expected to make any change in his dress. Still, from the fourth to
the ninth century everything seems to show that his proper costume was
always white, or at least that it was so during the celebration of the
highest ceremonies. St. Chrysostom, feeling the approach of death, and
being anxious to partake of the holy sacrament, called for his white
vestments, and distributed those he was wearing, even to his shoes,
among his assistants. The customs and traditions of the West conformed
in this to those of the East. The neophyte was stripped of his worldly
garments, he was clad in a white or religious robe (_habitus
religionis_), and was then considered fit to perform his duties.
Sometimes, however, the white robes of the sovereign pontiff were
adorned with bands of gold or purple. White was not mixed with other
tints in the dress of the clergy till towards the ninth century; the
five hues admitted by religious symbolism date only from the twelfth
century.
[Illustration: Fig. 187.--Romanesque perforated Handbell,
representing the symbols of the Four Evangelists (Twelfth
Century).--From the Archæological Museum at Rheims.]
Charlemagne, who was proud of his thorough acquaintance with the
liturgy, who esteemed it an honour to wear, on high occasions, the
green chasuble embroidered with gold, and to chant the epistles before
the assembled congregations, took the greatest pains with all the
ceremonies of the Church; and it is an undoubted fact that the pomp
with which they were afterwards celebrated was inaugurated by him.
Charlemagne and his successors, Louis the Affable and Charles the
Bald, did not, however, content themselves with merely attending to
ceremonial pomp; they did their best to introduce a principle of
unity in conformity with the Roman liturgy. At the commencement of
the eighth century Pope Adrian I., having sent to Charlemagne an
antiphonary scored by St. Gregory himself, the Emperor ordered all the
churches in his dominions to adopt the Gregorian chant. Thenceforward
the ancient Gallican liturgy almost disappeared, and when Charles
the Bald was desirous of comparing together the Greek, Roman, and
Gallican liturgies, he was obliged to summon ecclesiastics from Toledo
to officiate in his presence according to the Gallican rite. Charles
preferred the Roman ritual; but notwithstanding this, each diocesan
cathedral, each separate abbey, introduced into the Gallo-Roman liturgy
various accessory forms differing more or less from one another.
It is possible to trace back to the sixth century the first use of
church bells, but their general introduction into the Western church
dates from the eighth century. They were termed _seings_ (in Latin
_signa_); they were not rung, but were simply struck with wooden
or metal hammers (Fig. 187), as is still done south of the Pyrenees.
From this practice comes the word _toc-seing_ or _tocsin_,
applied to the municipal peals of the Middle Ages and of still later
times. The organ (_organum_) also dates from the eighth century.
Imperfect as this instrument originally was, it caused tremendous
enthusiasm among its hearers. Indeed, it may be said that organs
and church bells had an equal share in raising the prestige of the
ceremonial liturgy, which charmed and captivated both the senses and
the souls of its hearers, by the display of its numerous officiating
clergy, by the solemn gravity of its chants, by the noble simplicity of
the vestments, and by the chaste and majestic arrangement of its ritual.
[Illustration: Fig. 188.--The Triumph of the Lamb.--Christ,
typified as the spotless lamb, with a glory round his head and
holding the cross, is at the feet of God the Father; around
him are the Four Evangelists, represented by their typical
attributes, and resting upon wheels of fire. The archangels are
bringing him their offerings. The firmament is supported by
four angels. Beneath is St. John explaining the Apocalypse to
his commentator.--From a Miniature in the “Commentary upon the
Apocalypse,” by Beatus; a Manuscript of the Twelfth Century, in
the Collection of M. Ambroise Firmin-Didot.]
Under the last Carlovingians the liturgy gradually deteriorated;
less in the East perhaps than in the West, less at Rome and Milan
perhaps than elsewhere, but everywhere the signs of deplorable
relaxation and falling away were manifest. The choristers attempted
to assume the privileges of the clerks; the deacons arrogated to
themselves impossible rights of independence; the priests despised the
bishops, and too frequently the bishops, presuming on their power,
had the audacity to disobey the pontifical decrees. This change and
deterioration principally showed itself in the psalmody, in the
chants, in the adornment of the sanctuary, and in the dress of the
ecclesiastics. The Byzantine methods of treatment, as applied to
architectural monuments and to the various forms of Christian art,
did something to preserve the traditions of the liturgy, but from the
close of the tenth century till the twelfth much confusion prevailed
in the Latin Church. It was reserved for the Crusades, after a century
and a half of adventurous expeditions, to bring back from countries
beyond the sea, from Antioch, from Constantinople, and from Jerusalem,
the elements and the principles of a Neo-Greek liturgy, in which
the degenerate Gallo-Roman was as it were saturated, and its whole
character remodelled.
