Chapter III (7)

Look at that piece of bunting hanging from a flag-staff and flying before the breeze. What is it? A first glance will tell you that it is a piece of stuff purchased for a trifle a few days ago from the merchant, on whose shelves it lay unnoticed and uncared for, except as far as it was capable of producing some day a few dollars for its owner. But now it has received a new destiny. It bears the national symbols, and it is the flag of the country. And, oh! what a change has taken place! It recalls the glories of the past, the hopes of the future; it is the symbol of the majesty of the nation. The patriot heart warms in beholding it; the warrior-breast is bared to do it honor. Through a hail of fire he stands by it or bears it on, and will see unmoved a thousand of his companions strewed o'er the battle-field while this yet floats before the breeze. And, when victory has crowned his efforts, he salutes it as the genius that nerved his right arm during the contest. Though torn almost to tatters, he bedews it with his tears of joy. It is his pride in life. He looks forward to descend in honor into the grave wrapped in its folds.

Wherever that flag is raised, one glance leads us to behold the genius of our country standing up before us with all her claims to our devotion and our love. Let it receive but the slightest insult, and a thrill vibrates throughout the land, every heart is wounded, every hand is ready to be raised in its defence. Yet it is, after all, but a piece of bunting, worth so many cents per yard. But by becoming a symbol, by being the object of a rite, it has become the depositary of the enthusiasm of the nation. It is made capable of evoking this, of quickening and communicating it, whenever it is unfurled.

Look at our national airs: what are they? The scientific musician will find little in them that is soul-stirring; but the feelings of our fathers are deposited in them. They were the tunes in which we expressed our gladness in days of triumph, by which we were aroused on the national holiday, in which we sung our joy on all {726} important occasions. Our love of home, of kindred, of fatherland, has been embalmed in them; and when they fall on our ears, all these dear and stirring feelings, as if buried in their notes, are sent forth, now unlocked, and again take possession of our souls. They thus arouse the warrior and the patriot, calling out all the feelings that cluster around what is most dear.

The Swiss soldier in foreign lands was so vividly recalled to the memories of home, by the airs to which he listened in childhood, and the recollection of his native mountains, and the associations revived by them, had such power, that a special disease, called "home-sickness" was frequently the result. As this proved fatal to many, the playing or singing of such tunes was forbidden in Swiss regiments in foreign service. And who does not know the stirring effect produced on certain occasions, when Yankee Doodle or Patrick's Day has been struck up, no matter what musical professors may say of their artistic merits.

In a similar manner our feelings of devotion are consigned to some homely religious tune. They are first expressed in it. They cling around it. They become identified with it. They are recalled vividly when we hear it again. They all come back in their original freshness, with accumulated force. They are transmitted to others, and thus we inherit the treasure of the devotional feeling of preceding generations.

Though _our_ being supplied with music by great artists, who are constantly changing, if not improving their compositions, deprives us in a great measure of the advantages that might arise from this source, we can feel it at times, in what is allowed to retain this traditional force. Who is there that does not feel the devotion so often experienced in assisting at the benediction of the blessed sacrament, or on other occasions renewed by the tones of the Tantum Ergo or other familiar tunes, when the performers do not destroy, or at least smother the old airs by their exquisiteness? Where the songs of the church are in more general use, the intonation of the Miserere or the Stabat Mater or the Pange Lingua and many other tunes is like the opening up of a flood-gate, through which feelings of devotion rush as it were in a torrent and take possession of a whole congregation.

What is said of songs may be applied to other rites. The feelings of the past are deposited in them; they express them, they arouse them, they communicate them. This occurs, though they may be chosen arbitrarily. What more arbitrary, generally speaking, than the meaning attached to words? The word "home," for example, for all that is in the sound, might as well have been adapted to signify anything else of the most different character. Yet now having received a definite meaning, it recalls uniformly a whole definite series of ideas and feelings. So it is with a rite--say that of anointing with oil, that of sprinkling with water, burning incense, the use of candles, or the making of the sign of the cross. Many rites were established primarily for this purpose, others had their origin in necessity or convenience or usage; but the church, anxious to make even these things a source of edification and an instrument of devotion, gave them a meaning, attached to them a lesson which they reproduce forever after. Even those which have a certain intrinsic fitness to signify what they are established for, derive their chief efficacy in this respect from their having been chosen for the purpose, or having gradually received a social meaning, well understood in the Christian family. These have the additional advantage of speaking out, as it were, a whole instruction at a glance. The moment you look at one of these acts, a lesson is presented which could scarcely be communicated in many words, and in performing them the heart says more, and that more simply and more effectually, than it could in a long discourse.

