ALINE’S HOPES.
The second day after Louis’ departure, we had in the afternoon an
agreeable surprise: Aline called to see us. All that Louis had told us
about her prepossessed us in her favor. The sight of her only increased
our disposition to love her.
Aline was at the time I am speaking of—and still is—a fine-looking
woman, tall, well-formed, and with a pleasing, intelligent face. Her
manner is a little cold at first, but her reserve is not unpleasing,
for it indicates a thoughtful mind. When she came into the room, my
husband and I were reading. She went directly to Victor, and with
emotion, but without any embarrassment, said:
“Monsieur, I am late in expressing my gratitude. Pardon this delay.
It has not been without good reasons. I was expecting my father every
moment, and was greatly preoccupied with all I had to communicate, as
well as about the reply he would make.” ...
“Mademoiselle,” replied Victor gently, “there is no need of excusing
yourself. I am happy, very happy, to see you, but had no right to
expect your visit.”
“No right, monsieur?... What! did you not save my brother’s life?...
And was it not you the unhappy fellow had before” ...
“O mademoiselle! do me the favor never to mention that circumstance!”
“You are generous, monsieur! But that is no reason why we should show
ourselves ungrateful—rather the contrary. Louis and I can never forget
that, before you saved his life, he had injured you to such a degree
that he can never be sufficiently repentant. As to my father, I have
not dared inform him of these details too painful to be acknowledged.
My father, alas! is not religious. Louis’ fault would seem so enormous
to him that he would never forgive him.”
“It is, however, of but little account. If harm has resulted from it,
Louis was only the involuntary cause. Let us adore the divine decrees,
and forgive our poor friend. He had not, after all, any very criminal
intentions.”
Aline looked at Victor with a sadness she could not wholly conceal. His
wasted features, his eyes hollowed by suffering, his air of languor,
nothing escaped her observation.
“I wish I could think so,” murmured she, as if speaking to herself.
“Ah! poor Louis, what remorse he must feel!”
This allusion to Victor’s sad condition brought tears to my eyes.
Victor suspected my emotion, and at once changed the subject.
“M. Louis has become my friend,” said he to Aline; “therefore pardon my
curiosity, mademoiselle, if it is indiscreet. May we hope to see him
again soon? Is M. Beauvais greatly offended with him?”
Everything is arranged for the best, though not without difficulty.
My father was not originally wealthy. It has only been by dint of
order, economy, and industry, that he has attained the position
he now occupies. When he learned that Louis had lost, or rather
squandered, his maternal inheritance, his anger was fearful. But by
degrees I made him comprehend that Louis, though ruined, had shown new
resolution—that he was willing to work; he wished to become useful,
and regain all he had lost. My father then grew calm. And yet all my
fears were not allayed. I had to tell him of Louis’ sad attempt at
suicide, of which he was still ignorant, but which he could not fail to
learn. I told him of it, dwelling on your devotedness, which struck him
most of all.
“Has Louis shown himself duly grateful to M. Barnier for the service?”
he asked. I replied that he had.
“So much the better. Such a sentiment does him honor. This circumstance
may lead to a friendship between them which cannot be too intimate, in
my opinion. And you say our prodigal son is willing to work? What is he
going to do?”
“Anything you wish, father.”
“That is easily said, but a poor reply. Nothing is well done that we
do not like to do. Has he manifested an inclination for any special
occupation?”
“Louis is a civil engineer. He would like to find a place somewhere in
that capacity.”
“Ah! he at length remembers he is a civil engineer!... He wishes to
turn his acquirements to some account?... It is a wonder! He need not
exile himself for that. You know Mr. Smithson?”
“Is not he the cold, ceremonious gentleman who came to see us Sunday?”
“The very one. Mr. Smithson is a wealthy Englishman who has been in
France these twenty years. He came on account of his health. He settled
at first in Paris, where he married a charming woman—a Catholic of
no property, but of a good family. This excellent Mr. Smithson was
so foolish as to speculate too much at the Bourse some years since,
and his losses were considerable. To withdraw himself from such a
temptation, he established his residence at St. M—— six months ago.
The situation pleased him, and there was another inducement: a large
paper manufactory there was offered for sale. He bought it, hoping
not only to find occupation, and feed his incessant activity, but to
repair the losses of the last few years. The mill is well situated
and well patronized. Everything would prove advantageous if Mr.
Smithson were better versed in the knowledge of machinery. But though
an Englishman, he has not been through the studies necessary to enable
him to superintend his industrial project as he ought. Besides this, he
is subject to frequent attacks of the gout. He has therefore besought
me to find him a man capable of superintending the mill under his
direction, and even of taking the whole charge if necessary.”
“So much for Louis’ affairs. What do you think of the arrangement? I
approved of it without any restriction. And you, monsieur?”
“I think, mademoiselle,” replied Victor, “that Providence continues to
treat Louis with parental kindness.”
“Oh! yes; truly parental! He will now remain under your influence. Even
in the house he is to enter, everything will encourage him, I hope, to
persist in his good resolutions. Mme. Smithson is said to be a woman of
lovely character. She has a daughter who must be a prodigy, unless I
have been misinformed. My father, who is very practical, and but little
given to exaggeration, is enthusiastic in her praise.”
Victor knowingly smiled at this last communication.
“You have divined my thoughts,” said Aline, blushing a little. “Well,
yes: this thought at once occurred to my mind. I said to myself, if
Louis can find at Mr. Smithson’s not only an occupation that will
enable him to forget the past, but an affection that will continue to
sustain him in a better course, I shall consider him the most fortunate
of men. But it is too soon to speak of that. This dear brother must
first return home, and be accepted by Mr. Smithson, to whom my father
wrote to-day.”
The next day both these things took place. Louis returned. Mr. Smithson
at once accepted him as his assistant. After calling on us with his
father, he left for St. M——.
While M. Beauvais was speaking to me, Louis said to Victor, in a low
tone:
“Everything is done. The bonds of iniquity are completely broken. I
have been to confession and to Holy Communion, and a new life has
begun!”
The air of satisfaction with which he uttered these words, the calmness
and unaffected gravity he manifested, all announced he had indeed
become a new man.
“In a year he will be an eminent Christian!” said Victor, as Louis
disappeared.
He was not mistaken.
TO BE CONTINUED.
CONCILIAR DECREES ON THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.
FROM THE ETUDES RELIGIEUSES.
THE church has been commissioned to teach all mankind. It is by
preaching she fulfils this great work. But to aid her in this divine
mission, her Founder has furnished her with books written under the
inspiration of the Holy Ghost, which contain the very word of God
graven in ineffaceable characters. So precious a treasure has always
been preserved by the church with the respect it merits. Her doctors
have carefully weighed every word of these holy books; they have
taken pleasure in developing the different significations; and their
commentaries form the finest monuments of Christian literature. There,
as in a well-furnished arsenal, they have sought spiritual arms in
their warfare against the enemies of the faith, and they have defended
the Bible with unequalled zeal against all attacks and alterations
by heretics. The Scriptures have been the object of the fury of
persecutors, and more than one hero has shed his blood to defend them
from the insults of the unbeliever, and thereby had his name inscribed
on the glorious roll of the martyrology.
Protestantism, at its very birth, was desirous of profiting by this
respect of the Christian world. It affected an ardent zeal for the
sacred books, and, carrying its veneration beyond reasonable limits,
maintained that the Bible is the only rule of faith. But its very
exaggerations, by a law of Providence, have led it to the opposite
extreme. Three centuries have hardly elapsed, and the followers of
those who acknowledged no other rule of faith than the Bible, gradually
led to the verge of rationalism, accord a merely human authority to the
sacred volume.
Even from the very dawn of the Reformation, the pernicious influence
of free examination gave a deadly blow to the canon of Scripture.
Luther was the foremost. Everything in Holy Writ that conflicted with
his doctrines of wholly imputative justification, of free-will, and
the sacraments was boldly consigned among the apocryphal books. The
canon of Scripture, thus at the option of individuals, no longer had
any stability. Individual caprice led to the admission or rejection
of books that had been regarded as inspired from all antiquity. The
authenticity of the Scriptures was not only questioned, but also
their legitimate meaning. Luther denied the doctrinal authority of
the church, and was obliged to make the Bible the ground of faith;
that is, the Bible interpreted according to the particular notions
of each believer. In reality, Luther wished to subject his followers
to his own interpretation. Like rebels of every age, he arrogated an
authority he refused to legitimate power. But logic has its inevitable
laws. The Lutheran theory claimed absolute independence. It made all
Christians, even the most ignorant, even those the farthest from
the knowledge of the truth, judges of the real signification of the
Scriptures. It promised each believer the interior illumination of
the Holy Spirit in ascertaining the true meaning of the sacred text
beneath all its obscurities. But, as the divine Spirit is not pledged
to fulfil the promises of the Reformer, each Protestant interprets the
Bible according to his own views, and the various sects sprung from
the Reform have, in the name of the Scriptures, maintained the most
contradictory opinions.
Besides the change in the canon, and the false interpretation of the
holy books, there was another abuse—that of unfaithful translations.
Protestantism rejected the authority of the church, therefore it would
not receive her version of the Scriptures. It had no regard for the
Vulgate. The innovators, with Luther at their head, undertook new
translations. In their boldness, they did not shrink from attempting
to surpass the work of S. Jerome. They were not well versed in
the knowledge of the original idioms; they had access to but few
manuscripts; the copies they had were not the choicest; and yet they
imagined they could excel the great doctor who spent so large a part
of his life in Palestine, absorbed in the profound study of the
ancient languages; who took pains to collate the best manuscripts,
and was aided by the ancient rabbis the most versed in the knowledge
of Hebrew antiquities and in the languages of the East. Every day a
new translation appeared, which, under the pretext of adapting God’s
own Word to the common mind, diffused heretical novelties by means of
insidious falsifications.
The Reform was equally unscrupulous as to the correctness of the
text. The Bible was left to the arbitrariness of its editors and the
carelessness of printers. Through unscrupulousness or negligence,
many incorrect expressions crept into the versions sold to the
public. The new heresy was not wholly responsible for the numerous
faults in the various editions of the Bible. The sacred book had for
ages been subjected to all the hazards of individual transcription.
The distractions of the copyist had, in many instances, caused the
substitution of one word for another, the omission of a part of a
verse, or the transferring of the marginal gloss to the text. Hence so
many copies alike in the main, but full of discrepancies.
II
Such was the state of the Bible question at the opening of the Council
of Trent. Its importance could not escape the bishops who composed
that assembly, and the theologians who assisted them with their
acquirements, consequently it was the first proposed for consideration.
On the 8th of February, 1546, the fathers being assembled in general
congregation, Cardinal del Monte, the chief legate of the Holy See,
proposed the council should first consider the subject of the Holy
Scriptures, and make a recension of the canon, in order to determine
the arms to be used in the struggle against heresy, and also to thereby
show Catholics whereon their faith was grounded, many of whom lived
in deplorable ignorance on this point, seeing the same book accepted
by some as dictated by the Holy Spirit, and rejected by others as
spurious.[59] The president of the council afterwards determined the
principal points to be submitted to the consideration of the Fathers.
But this is not the place to review the account of this interesting
discussion. We will only state the results.
In the fourth session, held April 8, 1546, the council promulgated its
celebrated decree respecting the Holy Scriptures, which comprehended
two very distinct parts: the first, dogmatic; the second, disciplinary.
The dogmatic part established the authority of the sacred books in
matters of faith and morals, their divine origin, the canon, the
authenticity of the Vulgate, and the rules for interpreting the
inspired text.
The disciplinary prescriptions had reference to the use of the
Vulgate in the lessons, sermons, controversies, and commentaries; the
obligation of interpreting the Scriptures according to the unanimous
teachings of the Fathers; the respect to be paid to the divine Word,
and, consequently, the crime of those who apply it to profane, light,
or superstitious uses. The council likewise enacted severe laws against
publishers who issue the holy books, or commentaries on them, without
a written authorization of the ordinary, and against the vendors or
holders of prohibited editions; finally, it ordained that the Holy
Scriptures, especially the Vulgate, be henceforth printed with all
possible correctness.
To these prescriptions of the fourth session we will add the first
chapter of the decree of reform, continued in the fifth session,
ordering the institution of a course of Holy Scripture in certain
churches, in order that the Christian community might not be ignorant
of the salutary truths contained in the sacred volume. Such was the
reply to Protestant calumnies which accused the church of withholding
the sacred treasure of God’s Word from the faithful.
