[1889]
Charles, or, more properly, Karl, King of the Franks, consecrated
Roman Emperor in St. Peter's on Christmas Day, A.D. 800, and known to
posterity as the Great (chiefly by his agglutinative Gallicised
denomination, of Charlemagne), was a man great in all ways, physically
and mentally. Within a couple of centuries after his death Charlemagne
became the centre of innumerable legends; and the myth-making process
does not seem to have been sensibly interfered with by the existence
of sober and truthful histories of the Emperor and of the times which
immediately preceded and followed his reign by a contemporary writer
who occupied a high and confidential position in his court, and in
that of his successor. This was one Eginhard, or Einhard, who appears
to have been born about A.D. 770, and spent his youth at the court,
being educated along with Charles's sons. There is excellent
contemporary testimony not only to Eginhard's existence, but to his
abilities, and to the place which he occupied in the circle of the
intimate friends of the great ruler whose life he subsequently wrote.
In fact, there is as good evidence of Eginhard's existence, of his
official position, and of his being the author of the chief works
attributed to him, as can reasonably be expected in the case of a man
who lived more than a thousand years ago, and was neither a great king
nor a great warrior. The works are--1. "The Life of the Emperor Karl."
2. "The Annals of the Franks." 3. "Letters." 4. "The History of the
Translation of the Blessed Martyrs of Christ, SS. Marcellinus and
Petrus."
It is to the last, as one of the most singular and interesting records
of the period during which the Roman world passed into that of the
Middle Ages, that I wish to direct attention.[33] It was written in
the ninth century, somewhere, apparently, about the year 830, when
Eginhard, ailing in health and weary of political life, had withdrawn
to the monastery of Seligenstadt, of which he was the founder. A
manuscript copy of the work, made in the tenth century, and once the
property of the monastery of St. Bavon on the Scheldt, of which
Eginhard was Abbot, is still extant, and there is no reason to believe
that, in this copy, the original has been in any way interpolated or
otherwise tampered with. The main features of the strange story
contained in the "Historia Translationis" are set forth in the
following pages, in which, in regard to all matters of importance, I
shall adhere as closely as possible to Eginhard's own words.
While I was still at Court, busied with secular affairs, I
often thought of the leisure which I hoped one day to enjoy
in a solitary place, far away from the crowd, with which the
liberality of Prince Louis, whom I then served, had provided
me. This place is situated in that part of Germany which
lies between the Neckar and the Maine,[34] and is nowadays
called the Odenwald by those who live in and about it. And
here having built, according to my capacity and resources,
not only houses and permanent dwellings, but also a basilica
fitted for the performance of divine service and of no mean
style of construction, I began to think to what saint or
martyr I could best dedicate it. A good deal of time had
passed while my thoughts fluctuated about this matter, when
it happened that a certain deacon of the Roman Church, named
Deusdona, arrived at the Court for the purpose of seeking
the favour of the King in some affairs in which he was
interested. He remained some time; and then, having
transacted his business, he was about to return to Rome,
when one day, moved by courtesy to a stranger, we invited
him to a modest refection; and while talking of many things
at table, mention was made of the translation of the body of
the blessed Sebastian,[35] and of the neglected tombs of
the martyrs, of which there is such a prodigious number at
Rome; and the conversation having turned towards the
dedication of our new basilica, I began to inquire how it
might be possible for me to obtain some of the true relics
of the saints which rest at Rome. He at first hesitated, and
declared that he did not know how that could be done. But
observing that I was both anxious and curious about the
subject, he promised to give me an answer some other day.
When I returned to the question some time afterwards, he
immediately drew from his bosom a paper, which he begged me
to read when I was alone, and to tell him what I was
disposed to think of that which was therein stated. I took
the paper and, as he desired, read it alone and in secret.
(Cap. i. 2, 3.)
I shall have occasion to return to Deacon Deusdona's conditions, and
to what happened after Eginhard's acceptance of them. Suffice it, for
the present, to say that Eginhard's notary, Ratleicus (Ratleig), was
despatched to Rome and succeeded in securing two bodies, supposed to
be those of the holy martyrs Marcellinus and Petrus; and when he had
got as far on his homeward journey as the Burgundian town of
Solothurn, or Soleure,[36] notary Ratleig despatched to his master, at
St. Bavon, a letter announcing the success of his mission.
As soon as by reading it I was assured of the arrival of the
saints, I despatched a confidential messenger to Maestricht
to gather together priests, other clerics, and also laymen,
to go out to meet the coming saints as speedily as possible.
And he and his companions, having lost no time, after a few
days met those who had charge of the saints at Solothurn.
