"With stores of spiritual provision,And magazines of ammunition,"
for the warfare, are expected
"To rise and start the ready wherefore,To all that sceptic may inquire for;Then raise their scruples dark and nice,And solve them after in a trice;As if divinity had catch'd,The itch, on purpose to be scratch'd!"
In short, these livingfantocciniare taught to expose heresies, and expound the dogmas of their faith, in words found for them by their priests; and he who best retains the lesson, and proves himself most loud and overbearing in the exercise, receives, for reward, a crown and royal robe, and is metamorphosed out of theimp, which he was an hour before, into theimperator; more fortunate by half, in the undisputed tenure of his title for a twelvemonth, than many of his Roman predecessors in the laurel. The little girls have an exhibition somewhat similar, but still more theatric in its character. At Christmas they assemble in the churches, dressed out by their parents (who delight in making them as fine as possible) very much, it must be admitted, like ballet-dancers; but supposed to represent, in their habiliments, youthful Christian virgins and martyrs. Thus apparelled, they hold forth on a platform in front of some favouritePræsepe, and sustain, with Pagan rivals, long dialogues on the Nativity, syllogising, in the shrill thin voice of childhood, upon all the sublime mysteries of our faith, till the Pagans abandon the scornful air with whichthey are taught to commence the discussion, and confess themselves vanquished by the arguments brought against them. The chief spokeswoman is then rewarded, like the head-boy, with robe and crown, and retains her regal dignity for the same period. Of all such education, what shall we say? Why, truly, in Hudibrastic plainness of speech, that it is
"More fitted for the cloudy nightOf Popery, than Gospel light."
Are our Britishinfantschools quite free from participation in the defects just noticed? By no means; and though the subject is far too important to be dismissed with a few words at the end of a slight sketch like the present, (especially since we hope to return to it later,) yet, even here, we must glance at one or two blemishes, that lie so immediately on the surface as to strike even the most casual observer, when once his attention is called to them. In such seminaries, it is known, the ages of the children usually vary from eighteen months to six years, at which tender period of life it is almost impossible to exercise too much discretion not to over-burden the memory, or to obscure the dawning reason; but alas! in the always well-meant, but certainly not always judicious, zeal for beginning education betimes, how often is it begun too early and pushed too far! In an over-anxiety to prevent, by pre-occupation of the ground, the arch-enemy of mankind from sowing his tares, how often is the good seed thrown in before it can have a chance of quickening!Festinare lenteshould be the motto, in moral and religious, as it is in all other branches of education; since neither in religion nor morals can we hope to arrive at the full stature of perfection, but by slow degrees and long training. The Bible, to be sure, (the only true source of either,) istheBook for all mankind; but as it contains "strong meat for men," as well as "milk for babes," great judgment is necessary, in separating these diets, to give to each age the food particularly adapted for it. We have the apostolic injunction for such discrimination,—"Every one that uses milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. Butstrong meatbelongeth to them that areof full age; even those whoby reason of use have their senses exercisedto discern both good and evil."[C]It is further obvious, from St Paul's catalogue of the armour which is to resistallthe attacks of the world, the flesh, and the devil, that it comprises many pieces of which young children can neither be made to comprehend the design, nor, at their time of life, to require the use. How unskilful, then, and abortive must be the attempt to put into the hands ofinstinctthe weapons of maturereason; to seek to explain the "beauty of holiness" to a child who does not "know his right hand from his left," and to invest an unbreeched urchin in the whole Christian panoply at once! With all due respect, too, to the pains-taking compilers of some of themanualsused in these classes, we cannot help thinking that their labour has been at times worse than thrown away; and it has excited our surprise to hear really judicious[D]persons speak of these lesson-books as "perfectly suited" to the purpose of infant education, and as requiring no amendment. Surely they cannot have read them; or they must have forgotten, when doing so, theageandconditionof those for whom they are intended. Not to be thought captious for nothing, we will let that "farrago libelli"—that sausage of all the sciences—that "Teacher's Assistant," speak for itself. It has gone through we know not how many editions, and continues to perpetuate in each succeeding one all the blunders of its predecessors. To begin at the beginning,—The scholars have to learn therefrom as many alphabets as there areletters; a historical, a geographical, a profane, and a biblical alphabet, &c., &c., not to attempt an enumeration of the whole. In the biblical, each letter is put opposite to some proper orimproperperson mentioned in Scripture, for whom it is said to stand representative—(leaving it to be supposed that it has been called into existence for no other purpose.) By this means thewrittencharacter of course becomes associated in the child's mind with themoralcharacter of the individual whose initial it is; and thus a certain prejudice is apt to arise against certain letters. For instance, the letterHis rendered fearfully significant,—
"Hstands for Herod, who spiltinfants'blood!"
