Chapter 8

SAINT ELIZABETH OF HUNGARY

More than seven hundred years ago there was born at Presburg in Hungary, a royal princess, who became one of the most pious women that the world has ever seen and whose good deeds have lived until the present day. This woman was christened Elizabeth. She was the daughter of King Andrew the Second of Hungary and of Gertrude, formerly a princess in Dalmatia; and soothsayers and prophets at the time of her birth foretold her coming greatness.

Elizabeth was born in 1207--a century when religion was more simple than it is to-day and when people believed that miracles were still being performed. It was a time, too, when a fiery passion for religion ruled the world. Soldiers were intent on crusades into the Holy Land to capture the city of Jerusalem and to rescue the tomb of the Savior from the hands of the heathen, and fanatical bands called "flagellants" were soon to appear throughout Europe--men and women who scourged each other with whips in public places until they fell down fainting from pain and exhaustion, believing that this practice was welcome in the eyes of the Lord and would assure them a place in Paradise.

It was a time when unquestioning faith held the minds and beliefs of men. Nothing seemed too marvelous to be accomplished through Divine means. When a great poet of whom we shall tell you later, wrote about Hell, Heaven and Purgatory, his neighbors all believed that he had really visited those places and seen all the wonders that he described. So when soothsayers and astrologers foretold that the infant Elizabeth was to become one of the Saints of Heaven, as the legends tell us they predicted, people marveled, but believed, for it did not seem strange for Angels and Saints to appear to the eyes of mortal men.

It was customary in those days for children of high rank to be betrothed almost before they had quitted the cradle, and when Elizabeth was four years old she was engaged to be married to the eldest son of the Landgrave of Thuringia--a boy named Herman who was about ten years older than herself. And it was also customary at that time for the future bride to be brought up in the house of her intended husband, so a number of lords and ladies came from Thuringia to fetch the Princess Elizabeth away.

She returned with them in great splendor, and many wagons and strong horses were needed to carry back to Thuringia all the costly things that went with her, for she was provided with every comfort and luxury then known. We are told that her dresses were all of the most costly silks adorned with precious stones, that her cradle, which was of silver, accompanied her to the house of the future bridegroom, that even her bath was of silver and so heavy that it was all that her handmaidens could do to carry it, and a large sum of money was allotted as her bridal portion or dowry.

Elizabeth was too young to remain homesick for any length of time after she left her parents, and she was kindly received in her new family. The Landgrave himself, Herman the First, was a kind-hearted man as well as a noble and distinguished ruler, and his second son, Ludwig, had qualities of greatness that gave every promise for the country if it should ever come under his direction. But the other children of the Landgrave, the princes named Conrad and Heinrich, were of different calibre from their brother Ludwig, and so was the girl, Agnes, who was about Elizabeth's own age. Herman, the eldest son, soon died, and Elizabeth was then betrothed to Ludwig.

When she was little more than a baby Elizabeth began to show signs of the religious fervor that was to shape her entire life. She prayed frequently and always tried to bring the forms of religious worship into the games that she played with her companions. She spent long hours at prayer and frequently arose to pray at night, and whenever she had the opportunity she practiced self-denial that was believed to be acceptable in the eyes of Heaven by withdrawing herself from some pleasure that she was taking part in, or abstaining when at table from some dainty that she loved.

Three years after Elizabeth had gone to live in Thuringia something happened that deepened her spiritual ardor, for her mother, Gertrude, was murdered in the absence of the King, and Andrew himself had to engage in war to put down the rebellion that had arisen in his country. This was a great sorrow to the little girl, although she remembered her mother only dimly, and it resulted in her saying more frequent prayers and giving more thought to her religion than before.

Many stories are told us of Elizabeth's piety. On one occasion, when she was dressed in her finest garments she beheld a crucifix supporting a life-size image of the Savior, and with an outburst of tears she threw herself on the ground at the foot of the crucifix, declaring that she could not bear to wear fine raiment and jewels, while her Lord was crowned with thorns. She did many other things of the same sort, and at last reaped the displeasure of the Landgrave's wife, Sophia, and of the courtiers and menials of the royal castle,--for Elizabeth's gentleness and piety were a constant reproach to the more worldly persons that surrounded her.

