A ROMAN CATHOLIC IDEAL.
IN a little volume to which the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster has prefixed a preface describing the life of the Poor Clares, therein depicted, as one which gives us "a standard by which to measure the Christian life and the high aspiration of Catholic faith," we have a very striking picture of the limits to which penance, self.humiliation, and personal austerity may be carried by a refined, lovable, and loving nature, with the full approbation of the Catholic Church and apparently to the profound delight of Catholic readers. Clare Vaughan, whose brief and pure life has been described by Lady Lovat in the little book to which we refer, was the daughter of an old Roman Catholic family that has given distinguished Bishops, as well as other dignitaries, to the Catholic Church, more than one eloquent member to the regular clergy, and a number of devoted nuns to the various charitable and contemplative orders of nuns which that Church contains. Clare was born in 1843, and died at the Amiens Convent of Poor Clares in jannary, 1862, before she had completed her nine- teenth year. She was, from the first, one of the happiest and most loving of children, and after the loss of a mother in whom she was wrapt up, at the age of ten, never seems to have hesitated in her passionate desire to fulfil that mother's wish that she should join the order of the saint after whom she was named. Even her childhood was marked by an enthusiastic love of Christ, —such a love that her companions discovered with pain that it was really filling her mind, almost to the eclipse of her devotion to them,—and also by a passion for self-inflicted suffer- ings endured to prove this deep love which seems to those who are not Roman Catholics a strange form of devotion, and one that contrasts very remarkably with the brightness and sweetness of Clare Vaughan's disposition. At one time, when, so far as we can make out, Clare was but fourteen years old—(but Lady Loved is so careless with her dates that it is not very easy to be sure ; she even alleges, for instance, that the late Dr. Ward gave Clare lessons in Latin font years after the date assigned for her death)— her most intimate friend gives us the following description of her Her love of mortification was such that nothing she saw or came across failed to suggest some means of torturing or annoying her unfortunate body. How well I remember one day when we were returning from a village in the neighbourhood. We happened to be passing through a stubble field, and breaking off suddenly from what she had been talking about, she cried, 'I have a splendid idea Sup- posing we take off our shoes and stockings and walk barefoot through the stubble field ?' It was no sooner said than done, and I can see now the calm enjoyment with which Clare walked up and down those cruel many-bristling thorns, followed by the sympathetic shrieks of her cowardly companion, who very soon resumed shoes and stockings, till at last she was obliged to succumb and allow the poor bleeding feet to be tied up. Another day we came across a flourishing family of nettles, and she instantly seized hold of a largo bunch in order to discipline herself with at leisure on her return home. Another favourite mortification of hers was to wait after she had got into bed till she was beginning to feel thoroughly warm and comfortable, and then springing out of bed to spend half-an-hour prostrate on the ground in prayer, often with arms extended, in order to add the dis- comfort of the posture to the other mortification."