A theorist might, perhaps, trace the absence of the aspirate in the speech of maturer years to the awe created by that dread tetrarch's name in infancy, when it is first feebly articulated, then dropped, and not recovered afterwards.[E]But we are not theatrical; in proof whereof, we observe that a child's natural aspirations are for tarts, dolls, or marbles; while, to counteract such propensities, these little hypocrites, before their time, are taught to sing out, among otherScripture wishes, the following formulary, which must, of course, act as a specific:—
"May Isaiah'shallow'dfire,Allmyferventheart inspire;Joseph'spurityimpart!Isaac'smeditativeheart!!!"
"May Isaiah'shallow'dfire,Allmyferventheart inspire;Joseph'spurityimpart!Isaac'smeditativeheart!!!"
A rhythmical dispute between two children, entitled a "Sabbath Dialogue," brings to our mind a similar farce at Ferrara, which we have formerly described. In this lively piece of absurdity, the naughty boy invites the good one to play instead of going to church, and, waxing warm as the other proves intractable, at length becomes absolutely abusive on finding he is not to prevail.
Once again. Behold a class of children with the picture of a sheep before them—to be taught, one would have supposed, the natural history of that animal, and to learn something about the material of which their little flannel petticoats and worsted stockings are made; when lo! in place of this, they are informed that "though their sins are red as crimson, they shall be aswool!!" If it were necessary to use any interjection here, surely a loud ovinebah!would be the most appropriate and natural. Butrevenons à nos moutons, for presently afterwards occurs this question—"What does the Bible tell us about wool?" Answer: "Gideon wrung a fleece!" Bah! again, for what othercommentarycan be made on suchinstructionas this? Why, Jason filched one; and the Lord Chancellor sits upon a woolsack; and either of these answers would convey as much useful knowledge to a child's mind, though they are not to be met with in the Bible.
These unfortunate babes are to know a little of every thing: so, after going throughversifiedweights and measures—arithmetic, including the higher branches—geometry—we hardly know what isomittedin this most comprehensive miscellany—they arrive at philosophy, and learn a great deal to the tune of "Miss Bailley." We give one stanza out of many, as an example:—
"The wondrous globe on which we live,Is close surrounded every whereBy something quite invisible,And callèdatmospheric air!This air is fluid, light and thin,And formed ofgaseswellcombined!It carries sound and odour well,But put in motion it iswind!"
"The wondrous globe on which we live,Is close surrounded every whereBy something quite invisible,And callèdatmospheric air!
This air is fluid, light and thin,And formed ofgaseswellcombined!It carries sound and odour well,But put in motion it iswind!"
At the end of each verse, the infant chorus repeats with enthusiasm, not "Poor Miss Bailley! unfortunate Miss Bailley!" &c., but—
"Oh how curious,—wonderfully curious,Thelaws of natureare indeedMost wonderfully curious!"
"Oh how curious,—wonderfully curious,Thelaws of natureare indeedMost wonderfully curious!"
The geography is as good as the physics:—
"Achannelis a passage wideThat flows from sea to sea;When narrow it is call'd astrait,—Thanks to Geography!"
"Achannelis a passage wideThat flows from sea to sea;When narrow it is call'd astrait,—Thanks to Geography!"
. . . . .
"When wise and older I am grown,I'll try and tell you more,But Teacher saysenough is knownAn infant's mind tostore!"
"When wise and older I am grown,I'll try and tell you more,But Teacher saysenough is knownAn infant's mind tostore!"
No doubt of it! enough and to spare! This is a fine specimen of the class of truths calledunquestionable. There is, moreover, a pleasingenjouementabout this last line, which recommends it to our regard. The teacher seems to be expostulating with her young charge, and saying, "My dear little four-year-old, eager for instruction beyond your years, but fearful oflearning upevery thing at school,—don't be frightened; the world will always find science sufficient to employ all good little boys like you." But though thistruthbe unquestionable, we doubt whether the line which conveys it be genuine; and rather fancy, should the original manuscript turn up, it would be found to run—
"Enough's enoughan infant's mind to store!"
which, though somewhat harsh to the ear, conveys an excellent meaning. Should this be thought to make the verse too rugged, we have yet a second various reading to propose, and that is simply to change the last word intobore, by which means the easy flow of the verse is preserved, and thesignificatio prœgnansof the original, though somewhat modified, is maintained.
