THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 /^ , oO. \MC^-t2^^
 
 GESTA CHRIST!.
 
 GESTA CHRIST/: 
 
 OR 
 
 A HISTORY OF HUMANE PROGRESS 
 UNDER CHRISTIANITY 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES LORING BRACE, 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 'Rmces of the Old World;' "Hone Life in Germany and Hungary 
 "Norse Folk" " Dungerous Classes of Ne^v I'o^k," etc. 
 
 FIFTH EDITION, 
 WITH NEW PREFACE AND SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 A. C. ARMSTRONG & SON, 
 
 51 East 10th Street, Near Broadway, 
 
 1897. 
 
 ^All riglUs rtsert<«d.\
 
 CorVRGMT, itts, 
 
 ^ CHARLES LORINO BRACK.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 TO THE FOURTH EDITION. 
 
 BR 
 C5^ 71. 
 
 The reception of this book by the critics and the 
 public both of England and the United States has 
 been cordial beyond what could have been reasonably 
 expected. 
 
 The adverse criticisms have been carefully and can- 
 didly considered by the author. The censures have 
 come from two opposite sources: from those who believe 
 little or nothing in Christianity as a supernatural power, 
 and from those who believe too much. 
 
 From the first has arisen the criticism that the work 
 has left out of view several great moral forces enter- 
 ing into the progress of the race — such as Judaism, 
 "' Classicism," or Greek philosophy and Roman law. 
 Buddhism, and the tendency to improvement which 
 comes from the advancing intellect of the leading 
 nations. 
 
 These objectors insist also that Christianity and 
 the Church should never be separated; that the latter 
 is the only embodiment and historical representative 
 of the other; that the sins and defects of the organ- 
 ized body must fall upon its Faith and its head; and 
 that Christianity as a system must stand or fall ac- 
 cording to the history of the Church. 
 
 126G072
 
 VI PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. 
 
 On the other hand, those who have been led by 
 their emotions and their imaginations to consider the 
 history of the Church as a kind of " Divine epic," have 
 charged that full justice was not done in this work 
 to the moral power and influence of the organized 
 ecclesiastical body in every age. They have seen 
 what blessings, in its purest epochs, it has scattered 
 among mankind; and they have inferred — against his- 
 torical facts — what a power of unmingled good it 
 must have been in all periods. 
 
 In regard to the first criticisms mentioned, coming 
 from agnostic sources, the author, with all candor and 
 humility, cannot admit their justice. He has assumed 
 (perhaps too frequently) that the best of "Judaism" — 
 its humanity as shown in legislation for the stranger, 
 its spirit of charity to the poor, its high morality, and 
 its deep sense of the divine — was contained in Chris- 
 tianity; that the latter was a reformed Judaism. Many 
 references have been made in this volume to its influ- 
 ence upon barbaric legislation, through the Mosaic 
 law. A portion of a chapter has been devoted to the 
 infamous and unchristian persecution of the Jews in 
 various centuries. More could not have been said of 
 Judaism, or such of its features as were inconsistent 
 with modern progress would have required explaining 
 and defending — such evils as legal slavery, polygamy, 
 divorce of the wife by the husband, blood-revenge and 
 various archaic laws and customs. This would have 
 led the investigation away from its object — namely, to 
 show the effects of Christianity on the moral progress 
 of the world. 
 
 In regard to " Classicism," surely the obligations of 
 the world to Stoic philosophy and Roman law are 
 reiterated in numerous pages. The author would feel
 
 PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. vu 
 
 himself basely ungrateful to a school of morals which 
 to him has only been next to the Christian faith, in its 
 support and invigoration amid the struggles of life, if 
 he ever neglected to acknowledge the courage, hero- 
 ism, elevation, and self-control brought home to him 
 by such moralists as Socrates, Epictetus, Marcus An- 
 toninus and others. And who that compares the Mid- 
 dle Age bigotry and superstition with the pure leason 
 and justice of the Roman law, can ever cease to be 
 grateful for its wonderful influence upon modern prog- 
 ress. Certainly this volume cannot justly be charged 
 with neglect of the world's obligation to this grand 
 system of human thought. 
 
 The criticism in regard to Buddhism seems hardly 
 worthy of reply. The author holds the Buddhist faith 
 in its origin as second only to the Christian religion 
 in pure humanity and elevated spirituality; he has even 
 avowed his belief in the inspiration of Cakya Muni, its 
 wonderful founder. 
 
 With reference to the present moral condition of 
 the world being due to its intellectual progress rather 
 than to the influence of its leading Faith, of course 
 much can be said on both sides. This book is a 
 carefully-framed argument to show what have been 
 the great causes working towards human advance- 
 ment. We have attempted to give due recognition 
 to all the forces tending towards the present moral 
 stage of progress of the world. It may be that 
 in so large a field we have not sufficiently consid- 
 ered each one of these influences. But we have at- 
 tempted to produce facts and evidence which should 
 make it probable, that by far the greatest factor 
 in the moral and humane progress of mankind, is 
 the influence of the person and teachings of Jesus
 
 viil PREFACE TO THE FOUR TFT EDITION. 
 
 Christ, The argument is logical; and whoever over- 
 throws it, cannot do so by vague declamation, but 
 only by presenting a sufficient cause, other than 
 Christianity, which shall account for these facts and 
 changes. 
 
 Whether Christianity should always and everywhere 
 be held as identical with the historical Church, is a 
 fair question, and will often be answered according to 
 previous prejudices. Christianity we have defined as 
 the system of religious faith and morals to be derived 
 from the words, teachings, and character of Christ, es- 
 pecially as conveyed to us in the Gospels. Now the 
 organization which teaches this system and represents 
 it to the world, may at times, from various causes, be 
 altogether inconsistent with its Founder, — His spirit, 
 and His doctrines. Surely then the Christian system 
 and the Church would be two different things. We 
 know what the Master taught; we know what His 
 followers at certain epochs practiced. We say then 
 that the latter did not represent their Teacher; that 
 the doctrines and words and lives of the leaders of 
 the historical Church at certain times are not Chris- 
 tianity, but are frequently directly opposed to it. This 
 surely is a reasonable position. And yet we would 
 never deny that there were in every age, godly men 
 and women, practicing the truths and making man- 
 ifest the spirit of their Master. These formed the 
 Church invisible, the unseen line of believers trans- 
 mitting the spirit and words and doctrines of the great 
 Teacher. 
 
 Christianity is to be tested by the life and words 
 and belief of its professors. Are they consistent with 
 those of the Founder ? If not, they are not what He 
 taught and introduced into the w^orld. Whatever be
 
 PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. at 
 
 the profession or name, this is not the Christian sys- 
 tem or its fruits. 
 
 That the historical Church has, with all its faults 
 and sins, been an aid to civilization, a patron of learn- 
 ing and the arts, a civilizer of wild and barbarous 
 tribes; and a restraint on cruel and tyrannical rulers, 
 ito candid student of history can deny. Even the sem- 
 blance of the gentle Teacher of Judea could not but 
 be a blessing to mankind. 
 
 To the present edition a chapter has been added on 
 the relations of Christianity to Art in the Middle Ages. 
 The aesthetic conceptions, the immortal works in paint- 
 ing and architecture that have arisen from religious 
 enthusiasm and the sense of beauty during the fifteenth 
 and sixteenth centuries, are but as a side effect of this 
 Faith. They seem hardly worthy of being classed with 
 the record of noble achievements which this volume 
 contains. Still, to some minds, it will be consistent 
 that He who felt so exquisitely the loveliness of the 
 Palestine lilies and the wild flowers on the shores of 
 the Galilean lake, should have inspired such souls as 
 the gentle monk of Fiesole and the pure artist of 
 Umbria, with ideals of beauty and devotion that must 
 last while Art endures; and that He whose commun- 
 ion with the Divine was especially in the temple not 
 made with hands, should yet have not disdained to call 
 forth in His followers a conception of a house of wor- 
 ship, than which the human imagination has not con- 
 ceived or created one more worthy of the adoration of 
 the Infinite Spirit. 
 
 It is a subject of deep thankfulness to the author 
 that some have found in the argument of this volume, 
 an aid to faith in things unseen and eternal. He him-
 
 B PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION, 
 
 self believes that the personality of Christ is to be 
 more and more an element in human progress, and 
 that the advance of humanity and of civilization in 
 the moral field, is but a continual approach towards 
 Him. 
 
 CHARLES LORING BRACE. 
 
 Chesknoll, 
 
 DoBBs Ferry, N. Y., 
 
 September, 1884.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The writer of this work has been engaged for some 
 thirty years in a practical application of the principles of 
 Christianity, with the view of curing certain great social 
 evils in the City of New York, He has been able to test 
 its power on a large scale, in diminishing poverty, crime 
 and misery. He has also had a humble share in, and 
 been a witness of, the great effort of the United States 
 to remove its tremendous evil — Slavery ; and he knows 
 how far Christian ideas were at the foundation of this 
 great reform, and how much they stimulated and sup- 
 ported the long struggle. 
 
 For many years studies in the laws and history of the 
 Roman Period and the Middle Ages have shown him the 
 traces (often almost obliterated) of the silent, profound 
 working of the great reforming Power of the world. He 
 has also been engaged in examining and presenting in 
 public writings, the influence of the Christian Faith in 
 the more modern period, on International Law, Arbitra- 
 tion, and the relations of nations. 
 
 It has seemed to him that to write a condensed history 
 of the progress of the humane ideas, practices, and rules 
 of action taught or encouraged by this Religion, would be
 
 rii PREFACE. 
 
 a useful thing — especially as making them a more dis- 
 tinct possession and code of the civilized world, and as 
 forming an indirect argument (not less powerful for being 
 indirect) for the truth of this Faith. Yet in considering 
 this subject, one must not confound Christianity and the 
 Church. Whoever believes he can construct a kind of 
 *' Divine epic " from the history of the organized Church, 
 either voluntarily deceives himself, or follows the will o' 
 wisp light of a false sentiment. 
 
 There are certain practices, principles and ideals — now 
 the richest inheritance of the race — that have been either 
 implanted or stimulated or supported by Christianity. 
 
 They are such as these : regard for the personality of 
 the weakest and poorest ; respect for woman ; the absolute 
 duty of each member of the fortunate classes to raise 
 up the unfortunate; humanity to the child, the prisoner, 
 the stranger, the needy, and even the brute ; unceasing 
 opposition to all forms of cruelty, oppression and slavery ; 
 the duty of personal purity and the sacredness of mar- 
 riage ; the necessity of temperance ; the obligation of a 
 more equitable division of the profits of labour, and of 
 greater co-operation between employers and employed ; 
 the right of every human being to have the utmost op- 
 portunity of developing his faculties, and of all persons 
 to enjoy equal political and social privileges ; the prin- 
 ciple that the injury of one nation is the injury of all, 
 and the expediency and duty of unrestricted trade and 
 intercourse between all countries ; and, finally and princi- 
 pally, a profound opposition to war, a determination to 
 limit its evils when existing, and to prevent its arising by 
 means of international Arbitration.
 
 PREFACE. 3dH 
 
 Ideals, principles and practices such as these are among 
 the best achievements of Christianity. 
 
 It has seemed to the writer not impossible, that great 
 numbers of the vast English-speaking race in Great 
 Britain, America, and Australia, and from the cultured 
 peoples of the Continent, might more and more unite in 
 a kind of moral Confederation throughout the world to 
 support and advance and spread these great and humane 
 ideas. To have given even the faintest impulse towards 
 this consummation and this progress, would be alone not 
 to have lived in vain. 
 
 CHARLES LORING BRACE. 
 
 Chesknoll, 
 
 DoBBS Ferry, N. Y., 
 
 Nov. C)th, 1882.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I.— Introduction , i 
 
 Plan of the work. — An Investigation of the Influence of 
 Christianity on the Practices, Customs, Laws and Morals, 
 (i) Of the Roman Period; (2) The Middle Ages.; (3) 
 The Modern Period. 
 
 I. 
 
 ROMAN PERIOD. 
 Chapter II.— Paternal Power o 
 
 Instances of Paternal Tyranny in Roman History. — Re- 
 forms in Constantine's and Justinian's Legislation under 
 Christian Influences. — Succession of Property. — Changes 
 through Stoical Influences. — Reforms in Justinian's Code. 
 — The Beginnings of Modern Reforms. 
 
 Chapter III.— The Position of Woman under Roman 
 
 Law 19 
 
 Tutelage of Woman. — Free Marriage. — Reforms under Jus- 
 tinian's Code. — Divorce. — Instances in the Roman Period. 
 — Reforms brought about by Christianity in Constantine's 
 and Justinian's Legislation. — Concubinage. — Improve- 
 ments under Christianity. 
 
 Chapter IV.— Personal Purity and Marriage . . 29 
 
 Christ's Influence on Masculine Purity, on Marriage. — His 
 Teachings as to Separation. — Celibacy. — Effect of Christ- 
 ianity on Position of Woman. — Unnatural Vices. — Plato's 
 Principles as to their Abolition. — Opposition of Early 
 Christians to them. — Victory of Christian Principles.
 
 xvi CONTENTS. 
 
 lAGt 
 
 Chapter V —Slavery 41 
 
 The Silence of Christ. — Explanation. — The Slave in the 
 Church. — Stoics and Slavery. — Number of Roman Slaves. 
 — Reforms under the Stoics. — Christian Influence on 
 Legislation. — Emancipation as a Religious Duty. — 
 Humanity Towards Slaves.— Justinian's Reform. — Hu- 
 manity under Christian Influence. — Reforms under other 
 Emperors. — Gradual Emancipation. 
 
 Chapter VI. — Slaves rN Cruel and Licentious Sports 6i 
 Bloody Sports. — Reforms by Constantine. — Human Sacri- 
 fices. — Licentious Shows. — Feelings of the Early Chris- 
 tians. — Reform in Roman Laws. — Licentiousness Re- 
 strained. — RansomingCapti ves. — Rehabilitation of Labour. 
 — Serfdom. — Reforms under Religious Teaching 
 
 Chapter VII.— Exposure of Children . ... 72 
 Allusions to it in Latin Literature. — Mode of Exposure. — 
 Stoical Protests. — The Early Fathers' Denunciations. — 
 Constantine's and Valentinian's Legislation. — The Coun- 
 cils. — Justinian's Code. — Treatment of Foundlings by the 
 Church. — Orphan Asylums. — Charities for Children. 
 
 Chapter VIII.— Humanity in Roman Law ... 84 
 Humane Legislation of Constantine. — Sunday Laws. — 
 Prison Reform. — Disfiguring the Face Forbidden.— 
 Kindly Feeling in Roman Law.— Opposition to War by 
 Early Christians. — Instances. — Burial Inscriptions. — Pre- 
 paration for Arbitration. 
 
 Chapter IX.— Distribution of Property .... 93 
 Christ's Teachings Tending to more Equitable Distribution. 
 — Charity. — Roman Pauperism. — Roman Charities. — 
 Bequests. — Collegia. — Christian Charity. — Refuges for 
 Orphans. — Strangers' Rests. — Hospitals. — The Code, — 
 Christ's Teachings Opposed to Pauperism.— Excessive 
 Almsgiving and Monasticism not an Effect of Christian- 
 ity. — The Problem not Solved by the Christian Religion, 
 but its Truths lead towards Equal Distribution. 
 
 Chapter X.— Resum^ of Reforms in Roman Period . 106 
 Christianity Influenced Patria Potestas and Succession of 
 Property ; Diminished Unnatural Vices ; Taught Purity ; 
 Put an end to Exposure of Children ; Founded Charities
 
 CONTENTS. xvu. 
 
 rAGB 
 
 and Taught more Equitable Distribution of Wealth 
 Checked Licentious and Cruel Sports, and caused Humane 
 Legislation ; Mitigated and Undermined Slavery and 
 Serfdom ; Elevated Woman and Marriage. — Need of 
 Fresh Races for the True Work of Religion. — Afforded by 
 the Keltic and German Tribes. 
 
 II. 
 
 MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 Chapter XI.— Position of Woman under the German 
 
 Tribes 117 
 
 German Chastity. — Tutelage of Woman. — Purchase of Wife. 
 — Instances. — Scandinavian Customs. — Subjection of 
 Woman. — Wife under Power of Husband in German Law. 
 — Position of Woman having Stamp of Barbarism ; de- 
 scended into English Common Law. — Free Marriage. — 
 Christianity strove to Elevate Woman and Strengthen 
 Marriage ; Changed Purchase-money into Dower ; 
 Lessened Tutelage. — The Dower. — Change of Tutelage. — 
 Religion opposed German Prejudice that Bodily 
 Strength was a Condition of Civil Capacity. — Inferiority 
 of Woman continued in Common Law. — Sir Thomas 
 Smith's Statements. — Gains of Christianity. 
 
 Chapter XII.— Personal Feuds and Private Wars . 137 
 Feuds Universal in Barbaric Society. — Money- Fines in Place 
 of Revenge stimulated by Religion. — Feuds checked in 
 Holy Days and Places. — Instance from old Russian Code. 
 — Law and Penalty substituted for Private Revenge, 
 under Influence of Christian Faith. 
 
 Chapter XIII. — Private War and Peace of God. — 
 
 Arbitration 143 
 
 Forms of Declaring Private War. — Instances.— The Desola- 
 tion of Germany and France. — The Peace of God. — 
 Crusade of Peace in France. — Efforts of Religious Men. 
 — Pledge of Peace. — Peace Associations. — Councils. — 
 Efforts of Popes. — A Messenger of Peace. — Truce of God. 
 — Peace in Germany. — Leagues of the Rhine. — Applica- 
 tion of Arbitration. — Forms.— Stimulated by Religious 
 Sentiment. — Instances. — End of Diffidation. — Abolitiop 
 »f Private War in Spain, Italy, and Iceland.
 
 xviii CONTENTS. 
 
 PACB 
 
 Chapter XIV. — Wager of Battle and Ordeal . . i6o 
 Judicial Duel Among the Northern Tribes. — English Prac- 
 tice. — Forms Used. — Opposition of the Spirit of Christi- 
 anity. — The Councils and Popes. — First Forbidden in 
 Iceland after its Conversion. — Its Abolition, Slow. — 
 Existed in England till the Nineteenth Century. — Ordeal 
 first Opposed by Church, then Accepted and Used. — 
 Spirit of Religion Opposed it. 
 
 Chapter XV. — Torture . . 178 
 
 Implanted by Roman Law. — Early Church Opposed, then 
 Used it. — Description of Tortures. — The Strappado. — 
 Torture in England. — Opposition of Church. — Subsequent 
 Acceptance. — Spirit of Religion Struggled against it. — 
 Not Abolished in Parts of Europe till Nineteenth Cen- 
 tury. — Recent Abolition in Japan. 
 
 Chapter XVI. — The Strangers' Rights . . . .190 
 Teutonic Hostility to Strangers. — Instances. — Droit cPaii- 
 bainc in France. — Abolished in 1790. — Other Inequali- 
 ties later. — The Teutonic Legislation shows the Influence 
 of Christianity. 
 
 Chapter XVII.— The Wreckers' Right, and Piracy . 197 
 All Teutonic Codes urge Humanity to the Shipwrecked on 
 Religious Grounds — Instances. — Judgments of the Sea. 
 — Councils. — Humane Legislation. — Treaties. — Piracy. — 
 A Form of Private War. 
 
 Chapter XVIII. — Charlemagne's Capitularies . . 202 
 Teaching of Morals on Religious Grounds.— Commands 
 against Feud, Oppression, and Perjury. — In favour of 
 Marriage, and against Divorce and Unnatural Vice. — 
 Injunctions against Oppression of the Stranger and the 
 Poor. — Laws soon swept away, but showing Influence of 
 this Faith. 
 
 Chapter XIX. — Anglo-Saxon Law 206 
 
 Its Spirit Manifestly Affected by Christianity. — Contrast 
 to other Codes. — Laws of Old English Kings. — King 
 Wihtraed. — Alfred's Dooms — Moral Teachings. — Sun- 
 day Laws. — Humanity to Shipwrecked. — False Swearing. 
 — King Ethelred's Dooms. — Religious Laws. — King
 
 CONTENTS. xir 
 
 PACK 
 
 Canute. — Saxon Piety. — Feuds. — Anc ent Laws. — 
 Alfred's Injunctions. — All show the Beginning of History 
 of Religious Forces in England. 
 
 Chapter XX, — Education in the Middle Ages . .217 
 Christianity Favourable to Intellectual Advance. — Early 
 Efforts of the Church Encouraging Learning.— Early 
 Christian Schools. — Councils. — Letter of Charlemagne. 
 — Instruction of Theodolfus. — Copying Manuscripts. — 
 Thomas k Kempis. — The Pope's Efforts. — Christian 
 Truth Opens Mind of Man to Truth. 
 
 Chapter XXL— Serfdom and Slavery in the Middle 
 
 Ages 224 
 
 The Process by which Serfdom Arose. — Christian Influence 
 on Slavery. — Slavery in the Middle Ages. — Acts of Coun- 
 cils Favourable to Slaves — Sunday Laws. — Religious 
 Element in Emancipation. — P'orms of Manumission. — 
 Muratori and Marculfus. — Peasants' Revolts Under the 
 Liberal Teaching of Christianity. — Their Objects. — 
 Effects on Villainage. — Emancipation Gradual. — Free- 
 dom of Serfs by Bologna. — Slave Trade. — Emancipation 
 in Germany. — Abolition in Scandinavia a Direct Effect 
 of Religion. — English Slavery Causes Selling Children. — 
 Number of Slaves in England — Religious Influence in 
 Emancipation.— Christian Brotherhood. — Gradual Eman- 
 cipation.— Forms. — Slave Trade Forbidden. — Slaves after 
 the Norman Conquest. — Religious Forces Causing Eman- 
 cipation. — Sir Thomas Smith's Testimony. — Serfdom Dis- 
 appeared in Reign of Charles I. 
 
 Chapter XXII. — Chivalry 253 
 
 Ideal of Chivalry. — Original. — Forms and Oaths Religious. — 
 Virtues Taught Corresponded to Christian. — Froissart. — 
 Humanity. — Courtesy. — Pity. — Purity. — Brotherhood. — 
 Devotion to Woman. — The Ideal an Effect of Chris- 
 tianity on the German Temperamenu — Its Defects and 
 Vices. — Uncertain how far Chivalry was a Reality. — The 
 Chivalric Character Endures under Religious Ir iuences. 
 
 Chapter XXII I. — Resum^ of Reforms in the Middle 
 
 Ages 27. 
 
 (i) Value Attached by Christianity to Marriage, nnd New 
 Position of Woman. — (2) Restraint of Feud and Blood
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Revenge. — (3) Checking Private War by Peace of God. — 
 (4) Urging Arbitration. — (5) Opposing Judicial Duel and 
 Ordeal. — (6) Restraining Torture. — (7) Commanding 
 Humanity to the Stranger and Shipwrecked. — (8) Power 
 of Religion over Codes of Law. — (9) Its Influence on 
 Education. — (10) Gradual Effect on Slavery and Serf- 
 dom. — (11) Founding Charities. — (12) Influence on the 
 Chivalric Ideals. — Reasons of its Want of Full Success. 
 
 III. 
 
 MODERN PERIOD. 
 
 Chapter XXIV. — The Position of Woman Under 
 
 Modern Influences 283 
 
 Position of Woman since Christianity a Composite One. — 
 Christian Idea Entire Equality of Man and Woman. — 
 English Common Law Inherits Teutonic Prejudice of 
 Measuring Civil Rights by Physical Power. — -The Wife's 
 Legal Existence Suspended. — Coverture. — Woman Under 
 Common Law. — Equity Courts. — American Legislation. 
 — Reforms in New York. — Position of the Mother. — Pro- 
 tection to the Young Girl. — Partnership in Property. — 
 Female Suffrage. — Woman in the United States. — In 
 Europe. — Future of Woman under Agnosticism. 
 
 Chapter XXV.— Divorce 300 
 
 Christian View. — Roman Law. — Churchly Doctrines. — 
 Views of Reformers. — European Tendencies. — United 
 States Law. — Views of Judges. — Laws in New York- 
 License of Divorce.— Change of Opinion in the United 
 States. — Effects of Free Divorce in New York. —Future 
 Effects in America. — General Happiness of Marriage in 
 the United States. — Concubinage. — Humane Progress. 
 
 Chapter XXVI. — Degradation of Woman . . .315 
 Apparent Failure of Christianity. — Reforms Begun. — Mas- 
 culine Purity. — Efforts for Children. — Effects of Religion. 
 — Hope for the Future. 
 
 Chapter XXVI I.— International Law.— Arbitration . 320 
 The Expense and Curse of War. — International Law among 
 the Greeks ; the Romans ; in the Middle Ages.— Cruelties
 
 CONTENTS. xxi 
 
 PAGB 
 
 and Barbarism in War. — Treatment of Prisoners ; of 
 Ambassadors. — Grotius' Views. — Claims of Christian Na- 
 tions on Heathen Territory. — Privateering. — FrankHn.— 
 Congress of Paris, 1856.— Inviolability of Private Property 
 on the Sea. — The New Codes of Prof. Bluntschli, and 
 the American Instructions. — The Wounded. — Arbitra- 
 tion. — History of Modem Cases. — Mediation. — Disputes 
 as to Territories. — The Geneva Settlement. — Universal 
 Peace. — International Courts. — Objections. — Interna- 
 tional Law Among Non-Christians. 
 
 Chapter XXVIII.— Slave Trade and Slavery in Mo- 
 dern Times 363 
 
 Both Catholic and Protestant Churches Guilty. — Sketch of 
 Slave Trade. — Treaty of Utrecht. — Slave Trade in British 
 Colonies; in Great Britain. — The Struggle. — Its Final 
 Abolition. — Slavery and its Abolition in the British 
 Colonies ; in the United States.— Early Anti-Slavery 
 Position of the Churches. — Later Weakness. — Origin of 
 the Opposition Religious. — Other Elements Mingling. 
 
 Chapter XXIX. — Modern Serfdom .... 387 
 
 Royal Ordinances against it in Prussia ; in France and 
 Italy.— Christian Ideas Working against it. — AboHtion in 
 Germany, Hungary, Prussia, and other Countries. 
 
 Chapter XXX. — The Duel . .391 
 
 Bentham's Arguments for it. — Reply. — The Struggle of 
 the Church. — Its Prevalence in France and England. — 
 Public Protests and Laws against it. — Experience of 
 the United States. — Its Cessation due to Christianised 
 Public Opinion. 
 
 Chapter XXXI.— Prison Reform and Charities . 399 
 
 Constantine's Legislation.— Howard. — The "Irish" Prison 
 System. — American Reforms.— Charities. — Societies to 
 Protect Animals. — Humanization of Punishments. — Cruel 
 Penalties of the Past.— Modern Improvements. — Imprison- 
 ment for Debt. — The Sunday.— Its Value to the World. 
 
 Chapter XXXIL— Co-operation and Pauperism . . 413 
 Co-operation. — Communism.— Insurance against Poverty. 
 — Religion lessening Pauperism.— A Socialist's Views on 
 Christianity.
 
 xxii CONTENTS. 
 
 PAd 
 
 Chapter XXXIII.— Free Trade. — Humanity. — Liberal 
 
 Government 420 
 
 Progress of Ideas in Favour of Freer Intercourse. — Hu- 
 manity between Nations. —Treatment of Inferior Races. 
 — Missions. — Popular Education. —Churclies.— Hope Im- 
 planted. — Liberal Government. — Diminution of Pesti- 
 lences, due only in Part to Religion. 
 
 Chapter XXXIV.— Intemperance 433 
 
 Its Evils in America and Europe. — Temperance Movement. 
 — Total Abstinence. — Influence of Religion. 
 
 Chapter XXXV.— Persecution 441 
 
 No Foundation for in Christianity. — Guilt of the Church. — 
 Treatment of the Jews ; of Heretics and Schismatics. — 
 Liberal Views of John Robinson ; of Grotius. — Experience 
 of the United States. 
 
 Chapter XXXVI. — Humane Progress Among Non- 
 Christian Peoples 445 
 
 Continuity of Revelation. — Spiritual Ideas of Hindoos. — 
 Caste, and Position of Woman. — Buddhism. — Inspiration 
 of Buddha. — His Defects. — The Failure of this Faith, — 
 Confucianism. — Its Merits and Wants. — The Arabs. — 
 Mohammedanism. — Its Wants and Failure. — Position of 
 Mohammedan Woman. — Buddhism, Brahmanism, Con- 
 fucianism not adapted for Humane Progress.— Climate 
 not alone the Cause. 
 
 Chapter XXXVII.— Objections.— Resume of Reforms 
 Begun.— The Future of Mankind Under Chris- 
 tianity 463 
 
 Objections that the Christian Ideal is Unmanly; Unfit for 
 the Struggle for Existence ; Not Favourable to Accumu- 
 lation of Wealth, Opposed to Progress of Science and 
 to Liberal Institutions. — Objection to Slow Working of 
 Christianity. — Obstructions. — The Drift of Evolution in 
 Favour of Sympathy, Unselfishness, and Morality. — 
 Christianity Works with it, and adds a New Force. — Its 
 Final Tendency a Perfect Society. — Inference from the 
 Facts, and Argument for the Truth of the Christian Re» 
 ligion
 
 CONTENTS. nfii 
 
 Supplementary Chapter. — The Influence of Christi- 
 anity UPON Art in the Middle Ages . . . 477 
 Supposed want of Sympathy of the Christian Religion 
 with the Sense of Beauty. — Two highest Conceptions 
 in Art from the Influence of this Faith; namely, (i) of 
 the Holy Madonna in Painting, and (2) the Pointed Gothic 
 Cathedral in Architecture. — The Madonna. — Raphael's 
 Sistine Madonna. — The Originality of this Ideal; its Re- 
 ligious Power. — New Religious Life in the Fourteenth 
 and Fifteenth Centuries. — Italian Preachers. — Savona- 
 rola. — Luther. — Influence on Art. — Cimabue. — Giotto. 
 — Encouragement by Synods and Popes. — Painting on 
 Glass. — Fraternities of Painters; their Religious Objects. 
 — Francis d'Assisi ; his Effect upon Fra Angelico. 
 Character and Works. — The Bologna School. — Lippo 
 Dalmasio. — Savonarola; his Influence on Art. — Lorenzodi 
 Credi. — Fra Bartolommeo. — Ridolfo Ghirlandaio. — Bot- 
 ticelli. — Michael Angelo. — Venetian School; Bellini and 
 others. — The Umbrian School. — Perugino. — Raphael. — 
 Pointed Gothic Cathedral. — Origin of Pointed Gothic; 
 its Ideal and Principles; the Pointed Arch; its Effect on 
 Structure. — The Cologne Cathedral; its Religious Power. 
 — Gilds of Masons in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Cen- 
 turies; their Religious Enthusiasm, Character, Honesty, 
 and Reverence of Work; a Laical Church; expressed their 
 Love of Beauty and Piety in building of Cathedrals; sole 
 Conditions, the Pointed Arch, Cruciform Ground-plan, and 
 Suitability to Climate. — But Pointed Gothic a Develop- 
 ment from other Styles. — Spirit of Founders of English 
 Cathedrals. — Free Masons or Gilds of Builders. — Their 
 Honesty of Work often an unconscious Religion; inspired 
 by Christianity. — These two Conceptions, the Madonna 
 and the Cathedral, Side-gifts of the Christian Faith. 
 
 Appendix.— Ancient Hungarian Legislation ... 501
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION.— PLAN OF THE WORK. 
 
 At a certain era in the world's history — not very remote 
 as compared with the duration of the human race on the 
 earth — there appeared a new moral force in human history. 
 It originated in an obscure tribe of a remote province of 
 the Roman Empire, and was embodied in the personality, 
 life and teachings of a remarkable Being — called jESUS 
 the Christ. 
 
 The moral truths in these teachings were not absolutely 
 new — as indeed the principles of morality rest on the prin- 
 ciples of human nature, and must be known, more or less 
 clearly, to all men — but they were presented with such 
 unequalled simplicity and earnestness, and illustrated by 
 a life and character of such unexampled elevation and 
 purity, and accompanied with spiritual truths so profound 
 and universal, as well as with supernatural claims, that the 
 whole formed a new power in the world for the moral 
 renovation of man — in other words, a RELIGION ; but 
 one claiming to be absolute and universal, for all ages and 
 races and circumstances. 
 
 The object of this work is to examine the effects of this 
 faith or moral power on the advancement of the race in 
 humanity and morality; both what it has accomplished, 
 and what it tends to accomplish. In other words, we shall 
 seek to show what Christianity has already done for the 
 world, and, considering its nature and objects, and its 
 effects in a comparatively brief period, we shall infer 
 
 1 B
 
 2 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 what will be its influence in a far longer period. Tho 
 investigation is difficult for various and often opposing 
 reasons. Many influences, material, moral and intellectual, 
 have combined to efl*ect the advance of the race in mo- 
 rality and humanity. The problem is to estimate the 
 peculiar influence of this new moral power. Then the 
 civilized world has become so imbued with the ideas and 
 feelings implanted or strengthened by this faith, that those 
 who have apparently opposed and attacked it, have not 
 unfrequently been those most animated by its principles. 
 While, on the other hand — so dangerous is the efiect of 
 power and ambition even in the religious field — the organi- 
 zation which might be supposed to most expressly represent 
 its truths has often been the most opposed to it in life and 
 action. In the course of history, the sceptics, in matters 
 of mercy and justice, have often been nearer Christ than 
 professed believers; and the Christian Church has favoured 
 practices and encouraged institutions, which have been a 
 travesty on the teachings of Christ, and an offence to every 
 feeling of humanity. The student who searches for the 
 pure and benevolent impress of the great Teacher on the 
 wild annals of human history, must divest himself of much 
 reverence for the so-called " Church of Christ " on earth. 
 The Church that is seen and known of men, represents 
 often anything but His image. At times it is filled with 
 bigotry and hate ; it implants persecution in Roman law ; 
 it encourages frightful religious wars ; it opposes liberty oi 
 thought, and the investigation of science ; its skirts are 
 stained with the blood of the Inquisition, and wet with 
 the tears of millions of victims of the slave-trade ; it en- 
 courages war, and is often only an emblem of power and 
 lust and ambition. Still in every age were simple men 
 and women, not known perhaps to history, or even to 
 those of their own time, whose souls and lives were filled
 
 INTRODUCTION.- PLAN OF THE WORK. 3 
 
 with the principles of this new faith. These gradually 
 affected social habits and practices ; sometimes changing 
 them before they influenced legislation, sometimes, by a 
 favouring public accident, being able first to reform laws 
 and public officials ; thus, day by day, by imperceptible 
 steps purifying Church, State and people ; gradually caus- 
 ing certain great abuses and wrongs to melt away before 
 the fervency of their spirit, and the innocence and bene- 
 ficence of their lives. These have been inspired by 
 Christ. Though for the most part unknown perhaps to 
 ecclesiastical records, or the historians of empires, they 
 have illustrated and transmitted the divine truths which 
 they received from Him. In lives of purity and human 
 brotherhood, in honesty, faithfulness, compassion and true 
 humanity, they have sought to follow their great Leader. 
 They have formed the true and invisible " Church of 
 Christ." While living for Him, they have lived for the 
 human race. Their spirit and their sacrifices have made it 
 possible that ages hence some of the great evils of man- 
 kind should come to an end, that some tears should be 
 forever wiped away, and a fair prospect be held forth of a 
 distant future of humanity, justice and righteousness. The 
 victories they have won in their silent struggles, and 
 bequeathed to us, were really the " Gesta CJiristi " — the 
 achievements of Christ. 
 
 The first portion of these investigations relates to the 
 Roman period of history, when the great empire, having 
 its centre on the banks of the Tiber, controlled the 
 civilized world. The object here is to trace the influence 
 of the new faith on the Roman law, and on the morals, 
 habits and practices of the Roman people and provinces. 
 Some of these researcties must of necessity be somewhat 
 technical, as bearing on slight changes in laws relating to 
 personal rights and the succession of property. They are
 
 4 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 important, however, as affecting the greater changes and 
 reforms which have since arisen, and are now in process of 
 development. Others relate to the lessening and doing 
 away of abuses, so deep-seated and long-continued, that it 
 would seem that nothing but the power of a Religion could 
 remove them. But in this field must ever be kept in view 
 the power of a system of philosophy and morals, the most 
 elevated and noble which the Greek and Roman antiquity 
 has known — the Stoical. The task of the investigator is 
 to trace out the peculiar working of the new Faith, as 
 distinguished from this older school of morals. 
 
 The second division relates to a more interesting and 
 picturesque period of history — the Middle Ages. Here 
 the difficulty lies in condensing and clearing the great mass 
 of material offered, and here, too, we stand on fields fought 
 over in incessant discussion. The exact position of woman 
 in the German tribes, the precise character of her Mnnd, or 
 " Tutelage," what marriage was with the ancient Teutons, 
 and what feminine rights were in those wild tribes, are 
 subjects still endlessly argued upon. Here, too, in all the 
 reforms of the Middle Ages, whether as to woman, or 
 humane legislation, or checking war, or abolishing cruel 
 practices, or doing away with serfdom and slavery, the 
 problem is to trace the precise influence of Christianity, as 
 distinguished from many other moral and material forces. 
 The only course in this investigation seems t(/ be to ex- 
 amine, so far as possible, original sources of evidence — codes 
 3f law, forms of will, the canons of the Church, decrees of 
 councils, the words of ancient historians or of contem- 
 porary scholars, and the most trustworthy and candid 
 historians, and attempt to draw the most probable con- 
 clusion, without fear or prejudice. 
 
