Brussels.
“There was a sound of revelry by night,
And Belgium's capital had gather'd then
Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men.
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes look'd love to eyes which spoke again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell;
But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!”
Childe Harold.
The roar of cannon that ushered in the day of Waterloo—the deadly Waterloo, big with the fate of empires—the fatal Waterloo, that sealed the doom of the mighty conqueror, that hurled him on the prison-island in the far-distant ocean, where expiation could be the only consolation of the proud, haughty heart that knew no law but the iron will, which, irresistible to all else, was shivered on the Rock of Peter—was not the first, and may not be the last, sound of fearful strife there heard, as Belgium has ever been the chosen battlefield of Europe.
And so well is the fact recognized, that the sole condition on which she now exists as an independent state, is that of perfect neutrality. No matter what may be her sympathies, what may be her interests, she cannot take the sword: she can only defend her frontier, and prevent the entrance of either friend or foe. This it is that gives her importance; her central position, which makes her the key of the Continent, causes England to watch over her with tender interest, gives the mistress of the seas a pied-à-terre in case of a general war—a contingency which may arise at any moment.
The late King Leopold I., the Nestor of the European sovereigns, held an exceptional position; the head of one of the smallest states, he had perhaps the largest personal influence. His sagacity and experience made his advice sought and respected by all. When, in the revolution of 1848, thrones were tumbling down, and kings flying in every direction, of course Brussels had to follow the prevailing fashion, and, without knowing exactly what was wanted, the Bruxellois assembled around the palace; but before they could state their grievances, Leopold appeared upon the balcony, told them there was no necessity of any demonstration; he had come to Brussels at their invitation, and was ready to leave, if his departure would make them happier. Whereupon they reconsidered the question, and concluded to let well enough alone.
After the separation of Holland and Belgium, Brussels increased rapidly, and is now one of the pleasantest capitals in Europe. The new part of the city, the Quartier Leopold, is a beautiful faubourg, and the boulevards that encircle the city with a belt of green verdure, furnish a delightful promenade. The park, a portion of the forest of Soignes, is charming; the great trees meet in arches, and shade the crowds of ladies and children, who live in the open air on fine days. On Sundays, the military bands play from 2 to 3 p.m.; and every summer evening, from the 1st of June to the 1st of [pg 767] September, the orchestra of the Grand Opera gives concerts in the kiosk of the Quinconce, the flower-garden of the park.
Life in Brussels is very pleasant, easy, and independent; all the appliances of modern civilization are within reach, botanical and zoological gardens, picture galleries, theatres; the opera is a permanent fact, at a reasonable rate; the orchestra led by Hanssens (recently departed for another world) was admirable; numbered among the violinists De Beriot, blind, but playing always with rare skill, and the other artists were of equal merit. Of late years Brussels has become a foyer for discontented spirits—
“Black spirits and white,
Red spirits and gray.
Mingle, mingle, mingle,
You that mingle may.”
And mingle they do without fear of mouchards, and air their opinions, no matter how wild and dangerous. If they go a little too far, the government or persons attacked interchange a few diplomatic notes with the Belgian authorities, and then the police politely request them either to be silent or try another dwelling-place. Prim was for a long time resident, but one fine morning was advised to take his departure, as his intrigues were becoming too open and dangerous, but had been kept secret long enough to lay the mine that exploded and blew the Queen of Spain into France; and Henri Rochefort, driven from France, issued his Lanterne, which threw light on many facts then thought to be false, but which events proved to have been only too true.
Brussels is a paradise for women of taste; for where else can be found such laces and fairy webs, such garnitures of point de Bruxelles, of Valenciennes, of Malines, of Duchesse? A morning stroll down the Montagne de la Cour and the Madeleine is a feast for the eye, for lace-making is one of the fine arts; the large houses employ three or four first-class artists to draw the designs, and, as the competition is great, the efforts to surpass are immense. In making up a bride's trousseau, it is etiquette for the mother of the bride to give the white laces, the happy bridegroom the black; and the prices where the parties are wealthy run up to an enormous amount.
The gold embroideries are equally beautiful; in one fabrique we saw a set of vestments just finished for the Cathedral of Tournai; they were for Lent, and were violet, with the instruments of the Passion exquisitely done in raised embroidery. The effect was admirable; on the back of the chasuble was the cross with the spear and the sponge, and so perfect was the sponge it seemed as though it could be grasped. The column was on the front of the vestment. It was a complete set for priest, deacon, and sub-deacon, with five copes, so that the artist had full opportunity for the display of his talent. The same house had recently sent off the dresses for the Empress of Austria and the ladies of her court, to be worn when they walked in the procession on the Feast of Corpus Christi. Specimens of the embroidery, which was of silver on white satin, were shown us, and, judging by what we saw, the effect of the whole must have been charming.
The Musée Ancien is devoted to the artists of the past. Hubert and Jean Van Eyck, whose discovery of the use of oil in mixing colors revolutionized art, are represented by the “Adam and Eve” and the “Adoration of the Magi.” Holbein's portrait of Sir Thomas More is worthy of the subject and the artist. Crayer's Saints and Martyrdoms abound; one, [pg 768] the “Apparition of Our Lord to S. Julien,” illustrates the beautiful legend of S. Julien and his wife, S. Basilisse, who founded a hospital, where they received and tended the sick poor. One winter night, hearing sighs and groans at the door, S. Julien went out, and found a man nearly frozen to death. He carried him in, warmed him before the fire, restored him to consciousness, and then laid him in his own bed. The next morning the holy couple went in to see their guest. The bed was empty, and, as they approached it, Jesus, for it was he who had taken the form of the poor sick man to try their charity, appeared to them, and said, “Julien, I am your Lord and Saviour, who announces to you that ere long you and your wife will repose in God.”
The “Martyrdom of S. Peter,” by Van Dyck, is terrible. The saint is fastened to the cross, and three men are placing it in the ground. One, kneeling, is endeavoring to push the end of the cross into the hole prepared to receive it, another supports the cross on his shoulders, the third steadies it. Meanwhile, all the blood in S. Peter's body seems to have descended into his head and face, which is brick-dust color, and looks as though it would burst. Altogether it is a fearful picture, so lifelike that one waits to hear the thump the cross will give when finally placed. Such pictures make us appreciate our feather-bed Christianity, the comfortable way we try to gain heaven and at the same time keep up an agreeable acquaintance with the world, and perhaps its friend, the devil.
The finest Rubens in this Musée is “Christ ascending Calvary.” It is when he is met by S. Veronica and some other women, who are magnificently dressed, thus making the contrast greater between them and the exhausted, blood-stained figure of Our Lord, who is sinking beneath the weight of the cross, and the agonized face of his blessed Mother, who, supported by S. John, is advancing with outstretched hands to the assistance of her beloved One.
The flower-pieces by Seghers, the famous Jesuit painter, are exquisite; interiors by Cuyp and Teniers, displaying their delicate care and finish, are numerous; pictures by Rembrandt, with all his wonderful effects of light and shade; some charming faces by Velasquez—two lovely little girls hand-in-hand, who look as if they would step out of the frame and speak; two splendid half-lengths of Albert and Isabella, by Rubens, whose portraits are always admirable; and some very good specimens of the Italian school, among which are a Madonna of Sassoferrato, and a portrait of a young woman, by Guercina, which is very beautiful.
