Roman Catholicism in Spain.
by Anonymous.
Introduction
Variableness of outward practice of Christianity-The like as to that of Mahometanism-Roman Catholicism most subject to that modification-Excesses of Roman Catholicism in Spain accounted for by Spanish history-The Goths and Moors of Africa-Their conversion to Christianity-The aborigines of America-Traditional coincidences with scriptural truth-National character of the religion of Spaniards-Religion of the affections-Santa Teresa-Amatory propensities in connection with religion-Knight-errantry-Motto of Spanish n.o.bility-The four primitive orders-Loyola-Religion the pretext for wars of Spain-Three distinct features of the national character of Spaniards, ill.u.s.trated by Isabella the Catholic, Charles V., and Philip II.
Christianity, although of divine origin, and, consequently, like all that partic.i.p.ates in the essence of Divinity, immutable in its doctrines and creeds, submits itself nevertheless, in outward practice, to the incidents common to all human inst.i.tutions, and receives an impression from the particular character of the people who observe its rites, and subject their conduct to its precepts. Every religious idea lays hold on the heart and understanding: consequently the state of the affections and the intellectual bias of each nation must communicate to the worship it professes a particular influence, which is seen, not only in the way in which ceremonies are practised, or in the organization of the hierarchy, or in the style and language which man uses in addressing the Deity, but in the entire system of actions, relations, and thoughts, which const.i.tutes what is called worship.
Worship partic.i.p.ates in the impulse which a nation has received at its origin,-from its historical antecedents,-from its political system,-and from the peculiarities which predominate in the formation of its intelligence. The Greek polytheism did not distinguish itself from the Roman either in its theogony or its rites; but there is no doubt that the former was more poetical, more artistic, and more scrupulous than the latter. The Romans, being brought into close contact with all the nations of the earth, and having become subjugated by the insolent despotism of the Caesars, opened the doors of their Pantheon, not only to the Goths of Egypt and of Gaul, but to monsters of cruelty, and to men sunk in every cla.s.s of those vices which had stained the throne of Augustus. The Greeks, lovers of science, had placed their city of Athens under the protection of Minerva; but Rome was too proud to humble herself by playing the inferior part of the protected. In order to provide for her own security, she declared herself a G.o.ddess, and erected her own temples and altars. The Roman priests were warriors and magistrates; those of Athens were philosophers and poets. The same observations apply to Mahometanism. In India it has always shown itself more contemplative, more tolerant, than in Arabia, Turkey, or on the northern coast of Africa, and when it propagated itself in the southern regions of Europe, its stern inflexibility was not able to resist even the influence of clime; the perfumed breezes of the Betis and the Xenil despoiled it, in part, of the austere physiognomy which had been impressed on its whole structure by the sands of Arabia. Even the severe laws of the harem were relaxed in the courts of Boabdil and of Almanzor, for the wives of those two monarchs, openly, and without shame, took part in the pompous fetes of the Alhambra and of the _serrania_ of Cordova.
Of all the religious systems. .h.i.therto known, none allows itself, with so much docility, to be modified by external circ.u.mstances which const.i.tute the national character as does Roman Catholicism; and there are many causes for this: Roman Catholicism exercises an infinitely greater dominion over the senses than over the reason and intelligence; the objects of its veneration, of its meditations, and of its devotional practices, are infinitely more various and numerous than those of any other sect of Christians; it introduces itself, so to speak, to all the occupations of life, in all hours of the day, in the trades, professions, amus.e.m.e.nts, and even gallantries of individuals; it fetters their reason, and deprives it of all liberty and independence; and, above all, it raises up in the midst of society, a privileged and isolated cla.s.s, superior to the power of the law and the government; into the hands of that cla.s.s it puts an absolute and irresistible authority, which is exercised by invisible means, but means far more efficacious and terrible in their effects than those of the civil power. From this universal and irresistible predominance it results that the entire existence of the Roman Catholic is a continual observance of the worship which he professes, and consequently, that Roman Catholicism, at the same time that it entirely modifies man, must of necessity, in its turn, receive, in some degree, the impress of that temper which nature has bestowed upon him. Thus we see that Roman Catholicism is more zealous, more enthusiastic, more turbulent, in Ireland, more artistic in Italy, more philosophic in Germany, more literary and discursive in France, more idolatrous in the States of South America, more reserved and modest, more decent and tolerant, less ambitious in its aspirations, and less audacious in its polemics, in England than in any other part of the world.
