August 10

FEAST OF ST. LAURENCE, DEACON AND MARTYR.

DURING the persecution under Valerian in the year 258, this heroic saint died a torturing death over a slow fire.

It is related of him as of St. Stephen, that while undergoing his agony his face was glorified as the face of an angel. His eyes gazed fixedly on heaven, his countenance remained unruffled.

To so sweet a soul, sorer perhaps than pangs of the body, had been that pang of parting when three days earlier his beloved Priest and Pope St. Sixtus went up before him by the road of martyrdom to the kingdom of peace.

   To meet, worth living for;
      Worth dying for, to meet;
   To meet, worth parting for,
      Bitter forgot in sweet:
   To meet, worth parting before
   Never to part more.