The Sacrifice and the Ransom.
Introduction.
Among the various manifestations of Christian charity in the middle ages—charity sometimes ill-understood perhaps, but always sincere and enthusiastic—there are few that show more expressively to what a degree the love of our fellow-creature can suppress all egotistical instincts, than the Order of Mercy for the redemption of captives. Sustained and encouraged by holy charity, the Father of Mercy embarked each year at Marseilles, braving plague, martyrdom, and slavery. In the name of that heavenly King, of whom he considered himself the ambassador, he demanded from the astonished tyrant of Algiers the liberty of the Christian captives, until then apparently condemned never to see again their homes. The savage Dey, awed by the heroic confidence of the unarmed pilgrim—moved, perhaps, by some secret compassion, accepted the gold offered as ransom; and the obscure and humble father recrossed the sea, and returned again on foot to his distant monastery.
And what was the origin of this institution? No legislative assembly, no council of ministers is entitled to the honor of having conceived the idea of this pious enterprise. The loving heart of a man who had devoted himself from his childhood to the service of suffering humanity was the first to devise a plan of carrying relief and consolation to misfortunes which, until then, had seemed beyond the ordinary action of Christian charity. Peter Nolasque, the founder of the Order of Mercy, was born in 1189, near Castelnaudari, in Languedoc, France. His learning was as remarkable as his piety, so that at the age of twenty-five, the education of the son of Peter of Aragon was confided to him by the celebrated Simon of Montfort. It was while at the court of Barcelona, in this high and responsible position, that Peter Nolasque resolved to devote his life and fortune to the ransom of the Christian slaves who languished hopelessly, under the burning sun of Africa.
For this purpose he determined to establish a religious order for the deliverance of captives. Several noblemen contributed large sums of money toward the good work; the court of Rome gave its supreme approbation, and on St. Lawrence's day, 1223, Peter Nolasque was declared the first general of the new institution, and invested with the monastic habit. He lived far from courts during the rest of his life, travelling painfully on foot to carry consolation and freedom to the wretched beings he pitied so truly. More than four hundred Christians were delivered from the hands of the Mussulman by his efforts alone.
He died on Christmas-day, 1256, leaving behind him the memory of a pure and generous life, and an institution which soon numbered among its members many of the bravest and noblest chevaliers of France.
The Sacrifice.
It was in the year of our Lord 1363. The curfew bell had just been rung, the doors of the village houses were all fast shut, and within the castle wall the measured tread of the sentinel on the battlements was the only sound that met the ear. If, perchance, some belated traveller was still abroad, he hung his rosary around his neck, and hurried onward muttering pious ejaculations; for a heavy mist deepened the shades of night, and the sad wailings of the wind and the hootings of the owl mingling together, sounded ominously in his terrified ears.
The only light visible was in the chapel of the monastery, where the monks of the Order of Mercy were reciting their evening prayers. They had just ended the last and solemn petition for "all Christians, captive and suffering in the hands of the infidel," when the bell at the great gate of the holy house rang loudly, and the brother-porter, rising from his knees, hastened to reconnoitre by the wicket who it was demanded admittance at such an unusual hour.
Three persons were at the gate; one, a young man, wore a rich emblazoned coat of arms; his head was uncovered save by the long clustering curls of dark hair, now heavy with the night-damp, that descended to his shoulders; a youth, apparently his page, bore in his arms the knight's helmet. The third individual was an old man, who kept himself in the background, and who appeared by his plain steel cuirass to be an humble squire, grown gray in harness.
The page's youthful face was sad and timid; the elder man's showed the traces of violent passions in the deep lines that furrowed it, and his eyes even now seemed to flash in the light of the torch that the monk carried. The chevalier's noble countenance was pale and grave, and he stood leaning pensively on his sword. "What wish you, Messire?" asked the brother-porter of the knight, when, after a deep but sharp scrutiny, his doubts were removed as to the quality of the strangers.
"May it please the Reverend Father Prior to grant me a short interview?"
"May it be as you desire, Messire. I will seek the reverend Father when you have entered with your followers."
The heavy iron-bound gate of the convent turned on its massive hinges, and closed the instant that the travellers were within.
The golden spurs of the chevalier resounded on the cloister's marble flags as he followed the monk, and he murmured to himself the words of the Psalm, "Haec requies mea in seculum seculi"—but his page and his squire knew no Latin, and his conductor heard him not.
They were introduced into a spacious ancient parlor lined with high black oaken wainscot; the brother placed the torch he carried in an iron claw that was fixed in the wall for that purpose, and invited the strangers to seat themselves on the bench that ran round the chamber, then bowing profoundly, left them.
The squire immediately drew nearer to his young lord who appeared to be absorbed in thought.
"How, my lord," cried he, "is it possible that you believe that these monks can forward your plans? Why thus retard our journey? A few days more and we should have reached our goal, and many a good man and true would have made your quarrel his own. The brave free companies would have served you as never a hooded priest in France!"
"Banish all such thoughts for the future, Michel," replied the knight, "it is better to pardon than to revenge."
"Good Saint Denis! do I hear the Lord of Montorgueil aright! My lord, pardon the frank speech of an old soldier, but never was the escutcheon of your house dimmed without being washed in blood—and would you be the first to let it lie soiled in the dust?"
"Alas! Michel, it is indeed true that too much blood has been shed in the quarrels of our house!"
"Holy Virgin! can it be possible that my liege lord has forgotten the duties of a valiant knight?"
"Friend," replied the young warrior sternly while his pale cheek reddened with the emotion awakened by the squire's reproach, "I have remembered that I was a Christian before I was made a knight!"
Michel drew back in silence, gazing on his master with a countenance in which astonishment and grief were nearly equally portrayed, while the Lord of Montorgueil silently proceeded to take off his shoulder-belt and untie his silken scarf.
The heavy oaken door at length opened and the venerable prior entered. Quick as thought, the knight threw the sword he held in his hands at the monk's feet; then, falling on his knees, exclaimed in a loud, firm voice, "Reverend Father, in the name of God and of the holy Virgin Mary, I, Raoul de Montorgueil, chevalier, pray and conjure you to admit me into the religious and devout observance of our Lady of Mercy, for the deliverance of captives!"
"Amen, my son, so be it, if it be God who sends thee," replied the Prior.
"My lord, my lord," cried Michel, "remember the Sire of Valeri! Proud will he be, and loud his boast that fear of him has moved you to this. You know his outre-cui-dance!"
"O my worshipful lord!" exclaimed the timid page, bursting into tears, "think of your lady-mother!"
"I think of the salvation of my soul more than of all else," replied the chevalier.
"Silence, good friend!" said the prior, as Michel appeared about to attempt another remonstrance; "and you, my son, seat yourself here by my side, and tell me what has induced you to seek this peaceful sanctuary."
The young knight arose and placed himself on the wooden bench by the monk; then, keeping his eyes steadfastly bent to the ground as if to avoid the sight of his two weeping retainers, "Reverend Father," he said, "most bitter is the remembrance of the past; for the last time will I recount the evil thoughts and deeds that once seemed so natural to me. For many a year all Brittany has resounded with the feuds of the Lords of Montorgueil and the Sires of Valeri; bitter has been the hatred and bloody the strife between these two proud houses; but I will not recall past outrages—let me relate only the last deadly wrong that filled my heart with unspeakable thirst of vengeance.
"Twelve days have not yet expired since the passage of arms at Rennes; the Sire of Valeri was there at the head of a numerous company of his partisans, and defied me to single combat, with many a vain and bragging word. I accepted his challenge, resolved to be the victor or die. The onslaught was terrible, for we were equal in strength and skill, and we long parried each other's thrusts. Forced at last to pause to take breath, the Sire of Valeri proposed a truce.
"'Let us meet a month hence,' he cried, 'with twenty good men each, and end our quarrel.'
"'Why should we adjourn till another day what can be so well ended now?' I replied; 'our swords will be no sharper and our hate no hotter. No, may my spurs be hacked off my heels by your basest varlet, ere I consent to sheathe again my sword before one of us fall!' Then again fast and furious fell our blows until the traitor knight making a feint, struck me before I had time to cover and I fell. 'Yield!' cried my exulting foe. 'Never! Never!' I replied. 'Then die the death!' and he raised his weapon.
