Very many of the _Catholic_ journals have taken their stand against the
late scenes at Treves. It is true, that several of those Journals may
have been actuated by secondary motives in so doing, or what is the
notorious fact, that some, at least of such Journals, want almost
entirely a religious character; and though Catholic in name, are infidel
in fact. Still it is equally notorious, that several of the Catholic
Journals, whose orthodoxy is above suspicion, have lifted up their
voice against what has taken place, as scandalous to Christianity, and
eminently perilous to the Church.
In addition to the discussions which have appeared in the public
prints, a vast mass of pamphlets has been issued on both sides. The
most remarkable of these is, one issued by two professors in Bonn,
_Gildermeister and Sybel_ (the latter a Catholic,) entering into a
grave and learned historical inquiry as to the genuineness of the relic,
exposing in the most triumphant manner the various defences which have
appeared on the Catholic side,--and all characterized by the most severe
sarcasm, in holding up the trumpery of the system of relic-worship to
contempt. The title of the book is "_The Holy Coat of Treves, and the
twenty other Holy Coats_." A second edition was soon called for, in
which four other such relics were stated as discovered. It is generally
known, that among these numerous claimants for genuineness, the great
body of the French clergy have bid hard to prove that the Coat of
Argenteuil is the genuine one; and this view has been warmly defended by
one of the Catholic clergy of Einsiedeln in Switzerland--notoriously
one of the most celebrated places of pilgrimage in the world. More than
this, writings have appeared stating the events connected with the other
relics of the same name, and treasured with equal sanctity in numerous
Cathedrals; also giving an account of the separate and independent
series of miracles wrought by each as the true Coat of the Lord. It
would be tedious to detain the reader with more of such details. We
desire merely to notice the various workings of the movement in and out
of the Catholic Church. It may accordingly suffice to state in addition,
that poetry as well as prose has been called into requisition, and
that satirical ballads and lyrics have been numerously circulated,
and eagerly read by all parties. Many of them are filled with the most
stinging remarks on the general position and moral character of the
clergy.
But by far the most important element in the movement, and, in fact,
that which has determined its subsequent direction, has been the
following letter of John Ronge, priest in Silesia, dated Laurahuette, 1st
October 1844, and entitled, "Opinion of the Catholic Priest John Ronge,
on the Holy Coat of Treves:"
Laurahuette, October 1st.
Opinion of a Catholic Priest in regard to the Holy Tunic at Treves.
"Christians of the nineteenth century,--you have heard--you know it--men
of Germany--you know it--spiritual and temporal teachers of the German
people, that what would once upon a time have sounded in our ears as a
fable or a fiction--is neither a fiction nor a fable, but real truth
and verity. Bishop Arnoldi of Treves has exhibited for the adoration and
reverence of Christians, a garment called the Tunic of our Lord!
"According to the last account, five hundred thousand persons have
already made a pilgrimage to see this relic, and every day fresh
thousands flock to it, especially since the garment in question is found
capable of curing diseases and working miracles.
"The news has spread among the people of all lands, while certain
priests in France maintain that they alone possess the real tunic of
Christ, and that the one at Treves is an imposture. Truly the saying
here applies,--'He who can occupy his mind about such things without
losing his reason, has none to lose.' Five hundred thousand men--five
hundred thousand intelligent Germans have--already hastened to see or to
adore a piece of dress at Treves! The greater number of these thousands
are from the lower orders of the people, and, besides, in deepest
poverty,--oppressed, uneducated, stupid, superstitious, and in part
demoralized. They leave the cultivation of their fields, the labour of
their workshops, the care of their households, the education of their
children, to take part in a Heathen festival at Treves--a disgraceful
spectacle, which the Romish Church displays before their eyes. Yes, it
is a Heathen festival, for many thousands of the credulous multitude to
render to a piece of dress,--the work of human hands,--that regard and
adoration which are due to God alone. And what pernicious consequences
must follow from these pilgrimages! Thousands of the pilgrims deprive
themselves of the necessaries of life to raise the money for their
journey, and the offering which they make to the Holy Tunic--that is,
to the clergy. They purchase it by sacrifices of their comfort, or by
begging--only to starve on their return; to suffer want, or to fall sick
in consequence of the fatigues of the journey. If these external results
are sufficiently melancholy, the moral consequences are far more so.
Will not many of them, reduced to want by the expenses of their journey,
endeavour to relieve themselves by unlawful means?
