Volume 18 — CHAPTER III. (continued 4)

The second wound of man in his fallen state is denominated concupiscence. In the system of Jansenius "it is a movement of the soul which leads to the enjoyment of self and of other creatures for some other end than God. It is, therefore, an affection of the soul contrary to order, and bad in itself. Hence it is that man without grace (that is, deprived of grace), and under the slavery of sin, since cupidity reigns in his heart, whatever effort he may make to withdraw himself from its influence, refers everything to himself, and by the general influence of the love which dominates him, spoils and corrupts all his actions."[220] This error of Jansenius has been stigmatized as it deserves in the bulls directed against Baius and Quesnel.[221] These writers present the error under forms the most various; for example, "All that man does without grace is sin. All the works of infidels are sins. The sinner, without grace, is free only for evil."

According to Catholic doctrine, man by his fall has become the slave of sin, and has from himself only sin and falsehood, in the sense that of himself he is for ever incapable of justifying himself from the stain of original sin and from the sins he has voluntarily committed; he can do nothing, absolutely nothing, towards his supernatural destiny; his weakness is so great that, without assistance from on high, he cannot but fall frequently and grievously, especially when assailed by powerful temptations. In these truths there are motives enough for humbling our pride, without needing to go so far as the Jansenists, and say that the necessity of our sinning is an absolute and continual necessity. This theory would be less repulsive if, with the fathers, the abundance of grace were also proclaimed. Christ's redemption, the latter tell us, embraces all time; but his grace is more palpable to us in these days, and more generally diffused. Divine assistance is always at hand, say they unanimously, at the moment it is wanted; so that man can at least call upon God for help, and thus obtain the strength of which he stands in need. Jansenius, on the contrary, pitilessly restrains the measure of liberating grace. Let us hear what the Synod of Pistoia has to say on this subject:

"The Lord willed that, before this plenitude of time [the time of our Saviour's appearance upon earth], mankind should pass through different states. It was his will that man, abandoned to his own lights, should learn to distrust his blind reason, and that his wanderings should thus lead him to desire the assistance of a superior light. This was the state of nature in which man knew not sin, and suffered himself to be drawn by concupiscence without being aware of it."[222] Thus, then, there was a long series of centuries in which mankind in general were abandoned to ignorance and cupidity, and when, without knowing it, without wishing it, they fell from sin to sin. Is this not frightful? But what follows is still more cruel: "God then gave him a law which brought him to a knowledge of sin. But man, being POWERLESS to observe it, became a prevaricator under the law. Sin became even more widespread, either because the law forbidding it heightened the desire for it, or because prevarication—that is, contempt of the law—was added to its violation.... The law, therefore, was given by God, ... not to heal the wounds of mankind, but to acquaint him with the malady and with the necessity of a remedy."[223] Thus viewed, the law of Sinai is an injustice and a subject of derision.

Finally, "The Son of God descended from the bosom of his Father and brought salvation."[224] Now, at least, grace, like a current of life, will pass into the veins of languishing humanity! Alas! no; the further we advance the more disheartening becomes the doctrine of Jansenius. He acknowledges at the outset that progress in the individual follows the same course as in the species. I will explain his thought: many men, even under the Christian law, have not the gift of faith—they are in the state of nature; others are enlightened by the rays of divine revelation or by the interior light of grace—they are in a state analogous to that of men under the law. "While earthly love reigns in the heart, the light of grace, if it be alone, produces the same effect as the law.... It is necessary, therefore, that the Lord should create in the heart a holy love, that he should inspire it with a holy delectation, contrary to the love which reigns there. This holy love, this holy delectation, is, properly speaking, the grace of Jesus Christ; it is the grace of the New Testament.... Dominant love is a holy passion which operates in man, in regard to God, the same effects which dominant cupidity operates therein in regard to the things of earth."[225] Millions of men are thus excluded from all participation in redeeming grace. Jansenius says distinctly that the graces indispensable to salvation are not accorded at all times except to the small number of the elect; all others receive nothing, or only temporary and insufficient helps, which serve but to render them more guilty. In this sense, the Jansenists refuse to admit that Christ died for the eternal salvation of all men; the predestined alone were comprehended in the great contract by which Jesus, in dying, offered his life, and the Eternal Father accepted his stainless oblation as the price of justifying grace. It is in this sense, also, that the fifth proposition of Jansenius has been condemned as heretical: "It is a semi-Pelagian error to say that Christ died or shed his blood for all men in general."[226]

Hence arose that horrible Jansenist doctrine of predestination, borrowed from Calvin, in which God is made to appear pitiless even in his mercies, the reprobate as a victim less guilty than unfortunate, and the elect one as a spoiled child who ought to blush at his immortal crown.[227]

I shall return to this latter point hereafter. Meanwhile, let us point out another consequence of the doctrine here laid down. If it be true that man is often abandoned by grace, and if, in consequence of his impotence, he necessarily violates the divine commands, must we, then, believe that God orders what is impossible? No doubt of it, reply the Jansenists; Pelagius first dared to deny this consequence—that the just themselves do often lack necessary grace.[228] This monstrous error is expressed in the first proposition of Jansenius, as follows: "Some of God's commandments are impossible to the just in the state of their present strength, whatever will they may have, and whatever efforts they may make; and the grace through which these commandments would become possible to them is wanting."[229] Catholics, with the Council of Trent (session vi. chap. xi.), say quite the contrary. It is a doctrine universally held in the church, and borne out by the unanimous consent of the fathers, that no one is deprived of the graces indispensable to salvation, except through his personal fault. Theologians also, for the most part, teach, with reason, that God confers the grace of conversion on sinners the most obstinate and hardened.

How is it that Jansenius was unable to perceive one of the clearest points of Christian revelation—the infinite mercy of God towards the sinner? It was the inevitable consequence of his doctrine concerning liberty.[230] In his eyes, the equilibrium of the human will has been irreparably lost; man naturally follows the attraction which dominates him.

Without grace, our poor will tends irresistibly to the depths of sin; an evil cupidity dominates it. But let the delectation of divine love take possession of this entirely passive and powerless heart, and it will be drawn to good by an equal necessity. Now, we see but too well that this holy passion which operates in man, in regard to God, the same effects which the dominant cupidity operates in regard to the things of earth, is the privilege of but a small number. One only explanation is possible—all the rest are without grace. Be it observed that, according to the Jansenists, every grace is charity, irresistible, victorious delectation. The Augustinus, it is true, speaks of certain little graces which do not at once carry the soul to the heights of perfection. Such as they are, they are none the less efficacious; if their power is not greater, it is because God has not given them more force than they in effect possess. The grace called by the theologians sufficient is held in aversion by the Jansenists; it is a grace which has for them the demerit of not being efficacious.[231] The three following propositions from Jansenius on liberty and grace have been pronounced heretical:

"In order to merit or demerit in the state of fallen nature, it is not necessary that man should have a liberty opposed to necessity (as to willing); it suffices that he should have a liberty opposed to constraint."[232] "In the state of fallen nature, we never resist interior grace."[233] "The semi-Pelagians admitted the necessity of an interior and preventing grace for all actions, even for the beginning of faith; they were heretics in so far as they assumed that grace to be such that the human will could resist it or obey it."[234]

Quesnel renewed every one of these errors,[235] and the Synod of Pistoia gives Quesnel's book an unreserved approbation.[236] Ricci and his adherents tell us, with Jansenius, that the equilibrium of the human will is lost, and that "this idea of equilibrium is a rock against which the enemies of grace" (that is, Catholic theologians) "have dashed themselves." They themselves ignore every grace from Jesus Christ, except that which creates in us a holy love, a holy delectation.[237]

The efficacy of grace, say they, "does not depend on our will, but produces it by changing us from not willing to willing, through its all-powerful force.... Far from waiting our consent, grace creates it in us."[238] In the synod's whole body of doctrine, by means of which it aims to bring back the faith to its primitive purity, we find not a word in contradiction of the heretical system of Jansenius; it everywhere follows, on the contrary, the spirit of that system, but carefully avoids reproducing literally any one of the famous five propositions. But we do find in the acts of the synod that celebrated conclusion which concentrates in itself the poison of the Jansenist heresy in its full force: "There are in man two loves, which are, as it were, the two roots of all our actions—cupidity and charity; the first is the bad tree, which can produce only bad fruit, and the second the good tree, which alone produces good works. Where cupidity dominates, charity reigns not; and where charity dominates, cupidity reigns not."[239] As if there were not, remarks Pius VI., lying between culpable love and divine charity, which conducts us to the kingdom of heaven, a legitimate human love![240]

When our common humanity is thus debased and disparaged, a distance is necessarily placed between it and its sole mediator, Jesus Christ, himself man also, but evidently incapable of taking upon himself a nature as incomplete as ours. Hence, the disciples of Jansenius have generally manifested an antipathy to devotions which bring us into intimate relations with the sacred humanity of our Saviour. The tender and Christian devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is especially intolerable to them.[241] As to the Blessed Virgin Mary, her title of Mother of God, so solemnly defined in the Council of Ephesus against Nestorius, hardly finds favor among them. To the Jansenists, Mary is certainly not the Immaculate One who crushes the head of the infernal serpent. They represent her the most frequently as the Virgin depicted by Michael Angelo, trembling and almost hiding before the glance of Christ the judge, on the last day.[242] Her greatness is terrible, said the Abbé de Saint-Cyran to Mère Angélique. Could it be otherwise? Could Jansenist fatalism give more room for confidence than for intercession?