The Musée Moderne is a collection of the modern Belgian school, which deservedly ranks among the first. “Hagar in the Desert,” by Navez, is as touchingly beautiful as any of the masterpieces of the great past; Leys, Wiertz, Gallait, Portaels, whose “Fuite en Egypte” is found everywhere, are men whose genius is recognized by all Europe; Van Schendel has produced effects of light as remarkable as Rembrandt; Willems and Stevens in finish rival Cuyp and Teniers; and Verboekhoven's cattle-pieces are unsurpassed. Art is encouraged and fostered by the government; every year there is a grand competition for the “Prix de Rome”; a committee is appointed by the crown to decide upon the merit of the pictures, and the successful one receives the Prix de Rome, which is four thousand francs, a sum sufficient to maintain a student in Rome, in [pg 769] artist style, three years, while he continues his studies.
Brussels is comparatively modern; it was a mere village when Malines, Louvain, and other towns had acquired importance. In 1005, it passed by marriage into the possession of the Comtes de Louvain, under whom it rapidly increased; in 1040, it was surrounded by massive walls, of which some portions still remain in the garden of the Curé of S. Gudule. In 1106, Comte Godfrey le Barbu acquired the title of Duc de Brabant, but Louvain continued the most important town in the duchy, and preserved the title of capital until the time of Albert and Isabella, who preferred Brussels on account of its healthful climate and the vicinity of the well-stocked forest of Soignies.
The Grande Place of Brussels is unique; any change is forbidden by law; as it has been for generations, so it must remain; and when one descends suddenly from the park and boulevards, brilliant and gay with all the sparkle of modern life, into the Grande Place, it is like another world. The Hôtel de Ville is on one side; opposite is the Maison du Roi, adorned with a statue of the Blessed Virgin, beneath which is the legend, A Feste, Fame et Bello, libera nos, Maria Pacis, placed there in 1625 by Isabella in gratitude to our Lady of Peace, for having delivered the city from plague, famine, and war. In the place immediately below, is the noble monument erected in reparation to the memory of the unfortunate Comtes d'Egmont and de Hornes, on the spot on which, as the inscription runs, “they were unjustly executed by the decree of the cruel Duc d'Albe.”
It was unjust and cruel, but still we cannot judge the past by the present. Then, principles were positive facts, not vagaries expected to give way at any moment to expediency, but realities plain and palpable, upon which depended not only this perishable present, but the never-ending future, with its eternity of weal or woe. As men were expected to live up to their principles, so were they expected to die for them. It is a high standard by which to live, but it is the safest. We fancy nowadays that the cruelty then dealt out for thoughts and opinions was abominable, but we forget that those ideas, those thoughts, produced the frightful effects of the ravages of the Gueux, of the orgies of John of Leyden; that from religious they degenerated into social excesses of the lowest kind—excesses which, if prolonged, would have reduced Christian Europe to Vandal barbarism.
And so the brave, unfortunate Comte d'Egmont, the hero, whose valor contributed so signally to the brilliant victory of Philip II. at St. Quentin, lost his life for having tampered with the political sectaries, or rather by being led into the snare by the Prince of Orange; when too late, he saw his error, which was only political; his faith he ever kept pure and untarnished. The Prince of Orange, on the eve of leaving Brussels to join the enemy in Germany, urged him to go, but Egmont refused; the prince told him if he remained he would be lost; that he was a fool to run the risk. Friends until then, they parted in anger. Egmont spurned him, and said, “Adieu, prince sans terre”; the prince replied, “Adieu, comte sans tête”—words which were too fatally verified soon after. The Maison du Roi is now occupied by the Cercle Artistique et Littéraire, and it was in a small room in the second story that Comte d'Egmont passed the night preceding his death, and wrote [pg 770] those touching farewell letters to his wife and the King of Spain which reveal the nobleness of his character. The famous picture by Gallait, “La tête d'un supplicié,” is a portrait of Egmont. We have seen the original in the atelier of Gallait, and he assured us it was an accurate resemblance. Requiescat in pace.
The Hôtel de Ville on the Grande Place is the finest of the municipal palaces found in almost every city of Belgium. It is built round a quadrangle, and the oldest part is the wing to the east of the tower, commenced in 1402, at the angles of which are elegant turrets; the façade consists of a gallery of open arches, surmounted by the Grande Brétèque, a balcony from whence proclamations were made; above this are two rows of windows, and an enormous battlemented roof, pierced with thirty-seven dormer windows.
The tower is 330 feet high; the lower half, from the basement to the summit of the roof, is square; the upper part, built in 1444, is octagonal, surmounted by a magnificent spire of open-work, remarkable for its lightness and delicacy; on its apex is fixed a table of stone, twelve feet in circumference, and on this stone a globe of copper, supporting a colossal figure of S. Michael trampling on the devil, thirteen feet high, made of a number of thin plates of copper-gilt, in 1454, which serves as a weathercock, and turns with the least breath of wind. There is a shocking tradition, currently reported, but not positively confirmed, that the architect of the beautiful tower hung himself on its completion, because he had not placed it exactly in the centre of the façade; which certainly did not remedy the evil, as putting himself out of the world did not put the tower in the right place.
The first story of the Hôtel de Ville contains a gallery in which are magnificent full-length portraits of Philippe le Beau, Charles V., Philip II., Albert and Isabella, and other dignitaries; the council-room, audience-chamber, and all the other apartments are splendidly ornamented, the walls hung with Gobelin tapestry, representing scenes in the life of Clovis and Clotilda. The ceiling of the council-chamber is a masterpiece of Janssens, in which the most extraordinary effects of light and shade are produced; it represents an assembly of the gods, and their majesties vary in their positions as they are seen from different points.
The remainder of the Grande Place is lined with venerable old houses, terminating in fantastic gables, most of which were originally the halls of various guilds and corporations; their façades pierced with numerous odd little windows and covered with quaint designs, bas-reliefs, pilasters, balustrades, and inscriptions; some of the houses are gilded, which adds to the picturesque appearance of the place, and on the summit of the Brewers' Guild is a fine equestrian statue of Prince Charles of Lorraine—the good prince, as he is still affectionately called. In mediæval times, the Grande Place was the ordinary scene of tournaments and executions; here the Knights of the Golden Fleece held their brilliant réunions, and Philip l'Asseuré and Charles V. gave splendid fêtes, which in the reign of Philip II. were succeeded by very different scenes, under the stern rule of the Duc d'Albe.
Just behind the Hôtel de Ville, at the corner of the Rue du Chêne and the Rue de l'Etuve, is the beloved little statue of the “Premier Bourgeois de Bruxelles.” The present [pg 771] bronze statue, after a model by Duquesnoy, was made in 1619, and this replaced an old stone statue which is said to have existed in the IXth century. Its origin is not known, but the favorite tradition is that it represents a youthful Duc de Brabant, whose father dying left him an infant of three years under the regency of his mother, the Duchesse Lutgarde. The neighboring Comte de Malines coveted the fair inheritance, declared war against the boy-duc, and approached Brussels, determined to take it by force of arms. The Brabançons flew to defend the rightful heir, and, when the decisive day arrived, they besought the duchesse to let them carry the little fellow in his cradle, and suspend it from a great oak-tree that overlooked the battle-field. The duchesse in tears consented, accompanied them to the field of Ransbeek, and remained by the tree, from the highest branch of which the cradle was suspended.
