It is a remarkable fact that two great and renowned phases of life existed in the world parallel to each other, and went out by natural decay just at the same period: chivalry and monasticism. The latter was of elder birth, but as in the reign of Henry VIII. England saw the last of monasticism, so amid some laughter, mingled with a little forced seriousness, did she see the man who was overturning that old system vainly endeavoring to revive the worn-out paraphernalia of chivalry. The jousts and tournaments of Henry's time were the sudden flashing up of that once brilliant life, before its utter extinction. Both had been great things in the world--both had done great things, and both have left traces of their influence upon modern society and modern refinement which have not yet been obliterated, and perhaps never will be. It may then be interesting and instructive if we were to endeavor to compare the value of each by the work it did in the world. The origin of monasticism we have already traced; that of chivalry requires a few comments. Those who go to novels and romances for their history, have a notion that chivalry existed only in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, the periods chosen for the incidents of those very highly colored romances which belong to that order of writing. There is also a notion that it sprang out of the Crusades, which, instead of being its origin, were rather the result of the system itself. The real origin of chivalry may be fairly traced to that period when the great empire of the West was broken up and subdivided by the barbarians of the North. Upon the ruins of that empire chivalry arose naturally. The feudal system was introduced, each petty state had a certain number of vassals, commanded by different chiefs, on whose estates they lived, and to whom they swore fealty in return for their subsistence; these again looked up to the king as head.
By-and-bye, as the new form of life fell into working order, it became evident that these chiefs, with their vassals, were a power in themselves, and by combination might interfere with, if not overthrow, the authority of the king himself. Their continued quarrels amongst themselves were the only protection the king had against them, but gradually that ceased, and a time came when there was no occupation for the superfluous valor of the country; retainers lay about castleyards in all the mischief of idleness, drunken and clamorous; the kings not yet firmly seated on their thrones looked about for some current into which they might divert this dangerous spirit. The condition of things in the states themselves was bad enough; the laws were feebly administered; it was vain for injured innocence to appeal against the violence of power; the sword was the only lawgiver, and strength the only opinion. Women were violated with impunity, houses burned, herds stolen, and even blood shed without any possibility of redress for the injured. This state of things was the foundation of chivalry. [{164}] Instinctively led, or insidiously directed to it, strong men began to take upon themselves the honor of redressing grievances, the injured woman found an armed liberator springing up in her defence, captives were rescued by superior force, injuries avenged, and the whole system--by the encouragement of the petty kings who saw in this rising feeling a vent for the idle valor they so much dreaded--soon consolidated itself, was embellished and made attractive by the charm of gallantry, and the rewards accorded to the successful by the fair ladies who graced the courts. Things went on well, and that dangerous spirit which threatened to overturn royalty now became its greatest ornament. In process of time it again outgrew its work, and with all the advantages of organization and flatteries of success, it once more became the tenor of the crowned heads of Europe. At this crisis, however, an event occurred which, in all probability, though it drained Europe of half her manhood, saved her from centuries of bloodshed and anarchy; that event was the banishment of the Christians and the taking of Jerusalem by the Saracens. Here was a grand field for the display of chivalry. Priestly influence was brought to bear upon the impetuous spirits of these chevaliers, religious fervor was aroused, and the element of religious enthusiasm infused into the whole organization; fair ladies bound the cross upon the breasts of their champions, and bid them go and fight under the banners of the Mother of God. The whole continent fired up under the preaching of Peter the Hermit; all the rampant floating chivalry of Europe was aroused, flocked to the standards of the church, and banded themselves together in favor of this Holy War; whilst the Goth, the Vandal, and the Lombard, sitting on their tottering thrones, encouraged by every means in their power this diversion of the prowess they had so much dreaded, and began to see in the troubles of Eastern Christianity a fitting point upon which to concentrate the fighting material of Europe out of their way until their own position was more thoroughly consolidated. The Crusades, however, came to an end in time, and Europe was once more deluged with bands of warriors who came trooping home from Eastern climes changed with new ideas, new traditions, and filled with martial ardor. But now the Goth, the Vandal, and the Lombard had made their position secure, and the knights and chieftains fell back naturally upon their old pursuit of chivalry, took up arms once more in defence of the weak and injured against the strong and oppressive. That valor which had fought foot to foot with the swarthy Saracen, had braved the pestilence of Eastern climes and the horrors of Eastern dungeons, soon enlisted itself in the more peaceable lists of the joust and tournament, and went forth under the inspiration of a mistress's love-knot to do that work which we material moderns consign to the office of a magistrate and the arena of a quarter sessions.
