The Contents

CHAPTER I—The Veneration of the Holy Places. ... Pp. 1-19.

Imitative tendency in our popular devotions—The Stations a pilgrimage in miniature—Ardour shown in making pilgrimages to Jerusalem—The Lady Egeria—The Holy Places measured to be copied in the West—St Petronius—Peter and John Bechetti or Becket—The spiritual Way of the Cross of the Blessed Henry Suso—The vow of the Nun of Lorvão.

CHAPTER II—The Beginnings of the Via Crucis. ... Pp. 20-45.

The Porte Doloreuse—Sites of incidents on the way to Calvary—The inverted order of the official pilgrimage route—The legend of our Lady’s pilgrimage—Fabri’s description of the road to Calvary and of our Lady’s daily journey—A night with the pilgrims in the Holy Sepulchre Church—Rules to be observed—The reopening of the doors.

CHAPTER III—The earliest Stations and their Sequence. ... Pp. 45-61.

The word “Station”—William Wey’s use of it in connexion with the road to Calvary—Wey’s memorial verses—Sir Richard Guylforde’s “pylgrymages within Jerusalem”—Torkington’s copy in reverse order—The practice of measuring the distances—Discrepancies in the order of the Stations.

CHAPTER IV—The “Seven Falls.” ... Pp. 46-75

The Stations at Görlitz—The “Seven Falls” of Adam Krafft at Nuremberg—The “Cruysganch” of Louvain—Romanet Boffin and the sets of seven pillars at Rhodes, Fribourg and Romans—The Stations of the Seven Dolours at Antwerp—Fifteenth-century engravings of the Seven Falls—The book of the “Mount of Calvary”—The Seven Falls in Pascha’s “Spiritual Pilgrimage.”

CHAPTER V—The Spiritual Pilgrimage of Jan Pascha. ... Pp. 76-95.

Some Dutch books relating to the stations—Bethlem’s “Meditations on the Passion” with distances—The Nuremberg “Ghostly Way” of 1521—Prevalence of the practice of erecting Stations—The “Spiritual Pilgrimage” of Jan Pascha the Carmelite—Description of the book—Various editions and translations—The “proper” Way of the Cross—Adrichomius and his indebtedness to Pascha—Origin of the triple fall in our present system of Stations—Impossibility in the sixteenth century of any public exercise of the “Way of the Cross” at Jerusalem—The initiative consequently did not come from the East but from Europe, especially from the Netherlands—Practice of the Stations in an Antwerp convent.

CHAPTER VI—The Via Dolorosa at Jerusalem from the Seventeenth century to the Present Day. ... Pp. 96-135.

Unique authority of the Franciscan traditions at Jerusalem—Contradictions with the map of Adrichomius—Testimony of Bernardino Amico and Quaresmius—Description of the Via Dolorosa—The Stations according to Surius—The Ecce Homo Arch—Place of our Lord’s meeting with His Blessed Mother—The place of the first fall and of the coming of Simon of Cyrene—Attempt to harmonize the Jerusalem tradition with the system of Adrichomius—Sites of our Lord’s meeting with the women of Jerusalem and with Veronica—The Judicial Gate—The gradual displacement of the traditional Stations in the eighteenth century—The question of the site of the Prætorium and of the true Way of the Cross—Prevalence of other systems of Stations and notably of that of Father Parviller.

CHAPTER VII—The Devotional Aspect of the Stations. ... Pp. 136-158.

Survival of the fittest in our devotional practices—A legendary element permissible and often helpful to piety—Words of Père Lagrange—Devotional suggestiveness of the legend of Veronica and of the triple fall—Illustrations from the writings of Cardinal Newman and Henri Perreyve—The spirit of the medieval pilgrims—Fabri’s description of Calvary and of the Holy Sepulchre—Perreyve’s meditation on the Holy Sepulchre.

CHAPTER VIII—The Stations In Modern Times. ... Pp. 159-177.

One uniform system now prevalent—Committed specially to the charge of the Franciscan Order—Indulgences of the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem attached to the ordinary Stations of the Cross—Early belief to this effect—Origin of the indulgences of the Holy Places—Impossible to attribute them to Pope St Silvester—Remarkable Bull of confirmation issued by Pope Pius IV—Conditions for gaining the indulgences at the present day.

APPENDIX A—Heer Bethlem’s “Ovewegingen,” p. 179

B—Table of Indulgences, p. 182

C—Relative Antiquity of the various Stations, p. 182