APPLICATION OF THE FOURTH NOTE OF A TRUE DEVELOPMENT.
LOGICAL SEQUENCE.
Logical Sequence has been set down above as a fourth test of fidelity in
development, and shall now be briefly illustrated in the history of
Christian doctrine. That is, I mean to give instances of one doctrine
leading to another; so that, if the former be admitted, the latter can
hardly be denied, and the latter can hardly be called a corruption
without taking exception to the former. And I use "logical sequence" in
contrast both to that process of incorporation and assimilation which
was last under review, and also to that principle of science, which has
put into order and defended the developments after they have been made.
Accordingly it will include any progress of the mind from one judgment
to another, as, for instance, by way of moral fitness, which may not
admit of analysis into premiss and conclusion. Thus St. Peter argued in
the case of Cornelius and his friends, "Can any man forbid water that
these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well
as we?"
Such is the series of doctrinal truths, which start from the dogma of
our Lord's Divinity, and again from such texts of Scripture as "Thou art
Peter," and which I should have introduced here, had I not already used
them for a previous purpose in the Fourth Chapter. I shall confine
myself then for an example to the instance of the developments which
follow on the consideration of sin after Baptism, a subject which was
touched upon in the same Chapter.
§ 1. _Pardons._
It is not necessary here to enlarge on the benefits which the primitive
Church held to be conveyed to the soul by means of the Sacrament of
Baptism. Its distinguishing gift, which is in point to mention, was the
plenary forgiveness of sins past. It was also held that the Sacrament
could not be repeated. The question immediately followed, how, since
there was but "one Baptism for the remission of sins," the guilt of such
sin was to be removed as was incurred after its administration. There
must be some provision in the revealed system for so obvious a need.
What could be done for those who had received the one remission of sins,
and had sinned since? Some who thought upon the subject appear to have
conceived that the Church was empowered to grant one, and one only,
reconciliation after grievous offences. Three sins seemed to many, at
least in the West, to be irremissible, idolatry, murder, and adultery.
But such a system of Church discipline, however suited to a small
community, and even expedient in a time of persecution, could not exist
in Christianity, as it spread into the _orbis terrarum_, and gathered
like a net of every kind. A more indulgent rule gradually gained ground;
yet the Spanish Church adhered to the ancient even in the fourth
century, and a portion of the African in the third, and in the remaining
portion there was a relaxation only as regards the crime of
incontinence.
2.
Meanwhile a protest was made against the growing innovation: at the
beginning of the third century Montanus, who was a zealot for the more
primitive rule, shrank from the laxity, as he considered it, of the
Asian Churches;[385:1] as, in a different subject-matter, Jovinian and
Vigilantius were offended at the developments in divine worship in the
century which followed. The Montanists had recourse to the See of Rome,
and at first with some appearance of success. Again, in Africa, where
there had been in the first instance a schism headed by Felicissimus in
favour of a milder discipline than St. Cyprian approved, a far more
formidable stand was soon made in favour of Antiquity, headed by
Novatus, who originally had been of the party of Felicissimus. This was
taken up at Rome by Novatian, who professed to adhere to the original,
or at least the primitive rule of the Church, viz. that those who had
once fallen from the faith could in no case be received again.[385:2]
The controversy seems to have found the following issue,--whether the
Church had the _means_ of pardoning sins committed after Baptism, which
the Novatians, at least practically, denied. "It is fitting," says the
Novatian Acesius, "to exhort those who have sinned after Baptism to
repentance, but to expect hope of remission, not from the priests, but
from God, who hath power to forgive sins."[385:3] The schism spread into
the East, and led to the appointment of a penitentiary priest in the
Catholic Churches. By the end of the third century as many as four
degrees of penance were appointed, through which offenders had to pass
in order to a reconciliation.
§ 2. _Penances._
The length and severity of the penance varied with times and places.
Sometimes, as we have seen, it lasted, in the case of grave offences,
through life and on to death, without any reconciliation; at other times
it ended only in the _viaticum_; and if, after reconciliation they did
not die, their ordinary penance was still binding on them either for
life or for a certain time. In other cases it lasted ten, fifteen, or
twenty years. But in all cases, from the first, the Bishop had the power
of shortening it, and of altering the nature and quality of the
punishment. Thus in the instance of the Emperor Theodosius, whom St.
