Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 9.djvu/633

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584


MANOHSBTEB


of Assyria; introduced the other enormities mentioned in the Sacred Text; and "made his son pass through fire" (verse 6) in the worship of Moloch. It was probably in this f rensy of his varied forms of idolatry that " Manasses shed also very much innocent blood, tin he filled Jerusalem up to the mouth" (verse 16). The historian of II Par. tells much the same storv, and adds that, in pimishment, the Lord brought the Assyrians upon jTuda. They carried Manasses to Babylon. The Lord heard his prayer for forgiveness and deliverance, and brought him again to Jerusalem, where Manasses did his part in stemming the tide of idolatry that he had formerly forced upon Juda (xzxiii, 11-20). At one time, doubt was oast on the historicity^ of this narrative of II Par., because IV Kings omits the captivity of Manasses . Schrader (op. cit., 2nd ed., Giessen, 1883, 355) gives cuneiform records of twenty-two Idn^ that submitted to Asar- haddon during his expedition against Egypt; second on the list is Mi-nansi-i sar ir Ya-u-di (Manasses, king of the city of Juda). Schrader also gives the fist m twenty-two kings who are recorded on a cuneiform tablet as tributaries to Asurbani]>al in the land of Qatti; second on this list is Mi-in-si-i sar mat Ya-u-di (Manasses, king of the land of Juda). Since a Baby- lonian brick confirms the record of the historian of II Par., his reputation is made a little more secure in rationalistic circles. Winckler and Zimmem admit the presence of Manasses in Babylon (see their re- vision of Schrader's " Keilinschr. und das A. T.". I, Berlin, 1902 274). Conjectures of the Pan-Baby- lonian School, as to the causes that led to the return of Manasses, the groundwork of the narrative in IV Kings, etc., do not militate against the historical worth of the Inspired Record.

The Tribe. — Deriving its naftie from Manasses (1^, son of Joseph, this tribe was divided into two half- tnbes— the eastern and the western. The tribe east of the Jordan was represented by the descendants of Machir (Judges, v, 14). Machir was the first-bom of Mainasses (Jos., xvii, 1). The children of Machir took Qalaad (Num., xxxii, 39); Moses gave the land of Qalaad to Machir (verse 40). Two other sons of Manasses, Jair and Nobe, also took villages in Galaad, and gave thereto their own names (verses 41-42). The territory of the western half-tribe is roughly sketched in Jos., xvi, 1-3. It was that part of Samaria which lay between the Jordan and tJie Mediterranean, the plain of Esdrelon and the towns of Jericho^ Sichem, and Samaria. The eastern half-tribe occupied north Galaad, all Basan, and Argob (Jos., xiii, 30-31; cf. Deut., iii, 13) — an immense tract of land extendingeast of Jordan to the present Mecca route (darb d~haj) and far beyond, so as to include the Hauran.

The Writing. — ^The Prayer of Manasses is an aprocryphal writing which puiports to give the prayer referred to in II Par., xxxiii, 13, 18-19. Its original is Greek. Nestle thinks that the prayer and other legends of Manasses in their present form are not earlier than the " Apost. Const. , xi, 22; and that the prayer found its way into some MSS. of the Septuagint as part, not of the Sept., but of the "Apost. CJonst." (see "Septuaginta Studien", III, 1889). The prayer is not in the canon of Trent, nor has there ever seemed to have been any serious claim to its canonicity.

Walter Drum.