The Catholic liturgy thus underwent a touching and marvellous
transformation; this transformation was inaugurated by the construction
of new churches, in which the Romanesque style gave place to that of
the Ogive or Gothic; by the erection of slender belfries, recalling the
minarets of the Mahometan mosques; by the introduction of transparent
pictures on painted glass; by the chaste but splendid appointments of
the chapels; by the dazzling decorations of the altars; by the melody
of the church bells, the sonorous messengers of religion calling the
faithful to prayer; and by the harmony of the human voice with the
organ and other musical instruments. A complete and ingenious symbolism
was contained in this comprehensive allegorical ritual, and rendered
the liturgy a veritable sanctuary of Christian instruction and sacred
tradition, each mystery (Fig. 188), each precept of which penetrated
into the soul, as it were, through the medium of the senses.
In the thirteenth century, when the celebrated William Durand,
Bishop of Mende, wrote his “Rationale of Divine Service,” a complete
collection of the liturgy of the day, this sort of canonical
legislation became settled as much as a matter could be which the
bishops and even the mere priests were continually modifying. William
Durand, following the example of his predecessors, included many
innovations which were to be lamented, many eccentric rites foreign to
the traditions of the primitive church, and lowering to the dignity
of divine worship. Enlightened minds felt the truth of this, and the
Council of Trent found it necessary to demand a liturgical reform. In
consequence of this demand Pope Pius V., in 1568, issued the corrected
form of the _Roman Breviary_, and, in 1570, the new _Missal_.
As the principal object was to reform the errors which had crept in
in later times, the dioceses which possessed rituals of at least two
hundred years old could either preserve their own customs or adopt the
Breviary and the Missal of Pius V.
The Church has deviated as little as possible from its ancient
ceremonial, particularly in what concerns the administration of the
sacraments. Nevertheless, seven sacraments, which we will rapidly
notice in the order in which they are enumerated by the Council of
Trent, were formerly accompanied by certain ceremonies which the change
of manners and customs has caused to fall into disuse, and which we
shall mention merely as a proof of their antiquity.
[Illustration: Fig 189.--Three Sacraments: _Baptism_,
which inaugurates life; _Confirmation_, which strengthens
childhood; and _Penance_, which reconciles manhood.
Left portion of the triptych painted on panel by Roger Van der
Weyden (Rogier del Pasturle).--From the Antwerp Museum (Fifteenth
Century).]
1. _Baptism_, which St. Peter had given by _aspersion_ to the
three thousand persons whom he converted by his first sermon, was also
given in primitive times by _immersion_; finally _infusion_
(from the Latin verb _infundere_, to sprinkle) was adopted in the
manner in which it is practised in our own day (Figs. 189 and 190).
2. _Confirmation_ was administered immediately after baptism,
when only adults were admitted to the latter sacrament; but when
baptism was administered to new-born infants, confirmation had to be
postponed till the receivers of the rite were old enough to answer for
themselves--that is to say, until they were capable of distinguishing
between good and evil (Fig. 189).
3. The _Eucharist_ from the earliest times was administered under
the name of _communion_ to those in sound health, and under the
name of _viaticum_ to those at the point of death (Figs. 192 and
193).
[Illustration: Fig. 190.--The Ship of Baptism, a Flemish work of
the Sixteenth Century, in chiselled gold and silver; from the
Collection of M. Onghena, at Ghent.--When a child was baptized,
it was the custom in the Low Countries to drink the infant’s
health in a cup of spiced wine. The cup, shaped like a boat, is
typical of the voyage of life: an aged knight is at the helm, two
others are fencing together, a sailor adjusts the rigging, the
wind fills the sail, and at the mast-head the look-out scans the
horizon. The Flemish device runs thus: “A fortunate voyage to the
new-born.”]
