Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

DEATH OF ST. EDMUND.
241
He died at Soissy in Champagne on 16th November,
1242, and fulfilled his promise of returning to
Pontigny on St. Edmund's day. On the feast of
St. Edmund, king and martyr, his body was conveyed
to Poiitigny, where it now rests. Thus, two
out of the three holy English Edmunds had gained
their
crown.
The Constitutions
of St. Edmund drawn up by
him in 1236 show some of the evils with which
he had to contend: simony and immorality in the
clergy are the chief. There are penalties against
mothers who overlay their children, a common
misfortune in those days as evidenced by canons of
Councils. " In some cases the parents were obliged
to go into a monastery for this offence : in others to
do penance for three years, and for seven if drunkenness
or any other sin were the occasion of their overlaying
a child."l All are admonished to confess to
their parish priest once a year, an obligation as long
as the parochial system was in full force.
St. Edmund's successor was elected in his life-
time, that is, in 1240. Boniface of Savoy was a
Carthusian, and uncle of the Queen of England,
Eleanor of Provence. He was known as the
"Absalom of Savoy," but physical beauty was far
from being his greatest gift. He was consecrated by
the Pope himself in 1245, and one of his first acts as
archbishop was to obtain a papal privilege to enable
him to pay off the debts of the archiepiscopal see.
1 Alban Butler, 16th November, vol. ii. p. 877.
16