As to Roman Catholicism in Spain: we see thrown in its face its cruel intolerance, its puerile practices, its profane language, its blind submission, or rather the absolute slavery in which it places the believer with respect to the priest. There is much truth in these charges; but all of them are accounted for by an observance of history, and by a knowledge of the natural character and circ.u.mstances which have contributed to foster and strengthen religious sentiments in Spain.
The intolerance of Roman Catholicism in the Peninsula, carried to tyranny, and, frequently, even to ferocity, has been a consequence of the religious wars of six centuries,-wars which the Goths sustained with unwearied perseverance against the Moors of Africa. The Goths had embraced the Christian religion with all the ardour and sincerity peculiar to a nation but recently delivered from a violent and savage state; for, although a generous race, they were ignorant and coa.r.s.e in their habits. Their conversion to Christianity not only entirely modified their moral and religious notions, and introduced among them a greater elevation of feeling and an amplitude of ideas, but a.s.sociated, intimately, the religious with the poetical sentiment, in such a manner that, in their eyes, every enemy of Christ was the enemy of the whole nation; difference of creed, therefore, according to their rude code of international laws, was a legitimate cause of war. In their eyes the unbeliever was a political enemy. Mere contact with an unbaptized person was considered a pollution. They believed that all who did not worship Christ were worshippers of the devil, and that Mahomet and the Moses of the Jews were nothing more than the representatives and agents of the fallen angel. Whilst those ideas were gaining ascendancy, the clergy, the only depositaries of letters and of knowledge, were rapidly possessing themselves of power, riches, and influence, and endeavouring to conserve and confirm those advantages by all possible means. Of those means none was so convenient, in times of continual violence and warfare, to the habits of a nation just emerging from a savage state, and which recognised no other merit than physical force and warlike valour, as that of encouraging those sanguinary and ruthless propensities, sanctifying them in some way or other by religious sentiment, and stirring up and inflaming the pa.s.sions of the nation, with a view of exterminating all persons who did not acknowledge the jurisdiction of the church and the power of its ministers. Thus it happened that Christianity, from a very early period after its introduction to Spain, was deprived of that spirit of meekness, suavity, and tolerance, impressed upon it by its Divine Founder, and became possessed of a spirit of the most implacable resentment against every person who had not gone through the baptismal ceremony; and thus, also, it was that the religion of the country degenerated into a violent and revengeful sentiment, and took part in all the excesses and all the aberrations of the human pa.s.sions; thus it was, in fine, that the national spirit became predisposed to the persecution of the Jews, Mahometans, and Protestants, by means of that execrable tribunal, the Inquisition.
Immediately after the conquest of Granada, in which these cruel and destructive habits were openly displayed, an occasion presented itself for giving still greater scope to their exercise. The subjugation of the Continent discovered by Columbus was a war of religion no less than of ambition and of conquest. The mere circ.u.mstance that the aborigines of America had not received the light of the gospel was sufficient to induce Spaniards to regard them as so many enemies of G.o.d, and as slaves and worshippers of the devil. In the various forms of religious worship which prevailed in those vast territories were embodied certain principles which might, if carried out, have been of great service to the conquered nation. In nearly all of those forms, the unity of G.o.d was acknowledged, and also, in many of them, the necessity of a spiritual regeneration. In Mexico, and that part of the country now called Central America, was preserved a traditional remembrance of a severe chastis.e.m.e.nt inflicted by the Supreme Creator on rebellious humanity, but accompanied with a promise that the species should not be annihilated. That tradition taught that G.o.d had sent into the world his Son, called _Teot-belche_, in order to repeople the earth;-that this personage had been shut up in a floating house during the time of the great flood, and was afraid to venture out, until he had seen an eagle bringing in its mouth a branch from a tree-a sign that the waters had abated, and that vegetation had re-appeared. Other great coincidences with revealed truth discovered themselves in the religious creeds of the people of Mechoacan, Guatemala, and in those also of the inhabitants of Peru, where the dogma had acquired a certain degree of elevation and purity, very different from the sensual ideas so common among the ancient Asiatics. The conquerors, therefore, whilst attempting to make proselytes to the true faith might have availed themselves of those antecedents, and could easily have corrected such notions, although founded on a tradition having the weight of ancestral authority. The right moral ideas found already impressed on the minds of these aborigines, especially those of Peru, might have been encouraged and amplified. Instead of embracing the system indicated by the mild and conciliatory spirit of Christianity, the Americans, _en ma.s.se_, were considered, from that moment, as enemies of G.o.d, and compelled, sometimes by force, to receive baptism, without any previous explanation of the origin and design of that rite; at other times they were tortured with the greatest cruelty, under a notion that in the extremity of their agony they might be induced to renounce the only creed which had come to their conviction. Many thousands of that unhappy people were exterminated, for they did not even understand the language in which doctrines the most sublime and marvellous in history were attempted to be enforced.
