CHAP. V. He addresses the Son of God as "the Redeemer of captives, the Saviour of the lost, the hope of exiles, the strength of the distressed, the enlarger of the enslaved spirit, the sweet solace and refreshment of the mournful soul, the crown of conquerors, the only reward and joy of all the citizens of heaven, the copious source of all grace The Holy Spirit he thus addresses in the same treatise. "Thee, Holy Spirit, I implore, if through my weakness, I have a very imperfect understanding of the truth of thy majesty, and if, through the concupiscence of sinful nature, I have neglected to obey the Lord's precepts when understood, that thou wouldst condescend to enlighten me with thy visitation, that through thee, whom I have called upon as my succour, in the dangerous ocean of life, I may, without shipwreck, arrive at the shore of a blessed immortality.' Could the pious spirit, who believes and longs for the rest which remains for the people of God, express its most ardent breathings in language more adapted to her frame than the following? "Hasten the time, my Saviour and my God, when, what I now believe, I may see with eyes uncovered; what I now hope and reverence at a distance, I may apprehend; what I now desire, according to the measure of my strength, I may affectionately embrace in the arms of my soul, and that I may be wholly absorbed in the abyss of thy love t!" After having uttered many petitions, he says, "I have asked many good things, my Creator, though I have deserved many evils. Not only I have no claim on thee for these good things, but I have merited exquisite punishments. But the case of publicans, harlots, and robbers, in a moment snatched from the jaws of the enemy, and received + Id. Chap. 18, Spec, Sermo Evang. C. 19. XI. in the bosom of the Shepherd, animates my soul CENT. with a cheering hope." With so intuitive a glance of Christian faith does he console his soul!-It is in the same way that divine mercy is apprehended by all humble and penitent spirits. The person of Christ, and the doctrine of justification by him alone, are the objects and supports of confidence in God. CHAP. I. A GENERAL VIEW OF THE LIFE OF BERNARD. GREAT luminary strikes our attention at the entrance of this century-the famous Bernard, abbot of Clairval. As the general scene of our history still continues dark and gloomy, let us stick close to the splendid object. At least I would wish to exhibit a just estimate of the life, character, and writings of this renowned saint. For the subject may not only throw a considerable light on the religion and manners of this century, but will also illustrate that connection between Christian doctrine and practice, which it is the principal design of this work to explore from age to age. There was a time when Bernard was idolized: his word was a law, while he lived, throughout Europe; and, for ages after his death, he was scarce thought to have been capable either of fault or mistake. But the public taste has long since deviated into the other extreme, and it will behove me to say a few words, with a view to combat that power of prejudice, by which most minds are apt to be carried down the torrent of fashion. Bernard was doubtless a very ardent champion of the popes of Rome; I mean, of their office, not of their personal characters. He inveighed against the vices of the men, and the various evils of their ecclesiastical administration. But he supported their pretensions to the chair of St. Peter, and opposed with vehemence all who withstood those pretensions. FORGIVE HIM THIS WRONG: it was common to him with the Christian world; and the German Reformer, who, four hundred years after, could see at length, though by slow degrees, the wickedness and folly of the whole established system, under which he had been strictly educated, has ever been looked on as a prodigy. In superstition also, Bernard was unhappily involved all his days; it was the evil of the times. His austerities have, with nauseous punctuality, been recited by his panegyrists*. They might have spared their accounts, as they themselves confess that he afterwards owned, he was in an error, both in injuring his own health, and in exacting too much of labour and sufferings from his disciples. Nor is the sincerity of Bernard to be doubted, either in his juvenile zeal, or in his candid and frank confession of his faults. He even accused himself of sacrilege, because by his indiscreet excesses he had rendered himself almost unfit to serve God and the Church. And though the weakness of his frame continued till death, as the consequence of the injuries which his body had received by his austerities, he seems to have taken some care of health in the latter part his life. But the strongest prejudices, which we are inclined to admit against him in our times, are derived from his supposed miracles, and from his real attachment to the cause of the Crusades. In truth, I was disgusted with the tedious perusal of his miracles, with not one of which do I mean to trouble the reader. But Bernard was These are several; the lives of Bernard, which they wrote, are at the close of the 2d Vol. of his Works; which are in two folios. I use the Parisian edition of Mabillon. + Vol. II. p. 1094. CENT. XII. I. CHAP. canonized: it was therefore necessary, by the etiquette of the Roman See, that a Saint should work miracles; and no wonder, when the interests of all parties concerned were favourable to fraud, and when credulity was a general evil, that miracles should be feigned, be circumstantially related, and be implicitly believed. Thus Ignatius, the father of the Jesuits, was said, sixty years after his death, to have wrought miracles; though in his life, published fifteen years after that event, no mention is made of any. Our king Henry III. was reported to have wrought a miracle after his death, at his tomb. He, also, might have been added to the Roman Calendar, if the imposture had not been detected and exposed by the vigour and sagacity of his son Edward I*. Let Bernard, then, be acquitted of all blame on this head, though his panegyrists, it must be owned, have written as absurdly concerning him, as if they had intended to disgrace his character. Of the policy of the Crusades, my judgment is not the same as concerning their justice. In the beginning of this century, prodigious armies marched out of Europe, to take possession of the Holy Land; and, notwithstanding the repeated calamities which attended their progress, the princes of the west still persevered in the attempt. That they should single out Palestine as the scene of their military exploits, was fanatical and superstitious. The great inconveniencies to which they were inevitably exposed, on account of the immense distances from their respective countries, and the want of all political and prudential wisdom in their plans, are evident; and, in the event, Europe suffered the punishment of their temerity and folly. Add to this, that the improvident waste of so much human blood, on so fantastic an object, and the mixture of Fox's B. of Martyrs, Vol, I. 399. |