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I have referred to the flag of the country; of its being raised, and how a look at it, or a salute, powerfully expresses at once the most important emotions and lively enthusiasm. Well, we do the same through the Christian's glorious standard, which is the sacred symbol of the cross. Be it of wood or of the most precious metal--be it the production of the most unskilful or the most cunning workman--it is for us the symbol of man's redemption, and around it cluster our most tender feelings of veneration and love. It is placed over our altars, over our churches; it hangs in our rooms; where Catholic feelings can save it from insult, it is raised up in the highways, and is made to meet our eyes wherever we turn. We impress its form on our persons whenever we call on God in prayer, whenever we find ourselves exposed to temptation or danger. In that one act the faith, the hope, the love of the church for Christ and Christ crucified, are all expressed. All these feelings are imbedded in it. All are called out again whenever that sign is made. What we have heard of him from the pulpit, what we have read in our private study, what has occurred, to our own minds in meditation, is all brought before us with the accompanying sentiments and feelings as soon as that sacred symbol presents itself to our eyes. All are a wakened, are revived, and seized again at its glance. No wonder, then, that the Catholic loves the cross; that he loves to prostrate himself in adoration before it; that he looks to it when he seeks consolation in suffering, support in affliction, light in his difficulties, purity of spirit in his joys. Do not tell me that it is of lifeless wood or of metal, that it is but the work of the craftsman, Oh! this is like stopping the soldier in battle, to direct his attention to the price per yard of his flag, or to the name and address of the store where it was bought, while he is advancing enthusiastically under its inspiration against his country's foes. Yes; who does not know that it is of wood or metal? but to me it is the symbol of my Saviour's love. As such, I love it; as such all my most sacred feelings cling around it: I impress kisses on it; I bathe it with my tears. And when, on Good Friday, the priest after bringing before us the whole scene of Calvary, having led us, in the service, to look on the death of Christ' as the great turning-point in the world's history, having shown us the woes of the past that were there to find a remedy, and the blessings for the future that were thence to spring forth, holds up the crucifix before the prostrate multitude, and sings out, in a solemn tone, "Ecce lignum Crucis," "Behold the wood of the cross on which did hang the salvation of the world," will we not all send up our whole souls in the deacon's answer, crying out, with him, "Venite adoremus," "Come, let us adore"? And when the priest looses his shoes, and on bare feet approaches the sacred symbol of redemption, that he may kneel down and kiss it with fondness, on the anniversary of the day on which the tragic scene was enacted; who is there that will not vie with him in kneeling and pressing the sacred symbol to his lips?

The same thing can be applied in different degrees to the various rites throughout the year, when succeeding festivals bring before us the other great mysteries of religion, or when we are called on to express the ordinary feelings of Christian devotion. He who has studied the simple devotions of the rosary, or the way of the cross, will be astonished at the mine of devotion, of enlightened piety contained in them, and at the treasures that are drawn from them by faithful souls, simple and unpretending as they are, and puerile as they appear to the self-sufficient.

But these acts and exercises intended to express and nourish our Christian feelings, can only be appreciated where there is faith. It is only into {728} hearts animated by faith that they can enter. It is only in such they can be aroused. A certain amount of instruction is even necessary to understand the conventional meaning of many. This instruction and training is received by the Catholic almost with his mother's milk. As he learns the meaning of words, which is still more arbitrary, and acquires a practical skill in the use of language, notwithstanding its complicated laws, so he learns the meaning of the ceremonial, and is initiated into its use. With clasped hands the child kneels before the crucifix, and imprints kisses on it. Little by little he learns the history of him whose figure is nailed to that cross, and knowledge grows in him with reverence and love. He goes to the church, and is struck with what he beholds. He catches reverence from those around, and infuses it into his own imitation of their mode of acting. As he learns more and more of what is there done, this reverence becomes more and more enlightened, and he grows up a devout and enlightened Christian, performing the acts expressive of worship with the same ease and intelligence with which he uses the ordinary expressions of social life. The looker-on who is without faith or instruction, who has no sympathy, and wishes to have no sympathy, with him, thinks his acts a mummery, if he do not give them a harsher name. Such a person may be compared to one who has no ear for music, to whom the enthusiasm of those who are aroused by a beautiful composition is incomprehensible; or to one who listens to an eloquent discourse in a tongue which he does not, and cares not to understand; or he is like Michol, who laughs at David dancing before the ark, because she has no sympathy with his jubilant gratitude. The Catholic ceremonial is made for Catholics. If it enable them to express and strengthen their reverence, it answers its purpose. Those who have no such feelings to be awakened cannot be surprised if it strike them without producing emotion. The ceremonial is useful, not only as an expression of feeling, it is eminently instructive and educational, if I may use the expression, by instilling and developing both the knowledge and the devotion it is intended to express. While it teaches, it leads to act in accordance with the teaching; properly performed it is itself such action. It thus instils truth into the mind, and shapes the heart in accordance with it, which is the highest aim of the best education.