Such, briefly, were the labors of the Council of Trent with regard
to the Holy Scriptures. The importance of the decree of the fourth
session must not be estimated according to the brief place it occupies
in the canons, for, brief as it is, it has had an incalculable
influence on sacred science. This decree, in fact, gave rise to those
admirable works of criticism that have defended the authentic canon
against the attacks of heresy, and reduced the pretended discoveries
of Protestantism respecting the true canon of holy books to their
proper value; thence the number of excellent commentaries that for
three centuries have been enriching Catholic theology; and thence so
many apologetic works which have defended the truth of the Biblical
narrative against the false pretensions of rationalistic history.
To this same decree we owe the many learned researches concerning
the original text, the primitive versions regarded as genuine in the
ancient churches, and, above all, the incomparable edition of the
Vulgate—the result of thirty years’ labor by those most versed in the
study of sacred literature.
It would seem as if there were no necessity of reconsidering a question
so fully weighed by the Council of Trent. And yet the Fathers of the
Vatican also deemed it proper to take up the subject of the Holy
Scriptures, in order to reaffirm what had been defined by the Council
of Trent, to give greater prominence to points that the council had
left obscure, and to clear up some difficulties of interpretation that
had arisen within three centuries even among Catholic schools. The
dogmatic part of the decree of Trent alone was renewed and completed
by the Fathers of the Vatican. The exclusively doctrinal character of
the decree _Dei Filius_ admitted no reconsideration of the disciplinary
laws relating to the publishing of the holy books, or their
commentaries, and the abuses that might be made of the sacred text.
Besides, the penalties decreed by the Council of Trent were such as in
our day could not be put in execution, as they consisted not only of
spiritual censures, but pecuniary fines. The ecclesiastical authority,
deprived of its ancient tribunals, and living in the midst of a society
whose leading maxim is liberty of the press and liberty of conscience,
could not revive the old penalties. The Fathers of the Vatican also
omitted everything respecting the authenticity of the Vulgate. Many of
them, however, requested the council to ratify the decree of the fourth
session of Trent on this point, but the greater part of the bishops did
not deem it advisable to accede to the request. What, indeed, could
they add to that which had been so wisely defined by the Fathers of
Trent? Besides, is not the Vulgate received without protest by the
whole Catholic world as the only version recognized by the church as
authentic? As to the rationalists, it is not the translation of the
sacred books they attack, but the books themselves, their canonicity
and supernatural origin.
Laying aside, therefore, all these questions so important in
themselves, but which are not now points of controversy, the Council of
the Vatican only dwelt on the authority of the Scriptures, their divine
origin, the canon, and the rule of interpretation. On all these points
it had to oppose modern rationalism, and banish false and dangerous
theories from Catholic schools of theology.
III.
First, in opposition to rationalism, the council teaches that divine
revelation is comprised in the Scriptures and tradition. This was
declared in the same terms by the Council of Trent, but it was by no
means useless in these times to renew so fundamental a definition.
Modern science rejects revelation: to be consistent, it ought also
to reject its monuments. It regards the Holy Scriptures as merely of
human authority. It does not, it is true, imitate the cynicism of the
philosophers of the XVIIIth century: it does not make our holy books
the butt of their foolish railleries. On the contrary, it affects
a profound respect for them, though it refuses to accept them as
the organ of divine communications. It regards them as it would the
discourses of Socrates—as books full of admirable wisdom which every
philosopher ought to know and study, but which do not owe their origin
to inspiration, properly so-called, or to revelation.
Discussion as to such an error was impossible. The council had merely
to pass its judgment, and repeat what the church had taught its members
for eighteen centuries, as a fresh proof that the Christian faith does
not falter in encountering the many new forms of incredulity. Having
affirmed the truth of revelation, it was necessary to point out what
it was contained in, that the Christian might know where to study the
science of salvation. It says: “This supernatural revelation, according
to the belief of the universal church, as declared by the holy Council
of Trent, is contained in the written books and in the unwritten
traditions that have come down to us.”
But what books contain this revelation? Pursuing the subject, the
council defined anew the canon of Scripture, which the state of the
times made, if not necessary, at least very opportune. Protestant
critics have not ceased since the Reformation to attack the canon
sanctioned by the authority of the church. Rationalism has come to the
support of Protestant criticism, and sometimes flatters itself it has,
by its historical discoveries, blotted out the entire list of the
holy books. The unadulterated traditions preserved by the church have
no scientific value in the eyes of rationalism, which only admits the
canonicity of those books that can trace the proofs of their origin
back to the very time of the apostles. Tertullian took a wrong stand in
asserting that the dogmas of faith should have prescriptive proof. In
vain the Catholic points out the wholly exceptional circumstances that
surround the Scriptural canon—the impossibility from the very first
of admitting books of doubtful origin as coming from the apostles,
or that these books could have been changed in any respect under the
jealous guardianship of a church and hierarchy spread over the face of
the earth, and charged with the conservation of the sacred deposit.
The incredulous critic refuses to receive proofs which the most common
mind perceives the full value of as well as the good sense. What does
he substitute for them? Theories founded on mere conjecture, and
constantly changing, but which are welcomed as the final conclusions
of science. Have we not seen the school of Tübingen found on some
obscure words of Papias a whole system tending to establish the more
recent composition of the Gospels? These new doctors regard the books
of divine truth as some of those legends that are embellished as they
pass from mouth to mouth till they are collected in a definite form by
some unknown writer. And has not this strange theory met with ardent
panegyrists in France, as if it were the definite solution of the great
controversy on the origin of the Gospels?[60]
Whoever attentively examines these strange theories will soon perceive
their weak point. But where are the men in the present generation who
read with sufficient care to see the hollowness of such solutions?
Their authors have seats in our academies; they occupy the most
important professorships; there is not an honorary distinction that
does not add its recommendation to their apparent knowledge. Skilled in
praising one another, the journals and reviews regarded as authorities,
even by certain Catholics, extol their labors. One would think they had
a monopoly of science. Has not all this been a source of real danger to
the faith of Christians?
The church had to counteract the influence of a criticism as bold as
it was easy, by her immutable decrees. It must once more affirm the
ancient canon of Scripture. This catalogue of the sacred books had
been solemnly approved at the end of the IVth century, in a celebrated
decree of the Councils of Hippo and Carthage, in which the Fathers
declared they received this canon from their ancestors in the faith. A
little later, Pope S. Innocent I. sent this same canon of Scripture to
S. Exuperius, the illustrious Bishop of Toulouse. S. Gelasius, in 494,
included it in his synodical decree. Finally, the Council of Florence,
in its decree relating to the Jacobites, and, at a later period, the
Council of Trent, sanctioned it by their supreme authority. Several
of the Fathers of Trent proposed to subject it to a re-examination;
not in order to retrench anything, but to satisfy the heretical, and
convince them by such a discussion that the Church of Rome had not
lightly decided on the list of the inspired books. But a large majority
of the Fathers thought, and with reason, that such a discussion
was appropriate to schools of Catholic theology, but to a council
it belonged to pronounce authoritatively. The canon of Scripture,
being a dogma of faith, formally defined by popes and councils, and
consequently unchangeable, could only be proclaimed anew and without
discussion.[61] The Council of the Vatican came to a like decision,
and, in declaring its acceptance of the canon of the Council of Trent,
with each of its books, in all the parts, it strengthened the faith of
Christians against the shameful pretensions of false science.
This course has shocked the Protestant historian of the council. M.
de Pressensé is indignant at so summary a procedure. “The council,”
he says, “has fallen into a profound and dangerous error on two
important points. In the first place, it proclaims the indisputable
canonicity of all the books of the Vulgate, including the Apocrypha[62]
of the Old Testament, thus showing it regards the immense labors of
the critics of the XIXth century as of no account, and acknowledging
that it is not permitted, for example, to question the origin of the
Gospel of Matthew, or the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, by
referring to such and such an expression of a Father of the IId and
IIId centuries.[63]The Catholic Church is thus prevented anew from
taking any part in the great work of Christian science of our day,
which consists in establishing a safeguard to the true canon of Holy
Scripture by free and conscientious research. What confidence can we
have in Catholic theology, on those points disputed by rationalism,
like the authenticity of the fourth Gospel? Examination, even, is
forbidden. Everything must be accepted in a lump. How much valuable
co-operation is thus lost or made fruitless through the council!”[64]
The church, then, at the bidding of this Protestant theologian, should
renounce her right to decide on the true Scriptures, and give up the
canon to the researches of rationalistic science, and this in order
to provide a safeguard for this same canon. An amusing idea, to give
up the catalogue of holy books to the caprice of incredulous critics
in order to preserve it intact! And besides, what new documents can
rationalistic science bring to light not perfectly known and considered
by the Catholic theologians of the last three centuries? Catholic
doctors have seen and weighed these difficulties as fully, to say
the least, as Protestant critics, but they have not thought a few
obscurities ought, scientifically, to outweigh immemorial prescription,
or, dogmatically, the perpetual usage of the church and the decrees of
councils.
Rationalism, on the contrary, appeals to obscure passages, or hasty
conclusions sometimes to be met with in the Fathers, in order to
exclude books from the Scriptural canon that have been venerated from
time immemorial as inspired. On which side is the real scientific
method? If historical records merit any confidence in spite of
difficulties of detail, no person of sincerity would hesitate to give
the preference to the theological rather than the rationalistic method.
As to the reproach made against the church for confining criticism
within such narrow limits as to stifle it, nothing is more contrary
to experience. The Council of Trent likewise decided on the canon of
Scripture, and yet what extensive labors, how many learned works,
have been published within three centuries in reply to the attacks of
Protestantism, and in order to establish the authenticity of the books
rejected by the Reformer! No, indeed; the church, in defining the
canon of Scripture, does not discourage the researches of the learned
respecting the Bible. The love of sacred literature, in the first
place, and also the necessity of defending Catholic belief against the
constantly renewed attacks of heterodox criticism, will keep Catholic
apologists constantly at work. The church, in maintaining its canon,
directs their labors, but without putting any restraint on their
abilities.
IV.
Besides reaffirming the ancient decrees relating to the canon of
Scripture, the Council of the Vatican has completed and explained more
clearly what faith requires us to believe respecting the origin of the
holy books. This point had not been fully decided. The wants of the
times had not before required it. But the attacks of rationalism, and
the misinterpretations of semi-rationalism, required a more definite
decision in order to put an end to dangerous teachings even in Catholic
schools.
Christians have from the beginning believed God to be the author of
the Holy Scriptures. The Fathers of the fourth Council of Carthage, in
the profession of faith required of the new bishops, expressly made
mention of this truth. The same profession of faith is made in our day
by those who are promoted to the episcopate. Pope S. Leo IX., in the
profession of faith to which he required Peter of Antioch to subscribe,
declared God to be the author of the Old and New Testaments, including
the law, the prophets, and the apostolic books. The Council of Florence
inserted this same article in the decree about the Jacobites: The most
holy Roman Church “confesses that it is one and the same God who is the
author of the Old and the New Testament; that is to say, the law, the
prophets, and the Gospel; the saints of both Testaments having spoken
under the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit.” Finally, the Council
of Trent, renewing the decree of Florence, accepted all the canonical
books of the two Testaments, God being the author of them both: _Cum
utriusque unus Deus sit auctor_. Besides, all these decrees were only
an expansion of the words of the Nicene Creed: _Qui locutus est per
prophetas_.
The Catholic dogma is explicit: “God is the author of the books
of the Old and the New Testament.” The definitions of the ancient
councils had for their direct object the condemnation of the errors
of the Manichees, who made a distinction between the two Testaments,
attributing the first to the evil principle, the second to the true
God. But, secondarily, these definitions, referring to the actual
origin of the Holy Scriptures, declare they have God for their author.
The Council of Florence gave this explanation: “Because the saints of
both Testaments wrote under the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit.”
But what is meant by inspiration? An important question, on which not
only Protestants differ from Catholics, but on which even orthodox
writers are not agreed.
To say what Protestantism understands by the inspiration of the
Scriptures would be difficult, or, to speak more correctly, impossible.
In a system where all belief is founded on free examination, there
must be an infinite variety of doctrinal opinions. The first Reformers
understood the inspiration of the holy books in the strictest
sense—every word of Scripture was sacred. Now, Protestantism, even
the most orthodox, allows greater latitude. Constrained to make more
or less concession to the encroaching spirit of rationalism, it takes
refuge in vague expressions that leave one in doubt as to the part
God had in the composition of the sacred books. Here is a pastor who
considers himself orthodox, and boasts of remaining faithful to the
principles of Luther and Calvin; he enters upon the subject of the
Scriptures, and speaks at length on the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.
Nevertheless, in these holy books inspired by God, he admits the
possibility of complete error when there is any question of history or
science which does not touch directly on religious dogmas or precepts.
