The practice of consecrating the month of May to the Virgin, and designating it the month of Mary, has the same origin, and been in the same way brought into general use in the Roman Catholic world. The religious feasts of those thirty-one days have a certain character of splendour and of gladness, which makes them resemble those of the Greeks and Romans consecrated to Flora. The altars, on which is placed the image of the Virgin, are adorned with an extraordinary profusion of feathers, flowers, rich silks, and precious jewels; the smoke of incense ascends perpetually before the image; the temples are illuminated by numerous candles, chandeliers, tapers; troops of women, dressed in white, surround the image; and the most celebrated singers from the public theatres chant hymns to the accompaniment of the organ and a numerous orchestra. Enough has been said to enable the reader to perceive the strict analogy that exists between the worship of saints and true idolatry; but still, Spaniards have carried the personification of these fragile works of men's hands far beyond the idolatries of ancient and modern times. Not content with addressing words to them, as if they possessed intelligence and the sense of hearing, they kiss their feet and their hands, as though the marble, the plaster, or the wood, of which they are made, were sensible of these demonstrations of tenderness. To kiss an image is an act of merit which confessors recommend, and one to which the popes have conceded spiritual privileges.

There is an anecdote related in Madrid, which proves to what an extreme vices deserving the severest censure may be associated with the grossest superstition. There was in that capital, towards the end of the reign of Charles IV., a grandee of Spain, the Duke of A—-, who professed especial devotion to an image of the Virgin, which he was continually kissing. Having taken under his protection a notorious courtesan, whose house he furnished sumptuously, he ordered an image of the Virgin to be placed in a corner of the staircase, which he never ascended without bestowing his accustomed tokens of affection upon that representation of the object of his devotion. One day, however, the favoured paramour had capriciously elevated the image far above the reach of the lips of her protector. Deprived of the exercise of his daily ceremony, the duke contented himself with throwing up his handkerchief against the image, and on its descent kissing it as an object which had been blessed by its mere contact with the idol!

We could adduce several other proofs of the belief, prevalent in the minds of Spaniards, that images can exercise many of the faculties of animate objects, and therefore are capable of reciprocal intercourse in the same way as living persons. For example, if it is intended that an immoral act shall be committed before a picture, or a piece of sculpture, representing the Virgin or any saint, in the first case it is turned towards the wall; or, in the second, it is covered over with a sheet, in order that it may not be a witness of the sin. In asking a favour of an image, it is a common practice for the devotee, in order to propitiate it, to inflict upon himself some punishment or privation; such, for example, as that of absenting himself from the theatre, or the bullfights (corridas de toros), abstaining from eating dessert, or from going to the promenade, balls, and routs. This is called making a promise. To wear the habit (llevar habito) signifies to dress modestly, and in clothes of a dark colour, and without any ornaments, until the desired favour from the image be obtained, and, at the same time, wearing a medal of the Virgin on the arm. Those persons who desire to carry these acts of penance and mortification to a greater degree of perfection, adopt much severer practices and even more painful, such as putting hard peas into their shoes, wearing cilicios,—which are belts made of hogs' bristles, and having sharp iron goads which penetrate the flesh,—sleeping on the ground, and other foolish practices.

All those inflictions are performed only when the favour stipulated for with the Virgin or the saints is obtained; so that if what is asked be not granted, the devotee remains absolved from the conditional obligation which he has contracted.

The practice of self-scourging has been established in the Roman Catholic Church from time immemorial. In the religious orders, particularly those of the Capuchines, there were appointed days, such as Good Friday, on which a whipping, self-inflicted, was a rigorous obligation. Among devotees it is a voluntary act, except when imposed by the confessor by way of penance. The number of lashes depends on the time which it takes to pray the Miserere. The instrument employed is exactly the same as that known to the English as the "cat o' nine tails."

There is a society, or brotherhood, designated the school of Christ ("La Escuela de Cristo"), very much addicted to this self-castigation. They meet together regularly in a subterranean chapel, which is kept in total darkness during their exercises. The priest who conducts them ascends a pulpit, and all his performance consists in the most lamentable exclamations, which excite not only the grief, but the horror, of the hearers. Every thing in these meetings breathes obscurity, and is calculated to appal the human mind. There nothing is heard of the goodness of God, or of his mercy, but, on the contrary, he is represented as an inexorable tyrant, always disposed to punish with the most horrible pains those who have offended him.



CHAPTER VI.

FEAST-DAYS—Processions and Novenas—Corpus Christi—How performed in Seville, and the sacred dances of los seises—How in Madrid—Procession of Holy Week—The Santo Entierro—Clerical processions—Procession of the Rosary—Rites of Roman Catholicism—Jubilee of forty hours—Romerias or pilgrimages.

From the time at which the true spirit of Christianity, under the dominion of the popes, began to be corrupted, and experience taught what effects might be drawn from material worship, founded chiefly on pomp and a complication of religious ceremonies, the Roman Catholic clergy, especially those of Spain, have never ceased to multiply and vary the means of occupying the imagination of men with exterior acts of an apparently religious character. One of the principal abuses emanating from this idea has been the invention of feast-days, which are ordered to be observed as days of rest in the same manner as Sunday. So numerous are the feast-days in the Spanish calendar, that there is scarcely a month in the year which does not contain three or four of them. The chief mysteries in the life of Jesus Christ, viz., the nativity, the epiphany, the passion, the resurrection, ascension, and others,—the celebrated epochs in the life of the Virgin Mary, and some of her advocations, and the apostles, and a few favourite saints,—are the objects to which those different feast-days are consecrated; and as on these all kinds of labour are suspended, and as their number, including Sundays, forms nearly a third part of the whole year, the vacuum they leave in productive labour and in the exercise of professional avocations is incalculable; so that feast-days may be enumerated among the various causes tending to bring about the poverty of the nation. But besides these days, there are others, called days of mass, on which it is obligatory to attend that rite, although it is lawful to pursue secular occupations.

Among the most popular exercises of worship, and from which the clergy draw most profit, are worthy of note those of processions and novenas. In the most important among the former, that of Corpus Christi is the chief, and most observed. In that procession, it is the practice to carry about the streets the host and certain images of saints. This rite was established in the twelfth century, in consequence of a dream or vision had by a woman of Liege, in which it is pretended this practice was commanded to be introduced to the church. At first, almost the whole church opposed the innovation, but, by degrees, the interests of the clergy prevailed, and the popes at length made this procession of Corpus Christi obligatory. In Spain, it is celebrated with all the pomp and ostentation imaginable. In the poor towns and villages, the priest carries the consecrated host in his hands; but in rich cathedral towns, an expensive tabernacle or canopy of silver, generally a master-work of art, is provided for the purpose. It is called La Custodia. That of Seville is divided into three bodies or compartments, and adorned with bas-relief, admirably executed, and having in the lower part an urn of gold containing the host. This production is a gem, and always attracts the wonder and amazement of foreigners. The structure, when carried about, is adorned with flowers, lights, bunches of grapes, and ears of wheat. The procession is composed of all the religious communities, all the brotherhoods, the clergy of all the neighbouring parishes, the municipal body, all public officers, and the most notable persons of the city, all carrying lighted candles in their hands. It is headed by detachments of cavalry, and surrounded by a numerous body of infantry, with a military band. In some towns it is usual to have in these processions immense giants, made up of pasteboard, similar to those seen in pantomimes at English theatres, and, as may be supposed, the laughter which these ridiculous exhibitions excite in the spectators contrasts greatly with the august character wished to be given to the ceremony. The cavalcade stops at various intervals during its progress, and on these occasions the priests burn incense before the perambulating temple; and thereupon an ecclesiastical choir chants, in succession, the stanzas of the famous hymn, Tantum ergo Sacramentum,—a poetical composition, attributed to Thomas de Aquinas, and which, although written in rhyme, according to the practice adopted on the degeneration of the pure Latinity, and although the verses have a species of jingling which never met the approbation of the literati of the Augustan age, nevertheless they contain lofty sentiments, and explain in an ingenious manner the dogma of transubstantiation. The following may serve as an example:—

"Tantum ergo sacramentum Veneremus cernui, Et antiquum documentum Novo cedat ritui. Suppleat fides complementum, Sensuum defectui." {125}

In the procession of Corpus Christi in Seville, which is the most celebrated one in all Spain, and which attracts an immense concourse of people from all parts of the province, the moving temple is preceded by a troop of chorister boys, called los seises. These boys are dressed up with much elegance in the picturesque Spanish costume of the fifteenth century, and, in the progress of the procession, they dance with large castanets to the sound of an ancient kind of music, much admired by those able to form a judgment on such matters. This custom had its origin in the will of a devotee, who left a considerable sum of money to be so employed, under a condition that the custom should terminate when the dresses he had ordered for the boys should be worn out; but the canons invented a very ingenious plan, by which the custom has been perpetuated. When one of these dresses begins to fail at any particular part, they order that part alone, the sleeve for example, to be replaced, so that all these vestments have gone through innumerable transformations from the foundation of the custom down to the present time. It is related that a certain pope, having been informed of such a custom, and seeing in it a profanation of the sacred ceremonies, attempted to suppress it, and reprehended the canons for their want of discretion. These canons, however, begged his holiness to suspend his judgment until he should behold with his own eyes what had so much offended him; and with that object one of the canons went to Rome, taking the boys with him. The pope at first most positively refused the sought-for condescension; but at last he yielded to the canon's entreaties, and the exhibition took place in presence of the whole conclave of cardinals, presided over by the head of the Roman Catholic Church. The sacred dance made so great an impression on that respectable company, and so excited the admiration of the august personages who witnessed it, that the pope changed his opinion, and sanctioned the practice which before he had condemned. {127}

In the rear of this ambulant temple goes the archbishop, the bishop, or principal ecclesiastical personage of the diocese, under an awning or canopy, supported by silver rods, and carried by eight of the chief citizens, and then come the civil authorities, with the functionaries of the tribunals, and the head officials of the public service.

