To these summonses Mendel Cerf replied that she would not return with him, and that she required him to send her, according to the Jewish forms, a bill of divorce, in order that she might marry another Jew.
Levi was not satisfied with this answer; he sent no bill of divorce; but he caused his wife to appear before the official of Strasburg, who, by a sentence of Sept. 7, 1754, declared that, in the sight of the Church, he was at liberty to marry a Catholic woman.
Furnished with this sentence, the Christianized Jew came into the diocese of Soissons, and there made promise of marriage to a young woman of Villeneuve. The clergyman refused to publish the banns. Levi communicated to him the summonses he had sent to his wife, the sentence of the official of Strasburg, and a certificate from the secretary of the bishopric of that place, attesting, that in that diocese baptized Jews had at all times been permitted to contract new marriages with Catholics, and that this usage had constantly been recognized by the Supreme Council of Colmar. But these documents appeared to the parson of Villeneuve to be insufficient. Levi was obliged to summon him before the official of Soissons.
This official did not think, like him of Strasburg, that the marriage of Levi with Mendel Cerf was null or dissoluble. By his sentence of Feb. 5, 1756, he declared the Jew's claim to be inadmissible. The latter appealed from this sentence to the Parliament of Paris, where he was not only opposed by the public ministry, but, by a decree of Jan. 2, 1758, the sentence was confirmed, and Levi was again forbidden to contract any marriage during the life of Mendel Cerf.
Here, then, a marriage contracted between French Jews, according to the Jewish rites, was declared valid by the first court in the kingdom.
But, some years afterwards, the same question was decided differently in another parliament, on the subject of a marriage contracted between two French Protestants, who had been married in the presence of their parents by a minister of their own communion. The Protestant spouse had, like the Jew, changed his religion; and after he had concluded a second marriage with a Catholic, the Parliament of Grenoble confirmed this second marriage, and declared the first to be null.
If we pass from jurisprudence to legislation, we shall find it as obscure on this important matter as on so many others.
A decree of the council, of Sept. 15, 1685, says: "Protestants may marry, provided, however, that it be in the presence of the principal officer of justice, and that the publication preceding such marriages shall be made at the royal see nearest the place of abode of each of the Protestants desirous of marrying, and at the audience only."
This decree was not revoked by the edict which, three weeks after, suppressed the Edict of Nantes. But after the declaration of May 14, 1724, drawn up by Cardinal Fleury, the judges would no longer preside over the marriages of Protestants, nor permit their banns to be published in their audiences.
By Article XV. of this law, the forms prescribed by the canons are to be observed in marriages, as well of new converts as of all the rest of the king's subjects.
This general expression, "all the rest of the king's subjects," has been thought to comprehend the Protestants, as well as the Catholics, and on this interpretation, such marriages of Protestants as were not solemnized according to the canonical forms have been annulled.
Nevertheless, it seems that the marriages of Protestants having been authorized by an express law, they cannot now be admitted but by another express law carrying with it this penalty. Besides, the term "new converts", mentioned in the declaration, appears to indicate that the term that follows relates to the Catholics only. In short, when the civil law is obscure or ambiguous, ought not the judges to decide according to the natural and the moral law?
Does it not result from all this that laws often have need of reformation, and princes of consulting better informed counsellors, rejecting priestly ministers, and distrusting courtiers in the garb of confessors?
I must own that I know not where the author of the "Critical History of Jesus Christ" found that St. Mary Magdalen had a criminal intimacy (des complaisances criminelles) with the "Saviour of the world." He says (page 130, line 11 of the note) that this is an assertion of the Albigenses. I have never read this horrible blasphemy either in the history of the Albigenses, or in their profession of faith. It is one of the great many things of which I am ignorant. I know that the Albigenses had the dire misfortune of not being Roman Catholics; but, otherwise, it seems to me, they had the most profound reverence for the person of Jesus.
This author of the "Critical History of Jesus Christ" refers us to the "Christiade," a sort of poem in prose—granting that there are such things as poems in prose. I have, therefore, been obliged to consult the passage of the "Christiade" in which this accusation is made. It is in the fourth book or canto, page 335, note 1; the poet of the "Christiade" cites no authority. In an epic poem, indeed, citations may be spared; but great authorities are requisite in prose, when so grave an assertion is made—one which makes every Christian's hair stand erect.
Whether the Albigenses advanced this impiety or not, the only result is that the author of the "Christiade" sports on the brink of criminality. He somewhat imitates the famous sermon of Menot. He introduces us to Mary Magdalen, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, brilliant with all the charms of youth and beauty, burning with every desire, and immersed in every voluptuousness. According to him, she is a lady at court, exalted in birth and in riches; her brother Lazarus was count of Bethany, and herself marchioness of Magdalet. Martha had a splendid portion, but he does not tell us where her estates lay. "She had," says the man of the "Christiade," "a hundred servants, and a crowd of lovers; she might have threatened the liberty of the whole world. But riches, dignities, ambitions, grandeur, never were so dear to Magdalen as the seductive error which caused her to be named the sinner. Such was the sovereign beauty of the capital when the young and divine hero arrived there from the extremities of Galilee. Her other passions yielded to the ambition of subduing the hero of whom she had heard."
The author of the "Christiade" then imitates Virgil. The marchioness of Magdalet conjures her portioned sister to furnish her coquettish designs upon her young hero, as Dido employed her sister Anna to gain the pious Æneas.
She goes to hear Christ's sermon in the temple, although he never preached there. "Her heart flies before her to the hero she adores; she awaits but one favorable look to triumph over him, to subdue this master of hearts and make him her captive."
She then goes to him at the house of Simon the Leper, a very rich man, who was giving him a grand supper, although the women were never admitted at these feastings, especially among the Pharisees. She pours a large pot of perfumes upon his legs, wipes them with her beautiful fair hair, and kisses them.
I shall not inquire whether the picture which the author draws of Magdalen's holy transports is not more worldly than devout; whether the kisses given are not expressed rather too warmly; nor whether this fine hair with which she wipes her hero's legs, does not remind one too strongly of Trimalcion, who, at dinner, wiped his hands with the hair of a young and beautiful slave. He must himself have felt that his pictures might be fancied too glowing; for he anticipates criticism by giving some pieces from a sermon of Massillon's on Magdalen. One passage is as follows:
"Magdalen had sacrificed her reputation to the world. Her bashfulness and her birth at first defended her against the emotions of her passion; and it is most likely, that to the first shaft which assailed her, she opposed the barrier of her modesty and her pride; but when she had lent her ear to the serpent, and consulted her own wisdom, her heart was open to all assaults of passion. Magdalen loved the world, and thenceforward all was sacrificed to this love; neither the pride that springs from birth, nor the modesty which is the ornament of her sex, is spared in this sacrifice; nothing can withhold her; neither the railleries of worldlings, nor the infidelities of her infatuated lovers, whom she fain would please, but by whom she cannot make herself esteemed—for virtue only is estimable; nothing can make her ashamed; and like the prostitute in the "Apocalypse," she bears on her forehead the name of mystery; that is, she was veiled, and was no longer known but in the character of the foolish passion."
I have sought this passage in Massillon's sermons, but it certainly is not in the edition which I possess. I will venture to say more—it is not in his style.