Notwithstanding these blemishes—which, after our strictures on foreign classes, we felt bound to point out—our English schools are very far superior to the Italian for the same rank. With us, the attention of government and of the public is roused, and directed to their improvement; laymen join with the clergy in forwarding the same scheme; great part of the tuition devolves upon females—and who so fitted as woman to form the mind at an early age? It is no small advantage, too, that authoresses of talent and judgment should have devoted their time to the composition of exclusively moral and religious tales and histories for the young. Lastly, with us, there is none of that masquerading and display, which we reprobate as forming so prominent a part in all Italian tuition. In these schools, women are excluded from their natural office of teaching; there are no books adapted to infant minds; the whole business is vested in the hands of the priests; and they, in strict compliance with the spirit of their Church, train the pupils in passive obedience to authority, and teach them very little besides. We fear it will be long before any revolution can reach these seminaries. The sense of personal importance attaching—not only to the children themselves, but to their parents—from these contemptible yearly exhibitions, added to the interested motives which induce the Church to foster such vanity, would render any considerable alteration for the better extremely difficult, even were the evil more generallyfeltthan we fear it is likely to be under the present system of things. We state this opinion with regret; for what is the tendency of such education? Can it inculcate that real humility, not abasement of mind, which should characterise the true disciples of our blessed Saviour? Nay, must it not rather, by holding out, as it does, a premium to natural quickness and a superficial acquaintance with the dogmas of theology, tend to foster pride and selfishness—those monster evils which it is the prime object of religion to eradicate—whilst the heart remains untouched and the moral sense unexercised? and will not the poor children, who are its victims, learn to prize a few dry leaves from the Tree of Knowledge, beyond the fair fruit of the Tree of Life?
LA CARA VITA."Mais où sont les vertus qui dementent les tiennes?Pour éclipser ton jour quel nouveau jour parait?Toi qui les remplaças,[F]qui te remplacerait?"De Lamartine,Harmonies, Hymne au Christ.
LA CARA VITA."Mais où sont les vertus qui dementent les tiennes?Pour éclipser ton jour quel nouveau jour parait?Toi qui les remplaças,[F]qui te remplacerait?"
De Lamartine,Harmonies, Hymne au Christ.
The Cara Vita is a small church situated in the Corso, and not possessing within itself any thing to attract the stranger's particular attention. It is interesting, however, from the solemn services which take place there every Friday in Lent. On these occasions, after an exciting harangue from the officiating priest, the lights are extinguished, knotted scourges are handed round by the sacristan, and each individual of the congregation takes one and begins to flagellate himself. We have been told—for we were never present at these exhibitions—that the noise and excitement are terrible—every penitent seeking to ease his inner at the expense of his outer man, and proportioning the amount of his physical suffering to that of the moral evil which it is intended to counteract. But all the ceremonies in the Cara Vita are not of this character; and the same friend who described the above, informed us that the preaching there was often eloquent, and the music always fine; so, when we read in theDiario di Roma, that at twelve o'clock on Good Friday there was to be a solemnfunzione, or Service in commemoration of our Saviour's Passion, and that in all probability the church would be crowded, we repaired thither on that day an hour before the time mentioned in the paper, in order to secure a place. Doubtful of the propriety of witnessing, as a pageant, a representation of the most awful and affecting scene that the mind of man can contemplate, yet fearing, from some experience in Roman ceremonies, that our visit might issue merely inthat, we lingered some time about the porch; then, pushing aside the heavy curtain, irresolutely entered; and what a contrast presented itself between the two sides of that matted door! It seemed the portal between life and death: light, noise, confusion, reigned without; within, all was dark, solemn, still. The ear that had been stunned by the babel of the streets, was startled at the unwonted calm; and the eye, dazzled by the splendour of the meridian sun upon the pavement, experienced a temporary blindness, and required some time before it could accommodate its powers to the obscurity of the interior. By degrees, however, it was, apparent that the church, notwithstanding the voiceless quiet which prevailed, was full. The whole assembly sat as if spell-bound; not a whisper was to be heard; an awful curiosity tied every tongue. The business and pleasures of life were forgotten; the sexes exchanged no furtive glances; men and women, alike unobservant of their neighbours, counted their beads and bent their eyes upon the ground; while each new comer, awed by the deep silence, entered with cautious tread, and took his seat noiselessly. When our eyes had become somewhat familiarised with the artificial light, they were attracted to two elevated extempore side-boxes, brilliantly illuminated with wax, and filled with choristers in full costume. Between them was stretched a voluminous curtain, not so opaque but that a number of tapers might be seen faintly glimmering through it; and before this curtain a dark temporary stage was erected. The, religious calm that prevailed around was at length gently broken by some soft and plaintive notes, proceeding from the white-robed choir. In a few minutes these died away again upon the ear, and a figure, suddenly rising from the stage, exclaimed in a voice of strenuous emotion—"Once again, ye faithful ones! ye are assembled here to accompany me to Calvary! Yes! another Good Friday has come round, another anniversary of the