As this feast always falls in spring, the serenity of the atmosphere, the perfumed air of Andalusia, the innumerable flowers thrown along the line of the procession, the balconies splendidly adorned, and full of beautiful women dressed in the highest state of luxury, the charms of music, and the brilliant display of uniforms, embroidered vestments, and other gay appearances which catch the eye of the spectator on every side, form a spectacle eminently picturesque and romantic, which seldom fails to make a lively impression on the exalted imaginations of the inhabitants of those regions. On these occasions, more particularly, may be observed the dexterity with which the Roman Catholic clergy avail themselves of every opportunity of profiting by human weakness, and of that imperium which the senses exercise over the mind, to augment the number of their proselytes and consolidate their power over the conscience.

In Madrid the parts of the streets through which the procession is to pass is shaded by awnings, and the pavement is sprinkled with sand. The ceremony over, all belonging to the elegant and fashionable class of society go at once to the Calle de Carretas, which is one of the streets in the line of the procession, and one which, on this occasion, may certainly vie with the far-famed Long-champs of Paris; for there the fair rulers of fashion display those tasteful changes in their personal attire which are to be in vogue during the remainder of the spring.

The processions of Holy Week are of a character entirely different from those of Corpus Christi. In the latter all is animation and joy, singing and triumph; but in the former every thing is sadness, seriousness, and grief. All the sculptured figures, called pasos, which are of the natural size and colour, and are carried about in those doleful processions, represent the principal scenes of our Saviour's passion,—such as his prayer in the garden, the treachery of Judas, the judgment of Pilate, and the crucifixion. In Seville, the processions of Holy Week are of an extent and character renowned all over Christendom. There they bring out one of these pasos, in which are seen the twelve apostles seated at table, with the slight anachronism that their chairs are of the most elegant description that can be manufactured in London or Paris. In the processions we are now describing, besides all those persons we have named as taking a part in that of Corpus Christi, are innumerable penitentes, who are men in masks, dressed in tunics of a white, black, or brown colour, their heads covered with an enormous cone, of the same colour and form used by the magicians or astrologers represented in English theatres. In Granada those tunics, which are called chias, are of black velvet, embroidered with gold or silver, and having a train of six or eight yards in length. The diversity of colour denotes the brotherhood to which the penitent belongs; and these brotherhoods, among which are many of opulence, bear the expenses of the procession.

In some small towns, instead of images of wood, living persons represent the personages of sacred history, and, generally, the young people of both sexes most distinguished for their fine personal endowments are selected to figure on those occasions. Even in Seville, where these ceremonies are performed with something more of decency, may be seen, following a paso, a number of children dressed up so as to represent angels, and each of them carrying an instrument connected with our Lord's passion, viz., the nails, the spunge, the lance, and the crown of thorns. There are also three persons to represent three of the principal doctors of the church who have defended the dogma of transubstantiation. In the midst is placed one young girl who plays the part of Veronica; and it is but a few years ago that she who was performing this part, not being adequate to the fatigue of the day, followed by a severe cold, was taken ill, and in a few hours died from the effects of her exertions and exposure. It is usual to reward the young woman who plays this part with an ounce of gold.

In a certain country-town in Spain there are two pasos, one representing our Saviour and the other the Virgin, and when the procession turns to enter the church, scarcely has the former been introduced when the second approaches, but before she can get within the porch the door is shut, and thereupon the whole concourse of attendants burst out into bitter sobs and crying, deploring that the mother of our Lord is denied the favour of following her Son into the sacred edifice.

The most solemn and brilliant of all the processions of Holy Week in Seville is that of the holy burial (Santo Entierro), the name of which indicates its object; and the expenses which it occasions are so considerable, that it is celebrated only once in four or five years,—an interval of time necessary for the brotherhoods to accumulate the required amount, which, according to assurances from persons likely to know the fact, does not fall far short of four thousand pounds sterling. The figure which on this occasion represents the dead body of our Saviour, and which is a fair work of art, is placed in an urn made of large squares of glass, in framework of silver, and adorned with extraordinary magnificence. Behind this goes the image of the Virgin, also the size of life, in a cloak of black velvet embroidered with silver, on her head a crown of gold, and in her hand, as if to wipe away her tears, an exceedingly rich cambric pocket-handkerchief, embroidered and trimmed with the most costly Brussels lace. There is also in this procession a figure emblematical of death, which is represented by a human skeleton at the foot of a cross. Such is the importance given in all Andalusia to the procession of the holy funeral, that the year in which it is celebrated forms an epoch in the history of Seville, and for many years, both before and afterwards, nothing else is spoken of. Many persons from Madrid and other principal cities, and even the English employes of the garrison of Gibraltar, are present in the Andalusian capital on these occasions.

As a proof that Spaniards themselves, and even the clergy, consider these ceremonies as a mere mundane spectacle, it is related of a king of Spain that, having gone to Seville at a time very far distant from the Holy Week, he was favoured by the authorities and the chapter with all the rites, feasts of the church, and processions, appropriate to that holy occasion.

In all the towns of Spain the last week of Lent is celebrated by processions. Where there are no pasos, or groups of statues, to represent the scenes of the passion, these are substituted by real men and women, among whom are distributed the parts of the Virgin, the apostles, Pilate, and the Saviour himself;—and this profanation does not excite the least scruple in a nation calling itself Christian.

It is certain that this abuse greatly prevailed in all the nations of Europe during the middle ages, and that such was the origin of those so-called mysteries, which, in reality, were but a species of sacred dramatic representation that preceded the true comedy, and turned the porch, and even the altar, of the sanctuary, into a theatre. But those customs disappeared at the beginning of the seventeenth century, and have not since been in use except in Spain.

Besides the processions of Corpus Christi, and those of Holy Week, there are several others paid for by the clergy themselves, by the brotherhoods, or by the public, according to the favourite devotions in the respective localities. The city of Valencia is particularly noted for its attachment to this class of exhibitions. There is scarcely a week in the year in which two or three processions are not celebrated there, in which a great majority of the people take a part. On these occasions all useful labours are suspended, and the sums which are spent in ornaments, music, and, above all, in wax, are beyond calculation. Every individual in the procession carries a wax candle in the hand. The images of the saints are adorned with great profusion. The balconies of the houses make an ostentatious display of rich festoons and garlands; while the presence of the authorities and of the troops, which serve as an escort to the clergy, the flowers which cover the streets, and the music, both military and religious, which never fails on these occasions, form a whole more like a public amusement than any part of religious worship.

In many of the towns in Spain, and particularly those of Andalusia, there is a nocturnal procession called the Rosary (el Rosario), for those who compose it go along either praying or singing those prayers of the rosary to which we have already alluded, when describing this part of devotion. The Rosary of the Aurora is another procession which goes forth at daybreak, to the great nuisance of the more peaceable inhabitants, who are then enjoying the sweets of sleep. In Toledo this nuisance has reached such an extent as really to be one of the gravest character. Before the procession sets out, there are certain heralds sent round the town, each having a bell in his hand which he rings continually, and at the same time calls out with all his might this doggrel couplet:—

"El Rosario de la Aurora! Ya es hora! Ya es hora!"

In some places the nearest relatives of some person recently deceased assemble together, and then all the full concourse are seen directing their steps towards the cemetery, and there to collect round the grave of the departed, whilst the relatives kneel at the tomb, and the clergy recite a part of the office for the burial of the dead. It cannot be denied that this part of the ceremony is extremely imposing and romantic.

The rites of Roman Catholicism may be divided into two classes, viz., those required by the liturgy, and for which it establishes fixed rules approved by the councils, such as the mass and the administration of the sacraments; and, secondly, those invented and practised by the devotions of the faithful, which are without any fixed limits. Among these, the most notable are the Jubilee of Forty Hours, and the Pilgrimages (romerias).