The author of the "Christiade" should have informed us where he picked up this rhapsody of Massillon's, as he should have told us where he read that the Albigenses dared to impute to Jesus Christ an unworthy intercourse with Mary Magdalen.
As for the marchioness, she is not again mentioned in the work. The author spares us her voyage to Marseilles with Lazarus, and the rest of her adventures.
What could induce a man of learning, and sometimes of eloquence, as the author of the "Christiade" appears to be, to compose this pretended poem? It was, as he tells us in his preface, the example of Milton; but we well know how deceitful are examples. Milton, who—be it observed—did not hazard that weakly monstrosity, a poem in prose—Milton, who in his Paradise Lost, has, amid the multitude of harsh and obscure lines of which it is full, scattered some very fine blank verse—could not please any but fanatical Whigs, as the Abbé Grécourt says:
En chantant l'univers perdu pour une pomme,Et Dieu pour le damner créant le premier homme.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . By singingHow God made man on purpose for hell-fire,And how a stolen apple damned us all.
He might delight the Presbyterians by making Sin cohabit with Death; by firing off twenty-four pounders in heaven; by making dryness fight with damp, and heat with cold; by cleaving angels in two, whose halves immediately joined again; by building a bridge over chaos; by representing the Messiah taking from a chest in heaven a great pair of compasses to describe the circuit of the earth, etc. Virgil and Horace would, perhaps, have thought these ideas rather strange. But if they succeeded in England by the aid of some very happy lines, the author of the "Christiade" was mistaken in expecting his romance to succeed without the assistance of fine verses, which are indeed very difficult to make.
But, says our author, one Jerome Vida, bishop of Alba, once wrote a very powerful "Christiade" in Latin verse, in which he transcribes many lines from Virgil. Well, my friend, why did you write yours in French prose? Why did not you, too, imitate Virgil?
But the late M. d'Escorbiac, of Toulouse, also wrote a "Christiade." Alas! why were you so unfortunate as to become the ape of M. d'Escorbiac?
But Milton, too, wrote his romance of the New Testament, his "Paradise Regained," in blank verse, frequently resembling the worst prose. Leave it, then, to Milton to set Satan and Jesus constantly at war. Let it be his to cause a drove of swine to be driven along by a legion of devils; that is, by six thousand seven hundred, who take possession of these swine—there being three devils and seven-twentieths per pig—and drown them in a lake. It well becomes Milton to make the devil propose to God that they shall take a good supper together. In Milton, the devil may at his ease cover the table with ortolans, partridges, soles, sturgeons, and make Hebe and Ganymede hand wine to Jesus Christ. In Milton, the devil may take God up a little hill, from the top of which he shows him the capital, the Molucca Islands, and the Indian city; the birthplace of the beauteous Angelica, who turned Orlando's brain; after which he may offer to God all this, provided that God will adore him. But even Milton labored in vain; people have laughed at him. They have laughed at poor brother Berruyer, the Jesuit. They have laughed at you. Bear it with patience!
Martyr, "witness"; martyrdom, testimony. The early Christian community at first gave the name of "martyrs" to those who announced new truths to mankind, who gave testimony to Jesus; who confessed Jesus; in the same manner as they gave the name of "saints" to the presbyters, to the supervisors of the community, and to their female benefactors; this is the reason why St. Jerome, in his letters, often calls his initiated Paul, St. Paul. All the first bishops were called saints.
Subsequently, the name of martyrs was given only to deceased Christians, or to those who had been tortured for punishment; and the little chapels that were erected to them received afterwards the name of "martyrion."
It is a great question, why the Roman Empire always tolerated in its bosom the Jewish sect, even after the two horrible wars of Titus and Adrian; why it tolerated the worship of Isis at several times; and why it frequently persecuted Christianity. It is evident that the Jews, who paid dearly for their synagogues, denounced the Christians as mortal foes, and excited the people against them. It is moreover evident that the Jews, occupied with the trade of brokers and usurers, did not preach against the ancient religion of the empire, and that the Christians, who were all busy in controversy, preached against the public worship, sought to destroy it, often burned the temples, and broke the consecrated statues, as St. Theodosius did at Amasia, and St. Polyeuctus in Mitylene.
The orthodox Christians, sure that their religion was the only true one, did not tolerate any other. In consequence, they themselves were hardly tolerated. Some of them were punished and died for the faith—and these were the martyrs.
This name is so respectable that it should not be prodigally bestowed; it is not right to assume the name and arms of a family to which one does not belong. Very heavy penalties have been established against those who have the audacity to decorate themselves with the cross of Malta or of St. Louis, without being chevaliers of those orders.
The learned Dodwell, the dexterous Middleton, the judicious Blondel, the exact Tillemont, the scrutinizing Launoy, and many others, all zealous for the glory of the true martyrs, have excluded from their catalogue an obscure multitude on whom this great title had been lavished. We have remarked that these learned men were sanctioned by the direct acknowledgment of Origen, who, in his "Refutation of Celsus," confesses that there are very few martyrs, and those at a great distance of time, and that it is easy to reckon them.
Nevertheless, the Benedictine Ruinart—who calls himself Don Ruinart, although he was no Spaniard—has contradicted all these learned persons! He has candidly given us many stories of martyrs which have appeared to the critics very suspicious. Many sensible persons have doubted various anecdotes relating to the legends recounted by Don Ruinart, from beginning to end.
1. Of Saint Symphorosia And Her Seven Children.
Their scruples commence with St. Symphorosia and her seven children who suffered martyrdom with her; which appears, at first sight, too much imitated from the seven Maccabees. It is not known whence this legend comes; and that is at once a great cause of skepticism.
It is therein related that the emperor Adrian himself wished to interrogate the unknown Symphorosia, to ascertain if she was a Christian. This would have been more extraordinary than if Louis XIV. had subjected a Huguenot to an interrogatory. You will further observe that Adrian, far from being a persecutor of the Christians, was their greatest protector.
He had then a long conversation with Symphorosia, and putting himself in a passion, he said to her: "I will sacrifice you to the gods"; as if the Roman emperors sacrificed women in their devotions. In the sequel, he caused her to be thrown into the Anio—which was not a usual mode of immolation. He afterwards had one of her sons cloven in two from the top of his head to his middle; a second from side to side; a third was broken on the wheel; a fourth was only stabbed in the stomach; a fifth right to the heart; a sixth had his throat cut; the seventh died of a parcel of needles thrust into his breast. The emperor Adrian was fond of variety. He commanded that they should be buried near the temple of Hercules—although no one is ever buried in Rome, much less near the temples, which would have been a horrible profanation. The legend adds that the chief priest of the temple named the place of their interment "the Seven Biotanates".
If it was extraordinary that a monument should be erected at Rome to persons thus treated, it was no less so that a high priest should concern himself with the inscription; and further, that this Roman priest should make a Greek epitaph for them. But what is still more strange is that it is pretended that this word biotanates signifies the seven tortured. Biotanates is a fabricated word, which one does not meet with in any author; and this signification can only be given to it by a play upon words, falsely using the word "thenon." There is scarcely any fable worse constructed. The writers of legends knew how to lie, but none of them knew how to lie skilfully.