The battle raged with fury; three times the Brabançons were driven back to the tree, but the sight of the brave little boy, who looked on with intense interest, never exhibiting fear or impatience, spurred them on to fresh efforts; at last the day was won, and the cradle carried back in triumph to Brussels, the duchesse radiant with joy. To commemorate the event, the oak-tree was transplanted to Brussels, placed at the corner of a street, since then called Rue du Chêne, and the statue erected at its side; in the course of time, the tree has disappeared, but the statue remains, the object of undying love and interest. To steal it is considered an impossibility; in 1585, he was seized and carried off to Antwerp, but was speedily recaptured and brought home in triumph by a small party of Bruxellois; again he was taken away in a baggage-wagon by the English troops after the battle of Fontenoy, and, on being recovered, was allowed for a short time to delight by his presence the inhabitants of Grammont, until he was reclaimed by the Bruxellois. In 1747, he was stolen by some soldiers of Louis XV., and again a few years later by two English soldiers, who, however, found him too heavy to carry away; the last time he was disturbed was in 1817, but the same good fortune attended him, and he was again recovered, to the great joy of the Bruxellois, who look upon him as the good genius of the city, and consider his loss a public calamity.
In the XVIth century, Louvain and Brussels gave him two splendid dresses for fête-days; Charles V. presented him with a complete suit, and settled a pension on him. In 1698, the Elector of Bavaria not only gave him a uniform, but invested him with a military order, and appointed a valet-de-chambre to wait on him. Peter the Great visited him, and added to his pension. In 1747, Louis XV. made him a knight, and solemnly decorated him with the Order of S. Louis, at the same time presenting him with a suit of gold-laced uniform, a chapeau-bros, and a sword; and in 1780 he was the first who wore the national cockade of Brabant, hence his present title, “Le Premier Bourgeois de Bruxelles.”
On national fêtes, and during the Kermesse in July, he is always dressed in the uniform of the Garde Civique, which he has worn since 1830, his numerous orders displayed on his infant breast. In addition to these gifts, several persons have made him presents, while some have actually remembered him in their wills. He thus possesses a positive revenue which is regularly paid, a treasurer who is responsible for his disbursements, [pg 772] a lawyer, and a valet-de-chambre; and let any stranger beware of ever speaking disrespectfully or slightingly to any Bruxellois of the “Premier Bourgeois de Bruxelles”!
Brussels abounds in charitable institutions and convents of every order; some are peculiar to the place. There is but one house in the world of the “Dames de Berlaimont”—an order of canonesses who follow the rule of S. Augustine—and it was founded by the Comtesse de Berlaimont, whose husband was one of the great officers of the court of Charles V. It is eminently aristocratic in its design. Any number of quarterings was required for the fair candidates in the palmy days of the old régime, but ideas have been modified by the wheel of the revolution, and now, if the head and heart are right, whether the blood is more or less blue is not strictly considered. The convent is splendid, the canonesses charming, and the education received by the young ladies under their charge leaves nothing to be desired.
Convents of Poor Clares are now few and far between; one is still found in Brussels. The rule is very strict—the strictest, we believe, for women in the world, not even excepting those of the Trappistines and Carmelites. It is forbidden to see strangers, but the superioress graciously relented in our favor, drew aside the heavy serge curtain behind double iron grilles armed with spikes, and told us we could look at her, but not speak. This announcement was made before the curtain was drawn. We kept profound silence, and for a few moments contemplated the figure, that stood motionless and speechless. What could have carried her there, from family, from home with all its charms? At the moment of solemn choice, the world enters but little into the thoughts: it is the strong ties that God and nature have implanted in the human heart that are the hardest to unloose.
She had left all for the rigid rule, for the self-denying life, of a Poor Clare; the happy unbroken sleep of youth for the broken night of prayer and meditation; and, when sleeping, not even to lie down, but to sit half-upright; to go barefooted, never to touch meat, never to speak—only imagine it, a woman, and never to speak!—never to her fellow-beings—ever to God. It was for him she had left home and friends, to find her eternal home and the never-failing Friend; to be thirteen hours a day in prayer and adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, to expiate by her life the sins of the world around her. It is a wonderful life, a supernatural life; but, when truly desired, supernatural grace is given to lead it courageously to the grave.
The oldest church in Brussels is Notre Dame de la Chapelle, in the Rue Haute, which derives its name from having been at first a simple oratory in which the great S. Boniface, the apostle of Germany, had said Mass. The style is Gothic, and recently the choir, which is very fine, has been restored; it had been disfigured by an atrocious high altar in the style of the Renaissance; but in this reign of good taste it was decided to remove it, and in making the changes it was found there was a false wall, which, on being destroyed, disclosed the beautiful circle of the apse, which is remarkable for having the presbyterium and the credence-table cut in the wall, something that has only been found in two other churches—one in France, another in Germany.
Notre Dame des Victoires—or Notre Dame du Sablon, as it is more generally called from its situation on the Place du Petit Sablon—is in the [pg 773] form of a Latin cross, with a polygonal apse to the choir. The Place du Petit Sablon during several centuries was the favorite residence of the aristocracy, and is yet surrounded by the Hôtel de Merode, and the palace of the Duc d'Aremberg, which was formerly occupied by Comte d'Egmont. Consequently in this church the monuments are very fine, especially the mortuary chapel of the Princes of Tour and Taxis, in which is an exquisite statue of S. Ursula, by Duquesnoy, and the tombs of the De Hornes, d'Egmonts, and De Chimay.
The beautiful collegiate church of SS. Michel and Gudule is built on a height formerly called Mont St. Michel, and its great towers dominate the city, and can be seen from every point. Its plan is cruciform. The choir is entirely surrounded by chapels, from which it is separated by double rows of columns; on one side is the Chapel du Saint-Sacrement de Miracle, on the other the Chapel of the Blessed Virgin, behind that of S. Mary Magdalen. It is a magnificent church, one of the richest in Belgium, and the vestments and appointments are superb. The laces are a treasure in themselves—laces which now cannot be bought, are used in the sanctuary, and the vestments and antependiums are of corresponding magnificence. One antependium, which is the Lamb surrounded by the symbols of the four evangelists, is considered the finest piece of embroidery in Belgium.
But the glory of S. Gudule is not the gold, and silver, and lace, but the Très-Saint-Sacrement de Miracle, which is there preserved, and which is the object of the profoundest love and veneration. For it did Charles V. build the exquisite chapel whose four splendid windows were presents from his sisters, the Queens of Portugal and Hungary, his brother Ferdinand, King of the Romans, and Francis I. of France. Sovereigns, princes, nobles, and people for five hundred years have adored the sacred Body of our Lord, so cruelly profaned and outraged by the Jews, on Good Friday of 1370, who on that day, the day of Redemption, assembled in their synagogue, and stabbed the consecrated hosts stolen from S. Catherine's, and, when they stabbed them, the blood which had flowed for them on Calvary, flowed again beneath their sacrilegious hands.
Day and night reparation is offered; the synagogue is now a chapelle expiatoire, attached to which is a community for perpetual adoration, and the Confrérie du Très-Saint-Sacrement de Miracle, established in S. Gudule, embraces thousands. The Duc d'Aremberg gave the monstrance, which is a cross of diamonds, surmounted by a triple crown of diamonds, from which hangs a little ship of the same precious stones, presented by the captain and crew of a vessel, in gratitude for delivery from shipwreck. Marie Antoinette sent her wedding necklace of diamonds to be suspended around it, and the lamps around the sanctuary are kept burning by the children of the family d'Aremberg.
