue do not seem to have been charges of false or imperfect doctrine, but rather of corrupt practices, and carelessness in religious worship.

The first charge which Margaret urged against the Culdees was, that they began to keep Lent, not on Ash-Wednesday, but on the Monday after the first Sunday in Lent. The native clergy pleaded the example of our Lord, who fasted only forty days. But you fast not forty, but only thirty-six days," replied Margaret, "when you have deducted from your fast the six Sundays in Lent. Therefore, an addition of four days must be made to fill up the full measure of forty days." The Scottish clergy were convinced, and conformed to the Catholic usage. It is impossible for ritualistic persons to conceive how trivial such questions appear to those not accustomed to these observances, and just as little can the latter imagine of what paramount importance such matters appeared to all Christians in early ages, and still appear to many Christians even now.

ing the Lord's body,' that is, not distinguishing the bread and wine of the Sacrament from common food. Those who, with all the defilement of their sins upon them, without confession of sin and repentance, come to the holy table, they fall under the condemnation. But those who, confessing their sins and repenting, in the Catholic faith, come on the day of the Lord's resurrection to His table, they come not to their condemnation, but to the remission of their sins, and their healthful preparation for eternal life." To these arguments of Margaret the Culdees made no reply, but thenceforth conformed in this matter to the rule of the Church.

Again Margaret charged them, priests and people alike, with neglecting the Lord's day, and working on it just as on other days. She showed that it ought to be kept holy as the day of our Lord's resurrection, and that they should do no servile work on that day, on which we were redeemed from slavery to the devil. She quotes too, Pope Gregory's authority for the strict observance of it.

Other abuses, as the use of certain barbarous rites at masses, and unnatural marriages with stepmothers and deceased brothers' wives, she sternly rebuked, and they were henceforth discontinued. Such was the work done in this three days' council. The authority to which Margaret always appealed, was Scripture, and the opinions of the fathers. These details are valuable not only as illustrating the character and work of St. Margaret, but as throwing light on the Culdee Church of the eleventh century, or, at least, on the charges which the new Saxon hierarchy brought against it.

But, however much the Culdees, or collegiate clergy, may have departed from old austerity, there were scattered about in secluded places solitary anchorites, who witnessed against the corruptions of the secularised clergy by lives of stern self-denial and devotedness. These probably kept alive the light of Christian faith in remote places, where but for them it would have been lost in surrounding heathenism. In the flesh, but not after it, they lived, says Turgot, an angelic life on earth. Margaret's whole heart went out to these. She used to visit and converse with them in their solitary cells, reverencing Christ in them, and asking earnestly for their prayers. When they refused any earthly benefit which she offered, she would beg of them to tell her some deed of mercy or charity she might do. And she set herself to do whatever they recommended, whether it was to befriend some poor ones in their poverty, or to relieve from their misery some who were downtrodden. The way these anchorites are spoken of shows that neither Margaret nor her confessor were so prejudiced against native Churchmen as not to acknowledge genuine devotion where it really existed.

The next charge the queen brought against the native Church was a graver one. She asked how it came that they had ceased to celebrate the Holy Communion on Easter day. And the reply of those Celtic priests is the same as many everywhere, and especially in the Celtic districts of Scotland, would make at the present hour. They quoted the apostle's words, "Whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup unworthily," &c. &c.: therefore, because we are sinners, we fear, by approaching to that holy mystery to come under the condemnation. This reasoning would equally, of course, bar them from ever partaking of the Communion. And So Lord Hailes has interpreted their words to mean that they had ceased to celebrate the Communion altogether. But for such an interpretation there is no warrant in Turgot's language. The more probable suggestion is, that they thought there was a peculiar sanctity about the Easter Communion, and were kept from celebrating it by some superstitious fear. It is likely enough that the reception of the Sacrament may have become unfrequent, but not that it was entirely abandoned. The reply of Mar- Whenever she walked or rode abroad, crowds of garet would do credit to any modern divine. "If widows, orphans, and other wretched ones would all who are sinners are forbidden to communicate, flock round her as a mother, and none went away then none ever ought to partake. But if so, why uncomforted. When she had given away everydid our Lord command His followers to do so? In thing she herself had, she would borrow from her the text you quoted, the apostle added, 'not discern-attendants their fine clothes, or whatever else

they had, and distribute them. They knew they would receive back their own twofold. She would steal from the king things to give away-a kind of theft which always pleased him. Sometimes he would pretend not to observe such thefts, and then catching her with his stolen gold coins in her hand, would upbraid her jestingly. In that troubled time there must have been no lack of persons in need of such a benefactress. Multitudes of Saxon captives had been driven from England, and were to be found as slaves everywhere throughout Scotland. The queen employed persons to find out such as were in hardest bondage, or most cruelly treated. She paid the ransom of these secretly, and set them free.

St. Andrews was then becoming more and more famous as the resort of pilgrims travelling to the apostle's shrine. For the accommodation of these she caused hospices to be built on either shore where they crossed the Firth, probably at North and South Queensferry, that the foreigners and the poor, when wearied with the journey, might rest there. There she ordered to be kept all the refreshments they would need, and servants to attend them; and those who rowed them over the ferry were not allowed to take any money from them.