Joined with them, and with a vast crowd of people who
gathered from all parts, singing hymns, and amidst great and
universal rejoicings, they travelled quickly to the city of
Argentoratum, which is now called Strasburg. Thence
embarking on the Rhine, they came to the place called
Portus,[37] and landing on the east bank of the river, at
the fifth station thence they arrived at Michilinstadt,[38]
accompanied by an immense multitude, praising God. This
place is in that forest of Germany which in modern times is
called the Odenwald, and about six leagues from the Maine.
And here, having found a basilica recently built by me, but
not yet consecrated, they carried the sacred remains into it
and deposited them therein, as if it were to be their final
resting-place. As soon as all this was reported to me I
travelled thither as quickly as I could. (Cap. ii. 14.)
Three days after Eginhard's arrival began the series of wonderful
events which he narrates, and for which we have his personal
guarantee. The first thing that he notices is the dream of a servant
of Ratleig, the notary, who, being set to watch the holy relics in the
church after vespers, went to sleep and, during his slumbers, had a
vision of two pigeons, one white and one gray and white, which came
and sat upon the bier over the relics; while, at the same time, a
voice ordered the man to tell his master that the holy martyrs had
chosen another resting-place and desired to be transported thither
without delay.
Unfortunately, the saints seem to have forgotten to mention where
they wished to go; and, with the most anxious desire to gratify their
smallest wishes, Eginhard was naturally greatly perplexed what to do.
While in this state of mind, he was one day contemplating his "great
and wonderful treasure, more precious than all the gold in the world,"
when it struck him that the chest in which the relics were contained
was quite unworthy of its contents; and, after vespers, he gave orders
to one of the sacristans to take the measure of the chest in order
that a more fitting shrine might be constructed. The man, having
lighted a wax candle and raised the pall which covered the relics, in
order to carry out his master's orders, was astonished and terrified
to observe that the chest was covered with a blood-like exudation
(_loculum mirum in modum humore sanguineo undique distillantem_), and
at once sent a message to Eginhard.
Then I and those priests who accompanied me beheld this
stupendous miracle, worthy of all admiration. For just as
when it is going to rain, pillars and slabs and marble
images exude moisture, and, as it were, sweat, so the chest
which contained the most sacred relics was found moist with
the blood exuding on all sides. (Cap. ii. 16.)
Three days' fast was ordained in order that the meaning of the portent
might be ascertained. All that happened, however, was that, at the end
of that time, the "blood," which had been exuding in drops all the
while, dried up. Eginhard is careful to say that the liquid "had a
saline taste, something like that of tears, and was thin as water
though of the colour of true blood," and he clearly thinks this
satisfactory evidence that it was blood.
The same night, another servant had a vision, in which still more
imperative orders for the removal of the relics were given; and, from
that time forth, "not a single night passed without one, two, or even
three of our companions receiving revelations in dreams that the
bodies of the saints were to be transferred from that place to
another." At last a priest, Hildfrid, saw, in a dream, a venerable
white-haired man in a priest's vestments, who bitterly reproached
Eginhard for not obeying the repeated orders of the saints; and, upon
this, the journey was commenced. Why Eginhard delayed obedience to
these repeated visions so long does not appear. He does not say so, in
so many words, but the general tenor of the narrative leads one to
suppose that Mulinheim (afterwards Seligenstadt) is the "solitary
place" in which he had built the church which awaited dedication. In
that case, all the people about him would know that he desired that
the saints should go there. If a glimmering of secular sense led him
to be a little suspicious about the real cause of the unanimity of the
visionary beings who manifested themselves to his _entourage_, in
favour of moving on, he does not say so.
At the end of the first day's journey, the precious relics were
deposited in the church of St. Martin, in the village of Ostheim.
Hither, a paralytic nun (_sanctimonialis quædam paralytica_) of the
name of Ruodlang was brought, in a car, by her friends and relatives
from a monastery a league off. She spent the night watching and
praying by the bier of the saints; "and health returning to all her
members, on the morrow she went back to her place whence she came, on
her feet, nobody supporting her, or in any way giving her assistance."
(Cap. ii. 19.)
On the second day, the relics were carried to Upper Mulinheim; and,
finally, in accordance with the orders of the martyrs, deposited in
the church of that place, which was therefore renamed Seligenstadt.
Here, Daniel, a beggar boy of fifteen, and so bent that "he could not
look at the sky without lying on his back," collapsed and fell down
during the celebration of the Mass. "Thus he lay a long time, as if
asleep, and all his limbs straightening and his flesh strengthening
(_recepta firmitate nervorum_), he arose before our eyes, quite well."
(Cap. ii. 20.)
Some time afterwards an old man entered the church on his hands and
knees, being unable to use his limbs properly:--
He, in presence of all of us, by the power of God and the
merits of the blessed martyrs, in the same hour in which he
entered was so perfectly cured that he walked without so
much as a stick. And he said that, though he had been deaf
for five years, his deafness had ceased along with the
palsy. (Cap. iii. 33.)
