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LONDON : |
WILLIAM HEINEMANN |
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A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
FROM THE FRENCH OF
SALOMON REINACH
AUTHOR OF "APOLLO," ETC. BY
FLORENCE SIMMONDS
OFFICIER d'ACAD^MIE
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S-3.M- a^
A Florentine painting of the fifteenth century at Narbonne, France.
JLONDON: ^WILLIAM HEINEMANN
TO
N. C. B.
S. R.
Printed in Great Britain.
PREFACE
This study is founded on the five concluding chapters of Orpheus^ Histoire generale des Religions^ first published in 1909, of which, in spite of the war, more than 30,000 copies have been sold. It has been translated into English, German, Russian, Italian, Spanish and Swedish. Certain chapters of it have become somewhat antiquated ; all require revision. While rewriting in part the history of Christianity, I have been careful not to alter its character as a sketch. The bibliography, an important feature even in such attempts, has been brought up to date.
Although I know more than I did thirteen years ago, my general ideas have not varied. Christianity, like all other religions, should be treated by history as a purely human institution ; but it is the greatest of all, not excepting Buddhism, because it suits the temper of progressive and laborious nations, and adapts itself to the most various conditions of society. Civilisation and Christianity are united as by an indissoluble marriage tie. Whatever may have been the mishaps and misdeeds of dogmatic theology and ambitious priestcraft, things which I have not tried to conceal, it is certain that Christianity, while opposing a veto to unbridled and degraded superstition, has taught and teaches the world the only moral lessons accessible to every one, thus preserving and propagating the most enduring elements of Hebrew and Hellenic wisdom, and cleansing and softening the animal instincts of the human race. If those gospel lessons, though preached to thousands of millions for twenty centuries, have not yet been assimilated by mankind,
vi PREFACE
they have at least acted as a permanent antidote against egotism and cruelty. Their beneficent influence is not only a thing of the past, but of the future. I do not share the opinion that they have as yet been superseded by some sort of a lay philosophy or theosophy.
S. R.
St. Germain-en-Laye March 1922.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PAQB
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS .
• •
CHAPTER H
CHRISTIANITY : FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN ... 40
CHAPTER HI
CHRISTIANITY : FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V . . .62
CHAPTER IV
CHRISTIANITY: FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA . . 108
CHAPTER V
CHRISTIANITY : FROM THE ENCYCLOPEDIA TO THE CONDEMNATION
OF MODERNISM ........ 151
EPILOGUE . . . . . . . . .212
INDEX .......... 217
VII
CHAPTER I
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS
Myth and history— The Canon of the New Testament— The orthodox tradition as to the Evangelists — The conclusions of criticism on this point — The date of our Gospels— The synoptical Gospels — Testimony of Papias— The composition of the synoptical Gospels— The Fourth Gospel— The lack of historical authority for the Gospels— The idea of the Messiah — The silence of secular writers — The testimony of Tacitus— Uncertain chronology of the life of Jesus — Uncertainty as to His trial and death — The Docetes— The Christ of St. Paul— The supposed fulfilment of prophe- cies—The apocrvphal Gospels — The Epistles of St. Paul— Chronology of St. Paul's apostolate— The Catholic Epistles— The Epistle of St. John and the verse of the "three witnesses" — The Apocalypse of St. John — The Apocalypse of St. Peter— Various Epistles— The Pastor of Hermas- The Symbols and the Doctrine of the Apostles — The pseudo-Clementine writings — Simon Magus — Antichrist.
1. The beginning of every history is shrouded in legend; Christianity is no exception to the rule. The Churches insist that the legends of Christianity are pure history ; if this were so, it would be the greatest of miracles.
2. Christianity belongs to a group of religions quite different from the official creeds of Judaea, Greece and Rome. The essential feature of the former group consists of initiation into the cult of a Saviour-God, who assumed human form, taught, suffered, died and rose from the dead ; the reward of the initiated is salvation. Such were the religions of Osiris, Diony- sos, Orpheus, Adonis, Attis, and the like. Christianity is the most recent of its class, the only perfectly moral and decent one, and the only one that has triumphed and survived. But it differs from all the others in a very striking peculiarity : the Saviour-God of the Christians lived in historical times, not in a remote, obscure and unattainable past. So what we may call, for analogy's sake, the myth of Christ, the evolution of which can be clearly traced from the time of St. Paul and of the Fourth Gospel, must be distinguished from the history oj Jesics :
B
2 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
a most difficult task, the more so as our earliest documents relating to Jesus are already steeped in miracle and myth.
3. Twenty-seven little Greek compositions, all the work of Christian writers, compose what is known as the Canon or rule of the New Testament. They are : the four so-called canonical Gospels ^ (the Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), the Acts of the Apostles, twenty-one letters attributed to Apostles (Paul, Peter, John, James and Jude), and the Apocalypse or Revelation attributed to St. John.
4. This Canon was practically established about 350 a.d., after the Council of Nicaea (a.d. 325), and was confirmed for the Western churches by St. Augustine in 397 ; the only doubtful item was the Apocalypse, and this was still considered not altogether above suspicion in France during the eighth century. But the first idea of a Canon dates from a.d. 150 ; it was the reputed heretic, Marcion, who then formed the first collection of the kind, which included Luke and the majority of the Pauline epistles. Down to this time all quotations from " the Scriptures " in the works of the Apostolic Fathers (or early orthodox Christian writers) refer almost exclusively to the Old Testament.^
5. A mutilated Latin catalogue, discovered at Milan by the Italian scholar Muratori (1672-1750) and dating from about 150 to 200 A. D., enumerates all the essentials of our Canon, but adds the Apocalypse of St. Peter, which has been discovered in Egypt in our own times. This catalogue was probably the Canon of the Roman Church in the second century.
6. It is supposed that the definitive Canon was formed of the collected writings which were read in the majority of the large Churches, and considered in harmony with the average opinion of Christendom. There could, of course, have been no question in those days of a scientific criterion, based on the origin and history of these writings. " If it be true that the Church applied a certain critical judgment to the choice and
* Euaiigdion (Greek), i.e. "good news."
* " It ma}"^ be confidently asserted that these writers [Christians of the first half of the second century] did not know our Gospels, or, if they did know thera, that they never mention or quote them, which comes to the same thing for us." (Michel Nicolas, Eludes sur la Bible, vol. ii. p. 5).
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 8
acceptance of the sacred books, it was not the critical judgment of the modern historian, but an opinion inspired by faith and based upon the value of these writings from the point of view of faith." 1
7. Matthew or Levi was, according to tradition, a publican or tax-collector who attached himself to Jesus. Mark is said to have been the secretary of Peter, whom he accompanied to Rome, and the founder of the Church of Alexandria. A companion of St. Paul, Luke, a physician of Antioch, wrote the Acts of the Apostles as a sequel to his Gospel. John the Evangelist, the son of Zebedee, was one of the twelve Apostles, the one to whom Jesus commended His mother from the Cross. After living at Ephesus, he was banished to Patmos, and there he is supposed to have written the Apocalypse in his old age.
Thus, if the tradition were well founded, we should possess the writings of two eye-witnesses of the life of Jesus, Matthew and John, and of two intimate friends of Peter and Paul. It matters little that the Gospels purport to be according to St. Matthew^ according to St. Luke, &c. ; the prologue to St. Luke's Gospel sufficiently shows that he claims to be the author, not only the inspirer of his book.
8. The tradition of the Church is no longer tenable. Not one of the Gospels is the work of an eye-witness ; we need only read them attentively to be convinced of this. It is true that certain passages seem to suggest the converse, and it is therefore necessary to examine them here. John xix. 35 (a soldier has pierced the side of Jesus with a spear) : " And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true ; and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe." This means that the witness invoked is John, whom the Fourth Gospel calls " the disciple whom Jesus loved," and who was the only one of the Apostles present at the Passion. But this mode of expression is ob- viously inappropriate to the author of the book ; it is an appeal to the testimony of another person ; so the writer of the Gospel cannot have been an eye-witness of what he describes. The second passage is to be found at the end of the same Gospel, as an early addition to the original text (xxi, 24) : " This
^ Loisy, Simples R^Jlexions (1908), p. 33.
4 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things, and we know that his testimony is true. And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written." Here it is even more evident that the writer is attesting the veracity of the disciple ; for, " if this disciple had been known to all as the author of the Gospel, it would not have been necessary to affirm the fact." ^ Thus we find that these two texts prove the exact opposite of what they are supposed to demonstrate, and further suggest the presumption of a pious fraud on the part of the ultimate compiler.
9. In the narrative of the arrest of Jesus as related by St. Mark (xiv. 51, 52) we read of the flight of the disciples, and of a young man who followed Jesus, " having a linen cloth cast about his naked body ; and the young men laid hold on him, and he left the linen cloth, and fled from them naked." It was long supposed that this young man was Mark himself, and this passage has been compared to an artisfs signature hidden away in the corner of a picture. Were this the case, it would give immense authority to Mark's narrative, such as none of the Gospel texts possess. But the source of this episode is a pro- phecy by Amos (ii. 16) : " And he that is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day." Here we have a detail, apparently characteristic, because it seems insignificant, which was inserted in the narrative to mark in the most puerile fashion the fulfilment of a prophecy. The same preoccupation caused the insertion of numerous episodes in our Gospels (| 45).
I What confidence can we feel in texts which have been so ' tampered with ?
10. The conclusion of liberal exegesis in this delicate matter has been formulated as follows by the Abbe Loisy : " To allege that the earliest testimony as to the origin of the Gospels is certain, precise, traditional and historical is to falsify its character entirely ; it is, on the contrary, hypothetical, vague, legendary and partisan ; it shows that at the period when the Gospels were brought forward by the Church to check the
^ Loisy, QuatrUme Evangile, p. 250.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 5
extravagances of Gnostic heresy, only the vaguest information existed as to their origin." ^
11. Why are there only ybz^r canonical Gospels ? " Because," says St. Irenaeus (c. 170), " there are four cardinal points." This reply cannot be taken seriously. There were indeed a great many writings called Gospels. The Church finally adopted four, guaranteeing their inspiration and absolute veracity, no doubt because they were in favour in four very influential churches, Matthew at Jerusalem, Mark at Rome or at Alexandria, Luke at Antioch, John at Ephesus. When the Canon Avas constituted, these Gospels were so well known that it was no longer possible to make an abstract from them in the shape of a single narrative, at the cost of destroying the sources. Such a single narrative — known as a harmonised Gospel — would have greatly facilitated the task of a Church, embarrassed by four Gospels claiming to be inspired which are contradictory and irreconcilable. If then we have four Canonical Gospels, when the inception of the Canon dates from a.d. 150, oui' Gospels are evidently considerably earlier than this in date, a conclusion which does not, however, exclude the hypothesis of later modifications.
12. It is possible to fix the approximate date of our Gospels
in the form in which they have come down to us. Matthew I makes Jesus predict the destruction of Jerusalem (xxiv. 29-31), * and, as its sequel, the coming of the Son of Man in the clouds. • This can only have been written a very short time before or after the catastrophe of a.d. 70, when it was still possible to ' believe in the speedy advent of Christ in glory, heralded by the great upheaval. In Luke (xxi. 9-24) the second coming (called Paro7ma^ presence) is foretold for a later period. " These things must first come to pass," said Jesus, " but the end is not by-and- by." 2 Here we are between a.d. 80 and 100, and nearer to the second than to the first of these dates. The parallel passage in Mark (chap, xiii.) is valueless, for in it Jesus predicts the sufferings of the Apostles and the propagation of the Gospel among all nations ; it is an obvious interpolation. But as the material in Mark was evidently used by Matthew, we may date
^ Loisy, Quelques Riflexionn, p. 127. * See Michel Nicolas, ttudes, ii. p. 8.
6 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
it between a.d. 60 and 70. As to the Gospel of St. John, if it is by the same hand as the Apocalypse, which dates from a.d. 93, we may place it towards the end of the first, or the beginning of the second century ; but it is probably somewhat later (a.d. 130).
13. The diffusion of our Gospels in Christian communities was a slow process. With the exception of Papias (c. 120), who speaks of a narrative by Mark, and a collection of the sayings of JesUs, no Christian writer of the first half of the second century quotes the Gospels or their reputed authors (§ 4). It is true that St. Justin (c. 150) mentions the Memoirs of the Apostles, but the extracts he gives from these are never textually identical with passages in our Gospels. Some of them come from unrecognised gospels, called apocryphal, others from unknown sources. The teaching of Jesus was still in a confused state, comprising those numerous narratives mentioned by Luke in his preamble, and a still more considerable body of oral tradition, which was transmitted by preaching. It is probable that our Evangelists acquired the authority faith has retained for them when the Church came into conflict with the Gnostic sects, which based their teaching upon books perhaps hardly less historical, but certainly much more extravagant.
14. The three Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke relate more or less the same facts in a similar order ; they may be printed side by side in three columns;^ this collation or synopsis of the three works has caused them to be known as the synoptical gospels. The Gospel of St. John does not lend itself to any comparative study of this sort, and must be examined bv itself.
15. Here we are confronted with the most difficult question of Gospel exegesis. When the three synoptical writers relate the same facts, they do not usually describe them as taking place under identical circumstances. When they do agree, it is not in a general way, but often literally, in every detail of a series of long phrases. These documents must therefore have had a common source, or several common sources. But this well-
^ See the convenient edition published by Chastand and 'M.oxe\,Concordance des Evangilcs, Neufchatel, 1901.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 7
spring cannot have been a lost Gospel, richer in details than those we possess, for in that case we should not find in one or the other of the three lacunae and important variations in a narrative of the same event. There must have been several sources, which we must endeavour to trace. We have, to help us in this task, two very important evidences : Luke''s preamble, and certain fragments by Papias, transcribed about 330 A.D. by Eusebius, Bishop of Cassarea. Papias' own work is lost.
16. This is Luke's exordium: "Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eye- witnesses and ministers of the word ; it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus,! that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed." This clearly means that when St. Luke wrote his Gospel, many evangelical narratives based on the testimony of the Apostles existed, but that they lacked proper co-ordination. Luke was therefore a compiler, working from written documents. If everything important in Matthew and Mark were to be found in Luke, we should suppose that he had referred to these two Gospels ; but, on the contrary, certain essential episodes, such as the Massacre of the Innocents and the Flight into Egypt, are found only in Matthew, and a few others only in Mark, about an eighth part of whose Gospel belongs exclusively to himself. It is evident therefore that Luke cannot have known either our Gospel according to St. Matthew or our Gospel according to St. Mark. We now perceive that Luke had no first-hand information, and that our Matthew and Mark are not the narratives of eye-witnesses, but are based upon records no longer in existence.
17. Let us now examine the texts of Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis in Asia about 120 a.d., who had known 'presbyters or elders said to have known the Apostles. An elder said this :
^ The epithet kratiste applied by Luke to this unknown personage has suggested the idea that he was a converted Roman official.
8 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
" Mark, the mouthpiece of Peter, carefully wrote down all he could remember, but he did not write all that Jesus did and said in proper order, for he had not heard or followed the Lord ; but at a later period, he had followed Peter, who gave instruction as occasion arose, but did not set forth the Lord's discourses in due order ; Mark is therefore not to be blamed for having written down certain things from memory, for he was careful not to omit anything he had heard, and not to introduce any errors. . . . Matthew had written down the Lord's speeches (or oracles) in Hebrew, and each one interpreted them as best he could."
In spite of the obvious mediocrity of the writer, these texts are of the utmost importance. They prove, in the first place, that the Mark referred to by the elder who gave this in- formation to Papias was not our Mark, whose Gospel shows no lack of order, but merely one of the sources drawn upon by our Mark ; and further, that our Matthew was not the original Matthew, which consisted of the sayings of Jesus recorded in Hebrew, and in a somewhat obscure manner. There is no reason whatever to doubt the good faith of Papias' informant.
18. A careful comparative study of the synoptical writers authorises, I think, the following propositions, as to which, however, critics are not entirely agreed :
a. The passages common to Matthew and Luke, which are absent from Mark, are derived from a Greek translation of the Aramaic collected sayings (in Greek Logia) of Jesus, attributed to Matthew. This collection further included certain narrative passages serving to connect the sayings, but, strangely enough, it did not include the Passion. It is designated by the letter Q (the initial of the German word Quelle, source).
b. Our Mark, the conclusion of which (xvi. 9-20) is an addition made at the end of the first century, and not to be found in the earliest manuscripts, is a compilation, perhaps written in Rome, from two older texts ; the first may have been Aramaic, and it is not certain that it described the Passion ; the writer of the second, who does describe it, was acquainted with Q ; the writer of ottr Mark was acquainted with Matthew and even with Luke and Paul.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 9
c. Our Matthew is based upon Q, a collection which was enlarged and recast several times, notably by the help of the second version of Mark. The Pauline epistles were not unknown to the writer.
d. Our Luke is perhaps a second and more complete edition, due to the same writer as the first, of a text owned by Marcion in A.D. 150. The Fathers of the Church (Tertullian, Epiphanius, &c.) accused Marcion of having mutilated the text of Luke, and pointed out various passages he had suppressed. In reality, he seems to have possessed the original Luke, compiled from a revised edition of Q, an ancient edition of Mark, and perhaps Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians, together with other lost documents. Our Luke attests a knowledge of Josephus"" Antiquities, published a.d. 93, or at least of some Greek source drawn upon in that work. It is notable that entire passages given by Matthew, but not by Mark {e. g. xvii. 24-7 ; xx. 1-16) are not to be found in Luke, and that not a single discourse in Matthew is reproduced in Luke.
e. The Church has always called Matthew the First Gospel, and Mark the Second Gospel. As a fact, the basis of Mark is earlier than our Matthew, but the basis of Matthew may be earlier than our Mark.
f. The Fourth Gospel, called that of St. John, is neither the work of St. John nor of a contemporary. The author is inspired by the Alexandrine theosophy of Philo the Jew. He knows the synoptical Gospels, but contradicts them ; he adds some historical material of uncertain origin and suspicious quality. But he is not interested in history nor in anecdotes : he is a theologian, justly called ho theologos by the Greek Fathers. St. John's Christ is, from the beginning, God Him- self ; His miracles are few, but stupendous ; He does not cast out devils, as in the Synoptics. St. John knows nothing of the contrast between Jewish law and Christianity ; he knows very little about the Jews of former days. The speeches addressed to them are, in reality, for the readers only. The object of the book is the spiritual teaching of Christianity, which is indeed founded upon it. Some later additions to the original text have been recognised; but the question of the sources
10 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
and successive editions of the Fourth Gospel remains very obscure.
19. Those who are disquieted by the discrepancies between the three synoptical writers and of their three Gospels with that of John, are generally assured that the " Gospels complete each other." This is not true. Far from completing, they con- tradict each other, and when they do not contradict, they repeat each other. The Christ of Mark is, however, compatible with the Christ of Matthew and Luke ; but the Christ of John is a totally different person. " If there is one thing above others that is obvious, but as to which the most powerful of theological interests has caused a deliberate or unconscious blindness, it is the profound, the irreducible incompatibility of the synoptical Gospels and the Fourth Gospel. If Jesus spoive and acted as He is said to have spoken and acted in the first three Gospels, He did not speak and act as He is reported to have done in the fourth." 1 It is only necessary to have an open mind, and to be able to read, to convince ourselves of this.
20. Broadly speaking, our Gospels tell us what different Christian communities believed concerning Jesus between the years 70 and 100 a.d. They reflect a legendary and expository labour carried on for at least forty years in the bosom of the communities. As John has no historic value and Luke comes to us at third hand, there remain the sources of Mark and of Matthew, notably Q, and the basis of Mark. Thus all that may be sound in Mark and Matthew is derived from two lost sources, of whose authority we have no guarantee. It is, indeed, certain that the basis of Mark cannot go back to Peter, an eye-witness, for all that relates to Peter in Mark is vague or hostile. As to the sayings in Q, it is obvious that no one had transcribed them at the moment ; at most we can only see in them an echo of the words that the disciples of Jesus repeated long after His death, and that more skilful men, influenced by the preaching of St. Paul, arranged, completed and transcribed. To speak of the authenticity of the Sermon on the Mount (the mountain itself being a fiction, intended to serve as a pendant to Sinai), is hardly consistent with serious criticism. Nay, more ;
^ Loisy, Quelques Lettres (1908), p. 130.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 11
there are words such as those Jesus is supposed to have uttered dui'ing the slumber of the Apostles (Matt. xxvi. 39 ; Mark xiv. 35 ; Luke xxii. 42), of which it may safely be said that they were neither heard nor put on record by any one. " I should not believe in the Gospel," wrote St. Augustine, " if I had not the authority of the Church for so doing." ^ The situation is unchanged, although science has defined it with singular emphasis. The Gospels, stripped of the authority of the Church, are documents which cannot be utilised for a history of the real life of Jesus. They can and should only serve to teach us what the primitive churches thought of Him, and to acquaint us with the origin of the immense influence those opinions exercised on the human race.
• • • • •
21. Collation of our Gospels, and perception of the successive strata which compose them prove that even the legend of Jesus as taught by the Church is not supported in all its details by the texts adduced. The miraculous birth is not mentioned in Mark ; it seems to have been deliberately ignored by John, who accepts the Philonian doctrine of the incarnation of the Word, "the first-born God, the second God, the intercessor between God and man," ^ making, however, an essential addition of his own by identifying this " Word " with the Messiah. In Matthew and in Luke the miraculous birth is recorded with conflicting details. Jesus himself never alludes to it, and His parents do not understand Him, when they find Him in the Temple and he speaks of His " Father's business " (Luke ii. 50). The fact that Matthew and Luke give two genealogies (irreconcilable one with another), which trace the descent of Jesus from King David through Joseph, is a sufficient evidence that the idea of the miraculous birth was introduced rather late into the tradition. These genealogies, and no doubt others no longer extant, were composed to confirm the Jewish belief that the Messiah would be of the family of David ; the story of the divine birth
^ St. Augustine, Against the epistle entitled: Of the Foundation, § 5 (ed. Vivfes, vol. XXV. p. 435). Bgo vera Evangelio non credcrem, nisi me catholicce ecclesioB commoveret auctoritas. . . . Ego me ad eos teneam, quibus prcecipientibus Evangelio credidi.
' Expressions used by Philo.
13 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
was, in its turn, introduced when the idea of the divinity of Jesus had become familiar.
22. The Gospels speak with great simplicity of the brothers and sisters of .Jesus. According to Matthew (i. 25), He was the eldest of the family. The notion that these brothers and sisters were cousins or children of Joseph by a former marriage is a mere theological subtlety. Belief in the virginity of Mary has forced ecclesiastical writers to explain or rather to eliminate the relationship.^
23. The idea that Jesus was the Messiah and that He was God is clearly formulated in the Fourth Gospel, but in the first three Gospels it appears in embryo only. The essential feature of the preaching of Jesus in the Gospels is the announcement of the reign of God, the speedy coming of which is indicated (Matt. xvi. 28 ; Mark ix. 1 ; Luke ix. 27). Jesus calls Himself the Son of Man, which in Hebrew is synonymous with man, and Son of God, which means inspired by God. He forbids His dis- ciples to call Him Messiah (Matt. xvi. 20), and He reproves the scribes for teaching that the Messiah would be a descendant of David (Mark xii. 35), a proof that the Davidic affiliation is no less an excrescence than the supernatural affiliation. In the speech ascribed to St. Peter in the Acts (ii. 22) Jesus is no more than a divine man whom God has raised from the dead. Finally, there is no trace of the Jews having accused Jesus of claiming to be God. " It is only in the Gospel of John that the sayings and the acts of Jesus tend to prove His supernatural mission, His celestial origin and His divinity. This peculiarity indicates the theological and non-historic character of the Fourth Gospel." 2
24. Jesus did not institute Peter the head of His Church, He did not " found the Papacy." The passage in Matthew (xvi. 18) :
I, " Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church . . . and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven," &c. is obviously an interpolation, made at a period when a Church separated from the Synagogue already existed. In the parallel passages in Mark (viii. 27-32) and in I.uke (ix. 18-22) there is not a word of the primacy of Peter, a detail Mark, the ' Loisy, Quclques Lettrcs, p. 155. * Loisy, Rifiexions, p. 69.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 18
reputed disciple of Peter, could hardly have omitted if he had known of it. The interpolation is probably later than the compilation of Luke's Gospel.
25. Jesus taught no dogma of any sort, nor anything resembling the Sacraments of the Church. Himself baptised by St. John, He baptised no one. The famous words : " This is my body, this is my blood," do not belong to the primitive tradition touching the last Sacrament. "Jesus simply gave bread and wine to His disciples, telling them that He would not eat and drink with them again, until they were together in the kingdom of heaven."^ The doctrine of sin and justification is also absent from the teaching of Christ in the Gospels. ^ The idea of redemption appears only in the passages interpolated under the influence of St. Paul's preaching.
26. The miracles attributed to Jesus by evangelical tradition are exorcisms (casting out devils), or allegories (the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, the transformation of water into wine at the marriage-feast of Cana). The most unequivocal of the miracles, the resurrection of Lazarus, whose body was already decomposed, is itself allegorical ; it is only recorded in the Fourth Gospel. If this had been an actual fact, or even a fact embellished and transformed by ancient tradition, it would be inexplicable that the Synoptic Writers make no reference to it.
27. The miracle of Christ's resurrection is related by the Synoptic Writers with irreconcilable discrepancies. The dis- covery of the empty tomb is the less credible in that the corpse of Jesus would no doubt have been thrown by the Roman soldiers into the common grave of malefactors. The end of Mark's Gospel (xvi. 9-20) is, as we have seen (§ 18), a later addition, which is not found in the best manuscripts. " The tradition followed by the author of the First Gospel is that of the authentic Mark, according to which the principal appearances took place in Galilee ; the appearances in Jerusalem on the day of the Resurrection notified by Luke and John are simply ignored." ^ Abbe Loisy is of opinion that the author of the Third Gospel purposely concealed the testimony of Mark
* Loisy, Reflexions, p. 90. * Loisy, EvangiU et £glise, p. 199.
* Loisy, Quelques Lettres, p. 226.
14 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
(xvi. 7), corroborated by Matthew, touching the appearances of Jesus in Galilee,^ in order to bring the disciples together on the day of the Resurrection and to keep them at Jerusalem until the Feast of Pentecost. Even in the revised form in which our texts have come do\\7i to us, it is evident that if the Resurrection of Jesus was accepted by the early Christian communities and St. Paul, it was known to them as a pious belief and not as an historic fact.
28. Is it even possible to extract the elements of a biography of Jesus from the Gospels ? It is contrary to every sound method to compose, as even Renan did, a life of Jesus, eliminating the marvellous elements of the Gospel story. It is no more possible to make real history with myths than to make bread with the pollen of flowers. The historic Jesus is essentially intangible, by which I do not mean that He never existed, but simply that we cannot affirm anything precise about Him, lacking, as we do, all evidence incontestably derived from those who saw and heard Him.
• • • • •
29. The period to which the teaching of Jesus must be referred is fairly well known to us by the works of secular writers ; now, all contemporary authors are silent concerning Him. Josephus, a Jew by birth, who wrote about a.d. 80 and enters into details concerning the history of Palestine, and the Roman procurator, Pontius Pilate, mentions John the Baptist, who was put to death under Herod Antipas, but ignores the preaching of Jesus. This silence seemed so amazing that at an early date a passage was introduced into his Jewish Antiquities (xviii. 3, 3), the apocryphal character of which is obvious. It is very doubtful whether any fragment of it. should be retained : "At this time appeared Jesus, a wise man, if indeed He is to be called a man. For He accomplished marvellous things, was the master of men who accept truth gladly, and drew many Jews and also many Greeks after Him. This man was the Christ. He was denounced by the elders of our nation to Pilate, who condemned Him to be crucified ; but those who had loved Him from the beginning did not cease to revere Him ; for He
^ -Loisy, Quelques Letires, p. 190.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 15
appeared on the third day, risen from the dead, as the holy prophets and as a thousand other marvels connected with Him had foretold. And the sect which received the name of Christians from Him still exists." If the Jew Josephus had written this, he would have been a Christian ; and as, since he was a Jew, he could not have written thus, he must either have said nothing of Jesus or have spoken of Him in hostile terms which Christian copyists suppressed.^
30. Another historian, Justus of Tiberias, who wrote at the same period, and whose work Photius read in the ninth century, says not a word of Jesus, which Photius attributes to his "malevolence."
31. We still possess the considerable works of Philo, the Jewish philosopher of Alexandria, a contemporary of Jesus, who survived Him. Philo never heard of Jesus, or at any rate he does not appear to have done so, a fact which the proximity of Jerusalem and Alexandria makes very singular.
32. The few words devoted to Jesus in the Talmud present insuperable difficulties. They say, notably, that Rabbi Joshua ben Perahyah fled to Alexandria with his pupil Jesus to escape the persecution of the Jewish king Jannseus (103-76 B.C.). On his return, Jesus founded a sect of apostate Jews. According to this, there were disciples of Jesus nearly a century before the Christian era ! How are we to explain the birth of such a legend, however absurd, if the preaching of Jesus, at the period assigned to it, had left any definite memories ?
33. Suetonius, speaking of the events of the year 52 a.d., says that Claudius banished the Jews from Rome, because they were perpetually revolting at the instigation of Christ {impulsore Chresto). He may have referred to some obscure Jew called Chrestus ; but even if he meant Jesus, this curt allusion tells us nothing of import.
34. The first non-Christian record of Jesus occurs in the Annals of Tacitus (xv. 44), in connection with the Neronian persecution. The emperor " inflicted cruel tortures on men
^ A German historian has recently suggested (1921) that the passage in question, reproducing the chief tenets of Christianity, was inserted by Josephus himself in a late edition of his work in order to appeal to a new class of readers (Christians of Jewish descent).
n
V
16 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
hated for their crimes, called by the vulgar Christians. Christ, from whom they took their name, had been put to death under Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilate. Repressed for a time, this detestable superstition broke out again, not only in Judaea, the fount of the evil, but at Rome, whither all irregu- larities and infamies tend to gravitate." The authenticity of these lines has been questioned, but quite groundlessly. How- ever, when Tacitus wrote this (117 a.d.), there were Christians throughout the Empire ; the three synoptical Gospels were in existence, and perhaps even the Fourth Gospel. Tacitus knew — perhaps through his friend the younger Pliny — of a tradition concerning the death of Jesus ; he can hardly be said to confirm it.
35. Jesus is alleged to have been crucified under Tiberius, by order of Pontius Pilate, because He claimed to be the King of the Jews. Tiberius was a suspicious sovereign, who insisted on being kept informed of all that was happening in his Empire. For instance, he ordered an inquiry to be held because some sailors, passing along the coast of Greece, thought they heard voices crying that the Great Pan was dead. Pontius Pilate would have sent Tiberius a report on the death of Jesus, if only to show his vigilance. The strongest proof of the non-existence of this report is the fact that at the beginning of the second century, the Christians themselves manufactured one which is still extant, and which Justin and Tertullian believed to be authentic ; and in the fourth century the pagans circulated another, also a forgery, which Eusebius read.
36. Do we know anything definite as to the date of Christ's birth and activity ? Matthew places His birth in the reign of Herod, that is to say, at latest in the year 4 b.c. ; Luke dates it at the time of a census which took place ten years after, in the year 6 a.d. The same Luke says Jesus was thirty in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius, the year 29 of our era, the date to which he assigns the baptism of Jesus by St. John ; but Luke seems to have taken this date from a passage in Josephus (which speaks of the death of John the Baptist in connection with an event of the year 36) and to have allowed for an interval of seven years between the preaching of John
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 17
the Baptist and the incident in question. Luke makes the ministry of Jesus last only a year and a half, whereas, according to John, it lasted three and a half years. Luke recounts an episode in the childhood of Jesus, whereas the other evangelists seem to have known nothing of this period of His life. John makes the Jews say to Jesus, "thou art not yet fifty years old," from which the early Church inferi'ed that He was about forty- nine at his death ; but in this case, if He was born in the year 4 B.C., He must have died in a.d. 45, not under Tiberius, but under Claudius, and, indeed, the forged report of Pilate fabricated by the Christians is addressed to Claudius. If, on the other hand, Jesus was born in the year of the census (the year 6 a.d.), and lived forty-nine years, He died in 55, and this opinion was stoutly upheld by certain Christians of Jerusalem. Finally, Eusebius mentions another false report ascribed to Pilate, according to which Jesus was crucified in A.r>. 21, which, remarks Eusebius, is impossible, as we know from Josephus that Pilate was not procurator at this period. Thus we see that even the fact of the condemnation of Jesus imder Pilate is not established, though the earliest Christian credo (a.d. 100) rather suspiciously insists upon it (I believe in God . . . and in Christ Jesus . . . cruc'ijled under Pontius Pilate . . .). Why emphasise this if there were no doubt about it ^ That Pilate correctly appears escorted by Annas and Caiaphas in Luke's Gospel proves only one thing, namel}', that Luke had read Josephus, or one of his authorities. To sum up, we find that less than a century after the Christian era, which tradition places four years after the birth of Jesus, no one knew precisely when He was born, when He taught, or when He died.
37. Did any one know with certainty how Jesus was arrested, judged and put to death .? The accounts of the Passion in the Gospels inspire confidence by their precision ; but this impression is not proof against careful examination. In the first place, these accounts show a bias ; they try to exonerate the Roman governor and to inculpate the Jews, which is comprehensible enough at a period when the Church, turning her back upon the Jews, was appealing to the Gentiles, but is inconsistent with history. The weak Pilate of the Gospels, who c
18 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
allows himself to be swayed by the mob, gives it a choice between Jesus and Barabbas, washes his hands of the blood he is about to shed (a non-Roman custom), is a romantic figure quite unlike the real, harsh Pilate described by Josephus and Philo. In the second place, the date of Jesus' death on the eve or day of the Passover is inadmissible ; the evident reason for assigning it to this date was to connect it with the sacrifice of the Pascal lamb. But we must also dwell on some further difficulties involved in the Gospel narrative of the Passion.
38. Judas of Kerioth, the traitor Apostle, is said to have shown his master to the soldiers who came to arrest Him. But as Jesus had just made a triumphal entry into Jerusalem and was not in hiding, there was no necessity for a traitor to reveal His presence. After the death of Jesus, remorseful Judas would not keep the money he had received and hurled it into the sanctuary ; the priests used it to purchase the potter's field, henceforth called Aceldama, the field of blood. According to the Acts, Judas bought that field himself and died there a miserable death. Now, there are verses in the Psalms (xli. 9 '•> Iv. 12) mentioning the ill-treatment of the Righteous One by a "familiar friend"; there is a passage in Zechariah (xi. 12, 13) : " So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver, and the Lord said to me : Cast it unto the potter . . . And I took the thirty pieces of silver and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord." Whatever that may mean, it is the origin of the legend, as proved by Acts i. 16: "This scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to
/ them that took Jesus." So the story of Judas is founded on / prophecy, not on fact.
39. The current belief that the Roman governor merely ratified a sentence pronounced by a Jewish tribunal is manifestly absurd. The Gospel narrative combines two traditions, one attributing the sentence to the Romans, the other (probably more recent) to the Jews. But if the Jews had condemned Jesus, He would have been stoned, crucifixion being unknown to Hebrew law. Now if Pilate caused a freeman to be scourged
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 19
and crucified, he must have had for that some more serious reason than the alleged pretence of Jesus to Messiahship, a thing that was of no concern to him. Was then Jesus con- sidered a disturber of the peace, claiming some sort of temporal power ? There is no trace whatever of this in the Gospels. The more we admit that the teaching and conduct of Jesus constituted a menace to Roman rule, the less do we understand the silence of contemporary historians. The Crucifixion remains a tragedy without a cause.
40. Nor can the episode of Barabbas be historic. We are told that the Roman governor was in the habit of releasing a prisoner on Easter Eve. He had a prisoner named Barabbas, who had taken part in some insurrection and committed a murder. (Neither the custom nor the revolt is mentioned elsewhere.) The governor proposes to set Jesus free, but the mob refuses Him and clamours for Barabbas, who is released. But how could a Roman governor have been induced by a Jewish mob to liberate a rebel and murderer who found suspicious favour with that mob ?
The name of Barabbas has lent itself to ingenious hypo- theses. We know from Philo that the populace of Alexandria, wishing to deride the petty Jewish King Agrippa, treated as a mock-king a fool called Karahas. That name being meaning- less, Sir G. Frazer once proposed to read Barabbas^ in Aramaic "the son of the father." Moreover, we learn that about the year 250 Origen read in a very old copy of St. Matthew's Gospel that Barabbas was called Jesus Barabbas. So it might be that Jesus was put to death, not instead of Barabbas, but in the character of a Barabbas, as an expiatory victim, the son paying for the father. But this is very uncertain and, till new evidence be forthcoming, must be merely noted.
41. Far greater importance attaches to texts concerning the Babylonian and Persian feast of the Sacasa, and also the Roman Saturnalia. At the Sacasa, there was a triumphal procession of a condemned criminal dressed as a king, who, at the end of the festival, was stripped of his finery, scourged, hanged or crucified. About 300 A.D., at Durostolum on the Danube, the Roman garrison, thirty days before the Saturnalia, elected by lot a
20 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
mock-king identified with the king and god Saturnus, who enjoyed royal honours and privileges, some of them of an immoral character, during those thirty days ; after which he was compelled to kill himself on the altar of the king-god whom he impersonated. A Christian soldier, Dasius, having been elected, refused to comply with the indecent practices usual at the feast and was put to death. Now, such a savage ritual must have been very old ; compared with that of the Sacaea, which is, of course, independent of it, it leads us to admit that in certain popular cults, founded perhaps on totemism or agrarian rites, a man was made to impersonate a king-god, treated in derision as such and finally slain. The story of the mocking and scourging of Jesus (Matt, xxvii. 26-31) is indeed so similar to the ritual of the Sacaea and Saturnalia that the parallelism cannot be accidental. So we are at first sight tempted to conclude that Pilate abandoned Jesus to the Roman soldiers that they might treat Him as a mock-king, though the season was not that of the Saturnalia. If that were the case, the story given in the Gospels should be considered as demon- strably true ; the writers, though unacquainted with the pagan ritual, produced a narrative that conformed to it, simply by stating the facts as they occurred. But serious arguments can be brought against such a conclusion which, if verified, would mean a triumph for the orthodox view. There is no trace of revelry, an element not to be omitted in the honours rendered by soldiers to a mock-king. The Roman governor, in a country seething with rebellion, could not possibly have authorised his guards to treat a rebel as a king ; such laxity, in the reign of Tiberius, would have cost him dear. On the other hand, supposing the first writer who related the death of Jesus had lacked information on that subject, it is natural enough that he should have taken as a model some very old Asiatic ritual according to which a god-king was reverenced, derided, ill- treated and finally put to death. The lack of evidence concerning the ritual invites us to caution ; but J. J. Rousseau was perhaps nearer the truth than he himself supposed when he wrote : " If the death of Socrates is that of a sage, the death of Jesus is that of a god."
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 21
42. What bearing on these questions have the Docetes,^ the most ancient Christian heretics, who contended that Jesus had been but a phantom, that He had only assumed the semblance of a body — and this, exclaims St. Jerome, when the blood of Jesus was not yet dry in Judaea ? The great antiquity of the sect is confirmed by two letters attributed to St. John, which are partly directed against Docetism, and perhaps also by the passage in the Fourth Gospel (xx. 24) concerning the incredulity of St. Thomas. Works by Docetes have not come down to us and we have no adequate knowledge of their tenets. One thing, however, is certain : the so-called extreme Docetes denied the Crucifixion. Irenseus (c. 180 a.d.) says that the heretic Basilides (c. 125) related the Crucifixion as follows : Simon of Cyrene was crucified by mistake "and Jesus himself took the form of Simon, and stood by and laughed at the executioners." Foolish as this may be, how could a fact be so ludicrously denied, if it had been historically ascertained ?
43. A keen adversary of the Docetes, St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, writing about 110, says that the hirth and death of Jesus were unknown to Satan, the Prince of the world ; he also speaks of certain persons who declared : " What we do not find in the archives we cannot accept in the Gospel." Efforts have been made to twist these texts, which are undoubtedly very odd, but must be taken as they stand and interpreted honestly. They seem to show that the Bishop of Antioch had to contend with unbelievers inspired by the Devil, who stated that they could find no evidences of the birth and death of Jesus in the public archives (of Caesarea ?). Ignatius answered them only with pious phrases ; after him, from the first half of the second century, forgeries were concocted to refute them.
44. St. Paul preached " Christ crucified," not Gospel history. He talked with men who had lived with Jesus, like Peter and James ; but their recollections of the earthly life of the master do not seem to have interested him. In his Epistles to distant communities he hardly says anything about Jesus, but dwells on Christ. We may nevertheless assert that the Epistles of Paul are the best historical evidence we possess relating to
^ From Greek dokein, to appear.
22 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Jesus, so far do all the rest fall short of the demands of criticism. If these Epistles were not by St. Paul, or if the decisive passages in them were spurious — of which we have, so far, no proof at all — it would almost be a pardonable paradox to doubt the historical existence of Jesus.^ All we can safely say is, that if historical facts are imbedded in the Gospel narrative, they are so overlaid with legend that it is impossible to extract from them the elements of a scientific biography.
• • • • •
45. Many events in the life of Jesus are related in the Gospels with the comment that they were fulfilments of prophecy. The text quoted in the Gospels is the Greek version of the Old Testament, the mistakes of which are accepted and occasionally aggravated. Jesus was born of a "virgin," because Isaiah was supposed to have said that " a virgin " would conceive; in the Hebrew text, he says "a woman," the wife of some Jewish king or prophet. Jesus is said to be " of Nazareth," because a prophet foretold that the Messiah should be a Nazarene (Matt. ii. 23) ; but Isaiah, who is invoked in this connection, said nothing of the sort. A Nazarenos or Nazorains was a man belonging to a holy community of Baptists, from the Semitic root ns'r, meaning " to protect," which still survives in the names of Syrian sects called Ndsordje (Mandaeans) and Nos'airi. Jesus was called Nazarenus for some such reason which the Gospel writers did not understand ; so they invented the village of Nazareth, which appears in no text before the Christian era. Jesus was born at Bethlehem because Micah (v. 2) had foretold that the Messiah would come from that place. He was taken by His parents into Egypt because Hosea wrote : " Out of Egypt have I called my Son."" All these coincidences which seemed formerly not only to attest the veracity of the Gospel narrative, but the superhuman character of the facts set
^ Apart from the mysterious passage in Ignatius (§ 43), there is no trace of this paradox till the eighteenth century, when it seems to have been current in Bolingbroke's circle. Voltaire censured it, but not Volney and Dupuy. This explains why Napoleon, meeting Wieland in 1808, asked him if he believed in the existence of Jesus. The same theory was propounded by the German critic Bruno Bauer (1842), who attributed the whole Gospel history to one forger, and, more recently, by many writers, Robertson, Benj. Smith, Drews, &c. But their wild hypotheses to account for the origin of the "myth of Christ" have failed hitherto to convince competent scholars.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 23
forth in it, now furnish irrefragable proof of their uncertainty. It sometimes seems as if a Greek writer, who knew nothing of Jesus, save that He was the Messiah, had taken the chief elements of His biography from the Old Testament by torturing the texts then considered as Messianic. But there is more than this. In Isaiah (1. 6), the Righteous servant gives his back to the smiters ; he hides not his face from shame and spitting ; later on (liii. 3-12), he is a man of sorrows, bearing our griefs, bruised for our iniquities, brought as a lamb to the slaughter, numbered with the transgressors, cut off out of the land of the living, " and he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death . . . ; yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him." Here we have strange sayings which, like the famous passage in Plato's Republic,^ may be derived from some myth of the suffering Saviour and which were evidently seized upon to compose the story of the Passion and Entombment. In Psalm xxii. the Righteous complains that his enemies have cast lots for his vesture, a detail which has found a place in the account of the Passion, where it is introduced to "fulfil" the prophecy. But the Righteous servant also says : " They pierced my hands and my feet," i. e. they crucified me. Unless we use two kinds of weights and measures, we must admit that this verse of the Psalm (xxii. 16) ynai/ be the origin of the tradition which declares that Jesus was crucified. If we do not admit it, we come very near to believing in prophecy. What then, after all we have said, remains unquestioned of the Gospel story, from the stable at Bethlehem to the Cross of Golgotha ?
46. Christianity remains, which is not only a great institu- tion, but the mightiest spiritual force which has ever transformed souls, a force which continues to evolve in them. Its influence is due partly to the beauty, now idyllic, now tragic, of the legend, but still more to what is called the morality of the Gospel, as revealed in the parables and sayings attributed to Jesus. " The spirit of the Gospel," as Abbe Loisy aptly says,^ " is the highest
1 Plato, Republic, II. p. 362 A. (H. Spens' transl., p. 42) : "The just man will be scoiTrged, tormented, fettered, have his eyes burn and lastly, haring suffered all manners of evils, will be crucified." Unless it alluded to some- thing of which we are ignorant this passage would be utterly absurd.
* Loisy, Quelques Lettres, p. 71.
24 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
manifestation of the human conscience seeking happiness in justice." It is true that Christian moraHty is no more original than is any other morality, religious or secular ; it is that of the contemporary Jewish schoolmen, of a Hillel or a Gamaliel ; but in the Gospels it appears divested of all scholasticism and ritualistic pedantry, robust and simple as befits a doctrine setting forth to conquer the world. It is the morality of the school without the school, purified and distilled in ardent souls, with all the charm and all the persuasive force of popular conceptions. It is not social; it neglects the duties of man to the city, because it invites to perfection, to individual purity, in view of the Advent of the Lord and the Judgment, which were considered imminent even by St. Paul ; but it prepares man to carry out his social duties by condemning hatred and violence, and enjoining fraternity. It is absurd to say that this morality is against nature ; so is kindness. But Christian morality was only the ideal rule of conduct of Christendom, a rule always preached, but rarely obeyed, even by those who preached it. Pity that St. Paul superimposed on these mild ethics the harsh doctrine of original sin, redemption and grace, which gave birth to eighteen centuries of arid disputation and still weighs like a nightmare on humanity !
• • • • •
47. The so-called apocryphal Gospels are of two kinds ; the one class, described as dogmatic, relates the whole life of Jesus, after the manner of the Synoptists ; the others, known as legendary, deal only with episodes. The former, which the Fathers of the Church in the third century frequently quote as if they were of equal authority with the canonical writings, were destroyed, no doubt deliberately, because they belonged to schismatic sects. But in 1886 a portion of the Gospel of St. Peter, comprising the Passion and Resurrection, was found in a tomb in Egypt. This Gospel was probably identical with that of the Egyptians, which the Fathers quoted, and of which they have preserved extracts ; it was no doubt written in Egypt, probably at Babylon (ancient Cairo). We have also some fragments of the Gospel according to the Hebrews, the loss of which is especially to be regretted, because it was written for
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 25
the Judseo-Christian communities of Palestine. The episode of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery, which was inserted in St. John's Gospel in the fourth century, was originally in this Gospel. It should, no doubt, be distinguished from that of the Ebionites (Ebionim^ the poor), a Jewish sect anterior to Christianity, which developed a gnostic doctrine. A con- temporary of St. John, Cerinthus, of whom we know hardly anything, was supposed to be the author of one Gospel ; at a very early period the Gospel of St. John was attributed to him and alleged to be a revised version of his Gospel.
48. The legendary Gospels which have come down to us are expurgated gnostic writings ; all that has been left in them are absurdities which are inoffensive to dogma, though singularly repugnant to taste. In the Gospel of the Childhood, or of St. Thomas, Jesus is a malicious and vindictive little demon ; the miracles of the apocryphal Gospels are worthy of the Arabian Nights. The result of the toleration shown by the Church for these legends was that they were widely circulated and translated into every language ; literature and art found inspiration in them. Many popular incidents of Gospel history have no authority but that of the apocryphal writers ; such are the story of Joachim and Anna, the parents of the Virgin, that of her marriage, of the birth of Jesus in a cav^e, where he was worshipped by an ox and an ass, of the descent of Jesus into hell,^ and of the death or trance of the Virgin.
49. In addition to these texts we have a considerable collection of sayings (in Greek logia) attributed to Jesus, some reported by writers of the first century, others forming little collections which have been discovered in Egypt in our own days. The grains of gold in this Gospel dust are rare ; there is indeed one very long sentence attributed to Jesus and recorded by Papias, which is nothing but an absurdity from beginning to end. Our Evangelists made a very happy choice among the confused elements of tradition ; to appreciate their taste, we have only to read the apocryphal Gospels.
50. The older parts of the Acts of the Apostles are by the
* The descent Into hell, to which the First Epistle of Peter alludes (iii. 18), has been generally accepted since the fourth century.
26 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
same author as our Third Gospel ; they must have been written about 80 A.D., probably in Rome. The compilation as we have it contains some precious information concerning a portion of St. Paul's journeys, taken apparently from an authentic journal of Luke's ; these elements are distinguished from the rest by the use of the word "we" in the narrative. The remainder, grossly interpolated and altered, is very unequal in value, and cannot be attributed to a disciple of Paul's, whose Epistles and whose individual doctrine it completely ignores. The rivalry of Peter and Paul is intentionally modified, in a spirit of conciliation ; but this conciliation is a growth of theology, not of history. The Paul of the Epistles is a very different man from the Paul of the Acts. A Swiss theologian, in 1841, sup- posed that the real object of the Acts was to show that there was no cause of conflict between Christianity and the Roman State, a theory that has been cleverly developed by Loisy (1920) in an epoch-making work.
51. We have further a whole collection of apocryphal Acts of various Apostles, Peter, Paul, Thomas, John, Andrew, and Philip. They are romances full of marvels, amusing enough to read, in which certain precise details attest a good knowledge of history and geography. These texts, which have come down to us in different languages, seem to have been derived from expurgated editions of gnostic works. The Church permitted them to be read on the same terms as the apocryphal Gospels, but merely as a matter of curiosity.
The most attractive of these stories is that of Thekla. This maiden, a member of a good family at Iconium, was converted by the teaching of Paul, baptised herself, braved all sorts of dangers, and ended by preaching Christianity at Seleucia. Tertullian tells us (c. 200) that this story was fabricated by an elder of Asia Minor, who, when convicted of the fraud, confessed that he had perpetrated it "for love of St. Paul." 1 There is, however, something suspicious in the alleged confession, intended to discredit a very ancient narrative which introduces a girl preaching and baptising, contrary to the tenets of the Church. St. Paul's distrustful attitude
^ Tertullian, De Baptismo, l^.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 27
towards women may possibly be due to impatience with the youthful presumption of his convert.
• • • • •
52. The Canon of the Church accepts fourteen Epistles of St. Paul, one to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, one to the Galatians, the Ephesians, the Philippians, the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians and Timothy, one to Titus, one to Philemon, one to the Hebrews. A school of criticism which sprang up in Holland about 1885 denies the authenticity of all these writings. Its principal argument is that in the communities Paul is supposed to address a complexity and intensity of religious life is implied which is inadmissible at the period. But what do we know of the primitive history of these communities ? All that can be conceded is that the whole of St. Paul's Epistles have not come down to us as he wrote them.
53. The Epistle to the Hebrews is a theological dissertation on the relations of the Law and the Gospels. Its attribution to St. Paul is purely hypothetical. Tertullian ascribed it to Barnabas, the companion of Paul, and Origen confessed that the author was not known. But it is an ancient composition, probably a little anterior to the year 70 a.d.
54. The Epistle to Titus and the two Epistles to Timothy are generally known by the name of Pastoral Epistles, because they are addressed to pastors of the Church. The attribution of the Pastorals to St. Paul has been strenuously contested, yet the spirit which animates them is certainly that of the Apostle ; they are at least documents emanating from his school, if indeed they are not modified versions of authentic letters.
55. The Epistle to Philemon is unimportant. The second Epistle to the Thessalonians seems to have been recast. The Epistle to the Colossians cannot be separated from the Epistle to the Ephesians. At the time of Marcion (a.d. 150), the latter was superscribed " to the Laodiceans," who were no doubt the original recipients. There are reasons for contesting its authenticity. The Epistle to the Philippians implies a state of organisation in the Church which is not borne out by St. Paul's other writings ; but good judges believe it to be genuine.
56. The four great Epistles, to the Romans, the Corinthians
28 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
(I and 2) and to the Galatians are the most important monu- ments of that PauHne doctrine which the Apostle himself, quoting the Greeks, called the "foolishness" of the Cross (1 Cor. i. 18-23). They are difficult texts, so rugged in style and capricious in composition, that they malce us wonder how the recipients can have understood them. At one point Paul rises to great heights in an eloquent passage on charity (1 Cor. xiii.) in the midst of an exhortation to purity of life ; here and there his atrabilious genius suggests to him observa- tions of the profoundest psychology, verbal felicities worthy of the greatest writers. But generally speaking his thought seems to elude us just as we are about to grasp it ; this Jew, though he wrote in Greek, had retained a purely Oriental method of expression. If we read the Epistles without a commentary, we are in peril of a good deal of lost labour and of ultimate bewilderment.
57. A vast literature has grown up round these Epistles.
When minutely studied, they seem to reflect the evolution of
St. Paul's thought, as it gradually diverged from Judaism
under Greek-Asiatic influences, not literary, but popular and
mystical. St. Paul teaches that sin and death came into the
world by Adam (whom Jesus never mentioned), and that Christ
came to redeem mankind by His voluntary oblation of Himself.
Jesus was the visible image of the invisible God ; He was the
Son of God, although of human birth (Paul knew nothing of
the miraculous affihation). The death of Jesus connoted that
of sin ; the new life, heralded by the resurrection of Jesus, was
to be the reign of holiness. In due time the faithful would be
caught up into heaven with the Lord ; then the dead would
arise and would be judged according to their deserts. Baptism
and faith in Jesus Christ are essential to salvation ; the works
prescribed by the Law of Moses are not enough, for Jesus has
redeemed us from the curse of the Law. But faith is not
within reach of every man. God chooses his elect as seems
good to him. This is the doctrine of predestination by grace,
which, however, St. Paul has not very clearly formulated (see
Rom. ix. 11 and xi. 5).
68. Ever since St. Paul, the ruling idea of Christianity has
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 29
been that of the redemption of man, guilty of a prehistoric fault, by the voluntary sacrifice of a superman. This doctrine is founded upon that of expiation — a guilty person must suffer to atone for his fault — and that of the substitution of victims — the efficacious suffering of an innocent person for a guilty one. Both are at once pagan and Jewish ideas ; they belong to the old fundamental errors of humanity. Yet Plato knew that the punishment inflicted on a guilty person is not, or should not be a vengeance : it is a painful remedy imposed on him for his own benefit and that of society. At about the same period, Athenian law laid down the principle that punishment should be as personal as the fault. Thus St. Paul founded Christian theology on two archaic ideas which had already been condemned by enlightened Athenians of the fourth century before our era, ideas which no one would dream of upholding in these days, though the structure built upon them still subsists.
59. In practice, Paul did not forget that he was addressing Jewish communities which already included many baptised pagans. The faithful are enjoined not to hold aloof from the Gentiles, but only from their sacrifices and impurities ; they may disregard the alimentary restrictions of the Law. " Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the Church of God" (1 Cor. x. 32). The virtue he enjoins is, in the main, of no very exalted order ; there is a Pauline opportunism. Such is his theory of marriage ; it is better to remain celibate, but he who marries does well ; a widow is even authorised to taiie a second husband, for a regular union is always preferable to disorderly life (1 Cor. vii. 27-40). For the rest, he reminds his flock that the end of the world is at hand ; and they should behave as if it were imminent ; " the time is short"" (1 Cor. vii. 29). The theologians who quote and com- mentate St. Paul, like those who expound the Gospels, often forget that these documents were written by men to whom the second coming of Christ and the final catastrophe were matters of daily hope or fear. If the Church contrived to build a lasting edifice upon such foundations, it was because, with necessary lack of logic, she transformed them rapidly and completely.
80 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
60. The chronology of Paul's life is very obscure ; the following are probable dates :
A.I). 36. The Conversion of Paul. He goes to Arabia.
39. Paul at Jerusalem. He preaches in Syria and
Cilicia. 49. The Conference at Jerusalem. Paul in Galatia and
Troas. 51. Paul in Macedonia.
53. Paul at Corinth and in Achaia.
54. Paul at Jerusalem, Antioch and Ephesus.
57. Paul in Macedonia, Achaia, Philippi and Jerusalem.
58-60. Paul in prison at Cresarea.
61-63. Paul at Rome, where he is put in prison.
64 (?). Death of Paul at Rome.
61. The group of letters attributed to St. Peter, St. John, St. Jude and St. James are called the Catholic Epistles, because they are addressed to the Church at large. Not one of them is authentic. The First Epistle of Peter, dated from Babylon, is thoroughly Pauline in spirit ; it was perhaps fabricated with a view to suggest that Peter had lived at Babylon (ancient Cairo), and that this community was more ancient than that of Alexandria, which claimed to have been founded by St. Mark. The author has thus helped to accredit the legend of the coming of St. Peter to Rome, which is called Babylon in the Apocalypse. It need hardly be pointed out that this satirical designation, comprehensible enough in an invective, w^ould be absurd in the heading of a letter. The Second Epistle of Peter is also Gra?co-Egyptian, and very near in date to the apocryphal Gospel of St. Peter (about 130). The three Epistles ascribed to St. John are probably by the same John as the Gospel, but not by the Apostle ; in the last two, the author speaks of himself as the elder (presbyter). The Epistle of Jude is a little homily against the heretics, written in Egypt after the year 100, in the same tone as the Second Epistle of St. Peter ; it could not possibly be by its reputed author, Judas, the brother of Jesus. The Epistle of James upholds the doctrine of salvation by works, in opposition to St. Paul's
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 31
theory ; this is why Luther characterised it disdainfully as the epistle of straio. St. Jerome knew that it was not by the brother of Jesus.
62. One of these forgeries was subjected to an interpolation of later date, probably by the Spaniard Priscillian (c. 380). In chap. V. of the First Epistle of St. John are these words : " There are three that bear witness in heaven, the Father, and the Word, and Holy Ghost : and these three are one." If these two verses were authentic, they would be an affirmation of the doctrine of the Trinity dating from the first century, at a time when the Gospels, the Acts and St. Paul ignore it. But it has been demonstrated that these verses were an interpolation, for they do not appear in the best manuscripts, notably all the Greek manuscripts down to the fifteenth century. The Roman Church refused to bow to evidence. "How," she argued, "if these verses were an interpolation, could the Holy Spirit, who guides and directs the Church, have allowed her to regard this lofty affirmation of the Trinity as authentic, and permitted its insertion in the official edition of the sacred books .?"i The Congregation of the Index, on January 13, 1897, with the approbation of Leo XIII., forbade any question as to the authenticity of the text relating to the "three heavenly witnesses." It showed in this connection a wilful ignorance to which Job's rebuke (xiii. 7) is specially applicable : " Will ye talk deceitfully for God .? "
63. The Apocalypse or Revelation of St. John was written, according to tradition, in the Isle of Patmos, to which John had been banished by Domitian. It is a glorification of the Lamb (Jesus), and a prediction of the downfall of Rome, which is called " Babylon the Great, the mother of abominations of the earth, drunken with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus" (xvii. 5, 6). At the end of one thousand years, after the triumph of the Church, the dead are to rise again. Satan will be released from his prison, and God will send down fire from heaven ; this was the origin of the so-called millenarian beliefs, which have seduced a large number of visionaries. The Apocalypse cannot be the work of the Apostle John ; it is
^ See Houtin, La Question hiblique au XJX^"^ siecle, p. 220.
