The work is printed on good paper, and illustrated with wood-cuts of the most noted places referred to in its pages.
Democracy in the United States:What it has Done, What it is Doing, and What it will Do.By Ransom H. Gillett, formerly Member of Congress from St. Lawrence County, N.Y.; more recently Registrar and Solicitor of the United States Treasury Department, and Solicitor for the United States in the Court of Claims, etc.New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1868.
This is what, we suppose, will be termed, in the language of the market, aseasonablebook, it being brought out just in time for, and adapted to, the political campaign upon which the country has now fully entered. It aims to give a succinct but complete history of the Democratic party, of its measures and its leading men, from its beginning down to the present time. We are not ourselves politicians enough to judge how faithfully or reliably this has been done. The volume—a compact one of some four hundred pages—is brought out in the Messrs. Appleton's excellent style of book publishing, and will, of course, have an extensive sale.
Histoire De France.Par V. Duruy.Nouvelle Edition, illustrée d'un grand nombre de gravures et de cartes geographiques.Paris: Hachette. (New York: Christern. 2 vols. 12mo.)
This is a part of a course of compendious universal history prepared by a number of learned writers, under the direction of M. Duruy. It is a clear and succinct history of France from the earliest epoch to the year 1815, with an appendix containing a summary of events from 1815 to 1866. The history of France is of the greatest interest and importance, and but little known among us, especially in its Catholic aspects. This book is, therefore, one of the most useful text-books for the instruction of classes studying the French language, which can be studied; and most invaluable also for others, who are able to read French, and who desire to have a brief but complete exposition of French history.
Besides its numerous and valuable maps, it contains more than 300 remarkably well-executed and artistic woodcuts, which add very much to its value and interest. The study of the French language and literature has been too much neglected in our American colleges and higher schools. Every person of liberal education ought to read and speak the French language. We recommend this book to the attention of teachers, parents, and all persons occupied with the study of French, and also to intelligent tourists, to whom it will prove an invaluable companion on a visit toLa Belle France.
O'Shea's Popular Juvenile Library.First series. 12 vols. Beautifully illustrated.New York: P. O'Shea. 1868.
The titles of the volumes in this series are as follows:
The Inquisitive Boy and the Little Ragman;The Picture and the Country Cousins;Augusta and Christmas Eve;The Young Guests, and other stories;The Page, and other stories;The Young Artist;The Gray Woman of Scharfenstein, and other stories;The Young Painter;Tailor and Fiddler;Sobieski's Achievements;Hedwig of Poland;The Young Countess.
These tales are taken principally from the German and French, and are unexceptional in matter.
The Catholic Crusoe.Adventures of Owen Evans, Esq., Surgeon's Mate, set ashore with five companions on a desolate island in the Caribbean Sea, 1739. Given from the Original MSS.,by Rev. W. H. Anderdon, M.A.New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Co. 12mo, pp. 519.
A notice of Dr. Anderdon's very entertaining story appeared inThe Catholic Worldfor December, 1867. The reprint before us is very well got up, but lacks an interesting feature of the original edition, namely, its maps and illustrations.
The Queen's Daughter; or, The Orphan of La Granja.By the author ofGrace Morton, etc.Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. Pp. 108.
A pleasant tale for young folk, neatly bound, and, in general typographical execution, a very decided improvement on its predecessor,Elinor Johnstone.
The Complete Poetical Works of Thomas Campbell, with a Memoir of his Life.New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1868.
So far as the paper and binding are concerned, this edition of Campbell is beautifully got up; but we cannot say as much for the type, which is the very reverse of beautiful.
A Popular Treatise on the Art of House Painting, Plain and Decorative.By John W. Masury. New York: D. Appleton & Co.
A very useful book, on an important subject, for those who would preserve their houses, and have them tastefully and, at the same time, economically painted. The mechanical portion of the work is executed in the Messrs. Appleton's best style.
Celebrated Sanctuaries of the Madonna.By Rev. J. Spencer Northcote, D.D.Philadelphia: P. F. Cunningham. 1868.
This is an American edition of Dr. Northcote's work, the English edition of which we noticed in our July number. It is brought out in very handsome style, and reflects credit on the taste of the publisher.
Announcements.—"The Catholic Publication Society" has in press, or in preparation, the following new works:
1. Symbolism. By Adam Moehler. This will be ready about August 1st.2. Second Series of Illustrated Sunday-School Library. Ready about September 1st, twelve vols., for titles of which see advertisement on second page of cover.3. Memorials of those who suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland, in the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Eighteenth Centuries. Collected and edited from the original authorities, by Myles O'Rielly. B.A., LL.D. This will be one of the most important books relative to Ireland ever published in this country. It will be ready about September 1st.4. Cradle Lands—Egypt, Palestine, etc. Illustrated. By Lady Herbert. Ready November 15.5. Love; or, Self-Sacrifice. By Lady Herbert.6. Life of Father Ravigan, S.J.7. Third Series of Illustrated Sunday-School Library.
From P. Donahoe, Boston.
Plain Talk about the Protestantism of To-day. From the French of Mgr. Segur. 1 vol. 32mo, pp. 253. Price, 60 cents.
From J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia.
Alleghania; or, Praises of American Heroes.By Christopher Laomedon Pindar.