The Jubilee of Forty Hours consists in the public exhibition of the consecrated host during the whole day, enclosed in a custodia, which has already been described. It lasts three days, and these are alternate in all the churches of great cities; so that there is not a day in the whole year, except the Thursday and Friday in the Holy Week, on which the host does not receive this kind of worship. At night-fall the custodia is covered with a curtain, which is generally made of rich gold and silver lace. This act, at which an officiating priest presides, and during which hymns are chanted and accompanied by music, usually attracts a great concourse of the devout. In the mornings the eucharist is uncovered with the same ceremonies.

The Pilgrimages or romerias are devout expeditions made to certain celebrated sanctuaries on the days of the saints to which they are dedicated. Those sanctuaries are generally situated out of the towns. Some of them are convents, others mere chapels; but in both one case and the other, large sums of money are collected on those occasions. In ancient times, in Spain, as also in all other Roman Catholic countries, these pilgrimages were acts of sincere devotion, which imposed the necessity of confession and communion. The devout passed all their time in the church,—in the morning hearing mass, in the evening reciting prayers dictated to them by a priest from the pulpit. On these occasions it was usual for enemies to be reconciled, confessing their most grievous sins, and celebrating other acts of true repentance and piety. But in modern times these usages have been much relaxed; the greater part of those who attend such pilgrimages give up the entire day to dinners, dancing, and other amusements. Many serious disorders have generally resulted from such customs, and the authorities have been under the necessity of suppressing them. In olden times the two sanctuaries of Santiago in Galicia, and of the Virgin del Pilar in Zaragoza, drew together immense crowds of devotees, not only of the Peninsula and other Spanish dominions, but from all parts of Europe; and the offerings which were made to the images in those temples, in money, and in jewels, and other precious things, amounted in value to sums which would, if named, be considered fabulous. In the present day, however, that zeal has considerably cooled, although the practice of attributing to those images, and others called Milagrosas, the cure of all human disorders, is not exploded, but still prevails. Whenever cases occur in which an individual believes that he has been restored to health by means of the Milagro, it is customary for him to deposit, in the chapel of the image he venerates, a small model or representation of that member or part of the body restored to health by the prodigy. These objects in great abundance adorn the walls of such edifices, where may be seen innumerable arms, legs, eyes, mouths, and so on, of silver or of wax, according to the circumstances of the persons so favoured. People, who have been cured of their lameness, leave in the chapel the crutches which they made use of during the continuance of their infirmities.

The processions del Viatico are worthy of note in this chapter. These are of two classes, and may be thus described. When a sick person is threatened with approaching death, the priest of the parish carries to his house, in his hands, the consecrated host. This he does with the greatest solemnity, preceded by a procession of great numbers of devout people, bearing in their hands large wax candles; and when the patient happens to be a person of distinction and rich, the procession is accompanied by a band of music. Before this group goes a number of people who are constantly ringing a bell. All persons who meet this concourse kneel down and take off their hats as it passes; and if a body-guard happen to be in the route, the troop immediately forms and goes through certain evolutions peculiar to such occasions, which consist in every soldier bending his knee and inclining his arms to the ground, whilst the drums beat the royal march. A piquette is then detached from the troop and follows the priest and escorts him to the church. If the procession in its route meets a carriage, no matter how high a personage may be in it, he cedes his place at once to the priest, who goes in it to the sick person, and returns in it to his parsonage. The monarch himself forms no exception to this rule. Ferdinand VII., after his return from France, subject entirely to the clergy, and desiring to give them his support, performed this customary duty on several occasions. But as the clergy abused this courtesy and the facility with which the sovereign was made to lend himself to their wishes, and as it became a fixed plan to set out at such a time and in such a direction as to make these processions fall in his way as he was returning from the Prado, the custom was at last found insupportable; and, therefore, it frequently happened that, on seeing the lights preceding the Viatico, the king ordered his coachman to turn back and take another direction, so as to avoid the inconvenience of coming in contact with the procession. Queen Isabella II. has been frequently obliged to discharge this act of devotion. On those occasions she not only placed her carriage at the disposition of the officiating priest, but, with a wax candle in her hand, formed part of the procession, entered the house of the patient, however humble, assisted in the ceremony, kneeling on her knees, and if the sick person was poor, defrayed the expenses attendant on the illness, and, if death ensued, on the burial of the sufferer. To those who believe in the doctrine of the bodily presence of Jesus Christ in the eucharist this act contains a sublime lesson of humiliation and reverence; for to see the pomp and power of an earthly potentate resigned, so to speak, before the presence of God, must certainly be to them a spectacle both moving and edifying.

Those persons who are prevented by acute, although not dangerous, diseases, from attending the churches in compliance with the paschal precept, are also privileged to have the viatico in a splendid procession once a-year. This ceremony is attended by all the brotherhoods and principal people of the parish. The grandees of Spain, and the richest inhabitants of the neighbourhood, send the best of all their carriages on those occasions. The balconies are covered with ornaments, and the fair occupants scatter abroad a profusion of flowers, and copies of rude engravings of devout subjects, which are called aleluyas, towards the coach in which the priest is conveyed. Numerous bands of music accompany the cavalcade, which is escorted by a strong detachment of troops. Every time that the priest descends from the carriage to enter the house of some infirm person, the soldiers perform those military honours which already have been described, and during the performance the band plays the royal march. In some parishes, the proprietor of the carriage, or one of his principal people, assumes, pro hac vice, the office of coachman.

Under the title of processions may conveniently be placed those of the funerals of such persons as have left sufficient funds to defray the expenses exacted by the church on such occasions. Until within a very few years ago, it was the custom to convey the body to the dead-house of the church, with the face uncovered, in some religious habit, which was called the shroud (la mortaja), and the body was borne on the shoulders of the brotherhood of some society. Now-a-days, however, it is usual to convey it in a closed coffin, and on a funeral car. In Madrid, some of these cars are on such a scale of luxury and sculpture as but ill accords with the character and nature of the ceremony. The body is preceded by the poor of the charitable institutions, with lighted candles or tapers in their hands; and the clergy follow it, chanting the office for the dead. The undertaker is a personage entirely unknown in Spain. The church takes possession of the body, and keeps it until the time of interment, and the bill of expenses for the offices which the church performs frequently amounts to a sum absolutely ruinous. There is a Spanish city of which it is recorded that no sooner has a person breathed his last sigh, than the surviving family are importuned by deputations from the different religious communities, offering their respective services to conduct the interment on the cheapest scale of prices.

We have several times had occasion to allude to the strange contrast formed in Spain between the superstitious character of Roman Catholicism there professed, and the mockery which, at the same time, is made of the most sacred objects and venerated practices. The most notable example which we have of this moral phenomenon is The funeral of the sprat, or, as called in Spain, El entierro de la sardina, which is performed yearly in Madrid. On Ash-Wednesday, the day on which the follies of the carnival cease, and on which the people proceed, at once, from dancing and revelling, to the church, to receive the ashes which the priest rubs in form of a cross on the forehead of every believer, and in the evening of the same day, the population of Madrid meet on the shores of the Manzanares, where they witness the caricature of a solemn funeral, the body interred being that of a dead sprat. This absurd feast is truly one of bacchanalian character; in it are committed a thousand excesses of many kinds, among which that of drunkenness, especially among the lower classes, greatly prevails. There is not in any modern society a more faithful copy of Pagan festivities than that we are now describing, as witnessed every year in Madrid. The clergy have often protested against this stupid ceremony; but all their efforts to procure its abolition have been fruitless, and the authorities have retroceded before a practice so deeply rooted in the public habits, and so analogous to the gay temperament of the people of the Spanish capital. In the year 1851, it having been reported that the government was going to prohibit this horrible profanation and mockery of one of the most solemn ceremonies of the church, all the periodicals of Madrid, except those under the influence of the clergy, put forth the most energetic remonstrances. In the Cortes the most violent debates took place on the same subject, and appeals were made to the cabinet; nay, there were symptoms of an approaching vote of censure on the ministers, in case they should have the temerity to think of abolishing the obnoxious practice. Senor Madoz, who afterwards became minister of Hacienda, put himself at the head of this opposition, and displayed great ardour; and in spite of the religious periodicals accusing him of inconsistency, and quoting a passage from his own writings, in which he advocated the suppression of the feast as a blot on Spanish civilization, the question was too popular to be easily given up. Warm debates followed, and the subject took an aspect so serious, that the government, seeing itself exposed to a crisis, was obliged, to save its own existence, to come to the Cortes and declare solemnly that it would not offer the least opposition to the Entierro de la sardina, the funeral of the sprat. After this triumph, the interment of the sprat was performed with a splendour never witnessed before. The whole city attended the procession; there were thousands of coaches and vehicles of every description, besides an incredible variety of masked characters; guitars and castanets resounded for more than twelve hours on the pradera adjoining the Manzanares. The burlesque of the religious ceremonies was greater than ever; and the history of Madrid never recorded a day on which was consumed so great a quantity of wine and escabeche (a kind of pickle of different sorts of fish), being the classical refreshments with which the people of Madrid honour that ceremony in taking leave of the carnival, and furnish themselves with strength to bear up against the fastings of Lent.



CHAPTER VII.