"Many wives and virgins sacrifice their purity of heart, their
reputation, and their chastity, destroying thus the peace, the
happiness, and comfort of their families.
"In fine, this most unchristian exhibition but creates an inlet for
superstition, hypocrisy, and fanaticism, with all the vice that follows
in their train. Such is the blessing spread abroad by the exhibition
of the Holy Tunic, and it is a matter but of small moment whether it be
genuine or false.
"And the man who publicly displays this piece of dress--the work
of human hands--for reverent regard--who leads astray the religious
feelings of the credulous, ignorant, or suffering people--giving thereby
an impulse to vice and superstition--who wrings their substance from
the poor and starving multitude--who entails on Germany the ridicule of
other lands, and who draws more close together the heavy clouds which
float already dark and dismally above our heads--this man is a bishop, a
German bishop. It is Arnoldi, Bishop of Treves!
"Arnoldi, Bishop of Treves, I therefore turn to you, and demand, by
authority of my office and calling as a priest and teacher of the German
people--in the name of Christendom, in the name of the German nation,
and in the name of its instructors--that you put an end to the
unchristian spectacle of the exhibition of the Holy Tunic--and withdraw
this garment, that the offence which it has given may not be still
increased! For, do you not know--as bishop you ought to know--that
the Founder of the Christian religion left to his disciples and his
followers not his coat but his spirit?--his coat, Bishop Arnoldi of
Treves, belongs to his _executioners!_ Do you not know--as bishop you
ought to know--that Jesus taught--'God is a Spirit, and they who worship
him must worship him in spirit and in truth?' and He may be worshipped
everywhere, not only in the temple at Jerusalem, on the Mount Gerizim,
or at Treves, in presence of the holy tunic; do you not know--as bishop
you ought to know--that the Gospel expressly forbids the adoration of
every image and of every relic? that Christians in the Apostolic age,
and in the three first centuries, suffered neither images nor relics
in their churches (and _they_ might have had plenty of them)? that the
worship of images and relics is a Heathen custom, and that the Fathers
in the first three centuries abused the Heathens on account of it? We
read, for instance, (Div. inst. 11., c. 2,) 'Neither do these besotted
men understand that if the images possessed life and motion, they would
rather worship the man by whom they had been formed.' Lastly, do you
not know--as bishop you ought to know this also--that the vigorous and
healthy mind of the German people was first degraded to the worship of
relics by the Crusades in the 13th and 14th centuries? when the exalted
conception of the Godhead which Christianity inculcates, had been
obscured by all the lying marvels brought from eastern lands? Hark ye!
Bishop Arnoldi of Treves, you know all this, and better probably than I
can tell it to you. You also know the effects which superstition and
the idolatrous adoration of relics have worked among us, namely, the
religious and political bondage of Germany; and yet, you can display
your relics to the admiration of the multitude. And were it even
possible you should be ignorant of all that I have told you,--that the
salvation of souls was your sole aim in the exhibition of this Holy
Tunic,--you would, notwithstanding, have two sins upon your conscience.
In the first place, it is unpardonable, if the garment in question
actually possess saving power, that you have withhold its benefits from
suffering men until the present time. And, secondly, it is unpardonable
that you accept the offerings of these countless multitudes. And is it
not unpardonable that you, as bishop, should accept of money from our
poor and starving people, especially when you have seen, not many weeks
ago, that hundreds have been driven by necessity to mutiny, despair, and
death? Do not allow yourself to be deceived by the influx of thousands
upon thousands, but, believe me, that while hundreds of thousands of the
German people hasten with holy fervour (?) to Treves, _millions_,
like myself, are filled with horror and the deepest indignation by the
disgraceful spectacle. And this indignation prevails not in individual
ranks and parties, but among all classes--even in the Catholic
priesthood. Judgment will overtake you, therefore, sooner than you think.
Arnoldi! the historian is already seizing his pen, to submit your name
to the contempt of your contemporaries and of posterity, and stigmatizes
you as the Tetzel of the nineteenth century!
"And you, fellow-citizens of Germany, whether near or at a distance from
Treves, unite your efforts to prevent the continuance of such an insult
to the German name. You have various means of working, take courage and
employ them; endeavour each and all, with resolute determination, to
encounter and restrain the tyrannous despotism of the Romish Church.
