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Christian faith, or with the influence of the Church in its temporal state of warfare; not but that there were attempts repeatedly made to create divisions; and as Roger Bacon says, this was the grand object of the enemies of Christians, that they might raise discords and wars between Christians; and these are excited by the common enemy, "licet multitudo stulta," he says, non consideret unde accidant." Nothing was more likely to convince men of the truth and excellence of religion, than this agreement and unity. "What can be conceived more sweet, happy, and admirable," said St. Basil," than to see men from different nations and regions so completely joined together in one by similarity of manners and discipline, that it appears to be one soul animating many bodies, and many bodies serving as the instruments of one soul t." The mere exercise of obedience was regarded as an act of religion. St. Bernard even said, "parum est esse subjectum Deo, nisi sis et omni humanæ creaturæ propter Deum t." "Sole obedience," said St. Anselm, "would have retained men in Paradise; and no one can enter the kingdom of heaven but by obedience §." To promote peace was the great object of the influence of the Holy See. "Let there be concord and unanimity every where between kings and bishops, ecclesiastics and laymen, and all Christian people, that the Churches of God may be at unity in all places, and there be peace in the one Church, continuing in one faith, hope, and charity, having one head, which is Christ, whose members ought to help each other, and to love with a mutual charity." So said the legatine canons at Cealchythe, A.D. 785. It was with justice that St. Augustin said, addressing the Church, "Doces reges prospicere populis, mones populos se subdere regibus |." "If a bishop or priest consent to the death of a king," says the Pope's legate when in England, "let him be thrust out as Judas was from the apostolical degree; and whoever approves of such sacrilege, shall perish in the eternal bond of an anathema, and, being a

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comrade of Judas, shall burn in everlasting fire." Marchangy supposes a traveller in the 14th century to have been offended at the corruption which then prevailed in Avignon, and to have been addressed in some such words as these by an intelligent companion: "You have met with the vices of the age at the Pontifical court, and you have said the Church is corrupt; but the court of the Pope is no more religion and the Church, than the court of Charles V. is monarchy and France. Wherever there are honours and dignities, there are intrigues, meanness, and congregations of hypocrites, making God serve them, rather than serving God :—that is seen at the court of the wisest monarchs; and how should the court of the Pope, which happens to be also the court of a temporal sovereign, be exempt from human infirmities? yet what has not been done to destroy these abuses which you lay to the charge of these sovereign Pontiffs? What other legislators would have have been able to enlighten nations with the torch of science and arts, without letting fall sparks that would kindle into a conflagration? other sages could have taught at the same time knowledge and virtue, glory and piety? What philosophers could have laboured as they have done for centuries to extirpate superstition, without endangering the faith; censure kings, and diminish not the respect which their people owe to them? Further, the Pontifical Court, which presents these disorders to your notice is only a point of Christendom; but the benefits of the Church, preserved in unity by the influence of the Holy See, extends from that centre to the extremities of the earth. It is not in the galleries of the palace of Avignon, that you should contemplate the miraculous and sublime effects of the religion of Jesus Christ. It is in the cloister, where prayer and solitude assist the erring soul to advance towards its true country. It is at the hearth of the father of a family, where this religion dispenses peace and happiness: it is in hospitals, where it teaches men to bear adversity; it is in rich domains, where it inculcates a harder lesson, to enjoy the good of fortune :-the sun which is to enlighten and warm the world, imparts its blessings from a distance; if you would behold the benefits resulting from the Holy See, you must visit the various nations of Christendom, where

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you will find religion preserved in unity." But the centre and metropolis of the Christian world excited in general no such anxiety for farther search. "The spirit of the Apostles yet resides there," said St. Chrysostom; "from their tombs and inanimate ashes sparkles of fire yet proceed, to inflame the world." "I entered St. Peter's," says the poet Gray, "and was struck dumb with wonder." Suppose," says Petrarch, "that I, an Italian, am not to be moved by the aspect of ancient Rome; still how sweet must it be to a Christian mind, to behold that city, like heaven upon earth, filled with the holy sinews and bones of the martyrs, and sprinkled with the precious blood of the witnesses of truth; to walk amid the tombs of the saints, to visit the threshold of the Apostles *!" These thoughts render him disdainful of all the monuments of heathen antiquity, and the Scipios and Cæsars are forgotten †. It is with the same feelings that the gentle knight Camoens beheld Rome and Italy, if

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Now no more her hostile spirit burns;
There now the saint in humble vespers mourns;
To heaven, more grateful than the pride of war,
And all the triumphs of the victor's car."