Ambrose shut out from communion for the massacre at Thessalonica,
"according to the mildest rules of ecclesiastical discipline, which were
established in the fourth century," says Gibbon, "the crime of homicide
was expiated by the penitence of twenty years; and as it was impossible,
in the period of human life, to purge the accumulated guilt of the
massacre . . . the murderer should have been excluded from the holy
communion till the hour of his death." He goes on to say that the public
edification which resulted from the humiliation of so illustrious a
penitent was a reason for abridging the punishment. "It was sufficient
that the Emperor of the Romans, stripped of the ensigns of royalty,
should appear in a mournful and suppliant posture, and that, in the
midst of the Church of Milan, he should humbly solicit with sighs and
tears the pardon of his sins." His penance was shortened to an interval
of about eight months. Hence arose the phrase of a "_poenitentia
legitima, plena, et justa_;" which signifies a penance sufficient,
perhaps in length of time, perhaps in intensity of punishment.
§ 3. _Satisfactions._
Here a serious question presented itself to the minds of Christians,
which was now to be wrought out:--Were these punishments merely signs
of contrition, or in any sense satisfactions for sin? If the former,
they might be absolutely remitted at the discretion of the Church, as
soon as true repentance was discovered; the end had then been attained,
and nothing more was necessary. Thus St. Chrysostom says in one of his
Homilies,[387:1] "I require not continuance of time, but the correction
of the soul. Show your contrition, show your reformation, and all is
done." Yet, though there might be a reason of the moment for shortening
the penance imposed by the Church, this does not at all decide the
question whether that ecclesiastical penance be not part of an expiation
made to the Almighty Judge for the sin; and supposing this really to be
the case, the question follows, How is the complement of that
satisfaction to be wrought out, which on just grounds of present
expedience has been suspended by the Church now?
As to this question, it cannot be doubted that the Fathers considered
penance as not a mere expression of contrition, but as an act done
directly towards God and a means of averting His anger. "If the sinner
spare not himself, he will be spared by God," says the writer who goes
under the name of St. Ambrose. "Let him lie in sackcloth, and by the
austerity of his life make amends for the offence of his past
pleasures," says St. Jerome. "As we have sinned greatly," says St.
Cyprian, "let us weep greatly; for a deep wound diligent and long
tending must not be wanting, the repentance must not fall short of the
offence." "Take heed to thyself," says St. Basil, "that, in proportion
to the fault, thou admit also the restoration from the remedy."[387:2]
If so, the question follows which was above contemplated,--if in
consequence of death, or in the exercise of the Church's discretion,
the "_plena poenitentia_" is not accomplished in its ecclesiastical
shape, how and when will the residue be exacted?
§ 4. _Purgatory._
Clement of Alexandria answers this particular question very distinctly,
according to Bishop Kaye, though not in some other points expressing
himself conformably to the doctrine afterwards received. "Clement," says
that author, "distinguishes between sins committed before and after
baptism: the former are remitted at baptism; the latter are purged by
discipline. . . . The necessity of this purifying discipline is such,
that if it does not take place in this life, it must after death, and is
then to be effected by fire, not by a destructive, but a discriminating
fire, pervading the soul which passes through it."[388:1]
There is a celebrated passage in St. Cyprian, on the subject of the
punishment of lapsed Christians, which certainly seems to express the
same doctrine. "St. Cyprian is arguing in favour of readmitting the
lapsed, when penitent; and his argument seems to be that it does not
follow that we absolve them simply because we simply restore them to the
Church. He writes thus to Antonian: 'It is one thing to stand for
pardon, another to arrive at glory; one to be sent to prison (_missum in
carcerem_) and not to go out till the last farthing be paid, another to
receive at once the reward of faith and virtue; one thing to be
tormented for sin in long pain, and so to be cleansed and purged a long
while by fire (_purgari diu igne_), another to be washed from all sin in
martyrdom; one thing, in short, to wait for the Lord's sentence in the
Day of Judgment, another at once to be crowned by Him.' Some understand
this passage to refer to the penitential discipline of the Church which
was imposed on the penitent; and, as far as the context goes, certainly
no sense could be more apposite. Yet . . . the words in themselves seem
to go beyond any mere ecclesiastical, though virtually divine censure;
especially '_missum in carcerem_' and '_purgari diu igne_.'"[389:1]
2.