Even in what relates to religious truth, inspiration, to him, is
reduced to I know not what particular assistance granted those who
had witnessed the life of Christ, in relating what they had seen and
heard.[65]
According to this theory, every way so vague, we ask ourselves, What
was the nature of the inspiration imparted to the Evangelists SS. Mark
and Luke, who were not witnesses of our Saviour’s deeds, but merely
related what they had heard from others; what was the nature of that
imparted to S. Paul, who had never seen Christ, and took something very
different for the subject of his epistles from the acts and discourses
of the Redeemer?
The incertitudes of Protestantism had pervaded more than one Catholic
school, especially in Germany. Jahn, in his introduction to the books
of the Old Testament, confounds inspiration with assistance. A book
composed by the mere light of reason and pure human industry might be
placed on the catalogue of Holy Writ, if the church declared God had
preserved the writer from all error in the composition of the work.
Who does not see the falseness of a system which would include all the
dogmatic decrees of the popes and councils in the canon of Scripture?
Others confound inspiration with revealed truth. Every book written
according to the precise spirit of divine revelation could be placed
in the canon. According to this, not only the definitions of popes and
councils, but many ascetic works, sermons, and catechisms, might be
reckoned among the Holy Scriptures.
Finally, others, desirous of explaining the difference to be seen in
the various books of the Bible, think several kinds of inspiration
are to be distinguished. Sometimes the truths the sacred writer had
to record were above human comprehension, or at least unknown to him,
and could only be learned by actual revelation. The inspiration God
accords for this class of truths supersedes all effort on the part
of the writer. It is a suggestive inspiration, or, as it is called,
_antecedent_.
If the sacred writer was himself aware of the facts he related, and the
philosophical maxims he proposed to insert in his book, or if he had
drawn from any other source the truths he undertook to record, he had
no need of suggestive inspiration. His book, however, is to be regarded
as the work of God if he received special assistance to guide him in
the choice of the truths he recorded, and prevent him from making any
mistake in expressing himself. This is what is called _concomitant_
inspiration.
Finally, suppose a work composed by mere human wisdom, without any
other participation on the part of God than general assistance, and
it comes to pass that God, by the testimony of his prophets, or the
voice of the church, declares this book exempt from error, it is
thereby endowed with infallible authority, and may be reckoned among
the Scriptures. This kind of approval has been styled, though very
improperly, _subsequent_ inspiration.
These three distinct kinds of inspiration have been taught by eminent
theologians, such as Sixtus of Sienna (_Biblioth. Sac._ l. viii. Hæres,
12 ad. obj. sept.), Bonfrère (_Proloq._ c. viii.), Lessius and Hamel
(_Hist. Congreg. de Auxiliis_, a Livino de Meyere, l. i. c. ix.). But
these doctors never actually applied this distinction to the books that
compose the canon of Scripture. It was for them a mere question of
possibility: could books thus authentically approved have a place in
the Scriptural canon? They replied in the affirmative. But are there
actually any of our holy books that are wholly due to human industry,
and which God has declared sacred by subsequent approval? We give
Lessius’ opinion: “Though I do not believe this kind of inspiration
produced any of our canonical books, I do not think it impossible”
(_loc. cit._).
But the wise reserve of these great theologians has not been imitated
by all. A learned German professor, who is likewise a highly esteemed
author, has not hesitated to apply the distinction of these three
kinds of inspiration to the existing books: “The kind of inspiration,”
he says, “that produced such and such a book, or such and such a
passage, it is almost impossible to determine in particular. We can
only say that the parts where we read, _Thus saith the Lord_, or a
similar formula, probably belong to the first kind of inspiration; the
historical narrations that came under the writer’s observation belong
to the third (subsequent inspiration); the poetical books seem to come
under the second (concomitant inspiration).”[66]
These systems, it is manifest, weaken one’s idea of the inspiration
of the sacred volume as always understood by the church. We want an
inspiration by virtue of which the book is really the work of God,
and not of man—the truths it contains of divine, and not of human,
origin: man is the instrument, he who dictates is the Holy Ghost:
man lends his hand and pen, the Spirit of truth puts them in action.
But in the systems referred to, it is not really God who speaks: it
is man. Supernatural testimony gives indeed a divine authority to a
book, but it could not make God the author of what was really composed
by man. And though these writings should contain the exact truths
of revelation, they would be as much the result of human wisdom as
sermons, catechisms, ascetic books, and even the creeds and decrees of
councils which clearly state the doctrines of the church.
It was the duty of the council to put an end to interpretations which,
depriving the sacred books of the prestige of divine origin, diminished
their authority among the faithful. It has therefore defined what every
Catholic must believe concerning the degree of inspiration accorded to
the sacred writers. This definition is first stated in a negative form:
“The church holds them (the Holy Scriptures) as sacred and canonical,
not for the reason that they have been compiled by mere human industry,
and afterwards approved by her authority; nor only because they contain
revelation without error.” To this definition in a negative form
succeeds a positive one, in which the council declares the essential
condition of a book’s being placed in the canon of Scripture—“because,
having been written under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, they
have God for their author”: _propterea quod Spiritu Sancto inspirante
conscripti, Deum habent auctorem_.
The council, therefore, by this dogmatic definition, has excluded
any other meaning to the inspiration of the Scriptures that does not
ascribe them to the special agency of God. The schools are still free
to discuss what this divine operation consists in, and the conditions
on which a book may be said to have God for its author. But they must
first reject every explanation that reduces the agency of God to mere
assistance, and, still more, to subsequent approbation. It is in this
sense we must understand the fourth canon of the second series: “If any
one shall refuse to receive for sacred and canonical the books of the
Holy Scriptures in their integrity, with all their parts, according as
they were enumerated by the Holy Council of Trent, or shall deny that
they are inspired by God, let him be anathema.” It is the same anathema
pronounced by the Council of Trent, to which the Council of the Vatican
has added the express mention of the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.
There are other important observations to be made concerning this
definition. Though by no means favorable to the system of Sixtus of
Sienna, Bonfrère, and Lessius, it does not, however, condemn them in
formal terms. These theologians, as we have said, only considered the
subject _in abstracto_: Would subsequent inspiration or approbation
give a book a right to be placed in the canon?—a verbal question
rather than one of doctrine. It is certain that such a book would
have a sacred authority, but it is also certain that it could not be
called the work of God in the same sense as the holy books now in
our possession. The council, in its definition, only considered the
actual point; it declared all the books of our canon have God for
their author, because the Holy Ghost was the chief agent in their
composition. But the opinion of the modern exegete who applies the
doctrine of subsequent approbation to the books contained in our actual
canon appears to us really condemned by the new definition.
Now, the decree of the Vatican does not forbid the division of the
holy books into several classes according as the truths they contain
are recorded by the writer as a special revelation, or from knowledge
acquired by his natural faculties. But this distinction does not
infringe on the overruling agency of God in the composition of the book.
Finally, the question of verbal inspiration, so often discussed by
theologians, remains as free since the council as before. It is not
necessary for a ruler who issues a decree to dictate every expression,
but merely the substance of the new law: the secretary clothes it in
his own style. The latter is not a mere copyist: he, too, is the author
of the decree, but in a secondary sense. It is the same with regard to
the Holy Scriptures. The Holy Spirit suggests the truths to be recorded
in the prophecy, and directs the writer, but David and Isaias clothe
them in their own royal style, Amos in his rustic language.
V.
We come now to the question of the interpretation of the holy books.
On this point, also, the Council of the Vatican has renewed and
completed the decree of the Council of Trent, which, in its fourth
session, endeavored to check the boldness, or, to make use of its
own expression, the restlessness of the free-thinkers of the age.
Protestants are constantly appealing to the Scriptures, but to the
Scriptures according to private interpretation. Agreed merely in
their opposition to the church and its doctrines, they are divided
infinitely as to the signification of the simplest texts. The strangest
interpretations are daily astonishing the faith of the believer, and
giving rise to scandals among Christians. To obviate this abuse, the
Council of Trent made the following decree: “In order to restrain
restless spirits, the council decrees that no one, relying on his own
wisdom in matters of faith and morals pertaining to the edification of
the Christian doctrine, shall wrest the Holy Scripture according to his
own private notions, and have the boldness to interpret it contrary to
the true sense in which it has been and is held by our holy mother, the
church, to whom it belongs to judge of the interpretation of the Holy
Scriptures, or contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.”
This decree, as to its form, is chiefly disciplinary: it prohibits
interpreting the Scriptures contrary to the definition of the church
and the unanimous opinion of the Fathers in all that relates to faith
and morals.
This disciplinary prescription is based on a dogmatic principle which
the Council of Trent did not define, but which it referred to as an
incontestable truth: to wit, that to the church it belongs to judge
of the true meaning of the Scriptures: _cujus est judicare de vero
sensu et interpretatione Scripturarum sanctarum_. This truth is the
necessary consequence of the supreme magistracy of the faith. All
Catholics venerate the church as the depository of revealed truth,
and consequently of the Scriptures. But the deposit is not merely a
material one. The Christian receives the Scriptures from her, first,
because it is by her testimony he is assured of the true canon, that
they have God for their author, and that he is enabled to distinguish
the real text from the inaccuracies that have, in the course of time,
been introduced by the carelessness of copyists, as well as the
unscrupulousness of heretics. Moreover, he receives them from the
church, because through her he is made aware of their true meaning.
What would it avail him to possess the inspired volume, if, like the
book in the Apocalypse, it were sealed with seven seals? And who has
the power to break these seals but the church—bride of the Lamb?
In vain Protestantism repeats that the Scriptures are plain in
themselves, or, at least, that the interior illumination of the Holy
Spirit renders them intelligible to all. If this is really the case,
why, whenever the voice of the church is unheeded, the infinite number
of ways of interpreting the same passages? How was it that Calvin
plainly saw a mere figure of the Presence in the passage relating to
the Eucharist, when Luther clearly understood it to mean the Real
Presence? Would the Holy Spirit speak to Luther in one way, and to
Calvin in another entirely opposite? Whatever the Reformers may say,
the Scriptures are full of obscurity. The truths of salvation they
contain are not expressed in the didactic manner of a theological
treatise. The truths are there, but veiled in mystery, expressed in a
language now dead, and full of allusions to a history and to customs
widely differing from ours, as well as to the institutions and local
circumstances of a nation no longer existing. Private research would,
no doubt, enable a small number of men of intelligence and learning
to comprehend many parts of our holy books; but this means is not
accessible to the masses, who would remain for ever deprived of the
truths contained in the Scriptures if there were not on earth an
authorized interpreter of the divine text. What certitude would the
learned themselves have on this point without the help of the church?
How many divergent opinions would not liberty of interpretation
produce! It was, therefore, necessary that the church, when entrusted
with the Scriptures, should at the same time receive power to
interpret them authentically. This is why the Council of Trent forbids
interpreting them contrary to the defined meaning of the church.
Now, the church acquits itself of its duties as interpreter in two
ways: by solemn definitions, and by the ordinary teachings of its
doctors. The definitions of the church are not, in fact, restricted
to the declaration of dogmatic decisions: they often decide the real
meaning of the Scriptures. Thus we see the Council of Trent is not
satisfied with defining the divine institution and existence of the
sacrament of Extreme Unction: it also declares that the well-known
words of the Apostle S. James refer to this sacrament, and designate
its ministry, its matter, its form, and its effects.[67] In like
manner, with regard to the sacrament of Penance, not content with
defining its existence, it declares, in the first chapter of the
fourteenth session, that our Lord referred to this sacrament when,
addressing his disciples, he said: _Quorum remiseritis peccata_. We
could point out many other passages of Scripture of a similar nature
which the Council of Trent and other councils have authentically
defined the meaning of.
But the interpretation of the sacred text is more frequently shown
by the usage of the church, especially in its liturgy, and by the
unanimous or almost unanimous teachings of the Fathers and doctors.
It was thus the meaning of the passages concerning the Eucharist were
clearly determined by the liturgy, the writings of the Fathers, the
teachings of the schools, and the general sentiment of the Christian
world a long time before it was expressly defined by the Council of
Trent. In the same way, the church did not wait for the definition of
the Council of the Vatican to regard the promises of Christ to S. Peter
as made to the See of Rome, and including the essential prerogatives of
the Pontifical power.
Such was the twofold manner of defining the meaning of the Scriptures
the Council of Trent had in view when it forbade their interpretation
on points of faith and morals contrary to the sense in which they are
held by holy church and the unanimous consent of the Fathers.
This decree appears sufficiently explicit. And yet semi-rationalism
found two ways of eluding its bearing. The first was to regard this
part of the decree of the fourth session as purely disciplinary,
doubtless necessary in the condition of Christendom at the time of
the Council of Trent, but susceptible of being afterwards modified.