The learned Lacroze, librarian to Frederick the Great, king of Prussia, observed: "I know not whether Ruinart is sincere, but I am afraid he is silly."
2. Of St. Felicita And Seven More Children.
It is from Surius that this legend is taken. This Surius is rather notorious for his absurdities. He was a monk of the sixteenth century, who writes about the martyrs of the second as if he had been present.
He pretends that that wicked man, that tyrant, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Pius, ordered the prefect of Rome to institute a process against St. Felicita, to have her and her seven children put to death, because there was a rumor that she was a Christian.
The prefect held his tribunal in the Campus Martius, which, however, was at that time used only for the reviewing of troops; and the first thing the prefect did was to cause a blow to be given her in full assembly.
The long discourses of the magistrates and the accused are worthy of the historian. He finishes by putting the seven brothers to death by different punishments, like the seven children of St. Symphorosia. This is only a duplicate affair. But as for St. Felicita, he leaves her there, and does not say another word about her.
3. Of Saint Polycarp.
Eusebius relates that St. Polycarp, being informed in a dream that he should be burned in three days, made it known to his friends. The legend-maker adds that the lieutenant of police at Smyrna, whose name was Herodius, had him seized by his archers; that he was abandoned to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre; that the sky opened, and a heavenly voice cried to him: "Be of good courage, Polycarp"; that the hour of letting loose the lions in the amphitheatre having passed, the people went about collecting wood from all the houses to burn him with; that the saint addressed himself to the God of the "archangels"—although the word archangel was not then known—that the flames formed themselves round him into a triumphal arch without touching him; that his body had the smell of baked bread; but that, having resisted the fire, he could not preserve himself against a sabre-cut; that his blood put out the burning pile, and that there sprung from it a dove which flew straight to heaven. To which planet is not precisely known.
4. Of Saint Ptolomais.
We follow the order of Don Ruinart; but we have no wish to call in question the martyrdom of St. Ptolomais, which is extracted from "St. Justin's Apology."
We could make some difficulties with regard to the woman who was accused by her husband of being a Christian, and who baffled him by giving him a bill of divorce. We might ask why, in this history, there is no further mention of this woman? We might make it manifest that in the time of Marcus Aurelius, women were not permitted to demand divorces of their husbands; that this permission was only granted them under the emperor Julian; and that this so much repeated story of the Christian woman who repudiated her husband—while no pagan would have dared to imagine such a thing—cannot well be other than a fable. But we do not desire to raise unpleasant disputes. As for the little probability there is in the compilation of Don Ruinart, we have too much respect for the subject he treats of to start objections.
We have not made any to the "Letter of the Churches of Vienna and Lyons," because there is still a great deal of obscurity connected with it; but we shall be pardoned for defending the memory of the great Marcus Aurelius, thus outraged in the life of "St. Symphorian of Autun," who was probably a relation of St. Symphorosia.
5. Of St. Symphorian Of Autun.
This legend, the author of which is unknown, begins thus: "The emperor Marcus Aurelius had just raised a frightful tempest against the Church, and his fulminating edicts assailed on all sides the religion of Jesus Christ, at the time when St. Symphorian lived at Autun in all the splendor that high birth and uncommon virtue can confer. He was of a Christian family, one of the most considerable of the city," etc.
Marcus Aurelius issued no sanguinary edicts against the Christians. It is a very criminal calumny. Tillemont himself admits that "he was the best prince the Romans ever had; that his reign was a golden age; and that he verified what he often quoted from Plato, that nations would only be happy when kings were philosophers."
Of all the emperors, this was the one who promulgated the best laws; he protected the wise, but persecuted no Christians, of whom he had a great many in his service.
The writer of the legend relates that St. Symphorian having refused to adore Cybele, the city judge inquired: "Who is this man?" Now it is impossible that the judge of Autun should not have known the most considerable person in Autun.
He was declared by the sentence to be guilty of treason, "divine and human." The Romans never employed this formula; and that alone should deprive the pretended martyr of Autun of all credit.
In order the better to refute this calumny against the sacred memory of Marcus Aurelius, let us bring under view the discourse of Meliton, bishop of Sardis, to this best of emperors, reported verbatim by Eusebius:
"The continual succession of good fortune which has attended the empire, without its happiness being disturbed by a single disgrace, since our religion, which was born with it, has grown in its bosom, is an evident proof that it contributes eminently to its greatness and glory. Among all the emperors, Nero and Domitian alone, deceived by certain impostors, have spread calumnies against us, which, as usual, have found some partial credence among the people. But your pious ancestors have corrected the people's ignorance, and by public edicts have repressed the audacity of those who attempted to treat us ill. Your grandfather Adrian wrote in our favor to Fundanus, governor of Asia, and to many other persons. The emperor, your father, during the period when you divided with him the cares of government, wrote to the inhabitants of Larissa, of Thessalonica, of Athens, and in short to all the people of Greece, to repress the seditions and tumults which have been excited against us."
This declaration by a most pious, learned, and veracious bishop is sufficient to confound forever all the lies and legends which may be regarded as the Arabian tales of Christianity.
6. Of Another Saint Felicita, And Of Saint Perpetua.
If it were an object to dispute the legend of Felicita and Perpetua, it would not be difficult to show how suspicious it is. These Carthaginian martyrs are only known by a writing, without date, of the church of Salzburg. Now, it is a great way from this part of Bavaria to Goletta. We are not informed under what emperor this Felicita and this Perpetua received the crown of martyrdom. The astounding sights with which this history is filled do not discover a very profound historian. A ladder entirely of gold, bordered with lances and swords; a dragon at the top of the ladder; a large garden near the dragon; sheep from which an old man drew milk; a reservoir full of water; a bottle of water whence they drank without diminishing the liquid; St. Perpetua fighting entirely naked against a wicked Egyptian; some handsome young men, all naked, who took her part; herself at last become a man and a vigorous wrestler; these are, it appears to me, conceits which should not have place in a respectable book.
There is one other reflection very important to make. It is that the style of all these stories of martyrdom, which took place at such different periods, is everywhere alike, everywhere equally puerile and bombastic. You find the same turns of expression, the same phrases, in the history of a martyr under Domitian and of another under Galerius. There are the same epithets, the same exaggerations. By the little we understand of style, we perceive that the same hand has compiled them all.
I do not here pretend to make a book against Don Ruinart; and while I always respect, admire, and invoke the true martyrs with the Holy Church, I confine myself to making it perceived, by one or two striking examples, how dangerous it is to mix what is purely ridiculous with what ought to be venerated.
7. Of Saint Theodotus Of The City Of Ancyra, And Of The Seven Virgins; Written By Nisus, An Eye-Witness, And Extracted From Bollandus.
Many critics, as eminent for wisdom as for true piety, have already given us to understand that the legend of St. Theodotus the Publican is a profanation and a species of impiety which ought to have been suppressed. The following is the story of Theodotus. We shall often employ the exact words of the "Genuine Acts," compiled by Don Ruinart.
"His trade of publican supplied him with the means of exercising his episcopal functions. Illustrious tavern! consecrated to piety instead of debauchery.... Sometimes Theodotus was a physician, sometimes he furnished tit-bits to the faithful. A tavern was seen to be to the Christians what Noah's ark was to those whom God wished to save from the deluge."
