The Catholic Church And The Bible.
Does the Catholic Church condemn the Bible and forbid her people to circulate and read it?
We answer: NO! On the contrary, the Catholic Church believes the Bible to be the inspired word of God himself, and constantly incites her people to its diligent perusal. In testimony of which, we offer: first, her official declarations; and second, her unvarying practice.
First, her official declarations.
The holy Council of Trent, which closed its sessions in the year 1564, and whose canons and decrees are the voice of the universal church, binding upon every Catholic under pain of sin, distinctly says:
"The Holy OEcumenical and General Council of Trent, ... following the example of the orthodox fathers, does with due veneration and piety receive all the books of the Old and the New Testament, of both which God himself is the immediate author. ... And, lest any doubt should exist as to what books this council has thus received, a catalogue of the same is annexed to this decree. (Here follows a list of the sacred books, as found in. English Catholic Bibles.) Now, if any one shall refuse to receive these books entire, with all their parts, according as they are accustomed to be read in the Catholic Church and are contained in the ancient Latin Vulgate edition, as sacred and canonical, ... let him be anathema." [Footnote 194]
[Footnote 194: Can. et Dec. Conc. Trid. Sess. iv.]
Again, the Pope, who, as the head and mouth-piece of the Catholic Church, administers its discipline and issues orders to which every Catholic, under pain of sin, must yield obedience, has positively declared, "that the faithful should be excited to the reading of the Holy Scriptures: for these are the most abundant sources which ought to be left open to every one, to draw from them purity of morals and of doctrine;" which declaration may be found in the preface to the English Catholic Bibles now in use.
Second, her unvarying practice.
The Catholic Church, from the beginning, has provided effectual means, not only for the distribution of the Bible among her people, but also for their knowledge of the truths which it contains. One of her holy orders is that of Reader, "whose duty," as her catechism says, "is to read the Sacred Scriptures to the people in a clear and distinct voice, and to instruct them in the rudiments of faith." [Footnote 195]
[Footnote 195: Catechism. Cone. Trid. pars. ii. De Ordin.]
Again, from the beginning, it has been made the daily duty of her priests and religious persons to recite "the divine office," which consists of psalms, of readings from the Bible, and of prayers. The new revision of this office made by Gregory VII., in which its different parts were first collected into one volume, became known as the "Breviary," and is still so called. From this was translated and compiled, in great part, the "Daily Morning and Evening Prayer" of the Protestant Episcopal Church, the epistles, gospels, lessons, and psalms of which, thus borrowed, present, as is well known, so large a portion of the Holy Scriptures. Indeed, the Breviary is but the Bible, in a form adapted to devotional uses, and illustrated with pious meditations and devout prayers. Before us lies a copy, published in the year 1632, during the Huguenotic wars and persecutions. It bears the official order of the great Richelieu; and, as we turn over its leaves, we find that a large part of the whole Bible is embraced within its pages, and we perceive that as long as this book can be found in the hands of all her clergy, and is accessible to every one who seeks it, so long, within the borders of the Catholic Church at least, the Holy Scriptures will be widely circulated and intimately known.
Again, in every age, the most eminent and pious of the pastors and scholars of the Catholic Church have devoted their lives to the study and explanation of the Bible. The sermons of the first eight centuries were principally oral commentaries on the sacred text. The great libraries of valuable Christian works, which have come down to us from the primitive church, are made up of volumes directly based on Holy Scripture. Their writers are well known as men of great intellect, of unwearied zeal, of deep and humble piety. Look at this list of some of them: In the second century, Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen; in the third century, Pierius, Pamphilus, Hesychius, and Eusebius; in the fourth century, Hilary, Ambrose, Jerome, Augustin, Chrysostom, and Ephrem; in the fifth century, Cyril, Theodoret, and Isidore of Pelusium; in the sixth century, Gregory the Great, Cassiodorus, Procopius, and Primasius; in the seventh century, Maximus, Isidore of Seville, Julian of Toledo, and John Damascene; in the eighth century, Venerable Bede, Alcuin, and Rabanus Maurus; in the ninth century, Christian Druthmar, Walafridus Strabo, Remigius of Auxerre, and Sedulius; in the tenth century, OEcumenius and Olympiodorus; in the eleventh century, Nicetas, Lanfranc, and Theophylact; in the twelfth century, Euthymius, Anselm, and Rupert; in the thirteenth century, the great Thomas Aquinas and Hugo de Sancto Caro; in the fourteenth century, Nicholas de Lyra, Paul of Burgos, and Gerson; in the fifteenth century, Laurentius Valla, Tostatus, Denis the Carthusian, Marsilius, and Le Fèvre: in the sixteenth century, Cornelius à Lapide, Maldonatus, and Jansen of Ghent; in the seventeenth century, Natalis Alexander and John Baptist du Hamel; in the eighteenth century, the learned Calmet, of whose work the famous Dr. Adam Clarke has written: "This is, without exception, the best comment on the sacred writings ever published, either by Catholics or Protestants." [Footnote 196]
[Footnote 196: Horne's Introduction. Vol. ii. part. iii. chap. V. sec. iii. § 3, Am. ed. 1836.]
Certainly, no age, illuminated with such lights as these, deserves to be called "dark;" no people, taught by such teachers, could ever have been ignorant. And when we remember that, as an eminent Protestant clergyman has said, "the writings of the dark ages are made of the Scriptures;" not merely, "that the writers constantly quoted the Scriptures, and appealed to them as authority on all occasions, but that they thought and spoke and wrote the thoughts and words and phrases of the Bible, and that they did this constantly as the natural mode of expressing themselves," (The Dark Ages. By Rev, S. R. Maidand, D.D. London, 1853;) and remember, further, that this could not be so, unless the people who wrote and those who read alike had free access to Holy Scripture both possessing the books and being permitted to circulate and use them, we shall be far enough from believing that in the Catholic Church the Bible has ever been "a hidden book," or that the doors of its rich treasure-house were ever closed to men.
