Transubstantiation had not polluted the table of the Lord by its presence; the mystery of the spiritual presence of the Lord in the Eucharist, appealing to faith, had not been replaced by the miracle, directed to the carnal senses. Images had no place in the house of God, picture worship was unknown. Confession of sins was practised, and penances were imposed, as tests of the sincerity of repentance; at the celebration of the Eucharist offerings were presented, in memory of the dead who in their lives had offered gifts to God; fasting was observed, but only from choice, and Sunday and the feast of Pentecost were the only festivals and holy-days observed. Gradually, however, after the alliance of the church with the state, and through the accession of converts from the heathen world, grosser elements mingled themselves with these observances; the superstition that the
spirits of the saints hovered around the mortal remains they had tenanted, led to the removal of their bodies from their tombs, and placing them within the walls of the church, and to the erection of shrines, where, first to offer up worship with them, afterwards to them.
And who among us cannot feel the poetry and truth that gave birth to this superstition? Who that has ever watched in the chamber of death the bursting of the earthly chrysalis, has not felt the soft touch of the spirit’s wing, has not been conscious of the presence of the spiritualized immortal, has not recognized the fragrance of the soul passing from its earthly habitation, and filling the air with the essence of its life, as the sweet scent of the flower when its perfect fruition has been accomplished, lingers around the leaves of the falling petals?
Who that has ever witnessed the laying down of life in ripened age, by some great and noble type of our humanity, in whose heart the lion and the lamb, the eagle and the dove have dwelt together, but has seemed to breathe an atmosphere laden with power and love, strength, beauty and gentleness, as the spirit passed forth at the call of Him who gave it birth? And who has ever seen the portals of the spirit world open before them, for one in whom all earthly trust, and confidence, and love were centred, but has felt that an angel guardian lived for them in
Heaven? Is there no plea for saint worship? But, alas! the poetry and the truth of the superstition became clouded, and were lost in the dark mists of ignorance and worldliness, and from their decay sprung up, like a fungus plant, the noxious idea of the efficacy of reliques, with the monstrous absurdities that accompanied their presence. Confession and penance merged into the sale of indulgences, purchased absolutions, and interdicts; the sleep of the dead, into a belief in purgatorial fires, voluntary seclusion from the gaieties and follies of the world, into forced separation from its active duties; saint worship, image worship, and picture worship gradually usurped the place of the worship of the one God; the cross, from a symbol grew into an idol, and emblems, vestments, and incense, losing their character, from the reality departing, whose presence they should only shadow forth, grew into mere accumulations of ceremonial, covering a decayed skeleton. In this process it is easy to trace the influence of Pagan superstition. As the heathen world gradually became converted to Christianity, objects in the new faith were sought out, around which to cluster the observances and rites of the old system. Thus the worship offered to Cybele, the great mother of the gods, who among the innumerable deities of ancient Rome was pre-eminent, was readily transferred to the madonna, from a fancied resemblance, and as
Juno, Minerva, Vesta, Pan, and others, were the especial guardians of women, olive trees, bakers, shepherds, &c. &c. So Erasmus, Teodoro, Genaro, and other saints received homage as the peculiar patrons of individuals or classes. The Genii, Lares, and Penates, occupying the Larrarium of the ancient houses, were replaced, or oftener rebaptized under the names of a madonna, saints or martyrs; the Emperor Alexander, the son of Mammaea, actually placed the image of Christ in his Larrarium, with his Lares and Penates. The Sacrarium took its origin hence. The Pagan had been accustomed to bring his hostia as a sacrifice to Jove; the convert found opportunity to engraft the idea on the commemorative service of the Eucharist.
Meantime church government had been going on in a floundering sort of way, groping about in the dark for authority on which to act, but having lost the apostleship and prophets, set in the church to rule and guide it, and to aid in the work of perfecting the saints, the pastors or bishops set about establishing a system to replace that given them from above—thence began divisions, schisms, and heresies without number, and as early as the commencement of the third century, we find the bishops holding synods as a means towards obtaining Catholic form of doctrine; gradually the bishops in whose provinces these synods were held, who were called metropolitans,
took precedence in rank to others, and thus those of Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria, came to be recognised as the heads or chiefs. After the removal of the seat of empire by Constantine, this principle extended itself in the western church at Rome, until the final assumption of temporal and spiritual power over all Christendom by Hildebrand, or Gregory VII., who, although not the first that bore the title of Pope, was the first who thoroughly established the power of the Papacy.
Another important feature of Christianity during these ages, was the progress of monasticism, which had steadily increased from the time of Anthony the Hermit, who fleeing from the corruptions and vanities of the world, had sought to prove and improve his sanctity, by retirement to a solitary cell, there to practise all manner of self tortures; in this laudable attempt he was followed by a host of others, each vying with his brother, as to which could attain the highest perfection in extravagant folly. Thus one lived on the top of a pillar, and was emulated by a whole tribe of pillar saints; another punished himself for killing a gnat, by taking up his abode in marshes where flies abounded, whose sting was sufficient to pierce the hide of a boar, and whose operations upon his person were such as to disfigure him so that his dearest friends could not recognise him; another class, the ascetics, carried on
their rigid system of self-denial in the midst of society, others wandered about as beggars, and were afterwards called mendicants, or wandering friars; but the anchorets, or pillar saints, attained the ultimatum of glory, in their elevation of sanctity on the top of their pillars. In progress of time these hermits began to associate themselves into fraternities; and as far back as the middle of the second century, we hear of a body of seventy, establishing themselves in the deserts of Nitria, by the Nitron lakes. It is told of St. Macarius, the head of this body, that having received a bunch of grapes, he sent it to another, who tasting one, passed it to another; he being like abstemious, sent it again forward to another, until, having gone the circuit, it reached Macarius again unfinished.