The veneration paid to saints by Catholics with the formal approbation or tacit sanction of the supreme authority in the church is, together with the use made of their images and that of Christ in religious worship, under the same sanction, the one feature of the Catholic system most obnoxious to Protestants. They do not hesitate ordinarily to qualify it as idolatry, that is, as a rendering of the worship due to God alone to creatures, both living and inanimate, similar to that which the heathen system of polytheism ascribes to its numerous divinities and their images.
We propose to discuss this matter briefly, not with the intention of proving that the Catholic doctrine and practice are truly a genuine outgrowth of the Christian religion by extrinsic evidence, but of showing their intrinsic harmony with Christian first principles, and refuting the objections derived from these first principles against them. As the subject naturally divides itself into two distinct parts, already clearly indicated in our opening paragraph, we shall confine our remarks at present to the first part of it, or that relating to the veneration of saints.
The preliminary charge of idolatry, or a direct contradiction to the monotheistic doctrine of natural and revealed theology, is perfectly groundless, and, however it may be modified and diminished, there is not an atom of truth in it upon which any objection to the Catholic doctrine can be based.
Idolatry, or the worship of the creature instead of the creator, originates in ignorance or denial of the true conception of the one living and true God. God is not worshipped, because he is not known or believed in. By necessary consequence, something which is not God is conceived as highest, best, most excellent, most powerful, without reference or relation to God as the author and sovereign of all that has any existence. The pantheist is an idolater of all nature, but especially of himself. Even Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were not free from idolatrous principles, although probably free from all sin in the matter, since they ascribed to the universe a certain amount of being not caused by the intelligence and will of God as creator.Neither are our modern rationalists free from the same error, since they withhold from God the homage of their reason, and give it to themselves as to persons possessing intelligence which is independent of God. Wilful and obstinate heretics are all likewise in the same category; for, by rejecting a part of what God has revealed, they, by implication, profess to be superior to God in intelligence, and substitute an idol of their own vain imagination in lieu of that eternal truth which is identical with the essence of God. Idolaters, in the strict sense of the word, or polytheists, such as the ancient Greeks and Romans were, paid a formal worship to their gods, as superior beings having a supreme and irresponsible control over nature and over men. It was a worship which was a substitute for that originally given to the true God, totally contrary to it, and an insuperable barrier to the spread of monotheism as a religion. These false divinities were, therefore, the rivals of the true God, and filled the place in the religious worship of the heathen which was filled by him in the worship established by divine revelation from the creation of mankind. It is evident, from the very statement of what idolatry is in itself, that a veneration paid to any creature, which is proportionate to the degree of excellence which it has received from the creator, is not idolatrous, and cannot detract from the supreme veneration which is due to God as the sovereign lord of the universe. Those who condemn the religious honor paid to created natures by the Catholic Church cannot therefore lay down ana prioriprinciple from which to demonstrate in advance that this honor is necessarily idolatrous, unless they previously demonstrate that the excellence ascribed to these natures is such that God cannot communicate it to a creature. The worship paid to the sacred humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ is that which is apparently the most obnoxious to the charge of idolatry of any other species of relative worship which the church has decreed to be due to any created nature. Our chief controversy is, therefore, with Jews, Mohammedans, Unitarians, and others who claim to be pure theists and who deny the incarnation. What we affirm against these is, that they cannot demonstrate the impossibility of the incarnation. They cannot demonstrate the impossibility of a hypostatic union between the human nature and the divine nature, by virtue of which the personality of the human nature is divine, and the human nature is the nature of God, and thus worthy of relative adoration. Therefore, they cannot argue that the divinity of Jesus Christ has not been revealed, and that divine worship is not due to him by the law of God, because God cannot reveal such a doctrine or command such a worship without contradicting the essential truth of his nature. Suppose that evidence is given sufficient in itself to authenticate the revelation of the mystery of the incarnation, and at once it becomes evident that divine worship is due to Jesus Christ as God incarnate, precisely because worship is due to God. The question is then only debatable on the point whether this revelation has been made or not. If it could be proved that it has not, and that Jesus Christ is a created and finite person, it would follow that the worship paid to him by all orthodox Christians is idolatrous.It would be idolatrous to worship any man who should pretend to be God incarnate when he is not, or who should be erroneously believed by his disciples to be a divine person, without any reference to the question whether any such incarnation can be or has been decreed by the wisdom of God. We are not attempting to prove the truth of the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus Christ, or to prove directly that the worship we pay to him is not idolatrous. Everything, we admit, depends on proving it. If it cannot be proved, Christianity is a superstition, and must be classed with Brahmanism, Buddhism, and Mohammedanism. For the proof of the truth and reality of the incarnation, we must refer the reader elsewhere. We are intent on showing that no elevation of created nature which is possible is in any way incompatible with the supreme dignity and sovereignty of God, and, consequently, no honor due to such an elevated nature incompatible with the supreme worship due to the divine