DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.71133#0259
CHAPTER VIII.
To the Colosseum and Palatine.
175.-VIA DEI SERPENTI-ST. BENEDICT JOSEPH
LABRE—ST. JOHN BERCHMANS.
FROM the Quirinal there is a direct road to the Colosseum by
the Via della Consulta and Via dei Serpenti, crossing the Via
Nazionale.
In a small house, No. 3, Via dei Serpenti, died St. Benedict
Joseph Labre, the holy mendicant, on April 16, 1783. His
favourite church was the neighbouring one of S. Maria ai Monti,
and there, as he knelt before the Blessed Sacrament on the
day mentioned, he felt that his end was near. Rising, he
staggered to the church door, and unable to proceed further,
sat down on the doorsteps, where his agony began. A kind
friend, who happened to be passing, took compassion on him
and carried him to his own house near the church, where the
Saint breathed forth his pure soul to God that same evening at
the early age of thirty-four years.
He was born in the diocese of Boulogne, France, in 1748, of
pious parents and in easy circumstances. A saint from his
childhood, his one desire was to consecrate himself to God in
some austere Religious Order, and he became a novice first of
the Carthusians, then of the Trappists, but in both cases was
compelled to leave because of his frail constitution. In the
world he resolved to lead a life of absolute poverty and severe
penance \ so, renouncing his home and the comforts of life,
he wandered through Europe as a mendicant pilgrim from
sanctuary to sanctuary, living on the scraps of food that were
given him as alms, and sleeping on the bare ground. In 1777
he came to Rome, never to leave it up to the time of his death,
except for an annual pilgrimage to Loreto. His time was spent
in prayer in the different churches of the Holy City (chiefly in
the Gesu and S. Maria ai Monti) and in works of charity to the
poor, for whom he begged alms, whose children he catechised,
and whom he taught by his holy example to bear with resigna-
To the Colosseum and Palatine.
175.-VIA DEI SERPENTI-ST. BENEDICT JOSEPH
LABRE—ST. JOHN BERCHMANS.
FROM the Quirinal there is a direct road to the Colosseum by
the Via della Consulta and Via dei Serpenti, crossing the Via
Nazionale.
In a small house, No. 3, Via dei Serpenti, died St. Benedict
Joseph Labre, the holy mendicant, on April 16, 1783. His
favourite church was the neighbouring one of S. Maria ai Monti,
and there, as he knelt before the Blessed Sacrament on the
day mentioned, he felt that his end was near. Rising, he
staggered to the church door, and unable to proceed further,
sat down on the doorsteps, where his agony began. A kind
friend, who happened to be passing, took compassion on him
and carried him to his own house near the church, where the
Saint breathed forth his pure soul to God that same evening at
the early age of thirty-four years.
He was born in the diocese of Boulogne, France, in 1748, of
pious parents and in easy circumstances. A saint from his
childhood, his one desire was to consecrate himself to God in
some austere Religious Order, and he became a novice first of
the Carthusians, then of the Trappists, but in both cases was
compelled to leave because of his frail constitution. In the
world he resolved to lead a life of absolute poverty and severe
penance \ so, renouncing his home and the comforts of life,
he wandered through Europe as a mendicant pilgrim from
sanctuary to sanctuary, living on the scraps of food that were
given him as alms, and sleeping on the bare ground. In 1777
he came to Rome, never to leave it up to the time of his death,
except for an annual pilgrimage to Loreto. His time was spent
in prayer in the different churches of the Holy City (chiefly in
the Gesu and S. Maria ai Monti) and in works of charity to the
poor, for whom he begged alms, whose children he catechised,
and whom he taught by his holy example to bear with resigna-