day announced by God himself for man's deliverance from the wages of his sin; this is the great day when typical sacrifice was done away with, and our blessed Lord made of 'himself a full andsufficient sacrifice for the sins of the'faithful. But in order to triumph, my brethren, we must conquer—to conquer we must contend; there is no warfare without wounds, and our Saviour, while in the flesh, must partake of our infirmities: he must be 'the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief,' before he can 'lead captivity captive, and receive gifts'for his holy Church; the ransom of his faithful followers must be at the expense of his own blood. He bled, as you know, on Good Friday; and accordingly, we are met here—not to celebrate a triumph, but to learn humility, patience, and forgiveness of injuries at the foot of the cross, in order thatwe, like our great Head, may become perfectthrough suffering. Permit me, then, to ask you, with the Psalmist, 'Are your hearts set upon righteousness, O ye congregation?' and are your minds prepared to follow the Lord to Calvary? Have you, for instance, been studying lately his sufferings atthe different stations of the cross? have you been thinking at all upon his passion? thinking what it must have been to be hooted at, spit upon, reviled, buffeted, and friendless upon earth? If not, ponder well these things now;now, atthis moment; for are we not arrived at the most sacredhourof this most sacred but sad and solemn day? About this hour was the Saviour condemned by his unjust judge, delivered up to the rabble to be crucified. Go back in your minds to that moment; see him crowned with thorns, and bearing the cross upon his shoulder, till, lo! he faints under its weight, and his persecutors compel a stranger to carry it to the fatal spot. Then see him toiling onward, surrounded by his deadly enemies; his chosen friends have forsaken him and fled! a few women follow him afar off, bewailing his fate; he turns and speaks; listen to his words—'Daughters of Jerusalem! weep not for me, but weep for yourselves andfor your children!' Well might the merciful Saviour speak thus, when he had just heard the mad shout of the multitude, 'his blood be upon us andupon our children.' The crowd approaches Golgotha! they halt to rear the fatal tree; methinks I hear the exulting outcries of his vindictive murderers as they fix it in the ground!" Here the curtain drawn between the preacher and the back of the stage fell, revealing three wooden crucifixes lit up by a lurid red light from above. The effect was startling, and produced a shudder of horror throughout the whole auditory. After a breathless pause, the preacher, turning towards the cross, exclaimed, "What! are we too late for the beginning of this tragedy! Is the Redeemer of mankind already nailed to the cross? Oh, cruel and fiendlike man, is this your triumph! surely he who came to save will reject you now! Such might be our feelings, but they were not Christ's. No, my brethren, far from it. Oh, let us contemplate, for our own future guidance, the behaviour of Jesus to his murderers, notafterbut at themomentof his extreme torture; and may the Holy Spirit give us grace to profit by the exercise. Look on your crucified Redeemer writhing and maddened with suffering; and listen to the first words uttered in the depth of his agony: he imprecates no curse upon these guilty men, but exclaims, 'Father, forgive them; they know not what they do!'Caro Jesu!" Here there was much emotion both in the preacher and in the congregation; when it had subsided, he added persuasively, "You have heard Christ pray that hismurderersmay be forgiven, and shall you hesitate to forgive one another?" Then, taking the words of our Saviour for a text, he delivered a short animated sermon upon the forgiveness of injuries; after which came a prayer for grace to perform this duty; the pause which succeeded being filled with music and chanting. Then again the dark form of the preacher rose up. "What, my brethren! did not Christ passthree hoursin his agony, and shall we leave him in the midst? He has still more gracious words in store. My dear brethren and fellow sinners, now hear his dying address to the penitent thief, 'Verily I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise!'Ladro felice!but washethenpredestinatedto salvation, and his companion to be the victim of God's wrath?Niente, niente; believe, not a word of this false and heretical creed." Then followed a second discourse, with a diatribe against Calvin(who deserved it!) andallheretics (who might not deserve it), with an anathema against heresy in general, and a prayer for the pardon and acceptance of the true Catholic,id estRoman, Church. In like manner the preacher continued to set before his hearers all the circumstances of our Saviour's passion; pronouncing a short discourse upon every sentence uttered by him in his agony. Each sermonette was succeeded by prayer; and that by an interlude of music and chanting, which enabled him to recover himself, and proceed with undiminished energy during a three hours' service. We had listened attentively, not always agreeing with his doctrine, but without any great shock to our Protestant principles, when, in conclusion, he exclaimed, "Now, brethren, before we disperse, let us do homage to the blessed Virgin, and sympathise with the afflicted and inconsolable Mother of our Lord. Think of her sufferings to-day; think and weep over them; and forget not the worship due to her holy name; whom Christ honoured, shall not we honour too? Sons of the blessed Virgin! is not your brother Christ her son also? make her then your friend; propitiate her, in order to obtain pardon from him! Let us all, then, fall down upon our knees before theIndolorata." A long prayer to the Madonna followed, then a hymn in her honour; and after a last glorious outburst of the organ, accompanying the ardent and sustained Hallelujahs of both choir and congregation, the curtain falls, the doors are thrown open, daylight rushes in through the no longer darkened windows; and presently the thronged and noisy Corso has absorbed the last member of the much moved, slowly dispersing crowd.
