Page:Barlaam and Josaphat. English lives of Buddha.djvu/24

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INTRODUCTION.

case for sainthood has been made out. Before canonisation can be obtained, the searching cross-examination of the Avvocato del Diavolo must be triumphantly sustained. Modern scholarship has acted the part of the Devil's Advocate with the result that the next edition of the Roman Martyrology will not, in all probability, contain the names of Barlaam and Josaphat.

But that these mysterious personages have been regarded by clergy and laity as veritable Saints of the Church, there can be no doubt. Sir Henry Yule visited a church at Palermo dedicated "Divo Josaphat."[1] In 1571 the Doge Luigi Mocenigo presented to King Sebastian of Portugal a bone and part of the spine of St. Josaphat. When Spain seized Portugal in 1580 these sacred treasures were removed by Antonio, the Pretender to the Portuguese crown, and ultimately found their way to Antwerp. On August 7, 1672, a grand procession defiled through the streets of Antwerp, carrying to the cloister of St. Salvator the holy remains of St. Josaphat. There, for ought

  1. It is, however, just possible that this refers to a Polish saint of that name of the seventeenth century.