"At that moment my young brother—alas! alas! why did my lady-mother bring him to those fatal lists!—my young brother leapt over the barriers and sprang to the rescue—the heavy blade descended on his fair head! Father, I saw the long hair of the noble child red with his young life's blood, and I saw no more. When I awoke from my deadly swoon, I found that my good squire and gentle page had carried me from the lists and were weeping over me while they swore vengeance on the enemy of our house.
"I, too, thirsted for vengeance, for vengeance on all the kith and kin of the house of Valeri, and I resolved to seek fifty lances and attack the miscreant in his stronghold. Vainly my lady-mother prayed me to lay aside my sword and live for her. 'Leave vengeance to heaven,' she said, 'I have seen too much blood—O my son! let me not weep over the mangled corpse of my last child!' Vainly she prayed; I left her, reverend father, to mourn over the grave of my brother, while I carried death to the homestead of our enemy.
"But as I journeyed toward the quarters of the Free Companions, followed by these, my squire and page, intending to enlist some good lances under my banner, the remembrance of my mother's grief returned again and again, and my heart softened each time that I thought of her, childless and alone in her sorrow. I was meditating sadly this very day, when the sound of a bell ringing the Angelus reminded me that it was the hour of prayer, and I alighted from my horse to repeat an Ave Maria. When I said, 'Pray for us in the hour of our death,' I asked myself for the first time, if in that supreme hour the remembrance of my revenge would be sweet to me, and if, when in the presence of him who is the suzerain of the lord as well as of the vassal, I should dare to vaunt me of the blood I had shed. Thus I continued to reflect as I resumed my journey, until at last I found myself before the gate of this holy house, and I heard echoing beneath the arched cloisters the strains of that sweet Salve Regina, that pilgrims say the angels sing at night beside the fountains.
"All the bitterness and anguish of my heart melted away as I listened; 'O Mother of Mercy!' I cried, 'it is then here that thou art awaiting me? Yes, I will henceforth be thy knight; it is better, I feel, to wipe tears away, than to cause them to flow.' I threw myself on my knees, and when again the holy strains repeated 'O clemens! O pia! O dulcis Virgo Maria!' my resolution was firmly taken, and I had vowed myself to the service of the blessed Virgin. Receive me then, Father, as her servant."
Raoul threw himself once more on his knees before the venerable priest, who raising his arms toward heaven, silently gave thanks for this miraculous conversion; then turning toward the knight, blessed him and gave him the kiss of peace. "How admirable are the ways of God, my son," said he; "how little did my brethren and I think while we were praying this night for all captives, that there was one so near us being freed at that moment from his bonds! Thou wast smitten on the road, my son, like Saint Paul; like him thou art, perhaps, destined to become a chosen vessel of grace. In the name of God and of the blessed Virgin, I receive thee into our holy order, and admit thee to the ordeal of our novitiate."
The sobs of the two retainers had been the only sign of their presence that they had given while the knight was speaking; but now the old squire cast himself at his feet, and in broken accents besought him to have pity on his poor vassals, and not abandon them to the scoffs and outrages of the enemy of his house.
"Have pity on us," repeated the page, wringing his hands.
"My friends, weep not like women," replied their master, "I have thought of everything. God will comfort my lady-mother, and she will rejoice to have her son a knight of the holy Virgin. My kinsman Gaston will be your lord; he is worthy of the inheritance I leave him, for he has a noble and generous heart. He is young, it is true, but I will place him under the tutelage of Messire Bertrand du Guesclin, and foolhardy will he be who shall then attack our house or harm its vassals. Reverend Father, I crave your hospitality for my two retainers, and I entreat you to permit me now to seek peace and strength in prayer."
The prior took his hand and conducted him in silence to the chapel. A single lamp burnt before the sanctuary, and shed a faint, solemn light upon the image of our Lady of Mercy. Raoul prostrated himself at the foot of the altar and poured forth his ardent soul in supplication. When he arose, the marble steps were wet with tears.
"Father," he said to the prior, "I am strong now—the sacrifice is accomplished."
The young convert passed that night in writing. He addressed a long and loving letter to his mother, relating to her all his struggle—his burning wish for vengeance, his fear of shame, the tender mercy that had touched his heart: the parchment on which he wrote was stained with many a tear. "I could not remain in the secular world without revenging our injuries," said he in conclusion, "I have left it that I may pardon. Honored lady and dear mother, bless your son and pray for him."
To Messire Bertrand du Guesclin he gave a rapid sketch of the facts, and besought his protection for his young kinsman, now Lord of Montorgueil.
A third letter still remained to be written; how much it cost him to break this last link with the outward world, was revealed by the sobs that burst from his quivering lips, by the tears that dropped heavily on the oaken table on which he leaned. "No," cried he at last, "this tie cannot be broken," and taking his pen he traced some hurried words: they were addressed to his brother-in-arms, his friend, his playmate in happy childhood, his rival in his first feats of arms.
"Dear Aymar," were his concluding words, "my heart can never change toward you—oh! believe that it beats the same under the monk's frock as under the knight's armor! For love of me, Aymar, avenge not my quarrel."
The ancient squire, who had passed the night in lamentations, interrupted only by exclamations of indignant surprise at the peaceful slumbers of his young companion, looked very sad and weary when Raoul entered his chamber at break of day.
"Michel," said the knight, "spare me your reproaches and tears; they can avail nothing to change my purpose, but I have need of all my fortitude. Here are divers messages; be heedful of them, that they may reach their destination speedily."
He put into the squire's hands the letters he had prepared, each fastened with a silken string, and impressed with his seal.
"Give this rosary of golden beads to my lady mother," he continued, "she hung it on my neck when we parted; henceforth when she tells it, the remembrance of her Raoul will be mingled with every prayer. This ring, that I won in my first tournament, is for Aymar de Boncourt; beg him also to take my armor and my war-horse. And now farewell, Michel, the matin-bell is ringing, and I belong no longer to the world, but to God. Farewell, old friend, farewell; be as faithful to Gaston as you have been to me." He threw himself on the old man's breast and pressed him to his heart, then tearing himself from his arms, he gazed an instant tenderly on the still sleeping page. "Recommend this poor child to the new Lord of Montorgueil, Michel, and be ever his friend." He stooped and kissed the boy's smooth brow, then turned softly away—the door closed, and the squire and the page never looked on him again.
When the morning prayers were ended, the prior summoned the disconsolate retainers to his presence, and, after a discourse full of consolation and good counsel, dismissed them with a handsome largess from their beloved master. We will not follow them on their journey; suffice it to say that when the lady of Montorgueil received her son's unexpected letter, the first pang of sorrow and regret was excruciating, but the Christian mother was soon able to accept the sacrifice. She ceased to grieve, and in a few months retired to a convent, where she passed the rest of her peaceful and honored life.
Du Guesclin, whose noble heart was full of generous sympathy, loudly proclaimed his affection for Raoul, and his determination to protect the house of Montorgueil. This was sufficient to prevent all attempts of the Sire of Valeri against the vassals and lands of the new lord; and he contented himself with whispering accusations of cowardice against the knight who had left the death of his brother unavenged, and his own quarrel unvoided.
Aymar alone could not be comforted for the loss of his brother-in-arms, and it was long before he was seen to take his wonted place in the feasts and tournaments that formed the greater part of the occupations of the young chevaliers of his time and country.
Raoul meantime consummated his sacrifice; his long curls were cropped close, and the monk's white woolen robe replaced the knight's brocade and velvet. After a novitiate of a year and a day, he pronounced the three vows of his order in the Chapel of our Lady of Mercy, with an especial promise to give his life for the ransom of captives. From this time forward he was only known as the Brother Sainte Foi.
The Ransom.
Time passed away, and France was once more at peace with England for a brief space; at peace, but far from tranquil, for the Free Companies, which at first consisted only of nobles, younger sons of powerful lords, had been terribly augmented by the disbanded soldiers of both countries, who found inaction intolerable, and who now ravaged her defenceless provinces. In vain the outraged people cried for help and protection; the state, without money or men, was unable either to prevent or punish. At length the brave du Guesclin imagined a means to employ these fiery spirits. He sought the formidable band, then encamped on the plains of Chalon, at the head of two hundred chevaliers, and addressed them: "Most of you," said he, "were once my companions-in-arms, you are all my friends. Your vocation is not to ravage and destroy, but to conquer and save. Necessity, only, I know, has forced you to such extremities. I come now to offer you the means of living honorably and of fighting gloriously. Spain groans beneath the yoke of the Saracen: would you not rather choose to be the deliverers of a great nation than the ruin of this fair country?"
