History of European Morals From Augustus to Charlemagne Volume II Part 43

368 "Quid meruere boves, animal sine fraude dolisque, Innocuum, simplex, natum tolerare labores?

Immemor est demum nec frugum munere dignus.

Qui potuit curvi dempto modo pondere aratri Ruricolam mactare suum."-

_Metamorph._ xv. 120-124.

369 "Cujus Turbavit nitidos extinctus pa.s.ser ocellos."

Juvenal, _Sat._ vi. 7-8.

There is a little poem in Catullus (iii.) to console his mistress upon the death of her favourite sparrow; and Martial more than once alludes to the pets of the Roman ladies.

Compare the charming description of the Prioress, in Chaucer:-

"She was so charitable and so pitous, She wolde wepe if that she saw a mous Caught in a trappe, if it were ded or bledde.

Of smale houndes had she that she fedde With rosted flesh and milke and wastel brede, But sore wept she if one of them were dede, Or if men smote it with a yerde smert: And all was conscience and tendre herte."

_Prologue to the __"__Canterbury Tales.__"_

370 Philost. _Apol._ i. 38.

371 See the curious chapter in his ?????et????, xvi. and compare it with No. 116 in the _Spectator_.

372 In his _De Abstinentia Carnis_. The controversy between Origen and Celsus furnishes us with a very curious ill.u.s.tration of the extravagances into which some Pagans of the third century fell about animals. Celsus objected to the Christian doctrine about the position of men in the universe, that many of the animals were at least the equals of men both in reason, religious feeling, and knowledge. (Orig. _Cont. Cels._ lib. iv.)

373 These views are chiefly defended in his two tracts on eating flesh.

Plutarch has also recurred to the subject, incidentally, in several other works, especially in a very beautiful pa.s.sage in his _Life of Marcus Cato_.

374 See, for example, a striking pa.s.sage in Clem. Alex. _Strom._ lib.

ii. St. Clement imagines Pythagoras had borrowed his sentiments on this subject from Moses.

375 There is, I believe, no record of any wild beast combats existing among the Jews, and the rabbinical writers have been remarkable for the great emphasis with which they inculcated the duty of kindness to animals. See some pa.s.sages from them, cited in Wollaston, _Religion of Nature_, sec. ii., note. Maimonides believed in a future life for animals, to recompense them for their sufferings here. (Bayle, _Dict._ art, "Rorarius D.") There is a curious collection of the opinions of different writers on this last point in a little book called the _Rights of Animals_, by William Drummond (London, 1838), pp. 197-205.

376 Thus St. Paul (1 Cor. ix. 9) turned aside the precept, "Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn," from its natural meaning, with the contemptuous question, "Doth G.o.d take care for oxen?"

377 I have taken these ill.u.s.trations from the collection of hermit literature in Rosweyde, from different volumes of the Bollandists, from the _Dialogues_ of Sulpicius Severus, and from what is perhaps the most interesting of all collections of saintly legends, Colgan's _Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae_. M. Alfred Maury, in his most valuable work, _Legendes pieuses du Moyen Age_, has examined minutely the part played by animals in symbolising virtues and vices, and has shown the way in which the same incidents were repeated, with slight variations, in different legends. M. de Montalembert has devoted what is probably the most beautiful chapter of his _Moines d'Occident_ ("Les Moines et la Nature") to the relations of monks to the animal world; but the numerous legends he cites are all, with one or two exceptions, different from those I have given.

378 Chateaubriand speaks, however (_etudes historiques_, etude vime, 1re partie), of an old Gallic law, forbidding to throw a stone at an ox attached to the plough, or to make its yoke too tight.

379 Bollandists, May 31. Leonardo da Vinci is said to have had the same fondness for buying and releasing caged birds, and (to go back a long way) Pythagoras to have purchased one day, near Metapontus, from some fishermen all the fish in their net, that he might have the pleasure of releasing them. (Apuleius, _Apologia_.)

380 See these legends collected by Hase (_St Francis. a.s.sisi_). It is said of Cardinal Bellarmine that he used to allow vermin to bite him, saying, "We shall have heaven to reward us for our sufferings, but these poor creatures have nothing but the enjoyment of this present life." (Bayle, _Dict. philos._ art. "Bellarmine.")

381 I have noticed, in my _History of Rationalism_, that, although some Popes did undoubtedly try to suppress Spanish bull-fights, this was solely on account of the destruction of human life they caused. Full details on this subject will be found in Concina, _De Spectaculis_ (Romae, 1752). Bayle says, "Il n'y a point de casuiste qui croie qu'on peche en faisant combattre des taureaux contre des dogues,"

&c. (_Dict. philos._ "Rorarius, C.")