Again, the efforts of the Catholic Church to preserve and perpetuate the Bible have been unceasing. As early as the fourth century, by the direction of Pope Damasus, St. Jerome entered on the work of preparing a full and perfect copy of the Scriptures. He devoted twelve years to the study of the Hebrew, Syriac, and other oriental languages. He collected at Jerusalem and in the East all the most accurate versions, both of the Old and New Testaments. From these, revised, compared, and corrected with each other, he prepared that Latin version which is commonly called the "Vulgate," and which, as all biblical critics allow, is the most perfect and complete copy of the Bible which now exists. During the period between the fourth and sixteenth centuries, every great monastery (and Europe was full of them) had its "scriptorium," or writing-chamber, in which copies of the Scriptures were constantly produced. Of the 1400 manuscripts of the New Testament which are now extant, not one was written earlier than the fourth century, or by other than Catholic hands; and Protestants themselves have no higher origin for their Scriptures than these Catholic copies, and no surer ground of reliance on their accuracy than the fidelity and learning of Catholic scholars. How easy, if the Catholic Church condemned the Bible, would it have been to neglect this multiplication of the sacred books, and to silently destroy existing copies! Yet those who depend altogether on her labors for their boasted Scripture, have said, and still will say, that she fears the Bible and would gladly banish it from men. But when the age of printing came, her efforts were redoubled. According to the popular idea, translations of the Scripture into the vulgar tongues were never made before the Reformation, or even till long after it, by Catholics. Nothing could be more false. The Bible, either wholly or in part, had been translated and published in no less than seven of the common languages of Europe, before Luther and his Reform were ever dreamed of. In the year 1466 a translation into German was printed, copies of which still exist. This translation passed through sixteen different editions at Strasburg, Nuremberg, and Augsburg, in the course of a few years, and was followed by another translation, of which three editions were published at Wittemberg in 1470, 1483, and 1490; two at Cologne in 1470 and 1480; one at Lubeck in 1494; one at Haberstadt in 1522; and one each at Mayence, at Strasburg, and at Basle, in 1517. Luther first published his translation in 1530, nine years after the Diet at Worms and twelve years after he had turned Reformer. Before his time, therefore, there were no less than twenty-seven different editions of the Bible in the German language in circulation among the people, besides almost innumerable editions in Latin, a tongue with which the clergy and the learned of that age were well acquainted. In the year 1471 a translation of the Bible into Italian was printed both at Rome and Venice, and passed through thirteen different editions before the year 1525. Two different translations into French were also published; one in 1478, which was printed in seventeen successive editions before 1546; and the other in 1512, which also passed through many editions. In 1478 a translation into Spanish was published, which was reprinted in 1515 with the express sanction of the Spanish Inquisition. In 1475, a translation into Flemish was published at Cologne, of which seven new editions were printed before 1530. In 1488, the Bible, in the Bohemian language, was printed at Prague, and again produced at Cutna in 1498, and at Venice in 1506 and 1511. An edition in Sclavonian was also published at Cracow in the first part of the same century. Add to these the different versions made in the "dark ages," and you have no less than twenty-two translations and seventy printed editions of the Holy Scriptures in the vulgar tongues of England, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, and Sweden, prepared by the Catholic pastors and scholars of Europe, and distributed among their people, before Luther and his Bible were ever heard of. When Protestant historians relate that this renowned Reformer never saw a Bible till he was twenty years of age, and had been a student at the university upward of two years, and depict his wonder and delight at its discovery, (Hist. Ref. D'Aubigné, vol. i. p. 131,) we hardly know whether to condemn the ignorance of the Reformer or the dishonesty of the historian, one of which must be true. Circumstances certainly seem to cast the odium of falsehood on the latter, rather than that of unparalleled stupidity upon the former.
After the Reformation began, the Catholic Church applied herself to preserve and perpetuate the Scriptures with the same diligence and zeal as of old. A new translation into German appeared in 1534, and passed through twenty different editions within the century. Another was printed in 1537, and also passed through several editions. Still another was published in 1630, and during the past fifty years there have been several others. Between the years 1525 and 1567, eight different editions of the Italian translation of 1471 were printed, with the formal permission of the Holy Office at Rome. Another translation appeared in 1532, which passed through ten editions within twenty years. Another still was published in 1538, 1546, and 1547, and more recently there have been several others; the principal of which is that of Antony Martini, which in 1778 received the written endorsement and recommendation of Pope Pius VI. Thirty-nine different editions of the French translation of Le Fèvre, as revised by the doctors of Louvain, were published between 1550 and the year 1700, since which latter date many new versions, and many reprints of former versions, have appeared in France; of one of which the great Bossuet is said to have distributed fifty thousand copies with his own hands. In Spain, likewise, the Bible, and especially the New Testament, has been frequently reprinted. The most famous Spanish edition is the renowned Polyglot Bible of Cardinal Ximenes, in six folio volumes, published at Alcala in 1515. In the year 1582, the New Testament in English was issued from Rheims, and in 1609, the Old Testament, in the same language, was printed at Douay, the two together forming the Douay Bible, an edition which, if not the most elegant in phraseology, is still generally admitted by all critics to be more faithful and correct than any other version in the Anglo-Saxon tongue. This latter version has appeared in almost every form, from the largest and most ornate to the smallest and least expensive, and may be found in almost every Catholic family which possesses the ability to read it. Nearly the same may be said of all other versions in the common languages of the present age. They were intended not for the learned, but for the people. The encouragement which they received came from the people, not in opposition to, but in consequence of, the permission and recommendation of the pastors of the church: and it is simply incredible that all these different translations should have been made, and these numerous editions printed, unless the Bible had been freely read and freely circulated among the Catholic masses both of Europe and America.
So far, therefore, from ever hiding the Holy Scriptures, or even keeping them in the background, history proves, beyond the possibility of doubt or denial, that the Catholic Church has always occupied the foremost position in the preservation and diffusion of the written word of God; and that to her efforts, and to her efforts alone, is due not only the continued existence of the Bible itself, but also of those vast treasures of research and investigation which tend to throw light upon its meaning, and enforce its teachings on the hearts of those who read it; nay more, that Protestants themselves possess a Bible, only so far as the same church has bestowed it on them; and that their commentaries and expositions are but mere digests and abridgments of the laborious and extensive works of Catholic philosophers and theologians.
How, then, when the Council of Trent—which is the unerring voice of the universal church—when the Pope, who is the head and ruler of the faithful—when the unvarying practice of all ages of Catholics throughout the world—proclaims that the Catholic Church believes the Bible to be the inspired word of God, and one of the great means for the enlightenment and instruction of mankind—how, then, can Protestants ask whether the Catholic Church condemns the Bible, and forbids its members to circulate and read it? Does not all history answer them? Do not thousands of sermons, homilies, and commentaries answer them? Do not hundreds of translations, scattered over all ages and all lands, answer them? Does not their own possession of the Bible at the present day, which they profess to prize so highly, and for which they are indebted to that same church, answer them? How, then, can they believe those slanders which have, for so many years, been uttered against the church of God in reference to the Scriptures? Above all, how can they repeat them, after the often made and complete demonstration of their falsehood?
Still it is asked, What, then, about these Bible burnings, this actual hinderance, in particular instances, to the use of the Bible? And why does not the Catholic Church join with the great Bible societies of the age in the diffusion of the Bible, or at least form societies of her own for the same purpose?
These are important questions, and questions, too, which must be answered, if the preceding demonstration would have its full effect upon the mind; and for this reason we will now consider them.
What is the Bible? Very few Protestants ever seem to know, or at least to remember, what the Bible really is. Most of those whom we have met appear to regard it as a book, delivered in its present form directly by God to man. But this is not so. On the contrary, the Bible is a collection of different books, written at various periods during the space of more than fifteen hundred years. Some of them were originally in Hebrew, some in Chaldaic, some in Greek. They had no less than thirty-six different authors, most of whom were widely separated from each other either in place or time; and they were neither collected into one volume nor arranged in the shape of the present Bible, until many years after the establishment of the Christian church.
Now, it is evident that, when we say, "The Bible is inspired," "The Bible is the word of God," we mean just this, and nothing more, namely, that the original manuscript, which any one of these authors wrote with his own hand, exactly as dictated to him by the Holy Ghost, was inspired, and contained the revelation of God. When a copy of that original manuscript was made, the copy was not inspired. If it precisely corresponded with its original, it would give a perfectly correct idea of that original; if it differed from it, it would, so far, fail to give such idea; and would, to that extent, fail to be a sure guide to the knowledge of the written word of God. So with a translation; if it rendered the ideas contained in the original manuscript into another language so exactly that a reader of the translation would receive precisely the same impressions that were intended to be conveyed by the original—supposing them to be rightly understood by him—then would the translation, in its turn, make known the exact truth of God. But if there was in this the smallest deviation, and the ideas imparted by it were not precisely those imparted by the original, then it would not convey the word of God. And since not one of these original manuscripts is now preserved, it becomes evident that there is not an inspired book in existence; but, at the best, only copies and translations of books that were inspired, but have long ago been lost or destroyed.
