Page images
PDF
EPUB

not unsatisfactory. In earlier ages, Latin, the language of prayer, was also the vulgar tongue of all western Christians; but as that grew into disuse, and became the object of study, instead of the vehicle of conversation, the greater part of the laity were unable to comprehend the offices of the church. Accordingly it was deemed necessary to distinguish between the educated and the wholly illiterate brethren; and, in pursuance of the principle, which then prevailed, of confining all learning to the sacred profession, the former were raised to the enjoyment of leisure and authority, the latter condemned to ignorance and servitude. This distinction, being earlier than the foundation of the Cistertian, Carthusian, and all subsequent orders, was admitted at once into their original constitution; and therefore, however. closely they might affect to imitate the most ancient models, there existed, from the very commencement, one essential peculiarity, in which they deviated from it.

According to the oldest practice, every monastery was governed by an abbot, chosen by the monks from their own

body, and ordained and instituted by the bishop of Papal Exemptions. the diocess. To the superintending authority of

the same the abbot was also subject; and thus abuses and contentions were readily repressed by the presence of a resident inspector. But when, in the progress of papal usurpation, those establishments were exempted from episcopal jurisdiction, and placed under the exclusive regulation of the Vatican, the facilities for corruption were multiplied; and a number of evils were created, which escaped the observation or correction of a distant and indulgent master. At the same time, the effect of this connexion was to infuse an entirely new spirit into the monastic system. Avarice, and especially ambition, took the place of those pious motives which certainly predominated in earlier days. The inmates of the cloister were associated in the grand schemes of the pontifical policy; they became its necessary and most obsequious instruments; they were exalted by its success, they were stained by its vices: and the successive reformations, which professed to renovate the declining fabric, were only vain attempts to restore its ancient character. They could at best only expect to repair its outward front, and replace the symbols of its former sanctity; the spirit, by which it had been really blessed and consecrated, was already departed from it.

[ocr errors]

Great complaints respecting monastic corruption were uttered both at the Council of Paris in 1212, and at that of the Lateran, which met three years afterwards. But, though some vigorous attempts were, on both those occasions, made to repress it, the counteracting causes were too powerful; and the evil continued to extend and become more poisonous during the times which followed. It is singular that, at the second of those councils, it was proclaimed as a great evil in the system, that new orders were too commonly established, and the forms of monasticism multiplied with a dangerous fertility. And therefore, lest their too great diversity should introduce confusion into the Church,' it was enacted that their future creation should be discouraged. This is considered by some Catholic writers to have been a provident regulation; since the jealousy among the rival congregations had by this time degenerated from pious emulation (if it ever possessed that character) into a mere conflict of evil passions. But whatever may have been the policy of the statute, it was at least treated in the observance with such peculiar contempt, that the institution of the Mendicants, the boldest of all the innovations in the annals of monachism, took place almost immediately afterwards.

SECTION III.

Canons Regular and Secular.

The order of monks was originally so widely distinct from that of clerks, that there were seldom found more than one or two ecclesiastics in any ancient convent. But presently, in the growing prevalence of the monastic life, persons ordained, or destined to the sacred profession, formed societies on similar principles; and as they were bound, though with less severity, by certain fixed canons, they were called, in process of time, Canonici*. The bishop of the diocese was their abbot and president. It is recorded that St. Augustine set the example of living with his clergy in one society, with community of property, according to the canons of the church; but he prescribed to them no vow, nor any other statutes for their observance, except such instructions as are found in his 109th Epistle t. Nevertheless, above a hundred and fifty religious congregations have in succeeding ages professed his rule and claimed his parentage, and assumed, with such slight pretensions, the authority of his venerable name. The true origin of the order is a subject of much uncertainty. Onuphrius, in his letter to Platina, asserts that it was instituted by Gelasius at Rome, about 495 †, and that it passed thence into other churches; and Dugdale appears to acquiesce in this opinion. It is, moreover, certain, that Chrodegangus, Bishop of Metz, prescribed a rule, about the year 750, to the Canons of his own reformation; and that he made some efforts, though not perhaps very effectually, to extend it more widely. Still some are not persuaded that societies of clerks were subject to one specified form of discipline, till the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle §, under the direction of Louis le Debonnaire, confirmed and completed the previous enactments of Mayence (in 813), and imposed on them one general and perpetual rule.

The plausible principle on which the order of canons was founded, to withdraw from the contagion of the world those who had peculiarly devoted themselves to the service of God, was found insufficient to preserve them from degeneracy. A division was early introduced (in Germany, according to Trithemius, and in the year 977), by which the reformed were separated from the unreformed members of the community, in name as well as in deed. The former, from their return to the original rule, assumed the appellation of Canons-Regular; the latter, who adhered to the abuse, were termed, in contradistinction, Canons-Secular; and this sort of schism extended to other countries, and became permanent in many.