A heartfelt and affecting ceremony was that we had just witnessed; every body had shed tears, and there had been evidently greatattrition, and probably somecontrition also. The strong appeals of the priest hadtold, though they were not legitimate; for what could be less so than, in the end, his misdirecting the thoughts from thetrueobject of worship, toher, who was, after all, but a mere mortal like ourselves?
Yet devotional feelings had been called forth, and in this it was unlike, and surely better than, the ordinary cold, formal, glittering, shifting pantomimic service of Te-Deums, and high masses, which, instead of "filling the hungry with good things," send all "empty away;" or worse,satisfiedwith "that which is not bread." Could piety really be appealed to through the senses, then might the ceremonies of the Romish Church hope to reach it, captivating as they are to most of them. The ear is pleased with exquisite music; the eye is dazzled with pictures, processions, scenic representations, glittering colours, gorgeous robes, rich laces, and embroidery; and even the nostril is propitiated by the grateful odour of frankincense; but the only address to the heart and intellect is a barbarous Latin prayer, unintelligible (were it to be heard) to most of the congregation, and rendered so to all by the mode in which it is gone through. On returning from such exhibitions as these, we feel more forcibly than ever, how much reason we have to thank those pious compilers of our expurgated English prayer-book, who, renouncing anunknown tongue, and rejecting all unscriptural interpolations, drew from the rich stores of Rome herself, and from the primitive Church, an almost faultless Liturgy,[G]where every desire of the human heart is anticipated, and every expression so carefully weighed, that not an unbecoming phrase can be found in it.
It is impossible for any one who has been much in Roman Catholic countries, to avoid drawing comparisons between the two services; and especially at this time, when many of our countrymen are halting between two opinions, and almost persuadingthemselves that there was no need of a Reformation, it behoves those not under the influence of
"That dark lanthorn of the SpiritWhich none see by but those that bear it;"
nor yet led away
"By crosses, relics, crucifixes,Beads, pictures, rosaries, and pyxes;Those tools for working out salvationBy meremechanicoperation,"
to protest against the return of Popery to this land, to the surrender of our consciences and our Bibles again into the hands of a fellow sinner.[H]"Quis custodet custodem?"—who shall watch our watcher?—was a question that men had been asking themselves for many years in England, but hitherto without result; till our pious Reformers, addressing themselves to the study of the Scriptures, received the sword of the Spirit, with which they were enabled to wage successful war against that wily serpent, coiled now for centuries round the Church of Christ, and waiting but a little furtherdevelopmentto crush her in his inextricable folds. Alike unallured by concessions and unterrified by threats, they boldly denounced thehereticalusurpation of Rome; opposing an honest conscience, and Christ the only mediator, to the caprice of councils, and the false unity of a pseudo-infallible head;[I]refusing to purchase their lives by rendering homage to any Phalaris of the Triple Crown.
Their perjured faith, though zealot Popes command,Point totheirBull, and raise the threatening hand:They deem'd those souls consummate guilt incurr'd,At conscience' fearful price, who life preferr'd:No length of days for bartered peace can pay,And what were life, take life's great end away?[J]
Their perjured faith, though zealot Popes command,Point totheirBull, and raise the threatening hand:They deem'd those souls consummate guilt incurr'd,At conscience' fearful price, who life preferr'd:No length of days for bartered peace can pay,And what were life, take life's great end away?[J]
THE BEATIFICATION.
"SanctisRoma, suis jam tollere gestit ad astra,Et cupit adsuperosevehere usque deos."Milton'sSonnets.