It was in this later age of chivalry, when the religious element had blended with it, and it was dignified with the traditions of religious championship, that the deeds were supposed to be done which form the subject of those wonderful romances;--that was more properly the perfection of the institution; its origin lay, as we have seen, much further back.
As regards the difference between the work and influence of chivalry and monasticism, it is the same which always must exist between the physical and the moral--the one was a material and the other was a spiritual force. The orders of chivalry included all the physical strength of the country, its active material; but the monastery included all its spiritual power and thinking material. Chivalry was the instrument by which mighty deeds were done, but the intellect which guided, directed, and in [{165}] fact used that instrument was developed and matured in the seclusion of the cloister. By the adoption of a stringent code of honor as regards the plighted word, and a gallant consideration toward the vanquished and weak, chivalry did much toward the refinement of social intercommunication and assuaging the atrocities of warfare. By the adoption, also, of a gentle bearing and respectful demeanor toward the opposite sex, it elevated woman from the obscurity in which she lay, and placed her in a position where she could exercise her softening influence upon the rude customs of a half-formed society; but we must not forget that the gallantry of chivalry was, after all, but a glossing over with the splendors of heroism the excrescences of a gross licentiousness--a licentiousness which mounted to its crisis in the polished gallantry of the court of Louis XIV. Monasticism did more for woman than chivalry. It was all very well for preux chevaliers to go out and fight for the honor of a woman's name whom they had never seen; but we find that when they were brought into contact with woman they behaved with like ruthless violence to her whatever her station may have been--no matter whether she was the pretty daughter of the herdsman, or the wife of some neighboring baron, she was seized by violence, carried off to some remote fortress, violated and abandoned. Monasticism did something better, it provided her when she was no longer safe, either in the house of her father or her husband, with an impregnable shelter against the licentious pursuit of these preux chevaliers; it gave her a position in the church equal to their own; she might become the prioress or the lady abbess of her convent; she was no longer the sport and victim of chivalrous licentiousness, but a pure and spotless handmaiden of the Most High--a fellow-servant in the church, where she was honored with equal position and rewarded with equal dignities--a far better thing this than chivalry, which broke skulls in honor of her name, whilst it openly violated the sanctity of her person. It may be summed up in a sentence. Monasticism worked long and silently at the foundation and superstructure of society, whilst chivalry labored at its decoration.
When we mention the fact that the history of the mere literary achievements of the Benedictine order fills four large quarto volumes, printed in double columns, it will be readily understood how impossible it is to give anything like an idea of its general work in the world in the space of a short summary. That book, written by Zeigelbauer, and called "Historia Rei Literariae Ordinis Sancti Benedicti," contains a short biography of every monk belonging to that order who had distinguished himself in the realms of literature, science, and art. Then comes Don Johannes Mabillon with his ponderous work, "Acta Sanctorum Ordinis Sancti Benedicti." These two authorities gave a minute history of that marvellous institution, of whose glories we can only offer a faint outline.
The Benedictines, after the death of their founder, steadily prospered, and as they prospered, sent out missionaries to preach the truth amongst the nations then plunged in the depths of paganism. It has been estimated that they were the means of converting upwards of thirty countries and provinces to the Christian faith. They were the first to overturn the altars of the heathen deities in the north of Europe; they carried the cross into Gaul, into Saxony and Belgium; they placed that cross between the abject misery of serfdom and the cruelty of feudal violation; between the beasts of burden and the beasts of prey--they proclaimed the common kinship of humanity in Christ the Elder Brother.
Strange to say, some of its most distinguished missionaries were natives of our own country. It was a [{166}] Scottish monk, St. Ribanus, who first preached the gospel in Franconia--it was an English monk, St. Wilfred, who did the same in Friesland and Holland in the year 683, but with little success--it was an Englishman, St. Swibert, who carried the cross to Saxony, and it was from the lips of another Englishman, St. Ulfred, that Sweden first heard the gospel--it was an Englishman and a Devonshire man, St. Boniface, who laid aside his mitre, put on his monk's dress, converted Germany to the truth, and then fell a victim to the fury of the heathen Frieslanders, who slaughtered him in cold blood. Four Benedictine monks carried the light of truth into Denmark, Sweden, and Gothland, sent there in the ninth century by the Emperor Ludovicus Pius. Gascony, Hungary, Lithuania, Russia, Pomerania, are all emblazoned on their banners as victories won by them in the fight of faith; and it was to the devotion of five martyr monks, who fell in the work, that Poland traces the foundation of her church.