32 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
scarcely possible that it can be by the same hand as the Fourth Gospel and the three Johannine Epistles. The author, though very personal in his style and composition, has made use of more ancient documents of the same stamp. The basis is a Jewish diatribe against Nero, who seems to be designated by the "number of the Beast," 666, the sum of the letters of the Emperor's name, according to their numeral value in Hebrew (xiii. 18) ; but the Christian revision must certainly have been carried out under Domitian — who was called the bald Nero — in 93, for there is a reference to the great crisis in the wine industry owing to a glut (chap, vi, 6), which, according to pagan texts, took place in a.d. 92.
64. The author of Revelation calls himself John the Apostle, and addresses the Seven Churches of Asia ; as he was not the Apostle John, who died perhaps in Palestine about 44, he was a forger. Many details, unintelligible at first sight, have been recently shown to refer to astrology ; but among such absurdities and hosts of others, there are certain sublime passages which have become classic in all literatures. The Church hesitated to admit this book into the Canon ; it was the name of John which decided the matter.
65. Since the year 1892, we have been in possession ot an Apocalypse attributed to St. Peter, discovered in Egypt, together with the Gospel known as that of St. Peter. It is a vision of the rewards and punishments of the other world, dating from about the year 130, and interesting as the first Christian essay in eschatology (the science of the Last Things). It is derived from popular Jewish and Greek sources, and shows striking analogies with the Orphic doctrines. The author was an Egyptian Jew, of Hellenistic tendencies. This Apocalypse was probably produced in the same litei-ary factory as the two letters of St. Peter and his Gospel, which are also Graeco-Egyptian forgeries.
66. Certain writings not included in the Canon have exercised so strong an influence that they demand a brief mention here.
They are in the first place letters. (1) A letter attributed to the Apostle Barnabas, the companion of St. Paul ; it is
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 33
posterior to the fall of Jerusalem, and very hostile to the Jews in tone ; this again is a forgery, made in Egypt. (2) The First Epistle of Clement, Bishop of Rome, to the Corinthians ; this is perhaps the work of a Hellenistic Jew, a freeman of the Consul Flavins Clemens, who was a Christian or a Jew. It is interesting to note at this early period (c. 100 a.d.) the moral influence exercised by the Church of Rome upon a Greek Church. (3) The so-called Second Epistle of Clement is a homily by another author, sometimes attributed to Clement of Alexandria. (4) The epistle of the disciple of John the Elder, Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, who was martyred in a.d. 155, at the age of eighty-six. This letter is addressed to the Philippians, and is probably authentic. (5) Seven very in- structive letters attributed to Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who was martyred under Trajan. Ignatius is supposed to have written them during his journey from Antioch to Rome, to communities which had received hixn cordially ; he warns them against schisms, Docetism and Judaism ; these communities were governed by Bishops. The first mention of the Gospels, in the sense of a history of Jesus, occurs in one of these letters (that to the Smyrnaeans). The authenticity of these letters has been denied, but not convincingly ; it is by no means impossible that the episcopate may have been organised in Greek territory as early as the year 100.
67. The Pastor of Hermas is a long and very tedious work which Clement of Alexandria and Origen believed to be "inspired." The Pastor is the guardian angel of the writer, who has had visions, and reveals them to bring back the faithful from error, Hermas, born in Greece, and sometime a slave in Rome, had obtained his freedom, and was living in the city with his family. The Pastor w^as probably written not much later than the year 100 a.d.
68. It was believed in Rome, in the third century, that after Pentecost the Apostles had drawn up a joint confession of faith or Symbol, which had to be recited by all adults before receiving the rite of baptism. This is obviously impossible, but the most ancient Symbol of this nature, known to Justin in 150, was a product of the Church of Rome shortly before the year 100.
D
34 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
69. We possess certain fragments of a work called the Preaching or Doctrine of St. Peter, which purports to be addressed to the heathen by the Apostle ; this is another Grasco-Roman forgery dating from the end of the first century.
70. A fortunate discovery in a Greek library (1883) revealed to us the Doctrine of the Apostles or Didache, a manual of the Christian life both individual and social, a document of the first importance to the student of the primitive communities, their organisations and rites. The Apostles, of course, had nothing to do with it ; but the Didache, a compilation from ancient catechisms, seems to have been drawn up in Syria before A.n. 150.
71. An important group of documents — called the pseudo- Clementine writings, because they were falsely attributed to Clement, Bishop of Rome — comprises twenty homilies and a didactic tale entitled The Recognitions. The ground-work of these compositions is almost identical. Clement, instituted Bishop of Rome by St. Peter, describes his conversion, on quitting the school of philosophy, to St. James, the head of the Church at Jerusalem. Having learnt that the Son of God was born in Judaja, he set out for that country, met Barnabas at Alexandria, and Peter at Caesarea ; the latter caused him to witness his dispute with Simon Magus and initiated him into his doctrine. Simon, vanquished, was pursued by Peter and Clement, who overtook him at Laodicea, and reopened the debate with him. Finally, Peter departed to Antioch, and there founded a community.^ The title of RecogJiitions is based on an episode in the seventh book : Matidia, the mother of Clement, had quitted Rome for Athens ; she is discovered there with her sons by her husband, who had set out in search of her. In all this farrago, Paul is not even mentioned ; it is a frankly Judaeo-Christian document. The Homilies and the Recognitions have a common source dating probably from about A.D. 150-200 ; the compilation was made in the third century.
72. There is no more mysterious figure than that Simon, the magician of Samaria, M'hom we find opposing St. Peter in the Acts, and whom Justin, the Clementine writings and the apocryphal Acts represent as a very important personage at
^ See Renan, Origines, vol. vii, p. 77.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 85
Rome. There, under Claudius or Nero, he rivals Peter in supernatural power, and ends by promising to fly through the air before the Emperor ; but a prayer offered up by St. Peter deprives him of his power ; he falls and breaks his neck. Justin (a.d. 150) asserts that he saw his tomb on the island in the Tiber, with this inscription : "To Simon, the holy god." This shows the ignorance and carelessness of Justin ; the inscription in question has been found, and bears a dedication to Semo Sanais, an ancient Roman god whom a professor of rhetoric like Justin should certainly have known. But who was this Simon, the divine honours accorded to whom in Samaria are attested ? The question has never been answered. In the nineteenth century, the school of Tubingen insisted a good deal on the traditions relative to the rivalry of Peter and Simon ; it suggested that Simon represented St. Paul, and hence drew the somewhat exaggerated conclusion that the rivalry between the two Apostles degenerated into personal hatred. Their theo- logical hatred, evident in the epistles of Paul, went far enough. Not only did the Judaising group at Jerusalem organise a kind of mission against Paul, but false epistles were circulated under his name (2 Thess. ii. 2). He accordingly denounces his adversaries as dogs, liars, children of the devil and forgers. It is necessary to call attention to these passages at the close of a chapter in which, examining the early books of the Church, we have found forgeries on every hand.
73. I might now consider many questions connected with the above : the first Apologies addressed by Christians to the pagan emperors, the Acts of the martyrs, very few of which are authentic, the Apostolic Constitutions ; but this would be to trench on the domain of literary history. I will conclude with a few words concerning Antichrist {i.e. the adversary opposed to Christ). This famous name first appears in the Epistles of St. John, but the idea is much more ancient ; it is that of the Babylonian Tiamat opposed to Marduk. The principle of evil is substituted for the dragon of the primitive myth, and between this and the principle of good a terrible conflict will be waged before the coming of the kingdom of God. Traces of this conception are to be found in Ezekiel, in Daniel, in Baruch, and
36 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
iu the Apocalypse. It is referred to in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians (ii. 3): "That day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." Good being personified in Christ, evil was personified in Antichrist: "For many shall come in my name," said Jesus, " saying, I am Christ ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars ; see that ye be not troubled ; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. . . . All these are the beginning of sorrows. . . . And many false prophets shall arise. . . . Then shall be great tribu- lation, such as was not since the beginning of this world to this time. . . . Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven ; and then shall all the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory " (Matt. xxiv.).
74. These terrifying words have borne terrible fruit. From Nero onwards, there has been no conspicuous adversary of the Church who has not been assimilated to the Antichrist whose appearance is to inaugurate an era of catastrophe. Luther identified the Pope of Rome with Antichrist ; millions of English people recognised him in Napoleon. We have already seen how in the Apocalypse the beast was Nero. After the death of this wretch there was a rumour that he had fled to the Parthians, and that he would come back. There is perhaps an allusion to this legend in the Apocalypse itself and in the First Epistle of St. John (iv. 3) : " Every spirit that confesseth not Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God ; and this is that spirit of Antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come ; and even now already it is in the world." Here, Antichrist is already assimilated to heresy. In the Sibylline oracles fabricated by the Jews of Alexandria, the name of Antichrist does not occur, but the Roman Empire, the object of a ferocious hatred, takes its place. Popular Jewish literature gave the name of Romuhis to this enemy of God, and described him as a hideous giant, the offspring of a stone virgin. The Christians in general reserved the name of Antichrist for heretics and schismatics ; but in the fourth century the idea still prevailed that the coming of Antichrist would be the awakening and return of Nero.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 87
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The most complete repertory is Hauck'a Real- Ency clop, fur protest aiUische Theologie (3rd ed. , 24 vols. ) ; the most convenient is Die Religion in Geschichfe und Gegeitwart, 5 vols., 1909-1913. Various other encyclopedias and diction- aries (Schaif-Herzog, Hastings, Lichtenberger, Encycl. Britann., Catholic Eiicycl., etc.) can be commended to students. There are special dictionaries of Christian biography (down to Charlemagne) by Smith, of Christian archeology by Martigny, Smith, and Dom Cabrol (in progress), of Catholic theology by Vacant (in progress), etc. Among periodicals I may mention the Expositor, the Revue biblique and the Theologische Literaturzeitung (bibliographical).
Renan, Oriyines du Christianisme, 8 vols., 1863-1883 (with a good index) ; Duchesne, Histoire ancienne de I'Eglise, vols. i. and ii., 1906-1908 ; Guignebert, Manuel d' histoire ancienne du Christianisme, 1906 ; Wendland, Die hellenistisch- romische Kultur in ihren Beziehungen zu Judmthitm und Christenthum, 1907 ; Conybeare, Christian Origins, 1909 ; The Historical Christ, 1914. There is a carefully selected bibliography in Nicolardot, Les trois premiers Evangilistes, 1908.
2. Loisy, Mysthres paiens et Myst, chrdtien, 1919 (cf. Rev. arcMol., 1919, ii. p. 384) ; W. Bousset, Geschichte des Christusglaubens, 1913 (cf. Rev. critique, 1914, p. 34).
3. Loisy, Hist, du canon du N. T., 1891 ; Th. Zahn, Gesch. des N. T. Kanons, 2nd ed., 1904 ; J. Leipoldt, same title, 2 vols., 1907-1908.
5. Text of the Fragmentum Muratorianum (and of most of the other docu- ments of the primitive church) in Rauschen, FlorilegiuTn patristicum, fasc. iii., 1905.
11. M. Nicolas, Etudes critiques siir la Bible, vol. ii., 1864 (old, but still very useful).
13. E. Preusschen, Antilegomena, 2nd ed., 1905 (fragments of the lost Gospels and quotations from the Fathers, with German translation).
14. Ad, Jiilicher, Einleitung in das N. T. 6th ed., 1915 (English transl.) ; E. Renan, Les iSvangiles, 1877 ; Loisy, Les ^vangilcs synoptiqties, 2 vols., 1907 ; Wellhausen, Einleitung in die Z ersten Ev., 1905; Holtzmann, Handcommentrir zum N. T., 3rd ed., 1901 et seq ; H. Weinel, Theologie des N. T., 2nd ed., 1913 ; A. Reville J6sus, 2nd ed., 1906; A. Loisy, Jesus, 1910; P. Wernle, Qioellcn des LchenJesu, 1906 ; Schmiedel, art. ffosj^eZs in Cheyne ; Schweitzer, Geschichte der Leben-Jesit-Forschung, 1913.
17. Preusschen, op. cit. (13), in Greek and German ; Loisy, Evangiles synoptiques, vol. i. (in French).
18. L. Venard, Les Ev. synoptiques (in Rev. du Clergi, July 15, 1908, p. 178).
186. B. W. Bacon, Is Mark a Roman Gospel 1 1919.
\M. A. Harnack, Lukas der Arzt, 1906; Burkitt, The Gospel History, 1906 (connection between St. Luke and Josephus) ; Lagrange, Ev. selon. Luc, 1921 ; P. C. Sense (pseudonym of Lyons), Origin of the Third Gospel, 1901 (the Luke of Marcion).
18/. Loisy, Le quatrieme Hvangile 1903 (1922); Wellhausen Das 4te Ev., 1908; works of B. Bacon (1910), C. Clemen (1912), M. W. Bauer (1912), on the same.
21. Saintyves, Le Vierges meres et les naissances miraculeuses, 1901.
22. A. Causse, Vivolution du messianisnw, 1908.
26. Saintyves, Le miracle et la critique historique, 1907.
29. Interpolations in the MSS. of the Slav translations of Josephus : Rev. crit., 1906, ii. 447; J. Frei, Die Probleme des Lcidnisgc.schichtr, 1909. — Th. Beinach, Josephe sur Jesus {in Rev. des Etudes juives, vol. xxxv. 1897) ; Norden, Neue Jahrb., 1913, p. 637 ; Laqueur, Josephus, 1921.
38 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
30. Photii BiUiotheca, ed. Bekker, cod. 3.3.
32. H. Strack, Jcm» nach judischen Angaben, 1010; W. Bauer, Leben Jesu, 1909.
35. Curiosity of Tiberius : S. R. , Cultes, vol. iii. p. 16.
36. Chapman in Journ. of Theological Studies, July and October, 1907 ; cf. S. R., CuUes, vol. iii. p. 21.
38. Art. Judas in Cheyne.
39. Goguel, Kcv. hist, rclig. 1910, p. 165 ; Juster, Les Juifs daiis V Empire, 1914, vol. ii. p. 135.
40. Frazer, Golden Bough, 2nd ed., iii. p. 191.
41. S. Reinach, Cultes, i. p. 232; Lagrange, Rem. sur VOrpheits, 1910.
42. Art. Docetism in Hastings, JEnq/d of Eel. , vol. iv.
43. S. Reinach, CiiUcs, iv. p. 200.
44. Conybeare, The Historical Christ, 1914 ; Guignebert, ProbUme de Jdsus, 1921 ; Loisy, Rev. crit. 1916, ii. p. 72.
45. Strauss, Lehen Jesu, gives all the reputed prophecies. — E. Carus Selvyn, The Oracles in the N. T. , 1912 ; Rendel Harris, Origin of the Doctrine of Trinity, 1919 (a very early collection of prophecies from the 0. T., used by Christian preachers before the Gospels). — On Psalm xxii. S. Reinach, Cultes, ii. p. 437 ; iii. p. 20 ; iv. p. 188.
46. Christian morals: Loisy, Rev. hist. litt. relig., 1920, p. 157.
47. E. Hennecke, Eandbuch zu den N. T. Apokryphen, 1904 ; M. Lepin, l^cang. canoniqucs et ^vang. apocryphes, 1907 ; A. Robinson, The Gospel accord- inq to Peter and the Revelation of Peter, 1892 (c/. S. R., Cultes, vol. iii. p. 284) ; identity of the Gospels of Peter and of the Egyptians : Volter, in Zeifschrift fur N. T. Wisscnschaft, 1905, p. 368.— Attribution of the Fourth Gospel to Cerinthus : P. C. Sense (Lyons), The Fourth Gospel, 1899.
48. Roberts, Apocryphal Gospels and Revelations, 1890 (English translation) ; M. Nicolas, Etudes sur les Evangiles apocryphes, 1866 ; P. Peeters, L'ivangile de VEnfance, 1914.
49. Griffinhoofe, The unwritten Sayings of Christ, 1903.
50. A. Harnack, Die Apostelgtschichte, 2nd ed., 1911 ; E. Norden, Agnostos Theos, 1913; Loisy, Les Actes des Ap., 1920; Goguel, same subject, 1922; Jackson and Kirsopp Lake, The Acts, 1920.
51. Lipsius, Dit aimkryphen Apostelgeschichten, 3 vols., 1883-1890. — Acts of Andrew and of Matthias : S. R., Cultes, i. p. 395; Thekla, ibid., iv. p. 229 ; L. Vouaux, Actefi de Paul, 1913.
52. W. Ramsay, 8. Paul, 1895 ; A. Sabatier, L'ap6trc Paul, 1896 ; Goguel, VapCtre Paul, 1904 ; A. Deissmann, Licht von Ostcn, 1908 (style of the Epistles compared with pagan documents of the same period) ; A. Schweitzer, Geschichte der Paulus-Forschung, 1911. — Supposed influence of the Pagan mysteries on Paul: Renan, J^ttcdcs, 1864, p. 58; Rcviie du Clergii, April 1, 1913 ; Loisy, Les Mysteres pawns et le Myst. chrilien, 1919. — See also Loisy, Rev. hist. litt. relig., 1921-2, and his ed. of Galatians, 1916.
58. Aug. Sabatier. La doctrine de Vexpiation et son Evolution (in Etitdes de thMogie, 1901, p. 1) ; Rashdall, The Idea of Atonement, 1919.— On the Greek idea of responsibility, first collective and then individual : Glotz, La solidaritd de lafamille dans le droit criminel, 1904.
60. Art. Chronology in Cheyne (p. 812) ; Rev. du Clergi, October 15, 1913.
61. T. Calmes, Epiitres catholiques, 1905 ; Reuss, La Bible, vol. xv. On the Epistles of Peter: S. R., Rev. archdol., 1908, i. p. 150; E. Robson, Second Epistle, 1915.
63. Art. Apocalypse, in Cheyne. — Astrology j F. Boll, Aus der Offenbarung Johannis, 1914; see Loisy, Rev. hist. litt. relig. 1922, p. 178.— On the date: S. R., Cultes, vol. ii. p. 356. —On the death of John: Cheyne, art. John, p. 2509.
65. S. R. , Cultes, vol. iii. p. 284, and the ed. of Robinson, Lods, etc.
66. Loisy, Rev. hist. litt. relig., 1921, p. 305.— On the primitive hierarchy : J. R^ville, Orig. de I'dpiscopat, 1894; Batiffol, Etudes d'histoire, p. 223.
67. A. Lelong, Lt Patteur d'Hermas, 1912.
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS 39
68. F. Kattenbusch, Das apostol. Symbol, 2 vols., 1894-1900 ; Vacandard, Le symhole des apdtres (in Etudes de critique, 1906, p. 1 et seq.).
70. Kriiger, AUchristliche Literatur, 1895, pp. 38, 40 ; Massebieau, L'enseignC' went des apdtres, 1884 ; Loisy, Rev. hist. Hit. relig., 1921, p. 443.
71. H. Waitz, Die PseiidoHeTnentinen, 1904; art. Clementinen in Hauck.
72. Alfaric, Simon le magicien, 1922.
73. Apologies: Kriiger, Altchristl. Literatur, 1895, p. 60 et seq. ; A. Puech, Les A2^ologistes grecs, 1912. — Acts of the martyrs : Cabrol, art. Actes ; Hauck, art. Afta martyn(,m ; Dufourcq, Les " Gesta martyrum" roviains, 3 vols., 1900-1907. — Antichrist : Renan, V Antichrist, 1873 ; art. Antichrist, in Hauck and the Jewish Encycl.
74. H, Preuss, Die Vorstellungen vom Antichrist im spdteren Mittelalter, 1906.
CHAPTER II
CHRISTIANITY : FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN
First Christian communities— The Preaching of St, Paul.— Particularism and universalism — The Gnostics — Organisation of communities — The gift of tongues or glossolaly — The function of the Jewish synagogues — Persecu- tion of Christians at Rome— Pliny's letter to Trajan— Motives for the persecutions — The martyrs— Christian virtues— Heresies ; the influence of heretics on the Church — The concentration of the spiritual power — Montanism — Persecutions under Decius and Diocletian — Constantine and the edict of toleration— Persecution of pagans by Christians— The Dona- tist schism— Christian Monachism — Gradual changes in the Church — Arius and Athanasius ; the dogma of the Trinity— The first murder for error of opinion : Priscillian — Monophysite heresy — The Coptic Church — St. Augustine and the doctrine of Purgatory— St. Jerome— St. Gregory Nazianzen— St. Basil— St. John Chrysostom— St. Ambrose — The growth of luxury in the Church.
1. The Jewish sect which proclaimed Jesus its master developed mainly in two small groups, one in Galilee, the other in Judaea. It was in Judaea, at Jerusalem, that the Apostles lived. While waiting for the glorious return of the Messiah, they organised their body with a view to the Kingdom of Heaven. It soon appeared necessary not to allow the double burden of preaching and distributing alms to rest upon the same men. For the latter task, deacons were instituted, among them a hellenising Jew named Stephen, who was accused of blasphemy by the orthodox Jews and stoned. He is called the Proto-martyr by the Church. This execution, which was followed by a persecution, accentuated the opposition between the synagogue and the dissenters ; it was favourable to the propaganda of the latter, inasmuch as it caused their dispersal. This propaganda, chiefly among the Jewish Hellenic communities, though also among the heathen, was not initiated by St. Paul, who reaped the fruit and fame of an obscure activity prior to his own. One of the most successful missionaries in Samaria was the deacon Philip, who is said to have converted the treasurer of an Ethiopian princess, thus opening up Abyssinia to the new influences.
40
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 41
2. Saul, a native of Tarsus, said to have been a pupil of the learned Pharisee Gamaliel, had shown great zeal in the pei'secu- tion. He set out for Damascus, to stir up the synagogue in that city. On the way he had a vision which converted him to the new sect. After preaching at Damascus, Saiil retired for three years to Hauran. On returning to Jerusalem, he was favourably received by the Apostles, and w^ent to Antioch with their delegate Barnabas. It was the Jews of Antioch, converted by Barnabas and Saul, who first took the name of Christians. This Greek town played a more important part than Jerusalem in the primitive history of Christianity.
3. From Antioch, Saul and Barnabas Avent to Cyprus, the birthplace of Barnabas. They w^ere sympathetically received by the Roman proconsul, Sergius Paulus, and to mark his gratitude, as some think, Saul changed his name to Paul. After Cyprus they visited Asia Minor. Paul preached at Antioch in Pisidia, and at Lystra.
4. The question now arose as to whether, in order to enter the new communion, it was necessary to pass into it through the synagogue, undergo circumcision, and conform to all the Jewish rites. These obligations were very irksome to the pagans. In spite of the opposition of Peter and the other Apostles of Jerusalem, Paul abolished them, preached salvation for all, Jews and Greeks alike, and thus rendered the rapid extension of Christianity among the Gentiles possible. Hence the name " Apostle of the Gentiles " (Gentiles = heathen) applied to St. Paul, not without some injustice to those who had shown him the way.
5. This evolution of infant Christianity was laborious. The struggle between Jewish particularism and Christian universalism was a struggle between Peter and Paul, between Jerusalem and Antioch. A first conference, held at Jerusalem, brought about a compromise which was almost immediately violated by both parties. Paul pursued his universalist apostolate in Asia Minor, then at Philippi in Macedonia, at Thessalonica, at Athens, and at Corinth, whence he returned by way of Ephesus to Antioch. The evangelisation of Ephesus had been already begun by an Alexandrian Jew called Apollos ; it soon made such progress
42 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
that the vendors of little objects of piety for the worship of the Ephesian Artemis were alarmed, and stirred up an insurrection, the prototype of many others which the Christians, and after- wards the reformers of Christianity, had to face.
6. Paul returned to Jerusalem in 57. A second conference, the echo of persistent dissensions, took place in the house of James, the reputed brother of Jesus. A Jewish riot then gave occasion for the intervention of the Roman Governor, who sent Paul to Caesarea. Paul, v/ho was a Roman citizen, demanded to be tried in Rome ; he was sent there at the end of the year 59. He was already in touch with the little Christian com- munity founded in the capital by Jewish merchants from Syria, having addressed an epistle to them from Corinth. We have no details of his trial at Rome, and his legendary journey to Spain or Great Britain is improbable. He is supposed to have been put to death in Rome in 64.
7. Mark, the cousin of Barnabas, had accompanied Paul to Italy ; after the arrest of Paul, it is alleged that he became the secretary of Peter. Luke, a Greek physician at Antioch, was also converted by Paul, and laboured to propagate his doctrine. As to Peter, his travels belong to the domain of legend ; it is probable that he died by violence in Palestine, and not in Rome, where tradition declares him to have been executed at the same time as Paul. It is true that before the end of the first century it was believed that Peter had been at Rome with Mark ; but this belief was based on an apocryphal letter attributed to Peter, which was circulated about the year 90 {cf. above, I, § 61 ).
8. Nothing definite is known of the history of the other Apostles, and the stories told of them are mere fables, James, a pious Jew who was hostile to Paul, continued as the head of the Church at Jerusalem, and was killed in a disturbance. Matthew is supposed to have gone to Arabia, Andrew to the Crimea, Thomas to India, Philip to Syria. John was believed to have settled at Ephesus and to have lived there to an advanced age, surrounded by disciples, one of whom, the Presbyter John, may have been the author of the Fourth Gospel, of the Apocalypse, and of the letters attributed to the Apostle.
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 43
The story of the sojourn and death of the Virgin Mary at Ephesus is an invention ; the discovery of her reputed house at Ephesus is a legend born of pious creduHty.
9. We have seen that an Alexandrian Jew, Apollos, first preached Christianity at Ephesus. The numerous writings of Philo, a contemporary of Jesus, and the Fourth Gospel may all be referred to Alexandrian Judaism, impregnated with Platonic speculations. The Hellenistic Jews introduced into Christianity the conception of the Logos or Word^ the intermediary between God and man, incorporated in Jesus. But before they connected it with Jesus, they had already incorporated the Word in a legion of angels, of immaterial beings or Eons^ of allegories; they had combined their traditional monotheism with the popular animistic and polydemonistic beliefs of Syria and of Babylonia. When Christianity took the place of Judaism in these combinations, Christian Gnosticism (from Gnosis, a know- ledge of hidden things) came into being. Outside Palestine, Christianity itself was a Gnostic sect, and this is why at a very early period the Fourth Gospel was attributed to the Gnostic Cerinthus, a contemporary of St. John at Ephesus. But Christianity was destined to triumph over the other Gnostic sects, because it was more reasonable, simpler, purer, and less inclined to lose itself in divagations. Intent on well-doing and essentially hostile to the depressing forms of asceticism, it found its adherents mainly among men of good sense and good will, whereas Gnosticism appealed to visionaries and persons of ill- balanced minds. The final victory of the Church over the Gnostics was that of disciplined mysticism over intemperate mysticism.
• • • • •
10. The Church about the year a.d. 80 was a very simple organisation. In addition to the deacons, there were deaconesses, generally widows, who busied themselves with works of charity and propaganda among women. Its assemblies, presided over by an elder {presbyter, whence the word priest) or superintendent (in Greek epislcopos, whence bishop), were held in private houses, first on Saturdays, and later on Sundays, the day of Christ's resurrection. The Old Testament, the Epistles, and the sayings
44 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
attributed to Jesus were read at these assemblies. Baptism was chiefly administered to adults, in the form of total immersion. Sick and dying persons were rubbed with holy oil, in order to scare away evil spirits, which baptism was also supposed to drown. Agapce (love-feasts) gathered together the faithful, who celebrated the Holy Communion in common in the dual form of bread and wine. It was called an "act of thanks- giving" in memory of the sacrifice of Jesus; this is the EucJiarist (from the Greek Eucharistia, thanksgiving).
11. Among the faithful of the primitive churches there 5 were, of course, a certain number of visionaries, and of idle and
degraded persons. Many believed themselves to be gifted with prophetic powers and disturbed the meetings by fits oi glossolaly, that is to say, an outburst of inarticulate sounds. It was this gift of "speaking with tongues" which the Apostles were supposed to have received at Pentecost by the grace of the Holy Ghost ; later, the double meaning of the word "tongue " was played upon, and it was maintained that the Apostles had been endowed with the power of speaking the idioms of all the people to whom they were to preach the gospel. The mani- festations of glossolaly were checked at an early stage ; St. Paul forbids it for women, together with teaching. Although celibacy was not imposed on any one, Christianity demanded purity of life, and had much difficulty in enforcing it. On the other hand, visionaries preached asceticism and vegetarianism, and inclined more or less openly to Gnostic mysticism ; the firmness and good sense of the Elders did not always succeed in neutralising these dangerous tendencies.
12. The destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans (a.d. 70) and the final dispersal of the Jews throughout the Empire weakened the hopes cherished by the Christians of the speedy return of Jesus in glory ; for these they substituted the expecta- tion of his spiritual reign. The dispersed Jews founded houses of prayer, or synagogues, on every hand, with butchers' shops which did not sell the " meat offered to idols," food forbidden to Jews and Christians alike ; these synagogues became so many new centres for Christian propaganda, which, although hostile to Judaism, could only recruit its first adherents round the
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 45
synagogues, where the words of Moses and the prophets found an echo.
13. The Christian propaganda soon alarmed the interests of those who lived upon the official pagan cult, and of those innumerable charlatans who exploited alien forms of worship ; it also alarmed the Roman Government, which distrusted secret societies, with good reason, and saw in the Christians a party of Jews more active and troublesome than the rest. When Nero was suspected of setting fire to Rome he turned the accusation upon the horde of Orientals who were always talking about the Last Judgment and the destruction of the world by fire. The Roman police forthwith inaugurated a series of wholesale arrests and executions ; Jews and Christians perished together ; this was what is known as the First Persecution (a.d. 65). It did not put a stop to the Christian propaganda, which was already carried on in some of the patrician households by slaves or female servants, natives of Syria. Under Domitian, the Consul Flavins Clemens and his wife Domitilla were condemned for "atheism"; they had no doubt become Christians, and their "atheism" consisted in denying the Roman gods. "Many others," says the historian Dion Cassius, "were punished for atheism and for Jewish customs,'" and afterwards he mentions Acilius Glabrio, a former consul, among the victims of Domitian. The fact that Christianity had penetrated into the upper classes of Rome before the year 100 was of vast importance to its ultimate development.
14. Pliny the younger, legate to Bithynia in a.d. 112, wrote to the Emperor Trajan asking how he was to treat the Christians. On this occasion he was primarily the spokesman of the cattle-dealers, who lamented that victims for sacrifice were no longer bought. " You must not seek out the Christians," replied Trajan, " but if they are denounced and convicted, they must be punished. If, however, any accused person should deny being a Christian, and should prove his innocence by invoking our gods, he may be pardoned." These few lines are of immense historical value ; they formed the rule of the Roman government until the persecution which began under Decius. The picture Pliny paints of the Christians is so greatly to their
46 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
credit that the authenticity of his letter has been (quite ground- lessly) suspected ; unfortunately the unique manuscript from which it was transcribed at the beginning of the sixteenth century has disappeared, no one knows how, and doubts as to the accuracy of the published version are possible.
15. The attitude of the Roman officials depended, in the first instance, on that of the communities they governed, who denounced the Christians or not, as best suited their own interests ; in the second place, on the attitude of the Christians and the degree of hostility they showed to official paganism ; finally, on the easily roused ferocity of popular superstition, which attributed all natural calamities to the enemies of its gods. The lying rumours that were spread abroad concerning the Christians, on account of the mystery with which they surrounded certain acts of their worship, such as the Eucharist, and more particularly the accusation, by which the populace was always readily inflamed, that they offered human sacrifices, determined certain local persecutions. The most notorious was that at Lyons in a.d. 177. Here there was a little community of Greek origin, persons of some means, against whom the most odious calumnies were circulated. Young girls and old men were cruelly tortured. " It is you who are the man-eaters ! " cried one of the victims to the judges. To combat these re- current accusations, a literature grew up, first in Greek, then in Latin, several specimens of which have come down to us. The most interesting, the Apology, written in Africa by Tertullian about A.D. 200, was shortly afterwards translated into Greek.
16. There was also a literature hostile to Christianity, but it has perished almost entirely. It has, however, been possible to reconstitute the Tnie Discomse of the philosopher Celsus (c. 170) from the long refutation of it composed by Origen, and a portion of the Emperor Julian's treatise against the Christians, thanks to the diatribe of St. Cyril {d. 444) which it inspired.
17. The ten persecutions enumerated by historians of Christianity are a fiction,^ and Dodwell (1684) already made short work of the legends which exaggerated the number of
^ The persecutions to the time of Decius were local and intermittent ; there were many more than ten.
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 47
martyrs. This name, which means witness in Greek, was given to those who proclaimed their faith in the face of suffering and died for it ; those who suffered but survived were called confessors. The choice of the term martyr seems singular, for testimony does not, to us, imply the infliction of a penalty. But this was not the case among the Greeks and Romans, where the evidence of a slave was not admissible unless it had been obtained by torture. In the language of the slave then, " to bear witness " and " to suffer "" were synonymous terms, and thus the use of the word martyr implies that the intermittent persecution was directed chiefly against persons of servile or very humble con- dition, among whom the early Christians were mainly recruited.
18. This also explains certain fine characteristics of Christi- anity before Constantine. It was the religion of poor people, who worked and suffered and helped one another. A Christian woman buried in the catacombs of Rome is called in her epitaph " a friend of the poor and a workwoman." This is a kind of affirmation of the dignity of work which was a much greater novelty in the antique world than charity. Triumphant Christianity forgot this truth, but recalled it at a later period, when it undertook the reform of its monastic orders in the sixth century.
• • • • •
19. The Church of the second and the third centuries suffered less from persecution than from heresies. I have already spoken of Gnosticism, which, as a fact, was more ancient than Christianity. Exaggerating the anti-Jewish tendencies of Paul, in opposition to the Judaising Christians known as Ebionites, certain Gnostic doctors renounced the Old Testament and represented the God of Israel as a demon, the creator but the enemy of mankind. This tendency is related to the Mazdaean (Persian) dualism which had such a strong influence upon Gnosticism. Had the Church wandered into this road, her ruin would have been assured, for she would have lost the support of the Old Testament and of the pretended prophecies which all then agreed to accept. She resisted the Gnostics energetically, though not without making certain concessions to them, and profiting by their literary activity. Even the great
48 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRITIANITY
Alexandrian Doctors of a.d. 180 to 250, Clment and Origen,
who created Christian exegesis and theolog} ilrew inspiration,
not without peril to the orthodoxy of their octrine, from the
Gnostics who had preceded them in these scmces. It was to
Marcion (c. 150), that the Church owed tc first idea of a
Canon, an authorised collection of the writins relating to the
New Law. It was in opposition to the Gnttics that she was
led to formulate her dogmas, her professioi of faith (called
the Symbol of the Apostles), and no doubt ah to publish the
definitive version of the Four Gospels whoacivine inspiration
she affirmed. Modern Christianity, the pro^iytising force of
which is by no means spent, was evolved uring the long
trial to which the Church was subjected b; rnostic assaults.
The works of the Gnostics are mainly lcnowi\ i us through the
refutations of which they were the object, a these polemical
writings theological animus plays an importnt part, and the
Gnostics are accused of crimes which were no oubt imaginary ;
but their extreme doctrines were dangerous bth to society and
the individual, and the Church did well to disird them.
20. It was also in the course of this ' 'uggle that the Church became a governing body and that spntual power was concentrated in her. The bishop was the bad of his com- munity, and Rome being the capital of the Eipire, the Roman Church naturally tended to become the Emprej of the Churches. This supremacy was not achieved without oposition. The widely spread conception of the original primcy of the Roman see, of the Papacy founded by St. Peter and xercised by the Roman bishops who succeeded him, is not confined by the texts, which rather reveal the usual phenomenon of t-low evolution.
21. Among the sects of the second centrr, Montanism, a sort of revival, which was quite distinct froL v rnosticism, was one of the most interesting. Its founder, th Phrygian Mon- tanus, a converted priest of Cybele, began toprophesy, in the company of two women, and recruited many atierents in spite of his condemnation by the bishops of the coutry (172). The serious points in his doctrine, to which Tertllian subscribed towards the end of his career, and which per5.:ed to the sixth century, were, that the era of divine revelatio was not at an
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end, that the lith of the Church accepted the possibihty of further fruitio, that women might receive and communicate inspiration (in opposition to the theory of St. Paul, who ordered them o keep silence). The Montanist discipline was rigorous ; it oiained two additional weeks of abstinence, for- bade second mrriage, and denied the remission of certain sins after baptism. The polemics to which Montanism gave rise inspired the Curch with a wholesome aversion from pronounced asceticism, in ractice too often associated with moral laxity. "Think sober'," said St. Paul.
22. Christmity, encouraged by the imperial favourite Marcia under Commous, and protected under the Syrian dynasty by the piety of tt Empresses and the eclecticism of the Emperors, had present!} to reckon with the brutality of the military Emperors, wh( were exasperated by the distaste of its adherents for a martial rareer and their persistent refusal to render divine honour 10 the head of the State. The Emperor Decius (a.d. 250) oronised a serious persecution, which made many martyrs and esn more apostates, known as Libellatici, persons who had rece^-sd a libellus or certificate for having given in their adhesionlo paganism. Bishops of Rome, Jerusalem and Antioch were ut to death. Origen, the great Christian scholar of Alexandrii narrowly escaped the executioner (a.d. 249). Cyprian, Bisho of Carthage, fell a victim to the persecution, which broke ot afresh under Valerian (a.d. 258). The position of the Christms improved somewhat under Gallienus, who restored their burches to them, but this lull in the storm was of short duraon. Diocletian began by following the example of Decius wit a veritable frenzy (a.d. 303) ; but he soon recognised th futility of his efforts, and abdicated. His successors wer weaker, if not more tolerant,
23. Christmity had now become such a power in the Empire that the arakious Constantine sought its support. After vanquishing ^ixentius at the bridge of Milvius, where he had displayed a stndard in the form of a cross (the labarum), he promulgated a edict of toleration in 313, which practically gave Christianiy a privileged position. Constantius removed the statue of \^tory from the Senate-chamber (356), and began
E
48 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Alexandrian Doctors of a.d. 180 to 250, Clement and Origan, who created Christian exegesis and theology, drew inspiration, not without peril to the orthodoxy of their doctrine, from the Gnostics who had preceded them in these sciences. It was to Marcion (c. 150), that the Church owed the first idea of a Canon, an authorised collection of the writings relating to the New Law. It was in opposition to the Gnostics that she was led to formulate her dogmas, her profession of faith (called the Symbol of the Apostles), and no doubt also to publish the definitive version of the Four Gospels whose divine inspiration she affirmed. Modern Christianity, the proselytising force of which is by no means spent, was evolved during the long trial to which the Church was subjected by Gnostic assaults. The works of the Gnostics are mainly known to us through the refutations of which they were the object. In these polemical writings theological animus plays an important part, and the Gnostics are accused of crimes which were no doubt imaginary ; but their extreme doctrines were dangerous both to society and the individual, and the Church did well to discard them.
20. It was also in the course of this struggle that the Church became a governing body and that spiritual power was concentrated in her. The bishop was the head of his com- munity, and Rome being the capital of the Empire, the Roman Church naturally tended to become the Empress of the Churches. This supremacy was not achieved without opposition. The widely spread conception of the original primacy of the Roman see, of the Papacy founded by St. Peter and exercised by the Roman bishops who succeeded him, is not confirmed by the texts, which rather reveal the usual phenomenon of a slow evolution.
21. Among the sects of the second century, Montanism, a sort of revival, which was quite distinct from Gnosticism, was one of the most interesting. Its founder, the Phrygian Mon- tanus, a converted priest of Cybele, began to prophesy, in the company of two women, and recruited many adherents in spite of his condemnation by the bishops of the country (172). The serious points in his doctrine, to which Tertullian subscribed towards the end of his career, and which persisted to the sixth century, were, that the era of divine revelation was not at an
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 49
end, that the faith of the Church accepted the possibility of further fruition, that women might receive and communicate inspiration (in opposition to the theory of St. Paul, who ordered them to keep silence). The Montanist discipline was rigorous ; it ordained two additional weeks of abstinence, for- bade second marriage, and denied the remission of certain sins after baptism. The polemics to which Montanism gave rise inspired the Church with a wholesome aversion from pronounced asceticism, in practice too often associated with moral laxity. "Think soberly," said St. Paul.
22. Christianity, encouraged by the imperial favourite Marcia under Com modus, and protected under the Syrian dynasty by the piety of the Empresses and the eclecticism of the Emperors, had presently to reckon with the brutality of the military Emperors, who were exasperated by the distaste of its adherents for a martial career and their persistent refusal to render divine honours to the head of the State. The Emperor Decius (a.d. 250) organised a serious persecution, which made many martyrs and even more apostates, known as Libellatici, persons who had received a libelhis or certificate for having given in their adhesion to paganism. Bishops of Rome, Jerusalem and Antioch were put to death. Origen, the great Christian scholar of Alexandria, narrowly escaped the executioner (a.d. 249). Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, fell a victim to the persecution, which broke out afresh under Valerian (a.d, 258). The position of the Christians improved somewhat under Gallienus, who restored their churches to them, but this lull in the storm was of short duration. Diocletian began by following the example of Decius with a veritable frenzy (a.d. 303) ; but he soon recognised the futility of his efforts, and abdicated. His successors were weaker, if not more tolerant.
23. Christianity had now become such a power in the Empire that the ambitious Constantine sought its support. After vanquishing Maxentius at the bridge of Milvius, where he had displayed a standard in the form of a cross (the labarum), he promulgated an edict of toleration in 313, which practically gave Christianity a privileged position. Constantius removed the statue of Victory from the Senate-chamber (356), and began
50 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
the overthrow of the images of the gods in the East. After his death in a.d, 361, a pagan reaction took place under Julian, but a reaction of a peaceful nature, for Julian, the mildest of men, was content merely to take the direction of education out of the hands of the Christians. He did justice to Christianity, nevertheless, and exhorted the pagans to imitate its charitable institutions. His premature death in 363 was the signal for the downfall of polytheism ; it retained adherents only in the aristocracy, the great schools, and the conservative population of country districts.^
24. Theodosius prohibited heathen sacrifices, and in spite of the eloquent protestations of Libanius, ordered the temples to be closed (a.d. 391). The zeal of the monks manifested itself against these buildings, notably in Egypt. In 408, Honorius forbade pagans to hold public office ; under Theodosius II., the fanatic Cyril, whom the Church has canonised, relentlessly pursued the learned Hypatia, the daughter of the mathematician Theon ; she was stoned and torn in pieces by the populace in the streets of Alexandria (a.d. 415). Victorious Christianity waged war upon science ; Justinian took but one step in advance when he closed the school of Athens (a.d. 529). The world was ripe for the Middle Ages.
25. The end of the persecutions gave rise in Africa to an original schism, that of the Donatists, one of the first to attack, not the doctrine, but the discipline of the Church. It was a schism before being a heresy. Could the bishops who, during the persecution, had given up the Scriptures to be burnt, and those who had received ordination from them, be considered as lawfully invested with their powers ? Was it not necessary to baptise afresh those whom they had baptised .? In other words, does the efficacy of the sacerdotal ministry depend on the personal character of the minister? If the Church had replied in the affirmative, her ruin would have been assured, for every bishop would have had to justify himself against accusations directed not only against his own conduct, but against that of the bishop who had ordained him, and the whole array of his spiritual
^ Pagani, hence pagans and the French jpaien. See J. Zeiller, Paganus, 1917.
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 51
ancestors. The good sense of the Church, in conformity with its interests, preserved it from this pitfall ; but this did not satisfy the Africans, who were naturally turbulent and often hostile to their bishops. A bishop of Carthage, Donatus, placed himself at the head of the movement (a.d. 313), which soon attracted not only the adversaries of the clergy, but the ruined farmers, the oppressed peasantry, and the vagabonds known as Circumcelliones. Donatism assumed the character of a Jacquerie. The Emperors first attempted to stem the torrent by pacific means ; then they had recourse to the extremes of violence. Donatus died in exile and his followers were massacred. The agitation broke out afresh under Julian, and in thirty years had spread throughout the greater part of Roman Africa. In 393, St. Augustine embarked on a long literary campaign against the Donatists, which was interrupted in 403 by a new insurrection of the Circumcelliones. The authority of the illustrious Bishop of Hippo, seconded by very severe imperial edicts, finally overcame the schism (418). But it reappeared under the Vandals, and a few groups of Donatists still existed at the time of the Musulman conquest.
26. During the Decian persecution, many Egyptian Christians had withdrawn to the desert, where they lived as hermits (from eremos, desert). Others followed, who formed themselves into communities (cenobites, from Jcoitios bios, life in common). Thus arose Christian monachism, which, indeed, had precedents both among Jews and Greeks. The Essenes of the time of Jesus and the Pythagoreans of Southern Italy about 600 b.c. had lived as veritable cenobites. About a.d. 340 St. Pachomius, or Pachonius, founded convents for women, who were called nuns (71071 nuptte, not married), on the same lines as the monasteries for men. Monasticism reached the West about the end of the fourth century. Here, conforming to the temperament of the people, it assumed a less contemplative and more practical character. St. Benedict of Nursia (480-543) has the credit of having imposed poverty and manual labour upon the cenobites, together with a severe discipline ; the monastery founded by him on INIonte Cassino became the model of Benedictine monasteries, where, according to a famous
52 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
formula, "he who works, prays." Civilisation owes to the Western monks the cultivation of a part of Europe, and the preservation of Latin literature, the texts of which wei'e copied in the monasteries. If idle and luxurious habits tended to appear in the monasteries, in spite of perpetual efforts for their reform, this was an effect of human weakness for v/hich the institution must not be held responsible. In the course of centuries it did much harm, but also, especially at the beginning, a great deal of good.
• ■ • • •
27. The example of the monks, added to the influence of Manichsean, Gnostic, and Montanist doctrines, tended to exalt the old popular idea of the superiority of a celibate life. As early as 305, the Spanish Council of Elvira enjoined the celibacy of the priesthood. This doctrine did not gain a complete victory until the twelfth century, and even now ecclesiastical celibacy is a matter of discipline, not of dogma, in the Roman Church. Other Oriental influences, more important still, modified the organisation of the Church during the fourth century. Following the example of the Empire, she adopted a rigorous hierarchy ; the bishops of the large towns became prefects, presiding over the councils or assemblies of the pro- vincial clergy. Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria, but especially the first named, became as it were Christian capitals ; by the end of the second century, a bishop of Rome was threatening to put the churches of Asia Minor " outside the catholic union '"' (that is to say, the universal union) because they differed from him as to the fixation of the date of Easter. Christian rites were complicated by hardly disguised borrowings from paganism : baptism implied the exorcism of devils ; the worship of martyrs, the origin of the worship of saints, took the place of the worship of the Greek heroes, and sometimes adopted even their names and their legends. The festival of Christmas or of the birth of Jesus, the date of which is not indicated by the Evangelists, was fixed on December 25, the reputed date of the birth of Mithra, who was identified with the Sun. Finally, the Church forgot her Jewish origin more and more, and changed the character of the festivals she was obliged to retain. Pasch
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 53
(Pesach), the Easter festival, became the anniversary of Christ's Resurrection, and the date was fixed to avoid coincidence with the Jewish Passover ; Pentecost, which among the Jews com- memorated the giving of the Law to Moses upon Sinai, was henceforth to recall the pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles. The Church, though even more hostile to Hellenism than to Judaism, became hellenised by force of cir- cumstances, because, ever since its origin under St. Paul, it had appeared as a Greek sect of Judaism. The transference of the seat of the Empire to Constantinople, a Greek centre over-in- clined to theological subtleties, where the disputes of the sophists still re-echoed, contributed a good deal to this development.
28. As soon as Christianity felt itself master of the Empire, it began to persecute not only the pagans, but dissident Christians. The disputes of the third and fourth centuries related more especially to the connection of Christ with God ; were they of the same substance ? Was Jesus equal to the Father ? What place was to be assigned to the Holy Spirit in this system ? A Bishop of Antioch, Paul of Samosata, a protege of the learned Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra, who definitely sub- ordinated Jesus to God, was condemned by a council and deposed (a.d. 270). Arius, a priest of Alexandria (a.d. 280- 336), engaged in a long conflict with Athanasius, the bishop of that city (a.d. 328), because he maintained the essential superiority of God to Jesus. This doctrine, known as the Arian "i heresy, was condemned in 325 by the Council of Nicaea, which I declared Jesus to be : " the Son of God, of the substance of the Father, consubstantial with him, begotten, not born, eternal like the Father, and immutable by nature." In spite of this luminous definition, to which Constantine lent the support of the secular arm — Arius was exiled and his books were burnt — Arianism spread not only in the Empire, but beyond it ; nearly all the barbarian peoples who invaded the frontiers in the fifth century became Arians, no doubt because they were evangelised by the Arians at a time when Arianism was dominant in the Empire. Several of the Roman Emperors of the fourth century were themselves favourable to Arianism, which was combated by St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan. The Church of Rome had
54 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
pronounced against Arianism at an early date ; at the Council of Constantinople (a.d. 381), which completed the work of the Council of Nicsea by declaring the Holy Spirit the third person of the Trinity, equal to the Father and the Son, it gained a decisive victory. Thus a third God was created as it were, by the evolution of Plato's Logos, through Philo, the Fourth Gospel, and the sophistical theology of Alexandria.
29. The doctrine of the Trinity was formulated by the Symbol or creed, erroneously ascribed to Athanasius, and per- haps the work of the African bishop Vigilius (c. 490) : " We worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the substance. . . . And yet they are not three Eternals but one Eternal, not three Almighties but one Ahnight3^ So the Father is God, the Son God, and the Holy Ghost God, and yet they are not three Gods but one God. . . . For likeas we are compelled by the Christian verity to acknowledge every Person by himself to be God and Lord, so are we forbidden by the Catholic Religion to say : There be three Gods or three Lords. The Father is made of none : neither created nor begotten. The Son is of the Father alone : not made, nor created, but begotten. The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son : neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding. ... And in this Trinity none is afore or after other : none is greater or less than another ; but the whole three Persons are co-eternal together and co-equal." Such is the belief it is necessary to hold if we would be Catholics and not Arians. In these days there are no professed Arians, perhaps because all Christians are Arians at heart. This is more especially true of the Protestants, among whom the idea of God is still vital ; for the Catholics habitually invoke Jesus, Mary and Joseph (JMJ, "the Jesuit Trinity"), and only name the Eternal Father mechanically. The Holy Ghost has always remained an abstraction. Thus the ancient Trinity subsists merely as a theological formula.
30. Meanwhile, the long series of judicial murders for errors of opinion had been inaugurated. From 380 to 395 Theodosius published edicts threatening the heresiarchs with death ; but it was reserved for his co-regent, Maximus, a Spaniard like
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 55
himself, to apply them for the first time. The victim was Priscillian, a Spanish bishop, who was accused of Manichaeism and denounced by two Spanish bishops to the Emperor Maximus, then at Treves. Priscillian, condemned by a council at Bordeaux, was summoned to Treves with six of his principal partisans ; they were there judged and put to death (385). The excellent St. Martin of Tours was indignant, as was also St. Ambrose ; but a few years later, St. Jerome, exasperated by Vigilantius, who attacked the worship of relics, declared that temporal chastisements are useful to save the guilty from eternal perdition. The Church of Africa and St. Augustine appealed to the secular arm against the Donatists ; ^ finally, in 447, Pope Leo I. not only justified the crime of Maximus, but declared that if the upholders of a damnable heresy were allowed to live there would be an end of all laws, human and divine. The Church, adopting this monstrous doctrine, caused torrents of blood to be shed by the secular power down to the day when in its tardy enlightenment the latter refused to lend itself any longer to the fury of theological hate.
31. The Arian quarrel had not exhausted the difficulties suggested by the incarnation of Jesus .'' Was Mary the Mother of God ? No, said Nestorius, the Patriarch of Constantinople ; she was only the Mother of Christ. In 431, at the Council of Ephesus, Cyril procured the deposition of Nestorius, who died in Egypt ; his adherents founded in Persia the Nestorian Church, which still exists. Another question which arose was this : were there two natures in Jesus, one divine and one human, or only one ? The second thesis, called Monophysism, upheld by the Egyptian monks, was submitted to the Council of Ephesus (a.d. 449) ; this time the Emperor Theodosius II. sent troops and the adversaries of Monophysism were treated with the utmost violence. The Patriarch of Constantinople died of his wounds. This Council is known in history as the Brigandage of Ephesus. Another Council in a.d. 451 pronounced against Monophysism, but declared at the same time that the humanity of Jesus was not absorbed by his divinity. The struggle
^ St. Augustine did not admit that heretics should be put to death ; but he insisted on their punishment. See Batiffol, Revue hiblique, 1915, p. 318.
56 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
began afresh under Justinian, who had a taste for theology, and became a Monophysite only less fervid than his consort, Theodora. He bore down the resistance of Pope Vigilius, and caused his own opinions to be confirmed by a whole series of councils. After his death, the Monophysites were again defeated ; but their doctrine has survived, notably in the Christian Church of Egypt, the Coptic community, which preserved its religious independence as a result of this schism.
• • • • •
32. We have already seen St. Augustine in conflict with African Donatism, and with Manichasism, which he had some time professed himself. A quarrel no less serious arose over the doctrine of the British monk Pelagius, which attacked the theory of original sin. How could the whole human race have been condemned for the sin of Adam ? How could the results of his fault still weigh upon innocent creatures ? Augustine, now an old man, combated these reasonable objections by an exaggeration of St. Paul's cruel paradox. Man can do nothing of his own will ; he is utterly powerless ; the grace of God alone can save him, and those who are not chosen by God are lost. The logical consequence is not fatalism, but the imperative necessity of faith, prayer, and appeals to intercessory saints. The Council of Ephesus condemned Pelagius (431), who had already been condemned at Carthage in 412. Nevertheless, his doctrine, somewhat modified, survived in semi-Pelagianism, notably in Gaul, and Rome ended by adopting in practice a conciliatory attitude founded upon subtle distinctions concerning the efficacy of grace, and the equal necessity for faith and works in the individual working out of salvation.
33. St. Augustine had held that there was an intermediate state of probation between future felicity and damnation, that of the purification ot souls by fire. This is the Orphic and Virgilian doctrine of Purgatory : there is not a word about it in the Gospels. But as the Last Judgment, with the final separation of the good and bad into the saved and the lost, was put oft' to a very remote period, it became necessary to invent something to define the condition of souls immediately after death. In imitation of the pagans, who represented them as
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 57
appearing for judgment before Minos and his assessors, a pro- visional judgment was suggested, followed by the classification of the dead in two divisions, the good, who have to undergo the probation of Purgatory, and the wdcked, who go straight to Hell. The Church had formed the habit of praying for the dead, and invoking the intercession of the saints in their favour. The implication was that the dead required the good offices of the living, and that their fate was not irrevocably sealed. The doctrine of Purgatory, the logic of which is undeniable, was formulated in the sixth century, and proclaimed a dogma of the Church by the Council of Florence (1439); the Christians who reject it (Protestants and members of the Greek Church) have evidently little curiosity about the hereafter.
34. St. Jerome, who was born in Dalmatia, revised the Latin translations of the Scriptures by order of Pope Damasus, and made use of his personal influence, which was as considerable as his talent, to win over the ladies of the Roman aristocracy to a conventual life. "Thou hast become the mother-in-law of God," he wrote to one of them, whose daughter had entered a nunnery, and was therefore the bride of God. Establishing himself at Bethlehem with his penitents (a.d. 385), he made it a centre of monasticism, and worked unceasingly till the age of ninety at commentaries on the sacred books. His relations with St. Augustine were courteous, but not without an undercurrent of bitterness, especially towards the end.
35. One of the adversaries of St. Jerome was a Pyrenean shepherd, Vigilantius, who returned from a journey in Italy and the Holy Land disgusted with official Christianity. He protested vehemently against the idolatrous worship of images, the legacy of paganism to the Church, a practice directly opposed to that Mosaic law which Jesus came not to destroy, but to fulfil. It was idle to reply that these images were the Scriptures of the illiterate, that they were not the object of, but the stimulus to, worship. Experience showed that the majority of the faithful confounded (as indeed they still do) the sign with the thing signified. Vigilantius was no less hostile to the worship of relics, which had become at once a disgrace to the Church and a source of revenue to the clergy. Asceticism,
58 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
prayers for the dead, the cehbacy of the clergy, which was exacted with increasing rigour, all seemed to him contrary to true religion. Violently attacked by St. Jerome, who invoked the severity of the civil authority against him, Vigilantius died in obscurity in 420 ; but his courageous words bore fruit in due season.
36. Two Greeks, St. Gregory Nazianzen and St. Basil, shed lustre upon the Eastern Church in the fourth century. They were scholars, gentle and amiable in disposition, whose some- what effeminate eloquence still has a certain charm. Basil, the Bishop of Csesaraea, set an admirable example of charity, founding many hospitals and refuges. Gregory was the son of a bishop of Nazianzus in Cappadocia, who had three other children after his ordination. Gregory became Patriarch of Constantinople, but, disgusted with the intrigues surrounding him, he returned to end his days in his bishopric of Nazianzus. When he was begged to leave his retreat and assist at a new council, he replied : " I never knew of a Synod that did any good or prevented any evil."
37. St. John Chrysostom ("the golden-mouthed") was a fluent orator, but, like St. Augustine, above all things a man of action. Born at Antioch in 347, a pupil of the pagan Libanius, he preached for twelve years in his native town. The Emperor Arcadius appointed him Patriarch of Byzantium, where he engaged in a memorable campaign against the Empress Eudoxia, whose extravagance and profligacy he publicly denounced. Eudoxia caused Chrysostom to be condemned by a council, but a popular insurrection reinstated him. He renewed his attacks on the Empress, whom he compared to Herodias. Hereupon there was another council, and another insurrection, followed by a great fire ; Chrysostom was exiled to Cucusus in the Taurus, and afterwards to Pontus, where he died miserably at Comana.
38. At about the same period, St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, the friend of St. Augustine, combated Arianism in the person of the Empress Justina, the wife of Maximus (386), refused the communion to Theodosius and compelled the Emperor to do penance for having ordered a massacre at
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 59
Thessalonica. The spiritual sword was drawn against the temporal sword, heralding that struggle between the priesthood and the Empire which was to fill the Middle Ages. How beneficent might the influence of the Church have been if, following the lead of St. Ambrose, she had used her power to restrain the violence of princes, instead of perpetually exciting it to serve her own ends !
39. Vigilantius and Chrysostom agreed in protesting against the advance of luxury in the life and habits of the Church. This was, indeed, one of the inevitable results of her triumph. Extolling humility in theory, she began to love splendour and adorned herself with the gorgeous trappings of paganism. Magnificent basilicas arose on every side, which were all eclipsed by the crowning glory of St. Sophia at Constantinople. The bishops and the majority of the monks lived in opulence, en- riched by gifts from the State and the devout. Divine service lost its first simplicity ; even in broad daylight the churches were resplendent with the radiance of innumerable candles ; incense and holy water were borrowed from pagan forms of Avorship ; the sacerdotal vestments became magnificent, festivals were multiplied. But these changes, by which art profited, did not impede the expansive force of Christianity ; following upon the Empire, the barbarian world became its pupil, and Clovis, a Catholic in the midst of Arian nations, made the cause of the Roman Church triumph in Western Europe by subjugating them (496-511).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
In addition to the great church histories (Neander, Rohrbacher), now somewhat antiquated, and the three volumes of the Hidoirc ancienne de I'Eglise by Duchesne (190G-1910), consult Hauck's Encylopsedia, and Smith and Wace's Diet, of Christian Biography. The following are useful manuals : F. Naef, Hxstoire de V^glise chretiemie, 1892 ; X. Funk, Lehrhich der Kirchen- geschichfr, 5th ed. , 1907; Kurtz, Abriss der KirchengeschicKf.e, 16th ed., 1906; "W. Walker, A Hist, of the Christian Church, 1920 (very good bibliography).