May I be permitted to add a last word to this already long analysis? It is said that Jansenism has had the merit of recalling Catholics to a respect for the sacraments.[243] Is this said seriously? Luther had made all spiritual life centre in faith; the sacraments were thus nothing but ceremonies proper to excite this principal sentiment. In place of faith, Baius and Jansenius have substituted charity. Redeeming grace, the divine adoption, justice, holiness, all these they identify with love, as Luther identified them with faith. Now, I ask, what is it that renders the sacraments so worthy of veneration? Christian tradition replies with one accord: it is their efficacy; the sacraments are truly the causes and the instruments of grace and charity; they are, as it were, vases filled with redeeming blood. But the Jansenists do not so regard them. According to them, the sacraments do not confer sanctity; they suppose it.[244] Before baptism, and before penance, the adult must have dominant charity in his heart; without this, his repentance, and even his prayers, would be but movements of the dominant cupidity, and, consequently, new sins. It may be thought that I exaggerate; I subjoin, therefore, passages from the Synod of Pistoia, in which Quesnel and Jansenius speak again: "When we have unequivocal signs that the love of God reigns in a man's heart, we may with reason judge him worthy of participation with Jesus Christ in the reception of the sacraments. This is the rule which should be observed in the tribunal of penance (in the question of granting absolution). Works alone afford a morally certain proof of conversion. When the love of God takes possession of the soul, it becomes active and efficacious."[245] Again: "The first disposition for praying as we ought is a perfect detachment from all created things and a kind of disgust for all earthly consolations."[246] Until the sinner has received this grace of the Holy Ghost, he is unworthy of absolution quite as much as of communion. The words of Saint-Cyran to poor Sister Mary Clare are well known: "It is necessary to come, living, to penance. This is why I have kept you waiting so long. I have left you to live; for five months you have been living a spiritual life." So far no sacraments. The practice was still worse than the theory, as we well know. And this is the way in which Jansenism would recall Catholics to a respect for the sacraments! It has, at one blow, narrowed Christ's functions and those of the church.[247]

TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.

FOOTNOTES:

AN ENGLISH MAIDEN'S LOVE.[248]

The third Crusade had commenced. The cry, "God wills it," had gone forth from many a manly breast, and already Frederic of Germany, Henry II. of England, and Philip Augustus of France had received the cross from William, Archbishop of Tyre. But a more powerful monarch than Saladin, against whom their combined strength was to be directed, struck Frederic before he reached Palestine, and called Henry II., whom domestic difficulties had detained in England. Death gives not back that which he takes, and, for the want of a leader, the German army was broken up.

Richard, the brave Cœur de Lion, took his royal father's place, both on the throne and in the Crusade, and, with Philip of France, started on his glorious mission. Among those brave men who gathered around England's standard, joying to be led by so bold a king, who, with his lion's heart, dared every danger of sea, land, or fierce and cruel Moslem, was one of the oldest and proudest of Norman blood. His forefather, who had fought by the side of William the Conqueror, had distinguished himself by many a daring deed, and had won from his royal master, in recognition of his bravery, an earlship over a fair and smiling province of "merrie England"; then, renouncing his Norman title in behalf of a younger son, and marrying his eldest to the daughter of a Saxon knight, he established his right to the soil of his adopted country. Much of his fearless nature seemed to have come down with the blood of Robert de Bracy, who, at the ripe age of fifty-five, had found himself unable to resist his monarch's call, and to whom Cœur de Lion himself owed much of wise counsel. Robert de Bracy was a man of stern aspect, but withal so compassionate and forbearing, that he won the love of every one who came in contact with him. His bravery had already been proved when, as a young man, he fought beside Henry II, during the war against France; and, later, in that most dreadful invasion of Ireland—dreadful, because of the blow it gave to Irish independence, and for the gradual sinking of her people, from that time, from the eminence in erudition and lore for which they were renowned among the nations, and which, be it to their credit said, they are using every effort to regain. A man perfectly incapable of the least dishonorable action, he was revered as a knight "without stain or reproach." A fervent Catholic, his religion was his pride, and he never was ashamed of kneeling in church beside the poorest beggar, nor felt insulted because poverty's rags touched his velvet robes. But the good earl's heart received a terrible blow when he heard of the murder of Thomas à Becket. His faith in his king was shaken, and nothing but the stern duty of allegiance could have induced Robert de Bracy to remain in England. So when the Crusade was preached, he gladly seized the opportunity to show his love for the crucified King—for him whose throne was a cross, and whose crown was of thorns—and enrolled himself among the Crusaders. He was joined by his only son and Sir John de Vere, who, like himself, was of Norman blood—a brave, honest man, of strict integrity, whose character will be better seen in the unfolding of the story. The earl was deeply attached to the young knight, and the highest proof he could give of his love was in his willing consent that, on their return from Palestine, Sir John should wed his daughter, Agnes de Bracy, whose heart was no less pure than her face was lovely. "An' we'll make an earl of thee, my lad!" cried the impetuous King Richard when the betrothal was announced to him.

The court of the earl's castle was crowded with armed retainers, knights, and esquires, who formed the retinue of De Bracy and De Vere. Even on and beyond the lowered drawbridge might be seen bands of neighing steeds, their impatience checked ever and anon by their riders, who awaited the earl to head and lead them to the rendezvous of the Crusaders. Court and castle alike resounded with the clank of steel and tread of armed men, while buxom waiting-maids and merry lads hastened to and fro in the bustle attendant on such a departure. Here and there stood a page giving the finishing polish to his master's sword, and, again, others assisted in the girding on of the armor. Every now and then might be heard the wailing of some fond wife or mother, contrasting somewhat strangely with the jests of those who had no tie to make the parting a sacrifice in the good cause. Apart from all this, in one of the inner rooms of the castle, were gathered the earl and his family. Lady de Bracy's loving eyes wandered sadly from her honored husband to the manly features of her son, kneeling by her side, and back again to the earl, who was soothing the grief of his youngest child, Mary, just old enough to know that her father was going over land and sea, and that she might never see him again. In the deep embrasure of one of the windows, partly concealed by heavy curtains, stood Sir John and his betrothed. Agnes had been weeping, but being calmed by Sir John, whose grief partook more of the nature of joy than fear, since on his return he was to claim her as his bride, she rested her head quietly against his breast, both her hands clasped around his neck, while her uplifted eyes sought to read every expression of his noble face.

"Beloved," he said in a low tone, "it will not be for long, please God, though I would that thou wert my wife e'en ere I go. And," he added, continuing his whispered tones, "I were no Christian knight to doubt thy faithfulness. I'll prove thee mine on our return from the holy wars."

Agnes looked steadily at the face so lovingly bent over her, and, unclasping her hands, she drew from her girdle a scarf, such as was worn in those days, and bound it on Sir John's sword-belt. Then, returning her head to its resting-place, and feeling his arm drawing her tightly to him, as though by the very motion to thank her, she said:

"An' there is thy love's guerdon; thou shalt wear it in battle, and, when thine eyes fall on it, remember that one is praying for thee in bonnie England."

Any further discourse was prevented by the earl, who cried:

"Sir John, we have no time to lose; the men are ready, the steeds drawn up, and our presence alone is needed for immediate departure. Come, Agnes, my daughter." And as he placed one arm around her, with the other he drew his wife gently to him. Raising his eyes to heaven, he exclaimed: "O God! protect these dear ones while I am fighting the good fight in thy name and for thee. And this child," he added, as, tenderly kissing his wife and Agnes, he loosened his hold and took Mary in his arms—"this child, Mother of God, belongs to thee; keep her pure, that thy name, borne by her, may be ever spotless!" Then, calling the knights, he hastily quitted the apartment, not daring to look back. The son tore himself from his mother's farewell embrace, and quickly followed; but Sir John still lingered. At last, summoning his courage, he strained Agnes to his breast:

"Farewell, my beloved! God have thee, my own, in his keeping for so long as it seems best to him that we be parted."

As the drawbridge was raised behind the retreating soldiers, Agnes stood at the loophole of the main turret, where, with her mother, she watched till the men, horses, and banners disappeared, shut from sight by the declivity of a distant hill, when she sank on her knees, and prayed fervently for the loved ones who had started on their perilous journey.

We have said that Agnes de Bracy was lovely; that word can hardly convey the true nature of her charms. Personal beauty she had, and much: dark eyes, a clear complexion, a perfect mouth, disclosing perfect teeth, and breaking into a smile of winning beauty, together with a graceful form; a character of womanly sweetness, and great strength of will. But as Spenser hath it:

It was the soul in Agnes de Bracy, rich in God's sweet grace, which gave her that wonderful expression; the pure heart, "without guile," which caused her eyes to gleam with a look that made Sir John once exclaim, "Methinks, Agnes, thine eyes would soften the stony heart of the Mussulman himself, and e'en make a Christian of him."

