BUCKFAST
27
BUCKFAST
in the fore part of Vol. II of the November "Acta".
Because of his extensive learning and investigating
turn of mind he was naturally bent upon probing
abstruse and perplexing questions; naturally, also, his
work was often the result of most urgent, requests.
Hence it was that, in 1862, he was led to publish
in the form of a letter to his brother Remi, then
professor of church history at the theological college
of Louvain and soon afterwards his colleague on the
Bollandist work, a Latin dissertation " De solemni-
tate pra-cipue paupertatis religiosa;", which was fol-
lowed in 1863 and 1864 by two treatises in French,
one under the title: "Solution aimable de la question
des couvents" and the other " De l'6tat religieux",
treating of the religious life in Belgium in the nine-
teenth century.
At the solicitation chiefly of prelates and dis- tinguished Catholic savants, he undertook the study of a particularly delicate question. In order to satisfy the many requests made to Rome by churches and religious communities for the relics of saints, it had become customary to take from the Roman catacombs the bodies of unknown personages be- lieved to have been honoured as martyrs in the early Church. The sign by which they were to be recog- nized was a glass via! sealed up in the plaster out- side the loculus that contained the body, and tear- ing traces of a red substance that had been enclosed and was supposed to have been blood. Doubts had arisen as to the correctness of this interpretation and, after careful study, Father De Buck felt con- vinced that it was false and that what had been taken for blood was probably the sediment of con- secrated wine which, owing to misguided piety, had been placed in tin- tomb near the bodies of the dead. This conclusion, together with its premises, was set fortli in a dissertation published in 1855 under the title "De phialis rubricatis quibus martyrum romanorum sepulera dignosci dicuntur". Naturally it raised lively protestations, particularly on the part of those who were responsible for distributing the bodies of the saints, the more so, as after the discussions on the vials of blood, the cardinal vicar in 1861 strictly forbade any further transportation of these relics. The author of the dissertation, " De phialis rubricatis", had but a few copies of his work struck off, these being intended for the cardinals and prelates particularly interested in the question, and as none were put on the market, it was rumoured that De Buck's superiors had sup- pressed the publication of the book and that all the copies printed, save five or six, had been de- stroyed. This, of course, was untrue; not one copy had been destroyed and his superiors had laid no blame upon the author. Then, in 1863, a decree was obtained from the Congregation of Rites, re- newing an older decree, whereby it was declared thai a vial of blood placed outside of a sepulchral niche in the catacombs was an unmistakable sign by which the tomb of a martyr might be known. and it was proclaimed thai Victor De Buck's opinion was formally disapprove. 1 and condemned by liome. This too was false, as Father De Buck had never intimated that the placing of the vial of blood did not indicate the resting-place of a martyr, when it, could be proved that the via] contained genuine
blood, such as was supposed by the decree of the
egation. finally, there appeared in Paris in
1867 a large quarto volume written by the Roman prelate, Monsignor Sconamiglio, "Reliquiarum eus-
tode". It was filled with caustic criticisms of tin' author of "De phialis rubricatis" and relegated him t-i tie- rank of notorious heretics who had combated
devotion to the saints and the veneration of their relics. Father De Buck Kerned all but insensible to these attacks and contented himself with op- posing to Monsignor Sconamiglio's book a protest
in which he rectified the more or less unconscious
error of his enemies by proving thai neither the
decree of 1863 nor any other decision emanating
from ecclesiastical authority had affected lii^ thesis.
However, another attack made about the same time touched him more deeply. The gravest and most direct accusations were made against him and reported to the Sovereign Pontiff himself; he was even credited with opinions which, if not formally heretical, at least openly defied the ideas that are universally accepted and held in veneration by Catholics devoted to the Holy See. In a Latin letter addressed to Cardinal l'atrizzi. and intended to come to the notice of the Supreme Pontiff, Father De Buck repudiated the calumnies in a maimer that betrayed how deeply he had been affected, his pro- test being supported by the testimony of four of his principal superiors, former provincials, and rec- tors who eagerly vouched for the sincerity of his declarations and the genuineness of his religious spirit. With the full consent of his superiors he published this letter in order to communicate with those of his friends who might have been disturbed by an echo of these accusations.
What might have invested these accusations with some semblance of truth and what certainly gave rise to them, were the amicable relations established, principally through correspondence, between Father De Buck and such men as Alexander Forbes, the learned Anglican bishop, the celebrated Edward Pu- sey in England, Montalembert, and Bishop Dupan- loup in France and a number of others whose names were distasteful to many ardent Catholics. These relations were brought about by the reputation for deep learning, integrity, and scientific independence that De Buck's works had rapidly earned for him, by his readiness to oblige those who addressed themselves to him in their perplexities, and by his remarkable earnestness and skill in elucidating the most difficult questions. Moreover, lie was equipped with all the information that incessant study and a splendid memory could ensure. But it was not only great minds groping outside of the true Faith or weakened bv harassing doubts who thus appealed to his knowledge. Tin' different papal nuncios who succeeded one another in Belgium during the course of his career as Bollandist, bishops, political men, members of learned bodies, and journalists, ceased not to importune this gracious scholar whose answers often formed important memoranda which, although the result of several days and sometimes several nights of uninterrupted labour, were read only by those who called them fortli or else appeared anony- mously in some Belgian or foreign periodical.
Although Father lie Luck had an unusually ro- bust constitution and enjoyed exceptionally good health, constant and excessive work at length told upon him and he was greatly fatigued when Father
Becks, Father General of the Society, summoned him to Home to acl at official theologian at the Vatican Council. Father Victor a urn 9 the e ne i duties with his accustomed ardour and, upon his return, showed the fir-t symptoms of the malady arterio-sclerosis that finally carried him off. He strug- gled for some years longer against a series of painful attacks each of which left him decidedly weaker, until a final attack that lasted almost interruptedly for nearly four years, caused his death
Elogium I'. Victoria />< Buck in Ada SS., November, II. Cm. Of, Smedt.
Buckfast Abbey. --The date of the foundation of the monastery of Our Lady of Buckfast, two miles from Ashburton, England, in a beautiful Devonshire valley watered by the Dart, is unki but it was certainly long before the Norman Con- quest. The earliest authentic documen i I grant by King Canute (1015-1035), to the monks of