But even these copies which we now possess are not first copies, made directly from the original manuscripts themselves. Moses wrote his five books of the Old Testament upward of three thousand years ago; and the oldest existing copy of them was made within the past nine hundred years. How many successive generations of copies, so to speak, filled up the intermediate two thousand years, no one can tell. The same is true, in their degree, of the remaining books; copy of these also being made from copy, and so on, until the art of printing was discovered. All of these copies, both of the Old and the New Testament, were made by hand, in rude characters, and with ruder implements, while languages were constantly changing, and different ideas were being conveyed to different generations by the same words and phrases. From these copies all of the modern translations have been made, and these translations are the "Bible," as commonly read and circulated among men.
Now, we ask in all candor, what certainty there is, on Protestant grounds, that any of these modern translations is the real word of God? To be such, the translation must be an infallible rendering from the copy; the copy must have been exactly like the preceding copy, and that, again, exactly like its predecessor, and so on back to the original inspired manuscript itself. And are Protestants so certain of this, that they have any right to feel sure that, when they open their Bible, the ideas which they receive are precisely those which God intended that the words of Moses, Samuel, Daniel, or the Evangelists should convey? And yet, unless they are sure of it, how can they really believe what they read in it, and stake the salvation of their souls on the correctness and fidelity of copies and translations, about which they can never, by any possible evidence short of a new revelation, become satisfied?
Our object is not, however, to destroy faith in the Bible as the word of God, (a truth which, on Catholic grounds, is thoroughly demonstrable,) although it is worth while to reflect on the difficulties which surround the attempt to make it the sole teacher of divine revelation; but to call to mind how important, how absolutely necessary, it is, that the Bible which we read should be a true translation from a correct copy of the original inspired book. And we think the reader will agree with us when we say, that the greatest care to secure correctness is none too great, and the most rigid exclusion of all erroneous, or even suspicious, copies and translations cannot be too rigid; but that, on the contrary, it is the duty of every Christian to obtain, and of the Christian church to provide, the very best and most perfect Bibles possible; and then to abandon and condemn all others.
And this is exactly what the Catholic Church has always done and is doing at this day. We have already mentioned the labors of St. Jerome. This holy man lived at an age when most of the old manuscripts were still existing, when those copies of the Old Testament which had been in use during the life of Christ had not all perished, and when the originals of the New Testament, or, at least, copies of them which had been made under apostolic supervision, were still attainable. All these, and many others—Hebrew, Syro-Chaldaic, Greek, Latin, and Syriac—he collected, and, having thoroughly compared them with each other, and restored the original text to its highest possible purity, he translated it into the Latin tongue, which was then, and probably always will be, the most definite and expressive of human languages. This translation is called the "Vulgate." It is the most complete and accurate version of the Bible in existence, and the only one which was made from the originals, or first copies, of the New Testament, and from authoritative copies of the Old. Protestant critics have said of it: "The Vulgate may be reasonably pronounced, upon the whole, a good and faithful version." [Footnote 197] "It is allowed to be, in general, a faithful translation, and sometimes exhibits the sense of Scripture with greater accuracy than the more modern versions." [Footnote 198] "The Latin Vulgate preserves many true readings where the modern Hebrew copies are corrupted." [Footnote 199] "It is in general skilful and faithful, and often gives the sense of Scripture better than modern versions." [Footnote 200]
[Footnote 197: Campbell's Dissertations on the Gospels. Diss. X. part iii. § 10.]
[Footnote 198: Horne's Int. Vol. i. p. i. ch. iii. § iii. p. 277. Am. ed. 1836.]
[Footnote 199: Ibid.]
[Footnote 200: Gerard's Institutes. Chap. iv. sec. 4, p. 82. Am. ed. 1823.]
This most excellent Vulgate edition is the very one which the Catholic Church has sanctioned as the authorized text of Scripture. The Council of Trent decreed, "that the ancient and Vulgate edition ... should be deemed authentic in public readings, disputes, sermons, and expositions, and that no one should dare or presume, on any pretext, to reject it." [Footnote 201]
[Footnote 201: Sess. iv.]
Moreover, as the original manuscript of St. Jerome was no more imperishable than others which had gone before it, and as it could be perpetuated only in copies, the church has put forth every effort to secure these in abundance and perfection. They were all written in her own monasteries, under the very eyes of her priests and bishops. They have been subject to constant and thorough revision. When printing was invented, and Bibles began to multiply on every side, (some of them filled with dangerous errors and perversions,) she remedied this evil by stringent legislation. Thus, the same council says: "Desiring to impose some limit upon printers in this matter, who, ... without licenses from their ecclesiastical superiors, do print these books of Holy Scripture, ... this Holy Synod decrees and declares, that hereafter the Holy Scriptures, and especially the ancient and Vulgate edition, shall be printed with the utmost exactness; and that it shall be lawful for no one to print, or to have printed, any books concerning sacred things, ... unless they shall have been examined and approved by the ordinary. ... This approval shall be given in writing, and shall appear, either written or printed, authentically in the front of the book; and both the approval and the examination shall be made gratis, to the end that good things may be countenanced and evil things condemned." [Footnote 202]
[Footnote 202: Sess. iv.]
In this manner has the Catholic Church secured the preservation of the pure text of Scripture. Starting at an age when it was possible, if it ever was, to obtain an exact version of the word of God, she, by the hand of St. Jerome, prepared one which has stood the test of the most hostile criticism. Exercising over this her constant vigilance, she brought it down to the age of printing. Then, rigidly excluding all editions which could not undergo the most searching scrutiny, she openly endorses all those which are genuine and faithful, so that the Catholic reader of to-day, seeing in his Latin Bible the approval of his bishop, and knowing that no bishop could sanction any false version without being immediately discovered and punished, knows also that what he reads and studies is the Holy Scripture, as Moses and the prophets wrote it, as Christ and his apostles used it, and as the church of all ages has received it.
Advancing one step further, the care of the church next manifests itself in the Bibles for the people. These are, of necessity, translations into the vulgar tongues. They are all made from the Vulgate by persons duly authorized for the purpose, and must also be certified as correct by ecclesiastical authority, before they can be printed, sold, or read. Take, for instance, the English translation, commonly called the Douay Bible. This version was prepared by some of the most eminent English scholars on the continent of Europe, who possessed a wide acquaintance with the Greek and Hebrew as well as with the Latin and more modern tongues. This version is admitted by all critics to be exact and literal, and to exhibit, as far as a translation can do so, the precise sense of the original text of Scripture. It has received the approbation of the Holy See and of innumerable bishops; and every new edition bears the official recommendation of the ecclesiastical superior, who vouches for its completeness and its purity. It is hardly possible that, with all these precautions, the Douay Bible should fail to be, in fidelity of rendering, the most perfect copy of the Scriptures that exists in the English tongue.
But the Catholic Church has not stopped even here. No one denies that in the Bible there are many passages difficult to understand, and that it is impossible for those who have no access to the original manuscript and no opportunities for critical research, to ascertain the true meaning of these passages without external aid. The object of commentaries and expositions is to supply this aid; but these have long ago grown so voluminous and costly as to be beyond the reach of ordinary men. And so, to meet this final difficulty, the church accompanies every translation into a vulgar tongue with proper notes and comments, prepared by competent and pious persons, for the illustration of the sacred text.