It has already been observed that this rancorous extravagance of the religious spirit in Spain had its origin in a political and patriotic struggle; but long and sanguinary as that was, it could not eradicate the primitive type of the nation, nor prevent its characteristic qualities from reflecting themselves in worship, devotion, and every thing else that const.i.tutes a national religion. Thus it was, that, with those intolerant and persecuting propensities, were also a.s.sociated, in Spanish Catholicism, the gorgeous, romantic, and poetic, which are still preserved among that semi-oriental race. The Spaniard, endowed with a lively imagination, appears to identify himself with the objects of his endearment; his soul is transported by them, and he dresses them up in his imagination till he fancies they reciprocate his own affections.
This vehement expansion of sentiments frequently opposes his reason, and transforms his real existence into a perpetual vision. Hence also we find that his devotion is not only tender and sympathetic, but pa.s.sionate and warm. His fervour in prayer arrives at such a pitch as to produce copious tears. The language of Spain"s mystical writers, especially that of the elegant Santa Teresa de Jesus, contains the same expressions as those which are used in addressing profane objects of the affections.
One of her most celebrated spiritual songs differs in nothing from those which might have been written by Ovid or Tibullus. Its burden is this:-
Cubridme de flores, Que muero de amores. {15}
The word _amores_, in the plural, does not signify merely the abstract feeling of love, the application of which is as various as are the objects which inspire it; for example, the divine love, the parental, the filial, and the s.e.xual. _Amores_ signifies courtship, flirtation, interchange of sentiments between two lovers; and yet we find this word, at every turn, in the prayers and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of devout Spaniards.
The distinguished woman to whom we have alluded carried, even to an incredible excess, this mixture of the sacred affections with the profane. In her voluminous writings, unrivalled in purity of language and elegance of style, she considers herself, always, as the bride of Jesus Christ, to whom she addresses herself with the same transports of love, and with the same demonstrations of tender submission and endearing respect, that might be used by an affectionate and dutiful wife to her husband. It requires but little knowledge of the human heart to see, at once, that in this mixture of two sentiments so opposed to each other as are that of the love profane and that of the love divine, the latter is liable to succ.u.mb to the former; and, in truth, this danger can only be averted by minds as favoured and as pure as was, without a doubt, the mind of that extraordinary woman. It is generally the case, and commonly observed in Spain, that the sensual element dominates over the mystical, and corrupts it. The common ma.s.s of mankind employs devotion as an instrument favourable to worldly views and to the material interests of life. In Andalucia, enamoured girls confide to the Virgin their ardent sorrows and desires, as the following couplet will show, and which is sung with frequency and is very popular in that province of the Peninsula:-
La Virgen de las Angustias, Es la que sabe mi mal, Pues me meto en su capilla, Y no me harto de llorar. {16}
With these amatory propensities was naturally bound up that spirit of knight-errantry which so much distinguished the national character of Spaniards among all the other nations of Europe; a spirit which neither the course of centuries, nor intestine nor foreign war, nor even revolution itself, although it has transformed in a few ages the temper of modern nations, has been able to blot out. The Spaniard was completely carried away in a transport by his religious practices, his gallantry, loyalty, bravery, exalted notions of honour, and other qualities of the mind, impregnated as they were with that poesy and wild romance which are delineated with so much propriety and skill by the immortal Cervantes.
