In many people who have been abroad, the mere mention of the old city of
Rouen is enough to kindle an enthusiasm. If you would know why this
is,--why those who are familiar with the cathedrals of Cologne, Milan,
Florence, and the basilicas of Rome, have yet so deep a feeling about
the old capital of Normandy,--the true answer is, that Rouen, with its
Gothic glories and the thrilling history of the middle ages written on
its every stone, was the first ancient city that they saw, and made the
deepest impression on their minds. They had left the stiff and
unsympathetic respectability of Boston, the tiresome cleanliness of
Philadelphia, or the ineffable filth of New York behind them; or
perchance they had been emancipated from some dreary western town, whose
wide, straight, unpaved streets seemed to have no beginning and to end
nowhere; whose atmosphere was pervaded with an odour of fresh paint and
new shingles, and whose inhabitants would regard fifty years as a highly
respectable antiquity,--and had come steaming across the unquiet
Atlantic to Havre, eager to see an old city. A short railway ride
carried them to one in which they could not turn a corner without seeing
something to remind them of what they had seen in pictures or read in
books about the middle ages. The richly-carved window frames, the
grotesque faces, the fanciful devices, the profusion of ornament, the
shrines and statues of the saints at the corners of the streets, and all
the other picturesque peculiarities of that queer old city, filled them
with wonder and delight. Those fantastic gables that seemed to be
leaning over to look at them, inspired them with a respect which all the
architectural wonders and artistic trophies of the continent are
powerless to disturb.
It was not my fortune thus to make acquaintance with Rouen. I had
several times tasted the pleasure of a continental sojourn. The streets
of several of the great European capitals were as familiar to me as
those of my native city. Yet Rouen captivated me with a charm peculiarly
its own. I shall not easily forget the delicious summer day in which I
left Paris for a short visit to Rouen. That four hours' ride over the
Western Railway of France was full of solid enjoyment for every sense.
The high cultivation of that fertile and unfenced country--the farmers
at work in the sunny broad-stretched fields--the hay-makers piling up
their fragrant loads--the chateau-like farm houses, looking as stately
as if they had strayed out of the city, and, getting lost, had thought
it beneath their dignity to inquire the way back--and those old
compactly built towns, in each of which the houses seem to have nestled
together around a moss-grown church tower, like children at the knees of
a fond mother,--made up a scene which harmonized admirably with my
feelings and with the day, "so calm, so cool, so bright, the bridal of
the earth and sky." My fellow-passengers shared in the general joy which
the blithesomeness of nature inspired. We all chatted merrily together,
and a German, who looked about as lively as Scott's Commentaries bound
in dark sheep-skin, tried to make a joke. So irresistible was the
contagion of cheerfulness, that an Englishman, who sat opposite me, so
far forgot his native dignity, as to volunteer the remark that it was a
"nice day."
At last we began to consult our watches and time tables, and, after a
shrill whistle and a ride through a long tunnel, I found myself, with a
punctuality by which you might set your Frodsham, in the station at
Rouen. I obeyed the instructions of the conductor to _Messieurs les
voyageurs pour Rouen_ to _descendez_, and was, in a very few minutes,
walking leisurely through narrow and winding streets, which I used to
think existed only in the imaginations of novelists and scene-painters.
I say walking, but the fact is, I did not know what means of locomotion
I employed in my progress through the town. My eyes and mind were too
busy to take cognizance of any inferior matters. My astonishment and
delight at all that met my sight was not so great as my astonishment and
delight to find myself astonished and delighted. I had seen so many old
cities that I had no thought of getting enthusiastic about Rouen, until
I found myself suddenly in a state of mental exaltation. I had visited
Rouen as many people visit churches and galleries of art in
Italy--because I had an opportunity, and feared that in after years I
might be asked if I had ever been there. But, if a dislike to
acknowledge my ignorance led me to Rouen, it was a very different
sentiment that took possession of me as soon as I caught the spirit of
the place. The genius of the past seemed to inhabit every street and
alley of that strange city. I half expected, whenever I heard the hoofs
of horses, to find myself encompassed by mailed knights; and if Joan of
Arc, with her sweet maidenly face beaming with the inspiration of
religious patriotism, had galloped by, it would not have surprised me so
much as it did to realize that I--a Yankee, clad in a gray travelling
suit, with an umbrella in my hand, and drafts to a limited amount on
Baring Brothers in my pocket--was moving about in the midst of such
scenes, and was not arrested and hustled out of the way as a profane
intruder.