Now, in our day, the Catholic faith is no longer attacked as it once
was through the authority of the Scriptures. Knowledge has increased.
The commentator is forced to be mindful of the progress of human
intelligence, and to reconcile the meaning of the Scriptures with the
discoveries of the age. If one persists in asserting that the decree of
the council relates to faith as well as discipline, semi-rationalism
has recourse to another evasion: it understands this decree merely
in a negative sense; namely, that it is not lawful to interpret the
Scriptures contrary to the Catholic belief, which does not imply any
obligation to regard the meaning the church attaches to a passage
of Scripture as an article of faith. According to this rule, the
Catholic theologian could not interpret any text in opposition to the
existence of the sacrament of Extreme Unction, but, notwithstanding the
declarations of the Council of Trent, he would remain within the bounds
of orthodoxy, even if he denied that the words of S. James had any
reference to this sacrament.
Such is the half-way manner in which unsubmissive souls flatter
themselves they can remain true to the faith without accepting the
teachings of the church. For a long time this doctrine was practically
followed, though not formally stated. We will give an example. In the
XVIIth century, the Oratorian, Richard Simon, carried the boldness of
his criticisms to such an extreme that he openly acknowledged he made
no account of traditional interpretation, the authority of the Fathers,
and the teachings of the church; pretending to correct, according
to the Hebrew or Greek text, the meaning constantly followed by the
doctors of the church. Our readers are well aware with what vigor
Bossuet attacked a system so thoroughly Protestant.[68]
But this way of understanding the decree of the Council of Trent was
in direct opposition to the terms in which it is conceived. The form
doubtless is disciplinary, but the foundation of this law is expressly
stated, and is wholly dogmatic: _Cujus (ecclesiæ) est judicare de vero
sensu et interpretatione Scripturarum sanctarum_. This was not a mere
disciplinary prescript made for the first time by the council, but the
reminder of an obligation imposed on all Christians by the very nature
of revelation and the authority of the church.
If it is not true that this decree is purely disciplinary, it is
still less so that it should be understood in a mere negative sense,
as if the council only intended forbidding the interpretation of the
Scriptures contrary to the express dogmas or even the definitions of
the church and the unanimous opinion of the Fathers. The principle
on which this decree is founded goes still further: “It is to the
church it belongs to judge of the true sense and interpretation of
the Holy Scriptures.” Consequently, we ought not only to refrain from
contradicting her authentic interpretation, but should regard her as
our guide, and her decision in matters of interpretation as binding on
every Christian, so that he would fall into heresy who should refuse to
accept the meaning of a passage of Scripture as defined by holy church.
Such is the evident meaning of the decree of the Council of Trent.
This truth is so manifest that the profession of faith by Pius IV.
substitutes the positive and general form for the negative and
restrictive terms of the decree: “I also admit the Holy Scriptures
according to that sense which our Holy Mother the church hath held
and doth hold, to whom it belongeth to judge of the true sense and
interpretation of the Scriptures; neither will I ever take and
interpret them otherwise than according to the unanimous consent
of the Fathers.” Here the teachings of the church and the opinions
of the Fathers are plainly made the positive and authentic rule of
interpretation.
There could be no doubt as to the meaning of the Fathers of Trent.
But a controversy having arisen on a point of so much importance, the
Fathers of the Vatican were forced to explain this decree in such a way
as to prevent any ambiguity. They did so in these terms: “And since
those things which the Council of Trent has declared by wholesome
decree concerning the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures, in order
to restrain restless spirits, are explained by some in a wrong sense;
we, renewing the same decree, declare this to be the mind of the synod:
that, in matters of faith and morals which pertain to the edification
of Christian doctrine, that is to be held as the true sense of the
sacred Scripture which Holy Mother Church, to whom it belongs to judge
of the true sense and interpretation of the sacred Scriptures, has held
and holds: and therefore that no one may interpret the sacred Scripture
contrary to this sense or contrary to the unanimous consent of the
Fathers.”
It follows from the definition of the Vatican that the decree of the
Council of Trent was not purely disciplinary, but likewise dogmatic:
that consequently it was not intended for a particular epoch and
exceptional circumstances, but was the expression of a divine law
applicable to every age, and as lasting as the church and the world;
that this decree not only forbids understanding the Scriptures contrary
to the belief and interpretation of the church, but makes it a positive
obligation to accept the meaning the church attaches to the sacred
text; in short, that the disciplinary law is founded on a dogmatic
truth which makes the authentic interpretation of the church a rule of
faith to which every mind should submit in the study of Holy Writ.
It is thus the Council of the Vatican has renewed, explained, and
completed the definitions of the Council of Trent touching the great
question of the Scriptures. The second chapter of the Constitution
_Dei Filius_, in addition to the decree of the fourth session of the
Council of Trent, henceforth forms the basis of theological teachings
in everything relating to Biblical science.
MYTHS AND MYTH-MONGERS.[69]
This bald, unjointed chat of his, my lord, I answered
indirectly—_Shakespeare, Henry IV._
AUTHORS are proverbially not the best judges of their own works. It is
as rare, therefore, as it is gratifying to meet with one whose verdict
on his own production exactly coincides with that of the critic. Such
a fortunate concurrence of opinion between the writer and the person
to whose lot it has fallen to pass sentence on a work for a certain
portion of the public, relieves the latter gentleman of a vast amount
of responsibility, and renders his difficult task infinitely lighter
and more pleasant than such a task generally proves to be.
When, then, Mr. Fiske, the author of _Myths and Myth-Makers_, is kind
enough gratuitously to inform us in his preface that the “series
of papers” of which his book is composed is “somewhat rambling and
unsystematic,” it can be considered no injustice to him, and no
presumption on our part, to say that we cordially agree with him.
And when he further informs us that, “in order to avoid confusing
the reader with intricate discussions, he has sometimes cut the
matter short by expressing himself with dogmatic definiteness where a
sceptical vagueness might perhaps have been more becoming,” we find
nothing whatever to object to in this statement, with the solitary
exception of the word “perhaps,” which, if suppressed, would bring it
nearer the exact truth.
However, Mr. Fiske has here furnished us with a very fair idea, of
what the reader is to expect from his _Myths_. He himself has passed
sentence on himself. He tells us practically that we must not expect
too much from his “rambling” papers; he forestalls, if he does not
deprecate, criticism by assuring us at the outstart that his fault
has not been on the side of modesty of opinion and judicial weighing
of what he set forth. What, then, is left for the critic to do but to
confirm the self-condemnation of the author?
But we cannot allow Mr. Fiske to escape us in this fashion. Mr. Fiske
is an M.A., and Mr. Fiske is an LL.B., and a professor, and a professor
of philosophy—at Harvard, too. So that, although the dates so
carefully affixed to the end of each of his “rambling and unsystematic”
papers indicate that Mr. Fiske knocked this book off in three months,
still three months of philosophic chaff from a Harvard professor ought
surely to contain some grains of wheat.
The book in itself is not an uninteresting one. It is chock-full of
mythical stories, or folk-lore, or whatever people may please to
call what in our younger days we should have comprised under the one
delicious head of fairy-tales. To be sure, the stories were all told
before and by somebody else; but then, Mr. Fiske gives everybody
due credit, and confines his own portion of the work to a running
commentary with an undercurrent of foot-notes, and all sorts of
quotations, from the Rig-Veda down to Jack and Jill. We cannot in
justice say that Mr. Fiske’s portion is as interesting as the myths
themselves, though partaking considerably of their character.
But to come to the point—what does Mr. Fiske mean by his book? What
idea would he convey to us? What would he have us infer from it? “A
book’s a book, although there’s nothing in’t.”
If it is suggestive of anything at all, it is this: all or the chief
portion of the great myths of antiquity refer to the struggle between
darkness and light. It was the phenomenon of night and day which
puzzled people in the dawn of the world, ages before men possessed the
great blessing of this XIXth century, which blessing is, according to
Mr. Fiske, _via_ M. Littré, “scientific faith,” seemingly the only sure
thing in this enlightened age.
Some people might require a definition of this wonderful faith of
modern invention; but then, some people always will ask disagreeable
questions. For their benefit, it may be said to mean taking nothing for
fact or truth except what you can arrive at, or prove, or demonstrate
by a scientific process: in plain English, no faith at all.
Mr. Fiske then takes up this theory: that all men, being puzzled by
this daily phenomenon of light and darkness, day and night, and having
no “scientific faith” to guide them, and nothing better (Mr. Fiske
will pardon us this little bit of heresy against the XIXth century)
to supply its place, set to thinking and endeavoring to solve this
tremendous problem. They were all a dreadful sort of people all the
world over: they “knew nothing about laws of nature, nothing about
physical forces, nothing about the relations of cause and effect,
nothing about the necessary regularity of things.” As a set-off against
all these “nothings,” they possessed a something in the shape of “an
unlimited capacity for believing and fancying, because fancy and
belief had not yet been checked and headed off in various directions
by established rules of experience.” To all of which, and a great deal
more of the same nature, we feel very much inclined to append that
awkward _Q. E. D._ of the geometry which somebody would tag on to the
end of those beautiful propositions at school, and which our professor
terrified us by translating, “Which must be proved.”
Mr. Fiske, then, having set this profound and eternal conundrum before
the crazed intellects of the human race, which were gifted, according
to him, with nothing but this “unlimited capacity for believing and
fancying”—one would imagine that there might have been room for
Revelation here; but Revelation, of course, clashes with “scientific
faith,” and is therefore a myth in Mr. Fiske’s eyes—what were the
poor beings to do but endow everything, particularly the sun, with the
“volition” which they felt within themselves? How or why this _must_
have been so Mr. Fiske fails to explain, or indeed that it was so
at all. However, just for argument’s sake, let us take his word for
it, though by so doing we are false to scientific faith. Mr. Fiske’s
proposition, then, runs thus: Given the sun, and given the people with
eyes to gaze at the sun, the people must necessarily have endowed the
sun with “volition,” and worshipped the sun as a god. Once more, _Q. E.
D._
Hence Mr. Fiske proceeds to argue: “The conception of infallible skill
in archery, which underlies such a great variety of myths and popular
fairy-tales, is originally derived from the inevitable victory of the
sun over his enemies, the demons of night, winter, and tempest. Arrows
and spears which never miss their mark, swords from whose blow no
armor can protect, are invariably the weapons of solar divinities or
heroes.” Consequently, Mr. Fiske is cruel enough to knock on the head a
considerable number of fictitious characters who were much better known
and loved by us years ago than many real characters to-day. He levels
his shaft tipped with scientific faith, whiz!—and down drop William
Tell, William of Cloudeslee, Beth-Gellert, Jack and the Beanstalk,
Roland, Sir Bedivere, Ulysses, Achilles, Balder the Beautiful,
Hercules, and a whole host of other famous heroes—or rather they
mount, for one and all represented the sun, and were types and figures
of his solar majesty.
Well, though we grieve to say it, it may be so; but the consolation
is still left us that, even if it be so, “it’s of no consequence,” as
our old friend Mr. Toots was wont sagaciously to remark. There is so
much of reality around us, and so much real sham, to speak a paradox,
to wing with our arrows, to shoot at all our lifelong and make no
visible impression on, that we have neither time, nor inclination, nor
patience to bother our brains with wire-drawn theories as to whether
Tell was Tell or the sun; whether a man ever performed the impossible
feat of piercing an apple, which happened to be on his boy’s head, with
a shaft or not, or whether a dog was killed by its master in mistake.
Such things may serve to amuse children or people who can find nothing
better to occupy their time. So far there is nothing to object to in
it. But when a man takes every imaginable story, collects them all as
he would old fossils, and tickets each off with a bad explanation,
or throws them together into a bag, as it were, and, charlatan-like,
shakes them all up in order to see if by any chance they might tumble
out in a shape antagonistic to Christianity, a work which, in view of
the many realities around us, is rubbish at the best, becomes in Mr.
Fiske’s hands rubbish at the worst.
For he does not hold to his tether; he will go out of his way to drag
religion into a place where, if it must enter, it shows itself, as
always, full of majesty, and beauty, and sublime truth, but not a thing
of ridicule, as this writer, by hint, and innuendo, and insinuating
little foot-note, and sly little chuckle, and weak little laugh, and
wit of the very smallest, would make it.
“The religious myths of antiquity, and the fireside legends of ancient
and modern times, have their common roots in the mental habits of
primeval humanity. They are the earliest recorded utterances of men
concerning the visible phenomena of the world into which they were
born.”
Now, there is nothing particularly startling in this passage; it is
just such an one as the reader might or might not assent to, being
really utterly careless on the subject. He would scarcely stop to
inquire how far Mr. Fiske’s “religious myths of antiquity” extended.
