Page 63 - FLIPBOOK - Life of Saint Gerard Majella - Vassall-Phillips

LIFE OF SAINT GERARD MAJELLA

the Physician of her soul the sins that until then were hidden in the
recesses of her guilty conscience, she must lose the sight of God for
all eternity. Catherine enjoyed perfect health when God in His
Goodness sent her this solemn warning. Shortly afterwards, however,
she was attacked by a dangerous malady. In a few months she was
dead.
Saint Gerard had paid several visits to Melfi, and was already well
known in that place, when in the year 1753 the Bishop asked Father
Fiocchi to preach a public Novena in the Cathedral. He requested
also, as a special favour, that the holy Brother might accompany his
Rector, and remain with him while the spiritual exercises lasted.
Numerous are the accounts that have been left to posterity of the
wonderful conversions operated by Saint Gerard at Melfi. At the
wish of the Bishop, any particularly hardened sinners were entrusted
to the care of the Servant of God. He spoke to them so winningly
and so wisely as at once to change the most hardened hearts. God
was with him, and no one could resist the power that spoke by his
lips. He then conducted his prisoners of love to Father Fiocchi, who
gladly heard their Confessions, and reconciled them with Our Lord.
He likewise rescued several secret sinners from the snares of Satan
through the supernatural light by which he was able to read even in
the inmost depths of the soul.
In the year 1843, ninety years after the visit to Melfi, a very old
man, now nearly a hundred years of age, was able to give the
following testimony before the commission appointed to take
evidence with a view to Brother Gerard's Beatification:
“I was a mere child,” he deposed, “when Gerard came to Melfi.
To the young people, who used to flock around him, he was
accustomed always to dwell on the love of God, at the same time
urging them to fidelity in the performance of their religious duties.
He would usually finish his little discourses by some such words as
these: ‘We understand one another, then, do we not? We are going to
give ourselves up altogether to the good God.’ He then signed our
foreheads with the sign of the Cross, and gave us little pictures of
Our Lady of Seven Dolours. He was most mortified. . . . Charitable
and kind towards the poor, he was wont to rob himself of food in
order to be able to give to the needy. Once I saw him deprive himself
even of his shoes and stockings to hand them over to a beggar. But
that which was most remarkable in him was his zeal for the

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