majesty. We are also intent on showing that it is principally the fact of the incarnation on which the whole question hinges, and the worship paid to Christ against which the objections of so-called theists to saint-worship are levelled. The incarnation is the principle of saint-worship. All orthodox Protestants are accused of idolatrous saint-worship by Unitarians, Jews, Mohammedans, and all pure theists. It is true that the orthodox do not regard Jesus Christ as a mere saint, but all others regard him as being, at the highest, only the greatest among the saints. All Protestants who are orthodox on the incarnation, and conformed in belief to the doctrine of their own confessions and great divines, believe that the holy humanity of Jesus Christ is entitled to divine worship. They are obliged to worship not only the divine nature of Jesus Christ, but also his human nature, his soul and body. Yet, the human nature of Christ is a created and finite substance, not possessing a single divine attribute. How, then, can it receive the worship due to God alone? Evidently it cannot receive such a worship as terminating in itself, or as absolute. It is impossible for the intellect to make the judgment that the substance of the body and of the soul of Jesus Christ is the infinite, self-existing being whom we call God, and from whom all things derive existence. Why, then, is the humanity of Jesus Christ to be worshipped? Because of the divine person to whom it belongs. The soul and the body of Jesus Christ are the soul and body of the Son of God. The same person who is God is also man, and his humanity is inseparable from his person. It is, therefore, on account of and in relation to his divine person that his human nature is adored with the worship of latria. If our Lord should condescend to come upon the earth again, we are persuaded that every sincere Protestant who believes in his divinity would gladly prostrate himself at his feet to pay him supreme adoration, and, if he were able to look upon his face, would feel that he was gazing upon the very countenance of God, and that the eyes of the Lord of heaven and earth were fixed upon him. If there are any whose mind or feelings revolt from the worship of the Son of God in his human body and through the medium of his visible form, let them admit at once that they are no believers in the incarnation, that they have abandoned the doctrine of the ancient Protestant confessions and are really Unitarians. Those who fully admit the Catholic doctrine that the sacred humanity of Jesus Christ is to be adored must range themselves at once on our side and prepare to defend our common cause. They must defend themselves and us against the charge of idolatry.They cannot do it without laying down the principle that, when a created nature is elevated to a special union with the divine nature, and made to participate with it in dignity, it is worthy of a proportionate religious veneration. The more orthodox Unitarians cannot deny this principle without condemning themselves. They give a veneration at least equal to that which Catholics call the worship of hyperdulia to Jesus Christ; and as they do not acknowledge in him any dignity differing in kind, but only one differing in degree, from that of angels, prophets, martyrs, confessors, and other saints, they cannot consistently deny the propriety of giving a lesser veneration, or worship of dulia, to the saints. Episcopalians and other Protestants dedicate days and churches in honor of the Blessed Virgin and the saints, which are acts of very high religious veneration. Only those who refuse all religious veneration either to Jesus Christ or to any created nature, because they deny any supernatural elevation of created nature into a mysterious union with the divine nature, have any pretext or appearance of consistency in their charge of idolatry against Catholic saint-worship. Yet it is precisely the trinitarian Protestants who are loudest and most violent in repeating this charge. So far as rationalists and Unitarians are concerned, it is not of much utility to discuss the question of the veneration of the Virgin and of the saints directly. The preliminary question of the incarnation has first to be settled. It is the divine worship we pay to Jesus Christ which is their great stone of stumbling and rock of offence. We leave them aside, therefore, to pursue the one direct line of argument on which we started, namely, that the veneration of saints flows logically out of the worship of the sacred humanity of Christ; and is rooted in the doctrine of the incarnation.
Orthodox Protestants are bound to pay divine worship, or the adoration of latria, to the soul and body of Jesus Christ; a worship which would be idolatry if the humanity of Christ were not united to the divine nature in one personality, so that the worship of Christ as man is necessarily referred to his divine person and terminates upon it. For the same reason, they are bound to pay an inferior veneration, or worship of dulia, to the saints, because they also are united to the divine nature through the incarnation and in Christ, as his co-heirs and brethren, the participators of his glory. They are not united with the divine nature in one personality, therefore they cannot receive divine worship. But they are in a lesser mode made "partakers of the divine nature," as the Scripture explicitly declares, and, therefore, deserve a veneration commensurate with their degree of union, which is ultimately referred to God, who is "worshipped in his saints." To compare the veneration of the saints of God with the Greek polytheism is simply absurd. It is connected with and springs out of the doctrine of pure monotheism and the worship paid to the one true God. It does not, in the slightest degree, supplant this doctrine or worship, confuse the idea of God, or interfere with the recognition of his sole and absolute sovereignty. It presents necessarily, and by its very essence, the saints as the creatures, the servants, the courtiers, ministers, and favored friends of God, intercessors and advocates for men before his throne.It presents, therefore, necessarily, God as their creator, sovereign, and as the source and fountain of all their sanctity, beatitude, and glory, the author and giver of all the blessings asked for through their intercession. The perpetual presence of the true idea of God preserves the idea of the hierarchy of creatures from all corruption or perversion, and keeps continually before the mind their relation and subordination to the supreme and absolute Lord of the universe.
