Part 25 (1/2)

I will now briefly call your attention to the devotional works of the celebrated Bonaventura. He is no ordinary man; and the circ.u.mstances under which his works were commended to the world are indeed remarkable.

I know not how a Church can give the impress of its own name and approval in a more full or unequivocal manner to the works of any human being, than the Church of Rome has stamped her authority on the works of this her saint.

In the ”Acta Sanctorum”, [Antwerp, 1723, July 14, p. 811-823.] it is stated, that this celebrated man was born in 1221, and died in 1274. He pa.s.sed through all degrees of ecclesiastical dignities, {355} short only of the pontifical throne itself. He was of the order of St. Francis, and refused the archbishopric of York, when it was offered to him by Pope Clement the Fourth, in 1265; whose successor, Gregory the Tenth, elevated him to the dignity of cardinal bishop. His biographer expresses his astonishment, that such a man's memory should have been so long buried with his body; but adds, that the tardiness of his honours was compensated by their splendour.

More than two centuries after his death, his claims to canonization were urged upon Sixtus the Fourth; and that Pope raised him to the dignity of saint; the diploma of his canonization bearing date 18 kalends of May, 1482, the eleventh year of that pope's reign.

Before a saint is canonized by the Pope, it is usually required, that miracles wrought by him, or upon him, or at his tomb, be proved to the satisfaction of the Roman court[130]. We need not dwell on the nature of an inquiry into a matter-of-fact, alleged to have been done by an individual two hundred years before; and whose memory is said to have lain buried with his corpse. Among the miracles specified, it is recorded, that on one occasion, when he was filled with solemn awe and fear at the celebration of the Lord's Supper, G.o.d, by an angel, took a particle of the consecrated host from the hands of the priest, and gently placed it in the holy man's mouth. But, with these transactions, I am not anxious to interfere, except so far as to ascertain the degree of authority with which any pious Roman Catholic must be induced to invest Bonaventura as a teacher and instructor in the doctrines of Christianity, authorized and appointed by his Church. The case stands thus:--Pope Sixtus IV. states in his {356} diploma, that the proctor of the order of Minors, proved by a dissertation on the pa.s.sage of St.

John, ”There are three that bear record in heaven,” that the blessed Trinity had borne testimony to the fact of Bonaventura being a saint in heaven: the Father proving it by the attested miracles; the Son, in the WISDOM OF HIS DOCTRINE; the Holy Spirit, by the goodness of his life.

The pontiff then adds, in his own words, ”He so wrote on divine subjects, THAT THE HOLY SPIRIT SEEMS TO HAVE SPOKEN IN HIM.” [Page 831.

”Ea de divinis rebus scripsit, ut in eo Spiritus Sanctus locutus videatur.”] A testimony referred to by Pope Sixtus the Fifth.

[Footnote 130: See the canonization of St. Bonaventura in the Acta Sanctorum.]

This latter pontiff was crowned May 1, 1585, more than a century after the canonization of Bonaventura, and more than three centuries after his death. By his order, the works of Bonaventura were ”most carefully emendated.” The decretal letters, A.D. 1588, p.r.o.nounced him to be an acknowledged doctor of Holy Church, directing his authority to be cited and employed in all places of education, and in all ecclesiastical discussions and studies. The same act offers plenary indulgence to all who a.s.sist at the ma.s.s on his feast, in certain specified places, with other minor immunities on the conditions annexed. [Page 837.]

In these doc.u.ments Bonaventura[131] is called the Seraphic Doctor; and I repeat my doubt, whether it is possible for any human authority to give a more full, entire, and unreserved sanction to the works of any human being than the Church of Rome has given to {357} the writings of Bonaventura. And what do those works present to us, on the subject of the Invocation and wors.h.i.+p of the Virgin Mary?

[Footnote 131: The edition of his works which I have used was published at Mentz in 1609; and the pa.s.sages referred to are in vol. vi. between pp. 400 and 500.]

Taking every one of the one hundred and fifty psalms[132], Bonaventura so changes the commencement of each, as to address them not as the inspired Psalmist did, to the Lord Jehovah, the One only Lord G.o.d Almighty, but to the Virgin Mary; inserting much of his own composition, and then adding the Gloria Patri to each. It is very painful to refer to these prost.i.tutions of any part of the Holy Book of revealed truth; but we must not be deterred from looking this evil in the face. A few examples, however, will suffice.

[Footnote 132: It is curious to find the Cardinal Du Perron, in his answer to our King James, declaring that he had never seen nor met with this Psalter in his life, and he was sure it was never written by Bonaventura; alleging that it was not mentioned by Trithemius or Gesner. The Vatican editors, however, have set that question at rest. They a.s.sure us that they have thrown into the appendix all the works about the genuineness of which there was any doubt, and that Bonaventura wrote many works not mentioned by Trithemius, which they have published from the Vatican press. Of this Psalter there is no doubt. See Cardinal Du Perron, Replique a la Rep. du Roi de Grand Bretagne. Paris, 1620, p. 974.]

In the 30th psalm. ”In thee, O Lord, have I trusted; let me not be confounded for ever,” &c., the Psalter of the Virgin subst.i.tutes these words: [In te, Domina, speravi; non confundar in aeternum, &c. &c. In ma.n.u.s tuas, Domina, commendo spiritum meum, totam vitam meam, et diem ultimum meum.--P. 480.]

”In thee, O Lady, have I trusted; let me not be confounded for ever: in thy grace take me.

”Thou art my fort.i.tude and my refuge; my consolation and my protection.

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”To thee, O Lady, have I cried, while my heart was in heaviness; and thou didst hear me from the top of the eternal hills.

”Bring thou me out of the snare which they have hid for me; for thou art my succour.

”Into thy hands, O Lady, I commend my spirit, my whole life, and my last day.--Gloria Patri,” &c.

In the 31st psalm we read, ”Blessed are they whose hearts love thee, O Virgin Mary; their sins shall be mercifully blotted out BY THEE....”

[Beati quorum corda te diligunt, Virgo Maria; peccata ipsorum A TE misericorditer diluentur.--P. 481.]

In the 35th, v. 2. ”Incline thou the countenance of G.o.d upon us; COMPEL HIM to have mercy upon sinners. O Lady, thy mercy is in the heaven, and thy grace is spread over the whole earth.” [Inclina vultum Dei super nos. COGE illum peccatoribus misereri; Domina, in coelo misericordia tua, et gratia diffusa est super terram.]

In the 67th, instead of, ”Let G.o.d arise, and let his enemies be scattered,” the Psalter of the Virgin has,

”Let Mary arise, and let her enemies be scattered.” [Exurgat Maria, et dissipentur inimici ejus.--P. 483.]

In the opening of the 93rd psalm there is a most extraordinary, rather, as it sounds to me, a most impious and blasphemous comparison of the Supreme G.o.d with the Virgin Mary, in reference to the very Attribute, which s.h.i.+nes first, last, and brightest in HIM,--His eternal mercy. Nay, it draws the contrast in favour of the Virgin, and against G.o.d. Most glad should I be, to find that I had misunderstood this pa.s.sage; and that it admits of another acceptation[133]. But I fear its real meaning is beyond controversy.

[Footnote 133: A similar idea indeed pervades some addresses to the Virgin of the present day, representing the great and only potentate as her heavenly husband, in himself full of rage, but softened into tenderness towards her votaries by her influence.

See a hymn, in the Paris collection already referred to, p. 353, &c. of this work (Nouveau Recueil de Cantiques, p. 183).