Wellhausen (and others), Die cJtristliche Religion mil EinsrMuss der jiidischen, 1906; A. Harnack, Lehrbuch drr Dogmevgrschichte, .Srd ed., 1894 (there is an abridgment by the author, 4th ed., 1906); L. Duchesne, Origines du culte chrdtien, 2nd ed., 1898; 0. Bardenhewer, Gesch. der altchristl. Literatur, 1903; A. Harnack, Die Ueberlieferung und der Best and der altchristl. Literatur his Eusebius, 1899; Die Chronologic der altchristl. Literatur, 2 vols., 1897-1904; A. Denzinger, Enchiridion symbolorum et definitionum, 9th ed., 1900 (in Latin) ; Labauche, iefons de th6ologie dogmatiqiie, 1908.
60 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
1. Ch. Guignebert, Le christianisme antique, 1920. — Pre-pauline propaganda : Loisy, Rev. hist. litt. rcl., 1921, p. 431.
2. Renan, 8. Paul, 18G9.
7. Supposed death of Peter in Palestine : art. PUrus, in Hauck, p. 201, 43. — Guignebert, La primauti de Pierre, 1909.
8. Harnack, Mission und Ausbreitung des Christcntums, 2nd ed., 2 vols., 1906 (c/. Monceaux, J. des Sav., 1904, p. 404).
9. Br^hier, Philon, 1908 ; E. de Faye, Introd. d VMude du gnosticisme, 1903 ; Bousset, Gnosis, in Pauly-Wissowa's Encycl. ; Bonaiuto, Lo gnosticismo, 1907.
10. E. von Dobschiitz, Die urchristlichen Oemeinden, 1902; A. Reville, L' Eucharistie, 1908 (same subject by M. Goguel, 1910) ; Batiffol, Vagape (in Hist, et thiologie, p. 227) ; art. Agape in Cabrol's Dirtionnaire.
11. Glossolaly and the supposed gifts of prophecy: art. Spiritual Gifts in Cheyne.
12. Harnack, op. cit. under 8. — The synagogues as nurseries of Christi- anity : S. R., Cultes, vol. iii., p. 449.
13. AUard, Hist, des pers6cutions jKudant les trois premiers si^cles, 5 vols., 1894-1903; Julien VApostat, 3 vols., 1900-1903; Le christianisme et Vempire de Niron d Thiodose, 5th ed., 1903; Bix. le^nns s\ir le martyre, 1906; B. Aubd, Hist, des persecutions, 4 vols., 1875-1885; G. Boissier, La fin du paganismc, 2 vols., 1891 ; Vineendie de Eome et la premiere persecution (in Journ. des Sav., 1902, p. 158) ; E. Ch(5non, Les rapports de V^glise et de V^tat du I"' aii JCX" siede, 1905 (good summary); A. Harnack, Der Vorimirf des Atheismus, 1905; Le Blant, Les pers^cuteurs et les martyrs, 1893; Leclercq, Les Martyrs, 1902 ct seq. ; Ramsay, The CMvrch in the Roman Empire, 6th ed., 1900.
14. Art. Trajanus in the Diet, of Christian Biography. — Glut in the cattle- market of Bithynia : S. R., Cxdtes, vol. i., p. 395 (after Ramsaj^).
15-16. Th. Mommsen, Der Religionsfrevel nach rbm. Recht (in Hist. Zcit- schrift, 1890, p. 389); Boucht^-Leclercq, LHntoUrance et la politique, 1911; art. Accusations in Cabrol's Dictionnaire. — P. de Labriolle, Hist, de la litt. latine chritienne, 1919. — The Jewish community and the martyrs of Lyons: S. R., Cultes, vol. iii., p. 449. — Celsus and his Logos Alethes (True Discourse) : Aube, Hist, des Pers6c., vol. ii., p. 118; A. Dide, La fin des religions, p. 162. — For the lost book of Julian see AUard's work quoted above, § 13.
18. Allard, Les esdaves ehretiens, 1876.
19. Art. Marcion and Apostolisches Symholum in Hauck. — Harnack, Das Evangelium . . . Marcion, 1921. — E. de Faye, CUment d' Alexandrie, 1898. — J. Denis, Philosophie d^Origene, 1884 (of. Journ. des Sav., 1884, p. 177).
20. Art, Verfassung [urchristliche) in Hauck.
21. G. de Labriolle, La crise montaniste, 1913.
22. Renegades and Libellatici : Aub^, V^glise et VlStat, 1885, p. 199; Foucart, J. des Sav., April 1908. — Art. Decius and Diocletianus in Diet, of Ch7-istian Biograjyhy.
23. Boissier, La fin du paganisme, 2 vols., 1893 (Constantine, Julian, etc.).
24. Chastel, Hist, de la destruction dto paganisme, 1850; V. Schultze, Gesch. des Untergangs des Heidentums, 2 vols., 1887-1892. — Art. CyriUus and Hypatia in Diet, of Christian Biography.
25. Monceaux, Histoire littiraire de V Afrique chrMenne,4c vols., 1901-1912; H. Leclercq, L' Afrique chritienne, 2 vols., 1904. — Art. Afrique in Cabrol, and Do7iatismus in Hauck.
26. A. Harnack, Das Moncht^im, 1901 ; W. H. Mackean, Christian Monasti- cism in Egypt, 1920; C. Butler, Benedictine monachism, 1919; E. Lesne, Hist, de la propri4t6 eceUs. en France, vol. i. , 1910.
27. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy, 3rd ed., vol. i., 1907. — Saiutyves, L s saints successeurs des dieux, 1908; H. Delehaye, Origine du culte des Martyrs, 1912; E. Lucius, Anfaenge des Heiligen Kultes, 1905. — Th. Reinach, Lafite de Pdques, 1906; A. Meyer, Weihnachisfest, 1911.
28. A. Dupin, Le dogme de la Trinitd, 1907 ; A. Reville, La christologie de Paul de Samosate (in Etudes de critique, 1896, p. 189); Athanase et Arius
FROM ST. PAUL TO JUSTINIAN 61
(Brussels, 1904). — Art. Arianistmis, Nicaenisches Konzil, and Trinitaet in Hauck. — J. Zoiller, Origiiies chrdtiennes dans les prov. danubiennes, 1918.
29. Art. Athanasmm, in Hauck.
30. Art. PriscilUamts in Hauck. — Ch. Babut, Primllien, 1909.
31. Art. Nestorius in Hauck, and R. Duval, V^glise lustoriennc (in Journ. des Sav., 1904, p. 109). — Art. Monophysiten, in Hauck. — Diehl, Justinien, 1901. — Art. Koptische Kirche in Hauck (vol. xii., p. 801). — Duchesne, Milangcs dc Romr, 1915, p. 57 (Theodosius).
32. E. Vacandard, S. Bernard, new ed., 1904. — Art. Pelagius and Semi- pelagianismus in Hauck.
.33. Art. Fegfeuer (purgatory) in Hauck. — Prayers for the Dead : S. R., Cultes, vol. i., p. 313.
34. Am. Thierry, S. J&rome, 1867.
35-36. Art. Vigilantius in Did. of Christ. Biogr. ; Art. Gregoritis and Basilius, ibid. — A. Reville, Vigilance, 1902.
37. Am. Thierry, S. Jean Chrysostome et Vimpiratrice Eudoxie, 1872; Puech, 8. J. Chrysostome, 1891.
38. R. Thamin, S. Ambroise, 1895.
^
k
1/
CHAPTER III
CHRISTIANITY : FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V
The services rendered by the Church to medieval society — The conversion of heathen nations — Charlemagne inaugurates the era of violent proselytism — Pilgrimages : the Crusades — The constitution of the temporal power of the Popes — False Decretals — Exactions of the Holy See — Excommunica- tion— Simony — Quarrels of the Popes and Emperors : Gregory VII., the Emperor at Canossa — The Popes and England — Innocent III. — The Emperor Frederick II. — The Great Schism of the West — The decadence of the Papacy in the fifteeiath century.
The monastic orders — Franciscans and Dominicans — Knights Hos- pitallers and Knights Templars.
The worship of the Virgin — The Immaculate Conception — The worship of saints, and the Golden Legend — Mass — The Eucharist — The feast of the Holy Sacrament — Confession, and the sale of indulgences — Jubilees — The celibacj' of the priesthood.
The Church and heresies — The image-breakers or Iconoclasts — The Catharists or Albigenses — The devastation of the south of France — The Vaudois or Waldenses.
Anselm of Canterbury and Ab^lard : Scholasticism — Roger Bacon and St. Thomas Aquinas — The Imitation of Christ — Humanism : Reuchlin and Erasmus — Wycliff and John Huss — Girolamo Savonarola.
The organisation of the Inquisition — The crimes of the Inquisition- Tortures and the stake — The persecution of so-called witches.
The Christian Churches which seceded from Rome : the so-called Orthodox Church.
1. Medieval society owed a great deal to the Church. To deny this is to make a miracle of her duration.
2. In the first place, the Church propagated the Gospel. Not that she practised it, or commended the study of it. But its principles were on her lips, a germ of humanity, a check upon barbarism. She also acted upon the inspiration of the Gospel in her charitable works, which Julian had held up to the admiration of the heathen. True, her charity was not always judicious. She gave freely and indiscriminately, and so encouraged mendicity. But both in the East and the West she multiplied hospitals, orphanages and asylums. When we remember that the Emperor Claudius had to make a law forbidding people to abandon their sick slaves and cast them
62
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 63
out to starve by the roadside, we realise that the Church, though intent, not on a social duty, but on spiritual salvation, was more humane than lettered paganism.
3. The Church further gave or imposed upon Europe the external forms of Christianity. It is, relatively, a simple creed, not overcharged with festivals, nor encumbered by alimentary prohibitions ; it does not demand too much of its adherents ; it suits laborious races. Activity was, indeed, generally en- joined as a duty by the Church, even to its monks ; Christianity is not, or has only occasionally been, a religion of parasites and sluggards.
4. Although the Church of Christ perpetually had recourse to violence and shed more blood than all secular ambitions, because she shared them, she at least affirmed the superiority of the spirit to mere brute force, at a period when might was by no means at the service of right. The bishops were the pro- tectors, somewhat capricious no doubt, but effectual, of the weak and oppressed. The Church taught kings mercy. As early as the tenth century she established truces (the Peace of God), intervals in private warfare ; she was not, it is true, the first or the only power who did so ; but we must give her the credit due for having revived this ancient custom, at a time of universal massacre and pillage,
5. Without any deliberate intention of preserving the literary masterpieces of antiquity, she had a great many of them copied in her monasteries, just as she saved many master- pieces of art in the treasuries of her churches. Her worship demanded magnificence ; artists worked for her glory and our delight.
6. Finally, at a time when society was divided into castes, when there were nobles, villeins and serfs, she upheld the principle of the equality of all men before God, and urged the essential dignity of the most wretched, since Christ had shed his blood for their salvation. The Church was the refuge of talent. She placed at her head, supreme over kings, the son of a workman, or even the son of a beggar. It was not necessary to be of noble birth to become a bishop, a cardinal, or a pope. Monarchical at its summit, the Church was democratic at its
K
!/
CH PTER III
CHRISTIANITY : FU I JUSTINIAN TO CHAllLES V
The services rendered by the CI eh to medieval society — The conversion of heathen nations — Charlema|. ■ inaugurates the era of violent proselytism — Pilgrimages : the Crusade -The constitution of the temporal power of the Popes — False Decretals- Exactions of the Holy See — Excommunica- tion— Simony — Quarrels of i Popes and Emperors: Gregory VII., the Emperor at Canossa — Tht ^opes and England — Innocent III. — The Emperor Frederick II. — Th' Jreat Schism of the West — The decadence of the Papacy in the fifteent century.
The monastic orders — I nciscans and Dominicans — Knights Hos- pitallers and Knights Tempi 3.
The worship of the Virgii -The Immaculate Conception — The worship of saints, and the Golden 1 jend — Mass — The Eucharist — The feast of the Holy Sacrament — Confe on, and the sale of indulgences — Jubilees — The celibacy of the priesthoi
The Church and heresit -The image-breakers or Iconoclasts — The Catharists or Albigenses — 1 devastation of the south of France — The Vaudois or Waldenses.
Anselm of Canterbury an Abelard : Scholasticism — Roger Bacon and St. Thomas Aquinas — The litation of Christ — Humanism : Reuchlin and Erasmus — WyclifF and .J in Huss — Girolamo Savonarola.
The organisation of the J [uisition — The crimes of the Inquisition^ Tortures and the stake — Thtiersecution of so-called witches.
The Christian Churches ,'hich seceded from Rome : the so-called Orthodox Church.
1. Medieval society owed a great deal to the Church. To
deny this is to make a mira e of her duration.
2. In the first place, t^ Church propagated the Gospel,
Not that she practised it, c commended the study of it. But
its principles were on her ps, a germ of humanity, a check
upon barbarism. She also icted upon the inspiration of the
Gospel in her charitable orks, which Julian had held up
to the admiration of the lathen. True, her charity was not
always judicious. She ga^ freely and indiscriminately, and
so encouraged mendicity, lit both in the East and the West
she multiplied hospitals, oihanages and asylums. When w-e
remember that the Empeir Claudius had to make a law
forbidding people to abanon their sick slaves and cast them
62
1
i
tkr
KUMf
:ti
> %' p^ ^.l
FROM JUSTTOAN
CSASUB ▼
.LiTO^
To
■ 'the
•P ot
of
out to starve by the roadjjjt. v though intent, not on a sooal was more humane than letter
3. The Church further ga^t external forms of Christianity. I" not overcharged with festivals, ri- prohibitions ; it does not den:'- it suits laborious races. Act. .. joined as a duty by the Church, e-- is not, or has only occasionally h. sluggards.
4. Although the Church of C to violence and shed more blood nan all •eeaue mtuMlmmn- because she shared them, she at lea. affirmta tut tu^neTtun^. ^ the spirit to mere brute force, at aperiod vhax aug^ i*r uj no means at the service of right. TTie bidbopi wwt U* iftu tectors, somewhat capricious no oubt, but pffwiiMJ, •? ^ weak and oppressed. The Churc taught king* ■mkj'. a» early as the tenth century she estalished tru«* (ti* • God), intervals in private warfare she was not, it i*
first or the only power who did so but we mutt p*t uc: tut credit due for having revived this ncient cuk-tom, at a Ium: «f universal massacre and pillage.
5. Without any deliberate iiention of pnMrtiai^ tW literary masterpieces of antiquity she had a great vatmy 0l them copied in her monasteries, juf as she saved uiauy pieces of art in the treasuries of ler churches. H«-r »« demanded magnificence ; artists wi'ked for he, ,^ ^ ^jf delight. -
6. Finally, at a time when socty was divided into ' when there were nobles, villeins ind serfs, she uj, principle of the equality of all me before God, and essential dignity of the most wre'hed, since Christ
his blood for their salvation. Th Church was the
talent. She placed at her head, ipreme over kings, ti. .
of a workman, or even the son of a %gar. It was not mm i
to be of noble birth to become a Ishop, a cardinal, or a pui«*-. Monarchical at its summit, the Curch was democratic «t jU
64 A SHOirr HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
base ; it was never aristocratic. This fact was clearly recognised by Voltaire: "The Roman Church has always enjoyed the advantage of being free to give to merit what was elsewhere reserved for birth ; and it is even noteworthy that the haughtiest among the Popes (Gregory VII. and Adrian IV.) were those of the humblest origin. In Germany, there are still convents which admit only persons of noble birth. The spirit of Rome is marked by more grandeur and less vanity."
• • • • •
7. The prodigiously rapid establishment of the Arab Empire ^was the first blow struck at the power of the Church ; Christi- anity retreated, for the first time, in Syria, Asia Minor, North Africa and Spain (710). In Spain alone, centres of resistance were soon formed, which became triumphant in the fifteenth century. But the Christian princes never invoked the aid of a Crusade ; this is remarkable as showing that even in Spain the behaviour of the Soldiers of the Cross was a matter of common knowledge.
8. Powerless against Islam, the Church was successful every- where else in her great work of proselytism among the Gentiles. Her best missionaries were the monks of Ireland, which had been evangelised by St. Patrick (450), and was called the Isle of Saints ; they were the first militia of the Church in Western Europe. After converting the Franks, who were baptised by St. Remigius (496), she christianised the Anglo-Saxons by means of the Roman monk Augustine (596), and the Germans by means of the Anglo-Saxon Winfrid, called St. Boniface, who was finally assassinated in Frisia (689-755). Many brilliant conversions were due to princesses such as Clotilde, the queen of Clovis ; Voltaire justly remarked that half Europe owes its Christianity to women. The conversion of Wladimir (988) was preceded by that of his grandmother, the Russian Duchess Olga, who came to Constantinople (957). As early as 868, the Patriarch of Constantinople had obtained permission to found a church at Kieff: The Russian mercenaries of the Imperial Guard, who became Christians at Constantinople, laboured to evangelise Russia after their return to their homes.
9. The Byzantine monks Cyril and Methodius baptised a
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 65
Bulgarian chief in 863 ; Cyril translated the Bible into the Slav tongue, making use of an alphabet derived from the Greek, which he had composed for the purpose. After Bulgaria, Methodius evangelised Bohemia, whence Christianity spread to Poland and Hungary (c. 1000). In the ninth century, the Church converted the Normans and the Danes of England, and then those of Denmark and Sweden. The influence of Christi- anity extended far towards the East ; the Persian Nestorians sent missionaries of the Gospel into Central Asia and even into China (c. 600), In the thirteenth century, Rome took up the propaganda of the Nestorians ; a church was founded at Pekin, but was soon destroyed, and the Mongolians, at first favourable to Christianity, were partially converted to Islamism. The Nestorian Churches perished in this reaction.
10. Down to the end of the eighth century, the spiritual victories of the Church had entailed no bloodshed. The era of violent prosel3rtisra was inaugurated by Charlemagne, who gave the Saxons a choice between baptism and death (772-782) and massacred over four thousand of them at once. The bishops he instituted were called upon to take cognisance of acts of idolatry and to punish them as crimes ; they were the ancestors of the Inquisitors. After the year 1000, conversion by force became general. The Wends of Pomerania were compelled by the Dukes of Poland to accept baptism ; Pope Honorius decreed a crusade to conquer the Prussians, against whom the Teutonic Knights waged a war of extermination (1236-1283). The Brethren of the Sword treated Livonia and Courland in the same manner. But the conversion of the Lithuanians was not completed till the end of the fourteenth century.
• • • • •
11. The custom of pilgrimages to the scenes of the Scrip- tures was anterior even to the triumph of Christianity; thus Helena, the mother of Constantine, went to Jerusalem, where later writers (but not the contemporary Eusebius) report that she discovered the " true Cross."" The conquest of Syria by the Musulmans made these pilgrimages more perilous ; pilgrims returned to tell moving tales of the sad state of Palestine, and the evils endured by the Christians. "Amidst the extreme
66 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
sufferings of the Middle Ages," says Michelet, " men still had tears for the misery of Jerusalem." The Papacy, in conjunction with the feudal nobles, whose very existence was due to war, accordingly organised those great military pilgrimages to the Holy Land known as the Crusades (1096-1291). Although these cost millions of lives, exhausted the resources of Christian Europe, aggravated fanaticism, exaggerated the worship of saints and relics to the point of mania, and encouraged the abuse of and traffic in indulgences, they must be credited with having kept back the rising flood of Islamism, re-established regular intercourse with the East, and introduced into Western chivalry ideas somewhat more liberal than those of Prankish barbarism. Even the disasters of the Crusades were not in vain, for they awoke doubts among the masses as to the efficacy of divine protection and the infallibility of the councils of Rome. Finally, " liberty, natural to man, was born again from the want of money among the princes." ^
12. The Crusaders in general, " in spite of their sacred cause, behaved like highway robbers." ^ The first host which set out in 1095, and was annihilated by the Turks at Nicaea, killed, burned and pillaged all they encountered. The army com- manded by Godfrey de Bouillon massacred the entire population of Jerusalem (1098). The astuteness of Venice turned aside the fourth Crusade upon Constantinople, and the sack of this city is a dark blot on the history of Western Christendom (1204). It was abominably ravaged, and the very church of St. Sophia was the scene of bloody and sacrilegious orgies. " This was the first time that the city of Constantinople had been taken and sacked by strangers : it was done by Christians who had vowed to fight only against the infidel." ^
The one consolatory element in the story is to be found in the unhappy crusades St. Louis directed upon Egypt and Tunis, in which the king, though a very indifferent general, showed himself at least worthy of the name of Christian.
• • • • •
13. The instigators of the Crusades were always the Popes, seconded by monks. As early as 1074, Gregory VII. had
1 Voltaire. « Ihid. » lUd.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 67
dreamt of reconquering Anatolia, which had fallen into the hands of the Seljuk Turks. Pope Urban II. appeared at the Council of Clermont in 1094, accompanied by a monk of Picardy, Peter the Hermit, promising the indulgences of the Church to all who would go and fight the infidel. The second Crusade M^as preached by Eugenius III. and Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux ; the fourth by Innocent HI. and Foulques of Neuilly. Even the frantic Children's Crusade (1212) was encouraged by the enthusiasm of Innocent III. It was naturally to the interest of the papacy to appear thus as the supreme power which set all the military forces of Europe in movement. As soon as a noble had taken the Cross, he belonged to the Church. The Crusader's vow was indissoluble save by the Pope's consent ; from the beginning of the thirteenth century he began to grant remission for ready money. In the crusading armies the papal legates became delegates of a theocracy which consolidated rapidly and threatened to absorb civil society altogether. On the other hand, the Church fattened on the general misery ; to obtain the money necessary for their enterprises, nobles and vassals were obliged to sell their lands, which the Church bought at prices far below their value. Thus Godfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Brabant, sold his estate of Bouillon to the Chapter of Liege, and Stenay to the Bishop of Verdun.^
In the twelfth century the Popes paid tithes on the church revenues to the princes ; but after the Lateran Council in 1215 they laid claim, as directors of the Crusades, to all this money, thus creating a tax which was levied in their interest throughout Christendom.
14. The last Christian town in Syria, St. John of Acre, was retaken by the Musulmans in 1291. Rhodes held out till the beginning of the sixteenth century. It was the zeal of the Hungarians and Slavs, newly converted to Christianity, and not the hopelessly divided forces of Europe, which arrested the Turks on the road to Central Europe and Vienna. Broadly speaking, the Crusades were a failure ; the political object of the papacy was not realised. The condition of Christians and pilgrims in the Holy Land was slightly bettered by various
^ Voltaire.
68 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
treaties ; but the Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted only eighty-eight years, and the Latin Empire of Constantinople was no less ephemeral. When the Paleologi overthrew it in 1261, they had to reckon not only with Musulman ambition, but with the religious hatred of the West. The loss of the Greek Empire to Christianity (1453), a disaster to all European civilisation, was the final defeat, we might almost say the logical conclusion, of the Crusades.
15. The ruin of the Western Empire had plunged Rome into poverty. Her bishop (the Pope) and her parish priests (the Cardinals) staggered under the crushing burdens imposed upon them by their dignity and the calls upon their charity. The Roman Church received large gifts of land even outside Italy to meet these requirements. In the seventh century she was deprived of nearly all her possessions by the disasters of the times. Her lands in the neighbourhood of Rome consti- tuted the patrimony of St. Peter, called in later days the Roman Province and Roman Duchy. Finally, as the price of its alliance with Pepin le Bref against the Lombards, the papacy obtained a guarantee of its property, to which something was added by Charlemagne. It is a mistake, however, to credit Pepin with the foundation of the temporal power of the Popes. They were at first his lieutenants and administrators. It was not until the ninth century that the papal suzerainty asserted itself, thanks partly to the decay of the Prankish kingdom, partly to the disorder which reigned in Italy, and, above all, to a false document, the pretended donation of Italy to Pope Sylvester by the Emperor Constantine, imposed by Pope Adrian upon Charlemagne. It was not until the days of the Re- naissance that the forgery was recognised by the learned Nicholas of Cues, long after it had produced all the effects which might have been expected from it.
16. The papal decisions, entitled canons or decretals, were collected about the year 630 ; this collection was attributed to Bishop Isidore of Seville. A second one was added about 850, also in the name of Isidore. It is a series of impudent forgeries, supporting the pretensions of the Pope and the bishops, in opposition to the councils, the synods, and the civil power.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 69
" The boldest and most magnificent forgery which has deceived the world for centuries," Voltaire calls it. The forger, who was probably a bishop, seems to have been living in the diocese of Tours. Strong in the possession of this weapon, the Popes no longer had any competition to fear in the spiritual kingdom, and were hereby encouraged to encroach upon the temporal. From 852 onwards the False Decretals were cited as authorities, and many among them still figure in the authorised collections of Canon Law. Definitive proof of their falsity was only brought forward in 1628 by the French pastor Blondel, whose work was put on the Index. Never yet has the Papacy ac- knowledged that for a thousand years it made use of forged documents to its own profit.
17. Down to the time of Julius II. the papal territories, continually encroached upon by feudal princes, produced scarcely anything. The papal revenues consisted of gifts from the Universal Church, of the tithes occasionally conceded by the clergy, and the income from dispensations and taxes. A continual want of funds was one cause of the gravest abuses of the Holy See — extortions, sale of indulgences, contribu- tions exacted from those appointed to vacant benefices. John XXII. instituted a tariff for sin. By an unhappy imitation of the German penal code, which allowed criminals to make a money compensation, he valued theft, murder, and worse, at a price, " and the men who were wicked enough to commit these sins were fools enough to pay for them." ^ " Lists of these con- tributions have been printed several times since the fifteenth century, and have brought to light infamies at once more ridiculous and more odious than anything we are told about the impudent deceptions of the priests of antiquity."^
13. An Anglo-Saxon king founded an ecclesiastical college at Rome, and to maintain it imposed on his subjects a tax known as " Peter's Pence" (725). The first certainly authentic document on the subject is a letter of Leo III. Gregory VII. relied upon this practice to justify the inclusion of England among the vassals of the Holy See. After England, other northern countries were subjected to the same tax, and paid it with more or less regularity * Voltaire, » Ihid.
70 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
down to the Reformation. France and Spain resisted. The Denier de St. Pierre^ re-established in 1860, had nothing but the name in common with the ancient tribute. It used to bring in more than ,£80,000 a year to Leo XIII., but was much more prolific in the days of Pius IX.
19. The most formidable weapon in the hands of the Church was excommunication, which deprived its victims of the sacra- ments and of all legal authority. The major excommunication had the force of an interdict. No one could speak to or serve the person excommunicated without contamination, and be- coming anathema himself. When a prince was excommunicated, all religious rites were suspended in his State. It was a strike declared by God. Then the credulous population became terror- stricken, and drove their political chiefs into submission. Thanks to this weapon of excommunication, the Popes of the Middle Ages were able to "give" to their favoured candidates the crowns of the Empire, of Portugal, Hungary, Denmark, England, Aragon, Sicily, and finally of France, which Boniface VIII., after having excommunicated Philippe le Bel, gave to Albert of Austria by a Bull : " We give you, in the plenitude of our power, the Kingdom of France, which belongs of right to the Emperors of the West." We know how Philip replied (1303).
20. The Popes established the universal use of Latin in divine service, and aimed at making the supremacy of Rome manifest by forcing the Roman liturgy upon all. From the year 400 onwards, the Latin service appears to have superseded the more ancient Greek in the churches of Rome. The Kyrie eleison (Lord, have mercy) of the Latin service is a notable Greek survival.
« • • • •
21. In the ninth and tenth centuries the Papacy passed through a period of shameful disorder. The Rome of John X. was a cloaca in which the Popes set the example of the worst misconduct. The priestly functions were openly sold, a pro- ceeding to which the name of simony was given, from the story of Simon in the Acts of the Apostles (viii. 18). This sore in the Church remained open till the thirteenth century, in spite of the honest efforts of Gregory VII. to close it. The Emperor
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 71
Henry III. intervened, deposed three Popes, who hurled mutual anathemas at each other, and set in their place the worthy Clement, Bishop of Bamberg. Clement was the first pontiff* nominated by the Emperor ; but the German rulers must soon have regretted their interference, for Rome, in its turn, wished to give laws to the Germans in order to avoid having to take laws from them.
22. The fundamental fact in the whole history of the J Middle Ages is the papal claim to the suzerainty of all States, in virtue of the pretension that the Pope, alone, was the successor of Jesus Christ ; while the German Emperors, on the other hand, pretended to believe that the kingdoms of Europe were nothing but dismembered fragments of the empire they had inherited from the Roman Caesars.^ The doctrine of the universal suzerainty of the Popes was never affirmed with more insistence than by Hildebrand, called Gregory VII., whom legend makes the son of a carpenter. He was a restless, enterprising spirit, who sometimes mingled cunning with his zeal for the claims of the Church. Not only did he wish to withdraw the Papacy from the guardianship of the Empire and concentrate in himself the power to nominate and invest bishops : he even dared to excommunicate the Emperor Henry IV., who resisted, and had caused him to be deposed by the Council of Worms (1076). " All the world trembled," says a chronicler of the time, " when the people learned the excommunication of their King." The Emperor had no choice but to humble himself before the Pope at Canossa, after having been kept waiting, as the story goes, barefooted in the snow (1077). " Believing himself then, not unnaturally, master of the crowns of the earth, Gregory wrote, in more than one letter, that he considered it his duty to humble the might of kings." ^ The quarrel broke out again as hotly as ever after this lame reconciliation ; Gregory VII. seems indeed to have been duped by the German, and his harshness has no doubt been exaggerated. The Emperor laid siege to Rome, which was saved by the Norman, Robert Guiscard. But the Pope had to fly, and died miserably at Salerno (1085). He had been the friend and director of Matilda, Countess of ^ Voltaire. » Ibid.
72 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Tuscany, who left her great estates to the Papacy after Gregory's death,
. 23. An understanding between the Empire and the Holy
/ See — between Ghibellines and Guelfs — took long to establish and cost much bloodshed. The conflict ended at last in a con- cordat (1122). " The real cause of quarrel was that neither the Popes nor the Roman people wanted emperors in Rome; the pretext, which was put forward as holy, was that the Popes, depositories of the Church's rights, could not allow secular princes to invest her bishops with pastoral staff and ring. It was clear enough that bishops, who were the subjects of princes and enriched by them, owed homage for their lands. Kings and emperors did not pretend to endow them with the Holy Ghost, but they demanded homage for the temporalities they had given. The ring and the pastoral staff were but accessories to the main question. But, as almost invariably happens, the heart of the matter was neglected and battle joined over an irrelevant detail." ^
24. The Papacy showed itself no less aggressive towards Henry II. of England. For having instigated the assassination of Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, who conspired against him, he was excommunicated by the Pope, and driven to purchase absolution by enormous concessions. Barefooted, the king had to do penance at the tomb of the murdered bishop. To this same Henry, Pope Adrian IV., himself an Englishman, wrote : " It is not doubted, and you know it, that Ireland and all those islands which have received the faith belong to the Church of Rome ; if you wish to enter that island, to drive vice out of it, to cause law to be obeyed and St. Peter's Pence to be paid by every house, it will please us to assign it to you."
25. At the Thirteenth Council of Lyons the English ambas- sadors said to Innocent IV. : " Through an Italian, you draw more than 60,000 marks from the kingdom of England ; you have lately sent us a legate who has given every benefice to Italians. He extorts excessive contributions from all the faith- ful, and he excommunicates every one who complains of these exactions." The Pope made no reply, but proceeded to excom-
^ Voltaire.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 78
municate Frederick II. In 1255 Alexander IV. ordered a crusade to be preached in England against Manfred of Naples, and sent a legate to collect tithes. " Matthew Paris reports that the Nuncio collected 50,000 pounds sterling in England. Seeing the English of to-day, it is hard to believe that their ancestors could have been so imbecile ! " ^
26. Gregory VII. found a worthy successor in the great Pope Innocent III. The son of a gentleman of Anagni, " he finally erected that edifice of the temporal power for which his predecessors had been amassing materials for some four hundred years. . . . The Roman pontiffs began to be kings in fact ; and religion, aided by circumstances, made them the masters of kings." ^ Innocent III. undertook, in the first place, to with- draw Italy from the influence of Germany ; and, secondly, to subject all the rest of Europe to his own jurisdiction. In 1199 he excommunicated Philip Augustus for repudiating Ingeborg ; in 1210 he excommunicated Otho IV. ; in 1213 he excommuni- cated John Lackland, King of England. At one moment he stood out, the uncontested master of Christendom. He preached the fourth Crusade, which threw the Greek Empire into Catholic hands (1204) ; he let loose all the furies of the crusade against the Albigenses (1207); from the fourth Lateran Council he obtained the terrible laws against heretics and Jews (1215). His successor, Honorius III., secured the help of a formidable army of monks, the Dominicans, for the Papacy.
27. The death of Innocent HI. (1216) marks a turning- point in the history of the Popes. From this date onward the temporal power shows a tendency to dwindle before the resist- ance of the secular authorities. Frederick II.'s Chancellor, Petrus de Vinea, wrote in support of the rights of the State. The Emperor himself replied to an excommunication by be- sieging Rome. Frederick II., who made atrocious laws against heresy, was himself a free-thinker. "We have proofs," wrote Gregory IX. in 1239, "that he declares publicly that the world has been deceived by three impostors, Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet. Jesus Christ he places below the other two, because, he says, they were glorious in their lives, while he was nothing
» Voltaire. « Ihid.
74 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
but a man sprung from the dregs of the people, who preached to others of the same condition." Sixty years later, Philip the Fair, intent on the posthumous condemnation of Boniface VIII., brought fourteen witnesses to declare that the Pope had been heard to say : " How profitable this fable of Christ has been to us ! " Calumny or not, it showed a considerable advance towards intellectual emancipation when such blasphemies could be ascribed to an emperor by a Pope, and to a Pope by a king.
28. After the fall of the Hohenstaufens, the Hapsburgs were but little disposed to put up with the tutelage of the Popes. England was at first more docile. The interdicted John Lackland had to submit to Rome when Innocent III. threatened to award his kingdom to Philip Augustus. But, in France, St. Louis was the true founder of that doctrine of royal
s and national independence, suggested by the legists of the I South, which has since then been called Gallicanism (the
• Pragmatic ascribed to him is, however, a forgery ^). Philip the Fair, having quarrelled with Boniface VIII., who declared that every living creature owed obedience to the Bishop of Rome, laughed at both interdict and excommunication, and caused the Pope to be insulted and arrested in his palace at Anagni (1303).
29. The great Western schism originated in 1378, as a result of the contest for the Papacy between two rival com- petitors. Urban VI. established himself in Rome and Clement VIL at Avignon, where a French Pope, Clement V., an accom- plice in the judicial murder of the Templars, had already lived under the haughty protection of Philip the Fair since 1305. For sixty years the Church had two Popes, and sometimes three. To put an end to the scandal, the cardinals summoned the two Councils of Pisa and Constance. The former (1409) set up a third Pope against the other two, but had no practical results. The latter (1414) ended in the deposition of both Popes, and
• the election of Martin V. (1417). " The Council declared itself
1 A forgery due to some jurisconsult of the fifteenth century, put forward as a royal decree! of 1268. Pragmatic is a word derived from the Greek, and means an ordinance regulating (religious) affairs.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 75
above the Pope, which was incontestable, as it had arraigned him ; but a council passes, whereas the Papacy and its authority endures." 1 Unity was only re-established in 1429, by the renunciation of Clement VIII. Finally, the Council of Basle (1431), which elected an Anti-Pope to Eugenius IV. (1440) and was dissolved by him, tried in vain to bring about im- portant reforms in the Church. The Papacy, supported on this occasion by the Empire, held to its pretensions, and, strengthened by the end of the great schism, would only consent to insufficient changes for the better.
30. At the end of the fifteenth century the papal dignity sank very low in the person of the Borgia Pope, Alexander VI., a man of taste and a friend to the arts, but a debauchee who scandalised even his contemporaries. His successor, Julius II., was an old man of great energy, given to laying about him with his stick, and more occupied with war and politics than with the Church. Finally, the great Renaissance Pope, Leo X., always surrounded by artists and men of letters, gave himself up to the joy of life. "Monks' quarrels!" he cried upon hearing of Luther's early outbursts. Rome in his time was so pagan, so in love with antiquity and with plastic beauty of every kind, that, without the rude shock of the Reformation, she might well have led the cultured world into the conditions it reached in the eighteenth century. Cardinal Peter Bembo, the Pope's intimate friend, refused to read the Epistles of St. Paul, lest, he declared, they should contaminate his Ciceronian Latin. The Church's awakening was terrible. We may judge from what happened during the second half of the sixteenth century, of the enormous force which lay concealed within her, in spite of her apparent senility and corruption.
* • • • •
31. The privileges and relative independence of the monastic life attracted the best Christians. The order of Cluny was founded in France in the tenth century, that of the Camalduli in Italy in the eleventh. These orders soon became possessed of great properties, given or bequeathed by the faithful. The consequence of this wealth was the corruption of the monks.
^ Voltaire.
76 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
To bring about a reaction, orders were founded with very severe *' rules " : the Carthusians by St. Bruno, the Poor of Christ at the end of the eleventh century, and the Cistercians (monks of Citeaux) adorned by the illustrious St. Bernard (1091-1153). Other orders, such as the Premonstrants (1120) and the Car- melites (1105), continued to absorb the best elements of the population, thus condemning them to sterility. Some among them rendered great and signal services ; the Mathurins, for instance, whose mission it was to redeem Christian prisoners from Turkish slavery. This order was founded by Jean de Matha, a doctor of Paris University, and encouraged by Pope Innocent III. But the literature of the Middle Ages sufficiently proves that both monks and nuns were unpopular, and that the morality of convents was subject to the gravest suspicions. The assertions of lay writers are confirmed by ecclesiastical writers, who never ceased to demand the reform of the monasteries, and gave excellent reasons for their clamour.
32. The fame of the mendicant orders — Franciscans or Cor- deliers, and Dominicans — finally eclipsed that of all the others. The mendicant orders formed a striking innovation on the old monastic conception. Monasticism was essentially the egotistic effort of the individual to ensure his own salvation while repudiating the duties and responsibilities of life. It is true that, at a certain period, monks had done good service to humanity by leaving their retreats and carrying Christian civilisation into regions still barbarous. St. Columba, St. Gall, St. Willibrod and their companions were such pioneers. But that period had long passed away, and monasticism had de- clined for centuries into a state even worse than its primitive egotism. The mendicant orders were a revelation to Christendom. Men, it appeared, existed who were ready to abandon all that made life sweet, and imitate the Apostles, doing for nothing what the Church failed to do with all its wealth and its privi- leges ! Wandering on foot from one end of Europe to the other, under burning suns and icy winds, refusing alms in money, but accepting the coarsest food with gratitude, taking no thought for the morrow, but incessantly occupied in snatching souls from Hell, such was the aspect under which the early
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 77
Dominicans and Franciscans presented themselves to men who had been accustomed to look upon a monk as a greedy, sensual wordling.i
33. The Franciscan order, created by Francis of Assisi (1182-1226) in spite of some resistance from the Papacy, owed its early prestige to the virtues of its founder. This gentle mystic, who refused to be ordained a priest,^ forbade his disciples to hold, not only private, but even collective property. He died opportunely and was hastily canonised two years later. The Inquisition was not long in falling out with the spiritual Franciscans or fraticelli, as they were called in Italy ; these followed the example of their master with a fidelity which was a standing reproach to the cupidity of Rome, and not a few were bunit by the Church in the fifteenth century (1426- 1449).
34. The short life of St. Francis left a deep impression on the spirit of the Middle Ages. One may say that to him Christianity owed a new lease of life, because in him the faithful found among themselves, and not in the mists of history, a man whom they could admire and even worship. " Never," says Voltaire, " have the eccentricities of the human intellect been pushed further than in the BooJc of the Conformities of Christ and St. Francis, written in his own time and afterwards supplemented. In this book Christ is looked upon as the precursor of Francis. Here we find the tale of the snow woman made by the saint with his own hands : that of the rabid wolf, which he tamed miraculously, making it promise to eat no more sheep ; of the doctor whose death he brought about by prayer, that he might have the pleasure of resuscitating him by further prayers. A prodigious number of miracles were credited to St. Francis. And, in truth, it was a great miracle to establish his order and so to multiply it that he found himself surrounded by five thousand of his monks at a General Chapter held near Assisi during his own
' Lea, History of the hvquisitiony vol. i.
* ' ' How astonished you will be to hear that Francis, Francis, that admirable man, who led a life more angelic than human, refused the holy priesthood ! ... He trembled and shuddered at the very name of a priest, and, in spite of the most legitimate vocation, dared not consider, otherwise than at a distance, so redoubtable a dignity 1 " (Bossuet, Punrgyric of St. Francis ; ed. Gaume, vol. iv., p. 438). This may not have been due solely to modesty.
78 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
lifetime." Our age understands St. Francis better than did Voltaire. We see in him not so much the worker of miracles as the friend of the lowly, the mystic spouse of Poverty, the heart beating in sympathy with that of universal nature ; perhaps we are even apt to modernise him too much, and bring him nearer to us than we ought.
35. The idea occurred to St. Francis of affiliating the laity to his order. This led to the powerful institution of the " third order" which was imitated by the Jesuits of the sixteenth century. St. Clara of Assisi, the friend of St. Francis, founded the order for women known as the Poor Clares (1224), whose rule was fixed by the saint herself. Thus the Franciscan army drew its recruits from Christian society as a whole, male and female, religious and secular.
36. The great revolution brought about by Franciscanism in the spirit, literature and art of Christianity cannot be ex- plained without a foreign influence. Christianity of the early Middle Ages was " high and dry " ; to St. Francis she owed new and priceless elements of emotion, sympathy and kindness, together with a feeling for the beauties of nature somewhat akin to pantheism. Now, while Francis was growing up in Assisi, the Oriental heretics called Cathari (the " pure "), who originated in Central Asia and professed tenets akin to Buddhism, were very powerful in Northern and Central Italy. They reigned almost supreme in Assisi about 1203, and Pope Innocent III. had to proceed against them. Francis' parents, whom he after- wards forsook and forgot, seem to have belonged to the sect. A Christian novel, Barlaam and Joasaph, which is a free paraphrase of the Buddha's life, circulated among them and found innumer- able readers in Europe from the eleventh century onwards ; traces of it can be detected in the legend of the saint himself. But he was no heretic ; always faithful to the Church and hierarchy, he was content with teaching and introducing into the very heart of his age the more innocent and humane elements of Catharic doctrine. Not without reason, and with more reason than he could himself believ^e, a learned Japanese of our day, Anesaki, dedicated a study of Buddhistic art " to the sweet memory of St. Francis." Indirectly and unknowingly, he was
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 79
the first to rejuvenate and sweeten Christianity with an aroma of distant Buddhism.
37. The Dominicans, more practical than the Franciscans, though equally vowed to poverty, were founded in 1216 by the Spaniard, Domingo di Guzman (1170-1221), They were called punningly the Dogs of God, Domini canes. They formed a kind of militia of preachers and inquisitors, with affiliated laymen, who devoted an unbending fanaticism and an unlimited obedience to the service of the Papacy. They were also known as the Preaching Friars, and in France as the Jacobins, Quarrels soon arose between Franciscans and Dominicans, and introduced a new element of disorder into times already troublous enough.
38. Another blossom sprang from the mystic spirit of Tuscany in the fourteenth century, in Catherine of Siena, a member of the lay order of St. Dominic (1347-1380). She flogged herself three times a day, once for her own sins, once for those of others still alive, and once for those of the dead. Betrothed in ecstasy to Jesus, she believed he had given her the nuptial ring ; she also believed she had been nourished on milk from the bosom of Mary. She played a considerable part in politics, and, in her charity for the suffering and desire to bring about the reign of peace among men, she showed more common sense than is usually expected from mystics. Sent to Pope Gregory XI., a native of the Limousin, to persuade him to quit Avignon and return to Rome (which he then intended to do), she achieved her mission with the aid of a Swedish visionary, St. Bridget, to whom an angel dictated several letters for delivery to the Pope (1376). Raimondo da Capua, Catherine's confessor, witnessed most of her miracles. "I saw her," he declares, "transformed into a man, with a little beard on her chin. The face into which hers was suddenly changed was that of Jesus Christ himself." A credible witness, indeed ! But under all the puerility of this legend, as under that of St. Francis receiving the stigniata (that is, the nail-marks of the crucifixion on his hands and feet), we may recognise the general idea of the supernatural identification of the faithful with their God, which is to be traced in the most ancient forms of human religion. Catherine was one of the most popular saints of the Italian
80 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Renaissance. She was canonised in 1461. Her miracles and her ecstasies are celebrated in a hundred masterpieces of art.
39. The eleventh and twelfth centuries saw the birth of various orders which were at once religious and military. Con- secrated in the first place to the service of the wounded in war, they vowed themselves, after 1118, to actual warfare against the infidel. Such were the Hospitallers, or Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, the Templars, the Teutonic Knights, the Knights of the Sword, of Santiago of Calatrava and of Alcantara in Spain. Their common object was to fight with and incidentally to con- vert infidels and heretics. They were, so to speak, in a condition of perpetual crusade, and their activity well represents that spirit of proselytism by violence which, after the year 1000, superseded proselytism by persuasion. Moreover, Templars and Hospitallers were always fighting with each other : in a certain combat between these military monks no Templar was left alive.
The Templars were bankers as well as warriors and became rich, although never so rich as the Hospitallers. Princes and Popes were tempted by their property. They were accused of secret rites of idolatry, and of various infamous practices. In 1307, Philip the Fair, assisted after a short resistance by Pope Clement V., arrested all the Templars in France. He caused them to be examined by his agents, who used torture to extort confessions, and afterwards handed them over to the Inquisition, his docile instrument. The knights confessed a thousand crimes. Outside France, however, where torture was not applied, they protested their innocence, while even in France itself the following singular fact was observed : Two Templars belonging to different commanderies, when tortured and questioned by the same judge, confessed the same crimes, while two Templars of the same commandery, tortured by different judges, confessed different crimes. The fraud is obvious. The confessions were extorted and dictated. There is not a shadow of proof that the Templars borrowed idolatrous rites and immoral practices from the Orientals with whom they had come in contact. Besides, at the last moment, those who could do so retracted their avowals, whereupon they were burnt alive for having relapsed (1310).
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 81
The Grand Master, Jacques de Molay, who had confessed under the threat of torture, retracted his confession four years later and perished at the stake (1314). The persecution spread to the other nations of Europe. Even in England, where the employment of torture has always been repugnant to the free instincts of the people, it was brought into play at the express demand of the Pope. When the order was suppressed (1312), the princes confiscated its property, giving a part to other orders and not a little to the Papacy. This was one of the most detestable affairs of a period in history which ignorance and fanaticism are still apt to admire. But if the Pope's responsibility was great, that of Philip the Fair was still heavier : for the pontiff, weak and domesticated, was the accomplice, not the instigator of the king. Philip acted with no less cruelty and cynicism when he turned his attention to getting rid of Jews and lepers.
• « • • •
40. The dogma of the Incarnation was a stumbling-block for human reason. As early as the fourth century some endeavoured to meet the difficulty by the theory of adoption. God had adopted Jesus Christ at the time of His baptism in the Jordan. This theory, not far removed from Arianism, was upheld chiefly in Spain, in the time of Charlemagne, condemned by the Council of Ratisbon (792), and refuted by Alcuin (799). Traces of it are to be found, however, in the teaching of Abelard.
41. Vain attempts have been made to impute the worship of the Virgin Mary to the Christians of the fourth century. It was not until the fifth and sixth centuries that Mariolatry declared itself in the East. Men were taught that Mary was carried up to Heaven by angels, and the Emperor Maurice instituted the Feast of the Assumption in her honour (582). This feast was adopted in the West about the year 750. From the twelfth century Mary has been adored, especially in France, as the Mother of God, almost as a goddess. It was to this epoch that a singular miracle was ascribed in documents concocted some three centuries later. It was said that the house {Casa) of the Virgin in Nazareth had been transported by angels, first into Dalmatia (1291) and thence to Loretto, where it became the
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82 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
object of a lucrative pilgrimage, attracting, in our days, more than a hundred thousand faithful annually. In order that nothing might be wanting to these pagan rites, many pilgrims got a figure of the Madonna of Loretto tattooed in blue on their arms. Hundreds of other still existing sanctuaries owe their foundation and prosperity to Mariolatry. Two facts contributed very powerfully to the formation of this cult : the honour in which celibacy was held, and the necessity for a feminine ideal in the Christian pantheon. Monasticism found satisfaction here for starved affections, as did chivalry for its romantic gallantry. Mary became the mediator between suffering humanity and the glorified Christ, who yielded up His role of intercessor to her more and more, being in His turn moved to pardon by her prayers.
42. But did Mary, at her birth, receive the infection of original sin ? If so, why did she not transmit it to Jesus ? This difficulty was met, in the twelfth century, by the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which means, not what the less in- structed public supposes, but that at the moment when the body of Mary received its soul, a particular act of grace preserved it from the contagion of sin. This doctrine was upheld by Duns Scotus against St. Thomas, by the Franciscans against the Dominicans, by the Jesuits against the Jansenists. In 1854 it became an article of faith in the Roman Church. The Greelc Church, Mariolatrous as it is, does not admit it. As for the Reformed Churches, they all, with the exception of the English Ritualists, hold the adoration of Mary in horror.
43. In order to combat the new opinion, the Dominicans of Berne, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, chose a young man of weak intellect, a tailor's apprentice, and caused Mary herself to appear before his eyes to protest against the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. The fraud was discovered, and four Dominicans were burnt at the stal^e (1509). Long before this, however, the Dominicans had made use of St. Catherine of Siena, to whom the Virgin revealed that she had been born in sin ; unfortunately, the Franciscans had a contemporary saint of their own, St. Bridget, to whom Mary declared, with equal confidence, that she had been born free from sin (1375).
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 83
44. It became necessary to put limits to the cult of saints, and the Church reserved to herself the right of choosing them (tenth century). Ever since the twelfth century, the Papacy alone has had the power to beatify or canonise individuals, after | a regular process of trial in which the deviPs advocate has to be ; heard. This advocate did not prevent the canonisation of blood- j thirsty Inquisitors, like the Italian Peter Martyr of Verona (t 1365), and the Spaniard, Pedro Arbues (t 1485), the latter enrolled among the saints by Pius IX., in defiance of all modern and humane ideas. The Roman Church, moreover, honours a number of saints — such as Rene, Philomena, Reine, Corona — whose only fault is that they never existed.
45. In order to feed the piety of the populace, which delighted in tales of miracles, a monk called Jacobus de Voragine published, in 1298, the Golden Legend, which still exercises a certain influence on literature and art. It is a regular Christian mythology, taken from the most doubtful sources, charming to the sceptical dilet- tante, exasperating to a reverent believer. If the first result is the more usual one in these days, it is easy to guess the reason.
46. In Catholic countries a man is still said to fulfil his religious duties when he "goes to Mass." The word Alass comes, perhaps, from the concluding formula of the service in the course of which the bread and the wine are consecrated and absorbed by the officiating priest : ite missa est. Doubts, how- ever, attach to this derivation. It is possible that viissa was a popular Latin word meaning function, or ceremony. As early as the end of the first century traces of a religious ceremony connected with the offering of bread and wine are to be found in Rome : this was the origin of the modern Mass.
47. If we examine the texts relating to the Eucharist in their chronological order, it appears that at first this repast was merely the commemoration of the Last Supper of Christ by the consumption of bread and wine in common by the faithful. As time passed the supper in common disappeared, the consumption of bread and wine took on a magic character, until finally it was believed that the actual body and blood of Jesus were present in the host and the chalice. That is the case as put by the Protestants. But to those who know how
84 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
great a part theophagy played in the more or less secret rites of many non-Christian religions it is difficult to deny that as early as the time of St. Paul, and in his thoughts, the Holy Supper tended to put on a similar character, hidden, at first, from the non-believer by a discreet and even compulsory silence (as were the arcana of the mystic rites of paganism). The dogma of the Real Presence was distinctly formulated by the monk Paschasius Radbertus of Corbie (844), but it had existed, as a belief, long before his time. Berengarius of Tours, by whom this materialistic conception was attacked, had to retract in 1059, and twenty years later the dogma of transubstantiation was adopted by a Council at Rome, j 48. About the year 1150 a discussion arose in Paris as to
I whether the bread was changed into the body of Christ as soon as the words " This is my body " were pronounced, or whether j it awaited the transformation of the wine. It was in order to j assert the former opinion that, about 1200, the priests of Paris I were instructed to elevate the host in full view of the congrega- tion, immediately after having pronounced the formula. By the thirteenth century this custom had become general.
49. It was at this period that the privilege of sharing the wine was withdrawn from the laity, who thenceforth had the right only to the host, the priest drinking the wine on behalf of all. The change was brought about by accidents which had become so frequent as to be a scandal, especially the spilling of the sacred wine. Those who persisted in claiming participation in the chalice were called Calixtines ; in Bohemia, where they were connected with the heresy of John Huss, they were treated with great rigour. I 50. The Eucharist gave occasion for a new festival. " No ' ceremony of the Church, perhaps, is nobler, more magnificent, ; more capable of filling beholders with piety, than the feast of the Holy Sacrament. Antiquity itself had no ceremony more august. And yet who was the real cause of its establishment ? A nun of the convent of Moncornillon near Liege, who fancied ev^ery night she saw a hole in the moon. This was duly followed by a revelation from which she learnt that the moon meant the Church and the hole a festival which was yet wanting. A
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 85
monk called John collaborated with her in composing the office of the Holy Sacrament. The festival was first established at Liege ; Urban IV. adopted it for the Church at large (1 264)." ^ This festival was long a source of trouble. In Paris, in the sixteenth century, the Catholics forced the Protestants to decorate their houses and kneel in the streets as the Communion procession went by. One of the crimes which brought the Chevalier de la Barre to the scaffold, in 1766, was that of having kept on his hat one rainy day as he passed a procession of the Sacrament.
51. The Church's tendency after the year 1000 was towards domination both in spiritual and temporal matters. The clergy had to think and act for every one. The laity was forbidden to read the Scriptures (1229). " It was an insult to humanity to say : we wish you to cherish a certain belief, but we do not wish you to read the book on which that belief is founded." ^ Prayer became little more than a mechanical exercise, aided, after the twelfth century (perhaps from Mahommedan example), by the use of chaplet and rosary. Hundreds, thousands of Ave Marias had to be recited as penance for the slightest fault. Excluded thus from religious life, which was the only life for the simple thought of the age, the crowd attached all the more importance to those rites in which they were allowed, and even compelled, to participate. The Church adjudicated on these points also. Following Peter Lombard, she decided in the twelfth century that there were seven sacraments, neither more nor less : Baptism, the Eucharist, Marriage, Confirmation, Ordination, Penance, and Extreme Unction. Needless to say, no foundation for such a doctrine could be discovered in the Gospels.
52. " Confess your faults one to another," says the writer ot the epistle ascribed to St. James. The primitive Church had practised confession in public, which had its obvious drawbacks. The victorious Church saw in confession a powerful means of influencing souls, and substituted private confession to a priest for confession in public. Confession implied penance, which was usually some good work, such as a gift to the Church. But the Church, the custodian of the infinite merits of Christ and the
1 Voltaire. « Ibid.
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Saints, could draw upon this inexhaustible treasure to exempt the penitent, either wholly or in part, from the consequences his acts would otherwise have brought upon him in the other life. Thus the practice of confession led inevitably to that traffic in the chastisements of Purgatory and in ecclesiastical indulgences which was one of the determining causes of the Reformation.
53. In 1215, under Innocent III., auricular confession at least once a year was made obligatory. A priest alone could hear confession. An abbess, even of the most important convent of women, had no such right — a curious indignity put by the Church on the sex to which the Mother of God belonged.
54. " A custom which began to be introduced in the eleventh century must not be forgotten, that of buying off' the dead and delivering their souls from Purgatory by the alms and prayers of the living. A solemn festival consecrated to this form of piety was established. The Cardinal Pierre Damien relates that a pilgrim, on his way back from Jerusalem, was cast upon an island, where he found a pious hermit, from whom he learnt that the island was inhabited by devils, that the country in his neighbourhood was covered with flames, into which the devils threw the souls of the newly dead, that these same devils never ceased to cry out and howl against Odilon, Abbot of Cluny, whom they called their mortal enemy. ' The prayers of Odilon,' they declared, * and his monks, were always robbing them of some soul.' This being reported to Odilon, he established the Fete des Moris (Festival of the Dead) at his Abbey of Cluny. The Church soon followed his example. If matters had stopped there it would have been but a form of devotion the more ; but abuses were not long in creeping in. The mendicant friars, especially, required payment for delivering souls from Purgatory. They talked of apparitions of the dead, of piteous souls who came to beg for rescue, and of the sudden deaths and eternal tortures of those who refused their help. Pure brigandage succeeded to pious credulity, and was one of the causes which lost half Europe to the Roman Church." ^
55. The traffic in indulgences became more shameless than ever after the institution of the jubilees by Boniface VIII.
* Voltaire.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 87
(1300). It was not long before jubilees at intervals of twenty- five years were established, in order that every one might have a chance of participating in the indulgence promised by the Church to all who made the pilgrimage to Rome. At the same time monks travelled about selling indulgences, both plenary and partial. One Franciscan declared that the Pope, if he chose, could empty Purgatory at a single stroke. Why, then, did he hesitate to do so ? That Franciscan was troublesome, but his statement was logical ; the Sorbonne condemned him on both counts.
56. The marriage of priests had already been prohibited in the West during the fourth century ; it seemed intolerable to Gregory VII., who sought to have it forbidden by the secular power. In spite of the Church's efforts, the principle of ecclesiastical celibacy did not triumph, however, until the thirteenth century ; and even then certain compromises with the full rigour of the law were admitted — in South America, for instance. Celibacy did not make the priests any better, but it exposed them to taunts which were often justified, and thus diminished their influence with the people ; it provided the Reformers with one of their arguments. However, from the point of view of efl^lciency, sacerdotal celibacy has added immensely to the power of the Roman Church. An unmarried priest or monk is free from worldly cares ; his superiors can send him to any place, or eventually dismiss him, without fearing to endanger or starve a family. The individual may suffer morally or otherwise ; but it means a permanent benefit to the govern- ment of souls.
• • • • •
57. When we examine the attitude of the Church toward heresies we are at first struck with admiration. She has always known how to preserve the just mean between mysticism and rationalism. Obliged by her very origin to impose upon the world a certain number of beliefs the truth of which she cannot demonstrate, she allows nothing to be either subtracted from or added to them. Dogma is a province administered by herself, in which intruders are treated as enemies. This good sense of the Church was in full accordance with her temporal interests.