The communion, that is to say the host, was received in the hand,
and was administered by the communicant himself. After the sixth
century women were enjoined to receive it in a white veil, termed
_dominical_, with which they lifted it to their mouths without
touching it with their hands. In 880 the Council of Rouen decreed that
in future the sacrament was only to be received at the hand of the
officiating priest. Until the thirteenth century the communion was
always preceded by the kiss of love; the men embraced the men, and
the women the women. After the distribution of bread the deacons came
forward with two-handled cups of large dimensions, containing wine for
the communicants, which each tasted through a golden pipe (Fig. 191).
[Illustration: Fig. 191.--Sacramental Cup; a work of the Twelfth
Century, in silver gilt, from the Abbey of the Benedictines of
Witten, near Inspruck.]
[Illustration: Fig. 192.--The Sacrament of the Eucharist, which
keeps youth holy.--Central portion of the triptych, by Roger Van
der Weyden, in the Antwerp Museum (Fifteenth Century).]
4. _Penance_, the obligatory practice of which was reduced to
once a year by the fourth Lateran Council, had always for its aim the
absolution from sin consequent upon confession.
Excommunication, the extreme punishment inflicted upon great sinners,
was pronounced by the faint light of a wax taper, which the priest
afterwards extinguished and trampled under foot. In some countries
the populace used to carry a bier to the door of the excommunicated
person; stones were hurled against his dwelling, and all kinds of
foul abuse were heaped upon him. Of a still more solemn nature was
the excommunication pronounced by the pope himself on Holy Thursday,
in virtue of the bull termed _In Cœna Domini_, against all who
appealed to the general council against the decrees and the ordinances
of the pontiffs; against the princes who exacted unfair tribute from
ecclesiastics; and against heretics, pirates, &c. A deacon read the
bull from the balcony (_loggia_, an open tribunal) of St. Peter’s
in the presence of the pope, who, as a symbol of anathema, dashed a
lighted torch of yellow wax into the open court of the Vatican, which
the assistants hastened to extinguish by trampling upon it. It was also
on Holy Thursday that the _reconciliation_ of the penitents took
place, that is to say, their general absolution, to enable them to take
part in the mysteries of Easter.
[Illustration: Fig. 193.--Legend of the passage of the viaticum
across a wooden bridge, at Utrecht, in 1277. Some dancers having
allowed the host to pass without discontinuing their dances, the
bridge suddenly gave way and two hundred persons were drowned in
the river.--Fac-simile of an Engraving upon Wood by P. Wolgemuth,
in the “Liber Chronicarum Mundi:” Nuremberg, 1493, in folio.]
5. _Extreme unction_ has always been given to sick people in
danger of death, according to the recommendation of the Apostle St.
James. The material of which this sacrament is composed is the _oil
of the infirm_, but we can see from old rituals that the place
and number of the unctions have varied at different times in the
administration of this sacrament (Fig. 194).
6. _Orders_. Besides the higher orders, which were conferred as
they are in our own day, the Church included from the earliest times
the four minor orders, which were bestowed, as now, upon the tonsured
clerks; that is to say, the orders of _porter_, _reader_,
_exorcist_, and _acolyte_.
[Illustration: Fig. 194.--Three Sacraments: _Marriage_,
at full manhood; _Orders_, at old age; and _Extreme
Unction_, at death. Right portion of the triptych painted
on panel by Roger Van der Weyden.--Antwerp Museum. Fifteenth
Century.]
The consecration of abbots and abbesses, although made with a great
deal of ceremony, was not considered as an ordination, but only as a
benediction. The bishop, after giving the abbot the communion under the
form of bread, blessed him, placed a mitre on his head, and gave him
his gloves, the symbols of his rank, with the customary prayers. The
abbot’s crosier and ring were bestowed upon him before the offertory.
Alexander II., elected pope in 1061, was the first to confer upon
abbots the privilege of wearing the mitre. Abbesses also enjoyed the
right of carrying the crosier; they received it from the hands of the
bishop, together with the pastoral cross and ring. In the synods and
councils the abbots were only allowed to wear a mitre ornamented with
_orfroi_ (a golden fringe), but devoid of pearls and precious
stones; the bishops wore the precious mitre, that is to say, one
ornamented with pearls and jewels.
7. The ceremony of _marriage_ has altered but little. In old days,
however, it was celebrated at the door and not in the interior of the
church. In the ninth century the priest placed jewelled crowns upon the
heads of husband and wife; these crowns were made in the shape of a
tower, and were afterwards kept near the altar.