In the same way, the presence of the true idea of the incarnation prevents the idea of the mediation of the saints between God and man from being corrupted. It is impossible for the Blessed Virgin or any other saint to take the place in the Catholic idea which belongs to Jesus Christ as the Redeemer and Saviour of mankind, the Mediator between God and man. It is clearly understood and vividly realized that Jesus Christ is the medium of union between God and man through the hypostatic union of human nature with the divine nature in his person. His expiation of sin derives its infinite value from the divinity of his person. His merits derive their infinite value also from his divinity. He is the source and fountain of grace and mercy, because he is God and possesses life in himself. He is the sacrifice perpetually offered in the divine eucharist, the perennial source of life from which the soul is fed in the holy communion. The mediation of the saints is derived from him, subordinate to and dependent on his mediation. The Blessed Virgin and the saints are honored on account of their relation to him, and are invoked as his agents and ministers in dispensing grace. It is impossible, therefore, to attribute to them any separate merit or independent power; and, so far from the devotion to Our Lady or the saints impeding the view of Christ, it only brings him into bolder relief, and by contrast and comparison enhances the conception of his infinite elevation, as their and our creator and sovereign, above all creatures even the most exalted. Dr. Johnson with his usual strong good sense, saw this, and with his usual manly honesty avowed it, as every one knows who has read his Life by Boswell. Intelligent Protestants ought to be ashamed of themselves for perpetually reiterating the stupid charge against the Catholic Church, that she substitutes the Virgin and the saints as objects of worship in the place of God, or as objects of confidence in the place of our Saviour Christ. The only excuse for those who make this assertion is invincible ignorance, an excuse not very creditable to men who profess to be theologians. It may avail for those who have grown too old to make any new studies or receive any new ideas, and for those whose intelligence and learning are so circumscribed that they cannot become acquainted with or understand the arguments of Catholic theologians. But for those who have the obligation and the opportunity to study and understand these grave questions, but yet persist, either through culpable ignorance or wilful dishonesty, in misrepresenting Catholic doctrine, there can be no excuse. In spite of our desire to stretch charity to its utmost limits, we cannot help thinking that they are afraid to meet the question openly and fairly, afraid to investigate, and afraid to discuss the issue between us on its real merits. They apprehend, more or less vaguely or distinctly, that they cannot maintain their ground if they state the Catholic doctrines fairly and argue against them as they really are. Their instinct of self-preservation teaches them that their only safety consists in the smoke which they create by their incessant fusillade of misrepresentation, and which hides the true aspect of the field from their deluded followers.
We leave this part of our subject with a reiteration of what we have already affirmed and proved. The attempt to provea priorifrom the idea of God, or from the idea of the incarnation and mediation of the Word made man, that the religious veneration of the saints is incompatible with the supreme worship due to God, and the supreme confidence we are bound to repose in the merits and grace of the sacred humanity of Jesus Christ, is perfectly futile. The only real question is one of evidence: whether the Catholic Church can furnish evidence of her divine authority to teach that the Blessed Virgin and the saints have received a subordinate office of mediation, and are to be honored and invoked by a special and formalcultus. If the evidence which is proposed can be refuted, the worship of the saints may be qualified as a vain observance, a superstition, a useless addition to Christianity. But it can never, with any reason, be denominated idolatry; because it distinctly limits itself to that veneration which is simply commensurate with a merely created and derived dignity, leaving intact and perfect the supreme worship of God. It can never be denominated a substitution of many saviours and mediators in place of the one Saviour and Mediator Jesus Christ; because it leaves the doctrine of his mediation intact and perfect. That this evidence can be demolished by sound historical learning, scientific exegesis of the Scriptures, or solid theological arguments, we have no fear. We do not think our antagonists have much hope of doing it. They have already said all that can be said on their side, and only damaged their own cause by it. They cannot get rid of the universal testimony of all ages and countries to the Catholic doctrine, without resorting to principles which subvert their own foundation and leave them to sink down into the pit that has swallowed up Rénan and Colenso. These topics have been exhaustively handled by numerous and able Catholic writers, to whom we refer those readers who wish to investigate them. We turn now to the second part of our subject, which relates to the honor paid to the sacred images of Christ and the saints.
Anticatholic writers are so illogical, careless, and confused in their arguments against Catholic doctrines and practices, and use so much rhetoric, directed merelyad captandum vulgus, especially when they take up this, which is one of their favorite themes, that it is very difficult to follow and refute them in a clear and methodical manner. They deal very much in assertions and vituperative expressions, in misrepresentations, ridicule, and low attempts at wit, in unmeaning laudations of themselves as the only enlightened and spiritual persons in the world, and wholesale depreciation of Catholics, especially the simple and pious peasantry and common people of Catholic countries. We suppose that the substance of their objections against the veneration of images, extracted and reduced to a clear and precise statement, would be something like this: The use made of images in religious worship by Catholics is idolatrous, because it either is actually an adoration of images as gods in place of the true God, or, if not, leads to and encourages such a worship, and bears the outward appearance of being identical with it. It is, therefore, to be condemned, as intrinsically dangerous in itself, and therefore prohibited under the old law, and as in many cases among the uneducated grossly superstitious and heathenish.It is, therefore, on a par with the idolatry of the Greeks and Romans, and other pagan nations, which is so severely denounced in the Holy Scriptures, and so unmercifully ridiculed by the early Christian writers; although enlightened Catholics, like enlightened pagans, may be free from the grossness of the vulgar superstition.