There is a seemingly unconscious vagueness about the phrase that
allows it to pass without question. And Mr. Fiske’s theories, if we
may dignify them by such a title, run on smoothly enough in killing
Beth-Gellert for the thousandth time, and bringing his powerful mind
and the infallible test of his “scientific faith” to bear on old
nursery jingles—such, for instance, as:
“Jack and Jill went up the hill
To get a pail of water;
Jack fell down and broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after.”
“This may read like mere nonsense,” says Mr. Fiske. Again we agree
with him it may; but the rising smile fades on the lip when met by the
solemn assurance immediately following: “But there is a point of view
from which it may be safely said that there is very little absolute
nonsense in the world.”
We grieve to say that the thought which struck us immediately on
reading this aphorism of Mr. Fiske’s was that, if one thing more than
another could tend to make us dubious as to its truth, it would be the
perusal of his own book. But _revenons_: “The story is a venerable
one,” he proceeds _in re_ “Jack and Jill.” “They—the children—fall
away from one another as the moon wanes, and their water-pail
symbolizes the supposed connection of the moon with rainstorms.”
Leaving our readers to ponder over this profound mystery so solemnly
set forth by the author, dazzled and bewildered, doubtless, by this
latest exhibition of moonshine, we pass from it to other things. It is
of a piece with all the author’s deductions, and as fair a sample as
any other of the ingenuity of his argument and the profundity of his
conclusions. We do not attempt to refute them; that task is above us;
we leave such questions to be argued out in their more fitting sphere,
where the characters in the story are best known and believed in—the
nursery.
To all this sort of thing we do not object; it is very harmless,
and though scarcely the style of study and method of deduction one
might expect from a professor of philosophy at what is esteemed the
leading university in the United States, we can only arrive, however
regretfully, at the conclusion that we had perhaps made a false
estimate of the intellectual standing of that university, and of the
calibre, mental and moral, of its professors. Still, Mr. Fiske may
argue all his lifelong in this fashion, and we can only wish him better
employment. But unfortunately he does not stop here.
All the unravelling of these worthless myths has one aim and tendency:
the connecting with them true religion, Judaism first, and afterwards
Christianity, the belief in Christ, the Christian sacraments, Christian
observances, Christian practices; not as the one truth of which all
these myths formed so many broken and distorted fragments, but—hear
it, Christian fathers who send your sons to Harvard to learn wisdom and
truth from such men as the one under our notice—a myth with the rest
of them!
Ulysses, Achilles, Ormutz, Thor, Tell, William of Cloudeslee, the sun,
Jesus Christ—“These be thy gods, O Israel!”
A mad world, my masters! We are all wrong; living in a myth,
worshipping a myth, teaching a myth, our social and political state
to-day built upon a myth. “We may learn anew the lesson, taught with
fresh emphasis by modern scholarship, that in the deepest sense there
is nothing new under the sun.” So says Mr. Fiske. There is nothing sure
but scientific faith as expounded by M. Littré and—Mr. Fiske. All the
rest is myth.
It would be no surprise to us if Mr. Fiske were indignantly to reject
the construction which the Catholic, or the Christian reader of
whatever denomination, who possesses any knowledge of Christianity,
must put upon his words. Apparently he himself is not sufficiently
acquainted with Christianity to understand the meaning of those words;
and yet he is a “professor of philosophy” at a presumably Christian
university. He is, to judge him by this book, of that school of
would-be atheists so fashionable tod-ay, who talk mild infidelity
over their tea, and take it down with their muffins—a toast-and-water
infidelity, nice to take hob-and-nob with and to the admiration of
some antiquated Blue-Stocking. Mr. Fiske, like his class, might be
considered an atheist did he only possess the faintest conception of
what Christianity meant. An atheist is not a man who does not, but
who _will_ not, know God—a rebellious spirit who, like the fallen
archangel who has seduced him, rejects God, flings back his offering,
and cries out: “I will not serve!”
Such is atheism—negation, not unconsciousness; denial, not lack of
knowledge. Mr. Fiske’s toast-and-water stuff partakes of the latter
character. It is so very weak, so very thin, so supremely unconscious
of its feebleness, so full of self-sufficiency, so sublimely ignorant
of the fact that the poor little hobby-horse which it rides astride of,
and on which it pranks out, with “all the pomp and circumstance” of
mimic warfare, to have a tilt with the church, has been long ago ridden
to death by far doughtier champions than Mr. Fiske, but with a like
result—a tumble in the dust. Like the carpet-knight, who, “but for
those vile guns, might himself have been a soldier,” but for the vile
faith, these carpet-atheists might themselves have become Christian.
Did we not recollect that they possess immortal souls destined for one
of two eternities, we might almost congratulate ourselves on their
defection.
But not to lay so very serious a charge at Mr. Fiske’s door without
just grounds, we proceed to give a few instances of that gentleman’s
mythical contortions, which will sufficiently vindicate the severe
strictures we feel compelled to pass upon his book—a book, indeed,
which should have passed unnoticed, only that it is typical of the tone
and tendency of the class of writers remarked upon above.
Mr. Fiske would seem to have received some sort of a Christian
education, if we may so call it, in his youth; for he tells us “of
that burning Calvinistic hell with which his childish imagination had
been unwisely terrified.” Calvinism probably drove him into revolt
against Christianity, as it has driven so many others, and, instead of
returning, and examining, and searching for truth, he has adopted the
easier course of saying that it was all a sham—the devil was only a
bogy conjured up by nurses to frighten children and make them good.
Christianity was an excellent religion for children and timid old
maids; but for MEN, men of the XIXth century, it was a little
too much. On reading the fables of the pagans, he found that they had
their bogies to frighten their children, as the heathen possesses them
still. All the same, all the same, all the way down to the cradle, if
there be such, of the race.
“Black spirits and white,
Red spirits and gray,
Mingle, mingle, mingle,
You that mingle may.”
Such, if put into a coherent shape, would be, we think, Mr. Fiske’s
mode of explaining his belief. To him all mystery is myth, and the one
true guide is scientific faith.
There is no mention of Revelation from beginning to end of the book:
the author evidently does not believe in it. But though he is careful
not to say so in express words, the meaning of all his deductions is
very clear; and passages from the sacred Scriptures are contorted to
suit his purpose.
Thus, we are told[70] that “the very idea of an archfiend, Satan,
which Christianity received from Judaism, seems to have been suggested
by the Persian Ahriman, or at least to have derived its principal
characteristics from that source. There is no evidence that the Jews,
previous to the Babylonish captivity, possessed the conception of
a devil as the author of all evil. In the earlier books of the Old
Testament, Jehovah is represented as dispensing with his own hand the
good and the evil, like the Zeus of the _Iliad_.”
Of course, to a man of Mr. Fiske’s vast knowledge and profound
erudition, it would be an impertinence to suggest that, as the
name—the mere name, apart from all belief in it—Jehovah is the more
ancient of the two, it might have been more in order to invert its
position, so that it would run: “The Zeus of the _Iliad_, like the
Jehovah of the Old Testament, was the dispenser of good and evil.” But
Mr. Fiske studiously sets Jehovah first in place, though second in
time, giving one to understand thereby that Zeus was his precursor.
This may have been done inadvertently, but, if so, there is a strange
method in Mr. Fiske’s carelessness. He is clearly a believer in that
“Divinity which doth shape our ends,
Rough hew them as we may.”
Then, again, Mr. Fiske is correct enough in the passages which he cites
as showing that the Jehovah of the Old Testament dispenses “with his
own hand the good and the evil.” There is nothing startling in this: it
is the soundest Catholic as well as Jewish doctrine. We believe that
God does dispense the good and the evil alike; but the “dispensing
of the good and the evil” is a very different thing from the phrase
which concludes the preceding sentence: “The author of _all_ evil.”
Mr. Fiske plumes himself on his philological knowledge; he is great
in word-science, if we may so call it; does he, then, recognize no
distinction between “a dispenser” and “an author,” or again, between
evil and evil, or still further, between “evil” and “_all_ evil”?
“Evil is natural and moral,” says the dictionary. In the first sense,
it means what we generally comprehend by the word “misfortune”; as,
evil tidings, evil news, evil accident. In this sense, God is said
to be the dispenser of evil; that is, of trials which he sets his
children, as a father sets his son a hard task, to prepare them, to
test them, to educate them, to lift them up to the fulness of manhood,
which is in God. “Whom the Lord loveth, he chastiseth.” But “moral
evil” or what Mr. Fiske calls “all evil,” is a very different thing. It
is that which is evil naturally, _in se_ and _per se_, which is in the
will of the devil, and which it is blasphemy to attribute to God. Evil
in the first sense may be, is generally, good in itself: the latter,
never. It may not be blasphemy in Mr. Fiske, for, as we said, he does
not, from insufficient acquaintance with the subject, know the meaning
of his own words. But observe how carefully all these words are placed
in connection and juxtaposition one with another, and how easily each
slides into its wrong place. Again, there is a singular method in Mr.
Fiske’s glaring—for a milder term in the face of what we have just
pointed out would be impossible—inaccuracies.
He goes on: “The story of the serpent in Eden—an Aryan story in every
particular, which has crept into the Pentateuch—is not once alluded
to in the Old Testament.” To this he adds a note: “Nor is there any
ground for believing that the serpent in the _Eden-myth_ is intended
for Satan?” Though Mr. Fiske is overrunning our space far more than we
intended he should do at the beginning, the next sentence is too good
to omit, as replete with a piece of criticism unique in its simplicity
and loftiness of tone: “The identification (of the serpent in the
Eden-myth with Satan) is entirely the work of modern dogmatic theology,
and is due, naturally enough, to the habit, so common alike among
theologians and laymen, of reasoning about the Bible as if it were a
single book (!), and not a collection of writings of different ages and
of very different degrees of historic authenticity.”
To all his readers the question will naturally suggest itself: Has Mr.
Fiske ever been outside the walls of Harvard? But there—we leave the
matter: it suggests its own comment; and, moreover, Mr. Fiske promises
us, “in a future work entitled (start not, ye publishers!) _Aryana
Vaedjo_, to examine, at considerable length, _this interesting myth_ of
the Garden of Eden.” We hope to see it.
Well, here we have in plain English the whole story of the fall of man,
the origin of good and evil in this world, and the cause of all the
consequences which followed therefrom; the whole story of the Creation
in fact, as in another place that of the Deluge, set aside quietly
and easily, without a word of doubt, or difficulty, or hesitation, as
a myth. It would be interesting to know what Mr. Fiske does believe
on these points—but his book is to come. We trust he will take the
pains to set us right on the subject of the origin of man and of the
Creation generally. Of man we should judge him to have as high an
opinion as Mr. Darwin, when he explains his present condition as being
brought about by “that stupendous process of breeding which we call
civilization; which has strengthened the feelings by which we are
chiefly distinguished from the brutes, leaving _our primitive bestial
impulses_ to die for want of exercise, or checking in every possible
way their further expansion by legislative enactments. (Draw this to
its legitimate conclusion, and there is no such thing as morality, it
being merely synonymous with law or education.) But this process which
is transforming us from savages into civilized men is a very slow one;
and now and then there occur cases of what physiologists call atavism,
or _reversion to an ancestral type of character_.... Now and then
persons are born possessed of the bestial appetite and cravings of
primitive man, his fiendish cruelty, and his liking for human flesh.”
This is a Harvard professor who thus explains what people generally
accredit to the maxims of the Gospel and the teachings of Jesus Christ.
Morality is simply education or force, and evil is inherent in the
naturally brutal being, man, who, like Topsy, gradually “growed” up to
what he is.
It were easy to go on thus multiplying instances of the truth of our
observation, that Mr. Fiske reduces Christianity to a myth; but we
think there is enough proof already. We pass by many things, therefore,
where the author’s display of shallow learning is only equalled by his
flimsy remarks. In a note (p. 48), he would have us infer that the
Jews believed in a plurality of gods just as did the pagans, because
Elohim—God—is plural—a common use of the word even in the English
Version, as when God says, “Let us go down and confound their tongue,”
etc.; but the Jews certainly never interpreted it as meaning anything
else than the one God, whom they adored. It was merely a foreshadowing
of the doctrine of the Trinity. In another place, he informs us that
S. Ursula is Artemis and Aphrodite, S. Gertrude the heathen Holda. He
is evidently unaware that one of the most popular books of Catholic
devotion is written by the “heathen Holda.” Stupid inaccuracies of
this description are unaccountable. In any other person they would
indicate a mind inflated with that dangerous “little learning” which
Pope warns us against; in a Harvard “professor of philosophy,” they
doubtless take the form of Shakespeare’s sins against grammar and good
taste, and go down as “beauties.” “Angels—women with large wings”
(_sic_)—are kinsfolk of the werewolf family, and Christianity has
“_degraded_ the beneficent lightning-god, Thor,” into the “grotesque
mediæval devil.” Odin and other glorious divinities undergo a similar
hideous transformation under the “degrading” influence of Christianity.