Wandering through the mouldy streets without any definite idea whither
they led, and so charmed by all I saw, that I did not care, I suddenly
turned a corner and suddenly found myself in a market-place well filled
with figures, which would have graced a similar scene in any
opera-house, and facing that stupendous cathedral which is one of the
glories of France. I do not know how to talk learnedly about
architecture; so I can spare you, dear reader, any criticism on the
details of that great church. I have no doubt that it is full of faults,
but my unskilful eyes rested only on its beauties. I would not have had
it one stroke of the chisel less ornate, nor one shade less dingy. I
could not, indeed, help thinking what it must have been centuries ago,
when it was in all the glory of its fresh beauty; but still I rejoiced
that it was reserved for me to behold it in the perfected loveliness and
richer glory of its decay. Never until then did I fully appreciate the
truth of Mr. Ruskin's declaration, that the greatest glory of a building
is not in its sculptures or in its gold, but in its age,--nor did I ever
before perfectly comprehend his eloquent words touching that mysterious
sympathy which we feel in "walls that have long been washed by the
passing waves of humanity."
After lingering for a while before the sacred edifice, I entered, and
stood within its northern aisle. Arches above arches, supported by a
forest of massive columns, seemed to be climbing up as if they aspired
to reach the throne of Him whose worship was daily celebrated there. The
sun was obscured by a passing cloud as I entered, and that made the
ancient arches seem doubly solemn. The stillness that reigned there was
rendered more profound by the occasional twitter of a swallow from some
"jutty frieze," or "coigne of vantage," high up above my head. I walked
half way up the aisle, and stopped on hearing voices at a distance. As I
stood listening, the sun uncovered his radiant face, and poured his
golden glory through the great western windows of the church, bathing
the whole interior with a prismatic brilliancy which made me wonder at
my presumption in being there. At the same moment a clear tenor voice
rang out from the choir as if the sunbeams had called it into being,
giving a wonderful expression to the words of the Psalmist, _Dominus
illuminatio mea et salus mea; quem timebo_. Then came a full burst of
music as the choir took up the old Gregorian Chant--the universal
language of prayer and praise. As the mute groves of the Academy reecho
still the wisdom of the sages, so did that ancient church people my mind
with forms and scenes of an age long passed away. "I was all ear," and
those solemn strains seemed to be endowed with the accumulated melody of
the _Misereres_ and _Glorias_ of a thousand years.
I have an especial affection for an old church, and I pity with all my
heart the man whom the silent eloquence of that vast cathedral does not
move. The very birds that build their nests in its mouldering towers
have more soul than he. Its every stone is a sermon on the
transitoriness of human enterprise and the vanity of worldly hopes.
Beneath its pavement lie buried hopes and ambitions which have left no
memorial but in the unread pages of forgotten historians. Richard, the
lion-hearted, who made two continents ring with the fame of his valour,
and yearned for new conquests, was obliged at last to content himself
with the dusty dignity and obscurity of a vault beneath those lofty
arches which stand unmoved amid the contentions of rival dynasties and
the insane violence of republican anarchy.
But it was not merely to write of the glories of Rouen and its churches,
that I took up my neglected pen. The old cathedral of which I have now a
few kind words to say, does not, like that of Rouen, date back sixteen
centuries to its foundation; neither is it one of those marvels of
architecture in which the conscious stone seems to have grown naturally
into forms of enduring beauty. No great synods or councils have been
held within its walls; nor have its humble aisles resounded daily with
the divine office chanted by a chapter of learned and pious canons.
Indeed it bears little in its external appearance that would raise a
suspicion of its being a cathedral at all. Yet its plain interior, its
simple altars, and its unpretentious episcopal throne, bear witness to
the abiding-place of that power which is radiated from the shrine of the
Prince of the Apostles--as unmistakably as if it were encrusted with
mosaics, and the genius of generations of great masters had been taxed
in its adornment.
The Cathedral of Boston is the last relic of Franklin Street as I
delight to remember it. One by one, the theatre, the residence of the
Catholic bishops, and the old mansions that bore such a Berkeley
Square-y look of respectability have passed away; and the old church
alone remains. Tall warehouses look down upon it, as if it were an
intruder there, and the triumphal car of traffic makes its old walls
tremble and disturbs the devotion of its worshippers. An irreverent
punster ventured a few months since to suggest that, out of regard to
its new associations, it ought to be rededicated under the invocation of
St. Casimir, and to be enlarged by the addition of a chapel built in
honor of St. Pantaleone.
Quid non mortalia pectora cogis,
Joci sacra fames!