It did not, however, follow that the civil governments of every state were to be moulded after the model of that which was deemed necessary for the church. Montesquieu concluded that the ancient religion agreed better with a monarchy, and that the modern was more adapted to a republic; but M. de Haller in the sixth volume of his work on the Restoration of Political Science, has shewn the fallacy of this sophistical decision. "The principle of the moderns," he argues, "is absolutely destructive of a republic, and if fully developed, for it is often counteracted by the ancient spirit, would prove so in every instance. The spirit of the moderns is manifestly not a spirit of union, but much rather of dividing asunder and of separation by virtue of this spirit, every individual knows all things, understands all things, even what he does not know, and places no faith in the authority of older or wiser men. With such a disposition no union is possible, or it could be

* Epist. II. 9.
Varior. Epist. 33.

established only by unjust compulsion : it can have neither strength nor continuance, and a republic in which every man may create and explain separate constitutions, laws, and usages, after his own judgment, could no more stand than a church in which every member would be authorized to define, according to his own private views, the faith, morals, and the ceremonial of worship. On the other hand, the relationship of a republic or civil community which binds men together, through common principles, and wants, requires much more than a monarchy, a constant sacrifice of the individual, a resignation to the community, reverence for antiquity and custom and ancestral tradition. No where would the private interpretation, and the selfish will be more frequently humbled; no where must it be more submissive to the common faith and the common will; and it cannot be denied that the ancient religion, inasmuch as it is founded on the same principle, more than the modern, is peculiarly adapted to develope and inspire that virtue. Experience also shews that the ancient religion unites itself with all common relations and particularly with a republic. Venice endured with the same 1400 years, and the other Italian states have not ascribed the loss of their freedom to their religion. The Swiss republics were founded and strengthened when all hearts were still united through the old and general faith. No one has thought of writing their history since the divisions of the church, as if from a melancholy conviction that they had nothing more great and renowned, which was worthy to be handed down to posterity. In the free democratic mountain-valleys of Switzerland, was internal peace preserved almost without interruption, and only by means of the Catholic religion, under many various and complicated relations. It is still the only rein, the only garrison, and it preserves real freedom, while the republics of Geneva and Holland, and many others, were so often torn by internal divisions.'

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XVII.-Passing from this view of ecclesiastical government, the preceding examples will suggest a reflection on the profound wisdom and spirituality which belonged to religion in our heroic age. And, first, it is wonderful to contemplate the exaltation of the cross, and the simplicity with which its doctrine was received by chivalry. Hear

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what Cicero says, "Nomen ipsum Crucis absit non modo a corpore civium Romanorum, sed etiam a cogitatione, oculis, auribus." "Of this," he continues, "not only the event, the suffering, but even the expectation, the very mention of the cross is unworthy of a Roman and a free man *." What more admirable than to see this most infamous sign become the most glorious? Kings and emperors," as Lewis of Granada says, "place the cross upon their purple, on their armour, on their crowns: the cross is at the entrance of temples, it is on the altars; it is used in the consecration of priests; we behold it on the sterns of ships, in public squares, in the most deep solitudes, on the roads, on the mountains; it appears in battle on standards; it is on every thing and no one is ashamed to bear the mark of this cursed punishment: the great and the low have recourse to it in all their necessities. Before the cross, the prince of the apostles trembled at the threat of a simple girl, and all his companions fled and abandoned their master; after the cross, they defied the world +." But it was not alone the image and the sign of the cross which became exalted it was the doctrine of the cross which inspired chivalry, "Spes prima et ultima Christus est," was the expression of Petrarch ‡.

"He can only pray with hope," said Lewis of Granada, "who takes refuge in the merits of his Saviour, who, by his testament, confirmed by his death, has made us heirs of all his merits and of all his pains, so that all his sufferings have been for us. It is on this that depends the faith and confidence which are requisite in prayer §." "All the prayers of the church are offered up in the name of our Saviour; for the everlasting Father has never vouchsafed, neither ever will vouchsafe a single grace to man, unless for the merit of the passion of his only Son ||." All grace and salvation are through Him ¶." St. Bernard says, "Si scribas, non sapit mihi nisi legero ibi Jesum. Si disputes aut conferas, non sapit mihi nisi sonuerit ibi Jesus **." He maintained this great doctrine

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Pro C. Rabirio.

Famil. Epist. x. 12.

+ Catechism ii. 29.

§ Catech. Part III. c. 22.
|| Id. ii. 9. 11.

Rodriguez Christian Perfection, 11. vii. 1.

** In Cantica Serm. 15.

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