In fact, Christianity is but a system of plagiarizing, and plagiarizing
which by no means improves on the old pagan superstitions. The devil is
really a good-natured sort of being, or was till Christianity came and
spoiled his temper and himself generally. Of course such a being never
existed except in the brain of superstitious people unendowed with
scientific faith, who were racking their brains to find out the meaning
of that eternal puzzle, darkness and light, so that they at length came
to embody darkness in the form of the devil, and light in the person of
God, or Jupiter, or Apollo, or William Tell. That is the plain English
of Mr. Fiske’s book.
Mr. Fiske seems to think that he has struck a new vein, and opened up
to the world a golden ore long hidden. His theory is as old as any
other; and he has only given us a poor rehash of what much cleverer
men than he have oversurfeited us with ages ago. Before attempting to
handle the subjects he has touched upon, it would be advisable to go
to school again, and he might thus be saved a lamentable display of
childish ignorance on points known to all the world, save apparently
to Mr. Fiske. In a very weak review of a most interesting and clever
book, _Juventus Mundi_, written by a scholar and a thinker, neither of
which titles we feel justified in applying to Mr. Fiske, this latter
gentleman remarks, with astonishment, that Mr. Gladstone draws an
analogy between the gods of heathendom and the God of Christianity;
in other words, between distorted truth and its first original. This,
again, is as old as the hills. _Prometheus_, for instance, has struck
all readers as a wonderful type of the Saviour; and so with other
gods and heroes of antiquity. Scholars are pleased to draw likenesses
between the characters of the fables of pagan antiquity and those of
the sacred Scriptures; such connection is by no means necessary to
prove the truth of Christianity and of the doctrines of Revelation.
Christianity is here, around us, living, real: we are in it. It is
clear, well defined, unchanging, distinct, a solemn and awful fact:
deal with _it_, study it, destroy it, if you can. It has no connection,
claims no connection, needs no connection, with paganism. It stands
alone, self-sufficient, for God is its centre. It embraces the world;
it rules nations; and the better the governments, the nearer they
approach to the observance of its codes. History hallows it; scientific
discovery only tends to confirm our faith in it. It is superseding all
things, as its Founder meant it should; and people have the impudence,
for it is nothing else, to come and tell us to-day, in out-of-the-way
notes in silly books, that this stupendous fact is a myth! We can only
say to them, _tolle, lege_!
It is easy for a man to sit down in his chair, and spin out a theory,
connecting the most distant objects together in his own mind. Thus
Mr. Fiske drives Tell back to the sun, or Ulysses, or Odysseus, as he
prefers to call him, for he takes kindly to what we may be pardoned
calling the _Grotesque_ etymology; and even in this, like all poor
imitators, goes beyond his master. Homer tells us Ulysses was a man,
a great traveller, who had seen many lands. Oh! no, says Mr. Fiske;
Homer made a great mistake; he did not know what he was talking about;
Ulysses was meant for the sun. And yet Mr. Fiske tells us that the
“minds of primitive men worked like our own, and, when they spoke of
the far-darting sun-god, they meant just what they said.” Why should
not this reasoning hold good for Ulysses, as well as for Apollo?
Why, we might take up the story of Mr. Stanley’s discovery of
Livingstone, and concoct a far better myth out of it than Mr. Fiske has
out of many of his materials. Livingstone, like Ulysses, is a man who
had seen many lands; he is hurried away and lost to the world in a dark
and fiery country—a land of demons and impenetrable burning deserts.
The world laments his loss, and Stanley, the youthful, the Dawn, goes
out to seek him, and, after the usual obstacles, finds him in the dark
land, clothed in rags, with a blue cap on his head, adorned with a gold
band, a long beard falling gray over his breast, surrounded by the dark
children of the desert. When that fabulous New Zealander sits on the
ruins of London Bridge, some future Professor Fiske will probably take
up this story of to-day, and weave a myth out of it as the present one
has done with Ulysses; but Mr. Fiske may remember that the prophet who
foretold the New Zealander in his incongruous position only did so to
serve as an example of the indestructibility of God’s church.
If he must refer everything back to light, why not go a little beyond
the sun to the _Lux Mundi_—the light which shineth in the darkness,
but which the darkness comprehended not? Light and fire run from the
beginning to the end of the New and Old Testaments, as typical of God.
The first thing God made was light; he spoke to Moses in a burning
bush; his angel accompanied his people in a cloud and a pillar of
light. Man cannot look upon his face and live, for the glory of it. Is
it possible that Mr. Fiske, who is so keen at connections, could miss
such palpable indications of the connection between the traditions he
has mentioned and Revelation, without being struck by it, unless he did
so intentionally?
Had we space, we could show by comparison that the very words he has
quoted from Indian and other traditions of the Michabo, the great white
One, of the origin of the world and the history of the Deluge, are
almost identical in phrase even with the Scriptures. From F. De Smet’s
interesting Indian sketches, appearing in the _Catholic Review_, we
find that the Indians adore the Great Medicine, who is, above all, the
All-powerful, and sacrifice to him through the sun and the thunder,
because the sun is his great servitor.
And as for the devil, whom Mr. Fiske finds such an amusing character
(happy man! may he never be undeceived!), it may make him laugh at us,
but, for our part, we have a very decided belief in his existence and
power to do harm; in fact, did we only discern a spice of something
stronger and more powerful than Mr. Fiske presents us in his book,
just the faintest flavor of the genuine article—real brimstone and
fire—we should have been led to refer its authorship to the very
personage whom Mr. Fiske so despises. As it is, the work is unworthy
of his Satanic majesty. He inspired the idea which animates it long
ago, but the present execution is by too weak a hand for his. In this
we find an indication that the idea is used up and gone beyond working
order—driven to death, in fact.
Superstition undoubtedly did exist in the middle ages; perhaps—for
we are not too ready to believe this age so very far superior in
many points to those days as is generally conceded; at all events,
the world, as the world, is materially even very little better off
than it then was, notwithstanding all our boasted science, and the
rest, and the days allotted to man are not lengthened—perhaps, then,
superstition did flourish at that time to a greater extent than it
does to-day; but what does that prove? Simply that Christianity, “that
stupendous process of breeding,” did not convert the world in a day.
Did superstition prevail to a greater or less degree than it did prior
to the introduction of Christianity, before the old Jewish order passed
away, and gave place to the new—to the religion which was no longer
to be restricted to a single nation, but which was to spread abroad,
to become Catholic, and embrace the world, the family of God’s human
creatures, within its bosom? Was it, so much of it as did exist, more
or less hideous in the supernatural figures with which it peoples the
universe? Were the Norse gods of blood and bestiality, Thor, and Odin,
and Friga, “degraded”? Could they be degraded? Was Venus degraded, or
Jupiter, or Bacchus, or the multitude of others, by being replaced by
the truth, by the light which was so long coming and expected of the
nations—by the Sun of Justice?
It was this bursting of the light of the world upon nations which
dispelled for ever the dark mists of superstition that had so long
hidden the creation from its Creator; this was the Sun the nations
dimly saw and adored; this was the victorious Conqueror who overcame
all obstacles by his own sufferings, and death, and sacrifice; who,
like Prometheus, “came to cast fire upon the earth,” and who died in
agony to save his fellows, and destroy the false Jove with his heaven
of immorality—Jesus Christ! at whose name “every knee shall bow.”
And the darkness was this very devil, the author of all evil, who fell,
freely and consciously, in eternal rebellion against God; who cannot
be destroyed, for God created him immortal; who uses the power still
left him, which was once heavenly, in order to lead into rebellion
all creation against the God he hates with an eternal hatred; who is
permitted by God to tempt man, for man is a free agent—God not having
endowed a mere machine with the breath of life, the breathing of his
spirit—and, if man falls, he falls freely and consciously as did Satan.
Here lay the puzzle of darkness and light, good and evil, right and
wrong. The world saw itself bounded everywhere by the impassable; by
its wickedness it had lost the clear knowledge of its God; it would
overleap those barriers, and reach him again. The craving of its heart
was eternal; it saw the marks of its God around it: “The heavens
declared the glory of God, and the firmament displayed the wonders of
his works.” Men felt the supernatural, and worshipped; but their eyes
were blinded, and, groping in the darkness for their God, they mistook
his enemy, and worshipped him.
Paganism was and is the worship of the devil. The evil one allows men
to worship him under whatever form they please, provided only they
rebel against God. Impurity, bestiality, drunkenness, intellectual
pride, all things that lead astray, are for him good; but the law
of God is one and unchangeable, the same yesterday, to-day, and for
ever; and, therefore, though it is hard to kick against the goad, the
free-will of man whispers rebellion to him ever, for he finds God
everywhere.
What, then, dealt the death-blow to superstition? Was it scientific
faith, or the coming of Christ?
In order completely to fill a void, you must have something adequate.
The world through all the ages had this yearning for a something
wanting, this searching after a something lost. It felt the
supernatural, the beyond—it felt, but did not see. So each one made
him a religion of his own. To fill that eternal void, to make all one,
to satisfy the craving of the world, that void must be filled. But what
can fill it, save the supernatural? An infinite want can only be filled
by infinity. Jesus Christ came in form and with surroundings the very
reverse of what those who had waited most anxiously for him expected.
Consequently, their pride revolted, and they refused to accept the
Messiah. Nevertheless, no sooner was his doctrine made known, than
the world outside, the gropers in the darkness, felt the Sun; the
scales dropped from their eyes, the void was at length filled, the
craving satisfied; they saw their God, and knew him. Then superstition
ended, for they found a reason for every mystery in the all-powerful,
all-pervading God.
Had the world to wait for scientific faith to clear up its doubts and
give a reason for its longings and beliefs, superstition would still
reign paramount among men. What is scientific faith? What can it do?
That science has advanced since the days when men built the pyramids,
constructed cities whose ruins are the wonders of to-day, converted
the Eastern deserts into gardens, constructed the alphabet, built the
Parthenon, devised the geometrical figure, organized the sciences
of numbers, philosophy, the heavens, and set up leaning towers, we
concede; but the men who performed those wonders can scarcely be set
down as “knowing nothing of the laws of nature, nothing about physical
forces, nothing about the relations of cause and effect.” This age
has made an advance on them, it is true; but an advance utterly
disproportionate to the centuries which have rolled between; nay, in
some things it has retrograded.
Did people wait, then, for scientific faith to lift the veil from their
eyes, or was it the teachings of Christianity and the appearance of
Jesus Christ which lifted it? How much more has scientific faith taught
us than it taught the men who centuries ago, by their intimate and
accurate knowledge of natural causes, wrought those wonders touched
upon above? The supernatural still confronts us as it did them. Science
ends with the scientist. Can it tell him who he is, or why he is? Can
it touch the lightning, weigh the sun, reveal the mystery of life and
death? It can tell us we live and we die; that, when such or such a
circumstance occurs, what we call life is over. But can it tell us what
is life, whence it came, whither it goes? what the world is, who made
it, why it was made? what the seed is, why it grows up into a tree,
why the leaves sprout from the hard wood, who set all this principle
of life going, and why? Here lies the mystery that puzzled men; here
science stops, and God reveals himself: it is awed into silence, and
listens for his voice.
On reading this article once more, the thought has occurred to
the writer that objection may be taken to its tone as not exactly
in accordance with that myth of myths which goes by the name of
“amenities of literature.” Catholics very rarely come across this
pleasing illusion in the columns of adverse writers. But even should
this charge be well grounded, it is idle for Catholics to wrap what
they have to say in wadding, lest it fall too roughly on the delicate
sensibilities of people who undertake to insult a religion of which
they know nothing. Mr. Fiske is only a type of a class to whom is
entrusted the sacred mission of educating the youth of this country,
those particularly whose means admit of the highest education, and from
whom, therefore, much should be expected. Men wonder at the immorality
of our youth—the young man of society of to-day. Why wonder, when his
professors teach him that morality is a name, Christianity a fable, and
all religion a sham? We cannot affect to toy when the stakes played for
are so high. The morality of the coming race depends on the education
it receives. When, therefore, we find men, set in high places in our
foremost universities, abusing their position, and striving by every
means in their power to sap and undermine Christian education, we
think studious phrases idle and polished courtesy thrown away. Insult
and evil must be met with other weapons. If Mr. Fiske wishes to know
whether Christianity is a myth or not, let him sit down and study
before pronouncing. When he has sought and inquired earnestly, he will
find plenty to furnish him with the right answer.