Eginhard was now obliged to return to the Court at Aix-la-Chapelle,
where his duties kept him through the winter; and he is careful to
point out that the later miracles which he proceeds to speak of are
known to him only at second hand. But, as he naturally observes,
having seen such wonderful events with his own eyes, why should he
doubt similar narrations when they are received from trustworthy
sources?
Wonderful stories these are indeed, but as they are, for the most
part, of the same general character as those already recounted, they
may be passed over. There is, however, an account of a possessed
maiden which is worth attention. This is set forth in a memoir, the
principal contents of which are the speeches of a demon who declared
himself to possess the singular appellation of "Wiggo," and revealed
himself in the presence of many witnesses, before the altar, close to
the relics of the blessed martyrs. It is noteworthy that the
revelations appear to have been made in the shape of replies to the
questions of the exorcising priest; and there is no means of judging
how far the answers are, really, only the questions to which the
patient replied yes or no.
The possessed girl, about sixteen years of age, was brought by her
parents to the basilica of the martyrs.
When she approached the tomb containing the sacred bodies,
the priest, according to custom, read the formula of
exorcism over her head. When he began to ask how and when
the demon had entered her, she answered, not in the tongue
of the barbarians, which alone the girl knew, but in the
Roman tongue. And when the priest was astonished and asked
how she came to know Latin, when her parents, who stood by,
were wholly ignorant of it, "Thou hast never seen my
parents," was the reply. To this the priest, "Whence art
thou, then, if these are not thy parents?" And the demon, by
the mouth of the girl, "I am a follower and disciple of
Satan, and for a long time I was gatekeeper (janitor) in
hell; but for some years, along with eleven companions, I
have ravaged the kingdom of the Franks." (Cap. v. 49.)
He then goes on to tell how they blasted the crops and scattered
pestilence among beasts and men, because of the prevalent wickedness
of the people.[39]
The enumeration of all these iniquities, in oratorical style, takes up
a whole octavo page; and at the end it is stated, "All these things
the demon spoke in Latin by the mouth of the girl."
And when the priest imperatively ordered him to come out, "I
shall go," said he, "not in obedience to you, but on account
of the power of the saints, who do not allow me to remain
any longer." And having said this, he threw the girl down on
the floor and there compelled her to lie prostrate for a
time, as though she slumbered. After a little while,
however, he going away, the girl, by the power of Christ and
the merits of the blessed martyrs, as it were awaking from
sleep, rose up quite well, to the astonishment of all
present; nor after the demon had gone out was she able to
speak Latin: so that it was plain enough that it was not she
who had spoken in that tongue, but the demon by her mouth.
(Cap. v. 51.)
If the "Historia Translationis" contained nothing more than has been
laid before the reader, up to this time, disbelief in the miracles of
which it gives so precise and full a record might well be regarded as
hyper-scepticism. It might fairly be said, Here you have a man, whose
high character, acute intelligence, and large instruction are
certified by eminent contemporaries; a man who stood high in the
confidence of one of the greatest rulers of any age, and whose other
works prove him to be an accurate and judicious narrator of ordinary
events. This man tells you, in language which bears the stamp of
sincerity, of things which happened within his own knowledge, or
within that of persons in whose veracity he has entire confidence,
while he appeals to his sovereign and the court as witnesses of
others; what possible ground can there be for disbelieving him?
Well, it is hard upon Eginhard to say so, but it is exactly the
honesty and sincerity of the man which are his undoing as a witness to
the miraculous. He himself makes it quite obvious that when his
profound piety comes on the stage, his good sense and even his
perception of right and wrong, make their exit. Let us go back to the
point at which we left him, secretly perusing the letter of Deacon
Deusdona. As he tells us, its contents were
that he [the deacon] had many relics of saints at home, and
that he would give them to me if I would furnish him with
the means of returning to Rome; he had observed that I had
two mules, and if I would let him have one of them and would
despatch with him a confidential servant to take charge of
the relics, he would at once send them to me. This plausibly
expressed proposition pleased me, and I made up my mind to
test the value of the somewhat ambiguous promise at
once;[40] so giving him the mule and money for his journey I
ordered my notary Ratleig (who already desired to go to Rome
to offer his devotions there) to go with him. Therefore,
having left Aix-la-Chapelle (where the Emperor and his Court
resided at the time) they came to Soissons. Here they spoke
with Hildoin, abbot of the monastery of St. Medardus,
because the said deacon had assured him that he had the
means of placing in his possession the body of the blessed
Tiburtius the Martyr. Attracted by which promises he
(Hildoin) sent with them a certain priest, Hunus by name, a
sharp man (_hominem callidum_), whom he ordered to receive
and bring back the body of the martyr in question. And so,
resuming their journey, they proceeded to Rome as fast as
they could. (Cap. i. 3.)
