History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French Revolution Volume I Part 23

Maur and continued by them till the Revolution, /Espana Sagrada/ begun by the Augustinian Enrique Florez in 1747, and the /Italia Sacra/ (1643-1662) of Ferdinand Ugh.e.l.li contained a veritable mine of information for future historians. Of the historical writers of this period the ablest were /Louis Sebastien Le Nain de Tillemont/ (1637- 1689), the author of the /Histoire des Empereurs pendant les six premiers Siecles/ and /Memoires pour servir a l'histoire eccl. des six premiers siecles/ (1693); /Claude Fleury/ (1640-1725) whose great work, /Histoire Ecclesiastique/ (dealing with the period from the Ascension till the Council of Constance, 1414) is marred only by the Gallican tendencies of its author, and /Natalis Alexander/ (Noel Alexandre, 1639-1724), a French Dominican who published an exceedingly valuable Church History under the t.i.tle /Selecta Historiae Eccl.

Capita/, etc., but which was condemned by Innocent XI. (1684) on account of the markedly Gallican bias under which it was composed.

Amongst some of the most noted authorities on Canon Law during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were /Benedict XIV./ (1675-1758) many of whose treatises are regarded as standard works till the present day; /Pirhing/ (1606-1679), a Jesuit, professor at Dillingen and Ingolstadt and well known as a theologian and canonist; /Reiffenstuel/ (1641-1703), a Bavarian Franciscan for some time professor at Freising, the author of several theological works, and unequalled as a Canonist in his own day; /Van Espen/ (1649-1728) professor at Louvain, a strong supporter of Gallicanism and Jansenism, whose great work /Jus Canonic.u.m Universum/ is marred by the pro- Gallican proclivities of its author; /Schmalzgrueber/ (1663-1735), a Bavarian Jesuit, professor of Canon Law at Dillingen and Ingolstadt, who in addition to treatises on such subjects as Trials, Espousals, Matrimony, and the Regular and Secular Clergy, published a work covering the entire Canon Law (/Jus Eccl. Universum/), and the Italian /Lucius Ferraris/ (d. 1763), whose /Prompta Bibliotheca Canonica/ went through several editions in the author's own lifetime and has been republished more than once since his death (latest edition 1899).

In the department of sacred oratory the palm must undoubtedly be awarded to the French Church. /Jacques-Benigne Bossuet/[5] (1627- 1704), in many senses the greatest of the French preachers, was the son of a lawyer at Dijon. Even in his early youth he was remarkable for his mastery of the Bible and cla.s.sical authors. He studied at the University of Paris, and after remaining two years under the spiritual education of St. Vincent de Paul was ordained a priest in 1662. He returned to Metz, in the cathedral of which he held a canonry, and where his abilities as a preacher and a controversialist soon attracted attention. He was appointed preceptor to the Dauphin of France, an office which he held from 1670 to 1681, when he was consecrated Bishop of Meaux. As bishop he took part in the a.s.sembly of the French Clergy (1681-82) and, though himself not such an extreme defender of Gallicanism as many of his contemporaries, he is credited generally with having been the author of the famous Declaration of the Clergy, known as the Articles of the Gallican Church. At the invitation of Louis XIV. he composed a treatise in defence of these articles, /Defensio Declarationis/, etc., published after his death (1730). As an orator Bossuet was far ahead of the preachers of his time, and as a writer and controversialist he had few equals. His untiring energy and ability are vouched for by the number of able works that proceeded from his pen. Of these the most instructive and best known are the /Discours sur l'histoire Universelle/ (1681), and the /Histoire des Variations des Eglises Protestantes/ (1688-89). His want of firmness, however, in his relations with the court, leading him as it did to show a sympathy which he could not have felt in his heart towards Gallicanism, his failure to move a finger to stay the ravages of Jansenism, his want of zeal for the spiritual care of his diocese, in marked contrast with the energy which he displayed when seeking to score a personal triumph over Fenelon and other less known adversaries, cannot be forgotten by any one who wishes to arrive at an impartial estimate of Bossuet's character.

/Fenelon/[6] (1651-1715), the great contemporary and rival of Bossuet, was sent as a youth for his education to the Universities of Cahors and Paris. Later on he returned to the seminary of Saint Sulpice then presided over by M. Tronson the superior of the Sulpicians, to whose wise and prudent counsels the future Archbishop of Cambrai was deeply indebted. After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes he was sent to preach to the Huguenots, upon whom his kindness and humility made a much more lasting impression than the violence resorted to by some of the officials of Louis XIV. Later on he was appointed preceptor to the Duke of Burgundy, grandson of Louis XIV., for whose education he composed the /Fables, Telemaque/, etc., and on the completion of his work as tutor he was nominated Archbishop of Cambrai (1695). Hardly had he received this honour than he was involved in a controversy on Quietism, which controversy cost him the friendship of Bossuet and the patronage of Louis XIV., by whom he was banished from the French court. But Fenelon found much at Cambrai to console him for what he had lost in Paris. In every sense of the word he proved himself a model bishop, visiting his parishes regularly, preaching in his cathedral and throughout his diocese, and always affable to those who came in contact with him whether they were rich or poor. Unlike Bossuet he never feared to speak out boldly against Jansenism and Gallicanism. As a preacher and a master of French literary style he was inferior to Bossuet, but as a man and as a bishop he was incomparably his superior. In addition to his works on literary and political questions he wrote voluminously on theology, philosophy, and the spiritual life.