From this brief sketch of what the Catholic Church has done concerning the Bible, it will be perceived:
1. That the church possesses, in the Latin Vulgate, the earliest, purest, and most exact version of the Holy Scriptures which exists in the whole world;
2. That her translations of the Vulgate into the languages of the people present them with the purest and most exact version of the Bible which they can possibly obtain;
3. That by her notes and comments she affords to them freedom from serious error and mistake in their perusal of the sacred text.
Now, for a moment, let us turn to the Bibles which Protestantism offers, and inquire as to their reliability. The ordinary translations of Protestants are made from Greek and Hebrew manuscripts. These manuscripts, as we have seen, are copies, not originals, and, of course, are not inspired. They are, therefore, reliable so far as they present the exact ideas presented by their originals, and no further; and the fidelity with which they do this depends, in a great measure, upon their own antiquity and their nearness to the originals themselves. But not a manuscript of the Old Testament in Hebrew now exists which dates back further than the eleventh century. The oldest extant Greek manuscripts of the New Testament are not older than the fourth century; and these are confessedly imperfect, and, in some places, entirely wanting. Out of these manuscripts and later ones, however, Protestant translators are first compelled to select a text which shall represent, as near as they can make it do so, the original Greek and Hebrew, and then, from this text make their translation.
To the first translation this work presented no small difficulties. They were unskilled in the languages in which these manuscripts were written. the manuscripts disagreed extensively among themselves, and many of them were without lines or punctuation marks, and in characters long fallen into disuse. It is not surprising, therefore, that the first Protestant versions were, both in the text and in the translation, exceedingly erroneous, and in some portions, utterly unreliable. Most of these difficulties have vanished with advancing years. Protestant scholars have become versed in Greek and Hebrew. They have learned to read with accuracy the ancient characters in which the manuscripts were written, and their extensive research among the various versions has done much to clear their text from ambiguity. But the fact still remains, that the best Greek or Hebrew text, which they can reach, is later by many centuries, and more fallible by numerous successive copyings, than those from which the Latin Vulgate was prepared; and, consequently, can bear no comparison in purity and genuineness with that which St. Jerome produced from the first copies, if not from the originals themselves, of the New Testament, and from versions of the Old, which Christ had sanctioned by his personal use. And it is this difference, between the sources of the text of Catholic and Protestant Bibles, which gives the Catholic version its deserved preeminence, and has won for it the encomiums to which we have referred.
Extending our view to the translations made and used by Protestants we perceive this difference still subsisting. Most of these were the result of private enterprise, and never have received the sanction of great ecclesiastical authority. Even the ordinary English, or "King James" version, (which is the one in common circulation in this country,) was a private venture of the king whose name it bears; and though indorsed by him as the head of the state church of England, it has never received the approval of any authority which can strictly be called ecclesiastical. The people who now use it have no other guarantee of its correctness than the fact that their fathers used it before them. They look in vain for any mark upon its pages which shall assure them, on an authority they know to be reliable, that what they read is the true word of God. On the contrary, if they examine their own writers, they find the sentiment prevailing the the "king's version" is not the word of God. It is accused of being "without fidelity," "ambiguous and incorrect, even in matters of the highest importance;" [Footnote 203] and a well-known commentator has even said, "That it is not so just a representation of the inspired originals, as merits to be implicitly relied on for determining the controverted articles of the Christian faith." [Footnote 204]
[Footnote 203: Horne's Int. Bibliographical Appendix, p. 37, Am. ed. 1836.]
[Footnote 204: Macknight. General Preface to Epistles, sec, 2, vol i. p. 26, Am. ed. 1810.]
These general statements are applicable to other Protestant translations as well as to the English. None of them are perfect, or are even claimed to be so. Each is in turn vilified and condemned by the authors of the others; and not one of them has yet received the sanction of such an authority as can assure the reader that he will find upon its pages the revelations of God. [Footnote 205]
[Footnote 205: In 1833, the Rev. T. Curtis, an English Protestant clergyman, published a work On the Errors and Corruptions in Modern Protestant Bibles. The work contains "Four Letters to the Hon. and Rt. Rev. the Lord Bishop of London, with specimens of the intentional and other departures from the authorized standard, to which is added a postscript, containing the complaints of a London committee of ministers on the subject; the reply of the universities, and a report on the importance of the alterations made." In the course of his work, Mr. Curtis gives various instances of "the largest church Bibles" "found very erroneous." On one occasion "an important part of a text he had taken in the lesson of the day, to his great astonishment was not in the church Bible when he came to read the lesson. In a note on the same page, Mr. Curtis says: "The church Bible still in use in the parish church of St. Mary's, Islington, is a remarkably erroneous one. A clergyman, who some years ago officiated in this parish, assured me he was occasionally at a loss to proceed in reading the lessons from it. One passage (l John i. 4) has, I have reason to believe, been read erroneously in this church four times a year for many years." Mr. Curtis says, (page 80,) "The British and Foreign Bible Society have never circulated a single copy of the Scriptures that has not contained THOUSANDS of intentional departures from the authorized version!" Who can now say with truth that the pure word of God is read or heard in Protestant churches or families?]
Here, then, the matter comes to a distinct issue between the Catholic and Protestant Churches. The Catholic Church has a reliable and accurate text from which to translate; a competent and literal translation, containing all sufficient notes and explanations; and never publishes a copy of even this without the express sanction of one whom her people know to be able to judge and impartial[ly] to decide on its fidelity and truth. The Protestant churches, on the other hand, have a text confessedly corrupt and unreliable; innumerable contradictory translations, each of which is admitted to be, in many respects, erroneous, and none of which enjoys the sanction of any spiritual authority. How could the Catholic Church do less than to command those of her children who wish to read the Bible, to read the one which she has provided for them? How could she do less than expose to them the faults and errors of the Protestant translations, and forbid their use by the faithful? What right would this church, what right would any church, have to be called a spiritual guide, if, having the pure wheat herself, she permitted those who follow her to feed on coarse grain, gathered from the store-house of her enemies? In reference to such a matter, reason and common-sense dictate a rigidly exclusive policy; and that is just the policy which has been, and is now, pursued by the Catholic Church. Her rules are few and simple, but sufficient. They are these:
1. That those who would read the Scriptures in a vulgar tongue must read a Catholic version.
2. That not only must this version be a Catholic one, but it must also have been approved by the proper spiritual authority.
3. That the version must not only be Catholic and properly approved, but must be accompanied by approved notes and explanations.
4. That those who in the judgment of their pastors would derive more hurt than good from the perusal of the Scriptures, may be forbidden to read them altogether.
Strict as these rules may seem, we believe that any one who reviews the reasons for them will now say, that at least the first three of them are eminently just, and that the Catholic Church, in prescribing and enforcing them, has acted wisely and for the best interests of men. And when we further state that she has never prevented the circulation of any Bible, or taken any Bible from her people, or burned any Bible, except those false, imperfect translations which, so far as they are imperfect, are not the word of God, we believe that it will be admitted that in this also she has done nothing but her duty toward the people committed to her care.