Unfortunately, a servant of the notary, one Reginbald, fell ill of a
tertian fever, and impeded the progress of the party. However, this
piece of adversity had its sweet uses; for three days before they
reached Rome, Reginbald had a vision. Somebody habited as a deacon
appeared to him and asked why his master was in such a hurry to get
to Rome; and when Reginbald explained their business, this visionary
deacon, who seems to have taken the measure of his brother in the
flesh with some accuracy, told him not by any means to expect that
Deusdona would fulfil his promises. Moreover, taking the servant by
the hand, he led him to the top of a high mountain and, showing him
Rome (where the man had never been), pointed out a church, adding
"Tell Ratleig the thing he wants is hidden there; let him get it as
quickly as he can and go back to his master." By way of a sign that
the order was authoritative, the servant was promised that, from that
time forth, his fever should disappear. And as the fever did vanish to
return no more, the faith of Eginhard's people in Deacon Deusdona
naturally vanished with it (_et fidem diaconi promissis non
haberent_). Nevertheless, they put up at the deacon's house near St.
Peter ad Vincula. But time went on and no relics made their
appearance, while the notary and the priest were put off with all
sorts of excuses--the brother to whom the relics had been confided was
gone to Beneventum and not expected back for some time, and so
on--until Ratleig and Hunus began to despair, and were minded to
return, _infecto negotio_.
But my notary, calling to mind his servant's dream, proposed
to his companion that they should go to the cemetery which
their host had talked about without him. So, having found
and hired a guide, they went in the first place to the
basilica of the blessed Tiburtius in the Via Labicana, about
three thousand paces fron the town, and cautiously and
carefully inspected the tomb of that martyr, in order to
discover whether it could be opened without any one being
the wiser. Then they descended into the adjoining crypt, in
which the bodies of the blessed martyrs of Christ,
Marcellinus and Petrus, were buried; and, having made out
the nature of their tomb, they went away thinking their host
would not know what they had been about. But things fell out
differently from what they had imagined. (Cap. i. 7.)
In fact, Deacon Deusdona, who doubtless kept an eye on his guests,
knew all about their manoeuvres and made haste to offer his services,
in order that, "with the help of God" (_si Deus votis eorum favere
dignaretur_), they should all work together. The deacon was evidently
alarmed lest they should succeed without _his_ help.
So, by way of preparation for the contemplated _vol avec effraction_
they fasted three days; and then, at night, without being seen, they
betook themselves to the basilica of St. Tiburtius, and tried to break
open the altar erected over his remains. But the marble proving too
solid, they descended to the crypt, and, "having evoked our Lord Jesus
Christ and adored the holy martyrs," they proceeded to prise off the
stone which covered the tomb, and thereby exposed the body of the most
sacred martyr, Marcellinus, "whose head rested on a marble tablet on
which his name was inscribed." The body was taken up with the
greatest veneration, wrapped in a rich covering, and given over to the
keeping of the deacon and his brother, Lunison, while the stone was
replaced with such care that no sign of the theft remained.
As sacrilegious proceedings of this kind were punishable with death by
the Roman law, it seems not unnatural that Deacon Deusdona should have
become uneasy, and have urged Ratleig to be satisfied with what he had
got and be off with his spoils. But the notary having thus cleverly
captured the blessed Marcellinus, thought it a pity he should be
parted from the blessed Petrus, side by side with whom he had rested,
for five hundred years and more, in the same sepulchre (as Eginhard
pathetically observes); and the pious man could neither eat, drink,
nor sleep, until he had compassed his desire to re-unite the saintly
colleagues. This time, apparently in consequence of Deusdona's
opposition to any further resurrectionist doings, he took counsel with
a Greek monk, one Basil, and, accompanied by Hunus, but saying nothing
to Deusdona, they committed another sacrilegious burglary, securing
this time, not only the body of the blessed Petrus, but a quantity of
dust, which they agreed the priest should take, and tell his employer
that it was the remains of the blessed Tiburtius. How Deusdona was
"squared," and what he got for his not very valuable complicity in
these transactions, does not appear. But at last the relics were sent
off in charge of Lunison, the brother of Deusdona, and the priest
Hunus, as far as Pavia, while Ratleig stopped behind for a week to see
if the robbery was discovered, and, presumably, to act as a blind, if
any hue and cry was raised. But, as everything remained quiet, the
notary betook himself to Pavia, where he found Lunison and Hunus
awaiting his arrival. The notary's opinion of the character of his
worthy colleagues, however, may be gathered from the fact that, having
persuaded them to set out in advance along the road which he told them
he was about to take, he immediately adopted another route, and,
travelling by way of St. Maurice and the Lake of Geneva, eventually
reached Soleure.