This publican Theodotus, walking by the river Halis with his companions towards a town adjacent to the city of Ancyra, "a fresh and soft plot of turf offered them a delicious couch; a spring which issued a few steps off, from the foot of the rock, and which by a channel crowned with flowers came running past them in order to quench their thirst, offered them clear and pure water. Trees bearing fruit, mixed with wild ones, furnished them with shade and fruits; and an assemblage of skilful nightingales, whom the grasshoppers relieved every now and then, formed a charming concert," etc.
The clergyman of the place, named Fronton, having arrived, and the publican having drunk with him on the grass, "the fresh green of which was relieved by the various gradations of color in the flowers, he said to the clergyman: 'Ah, father! what a pleasure it would be to build a chapel here.' 'Yes,' said Fronton, 'but it would be necessary to have some relics to begin with.' 'Well, well,' replied St. Theodotus, 'you shall have some soon, I give you my word; here is my ring, which I give you as a pledge; build your chapel quickly.'"
The publican had the gift of prophecy, and knew well what he was saying. He went away to the city of Ancyra, while the clergyman Fronton set himself about building. He found there the most horrible persecution, which lasted very long. Seven Christian virgins, of whom the youngest was seventy years old, had just been condemned, according to custom, to lose their virginity, through the agency of all the young men of the city. The youth of Ancyra, who had probably more urgent affairs, were in no hurry to execute the sentence. One only could be found obedient to justice. He applied himself to St. Thecusa, and carried her into a closet with surprising courage. Thecusa threw herself on her knees, and said to him, "For God's sake, my son, a little shame! Behold these lacklustre eyes, this half-dead flesh, these greasy wrinkles, which seventy years have ploughed in my forehead, this face of the color of the earth; abandon thoughts so unworthy of a young man like you—Jesus Christ entreats you by my mouth. He asks it of you as a favor, and if you grant it Him, you may expect His entire gratitude." The discourse of the old woman, and her countenance made the executioner recollect himself. The seven virgins were not deflowered.
The irritated governor sought for another punishment; he caused them to be initiated forthwith in the mysteries of Diana and Minerva. It is true that great feasts had been instituted in honor of those divinities, but the mysteries of Diana and Minerva were not known to antiquity. St. Nil, an intimate friend of the publican Theodotus, and the author of this marvellous story, was not quite correct.
According to him, these seven pretty lasses were placed quite naked on the car which carried the great Diana and the wise Minerva to the banks of a neighboring lake. The Thucydides St. Nil still appears to be very ill-informed here. The priestesses were always covered with veils; and the Roman magistrates never caused the goddesses of chastity and wisdom to be attended by girls who showed themselves both before and behind to the people.
St. Nil adds that the car was preceded by two choirs of priestesses of Bacchus, who carried the thyrses in their hands. St. Nil has here mistaken the priestesses of Minerva for those of Bacchus. He was not versed in the liturgy of Ancyra.
Entering the city, the publican saw this sad spectacle—the governor, the priestesses, the car, Minerva, and the seven maidens. He runs to throw himself on his knees in a hut, along with a nephew of St. Thecusa. He beseeches heaven that the seven ladies should be dead rather than naked. His prayer is heard; he learns that the seven damsels, instead of being deflowered, have been thrown into the lake with stones round their necks, by order of the governor. Their virginity is in safe-keeping. At this news the saint, raising himself from the ground and placing himself upon his knees, turned his eyes towards heaven; and in the midst of the various emotions he experienced of love, joy, and gratitude, he said, "I give Thee thanks, O Lord! that Thou has not rejected the prayer of Thy servant."
He slept; and during his sleep, St. Thecusa, the youngest of the drowned women, appeared to him. "How now, son Theodotus!" she said, "you are sleeping without thinking of us: have you forgotten so soon the care I took of your youth? Do not, dear Theodotus, suffer our bodies to be devoured by the fishes. Go to the lake, but beware of a traitor." This traitor was, in fact, the nephew of St. Thecusa.
I omit here a multitude of miraculous adventures that happened to the publican, in order to come to the most important. A celestial cavalier, armedcap-a-pie,preceded by a celestial flambeau, descends from the height of the empyrean, conducts the publican to the lake in the midst of storms, drives away all the soldiers who guard the shore, and gives Theodotus time to fish up the seven old women and to bury them.
The nephew of St. Thecusa unfortunately went and told all. Theodotus was seized, and for three days all sorts of punishments were tried in vain to kill him. They could only attain their object by cleaving his skull; an operation which saints are never proof against.
He was still to be buried. His friend the minister Fronton—to whom Theodotus, in his capacity of publican, had given two leathern bottles filled with wine—made the guards drunk, and carried off the body. Theodotus then appeared in body and spirit to the minister: "Well, my friend," he said to him, "did I not say well, that you should have relics for your chapel?"
Such is what is narrated by St. Nil, an eye-witness, who could neither be deceived nor deceive; such is what Don Ruinart has quoted as a genuine act. Now every man of sense, every intelligent Christian, will ask himself, whether a better mode could be adopted of dishonoring the most holy and venerated religion in the world, and of turning it into ridicule?
I shall not speak of the Eleven Thousand Virgins; I shall not discuss the fable of the Theban legion, composed—says the author—of six thousand six hundred men, all Christians coming from the East by Mount St. Bernard, suffering martyrdom in the year 286, the period of the most profound peace as regarded the Church, and in the gorge of a mountain where it is impossible to place 300 men abreast; a fable written more than 550 years after the event; a fable in which a king of Burgundy is spoken of who never existed; a fable, in short, acknowledged to be absurd by all the learned who have not lost their reason.
Behold what Don Ruinart narrates seriously! Let us pray to God for the good sense of Don Ruinart!
How does it happen that, in the enlightened age in which we live, learned and useful writers are still found who nevertheless follow the stream of old errors, and who corrupt many truths by admitted fables? They reckon the era of the martyrs from the first year of the empire of Diocletian, who was then far enough from inflicting martyrdom on anybody. They forget that his wife Prisca was a Christian, that the principal officers of his household were Christians; that he protected them constantly during eighteen years; that they built at Nicomedia a church more sumptuous than his palace; and that they would never have been persecuted if they had not outraged the Cæsar Valerius.
Is it possible that any one should still dare to assert "that Diocletian died of age, despair, and misery;" he who was seen to quit life like a philosopher, as he had quitted the empire; he who, solicited to resume the supreme power loved better to cultivate his fine gardens at Salonica, than to reign again over the whole of the then known world?
Oh, ye compilers! will you never cease to compile? You have usefully employed your three fingers; employ still more usefully your reason.
What! you repeat to me that St. Peter reigned over the faithful at Rome for twenty-five years, and that Nero had him put to death together with St. Paul, in order to avenge the death of Simon the Magician, whose legs they had broken by their prayers?
To report such fables, though with the best motive, is to insult Christianity.
The poor creatures who still repeat these absurdities are copyists who renew in octavo and duodecimo old stories that honest men no longer read, and who have never opened a book of wholesome criticism. They rake up the antiquated tales of the Church; they know nothing of either Middleton, or Dodwell, or Bruker, or Dumoulin, or Fabricius, or Grabius, or even Dupin, or of any one of those who have lately carried light into the darkness.