HEAVEN.
WHAT man that is journeying abroad, doth not hasten backward to his
native land? Who that is speeding a voyage toward them he loves, longs
not with more ardor for a prosperous wind, that so he may embrace his
friends the sooner?... It is a large and loving company who expect us
there: parents, brothers, children, a manifold and numerous assemblage
longing after us, who, having security of their own immortality,
still feel anxious for our salvation.... Ah! perfect and perpetual
bliss! There is the glorious company of the apostles; there is the
assembly of prophets exulting; there is the innumerable multitude of
martyrs, crowned after their victory of strife and passion; there are
virgins triumphant, who have overcome, by vigor of continency, the
concupiscence of the flesh and body.... To these, dearest brethren, let
us with eager longings hasten: let it be the portion which we desire,
speedily to be among them, speedily to be gone to Christ. God behold
this thought of ours! This purpose of our mind and faith may the Lord
Christ witness!—who will make the recompenses of his glory the larger
according as man’s longings after him have been the stronger.—_S.
Cyprian._
DIES IRÆ.
Day of Doom! O day of terror!
Prophet’s word, and Sibyl’s finger
Point to one dread day of anger,
When the skies shall warp and wither,
Ocean shrink and dry together,
Solid earth consume to cinder.
Day of nature’s dissolution,
Day of final retribution—
Some to joy, and some to sorrow.
Hark! the trumpet-blast terrific.
How the dead, in mingled panic,
Gather to the dread assizes!
Death shall stand aghast, and Nature,
When from dust the summoned creature
Rises trembling to make answer.
Ah, the wonder! oh, the wailing!
When the heavens above unveiling,
Show the Judge of all descending.
Now begins the awful session.
Sinner, make thy full confession;
Naught avails the least evasion.
Lo, the Book of Doom! each action,
Secret sin, or bold transgression,
Idle word, foul thought, is noted.
Strictest justice is accorded;
Grace to gracious deed afforded,
Death to deadly sin awarded.
Oh! where saints must fear and tremble,
Could I stand the test, thus sinful?
Could I find a plea for pardon?
Could an advocate avail me?
Pleas and advocates all fail me.
Jesus! thou alone canst save me.
Mighty Monarch! oh, remember
That blest day of blest December—
‘Twas for me the Virgin bore thee.
Seeking me, beside the fountain
Thou didst rest thee; to the mountain,
For my sake, thou didst betake thee;
On that dear cross, to redeem me,
Thou didst hang. Lord! is it seemly,
So much costing, I should perish?
Thou didst smile on Mary’s unction,
Tearful love, and deep compunction,
On the dying thief’s confession.
Like them guilty, like them grieving,
Like them loving, and believing,
Lord! show me a like compassion.
To thy mercy I confide me;
From thy justice, Saviour, hide me,
Ere that day of dread accounting.
Oh, that day of strange uprising!
Oh, that solemn criticising!
Oh, that sentence past reversal!
Peace to thee! departed brother,
Tenant once of this cold clay!
Jesus! give him rest alway. Amen.
C. W.
WOMAN AS A BREAD-WINNER.
IN all things that are not of precept, we must needs, if we wish to
influence the world, take the world as it is. We may deplore that the
stream has passed the romantic scenery through which its course once
flowed, but we are powerless to turn the current back. Indeed, its
oncoming strength is so ominous that no wise man can stand long on its
banks without seeing the urgent need of providing fresh outlets for
its impetuosity, lest it should come upon him unawares, and sweep him
away in a roaring inundation. The mental ferment of our age is this
stream which demands of us new channels whereon to spend its exuberant
activity; and it perhaps depends upon Catholic action whether the new
development shall be a blessing or a curse. The church knows that her
place is in the van of humanity, and to each young century she turns
her speedy encouragement, bidding it go forth and do its allotted
work under her banner. She hallows all discoveries, and knits them to
herself by the services she causes them to render to the truth, and, a
bolder innovator than the veriest sceptic, she opens her arms to every
development whose capabilities may be turned to a divine account. We
may depend upon this: that no new thing or idea which does not at once
draw upon itself the church’s approving notice, is worth more than a
passing thought. She lets the ephemeral go by, and fixes her eyes only
on the stable and the solid. More than that, all that is claimed as new
and good is contained or foreshadowed somewhere within her pale, either
in the hidden achievements of her sons, or in the written record of her
attitude towards human progress.
Now, the position of woman is a topic universally discussed, and one
which it has become the fashion to look upon as the pet offspring
of this particular century. There are two questions involved in the
discussion: one theoretical, upon which we have already touched, and
one practical. The former treats of the abstract right of equality
between man and woman, the latter (more sensibly) of the employment of
women, and of their fitness for bread-winning purposes. Woman has so
many spheres that it is difficult to mass her duties and rights in one
sweeping code; and, though her peculiar gift of home ministry is the
one which renders her most amiable in the eyes of the opposite sex,
it should be remembered that it is this very domesticity which often
obliges her to take to self-supporting labor. In this, how far superior
is womanhood to manhood! For whereas a man’s chief thought when
entering a profession or learning a trade is for his own advancement
and pecuniary success in life, a woman’s intention when working for her
bread is almost invariably the support of one weaker than herself, or
the lightening of the burden already borne by the other. In this sense,
we may say that woman is more heroic than man, constrained as she is by
the very nobility of her nature to ennoble the lowest things with which
necessity brings her in contact. Work in itself, simply as occupation
and discipline, is a noble thing and the fulfilment of the divine
law, but when undertaken with a motive such as the support of aged
parents and of sick children, or the reparation of an act of dishonesty
committed by a dishonorable member of the family, it rises even to
sublimity. Women are not exempt from the law of labor, though it has
been an immemorial custom that their fathers, brothers, and husbands
should shield them from its heaviest penalties. Work, in a mitigated
sense, has always been the lot of woman, but among Christians it is so
hallowed as to be rather a privilege than a yoke. In heathen nations,
woman’s work was merely that of a female animal, necessarily not quite
so hard as man’s, but only lighter in consideration of her physical
powers, and certainly not in reverence for her rightful dignity. It
was not the wife and mother who was thought of then: it was the female
beast of burden, at most the favorite of the hour. Judaism, the dawn of
a broader and holier dispensation, naturally betrayed its divine origin
by protecting the person and property and regulating the labor of
woman, thereby elevating drudgery into home duties, and raising to the
dignity of a contracting party one who had been hitherto but a servile
tool. Christianity went a step further, and threw open the doors of the
temple to woman, suffering her to assume every position her mental or
moral ambition led her to desire, save the office of the priesthood.
Judaism had sanctified and glorified marriage by looking upon every
union as a possible link in the future genealogy of the Messiah; and
the perfection of the Hebrew ideal culminated in Mary, the veritable
human mother of the Eternal Word. But Christianity had an additional
crown to bestow on womanhood, and, unlike Judaism, instead of leading
up to this new perfection, it first reared its ideal, and then called
upon all unborn generations to follow it as closely as might be. Thus
the two systems, marriage and virginity, converged for one miraculous
moment in the stainless person of the Blessed Virgin Mary; and since
after that unique motherhood there could be no aspiring to become an
earthly ancestor of the Promised One, a new relationship with God—that
of Spouse—came to be the highest honor attainable by womanhood. Step
by step, God had brought about woman’s enfranchisement, had united in
his law the dignity with which the Jews had invested her, and a new,
mysterious, unearthly dignity which he alone can understand, and had,
in one word, made perfection easy of attainment by her. Her work, too,
necessarily came under this ennobling process, and she can look back
with pride to the example of the typical woman—the last perfect Jewish
matron, the first perfect Christian virgin—and see the daughter of
kings and the Mother of God stooping to lowly household duties.
The Old and New Testament are full of circumstances or sayings with
reference to the subject of woman’s work. Although it is not expressly
mentioned in the curse pronounced on Adam after the Fall, there can
be little doubt that it is included in it. The race of man was there
doomed to earn its bread by the sweat of its brow, and though a special
punishment was also awarded the offending “mother of all the living,”
still she seems to have been included in the general curse of labor.
Events have proved this, and so long and regular a succession of events
must needs have had a deeper reason than mere temporal expediency.
In the history of Jacob and his two wives, we see a plain reference
to the importance of woman in a question of wages and inheritance.
Jacob, after serving his father-in-law Laban for twenty years,
departs secretly, but before doing so takes counsel with his wives,
and puts his case before them, calling them to witness that Laban
has overreached him and striven to do him harm. Their answer is as
practical as could be wished for: they complain of their father having
wasted their lawful inheritance and having counted them as strangers,
while they commend Jacob for championing their rights by taking, as the
Lord had commanded, all that was otherwise denied them.
In the history of the infant Moses, Pharaoh’s daughter makes a regular
engagement with the child’s unknown mother “to nurse him for her, and
she would give her _her wages_.” It was a fair contract, by which the
Hebrew woman earned an equivalent for her services as nurse.
Then, again, we have Anna, the wife of Tobias, a genuine bread-winner,
though perhaps a lesser example of patience than she is of energy.
“Now, Anna his wife went daily to weaving work, and she brought home
what she could get for their living by the labor of her hands.”[71]
The picture of her domestic trials is pathetic, and her husband seems
to have had but a poor opinion of her discretion, for he asked her one
day, when she had brought home a young kid, whether she were sure that
it was not stolen? Her answer was certainly petulant, and consisted of
what many modern wives would say under the same provocation, but it was
ungrateful towards God. Human nature was much the same then as it is
now; and one charm of the old Bible narratives lies just in this, that
they _are_ so naïvely human. In the Book of Ecclesiasticus we read: “He
created of him [man] a helpmate like to himself: he gave _them_ counsel
and a tongue, and eyes, and ears, and a heart to devise....”[72] The
woman is here expressly included in the intellectual benefits heaped
upon man, and it is contrary to the whole spirit of the Scriptures to
suppose that these gifts were in her merely ornamental. Matters of
foresight, discretion, and business evidently come under the head of
things to be “devised.” Again, a little further on we find that “a
good wife is a _good portion_,” and “the grace of a diligent woman
shall delight her husband and shall _fat his bones_.”[73] By this is
meant “increase his substance,” which a woman can do in two ways—by
husbanding her means, or earning something herself. Even if the
“diligent woman” gave her husband nothing but counsel, that in itself
would be a material help: “A _prudent_ wife is from the Lord.”[74]
To guard against the abuses of unremunerated labor, to which through
poverty or improvidence the Hebrews might be subjected, Moses provided
the law of the seventh year of remission and the fiftieth of jubilee.
“Thou shalt not oppress him with the service of bond-servants, but he
shall be as a _hireling_ and a _sojourner_,” and “_his wages_ being
allowed for which he served before.”[75] With regard to women, the
laws were the same. “When thy brother a Hebrew man or Hebrew _woman_
is sold to thee and hath served thee six years, in the seventh year
thou shalt let him go free. And when thou sendest him out free, _thou
shalt not let him go away empty_; but shalt give him for his way out
of thy flocks, and out of thy barn-floor and thy wine-press,”[76] and
it is specially recommended that bondmen and bondwomen should not
be of the chosen race, but of the “nations around” the Hebrews. As
to the responsibility of women concerning vows, we read that a woman
under the power of her father or husband shall be bound to fulfil a
vow contingently on the consent of her superior, but an independent
woman is bound like a man: “The widow, and she that is divorced, _shall
fulfil whatsoever_ they vow.”[77] This argues at least a recognition
of woman’s full powers of reasoning, choice, and accountability, all
of which are involved in the serious matter of a vow. In the Gospel
of S. Luke, there is a passing allusion to female manual labor in the
parable that foretells Christ’s second coming: “_Two women_ shall be
_grinding_ together, the one shall be taken and the other left”—which
allusion is not meaningless. All through the New Testament, additional
light is thrown on the figurative expressions by the common customs of
the country during our Lord’s human life in Judea, and so we may infer
that in those days women frequently helped their husbands in various
agricultural pursuits.
Martha, the sister of Lazarus, has always been looked upon as a
type of active, busy life, according to our Lord’s words, “Thou
art troubled about many things.” But this was not wholly meant as
a rebuke, for there is a great difference between being _troubled_
and being _absorbed_ by worldly matters. Some among us must bear the
domestic burden, in order that others may have the leisure needed for
contemplation. Their place in the world is none the less holy because
it is not the most perfect, for if there were no rungs to the ladder
but the topmost one, how would it be possible to reach heaven? The
workers of this world have a mission as well as the seers, and Martha
holds almost as high a place in heaven as her sister who chose “the
better part.” In the Acts of the Apostles, it is related that S.