Nor was Sir John deficient in those qualities which would be apt to win the admiration and love of such as she. Like the earl, he was a most devout Catholic. With a full, heartfelt appreciation of his holy faith, he could not—as many, alas! do—put it on and off with holiday attire, but every word and action proved how thoroughly it was a part of himself, and how, without it, in spite of great natural talents, he would be—nothing.

To follow the Crusaders on their journey, every step of which was fraught with danger; to watch the course of events as they shaped themselves during the march of the two armies, is not the province of this story. About three years later, the earl, with wounds scarcely healed and a heavy heart, stood before the drawbridge of his castle, which was being rapidly lowered at the unexpected blast of his bugle. The clanking of the heavy armor was a joyful, long-looked-for sound to the inmates of the castle, who had assembled in the court to welcome back the earl and his followers. Weary and dust-laden, they passed under the portal of the gateway, a sad remnant of their former numbers, greeting those who stood expectant with joy or fear. Suddenly a loud wailing arose, as many a mother looked in vain for the well-remembered form of her brave lad, who died fighting the Saracen; and the sounds of glad rejoicing were hushed in the presence of the angel of sorrow. The earl and his son made their way rapidly to the same room that had witnessed their farewell, and there their loved ones awaited them. A thrill of terror passed through Agnes' frame as she missed the features of Sir John; and, seeing a strange look in her father's eyes, which were fixed so tenderly but sorrowfully on her, she clasped her hands tightly, and cried out: "My God! my God! thy will, not mine, be done; but, oh! if he is dead!"

"Agnes, my child, my precious child!"—and Robert de Bracy drew his daughter to him—"God knows my heart is heavy enough with the story I have to tell thee, yet it is not what thou dost expect. Sir John is living, strong and well, but"—and his lips quivered with emotion—"but he is Saladin's prisoner; and I fear me greatly that neither gold nor silver will ransom him."

"Saladin's prisoner, my father? Saladin's prisoner? And will nothing ransom him?" And bowing her face in her hands, she wept bitterly. But her violent grief was not of long duration; her nature was too thoroughly schooled. She checked its first outburst; and, trusting to Him who had always given her help in her troubles, she breathed a short, fervent prayer. Then, raising her head, she turned to the earl, and in her sweetest voice:

"Forgive me, my father," she said, "for that I have not been thy daughter, and, in my selfish sorrow for what God has ordained, I have forgotten to bid thee welcome home."

"Agnes! Agnes!" And the old earl nearly broke down under the weight of his sorrow—sorrow all the keener for the suffering of his daughter. "Agnes, we will not give up all hope. I would have begged of Saladin on my knees for his ransom, but it could not have been; I was ordered away, and no respite granted."

"Give up all hope? No, indeed, my father. Far from me be such a thought! God will help us, and my beloved shall be ransomed if it is his will; for he gave him to me, and he can take him away."

Lo! Damascus is rising before us; not the Damascus of to-day, but the quaint, beautiful Oriental city of the XIIth century. The golden crescents of her domed mosques flash in the light of the Eastern sun. Her thoroughfares are crowded with men in their Turkish garb, and women veiled after the manner of their nation. Her shops are resplendent with jewels, pearls, and jacinths; fragrant with the perfumes of musk, ambergris, and aloes-wood; glittering with rustling silks and heavy brocades, interwoven with gold, and scarlet, and silver. Houses, beautiful in their quaint architecture, meet the eye at every corner, together with palaces, the residences of emir and vizier. But with naught of these have we to do. Our story takes us into the heart of the city to the palace of Saladin, Sultan of the Turks. As we enter, we behold banners unfurled. Shields, helmets, every species of armor decorate the main hall, along whose sides are ivory benches, where the eunuchs wait their master's orders. A great dome is overhead, and the sun, pouring down through its latticed windows, floods the hall with light, and causes the steel of the armor and the jewels of the hall to sparkle and flash with brilliancy. At the further end is a heavy curtain of brocade, richly wrought with various kinds of embroidery in white, red, and gold. Two tall armed men guard the corners. We will imagine the curtain lifted for us, and enter. There sits Saladin on his throne. His followers are around him. Rich are the robes which fall from his shoulders, well befitting the Sultan of the East. If the hall was gorgeous in its beauty, the room of the throne is no less so. The hangings on the walls are figured with various wild beasts and birds, worked with silk and gold. The sandal-wood work gives out its own peculiar perfume. In fact, all betokens a royal presence. And of what sort is Saladin? Great talents in him combine for mastery; great activity and valor. The severity and rigor, so inflexible as to make the bravest heart quail with fear before him, was often replaced by such kindness, such generosity, that the poor, the widowed, and orphaned did not hesitate to appeal to his mercy. And as he sits before us, we must draw back and continue our story.

An eunuch has presented the bowl and vase, and, having performed the ablution, Saladin turned slowly round, gazing steadily at the stern faces before him. "By Allah!" he exclaimed, as his eyes rested on the one nearest him—"by Allah! I trow, Moslem chiefs, you are brave, yea, very brave and very skilful. You have beaten back the Christians. You have proved yourselves true sons of Mahomet; but, for all that, I know a braver man than you. Eunuch! bid the Christian slave come forth." At his sultan's orders, the eunuch made a low bow, and retired behind one of the hangings. In a few moments he returned, followed by a guard of men, and Sir John de Vere in their centre. As they approached with him, Saladin waved them back, and bade the Christian only to remain before the throne. Then suddenly he made a sign—a sign dreaded alike by vizier and eunuch. It was obeyed, and a soldier, stepping forward, waved a sharp and gleaming scimitar over the head of the captive; but he did not flinch, nor move a muscle of his face, but continued gazing with stern, unshrinking eye straight forward. The sultan, as if satisfied with the courage the prisoner evinced, motioned the soldier back. Then he said:

"John de Vere, thy father's land, thine ancient home, thou shalt see no more; but I have great need of men like thee. I command thee, forsake thy Christian faith; and, if thou wilt adore Mahomet and God, there is no favor thou shalt ask, by my royal word, that shall not be granted thee. I will set thee above all men. I alone will be above thee. I will make thee my son. I will give thee palaces, gold, and precious gems; and from all the queenly maidens thou shalt choose one and wed her as thy bride. Thou canst not refuse that which my caliphs strive for years to obtain, and which to thee is given in one day. I bid thee reply."

As Saladin finished, he sank back on his throne, and a quiet smile played around his lips as he awaited his captive's answer. Sir John listened to him calmly and patiently. Then having bowed low, he raised his head erect, and made the Christian's mark—the sign of the cross—upon himself.

"Saladin," he said, "Sultan of the Mussulmans, since thou dost bid me reply, I will first return thanks for all the favors I have received at thy hands. From the first day of my captivity till now thou hast loaded me with kindnesses; for these I am grateful, though gratitude may not seem to be in the answer I make thee. Know, then, I, a Christian, cannot renounce my faith. I am a sworn soldier of my God—of him who died for me. Dost thou think that I, who bear the cross upon my shoulder, could on that cross bring scorn? Thou dost promise me a Moslem wife. In that far-off land—which God grant I may see before I die!—I have a love, whom as my very life I love. To her sweet heart I will not be false. Saladin, I cannot bear a Moslem name nor wed a Moslem maiden."

"Ah!" cried the sultan, "thou dost not know woman's heart. Perchance she whom thou lovest so fondly is the bride of another; nor doubt me, that heart, fickle and false as any woman's, which swore such fealty to thee, belongs now perhaps to thy rival. Never yet was woman known to be constant. Ah! John de Vere, thou hadst better remain with me."

As he ceased, the curtain was raised, and two by two came those holy men vowed to ransom Christian captives from the hands of the Turks. They approached Saladin's throne, and, opening their bags, they poured out with lavish hand an untold treasure at his feet.

Then the chief monk said:

"The bride of Sir John de Vere, O Sultan Saladin! sends all she hath, gold and gems, and bids thee take them, but to restore to her her betrothed."

"The other captive knights may go with thee," replied the sultan; "but as for all these gems and gold, his lady-love would give them for a dress. Sir John de Vere may not go with thee. No wealth can ransom him, for I love him with a more than brother's love, and hope to win his in return. Why, I would give a hundred slaves, if he would renounce his Christian faith. So thus to thy lady this answer; for I will prove how Christian maidens love. Tell her that, before I yield my thrall, she must cut off her own right arm and hand, and send it hither to ransom John de Vere!"

"Saladin," said the captive, "thy permission for one word to say to these monks before they go. I bid you, brothers," he added, turning to them, "to speak of me as dead. For, O sweet-heart! my betrothed bride, well do I know that not only arm and hand, but even life itself, thou wouldst willingly give for me; and I cannot prove thy death, that I may live. Do not tell her the sultan's cruel words. O brothers! I beg you do not!"

As sole reply, they gathered up the useless treasure, and, returning to their ships, they sailed for England. With mournful hearts they landed on the shore, and travelled day and night till they reached De Bracy's castle. There they laid down their full bags, and told Agnes that for neither gold nor silver could Sir John be ransomed; but if it was still her heart's wish that he should see his native land again, the sultan had promised that for one gift her betrothed should go free.