We are fooled with martyrdoms that make us break out into laughter. The Tituses, the Trajans, the Marcus Aureliuses, are painted as monsters of cruelty. Fleury, abbé of Loc Dieu, has disgraced his ecclesiastical history by tales which a sensible old woman would not tell to little children.
Can it be seriously repeated, that the Romans condemned seven virgins, each seventy years old, to pass through the hands of all the young men of the city of Ancyra—those Romans who punished the Vestals with death for the least gallantry?
A hundred tales of this sort are found in the martyrologies. The narrators have hoped to render the ancient Romans odious, and they have rendered themselves ridiculous. Do you want good, well-authenticated barbarities—good and well-attested massacres, rivers of blood which have actually flowed—fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, infants at the breast, who have in reality had their throats cut, and been heaped on one another? Persecuting monsters! seek these truths only in your own annals: you will find them in the crusades against the Albigenses, in the massacres of Merindol and Cabrière, in the frightful day of St. Bartholomew, in the massacres of Ireland, in the valleys of the Pays de Vaud. It becomes you well, barbarians as you are, to impute extravagant cruelties to the best of emperors; you who have deluged Europe with blood, and covered it with corpses, in order to prove that the same body can be in a thousand places at once, and that the pope can sell indulgences! Cease to calumniate the Romans, your law-givers, and ask pardon of God for the abominations of your forefathers!
It is not the torture, you say, which makes martyrdom; it is the cause. Well! I agree with you that your victims ought not to be designated by the name of martyr, which signifies witness; but what name shall we give to your executioners? Phalaris and Busiris were the gentlest of men in comparison with you. Does not your Inquisition, which still remains, make reason, nature, and religion boil with indignation! Great God! if mankind should reduce to ashes that infernal tribunal, would they be unacceptable in thy avenging eyes?
The mass, in ordinary language, is the greatest and most august of the ceremonies of the Church. Different names are given to it, according to the rites practised in the various countries where it is celebrated; as the Mozarabian or Gothic mass, the Greek mass, the Latin mass. Durandus and Eckius call those masses dry, in which no consecration is made, as that which is appointed to be said in particular by aspirants to the priesthood; and Cardinal Bona relates, on the authority of William of Nangis, that St. Louis, in his voyage abroad, had it said in this manner, lest the motion of the vessel should spill the consecrated wine. He also quoted Génébrard, who says that he assisted at Turin, in 1587, at a similar mass, celebrated in a church, but after dinner and very late, for the funeral of a person of rank.
Pierre le Chantre also speaks of the two-fold, three-fold, and even four-fold mass, in which the priest celebrated the mass of the day or the feast, as far as the offertory, then began a second, third, and sometimes a fourth, as far as the same place; after which he said as many secretas as he had begun masses; he recited the canon only once for the whole; and at the end he added as many collects as he had joined together masses.
It was not until about the close of the fourth century that the word "mass" began to signify the celebration of the eucharist. The learned Beatus Rhenanus, in his notes on Tertullian, observes, that St. Ambrose consecrated this popular expression, "missa," taken from the sending out of the catechumens, after the reading of the gospel.
In the "Apostolical Constitutions," we find a liturgy in the name of St. James, by which it appears, that instead of invoking the saints in the canon of the mass, the primitive Church prayed for them. "We also offer to Thee, O Lord," said the celebrator, "this bread and this chalice for all the saints that have been pleasing in Thy sight from the beginning of ages: for the patriarchs, the prophets, the just, the apostles, the martyrs, the confessors, bishops, priests, deacons, subdeacons, readers, chanters, virgins, widows, laymen, and all whose names are known unto Thee." But St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who lived in the fourth century, substituted this explanation: "After which," says he, "we commemorate those who die before us, and first the patriarchs, apostles, and martyrs, that God may receive our prayers through their intercession." This proves—as will be said in the article on "Relics"—that the worship of the saints was then beginning to be introduced into the Church.
Ancient Rome.Ancient Rome.
Noel Alexander cites acts of St. Andrew, in which that apostle is made to say: "I offer up every day, on the altar of the only true God, not the flesh of bulls, nor the blood of goats, but the unspotted lamb, which still remains living and entire after it is sacrificed, and all the faithful eat of its flesh"; but this learned Dominican acknowledges that this piece was unknown until the eighth century. The first who cited it was Ætherius, bishop of Osma in Spain, who wrote against Ælipard in 788.
Abdias relates that St. John, being warned by the Lord of the termination of his career, prepared for death and recommended his Church to God. He then had bread brought to him, which he took, and lifting up his hands to heaven, blessed it, broke it, and distributed it among those who were present, saying: "Let my portion be yours, and let yours be mine." This manner of celebrating the eucharist—which means thanksgiving—is more conformable to the institution of that ceremony.
St. Luke indeed informs us, that Jesus, after distributing bread and wine among his apostles, who were supping with him, said to them: "Do this in memory of me." St. Matthew and St. Mark say, moreover, that Jesus sang a hymn. St. John, who in his gospel mentions neither the distribution of the bread and wine, nor the hymn, speaks of the latter at great length in his Acts, of which we give the text, as quoted by the Second Council of Nice:
"Before our Lord was taken by the Jews," says this well-beloved apostle of Jesus, "He assembled us all together, and said to us: 'Let us sing a hymn in honor of the Father, after which we will execute the design we have conceived.' He ordered us therefore to form a circle, holding one another by the hand; then, having placed Himself in the middle of the circle, He said to us: 'Amen; follow me.' Then He began the canticle, and said: 'Glory be to Thee, O Father!' We all answered, 'Amen.' Jesus continued, saying, 'Glory to the Word,' etc. 'Glory to the Spirit,' etc. 'Glory to Grace,' etc., and the apostles constantly answered, 'Amen.'"
After some other doxologies, Jesus said, "I will save, and I will be saved, Amen. I will unbind, and I will be unbound, Amen. I will be wounded, and I will wound, Amen. I will be born, and I will beget, Amen. I will eat, and I will be consumed, Amen. I will be hearkened to, and I will hearken, Amen. I will be comprehended by the spirit, being all spirit, all understanding, Amen. I will be washed, and I will wash, Amen. Grace brings dancing; I will play on the flute; all of you dance, Amen. I will sing sorrowful airs; now all of you lament, Amen."
St. Augustine, who begins a part of this hymn in his "Epistle to Ceretius", gives also the following: "I will deck, and I will be decked. I am a lamp to those who see me and know me. I am the door for all who will knock at it. Do you, who see what I do, be careful not to speak of it."
This dance of Jesus and the apostles is evidently imitated from that of the Egyptian Therapeutæ, who danced after supper in their assemblies, at first divided into two choirs, then united the men and the women together, as at the feast of Bacchus, after swallowing plenty of celestial wine as Philo says.
Besides we know, that according to the Jewish tradition, after their coming out of Egypt, and passing the Red Sea, whence the solemnity of the Passover took its name, Moses and his sister assembled two musical choirs, one composed of men, the other of women, who, while dancing, sang a canticle of thanksgiving. These instruments instantaneously assembled, these choirs arranged with so much promptitude, the facility with which the songs and dances are executed, suppose a training in these two exercises much anterior to the moment of execution.