But that the fourth rule is also just, we think a moment's reflection will determine. At the date of the Reformation, as we have seen, the Bible had been largely printed in many languages. When Luther and the other reformers began to preach, they pointed to their own translations of the Scriptures as the sole divine authority, and bade all the people to read them and examine for themselves. And hence arose a Babel of religions, of which we, at this day, can form no adequate conception. Text was pitted against text, author against author. Men claimed the most outrageous license under the name of Christian liberty. The sacred words of God were bandied from mouth to mouth in jest and song and ribaldry. The contagion spread even into the borders of the Catholic Church. The danger was most imminent that, by this fearful abuse, men might lose all respect, not only for true learning, but also for the Bible and for Christianity itself. It became absolutely necessary to put a check somewhere; and the Council of Trent, therefore, decreed that in order "to repress all that rashness by which the words of Holy Scripture are turned about and perverted to profane uses, to wit, to buffoonery, to fables, vanities, detractions, impious superstitions, devilish incantations, divinations, lots, and even impious libels," no one should dare to take the words of Holy Scripture in any manner for these uses, but that all such "presumers upon, and violators of, the word of God," should be punished. [Footnote 206]
[Footnote 206: Sess. iv.]
When further measures became necessary, on account of the increasing turmoil and disputes, the rule which we have cited was adopted; a rule under which no one who is able to be profited by the reading of the Bible was ever hindered from perusing it, and by which, probably, thousands who, but for it, might have made utter shipwreck of their souls through the abuse of God's holy word, have been saved from pride and error. But this rule is now virtually rescinded. The occasion for its exercise has long since passed away. The increasing learning of biblical scholars, the progress of intelligence among the masses, the subsidence of the wild storm of fanaticism and impiety which marked the age of its enactment, have removed the necessity for enforcing it; and the sole restraint now placed upon the reading of the Scriptures, is that contained in those three rules which we have seen to be so wise and just.
How then, when no conditions are imposed upon the use of the original Greek, Hebrew, or Latin texts of Scripture, and when only such ones are imposed upon the use of popular translations as tend to give the people a more accurate and reliable version of the word of God, how can it be said, with even the semblance of truth, that the Catholic Church forbids or even discourages the reading of the Bible; or how can it be denied that, in providing her children with complete and accurate Bibles, she has given them every inducement to their careful and continued study?
But now we think we hear it asked, with redoubled earnestness:
If the Catholic Church possesses the most perfect of all copies of the Bible, and really desires it to be read among her people, why does she not coëperate with the existing Bible societies in its diffusion, or, at least, form such societies of her own?
The answer is an easy one. The commandment which the Catholic Church received from Christ was, "Go into all the world and preach the Gospel," not "Go, distribute Bibles;" and the commandment which she received she has obeyed. The energies, the money, which Protestants would have expended in printing and circulating translations of the Scriptures, she has expended in founding churches, hospitals, convents, and seminaries, and in providing the whole world with missionaries, by whose labors, nations, to whom the Bible could have no access, have been subjugated to the faith. She recognizes but one means for the conversion of mankind, and that is, the voice of the living teacher; and never can she substitute another in its stead.
Moreover, God gave the sacred books of the Old Testament to his own Israel, not to heathens. Our Lord, through his apostles, bestowed on Christians, not on pagans, the inestimable treasures of the New. The Bible is for those who believe already, for the "man of God," "that he may be thoroughly furnished unto all good works," not for the infidel and heathen, who perhaps read it, but are infidels and heathens still. Such is the will of God, as the Catholic Church has received the same, and the facts of history prove that she is right. For when Protestantism arose, its great aim was to spread the Bible. Its history has been the history of Bible-circulation, and in the Bible Society has culminated the Reformation. These societies have labored bravely,0. We read that previous to the year 1834, a single society in Germany had distributed nearly 3,000,000 copies of the entire Bible, and 2,000,000 more of the New Testament. That by another society in Great Britain, over 35,000,000 copies of the Bible, or New Testament, had been put into circulation before 1859; and that another in New York publishes every year more than 250,000 Bibles, and twice that number of New Testaments, and parts of Scripture. But what are the results? Where are the nations which have been added to the Christian fold? Where are the signs of well-developed and intelligent piety in the great Protestant empires of the age? Have not their own writers told us that the boundaries of Protestantism are the same to-day that they were when Luther left it—that no new nations have been added to its numbers, and, with the exception of the Anglo-Saxon portion of this continent, that no new territory has been subjected to its sway; that for the heathen it has done comparatively nothing, and for the irreligious of its own lands but little more? Look at the United States, for instance, all of whose people come of good Christian stock. The census of 1860 fixes the population at over 30,000,000, while a census of professing Christians, of all Protestant denominations, estimates their number at less than 6,000,000. Is the proportion greater in Germany or in England? And what a comment is this upon the boast of these societies, that they evangelize the world, and that the work they are performing is the work of God!
And has the Catholic Church by preaching done no better? While men yet lived who heard the voice of Luther, the Catholic preachers of Europe had won back to the church more than one half of what she lost by the Reformation. In a few years longer the continent of South America, the Canadas, and thousands of the inhabitants of India, China, and Japan, were sheltered in her bosom. Another century, and again the Catholic faith was blossoming in England, and springing green and vigorous from the soil of our own land. To-day where is the country in which she is not strong and valorous, strong in the blood of her martyrs, valorous in the surety of her victory?
Does history leave a doubt upon the mind as to the true means of Christian labor? Or who can wonder that the Catholic Church refuses to substitute the human means for the divine, or even to waste her energies and money on what experience has shown to be so fruitless? She has the Bible for her children. She places it within the reach of all. Those who are able, can buy it for themselves. To those who are unable to buy, she gives it when they ask. But never has she taken pains to strew the pure pearls of written revelation underneath the feet of infidels and heathen—mindful that, as the Lord warned her, "they will turn again and rend you."
In conclusion, let us ask of every Christian reader a single favor more. It is, that he will candidly examine the best authorities upon this important subject; that he will carefully reflect upon the reasons we have offered, and decide for himself the great questions which we have tried to answer. And when he finds, as he surely will, that the Catholic Church does not condemn the Bible, or forbid her people to circulate and read it—that she has never prohibited or burned a Bible which she did not know to be erroneous and liable to lead her children into error—that she has never cast her lot in with the Bible society, simply because she follows the command of Christ—let him undo the evil he, perhaps, has done, in stating that concerning her which he now knows is false, and manfully assert the truth he now has learned, thus doing justice to the church of God.
[Footnote 207(No reference *): Macaulay's Misc., art. Ranke's History of the Popes.]
Sketches Drawn From The Abbé Lagrange's
Life Of St. Paula.
In Three Chapters.
Concluded.
Chapter III.
The government of Paula in her newly founded monastery was admirable, and she herself was the example of all virtues, as was also Eustochium. The fame of her rule spread throughout the East, and went back to Rome, where Marcella still lived and gloried in her friend.
The chief happiness of the recluses was to study the Scriptures, which they now read from beginning to end. Jerome read with them, explaining everything. His grotto was not far off, and he passed his nights there, by the light of a lamp, surrounded with manuscripts and assisted by others copying for him; for he was now growing old, and his failing eyesight no longer allowed of his enduring the fatigue of writing. He resumed the study of the eastern dialects in order the better to comprehend the original of the holy works, and, encouraged by Paula and Eustochium, resumed his work of translation, which was continued for nearly twenty years under their saintly influence.
At the end of three years Paula's monasteries, church, and hospital were all finished, with their surrounding walls, which in those times were so necessary a protection from the raids of the neighboring Arabs.
