[82] Concilium Claromontanum, A.D. 1095, can. 11 (Labbe-Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum collectio, xx. 817):—“Ut nulli filii concubinarum ad ordines vel aliquos honores ecclesiasticos promoveantur, nisi monchaliter vel canonice vixerint in ecclesia.” See also supra, [i. 47].
[83] “Perit ergo et ipsa mente virginitas.” Katz, Grundriss des kanonischen Strafrechts, p. 114 sq. For the subject of kissing see also Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologica, ii.-ii. 154. 4.
[84] Laurent, Études sur l’histoire de l’Humanité, iv. 114.
In this, as in so many other points of morals, however, there is a considerable discrepancy between Christian doctrine and public opinion in Christian countries. The gross and open immorality of the Middle Ages indicates how little the idea of sexual purity entered into the manners and opinions of the people. The influence of the ascetic doctrine of the Church was in fact quite contrary to its aspirations. The institution of clerical celibacy lowered the estimation of virtue by promoting vice. During the Middle Ages unchastity was regarded as an object of ridicule rather than censure, and in the comic literature of that period the clergy are universally represented as the great corrupters of domestic virtue.[85] Whether the tenet of chastity laid down by the code of Chivalry was taken more seriously may be fairly doubted. A knight, it was said, should be abstinent and chaste;[86] he should love only the virtues, talents, and graces of his lady;[87] and love was defined as the “chaste union of two hearts by virtue wrought.”[88] But whilst the knight had certain claims as regards the virtue of his lady, whilst he probably was inclined to draw his sword only for a woman of fair reputation, and whilst he himself professed to aspire only to her lip or hand, we have reason to believe that the amours in which he indulged with her were of a far less delicate kind. Sainte-Palaye observes, “Jamais on ne vit les mœurs plus corrompues que du temps de nos Chevaliers, et jamais le règne de la débauche ne fut plus universel.”[89] For a mediæval knight the chief object of life was love. He who did not understand how to win a lady was but half a man; and the difference between a lover and a seducer was apparently slight. The character of the seducer, as Mr. Lecky remarks, and especially of the passionless seducer who pursues his career simply as a kind of sport, and under the influence of no stronger motive than vanity or a spirit of adventure, has for many centuries been glorified and idealised in the popular literature of Christendom in a manner to which there is no parallel in antiquity.[90]
[85] Wright, Essays on Archæological Subjects, ii. 238. Cf. Idem, History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments in England during the Middle Ages, pp. 54, 281, 420.
[86] Book of the Ordre of Chyualry, fol. 40.
[87] Sainte-Palaye, Mémoires sur l’ancienne Chevalerie, ii. 17.
[88] Mills, History of Chivalry, i. 214 sq.
[89] Sainte-Palaye, op. cit. ii. 19. Cf. Walter Scott, ‘Essay on Chivalry,’ in Miscellaneous Prose Works, vi. 48 sq.
[90] Lecky, op. cit. ii. 346. Cf. Delécluze, Roland ou la Chevalerie, i. 356.