Eginhard tells all this story with the most naive air of
unconsciousness that there is anything remarkable about an abbot, and
a high officer of state to boot, being an accessory, both before and
after the fact, to a most gross and scandalous act of sacrilegious and
burglarious robbery. And an amusing sequel to the story proves that,
where relics were concerned, his friend Hildoin, another high
ecclesiastical dignitary, was even less scrupulous than himself.
On going to the palace early one morning, after the saints were safely
bestowed at Seligenstadt, he found Hildoin waiting for an audience in
the Emperor's antechamber, and began to talk to him about the miracle
of the bloody exudation. In the course of conversation, Eginhard
happened to allude to the remarkable fineness of the garment of the
blessed Marcellinus. Whereupon Abbot Hildoin observed (to Eginhard's
stupefaction) that his observation was quite correct. Much astonished
at this remark from a person who was supposed not to have seen the
relics, Eginhard asked him how he knew that? Upon this, Hildoin saw
that he had better make a clean breast of it, and he told the
following story, which he had received from his priestly agent, Hunus.
While Hunus and Lunison were at Pavia, waiting for Eginhard's notary,
Hunus (according to his own account) had robbed the robbers. The
relics were placed in a church; and a number of laymen and clerics, of
whom Hunus was one, undertook to keep watch over them. One night,
however, all the watchers, save the wide-awake Hunus, went to sleep;
and then, according to the story which this "sharp" ecclesiastic
foisted upon his patron,
it was borne in upon his mind that there must be some great
reason why all the people, except himself, had suddenly
become somnolent; and, determining to avail himself of the
opportunity thus offered (_oblata occasione utendum_), he
rose and, having lighted a candle, silently approached the
chests. Then, having burnt through the threads of the seals
with the flame of the candle, he quickly opened the chests,
which had no locks;[41] and taking out portions of each of
the bodies which were thus exposed, he closed the chests
and connected the burnt ends of the threads with the seals
again, so that they appeared not to have been touched; and,
no one having seen him, he returned to his place. (Cap. iii.
23.)
Hildoin went on to tell Eginhard that Hunus at first declared to him
that these purloined relics belonged to St. Tiburtius; but afterwards
confessed, as a great secret, how he had come by them, and he wound up
his discourse thus:
They have a place of honour beside St. Medardus, where they
are worshipped with great veneration by all the people; but
whether we may keep them or not is for your judgment (Cap.
iii. 23.)
Poor Eginhard was thrown into a state of great perturbation of mind by
this revelation. An acquaintance of his had recently told him of a
rumour that was spread about that Hunus had contrived to abstract
_all_ the remains of SS. Marcellinus and Petrus while Eginhard's
agents were in a drunken sleep; and that, while the real relics were
in Abbot Hildoin's hands at St. Medardus, the shrine at Seligenstadt
contained nothing but a little dust. Though greatly annoyed by this
"execrable rumour, spread everywhere by the subtlety of the devil,"
Eginhard had doubtless comforted himself by his supposed knowledge of
its falsity, and he only now discovered how considerable a foundation
there was for the scandal. There was nothing for it but to insist upon
the return of the stolen treasures. One would have thought that the
holy man, who had admitted himself to be knowingly a receiver of
stolen goods, would have made instant restitution and begged only for
absolution. But Eginhard intimates that he had very great difficulty
in getting his brother abbot to see that even restitution was
necessary.
Hildoin's proceedings were not of such a nature as to lead any one to
place implicit confidence in anything he might say; still less had his
agent, priest Hunus, established much claim to confidence; and it is
not surprising that Eginhard should have lost no time in summoning his
notary and Lunison to his presence, in order that he might hear what
they had to say about the business. They, however, at once protested
that priest Hunus's story was a parcel of lies, and that after the
relics left Rome no one had any opportunity of meddling with them.
Moreover, Lunison, throwing himself at Eginhard's feet, confessed with
many tears what actually took place. It will be remembered that after
the body of St. Marcellinus was abstracted from its tomb, Ratleig
deposited it in the house of Deusdona, in charge of the latter's
brother, Lunison. But Hunus, being very much disappointed that he
could not get hold of the body of St. Tiburtius, and afraid to go back
to his abbot empty-handed, bribed Lunison with four pieces of gold and
five of silver to give him access to the chest. This Lunison did, and
Hunus helped himself to as much as would fill a gallon measure (_vas
sextarii mensuram_) of the sacred remains. Eginhard's indignation at
the "rapine" of this "nequissimus nebulo" is exquisitely droll. It
would appear that the adage about the receiver being as bad as the
thief was not current in the ninth century.