Some are pleased to look upon the mass of our people as very ignorant in matters of religion. If by this it be meant to say, that all are not experts in quoting texts of scripture; that they know nothing of many controversies that appear of great importance to our separated brethren; that they do not understand the meaning of many phrases that have become households words amongst them, though, sometimes, I fear, passing round without any very, definite meaning, I am willing to acknowledge the charge. But if it be meant to say that they are ignorant of those great facts and truths of religion which it is necessary or important for men to know, I repudiate it most solemnly. Nay, I contend that there is a better knowledge of these amongst many or most Catholics who can neither read nor write, if they have only followed in the paths where the church led them, than amongst many of our opponents who are considered learned theologians; and this they owe chiefly to this very ceremonial of which I am treating. They may know nothing of Greek particles, or of many other things good enough and useful in their place, but which God has not required anyone to learn; but they know that the incarnate God died for the salvation of man. They know the mystery of the Trinity, which is implied in that of the incarnation. They know the sinful character of man, their need of such a Redeemer. They are led to thank him, to love him, to {729} obey him. They know his sufferings, one by one; they are familiar with his thorns and his nails; they have pondered over his wounds and mangled flesh; they penetrate into the side pierced for their love. He who knows even this much is not ignorant. Yet all this, and, much more, is familiar to every one accustomed to look with faith on the crucifix. He sees in the face of the crucified One patience, resignation, compassion for sinners, love even for his enemies. He sees the consequences of sin, and he beholds their remedy. Looking on this, the Catholic finds support in his trials or afflictions and moderation in his joy. Show me the volume he could ponder over and learn as much. All that he heard at his mother's knee and from the preacher's lips is brought before him in a single glance at his crucifix. All is brought up again when he makes the sign of the cross. Yet the cross, so fraught with instruction and moving appeals, is that which is presented to him a thousand times in the rites of the church, inasmuch as it is the great pervading principle that must animate all his devotion and all his actions. It is brought before him, not in a cold way, merely teaching him a lesson. He is taught to know and to believe; he is led to adore and to confide; he is brought to invoke through it all the graces of which he stands in need. All this is done every time that he makes the sign of the cross, pronouncing the blessed words, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."

While many of your learned expounders of scripture are comparing text with text on these subjects, trying to remove, but scarcely removing the doubts which they know to exist among their hearers, which they feel, perhaps, rising up in their own breasts, or what is worse while they are proposing theories in a Christian pulpit which make nought the cross of Christ and the mystery of redemption as ever taught in the Christian family, the poor Catholic, on whom they look with contempt, is making his starting point what others are but trying to prove, and while signing himself with the cross, believing, adoring, penetrating into the depths of the love of the incarnate God, and endeavoring to shape his own soul into conformity with its teachings. And you call him ignorant. Indeed, a pure though simple faith, among these people enables them to see the great truths of religion with a clearness that supplies frequently an apt reply to difficulties that seem very embarrassing to their opponents.

Yet, this is the first lesson that the Catholic child learns at his mother's knee, As he goes on, he learns more and more of God's works of mercy toward man, of his institutions for our salvation and our sanctification, and all he learns he sees reproduced in a glance in the ceremonial of the church, which speaks to him in accents more and more eloquent, as his knowledge expands and his heart is brought more fully into conformity with God's holy teachings. In the liturgy and the various other rites of the church, she has enshrined all the great dogmas of religion. There she teaches them, there she keeps them beyond the reach of the innovator. The priest himself, the bishop, and the pope, there see them inculcated, and from thence, as from a rich treasury, draw them out to present them to the faithful. This teaching by rites in use from the beginning of the church, addresses itself to all with power, for in it they find the teaching of the saints and the sages of by-gone ages, and feel themselves breathing the same atmosphere with them. The martyrs, who bore testimony to their faith with their blood, the apostolic men, who by their preaching, their labors, and their prayers, brought nations to the knowledge of Christ, the holy confessors and virgins, who, in frail vessels, showed forth his power in every age, practised these same rites, and were therefore animated by the same faith. The church, throughout the whole world, uses them, and therefore believes as we do. What {730} more powerful for bringing home to each one the faith of the universal, everlasting church!

There is great security for the faith of a Catholic in his receiving it through the teaching of a pastor in communion with the church of the whole world, and sanctioned by its highest authority; but I would venture to say that there is something even more solemn in this voice of the ceremonial, which is a voice of the living and the dead--of the church of the Catacombs, and of the church of this day--throughout the world. With all the force which this gives, leaning as the church does upon Christ, who died to sanctify her in truth, we are taught the great dogmas of the Trinity and the Incarnation; of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ; the plan and means of the redemption, the need in which we stand of divine grace, and the means of obtaining it. We are taught the character of the great Christian oblation, the nature and effects of the sacraments, as well as the dispositions they require, and the duties they impose.