At these words the Free Companions surrounded the chief, and with enthusiastic acclamations swore as one man to follow him whithersoever he should lead. The noblest of the French chivalry joined the enterprise, and Spain soon reechoed with the well-known war-cry of "Notre-Dame Guesclin!"
The Sire of Valeri and young Aymar of Boncourt were among the bravest of du Guesclin's gallant band, and their exploits soon became the favorite themes of the troubadours and trouvères of tuneful, glory-loving France. But when the chief and his victorious warriors returned to their native land, Aymar and the Sire of Valeri were not among them. Had they fallen in the last bloody encounter? Had they been traitorously ensnared and were they now languishing in some Moorish dungeon? Several of the adventurers affirmed that the two knights had embarked for France, but no vessel from Gallicia had reached a port of Brittany.
The Fathers of the Order of Mercy were soon aware of the rumors that circulated concerning the fate of the two bravest chevaliers of the age; their continual efforts to collect funds for the ransom of captives placed them in communication with all parts of Christendom, and the news of the disappearance of the Sire of Valeri quickly reached the ears of Brother Sainte Foi. The mysterious fate of him who was Raoul's enemy saddened him, but terrible indeed was the pang he felt when he learnt that his friend Aymar was also lost. All his fortitude, all his resignation, suddenly forsook him, and he wept bitterly.
"My son," said the prior reproachfully, "I thought thou wast dead to all earthly things."
"O reverend father!" replied he, "earthly things are perishable, but holy friendship comes from Heaven and dieth not. Let me weep for my friend. David wept for Jonathan; their souls were one; mine also was one with Aymar's."
From this time forward the young monk seemed to waste away, his cheek grew thinner and paler, his eyes were dim and tear-worn. In vain, hoping to arouse him, his superior sent him without, to seek funds for their work of charity; no change of scene could dispel the melancholy languor that had taken possession of him, and the whole fraternity deplored that so pious and ardent a spirit would, in all probability, be so soon taken from among them. After much anxious deliberation the chapter at last resolved to invest him with the title and functions of Redemptorist, and, on account of his youth and inexperience, to associate him with an aged monk who had been several times sent on the errand of love and mercy.
Brother Sainte Foi was accordingly summoned one day before the assembled fathers.
"Brother," said the prior, "don thy sandals, take thy staff, and be ready to depart."
"I am ready, reverend father."
"Thou dost not enquire whither?"
"Obedience questioneth not, reverend father."
"It is well, my son; depart, then, and may God be with thee! Go to the land of the infidel—go ransom the captives!"
Brother Sainte Foi, transported with joy, threw himself at the prior's feet, unable to speak his thanks, while his dim eyes flashed, and his faded cheek reddened; youth, and health and strength came back, as if by a miracle, and the good prior, delighted to see the effect he had produced, entered into full details for the guidance of the young Redemptorist during his mission. The whole community assembled to pray for the happy issue of his journey; and after receiving the blessing of the elders, he set forth laden with the rich alms destined to relieve so much misery.
A long and wearisome journey on foot brought the Redemptorist father to the port where he was to take ship for Algiers, and here he was joined by the venerable monk who had been appointed his guide and counsellor in the holy work. They embarked together on a Genoese vessel they found ready to sail, and a favorable wind soon carried them across the Mediterranean. The young father's heart beat hard when he heard the cry of "land!" and saw the cruel coast of Africa, where so many fellow-Christians were groaning hopelessly beneath the yoke of the bigot Mussulman.
"It is there that our brethren suffer. O father!" cried he to his companion, "but we are going to succor, we are going to save!"
And when, at last, the vessel entered the port of Algiers, the Redemptorist knight knelt and kissed the soil of the wished-for land, where he was about to make his first trial of arms in the holy lists of charity.
The two monks, whose errand was well known, were immediately surrounded by a crowd of slave-merchants, who scoffingly taunted them, "Have you plenty of gold, Christians? for we have plenty of slaves; you may have a shipload of them." Father Antoine had learned prudence and replied as guardedly and as briefly as he could to the miscreants that pressed upon him. He hastily directed his steps, followed by his companion, toward the hospital which the Order of Mercy had with much difficulty obtained permission to build at the entrance of the port. Arrived there, without tarrying to rest, he commenced ringing the great bell that never tolled but to announce the joyful tidings that charity, holy charity that suffereth long and is kind, that beareth all things, that believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things; charity that never faileth, had landed again on those burning sands, to bring hope and aid to the followers of the cross.
At that signal a crowd of disheveled, ragged men, many wearing chains at their wrists and ankles, were seen hurrying toward the chapel. Alas! who would have recognized in those emaciated, tear-worn spectres, the stalwart soldiers, the valiant chevaliers, whose deeds the silver-tongued minstrels of France were singing even then?
Sobs and joyous cries, prayers and ejaculations, burst from them as they threw themselves on their knees before their deliverers, and kissed their garments.
"Brethren," said the venerable father, his voice troubled and trembling, "we have come hither in the first place for the salvation of your souls: during eight days we shall be here waiting to listen to your confessions, and to give you ghostly consolation, to preach to you the word of life, and to bestow on you the sacraments of our holy mother church. In the second place, we have come to work for your deliverance from captivity. Pray for us, brethren, that we may worthily acquit ourselves of our sacred tasks."
The unhappy slaves, whose hopes and fears could be read in their agitated features, gave a great cry when the good father ceased speaking. It seemed as if despair was calling on heaven for mercy, and then slowly withdrew.
The next, and the following days, slaves and masters besieged the hospital gate, and the two monks knew not a moment's rest while daylight lasted. Each evening, when they were once more alone, Father Sainte Foi would enquire eagerly of his aged companion if he thought that they would be able to ransom all the captives.
"We shall be able to save them all, father, shall we not?" he would say with trembling anxiety; "I have so raised their hopes to-day that I could not leave one now to despair."
Father Antoine returned no answer to these enquiries; he seemed rather to avoid the pleading eyes that tried to read his thoughts. So passed the eight days allowed them by the infidel. At length, on the eve of that fixed for their departure, a little before the solemn hour, when all the slaves that the alms of the faithful had been able to ransom were to be surrendered into the hands of the Redemptorists, the old man sought his young coadjutor.
"There are two hundred and twenty, dear brother," cried he, with a radiant look of triumph; "and we have ransomed them all!"
"All, father! oh! thank God and our Lady;" and the monk cast himself on his knees, and prayed silently; then rising, clasped the good old father in his arms, in an ecstasy of joy.
That night Father Antoine repeated the evening prayer, as usual, with the captives, but his voice trembled, while Father Sainte Foi could scarcely restrain his tears. All hearts beat hard, and every face was pale and anxious. In the midst of the solemn silence that followed the repetition of the last supplication to the throne of grace, the priest arose slowly, and cast upon the woe-begone crowd a look so pitiful and so loving, that consolation seemed to fall like heavenly dew upon even the most despondent.
"Brethren," said he, "dear brethren! dear children! this is the twelfth time that the honored title of Redemptorist has been conferred on me; sometimes it has been the cause of much pain and disappointment to me, sometimes too of great joy."
Here the slaves stretched their trembling hands toward him, but their lips uttered no sound.
"My children, my dear children! at this moment my heart overflows with joy!"
A cry, a terrible, unearthly cry escaped from every mouth, as, moved by one and the same impulse, the liberated slaves flung themselves on their knees.
"In the name of our omnipotent God and of the Mother of our Redeemer, the Blessed Lady of Mercy, I, an unworthy priest, and my companion here present, declare you to be all free! The alms of the faithful have been sufficient to ransom you all. All of you, Christian brethren, will see your native land again!"
Bursts of frantic joy, rapturous embraces again and again repeated, succeeded to the silent anguish with which they had awaited their doom. The venerable father endeavored to calm this exhausting excitement, and then left to go pay the Moors the sum stipulated. Father Sainte Foi remained behind to help remove the fetters whose iron verily entered into his soul.