The Acts of the Martyrs St. Perpetua and St. Felicitas, which are prior
to St. Cyprian, confirm this interpretation. In the course of the
narrative, St. Perpetua prays for her brother Dinocrates, who had died
at the age of seven; and has a vision of a dark place, and next of a
pool of water, which he was not tall enough to reach. She goes on
praying; and in a second vision the water descended to him, and he was
able to drink, and went to play as children use. "Then I knew," she
says, "that he was translated from his place of punishment."[389:2]
The prayers in the Eucharistic Service for the faithful departed,
inculcate, at least according to the belief of the fourth century, the
same doctrine, that the sins of accepted and elect souls, which were not
expiated here, would receive punishment hereafter. Certainly such was
St. Cyril's belief: "I know that many say," he observes, "what is a soul
profited, which departs from this world either with sins or without
sins, if it be commemorated in the [Eucharistic] Prayer? Now, surely, if
when a king had banished certain who had given him offence, their
connexions should weave a crown and offer it to him on behalf of those
under his vengeance, would he not grant a respite to their punishments?
In the same way we, when we offer to Him our supplications for those who
have fallen asleep, though they be sinners, weave no crown, but offer up
Christ, sacrificed for our sins, propitiating our merciful God, both
for them and for ourselves."[390:1]
3.
Thus we see how, as time went on, the doctrine of Purgatory was brought
home to the minds of the faithful as a portion or form of Penance due
for post-baptismal sin. And thus the apprehension of this doctrine and
the practice of Infant Baptism would grow into general reception
together. Cardinal Fisher gives another reason for Purgatory being then
developed out of earlier points of faith. He says, "Faith, whether in
Purgatory or in Indulgences, was not so necessary in the Primitive
Church as now. For then love so burned, that every one was ready to meet
death for Christ. Crimes were rare, and such as occurred were avenged by
the great severity of the Canons."[390:2]
4.
An author, who quotes this passage, analyzes the circumstances and the
reflections which prepared the Christian mind for the doctrine, when it
was first insisted on, and his remarks with a few corrections may be
accepted here. "Most men," he says, "to our apprehensions, are too
little formed in religious habits either for heaven or for hell, yet
there is no middle state when Christ comes in judgment. In consequence
it is obvious to have recourse to the interval before His coming, as a
time during which this incompleteness may be remedied; as a season, not
of changing the spiritual bent and character of the soul departed,
whatever that be, for probation ends with mortal life, but of developing
it in a more determinate form, whether of good or of evil. Again, when
the mind once allows itself to speculate, it will discern in such a
provision a means, whereby those, who, not without true faith at bottom,
yet have committed great crimes, or those who have been carried off in
youth while still undecided, or who die after a barren though not an
immoral or scandalous life, may receive such chastisement as may prepare
them for heaven, and render it consistent with God's justice to admit
them thither. Again, the inequality of the sufferings of Christians in
this life, compared one with another, leads the mind to the same
speculations; the intense suffering, for instance, which some men
undergo on their death-bed, seeming as if but an anticipation in their
case of what comes after death upon others, who, without greater claim
on God's forbearance, live without chastisement, and die easily. The
mind will inevitably dwell upon such thoughts, unless it has been taught
to subdue them by education or by the fear or the experience of their
dangerousness.
5.
