Primitive Christian Worship Part 16

"The Holy Council commands all bishops and others bearing the office and care of instruction, that according to the usage of the Catholic and Apostolic Church, received from the primitive times of the Christian religion, and the consent of holy fathers, and decrees of sacred councils, they in the first place should instruct the faithful concerning the intercession and invocation of saints, the honour of reliques, and the lawful use of images, teaching them, that the SAINTS REIGNING TOGETHER WITH CHRIST, offer their own {231} prayers for men to G.o.d: that it is good and profitable SUPPLIANTLY TO INVOKE THEM: and to fly to their PRAYERS, HELP, and a.s.sISTANCE, for obtaining benefits from G.o.d, by his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who is our only Redeemer and Saviour. But that those who deny that the saints, enjoying everlasting happiness in heaven, are to be invoked; or who a.s.sert either that they do not pray for us; or that the invocation of them to pray for us even as individuals is idolatry, or is repugnant to the word of G.o.d, and is opposed to the honour of the one Mediator of G.o.d and man, Jesus Christ; or that it is folly, by voice or mentally, to supplicate those who reign in heaven, hold impious sentiments.

"That the bodies also of the holy martyrs and others living with Christ, which were living members of Christ, and a temple of the Holy Ghost to be raised by Him to eternal life, and to be glorified, are to be worshipped by the faithful; by means of which many benefits are conferred on men by G.o.d; so that those who affirm that worship and honour are not due to the reliques of the saints, or that they and other sacred monuments are unprofitably honoured by the faithful; and that the shrines of the saints are frequented in vain for the purpose of obtaining their succour, are altogether to be condemned, as the Church has long ago condemned them, and now also condemns them."

[Footnote 89: The Latin, which will be found in the Appendix, is a transcript from a printed copy of the Acts of the Council of Trent, preserved in the British Museum, to which are annexed the autograph signatures of the secretaries (notarii), and their seals.]

An examination of this decree, in comparison with the form and language of other decrees of the same Council, forces the remark upon us, That the Council does not a.s.sert that the practice of invoking saints has any foundation in Holy Scripture. The absence of all such declaration is the more striking and important, because in the very decree immediately preceding this, {232} which establishes Purgatory as a doctrine of the Church of Rome, the Council declares that doctrine to be drawn from the Holy Scriptures. In the present instance the Council proceeds no further than to charge with impiety those who maintain the invocation of saints to be contrary to the word of G.o.d. Many a doctrine or practice, not found in Scripture, may nevertheless be not contrary to the word of G.o.d; but here the Council abstains from affirming any thing whatever as to the scriptural origin of the doctrine and practice which it authoritatively enforces. In this respect the framers of the decree acted with far more caution and wisdom than they had shown in wording the decree on Purgatory; and with far more caution and wisdom too than they exercised in this decree, when they affirmed that the doctrine of the invocation of saints was to be taught the people according to the usage of the Catholic and Apostolic Church, received from the primitive times of the Christian religion, and the consent of the holy fathers. I have good hope that these pages have already proved beyond gainsaying, that the invocation of saints is a manifest departure from the usage of the Primitive Church, and contrary to the testimony of "the holy fathers." However, the fact of the Council not having professed to trace the doctrine, or its promulgation, to any authority of Holy Scripture, is of very serious import, and deserves to be well weighed in all its bearings.

With regard to the condemnatory clauses of this decree, I would for myself observe, that I should never have engaged in preparing this volume, had I not believed, "that it was neither good nor profitable to invoke the saints, or to fly to their prayers, their a.s.sistance, and succour." I am bound, with this decree {233} before me, to p.r.o.nounce, that it is a vain thing to offer supplications, either by the voice or in the mind, to the saints, even if they be reigning in heaven; and that it is also in vain for Christians to frequent the shrines of the saints for the purpose of obtaining their succour.

I am, moreover, under a deep conviction, that the invocation of them is both at variance with the word of G.o.d, and contrary to the honour of the one Mediator between G.o.d and man, Jesus Christ.

