Baring-Gould’s sources: Roman and Spanish Martyrologies and that of Usuardus. Authorities! — S. Braulio, in Praefat. ad litt. S. Isidori, and his own writings.] Spain, under the dominion of the Visigoths, was Arian, and severe had been the repression exercised on the Church by the Visigoth kings. But Ingundis, daughter of Sigebert, king of Austrasia, had married the young prince of Spain, Hermenigild, and she converted him to the true faith. It cost him his life. Reccared, on succeeding to the throne, abjured Arianism at the Third Council of Toledo, a.d. 589, thanks, as we are told by S. Gregory, to the influence of S. Leander, elder brother of S. Isidore, and his immediate predecessor in the See of Seville. The life of S. Leander has been already given, (Feb. 27 th.) S. Isidore was son of Severian, governor of the province of Carthagena, in Spain, who was either the son, or son-inlaw of the Ostrogoth King Theodoric, 1 and the brothers of S. Isidore were the illustrious Leander of Seville, and Fulgentius of Ecija. His sister were S. Florentusa, an abbess, and the princess Theodosia, married to the king Leovigild, and the mother of the martyr Hermenigild. Severian and his wife Turturace were exiled on account of their faith, a.d. 552, or thereabouts, and S. Isidore was born in exile. Where this occured has never been ascertained, though variously conjectured. Many years afterwards, S. Gregory the Great met S. Leander at Constantinople, during his own residence there, a.d. 578-84, and the biographer of S. Gregory says that u Leander had come thither on business of the Visigoths as ambassador.” 8 So that the family must have been recalled to Spain before that time. S. Isidore must have been born about the year 570; and the legend 1 Areral, Prolegom, ad S. Isid. c. 17. * Vit. S. Greg. Magn. i. 17. April*] S. Isidore.
His told of him, as of other saints famous for their oratorical powers, that the nurse one day found a swarm of bees settled about the child’s mouth. Another graceful story is told of his boyhood Wearied and disgusted with the drudgery of learning, he ran away from school, and as the sun grew hot, sat himself down to rest beside a little spring that gushed over a rock. As he rested in the shade, he noticed that the continual dropping of the water had worn away a large stone beneath the jet, and the waterdrops pattering on the stone were to him what the Bow Bells were in after years to Whittington; for he thought that if the light rain of the spring could scoop out the hard heart of the stone, then assuredly constant learning would at last overcome his natural inaptitude to acquire knowledge Where was this school to which he returned, and where he became in time such an accomplished Greek scholar ? It is impossible to suppose that it was in a re-barbarised country like Spain; and it is highly probable that Severian, on his banishment, had retired to Aquileia, capital of Istria, which had long been subject to the Ostrogoths, his near kinsmen. There Isidore may have been left to complete his education. The schools there were famous, founded by Boethius and Cassiodorus, and from them Venantius Fortunatus, the poet-bishop, was just departing. We may perhaps be allowed to suppose it was so, and that the boy’s heart ached with loneliness, when he saw his parents depart, and then feeling his desolation and the irksomeness of learning, he shut his books and ran away. But God sent His messengers to recall him, and the messengers were little water-drops. Those drops gave to Spain an historian, and to the Church a doctor.
Upon the death of his brother, S. Leander (about a.d. 601), he was elected to the see of Hispalis [a bishop’s “see” is his diocese, named from his seat (Latin sedes)], or Seville, and he laboured to accomplish what his brother had begun, the VOL. iv. 5 complete conversion of his flock from Arianism [followers of Arius, who taught that the Son is a created being, not fully God]. For the discipline of the monasteries in his diocese he drew up a collection of Rules.
Two councils were held whilst he was bishop, the second of Seville and the fourth of Toledo. The second council of Seville was attended by eight bishops of the province of Betica, and assembled in the chapter-house of the Jerusalem Church at Seville, on the 13th Nov., a.d. 619. The archbishop of Seville presided, the clergy of the city were present, and two laymen, Sisisclus, governor of the province, and Suanilla, the chancellor, were allowed seats. Among the acts of this council, one of the most curious has reference to the ordinations by a blind bishop, who laid his hands on the heads of the candidates, whilst a priest said the words of benediction. All such ordinations were decreed invalid.