"To-morrow!" he cried, as he knocked off the heavy chains, "to-morrow, we shall quit this land of slavery and death!"
"To-morrow!" echoed the pale victims, "to-morrow! Thanks, O Lord God! Thanks, O well-named Lady of Mercy! Thanks Redemptorist Fathers! We are going home to-morrow!"
"Retire now, dear brethren," said Father Antoine, returning, "the Moors are satisfied, and to-morrow at break of day we shall meet again!"
The now happy crowd left the chapel to seek repose in the dormitories of the hospital until the wished-for morning light, and the two monks prostrated themselves before the altar in humble, hearty thanksgiving.
At dawn, the next day, the ransomed slaves were already marshalled on the open space before the hospital gate, waiting the signal for embarking. Father Sainte Foi was in the midst of them, full of ardor and energy, and as impatient for the happy moment when they should quit the land of the infidel as the unfortunate men he had saved. Father Antoine was there also, but, more reserved in the expression of his joy, he could scarcely repress a smile as he remarked the excitement and triumph of his young companion.
"But I was also once young," said he, "nay, to-day I could almost fancy myself so again! And now, my son, see that all is ready, that no one is missing; it is time to begin our march to the ship."
At this moment a cry arose from the assembled Christians. "Slaves! more slaves! O God! they come too late—they have just arrived from the desert with their master—there are two of them—they are too late!"
"There are two of them," repeated Father Sainte Foi, and his cheek turned pale, "oh! if there had been but one!"
"Alas! they arrive too late," cried the good old priest, "our purse is empty. Go to them, my son. I cannot comfort them; promise them that next year—but oh! hide from them, if possible, the joy of the others!" Father Sainte Foi forced a passage through the assembled multitude, and found himself before the two unfortunate captives who had already learned their fate, and were bewailing it in heartrending accents. One, a man already past the prime of life, was wringing his hands and sobbing with a choking voice, "My children, my children, shall I then never see you again?" Overcome by his emotion he fell fainting to the ground; the father rushed to his assistance, but started back as he caught sight of his features. One moment, one single moment he hesitated, then cast himself on his knees by the side of the prostrate man, raised and supported the sinking head, and impressed a kiss on the pale brow. "Thus do I seal my pardon!" said he; "Sire of Valeri, you shall see your children again!"
The other slave whom he had not yet remarked, at this instant uttered a joyful cry, and threw himself into his arms, exclaiming, "Friend, brother, dear Raoul!"
"Aymar—Sire de Valeri—O Blessed Virgin!" stammered the monk, with a stifled voice as he fell back insensible.
"Help! help!" exclaimed Aymar, for it was indeed he, "I have killed my friend!"
The unconscious father was carried into the hospital chapel, Aymar supporting him in his arms, while tears of mingled joy and grief coursed down his thin cheeks. Father Antoine desired him to retire, but not until his friend gave signs of returning life would Aymar leave him, to await in silence at the other end of the chapel the effect of the aged monk's consolations and admonitions.
"Father Antoine," spoke the young priest at length, raising himself on the bench on which he had been laid, "you know the vow I made on the day of my profession? If gold I had none, to give my body for the ransom of Christian captives. That time is come, father, but I cannot choose between these two. One is—no, was my enemy, and the other is my dearest friend! O reverend father, I fear to fail in my duty toward God if I refuse to return good for evil, if I leave the Sire of Valeri in captivity. And yet—how can I prefer him to my dear Aymar?—to Aymar for whom I would gladly give my life! Venerable father, help me in this terrible struggle and choose for me!"
"Hold!" cried Aymar, coming forward; "there is no choice needful here! Can you believe, Raoul, that I will accept your sacrifice? What, you a slave in my place! I return again to France at the cost of your freedom! Raoul, Raoul, do you know me so little? If your noble heart prompts you to ransom the Sire of Valeri at such a cost, let it be so, but never will Aymar consent to it for himself!"
"Generous friend!" exclaimed the young monk, seizing his hand.
"Nay, Raoul, we have been brothers-in-arms, we will now be brothers-in-chains; it is but a change of harness!" The two friends threw themselves into each other's arms, and Father Antoine blessed them while he wept.
"I cannot prevent you from making this sacrifice, my son," said he, at length, "it is according to our holy rules; but if God grant me life, next spring will see me here again to deliver you both. And now go, tell the Sire of Valeri what your charity has inspired you to do for him."
"No, no, father; I must not see him again. He is too proud—I know him well—to receive a gift from the hands of Raoul de Montorgueil; he would rather die a slave than be delivered by me. Let him never learn, I entreat you, by what means he recovered his freedom."
"It is well, my brother; it shall be as you desire."
Father Antoine hastened to the beach, where he found the Sire of Valeri recovered from his swoon. Without further explanation the good father told him simply that he was free, and invited the Mussulman, his master, to accompany him back to the hospital, where Father Sainte Foi, with a calm, clear voice, proposed to the astonished unbeliever to take him, a strong, young man and he showed his muscular, nervous arm—in exchange for the broken-down and aged slave on the strand.
The avaricious master willingly accepted an offer so advantageous to himself, and Father Sainte Foi put on with a smile of ineffable happiness, the chains that had weighed so heavily on the once stalwart limbs of the enemy of his name and race. Father Antoine pressed his lips reverentially to those chains, and then seizing his cross, hastened to take his place at the head of the long line of ransomed Christians. But no chant of joy and triumph resounded as they bent their way toward the ship that was to bear them to their homes—they embarked silently, almost sadly—the sails spread, and the swift vessel was soon lost to sight.
The Moor took possession of his slaves. But we will pass over in silence their toils and their sufferings: his living faith sustained the Redemptorist father; hope was the life-spring of Aymar; their mutual friendship was the consolation of both. Aymar found his chains light to bear, since his friend was near him, and the monk feared that he had received his reward in this world, so sweet did their daily intercourse appear to him.
The young knight related to his younger brother-in-arms, how, on his return from du Guesclin's victorious expedition, the vessel in which he and the Sire of Valeri were embarked, had fallen into the hands of Moorish pirates, and how they had been sold together in the slave-market at Algiers. He loved, too, to recount to his sympathizing listener his feats of arms in Spain, until his friend, reproaching himself for giving ear to such worldly matters, would talk, in his turn, of heavenly things, of the peaceful joys and aspirations of his convent life, and would repeat the history of the Son of Man, who loved us so that he had willed to bear poverty, hunger, and death for us. When he told how he had not where to lay his head, "Oh! never more shall I complain," cried Aymar, "for mine rests on the bosom of a friend!"
Thus the long days of slavery passed over the two captives, and when at last the hour of deliverance arrived; when Father Antoine, true to his word, came with the first days of the next spring to unloose their chains, Aymar looked tenderly in his friend's face, while Father Sainte Foi endeavored to hide a tear.
"Can you believe that I will ever leave you again?" said Aymar, replying to his friend's thoughts. "No, death alone shall separate us henceforth! I will accompany you to your monastery. The world smiled on me, but gave me pain and slavery; Heaven has given me a true friend, and to Heaven I devote myself for ever!"
Then turning toward Father Antoine, "Father," said he, "receive me here, in the land of our cruel taskmasters, here, where we have suffered together, as a novice of the Order of Mercy!"
Father Antoine in answer threw his white mantle on the young knight's shoulders, and the two friends, hand in hand, climbed the side of the ship that was waiting to carry them back to France.
Here we will bid them farewell, in the full enjoyment of that perfect friendship; we will not seek to know if other vicissitudes came to try it; let us lose sight of them now, and believe, that, retired from the strife and noise of the world, they passed together the remainder of their quiet lives, busied in the acquirement of heavenly wisdom, and in the practice of those pure, simple, but sublime virtues which find in themselves their own reward and glory.
Can we doubt that Father Sainte Foi experienced that charity, like mercy, "is twice blessed,"
"It blesseth him that gives,
and him that takes"?
From The German Of Dr. J. B. Henry.
Joseph Görres.
A Life-portrait Of
The Author Of Die Mystik.