On this last point, indeed, I am aware of an anxious desire prevailing on the part of many Roman Catholics, to establish a distinction between a mediation of Redemption, and a mediation of Intercession: and thus by limiting the mediation of the saints and angels to intercession, and reserving the mediation of redemption to Christ only, to avoid the setting up of another to share the office of Mediator with Him, who is so solemnly declared in Scripture to be the one Mediator between G.o.d and man. But this distinction has no foundation in the revealed will of G.o.d; on the contrary, it is directly at variance with the words and with the spirit of many portions of the sacred volume. There we find the two offices of redemption and mediation joined together in Christ. "If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins." [1 John ii. 1, 2.

Heb. ix. 12. vii. 25.] In the Epistle to the Hebrews, the same Saviour who is declared "by his own blood to have obtained eternal redemption,"

is announced also as the Mediator of Intercession. "Wherefore he is able to save them to the uttermost who come unto G.o.d through him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them." The {234} redemption wrought by Christ, and the intercession still made in our behalf by Christ, are both equally declared to us by the most sure warrant of Holy Scripture; of any other intercession by saints in glory, by angels, or Virgin, to be sought by our suppliant invocations to them, the covenant of G.o.d speaks not.

It may be observed, that the enactment of this decree by the Council of Trent, has been chiefly lamented by some persons on the ground of its presenting the most formidable barrier against any reconciliation between the Church of Rome, and those who hold the unlawfulness of the invocation of saints. Indeed persons of erudition, judgment, piety, and charity, in communion with Rome, have not been wanting to express openly their regret, that decrees so positive, peremptory, and exclusive, should have been adopted. They would have been better satisfied with the terms of communion in the Church to which they still adhered, had individuals been left to their own responsibility on questions of disputable origin and doubtful antiquity, involving rather the subtilty of metaphysical disquisitions, than agreeable to the simplicity of Gospel truth, and essential Christian doctrine. On this point I would content myself with quoting the sentiments of a Roman Catholic author.

Many of the facts alleged in his interesting comments deserve the patient consideration of every Christian. Here (observes the commentator on Paoli Sarpi's History of the Council of Trent[90]) the Council makes it a duty to pray to saints, though the ancient Church never regarded it as necessary. The practice cannot be proved to be introduced into public worship {235} before the sixth century; and it is certain, that in the ancient liturgies and sacramentaries no direct invocation is found. Even in our modern missals, being those of our ecclesiastical books in which the ancient form has been longest retained, scarcely is there a collect [those he means in which mention is made of the saints] where the address is not offered directly to G.o.d, imploring Him to hear the prayers of the saints for us; and this is the ancient form of invocation. It is true, that in the Breviaries and other ecclesiastical books, direct prayers to the saints have been subsequently introduced, as in litanies, hymns, and even some collects. But the usage is more modern, and cannot be evidence for ancient tradition. For this [ancient tradition] only some invocations addressed to saints in public harangues are alleged, but which ought to be regarded as figures of rhetoric, _apostrophes_, rather than real invocations; though at the same time some fathers laid the foundation for such a practice by a.s.serting that one could address himself to the saints, and hope for succour from them.

[Footnote 90: Histoire du Conc. de Trent, par Fra. Paoli Sarpi, traduit par Pierre Francois de Courayer. Amsterdam, note 31.

1751. vol. iii. p. 182.]

We have already alluded to the very great lat.i.tude of interpretation which the words of this Council admit. The expressions indeed are most remarkably elastic; capable of being expanded widely enough to justify those of the Church of Rome who allow themselves in the practice of asking for aid and a.s.sistance, temporal and spiritual, to be expected from the saints themselves; and at the same time, the words of the decree admit of being so far contracted as not in appearance palpably to contradict those who allege, that the Church of Rome never addresses a saint with any other pet.i.tion, than purely and simply that the saint would by prayer intercede for the worshippers. The words "suppliantly {236} to invoke them," and "to fly to their prayers, HELP, and SUCCOUR,"

are sufficiently comprehensive to cover all kinds of prayer for all kinds of benefits, whilst "the invocation of them to pray for us even individually," will countenance those who would restrict the faithful to an entreaty for their prayers only.