Far be it from me to undervalue the oral teaching of the ministry. That found in the ceremonial presupposes it, and is based on it. Both are, as they should be, combined in the ministrations of the church; but the ceremonial fixes the oral teaching. It gives the Christian system a body, as it were, in which it enables it to prolong its life beyond the moments of the passing voice. When once embodied in a rite, the impressions of oral instruction, which otherwise so easily pass away, live for ever. They are seized in their whole entirety at a glance; they are brought down to the comprehension of the lowest; they are put forth with a majesty that the highest may admire. Men are taught there, and, what is most important they are led to act on the teaching, and thus conform their hearts as well as their minds, to the holy dogmas of faith, which is the best and most useful way of imparting Christian instruction. But I will be told that this teaching, however useful for those who understand it, is lost for the great mass of the people, as the language used is a dead one, which few understand. But, in the first place, it is not lost, even though the clergy alone should understand it. Is it not an important thing that the clergy themselves should have something to keep alive powerfully, amongst them the one, universal and everlasting faith? Will not all the faithful find strength in their strength, and light in their light? If they are kept right, the truth spread abroad by them will easily he preserved pure among the masses of the people. Almost all heresies--be it said to our shame--either had their source in the sanctuary, or could not have succeeded if they had not found support there. And is it not a great thing that he who would become a prevaricator, must first brand himself as unfaithful, must cease to minister today, all he did yesterday, and thus give public notice, as it were, that he seeks to devour the flock which he had undertaken to feed; that instead of keeping the deposit which was the first duty of his office, as dispenser of the mysteries of God, he is substituting some new-fangled theory of his own, palming it off as an institution of heaven? Luther can establish a new system only by ceasing to say mass. The church of Cranmer is not at ease until it has formed for itself a new liturgy. The Greeks and other orientals by preserving their ancient rites and ceremonies, have preserved almost all their ancient dogmas, and to re-enter the church have little else to do but to submit to the authority of its supreme pastor. But apart from this, the ceremonial itself speaks to all the people in a language which all understand. The rites are themselves a language easily learned, and speaking with silent eloquence to men of every tongue. They are to some extent what the learned have been so long looking for, a universal language. In fact, when the priest raises up the host, the Irishman and the German, the Greek and the Armenian, see the presence of Christ {731} preached to them, and they kneel down and adore. When the water is poured on the head of the child that is baptized, men of every clime know that the regenerating rite is being performed. The rite once properly explained ever after expresses to them better than any combination of words, the internal change that is effected in the soul. Then, it must be remembered that the main thing in the public service is what is _done_, not what is _said_. Every moderately instructed Catholic is fully aware of what there takes place, and with this knowledge he can assist, not only devoutly but intelligently, though he may not understand or even hear one word.

The great source of mistake, in this connection, with our separated brethren, arises from the fact that they go to church merely to hear instruction, or to have words put into their mouths, in which to address Almighty God. The Catholic also often goes for instruction, and this he receives in the language which he understands. But he goes for what is even more important--he goes to take a part in the great act that is performed in God's holy temple. He knows the nature and ends of this, and the dispositions required of him, and as I said before, he can perform his part though he may not even hear, much less understand one word that is pronounced. I will suppose a case of the surrender of a large army. The vanquished soldiers march to the place appointed. They lay down their arms, they lower their flag. The victorious general, with his warriors, stands, by and receives them. A speech perhaps is made. But all who are present take an intelligent part in the Proceedings, though many may not hear one word that is uttered. So it is with the great action at mass. I will not have recourse to the common reply, that all that the priest says at the altar is translated and published; that any one who desires may read and know for himself; for though the fact be true, it is not the true solution of the difficulty. I have no hesitation in saying that in assisting at the most solemn part of the celebration of the divine mysteries, it is best not to attend to the particular prayers recited by the priest, whether one hear them or not whether he be or be not capable of understanding them. It is better to assist with an enlightened faith in the action that is performed, and then give full play to such sentiments as this faith will awaken in each individual soul. This is evidently the view of the church. For this reason, after the offertory, that is, when the most important portion begins, the priest is made to recite almost all his part of the liturgy in a low tone, so that those present cannot hear him even if they be capable of understanding what he says. Among the Greeks a curtain is drawn across the sanctuary, so that they cannot even see him, but merely know by some signals, if I may so call them, given from time to time, in what part of the sacred act he is engaged.

