Order, in 1623, and
she was canonized by Benedict XIII. in 1728.

SS. THALASSIUS AND LIMNEUS, CC.

THEY were contemporaries with the great Theodoret, bishop of Cyr, and
lived in his diocese. The former dwelt in a cavern in a neighboring
mountain, and was endowed with extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost,
but was a treasure unknown to the world. His disciple St. Limneus was
famous for miraculous cures of the sick, while he himself bore patiently
the sharpest colics and other distempers without any human succor. He
opened his enclosure only to Theodoret, his bishop, but spoke to others
through a window. See Theodoret, Phil. c. 22.

ST. BARADAT, C.

HE lived in the same diocese, in a solitary hut, made of wood in
trellis, like windows, says Theodoret,[1] exposed to all the severities
of the weather. He was clothed with the skins of wild beasts, and by
conversing continually with God, he attained to an eminent degree of
wisdom, and knowledge of heavenly things. He left his wooden prison by
the order of the patriarch of Antioch, giving a proof of his humility by
his ready obedience. He studied to imitate all the practices of penance,
which all the other solitaries of those parts exercised, though of a
tender constitution himself. The fervor of his soul, and the fire of
divine love, supported him under his incredible labors {445} though his
body was weak and infirm. It is sloth that makes us so often allege a
pretended weakness of constitution, in the practice of penance and the
exercises of devotion, which courage and fervor would not even feel. See
Theodoret, Phil. c. 22, t. 3, p. 868, and c. 27.

Footnotes:
1. This passage of Theodoret shows, that the windows of the ancients
were made of trellis or wicker before the invention of glass; though
not universally; for in the ruins of Herculaneum, near Portichi were
found windows of a diaphanous thin slate, such as the rich in Rome
sometimes used.

FEBRUARY XXIII.

ST. SERENUS, A GARDENER, MARTYR.

From his genuine acts in Ruinart, p. 546.

A.D. 327.

SERENUS was by birth a Grecian. He quitted estate, friends, and country,
to serve God in an ascetic life, that is, in celibacy, penance, and
prayer. Coming with this design to Sirmium, in Pannonia or Hungary, he
there bought a garden, which he cultivated with his own hands, and lived
on the fruits and herbs it produced. The apprehension of the persecution
made him hide himself for some months; afte