382 On the ancient amus.e.m.e.nts of England the reader may consult Seymour's _Survey of London_ (1734), vol. i. pp. 227-235; Strutt's _Sports and Pastimes of the English People_. c.o.c.k-fighting was a favourite children's amus.e.m.e.nt in England as early as the twelfth century. (Hampson's _Medii aevi Kalendarii_, vol. i. p. 160.) It was, with foot-ball and several other amus.e.m.e.nts, for a time suppressed by Edward III., on the ground that they were diverting the people from archery, which was necessary to the military greatness of England.

383 The decline of these amus.e.m.e.nts in England began with the great development of the theatre under Elizabeth. An order of the Privy Council in July, 1591, prohibits the exhibition of plays on Thursday, because on Thursdays bear-baiting and suchlike pastimes had been usually practised, and an injunction to the same effect was sent to the Lord Mayor, wherein it was stated that, "in divers places the players do use to recite their plays, to the great hurt and destruction of the game of bear-baiting and like pastimes, which are maintained for Her Majesty's pleasure."-Nichols, _Progresses of Queen Elizabeth_ (ed. 1823), vol. i. p. 438. The reader will remember the picture in _Kenilworth_ of the Earl of Suss.e.x pet.i.tioning Elizabeth against Shakespeare, on the ground of his plays distracting men from bear-baiting. Elizabeth (see Nichols) was extremely fond of bear-baiting. James I. especially delighted in c.o.c.k-fighting, and in 1610 was present at a great fight between a lion and a bear. (Hone, _Every Day Book_, vol. i. pp. 255-299.) The theatres, however, rapidly multiplied, and a writer who lived about 1629 said, "that no less than seventeen playhouses had been built in or about London within threescore years." (Seymour's _Survey_, vol.

i. p. 229.) The Rebellion suppressed all public amus.e.m.e.nts, and when they were re-established after the Restoration, it was found that the tastes of the better cla.s.ses no longer sympathised with the bear-garden. Pepys (_Diary_, August 14, 1666) speaks of bull-baiting as "a very rude and nasty pleasure," and says he had not been in the bear-garden for many years. Evelyn (_Diary_, June 16, 1670), having been present at these shows, describes them as "butcherly sports, or rather barbarous cruelties," and says he had not visited them before for twenty years. A paper in the _Spectator_ (No. 141, written in 1711) talks of those who "seek their diversion at the bear-garden, ... where reason and good manners have no right to disturb them." In 1751, however, Lord Kames was able to say, "The bear garden, which is one of the chief entertainments of the English, is held in abhorrence by the French and other polite nations."-_Essay on Morals_ (1st ed.), p. 7; and he warmly defends (p. 30) the English taste. During the latter half of the last century there was constant controversy on the subject (which may be traced in the pages of the _Annual Register_), and several forgotten clergymen published sermons upon it, and the frequent riots resulting from the fact that the bear-gardens had become the resort of the worst cla.s.ses a.s.sisted the movement. The London magistrates took measures to suppress c.o.c.k-throwing in 1769 (Hampson's _Med. aev. Kalend._ p. 160); but bull-baiting continued far into the present century. Windham and Canning strongly defended it; Dr. Parr is said to have been fond of it (_Southey's Commonplace Book_, vol. iv. p. 585); and as late as 1824, Sir Robert (then Mr) Peel argued strongly against its prohibition. (_Parliamentary Debates_, vol. x. pp. 132-133, 491-495.)

384 Bacon, in an account of the deficiencies of medicine, recommends vivisection in terms that seem to imply that it was not practised in his time. "As for the pa.s.sages and pores, it is true, which was anciently noted, that the more subtle of them appear not in anatomies, because they are shut and latent in dead bodies, though they be open and manifest in live; which being supposed, though the inhumanity of _anatomia vivorum_ was by Celsus justly reproved, yet, in regard of the great use of this observation, the enquiry needed not by him so slightly to have been relinquished altogether, or referred to the casual practices of surgery; but might have been well diverted upon the dissection of beasts alive, which, notwithstanding the dissimilitude of their parts, may sufficiently satisfy this enquiry."-_Advancement of Learning_, x. 4. Harvey speaks of vivisections as having contributed to lead him to the discovery of the circulation of the blood. (Acland's _Harveian Oration_ (1865), p. 55.) Bayle, describing the treatment of animals by men, says, "Nous fouillons dans leurs entrailles pendant leur vie afin de satisfaire notre curiosite."-_Dict. philos._ art. "Rorarius, C." Public opinion in England was very strongly directed to the subject in the present century, by the atrocious cruelties perpetrated by Majendie at his lectures. See a most frightful account of them in a speech by Mr. Martin (an eccentric Irish member, who was generally ridiculed during his life, and has been almost forgotten since his death, but to whose untiring exertions the legislative protection of animals in England is due).-_Parliament. Hist._ vol. xii. p. 652. Mandeville, in his day, was a very strong advocate of kindness to animals.-_Commentary on the Fable of the Bees._