To receive Beatification, which is the first step towards Canonisation, and may in time lead to a fellowship with the saints,—to be pronounced "blessed" by him who arrogates to himself the title ofHoly, and must therefore know the full value of the dignity he confers—sic laudari a laudato, and that too in the finest church in Christendom, before the eyes of a countless assembly of all the nations of Europe,—is an honour indeed! No wonder, then, that every promotion should be jealously canvassed, and that sometimes the rumour of "unfairness," or "favouritism," should be heard among the people, when each fresh brevet comes out. For example—"Who's this third St Anthony? Are not two enough in the Calendar? The great St Antonio, and he of the pig!—(del porco,)—another will only create confusion;" or else, "Surely theBeataErnestinahas not been long enough dead to have attained to such an 'odour of sanctity;'" or, "Though the good Pasquale might deserve the title, the pious Teodoro's miracles are as well attested, and much more numerous, and should therefore have been first recognised." Of such sort are the comments of the crowd. All this grumbling, however, is at an end, when once theFestacomes round; the Church, by the brilliancy of her exhibitions, wins over her discontented children, and the installation is sure to be well attended. Sometimes the saint expectant stops short of true canonisation; and, having gained one step, finds himself like a yellow admiral, placed on the shelf without chance of further promotion. (This by the way.) No one can say precisely what entitles the dead to these honours. Large bequests alone are not always sufficient; witness the rejection of a certain distinguished Begum, who left much of her enormous wealth to the Pope, with a well-known view to this distinction. Some imagine that eminent piety is a necessary condition; but no! there is very little talk of religion. It seems chiefly to be the attestation of a sufficient number of miracles at a tomb, which confers the title of Beatus on its tenant, and converts it into a shrine, sure ever after to be profusely hung with glass eyes, wax fœtuses, silver hearts, discarded crutches, votive shipwrecks, &c., &c.,[K]in token of cures and deliverances which have emanated from it. Next to miracles, perhaps, we may reckondates—seniores priores—first buried, first beatified, and no superannuation here: on the contrary, holiness, like many other good things, requires time to ripen its virtues and to bring it to perfection; and it is a rule of the Church that chemistry must disintegrate the mortal before she can build up the saint. Thus it happens of two candidates of equal merit; he whose dissolution took place half a century or so before his rival, obtains the preference. The first steps are taken by the lawyers; one being retained to advance the merits of the aspirant saint, another to asperse them if possible. Should the election be contested, much special pleading is then resorted to. Both sides are paid by the Church, but he who opposes the nomination is termed thedevil'scounsel. This title, however, is a legal or rather a theological fiction; the miracles alleged to have been performed by the defunct being only more triumphantly established and set off by the apparent disposition of the rival pleader to deny their reality; who, after a proper show of resistance and incredulity, allows himself to be foiled. This is indeed beating Satan with his own weapons; but the advocates of saints belong to that party who
"E'en to the Devil himself will go,If they have motive thereunto;And think, as there is war betweenThe Devil and them, it is no sinIf they by subtle stratagemMake use of him as he does them."
"E'en to the Devil himself will go,If they have motive thereunto;And think, as there is war betweenThe Devil and them, it is no sinIf they by subtle stratagemMake use of him as he does them."
We had never witnessed a Beatification: so, when the Pope, in his character of umpire, had pronounced his fiat in favour of "good sister Frances," and all that remained to be done was the church ceremonial necessary to admit her to piety's peerage, we procured one of the many thousand tickets printed for the occasion, and followed the crowd to St Peter's. Here all was prepared to give due effect to the scene: the interior was studiously darkened, that the rich upholstery might be set off by a grove of countless wax lights, thick and tall as young pine trees. The workmen, after a whole fortnight of bustle and activity, had done their part well. Curtains had been hung and carpets spread; organs wheeled up towards the throne of St Peter; and a whole gallery of villanously painted historical pictures, blasphemous and absurd, were suspended round, representing the miracles for which the new "beatified" was toreceive her first degree towards sainthood; and showing amongst other wonders, how in one case her blood, in another her image, restored a blind man to sight, and so completely cured the palsy of one Salvator di Sales, that he is dancing a hornpipe on his recovery, while a priest is looking on approvingly. We were too early for the ceremony; and after curiously scanning these preparations, our attention was attracted to a group near, eagerly listening to the recital of a bare-footed Capuchin. On approaching, we found that he was discoursing on the virtues of a picture of the Virgin, known by the name ofSta Maria del Pianto, a fresco daub, painted in a very dirty back street. He was affirming that it had lately taken towinking, and had also been seen to shed tears over the body of a man recently found murdered under the lamp. "Who saw her weep?" inquired one of his hearers. "Do you doubt the miracle, my son?" said the friar. "No indeed, father," returned he; "but why did she not call out to the assassin; and what is the use of weeping over a dead man?" "It was owing to the gentleness of her sex," said another, who appeared interested in proclaiming the notoriety of the shrine: he proceeded, therefore, to inform the attentive listeners, that he had the face newly painted some months back, since which operation there was no end to the miracles performed by it. Several persons round hereon testified to having heard repeatedly of these wonders. "Ah!" said a sceptical craftsman, "I dare say you live in another quarter of the city, for it is well known that those at a distance see these things more clearly than the neighbours, unless, like our friend here," nodding to the restorer of the shrine, "they hope to attract customers to the shop by drawing votaries to the shrine." "I don't believe a word of it," said we, taking part in the colloquy. "Caro lei—who can help that? we can only pity your unbelief," said the good-humoured Capuchin, offering us, however, a pinch out of his snuff-box. "You," continued he, "should call to mind 'in dubiis fides;' andwe, in compassion to your being a heretic, will remember 'in omnibus caritas.'" We accepted the good man's courtesy, albeit no snuff-taker; and he was resuming the interrupted narrative, when a stir among the crowd outside announced the near approach of the procession, and every one hastened to secure a good seat. Presently the Swiss guards enter, the choristers take their places, in come priests, bishops, cardinals, all sumptuously arrayed; at length the Pope himself arrives and assumes his throne. Mass commences.