"And that gift?" said Agnes.

"Is," replied the head monk slowly, "thine own right arm and hand, cut off for his sake. This is the ransom asked. Thou canst not prevail on Saladin to take a meaner thing."

Every face grew white at these cruel words. They shuddered as they listened to the monk; only Agnes preserved her usual calmness. The earl clutched his sword, and could hardly refrain from vowing death to every man of the Moslem race. Little Mary cried out, clasping her sister tightly, "Sure, Agnes, such a wicked man cannot be found." But quieting the child, she looked at Lady de Bracy. The face of the mother was marked with keen suffering. It was a dreadful moment for the brave spirit of Agnes; she knew she must make answer, and that at once. But how could she tell those, who suffered so much at the very thought of the deed, of her resolution? "My God! it is hard; but as we love in thee, thou must help me to do what is right," was the prayer which rose from her heart, as with her lips she framed her answer.

"My dear ones, your daughter need not say how much she grieves for your sakes that she must suffer. Cruel is the ransom asked; who could know it better than I? But God loves us, and did he not, because of his love, give his own beloved Son? And do we not see every day how churls and nobles give their lives for their king? 'Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends.' That, my father, we know from the holy Gospels. Wouldst thou have thy daughter shrink duty, thou, my lord and father, who hast bled by Cœur de Lion's side?" She hesitated a moment, then, her sweet voice growing clearer and stronger, she continued:

"I am John de Vere's betrothed, and to him I owe my fealty, even though it should cost my life. My lord and father, what is my life? Long years spent in pleading with God to end the banishment of my love. And at last he has heard, at last my prayer has been granted. Only it must be proved that my love is pure; so he sends me pain, and I will take it, grateful to endure; for is not the reward great?"

Once again the holy friars found themselves in the beautiful city of Damascus. Eagerly they threaded their way through its broad but devious thoroughfares till they reached the palace of the sultan. Within, in the room of the throne, sat Saladin in royal state. By his side stood Sir John de Vere. He still retained the badge of slavery, for he was too true to give up his faith; but to Saladin's councils he was often summoned. When any measure to be taken against the Christians was the theme of debate, he remained respectfully but firmly silent. Against his brothers he could not in conscience speak; to do so for them he knew would prove more than useless. But yet many were the subjects on which his knowledge and fine sense of justice could be brought to bear; and Saladin was not the man to fail in taking advantage of his wise judgment.

Some such serious business had called around the sultan his advisers, and, as usual, Sir John stood foremost among them. They had all but finished the subject under consideration, when the folds of the curtain were lifted, and a herald entered the royal presence.

"Sultan, our lord," he said, "the monks appointed to ransom the Christians stand without. They crave an audience again."

"Let them enter," was the command given, and swiftly obeyed. Again the curtain was lifted upon the holy men, and again it fell, shutting them from the outer hall, as they stood in the presence of Saladin. The superior stepped forward:

"We thank thee, sultan, for the favor thou hast accorded us in this audience. But we bid thee learn, O monarch! a lesson we bring thee—a lesson of how great, in a nobler faith than thine, is love's purity and power." A dim foreboding seized Sir John at the monk's words, and his whole form shook with ill-suppressed emotion, as he listened to the conclusion:

"Monarch! what are women to thee? Slaves, toys of an idle hour, the playthings of passion. What women of thine would do for thee as Agnes de Bracy hath done for him who stands beside thee—him whom thou callest thy slave? Thy cruel words have been heeded. Lo! the answer." And he laid at Saladin's feet a casket, richly wrought in gold and silver. Sir John looked as one frenzied, then seizing the casket pressed it to his heart:

"Why did you tell her, O cruel monks? Did I not ask you to speak of me as dead? O fair arm! O dear, sweet hand! that thou shouldst cut it off, my beloved, and for my poor sake!"

Saladin stretched out his hand to take the casket; but Sir John only pressed it the tighter, and sobbed aloud. At this, the superior of the monks, coming forward, said something in a low voice, which caused the young knight to lift up his face and look at the brother. Then, turning to the sultan, he placed the casket reverently before him. Saladin took it and opened it; as he raised the lid, the perfume of aromatic spices escaped therefrom. Lifting the linen, he looked steadily for a moment, then large tears were seen to escape from his eyes and roll down his cheeks. All the higher nature of the man seemed to be aroused. Calling his nobles around him, he held the casket silently for their inspection. Within it lay embalmed the lily-white right arm and hand of Agnes de Bracy. There was no mistaking the delicate form of the arm, the shape of the tapering fingers. Severed from the shoulder of that noble girl, they lay in all their beauty, a reproach to the cruelty of the sultan. In that throne-room not one man but was moved to tears. Then Saladin closed the casket, but, still keeping a firm hold on it, he cried out:

"Mahomet and God witness for me! with a deep brother's love I love John de Vere, and I thought I might retain him by me if I asked this ransom. But now I would give my kingdom to recall those words. Haste, John de Vere, haste to thy noble love. O fair arm! O fair hand! True, brave heart! Oh! that I could claim such love as thine! John de Vere, tell that noble woman that Saladin yields his selfish love. Take to her gold, gems; load the ship with all of wealth and beauty I have; but they would vainly prove Saladin's grief. She who has proved thee such a noble love will make thee a noble wife, John de Vere. But thou canst not take with thee this precious casket. Among my treasures I shall store it away. It will prove to future ages how Christian maidens keep their troth, and how pure is their love."

More than this the legend tells us not. But it is said that in a church in England may still be seen a statue of the knight and his noble, one-armed lady.

FOOTNOTES:

OUR MASTERS.

Freedom is the boast of half the civilized world, and the envy of the other half. It is the embodiment of the desires of our age, the goal of the individual, as well as the collective life of nations. It is a treasure jealously guarded or a prize passionately longed for, the pretext for riot and disorder, the burden of diplomatic messages, the ostensible object of all civic government. England records in the words of a national song, "Britons never will be slaves," her proud determination to grasp it; America asserts elasticity of personal liberty as the chief attraction of her territory; everywhere the cry is, "We will do as we like, and accept no dictation from any man." It is a somewhat strange commentary on this fierce vindication of one man's rights that they invariably clash with the rights of all other men, provided the latter happen to differ in the interpretation of freedom. Again, it is a curious psychological phenomenon that this much-vaunted freedom generally ends in a frantic appeal to the state to force one particular set of principles upon a large majority to whom these principles are repulsive. In some countries "freedom" means expulsion from a quiet retreat deliberately chosen years ago by men and women in full possession of their senses: witness the depopulated monasteries and the poor religious thrust out to starve or beg. In others it means the minute supervision of state officials over the educational and religious interest of thousands—a sort of domestic inquisition in perpetual session on moral subjects, which the individual inquisitors do not pretend even to have studied. In conjunction with this species of freedom we have the ravenous appetite for unbelief of all shades, for laxity of morals, for the elasticity of the marriage-tie, for a pleasant and dignified way of losing our souls, for decorous but unrestrained indulgence of our passions—in short, for the manifold attractions of the "broad road." This is the serious side of the question—the one to be dwelt upon by preachers and philosophers, and that which the heedless actors in the world's drama are apt to pass by as a matter of course—a thing taken for granted long ago.

But there is another aspect, more personal and more intimate, in which this question appears to us. We boast of being free, and at every turn the commonest circumstances of our daily life belie us. Free! why, we are tied as fast as we can be to a perpetual pillory; like the prisoner of Chillon, we can just walk round and round our post at the length of our chain, and wear a groove into the hard stone of our surroundings. Free! with a hundred masters: the gout, dyspepsia, the doctor, the cook, society, the weather. Free! with the newspaper to dictate our ideas and opinions, to choose, recommend, and puff our candidates, to lay down the law in criminal cases, to patronize the jury and pass sentence on the prisoner!

It would be hard to find a condition in life which is not eminently a bondage, and a bondage the more galling because the bonds are so insignificant. It is almost equally hard to know where to begin the record of our abject submission to external trammels. You are tired, and want to sleep an extra hour in the morning. Of course, you think you have only to will this, and it is done. But you are not allowed to sleep; the noise in the street increases; the bells of the cars mingle in determined clangor with the whistle of the steamboat; an organ-grinder takes up his position under your window, and serenades you into madness; the "horn of the fish-man is heard on the hill" (Murray Hill); presently the fire-alarm sounds, and the clatter of engines follows close upon it; while all the time the flies are industriously reconnoitring your face, walking over your eyelids, losing themselves in your hair, and, despite your half-unconscious protest, you must own after all that you are awake.