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Mystics and infidels alike claim to do without her, without her images, her relics, her magic. They are " bad taxpa 'ers." But the Church is a vast and very expensive organisation. She requires a great deal of money. Now, I defy any one to name a single opinion persecuted by the Church in the Middle Ages, the adoption of which would not have brought about a diminution in her revenues. Voltaire is absolutely in the wrong when he writes : " In all the disputes which have excited Christians against each other, Rome has invariably decided in favour of that opinion which tended most towards the sup- pression of the human intellect and the annihilation of the reasoning powers." The Church did not take arms against reason whenever her tenets allowed her to be reasonable ; moreover, she was not tyrannical for the mere pleasure of being so ; she had to think of her finances.
58. When her authority and material interests were not involved the Church was tolerant enough. People might amuse themselves, even at the expense of the decencies of worship, so long as they made no pretence of doing without it. " The most august features of religion were disfigured in the West by the most ridiculous customs. The Feast of Fools, and that of the Ass, were established festivals in the majority of churches. On certain solemn days a Bishop of Fools was elected ; an ass was introduced into the nave dressed up in cope and biretta. The ass was honoured in memory of the animal which carried Jesus Christ. At the end of the Mass the priest set himself to bray three times with all his might, and the people echoed him. Dancing in the churches and indecent fooleries formed part of the ceremonies at these commemorations, a practice which lasted for some seven centuries in many a diocese. Rome could not put an end to these barbarous usages, any more than to the duel and the trial by ordeal. In the rites of the Roman Church, how- ever, there was always more decency and gravity than elsewhere ; we feel that, on the whole, when she was free and well governed, she existed to set a good example to other communions."^
59. The Iconoclasts, or image-breakers, were those Eastern Christians who attempted, in the eighth century, to strip the
1 Voltaire.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 89
churches of statues, which had come to be venerated Hke idols. Many causes have been named for this movement — memories of the Mosaic legislation, so hostile to idolatry ; fear of Musulman satire. The true reason seems to have been hostility to the monks, whom the manufacture of images enriched. Leo the Isaurian was a violent Iconoclast ; his son, Constantine Copro- nymus, obtained the condemnation of images by the Council of 754. But the Empress Irene, wife of Leo IV., Constantine's successor, was won over by the monks when she became regent, and caused the condemnation to be reversed by a later Council (786). To worship images was not permitted, but to kiss them, to prostrate oneself before them, to burn candles and incense at their feet, was legitimate. Charlemagne, or rather Alcuin, director of the Palace School, who had iconoclastic tendencies, protested against the adoration at least, if not against the existence, of the images themselves, in the West. His protest was upheld by two Prankish Councils ; but the pagan current in the Church was too strong, and too many material interests were involved. Down to the time of the Reformation the advocates of images triumphed all over Europe. Happily for art, they have never been silenced, though the Tridentine Council made some concessions to them.
60. "A heretic," says Bossuet, "is a man with an opinion." (hairesis, in Greek, " choice.") In the darker centuries of the Middle Ages few men had intellect enough to think for them- selves. Gottschalk, a monk of Fulda, exaggerated Augustinism and the doctrine of predestination. He was condemned by two synods and thrown into prison (849). The other heresies of the time need not be recorded here. It is only after the year 1000 that they become interesting.
61. The great heresies of the twelfth and thirteenth cen- turies may be divided into two classes. The first were the revolts of honest people, who dreamt of the purity of apostolic times and wished profoundly to reform the hierarchy, or even to suppress it. These were the anti- sacerdotal heretics, whom the Church persecuted with most severity because they threatened both her organisation and her property. The other class were the dogmatic heretics, affiliated to Oriental Manichaeisra, which
\
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ended in the ascetic doctrine. The Church, a government wishing to hve and to let live, could not tolerate them either.
62. Arnold of Brescia, a pupil of Abelard, took the field in Italy, Switzerland, and France against the wealth and corrup- tion of the clergy. By his eloquence he gained over the citizens of Rome, who established the simulacrum of a republic. The Pope summoned the Emperor Frederick I. to his assistance. Frederick besieged Rome, and took it through the treachery of the nobles. Arnold was strangled and his body burnt (1155).
63. A sect of Eastern Manichees, or Manichaeans, the Pauli- cians (referring not to Paul the Apostle, but to Paul of Samo- sata), had spread over Bulgaria, and thence up the valley of the Danube towards Italy and France. Its members called them- selves Cathari ; that is. The ptire. The name was corrupted into Patarins, and in Germany into Ketzer, which became the German term for heretics in general. Indian Buddhism and Persian Mazdeism both contributed elements to their creed. They taught that the God of the Old Testament was the Devil, that Jesus was the good God, and that the Devil in the form of sensuality was to be fought against. An inner ring, the Perfect, vowed themselves to celibacy, and all renounced the eating of flesh, except that of fishes. They had no baptism ; only a laying on of hands, which they called Consolation, which seems indeed to have been a custom of the primitive Christian Church. It was equivalent to initiation. The members con-
i fessed to each other. The Cathari were strictly moral, although •^U they were calumniated by hostile rumours. In the comparatively 'i advanced civilisation of the south of France they gathered ;1 numerous recruits, and had bishops both at Toulouse and at jiAlbi. It was from the latter city that they took their name of Albigenses.
64. The Church waged a relentless war against these in- offensive sectaries. As St. Bernard failed to convince them of their errors. Innocent III., in 1208, preached a crusade against them. Raymond VI., Count of Toulouse, was obliged to take the field against his own subjects. He saw his lands invaded by 300,000 adventurers, who for some twenty years murdered.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 91
burnt, and pillaged under the orders of the Pope's legate (1209- 1229). 1 Flourishing cities, like Beziers and Carcassonne, were treated as the Crusaders treated Byzantium. At the siege of Lavaur, the Seigtieur and eighty knights were taken prisoners and condemned to be hanged. But the gallows being broken, they were handed over to the Crusaders, who massacred them all. Three hundred of the inhabitants, who refused to recant their opinions, were burnt round a well down which the sister of the Seigneur had been previously thrown (1211). And besides the thousands of wretched people who died by the sword and at the stake, how many rotted to death in obscure dungeons! The Inquisition, established in 1232 in order to stamp out the remains of this particular heresy, set the faggots blazing all over the country and completed its ruin. Provencal civilisation received such a blow that it took three centuries to recover. We are still waiting, both at Beziers and at Carcassonne, for expiatory memorials to the Albigensian martyrs.
65. As early as the ninth century, when Claude, Bishop of Turin, combated the worship of images and other pagan prac- tices, Piedmont formed a school of honest clerics who turned their attention to the reform of the Church. Towards 1100 we find Pierre de Brueys, burnt in 1124, insisting that the Bible afforded the only rule of faith and worship. After him Henry, a Lombard, preached at Lausanne, in Burgundy, and at Le Mans ; he was condemned in 1148. Finally a rich citizen of Lyons, Pierre Waldo, having read the Bible and admired it, caused it to be translated into the vernacular, divided his property among the people, and founded a church for the poor, the Pauvres de Lyon^ or Htimilies. Of course these " Poor Men " were perse- cuted. The remains of their community withdrew into the valleys of the Alps, and there founded the Church of the Waldenses, the principles of which are very similar to those of the Reformation. Like the Reformers, the Waldenses endeavoured to spread the knowledge of those sacred writings which Pope Innocent III. had forbidden the faithful to read.
66. The persecution of the Waldenses was revived under
^ Lea, History oftht Inquisition, vol. i.
i
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Clement XII., an Avignon Pope. Hundreds were burnt by the Inquisition at Grenoble and in Dauphind. Towards the end of the fifteenth century a papal legate undertook their extermina- tion, and conducted a ferocious crusade against them. Whole bands were smoked to death by him in caves in which they had taken refuge. Those of the Piedmontese valleys only escaped similar treatment through the protection of one of the Dukes of Savoy. In 1663, and again in 1686, these hateful persecutions were revived at the instigation of Louis XIV., and entire valleys were depopulated. The executioners were Irish mercenaries, retained for the purpose by the then Duke of Savoy. The survivors found asylum in Switzerland and Germany. Acting from that base, a few hundred brave men, led by their pastor, Henri Arnaud, undertook to reconquer their country. They were on the point of failure, when the Duke of Savoy, who was by that time at war with France, made peace with them and put the defence of their valleys into their own hands. An edict of toleration, obtained in 1694, allowed them to live in peace thenceforward.
67. Other less extensive heresies were suppressed with equal vigour by the Church. Nicholas of Basle, founder of the Friends of God (Gottesfreunde), was burnt by the Inquisition in 1383. The Flagellants, who were at first encouraged in their silly forms of penance, had to undergo the lot of all those mystics who fell short of entire submission to the Church. We have seen that the Inquisition raged against the spiritual Franciscans ; it also persecuted the Beguins and Beguines of Flanders, whose semi- secular associations had a tendency to disregard the hierarchy.
68. With the exception of the Waldenses, the sects persecuted by the Church lacked moderation and good sense. Even the Albigenses, with their extravagant asceticism, would eventually have become a danger to civil society. It does not appear, however, that in its struggle against the sectaries the Church was moved by any such wise consideration as this. Those historians who uphold the opposite view are not arguing in good faith. The Church fought for her own authority, for her privileges and wealth ; and she did so with an unexampled ferocity, which was all the more culpable in that she pretended
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 93
to be inspired by the Gospel, by a religion of kindness and humility.
• • • • •
69. During the second half of the twelfth century Paris was the centre of theological studies. Pope Innocent III. and John of Salisbury, the one Italian, the other English, came there for instruction. Speculative thinking had been revived in the schools, about the end of the eleventh century, by the influence ^ of Aristotle, whose works had been translated first into Arabic, i and afterwards into Latin. Thence arose what was called j the Scholastic Philosophy, a sort of Aristotelian Christianity. Among its teachers, who sought to found Christianity upon logic and metaphysics, were some men of great ability, such as Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury (1033-1109). Not only did he con- ceive what is called the ontological proof of God's existence (" I conceive God as perfect ; being perfect He must exist, because reality is an attribute of perfection " — the sophistry of this was only fully demonstrated by Kant) ; he also formulated, with the full approbation of the Church, the ingenious theory of Atone- ment. Man has sinned against God, he has accumulated an infinity of misdeeds ; to counterbalance such a mass of in- debtedness all good works are insufficient ; hence the necessity for the sacrifice of God made man, for the Incarnation and the Redemption. It was by the example of Anselm that people were taught to find arguments for the faith in reason, and not only in the opinions of the Fathers of the Church. So far we may say he opened the door to rationalism. Progress in this direction was helped by the long quarrel of the Nominalists, who denied the real existence of general ideas ; of the Realists, who (like Anselm) affirmed it ; and of the Conceptualists (like Abelard), who declared that conceptions were the only realities. This discussion, which has seemed so idle since the days of Kant, helped to withdraw educated men from the tyranny of ready- made opinions, to induce them to seek truth outside tradition and to reason freely. " You may discuss," said St. Bernard, " provided that your faith is impregnable." In his eyes philo- sophy was the servant of faith. It was a servant, however, which from the very beginning sometimes assumed the attitude of a
94 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
mistress. This the Church perceived, and Scholastic Philosophy soon created no little trouble for her.
70. The learned and subtle Abelard (1079-1143), surrounded by hundreds of disciples, both in Paris and Champagne, trans- formed the sacraments into symbols and denied the power of indulgences. Condemned by a Council of 1121, and combated by St. Bernard, he ended his days in the cloisters of Cluny, almost as a captive. Albertus Magnus, or Albert the Great, the Dominican, was chiefly occupied with science, and, while gaining for himself the reputation of a sorcerer, contrived to turn minds towards the study of nature (1193-1280). But the greatest and most original of medieval savants was the monk Roger Bacon (1214-1294), who passed fourteen years in prison under a charge of magic. His "magic" consisted in searching for and surprising the secrets of created things. At the same epoch the Catholicism of the Middle Ages found its most complete expression in the great Summa Theologice of
; St. Thomas Aquinas. This Italian Dominican, who died in
/ 1274, aged only forty-nine, was a man of genius in his way.
' In spite of its crabbed and essentially scholastic character, his
Sutnma reveals an intellect that was almost liberal. The
Papacy of our day recommends the study of his works as the
foundation of all sound theology.
71. To St. Thomas Aquinas the Franciscans opposed a member of their own order in Duns Scotus (t 1308), who would now be completely forgotten but for the long rivalry of the Scotists and the Thomisfs. No less neglected are the mystics Bonaventura, Eckart, and Tauler, on whom, moreover, the Church looks askance. But the chief mystical work of these dreary times is still read with emotion. This is the Imitation of Christ, sometimes attributed to Jean Gerson, a Paris doctor, but in reality the work of the canon Thomas a Kempis, of Deventer (t 1471). Disgusted with the world, and even with the Church, the soul of the writer turns wholly towards God,
and finds peace in solitary meditation.
. • . • •
72. The dawn of the Renaissance at once brought new tendencies into the world of thought. The exodus of Greek
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 95
scholars from Byzantium introduced the works of Plato to Western Europe, and initiated a change which was greatly hastened by the invention of printing. In Italy the Hiimanists were inclined towards a sort of pagan pantheism ; in Germany they became passionately absorbed in the study of texts, both Greek and Hebrew, and inaugurated historical criticism. Hans Reuchlin, of Basle (1455-1522), a Hebraist of great merit, saved the Jewish books of the Middle Ages, which the Cologne Inquisition wished to burn. Erasmus of Rotterdam, prince of the scholars of his age, established himself in 1521 at Basle, which he made a focus of light. In his elegant Latin he laughs at the superstitions, abuses, and ignorance of the monks with an irony worthy of Voltaire. He published the Greek text of the New Testament for the first time, with a really exact translation into Latin, and recommended study of the Scriptures as the pious work par excellence. The philological science of the sacred texts, which was destined to destroy the pretensions of the Church, recognises Erasmus and Reuchlin as its founders.
73. Even more than these keen-minded savants, two men of action, John Wyclif and John Huss, deserved to be called reformers before the Reformation. Wyclif, a native of England (6. 1320), led a strong party against the tyranny and greed of the monastic orders, against the encroachments of the Roman Curia and the idolatrous beliefs it propagated. "What the Waldenses taught in secret he preached in public ; and, with but slight modifications, his doctrine was that of the Protestants who appeared more than a century after his death." ^ In 1380 he translated the Bible into English, which gave him great prestige with the people. But his advanced opinions disquieted the ruling classes, who obliged him to resign his chair at Oxford and retire into a country parish, where he died in 1384. His disciples, who were called Lollards^ or "mutterers," were persecuted after his death.
74. John Huss was born in Bohemia in 1373. He was Rector of the University of Prague, and in conjunction with his friend Jerome of Prague, who had read Wyclifs books, undertook a war against the Papacy in the name of the Bible. Driven out
^ Voltaire.
96 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
of the university, and a wanderer, but always commanding an audience, he was summoned by the Emperor Sigismund before the Council of Constance. Arming himself with a safe-conduct, he obeyed the summons ; but his safe-conduct was outrageously set at naught by the Dominicans. In spite of the protests of the Bohemian deputies, he was kept in prison for six months, and afterwards brought before the Council, by which he was ordered to retract his opinions. On his refusal they burnt him. He met his death like a hero. Shortly afterwards they burnt his friend Jerome also. Sigismund had behaved like a coward, and the fathers of the Council like rascals. There was an explosion of fury in Bohemia, where the sect of the CalixtineSy who demanded the Eucharist in both sorts (chalice and host), had already found many adherents. Calixtines and Hussites united to claim for the reform of the clergy and the suppression of abuses. The mountain of Tabor became their fortress, whence they defied the armies of Sigismund, and replied to the massacres of Hussites by massacres of friars. In the end the Council of Basle re-established peace ; but Hussite communities survived in both Moravia and Bohemia. The so-called Moravian Brothers, who have distinguished themselves as missionaries, were recruited from what was left of the Hussites (1457). Reconstituted after long persecutions in 1722, the Moravians settled at Herrnhut, in Lusatia. They are the Quakers of Germany. These Herrnhutians exercised a strong influence over the English Methodists in the eighteenth century. They enlisted many recruits even in America, and still number more than a hundred thousand souls.
75. Even in Italy, at the very gates of Rome, the militant spirit of reform was blowing up for tempest. The eloquence of the Dominican monk Savonarola, directed in the main against immorality and luxury, aroused extraordinary enthusiasm at Florence. Bonfires were made of pictures, books, women's ornaments. It was not long, however, before this wild sect {Arrahiati) had to count with the ill-will of the Medici and of all those who depended on luxury and depravity for their living. Florence was by no means ripe for a Calvin ; and yet she bore with the Dominican for eight years. The flight of the Medici
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 97
and the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. seemed at first to confirm his forecasts. But as soon as the French king left the country Rome excommunicated Savonarola, and Alexander VI. (Borgia) determined to make short work of him. As Alexander was a voluptuary himself, the Dominican attacked him openly, and was foolish enough to offer to prove his own innocence by undergoing the ordeal of fire. At the last moment he shrank from the test, and the Franciscans, his sworn enemies, took the offensive against him. Condemned as a heretic by the Inquisition, he expiated his reforming ardour at the stake (1498).
Voltaire thus concludes his account of these events : " You follow these scenes of absurdity and horror with pity ; you find nothing like them among the Romans, the Greeks, or the old barbarians. They were the fruit of the most infamous supersti- tion which has ever degraded man. . . . But you know that we have not long emerged from such darkness, and that not even yet is the light complete."
* • • • «
76. The repression of unacceptable opinions, considered to be offences against God, was at first left to the bishops and the secular priests. But the progress of the Albigensian heresy convinced the Holy See that a special organisation, entirely dependent on Rome, was required to make head against such formidable dangers. The bishops were too much occupied, too indulgent, too accessible to local considerations. From 1215 to 1229, between the fourth Lateran Council and the Synod of Toulouse, the nascent Inquisition felt its way. In 1232 Gregory IX. created the tribunals of the Inquisition to deal with heretical perversity (hceretka pravitas), and put the Dominicans in charge of them. The term " Inquisition " was borrowed from the juridical language of ancient Rome. In- quisition is an inquiry, set afoot by denunciations or merely on suspicion, having for its object to compel those suspected to prove the orthodoxy of their beliefs. The tribunals of the Inquisition were empowered to condemn their victims to be imprisoned, to be flogged, to go on distant pilgrimages, to wear disgraceful badges which prevented them from earning their bread; but they could not inflict the punishment of death : this would have II
98 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
violated the axiom " The Church has a horror of blood," a prin- ciple which forbade, for instance, a priest to practise surgery. It was in obedience to this principle that a bishop of Beauvais, in the time of Philip Augustus, used a mace in battle instead of a lance, saying it would be irregular for him to shed human blood.^ The Inquisition, however, concocted a device which allowed it to be sanguinary without "irregularity." When it considered one of its prisoners to be worthy of death, it an- nounced that the Church could do nothing more for him, that he was cut off from her and abandoned to the secular arm — that is, to the civil magistrates. These latter were directed to burn him alive. If they hesitated, the Church threatened them with excommunication. Thus she combined hypocrisy with cruelty. All this did not prevent sophists like Joseph de Maistre from affirming, in the nineteenth century, that blood has never been shed by the Church ; she had contented herself with forcing the civil power to shed it for her ! Not only was the Papacy responsible for the Inquisition ; it actively encouraged and excited its ferocity. The horrible punishment of death by fire was formally prescribed by Rome (1231), and indulgences were promised to those who provided faggots for the' purpose. As a well-meaning old woman at Constance deposited a faggot at the feet of John Huss, " Oh ! sacred simplicity," said the martyr, with a smile.
77. Frightful as were the punishments inflicted by the Inquisition — and imprisonment for life in pestilential gaols was perhaps worse than death at the stake — its methods of procedure were still more abominable. The accused, who was generally some poor wretch without education, had to do without counsel, for an advocate would have been accused of impeding the Inquisition, and prosecuted in his turn. He did not know of what he was accused ; he knew neither the names of the witnesses against him nor the nature of their depositions. Captious questions were put to him ; traps were laid for him ; he was induced to accuse himself. If he proved obdurate he was tortured. To torture more than once was forbidden, but the torture was "continued," even after a long interval, if at first
* Voltaire.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 99
it had not produced the desired effect. Now, St. Augustine had insisted on the absurdity of torture ; Pope Nicholas I. had forbidden the use of it (866) ; Gratian condemned it (1150). So when Innocent IV. enjoined it to extort confessions from Italian heretics (1252), he could not even plead ignorance as an excuse.
Manuals for the guidance of inquisitors are still extant, with their schemes of interrogatories. They are monuments of astute trickery. The chief object of "the question" — as torture was called — was to oblige the accused to denounce his accomplices, or those who shared his opinions. One can imagine how many innocent victims must have been dragged before such tribunals, which, as a consummation of their infamy, took possession of the property they confiscated and handed it over to the Holy See. They had the power to put a man who had been dead for forty years on his trial for heresy, and, if he were convicted, to dig up and burn his body, strip his heirs of their property, and reduce his family to misery and despair. Such was the regime established by the Dominican Inquisition in the south of France, and extended so far as possible to the other nations of Christendom.
78. We are speaking here of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, called the Papal or Holy hiquisition, and the Holy Ojfice^ because it depended on the Holy See. Further on we shall discuss the Royal Inquisition of Spain, the only one of which the general public has some knowledge. The former was the more atrocious and pitiless of the two. It burnt Albigenses, Waldenses, Hussites and witches by the thousand. It meanly placed itself at the service of the political authorities, satisfying their cupidity and their revenge, as when it burnt the innocent Knights of the Temple and the innocent Joan of Arc. It covered the world with desolation and terror, until kings and rulers, disgusted by its arbitrary proceedings, had gradually proscribed its entrance into their States. It is difficult to understand how such horrors could have been submitted to by one part of Europe for century after century. Such toleration is only to be explained by the idea the Church had implanted in the hearts of the people, who thought heresy, the crime against
100 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
God, to be the worst of crimes, one which exposed a city, a pro- I vince, or a nation to the divine anger, and to such punishments as floods, pestilence, and famine, if it were not promptly and sternly suppressed. The heretic had to be treated like one stricken by the plague, or rather like his garments, which are thrown into the fire without hesitation. Again, the sight of these solemn executions, to which people flocked as if to a ftte^ hardened hearts, awakened hereditary instincts of ferocity, and made the populace indifferent to the sufferings of others. Indeed, the long duration of the Inquisition is not so surprising as the fact that means were found to put an end to it.
79. Except in Spain, where its flourishing period was just setting in, the Inquisition was greatly discredited at the opening of the sixteenth century. This was one cause of the comparative success of the Reformation. If they had found themselves in presence of the formidable Inquisitors of the thirteenth century, the Reformers would have met the same fate as the Albigenses.
80. Satan was all-pervading in the Middle Ages, both as god of evil and as dispenser of worldly wealth. This belief was not created by the Church, any more than the idea that certain women, having made a bargain with the devil, betook themselves to the " Sabbath " on grotesque steeds, and there acquired redoubtable powers for evil. These tenacious superstitions had an ancient pagan and Germanic foundation. But the better instructed Church ought not to have shared them. Not only did she do so, but her theologians, pointing to the verse of Exodus, " Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," organised witch hunts with the help of the Inquisition, and stirred up the civil power to do likewise. Denounced by gossips and subjected to frightful tortures, the unhappy women avowed that they had joined in a " Sabbath," and gave details of imaginary orgies. They were burnt in crowds, and their punishments both inflamed imaginations and loosened tongues. Every inquisitor who
• received a mandate to suppress witchcraft became an active missionary in spreading it. People's minds grew familiar with the idea that they were surrounded by sorceries, and that the least misfortune was the result of some witch's malignity. Wherever an inquisitor came, he found himself overwhelmed
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 101
with denunciations, accusing every one who might be sup- posed guilty, from young people to very old women. The epidemic was greatly increased by the publication of the Bull Summis desiderantes, launched by Innocent VIII. on December 5, 1484. In it the Pope affirms with sorrow that all the Germanic territories are filled with men and women who put the maleficent power of sorcery in action against the faithful. He describes the results with a terrifying wealth of detail. . . . To contest the reality of witchcraft was, therefore, to throw doubt on the authority of Christ's vicar on earth. ^
Under the sceptical Pope Leo X., the friend of Bembo and Raphael, hundreds of witches were burnt in the Lombard and Venetian valleys. It was in Germany, however, that the fury of the Dominican inquisitors piled up the greatest heaps of victims. Two of these inquisitors published an absurd book, " The Hammer of Witches," in which they pointed out the signs by which such women might be recognised and the means by which avowals might be extorted from them. The witch hunts lasted through- out the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It has been calcu- lated that 100,000 were burnt in Germany alone. It may be undeniable that in this business the civil tribunals showed them- selves even more savage and credulous than those of the Church ; that — even in America, in the eighteenth century — the Protes- tant communities were no less so ; it is none the less true that the Roman Church, in giving its official sanction to prosecutions for witchcraft and in appointing inquisitors for its suppression, must bear the chief responsibility for a murderous frenzy which confounds and mortifies human reason. ^
• • • • • '
81. Before the Reformation, the only great schism which succeeded was that of the Eastern Empire.
^ Lea, History of the Inquisition, vol. iii.
* The most celebrated case of sorcery in the seventeenth century was that of Urbain Grandier, a parish priest. He was accused of having bewitched the Ursulines of Loudun by throwing a branch of laurel into their convent. Pro- secuted with atrocious virulence by the Counsellor Laubardemont, a creature of Richelieu, he was convicted of black magic and burnt alive (1634). The most extraordinary part of the business is that Cardinal Richelieu, by whom the prosecution was inspired, seems to have believed in all good faith that a priest could bewitch nuns. Writing but fifty years later, Bossuet never alludes to witchcraft, though he was too prudent to denj' its existence.
102 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Since the time of Theodosius, Byzantium had become the New Rome"; so it was but natural that she should claim supremacy over the other Oriental Churches, especially that of Alexandria. About the year 500, the Bishop of Constantinople received from the Emperor the title of CEcumenical Patriarch, that is to say, Patriarch of the Empire (not of the Universe, as they pretended to interpret it in Rome), The Western Church rendered good service to the Eastern in the quarrel over images, when the seventh and last council before the schism, that of Nicsea, put an end to the Iconoclastic feud (787). But the pretensions of Rome to the government of all Christendom soon became intolerable in the city of Constantine. As early as the ninth century the Patriarch Photios protested against the innovations of Rome. The dispute was envenomed by the dis- agreement over the so-called " procession "" of the Holy Ghost. Did the Holy Ghost proceed from both the Father and the Son } No, said the Eastern Church, from the Father alone. This was the substance of the Filioque quarrel. The two churches failed to come to an agreement. The causes, however, of their antagonism were in reality more profound, and were of a political nature. The divorce, which still endures, was com- pleted about the middle of the eleventh century by the mutual anathemas of the Pope and the Patriarch. The Maronites of the Lebanon and, to a small extent, the Armenians, alone remained faithful to their Roman allegiance.
82. Attempts at reunion were not lacking. It was thought that success had crowned these efforts at the Council of Florence in 1439, when the Byzantines, in fear of the Turks, made all the concessions demanded. But the people, who had not forgotten the horrors worked by the Latins in 1204, refused to confirm the agreement. Constantinople fell to the infidels, sent by God to punish heretics. The latest attempt was due to Leo XHI. (July 1894), who addressed a most conciliatory letter to the Patriarch of Constantinople. The latter replied with some violence (August 1895), recalling all the innovations of the Roman Church : the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Son, Purgatory, the Immaculate Conception, Papal Infallibility ; and there the matter rests. Other differences between the two
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 103
Chiu'ches have to do with the baptismal rite — the Greeks prac- tising total immersion, like the Primitive Church — and the Eucharist, in which they give leavened bread, dipped in wine, to the communicant, instead of a dry, unleavened wafer.
83. The Eastern Church, which calls itself the Orthodox or Greek Church, numbers 150 millions of adherents. It is sub- divided into fifteen Churches, each with its own head and its own hierarchy. The Patriarch of Constantinople, great personage though he be, has no real authority. He has for a long time been on bad terms with the Churches of Bulgaria and Rou- mania. The Russian Church was not governed by the Czar, but by the Holy Synod, whose procurator, however, was nominated by the Czar. The priests of the Greek Church marry, but do not remarry. Bishops are chosen from among the unmarried monks. Nuns are not much esteemed and live apart from the com- munity. In the pomp of its ceremonial and its borrowings from paganism, notably its use of incense and wax candles and its adoration of images, the Orthodox Church stands closer to Romanism than to the Reformed Churches. These dallied with her, nevertheless, at the end of the sixteenth century, and the Anglican Church has not abandoned the game even now. The Russian moujik^ or peasant, has remained more pagan than Christian. His real religion belongs to the domain of folk-lore. The Hellene is profoundly sceptical, but clings to his Church as the safeguard of his nationality. It has been said that the Greek awaited the restoration of his independence for four centuries, in the shadow of his Church. This is true. Enslaved Greece was nourished by her Church as an infant in swaddling-clothes is nourished by milk. But this is no reason why the adolescent should continue to live on milk. If the Greeks of to-day, like the Byzantine Greeks of the Middle Ages, are inferior to their glorious ancestors, their inferiority seems to be in some degree imputable to their Church. It familiarises them, from their earliest youth, with horrible colour-daubs which it calls Icons, with drawling and nasal voices, with stories of the saints which are an outrage on reason. The modern Greeks, though very intelligent, are no artists, they cannot sing in tune, and they have not yet given a man of genius to the world.
104 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
84. Their long struggles with the Mongols, the Musulmans, and the Latins have kept the Eastern Churches conservative and nationalist. For the people, forms of worship are more important than creeds. Divine service is performed in the national languages, but archaic forms no longer understood by the com- monalty are employed. The sacred books play a great part in worship, but they are not generally used in the vernacular. In March 1903, the publication of a translation of the Gospels caused a popular outbreak in Athens. Festivals do not coincide with those of the Roman Church, because the Greek Church is faithful to the Julian Calendar, which is now thirteen days behind ours. There is no regular process for the canonisation of saints, who consequently swarm, and work miracles through their images. Pilgrimages, especially to Jerusalem, are held in great honour, and the adoration of relics is no less flourishing than in the Roman Church. The clergy and the monks are held in slight consideration. " You are good for nothing," says a Greek song, " become a pope [j)appas] ! "
The lack of real Christianity in the Russian Empire explains the lack of popular resistance to atheistic Bolshevism (1917). The protests of the higher clergy remained unheeded ; convents and churches were sacked, priests and nuns killed or grossly insulted. A reaction, partly due to the intense misery of the people, especially in the towns, has made itself felt since 1919 ; large audiences flocked again into the churches ; associations were formed to feed the clergy. But the tendency seems to be rather towards mysticism and illuminism than in favour of the antiquated formalist religion which discredited itself, in auto- cratic Russia, by a too close alliance with the police.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The most abundant source of information is the Real-EncydojMdie of Hauck. Reference may also be made to the Biographie Univcrselle of Michaud, to the Oraiide EricyclopMie and the Eiwyd. Britannica, and to the Dictionary of National Biography (Stephen and Lee).
1. P. VioUet, Histoire cles TnstUutioTis politiques dt la France, 3 vols., 1890 (on the beneficent part played by the Church, vol. i, p. 380).
'2. Art. Armenflegc (Charity) in Hauck.
4. The Truce of God is found among the Germans, Arabs, and other nations. See art. Gottesfricde in Hauck. — Semichon, La Paix de Dieu, 2nd ed., 1869.
5. Em. Male, L'art religieux du XIW siecle, 1902.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 105
8. Art. Augustinus, Bonifatiits ( Wivfrid), Gregorius, Keltische Kirchc, Russ- land in Hauck ; Dom Cabrol, L' Angleterre chrMenne avant les Normands, 1908 ; H. Howortb, Early English Church, 3 vols., 1917 ; S. Czarnowski, Saint Patrick, 1919 ; J. Zeiller, Les orig. clirit. dans les prov. danubieyincs, 1918.
9. Art. Cyrillus und Methodius, Tschechcn (Bohemians), Anglikanische Kirche, Mongoltn, Nestorianer, in Hauck. — J. Labourt, Le Christianisme dans I'Empire Perse, 1904.
10. Art. Sachsen, TFenden, Albert von Riga (Livonia) in Hauck.
11. Art. Kreuzauffindung, in Hauck. — A. Luchaire, Le Culte des reliqioes (in Revue de Paris, July 1900).
13. Art. Legaten in Hauck.
15. Lea, Rise of the Tenworal Power {\n Stt(dies, 1883, p. 1 et seq.) ; Duchesne, Les Premiers Temps dt VEtat Pontifical, 1904. — Th. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, vol. vii., p. 135 (1899) ; M. Moresco, H patrimonio di S. Pietro, 1916 ; A. Gaudenzi, II constituto di Constantino, 1920.
16. Lea, Studies, 18S3, p. 46 (forged decretals) ; art. Kanonenund Decreten- Sammhmgeii and Pseudoisidor in Hauck ; P. Fournier, ^Lucle sur les faiiss/'s d6cr6tales, 1907 (decided in favour of Touraine rather than the neighbourhood of Reims or of Metz) ; Lot, Rev. hist., 1907, xciv., p. 290.
17. Lea, Auricular Cmijession and Indulgences, 3 vols., 1896.
18. Art. Peterspfennig (Peter's Pence) in Hauck.
19. Lea, Studies, 1883, p. 235 (excommunication).
20. Duchesne, Origincs du Culte chrititn, 1899 ; art. Liturgie in Hauck.
21. Art. Simonie in Hauck.
22. The sources are given in F. X. Funk, Lehrhuch dcr Kirchengeschichte, 5th ed., p. 281 ; Villemain, Gr^goire VII., 1873 ; A. Fliche, S. Grdgoire VII., 1920. See also art. Gregorius VII. in Hauck, with a copious bibliography.
24. Art. Rccket in Hauck.
26. A. Luchaire, Innocent III., 4 vols., 1904-1908; E, W. Meyer, Staatstheorien Innoz. III., 1920.
27. Frederick II., the heretics and free thought: Lea, History of the Inquisition, vol. i. ; Ch. V. Langlois, Philippe Ic Bel et Boniface VIII. (in Lavisse, Histoirede France, iii. 2, 1901) ; H. Koehler, Die Ketzerjwlitikder d. Kcdser, 1913 ; the legend of the three impostors is of Islamic origin and appears as early as 909 (Rev. hist. litt. rel.. May 1920).
29. N. Valois, Bistoire du grand schisme d' Occident, i vols., 1896-1902; Le pape et le Concile, 1909 ; Journal des Savants, 1905, p. 345 (on the Council of Basle).
30. Burckhardt, Cullur dcr Renaissance, 5th ed., 1906.
31. 0. Zoeckler, Askese und Monchtum (Western), 2nd ed., 1897; Mont- alembert, Les Moines d' Occident, 2 vols., 1860; Vacandard, Saint Bernard, 2 vols., 1895 (abridged in 1904). See also under the names of the dififerent religious orders in Hauck.
33. P. Sabatier, Vie de St. Francois, 1894 (numerous editions and transla- tions ); Lea, History of the Inquisition, vols, ii, iii (persecution of the fratice Hi) ; F. van der Borne, Die Franziskusforschung, 1917 ; Ubald d'Alengon, Le<:ons d'hist. franciscaine, 1918.
36. S. Reinach, Rev. hist., 1920, cxxxiii., p. 193 (St. Francis and Buddhism).
37. Dominicans : Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vol. i.
38. Gebhart, Sainte Catherine de Sienne (in Revue des Deux Mondcs, 1890, vol. xcv., reprinted in L'ltcdie Mystique). — Art. Stigmatisation in Hauck.
39. Templars : Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vol. iii. ; H. Finke, Papstuvi tmd Templerorden, 1907 (cf. Langlois, Journal des Savants, 1908, p. 417) ; S. R. , Cultrs, vol. iv., p. 252 ; P. VioUet, U interrogatoire de J. de Moled, 1909.
40. Art. Adopticmismus in Hauck ; Conybeare, Key of Truth, 1898, p. 87.
41. G. Herzog, La Sainte Vierge dans I'histoire, 1908. — Holy House of Loretto : U. Chevalier, N. D. de Lorettc, 1906 {cf. Delaborde, Journal des Savants, 1907, p. 367 ; Rev. arch., 1906, ii. p. 460).
42. Art. Maria in Hauck ; Vacandard, Rev. du Glergi, April 1, 1910. — Lea, Hiit. of the Inquisition, vol, iii.
106 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
44. H. Delehaye, Les Leg6ndes hagiographiques, 1905 ; P. Saintyves, Les Saints successeurs des dieux, 1907; Boudinhon, Prods de Ratification et canoni- sation, ]905. — Pedro Arbues : Lea, Inquisition oj Spain, vol. i. ; Peter Martyr : Lea, Inquisition of the Middle Ages, vol. ii.
45. T. de Wyzewa, La Ldgcnde Dorie (a readable translation), 1902.
46. Art. Mts&e, in Hauck.
47. Art. TransxCbstantiation in Hauck ; A. Boudinhon, Les Originea de ViUvation (in the Rev. die clergi, June-July 1908, pp. 535, 158). — Arcani disci- plina: Ba,tiSo\, Etudes d' Histoire, 'p. I et seq. ; &Tt. Arcani discipUria in Hastings, Encyclop., vol. i.
49. Lea, Hist, of the Inq'Msition, vol. ii.
50. Art. Fronleichnaynsfest (Feast of Corpus Christi) in Hauck.
51. Prohibition to read or translate the Bible : Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vols, i., iii. — Art. Gehet, Rosenkranz (rosary), and Sakrament in Hauck.
52. Lea, Auricular Confession and Indulgences, 3 vols. , 1896. — A. Boudinhon, Histoire de la Penitence, 1879 (criticism on Lea) ; Batiflfol, Les Origines de la Penitence (in Etudes d' Histoire, p. 43).
53. Upon the question of Woman and Christianity, see a learned note by Lejay, Rev. crit., 1908, i. p. 79.
54. Allcrseelentag (Commemoratio fidelium defunctorum) in Hauck ; Saint- yves, Les Saints, kc, p. 83.
55. Art, Indidgenzen in Hauck.
56. Lea, Hist, of Sacerdotal Celibacy, 3rd ed., 2 vols., 1907.
57. J. Havet, L'hiresie et Ic bras stcnlier jusqu^au XIII* siecle (reprinted in his (Euvres, vol. ii., 1896) ; H. Ch. Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition in the Middle Ages, 1888 ; E. Jordan, La responsab. de V^glise dans la repression, 1915.
58. Art. Narrcnfcst (Feast of Fools) in Hauck.
59. L. Brehier, La Querellc des Images, 1904.
60. et seq. —All the details will be found in Lea's work (§ 56), which has an excellent index.
63. Paulicians inspired by Paul of Samosata : Conybeare, Key of Truth, 1898, pp. cv. tt seq. — Albigenses : A. Luchaire, Innocent III. et la Croisade des Albigcois, 1905 (of. Jo%i,rnal des Savants, 1905, p. 528 ; 1908, p. 17) ; J. Guiraud, Quest, d ArcMologie et d' Histoire, 1906 ; E. Broekx, Lc catharisme, 1916.
64. The Inquisition glorified : Rev. arch., 1907, ii. p. 184; Rev. crit., 1907, i. p. 211.
65. Lea, History of the Inquisition, vol. i.
66. Art. IValdenscr (Vaudois, or Waldenses) in Hauck ; J. Marx, L'in^uis. en Daiqjhini, 1914.
67. Flagellants: Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vols. i. and ii.
68. See Fredericq's preface to the French translation of Lea's Hist, of the Inquisition.
69. B. Haurdau, Histoire de la Philosophie scolastique, 1872 ; Prantl, Gesch. cler Logik im Abendlande, 4 vols., 1855-1870 ; F. Picavet, Histoire ginirale des Philosojihies m&lievales, 1906 ; M. Grabmann, Oesch. der scolast. Mcthode, 2 vols., 1909 ; Ch. de Remusat, ;S'. Anselme, 2nd ed., 1868 ; Vacandard, Abdlard et S. Bernard, 1881 ; V. Cousin, Introd. aux ceuvres d'Abilard, 1836.
Hauck adds a long bibliography to his article Scholastik.
70. R.Bacon: Journal des Savants, 1905, p. 362. — Vaughan, S. Thomas of Aquin, 2 vols., 1871 ; and the art. Thomas von Aquin, in Hauck.
71. Preger, Gesch. der deutschen Mystik im MittelaUer, 3 vols. , 1879-1893. On the Imitatio, see art. Thomas A Kempis in Hauck (vol. xix. p. 719), and Vacandard, Rev. du clergi^, December 1908, p. 633; F. Pelster, Xrit. Stud, zu Albert clem Grossen, 1920.
72. J. Burckhardt, Die Kultur der Renaissance, 5th ed., 2 vols., 1896 ; art. Erasmus and Reuchlin in Hauck.
73. Wyclif, Huss, Lollards : Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vol. ii.
74. Moravians and Herrnhutians : art. Briider (fiohmische) and Zinzendorf (re-founder of the Herrnhutians) in Hauck.
75. Savonarola : Lea, Hist, of the Inquisition, vol. iii.
FROM JUSTINIAN TO CHARLES V 107
76. Art. Inquintion in Hauck. On the scruple touching the shedding of blood, see Lea, Hist, of the Inquidtion, vol. i.
77. Torture : Lea, Superstition ami Force, 1892, pp. 429, 484.
80. A German translation of the Malleus maleficarum appeared in 1906, in 3 vols. (On the sources of that book, see the Rev. crit. 1905, ii. p. 358) ; J. Hansen, Zauberwahn, Inquisition und Rexenprozesse, 1900 ; Hoensbroech, Das Papstum, Inquisition, Hexemmhn, 1901.— See also the art. ^Cicen in Hauck, and Lea's Hist, of the Inquisition, vol. iii.
81. Art. Oritntalische Kirche, in Hauck ; Pargoire, L'Eglise Byzantine de, 627 d, 84-7, 1905 ; C. Callinicos, The Greek Orthodox Church, 1918 ; Pisani, A travers VOrient, 1897 ; Giraud, Rev. du Clerg6, Feb. 15, 1910.
82. Art. Ferrara-Florenz, in Hauck. On the Encyclical of Leo. XIII. and the Patriarch's slighting reply, see the Rev. Anglo- Romaine, 1895, pp. 108 et seq. — On the flirtation of the Anglicans with the Greek Church : Rev. du Clerge, March 1908, p. 550.
84. S. R., \n Revue critique, 1922, p. 167.
CHAPTER IV
CHRISTIANITY : FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOREDIA
Causes of the Reformation — Martin Luther — Diet of Worms — The Ana- baptists and the Peasants' War — Zwingli — Calvin at Geneva— Michael Servetus— Henry VIII. and the Anglican Church — Mary Tudor— Elizabeth — The Reformation in France — Massacre of the Waldensee.
The Counter- Reformation — New Policy of the Church— The Council of Trent — Progress of Catholicism — The Jesuits — Protestant Sects — Philip II. and William the Silent.
Charles I. and the English Rebellion — James II. and William of Orange — The Persecutions in Ireland — The Pilgrim Fathers — The Quakers — The Thirty Years' War — German Pietism — Socinus.
France under the last Valois — Massacre of St. Bartholomew — Edict of Nantes — Revocation of the Edict of Nantes — The Dragonades — The Camisards — Responsibility of the Roman Church — The Earliest Ideas of Toleration — New Religious Orders — The Liberties of the Galilean Chui-ch — The Four Articles of 1682 — Jansenism and Port Royal — The Bull Unigenitus — Quietism : F6nelon and Bossuet.
The Inquisition in Spain : Torquemada — Expulsion of the Jews and Moors — Conquest and Christianisation of America.
Condemnation of Giordano Bruno — Retractation imposed on Galileo by the Inquisition.
1. If the Reformation had been the effect of a single cause, it would not have succeeded, even partially. Its comparative success was due to the variety of its origins — religious, political, and social.
2. The religious cause was the corruption of Catholicism, which appeared to Luther on his visit to Rome in 1511 to be a caricature of Christianity. Paganised by her rites and by the traffic in indulgences, the Church had also lost her salutary contact with Scripture. The Reformation wished to lead her back to the Bible, and succeeded with its own adherents at least.
3. One political cause was impatience of the spiritual domi- nation of Rome, and of her interference in temporal affairs ; another was the necessity of resistance to the Emperors, who called themselves Roman Emperors and were making long strides towards despotic power. ^ The definitive successes of
* Voltaire. 108
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 109
the Reformation were won in those countries into Avhicli the influence of Rome, from the first to the fourth centuries, had not penetrated very deeply. In this connection, the Reformation was only a continuation of the movement which had withdrawn the ancient provinces of the Eastern Empire from obedience to Rome ; it was, in short, a reaction of Germanism against Romanism.
4. The social and economical causes were numerous. Both prince and peasant coveted the riches of the Church. The Knights with nothing — Conti di Allemagna poverty as the legate wrote to the Pope — were jealous of the wealthy abbots. The people resented being squeezed by monks and priests. The secular clergy rebelled against the exactions of the Roman Curia and the competition of the monastic orders. These abuses were not new, but the invention of printing (1447), by spreading the taste for reading, had stimulated thought and enabled one man to speak for many.
5, The transition from despotism to liberty must be slow. Wherever it was successful, the Reformation adopted the autho- ritative principles of the Roman Church. Instead of individual freedom of faith and thought, it produced a kind of attenuated Catholicism. The seeds of religious liberty were there, but it was only after two centuries that they blossomed and bore fruit, thanks to the breach made by Luther in the ancient edifice of Rome. The Reformation miscarried in those quarters where habit was stronger than the desire for an even partial emanci- pation. Face to face with the uncompromising theologians of Wittenberg and Geneva, many confessed that "all they had was a choice of fetters, and that it would be better to keep those to which they had been born." ^ Again, rulers such as Charles V. and Francis I. were alarmed at the effect so profound a revolution threatened to have upon the principle of authority. Monarchists by trade — as Joseph II. was to say at a later date — they fought against a movement which menaced all authority and pointed to the triumph of the democratic idea as its natural conclusion. Even Luther himself, during the Peasant's Revolt, took fright and recoiled before the social consequences
* Voltaire.
110 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
of his own doctrines. After ten centuries of Catholicism, Europe was unripe for liberty, all the more unripe because no scientific criticism of the Scriptures yet existed. Luther's work had to be completed by that of a pious French Catholic, Richard Simon.
• • • • •
6. The final exciting cause of the Reformation was an extravagant sale of indulgences conceded to the German Dominicans, under pretext of a war against the Turks, but in reality to provide funds for the construction of St. Peter''s at Rome. In the sixteenth century it was asserted, but not proved, that the Augustinians envied the Dominicans this privilege. An Augustinian monk, Martin Luther, a native of Eisleben, where he was born in 1483, on the approach of Tetzel, the indulgence broker, affixed to the Cathedral door at Wittenberg ninety-five arguments against the abuses of such a commerce (October 31, 1517). These flew over Germany like a train of gunpowder. Luther had penned what thousands of the faithful had been thinking in silence. A war of words began between Dominican and Augustinian. Others struck in and embittered it. Leo. X., impatient of this " monks' quarrel," began by trying to make terms, but ended by launching his anathema. Luther treated him very roughly in his Captivity of Babylon^ in which he fulminated against private Masses and against transubstantiation, " a word not to be found in the Scriptures." The gravest difference of opinion had to do with the Communion. " Luther retained one-half of the mystery and rejected the other. He confesses that the body of Jesus Christ is in the consecrated elements, but it is, he says, as fire is in red-hot iron : the fire and the iron subsist together. This is what they called impanation^ invination, consuhstantiation. Thus, while those they called Papists ate God without bread, \ the Lutherans ate God and bread ; soon afterwards came the Calvinists, who ate bread and did not eat God." ^
7. In order to make the schism complete, Luther burnt Leo's Bull of excommunication on the public place of Witten- berg (December 1520), and hurled insults at the Holy Father:
^ Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 111
" Little Pope,"" he wrote, " little Popelet, you are an ass, a little ass." German grossness found such an address amusing. "Luther, rough and uncouth, triumphed in his own country over all the urbanity of Rome."" ^
8. " He demanded the abolition of monastic vows, because they were not of primitive institution ; permission for priests to marry, because several of the apostles were married men ; the Communion in both kinds, because Jesus said Drink ye of it ; the cessation of image worship, because Jesus had no image ; in short, he was in harmony with the Roman Church in nothing but the doctrines of the Trinity, Baptism, the Incarnation and the Resurrection." ^
Under the influence of St. Augustine, the patron of his order, Luther also rejected free-will, which was afterwards admitted by his followers ; and, to the great scandal of the Faculty of Paris, he denied that the study of Aristotle was any help to the comprehension of the Scriptures. Reacting against the Roman doctrine of salvation by works, the origin of the abuse of indulgences, he proclaimed that faith alone was effi- cacious, and that faith was the fruit of grace. This was to reject as superfluous all those ideas on which the Church lived, all those things by which her wealth and power were secured.
9. Charles V., who had been Emperor since February 1519, summoned the reformer to appear before the Diet at Worms (January 1521). He obeyed the summons with a safe-conduct which was respected, supported by popular sympathy, and pro- tected by Frederick the Wise and the German Knights. Before the Diet, he pleaded his conscience and refused to retract. Charles placed him under the ban of the Empire, but the sentence could not be put in force. Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, a convert to the new ideas, carried him oft' in the night and hid him in the Saxon fortress of the Wartburg, where he lived under the name of " Junker Georg." It was in this Patmos, as he called it, that he began his translation of the Bible, an admirable version, which became the Reformer's most efficient weapon in German lands.
10. " The aged Frederick hoped for the extirpation of the
^ Voltaire. 2 l^l^^^
112 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Roman Church. Luther thought it was time to abolish private Mass. He pretended the devil had appeared to him and reproached him for saying Mass and consecrating the elements. The devil had proved to him, he said, that it was idolatry. Luther declared that the devil was right and must be believed. The Mass was abolished in Wittenberg, and soon afterwards throughout Saxony. The images were thrown down, monks and nuns left their cloisters, and, a few years later, Luther married a nun called Catherine von Bora (1525)." ^ This is why when a priest quits the Roman Church in order to marry, he is said " to go out through Luther''s door."
11. After having taken the devil's advice as to the abolition of the Mass, Luther restricted or abolished the use of exorcisms intended to keep the fiend at a distance. " It was afterwards noticed that wherever exorcism was abandoned, the number of those possessed or bewitched greatly diminished."" ^
12. Luther's activity was seconded by that of a gentle and amiable scholar, Melancthon. It was embarrassed rather than helped by the fanatical Carlstadt, who declared the marriage ot priests not only permissible, but obligatory, and, in his hatred of Catholicism, handled the monks roughly and destroyed works of art. In 1 522, Luther quitted his retreat in order to combat the violent adherents of Carlstadt at Wittenberg itself. These were known as the Sacramentarians, because they refused to recognise more than one sacrament, that of Baptism. liUther denounced them as " supporters of Satan," and drove them out of the town.
13. Denmark and Sweden, where the archbishops of Upsala had wielded despotic power, also rallied to the Reformation. " Luther found himself the apostle of the north, and enjoyed his glory in peace. As early as 1525 the States of Saxony, Brunswick and Hesse, and the cities of Strasburg and Frankfort embraced his doctrine. . . . This Anti-Pope imitated the Pope by authorising Philip Landgrave of Hesse to marry a second wife while his first was still alive. This permission was accorded at a little Synod gathered at Wittenberg. It is true that Gregory II., in a decretal of 726, had allowed that in certain
1 Voltaii-e. * Ibid.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 113
cases a man might marry a second wife. But neither times nor circumstances were the same. . . . What no pontiff since Gregory had ventured to do, Luther, who attacked the excessive power of the Popes, did without any power at all. His dis- pensation was secret, but time reveals all secrets of this nature." ^
1 4. A new burst of fanaticism came to trouble these " pacific scandals." A pair of Saxon enthusiasts, pretending to be in- spired, demanded that children should be rebaptised, on the ground that Jesus was baptised after he was grown up. They founded the violent sect of the Anabaptists, who preached a sort of holy war against both Romans and Lutherans. This sect attracted the peasantry, which then suffered from the most outrageous oppression that ever existed, and stirred up a Jacquerie. " They made the most of the dangerous truth that all men are born equal, and that if the Popes had treated princes as their subjects, peasants had been treated like cattle by their lords. . . . They claimed the rights of humanity ; but they sustained their claim like wild beasts." ^
15. The peasants rose from Saxony to Lorraine (1525), and, after committing horrible excesses, were exterminated by the regular troops. The number of victims has been put at 150,000. They got no sympathy from Luther. Alarmed at this menace to social order, the doctrinaire turned his back on the fanatics created by his own teaching.
When the second Diet of Spires (1529) attempted a Catholic reaction, fourteen cities and several princes protested, from which action the enemies of Rome took their name of Pro- testants. At Augsburg, the Lutherans presented a confession of faith, to which a third of Germany subscribed. The princes of this party combined against the Emperor, Charles V., as well as against Rome (1530).
16. The Anabaptists, however, seized Munster and drove out the bishop (1536). At first they wanted to re-establish the
^Voltaire. See also, for the decretal of Gregory II., Bossuet, (Euvres, ed. Gaume, vol. vii. p. 540. "^ Voltaire.
114 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Jewish theocracy, and be governed by God alone. But a tailor, named John of Leyden, declared that God had appeared to him and appointed him king. His assertion was believed. John, monarch and prophet, polygamous in the fashion of the Kings of Israel, was crowned with pomp and sent his apostles into Germany. He was afterwards taken with arms in his hands, and tortured, by the Bishop of Munster's orders, with red-hot pincers. All the Anabaptists caught in Westphalia and the Low Countries were drowned, strangled, or burnt. The sect survived, however, but in a quiescent state, and amalgamated with the Unitarians, that is with those " who recognise only one God, and, while venerating Christ, live without much dogma and with no disputations. . . . The Anabaptists began with barbarism, but have ended with mildness and good sense." ^
17. The embarrassments of Charles V., who was seriously threatened by the Turks, had prevented him from acting with energy against the Reformation. After the Diet of Augsburg (1530) the Lutherans came to an understanding with each other at Smalkalde (1532), and Charles concluded an agreement with them which held good for twelve years (1534).
18. Luther died in 1546. The Emperor, at peace with France and Turkey, then summoned the Protestants to dissolve their league, and, on their refusal, crushed them at the battle of Miihlberg (1547). But this victory did not end the war. At last, in 1552, religious liberty was conceded to the Pro- testants by the treaty of Passau. Not long afterwards Charles, discouraged as Diocletian had been before him, abdicated and retired to the monastery of Yuste, leaving the Empire to his brother Ferdinand and Spain to his son Philip II.
• • • • •
19. Switzerland had taken fire at the same time as Germany. " Zwingli, parish priest of Zurich, had gone even further than Luther : he refused to admit that the Deity entered into the bread and wine." ^ The senate of Zurich agreed with him, Berne followed Zurich (1528), and soon afterwards CEcolampa- dius brought about the triumph of the Reformation at Basle. But Lucerne and four other cantons remained faithful to Rome.
» Voltaire. » Ibid.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 115
They declared war, and Zwingli was defeated and killed at Keppel (1531). The Catholics quartered his body and burnt it. " Zwingli's religion was called Calvinism. Calvin gave it his name, just as Amerigo Vespucci gave his to the continent discovered by Columbus. "^
20. The magistrates of Geneva, following the example set by Zurich and Berne, undertook a patient examination of the conflicting doctrines. They ended by proscribing popery, and the bishop had to fly. The Genevese, in their alliance with Friburg and Berne against the Duke of Savoy, called themselves Eidgenossen (allied by oath), whence, probably, the word Huguenots. Their reformation was characterised by a moral severity amounting to austerity. It found a sort of Pope in Calvin (born at Noyon in 1509), a man of irreproachable morals and as hard as Luther was violent. He was, moreover, a good wi-iter, as his Institution chretienne proves, and a man of power in the bitterness of his convictions. Games and shows were forbidden. For more than a hundred years no musical instrument was allowed in Geneva. The practice of public confession was restored to favour. Calvin established synods, consistories, and deacons; he even instituted a consistorial jurisdiction with the right of excommunication. The Re- formation had good reason, no doubt, for shutting up the convents; but Calvin tended to re-establish them in a lay form, and even to transform a whole canton into a convent !
21. A Spanish doctor, Miguel Servetus, who had a premoni- tion of the circulation of the blood even before Harvey, and had distinguished himself by his courage during an epidemic at Vienne (Dauphine), addressed a letter to Calvin on the Trinity. They held different opinions on the question. Beginning with discussion, they ended by invective. A theological work which Servetus had printed secretly appeared anonymously, but was denounced to the Inquisition at Lyons by a friend of Calvin's. To reinforce his denunciation, this man followed it up by a number of letters written by Servetus, which Calvin gave him for this base purpose. " What a part for an apostle to play ! Servetus, who well knew that in France they sent all innovators
' Voltaire.
116 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
to the stake, took flight while his cause was pending. Unhappily he passed through Geneva, where Calvin denounced him." * And yet Calvin was not the monster of intolerance he has been called. Shortly before the prosecution of Servetus, he wrote : " In a case where a man is simply heterodox, we do not consider that a sufficient reason for rejecting him ; we must tolerate him and not drive him from the Church or expose him to censure as a heretic." Servetus was tried by the Council of Geneva, an elected body, quite independent of Calvin, and, indeed, hostile to his ideas : the indictment was drawn up by a member of the Anti-Calvinist party. On August 26, 1553, Calvin wrote to his friend Farel, who had endeavoured to get Servetus to retract : " I hope he will be condemned, but I desire that he should be spared the atrocities of the penalty.'' And on October 26 : " To-morrow he will be executed : we did our best to change the manner of his death, but in vain."" The Council had, in fact, decided the day before that he should be burnt alive at Champel. He bore his punishment like a stoic. On November 1, 1903, the Calvinists of Geneva inaugurated a monument to his memory. The crime of his burning must be jjudged like those of the Terror. It was a fruit of the education in intolerance given to Europe by the Roman Church.
22. Voltaire remarks that certain letters of Luther breathe a spirit no more pacific than those of Calvin, to which the Protestants answer " that they believe it their duty to follow the doctrines of the primitive Church, not to canonise the passions of either Luther or Calvin.'"' To which Voltaii'e : " A wise reason ! The spirit of philosophy has at last blunted the sword. But was it necessary to pass through two centuries of lunacy to arrive at these peaceful years .^" When Voltaire wrote, the days of a new frenzy were not very far off.
• • • • •
23. The elements of the Reformation had existed in England since the days of Wyclif ; it only wanted the caprice of a prince to bring them to maturity.