* The term Canon originally included not only all professors of the monastic life, but the very Hierodules and inferior officers of the Church. Mosheim (on the authority of Le Bœuf, Mémoires sur l'Histoire d'Auxerre, vol. i. p. 174.) asserts that it became peculiar to clerical monks (Fratres Dominici) soon after the middle of the eighth century. But we should rather collect from the Histoire des Ordres Monastiques, that the distinction was not generally established till the eleventh age.

It should be observed, that this epistle, which is cited by ecclesiastical writers as containing instructions for an institution of Canons, was in fact addressed to a convent of refractory nuns, who had quarrelled with their Abbess, and exhibited some unbecoming violence in the dispute.

See Dugdale. De Canonorum Ordinis Origine. There may be found the Rule which St. Augustine is said to have prescribed.

The rule here published was borrowed, in many particulars, from that of St. Benedict. But the order still retained the name and banners of St. Augustine.-Hist. des Ordres Monastiques.

The discipline of the regular canons was more seriously enforced by Nicholas II. in the year 1059; and about eighty years later, Innocent II. ́subjected them to the additional obligation of a vow; for they seem hitherto to have been exempt from such profession. Nevertheless, in the course of the two following centuries, they once more relapsed into such abandoned licentiousness, as to require an entire reconstruction from Benedict XII. After that period, they rose into more consideration than in their earlier history they appear to have attained.

There were besides some other orders, both military and mendicant, which professed the rule, or rather the name, of St. Augustine-the Hospitallers, for instance, the Teutonic Knights, and the Hermits of St. Augustine. But they will be mentioned under those heads where we have thought it more convenient to place them, than to follow in this matter the perplexed method of the Historian of the Monastic Orders.'

·

SECTION IV.

On the Military Orders.

We have thus shortly mentioned the three grand religious Orders, which have been diversified by so many names and rules, and regenerated by so many reforms; which began in austerity, and yet fell into the most shameless debauchery; which arose in piety, and passed into wicked and lying superstition; which originated in poverty, and finally fattened on the credulity of the faithful, so as to spread their solid territorial acquisitions from one end of Christendom to the other. Founded on the genuine monastic principle of devout seclusion, so venerable to the ignorant and the vulgar, they presently surpassed the secular clergy in the reputation of sanctity, and in popular influence. Thus were they soon recommended to the Bishop of Rome; and in his ambition to exalt himself above his brother prelates, he discovered an efficient and willing instrument in the regular establishments. At an early period, he granted them protection, and patronage, and property, with the means of augmenting it: presently, he accorded to certain monasteries exemption from the episcopal authority; and in process of time, he extended that privilege to almost all. Thus he gradually constituted himself sole visitor, legislator, and guardian of the numberless religious institutions which covered the Christian world. The monks repaid these services by the most implicit obedience -for obedience was that of their three vows which they continued to respect the longest-and to their aid and influence may generally be ascribed the triumphs of the pontiff in his disputes with the secular clergy. In his contests with the State, they were not less necessary to his cause; for, as his success in those struggles usually depended on the divisions which he was enabled to sow among the subjects of his enemy, and the strength of the party which he could thus create, so the monks, in every nation in Europe, were his most powerful agents for that purpose. And thus, when we consider the victory, which the spiritual sometimes obtained over the temporal power, as a mere triumph of opinion over arins and physical force, we do indeed, at the bottom, consider it rightly; but our surprise at the result is much diminished, when we reflect how extensive a control over men's minds was everywhere possessed by the religious orders, how fearlessly and unsparingly they exercised that control, and with what persevering zeal it was directed to the support and aggrandisement of papal power.

The Benedictines and Augustinians were the standing army of the

Vatican, and they fought its spiritual battles with constancy and success for nearly six centuries. The first addition which was made to them was that of the Military orders; and this proceeded not from any sense of the insufficiency of the veteran establishments, nor from any distrust in them, but from circumstances wholly independent of those or any such causes. They arose in the agitation of the crusades, and they were nourished by the sort of spirit which first created those expeditions, and then caught from them some additional fury.

The union of the military with the ecclesiastical character was become common, in spite of repeated prohibitions, among all ranks of the clergy. It was exercised by the vices of the feudal system; which had given them wealth in enviable profusion, but which provided by no sufficient laws or strength of government for the protection of that which it had bestowedso that force was necessary to defend what had been lavished by superstition. The warlike habits which ecclesiastics seem really to have first acquired in the defence of their property, were presently carried forth by them into distant and offensive campaigns, and exhibited in voluntary feats of arms, to which loyalty did not oblige them, and for which loyalty itself furnished a very insufficient pretext. But these general excesses did not give birth to any distinct order professing to unite religious vows with the exercise of arms; and even the first of those, which did afterwards make such profession, was in its origin a pacific and charitable institution.