Let us now briefly sum up the history of the acquisition of the
relics. Eginhard makes a contract with Deusdona for the delivery of
certain relics which the latter says he possesses. Eginhard makes no
inquiry how he came by them; otherwise, the transaction is innocent
enough.
Deusdona turns out to be a swindler, and has no relics. Thereupon
Eginhard's agent, after due fasting and prayer, breaks open the tombs
and helps himself.
Eginhard discovers by the self-betrayal of his brother abbot, Hildoin,
that portions of his relics have been stolen and conveyed to the
latter. With much ado he succeeds in getting them back.
Hildoin's agent, Hunus, in delivering these stolen goods to him, at
first declared they were the relics of St. Tiburtius, which Hildoin
desired him to obtain; but afterwards invented a story of their being
the product of a theft, which the providential drowsiness of his
companions enabled him to perpetrate, from the relics which Hildoin
well knew were the property of his friend.
Lunison, on the contrary, swears that all his story is false, and that
he himself was bribed by Hunus to allow him to steal what he pleased
from the property confided to his own and his brother's care by their
guest Ratleig. And the honest notary himself seems to have no
hesitation about lying and stealing to any extent, where the
acquisition of relics is the object in view.
For a parallel to these transactions one must read a police report of
the doings of a "long firm" or of a set of horse-coupers; yet Eginhard
seems to be aware of nothing, but that he has been rather badly used
by his friend Hildoin, and the "nequissimus nebulo" Hunus.
It is not easy for a modern Protestant, still less for any one who has
the least tincture of scientific culture, whether physical or
historical, to picture to himself the state of mind of a man of the
ninth century, however cultivated, enlightened, and sincere he may
have been. His deepest convictions, his most cherished hopes, were
bound up with the belief in the miraculous. Life was a constant battle
between saints and demons for the possession of the souls of men. The
most superstitious among our modern countrymen turn to supernatural
agencies only when natural causes seem insufficient; to Eginhard and
his friends the supernatural was the rule; and the sufficiency of
natural causes was allowed only when there was nothing to suggest
others.
Moreover, it must be recollected that the possession of
miracle-working relics was greatly coveted, not only on high, but on
very low grounds. To a man like Eginhard, the mere satisfaction of the
religious sentiment was obviously a powerful attraction. But, more
than, this, the possession of such a treasure was an immense practical
advantage. If the saints were duly flattered and worshipped, there was
no telling what benefits might result from their interposition on your
behalf. For physical evils, access to the shrine was like the grant of
the use of a universal pill and ointment manufactory; and pilgrimages
thereto might suffice to cleanse the performers from any amount of
sin. A letter to Lupus, subsequently abbot of Ferrara, written while
Eginhard was smarting under the grief caused by the loss of his
much-loved wife Imma, affords a striking insight into the current view
of the relation between the glorified saints and their worshippers.
The writer shows that he is anything but satisfied with the way in
which he has been treated by the blessed martyrs whose remains he has
taken such pains to "convey" to Seligenstadt, and to honour there as
they would never have been honoured in their Roman obscurity.
It is an aggravation of my grief and a reopening of my
wound, that our vows have been of no avail, and that the
faith which we placed in the merits and intervention of the
martyrs has been utterly disappointed.
We may admit, then, without impeachment of Eginhard's sincerity, or
of his honour under all ordinary circumstances, that when piety,
self-interest, the glory of the Church in general, and that of the
church at Seligenstadt in particular, all pulled one way, even the
workaday principles of morality were disregarded; and, _a fortiori_,
anything like proper investigation of the reality of alleged miracles
was thrown to the winds.
And if this was the condition of mind of such a man as Eginhard, what
is it not legitimate to suppose may have been that of Deacon Deusdona,
Lunison, Hunus, and Company, thieves and cheats by their own
confession, or of the probably hysterical nun, or of the professional
beggars, for whose incapacity to walk and straighten themselves there
is no guarantee but their own? Who is to make sure that the exorcist
of the demon Wiggo was not just such another priest as Hunus; and is
it not at least possible, when Eginhard's servants dreamed, night
after night, in such a curiously coincident fashion, that a careful
inquirer might have found they were very anxious to please their
master.
Quite apart from deliberate and conscious fraud (which is a rarer
thing than is often supposed), people, whose mythopoeic faculty is
once stirred, are capable of saying the thing that is not, and of
acting as they should not, to an extent which is hardly imaginable by
persons who are not so easily affected by the contagion of blind
faith. There is no falsity so gross that honest men and, still more,
virtuous women, anxious to promote a good cause, will not lend
themselves to it without any clear consciousness of the moral bearings
of what they are doing.
