There is no art too rough or primitive, or even too vulgar, for the Church to disdain, if it offers the only medium of conveying her truth to certain minds. Though custom has made it classical, her liturgical language, whether Latin or Greek, when first assumed, was that of the mob—about as elegant as we consider the dialects of the peasantry. She did not use plain-chaunt for any of those reasons which antiquarians and ecclesiologists urge in its favour now-a-days, but because it was the only music then in vogue. Even to-day the breeziest popular melodies in the East are suggestive of the Oratio Jeremiæ. Her vestments (even Gothic vestments!) were once simply the "Sunday best" of the fashion of those days. If to-day these things have a different value and excellence, it is in obedience to the law by which what is "romantic" in one age becomes "classical" in the next, or what is at first useful and commonplace becomes at last ceremonial and symbolic; and by which the common tongue of the vulgar comes by mere process of time to be archaic and stately. To "create" ancient custom and ritual on a sudden, or to resuscitate abruptly that which has lapsed into oblivion, is, to say the least, a very Western idea, akin to the pedantry of trying to restore Chaucer's English to common use. Nascitur non fit, is the law in all such matters.
While we assert the Church's independence of any one in particular of these means of self-expression, her indifference to style and mode of speech so long as substantial fidelity is secured, we must not deny that some of them are, of their own nature, more apt to her purpose than others and allow a fuller revelation of her sense; and that in proportion as her influence is strong in the world she tends to modify human thought and language, to leaven philosophy and fine art, so as to form by a process of selection and refusal, and in some measure even to create, an ever richer and more flexible medium of utterance.
In this sense we can with some caution speak of "Catholic art" in music, architecture, and painting, so far, that is, as we can determine the extent and nature of the Church's action, and therefore the tendency of her influence in the way of stimulus and restraint with regard to subject and treatment. We do not unjustly discern an author's style as a personal element distinct from the language and phraseology of which no item is his own. The manner in which he uses that language, his selections and refusals make, in union with the borrowed elements, a tongue that may be called his, in an exclusive sense. The Church, too, has her style, which, though difficult to discern amid her use of a Pentecostal variety of languages, is no doubt always the same—at least in tendency.
Salvation-Army worship is certainly not of the Church's style, but I do not think, were there no absolute irreverence and scandal to be feared, that she would hesitate to use such a language, were it the only one understood by such a people. St. Francis Xavier's "catechisms" were often hardly less uncouth. Still, her whole tendency would be towards restraint, order, and exterior reverence. Again, the stoical coldness and formalism of a liturgical worship, centered round no soul-stirring mystery of Divine love where there can be feeling so strong as to need the restraint of liturgy and ritual, has still less of the Church's style about it. For she is human, not merely in her reason and self-restraint, but in the fulness of her passion and enthusiasm; and restraint is only beautiful and needful where there is something to restrain.
We are now in a position to consider the surface objection that will present itself to many a reader concerning Durtal's conversion. "He has been converted," it will be said, "by a fallacy. He has identified the Catholic religion with the cause of plain-chaunt and Gothic architecture, and of all that is, or that he considers to be, best in art. He has laid hold not of Catholicism, but of its merest accessories, which it might shake off any day, and him along with them. Indeed, he scarcely makes any pretence at being in sympathy with the Catholicism of to-day, which he regards as almost entirely philistine and degenerate, if we except La Trappe and Solesmes and a few other corners where the old observances linger on. 'It was so ugly, so painfully adorned with images, that only by shutting his eyes could Durtal endure to remain in Notre Dame de la Brèche.' Yes, but what sort of convert is this who is so insensible to substantials, so morbidly sensitive about mere accidentals? We come to the Church for the true faith and the sacraments, not for 'sensations.' In fine, Durtal has not observed the route prescribed by the apologetics for reaching the door of the sheep-fold, but has climbed over in his own way, like a thief and a robber; he has not (as a recent critic says of him) tombé entre les bras maternals de l'Eglise selon toutes les régles."
Without for a moment denying one of the legitimate claims of scientific apologetic, we may at once dismiss the idea that it pretends to represent a process through which the mind of the convert to Christianity either does or ought necessarily to pass. Its sole purport is to show that if it is not always possible to synthetize Christianity with the current philosophy, science, and history of the day, at least no want of harmony can be positively demonstrated. As secular beliefs and opinions are continually shifting, so too apologetic needs continual adjustment: and as that of a century back is useless to us now, so will ours be in many ways inadequate a century hence. It is fitting for the Church at large that she should in each age and country have a suitable apologetic, taking cognizance of the latest developments of profane knowledge. It is needful for her public honour in the eyes of the world that she should not seem to be in contradiction with truth, but that either the apparent truth should be proved questionable, or else that her own teaching should be shown to be compatible with it. But in no sense is such apologetic always a necessity for the individual, still less a safe or adequate basis for a solid conversion, which in that case would be shaken by every new difficulty unthought of before.
Our subjective faith in the Church must be like the faith of the disciples of Christ, an entirely personal relation; an act of implicit trust based on no lean argument or chain of reasoning, but on the irresistible spell, the overmastering impression created upon us by a character manifested in life, action, speech, even in manner; as impossible to state in its entirety and as impossible to doubt as are our reasons for loving or loathing, for trusting or fearing.
No doubt we hear of men of intellect and learning "reading" or "reasoning" themselves into the Church; but others as able have read and reasoned along the same line, and yet have not come; for in truth, reason at the most can set free a force of attraction created by motives other than reason.
What this attraction is in each case is impossible to specify accurately—"Ask me and I know not," one might say, "do not ask me and I know." Each soul is hooked with its own bait, called by its own name, drawn in its own way; and as the attractiveness of Christ is virtually infinite in its multiformity, so is that of His Church, nor is there a more unpardonable narrowness than that of insisting that others shall be drawn in the same way as we ourselves, or not at all.
Let it also be noticed that a very prolonged and minute intimacy is not always necessary in order that we should feel the spell of personality. Much depends on our own gifts of sympathy, insight and apprehension, on the simplicity and strength of the personality in question, on the nature of the incidents by which it is disclosed to us. We know one man in a moment, another only after years of intimacy, while others in regard to the same individuals might experience the converse. We must not then suppose that because in one case the impression is the result of slowly-accumulated observations, and in another the work of an instant, it is less trustworthy in the latter instance than in the former. It may be, or it may not be. St. Augustine needed years to feel the spell that one word, nay, one glance from Christ cast upon St. Peter. Nor again is it always in some striking and notable crisis that a character reveals itself abruptly, but often in the merest nuance—a manner, an intonation, something quite unintentional, unpremeditated. We know well, if we know ourselves at all, how irresistible is the impression created on us at times by such trifles, and yet how more than reasonable it often is.