Whatever may be the advantage of this lat.i.tude of interpretation, in one point of view it must be a subject of regret. Complaints had long been made in Christendom, that other prayers were offered to the saints, besides those which pet.i.tioned only for their intercession; and if the Council of Trent had intended it to be a rule of universal application, that in whatever words the invocations of the saints might be couched, they should be taken to mean only requests for their prayers, it may be lamented, that no declaration to that effect was given.

The manner in which writers of the Church of Rome have attempted to reconcile the prayers actually offered in her ritual, with the principle of invoking the saints only for their prayers, is indeed most unsatisfactory. Whilst to some minds the expedient to which those writers have had recourse carries with it the stamp of mental reservation, and spiritual subterfuge, and moral obliquity; others under the influence of the purest charity will regret in it the absence of that simplicity, and direct openness in word and deed, which we regard as characteristic of the religion of the Gospel; and will deprecate its adoption as tending, in many cases inevitably, to become a most dangerous snare to the conscience. I will here refer only to the profession of that principle as made by Bellarmin. Subsequent writers seem to have adopted his sentiments, and to have expressed themselves very much in his words. {237}

Bellarmin unreservedly a.s.serts that Christians are to invoke the saints solely and exclusively for their prayers, and not for any benefits as from the saints themselves. But then he seems to paralyse that declaration by this refinement: "It must nevertheless be observed that we have not to do with words, but with the meaning of words; for as far as concerns the words, it is lawful to say, 'Saint Peter, have mercy on me! Save me! Open to me the entrance of heaven!' So also, 'Give to me health of body, Give me patience, Give me fort.i.tude!' Whilst only we understand 'Save me, and have mercy upon me BY PRAYING for me: Give me this and that, BY THY PRAYERS AND MERITS.' For thus Gregory of n.a.z.ianzen, in his Oratio in Cyprianum; and the Universal Church, when in the hymn to the Virgin she says,

Mary, Mother of Grace, Mother of Mercy, Do thou protect us from the enemy, And take us in the hour of death.

"And in that of the Apostles,

'To whose command is subject'

The health and weakness of all: Heal us who are morally diseased; Restore us to virtue.

"And as the Apostle says of himself 'that I might save some,' [Rom. xi.]

and 'that he might save all,' [I Cor. ix.] not as G.o.d, but Thy prayer and counsel."

I wish not to enter upon the question how far this distinction is consistent with that openness and straightforward undisguised dealing which is alone allowable when we are contending for the truth; nor how far the {238} charge of moral obliquity and double dealing, often brought against it, can be satisfactorily met. But suppose for a moment that we grant (what is not the case) that in the metaphysical disquisitions of the experienced casuist such a distinction might be maintained, how can we expect it to be recognized, and felt, and acted upon by the large body of Christians? Abstractedly considered, such an interpretation in a religious act of daily recurrence by the ma.s.s of unlearned believers would, I conceive, appear to reflecting minds most improbable, if not utterly impossible. And as to its actual _bona-fide_ result in practice, a very brief sojourn in countries where the religion of Rome is dominant, will suffice to convince us, that such subtilties of the casuist are neither received nor understood by the great body of worshippers; and that the large majority of them, when they pray to an individual saint to deliver them from any evil, or to put them in possession of some good, do in very deed look to the saint himself for the fulfilment of their wishes. It is a snare to the conscience only too evidently successful.

And I regret to add, that in the errors into which such language of their prayers may unhappily betray them, they cannot be otherwise than confirmed as well by the recorded sentiments of men in past years, whom they have been taught to reverence, as by the sentiments which are circulated through the world now, even by what they are accustomed to regard as the highest authority on earth[91].

[Footnote 91: See in subsequent parts of this work the references to Bonaventura, Bernardin Sen., Bernardin de Bust., &c.; and also the encyclical letter of the present (A.D. 1840) reigning pontiff.]

