Cepari, Virgilio

CEPARI, VIRGILIO. - Jesuit, hagiographer and ascetical writer, b. at Panicale on Lake Trasimeno in 1563 or '64, d. at Rome on 14 March 1631. Professor of theology at Parma and Padua, rector at Florence and Rome, he long concerned himself with the subject of beatifications and canonizations (he was indeed the promoter of the causes of St. Robert Bellarmine, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, St. John Berchmans, and St. Mary Magdalene de' Pazzi, of whom he was also spiritual director) and cooperated in the establishment of the Virgins of Jesus founded by the three nieces of St. Aloysius.

He wrote: Vita del S. Luigi Gonzaga, primogenito di D. Ferrante Gonzaga, Principe dell'Imperio, Marchese di Castiglione (Rome 1606); Esercizio della presenza di Dio (Milan and Rome 1621), so esteemed by St. R. Bellarmine that he had it in his hands in the last hours of his life; Regole Comuni delle Vergini di Gesù nel Collegio di Castiglione (Bologna 1622); Ristretto della vita del b. Francesco Borgia, che fu duca di Gandia... (Rome 1624); Vita di G. Berchmans, Fiammingo... (ibid. 1627); Vita di s. Francesca Romana (ibid. 1641); Vita della serafica vergine suor Maria M. de' Pazzi, Fiorentina (ibid. 1669); he also wrote Directorium canonizationis Sanctorum, which remained in manuscript, praised and used for the composition of his work by Benedict XIV.

Celestino Testore