The great ornament of the nave is the pulpit, elaborately and exquisitely carved in oak by Verbruggen in 1699, originally in the church of the Jesuits, in Louvain, and, on the suppression of the Order, given to S. Gudule by Maria Theresa, in 1776. The lower part represents the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise by the angel of the Lord, armed with a flaming sword. On the left is seen Death gliding around with his dart. The pulpit itself, in the hollow of the globe, is supported by the tree of knowledge, crawling up which is the [pg 774] serpent, while on the extreme summit stands the Blessed Virgin holding her divine Son, whom she is assisting to bruise the serpent's head with a large cross. On either side the railing of the steps is formed by a hedge in which numerous birds are enjoying themselves; on the side of Adam are the eagle, the jay, and a monkey; while in the vicinity of Eve are the peacock, the ape, and the parrot.
And why these birds are there is the result of a little domestic disagreement between the artist Henri Verbruggen and his wife Martha Van Meeren, whom he married, hoping to find a tenth muse, but who only proved a prosaic everyday somebody, who fretted herself to death because Henri loved pleasure even more than art, and, while amusing himself with his friends, forgot there was no money in the house, nothing in the larder, nothing wherewith to dress Mme. and Mlle. Verbruggen. Poor Martha, who loved order, and would have been the treasure of some honest burgher, only provoked and irritated Henri by her occasional plain statement of facts. Affairs were in this sad condition when the Jesuits of Louvain, knowing the splendid talent of Verbruggen, ordered a pulpit for their church. The artist was enchanted. Here was a field for his genius; he immediately conceived an admirable work, which should contain, as in a book, the whole history of the Christian religion.
Said he, “I will make a globe, which will represent the earth, under which I will place Adam and Eve, the moment after their fatal disobedience, which entailed on us such misery. This globe will be the pulpit, the canopy of heaven will cover it, the tree of knowledge will overshadow it, around which will creep the serpent, and above, Mary, crowned with stars, the moon at her feet, her infant Son before her, will bruise the serpent's head with the cross. By the side of the man I will place the cherubim with the flaming sword; near the woman, young and beautiful, hideous death—that will be a contrast!”
The artist commenced his work with ardor. The wood grew animated beneath his fingers. But pleasure for ever distracted him; the more people admired, the more he amused himself. Martha was miserable; she could see no hope of order and plenty. Irritated by the complaints of his wife, Verbruggen determined to revenge himself in his chef-d'œuvre, and so perpetuate his vengeance. He was making the stairs of the pulpit. In his angry malice, Verbruggen thought he would punish Martha by placing satirical emblems to characterize women. On the staircase, by the side of Eve, who has just sinned, and who still holds the apple, he placed, as symbols, a peacock for pride, a squirrel for destructiveness, a cock for noise, an ape for malice—four defects of which poor Martha was totally innocent.
Man he made with pleasure. On his side he placed, first, an eagle, to typify genius—but just then Martha bade adieu to the world and her troubles, and Verbruggen was a happy widower. Too late, the sculptor understood his loss; the gentle, patient wife was gone, and now he only remembered her good qualities; his courage and energy forsook him; he could not work. Months rolled on; his friends pitied him, and tried to rouse him from his deep despondency.
“You weep for Martha,” said they; “there are others as good; you are only thirty-six—marry Cecile Byns. She is joyous and lively like you. She will be a mother to your daughter, a charming companion for you.”
Verbruggen listened to the good advice; he asked the hand of Cecile Byns, who was one of those women that rule while laughing, that carry the point while appearing to submit. Cecile knew her power over Verbruggen, and made him obey.
“I love you,” said she, “but I will not marry you until the work which will make me proud of the name of Verbruggen is finished.”
“Only say the word,” replied Henri, “and I will complete it.”
Accompanied by her mother, she visited his atelier. She asked the explanation of the emblems he had placed on the side of Eve. The sculptor blushed.
“When I made what astonishes you,” he stammered, “I did not know Cecile Byns.”
“Very well,” replied the young lady; “but after the symbols of our defects, which perhaps we have not, how do you intend to designate your own noble sex?”
“I had just commenced,” he answered, blushing redder than before. “You already see the eagle, perhaps it typifies vanity.”
“Not at all,” interrupted Cecile. “The eagle is a bird of prey, an emblem of brutal tyranny. What do you intend adding?”
Verbruggen was silent. Cecile continued: “To be just to men, as you fancied you were towards us, you will place near the eagle a fox, a symbol of vain gossip; a monkey eating grapes, for drunkenness; a jay, for foolish pride. You must avow, my dear Verbruggen, these defects belong to men as much as the faults you have given to us, and which adorn the other staircase. And now, when this great work is completed, I will accompany you to the altar.”
The sculptor did not reply. He obeyed, fulfilled faithfully the orders given, and received for reward the hand of Cecile Byns; since which happy event he was never known to offer any further insult to the devout female sex.
And so the pulpit was finished and placed in the church of the Jesuits in Louvain, where it was the object of universal admiration, as it still continues to be in beautiful S. Gudule the pride and joy of Brussels.
Sayings Of S. John Climacus.
It is better to displease our relatives than displease God.
Obedience is simply going about anything without any judgment of our own.
Let your conscience be the mirror in which you behold the nature of your obedience.
A new wound is easily closed and healed; but the old wounds of the soul are cured, if ever, with great difficulty.
He is truly virtuous who expects his death every day; but he is a saint who desires it every hour.
Marriage In The Nineteenth Century.
“Heaven and earth shall pass, but my words shall not pass.”—Matt. xxiv. 35.
It is only truth that is immutable in this world, and only truth's representative that dare speak to-day the same language it spoke eighteen, twelve, or three centuries ago.
Truth cannot progress, for it partakes of the nature of God's perfection; it is not an ideal of our own evolving, susceptible of improvement as our knowledge grows wider, but a type towards which we are, on the contrary, making slow stages of assimilation. Of all individual parts of truth, hardly one of which remains in our day unassailed, none is so fiercely attacked as the truth about marriage. And yet, as we have shown in a previous paper,[232] almost every argument against it has repeatedly been put forward by barbarians and Romans, Byzantine emperors and feudal chiefs, and borne out by all the imposing display of military force, legal servility, and even ecclesiastical truculence. One might almost say of the agitation against marriage in our day, “What has been will be, and what will be has been.” If it is no longer in the individual passions of kings and nobles that the conflict centres, it is still a “sovereign” who plays the part of Philip Augustus or Henry VIII.—the “sovereign people.” Instead of one mighty colossus, it is a legion of personally obscure individuals which the church finds opposed to her; but the principle is the same, the issue is identical. What councils and embassies did formerly is now done oftener and in privacy; new agencies have widened the possibilities of communication, of discussion, and of adjustment, and causes are more rapidly multiplied, as well as more speedily settled. The press has lent its power to the altar, and redeemed, in part, its too well-earned reputation as a pander and a tempter; and besides these new helps, we have, as of old, all those oft-tried resources of personal eloquence, canonical censures, and grievous penances.
Still the question is exactly the same in the nineteenth as it was in all preceding centuries: Shall passion or reason rule mankind? Shall the most sacred of all rights of property be protected and maintained, or shall communism be allowed gradually to extirpate the human race?
The historian Rohrbacher, whom we have often quoted in the paper referred to above, specially insists upon the confusion which the legalized disruption or total disregard of the marriage vow would introduce into society, and supports his opinion by that of De Maistre. He also adduces the argument that, since the creation of man in the earthly Paradise was a perfect and complete act, and only one woman was there joined to one man, therefore the union of one man and one woman was distinctly God's type of what he meant all future unions to be. We might speak of many Scripture proofs of the original institution of marriage being a state of perpetual monogamy until death, but such proofs would [pg 777] involve too lengthy a sketch of one portion of the subject, and this aspect has been so often discussed that we turn with a feeling of relief to any less hackneyed view of the question.