The number of the recluses had increased, and Paula now divided them into three communities, each one having an abbess or mother at its head, after the plan of St. Pacomius.
During the week their vows of enclosure prevented all intercourse with the outer world. They all went on Sunday to the church at Bethlehem; for the holy sacrifice of the Mass was not offered up at their own chapel, St. Jerome never having deemed himself worthy to mount the steps of the altar, such was his profound humility; and Vincentius, the only priest they had beside, did not attempt to officiate where Jerome dared not.
Paula was the soul of her communities. Her austerities were as great as her charities, and these were without number. St. Jerome represents her like a devoted mother to each and all of her spiritual daughters, loving them all and studying their characters equally, in order to guide each one according to her individual nature and for the best. Intellectual activity was greatly encouraged among them by her, and she took care to furnish them with books and food for the mind. In this Jerome was of great assistance to her. His convent was the dwelling of science and letters as well as of asceticism. He had around him many men of vast erudition, who in taking care of their souls did not forswear the paths of learning, and in solitude pursued their studies. They also wrote books which were read with great avidity by Paula and her religious family. Jerome himself, in addition to his great works, composed many pious biographies, and among others the life of St. Epiphanius, at the particular request of Paula. The latter had now taught her daughters to copy the Psalms, which Jerome had translated at Rome by the order of Pope Damasus. This was a work of importance, as exactness was necessary in order to repair the harm done to the work by neglect of the original manuscripts. Copying thus became universal in all monasteries, owing to the impetus given to it by Paula, and to it we are indebted for the preservation of much that is of inestimable value to Christianity.
Paula now urged Jerome to revise all his various translations of the Holy Scriptures, and this prodigious work was concluded by him as early as the year 390. The book was dedicated to Paula and Eustochium. To Paula particularly, palmam ferat qui meruit, great praise is due for the holy influence she exercised for so many years over St. Jerome, to such a noble purpose, and which produced such fruits in the translation of the Bible called the Vulgate, still used in the church after the lapse of so many centuries.
All these pious labors gave great renown to Paula's monasteries, and she who had thought to hide herself from the world, saw the curious world appear at her gates, attracted by the beacon light of Bethlehem. Her buildings could scarcely contain the visitors who flocked to see her. St. Augustine himself had sent his beloved friend, Alypius, across the seas to witness these wonders and to see Jerome and Paula. Augustine afterward wrote to Jerome, thus beginning a friendship between these two great men, one of whom was just risen above the horizon of the church, while the other great luminary was on the decline, though spreading out his rays in all the splendor of the setting sun.
But that which most astonished the pilgrims to Bethlehem was not Jerome nor any other inhabitant of this holy place, but Paula in the midst of her virgins. "What country," says St. Jerome, "does not send hither its pilgrims to see Paula, who eclipses us all in humility? She has attained that earthly glory from which she fled; for in flying from it she found it, because glory follows virtue as shadows follow the light."
Among all the visits paid to the recluses, none filled them with so much joy as that of the venerable Epiphanius, whose early lessons had had so much to do with the religious training of Paula. He, too, was delighted; he had seen nothing more perfect in the desert. The order, the prayerful and fervent nuns, the austere and laborious monks, the wonderful intellectual activity, amazed him. He remained some time with his friends at Bethlehem, praising God for what he saw.
About this time the discussions on Origenism began to trouble the church of Alexandria, and finally penetrated to Jerusalem and to Bethlehem. Jerome was estranged from Rufinus and Melanie, and others of his early friends, by differing with them on the subject of this celebrated heresy. Paula was afflicted at this, and foresaw clouds in the future which did not fail to burst on her own monasteries. The great doctrinal combats of the fourth century, in which the church was destined to come off victorious, Paula would gladly have avoided entirely, but in spite of herself she became involved in them. Her sorrow was great when she saw her monasteries as well as St. Jerome and herself excluded from the Holy Sepulchre because of their clinging to their old friend St. Epiphanius, who was the champion of orthodoxy and the great antagonist of Origenism, The ordination of a priest for the monasteries was the ostensible cause of their being put under the ban. This priest was Paulinianus, the brother of Jerome, and the validity of his ordination by Epiphanius was questioned by John, the Bishop of Jerusalem, on the ground of the youth of Paulinianus, but in reality because John, instigated by Rufinus, was profoundly irritated against Jerome and Epiphanius on account of his own leanings toward the doctrine of Origen. He forbade the entrance of the church of the Nativity or of the Holy Sepulchre to all who considered the ordination of Paulinianus canonical. This, of course, included the recluses of Bethlehem. Their dismay was great.
Epiphanius did not consider it derogatory to his dignity for him to bend his white head before the younger bishop and sue for clemency for others. He explained the great want of a priest at the monasteries, and the motives for the ordination of Paulinianus, and he begged John, for the sake of charity, to cease such persecution; and then the illustrious patriarch, on his knees, conjured him to abjure the false doctrines that had divided them.
But John would not yield, and talked only of the offence of the uncanonical ordination. Whereupon, Epiphanius thought it his duty to expose him, and demanded of the recluses that they should suspend all communion with the bishop of Jerusalem until the latter should renounce his errors.
Notwithstanding this moderation, the rancor of John burst upon them. All ecclesiastical functions were forbidden Jerome and Vincentius. Paula's catechumens were refused baptism, and his wrath went so far as to deny religious burial to the hermits as if they were excommunicated. Paula suffered inwardly from this warfare, so different from the quiet and repose she longed for. Herself untouched by the arguments of the heretics, she became an object of envy. But the voice of calumny could not disturb the serenity of her mind, and by no word or sign did she ever show impatience or anger. She endeavored also to console St. Jerome for the wounds he had received. She loved to quote Scripture to him, to soothe his mind. It was in the Bible that she always found strength to endure every evil.
Finally, Bishop John, carrying his hatred to Jerome to its climax, passed a decree of banishment against him. Jerome, worn out by contention, wished to depart at once, but Paula said to him these touching words: "They hate us and would crush us, but let us return patience for hatred, humility for arrogance. Does not St. Paul bid us return good for evil? And when our conscience tells us that our sufferings do not proceed from sin, we are very certain that the afflictions of this world are only the assurance of eternal reward. Bear, then, with the trials that assail you and do not quit our beloved Bethlehem."
In this way Paula sustained and soothed the old monk by the delicacy and serenity of her own noble soul, which lived so high up in the love of God that the storms of this world passed by leaving her unharmed.
After a while Jerome was freed from this phase of persecution by the Metropolitan of Palestine, Cesarius, who was a prudent and wise man. These perils ended, Paula encouraged him to recommence his great labors on the Bible, and also to renew his correspondence with his friends, and to think no more of this painful episode, but to suffer the tempest without to rage and no longer disturb him. [sic]
We will turn away from these discussions, at which we have glanced but cursorily, though unavoidably, to rest our minds in the contemplation of virtue.
Jerome now wrote more of his most admirable letters, and Paula continued the even tenor and pious practices of her life. She received a visit from Fabiola, who came from Rome in search of that peace and solitude which she believed could be best found in Bethlehem. This visit gave great joy to the recluses; for Fabiola could tell them of all their friends in Rome, of Paulina and Pammachius, of Toxotius and his wife Laeta, and of the young Paula, called after her venerable grandmother. She brought them messages from Marcella and the Aventine. While Fabiola was with them, they resumed the habits of former years, and read the Holy Scriptures together, Jerome explaining it to them. The ardor of Fabiola was wonderful. After she had ended her visit and left Bethlehem, much was done by Rufinus and Melanie to estrange her from her old friends. But she could not be moved and had determined to settle near them.