The church, by, this evidently tells us, that by an assistance in faith, each one yielding to the promptings of his own devotion will derive more profit than by following the priest's words. Indeed, the parts of the priest and people in this sacred act are so essentially different, that it is scarcely to be expected that the same prayers should be best for both. While the church has minutely arranged the rites and prayers used by him who offers the sacrifice, she is satisfied with awakening the faith and enlightening the devotion of others who assist: and then leaving it to their enlightened faith what each shall say to God on such occasions. She acts like the master of the house, who prepares the banquet, where each guest finds abundance of everything agreeable to the palate, and nourishing to the body. With great care he has prescribed the parts of those who are occupied in preparing or serving it up, so that all present may receive substantial proofs of his interest; but when, this is done, he {732} leaves the invited to partake of what is prepared, as their own tastes will prompt. It is thus that the Catholic system, which is accused of tying men down to a performance of mere routine, is that which really gives more scope to individual liberty in public worship, while public decorum and dignity are effectually secured by an established ritual. With your extempore prayers, he who utters them has indeed full scope for his feeling and his fancy, but he is liable also to their vagaries, and his hearers are at his mercy. As he weeps or rejoices, all must weep or rejoice, or he becomes to them a hindrance. Their hearts move or try to move, not as the spirit, but as the leader willeth, and not unfrequently may he lend them into paths from which their instincts will recoil. They, whose whole time is engaged in following a prescribed liturgy, must ever go on in the same groove. Whatever be the feelings or the wants or the temper of mind of each individual habitually or at the moment, the same unchanging road is chalked out for all. What they hear may be beautiful, but it may be far from being the best suited for many at that moment. Hence disgust or cold indifference is sure to follow, of which beautiful forms may be only a pompous covering. Amongst Catholics on the other hand, while the church to secure order and truth and public decorum, has carefully regulated every word and act of the priest, and presents in the celebration of the divine mysteries the most powerful incentive to faith and devotion in all its bearings, she leaves each one else who is present to assist as his own wants and dispositions may prompt.

The ingenious zeal of pious men has provided helps for all in manuals of various kinds, and each one will select what he finds best suited for himself. He will use it or interrupt its use, or drop it altogether as experience will show him to be most useful in his own case. When it is not done through apathy or listlessness, he may find it better to dispense with them all, being satisfied with a look, with vivid faith, and such other interior acts as a faithful soul will soon learn to perform with alacrity. Knowing what he himself is, and who is before him, he will not be at a loss what to say. At one time he will weep over his sins; at another he will give thanks to God; at another he will lay open his wants, or ask pardon for his transgressions. Where can he do any of these things more effectually than in the presence of him who died for our sins, and to procure for us every blessing.

And many, in fact, thus assist in silent prayer, but with more intelligent and true devotion, though they neither use a book nor hear a word, than others who are pondering over most beautiful manuals.

The danger of cold formality from the steady use of prescribed forms, and nothing else, is so thoroughly realized by the church, and this fear is so fully justified by her experience that the priest himself is warned over and over against it. The remedy that is given him, is the practice of what might be called private individual prayer. All spiritual writers tell him that if he be not fond of this, if especially he be not careful to renew his spirit by it, in immediate preparation for the exercise of his sacred functions, they will degenerate into mere formalism. With this private preparation he will prepare and carry into them a proper spirit and will then find them a heavenly manna, having every sweet taste; without this, he will be but as the conduit pipe, carrying to others the refreshing waters, but retaining himself' none of the effects of their invigorating powers.

These remarks apply to the most sacred and most important part of' the mass. If the church do not wish us even to hear them, much less require us to understand them, if she be right in believing that we may thus assist most advantageously, it is a matter of no consequence what language the priest uses in addressing the Almighty {733} God, for he understands him, and that is enough. The rites he performs give all the instruction of admonition that is useful at that moment, and this instruction does not disturb our individual devotion. On the contrary, whatever turn it may take, it enlivens, supports, and directs it.

As to the first parts of the mass, to which these remarks are not so applicable, the "Gospels," which vary at every festival, are required to be read at least on festivals in their own language, and explained by each pastor to his people. The "Collects," are known to be all substantially supplications for grace, to which, therefore, we may heartily answer, _Amen_, though we do not understand each word. Little else remains but the "Kyrie," the "Gloria," and the "Credo," and these like the "Pater Noster," and a few other things sung by the priest, might be easily learned, so as to be understood by any diligent person. Indeed, I may say it is the wish of the church that all should learn them. She would be glad that all would take a part in singing them, as the people do in many countries. The study of Latin required for this is not much; for all that I have referred to might be contained in two or three pages, and is not beyond the reach of anyone, not even of those who cannot read. Many such learn it by heart, and understand what they have learned. Doing so would be but a light task in view of the many advantages gained. All might then join in the public chants of the church and be gainers in spiritual life, even if they did not discourse equally elegant music; or, if our apathy compels the church to let our parts be discharged, as it were, by deputies in the choir, we would assist and join in the beautiful sentiments which are expressed, and not merely sit inactive to receive the sweet impressions of their melodies.