The bells of Coblenz were tolling the Angelus at noon on January 25th, 1776, the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, when John Joseph Görres was born, the son of a timber merchant, of an old Catholic family of the Rhineland. In this traditional land of valor, beauty, poetry, and art Görres spent his childhood. Here he made his first studies, devoting himself especially to history, geography, and the natural sciences, which had for him a peculiar attraction. This led him at the University of Bonn to choose medicine as a profession. But his studies were hardly begun than interrupted, so that Görres, who, later, had so many disciples himself, never sat for any length of time at the feet of a master.
The torrent of the French revolution broke over his home, and carried the youth along on its waves. At a period so exciting, when all order seemed to be destroyed, and when good and evil were so strongly marked, young Görres rose above his compeers, remarkable for his uncommon political talent, a powerful eloquence, and a determined, persevering character. Hardly twenty years old, he had already great weight in the clubs; and his influence became still more widely felt by the publication of a political paper called The Red Letter, which, suppressed by the republican directory, reappeared with the title of Puck in Blue; and a pamphlet called The Political Menagerie; all distinguished for their historical and philosophical depth of thought, as well as for a vigorous and glowing style.
At the age of twenty-four he was sent, at the head of a deputation, in November, 1799, to Paris, to obtain from the First Consul, in whom Görres already saw the future emperor and despot, the cessation of the oppressive occupation of the Rhine province. In a pamphlet entitled Result of my Embassy to Paris in Brumaire VIII., A.D. 1800, he gave a full account of his mission; but expressed a complete change in his political opinions, after he had clearly perceived the abyss in which the French revolution ended; and he never after this returned to the errors of his youth.
When, at a later date, Görres stood forth as the champion of the rights and freedom of the Catholic Church, his enemies reproached him with having proved a traitor to the cause of liberty, which he had defended in his youth, and tried to represent him sometimes as a revolutionist, and then again as a man of weak, inconsequent, and vacillating character. He was thus severely blamed for an enthusiastic aberration of youth, into which not only Schiller but even the grave and aged Klopstock, as well as many other distinguished Germans of the time, had fallen.
It was a time of such confusion that even the foundations of the earth quaked and the stars from heaven fell. The glorious edifice of the German empire, encircled with the halo of a thousand years of glory, had crumbled in a day; the emperor became a mere shadow; and the nobility, corrupted by despotism, became as immoral as in the days of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. Religious life was torpid; and religious indifference, through the influence of both the French and German press, through liberalism and the aid of the illuminati, had gained the mastery over not only the Protestant but the Catholic mind. Even an Emperor, Joseph II., had placed himself at the head of the most shallow liberals; the principal churchmen sought even to surpass him; in short, so great was the decay and blindness of those who should have been the mainstay of the old Christian order, that God could choose no gentler means of chastising the universal iniquity, than by letting the fires of the mad revolution have full scope. How can we be astonished, therefore, that a youth like Görres should have been carried away with the spirit of the age? But even then he displayed that straightforwardness and purity of character which always distinguished him. In the latter half of his revolutionary life, he had only sought to serve the welfare of the Rhine province, by his struggle against the oppressions of the French generals and officials who persecuted him as well as his country.
But Görres was certainly not blamed most for having doffed his bonnet to the spirit of the revolution; but because, as Paul was changed from a jealous Pharisee into an apostle, the young Jacobin became the great defender of the church and Christian ideas.
Görres gave up politics in the beginning of his twenty-fifth year, and devoted himself exclusively to science and art for a period of ten years. He occupied the chair of natural history and science, in a college at Coblenz, and published during this time many works, the product of his restless activity. Then came to light his Aphorisms on Art, (A.D. 1802;) Aphorisms on Organic Laws, (1803;) Exposition of Physiology, (1805;) Aphorisms on Organology, (1805;) and his book on Faith and Science, (1806;) writings composed under the influence of the Schelling natural philosophy. Görres had not yet reached a full and clear knowledge of Christian truth. In the year 1806 he went on vacation to Heidelberg, where he gave lectures on natural philosophy, metaphysics, and literature in the university. Here he was also led more deeply into a study that exercised great influence on his later development. He studied the Christian middle age of Germany from an aesthetic and poetic point of view. He was led in this direction by his personal acquaintance and friendship with two men, Clement Brentano and Achim von Arnim, who have deserved highly of their country for having awakened the muse of German romantic poetry from her slumbers.
The reformation separated one half of Germany from the past; and the rationalism of the eighteenth century completed the separation. The German people were accustomed to despise, as a period of darkness and barbarism, the most glorious age in their history, when they were the first nation of the earth; when Albert the Great taught divine philosophy, Wolfram of Eschenbach wrote poetry, and Ervinius of Steinbach built cathedrals. This entire schism of German consciousness from the past had much to do in causing that deplorable decay of national feeling and unity. The corruption had reached its height in the eighteenth century, and Germany became the spoil and the contempt of the foreigner. In order that fatherland should be politically free, the German conscience must be aroused. Nothing could have more power, in this respect, than the revival of the hitherto despised Christian-German middle age and its glorious ballad poetry. For this purpose the Pilgrim, a journal, was started by Arnim, Brentano, and Görres. The undertaking failed for the want of cooperation; but produced fruit at a later period. Görres was more successful in obtaining his purpose in the year 1807 by his German Books for the People, in which he held up to the eyes of his contemporaries the mirror of the middle ages.
Plunging his mind more and more deeply into the Christian middle age, his comprehensive intellect turned its attention to another domain of history, namely, to the primeval times of the East. After his return to Coblenz, in 1808, appeared in two volumes, his Mythology of the Asiatic World, a work of great importance, which influenced considerably the ideas of both Creuzer and Schelling. At the same time he explained northern mythology, as contained in the Edda; cultivated the German mediaeval muse, and enriched the literature of the Nibelung Song, by hitherto undiscovered fragments.
While Görres was thus engaged, a great change had taken place in France. The absolutism and godlessness of the revolution naturally begot the unlimited despotism of Napoleon. His was not the tyranny of mere brute force, as in the barbaric times, but a despotism engendered by modern civilization and enlightened egotism. Napoleon made all the forces of the revolution subserve his will, and with them conquered all the degenerate nations of Europe; for the corruption and infidelity of the age of Louis XIV. and Louis XV., which caused the revolution, were more or less extended and felt in the neighboring nations in the eighteenth century. Hence, France was to be punished, first by her own hands, and, through her, the other peoples were to be chastised.
Since Christianity had destroyed the universal monarchy of Rome, God had never allowed another to arise and destroy the autonomy of nations, and with it the independence of the church; for both are inseparable. What was the empire Napoleon tried to found but the same work which the Hohenstaufens failed in accomplishing; what was it else but an attempt to revive the old Roman pagan sovereignty of the world? His work seemed completed; the outside power of all the states of the continent seemed broken; within, minds were enslaved, and, under the appearance of liberal forms, freedom was destroyed; the sciences, the whole instruction of youth moulded, on military principles, to aid the imperial power; religion even became the handmaid of worldly majesty, and a mere affair of policy; the pope himself, the last refuge of religious liberty, was in chains, for refusing to become the court chaplain of the new Caesar.
Thus stood matters, when the spirit of God, breathing over the earth, destroyed the enchanter who had chained victory to his car of triumph, and awaked the nations from the slumber of death. That was a grand period in history, when the nations arose, and above all Germany—Germany that had been the most enslaved and dishonored, because she had betrayed, disgraced, and sold herself. Peoples broke their gyves on the head of the conqueror. The man who, at this time above all his contemporaries, felt the chains of slavery in his very soul, and in whose heart the flames of patriotism burned most brightly; whose genius made him the spokesman, herald, and prophet of liberty against French despotism, was Joseph Görres. In the year 1814 he left his retirement, and, conscious of his vocation by the spirit that quickened him, he spoke out for all in the name of God and fatherland. He edited the Mercury of the Rhine, a journal which has never been equalled since. As Menzel observes, he wrote it, not with ink, but with fire; and in a short time this newspaper, full of Görres' best essays, became universally received as the vehicle of public opinion. Napoleon himself felt the influence of this powerful journal, and called the man at Coblenz the fifth of the allied powers against him. It was in the Mercury of the Rhine that Görres wrote the "Proclamation to the Peoples of Europe," which he puts into the mouth of Napoleon after the escape from Elba. In this proclamation the character of the great soldier is personified with a creative power hardly surpassed by any production of Shakespeare's genius. [Footnote 50]
[Footnote 50: At the end of this fictitious proclamation Napoleon is made to express himself thus: "I have conquered the revolution, and then devoured and assimilated it to myself, and worked through it and by its forces. But now, tired out, I give it back to you uninjured, and spew it out upon you. And you will continue in the condition in which I found you; for my spirit rests upon you, though my body may be absent." After a period of fifty-three years these words seem still prophetic.]