For it is not in Treves alone that the modern traffic in indulgences
is carried on; you are aware that in the east and west, the north and
south, rosary, mass, indulgence, burial moneys, and the like, are still
increasing, and with them spiritual darkness. Forward, then! Catholics
and Protestants, together to the work! Our happiness, our honour, our
freedom are at stake. Do not the manes of your fathers, who stormed the
Capitol, frown to see you suffer patiently the Castle of St. Angelo to
lord it over Germany. Dishonour not the laurels of a Huss, a Huetten, and
a Luther. Give words to their ideas, and convert their will into deed.
"Finally, my colleagues, whose sole endeavours and desires are centred
in the welfare of your congregations, the honour, the freedom, and the
happiness of your German countrymen, keep no longer silence! You sin
against your reputation, your religion, and your fatherland, if you
longer hesitate to follow out your improved convictions. I have already,
elsewhere, briefly addressed you, and shall therefore now conclude.
Prove yourselves the true disciples of Him who gave up all for truth,
and light, and liberty. Show that you have inherited, not his garment,
but his spirit.
"Johannes Ronge, _Catholic Priest_."
It may be at once seen that this letter is the production of no ordinary
man; and, at a glance, it cannot but remind us of him "whose words were
half battles." Few living Germans have such mastery over their language
in all its native strength. It was just such a production,--short,
nervous, and earnest,--that was required to give utterance to the
slumbering thoughts and sympathies of thousands. Appearing in a distant
and comparatively unknown part of Germany, it soon found its way
wherever the German language was spoken, and, wherever it has found its
way, there it has called forth a deep and hearty response. It has now
been translated into various languages, and, despite all the preventive
measures of police and clergy, it may now be found by the thousand all
over Germany. It is not our present purpose to state in what points the
views of the author seem defective. Our immediate object is simply
to lay before the reader some facts illustrative of the anti-Catholic
movement which has taken place, and is now advancing steadily. But first
a word about the course pursued with regard to the author. From events
which had previously taken place in the Cathedral of Breslau, to
which diocese he was attached, the suspicions of the ecclesiastical
authorities were not long in fixing upon Ronge as the author of
the above letter, which appeared anonymously in the _Saechsische
Vaterlands-blaetter_. His manly love of truth disdained equivocation
or subterfuge, and, as the result of all, he was deposed and
excommunicated. A complete host of pamphlets were called suddenly into
existence by the daring letter of one who, calling himself a Catholic
priest, had still the hardihood to asperse the character and cause of
the one all-holy Church, by attacking one of its most imposing rites,
and treating with scorn and shame one of its consecrated bishops. Every
possible charge, affecting his character as a student, as a clergyman,
as a teacher, and as a man, was raked up against him. Those who had
not a tithe of his power of fierce and indignant invective, when truth
called for the vindication of its claims, made up for the defect by
personal scurrility and the most vulgar abuse. His former associates in
the priesthood openly denounced him, to exculpate themselves from
any supposed sympathy with the sentiments or with the man. A friend
generously undertook his defence--who declares, that at the Catholic
seminary he was distinguished by great diligence in his studies, as well
as by the purity of his moral life; so much so, that the superintendents
stated that they had seldom under their care a young man who sought to
become acquainted with the truths of the Catholic faith with such a deep
and holy earnestness. After a slight sketch of his doings in Breslau and
Grottkau, he states, "that every friend of his must feel persuaded that
the above letter proceeded from his inmost convictions. He is utterly
incapable of falsehood, in word or deed; and, as regards moral
character, that he is, perhaps, too stringent towards himself, but mild
and considerate to others. It was only the public wild proceedings of
the ultra-Montanists and Jesuits that filled him with holy indignation."
Ronge himself soon felt and saw the importance of the step which he had
taken. He was now beyond the pale of the Catholic Church, obliged to
relinquish all in defence of the truth, and exposed, from all quarters,
to attacks which his conscience told him to be groundless. The cause of
truth, for which he had already suffered, again demanded that his voice
should be upraised; and this he does in the following _Justification_,
which cannot but interest the reader as the autobiography of a
remarkable man, but especially from the fearful disclosures which it
makes of the present state and actual workings of Romanism. All the
facts adduced with regard to his anguish of mind--his deep sense of
the spiritual bondage under which he lay--his inward and outward
struggles--his determined opposition to what he believed to be wrong
and unjust--his plain but triumphant vindication of his conduct
throughout--all give a character of _truthfulness_ to the document,
which is its best guarantee, and makes it emphatically _speak for
itself_. It may enhance the interest of the following document to know
that it was soon prohibited by the censor of the press, notwithstanding
that the press of Leipsic is one of the freest in Germany:--