The usage was afterwards perpetrated among the Jews. The daughters of Shiloh were dancing according to custom, at the solemn feast of the Lord, when the young men of the tribe of Benjamin, to whom they had been refused for wives, carried them off by the counsel of the old men of Israel. And at this day, in Palestine, the women, assembled near the tombs of their relatives, dance in a mournful manner, and utter cries of lamentation.
We also know that the first Christians held among themselvesagapæ,or feasts of charity, in memory of the last supper which Jesus celebrated with his apostles, from which the Pagans took occasion to bring against them the most odious charges; on which, to banish every shadow of licentiousness, the pastors forbade the kiss of peace, that concluded the ceremony to be given between persons of different sexes. But various abuses, which were even then complained of by St. Paul, and which the Council of Gangres, in the year 324, vainly undertook to reform, at length caused theagapæto be abolished in 397, by the Third Council of Carthage, of which the forty-first canon ordained, that the holy mysteries should be celebrated fasting.
It will not be doubted that these feastings were accompanied by dances, when it is recollected that, according to Scaliger, the bishops were called in the Latin Church "præsules," (from "præsiliendo") only because they led off the dance. Heliot, in his "History of the Monastic Orders," says also, that during the persecutions which disturbed the peace of the first Christians, congregations were formed of men and women, who, after the manner of the Therapeutæ, retired into the deserts, where they assembled in the hamlets on Sundays and feast days, and danced piously, singing the prayers of the Church.
In Portugal, in Spain, and in Roussillon, solemn dances are still performed in honor of the mysteries of Christianity. On every vigil of a feast of the Virgin, the young women assemble before the doors of the churches dedicated to her, and pass the night in dancing round, and singing hymns and canticles in honor of her. Cardinal Ximenes restored in his time, in the cathedral of Toledo, the ancient usage of the Mozarabian mass, during which dances are performed in the choir and the nave, with equal order and devotion. In France too, about the middle of the last century, the priests and all the people of the Limoges might be seen dancing round in the collegiate church, singing: "Sant Marcian pregas pernous et nous epingaren per bous"—that is, "St. Martian, pray for us, and we will dance for you."
And lastly, the Jesuit Menestrier, in the preface to his "Treatise on Ballets", published in 1682, says, that he had himself seen the canons of some churches take the singing boys by the hand on Easter day, and dance in the choir, singing hymns of rejoicing. What has been said in the article on "Calends," of the extravagant dances of the feast of fools, exhibits a part of the abuses which have caused dancing to be discontinued in the ceremonies of the mass, which, the greater their gravity, are the better calculated to impose on the simple.
It is perhaps as difficult as it is useless to ascertain whether "mazzacrium," a word of the low Latin, is the root of "massacre," or whether "massacre" is the root of "mazzacrium."
A massacre signifies a number of men killed. There was yesterday a great massacre near Warsaw—near Cracow. We never say: "There has been a massacre of a man; yet we do say": "A man has been massacred": in that case it is understood that he has been killed barbarously by many blows.
Poetry makes use of the word massacred for killed, assassinated: "Que par ses propres mains son père massacré."—Cinna.
An Englishman has made a compilation of all the massacres perpetrated on account of religion since the first centuries of our vulgar era. I have been very much tempted to write against the English author; but his memoir not appearing to be exaggerated, I have restrained myself. For the future I hope there will be no more such calculations to make. But to whom shall we be indebted for that?
"How unfortunate am I to have been born!" said Ardassan Ougli, a youngicoglanof the grand sultan of the Turks. Yet if I depended only on the sultan—but I am also subject to the chief of myoda,to thecassigi bachi; and when I receive my pay, I must prostrate myself before a clerk of theteftardar,who keeps back half of it. I was not seven years old, when, in spite of myself, I was circumcised with great ceremony, and was ill for a fortnight after it. The dervish who prays to us is also my master; animanis still more my master, and themullahstill more so than theiman.Thecadiis another master, thekadesleskera greater; themuftia greater than all these together. Thekiaiaof the grand vizier with one word could cause me to be thrown into the canal; and finally, the grand vizier could have me beheaded, and the skin of my head stripped off, without any person caring about the matter.
"Great God, how many masters! If I had as many souls and bodies as I have duties to fulfil, I could not bear it. Oh Allah! why hast thou not made me an owl? I should live free in my hole and eat mice at my ease, without masters or servants. This is assuredly the true destiny of man; there were no masters until it was perverted; no man was made to serve another continually. If things were in order, each should charitably help his neighbor. The quick-sighted would conduct the blind, the active would be crutches to the lame. This would be the paradise of Mahomet, instead of the hell which is formed precisely under the inconceivably narrow bridge."
Thus spoke Ardassan Ougli, after being bastinadoed by one of his masters.
Some years afterwards, Ardassan Ougli became a pasha with three tails. He made a prodigious fortune, and firmly believed that all men except the grand Turk and the grand vizier were born to serve him, and all women to give him pleasure according to his wishes.
How can one man become the master of another? And by what kind of incomprehensible magic has he been able to become the master of several other men? A great number of good volumes have been written on this subject, but I give the preference to an Indian fable, because it is short, and fables explain everything.
Adimo, the father of all the Indians, had two sons and two daughters by his wife Pocriti. The eldest was a vigorous giant, the youngest was a little hunchback, the two girls were pretty. As soon as the giant was strong enough, he lay with his two sisters, and caused the little hunchback to serve him. Of his two sisters, the one was his cook, the other his gardener. When the giant would sleep, he began by chaining his little brother to a tree; and when the latter fled from him, he caught him in four strides, and gave him twenty blows with the strength of an ox.
The dwarf submitted and became the best subject in the world. The giant, satisfied with seeing him fulfil the duties of a subject, permitted him to sleep with one of his sisters, with whom he was disgusted. The children who sprang from this marriage were not quite hunchbacks, but they were sufficiently deformed. They were brought up in the fear of God and of the giant. They received an excellent education; they were taught that their uncle was a giant by divine right, who could do what he pleased with all his family; that if he had some pretty niece or grand-niece, he should have her without difficulty, and not one should marry her unless he permitted it.
The giant dying, his son, who was neither so strong or so great as he was, believed himself to be like his father, a giant by divine right. He pretended to make all the men work for him, and slept with all the girls. The family lagued against him: he was killed, and they became a republic.
The Siamese pretend, that on the contrary the family commenced by being republican; and that the giant existed not until after a great many years and dissensions: but all the authors of Benares and Siam agree that men lived an infinity of ages before they had the wit to make laws, and they prove it by an unanswerable argument, which is that even at present, when all the world piques itself upon having wit, we have not yet found the means of making a score of laws passably good.
It is still, for example, an insoluble question in India, whether republics were established before or after monarchies; if confusion has appeared more horrible to men than despotism! I am ignorant how it happened in order of time, but in that of nature we must agree that men are all born equal: violence and ability made the first masters; laws have made the present.
A Polite Dialogue Between A Demoniac And A Philosopher.
DEMONIAC.
Yes, thou enemy of God and man, who believest that God is all-powerful, and is at liberty to confer the gift of thought on every being whom He shall vouchsafe to choose, I will go and denounce thee to the inquisitor; I will have thee burned. Beware, I warn thee for the last time.