The motto of the Spanish n.o.bility has always been, "My G.o.d, my king, and my lady,"-a very significant one, and one which described in a lively manner the predominating sentiments of the nation and the equal degree of veneration and enthusiasm which those three objects excited in the minds of the people. The Spaniard is always as disposed to brandish the sword in defence of the religion which he professes, as in that of the king whom he serves or of the lady whom he loves. The processions and all the feasts of the church are invariably accompanied by a military show. The four primitive orders of the nation, viz., Santiago, Alcantara, Calatrava, and Montesa, were, in their origin, inst.i.tutions as religious in their character as the order of the Templars and as that of St John of Jerusalem. Even in the present day, though they have degenerated, they preserve still much of their primitive character. The knights, it is true, do not observe celibacy, as in ancient times; but they still have churches in which they celebrate sumptuous festivities; they take an oath to defend the Catholic religion and the doctrine of the immaculate conception of the Virgin, and to each of these orders there still pertains a certain number of convents of nuns, who wear the habit and carry the cross of their respective orders. These nuns are called _Commendadoras_, and none can be admitted into their numbers but ladies who are descended from an ancient n.o.bility, preserved for many generations from any mixture of plebeian blood.
The celebrated Ignatius de Loyola, founder of the order of the Jesuits, carried this singular amalgamation of piety and of a belligerent spirit to such an extreme as, in our times, cannot but appear ridiculous. On the day on which he was made a knight, it being then the custom that a candidate for such an honour should choose for himself a lady to whose service he might consecrate his arms, and whose image should be constantly before him, his election fell upon the Virgin, as in the same manner did that of Durandarte on Belerma, and that of the celebrated hero of La Mancha on Dulcinea.
In all wars which have been waged by Spaniards, from the times of Pelayo down to those of Espartero, religion has been one of the motives which have impelled them to arms. In the war of succession of 1770, which gave the throne of Castille to the grandson of Louis XIV., the dispute was between two nations equally Roman Catholic-Austria and France.
Nevertheless, the circ.u.mstance that Great Britain had embraced the cause of the archduke was sufficient for considering the war as a religious one; and those who fought for Philip V. regarded the extirpation of the heretical subjects of the House of Orange as the consolidation of the Bourbon dynasty. In our own times we have seen these same sentiments predominating in the civil war of Don Carlos, whose partisans considered their enemies as impious and as atheists, words which in their dictionary were synonymous with "const.i.tutional and liberal." Most of the proclamations emanating from the press of Onate spoke of the dangers which threatened Roman Catholicism, in case the Christine party should triumph.
Thus far we have spoken of the influence exercised by the national character on the religion of Spaniards. That influence has not been lessened by the circ.u.mstance that some of their monarchs have exercised it, and, among others deserving particular mention, the three gigantic models, viz., Isabella the Catholic, Charles V., and Philip II. Each one of the distinctive features which we have hitherto noted in the religion of Spaniards is represented in history by one or another of those three sovereigns: Isabella represented the tender, affectionate, and correlative; Charles, the knight of chivalry and the warrior; Philip, the cruel and sanguinary persecutor.
Isabella united to her eminent qualities, to her profound policy, to her unrivalled valour, to her constancy in the prosecution of her designs, and to the elevation and grandeur of her views, a heart full of tenderness and benevolence, and an ardent disposition to contribute, by all possible means, toward the good of her fellow-creatures. Persuaded that religion was the greatest good which it was possible for man to enjoy, all her anxiety was concentrated in extending that benefit to the greatest number of human beings. It was this which induced her to show herself benevolent and compa.s.sionate toward the Moors of Granada after the conquest of that city; it was this, also, which induced her to lavish her gifts upon, and afterwards to take under her protection, such of those Moors as submitted to baptism. All the incidents of her private life, all her letters, many of which are still extant, show that she was actuated by the most ardent spirit of Christian charity.
History accuses Isabella of having established the Inquisition in Spain.
This great blot in her character, the origin of many of the misfortunes and of all the intellectual drawbacks which that nation has experienced, explains, if it cannot justify, itself, by the circ.u.mstances in which, at that time, the people of the Peninsula were placed. After the surrender of Granada, there remained in the kingdom a great part of the Mussulman population. The queen fostered the hope of their conversion to Christianity and omitted no means to realise it. But the Moors, with very few exceptions at the beginning, resisted every effort whether by persuasion or by promises; they became but the more firmly addicted to their own faith, and being prohibited the public celebration of its rites, they practised them in secret, with all the zeal and enthusiasm which the rigours of intolerance invariably produce in the persecuted.
The clergy, who imagined they saw in the religion of Mahomet the worship of Satan, nay even warriors themselves who had wrought prodigies of valour and shed their blood in order to exterminate that religion, could not regard its prevalence with indifference, nor endure the thought that it should survive the ruin of the capital of the Saracenic empire.
