An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine Part 37

[415:1] Pp. 19-21.

[416:1] Tryph. 100.

[416:2] Carn. Christ. 17.

[417:1] Haer. iii. 22, -- 4.

[418:1] Nyss. Opp. t. ii. p. 977.

[418:2] Def. F. N. ii. 12.

CHAPTER XI.

APPLICATION OF THE SIXTH NOTE OF A TRUE DEVELOPMENT.

CONSERVATIVE ACTION ON ITS PAST.

It is the general pretext of heretics that they are but serving and protecting Christianity by their innovations; and it is their charge against what by this time we may surely call the Catholic Church, that her successive definitions of doctrine have but overlaid and obscured it. That is, they a.s.sume, what we have no wish to deny, that a true development is that which is conservative of its original, and a corruption is that which tends to its destruction. This has already been set down as a Sixth Test, discriminative of a development from a corruption, and must now be applied to the Catholic doctrines; though this Essay has so far exceeded its proposed limits, that both reader and writer may well be weary, and may content themselves with a brief consideration of the portions of the subject which remain.

It has been observed already that a strict correspondence between the various members of a development, and those of the doctrine from which it is derived, is more than we have any right to expect. The bodily structure of a grown man is not merely that of a magnified boy; he differs from what he was in his make and proportions; still manhood is the perfection of boyhood, adding something of its own, yet keeping what it finds. "Ut nihil novum," says Vincentius, "proferatur in senibus, quod non in pueris jam antea lat.i.taverit." This character of addition,--that is, of a change which is in one sense real and perceptible, yet without loss or reversal of what was before, but, on the contrary, protective and confirmative of it,--in many respects and in a special way belongs to Christianity.

SECTION I.

VARIOUS INSTANCES.

If we take the simplest and most general view of its history, as existing in an individual mind, or in the Church at large, we shall see in it an instance of this peculiarity. It is the birth of something virtually new, because latent in what was before. Thus we know that no temper of mind is acceptable in the Divine Presence without love; it is love which makes Christian fear differ from servile dread, and true faith differ from the faith of devils; yet in the beginning of the religious life, fear is the prominent evangelical grace, and love is but latent in fear, and has in course of time to be developed out of what seems its contradictory. Then, when it is developed, it takes that prominent place which fear held before, yet protecting not superseding it. Love is added, not fear removed, and the mind is but perfected in grace by what seems a revolution. "They that sow in tears, reap in joy;"

yet afterwards still they are "sorrowful," though "alway rejoicing."

And so was it with the Church at large. She started with suffering, which turned to victory; but when she was set free from the house of her prison, she did not quit it so much as turn it into a cell. Meekness inherited the earth; strength came forth from weakness; the poor made many rich; yet meekness and poverty remained. The rulers of the world were Monks, when they could not be Martyrs.

2.

Immediately on the overthrow of the heathen power, two movements simultaneously ran through the world from East to West, as quickly as the lightning in the prophecy, a development of worship and of asceticism. Hence, while the world's first reproach in heathen times had been that Christianity was a dark malevolent magic, its second has been that it is a joyous carnal paganism;--according to that saying, "We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented. For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He hath a devil. The Son of man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners." Yet our Lord too was "a man of sorrows" all the while, but softened His austerity by His gracious gentleness.

3.

The like characteristic attends also on the mystery of His Incarnation.

He was first G.o.d and He became man; but Eutyches and heretics of his school refused to admit that He was man, lest they should deny that He was G.o.d. In consequence the Catholic Fathers are frequent and unanimous in their a.s.severations, that "the Word" had become flesh, not to His loss, but by an addition. Each Nature is distinct, but the created Nature lives in and by the Eternal. "Non amittendo quod erat, sed sumendo quod non erat," is the Church's principle. And hence, though the course of development, as was observed in a former Chapter, has been to bring into prominence the divine aspect of our Lord's mediation, this has been attended by even a more open manifestation of the doctrine of His atoning sufferings. The pa.s.sion of our Lord is one of the most imperative and engrossing subjects of Catholic teaching. It is the great topic of meditations and prayers; it is brought into continual remembrance by the sign of the Cross; it is preached to the world in the Crucifix; it is variously honoured by the many houses of prayer, and a.s.sociations of religious men, and pious inst.i.tutions and undertakings, which in some way or other are placed under the name and the shadow of Jesus, or the Saviour, or the Redeemer, or His Cross, or His Pa.s.sion, or His sacred Heart.

4.

Here a singular development may be mentioned of the doctrine of the Cross, which some have thought so contrary to its original meaning,[422:1] as to be a manifest corruption; I mean the introduction of the Sign of the meek Jesus into the armies of men, and the use of an emblem of peace as a protection in battle. If light has no communion with darkness, or Christ with Belial, what has He to do with Moloch, who would not call down fire on His enemies, and came not to destroy but to save? Yet this seeming anomaly is but one instance of a great law which is seen in developments generally, that changes which appear at first sight to contradict that out of which they grew, are really its protection or ill.u.s.tration. Our Lord Himself is represented in the Prophets as a combatant inflicting wounds while He received them, as coming from Bozrah with dyed garments, sprinkled and red in His apparel with the blood of His enemies; and, whereas no war is lawful but what is just, it surely beseems that they who are engaged in so dreadful a commission as that of taking away life at the price of their own, should at least have the support of His Presence, and fight under the mystical influence of His Name, who redeemed His elect as a combatant by the Blood of Atonement, with the slaughter of His foes, the sudden overthrow of the Jews, and the slow and awful fall of the Pagan Empire.