PHILOSOPHER.
Are these your arguments? Is it thus you teach mankind? I admire your mildness.
DEMONIAC.
Come, I will be patient for a moment while the fagots are preparing. Answer me: What is spirit?
PHILOSOPHER.
I know not.
DEMONIAC.
What is matter?
PHILOSOPHER.
I scarcely know. I believe it to have extent, solidity, resistance, gravity, divisibility, mobility. God may have given it a thousand other qualities of which I am ignorant.
DEMONIAC.
A thousand other qualities, traitor! I see what thou wouldst be at; thou wouldst tell me that God can animate matter, that He has given instinct to animals, that He is the Master of all.
PHILOSOPHER.
But it may very well be, that He has granted to this matter many properties which you cannot comprehend.
DEMONIAC.
Which I cannot comprehend, villain!
PHILOSOPHER.
Yes. His power goes much further than your understanding.
DEMONIAC.
His power! His power! thou talkest like a true atheist.
PHILOSOPHER.
However, I have the testimony of many holy fathers on my side.
DEMONIAC.
Go to, go to: neither God nor they shall prevent us from burning thee alive—the death inflicted on parricides and on philosophers who are not of our opinion.
PHILOSOPHER.
Was it the devil or yourself that invented this method of arguing?
DEMONIAC.
Vile wretch! darest thou to couple my name with the devil's?
(Here the demoniac strikes the philosopher, who returns him the blow with interest.)
PHILOSOPHER.
Help! philosophers!
DEMONIAC.
Holy brotherhood! help!
(Here half a dozen philosophers arrive on one side, and on the other rush in a hundred Dominicans, with a hundred Familiars of the Inquisition, and a hundred alguazils. The contest is too unequal.)
When wise men are asked what is the soul they answer that they know not. If they are asked what matter is, they make the same reply. It is true that there are professors, and particularly scholars, who know all this perfectly; and when they have repeated that matter has extent and divisibility, they think they have said all; being pressed, however, to say what this thing is which is extended, they find themselves considerably embarrassed. It is composed of parts, say they. And of what are these parts composed? Are the elements of the parts divisible? Then they are mute, or they talk a great deal; which are equally suspicious. Is this almost unknown being called matter, eternal? Such was the belief of all antiquity. Has it of itself force? Many philosophers have thought so. Have those who deny it a right to deny it? You conceive not that matter can have anything of itself; but how can you be assured that it has not of itself the properties necessary to it? You are ignorant of its nature, and you refuse it the modes which nevertheless are in its nature: for it can no sooner have been, than it has been in a certain fashion—it has had figure, and having necessarily figure, is it impossible that it should not have had other modes attached to its configuration? Matter exists, but you know it only by your sensations. Alas! of what avail have been all the subtleties of the mind since man first reasoned? Geometry has taught us many truths, metaphysics very few. We weigh matter, we measure it, we decompose it; and if we seek to advance one step beyond these gross operations, we find ourselves powerless, and before us an immeasurable abyss.
Pray forgive all mankind who were deceived in thinking that matter existed by itself. Could they do otherwise? How are we to imagine that what is without succession has not always been? If it were not necessary for matter to exist, why should it exist? And if it were necessary that it should be, why should it not have been forever? No axiom has ever been more universally received than this: Of nothing, nothing comes. Indeed the contrary is incomprehensible. With every nation, chaos preceded the arrangement which a divine hand made of the whole world. The eternity of matter has with no people been injurious to the worship of the Divinity. Religion was never startled at the recognition of an eternal God as the master of an eternal matter. We of the present day are so happy as to know by faith that God brought matter out of nothing; but no nation has ever been instructed in this dogma; even the Jews were ignorant of it. The first verse of Genesis says, that the Gods—Eloïm,notEloi—made heaven and earth. It does not say, that heaven and earth were created out of nothing.
Philo, who lived at the only time when the Jews had any erudition, says, in his "Chapter on the Creation", "God, being good by nature, bore no envy against substance, matter; which of itself had nothing good, having by nature only inertness, confusion, and disorder; it was bad, and He vouchsafed to make it good."
The idea of chaos put into order by a God, is to be found in all ancient theogonies. Hesiod repeated the opinion of the Orientals, when he said in his "Theogony," "Chaos was that which first existed." The whole Roman Empire spoke in these words of Ovid: "Sic ubi dispositam quisquis fuit ille Deorum Congeriem secuit."
Matter then, in the hands of God, was considered like clay under the potter's wheel, if these feeble images may be used to express His divine power.
Matter, being eternal, must have had eternal properties—as configuration, thevis inertiæ,motion, and divisibility. But this divisibility is only a consequence of motion; for without motion nothing is divided, nor separated, nor arranged. Motion therefore was regarded as essential to matter. Chaos had been a confused motion, and the arrangement of the universe was a regular motion, communicated to all bodies by the Master of the world. But how can matter have motion by itself, as it has, according to all the ancients, extent and divisibility?
But it cannot be conceived to be without extent, and it may be conceived to be without motion. To this it was answered: It is impossible that matter should not be permeable; and being permeable, something must be continually passing through its pores. Why should there be passages, if nothing passes?
Reply and rejoinder might thus be continued forever. The system of the eternity of matter, like all other systems, has very great difficulties. That of the formation of matter out of nothing is no less incomprehensible. We must admit it, and not flatter ourselves with accounting for it; philosophy does not account for everything. How many incomprehensible things are we not obliged to admit, even in geometry! Can any one conceive two lines constantly approaching each other, yet never meeting?
Geometricians indeed will tell you, the properties of asymptotes are demonstrated; you cannot help admitting them—but creation is not; why then admit it? Why is it hard for you to believe, like all the ancients, in the eternity of matter? The theologian will press you on the other side, and say: If you believe in the eternity of matter then you acknowledge two principles—God and matter; you fall into the error of Zoroaster and of Manes.
No answer can be given to the geometricians, for those folks know of nothing but their lines, their superficies, and their solids; but you may say to the theologians: "Wherein am I a Manichæan? Here are stones which an architect has not made, but of which he has erected an immense building. I do not admit two architects; the rough stones have obeyed power and genius."
Happily, whatever system a man embraces, it is in no way hurtful to morality; for what imports it whether matter is made or arranged? God is still an absolute master. Whether chaos was created out of nothing, or only reduced to order, it is still our duty to be virtuous; scarcely any of these metaphysical questions affect the conduct of life. It is with disputes as with table talk; each one forgets after dinner what he has said, and goes whithersoever his interest or his inclination calls him.
Meeting, "assemblée," is a general term applicable to any collection of people for secular, sacred, political, conversational, festive, or corporate purposes; in short, to all occasions on which numbers meet together.
It is a term which prevents all verbal disputes, and all abusive and injurious implications by which men are in the habit of stigmatizing societies to which they do not themselves belong.
The legal meeting or assembly of the Athenians was called the "church". This word "church", being peculiarly appropriated among us to express a convocation of Catholics in one place, we did not in the first instance apply it to the public assembly of Protestants; but used indeed the expression—"a flock of Huguenots." Politeness however, which in time explodes all noxious terms, at length employed for the purpose the term "assembly" or "meeting", which offends no one. In England the dominant Church applies the name of "meeting" to the churches of all the non-conformists.