The opposition to Scholasticism, that manifested itself in the writings and teaching of so many Humanists, grew more accentuated in the universities, especially after the establishment of ecclesiastical seminaries had led to the withdrawal from the universities of a great body of the clerical students. For centuries philosophy and theology had gone hand in hand, the former supplying the rational basis for the acceptance of revelation, the latter providing the necessary restraint upon the vagaries of human thought. The princ.i.p.al of individual judgment, proclaimed by the early Reformers and received so enthusiastically by their followers, had as its logical consequence an exaggeration of the powers of the human mind at the expense of authority, with the result that scepticism, atheism, and materialism, found favour in learned circles.

In face of such evident proofs of the limitations of the human mind, and with the object of preserving in one way or another the Christian Revelation, a reaction against the supposed infallibility of reason set in both amongst Protestant and Catholic scholars. Catholic philosophers were inclined to distrust reason entirely, and to rely solely on divine authority as a guarantee of truth. In other words they accepted Traditionalism, while Protestants, equally suspicious of reason, proclaimed that in judging the value of revelation the human will and sentiment must be heeded as well as the intellect, that is to say they accepted Sentimentalism.

The attempt to replace Scholasticism by some new philosophic system gave rise to various schools of thought, most of which can be traced back ultimately to Bacon and Descartes, the former a partisan of the inductive, the latter of the deductive method. /Rene Descartes/[7]

(1596-1649) was born at Touraine, and received his early education with the Jesuits. In his desire to see the world for himself he took service as a soldier in the army of Prince Maurice of Na.s.sau, and later on in that of the Elector of Bavaria. He retired from active life to give himself up to the study of mathematics and philosophy. At first he found a quiet retreat in Holland, from which he migrated to Stockholm at the invitation of Queen Christina. Here after a few months' residence he died. Throughout his life Descartes remained a sincere and practical Catholic. Putting aside Revelation, with which he did not profess to deal, Descartes, by an application of his principle of methodic doubt, arrived at the conclusion that the foundation of all certainty lay in the proposition /Cogito ergo sum/ (I think, therefore I exist). From an examination of his own ideas of a most perfect being he arrived at the conclusion that G.o.d exists, and from the existence of a good and wise supreme Being who has given men reason, sense, and perception in order to acquire knowledge, he argued that these faculties cannot lead men into error, and that consequently the veracity of G.o.d was the ultimate basis of cert.i.tude.

The theories of Descartes were pushed to their logical conclusion by those who succeeded him. /Blaise Pascal/[8] (1623-1662) was influenced largely by the false mysticism of the Middle Ages. He distrusted reason and exalted faith, as the only means of answering the difficulties that pure intellectualism could not solve. /Arnold Geulincx/ (1625-1669) at first a Catholic and afterwards a Calvinist, arguing from the ant.i.thesis supposed by Descartes to exist between mind and matter, maintained that since matter was inert it could not produce the sensations and volitions which men experienced, and that therefore these must be caused by G.o.d. In other words he propounded the theory of Occasionalism. This doctrine of Occasionalism as furnishing an explanation of sensations was extended by Malebranche[9]

(1638-1715), a student of the Sorbonne, so as to explain the origin of human ideas. These he maintained could not come from outside, because there can be no contact between mind and matter; they could not come from the mind itself, because creation is an attribute only of the infinite being, and therefore they must come from G.o.d. Hence, according to him, it is in G.o.d or in the divine essence that we see all things (Ontologism). If all activity and all knowledge come directly from G.o.d, it was only natural to conclude, as did /Spinoza/ (1632-77), that there exists only one substance endowed with the two attributes of thought and extension (Monism, Pantheism).[10]

From this brief sketch it will be seen that the rejection of the Scholastic System and the divorce between theology and philosophy led to dogmatic chaos, and ultimately to the rejection of divine revelation. By his attacks on the old proofs given for the existence of G.o.d and the motives of credibility, by the emphasis which he placed upon methodic doubt as the only safe way to certainty, and by the suspicions raised by him against the reliability of human reason, Descartes unwittingly paved the way for scepticism and atheism. Though his system was condemned by Rome and forbidden more than once by Louis XIV. it was taken up by the Oratorians and by most of the leading scholars in France.