Bitter complaints were made to the queen on account of the impunity with which such excesses against her authority were committed. To her indulgence the princ.i.p.al persons of the state attributed the obstinacy of the Moors who persisted in their errors, and the perfidy of the converted who were accused of continuing in them after having submitted to the ordinance of baptism. Religious phrenzy had arrived at its climax; men"s only occupation seemed to be that of building churches, destroying mosques, and ostentatiously displaying the triumphs of the new creed over that which for many centuries had polluted the soil. It was impossible that Isabella could long resist these continuous remonstrances. The inst.i.tution of the Inquisition was proposed to her as a last resource to maintain the purity of the faith, and that woman, superior to the age in which she lived, and naturally affectionate and charitable, had the unpardonable weakness of ceding to the councils of the implacable Torquemada.
Among the qualities for which Isabella was remarkable none were more admired by contemporary writers than her humility. In proof of this we have but to follow the line of conduct pursued by her during the whole course of her existence. She humbled herself before the church, whose voice she believed she heard through the lips of her confessor.
We have referred to the cruel character of Roman Catholicism in Spain: is not the Inquisition a proof of it? Experience shows how easily habit familiarises us with spectacles most revolting to those feelings of pity and compa.s.sion which Nature has bestowed upon us. Habit always destroys the essential qualities of our moral const.i.tution, sometimes a.s.sociating ideas of pleasure and enjoyment with those of blood and destruction; as, for example, it happened in the games of the circus under the Roman emperors; nay, some have even looked upon homicide and torture as religious duties, and a part of the worship due to the Divine Being!
Fanaticism naturally engenders that sacrilegious alliance, and man, under its irresistible influence, becomes more frightful in his hatred, more cruel in his hostilities, than the beasts of the forest.
The Inquisition inaugurated, in Spain, a sanguinary fanaticism which consecrated, as religious virtues, the blackest crimes that man can commit against his fellow-creatures; and although it must be admitted that many thousands of human beings perished in the flames for their religious opinions under the reign of Isabella, yet the natural suavity of her mind, influenced as it was by the tender and pa.s.sionate, repressed, to a considerable degree, those intolerant impulses with which Torquemada was wont to impose upon the good sense of Spaniards. Isabella was liberal, even in the sense which that word conveys according to the language of modern politics. {22} She, doubtless, consented to the formation of the b.l.o.o.d.y tribunal; and hence the annals of even her reign are stained with some of those hecatombs which were more frequent in a subsequent era, and banished from the Spanish peninsula those mental energies which, at that time, were enabling human reason to recover her rights, and Spain once more to occupy that eminent position a.s.signed her, by Providence, in the scale of creation.
History cannot accuse the Emperor Charles V. with having lent himself, as a docile instrument, to the intolerant devices of the clergy. Charles was never the sincere friend of the court of Rome. On the contrary, no Christian monarch ever treated that court with greater contumely, or in a manner more hostile and effectively prejudicial to its prosperity and influence. The war which he made against the Pope, and which terminated by the invasion of Rome itself, involved that court in all the ills of a destructive conquest. The pillage and burning of the public temples and of private houses, the violation of the nuns, the ma.s.sacre of the citizens, were not enough to satisfy the fury of his soldiers. Released suddenly from that respect which, from childhood, they had been accustomed to show towards the practices and ministers of religion, they now openly ridiculed them in the streets of Rome, representing mock processions, dressing themselves up in the splendid and ornamental attire of cardinals and bishops. Their spirit of profanation and impiety arrived at the extreme pitch. They composed satirical and other songs against the Pope-one of these in the form of a parody on our Lord"s prayer-and sung them in the public streets, and even under the windows of the pontifical palace.
To those deeds, which proved how little the heart of the emperor was disposed to favour the doctrines of Roman Catholicism, we could add many others which the patient investigation of German writers have discovered in the archives of Italy. A tolerable knowledge, however, of the occurrences of that reign will be sufficient to convince us that Charles V. was not sincerely religious until age, infirmities, and misanthropy, had brought upon him the misfortunes which attended the last years of his life, and induced him to abdicate the crown, and retire to the solitudes of Yuste. It is already known that, at the beginning of Luther"s rebellion against the Roman church, Charles resolved to avail himself of the terror which the name of that celebrated reformer inspired in the hearts of Roman Catholics, in order to intimidate the court of Rome and humiliate its pride. It is not therefore to be wondered at, that, with this vacillation of principles and declared antipathy to Rome, Charles should have regarded, in his dominions, if not with manifest favour, at least with cold indifference, the propagation of what were then called, by Spaniards, the new doctrines.