Then the whole tenor of your mind for the day may depend upon the exact degree of tenderness in the customary beefsteak or on the extra turn given to the crisp buckwheat. So the wire-pulling is done in the kitchen, and your vaunted independence as a man and a citizen goes down ignominiously before the fiat of the cook. This kind of thing is interminable. You are at the mercy of your tradesmen, and, for the sake of peace, you pay the bills and submit to be cheated with inferior provisions while paying the price of superior ones. The newspaper is not always ready to your hand when you feel inclined to look at the news of the world, and straightway your mind becomes uneasy, your temper rises, and you have again surrendered your freedom. You order your horse, but find he is lame, and so you must forego your plans for the day; you make up your mind to start by the early train to-morrow, and enjoy a day in the country, and find, when you open your window in the morning, that the rain is pouring with dismal steadiness, and promises to do so for many hours to come. Sometimes your wife keeps you waiting fifteen minutes for dinner, and, on sitting down, you find the soup cold and the entrées spoiled; and it is well known that not even Job could have stood that! The wind and tide wait for no man; and so you are hurried out of bed against your will at unseasonable hours of the night or morning, and packed on board the steamer bound for Europe while yet half asleep and as sulky as a bear, your free-will practically gone as much as if you were a bale of goods being shipped and checked for Liverpool.

Social customs are no less a hidden tyranny. If you would not appear eccentric, you must do as others do—wear a dress-coat when you would fain be in your shirt-sleeves, and a smile when you are dying for an opportunity to yawn. If you are a silent man, you must nevertheless join in the gossip of your fellow-guests, and laugh at unmeaning jokes, for fear people should call you a misanthrope, and avoid you as a "wet blanket" to conversation. If you have any decided opinion, you must keep it to yourself, and avoid the vacant stare of astonished good-breeding which is the penalty of any energetic statement. It is vulgar to be too demonstrative or to have any settled opinions; enthusiasm is out of fashion, and indifference has at least the advantage of never committing you to anything. If a little deviation in manner from the recognized standard is not reprehensible, then it is voted amusing, and the self-asserting individual is considered a good butt; but no one dreams of asking his advice or even crediting him with common sense. All his real qualities are lost sight of, and he is judged by the mere accident of "originality." No one takes the trouble further to investigate his character; he is "odd," and people either drop him as a bore, or run after him as a lion.

If a man has a hundred invisible masters, a woman has five hundred. From the cook to the dressmaker, from the nurse to the baby, she is surrounded by tyrants. She is at the mercy of the coiffeur, who comes in an hour behind time, and tumbles her hair into shape in a violent hurry, so that she is late at the ball; she lives with the sword of Damocles above her head in the shape of the dressmaker, who will send in a ball-dress so loosely sewn together that it splits in many places before the evening is over; if she is poor, she is the slave of desire, perpetually tantalized by the splendors she cannot reach, eating her heart out because Mrs. Jones has got a new bonnet so far finer than her own, or Mrs. Smith's rich uncle gave her a cashmere shawl impossible to outrival; if she is married, the regulating of the domestic atmosphere will cost her many an anxious thought, a curtailed hour of leisure, an uneasiness regarding a possible storm when Harry comes home and finds his new hat mangled by the pet puppy; if she is single, she will be always scheming for an escort, and fretting lest she should be overlooked, and so on through every variety of possible female situations. To this picture there is a companion. See the unhappy bachelor of moderate means, in a forlorn boarding-house, pining for the simplest luxuries or the innocent liberty of stretching at full length on a lounge without taking off his working-clothes; sighing for a variety in the round of his monotonous meals, and for the possibility—without hazard of starvation—of an occasional morning snooze when the inexorable breakfast-bell calls him to the renewed treadmill of existence. But woe to the man who rashly turns to matrimony, and surrenders, without mature deliberation and cogent reasons, the liberty—such as it is—which still remains to him. His change may be from the "frying-pan into the fire," and the nightly fate of the wretched Caudle, of curtain-lecture memory, may claim him for life. Is the rash Benedict "free," when the irreproachable wife begins to make her hand felt, and, together with the immaculate table-linen, the punctual and succulent meals, the orderly household, the never-failing newspaper always at hand at the right moment, yet silently conveys to him the awful impression that she is heaping coals of fire on his head? A man may be in prison, and, if he can pay for them, may yet enjoy every luxury and attention; still, it would be rather stretching the point to say that he was therefore free. So both sexes know how to tighten invisible bonds around each other's claims, and "freedom" is practically as meaningless as the apparent life of a still green tree woven round by the graceful and fatal vine.

The majority of mankind are quite debarred from any tangible freedom by the lack of means with which to procure it. A poor man cannot, physically speaking, be a free agent; but, in compensation, the richer and higher placed a man is, the more social and moral trammels will he encounter. Excess of want and excess of possession often end by producing the same result. The poor man cannot move from his post, because he has not the money to do so; the rich man cannot move from it, because he has too much money to watch over. Wealth, too, brings its responsibilities; and a conscientious man, in whose hands lie the life and comfort of hundreds of his fellow-creatures, cannot leave his post because his tenants or operatives would suffer through his absence. In fact, no one, in a certain sense, can be "free," except an unprincipled man and an unbeliever. Selfishness is the only road to such animal freedom as would content a sensualist. A Christian, be he poor or rich, cannot aspire to this worldly freedom, because his religion tells him that he is not free to desert those with whom God has linked his fortunes. Family circumstances fetter one to an incredible degree; conscience is a perpetual trammel; and even the exigencies of position are sometimes a legitimate restraint on our actions. Many persons of narrow minds, not particularly influenced by moral forces, fall a prey to Mrs. Grundy, and dare not face the opinion and comments of their neighbors. In the most trivial things we are slaves to the verdict of society. Who would not rather have danger than ridicule? How many things, whether lawful or unlawful, are we not ashamed to do, because of what "people would say," quite irrespective of the intrinsic right or wrong, expediency or uselessness, of the thing itself? It may well be said that it is less a sin in the eyes of the world to break every one of the Ten Commandments than to enter a room with your hat on, or ask a girl to marry you on nothing a year. It would require more pluck to stand up for an unfashionable religion, or defend an unpopular person in a cultivated assemblage arrayed on the opposite side of the question, than it would to storm a citadel or rescue a sinking ship. To contravene one-quarter of an article of the impalpable code of society entails downright ostracism; and the lynch-law administered to social delinquents effectually keeps people in this imaginary groove, where the invisible penalties of religious codes are unavailing to enforce good morals. How hollow the system is which thus intrenches itself behind such paltry defences we need not say; but how infinitely more galling and more belittling is this servitude than the yoke of God which men fly from! Absolute hardships, real privations, men will cheerfully undergo, provided it is with a worldly object; nobody minds being a slave when the devil is master and the livery is cloth-of-gold.

One of the axioms of the day is that marriage should be a profitable speculation. To what lengths do not men and women proceed in order to fulfil this inculcation to the letter? The writer once heard the hunt after wealthy marriages likened to the vicissitudes of S. Paul on his journeys. The likeness was forcible, though hardly elegant; but, at any rate, it was earnestly and not irreverently meant. The best of it was that it was so startlingly true, and that no part of the world, no system of society, could escape the allusion. Perils by sea and land, perils by robbers, perils by false brethren, watchings and hunger, cold and nakedness—there was not one detail which did not find its counterpart in the modern race after matrimonial advantages. People undergo for the world more hard penances than would suffice to bridge over purgatory, did they suffer them for God. Wolsey, in his disgrace, cried out that if he had served his God but half so well as he had served his king, he would not now be reaping a meed of contempt and ingratitude. So with the world; it despises those who toil for it, and no one is less respected by it than the very man who has sacrificed principle to win its life-homage. As to the marriage lottery, there is very little that is not staked for a lucky throw of the dice. Health is ruthlessly sacrificed; delicate girls brave the night air, the draughts in the corridor, the sudden change from a fetid heat to intense cold, the unwholesome meal at abnormal hours, the loss of actual rest, all for the questionable pleasure of attending a ball every night in the week, and being seen "everywhere." Economy is disregarded, and reckless outlay on flimsy, temporary dress indulged in without a murmur; delicacy and modesty are tacitly put by as unfit considerations in the present, however useful they may prove in the future; underhand inquiries as to a young man's habits and associates, his fortune and his prospects, are unblushingly made, quite as a matter of business; snares and pitfalls are judiciously contrived for the coroneted or gilded victim; pride of birth, of which, at any other time, the practised diplomatists of the salons are so tenacious, is pocketed at the approach of some plebeian prize, and the son or daughter of a self-made man is welcomed with admirably simulated rapture when duly weighted with the parent's hardly-earned money. Stranger than all, this mania of gambling in marriage—for it is nothing less—seizes even persons whom you would naturally suppose would, by instinct or principle, be averse to any such transactions; but though you will find them proof against every other meanness, the very shadow of this one will unsettle their minds. Good people seem impelled to join this race as by an irresistible fatality, and will actually blind themselves to the repulsiveness of such a course by glossing it over as an outgrowth of a sacred instinct, parental love, and solicitude. Needy and idle men, seeking a fortune by marriage with an heiress, are not a whit better—nay, a shade more despicable—than mercenary women on the same lookout.

But it must be confessed that there is a healthier and nobler side to human nature which is too often obscured by the supposed requirements of our worst tyrant—society. There are women who, being rich and high-minded, view this pursuit of themselves with disgust; and there are men, equally high-minded, but poor, who love these women, but, for fear of being classed with interested suitors, and sometimes for fear of a contemptuous refusal, never come forward and acknowledge their love. The woman who sees this may love such a man, but maidenly dignity forbids her making it too plain; and "society" thus manages to make two honest hearts wretched for years, sometimes for life, and perhaps in the end to efface in them even the belief in true and disinterested affection. And we dare to call ourselves "free"!