When, at the age of eighteen, she joined the Poor Clares, there was the greatest possible danger that the austerities of the Order might be too much for her,—indeed, more than danger; for though, of course, it is conceivable that she might have died as early had she remained at home, no physician in the world would deny that for a consumptive habit of body, the long fasts, the exposure to cold,—(the Poor Clares go barefoot, and though she was ordered to wear sandals, she did all in her power to evade this exceptional privilege),—the meagre fare, and the broken nights would tend greatly to accelerate the progress of the disease, if, indeed, it were already developed before she joined the Poor Clares. Yet not satisfied with the ordinary austerities of the nuns, "she used to mix earth with what she ate, and put cinders into her soup and the rest of her food, begging at the same time her slater novice who used to see her doing it, 'for the love of God' to say nothing about it" Were not such practices as these, for a girl whose digestion was delicate and whose whole constitution was feeble, the very next thing to suicidal P We do not, of course, mean to suggest that she intended to hasten her death by them, bat that she actually did so, and that she was apparently entirely unconscious that it was in any sense her duty to preserve her own health of body, if by her austerities she could contrive to show a deeper devotion. And this strikes the reader of this loving and lovable girl's life so forcibly, that he finds it difficult to interpret Cardinal Manning's language con- cerning the book otherwise than as formally adopting as a Catholic standard of life, the doctrine that members of the purely contemplative monastic orders have a right to display complete indifference to the ill-effects of self-infficted sufferings on their bodily health, so long as these self-inflicted sufferings are suggested by and minister to their enthusiasm of devotion. We believe that the ordinary theological defence made by Roman Catholics for these severe austerities is that the self- inflicted sufferings of true Christians, if inflicted with the intention of benefiting others, have an expiatory effect, and tend to promote the conversion of impenitent sinners, and to hasten the purification even of the penitent. Their doctrine, if we understand it rightly, is that Clare Vaughan's self-inflicted sufferings,—say in the way of cold, or indigestion, or nausea, or humiliation,—if endured with the intention of helping sinners to repent, or helping the penitent towards holiness, would be accepted by God as some infinitesimal addition to the great agony of the Redeemer in aid of the work of atonement. We cannot say that we have ever understood how such a doctrine can be theologically supported. Of course, where the self-inflicted suffering has a direct and obvious tendency to touch the hearts of sinners, there is no need for such a doctrine. In that case, the suffering is a means to an end, and may be justified just as a mother is justified in overstraining or exhausting her own strength for her children. But no one could say that the wounds voluntarily contracted in a stubble-field, or the pangs caused by earth accumulated in the stomach, have any direct tendency to touch evil hearts. If suffering that is not in any way the means to any end beyond itself, is really to benefit the sinful solely through the intention of the sufferer, there must clearly be a spontaneous decree of God by virtue of which he accepts it as the equivalent of a work of mercy, and himself tenches some heart for which the sufferer had in intention interceded. But where is there the smallest assurance of any such divine promise in any recorded revelation ? We are, indeed, told that the prayer of the righteous man availeth much, but not that it avails all the more if supported by self-inflicted pangs. Yet the Cardinal Archbishop can hardly have read this biography, and expressed of it the opinion we have quoted, unless he holds that the con- templative monastic orders may rightly do what must in all probability shorten their lives, what is, indeed, a painfully pro- tracted kind of semi-suicide, with the full approval of the Church, so long as the secret intention of all these sufferings is to bring the impenitent to penitence or the penitent to greater holiness. But if the Catholic Church approves this, why should it be otherwise than praiseworthy for a member of these monastic orders to take a very painful kind of slow poison, so long as he deliberately dedicates the pains he would stiffer in the process of dying, to the purpose of procuring grace for sinners ? We know that each a suggestion would, in fact, be rejected with horror ; but we really cannot see the difference in principle between austerities the almost certain effect of which is to shorten a very frail life by painful means, and a deliberate intention to hasten death for the same end. We say this without in the least wishing to diminish the impression of wonder and admiration with which the beauty, the enthusiasm, and the parity of Clare Vaughan's life should be viewed by the reader. It is perfectly true that we have hardly anything among Protestants like this early and passionate love of Christ, and this delight in bearing all sorts of suffering for what she supposed to be his will. But we must say that literal bodily self-crucifixion in Christ's name might almost as well be per- mitted and approved, as the sort of self-immolation which is so often honoured by implication in the "Lives of the Saints," and in the story of this life which is modelled upon theirs.