But it is well that it should follow the buildings with which it held
companionship through so many quiet years. The charm of the old street
has been destroyed, and the sooner the last monument of its former state
is removed the better it will be. The land on which it stands formerly
belonged to the Boston Theatre corporation. It was transferred to its
present proprietorship in the last week of the last century, and the
first Catholic church in New England was erected upon it. That church
(enlarged considerably by the late Bishop Fenwick) is the one which
still stands, and towards which I feel a veneration similar in kind to
that inspired by the cathedrals of the old world. Even now I remember
with pleasure how I used to enjoy an occasional visit to that strange
place in my boyhood. "Logic made easy" and "Geometry for Infant Schools"
were things unknown in my young days. I was weaned from the Primer and
Spelling-book with the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, and the works of
Defoe, Goldsmith, Addison, and Shakespeare. Therefore the romantic
instinct was not entirely crushed out of my youthful heart, and it would
be difficult, dear reader, for you to conceive how much I found to feed
it on, within those plain brick walls.
The lamp which used to burn constantly before the altar, until an
anxiety for "improvement" removed it out of sight behind the pulpit,
filled me with an indescribable awe. I was ignorant of its meaning, and
for years was unaware that my childish reverence for its mild flicker
was a blind homage to one of the profoundest mysteries of the Catholic
faith. I remember to this day the satisfaction I took in the lighting of
those tall candles, and what a halo of mysterious dignity surrounded
even the surpliced boys grouped around that altar. That strange
ceremonial surpassed my comprehension. The Latin, as I heard it sung
there, was pronounced so differently from what I had been taught at
school, that it was all Greek to me. Yet, when I saw the devotion of
that congregation, and the pious zeal of the devoted clergymen who built
that church, I could not call their worship "mummery," nor join in the
irreverent laughter of my comrades at those ancient rites. There was
something about them that seemed to fill up my ideal of worship--a
soothing and consoling influence which I found nowhere else.
I never entertained the vulgar notion of a Catholic priest. Of course my
education led me to regard the dogmas of the Roman Church with any thing
but a friendly eye; but my ideas of the clergy of that Church were not
influenced by popular prejudice. I was always willing to believe that
Vincent de Paul, and Charles Borromeo, and Fenelon were what they were,
_in consequence_ of their religion, rather than _in spite_ of it, as
some people, who make pretensions to liberality, would fain persuade us.
When I recall the self-denying lives of the two founders of the Catholic
Church in Boston,--Matignon and Cheverus,--I wonder that the influence
of their virtues has not extended even to the present day, to soften
prejudice and do away with _irreligious_ animosity. They were regarded
with distrust, if not with hatred, when they first came among us to take
charge of that humble flock; but their devotedness, joined with great
acquirements and rare personal worth, overcame even the force of the
great Protestant tradition of enmity towards their office. Protestant
admiration kept pace with Catholic love and veneration in their regard,
and when they built the church which is now so near the term of its
existence, there were few wealthy Protestants in Boston who did not
esteem it a privilege to aid them with liberal contributions. The first
subscription paper for its erection was headed by the illustrious and
venerable name of John Adams, the successor of Washington in the
presidency of the United States.
The memory of the first Bishop of Boston, Dr. Cheverus, is (for most
Bostonians of my age) the most precious association connected with the
Cathedral. He was endeared to the people of this city by ten years of
unselfish exertion in the duties of a missionary priest, before he was
elevated to the dignity of the episcopate. His unwillingness to receive
the proffered mitre was as characteristic of his modest and humble
spirit, as the meekness with which he bore his faculties when the burden
of that responsibility was forced upon him. His "episcopal palace," as
he used facetiously to term his small and scantily-furnished dwelling,
which was contiguous to the rear of the church, was the resort of all
classes of the community. His simplicity of manner and ingenuous
affability won all hearts. The needy and opulent, the learned and
illiterate, the prosperous merchant and the Indians in the unknown wilds
of Maine, found in him a father and a friend. Children used to run after
him as he walked down Franklin Place, delighted to receive a smile and a
kind word from one whose personal presence was like a benediction.
His face was the index of a pure heart and a great mind. It was
impossible to look at him without recalling that fine stanza of the old
poet.--
"A sweete attractive kind of grace,
A full assurance given by lookes,
Continuall comfort in a face,
The lineaments of Gospel bookes;--
I trow that countenance cannot lie
Whose thoughts are legible in the eye."
One of the ancient Hebrew prophets, in describing the glories of the
millennial period, tells us that upon the bells of the horses shall be
the words, _Holiness unto the Lord_--a prophecy which always reminded me
of Cheverus; for that divine inscription seemed to have been written all
over his benign countenance as with the luminous pen of the rapt
evangelist in Patmos.