PURGATORY—Deliverance from by devotions of survivors—Those devotions described—Difference between dogma of purgatory and other dogmas—Modes of drawing out souls—Masses for the dead—Legacies to pay for them—External representations of images and pictures—Day of All Souls and its practices—The Andalusian Confraternity of Souls—Mandas piadosas—Debtor and creditor account between the church and purgatory—How balanced—Bull of Composition—Soul-days—Responsos—Cepillo, or alms-box—Financial operation—Origin of bills of exchange and clearing house—Wax Candles—Their efficacy—Cenotaphs—Summary of funds, and reflections on their misapplication.

In the year 1802, the Inquisition of Granada celebrated an auto-de-fe against a teacher of languages, who lived at Malaga, for having said and written that the true purgatory was the purse of the friars and clergy. All persons who have considered the immense gains which the Spanish clergy have drawn, and continue to draw, from the belief in purgatory, will agree that the unhappy professor did not wander far from the truth. According to the doctrine, generally admitted among the Roman Catholic clergy, upon this dogma, which the Roman Catholic Church alone receives, the liberation of souls suffering the torments of fire in purgatory, or, what is much the same, their admission to the joys of the celestial state, does not depend so much on the culpability of the defunct individual as on the devotion of those who survive. It is taught in the catechism, it is preached in the pulpit, and enforced in the comments of theological works, that the souls of those condemned to purgatory can be ransomed and drawn out by means of prayer, penance, alms, and religious rites; and that one of the works of charity, most meritorious in the eyes of the Almighty, is the use of those means to abbreviate the duration of punishment of the sufferers. Hence it is that what is called in Spain devotion, with reference to souls in purgatory, is one of the most striking characteristics of religious life in that country. Nobody there has hitherto ventured to examine whether this belief is or is not conformable to the sacred Scripture, and to the doctrines of the first centuries of Christianity.

Purgatory in Spain, and in all Roman Catholic countries, is a dogma as sacred as that of the Incarnation and that of the Trinity, with this difference,—that the latter mysteries, and all those relative to the Saviour, place man in a position of immense inferiority with respect to their object, whilst purgatory, on the contrary, gives him an effective power, the object of which is nothing less than the salvation of souls. It is scarcely possible to conceive that to a being so weak as man could ever be attributed a power equal to that of Divinity itself. This creature, man, whom we see occupied in his business or his diversions, impregnated with profane ideas, and perhaps on the very point of committing crime, or of abandoning himself to criminal excesses, is supposed to be capable, even in these very acts, to open the gates of heaven to the soul of a relative or of a friend, and this, too, without any effort of his conscience or his will, but simply by taking out a piece of money from a purse, laying it on the plate of the sanctuary, or saying a paternoster.

Many and various are the methods which have been invented "to draw out souls from purgatory." The principal of these is "the mass of the dead;" and it constitutes one of the most lucrative sources from which the Roman Catholic clergy derive their revenues. As a general rule, when a testator makes his will, he bequeathes a certain sum of money to be laid out in masses, which are to be said as suffrages for his soul. These sums are sometimes more than sufficient to pay for a thousand, or even two thousand, masses. The relatives or friends pay for other masses for the same object, and many devout persons contribute large sums to draw out, indiscriminately, those souls which are most ready to avail themselves of such generosity. In all acts of devotion, including the daily and common mass, a prayer is introduced in favour of departed souls; and in order to exalt the imaginations of the faithful, by means of external representations, which, as we have seen in preceding chapters, form the grand arm of Roman Catholicism, they present, in painting, or engraving, or in statuary, figures of human beings surrounded by flames, and extending the hands as if in the act of imploring the compassion of their friends. In truth, in order to see this there is no need to go to Spain; for even in London, that great centre of civilization, and at a few paces from Temple-bar, some of these impious caricatures are exhibited for the edification of the English public.

On the day of All Souls (el dia de difuntos), in Spain, we find exhibited in the churches the most disgusting representations, such as human bones, skulls, and entire skeletons; the churches are kept in profound darkness; and nothing is omitted to inspire terror and move the hearts of the devout. In the middle of the church is placed a large table with a silver plate, two immense wax candles, lighted, and some of the figures just alluded to. A priest, seated by the table, is imploring, in the most pitiful language, the generosity of the attendants. "He who puts a half-dollar in this plate," said the priest in one of the churches in Cadiz, "draws out a soul from purgatory." An Andalusian, as great an epigrammatist and jester as are generally the natives of that agreeable province, on one of these occasions took out from his purse his half-dollar, and put it on the plate, saying that his intention was to rescue the soul of his father. At the end of a moment or two he asked the priest if the soul of his father was now drawn out of purgatory, and on being answered by the oracle in the affirmative, very quietly re-took possession of his coin, with this pungent observation, "Very well then, my father is not such a fool as to return to purgatory after having succeeded in entering heaven." Ridiculous and irreverent as this incident may appear, it cannot be denied that the logic contained in it is irresistible.

In every parish in Spain there is a confraternity of souls (hermandad de animas), whose treasure is composed not only of the contributions of the faithful, but of vast properties and metallic recompenses called censos, which always, in fact, consist of available money. The pious legacies (mandas piadosas), which abound in all the provinces of Spain, form a capital of incalculable amount. They call mandas piadosas those rustic or urban securities which have been left by testators with the sole object of investing their products in masses to be said for the dead. The church receives these proceeds, and pays for the masses. It often occurs that the number of those masses is so immensely great that there is not a sufficient number of priests in the neighbourhood to discharge the duty of saying them; the incomes, therefore, received by the clergy accumulate, and are disposed of for other purposes. Thus the church becomes a debtor to purgatory for thousands of masses which, though paid for, remain unsaid. In these cases the clergy have recourse to the pope, and demand a bull called bulla de composicion, for which the datary at Rome exacts a considerable sum of money. In fact, this bull is to compress, by a science which appears very like that of chemistry, the virtue of four or five thousand masses unsaid into only one which is said; so that if four or five thousand or more souls ought to be drawn out by means of the like number of masses, one single mass alone, through the medium of the bull, produces this grand result; and by this homoeopathic process the consciences of the debtors are pacified.

It may easily be imagined that these practices lead to the greatest abuse. Before the suppression of the friars, the convents were the great depositaries of this species of treasure. The bishops, and even the government itself, have often desired to look into these accounts in order to see whether the will of the testator had been exactly complied with in the application of the funds to their intended purposes. But the prelates of the respective orders have always most tenaciously resisted any such encroachment on their faculties and jurisdiction. It is quite certain that the incomes from these mandas piadosas were frequently laid out in repairing convents, erecting new chapels, celebrating religious feasts, and purchasing rich ornaments, and other precious objects, for augmenting the splendour of the sacred rites and ceremonies. When, at the end of the year, the account came to be stated of this branch of the church's industry, and there appeared to be a vast disproportion of masses said in comparison with the sums received, the procurador of the order in Rome solicited a bull of composition. The account was thus balanced, and every thing nicely adjusted.

Although, on every day in the year, the suffrages of all classes may be offered in favour of souls in purgatory, there are some days especially privileged and set apart in the calendar for the purpose, with this note affixed to them, dia de anima (Soul-day), and on which the effect of the suffrage is supposed to be infallible; that is to say, that each devout person draws out as many souls from purgatory as pieces of money which he draws out of his purse to pay for the like number of masses, or other acts of devotion to be performed. On those days, a large placard is erected at the church-doors, and bearing this inscription, "Hoy se saca anima," (To-day souls are drawn out). The churches are full of people, and the contributions of money are numerous and abundant.

The prayer especially consecrated to the drawing souls out of purgatory, and which forms an essential part of the office for the dead, is called in Spanish responso. It is composed of three anthems taken from the book of Job, a paternoster, and a collect, and ends with the formula, Requiem eternam dona eis, Domine. When the prayer is in favour of all souls, the eis remains in the plural; but if it is in favour of one particular soul, then the singular ei is used. On the day of All Souls, when an innumerable crowd of people assembles in the cemeteries, the priests also attend in great numbers to say responsos, at so much a-piece, for those who desire them. In a certain Spanish city, which we forbear to name, we have seen these priests rival each other in lowering the prices current of these precious performances. One was crying out, "I say a responso for tenpence;" {148a} and another, "I say it for fivepence." {148b} This may appear incredible, but it is an undeniable fact.

In all Roman Catholic churches there is a cepillo (alms-box), nailed to the wall, and having this inscription upon it, "Para las benditas almas del purgatorio," (For the blessed souls in purgatory), for the reception of contributions: and the circumstance has given rise to an operation of mercantile character which is certainly very ingenious, and to which some Spaniards attribute the origin of bills of exchange. The priest of a parish of Andalusia, for example, has occasion for a certificate of the baptism or of the burial of some person in a parish of Arragon or in Navarre. The fee for this document is usually two pesetas. As it is almost impossible to send so small a sum from one extremity of the Peninsula to the other, the priest of Arragon or of Navarre draws two pesetas from the cepillo, or alms-box of his parish, and the Andalusian priest puts the same sum into the cepillo of his parish, or he says two masses as an equivalent. In this way purgatory is converted into a kind of clearing-house, which wonderfully facilitates the transaction of business in the funds of the ecclesiastical market.