Paul, going out of the gates of Philippi and seeing there some women
assembled, spoke to them, whereupon “a certain woman named Lydia, _a
seller of purple_ of the city of Thyatira ... did hear ... and when
she was baptized, _and her household_, she besought us, saying: ...
come into my _house_ and abide there. And she constrained us.”[78]
This woman must doubtless have been sufficiently well-off, and was
most likely a widow or an unmarried woman. Her business, which she
probably conducted herself, since she is distinguished by the epithet
“a seller of purple,” must have brought her affluence, for her house
and household are specially mentioned, and it strikes us also as a
proof of her self-supporting and successful operations, that, being of
the city of Thyatira, she had travelled to Philippi and established a
home for herself within its walls. S. Paul and Silas are put in prison
and freed again while in Philippi, and as soon as they leave their
confinement, it is to Lydia’s house that they again repair. “And they
went out of the prison, and entered into the house of Lydia; and having
seen the brethren, they comforted them and departed.”[79] The natural
inference is that the house of the generous “seller of purple” was the
centre, for the time being, of the little Christian community; that
here were the assemblies held and religious ceremonies performed; and
that Lydia, in fact, gave up her dwelling to be practically a school
and church. Her riches were her own; legitimately accumulated by an
ordinary trade. We are told nothing of her origin, her education, her
social position; she appears only as a “seller of purple” and a docile
recipient of God’s Word. There was probably nothing at all wonderful
about her—she was the ordinary business woman of her day: thrifty,
since she had worked to so successful a purpose—simple-minded,
since she so quickly believed the Word of God—generous, since she
“constrained” the Apostles to dwell with her. S. Paul, who found in
women such powerful auxiliaries, speaks in his Epistle to the Romans
of “Phœbe, our sister in the ministry of the church [a deaconess] ...
that you assist her in whatsoever _business_ she shall have need of
you: for she also _hath assisted many_.”[80] Now, this clearly points
to her having, or having had, either great possessions, which must have
entailed many cares of management, or great zeal in stirring up others
who were wealthier, which zeal also proves a capability for affairs.
But let us turn back to yet more emphatic Scriptural proof that woman
is noways debarred from a certain share in even great enterprises,
so long as her modesty is not endangered by it. Judith, the queenly
widow, occupied a position of this kind. “And her husband left her
great riches, and very many servants, and large possessions of herds
and oxen.”[81] The sequel of Judith’s history showed that she was as
wise as she was rich, and that prudence and discretion were her most
conspicuous gifts. She must have had great powers of government, and
an eye for ruling the many subordinates whom she probably employed
in the management of her possessions. She was no doubt a mother and
a guardian to her servants, and, although young and beautiful, as
the Scripture tells us she was, yet possessed a gravity and dignity
beyond her years. Her mind was not set upon the frivolities of social
life, and she gave herself much to prayer and fasting, abiding “shut
up with her maids” in an upper chamber of her house. It is a great
mistake to suppose that piety interferes with business habits in either
man or woman. The legitimate cares of life are perfectly compatible
with an unusual degree of spirituality, indeed, in many cases such
cares become absolute duties. The spiritual life reacts upon the
outer sphere of business relations, and while eliminating from it all
tendency to mere selfish aggrandizement, enhances and hallows the
worldly qualities requisite to its successful development. The world
needs holy and grave influences to leaven its pursuits in every field,
whether artistic, literary, or commercial, and while women can impart
to every lawful calling into which they enter that natural grace and
refinement which is their birthright, they should also strive to infuse
into it a supernatural influence. In the Book of Proverbs,[82] we read
the memorable description of the “wise woman,” and nothing is further
removed than this Scripture ideal from the various types of modern
womanhood which, in the clamor of the present questions as to woman’s
place and proper employment, have terrified the sight and darkened
the understanding of observers. Of her devotion to her husband, it is
said that “his heart trusteth in her, _and he shall have no need of
spoils_.” She is not of that aggressive, self-protecting type with
which we are (for our sins) familiar; she is not of those to whom a
husband is an appendage, insignificant at all times, removable at
any; she is not of the independent sisterhood who take their passions
for inspirations and their caprices for rules. Her influence must
mightily serve her husband’s lawful interests, for we are told that “he
is honorable in the gates when he sitteth among the senators of the
land.” This points to the wise woman’s high social position, no doubt
more due to her efforts, her industry, and her prudence, than simply
to her noble birth. She might—like many of her modern sisters—have
been born in the more fortunate walks of life, she might have been
educated with care and assiduity, she might have been taught that
perfect command of domestic details which secures an orderly and
attractive household, she might even have acquired that unconscious
good-breeding that marks the well-born and gently nurtured all over
the civilized world; and yet with all these advantages she might still
have failed to take a place in life—she might still have remained a
social nonentity. How many such worthy and estimable blanks are there
not in this world, in all ranks and shades of social standing! But the
model woman of the Scripture has risen above this level of neglected
or barren opportunities, and bears away the first honors of the race
of life, simply because she is _wise_. The prudence of her counsels,
shown in the ordering of her well-appointed household, her bargains and
her forethought, her stores of bread, linen, and wool, redound to her
husband’s honor; and when he “sitteth among the senators” he is known
as possessing a treasure that doubles all his wealth, and is herself
worth all his riches thrice doubled. But she is not entirely dependent
on him in her transactions, for we see that “she hath considered a
field and bought it; with the fruit of her hands she hath planted a
vineyard.” This bears very closely on our subject, and proves how
far the Scriptures hold a woman competent to think, speculate, work,
and achieve, unassisted by man. “She hath tasted and seen that her
traffic is good: ... she made fine linen and sold it, ... and hath
not eaten her bread idle.” Now, all this points to more than mere
domestic thrift. Here we see woman, not as a divorced wife, not as an
aggressive spinster, not as a frivolous social ornament, not as a mere
household drudge, but woman as a responsible being, with grave duties
and a wide field of action, taking a place in the world fully equal to
and yet utterly distinct from that of a man. She considers, she buys,
she sells, she rules, yet all the while she is solicitous for her
“maidens,” charitable and gentle to the poor, beloved by her husband,
and blessed by her children. She appears here as judged by the real
standard of her real worth. “Favor is deceitful, and beauty is vain;
the woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her of the
fruit of her hands; and let her works praise her in the gates.”
So that she is not only to earn, but to enjoy. She is to have a stake
in the world, and a voice in matters of importance—she “opens her
mouth in wisdom, and the law of clemency is on her tongue.” Her opinion
is to be sought, considered, followed; her example is to be looked upon
with reverence, and criticism is to merge into admiration. Her position
is to be that of an arbiter and referee, neither sinking to that of
a petted child nor drifting into that of an unmated, unloved, and
defiant waif. It is not from a band of social outlaws, whose common
exile links them in common defence, that she is to seek support; but
in the circle of her own home, in the centre where God and nature have
placed her, she is to take the helm and gracefully mount the throne. No
violence and no straining after impossible immunities are to disfigure
her calm attitude of secure headship, and, even if her advice be
disregarded, time and not she herself must vindicate its wisdom.
It may be objected that all this is very well in theory, and would work
admirably if all women were _wise_, and all men worthy of them. But
who does not know that ideals will never become healthful influences
unless translated into facts, and that theories will never succeed in
bettering the world unless exemplified here and there in trial cases?
Would the _theory_ of Christianity be worth anything to the outside
world unless realized in the daily life of its Founder and in the model
existences of thousands of saints? It is impossible that anything
should take hold of the human mind and mould it to new perfections
before it has been put into tangible shape, and it is equally
impossible in our fallen state that _all_ the world should be converted
at once into so many perfect entities. Yet because all men will not
become saints, because all cannot write like Shakespeare, paint like
Raphael, or compose like Beethoven, are religion, poetry, and art to
be eschewed by lower aspirants, and relegated to the barren region of
things to be admired but not imitated? If, because absolute perfection
was never attainable by man, every man had therefore resigned himself
to a hopeless contemplation of the fine possibilities of Christianity,
we should have had no Anthony, no Jerome, no Augustine. If, later on,
because it was impossible to reform the _whole_ world and strike at
the root of _every_ abuse, the pontiffs had calmly looked on while
Christendom crumbled away, we should have had no Gregory the Great,
no Hildebrand, no Innocent III., no Sixtus V. Again, if an inflexible
adherence to rule were the only point worth aiming at, should we have
had a Dominic, a Teresa, a Francis Xavier, a Philip Neri, a Vincent
of Paul? In this world there are many experiments—tentative steps
leading to higher things, and opening doors of possibility to hitherto
untried systems. Even in the church, where all else is immovable,
there is constant _human_ progress, and if here or there one soldier
falls at his post—not through lack of enthusiasm, but through the
force of adverse circumstances, or the darkness of mind which still
shrouds his contemporaries while he himself has prematurely pierced
beyond it—still the great search after perfection, the great work of
Christian development, rolls on. So it is in the world, in art, in
philosophy, in science, in society. What if woman’s position never
has been made absolutely and securely certain? The church has always
theoretically pointed it out, and has often secured its partial
realization within her pale; it remains for the world to open its eyes,
and extend those barriers of the church to the furthest limits of
civilization, taking with it those improvements which it has so long
groped for in its wilful darkness, and which all the time have been
steadily in operation in the sanctuary of the old church.
So that it is idle to object that all we have said about woman’s work,
reward, and position is “very well in theory.” If a few pioneers will
do for the system what companies or even enterprising individuals
are ever ready to do for any material scheme that presents but the
slightest chance of success, the world would soon see the noblest
reform of all achieved in the very core of society. Nay, we will say
more: the pioneers _are_ there, the reform _is_ going on; only let the
busy, sceptical world stop a moment and look into the silent, gigantic
work ever renewing its strength in the church; let it pause and see
homes where woman, either as manager or worker, holds her supreme
rod of gentle authority; let it see the maiden toiling cheerfully
for her aged parents, or bringing home food and clothes to helpless
little sisters or ailing brothers—the wife helping and encouraging
the husband, and eking out by skilful management a pittance into an
income, and evolving comfort out of what in careless hands could hardly
compass necessaries; the widow keeping her sacred state, unassailed by
calumny, through the earnings which secure her privacy, or the widowed
mother joyfully burdened with the twofold legacy that gives her both
an object to live for and a memory to live in. Hidden homes these may
be, poor homes they almost all are—homes bounded by the four walls of
one squalid room, homes cramped in the garrets of tenement-houses or
saddened by the dreary respectability of furnished lodgings, but none
the less precious in the sight of the angels, and an example in the
sight of men.
We have spoken much of the Scriptural conception of woman as a
bread-winner, because upon this as a solid foundation we can build up
the further development of such a woman’s position. Everything that is
compatible with the _spirit_ of this conception may be said, in broad
comprehensiveness, to be allowable in woman. Everything that can be
referred to this ideal, as naturally flowing therefrom, is admissible
in her relations with the great working hive of mankind. Intellectual
labor especially is befitting to her, within the limits prescribed
by modesty. Manual labor, especially agricultural or mining, is
proportionately less fitting, both because of her physical weakness and
more still because of the too free association with men which it often
necessitates. Domestic labor, where this is not unreasonably heavy, is
certainly within her sphere—and for this no better reason can be given
than that the women of patriarchal times thought domestic labor no
shame.
With this view, we say that as many openings for the employment of
woman as can possibly be made, consistently with delicacy and womanly
modesty, should be speedily contrived. No one need fear that such
openings will deprive us of necessary comforts in the way of domestic
attendance; there will always be a residuum of womankind to whom
service will be the most natural and desirable outlet, to whom in fact
it will be the only career which will give scope to the capacities
they have. This will be the least difficulty; the real problem will
always remain rather on the other side—that is, as to how many
women can be redeemed from the bondage of circumstances by any known
method of redemption. It is appalling to think of the many women,
delicate-minded, earnest, persevering, who see in their womanhood,
which should be their crown and their boast, only the barrier to their
aspirations, the prison-door of their capabilities. It is terrible
to reckon the number of women who lose themselves, and wander away
from their place in society, either through the door of open shame
or through the only less revolting path of that which is called but
is not marriage; or visionary, defiant “independence.” How many
fallen women sadly excuse themselves by saying that they could find
no work to do, and yet could not bear to starve! On the other hand,
in women who have obviated that degradation by leaping into another,
we see the inevitable action of the narrow-mindedness of the world
upon an undisciplined nature. Women are often accused of being always
in extremes, and the accusation, in the case of women untrained by
religious influences, is in the main true, although it may as well be
said that the fact holds equally good with men who are not restrained
by such influences. So, between open degradation and blatant “woman’s
rightism,” the mind of the untutored woman will almost certainly,
except by a happy chance, find no mean.