At this time, however, dark rumors of invasion threw consternation among the quiet inhabitants of the monasteries. It was rumored that the Huns threatened Jerusalem. Other cities had already been besieged, and they were now before Antioch. Arabia, Phoenicia, Palestine, and Egypt were filled with terror. On all sides preparations for defence were being made, and the walls of Jerusalem, too long neglected, were now under repair.
To save her monasteries from insult, Paula meditated flight, and conducted her whole community to the sea-shore, ready to embark if the barbarians made their appearance. But the Huns having suddenly diverged in another direction, Paula brought back her followers to their beloved monasteries, and with a joyful heart once more took possession of them.
These events decided Fabiola to return to Rome. When all the troubles had ceased, Jerome wrote to her: "You would not remain with us; you feared new alarms. So be it. You are now tranquil; but, notwithstanding your tranquillity, I venture to say that Babylon will often make you sigh for the fields of Bethlehem. We are now at peace, and from this manger, which has been restored to us, we once more hear the wail of the infant Christ, the echoes of which I send you across the seas."
Unfortunately, however, the peace and quiet did not last long. After three years the dispute with the Bishop of Jerusalem was renewed with great violence. But the bishop, Theophilus, having only declared himself against Origenism, John was finally brought to reason by him, and Jerome and Rufinus were reconciled in his presence, before the altar in the church of the Holy Sepulchre. Peace now reigned in the monasteries on what appeared to be a surer foundation.
But other sorrows came pouring in. News arrived from Rome of the death of Paulina, when she was but thirty, and Pammachius was left a widower and without posterity.
His loss in the daughter of Paula was great, for theirs was an admirable and holy union; for Paulina loved her husband and would have endeavored not only to make him happy, but virtuous. The grief of Pammachius was overwhelming. He had now but one wish on earth, which was to do something for the good of Paulina's soul.
It was an ancient custom in Rome at the obsequies of persons of distinction to give alms in honor of the dead, and to perpetuate their memory. This was called the funeraticium. On the day fixed for that of Paulina the streets of Rome were thronged. Troops of the poor, the lame, and the maimed wended their way to the church in answer to the invitation of Pammachius. The gilded door of the great basilica was open before them, and Pammachius himself was there distributing on all sides abundant alms in the name of Paulina.
Who can describe the grief of Paula when the news reached Bethlehem of the death of Paulina? She was ill for days afterward, and Eustochium feared for her life. Jerome wrote to Pammachius on the sorrowful event. "Who can see," cried he, "without grief, this beauteous rose gathered before her time and faded away? Our precious pearl, our emerald, is broken."
Paula's only consolation was in the admirable conduct of Pammachius. "This death was prolific," said St. Jerome, "for it gave a new life to Pammachius." He had always been a good Christian, he now became a heroic one. He thought of heaven, where his faith made him see his beloved Paulina; the example of Paula and Eustochium, and of his holy friend Jerome, all combined to detach him from the things of earth. He felt inspired with the noble resolution to consecrate to God the remaining years of his life. He assumed the dress of a monk and passed his time in charities and prayer. The jewels of Paulina were converted into money and given to the poor, and also her dower and the house of the noble senator was thrown open to all who were in want. Fabiola generously seconded him in founding hospitals, and their combined resources enabled them to accomplish great charities in Rome.
"Ordinary husbands," said St. Jerome, "show their affection and love by scattering roses and lilies and violets over a grave. Our Pammachius has covered the tomb of his departed wife with holy ashes, and with the perfume of charity. These are the aromatics with which he has embalmed Paulina." Such fruits were a great solace to Paula. When she heard that he had given away Paulina's dower to the poor, she exclaimed, "These are indeed the heirs that I would see my daughter have! Pammachius has not given me time even to express my wish; he has been beforehand with me!"
In the midst of her grief a ray of joy came from Rome, in the proposition from Toxotius and Laeta to send young Paula to her grandmother. They had determined that, in order to secure such holy training for their child, she should leave Rome and go to the East, where Paula and Eustochium would bring her up in the way of truth. Eustochium begged her of Laeta, and young Paula did eventually come to Bethlehem to join her aunt; but her venerable grandmother was no longer there to receive her.
The burden of years was now beginning to be felt by Paula. Sorrow and sadness pressed upon her, yet the ineffable beauty of her soul was greater than ever. St. Francis de Sales says of her that "she was like a beautiful and sweet violet, so sweet to see in the garden of the church." It is this exquisite and rare perfume which we must enjoy more in speaking of her in the years just before her death, when God seemed to touch her soul with a singularly soft and mellow light, like the evening of a fair day. She had been much disturbed by the renewal of the dissensions between St. Jerome and the Origenists. We have already said how she had grieved over the first encounter, seeing bishops against bishops, friends against friends, hermits against hermits. But the new struggles were still more painful to her: they had become personal, and, notwithstanding the reconciliation with Rufinus, he had attacked St. Jerome's character and writings, and the latter was obliged to defend himself. Paula had also witnessed another painful sight. After the council condemning Origen, the monks accused of sharing his erroneous opinions were driven away from the desert, and among them were many whom Paula had formerly known and venerated, and who were now homeless wanderers. The severity of the Patriarch of Alexandria against them grieved her deeply; and, the most bitter of all, her tears were those she shed for the throes of the church and for the evil passions of men. New sorrows came upon her also. She heard of the death of Fabiola, her old and dear friend. Then came the death of St. Epiphanius, who had been to Paula like a beloved father.
Toxotius, her only son, was now taken away. All her children but Eustochium were dead. What was left for Paula but suffering? Physical infirmities accumulated upon her the result of her austerities. Of these she would merely say, "When I am weak, then it is that I am strong;" and again, "We must resign ourselves to carrying our treasure in brittle vases, until the day comes when this miserable body shall be robed in immortality." She also loved to repeat these words: "If the sufferings of Christ abound in us, his consolations abound also. Sharers of his bodily agony, we will also be partakers of his glory."
The things of earth could no longer touch her, for she had seen how passing they are and knew that they could not last. The longing for the heavenly country grew in proportion. She would say with the patriarchs of the desert, "We are but travellers on the earth." And when her sufferings increased, she murmured gently, "Oh! who will give me the wings of a dove, that I may fly to everlasting rest?"
She no longer belonged to the earth, she was almost in heaven. Her soul had reached such extraordinary perfection that she seemed already to see the glory and to hear the harmonies of heaven. Peace and joy were suffused throughout her being, rising above her sufferings. Her love of God grew greater, and death seemed to her not a separation from those she loved on earth, but an indissoluble union with God, in whom all joys are found again. "Who," says St. Jerome, "can tell without tears how Paula died?" He himself wrote immortal pages on the subject, which have consoled many a dying soul since.
When Sainte Chantal was on her death-bed, she asked to have read to her once more St. Jerome's account of the death of Paula, to which she listened with wonderful attention, repeating several times these words: "What are we? Nothing but atoms alongside of these grand nuns."
It was in the year A.D. 403 that Paula fell ill. When it became known that her life was in imminent danger, the whole monastery was in consternation.