A full discussion of the subject would require us to go into the question of the nature of image-worship among the heathen nations. This has been done already by Bishop England, who has handled the whole matter with great learning and ability in his "Letters to theGospel Messenger." It has also been briefly but satisfactorily treated in an article on "Is it Honest?" in a former number of this magazine. We may assert it as a certain and established fact, that the heathen priests and other intelligent advocates of polytheism held the opinion, so far as they were sincere believers in their own system, that the divinities whom they worshipped were in some way bound to their images, and acted through them as the soul acts through the body. They did not, of course, worship the metal or wood of which the images were composed; but they did worship the images themselves, as being animated statues informed by a divine virtue, and really containing the persons they represented. Philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and others, and persons who were imbued with the principles of the more sound and monotheistic philosophy, were not idolaters in the strict and gross sense. They regarded the divinities of the popular mythology as only a sort of genii, and probably considered their images as only representations intended to impress the senses and keep alive the belief and devotion of the people. But the doctrine of polytheism was not the doctrine of the sounder and higher philosophy. The system was idolatrous, both in its substitution of imaginary beings for the one, true God, and also in its offering of the worship due to God to images as containing their imaginary divinities. It is necessary to take into account, in estimating the idolatrous character of this heathen worship, not only that it terminated upon objects which were not divine as the ultimate end of the homage given, without reference to the supreme creator and lord, but also that these objects were unreal and imaginary beings. It was not, therefore, merely an undue exaltation of the creature, but a substitution of mere creations of the imagination in lieu of the true God. It was, therefore, not only polytheism, or a denial of the unity of God, and a division of the deity among many beings possessing divine attributes, butidol-worship, that is, the worship of nonentities in place of the real, infinite Being. The image represented nothing real. It was worshipped as related to an imaginary divinity, supposed to reside in it and to communicate to it a certain divine quality. There being no such person really existing, the image was a mere idol; and the worship had no real object to terminate upon except the material of which it was composed. A man who cherishes and honors the picture of his wife has a real and legitimate object upon which the affections and emotions awakened by the picture may terminate; but an artist who falls in love with a picture painted after an imaginary ideal in his own mind loves a mere painted form, an idol, and is, therefore, guilty of an absurd form of picture-worship.If this love takes the place of the love of God in his soul and leads him to place his supreme good in this imaginary being, he is an idolater. The heathen had nothing in their idols but lumps of wood, stone, or metal, fashioned to represent some imaginary being. They were therefore open to all the ridicule and scorn of the prophets and other servants of the true God, for shaping to themselves gods which were the mere creations of their own art and skill. The condemnation of idols in the Holy Scripture falls, therefore, not chiefly upon the mere use of images as representing the object of worship, but upon the making and honoring of images representing beings who, if they existed, would not be entitled to the worship they received, and who, in point of fact, had no real existence. Idolatry is also called in the Scripture demon-worship, because, as we understand it, the demons by means of it seduced men away from the worship of God, and also because, by possessing the images of the false gods, speaking through the oracles, and inciting to the commission of a multitude of crimes in connection with idolatry, they reduced the heathen into servitude to themselves.
The prohibition of images to be used in the worship sanctioned by the divine law was a precept of discipline enacted for a special reason. The reason was the same which lay at the foundation of that economy by which the trinity of persons in the Godhead, the incarnation of the Son in human form, the hierarchy of angels, the glory of the Mother of God, the exaltation of the saints to a deific union, were at first obscurely revealed, and only gradually disclosed to the clear knowledge and belief of the generality of the faithful. It was necessary to establish first the doctrine of the divine unity and spirituality, then the Trinity and Incarnation, so firmly in the faith of the people of God, that it could not be disturbed by anything similar to the corrupt worshipping of created things, before it was safe to allow the glorification of all creation and all nature, which is the consequence of the Incarnation, to be fully manifested. The Trinity and Incarnation were but dimly revealed, and only explicitly known by theéliteof the faithful, in order that the attention of the childish, imperfect minds of those who lived in those early ages, surrounded by a brilliant and seductive polytheism, might be fixed principally on the unity and spirituality of the divine nature. It was the special mission of the patriarchal and Mosaic dispensations to preserve and hand down the doctrine of the one, true God. There would have been a danger in distinctly revealing the Trinity before the time, that the dogma would have been corrupted and perverted by a false conception of the plurality of persons in the divine being, as of a plurality of beings. The Incarnation would have been perverted also into anthropomorphism, or the conception of the divine nature as identical with human nature. Too distinct a knowledge of the angelic hierarchy would have dazzled the minds of a people predisposed and continually tempted to idolatry, and would have withdrawn them from the contemplation and worship of God. Sculpture and painting would have affected their senses and imagination too powerfully, and would have fostered the disposition to conceive of the divine nature as divided among many deities, and resembling material, created objects. It was necessary that Christ should come and manifest himself to men in his true character, and that he should establish an infallible church, competent to teach and define the Trinity and Incarnation in their relation to the divine unity, to condemn all errors, and to direct the development of theology with unerring certitude, before the grand and abstruse mysteries of faith could be safely exposed to the gaze of the multitude.Our Lord himself proceeded with great caution in these matters, and so did the apostles and their successors. The trinity in unity and the person of Christ had first to be proposed and to be sunk indelibly into the mind of the church, before the Blessed Virgin and the saints could be brought prominently forward; and religion had first to be imbued with spirituality and pure, robust morality, before the splendor of worship and the riches of the fine arts, and all the subsidiary means of