 It cannot be hoped that absolute certainty will be at- 
 tained. The question of the precise work accomplished in
 
 INTRODUCTION.— PLAN OF THE WORK. 5 
 
 the past by the great Teacher of Nazareth, will long be a 
 question of historical probabilities. We can only offer to 
 the discussion, patient investigation, and the love of Truth 
 for its own sake. 
 
 In the Modern Period, we enter on firmer ground. We ' -fn 
 are nearer the actors, or we have taken part in the events. 
 In such matters as the abolition of the slave-trade and of 
 slavery, in the repression of the duel, in the improvements 
 of International Law, and the various modern charities and 
 reforms, as well as the change in woman's position, we 
 know what part the Faith taught by Jesus has had, and 
 what power it exerted, and what it continues to exert. 
 Here the weak point which strikes the candid investigator, 
 is not that Christianity has done what it has in modern 
 times, but that it has not done a great deal more. This, 
 too, must be considered in the argument. 
 
 And, though not demanded by the investigation, a brief 
 comparison of humane progress under this Religion, and 
 under the highest beliefs among modern non-Christian 
 peoples, will strengthen the conclusion. 
 
 We offer the investigation to all lovers of truth. No 
 friend of humanity will hesitate to rejoice, should it in- 
 directly serve to strengthen the ancient Hope and Faith 
 of the leading races of mankind.
 
 I. 
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY ON THE LAWS, 
 
 PRACTICES AND INSTITUTIONS Of 
 
 THE ROMAN PERIOD.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 PATERNAL POWER. 
 
 What may be called the " natural progress " of mankind 
 under the influence of the Divine Spirit and the instincts 
 implanted in the human mind, is towards respect for the 
 individual and towards self-control, in the preference of 
 the higher and distant good to the lower and present. 
 Our plan in the beginning of this investigation is to make 
 plain the stimulus given to this progress in the Roman 
 Empire, by the new system of ideas and the new forces 
 thrown into the world through the Christian Religion. 
 The improvements thus caused or hastened have been at 
 the basis of all modern civilization and progress, and, 
 though often apparently slight, are such as will influence 
 all future history. 
 
 One remarkable archaic institution survived and was 
 transmitted through successive ages of Roman history 
 before and after Christianity — the primitive paternal 
 authority. It was thought by Roman legal writers, even 
 ar; late as the time of the Pandects,^ to be peculiar to the 
 Romans. But modern investigation shows that it belongs 
 to nearly all races in a certain stage of development, and 
 that the Germanic tribes who overwhelmed the Romans, 
 had, many of them, carried it to an extreme degree. In 
 the father's house, the Roman father had absolute authority 
 over the son ; he could chastise, put in chains, exile or 
 
 ' Jus potestatis quod in liberos habemus, proprium est civium 
 Romanorum. {Instit., lib. I., tit. ix. Pand.^ I., tit vi. vii.) 
 
 9
 
 10 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 sell him as a slave ; he had power of life and death over 
 him. The son's property became the father's ; he could 
 assign a wife to him, divorce him when married, or trans- 
 fer him to another family by " adoption." The son only 
 escaped and was " emancipated "^ by a sale of his person, 
 three times repeated, by his father. This custom, origin- 
 ally designed to control parental greed, became used as a 
 fictitious legal form for freeing the son. The son in a legal 
 view seemed worse off than the slave : the latter, if formally 
 emancipated, was finally free ; the former reverted to his 
 previous condition under his father, and in early ages 
 required this triple form for entire freedom. 
 
 The power of life and death was not a legal fiction. 
 Three different Romans of position, Cassius, Scaurus, and 
 Fulvius are mentioned by Valerius Maximus^ as having 
 been executed by their father ; and another son was 
 banished by his father, Titus Avius. Seneca^ relates that 
 the populace pursued with daggers, on the public square, 
 a knight (Erixon) who had scourged his son to death ; 
 an act legal, but held to be too severe. The right of a 
 father to kill a daughter taken in adultery was universally 
 conceded. Cicero appears to admit a right of life and 
 death even in case of an adopted son.* He alludes to it as 
 a recognised right in regard to a real son.^ 
 
 Manlius is said to have put his own son, though 
 
 ' A son thrice sold by his father, was free from his power ; after this 
 form he became emancipatus, or sold out of his family. In a similar 
 manner, another son could be bought in from another family, or 
 adopted. See Ulpian, tit. x. " Qui in potestate, etc." 
 
 2 Val. Max., v. 8. 
 
 * De Cletn., 12, 14. Populus in foro graphiis confodit. 
 
 * . . . Vi'ae nccisque potestatem habere ut in filio, erat. (Pro 
 Do mo, 29.) 
 
 * Patrem tuum civem optimum, clarissimi viri filium : qui, si viverat, 
 quA severitate fuit, profecto non viveris. {Pro Domo, c. 32.)
 
 INSTANCES OF PATERNAL TYRANNY. 11 
 
 victorious, to death for disobeying^ orders ; and Cassius 
 Brutus killed a son who had negotiated with the enemy.^ 
 
 A Latin historian^ says, " One has seen fathers author- 
 ised by law, drag their children from the tribune while 
 they were addressing the people, in order to punish them 
 at their discretion. They were dragged across the public 
 square and no one dared defend them. The consul, the 
 tribune of the people, in fine the people itself, so proud 
 of its power and force, who came to applaud them were 
 obliged to keep silent, and respect in the fathers, an 
 authority which the law gave them." 
 
 At the close of the republic, the Lex Pompeia de Parric, 
 or the law in regard to the murder of relatives by 
 relatives, is silent with respect to the murder of a child 
 by the father. 
 
 It is related that the Emperor Augustus was present as 
 witness and judge in a family-council which a father had 
 assembled to decide on the fate of a son, guilty of pur- 
 poses of parricide. The Emperor Trajan is said to have 
 " emancipated " a son, because the father violated the 
 duties of paternal affection. And an ancient authority 
 approves the sentence which had deprived the father of 
 the succession of a deceased son, thus emancipated.'* Even 
 the Stoical jurist, Paul, seems to recognise the right of a 
 father to sell his son in case of great need and poverty.^ 
 
 The paternal power existed also over the person of the 
 daughter. 
 
 This deeply-rooted institution was grafted throughout 
 the world wherever Roman citizenship extended, though 
 often modified and humanized. The spirit of humanity, 
 
 » Liv., vii. 7. ^ Pltit- (P Gr. et Rom.). 
 
 » Den. H. (AnL Rom., 2, 26). ■• Di^. Pap. 
 
 • Qui contemplatiDne extremae necessitatis aut alimentorum gratii, 
 filios suos vendiderint, etc. (^Sent., v. i, i.)
 
 13 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 especially under Stoical influences, worked upon it through 
 all periods of the Republic and the Empire. No student 
 of history can ever cease to be grateful for the profound 
 moral power which went forth from the Stoical school 
 in antiquity. 
 
 But under the Christian emperors, whatever may have 
 been their individual characters, a great and marked 
 change shows itself in this custom and the legislation 
 upon it. A new idea had entered all classes as to the 
 rights and personality of each individual, whether child or 
 parent. When the son was recognised as the child of God 
 and " joint heir with Christ," equal with his father in the 
 kingdom of the Lord, for whom Christ had died, paternal 
 tyranny could not long continue. The change did not at 
 once show itself in legislation ; society is usually reformed 
 before laws : but that elevation of each person began 
 which, after many ages, must result in absolute emanci- 
 pation and equality of rights. 
 
 The learned commentator on the Theodosian Code saw 
 at once the source of the reforms which appear in that 
 legislation. " It is Christian discipline," says Godefroy, 
 in regard to the Roman law, " which gradually softens the 
 severity of paternal authority," ^ 
 
 The spirit of humanity as expressed in the thoughts 
 and legislation of the Stoical jurists, laboured steadily 
 to mitigate this authority through many centuries. The. 
 words of the jurist Marcian were quoted even by thoso 
 who had absolute power over the lives of the children : 
 
 ** Paternal power ought to rest in affection, not in 
 atrocity." ' 
 
 • Christiana disciplina paulatim patriae potestatis duritiem emol- 
 liente. (De Maternis bonis. Inst., 248.) 
 
 2 Nam patria potestas in pietate debet, non in atrocitate, consistere. 
 {^Marc. Inst., lib. xiv. ; Pand., xlviii. 9, 5.) 
 
 Adrian used these words on a remarkable occasion when tho 
 punishiaent of a son was softened.
 
 JUSTINIAN'S REFORMS. 13 
 
 Constantine (333 A.D.) was as far removed from the 
 spirit of Christianity as possible in his character, but his 
 legislation, framed by men feeling the new power in the 
 world, shows the humane forces derived from this faith. 
 He ventured to punish as a parricide, a father killing his 
 son.i Under Justinian (528 A.D.) the Christian influences 
 are more distinctly felt, and the father could only inflict 
 moderate penalties, and summon his children before the 
 courts, where he could suggest such sentence as might 
 be appropriate to domestic discipline. He could also 
 disinherit. The mitigations in regard to the son's pro- 
 perty were of gradual growth. At first, all his earnings 
 and possessions belonged to the father. The humane 
 spirit step by step protected him, and obtained for him 
 more individual rights. Certain portions of his property, 
 acquired in specific modes, were secured to him. But 
 it was only under Constantine and the early Christian 
 emperors that the son's rights of property were extended 
 to acquisitions made in a great variety of public and 
 religious offices. He was not yet on a plane of legal 
 equality with his father, but his position approached the 
 modern position under the laws of Christian nations. 
 
 Under the former ideas of the paternal tyranny, the 
 father claimed as a right all the property of the deceased 
 ancestors of the family, or of the mother, if they died 
 intestate, and of his own children deceased. The laws of 
 the Christian emperors gradually converted these rights 
 of the Roman father into what are almost the rights of 
 the modern father. He becomes only one of the heirs of 
 property thus left ; and his interests are made inferior 
 to those of the minor children. The peculiar distinction of 
 
 ' Cod. Theod., De Parricid. ; et yust., De his qui parentes, etc 
 (c. ix, 17, I.)
 
 i4 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 the new power in the world was the protection it afforded 
 to, and the interest it showed in, the child. 
 
 The property of children who came under the power of 
 a father by marriage, was especially protected from his 
 claims. The mother was shielded in her rights ; and her 
 property, if she died intestate, descended at length to her 
 children. The modern conditions of inheritance appear 
 even under Constantine. The son, however, could not 
 yet sell, mortgage, or bequeath by will his own property. 
 Under the new ideas, Justinian ^ gave to the son full 
 control over all his acquisitions. In the new light spread 
 through the world, it seemed to him " inhuman " to do 
 otherwise. The father had only a life-interest in his son's 
 acquisitions or property, unless they were derived from 
 his own. In case of " emancipation," he was allowed 
 a life-interest of one-half. The father could still dis- 
 inherit. 
 
 These changes in Roman law relating to paternal power 
 after Christianity became a power in the world, may seem 
 to the modern reader of no great account. But the differ- 
 ence between the father's power under the old Roman law 
 and that under Justinian, measures the difference between 
 the old and the modern world. The tyrant of the family 
 has merely become the judge, or indeed little more than 
 the modern father. He cannot " expose," buy or sell, or 
 imprison his son (except through the agency of the courts), 
 or abuse or kill him ; he cannot adopt him into another 
 family without his consent, or give him by force in mar- 
 riage, but is only permitted to declare a veto on a marriage 
 which is not agreeable to him. 
 
 The drift of modern opinion and practice is towards the 
 independence of the child, both social and legal. The 
 
 ' Just., lib. II. tit. ix. Per quas personas. De bonis quae liberis, etc 
 Quod nobis inhutnanum visum est
 
 SUCCESSION OF PROPERTY. Z$ 
 
 authority of the father is becoming more and more one of 
 affection and of moral influence. Paternal tyranny, even 
 in the most private matters of the family, is passing away. 
 The beginning of this great change was in the reforms of 
 Roman law under the teachings which came forth from 
 Judea. 
 
 Succession.— To understand these reforms still further, 
 we must consider a subject somewhat technical, but im- 
 portant as affecting modern society — the bearing of the 
 paternal power upon relationship and the transmission of 
 property. 
 
 The family was for ages in Rome (as in many other 
 countries) an iiuperium in imperio, and it could only be 
 maintained thus by limiting relationship to descendants 
 by males, or to " agnates" If a married daughter were 
 considered a member of the family, with equal rights to 
 property and protection, it is manifest that great confusion 
 would arise and conflicting interests be introduced in the 
 family. From this principle arose much injustice to the 
 woman. The relatives by males were the persons said to 
 be especially " in power " {in inamt), or in the family, of the 
 father, though he was permitted to introduce others into the 
 family by adoption. Without enlarging upon this import- 
 ant topic, we would only say that under the old Roman 
 law the succession of property followed the bond of 
 " power," and was determined by family, not blood. One 
 could be a near relative of a deceased person, even a child, 
 without being an heir. The son " emancipated " by the 
 father was no longer in the family, and was not an heir. 
 The heirs were especially the children or grandchildren 
 who were in the family ; they might even be adopted, 
 but they are still first heirs. Daughters " in the family " 
 succeed like males ; there is under this archaic system no 
 primogeniture or inferiority of sex. The wife not married
 
 i6 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 out of the family is like a daughter and heir ; the wife of a 
 son (himself in "the family ") is also an heir and in power. 
 These are called "heirs of themselves"^ or "necessary 
 heirs," continuing the person of the father. When there 
 are no necessary heirs, then comes in the nearest agnate or 
 relative by males, who would be " in power " if his ancestor 
 were living. " Emancipation " or separation from the 
 family breaks this relation, so that the direct descendants 
 of an emancipated son do not succeed any more than do 
 the descendants by married females. 
 
 Reforms in this as in other directions of the paternal 
 power began under Stoical influences ; but under the 
 Christian emperors there was, as might be expected, a 
 more decided drift towards the natural bonds of succession. 
 The influence of the new Faith was everywhere to protect 
 woman, and to give her equal rights, whether in the family 
 or out of it. Valentinian the Younger had enacted that 
 the children of the daughter (who had been legally out- 
 side of the family) sliould succeed to the maternal * grand- 
 father with the " necessary heirs," and that they should 
 receive two-thirds of what would have fallen to their 
 mother. Constantine, whose legislation is touched by the 
 new spirit, goes still further. He provides in certain cases 
 that she should take from the agnates, their children and 
 grandchildren, one-third of their succession, excluding all 
 other agnates. With Justinian (528 A.D.) came more of 
 the force of the new religion upon the law of the Roman 
 Empire. The reforms of his code struck deeper. The 
 great codifiers who prepared his body of laws, seemed to 
 
 * Sui hseredes {hist., lib. II. t. xix). Nov., 164. Gains, lib. II. t. x. 
 De intest. hasred. (De Agnatis). One of the reforms in succession 
 Justinian alludes to as "actionem Deo placer teni," as if feeling the 
 religious motive. 
 
 3/«j/., lib. III. tit L
 
 REFORMS IN JUSTINIAN'S CODE. 17 
 
 teel, and even in their dry labour to be elevated, by 
 the fresh " enthusiasm of humanity " working in the world. 
 They often speak of such and such a measure as "in- 
 human." ^ Justinian's code enacted that the children of the 
 daughter should represent their mother entirely, as if she 
 were in the family. It does away with all distinctions 
 of being " in the family " or outside of it, or those derived 
 from the number of children {j7is liberoniin) of a woman, 
 and established that those who had one as well as those 
 with four children, whether " in power " or emancipated, 
 were called equally to the succession of their deceased 
 children. It preferred the mother to all the agnates or 
 relatives by the males ; all were excluded by her ; the only 
 competitors being the brothers and sisters of the deceased. 
 The natural relatives, or cognates, were made equal to the 
 relatives by the males or agnates. The new code abolished 
 all distinctions between agnates and cognates. The 
 bond of "power" disappeared before the bond of blood. 
 Paternal authority lost its pre-eminence. Property re- 
 verted to the natural descendants of the deceased, whether 
 " in power " or of their own right, whether " emancipated " 
 or not, without distinction of sex or degree, to the ex- 
 clusion of all other relatives. The masculine and feminine 
 lines are equal. The drift of these reforms is towards 
 equality of rights between women and men, or between 
 different members of the same family, so far as succession 
 is concerned. The children of the daughter separated 
 from her family by marriage, or of the mother who 
 from some form of marriage had never been considered 
 as belonging to the family, and the mother and sister 
 who had been excluded by " emancipation " were placed 
 
 • Quod nobis inhumanum visum est, et liberis pepercimus, et patri- 
 bus debitum reservavimus. (Jnst,, lib. II, tit. ix.) 
 
 a
 
 i8 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 before the relatives by males of a distant degree. Even 
 the male and female children by a mother from a former 
 marriage (" uterine " children) were placed on an equality 
 with the other heirs.^ All these with the female descendants 
 of male heirs and sisters shared equally in the inheritance. 
 These reforms in the Roman law may seem to the 
 modern student of little importance. But they are an in- 
 dication of the tendency everywhere of the Christian Faith 
 to introduce equality of rights among persons, to elevate 
 the individual, to control arbitrary power, to substitute 
 self-command, consideration and the influence of the 
 affections for tyranny and unchecked power in the family. 
 They were apparently but small advances ; they had, 
 it is true, been begun by Stoicism ; but they received 
 their greatest stimulus from Christianity, and properly 
 heralded the greater and more profound changes which 
 the new Faith was to introduce into modern society. 
 
 NOTE ON CHAPTER II. 
 
 De Consang. et uterin. frat. (Col. VI. t. xii. Nov. wyixv.) 
 
 De Desc. succ. {N^ov. cxviii.) cap. 20. De Asc. succ. De succ. ex. 
 etc., cap. iii. De Agn., etc., cap. 18. Sed in omnibus successionibus 
 agnatorum, cognatorumque differentiam vocare prsecipimus, etc. {Nov. 
 118.) 
 
 De legit, tut. cap. iv. 
 
 Et quoniam mater excludebatur quidem a filio masculo . . . nos 
 non quterentes filiorum jus, sed exinde ei legitima jura dant, etc 
 (Col. IV. t. i. Nov. 22.) 
 
 Nulla introducenda differentia, sive masculi, sive foeminas sint et 
 seu ex masculorum seu feminarum prole descendant, sive sua: potes- 
 tatis sint constitute (Col. IV. t. i. Nov. 108.) 
 
 Just., lib. III. tit. ii. 
 
 ' Troplong. Linfluetice du Christianisme sur le Droit Remain, 
 Inst, jftisiifi., Bandar's note, lib. III. tit. iv.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE POSITION OF WOMAN UNDER ROMAN LAW, 
 
 It was a necessary part of the archaic institution of the 
 family, that woman should be under the perpetual tutelage 
 of her relatives by males ; the object being to keep her 
 property in the family and to separate her from public 
 affairs. Under the old Roman law, such of her property as 
 was inancipii} — land, slaves and beasts of burden, — could 
 not be disposed of without consent of her tutor. But she 
 could not intervene in the government of the family, nor in 
 industrial or commercial affairs, nor in public matters. A 
 court of her relatives could inflict upon her the severest 
 penalties in case of certain offences. In the time of Nero, 
 a distinguished Roman lady, Pomponia Graecina, wife of 
 Aulus Plautius, first conqueror of Britain, was accused of a 
 " foreign superstition." She was submitted to the judg- 
 ment of her husband. Aulus assembled the relatives, and, 
 after an examination, he declared her innocent. There is 
 much probability that this lady, one of the last instances 
 of the extreme exercise of the marital power, was one of 
 the first secret converts to Christianity.^ As a mother, the 
 
 * Perhaps, in its origin, such property as was " taken by hand," but 
 later, such objects as were transferred by the ceremony of " manci- 
 pation." {Ulpian. tit. xix. i.) 
 
 Majores nostri, nullam, ne privatam quidem rem agere feminas sine 
 auctore voluerunt ; in manu esse parentum, fratnun virorum. (Cato's 
 Speech. Livy, 34, 2.) 
 
 • Tac A?iu., xiii. 32. Agrt'c, 4. 
 
 19
 
 30 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 Roman woman had originally no legal irheritance in the 
 property of her minor children. A child desiring to marry 
 need not obtain her consent ; the children were not in the 
 family of the mother but of the father ; the mother had 
 no power over them. As a wife, the husband had, under 
 old Roman law, power of life and death over her, and 
 absolute control of her property. When she passed in 
 manum — into the power — of her husband, she became not 
 his equal, but his adopted daughter or ward. The law 
 considered her as a sister of her own children ; all her 
 property became that of her husband ; all her earnings 
 were his. Like children and slaves, she was not, while 
 in viaii7i, a person in her own right. She lost all her 
 family rights, and her agnates were deprived of their rights 
 of tutelage or of succession to whatever of her property 
 would revert to them. 
 
 The great object of these legal arrangements was un- 
 doubtedly to preserve the woman's property in certain 
 families. Yet there was underlying them a deep contempt 
 for woman, utterly foreign to the new Faith, but familiar 
 to the Stoical school. Thus Gaius gives as the ground for 
 the tutelage of woman, her " levity of mind "; ^ and Cicero 
 in like manner, explains it as due to her "infirmity of pur- 
 pose." * 
 
 The three ancient forms of Roman marriage, the con- 
 farrcation,^ or religious ceremony ; the co-emption,* or civil 
 contract ; and the tisus, or intercourse, all gave the husband 
 most of these rights over the wife. But side by side with 
 
 ' Veteres enim voluerunt feminas etiam si perfectje setatis sint 
 propter animi levitatem in tutela esse. {Gains, Comm. i, 144.) 
 
 ^ Mulieres omnes, propter infirmitatem consilii, majo^es in tutorum 
 potestate esse voluerunt. {Cic. pro Mtiren.) 
 
 • The eating of a cake oi/ar, or rice, together, 
 
 * The form of purchase.
 
 FREE MARRIAGE. ai 
 
 the ancient marriage, sprang up another form, of " Free 
 marriage," — a re-action from the former and in the interest 
 of the woman, as that had been entirely in favour of the 
 man. It was recognised by law, and produced legitimate 
 children, though not always held as a respectable con« 
 nection. Under it the children were submitted to the 
 " paternal power," and the woman lived with her husband, 
 but she possessed her own property, worshipped her own 
 gods, and was still connected with her own family. There 
 was, under this form, entire separation of property between 
 husband and wife, and they could even bring a civil action 
 against one another in the courts. Such a wife was called 
 uxor and iiiatrona, while under the old marriage she en- 
 joyed the proud title of mater-familias. The old form 
 of usus became changed into this form whenever a wife 
 absented herself for at least three nights. 
 
 Thus, in Rome, there were two extremes in the history 
 of marriage ; the excessive power of the husband under 
 the ancient form, and too great laxity under the new. 
 This is to be borne in mind in considering the peculiar 
 influence of Christian teachings upon the Roman law. By 
 the second century after Christ, iistis and usiicapio had 
 disappeared as a rite by which the husband acquired his 
 wife as a thing. " Confarreation " (the religious marriage) 
 was only practised by families who discharged certain 
 pontifical offices, and where this marriage was required 
 as a condition of the children entering on these duties. 
 " Co-ewption " became the principal form for acquiring the 
 absolute marital power. But " Free marriage " grew to be 
 more and more the custom. Its effects on the rights of 
 property in the woman were very marked. Under the old 
 marriage, the woman in maim had nothing, could earn 
 nothing, and own nothing. If the husband died, she 
 divided the inheritance as one heir among the children ;
 
 29 GESTA CHRISTI, 
 
 if there were no children, she was sole heir like a daughter, 
 If she died first, the husband took everything, even the 
 property which she had brought to the marriage. In Free 
 marriage arose the dos for a daughter ; that is, the father 
 and daughter were bound to aid in the expenses of the 
 future family. The Julian Law made it obligatory on 
 fathers and the paternal ancestors to dower their daughters. 
 The dos was acquired by the husband, and united with his 
 fortune ; he could alienate it, and even bring an action 
 against his wife for objects in the dos, and, at her death, he 
 was not obliged to restore it to her heirs. 
 
 With Christianity, naturally came in a new conception 
 of the position of woman. Her relation to her husband 
 was gradually changed, and, step by step, these disabili- 
 ties or disadvantages disappeared. The husband was first 
 obliged to restore the dos to his father-in-law, solatii loco, 
 as a solace at her death. In case of her husband's death, 
 she was permitted to demand from his heirs what she had 
 brought in dos. And finally, dotes were guaranteed to the 
 widow. 
 
 But the spirit of the new times was especially expressed 
 in the Code of Justinian. " It is worthy of the chastity of 
 our times," ^ say the Institutes, "to give this new position 
 to women ; tutelage of women must be done away with." ^ 
 The dos must always be restored at the dissolution of mar- 
 riage ; the husband was to have only a temporary limited 
 interest in it ; it was inalienable even by consent of the 
 wife. She even had a legal mortgage over all the immov- 
 able property of her husband to guarantee its restitution.* 
 The absolute power of the husband ceased under Justi« 
 nian's laws. 
 
 * Dignum castitate nostorum temporum, etc {Jtist. lib. I. tit. xii.) 
 
 ' Pupilli, pupillasque cum puberes esse coeperint, tuteld liberarentur 
 
 • Inst., lib. I. tit xxii. Lib. II. tit viil
 
 DIVORCE. 23 
 
 This great code, under the inspiration of the fervent 
 humanity taught by the new Faith, made one great step 
 in this important reform, which is at length to give 
 woman entire equality of rights under the law. 
 
 The tendency towards " the personal and proprietary 
 independence " of women in modern law and custom 
 received its first great stimulus in the religion of Jesus 
 affecting Roman law. 
 
 The mother acquires also under this code equal rights 
 with the father over the succession of deceased children ; 
 she becomes their legal tutor, and presides over the choice 
 of a husband for the daughter. If the husband unjustly 
 repudiates her, she receives full paternal power. ^ This 
 is the beginning of that advance in the legal position 
 of the mother, which has culminated in modern legisla- 
 tion.^ 
 
 Divorce. — The " Free marriage " naturally gave rise to the 
 utmost freedom of divorce. Separation could be legally 
 caused by either party, by a desire to divorce expressed in 
 writing {libeliiim repudii). Women made use of this even 
 more than men. At the close of the Republic the licence 
 was frightful. Augustus attempted in vain to struggle with 
 it by legal enactments. The Julian Law deprived women 
 of their dos who provoked divorce, but without effect. 
 Seneca speaks of " quotidiana repudia^' daily divorces, and 
 in another well-known passage, of the illustrious and noble- 
 born women who reckon their years not by the number 
 of the consuls, but by that of their husbands.' Juvenal's 
 epigram is well-known, of the woman who had eight 
 
 ' C. Theod., v. 4, 5. Nov., 117, c. 7. 
 
 • See chapter of this work on " Position of Woman under Modem 
 Influence." 
 
 ' . . . Non consulum numero sed maritorum, annos suos compu« 
 Umt. (De Ben., iii. 15.)
 
 24 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 husbands in five years.^ Martial says : " who marries so 
 often, marries not all ; - she is but an adulteress " ; Tacitus 
 speaks of " magna adulteria " of the time, and later, Ter- 
 tullian ^ represents divorce as the very purpose and end 
 of Roman marriage. Vice among Roman families had 
 reached its lowest depths during the first centuries of the 
 Christian era. The Roman senate in the year 19 A.D. was 
 obliged to pass an act, that no woman whose grandfather 
 or husband had been a Roman knight was permitted to 
 make her person venal.* A lady, whose father had been 
 of Praetorian rank, had appeared before the .^diles to 
 make a public profession of lewdness. 
 
 Even before this, the more strict Romans had felt 
 keenly the degradation of woman. Porcius Cato, in the 
 year 558 of the city, had reproached women from the 
 tribune for their desires for liberty and even licence in 
 everything,^ and for so much neglecting the " right and 
 dignity of the man " (j'/is majestatenique viri). Juvenal 
 might well say that no crime or deed of lust was wanting 
 to that age ^ : — " the age of iron," "^ where the good were 
 indeed few.' Even the calm philosophers, like Seneca, felt 
 the deep depravity of the time. Woman he stigmatizes 
 as a foolish, wild creature, unable to control her lusts. • 
 
 •• Sic crescit numerus, sic fiunt octo mariti, 
 
 Quinque per autumnos. {^Sat. vi.) 
 ' Quae nubit toties, non nubit ; adultera lege est. {Ep. vi. 7). 
 ^ Repudium jam et votum est, quasi matrimonii fructus. {Apol. c. vi.) 
 
 • . . . ne qua^stum corpore facerit, aut maritus eques Ro- 
 ;nanus fuisset. {Tac. Aim., 2, 83). 
 
 • Omnium rerum libertatem, imo licentiam desiderant. 
 
 • Nullum crimen abest, facinus que libidinis, ex quo 
 
 Paupertas Romana perit. {Sat. vi. 223.) 
 ' Nunc aotas agitur, pejoraque saacula ferri. (xiii. 29.) 
 
 • Rari quippe boni. (xiii. 25.) 
 
 ' Animal imprudens,ferum,cupiditatumimpatiens. {DeConst.Safi. 14^
 
 INSTANCES IN THE ROMAN PERIOD. 2$ 
 
 Paulus vEmilius, when he discarded the beautiful Papyria, 
 only deigned to say, " My shoes are new and well-made, 
 but no one knows where they pinch me." ^ 
 
 Seneca speaks of Maecenas as having "married a thousand 
 times." ^ C. Sulp. Gallus is said to have repudiated his 
 wife because he had seen her abroad with head un- 
 covered. ^ 
 
 Modesty was held to be a presumption of ugliness.* A 
 correspondent of Cicero in one of his letters casually men- 
 tions, as an item of news, a divorce without cause (sine 
 causa) of one Paula Valeria, who announced to her husband 
 on his return from a journey that she was separated from 
 him and was about to marry Dec. Brutus.^ Cicero himself 
 repudiated his wife Terentia in order to escape his creditors, 
 by giving up to them the dos of his new wife, Publilia, 
 whom again he afterwards repudiated. 
 
 It is possible that we may exaggerate the depravity 
 of these times, and judge too much from the epigrams of 
 satirists and the condensed phrases of historians, still such 
 legislation as we have quoted from Tacitus is a kind of 
 evidence not easily to be overthrown.^ It should not be 
 forgotten, however, that intellectually the Roman woman 
 must have received much training in the first two centuries, 
 through the great number of secret associations existing. 
 The burial inscriptions show that she bore an important 
 part in these, and even held office in some of the munici- 
 
 » P/uf. Vit. P. jEtn. 
 
 ' Qui uxorem millies ducit. 
 
 » Val. Max. (vi. 3, 10). De Prov., c. 3. 
 
 * Argumentum est deformitatis pudicitia • • . Numquid jam 
 ullus adulterii pudor est, postquam coavcntum est, ut nulla virum 
 habeat, nisi ut adulterum irritet? {De Ben., 1, iii. c. l6.) 
 
 ' Lib. 8, ad Fajn.^ ep. 7. 
 
 • Amu, 2, 83.
 
 26 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 palities. It does not appear that these societies elevated 
 her morals or character.^ 
 
 Of the effect of the new Faith on this debasement 
 of morals we shall speak elsewhere. Our present concern 
 is with its influence on legislation. Laws are often far 
 behind the morals of a community ; and the Christian 
 principles would naturally enter very slowly into the legis- 
 lation of an empire like the Roman. Constantine is the 
 first nominally Christian emperor, but in life and character 
 was much further from the Christian standards than some 
 of the Pagan emperors. Yet his body of legislation first 
 shows the new principles struggling with old habits and 
 modes of life. By laws passed in 330-331 A.D., a wife 
 may be divorced from her husband only under three con- 
 ditions ; when he is a murderer, a magician, and a violator 
 of tombs. A wife who divorces herself without cause 
 loses her dos, and is banished to an island. The husband 
 may be divorced from his wife when she is adulterous 
 or given to evil practices. The divorced husband can 
 marry again and keep the <'/(C7J" of his first wife. But if the 
 woman succeeds in proving her innocence, she has right 
 again to all the property of her husband, and even to the 
 dos of the second wife. 
 
 This legislation under Constantine sought in every way 
 to strengthen the marriage tie. Civil equality was restored 
 between the spouses. The duty of fidelity was presented 
 to the husband by the law, as a sacred obligation to him 
 as much as to the woman. A married man was prohibited 
 (340 A.D.) from having a concubine, and finally adultery 
 was punished as a capital crime {^faciiins atrocissimiwi). 
 
 * Boissier, in his excellent work, La Religion Romaine, has argued 
 with great force for a better character of Roman Society than 
 historians ha'C given to it. (See De Rossi, La Roina sotL^ torn, iil 
 1877.)
 
 ROMAN CODE UPON DIVORCE. 27 
 
 Concubinage was opposed, and efforts were made to change 
 it into a permanent marriage. This legislation went on 
 under succeeding emperors. Honorius and Theodosius 
 (421 A.D.) provided by law that any woman divorcing her 
 husband, without legitimate cause, should lose her dos and 
 all gifts of her husband, and be banished without hope 
 of re-marriage. A husband guilty of this offence was 
 punished in like manner. A woman repudiated wrongfully 
 could re-marry in a year ; and the husband abandoned by 
 his wife, could re- marry at once. After a legal divorce, 
 the wife could re- marry in five years. Theodosius and 
 Valerian III. returned somewhat to liberty of divorce, but 
 afterwards were compelled to limit it again. 
 
 It cannot be said that this struggle of Christianity to 
 impress upon Roman law the sanctity of marriage, was 
 pre-eminently successful. What was gained in one reign 
 was lost in another. Justinian's Code even extended the 
 causes of divorce. The marriage by " civil contract " 
 could be dissolved by mutual consent ; but if one party 
 only consented, heavy penalties were inflicted on the other 
 unless legal grounds for divorce existed. The woman 
 who divorced herself from her husband without reason, 
 lost her dos and was shut up in a monastery ; her property 
 was divided, one-third falling to the children, and two- 
 thirds to the monastery. The husband for a similar 
 offence was first fined, and finally imprisoned in a mon- 
 astery, and deprived of his property.^ The children were 
 usually delivered to that one of the parents believed by 
 the court to be most capable of taking care of them. A 
 preference was expressed in the laws, that that parent 
 should have the charge of them who had not been a 
 cause of the divorce. 
 
 So changing and inconsistent were the different laws of 
 ' Nov., 117, c. 13.
 
 28 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 Justinian on this important matter, that the commentators 
 have been obliged to confess, that " some were the laws 
 of the Caesars and some of Christ." ^ 
 
 The successors of Justinian fell into the non-Christian 
 practice, and restored the liberty of divorce by mutual 
 consent. 
 
 Concubinage. — By the side of legal marriage, existed 
 in Rome the connection of concubinage. Constantine's 
 legislation shows the effect of the new ideas spreading in 
 the world, in its struggle with this evil. His laws gave 
 legitimacy to children born in concubinage, provided the 
 parents were subsequently married ; another law forbade 
 any gift or bequest to natural children, and still another 
 forbade official personages making public their condition 
 of concubinage. 
 
 Under Justinian, natural children were legitimized in 
 three modes : by incorporation in the curia (the class 
 from which magistrates were elected), by subsequent 
 marriage of the parents, and by special edict of the 
 emperor. 
 
 As we have said, these effects of Christianity on Roman 
 law in regard to marriage and divorce, and the violation 
 of purity, are not striking, yet they show the beginning of 
 the great reforms which this Faith is adapted to produce. 
 
 ' Alias sunt leges Cassarum, aliae Christi, {Jerom ^ i 178. Selden, 
 Uxor. Eb 1. iii. c. 31.)
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PERSONAL PURITY AND MARRIAGE. 
 
 It need not be said that the Christian system of morals 
 demanded the utmost purity of Hfe, as well from the man 
 as the woman. In regard to masculine purity, it is still in 
 advance of the current opinion of the civilized world. So 
 strongly is this elevation of morals characteristic of Christ's 
 life, that we do not look for or expect direct teachings 
 against vice. No direct denunciation is transmitted from 
 Him against one of the most terrible organized evils of 
 ancient or modern times — prostitution, or against the 
 unnatural vices which were eating out the heart of Roman 
 and Greek society. The impression, however, which an 
 impartial reader would get from the narrative, is of a 
 person so pure and elevated that such vices could not 
 even be thought of when under His influence. His power 
 goes back of organized vices, and touches the sources of 
 character. His relations to abandoned women ; the story 
 of the adulterous woman, which, whether true or imagined, 
 shows the popular conception of His character ; and the 
 few words reported from Him on these and related 
 topics, together with the character of His early followers, 
 all point to the unique elevation and nature of His in- 
 fluence on the great weakness and sin of mankind. He 
 required absolute purity from man as from woman. He 
 was not, however, alone in this. The Stoical moralists 
 had done the like ; yet but few of their followers had ever 
 
 practised this high self-restraint, and no great example 
 
 29
 
 30 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 stimulated them to it. Even the Stoical jurists ^ alluded 
 to the principle ; but there is little question that before 
 Christianity entered the world, comparatively few persons 
 felt this obligation of morals, and it may be said that now, 
 a ereat multitude in all Christian countries have never 
 yet reached the level of Christian doctrines in this respect 
 Had the Founder of Christianity simply taught purity as 
 some of the early Fathers taught it— as meaning absolute 
 asceticism and celibacy — the world would have been com- 
 paratively little benefited. The nature of man would have 
 re-acted against it. We should have had even more celi- 
 bate sects, greater reactions, a more unnatural condition of 
 society, and a falling again into vices and habits as bad 
 as those of the imperial era. Such a system of morality 
 could not have met some of the first conditions of a 
 divinely sanctioned system ; it would have been only 
 temporary and incomplete. 
 