It is a remarkable fact in the history of Christianity, that in its earliest stage--the first phase of its existence--its tendency was to elevate peasants to the dignity of apostles, but in its second stage it reversed its operations and brought kings from their thrones to the seclusion of the cloister--humbled the great ones of the earth to the dust of penitential humility. Up to the fourth century Christianity was a terrible struggle against principalities and powers: then a time came when principalities and powers humbled themselves at the foot of that cross whose followers they had so cruelly persecuted. The innumerable martyrdoms of the first four centuries of its career were followed by a long succession of' royal humiliations, for, during the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries, in addition to what took place as regards other orders, no less than ten emperors and twenty kings resigned their crowns and became monks of the Benedictine order alone. Amongst this band of great ones the most conspicuous are the Emperors Anastasius, Theodosius, Michael, Theophilus, and Ludovicus Pius. Amongst the kings are Sigismund of Burgundy, Cassimir of Poland, Bamba of Spain, Childeric and Theodoric of France, Sigisbert of Northumberland, Ina of the West Saxons, Veremunde of Castille, Pepin of Italy, and Pipin of Acquitaine. Adding to these their subsequent acquisitions, the Benedictines claim up to the 14th. century the honor of enrolling amongst their number twenty emperors and forty-seven kings: twenty sons of emperors and forty-eight sons of kings--amongst whom were Drogus, Pipin, and Hugh, sons of Charlemagne; Lothair and Carlomen, sons of Charles; and Fredericq, son of Louis III. of France. As nuns of their order they have had no less than ten empresses and fifty queens, including the Empresses Zoa Euphrosyne, St. Cunegunda, Agnes, Augusta, and Constantina; the Queens Batilda of France, Elfreda of Northumberland, Sexburga of Kent, Ethelberga of the West Saxons, Ethelreda of Mercia, Ferasia of Toledo, Maud of England. In the year 1290 the Empress Elizabeth took the veil with her daughters Agnes, queen of Hungary, and the Countess Cueba; also Anne, queen of Poland, and Cecily, her daughter. In the wake of these crowned heads follow more than one hundred princesses, daughters of kings and emperors. Five Benedictine nuns have attained literary distinction--Rosinda, St. Elizabeth, St. Hildegardis, whose works were approved of by the Council of Treves, St. Hiltrudis, and St. Metilda.
For the space of 239 years 1 month and 26 days the Benedictines governed the church in the shape of 48 popes chosen from their order, most prominent among whom was Gregory the Great, through whose means the rule was introduced into England. Four of these pontiffs came from the original [{167}] monastery of Monte Cassino, and three of them quitted the throne and resumed the monastic life--Constantine II., Christopher I., and Gregory XII. Two hundred cardinals had been monks in their cloisters--they produced 7,000 archbishops, 15,000 bishops, fifteen of whom took off their mitres, resumed their monks' frock, and died in seclusion; 15,000 abbots; 4,000 saints. They established in different countries altogether 87,000 monasteries, which sent out into the world upwards of 15,700 monks, all of whom attained distinction as authors of books or scientific inventors. Rabanus established the first school in Germany. Alcuin founded the University of Paris, where 30,000 students were educated at one time, and whence issued, to the honor of England, St. Thomas à Becket, Robert of Melun, Robert White, made cardinal by Celestine II., Nicholas Broakspear, the only Englishman ever made Pope, who filled the chair under the title of Adrian IV., and John of Salisbury, whose writings give us the best description of the learning both of the university and the times. Theodore and Adrian, two Benedictine monks, revived the University of Oxford, which Bede, another of the order, considerably advanced. It was in the obscurity of a Benedictine monastery that the musical scale or gamut--the very alphabet of the greatest refinement of modern life--was invented, and Guido d'Arezzo, who wrested this secret from the realms of sound, was the first to found a school of music. Sylvester invented the organ, and Dionysius Exiguus perfected the ecclesiastical computation.