Another point in this life, as, again, in that of many of the saints, raises great difficulties in the mind of a candid non- Catholic reader,—we mean the artificial desire for humiliation. We say" artificial" only because it is obvious that Clare Vaughan did not really think herself the worst of sinners; indeed, rationally speaking, she could not have done so. Cardinal Wiseman spoke of her as having never stained the perfect innocence of her Christian childhood, and she herself honestly said that she could not entertain the least fear for her own salvation ; indeed, she begged her friends to pray that she might be spared all purgatorial sufferings, and thought it a thing to be hoped for that she would pass straight from this mortal state to a state of perfect blessedness. This being so, how can we help speaking of anecdotes like the following as showing an artificial desire for humiliation ?—
" She would not suffer any one to kiss her feet as it is the custom to do on certain occasions among the Poor Clues; and one day one of the younger Religious having whilst helping her to bed, found an opportunity of doing so out of reverence, she instantly rose and kneeling down exclaimed, What have you done, Sister ; I am going
to pray to God to forgive you!' Some time before her clothing, when there was to be a deliberation on the subject of her
admission, she said to one of the Sisters, do hope my health will not be the cause of my rejection.'—' Your rejection !' said the Sister ; 'we love you a great deal too much ever to be able to make up our minds to send you away.'—' Oh, how good you are,' said the Postu- lant, to be so fond of an abomination like me P Very shortly after- wards she happened to say without reflection to a Religions who asked her how she felt, 'My health is the only difficulty in the way of my admission, is it not? but hardly had she uttered the words when the blood rushed to her face and she quickly corrected herself. 'What have I said?' she continued ; 'I am too great a sinner, I might even call myself a devil, I have sinned so much.' Once as she asked one of the Nuns to pray for her, 'Are you not our sister?' she answered, and as such could we possibly forget you P'—' What ! do you look upon me as your sister ?' she said instantly. 'Indeed I do not deserve it, I am a wretched creature, a great sinner.'—Some of the Com- munity asked her the day after her clothing if she was happy ; also if her under-clothing caused her mach discomfort.—' I am perfectly happy,' she answered ; 'this serge pricks me a little, but I am very fond of it.'—' And your grand cord ?' continued the other; 'you don't say anything about that.'—' Oh, that also is very dear to me,' she said, and in pronouncing these words she put it to her lips and kissed it affectionately.—' Yet it is very hard and coarse, your cord,' said the other ; it does not resemble the least the beautiful girdles you used to wear in the world.'—' Oh, I did not care a straw for those girdles I used to wear in the world ; I certainly never kissed them out of love !'—Then another Nun, who knew what pleasure she was giving her by saying something a little humiliating, appearing to doubt the truth of her words, said,' I should have liked very much to have been present to see if you are really speaking the truth.' When she said this, an expression of joy lit up the countenance of the dear Novice as she sweetly answered the person who doubted her, Oh thanks, thanks, dear Sister, for your just opinion of me.'" It seems impossible that one who really could not find it in her heart to doubt God's love to her, and who hoped even to pass straight from this world to perfect blessedness, should have thought of herself as a devil, or seriously prayed God to forgive one of her companions for doing to her what she herself delighted to do to them. And, further, the whole notion of one nun passing a somewhat humiliating judgment upon another, not because she held it to be true (for evidently that was not so), but because it would give pleasure to the one thus by implication censured, to hear the censure, reads like a little dramatic entertainment got up for the interest of the by-play, rather than as a serious discipline in true humility. We do not in the least doubt that there is some sense in which a true Christian may rejoice in the patient bearing of humiliations ; but surely it is the patience which should give him satisfaction, not the humiliations themselves. We are told here that this devout and spiritual creature "wished to see herself the object of universal contempt." (p. 139.) Did she wish for real contempt, or only such simulated contempt as that of the worthy nun who expressed doubts of her truthfulness in order to please her ? And if she wished for real contempt, can each a wish genuinely exist in any heart ? Or if it could, would it be a right wish? It seems to us that these contemplative monastic orders, in separating themselves as they do from the practical life of the world, fall as a consequence into a habit of morbid analysis of themselves and their companions which it is im- possible to justify, still less to exalt, as Cardinal Manning does, into an ideal standard of life. We can concede a good deal to moderate asceticism as a mere discipline of character, if it does not go beyond the point of training men to master themselves ; and also we can see that worship and adoration ought to be a far more substantial part or life than the Protestant Churches make it ; indeed, they have learnt unduly to depreciate it. But we cannot but believe that the excessive asceticism and exclusively interior life of what are called the contemplative orders, have issued in morbid standards of thought and feeling, which the Catholic Church can only foster at the greatest risk to its own strength and sanity.
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