To this point, however, we must repeatedly revert {239} hereafter; at present, I will only add one further consideration. If, as we are now repeatedly told, the utmost sought by the invocation of saints is that they would intercede for the supplicants; that no more is meant than we of the Anglican Church mean when we earnestly entreat our fellow-Christians on earth to pray for us,--why should not the prayers to the saints be confined exclusively to that form of words which would convey the meaning intended? why should other forms of supplicating them be adopted, whose obvious and direct meaning implies a different thing?

If we request a Christian friend to pray for us, that we may be strengthened and supported under a trial and struggle in our spiritual warfare, we do not say, "Friend, strengthen me; Friend, support me."

That entreaty would imply our desire to be, that he would visit us himself, and comfort and strengthen us by his own kind words and cheering offices of consolation and encouragement. To convey our meaning, our words would be, "Pray for me; remember me in your supplications to the throne of grace. Implore G.o.d, of his mercy, to give me the strength and comfort of his Holy Spirit." If nothing more is ever intended to be conveyed, than a similar request for their prayers, when the saints are "suppliantly invoked," in a case of such delicacy, and where there is so much danger of words misleading, why have other expressions of every variety been employed in the Roman Liturgies, as well as in the devotions of individuals, which in words appeal to the saints, not for their prayers, but for their own immediate exertion in our behalf, their a.s.sistance, succour, defence, and comfort,--"Protect us from our enemies--Heal the diseases of our minds--Release us from our sin--Receive us at the hour of death?" {240}

In the present work, however, were it not for the example and warning set us by this still greater departure from Scripture and the primitive Church, we need not have dwelt on this immediate point; because we maintain that any invocation of saint or angel, even if it were confined to a pet.i.tioning for their prayers and intercessions, is contrary both to G.o.d's word and to the faith and practice of the primitive, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. We now proceed to the next portion of our proposed inquiry,--the present state of Roman Catholic worship, with respect to the invocation of saints and angels. {241}

CHAPTER III.

SECTION I.--PRESENT SERVICE IN THE CHURCH OF ROME.

In submitting to the reader's consideration the actual state of Roman Catholic worship at the present hour, I disclaim all desire to fasten upon the Church of Rome any of the follies and extravagancies of individual superst.i.tion. Probably many English Roman Catholics have been themselves shocked and scandalized by the scenes which their own eyes have witnessed in various parts of continental Europe. It would be no less unfair in us to represent the excesses of superst.i.tion there forced on our notice as the genuine legitimate fruits of the religion of Rome, than it would be in Roman Catholics to affiliate on the Catholics of the Anglican Church the wild theories and revolting tenets of all who a.s.sume the name of opponents to Rome. Well indeed does it become us of both Churches to watch jealously and adversely as against ourselves the errors into which our doctrines, if not preserved and guarded in their purity and simplicity, might have a tendency to seduce the unwary. And whilst I am fully alive to the necessity of us Anglican Catholics prescribing to ourselves a {242} practical application of the same rule in various points of faith and discipline, I would with all delicacy and respect invite Roman Catholics to do likewise. Especially would I entreat them to reflect with more than ordinary scrutiny and solicitude on the vast evils into which the practice of praying to saints and angels, and of pleading their merits at the throne of grace, has a tendency to betray those who are unenlightened and off their guard; and unless my eyes and my ears and my powers of discernment have altogether often deceived and failed me, I must add, actually betrays thousands.

