t by his death regent of the
empire during the minority of her son, Michael III., she put an end to
the Iconoclast heresy, one hundred and twenty years after the first
establishment of it by Leo the Isaurian: and the patriarch Methodius
with great solemnity restored holy images in the great church in
Constantinople, on the first Sunday of Lent, which we call the second,
of which event the Greeks make an annual commemoration, calling it the
feast of Orthodoxy. After she had governed the empire with great glory
twelve years, she was banished by her unnatural son and his impious
uncle, Bardas. She prepared herself for death by spending the last eight
years of her life in a monastery, where she gave up her soul to God in
867. She is ranked among the saints in the Menology of the emperor
Basil, in the Menaea, and other calendars of the Greeks. See the
compilations of Bollandus from the authors of the Byzantine history.

FEBRUARY XII.

ST. BENEDICT, OF ANIAN, ABBOT.

From his life, written with great piety, gravity, and erudition, by St.
Ardo Smaragdus, his disciple, to whom he committed the government of his
monastery of Anian, when he was called by the emperor near the court.
Ardo died March the 7th, in 843, and is honored at Anian among the
saints. He is not to be confounded with Smaragdus, abbot in the diocese
of Verdun, author of a commentary on the rules of St. Bennet. This
excellent life is published by Dom Menard, at the head of St. Bennet's
Concordia Regularum; by Henschenius, 12 Feb., and by Dom Mabillon, Acta
SS. Ben., vol. 5, pp. 191, 817. See Helyot, Hist. des Ord. Relig. t. 5,
p. 139. See also Bulteau, Hist. de l'Ord. de S. Benoit, l. 5, c. 2, p.
342. Eckart. de Reb. Fran. t. 2, pp. 117, 163.

A.D. 821.

HE was the son of Aigulf, count or governor of Languedoc, and served
king Pepin and his son Charlemagne in quality of cupbearer, enjoying
under them great honors and possessions. Grace made him sensible of the
vanity of all perishable goods, and at twenty years of age he took a
resolution of seeking the kingdom of God with his whole heart. From that
time he led a most mortified life in the court itself for three years,
eating very sparingly and of the coarsest fare, allowing himself very
little sleep, and mortifying all his senses. In 774, having narrowly
escaped being drowned in the Tesin, near Pavia, in endeavoring to save
his brother, he made a vow to quit the world entirely. Returning to
Languedoc, h