Under his reign, notwithstanding the austere character of his minister, the Cardinal Ximenes de Cisneros, the Inquisition dared not, in Spain, commence a system of intolerance.
One proof of this a.s.sertion is to be found in the progress which, at that time, Lutheranism made in the Peninsula. To those days belonged, in truth, the ill.u.s.trious victims who were subsequently sacrificed on the altar of fanaticism, and whose names may be found by the reader in the celebrated work of M"Crie, or in that of De Castro. {25}
Philip II. ascended the throne, and the whole aspect of the unhappy nation, delivered over by Providence to the hands of that implacable enemy of humanity, was entirely changed. Philip"s inclination was to hate and persecute; and religion, in name, afforded him the pretext for giving vent, with impunity, to those propensities, and covering with a sacred veil all the excesses of a bloodthirsty and revengeful heart to which he could abandon himself. Some writers have doubted the sincerity of his religious sentiments, considering them as mere pretexts, of which he availed himself in order to suggest false motives for his bitter spirit in the war which he carried on against Henry IV. of France. And, in truth, what sincerity could there be in the religion of a man who lived in perpetual adultery; who seduced the wives of his most faithful servants; who paid a.s.sa.s.sins to get rid of men he disliked, and afterwards relentlessly persecuted these same persons hired by him to commit such crimes? How could faith, devotion, hope, charity, and self-consecration to G.o.d, exist in combination with vices the most degrading to human nature, and a system of conduct diametrically opposed to the letter and spirit of the gospel? But, without discussing those questions which more properly pertain to the severe tribunal of history and will be found fully examined in the works cited, it is sufficient, for the present purpose, to indicate the reign of Philip II. as that epoch in which an intolerant fanaticism extended its roots wide and deep in the hearts of Spaniards,-a fanaticism which, until but a few years previous to our own times, formed one of the most conspicuous elements of the national character. The frequent repet.i.tion of the _autos de fe_, in which the terrible spectacle of burning human victims alive was countenanced by the presence of the court,-the furious harangues of the friars,-the excommunications fulminated from the pulpit against all those who did not prostrate themselves as slaves before the power of the church,-and, above all, the example of the monarch, who was always ready to exalt the clergy above other cla.s.ses of the community, and whose domestic and foreign policy was founded, invariably, on the principle of the ident.i.ty of the altar and the throne, were circ.u.mstances more than sufficient to mould the genius, the habits, the affections, and even the literary tastes and domestic intercourse, of any nation in the world.
Hence the entire existence of the nation was, so to speak, exclusively religious. The ma.s.s, confession, processions, and _novenas_, {26} were the occupations which consumed all the days and all the hours of life.
The priesthood was the grand social supremacy. All the riches of the nation were in its hands. All consciences ceded to its voice, and were directed by its influence. The king favoured all its pretensions, enlarged its privileges, and put into its hands the highest dignities and employments. The bishops occupied the princ.i.p.al posts in the councils of Castille, of the finances, and of the Indies; to many of these bishops emba.s.sies and vice-regal appointments were confided; and, in the provinces, the civil authority was eclipsed before their influence, for they became usurpers of its most important functions. Those were the palmy days of the Inquisition, when, secure of the monarch"s favour and co-operation, it gave itself up, without restraint, to that spirit of hatred which const.i.tuted the chief ingredient of its inst.i.tution, and covered the Spanish peninsula and its colonies with suffering, with tears, and with blood.
As those ideas and sentiments entirely absorbed the minds of Spaniards; so, on the other hand, all public action was concentrated in the king, he having silenced the voice of the Cortes and abolished the charters (_fueros_) of the munic.i.p.alities, to which had pertained all the political and civil legislation of Spain from the foundation of the monarchy; in fine, as the severity of the fiscal laws opposed an insuperable barrier to all sorts of industry and enterprise, it is not surprising that it should have transformed, as in effect it did, the national character, or that the whole social and domestic life of Spaniards should be nothing short of an entire and absolute consecration to the church and its ministers, to religious ceremonies, and to the exercises of devotion and penance. In all the hours of his life, in all professional and lucrative occupations, in all functions incident to public employments, nay, even in his very amus.e.m.e.nts, the religious idea is always present to the eyes of a Spaniard; sometimes, indeed, severe and gloomy, at others majestic and solemn, but always overwhelming him with the weight of its preponderance, and a.s.suming the rule and arbitrament of his thoughts and actions. The following pages will offer to the reader sufficient proofs of this truth; and in each of the scenes which they present will be discovered, without difficulty, the features of the sketch which, in this introduction, we have endeavoured to trace.