The word "assembly" is particularly suitable to a collection of persons invited to go and pass their evening at a house where the host receives them with courtesy and kindness, and where play, conversation, supper, and dancing, constitute their amusements. If the number invited be small, it is not called an "assembly", but a "rendezvous of friends"; and friends are never very numerous.
Assemblies are called, in Italian, "conversazione," "ridotto". The word "ridotto" is properly what we once signified by the word "reduit," intrenchment; but "reduit" having sunk into a term of contempt among us, our editors translated "ridout" by "redoubt." The papers informed us, among the important intelligence contained in them relating to Europe, that many noblemen of the highest consideration went to take chocolate at the house of the princess Borghese; and that there was a "redoubt" there. It was announced to Europe, in another paragraph, that there would be a "redoubt" on the following Tuesday at the house of her excellency the marchioness of Santafior.
It was found, however, that in relating the events of war, it was necessary to speak of real redoubts, which in fact implied things actually redoubtable and formidable, from which cannon were discharged. The word was, therefore, in such circumstances, obviously unsuitable to the"ridotti pacifici,"the pacific redoubts of mere amusement; and the old term "assembly" was restored, which is indeed the only proper one. "Rendezvous" is occasionally used, but it is more adapted to a small company, and most of all for two individuals.
This article is by M. Polier de Bottens, of an old French family, settled for two hundred years in Switzerland. He is first pastor of Lausanne, and his knowledge is equal to his piety. He composed this article for the great Encyclopædia, in which it was inserted. Only those passages were suppressed which the examiners thought might be abused by the Catholics, less learned and less pious than the author. It was received with applause by all the wise.
It was printed at the same time in another small dictionary, and was attributed in France to a man whom there was no reluctance to molest. The article was supposed to be impious, because it was supposed to be by a layman; and the work and its pretended author were violently attacked. The man thus accused contented himself with laughing at the mistake. He beheld with compassion this instance of the errors and injustices which men are every day committing in their judgments; for he had the wise and learned priest's manuscript, written by his own hand. It is still in his possession, and will be shown to whoever may choose to examine it. In it will be found the very erasures made by this layman himself, to prevent malignant interpretations.
Now we reprint this article in all the integrity of the original. We have contracted it only to prevent repeating what we have printed elsewhere; but we have not added a single word.
The best of this affair is, that one of the venerable author's brethren wrote the most ridiculous things in the world against this article of his reverend brother's, thinking that he was writing against a common enemy. This is like fighting in the dark, when one is attacked by one's own party.
It has a thousand times happened that controversialists have condemned passages in St. Augustine and St. Jerome, not knowing that they were by those fathers. They would anathematize a part of the New Testament if they had not heard by whom it was written. Thus it is that men too often judge.
Messiah, "Messias." This word comes from the Hebrew, and is synonymous with the Greek word "Christ." Both are terms consecrated in religion, which are now no longer given to any but the anointed by eminence—the Sovereign Deliverer whom the ancient Jewish people expected, for whose coming they still sigh, and whom the Christians find in the person of Jesus the Son of Mary, whom they consider as the anointed of the Lord, the Messiah promised to humanity. The Greeks also use the word "Elcimmeros", meaning the same thing as "Christos."
In the Old Testament we see that the word "Messiah," far from being peculiar to the Deliverer, for whose coming the people of Israel sighed, was not even so to the true and faithful servants of God, but that this name was often given to idolatrous kings and princes, who were, in the hands of the Eternal, the ministers of His vengeance, or instruments for executing the counsels of His wisdom. So the author of "Ecclesiasticus" says of Elisha: "Qui ungis reges ad penitentiam;" or, as it is rendered by the "Septuagint," "ad vindictam"—"You anoint kings to execute the vengeance of the Lord". Therefore He sent a prophet to anoint Jehu, king of Israel, and announced sacred unction to Hazael, king of Damascus and Syria; those two princes being the Messiahs of the Most High, to revenge the crimes and abominations of the house of Ahab.
But in Isaiah, xlv., 1, the name of Messiah is expressly given to Cyrus: "Thus saith the Lord to Cyrus, His anointed, His Messiah, whose right hand I have holden to subdue nations before him." etc.
Ezekiel, in his Revelations, xxviii., 14, gives the name of Messiah to the king of Tyre, whom he also calls Cherubin, and speaks of him and his glory in terms full of an emphasis of which it is easier to feel the beauties than to catch the sense. "Son of man," says the Eternal to the prophet, "take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyre, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God; thou sealest up the sun, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been the Lord's Garden of Eden"—or, according to other versions, "Thou wast all the Lord's delight"—"every precious stone was thy covering; the sardius, topaz, and the diamond; the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper; the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou wast a Cherubin, a Messiah, for protection, and I set thee up; thou hast been upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou was created till iniquity was found in thee."
And the name of Messiah, in Greek, Christ, was given to the king, prophets, and high priests of the Hebrews. We read, in I. Kings, xii., 5: "The Lord is witness against you, and his Messiah is witness"; that is, the king whom he has set up. And elsewhere: "Touch not my Anointed; do no evil to my prophets...." David, animated by the Spirit of God, repeatedly gives to his father-in-law Saul, whom he had no cause to love—he gives, I say, to this reprobate king, from whom the Spirit of the Eternal was withdrawn, the name and title of Anointed, or Messiah of the Lord. "God preserve me," says he frequently, "from laying my hand upon the Lord's Anointed, upon God's Messiah."
If the fine title of Messiah, or Anointed of the Eternal, was given to idolatrous kings, to cruel and tyrannical princes, it very often indeed, in our ancient oracles, designated the real Anointed of the Lord, the Messiah by eminence; the object of the desire and expectation of all the faithful of Israel. Thus Hannah, the mother of Samuel, concluded her canticle with these remarkable words, which cannot apply to any king, for we know that at that time the Jews had not one: "The Lord shall judge the ends of the earth; and He shall give strength unto His king, and exalt the horn of His Messiah." We find the same word in the following oracles: Psalm ii, 2; Jeremiah, Lamentations, iv, 20; Daniel, ix, 25; Habakkuk, iii, 13.
If we compare all these different oracles, and in general all those ordinarily applied to the Messiah, there will result contradictions, almost irreconcilable, justifying to a certain point the obstinacy of the people to whom these oracles were given.
How indeed could these be conceived, before the event had so well justified it in the person of Jesus, Son of Mary? How, I say, could there be conceived an intelligence in some sort divine and human together; a being both great and lovely, triumphing over the devil, yet tempted and carried away by that infernal spirit, that prince of the powers of the air, and made to travel in spite of himself; at once master and servant, king and subject, sacrificer and victim, mortal and immortal, rich and poor, a glorious conqueror, whose reign shall have no end, who is to subdue all nature by prodigies, and yet a man of sorrows, without the conveniences, often without the absolute necessaries of this life, of which he calls himself king; and that he comes, covered with glory and honor, terminating a life of innocence and wretchedness, of incessant crosses and contradictions, by a death alike shameful and cruel, finding in this very humiliation, this extraordinary abasement, the source of an unparalleled elevation, which raises him to the summit of glory, power, and felicity; that is, to the rank of the first of creatures?