We have an example of this class in an invocation addressed to St. Ambrose on his day, December 7; the very servant of Christ in whose hymns and prayers no address of prayer or invocation to any saint or martyr can be found.
"O thou most excellent teacher, the light of the Holy Church, O blessed Ambrose, thou lover of the divine law, deprecate for us [or intercede for us with] the Son of God[97]."
Footnote 97:[(return)]
H. 438. "Deprecare pro nobis Filium Dei." This invocation to Ambrose is instantly followed by this prayer to God: "O God, who didst assign to thy people the blessed Ambrose as a minister of eternal salvation, grant, we beseech Thee, that we may deserve to have him as our intercessor in heaven, whom we had as a teacher of life on earth."
The Church of Rome has wisely availed herself of the pious labours of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan; and has introduced into her public worship many of the hymns usually ascribed to him. Would she had followed his example, and addressed her invocations to no one but our Creator, our Redeemer, and our Sanctifier! Could that holy man hear the supplications now offered to him, and could be make his voice heard in return among those who now invoke him, that voice, we believe, would only convey a prohibitory monition like that of the Angel to St. John when he fell down before him, See thou do it not; I am thy fellow-servant; worship God.
It is needless to multiply instances of this fifth kind of invocation. In the "Litany of the Saints" more than fifty different saints are enumerated by name, and are invoked to pray and intercede for those who join in it. Among the persons invoked are Raphael [Æ. cxcii.], Gervasius, Protasius, and Mary Magdalene; whilst in the Litany [Æ. cxcvi.] for the recommendation of the soul of the sick and dying, the names of Abel, and Abraham, are specified.
Under this head I will call your attention only to one more example. Indeed I scarcely know whether this hymn would more properly be classed under this head, or reserved for the next; since it appears to partake of the nature of each. It supplicates the martyr to obtain by his prayers spiritual blessings, and yet addresses him as the person who is to grant those blessings. It implores him to liberate us by the love of Christ; but so should we implore the Father of mercies himself. Still, as the more safe course, I would regard it as a prayer to St. Stephen only to intercede for us. But it may be well to derive from it a lesson on this point; how easily the transition glides from one false step to a worse; how infinitely wiser and safer it is to avoid evil in its very lowest and least noxious appearance:
"Martyr of God [or Unconquered Martyr], who, by following the only Son of the Father, triumphest over thy conquered enemies, and, as conqueror, enjoyest heavenly things; by the office of thy prayer wash out our guilt; driving away the contagion of evil; removing the weariness of life. The bands of thy hallowed body are already loosed; loose thou us from the bands of the world, by the love of the Son of God [or by the gift of God Most High]." [H. 237.]
In the above hymn the words included within brackets are the readings adopted in the last English edition of the Roman Breviary; and in this place, when we are about to refer to many hymns now in use, it may be well to observe, that in the present day we find various readings in the hymns as they are still printed for the use of Roman Catholics in different countries. In some instances the changes are curious and striking. Grancolas, in his historical commentary on the Roman Breviary (Venice, 1734, p. 84), furnishes us with interesting information as to the chief cause of this diversity. He tells us that Pope Urban VIII., who filled the papal throne from 1623 to 1644, a man well versed in literature, especially in Latin poetry, and himself one of the distinguished poets of his time, took measures for the emendation of the hymns in the Roman Breviary. He was offended by the many defects in their metrical composition, and it is said that upwards of nine hundred and fifty faults in metre were corrected, which gave to Urban occasion to say that the Fathers had begun rather than completed the hymns. These, as corrected, he caused to be inserted in the Breviary. Grancolas proceeds to tell us that many complained of these changes, alleging that the primitive simplicity and piety which breathed in the hymns had been sacrificed to the niceties of poetry. "Accessit Latinitas, et recessit pietas." The verse was neater, but the thought was chilled.
VI. But the Roman Church by no means limits herself to this kind of invocation; prayers are addressed to saints, imploring them to hear, and, as of themselves, to grant the prayers of the faithful on earth, and to release them from the bands of sin, without any allusion to prayers to be made by those saints. It grieves me to copy out the invocation made to St. Peter on the 18th of January, called the anniversary of the Chair of St. Peter at Rome; the words of our Blessed Lord himself, and of his beloved and inspired Apostle, seem to rise up in judgment against that prayer, and condemn it. It will be well to place that hymn addressed to St. Peter, side by side with the very word of God, and then ask, Can this prayer be safe?
1. Now, O good Shepherd, 1. Jesus saith, I am the good merciful Peter, Shepherd. John x. 11.
2. Accept the prayers of us 2. Whatsoever ye shall ask in who supplicate, my name, that will I do. That whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he may give it you. John xiv. 13; xv. 16.
3. And loose the bands of our 3. The blood of Jesus Christ sins, by the power committed to his Son cleanseth us from all sin. thee, 1 John i. 7.
4. By which thou shuttest 4. These things saith he that heaven against all by a word, is holy, he that is true, he that and openest it[98]. openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man openeth. Rev. iii. 7.
I am he that liveth and was dead, and am alive for evermore, and have the keys of hell and of death. Rev. i. 18.