24. " It is well known that England severed her connection with the Pope because Henry VIII. fell in love. What neither
^ Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 117
Peter's Pence, nor the sale of indulgences, nor five hundred years of extortions, always resisted by parliament and people, could effect, was effected, or, at least, determined, by a passing love affair." ^ Henry VHL wished to exchange Catherine of Aragon for Anne Boleyn, and Clement VH. refused to annul his marriage with Charles V/s aunt. Henry accordingly had it annulled by Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury. The Pope excommunicated him, so he proclaimed himself supreme head of the Church and his parliament abolished the papal authority. Being in want of money, the king confiscated the property of the religious bodies, and displayed the most impudent cynicism in stripping the rich abbeys of their wealth. A Pope himself, in his own way and to his own advantage, he took good care not to declare himself a Lutheran. " The invocation of saints was only restricted, not abolished. He caused the Bible to be read in English, but wished to go no further. It was a capital offence to believe in the Pope; and also to be a Protestant." The Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas More, and Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, were condemned to death by Parliament for refusing to acknowledge the king as head of the Church. Henry, after the fashion of the sixteenth century, was completely unaffected by moral scruples, but he was a king. After his death England had Lutherans, Zwinglians, and even Anabaptists, " the fathers of those peace-loving Quakers whose religion was so often laughed at while their morals enforced respect. . . . Believing themselves to be Christians and in nowise priding themselves on their philosophy, they were in reality deists, for in Christ they only recognised a man to whom God had given purer lights than to his contemporaries. The people called them Anabaptists, because they did not acknowledge the validity of baptism for infants, requiring adults to be baptised even when they had already undergone the rite."^
25. Mary Tudor, the daughter of Henry VHL and wife of Philip H., was passionately Catholic. While she was on the throne, over two hundred Protestants were burnt, including Archbishop Cranmer ; her successor, Elizabeth (1558-1603), was a Protestant. " Parliament was Protestant ; the whole nation ^ Voltaire. * Jbid.
118 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
became Protestant and is so still. Its religion was now fixed and its liturgy established. The Roman form of hierarchy, with a greatly diminished ceremonial, although with more than the Lutherans allowed ; confession, permitted but not ordained ; the belief that God is in the Eucharist without transubstantia- tion : broadly speaking, these are the elements of the Anglican religion."^ During the short reign of Edward VI., the son of Henry VIII. (1547-1553), a Confession of Faith in forty-two articles and an official prayer-book had been promulgated. Elizabeth retained thirty-nine of the forty-two articles in her Act of Uniformity^ which also imposed the Creed (1562). The Edwardian prayer-book, proscribed under Mary, was re- established, with a few alterations, and became the foundation of Anglican worship.
26. Elizabeth, though very hostile to Popery, was no more of a fanatic than her father. She hanged two Jesuits and beheaded Mary of Scotland (1587), but these cruelties were inspired by political considerations, and the proceedings were always legal. By excommunicating Elizabeth during Mary"'s captivity, Pope Pius V. only made her more implacable. Scot- land was agitated by the wars between Catholics and Protestants. A preacher, John Knox, who had at one time been a refugee with Calvin (1554), propagated Calvinism in Scotland. He led it to victory after the flight of Mary, for whose head he clamoured as early as 1570. Ireland remained faithful to Rome in spite of Elizabeth, who showed her despotic temper by forcing an Anglican priesthood on the Irish parishes. That unhappy island was still more harshly treated in the sequel, but remained faithful to her Church ; she would not, and will not even now, accept that of her conquerors.
• • • ■ •
27. In 1516, Francis I. and Leo X. had concluded a Concordat which gave the king the nominations to benefices and the Pope their first year's revenue. To the University and the Parlia- ment of Paris these terms seemed too favourable to Rome. The king's sister, Marguerite d'Alen^on, afterwards Queen of Navarre, favoured the propaganda of Jacques Lefevre of Etaples
^ Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 119
(born in 1435), in support of the Augustinian doctrines, which resembled those of Luther. Among the disciples of I^efevre was Guillaume Farel, afterwards a friend of Calvin, who preached the Reformation at Neuchatel and invited Calvin to Geneva. Calvin himself could not stay in France ; his Institution chre- tienne was first published at Basle. In spite of Marguerite's influence, the reformers were horribly persecuted in France. Jean le Clerc was torn to pieces with pincers for having spoken against images and relics : twenty reformers were burnt at the stake. To prevent them from addressing the people, the Parliament of Paris ordered their tongues to be cut out before the execution. At the same time Francis I. was allying himself with the German Protestants and even with the Tui'ks against Charles V. Profoundly indifferent in religious matters, he let his parliaments and his monks do as they liked. The close of his reign was disgraced by an infamous crime. The Parliament of Provence condemned to the stake nineteen Waldenses of Merindol, who had adopted the reformed doctrines. Francis offered to pardon them on condition that they recanted. On their refusal the First President of the Parliament, one d'Oppede, called in troops, who burnt and massacred them all. " A com- pany of sixty men and thirty women had taken refuge in the walled village of Cabrieres. They surrendered on a promise of their lives ; no sooner was the surrender complete than they were massacred. A few women escaped to a neighbouring church ; they were dragged out by d'Oppede's orders, shut up in a barn, and there burnt. Twenty-two small townships were burnt to the ground. Francis I. was horrified. The warrant he had signed was for the execution of nineteen heretics only. D'Oppede and Guerin, the Avocat General^ had caused the massacre of thousands." ^ On his death-bed the king requested his son to punish this barbarity. The Parliament of Paris condemned Guerin to death, but acquitted d'Oppede, the more criminal of the pair.
28. " The progress of Calvinism was not stemmed by these executions. On one side the faggots were ablaze, on the other the psalms of Clement Marot were sung laughingly, true to that
^ Voltaire,
120 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
genius of the French nation which is always Hght and some- times very cruel. Marguerite's whole Court was thoroughly Calvinist ; that of her brother, the king, more than half so. What the people had begun, the nobles were carrying on. More than one member of the Parliament of Paris itself was attached to the Reformation." ^ Henry II. arrested five coun- sellors, among them Anne du Bourg, who was hanged and burnt under Francis II.
The success of the Reformation among the French nobles was not solely due to the Renaissance and the intellectual illumination which followed it ; they saw the German knights growing rich on the spoils of the abbeys, and hoped for similar good fortune. In all the religious wars which stained the second half of the sixteenth century, both sides were eager for rapine and pillage. At that sinister epoch honest and kindly men like the Chancellor de THopital and Admiral de Coligny were rare and admirable exceptions.
• • • • - •
29. The so-called Counter-Reformation was the movement towards reform within the Roman Church brought about by the threat of a Protestant revolution. It was, in a sense, a Pro- testant infiltration into Romanism, not, of course, in rites and dogmas, but in the discipline of the clergy. Not only did the Popes become, for the most part, respectable men, whose only weakness was the appointment to lucrative posts of their own nephews {nipoti, whence the term nepotum) ; but priests and monks were better controlled and their duties more clearly defined. The sale of indulgences came to an end ; and, in confession, the use of a little box known as a confessional was made obligatory, which minimised certain dangerous opportunities.
30. Profiting by its trials, the Church, without ceasing to urge violence upon the "civil arm," now sought to gain, or regain, souls by softer methods. In this task she was admirably seconded by the Jesuits, who gradually acquired the control of education, and, through the confessional, of the consciences of the ruling classes. Lay societies, more or less affiliated to the
^ Voltaire.
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Jesuits, were formed in many centres to work " for the greater glory of God."" Recent publications have made us well acquainted with one of these, which wielded a great and mysterious influ- ence in France between 1627 and 1666. This was the Brother- hood of the Holy Sacrament {Confririe du Saint Sacrement), which was known as the Cabale des Devots} The secrecy with which this Brotherhood carried on its works of charity is to be explained by the fundamental object of its activity : an elaborate system of espionage, directed against the reputation and property of all heretics and unbelievers. To deprive them of their functions or their customers, and reduce them to poverty, became the ambition of opponents who were no longer permitted to burn them.
31. While Protestantism, inspired by Saint Paul and Saint Augustine, narrowed the way of salvation and frightened the sinner from his sin, Jesuitical Catholicism adopted a more skilful policy : it made religion gentle and almost indulgent to human frailty. The Jesuits were not indeed the inventors of casuistry, which was familiar to classic Greece, and of which many examples are to be found in Cicero's De Officiis ; but thev developed the useful science which takes note of the shades and degrees of acts no less than of thoughts, and judges them chiefly by their motives. The Jesuits never taught the crude doctrine that the end justifies the means, but their main pre- occupation was, very rightly, with intentions. Those Jesuits whom the Jansenists were never weary of vilifying, writers on moral theology like Sanchez and Suarez, were, in their way, profound psychologists, liberal and liberating moralists, to whom humanity would have owed a deep debt of gratitude had they not used liberty itself in a domineering spirit, and lightened the chains of the human race in order to subdue it the better.
32. The new course of the Church was fixed by the Council of Trent, which lasted for seventeen years (1546-1563), with considerable intervals. In its eai'ly days, the Primate of
^ It was perhaps in opposition to this cabal, fallen into discredit with the 7 powers, that Moli^re wrote Tartufe, which was represented at Versailles in [ 1664, by commaud of Louis XIV.
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Portugal facetiously announced that "these most illustrious cardinals will have to be most illustriously reformed."" The necessity of a firm discipline was universally acknowledged, but it was by no means the only necessity. The Council of Trent dealt a good deal in scholastic theology ; it codified Catholicism ; it defined original sin ; it decreed the perpetuity of the marriage tie; it pronounced anathema against those who rejected the invocation of saints or the adoration of relics, who denied the existence of Purgatory or the validity of indulgences. "The theologians, who had no votes, explained the dogmas ; the prelates voted under the directions of the papal legates, who quieted the grumblers, softened the acrimonious, parried every- thing that might offend the Court of Rome, and were from first to last the masters." ^
33. Thanks to the Counter-Reformation and to the Jesuits, the Church regained part of the ground she had lost in Europe, Southern Germany, France, some of the Swiss Cantons, Savoy, and Poland. In Italy, Protestantism was almost completely crushed by the Inquisition established in 1542. It was the same in Spain. The propaganda of the Polish Jesuits spread into Western Russia and into Lithuania. Catholicism conquered America, several of the cities of India, and won a footing in Japan and China. This development in the Far East was chiefly the work of the zealous Jesuit Francois Xavier (1542- 1552). But while the Jesuits kept their place in Pekin, thanks chiefly to concessions to the native faith which brought suspicion upon their own, they were driven out of Japan and their religion proscribed (1637) as soon as the intelligent population of its islands awoke to the fact that their liberty was at stake.
34. In the war against the Reformation the Jesuits played a part no less considerable than that of the Dominicans in the less dangerous struggle with the Albigenses. Taking their share in every political and religious conflict, they have, down to our own days, excited violent hatred and equally fervent admiration. History, moreover, has to show some reserve in discussing them, for no one outside the Order knows exactly
* Voltaire,
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where its archives are kept, and no independent layman has ever been allowed to explore them.
35. The founder of this illustrious company was Ignatius Loyola, a noble from Guipuscoa (1491-1556). Wounded at the siege of Pampeluna, he was attracted to mysticism by a perusal of the Lives of the Saints. After a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, he came, at the age of thirty-three, to study at Salamanca and at Paris, In Paris, on Montmartre, he founded an association which at first devoted itself to teaching. In 1540, Paul III. promulgated the Bull by which the Order of Jesuits was instituted. The fourth vow it imposed was that of absolute obedience to the Pope. Loyola finished in 1548 The Book of the Spiritual Exercises, a series of pious medita- tions and rules of conduct, "one of the world-moving books." It puts forth a programme for the society, in which God is represented as a general and the Jesuits as his officers. As an old soldier, he understood how to bring his order under that quasi-military discipline which has counted for so much in its success. In this respect, perhaps, it was in some measure inspired by those brotherhoods of Islam, at once religious and military, which had already been imitated in the Middle Ages by the Templars and the Hospitallers.
36. Loyola found very efficient lieutenants in Lainez and Salmeron, and since his time the Society has never lacked men of talent. " It has controlled several European Courts and won a great name for itself by the education of youth [Voltaire was one of its pupils] ; it reformed science in China, christianised Japan — for a time ! — and gave laws to the people of Paraguay. At the date of its expulsion from Portugal, it numbered about 18,000 individuals, all subject to a permanent and absolute ruler in their General, and bound to each other by this obedience sworn to a single person. . . . The Order had great difficulty in establishing itself in France. It was born and reared under the House of Austria, France's sometime enemy, and was pro- tected by her. In the days of the League, the Jesuits were the pensioners of Philip II. The other religious bodies, who all belonged to this faction except the Benedictines and the Carthusians, fanned the flame only in France ; the Jesuits
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did so from Rome, Madrid and Brussels, setting fire to Paris."!
• • • • •
37. Whereas the forces of the Roman Church stood centralised for the struggle, the reformed Churches were divided. Closely allied to the civil power, they were national and not universal. If Rome tended to dominate the secular authorities, her rivals too often and too willingly became their instruments. Another characteristic these latter have in common is the large share in ecclesiastical matters given to the laity, which is not differen- tiated from the clergy by marriage. In England and in the Scandinavian countries a hierarchy analogous to that of Rome was preserved. Those countries are episcopalian. The Calvinists of Switzerland, France, Holland and Scotland preferred the Synodal or Presbyterian system, so called because the synods or councils of elders (Presbyteroi in Greek) had the direction of spiritual affairs, as in the primitive Church. The Lutherans, in default of bishops, had superintendents. Finally, the sects called Independents and Congregationalists had no hierarchy at all, but governed themselves. These flourished chiefly in England. As for their methods of worship, the Reformed Churches agreed in banishing images, relics, and the invocation of saints ; but in detail they varied, according to the severity of their principles. The Anglican Church remained very close to Roman Catholicism, and, in the nineteenth century, part of it, known as the High Church, approached it more closely still. The Lutheran Church gave an important place to music and singing ; the Calvinist Churches no more tolerated instrumental music than images, and permitted nothing but psalms and hymns. The national languages everywhere ousted Latin in the liturgies, and preaching encroached upon ritual.
• • • • •
38. The spirit of the Inquisition was incarnate in Philip II. He swore before a crucifix to exterminate the scanty Protestants of Spain and had them burnt under his palace windows. Hear- ing that heretics existed in a certain valley of Piedmont, he wrote to the Governor of Milan : Send them all to the g-alloxvs !
* Voltaire.
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They told him of reformers in Calabria : he directed that they should be put to the sword, reserving thirty for the gallows and thirty for the stake. It is not to be wondered that such a fanatic should have employed a hangman like Alva in the subjection of the Protestant Netherlands, where he had established the Inquisition in 1565,
39. " William the Silent had neither the men nor the money to resist such a monarch as Philip IL The persecutions gave him both. The new tribunal set up in Brussels threw the people into despair. Counts Egmont and Horn, with eighteen others of gentle birth, were beheaded and their blood was the first cement for the Republic of the United Netherlands." ^ When the Duke of Alva was at last recalled, he boasted of having put eighteen thousand people to death. A vain boast ; for the Union of Utrecht brought about the birth of the political liberties of Holland in the seven united provinces (1579). But religious liberty only comes after a long education, and the Dutch Reformation was far from being always liberal. In its turn, it was guilty of murdering men for their opinions.
40. Calvin had uncompromisingly upheld the Augustinian theory of predestination, which makes God either the benefactor or the capricious foe of individuals. This doctrine, a logical deduction from premises which are an outrage upon reason, was contested by Harmensen, called Arminius, a pastor of * Leyden (1603), against Gomar, a fanatical Calvinist. As the Arminians were Liberals in politics, they were opposed by the Stadtholder, Maurice of Nassau. At the Synod of Dort (1618), they were insulted, maltreated, and condemned. One of their number, the old patriot Barnevelt, was beheaded. Arminian pastors and professors were stripped of their offices. Many took refuge in Schleswig, whence they returned in 1625, the death of Maurice having caused a certain reaction in favour of toleration. We must add, for the credit of Holland, that the Dutch neither proscribed nor persecuted the Roman Catholic worship.
41. The Catholics did not abandon the idea of regaining England, even after the dispersal of Philip's "Invincible
* Voltaire.
126 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Armada." Elizabeth's successor, James I., the son of Mary Stuart, inchned towards Catholicism, but demanded toleration ; he considered persecution "as one of the infallible notes of a false Church." But, after 1604, he was driven by the Protestant party in that direction. For this a further pretext was found in the Gunpowder Plot, a conspiracy to blow up the Houses of Parliament, the inception of which was ascribed to the Jesuits (November 5th, 1605). Their complicity has never been established. The Jesuit Garnet, executed for a share in the plot, or for having had some knowledge of it, was probably innocent. Charles I., son of James I., married Henrietta Maria, the Catholic daughter of Henri Quatre. He was reproached with favouring 7-itualism, those ceremonies of the Anglican Church which brought it nearest to Rome. This tendency was fostered by Laud, Bishop of London, and afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. Charles was imprudent enough to attempt the imposition of the Anglican liturgy on Presbyterian Scotland, which revolted. Passing through various stages of a struggle with his Parliament, he was finally arrested, tried, and beheaded (1649). Parliament was dominated by the spirit of the Scottish Puritans, an austere and sectarian form of Protestantism. Sensible men as they were, they were drunk with the wine of the Bible, and believed themselves prophets of Israel because they could quote their sayings. One of the most energetic members of Parliament, who soon became its leader, Oliver Cromwell, conqueror of Charles I. at Marston Moor (1644) and Naseby (1645), had passed from the Preshytenans to the Inde- pendents^ that is, to a democratic form of religion, in which full autonomy was left to local communities (1640). But when he became Lord Protector (1653), he gave a Presbyterian form to the English Church, modified by a large toleration, which was not, however, extended to the Catholics.
Charles II., restored by General Monk after the death of Cromwell, reverted to the Anglican forms and tried to impose them in his turn. The main point was to compel every ecclesi- astic to receive ordination from a bishop. Thousands preferred destitution to such an appearance of concession to Catholicism. The truth was that Charles, a dissolute prince and pensioner of
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France, sought to re-establish the ancient faith. His brother and successor, James II., threw off the mask, and imprisoned seven Anglican bishops who refused to lend themselves to an understanding with Rome. The bishops were tried and ac- quitted. The king's unpopularity went on increasing until at last his son-in-law, William of Orange, Stadtholder of the Netherlands, deprived him of his crown, with the help and consent of Parliament (1689). Thenceforward English policy took No Poperi/ ! for its motto : a principle which became all the dearer to the English people through the attempts made by Louis XIV. to restore James 11.
42. Ireland had revolted in 1641. The Catholics massacred thousands of Protestants, but were punished with equal cruelty by Cromwell (1650). A second rising took place in favour of James II. (1690) ; after the rebels had been defeated, the oppres- sion of Catholic Ireland became atrocious. And yet it must be confessed that England never behaved towards her Catholic subjects as Louis XIV. did towards the French Protestants. Their lives were made insupportable, but their priests were not condemned to death, nor were those who wished to emigrate sent to the galleys.
A Swiss follower of Zwingli, Thomas Lieber, called Erastus (+ 1583), claimed that the Church should be subordinate to the State. His doctrine, by no means a new one, is known in Great Britain as Erastianism ; it has been that of Henry II,, Edward IH., Henry VIIL, Elizabeth and later statesmen, but was opposed, ever since 1560, by the Church of Scotland.
43. At the time when, under James I., Presbyterians and Independents refused to accept the Anglican liturgy, a certain number of these austere Puritans, known as the Pilgrim Fathers^ embarked for North America on a ship called the Mayflower (September 1620). They landed in Massachusetts and there founded the colonies which also afforded asylum to the persecuted French Protestants. It is now a kind of title to noblesse in the United States to comit one of the Pilgrim Fathers among one's ancestors.
44. Reformed England has never lacked reformers. One of these — George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends— \ia.%
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imprisoned under Charles 11. He taught that the divine spirit acted directly upon individuals, occasionally inspiring them with a sort of convulsive shaking. People took advantage of this doctrine to call the Friends Quakers, although their worship is remarkably free from fuss or affectation. The Quakers are honest folk, who know neither sacraments nor rites, whose lives are simple to austerity^ who neither swear nor play, nor carry arms, nor dance, nor drink strong liquors. Their religious ex- altation, inoffensive enough, declares itself at their " meetings,'' when, amid a profound silence, one of the congregation may begin to hold forth in the name of the Holy Spirit. The most intelligent of the Quakers, William Penn, the son of an admiral, was a creditor of Charles II. 's Government, which paid its debt with a gift of land in America. Penn betook himself thither with a body of Friends in 1681. The flourishing State of Pennsylvania preserves his name, and its capital, Philadelphia, reveres his memory. The Friends have always exercised a certain influence in England and in the United States, where they co-operated with effect in the movement for negro emanci- pation. Quite recently, they have had the honour of being the first to rebuild houses in the devastated regions of France (1915), and they have played a merciful part in combating the famine in Russia (1922).
• • • • •
45. One of the first results of the Catholic reaction was the Thirty Years' War. It ruined Germany for two hundred years, but with the help of Catholic France under Richelieu, Protestant Sweden under Gustavus Adolphus, and the Low Countries, the Reformed Princes of Germany were upheld against the House of Austria. In the end this frightful havoc and bloodshed left things much as it found them. Catholics and Protestants retained their position. France alone profited by the long con- flict in the weakening of the Empire. The Treaty of AVestphalia (1648) made her the first Power in Europe. Dreadful cruelties were enacted on both sides, but the Catholic leaders showed themselves even more savage than their opponents. Few more disgusting acts of barbarity have ever been committed than the sack and burning of Magdeburg by Tilly. Not only was the
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torch of war lighted by the Jesuit councillors of Ferdinand IL, but after all its ravages the Pope refused to recognise the peace of 1648. In 1631 Urban VIII. had congratulated Ferdinand on the destruction of Magdeburg, and had expressed the hope that other rebel cities would soon meet with the same fate !
46. The Lutherans of Germany had a reformer of their own in the Alsatian, Philip Jacob Spener (1635-1705). Distressed by the external and formalistic character of the religion he saw about him, he formed what he called the Collegia pietatis, from which his followers were called Pietists. It was in Berlin that he wielded most influence, the upper middle classes receiving an impression from his teaching which they preserved down to the middle of the nineteenth century. A Pietist is not a theologian. His preoccupations are with the practical side of the Christian life. Here he approaches the rationalist and the simple deist. From these, however, he is separated by a certain air of superi- ority and by a slight pretension to asceticism. A religious movement in its origin. Pietism became an attitude, and a pro- voking one. However, the tendency breathed by the writings and preachings of Spener evolved very differently in various parts of Germany, so that we cannot speak of Pietism in general, but only of Pietists in particular times and places.
47. Towards the end of the sixteenth century, Poland seemed almost lost to the Roman Church. The nobility were either Lutherans or Calvinists ; there were more than 2000 reformed communities in the country. Then a singular event took place. Two natives of Siena, Laelius Socinus (Lelio Sozzini) and his nephew Faustus, or Fausto, taught in Switzerland the doctrine known as Unitarianism, a kind of deism hostile to the dogma of the Trinity and still more to that of salvation by faith. Faustus came to Poland and founded a Socinian Church there, which Jesuits and Reformers united to attack. The Socinians had to take refuge in Transylvania, and the Polish reformers, weakened by the struggle and their loss in numbers, were soon reduced to impotence. The Roman Church profited by these events to regain all the ground she had lost.
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48. In spite of all the violence that darkened the reign of Henri II., violence in which the populace, excited by the monks, began to participate, the French Protestants were a fairly powerful body when Fran9ois II. mounted the throne. He was a child in poor health, dominated by the faction of the Guises. The struggle then took on a political complexion, the Huguenots recognising Prince Louis de Conde for their chief, the Catholics the Due de Guise. Desiring to withdraw the young king from the influence of Fran^^ois de Guise and his brother, the Cardinal de Lorraine, certain Protestants organised what is known as the Conspiracy of Amboise. This failed and was followed by numerous executions. At the begin- ning of Charles IX.'s reign, Catherine de' Medici being regent, the States-General demanded liberty of worship (1561). As a result of this a congress of theologians was held at Poissy, in which the Reformation was defended by Theodore de Beze, a pupil of Calvin and afterwards his successor at Geneva. Like all religious conferences it was quite useless.
In January, 1562, an important concession was made to the Protestants by an edict which gave them permission to have conventicles in cities. But almost immediately afterwards Francois de Guise attacked a group of Huguenots who were at worship near Vassy, and basely massacred women and children. A civil war followed which lasted with a few intervals for some eight years. It terminated through the influence of Admiral de Coligny, by a treaty favourable to liberty of worship, signed at St. Germain.
Henri de Bourbon, Protestant King of Navarre, was be- trothed to the sister of Charles IX. As it appeared unlikely that either Charles or his brother Henri would have children, the crown of France threatened to pass to a Prince of the Reformation ; an alarming prospect for Rome, for having lost England, she was all the more tenacious of her footing in France. As early as March 28, 1569, Pius V. wrote to Charles IX : '' Pursue and crush all enemies who remain. Unless you pull up the last roots of the evil, they will shoot again as they have already done so often." This was preaching the policy of extermination, which had already been put in
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force against the Albigenses. It led directly to the Massacre of St. Bartholomew.
49. Catherine de' Medici and Charles prepared the trap. They chose a moment when all the Huguenot chiefs were in Paris for the marriage of the King of Navarre. On the night of August 24, 1572, the Eve of St. Bartholomew, the mob, warned by the tocsin, flung themselves upon the Huguenots and began a massacre which lasted for several days. Admiral de Coligny, who " only breathed for the good of the State," ^ was the first victim. Ten thousand men were slaughtered in Paris, and in spite of the resistance of a few governors and military commandants, who were willing to be soldiers but not to be executioners, the same horrors were enacted in the provinces. Henry of Navarre abjured his faith to save his life, and for some four years gave himself up to shameful pleasures. He even did his best to harry his former co-religionists. One day, however, he disappeared from Paris, and again joined the Reformers.
" The throats of thirty thousand of their comrades had been cut at a time of peace ; about two millions were left to make war." 2 After the death of Charles IX., which followed the massacre at no long interval, his brother and successor, Henri ni., fearing the ambition of the Due de Guise, began by making overtures to the Protestants and disavowing the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. Henri de Guise, encouraged by the Pope and helped by Philip II., created the Holy League, the object of which was to exterminate the Reformers and to prevent the crown of France from passing to a Huguenot king. They avowedly preferred the daughter of Philip II. to the King of Navarre, secretly hoping to substitute the House of Lorraine for that ot Valois. The League was recruited among the ignorant rabble, directed and paid by the monks, who took care to feed their fanaticism. It was an army of crime and disorder in the service of the Church. Henri III., a feeble and abject creature, was driven by fear to declare himself head of the League. Under the impulse of the same passion, he ended by allying himself with the King of Navarre, and besieging Paris in his company
* Montesquieu.
* Voltaire. Two millions seems an over-statement of their number.
182 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
(1589). He was assassinated by Jacques Clement, a Dominican friar. Henri de Bourbon then became legitimate King of France. He knew well enough, however, that in spite of his repeated successes he was not accepted by the Catholic majority in the country. So once more he abjured, made the dangerous leap {saut perilletix), in the conviction that " Paris was well worth a Mass," and obtained the submission of the League (1593) chiefly by gifts of money and pensions to the leaders.
50. Pius V.'s successor, Gregory XIII., struck a medal in memory of the St. Bartholomew with the legend Ugonotorum strages (the carnage of the Huguenots), and commissioned Vasari to paint those frescoes representing the massacre which still dishonour the walls of a saloon in the Vatican. Vain attempts have been made to absolve the Pope and his Legate of all responsibility for this inexpiable crime. The Church found it quite a natural proceeding to get rid of the Huguenots, as it had of the sectaries of the Middle Ages, by collective murder. We have already quoted the message of Pius V. to Charles IX. On the fatal 24th of August, while the massacre was going on, the Nuncio Salviati wrote to Gregory XIII. : " With your Holiness I rejoice from my heart that the King and the Queen Mother have been able to exterminate these infected people with so much prudence and at a moment so opportune, when the rebels were all locked up in their cage." Gregory XIII. celebrated " the most happy tidings of the destruction of the Huguenot sect" with a religious ceremony. He sent to the French Court the Legate Orsini, who, on his way through Lyons, publicly distributed indulgences to those who had taken part in the massacres. Finally he presented the golden rose, instituted to reward ardent zeal for the Church, to Charles IX., the crowned assassin of his own subjects.
51. The Edict of Nantes (1598), a decree confirmatory of previous treaties, though with certain restrictions, gave religious peace to France for a time. This " perpetual and irrevocable " edict authorised the reformed worship and the teaching of Protestant theology ; also, by the institution of mixed tribunals [chamhres mi-parties)^ secured equality for the Huguenots in the administration of justice. Several cities, called Cities of
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Refuge [Villes de sHrete), were awarded to the Protestants. One of these, La Rochellc, became a sort of French Geneva. This was repeating the mistake already committed in the Edict of St. Germain, and setting up a state within the State for the benefit of the Reformers.
52. After the assassination (1610) of Henri Quatre by Ravaillac, the " blind instrument of the spirit of the age," ^ the condition of the Huguenots remained a favourable one during the early years of Louis XHL's minority. But Richelieu, although allied with the Protestant princes against the House of Austria, was too eager for the grandeur and unity of France to tolerate such an institution as the Villes de surcte. After an heroic defence by her mayor, Guiton, La Rochelle had to yield to famine (1628). The Edict of Nantes was confirmed by that of Nimes (1629), but the Huguenots were deprived of their strongholds.
53. From this time onward it was no longer policy but fanaticism and cupidity which controlled events. Taking advan- tage of every rivalry in interests or commerce, the Church never ceased to demand from the Crown the withdrawal of all conces- sions granted to the Protestants. Her chief supporters in this campaign were the Chancellor Le Tellier and his son Louvois. The Edict of Nantes was never accepted by the Catholic clergy, and its history is that of its revocation. ^
The learned Oratorian, Richard Simon, wrote : " If Cardinal Richelieu had not died so early, we should long ago have had no Huguenots in the kingdom." The Crown needed the gratuities it received from the clergy. These were always accompanied by demands for measures against the Protestants. " Where are the laws," said an orator before the child Louis XIV., at an assembly of the clergy in 1651 — " where are the laws which banish heretics from intercourse with their fellow-men ? " "We hope, at least," said another speaker, "that if your authority cannot put a summary end to this evil, it may cause it to languish and die through the gradual retrenchment and
* Voltaire.
2 Puaux, Leg prdcurxeurs franfaise de la toUratice, Paris, 1881, p. 2.
134. A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
diminution of its forces." This programme was faithfully carried out. Protestant advocates were excluded from the tribunals (1664), Protestant notaries were forbidden to prac- tise (1682). Protestants were shut out from all sorts of trades. They could not be apothecaries, or surgeons, or midwives ; they could be employed in no public office. Their places of worship were next attacked and demolished, their pastors were driven out, their schoolmasters restricted to teaching their pupils to read, while children were allowed to become Catholics at the age of seven, whether their parents sanctioned their conversion or not (1684). The condition of the Protestants became intolerable. Many of the rich and noble apostatised in order to obtain posts at Court. Thousands of the poor were bought by the gold of Pellisson, himself a converted Calvinist, who had the administration of the secret largesses of the Church. Many more of the poor and of the learned classes emigrated, and formed, especially in Holland, those communities of refugees from whom the world learnt the truth about Louis XIV.'s government, and among which, under the lash of persecution, the notion of religious toleration and political liberty first took definite shape.
54. Louis XIV. seems to have been led to believe that most of the Protestants had been converted or had quitted France. So he revoked the presumably useless Edict of Nantes, " in order to efface the memory of the past troubles " (October 18, 1685). Protestant places of worship were to be demolished, Protestant worship itself suppressed, schools closed, pastors banished on pain of death. But the Protestant laity were forbidden to leave France on pain of the galleys. They were compelled to remain, but had to abstain from any form of worship. Their children, being inscribed on no parish registers, were all accounted illegitimate. Family ties suffered no less than individual consciences.
55. Those Protestants who succeeded in evading or corrupt- ing the King's police passed the frontier (fifty thousand families in three years), taking their energies and what was left of their property to Holland, Prussia, England, and Switzerland. In order to crush those who stayed behind, the authorities imposed
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garrisons of dragoons upon them (1685). These soldiers be- haved Hke drunken savages, hanging, smoking out, and flogging men and women, dragging them half dead to the churches, " where their mere enforced presence," writes Pastor Claude in 1686, " was reckoned as a recantation." Houses were destroyed, trees cut down, women and children thrown into convents. Even the dead were not spared. As in the days of the In- quisition in Languedoc, the corpses of those who had died without confession were tried and dragged off on hurdles to be thrown into the common sewer. " At Caen, as in many other towns, unhappy parents might be seen following the hurdles on which the bodies of their children were being drawn, to be hacked in pieces by the pupils of the Jesuits." ^ The Hugue- nots made the country ring with their lamentations, but they did not rebel. "Must they make all these efforts," asked Jurieu, " to tear out those French hearts which God and our birth have given us ? " ^
56. At last, after seventeen years of atrocious persecution, an insurrection did break out (1702). Deprived of their pastors, the Protestants of the Cevennes used to celebrate their worship in the solitude of the mountains. Every meeting surprised by the authorities was treated with frightful severity, chiefly on the instigation of the Intendant Lamoignon de Baville, a 'protege of Madame de Maintenon. The unhappy people, who were called Camisards, exasperated and fired by mystic delirium, revolted, and for three years kept at bay three Marshals of France, of whom Villars was one. Their leaders were Roland and Jean Cavalier.^ It was a horrible war, in which the vanquished were put to death or sent to the galleys, and in which neither age nor sex was a protection from the violence of the soldiers. The memory of all this still lingers in the Cevennes. It should be kept alive everywhere. But during the whole of the nineteenth century public education, severely
^ F. Puaux, Pricurseurs de la toUrance, p. 23 (after Legendre, Vic de Du Bosc, p. 150).
* Ihid., p. 31.
^ Cavalier afterwards escaped to England, where he was well received by Queen Anne, and ended his days as Governor of Jersey. Voltaire met him in England, and formed a high opinion of him.
136 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
controlled by the Roman Church, threw a veil over these crimes as it did over so many others. French historical manuals gave them at most a few lines, while one generation after another has learnt from these same books to pity the victims of the Terror. 57. Everywhere and always, in this long catalogue of out- rages on human right, when kings and ministers proscribe and soldiers strike, it is the implacable Roman Church which directs sword or pen. This has to be shown, in answer to the falsehoods of those apologists who pretend, for example, that the Pope disapproved of the Revocation. After the disaster of Ramillies, Louis XIV. cried : " Has God then for- gotten all I have done for Him?" As God did not address himself directly to the Roi Soleil^ Louis here implies that he had followed the advice of his clergy, of those Jesuit directors who were for him the sole interpreters of the Divine Will. In January 1685, the French Ambassador to the Vatican trans- mitted the following words of Pope Innocent XI. to Versailles : " Truly, we give all praise to the king (Louis XIV.), who has destroyed so great a number of heretics, and wishes to exter- minate that unhappy sect entirely in his kingdom." On May 8, 1685, d'Estrees wrote to the king: "The Pope praised not only the continual care and application of your Majesty for the extirpation of heresy, but also the methods of which your Majesty has made use, winning some by kindness, driving others from their charges and employments, striking terror into those who could not be otherwise reduced." After the Revoca- tion, the Pope declared to the ambassador " that nothing could be finer, and that no other instance of such an action could be found." He also decided " that he would bear public witness to his joy and satisfaction with all possible splendour," On April 28, 1686, he celebrated the Revocation by giving plenary indulgence to all those who visited the French Church of St. Louis in Rome. St. Peter's and the Vatican were illuminated. Father Coronelli published an account of these celebrations under the significant title, " Rome triumphant on the occasion of the extirpation of heresy, by an edict given at Fontainebleau in October 1685." The Jesuit Semery gave a discourse from which we learn that Pope Innocent XI. had requested the
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 137
Cardinal d'Estr^es to use all his influence with Louis XIV. to get him " to destroy the plague and contagion of Calvinism." Finally, it must not be forgotten that on November 13, 1685, Innocent addressed a brief to Louis, in which he declared the Revocation to be " the finest thing his Majesty had ever done, the best fitted to immortalise his memory and to draw upon him the rarest blessings of Heaven."
58. If God forgot what Louis XIV. had done for Him, there were also a few Catholics who preached a somewhat tardy tolera- tion after the military and economical disasters by which the Revocation was followed. Thus Fenelon advised the English Young Pretender, James Stuart: "Never compel your subjects to change their religion ; no human power can force the im- pregnable retrenchment of the heart. Force can never persuade men : it only makes hypocrites. Grant civil toleration to all, not as approving everything indifferently, but as suffering with patience all that God suffers ; and seek to recall men to their duty by gentle persuasion."^ In these beautiful lines we recognise the remorse of a conscience illuminated by recent misfortune. But Fenelon himself was then undergoing persecu- tion. As for his great rival, Bossuet, he argued against the Protestant ministers, calling attention in his own magnificent periods to the variations of their creeds, but, so far as we know, he had'no word of pity for their sufferings. Indeed, he glorified the Revocation. " You have," he said to Louis XIV., " strengthened the faith ; you have exterminated the heretics ; that is an exploit worthy of your reign." What is true of Bossuet is true of most of his contemporaries. When the Church's glory is at stake, even noble hearts are hardened. "Our one preoccupation is the destruction of heresy," cried Daniel de Cosnac, Bishop of Valence, on July 2, 1685.
• • • • •
59. Louis XIV., who came near to extirpating Protestantism in France, deserves credit for introducing order and decency {la regie et la decence is Voltaire's phrase) into French Catholicism. Great disorders had existed under Louis XIII. " Nearly all
* Fenelon, CEuvres (Gaume ed. vol. vii. p. 102). The authenticity of this passage has been questioned.
138 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
the benefices were in the hands of laymen, who employed poor clergy at small salaries to carry on the services. Every prince of the blood owned rich abbeys. More than one benefice of the Church was looked upon as family property. An abbey would be given as part of a dowry, and a colonel would use the income of a priory to equip his regiment. Churchmen about the Court often wore swords, and ecclesiastics were engaged in not a few of the duels which at that time brought such sorrow to France." ^ These abuses ceased, at least in great part, and the French clergy became what they have remained to our own day, the most respected and respectable in Catholic Europe.
60. Those religious orders which were founded in France in the seventeenth century were nearly all of a charitable and practical character. Cardinal de Berulle established the Oratorians, an association of teaching priests on the model of the Italian foundation of St. Philip Neri. The Benedictines of Saint-Maur were distinguished for their works of erudition. J. B. de la Salle founded the Freres des ikoles Chretiennes (Christian Brothers) in 1680. St. Vincent de Paul, an active apostle, of untiring zeal, "the most popular of modern saints," founded the Lazarists, or priests of the Mission, and inspired the association of Sisters of Chanty, who devoted themselves to the help of the poor and suffering without being bound by any perpetual vows (1634). The whole world has done homage to the virtues of these kind women, whose starched caps have served religion better than many a tiara. Among the con- templative orders only one has become famous, that of La Trappe, founded in 1671 by a penitent libertine, Armand de Ranee.
61. The "liberties of the Gallican Church" had nothing to do with the consciences of the faithful, but were connected chiefly with the royal authority and with financial interests. It was not a question of religious liberty, but, in the first place, of the right, called the Regale^ claimed by the crown to absorb the revenues of vacant bishoprics and abbacies, and to nominate to benefices in any vacant see. It was asserted that these rights
^ Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA 139
had been exercised by the first two French dynasties ; after being neglected for a time to the advantage of the bishops, they were energetically reclaimed by Louis XIV. (1673). Certain bishops resisted ; the Pope protested. An assembly of clergy, convoked in 1682, adopted the following resolutions, as reprisals against Rome : (1) God gave no power in temporal concerns to either Peter or his successors. (2) The Galilean Church approves the Council of Constance, which declared Councils-general superior to the Pope in spiritual matters. (3) The rules, usages, and practices accepted in the Galilean Church and kingdom are immutable. (4) The Pope's decisions in questions of faith are only valid after they have been adopted by the Church. These propositions, which were ratified by the tri- bunals and theological faculties, appeared, with good reason, so intolerable to Innocent XI. that he at once refused Bulls to any bishops or abbots appointed by the king. At his death, in 1689, twenty-nine French dioceses had no bishops. His successors were no less uncompromising. Louis XIV., impor- tuned by the Jesuits, ended by permitting the bishops to send letters to Rome expressing their regret at the decisions the assembly had adopted. He himself wrote to the Pope to the same effect. Innocent XII. accepted these excuses. Later, Cardinal de Fleury caused the four articles to be partly dis- avowed by a second congress of clergy, and the struggle relaxed. The vital point was never decided, however. It was turned by various expedients which need not here be detailed.
• • • • •
62. From the fabliaux of the fourteenth century down to the Encyclopaedia, through Rabelais, Montaigne, Moliere and Bayle, runs a vein of criticism and of thought hostile to Christian dogma, to unproved assertions, to the intolerance of Popes and priests. In intimate conversation this free-thought went as far as atheism. This was averred in the seventeenth century ; it was believed, according to Pere Mersenne, who wrote under Louis XIIL, that there were as many as 40,000 atheists in Paris. Among the forces by which these were controlled, the most important, no doubt, were the clergy and the monarchy.
140 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
But two others existed which, in spite of being condemned by the Church, did good service in repressing what was then called Libertinage. These were the Protestant Reformation, which was a revival of the religious spirit ; and Jansenism, which a Jesuit described as a bungled Calvinism (Calvinisme harhouille).
63. The famous quarrel between Jesuits and Jansenists in France corresponds to the fight between Arminians and Gomar- ists in Holland. Cornelius Jansen (Jansenius), Bishop of Ypres, had written three great folio volumes upon St. Augustine which appeared after his death and found a certain number of readers in France. In this book Jansen adopted St. Augustine's opinions on Grace, whittling away, like Calvin, the part played by the human will in the work of salvation. The Jesuits, with their practical good sense, could not admit such a doctrine ; not that it was logically false, but because it tended, like Calvinism, towards the neglect of those good works which benefited the Church and, it must be added, society at large. In France, certain theologians grouped about the Abbey of Port Royal — Duvergier, Abbot of St, Cyran, the Arnaulds, Nicole and Pascal — adopted Jansenism in their antagonism to the Jesuits, to whom some of the Port Royalists, the Arnaulds, for instance, were opposed for personal motives. They made a difference of opinion on an insoluble question a pretext for discrediting their enemies. These latter, supported by Rome and with the strength given by the confessional and by their wealth, ended by getting the upper hand. But a whole century was disturbed by the dispute. The details of the long controversy are so futile that it would be folly to load one's memory with them. Their chief interest lies in the fact that they contributed indirectly to prepare the religious emancipation of the eighteenth century. But the men who set themselves against the easy religion of the Jesuits, and the saintly women, such as Angeiique Arnauld, Abbess of Port Royal, who were associated with them, still retain their influence on men's minds by the intensity of their moral life, the gravity of their mode of thought, and their tranquil courage. " Ces Messieurs de Port Royal" are imposing doctrinaires, great figures towering above the baseness and corruption of their times.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 141
64. Li 1641, the Jesuits obtained the condemnation of Jansen's book by Rome. The Paris Faculty of Theology denounced five of its propositions. The sense of these proposi- tions was taken from the book, but not their text. Hence an interminable quarrel. Were the five propositions in Jansen or were they not.'^ Innocent X., in his turn, condemned the five propositions, but again without quoting the pages from which they professed to be taken. Antoine Arnauld, a prolific and lucid writer, took up the struggle ; the propositions, he said, were in St. Augustine, so it was that great Father of the Church they were condemning ! Here Arnauld was quite right. " The Jansenists affirmed that their system, the doctrine of St. Augus- tine, was the veritable tradition of the Church. In this they were not altogether wrong, but their mistake lay in wishing to impose St. Augustine on a Church which had to some extent outgrown him." ^ In 1654 the Sorbonne expelled Arnauld, but it could not silence him. Under persecution he had more friends than ever. The French bishops wished to compel the nuns of Port Royal to endorse the condemnation of the five propositions. They refused. Rigorous measures were about to be taken, when Pascal's niece, a pensionnaire of Port Royal, was cured of a lachrymal fistula by kissing a thorn from the Crown of Jesus. The Jesuits denied the miracle. Racine and Pascal believed in it, the latter to the extent of accepting it as proof that the five propositions were true ! Fanned by a passion of credulity, the campaign against the Jesuits grew more furious than ever. " Every means of making them odious was tried. Pascal went further : he made them ridiculous. His Provincial Letters^ which appeared at this time, were models of eloquence and judicious mockery. The best comedies of Moliere are not richer in humour than the earlier Letters : Bossuet has left us nothing more sublime than the later." ^ No doubt. But if we look a little closer, we see that what Pascal denounces in the Jesuits is modernism in the moral law, preference of the spirit to the letter, and progress.^
^ Loisy, Qudques Lettres, p. 175. ^ Voltaire.
• We must, of course, except certain intolerable theories advanced bj' a few Jesuit writers, which Pascal very justly condemns.
142 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
65. The subtle Italian, Clement X., re-established a sem- blance of peace. Jansenism, under the protection of the Dachesse de Longueville, sister of the great Conde, took advantage of this to extend its influence. The king and the Jesuits resumed the struggle. Arnauld had to fly, and died at Brussels in 1694, at a great age. A new Bull from Clement XL (1705) was presented for signature to the nuns of Port Royal. On their refusal they were again driven out of their convent. Worse still, this was demolished in 1709 by order of the lieutenant of police. In 1711 the bodies interred in the churchyard were dug up. Boileau himself shuddered at this. His fine epitaph on the " Great Arnauld," whose corpse in its Belgian grave was beyond the reach of Jesuit vengeance, concludes with the following quatrain :
Et meme par sa mort leur fureur mal ^teinte N'aurait jamais ]aiss6 ses cendres en repos, Si Dieu lui-meme, ici, de son ouaille sainte A ces loups devorants n'avait cach6 les os.^
66. An Oratorian, Pere Quesnel, a friend and companion of Arnauld, had written a pious book which at first won the approval of Clement XL It was dedicated to Cardinal de Noailles, Archbishop of Paris, an honest prelate who was hated by the Jesuits. These latter, who had become all-powerful when Pere de la Chaise had been chosen to direct the conscience of Louis XIV., denounced Quesnel, who retired to Amsterdam, where he died. The condemnation of his book was demanded from Rome, and obtained from the same Pope who had previously blessed it. After the death of La Chaise, the king's Jesuit confessor was Le Tellier, a thoroughly bad man, bent on the ruin of Cardinal de Noailles. He reached his end through the weakness of Louis, who obtained the famous Bull Unigenitus from the Pope. This Bull condemned a hundred and one more or less Jansenist propositions put forward by Quesnel. Most of these were entirely inoffensive. The cardinal refused to accept the Bull, and complained to the Pope. The king forbade the cardinal to appear at Court. Le Tellier was all-powerful, and the prisons were filled with Jansenists. The king's death alone
* Sainte-Beuve, Port Royal, vol. v, p. 476. Boileau wrote this epigram but never published it.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 143
prevented the deposition of the cardinal. As the latter was very popular, the Regent made him president of the Conseil de Conscience, and banished Le Tellier. But the affair of the Bull was by no means at an end. " The Church in France remained divided into two camps, the Acceptans and the Refusans. The acceptors were the hundred bishops who had given in their adhesion under Louis XIV., together with the Jesuits and the Capuchins. The refusers were fifteen bishops and the nation at large." ^
67. Thanks to the amiable scepticism of the Regent, who
wanted peace, and the tact of Archbishop, afterwards Cardinal,
Dubois, the Bull was at last registered, and Cardinal de Noailles
retracted (1720). But the Jansenists did not disarm. A deacon
called Paris, who had died in the odour of sanctity, had been
buried in the cemetery of St. Medard. The Jansenists announced
that miracles were being worked at his tomb ; that tremblings
and upheavals were felt there, which cured the deaf, the blind,
and the lame. " These prodigies were attested in due form of
law by a crowd of witnesses, who had almost seen them, because
they had come in hopes of seeing them." As the cemetery was
invaded day and night by a crowd of sick and idle people, it
was shut up and a guard set at the gate, on which some wit wrote
the famous distich :
De par le roi, defense k Dieu De faire miracle en oe lieu !
68. The Jansenists survived in France throughout the eighteenth century, especially in the parliaments. When Christophe de Beaumont, Archbishop of Paris, attempted, in 1752, to refuse absolution to those who had not subscribed to the Bull Unigenitiis, the parliaments rose against the foolish pretension, and it required the intervention of the Pope to prevent the quarrel between the parliament and the archbishop from becoming one between the parliament and the monarchy.
69. There are Jansenists still in Paris and in Holland. They are quiet people, of excellent morals, who no longer work miracles.
• . . .
^ Voltaire.
144 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
70. The Quietist movement was of no less import, for it set Bossuet and Fenelon in opposition to each other. This extra- vagance was of Spanish origin. Thanks to the protection of Philip XL, St. Theresa had escaped the rigours of the Inquisi- tion, which did not readily tolerate mystics. But the Spaniard, Miguel Molinos, who taught in Rome the doctrine of the perfect contemplation, of direct communication with God, with- out the intervention of a priest, was condemned by the Inquisi- tion (1685) and died in prison (1696). A young and fascinating widow, Madame Guyon, aspired to be the St. Theresa of France. Under the direction of a Barnabite called La Combe, she succeeded in gathering recruits in Paris, among others Madame de Maintenon and the Duchesses de Chevreuse and de Beau- villiers. Fenelon, at that time tutor to the royal children, set himself to love God in company with Madame Guyon. " It is strange that he should have been seduced by a woman given over to prophecies, revelations, and jargon, who was choked by internal grace, and had to have her stays loosened to give it room, pouring out the overflow of her own grace on the elect who sat beside her." ^ When Madame Guyon propagated her illusions at Saint-Cyr, Madame de Maintenon, warned by the bishops, withdrew her countenance and forbade the lady to enter the house. Fenelon advised Madame Guyon to submit her writings to Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux. Bossuet condemned them, and she promised to dogmatise no more. Meanwhile Fenelon had become Bishop of Cambrai (1695). In spite of her promise, Madame Guyon failed to keep silence, so the king shut her up in Vincennes. Bossuet required Fenelon to associate himself with the condemnation of Madame Guyon. Fenelon refused, and published his Maximes des Saints, which is tainted with Quietism. Bossuet hated the Quietists and no longer loved Fenelon. He wrote in opposition to his quondam friend, and both submitted their works to Innocent XII. After much hesitation, the Pope, hard pressed by Louis XIV., condemned Fenelon (1699). He submitted nobly, and disavowed his own book from his pulpit at Cambrai. He spent the rest of his life in " honourable and philosophical " retreat, as Voltaire called it,
1 Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 145
at Carabrai, and gave up his time to good works. His Telemaque^ which is still read, suffices to class him among the Utopians ; those who see in him an intellectual ancestor of Rousseau are not altogether wrong.
71. Madame Guyon died in obscurity, in 1717, after fifteen years of retirement in the neighbourhood of Blois. Age and solitude calmed the nerves of this honest but hysterical woman, " who had espoused Jesus Christ in one of her ecstasies and, from that time onward, had prayed no more to the saints, explaining that the " mistress of a house does not petition her servants." ^
• • • • •
72. In Spain, political supremacy had been reconquered by the Christians after long years of war (1492). The population was divided into three groups, the Christians, the Musulmans or Moors, and the Jews. The first were chiefly warriors, the second agriculturists, and the third scholars and traders. All these people asked for nothing but to live in peace and keep up friendly relations. It was the Church which worked hard, as early as the eleventh century, to set them at each other's throats. She succeeded only too well. The Inquisition, legally subject to the royal power, which, however, it threatened to usurp, was instituted in 1480. It set about harrying and burning Musul- mans and Jews. Many of these had been forcibly converted in the fourteenth century, but were suspected of the crime of relapse and of secretly practising their ancient rites. Infidels, as such, escaped the Inquisition, but if a man had been baptised, even by force or fraud, it claimed power over his body and con- science. As the smallest offence in the direction of relapse (such, for example, as abstaining from pork) was punishable by the confiscation of the offender's property and its division between the Crown and the Inquisition, the cupidity of her princes and the fanaticism of her monks soon turned Spain into a hell lighted only by the flames of the stake.
73. The first Grand Inquisitor, Confessor of both King and Queen, the Dominican friar Torquemada, was eulogised by Pope Sixtus IV. He had caused six thousand victims to be burnt.
1 Voltaire. L
146 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
These infamous ceremonies were called acts of faith, autos dafe. The king was present at them, bareheaded, and on a seat lower than that of the Grand Inquisitor. Thus began a long drama of misery and oppression. All scientific activities were sup- pressed, and the Middle Ages were prolonged in Spain down to our own days, " Thence it is that silence has become one of the characteristics of the Spanish people, though they are born with all the vivacity given by a warm and fertile climate." ^
But the most outrageous prosecutions were not enough. The authorities believed, or pretended to believe, that national unity could only be secured by the expulsion of the Jews (1492) and Moors (1609) en masse. Hundreds of thousands of these unhappy people had to go into exile ; tens of thousands died on the way. Spain was stripped of its best workers, of its ablest traders, of its most skilful doctors. The Papacy found all these severities natural enough. If, sometimes, it seems to have sought a quarrel with the all-powerful Spanish Inquisition, this was not because the latter roasted or slaughtered too many unbelievers, but because it failed to show sufficient respect for the rights or financial interests of the Church.
74, The eighteenth century saw the Inquisition discredited in the Spanish peninsula, but it was still formidable for mischief in the colonies, both Spanish and Portuguese. It was suppressed by Napoleon when he entered Madrid (December 1808). It was re-established at the Restoration and still tried to bite ; but, even in Spain, the days of the auto da fe were over by then. The Inquisition was finally abolished by Queen Christina in 1834. It had put to death at least 100,000 persons in Spain alone; it had expelled 1,500,000, and had ruined the civilisation of that noble country.
• • • • •
75. At the very moment when the capture of Granada had assured the triumph of Christendom in Spain, a native of Genoa discovered a new world and opened it to Christianity. The Spanish and Portuguese conquerors of America behaved like bandits. Peaceable and confiding populations were ex- terminated, root and branch. Those who were forcibly
^ Voltaire.
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 147
" converted," vegetated in a condition often more cruel than slavery. The Inquisition was installed and brought about a reign of terror. In the P^ast Indies, especially at Goa, it was no less murderous. In Rome, warned by a popular outbreak at the death of Paul IV., it showed itself more prudent. Never- theless, on February 17, 1600, it sent to the stake the philo- sopher Giordano Bruno, the opponent of Aristotle and partisan of Copernicus, who had been handed over to the Holy Office by the Inquisitors of Venice.
76. The Roman Inquisition made itself both odious and ridiculous by its two prosecutions of Galileo. As early as 1616 the opinion of Copernicus on the movement of the earth, revived and demonstrated by Galileo, was denounced by the Dominicans as inconsistent with the story of Joshua, who, according to the Bible, caused the sun to stand still. The Inquisition declared Galileo's assertion to be " not only heretical in faith, but absurd as philosophy." Galileo bowed to this decision, but went on with his researches. His great work, the Dialogo di Galileo Galilei, appeared in 1632, under licence from the Inquisition of Florence. Extremely prudent in form, it was substantially a new demonsti'ation of the system of Copernicus. The upholder of the opposite system was made to talk learnedly enough, but like an imbecile : a trick which had escaped detection by the good Florentine inquisitor. Urban VIII. referred the Dialogo to a commission, and Galileo, nearly seventy years old and weak in health, had to travel from Florence to Rome to appear before the Inquisition. At a sitting of the Congregation of the Holy Office (June 16, 1633), the Pope decided that he should be interrogated " even under threat of torture." Galileo was a scholar of genius, but no hero. When thrown into prison he retracted humbly, on his knees. The famous saying, " E pur si muove " (And yet it does move!) was invented for him by a wit, 130 years later (in 1761). The system of Galileo was universally admitted in the eighteenth century; but it was not until September 11, 1822, that the Congregation of the Incjuisition gave a licence to print books teaching the true movement of the earth, a decision approved a fortnight later by Pope Pius VII. " It is wrong to nurse
148 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
an eternal suspicion of the well-known prudence of the Roman congregations on account of a single blunder. But those men of little faith mentioned by the Evangelist are very numerous, and they still instinctively believe that what has happened once can happen again. And this dread, this proneness to voluntary or involuntary distrust, is a lingering consequence of the condemnation of Galileo." ^ So writes an honest apologist, and he is right : but are the men of little faith wrong ^
BIBLIOGRAPHY
L. Ranke, Deutsche Oeschichte im Zeitalter der Reformation, 6 vols., 1867- 1868 ; L. Pastor, Qeschichteder Pdpste, 4 vols., 1899-1907 (Engl, trans.) ; Ward, Prothero and others, Cambridge Modern History, vol. iii., 1905 ; Imbart de la Tour, Les Origines de la Riforme (1476-1520), 1905 ; Lavisse and others, Histoirc de France, vols, v., vi., 1904-1905 (the Reformation in France); E. Rodocanachi, La Rijorme en Italie, 1920.
6. Art. Luther and Sta^ipitz in Hauck ; H. Grisar, Luther, 1911 (hostile).
11. Art. Exorcis7nus in Jia.uck.
12. Art. Karlstadt and Melancthon in Hauck.
13. J. Martin, Oustave Vasa et la iUforme en Sulde, 1906.
14-16. Art. Anabaptisten, Augsburger Bekentniss and Bauernkrieg in Hauck.
18. Art. Augsbicrgcr Religionsfriede in Hauck.
19-21. Arts. Zwingli and Calvin in Hauck ; A. Bossert, Calvin, 1906 ; P. Paulsen, Calvin, 1909.
24-25. G. G. Perry, A History of the English Church, 3 vols., 1861-1864; Gasquet, Edward VI. and the Book of Common Prayer, 1890 ; H. N. Birt, The Elizabethan Religious Settlement, 1908 ; J. Hungerford Pollen, The English Catholics in the Reign of Elizabeth, 1920; E. .Jaj'klem, Intol. in the Reign of Elizabeth, 1917; G. O'Brien, Economic History of Ireland, 1919.
26. Skelton, M'iry Stuart, 1893 ; art. Knox in Hauck ; Hassenkamp, Gcschichte Ir lands, 1886.
27. Aguesse, Hidoire de V Etablissement du protestantisme en France, 2 vols. , 1891 ; F. Buisson, Sibastien Castellion, 2 vols., 1893; J. Thomas, Le Concordat de 1516, 1910 ; J. Vienot, Le Paris des Martyrs, 1914.
29. M. Philippson, La Contre-Rdrolution religimse au XVP"'' sikle, 1884 ; L. Ranke, Die romischen Pdpste im I6ten und 17ten Jahrhundert, 9th ed. , 1889 (English translations) ; Ugo Balzani, Rome %mder Sixlus V. (in Cambridge Modern History), vol. iii., 1905. — On the Confessional : 'Laa,, Inquisition of Spain, vol. iv. , p 96.
30. R. Allier, La Cabale des Divots (1627-1666), 1902 {cf. R^belliau, Rev. des deux Monde*, 1903).— Catholic revival, chiefly due to S. Vincent de Paul: Rev. hist., cxxxviii., p. 263.
31. See the prefaces by H. Michel, Bruneti^re, &c., to the classic editions of the Provincial es.— Art. Kasuistik in Hauck ; Lejay, Le r6le thMogique de Saint-Cesaire d' Aries, 1906.
32. Art. Trienter Konzil in Hauck.
33. The reconquest of Poland : art. Hosiiis and Polen in Hauck.— The Inquisition in Spanish America : Lea, The Inquisition in the Spanish Dependencies, 1908.— Missions to India, Japan and China: Funck, Kirchen- geschichte, p. 500.