But Bishop Cheverus was not merely a good man--he was a great man. He
did not court the society of the learned, for his line of duty lay among
the poor; but, even in that humble sphere, his talents shone out
brightly, and won the respect even of those who had the least sympathy
with the Church to which his every energy was devoted. Boston valued him
highly; but few of her citizens thought, as they saw him bound on some
errand of mercy through her streets, that France envied them the
possession of such a prelate, that the peerage of the old monarchy was
thought to need his virtuous presence, and that the scarlet dignity of a
Prince of the Church was in reserve for that meek and self-sacrificing
servant of the poor. Had he been gifted with prophetic vision, his
humility would have had much to suffer, and his life would have been
made unhappy, by the thought of coming power and honour. He had given
the best part of his life to Boston, and here he wished to die. He had
buried his friend and fellow-labourer, Dr. Matignon, in the Church of
St. Augustine at South Boston, and when he placed the mural tablet over
the tomb of that venerable priest, he left a space for his own name, and
expressed the hope that, as they had lived together harmoniously for so
many years, they might not in death be separated. It was a strange sight
to see more than two hundred Protestants remonstrating against the
translation of a Catholic bishop from their city, and speaking of him in
such terms as these: "We hold him to be a blessing and a treasure in our
social community, which we cannot part with, and which, without
injustice to any man, we may affirm, if withdrawn from us, can never be
replaced." And when he distributed all that he possessed among his
clergy, his personal friends and the poor, and left Boston as poor as he
had entered it, with the single trunk that contained his clothes when he
arrived, twenty-seven years before,--public admiration outran the power
of language. Doctrinal differences were forgotten. Three hundred
carriages and other vehicles escorted him several miles on the road to
New York, where he was to embark.
Of his life as Bishop of Montauban, Archbishop of Bordeaux, a Peer of
France, and a Cardinal, there is not space for me to speak. Suffice it
to say, that amid all the dignities to which he was successively
promoted, he lived as simply and unostentatiously as when he dwelt in
Franklin Street; and that in time of pestilence and public distress he
showed the same unbounded charity which caused his departure from Boston
to be considered a public calamity. To the last day of his life he
maintained his interest in his American home, and would gladly have
relinquished all his dignities to return and minister at the altar of
the church he here erected. Throughout France he was honoured and
beloved, even as he had been in the metropolis of New England, and a
nation sorrowed at his death. Full as his life was of good works, it was
not in his eloquence, nor his learning, nor in the pious and charitable
enterprises which he originated, that the glory of Cardinal Cheverus
consisted; it was in the simplicity of his character and the daily
beauty of his life:--
"His thoughts were as a pyramid up-piled,
On whose far top an angel stood and smiled,
Yet in his heart he was a little child."
The gentle and benevolent spirit of that illustrious prelate has never
departed from the church he built. When Channing died, and was buried
from the church which his eloquence had made famous, the successor of
Cheverus caused the bell of the neighbouring Cathedral to be tolled,
that it might not seem as if the Catholics had forgotten the friendly
relations which had existed between the great Unitarian preacher and
their first bishop. And when the good Bishop Fenwick was borne from the
old Cathedral, with all the pomp of pontifical obsequies, his courtesy
and regard for Dr. Channing's memory was not forgotten, and the bell
which was so lately removed from the tower, where it had swung for half
a century, joined with that of the Cathedral in giving expression to the
general sorrow, and proved that no dogmatic differences had disturbed
the kindly spirit which Channing inculcated and had exemplified in his
blameless life.
Of the later history of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross I may not speak.
My youthful respect for it has in no degree diminished, and I shall
always consider it a substantial refutation of the old apothegm,
"Familiarity breeds contempt." There are, I doubt not, those who regard
that old edifice with deeper feelings than mine. Who can estimate the
affection and veneration in which it is held by those who may there have
found an asylum from harassing doubts, who have received from that font
the joy of a renovated heart, and from that altar the divine gift which
is at the same time a consolation for past sorrows and a renewal of
strength to tread the rough path of life!
I am told that it will not probably be long before the glittering cross
which the pure-hearted Cheverus placed upon the old church will be
removed, and the demolition of his only monument in Boston will be
effected. Permit me to conclude these reminiscences with the expression
of the hope that the new Cathedral of Boston will be an edifice worthy
of this wealthy city, and that it may contain some fitting memorial of
the remarkable man who exercised his beneficent apostolate among us
during more than a quarter of a century. The virtues which merited the
gratitude of the poor and the highest honours which pontiffs and kings
can bestow, ought not to go uncommemorated in the city which witnessed
their development, and never hesitated to give expression to its love
and veneration for their possessor. But whatever the new Cathedral may
be,--however glorious the skill of the architect, the sculptor, and the
painter may render it,--there are those in whose affections it will
never be able to replace the little unpretending church which Cheverus
built, and which the remembrance of his saintly life has embalmed in all
their hearts.