The spirit of the eighteenth century was distinctly unfavourable to the religious orders. The Rationalists, the Freemasons, and the friends of absolutism joined hands in opposing the foundation of new establishments and in securing the suppression of the houses that had already been founded. In Austria, in Naples, in Spain, and in France a violent campaign was carried on to bring about the dissolution of several of the religious orders and congregations, or at least to so alter their rules and const.i.tutions that they should be cut adrift from Rome and subject to the authority of the secular rulers. During the campaign many houses were suppressed in Austria and in the other territories of the empire, but by far the greatest victory of which its authors could boast was the suppression of the Society of Jesus.

Yet in spite of the enemies of the Church the religious orders held their ground, and apostolic men arose to lay the foundations of new bodies, that were destined to take a glorious part in the religious revival of the nineteenth century. One of the most remarkable of these was St. Alphonsus Maria de' Liguori[11] (1696-1787). He was born near Naples, adopted at first the profession of a lawyer, but he soon forsook the bar to give himself entirely to G.o.d, and was ordained a priest in 1726. In 1732 he laid the foundation of a new religious society, the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, which was approved by Benedict XIV. in 1749. After having refused various honours he was compelled to accept the Bishopric of St. Agatha (1762) from which he retired in 1775 to devote himself to prayer, and to the composition of those spiritual treatises that have given him such a leading place not merely as a moral theologian but as a master in the ascetic life. In 1744 he issued his Notes on Busenbaum's Moral Theology, which notes formed the basis of his /Theologia Moralis/ published in 1753-55, and which went through nine editions during his own life-time. He was declared Venerable (1796), canonised (1839), and recognised as a Doctor of the Church (1871).

The Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (The Redemptorists) was founded by St. Alphonsus at Scala, near Amalfi, in the kingdom of Naples (1732), and was approved in 1749. The aim of its members was to imitate the virtues and example of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, by consecrating themselves especially to preaching the word of G.o.d to the poor. The opposition of the Neapolitan prime minister, Tanucci, was a source of great trouble to the holy founder. On the fall of Tanucci St. Alphonsus thought that a favourable opportunity had come for securing the approval of the government, but he was betrayed by his friends into accepting a modification of the const.i.tution, the /Regolamento/ (1779-80), which led to a separation between the Redemptorist houses in Naples and those situated in the Papal States.

The dispute was, however, healed in 1793. The Society spread rapidly in Italy, in Germany, where its interests were safeguarded by Father Hofbauer, and during the nineteenth century houses were established in every country in Europe, in America and in Australia.

The Pa.s.sionists[12] (The Congregation of Discalced Clerics of the Most Holy Cross and Pa.s.sion of Our Lord Jesus Christ) were founded by St.

Paul of the Cross (1694-1775). The latter was born at Ovada near Genoa, was ordained by Pope Benedict XIII. (1727) who at the same time gave his approval of the rules drawn up for the new society, founded his first house at Argentaro, and thereby laid the foundation of the Congregation of the Pa.s.sionists. The new society received the formal sanction and approval of Clement XIV. (1769) and of Pius VI. (1775).

Before the death of the founder several houses had been established in Italy, all of which were suppressed during the disturbances that followed in the wake of the French Revolution. The congregation was, however, re-const.i.tuted by Pius VII. (1814), and spread rapidly in Europe, in the United States, and in South America. The first house of the Pa.s.sionists in England was established by the celebrated Father Dominic at Aston Hall in Staffordshire (1842), and the first house in Ireland was opened at Mount Argus in 1856.

[1] /Summa S. Thomas hodiernis Academiarum moribus accomodata/.

[2] New edition, 10 vols., 1902-5.

[3] Denzinger, op. cit., no. 1219.

[4] Berthe-Castle, /Life of St. Alphonsus de' Liguori/, 1905.

[5] Bausset, /Histoire de Bossuet/, 4 vols., 1814. Jovy, /Etudes et recherches sur Jacques-Benigne Bossuet/, etc., 1903.

[6] Bausset, /Histoire de Fenelon/, 1809. De Broglie, /Episcopat de Fenelon/, 1884.

[7] Bouillier, /Histoire de la philosophie cartesienne/, 2 vols., 1868. Haldane, /Descartes, His Life and Times/, 1906.

[8] Giraud, /Pascal, l'homme, l'oeuvre, l'influence/, 1905. Janssens, /La philosophie et l'apologetique de Pascal/, 1896.

[9] Andre, /Vie du R. P. Malebranche/, 1886. Olle-Laprune, /La philosophie de Malebranche/, 2 vols., 1870.

[10] Ferriere, /La doctrine de Spinoza exposee et commentee/, 1899.

[11] Berthe-Castle, /Life of St. Alphonsus de' Liguori/, 2 vols., 1905.

[12] Pius a Spiritu Sancto, /The Life of St. Paul of the Cross/, 1868.