1 Vacaiidard, Etudes de Critique, 1906, p. 386,
FROM LUTHER TO THE ENCYCLOPEDIA 149
34. Art. Jesuilenorden in Hauck ; A. Michel, Les J<fstiUes, 1879 ; Peyrat, La Compagnie de Ji^us (in Histoire et Religion^ p. 86 et seq) ; Boehmer, Lea jisidtes, transl. by G. Monod, 1910 ; J. Brucker, La Compagnie de Jisus, 1919 ; J. B. Herman, La p6dagogie des j6suites, 1920.
36. Pfotenhauer, Die Missionen der Jesuiten in Paragxuiy, 3 vols., 1891- 1893.
38-39. Foraeron, Histoire df Philippe II., 4 vols., 1880-1882; Namfeche, Philijrpe II. et les Pays-Bas, 4 vols., 1886 ; P. J. Blok, Willem de Eerste, 1920.
40. Art. Arminius and Remonslranten in Hauck.
41-42. In addition to the great histories of England (Hume, Gardiner, Green), consult Th. Firth, OUver Crovnvell, 1900 ; R. Gardiner, The Gun- powder Plot, 1897 ; Peyrat, La revolution et la rcstauration anglaise (in Histoire et Religion, p. 207); Ethelr. Taunton, History of the Jesuits in England, 1901.
43. Walker, A History of the Congregational Churches in the United Stales, 1894; R. G. Usher, The Pilgrims, 1918; art. Kongregationalisten in Hauck (p. 684).
44. Cunningham, The Quakers, 1868 ; Rufus H. Jones, The Story of G. Foa-, 1919.
45. Art. Urban VIII. in Hauck. The Pope's brief to Ferdinand II. was first published in 1884.
46. Pietisvius and Spencr in Hauck; A. Ritschl, Gcschichte des Pietismus, 3 vols., 1880-1886.
47. Art. Hosius, Polcn, and Socin in Hauck.
48. Lavisse and others, Histoire de France, vols. v. and vi. ; art. Coligny inXffi France Protestante ; H. Hauser, Etudes sur la Riformc fram^aise, 1909; J. Mariejol, Cath. de Midicis, 1920 ; L. Romier, Les protestanls ii la veille des guerres civiles, in Rev. hist., cxxiv. p. 1 ; A. Maury, La Saint-Barth6lemy (in Journ. des Savants, 1880, p. 154) ; Vacandard, Les Rapes et la Saint-Barthd- leiny (in £tudes, 1906, p. 217). Recent studies on that subject: Rev. hist., cxxxvii., p. 87; Rev. du XVI' siecle, 1913, p. 525.
50. The medal, of which there is an example in the Biblioth^que Nationale, was engraved in the Numismata romanorum pontificum by Bonanni (vol. i., p. 323). On the face is a portrait of Gregory XIII. ; on the reverse, the destroying angel smiting the Huguenots, and the inscription Ugonotorum strages, 1572. Vasari's paintings are described in Lafenestre and Richten- berger, Le Vatican, p. 136. (Royal Room, Admiral Coligny, wounded by an arquebuse, is carried into his house; murder of the Admiral, of his son-in- law, Teligny, and his servants ; King Charles IX. manifests his joy at the deed.) "Thus," wrote Stendhal, "there is still one place in Europe where murder is publicly honoured." Visitors of the Vatican have no access to that room.
51. Peyrat, Henri IV. (in Histoire et RrUgion, p. 374), a learned and original memoir ; art. Nimes in Hauck.
53-58. F. Puaux, Les pr^curseurs fran^ais de la toWance, 1884; P. Gachon, Prtliminaires de la Revocation en Languedoe, 1899 ; Les dt!fenseurs de la souve- raineti du peuple sous Louis XIV., 1917; the same, Rev. hist., cxxix., 1; exxxvi., 1 ; cxxxvii, 1 (Camisards) ; J. Vi^not, d propos de F^nelon, 1910 (his former intolerance) ; R^belliau, Bossuet, historien du protestantisme, 1891 ; Crousle, Bossuet et le protestantisme, 2 vols., 1894-1895 ; Peyrat, Bossuet (in Histoire et Religion, p. 1-44) ; Gazier, Bossuet et Louis XIV., 1914.
55. Orders issued by the minister Louvois : " Let there be as much disorder as possible . . . allow^ the soldiers to live as licentiously as they choose " (1685). "Make very few prisoners, but shoot down a great many people; and do not spare the women any more than the men " (1687).
59. Voltaire, Silcle de Louis XIV., excellent edition with notes by E. Bourgeois, 1898.
60-61. Lang^nieux and Baudrillart, La France chretienne dans VRistoire, 1896; G^rin, Louis XIV. et le Saint-Siege, 2 vols., 1894.— The practical character of religious Orders in the seventeenth century : R. Allier, La Cabale des Divots, 1902, p. 17.— On Ranc6: Sainte-Beuve, Verniers Portraits,
150 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
p. 414; on St. Vincent de Paul: E. de Broglie, Saint Vincent de Paul, 5th ed. 1899; also Rev. hist., cxxxvii., p. 93; cxxxviii., p. 260.
62. Sainte-Beuve, Port Hoy al, 6 vols., 1840-1862; Fuzet, Les Jansinistes an XVlpx" sikle, 1876; A. Gazier, Une Suite d Vhistoire de Port Poyal, 1908; A. Hallays, Le Pllerinage de Port Royal, 1909 ; Strowski, Le Sentiment religieux en France cniXFII'"" siecle (St. Fran9ois de Sales, Pascal, &c. ), 3 vols., 1906-8 ; H. Br^mond, Histoire du sentiment religieux en France, 1917 and foil. ; Sech^, Les derniers Jansinistes, 2 vols., 1891. — On the French free-thinkers of the seventeenth century : F. T. Perrens, Lts Lihertins, 1887 ; Brunetifere, La Philosophie de Molibre (in iStudes critiques, 4th series) ; F. Lach^vre, Le libertinage au X VII' siecle, 1920,
63-69. A. Le Roy, Le gallicanisme et la hulle Unigenitus, 1892. — J. Turmel, Histoire de la tMologie positive du Candle de Trente au Concile du Vatican, 1906 (learned and lucid). — A. de Meyer, Premieres controverses jans6nistes, 1917.
68. Napoleon, hearing that there were Jansenists in the Lyonnais in 1803, ordered them to be evicted and even imprisoned ; he had no liking, he wrote, " for lunatics allied to the sect of convulsionaries " {Revxie d^ Histoire de Lyon, 1905, p. 431).
70. E. de Broglie, F^nelon A Cavihrai, 1884.
71. C. T. Upham, Madame Guyon, 1905 ; M. Masson, Finelon et Madame Guyon, 1907 ((/. Fdinburgh Reviev), April 1908) ; E. Seilli^re, Finelon ct M"" Guyon, 1920. — On F(^nelon: Sainte-Beuve, Lundis, vol. ii., p. 5, and vol. x. , p. 16 ; A. Delplanque, Finelon et la doctrine de V amour 2)ur, 1907.
72—74. Lea, History of the Inquisition in Spain, 4 vols., 1906—1907; see also S. Reinach, Cultes, vol. iii., p. 472. — The Inquisition and the Jews: S. Reinach, Cultes, vol. ii., p. 401 ; E. Adler, Aioto de f6 o,nd Jew, 1908 ; art. Inquisition in the Jewish Encyclopccdia ; E. Vacandard, V Inquisition, 1907; Lea, The Moriscos in Sjjain, 1901 ((/. Morel-Fatio, Rev. Hist. Relig., 1902, vol. xlv. , p. 113, an apology for the Inquisition).
75. Lea, The Inquisition in the Sjjanish Dependencies, 1908. — Bartholomes, G. Bruno, 2 vols., 1847; Plumptree, Life and Works of Giordano Bruno, 2 vols., 1884; W. Boulting, O. Bruno, 1917.
76. Vacandard, GaliUe (in ^tiules, 1906, p. 292).
CHAPTER V
CHRISTIANITY : FROM THE ENCYCLOREDIA TO THE CONDEMNATION OF MODERNISM
From the sixteenth to the twentieth century : Emancipation of thought and reaction — Persistence of religious feeling in France in the eighteenth century — The Encyclopaedia — The Philosophers — Voltaire's hostility to Christianity — '"^crasons Vinfdme " — Galas. — Expulsion of the Jesuits from France and Portugal : Suppression of the Order — Secularisation of Church property by the National Assembly — The Civil Constitution of the clergy — Public worship impeded by the Convention — The Goddess of Reason — The Theophilanthropists.
Revivals in Protestant countries : Sects — Sects in Scotland — Baptists — Methodists — Darbyites and Irvingites — Christian Scientists — The British Israelites — Tractarianism, Puseyism, Ritualism — The Unitarians.
Liberty of worship in the United States — The Mormons.
Joseph II. and the Catholic reaction in Austria — Protestantism in Austria — Sects in Russia : persecution of the Poles and the Umiaces — Mme. de Kriidener.
Catholic revival under the Directory — The Concordat and its results — Reaction begun by Pius VII. continued by Pius IX. — The Syllabus and the Vatican Council — End of the temporal power — The reaction in French literature : Chateaubriand, Bonald, J. de Maistre and their successors — Liberal Catholicism : Lamennais, Lacordaire, Montalembert — The political reaction in France : the White Terror, the Congrigation, the Law of Sacrilege — Religious indifference — Freedom of teaching and the loi FalloxLx — Religious affairs under Napoleon III. — The clerical reactions after 1871 — Boulangism — Anti-Semitism — The Dreyfus affair — Separation of Church and State — French Protestantism — Switzerland : War of the Sonderbimd — The Jesuits since 1814 ; their influence in France and the Catholic world generally — The German "Old Catholics" — H. Loyson — Policy of Leo XIII. — Pius X. — The Sacr6 Cceur, La Salette, Lourdes — The Church and mysticism — Mediums — Condemnation of spiritualism — The Neo-Buddhists — The Freemasons — The Church and Socialism.
Religious philosophy: Schleiermacher, Vinet — Evolutionary Catho- licism— Americanism — Modernism — Foreign Missions — The Church and Slavery — The Church and the upper classes.
1. The sixteenth century saw the development of the critical spirit and the breaking down of Roman despotism in Europe. The seventeenth century was almost universally a period of reaction towards the pi'inciple of authority. The eighteenth century took up the work of the sixteenth, and freed the human intellect from its shackles. Kings philosophised and philosophers reigned. The Order of Jesus was abolished by the Papacy
151
152 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
itself. The Inquisition became ridiculous, and hid itself to die. Under the stimulus of progressive science, liberty of thought made definitive conquests among the enlightened classes. Un- happily it was not realised that these classes were not very numerous. In default of a sufficient provision for lay teaching, the great majority of men remained ignorant and superstitious. The French Revolution put influence and power in the hands of a class unprepared for their use. The result, both in France and elsewhere, was the reaction of the nineteenth century, a reaction which was Catholic in one place, Calvinist or Pietist in another, Greek Orthodox in a third. To twentieth-century France belongs the honour of renewing the march towards complete liberty, in her attempts to laicise society by the separation of Church and State.
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2. Eighteenth-century France must not be looked for only in the salons of Paris and Versailles, in the courts of Frederick the Great and Voltaire. The country as a whole remained profoundly Catholic, with a tendency towards Jansenism in the upper classes, especially among the magistrates, the so-called noblesse de la robe. Atheistic cardinals were to be found at Versailles, frivolous and sceptical abbes abounded. But the clergy, the magistracy, and the tiers etat included even then a mass of austere Catholics intent upon working out their salva- tion, and a still much greater mass of the intellectually deficient, in whom the religion of the Middle Ages survived. The latter formed, so to speak, the reserves of the nation. When these were called to political and social action, medieval ideas re- appeared on the surface, and brought about a reaction which still endures.
3. The Encyclopsedia began to appear in 1751. Voltaire was its soul, from his secure retreat, Les Delices, and afterwards at Ferney. But Diderot, the most universal of all men of letters, was its mainspring for twenty years, in spite of all the thunders of the clergy and the severities of the Parliament. The manifesto of the Encyclopaedia was d'Alembert's excellent preface on the classification of our knowledge. The articles on theology, from the pens of liberal priests, are irreproachable in
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 153
tone, although hostile enough to the pretensions of the Papacy. But the irreligious tendency of the compilation as a whole is clearly shown by the articles on philosophy. These are chiefly from the pen of Diderot himself, a materialist and atheist.
4. Not all the philosophers of the eighteenth century were above reproach. D'Alembert was the best and most trust- worthy. Voltaire, for all his genius, was a buiFoon, not over- delicate in money matters, sycophantic to the great, and contemptuous of the masses. Montesquieu had some of the pettinesses of a provincial judge and shows an over- weening conceit in his writings ; Diderot was a kindly Bohemian, rather destitute of manners and morals ; Rousseau was set against the philosophers by jealousy and against reason by vanity. But all these men had one admirable quality — their love of humanity. They wished to shine, but still more to serve. Their intellectual activity had a practical object, to destroy prejudices and better man's lot ; so we must forgive them much.
5. To understand the spirit in which the Encyclopaedists really worked, we should read Voltaire's correspondence with d'Alembert. The latter had to be prudent. He lived by his pen, in Paris, where he had been a member of the Academic des Sciences ever since he was twenty-three. " Fear of the stake," he wrote to Voltaire, "is cooling to the blood" (July 31, 1762). But Voltaire was rich ; he was a member of the King's house- hold {gentilhornvie de la Chamhre) ; he reigned both at Ferney and to some extent in every capital in Europe ; he never ceased to spur into the fight those who were to feel the blows he himself had earned. His letters breathe an anti-Christian rage which d'Alembert did nothing to combat in his replies, because as a fact he shared it. Voltaire writes : " It is a good tree, say the devout rascals, which has produced bad fruit. But as it has produced so much, doesn't it deserve to be thrown into the fire .? Light one then, you and your friends, and make your- selves as hot as you can " (November 28, 1762). Clearly, here he is concerned with Christianity, not with fanaticism. " Yet a little time and I daresay all these books will not be wanted ; the human race may have sense enough to understand of itself that three do not make one, and that a piece of bread is not
154 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
God. Even now the enemies of reason cut a silly figure enough " (March 31, 1762). "I can see from here the Jansenists dying a natural death twelve months hence, after killing the Jesuits this year; I can see toleration established, the Protestants recalled, priests married, the confession abolished, and fanaticism crushed as a matter of course" (May 4, 1762). "Many a fanatical group may kick against it, but reason will triumph, at least among the better sort ; as for the rabble, reason is not for them " (February 4, 1757). " Our business is not to prevent our lackeys from going to Mass or preachings ; it is to snatch fathers of families from the tyranny of impostors" (December 6, 1757).
6. Such quotations might be multiplied almost indefinitely ; they show how much we restrict the role of Voltaire in making him an apostle of toleration, a term which implies a certain complaisance of truth towards error. Voltaire demanded legal toleration because that represented progress at a time when Calas and the Chevalier de la Barre died, the victims of religious bigotry. But his ambition went much further. He dreamt of the abolition, even by violence, of positive religions as impos- tures, at least in those well-to-do and enlightened classes which alone excited his interest. In his hatred of fanaticism he became intolerant himself.
7. Many of Voltaire's letters end with ^' £cr. rinf." (£craso7is Vinfdrne: Crush the infamous thing !). A comparison of texts leaves no doubt that by Vmfame Voltaire meant not only fanaticism and superstition, but Christianity. He was, or called himself, a deist. But the God of Voltaire was a prop of the social system. He was a D'leu- gendarme — a policeman- God! — like that of the right-thinking middle classes of the nineteenth century, a God to be imposed on the lower orders, without any thought of loving or pleasing Him oneself. There is more honesty and frankness in the atheism, otherwise dull enough, of Diderot or even of the Baron d'Holbach. As for the God of Rousseau, he was in the main a mere text for declamation. But Rousseau''s God, who identifies himself alter- nately with the beneficence of Nature and the rigour of the moral laws, is thoroughly impregnated with the spirit of the Bible. If no longer Christian, he might become so again.
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 155
Rousseau's eloquent and sentimental deism leads to the eloquent and sentimental Catholicism of Chateaubriand. The Calvinistic Jean-Jacques thus prepared the way for the Catholic reaction of the nineteenth century, after corrupting the Revolution with his sophistry. For it was in his name that the Revolution was made, and rather ill made. Voltaire, who was little read between 1789 and 1815, Avould have inspired it better.
• • ■ t •
8. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes was never repealed under the ancien regime. As late as 1762 a pastor was con- demned to death for having preached. It was only in 1787, two years before the Revolution, that Protestants were admitted to civil rights {etat civil) and that their children ceased to be considered illegitimate. Philosophy had something to do with this change. It had undertaken, through the mouth of Voltaire, the posthumous defence of Calas, the Protestant who had been broken on the wheel at Toulouse, 1762, for having, it was asserted, killed a son who wished to abjure Calvinism. In reality the young man had committed suicide. Voltaire de- manded the rehabilitation of the innocent victim, and was seconded in his honourable task by the " intellectuals " of his time, as well as by the upper classes of society. In 1765, three years after Calas had suffered, his efforts were crowned with success. A century later, it took ten years to bring about the rehabilitation of Alfred Dreyfus.
9. Although the Jesuits had shown themselves tyrannical, seditious, and greedy ever since the middle of the sixteenth century, it cannot be denied that the suppression of the Order in the eighteenth century was brought about by the basest intrigues and calumny. Having taken to trade, like the Templars of old, they had become very rich. The trade with South America and with India was partly in their hands. Their wealth awoke the cupidity of Sebastian Pombal, Prime Minister and more or less Viceroy of Portugal. He accused them of conspiring against the State (1757), confiscated their property, and burnt one of them alive. This was the old visionary, Malagrida, whose trial was conducted by the docile Inquisition.
156 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
10. In France a great many families were ruined by the failure of a commercial house intimately connected with the Jesuits. In this the Parliament saw an opportunity for in- dulging its Jansenist rancour. Strong in the support of Choiseul and of Madame de Pompadour, whom one of the king's Jesuit confessors had offended, it instituted an inquiry into the affairs of the Order and obtained its suppression. This, however, Pope Clement XIII. was not inclined to ratify. The example of France was soon followed by Spain, where the Order had fallen under suspicion with the king and the Inquisition. A new Pope, Clement XIV., accepted the inevitable and declared that the Order no longer met the needs of the time. He suppressed it in 1773.
11. Some of the fugitive Jesuits were welcomed at Ferney. Educated by the Jesuits, Voltaire had kindly feelings towards his masters, and displayed them in his own fashion. But he disgraced his pen by scandalous jests at the hapless Malagrida, the innocent victim of Pombal's tyranny.
• • • • •
12. During the second half of the eighteenth century the philosophers frequently demanded the secularisation, in other words, the confiscation, of Church property, which was valued at several milliards.^ This the National Assembly decreed (November 2, 1789), but at the same time it voted an annual contribution in return for what the nation received. Such was the origin of the Budget des Cultes (Public Worship Budget). On July 12, 1790, the Assembly went still further, imposing on the clergy the Constitution Civile, inspired by the most radical ideas of Gallicanism. The Church was, in their opinion, a part of the State, subject to reform like all other institutions. But in acting on these lines the deputies ignored the Pope's authority, taking from him the right to institute bishops, and making the functions of the clergy elective. This was the end of the Concordat of 1516. The Assembly required that all ecclesiastics should pledge themselves by oath to accept the Civil Constitution. The Pope, Pius VI., sternly objected, though many bishops agreed (March- April 1791), and from that
1 A milliard of francs equals forty million pounds sterling.
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 157
time the clergy were divided into assermentes or Jureurs (jurors) on the one hand, and insermentes or refractaires (non-jurors) on the other. The latter were soon compelled to celebrate Mass in secret, in buildings of their own, often in stables or barns. Although less cruelly molested than the Protestants after the Revocation, they were persecuted in the same spirit ; so true is it that toleration is not to be learnt in a school of persecution.
13. The Convention took a great stride in advance. Though it did not actually suppress Catholic worship and did proclaim religious freedom, it gave no pecuniary aid to the Church, and failed to protect the priests in the discharge of their duties. Many were put to death ; churches were looted and art treasures wantonly destroyed. For the space of about two years, Catholicism was almost abolished in a great part of the country. The Abbe Gregoire, one of the bishops who had taken the oath, and had distinguished himself by his noble efforts for the emancipation of the Jews and the abolition of negro slavery in the colonies, protested in the name of Christian tradition and liberty, but in vain. The Bishop of Paris, who had also taken the oath, came to the bar of the Convention to lay down his insignia. A new calendar, with purely civic festivals and a day of rest every ten days, was inforced (1793-1805). Inverted fanatics, who could not live without some form of worship, founded in Paris that of the Goddess of Reason (November 10, 1793). The new goddess was impersonated by an actress from the Opera. She was received with great pomp at the Convention, the members joining the people in escorting her to the Temple of Reason (Notre-Dame), and in singing the hymn to Liberty. These buffooneries were imitated in other sections of the capital, where Temples of Reason rapidly multiplied. Robespierre, bitten by Rousseau's deism and intolerance, caused the Conven- tion to decree the existence of a Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul. The terms of this decree were affixed to the Temple of Reason (May 1794).
14. The sect of TTieophilanthropists was not long in making its appearance. " Friends of God and Man," they pretended to supersede all religions by a belief founded upon morality alone. Protected by a member of the Directory, Larevelliere-Lepeaux,
158 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
who thought himself a pontiff, and acted as such, they had eighteen churches in Paris at their disposal (1797). Their services were carried on by the members in turn : they consisted of moral sermons and French chants and hymns. The sect made a certain headway in Paris, but as it came under suspicion of Jacobinism, the Consuls deprived it of the churches ia October 1801, and the Theophilanthropists disappeared after a some- what ludicrous existence of about five years.
• • • • •
15. The strides made by free-thought, materialism, and atheism in the eighteenth century excited, in Protestant countries, those reactions which are called revivals. They are generally characterised by mysticism, and by fantastic inter- pretations of the Holy Scriptures. These movements have taken place chiefly in England and the United States, where they continued during the nineteenth century. But Germany, Switzerland, and Holland have had them too, especially after the political reaction of 1815. In England and America, revivals have led to the creation of new sects, for which party struggles and encroachments of the temporal domain on the spiritual have also furnished occasions.
16. Although the Presbyterian system implies the election of clergy by the congregations, a right of patronage^ or nomina- tion of parochial clergy by the Crown or over-lord, existed in Scotland as an abuse, and was confirmed by an Act of the British Parliament in 1712. This brought about a first dis- ruption in 1733, when a minister at Stirling, one Ebenezer Erskine, founded a body known as the Refo7'med Presbyterians. In 1843 a second disruption gave rise to the Free CImrch oj Scotland. The greater Disruption took place in 1847. The reformed communities, which had greatly increased, assumed the name of the United Preshyte^'ian Church, to distinguish them from the Established Church of Scotland. In 1874 Parliament finally abolished patronage, and, in 1900, the Free Church and the United Presbyterians amalgamated to form the United Free Church. A small minority of the Free Church ministers were hostile to this fusion, and contested its legality. They established their claims to the whole property of their
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 159
Church, bringing about new difficulties which were, however, happily arranged. The Scottish Churches do not differ in doctrine. They have a creed in common, known as the Westminster Confession (1647), the Calvinistic rigours of which have been softened by the Declaratory Acts of 1879 and 1892.
17. Baptist sects, which have been erroneously supposed to have their roots in the Christianity of Roman Britain, appeared in England at the beginning of the seventeenth century. Like the Mennonites, disciples of the Dutchman Simonis Menno (t 1559), who were scarcely distinguishable from the Anabaptists^ the early Baptists condemned the baptism of infants, the taking of oaths, and military service. Their distinctive rite is baptism by total immersion, which is received by adults only. The poet Milton has been claimed by this sect, to which John Bunyan, author of the PilgTirn's Progress^ who spent ten years in prison under Charles II., certainly belonged.^ The Baptists have enjoyed toleration ever since 1689, and have greatly increased in numbers in Germany, the United States, and elsewhere. They number 350,000 in England, four millions in the United States. They keep up important foreign missions, especially in Africa and Asia. The Baptists have no bishops. Their officers are elders elected by the communities, doctors entrusted with preaching, and servitors or deacons. The Baptists are perhaps the only Christian sect in which a Christian of the year 100 would not find himself out of place.
18. More than thirty millions of Protestants call themselves Methodists to-day. This great sect was founded in England about the year 1740 by an eloquent and energetic Puritan, John Wesley (tl791), with the help of his brother Charles and his friend Whitefield (t 1770), who preached more than 18,000 sermons. At first their one aim was to bring about a revival in the Anglican Church by the reading of the Bible, by regularity of religious observance, and by the purification of the moral life. The name Methodists, which occurs as early as 1639, desig- nated a school of preachers who taught a method of reaching
^ Milton was an "irregular and defective Baptist." Like Bunyan and many other devout spirits of his time he belonged rather to that independent group of Nonconformists who were neither Presbyterians nor Anglicans. See R. Hofmann's article, BapfAsten, in Hauck, p. 387.
160 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
happiness through virtue. While directing most of its attention to preaching, practised by laymen as well as ministers, the Methodists fostered the creation of religious societies, which became the centres of propaganda. Methodism offers certain analogies with German Pietism, but, unlike the latter, it addresses itself to the masses, which it desires to educate religiously and morally. The great meetings of the sect have been occasionally discredited by a touch of convulsionary charla- tanism, but, on the whole, they have been powerful instruments of evangelisation and conversion. The Methodist missions, which have now spread themselves all over the globe, dispose of a huge annual revenue.
19. Since 1797 the Methodists have been divided into various sects — the Wesleyans, the Bible Christians, &c. — which are separated by but slight shades of difference in opinions. The rupture with the Anglican Church, which John Wesley did his best to avoid, was gradually brought about towards the end of the eighteenth century. The Methodists of to-day form a dissenting Church, which governs itself through its Conference, and possesses a hierarchy composed of both clerics and laymen.
20. Introduced into New York in 1768, Methodism was rapidly extended by the missionary vigour of Whitefield. It attracted most of the negroes, who constituted independent communities. It is to the honour of the American Methodists that they protested against negro slavery as early as 1784. The sect multiplied even more rapidly in America than in England, but its principles everywhere remained the same : it was above all a revivalist and missionary Church. The Methodist Missions of the United States spend ,£280,000 a year, and own a fixed capital estimated at more than a million sterling,
21. The dry formalism into which the Anglican Church had sunk in the early years of the nineteenth century provoked the formation of yet another sect, the Plymouth Brethren. These were joined in 1831 by the Anglican priest, John Darby, from whom the Plymouthists are generally known as Darbystes, or Darbyites, on the Continent. The sect was really an association
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 161
of brothers, because the Holy Spirit, they said, was " essentially the Spirit of Unity." This opened the way to prophesying at large, and to all the evils of individualism in religion. The Plymouth Brethren, in their various subdivisions, have spread all over Western Europe and North America.
22. Darby, about the year 1826, encountered some of the disciples of Edward Irving (t 1834), a Scottish minister who prophesied the end of the world, and the Second Coming of Christ in glory. In 1832, after all kinds of absurdities, Irving founded a Church, and in order to preserve the prophetic enthusiasm of his followers, instituted a hierarchy inspired by St, Paul, which alone had authority to talk the official nonsense. The most extraordinary thing about this particular mystification is that its effects have been permanent. There are from seven to eight thousand members of the Catholic Apostolic Chm'ch (as the Irvingites call their community) in the British Empire, twenty-five thousand in Prussia and Bavaria, with many more in Holland and even in Java. They have tacitly abandoned some of the follies which attended their foundation, but they still cultivate prophecy and await in joyous confidence the Second Coming of their Lord.
23. England and the United States of America contain more than 100,000 members of a sect founded in Boston about 1880, which calls itself the Church of Christ Scientist. Its founder was a certain Mary Baker Eddy, and its chief propa- gandists have been enthusiastic women. It pretends to cure all sorts of illness with no remedies but suggestion and meditation. The suggestion is not hypnotic. It is simply the assertion, repeated until conviction is produced, that all disease is imaginary. Christian Scientists are found also in France and Germany, where, as well as in England, they have been prose- cuted for illegally acting as doctors. Christian Scientists deny that they are occultists or even mystics. But the fact that they ascribe a practical efficiency to their curative formulae obliges us to give them a place, which they by no means solicit, in the modern history of magic.
24. The idea that America was colonised by Jewish refugees, in very ancient times, is an illusion older than Mormonism.
M
162 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
A large number of people still exist, both in England and the United States, who believe the Anglo-Saxons to be identical with the lost tribes of Israel, the ten tribes who never returned to Judaea after their Babylonian captivity. An itinerary has even been traced for them ! According to this they moved along the valley of the Danube to Denmark (countries of the tribe of Dan). God promised Israel that she should reign over the nations. God cannot lie. The Anglo-Saxons are the strongest race in the world : therefore the Anglo-Saxons are the descendants of Israel ! I myself heard this doctrine preached at Brighton in the open air, by a man of venerable appearance who seemed to believe what he said.
• • • • •
25. The established Anglican Church, with the king for its head, is Calvinist in spirit, Romanist in form. Putting Rome aside in matters dogmatic, she has preserved, or at least imitated, the Roman hierarchy. Her declaration of faith is contained in the Thirty-nine Articles promulgated by Elizabeth. At the beginning of the nineteenth century she had all the faults of a rich and powerful institution. She was governed by formalism, and all warmth of piety was smothered under external correct- ness. The other Protestant sects — Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists — made up the great body of Nonconformists or Dis- senters. With them the Calvinistic traditions were undiluted by borrowings from the Catholic hierarchy.
26. In 1661 and again in 1673, fear of Catholicism and hatred of the Dissenters led to the imposition of a test on all public functionaries. They were called upon to reject on oath the doctrine of Transnhstantiation on the one hand, and, on the other, all connection with the Solemn League and Covenant^ the Scottish pact concluded in 1588 and renewed in 1637, for the defence of the National Presbyterianism against Anglicanism and Popery. The Corporation and Test Acts remained in force until 1828, when they were abolished, and public functions opened to both Catholics and Nonconformists.
27. The Dissenters, who included a large part of the middle and lower classes, were no less hostile to Popery than to the Established Church. The latter, deprived of the protection of
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 163
the Test Acts, not unreasonably felt itself threatened. One of its intellectual centres was the University of Oxford, whose Christianity, it used to be said, was somewhat " high and dry."" There a movement towards reform took place, which has been called the Oxford or Tractarian Movement. This second title commemorates the publication of a series of ninety tracts, which issued from Oxford between 1833 and 1841 to spread all over England.
28. Among the writers of these tracts the two most notable were Newman (1801-1890) and Pusey (1800-1882). They pro- posed to breathe new life into the Anglican Church by removing its Calvinistic elements, and bringing it nearer to pre-Reforma- tion Christianity while purifying the latter. Here the influence of Schleiermacher, whom Pusey had knoAvn, came in and also that of the Romantic movement, with its uncritical admira- tion for the Middle Ages. This admiration had been raised in England almost to the point of intoxication by the popularity of Sir Walter Scotfs novels.
29. It soon became apparent that, in his search for a via media between Anglicanism and Romanism, Newman was taking on a strong bias towards the latter. The Bishop of Oxford condemned Tract No. 90, and forbade the continuation of the series (1841). Newman obeyed, but four years later was received into the Roman Church (1845). For a time he was Rector of the Catholic University in Dublin (1851-1858), was made a Cardinal by Leo XIII. in 1879, and died in 1890, in a religious house founded by himself (the Birmingham Oratory). Pusey, who wished to stop short of Rome, became the head of a new group in the Church, which, while professing fidelity, dreamt of reconciliation with the Papacy down to the time of the Vatican Council (1869—1870). Personally, he was always against the adoption of medieval ceremonies in Anglican worship. His disciples, however, were not so wise. They were carried away by the spirit which produced the great aesthetic movements of the time, and Piiseyism degenerated into Ritualism (about 1850). This High Church sect, forming the extreme Right of Anglican- ism, borrows the crucifix, candles, incense and sacerdotal orna- ments of Rome, to whom it also makes important concessions in
164 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
matters of dogma, admitting the Real Presence, auricular con- fession, and the cult of the Virgin. Gregory XVI. said of the Tractarians : " They are Papists without a Pope, Catholics without unity, and Protestants without liberty." His dictum was truer still of the Ritualists.
30. Orthodox Anglicans and Dissenters united against the new tendencies. The London mob sacked a Ritualist church (1860). The national sentiments were wounded by what was called the Papal Aggression, when in 1850 Pius IX. nominated a Roman hierarchy for Great Britain, appointing the Vicar Apostolic, W^iseman, a Cardinal and Archbishop of Westminster. The cry of No Popery ! was raised as in the days of Anne. In reply to the creation of the English Church Union (I860) by the Ritualists, the Church Association was formed (1865) to combat the romanising of English worship. Parliament and the Courts of Justice interposed more than once in favour of Anglicanism. But they failed to arrest the growth of Ritualism, which denies the right of the State to meddle with religious matters, and clamours, like the Nonconformists, for disestablish- ment. Any union with Rome is prevented — in spite of the renewal, by Leo XIII. (1896), of attempts at an understanding — by the opposition, even of the Ritualists, to the primacy and infallibility claimed by the " Bishop of Rome." The internal conflict has died down in the twentieth century, not because the Ritualists have modified their practices, but because the differences between them and orthodox High Churchmen are gradually vanishing.
31. The Ritualists not only have schools, hospitals, and missions : they have imitated Rome in founding congregations, like those of the Holy Cross (1853) and the Holy Sacrament (1862). They have even formed a congregation of Sisters of Mercy, the first idea of which came from Pusey. These Sisters are now established in most of the great London Hospitals.
32. The good sense of the English soon taught them that Ritualism was disguised Catholicism. Many Tractarians and Ritualists — Newman, for instance, and Manning, who both became cardinals — went over to Rome. Romanism is integral Ritualism. At first Ritualism gained most of its recruits among
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 165
the upper classes, to whom religious dilettantism and love of art made the severity of Calvinistic worship repulsive. But thanks to its organisation of work among the poor, which every one can appreciate, it has now conquered a great following among the labouring and necessitous classes.
33. The accession to Catholicism of a scholar like Newman, trained in Anglican Oxford, had grave results for the religion he embraced. One of his works, an Essay on the Development of Christian Docti-ine (1845), introduced the idea of religious progress and the evolution of dogmas among educated Catholics and made its author, much against his will, one of the parents of Modeimism. Down to 1854 the Catholic doctrine was reputed to be unchangeable. St. Vincent de Lerins had given as its formula : " What all men have believed, everywhere and always." Bossuet had contrasted the stable and definite character of the Roman Church with the variations of the Reformed Churches. But in 1854, Pius IX. promulgated the dogma of the Immacu- late Conception, without summoning a council, converting what had previously been a free opinion into a dogma of the Church. This was to break with tradition, to affirm, according to New- man's ideas, the dogmatic evolution of Catholicism. Where was this to stop ? The dogma of Papal Infallibility, promul- gated in 1870, was the answer: it would stop where the Pope chose ! This solution, which satisfied Newman, was only valid in dogmatic questions. Historical matters remained where they were. The idea of e^olution in dogmas, and the resulting necessity for the study of their genesis and development, opened the door to free exegesis, which had previously been out of the reach of Catholics. The Abbe Loisy and others passed through the door thus flung wide.
34. The nineteenth century saw the development, in England and the United States, of the rationalistic Christian sect of the Unitarians. As early as the sixteenth century people had been burnt in England for professing the principles of Arianism and denying the Trinity. The adherents of this doctrine coalesced with the Socinia7is in the seventeenth century, and with the Deists in the eighteenth. Theophilus Lindsay (t]808) and Joseph Priestley, the great chemist (t 1804), were the prophets
166 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
of British Unitariaiiism. The latter was obliged to leave England (1794) on account of his sympathies with the French Revolution. He introduced Unitarianism into Pennsylvania. Christianity thus purified found a favourable soil in Boston, the American Athens. Channing, who was to become so famous for his opposition to slavery (1835) and for his championship of the rights of justice and reason, became a Unitarian in 1819, although he was opposed to the foundation of a new Church. " An Established Church,*" he declared, " is the tomb of intelli- gence." After Channing, the poet and moralist, Ralph Waldo Emerson, advocated Unitarianism, the religion of intellectual people, a Christianity without dogma, and with no temple but men's hearts. In England, its chief representative was James Martineau (t 1900), the author of works on Unitarianism which have now become classics. In their pantheistic tendency they have much in common with Spinoza, and no dogmatic difficulties stand in the way of their acceptance by the liberal Judaism of our own da)%
35. The United States was the first great country to separate Church and State completely, leaving the field entirely open to the free rivalry of religions. The result has been to give a certain advantage to Catholicism, which has the centralisation of power for one of its principles, over Protestantism, which splits naturally into sects. Among the numerous Protestant sects, selection will do its work and will develop, as elsewhere, a form of religion without any exacting theology, but preoccupied rather with social and moral questions. At the present moment the fifteen millions of Catholics form a larger group than any one of the Protestant sects of America.
36. Spiritualism, which is really a religion, had its origin in the United States. There, too, arose one of the strangest phenomena of the nineteenth century, Mormonism. Mormonism is one of those religious epidemics, or revivals^ to which the Anglo-Saxon peoples seem more prone than others, on account of their free reading, often practised in common, of the sacred writings. In 1 830, Joseph Smith, a visionary pedlar, announced to credulous people that he had had a revelation referring the American people to the family of the patriarch Joseph, and
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 167
foretelling the early appearance of a Messiah. An angel had brought him this revelation, engraved on gold plates in Egyptian characters. The imposture succeeded in spite of its grossness. After several migrations, the new sect established itself in the State of Illinois, where it built a great temple (1841). It called itself The Church of Latter Day Saints. They were also called Mormons^ because one of the pretended descendants of Joseph, who had emigrated to America some six hundred years B.C., bore the name of Mormon, and had compiled the holy book of the sect, a translation of the pretended golden tablets. This holy book is a clumsy plagiarism from the Bible and from a romance published in 1812. It is devoid of both talent and originality ; but religious enthusiasm does not reason. Formed into an agricultural and industrial republic, rapidly increased by immigrants from various other countries, the Mormons gave themselves up with docility to the guidance of their " prophet." Smith, wishing to restore patriarchal manners, authorised poly- gamy (1843). This scandalised the population of Illinois, who first imprisoned the prophet and then put him to death (1844). Upon that the Mormons, led by Smith's favourite disciple, Brigham Young, a carpenter, went on trek once more. They settled in Utah, near the Great Salt Lake, and there built a new capital in Salt Lake City (1847). When Brigham Young died in his turn (1877), he left seventeen wives, fifty-six children, and a fortune of two million dollars. The head of the Mormons in 1901 was Joseph F. Smith, a nephew of the prophet. The number of his followers was estimated at 300,000, exclusive of some 15,000 dispersed about Europe. Their religion requires the baptism of adults only by total immersion. They also baptise " for the dead," after the example of certain primitive Christians. Franklin and Lincoln were thus rescued from the fires of hell.
37. In 1884 the United States Congress forbade polygamy in any part of the Union, and instituted prosecutions against those who practised it ; so the Mormons renounced part of their inheritance from the patriarchs of Israel. The 2000 missionaries they support have been better received in consequence. The still incomplete history of the Latter Day Saints is that of an
168 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
initial fraud from which certain energetic organisers, helped by many willing dupes, have won great results in the interests of a whole community.
■ • • • •
38. Frederick the Great and Catherine II. were philosophic sovereigns, so far as laughing at sacred things in company with Voltaire, Diderot, and others went ; but they had no idea of weakening in their States that Christianity which, personally, they despised. The German Emperor, Joseph II., was the true crowned philosopher of his time, in spite of his mediocre abilities and his tactlessness. He wished to realise in law the secular ideas with which his mind was imbued. In 1781 he established toleration in his Empire, closed nearly all the con- vents and sequestrated their property, forbade the publication of papal briefs without his own authority, and stopped those appeals to Rome which fostered defective discipline in his clergy. He was compared to Julian the Apostate and became most unpopular, in spite of the useful reforms by which his reign was distinguished. The French Revolution frightened him. By the time he died, in 1790, he could foresee that philosophy would soon attack the occupants of thrones them- selves. Nevertheless, it was not until 1855 that Austria dis- avowed Joseph II, In that year a Concordat (repealed in 1870) was concluded with Pius IX., restoring the prerogatives to the clergy and rescinding all the laws by which the Church was deprived of its power over education. The Roman Church again took up its control of schools, of marriage, and of literature. This treaty was one of the last triumphs of theocracy in Europe.
39. In the eighteenth century Protestantism was no more tolerated in Austria than in France. The province of Salzbui-g, which had been governed by a prince-bishop ever since 1278, drove the Protestants out in 1731, after inflicting outrages upon them which drew protests from the Prussian king. The exiles went to Holland and North America, where refugees are always welcome. The nineteenth century recognised toleration, at least in principle. During its last twenty years Protestantism even gained some ground in Austria. A movement with the
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motto Los von Rom (Away from Rome !) detached a few thousand families from Catholicism, but was soon checked, it is said, by sheer bribery.
40. The revision of the Russian liturgical boolcs by the patriarch Nikon (1605-1681) provoked the secession of the Raskolniks from the State Church. These fanatical conserva- tives are known as "Old Believers," and still number several millions in Russia. Among Russian heretics there are certain wild mystics, called Skoptsy^ who aim, not at the ameliora- tion, but at the extinction, of the human race. There is also the rationalistic sect of the Dukhoborts?/, who reject all cere- monial and veneration of images. As Orthodox Christianity was the State religion, all these sectaries were held in suspicion and persecuted under the autocratic regime.
41. The Polish Catholics and those Ruthenians who remain in communion with the Roman Church, although their rites are Oriental, have suffered even more. If the Polish martyrs were immolated for political rather than fanatical reasons, the Uniates were persecuted solely because they refused to enter the State Church. " They have undergone trials and punishments of every kind, exile from their homes, Siberia. They numbered eight millions in the seventeenth century ; had shrunk to 800,000 at the beginning of the nineteenth; to-day (1897) not more than 100,000 Ruthenians are left to groan. . . . The others have disappeared : exile, prison, death, and apostasy have accounted for what was once an important Church." ^
42. A curious episode in the reaction of 1815 was the influence wielded over the Czar Alexander I. by the Baroness von Krlidener, who, after a most dissipated youth, became a mystic at the age of forty. Still beautiful, and believing herself inspired, she gained such ascendancy over the Pietist Emperor that he accepted from her (and from the mesmerist Bergasse) the curious idea of the Holy Alliance, concluded on September 26, 1815, in the name of the Holy Trinity, between Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Alexander ended by finding that she lacked discretion, and broke with her. But she continued to rush about the world, preaching, giving alms, dragging people as
* Pisani, A travers V Orient, p. 177.
170 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
crazy as herself into her own track. The missions undertaken by her and her friends were a sort of foretaste of the Salvation Army. Madame de Krudener"'s adventurous existence came to an end in the Crimea, in 1824. In one of her last letters she wrote : " Very often have I taken for the voice of God what was nothing but the fruit of my own pride and imagination." She might have recognised this a little sooner.
43. The period of the Directory in France witnessed a revival of Catholicism, under the new regime of Disestablish- ment, though the Government was quite irreligious. In 1796 public worship had been resumed in more than 30,000 French parishes. Parisian society again found its way to church, ecclesiastics again donned their vestments. Five hundred priests were ordained in a single year. Madame de Stael, Lafayette, and other moderate spirits wished this state of things to continue, as favourable to the free play of opinions. But the First Consul, Bonaparte, had need of the Pope ; he thought he could secure the support of the Roman Church by intimidation, that he could turn bishops and priests into gendarmes without again subjecting France to the demands of the Holy See. He made up his mind to conclude a new Concordat with Pius VII., to replace that of 1516, which had been torn up by the National Assembly.
44. The essential aim of every Concordat between a Pope and a temporal sovereign is to secure the latter in his right of nominating bishops, and to preserve for the former the right of canonical institution, permitting him to reject unworthy candi- dates or those whom Rome has reason to mistrust. The Parliament of Paris, looking with favour on the old Galilean custom by which bishops were elected by the cathedral chapters, long resisted the Concordat between Leo X. and Francis I. (1516). The French monarchs, who owed their spiritual investiture to the Papacy, never ceased to busy themselves with whittling away the rights of Rome over the Church of France, not because they wished to make that Church in- dependent, but because, from fiscal motives among others, they wished to keep it well in hand. In that, as in many
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 171
other things, Bonaparte simply took up the traditions of the monarchy.
45. After rapid though difficult negotiations, in which Bonaparte recoiled neither at threats of violence nor attempts at fraud, the Concordat was signed in 1801 and promulgated in 1802. Catholicism was recognised not as the State religion, but as the religion "of the great majority of French citizens."" The clergy were to receive salaries from the State, the bishops were to be nominated by the State, with the reserve that their investiture lay with the Pope. Resorting to trickery, Bonaparte promulgated, at the same time as the Concordat (April 8, 1802), certain so-called Organic Articles, forming a sort of religious police code. Among other things these articles had to do with the regulation of Protestant worship (Jewish worship was not recognised and regulated until 1808). But the essential articles were aimed at Rome, paralysing all direct interference by the Pope in the affairs of the French Church. Pius VII., who had had no warning, protested (1803). "The Organic Articles,"" said Montalembert in 1844, "were in our opinion a violation of the Concordat. They were never recog- nised by the Church."'"' The contrary has been asserted. The whole question is one of shades of meaning. It is certain that Pius VII,, although he was obliged to crown Bonaparte at Notre-Dame, believed that he had been duped, and never ceased to show his resentment. He refused investiture to the new bishops, and replied to the brutalities of Napoleon by excommunication (1809). Deprived of his dominions, he be- came the Emperor's prisoner, first at Savona and then at Fontainebleau, where in 1813 he was driven almost by force to sign a new Concordat, which was never recognised. By it the Pope agreed thenceforward to live at Avignon ! Very soon afterwards this treaty was disavowed by Pius VII., who regained the States of the Church after the successes of the Allies in 1814. If Pius VII. had died at this juncture he would have left the reputation of a saint and hero behind him, for he had faced the insults and injustice of Napoleon with a steadfastness which was truly admirable. Unhappily for his memory, he lived long enough to unchain the reaction.
172 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
46. The definitive restoration of temporal power to the Popes (1815) marked the beginning of a long period of bad government. In their own States, where the oppression of the papal agents brought about poverty, and poverty brigandage, the Popes had to reckon with ever-increasing opposition ; out- side, in Italy, aspirations towards unity threatened the very foundations of their power ; in Europe generally those liberal ideas which had survived the collapse of the Encyclopaedia were enemies against which it was difficult to make head, now that the scourge, the dungeon and the stake were no longer at the service of the Church.
47. Pius \IL re-established the Society of Jesus (August 1814), which, indeed, had managed to survive in Prussia and Poland, in spite of its condemnation by Clement XIV. Their wealth, intelligence and influence over women and young people made the Jesuits very powerful auxiliaries to the Papacy. The Pope condemned the Freemasons and the Carbonari (a secret society which had the liberation of Italy for its aim), excited the Congregation of the Index to renewed activity, restricted the translation of the Bible into the vulgar tongue, and fought against that liberal evolution in Spain and Portugal which was presently to be arrested by French intervention. His successors were scarcely more happily inspired. But the supreme perils and difficulties were reserved for Pius IX. (Mastai Ferretti, 1846-1878). At the beginning of his reign he showed a disposition to grant the reforms demanded by the wretched economical condition of his States. But after a popular out- break, which obliged him to take refuge in Gaeta (November 1848), his attitude changed completely. The French Republic declared war against the Roman : Rome was taken, and Pius IX. replaced on his throne (April 1850). He abused his power like a tyrant. Between 1850 and 1855 more than ninety people were condemned to death in Rome for political offences. Between 1849 and 1856, no fewer than 276 executions took place in Bologna. The Papal Government was for years in the hands of the unworthy Cardinal Antonelli, who scandalised Europe with the reign of terror he established. A Jewish child, Mortara, baptised by a servant, was taken by force from its parents at
FROM ENCYCLOPAEDIA TO MODERNISM 173
Bologna and kept in a convent, in spite of the energetic protests of Napoleon III., of the English Government, and of liberal Europe generally (1858). Four years earlier Pius IX. had pro- mulgated the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. In 1864 he published, or allowed to be published, what was called The Syllabus. This was a summary of all the opinions condemned , in his previous Bulls and allocutions. Every one of the con- '• demned propositions is such as any sensible man and liberal Christian would accept without hesitation. It was a defiance to secular Europe, to science, to the very idea of progress. Napoleon III. forbade its official publication in France, and would, indeed, have abandoned Pio Nono's government to its fate but for certain feminine influences which hampered him. The States of the Church had been greatly diminished in 1860, to the gain of the new kingdom of Italy. Ever since 1850 a French garrison had occupied Rome, upholding Antonelli's oppressive regime. In 1864 it was withdrawn at the instance of the Italian Government. In 1867 Garibaldi marched against the Papal States. A French division was landed to oppose him ; it added the pitiful name of Mentana to the list of French victories, and renewed that occupation of Rome which lasted until 1870.
48. It occurred to the Jesuits to have a new council, in order that the doctrine of Papal Infallibility might be erected into a dogma. This only meant, of course, that the Pope should be declared infallible when proclaiming a religious proposition from his chair {ex cathedra). But even when so restricted, infallibility wounded the reason not less than the teachings of the past. It was an outcome of that Ultramontanisni which the Dominican Lacordaire once declared to be " the greatest piece of insolence yet put forward in the name of Jesus Christ." The first result was to elevate the Pope's authority in dogmatic questions above that of a council. The second was to give the lie to undeniable historical facts, such as the condemnation of the heresy of Pope Honorius I. by the Ecumenical Council of 681 and a whole series of its successors. Enlightened pre- lates, in France, Germany and Austria, were hostile to the doctrine of Infallibility ; but the Jesuits, relying on the
I
174 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
support of the fanatical masses, pushed on to their goal, and the dogma was proclaimed on July 18, 1870, on the eve of the declaration of war between France and Prussia. At that moment, Napoleon .III. might perhaps have saved his crown and secured the military co-operation of Victor Emmanuel by abandoning Rome to Italy. The Catholic coterie at the Tuileries prevented him. But he was soon obliged to withdraw the French garrison from Rome. After a slight bombardment^ the Italian troops marched in through the breach on September 20, and put an end to the temporal power of the Popes, Pius IX. refused to accept the law of guarantee, which left him, with certain other privileges, the sovereignty of the Vatican and the Lateran. Until his death in 1878 he never ceased to protest against the Italian usurpation, and his successors, Leo XIII. and Pius X., have done the same. But the Italian Government has shown the greatest deference towards the Popes. It has scrupulously refrained from pushing its authority over the thresholds of the pontifical palaces. That has not prevented the country clergy from talking of the " prisoner of the Vatican," or from describing to emotional peasants " the damp straw of the Pope's dungeon."
• • • • •
49. As early as the end of the eighteenth century, the Catholic reaction began to show itself in France in the domain of ideas. La Harpe, the p-otege and servile admirer of Voltaire, chanted a palinode after the Terror and posed as an enemy of the philosophers. A Breton noble, more highly gifted than La Harpe, published in 1802 a brilliant and superficial work which foreshadowed Romanticism and had an extraordinary success. This was Chateaubriand's Genie du Christianisme. The Catho- licism of Chateaubriand was mainly sentimental and aesthetic ; that of Bonald, also proclaimed in 1802, was simply theological, and even theocratical. Joseph de Maistre, a Savoyard by birth, went still further in his hatred of revolutionary principles, in his exaltation of the Papacy of the Middle Ages, in his impudent denials of, and apologies for, the misdeeds of the Church. This gifted fanatic was the founder of the Ultramontane I School, so called because it looks for its inspiration to Rome,
FROM ENCYCLOPAEDIA TO MODERNISM 175
" beyond the Alps." Throughout the nineteenth century Jesuit \ intolerance of the GalHcan tendencies shown by many of the ■ French clergy, and of the liberal trend of opinion generally, ) found its spokesmen among the publicists of this school. Of these men the most noisy and aggressive was Louis Veuillot (1813-1883). Most of the present members of the Royalist party known as the Action frani^aise are followers of Joseph de Maistre and Veuillot, although personally they may be avowed sceptics. One of the worst features of Ultramontane polemics is their scurrility. Once enrolled in the party, even cultivated laymen talk like monks of the League, lying and insulting ad lihitum. Writing in 1850, Victor Hugo thus castigated Veuillot and his organ, L'Univers:
Regardez : le voil^ ! Son journal fr^n^tique Plait aux devots et semble (5crit par des bandits. II fait des fausses clefs dans I'arri^re-boutique Pour la porte du Paradis. . . .
C'est ainsi qu'outrageant gloires, vertus, genies, Charmant par tant d'horreurs quelques niais fougueux, II vit tranquillement dans les ignominies, Simple j^suite et triple gueux.
50. Of a higher order than these men whose pens were steeped in gall were the Liberal Catholics, who endeavoured to reconcile Catholicism not only with the principles of 1789, but even with more recent aspirations towards fraternity and social justice. The first organ of this party in France was UAvenir (1830), a journal edited by the Abbe de Lamennais (1782-1854), Pere Lacordaire (1802-1861), and Montalembert (1810-1870). It exhorted the Church to accept democracy, and was denounced as subversive to Gregory XVI. Lamennais made his submission in 1832, but shortly afterwards published his Paroles cTun Croyant, in which he aggravated what were called his errors. A bishop stigmatised it as an " Apocalypse of the devil." He was excommunicated, and passed over to the revolutionary party. Lacordaire submitted without reserve in 1832, after which he devoted his great powers to preaching. He became a Dominican in 1840, and did much to revive the glory of the Order in France. No less docile under the censures of the Church, the Comte de Montalembert took refuge in
176 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
politics, and became a brilliant defender of oppressed nationali- ties— the Poles, the Irish — but nevertheless did his best to stem the flowing tide of democratic ideas, which terrified him. Men like Due Victor de Broglie, and the two Cochins, Augustin and Denys, followed the same route down to our own time, a route midway between Ultramontanism on the one hand, and aristocratic Liberalism on the other.
51. Catholic democracy was also represented by the priest Murri, in Italy, and in France by the lay society of the Sillon, founded by Marc Sangnier. The Sillon displeased some French bishops by its independence, and its alleged Franciscan tendencies, while Murri was ordered by Pius X. to cease his publications, and excommunicated (March 1909) for having disobeyed the injunction.
52. The political reaction which followed the Hundred Days was marked, in Southern France, by a sanguinary persecution of Protestants and Liberals. This was called the Terreur hlanclie^ or White Terror. In Paris, and in spite of the moderation of the Voltairian Louis XVIII., who was hostile to Joseph le Maistre, the so-called introuvable Chamber seemed desirous of bringing back the Middle Ages. It was dissolved by the king on the advice of his minister Richelieu (September 1816). Thereupon a society of priests and laymen, known as the Con- gregation (originally founded under the Directory) rose to considerable importance in politics. Its leaders were the Comte d'Artois (Charles X.), the Vicomte de Montmorency and Prince Jules de Polignac. It opposed Liberal ideas with all its force, especially in matters of education. In its solicitude for the throne and the altar, it imposed upon Louis XVIII. the shame- ful Spanish expedition which restored despotism in that unhappy country. Under Charles X. the Congregation was powerful enough to secure the passing of the Loi du saci'ilhge (1825), which, among other severities, put the profanation of the host on the same level as parricide. It must be allowed that this law was never put in force.
53. The extravagances of the Congregation should not mislead us, however. Its members were inspired more by politics than by religious fanaticism. These survivors from the
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eighteenth century put the throne before the altar, and what the throne had to give before the throne itself. While the Chambre introuvahle was still in existence, Lam€nnais was writing his Essai sur F Indifference, in which he reproached the upper classes of his time with infidelity, and with giving all their aspirations to temporal matters. One has only to read the Memoires of the Comtesse de Boigne and of the Duchesse de Dino to be convinced that the aristocracy of those days looked upon religion mainly as a guarantee of the social order which safeguarded their interests.
54. Louis Philippe, who had ousted the legitimate monarchy, thought a great deal more about the throne than about the altar. The University, founded by Napoleon, possessed the monopoly of instruction. She clung to it jealously, and the struggles in favour of what was called liberty of teaching — that is, the teaching of the Jesuits — did not succeed. There was a change after the Revolution of 1848. In their hatred of the Orleanists, the clergy made common cause with the Repub- licans, especially after those sanguinary days of June which terrified the Conservative middle classes. " Let us throw our- selves at the feet of the bishops ! " cried Victor Cousin. The Jesuits at once reappeared in France. Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, elected President in December, had need of the clergy in his meditated usurpation. He gave them a pledge of his good intentions by the expedition to Rome which restored the govern- ment of Pius IX. But the chief aim of the Jesuits was to lay their hands once more on the machinery of secondary education. Thanks to the interested complaisance of the President and the unscrupulous skill of the Comte de Falloux, an apologist for the Inquisition, they succeeded in their aim (1850). From that time forward, French youth was divided into two camps. The most wealthy, and, in consequence of the desire of the bourgeois to rub shoulders with the noble, the most rapidly increasing was that which grew up in the hatred of Liberalism, and in the worship of an intolerant and despotic past. In twenty years this regime bore fruit ; the Third Republic, long captive to the ^^ parti rioir,'''' tasted all its bitterness.
55. The insatiable pretensions of the Roman Church were a
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178 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
cause of weakness to the Second Empire. Napoleon III., liberal enough himself, but married to a devout Spanish wife, was gradually driven, by the pressure of cardinals, bishops, and Jesuits, to sacrifice his throne and country to the cause of Pius IX. In home affairs his most liberal and best-liked minister, Victor Duruy, was continually called upon to defend the teach- ing of the University against the calumnies and chicaneries of the Clericals. The Emperor was the captive of his past. The Church had sung the Te Deum after the coup d'etat, so he was compelled to put up with its encroachments.
56. The disasters of 1870-71 brought about a religious and political reaction. France fell into the grip of Clericalism. While awaiting the restoration of the monarchy and the temporal power of the Papacy, the clergy developed their educational machinery in every direction and founded Catholic universities. Two reactions, baffled by universal suffrage, those of May 24, 1873, and May 16, 1877, were the scarcely masked work of the Clerical party, which had found a discreet but safe protector in Marshal MacMahon, who had succeeded Thiers as President of the Republic. Under a third President, Jules Grevy, the Republican party became the majority, and, awaken- ing at last to the source of its peril, obtained the dissolution of all non-legalised congregations (1880). This dissolution was a farce, very discreetly combined, of which we do not yet under- stand the details. A few years afterwards the Jesuit schools were even more numerous and flourishing. It was within their walls, especially within those of the Ecole de la Rue des Pastes in Paris, that future officers of the army and navy were pre- pared. The Congregations supported General Boulanger in his attempt at a dictatorship (1887), and imprudently threw in their lot with those Anti-Semitic, Anti-Protestant, and Anti- Liberal movements which declared themselves after 1885. Pope Leo XIII. advised Catholics to rally to Republican institutions (1891). Their chiefs obeyed, without enthusiasm, and set themselves to prepare a Clerical republic.