Often when I have witnessed abroad mult.i.tudes of pilgrims prostrate before an image of the Virgin, their arms extended, their eyes fixed on her countenance, their words in their native language pouring forth her praises and imploring her aid, I have asked myself, If this be not religious worship, what is? If I could transport myself into the midst of pagans in some distant part of the world at the present day; or could I have mingled with the crowd of worshippers surrounding the image of Minerva in Athens, or of Diana in Ephesus, when the servants of the only G.o.d called their fellow-creatures from such vanities, should I have seen or heard more unequivocal proofs that the worshippers were addressing their prayers to the idols as representations of their deities? Would any difference have appeared in their external worship? When the Ephesians worshipped their "great G.o.ddess Diana and the image which fell down from Jupiter," could their att.i.tude, their eyes, or their words more clearly have indicated an a.s.surance in the worshipper, that the Spirit of the Deity was especially present in that image, than the att.i.tude, the eyes, the words of the pilgrims at Einsiedlin for example, are indications of the same {243} belief and a.s.surance with regard to the statue of the Virgin Mary? These thoughts would force themselves again and again on my mind; and though since I first witnessed such things many years have intervened, chequered with various events of life, yet whilst I am writing, the scenes are brought again fresh to my remembrance; the same train of thought is awakened; and the lapse of time has not in the least diminished the estimate then formed of the danger, the awful peril, to which the practice of addressing saints and angels in prayer, even in its most modified and mitigated form, exposes those who are in communion with Rome. I am unwilling to dwell on this point longer, or to paint in deeper or more vivid colours the scenes which I have witnessed, than the necessity of the case requires. But it would have been the fruit of a morbid delicacy rather than of brotherly love, had I disguised, in this part of my address, the full extent of the awful dread with which I contemplate any approximation to prayers, of whatever kind, uttered by the lips or mentally conceived, to any spiritual existence in heaven above, save only to the one G.o.d exclusively. It is indeed a dread suggested by the highest and purest feelings of which I believe my frame of mind to be susceptible; it is sanctioned and enforced by my reason; and it is confirmed and strengthened more and more by every year's additional reflection and experience. Ardently as I long and pray for Christian unity, I could not join in communion with a Church, one of whose fundamental articles accuses of impiety those who deny the lawfulness of the invocations of saints.

But I return from this digression on the peril of idolatry, to which as well the theory as the practice of {244} the Roman Catholic Church exposes her members; and willingly repeat my disclaimer of any wish or intention whatever to fasten and filiate upon the Church of Rome the doctrines or the practice of individuals, or even of different sections of her communion. Still, in the same manner as I have referred to the extravagancies which offend us in many parts of Christendom now, I would recall some of the excesses into which renowned and approved authors of her communion have been betrayed. I seek not to fix on those members of the Roman Church who disclaim any partic.i.p.ation in such excesses, the folly or guilt of others; but when we find many of the most celebrated among her sons tempted into such lamentable departures from primitive Christian worship, we are naturally led to ascertain whether the doctrine be not itself the genuine cause and source of the mischief;--whether the malady be not the immediate and natural effect of the tenet and practice operating generally, and not to be referred to the idiosyncrasy of the patient. A voice seems to address us from every side, when such excesses are witnessed, Firmly resist the beginnings of the evil; oppose its very commencement; it is not a question of degree, exclude the principle itself from your worship; give utterance to no invocation; mentally conceive no prayer to any being, save G.o.d alone; plead no other merits with Him than the merits of his only Son. Then, and then only, are you safe. Then, and then only, is your prayer catholic, primitive, apostolic, and scriptural.

The[92] most satisfactory method of conducting this {245} branch of our inquiry seems to be, that we should examine the Roman Ritual with reference to those several and progressive stages to which I have before generally referred; from the mere rhetorical apostrophe to the direct prayer for spiritual blessings pet.i.tioned for immediately from the person addressed. I am neither anxious to establish the progress historically, nor do I wish to tie myself down in all cases to the exact order of those successive stages, in my present citation of testimonies from the Roman Ritual. My anxiety is to give a fair view of what is now the real character of Roman Catholic worship, rather than to draw fine distinctions. I shall therefore survey within the same field of view the two fatal errors by which, as we believe, the worship of the Church of Rome is rendered unfit for the family of Christ to acknowledge it generally as their own: I mean the adoration of saints, and the pleading of their merits at the throne of grace, instead of trusting to the alone exclusive merits of the one only Mediator Jesus Christ our Lord, and addressing G.o.d Almighty alone.

[Footnote 92: I believe the method best calculated to supply us with the very truth is, as I have before observed, to trace the conduct of Christians at the shrines of the martyrs, and follow them in their successive departures further and further from primitive purity and simplicity, on the anniversaries of those servants of G.o.d. What was hailed there first in the full warmth of admiration and zeal for the honour and glory of a national or favourite martyr, crept stealthily, and step by step, into the regular and stated services of the Church.]

