him long familiar? How delightful to be introduced to them in their meditative hours; to hear their calm soliloquies, or their conversations philosophical, on the subjects which have an equal interest for ourselves? Then indeed the ruins that are scattered everywhere will be able to excite in the mind a useful remembrance, and in the heart a strong emotion. It will no longer be the artist only who visits with advantage the rock, beneath which hermits once were sheltered, the poor grey abbey, tottering to its fall, the feudal towers, to which it so often looked for protection, and the ancient seats of just authority, that so long sheltered peaceful holy kings; no philosopher, no Christian, will then ever pass them by without a wise reflection, or without a tear. Researches of this nature, it is true, cannot be concluded in brief space, and without labour; we shall, besides, in the beginning, have to traverse ground that will seem to those who are familiar with the instructions of faith, as void of any literary interest, from its appearing at the first glance to yield only what every book of devotion can supply; but they will view it differently, if they keep in mind that our object in approaching it is to hear those speak who are seldom interrogated by others; and that the authors who address them will be men of the middle ages, whom, perhaps, they have never met before, excepting on the page of Dante, or of some other mighty genius of the olden time. They will then feel that the words, independent of the truths divine which they convey, acquire a solemnity purely human, which men of hearts like ours, unsanctified and blind, may pretend without folly to appreciate; for they are those of authors whose volumes are not always accessible, though their glory lives yet on the tongue of poets, historians, and philosophers of a past world; men so venerable and great on all accounts, that whatever is uttered by them has a distinct value, in consideration of its having fallen from their lips. Listening to their discourse, indeed, will make our progress slow; but, as Plato observes, in reply to some who were for avoiding delay, "We must not refuse to pursue the longest road, which may lead with greatest certainty to the object of our enquiry; for it would be ridiculous to use every effort in exposing with the greatest exactness and clearness things of the least worth, and not to esteem the greatest as worthy of being determined with the most precision, and while the greatest subject of learning is that which instructs us in the idea of the highest good, assuredly there is no result of historical knowledge more important than that which enables us to learn in what manner the men of former times were able to conceive and secure it. Still I am aware, as Wadding says in the beginning of his eleventh volume, that the things which are here to be published respecting the admirable piety of men and women, may seem frivolous to those whose ears are accustomed to grand descriptions of republics, to narratives of battles and other military operations; but, as he continues, the philosophy of Christ has this peculiar property, that while nothing is more contemptible than its first, nothing is more divine than its subsequent aspect; for it inflames minds, not with the thirst of blood and slaughter, or with the cupidity of vain glory; but with humanity and gentleness, and the love of solid and true virtue ** There was, however, a difficulty greater still, that might have discouraged us from pursuing this history any further; for here we enter upon an investigation that will lead immediately to holy ground, towards which men of hearts like ours should pause before they dare so much as to turn even their eyes. Yet I was tempted to proceed, when I considered that in this journey through the literature of past ages, as in that of life, the profane may join the company of blessed pilgrims, and pass in at their side, where alone they would have never thought of entering; that then, on their return, they may describe what they have seen, and repeat what they have heard; and that to their rhapsodies perpetual sober men may turn a willing ear, as though they could discern what is holy on their lips, so that even the simple wanderer who strays uncommissioned like myself to explore the beauties, and inhale the perfume of the ancient world of faith, may approach it without presumption, and yet with confidence; "For saints have hands that pilgrim's hands do touch, And palm to palm is holy palmer's kiss." The Angel of the School, Richard of St. Victor, Bernard, and Francis-such are the deathless minds which leave, where they have past, a track of light that will * Annal. Minorum, tom. xi. sustain us now. With them, by aid of sentences transcribed, our souls shall know communion, till, as the poet saith, from that glorious intercourse, as from a mine of magic store, we shall draw words which are weapons; round the hearts of some there shall grow the adamantine armour of their power, and from their fancy wings of golden hue." Therefore let this book be taken up as if the limbs of him who wrote it had long been scattered in the dust, and it had been only copied, as in effect it is, from some huge and antique volume, bound by two solemn clasps, 66 as neither to be opened nor laid by but with due thought profound." Omnia bona corporis ordinantur ad bona animæ sicut ad finem *. This axiom, laid down by the Angel of the School, is a key to unlock the secrets of the middle ages; for during the predominance of faith, all goods of the body, all important institutions, all offices, all combinations of intellectual and material things that received the highest sanction, were ordained to cleanness of heart as to their end. Therefore, in order to comprehend the history of those ages, we