CHAPTER VI.

RELIGIOUS AND MORAL LIFE-PENITENTIAL DISCIPLINE-PROPAGA

TION OF CHRISTIANITY.

§ 259. Religious and Moral Life.

+*Montalembert, Histoire de Sainte Elisabeth de Hongrie (Paris, 1836); English by Mary Hackett; German, Städler, Aix-la-Chapelle, 1837, especially in the preface, 3 ed., Cologne, 1853. Ratisbonne, Life of St. Bernard; above all, in the introduction; excellent pen-pictures in Leo's Lectures on German History, Vol. III. Hurter, Vol. IV., p. 510 sq.

The ecumenical and provincial councils of this epoch enacted many prohibitory canons, from which may be learned the chief evils that then afflicted the world. These were acts of barbarity and violence; armed brigandage against pilgrims. and churches; a disregard of the Truce of God; the extravagant practice of engaging in tournaments and dangerous combats; the atrocious persecution carried on against the Jews; the inhuman treatment of captured enemies; and, finally, assassination, usury, and the violation of corpses then reputed holy; to which may be added superstition in its varous forms, witchcraft, and magic.

The sight of these disorders called from St. Bernard, St. Hildegarde, and other distinguished personages of this epoch, expressions of deep and poignant grief; and from pontiffs, ever vigilant in their solitude for the Christian people, fears that the churches might be eventually destroyed or permitted to go to ruin. It is not difficult to assign the cause of these evils. There was the controversy on investitures, which lasted fifty years, and the conflict between the Popes and the Hohenstaufens, which lasted twice that length of time. Add to these an ill-regulated and inordinate desire of freedom; the constant grasping after privilege and exemption, issuing event

1 Fehr, Superstition and the Catholic Church during the Middle Ages, Stuttg. 1857. Hurter, Innocent III., Vol. IV.

ually in a powerful aristocracy, so strong as to menace the throne itself; and, finally, the imperfect organization of the machinery of civil government and the want of necessary police regulations, all contributed, each in its own way, to perpetuate a barbarous condition of things, and, in many instances, to stifle the religious sentiments of the people.

But, if the blots and stains of the Middle Ages be conspicuous, it is because the purity of the surface on which they are found make them so. Deeds of excellence and goodness abound. The Middle Ages were religious and theological in character. Every tendency and display of energy bore upon it the impress of religion, proving the correctness of the fine remark of Goethe,' that "ages of faith are always majestic, exercise an elevating influence upon the mind, and are fruitful of good both to contemporaries and to posterity." The numerous crusades undertaken in the Middle Ages, the sacrifices they entailed, and the results of which they were productive, amply justify the statement of Goethe. Faith ruled supreme in the Middle Ages; the claims of the soul, religious feelings and aspirations were paramount; everything had a tendency to raise one's thoughts from earth to Heaven; and this tendency pervading every class of society made people extremely credulous of all sorts of miracles.2 This ready credulity, though giving rise to some extravagances, exercised upon the whole a beneficial influence.

Another manifestation of the religious sentiments of these

1 Eastern and Western Divan.

2 Speaking of these miracles, Hurter (Innocent III., Vol. IV., p. 537–548) says: "The miraculous stories that abound in every writer of these times prove that the belief in miracles was general and exercised a vital influence. Some of these reputed miracles may be at once dismissed as fabulous; others have assumed a fabulous character from having been decked out with the usual embellishments of fable; but many of them drive criticism to the alternative of either acknowledging itself synonymous with negation or confessing its incompetency to judge in the premises. But, whatever be the ultimate decision, one fact can not, in any event, be denied-viz., that these abundant miracles must have exercised a determining influence upon the lives of thousands.” "Many of these miracles may be fairly declared childish and grotesque, but behind so much rubbish one may recognize the influence of a higher power, all-ruling and omnipresent, whose ubiquitous providence protects the God-fearing, inspires the faint of heart with courage, and punishes the wicked."

times was the general enthusiasm of the people for the erection of great and magnificent minsters and churches. Troops of pious confraternities, composed of persons of every age and rank and of both sexes, might be seen assembling from far and near, to build to the Lord a dwelling worthy His majesty. The splendid cathedral-church of Our Lady of Chartres was built in this way.1

Finally, were not the numerous monastic congregations that then sprung up, whose founders were not unfrequently the descendants of powerful and noble houses, a living proof of the depth and sincerity of the religious life of the epoch? Its active energy pervaded all things and cropped out everywhere. Even the earth, the marvelous handiwork of God, became an object of tender solicitude and childlike love. The student of nature conceived the celestial bodies to be directed in their course by a supernatural agency, to be animated by a supernatural power, and sought to trace in them mysterious analogies and relations to the duties and convictions of man, purchased by the Blood of Christ, and to the expressions and signs of Christian belief and symbolism. The instincts of animals, the varied phenomena of the vegetable and floral kingdoms, the singing of birds, the properties of the precious metals and stones, came to be symbolical of Christian verities, and were made to express in rich and varied imagery the strongest and tenderest emotions of the human soul. All nature was believed, by the simple, the childlike, and the pure faith of those days, to be in sympathy with religion and religion's truths and instincts. People were wont to go out, of a Christmas Eve, and proclaim to the trees of the forest that the coming of Christ was at hand, and to call upon the earth to open and bud forth a Savior (aperiatur terra et germinet Salvatorem.) Everything that met the eye— the birds of the air, the beasts of the field, the trees of the forest-all bore upon them the impress of faith and hope. The earth and all thereon, the universe and all its wonders, were united by the bonds of science and love, and under all and through all ran the golden thread of faith. In those times the Christian religion, with its inherent vitality of force, its

1 Wilken, Hist. of the Crusades, Vol. III., p. 45 sq.

mysteries and its promises, was the well-spring and center of all energy and action-the great heart whence went forth the warm stream of life, whose pulsations were felt to the uttermost limits of the body social, and gave manifestations of its presence even in guilds and national festivals.1 The atmosphere of religion was everywhere; and so holy was it-so pure, so exhilarating-that it seemed the days of the Apostles had returned and Christianity was once more in her first beauty and lustre, so loyal then were the hearts of men to the teachings and instincts of faith.