It was not enough, then, to crush the Napoleonic tyranny; but it was also necessary to renovate the European states, especially Germany, with an infusion of Christian and national principles; and thus connect, in an enduring relation, the rights of princes and the nobility with the liberties of the people. It was then the conviction of many, and of the best men, that the unity, the freedom, and the greatness of Germany could be placed on a solid foundation only by a reinstallment of the old empire, under which Germany had existed and flourished for a thousand years. Of this conviction Görres wrote in the year 1819: "A glance at the history of the past shows us that Germany was the true guardian and refuge of Christianity, and a bulwark against internal and external enemies, only when its stirring, living variety was made unity under the direction of a sole emperor. It therefore becomes almost an instinct with many, that the stone which the builders rejected should become the head of the corner; that the old ideas should be revived, quickened with an infusion of young blood, and accommodated to the march of progress." Some of the ablest men agreed with Görres in favor of a revival of the old Roman empire, modified according to modern notions.
This was the ideal for the realization of which Görres strove with all the power of his genius and eloquence; while at the same time he attacked with vigor the egotism and meanness of selfish politics wherever he met them. On this account, as the most independent and yet the most conservative publicist of his time, he came into collision with both statesmen and governments. Hence the Mercury of the Rhine was suppressed; but Görres, in a pamphlet called the Future Condition of Germany, still argued for the reestablishment of the old empire. In 1817, during the famine, he went from Heidelberg to his own home, where he became president of a relief society, and thus was a benefactor of the Rhine province. At the same time he found leisure to publish Old German Ballads and Classic Poetry. Appointed director of public instruction by Justus Grüner, governor of the middle countries of the Rhine, he was soon removed from his position by the Prussian government and offered a large pension if he would agree to write nothing hostile to the existing order. But money and personal interest never had the slightest influence over Görres. By an address to the city and province of Coblenz; and more especially by a pamphlet published in 1820, on Germany and the Revolution, he drew on himself the hatred of the prime minister Hardenberg, escaped imprisonment in a fortress only by flight, and not being able to succeed in obtaining a trial by the ordinary civil judges, he never more returned to his birthplace.
He spent almost a year in Strasburg, where he occupied his leisure, hours in translating from the Persian the epic poem of Shah Nameh of Ferdusi. It is called The Heroes of Ivan; and was published in two volumes in 1820. From Strasburg he went to Switzerland which he travelled on foot; and from the Alpine summits he studied and looked down upon the past and present of Europe, and saw with a prophet's eye the history of its future. He wrote in twenty-seven days the fruits of his meditations on European society, and printed them under the title of Europe and the Revolution. This was in 1821. Finding that all efforts to have the decree against him revoked by Hardenberg were vain, he wrote in 1822 his work on The Condition and Affairs of the Rhine Province; and gave a full account of his thoughts, hopes, and resignation in another work written on the eve of the Congress of Verona in 1822, entitled The Holy Alliance and the People in the Congress of Verona. After this he resided in Strasburg.
It cannot be denied that Görres had been carried away in his youth by the spirit of the French revolution; and that his faith, if not entirely destroyed, was then of a very uncertain and slippery character. Still, we never find in him that poisonous hate and contempt for religion and the church, which the spirit of sect is apt to infuse into its votaries, and which renders their minds almost impervious to truth. He was also saved by God from moral corruption. We even perceive in his early writings traces of that deep religious feeling which he had imbibed with his mother's milk, and of love for the religion of his race and fathers. In the Mercury of the Rhine he often raised his voice in defence of the rights and interests of the abused Catholic Church. When he began to study more closely the dogmas and history of Christianity, he learned to appreciate it better, and grew less confident in the reigning German philosophy, which had captivated his youth. It was not the triumph of his system, but of truth that he sought with all the love of his heart, and the force and clearness of his penetrating genius. When he found truth, no one could be a more ardent and able champion of it. There was no half-way in his character. He trampled on human respect. Undoubtedly it was at Strasburg that he became thoroughly catholicized. Maria Görres, the heiress of her father's talents, thus beautifully and appropriately writes of his religious life: "As in the legend of St. Christopher, he would obey only the strongest; so can it be truly said of my father that he was the slave of truth and of truth alone. With great rectitude of heart he strove ever to attain it, and came nearer to it as he increased in years; new prospects of it, and new insights into it, developing gradually before his mind's eye. Principles were not for him the limits of science, but secure foundations on which he could build further without fear or deceit. He never wanted to systematize truth; but rather to make systems subservient to it. Hence he never thought that his own discoveries were absolute truths, or that dogmas were erroneous because they did not chime with the result of his investigations; but sought the fault in his own work, renewed his arduous studies until he found them agreeing with the received doctrines, and thus discovered where his error lay." [Footnote 51]
[Footnote 51: Görres, Politische Schriften, Bd. i. p. 9 of the Preface.]
When Görres acknowledged the Catholic Church to be the church of the living God, it was in a state of slavery and abasement in Germany; where it was the object of a hateful and shallow persecution fomented by Vossius, especially since the conversion of Count Frederic Leopold Stolberg, and since the celebration of the Reformation Jubilee in 1817.
In the year 1820, two young professors in the episcopal seminary at Mayence, urged by an earnest faith and supernatural courage, started The Catholic, a magazine intended to defend the almost defenceless church from external attacks and internal dangers which were threatened by the introduction of false science into the Catholic mind. To escape the illiberal opposition and censure of Prussia, The Catholic was published for some time at Strasburg, where Görres, then in exile, wrote much for it in the year 1826. With his invincible humor and sarcasm he lashed the authors of the stories told about the formulas of excommunication in the church, exploded the Monita Secreta of the Jesuits, and scourged the contemptible prejudices and falsehoods brought to bear against catholicity. He raised the cry of freedom for the church; showed her influence on the hearts of the people; portrayed in striking colors the internal truth and moral rectitude of Catholic principles, and taught Catholics to respect themselves, to trust in their cause, to despise the hollow phrases of the sham liberals, and fight their adversaries with that security which truth alone can give to its champions.
In the mean time a favorable change took place in his external relations. King Louis of Bavaria, a prince of great talents, devoted to the church and fatherland, appointed Görres professor of history in the University of Munich, A.D. 1827. Here he became the centre of that group of distinguished Catholic thinkers whom the king had gathered together, in order to create a powerful and free development of the hitherto debased and despised spirit of Catholicism. The efforts of Görres and his friends and colaborers in Munich form a brilliant epoch in the history of the revival of catholic life in Germany. It was for him the glorious evening of an eventful life of battle.
The patriotic hopes and ideas of his early life were more and more baffled, and he at last saw that any mere political efforts are fruitless; for the decay of peoples and states is not caused so much by political degradation, as by religious and moral corruption. The more he dived into the history of mankind, the more clearly did he perceive that Christianity, which brings redemption to the individual and true freedom to the children of God, is the only source of a people's salvation. When living Christian faith becomes a stranger in the public and private life of citizens; when self-interest and worldly wisdom take the place of Christian charity and justice, then will the interest of the ruler and the subject, of the church and state, of private wealth and corporations, which should all conspire to the common weal, collide, become hostile, and engender confusion and revolution. Görres learned by experience that, since religion had lost its authority, and the Gospel ceased to command respect, the civil power had also lost force, and the liberty of the people had become unstable and undefined, so that Europe wavered with feverish restlessness between despotism and anarchy, revolution and reaction. Men in this doubtful conflict b the egotism of princes and the egotism of subjects, become wrapped up in the natural and earthly, and supernatural.