The Knights of the Hospital.

This was the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, or the Knights of the Hospital. About the year 1050, at the wish of some merchants of Amalfi trading with Syria, a Latin Church had been erected at Jerusalem, to which a hospital was presently added, with a chapel dedicated to the Baptist. When Godfrey de Bouillon took the city in 1099, he endowed the hospital: it then assumed the form of a new religious order, and immediately received confirmation from Rome, with a rule for its observance *. The revenues were soon found to exceed the necessities of the establishment; and it was then that the Grand Master changed its principle and design by the infusion of the military character.

The Knights of the Hospital were distinguished by three gradations. The first in dignity were the noble and military; the second were ecclesiastical, superintending the original objects of the institution; the third consisted of the 'Serving Brethren,' whose duties also were chiefly military. To the ordinary vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, they added the obligations of charity, fasting, and penitence: and, whatsoever laxity they may have admitted in the observance of them, they unquestionably derived from that profession some real virtues which were not shared by the fanatics who surrounded them; and they softened the savage features of religious warfare with some faint shades of unwonted humanity. So long as their residence was Jerusalem, they retained the peaceful name of Hospitallers; but they were subsequently better known by the successive appellations of Knights of Rhodes and of Malta. Faithful at least to one of the objects of their institution, they valiantly defended the outworks of Christendom against the progress of the invading Mussulman, and never sullied their arms by the massacre of Pagans or heretics.

*The rule of the Hospitallers (as confirmed by Boniface) may be found in Dugdale's Monasticon, vol. ii. p. 493.

The Knights Templars.

The Knights Templars received their name from their residence in the immediate neighbourhood of the Temple at Jerusalem. The foundations of this order were laid in the year 1118; and the rule, to which it was afterwards subjected, was from the pen of St. Bernard. This institution, both in its original purpose and prescribed duties, was exclusively military.-To extend the boundaries of Christendom, to preserve the internal tranquillity of Palestine, to secure the public roads from robbers and outlaws *, to protect the devout on their pilgrimage to the holy places-such were the peculiar offices of the Templar. They were discharged with fearlessness and rewarded by renown. Renown was followed by the most abundant opulence. Corruption came in its train; and on their final expulsion from Palestine, they carried back with them to Europe much of the wild unbridled license, which had been familiar to them in the East. But their unhappy fate, as it is connected with one of the most important periods in papal history, must be reserved for more particular mention in its proper place.

The Teutonic Order.

The Teutonic, or German Order, had its origin again in the offices of charity. During the siege of Acre, a hospital was erected for the reception of the sick and wounded. This establishment survived the occasion which created it; and, to confirm its character and its permanency, it obtained a rule (in 1192) from Celestine III., and a place among the 'Orders Hospitable and Military.' On the termination of the Crusades, these knights returned to Germany †, where they enjoyed considerable possessions; and soon afterwards, by a deviation from the purpose of their institution, which might seem slight perhaps in a superstitious age, they turned their consecrated arms to the conversion of Prussia.

That country, and the contiguous Pomerania, had hitherto resisted the peaceful exertions of successive missionaries, and continued to worship the rude deities, and follow the barbarous manners, of antiquity. But where the language of persuasion had been employed in vain, the disciplined valour of the Teutonic Knights prevailed. It was recompensed by the conquest of two rich provinces; and the faith which was inflicted upon the vanquished in the rage of massacre, was perpetuated under the deliberate oppression of military government. This event took place about the year 1230; but in another generation, when the memory of its introduction was effaced, the religion really took root and flourished, by the sure and legitimate authority of its excellence and its truth. After that celebrated exploit, the Teutonic Order continued to subsist in great estimation with the Church; and this patronage was repaid with persevering fidelity, until at length, when they perceived the grand consummation approaching, the holy knights generally deserted that tottering fortress, and arrayed their rebellious host under the banners of Luther.

An order, with a somewhat similar object, was founded in France about the year 1233, called the Order of the Glorious Virgin Mary. It was confined to young men of family, who associated themselves, under the title of Les Frères Joyeux, for the defence of the injured, and the preservation of public tranquillity. They took vows of obedience and conjugal chastity, and solemnly pledged themselves to the protection of widows and orphans.

In the treaty between the empire and the popedom in 1230, we find that the interests of the three military orders were expressly stipulated for by the Pope; and also, that certain places were held in sequestration by Herman, Master of the Teutonic Order until the Emperor should have fulfilled his part of the engagement. Fleury, l. 79. s. 64.

« PreviousContinue »