The cases of miraculously-effected cures of which Eginhard is ocular
witness appear to belong to classes of disease in which malingering is
possible or hysteria presumable. Without modern means of diagnosis,
the names given to them are quite worthless. One "miracle," however,
in which the patient, a woman, was cured by the mere sight of the
church in which the relics of the blessed martyrs lay, is an
unmistakable case of dislocation of the lower jaw; and it is obvious
that, as not unfrequently happens in such accidents in weakly
subjects, the jaws slipped suddenly back into place, perhaps in
consequence of a jolt, as the woman rode towards the church. (Cap. v.
53.)[42]
There is also a good deal said about a very questionable blind
man--one Albricus (Alberich?)--who, having been cured, not of his
blindness, but of another disease under which he laboured, took up his
quarters at Seligenstadt, and came out as a prophet, inspired by the
Archangel Gabriel. Eginhard intimates that his prophecies were
fulfilled; but as he does not state exactly what they were, or how
they were accomplished, the statement must be accepted with much
caution. It is obvious that he was not the man to hesitate to "ease" a
prophecy until it fitted, if the credit of the shrine of his favourite
saints could be increased by such a procedure. There is no impeachment
of his honour in the supposition. The logic of the matter is quite
simple, if somewhat sophistical. The holiness of the church of the
martyrs guarantees the reality of the appearance of the Archangel
Gabriel there; and what the archangel says must be true. Therefore, if
anything seem to be wrong, that must be the mistake of the
transmitter; and, in justice to the archangel, it must be suppressed
or set right. This sort of "reconciliation" is not unknown in quite
modern times, and among people who would be very much shocked to be
compared with a "benighted papist" of the ninth century.
The readers of this essay are, I imagine, very largely composed of
people who would be shocked to be regarded as anything but enlightened
Protestants. It is not unlikely that those of them who have
accompanied me thus far may be disposed to say, "Well, this is all
very amusing as a story, but what is the practical interest of it? We
are not likely to believe in the miracles worked by the spolia of SS.
Marcellinus and Petrus, or by those of any other saints in the Roman
Calendar."
The practical interest is this: if you do not believe in these
miracles recounted by a witness whose character and competency are
firmly established, whose sincerity cannot be doubted, and who appeals
to his sovereign and other contemporaries as witnesses of the truth of
what he says, in a document of which a MS. copy exists, probably
dating within a century of the author's death, why do you profess to
believe in stories of a like character, which are found in documents
of the dates and of the authorship of which nothing is certainly
determined, and no known copies of which come within two or three
centuries of the events they record? If it be true that the four
Gospels and the Acts were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,
all that we know of these persons comes to nothing in comparison with
our knowledge of Eginhard; and not only is there no proof that the
traditional authors of these works wrote them, but very strong reasons
to the contrary may be alleged. If, therefore, you refuse to believe
that "Wiggo" was cast out of the possessed girl on Eginhard's
authority, with what justice can you profess to believe that the
legion of devils were cast out of the man among the tombs of the
Gadarenes? And if, on the other hand, you accept Eginhard's evidence,
why do you laugh at the supposed efficacy of relics and the
saint-worship of the modern Romanists? It cannot be pretended, in the
face of all evidence, that the Jews of the year 30 A.D., or
thereabouts, were less imbued with the belief in the supernatural than
were the Franks of the year 800 A.D. The same influences were at work
in each case, and it is only reasonable to suppose that the results
were the same. If the evidence of Eginhard is insufficient to lead
reasonable men to believe in the miracles he relates, _a fortiori_ the
evidence afforded by the Gospels and the Acts must be so.[43]
But it may be said that no serious critic denies the genuineness of
the four great Pauline Epistles--Galatians, First and Second
Corinthians, and Romans--and that in three out of these four Paul lays
claim to the power of working miracles.[44] Must we suppose,
therefore, that the Apostle to the Gentiles has stated that which is
false? But to how much does this so-called claim amount? It may mean
much or little. Paul nowhere tells us what he did in this direction;
and in his sore need to justify his assumption of apostleship against
the sneers of his enemies, it is hardly likely that, if he had any
very striking cases to bring forward, he would have neglected evidence
so well calculated to put them to shame. And, without the slightest
impeachment of Paul's veracity, we must further remember that his
strongly-marked mental characteristics, displayed in unmistakable
fashion by these Epistles, are anything but those which would justify
us in regarding him as a critical witness respecting matters of fact,
or as a trustworthy interpreter of their significance. When a man
testifies to a miracle, he not only states a fact, but he adds an
interpretation of the fact. We may admit his evidence as to the
former, and yet think his opinion as to the latter worthless. If
Eginhard's calm and objective narrative of the historical events of
his time is no guarantee for the soundness of his judgment where the
supernatural is concerned, the heated rhetoric of the Apostle of the
Gentiles, his absolute confidence in the "inner light," and the
extraordinary conceptions of the nature and requirements of logical
proof which he betrays, in page after page of his Epistles, afford
still less security.