Mance, Jeanne, foundress of the Montreal H6tel- Dieu, and one of the first women settlers in Canada, b. at Nogent-le-Roi Champacne, 1606; d. at Montreal, 19 June, 1673. Bom of a family who belonged to the magistracy, she lived with her father, Pierre Mance, procureur du roi (king's attomgr) until his death in 1640. In this year she met M. de La Dauversi^re, who, with M. Olier, was actively interested in the foun- dation of Montreal. For the first time Mile Mance heard of New Prance (Canada) and of the women who


were going there to consecrate themselves to the spreadmg of the Faith. She embarked at La Ro- cneUe in June, 1641, with P^re Laplace, a dozen men, and a pious young Dieppe woman. The following (probably 24) August sne reached Quebec, and de- voted herself durine the entire winter to the care of the settlers. They wisned to retain her at Quebec, but on 8 May, 1642, she w«it up the river with M. de Maison- neuve and her early companions, and reached Mon- treal on 17 May. It was she who decorated the sJtar on which the first Mass was said in Montreal (18 May, 1642). The same year she founded a hospital in her own home, a very humble one, into which sne received the sick, settlers or natives. Two vears later (1644) she opened a hospital in Rue St-Paul, which cost 6000 francs — a gift ot Mme de Bullion to Jeanne on her departure for Canada — and stood for fifty vears. For seventeen years she had sole care of this hospital.

In 1650 she visited France in the interests of the colony, and brought back 22.000 livres of the 60,000 set apart by Mme de Bullion tor the foundation of the hospital. On her return to Montreal, finding that without reinforcements^ the colonists must succumb under the attacks of the Iroquois and the many hard- ships of their position, she lent the hospital money to M. de Maisonneuve, who proceeded to France and organized a band of one hundred men for the defence of the colony. In 1659 Jeanne made a second trip to France to secure religious to assist her in her wqrk. She had for twentv months been suffering from a fractured wrist badly reduced, but in Paris, w^hile praying at Saint-Sulpice where M. Olier's heart was preserved, she was suddenly cured (2 Feb., 1659). She was so fortunate as to secure three Hospital Sis- ters of St. Joseph from the convent of La Fl^che in Anion, Judith Moreau de Br^oles, Catherine Mac6. and Marie Maillet. They had a rough passage ana the plague broke out on board. On their arrival, Mgr de Laval vainly tried to retain the three sisters at Quebec in the community of the Hospital Sisters of St. Augustine. Every obstacle having been over- come, they reached Montreal on 17 or 18 Octob^. Jeanne's good work being now fully establishedi she lived henceforth a more retired life. On her aeat^ after a long and painful illness, she was buried in the church of the H6tel-Dieu, the burning of which in 1695 destroyed at once the remains of the noble woman and the house that she had built. Her work, however, was continued, and two centuries later (1861) the hospital was transferred to the foot of Mount Royal, on the slope which overlooks the city and the river. The Hdtel-Dieu still flourishes, and in 1909 the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the arrival of the first three Hospital Sisters (1659) was solemnly celebrated. On the mitiative of Mgr Bnich^si, Arch- bishop of Montreal, a fine monument in bronze on a granite base, by the sculptor Philip Hubert, repre- soiting " Jeanne Mance soignant un colon bless^ , has bc«n decided on. The hospital contains more than 300 beds. It is estimated that the hospital cared for 82,000 patients between 1760 (dat« on which Canada was ceded to England) and 1860; 128,000 patients have been receivea between 1860 and 1910. A street and a public park in Montreal bear the name of Mance.

Annalea de la Sctur Morin (MS), from 1697 to 1725 and con- tinued by other annalists; Faillon, Vie de Mile Mance et Atj- toirede VH6tek-Dxeude Ville-Marie (2 vols., Paris, 1864); Bru- MATS, Vie de Mile Mance d commencements de la colonie de Montreal (Montreal, 1883); Ladnay, Hifttoire den religieueea hoe- pitalti-ree de St-Joeeph (2 vols., Paris, 1887) ; Auclair, Lea /He* de VHOtd-Dieu en 1909 (Montreal, 1909). illustrated.

Elie-J. Auclair.

Manchester, Diogebe of (Manchesteriensis), suffragan of the Archdiocese of Boston, U. S. A. The city of Manchester is situated on the Merrimac River, in the Stiite of New Hampshire, and was granted its charter 10 July , 1846. Its population is about 70,000, nearly three-fifths of which is Catholic. There are in