must previously learn what was understood by cleanness of heart, and what were the precepts generally given for its acquirement. When this point has been ascertained, it will be required to show in what manner and to what extent that interior disposition affected the course of human events, and the institutions and manners of society, after which a wide and truly enchanting field will open before us, while tracing the immediate and temporal verification of the divine promise, that those who attained to it should see God. "As health is the nature of the body," says St. Bernard, " so purity is the nature of the heart; for with a disturbed eye God cannot be seen, and the human heart is made for this end, that it should see its Creator +." By cleanness of heart was understood, therefore, a restoration of the original state of the human character, and consequently something very different from that condition of conscience at which men arrive by natural means, the purity of which may be estimated by the one simple observation, that there is no inconsistency between the sense of the modern proposition, "that the majority of men, by a happy necessity, are constrained to be moral;" St. Thom. sum. 9. 11. art. 5. De Divin. Serm. XVI. and the conclusion to which Socrates came, that men do much more evil than good, beginning from their childhood*, testimony of human reason to its own misery, which is borne also by the ancient poet, who declares "that few there are whom just God loves, or ardent virtue raises to the sky +." The purity of heart which led to blessed vision, was understood in ages of faith to consist in a conformity with the divine image; but in order to supply a wisdom that was practical, and free from ambiguity in terms, it was necessary that some further explanation, in the form of axioms, should be laid down; for, as St. Thomas observes, "it would not suffice for beatitude that man should be assimilated to God in regard to power, unless he were assimilated to him in regard to goodness t." Moreover, as St. Gregory remarks, "God is holy; but of a holiness invisible, inaccessible, incomprehensible. God is not holy in the manner that we ought to be; and holiness in him is not what it ought to be in us. For in us, holiness is inseparable from penitence; which can no more accord with God than sin. In us, a part of holiness consists in subjection, dependence, obedience; for this is what sanctifies us; and in God it is exactly the contrary. We are holy by despising ourselves; and God is holy in glorifying himself: he is holy in an entire and perfect possession of his beatitude, and we are holy by patience in our misery." Nor is this all: for, as the Angel of the School saith, "If any one should seek to be like God in respect to justice, as if by his own virtue, and not by the virtue of God, he would sin; or, if he were to seek as the last end that similitude with God which is given by grace, wishing to have it by the virtue of his nature, and not by the divine assistance, according to the ordinance of God, he would sin §." Already, therefore, we may begin to perceive how well guarded from error, at the very first step on the way to perfection, were the men of those ages, and what a protection was afforded to society from the calamities and horrors, to which a want of Catholic instruction on this very point has frequently led in later times. Again, say these high teachers, "the holiness of man must be some *Plato, Hippias Major. Sum. p. 1. Q. xi. a. 4. † Eneid, tom. vi. 129. thing different from that of the incorporeal Divinity." And here I would invite the reader to remark, that when treating on this difference, the great Catholic philosophers of the middle ages evince a clearness and good sense, which some of our contemporaries, who have not had a personal acquaintance with their writings, are apparently but little prepared to find in them. Of the great leading mysteries of our moral nature, as far as relates to an observation of facts, the ancient sages were not ignorant. The Pythagoreans said, that men should aim at purification, which consisted in separating, as far as possible, the mind from the body, and accustoming it to dwell by itself, free from the contagion of the body *." "The great object of a philosopher," says Plato, "must be the purification of his mind; and this purification can only be effected by separating, as far as possible, the soul from the body, and accustoming it to live and dwell by itself, and delivering it from the body as if from chains; and this full and perfect deliverance is named death, and this should be the object of every real philosopher's desire +." Cicero, too, in the first book of the Tusculans, speaks of separating the mind, as far as possible, from the body, which is learning to die; and he says, that "while we remain on earth, this will be similar to a celestial life." Later philosophers without the church have expressed the same convictions. "Hitherto," says Novalis," soul has prevailed only here and there; when will it have universal sway?" The similarity between these views and the Catholic doctrine, must have struck every one; but it is no less clear, that there is much to modify and change before they can be brought to a real and complete agreement with it. Certainly, as Savonarola desires the philosophers of Florence to remark, whatever the ancient sages laid down respecting purity of heart, and the necessity of purging the mind from the misdirected love of sensible things, is not only enforced by the Catholic religion, but infinitely extended and reduced to practice in a manner that would have been incredible to them. It would be wholly useless to adduce evidence in proof of a fact so generally known as the conviction of men during ages of ✦ Jamblichi Adhortat. ad Philosoph. cap. 13. |