Business and our material interests are so many burdens and trammels to our liberty. Say that we are easy-going and indolent, fond of sedentary pleasures; but a long and uncomfortable journey becomes necessary, and, under the penalty of material losses, we are obliged to choose the lesser of the two evils. Or reverses swoop down so suddenly upon us that, having been used to elegant leisure and comparative security, we are incontinently thrown on our own resources, and obliged to work, if we would not starve. Even the choice of work is not always open to us, or we may happen to choose some unremunerative work, which fate and our hard-hearted neighbor will persist in making useless to us. Even with prosperity work itself becomes a tyrant; and when the lucky worker thinks of enjoying his earnings in peace and retirement, the restless demon of habit steps in to make his very retirement wretched. He is allowed no peace, but sighs for the counting-house or the workshop; and one has heard of such haunted men going about disconsolately beneath the weight of fortune, until solaced by a miniature feint of the old work—a place where, far from the satin, gilding, and ormolu of the fashionable mansion, they can plane and turn common chairs and tables, or sit in a leathern apron, cobbling their own boots. Poor millionaire! are you "free"?

Other men are slaves not so much to their passions as their tastes. Such an one undergoes tortures if another's collection of china is better than his own, or if a rival bids higher than he can afford to do for an old Italian or Flemish picture. This man would give himself more trouble to secure an old carved secrétaire of English oak or Indian ebony than he would to promote some work of charity; another has a hobby about sumptuous bindings, or rare lace, or any bric-a-brac of the kind; inartistic furniture is an eyesore to him, inharmonious colors upset his equanimity, and everywhere, even in church, any defect of form irritates and repulses him. He is hardly master of his own thoughts, and is apt to form hidden prejudices; he lives in the clouds, and often makes himself disagreeable to those who do not.

The tyrannous custom of making funerals and weddings an occasion of useless pomp is perhaps one of the most reprehensible of all. The fashion has insensibly grown till one's perverted sense of what is "fitting" has almost acknowledged it to be a necessity. So the mourners are disturbed, their privacy broken in upon, delicacy outraged in every possible way, the curiosity of strangers gratified, an unseemly hubbub substituted for the solemn stillness natural to the presence of death—all in order that the world's fiat may be duly obeyed. People pretend that all this fuss is to honor the memory of the dead. No such thing; it is to feed the vanity of the living. It must not be said that Mr. S—- did not provide as good a table, as handsome any array of carriages, as great a profusion of flowers, as richly ornamented a coffin, for his wife's funeral, as did Mr. R—— last year on a similar "melancholy occasion," any more than in the lifetime of the two ladies could it have been suffered to have gone abroad that Mrs. S——'s rooms were not as uncomfortably crowded for a reception as Mrs. R——'s, or her carriage not of the same irreproachable build.

The world has undertaken to decide for us, in the privacy of home as well as beyond its walls, exactly the degree of outward respect to be shown to the dead. Such and such a particular texture, and crape of such and such a particular width, is the measure of the widow's, the daughter's, or the sister's grief; less would be indecorous, more would be eccentric! The milliner tells us in a subdued voice how much jet is allowable, and how soon the world expects the appearance of a white collar in place of a black one, just as the world dictates the exact length of a court-train, and mentions the appropriate number of feathers to be worn in the hair. In England, a widow's cap is de rigueur, and not to wear it would be to brand one's self with the mark of a flirt and a questionable character. In other countries in Europe, it is not in use, and the character of French and Italian widows is not dependent on an extra frill of white crape. How a poor and proud woman, unwilling to be behind her neighbors in respect of decorous mourning-robes, can manage the enormous expense of a thing so perishable and so dear as crape, in such quantities as to entirely cover a dress, is a mystery which the peremptory laws of society do not care to enter into and do not pretend to solve.

Weddings are hardly, under the iron hand of custom, what one might reasonably expect them to be—i.e., family festivities. They are not occasions of personal rejoicing over the happiness of your nearest and dearest—oh! no, that is humdrum and "slow"; so the wedding-day is turned into a gorgeous manifestation of your worldly wealth—a day of hollow ostentation and often of hidden sadness. The extravagance of your floral decorations, and the judicious display of the bride's presents, cost you more thought than the solemn covenant about to be made; the adjustment of the pearl necklace, the graceful folds of the bridal veil, the perfect fit of the white kid glove, are of far more importance than the vow pronounced so lightly at the altar. It is the reception, not the sacrament, that predominates in most minds. Instead of a family gathering, reverently waiting in prayer for the happy consummation of a very solemn and awful contract, you have a mob of slight and careless acquaintances, down to the very scourings of your visiting-list, assembled to stare and gape at the show, to talk slang and make unseemly jokes, to criticise your hospitality, and make bets as to how soon the marriage may be followed by a separation. Everybody asks how much money has the bride, what is the standing of the bridegroom, what are the settlements, etc. When they go away, they do not even thank you for the lavish expense, whose fruits they, and they alone, have enjoyed; but, instead of that, they abuse your champagne and rebuke your extravagance. Privacy—a necessary condition of domestic happiness—is impossible on this great day; prayer is almost out of the question; reflection is scared away. It might be hoped that the young couple would now be allowed to retire into private life, after this free exhibition of themselves as the central figures of a puppet-show. But, no; fashion pronounces otherwise. A wedding-trip, though not deemed quite indispensable by the code of society, is still favorably looked upon, and, if possible, is a still worse thing than the wedding itself. Dissipation is the order of the day; the change of toilets becomes the all-absorbing topic of the bride's thoughts and conversation; the tour must include the showiest watering-places; perpetual motion and a full meed of frivolity are ensured, a kaleidoscope of discreet admirers provided, little mild triumphs of flirtation enjoyed, with the added zest of perfect security from embarrassing proposals, and equal immunity from the new-made husband's wrath, since he could not thus early begin to lay down the law; and a most miserable foundation is laid for the after-comfort of home. Besides, what does a wedding-trip imply? That life is a drudgery, and a respite is necessary before taking up the burden. The home is thus made a vision of imprisonment—scarcely a wise preparation. Then the foolish and utterly useless expenditure probably cripples the young couple, in ordinary cases, for some time to come. The month's trip has swallowed what would have covered half the year's expenses, and "going home," instead of holding out a bright prospect, is connected with dulness, retrenchment, and monotony. This is what society and its tyranny have succeeded in making of marriage. Are such couples "free" agents?

Who is free on this earth? Who is not the slave of petty caprices, even if he escapes the worse servitude of degrading vices? The drunkard, the sensualist, the gambler, are victims of low passions that destroy health and sap vitality, while they surely lead to a lonely or a violent end; but with such aberrations we do not propose to deal. But even those who pride themselves on their freedom from any vice or bad habit, what are they, often, but puppets swayed by absurd influences radiating from such sources as the loss of a night's rest, the delay of a meal, the failure to reach a certain train?

Children and pets are well-known tyrants, not only to the mother or the maiden aunt, but to the male creation in general and the old generation in particular. The grandfather is ready at all times to be made a hobby-horse, the grandmother to drudge for king baby. The children's dinner is the event of the day; Harry's destructiveness of his first pair and all following pairs of trousers is the burden of the household lament; little Cissy's first tooth is a matter of deep interest; baby Maggie is allowed to pull mother's hair down just before dinner, unrebuked—nay, even encouraged. Pet poodles and favorite parrots, and, indeed, all tame companions of mankind, absorb a wonderful amount of human interest and attention, and often demand it at unseasonable hours; compelling idleness, or at least encouraging loss of time. In fact, our time and mind are ever occupied with supplementary things, forced upon us by custom or caprice; and we secretly but helplessly rebel, incapable, we think, of either resistance to our own follies, or courage to laugh in the face of Mrs. Grundy.

It is impossible to stand absolutely free in the world, but there is freedom and freedom. Of all freedoms, that of the free-thinker is the narrowest. Uncertainty is a grievous spirit, doubt a bad master; and the poor free-thinker finds that his mental companion and philosophic guide offers him but slight comfort under misfortune. Moral restraints are to him but chaff in the wind, religious forms mere dust shaken off his shoes; but what remains? He deems himself king of the world of thought, but he finds his kingdom turned into a desert; he acknowledges no ties or duties, undertakes no responsibility, works (if he works) for himself alone, and then finds that what he earns he cannot enjoy unshared. Temporary human companionship on earth has no charms for him; for he reflects that annihilation follows death, and it is therefore useless to make bosom friends of men who will so soon be less than nothing, and whose only memento will be in the richness of the crops grown over their graves. The mental solitude of the free-thinker is not an agreeable or a soothing one; much less is it fruitful in high thoughts or heroic actions.

If any ask in an earnest spirit, where are the fewest masters, and where freest men?—we would answer, in the cloister.