 Marriage. — But it is evident that Christ set the highest 
 value on marriage. The only human institution in regard 
 to which He departed from His ordinary habit, was that of 
 marriage. He lays down here a direct and positive rule. 
 The words are so clear and definite, that a mistake of 
 the historian or transcriber seems hardly possible. He 
 evidently felt the bond as one which more than any other 
 binds human society together. He foresaw the boundless 
 evils which would arise to the world from a looseness of its 
 tics ; the breaking up of homes ; the neglect and ruin of 
 children ; the low position which freedom of divorce would 
 give to woman ; the temptation to man to choose and to 
 throw aside; the destruction and degradation of family life 
 which must ensue where marriage is taken up and broken 
 
 ' Periniquiim enim mihi videtur esse, ut pudicitiam v'.r ab uxore 
 exigat, quam ipse non exhibet. {De conj. adult., 1. ii c. 8. Cod. Greg., 
 XIV.)
 
 CHRISTIAN IDEAL OF MARRIAGE. 31 
 
 at every whim He either foresaw these evi.s, now so 
 famiHar to morahsts, or He felt the sacredness of the union 
 so deeply, as to command that only one cause should break 
 it — unfaithfulness to the lie, or its moral equivalent. 
 
 And in the case of separation for just cause — which He 
 does not forbid — He does not permit a second marriage 
 In His view, the unliappy partners must bear the evils they 
 have brought upon themselves, for the sake of the general 
 good. At least this would seem, from the few words 
 reported, to have been the position of the Founder of 
 Christianity ; and the words are quite as distinct as many 
 on which lasting Christian customs and doctrines and 
 institutions have been founded. 
 
 In a matter, however, of such vast importance to society, 
 it would not be wise to form our permanent judgment as 
 to the teachings of Christianity from a few literal words 
 of Christ. There may be qualifications which have not 
 been reported to us, or other commands which have not 
 reached modern times. We can only reasonably infer 
 from the language and drift of the gospel historians, that 
 our Lord attached the highest sanctity to the idea of 
 marriage, and taught the exceeding strictness of the tie, 
 allowing no cause but unfaithfulness, or some equivalent 
 moral evil, to be a cause of separation. 
 
 Here, again, as we shall show later, the Leader is far in 
 advance of His followers ; and the modern Christian world 
 itself has not yet accepted the principles of their Teacher. 
 The Apostles followed on in the same footsteps. Mar- 
 riage was, to them, a mystical union of the most holy 
 and ennobling character. Under the great Christian idea 
 that the body was " the temple of the Holy Spirit," all 
 forms of illicit intercourse were profanation, and marriage 
 like the union of Christ with tne souls of his followers. 
 This elevating and wholesome idea, which was equally
 
 3a GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 removed from asceticism and sensuality, was thrown as a 
 new purifying element into the fetid mass of Roman vices 
 and evil habits. The early Christians illustrated the 
 principle with their lives and ennobled it with their death. 
 Their wives shared every persecution and pain of mortal 
 life, and the repeated inscriptions on their tombs showed 
 that the hope of sharing immortality together lighted up 
 even the ghastly arena with heavenly joy. Though the 
 Master had not promised the continuance of the relations 
 of earth in the present form, it became a favourite 
 Christian inscription over the grave that the departed 
 had been the husband of but one wife, or the wife of but 
 one husband in the life below. 
 
 It is true that this sense of personal purity worked at 
 length beyond the original teachings, and produced great 
 calamities in the world, by the doctrine and practice of 
 asceticism. The history of celibacy in the early centuries 
 after Christ down to the Middle Ages, forms one of the 
 darkest features in the annals of the Church. The practice 
 was commenced, no doubt, under reasonable motives, to 
 give greater freedom to the religious teacher in a wild age, 
 and enable him to consecrate himself more absolutely to 
 the work of religion. It was stimulated by the Oriental 
 spirit of asceticism which early entered and finally cor- 
 rupted the Church. The opposition of the most elevated 
 spirits of the Church assailed it in every century ; but 
 it was sustained by the astute ecclesiastical leaders, who 
 feared the growth of a kind of ecclesiastical feudalism 
 with a married clergy, where power and possessions 
 would be transmitted from the priest to his children. It 
 became the interest of the Roman ciiria to cut off every 
 servant of the Church from human ties, making itself 
 the sole power in the ecclesiastical world. A priest with 
 children and possessions, it was thought, would never
 
 CELIBACY. 33 
 
 be an utterly obedient and faithful servant to churchly 
 authority. Devoted Christians in every age, among the 
 clergy, opposed the practice, but the power of organiza- 
 tion, the interest of authority and no doubt often an 
 exaggerated asceticism, overcame them. The custom at 
 length proved one of the curses of humanity. As has 
 been frequently remarked, it withdrew the most able and 
 earnest among religious men and women during many 
 centuries, from family life, and cut off their legitimate line. 
 Those who were the most sincere left no children, and 
 by so much diminished the inheritance of human good. 
 The weak and dishonest left children to chance care and 
 public protection, and thus increased the numbers of those 
 exposed to moral dangers and physical suffering. Then, 
 worst of all, the practice let loose through the early and 
 middle ages after Christ, a fearful flood of licentiousness, 
 hidden indulgence, crime against families, and even un- 
 natural vices. The licentiousness of the convents and 
 clergy became one of the greatest obstacles to the progress 
 of the Christian religion.^ But for all this Christianity is 
 not responsible. Asceticism was, in part, a natural re- 
 action against the boundless licentiousness and immorality 
 of the Roman world. 
 
 The Christian influence, it is true, worked with only 
 partial success in its struggle with Roman customs and 
 laws in regard to marriage. The laxity had too deeply 
 penetrated the habits of the people. We have seen that 
 the legislation under the Christian emperors was of a 
 shifting character, and it is evident that the old customs 
 of the Romans long resisted the new ideas. Christianity 
 
 ' The best history of this important topic is contained in Mr. Lea's 
 admirable Hislofical Sketch of Celibacy, one of the clearest and 
 most valuable works on the Middle Ages, yet written.
 
 34 GESTA LHRISTL 
 
 laboured in two directions : it strove to ennoble and make 
 firm tlie marriage relation, and it by no means allowed 
 the freedom of action which was permitted to the Roman 
 lady under the marriage of " usus," or the " Free marriage." 
 It elevated the position of woman and the character of 
 the relation between husband and wife ; but required of 
 the latter a certain propriety and deference in appro- 
 priate things to the wishes of her husband and the rules 
 of the Church, which the Roman uxor had not latterly 
 known. The influence, however, of the Church on Roman 
 law relating to marriage and the sexes, is to be dis- 
 tinguished from that of Christianity. All that the latter 
 taught was personal purity, and the absolute sacredness 
 of the tie. 
 
 But when we hear in Justinian's i iV^7v//(^ that nothing 
 in human affairs is so much to be venerated as marriage, 
 we may be sure that here is a clear trace of the new 
 influence. 
 
 We contrast the position given to women by one of the 
 noblest of the Stoical jurists, Paul, who wrote in the third 
 century, but under no influence from the new Faith 
 "Women," he says, "in every kind of affairs and obli- 
 gations, whether in behalf of men or women, are prohibited 
 from having any concern." ^ 
 
 When Justinian says :^ " We enact then that all persons, 
 so far as they can, should preserve chastity, which alone 
 is able to present the souls of men with confidence before 
 
 ' Nihil in rebus mortalium perinde venerandum est, atque matii- 
 monium. De Nii/tiis. 
 
 - In omni genere negotiorum et obligationum, tarn pro viris quam 
 pro feminis, intercedere mulieres prohibentur. {Paul. Sent,, lib. II. 
 t. xii.) 
 
 ' Sancimus igitur omnes quidam, secundum quod possunt, casti- 
 latem agere ; qua; etiam sola Deo cum fiducia potis est hominum 
 animas praescntare. {Nov., iii. i, 14.)
 
 EFFECT UPON WOMAN. 35 
 
 God," we know immediately that here is a faint reflection 
 of the new Light shining in the world. And when the 
 law-giver expresses his belief in the Lord God, that 
 through his zeal for chastity, a great benefit will accrue 
 to the Republic,^ we can see distinctly the workings of 
 the new power. 
 
 Under Cliristianity begins that position of woman, which 
 has been since both an element and an evidence of the 
 progress of the most civilized races. With all changes of 
 society, she has never lost the halo which the new Faith 
 threw about her then, and, as we shall show later, even the 
 submergence of the Roman empire under the Northern 
 barbarians, only aided the influence of Christianity in 
 exalting the weaker sex. 
 
 Sir Henry Maine, in his valuable work on the " Early 
 History of Institutions," states that the existing written 
 law of the Hindoos has preserved many of the strict and 
 harsh features in regard to the paternal and marital power, 
 which belonged to the ancient despotism of the family, and 
 is distinguished for " its excessive harshness to the personal 
 and proprietary liberty of women." ^ 
 
 Whatever independence from the family despotism has 
 been secured to the child or the woman in India, he justly 
 attributes to the influence of religion — the ancient faiths of 
 India. Wherever there prevailed any belief in responsi- 
 bility after death,^ " the conception of the individual who 
 was to suffer separately was necessarily realized with 
 extreme distinctness," and it is this conception of the in- 
 dividual and his rights which lies at the basis of the great 
 modern legal reforms. 
 
 ' Credimus in Domino Deo, etiam ex hoc nostro circa castitatem 
 studio, magnum fieri nostrae republic3s incrementum. {Nov. xiv 
 
 3,1.) 
 2 Page 303. » Page 331.
 
 36 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 It is not improbable that Buddhism, in teaching the 
 absorption or annihilation of individuality {iiirvand) in 
 divinity, may have also aided in giving that inferior 
 position to woman which is characteristic of Oriental 
 countries. 
 
 The author quoted above, who is certainly not too 
 favourable to Christianity, admits that among all the in- 
 fluences which have made the two great branches of the 
 Aryan races so different — the Hindoos on the one side 
 and the European on the other — the one most powerful 
 in forming the civilization of each is, that the one branch 
 steadily carried forward the series of reforms which elevated 
 woman, and the other, though going a little way, recoiled 
 from them.* 
 
 In other words, the European races lived under the 
 peculiar influence and stimulus of the teachings of Christ, 
 and the Hindoos under non-Christian faiths. The former 
 everywhere tended to elevate woman, both through the 
 individual responsibility taught and through the example of 
 the Teacher. The latter only partially ensured this end. 
 
 Unnatural Vices. — In one violation of personal purity, 
 the Christian system has achieved a signal and lasting 
 victory ; and yet — so far has the Christian world advanced 
 beyond the Greek and Roman standards — the subject 
 itself has become revolting and abhorrent to modern tastes. 
 But to omit all mention of it would be to leave out of 
 view one of the great and beneficent triumphs of the 
 system of morals which came forth from the teachings 
 and life of Christ. Our Lord Himself never speaks of 
 unijatural passions. The very spirit of His personality 
 would banish even the thought of them, and the personal 
 love He inspired put the soul far above all temptation 
 under them. 
 
 ' Early Hist of Inst., p. 341.
 
 PLATO ON UNNATURAL PASSION. 37 
 
 One great philosopher, who in Greek and Roman 
 history approached nearest Jesus in his conception of the 
 reforming and renovating power of love to a Divine charac- 
 ter — Plato, speaks with a despairing sadness of these lusts 
 which were eating out the vigour and character of his 
 people. He evidently looks to the future abolition of 
 these fearful evils as remote as we would in this day to 
 the removal of prostitution, or the entire doing away of 
 war. Three principles or moral forces, he says in the 
 " Laws," may break up these evils. First, that of piety, or 
 love to a Divine person ; second, the desire for honour or 
 the respect of the good ; and thirdly, the love of moral 
 beauty — that not of the body but of the soul.^ " These 
 be perhaps romantic aspirations, but they are the noblest 
 of aspirations, if they could only be realized in any state ; 
 and, God willing, in the matter of love, we may be able to 
 enforce this." He urges then that those, not only guilty 
 of these passions, but all who sinned publicly against the 
 marriage tie, should be excluded from all civic honours 
 and privileges, and be deemed strangers and barbarians. 
 In another passage, he says, " Now if a law to this effect 
 could only be made perpetual, such as already prevents 
 incest, such a law, extending to other desires and conquer- 
 ing them, would be the source of ten thousand blessings;. 
 
 ^ Iv yevos 6V, ireptXa/Jov to, rpta y^f], ^ta^otr' av ^yj irapavofiiiv. 
 
 KA. noia 87^ ; 
 
 A.©. To re Oeoae/^ks afxa Koi <^tXort/zoi/ koL to fxr) twv o-w/iarwv, 
 dXXa Twv rpoTTOv Trj<; i/'^X'/^ ovtcjv KaXQ)V ye yovos iv iTriOv/xta, ravra 
 8rj Ka9a.7rep tcTws iv fwOtiJ to, vvv Aeyo/icv 1<ttlv cu^^at', ttoXv ye fxijv 
 apLCTTa, ctTrep yt'yrocTO iv Tracrats TToXecrt, ytyvotro av, ra^a 8' av, 
 el ^eos iOiXni, kuv 8voiv Odrepa ^tacrat/xe^a Trepl ipiHTiKSiv, rj firjBiva 
 ToXjjLav p.TjZe.vo'; aTrrecrOat twv yei'ratojr ayu.a .vat iXevdcpcDV -jrXrjV 
 ya/AerJjs lavrov yvratKos, aOvra Se 7raA.Xa/ctoi/ cnripp-ara koL voOa /xi^ 
 <ntf.ipe.LV firjBk ayova appcvinv Trapa ij/vaiv. {Noinoi^ 8.)
 
 38 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 . . . But matters have now come to such a pass thai 
 the enactment of such laws seems to be impossible, and 
 never likely to take place ; just as the continuance of an 
 entire state in the practice of common meals is also deemed 
 impossible." 
 
 The passion of which he speaks arose in Greece un- 
 doubtedly from an exaggerated love of youthful beauty, 
 and was, with some of the moralists, like Socrates, one of 
 the purest of sentiments. The three forces of which Plato 
 spoke, were especially thrown into the world by Jesus : — 
 love to a Divine Person ; the respect of the good or of His 
 followers ; and an elevated feeling for moral beauty. In 
 the mind of the humble follower of Christ was ever that 
 pure and Divine image, into whose likeness he hoped day 
 by day to be changed ; around him were the good, whose 
 respect was his comfort ; and before his thoughts were 
 oftentimes things pure and noble and of good report. 
 
 Nothing shows more distinctly the degradation of the 
 moral sense of the ancient world in these matters than the 
 speech which Plato puts in the mouth of Alcibiades in 
 regard to Socrates, in the drunken dinner of the " Sym- 
 posium." It is utterly untranslatable to modern ears ; and 
 though the great moralist is everywhere pictured as free 
 from vice, his purity seems rather an effect of his intel- 
 lectual pre-occupations, and is never once spoken of by 
 dramatist, or biographer, or by himself, as any virtue. The 
 Greek, and more particularly the Latin literature, is filled 
 with traces of vices which have utterly passed out of 
 memory in the Christian world. Lucian, nearly all the 
 Latin poets and dramatists, Apuleius, Petronius Arbiter, 
 Athenaeus, reveal a debasement of morality among classes 
 not corrupted by luxury, which has not been known 
 in modern times. It is not that, like Juvenal, they pick 
 out extreme immoralities for a biting sarcasm ; but they
 
 CHRISTIAN OPPOSITION. 39 
 
 allude casually and without shame to excesses ?.nd habit lal 
 vices, whose very name is lost to modern ears. Even 
 Cicero says soberly that it was held as a disgrace among 
 the Greeks not to indulge in unnatural vices.^ He did not 
 say that his own countrymen fell even lower than the 
 Greeks. 
 
 The early Ch ristian s set the mselves like a wall ag ainst 
 this tide oj s ensuality . The plain words of the Apostle 
 are well known." Where Christianity had the faintest 
 power, there such impurity could not even be thought 
 of As soon as its influence reached legislation, we find 
 a vigour of denunciation and a severity against these 
 excesses, which show the new Power in the world. 
 The Theodosian Code, which codifies the legislation even 
 of Constantine, orders the most intense punishments on 
 those guilty of such crimes.^ And again, filled with the 
 Christian idea of the body as the temple of the Holy 
 Spirit, the law-maker speaks of the duty of preserving 
 the abode of a manly soul sacred,* and threatens the 
 severest penalty on anj^ who should violate it. Justinian 
 shows even more clearly the influence of the Apostles 
 and of the Scripture in following the new ideas on these 
 crimes. He says, " taught by the Holy Scripture, we know 
 what a just punishment God inflicted on the inliabitants 
 of Sodom," and he warns all who have the fear of God, to 
 abstain from actions so wicked and impious that even the 
 
 * Apud Grsecos, opprobrium fuit adolescentibus, si amatores non 
 haberent. {De Rep./iagm., lib. iv.) 
 
 ^ Romans i. 23-29. 
 
 3 Ubi Venus mutatur in alteram formam, ubi Amor quceritur nee 
 videtur, jubemus insurgere leges ut exquisitis pcenis su'^dantur in* 
 fames, qui sunt, vel qui futuri sunt tei. (Cod. Thr:od.,\y.. tit. vii. 2, 3.) 
 
 ■' Sacrosanctum cunctis esse deoere hospitium virilis animae ; nee 
 sine summo supplicio alienum expetisse sexum, qui suum turpitef 
 perdidisset. (ix. t. 7.)
 
 40 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 brutes do not commit them,^ And still again, the law 
 bids the offenders who violate nature, to bear in mind the 
 fear of God and a future judgment.^ 
 
 So far as is known, no philosophy or religion among 
 the Greek and Roman races freed mankind from these 
 detestable vices. 
 
 The emperors under Stoical influences made some effort 
 to check them, but without success. Domitian punished 
 certain knights and senators for these offences. Antoninus 
 Pius and Marcus Aurelius had the virtue to avoid but not 
 to punish. A. Severus, it is said by the historian, '' habiiit^ 
 in animo ut exoletos'^ vetaref' ; but he feared the increase 
 of private vice, and therefore let alone the ''scorta virilia." 
 These vices still exist among peoples outside of Chris- 
 tianity. They are well-known in Turkey and India. But 
 so imbued has civilized society become with the principles 
 taught by the Master, that such evils are left behind in 
 its moral progress, and no longer threaten the future of the 
 race. 
 
 May it be an omen of other triumphs ! 
 
 ' Scimus etenim, sacris scriptuiis edocti, quam jiistum Deus suppli- 
 cium, his qui olim in Sodomis habitabant, propter hunc ipsum in 
 commistione furorem intulerit, . . . unde omnes qui limori Dei 
 intenti sunt, convenit, ut a tarn impia et scelesta actione abstineant, 
 quam ne in brutis quidam admissum reperire est. {Nov., clx. i.) 
 
 ^ . . . Et ipsi naturae contraria agunt ; istis injungimus in sensi- 
 bus accipere Dei timorem, et futurum judicium, et abstinere ab hujus- 
 modi diabolicis et illicitis luxuriis. {Col., vi. t. i. Nov., yj.) 
 
 ^ Exoletos suos ut ad longiorem patientiam impudicitiae idonei sint 
 amputant. {Seneca, Coiitrov., lo, 4 ; Ep., p. 49). 
 
 •* This expressive word described a class ; they were indeed utterly 
 ** burned cut" in body and souL
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SLAVERY. 
 
 There Is probably no one organised evil in history which 
 has been so replete with human misery, and has drawn 
 after it such a train of vice, degradation and corruption, 
 as slavery. It is doubtful if it ever existed in a worse con- 
 dition than in the Roman Empire at the time of Christ. In 
 the moral struggle with the abuses of slavery in different 
 countries and ages, especially where the victims were of a 
 totally different and inferior race, it has been the custom 
 in the heat of the argument to speak of modern slavery as 
 worse than that of the ancient world. But closer investi- 
 gation shows that the system of Roman servitude had 
 more than the cruelty of the modern, and was even more 
 of an irresponsible despotism, while it debauched society 
 and literature beyond what has ever been experienced in 
 any community of recent times. 
 
 A distinguished French author on this subject (Wallon) 
 has somewhere said, that for public depravity to reach 
 its utmost depths of licentiousness, there needed to be a 
 being with the passions and attractions of a man, yet 
 stripped by public opinion of all the moral obligations of 
 a human being ; all whose wildest excesses were lawful, 
 provided they were commanded by a master. Such a 
 being was the Roman slave. We can see his influence in 
 the disgusting and debasing comedy and poetry of the 
 Imperial age, wherein the relation of the beautiful and
 
 42 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 irresponsible victims of power to masters without shame 
 and youth without virtue, is the perpetual theme. 
 
 We discern the canker of slavery in the unexampled and 
 incredible degradation of Roman family life in the age 
 accompanying and following the life of Christ. And the 
 political economist finds everywhere in Roman polity the 
 seeds of boundless misery and of certain financial ruin, in 
 the habits and customs born of this institution. 
 
 It was not latifmidia, or the " large farm system," which 
 was destroying the Roman Empire, but the poor agricul- 
 ture, the waste, extravagance, bad management, aversion 
 to labour, and general discontent — the natural fruit, in the 
 rural districts, of slavery. This unjust system was eating 
 away the character and life of the ancient world, and 
 preparing calamities which should be felt by Europe for 
 hundreds of years to come. 
 
 Christ appeared in a remote corner of the Roman 
 empire, in an age when these evils v/ere at their worst, 
 though probably but iew of them presented themselves 
 prominently in Galilee. 
 
 It might have been thought that the great Reformer 
 would have uttered some words against this stupendous 
 abuse. To the mind of the writer, it has often been a 
 subject of difficult questioning, why He, who felt so 
 keenly the evils of humanity, should not have put forth one 
 simple command against this gigantic system of injustice. 
 
 No direct word against slavery, however, came forth from 
 the great Teacher. It was not until the ninth century 
 after, that one of his humble followers. Saint Theodore of 
 Studium (Constantinople), ventured to put forth the com- 
 mand " Thou shalt possess no slave, neither for domestic 
 service nor for the labour of the fields, for man is made in 
 the image of God. "^ 
 
 " Quoted l)y WuUo i, I/ist. de F Esclavagc, vol. iii. p. 484.
 
 SILENCE OF CHRIST. 42 
 
 The explanation of the silence of our Lord is no doubt 
 to be found in the general character and design of His 
 mission, as we gather them from His life and the words 
 recorded of Him. An organised evil almost as destructive 
 and debasing to the world as slavery, was prostitution. 
 Unnatural passions were consuming the life and virtue of 
 the Greek and Roman races. War was desolating almost 
 every portion of the world and bringing after it trains of 
 evils and calamities. Yet Christ only alludes to these, 
 or implies his deep and fervent opposition to, or condem- 
 nation of, them. 
 
 As is well understood, His aim was to renovate and 
 rescue the individual soul, looking forward through that, 
 n very remote ages, to the establishment of the " kingdom 
 of God " on the earth, or in other words, to the social and 
 complete reorganization of mankind on His principles. 
 We find no evidence in His words, that He even designed 
 to form a Church or general organization of believers, but 
 rather that He expected that little gatherings and brother- 
 hoods of those who loved and followed Him would form 
 themselves for mutual good. His language in innumerable 
 similes showed that He believed that these principles He 
 taught would only be successful after long periods of time 
 and gradual development. Most of His figures and 
 analogies in regard to the " kingdom of God," rest upon 
 the idea of slow and progressive growth or change. He 
 undoubtedly saw that the only true fenovation of the world 
 would come, not through reforms of institutions or govern- 
 ments, but through individual change of character, effected 
 by the same power to which Plato appealed — the love- 
 power, but a love exercised towards Himself as a perfect 
 and divine model. It was the " kingdom of God " in the 
 soul which should bring on the kingdom of God in human 
 society. With such a mission and such an aim. or filled
 
 44 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 with such intense sympathy towards men and such a pro- 
 found sense of what God could effect in each human soui, 
 the institutions and practices of men would sink away as 
 of comparatively little importance. The enduring things 
 below all governments and organized evils, were the human 
 conscience and the human affections. If they were pure 
 and right, all else would gradually become so. Such an 
 aspect of human life naturally takes no account of some ot 
 the grandest movements of reform in different ages. To 
 a certain extent it is apart from all efforts for liberty, for 
 improvement of laws or the advancem.ent of science, for 
 the spread of temperance or education, for opposition 
 to social impurity, for the protection of children and the 
 elevation of the poor. And yet ultimately this Christian 
 system will be found at the basis of all these great move- 
 ments of progress in human history. But it began by 
 aiming at the individual and not at society, and aiming 
 alone at an entire change of the affectional and moral 
 tendencies. 
 
 If our Lord may be conceived as looking at the imme- 
 diate consequences of His inspiration and His teachings 
 (which we doubt), it may well be that He would hesitate 
 before preaching the duty of immediate emancipation in 
 the Roman empire as it then was. The truth is, that a 
 fathomless pauperism was then covering the empire — the 
 result of conquests, oppression, bad finance, invasion of 
 barbarians, and slavery — and to thousands of the poor 
 slavery v/as a less evil than the poverty they endured. As 
 we shall relate afterwards, there came a time when an 
 imperial law, permitting those who " took up " exposed 
 children to make slaves of them, was a law dictated by 
 motives of humanity. It is doubtful if the world has ever 
 seen an era when so many human beings were exposed to 
 such bitter poverty, and even to starvation, as during the
 
 THE SLAVE IN THE CHURCH. 45 
 
 fev/ centuries after Christ. Now for a Divine teacher to 
 have proclaimed, then and there, the duty of absolute and 
 immediate emancipation, would have plunged the Roman 
 world into a " misery " beyond all bounds of conception, 
 and would have let loose a war of extermination between 
 masters and slaves, which would have turned Europe and 
 Asia into a field of blood and slaughter. The principles 
 which Christ taught evidently must overturn slavery from 
 its foundation. They scattered the seeds of absolute free- 
 dom and equal justice. They destroyed all distinctions 
 of caste and race. The individual soul became of infinite 
 importance and of equal value, whether in the slave or the 
 king. The Apostles only followed in the footsteps of the 
 Master. In the great community of the lovers of Christ, 
 " bond and free " were alike. There was no distinction in 
 the sight of God, none in the Church. They recognised 
 slavery as they recognised the tyranny of Cssar, but they 
 put the slave, in their treatment and their language, on the 
 like footing with his owner. And the owner could only be 
 a member of their association by professing to be willing 
 to treat his servant as he would himself in like case be 
 treated. The slave partook of the memorials of the life 
 and death of the Lord side by side with his master. The 
 infant ecclcsia, or assembly and brotherhood of believers, 
 began to be a shelter and receptacle for numbers of that 
 great despised multitude — the slaves of the Romans.^ 
 It is true that in the succeeding centuries bishops and 
 clergymen not unfrequently held slaves. But the spirit 
 of Christianity began immediately that long contest 
 with human slavery, which, under changing fortunes and 
 with many defeats, has been waged now for eighteen 
 centuries, and may be said only to have won its final 
 
 ' It should be remembered that the Romans excluded their slaves 
 from a share in patriotic worship. (Gz/, Pe Re Rust.^ 143.)
 
 46 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 victories in the middle and latter half of the nineteenth 
 century. 
 
 In considering this and similar struggles, it should be 
 understood that I distinguish always between " Chris- 
 tianity " and " the Cliurch." The history of the latter 
 has been by no means consistent with, or a development 
 of, the spirit of its Founder. Its course has been not 
 seldom marked by the qualities which He most con- 
 demned. It has committed gigantic blunders, which have 
 retarded for ages the progress of His principles. An 
 organization may bear the name and represent some of 
 the features of a great principle, and yet in others be 
 entirely inconsistent with it. No true Republican would 
 admit that the first French Republic represented the 
 genuine idea of a Republic, even if it had been trans- 
 mitted under that name for many centuries. Under the 
 term " Christianity " we include the principles and moral 
 sentiments taught and illustrated by the life and words of 
 Christ, as they are made known in the writings of the 
 gospel historians and the Apostles. They form a suf- 
 ficiently distinct body of moral teaching, and are often an 
 entirely different matter from the teachings or the example 
 of the professed followers of Christ. 
 
 Christianity and Roman Law upon Slavery. — In studying 
 the influence of Christianity upon slavery in the Roman 
 empire, we are never to lose out of view the noblest 
 school of moralists which the world has seen outside 
 of Christian believers — the Stoics. These philosophers 
 had a profound effect upon Roman jurisprudence just 
 preceding the Christian emperors. The statements and 
 principles of the Stoical jurists in regard to liberty and 
 natural right have become apopthegms of liberty, and 
 have influenced all succeeding ages. They have reappeared 
 in the declarations and charters of American freedom, and
 
 STOICS AND SLAVERY. 47 
 
 in the enthusiastic statements of the French writers on 
 Natural Right. 
 
 It does not appear, however, that they had any very 
 strong efifect upon the position of the slave under Roman 
 law, and still less on the practices of the people towards 
 this unhappy victim. The Stoics were even more in- 
 consistent with their principles of humanity than the 
 Christians ; and some of the most heartless acts of in- 
 humanity recorded in ancient history are those of Stoics 
 to their slaves. 
 
 Cato deliberately gives permission to sell an old, or a 
 sick slave.^ / 
 
 The following instance is related by Tacitus 2 : A wealthy 
 citizen of Rome had pledged freedom to a slave, and had 
 broken his promise. The man, enraged and disappointed, 
 assassinated his master. By law, in such cases, all the 
 slaves under the same roof should be executed. The pub- 
 lic duty in this case was discussed in the Senate ; and the 
 celebrated Stoic, Cassius, defended the law, and urged its 
 enforcement. The slaves, all innocent, to the number of 
 six hundred persons, were finally executed. 
 
 Plutarch says that Flaminius put a slave to death merely 
 to afford a spectacle to a guest who had never seen a man 
 die. Cato, the Stoic, when he put one to death, used to 
 take the opinion of all the others before killing him. The 
 story of Pollio — also a Stoic — is well known as related by 
 Seneca ; how he amused himself by feeding his fish with 
 fragments of his mutilated slaves. Many were furnished 
 to the amphitheatres to be killed in the public festivals. 
 Old and infirm slaves were abandoned to die of hunger. 
 Many were brought to an island in the Tiber and left in 
 
 ' Vendat boves vetiilos, oves deliculas . . servum senera, 
 
 servum morbosum vendat. {Cato, De remot., 11.) 
 * Ann., xii. lib. 42.
 
 48 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 the temple of i5£sculapius to the care of the god. The 
 poet says of such, that to help them only lengthens out a 
 life of misery.^ 
 
 Juvenal, who wrote when Stoicism had full sweep among 
 the Roman cultivated class, asks with bitter irony, " how 
 a slave could be a man." ^ 
 
 The Stoic Ulpian speaks of "a slave or any other 
 animal " ^ ; even as the book of Revelation describes the 
 wealth of the wicked Babylon, as in " the bodies and souls 
 of men." 
 
 Seneca the Elder says that a slave has no hearth nor 
 religion.^ 
 
 Even Gains, the Stoical jurist, under the rule of that 
 mild philosopher, Marcus Aurelius, could observe inci- 
 dentally that with almost all nations, the right of life and 
 death is given to the master over the slave ; ^ and he 
 classes slaves with animals. Yet even he speaks of " manu- 
 mitting in church," ^ as if Christian ideas had reached 
 the legislation of the Stoics, and he afterwards quotes : 
 " This age "^ of humanity," as if he felt the new Power 
 which was permeating the world. 
 
 Still the inconsistencies of the Stoics should never cause 
 mankind to forget that one of those condensed expressions 
 
 * De mendico male meretur qui ei dat quod edit aut quod bibat 
 Nam et illud quod dat, parcit, et illi producit vitam ad miseriam. 
 
 « O demens ! ita servus homo est ! 
 
 Hoc volo, sic jubeo, sit pro ratione voluntas ! 
 
 {Juv. Sat., vi. 475.) 
 ' Ulpian. Dig., vi. i, 15. * Controv., 10, 21. 
 
 * Apud omnes pera^que gentes animadvertere possumus, dominii 
 in servos vita;, necisque potestatem esse. {G.^ c. I. A., 52.) Servis, 
 et jumentis, ceterisque rebus, (vii. i, 3.) 
 
 ^ Nam qui voluerit aut in ecclesia ... manumittere G., I 
 it I.) 
 
 ' Hoc tempore. (G., II. x. 1.)
 
 NUMBER OF ROMAN SLAVES. 49 
 
 of human instincts, which has been a charter of h'berty to 
 so many races and countries since, embodied by Justinian 
 in a Christian code, came originally from a Stoical jurist, 
 " By natural right all men are born free ; by right of 
 nations {i.e.^ by conquest) slavery has come in." ^ 
 
 The number of Roman slaves can only be judged of by 
 side indications. A law of Augustus forbade a poor exile 
 from carrying away with him more than twenty slaves ; 
 another reduced the number which could be maintained 
 by testamentary provisions, making one hundred the 
 maximum, which, from the proportions mentioned, would 
 indicate that five hundred was not an uncommon number 
 to be owned by one person. We hear from Seneca," of 
 a master counting the roll of his slaves as a general counts 
 his soldiers. Martial alludes to an eccentric person being 
 attended by from ten to two hundred slaves ; Pliny says 
 that Caecilius left 4,1 16 slaves after his death. The poets 
 mention them as the sign of wealth ; -^ the want of them 
 was the last evidence of poverty.* Tacitus speaks of the 
 city becoming frightened at the increasing number of 
 slaves.^ A proposition was once made in the Senate to 
 indicate the slaves by their dress, but was dropped because 
 of the danger that the slaves would outnumber the free- 
 men.^ When Alaric besieged Rome, he was aided by a 
 force of 40,000 slaves from the city itself The number 
 
 ' Cum jure naturali, omnes liberi nascerentur ; . . . jure gen- 
 tium servitas invasit. {Nov.) {Dig., 1. 4. L., xvii. 52.) 
 - De Tranq. an., IX. v. 
 
 * . . . quot pascit servos ! quot possidet agri 
 
 Jugera ! {Mart,, xxii. 88, 3.) 
 
 * Isti quoi neque servus est, neque area. {Cat., xxiv. 5, 8.) 
 
 » In urbem jam trepidam ob multitudinem familiorum. {Afm}^ 
 ix. 27.) 
 
 ° Si servi nostri numerate nos ccepissint (Sen., De CUm.f 
 24.) 
 
 E
 
 50 
 
 CESTA CHRIST r. 
 
 evidently was formidable throughout the period imme- 
 diately succeeding Christ. 
 
 In his legal position the slave was a property, whose 
 nature nothing but the will of the master could change ; 
 he could be given, let, sold, exchanged, and seized for 
 debt. He had no civil rights ; could enjoy no legal 
 marriage, only cohabitation {conhibernium), and therefore 
 could not be accused of adultery.^ He had no legal 
 parentage, no property, no right to legacy ; could sustain 
 no action before a court, could not be a witness, and his 
 testimony was only legal with torture.* 
 
 Of his capacities and moral nature it was said, "immo- 
 desty is a crime in a freeman, a necessity in a slave, a duty 
 in a freedman (or liberated slave)." Still, with all this, the 
 Roman slave was not considered in law as altogether a 
 thing. The Cornelian law against murder applied to all 
 conditions of men. The Stoical spirit had begun before 
 Christianity to bring about some alleviations to the lot of 
 the slave. A certain right of property was given him, and 
 under Adrian a master was forbid to kill his slave. Under 
 Antoninus Pius, a master who killed his bondman without 
 cause was punished for homicide. Severus forbade personal 
 injury to foreign slaves. The Petronian law prevented 
 masters from delivering servants to be employed in the 
 combats of wild beasts. Adrian prohibited the sale of 
 slaves, without the intervention of judges, for the contests 
 of gladiators ; and Marcus Aurelius, as one would have 
 expected from his humanity, enacted a similar law with 
 reference to the combats of wild beasts. Antoninus Pius 
 permitted slaves to be sold, rather than punished, who took 
 
 ' Servi ob violatum contubernium adulterii nomine accusari non 
 possunt. (Z., 23. C. /., ix. 9. Ad. leg. Jul. de Aditlt.) 
 
 - Sine tormentis, testimonium ejus credendum non est. {L., 21, 2, 
 DXXII. De Testi.)
 