Most religious ceremonies were accompanied with processions; but
besides these there were great public processions varying according
to the country and the diocese in which they took place. They were
regulated by special liturgies, which formed a separate ritual termed
_processional_. The procession of palms or of branches, which
takes place the Sunday before Easter, in remembrance of the entry of
Christ into Jerusalem, had for a long time been customary in the East,
when towards the sixth or seventh century it was adopted by the Latin
church, which frequently added scenic accessories, intended to make a
still deeper impression on the minds of the spectators. This ancient
festival was distinguished by many names; by some it was termed the
_Hosanna_, in memory of the acclamations with which Jesus was
received in Jerusalem; by others the _Sunday of Indulgences_,
on account of the indulgences distributed by the Church on that holy
day. In old times verses from the Gospels, inscribed upon a richly
ornamented banner surrounded with palm-leaves, were carried in this
procession, and it was frequently also accompanied by the chalice
containing the host, in the midst of consecrated branches. It was,
as a rule, customary that the ashes employed for the ceremony of Ash
Wednesday should be those of the branches carried in the procession of
the preceding year, and which were carefully preserved from year to
year, and burnt when thoroughly desiccated.
In 1262 Pope Urban IV. confirmed and extended to the whole of
Christendom the statute of Robert, Bishop of Liége; who, being of
opinion that the ceremony of the eucharist ought to be celebrated in
a more solemn manner than it was possible to do upon Holy Thursday,
the day set aside for the reconciliation of penitents, had decreed that
every year, on the first Thursday after Pentecost, the festival of
Corpus Christi, or the _Fête-Dieu_ should take place (Fig. 195);
the office for which, the same as is used in our own day, was composed
by St. Thomas d’Aquinas.
[Illustration: Fig. 195.--Procession of the Host, in Paris: “The
procession proceeds from the Maison aux Piliers, the ancient
Hôtel de Ville, to the Place de Grève. To the left may be seen
Jean Juvénal des Ursins, on his knees before the host, which
is carried on a species of litter by a couple of monks of the
Sainte-Chapelle, and surrounded by the clerks of the brotherhood
crowned with wreaths of roses and carrying large lighted
tapers.... To the right, and towards the banks of the Seine, and
in front of the floating piles of wood, is the great Croix de
Grève. On the other side of the Seine may be seen the Cathedral
of Notre-Dame.”--From a Miniature in the Manuscript of the “Hours
of Juvénal des Ursins,” presented by M. Ambroise Firmin-Didot to
the town of Paris, and burnt in 1871 in the conflagration of the
Hôtel de Ville.]
[Illustration: Fig. 196.--Solemn Procession made on the 7th
September, 1513, by the clergy and inhabitants of Dijon, to
obtain from Our Lady the relief of the town, at that time
besieged by the Swiss. The ceremony was afterwards renewed every
year at the same epoch; it was termed the “Festival of Our Lady
of the Swiss.”--Tapestry of the Sixteenth Century, in the Dijon
Museum.--From a copy in the possession of M. Ach. Jubinal.]
The procession termed _Litanies majeures_, first instituted in 589
by Pope Pelagius II., owed its origin to a plague that desolated Rome
after an inundation of the Tiber.
In 474 St. Mamert, Archbishop of Vienne, in Dauphiny, in order to thank
God for having delivered his diocese from the scourges which desolated
it, and from the wild beasts which ravaged it, founded the procession
of _Rogations_, which took place during the three days which
precede the feast of the Ascension. This procession was ordered for the
whole of France by the Council of Orleans in 511; but it only came into
use at Rome towards the close of the eighth century, under Pope Leo III.
[Illustration: Fig. 197.--Pentecost.--Fac-simile of a Miniature
from the “Psalmody of St. Louis.”--Manuscript of the Thirteenth
Century, in the National Library, Paris.]
The procession which precedes the mass of Ascension Thursday is of
the highest antiquity; but nowhere was it carried out with greater
ceremony, or attended by a larger number of pilgrims, than at the
church built in Palestine by St. Helen, mother of Constantine, on the
very spot where the ascension took place, and where still might be seen
on the stone the last footprints of our Saviour, as He left this earth
and ascended to heaven.