And here the reader doubtless expects, if not a full description of the ceremony of canonisation, at least an accurate detail of the various steps of the process by which it was effected; but, as we have stated above, the incubation had been completed six weeks before in a private Eccaleiobion, and the pageant to-day was merely to give publicity to the metamorphosis—to read in, and to enrol among the saints the Beata Francesca. As we cannot give a particular account of thefunzione, we give a general one of all masses:—
High mass! The stall'd and banner'd quire—White canons—priests in quaint attire—The unfamiliar prayer:The fumes that practised hands dispense,The tinkling bells, the jingling pence,The tax'd but welcome chair:The beams from ruby panes that glow,Of rhythmal chant the ebb and flow:The organ, that from boundless storesIts trembling inspiration poursO'er all the sons of care;Now joyous as the festal lyre,When torch and song and wine inspire;Now tender as Cremona's shell,When hush'd orchestras own the spellAnd watch the ductile bow—Now rolling from its thunder-cloud,Dark peals o'er that retiring crowd,And now has ceased to blow.
The sunshine and the green leaves embrace not all that we should know of physical nature. Storm and darkness have their signs, which we do well to study; and in the tempests of the tropics, or the long winter darkness of the poles, we have types of the character of different sections of the globe, more marked than the varying warmth of the sun, or the character of the vegetation—but not perhaps so pleasing. Even so, the storm and darkness of the human soul—the criminal nature of man, provide their peculiar food for the thinker and inquirer. The annals of virtue have their own elevations and delights; but those of vice are no more to be passed over than the dark and stormy hours in the history of each revolution round the sun. "While some affect the sun, and some the shade," there may even be those whose most deeply cherished associations are with these unlit hours—who prefer the night thoughts to the day dreams. But to all, the crimes peculiar to different nations are a large part of the knowledge which man may profitably have of his race. In the history of its great criminals, a nation's character is drawn, as it were, colossally, with the broadest brush, and in the deepest shadows. National virtues have delicate and subtle tints, and exquisitely minute shadings, inviting to a nearer view—like Carlo Dolci's Madonnas, or Constable's forest landscapes: the crimes of a nation present the character of its people, as they rise from the dead in Michael Angelo's Last Judgment. Theordinaryvices of men have a certain vulgar air of uniformity; but each great crime is a broad dash of the national character of the people among whom it was committed. The Cenci, and Joanna of Naples were of Italy. It was in Holland that two great and virtuous statesmen were torn to pieces by the mob. The dirk, long buried beyond the Grampians, has re-appeared across the Atlantic in the shape of the bowie-knife. The country of Woldemar and the sorrows of Werther produced that most amiable and sentimental of murderesses, Madame Zwanziger, who loved and was beloved wherever she went; so sensitive, so sympathising, so sedulous, so studious of the wants of those by whom she was surrounded, so disinterestedly patient; she had but one peculiarity to distinguish her from an angel of light—it was an unfortunate propensity to poison people! We read in theCauses Célèbres, of a Bluebeard who slew a succession of wives by tickling them till they died in convulsions; and at once we are reminded of that populace who are said to partake of the natures of the ape and the tiger. The people who, for more centuries than are included in the events of European history, have been resolved into the mysterious classification of castes, produced those equally mysterious criminals the Thugs, for whose deeds our so utterly different habits and ideas are quite incapable of finding or conceiving a motive. Our own country produced the assassinations of Rizzio, Regent Murray, and Archbishop Sharpe—all pregnant with marked national characteristics; aristocratic pride, revenge of wrong, and fanatical fury. We propose to offer for the amusement or instruction—which he pleases—of our reader, a few more records of Scottish crimes, not probably all so conspicuously known to the general reader as the three we have just alluded to, yet not, we trust, without something to commend them to notice, as characteristic of the country and the age in which they were respectively enacted.
The raw materials from which we propose to work out our little groups, are the records of our criminal trials; and yet we feel an insuperable inclination to begin with a name not certainly unknown, yet not to be found in the proceedings of the Court of Justiciary—Macbeth, King of Scotland. Perhaps we might consider it a sufficient reason for holding his case equivalent to a trial, that before a tribunal called the Public Opinion, he has been tried, and that at the instanceof such a public prosecutor as never opened his lips in any court of law—one whose accusation has carried a conviction deep into the very heart of literature, whence no archæological evidence, and no critical pleading will ever eradicate it. Nor would we desire to touch it: let Macbeth the murderer remain to all time the most powerful picture of temptation, leading its victim through crime into the hideous shadows of remorse, that human pen has ever drawn. But there was an actual prose Macbeth, as different from the ideal as the canvass bought by Raphael of some respectable dealer in the soft line, was from the Transfiguration which he afterwards painted on it. Withhim, being but a simple historical king, we may take liberties; and the liberty we propose to take on the present occasion is that of vindicating his character. Vindications are fashionable; and since Catiline and Machiavelli, Richard III., and Philip II. have been vindicated, why not Macbeth? We shall say 'tis our humour to whiten him, and no man can say it is a criminal or mischievous one.