A circumstance peculiar to the worship celebrated in favour of souls in purgatory is the prodigality of lighted candles which are consumed on those occasions. There is no doubt that the object of this practice is to expose to the view of the faithful a lively image of the flames by which these souls are tormented in their probationary state. A traveller, worthy of credit, assures us that the wax consumed with this object in the city of Granada alone (in which there are about forty churches), on the day of All Souls, amounted, a few years ago, to the incredible sum of 10,000 pounds.

The cenotaphs placed in the churches when the funeral rites of some rich man are celebrated, are, in truth, nothing but perfect pyramids of burning flames produced by wax candles. It is a common belief, maintained in the pulpit and in the confessional, that the brighter these candles burn the more efficacious will be the suffrages. The royal family of Spain has had the good taste to avoid this error. In the magnificent monastery of the Escurial, where the remains of deceased members of the royal family are deposited, all show is reduced to a sumptuous carpet of black velvet, worked with gold, and spread out upon the floor, on the centre of which is a cushion of the same materials, and upon that a royal crown of gold. At the extremities are placed four immense candelabra of solid silver, called blandones, with their corresponding wax candles of various diameters and sizes.

From what has been said in this chapter the reader may form some idea of the immense sums of money which the clergy absorb by virtue of this belief in the dogma of purgatory. When he reflects that those contributions are upon a more liberal scale than any others which the Spanish nation pays, and that the product is sunk by the most unproductive of all the classes in society, he will then be able to arrive at some conjecture as to who and what are the Roman Catholic clergy of Spain. These contributions, be it remembered, are paid, on every day in the year, in all parts of the Peninsula, and by persons of every category in the nation, from the very meanest to the most elevated in rank. The means employed to wring these sums from the contributors are infallible in their effects. The attack is made, indiscriminately, by appeals to charity, family affection, and reciprocal duties of parents, children, brothers, and sisters. The act of liberating a Christian soul from the dreadful torments which purgatory is supposed to inflict, however opposed to reason may be the idea of operating by material fire upon the incorporeal essence of the soul, is considered superior, in the estimation of every sensible and Christian heart, to any succour which can be given to hunger, misery, nakedness, or other numerous corporal afflictions. In this way the money which might be spent in wiping the tears from the cheek of the widow and the orphan, and be applied to the erection of useful human institutions, is prodigally spent in a mysterious and incomprehensible operation, which, after all, is a purely human invention, and which, by its practical results, and the great amount of wealth it draws to the Roman Catholic Church, bears a greater affinity to a financial operation than to any religious duty.

It would be almost impossible to calculate the advantages which would have resulted to the Spanish nation from those great resources, if the product had been applied in the construction of roads, canals, or other useful labours. But this immense capital being thus spread about in small fractions, the inevitable consequence has been a continual draining of the public wealth, the perpetuating of a theological error (contradicted by Holy Scripture, and by the true doctrine of the church of Christ), and that pomp and splendour which the clergy are enabled to assume by such abundant means, in addition to the funds received by them from other sources.



CHAPTER VIII.

Auricular Confession, a sacrament inseparable from that of communion—Obligatory on all once a-year—Plan of discovering defaulters—How punished—Evils of confession—Power of the priest—Four evils pointed out—Discoveries in the Inquisition in 1820—Facility of obtaining absolution—Louis XIV.—Robbers and assassins—The confessional—Practice, how conducted—Expiatory acts—Refusal of absolution—A husband disguised as his wife's confessor—The injunction of secrecy on part of confessor—Advantages of the knowledge he gains—Jesuits advocate the confessional—No fees for confession, but gratuities are generally given.

Confession is one of the sacraments of the Church of Rome. Roman Catholicism, at least in Spain, requires that all believers shall celebrate that sacrament, as well as the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, at least once a-year. Confessors amplify this obligation, and require their penitents to observe both these sacraments frequently. Devout persons who aspire to greater spiritual perfection practise these observances once a week. Still, however, the church is satisfied with an annual celebration of them by each of its members, and fixes the period for that performance at Easter. The infraction of this rule is considered a mortal sin, and the clergy use every possible means to enforce the precept. The two sacraments are inseparable, and to obey the injunction of confession and communion is called "to comply with the church," (cumplir con la Iglesia).

The method employed by the clergy to discover delinquents with reference to these obligations, is as rigid and severe as any that can be devised by the most despotic civil authority. About the middle of Lent the priest and one of his assistants form a general census of all their parishioners. In the acts of confession and communion, the penitent receives two tickets, which certify his obedience to the paschal precept, and when the assigned period is over for these observances, the priest goes from house to house to gather the tickets; so that it is impossible to conceal any infraction of the rule. Until within the last few years, it was the custom to write the names of all defaulters upon a board, exposed to public view in the churches, by way of punishment of the delinquents; and, consequently, those who were the subjects of this punishment were badly looked upon by the towns-people, and considered as atheists and heretics. The result of this absurd penal code was, that men preferred sacrilege to dishonour, and complied externally with the precept, making an imperfect confession, receiving the eucharist in a state of culpability, and committing, consequently, in the eyes of a Roman Catholic, one of the blackest crimes. Whether it was on account of a grave inconvenience resulting from this mode of punishment, or by virtue of that decay in the ecclesiastical influence in Spain, so notable in recent years, we cannot determine, but that practice has now been completely abolished; and even in Madrid and the principal cities of the kingdom, the "complying with the church" has lost its compulsory character, and been reduced to those who truly believe in its efficacy. It is true that the clergy still give tickets, as testimonials, to those who perform acts of confession and communion, but they have not the temerity to go from house to house to collect them as formerly, and the clergy who would venture to demand them would be exposed to mortification and rebuke. Still, however, in some families, the children are bound in duty to prove before the paternal tribunal their compliance with those obligations, by means of those official documents; but even this test is easily evaded by the purchase of the tickets, which are publicly sold in the churches by the sacristans and other inferior agents of the priesthood, for the moderate sum of a peseta, (ten-pence.)

The practice of confession, however, is not quite extinct, particularly among the inferior classes of society, and it is natural that the clergy should represent it as absolutely necessary to the salvation of souls, looking to the great advantages which they themselves derive from it. By means of the sacrament of confession, the confessor makes himself the absolute master of the conscience of his penitent,—not merely of his own secrets, but of those of his whole family; he directs all their operations, and superintends all their domestic concerns, as well as their social and even their political affairs. The confessor has constantly suspended over the head of his penitent the terrible menace of eternal punishment. It is not the pure and genuine law of God which the devotee observes,—it is the law of God explained, augmented, or diminished, and often distorted, by the voice of a fallible man, only his equal, and perhaps vastly inferior to him in point of erudition and purity of morals. The devotee has no right to obey God in the way he understands the precepts imposed upon him by God and God's church. In his view, God and the church are a sort of concrete centred in the confessor. The confessor not only directs him, but punishes him with the severest penances that a confessor can enjoin, for the penal code of the confessional not only embraces the religious practices of fasting, alms, scourging, and other inflictions, which are entirely at the disposal of that terrible judge, but he has, or assumes to have, the power of denying absolution; that is to say, of condemning the soul to the terrible state of mortal sin, of interposing himself between the sinner and the divine mercy, and of annulling the consoling hopes of Him who in compassion to human weakness has said, "I have no pleasure in the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live." The confessor is just as frail, as mortal, as subject to human weakness, as susceptible of human passions and vices, as the penitent himself. The character he assumes to perform, by the imposition of his hands, does not allay in him either the violence of appetite, or the claims of self-interest. How is it possible to believe that, in the exercise of his ministry, he can entirely rid himself of sentiments of hatred, sympathy, rancour, and envy, with respect to the man or woman who kneels at his feet, imploring through him the pardon of sin?

People greatly deceive themselves who imagine that the confessional, at least in Spain, bears the least analogy to the case of a man who, burthened with sorrow and repentance, comes in confidence to deposit the weight of the burden which oppresses him on the bosom of his friend. No; do not believe that the penitent hopes to find in the confessor a kind consoling guide to wipe away his tears, pour into his bosom the balm of hope, and present to him an endearing hand which may lead him in the way of holiness. The confessor is an implacable judge, who speaks with gentle smiles or bland insinuations, but who tears out, with an imperious tone and formidable menaces, the secrets of the heart, and not only those which may be connected with crime worthy of deep contrition and sincere repentance, but even others which pertain to an order of things exempt from the sinfulness attaching to human actions. The confessor has an absolute right to know every thing without exception. The most insignificant actions, and even the most innocent ones, must come to his knowledge. He is not content with the spontaneous declaration that the penitent feels disposed to make of all infractions of duty; but he insists on examining the case with the most scrupulous minuteness, and takes as much pains as would a clever, cunning lawyer to extract every particle of evidence from the witnesses for or against a culprit on his trial. Under this last point of view, auricular confession may be considered as the most tyrannical, odious, and unmoral institution, which superstition, leagued with sordid interests, could ever have invented.