And if the wars of Christian nations have often been unjust, this is a reason against much more than the use of religious symbols by the parties who engage in them, though the pretence of religion may increase the sin.

5.

The same rule of development has been observed in respect of the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity. It is the objection of the School of Socinus, that belief in the Trinity is destructive of any true maintenance of the Divine Unity, however strongly the latter may be professed; but Petavius, as we have seen,[423:1] sets it down as one especial recommendation of the Catholic doctrine, that it subserves that original truth which at first sight it does but obscure and compromise.

6.

This representation of the consistency of the Catholic system will be found to be true, even in respect of those peculiarities of it, which have been considered by Protestants most open to the charge of corruption and innovation. It is maintained, for instance, that the veneration paid to Images in the Catholic Church directly contradicts the command of Scripture, and the usage of the primitive ages. As to primitive usage, that part of the subject has been incidentally observed upon already; here I will make one remark on the argument from Scripture.

It may be reasonably questioned, then, whether the Commandment which stands second in the Protestant Decalogue, on which the prohibition of Images is grounded, was intended in its letter for more than temporary observance. So far is certain, that, though none could surpa.s.s the later Jews in its literal observance, nevertheless this did not save them from the punishments attached to the violation of it. If this be so, the literal observance is not its true and evangelical import.

7.

"When the generation to come of your children shall rise up after you,"

says their inspired lawgiver, "and the stranger that shall come from a far land shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and its sicknesses which the Lord hath laid upon it; and that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any gra.s.s groweth therein, . . . even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this land? What meaneth the heat of this great anger? Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenants of the Lord G.o.d of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them forth out of the land of Egypt; for they went and served other G.o.ds, and worshipped them, G.o.ds whom they knew not, and whom He had not given them." Now the Jews of our Lord's day did not keep this covenant, for they incurred the penalty; yet they kept the letter of the Commandment rigidly, and were known among the heathen far and wide for their devotion to the "Lord G.o.d of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt," and for their abhorrence of the "G.o.ds whom He had not given them." If then adherence to the letter was no protection to the Jews, departure from the letter may be no guilt in Christians.

It should be observed, moreover, that there certainly is a difference between the two covenants in their respective view of symbols of the Almighty. In the Old, it was blasphemy to represent Him under "the similitude of a calf that eateth hay;" in the New, the Third Person of the Holy Trinity has signified His Presence by the appearance of a Dove, and the Second Person has presented His sacred Humanity for worship under the name of the Lamb.

8.

It follows that, if the letter of the Decalogue is but partially binding on Christians, it is as justifiable, in setting it before persons under instruction, to omit such parts as do not apply to them, as, when we quote pa.s.sages from the Pentateuch in Sermons or Lectures generally, to pa.s.s over verses which refer simply to the temporal promises or the ceremonial law, a practice which we allow without any intention or appearance of dealing irreverently with the sacred text.

SECTION II.

DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN.

It has been anxiously asked, whether the honours paid to St. Mary, which have grown out of devotion to her Almighty Lord and Son, do not, in fact, tend to weaken that devotion; and whether, from the nature of the case, it is possible so to exalt a creature without withdrawing the heart from the Creator.

In addition to what has been said on this subject in foregoing Chapters, I would here observe that the question is one of fact, not of presumption or conjecture. The abstract lawfulness of the honours paid to St. Mary, and their distinction in theory from the incommunicable worship paid to G.o.d, are points which have already been dwelt upon; but here the question turns upon their practicability or expedience, which must be determined by the fact whether they are practicable, and whether they have been found to be expedient.

1.

Here I observe, first, that, to those who admit the authority of the Fathers of Ephesus, the question is in no slight degree answered by their sanction of the ?e?t????, or "Mother of G.o.d," as a t.i.tle of St.

Mary, and as given in order to protect the doctrine of the Incarnation, and to preserve the faith of Catholics from a specious Humanitarianism.

And if we take a survey at least of Europe, we shall find that it is not those religious communions which are characterized by devotion towards the Blessed Virgin that have ceased to adore her Eternal Son, but those very bodies, (when allowed by the law,) which have renounced devotion to her. The regard for His glory, which was professed in that keen jealousy of her exaltation, has not been supported by the event. They who were accused of worshipping a creature in His stead, still worship Him; their accusers, who hoped to worship Him so purely, they, wherever obstacles to the development of their principles have been removed, have ceased to worship Him altogether.

2.

Next, it must be observed, that the tone of the devotion paid to the Blessed Mary is altogether distinct from that which is paid to her Eternal Son, and to the Holy Trinity, as we must certainly allow on inspection of the Catholic services. The supreme and true worship paid to the Almighty is severe, profound, awful, as well as tender, confiding, and dutiful. Christ is addressed as true G.o.d, while He is true Man; as our Creator and Judge, while He is most loving, gentle, and gracious. On the other hand, towards St. Mary the language employed is affectionate and ardent, as towards a mere child of Adam; though subdued, as coming from her sinful kindred. How different, for instance, is the tone of the _Dies Irae_ from that of the _Stabat Mater_. In the "Tristis et afflicta Mater Unigeniti," in the "Virgo virginum praeclara Mihi jam non sis amara, Pnas mec.u.m divide," in the "Fac me vere tec.u.m flere," we have an expression of the feelings with which we regard one who is a creature and a mere human being; but in the "Rex tremendae majestatis qui salvandos salvas gratis, salva me Fons pietatis," the "Ne me perdas illa die," the "Juste judex ultionis, donum fac remissionis,"

the "Oro supplex et acclinis, cor contritum quasi cinis," the "Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem," we hear the voice of the creature raised in hope and love, yet in deep awe to his Creator, Infinite Benefactor, and Judge.