Investigating the causes of this decline of Christianity, Görres discovered that the faith of Christ is not a dead letter, but a thing endowed with divine life; and as political and social life has stability and force only in the state, so Christian life is only in the church, the kingdom founded by Christ; and as a sound social system depends on the autonomy and freedom of the state, so religious life rests on the liberty of the church. Hence the chief cause of the decay of religion is in the dependence and subjection of the church to the state. The eighteenth century, that age of tyranny and unbelief, had enslaved the church; the revolution and Napoleon made the slavery complete. True, the animus of the war of freedom was a religious as well as a national one; the Holy Alliance, formed in the name of the Trinity, proclaimed Christianity as the groundwork of politics and popular rights; but this religious enthusiasm of 1813 and 1814, not resting on the solid basis of faith, being rather a vague feeling than a conviction, soon cooled off, and the Christian principles of the Holy Alliance were only written on paper, not on the hearts and minds of the high contracting parties. In reality, religion and church remained in the oppressed and debased condition in which Josephism and Napoleonism had placed them. Educated the school of the 18th century, and under Napoleonic influence, statesmen, even after the restoration, continued to mistrust the church, to keep her in the leading-strings of high policy, and repress every one of her free motions. To cap the climax of evil, the church herself, especially in Germany, was so poor and powerless, that she could make no valid opposition to the insulting guardianship of the state; and even churchmen were found weak and selfish enough to become the willing tools of the civil government in destroying their own rights. The curse and plague of the church has ever been cowardly or renegade churchmen. This enslavement of the church was most oppressive and dangerous in those districts of Germany which had been governed by catholic, and, as long as the empire lasted, by spiritual lords, but were now controlled by Protestant rulers. These, accustomed to Protestant teaching, which admitted an unlimited civil surveillance in ecclesiastical affairs, were only too willing to exercise their power over the Catholic Church. They wished and hoped to sever her connection with Rome; change her into a national church, and, uniting her with Lutherans and other sectaries, form one state church. Such a thought will not appear strange to us, if we consider that religious indifference reigned supreme, particularly among the educated classes. A fierce battle, not with the material sword, but with the weapons of faith and talent, was to be fought in order to free the church from the shackles of state control. The standard-bearer in this great conflict was, again, Joseph Görres.
The 11th of November, 1837, marks the turning-point of the career of the modern church in Germany. From that date it revived and began to be independent. To Clement Augustus von Dröste-Vischering, the great and pious Archbishop of Cologne, belongs the glory of opening the battle, and of bearing the first brunt of the onslaughts of the state. The civil government wished him, in contradiction to the laws of the church, to impart her blessing to mixed marriages; and also to give over the chairs of theology and the education of the young clergy to the Hermesians, whose coryphaeus, Hermes, had invented a half-way system between faith and rationalism. Clement Augustus, the Athanasius of our times, unarmed and alone, bravely entered the lists against the spirit of indifferentism and the whole power of the Prussian government. But Gregory XVI., in his memorable allocution of December 10th, 1837, made the cause of the archbishop his own; for it was the cause of religion, and the church. The Catholics of the Rhine province, awakened from their slumbers, rallied with unexpected ardor to the support of their chief pastor. But their cause needed the aid of the press, and Görres was the man to wield that power in their defence. He who had been standing so long on the watch-tower, observing and noting the signs of the times, saw that the moment had arrived to strike a blow for the liberty of the church. In January, 1838, appeared his Athanasius. It fell like a thunderbolt from an unclouded sky among all those who had expected, with the power of the state and an enlightened press, to make short work of the mediaeval archbishop. It came like a ray of divine light into the minds of the despised and intimidated Catholics, a ray that shone in their hearts, and enkindled in them faith and courage. There now arose in Germany a powerful catholic public opinion, which enforced respect from its adversaries. In vain did opponents swarm. Pietists, Hegelians, politicians, jurists, professors, and journalists wrote against Athanasius, which was spread over all Germany by four large editions. Görres answered the critics of Athanasius by another work, called Die Triarier, printed in 1838, and which achieved the spiritual victory of his first book.
The further history of this cause is known. The innocence of the archbishop and the right of the church were acknowledged; and the noble ruler, who then sat on the Prussian throne, confessed the justice of the principles which Görres had so ably explained and defended. The battle between Protestantism and Catholicity for the future should be on even footing; carried on no longer by force or cunning, but by spiritual weapons alone. This is all that truth requires to disarm her enemies—a fair field and no treachery. At the same time with the Athanasius of Görres, catholic public opinion found a vehicle in the Historisch-politische Blätter, edited at Munich. Görres was its chief of staff. His last article in this magazine, which exercised the greatest influence throughout Germany, and which still flourishes, appeared in the January number of 1848, shortly before his death.
Freedom of the church is the condition of its beneficent and working life, but not the life itself. Faith is the basis of religious and church life; faith in the supernatural ideas and facts of revelation, whose centre is Christ, the incarnate Son of God and Redeemer of the world. This faith seemed to have disappeared with the freedom of the church. Protestantism, which began by denying the church, logically ended with a denial of the existence of Christ. Strauss wrote his Life of Jesus with this intention. Even among the Catholics, indifferentism, rationalism, and infidelity had made ravages, and men asked, Where was the faith of the Catholic populations? A striking answer to this question was the Pilgrimage to Trier; the extraordinary spectacle of over a million of free men attesting their living belief in Christ the Son of God; a proof that the Catholic people despised sham liberalism and sham enlightenment, set revolutions at defiance, and professed the same faith as in the days of their fathers. This was the meaning of that remarkable event, which Görres explains in his last published pamphlet, called the Pilgrimage to Trier.
Görres now ceased to be a publicist. He had written countless works; he had aided truth with word and work. No one had done more. No one had seen so clearly into the future. He had attacked selfishness in high and low. His enemies were countless. No man received so much abuse as he; no one was the object of greater hate and more fierce persecution. Yet you will seek in vain for one word of invective against his adversaries in any of his works. His blood boils; his words rush; his lips quiver; his pen runs nervously along the paper; his sentences glow and thrill in defence of truth; but he is never abusive or personal. He chastises wickedness, carves iniquity with the knife of satire, and scourges folly by his wit; but in the midst of the battle he has ever a friendly hand to stretch out to his opponent. Would that all our modern journalists might take a lesson from him in this respect!
Viewing things from the standpoint of divine providence, and having no desire but that of seeing the divine plans realized, he was always tranquil in the midst of storms and confusion. His writings as a publicist are consequently not merely ephemeral, or of passing importance but contain the most profound views on the relations of church and state, on the dogmas of religion, the principles of philosophy, politics, and history.
But the influence of Görres was not confined to mere journalism; he studied and developed science and art. Görres possessed immense knowledge; yet little of it was school learning. He had aided to free his fatherland and the church; he also helped to free science and art from their shackles. The learned almost despised the supernatural. The lives of the saints were looked on as so many myths; their miracles absurd; and everything that was not rational or natural was considered as the result of superstition and ignorance. In order to counteract this tendency of the age, and bring out boldly the belief in the supernatural, Görres wrote in 1826, his St. Francis, a Troubadour; in 1827, Emmanuel Swedenborg, his Visions, and Relation to the Church; an introduction to Diepenbrock's edition of the works of Blessed Henry Suso; and in 1842, his greatest work, in five volumes, entitled Christian Mysticism.
The foundation and source of all mystic theology is the incarnation of God, the union of the divine with the human, in order that the latter should be united with the divine. But what took place in Christ is not merely a passing event, but a living, enduring act of God; who continues the incarnation in the most holy sacrament of the altar, the mystery of mysteries; through which the wonderful life and works of Christ, according to his promise, are continued in the saints of his church. Hence come the supernatural phenomena of visions and ecstasies in the corporal and spiritual life of the saints.
Görres sought to give not a bare, dry history of those marvels, but to explain and prove them scientifically. But, as to the kingdom of the good, of grace, and of the celestial, there is opposed a kingdom of evil, which is controlled by the fallen angels; Görres has also endeavored in his Mystik to render intelligible this night-side of the supernatural.