But though this would better accord with the spirit of the church, if these parts also through our own apathy are unintelligible, the intrinsic character of the act for which we are preparing will suggest pious sentiments that will enable us to pass the time with substantial profit to our souls.

But, be it that there is some little disadvantage in having the mass in a dead language, what I have said, I think, abundantly proves at least that it is not very great. Look, on the other hand, at the immense advantages gained by keeping it uniform and without change, which implies keeping it in the language in which it was first established. By this, uniformity and steadiness is secured in the faith. The faith of every nation embalmed, as I said before, in the liturgy, is before the eyes of the universal church; it is transmitted untarnished from generation to generation. This uniform and steady liturgy becomes as an anchor to which every church is moored. As long as it clings to this, it is safe. And can anyone who knows the value of faith, of that faith for which legions of martyrs shed their blood, deem the little loss that is sustained, if any, by our Latin liturgy, not well compensated by the stability of faith which it secures. For this reason, though the world in the apostolic days was even more divided in language than it is now, yet in those times, as we know from all antiquity, the liturgy was celebrated only in three languages--the three languages of the cross. These are, the Hebrew, in its cognate dialects, which are but branches of the one Semitic tongue, as a homage to the ancient dispensation; the Greek, which was the language of the civilization of that age, and that adopted in the New Testament; and the Latin, which was the language of the people whose capital was to be the seat of the government of the Church of the New Dispensation. In these three languages was written the inscription over the bloody sacrifice on Calvary; in these, and in no others from the beginning, was the unbloody one offered to God by the church. No others having been adopted was a clear proof that in the apostolic {734} view it was not deemed necessary that all should understand the language used in the sacred mysteries; and, when even these ceased to be popular languages anywhere, what had always been the condition of the great number became the condition of all.

In after ages a few exceptions, and only a few, were permitted or rather tolerated. The liturgy was allowed to be celebrated in one other language in Asia, the Armenian; in two in Africa, the Coptic and the Ethiopic; and in one in Europe, the Slavonic. No others were used. But these were exceptional cases--they occurred at a later period, and under peculiar circumstances, showing rather the sufferance than the genuine spirit of the church, while she cordially adopted from the beginning, and ever clung to the three languages of the cross.

It is both beautiful and useful to the Catholic to assist at the divine offices in the same language, and in the main, with the same rites, in which they have been performed for eighteen hundred years. They seem like the voice of the martyrs, the confessors, the saints who have lived through these eighteen centuries. They echo their faith and their devotion. We feel that in them we are breathing the life of a church now and ever spread throughout the whole world, everywhere offering to God one sacrifice of praise.

A dignitary of the Protestant Episcopal Church in this country has lately written an angry letter against those of his brethren who are called "Ritualists," because they are anxious to introduce into their church many Catholic, or, as he calls them, "Romish" ceremonies. His ground of complaint is that behind these ceremonies stand the doctrines of the Catholic Church. "Their course," he says, "means return to what the reformation cast out with indignation." "It means Romanism in all its strength and substance," and he enumerates the various doctrines which it implies, which he considers abominations. I do not wish to pronounce an opinion on the extent to which his remarks are justifiable in their application to the parties against whom he writes; but he is certainly right in believing that behind the Catholic ritual stands Catholic doctrine, which is nothing else but Christian doctrine; and as the reformation "cast out" many of the rites in use in the Christian family from the beginning, with them it "cast out" a great portion of the Christian dogma. The good man's charge will only make those who preserve the dogma see more clearly the value of the rites in which it is enshrined, and cling more tenaciously to dogmas thus shown to be coeval with Christianity.

Every rite has thus a lesson, and becomes an act of devotion. The cross above our churches and our altars, continually reappearing in all our ceremonies, impresses on us the incarnation, death, and atonement of Christ crucified, as the great central point of all religion. To this we are constantly brought back in every prayer which concludes by asking what we demand, through Jesus Christ, the familiar closing of which, the "_per omnia saecula saeculorum_," known to every child, calls forth from all, the heartfelt _Amen_! To this, and to what should accompany it, the Catholic is constantly directed by the ceremonial. The church bell, signed with the cross, and anointed with oil, which is a symbol of Christ, swings in the tower, and as his messenger, calls us in his name to his house--now, ringing out with joy, when some great mystery is to be commemorated--now, in deep solemn notes, to pray for one of his departed members. Three times every day it summons us to the recital of the Angelus, in which we commemorate the great mystery of the incarnation, and invoke the merits of the Saviour's death, and ask the benefit of his resurrection. If we enter the {735} church, the font at the door, from which we take a drop of blessed water to sprinkle our foreheads, is itself a sermon on the purity with which we should approach, and bids us cleanse our souls before we come near to him in prayer. The burning lamp speaks to us of him who is the light of the world, now dwelling on the altar, as well as of the constant fire of devotion, and pure adoration, due to the present God. The priest whom you see at the altar, clad in those quaint old vestments, tells you at a glance that you are in the presence of a worship that has come down from the remotest ages. The burning lights on the altar, which have now become an emblem of gladness, speak to you of the catacombs, in which our fathers took refuge, and preserved for us the sacred deposit, at the cost of property, of liberty, and of life.