57. The condemnation for treason of a Jewish officer, Alfred Dreyfus (December 1894), was a triumph for the Clericals. Unhappily for them, Dreyfus was innocent. He had been
FROM ENCYCLOPAEDIA TO MODERNISM 179
saddled with the crime of a quondam papal officer, Esterhazy, who had passed into the service of France. As soon as Scheurer- Kestner, Vice-President of the Senate, had convinced himself of the prisoner's innocence, he formed a party to demand the revision of his trial. The one document on which Dreyfus had been condemned and sent to the lie du Diable (Guiana), was a letter in which all the expert paleographers recognised the writing of Esterhazy, as soon as they had had an opportunity of comparison (1897). The evidence was decisive, and the whole business might have been settled in a fortnight. It took nearly ten years. In spite of all the proofs of his felony, Ester- hazy was acquitted. Colonel Picquart, who had discovered and asserted the innocence of Dreyfus even before Scheurer-Kestner, was thrown into prison. Those who cried for justice were accused of forming a "syndicate of treason," and the whole Church, priests and monks, with a few honourable exceptions, cast its influence into the scales on the side of injustice, flooding the entire country with calumnies and lies. The Assumptionists especially distinguished themselves in the disgraceful campaign. Their organ. La Croix^ rivalled that of the declared Anti- Semites in preaching a new St. Bartholomew. The head of the General Staff of the army. General Boisdeflre, was an intimate friend of Father du Lac, the most influential of the Jesuits. The Jesuits had in their hands the supply of officers and their promotion. Every Republican and Liberal officer had a bad mark against him. The President himself, Felix Faure, had been captured by the Clericals, who had their creatures and accomplices in all the public offices. For two years a real terror hung over France. Encouraged by practically the whole of external Europe, the Intellectuels fought for the honour of their country under a flood of insults at home. Their final success, modest though it was, was due to the help of the Socialists, who, indiffiirent at first to what they looked upon as a bourgeois quarrel, understood at last that they would be the first victims of any political reaction. Condemned a second time at Rennes (1899), but afterwards pardoned by the new President, Loubet, Dreyfus did not regain his rank until 1906, when his rehabilita- tion followed upon an inquiry which enabled the Cour de
180 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Cassation to quash the Rennes conviction. During the war of 1914-8, he served in the artillery and was promoted lieutenant- colonel. Picquart became Minister of War after being promoted General, but the amnesty voted by the Chambers in 1900 pre- vented the prosecution of those who had gravely sinned against justice and honesty.
58. Waldeck-Rousseau, who was Prime Minister in 1899, had been stirred by the scenes of disorder which had marked the election of President Loubet at the beginning of the year. He determined to make an end of those whom he called moines Ugtieurs and moines d'affaires (Leaguers and commercial monks). Various circumstances led to a regrettable increase in the rigour of his early proposals. Emile Combes, who succeeded him as minister, v^^as not a man to be content with half- measures. This time the non-authorised congregations were really dispersed. It might have been well had an exception been made in favour of many inoffensive, and even useful, congregations. In 1905 the Chambers passed a law for the separation of the Churches from the State, which put an end to the Concordat of 1801. But the hi Fallonx of 1850 has not been abrogated, no doubt because too many respectable interests are still concerned in its maintenance.
59. In the bosom of French Protestantism the two opposite tendencies, obscurantist and liberal, were represented by the rival faculties of Montauban and Strasburg. After 1871 the latter was transferred to Paris. This rivalry gave rise to a wretched occurrence in 1864*, when Coquerel, a pastor in the capital and an adherent of the Union Protestante Liberale, was deprived by the Conseil Presbyteral at the instance of Guizot. This historian, who pretended to believe in miracles, brought about a general synod at which an obligatory confession of faith was drawn up. Orthodox Protestantism, which is a caricature of Romanism, has again sown dissension in the attempt, made at the Synod of Orleans in 1906, to impose a creed on the active members of the Protestant Associations formed after the separation of the Churches from the State (1905).
• • • • •
60. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, Switzerland
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 181
had engaged in a civil war, which ended in the triumph of the Reformers (1712), although the numerical proportion of Catholics and Protestants remained practically unchanged ; but in Switzerland, as elsewhere, the Reformed cantons were the richest and the most industrious. The recall of the Jesuits to Fribourg (1818) was the signal for intrigues and disturbances throughout the Catholic cantons. To put an end to these, the Helvetic Diet suppressed the convents ; upon which the Catholic cantons formed a league, the Sonderhundy in open preparation for civil war. General Dufour, at the head of 30,000 men, averted this calamity by his energy ; he took possession of Fribourg, which the Jesuits evacuated, not, how- ever, without a sanguinary encounter, in which the Catholics were defeated ; the Sonderhund was dissolved, and the dis- affected cantons submitted. The new Swiss Constitution of 1848, while it proclaimed liberty of association and of worship, forbade the Jesuits to settle in the territory of the Confederation. Nevertheless, they returned to the Catholic cantons after 1858 ; the University of Fribourg belongs ostensibly to the Dominicans, but the theology taught there is that of the Jesuits.
61. Thus, as we have seen, the Catholicism of the nineteenth century was dominated by the Pope and the Jesuits, always closely united " for the greater glory of God.*" Of the 20,000 Jesuits struck at by the sentence of Clement XIV., the greater part, secretly favoured by Pius VI., took refuge in the Confra- ternities of the Heart of Jesus, and in those of the Fathers of the Faith, or Paccanarists, founded by Father Paccanari in 1797.^
Russia was the only country where they subsisted openly. Catherine II., who wanted them in Poland, even allowed them to affiliate foreign Jesuits to their body. Pius VII. formally re-established the order in Rome (1801) and in Sicily (1804). He restored it in its entirety on August 7, 1814 ; but at first the Jesuits were only received in Spain, Naples, Sardinia and Modena ; even Austria and France would not have them.
62. In 1820, the Jesuits were banished from Russia, where
^ Napoleon to Fouch^ (Dec. 17, 1807) : " I won't have any Fathers of the Faith, I won't allow them to meddle with education, and poison the mind of youth by their ridiculous Ultramontane principles" (Lecestre, Lettres inidites de NapoUon, i. p. 129).
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their propaganda had alarmed Greek Orthodoxy. Leo XII. consoled them for this check by entrusting the Roman College to them (1824), thus placing the entire education of the clergy in their hands. In 1836, Gregory XVI. also confided the direction of the College of the Propaganda to them, and delighted them by the canonisation of Alfonso of Liguori, not a Jesuit himself, but one of their favourite theologians. The General of the Order, living either at Fiesole or Rome, became known in popular speech as the Black Pope.
63. In Spain, the Jesuits were the mainstay of despotism until their banishment in 1834 by the Queen Regent, INIaria Christina ; they returned shortly afterwards, notwithstanding this measure. In 1838 they established themselves in Austria, and still dominate all the education of the country. They have also regained their power in Belgium since the Revolution of 1830, which was rather clerical than liberal ; but here, in spite of the extraordinary multiplication of convents, the secular clergy remained strong enough to counterbalance the influence of the Congregations.
64. Louis XVIII. would not admit the Jesuits ; but by an ordinance of October 5, 1814, he left the direction of the smaller seminaries in the hands of the bishops, who appointed Jesuit professors. Soon their colleges at Saint-Acheul and Montrouge, and also a propagandist society founded by them at Lyons, gave the Government a good deal of anxiety, and provoked the ordinance of 1828. The colleges were closed. The Revolution of 1830 expelled the Jesuits again, not without some outbreaks of popular violence. As usual, they returned quietly, and began to be talked of again in 1838 ; the eloquence of one of their number, Pere de Ravignan, contributed greatly to their growing credit, which Eugene Sue denounced as a danger in a famous novel. The Wandering Jeio. In 1845 some legal proceedings made it evident that the Jesuits were very numerous in Prance, in spite of a law which threatened them with imprisonment. The Chamber of Peers was alarmed, and Guizot, then Prime Minister, took certain ineffectual measures against them ; the Second Republic was soon to make them reparation.
FROM ENCYCLOPAEDIA TO MODERNISM 183
65. In spite of the defeat of their party in Switzerland, the Jesuits profited by the Revolution of 1848 ; they became the directors of the reactionary policy of Pius IX. ; they acquired or regained a preponderating influence in Prussia and Austria; they laid hands on education in France (1850). The events of 1870-71 were unfavourable to them in Prussia, where they were forbidden by a law of 1872 to establish themselves ; but in all Catholic countries, the close alliance of the Papacy, the Episcopacy and Jesuitism, uniting to suppress free thought, made the Jesuits the true masters of the faithful, while the Anglo-Saxon countries were once more open to their propa- ganda. In the United States and in England, the Jesuits, now numerous and very active, have hitherto left public opinion and parliaments quite indifferent to their progress.
66. One of the great sources of strength of the Jesuit Order, setting aside its admirable recruiting system, is the absence of any rivalry between it and the other religious orders. The reconciliation between Dominicans and Jesuits has long been an accomplished fact. Assumptionists, Redemptorists or Liguorists are mere instruments, sometimes mere aliases, of the Jesuits. These have no charitable organisations ; their activities are all lucrative, and even very lucrative ones, notably schools for the well-to-do classes ; thus the Jesuits are richer than all the other orders, and can command support among the laity when they require it. Nearly the whole of the Catholic Press in both hemispheres is controlled by them, and they have affiliated members even in the Liberal Press. In spite of the measures taken against them in France, the Jesuits rival the bureaucracy (in which their influence has long been and still remains powerful) as the best organised power in the country.
67. The Vatican Council ended in the triumph of the Jesuits. After the proclamation of Papal Infallibility (July 18, 1870), in spite of the opposition or abstention of many bishops, Pius IX. embarked upon reprisals against the dissentient German bishops ; abandoned by their Governments, which were absorbed in the war, they submitted. The learned Canon Dollinger (1799-1890) then organised the opposition of Old
184 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Catholics at Munich (April 1871) ; they formed themselves into associations for worship, choosing for their bishop Reinkens, professor of theology at Breslau (1873) who was consecrated by a Dutch Jansenist bishop. The Old Catholics were recognised by several of the German States, and penetrated into Switzer- land ; but the celebration of worship in the orthodox Catholic churches set up grave difficulties, which were further increased by Germany's reaction in favour of Leo XIII. 's policy, after the check administered to Bismarck's attempt to humiliate Catholicism {Kulturkampf^ 1872-79). There is no longer faith enough in Western Europe to make the creation of a new religion possible ; the Old Catholics subsist, but with difficulty, and in small numbers. Reinken's successor. Bishop Weber (1896), was recognised only by Prussia, Hesse and the Grand Duchy of Baden ; there was also an Old Catholic Bishop at Berne, Eduard Herzog.
68. The French bishops of the opposition, Darboy and Dupanloup, had submitted in 1870, when men's minds were oppressed by other and more cruel preoccupations. In 1869, a former Barefooted Carmelite, Hyacinthe Loyson, after a brilliant career as a preacher, was censured on several occasions for the freedom of his opinions. In 1871 he went to see Dollinger at Munich, and tried to create a Church in France analogous to the Anglican Church. Loyson, who married in 1872, remained to an advanced old age the disciple of truth and justice, those consolations of the disillusioned theologian ; but his attempt at schism was even less successful than that of the German Old Catholics.
69. Leo XIII. (1878-1903) was a skilful diplomatist, and showed that the prestige of the Holy See had as a fact gained by abolition of a temporal power in which its spiritual dignity was often compromised. His successes in the United Str ^es, in England, in France, in Germany, and even in Italy itself, belong more especially to political history ; it will be sufficient to allude to them here. Not only did the Kulturkampf directed against Catholicism by Bismarck end in the victory of Leo XIIL, but the German Catholic party, known as the Centre^ became the pivot of the policy of the Empire. In France the Pope enjoined
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 185
the Catholics to rally to the Republic, a measure which put a great number of the highest posts in the State into the hands of Clericals calling themselves Republicans ; the success of this " turning movement " was so complete that but for the Dreyfus affair, in which the French Church embarked on a fatal course, France would have become a Clerical Republic. In the domain of religion, Leo XIII. did not favour Modernism, but he was careful not to adopt a bellicose attitude towards it. His successor, Pius X. (1903-14) was the antithesis of a clever politician ; he was simply an honest parish priest. Bossuet said of Pope Innocent XL : " Good intentions combined with a limited in- telligence are fatal in high places."" Guided by fanatical and ill-informed Spanish cardinals, Pius harshly condemned the Modernists in France and Italy, as well as in Germany ; he refused the conciliatory offers of the French Government, pro- hibited the formation of Catholic associations for worship, which were readily admitted by French Protestants, and even by the majority of Catholic bishops, and thus caused the partial ruin of the Church of France ; separated from the State since 1905, she has great difficulty in finding means of sub- sistence, and in recruiting the secular clergy for the parishes. Reacting against the prudent policy of his predecessor, Pius X. subjected the ecclesiastics to a military discipline, threatening the daily bread of the recalcitrant, and organising a system of espionage which transformed even the moderates into suspects. However, one good result of the disestablishment, from the Catholic point of view, has been to intensify the intercourse between the faithful and the clergy, the latter being obliged to pay frequent visits and make individual appeals in order to collect the necessary funds for public worship, schools, pensions for aged priests and other useful work on the same lines.
• • • • •
70. The influence of the Order of Jesus is not only exercised upon dogma, upon politics and upon social life ; it penetrates all the religious manifestations of Catholicism. The senti- mental or puerile aberrations of the worship of the Virgin and the saints (as, for instance, of St. Anthony of Padua, who causes lost objects to be found), the exploitation of relics,
186 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
amulets and miraculous springs, have been established or developed under its protection. But all that is food for the ignorant masses only, and the no less ignorant middle classes. The same Order supports in Brussels a small group of very learned Jesuits called Bollandists (in memory of that giant of knowledge, John Bolland, 1596-1665), intrusted with the publication of the Lives of the Saints (Acta Sanctorum, 62 folios, in progress) and of a periodical, Analecta Bollandiana, which has done more than all lay criticism to uproot baseless legends and expose pious frauds. This is another and little known aspect of Jesuitism, in relation to the history of religion and the vindication of truth.
71. The worship of St. Joseph, which was non-existent in the Middle Ages and during the Renaissance, grew up mider the Jesuit influence of the nineteenth century. Pius IX. raised St. Joseph to the rank of a patron of the Catholic Church, above the Apostles Peter and Paul (1870) ; this promotion was con- firmed by Leo XIII. (1889). To the Christian conception of the Trinity, the Jesuits have added one which is expressed by the formula JMJ — that is to say, Jesus, Mary, Joseph. It has practically superseded the other. God is too lofty, and the Holy Spirit too immaterial ; the people must have white idols, with plenty of gold, pink and blue. An aristocratic contempt for the devout masses is a ruling sentiment among the Jesuits, one they shared with their pupil Voltaire.
72. The Jesuits also instituted the worship of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, beside which that of the Pure Heart of Mary holds but a secondary place. A girl-mystic, Marguerite or Marie Alacoque, had a vision of the bleeding heart of Jesus Christ (1675) ; she gave Him hers, and received His in exchange. Her Jesuit confessor, Pere La Colombiere, exploited the utter- ances of this mad woman, and founded a new cult, which Rome at first energetically condemned. But special confraternities propagated Cordicolism under the protection of the Jesuits, mainly in France, Germany and Poland, in spite of the attacks of the Jansenists. Pius VI. yielded to the popular idolatry, and sanctioned the worship. Pius IX. went still further ; he insti- tuted the Feast of the Sacred Heart for the whole Church, and
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 187
proclaimed the beatification of Marie Alacoque (1864). The Church had originally insisted on the symbolic character of the heart, but the mystic materialism of the Jesuits, harmonising with the spirit of the nineteenth century, proposed the adoration of the actual heart of the Saviour. This conception, a sur- vival from very primitive religion, was approved by Pius IX. Painted images of the Sacred Heart have found their way into all the churches. The National Assembly of 1871 pronounced the construction of a basilica at Montmartre, dedicated to the Sacred Heart, to be a work of public utility. It was begun in 1875, and the white mass of its buildings now towers over Paris from the height. It will stand to future ages as a monu- ment of Jesuist theology, and of the illimitable credulity of the human mind.
73. The increased facilities of communication in the nine- teenth century multiplied pilgrimages and brought increasing crowds to privileged altars, to the relics of the saints and to healing springs. Commercial exploitation of faith has kept pace with the mystic exaltation which has been stimulated by every possible means. Those who wish for information on this score should read Paul Parfait's Dossier des Pelerinages. The Jesuits have been foremost among the religious orders which have encouraged these practices : the learned and pacific orders, such as the Benedictines and the Oratorians, have held signifi- cantly aloof. In France the mania for pilgrimages developed chiefly under the Third Republic ; a special newspaper, Le Pelerin {The Pilgrim), with a circulation of hundreds of thou- sands, fans the ardour of the ignorant by tales of miracles ; and wealthy society — Voltairian at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and Jesuitical at the dawn of the twentieth — adopts these debased forms of piety in fear of the political and social consequences of free-thought.
74. In 1846, a fanatic, one Mdlle. de la Merliere, dressed herself in yellow robes and a sugar-loaf hat, and " appeared "" on the mountain of La Salette (Isere) to two little shepherds, revealing hei'self to them as the Blessed Virgin. A subsequent legal inquiry exposed the fraud, against which the Cardinal Archbishop of Lyons had protested from the first. Nevertheless,
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the canonical examination resulted in the confirmation of the miracle by the Bishop of Grenoble in 1847. A congregation was founded to exploit it. Pilgrimages began, and still con- tinue, to La Salette, where a certain spring was supposed to work miraculous cures,
75, " Three years after the day on which, by a solemn act of Pius IX., the Virgin was declared free from the taint of original sin, she appeared in a little town of the French Pyrenees to a child of the people. When asked her name, she replied : ' / am the Immaculate Conception.^ This was the definition of heaven following on that of earth, A doctrine had been taught to the world by the Church : God put His sign manual upon it ! "*' ^ Bernadette Soubirous, the little girl to whom the Virgin Mary declared that her name was that of a dogma, an obvious absurdity,^ saw the Virgin several times from February to July, 1858 ; she lived twenty years after this, supported by the nuns " as a destitute sick person," but the celestial vision " never again appeared to dazzle and delight her eyes,"
Ecclesiastical authority did not neglect this striking miracle. It was, indeed, forced to take action by popular credulity, which made the grotto a place of pilgrimage. Very soon a report that the water of the spring cured all sorts of diseases found credence, and religious commerce took the matter in hand. The grotto became a sanctuary over which an imposing church was built. The little town was covered with hotels and boarding-houses ; hundreds of thousands of pilgrims flocked to it, and a great number of miraculous cures after immersion in the piscina were certified. Cures equally wonderful had been recorded twenty centuries before of sufferers issuing from .the dormitories of Asklepios at Epidaurus and Cos ; whether they were due to suggestion or to the radio-active qualities of the water is a scientific, not a religious, question. The " Fathers of the
^ G. Bertrin, Histoire critique (sic) des ivenements des Lourcles, new ed. Paris, 1908.
^ The error may be explained by a confusion arising out of the inscription on a devotional print. Coloured pictures of the Virgin inscribed The Im- mandate Conception have been widely circulated, especially since the year 1852, when the Louvre acquired Murillo's famous picture of this name for the enormous sum of 615,000 fr. A confusion of the same sort arose of old at Athens (Acts xvii. 18) : the philosophers thought Paul was preaching a new deity, Anastasis, when he announced the Resurrection.
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 189
Grotto" have become very wealthy, and the Government is indulgent to their traffic, in order not to ruin the town of Lourdes. Official consecration of this worship was given by Leo XIIL, who had a model of tlie grotto and the church put up in the Vatican gardens. But as the Council of Trent decided at its twenty-fifth session that all new miracles should be recognised and approved by the bishops before being published to the world, cases of healing are always submitted to the Church. On June 14, 1908, the Parisian Semaine religieuse published an ordinance of the Archbishop of Paris, Mgr. Amette, declaring that the cures of five young girls at Lourdes, from 1891 to 1899, which had been studied with the utmost attention by the commissioners, were to be attributed to a special intervention of God, brought about by the intercession of the Virgin, and consequently were to be accounted miracles. ^
76. Those whose piety takes them to Lourdes are not seek- ing their salvation in the world to come, or preparing a blessed eternity for themselves ; their most pressing preoccupations are purely secular and terrestrial; they ask for health and long I life. The Church of the sixteenth century sold indulgences: ' she abused this traffic, and the merchandise lost its value. In the twentieth century, at Lourdes and elsewhere, she no longer claims to give dispensation from Purgatory, but to put off the day of reckoning ; she opposes sacerdotal to secular medicine, and thus, consciously or unconsciously, returns to the errors of pagan materialism.
• • • . .
77. Mysticism, a supposed communion with God in ecstasy, is a chronic delusion of the human heart. The Church has beatified or canonised certain mystics, but she has silenced many more. The Spanish Inquisition showed a good deal of sense in this connection ; it treated mystics as impostors rather than as persons possessed. One of the benefits of Christianity as t . organised into Churches has been to regulate mysticism and the ] i superstitions to which it gives rise ; wherever official religion
1 From 1905 to October 1908, a score of episcopal ordinances of this kind were promulgated ; a certain number of cures are always under canonical consideration.
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has lost its power, individual magic and charlatanism have become rampant. This phenomenon was noticeable in France towards the close of the eighteenth century, when clairvoyants and swindlers like the Comte de St. Germain {d. 1784), Cag- liostro {d. 1795), St. Martin (d 1803), and Mesmer {d. 1815), acquired an amazing ascendancy in a society which was reading Voltaire, but was not content with that.
78. The most influential of eighteenth-century mystics was the learned Swede Emmanuel Swedenborg, the son of a clergy- man (1688-1722). His followers still exist as members of the Church of Nexo Jerusalem. After having done good service in many branches of natural sciences, where he sometimes showed the way to Buffon, Laplace and Goethe, Swedenborg had his first vision in 1743. From 1745 onwards he gave himself up entirely to theosophy, which means individual theology, in contrast with that of the accepted creeds. In 1749 he wrote as follows : " It has been granted to me, now for several years, to be constantly and uninterruptedly in company with spirits and angels ... I have thus been instructed concerning the state of souls after death." Later on, he conversed with Jesus, the Apostle Paul, Luther and others. His diary for 1744, dis- covered in 1858, shows clearly that he was deranged and probably remained so ; but there was little of a miracle- monger or of a charlatan about him. His theology, founded not only on revelation, but on allegorical interpretation of Scripture, may even be called reasonable and humane when compared with the orthodox teaching on salvation, damnation and the like. Swedenborg believed himself to be the herald of the Second Coming. Jesus had, in fact, returned, having paid a visit to Swedenborg. " All religion," he said, " has relation to life, and the life of religion is to do good." That warm desire to benefit humanity associates him, in spite of his vagaries and dreams, with the more temperate philosophers of his age.
79. Territory gained by science is always lost to dogmatic religion. Nevertheless, certain writers have tried to add lustre to the latter by the, as yet, very obscure phenomena which belong, broadly speaking, to the domain of spiritualism, because
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 191
they are attributed to the intervention of spirits. The Roman Church has wisely opposed this tendency. She only admits the marvels that are under her own control. All the rest are the work of the devil, or of human rascality. Magic, be it white or black, cannot be the handmaid of Religion.
Every one has heard of table-turning, spirit-rapping, evo- cations of the dead, who appear as phantoms and dictate answers and revelations to mediums. These medmms, several of whom have become famous in our times — the Englishman, Daniel Dunglas Home, for instance, who deceived the famous scientist Crookes, and Eusapia Paladino, who cheated many others — were charlatans who had recourse to subtle methods of fraud, and always refused to operate in daylight and in the presence of learned bodies ; but the progress of science, and more especially the study of nervous phenomena, have brought to light physiological or psychological facts which must neces- sarily have seemed miraculous in the eighteenth century, and even later. Thus, it has been shown that nervous persons may be thrown into a hypnotic sleep ; some even assert that, receiving orders in this state, they will carry them out on waking. It has also been said that persons of this tempera- ment are amenable to suggestions made at a distance. The power of suggestion of some persons is undeniable, and has already effected cures which resemble those obtained by pilgrimages and relics. The facts of telepathy — that is to say, of communications from a distance, such as a sudden vision, sometimes confirmed by the event, of the death of a friend — • are not yet scientifically established ; but, after all, they do not seem any more extraordinary than the experiments of wireless telegraphy.
80. When the spirits dogmatise, they show a disposition to amalgamate existing religions, in oi'der to rise to forms they hold to be superior. The most striking instance of this syn- cretism in the nineteenth century is furnished by the so-called Theosophists or Occultists, founded at New York about 1875 by Colonel Olcott {d. 1906) and Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891). This sect, which has met with increasing favour, claims to combine Buddhism, Platonism, Christianity, and certain
192 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
mysterious doctrines, such as the Jewish Kabbalah. The Russian lady pretended to derive her knowledge from two Tibetan sages, with whom she enjoyed instantaneous com- munication ; but her works are full of extracts from printed books and not always reliable translations. Indian and other philosophies had better be studied at first hand.
81. In the Middle Ages there were, in addition to the stationary guilds of masons, a number of free-masons, who travelled from town to town ; they constituted, it is said, a confraternity whose headquarters were at Strasburg. These associations existed in England longer than elsewhere, and the Great Fire of London (1666), which necessitated the rebuilding of the city, increased their activity. After the completion of St. Paul's Cathedral (1717), the last four groups of masons founded a Grand Lodge in London, designed, not for the furtherance of their calling, but for the amelioration of the moral and material condition of man. Side by side with and above temples of stone, was to rise the spiritual temple of humanity. From the end of the sixteenth century, members who were not masons had been admitted to these conventicles — a modification of the primitive character of the institution. But certain features were preserved with a jealous and, indeed, pedantic care : such were the distinctions between masters, associates and apprentices, the exclusion of non-members, and the oath never to reveal the proceedings in the lodges. The constitution of the Freemasons was the work of the preacher James Anderson. It binds its adherents to respect for morality, humanity, and the fatherland ; each member may continue to practise his special religion, but the community is further to hold collectively the religious principles of all mankind, the rest being accounted merely individual opinion. The religion of English Freemasonry is, accordingly, a sort of humanitarian deism, which found, and still finds, many adherents in Great Britain.
82. A few English noblemen established the first Lodge in Paris in 1725 ; in spite of the interdict of Louis XV. (1737), it made numerous recruits. In 1733 a Lodge was founded at Florence and at Boston, and in 1737 at Hamburg. The
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Hamburg Lodge included the Crown Prince of Prussia, after- wards Frederick the Great, among its members. After his accession, he created a Lodge at Berlin, and became its Grand Master. Since this period, all the Kings of Prussia down to William II. have presided over this Lodge. William IL de- clined the office, but nominated Prince Frederick Leopold of Prussia as his substitute. In the course of the eighteenth century, Freemasonry took root in all European countries and also in North America. Catholicism naturally could not tolerate a society of religious tendencies which ignored it ; the Pope condemned Freemasonry as early as 1738. An edict of the Cardinal Secretary of State of January 14, 1739, pro- nounced sentence of death not only against Freemasons, but against all who should seek admittance to the order, and all who should let premises to the association.^ The Papacy has never ceased the renewal of these prohibitions. Leo XIII. solemnly reiterated them in his Encyclical of April 20, 1884.
83. Shortly after this, a Frenchman who had written some scurrilous pamphlets against the Church, under the pseudonym of Leo Taxil, declared himself a convert to Catholicism, and offered to reveal the secrets of Freemasonry. He had his information, he declared, from a young American, Miss Diana Vaughan, who had been initiated into all the details of the Satanic rites performed in the Lodges. Taxil published several absurd books, full of horrors and divagations borrowed from ancient trials for witchcraft ; they had an immense success in Catholic circles. Cardinal Parocchi sent the Papal benediction to Miss Vaughan. In 1896, an international Anti-Masonic Congress was held at Trent. As doubts were here cast upon Leo Taxil's statements, the rascal thought it better to unmask himself. He summoned a large meeting at Paris, and there, to the great scandal of the assembled priests and clericals, he declared that the Satanic Diana Vaughan had never existed, and that he had been deceiving the Roman Church for ten years (April 19, 1897). The laugh was hardly on the side of the Jesuits and their friends, the protectors or dupes of Leo Taxil.
^ Lea, History of the Inquisition in Spain, vol. iv. p. 297. O
194 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
84. Freemasonry was complicated and perverted by all kinds of affectations and impostures in the course of the eighteenth century. Superior grades were created, such as the Templars, the Rosicrucians and the Egyptian Masons ; absurd pretensions were formulated, connecting these with the Knights Templars, the medieval Rosicrucians, and the mystic teachings of the Egyptian priesthood. The Egyptian or Coptic Order was founded by Joseph Balsamo {d. 1795), the soi-disant Count Cagliostro. Spiritualism, the search for the philosopher's stone, and innumerable other chimeras were grafted on to Masonic Deism and its principles of tolerant philanthropy. Fortunately, most of the Lodges held aloof from these follies.
85. English Freemasonry separated from French Free- masonry in 1877, when the latter pronounced a belief in God to be non-essential. In England, Scotland and Northern Germany, the Masonic Lodges have remained merely centres of humanitarian philosophy ; in France, from the Revolution onwards, they have played a certain political part, which has, however, been greatly exaggerated by their enemies. In 1903, Genera] Andre, Minister of War, a free-thinker, but not himself a Freemason, was imprudent enough to ask the provincial Lodges to furnish reports on the religious opinions of officers in the army. This system of denunciation was betrayed to the clericals by a defaulting clerk of the Grand Orient of Paris ; the result was the so-called scandal of the Fiches (i.e., dockets), which showed that it is easier to combat Clericalism than to break with the tradition it has instilled.
86. A similar mania (intelligible enough, indeed) for imitat- ing Catholicism while claiming complete emancipation from its influence, appears throughout the nineteenth century in rationalist sects with a practical philosophy, tending to the material and spiritual amelioration of man. Though the Comte de St. Simon, the founder of Saint-Simonism, was content to be a prophet, his disciples, Bazard and Enfantin, behaved like pontiffs or bonzes. Auguste Comte, the founder of Positivism, in his Systeme de Politique positive, sets forth a social programme almost identical with the conventual regime established by the Jesuits in Paraguay. He even sought to
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 195
enrich Positivism Avith the worship of the Virgin and the saints ; his Virgin, however, was to be his dead friend, Clotilde de Vaux, his " Sainte Clotilde," and his saints the illustrious men, or men he considered illustrious, whose grotesque nomenclature encumbers the Positivist calendar. ^ The basis of Fourierism (Fourier, d. 1837) also rests upon medieval Catholicism ; its phalansteries are closely akin to monasteries. Even the Socialism of Kai'l Marx's disciples betrays the same intellectual habits, the fruits of a long apprenticeship to servitude ; modern Socialists have pontiffs, councils which excommunicate, credos they claim to impose, a discipline no less tyrannical than that of the Jesuits. Among them there are persons who think themselves revolu- tionaries when they preach paradoxes twenty centuries old. Thus the anti-militarist crotchet called Herveism (once dear to Professor G. Herve in France) is a doctrine of the second century, aggravated by a menace of civil war. It is the mystic doctrine of non-resistance, of abhorrence of all service but that of God, which the philosopher Celsus made a reproach to the Christians when he exhorted them to unite with the pagans to defend the threatened Empire against the barbarians.^
87. The Roman Church, which cannot afford to alienate the middle classes, has hitherto shown no disposition to ally itself with Socialism ; but it has insisted on its solicitude for the working classes. Leo XIII. even published an Encyclical " on the condition of workmen," in which he suggests as a remedy for the social evil " equitable payment," without saying how this is to be fixed. Both in France and Austria, indeed, Catholics who call themselves Socialists are not uncommon, and taking into account the fondness of clerical strategy for " turning movements," there may be reason to distrust these more extreme Socialists, whose extravagances may sometimes be suggested by the party which openly combats their views.
^ I deal here with Comte as a mystic, and am not concerned with his philosophy, which has exercised a legitimate influence on the modern mind. But I may recall Huxley's saying: " Positivism is the incongruous mixture of bad science with eviscerated papistry." {Collected Essays, vol. v., p. 255.)
* " We Christians," replied Origen {Contra Celsum, viii. 73) "fight for the Emperor even more than do the others ; it is true that we do not follow him into the field when he orders us, but we form an army of piety for him, and support him by our prayers." This did not satisfy Emperor Decius.
196 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
In Protestant countries, Socialist doctrines have found numerous adherents among the clergy. "Christianity is the f theory of which Socialism is the practice," said a clergyman I at the Pan- Anglican Conference in London (1908). The same doctrine was taught by the Avant-Garde, the organ of the French pastors who professed modern Socialism. This is a novel example of the old anti-historical illusion of Concordism ; it consists in harmonising, by means of a partisan exegesis, the mystic conceptions of two thousand years ago, with the realistic and practical ideas of reform which have sprung up in the industrial societies of our age.^
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88. Together with German Pietism, the influence of which is even perceptible in the philosophy of Kant, Voltairian free- thought had grown up, especially at Berlin. The reaction was not Pietist, but poetic and scientific. Schleiermacher (1768- 1834) pointed out a new path for the Reformation, that of religious Romanticism, in which sentiment plays a greater part than dogma, and allies itself with the critical study of history. " Religion," he said, " should float about human life like a sweet and pleasant melody, a vague but beneficent presentiment of a life of dreams in which the human soul can find felicity." This was at once to exalt religion and to make it inoffensive to science, by assigning it a separate sphere. Schleiermacher, the translator of Plato, the admirer of Spinoza and of Kant, encouraged the critical exegesis of the New Testament. His pupil Neander, a converted Jew (1789-1850), built up the history of primitive Christianity on a solid basis. But the great German school of exegesis, that of Tubingen, was formed more especially under the influence of the " doctrine of develop- ment " due to Hegel, who introduced the idea of evolution into science before Darwin. Anything I could say of it here would be insufficient, and therefore obscure ; but it is well to remember that the scientific liberty of German criticism was mainly
1 «' There is no more absurd error than to represent Jesus as an apostle of Socialism. The exhortation to voluntary abnegation in the Gospel bore upon the idea of the approaching Parotisi'a, or Second Coming of Christ in Glory ; it was purely mystical, or rather at once mystical and utilitarian, without any economical or social application." — Dide [a former pastor], La Fin des Religions, p. 130.
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effected by the teaching of two philosophers, Schleiermacher and Hegel.
89. One of the noblest thinkers of the nineteenth century, Alexandre Vinet (of Ouchy, 1797-1847), holds a place in French Protestantism analogous to that of Schleiermacher in Germany. Less a reformer than a religious initiator, he com- bated all forms of official intolerance, claimed the independence of Churches in relation to the State, and preached a pacific Christ, reconciled to modern civilisation, and still living in the conscience of humanity. This ideal has been shared by many superior minds. But one may reasonably ask which Christ they mean — the Christ of Mark or the Christ of John ? They must choose, for the two are historically irreconcilable. Jesus as he may actually have lived and taught is inaccessible to us ; the only concrete reality we have before us is Christianity, which is divided into many hostile sects. Is it not therefore simpler to seek a moral law in our consciences, the depositories of all the experiences and teachings of the past, including those of Christianity ?
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90. The name Americanism has been given by theologians to a very broad form of Catholicism which was propagated mainly in tlie United States by Father Isaac Hecker, of the Paulist Order {d. 1888). The Papacy has always shown indul- f gence to the Catholicism of America, both North and South, / on condition of its making no attempt to extend beyond that continent. About 1890, Americanism, of which Archbishop Ireland (of St. Paul, Minnesota) was the accepted high priest, began to penetrate into Europe. Its distinguishing doctrine was the characteristically American exaltation of good works over faith. Leo XIII. nipped it in the bud by a letter addressed to Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore, which brought about the submission of Archbishop Ireland (1899). A curious incident in this connection was the publication in the United States in 1896 of a book by a monk. Father Zahm, purporting to reconcile Darwinism and the Book of Genesis. Its author was congratulated by Leo XIII., but the work was at once " with- drawn from circulation " after its translation into Italian (1899).
198 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
The Pragmatism of the American psychologist, William James, responds to some extent to the practical tendency of Americanism. Doctrines are not, he says, solutions of problems, but principles of action. They must, therefore, be judged by their fruits, and according to their moral efficacy. This conception, applied to religious dogmatism, would perhaps sanction the sophism of " beneficent errors," and contempt of the historical criticism which seeks to combat them.
91. The last years of the nineteenth century witnessed the rise, especially in France, of the momentous Catholic movement commonly called Modernism. In its general outlook it is related to Newman, and "his doctrine of development ; but Modernism is something more and something better than a religious philosophy. It is the assimilation of criticism by orthodox Catholicism. As such, it is essentially French, for it may claim descent from Richard Simon, the real founder, together with Spinoza, of critical exegesis of the Scriptures. This science, which was received with suspicion in France, passed into Germany, and flourished there in the Protestant Univer- sities from the middle of the eighteenth century onwards. The most famous, if not the most readable book it has produced, is David Strauss's celebrated Life of Jesus, translated into English by "George Eliot," and into French by Littre. An Alsatian Protestant, Edouard Reuss, a scholar of the highest rank, and Michel Nicolas, a pastor of Nimes, who held a professorship at Montauban, made an attempt to popularise these studies in France ; but the general public and the Catholic seminaries remained impenetrable, in spite of the sensation created by Ernest Renan's Life of Jesus. The author's lectureship at the College de France was suppressed because he contested the divinity of Christ (1862). Religious teaching continued to be very antiquated in the seminaries, dwelling complacently on the puerilities of Concordism. Strange to say, reform has come, not from the laity, but from the Church herself. The Catholic Institute of Paris was founded in 1875, and the Abbe Duchesne, still a young man, was appointed professor of sacred history. Duchesne, prudent and discreet, wrote in general on non- scriptural subjects, but he nevertheless inculcated a severe
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scientific method among his pupils. He himself applied it, exciting the acrimonious disapproval of the orthodox, in refuting the absurd legends of the Apostolic origin of the French Churches. These had been condemned as puerile even by the pious Tillemont (1637-1698), but they had found favour again as a result of the debasement of theological study, and the ingenuous credulity of hagiographers.
92. One of Duchesne's pupils, the Abbe Loisy (6. 1857), a Hebrew scholar and an Assyriologist, made a very brilliant debut, and was soon himself nominated a professor of exegesis at the Catholic Institute. About the year 1890 this young priest was the pride of the Gallican Church ; a splendid future seemed assured to him. But the orthodox, and more especially the Jesuits, soon detected in his lectures and writings what they called "Protestant infiltrations" (1892). When Mgr. d'Hulst, the Rector of the Catholic University, published a liberal article in the Correspondant, in which he proposed to abandon the thesis of the infallibility of the Old Testament in scientific and historical matters, this daring attempt was attributed to the influence of Loisy. As a fact, he had nothing to do with it, but Mgr. d'Hulst had supposed himself inspired by Loisy's ideas. Leo XHI. responded by an Encyclical on Scriptural studies (called Providentissimics), in which the infallibility of the Sacred Books was reaffirmed, in accordance with the teaching of the Council of Trent, but discounted by so many linguistic niceties that the question was left very much as before (1893). This Pope was patient and prudent ; he knew that Loisy was greatly respected by the French clergy, and he dreaded a revolt. Loisy, though continually denounced by the monks and canons, published in 1902 his U^lvangile et VEglise, in Avhich he formulated his doctrine in reply to the Essence of Christianity of Harnack, a Protestant theologian of Berlin ; this was followed in 1903 by his commentary on the Fourth Gospel, the historic character of which he denied. At the same time, the enfant terrible of the party, the Abbe Houtin, gave the history of Biblical study in France with much grace and a spice of malice. An English Jesuit, Tyrrell, several German professors, and even a German Jesuit, Father Hummelauer, manifested tendencies
200 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
that were disquieting to the orthodox exegesists of the Sacred Books. Pius X., after hesitating for a while, felt called upon to act ; in 1907 he published in rapid succession a decree of the Inquisition (LamentaUli) and an Encyclical (Pascendi), which were aimed at the very heart of Modernism. Loisy, whose boolcs had already been put upon the Index, was excom- municated, and soon after this was elected professor of the College de France ; Tyrrell was deprived of the Sacraments, and left, as it were, on the threshold of the Church ; Hummelauer was reduced to silence.
93. " The Pope has spoken — Modernism is no more ! " wrote Paul Bourget with naive fervour. What greater insult could he have offered to the thousands of honest and intelligent priests of the Catholic clergy, who cannot change their opinions as they change their cassocks, or, following the example of the snobs M. Bourget knows so well, accept without conviction the credo of the houses where they dine ! Modernism once con- demned, Rome exacted from the priests the " antimodernist oath " ; there remained no avowed Modernists in the Church, but Modernism only gained more ground, Iliacos intra muros et extra. Serious Catholic writers on Scripture respect and occasion- ally reiterate the antiquated decisions of the Biblical Commis- sion in the Vatican, but they give such full accounts of the contrary theses that the competent reader has an easy choice. In dogmatic matters, we have seen the French Cardinal Billot, author (it is said) of the Encjxlical Pascetidi, convicted ot indulging in the purest principles of Modernism when writing about original sin and the condition of infidels after death. Indeed, Modernism has proved an irresistible movement, for it is founded on Catholic science. Orthodoxy has defended itself successfully against the libels of laymen and the aggressive erudition of Protestants ; the strength and menace of Modernism lie herein, that it was born in the Church herself, at the foot of the altar ; that it is a product of the learning of clerics, who, by the study of the texts, have arrived at conclusions even more radical than those of Pj'otestant and liberal historians.
94. The accepted thesis of the Roman Church is that the
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authority of the Sacred Books is guaranteed by the Church, and that the authority of the Church is founded on that of the Sacred Books. Is not this to argue in a circle ? Pro- testantism was content with the authority of the Sacred Books, as demonstrated by a study of these books themselves. But Modernism — or, to be more precise, the Modernist Left — main- tains that neither the existence of God, nor the redeeming mission, nor the divinity, nor the miracles of Jesus, nor a single dogma, nor a single sacrament, can be founded on the fragile historical basis of the Scriptures. This leaves us face to face with a great fact, indisputably historical ; this is the Church itself, inspired by the Scriptures, in the shadow of which hundreds of millions of souls have lived, which is the realisation of the Scriptures throughout the ages, whatever the authority of these may be. The Church has been able to promulgate dogmas, which have evolved like herself, but not historical truths, which belong to the domain of criticism alone. Thus the whole edifice is without an ontological foundation ; and yet it is an edifice, the most magnificent the world has seen, and this is enough for those who seek shelter in it. Thus enlarged, it may receive not only Protestants and Jews, but all " men of good- will." The evolution of the Christian temple makes it a house of refuge for all humanity. Such, at any rate, are the conclu- sions that may be drawn from the thesis of Modernism ; it is obvious that the Roman Church cannot accept them, and no less obvious that her narrow orthodoxy is doomed to founder sooner or later, though not suddenly, in utter discredit.
95. The Church has not only to reckon with erudite Modernism, but with parallel philosophical tendencies. In 1834, Gregory XVI. condemned the so-called Fideist thesis of a Strasburg abbe, Bautain, according to which reason is powerless to establish truths, the benefit of which must be sought in the traditional faith. This doctrine was resuscitated from Pascal ; it is also to be found in the writings of Bonald and Lamennais. But Rome maintains that there can be no conflict between faith and reason, and that the use of reason, the gift of God, precedes the act of faith. In spite of the condemnation reiterated by the Vatican Council in 1870, Fideism made numerous recruits in the
202 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
Catholic world, especially in France, where Brunetiere, Blondel, Laberthonniere, and Le Roy showed themselves to be more or less imbued with it. In its principles, as in its conclusions, it is akin to Modernism, to Pragmatism, and to the Symbolism of the Alexandrians of the third century. It has even been said that Loisy's Modernism was the historic form of Fideism, as Brunetiere's Catholicism was the social form. Fideism had its uses when historical criticism was as yet non-existent. Now that this has become a positive science, any system which tends to dispense with it is open to the suspicion of ignoring it.
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96. Conversions of cultured unbelievers to Protestantism are rather rare ; but in the latter decades of the past century and the first of this, numerous distinguished men of letters and artists, especially in France and in Italy, have returned, with some ostentation, to Catholicism : one of them was Psichari, Ernest Renan's grandson, who fell a victim to the war. Such conversions are usually sentimental and quite independent of theological knowledge. Even a scholar like Brunetiere, when asked what he really believed in (he had been an agnostic froiii the age of thirteen), answered : " Go and inquire from Rome ! " hinting thereby that he accepted a discipline, not a creed. Many conversions of poets and novelists savour of dilettantism and drawing-room devoutness. The religion of these converts is a kind of modernised Franciscanism, with no small mixture of sensuousness and frivolity. The real and enduring power of the Roman Church rests not on such brilliant and self- advertis- ing recruits, but on the great and silent mass of the faithful who strain every nerve and faculty to support a Church now abandoned to her own resources by the State.
97. Down to the beginning of the eighteenth century, the missionaries of the Gospel were, for the most part. Catholics ; since this period the Protestant sects, more particularly those of England and the United States, have shown even greater activity. The sums now spent by Protestants and Catholics in non-Christian countries must be counted by tens of millions. They are applied to the construction and maintenance of churches, schools, training colleges and hospitals, and to the
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distribution of Bibles and catechisms in all tongues. It cannot be said that this money is always well spent. No praise can be too great for the courage and self-denial of certain missionaries, the labours of a Livingstone or a Hue, which have benefited both the cause of civilisation and that of science ; thousands of obscure heroes have fallen in like manner on the field of honour, victims of disease and often of cruel tortures. But in too many cases the indiscreet zeal of missionaries, their interference in the home affairs of States, their national and denominational rivalries, have brought discredit upon their work. In China, more especially, the protection they give to their converts, often the dregs of the population, is largely responsible for the native abhorrence of foreigners.
98. The centre of the Catholic missions is the Roman con- gregation of the Propaganda {De Propaganda fide) ; its most important branch was, up to our time (1922), the Societe de Saint-Xavier at Lyons, which dispensed an annual budget of 7,000,000 francs (de280,000). A French society, called the Sainte-Enfance (1843), has spent nearly 80,000,000 francs (^3,200,000) in a half-century to ensure the baptism of heathen children at the point of death ; China has been the chief beneficiary of this extravagance. The Protestant missions, English and American, spend about =P2, 400,000 a year ; Pro- testant Germany contributes about d£^240,000 to the same cause, France and Switzerland together about =£"40,000. The Russian Church has missionaries in Siberia ; Buddhism sends its emissaries into the Far East, and Islam proselytises mainly among the negroes of Africa, where it has made rapid progress within the last sixty or seventy years.
99. Following the example of Jesus in Israel, the Church has also organised missions to convert the " heathen at home," criminals, infidels, and ignorant persons. This was one of the favourite ideas of St. Vincent de Paul. As the temporal sword was blunted in the nineteenth century, these missions have per- force become civilising and charitable undertakings, especially in Protestant countries, where the religious orders which carry on the work in other lands are lacking. Germany reveres the pastor Bodelschwingh (1831-1910), who founded many charities for
204 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
the sick, labour colonies, asylums and worlcmen's dwellings. But no efforts in this direction have equalled those of the % Salvation Army (the name dates from 1878 only), founded in London in 1872 by the Reverend William Booth. This charity, which is organised on a purely military model, and is not afraid of advertisement even of the noisiest kind, has done an immense amount of good, both in England and abroad. " General " Booth and his wife remain popular figures throughout the world. To procure the funds necessary for its far-reaching benevolence, the Salvation Army has become a manufacturing, commercial and agricultural enterprise ; it undertakes banking and insurance, and extends its influence and its relations every- where. Originally an off-shoot of Methodism, it has gradually lost its sectarian character, to concentrate its efforts upon the elevation of the masses ; the spirit which now inspires it is essentially philanthropical. Some critics have found fault with its Socialist tendencies, others with its abuse of advertisement and its buffoonery ; but the work it has done and is still doing in the slums of London and New York is enough to command gratitude and respect for it.
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100. It may be asked whether moral progress or the in- fluence of Christianity was the determining factor in the abolition of slavery, that blot upon antiquity which had come down to the nineteenth century. No doubt the two influences were at work side by side ; but in justice we must not forget that the Book of Deuteronomy (xv. 14 ; xxiii. 16) bears witness to a touching solicitude for slaves, that the Jewish Essenes and Therapeutists alone in the civilised world of antiquity refused to keep slaves, and that the Primitive Church looked upon slaves as brothers — spirihi fr aires, religlone conservi, as Lac- tantius says in imitation of Seneca.^ She facilitated enfranchise- ment and reckoned it among good works. Although she made no direct attempt to abolish slavery, and even herself owned slaves in the Middle Ages, she made great efforts to redeem the Christian slaves of the Musulmans, and when the conquest of America introduced negro slaves into the
^ Lactantius, Inst. v. 15, 3 (written about a.d. 300).
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Continent, she did her utmost to improve their condition. " The Christian principle," as Paul Viollet truly says, " slowly struck at the heart of slavery."
101. In the twelfth century, slavery tended to disappear in the North-West of Europe, but serfdom survived in France until the eighteenth. In the South and the East, slavery persisted much longer, as a result of contact with Islam ; the Crusaders even had Greek Christians as slaves. The restoration of Roman law, and the sanction of Aristotle — who considered slave-holding a natural right — were obstacles to the reform for which Eastern monks had prepared the way in the fifth century. There were Saracen slaves at the Papal Court in the fifteenth century, and in 1548 Paul III. confirmed the rights of laity and clergy to own them. The importation of negro slaves to Portugal began in 1442 ; in 1454, this traffic was endorsed by Nicholas V. In the New World, the Spaniards and the Portuguese reduced the natives to a state more terrible than slavery ; they died by hundreds as a result of forced labour in the mines. The Dominican, Bartolomeo de Las Casas, sought to save them by advising the importation of negroes. His counsel was followed, and at the end of his life he repented it, realising too late that the negroes were men as well as the Indians. The traffic in negroes became a very profitable trade, entailing horrible cruelty, both in Africa and America. By the year 1790, there were 200,000 negroes in Virginia alone. The economic rivalry between North and South played a part in the Abolitionist campaign, which began in the North ; but the Quakers of Pennsylvania, who had prohibited the slave-trade in their State as early as 1696, were actuated by religious motives. In 1776, the House of Commons rejected a motion of David Hartley's " that the slave-trade is contrary to the laws of God and the rights of man." Undaunted by this, the English Quakers formed an Anti-Slavery Association in 1783 ; others sprang up in America, Wilberforce (1759-1833), a member of the House of Commons, has the honour of having effected the repudiation of the traffic by England (1807), following the example of Denmark, who had led the way in 1792. In France, the Convention decreed the enfranchisement of slaves (1794), a
206 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
measure which was repealed under the Consulate (1802). Slavery did not disappear from the English colonies till 1833, and from the French colonies till 1848. Its abolition in the United States was only brought about by a long civil war (1860-1865). The wisdom of Dom Pedro gradually delivered Brazil from the evil (1871 and onwards) ; finally, a French prelate, Lavigerie, threw himself with great fervour into a campaign against the traffic in negro slaves for the Musulmans. The Anti-Slavery Congress held at Brussels in 1889 also took measures in this connection, which have proved more or less futile. We must unfortunately add that certain forms of slavery, notably the forced labour of the blacks, still obtain in the European colonies of Africa, and that the Chinese coolies are often treated like slaves where they are employed in mines or on public works. In this long struggle against an execrable custom, the part played by the Catholic clergy has been, on the whole, less prominent than that of the Protestant Churches.
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102. It was not generally recognised by the society of the eighteenth century that religions, and even superstitions, are conservative forces. The French Revolution opened its eyes. Society did not become religious, but it pretended to do so ; it desired that women, children, and the poor should be disciplined and tempered by faith. This is the hypocrisy denounced afresh by Leo Tolstoy on the day of his Jubilee (July, 1908) : " The infamous lie of a religion in which we do not believe ourselves, but which we forcibly impose on others." This lie filled the nineteenth century, and has survived it. The French University, by nature liberal, was long obliged to pay homage to it, notably in the teaching of the so-called spiritualist philosophy, a Christianity without dogmas, but not without theological prejudices. Sainte-Beuve remarked playfully that whereas the bishops spoke of the IIoli/ Scriptures, Victor Cousin said the most Holy Scripttires. What is known as " Society " has been the greatest offender in this respect ; seconded by the middle-class infirmity of snobbery, it has con- strained its members either to adopt the conventional falsehood, or to keep silence. Throughout the reign of Queen Victoria,
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England set the example of this insincerity ; free-thought was considered disreputable. But nowhere has the tyrannical power of the so-called upper classes, coalescing to stifle truth in favour of a clerical faction, manifested itself more painfully than in France, at the time of the Dreyfus affair, when the revision of a trial in which all the evidence was in favour of the right was resisted by the Jesuits and nearly all the French clergy at their commands, and divided all France into two hostile camps. No one could belong to " Society " and retain his place in it if he would not voluntarily shut his eyes to the truth, and take the part of Jesuitism against justice. Even in the literary world there were examples of lamentable weakness which had not even the excuse of religious conviction. The Esau of the Scriptures sold his birthright for a mess of pottage ; our Hn-de-siecle Trissotins bartered their right of judgment for truffles.
103. Amidst all these shades of hypocrisy, and all the honourable bonds of tradition and habit, it is impossible to determine, even after long investigation, in what measure religion still retains its hold upon the souls of our con- temporaries. How are we to distinguish those who conform without believing from those who believe without professing conformity ? But a general fact, which was already perceptible towards the middle of the nineteenth century, becomes more and more apparent in our days. In the time of Voltaire, free- thought lighted up the summits only ; it did not descend into the depths. In the nineteenth century, the leisured classes professed without believing ; the workers, in the towns at least, ceased to believe and dared to say so. The working classes are everywhere escaping from the authority of the Churches ; even the peasants are emancipating themselves. Musset's apostrophe to Voltaire is being verified :
Ton si^cle ^tait, dit-on, trop jeune pour te lire :
Le notre doit te plaire, et tes hommes sont nes. . . .
But as free-thought, without the support of solid knowledge, is only an inverted dogmatism, leaving the field open to other attacks upon the reason, one of the most pressing duties of the
208 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
twentieth century is to fortify the reason by study, with a view to the cahn and dehberate exercise of free-thought.
104. Rehgious instruction, which exists in almost every country in Europe, has been suppressed in French schools, those "schools without God," as their detractors call them. And further, it has been impressed upon the teachers in the name of " scholastic neutrality " that they are never to speak of religion to their pupils. This silence is sensible enough in the elemen- tary schools, where the minds of children are not sufficiently cultivated to receive scientific knowledge. But the adolescent pupils of the colleges and higher schools know nothing of the Pentateuch, the Prophets and the Gospels, the origin and the evolution of dogmas, save the historical errors taught in the catechisms, or the equally pernicious absurdities dear to the free-thinking orator of the wine-shop. In Protestant countries the Scriptural texts are better known, but those who read do not, as a rule, understand them, and criticism of them is reserved for scholars. Thus practised, " scholastic neutrality *" is at once a neglect of duty on the part of the State as in- structor, and an abdication of its powers in favour of those who propagate error. Not only in France, but throughout the world, the salvation of thinking humanity must be sought in education, and if there is one duty more imperative than another laid upon secondary education, it is to teach young men, the future fathers of families, wherein religions consist, when and how they have met a universal want, what indis- putable services they have rendered, but also how past generations have suffered from ignorance and fanaticism, on what literary frauds the domination of the Church was estab- lished in the Middle Ages, and finally, what a consoling prospect the ultimate reign of reason and the enfranchisement of thought opens out before the human mind.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
General sources the same as for Chapter III.
1. A. Lorand, L'^tat et Us J^glises (constitutional texts regulating their relations in the different countries), Brussels, 1904.
2. H. Br^mond, Hist. litt. du sentiment religieux in France, vol. iv., 1920. 3-4. In general, see Lanson, Histoire de la litt6rature fraiv^aise, 1894. — On
FROM ENCYCLOPAEDIA TO MODERNISM 209
Voltaire: Lanson, Voltaire, 1906; Nourrisson, Voltaire et le VoUairianisme, 1896: on J. J. Rousseau, L. Ducros, 3 vols., 1918.
6. On the chevalier de La Barre, a silly libertine : Marc Chassaigne, Le proces du chevalier d. L.B., 1921, and Aulard, Grande Revue, August 1921.
7. Peyrat, La Revolution, 1866.
8. R. Allier, Voltaire et Calas, 1898.
10. A. Theiner, Geschichte des Pontifikats Klemens XIV., 2 vols., 1852.
12. E. Chenon, L'^glise et la Revolution, L'£glise notes le Consulat et V Empire, in Lavisse and Rambaud's Eistoire generate, vols. viii. and ix. (1906) ; Pisani, La Constitution civile du Clergi (in Revue die clerg4, June 1, 1908) ; LJSglise de Paris et la Revolution, 1909 ; A. Mathiez, Rome et le clerge sous la Constituante, 1911 ; Champion, Separation de I'J^glise et de I'^tat en 1791, 1903 ; Aulard, La Revolution et les Congregations, 1903 ; Annates i-evoL, May-August, 1919.
13. Aulard, Le Culte de la Raison et de I'J^tre SuprSme, 1892 ; Patry, La premiere separation, 1920.
14. A. Mathiez, La theophilanthropie, 1904; Annates revol. , 1921, p. 441,
16, N, Hill, The Story of the Scottish Church, 1919.
17. J. C. Carlisle, Story of the English Baptists, 1906 ; art. Bunyan and Menno in Hauck ; Revue du clerge, May 1910 ; C. Henry Smith, The Mennonites, 1920.
18-20. A Workman, Methodism, 1912; art. Methodismus and Wesley in Hauck; H. Bargy, La Religion aux iStats-Unis, 1902.
21-22. E. E. Miller, History of Irvingism, 2 vols., 1878 ; art. Darby and Irving in Hauck.
23. A. Major, M. Eddy et la Science chretienne, 1912. — M. Geiger, Christian Science, in the Siiddeutsche Monaishefte, June 1909.
24. Art. Anglo-Israelites, in Hastings, Encycl. of Religion, vol. i. (1908). 26. Art. Testakte in Hauck ; Amherst, History of Catholic Emancipation,
2 vols., 1886; Revue du clerge, February 1914.
27-34. Art. Ritualismus, Traktarianismus Newman, Pusey in Hauck ; P. Thureau-Dangin, La Renaissance cathol. en Angleterre au XIX' siecle (1865- 1892), 1906; Ch. Sarolea, Cardinal Newman, 1906.— G. Planque, Chez les Anglicans (in Revtoe du clerge, March 1908, p. 542) ; F. de Pressense, Ze cardinal Manning, 1897 ; Shane Leslie, same subject, 1921 ; A. Galton, The Message and Position of the Church of England, 1899. — The Catholic Directory, 1921.
34. Art. Channing and Unitarier in Hauck ; Renan, jStudes, p. 357.
35. Art. Nordamerika in Hauck.
36-37. Art. Mormonismus in Haui?k ; E. Meyer, Die Mormonen, 1912 ; Burton, The City of the Saints, 1861 (with facsimiles of the tablets).
38. K. Ritter, Kaiser Joeeph II., 1867; H. Franz, Reformen Joseph II., 1909; Pirenne, Hist, de Belgique. vol. v., 1920.
39, Art. Oesterreich in Hauck.
40-41. K. Grass, Die russischen Sekten, vol. i., 1907 ; vol. ii., 1909; Pisani, A travers V Orient, 1897 ; F. C. Conybeare, Russian Dissenters, 1921.