impressing the senses and the imagination, could receive their due development. Nevertheless, that the unity of revelation might be manifest and the continuity of development be kept unbroken, everything which was destined to bloom forth in its season in full splendor upon this grand plant of God whose branches are destined to overshadow the world, existed in germ and bud from the very beginning. It would lead us too far to follow up this thought. Orthodox Protestants will admit it in regard to the principal mysteries of Catholic faith. The text of Scripture shows plainly that ceremonial, architecture, and music, in a word, all that was not liable to lose its symbolic character too easily in the minds of the people, were profusely employed in the religion of the old law. Philosophy, poetry, science, and literature were kept in abeyance to a great extent, and yet given sufficiently for intellectual culture in the inspired writings. And, notwithstanding the restriction placed on sculpture and painting, yet images were to a certain extent made use of, by the divine commandment, for symbolic purposes in the sanctuary and in the temple. This is their true and legitimate use, and they are to be classed with other symbols, emblems, or exterior signs and representations to the senses of persons and things in the supersensible and celestial world. Sacraments, holy places, holy things, temples, altars, vestments, ceremonies, images, all belong to the same order, and find their reason and principle in the Incarnation. The Incarnation is the highest consecration and elevation of material substance and form. The body of Christ is hypostatically united to the divine nature and made the true, living image of the Godhead, as the Second Council of Nice teaches, the medium by which God is manifested in the sensible and visible order. Through Christ the whole material universe is sanctified and united with God as its final cause. The fanciful theosophies and mythologies of the heathen world were only abortive efforts to express this truth. Mr. Gladstone has recently given utterance to this idea in very beautiful language, so far as Greek polytheism is concerned, in his review ofEcce Homo. Heathen art was similarly a perverted foreshadowing of Catholic art, copied after the ideal, not of redeemed and glorified but of fallen nature, not of heaven but of hell, which is but a dark counterpart of heaven.
Modern Protestants will generally admit the lawfulness and utility of sculpture and painting, considered as the outward expression of the Christian ideal of beauty, the representation of persons, scenes, places worthy of respect, means of improving the senses and imagination with religious ideas.They are not like their ancestors, who defaced sanctuaries, rifled the tombs of the saints, burned relics, broke stained-glass windows, destroyed sculptures and paintings, and, with barbarous vandalism, did what they could to efface the glorious monuments of the ages of faith. The remnants of these sacred relics of antiquity which they have now in their possession they preserve with jealous care. They even make use of sculpture and painting to perpetuate their own heretical tradition, as well as to set forth what they have retained that is truly Christian. They adorn their churches with works of art, and erect monuments and statues to their own chiefs and leaders, as, for instance, the monument to the English pseudo-martyrs at Oxford, and the statue of Luther recently unveiled with so much pomp and ceremony at Worms. They are, therefore, precluded from making objection to the use of sculptured or painted images of Christ and the saints in general, and are restricted to objections against certain uses of these images in religious rites or worship, and certain acts of respect and veneration which are exhibited toward them. We will, therefore, proceed to show that this use of images is precisely identical in principle with that use of them to which Protestants do not object, and in conformity with the natural and necessary laws of the human mind, which even the most violent iconoclasts cannot break.
The human mind is forced to use images as its media; and, although it is not necessary to have these images sculptured or painted, it is by reason of the aforesaid necessity of using images of some kind that man instinctively seeks in sculpture and painting a suitable outward form and expression of his intellectual images, and finds so much pleasure in beholding these intellectual images expressed in works of art by others.
The human intellect is incapable of contemplating the divine essence immediately. It forms an intellectual conception or image which represents God to itself, but which is most imperfect and inadequate. Any one who should believe that God really is like the conception or imagination he is able to form of him, would commit as great an absurdity as one who should believe that he is like a venerable old man with a long white beard. Not only is the conception or intellectual image of God formed by the mind always inadequate, but it is often false in certain respects. Aristotle's conception of God was essentially a false one; so is that of the Deists, of the Calvinists, and of those Universalists who deny his retributive justice. Even the highest contemplatives, as they themselves positively affirm, although they speak of a certain purely spiritual and imageless view of God, never contemplate God so directly that they can dispense with every intellectual species or image as a medium, and intend only by imageless contemplation to designate a degree of subtility in their intellectual operations which renders them pure and spiritual by comparison with those of grosser minds. Probably most persons of uncultivated intellects represent God to their imagination under some majestic and venerable human form, and think of him as seated on a throne, in a superb palace, with his ministering angels, also clothed in corporeal forms, attending upon him. Those whose clear intellectual conceptions enable them to rid themselves of every image borrowed from the human figure in thinking of God, will still find that their minds make use of certain emblems, figures, or images of the divine attributes, such as light, the sea, the atmosphere.Much more will they find themselves compelled to transfer to their conception of the divine intelligence and volition the analogy of their own manner of thought, of their sentiments and affections. In the same manner, when a person thinks of Jesus Christ, meditates on his life, death, and glorified state in heaven, he will form to himself images which represent his ideal conception, images so much the more distinct as they reflect the humanity of Christ with which we are far more immediately united than we are with the divine nature, and which we are therefore able to represent more exactly and vividly to our imagination. Are we to say, then, that every person worships the image of God or of Jesus Christ which his intellect has formed, and becomes thereby an idolater? Certainly not. His reason and faith assure him of the existence of God and Christ as objectively real, distinct from his own mental conception, and surpassing all his apprehensions. His intention in worship is directed to God as he really is, and is true worship, although the intellectual media which the soul is obliged to make use of are imperfect and inadequate.