England in the early periods of her history contributed upwards of a hundred sons to this band of immortals, the most distinguished of whom we will just enumerate--St. Cuthbert, bishop of Lindisfarne, whose life Bede has written, and whose "Ordinationes" and "De Vita Monastica" have reached to our times. St. Benedict Biscop, the founder of the monasteries of St. Peter and St. Paul, at Wearmouth and Jarrow, a nobleman by birth, and a man of extraordinary learning and ability, to whom England owes the training of the father of her ecclesiastical history, the Venerable Bede. St. Aldhelm, nephew of King Ina, St. Wilfrid, St Brithwald, a monk of Glastonbury, elevated to the dignity of Archbishop of Canterbury, which he held over thirty-seven years. His works which have come down to us are a "Life of St. Egwin, bishop of Worcester," and the "Origin of the Monastery of Evesham." Tatwin, who succeeded him in the archbishopric. Bede the Venerable, who was skilled in all the learning of the times, and; in addition to Latin and Greek, was versed in Hebrew; he wrote an immense number of works, many of which are lost, but the best known are the greater portion of the "Saxon Chronicle," which was continued after his death as a national record; and his "Ecclesiastical History," which gives to England a more compendious and valuable account of her early church than has fallen to the lot of any other nation. He was also one of the earliest translators of the Scriptures, and oven on his death-bed dictated to a scribe almost up to the final moment; when the last struggle came upon him he had reached as far as the words, "But what are they among so many," in the sixth chapter of St. John's Gospel, and the ninth verse. St. Boniface, already alluded to as the apostle of Germany, was a native of Devonshire. He was made Archbishop of Mentz, but being possessed with an earnest longing to convert the heathen Frieslanders, he retired from his archbishopric, and putting on his monk's dress took with him no other treasure than a book he was very fond of reading, called "De Bono Mortis," went amongst these people, who cruelly beat him to death in the year 755; and the book stained with his blood [{168}] was cherished as a sacred relic long after. Alcuin, whom we have already mentioned as the founder of the University of Paris, was a Yorkshireman, and was educated under Bede. He lived to become the friend of Charlemagne, and next to his venerable master was the greatest scholar and divine in Europe; he died about the year 790. John Asser, a native of Pembrokeshire, is another of these worthies. It is supposed that Alfred endowed Oxford with professors, and settled stipends upon them, under his influence, he being invited to the court of that monarch for his great learning. He wrote a "Commentary" upon Boethius de Consolatione Philosophiae, the "Life of King Alfred," and the "Annals of Great Britain." St. Dunstan, a monk of Glastonbury, the best known of all these great Englishmen, died Archbishop of Canterbury; but as we shall have much to say of him hereafter we pass on to St. Ethelwold, his pupil, also a monk at Glastonbury, distinguished for his learning and piety, for which he was made abbot of the Monastery of Abingdon, where he died in the year 984. Ingulphus, a native of London, was made Abbot of Croyland, in Lincolnshire, in the year 1075. A history of the abbey over which he presided has been attributed to him, but its authenticity has been gravely disputed. Alfric, a noted grammarian. Florence, of Worcester, was another great annalist, who in his "Chronicon ex Chronici" brings the history down to the year 1119, that in which he died; his book is chiefly valuable as a key to the "Saxon Chronicle." William, the renowned monk of Malmesbury, the most elegant of all the monastic Latinists, was born about the time of the Norman Conquest. His history consists of two parts, the "Gesta Regum Anglorum," in five books, including the period between the arrival of the Saxons and the year 1120. The "Historia Novella," in three books, brings it down to the year 1142. He ranks next to Bede as an historic writer, most of the others being mere compilers and selectors from extant chronicles. He also wrote a work on the history of the English bishops, called "De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum," in which he speaks out fearlessly and without sparing: also a treatise on the antiquity of Glastonbury Abbey, "De Antiquitate Glastoniensis Ecclesiae;" his style is most interesting, and he is supposed to have written impartially, separating the improbable from the real, and gives us what can readily be appreciated as a fair and real picture of the state of things, more especially of the influence and policy of the Norman court, and the opening of the struggle between the two races. Eadmer was another contemporaneous celebrity with William of Malmesbury; he was the author of a history of his own times, called "Historia Novorum sive Sui Secula," which is spoken of very highly by William of Malmesbury; it contains the reigns of William the Conqueror and Rufus, and a portion of that of Henry I., embracing a period extending from 1066 to 1122. Matthew Paris, another historian who lived about the year 1259, closes our selection from the long list of British worthies who were members of the Benedictine order.