When Elizabeth was ten years old there took place another of the crusades in which knights, nobles and common peasants set forth for the Holy Land to make war against the heathen; and Elizabeth's father, the King of Hungary, left his dominions to engage in the holy war. There was grave doubt if he would ever return, and it seemed too as if his throne might be wrested from him by rebellion in his absence; so many of the noblemen and statesmen of Thuringia believed that the marriage of Ludwig with Elizabeth would be unwise, since there might be no benefit to be reaped from it on behalf of the State. The Landgravine Sophia, we are told, was inclined to agree with them--all the more so because the kind ruler, Herman, had lately died and Ludwig was now on the throne of Thuringia, and could marry some great princess whose country was not in the danger of civil war.

It is not known if the stories of the ill-treatment that was then visited on the helpless little Elizabeth are true or not, but many writers have told us that Sophia was determined by harshness and unkindness to force Elizabeth to enter a convent so that her son would be free to marry elsewhere. At all events, Ludwig heard of the plans to break off his engagement, and angrily refused to listen to them, declaring that he loved Elizabeth dearly and would marry her in spite of every person and relative in his dominions. And when Elizabeth was fourteen years old, she was married with great magnificence to Ludwig, who was as handsome as he was honorable, and made a fitting husband for the beautiful young girl who had already become famous for her great piety and her charitable deeds.

The marriage was ideally happy, for the young couple was passionately attached, and Ludwig encouraged his wife in her pious and kindly undertakings. He understood her so well and gave her such hearty support in her dealings with the poor and her gifts of food, money and clothing, that after his death he was often referred to as Saint Ludwig, just as his wife was called Saint Elizabeth.

Ludwig, however, did not like to see his wife go poorly dressed, and she wore splendid raiment to please him. Moreover, he disapproved of her giving so much time and effort to her charity and her prayers that she taxed her strength. She had to desist from many of her undertakings, or perform them without his knowledge, when he feared that her severe fasts and her long prayers were wearing out her health; and Elizabeth would steal from her chamber to pray when she thought him asleep, and would wear a coarse sackcloth skirt beneath the silks that pleased him.

One time, when Ludwig was climbing the steep path to the castle of the Wartburg where he held his court, he met Elizabeth, who was carrying in her dress loaves of bread for the poor people in the nearby village of Marburg. Elizabeth always tried to perform her charity secretly, for she believed that it would lose its value if it were widely known--and moreover she feared that her husband would not approve of her taking a heavy burden down the steep path into the village. When he stopped her and gaily asked her what she had in her apron, she opened it shyly, expecting him to blame her when he saw its contents--but how great was her amazement as well as his when there tumbled forth upon the ground a profusion of the sweetest smelling roses of all colors, which had miraculously taken the place of the provisions that Elizabeth had carried!

That was only the first of a series of miracles that those who worshipped her memory have accredited to her lifetime, and Ludwig, astonished and awed by what had taken place, is said to have erected a monument at the spot where the beautiful roses appeared.

Elizabeth pitied the sick and tended them with the utmost kindness--and she was particularly kind to the wretched sufferers from the dreadful disease of leprosy. From earliest times the leper was an outcast from his fellow men. They fled at his approach, and he was obliged to warn them of his coming by outcry, or by use of a clapper or bell. But Elizabeth went to the lepers without fear and fed and comforted them, and even bathed their sores and bandaged them with her own hands.

At last her father, King Andrew, returned from the crusade, and on his way back to his own dominions stopped in Thuringia to see his daughter. By this time Elizabeth had refused to wear her splendid garments any longer and had parted with all except her simplest dresses; and Ludwig feared that her father the King might blame him for not maintaining Elizabeth in the state that was her due as a royal princess, so he inquired of Elizabeth if she had any fine dress to wear when greeting her father. She replied that she had none, but that by grace of God some way would be found out of the difficulty; and when she put on the only dress that was left to her it suddenly changed by a miracle into a gown so beautiful and lustrous that its like had never been seen before, and King Andrew rejoiced in the appearance of his daughter when she came before him.