 REFORMS UNDER THE STOICS. 51 
 
 refuge at altars or before sacred images. The recourse of 
 law was gradually had to prevent other abuses of the servile 
 class ; thus the application of torture to servants on trial 
 or as witnesses was by degrees disused. Those blessed 
 words so much used by the Stoical jurists, "favor libertatis/'^ 
 the presumption of liberty, came to have more and more 
 power on legislation. This was especially true of the 
 interpretation of wills. It was not permitted to bestow 
 liberty for a certain number of years ; "once free, always 
 free," was the motto. If a slave had partly paid for his 
 liberty, and his time of manumission had come, it was not 
 held humane to cause delay through a question of pecu- 
 niary profit.2 
 
 Nothing shows better how comparatively superficial 
 the influence of Stoicism was, how confined to the Roman 
 cultivated classes, than the unhappy position of the slave, 
 both in custom and law, through all the reign of this noble 
 philosophy. Even the influence of Christianity, when 
 united with the government, had a long and often defeated 
 struggle to ameliorate the lot of the unhappy victims of 
 man's greed and cruelty. 
 
 The union of the Christian Church with the State under 
 Constantine we regard as one of the great blunders of the 
 historical Church, which has drawn after it a long train 
 of evils, whose efl'ects are even yet experienced. Could 
 Christianity have been permitted to grow, as it did under 
 the Apostles, in little voluntary associations of believers, 
 unconnected with the civil power and with a simple organi- 
 zation, we should not have had, indeed, the grand spectacle 
 of an apparently converted imperial court, and an official 
 
 > Ulpian. (XI. Defib. lib). 
 
 2 Neque humanum fuerit ob rei pecuniarias quaestionem libertati 
 moram fieri. {Ulpian)
 
 52 GEST/l CHRISTI 
 
 hierarchy, and a Church supported by Armies and governed 
 by warriors and courtiers, and of vast populations suddenly 
 made into nominal Christians — but we should have been 
 saved a paganized peasantry, a corrupt priesthood, a hier- 
 archy full of greed and ambition, ages of blood and 
 relisfious warfare, and a Church which persecuted both 
 science and differing opinions. The Christian faith would 
 have grown up where it belongs — in quiet, humble places 
 — and have reformed manners and morals before it took 
 hold of legislation. Christ's principles would have been a 
 spiritual power in the world, not a form or an institution, 
 and would thus have finally permeated society. So far 
 from regarding the rapid spread of the Christian religion in 
 the Roman world as a sign of its Divine origin, and an 
 evidence of its triumph, we consider it as almost a fatal 
 occurrence, and as having impeded the spread of Christ's 
 real truth ever since. 
 
 We are aware of the very strong arguments presented by 
 liberal Catholic writers for the early union of State and 
 Church. It could not but be productive of some good in a 
 barbarous age. But the present spiritual condition of a 
 large part of Europe, is a proof how great was the mistake 
 then made. The best effect of this union was seen in legis- 
 lation. A new spirit began at once to influence Roman law. 
 We only claim that this influence would have been more 
 thorough and more lasting had it more generally pervaded 
 society first, and reached the law-givers through the people. 
 
 Whatever motives Constantine himself may have had in 
 his change of faith, the jurists who framed his legislation 
 were evidently inspired and influenced by Christianity. 
 In laws relating to slavery, we hear of being "imbued 
 with Christian discipline " ^ as a reason for humanity ; of 
 
 'Christiana disci plina imbutus. {Cod. Theod.,\\. 12.)
 
 EMANCIPATION AS A RELIGIOUS DUTY, 53 
 
 emancipating- in church with "religious purpose,"^ and 
 numerous other expressions which indicate the new forces 
 working on the law-givers. The " Day of the Lord " has 
 become a day appropriate to emancipation and to a rest 
 from all litigation ; ^ and emancipation in church has the 
 same legal force with the formal emancipation of a Roman 
 citizen. The official setting free of a slave became com- 
 mon as an act of piety or gratitude to God at recovery 
 from illness, at the birth of a child, at death, or in wills. 
 Many charters and epitaphs bore the expression of 
 " liberty for the benefit of the soul." 
 
 The Church early included a prayer in its liturgy " for 
 them that suffer in bitter bondage." The burial inscrip- 
 tions and pictures recently made known, often show 
 the masters standing before the Good Shepherd, with 
 a band of their slaves, liberated at death, pleading for 
 them at the last judgment.^ But scarcely any Christian 
 inscription speaks of the dead, as a " slave " or " freed- 
 man," but only of the "slave of Christ"; or the " freed- 
 man of Christ";* as if human slavery could not even 
 be mentioned in the kingdom of God. 
 
 A series of remarkable laws under Constantine showed 
 the new spirit v/orking upon legislation. In 312 A.D, a 
 law was passed declaring the poisoning of a slave or 
 the tearing his body with the nails of a wild beast, or 
 branding him, to be homicide. In 314, liberty was 
 declared a right which could not be taken away : sixty 
 years of captivity could not take from the free-born 
 Ihe right of demanding liberty. In 316, Constantine 
 
 * Religiosa mente in Ecclesia. iC. T., ix. 7.) 
 
 * Ut in die Domini, imancipare et manumittere liceat, reliqux 
 causce vel lites quiescant. (C T., 1. 2. C. 3, 11.) 
 
 ^ Le Blant, Iiiscript. Chret. Acad, de Sc. etc. 
 
 * De Rossi, Bull. Arch. Chrdt., 1866; and La Roma sott. Christ.^ 
 torn. iii. 1877.
 
 54 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 writes to an archbishop : " It has pleased me for a long 
 time to establish that in the Christian Church, masters 
 can give liberty to their slaves provided they do it in 
 presence of all the assembled people and with the assist- 
 ance of Christian priests, and provided that, in order to 
 preserve the memory of the fact, some written document 
 informs where they sign as parties or as witnesses." ^ In 
 321, he directs that "he who under a religious feeling 
 has given a just liberty to his slaves in the bosom of 
 the Christian Church, will be thought to have made a 
 gift of a right similar to Roman citizenship." But this 
 privilege is only granted to those who emancipate under 
 the eyes of the priest.* In 322, various laws defined 
 methods by which persons whose liberty is assailed, 
 even after sentence, may present new proofs of liberty 
 and secure it. ^ 
 
 The progress of legal emancipation under the Chris- 
 tian emperors was slow but certain. Each new ruler 
 enacted some measure which made emancipation easier. 
 The informer against those guilty of certain capital 
 offences, became free. Theodosius the Great freed those 
 who had been circumcised by the Jews, and those who 
 informed against a deserter ; and the emperor Zeno, 
 those who joined the monastic life with the consent of 
 their masters. 
 
 A few words from the priest, even away from the 
 church, would manumit the slave.* 
 
 The law threw every obstacle in the way of separating 
 families. "Who can bear," says the Theodosian Code, 
 
 » Cod. Just, lib. vi. tit. 1. 3. 
 ' Ibid., lib. i. tit. 13, 1. I. 
 
 • Ibid., lib. i. tit. 13, 1. 2. Ibid. Nov. et Cod. Theod., lib. iv. 
 tit. 7, 1- I. 
 
 * De IManumissionibus in ecclesia. {Ibid., lib. iv. tit. 7, 1. 2.)
 
 HUMANITY TOWARDS THE SLAVES $5 
 
 "to see children separated from parents, brothers from 
 sisters, wives from husbands ? " ^ 
 
 The master was held legally as a murderer, if by 
 torture or branding he caused death, after the cruel cus- 
 toms of the horrid barbarians. ^ 
 
 Let the reader compare this with the command of 
 one of the purest of the Stoical jurists. "If by chance 
 there is doubt . . . for the sake of discovering the 
 truth, let hereditary slaves be tortured."^ 
 
 In 441 A.D. a church council (Orange) enacted that 
 a slave once emancipated in church, could not be made 
 either slave or serf again, without incurring ecclesiastical 
 censures. 
 
 Justinian s Reforms. — It is, however, finally under 
 Justinian that the great moral power of Christianity 
 begins most to be felt in the Roman law upon slavery. 
 The Institutes (quoting indeed an older law) speak of 
 that age as one of special humanity, when no one is per- 
 mitted to be cruel to his slave without legal authority.'* 
 
 All presumptions are to be now in " favour of liberty." 
 Thus if there chance to be several owners of a slave, 
 the will of any one could emancipate, and the others are 
 forced to accept compensation at a reduced valuation.^ 
 
 The drift is everwhere towards "the inestimable value* 
 of liberty."'' Slavery was suppressed as a penalty. "We 
 
 ' Quis ferat liberos a parentibus, a fratribus sorores, a viris con- 
 
 juges, segregari. (Lib. ii. tit. 24.) 
 
 2 Saevitia immanium barbarorum. (Lib. ix. tit. 12.) 
 
 ' Si fortasse de filiis aliqua dubitatio habeatur, ut Veritas inveniri 
 
 possit, torqueri servi hereditarii jubentur. {Paul. Sent., v. 16). 
 
 * Sed hoc tempore, nuUis hominibus licet sine causa legibus cognitA 
 in servos suos supra modum sevire. (//«/., p. 109). 
 
 ' T. C. I., vii. 7. De Cormn. Serv. Manuni. 
 
 • Ouum libertas in^stimabilis res sit. {Inst., I. vi. 7). 
 
 ' Pro libertate, quam et favere et tueri Romanis legibus . • , 
 peculiare est. {Covim de Manum.)
 
 56 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 do not transfer" says the Imperial law-giver,* "persons 
 from a free condition into a servile — we who have so 
 much at heart to raise slaves to liberty." He liberates 
 the mutilated ; and those who had served in the army 
 with the knowledge of their master, became as freeborn. 
 Liberty was a reward to certain informers against cer 
 tain offences. The marriage of slaves was strengthened, 
 and the marriage of a free woman with a foreign slave 
 was not forbidden ; a freeman could marry a slave woman 
 by first freeing her. 
 
 A slave who was ordained priest became free by the 
 act usually with the consent of the master. The monas- 
 teries became refuges of slaves. Justinian's Code re- 
 quired every slave entering a monastery to pass a novi- 
 tiate of three years, during which he might be claimed ; 
 if he was proved guilty of theft, he was to be delivered 
 up to his master, but to suffer no further injury. If no- 
 thing was proved against him, and he was not claimed, 
 at the end of three years he was considered "to belong 
 to the common Master of all." A slave-priest, if he re- 
 nounced his sacred office, became slave again. 
 
 The old law had fixed a limit to the age under which 
 a bondman could be freed, and the number who could be 
 thus emancipated : it demanded of freedmen a maturity 
 of thirty years, and created different degrees between 
 the citizen and slave. Justinian abolished all this scale. 
 Legacies and testamentary provisions made before the 
 final will, had been considered null. The new code 
 changed this in favour of liberty. The dying man in 
 his last moments, could set free the infant in the bosom 
 of its mother. If the heir received directions to free one 
 slave, all became free. The new code takes the smallest 
 
 ^ Nov., xxii. 8.
 
 HUMANITY UNDER CHRISTIAN INFLUENCE. 57 
 
 indication as sign of the master's purpose to free his 
 slave. The marriage of the master with a bondwoman 
 freed and legitimated all the children ; and even without 
 marriage, if a slave had the position of wife, she became 
 free with her children, and equally so if bequeathed as 
 a wife to a frecdman. The law gave a new value to all 
 familiar modes of enfranchisement, whether by letter or 
 in presence of friends ; by abandonment, or by covering 
 the slave with a symbolic bonnet at the funeral of his 
 master, or by marriage. The code, with a certain en- 
 thusiasm uncommon in such dry documents, declared its 
 purpose "to have the Republic frequented by freemen 
 rather than liberated slaves." ^ 
 
 Among other laws, one act made the violation of a 
 slave-woman an equal offence with crime committed upon 
 a free — punishable by death. The moveable property of 
 bondmen became their own property, and with it they 
 often purchased their liberty. 
 
 Other acts made the killing of a slave with malice 
 aforethought, homicide ; and the death of a slave after 
 certain barbarous punishments, equivalent to the same 
 offence. Masters also were enjoined to send their sick 
 and useless slaves to the hospital.^ 
 
 We find, too, an expression in the code, as if an in- 
 fluence from the new Religion of humanity, " the intuition 
 of humanity." ^ 
 
 Slaves or freedmen could arrive at the most important 
 offices, provided the masters did not oppose. 
 
 The legal weakening of slavery proceeded by various 
 steps, such as the forbidding the sale of new-born in- 
 
 ' In nostra Rcpublica . . . quum nobis cordi est, ingenuis 
 magis hominibus, quam a libertis, earn frequentari. {De Bonis.) 
 2 Cod., ix. 14. 
 ' Dig. XUt ix.
 
 58 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 fants ; the introducing new modes of emancipation bj 
 the Christian Church ; the delay afforded in proof of 
 hberty and the legal presumption in its favour ; the 
 privileges granted in reclaiming it, and many precautions 
 taken to prevent slavery from being used for purposes 
 of unchastity and of crime. 
 
 Reforms under other Emperors. — Under the Emperor 
 Leo (717 A.D.) all slaves on" imperial domains were allowed 
 to do with their property as they chose ; the law thus at 
 once recognising the ownership of property by a large body 
 of bondmen. Again, the marriage of a free woman and 
 a slave was recognised as legal. The woman could buy 
 her husband, to associate him in her liberty, or share his 
 servitude till the death of the master, which at once 
 freed them and their children ; or the man could free 
 himself by labour for a term of years, which term was 
 fixed by law. The same rules applied to slave marriage, 
 if one of the parties became free. Many Christian freed- 
 men married noble-born women (feminae clarissimae^). 
 One great source of slavery was dried up in this age of 
 " misery " by a law forbidding a freeman to alienate his 
 liberty. Other acts encouraged emancipation. A slave- 
 child held over the sacred font of baptism by the master, 
 his wife or son, became free in the act. A servant taken 
 prisoner by the enemy, was lost to his master; and if he 
 was returned to Roman territory, he became a freeman, 
 provided he had suffered in the public service. By a law 
 under Basil {^6y) it was declared that if a property reverted 
 to the state, the slaves in it became free, If a man died 
 intestate, two-thirds of his property fell to his natural heirs, 
 and one-third went to the state : in this one-third were 
 reckoned the slaves, who thus became free. " It would 
 
 * De llossi, La Rotna soii. Renan, AT. Aur.,c. 11. Tertull., Ad 
 uxor., 1 1, 8.
 
 GRADUAL EMANCIPATION. 59 
 
 be an outrage," says the law, " to the holiness of God- 
 to the wisdom of the prince, and to the conscience of 
 man, not to permit the death of the master to break the 
 yoke of servitude." 
 
 In the tenth century the state preserved a right over 
 the sale of prisoners and of slaves. In 1098, Alexius 
 Comnenus was obliged to invoke the great principle of 
 Christianity, " One God, one Faith, one Baptism," and 
 order all slaves to be freed to whom their masters had 
 refused the benediction of the Christian Church. Legisla- 
 tion became more severe against bondage : the bondman 
 could produce witnesses in favour of his freedom and 
 opposing testimony was not received. If a person was 
 claimed as a slave and could produce witnesses of good 
 character in his favour, his oath could annul the suit 
 (1094 A.D.). Manuel I. (1143) proclaimed freedom to all 
 fallen into slavery through the sale of property, or who 
 had been forced to sell themselves from reasons of 
 poverty. 
 
 Slavery is alluded to in the Eastern empire in 1344, 
 1358, and 1394. It existed in Greece till 1437. 
 
 Among other terrible results of the pauperism of the 
 Roman empire, the masters were in the habit of forcing 
 freemen to contracts which alienated their independence. 
 To check this, Manuel Comnenus declared free all who 
 had been born in liberty. 
 
 In the ninth century, as we stated before, is the first 
 formal mention of a command of the Church against 
 slavery itself. They are the words of St. Theodore of 
 Stude. " Thou shalt possess no slave, neither for domestic 
 service nor for the work of the fields ; for man is made 
 in the image of God." 
 
 No one can carefully study this long series of laws, from 
 Constantine to the tenth century, in regard to slavery.
 
 6o GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 without clearly seeing the effect of Christianity. It is 
 true that the unjust institution still survived, and some 
 of its cruel features remained ; but all through this period 
 the new spirit of humanity is seen struggling against it, 
 even in legislation, which is always the last to feel a new 
 moral power in society. The very language of the acts 
 speaks of the inspiration of the Christian faith ; and the 
 idea which lay at the bottom of the reforms, the value 
 of each individual, and his equality to all others in the 
 sight of God, was essentially Christian. 
 
 But laws are often far behind the practices of a com- 
 munity. The foundation idea of Christ's principles com- 
 pelled his followers to recognise the slave as equal with 
 the master. They sat side by side in church, and partook 
 of the communion together. By the civil law, a master 
 killing his slave accidentally by excessive punishment, 
 was not punished ; but in the church, he was excluded 
 from communion. The chastity of the slave was strictly 
 guarded by the church ; slave-priests were free. The 
 festivals of religion — the Sundays, fast-days and days of 
 joy — were early connected in the Church with the eman- 
 cipation of those in servitude. The consoling words of 
 Christ, repeated from mouth to mouth, and the hope which 
 now dawned on the world through Him, became the 
 especial comfort of that great multitude of unhappy 
 persons, — the Roman bondsmen. The Christian teachers 
 and clergymen became known as " the brothers of the 
 slave " : ^ and the slaves themselves were called " the 
 freedmen of Christ." ^ 
 
 1 Lactantius, Dei hist., lib. v. Also St. Chrys. {Horn.) (xxii. in 
 Ep. ad Ej)h.) No Christian is a slave ; those born again are all 
 brothers. * Acta Si. Justin.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SLAVES IN CRUEL AND LICENTIOUS SPORTS 
 
 The full power of Christianity over Roman slavery can 
 only be fully recognised by also studying its influence on 
 the cruel or licentious shows and games, for which the 
 slaves especially furnished the victims and the debauched 
 actors. 
 
 The highest gratification which an eminent Roman could 
 furnish to the populace, was in some bloody or licentious 
 show. The Stoics spoke of the gladiatorial games with 
 contempt or reproval, but their censure never reached the 
 masses. 
 
 Cicero asks how a cultivated man can possibly take 
 pleasure in seeing a weak man torn by a strong animal, 
 or a splendid brute transfixed by the spear of a well-armed 
 gladiator : ^ and Tacitus dismisses the cruel Drusus, in 
 one of his condensed epithets, as rejoicing too much in 
 cheap blood :^ Caesar is said to have had 320 pairs of 
 gladiators at once in the arena, and to add to the scenic 
 effect, the bloody struggles were at night. 
 
 Trajan surpassed all in forcing 10,000 unhappy prisoners 
 and gladiators to contend for life in the Roman amphi- 
 theatre; the bloody and brutal sport lasted 123 days. 
 
 * Sed quse potest homini esse polito delectatio, quum aut homo 
 imbecillus a valentissima bestia laniatur etc. (Ad Dir.) 
 ^ Vili sanguine nimio gaudens. {Ann., i, 76.) 
 
 61
 
 62 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Constantine, in the very year before his acceptance of 
 Christianity, exposed a vast multitude of prisoners to wild 
 beasts in the amphitheatre, and glutted the people with 
 the sight of blood.^ Under the thorough reform which 
 Christian teaching has introduced in the world, in the 
 matter of bloody sports, we cannot conceive the passion 
 for them among the Roman populace, a passion which 
 centuries of teaching and example scarcely broke up. 
 
 It is related of one Prefect of Rome, Symmachus (392 
 A.D.), that he desired to make a special celebration of a 
 birthday of his little son (parvuli nostri) and for that pur- 
 pose held in reserve a large troop of Saxon prisoners, who 
 were to be slaughtered by wild animals in the arena. To 
 the intense disappointment of the populace and the grief 
 of the Prefect, our savage ancestors, on the very day of the 
 hoped-for festival, all strangled each other (fractas sine 
 laqueo fauces). The worthy Prefect could only resign 
 himself to the consolations of philosophy." It was re- 
 served for a Christian to remind this philosopher of his 
 brutality, in the well-put apopthegm : " No one should 
 perish in the city whose punishment is an amusement." ' 
 
 It was the peculiar duty of Roman magistrates to 
 provide cruel sports for the people ; many made a trade 
 of it. 
 
 The early Christians and the Fathers waged a continual 
 struggle against these bloody shows. So strong was the 
 passion for them, that it is related by Augustine of one 
 convert, that he was forced to the spectacle by his family, 
 but carefully covered his eyes, when a shout from the 
 
 ' Tantam captivoriim multitudinem bestiis objecit, etc. {Pan. Con. 
 
 Aug.. 23, A.D. 313.) 
 
 ^ Sequor sapientis e.xemplum. {Symm. Ep., n, 46.) 
 
 ^ NuUus in urbe cadat, cujus sit poena voluptas. {frud. contra 
 
 Symm., li, 1126.)
 
 BLOODY SHOWS. 63 
 
 multitude caused him to open them in the midst of some 
 bloody scene, and immediately the old savage thirst for 
 blood was aroused, and he became as wildly eager for 
 slaughter as the heathen Romans, and henceforth was an 
 outcast from the Church.^ Even as late as the time of 
 Salvian (450 A.D.) the converts were led away to these 
 shows, and this great preacher thunders against those 
 renegade Christians who find their highest pleasure in 
 seeing men die in the arena, or, what was worse than 
 death, torn and eaten by wild beasts.^ In the East the 
 cruel games ceased with the reign of Theodosius, though 
 combats of beasts still continued. Their final abolition 
 in the West, by the heroism of the monk Telemachus 
 (404), who leaped into the arena and gave his own life for 
 the victims, is well known. 
 
 The first effect of the new spirit on legislation is seen 
 in a law of Constantine, as early as 325 A.D. " Bloody 
 spectacles," he says, " in our present state of civil tran- 
 quillity and domestic peace, do not please us, wherefore 
 we order that all gladiators be prohibited from carrying 
 on their profession." ^ 
 
 He also forbade criminals to be sent to the amphi- 
 theatre, — a practice he had formally sanctioned ten years 
 before. 
 
 ' Confessions, lib. vi. 8. For so soon as he saw that blood, he 
 drank down savageness ; nor turned away, but fixed his eyes, drinking 
 in phrensy and madness, and was delighted with that guilty fighting 
 and intoxicated with the bloody pastime. Nor was he now the man 
 he came, but one of the throng he came unto ; yea, a true associate 
 of them that brought him hither. 
 
 2 Ubi summum deliciorum genus est mori homines, aut quod morte 
 gravius, acerbiusque, lacerari, expleri ferarum alvos humanis carni- 
 bus. {De Glib. Dei., vi.) 
 
 * Cruenta spectacula in otio civili et domestica quiete, non 
 placuit ; qua propter omnino gladiatoies esse prohibemus. {Cod, 
 Theod.^ Ixv. tit. 12, L I.)
 
 64 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Human Sacrifices. — Besides the influence of Christi- 
 anity on bloody sports, it should not be forgotten that in 
 the Roman empire, and wherever it has had sway, it 
 has done away with human sacrifices. Whenever, in the 
 earlier history, dangers approached Rome, foreign captives 
 were burned in the forum, though at the same period a 
 poet could say that God was ever gentle and kindred to 
 man.^ Even in the time of Pliny there were sacrifices of 
 human beings, though Seneca was proclaiming that " man 
 ought to be sacred to man." ^ Still later, emperors like 
 Commodus and Elagabalus believed that they gave the 
 highest pleasure to the gods by sacrificing children of 
 noble birth and beauty. 
 
 It need scarcely be said that such cruelties passed away 
 under the faintest light from the Religion of Love. Not 
 only in the Roman empire, but in all countries where 
 Christianity has any influence, have these barbarities ac- 
 companying the religious sentiment ceased to exist. 
 
 Licentious Shoivs. — The cruel sports of Rome were not 
 the only source of the degradation of Roman society. 
 The exhibition of licentious shows and immoral plays had 
 a profound influence. The extremes to which these were 
 carried cannot even be explained in modern writings. In 
 fact, few classical scholars who have not waded through the 
 disgusting mire of a large part of Roman literature, can 
 have even an idea of the depth of obscenity and immor- 
 ality which it reached. Athenaeus, Petronius, Apuleius (in 
 his lighter works), Juvenal, and many others, only show 
 how debased even genius and talent may become under 
 such influences as so much of the Greek and Roman 
 religions furnished. Even the universal suffering and ruin 
 of the Roman empire had no influence on the public 
 
 ' Mite et cognatum est homini Deus. {Silius, iv. J^^.) 
 2 BoissUr.
 
 FEELINGS OF THE EARLY CHRISTIANS. 65 
 
 appetite for these enjoyments. In Salvian's bitter epi- 
 gram, the empire "ridet et moritur," laughs while it is 
 dying. 
 
 It is not strange that the early Christians came to have 
 towards these shows somewhat of the feelings which the 
 English Puritans entertained towards all dramatic exhibi- 
 tions. They were not only offensive to the new ideas 
 of purity spreading through the world, but they were 
 products of and associated with the idolatrous faith of 
 the day. The Fathers and early disciples set themselves 
 especially to free great classes of human beings who were 
 the peculiar victims of these degrading customs — the 
 slaves of the stage. 
 
 The effect of their spirit even upon a half-converted 
 Roman, like Constantino, is striking. Much of his legis- 
 lation has the sound of Puritan rigidity and purity. A 
 public show of the most indecent description, a great 
 favourite with the populace, called Maiiiina, wherein, 
 among other licentiousness, nude women bathed before the 
 crowd, was utterly forbidden and denounced as " foedum 
 atque indecorum spectaculum"; yet, says wisely the law, 
 " we allow ludicrous arts to be practised, lest sadness be 
 produced by excessive restriction." ^ 111385 several laws 
 were passed against the profession of female musicians, 
 who were frequently seduced, and whose business was a 
 means of vice. Theodosius forbade judges and magistrates 
 to be present at theatrical shows after noon, for it was 
 in that part of the day that indecent plays were exhibited. 
 At length all spectacles were forbidden on Sunday, and 
 the prohibition was extended still further to saints' days 
 by Theodosius III. A general endeavour appears in all 
 this legislation to withdraw from such professions all whom 
 
 ^ Ludicros artes concedimus agitari, ne ex nimia harum restric- 
 tione, tristia ^encretur. {Cod. Theod.^ Ixx. tit, 6. 1. 2.)
 
 66 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 poverty or slavery kept in them. In 343 a law forbade 
 procurers from selling Christian female slaves to any 
 except to Christian masters,^ and authorized priests and 
 all Christians summarily to deliver any Christian women 
 who were about to be handed over to prostitution,* 
 and on their complaint they could be brought before the 
 court and delivered from misery. No Christian woman, 
 free or slave, could be forced to serve as a prostitute 
 on the stage ; and if a slave, could be freed at once on 
 appeal. 
 
 It may here be remarked, that in 439 a law of Theo- 
 dosius suppressed the profession of the Icno, or " procurer," 
 in Constantinople ; though no legislation could cure the 
 deep-seated disease of Roman society. 
 
 Under Constantine, the crime of violence upon a woman 
 which had formerly been punished only when the victim 
 demanded redress, and was then considered merely as a 
 loss of services or property inflicted on the father of the 
 woman, received now the penalty of death, even if the 
 one injured did not bring action. 
 
 Justiniaiis Refonns. — The Roman law, as codified under 
 Justinian, shows a still greater disposition to deliver all 
 Christians who were bound to these foul trades.^ In 
 case of approaching death, it was provided that if the last 
 sacraments were administered, and still the slaves of the 
 stage recovered, then these women were freed from their 
 
 1 Cod. Theod., Ixv. tit. 18, I.4. 
 
 ^ Lenones, patres et dominos qui suis filiis vel ancillis peccande 
 necessitatem imponunt nee jure frui domini, nee tanti criminis 
 libertate gaudere. {Cod. Theod., Ixv. tit. 8, 1. 26.) 
 
 ^ Quaecunque ex his jus modi /^^^ progenit^, seenica offieio decli- 
 nare . . . deputentur. {Cod. 'J'/ieod., xv.) 
 
 Quicumque Christianus sit in quolibet crimine deprehensus, lud« 
 non adjucitur. {Cod. Theod., ix. 40.)
 
 LICENTIOUSNESS RESTRAINED. 67 
 
 bonds to the theatre. But even then, public officials were 
 bound to sit in judgment as to their need of the last 
 sacraments. The stern Roman law held them bound to 
 these degrading occupations by a " natural bond." They 
 were not even considered worthy of suffering the penalties 
 of adultery. The Christian law forbade them to be taken 
 back to the stage if they had become Christians and were 
 leading a worthy life.^ If, however, they fell again into 
 their old vices, they were forced to retake their old pro- 
 fession, and could be absolved from it no more until old 
 age drove them from the stage. Justinian also declared all 
 engagements retaining women by force on the stage as 
 null and void. The archbishops were required, in union 
 with the magistrates, to watch over the execution of this 
 law. 
 
 When at length these unfortunate women, slaves of 
 sensuality, were excluded from the public stage, they were 
 employed in private festivals, until Theodosius was com- 
 pelled to forbid by law women from being sold or trained 
 for these social entertainments. Even as late as the 
 eleventh century, the Council of France condemned the 
 presence of the clergy at fetes where such professional 
 actors were employed. 
 
 The Church carefully excluded from communion all who 
 had any connection with licentious sports ; and so powerful 
 was the new feeling of purity, that even obscene statues in 
 public places were forbidden by law.^ 
 
 It is a part of this new reign of chastity and humanity, 
 that the employment of mutilated persons, as attendants, 
 was forbidden by the Church, and the maiming of them 
 
 ' Qiias melior vivendi usus vinculo nahiralis conditionis evolvit, 
 retrahi vetamus. {Cod. Th., xv.) 
 
 * Neque unquam posthac liceat in loco honesto inhonestas adstari 
 personas. {Cod. Th., xv.)
 
 68 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 was attended with the severest penalties. A slave muti- 
 lated became free.^ 
 
 The early Christians not only attacked and weakened 
 slavery by freeing this unfortunate class, who were bound 
 to licentious professions, but their spirit of humanity led 
 to a ransoming of captives, which assumed considerable 
 importance. The laws encouraged this in the highest 
 degree. The Theodosian Code especially exhorts Christians 
 who are near these captives, to take pains in regard to 
 their redemption ;~ and the commentator speaks of the 
 '•ansoming of prisoners as an act of special generosity.^ 
 Whole populations were ransomed, and it became one of 
 the first duties of the Church "to set the captive free." 
 The wealth of private individuals, and the treasures of 
 the churches, were continually used for this purpose. One 
 saint (Paul) is said to have delivered himself up to slavery 
 for the sake of saving the son of a widow from captivity. 
 
 It was a favourite proverb that " to buy a slave is to gain 
 a soul." 4 
 
 The Christians equally dried up another source of slavery 
 by steadily and consistently opposing, as we shall show 
 later, the abandonment and exposition of children. Their 
 charity, also, constantly saved fcimilics from the depths of 
 pauperism which were opening ; for, as the eloquent Salvian 
 says, the Roman state in the fifth century, owing to its 
 wasteful financial system and eno;mous taxation, was 
 "dying as if of strangulation." ^ The tendency, too, of the 
 
 ' Novell., cxlii. 
 
 2 Christirinos proximorum locoriim, voliimus hujus rei solicitu- 
 dinem gerere. {Cod. Theod. v. 5, i.) 
 
 3 PriEcipua liberalitas redimere captivos. 
 * Const. Apost., 1 1, 62. 
 
 ' Quum Romana republica, vel jam mortua, vel certe extremum 
 spirilum agens , . . tributorum vinculis, quasi manibus stranj;ulata, 
 moriatur {De Gub. Dei, iv. i.)
 
 REHABILITATION OF LABOUR. 69 
 
 Christian belief must have continually raised the poor by 
 elevating their sense of their own dignity — a sense which 
 in all ages has worked against the degrading tendencies of 
 poverty, and would therefore preserve a population from 
 falling into slavery. Christ and the Apostles taught, by 
 example and words, the value and dignity of labour ; and 
 a cardinal doctrine of Christian morals was the importance 
 of industry. The word operative {pperarins) became ele- 
 vated in public esteem, and Christian working men and 
 women are praised in the epitaphs for being good workers.^ 
 In fact, throughout the Roman empire a grand rehabi- 
 litation of labour began under Christianity, which has 
 never ceased. All the useless servants of Roman society 
 — the parasite, the pimp, the circus rider, the gladiator, 
 the debauched actor, the representative of indecent amuse- 
 ments, the servant of idols, the object of disgusting and 
 unnatural pleasures, the low and obscene comedian and 
 prostitute — were changed by the new Faith into industrious 
 producers and workers.- Work became honoured under 
 the new religion. Christ was reproached by the assailants 
 of Christianity as being born of a " working mother " 
 (operariae matris) ; and the Christian ecclesicB became little 
 fraternities of free labourers and competitors of the great 
 slave-estates,^ 
 
 We have already remarked that the word servus^ 
 seldom occurs on a Christian epitaph ; as if the believer 
 felt that in the kingdom of Christ all were free. A 
 slave, when examined before a judge, not unfrequently 
 replied, " I am not a slave : I am a Christian — Christ has 
 freed me." ^ 
 
 ' De Rossi, " Amatrix pauperorum et operaria." 
 
 ^ See Allard, Les Esclaves CJwet. 
 
 ■ See De Rossi, La Roma softer. Chriif., tomo iii. 1877 
 
 * Le Blant, Inscr. Chrdt., etc., i., 119. ' Ibid.
 
 70 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 All these profound moral and legal influences worked 
 ap^ainst Roman slavery. But the fearful " misery " of the 
 empire still sustained it. So profoundly was Roman 
 society disorganized by its own vices, by bad govern- 
 ment, absurd finance, civil war, the invasion of barbarians, 
 and universal poverty among the working classes, that 
 bondage became often the least of many evils threaten- 
 ing. 
 
 Serfdom. — In such universal disorder, it is not unnatural 
 that an intermediate state should have formed itself be- 
 tween freedom and servitude. The peasants and poor 
 farmers would find themselves safer under the protection 
 of a larger cultivator, to whom they bound themselves 
 for certain obligations ; or the state settled such colonists 
 {coloni) on the large farms, holding them bound to the soil, 
 but with many personal rights ; or, under these moral 
 forces of which we have been speaking, the personal slave 
 was gradually transformed into the serf bound to the 
 soil. 
 
 The serfs or coloni began to appear after Constantine ; 
 they were especially found on the frontiers of the em- 
 pire, and in the Gauls, Thrace and Illyria. They were 
 sold with the land ; their only obligation being a small 
 rent. They could make contracts, marry, and even acquire 
 property under certain conditions. 
 
 Yet the new law, modified by Christianity, protected 
 even the serfs. Justinian was careful not to accept the 
 avowals of coloni who would become adscriptitii, — those 
 more closely bound to the soil and liable to a tribute, — 
 but demanded other testimony, lest "freemen might fall 
 into an inferior state " from temporary misfortune. He 
 abolished also the legal distinction which existed be- 
 tween three different classes of freedmen, making them 
 all equal before the Roman law. A slave became at once
 
 OTHER INFLUENCES ON SLAVERY. 71 
 
 free by any act of his owner signifying an intention of 
 bestowing freedom.^ 
 
 It is of course understood that many material and even 
 economical causes combined with such a moral power as 
 Christianity to mitigate and overthrow an ancient abuse, 
 like Roman slavery. The province of the moral forces 
 is to stimulate the conscience and sympathies ; the result 
 may be hastened or long delayed by external influences. 
 
 ' Nullo nee setatis manumisse, nee dominii manumitteiitis, nee ia 
 modo manumissionis discrimine habita (C. 71, xix. 17, 1.)
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 EXPOSURE OF CHILDREN. 
 
 Slavery in the Roman world, as we have said, was In 
 part sustained by a practice so revolting and inhuman as 
 hardly to be comprehensible to modern ideas — the sys- 
 tematic exposure or abandonment of the children of the 
 poor, and of female or defective children by the rich. So 
 completely had luxury eaten away the natural instincts 
 in one class, and so deep and degrading was the misery in 
 another, that parents were found willing continually to 
 abandon their offspring to the worst of destinies, in order 
 to escape inconvenience, anxiety or burden ; — these little 
 ones, be it remembered, being not usually the fruit of 
 illicit connections, but the children of legal marriage. 
 
 One of the most powerful of the natural instincts and 
 affections was, throughout a wide multitude, utterly sub- 
 verted by the low moral tone of the then civilized world. 
 There are innumerable allusions to this inhuman treatment 
 of young children throughout Latin literature. In two 
 different comedies or dialogues, the husband on starting 
 upon a journey is represented as ordering his wife who is 
 soon to give birth to a babe, to destroy it, if it prove a 
 girl ; and the plot of one turns on the wife's foolish weak- 
 ness in exposing rather than killing the female infant.^ 
 It has often been observed that the famous apopthegm of 
 
 ' Apuleius, Met., lib. x. Terence, Andr., Act iv. scene 5. Heaui., 
 Act iii. scene 5. 
 
 n
 
 EXPOSURE OF CHILDREN. 73 
 
 humanity, "I am a man, and nothing of man is foreign to 
 me," which called out such applause in the Roman theatre, 
 is uttered in this play by the very father who had rebuked 
 the mother for thus sparing the child. 
 
 Plautus,^ alludes to the custom of exposing the girl to 
 death, without any especial condemnation. Lucian speaks 
 of it in his " Courtesans." 
 
 Stobaeus ^ says : " The poor man raises his sons, but the 
 daughters, even if one is poor, we expose." Quintilian's 
 apopthegm is that, " to kill a man is often held to be 
 a crime, but to kill one's own children is sometimes 
 considered a beautiful action among the Romans ; " and 
 he admits that the exposed little ones rarely survive.' 
 Ovid gives a pathetic picture of the new born whose first 
 day was its last, exposed to wild beasts ; and describes 
 those who flit about in the night, seeking for these un- 
 fortunate little creatures for the worst of purposes.* Pliny ^ 
 speaks coolly of those who hunt for the brains and marrow 
 of infants, probably for superstitious or medicinal pur- 
 poses. 
 
