Extracts from the Life of St. Lydwine of Schiedam

Today is her feast day. . .

Her story is a very moving one. . .

Here is an incident from her life. . .

'One day two men were quarrelling in a Square, and one of them, drawing his sword, fell upon the other, who, being either disarmed or less courageous, took to flight. Seeing the door of Lydwine's house open at the corner of the street, he burst in. His adversary, who had not seen him enter, suspected, nevertheless, that he had taken refuge there, and seeing Petronille looking at him in terror on the threshold, he cried, foaming with rage: "Where is he, this son of death? Do not try to deceive me, he must be hidden with you!" She assured him, trembling, that he was not; but he did not believe her. Pushing her aside and uttering the most terrible threats, he penetrated right into Lydwine's room and commanded the sick girl not to deceive him.

Lydwine, incapable of lying, replied: "He whom you are pursuing is indeed here." At these words Petronille, who had slipped in behind the man, could not contain herself and boxed her girl's ears, crying: "How now, miserable fool, you give up a man who is your guest when he is in danger of death!"

The furious man, however, neither saw nor heard anything of this scene. Blaspheming aloud, he searched for his enemy who had become invisible to him, but who was standing before him in the middle of the room. Not discovering him, he rushed out to recover his traces, whilst his antagonist decamped in the other direction as quickly as his legs would carry him. When they had gone, Lydwine, who had received this correction without complaint, murmured: "I thought, mother, that the fact of telling the truth would suffice to save this man"; and Petronille, admiring her daughter's faith and the miracle which had rewarded it, was filled with the most kindly sentiments and in future bore the trouble which Lydwine's infirmities caused her with less resentment and bitterness.'

And another extract:

This was the dreaded plague of the Middle Ages, the fire of the burning ill, which attacked the right arm and consumed the flesh to the bone. The nerves all twisted and broke, except one which retained the arm and prevented it from becoming detached from the trunk. It was from now onwards impossible for Lydwine to turn herself to this side, and only her left arm remained free to raise her head, which was also attacked. Violent neuralgic pains assailed her, which bored into her temples like a gimlet and beat like a mallet with constant blows on her skull. Her forehead was cleft from the roots of the hair to the centre of the nose; her chin dropped under the lower lip, and her mouth swelled ; her right eye was extinguished, and the other became so tender that the least light caused it to bleed. She suffered also from violent toothache, which raged sometimes for weeks and rendered her half mad; and finally, after a quinsy, which suffocated her, she lost blood through the mouth, ears, and nose, with such profusion that the bed was running with it. Those who stood by wondered how such a quantity of blood could flow from a body so completely exhausted, and poor Lydwine tried to smile.

"Say," she murmured, "you who have been in the world longer than I, whence can that sap come which in spring swells the vine, so black and bare in winter?

And another:

"Tell me, father abbot," said the Prelate, reassured by this smile, "how long have you lived in this tree?"
"For seventeen years," replied the hermit.
"How old were you when you fled from the world?"
"Nineteen years."
"And what do you live on?" continued the Englishman.
"I can discover no trace of roots or vegetation round your lair, and yet your obesity is unrivalled." "He who fed the children of Israel in the wilderness sees to it that I want nothing," replied Gerard. The bishop thought he was speaking of spiritual food and asked him if he knew any other human creature who lived without eating. "Yes, in Holland, in a little town called Schiedam, a virgin has lived fasting for years, and has raised herself to such a high state of perfection that she is far in advance of me. We converse, however, and have done so for a long time, in the uncreated light; but one thing does astonish me at this moment: for some days now she has not left the earth and I do not perceive her spirit in ecstasy; and yet she is not dead!"

'I think I can divine, nevertheless," pursued Gerard, after a pause, "that she has afflicted herself more than is justified over the loss of one near and dear to her, and that GOD has allowed her to do' this in order to humiliate her. I think it is because of the intemperance of her tears that the Saviour deprives her for the moment of His grace. When you return to Europe, if you go by the Low Countries, go and see her and put these three questions to her from me."'

The rest can be read in the two books of the life of 'St. Lydwine of Schiedam' available for free on Saints' Books or for purchase at an old book seller's.