We have written them without anger and without partiality, and we propose to insert in them no facts, or even statements, but those gathered from personal observation, and which no Spaniard will dare to deny; facts which many sensible and upright men in that nation worthy a better condition, do most bitterly lament.
It may be right to add, as an undoubted fact which cannot be too often referred to or too widely made known, that among all cla.s.ses of Spaniards, and even among the clergy themselves, are to be found men eminently pious; men who, although outwardly submitting to the exigencies of the worship which they are bound by their present laws to profess, are not ignorant of the true spirit and doctrines of Christianity, and who, perhaps, only need a more intimate acquaintance with scriptural truth in all its purity to be transformed into a visible part of the faithful and chosen flock of Christ, and enabled to adopt, in all its lat.i.tude, the true gospel as the rule and standard of their faith and conduct.
The publication of this work, at the present juncture, has no other object than to accelerate that desired transition, the influence of which may give fecundity to the n.o.ble qualities of a nation under all aspects interesting, worthy, and capable of figuring in the foremost rank of the polished and regenerate.
CHAPTER I.
THE SPANISH CLERGY-Their primitive state-Their subsequent organization-_Barraganas_-Immoral practices of the clergy-Their wealth, and its sources-Their territorial possessions-Their influence and incomes-Their opposition to the sciences-Their ultramontane principles-The "pa.s.s" of the Spanish sovereign necessary to the validity of the Pope"s bulls-Doctrine of the Jansenists favoured by the ministers of Charles III.-Port-Royal and San Isidro-Parish priests-Sources of their income-Many of them good men, but deficient in scriptural knowledge and teaching-Their preaching-Abolition of t.i.thes by the minister, Mendizabal-Effects of that measure-Poverty and present state of the clergy-Their degraded character and unpopularity-Their timidity in recent times of tumult-Ecclesiastical writers of the Peninsula-Power of the Inquisition curtailed by Charles III.
Among the northern nations which invaded Europe, on the fall of the Roman Empire, the Goths were those who most distinguished themselves by the prompt.i.tude with which they embraced Christianity, and by the sincerity and constancy with which they observed its precepts and adhered to its dogmas.
When they founded the Spanish monarchy, they were in a complete state of ignorance and barbarism; and as the clergy were at that time the sole depositaries of the little that was known of the dead languages, science, and literature, they were the counsellors of the sovereigns, the directors and prime movers of the public power, and the oracles of the court, the n.o.bility, and the people. The Councils of Toledo, which were true legislative bodies, better and more methodically const.i.tuted than the a.s.semblies of the great barons, not only legislated in religious and ecclesiastical matters, but in all political branches of the administration and of the government. To these celebrated a.s.semblies is owing the _Fuero-Juzgo_, the most ancient of the codes promulgated in the new monarchies founded on the ruins of the empire. But what gave most renown to these a.s.semblies was the system which they embraced with respect to the relations between the court of the Gothic kings and the pontifical see. In no Catholic nation was the ecclesiastic independence consolidated with greater vigour than in the Spanish church of those times. In truth the Pope, as such, exercised no authority whatever, directly or indirectly, either in the discipline or the administration of that church. He was acknowledged as the first of its bishops, but only as equal in power to each of them. Thus it was that the bishops of the Spanish peninsula had formerly no need of recourse to Rome for the presentation of candidates, the invest.i.ture of ecclesiastical dignities, or for matrimonial and other dispensations. Spain presented, at that time, an edifying spectacle of pure and evangelical Christianity, resembling that which prevailed in the primitive ages of the church, when neither councils nor traditions, nor the _motu propria_ of popes, had corrupted the dogma and the ritual. In the fourth Eliberitan council, celebrated in Granada, not only the worship but even the use of images, pictures, and sculpture, was prohibited in the temples, a prohibition before unheard of in the annals of that age,-an age in which the practice of invoking saints had become familiar, and more importance was beginning to be attached to the pomp of rites than to true piety and sincere devotion. The Spanish clergy, it is true, were then powerful, and could do much; but there is no reason to think that they abused such power, or that their conduct was regulated, at that early period, with a view to their temporal interests. That golden age, however, was of short duration; at least there are strong grounds for believing that, under the reign of Alfonso the Wise, the manners of the clergy had become greatly corrupted, and still more so under that of John II. Their ambition had so far increased as to provoke the rigour of the laws and of the civil authority. It is proved by the codes of that time, by several chronicles, and a variety of other doc.u.ments worthy of credit, that the greater number of the clergy were living openly in a state of concubinage. The term _barraganas_ formed part of the ordinary language of the people, as well as of that used in legislation, and was applied to designate the paramours of the ecclesiastics: indeed, these _barraganas_ were commanded by certain sovereigns to dress in a peculiar manner, so that they might be distinguished from virtuous women; while other sovereigns insisted on their also living in separate buildings, called _barraganerias_, one of which, according to tradition, was situated in that spot in Madrid now called Puerta del Sol. In one of the ancient codes is to be found a regulation, in virtue of which it was ordered that no clergyman should have more than one _barragana_!