 Seneca gives this horrible description of the mutilation 
 to which unfortunate children were exposed : " Portentos 
 foetus extinguimus ; liberos quoque si debiles, monstrosi- 
 que editi sunt, mergimus. Non ira, sed ratio est, a sanis, 
 inutilia secernere." (Monstrous offspring we destroy ; 
 children too, if weak and unnaturally formed from birth, 
 we drown. It is not anger, but reason, thus to separate 
 the useless from the sound.) {De Ira, I. 15.) 
 
 ' Dat earn puellam ei servo exponendam ad necem. (Act L 
 scene 3.) 
 ' Serm.y 75. 
 » Quint. DeCy 306, vi. 
 
 Ovid., Fast., vi. 91, Her. Ep. xi. 
 
 • Alii medullas crurum quaerunt, et cerebrorum infantum. (JPlm. 
 Hist. Nat., lib. 28, c 2,)
 
 74 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 In another work {Controversi, lib. v., 33) he denounces 
 the horrible practice, common in Rome, of maiming these 
 unfortunate children, and then offering them to the gaze 
 of the compassionate. He describes the miserable little 
 creatures, with shortened limbs, broken joints and curved 
 backs, exhibited by the villanous beggars who had gathered 
 them at the Lactarian column, and then deformed them : 
 " Volo nosse," " I should like to know," says the moralist, 
 with a burst of human indignation, " illam calamitatum 
 humanarum ofhcinam — illud infantum spoliarium !" — "that 
 workshop of human misfortunes — those shambles of in- 
 fants ! " 
 
 On the day that Germanicus died, says Suetonius 
 {Calig., n. 5), " Subversae Deiim arae, partus conjugum 
 expositi," parents exposed their new born babes. 
 
 The little ones thus abandoned were gathered, some- 
 times by witches, to use their bodies in incantations, or 
 more frequently by slave-dealers, to train as female slaves 
 or prostitutes. In the dialogue by Terence, to which we 
 have alluded, the father (Chremes) while reproaching the 
 mother for not killing the child, says, " What did you 
 propose to do ? What did you desire ? Consider, you 
 would have abandoned your daughter to that old witch ! 
 That is clear enough. To make her, by your help, a slave 
 or a prostitute ! "^ 
 
 The exposure in Rome was commonly made by night, 
 near the Lactarian column, and in the Velabrum, a parish 
 or district in the city, near Mount Aventine. Though 
 the father often designed the death of the infant, yet 
 some benevolent persons now and then rescued a child, 
 who became afterwards distinguished. Several instances of 
 
 - Quam bene viro abste prospectum est? quid voluisti ? cogita! 
 Nempe anni illi prodita abste filia est planissime ; 
 Per te veluti auaestum faceret, velubi veniret palaiu
 
 STOICAL PROTESTS. 75 
 
 this are given by classic historians. Quintihan calls on 
 his readers to imagine the pitiable fate of the abandoned 
 child, exposed to birds of prey and wild beasts ; ^ and 
 Juvenal pictures the fine lady of the day going to the 
 Velabrum, to find some infant whom she can substitute 
 for her own, — in vain expected, — and thus secure some 
 inheritance.^ 
 
 With this practice was intimately connected the custom 
 of destroying life in its germ, which was so common in 
 Roman wealthy society. We need not adduce proofs of 
 this well-known crime. 
 
 It is not to be supposed that the instinct of humanity 
 before Christianity was utterly silent as to these cruel or 
 pernicious habits and practices. A Stoical jurist, Julius 
 Paulus, in the time of the Emperor Severus (222-225 A.D.), 
 though he could not directly say that these offences were 
 contrary to law, yet ventured to pronounce the mother 
 who destroyed life in the womb, or who refused nourish- 
 ment, or exposed her offspring in public places, as equally 
 guilty of murder.^ 
 
 The Stoical philosophers, rhetoricians, historians, and 
 even the poets, pleaded or declaimed incessantly against 
 these crimes. They knew the right. Yet here, as in so 
 many other instances in antiquity, there was a fatal want of 
 power to carry out the good instincts into practical action. 
 The overwhelming poverty of the empire led the poor 
 incessantly to these offences, and the rich had found no 
 sufficient impulse in the maxims of Stoicism to resist the 
 
 ' Vos ponite ante oculos puerum statim neglectum ; cui mori domi 
 expediret, inde nudum corpus, sub ccelo, inter feras et volucres. 
 {Dec, 306.) 
 
 - Sat., vi. 605. 
 
 3 Necare videtur non tantum is qui partum perfocat, sed is qui 
 abjecit et qui alimonia denegat, et is qui p blicis locis, misericordise 
 causa, exponit, quam ipse non habet.
 
 76 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 enticements of a selfish cruelty. Some of the more 
 humane of the Roman emperors, as we have described 
 elsewhere, attempted to cure these evils, by founding 
 charities for abandoned and destitute children. It was all 
 however in vain. Exposure and child murder and the 
 sale of children increased. Nor did the Stoical philosophy 
 seem to exert much more influence on legislation than on 
 practical morals. There was indeed under Severus a law 
 passed which secured the liberty of a child sold by its 
 father from reasons of poverty ; another act punished with 
 banishment the creditor who would receive children as 
 security for debt, before ascertaining whether they were 
 free or not. The Emperor Diocletian renewed the edicts 
 of Severus, and took away from the father all right of 
 giving, selling, or pledging his children. 
 
 When the peculiar power of Christianity began to work 
 in the Roman empire, it tended, of course, in every way to 
 eradicate these horrible evils. Nothing could be further 
 from its spirit than such enormities. Human life every- 
 where was profoundly sacred to it, and the Church began 
 immediately to protect and shelter unfortunate children. 
 The Christian Fathers, whose influence in some directions 
 is by no means admirable, in this were consistent with the 
 teachings of their great Leader and the Founder of theiir 
 Faith. They struggled incessantly against the exposure 
 of children. " We have renounced," says one,^ " your 
 bloody spectacles, believing that there is no difl"erence 
 between regarding a murder and committing it. We hold 
 for homicides the women who commit abortion, and we 
 think that to expose a child is to kill him." " One meets," 
 says another,^ " among all nations only children destined 
 for the most horrible purposes, and who arc nourished like 
 troops of animals ; you raise a tribute on these children.' 
 * Athenag. Apol. ^ Justin. Apol.
 
 THE FATHERS ON EXPOSURE OF CHHDREN. 77 
 
 ** The wicked alone can expose his children ; for us, this 
 impiety only inspires horror : first, because the most of 
 these unfortunate little ones are destined for debauch ; 
 then, because we would fear the accusation of murder if 
 they should die." Clement says, " Man is more cruel to 
 his offspring than animals." TertuUian's appeal is well 
 known. 
 
 Felix speaks of children exposed to wild beasts and 
 birds, and of these crimes as exceeding the worst of ancient 
 times, Lactantius, after an eloquent passage, says, " These 
 parricides allege their extreme poverty and the impossi- 
 bility of raising their families." ..." They have 
 educated their own blood for slavery or the brothel." ^ 
 Basil (381 A.D.) preaches against the spectacle of free 
 children sold by creditors in the market, and those who 
 expose them from reasons of poverty.^ 
 
 Justin pours forth indignation at those who expose 
 their offspring, and thus suffer both girls and boys to be 
 brought up for the basest purposes.^ 
 
 It is unnecessary to give more instances of the unceasing 
 protests of humanity, addressed by the early Fathers 
 against this cruel practice. 
 
 The great obstacle to reform, however, was the profound 
 and terrible pauperism of the Roman empire. When, 
 under Constantine, the spirit of Christianity began to affect 
 Roman legislation on this subject, there came up always 
 the practical difficulty — What shall be done with the ex- 
 posed child .'' He will only be preserved from death by 
 
 * Addixit certe sanguinem suum vel ad servitutem vel ad lupanar. 
 (L. C. Lact., De vero cultu, lib. vi.) 
 ^ Qui praetextu ad paupertate qusesito suos infantes exponunt. 
 
 {Jl077iel^ 
 
 ^ Quia videmus ... ad stupra non puellas solum, sed etiam 
 masculos produci . . . , pueros ad turpes usus, etc {Apol., 1, 
 c. 27.)
 
 y8 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 those who would make a slave of him. To forbid such 
 slavery may only increase the evils of exposure. These 
 difficulties constantly modified legislation on this evil. 
 Constantine, in the year 315, was obliged to put forth the 
 following proclamation : " Let a law be at once promul- 
 gated in all the towns of Italy, to turn parents from using 
 a parricidal hand on their new-born children, and to dispose 
 their hearts to the best sentiments. Watch with care over 
 this, that, if a father bring his child, saying, that he cannot 
 support it, one should supply him without delay with food 
 and clothing; for the cares of the new born suffer no delay, 
 and we order that our revenue, as well as our treasure, aid 
 in this expense." And again in 321 : "We have learned 
 that the inhabitants of provinces, suffering from scarcity of 
 food, sell and put in pledge their children. We command 
 then that those found in this situation, without any per- 
 sonal resource, and only being able with great trouble to 
 support their children, be succoured by our treasury before 
 they fall under the blows of poverty ; for it is repugnant 
 to our morals that any one under our empire should be 
 pushed by hunger to commit a crime." ^ 
 
 Constantine was subsequently (331) obliged, in view of 
 the increasing calamities of the empire, to enact a law that 
 any one " taking up " an exposed infant had the power 
 to adopt him as a child, or to keep him as a slave, and 
 the natural father had no right to reclaim him. He was 
 however permitted to obtain his child again, if he paid the 
 full price, or replaced him by another slave. 
 
 Valentinian (366) proclaimed to the empire the duty of 
 parents supporting their children, and threatened punish- 
 ment for the crime of exposure ; but the unnatural parent 
 was not permitted "to claim as his, whom he had led to 
 death." The sale of the children of the poor was not 
 ' Cod. Theod., xi. tit. 27.
 
 THE COUNCILS. 79 
 
 absolutely forbidden (from motives of humanity), but if 
 reclaimed, parents were to pay the full price and one-fifth 
 in addition. 
 
 The Christian councils, which set themselves firmly 
 against the crime, as well as the Christian emperors and 
 law-givers, were obliged through the fourth, fifth, and sixth 
 centuries to leave children to become slaves to save them, 
 as the phrase was, " from the teeth of dogs." The councils 
 repeatedly exhorted the faithful to collect abandoned 
 children, and to hold them either in adoption or servitude. 
 
 As early as 325, the Council of Nice ordered the founda- 
 tion of hospitals in the principal towns, some of which 
 would no doubt shelter the foundlings. The Council of 
 Vaison (442) established rules as to the receiving and 
 taking care of abandoned little ones. Whoever shall find 
 one, shall bring him to the church, where the fact shall 
 be formally certified. The following Lord's Day, the 
 clergyman shall announce to the faithful, that a new born 
 has been found, and ten days' time will be granted to the 
 parents to recognize and reclaim him. When these for- 
 malities had been fulfilled, if any one reclaimed a child 
 or calumniated him who received it, he was punished 
 with severe ecclesiastical penalties.^ No council, however, 
 ventured to proclaim the emancipation of the abandoned 
 little ones. 
 
 The full effect of the new Faith upon legislation on this 
 matter was not seen however before the reign of Justinian. 
 This emperor (529-534) took the humane ground that 
 the abandoned infant, even if a slave, became free by the 
 act ; and that if it were found, it became the property 
 neither of the finder nor of the parent who had exposed 
 it ; the law recognized in such children the power of ac- 
 
 * Acta Cone. Concil. Vas. (ix. 1), De ExpositiSy etc.
 
 8o GESTA CHRTSTL 
 
 quiring property for themselves and of disposing of it in 
 favour of their own descendants.! 
 
 In 533, the emperor, finding how little legislation was 
 lessening this fearful evil, proclaimed as the height of 
 cruelty the depriving such unfortunate children of their 
 liberty, and threatened the authors of the crime with the 
 severest penalties. He announced again that all infants 
 exposed near churches or in other places, became free by 
 this act,^ and declared anew that no right of reclaiming 
 existed over these unfortunate beings. The famous Code 
 made the act of exposure as much more cruel than 
 murder, as it strikes beings more feeble and worlhy of 
 pity. The Novelise^ speak of the crime as one alien to 
 human feeling and which even barbarians could not 
 commit. 
 
 In 553, Justinian invited the Archbishop and Prefect of 
 Thessalonica to give to exposed infants all the assistance 
 possible, while threatening a severe fine on all who diso- 
 beyed.* The law, however, still allowed the father, in 
 extreme distress, to sell his child at the moment of birth, 
 and permitted the purchaser to retain it in service. 
 
 Houses of mercy for children were founded also by 
 Justinian. The churches and Church charities became 
 refuges for this unfortunate class. Christian charity at- 
 tempted to alleviate the great evil which law could not 
 correct or the usual spirit of humanity prevent. A marble 
 vessel was provided for exposed infants at the door of 
 
 1 Sancimus nemini licere, sive ab ingenuis genitoribus puer parvu- 
 lus procreatus, sive a libertini progenie, sive servili conditione macu- 
 latus, expositus sit, enim puerum in suum dominum indicare. 
 
 ^ Sancimus ut quosque vel in ecclesiis vel in vicis vel aliis locis 
 abjectos constiterit, modis omnibus liberi sint. {Cod. Just., lib. xii.) 
 
 3 Crimen a sensu humano alicnum, et quod ne ab uUis quidem 
 barbaris admitti credibile est. (Aw., iii.) 
 
 * Nov.^ ix. 38.
 
 FOUNDLINGS. 8i 
 
 each church. In a later age, this simple provision of 
 humanity was imitated in a manner which produced great 
 evils, in the well-known "turning-slide" [tour) of French 
 asylums for foundlings. In that time of cruelty and hard- 
 ness, however, the church receptacle was for these infants 
 the alternative to "servitas aut lupanar," the slave's chain 
 or the brothel. 
 
 The servants of the Church (matricularii) or the clergy- 
 man received the infant, and drew up a legal form, certi- 
 fying to abandonment. The latter then enquired, in the 
 religious meeting of the faithful, if any would take charge 
 of the infant. All these formalities must receive the 
 sanction of the archbishop. Often a family was found 
 who would consent to adopt the orphan, or, if not, the 
 Church took charge of him. In some of the towns, the 
 new born thus abandoned was exposed at the doors of 
 the church by order of the archbishop, during ten days.^ 
 If any one recognized the babe, or could designate the 
 parents, he was bound to inform the ecclesiastical authori- 
 ties. The nurses (nutricarii) who had charge of the infant 
 received a formal and legal paper, in which their own 
 compensation was fixed, and the circumstances of the 
 exposure were stated, and their right recognized of holding, 
 if necessary, the child as a slave. 
 
 The churches generally held among their serfs the new 
 born thus found and supported. Many churches had 
 orphan or foundling refuges connected with them. 
 
 In the eighth century, the evil in Europe was at an 
 extreme point ; the poor sold their offspring, and great 
 numbers of children perished. In the Gauls, as well as 
 Germany, Italy, and England, needy peasants openly 
 offered their children for sale. Many of the saints are 
 
 ' Hist. d(s Enfanls tronvh, par J. F. Terme et J. B. Monfalgon, 
 Paris, 1840. 
 
 a
 
 82 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 related to have been thus sold. In the British Islands, 
 the traffic became an object of a special mission by Pope 
 Gregory, who sought to abolish it. " Our Divine Re- 
 deemer," says this pontiff", "in making Himself man, has 
 delivered us all from servitude, and has restored us to our 
 primeval liberty. Let us imitate His example, in freeing 
 from slavery the men who are free by the laws of nature." ^ 
 
 As we have related elsewhere, Christian charity early 
 began efforts to relieve these great evils, by the foundation 
 of refuges and orphan-asylums. There is an indication of 
 one as early as the fifth century in Treves ; ^ and another 
 was founded in 'jZ'j, by Archbishop Datheus, at Milan, 
 whose words are thus reported : " I desire that as soon as 
 an infant shall be exposed in church, he be received by the 
 superintendent of the hospital, and entrusted to the care 
 of nurses employed for this purpose. These children are to 
 learn a trade, and when they have arrived at the age of 
 eight years, I desire that they be freed from all servitude, 
 and be at liberty to go and dwell where they please." ^ 
 
 Several asylums are mentioned in the eighth century in 
 different portions of Europe ; some created by individuals, 
 and others founded by royal authority. Still others are 
 spoken of in Italy in the fourteenth century. From these 
 has sprung the long list of Christian charities for children in 
 all civilized countries ; asylums, refuges, creches, infant and 
 industrial schools, reformatory institutions and aid societies 
 without number, caring for the orphan, the blind, the deaf 
 and dumb, the crippled and defective, the foundling and 
 
 * Greg, op., Ep. xii. 1. vi. l6. 
 
 2 Terine et Monfalqon. 
 
 ' Quoted in Hist, des Enfans TrouvSs, Terme et Monfalgon. 
 also Miiratori. 
 
 Volo atque statuo, ut cum tales fcminte, quae instiyante adver- 
 sario ex adultero acceperint et parturierint, etc. Muratori, Ant. Ital.^ 
 3,558.
 
 CHARITIES FOR CHILDREN. 83 
 
 outcast. Christ especially showed his feeling for the child \ 
 and Christianity, following His teachings, has always set 
 the utmost value on the person and well-being of children, 
 which, indeed, is but the natural fruit of the whole 
 tendency of this religion. Probably, of all practical 
 changes which Christianity has encouraged or commenced 
 in the history of the world, this respect and value for 
 children is the most important, as it affects the foundation 
 of all society and government, and influences a far distant 
 future.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 HUMANITY IN ROMAN LAW. 
 
 We refer continually to Constantine's legislation, not 
 because this emperor could be considered a Christian 
 convert, but because now, for the first time, Christianity 
 was openly influencing Roman jurists. A brief review 
 of some of the humane legislation of Constantine wili 
 show the working of the new system of morals. A law 
 (312 A.D.) exempted Christian ministers from municipal 
 charges, even as the pagan priests had been, thus putting 
 the officials of the new religion on an equality with those 
 of the old. An edict at Milan (313) granted liberty of 
 conscience to Christians and worshippers under all other 
 religions. In the same year emancipation was permitted 
 in a Christian church. In 321 legacies were allowed to 
 religious houses ; succour was sent to the African clergy, 
 and the general observance of Sunday was prescribed. The 
 panegyrics on Constantine spoke of his laws, as especially 
 established for the control of morals and breaking the 
 power of vices.^ His biographer expressly says that he 
 desired to conform his legislation to the spirit of Christi- 
 anity, and in this view he endeavoured to break down the 
 old legislation which had oppressed the weak. It was 
 with this purpose that he conferred upon the archbishops 
 
 ' Novte leges regcndis moribus et frangcndis vitiis constitutae; 
 (Paneg. Con., c. 38.)
 
 HUMANE LEGISLATION. 85 
 
 the legal right to protect the weak and become arbiters in 
 civil cases, which, in an age of such cruelty and oppression, 
 was often a great means of protection to the poorer classes. 
 In fact this practice was the beginning of the system of 
 arbitration (y^?/i-/r^>^), which in the Middle Ages became 
 so important an influence in rescuing society in Germany 
 from " private war " and anarchy. The custom itself dates 
 from the habit of the early Christians, taught by the 
 Apostles, of deciding their disputes by arbiters chosen 
 among themselves. 
 
 An act (325) asserts the rigb' of all the inhabitants of 
 the empire to have recourse to ^the courts of justice, and 
 the duty of all judges and magistrates to exercise strict 
 impartiality. All were held equal before the law. Another 
 (331) protests against the venality so common throughout 
 the administration. " Let the rapacious hands of officials 
 cease from their plunder — cease, I say!"^ In 334, it was 
 proclaimed that widows and orphans, the weak and the 
 poor, cannot be forced before a tribunal of their own 
 province (where influence and wealth might oppress them), 
 but can appeal to the emperor. In 365, Valentinian I. 
 freed widows from the tax laid on the common people, 
 and exempted orphans up to the age of 20, and female 
 orphans till they were married. 
 
 The first laws upon the observance of Sunday are 
 especially in the interest of the working-classes, and clearly 
 manifest the influence of the new ideas in the Roman 
 world. Thus one (321) forbade other labours than those 
 of the fields on Sunday, and all civil public acts, except 
 emancipation. Soldiers, too, were allowed the privilege of 
 assisting at divine worship on that day. 
 
 ' Cessent jam nunc rapaces officialium inanus, cessent inquam ! 
 Cod. Theod., 1 i. tit. 72, 4. Cod. yiist., lib. iii. tit. 12, 2, 3. Cod 
 r/ieod., lib. ii. tit. 8. 2, i. Cod. Just., lib. ii. tit. 58, 2, i.
 
 86 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 If we reflect on the condition of Roman slaves and 
 all labourers at that period, how incessant and wasting 
 the toil, and what sacrifice of human life was the result, 
 we shall appreciate the humanity of the first " Sunday- 
 La ws." 
 
 A law of Emperor Leo says: "On the Lord's Day> 
 eternally worthy of honour and of veneration, let no act of 
 legal procedure be done ; let no debtor receive a summons, 
 let no pleadings be heard, let there be no process, let the 
 hard voice of the public crier be silent, let the pleaders see 
 their discussions interrupted, and enjoy a moment of truce ; 
 let adversaries agree and repentance enter into their soul. 
 We make, then, this day a day of repose, but we do not 
 wish that obscene pleasures should fill it. On Sunday, 
 let all theatrical representations, and races in the amphi- 
 theatre, and lamentable combats of wild beasts, be sus- 
 pended ; and if the solemnity of our birth or coronation 
 fall on that day, let the celebration be deferred." ^ 
 
 The new spirit touched even the forms of law. In 
 A.D. 342, the enactments said boldly, " Let the formulae of 
 ancient law, those captious syllables which are nets for 
 good faith, disappear completely from all acts." 
 
 No classic legislator, so far as we can recall, had ever 
 cared for that often unfortunate class — the prisoners. 
 Many were merely confined as witnesses, many on false 
 accusations, and all demanded, at least, common humanity 
 in their public treatment 
 
 The prison reform of succeeding centuries began under 
 Constantine's reign. Those accused of crimes are to be 
 examined with all diligence, and those arrested must be 
 confined in a humane manner. The cells must have ait 
 and light. Persons under accusations are not to be put in 
 jails, or scourged, but are to be placed under " military 
 * Code,\\\. 411, II.
 
 PRISON REFORM. 87 
 
 arrest," and in a prison open to the liglit.'^ A law in 314 
 forbade the judges to inflict capital punishment without 
 the confession of the accused, or sworn testimony of the 
 accusers. The new moral power in the world seemed tr 
 give a fresh dignity to the human countenance, as having 
 been borne by Him who was the Son of God, and who had 
 died for men. " Let those who are condemned," says a 
 writing of Constantine (318), "whether to gladiatorial 
 games or to the mines, not be branded on the forehead, 
 that the majesty of the face formed in the image of celes- 
 tial beauty be not dishonoured." ^ In 340, a law forbade 
 the mingling of sexes in prison ; and another was enacted 
 protecting the modesty of Christian virgins against traf- 
 fickers in prostitution.* Honorius ^ charged the judges to 
 visit the prisons every Sunday to see that the prisoners 
 received sufficient nourishment, and to guard lest the 
 proper humanity be not shown the convicts by corrupt 
 jailors. The sentiment of humanity reached even the 
 rights over material things, and in Justinian's Code the 
 following beautiful passage occurs in regard to selling the 
 home of a minor : — 
 
 " It shall not be lawful to sell the home in which the 
 father has died and the youth grown up ; in which either 
 to see the statues of ancestors not placed or overthrown is 
 melancholy indeed." ^ 
 
 Such a provision as the following, though made for a 
 
 * Cod. Theod., lib. ix. tit. 5. 
 ' Ibid., lib. ix. tit. 40, 21, 2. 
 3 Ibid., lib. XV. tit. 8, 21. 
 
 * Ibid., lib. XV. tit. 8, i. 
 
 * Ne his hLiinanitas clausis per corruptos carcerum custodes nege- 
 tur. {Ibid., lib. x. tit. 3, 27.) 
 
 ' Nee vero domum vendere liceat, in qua defecit pater, minor 
 crevit ; in qua, majorum imagines, aut non videre fixas aut revulsas, 
 videre, satis est lugubre. {Cod., ix. tit. 37.)
 
 88 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 personal object by the emperor, breathed the new spirit in 
 the Roman world. By the severe old Papinian law, if a 
 free man should marry a woman who had been a slave 
 though now a freed woman, and should afterwards chance 
 to be elevated to the senatorial dignity, the marriage was 
 thereby dissolved. The law of the codifiers, full of the 
 new humanity, says : " We then, following the judgment 
 of God, do not suffer the good fortune of the husband to 
 become the calamity of the wife. Far from our times be 
 any severity of this kind ! " and it is enacted that such a 
 marriage is good.^ 
 
 The deep enthusiasm of humanity working throughout 
 the Roman world under the new impulse, finds its fitting 
 expression in these mild provisions of the Roman law. 
 The personality of the Jewish teacher is felt by students 
 labouring in their closets in codifying or improving legis- 
 lation for the empire, and the dry details of law bear the 
 stamp upon them of Him who held all men as children of 
 a common Father, and believed in overcoming evil with 
 good. 
 
 These are interesting as the first traces of the Gesta 
 Christi in European legislation ; they herald a long history 
 of humane victories. 
 
 Opposition to War by Christians in the Roman Period. 
 — It need scarcely be said that the spirit of Christ's 
 teachings is opposed to war, and, above all, to wars of 
 vengeance or conquest. But this is one of those points 
 in which He was so much in advance not only of His own 
 times, but of all succeeding ages, that His followers have 
 only been able to make a kind of compromise between His 
 principles and the ideas of the time. They have often 
 excused only defensive wars, or service given on compul- 
 
 ' Nos igitur Dei sequentes judicium, etc. Absit a nostro tempore, 
 hujusmodi asperitas ! (Cod.y lib. v. tit. 4.)
 
 OPPOSITION TO WAR. 89 
 
 sion, or they have sought to mitigate the horrors of war, 
 or to prevent it by arbitration. The habits of arbitration 
 in private matters were very early implanted among be- 
 lievers by the words of Jesus (Matt, xviii. 15-17) and the 
 apostles (l Cor. vi. 4-7). But the early followers, being 
 under the more immediate inspiration of the Master, went 
 much farther, and great numbers seem to have refused 
 entirely to serve as soldiers, or to join in any war what- 
 ever. The phrase is often repeated by the earlier Fathers, 
 that "Jesus in disarming Peter disarmed all soldiers." 
 
 An anecdote is related of a certain Christian, Maxi- 
 milian by name, who was brought before a Roman tribunal 
 to be enrolled as a soldier in one of the legions of Rome. 
 On the proconsul asking his name, he replied : " I am a 
 Christian — I cannot fight ! " He was enrolled, but still 
 refused to fight. He was told that he must either serve 
 or die. He again replied, " I am a Christian ! I can- 
 not fight, even if I die ! " whereupon he was executed.^ 
 Another instance is given of a centurion named Marcellus, 
 in the legion of " Trajan." He became a Christian, and 
 believing war not permitted by his faith, he threw down his 
 belt before his legion, and declared that, consistently with 
 his principles, he could not fight. He was sent to prison, 
 but still persisting in his refusal, and his declaration that it 
 was not lawful for a Christian to engage in war, he was 
 put to death. Another officer ^ in the same legion resigned 
 for a similar reason, and was also executed. A number of 
 such instances are recorded, and probably many more have 
 never come down to us. 
 
 Many of the early Fathers took the ground that no 
 Christian could lawfully be a soldier or engage in a war. 
 
 * Acts of Ridnart, quoted by Dymond, Essays on Principles oj 
 Morality, p. 418. 
 
 * Dymondy p. 418.
 
 90 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 Justin Martyr and Tatian speak of soldiers and Christians as 
 distinct characters, and Tatian says that Christians decHne 
 mihtary commands. Clemens calls Christians " followers 
 of peace," and says they use no implements of war. Lac- 
 tantius states repeatedly that it can never be lawful for a 
 righteous man to go to war.^ Tertullian argues against 
 it in " De Corona " (c. xi.), and states that in a large 
 portion of the Roman armies, embracing more than one- 
 third of the best legions, not a Christian is to be found. 
 In another passage, spealcing of the prophecy of Isaiah as 
 to universal peace, he adds : " " You must confess that the 
 prophecy of Isaiah is accomplished, as far as the practice of 
 every individual is concerned to whom it is applicable." 
 He calls Christians " priests of peace." Irenaeus says, 
 " Christians have turned swords and spears into pruning- 
 hooks, and know not how to fight." Justin Martyr 
 declares that " the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, you have 
 reason to know ; for we, who in times past killed one 
 another, do not now fight with our enemies.^ 
 
 One of the accusations against Christians was that they 
 refused to serve in the Roman armies. Origen, in answer- 
 ing this reproach from Celsus, says (Apol., i. 6) : " To 
 those unbelievers who would force us to fight for the 
 commonwealth, to destroy human beings, we would 
 answer : That even their own idol-priests, and those who 
 attend upon the service of their reputed gods, do keep 
 themselves unstained with human blood, that so they 
 may offer sacrifices for the whole nation with clean and 
 unpolluted hands. Neither, in case war should arise, are 
 
 * Ita neque militare justo licebit. {Div. Inst., lib. xi.) 
 ' Dyinond, p. 418. 
 
 • Quoted by Dymond ; but see Justin, Dialog, cum. Tryph. Apol., 2. 
 Tertull., ApoL, c. 21 and 2>7- Origen con. Cclsiim, 3, 5, 8. Cypr. 
 Epist., 56. Athan. Cyrill. etc.
 
 EARLY CHRISTIANS NOT SOLDIERS. 91 
 
 these men to be enlisted in their armies. And if this be 
 done without reason, how much more may they be said 
 after their manner to fight, who, being priests to the most 
 high God, endeavour to preserve themselves free from blood 
 and rapine ; that so, while others are polluted with spoil 
 and slaughter, they may wrestle with God Himself, by 
 constant and incessant prayer, for the welfare of them that 
 make war justly, and for the safety of them that govern 
 righteously." 
 
 Le Blant, in his investigation of Christian inscriptions, 
 mentions that among 10,050 Pagan inscriptions which he 
 had examined, 545 were those over the bodies of soldiers, 
 while in 4,734 Christian inscriptions only twenty-seven were 
 memorials of military men.^ 
 
 Dymond states, that for two hundred years not a Chris- 
 tian soldier is on record in the Roman armies ; and that 
 only in the third century, when Christianity was more 
 corrupted, they began to be enrolled. 
 
 This may be an exaggeration ; for we know that some 
 of the most influential of the Fathers, as Augustine^ for 
 instance, defended military service and did not object to a 
 Christian's enlisting in a " righteous war." Then, much of 
 the objection on the part of the believers was more to the 
 idolatrous practices connected with the Roman military ser- 
 vice than to the shedding of blood itself. Still it all shows 
 that the first unconscious drift of the early Christian teach- 
 ings was against war, or any participation in it. This did 
 not indeed become a reality in Christian life in later ages, for 
 
 ^ Inscr. Chrdt. de la Gaule, p. 81. 
 
 ^ Yet Augustine was a lover of peace, as were all the Fathers. 
 " What shall I say of peace or of praise of peace till we arrive at that 
 country of peace ? There we shall be able to praise it, where we more 
 fully possess it. Jerusalem is the vision of peace, and all who possess 
 and love peace, are blessed therefor evermore.'" {Trad, in Ps. ex. 
 57.)
 
 92 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Christians have supported war in every century, yet it 
 prepared the way for the efforts for peace and arbitration 
 in the Middle Ages whicli we shall detail later, — for the 
 modern efforts to mitigate the evils of war and to prevent 
 it by arbitration, — and for the higher efforts of the followers 
 of the Prince of Peace, sure to come, to put an end to war 
 on the earth, and bring on universal peace.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 DISTRIBUTION OF PROPERTY. 
 
 There v/i\\ be diverse difficulties in examining the direc- 
 tion and effect of Christ's teachings on the distribution of 
 property. We are not to define Oriental and half-poetic 
 expressions as we would similar phrases in a Western and 
 more prosaic narrative ; and on the other hand, we should 
 not interpret Christ's words solely by the practice of his 
 later followers and by the ideas of a modern and industrial 
 age. It is not to be assumed, as is done by most writers 
 on this subject, that the modern form of the distribution 
 of wealth is the final and perfect one, and that society as 
 it is now is substantially what it must be in all coming 
 ages, or what our Lord contemplated in his future " King- 
 dom of Heaven," or regenerated society of all men. A 
 Christian writer in the early Middle Age would have had 
 equal right to assume that society must always be made 
 up of landlords owning vast tracts of country, who pro- 
 tected their vassals, of large bodies of military followers, 
 and of serfs bound to the soil, or that justice in regard to 
 quarrels over property and land must always be decided 
 thejudicial duel. Both conditions were not directly touched 
 upon by the teachings of the great Reformer, yet the prin- 
 ciples He taught must gradually undermine both. The 
 feudal system belonged to a stage of human progress. 
 The modern industrial and commercial system may be 
 equally one phase in the gradual change or advance of 
 
 S3
 
 94 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 mankind. At all events, it is not the ideal or perfect 
 system. A condition of society in which enormous masses 
 of human beings are born to an almost inevitable lot of 
 squalor, penury and ignorance, and still other multitudes 
 to incessant labour with few alleviations or enjoyments, 
 while another considerable class, with little or no effort of 
 their own, have all the blessings of life and transmit them 
 to others, — or an industrial system which leaves to the few 
 who are gifted with the brains or enjoy the fortune to lead 
 industrial enterprizes the power to reap the benefits of 
 labour, while the many who toil, only gain a bare pittance, 
 — a society which presents on one side, enormous fortunes 
 and endless accumulations of wealth, while on the other, 
 it offers classes ground down by poverty and pinched with 
 want, is certainly not the Christian ideal of society or any 
 approach to the " Kingdom of God " on earth. 
 
 The great moral progress of the future of the race will 
 plainly be toward some form of a more equable distribution 
 of the proceeds of labour. What form this will take is as 
 impossible to predict, as would have been for a citizen of 
 the Roman empire at the time of Tacitus to predict the 
 present condition of Europe. 
 
 If we read Christ's teachings with perfect candour, and as 
 far removed from modern habits of thought as possible, 
 we discover a continual tendency towards exalting poverty, 
 humbling wealth, and equalizing the conditions of life. 
 Leaving out of view the fact that Christ and His disciples 
 lived in almost an atmosphere of agrarianism, or at least 
 of inalienability of family property in land, under the 
 Jesvish land-system,^ and also the natural freedom from 
 all burdens of property which the teacher of a new faith 
 
 ' How far this was a practical feature of Jewish economy at the 
 time of Christ, is, of course, difficult to say. The id^al was in the law, 
 (^nd must have influenced the minds of the reformers of Judaea.
 
 CHRISrS COMMUNISM. 95 
 
 might well inculcate in a climate such as that of Syria ; 
 still, there is even then a certain tone throughout the 
 gospels, if not of "communism," at least in favour of 
 greater distribution of wealth than would suit modern 
 ideas. Christ and the apostles warn incessantly against 
 accumulation of wealth. They almost denounce the rich ; 
 they praise and commend the poor ; their sympathies are 
 strongly with the working classes ; they urge continually 
 the diffusion of property, in whatever way would benefit 
 the world ; they warn those who do not scatter their ac- 
 quisitions among the needy ; they leave the impression 
 everywhere, that a greater equalizing of human goods, a 
 moderate acquisition, and a raising up from poverty is 
 what is demanded. The parable of Lazarus has been 
 too often interpreted under modern conditions, and it may 
 well be that some explanatory features given by Christ 
 are omitted by the historian ; but its literal interpretation 
 plainly contains a plea against the great inequalities of 
 fortune in this world. 
 
 Nothing, however, in Christ's teachings tends towards any 
 forcible interfering with rights of property, or encourages 
 dependence on others. As we have so often said, He 
 seldom concerns Himself with human institutions. He 
 would not interfere with property any more than He would 
 with government. And, as we shall show, in presenting 
 His influence on the charity of the world, neither He nor 
 His apostles ever taught idleness or dependence. On the 
 contrary, they enforced the lesson of industry by word and 
 example ; and the very foundation of the new character, 
 stamped by Christ, contained those features of dignity and 
 true manhood which have lain at the basis of all real 
 independence and liberty ever since, Neither the idleness 
 of socialism or monasticism nor the weakness of pauper- 
 ism finds any support in the gospels.
 
 96 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 The especial methods by which our Lord would resist 
 accumulation, are by inculcating the absolute duty of 
 giving and of sharing means with others who are less for- 
 tunate, and by withdrawing the mind from the excessive 
 greed for money. In many cases, the entire giving up 
 of property for the good of others is made the test of 
 discipleship. 
 