There is a comparatively modern man who shared to the full Paul's
trust in the "inner light," and who, though widely different from the
fiery evangelist of Tarsus in various obvious particulars, yet, if I
am not mistaken, shares his deepest characteristics. I speak of George
Fox, who separated himself from the current Protestantism of England,
in the seventeenth century, as Paul separated himself from the
Judaism of the first century, at the bidding of the "inner light"; who
went through persecutions as serious as those which Paul enumerates;
who was beaten, stoned, cast out for dead, imprisoned nine times,
sometimes for long periods; who was in perils on land and perils at
sea. George Fox was an even more widely-travelled missionary; while
his success in founding congregations, and his energy in visiting
them, not merely in Great Britain and Ireland and the West India
Islands, but on the continent of Europe and that of North America,
were no less remarkable. A few years after Fox began to preach, there
were reckoned to be a thousand Friends in prison in the various gaols
of England; at his death, less than fifty years after the foundation
of the sect, there were 70,000 Quakers in the United Kingdom. The
cheerfulness with which these people--women as well as men--underwent
martyrdom in this country and in the New England States is one of the
most remarkable facts in the history of religion.
No one who reads the voluminous autobiography of "Honest George" can
doubt the man's utter truthfulness; and though, in his multitudinous
letters, he but rarely rises for above the incoherent commonplaces of
a street preacher, there can be no question of his power as a speaker,
nor any doubt as to the dignity and attractiveness of his personality,
or of his possession of a large amount of practical good sense and
governing faculty.
But that George Fox had full faith in his own powers as a
miracle-worker, the following passage of his autobiography (to which
others might he added) demonstrates:--
Now after I was set at liberty from Nottingham gaol (where I
had been kept a prisoner a pretty long time) I travelled as
before, in the work of the Lord. And coming to Mansfield
Woodhouse, there was a distracted woman, under a doctor's
hand, with her hair let loose all about her ears; and he was
about to let her blood, she being first bound, and many
people being about her, holding her by violence; but he
could get no blood from her. And I desired them to unbind
her and let her alone; for they could not touch the spirit
in her by which she was tormented. So they did unbind her,
and I was moved to speak to her, and in the name of the Lord
to bid her be quiet and still. And she was so. And the
Lord's power settled her mind and she mended; and afterwards
received the truth and continued in it to her death. And the
Lord's name was honoured; to whom the glory of all His works
belongs. Many great and wonderful things were wrought by the
heavenly power in those days. For the Lord made bare his
omnipotent arm and manifested His power to the astonishment
of many; by the healing virtue whereof many have been
delivered from great infirmities, and the devils were made
subject through his name: of which particular instances
might be given beyond what this unbelieving age is able to
receive or bear.[45]
It needs no long study of Fox's writings, however, to arrive at the
conviction that the distinction between subjective and objective
verities had not the same place in his mind as it has in that of an
ordinary mortal. When an ordinary person would say "I thought so and
so," or "I made up my mind to do so and so," George Fox says, "It was
opened to me," or "at the command of God I did so and so." "Then at
the command of God on the ninth day of the seventh month 1643 (Fox
being just nineteen), I left my relations and brake off all
familiarity or friendship with young or old." "About the beginning of
the year 1647 I was moved of the Lord to go into Darbyshire." Fox
hears voices and he sees visions, some of which he brings before the
reader with apocalyptic power in the simple and strong English, alike
untutored and undefiled, of which, like John Bunyan, his contemporary,
he was a master.
"And one morning as I was sitting by the fire, a great cloud came over
me and a temptation beset me; and I sate still. And it was said, _All
things come by Nature_. And the elements and stars came over me; so
that I was in a manner quite clouded with it.... And as I sate still
under it, and let it alone, a living hope arose in me, and a true
voice arose in me which said, _There is a living God who made all
things_. And immediately the cloud and the temptation vanished away,
and life rose over it all, and my heart was glad and I praised the
living God" (p. 13).
If George Fox could speak, as he proves in this and some other
passages he could write, his astounding influence on the
contemporaries of Milton and of Cromwell is no mystery. But this
modern reproduction of the ancient prophet, with his "Thus saith the
Lord," "This is the work of the Lord," steeped in supernaturalism and
glorying in blind faith, is the mental antipodes of the philosopher,
founded in naturalism and a fanatic for evidence, to whom these
affirmations inevitably suggest the previous question: "How do you
know that the Lord saith it?" "How do you know that the Lord doeth
it?" and who is compelled to demand that rational ground for belief,
without which, to the man of science, assent is merely an immoral
pretence.
And it is this rational ground of belief which the writers of the
Gospels, no less than Paul, and Eginhard, and Fox, so little dream of
offering that they would regard the demand for it as a kind of
blasphemy.