By this time Elizabeth had two children, and the Landgrave was rejoiced. He was a powerful and a wise ruler, and while he was perfectly just, he punished evil-doers with a hand of iron. On one occasion he was called away from home to give aid to the Emperor Frederick the Second in putting down a revolt in his dominions; and Elizabeth ruled over Thuringia until his return.

Famine and pestilence wasted the country, and the gentle lady was sorely beset to give aid to her suffering people. She spent so much on charity that she nearly emptied the treasury, and even sold the robes of state and the official ornaments to feed the poor. When Ludwig returned he found his coffers nearly empty--but the money had been wisely used, for Elizabeth had saved the lives of many of his subjects.

Then another crusade took place and the brave Ludwig planned to join it and do his share in driving the heathen Saracens away from the tomb of Christ. With bitterness and sorrow he said farewell to his wife whom he loved above all things, and kissed his children for the last time. For when he was waiting at Otranto to embark for the far east, a terrible pestilence broke out among the crusaders and Ludwig sickened and died.

Word of his death was brought to Elizabeth, who had just given birth to her third child. And when she heard of it she wept bitterly, crying out that now the world was dead to her indeed, and she never could know joy again, since her dear lord was taken from her.

For a time she ruled over Thuringia, but she was hated in the court on account of her piety, and according to many stories of her life, the dead Landgrave's brothers, Conrad and Heinrich, conspired against her. At all events, her life was most unhappy, and in the dead of winter she quitted the court and went to live in the village, earning her daily bread by spinning for her living, and eating barely enough to keep alive. And all the villagers whom she had treated kindly, now that they found her alone and poor and out of favor at court, would do nothing for her, and she was laughed at and insulted on the streets.

But in this time she was sustained by divine means, for she began to have visions of Heavenly things and beheld angels, and once, so she declares, she saw the face of the Savior himself, who looked down on her and comforted her.

At last Elizabeth went to live with her uncle, the Bishop of Bamberg, who treated her with the utmost kindness. She had been obliged to send her children away in the bitter winter that she had been through, and soon she was obliged to leave the Bishop's protection, for he desired her to marry again, and this she refused to do. She went to live in a cottage and took with her two of her former waiting women who accompanied her all through the hardships she had suffered, and she busied herself with caring for the sick and giving alms from the small amount of money that was allowed for her support.

At this time Elizabeth came under the influence of a priest and a religious enthusiast called Master Conrad, previously known to her, who was an ardent, though a narrow-minded believer in the Catholic faith; and Conrad encouraged her in the severe rites of self-denial that she practised. At times he punished her with the lash and at last he brought her completely under the domination of his will. But she yielded so readily to all penances and voluntary inflictions of sufferings that even this fanatical zealot was compelled to restrain her, for Elizabeth desired constantly to do more than he suggested or wished. At last, with her two waiting women, Elizabeth became a member of the Third Order of Saint Francis, renounced her family and children, and spent all her time in caring for the sick and visiting the afflicted.

She ate almost nothing, and her strength soon gave way under the privations that she endured. Although she was only twenty-four years old, she had suffered so greatly that her vitality was sapped and she had not long to live. She died on November 19, 1231, and Master Conrad himself soon followed her to the grave.

Elizabeth had not wasted herself in vain, in spite of the fanatical zeal of her belief and the needless sufferings that she inflicted upon herself. For years she had cared for nine hundred poor folk every day, and she had founded a hospital of twenty-eight beds that she visited daily. She had encouraged her husband in kindness and generous government, and she saved countless lives in the winter when she herself sat on the throne of Thuringia.

After her death the zealous Conrad set about collecting proofs of the miracles that had happened in connection with her, to submit them to the Pope, who might declare her to be a Saint. Further proofs were forthcoming even after she had died, for when pilgrims visited her tomb many of them were marvelously cured of the sicknesses from which they had been suffering. Her brother-in-law, Conrad, repenting of his former treatment of her, built a splendid church in her honor, and her bones were laid in their last resting-place a few years after her death. In the meantime the Pope examined all the proofs of her piety and holiness, as well as of the cures that had been effected at her tomb, and at last Elizabeth was made a Saint, and became known as Saint Elizabeth of Hungary. For centuries pilgrims have worshipped at her shrine, and the church that was built in her memory still stands as a monument of the wonderful life of this holy woman who lived and died the better part of a thousand years ago.