 The early " communism " of the apostles is an evidence 
 how deeply these instructions penetrated ; but nothing in 
 the words of Christ or His disciples shows that they set 
 forth this as a model for the future. Their great prin- 
 ciples were, not to hunger for riches, to be content with 
 moderate means, and if wealth came, to hold it rigidly as 
 a trust for the good of humanity. These principles would 
 certainly tend towards equalization of property. 
 
 Charity. — One great means of equalizing human con- 
 ditions was evidently to be through benefaction and charity. 
 Those who had were to give to those who had not. This, 
 however, did not arise under Christ's system so much from 
 a desire of setting right the distribution of wealth, as from 
 the great underlying principle of His whole teachings, 
 that the individual and society were to be renewed by 
 love to God, and to man through Him. The world never 
 needed charity and compassion as it did in the centuries 
 just following Christ. The irresponsible and despotic 
 authority of Rome had stripped some of the richest 
 provinces of the ancient world of ever}^ vestige of wealth 
 for the sake of adding to the incredible extravagance and 
 display of the imperial court and city. The system of 
 taxation in distant communities was like that in the states 
 of European Turkey in this century. It soon left nothing 
 to the unfortunate peasants, and mortgaged their harvests 
 years before. Nor did the taxes always reach the imperial 
 exactor. Knavish tax-gatherers, peculating officials and
 
 ROMAN PAUPERISM. 97 
 
 local " rings," plundered the money which was wrung from 
 the half-starved farmers. There was no science, order or 
 justice in Roman systems of taxation. Incessant wars 
 and conquests added to the misery of the labouring 
 classes ; and slavery, as we have shown, depressed the in- 
 dustry and wasted the means of the whole empire. Vast 
 masses oi proletaires were gathered in the cities, especially 
 in the imperial capital ; and poverty, orphanage, abandon- 
 ment of children, with wide-spread pauperism prevailed, 
 as they have scarcely ever been known in the history 
 of the world. 
 
 But it must not be supposed that there were no efforts 
 of compassion to alleviate these evils before the first 
 proclamation of Christian charity. The sympathies of 
 humanity have been felt in every age and by every race, 
 even if in a feeble degree. In ancient Rome, men always 
 acknowledged a certain duty in giving alms to beggars 
 and in relieving extreme distress, though infant misery 
 seems to have excited comparatively little compassion. 
 
 Still, an3'thing like the modern sentiment or conviction, 
 born of Christianity, of the obligation resting upon each 
 man of doing all in his power to wisely relieve human 
 misery; and the wide-spread, thorough, conscientious bene- 
 factions by individuals, so common in modern days, were 
 things almost unknown in the ancient world. 
 
 Nor were the efforts of the imperial government for the 
 poor, true charities. It depended to a certain degree on 
 the favour of the crowd, and therefore food was supplied 
 indiscriminately to all the hungry and idle who poured 
 into the capital. In Cicero's time, it is estimated that 
 about 12 per cent, of the whole population, and in the year 
 683 of the Republic, 33 per cent, were supported at public 
 expense.^ 
 
 • Naudet, Mem. sitrles secoiirs publics cliez les Romains, 
 
 H
 
 98 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 It is related that Caesar found 320,000 persons, or nearly 
 three-quarters of the whole population of the city, on the 
 roll of public succour ; five modii of bread (or about 56 
 lbs.) were distributed to each person per month. Under 
 Augustus, there were 200,000 persons in Rome receiving 
 "out-door relief" from the authorities ; this was continued 
 to the reign of Septimius Severus, who added a ration of 
 oil to the alms thus given. Valentinian the Elder ordered 
 a gratuituous distribution of white bread to each citizen ; ^ 
 80,000 modii were distributed per day in Constantinople, 
 and an increase of 125,000 modii per day was made by 
 Constans. Constantine, who desired to have as many 
 houses built in the new capital as possible, allotted bread 
 according to the houses, not to the number of persons. 
 Some of the emperors appropriated large amounts of 
 money to keeping down the price of bread in the capital, 
 while others taxed the provinces heavily in order to make 
 provisions cheap in the metropolis. The effects of such 
 a vicious system of charity can easily be inferred. The 
 idle and improvident of all countries were attracted to 
 Rome to enjoy this "out-door relief;" the industrious 
 were discouraged, those who produced the wealth bur- 
 dened, and the working- classes were led to depend on the 
 government for everything, while the government lived 
 in fear of them. There was no spirit of true compassion 
 in it, and no wise economy. The masses supported a 
 tyranny and received bread and shows. The real workers 
 were despoiled. But there were other indirect methods 
 of distributing property under the Republic and Empire. 
 Such articles as salt were furnished gratuitously to the 
 people ; patrons supported their clients ; " stay-laws " were 
 passed to prevent the collection of debts ; agrarian laws 
 furnished, like the American public-land laws, free home- 
 ^ C. Theod., xiv. 17, 5 and 16, 2 ; xi. 24, 2.
 
 ROMAN CHARITIES. 99 
 
 steads to the landless, on conquered or public territory. 
 Caesar bought lands to be distributed among the poor. 
 The vicious system of public distribution of bread or grain 
 among the people was not abandoned till the seventh 
 century after Christ. 
 
 There even existed some forms of public assistance in 
 harmony with modern ideas. Aristotle had the wisdom 
 to say that the best way to relieve poverty was to prevent 
 it, by giving means to buy a little piece of land or by a loan 
 to found a trade. Mutual assistance or insurance societies 
 seem to have existed in Greece, and are spoken of by 
 Pliny^ in Trajan's time, as formed for " making poverty 
 more endurable." ^ Before this time, the emperors had 
 seen with anxiety the constant diminution of popula- 
 tion, especially shown in the lessening number of children 
 in the empire. Augustus attempted to encourage the 
 increase of children by well-known laws, and it is related 
 that on his travels through Italy, he was in the habit of 
 bestowing an allowance (congiarium) of 400 sesterces^ on 
 any one whom the authorities could prove to have sup- 
 ported a family ; subsequently, children over eleven years 
 of age were made participators in these bounties. 
 
 The Emperor Nerva left benefactions to encourage the 
 increase of children. Trajan, in 100 A.D., supported 5>00C> 
 destitute or orphan children at public expense, and in- 
 creased the number every year. Money was invested by 
 him for this purpose in land and farms at Veleia, Cisalpine 
 Gaul, which appears to have paid about '5 per cent, interest. 
 In this particular school or asylum, there were 263 boys 
 and 33 girls; in some villages poor children were supported 
 in their homes by the emperor, while municipalities main- 
 tained others. 
 
 » Pliny, Ep. x. 93, 94. 
 
 ' Ad sustinendum tenuorum inopiam. * About ;^8 or $41.
 
 loo GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 Pliny endowed a charity for the children of the poor ; 
 while the emperors Adrian, Antoninus, and M. Aurelius 
 founded or continued benefactions of a like character.^ 
 
 Charitable bequests are occasionally alluded to in the 
 burial inscriptions. Thus a citizen of Atona bequeathed 
 to his native town a sum equal to ^^3,200 or $16,000; a 
 lady of rank, " in memory of her son," gives to Terra- 
 cina ;^8ooo or f 40,000 to establish a charity; and various 
 smaller bequests for benevolent purposes are mentioned.^ 
 
 One of the nearest approaches to the charitable associ- 
 ations of the Christian world, were the curious collegia of 
 the Roman empire in the first and second centuries. The 
 history of these has been especially brought forward 
 through the burial inscriptions^ recently deciphered. 
 
 They seem to have been a kind of social clubs or 
 masonic associations, where all were equal, where fraternal 
 meals were common, and monthly payments prepared a 
 fund for sepulture, for common festivals, and sometimes 
 for ornamental buildings. They formed a natural pro- 
 totype for the Christian Churches and their charitable 
 societies ; but, so far as can be ascertained, they did not 
 use their funds for the poor. They cultivated the habit 
 of equality, and the fraternal spirit, but they did not feel 
 or express " the enthusiasm of humanity," and therefore 
 died out, or were converted into Christian societies. Yet 
 the ideal was sometimes there, as in one beautiful in- 
 scription on a woman's tomb, who is pictured as " the 
 mother of all human beings, ready to help all, and who 
 had made the life of no one sad." * 
 
 * Sen. de Rhet, 71, 72, ts, 77, 79, "S- 
 
 ^ Orelli and Mommsen, quoted in Boissier, La Religion Romatne, 
 i, 191, and 2, 3, V. 4. 
 
 * De Rossi, La Roma sott. Christ. 
 
 * Omnium hominum parens, omnibus subvenicns, tristcm fecit 
 neminem.
 
 CHRISTIAN CHARITY. lOJ 
 
 But ^&\v, however, of such institutions existed in the 
 pre-Christian period. The great masses suffering poverty 
 and orphanage in the Roman empire remained almost 
 untouched by any influence of compassion or any effort 
 df relief. 
 
 With Christianity began the organized and individual 
 charity of modern Europe, which for these eighteen cen- 
 turies has wiped away so many tears, softened so much 
 suffering, saved so many young lives from misery and 
 sin, ministered at so many death-beds, made the solitary 
 evening of life sweet to so many forsaken ones, and the 
 morning glad to so many who would have been born to 
 sorrow and shame ; which in so many countries has cared 
 for the sick, the blind, the deaf, the crippled, the outcast 
 and tempted ; the young, the orphan, the foundling, and 
 the aged. Surely, if anything is a fore-gleam of that 
 kingdom of heaven which is yet to shine over the earth, 
 it is the brotherhood of spirit, shown in the charity of the 
 modern world. This is most distinctly the fruit of Christ's 
 teachings. And yet the Master did not lay any extraor- 
 dinary weight on alms-giving. He simply taught the love 
 of man through love to Himself, that the poorest and 
 lowest of the human race represented Himself, and what 
 was done to them was done to Him. The equal brother- 
 hood of man came forth from His teachings, and all 
 human beings of whatever rank, or under whatever dis- 
 abilities of misfortune, became of equal value in the eyes 
 of His followers, as being those for whom He lived and in 
 behalf of whom He felt it not unworthy to die. The un- 
 fortunate had henceforth around them the halo of the great 
 Sufferer, and a very different place in the sympathies of 
 the new world of Europe. 
 
 The Christian Churches became very early centres of 
 charity. Refuges for orphans (orphano-trophiae) were
 
 I02 GESTA CHRTSTL 
 
 formed in connection with them, and hospitals for mothers j 
 many of them maintained free " strangers' rests " (xeno- 
 dochiae). The emperor Julian's famous letter to Arsenius, 
 speaks in reproach of the Galilaeans supporting not only 
 their own poor, but also those of the Romans. 
 
 Valentinian in 364 A.D., in a proclamation, says that the 
 true worship ^ consists in helping the poor and relieving 
 those in necessity, while he charges the bishops to watch 
 over the poor and save them from exactions. Several of 
 the Christian emperors took under their especial protection 
 houses for the orphan and infirm.^ The Code pronounces 
 it a pious duty to support orphan-asylums.^ 
 
 Justinian's Code speaks of hospitals for mothers.* 
 
 Churches were constantly enriched by the offerings of 
 Christian charity, in order that they might extend their 
 benefactions ; and the clergy were allowed especial pri- 
 vileges, inasmuch as their property was employed for the 
 good of others.^ This is the beginning of that ecclesiastical 
 endowment and freedom from public burdens, which after- 
 wards became so great a weight upon many European 
 communities. It proves, at least in that age, the fervour 
 of charity under the new influences. 
 
 The month of December, which had been the especial 
 month in which gladiatorial games and cruel shows were 
 provided by the rich for the poor in memory of the dead, 
 became the month of offerings for the poor and suffering 
 in memory of Him who had died for all. 
 
 The first hospital is said to have been built in Rome at 
 
 * Corp. Jur.y I, 3, 32. 
 
 ^ Verus cultus est adjuvare pauperes (sic) et positos in necessitate. 
 {Corp. Jur. I, 4, I-) 
 
 ' Pium atque religiosum officium pro tempore orphanotrophos ita 
 peragere convenit. {Corp. Jur., i, 3.) 
 
 * Cod. Theod.y i. 2, 17, 22. 
 ' Ibid., xvi. 2, la
 
 PAUPERISM NOT ENCOURAGED. 103 
 
 the end of the fourth century. A little later, Pulcheria, 
 sister of Theodosius the younger, built and endowed 
 several at Constantinople ; they increased under later 
 reigns.^ The Church councils, by repeated acts of legisla- 
 tion, imposed on the clergy and citizens the obligation 
 of supporting, feeding, and clothing the poor, and these 
 declarations were re-affirmed in every city by the local 
 clergy. 
 
 Effects of Charity. — It has been alleged with some 
 apparent justice, that this spirit of Christian charity, which 
 has made modern society so different from ancient, has 
 cultivated dependence, and increased pauperism or that 
 kind of poverty which is without hope or energy. 
 
 But it should be remembered that there is nothing in 
 the teachings of Christ or the apostles which favoured 
 indiscriminate alms-giving, or the supporting the poor 
 without labour. " If a man will not work neither shall 
 he eat " is evidently a favourite proverb with the great 
 apostle. He himself laboured with his own hands. The 
 disciples were working people, and Christ, in human 
 relations, belonged to the working-classes. The type of 
 character He stamped on men was the very opposite of 
 the idle and dependent kind ; it was earnest, self-controlled, 
 under a deep sense of responsibility, looking continually 
 to Him to whom man should give an account of every 
 word and work, with a conviction of being the child of 
 God, and therefore calling no man master. It was such a 
 character as could not possibly in the long course of ages 
 sustain tyranny, or support even priestly arbitrary rule, 
 or encourage any form of pauperism and dependence. It 
 seems to contain the stuff out of which republicans and 
 lovers of freedom in all ages are made, and from which the 
 most independent and self-relying (because God-relying) 
 ^ Cod. Just., i. 2, 17, 22.
 
 t04 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 races are formed. Yet forms of government or laws re- 
 lating to the management of the poor were the last things 
 which Christ would interfere with. 
 
 The excessive and unreasoning alms-giving of European 
 countries, and the monastic associations of the Middle 
 Ages, are not due to the legitimate and logical influence of 
 Christianity. They are a natural re-action from the selfish- 
 ness of the classic period, and sprang from the fearful 
 economical condition in which Europe found itself at the 
 destruction of the Roman empire. So profound and ap- 
 parently remediless were the evils of the civilized world, 
 so impossible did it seem then to reach the sources of the 
 universal calamity, that a humane person, and above all, 
 one filled with this new love of God and man might well 
 think he had done enough and the best, in sacrificing all 
 to relieve present human misery. He might be willing to 
 take on him the garb of a servant, and, unlike his Master, 
 merely minister to terrible bodily wants, without regard 
 to what was beyond or to the causes of pauperism and 
 suffering. He could become an alms-distributing monk ; 
 or, wearied out with the intense struggle to support life 
 amid a world of suffering and selfishness, it would not be 
 strange that he should join one of the " mutual assistance 
 societies " of those ages, and withdraw to a convent where 
 he could pass his days in quiet labour, peaceful studies, 
 and rapt devotion. The world of the Roman empire 
 seemed perishing ; the imperial city was half-destroyed ; 
 the monk felt only too happy to belong to the city of 
 God, and to keep his thoughts on the world unseen and 
 eternal. 
 
 Christianity cannot be considered directly responsible 
 for monasticism any more than for numerous other vaga- 
 ries of the human mind since its advent. A very large 
 part of the wealth of the community which before Christ
 
 DISTRIBVTION OF WEALTH. 105 
 
 was devoted to the luxuries of the rich, or was expended 
 in debasing and cruel spectacles, was henceforth mainly 
 distributed among the labouring classes through hospitals, 
 asylums, free-schools, institutions of learning and various 
 charities. 
 
 Charity is not the best form of the distribution of the 
 profits of labour, but it is certainly one form. Education, 
 as endowed by individuals or the State, is another and 
 better form. And this began in Europe especially after 
 Christianity, though the efforts of the Arabs in this direc- 
 tion in subsequent ages should never be forgotten. 
 
 We do not claim, of course, that the Christian religion 
 in the Roman period solved the problem of ages — the 
 proper distribution of wealth. We only urge that its 
 principles and the words of its Founder tended towards a 
 far more equitable division of property than the world has 
 yet known ; that, as its truths more and more control men, 
 there will continually be in some form or other a more 
 equal distribution of the profits of labour, and that sonie- 
 thing of the just sharing by those who have with those who 
 have not was seen at that period. 
 
 The method of distribution will var^ with each succed- 
 ing age.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 RESUMfi OF REFORMS IN THE ROMAN PERIOIX 
 
 The reforms to be traced in the foregoing chapters show 
 the natural and legitimate influence of the Christian 
 system. Parents are bid by the apostle to respect their 
 children, and under Christ's ideas, the son stands with the 
 father as a common child of God whose rights and claims 
 are to be equally considered before Him. Such a tyranny 
 as that of the Roman Patria Potestas could not possibly 
 exist for a long period where society was even feebly 
 touched with the spirit of Christ 
 
 The Stoical spirit of humanity had undoubtedly softened 
 the extreme features of harshness of this rule, but it did 
 not come to an end till the new Faith had reached the 
 legislation of the empire. Equally so with the succession 
 of property. The humane views of the Stoical school had 
 already modified the strict tendencies of the Roman law, 
 but it was only after the new doctrines of brotherhood 
 and justice, taught by the followers of the great Jewish 
 teachers, had touched the imperial legislators, that suc- 
 cession followed the bonds of blood and moved in the 
 channels of true equity. 
 
 The power of Christianity on the Roman world was 
 especially the influence of a Person, of a pure and elevated 
 character who claimed to be a supernatural Being in his 
 relations to men and God, and who was the Founder of 
 a new religion. His nature alone, from its purity and 
 elevation, seemed to sweep away unnatural passions from 
 
 io6
 
 THE CONQUESTS OF CHRIST. 107 
 
 among men, and both in the Roman empire, and since 
 among all races following Him, unnatural vice — one of the 
 greatest evils of antiquity, — has substantially passed away. 
 His character and teachings naturally checked and finally 
 rooted out such a barbarous cruelty and selfish practice, as 
 the exposure of children by parents ; and through His 
 influence began the long series of charities for children and 
 the poor and unhappy, which have come down through 
 the centuries. He was not only in advance of the Roman 
 period, but of all ages since, in teaching the duty of a more 
 equitable distribution of wealth in behalf of the poor, the 
 unfortunate and the labouring classes. 
 
 The influence of the great Friend of humanity was espe- 
 cially seen in the Roman empire in checking licentious and 
 cruel sports, so common and so demoralizing among the 
 classic races ; and in bringing on a new legislation of bene- 
 ficence in favour of the outcast woman, the mutilated, the 
 prisoner, and the slave. For the first time the stern and 
 noble features of Roman law took on an unwonted expres- 
 sion of gentle humanity and sweet compassion, under the 
 power of Him who was the brother of the unfortunate and 
 the sinful. The great followers of the Teacher of Galilee 
 became known as the " brothers of the slave," and the 
 Christian religion began its struggle of many centuries 
 with those greatest of human evils — slavery and serfdom. 
 It did not indeed succeed in abolishing them ; but the 
 remarkable mitigations of the system in Roman law, and 
 the constant drift towards a condition of liberty, and the 
 increasing emancipation throughout the Roman empire, 
 are plainly fruits of its principles. All these and similar 
 steps of humane progress are the " Gesta Christi " and the 
 direct effects of His personal influence on the world. 
 
 As to the position of woman, it was the continual re- 
 proach of the early enemies of the Christians that they
 
 io8 GESTA CHRIST!, 
 
 put woman on so high a position. Women had from the 
 first a strong influence in the Church ; the earliest converts 
 from all ranks of society were women, and the example 
 of Christ and the apostles has given the key-note to all 
 modern civilization in the tender respect and dignity thrown 
 around the weaker sex. In this, the Jews of the imperial 
 era only followed out much of the early teachings of the 
 Sacred Book. The picture of the Jewish woman in the 
 last chapter of Proverbs (xxxi. IO-31) might describe the 
 position of a Christian lady with many dependents in the 
 nineteenth century in any civilized portion of America or 
 Europe. 
 
 At the period of which we are speaking, the peculiar in- 
 fluence of the German tribes upon the position of woman 
 had not been much felt in the Empire. The "tutelage" 
 of woman existed among them also. There was nothing 
 in the Stoical mode of thought, or in the teachings and 
 example of Stoics, which especially tended to elevate 
 woman. The current opinion in the cultivated classes of 
 the Roman empire, if we may judge from poets, satirists, 
 and fragments of speeches handed down, was of profound 
 contempt for woman in the moral and intellectual aspect. 
 There were of course happy marriages, and many instances 
 of affection for sisters and female relatives or friends, 
 and the annals of Rome presented not a few examples 
 of very heroic and superior women ; but, in general, 
 Roman women merited by their conduct and their lack of 
 intelligence in the imperial era, the contempt and censure 
 so freely showered on them by the men. 
 
 The change in their legal position and the removal of 
 tutelage, is plainly due to the effects of the new Faith. 
 Their own character rose with the increased respect 
 accorded them in the rising Church. They became the 
 confessors of the Faith under the most brutal and savage
 
 INFLUENCE ON WOMAN. 109 
 
 persecutions ; their martyrdoms on the cross, in the bloody 
 arena or under frightful tortures, formed the most touching 
 incidents in Christian traditions. The sufferings and death 
 of women in the early ages of the Faith for ever hallowed 
 the sex in the history of the Church. 
 
 Marriage, too, under the Christian idea, was a bond of 
 equal union, and the highest spiritual partnership. It 
 recognised the two partners as equal before God, and as 
 of one flesh, even though different offices were assigned to 
 each. The Roman tutelage could not exist long under 
 it. It is true that this idea of marriage existed with 
 the Stoics, but it was seldom realized ; and what the 
 Roman practice became, we have seen. Yet the new Faith 
 would not permit the entire freedom and laxity which 
 arose under the Roman " free marriage," any more than it 
 recognised the entire subjection and inferiority of the wife 
 under the ancient Latin marriage. It demanded faithful- 
 ness, virtue, and propriety ; it urged the indissolubility 
 of marriage, except for unfaithfulness or its moral equi- 
 valent ; it taught the continuance of the union through 
 endless ages of a coming life. So it happened, that this 
 Faith had a composite influence on the position of woman. 
 It strengthened the marriage tie, and therefore, restrained 
 woman of the great freedom she had been enjoying as a 
 married woman under Roman practice. It gave her on the 
 other hand, greater dignity, both as wife and unmarried, 
 and removed her from under the excessive restraints of the 
 old Roman law. The Church, with its Canon law, has un- 
 doubtedly often gone beyond the teachings of its Founder, 
 and subjected the wife to unreasonable legal restraints. 
 But at the period of which we speak, the power of both 
 Religion and Church entered Roman society as a thoroughly 
 purifying and ennobling agency. It did not accomplish, 
 indeed, all that in its nature it was intended to effect ;
 
 no GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 the Roman habits were too long formed and the influence 
 of both laws and emperors was too weak to eradicate 
 them. Moreover, there comes a period in the history 
 of the decadence of a race when its moral condition is 
 aparently beyond the reach of any system of morality, or 
 of the purest religion.' We know that moral changes are 
 wrought out by slow moral means, and that it is possible 
 for a race as for an individual to reach such depths of 
 corruption and weakness as to forbid any reasonable 
 possibility of renovation and restoration. 
 
 The Roman race, and many of the races under its sway, 
 had evidently fallen to that stage of degeneracy. They 
 were eaten away by vices and corruption beyond any hope 
 of redemption. Their great historian — the prophet of 
 evil — Tacitus, saw this with singular clearness, and this 
 thought inspires his solemn and sombre eloquence. But 
 he sees no redemption possible. Human affairs seem to 
 him the sport of unseen powers,^ and final and general 
 ruin the only and probable ending. The poets are full of 
 this melancholy tone. The moralists take refuge in the 
 sublime truths of Stoicism and create an ideal city of 
 virtue which shall take the place of the imperial city, 
 soon to perish. It may be, it was this idea which lay at 
 the bottom of the solemn conviction of the apostles, that 
 the end of all things was at hand : the world of the day 
 was coming to an end ; not even the religion of Jesus could 
 save it. 
 
 What could preserve European society .-* The usual 
 
 ' This seems the condition of the Sandwich Islanders at this 
 present time ; the race is dying out, and Christian influences do not 
 reach it thoroughly enough to save it. On the other hand, the Fijis, 
 a more savage, but vigorous race, show the genume action of the 
 Christian Faith. (See Miss Cummings on the Fijis.) 
 
 ^ Res humanae superis ludibrio.
 
 A FRESH RACE NEEDED. m 
 
 Answer has been, the invasion and intermingHng of the 
 German and Keltic races. But, as we shall show later, it 
 was not the fresh infusion of barbarian blood alone which 
 could renovate the world. The northern tribes brought 
 indeed a more healthy physical nature into the Roman 
 empire, and purer habits, and characters less enervated by 
 luxury or corrupted by vice. But they had their own vices; 
 they were cruel, revengeful and passionate ; certain lusts 
 had made deep inroads in their natures ; the paternal 
 tyranny and a tutelage of woman existed among them. 
 Their ideas of justice were much less developed than were 
 those of the Romans ; and humanity was scarcely under- 
 stood by them. Yet from the first, they formed a fruitful 
 soil in which Christianity could work. It is altogether 
 probable that this Faith can more easily plant itself in a 
 wild barbarous nature, with many generous qualities, than 
 in a more cultivated mind, where the pride and vices of 
 luxury have been long growing rankly. Without the 
 Christian influences, the northern barbarians might have 
 either overwhelmed Roman civilization and brought on a 
 night of barbarism, or have been themselves corrupted and 
 destroyed by the vices and sensuality which surrounded 
 them ; in either case, they could not have renovated the 
 world. Their influence would perhaps have been like that 
 of the Sclavonians on the Greeks ; and no important result 
 for human progress have appeared. The advance of man- 
 kind for future ages seemed at that time to depend on two 
 factors : the power of a system of morality supported by 
 supernatural sanctions, or upon Religion ; and a fresh race 
 in which this religion was to manifest itself The Roman 
 and Greek races were in their last stages of degeneracy. 
 Physical evils and weakness of will had been transmitted 
 for generations. Unnatural vices, the sign of final decrepi- 
 tude, had attacked all classes. Marriage had become a
 
 112 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 farce, or the feeblest bond. Exposure of children was 
 practised to an incredible extent. The spirit of cruelty 
 was nourished by every device and encouraged by in- 
 cessant bloody sports ; even human sacrifices were offered 
 at the altars of the gods. Slavery had eaten out the life 
 of the nation and wasted its substance. Owing to forced 
 labour, imperial tyranny, bad finance and wars, an almost 
 immeasurable pauperism covered the empire. The only 
 help possible seemed in utterly breaking up society and 
 introducing fresh blood and new institutions. 
 
 A new religion or a system of exalted morality could not 
 penetrate to the heart of Roman society as it then was. 
 It reached certain individuals, who became conspicuous 
 instances to all ages of its power. But it left untouched 
 great masses of men, and therefore many of the evil 
 habits and practices of a sensual past. This was the 
 more true in that the new Faith soon became a State 
 Religion, and therefore was upheld by force and self 
 interest, instead of being left to its own spiritual power. 
 It was professed by multitudes who never felt its con- 
 verting influences. 
 
 What Christianity could do with an old and degenerate 
 race under a State Church, where religion became an ex- 
 ternality and faith a matter of government, we see in 
 the dreary history of the Eastern empire. The power of 
 the system never touched the heart of the people. If 
 we except the grand legacy of Roman law, as reformed by 
 Christian influences, left by Justinian and his predecessors, 
 we can hardly point to one blessing transmitted to the 
 world by the nominally Christian empire, whose seat was 
 at Constantinople. The Greek population needed the 
 German blood. 
 
 What a fresh barbarian race could accomplish in reno- 
 vating the world without Christianity, we may see in the
 
 A BARBAROUS RACE WITHOUT CHRISTIANITY. 113 
 
 effects of the Turkish conquest on the races of the Greek 
 empire. The Turks had many of the noble savage quali- 
 ties of the ancient Germans ; their faith in some points 
 was purer than the half-idolatrous worship of the Greek 
 masses, and for this reason and others, they did not 
 accept the faith of the conquered races, as did the north- 
 ern barbarians. 
 
 Christianity never mitigated their savagery or purified 
 their passions. Under Mohammedism, Turkey and some 
 of the fairest provinces of the world have been kept out of 
 the march of human progress. Sensuality and unnatural 
 vice are said to prevail as they did in the Roman Empire, 
 and even this century has witnessed cruelties and bar- 
 barisms such as were common in Europe before the new 
 Faith appeared. 
 
 For the coming triumph of Christianity, or even its 
 partial infusion into European life, there were needed 
 fresh races or peoples, not exposed to Roman corruption, 
 who would receive its teachings gladly. These appeared 
 in the Germanic and Keltic tribes ; and their influence, 
 as modified by Christianity, on the moral progress of 
 Europe is now to be examined.
 
 IL 
 
 POWER OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH OK THE HABITS^ 
 MORALS, AND LAWS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 POSITION OF WOMAN UNDER THE GERMAN TRIBES. 
 
 When the German and Keltic tribes first met the in- 
 fluences of the Christian Faith, they had about them 
 something of the wholesome purity, as well as the savage- 
 ness of the vigorous life in the forests and on the waters. 
 For some unexplained reason, woman held, in the Teu- 
 tonic tribes, a peculiar and revered position. It is true 
 that she was under the absolute authority of her husband 
 or guardian, and could be sold by the former, or bought 
 or beaten or killed. Yet she was the companion of his 
 labours and dangers ;^ her counsel in moments of great 
 peril was looked upon by the tribe as almost inspired ; 
 she was often the prophetess of revealed destinies ; she 
 encouraged the men in their fiercest battles, and it was said 
 that, to the soldier despairing and dying, her whisper 
 would bring back life and courage, and often arouse 
 him to victory." Repeatedly in their long struggles with 
 the Romans, have women of the Germans deliberately 
 murdered themselves, rather than submit to dishonour. 
 It may not be reasonable to trust entirely to an epi- 
 grammatic satirist like Tacitus, or to a fiery denunciator 
 like Salvian, yet under the comparisons of both there must 
 be some truth. The purity of German women must have 
 
 * Tacitus. 
 
 * Gidd, Condition privde de la Fe}n7ne. Tacitus.
 
 xi8 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 been a striking contrast with Roman impurity ; and ac- 
 cording to the " eloquent priest of Marseilles," the virtue 
 of the Gallic Christians made but a poor appearance 
 placed beside this heathen chastity. The Teutons are 
 represented as at first shocked with the abominations they 
 beheld in Roman cities ; they destroyed the houses of lust 
 and even slew the women who were instruments of such 
 debasing pleasure. The old sagas show the estimate the 
 early Teutons put on female purity ; and the ancient 
 legislation which affixes such severe penalties for even 
 innocent familiarities, and which has scales of penalties 
 for every approach against woman's virtue, prove how 
 early this was embodied in law and custom. 
 
 Unlike most barbarous or semi-civilized tribes, the 
 Germans had succeeded in preserving the morals of their 
 women measurably pure. It was this undoubtedly which 
 retained the physical vigour of these tribes, and gave 
 them the bodily force which overwhelmed the degenerate 
 Romans, and which has kept their descendants at the head 
 of the world's affairs even to this day. Yet it will not be 
 wise to exaggerate these qualities. Such writers as Tacitus 
 and Salvian have no doubt painted their virtues in brighter 
 colours in order to throw Roman vice into darker shade. 
 Polygamy was not unknown among them, or unnatural 
 vice.^ The absolute tyranny of the husband often ended 
 in cruelty and bitter oppression. The provision in certain 
 laws that the husband could not put out the eyes or break 
 the limbs of the unhappy wife,^ shows to what violence he 
 did sometimes proceed. 
 
 It is true that as time went on the archaic form of 
 purchase of the wife became more and more a purchase 
 
 ' See Tacitus. Corpora infames. The one guilty of these vices 
 was called by the Anglo-Saxons bccdling ; by the Salians, cynitus. 
 2 See Davoud-Oghlou's Legislation des ancietis Germains.
 
 GERMAN CHASTITY. 119 
 
 of the guardianship and not of the person of the woman, 
 and finally was only the mode of providing a dower. 
 Yet in the early centuries marriage with the Germans 
 was the buying^ of a woman like any other property, and 
 one of the first endowments of a wife was the barbarous 
 and coarse MoTgengabe. Woman was the maiden serving 
 her lord, who knelt at his feet during his meal and yielded 
 to his every whim.^ There was a coarse and brutal side to 
 German marriage, as well as a more elevated. A wife 
 rated at so many pieces of silver could not be the ideal 
 " socium laborum et periculorum," companion of labours 
 and dangers, whom Tacitus pictures. Nothing shows the 
 degrading side of this connection better than that provision 
 of the Anglo-Saxon law, which we shall quote, in regard 
 to the compensation made to a husband for the adultery 
 of his wife, wherein a woman seems to be valued like any 
 other property, and the offender is obliged to furnish 
 another wife in place of the false one.^ Whatever purity 
 the Teutons may have preserved in their native wilds, they 
 did not long retain under the temptations of the Roman 
 cities. 
 
 When Christianity first touched them they were begin- 
 ning to feel these degenerating influences. It was fortu- 
 nate for the future of Europe that the elevating power of 
 this Religion came to aid the German habit of purity and 
 estimate of woman, before Roman and Greek vices had 
 sapped the Teutonic character. The best results of modern 
 civilization have probably come from the position given 
 to women in Europe by German customs, purified by the 
 
 ^ According to Grimm (Z>. Alfeiihiimer) the phrase " buy a woman " 
 for " take a wife " came dovm into the Middle Ages in many parts of 
 Germany. (P. 421.) 
 
 ■ Leg. Aethel., 32,
 
 I20 GESTA CHRIST!, 
 
 Christian Faith. That modern society has not decayed 
 Hke ancient, and that pure family-life still supplies fresh 
 forces to races a thousand years old, is due above all to the 
 teachings of Christ, acting on German barbaric virtue and 
 respect for woman. The peculiar chivalry in the sentiment 
 towards woman which softened manners and civilized 
 certain classes so much in the Middle Ages, and which still 
 ornaments modern society, is a combined product of the 
 German and the Christian, and is a feature unknown to 
 classic races. 
 
 German Tutelage — The Tutelage or Miind {mundiiimy 
 probably from inajuis) of the German woman was very 
 different from the Roman inanus. It was a guardian- 
 ship more in the interest of the woman and ward than 
 of the husband or guardian. The " subjection of woman " 
 rested on a different basis from that implied, and often 
 acknowledged in the Roman law. There was none of 
 that cynical contempt for her which even the Stoical jurists 
 could not avoid expressing as for an inferior and very 
 uncertain being. The German theory of tutelage simply 
 rested on the fact that she could not bear arms, and there- 
 fore could not appear personally in the only forms of legal 
 trial known to that people. She must be represented by 
 another who must guard her rights and her interests. It 
 has been said by a thorough investigator of this field,^ that 
 throughout ancient German legislation " woman appears 
 with a mingled character of feebleness and of grandeur," 
 which would not badly describe her position in modern 
 civilization. 
 
 No German woman ^ of the higher classes was permitted 
 
 * Sallantin. De la Ptiissance Maritale en Droit Rottiaiti et en 
 Droit Frafigais. 
 
 2 Nulli mulicri liceat in suae potestatis arbitrio, id est sine mundio 
 vivere. {Rolharis., p. 205.)
 
 GERMAN TUTELAGE. lai 
 
 to live without a guardian.^ The tutelage passed from the 
 father to the husband.^ If the husband died the relatives 
 of the widow could liberate the tutelage {iniindium liberare) 
 and buy rights of guardianship. The tutelage gave the 
 husband the right to sell, punish, or kill his wife. If he 
 killed her when innocent he was obliged to pay a heavy 
 fine to the parents who had given her to him.' 
 
 The original form of marriage with the Teutons indi- 
 cated a purchase ; with the Scandinavians it is called in 
 the sagas brod-kaup,^ kaup mali, miindi-kaicp. By the law 
 of the Alemanns, if the father demand the wife back, the 
 husband must return her and compensate her with forty 
 solidij" By the Saxon law the future husband must pay 
 three hundred solidi ^ to the parents. 
 
 The law of the Visigoths speaks of the " price " given 
 by the groom to the parents ; '^ the Burgundians give it a 
 similar name ; the Lombards call it meta. The Francs in 
 later time, when it had become a mere form, speak of it 
 as "per solidum et de7iaritun!' 
 
 The laws of king Ine (688 a.d) say : " Gif man wif 
 
 * Megede unde wif muten aver vormunden hebben an jewelker 
 klage. {Sachsensp., 1,46.) Mulier semper potestate viri aut potestate 
 Curtis regiae debeat permanere. {Ed. Rotliar., p. 205.) 
 
 2 Maritus est tutor uxoris post deponsationem. {Sachsensp., iii, 115). 
 
 ^ Si maritus uxorem suam occiderit immerentem, componat 
 solidos mille ducentos parentibus qui earn ad maritum dederint. 
 (Rothar., 203.) 
 
 * Grimm, D. Alt., p. 422. 
 
 * . . . reddat earn et cum quadraginta solidis earn componat. 
 (Z. Alem., tit. 54.) 
 
 ^ Uxorem ducturus ccc. sol. det parentibus ejus. (Z. Sax., tit. vi.) 
 Qui viduam ducere velit, offerat tutori pretium emptionis ejus. (Z. 
 Sax., 7, 3.) 
 