42. Art. Kriidener in Hauck.
43. Peyrat, Le Directoire (in Hist, et Religion, p. 153).
4A-i5. Matthieu, Le Concordat, 1903 (c/. Rambaud, Journ. des Sav., 1904, p. 96) ; Welschinger, Le pape et I'empereur, 1905 ; Haussonville, L'JSglise romaine et V Empire, 3rd ed., 5 vols., 1870; Debidour, Hist, des rapports de V£glise et de V^tat (1789-1870), 1898 ; Baunard, Un siecle de VJ^glise de France (1800-1900), 1901 ; Lanzac de Laborie, Paris sous NapoUon, la religion, 1907 ; iBoulay de la Meurthe, Hist, de la negoc. du Concordat, 1920.
46. Brosch, Geschichte des Kirchenstaats, vol. ii., 1881; Ranke, Die rom. Pdpste, vol. iii., 1874 (English translations); Stillman, The Union of Italy, 1908.
47-48. Biographies of Pius VII., Leo XII., Pius VIIL, Gregory XVI. and Pius IX. in Hauck. — Art. Mortara Case in the Jewish Encycl. (a similar case in 1840, Rev. hist, cxxxvii, p. 49). — On the Syllabus : Ollivier, VEmpire liberal, vol. vii., 1902 ; Ch. Beck, Le Syllabus, texte et commentaire (Brussels), 1905 ; P. VioUet, V Infaillibilite et le Syllabus, 1904. — Hauck, art. Empfdngniss
210 A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY
(Immaculate Conception) and Vatikanisches Konzil. — Prince Jer6me Napoleon, Les alliances de VEtnpire (in Eevue des Deux Mondes, April 1, 1878).
49. J. de Maistre (Ste.-Beuve, Porlr. litt., vol. ii. p. 379, and Lundis, vol. iv. p. 150).— Bonald (Luiidis, vol. iv, p. 328). — Veuillot {Nouveaux Lundis, vol. i. p. 42). — On the Action fran^aise and the Catholic atheism of some of its adherents : D. Parodi, Pages Libres, May 30 and June 6, 1908. — The verses by V. Hugo quoted are in Les Chdtiments.
50. Ch. Boulard, Lamennais, 1905. — Lacordaire (Ste.-Beuve, Litndis, vol. i., p. 208, and Nouv. Lxindis, vol. iv. p. 392). — Montalembert {Lundis, vol. i., p. 74 ; Peyrat, Hist, et Religion, 1858, p. 86) ; G. Weill, Hist, du catholicisme liberal en France, 1909. There are full bibliographies in Hauck's articles.
51. Marc Sangnier, CUricalisme et d(^mocratie, 1907. — Condemnation of Le Sillon by the bishops : Revue du chrg6, March 1909. — On the Sillon, see Pages Libres, April 24, 1909. — Italian social modernism : A. della Torre, appendix to the Italian version of Orpheus, vol. ii. p. 1013.
52-53. E. Daudet, La Terreur blanche, 1887 ; G. de Grandmaison, La Congregation (1801-1830), 1889 ; A. Bardoux, Le comte de Montlosier et U gallicanisme, 1891.
54. Thureau-Dangin, VlSglise et VMat sous la vionarchie de Juillet, 1880 ; Colani, Le x>ci,'''ti catholique sons la monarchic de Juillet (in Etudes de critique, p. 137) ; H. Michel, La hi Falloux, 1905 ; F. Mouret, Le Mouvemejit cathol. en J'ra?ice (1830-1850), 1917.
55. See the histories of the Second Empire by Taxile Delord and P. de la Gorce. — E. Bourgeois and E. Clermont, Roine et NapoUon IIL, 1907.
56. A. Debidour, V^glisc catholique et V^tat sous le troisieme Republique, 2 vols., 1906-1909.— P. Cloch^, Le seize mai (in Pages Libres, October 10, 1908).
57-59. J. Reinach, Histoire de V affaire Drey jus, 7 vols., 1901-1911 ; T. R., art. Dreyfus in the Jewish Encycl. — L. Chaine, Les cathol. frant^ais et leurs difficult6s actuelles, 1903 (confessions of a Lyonese Catholic on the ugly part played by the Church during the crisis) ; Anat. France, Le parti noir (Brussels), 1905 ; Fred. Conybeare, Roman Catholicism, 1901. — P. Sabatier, separation des ^glises et de I'^tat, 1905 ; Russacq, Apres la Separation (in Pages Libres, September 28, 1907) ; Eth. Taunton, The Holy See and France (in Nineteenth Century, March 1906, p. 495). — C. Coignet, Le protestantisme ^ran(ais an, XIX' siecle, 1908 ; T. Bricout, Les iSglists riformies de France (in Rev. du cltrgi, 1908, pp. 156, 268) ; H. Kuss, Constitution des Assoc, cultuelles des ^glises reformies en France, 1907.
60. WcBste, Histoire du Kulturkampf en Suisse, 1887.
61-66. Art. Jesuitenorde7i in Hauck.
67-70. Art. Altcatholicismus, Dollinger and JJltramontanisjnus in Hauck ; J. F. Schulte, Dollinger, 3 vols., 1901. — On the Kulturkampf: C. Goyau, UAllemagne religieuse, le Catholicisme, 4 vols., 1905-1908 ; L. de Behaine, Leon XIII. et Bismarck, 1898. — A. Houtin, La qiiestion biblique au XX" siecle, 1906 ; La crise du clerge, 1907 ; Le Pere Hyacinthe, 2 vols. , 1920, 1922. — D'Avenel, Rev. des Deux Mondes, August 19, 1921. — J. Bournichon, Le Compagnie de Jesus en France, 1921 ; M. Charny, Cahitrs des Droits de V Homme, June 25, 1922.
70-76. P. Parfait, Harsenal de la devotion, 9th ed., 1879 ; Le dossier des pelerinages, 4th ed., 1879; La foire aux reliques, 1879; Colani, Essais,-p. 123; G. T^ry, Les cordicoles, 1902; art. Herz Jezu in Hauck.
77-80. Lea, Inquis. of Spain, vol. iv. p. 2 et seq. : R. P. Rolfi, La magie onoderne, 1902; D. P. Abbott, Behind the Scenes with the Mediums, 1908; Thulie, Phenoinenes mystiques (in Rev. mensu£lle d'anthrop., October 1908); L. Wintrebert, L'occultisme (in Revue du clerge, August, 1, 1908, p. 327) ; cf. art. Magic in Hauck. — On Neo-Buddhism : Barth, Rev. Hist. Relig. 1902, vol. xlv. p. 346 ; art. Blavatzky and Theosophy in Brit. Encycl. — E. Caro, Saint Martin, 1862.— E. Bersot, Mesmer, 1853.— G. Ballet, Swedenborg, 1902 ; G, Trobridge, Swedenborg, 1907.
81. Rob. Freke Gould, Concise History of Freemasonry, 1887. — Vauthier, Rev. Univ. deBrux., November 1908, p. 134. — Art. Freimaurer, in Hauck.
83. Lea, Leo Taxil, Diana Vaughan and the Roman Chtcrch, 1901.
FROM ENCYCLOPEDIA TO MODERNISM 211
86. G. Weil, V^cole. Saint- Simonienne, 1896 ; L^vy-Bruhl, Philos. d^ Augusts, Comte, 1899 ; G. Dumas, Psychologie de Deux Messies positivites (Saint-Simon and Comte), 1905. — Positivist calendar: Morley, Critical Miscellanies, vol. iv. , 1908. — H. Boiu'gin, Fourier, 1907. — On the anti-military ideas of the early Christians : Harnack, Militia Christi, 1905 ; P. Gerosa, S. Agostino e la decadcnza dell' Imjjero, 1916.
88. Schleiermacher, Redeniiber Religion, 1800. — A. Otto, Fr. Schleiermacher, 1899 ; art. Schleiermacher, in Hauck ; A. Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, Engl, ed., 1853 (coll. Bohn); art. Neander, in Hauck; Hegel, Vorlcsungen iiber die Fhiloso2)hie der Religion, 1832. — See also art. Tiibinger Schule (School of Tiibingen) in Hauck.
89. Edm. Scherer, Alex. Vinet, 1853.
90. Houtin, U Amiricanisme, 1903; S. Reinach, Cultes, vol. iii. p. 510; Marcel Hebert, Le Pragmatisme, 1908; L. Stein, Philosophische Stromungen, 1908, p. 37 et seq. ; Edinburgh Review, April 1909 (Pragmatism).
91. Guignebert, Modernisms et tradition catholique, 1907; A. Houtin, La crise du clergi, 1907 ; La question biblique au XX' siecle, 1906 ; La q. bibl. au XIX' siecle, 1902 ; L'apostolicit^ des ^glises de France, 3rd ed., 1903 ; Hist, du modernisme, 1913. — Evolution in theology : S. Reinach, Cultes, vol. i. p. 410 ; Bricout, Le cUvelopipement die dogme (in Revue du clergi, April 15, 1908, p. 150). — Works of the Abbe Loisy : VEvangile et I'^glise, 1902 (in answer to Harnack, Das Wesen dcs Christentums, 1900) ; Autour d'un ijetit livre, 1903 ; Quelques ettres and Simp les rijlexions, 1908.
On Strausss, Reuss and M. Nicolas, see the articles in Hauck's Eucycl — On Nicolas, see also E. Stapfer, in Etudes de th^ologie, 1901, p. 153. — On Renan : S^ailles, Ernest Renan, 2nd ed., 1895. — On the syllabus Lamentabili, see Pages Libres, August 10, 1907.
92. Modernism in England and Germany : Revue dxi clerg4, March 1909, p. 541, 678.— M. Petre, Life of 0. Tyrrell, 1912 (d. July 1909).
93. On Cardinal Billot : E. Perrin. Rev. hist. Hit. rel., 1921, p. 319.
95. M. Hebert, L'^volution de lafoi catholique, 1905, p. 132 et seq.
96. Converts : Huby, Lcs Etudes, May 20, 1918 ; S. Reinach, Revue sud- amiricaine. May 1914.
97. Art. Mission in Hauck ; J. B. Piolet, Les missions catholiques, 6 vols., 1902 ; Louvety, Les miss, cathol. au XIX' siecle, 1898 ; R. AUier, Les troubles en Chine et les ynissions, 1901 ; J. Feillet, Maristes et Canaques (Brussels), 1906.
97. M. Goyau, L'Allemagne religieuse, le protestantisme, 1898 ; Le catho- licisme (1800-1870), 4 vols., 1905-1908.— Art. Heilsarmee (Salvation Army) in Hauck ; Les Etudes, August 20, p. 1920 (Booth).
100. Lea, The Church and Slavery (in Studies in Church History, p. 524. — Zadok Kahn, L'Esclavage selon la Bible et le Talmud, 1867. — Art. Slavery in Encycl. Brit. ; art. Sklaverei und Christentum in Hauck.
101-102. See Colani's Etudes, which are full of judicious observations on these questions, notably the essays on the Bible, and on the revival of the Catholic party among the middle classes in the reign of Louis Philippe.
104. See on "Scholastic Neutrality" G. Lanson, Revue Bleue, April-May, 1905.
P2
EPILOGUE
Established Churches played a very small part in the great world-war (1914-1918). No doubt, the chief offenders, Austrian and Prussian nobles, were Lutheran Pietists or Roman Catholics ; but their crime was a result of their greed, not of their creed. The various religions affbrded solace to millions of broken hearts and broken limbs ; they stimulated charitable work ; but patriot- ism and love of humanity did just the same. Religions, as such, remained powerless. Vainly did the Khalif proclaim the sacred war : Arab Musulmans fought by the side of the British to conquer Jerusalem (1918). The Orthodox Church of Russia, enslaved by despotism, was no element of strength to be reckoned with, and collapsed miserably in the short struggle against miscreant Bolshevism. Even the Japanese Shinto was made subservient to a clever policy of " wait and see."
If established religions stood aloof, some sort of religion did not. Christianity is a universal religion, regardless of nations and frontiers; Rousseau even thought that it was directly antagonistic to patriotism. In the beginning of the twentieth century, decaying creeds had tried, like Paganism in the fourth century, to identify themselves with patriotism ; it was generally said, though not believed, that a true Frenchman should be Roman Catholic, a true Russian should be Orthodox, &c. When the war began and shook the nerves of the nations, patriotism at once imbibed the spirit, energy and intolerance of religions. National saints, like St. George and Joan of Arc, came to the fore ; in Germany, the " German God," repeatedly appealed to by William 11., was not the Christian God, but the Odin or Thor of Norse mythology.^ If Islam seemed to break
^ On the religious character of Germanism, see Rev. hist, cxxiv. p. 130.
212
EPILOGUE 213
down, patriotic Panislamism and Turkish nationalism took its place. The greater number of the Jews rallied around the flag of Zionism, not a form of religious Judaism, but a new religion founded on the misconception of race. In those days of strife and hatred between groups of nations, internationalism was looked upon with the same suspicion and ire as would have been free-thought in the time of the Crusades.
Superstitions of the grossest sort and childish legends — such as that of guardian angels protecting the British retreat from Mons — flourished both in the armies and among distressed civilians. Soothsayers never had better opportunities ; prophets found audiences ; amulets were sold by the million ; ^ the absurdities of occultism and spiritualism spread like prairie fires. Superstitions are older than religions ; they are often disciplined and purified by these ; they run wild when religions decline. Belief or disbelief in accepted creeds is a thousand times more attractive and attainable than rationalism, and therefore much more frequent in our day.
One great spiritual power remained, which could have interposed to prevent the outbreak of the war. But Pius X. vainly bade his Nuncio admonish the Austrian Emperor ; he failed even to get a hearing from that well-guarded old imbecile. The next Pope, Benedict XV., had to reckon with a majority of pro-German cardinals, with the hatred of the monastic Orders for " persecuting " France, with the aristocratic leaning towards autJiority which, in many Catholic countries, such as Spain,^ gained sympathy for the German cause. He strove to remain strictly neutral. He spoke words of solace to Belgium, but not one word of reproof to the invaders, murderers and burglars though they w^ere ; he protested against new and abominable methods of warfare, but did not condemn those who first resorted to them ; he ordered prayers for peace, peace without victory, but disregarded the responsibilities incurred by the aggressors and the legitimate demands of the oppressed.' The time came when truly Christian words about the infamy of the war and
^ Bellucci, Folklore di guerra, 1920.
* F. Girerd, Spain during the war, in Eevne. du elergi, February 1917. ^ Anonymous, La politique de Benoit XV., in Revue de Paris, October 15, 1918 ; Glorieux, Benoit XV. ei la guerre, in Revue du chrg6, August 1, 1916.
214 EPILOGUE
hopes for the advent of a better era were uttered only by the Protestant professor, President Wilson, whom Loisy, lecturing at the College de France, called " the Pope of humanity."
Perilous as it was, because over-cautious, the Roman Pope's policy was not unsuccessful. He had disappointed many expec- tations, but wounded no susceptibilities. His charity, if not his judgment, had been impartial. When the German star declined, Benedict found good words for his "dear France" ; the French national heroine, Joan of Arc, was canonised (1920) ; diplomatic relations were renewed between France and the Holy See (1921) ; the Italian Government was no longer held in suspicion, and Benedict's successor, Pius XI. (February 1922), received official Italian honours when he ascended the throne.
The prospects of Catholicism are now indeed very bright. Two new independent States that are Catholic, Poland and Hungary, stand in close contact with the schismatic Slavs, who may be induced to reunite, Syria and Palestine are under Chris- tian rule, widely open to Catholic teaching and proselytism. Catholicism remains all-powerful in Austria and in western Germany. France, having recovered Alsace-Lorraine, where Catholic traditions prevail, and occupied the left banks of the Rhine, has been obliged to modify her policy of ignoring the Church. The Catholic part of Ireland has become practically independent (December 1921). In Great Britain itself, the religious Orders and their schools have risen to great prosperity. In the United States, the Church of Rome is more influential than ever ; a Catholic union, the Knights of Columbus, have made themselves conspicuous in peace and in war.
But that is not all. In our revolutionary days, a great and very ancient authority is an element of stability not to be despised. Russian Bolshevism has terrified the better classes all over the world.^ Even agnostics reverence a power which may avert similar collapses of civilisation.^ This does not mean nor foreshadow a truly religious revival, though there are symptoms of such a revival in Russia ; but it does mean for all Churches, and especially for the well-organised Roman Church, a renewal
^ Marc Slonim, Le Bolchivisme, 1921. 2 See Les Etudes, August 5, 1921.
EPILOGUE 215
of past influence in politics. Empires and kingdoms have crumbled to dust; the "servant of God's servants" in the Vatican, having survived them all, and teaching a better lesson than theirs, has at least a chance of being recognised once more as one of the solid pillars of this shaken world.
INDEX
AbAlard, 81, 94
Acilius Glabrio, 45
Acta of the Apostles, 2-3 ; date of, 26 ; apocryphal Acts, 26-7
Adrian I, Pope, 68
IV, Pope, 72
Albertus Magnus, 94
Albigenses, 73, 92, 97 ; and see Cathari
Alexandria Church, 52, 102
Alfonso of Liguori, 182
Alva, Duke of, 125.
Amboise, conspiracy of, 130
Ambrose, St., 58-9
America : Moravian influence in, 96 ; bigotry in (eighteenth century), 101 ; Catholicism in, 122, 166, 214 ; French Protestants and Quakers in, 127-8 ; the Inquisition in, 146-7 ; Baptists, Methodists, and Plymouth Brethren in, 159-61 ; Jesuits in, 183 ; polygamy forbidden in, 167 ; reli- gious liberty in, 166
Americanism, 197-8
Anabaptists, 113-14, 117
Anglican Church : Edward VI's Prayer Book, 118 ; in the Commonwealth and Stuart period, 126-7 ; the Wes- leyan rupture, 160 ; in early nine- teenth century, 162 ; the Ritualistic party, 163-5 ; their attitude to the Roman Church, 124; relations with the Orthodox Church, 103
Anglo-Saxons, 64, 161-2
Anselm, Archbishop, 93
Antichrist, 35-6
Antioch, 52
Antonelli, Cardinal, 172 seq.
Apocalypse, The, 2-3, 31-2 ; St. Peter's, 2
ApoUos, 41, 43
Arab Empire, 64
Arianism, 53-4, 58
Aristotle, 93
Armenians, 102
Arminians, 125
Arnaud, Henri, 92
Arnaulds, 140-2
Arnold of Brescia, 90
Art in the Church, 89
Asia, Central, 65
217
Assumption, Feast of the, 81
Athanasian Creed, 54
Atheism : denial of Roman gods, 45 ; free thought in seventeenth century, 139; in eighteenth century, 158
Atonement doctrine, 93
Augustine, St., and his teaching, 11 and note \ 121 ; literary campaign against the Donatists, 51, 55 and note ^ ; the Jansenist controversy, 140-1 ; Luther's attitude to his doc- trine, 111 ; cited on Purgatory, 56
Augustine the Monk, 64
Augustinians, 110
Austria, 123 ; the Thii'ty Years' War, 128 ; Catholic re-action and Pro- testantism in (eighteenth century), 168 ; Los von Rom movement (nine- teenth century), 168-9 ; the Jesnits in, 182-3
Avenir, U, 175
Avignon, 74, 171
Bacon, Roger, 94 Baptismal rites, 90, 102, 167 Baptists, 159 and note; and see AnSi'
baptists Barabbas, 19
Barlaam and Joasaph, 78 Barnabas, St., 41 Basil, St., 58 Basle, Council of, 75 Bayle, 139
Becket, Thomas h., 72 Benedict XV, Pope, 213-14 Benedict, St., 51 Benedictines, attitude of, to Jesuits,
123 ; to Pilgrimages, 187 ; erudition
of, at St. Maur, 138 ; and seeMonaati-
cism Bernard, St., 76 ; quoted, 93 Beziers, 91 Bible, Cyiil's translation of, 65 ;
Erasmus' of N.T., 95 ; Wyclil's, 95;
Luther's, 111 ; see also Scriptures Bishops, 33, 43, 97, 124; in Eastern
Church, 103-4 Bismarck, Prince, 184 Black Pope, the, 182 Blondel, 69
218
INDEX
Bohemia, 66, 96
Boileau's epitaph on Arnaud, 142
BoUandists, 186
Bolshevism, 104, 212, 214
Bonald, 174
Boniface, St., 64
VIII, Pope, 70
Bora, Catherine, 112
Bossuet, 141, 144; cited 101 note*;
quoted, 137 Bouillon, Godfrey -de, 66-7 Boulanger, General, 178 Bridget, St., 79, 82 Brotherhood of the Holy Sacrament,
121 Brueys, Pierre de, 91 Buddhism, 78, 90; Neo-Buddhists,
191-2 Bulgaria, 65, 103 Bunyan, John, 159 note Byzantium, 102
Calas, 155
Calixtenes, 84, 96
Calvinism: 115-16, 119-20, 140; eucharistic doctrine of, 110 ; in Eng- land and Scotland, 159, 162
Camalduli, Order of, 75
Camisards, 135
Canon of the Church, 2, 27 seq., 48
Canonisation, 83 ; no provision for, in Eastern Church, 104
Carcassonne, 91
Carlstadt, 112
Carmelites, Order of, 76
Carthusians, Order of, 76 ; attitude to Jesuits, 123
Casuistry, 121
Cathari, 78, 90
Catherine of Siena, St., 79, 82
Catholic Apostolic Church (Irvingites), 161
Institute of Paris, 198-9
Celibacy of the Priesthood: 44, 52; influence on the Roman Church, 87 ; not enforced in the Eastern Church, 103; "Luther's door," 112
Celsus, True Discourse " by, 46
Cenobites, 51
Cerinthus the Gnostic, 43
Charlemagne, 65, 68
Charles I, King of England, 126
II, King of England, 126-7
V, Emperor of Germany, 113-
114
IX, King of France, 131-2
Chateaubriand, 155, 174
China, 65, 122, 123
Christ, s$e Jesus
Christian Brothers, 138
Christian Scientists, 161
Christianity, origin of, 1-2, 40-41 ; as a spiritual force, 23-24; first communities, 40 seq. ; supersedes Judaism and defeats Gnosticism, 43; spread and effects of, 44-5; lying rumours concerning, 46 ; early litera- ture regarding, 46-7 ; fine charac- teristics of early Christians, 47; in a privileged position under Constan- tine, 49-51 ; imposed on Europe by the Church, 63 ; evolution of modern Christianity, 48 ; rites and festivals borrowed from paganism, 52-3, 59, 89, 103
Christmas, 52
Chiysostom, St., 58, 59
Church, Primitive (see also Anglican, Eastern, Roman), organisation of, about A.D. 80, 43; becomes a govern- ing body, 48 ; changes effected in fourth century, 52-3 ; Hierarchy adopted, 52 ; Hellenised, 53 ; perse- cutions by, 53, 55 ; growth of luxury in, 59 ; the Coptic Church, 56
of Christ Scientist, 161
of Latter Day Saints, 167
of New Jerusalem, 190
Cicero, 121
Circumcelliones, 51
Cistercians, Order of, 76
Civil tribunals, bigotry of, 101
Clara, St., of Assisi, 78
Claude, Bishop of Turin, 91
Clement, Bishop of Rome, 34, 48
II, Pope, 71
X, Pope, 142
XI, Pope, 142
XIV, Pope, 156
Clermont, Council of, 67
Clotilde, 64
Clovis, 59
Cluny, Order of, 75, 86
Coligny, Adm. de, 130-1
Columba, St., 76
Comte, Auguste, 194
Conceptualists, 93
Concordat of 1516, 118, 156, 170; Concordat of 1802, 170-71 ; of 1813, 171
Confession, auricular, 85-6 ; the con- fessional box, 120
Confessors as distinguished from mar- tyrs, 47
Congregationalists, 124
Couhtance, Council of, 74-5, 139; burning of John Huss, 96, 98
Constantine, Emperor, seeks support of Christians, 49 ; so-called donation of Italy to the Pope, 68
INDEX
219
Coustantinople, the seat of the Empire, 53 ; Church of St. Sophia, 59, 66 ; the Latin Empire of, 68
, the Patriarch of, 102-3
, Council of, 54
Convents, morality in, 76
Coptic Church, the, 56
Corporation and Test Acts, 162
Crannier, Archbishop, 117
Creeds, 54 ; and see Symbols
Croix, La, 179
Cromwell, Oliver, 126-7
Cross, "the true," 65
Crusades, the, 66-8; not invoked by Christian Princes, 64 ; the instigators of, 66; in south of France (1208), 90-1
Cyprian, Bishop, 49
Cyril, St., 50, 55
the Monk, 64-5
D'Alembert, 153-4
Darby, Rev. John, 160-1
Darius, 20
Darwinism, 196-7
Deacons, 40, 43
Dead, the, prayers for, 57; Feast of, 86 ; baptism for, 167
Decius, Emperor, 49
Decretals, false, 68-9
Denmark, 65, 112
Development of Christian Doctrine, Essay on the (Newman), 165
Didache, the, 34
Diderot, 152 seq.
Diocletian, Emperor, 49
Docetes, the, 21
Dodwell cited, 46
DoUinger, Canon, 183
Dominicans, Order of, 73, 76, 79; their treatment of Huss, 96 ; in charge of Inquisition tribunals, 97-9, 101 ; the "Monks' Quarrel," 110 ; attitude to Copernicus, 147 ; reconciled to the Jesuits, 183; and see Monasti- cism
Domitian, 45
Donatists, 50-1, 55
Dragonades, 134-5
Dreyfus, Alfred, 155, 178-80, 185, 207
Dukhobortsy, 169
Duns Scotus, 94
Easter, 53
Eastern Church, 102-4 ; Immaculate Conception doctrine not accepted by, 82 ; worship of images in, 88-9, 103 ; attitude of, to clergy and monks, 89, 104 ; "Old Believers " in Russia, 169
East Indies, the Inquisition in, 147
Ebionites, 25, 47
Eddy, Mrs. M. B., 161
Egypt, 51
Elders : primitive, 43 ; Baptist, 159
Elizabeth, Queen of England, 118
Emerson, R. W.,166
Encydopsedia, The, 139, 152 seq.
England : Church of, see Anglican Church; Nonnans and Danes in, con- verted, 65 ; in relation to the Holy See, 69, 72-3, 118 ; Cromwell's treat- ment of Catholics, 126; the "No Popery "motto, 127, 164; Noncon- formists in, 159, 162 ; the Tractarian Movement, 163; attitude to Pius IX (1858), 173 ; to Jesuits, 183
Ephesus, 42-3 ; Council of, 55-6
Episcopacy, 33, 43, 124 ; in Eastern Chm-ch, 103-4
Epistles : in the Canon 27 seq. ; others, 32-3
Erasmus, 95
Erastianism, 127
Essenes, 51
Eucharist, the, 44 ; mystery surround- ing, 46; dogmas regarding — transub- stantiatiou, etc., 83-4, 110, 118; the elevation of the Host, 84 ; the Feast of the Holy Sacrament, 84-5 ; Communion in one kind, 84, 102 ; Luther's doctrine, 110
Eudoxia, Empress, 58
Evolutionary Catholicism, 165, 197
Excommunications, 70 ; abuse of, 98
Exorcisms, 112
Fabliaux of fourteenth century, 139
Falloux, Comte de, 177
Feasts and Festivals : Sundays, 43 ; Christmas, 52 ; Easter, 53 ; Blessed Virgin Mary's Assumption, 81 ; the Holy Sacrament, 84-5 ; the Dead, 86 ; Fools, 88 ; the Sacred Heart, 186
F^nelon quoted on civil toleration, 137 ; Maximes des Saints and TiUmaque by, 144-5
Fideism, 201-2
Filioque quarrel, 102
Flagellants, 92
Flavins Clemens, 45
Florence, 96-7 ; Council of, 67, 102
Fourierism, 195
Fox, George, 127
France, Church of, see Gallican Church ; attitude to Peter's Pence, 70 ; Monastic orders in, 75, 137-8 ; Crusade against Albigenses (1208), 90-1; the Reformation 118-20;
220
INDEX
Concordat of 1516, 118, 156, 176 ; images and relics, 119 ; attitude to Jesuits, 123 ; French Protestants in America, 127 ; demand of the States- General for liberty of worship (1561), 130 ; under the last Valois, 180-2 ; massacre of S. Bartholomew, 131 ; Edict of Nantes, 132-4 ; its revoca- tion, 134-7 ; Protestants under Louis XIV, 133 seq. ; state of, under Louis XIII, 137-8 ; libertinage in seventeenth century, 139-40; Acceptans and Refusans, 143 ; Catholic with Jansenist tendency in eighteenth century, 152 ; Protest- ants admitted to Civil rights (1787), 155; the Revolution, 152; National Assembly's decrees regarding re- ligion, 156-7; Civil calendar (1793- 1805), 157; persecution of Catholics, 157 ; the Directory : revival of Catholicism, 170 seq. ; Concordat of 1801, 170-1; ended, 180, 185; the Republic's war against Roman Republic, 172 ; Liberal Catholicism, 174 feq. ; political reaction (1816), 176; the White Terror, 176; Ex- travagances of the Congregation (1825), 176-7 ; education controlled by the Church and Jesuits, 135-6, 168, 177, 183 ; the Loi Falloux (1850), 177, 180 ; Jesuitical influence, 178, 186-7; clerical influence after 1870-71, 178; the Dreyfus affair, 155, ]7«-80, 185, 207; Protestant- ism after 1871, 180 ; Freemasonry, 192-4 ; suppression of religious in- struction, 208 ; canonisation of Joan of Arc, 212, 214 ; relations with the Papacy resumed, 214
Francis I, King of France, 118-19, 170
Francis, St. , of Assisi, 77 and note ^ ; " the sweet memory of," 78
Franciscans, Order of, 76-9 ; laymen and women affiliated with, 78 ; oppo- sition to St. Thomas Aquinas, 94 ; treatment of Savonarola, 97 ; see also Monasticism
Pranks, 64
Frederick I, Emperor, 90
II, Emperor, 73
Free thought, 139, 158, 207-8
Freemasons, 172, 192-4
Fribourg University, 181
Friends, see Quakers
of God, 92
Galileo, 147-8 Gall, St., 76
Galilean Church : demands persecu- tion of Protestants, 133 ; under Louis XIII, 137-8 ; attitude to Rome : the four resolutions of 1682, 138-9 ; in eighteenth century, 152; under the Revolution, 156-7; separated from the State, 180, 185 ; opposition to Infallibility decree, 184 ; blight- ing influence on, of Pius X, 185
Gallicanism, 74
Garibaldi, 173
Geneva, Council of, 115-16
Gentiles, 41, 64
Germany : conflict with the Papacy, 59, 71 ; Christianised, 64 ; Innocent VIII's Bull, 101 ; reaction against Romanism, 109; Lutheranism, 112- 14, 129 ; the Thirty Years' War, 128 ; Baptists, 159; toleration established (1781), 168; opposition to Papal Infallibility, 183 ; Catholic party, the pivot of the policy of the Empire, 184 ; historical criticism in, 95, 196 ; AVilliam II's German God, 212
Ghibellines and Guelphs, 72
Glossolaly, 44
Gnosticism, 25, 43-4, 47-8
Golden Legend, 83
Gospels, the, not the work of eye- witnesses, 3-4, 6-7 ; dates of, 5-6 ; synoptical gospels, 6-7, 10-11 ; dis- crepancies with S. John's, 10 ; legends in, 22 ; untrustworthy evidence in, 23; Apocryphal Gospels, 24-5 ; divine inspiration of Canonical Gospels affirmed, 48 ; no foundation therein for the seven sacraments, 85
Grandier, Urbain, 1 01 note ^
Greek Empire lost to Christianity, 68
Greeks, modern, 103
Gregory VII, Pope, 66, 69-71
IX, Pope, creates Inquisition tri- bunals, 97
XIII, Pope, Huguenot policy of,
132
XVI, Pope, 182
of Nazianzen, St., 58
Guises, 130-1 Gunpowder plot, 126 Guyon, Madame, 144-5 Guzman, Domingo di, 79
Hammer of JVitches, The, 101
Hapsburgs, 74
Harnack, 199
Hegel, 196-7
Henry II, King of England, 72
Ill, Emperor, 71
IV, Emperor, 71
IV, King of Navarre, 130-3
INDEX
221
Henry VIII, King of England, 116-18
Heresy {see also Arianism, etc. ), edicts against, 54-5, 73 ; Church's attitude to, 87-8 ; definition of a heretic, 89 ; two classes of heresies, 89
Hermits, 51
Historical criticism, 95, 196 ; see also Modernism
Hohenstaufens, 74
Holland, Inquisition in (1565), 125 attitude of, to Catholic worship, 125 Huguenot emigration into, 134 Jansenists in, 143
Holy Alliance, the, 169
League, the, 123, 131-2
Honorius, Emperor, 50
, Pope, crusade of, against Prus- sians, 65
Hospitallers, 80
Hugo, Victor, 175
Huguenots: origin of, 115; massacres of, in 1562, 130; in 1572, 131; Edict of Nantes and its revocation, 132 seq
Humanists, 95
Hungary, 65, 67
Huss, John, 95-6, 93
Huxley, Professor, quoted, 195 note *
Hypatia, 50
Iconoclasts, 88-9, 102 ; and see Image
worship Icons, 103
Ignatius, St., 21, 22 note Image worship, 57, 89, 103, 119 Imitatimi of Christ, the, 94 Immaculate Conception : meaning of,
82 ; the doctrine promulj^ated, 102,
165, 173 ; Lourdes vision and cures,
188 andwo^e^
Incarnation, doctrine of, in the Gos- pels, 11-12, 14-22; Mother of God controversy, 55 ; adoption theory, 81
Independents, 124, 127
India, Catholicism in, 122
Indulgences, 66; sale of, 69, 120; monks' traffic in, 86-7 ; given to Inquisitors, 98 ; the final cause of the Reformation, 110; distributed to Huguenot persecutors, 132 ; in contrast with Lom'des cures, 189 and note
Infallibility dogma, 165, 173-4 ; and see uiuler Papacy
Innocent III, Pope, 73, 90
VIII, Pope, 101
IX, Pope, 136, 139
Inquisition, the Papal, precursors of, 65; establishment of (1232), 91;
punishments inflicted by, 80-1, 92, 98-9 ; methods of, 98-9 ; organisa- tion of, 97-8 ; manuals of, 99 ; crimes of, 99-101; decline and death of, 152
Inquisition, the Spanish, 124, 145-7
Invocation of saints, 57
Ireland : evangelised, 64 ; mercenaries from, as persecutors of the Waldenses, 92 ; faithful to Rome, 118, 214 ; per- secutions in, 127
Irene, Empress, 89
Irving, Edward, 161
Islamism, crusades against, 64-6 ; in- fluence of, on Templars, Hospitallers and Jesuits, 123; persecution of Musulmans, 145-6
Italy, so-called donation of, to Pope Sylvester, 68 ; Protestantism in (1542), 122; the Carbonari, 172; attitude of the new kingdom to the Papacy, 173-4, 214
James, St., 42; Epistle of, 2, 30
I, King of England, 126
II, King of England, 127
Jansenism, 140 seq. ; the Bull Uni- genitus, 142-3
Japan, 122-3
Jerome, St., 55, 57-8
of Prague, 95-6
Jerusalem : the compromise at first con- ference, 41 ; destruction of (a.d. 70), 44 ; massacre (1098), 66 ; overtlu'ow of the Christian kingdom, 68 ; re- conquest of (1918), 212
Jesuits, the Order of : their control of education, and their social, political and religious influence, 78, 120-1, 177, 185-6 ; the Jansenist contro- versy, 140-1 ; abolished in 1773, 151, 155-6, 181; re-established (1814), 172, 181-2 ; Propaganda and the Roman College entrusted to (1824-36), 182 ; in France after 1848, 177 ; in the Dreyfus affair, 179 ; responsible for reactionary policy of Pius IX, 183, 186 ; duped by Freemasons, 193; their Trinity, 54, 186
Jesus Christ: Myth of Christ, 1, 22 andno^e; genealogies of Jesus, 11; history of: contemporary authors' silence regarding, 14-15; no definite date of His birth, activities and death, 16-18 ; Passion Stories, 17 seq. ; the Crucifixion, 18-20 ; no relation to Socialism, 196 note; Ser- mon on the Mount, 10 ; His speedy return expected by Primitive Church, 44
222
INDEX
Jewish particularism and Christian Universalism, struggle between , 41-2 ; influence of Judaism on Christianity, 43
Jews, dispersal of, 44-5 ; laws against, 73 ; their persecution in Spain, 145-6 ; regulations regarding, in France, 171 ; clerical antagonism to, 178 seq.
Joan of Arc, 99, 212, 214
John the Apostle, St., 32, 42 : Epistles of, 2, 30 ; Gospel of, 2-3 ; its unique nature, 6, 8 ; its sources and author- ship, 9-10, 42-3 ; theological and non-historic in character, 12
the Presbyter, 42
King of England, 73, 74
XXII, Pope, tariff for sin formu- lated by, 69
Joseph, St., worship of, 54, 186
II, Emperor of Germany, 168
Josephus silent regarding Jesus, 14- 15 and note ^
Jubilees, 87
Judas the Apostle, 18
Jude, St., Epistle of, 2, 30, 31
Julian, Emperor, 50, 51
Julian Calendar, 104
Justin, 35
Justinian, Emperor, 50
Justus of Tiberias, 15
Kant, 93, 196
Kiefi; 64
Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, 80
of the Sword, 80
Templars, 80-1
Knox, John, 118 Kriidener, Baroness, 169-70 Kyrie Eleison, the, 70
La Croix, 179
La Rochelle, 133
La Salette, 187-8
La Ti'appe Community, 138
L'Avenir, 175
Lacordaire, Pere, 175
Lamennais, Abb^ de, 175
Lateran Council, Fourth, 67, 73
Latin in Church Services, 70, 124
Laud, Archbishop, 126
Lazarists, 138
Lea : History of the Inquisition, cited, 101
Legends and Stories : of St. Francis, 77, 79; of Catherine of Siena, 79-80, 82 ; of Templars, 80 ; of the house of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 81-2 ; of St. Bridget, 82; of the tailor's apprentice, 82; Golden Legend,
83; Hole in the Moon, 84; "The Prayers of Odilon," 86; Luther's vision of the Devil, 112; John of Leyden's vision, 114; Pascal's niece, 141 ; the Deacon Paris, 143; Madame Guyon, 145 ; the revela- tion to Joseph Smith, 166; Madame de Kriidener, 169-70; Marie Ala- coque's vision, 186; La Salette, 187 ; the Immaculate Conception, 188 ; Lourdes, 189 ; Swedenborg, 190 ; Helena Blavatsky, 191-2 ; Diana Vaughan, 193; Mons Retreat, 213
Leo the Isaurian, Emperor, 89
X, Pope, 75, 101; Bull of ex- communication burnt by Luther, 110 ; concordat with Francis I, 118, 156, 176
XIII, Pope, 31 ; efforts towards
re-union, 102, 164 ; advice to French Catholics, 178, 185; diplomacy of, 197, 199 ; Providentissimus Encycli- cal, 199 ; estimate of, 184-5
Leyden, John of, 114
Libellatici, 49
Lindsay, Theophilus, 165
Literature of antiquity preserved by the Church, 63
Lithuanians, 65
Loisy, Abbe, 165, 199-200; quoted, on the canon, 2-5; on Christianity as a spiritual force, 23-4 ; on the Jansenists, 141 ; on President Wilson, 214 ; cited, 26
Lollards, 95
Lombard, Peter, 85
and Venetian Valley witch-burn- ings, 101
Lombards, 68, 91
Loretto, 81-2
Louis, St., QQ, 74
XIV, King of France, cruelty of,
to Protestants, 127 ; revokes Edict of Nantes, 134 seq.; attitude to French Catholicism, 137 ; re-claims the R(^gale, 139
Lourdes, 188-9
Loyola, Ignatius, 123; The Booh of Spiritual Exercises, 123
Loyson, Hyacinthe, 184
Luke, St., 42 ; Gospel of, 2-3, 5-7
Luther, Martin, 31, 36, 114 ; the Reformation, 108-13 ; at the Witten- berg Synod, 112-13; his translation of the Bible, 111 ; Captinty of Bahyloii, 110
Lyons : persecution in A.D. 177, 46 ; thirteenth council of, 72 ; the Poor Men of, 91
INDEX
223
Magdeburg, 128-9
Maistre, Joseph de, 174-5
Malagrida, 155
Manichaeism, 55, 89, 90
Marcion, 9, 48
Marie Alacoque beatified, 187
Mark, St., 42; his Gospel, 2-7; its text tampered with, 4 ; its basis, 9
Maronites, 102
Martiueau, James, 166
Martyrs, 47
Mary, St. {sec also Immaculate Con- ceptiou) : belief in her virginity, 12 ; story of her sojourn in Ephesus and death, 43 ; Mother of God controversy, 55 ; growth of her worship; 71, 81-2, 185
Mary Tudor, Queen, 117
Mars, 83
Mathurins, the Order of, 76
Matilda, Countess of Tuscany, 71
Matthew, St., 42; his Gospel, 2-3, 5-7 ; its basis, 9
Mazdeisni (Persian), 90
Medici, 96-7
Melancthon, 112
Mendicant friars, 76-7 ; their traffic in Indulgences, 86-7
Messiah, tire, 11-12
Methodism, 96, 159, 160
Methodius, 64-5
Michelet quoted, 66
Middle Ages : conflict of the Papacy v. the Empire, 71 ; unpopularity of monks and nuns in, 76 ; impression on, of St. Francis' life, 77-8 ; Christi- anity " high and dry " in, 78 ; cha- racteristics of, 89 ; Catholicism of, 94 ; Jewish books of, 95 ; Satan all-per- vading in, 100-1; Byzantine Greeks of, 103; prolongation of, in Spain, 146 ; survival of, amongst the intel- lectually deficient of eighteenth century, 152 ; slavery in, 204-5 ; Church's supremacy in, based on literary frauds, 208 Milton, 159 and note Miracles, Christ's, allegorical character
of, 13 Missionaries, 202-4 Modernism, 141, 165, 198 seq. ; atti- tude to, of Leo XIII and Pius X, 185, 200 ; attitude of, to historical basis of the Scriptures, 201 Molay, Jacques de, 81 Moliere, 139, 141 ; Tariaffe, 121 note Monasticism {see also names of Orders), good derived from, 51-2 ; Crusades instigated by monks, 66 ; spread of, 75 ; reform demanded, 76 ; fame of
the Mendicant Orders, 76 ; work done by, and decline of, before 1200, 76 ; monks' sale of Indulgences, 86-7 ; image manufacture profitable to monks, 89 ; monks in Greek Church held in no esteem. 104
Monophysism, 55-6
Mons retreat superstition, 213
Montaigne, 139
Moutalembert, Comte de, 175-6
Montanism, 48-9
Montesquieu, 153
Montinartre Basilica, 187
Moravians, 96
Mormonism, 166-7
Music in religious services, 124
Musulmans, see Islamism
Mysticism in seventeenth century, 144 ; in eighteenth century, 158 ; Church's attitude to, 189
Nantes, Edict of, 132 seq., 155, and see under France
Napoleon I, Emperor, 22 note ; as First Consul : his Organic Articles (1801), 170-1 ; suppresses Spanish Inquisi- tion (1808), 146 ; his attitude to Jesuits, 181 note
Ill, Emperor, relations with Pius
IX, 173-4, 178
Navarre, Queen of (Marguerite), 118- 20
Neo-Buddhists, 191-2
Nepotism, 120
Nero, Emperor, 45
Nfstorian chmxhes, 55, 65
Netherlands, see Holland
Newman, Cardinal, 163-5 ; his in- fluence on Modernism, 165, 198
New Testament, see under Scriptures
Nicrea, Councils of (325), 53-4; (787), 102
Nicholas of Cues, 68
Noailles, Cardinal de, 142-3
Nominalists, 93
Normans and Danes, conversion of, 65
Nuns, 51, 138 ; in Eastern Church, 103
(Ecumenical Patriarch 102
Old Catholics, 183-4
Oratorians, 138 ; their liberalism, 187
Origen, 46, 48, 49 ; quoted on non- resistance, 195 and note^
Original sin, disputes regarding, 24, 56 ; defined by Council of Trent, 122
Oxford University, 163
Pagan influence on the Church, 52-3, 59, 89 ; on Eastern Church, 103
224
INDEX
Paleologi, 68
Papacy, the, not founded by Jesus, 12 ; not founded by Peter, 48 ; in- stigates the Crusades, 66 ; plunged into poverty, 68 ; Crusades tax, In- dulgences, etc. , 67, 69, 72 ; Peter's Pence, 69-70 ; Denier de St. Pierre, 70 ; debasement of, in ninth and tenth centuries, 70 ; at end of fif- teenth century, 75 ; Schism : the rival Popes, 74 ; relations with the Templars, 81 ; responsible for the In-
auisition, 98-9, 101 ; effect on, of the ounter-Eeformatiou, 120 ; attitude to Huguenots, 130-2 ; Edict of Nantes never accepted by, 133 ; re- sponsibility and rejoicings for its revocation, 136-7 ; attitude to the Spanish Inquisition, 146 ; Infalli- bility doctrine promulgated (1870), 165, 173-4 ; the doctrine opposed by Eastern Church, 102 ; by Gallican Church, 139, 184 ; by Anglican Church, 164 ; by German Bishops, 183-4 ; temporal power of : its foundation, 68-9 ; the suzerainty claim and mediaeval conflict with Germany, 59, 71, 72, 74 ; Concordat of 1122, 72 ; supreme power in Europe, 67 ; pretensions to govern Christendom, 102; decline of tempo- ral power (1216), 73 ; its restoration (1815), 172; its diminution (1860), 173; its end (1870), 174; its loss a gain to spiritual dignity, 184
Papal States, the : Revenues from, 69; ndsgovernment of, 172; Mentana, 173
Papias, Bishop, 6-8 ; cited, 25
Paraguay, Jesuits in, 123
Paris (and see France) : observances of the Holy Sacrament in, 85 ; the centre of theological studies (1150- 1200), 93-4; attitude of the Uni- versity and Parliament to King and Pope (1516), 118-19 ; Faculty of Theology denounces Jansenism, 141; Montmartre Basilica, 187 ; Catholic Institute of, 198-9
Pascal : Proviiuial Letters, 141 and note *
Pastor of Herw as, The, 33
Patrick, St., 64
Paul, St. : chronology of his life, 30 ; conversion and preaching of, 41 ; character of his preaching, 21-2 ; at Athens, 188 note'^ ; legendary tales of his trial and death, 42; Original Sin dogma derived from, 24 ; his attitude to women, 26-7, 44, 49 ; his
theory of marriage, 29 ; his Epistles : the best historical evidence of Jesus, 2, 22; their nature, 27-9; false epistles circulated under his name, 35 ; the Peter and Paul rivalry, 26, 35, 41-2
Paul III, Pope, Jesuit Order instituted by, 123 ; his attitude to slavery, 205
Peasants' War, 113-14
Pelagius, 56
Pdcrin, Le, 187
Penn, William, 128
Pentecost, 53
Pepin le Bref, 68
Persecutions [and see Inquisitions ; also Huguenots, Waldenses, etc.) : the first, between the synagogue and the dissenters, 40 ; so-called First (a.d. 65), 45 ; under Domitian, 45 ; under Decius and Diocletian, 46 note, 49 ; ' ' the ten, " 46 and 7iote
Peter, St., primacy of, 12; legend of, in Rome, 30 ; his attitude to the Gentiles, 41 ; his death — legendary tales, 42 ; the Peter and Paul rivalry, 26, 35, 41-2 ; his Epistles, Apoca- lypse and Gospel, 2, 25, 30-1, 34; forgeries, 32 ; Patrimony of, sec Papal States
Peter the Hermit, 67
Philip the Deacon, 40
Philip the Fair, King of France, 70, 74, 80-1
Philip II, King of Spain, 123, 124
Philo cited, 11 ; his silence regarding Jesus, 15
Photius, Patriarch, 15, 102
Piedmont, 91 ; heretics in, 124
Pietism, 129 ; its influence on Metho- dists, 160
Pilate traditions, 16-18
Pilgrim Fathers, 127
Pilgrimages : in primitive times, 65 ; in Eastern Church, 104 ; multiplication of, in nineteenth century, 187
Pisa, Council of, 74
PiusV, Pope, 130
VII, Pope, 147 ; Concordat with
France, 170-1; re-establishes the Jesuits (1814), 172, 181; his re- actionary policy, 171-2
IX, Pope, canonises Pedro
Arbues, 83; 'f he Syllables, 173; his tyranny, 172-4, 178, 183
X, Pope, 185; his attitude to
Modernism, 200 ; to the European War, 213 Plato's Works in Western Europe, 95 ; Republic quoted, 23 and note ^
INDEX
225
Pliny the Younger : his picture of the
early Christians, 45-6 Plymouth Brethren, 160-1 Poland, 65, 129, 169 Policeman- God concept, 154, 177 Polytheism, downfall of, 50 Poor Clares, 76, 78 Port Royal, 140-2 Portugal, Jesuits expelled from, 123 Positivism, 194-5 and note Pragmatism, 74 and note ^ Predestination doctrine, 28-9, 125 Premonstrants, the Order of, 76 Presbyterian System, 124 Presbyterians, Anglicanism rejected
by, 126-7 ; Refonned Presbyterians,
158 Priestley, Joseph, 165-6 Priests, derivation of name, 43 Printing invention, 95, 109 Priscillian, 31, 55 Prophecies, alleged fulfilments of, 4,
22-3 and note Protestantism (see also Reformation) :
origin of, 113; as inspired by St.
Paul and St. Augustine contrasted
with Jesuitical Catholicism, 121 ; its
attitude to Scripture, 201 ; to
slavery, 206 Provencal civilisation as affected by
the Crusade and the Inquisition, 91 Prussia, Jesuits forbidden in, 183 Purgatory, doctrine of, not in the
Gospels, 56 ; proclaimed a dogma of
the Church, 57 ; abuse of, 86 ;
Eastern Church's objection to, 102 Pusey, Dr., 163-4 Pythagoreans, 51
Q document, 8-9 Quakers, 96, 117, 128 Quietism, 144-5
Rabelais, 139
Racine, 141
Rationalism, 93
Ratisbon Council (792), 81
Ravaillac, 133
Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, 90-1
Realists, 93
Reason, Goddess of, 157
Recognitions, The, 34
Reformation, the, causes leading to, 108 seq. ; successes and miscarriages, 100, 109; triumph of, at Basle, 114 ; in England, 116-18 ; in France, 118-20; in Holland, 125; the Counter- Reformation, 120-2 ; attitude of the Reformed Churches to Orthodox Church and Roman
Chm-ch, 103 ; contrast between Reformed Churches and Roman, as to relations with civil power, 124
Regale, the, 138
Relics, worship of, 57 ; in Eastern Church, 104 ; cures by, resembling those by telepathic suggestion, 191
Religious instruction, 206-8
orders and communities, 51, 75-
81, 138, 140-2
wars of 16th century, 120
Remigius, St., 64
Renaissance, the, 94
Renan, Ernest, 198 ; cited, 34
Resurrection doctrine, a pious belief, 13-14
Reuchlin, Hans, 95
Richelieu, Cardinal, 101 Twte*, 128, 133, 176
Revivals, 158
Robespierre, 157
Rochelle, La, 133
Roman Church, early supremacy of, 33-48 ; services of, to mediseval society, 62-3 ; inculcates mercy in theory, 63 ; democratic at base, 63- 4 ; violent proselytism inaugurated A.D. 1000, 65; its use of excommuni- cations, 70 ; simony rampant in, 70- 1 ; reforms attempted — in ninth and tenth centuries, 91 ; in 1431, 75; Papal schism (1378), see under Papacy ; saints honoured by, 83 ; accepts Transubstantiation dogma, 84 ; feast of the Holy Sacrament established, 84-5 ; decides (twelfth century) on the Seven Sacraments, 85 ; domination in temporal matters after 1000, 85 ; attitude to women, 86 ; Confession made obligatory, 86 ; Feast of the Dead established, 86 ; traffic in Indulgences, 86, and see Indulgences ; attitude to heresy, 87- 8 ; tolerant within limits, 88 ; bar- barous usages permitted, 88 ; wealth and corruption of clergy (about 1150), 90 ; motives actuating the Inquisition, 92-3; recourse to the civil power, 98-101 ; sorcery persecutions, 101 and note * ; efforts towards re-union, 102; exactions of Roman Curia, 109; the Counter-Reformation, 120-22 ; contrasted with Reformed Churches in its relation to civil power, 124 ; severe control of education, 135-6, 168, 177-8, 183 ; Modernism, 165 and see that heading ; Liberal Catholicism in, 175 ; attitude to magic, 191 ; to Freemasonry, 193 ; to Socialism, 195 ; to slavery, 204-6; relation to th
226
INDEX
Scriptures, 201 ; conversions of cul- tured unbelievers, 202 ; its present opportunity, 214-15
Romanticism, 163
Rome : Imperial, attitude of, to Chris- tians, 45-6 ; a Christian capital, 52 ; in time of Leo X, 75; besieged and taken (1155), 90; French occupation of (1850-70), 173-4; Indulgences sold to provide funds for St. Peter's, 110
Rosary, the, 85
Roumanian Church, 103
Rousseau, J. J., 153-5 ; influence on, of Fenelon, 145 ; quoted, 20 ; cited, 212
Russia : early efforts to evangelise, 64 ; the Othodox Church, 103-4, 169, 212 ; no real Christianity in, 104 ; sects in, 169 ; Jesuits in (nineteenth century), 181 ; banished, 181
Ruthenians, 169
Sacfea, Feast of the, 19-20
Sacrament, Feast of the Holy, 84-5
Sacramental system, no part of Christ's teaching, 13
Sacramentarians, 112
Sacraments, question of efficacy of: the Donatist theory, 50
Sacred Heart cult, 186-7
St. Bartholomew massacre, 131 ; the medal, 132
St. Germain, Edict of, 130, 133
Saint-Simonism, 194
Salette, La, 187-8
Salvation Army, 204
Saturnalia, the Roman, 19-20
Savonarola, 96-7
Saxony, 113
Schleiermacher, 163, 196-7
Scholastic philosophy, 93-4
Scotists and Thomists, 94
Scotland : Catholic v. Protestant wars in, 118 ; the Anglican Liturgy re- fused by Scottish Puritans, 126 ; opposed to Erastiauism, 127 ; the Solemn League and Covenant, 162 ; disruptions and amalgamations in, 158 ; the "Westminster Confession in, 159
Scriptures, the, before a.d. 150, 2 and note * ; canon established about 350, 2, 27, 48 ; forbidden to the laity, 85 ; Greek text of N. T. published by Erasmus and translated into Latin, 95 ; allegorical interpretation of, 190; infallibility of: Frovidentissi- mus Encyclical, 199; the historic basis of, 201 ; authority of, guaran-
teed by the Church, 201 ; translations
of, see Bible ; Gospels, see that
heading ; Pauline Epistles, see under
PauL Sermon on the Mount, 10 Servetus, Miguel, 115-16 Sigismund, Emperor, 96 Simon, Richard, completed Luther's
work, 110; attitude to Modernism,
198 ; quoted, 133 Simon Magus, 34-5 Simony, 70-1 Sisters of Charity, 138 Slavery, 204-6 Socialism, 195-6 Socinians, 129
St. Sophia, Church of, 59, 66 Spain, resists the Church, 64 ; attitude
to Peter's Pence, 70; the Inquisition,
124, 145-7 ; persecution of Jews and
Moors, 145 ; Jesuits in (nineteenth
century), 182 Spener, Philip Jakob, 129 Spinoza, 196, 198 Spiritualism, 166, 190-1, 194 Stephen, St., 35, 40 Suetonius, 15 Summa Theologim, 94 Sundays, 43
Superintendents, 43, 124 Superstitions, as conservative forces,
206 ; in the European War, 213 Sweden, 65, 112 Swedenborg, Emanuel, 190 Switzerland : the Jesuits and the
Sonderbund, 181 Sylvester, Pope, 68 Symbols : of the Apostles, 33, 48 ;
Athanasian, 54 Syria, 65, 67
Tacitus' Annals, record in, regarding
Jesus, 15-16 Talmud, the, legend in, regarding
Jesus, 15 Tariffs for sin, 69 Taxil, Leo, 193 Telepathy, 191 Templars, the, 80-1 TertuUian's Apoloi/y, 46 ; his attitude
to Montanism, 48 Teutonic knights, 80 Thekla, 26 Theodosius I, Emperor, 50
II, Emperor, 50, 55
Theophilanthropists, 157-8 Theosophy, 191-2 Theresa, St., 144 "Third Order," the, 78 Thirty Years' War, 128
INDEX
227
Thomas k Kempis, 94
Aquinas, St., 94
Tiberius, Emperor, 16
Titlies from Church to Princes (twelfth century), 67
Tolstoy, Leo, quoted, 206
"Tongues, speaking with," 44
Torquemada, 145-6
Toulouse, 90
Trajan, Emperor, quoted, 45
Transubstantiation Doctrine (see also Eucharist), 83, 84, 110 ; "test" im- posed against, in England, 162
Trappe, La, 188
Trent, Council of, 121-2
Trinity, the. Doctrine of, 31, 54, 115
of the Jesuits, 54, 186
Truces established by the Church, 63
Ultramontanism, 173-5 Unitarianism, 114, 129, 165-6 Urban VIII, Pope, 147
Vacandard quoted, 148
Veuillot, 175
Vigilantius, 55, 57-9
Vincent de Paul, St., 138
Vinet, Alexandre, 197
Visionaries, 44
Voltaire, estimate of, 153 ; his intoler- ance, 154; his aristocratic contempt for the masses, 1 86 ; correspondence with D'Alembert, 153-4 ; The Encyclopcedia, 152 seq. ; Ecrasons Vinfame, 154 ; quoted, on democratic base of the Roman Church, 64 ; on the Crusades, 66 ; on the taritf for sin, 69 ; on the False Decretals, 69 ; on Gregory VII, 71; on supreme powers of the Papacy, 73 ; on St.
Francis of Assisi, 77-8 ; on Eome's attitude to reason, 88 ; on Wyclif, 95; on "infamous superstition," 97 ; on Eucharistic doctrines, 110; on Luther's alleged yision of the devil, 111-12; on Luther as anti- Pope, 112-13; on the Reformation in England, 117; on Quakers, 117 ; on Feuelon, 144 ; on Spaniards' silence, 146 : cited, 98, 108-13, 116
Waldenses, Church of the, 91 ; doctrines of, preached by Wyclif, 95 ; perse- cution of, 91; massacre of, 119
Waldo, Pierre, 91
Wandering Jew, The, 182
War of 1914-18, superstitions in, and attitude to, of the Churches, 212-15
Wesley, John and Charles, 159
Westminster Confession, 159
Westphalia Treaty, 128-9
Whitefield, George, 159-60
William of Orange, 127
the Silent, 125
Willibrod, St., 76
Witches, 100-1
Wladimir, conversion of, 64
Women, St. Paul's attitude to, 26-7, 44, 49 ; Montanist attitude to, 49 ; Franciscan attitude to, 78 ; Roman Church's attitude to (1215), 86
Worms, Council of (1076), 71 ; Diet of (1521), 111 seq.
Wyclif, John, 95
Xavier, St. Fran9ois, 122 Young, Brigham, 167 Zwingli, 114-15
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