Many of the bishops were accustomed to take these creatures with them on official visits to their dioceses. This scandal began to disappear under the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, "the Catholic sovereigns," and from that time the clergy, by slow degrees, began to give to their body a more compact organization, and to introduce among their ranks a stricter discipline. Those amendments, however, did but tend to augment their influence and their power. But what most contributed to the aggrandis.e.m.e.nt of that privileged cla.s.s was the wealth which rapidly acc.u.mulated in their treasury and in all their establishments.
This wealth flowed from a variety of sources. The church took its t.i.thes and first-fruits; and this income, slender and precarious as it was during the wars against the Moors and the lengthened dispute between the crowns of Castille and Arragon, increased, afterwards, to such an extent as to produce most incredible amounts so soon as order had once become consolidated under the firm rule of Isabella; for, then, all kinds of useful labour began to fructify, especially those of agriculture, which had to sustain the weight of these onerous burdens.
But besides that source of income, the churches were daily enriched by the donations which they received from the munificence of kings and magnates. The most meritorious act of devotion and of religion, according to the popular notion of those times, was the endowment of a church with lands, flocks, and plate. These fits of generosity were held to be sufficient to absolve the donors from all their sins, and at the hour of death, when the terror of future punishments burdened the soul of the ambitious politician, of the a.s.sa.s.sin, of the adulterer, and of the usurper of others" goods, a very handsome legacy, and sometimes the abandonment of all he possessed, was considered as a safe pa.s.sport to the enjoyment of treasures in heaven. The priest, called to administer the last consolations to the patient, never lost an opportunity of exacting these imprudent donations; and so long did this abuse endure, and to such an extent did it arrive and predominate in the public customs of the age, that, under the reign of Charles III., the Council of Castille promulgated a royal order, declaring that all such testamentary dispositions made at the hour of death, in favour of chapels, churches, convents, and other religious establishments, should be null and void.
The opulence which the Spanish clergy enjoyed from the conquest of Granada until the period of invasion by the French, cannot be reduced to calculation, nor even to any accurate conjectures. It was said of England that, previous to the Reformation, the clergy possessed a fifth part of the whole territory within the British Isles; of Spain it may be said that the proportion amounted to one-third. The lands most productive, and the estates in the most choice situations, certainly belonged to the Spanish clergy; and there were cities, such, for example, as Toledo, Cuenca, Leon, and Santiago, in which nearly the whole territory belonged to their respective cathedrals.
Several other circ.u.mstances tended to strengthen the imperium of the church. Many young men of n.o.ble families took holy orders, with a view of aspiring to the rich prebends belonging to the cathedrals; in the universities and in the colleges the best organised and most popular study was that of theology, in which many Spaniards excelled. At the same time, by means of the confessional, the clergy got power over the conscience; they knew all the secrets of families as well as those of the state, and there was no grave matter, concerning any cla.s.s of society, which was not submitted to the decision of some dignitary of the church.
The magnificence of the edifices consecrated to worship, the frequency and the pomp of religious ceremonies, the alms which the bishops distributed, the public works which they paid for, and the absolute direction of all charitable establishments, of which they had taken the command, were so many other favourable supports to that supremacy which they had a.s.sumed and maintained in society.