Innumerable are the abuses made of this wicked instrument by the Spanish clergy, and which have resulted in the abandonment of the confessional by every educated, discreet, and intelligent man. Of those abuses we shall only point out four of the most important, and which have most efficaciously contributed to bring auricular confession into disrepute.

First. The great interest of the clergy being to consolidate the papal power, the confession serves to ascertain the extent of hostilities raised against that power by philosophy, impiety, the tendency to religious reform, and the general spirit of the age. The confessor asks every penitent whether he has any prohibited or simply profane books; if he, or his parents, or his friends, listen to the conversation or discourse of heretics, or murmur against the ecclesiastical power, or satirise the conduct of the clergy, or even attend balls, theatres, or other profane amusements. Many confessors give to these things infinitely greater importance than to the infraction of the Decalogue. If the answer to these questions is in the affirmative, then the confessor requires, under pain of refusing absolution, that such books be given up,—that all further communication with the enemies of the church be discontinued,—and that such carnal entertainments as balls and theatres, and the like, be renounced for ever.

Secondly. As the exorbitant ecclesiastical power of the Church of Rome is bound up intimately, and by a well-known analogy, with absolute power and civil despotism, the confessional is converted into a political engine by a true espionage, by means of which is discovered every liberal tendency, every germ of conspiracy or rebellion, and every thing that can offend the supreme authority.

In the epoch of the restoration of Ferdinand VII. to Spain, after his captivity in France, when the persecution of the liberal party became the essence of that monarch's policy, the confessors were actively occupied, by command of the bishops, in these odious examinations and inquiries. Thus, the wife was made to denounce the husband, the son the father, and the friend the friend. Peace, thus disturbed, flew from the abodes of families; the clergy acquired new rights to the hatred of the nation,—for many were the persecutions to which the accusations, thus dragged from the weakness of penitents, gave rise. Freemasonry was considered then not only as a political crime, but as a challenge to pontifical bulls, which were fulminated against the mystery with violent anathemas. The penitent saw himself obligated to accuse, before the tribunal of the Inquisition, any persons whom he knew to be members of a lodge, although bound to such persons by the ties of kindred or friendship.

Thirdly. The most dangerous use of the power of examination, which the confessor exercises, is that of interrogating persons of the weaker sex. A woman who once kneels before a confessor renounces from that moment the most noble, the most pure, and the most amiable of the sentiments which can animate the bosom of her sex. The searching voice and tone of her judge breaks down with violence, at once, all those barriers which modesty and self-respect by turns have raised up in her heart and conscience. Not only is she compelled to reveal the positive acts, gestures, and words, containing the least element of culpability or blame against the chastity and purity of her habits, but even the most vague and inevitable thoughts,—those against which woman recoils with indignation, and which she would even blush and refuse to give an account of to herself,—have all to be expressed and uttered by her lips without the least palliation or disguise. It is a fact generally admitted in Spain, and one spoken of without reserve in all classes of society, that the most uncontaminated and pure maiden rises from the confessional as well instructed in things of which before she was absolutely ignorant, as though she had come from a house of the vilest character. It is enough to indicate the nature of this abuse, in order to form some idea of its pernicious consequences. Women worthy of credit have declared over and over again that their first visit to the confessional opened the way to their perdition, by inflaming the imagination with ideas of a most voluptuous and obscene nature, and exciting their curiosity on subjects which had never before even entered into the mind or conception. Should any person doubt these statements, let him turn to any book of Roman Catholic devotion, which contains what is called, in ecclesiastical language, "examination of the conscience." The famous treatise, "De Matrimonio," cited in our introduction, by the Jesuit Sanchez, for the use of confessors of married women, contains particulars so filthy, and pictures, descriptive of certain sins, so utterly disgusting and obscene, that even the Court of Rome has been obliged to order all copies of the work to be bought up and suppressed.

Fourthly and finally. Another of the great dangers of the indefinite authority of the confessor, with respect to penitents of the weaker sex, is the facility it offers for seduction.

Consider the situation of a single man in the presence of a young and beautiful woman, alone with her, and master of her conscience and all the secrets of her heart. How much denial, how much virtue must he not possess to resist the temptation which such circumstances bring before him! That great crimes do very commonly result from such circumstances in Roman Catholic countries, is proved by the existence of the penalties which the canon law imposes on the authors of such crimes, in the book which goes by the title of "De Solicitante in Confessione." In almost all the cities of Spain are recounted scandalous examples of this class of abuses, and it is generally believed that in the greater number of the cases, criminal relations between the clergy and women of all classes had their origin in the confessional. When the people in Spain rose against the Inquisition in 1820, and sacked the archives of that tribunal, they found numerous informations by modest women against their confessors, who had assailed their virtue in the confessional. The interests of the clergy required that a veil should be thrown over those excesses, and thus we find but very few instances in which the Inquisition awarded punishment to the culprits.

With such efficacious instruments of power and of influence, it is not surprising that the clergy and friars should wield an authority, without limit, over all the affairs of families. Spaniards, who are old enough to remember the moral state of their country towards the end of the last century, are well aware that there was scarcely a family of any importance in Spain which was not blindly subjected to the advice and even orders of some individual member of the priesthood. Nothing could be done without such advice and sanction. The clergy had great influence in the marriages, domestic disputes, business, studies, and even diversions, of all who recognised their superiority. They prohibited the reading of the most innocent books,—even those respected by "the Index." They exacted acts of devotion, such as masses, romerias, novenas, and others, from which there resulted constant droppings of money into the coffers of the church. In short, it may be taken as a fact, that, until the period of the French invasion, the true government of the Spanish nation had been a theocracy in the hands of forty or fifty thousand individuals, freed from all responsibility with respect to the civil power, united among themselves by the bonds of a common interest, and forming a privileged caste, considered generally as the depositaries of divine power. All this rested upon the basis of confession.

But the most deplorable inconvenience of these practices, and that which makes it incompatible with the public morals, is the facility of pardon offered for those criminal excesses and to the most abandoned depravity. He who can be assured of the efficacy of a remedy which is at his disposition every moment does not fear exposing himself to temptation. The most obstinate sinner, the perpetrator of the most atrocious crimes, knows that he has in his hand, already, absolution for all his excesses,—that he is free from all responsibility and all consequences,—and, in a word, that he can transform himself into a saint or an angel by the mere performance of the rite which his church prescribes. If, after this purification, he returns to his old habits, and gives himself up to his wicked inclinations, the same process of absolution is at hand, and can be repeated as often as he pleases; and as the administration of this sacrament, on the part of the priest, becomes, through force of repetition, a mere matter of routine, it can hardly be supposed that the words he utters can carry along with them any efficacy, as they might be expected to do if they were those of a truly devoted minister of Jesus Christ. To assure oneself of these truths, let any one attend a Spanish church on one of those days on which it is necessary "to comply with the church," and draw near to those confessional-boxes which are there erected for the use of the penitents. He will there see people successively throw themselves down on their knees before a priest, pronounce a few words, hear a slight admonition, and then rise up to make way for another person who in his turn does the like, and so on during the day. Can any one believe that this almost insignificant ceremony is sufficient to impress on any mind that profound feeling, that intense grief for past sins, and that firm resolve to sin no more, which are the true signs of contrition and repentance? Can it be believed that the treasures of divine mercy and forgiveness are open to all comers, who, persisting in their sinful course, think fit to come, and, as a matter of right, demand them as they would passports at the office of the police?

It is well known that even Louis XIV., notorious for his open and profligate as well as habitual adulteries, had a confessor, and complied with the duties of confession and communion in the presence of his whole court. In Spain, robbers, assassins, and the most corrupt of the people, pursued by justice for their crimes, and who are the terror of society, always confess and receive the eucharist at Easter, but without ever amending their lives or even intending to do so.

The priest, before saying mass, in which rite he is about to identify himself with what he supposes to be the very body of our Saviour, is bound to purify himself previously, so that in that awful ceremony the holy elements may not enter a temple wherein dwelleth sin. The greater number of those priests say mass every day, but seldom are they seen, before assuming the sacred vestments to officiate at the altar, to prepare themselves by means of confession, as the rules of their religion most strictly enjoin. There are innumerable towns in Spain in which there are no other clergymen than the parish priest. In what state then must his soul be when he approaches the altar to eat and drink, as he professes to believe, the body and blood of Jesus Christ?