"As the eyes of the Spaniards," he writes in the beginning of this wonderful book, "on crossing the ocean, whose dangers, unconquered for so many centuries, they had braved and escaped, were struck with admiration and astonishment at the spectacle of a new world, whose chains of mountains, mighty lakes, and rivers murmuring with strange voices, primeval forests, unaccustomed flowers, birds, beasts, and another race of men speaking a hitherto unheard language, greeted their arrival; so will it happen to the majority of those who cast a glance over the marvellous world, which is here exposed to their vision; and whose existence and comprehensibility have been unknown to them by their own fault, and through the neglect and calumny of others; just as the Atlantis of the ancients had been well-nigh forgotten through the inattention of mankind. I call it a world of marvels, and, as no one will contradict this assertion, I further ask, When has a book appeared in these later days, which, leaving higher considerations aside, has, in the interests of science alone, sought to explain such a variety of the most remarkable and important events; facts, acts, and experiences which give us an insight into the interior recesses of the soul; which lay open its most hidden nature, and throw the greatest light on metaphysiology and metapsychology? These materials have lain scattered about publicly, yet no one has thought it worth while to stoop down and collect them. In vain has the rich harvest presented its nodding ears, no one would take the trouble to apply the sickle. For the learned put their heads together and decided that the miraculous phenomena were all false, mere jugglery, or the hallucinations of superstitious imaginations; and that it would be ridiculous and contemptible in any one even to give them a thought."
Another remarkable writing of Görres is his introduction to the Life of Christ, composed against Strauss by Sepp. His historical works while occupying the chair of professor of history were few. In 1830, appeared his Basis, Connection, and Chronology of the History of the World; in 1844, he printed The Sons of Japhet and their Common Origin in Armenia, in which he tried to clear up the difficulties of the Mosaic account of the races of men; and in 1845, came forth from the press, The Three Roots of the Celtic Race in Gaul, and their Immigrations. He had conceived the idea of composing a universal history; but he never accomplished this intention.
Wolfgang Menzel, one of the ablest of German critics, in his History of Literature, p. 157, thus ably judges the character of Görres as a writer: "I know not what better expresses the character of his mind than to compare it to the Strasburg Minster or the Cathedral of Cologne. It is said that Winckelmann was an interior artist, and Tieck an internal tragedian; so Görres may be called an interior architect. At least all his writings, by their logical design and their gorgeous ornaments of imagination, remind us of the art of Ervinius. In all his works of natural philosophy, of mythology, politics, and history, we perceive the deep feeling and reverie of the Gothic mason. Görres's works are to be aesthetically regarded as churches wonderfully planned, thoroughly executed from deep foundations to spire-top; rich and finished masterpieces; but entirely distinct and different from other creations of the human mind by their Christian, holy, and ecclesiastical character. Hence arises their unpopularity in our time. Those who are able to understand and love art, as a rule, admire only the superficial, and are incapable of fathoming the depth of a work of Görres, and comprehending, in all its grandeur and vastness, his spiritual architecture. Even persons who have genius enough to think deeply are inspired by too profane a spirit to contemplate properly and feel the force of Görres' writings, which the incense of the holy of holies is ever wreathing with its delicious aroma. The literati, therefore, call him bombastic; and the philosophists say he is mystical; and thus one of the richest and deepest intellects of the nation remains a stranger to them, if not actually an object of their contempt." Thus Menzel.
The last observation is not, however, entirely true. As Catholic Germany awakes from its lethargy, and rises gradually higher over the materialism and frivolity of the present, bringing with it again into notice the lofty and eternal ideas of religion and history, recalling the glories of its artistic days, attested by its grand monasteries and cathedrals, the fame of Görres will grow, his merits be disclosed, his mind and services be better appreciated. Men will say of him in the future what he himself has written of the architect of the Cathedral of Cologne in his little book on The Cathedral of Cologne and the Minster of Strasburg: "The Cathedral of Cologne is the work of one of the greatest minds that ever left a trace of its power on earth. The dizzy height of the building, which we cannot contemplate without awe, gives us an idea of the profundity of the genius that planned it. In the conceiver of such a work were harmoniously blended the most singular and exceptional mental faculties. A creative imagination, productive as nature, which takes pleasure in the generation of manifold forms of being; power of intellect, which penetrates the very essence of things, and comprehends the whole ideal realm without effort; a clearness of apprehension, which, like a flash, lays bare the darkest objects; a reason which grasps the relation of things with perspicuity; arranging with ease their synthetic and analytic connections; finally, a deep feeling and sentiment of the beautiful, of the most pure and exalted character; all united to make their possessor capable for his undertaking. Besides, had he succeeded in completing it, he must have possessed a persevering will, a most extensive technical knowledge of the arts and trades; and an amount of practical knowledge which alone would make him an extraordinary genius." Görres, in thus describing the architect of the Cologne Cathedral, leaves us his own portrait.
The private life of Görres was free from blame; and in this regard he is a model among so many distinguished men, who are not always free from reproach in their domestic relations. Even his youth was marked by no follies. His domestic life was pure, and he brought up his children not only with a high intellectual training, but also in the fear of God and in the principles of Christian morality.
His house was the picture of a German farmer's. It was open to every good man, and closed only to the wicked and false. Its master was pleasant, jovial, and fond of gayety and innocent amusement. Görres was not a mere theoretical Catholic; but a true son of the church in his practical conduct, full of piety and Christian charity. He was generous to the poor and needy. He feared God, loved the church, and obeyed the pope. He was edifying at divine service, assisted daily at the holy sacrifice, and received holy communion frequently.
He was a short, thick-set man, able to bear labor and fatigue. Always healthy, he had hardly ever spent a day in bed. He had a broad brow and brilliant eyes. His hair was auburn, streaked with grey in his old age, hanging loosely about his head, so that Clement Brentano compared his appearance to that of an old lion shaking and pulling his mane caught in the bars of his cage.
Görres died as he had lived, well, pious, and happy. It is a remarkable fact, that great men have at last often to undergo great trials. Moses died before entering the promised land; Peter and Paul, in the midst of a fierce persecution excited against the young church they had founded; St. Augustine, while African Christianity was being destroyed by the Vandals; Gregory VII., dying, exclaimed, "I have loved justice and hated iniquity, therefore do I die in exile." In our time, O'Connell saw his beloved island a prey to famine, while he breathed his last far away from her. Görres, too, saw all that he had contended for well-nigh ruined, and the labor of years appeared to be in vain. Eight days before his death, he took to his bed, and received the blessed Eucharist. On January 25th, 1848, his children and friends celebrated his seventy-second birthday. He received holy communion again two days before his departure, which took place on January 29th, at half-past six in the morning, whilst his children and friends knelt at his bedside repeating the Litany for the dying; and while his friend and pupil, Professor Haneberg, was saying Mass for him. A letter, written just after his death by an eye-witness, contains this passage: "The corpse was beautiful. It became like alabaster. The head, face, and broad brow were calm, clear, and peaceful, as if freed from the cares of this life, and awaiting the resurrection of the just." Thus died, uttering holy sentiments, one of the greatest intellects of this or any other age.
An extraordinary remark of Görres, just before his death, is preserved. His mind wandered among the scenes of his former studies, and, recalling the dead nations of history, he said, "Let us pray for the peoples that are no more!"
Görres has been frequently called the O'Connell of Catholic Germany. There is some truth in the parallel. It is true he could not address a hundred thousand of his countrymen from the rostrum; yet his Mercury of the Rhine and his Athanasius could effect as much as his living voice. He was not, like O'Connell, the recognized leader of his people; yet all good men regarded him as their master; and all who had witnessed his patriotism in 1814, and his faith in 1837, trusted him as Ireland did her O'Connell. O'Connell's work was indeed more rapid and exciting in the present; but more efficacious in the future was what Görres had done, and more fruitful the seed which he planted. Görres had not to free the Catholics of Germany from a yoke, such as England had put over the neck of her sister isle; still he was a real liberator, a liberator of Germans from foreign manners; for every nation is ordained of God, and it is a shame and a disgrace, by aping foreign manners, to deny the fatherland to which we belong by speech and nativity; a liberator of the church from state tutelage, which injured the civil as well as the ecclesiastical power; a liberator of the sciences from the shackles of rationalism and infidelity; a liberator of the catholic spirit and of catholic self-consciousness from the slumber of indifferentism and the chains of the spirit of the age; an agitator and excitator was he in the cause of truth and virtue; he dragged Catholic Germany out of the miry dungeon of pusillanimity, taught her self-respect, and made the blood, which had been stagnant, flow again in her veins. As O'Connell loved his country, his church, and liberty, so did Görres; especially that true liberty which is as distinct from the false as God is from idols. May Germany and the church never want geniuses like Görres in their need; and may God send a shower of such men to our own United States!