But amid all this outward activity, while she zealously cleansed God's temple, she was not less earnest to purify her own soul. "This I know,"

Nave of the Abbey Church, Dunfermline. says Turgot, "for I not only saw her outward works, but knew the secrets of her heart. For she used to open to me her hidden thoughts very unreservedly; not that there was any good in me, but because she thought there was. Many times as she spoke she has melted in tears, and I, touched with her godly sorrow, have wept too. Beyond all mortals I have known she was given to prayer and fasting, to almsgiving and works of mercy." By her excessive abstinence she brought on great weakness and bodily pain. Stern towards herself, she was to the poor so nder-hearted she would have given not only her

own, but herself. We now-a-days can hardly enter into the account given of her vigils, church services, fastings, and ministrations to the poor. Always rising early, she spent some time in prayer and psalms. Then nine young orphan children, quite destitute, were brought into her chamber, and these on bended knees she fed, out of the spoons she herself used, with the most delicate and well-prepared meats and drinks. Ministering to these children, she felt she was ministering to Christ. Then three hundred poor were brought into the great hall, and seated in rows all round it. The doors were closed, and none

SAINT MARGARET OF SCOTLAND.

by the love you bear me, I adjure you, tell me the truth." He told it all. His father and his brother Edward were dead. No murmur escaped her; but lifting up her eyes and hands to heaven, she said, "I thank and praise Thee, Almighty God, that Thou hast willed to lay on me this anguish at the last, and by this suffering to purge me from some of the stains of sin." And then she began that prayer which is wont to be said immediately after the reception of the sacred elements, "O Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to the will of the Father and with the co-operation of the Holy Ghost, hast by Thy death given life to the world, deliver me." As she uttered that "libera me," her spirit passed to the great Deliverer.

Just as she died, Donald Bane, a brother of Malcolm's, who had come from the Hebrides with his wild caterans to claim the kingdom, laid siege to the Maiden Castle. So they had to convey the body of Margaret by stealth from the chamber where she died, which for centuries after was known as "the blessed Margaret's chalmer." They bore it through a postern, called by Wyntoun the "west yhet," down the steep western side of the castle rock, and so, by her own ferry, to Dunfermline. And there they laid her down in the church of the Holy Trinity, which she had built, before the high altar and the cross placed there by herself. And so, concludes the biographer, her body rests in that spot where she had so often knelt and prayed.

Of that body the subsequent story is too remarkable to be passed over. first buried in the monastery of Tynemouth, but seem Malcolm's remains were at to have been soon after removed thence by his people and laid beside his queen in Dunfermline Church. In 1246, Margaret was, after due scrutiny, canonized by Pope Innocent IV. Soon after this it was resolved to translate her remains from their original resting-place, in what is now the nave, to a more honourable place in the choir. On the 13th of June, 1250, King Alexander III., with his mother, and many of the clergy and chief nobility, came to Dunfermline. In their presence the relics of Margaret were taken from the tomb of stone, placed in a shrine of silver, and borne by the hands of princes and earls inward towards the choir. When the procession had reached the chancel arch, opposite to the spot where the bones of Malcolm lay, suddenly the shrine, which contained the relics of Margaret, became so heavy that they could carry it no farther. The queen's body refused, so they thought, a more honourable resting-place, unless her husband's remains shared it along with her. suggestion of a bystander, according to Fordun, On the or warned by a voice from heaven, as the Aberdeen Breviary has it, they opened the tomb of the king, placed his bones also in a shrine, and then, without difficulty, carried them both, and laid them in a large tomb at the east end of the choir. That tomb, covered with its ponderous blue grey slab, is still to be seen, but now in the open air, outside of the modern choir. Still visible on it are the sockets

Good Words, Aug. 1, 1887.

in which once burned the silver lamps that for cen-
turies were kept lit above her shrine night and day;
but the tomb itself has been empty for three hun-
dred years-type of the oblivion to which Margaret
has been consigned in the land which once so greatly
revered her. At the Reformation, the remains were
thought no longer safe there. The head of Margaret
Queen Mary, but, on her flight to England, it passed
was brought to Edinburgh Castle at the desire of
through several hands, till at last it found a resting-
place in the Scots College at Douay. There for a
time it recovered its ancient sanctity, and was ex-
posed to the veneration of the faithful; but it dis-
appeared again, and for the last time, amid the storms
Queen Margaret, with those of Malcolm, are said to
of the French Revolution. The rest of the remains of
have been acquired after the Reformation by Philip
of Spain. He placed them in the church of St. Lau-
rence at the Escurial. Attempts have recently been
made to have them restored to Scotland, but they,
too, had disappeared, or could not be identified.

rence it was necessary to give. But these follies,
These details of relic worship and misplaced reve-
the accretions of later ages, ought not to be allowed
to obscure the fair memory of Margaret, or to blind
our eyes to her real sanctity. What has been told
of her above is enough to show that her wisdom was
nearly equal to her devotion. Her whole life was
given almost as much to soften and civilize the rude
people whom her husband ruled, as to make them
work she did. She strove, it may be said, to Angli-
more religious. Two objections may be made to the
to the first, it is curious enough that Margaret is the
cise, and also to Romanise Scotland.
earliest example of a process which has gone on ever
With regard
since, and which we see every day before our eyes.
marrying Scotch husbands and using all their in-
For eight hundred years English women have been
to the English feelings and customs.
fluence to win them over from their national ways
be forgiven for this if they were all Saint Margarets.
The Saxon infusion which she brought into Scotland
must be allowed to have enriched, civilised, elevated
They might
Romanism, two things only need be said. First, the
the Celtic people.
native Church was well-nigh dead.
As to Margaret's introducing
excused for supplanting its decrepitude by the ener-
getic faith of Lanfranc and Anselm.
She may be
expect her to be other than she was, to disparage her
because she was not a good Protestant in the eleventh
century, is to blame her for not being an historical
Secondly, to
miracle or anomaly.
even disguises through which in this world it is often
essential goodness under all the variety of garbs and
Let us try to see and own
forced to reveal itself.
that divine element which links together all the
good of all ages. She had in rare
Margaret was a partaker of
faith which pierces through shadows and enters
within the veil,-that strong hold
measure that
world which is the only true lever for moving this
on the eternal

one.