 ' Si inter sponsum et sponsae parentes . . . dato pretio, etc. 
 (Z. Visig., II I, 452.) Si pater de filiae nuptiis definierit, et de pretio 
 convenerit, etc. Ubid, iii, i, 3.)
 
 122 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 gebycge, etc." " If a man buy a wife and the marriage 
 take not place, let him give the money and compensate, 
 and make bot (compensation) to his surety." ^ 
 
 An ancient historian speaks of marriage as being firmer 
 if purchase-money had been paid.^ The ancient Germans 
 could sell wives as an insult or a punishment ; the Ice- 
 landers had this power ; the Frisians are related to have 
 sold their wives and children to pay their taxes to the 
 Romans. The Saxons, as we have seen, could buy a wife, 
 but wej-e not permitted to sell her. The Langobards gave 
 away a wife, sometimes to an unfree person, probably as a 
 punishment. 
 
 Aethelbert speaks also of buying a wife ; ^ the price was 
 called a ccap, sceatt, gyft. This king also commands that 
 if a free man breaks the marriage tie with a free married 
 woman, he shall buy another woman and bring her to the 
 injured husband.* And, again, " If a free man take away 
 a free man's wife, let him pay for it with his wergeld, and 
 provide another wife with his own money and bring her 
 to the other."^ 
 
 By the laws of the Alemanns, he who marries the wife of 
 another shall pay forty solidi to the injured husband, and 
 restore the woman. If he keep the wife with the consent 
 of the husband, he will pay 400 solidi — her full value ; 
 if she die before the husband has reclaimed her, he will 
 also pay 400 solidi. The children born before the pay- 
 ment of her value, will belong to the first husband ; if one 
 
 ' Leg. IncB, 31. 
 
 2 Tutiorem matrimonii fidem censebat quod pretio firmaretur. {SaXt 
 Gramvi., lib. v. p. 88.) 
 
 3 Leg. Aeth., 76, 82. 
 
 ■* Idem, 32. Si liber homo cum hominis liberi uxore concubuerit 
 ejus capitale redimat, et aliam uxorem propria pecunia mercex^r, 
 et illi alteri adducat. 
 
 * Idem, 31.
 
 BUYING A WIFE. 123 
 
 of them should die, the second husband mi st pay wergeld 
 or compensation -^ that is, the wife and all that belong 
 to her, are regarded as the property of him who bought 
 her. 
 
 In the old Welsh laws, compiled 11 80 A.D. and be- 
 longing to a much older period, we find the three stages 
 of endowment of the wife existing together — the avwbyr 
 or purchase-money paid to the father by the husband, the 
 coivyll or morgengabe, given by the husband to the wife 
 on the morning after marriage, and the agivaddi or dower 
 given by the father to the husband.- All the ancient 
 Welsh laws give the wife half the property if she be seven 
 years married and separated without fault of her own. 
 
 Scandinavian Cnstojiis. — The most ancient German cus- 
 toms are those of the Scandinavian races. They are 
 stamped with a singular respect for woman ; and yet in 
 some directions she was especially under subjection. 
 
 Their oldest laws punished the murder of a humble 
 m.aiden more than that of a chief The weaker sex was 
 protected in innumerable ways ; and even as late as the 
 1 2th century, a simple kiss forced upon a maiden was 
 punished with fine or exile ; and in the 15th century, 
 a law of Copenhagen orders the adulterous woman to be 
 buried alive, and the guilty partner to be decapitated. 
 
 The Scandinavian woman carried arms by a champion, 
 and pleaded or sat in justice through a representative. She 
 was excluded from judicial debates but could act alone 
 in small matters. At times, she had the right to choose 
 her own guardian ; if her tutor abused his rights she could 
 bring an action. She had personality — property which 
 she could call her own. If a elative was killed, she took 
 a portion of the inheritance, or received the blood-money, 
 
 ' Lex. Alem., 51, 1,2. 
 
 ' Ancient Laws of IVaUs, Dimetian Code, p. 223,
 
 124 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 though a less share than the males. The price paid to hef 
 natural guardian was gradually changed here, as every- 
 where among the German tribes, under the influence of 
 Christianity, into a dower, which was increased by gifts 
 from her own family. She received not alone arms and 
 horses, but land and houses ; so that her independence 
 might be guaranteed. Reciprocal fidelity was demanded 
 from her and her husband ; if he abandoned or ill-treated 
 her, he could be punished by the relatives, and wcrgeld 
 demanded of him. Her dower could be secured by a 
 kind of separation of goods. Partnership in property was 
 permitted in Iceland between husband and wife, but the 
 husband usually had the power of management. At the 
 husband's death, the widow succeeded to a portion of his 
 power ; she could dispose of the hand of her daughter, and 
 be guardian of the minor children ; she was in fact tutor, 
 except that she must call in her near relatives for assistance. 
 She could perform no acts in law, for in these arms are 
 necessary, but she could direct her champion ; she was not 
 the legal guardian of her children, but must be consulted 
 by the "tutor"; she did not fight, but encouraged the war- 
 riors ; she did not sacrifice, but interpreted and revealed 
 the oracles.^ 
 
 In Norway, the woman was always in minority, but, 
 under certain conditions, was allowed a free administra- 
 tion of her property. In Sweden and Denmark, she was 
 more like a minor and the tutor represented her more 
 generally ; he could dispose of her hand, but she could 
 refuse, and, if he neglected his duty, choose a husband 
 for herself. 
 
 Marriage in Scandinavia could take place without clergy, 
 but divorce required a religious rite. 
 
 The wife could demand this, if the husband wasted 
 
 ' GicU.
 
 THE SCANDINAVIAN LAW. 125 
 
 their common property. The husband was absolute 
 master of the property of the wife, ^ even of her dower, 
 but if they were separated, he must restore all that be- 
 longed to her, and from one-third to one-half of their 
 common acquisitions. Her natural tutors could always 
 act against him in law. She had few separate rights, 
 and could contract but few debts without his authority. 
 It may be said in general that the oldest and most 
 characteristic German customs — the Scandinavian — placed 
 woman more under subjection than do those of the tribes 
 brought under Roman and Keltic influences. This pecu- 
 liarity has affected all modern legislation in the Scandi- 
 navian countries. 
 
 Marriage under German Cnstojns. — A wife under the 
 old German law was in the power of the husband in all 
 acts of domestic life, and in civil life she could only act 
 through him. She entered with all her property under his 
 Mund or guardianship, but he could not dispose alone of 
 her estate. In acts of sale, he appears as her guardian, 
 not master. At his death, she received a certain portion 
 of their common acquisitions, one-third in some tribes and 
 one-half in others. There was as yet no partnership, and 
 she transmitted no right in the common property to her 
 heirs. The husband could dispose of their common goods; 
 he alone had the right to sell. The wife's property con- 
 sisted, first of the price of purchase, which gradually became 
 changed under the higher views of marriage taught by 
 the new Faith, into the dower, and was finally paid by 
 the father ; secondly, of the " morning-gift ;" thirdly, of 
 
 ^ In case of there being no children, it was not considered just fo? 
 the husband to alienate the property of the wife, but when it was done, 
 the action must stand in law. Nulla prole suscitata vel superstite, 
 alienare non debet prcedium uxoris niaiitus ; si tameu alienaverit, 
 stabit aUenatio. {JLex Scauice Simon, p. 97.)
 
 <26 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 her private possessions, and finally of a certain portion 
 of the common gains. During marriage, the husband 
 managed the dower ; if he died first, it returned to the 
 widow and her children, the principal belonging to the 
 latter. If the wife died first without children, the dower 
 fell to tiie husband. 
 
 The Sachsenspiegel, a German code of the thirteenth 
 century, says of the wife, that " she must live after the 
 will of the husband, and be subject and obedient, for she 
 is not competent of herself without her husband, whether 
 to do or to leave undone."^ 
 
 Girls were often excluded from the inheritance of land, 
 under the necessities of a warlike time." The position of 
 woman was made secondary, and the rights of succession 
 were restrained, so that she could not bring too great 
 estates to her husband and thus break up a family pro- 
 perty. 
 
 Approaches to partnership in property in marriage, 
 and equality of rights of the sexes, have been the slow 
 gains won by the Christian spirit in Europe. Even in 
 the seventh century, the customary wills, bequeathing 
 property, begin to show the Christian influence, equalizing 
 the sexes. One of Marculfus' forms speaks of "the long- 
 continued but impious custom " of providing differently 
 for the sister from the brother, and divides the estate 
 equally between the sons and daughters.^ 
 
 ' Und sie sol nach seinem willen leben, und unterthenig und gehor- 
 sam sein, denn sie ist ihies selbes nicht gewaltig, one ihren man, weder 
 zu thun noch zu lassen. {Sachs., i, 97.) 
 
 ^ Glanville seems to assert in regard to the old English law, that 
 no female could share in any inheritance with males. Mulier nun- 
 quam cum masculo partem capit in hereditate aliqua. {Glen., v. i.) 
 
 ^ Diuturna sed impia inter nos consuetudo tenetur, ut terra paterna 
 sorores cum fratribus portionem non habeant. Sed ego . . . sicut 
 mihi equaliter a Deo donati eslis lilio. {Marc, Form,, 1. 11, p. 177.)
 
 FREE MARRIAGE. ivf 
 
 Under the German customs, all sins and errois o{ the 
 wife are severely punished. The husband can be faithless 
 without redress. He can send her away, provided he 
 give her a dower as large as the original one, and pay a 
 fine to the king ; he may abandon his home, provided he 
 take nothing with him. If she leave him without good 
 reasons, she may be suffocated in a ditch (necetur in luteo). 
 
 It is obvious that the position of woman under all the 
 Teutonic tribes bore a stamp of barbarism. Something 
 of that barbarism has descended in the English common 
 law ; though here the ascetic principles of the Canon law 
 have aided in making her legal position as wife, inferior. 
 The influence of the Christian idea as distinguished from 
 asceticism of the Church, on the one side, or from the 
 coarseness of German custom and law on the other, has 
 been continually to make her, in all personal rights, the 
 equal of man, and his superior in the moral field. 
 
 Free Marriage. — As the Roman institutions were 
 transplanted to Gaul, "free marriage" (terminated at will) 
 was especially adopted. Even Christianity did not for 
 a time change it. The consent of relatives and friends 
 was desirable, but not necessary. Marriage was held good 
 without religious ceremonial or dower. The various laws 
 of the Christian emperors only demanded the consent of 
 the spouses and the testimony of friends. Divorce was 
 comparatively easy, and among some of the tribes, was 
 possible under mutual consent. Legal concubinage — a 
 very different relation from " free marriage " — was almost 
 universal, and even at times winked at by the Church.' 
 Justinian regarded it as lawful, and it endured till the 
 thirteenth century. 
 
 The new Faith of course acted directly against these 
 evils, and everywhere — when allowed its natural power — 
 * Dec. Cone. Toledo (589 A.D.). {Ic. xvii.)
 
 128 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 tended to abolish free marriage, unlimited divorce and 
 concubinage. Even the Church, in the matter of divorce, 
 was true to the teachings of the Master. The Council of 
 Aries (314 A.D.) endeavoured to recall the Gallo-Romans 
 to the respect of marriage, and warns those husbands who 
 had surprised their wives in criminal practices, to take no 
 others to wife, — a direction more strict than the apparent 
 teachings of Christ. Another Council (365) excommuni- 
 cated those husbands who abandoned their wives without 
 proof of crime, and contracted new marriages ; others were 
 excommunicated who repudiated their spouses before the 
 matter had been brought to the bishop for judgment. 
 
 The law of Aethelred^ is striking. "And we direct 
 very earnestly that every Christian man carefully avoid 
 unlawful concubinage and rightly observe Christian law ; 
 and let it never be that a Christian man marry within 
 the fourth degree nor have more wives than one as long 
 as she may live. Whoever will rightly observe God's 
 law and secure his soul from the burnings of hell." 
 The Pepin Capitulary, addressed (744) to the Council of 
 Soissons, declares that " during the life of the husband, 
 no other ought to marry his wife," etc., and that the 
 husband is not permitted to repudiate his wife except for 
 the cause of fornication.^ The Capitularies of Charlemagne 
 (789 A.D.) are strongly for the indissolubility of marriage. 
 In one he declares that nothing can break a Christian 
 marriage,^ and calls another union adultery. 
 
 The growing love and worship for the mother of Jesus, 
 no doubt strengthened and intensified this respect for 
 woman, now increasing in Europe. 
 
 ^ Lex. Ethel., v. ri, vi. 11. 
 
 ' Maritus non debet mulierem suam dimittere, excepto causa forni- 
 cationis deprehensa. {BaL, i, 159.) 
 
 • Nequaquani posse ulla occasione separari.
 
 THE STRUGGLE OF CHRISTIANITY, 129 
 
 The Church, too, set itself vigorously to root out the old 
 venal character of marriage. The Council of Treves (1227) 
 forbade the relatives of the bridal pair from taking money 
 under any pretence for the giving the woman in marriage.^ 
 The maternal power introduced into, or strengthened in 
 ancient legislation by Christianity, was gradually developed 
 until it finally reached almost the level of the paternal 
 power. 
 
 The low idea of marriage, shown especially in the 
 Anglo-Saxon laws, was elevated step by step. Under the 
 Burgundians, two-thirds of the purchase money of the bride 
 went to the father and one-third to the woman, showing 
 that the archaic idea of sale still survived, This soon 
 became only the purchase of the woman's tutelage, and 
 later, under the higher influences, a mode of securing the 
 independence and safety of the wife. The AIorgeiig-ab& 
 was gradually merged in the dower, and at length under 
 the new refinement, dropped out of use. All the various 
 forms of protecting or adding to the wife's property ; — the 
 purchase money, the morning gift, the Norman doiiaire, the 
 " thirds " or " half " of the different tribes, the dos ad ostium 
 ecdesi(2, all have formed the modern "dower." The ring is 
 the only relic of the ancient ived, or pledge, that the man 
 would fulfil his part of the money contract. Even as early 
 as King Edmund (940-946 A.D.), the influence of the new 
 Faith was felt in elevating the idea of the wed or pledge. 
 It was then recognised as a promise that " the husband will 
 keep the wife according to God's law, as a husband should 
 his wife." Still a wed is paid at the same time to the 
 father for the tutelage (foster-lean) of his daughter ; and 
 the husband's authority is described as that of a baron over 
 his vassal ; she is said to " choose his will." Even then, 
 
 '^ . . . quocunque colore qu^esito aliquam pecuniam pro matri- 
 monia contrahenda, etc
 
 130 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 on agreement, she was entitled to half the common pro- 
 perty if they had children, and she did not choose another 
 husband on sepa^'ation.^ 
 
 In the time of Henry I. (1070 A.D.) the widow was 
 entitled to her dowry (when delivered to her before 
 witnesses), and her " marriage gift," and one-third of their 
 common earnings, as well as her clothing and furniture. 
 If she died without children, her relatives divided her share 
 with her husband.^ 
 
 The Church laboured unceasingly to confirm the dower. 
 Many canons made marriage illegal unless the v/oman were 
 thus protected.^ And even as early as King Canute, the 
 Christian spirit seems to have influenced legislation against 
 selling a woman in marriage.* 
 
 Sir Thomas Smith states that even as late as his time 
 (1570), gold and silver were laid upon the " church book " 
 at the door of the church by the husband when the father 
 or next of kin gave the bride up, " as though he did buy 
 her." ^ 
 
 The laws of the Germanic and Scandinavian nations 
 show everyv/here the effect of Christian influence in modi- 
 fying the old license of divorce. The West-Gothic later 
 laws permitted divorce only for adultery, though earlier 
 customs allowed it by mutual consent. 
 
 " Tutelage," at first a domestic right in the interest of 
 the tutor, became by degrees, under Christianity a public 
 charge in the interest of the ward. In the time of Clovis, 
 
 * Leg. Edmund. Thorpe, p. 255. 
 
 * L. H. Prim., Ixx. 22. 
 
 * Dubium non est earn mulierem non pertinere ad matrimonium 
 . . . nisi ilia mulier . . . et dotata legitime . . . videatur 
 Cont. ap. Tus. 
 
 •* .^nd let no one compel either woman or man to hinj whom sha 
 herself mislikes, nor for money sell her, etc. (Z,. oj King Canute, "J^.) 
 
 * TUe Commonwealth of Etigland, p. 124.
 
 TUTELAGE OF WOMAN. 131 
 
 the Mtmd of the woman belonged to her family ; of 
 Charlemagne, to the State. The king became gradually 
 the protector of the weak, according to the words of the 
 Holy Book, which entitle him the " Father of orphans and 
 refuge of widows." At his crowning, he took the oath to be 
 the " guardian of widows and orphans " {tutor viduarum, 
 et orpJianorum) and promised officially to be the "especial 
 defender of widows and wards " (viduis et piipillis maximus 
 defensor). 
 
 "Let our envoys," says Charlemagne, "enquire into the 
 condition of all widows and persons incapable of legal 
 action ; let them watch that they be provided with skilful 
 tutors and friends of justice ; if there be any bad tutors, 
 let them replace them, because, next to the Lord and the 
 saints, the emperor is constituted to be the protector and 
 defender of such." ^ 
 
 Whoever injured the widow, was held to have violated 
 the " Peace of the king." A special jurisdicLion was 
 constituted in her behalf ; justice was made easy for her, 
 and her complaints were always listened to. Woman was 
 not yet made equal to man under the law, but was at least 
 protected. 
 
 From the king, whenever his authority became weakened, 
 the tutelage passed to the feudal baron. At first, the 
 woman could not inherit land, but later she held it 
 under the tutelage of the seigneur who represented her in 
 law. Subsequently she was permitted the right of choosing 
 her guardian, and the seigneur sold his right of tutelage. 
 The tutor acted for her in all things. He could choose her 
 '"champion" {advocates), and in this way gained the right 
 of choosing her husband. Her hand thus became venal. 
 Both widow and daughter were sold in marriage, for they 
 
 * Quia ipse Dominus Imperator, post Domini et sanctorum ejus, 
 quorum et protector et defensor constitutus est. (Cap. i, 8.)
 
 132 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 became of importance to any baron, as controlling one oi 
 more men-at-arms with their estates. The baron had also 
 an equal right in France over the marriage and landed 
 property of the serf (or mainmortable). During the early 
 part of the Middle Ages, the daughter of the serf did not 
 succeed to the land of her parents. Through these rights 
 of the master, arose the extraordinary and brutal " droit de 
 seigneur." ^ 
 
 Under the softening influences of the new Faith, all 
 these " rights " were gradually modified. The right of 
 the seigneur over the hand of his ward was first attacked, 
 and he was not permitted to affix a high price to his 
 consent ; at length the right of tutor came to apply only 
 to the fief and not to the patrimony ; so there became 
 two tutors, the seigneur and the natural guardian, and the 
 right of tutelage was bought and sold. As mercenaries 
 took the place of vassals in the service of the king, the 
 fiefs became simple patrimonies, and the two sexes equal. 
 The woman owning a fief soon exercised all the rights 
 of sovereignty ; she became guardian, dispensed justice, 
 signed treaties, and performed all the public legal acts of 
 the man.2 
 
 France was the first to abolish tutelage ; charters in 
 the twelfth and thirteenth centuries omit any mention of it. 
 Outside of marriage was complete emancipation ; inside, 
 the old incapacities. After the fall of feudalism, no 
 guardian — at least in the cities — was appointed for a girl 
 no longer a minor, or for a widow ; she had access to all 
 
 * See on this curious subject, Delpit, Siir le droit du Seigneur, 
 Delisle, Etudes siir la co>idilio7t de la classe agric. en Normandie, and 
 other works on Jus prinKe noctis. Also Du Cange, on Mercheta 
 and Cullage. 
 
 ^ Gid!;. I desire to express especial obligations to this most clear 
 and thorough writer on this topic.
 
 GAINS OF CHRISTIANITY, 133 
 
 courts ; could plead and was represented in judicial duels 
 by champions selected by herself. The incapacities of the 
 Roman law disappear ; she can give bail, appear in courts, 
 be arbitrator and render testimony in civil or criminal 
 cases. Her incapacity begins with marriage, and is de- 
 rived from the German mimdium or tutelage. The 
 husband can beat his wife, though not to death, and 
 chastise her reasonably.^ The husband is responsible for 
 his wife's offences and has the right to administer her 
 property ; all their goods and effects are common. 
 
 In general, it may be said that throughout Europe the 
 influence of Christianity tended to purify law of the gross 
 German prejudice, that bodily strength was a condition of 
 civil capacity, and that woman was an inferior being — 
 an impression from which even the Stoical jurists were not 
 free. The sex unable to bear arms was gradually freed 
 from disability and received an equal part in the suc- 
 cession of property, while in marriage the wife retained 
 ttie administration of her property, and gradually acquired 
 almost full legal equality with the husband. 
 
 It is not to be understood, however, that in this matter 
 the Church corresponded to the Spirit of the Master's 
 teachings. The Canon law was a reaction from pagan 
 licentiousness, and too much narrowed the field of woman's 
 activity, holding her in too close subjection, and has thus 
 been adverse to modern progress. 
 
 In the north of Europe the old German tutelage of 
 woman continued the latest ; in the south, other incapa- 
 cities from Roman law survived. In every part of Europe, 
 there was a preference for male heirs for many centuries. 
 In France, it was 179 1 before all children were assured 
 
 * . . . battre sa femme, sans mort et sans mehaing, et la castid 
 resonablement. (Ord. XII.)
 
 134 GESTA CHRIST!, 
 
 equal rights in the family. The Code Napoleon abolished 
 
 all legal distinctions of sex. 
 
 In Scandinavia, it is only in this century that the legal 
 disabilities of woman have been dimi/iished, and in some 
 directions entirely removed ; and in this century also, 
 woman may be said to have been legally emancipated in 
 Germany.^ 
 
 In England the old inferiority of woman in marriage — 
 an effect of German tutelage — was retained longer than 
 in France, which came more under the Roman law. The 
 canonists, who held the ascetic idea of marriage as an 
 impurity, and of woman as an inferior creature, and a 
 source of endless temptations to man, were only too re- 
 joiced to place the wife under strict subjection and to 
 almost absorb her personality in her husband's. 
 
 The religious influence, promoting entire partnership in 
 property and interests, seems to have had more weight 
 in France than in England 
 
 Of the rigorous English common law Sir Thomas Smith 
 says (1571) : "And although our Lavve may seeme some- 
 what rigorous towards the wives, yet for the most part 
 they can handle their husbands so well and so dulcly, and 
 specially when their husbands be sicke, that where the law 
 giveth them nothing, their husbands at their death of their 
 own good will give them all."^ Glanville^ still earlier 
 (1181) says : "It should be understood that a woman can- 
 not during the life of her husband make any disposition 
 of her dower. For since the wife herself is in a legal 
 sense under the absolute power of her husband, it is not 
 
 ' Tutelage of woman was only abolished in Wiirtemberg in 1828, 
 in Baden in 1835, and in Saxony in 1838 ; it is said to still exist la 
 the Ilaiiscatic ' )vvns and a portion of Hanover, ^idd. 
 
 ^ Commowwealfh 0/ England, p. 125. 
 
 ' ClanviUe^ c. iiL p. 16 (Beames).
 
 THE COMMON LAW. 135 
 
 singular if the dower as well as the woman herseif should 
 be considered to be fully at the disposal of her husband 
 elect." He adds, that the husband can give, sell, or alien- 
 ate her dower, and that the wife has no redress, even if 
 she have not consented to this disposition of her property.'^ 
 She cannot even make a will without the authority of her 
 husband.^ The same author testifies to the influence of 
 the Church in confirming her dowry, " for every man is 
 bound as well by the ecclesiastical law, as by the secular, 
 to endow his bride at the time of his being affianced to 
 her." 3 
 
 The spiritual courts were not always in favour of the 
 legal subjection of woman. Thus in the reign of Edward 
 III. (1336-143 1, A.D.) they held that wives had the right 
 to make wills, and that efforts to prevent them were in 
 violation of the usage of canon law. The church-door 
 dower {ad osthini ccclesicE) seems to have mainly passed 
 away in the seventeenth century.* 
 
 The modern idea of absolute partnership between hus- 
 band and wife, is not to be found in the old English law. 
 
 There exists still a form of contract, made in the time of 
 Edward I., in which a man engaged to sell and deliver his 
 wife to another man,^ and a historical document speaks of 
 a "bought wife delivered in a halter," as late as 1782.^ 
 
 ' GlanviUe (Beames), p. 63. ' Ibid. 
 
 ^ Ibid.., p. 163. It is clearly not the canonists who put the wife's 
 dower and property so absolutely in the power of the husband. This 
 feature belongs to an archaic idea among the Teutonic tribes, of the 
 subjection of the weaker sex. 
 
 ■• See that quaint book, The IVo/nan's Lawyer, p. in. 
 
 * Noveritis me tradidisse et dimisse spontanea voluntate mea, Gul. 
 Paynell milite, Margaretam uxorem meam, etc. (Quoted from Rot. 
 Pari., vol. i. p. 146, by Pearson, in his History of En inland, vol. i. p 601.) 
 
 " Anne, daughter of Moses Stebbing, by a bought wife, delivered 
 to him in a halter, Sept., 1782. {Ibid., vol. i. p. 601, from Purleigh's 
 Register^
 
 136 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Fleta^ defines the legal status of woman as "under the 
 rod." 
 
 The conclusion from this very brief resume of an impor- 
 tant topic, may fairly be that the modern social and legal 
 position of woman, while it owes much to ancient German 
 customs, has been far more influenced by the estimate set 
 upon woman and marriage by the Christian doctrines. 
 
 Christianity, it will be seen, has done away with " tute- 
 lage," at least in central Europe ; has elevated marriage 
 from the idea of a purchase to that of a spiritual and bodily 
 union ; it has protected woman by everywhere encouraging 
 the dower ; it has sought to make her in its own fields the 
 equal of man ; and through its influence, more than any 
 other, has " the proprietary and personal independence of 
 woman " been advanced throughout Europe and the Chris- 
 tian world. This has been one of the most important 
 contributions of the religion of Jesus to the progress of the 
 race ; its effects are to be felt through all succeeding ages. 
 
 ' Quaedam sub virga velut uxores. Fl.^ i,-, c. 9.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 PERSONAL FEUDS AND PRIVATE WAR. 
 
 In all barbaric society, individual injury is at once re- 
 venged on the person of the enemy, and the injured, being 
 a member of a family, is protected by this association, and 
 his wrongs are held as wrongs done to the famil3% So 
 " feuds " [faidd) arise, which are so large a part of the 
 objects of legislation of the early Teutonic and Keltic 
 races. Wherever lands are inherited, there goes with it 
 the inheritance of the coat of mail and the family feud.^ 
 Among the American Indians, it is well known that 
 the murder of a single member by one of another tribe, 
 entails a feud against all of that tribe, until revenge 
 is satiated by another murder. The same thing is still 
 true of the Arabs, who carry out blood-feuds to an ex- 
 treme, and whose faith has not softened this feature of 
 barbarism. Philosophers have called the practice the 
 habit of "self-help," as opposed to leaving punishment 
 with government. It seems rather the unbridling of re- 
 vengeful passions, and belongs to a low state of human 
 progress. The Teutonic races, however, early attempted 
 to restore order to society by arranging fixed methods of 
 satisfying enmities. A careful and elaborate system of 
 
 * Ad quemcunque hereditas terrcC pervenerit, ad ilium vestis bellica 
 et ultio proximi . . . debet pertinere. {Leg. Angl. et Wer. Lex. 
 Salic, tit J 3, and many Anglo-Saxon Laws.) 
 
 »37
 
 <38 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 fines, or amends, was arranged, first no doubt paid to the 
 sufferer or his family alone, and afterwards to the prince 
 or king also, as representing the injured community. Each 
 member and portion of the body was strictly valued, and 
 every possible injury estimated, so that all penal and re- 
 pressive legislation was represented by scales of fines and 
 pecuniary penalties. A favourite Anglo-Saxon proverb 
 was : " Buy a spear from the side, or bear it ! " (Biege 
 spere of side oder here !) Capital punishment was seldom 
 employed, as the tribe could not spare a member, and 
 preferred fines to death-penalties. The extreme punish- 
 ment with the early Teutons was " out-lawing," which 
 not only banished the offender from the society of his 
 fellow-men and made his murder an act of justice, but 
 even cast out his body from honourable burial. The first 
 effort of the new Faith on the barbaric tribes of Europe, 
 was to repress feuds by encouraging fines. King Alfred, in 
 tlie introduction of his laws, speaks of the ordaining of bot^ 
 or money-fines to repress feuds, by the legislative assem- 
 blies of England, as a special effect of the Christian faith.^ 
 The codes of ever}^ tribe, after its conversion to Christi- 
 anity, are filled uith rules as to pecuniary amends. The 
 two sexes and different ranks of life are carefully estimated 
 as to their relative values. It is curious that by the laws 
 of the Wisigoths, the compensation, or xvergeld (" man- 
 money," or " blood-money ") of a maiden under fifteen 
 years was only half that of a youth, while between fifteer. 
 and twenty years, it was more than that of a man ; between 
 twenty and forty it was less, and still later, yet less. This 
 people felt among the first the influence of the new power 
 in the world, and faida, or feud, was early abolished, and 
 it was declared that the author of the crime is alone re- 
 
 ' See Thorpe's Coll. and the chapter of this woik, on " A»ijlo .Saxon 
 Laws."
 
 FINES FOR CRIMES. 139 
 
 sponsible, and no persons, whether relatives, or neighbours, 
 will have to fear any calumnia (offence). (Lang. C. 6, 8.) 
 
 Among the Alemanns and Burgundians faida still 
 existed, though restrained, but with the Langobards it 
 was declared that : " In all wounds between freemen, we 
 have put stronger compositions than the ancients, that nc 
 recourse be had to feud {faida), and it be replaced by 
 an amiable friendship." ^ And, " He who for a wound or 
 a blow hath received fine for a murdered man, and taken 
 care not to exercise faida, yet killeth a man of the other 
 pa.rty, he will pay to the relatives double the fine."^ Feud 
 is raised, or ended, usually by paying a certain fine. The 
 steps for abolishing feud were gradual ; first the home was 
 protected, and whoever killed a murderer in his own home, 
 even in anger, paid a fine equal to the legal value of the 
 person, provided he were slain at once. But if he were 
 killed after consideration, the fine was increased seven-fold. 
 And in certain cases, all the offender's goods were confis- 
 cated, and even he himself was put to death. In the law 
 of the Bc^varians, different parts of the house were valued 
 even as different members of the body, and suitable fines 
 fixed on their violation. Next, certain places were made 
 sacred from feud, such as public places like the mallum 
 (or legislative hall), the market, the town, and various 
 asylums, and most of all, the church. Then the transit, 
 or journey from the house to the mallum, the town, the 
 market, the court, or the church was protected. From 
 protection in space, the legislation was transferred to time. 
 All religious days were sacred from feud, such as Sundays, 
 Festival days, the Christmas-tide, Good Friday, Ascension- 
 day, and the like. The power of the king, too, imposed 
 peace on certain places, such as royal roads, water-courses, 
 and forests. Protection was extended also to widows 
 * Le^. Roth., 74. - Ibid., 6.
 
 f40 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 orphans, the poor, and pilgrims. And finally, even draw, 
 ing the sword in presence of a bishop, or dignitary of the 
 Church or state, was punished by a fine. 
 
 Among the Salian Francs, we find a decree very early 
 (596 A.D.) against feuds. Childebert II. limits it to murder, 
 and declares it a pagan institution which had destroyed 
 many families. He orders that unprovoked murder should 
 be punished with death, and should not be redeemed with 
 fine, " because it is but just that he who has known how 
 to kill, should learn how to die."^ 
 
 The Church everywhere sought in the Middle Ages to 
 encourage the settlement of contests by fines rather than 
 fighting, and to obtain concord by arbitration or through 
 judges rather than by litigation. It was earnest in its 
 endeavours to determine facts, not by duel, but by wit- 
 nesses.^ In England, in the seventh and eighth centuries, 
 so great was the influence of Christian principles, war itself 
 was for a period regarded as antichristian, and a confessor 
 at shrove-tide would refuse absolution to a man at feud, 
 who would not make peace with his enemy.^ 
 
 A precious document describes to us the early influence 
 of Christianity in substituting punishment instead of fines 
 for murder. Pravda^ is the name of the ancient Russian 
 code, first collected thirty-two years before the introduction 
 of Christianity (988 A.D.). From this we learn that "King 
 Wladimir lived in the fear of God, and murders waxed 
 greatly. Then spake the bishops to Wladimir, ' Murders 
 wax greatly. Why dost thou not punish ? ' He answered, 
 
 ' De homicidiis, vero ita jussimus observare, ut quicumque teme- 
 rario, ausu alius sine causa occidcrit, vitai pcriculum feriatur. Nam 
 non de precio redemptionis se redimat aut componat ... quia 
 justum est, ut qui novit occidere, discat monri. 
 
 * Reeves' Hist, of English Law (i, 116). 
 ' Pearson's Hist, of England. 
 
 * Las dlteste Recht der Russen. Ewers. Hamburgh, 182&
 
 ANCIENT RUSSIAN LAW. I41 
 
 * T feared injustice.' But they replied, 'Thou hast been set 
 by God, for the punishment of the wicked and for grace 
 to the good. It becometh thee to punish the murderers ; 
 but only after much searching out' Then Wladimir re- 
 jected the wergeld (fine) and punished the murderers," 
 
 This ancient chronicle shows remarkably the change 
 which must have passed through every barbaric tribe after 
 the new power began to work. First the bitter and 
 deadly feud under the reign of private revenge ; then 
 blood-money paid to the person injured or to his relatives ; 
 then a fine paid to the prince by one who had no family, 
 and afterwards by any ofiender, as a surety of peace and 
 to atone for injury done to the community. The first 
 effect of the new Faith is a fresh sanctity given to human 
 life. Wladimir feared to execute murderers, lest he should 
 do wrong by taking life. But the new view of justice and 
 of punishment which also came from this Faith, taught 
 him that he must repress evil-doers even at the sacrifice of 
 life. The fines which were once a safeguard of order, now 
 became a composition with guilt. Capital punishment 
 here was an offspring of the spirit of true humanity. 
 
 Thus one of the great movements in human progress, 
 the substitution of law and legal penalty for private 
 revenge, was especially aided on the continent of Europe 
 by Christianity. 
 
 It is true that society everywhere tends, under Divine 
 influences and the instincts and sympathies of human 
 nature, towards this improvement. Yet imperfect faiths 
 and other causes retaid the drift. Christianity has no 
 purer page in its record, than the history of its efforts to 
 abolish feuds and blood-revenge, and to draw men under 
 law and government ; thus beginning that great work of 
 bringing Peace to the earth, which after many ages it shall 
 certainly consummate.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 PRIVATE WAR AND PEACE OF GOD. — ARBITRATION. 
 
 One of the especial curses of the Middle Ages — a natural 
 accompaniment of feudalism — was the practice of waging 
 " private war." This was a privilege allowed in many 
 countries only to gentlemen, but in Germany, the custom 
 prevailed through all classes. Every one who thought him- 
 self wronged, had the right to send a formal declaration of 
 war to his enemy. The forms were fixed, a special code 
 existed for it ; the messenger or ambassador must convey 
 the challenge on the same day with the offence ; the 
 challenger and his messenger must give proof by oath of 
 having gone through the necessary forms. If the ambas- 
 sador happened to die, the author of the war must prove 
 by two compurgators that the challenge was given. If 
 the messenger was injured by the one challenged, he was 
 dishonoured, and the other was not obliged to observe the 
 forms and delays of war. The challenge must proclaim 
 openly that the one desired to be the enemy of the other, 
 and declared war ; as thus (in 145 1) " Know, Imperial cities 
 of Ulm and Esslingen, that I, Claude, Duke Von Salz, 
 etc., etc., do declare and desire to be your enemies on 
 account of Henry etc., etc. ! And he who would deliver 
 himself to acts of enmity before the time, let him be 
 considered brigand, incendiary, and murderer ; and w<s 
 
 14a
 
 PRIVATE WAR. 143 
 
 desire by this note, sealed by our arms, addressed to you 
 publicly, to preserve our honour." ^ 
 
 In France, the author of the war could call upon those 
 owing him assistance, and upon his relations up to the 
 seventh degree. If they refused help, they lost all the 
 advantage of relationship. Two brothers of the same 
 father and mother were not permitted to wage war with 
 one another ; two " uterine brothers " were allowed the 
 privilege. Holy clerks, monks, women and children were 
 not bound to join in these personal wars. The towns often 
 had the privilege of war granted them in their charters. 
 
 Among the instances of private war in the Middle Ages, 
 it is related that in the fifteenth century, a cook of Eppen- 
 stein, — a sheep of his having been killed by Count Von 
 Solms, and the value not being paid — sent, with the scul- 
 lions, a formal challenge of war to the nobleman. In 1501, 
 a ruined merchant of Nuremberg is said to have been 
 imprisoned for debt. He escaped and demanded from 
 the city a heavy sum as indemnity for his unjust imprison- 
 ment. The town refused his demand ; whereupon he sent 
 a challenge of war, seized one of the wealthy citizens who 
 had gone to visit his estates in the country, refusing to 
 ransom him for less than 3,500 florins, and forming an 
 alliance with some barons, plundered and annoyed the city 
 till the inhabitants were obliged to yield. 
 