Like old heirlooms, with their quaint old forms and their several indentations, these vestments and rites tell at the same time of their real antiquity and of the many vicissitudes through which they have passed. They are not like those imitations of the antique in use amongst some of our friends got up by studying ancient drawings and descriptions, having all the inconvenience without anything of the venerable character of what is truly ancient. With us they are inherited through uninterrupted use from the beginning. Whatever changes have occurred in minor details, only render them more venerable, for if on the one hand we are brought back to ancient days, these are marks of the many ages through which they have passed. Everything in the rites of the church is fraught with instruction, with devotion. It enables you to know, and what is better, to practice--for while it teaches, it leads you to love and adore. Do you wish to know the efficacy of that ceremonial? Look at those who have been nursed under its training. See the all-pervading influence of religion, that exists among them. Long and powerful discourses may make men skilful talkers and ardent partisans. Those who have been reared under a divinely inspired ritual have religion deeply engraven on their hearts. It takes possession and enters into the whole nature of the man; and even when he gives way to the allurements of iniquity, it retains its hold on him. This may indeed make him appear, and be, an inconsistent object of pity or of scorn. But, happy inconsistency! For if he will not be consistent in good, far better that he be inconsistent or not consistent in evil. He would otherwise become a monster. The links by which he is yet bound to what is good, may one day draw him within the pale of that mercy to which no sinner appealed in vain, before which no sinner is too great to be pardoned.

To the Catholic, in every position, the ceremonial is light and nourishment--a plentiful source of vigor and life.

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{736}

From Le Correspondant.

MADAME DE SWETCHINE.

BY REV. FATHER LACORDAIRE.

Many times already have I rendered to illustrious Catholics who have died in our day, a funeral and a pious homage. In turn, General Drouot, Daniel O'Connell, and Frederic Ozanam have heard my voice above their tomb, a voice far below that which their glory merited, but which, nevertheless, holds from a sincere admiration the right to praise them. To-day, after these familiar names for which praise can do nothing, I pronounce another name, a name which may appear almost unknown, perhaps even that of a foreigner, which, however, belongs to the nation of the great minds of our age. A superior writer, Madame de Swetchine published nothing; a conversationalist of the first order, the fame of her salon never penetrated beyond that circle which, though not public, is more than privacy; a woman of antique faith and of active piety, she neither founded nor presided over any orders; and yet, for more than forty years she swayed an empire, to which the Count de Maistre submitted, before which Madame de Staël inclined, and which retained around her, even to her last days, admirers accustomed to act on public opinion, but still more accustomed to enlighten their own by hers. To the Count de Maistre succeeded M. de Bonald. The Abbé Frayssinous, M. Cuvier, to these M. de Montalembert, the Count de Falloux, Prince Albert de Broglie, and many others, a younger generation, but not less submissive to the ascendency of a soul where virtue served genius.

Why should we be silent? Why not tell the living what they have lost in the dead? While a man lives, modesty should guard all his actions, and friendship itself should be restrained by it; but death has this of admirable; that it restores to memory as to judgment all its liberty. In taking away those from whom it strikes the double rock of weakness and envy, it permits those who have seen to lift the veil, those who have received to acknowledge the benefit, those who have loved to pour forth their affection. Even the obscurity of merit adds to the desire of making it known; and if this merit was illustrious, being all hidden, it is almost a religious duty to draw it forth from the tomb, and to render it before men the honor it has before God. So I hope I shall be pardoned these few pages; but did I not, yet I should still write them. I owe them to a friendship which began in the shadows and perils of my youth, and which since, through all the vicissitudes of a quarter of a century, never ceased to open to me perspectives of honor so difficult to recognize in the confused and agitated times when faith itself is troubled by earthly events, and seeks a route worthy of its mission.

Madame Sophie Jeanne de Swetchine was born in Russia, on the 4th December, 1782. Her family name was Soymonoff. She had a sister who married the Prince de Gagarin, a former Russian ambassador at Rome; she herself was united at the age of seventeen to General de Swetchine, Military Governor of St. Petersburg. She belonged by birth to the Greek religion, but her education had abandoned her to the scepticism of the eighteenth century, and {737} according to the natural course of things, she would have died an unbeliever or a schismatic in the depth of some half-oriental estate. God willed it otherwise, and hence arises from the first the lively interest attached to her life. For a Christian, a soul's predestination, and the mysterious ways by which God conducts it to its end without infringing its liberty, are a spectacle that has above all others an inexhaustible charm. The secrets of grace and free will, so intimate in our own hearts, are less enlightened in a history which is not our own; and the communion of saints which makes us all, believing and loving, one in a single light and a single goodness, gives us, in the account of a difficult conversion, the feeling of a conquest in which we ourselves have shared.