I. In the original form of those prayers in which mention was made of the saints departed, Christians addressed the Supreme Being alone, either in praise for the mercies shown to the saints themselves, and to the Church through their means; or else in supplication, that the worshippers might have grace to follow their example, and profit by their instruction. Such, for instance, is the prayer in the Roman ritual[93] on St. {246} John's day[94] which is evidently the foundation of the beautiful Collect now used in the Anglican Church,--"Merciful Lord, we beseech thee to cast thy bright beams of light upon thy Church, that it being enlightened by the doctrine of thy Apostle and Evangelist St. John, may so walk in the light of thy truth, that it may at length attain to the light of everlasting life, through Jesus our Lord. Amen."

Such too is the close of the Prayer for the whole state of Christ's Church militant here on earth, offered in our Anglican service,--"We bless thy holy name for all thy servants departed this life in thy faith and fear, beseeching thee to give us grace so to follow their good examples, that with them we may be partakers of thy heavenly kingdom.

Grant this, O Father, for the sake of Jesus Christ our only Mediator and Advocate. Amen."

[Footnote 93: The references will generally be given to the Roman Breviary as edited by F.C. Husenbeth, Norwich, 1830. That work consists of four volumes, corresponding with the four quarters of the ecclesiastical year--Winter, Hiem.; Spring, Vern.; Summer, _aestiv_.; Autumn, Aut.; and the volumes will be designated by the corresponding initials, H. V. ae. A.]

[Footnote 94: "Ecclesiam, tuam, Domine, benignus ill.u.s.tra, ut beati Johannis Apostoli tui et evangelistae illuminata doctrinis, ad dona perveniat sempiterna. Per Dominum."--Husen. H. p. 243.]

II. The second stage supplies examples of a kind of rhetorical apostrophe; the speaker addressing one who was departed as though he had ears to hear. Were not this the foundation stone on which the rest of the edifice seems to have been built, we might have pa.s.sed it by unnoticed. Of this we have an instance in the address to the Shepherds on Christmas-day. "Whom have ye seen, ye shepherds? Say ye, tell ye, who hath appeared on the earth? Say ye, what saw ye? Announce to us the nativity of Christ[95]."

[Footnote 95: Quem vidistis, Pastores? Dicite, Annunciate n.o.bis.

In terris quis apparuit? Dicite quidnam vidistis? Et annunciate Christi nativitatem.--H. 219.] {247}

Another instance is seen in that beautiful song ascribed to Prudentius and used on the day of Holy Innocents:

"Hail! ye flowers of Martyrs." [Salvete flores martyrum. H. 249.]

It is of the same character with other songs, said to be from the same pen, in which the town of Bethlehem is addressed, and even the Cross.

"O Thou of mighty cities." [O sola magnarum urbium. H. 306.]

"Bend thy boughs, thou lofty tree...."

[Flecte ramos arbor alta, &c. Aut. 344.]

"Worthy wast thou alone To bear the victim of the world."

Thus, on the feast of the exaltation of the Cross, this anthem is sung,--"O blessed Cross, who wast alone worthy to bear the King of the heavens and the Lord." [O crux benedicta, quae sola fuisti digna portare Regem coelorum et Dominum. Alleluia. A. 345.] Though unhappily, in an anthem on St. Andrew's day, this apostrophe becomes painful and distressing, in which not only is the cross thus apostrophised, but it is prayed to, as though it had ears to hear, and a mind to understand, and power to act,--"Hail, precious Cross! do thou receive the disciple of Him who hung upon thee, my master, Christ." [Salve, crux pretiosa suscipe discipulum ejus, qui pependit in te, magister meus Christus. A.

547.] The Church of Rome, in this instance, gives us a vivid example of the ease with which exclamations and apostrophes are made the ground-work of invocations. In the legend of the day similar, though not the same, words form a part of the salutation, which St. Andrew is there said to have addressed {248} to the cross of wood prepared for his own martyrdom, and then bodily before his eyes. There are many such addresses to the Cross, in various parts of the Roman ritual. (See A.

344.)