Speaking broadly, we may say that the Hebrews were the first, as they were for a long time the only, people whose laws protected both the honor and the property of women. Because they did so, they were also most stringent as regards the tie of marriage. Again, with them ancestry and descent were of paramount importance, and every family jealously guarded its record and registers; this also implied a strict protection of marriage, and, in fact, would have been impossible without it. Even when dispensations were allowed the Jews “because of the hardness of their hearts,” the son of the first wife was not to be put aside for the son of the second, if the latter were more pleasing to her husband than the former, and this because the sacred rights acquired at her betrothal were absolutely inalienable.[233] In the marriages mentioned in the Old Testament, the consent of the woman is always formally asked,[234] and she is considered competent to inherit property and transfer it to her husband.[235]
Among other nations of antiquity, the more truth was obscured in their religious forms, the more degraded became their ideal of marriage. This is patent even among such civilized nations as the Greeks and Romans; the whole of mythology is a deification of the passion of lust, and a caricature on marriage. Still, where greater genius abounds, there also we find glimpses of a higher morality. For instance, in Homer's magnificent poems, conjugal love and fidelity stand out nobly as the themes of his especial admiration. It would require a thorough examination of many of the passages of the Iliad, and greater space than we have now before us (since this idea can only be used here as a collateral one), to bring out the full force of this striking fact, and some day perhaps it may be our good fortune to return to this topic; suffice it to say at present, that any one who reads Homer attentively will be struck by the majestic attitude of Juno, the constant protectress of the Greeks, and by the hearty sympathy shown by the poet in a struggle undertaken purely to vindicate the dignity of marriage and the rights of hospitality. This is perhaps even more obvious from the fact that even the good personages of the poem, the self-sacrificing and devoted Andromache, the noble Hector, the infirm and guiltless Priam, are all included in the sweeping misfortune which is the swift and just retribution of the cowardly rape of Helen. The vindication of the principle of marriage is evident, while in the Odyssey its glorification is even more obvious. This illustration, for which we have to thank a very zealous and learned religious whose kindness put the suggestion entirely at our own disposal, is one which it is worth while for thoughtful persons to consider, as it gives a far greater moral importance, and consequently a more perfect artistic interest, to one of the few colossi of the intellectual world.
The law of Jesus Christ succeeded the preparatory dispensation of Moses, and perfected all its enactments, marriage among the rest. It gave the marriage contract an added dignity by making it the image of the union—single and indivisible—of Christ and the church, and by elevating it into a sacrament; in other [pg 778] words, a means of sanctifying and special grace. In this is certainly the secret of the church's inflexibility with regard to marriage. Since by it a distinct and sacramental grace was vouchsafed, it followed that this grace in itself was sufficient to enable the contracting parties, provided they faithfully corresponded to it, to remain holily in the state of matrimony until death; so that, whenever any serious breach took place between them, the church could reasonably argue that the fault lay with their dispositions, not with the contract itself. In the old law, marriage, though holy, was not a sacrament, and was susceptible of greater relaxations; but in the new law, with a higher dignity added to it, and more abundant grace attached to it, it is too strong to need concessions and too noble to wish for them.
The Hebrews also, in propagating their own race, used the only means then in their power of propagating the knowledge of the true God; but in the new dispensation we have substituted a generation according to the spirit for the previous generation according to the flesh. Polygamous marriages among the Jews were a mysterious channel provisionally used for the increase and maintenance of God's worship upon earth; but, since the coming of Christ, men have been won by the Word of God, the preaching of his servants, the sufferings of his martyrs, and the learning of his disciples. Those who are now constantly born into his fold are born “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”[236] Having said so much upon the historical and Scriptural aspect of marriage, we leave it to others to dispute the particular meaning of such and such texts, and the particular inferences to be drawn from the context, and go back to the church's firm stand upon this matter.
Not only has she been the foremost champion of the integrity of marriage in past ages, but she is now almost its only one. No body of such force or numbers exists in the world, which alone gives her the priority among the upholders of Christian marriage; and when the tenets of the few other bodies to whom marriage is sacred are examined, they will be found to be inspired and created by her principles, so far as they refer to this matter.
Of the Anglican communion, especially in its more advanced branches, it is sufficient to say that, having better than any other body preserved the forms, it has as its reward attained to more of the spirit, of a “church,” and consequently inculcates a higher morality. But the following testimony, which, from the name of the sheet furnishing it (the Reformed Missionary), we suppose represents some other Protestant body, is more interesting because more unexpected. A Catholic paper of Nov. 16, 1872, the Standard, has preserved this testimony for us. Under the title of “The Divorce Question Again,” it discusses church authority and its relation to the civil law, and uses the following strong language: “Spiritual interests and spiritual discipline belong to that supernatural order of grace which has its home in the bosom of the Christian church.... There are many things besides loose divorce legislation which the state either tolerates or legalizes, but which the church cannot sanction or countenance for a single instant without committing spiritual suicide. And if the state should expressly dictate to the church a line of action at variance with the plain teaching of Christ, then it [pg 779] would be our solemn duty to obey God rather than men.... The church must interpret God's Word, and exercise spiritual discipline in accordance therewith, no matter what course the state may take in disposing of kindred questions. As Dr. Woolsey has expressed it: ‘Whatever be the attitude of the state, the church must stand upon the principles of the New Testament as she expounds them, and apply them to all within her reach!’ ”
What is here said of the “state” may be applied to the people, the press, popular license, and all the modern agencies which the evil one has added to his former royal and learned tools. But if among earnest though mistaken Christians we find such auxiliaries as the Reformed Missionary and the eloquent sermons of Anglican divines,[237] we have also to encounter such authorities as the following on the side of passion and licentiousness: “Dr. Colenso, embarrassed by the obstinate adherence to polygamy which he observed among the Kaffirs, came to the resolution, after conference, it is said, with other Anglican authorities of the highest rank, to remove the difficulty by a process which, though adopted in a well-known case by Luther and Melancthon, had not previously received the official sanction of Anglican bishops. As polygamy would not yield to Protestantism, Dr. Colenso agreed to consider polygamy ‘a Scriptural mode of existence.’ Here are his own words: ‘I must confess that I feel very strongly that the usual practice of enforcing the separation of wives from their husbands, upon their conversion to Christianity, is quite unwarrantable, and opposed to the plain teaching of our Lord.’ And then he proves, of course from the Bible, that polygamy is not inconsistent with the all-holy religion of the Gospel. Here is the proof: ‘What is the use,’ he asks, ‘of our reading to them (the heathen) the Bible stories of Abraham, Israel, and David, with their many wives?’ But Dr. Colenso was not without support in his view on polygamy. ‘The whole body of American missionaries in Burmah,’ he observes, ‘after some difference of opinion, came to the unanimous decision to admit in future polygamists of old standing to communion, but not to offices in the church (as if the last were a greater privilege than the first!)’ ‘I must say,’ he continues, ‘that this appears to me the only right and reasonable course!’ ”
At the beginning of this extract, we read that Dr. Colenso was embarrassed by the obstinate adherence to polygamy among the Kaffirs. This means, we infer, that he had originally withstood this heathen practice. Why had he done so? If he believed it sufficiently immoral to attack it, he was guilty of violating his conscience in ceasing his attack; if he had always believed it “Scriptural” or allowable, he was guilty of hypocrisy in attacking it at all. Then, when he asks, “What is the use of our reading to them the Bible stories of Abraham, Israel, and David, with their many wives?” he gives us unconsciously another advantage by tacitly confessing the necessity of a divinely inspired interpreter of the Bible. If Dr. Colenso had been a Catholic, the difficulty would not have existed. Does he suppose that Catholic converts among savage nations do not hear the same stories? But in their case, a teaching and speaking church comes to their rescue, and explains what otherwise would seem dark. It is strange to hear a Protestant [pg 780] Christian, bred up on the rule of “the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible,” hesitate as to the effect of certain stories in the Bible. If the poor Kaffirs were to be evangelized upon the principle that a Bible precedent was practically a permission for all time, they would soon have Judiths and Jaels among them, as well as Abrahams, Israels, and Davids.
