had died excommunicate or under some curse, and was at any rate in a state of unhappiness, of painful detention or probation. It is now necessary to consider an aspect of the question which is diametrically and entirely opposed to this idea, namely those cases where incorruption is an evidence of extraordinary sanctity, when the mortal remains of some great saint having been exhumed after death are found to be miraculously preserved for the veneration of the faithful. It is not perhaps even to-day generally recognized how solemn and weighty, how lengthy and detailed a process is that inquiry which must precede those decrees regarding religious honour paid to a deceased person distinguished for eminent holiness of life whether it be that permissive cultus known as Beatification, or that complete preceptive universal cultus known as Canonization. The real trial of a subject proposed for Canonization may be said to begin when a number of very exhaustive examinations have already been made, which for all their rigour are preliminary and ordinary, and the Apostolic process commences which investigates the Virtues and Miracles of the person. S. Thomas defines a miracle as an effect which is beyond the “Order of the whole of created nature.” And he explains this by telling us that, if a man throws a stone up into the air, such a motion is no wise miraculous, for though it exceed the powers in a nature of a stone, it is produced by the natural power of man, and therefore it does not exceed the power of the whole of created nature. Besides genuine miracles a number of marvellous phenomena may be and indeed are exhibited, many of which are due to natural powers, as yet imperfectly known or entirely unknown, to hallucination, or to fraud. Therefore miracles do not constitute sanctity of themselves, and Benedict XIV discusses in his great work Ds Seruorum Dei Beatificatione st Beatorum Canonizatione, IV, pars. I, c. iv. Ds Fine Miraculorum, et de differentiis inter uera et falsa Miracula.[57] The same great authority lays down that heroic virtues are the first and most decisive witness to sanctity; “visions, prophecies and miracles are only of secondary importance, and they are absolutely ignored if proof of heroic virtues is not forthcoming.” This is further insisted upon by Scacchus,[58] and Castellinus[59] prudently says: “Not all the just are to be canonized by the Church, but those who have shone forth with heroic