Were proof wanted of the presence then of this all-pervading religious spirit, we might cite, aside from countless pious warriors like Godfrey de Bouillon, whose names are clothed in a glory of unfading lustre, the royal saints Louis of France, Leopold of Austria, Ferdinand of Castile and Leon, Elizabeth of Thuringia, Hedwige of Silesia and Poland, and Eleanor of England, besides an innumerable host of other saints in every walk of life,2 from royalty down to the humblest peasant, who were a pattern to their own age and a light to every succeeding one since. We might also refer to the "Manual of Saints"—that treasure of the faithful, which Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa († 1298), by incorporating into it the traditions living in the mouths of the people, transformed into the "Golden Legends" (Legenda aurea).3

Unfortunately, thé frequent performance of the mysteries and miracle plays, which, either intentionally or otherwise,

1Cf. Cantù, Universal History, Vol. VI., p. 720 sq. Description of the National Festivals of divers Countries.

2 The principal saints of the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries were enumerated by Klein, Ch. Hist., Vol. I., p. 773-779. Cf. Villeneuve-Trans, Hist. de St. Louis, etc., Paris, 1839, 3 vols. See above, p. 600 sq.

3 Legenda aurea s. hist. Lombardica, Argent. 1429 and oftener; translated into many languages; ad. optim. libror. fidem recensuit, emendavit, replevit, etc., Dr. Graesse, Lips. et Dresd. 1843; 2 ed., Lips. 1850. Haupt, On the Book of Martyrs, written in the Midland High-German dialect, being a report made in the Imperial and Royal Academy of Sciences, Vienna, 1872. Rousseau, Violet Wreaths of Saints, or Poetry and Art in the Catholic Church, Frankfort, 1835, 6 vols. (incomplete.)

4 Favorite subjects: The historical portions of the Old and New Testament and the lives of the saints—the former for "Mysteries," the latter for "MiraclePlays." Instances, the "Mystery of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, St. Cath

were often turned from their original and legitimate aim and made the occasion of unseemly and irreverent buffoonery; the satirical tone and undue license assumed by the Minnesingers, whose audacity led them to attack the Blessed Virgin and God Himself; the ludicrous profanity of those relics of the Pagan Saturnalia called the Feasts of Fools and Asses, celebrated at Christmas and New Year's, before the beginning of Lent, and at Easter, in which ecclesiastics participated, thus lending the encouragement of their presence to disgraceful parodies on the Holy Mysteries' and the dignitaries of the

arine." (Tr.) See Mone, Plays of the Middle Ages, Carlsruhe, 1856, 2 vols. Ed. Devrient, Hist. of the German Dramatic Art., Lips. 1848, 3 vols. Cantù, Vol. VI., p. 729 sq. Hase, The Religious Drama, a Historical Review, Lps. 1858. Holland, The German Theater during the Middle Ages, and the Ammergau Passion Play, Munich, 1861. † Ludwig Clarus, The Passion Play of Oberammergau, Munich, 1860. Wilken, History of Mysteries and Miracle-Plays (der geistlichen Spiele) in Germany, Götting. 1872.

1 Du Fresne, Glossar. ad scriptt. med. et infim. Lat. s. v. Cerula Kalendae. Tiliot, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire de la fête des Foux, Laus. 1751. · Dürr, Commentatio historica de Episcopo puerorum, Mogunt. 1755. From the fact that in the Feast of Fools an inferior cleric was chosen bishop, it was sometimes called the Subdeacon's Feast. The cleric thus chosen travestied the pontifical functions; but when incensed, instead of olibanum, an offensive and foul matter was used. The stalls of the canons were filled by others of the inferior clerics, who sang: "Deposuit potentes et exultavit humiles." At the close of these mock ceremonies, the choir was turned into a banqueting hall, and was the scene of unseemly antics and disgraceful performances of all sorts. The Feast of Asses is supposed to have been originally intended to commemorate the Flight into Egypt or the Entry into Jerusalem, and accordingly celebrated about Christmas or Easter. An ass was clad in a surplice, and, when conducted into church, his entry was greeted with the singing of a ludicrous canticle, the refrain of which was, "Hez, Sire Asnes."(a) A remark of J. P. Richter (Propedeutics of Aesthetics) is here apposite: "It was precisely in the most religious epochs that the Feasts of Fools and Asses, the representation of the mysteries and mock sermons on Easter Sunday, were most in favor. There was no apprehension of religion suffering any detriment, being too far above anything like a travesty. The same rule holds here as in the case of the Socrates of Xenophon and Aristophanes the former wâs not injured by the travesty of the latter. The very fact of a travesty proves the existence of something higher travestied; a comedy presupposes a tragedy."

(a)" Hez, Sire Asnes, car chantez,

Belle bouche rechignez

Vous aurez du foin assez

Et de l'avoine a planter."

-Dufresne, Glossar. ad scriptt. med. et infim. Lat. ad verbum Festum (asinorum). (TR.)