The Life of Saint Martin · Chapter XXI
Conversations with the angels and the Devil with the ox horn covered in blood
It is also known for certain that Martin often saw angels, even conversing directly with them. As for the Devil, he saw him so clearly before him that he could never slip past unnoticed, whether he appeared just as he was or took on the most varied disguises in order to do harm. Realising that there was no trick capable of deceiving Martin, the Devil took his revenge by turning up left, right and centre just to insult him, since he could not set traps for him.
One day he burst into Martin’s cell letting out a hideous roar, holding in his right hand, all smeared with blood, a bloodstained ox horn. Delighted with the misfortune he had just caused, he shouted at him: “Where is your power now, Martin? I have just killed one of yours!”
Martin immediately called the monks, told them what the Devil had just said and sent them to go through all the cells one by one to see who was missing or who had met with some misfortune. They came back shortly afterwards to say that the monks were all well, but that a peasant hired by the day to bring firewood in a cart had gone to the woods that morning. Martin at once asked some of the brothers to go and look for him with all speed. Not far from the monastery, they came upon the poor man stretched out on the ground, already almost dead. With the little breath he had left, he explained to the monks what had happened: as he was tightening the leather straps that had worked loose on the yoke of oxen, one of the animals tossed its head hard and drove a horn into his groin. A few moments later he died.
It is for each reader to reflect on the reasons why God allowed the Devil to have a hand in a misfortune like this. What was astonishing in Martin was the clarity with which, both in this case and in many similar ones, he knew of things long before they happened, or at once received an inner warning to tell the brothers what was going on at a distance.
There are two very beautiful human details in this chapter:
1. “One of yours”: Since the monks of Marmoutier lived withdrawn in prayer (and the youngest spent their days copying books), the monastery hired rural workers from the area (mercede conducti, paid by the day) to fetch firewood from the woods in ox-carts. Even though he was not a monk, that humble worker was part of Martin’s spiritual family.
2. No easy answers to suffering: Faced with the tragic death of that man in an accident at work, Sulpicius Severus does not try to invent a moralising lesson or to blame the victim. He has the honesty to leave the question open: “It is for each reader to reflect on the reasons why God allowed the Devil to have a hand in a misfortune like this” (Viderit is, quo judicio Domini...).