In the Times (London) of Dec. 20, 1872, on the occasion of a public “Day of Intercession” for more missionaries, we read the following stringent criticism upon the body which of all others most nearly approaches the ideal of a church: “The Church of England,” says the Times, “utterly abandons large regions on the ground that in tropical climes there will be polygamy or an equivalent disregard of the marriage ties, and that no preaching can prevail against it”—a confession of powerlessness which quite coincides with what we have said of Dr. Colenso. Still it is not fair to class the Anglican communion, despite this weak shrinking from a difficult task, with the more systematic deserters from the championship of duty; but, if we are grieved and astonished at her defection under certain circumstances, what shall we say of the following breach of ecclesiastical discipline on the part of those whose very names argue in this case a departure from the path of known duty? In the New York World of the 5th of January, 1873, we read among the announcements of business transacted in the mayor's office the previous day this startling disclosure: “During the day the mayor was waited upon by a wedding-party, the principals of which were Michael M'Clannahan and Mary Donovan, who wished to be united in matrimony without going to the trouble of getting up a public church celebration. Mr. H—— performed the duty according to the statute, and the bride and bridegroom went on their way rejoicing.”
It is not for us to judge these persons, nor speculate upon the motives that led them to take such a step; but the occurrence is nevertheless a sign of the demoralization which is every day on the increase among our people.
Polygamy, under the name of Mormonism, is still tolerated and protected in the United States, and the annals of divorce in the states where Mormonism is illegal quite make up the deficiency. In Connecticut, according to the deposition of the Rev. Dr. Woolsey, President of Yale College, made before the Western Social Science Congress in Chicago, the ratio of divorce is one in every eight marriages. We were told by a distinguished New England convert that the Vermont marriage law was practically so lax that the following “cause” for a divorce was considered legal: A couple, not very long married, mutually wished for a separation, simply on the score that they were dissatisfied with their bargain. They went to a lawyer to ascertain the technicalities of the case, and were told—appearances having to be saved!—that some specific cause must be alleged. The easiest was cruelty. But the parties had never been violent; so the lawyer suggested that the husband should, in his presence, give his wife a “blow.” This was soon accomplished by a light slap on the cheek of the willing “victim”; cruelty was pleaded, and the divorce obtained.
In Rhode Island, the proportion of divorces to marriages in 1869 was one to fourteen, and the law of that state leaves it practically to the discretion of the courts to annul any ill-assorted marriage on the ground of [pg 781] uncongenial temper, desertion, drunkenness, or any sort of bad conduct. In that year, out of 166 divorces, only 66 were granted on the plea of adultery, while it must also be borne in mind that this grave charge is often unjustly and maliciously made to cover some shameful behavior on the part of the plaintiff, or to gratify his or her revenge. Speaking of a clergyman who was reported to have married one man successively to five wives, all of whom were living at the same time, a Protestant paper comments thus on the story: “It may be true or false. It is not altogether improbable. It suggests very serious reflections, as indicating what is possible under our laws, and the course things are taking in American society.” The paper goes on to speak of the clergyman's responsibility in such a case, and although advocating the desirability, “for many reasons,” of the office of solemnizing marriage being “confined almost entirely to ministers of the Gospel,” does not see that it stultifies itself directly after by explaining that “the trust is reposed in them, not by any right to it on their part, as holding an ecclesiastical office, but on account of their position and general character(!). They are able to guard marriage, and give it a religious character and sanction. But they act, so far as the law goes, simply as civil magistrates.”
And let us add that here is precisely the evil, and that as long as clergymen are lowered to the level of magistrates, loose morals will never be uprooted.
The Nation of March 2, 1871, has the following:
“We cut from the marriage notices of the Philadelphia Press the following illustration, omitting names, of the way in which attempts to reduce human marriages to the level of those of the lower animals are dressed up in fine language:
“ ‘In Philadelphia, February 23, S—— and S——, the parties protesting against all marriage laws, whether legal or conventional, which subject either the wife or the husband to any control or influence on the part of the other which is not in accordance with the dictates of pure and mutual love.’
“This is, of course, simple ‘pairing.’Marriage means the assumption by a moral agent of an obligation to perform certain duties, even after they become disagreeable. The arrangement by which the parties live together as long as they find it thoroughly pleasant is that common among birds, beasts, and fishes, and has nothing human about it.”
The Independent, a Protestant religious paper, sneers at all barriers to divorce, Catholic, Protestant, or civil, as “shallow,” and declares that “no matter with what solemn ceremony the twain may have been made one, yet when love departs, then marriage ceases and divorce begins.”
A certain unhappy section of those waifs of womanhood, the advocates of woman's rights, is known as the champion of “free-love,” that is, in plain words, adultery. Mrs. Stanton, one of the leaders, has said somewhere that “marriage is but a partnership contract terminable at the will of the parties,” and has advocated marriages for three years.
To this last proposition we have only one objection. Why three years? If a marriage is based on mere passion, three months or six at the furthest would be enough to exhaust the cohesive element, for if the adage be true that “no man is a hero to his valet,” it is equally certain that no man and woman could by any human possibility live together for that time in the familiar intercourse implied by marriage, without discovering to each other certain asperities of temper, inequalities of disposition, in short, all the little meannesses of our poor human nature. This disenchantment, following the [pg 782] close and daily companionship that is almost inevitable in married life, is enough to kill passion, though it cannot even daunt principle. Again, in a marriage based on passion, the satiety that follows in the train of unlawful love would be reproduced, and would break up the connection in far less than three years. In fact, when we come to sift the question, we find that, putting aside the religious spirit presiding over marriage, that state of life has no appreciable sign to distinguish it from the score of illicit connections punished by law or branded by society. We find here almost a parallel to the question lately agitated in England among Episcopalians, as to the reason why the Church of England should be called a “church,” and not, like all other independent Protestant bodies, a “sect.” We ask, What is to distinguish such a “marriage” as our modern reformers advocate from the “liaisons” at which society pretends to be so virtuously shocked? Where is the intrinsic difference between a woman who sells her honor to many men at once and one who surrenders it to a single man at a time for just that period during which pleasure shall keep her constant to him?
Another form of attack upon the sanctity of marriage is the trade of the great journals in daily advertisements such as these, which meet our eyes every morning:
“Absolute divorces legally obtained in different states. Desertion, etc., sufficient cause. No publicity. No charge until divorce is obtained. Advice free.
——, Attorney, —— Broadway.”
Or, with slight variations, thus:
“Also Commissioner for every State.
——, Counsellor-at-Law,
—— Broadway.”
Here we see the press and the law conspiring to lend aid—and, more than that, encouragement—to the loosest and most devastating of passions. Then, again, the tone of the newspapers with regard to moral irregularities is a painful sign of the times. Thus we read in a great “daily”:
“Out West they call divorces ‘escapes.’A speedy and safe ‘escape’ is guaranteed for a very low figure, and, as usual, a great many parties figure for it.”