The fourth council of Toledo was held in 633, on Dec. 9th, in the third year of the reign of King Sisnand. It was attended by sixty-two bishops, and was presided over by S. Isidore of Seville. Next to him sat six other metropolitans, the bishops of Narbonne, Merida, Braga, Toledo, and Tarragona; there were also present seven deputies of absent bishops. When the council had assembled in the church of S. Leocadia, King Sisnand entered, and having prostrated himself before the bishops, he requested them to pray for him. It must have been a solemn spectacle, that conclave of prelates; and the king is said on entering to have burst into tears. The Council drew up seventy-five canons, the first of which is a profession of faith, in which the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation are unfolded. In it, it is distinctly enunciated, that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son. The negligence of the bishops in the matter of holding synods was reprimanded, and they were required to convene one every S. Isidore.
April 4O year; but in these synods nothing concerning the faith was to be decided, for all such matters were to be discussed only before a general council of all Spain and Gaul [roughly modern France and Belgium]. The manner in which councils were to be held was carefully prescribed; and this is the earliest and only such regulation recorded; it is unquestionably a formulization of ancient traditional usage. At the first hour of the day, before sunrise, the church was to be cleared, and the gates to be closed, and the porters were to admit at first only the bishops, who were to seat themselves in order according to their rank. They were to sit in a circle, and then the priests were to be admitted, who were to range themselves behind the bishops. Then such laity as the council judged worthy were to be admitted, as also the notaries to read and write what was required. And the gates were to be kept closed. And after the bishops had long kept silence, communing in heart with God, the archdeacon was to cry aloud, “ Let us pray.” Then all were to fall on the ground, and remain long in silence: but one of the oldest of the bishops was to pray aloud, standing, all the rest remaining pros| trate. And when the prayer was over, all were to respond I “Amen,” and then the archdeacon should cry, "Arise!” I And when all had risen and taken their seats, a deacon in | an alb was to bring the book of Canons into the middle of I the assembly, and to read such as treated of the conduct i of Councils. Then the metropolitan [the archbishop who heads a group of dioceses] was to exhort all such j as had motions to make to propose them in order. And I each motion was to be considered in its entirety, and not | to be passed over to take up another of greater interest. If I anyone from without, priest, clerk, or layman, desired to ad1 dress the council, he must confer with the archdeacon, who I would announce his purpose to the council, and the council might permit him to enter to propose what he desired. And no bishop was to be suffered to depart from the council till it was closed and he had subscribed its canons.
In 636, S. Isidore died, after having governed his Church for about forty years. Feeling his end approach, he sent for two bishops, and going forth with them and followed by a great multitude of clergy and laity, uttering cries of sorrow, he went to the church of S. Vincent. On reaching the church he was carried into the choir, and all the women were put forth till the two bishops had put upon him a sackcloth habit, then he was laid upon ashes, and extending his hands to heaven, he prayed for pardon. After that, he received the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ from the two bishops, and asked all present to pray for him, and distributed all his money among the poor. It was Easter Eve. He was then carried back to his house, where he died, four days after, on April 4th, 636.
S. Braulio, Bishop of Saragossa, thus speaks of S. Isidore his contemporary: “ I think that God must have raised him up in these latter times to restore Spain from the decay into which it has fallen, to set up again the ancient landmarks and to save us from altogether becoming rude, and countrified.”
S. Isidore, besides leaving numerous writings, is believed to have composed or arranged the Mozarabic liturgy, though we have not got that liturgy now in exactly the same form as he is thought to have left it.
The body of S. Isidore reposes in the Church of his title at Leon in Spain. In art he is represented with a pen and a hive of bees. April 4-1 S. Plato.