"Various suppositions have, accordingly, been made, as pure
suppositions, as mere specimens of the capabilities (if one may so
speak) of the Divine Dispensation, as efforts of the mind reaching
forward and venturing beyond its depth into the abyss of the Divine
Counsels. If one supposition could be hazarded, sufficient to solve the
problem, the existence of ten thousand others is conceivable, unless
indeed the resources of God's Providence are exactly commensurate with
man's discernment of them. Religious men, amid these searchings of
heart, have naturally gone to Scripture for relief; to see if the
inspired word anywhere gave them any clue for their inquiries. And from
what was there found, and from the speculations of reason upon it,
various notions have been hazarded at different times; for instance,
that there is a certain momentary ordeal to be undergone by all men
after this life, more or less severe according to their spiritual
state; or that certain gross sins in good men will be thus visited, or
their lighter failings and habitual imperfections; or that the very
sight of Divine Perfection in the invisible world will be in itself a
pain, while it constitutes the purification of the imperfect but
believing soul; or that, happiness admitting of various degrees of
intensity, penitents late in life may sink for ever into a state,
blissful as far as it goes, but more or less approaching to
unconsciousness; and infants dying after baptism may be as gems paving
the courts of heaven, or as the living wheels of the Prophet's vision;
while matured Saints may excel in capacity of bliss, as well as in
dignity, the highest Archangels.
6.
"Now, as to the punishments and satisfactions for sin, the texts to
which the minds of the early Christians seem to have been principally
drawn, and from which they ventured to argue in behalf of these vague
notions, were these two: 'The fire shall try every man's work,' &c., and
'He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire.' These
passages, with which many more were found to accord, directed their
thoughts one way, as making mention of 'fire,' whatever was meant by the
word, as the instrument of trial and purification; and that, at some
time between the present time and the Judgment, or at the Judgment.
"As the doctrine, thus suggested by certain striking texts, grew in
popularity and definiteness, and verged towards its present Roman form,
it seemed a key to many others. Great portions of the books of Psalms,
Job, and the Lamentations, which express the feelings of religious men
under suffering, would powerfully recommend it by the forcible and most
affecting and awful meaning which they received from it. When this was
once suggested, all other meanings would seem tame and inadequate.
"To these may be added various passages from the Prophets, as that in
the beginning of the third chapter of Malachi, which speaks of fire as
the instrument of judgment and purification, when Christ comes to visit
His Church.
"Moreover, there were other texts of obscure and indeterminate bearing,
which seemed on this hypothesis to receive a profitable meaning; such as
our Lord's words in the Sermon on the Mount, 'Verily, I say unto thee,
thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid the uttermost
farthing;' and St. John's expression in the Apocalypse, that 'no man in
heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the
book.'"[393:1]
7.
When then an answer had to be made to the question, how is
post-baptismal sin to be remitted, there was an abundance of passages in
Scripture to make easy to the faith of the inquirer the definitive
decision of the Church.
§ 5. _Meritorious Works._
The doctrine of post-baptismal sin, especially when realized in the
doctrine of Purgatory, leads the inquirer to fresh developments beyond
itself. Its effect is to convert a Scripture statement, which might seem
only of temporary application, into a universal and perpetual truth.
When St. Paul and St. Barnabas would "confirm the souls of the
disciples," they taught them "that we must through much tribulation
enter into the kingdom of God." It is obvious what very practical
results would follow on such an announcement, in the instance of those
who simply accepted the Apostolic decision; and in like manner a
conviction that sin must have its punishment, here or hereafter, and
that we all must suffer, how overpowering will be its effect, what a new
light does it cast on the history of the soul, what a change does it
make in our judgment of the external world, what a reversal of our
natural wishes and aims for the future! Is a doctrine conceivable which
would so elevate the mind above this present state, and teach it so
successfully to dare difficult things, and to be reckless of danger and
pain? He who believes that suffer he must, and that delayed punishment
may be the greater, will be above the world, will admire nothing, fear
nothing, desire nothing. He has within his breast a source of greatness,
self-denial, heroism. This is the secret spring of strenuous efforts and
persevering toil, of the sacrifice of fortune, friends, ease,
reputation, happiness. There is, it is true, a higher class of motives
which will be felt by the Saint; who will do from love what all
Christians, who act acceptably, do from faith. And, moreover, the
ordinary measures of charity which Christians possess, suffice for
securing such respectable attention to religious duties as the routine
necessities of the Church require. But if we would raise an army of
devoted men to resist the world, to oppose sin and error, to relieve
misery, or to propagate the truth, we must be provided with motives
which keenly affect the many. Christian love is too rare a gift,
philanthropy is too weak a material, for the occasion. Nor is there an
influence to be found to suit our purpose, besides this solemn
conviction, which arises out of the very rudiments of Christian
theology, and is taught by its most ancient masters,--this sense of the
awfulness of post-baptismal sin. It is in vain to look out for
missionaries for China or Africa, or evangelists for our great towns, or
Christian attendants on the sick, or teachers of the ignorant, on such a
scale of numbers as the need requires, without the doctrine of
Purgatory. For thus the sins of youth are turned to account by the
profitable penance of manhood; and terrors, which the philosopher scorns
in the individual, become the benefactors and earn the gratitude of
nations.