These considerations are so obviously natural and simple, that it has required six centuries of civil and religious oppression to hide them under the weight of ignorance and the fear of punishment. Nevertheless, the invasion of the French, the political revolutions which have followed, intercourse with foreign nations, and other causes which have co-operated with these, have at last begun to open the eyes of Spaniards, and confession is daily falling into disuse, particularly among the educated classes of society. Even in these same classes, however, there are many persons who, although persuaded of the truth of all that their clergy teach them, refuse to confess, and declare that they will do so only at the hour of death. Confession is, in the present day, more common in the inferior ranks; for these move in a sphere without the pale of civilization, and consequently are yet under the clerical power. Still, there are villages in Spain in which the bad example of the priest, and the enmity which is manifested towards him by the inhabitants, prevent the compliance with those sacraments, so that for years together the great majority of the people never think of purifying their consciences in the way prescribed by their church. In the eyes of a true Roman Catholic, these people are therefore living in a state of complete reprobation, and are destined to perdition. And yet, how can a human being throw himself at the feet of a man whom he despises? How can he ask absolution of a man who he knows requires it more, perhaps, than himself? And, above all, how can he confide the consciences and souls of his daughters to a man who carries seduction in his eyes and pollution on his lips?

The act of confession is practised after the following manner:—First of all, the penitent makes, whilst alone, a private examination of the heart and conscience, according to the instructions of books written with this special object in view, some of which have justly merited the censures passed upon them by the English press, in citing them by way of argument against Parliamentary grants in favour of the college of Maynooth. The hour of confession arrived, the penitent kneels before the priest, who is seated in a kind of sentry-box, called the confessional, open in front, and having the two sides of trellis-work, by which the priest is separated from actual contact with the woman who comes to confess. This confessional is placed in the church. Those who have visited the churches and cathedrals on the continent of Europe may have seen several of them in almost every one of these. Thus the confession may be said to be made in public, for the rite is most frequently performed when there is a crowd assembled, so that persons nearest to the confessional can often distinctly hear much of what passes between the confessor and his penitent. Now, only consider the situation of a woman observed, at least, by so many witnesses, who, even though they do not hear her words, can, by the alteration of her features and visage, understand what emotions of mind she is enduring whilst undergoing the painful process.

The parties thus placed, the ceremony then begins with an act of contrition, which the penitent pronounces.

Then follows the self-accusation of sins, in the order of the ten commandments, or the Decalogue, and the other five of the Roman Catholic Church. The priest frequently interrupts this self-accusation with leading questions concerning the most minute particulars of the act which is the subject of accusation. For example, suppose the accusation to be this: "I accuse myself, holy father, of having uttered a falsehood." The priest interrupts: "On a light matter, or on a serious one? was it for personal interest? was it in order to stain the reputation of another? and if so, was the person calumniated a man or a woman? and was that person married or single? a member of the civil authority, or one of the clergy?" This introductory part being ended, the priest begins a fresh tack, and interrogates the penitent upon infractions not specified in any of the commandments. For example: If the penitent is accustomed to pray the rosary; if she frequents churches; if she contributes her money towards the support of divine worship; if she knows, and omits to denounce, impious persons, heretics, and enemies of the church; if she prefers the society of worldly men to that of the clergy and friars; if her parents, brothers, husband, sons, relatives, or friends, read prohibited or dangerous books; if she orders masses to be said for the souls of the dead; and other things of a similar kind. Then follows an exhortation to show the turpitude of the sins confessed and the necessity of repentance, and the priest concludes this peroration by the imposition of penance or other expiatory act. Here the confessor has an open field before him, in which he shows the fecundity of his imagination,—prayers, paying for masses, fasting, alms, corporal mortification, pilgrimages to sanctuaries, privation from theatres, balls, and parties, and other penalties of a similar nature, which form the criminal code of the confessional tribunal; and here it is easy to imagine what a latitude this faculty offers to gratify hatred, show revenge, flatter the powerful, and make things pleasant to those who have the power of conferring favours. The act concludes with the words of absolution, which is a formula consisting of a few Latin phrases.

The priest has the power of refusing absolution, but which however he seldom ventures to exercise, for there is no penitent, be she who she may, that would not sooner make the most terrible sacrifices of her self-respect, than expose herself to such an affront. There have been instances in which refusal of absolution has provoked the penitent to personal vengeance against an inexorable confessor.

There is a fact well known in Spain, which proves the abuses to which the practice of confession may lead. A husband who suspected the fidelity of his wife, knowing that she was accustomed always to go to the same church and the same confessional to confess, dressed himself up as a friar, and taking care to conceal his face with the capucha, entered the church and sat down in the confessional. The unlucky woman fell into the snare, and confided to her husband the particulars of her faithless conduct. The result was, as the reader may readily suppose, a great outcry among the clergy against such profanation and sacrilege; but the man who was guilty of this delinquency being high and powerful, escaped punishment.

The canon law imposes on the confessor the most inviolable secrecy, and provides severe penalties for the least infraction. This injunction, it must be admitted, is most scrupulously obeyed; but then it must be considered, that, if the prohibition favour the penitent by preventing the disclosure of her frailties, it equally favours the clergy themselves, by making them the masters of all consciences, and lifts up to their own eyes the veil which is supposed to conceal the infirmities of their fellow-creatures.

It is not difficult to calculate the advantages the clergy are able to draw from this intimate knowledge of the interests, and the ambition, hatred, and other passions of the mind most dangerous to the quietude of families. One would think it impossible that there could exist a human society in which a privileged body of men were to be found, invested with the faculty of penetrating into those mysteries which are generally supposed to be open only to the Almighty. But it was for the possession of this very faculty, that the Jesuits, so clever in discovering and practising the means of their greatness and influence, abandoning their vulgar ambition, their mitres, and other ecclesiastical insignia, fixed all their hopes and attention on the confessional. Before the extinction of that order, confessors of the popes, kings of Europe, and the chief persons of their courts, pertained to it. Leo X., Louis XIV., Louis XV., and Catherine de Medicis, may be looked upon as regulators who qualified that temperament of Christian morals which domineered over the world under the imperium of those reverend fathers.

The administration of the sacrament of absolution does not figure in the tariff of regular parochial dues, payable for baptism, marriage, and burial. That act, according to the canons of the church, must be gratuitous. But in Spain, since the abolition of the tithes, which brought with it that state of poverty under which the clergy now groan, there has been introduced a custom of slipping a few pieces of money into the hand of the confessor at parting. This gratuity varies according to the means of the penitents; but the average may be taken at a dollar and a half. May not the probability of a larger or a smaller fee on these occasions, as pourtrayed in the aspect of the giver, have an influence, more or less, in proportioning the amount of severity in the penance imposed?



CHAPTER IX.

FASTS AND PENANCES—How observed—Indulgences—Spain is privileged by the Bull of the Holy Crusade—Description of that bull—Prices of copies—Commissary-General of Crusades—His Revenues—Their shameful application—Copy of that bull—Other acts of penance—The Disciplina or whipping—Cilicios.

The Roman Catholic Church prescribes two kinds of mortification with respect to food, viz., fasting and abstinence from meat. Fasting is obligatory during the whole period of Lent, and on the eve of each principal feast-day in the year. To comply with this obligation, it is enough to eat a mere formal meal on these days, consisting of some light vegetable diet in the morning, and again in the evening. This observance, however, admits of some indulgence, and confessors are wont to absolve many of their penitents from its severity, under pretext of their having to do hard work, or to contend with physical infirmity. The clergy, besides the fasting common to all the devout, are bound also, during the holy week, to abstain from eggs, milk, and all sorts of food which come under the denomination of lacticinio, or any thing of which milk or eggs form a component part. Friars and nuns fast, also, during the whole of the period called advent; and when those obligations are truly performed, there is no doubt that they have a considerable influence on the physical constitution. Medical men are authorised to consent to its infraction by their patients. In some religious communities of both sexes, but especially in those of the Capuchines, the fast-days are multiplied to such an extent, that they compose the greater number of days in the year.

Abstinence from meat varies in the different bishoprics, according to the established custom or the bishop's will. In France, for example, in some dioceses they never eat animal food on Fridays or Saturdays; in others, Friday only is a fast-day, but in all of them abstinence from meat is obligatory during the whole of Lent, Sundays excepted.

Spain is a country privileged in this respect. By virtue of a contribution paid to the government, and which the latter divides with the Pope, Spaniards are absolved from the greater part of all those duties. The origin of this privilege dates from the time of the crusades, when the popes, in order to meet the expenses of those expeditions, imposed this tribute on Spaniards, in exchange for the dispensation. In course of time, however, this usage was abolished; but Charles III. solicited of the Pope its renovation, with a view of depriving the English of the vast sums of money which they received in Spain from the produce of the stockfish (bacalao) of Terranova. This singular institution, called the Holy Crusade, occupies a great number of public officials, and had produced immense sums previous to the general change of ideas brought about in Spain by the war of invasion by the French. In every year, at the beginning of January, the Commissary of the Holy Crusade, who is generally a high personage among the clergy, and his attendants, set out in carriages, with a procession consisting of his subalterns and the municipal body-guard of the city. In one of the carriages is unfurled and exposed to view the standard of the Holy Crusade. From that day the sale of the bull is opened, and several thousands of copies of this bull are printed. The price of each copy is about sevenpence. The printing is executed in a very inferior manner, and the paper used for the occasion is of the most inferior quality. The bull in substance states that the contributor, having paid the money required for it, is authorised for a year to enjoy all the prerogatives which it concedes to him. By its influence, the days of abstinence from meat are reduced to Ash-Wednesday and the Fridays in Lent, the last three days of the holy week, and the eve of the great festivals.