A startling answer to the worldling; a suggestive one to the thinker. Let us examine it, and see whether it can be substantiated. Religious are the men supposed to be the most subjected to authority in the world—those whose duty it is to have not only no will of their own, but even no individual thought, no opinion of any kind. Even so, in a sense; and on that account, not despite it, but because of it, are they the freest men on earth. The secular clergy are comparatively free, because they have one object only; that is, one Master. Priests are not burdened with family and household cares, scarcely with social necessities; but none the less are they sometimes vexed by circumstances which they cannot control, and are made to pay the tithe of that slavery which any contact with the world, even for the world's good, and by men who are not of the world, necessarily entails. Religious even of active orders are still freer, because they are less of the world; but the man who stands before God in silent contemplation, as the eagle pauses before the sun and looks into its depths, is the freest of all. A purely contemplative order, whose mission, higher yet than that of the captains of Israel, is that of Moses praying with uplifted arms for the triumph of the people of God—such is the home of the highest and truest freedom.

The ascetic has found the secret that philosophers seek for in vain, that attitude of godlike calm in the midst of all transient storms of life. The supremest exercise of freedom is to surrender that freedom itself, with full confidence that the person into whose hands it is surrendered is the representative of a higher power. A king would not be free were he prevented from abdicating his kingship; the religious vow is the abdication of a kingdom greater than is constituted by so many thousands of square miles. This renunciation once made, no earthly event can be of the slightest interest to the disenthralled man. No care for his body, no solicitude for his reputation, remains; he has disrobed himself of his earthly belongings, and let slip every vestige of the garments of worldliness. A spirit—practically almost disembodied—he looks above for inspiration, comfort, guidance, knowledge. The miseries of earth, if poured into his ear by some despairing fellow-mortal, gain from him the divine pity of an angel rather than the passionate sympathy of a man; he is raised above the wants of nature, the wrangles of society, even the perplexities of the intellect. Taught no longer by men or by books, he speaks face to face with God in his long prayers and meditations, and no human interest ever distracts his mind from this exalted colloquy. Insensible to the influences of time, place, and circumstance, he is still as free as air when hunted from his retreat by men to whom his whole life is an enigma; the oracle speaks to him in the midst of a crowd, and he no more hears the murmur of those around him than if he were at sea, a thousand miles from land; a palace, a prison, or a scaffold are all reproductions of his cell, for the same all-filling Presence surrounds him, blinding him to all else. His indifference is so galling to his enemies, his freedom so mysterious and so provoking, that they would rather put him to death than witness the unutterable calm they can neither disturb nor emulate; but that death is only the one more step needed for his perfect bliss—the one veil to be yet lifted between the ascetic philosopher and the freedom that taught him his philosophy.

Serene land of passionless perfection, which men call the monastic life! How many, even among religious, scale thy furthermost heights? Yet it is a consolation to mankind to know that there is, even on earth, a sanctuary where human nature, be it only represented by ever so few, can reach to that ideal state of perfect communion with God and perfect contempt of all trammels which alone should be dignified with the name of philosophy.

A LOOKER-BACK.

There are some people in the world who, like the sad mourners that come up through Dante's hollow vale with heads reversed, have not the power to see before them. Their eyes are always peering into the past, they go groping in the dim twilight of bygone days; they wander off the highway of ordinary life, till they lose their place in its sphere; they have no knowledge but legendary lore, no wisdom but that of past generations. And when, by some accident, they cross the current of the present age, they grasp at the very first relic of the past as a link with the receding shore.

It was such a one that found himself adrift on the high tide at Charing Cross—which Dr. Johnson so loved; and, amazed and confused by the incessant, tumultuous flow of a life in which he had no part, took refuge in the thousand sanctuaries of the past to be found in London. Belonging by a peculiar grace, as one born out of due time, to the ancient church—for ever ancient, for ever new!—he turned particularly to those old Catholic foundations around which cluster so many associations, at once religious, historical, and poetic. Having read of them from childhood, and learned to connect them with the past glory of the church, and familiar with all the romantic and legendary lore concerning them, when he found himself in their midst his heart and soul and imagination were at once aflame. It was then to such places as Westminster Abbey, Christ's Hospital, the Charter-House, and the Temple that his heart instinctively turned on his arrival in London.

Not that he actually visited them first. The Divine Presence, alas! no longer dwells in them incarnate; and it was of course, as became one with pilgrim-staff and scallop-shell, to the foot of the Tabernacle he hastened, the first time he issued from his lodgings, to offer up his prayer of thanksgiving to Jésus-Hostie for a safe voyage across the Atlantic. But at his very threshold he could see a spot associated with many terrible memories, marked by a stone: "Here stood Tyburn Gate." Here the last prior of the Charter-House was executed, and Robert Southwell, the Jesuit poet of Queen Elizabeth's time, whose last words were expressive of his attachment to the Society of Jesus and his happiness to suffer martyrdom. Many others, too, of religious and historic memory, ascended here from earth to heaven. Close beside the spot is the Marble Arch of Hyde Park. "Beyond Hyde Park all is a desert!" said our pilgrim with Sir Fopling Flutter, glad to be diverted from memories too sad for one's first impressions of a foreign city. Two serene-looking "Little Sisters of the Poor," providentially crossing the path, directed him to the French chapel—a modest sanctuary, but where such men as Lacordaire, De Ravignan, and other distinguished French pulpit-orators have been heard. The way thither was through Portman Square, once the property of the Knights of S. John of Jerusalem. Here the celebrated Mrs. Montague once lived. In one corner of the square stands apart—in a large yard, a square old-fashioned brick house with an immense portico in front, and a two-story bow window at the end—one of those houses that we at once feel have a history. This is Montague House, where Mrs. Montague used to give an annual dinner to the London chimney-sweeps, "that they might enjoy one happy day in the year"—a house frequented by the literary celebrities of the time—where Miss Burney was welcomed, and Ursa Major grew tame.

A short distance from the French chapel is the Spanish church, dedicated to S. James, with its S. Mary's aisle lighted from above, giving a fine chiaro-oscuro effect to the edifice. It was pleasant to find an altar to the glorious Patron of Spain in a city where he was once so venerated, and whose name has been given to one of its social extremes. The devotion of the English to S. Jago di Compostella was extraordinary in the Middle Ages. So general was it, that the Constable of the Tower, in the time of Edward II., used to receive a custom of two-pence from each pilgrim to Spain going or returning by the Thames. Rymer mentions 916 licenses to visitors to that shrine in the year 1428, and 2,460 in 1434. And here, in this modern English church, is a statue of the saint, with the scallop-shell on his cape, first assumed by pilgrims to Compostella as a token that they had extended their penitential wanderings to that sainted shore. English Catholics of the olden time seemed to have had a special love for pilgrimages, and we hail a renewed taste for such a devotion as a revival of the spirit of the past.

It was the good fortune of our modern pilgrim to hear the Archbishop of Westminster preach a few days after in the Spanish church on the state of the soul after death—a preacher that harmonizes at once with the past and the present—full of sympathy with the present, full of the spirit of the past. A S. Jerome from his cave, a S. Anthony from the desert! is the first thought, and his wonderfully solemn style of preaching is in harmony with his ascetic appearance. Nothing could be more impressive and affecting. Neither did our wanderer forget the ivy-clad oratory at Kensington, still perfumed with holy memories of F. Faber. He felt the need of thanking him here for the thousand precious words he had spoken to his soul through his beautiful hymns and invaluable works on the inner life; soothing it in sorrow, and arming it against the transitory evils of life. Such evils follow every one, even the pilgrim, and it was good to repeat here Faber's lines:

What a round of sweet devotions in this church, with the taper-lighted oratory of Mary Most Pure! Oh! how near to heaven one gets there!—the beautiful shrine-like chapel of S. Philip Neri, and the solemn Calvary where, between the two thieves, the Divine Image is outstretched on the huge cross, embalming the wood—

Many pious hearts seem drawn here to meditate on the Passion, and, one after another, go up to kiss the blood-stained cross. Oh! how many ways the church has of leading the soul to God! Guido declared he had two hundred ways of making the eyes look up to heaven. The church has many more with its multiplied popular devotions, each peculiarly adapted to some cast of soul. It would be heaven enough below to have a cell somewhere near this sweet school of S. Philip's sons and the beautiful altars they have set up.

While thus gratifying the devotional instincts of his heart, some religious monument of bygone ages was constantly falling in our pilgrim's way. How could he pass S. Pancras-in-the-Fields without falling into prayer, as Windham in his diary tells us Dr. Johnson did, recalling the Catholic martyrs burnt here at the stake in Queen Elizabeth's time? The bell of S. Pancras—O funeral note of woe!—was the last to ring for Mass in England at the time of the so-called Reformation. A wonder it did not break in twain as it sounded that last elevation of the Host! Has it ever uttered one joyful note since that sad morn, when the altars were stripped, the lights one by one put sorrowfully out, and the Divine Presence faded away? No, no; it has the saddest tone of any bell in London, at least to the Catholic ear. As it was here he was laid away, it is no wonder that faithful Catholics, down to the present century, were in the habit of coming to S. Pancras at early morning hour to seek some trace of their buried Lord. Perhaps he sometimes appeared to such devout souls, as of old to his Mother and Magdalen. It is certain that, at least, he spoke to their hearts as they lingered here to pray—pray that he might rise again! And here they wished to rest after death, till they were again allowed to have a cemetery apart. This was the burial-place of the Howards and Cliffords, and others of high lineage, both foreign and native. One old friend lies here, John Walker—well known from his Dictionary, once extensively used in America, a convert to the Catholic Church, and a friend of Dr. Milner's, who calls him "the Guido d'Arezzo of elocution, who discovered the scale of speaking sounds by which reading and delivery have been reduced to a system."