§ 6. _The Monastic Rule._
But there is one form of Penance which has been more prevalent and
uniform than any other, out of which the forms just noticed have grown,
or on which they have been engrafted,--the Monastic Rule. In the first
ages, the doctrine of the punishments of sin, whether in this world or
in the next, was little called for. The rigid discipline of the infant
Church was the preventive of greater offences, and its persecutions the
penance of their commission; but when the Canons were relaxed and
confessorship ceased, then some substitute was needed, and such was
Monachism, being at once a sort of continuation of primeval innocence,
and a school of self-chastisement. And, as it is a great principle in
economical and political science that everything should be turned to
account, and there should be no waste, so, in the instance of
Christianity, the penitential observances of individuals, which were
necessarily on a large scale as its professors increased, took the form
of works, whether for the defence of the Church, or the spiritual and
temporal good of mankind.
2.
In no aspect of the Divine system do we see more striking developments
than in the successive fortunes of Monachism. Little did the youth
Antony foresee, when he set off to fight the evil one in the wilderness,
what a sublime and various history he was opening, a history which had
its first developments even in his own lifetime. He was himself a
hermit in the desert; but when others followed his example, he was
obliged to give them guidance, and thus he found himself, by degrees, at
the head of a large family of solitaries, five thousand of whom were
scattered in the district of Nitria alone. He lived to see a second
stage in the development; the huts in which they lived were brought
together, sometimes round a church, and a sort of subordinate community,
or college, formed among certain individuals of their number. St.
Pachomius was the first who imposed a general rule of discipline upon
the brethren, gave them a common dress, and set before them the objects
to which the religious life was dedicated. Manual labour, study,
devotion, bodily mortification, were now their peculiarities; and the
institution, thus defined, spread and established itself through Eastern
and Western Christendom.
The penitential character of Monachism is not prominent in St. Antony,
though it is distinctly noticed by Pliny in his description of the
Essenes of the Dead Sea, who anticipated the monastic life at the rise
of Christianity. In St. Basil, however, it becomes a distinguishing
feature;--so much so that the monastic profession was made a
disqualification for the pastoral office,[396:1] and in theory involved
an absolute separation from mankind; though in St. Basil's, as well as
St. Antony's disciples, it performed the office of resisting heresy.
Next, the monasteries, which in their ecclesiastical capacity had been
at first separate churches under a Presbyter or Abbot, became schools
for the education of the clergy.[396:2]
3.
Centuries passed, and after many extravagant shapes of the institution,
and much wildness and insubordination in its members, a new development
took place under St. Benedict. Revising and digesting the provisions of
St. Antony, St. Pachomius, and St. Basil, he bound together his monks by
a perpetual vow, brought them into the cloister, united the separate
convents into one Order,[397:1] and added objects of an ecclesiastical
and civil nature to that of personal edification. Of these objects,
agriculture seemed to St. Benedict himself of first importance; but in a
very short time it was superseded by study and education, and the
monasteries of the following centuries became the schools and libraries,
and the monks the chroniclers and copyists, of a dark period. Centuries
later, the Benedictine Order was divided into separate Congregations,
and propagated in separate monastic bodies. The Congregation of Cluni
was the most celebrated of the former; and of the latter, the hermit
order of the Camaldoli and the agricultural Cistercians.
4.