The young Sophie de Soymonoff was then a Greek and an unbeliever. She had been beguiled from her birth by the illusions of rationalism, and the snares of the most singular fortune which error ever had; for the Greek religion has this trait solely its own, that it presents a much restricted and very firm negation to the true faith, under an authority cut loose from its base; yet which, however, preserves all the rest with a profound respect for antiquity. In seeing this exact episcopal succession, this unaltered symbol, this inviolable discipline, these sacraments which Rome herself recognizes, we ask if an error, respecting so long and so well the limits which it traced when it first arose, does not seem like those rocks which an irruption has thrown from their foundations and which remain immovable under the eye and the action of ages? Whilst in the West, Protestantism is unable to create either dogmas or discipline or hierarchy, and floats as a wandering cloud from mind to mind, the East, on the contrary, sees produced the fixity of error. Here dissolution, there petrifaction; and between the two the truth which is immutable without being inert, progressive without being subject to change. However surprising may be this contrast, it is not difficult to account for it, if we consider, on the one hand, the difference of nature between the eastern man and the western; and on the other, the diversity of the political destiny assigned them. The eastern man contemplates and adores, while his rival, less happy in contemplation, is more so in acting. Thus the one has created generous institutions, under which he has from age to age extended his empire, while the other has passed from servitude to servitude, incapable of seating himself in the shade of a regular authority, and of developing in a free atmosphere either the evil or the good which, he has conceived. Hence in Europe error takes a character of life which conducts it to its most extreme logical consequences, at the same time that it wears at Constantinople a character of death, which leaves it what it was, by impotence, not by virtue.

Nevertheless, it is easy for a vulgar intelligence to be deceived, especially where family and national traditions give to error the reflex of patriotism, and when an absolute government, the jealous guardian of a religion of which it is the head, suffers no emanations of the truth to reach the soul. Sophie de Soymonoff was born a prisoner in an empire of seventy millions of souls. She was six hundred leagues from St. Peter's, and a thousand years from the true faith. But, however vigilant despotism may be, however thick its dungeon walls, God remains ever near, and he draws therefrom, when he wills, the instruments which his Providence uses to preserve for man the share which he assigns him in all his works. At an age when Madame de Swetchine could not yet sound either the poverty of the Greek schism or the abyss of unbelief, a man of God came to her. He was not a priest, but an ambassador of a king despoiled of the greater part of his possessions, shut up in an island of the Mediterranean, and who, in sending to St. Petersburg a {738} representative of his misfortunes, thought not that he sent there a _chargé d'affaires_ of divine grace, marked with the seal of the elect. Count Joseph de Maistre, tor he it was, detested with all his soul the two Colossuses of his day, the French revolution and the French empire, because in the one he saw the oppression of European nationalities; and the other, because he thought he saw it imprinted forever with an anti-Christian spirit. But he loved France, because, though it was the seat of the revolution and of the empire, he discerned there an indestructible faith, the faith of Clovis, of Charlemagne, and of St. Louis, and I know not what predestination that ravished his judgment, and rendered him the prophet of that very country which he esteemed so culpable and yet so great. Born in Savoy, in the country of St. Francis de Sales, and of Jean Jacques Rousseau, he was French like them in his genius, but even more so by his faith and his heart, which had but two pulsations, one for the church, the other for France; generous mortal who silenced his antipathies by his convictions, in whom blindness did not extinguish the light, and who, like Philoctetes, wounded by the arrows of Hercules, could be separated from Greece, neither in his accusations nor in his affections. Madame de Swetchine soon met this extraordinary man in the saloons of St. Petersburg, and it was the first great event of her life. A positive spirit, but amiable, as his posthumous correspondence proves, M. de Maistre loved conversation. He did not love it as a throne from which his genius could display its brilliancy, but as a free and delicate interchange of thoughts, in which grace unites with intelligence, taste with boldness, freedom with reserve, bringing together in an hour all times and all gifts; and forming a bond of union between men who are pleased with sentiments of kindness and esteem. Generous focus of cultivated minds of all countries, conversation is the last asylum of human liberty. It speaks when the tribune is silent; it supplies the place of books when books are not to be had; it gives currency to thoughts which despotism persecutes; finally, it warms, and agitates; it moves, and is, where it can live, the principle and the all-powerful echo of public opinion. It is not astonishing then that great men find in it a pleasure which is for them like the accomplishment of a duty. So long as society converses it is safe.