There is a levity about such remarks that is saddening, when taken in connection with the future of a great people.
The morbid curiosity of the public is thus excited under the convenient plea of satisfying it, while, with regard to the institution of marriage itself, the saying is exemplified, “Give a dog a bad name, and then shoot him.” Marriage is ridiculed, conjugal affection put down as antiquated, home-lovingness pitied as old-fashioned, family reunions voted dull, and, as a natural consequence, youth is more or less alienated from the unfashionable circle. It is easy, then, to turn on marriage as a principle, remove the stumbling-block altogether, paint in seductive colors a substitute for home, and familiarize the public with so-called legal but transient unions. Once this principle is established in the abstract, it will be merely a question of time as to its practical extension. Granted that a man or woman may change companions as often as they choose, who is to regulate how often? Like the husband of Scheherazade in the Arabian Nights, every day? Why not? Again, if one man may have many “wives,” why should not a woman have many “husbands”? And so on ad infinitum the license might spread unchecked, till there would be as many conflicting interpretations of marriage as there are already of the Bible. Absolute communism [pg 783] would be quite a logical sequence, and, in a society so utterly confused as to parentage, there could be little question as to inheritance!
Christian marriage, on the contrary, has both a social and a sanitary, as well as a religious aspect. It creates a strong and healthy race, and at the very outset of each man's career gives him a position by investing him with a responsibility. He feels that the pride which his old father and mother have in him must not be shamed; that the honor of his family is bound up in his actions; and that his behavior may influence for good or for evil both the moral and temporal prospects of his near kindred. A man so weighted feels a just pride, which, in default of higher motives, may even yet guide him into greatness; and though such a man may yield to temptation, fall into vice, and disgrace himself, so much at least of his early training will survive as to make him feel keenly the shame of his position. This alone has saved hundreds. It has been the serpent in the wilderness to many, but it would no longer be an imaginable motive were the ideal of Christian marriage, with its attendant responsibilities, to be swept away. There is another aspect under which the frequency of divorce and the condoned irregularities of intercourse between the sexes are a constant threat to public security—we mean in provoking murder. Three parts of the fearful murders committed in New York, and also in many other parts of the Union, are traceable more or less to ill-assorted marriages and a spirit of unchristian rebellion against lawful restraints. Lately there has been a glaring case in point, the details of which are fresh in the memory of every one. A man is deliberately shot dead on the very threshold of what is practically a “Divorce Court”; the murderer is a brutal husband incensed at the victim's testimony against himself. In 1872, three of the most famous New York “characters” figured in a terrible drama ending in death, imprisonment, and disgrace. What was the reason that set two of the most unscrupulous speculators in the world at deadly enmity? The disputed favor of a woman who, according to the new code, only asserts her rights, and claims to change “husbands” as often as she pleases. God help the age and nation in which such things are daily done, and where animal passion laughs in the teeth of law! Who does not see how every right and security hangs by the sanctity of marriage? Marriage, in the proper sense of the word, implies exclusive and permanent possession, and represents the first and greatest right of property. If that property is to be made movable, salable, takable, in a word, why not other less sacred and less valuable property also? “Property is theft,” say the socialists, and certainly it is, if we can previously agree to consider marriage so. If all kinds of possessions (life itself included) are to be thus transferable, every individual will be reduced to protect them single-handed against the world, and from this state of things will grow a monster system of organized murder and legalized rapine. The early Californian society would be nothing to this imaginary community.
In France, Italy, and Spain, the infamous laws not only encouraging but actually enforcing civil marriage are sapping the foundations of society; and in England, a country hitherto held as a model for its conjugal and homely tendencies, the tenets of “free-love” are making giant inroads into social life, and leavening the mass of everyday literature. [pg 784] Bigamy and divorce are almost worn-out sensations; they have supplied the ablest pens with thrilling subjects, and have furnished the best theatres with the only dramas that really “take.” Something new and more monstrous yet is needed, and the prurient imagination that shall first succeed in originating a new version of social sin will become the power of the moment.
Such is the present situation. We do not know if there ever has been a worse stage of immorality, except, perhaps, that before the Flood; for at all times of unparalleled license there have been some extenuating circumstances, of which we are afraid we must own ourselves bereft. In the beginning of the Christian era, license was confined to pagans; for in the tottering Roman Empire the Christians were all soldiers of the cross, and their watch for the Bridegroom was too eager to allow them time for temptation; in the transition state that followed, the church's power already made itself felt, and though barbarian kings still defied their pastors, the latter had at hand ecclesiastical terrors that seldom failed in the end to subdue the half-converted Goth or Lombard. In the days of the ill-starred Renaissance, when a spirit of neo-classicism threatened once more to deify sin under the garb of art, the Council of Trent sat in solemn judgment, and condemned abuses which had unhappily paved an easy way for heresy: while later on, even in the days of the wicked and brilliant court of Versailles, there was found a Bourdaloue to rebuke the public sinners who sat in the high places, and to eulogize Christian marriage in the midst of a gathering which seemed to have utterly forgotten its meaning.
Faith still lingered—the faith that made the middle ages what they were—that faith that condemned public sin to as public a penance, and out of great excesses drew great examples. Louise de la Vallière was almost the last representative of this mediæval spirit of generous atonement; and her heroic words, when told in her cloister of the death of her son, “I should weep rather for his birth than for his death,” were the genuine outcome of a faith that could restore a prostitute to innocence, and place upon a once guilty brow almost a virgin's crown.
With Voltaire, the work that Luther had begun was perfected, and henceforth it was not Europe that believed, but only a few scattered exiles who here and there kept the lamp of the faith dimly alight in the stifling atmosphere of universal and fashionable doubt. Even among believers the spirit of ready sympathy, with the slightest indication of the church's unspoken meaning was gone, and there remained only the too self-conscious effort of unquestioning loyalty. Still, thank God! it did and does remain, and, though shorn of all poetry, it is none the less vigorous in self-defence. But we may now say that indeed the flood has broken loose, the Philistines are upon us, the whole array of the world's newest forces is brought to bear against us, and behind her dismantled outposts the church retreats to her citadel, the naked Rock of Peter. Men say that the Council of the Vatican was inopportune, presumptuous, and imprudent; let the world's gracefully lapsing course be a living refutation to such words. Every outward stay is gone; every difficulty in the way of the reunion of pastors is trebled; every see is hedged about with physical bars that are insurmountable; nothing remains free but what cannot be fettered—the tongue. Who can wonder if the church, in this dire emergency, delegates to one [pg 785] man the power she can no longer collectively exercise in peace? As in old Flemish cities there sits up in the lonely belfry of the cathedral a watcher whose duty it is to guard the city against fire, and to warn the people through a brazen trumpet at which spot he descries the first appearance of danger, so in the heart of the City of God there sits now the watchman whose eye and voice are bound to raise the alarm and direct the remedies through the length and breadth of listening Christendom.
The Council of the Vatican has made the word of the Pope the brazen tocsin of the Christian world.