385 See his _Life_ by Sulpicius Severus.

386 Milman.

387 Greg. Turon. ii. 29.

388 This was the first step towards the conversion of the Bulgarians.-Milman's _Latin Christianity_, vol. iii. p. 249.

389 A remarkable collection of instances of this kind is given by Ozanam, _Civilisation in the Fifth Century_ (Eng. trans.), vol. i.

pp. 124-127.

390 St. Gregory, _Dial._ iii. 7. The particular temptation the Jew heard discussed was that of the bishop of the diocese, who, under the instigation of one of the daemons, was rapidly falling in love with a nun, and had proceeded so far as jocosely to stroke her on the back.

The Jew, having related the vision to the bishop, the latter reformed his manners, the Jew became a Christian, and the temple was turned into a church.

391 William of Malmesbury, ii. 13.

392 See Milman's _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, vol. ii. p. 293.

393 Ca.s.sian. _Cn.o.b. Inst.i.t._ v. 4. See, too, some striking instances of this in the life of St. Antony.

394 This spiritual pride is well noticed by Neander, _Ecclesiastical History_ (Bohn's ed.), vol. iii. pp. 321-323. It appears in many traits scattered through the lives of these saints. I have already cited the visions telling St. Antony and St. Macarius that they were not the best of living people; and also the case of the hermit, who was deceived by a devil in the form of a woman, because he had been exalted by pride. Another hermit, being very holy, received pure white bread every day from heaven, but, being extravagantly elated, the bread got worse and worse till it became perfectly black.

(Tillemont, tome x. pp. 27-28.) A certain Isidore affirmed that he had not been conscious of sin, even in thought, for forty years.

(Socrates, iv. 23.) It was a saying of St. Antony, that a solitary man in the desert is free from three wars-of sight, speech, and hearing: he has to combat only fornication. (_Apothegmata Patrum._)

395 "Pride, under such training [that of modern rationalistic philosophy], instead of running to waste, is turned to account. It gets a new name; it is called self-respect.... It is directed into the channel of industry, frugality, honesty, and obedience, and it becomes the very staple of the religion and morality held in honour in a day like our own. It becomes the safeguard of chast.i.ty, the guarantee of veracity, in high and low; it is the very household G.o.d of the Protestant, inspiring neatness and decency in the servant-girl, propriety of carriage and refined manners in her mistress, uprightness, manliness, and generosity in the head of the family.... It is the stimulating principle of providence on the one hand, and of free expenditure on the other; of an honourable ambition and of elegant enjoyment."-Newman, _On University Education_, Discourse ix. In the same lecture (which is, perhaps, the most beautiful of the many beautiful productions of its ill.u.s.trious author), Dr. Newman describes, with admirable eloquence, the manner in which modesty has supplanted humility in the modern type of excellence. It is scarcely necessary to say that the lecturer strongly disapproves of the movement he describes.

396 Thus "indagatio veri" was reckoned among the leading virtues, and the high place given to s?f?a and "prudentia" in ethical writings preserved the notion of the moral duties connected with the discipline of the intellect.

397 St. Augustine reckoned eighty-eight sects as existing in his time.

398 See a full account of these persecutions in Tillemont, _Mem.

d'Histoire eccles._ tome vi.

399 Socrates, _H. E._, iv. 16. This anecdote is much doubted by modern historians.

400 Milman's _Hist. of Christianity_ (ed. 1867), vol. ii. p. 422.

401 St. Athanasius, _Historical Treatises_ (Library of the Fathers), pp.

192, 284.

402 Milman, _Hist. of Christianity_, ii. pp. 436-437.

403 The death of Arius, as is well known, took place suddenly (his bowels, it is said, coming out) when he was just about to make his triumphal entry into the Cathedral of Constantinople. The death (though possibly natural) never seems to have been regarded as such, but it was a matter of controversy whether it was a miracle or a murder.

404 Socrates, _H. E._, vii. 13-15.

405 Milman, _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, vol. i. pp. 214-215.