[Illustration: Fig. 198.--The Adoration of the Magi.--From a pax
attributed to Maso Finiguerra (Fifteenth Century), preserved at
Florence. One of the kings is on his knees, and has taken off
his crown to present incense and myrrh to the Infant Jesus; the
others are riding towards the manger, escorted by their varlets
and pages, and followed by a long caravan; there are angels on
the roof playing the viol and the lute.]
In fact, in the Middle Ages there were an immense number of festivals
which gave rise to processions (Fig. 196) and to other religious
ceremonies. It must not be forgotten that all great festivals were
indifferently termed Easters. The anniversary of the resurrection of
Jesus Christ was the great Easter, and in order to prepare worthily
for it, the body was purified by baths, and the hair and the beard
were cut, as tokens of the care with which the Christian ought to
preserve the purity of his soul, and to remove the vices that infect
the unregenerated man. The Nativity, Epiphany, Ascension, and Pentecost
were also called Easter. In some churches, at Great Easter, dramatic
representations were given of the mysteries the festival celebrated. A
procession was undertaken to a tomb cut in a rock. Three women and two
men in Israelitish dress represented the three Marys and the disciples
John and Peter, and others dressed in white, with crowns on their
heads and wings on their shoulders, played the part of the angels who
communed with them.
_Pentecost_ (Fig. 197), or the _Easter of Roses_, was accompanied
with the same dramatic and religious accessories. In many churches
during mass, at the words _Veni, Sancte Spiritus_, a sudden blast of
the trumpet was given to recall the great noise in the midst of which
the Holy Ghost descended upon the apostles. Sometimes, indeed, to add
to the scenic imitation of the mystery, tongues of fire fell from the
roof, or a shower of red rose-leaves took place; and doves, emblems of
the Holy Ghost, were allowed to flutter about the church.
[Illustration: Fig. 199.--Knife with which the consecrated bread
was cut; on the blade may be read on one side a prayer for a
blessing on the food, on the other a thanksgiving, both with
music (Sixteenth Century).--Collection of M. Ach. Jubinal, Paris.]
[Illustration: Fig. 200.--Altar of the ancient Cathedral of
Arras (Thirteenth Century), now destroyed; from a picture of the
Sixteenth Century preserved in the sacristy of the Cathedral of
Arras.--The angels on the top of the columns bear the instruments
of the Passion. Along the summit of the screen are placed six
reliquaries containing the relics of different saints; they form
a retinue for Jesus, the chief of all martyrs. The tabernacle
is not a heavy square case, but a suspended casket borne by an
angel, who appears to descend from heaven. Higher up three angels
collect in the mysterious cup of the Grail the blood which flows
from the feet and hands of the crucified Jesus.]
At high festivals the mass was followed by the ceremony of the
offering, at which all present were expected to deposit a coin in a
plate, and kiss the emblem of good-will presented to them (Fig. 198).
This offering was in memory of an ancient custom. The offerings, which
in the primitive Church the faithful were accustomed to make every
day, consisted of bread and wine. They were placed before the altar
at the commencement of the second part of the mass, after the reading
of the Gospel and of the Apostles’ Creed. The capitularies of the
early Frankish kings prescribed that neophytes were to offer bread and
wine at least every Sunday. Until the eighth or ninth century, some
authors assert that for the sacrifice of the mass, either leavened or
unleavened bread was used indifferently; but since that period leavened
bread has only been in use in the Eastern Church. From this epoch,
also, the offered bread was no longer used except for distribution to
the people, as a symbol of the communion, and it then took the name
of _eulogy_ or _consecrated bread_ (Fig. 199). These pieces of bread,
which the assisting priests and deacons offered successively at the
altar upon white napkins, were of a round shape. They were termed
_hoops_, _crowns_, and _wheels_. The custom of offering bread and wine
whilst holding a lighted taper in the hand has been handed down, and
still exists at burials in many dioceses.
The altar where the offerings were made was surmounted by a cupola
(called _ciborium_) sustained by four columns, between which were
curtains, which were closed during part of the service to hide the
sacred mysteries about to take place (Fig. 200). In the middle of the
cupola, above the altar, a hollow dove, made of gold or silver, was
suspended (Fig. 201); in this the eucharist for the sick was kept. This
silver dove was replaced at a later period by the tabernacle.
[Illustration: Fig. 201.--Dove suspended above the altar,
containing the eucharistic box (Thirteenth Century).--“Studies
upon the Archæology of the Altar,” by Laib and Schwarz.]