Eustochium could not be comforted; she who had never quit her mother from childhood could not bear the thought of separation. Her love for her mother, which had always been so touching, shone now in all the ardor and strength of her nature. She would yield her place by the bedside to no one by day or by night. Every remedy was administered by her hands, and she would throw herself on her knees by the bed, and implore God to suffer them to die together and be laid in one tomb. But these tears and these prayers could not postpone the hour marked by God for the end. Her time had expired; Paula had suffered enough and wept enough. She should now see joy, and put on the robes of glory. It became evident that her strength was failing, and that she had but a few days left to live. She bore her sufferings with admirable patience and heavenly serenity. She was grateful for the care bestowed on her by Eustochium and the devoted daughters of the house, but her whole mind was given up to the thought of opening Paradise. Her lips were heard to murmur her favorite verses from Scripture.
The Bishop of Jerusalem and all the bishops of Palestine, together with a great number of religious, flocked to her bedside to witness this saintly death. The monastery was filled with them. But Paula, absorbed in God, saw them not, heard them not. Several asked her questions, but she did not answer. Jerome then approached and wished to know if she were troubled and why she did not speak. She answered in Greek, "Oh! no; I have neither trouble nor regret; I feel, on the contrary, great inward peace."
After these words she spoke no more, but her fingers ceased not to make the sign of the cross. At last, however, she opened her eyes with joy, as if she saw a celestial vision, and as if hearing the divine voice of the canticle, "Rise up, come to me, O my dove, my beloved, for winter is past and the rain has disappeared." She spoke as if in answer, for she continued, in low but joyful tones, the words of the sacred song: "Flowers have appeared on the earth, the time for gathering them has arrived." Then she added, "I think I see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living." With these words on her lips Paula expired. She had lived to the age of fifty-six years eight months and twenty-one days; of which time, twenty-five years had been passed since her widowhood in religious life.
Her obsequies were a marvel. Before consigning her body to the tomb, it was carried to the church of the Nativity at Bethlehem, which she loved and where she lay for three days with uncovered face, for the visitation and veneration of the faithful. Crowds flocked from all parts to do her honor, and bishops sought to take part in the funeral ceremonies and to show respect to the lamented deceased. Among the hermits of the desert, it was almost esteemed a sacrilege to stay away. John of Jerusalem himself officiated. But the most touching part of the spectacle was the long array of the poor, following in the procession, and weeping for their mother. Death had not altered the noble countenance of Paula; she was only pale, and looked as if sleeping. The people could not tear themselves away from this last view of her beloved features. She was finally interred under this same church, in a grotto, where her tomb may still be seen up to the present time. During the week following her burial, the crowd continued to linger about her tomb, singing psalms in Hebrew, in Greek, and in Latin or in Syriac.
All this time, the sorrow of Eustochium had been terrible to behold. Her very being was rent in twain. She could not be torn away from her mother's body up to the last, but would remain by her, tenderly kissing her eyes, throwing her arms around her, and beseeching to be buried in the tomb with her. This continued until the grave shut out the form of Paula from her for ever.
Jerome tried to console her, though himself bowed down by grief. Of all the souls he had directed, none were so lofty nor so intimately connected with his own as that of Paula. So crushed was he by this loss, that it was long before the world again heard his mighty voice.
He found some solace in composing two epitaphs in her honor, to be engraved, one at the entrance of the grotto where the grave lay, the other on the grave itself. The following is the translation of the inscription on the sepulchre of Paula:
"The daughter of the Scipios, of the Gracchi, the illustrious blood of Agamemnon, rests in this place. She bore the name of Paula. She was the mother of Eustochium. First in the senate of Roman matrons, she preferred the poverty of Christ and the humble fields of Bethlehem, to all the splendor of Rome."
In this epitaph, Paula's whole history is told. The other epitaph of St. Jerome, engraved on the entrance of the grotto, reproduces, in other terms, the same record of virtue, and, what is more, shows its sublime origin. It is in the following words:
"Seest thou that grotto cut in the rock? It is the tomb of Paula, now an inhabitant of the heavenly kingdom. She gave up her brother, her relations, Rome, her country, her wealth, her children, for the grotto of Bethlehem, where she is buried. It was there, O Christ! that your cradle was. It was there that the Magi came to make you their mystical offerings, O man God!"
Eustochium desired St. Jerome, besides these two epitaphs, to write a funeral eulogium on her mother. With a hand trembling with age and emotion, he performed this pious duty. We should here mention that most of the details we have endeavored to give in this short narrative, are taken from what is, perhaps, considered the most eloquent and touching of all his writings. At the conclusion, he thus apostrophizes her:
"Farewell, O Paula! Sustain, by your prayers, the declining years of him who so revered you. United now by faith and good works with Christ, you will be more powerful above than you were here below. I have engraved your praise, O Paula! on the rock of your sepulchre, and to it I add these pages; for I wish to raise to you a monument more lasting than adamant, that all may learn that your memory was honored in Bethlehem, where your ashes repose."
Paula's good works died not with her. Her monasteries were continued piously and courageously by Eustochium, the worthy daughter of such a mother. With time, heresies arose to disturb the atmosphere anew; and the controversy of Pelagius aroused the latent powers of Jerome, and for some time absorbed him, to the detriment of his studies. But at the prayer of Eustochium, and in memory of Paula, he finally resumed his labors, and in the year 403 concluded his great work in the translation of the Bible, which is called the Vulgate, and was adopted by the church in the last universal council.
The Pelagians having set fire to the monasteries of Bethlehem, all the buildings erected by the pious care of Paula were burned to the ground. This act was odious to the whole world. It was admirable to see the serenity of Eustochium under this trial. She went to work, and, using for that purpose the noble dower brought to her by her niece Paula, who had come to her at Bethlehem, the monasteries were soon built up again, and filled with their former inhabitants. About this time, Alaric, King of the Huns, overran Rome with his barbarian hordes, and numberless Christian refugees from them came to the East in search of an asylum. Pammachius and Marcella were dead, but many of their friends were numbered among the exiles. Eustochium and Jerome received all who came with wide-open doors, and the hospitality of Paula still lived in her successors.
Eustochium survived her mother only sixteen years. She expired without a struggle, like one falling asleep. No further details are given of her last moments. This was on the 28th day of September, A.D. 418. Her remains were laid by those of her mother, according to her wish. St. Jerome did not long survive her. Her death was his last great sorrow; and he died in the following year. He was too old now to resist the final dispersion of what he had called his domestic church. Marcella, Asella, Paula, Fabiola, Pammachius, Eustochium, had all ceased to live. Rome itself was gone, for, to a Roman heart like that of Jerome's, her captivity was her death.
He fell into a state of settled melancholy, his voice having become so weak and feeble that it was with difficulty he could be heard at all. It was soon impossible for him to be raised from his miserable couch, but by means of a cord suspended from the roof of his grotto; and in this position he would recite his prayers, or give his instructions to the monks for the management of the monastery. He died at the age of seventy-two years, after living thirty-four years at Bethlehem. His eyes rested, when he was dying, on young Paula, who was beside him. She who had been his spiritual child from her cradle, now performed the last sad offices for him. We have no details of his obsequies. According to his request, she placed his remains in the grotto not far from the venerable Paula, her grandmother, and Eustochium. United in life, they were so also in death. Jerome's principal disciple, Eusebius of Cremona, now assumed the head of his convents, while young Paula continued to rule those of her grandmother's. We know nothing more. With the correspondence of Jerome died all traces of these communities, and night fell upon the East.