And now, having said so much of the possibilities opened up by the present lax spirit in morals and equally lax interpretation of what remains in the shape of legal restraints upon vice, let us speak of what Christian marriage ought to be. We will be brief, for the position almost defines itself. Of the indissolubility of marriage under all circumstances, even in the case of one of the parties breaking the marriage vow, we will not speak, nor even of the fidelity which marriage requires in every thought and slightest intention. But we would insist upon that which ensures a happy and holy union, namely, the preliminary motive. We have seen how bad marriages and an unworthy idea of this state of life lead to shame, to socialism, to violence, sometimes to a criminal ending in a common jail; let us see now what leads to bad marriages themselves. Two motives there are—one mercenary, and one sensual. We heard a very impressive Jesuit preacher say a few years ago, in the pulpit of one of the most beautiful and frequented churches in London, that to make a good marriage both prayer and seemly preparation are necessary. Some parents, he said, in their pious anxiety to leave all things to Providence, and to avoid that solicitude for worldly things which the Gospel condemns, neglect to avail themselves for their children of the allowable means and legitimate opportunities of social life; but to these he would say, Remember the words of Christ: “Not every one that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.”[238] On the other hand, many parents sinned far more grievously and—he was loth to say it—more frequently by altogether leaving the Creator out of the question in the serious matter of their children's settlement in life. Which of these two extremes is the prominent one in this country? We need not answer the question. We know too well how nine-tenths of those marriages are made which within a few months or years are broken in the divorce courts, or otherwise dissolved by a shameful esclandre. We know how wealth especially, position, associations, beauty, and accomplishments all rank before moral worth in what is called lightly but too truly the “marriage-market.” We know how marriage is looked forward to through girlhood, not as the assumption of a sacred responsibility, but as the preliminary step to emancipation; we know how it is heartlessly canvassed by men as an expensive but advantageous luxury, its cost being in proportion to the social figure it will enable them to make, but its essence of no deeper moral account to them than the purchase of one trotter or the undertaking of one speculation more or less. We do not say that there are no exceptions to this rule—far from it; but that is just the point: however honorable these cases are, the fact still remains that they are exceptions. Again, where the motive [pg 786] is not directly mercenary, it is often selfish; old men will marry for mere comfort, physical luxury, and the regularity of a well-appointed home—things which the presence of a handsome, thoughtful, and tolerably intellectual woman alone can ensure; women no longer young, but still hungering for the whirl of fashion, will marry unsuitably for the sake of an assured position and means to continue the frivolous course of their former lives; in fact, all shallow disguises of selfishness have their representatives in the “marriage-market,” from that of the millionaire who wants a wife to sit at the head of his table and wear his diamonds, to that of the day-laborer who wants one to cook his dinner, mend his clothes, and eke out his week's earnings by her own hard work. Marriages made in this spirit are unblest and always end badly: the millionaire will divorce his wife, and the laborer murder his in a fit of intoxication; the end is the same, the means differ only according as natural temperament and habits of education diverge.
How far otherwise with marriage in the true Scriptural, Christian sense of the word! In poverty or in riches, alike sacred and full of dignity; always conscious of its sacramental crown; ever mindful of its holy ministry, the salvation of two souls, the ladder to heaven of two lives that without it might have made shipwreck of their eternal interests! A thing apart from the common unions of earth, different from a commercial partnership, stronger than a political coalition, holier than even a spontaneous friendship. A thing which, like the riddle of Samson, is “sweetness out of strength,” and whose grace is so sublime that in heaven it can only find one transformation worthy of itself. “You err, not knowing the power of God; for in the resurrection they shall neither marry nor be married; but shall be as the angels of God in heaven.”[239] We are not told that the tie will be like brotherhood or like friendship; we are left to infer that between husband and wife some more peculiar link will exist hereafter than will be common to us all as children of the same Father, and it is plainly foretold that this relation will be as that of the angels towards each other.
We have only to look into the gospels and the teachings of the Apostle of the Gentiles to see by what means we may in the married state so sanctify our lives as to deserve this heavenly transformation; we have only to read the marriage-service to learn the plain, straightforward, but most solemn duties, the performance of which will secure us spiritual peace and joy in this life or the next. To use the sacrament worthily, we must come to it with worthy preparation and steadfast intention, first as Christians resolved never to perjure themselves before God, then as rational beings willing to abide by whatever unforeseen consequences their deliberate vow may entail in the future. For it is an idle pretext to allege that, if one party breaks the engagement, the other is de facto absolved from it. Where in the formula, Catholic or Protestant, is this proviso? The only qualifying sentence is this, “Until death do us part.” How, then, can any reasonable person interpret “death” to mean sin, incompatibility, or any other incidental unpleasantness? We think that those who are so ready to foist unwarrantable meanings on the plain and naked oath they have sworn in full possession of their senses at the altar, would hardly be the persons we should like to trust as men or women of unimpeachable [pg 787] honor in the ordinary transactions of life.
If mercenary motives are uppermost in the majority of marriages in this age and in this nation, sensuality is none the less responsible for a share of the misery attendant upon modern unions. We have already spoken of the evil of marriages founded on passion, and of the shameful way in which the colloquial adage, “Marry in haste, and repent at leisure,” is thus frequently illustrated. To this also the remedy lies in a serious Christian spirit of preparation for marriage. The root of all evil developments in the relations between the sexes lies in the early education of the contracting parties, and it is here that the only radical cure can be tried. The church bids her children be especially circumspect at the juncture of marriage, but she also teaches them to reverence the sacrament from childhood upward as a type of the union between herself and her divine Spouse. If, as children, marriage appears to us in the shape of the angel of home, watching over the existence it has created, and dignifying the parental authority it has built up; if in youth the goal of marriage is looked forward to as the toga virilis of life, the reward of a dutiful childhood, the ennobling badge of our enrolment among the soldiers of the cross, then and only then will our country find in us efficient citizens, earnest patriots, and reliable defenders. If among men there is revived the chivalrous spirit of deference and forbearance towards women which sealed the middle ages as a charmed cycle among all divisions of time, and among women there is cultivated that generous and true womanliness which made SS. Monica and Paula, and Blanche of Castille, the typical heroines of the wedded state, then may we expect to see “a new heaven and a new earth.” Marriage means reverence for each other on the part of the persons married, as representing in themselves the sacrament typical of Christ's union with the church; it means reverence for the children who are entrusted to their care by God and their country, and whom they are bound by the solemn adjuration of Christ not to scandalize; it means reverence for themselves, as the tabernacles of a special grace and the progenitors of new worshippers at God's feet, new subjects of the kingdom of heaven. It is the woman especially who is bound to feel and express this reverence, for woman is, as the French poetically say, the priestess of the ideal. Besides, the highest perfection ever reached in the married state was reached by a woman, the Blessed Virgin, Mother of God. Among married saints there have always been more women canonized than men. The women of a nation form the men; and, if marriage is to be reformed, it must be done first through the women. We hope and pray that it may soon be so, but we fear that outside the church, where the reform is, in the abstract, not needed, there is not sufficient impetus to ensure its being made. We say in the abstract, because practically there are many marriages made among Catholics, celebrated in Catholic churches, and decorously observed through the course of a blameless life, which yet call loudly for reform, and sadly lack the noble Christian spirit that made perfect the unions of Delphina and Eleazar, and of S. Louis of France and Margaret of Provence. But however deficient in some cases our practice may unhappily be, our doctrine remains ever unchanged, and our laws ever inflexible. Thanks to the church, marriage is still recognized as an act not purely animal nor yet purely civil; and, thanks to the infallibility of the church [pg 788] and her calm expectancy of eternal duration, it will remain to the end of time an honored institution. If threatened, it will still live; if derided, it will nevertheless conquer. Christian marriage is the mould in which God has chosen to throw the lava of natural passion, and without whose wholesome restraints we should have a shapeless torrent of licentiousness, scathing mankind with its poisonous breath, carrying away all landmarks of ancestry, property, and personal safety, and finally exterminating the human race long before the appointed time for the dread judgment in the Valley of Josaphat.