The case is no way altered if the sculptured or painted image of Christ is made use of, instead of or together with the intellectual image. The crucifix is only a permanent image affecting the exterior senses, as the intellectual representation is a transient image affecting the interior senses. Coleridge says that a picture is "an intermediate somewhat between a thought and a thing." The same may be said of a statue, though a statue is more of a thing than a painting is. The material substance employed by the artist is merely the substratum of the form, which is something ideal, as language is merely the medium of thought. In painting or sculpture of real merit, the higher and more perfect conceptions of men who possess the artistic gift are transferred to the minds of those whose ideal conceptions are of an inferior order, or who, at least, are not able to give their conceptions an outward and permanent expression. The artist who makes a statue or painting of our Lord intends to represent him according to the ideal which he has in his own mind. His object is to bring the ideal conception of Christ vividly and distinctly before the imagination of the beholder. The more completely he succeeds in producing the desired effect, the more perfect will be the identification of the image with the object it represents in the imagination of the beholder; that is, the image, the more completely it is an image, the less does it attract attention to its own separate reality, and the more does it fix the attention of the mind on the object it represents. A person whose mind is susceptible to the influence of art, looking at a masterpiece of painting or sculpture, forgets that it is only a representation, and seems to himself to be looking at the reality. His imagination transports him to the scene of crucifixion, and he is spell-bound as he gazes on the face of the dying Christ. The same emotions arise in his mind that would arise if he were actually gazing upon the crucifixion itself. If he is a Christian, he will spontaneously elicit acts of worship toward the Son of God dying on the cross. These interior acts will manifest themselves by exterior signs, by the respectful posture, the silence, the reverential expression of countenance, the moistened eye, which betray the workings of the soul within to any attentive observer. Suppose that he kneels down and offers a prayer, that he kisses the feet of the image of Christ, that he exclaims aloud, "My Lord and my God!" is that idolatry?Is he worshipping a picture or a statue? If he is, then all the merely interior and mental acts of a person who is affected by a statue or picture of Christ are equally idolatrous. If the sculptured or painted image of Christ is really substituted for Christ himself, and receives as a reality, distinct in itself, any homage or affection which it terminates as an ultimate object, then all admirers of works of art are guilty of the same species of absurdity, commit the same unreasonable act, in a lesser degree, which culminates, in the case supposed, in the supreme folly of adoring marble, ivory, canvas, and paint. That class of persons who go into raptures over works of art, therefore, have nothing to say against the Catholic use of the crucifix which is not contradicted by their own practice and avowed sentiments. If the devout sentiments awakened by a crucifix or a painting of the crucifixion are legitimate for once and for the space of half an hour, they are legitimate at all times. If it is lawful to go to a picture-gallery in order to see a masterpiece, it is lawful to buy it, to hang it in an oratory, to visit it every day, and to make a regular and constant use of it, as a means of exciting devotion. If the inward sentiments it awakens are lawful, so is their outward expression; and if this outward expression is in itself lawful, it may be prescribed as a law by the ritual of the church. The same principle that justifies the making of a crucifix, and the looking upon it with emotion, justifies the church in placing it above the altar, bowing or genuflecting before it, incensing it, exposing it on Good Friday to veneration, and chanting the words: "Ecce lignum crucis,venite adoremus."
The crucifix, considered as a material object, is merely treated with the same respect which is shown to a Bible, an altar-cloth, a chalice, or any other object devoted to sacred uses. As a representation, it is not distinguished from the object which it represents, and the acts of interior or exterior veneration which terminate upon it are merely relative, and are referred altogether to Jesus Christ. They are like the kiss which a man imprints upon his wife's picture, or the uncovering of the head when a procession passes the statue of Washington. There is only one question, therefore, in regard to the veneration given to the crucifix, and that is, Does the object or person represented, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, deserve the worship of latria, or divine worship, which we pay to him, and which we signify by these exterior marks of respect toward his image? The same is the case with the images of the Blessed Virgin and the saints. The veneration paid to them has no respect to the material of which they are composed, but passes to their prototypes, that is, the persons represented. The only question, therefore, is, Do these prototypes deserve the honor we intend to pay them? If they do, it is right to signify this honor by marks of respect to their images, such as bowing, offering incense, burning lights, decorating the shrines in which they are placed with flowers, and kneeling before them to offer prayers.
