n of their plundering the cathedral of
Bourges, as Baillet and Bollandus mention. A bone of his arm is shown
with veneration at Chaalis, whither it had been sent soon after the
saint's body was taken up; and a rib is preserved in the church of the
college of Navarre, at Paris, on which the canons of St. Bourges
bestowed it in 1399.[2] His festival is kept in that church with great,
solemnity, and a great concourse of devout persons; St. William being
regarded in several parts of France as one of the patrons of the nation,
though his name is not mentioned in the Roman Martyrology. The
celebrated countess Maud, his niece, out of veneration for his memory,
bestowed certain lands in the {122} Nivernois, on the church of
Bourges.[3] B. Philip Berruyer, a nephew of St. William, was archbishop
of Bourges from the year 1236 to 1260, in which he died in the odor of
sanctity. Nangi ascribes to him many miracles, and other historians bear
testimony to his eminent virtue.[4] Dom Martenne has published his
edifying original life.[5]

* * * * *

If we look into the lives of all the saints, we shall find that it was
by a spirit and gift of prayer that the Holy Ghost formed in their
hearts the most perfect sentiments of all virtues. It is this which
enlightens the understanding, and infuses a spiritual knowledge, and a
heavenly wisdom, which is incomparably more excellent than that in which
philosophers pride themselves. The same purifies the affections,
sanctifies the soul, adorns it with virtues, and enriches it with every
gift of heaven. Christ, who is the eternal wisdom, came down among us on
earth to teach us more perfectly this heavenly language, and he alone is
our master in it. He vouchsafed also to be our model. In the first
moment in which his holy soul began to exist, it exerted all its powers
in contemplating and adorning the divine Trinity, and employed his
affections in the most ardent acts of praise, love, thanksgiving,
oblation, and the like. His whole moral life was an uninterrupted
prayer; more freely to apply himself to this exercise, and to set us an
example, he often retired into mountains and deserts, and spent whole
nights in prayer; and to this employment he consecrated his last breath
upon the cross. By him the saints were inspired to conceive an infinite
esteem for holy prayer, and such a wonderful assiduity and ardor in this
exercise, that many renounced altogether the commerce