Both a unity and an originality are observable in the successive phases
under which Monachism has shown itself; and while its developments bring
it more and more into the ecclesiastical system, and subordinate it to
the governing power, they are true to their first idea, and spring fresh
and fresh from the parent stock, which from time immemorial had thriven
in Syria and Egypt. The sheepskin and desert of St. Antony did but
revive "the mantle"[397:2] and the mountain of the first Carmelite, and
St. Basil's penitential exercises had already been practised by the
Therapeutæ. In like manner the Congregational principle, which is
ascribed to St. Benedict, had been anticipated by St. Antony and St.
Pachomius; and after centuries of disorder, another function of early
Monachism, for which there had been little call for centuries, the
defence of Catholic truth, was exercised with singular success by the
rival orders of Dominicans and Franciscans.
St. Benedict had come as if to preserve a principle of civilization, and
a refuge for learning, at a time when the old framework of society was
falling, and new political creations were taking their place. And when
the young intellect within them began to stir, and a change of another
kind discovered itself, then appeared St. Francis and St. Dominic to
teach and chastise it; and in proportion as Monachism assumed this
public office, so did the principle of penance, which had been the chief
characteristic of its earlier forms, hold a less prominent place. The
Tertiaries indeed, or members of the third order of St. Francis and St.
Dominic, were penitents; but the friar himself, instead of a penitent,
was made a priest, and was allowed to quit cloister. Nay, they assumed
the character of what may be called an Ecumenical Order, as being
supported by begging, not by endowments, and being under the
jurisdiction, not of the local Bishop, but of the Holy See. The
Dominicans too came forward especially as a learned body, and as
entrusted with the office of preaching, at a time when the mind of
Europe seemed to be developing into infidelity. They filled the chairs
at the Universities, while the strength of the Franciscans lay among the
lower orders.
5.
At length, in the last era of ecclesiastical revolution, another
principle of early Monachism, which had been but partially developed,
was brought out into singular prominence in the history of the Jesuits.
"Obedience," said an ancient abbot, "is a monk's service, with which he
shall be heard in prayer, and shall stand with confidence by the
Crucified, for so the Lord came to the cross, being made obedient even
unto death;"[399:1] but it was reserved for modern times to furnish the
perfect illustration of this virtue, and to receive the full blessing
which follows it. The great Society, which bears no earthly name, still
more secular in its organization, and still more simply dependent on the
See of St. Peter, has been still more distinguished than any Order
before it for the rule of obedience, while it has compensated the danger
of its free intercourse with the world by its scientific adherence to
devotional exercises. The hermitage, the cloister, the inquisitor, and
the friar were suited to other states of society; with the Jesuits, as
well as with the religious Communities, which are their juniors,
usefulness, secular and religious, literature, education, the
confessional, preaching, the oversight of the poor, missions, the care
of the sick, have been chief objects of attention; great cities have
been the scene of operation: bodily austerities and the ceremonial of
devotion have been made of but secondary importance. Yet it may fairly
be questioned, whether, in an intellectual age, when freedom both of
thought and of action is so dearly prized, a greater penance can be
devised for the soldier of Christ than the absolute surrender of
judgment and will to the command of another.
FOOTNOTES:
[385:1] Gieseler, Text-book, vol. i. p. 108.
[385:2] Gieseler, ibid. p. 164.
[385:3] Socr. Hist. i. 10.
[387:1] Hom. 14, in 2 Cor. fin.
[387:2] Vid. Tertull. Oxf. tr. pp. 374, 5.
[388:1] Clem. ch. 12. Vid. also Tertull. de Anim. fin.
[389:1] Tracts for the Times, No. 79, p. 38.
[389:2] Ruinart, Mart. p. 96.
[390:1] Mystagog. 5.
[390:2] [Vid. Via Media, vol. i. p 72.]
[393:1] [Via Media, vol. i. pp. 174-177.]
[396:1] Gieseler, vol. ii. p. 288.
[396:2] Ibid. p. 279.
[397:1] Or rather his successors, as St. Benedict of Anian, were the
founders of the Order; but minute accuracy on these points is
unnecessary in a mere sketch of the history.
[397:2] +mêlôtês+, 2 Kings ii. Sept. Vid. also, "They wandered about in
sheepskins and goatskins" (Heb. xi. 37).
[399:1] Rosweyde, V. P. p. 618.