We have already shown that those who have the mere devotion of taste and imagination toward statues and pictures act in a manner precisely analogous, and pass through the same mental process which is exhibited by the Catholic in the respect which he pays to the sacred images of Christ and the saints.The only difference is, that the latter makes use of his imagination in the service of a real and practical faith and piety. His devotion is not a mere intellectual or sentimental devotion, but a spiritual exercise. It is, therefore, less dependent on the artistic merit and excellence of the representation than the merely sentimental excitement of the votary of art. A rude crucifix or a simple image of the Blessed Virgin is sufficient for the only purpose for which the devout Catholic makes use of them, as a help to fix the senses and attention, a sort of step-ladder by which he may raise his mind to the contemplation of Christ and his blessed mother. Many other circumstances give value to sacred objects besides their intrinsic worth. Their history, their antiquity, the associations connected with them, the traditions of past ages which cluster about them, often give them a sacredness far beyond the charm of symmetry and beauty. Of the two, we should much prefer to have Bernini's exquisite statue, over which the Rev. Mr. Bacon goes into raptures which betray his refined love of art, destroyed, rather than the venerable statue of St. Peter, which, with manners the reverse of exquisite and refined, he calls "a grimy idol." Even persons of the most exquisite taste often love an old house, old portraits, old articles of furniture, and many other old things, intrinsically ugly and valueless, far more than any similar objects which are new, costly, and fabricated in the highest style of art. For the same reason, certain objects of devotion, which are devoid of all artistic excellence, may be very dear and venerable to Catholics of the most cultivated taste. Much more, then, it is natural that rude and unsightly statues or pictures should be objects of devotion to Catholics of uncultivated taste. Protestants make a great mistake in judging of the sentiments of the common people in Catholic countries. They attribute to superstition what is really to be ascribed only to uncultivated taste. The sentiments which are awakened by masterpieces of art they can understand; but they cannot understand that ordinary and even grotesque images are masterpieces of art and models of beauty to the rude and childish mind of the multitude. To their prejudiced and distorted fancy, these images appear like idols, and the devotion of the people toward them like a stupid idol-worship. They do not appreciate the fact that they are to these simple people whatchefs-d'oeuvreof religious art are to them—a vivid representation, in outward form, of their own highest ideal. The susceptibility of these untutored minds to those emotions which are awakened through the senses is far greater than that of the more educated, though it is not so chastened. This is especially the case with the southern races. Poetry, music, painting, everything which appeals to the imagination, finds a ready response in their ardent temperament. It is, therefore, a proof of the highest wisdom in the church that she has taken advantage of all these means of impressing religious ideas upon the minds of all classes of men in every stage of intellectual development. There are some whose devotion takes a more purely intellectual form, and who elevate their minds to God and heaven more easily by interior recollection and meditation than by any exercise of the imagination or any outward aids. A few prefer the solitude of a cell or a cave to Cologne Cathedral, and an hour's abstracted contemplation to all the pageantry of St. Peter's.Such are permitted and encouraged to follow the bent of their own inclination and the leading of the divine Spirit. The mass of men, however, even of the educated and cultivated, need the help of the exterior world to give them the images and emblems of divine and spiritual things without which they cannot fix their attention or awaken their emotions. The quality and quantity of the helps and instruments with which they worship God vary indefinitely. The devotion of those whose state is a kind of intellectual childhood, or in whose temperament imagination and passion predominate, will necessarily be more sensuous than that of more cultivated minds or races of a more cool and sedate temperament. It is the same principle, however, which pervades and regulates all; the spirit is one, though the form varies. The true mystic, who is absorbed in the contemplation of the divine nature, does not deny to the sacred humanity of Christ, to the Blessed Virgin, the saints, or to any holy things, their worth and excellence, although he does not fix his attention upon them so frequently and so directly as others. The great saints and theologians of the church never despise the devotions of the people or accuse them of superstition. The distinction between the intelligent few and the superstitious many in the Catholic Church, is one which the most highly educated and spiritually minded Catholics disdain and repudiate as a dishonor to themselves. It is made by sciolists, who are unable to answer the arguments of our theologians or to deny the sanctity of our saints, and who seek to evade in this way the overwhelming force of the evidence for the truth of our religion. The veneration of saints and the use of images in religious worship, they say, though it does not prevent theéliteof Catholics from offering a supreme and pure worship to God and looking up to Jesus Christ as their only Saviour, leads the multitude to superstition and idolatry. We are better judges of the fact than they are. They know next to nothing of the practical working of our religion, or of the ideas and state of mind of our people. We know these things. We have, at least, as much abhorrence of idolatry as they have, and as much zeal for the enlightenment and spiritual welfare of the multitude. We know that there is no taint of superstition or idolatry in the devotion of our people. The Catholic Church keeps the ideas of God and Christ vividly before the minds of her children; they realize them in a manner of which those who are out of the church have no conception. The accusation of withdrawing from God and our Lord that which is due to them—to divide and scatter it among inferior beings—comes with a very bad grace from Protestants. What have they done to reclaim mankind from polytheism and to spread the worship of the true God? They have done nothing, except to cripple the efforts of the Catholic priesthood by sowing dissension in Christendom and giving the scandal of disunion to infidels. They have bred anew the old heresies against the Trinity and the Divinity of Christ which had become extinct, together with the more monstrous error of pantheism. We, the Catholic priesthood, have conquered the ancient heathenism, have planted everywhere Christianity, have established on an immovable foundation the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus Christ, together with the worship of his adorable name.