The main question is, did Macbeth murder Duncan? It was an older story in Shakspeare's time than the murder of Darnley is now, and he may have taken a false view of it. We shall approach the question by an inquiry who Duncan and Macbeth were, and in what relation they stood to each other. About the end of the eleventh century, there reigned in Scotland a king called Kenneth III. Like all the other Scottish monarchs of the period, the chroniclers have given him his own peculiar tragic history, in this wise: he was induced to poison the young prince Malcolm Duff, who might possibly show a title to the throne enabling him to compete with Kenneth's own offspring. This troubled his conscience. He "ever dreaded in his mind," in the expressive words of old Bellenden, that it "should come some time to light: and was so full of suspicion, that he believed when any man rounded to his fellow, that they spake evil of him; for it is given by nature to ilk creature, when he is guilty of any horrible crime, by impulsion of his conscience, to interpret every thing that he sees to some terror of himself." He was one night appalled by a terrific vision, and next morning making his confession, he was sentenced to a pilgrimage to the tomb of St Palladius at Fordun. When the pilgrimage was over, he was invited to partake of the hospitalities of a lady named Fenella—a very neat name for a romance—at her fortalice of Fettercairn. In the civil conflicts or the administration of justice during his reign, some of the relations of this lady had been slain; among the rest her son. Having got the king into her toils, she resolved to put him to death; and the method which the chroniclers make her adopt, shows a superfluous ingenuity ridiculous enough to strip a murder of all its horrors. Kenneth was taken to see a tower of the castle "quhilk was theeket with copper, and hewn with maist subtle mouldry of sundry flowers and imageries, the werk so curious, that it exceeded all the stuff thereof." In the middle of this tower stood an image of Kenneth himself, in brass, holding in his hand a golden apple studded with costly gems. "That image," said the lady, "is set up in honour of thee, to show the world how much I honour my king; the precious apple is intended for a gift for the king, who will honour his poor subject by taking it from the hand of the image." Now matters were so arranged, that the removal of the apple caused certain springs to touch the triggers of a series of bent cross-bows pointed to the spot, and so, when the unsuspecting monarch went to take the gift, a whole sheaf of arrows penetrated to his heart. On the death of this king, though he left a son called Malcolm, the succession went to a rival line. His immediate successor was Constantine, who was killed by another Kenneth, called IV., who in his turn was killed by Malcolm, who thus regained the throne his father had filled. "The gracious Duncan" was the son of a daughter of this Malcolm. His father, strangely enough, appears to have been a priest; he is called in the old dry chronicles, which are the only ones to be depended on, Duncan the son of Trini, or Trivi, abbot of Dunkeld. Now the Kenneth IV. of the rival line, who had been slain byDuncan's grandfather, left behind him a son, and that son left a daughter, whose name was Gruach, and in whom the reader, though certainly in an unusual shape, must welcome Lady Macbeth herself. There being thus two rival races, alternately seizing the throne: while Duncan was the son of a daughter of one king,shewas the daughter of the son of another. This gave her no contemptible title to the throne, and when she married Macbeth, or Machaboedth, as he is called by the chroniclers, she had a husband who, possessing the almost independent principality of Ross, might be able to fight her battles. It is somewhat remarkable that, in an ecclesiastical record still preserved, in which a royal grant is made to a religious house, dedicated to St Servanus, Macbeth's wife appears along with himself, as granter of the deed; and they are called, "Machabet filius Finlach, et Gruach filia Bodhae—Rex et Regina Scotorum;"[L]an equal juxtaposition, only to be accounted for by the supposition that Macbeth was king in right of his wife. As to Macbeth himself, his origin, save in the supernatural legend we shall hereafter notice, appears not to have been known; but Fordun seems to intimate, that he was a descendant of that same Fenella who had so curiously murdered Duncan's great-grandfather. If we were disposed, indeed, to take a proper antiquarian partisanship of the one dynasty against the other, we might speak of Duncan as a treacherous usurper, and Lady Macbeth as an injured and insulted queen, whose cause is heroically adopted and vindicated by a true knight, who, while redressing her wrongs, wins her heart and hand.
Let us now look to the manner in which the death of Duncan is spoken of by the most ancient authorities. Old Andrew Wyntoun, Prior of St Serfs on Lochleven, who has never yet, to our great wonder, been upheld as one of the greatest poets of his own or any other age,—perhaps we may undertake the task some day, let our readers judge by the extracts on the present occasion with what prospect of success:—Wyntoun narrates the event with the true simplicity of genius, in these two lines:—