The Commissary-General of Crusades, the absolute master of this enormous public revenue, is bound to deliver a part of the profits to the treasury, and to lay out the rest in works of benevolence in such manner as he, in the exercise of his charity, may think fit. This important office is usually conferred on some one of the clergy who may happen to be a favourite of the court; and almost every person who has attained this distinction has been notorious for his luxuriousness and prodigality. It is related of some of them in the time of Ferdinand VII., that having exhausted all inventions in the culinary art, in the splendid banquets given by them frequently to the chief persons of the court, they have even placed upon their tables live sardines, brought from a distance of three hundred miles through a country in which there were no regular roads, swimming in sea water, in large glass bowls, and after gratifying the guests with the amusement which such a spectacle afforded, the little finned creatures were then sent to the kitchen, and served up as a dish of the greatest delicacy.

It is a public thing in Madrid, and one which is spoken of without the least disguise, that a large portion of those funds is set apart as pensions of considerable amounts to the mistresses of grandees, and persons in high offices of the state, and also in order to political and other purposes, far alien to the objects of the institution. The Roman Catholics of other countries are scarcely able to credit that so monstrous an abuse of the pontifical authority really exists, it not being possible to conceive that, for a paltry sum of money, Christians can remain exempt from an obligation considered sacred by Catholicism.

We have alluded to the small sum paid to obtain that exemption; but the tariff of the Holy Crusade exacts a larger sum from the nobility and persons of high dignity. To those a bull is sold, which is called Bula de ilustres, which costs from eight to twelve shillings; and in order to leave the door open for the augmentation of those revenues, there is a clause which says that every person purchasing them is bound, as a matter of conscience, to contribute according to his ability.

In order that the reader may have a right idea of these bulls, we insert a translation of one of them, which doubtless will be interesting:—

The Bull published and sold every year in Spain, and by which Spaniards, and all Catholics resident in Spain, are authorised (provided they purchase a copy of it) to eat meat on certain days of the week and throughout Lent, when Catholics in all other parts of the world are bound to abstain from eating meat.

M.DCCC.LII.

Summary of Faculties, Indulgences, and Graces, which our Most Holy Father Pius IX. (who now governs the church), deigns to concede, by the Bull of the Holy Crusade, to all the faithful who, being in the kingdoms of Spain and other the dominions subjected to his Catholic Majesty, or coming to them, shall take it, giving the alms {174} assessed by us for the same, expedited for the year 1852.

A long time ago, when infidel people made a cruel war against the Catholic nations, and by their arms placed divers regions of Europe in great danger, with risk to the faith and to souls, our Catholic kings obtained apostolical letters from the Holy See, by which were conceded many spiritual and temporal graces, during some years, to those who might leave the Spanish dominions to fight against the infidels, or who might assist those military expeditions with special aid, contributing, to some extent, towards the expenses of such necessary purposes. The same indulgence, with some additions or declarations, was repeated many times afterwards by the Roman pontiffs, and the necessity for continuing that war having ceased on account of a change in the times, the last prorogations of this indulgence were upon condition that the alms collected should be laid out and employed in other pious objects. H. M. has recently obtained, by entreaty of the Holy See, a further prorogation of the said indulgence, with a view of applying the alms collected in respect thereof towards the expenses of divine worship, in aid of necessitous churches, or in the endowment of priestly seminaries, in order, by this means, to repair the damages caused by the public calamities which have afflicted us. Our most holy father, benignantly hearkening to the entreaties of H. M., has not hesitated to make this ample concession in favour of the objects indicated, and for the benefit of our queen and of all Spaniards. In order, therefore, to have temples worthy of God, to whom they are consecrated, and to form a clergy capable of fulfilling their high and divine mission, our most holy father, Pius IX., listening benignantly to the supplications of H. M., did, by the bull issued at Gaeta on the 8th of May 1849, give us the privileges, indulgences, and graces, contained in the bull of the Holy Crusade, the execution of which is committed to us. Therefore we, Don Manuel Lopez Santaella, priest, Knight Grand Cross of the royal and distinguished Spanish order of Charles III., archdeacon of Huete, dignitary of the holy church of Cuenca, president of its illustrious chapter, preacher to H. M., member on his own right (individuo nato) of the royal junta of the Immaculate Conception, and of various literary societies, only judge of the new liturgy, president of the apostolical commission of the subsidy of the clergy, of the tribunal of the grace of the Excusado, and of that of the general treasury of Espolios y Vacantes, {176} senator of the kingdom, and apostolical commissary-general of the Holy Crusade, and other pontifical graces in all the dominions of H. M., with a view of making them known to the faithful, and that they may be able to avail themselves of so precious a treasure, reduce them into a summary in the form following:—

In the first place,—To our lady the queen, who with constant care and diligence watches over the propagation of our holy Catholic faith, the splendour of the worship, and the decorum of the temples; and to all the faithful Christians who are on the Spanish territory, or who may come to it within the year, reckoning from the day of the publication of this bull, and who shall contribute to such holy ends with their alms, taking this summary, and having our authority to enjoy the graces in it contained, his holiness concedes the same plenary indulgence which has been accustomed to be conceded to those who went to the conquest of the Holy Land, and in the year of Jubilee; if contrite for their sins they shall confess them with the mouth and receive the holy sacrament of the eucharist, or, not being able to confess, desire truly to do so.

Item,—To those above said, his holiness concedes that even in time of interdict (provided they have not given cause for it, nor been an obstacle to its being raised), and having permission for it from the commissary-general, even one hour before daybreak, and another after noon, can within the same year celebrate, if they are presbyters, or cause masses to be celebrated and other divine offices in their presence, and in the presence of their familiar friends, domestics, and relatives, and receive the eucharist and other sacraments (except on Easter-day), as well as in churches where, on the other hand, it is permitted in any mode of celebration whatever of the divine offices during such interdict, as in a private oratory set apart solely for divine worship, and that it may be visited and appointed by the ordinary; and that they may assist at the divine offices in time of interdict, it being their duty, provided they use it for the said purpose, always to pray to God for the prosperity of the Roman Catholic apostolic Church, for the peace and concord of Christian princes, and for the other pious ends already expressed. In like manner, it is conceded to them that their bodies may be buried in the said time of interdict with moderate funeral pomp, as if they had not died excommunicated.

Item,—That during the said year of publication, they being in the said Spanish territory (but not out of it), may eat meat, by the advice both of their spiritual and corporal physicians, in all times of fasting throughout the year, even those in Lent, and in the same way, at their own free will, eat eggs and lacticinios (any thing made up with milk), so that it is understood the obligation to fast will be satisfied by those who eat meat, as much as it will be by those who strictly observe the form of fasting. In which pardon are comprehended the religious persons of all military orders, but excepting from it all patriarchs, archbishops, bishops, inferior prelates, regular ecclesiastics, and secular presbyters, who may not have attained sixty years of age, and, out of Lent, all of them may have recourse to such pardon in respect of eating eggs and lacticinios.

Item,—As to the faithful who contribute their alms in form aforesaid, and who, in order to implore the divine aid for the ends above expressed, shall fast voluntarily on days not appointed as fast-days, or, being lawfully hindered from fasting, shall do some other pious work at the free-will of their confessor or parish priest, and pray to God for those ends; as often as they shall do so, so often shall they be released and freed mercifully by the Lord for fifteen years and fifteen times forty days from the penance imposed on them owing to whatever cause, and shall, besides, be made partakers of all the prayers, alms, pilgrimages (even those to Jerusalem), and of all other good works done in the church militant, and by every one of its members.

Item,—Those who devoutly visit, on each one of the days of the Estaciones of Rome, five churches or altars, or in default of such five, five times the same altar, and pray to God for the expressed ends, shall obtain a plenary indulgence, as well for themselves as also, by way of suffrage, for the deceased persons in whose favour they make such visit and prayer.

Item,—In order that all those, and each one of those before-named, may pray to God with more facility, and more efficaciously implore his divine aid, it is conceded to them that they shall be at liberty to choose a secular or regular confession from those approved by the ordinary, and to obtain from him plenary indulgence, and remission of whatever sins and censures, even those reserved to the apostolical see (except the crime of mixed heresy, and, as to ecclesiastics, the censure treated of in the constitution of Benedict XIV., sacramentum Poenitentiae), once in their lives, and again in the article of death; imposing on themselves salutary penance, according to what the crimes demand, and so that if satisfaction may be necessary they may give it of themselves, or by their heirs or others in case of impediment. All vows also, excepting those of ultramarine, chastity, and religion, may be commutated by the same confessor for the performance of some other good work, and some contribution towards the said ends.

Item,—If death shall occur within the said year without confession, in consequence of the death being sudden, or for want of confessors, still the same plenary indulgence shall be extended as if they had died contrite, and as though they had been confessed at the proper time determined by the church, and had not been negligent in doing so through confidence in this concession.