S. Pancras was once a popular saint. The boy-martyr of Rome, whose blood was shed in the cause of truth, was regarded in the middle ages as the avenger of false oaths. The kings of France used to confirm treaties in his name. The English, with their natural abhorrence of lying, so honored him as to give his name to one of the oldest churches in London. Cardinal Wiseman has popularized his memory in these days through Fabiola.

Again, what a flood of recollections comes over the pilgrim in passing through Temple Bar, or going across London Bridge, first built by the pious brothers of S. Mary's Monastery in 994. The old bishops and monks were truly the pontifices of the middle ages—not only as builders of

but good substantial arches of stone over stream and flood. The Pont Royal over the Seine was built by a Dominican. So was the Carraja at Florence. The old bridges of Spain were mostly due to the clergy.

Bridge-building was esteemed a good work in those times, and prayers were offered for those engaged in it. At the bidding of the beads, the faithful were thus invited: "Masters and frendes, ye shall praye for all them that bridges and streets make and amend, that God grant us part of their good deeds, and them of ours."

London Bridge was rebuilt of stone nearly two centuries later. Peter of S. Mary's, Colechurch, began it. Henry II. gave towards it the tax on wool, which led to the saying that "London Bridge was built on wool-packs." Peter did not live to complete it. That was done by Isenbert, master of the schools at Xainctes—a builder of bridges in his own country. He finished London Bridge in 1280. Near the middle of it was a Gothic chapel, dedicated to S. Thomas à Becket, and under the wool-packs—that is to say, in the crypt—a tomb was hollowed out of a pier of the bridge for Peter of Colechurch. When this pier was removed in 1832, his remains were found where they had lain nearly six hundred years. On the Gate-house of London Bridge was hung the head of Sir William Wallace. Bishop Fisher's (of Rochester) was hung here the very day his cardinal's hat arrived at Dover; and two weeks after, that of his friend, Sir Thomas More. Here, too, were suspended the heads of F. Garnet, of the Society of Jesus, and scores of Catholic priests in Queen Elizabeth's time.

Yes, London is full of Catholic memories. Bridewell, Bedlam, Mincing Lane, Tooley St., and many more are names of Catholic origin, now corrupted, the derivation of which it is pleasant to recall as they meet the eye. One strolls through Paternoster Row, and Ave Maria Lane, and by Amen Corner, out of love for their very names, reminding us of the Catholic processions around Old S. Paul's. Shall it be confessed?—profaner thoughts here mingle with such memories. Passing through Paternoster Row, one naturally looks up, expecting to see the splendid Mrs. Bungay come forth to take her drive with a look of defiance at the chaise-less Mrs. Bacon at the opposite window!

Not far from here is Christ's Hospital, so familiar to us all through Lamb, Coleridge, and Leigh Hunt. It is at once recognized by the bust of Edward VI. over the entrance. It is pleasant to be allowed to wander through the arcades and quadrangles at one's pleasure, with no guide to disturb the delightful memories evoked by such a place. Going into a quadrangle, surrounded by a kind of cloister hung with memorial tablets, the first thing noticed is a marble slab on the wall to the right, inscribed:

"In memory of the Rev. James Boyer, who for many years was head grammar-master of this Hospital. He died July 28, 1814, aged seventy-nine years."

One could not help pausing to read and copy this tribute to so old an acquaintance. To be sure, "J. B. had a heavy hand," which was rather too familiar with a rod of fearful omen, but he ground out some fine scholars, and has been immortalized by the great geniuses that expanded under his tuition. I can see Master Boyer now, as Charles Lamb describes him, calling upon the boys with a sardonic grin to see how neat and fresh his rod looked!—see him in his passy, or passionate wig, make a precipitate entry into the school-room from his inner den, and, with his knotty fist doubled up, and a turbulent eye, single out some unhappy boy, roaring: "Od's my life, sirrah! I have a mind to whip you"; and then, with a sudden retracting impulse, return to his lair, and, after a lapse of some moments, drive out headlong again with the context which the poor boy almost hoped was forgotten: "And I will, too!"—treating the trembling culprit to a sandwich of alternate lash and paragraph till his rabidus furor was assuaged.

Lamb, in his delightful essay, Recollections of Christ's Hospital, dwells on some of his fellow-pupils whose memory one cannot help recalling while lingering under these arches. And chief among them, "Samuel Taylor Coleridge, logician, metaphysician, bard—who in these cloisters unfolded in deep and sweet intonations the mysteries of Jamblichus or Plotinus, or recited Homer in his Greek, or Pindar, while the walls of the old Grey Friars re-echoed to the accents of the inspired charity boy." He tells us, too, of Thomas Fanshawe Middleton, "a scholar and a gentleman in his teens," but said afterwards to have borne his mitre rather high as the first Protestant bishop of Calcutta, though a more humble and apostolic bearing "might not have been exactly fitted to impress the minds of those Anglo-Asiatic diocesans with reverence for home institutions and the church which such fathers watered." There is a monument to the memory of Bishop Middleton at S. Paul's, where he is represented, in his robes of office, in the act of confirming two East Indians, but the hand raised over their heads has all the fingers broken off but one. Let us hope what apostolic authority he possessed was centred in that digit!

Above all, at Christ's Hospital one recalls the gentle Elia himself. Perhaps in yonder dim corner he furtively ate the griskin brought from the paternal kitchen by his aunt. "I remember the good old relative," he says (in whom love forbade pride), "squatting down upon some odd stone in a by-nook of the cloisters, disclosing the viands (of higher regale than those cates which the ravens ministered to the Tishbite), and the contending passions of L. at the unfolding. There was love for the bringer, shame for the thing brought and the manner of its bringing."

Under these pillared arches, so shadowy to-day with the heavy London fog, Richardson perhaps conceived his first dramatic scenes, and Leigh Hunt began to weave the delicious fancies that have since charmed us all. Yonder was the dormitory the young ass was smuggled into, which waxed fat, and proclaimed his good fortune to the world below, setting concealment any longer at defiance.

While thus musing, an instalment of the eight hundred boys at the Hospital came out to their sports in their quaint costume of black breeches, long yellow stockings to the knees, and a dark-blue gown down to the heels, garnished with bright buttons bearing the likeness of Edward VI., and confined by a leather belt. White bands at the neck give them a clerical look by no means at variance with so monastic a place. They had innocent, open faces, such as we find in our monastic schools, reminding one of Pope Gregory's well-known exclamation: "Non Angli sed angeli." They tucked up their skirts and betook themselves most heartily to their sports. It was queer to see their long yellow-stockinged legs flying across the quadrangle. They have caps, it is said, about the size of a saucer, which they dislike so much that they prefer going bare-headed, but they did not mind the fog, now almost amounting to rain. Children, we all know, are, as Lamb says, "proof against weather, ingratitude, meat under-done, and every weapon of fate." One of them stopped to pump some water for the visitor to offer as a libation to the memory of Charles Lamb.

"Pierian spring!" scornfully shouted Master Boyer to a young writer of a classical turn: "the cloister pump, you mean!"

The school-room visited bore marks that would have done credit to a Yankee jack-knife, and revived pleasant reminiscences of youthful achievements in a New England school-house. The chapel, too, with its mural tablets, and flag tombstones, and painted window, of Christ blessing little children, is interesting. At the right of the chancel is a remnant of old monastic charity. An inscription in yellow letters on a claret-colored ground announces that "the bread here given weekly to the poor of the parish of S. Leonard's is from a bequest of Sir John Trott and other benefactors," and on the other side in equally glaring characters: "Praise be to thee, O Lord God, for this thy gift unto the poor!" There is rather a more amusing inscription of a similar nature at S. Giles', Cripplegate, opposite the monument to Milton:

The said Busby is represented above this curious inscription, in bold relief, as a be-ruffed man of jovial type, holding a bottle in one hand, and a death's-head in the other, so that one does not know whether to laugh or cry. It would be more reasonable to cry over the grave of that dreadful prevaricator Fox, called the Martyrologist, said to be buried in the same church, only one does not know where to weep, as the precise spot is not known. So one has to be satisfied with sighing before a huge stone set up to his memory at the end of the church, and thinking with Lessing that "if the world is to be held together by lies, the old ones which are already current are as good as the new." What a pity Fox had not belonged to S. Pancras' parish! However, that saint seems to have kept an eye on him, and avenged the cause of truth. We do not suppose there are many now who are credulous enough to accept Fox as reliable authority concerning the history of those sad times. And if we stop to look at his tablet here, it is with something of the same feeling that we turn down Fetter Lane to see where "Praise God Barebones" and his brother "Damned Barebones" lived, and wonder how any one house could hold them both.