 In another case, a nobleman declared war against the city 
 of Frankfort, because a lady residing there had promised 
 a dance with his cousin and had danced with another. The 
 city was obliged to satisfy the wounded honour of the 
 gentleman. Even as late as 1450, there was a challenge 
 from the baker and domestics of the Margrave of Baden 
 to seven Imperial cities ; and in 1462, a baker of the Count 
 Palatine defied three cities; and in 147 1, the shoe-blacks 
 ' Wachter, Beitrdge, etc. Deauinancir,
 
 144 CESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 of the Leipsic University formally challenged the Provost 
 of the city. 
 
 In the fifteenth century Germany was described by a 
 Roman Cardinal " as one grand robbery " and that noble- 
 man as most famous who plundered most.^ 
 
 The Margrave of Brandenburg boasted that he had 
 burned 170 villages ; everywhere were the desolation of 
 farms and the obstruction of commerce. The peasants 
 and humble cultivators of the ground suffered most from 
 this anarchy. An estate was valued by its convenience 
 of situation for despoiling peasants and travellers. 
 
 Of P'rance, in the eleventh century, a monkish authority 
 says, that the whole kingdom was disturbed by incessant 
 fightings : — " Everywhere were robberies, and besieging of 
 public roads, endless burnings of houses," the only causes 
 being an unconquerable greed for money." So terrible 
 were the evils that a Church Council held near Soissons 
 (a.d. 909) declared that " the cities of France were depopu- 
 lated, the monasteries burned or destroyed, the fields re- 
 duced to solitude, so that we can truly say that the sword 
 has pierced to the very soul." ^ Wherever feudalism 
 extended, there was private war. Each gentleman and 
 nobleman felt it to be a peculiar right of his class. It 
 existed in all parts of Europe ; less perhaps in England 
 than elsewhere, owing either to the greater power of the 
 Norman kings, or to the deeper working of Christianity. 
 In Germany, as we have said, its effects were the most 
 
 ' Germania tota magnum latrocinium, et ille inter nobiles glorioslor 
 qui rapacior. 
 
 2 Erat eo tempore, maximis ad invicem hostilitatibus, totius Franco- 
 rum regni facta turbatio ; crebra ubique latrocinia, viarum obsessio. 
 
 . . incendia infinita, etc. {Gesta Dei per Francos, 1, ^Zz) 
 
 2 Depopulatae urbes, destructa vel incensa monasteria, agri in 
 solitudinem sunt redacti, ut aut vere possimus dicere, quia pervenit 
 gladius usque ad animam. (fiesta. Tros., 2, 536).
 
 PEACE OF GOD, 145 
 
 disastrous, threatening even the dissolution of society. 
 There was in that country a greater number of nobles and 
 of self-governing jurisdictions than in any other. Each 
 city or province had independent powers with especial 
 privileges. The interregnum between 1256-73 accustomed 
 these powers to uncontrollable license. The Diets seldom 
 met, and were not, from their numbers, adapted to settle 
 questions of right. In consequence, Germany had no 
 court capable of deciding disputes between its more power- 
 ful members, or of repressing such evils as private war. 
 
 The " Peace of God." — A remarkable mode in which 
 the religious spirit aided to raise society of the Middle 
 Ages out of this barbarism was through the establishment, 
 by the clergy and the mercantile community, of the so- 
 called " Peace of God." In France especially, in the tenth 
 and eleventh centuries, there seems to have been a kind 
 of religious " revival " of peace. The clergy preached it; 
 religious enthusiasts went from village to village proclaim- 
 ing it in the name of Christ the " Prince of Peace ; " holy 
 relics were brought to public places, on which the wild 
 barons swore a vow of peace ; great councils were held to 
 spread abroad the ideas of brotherly amity, and the Popes 
 themselves wrote letters and published Encyclicals to 
 recommend the vows and habits of concord to all Christian 
 nations. An enthusiasm thus nourished by religion took 
 possession of a military and uncontrolled population for a 
 period, in favour of quiet and good will towards especially 
 the poor, the unbefriended, the weak, and those engaged 
 in useful occupations, or in the services of religion. There 
 was almost a " crusade of peace " in certain parts of France 
 in the eleventh century, One of the old liturgies of this 
 period made a special ground of penitence that the peti- 
 tioner had not reconciled two enemies.^ The clergy not 
 * Peccavi, duos non conciliavi. {Digby. Mor. Caih., 9, 12.) 
 
 L
 
 146 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 being able in such an age to secure all the year for peaceful 
 pursuits, induced the wild barons to admit certain days, 
 certain places and pursuits, as always resting under the 
 protection of a consecrated peace. Whoever violated this 
 compact was exposed to every worldly and spiritual penalty. 
 He lost his fief if a baron, his other property went to his 
 heirs, he was driven out from among Christian men, and 
 his body refused Christian burial ; if a serf he might be 
 punished by the loss of his hand or even of his life. All 
 the thunders of the law and religion followed the accursed 
 man who broke the peace of God. The holy days were 
 protected, the feasts and other Christian festivals, and even 
 in each week, the time from Thursday evening to Monday 
 morning — this period covering the days of the Passion and 
 the Resurrection. The peasants were especially guarded 
 by this humane impulse, and the cart and grain and cattle 
 of the farmer were made as sacred as the altar or the 
 church. Christianity, with its usual spirit, led men to pro- 
 tect particularly the weak, and every vow of peace included 
 the women, children, travellers, strangers, and holy clerks. 
 
 When society was in the chaos we have just described, 
 and law existed alone in the strong hand, and all the 
 weaker classes were exposed to incessant oppression and 
 cruelty from the stronger, we can imagine what it was to 
 have created a religious and sacred protection, if only for 
 a time, for all who were trodden down and injured. It 
 gave European society its first taste of a rule of law and 
 order. The brotherhoods for the Paix dc Dieii in France 
 in the eleventh century formed the great point of resist- 
 ance against the feudal barons and their anarchical con- 
 flicts. They laid the foundation for the rural CoinnnincSy 
 which have been so important an element since in the 
 French political life, and they formed the first great 
 support for the kings when they subsequently endeavoured
 
 THE PLEDGE OF PEACE. 147 
 
 to introduce law and courts and royal power in place of 
 "Private War "^ among feudal or half independent barons. 
 
 Many religious fraternities to reconcile enemies were 
 formed in the Middle Ages. Muratori traces the guilds 
 of Italy to missionaries, who in the time of Frederick II. 
 went about endeavouring to appease discords and make 
 peace.^ One of the conditions for entering a fraternity 
 of builders formed at Chartres in the Middle Ages was 
 that the candidate must confess and be reconciled to his 
 enemies.^ 
 
 Among the early efforts to bring about peace in France 
 was a meeting of the clergy and Christians at Charons, 
 989 A.D., which solemnly anathematized all who should 
 plunder the poor and attack the holy clergy. The estab- 
 lishment of peace was held to be a means of removing 
 Divine displeasure, and in 944, after a terrible pestilence 
 in Limoges, the clergy ordered a fast and the " Pact of 
 Peace " was concluded by the seigneurs and the duke. It 
 is related by the chroniclers that the archbishop "on 
 account of the violence of the men of war and the ruin 
 of the poor," forbade divine worship in monasteries or 
 churches to those engaged in breaking the peace. 
 
 The form of the pledge of peace, administered by the 
 archbishop to the fierce barons, is given by Du Cange : 
 
 " I, W , Archbishop of Puy, in the name of the Holy 
 
 Trinity, to all who expect supreme pity . . . As we 
 know that without peace no one shall see the Lord ; we 
 order the faithful . . . that no one shall make an 
 attack on a church, that no one shall plunder horses, 
 cattle, chickens, etc., from the peasants . . . that ne 
 one shall attack merchants or plunder them ... If 
 
 » See Semichon, La Pedx et la Trive de Dwt, 
 
 * Ant. Ital., Ixxv.
 
 148 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 any one do not keep this peace let him be excommunicated, 
 anathematized and driven from the Church." 
 
 The Council of Poictiers (1004 A.D.) attempted to estab- 
 lish forms of law to check private war. If there was a 
 quarrel between two dioceses both must appear before the 
 seigneur or judge of the county, and endeavour to obtain 
 justice. If one should refuse to appear, the judge must do 
 justice and seize upon " the hostage " of the recusant. If 
 he had not the power, he must convoke the princes and 
 bishops, and all should unite to attack and punish the 
 resisting member, and not cease till he yields to the claims 
 of justice. 
 
 These first efforts under the religious impulse to bring 
 order out of chaos and to create law in a barbarous society, 
 are highly important in the history of progress. 
 
 In 1 02 1 famine and war desolated the country around 
 Amiens. To avert these evils the relics of saints were col- 
 lected in the churches, and a vow -w'as made over them of 
 an inviolable " Peace of God " during one week, and the 
 people took oath, if a quarrel arose, not to resort to rapine 
 and burning till they had on a fixed day exposed their 
 griefs before the Church. The most terrible forms of ex- 
 communication were uttered against those " Chevaliers 
 who would not promise peace," and " in the name of God 
 the All powerful, of Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost," 
 they were accursed of men. 
 
 These efforts of the clergy succeeded in forming Peace 
 Associations, which frequently employed the barons to 
 execute the orders of the councils, and to collect the 
 tribute {paciegiunt) which formed a fund to compensate the 
 sufferers under violence. Thus early began a kind of assu- 
 rance fund or public tax to protect the weak of society. In 
 1030, a famine occurred in parts of P'rance, followed by 
 years of abundance. The popular gratitude to Providence
 
 THE PEACE OF GOD. 149 
 
 was made manifest in councils for the Peace of God. Laws 
 were passed to forbid travelling with arms, and the church 
 was made an inviolable asylum for the weak and perse 
 cuted. The assemblies were electrified with pious ardour, 
 and the bishops raised their crosses to heaven, and men of 
 the people, holding their hands in the air, cried " Peace ! 
 Peace!" and took God to witness of their " perfect pact 
 of peace." 1 
 
 Among the ordinances establishing peace, are those of 
 the Council of Limoges (103 1), r. iking the church an 
 asylum, protecting the clergy, forbidding violence or rapine 
 upon peasants, serfs or clerks, proclaiming fines for break- 
 ing peace, establishing days of peace, and enforcing it 
 on all religious days. Peasants, serfs and their animals 
 are protected, and war is confined to the seigneurs. All 
 disputes are to be brought before the bishop and his chap- 
 ter. This, be it remembered, was two centuries before the 
 royal power in France atte.aipted to restrain the warlike 
 propensities of the feudal barons. The proclamation 
 of peace was somevvliat in this wise : " From Thursday 
 evening, among all Christians, friends or enemies, neigh- 
 bours or distant, peace must reign till Monday at sun-rise ; 
 and during these four days and four nights there ought to 
 exist a complete security, and every one can go about his 
 own affairs in safety from all fear of his enemies and under 
 protection of this truce and this peace. Let those who 
 observe this peace be absolved by the Father All-powerful, 
 by Jesus Christ His Son, and by the Holy Ghost," etc. etc. 
 
 " Let those who have promised truce and have volun- 
 tarily broken it, be excommunicated by God, etc. ; let 
 these be accursed for ever, damned as Dathan and Abiram 
 etc ... If any one in the days of the truce of 
 
 ' Quoted from old chronicles, by Semichon.
 
 r50 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 God commit a homicide, let him be banished from his 
 country, let him depart from Jesus !" etc. ! ^ 
 
 The decrees of the Council of Roussillon (1047) " estab- 
 lished this peace and this truce, because the Divine Law 
 and the Christian Religion were almost destroyed, and 
 iniquity passed all bounds, and charity was cooled," etc. 
 
 The Popes were not behind the councils in encouraging 
 peace among the barbarous barons. Pope Nicholas 11. 
 (1059) 9-"d Alexander II (1068) make public proclama- 
 tion of the Peace of God, so that this first effort for 
 civilization and order spread into North and Middle France, 
 Italy, Spain, England, Normandy and. Belgium. 
 
 It is worthy of notice that in a charter of this period, 
 from the Archbishop of Bourges (1065), commerce is pro- 
 tected by this new pact of amity, and whoever takes refuge 
 in a fair is to be especially safe. 
 
 Under Pope Urban II., the Council of Clermont (1095) 
 re-affirmed this peace, and ordered that whoever on the 
 days of peace should strike man or woman, unless in 
 self-defence, should be held a violator of the peace. If 
 after a summons by the archbishop he appear in seven 
 days, he will merely pay a fine. If he refuse to appear 
 he will be excommunicated, and after excommunication 
 will pay whatever fine the bishop's court may set. Who- 
 ever kills a man during these days will be exiled for seven 
 years, unless he reconcile himself with the relatives of 
 the murdered one, and pay a fine, which is to be divided 
 between the ecclesiastical and civil authorities. Merchants, 
 travellers, women, ^ and the cattle, implements and flocks 
 of the peasants are protected. If any baron violated 
 this compact, the count and other nobility must prosecute 
 
 * Historiens de France, quoted by Semichon. 
 
 ' Statutum est ut in omni die, et monachi et clerici, et feminae et 
 quae cum eis fuerint, in pace permaneant, etc.
 
 A REVIVAL OF PEACE. 15 1 
 
 him, after due warning by the Peace Association. This 
 pact was to last three years. In other associations, all the 
 nobility over twelve years of age took oath to observe 
 this constitution of public order, and, if summoned by the 
 archbishop, to take arms and aid, " so may God and the 
 saints aid me !" 
 
 The king gradually put himself at the head of these 
 peace associations, and they were no doubt one means 
 by which the royal power in France controlled the feudal 
 savagery. 
 
 At the end of the twelfth century, the enthusiasm was 
 increased by the appearance of one who claimed to be a 
 divine messenger. A carpenter of Guienne, working in a 
 forest, had a vision of the Virgin Mary, who showed him 
 a banner with the words, " Lamb of God who takest away 
 the sins of the world! give us peace!" and directed 
 him to carry this banner to the bishop and invite him to 
 preach the " Peace of God." He obeyed, and was received 
 everywhere as a messenger from heaven, and various noble 
 persons and others formed brotherhoods of " Agnus Dei " 
 under this banner, and laboured for peace. 
 
 In the thirteenth century, Philip Augustus prohibited 
 any one from commencing hostilities against the friends 
 or vassals of adversaries until forty days after the offence ; 
 this was called the " Royal Truce " or " King's Quaran- 
 tine." 
 
 In the same century. Friar John of Vicenza traversed a 
 great portion of Italy, preaching the " Peace of God," 
 reconciling individuals, and even the feuds of towns. In 
 the succeeding centuries, other monks made similar 
 journeys, and aided to deliver Europe from its ancient 
 barbarism. In the fourteenth century, a great religious 
 movement f)r peace stirred the minds of different nations 
 of Europe. Pilgrims with white bands around their neckSj
 
 Ija GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 I Bianchi} marched through various lands, preaching the 
 duty of a Christian peace. It is related that in the month 
 of October, 1338, there appeared in a church of Rome, in 
 the silence of the night, certain unknown persons who 
 cried incessantly, "Peace! Peace!" and uttered no other 
 words. The people hearing these appeals, went to the 
 palaces of the Orsinis and the Colonnas, who were enemies, 
 and made peace between them in a truly miraculous 
 manner.^ A beautiful letter of the good king of France, 
 St. Louis (1276 A.D.), to his son, is handed down, showing 
 how religion acted in promoting peace. " Dear son, I 
 charge thee that to the utmost of thy power, thou keepest 
 thyself from making war with any Christian, and if any 
 have injured thee, try various ways of recovering thy right 
 before thou makest war ; and have cai'e to eschew the sins 
 that are committed in war," etc. He is exhorted to spare 
 the clergy, and poor people, and the property of those who 
 have not injured him ; and, best of all, to avoid all wars, 
 for that was pleasing to our Lord.^ 
 
 The nobles themselves, in France, feeling the calamities 
 of private war, gave bonds of assurance, by which any 
 violation of order might be punished ; and even agreed 
 to refer their disputes to a majority of their own number. 
 But it required all the efforts of the Church, the mercantile 
 community and the crown, for centuries, before this great 
 abuse could be remedied. It is said that no less than 
 thirty councils in different parts of Europe proclaimed the 
 Trenga Dei (Truce of God), or dies treiigarios. And it 
 was not till the fifteenth century that Charles VI. ventured 
 
 ^ Mu7'atori. 
 
 ^ Lagacio (quoted by Digby, Mor. Cafh., 9, 12). 
 
 * Chier fiuz, je I'enscigne que tu te gardes a ton pooir que tu 
 n'aies guerre a nul Cretien, et s'il te faisoit aucunes injures, essai 
 plusieurs voies a savoir se tu pensser recouvrer ton dioit, etc. 
 — Duchesne.
 
 PEACE OF GOD IN GERMANY. 153 
 
 to put forth a law absolutely forbidding, under heavy 
 penalties, private war in France. 
 
 The power of Jesus on human society is seen in the slow 
 humanizing of feelings and practices. It is aided often by 
 other forces, which are more selfish. All self-guarding 
 interests in European communities must have discouraged 
 private war ; the influence of associated life in towns, the 
 prospects of gains in trade, and the struggle of kings 
 against feudalism worked to put an end to it. But more 
 than any or all of these were the teachings of benevolence 
 and unselfishness read each day, or expressed at the altar, 
 or from the chancel, and the sentiments of affection and 
 reverence cherished everywhere by individuals towards 
 Him who is the " Prince of Peace." 
 
 Geniiany. — The Peace of God is said to have been first 
 established in Germany in 108 1, by the bishop of Liege. It 
 was agreed by common consent in his bishopric, that from 
 the first day of Advent till Christmas, and from the be- 
 ginning of Lent to the eighth of Pentecost, no one should 
 carry arms, or be guilty of incendiarism, brigandage, or 
 acts of violence; that no one should wound or kill any one. 
 Every free man convicted of such an attempt, would lose 
 his heritage, be deprived of his fief, and driven from the 
 diocese. Every serf would be punished by loss of his 
 property and his right hand. The " peaceful " time each 
 week was to be from Saturday at sunset till Monday 
 morning. The Archbishop of Cologne soon after intro- 
 duced a similar truce in his diocese, with the solemn order 
 that " one ought never to forget that the vow of holy 
 peace must be kept with a fidelity as much greater as it is 
 made to God and not to man." During 1093, an associa- 
 tion was formed in Germany, of the nobles and princes, 
 without the concurrence of the emperor, for a peace to 
 last from November for two years till the Feast of the
 
 154 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 Passover. In 1097, the emperor united with it ; in r 103, 
 a pact of peace was formed by nobles, bishops, and 
 emperor for four years ; it was similar to the French 
 compact, but included also the Jews.^ Very severe penal- 
 ties were affixed to its violation. The council of 1105 
 proclaimed the Peace of God 3 but in general it may be 
 said that in Germany the imperial power, more than the 
 Church, sustained and protected order. Under Frederick 
 11. (1224) the "truce of God" had become the "truce of 
 the empire," with similar days devoted to cessation from 
 violence and war. 
 
 The evil of private war, as we have before described, had 
 reached in that country its utmost extreme. All efforts 
 against it seemed in vain. The emperor (1255) forbade it 
 absolutely, but without avail. Finally cities and nobles 
 entered into alliances and associations to form a public 
 peace, and to punish those who should violate it ; and in 
 this mode, the leagues of the Rhine and of Suabia, from 
 the twelfth to the fifteenth century, endeavoured to secure 
 general order and security. Owing to the greater indepen- 
 dence of the rural nobility and of the separate provinces in 
 Germany, the devices which were so successful in France 
 failed here. The religious sentiment alone could not put 
 an end to this savagery. The last remedy tried was the 
 application of an ancient religious custom, under the 
 combined influence of the Church and the free cities — 
 the formation in the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth 
 centuries by the barons, nobles, bishops, and cities, of 
 courts of arbitration, or Austrdge? 
 
 ' The Sachsenspiegel also includes the Jews. Cleric!, mulieres, 
 monickes, agricole, mercatores, itineratores, piscatores, Judet, omni 
 die at omni tempore firmam pacem habebunt in personis et in rebus. 
 {Ssp., ii. 66.) 
 
 * Das Austrdgal-verfahren d. D. Bundes. Von Leonhaidi. Frank- 
 furt, 1838.
 
 ARBITRATION 155 
 
 Arbitration. — This practice exerted so strong an influence 
 in bringing order out of anarchy, and introducing peace 
 instead of war, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 
 through a large portion of Germany, that it is worth while 
 to dwell on it briefly. It was an ancient custom among the 
 German race, when a case in dispute could not be readily 
 decided by the wager of battle, to refer it to wise men of 
 the tribe for arbitration. Yet even as late as the tenth 
 century, an Emperor of Germany (Otto I., 938 A.D.) 
 refused to decide certain difficult cases by arbiters, and 
 preferred to refer them to the sword ; ^ and another 
 important legal question — whether the sons of brothers 
 should inherit property equally with the fathers or ances- 
 tors — was decided in Otto's reign (942) by the sword, in 
 favour of the former." When Christianity became a living 
 force among these tribes, the practice of arbitration was 
 strengthened and reinforced by the words of Christ to His 
 disciples : " If thy brother sin against thee, go, show 
 him his fault between thee and him alone ; if he hear thee, 
 thou hast gained thy brother. But if he hear thee not, 
 take with thee one or two more, that at the mouth of two 
 witnesses, or three, every word may be established. And 
 if he refuse to hear them, tell it unto the congregation," 
 etc. (Matt, xviii. 15- 17); and by the words of Paul, "If 
 then ye have to judge of things pertaining to this life, do 
 ye set them to judge who are of no account in the church ! 
 . . . Is it so, that there cannot be found among you 
 one wise man who shall be able to decide between his 
 brethren, but brother goeth to law with brother and that 
 before unbelievers ? Nay, already it is altogether a defect 
 
 ' Von Leonhardi. 
 
 • Rex autem meliori consilio usus noluit viris nobiles ac senes populi 
 inhonesti tractari ; sed magis rem inter gladiatores discern! jussit, 
 etc. i^Annai. de rebus Sax in. eic, quoted by Leonhardi, p. 20.)
 
 Ij6 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 in you, that ye have lawsuits one with another" (l Cor. 
 vi. II, 7). 
 
 It became a habit of the Christians to refer theif 
 disputes and difficulties to their own brethren, or their 
 leaders and overseers, for decision. The bishops' trials 
 (audientice episcopales) became a regular part of the legal 
 machinery of Christian society. Their decisions ^ were 
 often without appeal ; and on the request of one of the 
 litigants even purely civil cases could be decided by them. 
 The habit of referring contests and disputes to the clergy as 
 arbitrators, came down in Germany into the Middle Ages. 
 And at length in those centuries we have mentioned, there 
 seemed no other way out of the anarchy of society, than 
 by some new application of this principle. The feuds 
 of the barons with one another, their disputes with the 
 peasantry, the contests of city with city, or of each with 
 the nobility, the differences of the clergy with the parishes 
 or with the barons, were continually referred during the 
 twelfth and thirteenth centuries, to Aiistrdge or courts 
 of arbitration. These arbiters were sometimes named in 
 treaties, sometimes chosen by mutual consent, or appointed 
 by neutral persons, or taken by lot. 
 
 Leonhardi,^ who has written a learned work on this 
 subject, gives a list of numerous arbitrations during these 
 centuries, and in almost all cases the arbiters are the 
 clergy. One of the first Austriige reported is in 873, in 
 a dispute between the Emperor Lewis and the Bishop 
 of Strasburg, which is referred to suitable persons among 
 the neighbouring citizens and among the faithful.^ 
 
 A few cases are also related in the succeeding centuries. 
 
 ' Cod. Theod., tit. i., tit. iv. de jud. episcop. ' Leonhardi, p. 20. 
 
 ' Ut per idoneos circa vicinos et fideles nostros, fideliumque 
 nostrorum homines plenissime sub sacramento inquiratur et ad 
 finem vite usque. {Leonhardi^ vol. i, p. 20.)
 
 FORMS OF ARBITRATION. 157 
 
 In the thirteenth century they are the most common ; and 
 various leagues are formed during this period among the 
 free cities and others, for mutual support and defence, all 
 of which contained provisions for settling disputes, feuds 
 and contests by arbiters. 
 
 The Forms of A rbitration. — These present a remarkable 
 evidence of the religious sentiment working. Thus in the 
 following, from Martene, quoted by Dig-by, " I, Henry, by 
 grace of God bishop of Liege, mindful, nay solicitous of 
 our Lord's example, who, coming into the world, brought 
 peace to men of good will, and who, departing from it, 
 left peace to his disciples, make known to all, present 
 and future, how the contention between the Church of 
 St. Peter of Liege and the Monastery of St. Hubert shall 
 be decided," etc.^ 
 
 Or this in 1 100 A.D. : " As the state of the whole Church 
 is consolidated by the pacific bonds of Charity, and as 
 the unity of holy charity is dissipated by the pestiferous 
 scandal of dissensions, whoever wishes to come to the 
 vision of eternal peace, must of necessity study with all 
 diligence to keep peace, if possible, with all men, and 
 especially with brethren ; therefore we, the Canons of the 
 
 Church of M , loving peace and concord, and desiring 
 
 to take away from the midst of us the evil of discord, have 
 put an end in this manner to the dispute between us and 
 the Monks of St. Vincent," etc.^ 
 
 This form breathes a like spirit. It is found in the 
 pact of reconciliation between Henry, Archbishop of 
 Treves, and Theoderic, Abbot of St. Matthew, and a 
 certain monk at Rome. " The pacific hearts of those 
 persons enlightened by truth and by the doctrine of Christ 
 teaching peace to men, though sometimes liable to be 
 
 > Mor. Cath., 3, 82. 
 
 « Ap. Martene. (Digby, 2, 81.)
 
 158 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 torn b> the enemy of the human race, sowing the seeds 
 of hatred, yet in the process of time, we are sure to expel 
 the darkness of that chief maligner, and to recover peace, 
 which puts an end to all strife." ^ 
 
 A striking instance of arbitration is given in the Rhenish 
 League (1254 A.D.), which stipulates with its confederates, 
 that in order to remove every occasion for contest and 
 every source of discord, they should each choose four men 
 who should together amicably decide all questions which 
 arose between them.^ Many cities, knights and parishes 
 united with this confederation on these conditions. A 
 characteristic instance of the use of Aiistrdge appears in 
 the sixteenth century, when a contest arose between the 
 Schwabian League and the rebellious peasants of Baiers- 
 furth (1525 A.D.), where each party were to choose two 
 arbiters of honour and position, who were to be laymen.^ 
 Another also is mentioned in 1 324, when a very ancient 
 feud between the Archbishop of Mainz, Count of Busdeck, 
 and Count John of Nassau, with the Landgraf of Hesse, 
 was settled in this way ; and again where (1350 A.D.) a dis- 
 pute between the Emperor and the Count of Brandenburg 
 was thus reasonably and peacefully closed.^ 
 
 These courts of arbitration came first to assume a fixed 
 and legal position under Maximilian I. (about 1500 A.D.) ; 
 and thus were the foundation of the Austragal Court of 
 the German Confederation in modern times. 
 
 In 1495, Maximilian put under the ban of the empire, 
 and fined to the amount of 2,000 marks gold, every city 
 or individual who accepted or gave a challenge to private 
 
 » Quoted by Digby. (3, 83.) 
 
 2 Ad removendum autem omnem litis occasionem aut discordia 
 fomitem . . . quatuor viros inter nos elegimus, etc. 'Quoted by 
 Leonhardi, vol. i. p. 26.) 
 
 2 Leon]ia7-di, vol. i. p. 45. 
 
 * Ibid.^ vol. i. p. 7^.
 
 END OF PRIVATE WAR, 159 
 
 war. This was the formal, though not the final, close of 
 the right of " diffidation," ^ as it was called. 
 
 Such then was the arbitration of the Middle Ages. In 
 other words, the Christian principle, aided by self-interest, 
 put an end during those centuries to private war in 
 Germany ; it lingered, however, till the end of the sixteen*^h 
 century. 
 
 In Spain and Italy, it was also abolished by the com- 
 bined influences of the Church and of mercantile society; 
 in the former, Charles V. (15 19) enforcing by a special 
 law all previous prohibitions of it. 
 
 In Iceland the Gragas hand down to us a form of 
 anathema against whoever shall break the Peace of God. 
 " Let him be proscribed with celestial anathemas, wherever 
 men pursue the wolf, or Christians visit the Church, or 
 pagans make sacrifice, or mothers give birth to infants, 
 or infants call upon their mothers, etc., let him be 
 accursed ! " 
 
 Here, too, as in other countries, Christianity aided to 
 bring order out of chaos. 
 
 ' Du Cange {Diffidatio). Fiebant etiam diffidationes plerumque 
 scripto ad hostem modo. The word implied a breaking of faith ot 
 peace ; and thus war between individuals. 
 
 Grotius defines di£idare as " to declare war." (3, 9.)
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 WAGER OF BATTLE AND ORDEAL. 
 
 One of the grandest fruits of the human intellect and 
 conscience combined has been the system of the Roman 
 law. It carried the principles of justice and reasonable 
 administration to the remotest and wildest tribes of the 
 empire, and everywhere, to a certain extent, substituted 
 law for force, reason for passion, and equity for abuse 
 and injustice. Whatever were the inconsistencies of its 
 practical execution, and the abuses of its administration, it 
 rested on some of the sublimest principles attainable by 
 the human reason, and exerted a most profound influence 
 on the progress of mankind. We have seen, however, 
 how ineffective Roman law was to eradicate some of the 
 worst abuses of antiquity, and how much Christianity 
 modified it under the later emperors. 
 
 With the rise of the northern barbarians and the dis- 
 memberment of the empire, this grand work of antiquity 
 was submerged by the current of barbarism and super- 
 stition, and the progress of the world, in regard to right- 
 reason and equity, was put back for centuries. In this 
 retrogression the Christian religion had no share. Its 
 principles are in harmony with the best of the Stoical 
 jurists, and the rules of equity and fairness which form so 
 large a part of the .system are such as the Christian faith 
 especially commends. The Church, however cannot 
 claim any such credit. It did indeed do great service in
 
 WAGER OF BATTLE. i6i 
 
 repressing among the German and Keltic tribes, violence, 
 cruelty, and lust, as we shall abundantly prove ; it steadily 
 resisted some of the worst tendencies of the Roman 
 law ; but it permitted and encouraged the childish super- 
 stition which for ages substituted the compurgators' oath, 
 and the ordeals of cold Vv^atcr, red-hot iron, the cross, 
 and the sacrament, for the grand principles of evidence 
 of this great body of law ; covering Europe with relics of 
 a childish age and retarding human progress for hundreds 
 of years. The great principle of the Stoical jurists, that 
 the defendant is acquitted if the accuser do not prove his 
 case,^ was reversed for almost a thousand years in Europe, 
 and the burden of proof was thrown on the accused by 
 innumerable superstitious conditions and observances. In- 
 stead of the old Roman rule, that a negative need not be 
 proved, was adopted the opposite maxim, and the greater 
 portion of the tests required the negative side to be made 
 evident.^ 
 
 It is true that the Church often opposed ordeals, but it 
 finally surrounded them with every ceremony to make them 
 impressive, and in many cases required them as religious 
 obligations. 
 
 In another of the great abuses of the Middle Ages, the 
 " wager of battle " to decide disputes and legal differences 
 — a relic of barbarism which lasted till this century in 
 England — the Church has a better " record," and the spirit 
 of Christianity had much to do with its final disuse and 
 abolition. But that for a thousand years, in Europe, a 
 title to the ownership of real estate, or a legal difference, 
 could be settled by duel, under the very shadow of the 
 Church, shows how slow was the progress, and how feeble 
 the influence, of the Christian Faith. 
 
 * Accusatore non probante, reus absolvitur. 
 ' Lea. Stipcrstition and Force. 
 
 M
 
 i62 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 One le<i-acy Roman law left to the world, which has been 
 a storehouse of curses and evils, the use of torture for the 
 accused and for witnesses. This horrible enoimity, which 
 so shocks all sentiments of justice and humanity, endured 
 in Europe from the time of the Twelve Tables to the 
 present century. Every principle of Christianity is against 
 it, and the power of this Religion has finally eradicated 
 it ; the Church, for several centuries being more inspired 
 with its faith, opposed it, but at length, as we shall see, in 
 the interests of bigotry, accepted this bequest of German 
 barbarism and Roman law, and inaugurated an era of 
 cruelty and injustice rarely surpassed in the world's annals. 
 The Inquisition is the great blot on the historical Church. 
 For centuries all principles of justice, reason, and humanity 
 were forgotten, and the name of the Teacher of love became 
 the cover for deeds of cruelty and injustice, equalling the 
 worst under Greek and Roman faiths. As tlie study of 
 the Roman law revived in the twelfth and thirteenth cen- 
 turies, this evil feature was eagerly adopted in the com- 
 bined interests of centralized power and of ecclesiastical 
 superstition. The commercial spirit and the spirit of 
 the free communes, struggled against it, but it was only 
 uprooted by the gradual spread of Christian principles. 
 
 Wager of Battle. — Tacitus says of the warlike tribes who 
 are the progenitors of the most vigorous races of the 
 present day, that they believe " God is especially present 
 with those in battle." ^ Two hostile tribes, before engaging 
 in hand-to-hand struggle, frequently deputed a courageous 
 warrior from each to contend for the cause at issue, and 
 the result was thought to show on which side the god 
 of battles inclined. The combat, whether between tv/o 
 
 • Deum adesse bellantibus credunt. (fiertn., ^)
 
 WAGER OF BATTLE. 163 
 
 or many, seemed in its uncertain issue to be especially 
 connected with unseen powers/ and the consciousness of 
 rectitude, no doubt did often strengthen the arms, as the 
 conviction of guilt would weaken the muscles, of one or 
 the other combatant. The single combat, to the minds of 
 the northern races, became the great test of truth. This 
 was especially the fact after the experience of general 
 perjury and falseness, introduced by the ancient custom of 
 the compurgators' oath. Under this peculiarly Teutonic 
 custom, which long remained in English jurisprudence 
 under the name of " wager of law," a person accused of a 
 crime appeared to deny it surrounded by a number of 
 compurgators, who swore not to their knowledge of the 
 facts, but as partakers in the oath of denial.^ This legal 
 practice, which existed in Europe as late as the sixteenth 
 century, offered irresistible temptations to false swearing, 
 and to the bold and honourable Northman, a usage which 
 tested the truth by his own right arm and at sacrifice of 
 his blood seemed infinitely preferable to this taking refugp-- 
 behind the oaths of associates. Wager of battle took the 
 place of the compurgators' oath in both civil and criminal 
 cases. It suited the fierce habit of the German and Keltic 
 tribes to decide doubtful cases by the stronger hand ; and 
 the settlement was in harmony with that singular defect of 
 barbarian jurisprudence for a thousand years in Europe (of 
 which we have already spoken), which, above all, showed 
 the loss of the influence of Roman law upon civilization — 
 namely, the throwing the proof of a negative on the 
 accused. 
 
 Under the compurgators' oath, the wager of battle, ordeal 
 
 * An old German proverb said : " Davon soUen wir Gott getruwen, 
 das er den Kampf nur nach Recht sheyde." 
 
 ^ Lea, Superstition and Force^ p. 24. Reeves' History of English 
 Law.
 
 i64 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 by fire or water or the sacraments, and the system of tor* 
 ture through so many centuries, Europe forgot the rules 
 of equity and the maxims^ of the Stoical jurists, and 
 threw the great burden of proof on the defendant. Cen- 
 turies of injustice to unfortunate persons in every f.ortion 
 of Europe prove what harvests of wrong a single unjust 
 principle will sow in the world, while they measure the 
 blessings which the noble ideas of the Stoical jurists have 
 scattered through every people which has felt the influence 
 of Roman law. 
 
 Wager of battle is to be distinguished from the duel, 
 though eminent writers confuse them. It is essentially a 
 judicial trial ; like war, an appeal to the god of battles, 
 conducted under given ceremonies and conditions, where 
 the penalties were fixed and legal. To nearly all 
 Europe outside of Ron^ m law, it was as natural once to 
 determine a title to real estate, or a question of law and 
 evidence, or matters of mortgage or debt, or questions con- 
 cerning service or slavery, or the guilt of a criminal charge, 
 or innumerable similar questions, by single combat, as it 
 is now by juries, courts, and arbitration. 
 
 Nearly all the tribes which overthrew the Roman empire 
 held to this practice ; it belonged to the Keltic, Slavonic, 
 and German races. Singular enough, it is not found in the 
 Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Danish Codes, and is believed 
 to have been introduced into England by William as a 
 Norman practice. The absence of mention of the judicial 
 combat in the laws of the Anglo-Saxons is not, however, 
 conclusive evidence against its practice.^ 
 
 The Goths, who were more under the combined influ- 
 
 * . . . cum per rerum naturam factum negantis probatio nulla 
 sit. {Const., 22. De prob.f iv. 9. Quoted by Lea.) 
 
 " An apparent allusion to judicial combat occurs in the laws of 
 Henry I. (//., 1,92.)
 
 JUDICIAL DUEL. 165 
 
 enccs of Roman law and Christianity, do not appear to 
 have retained the trial as judicial. The practice gained 
 its greatest power in the custom of challenging witnesses. 
 Any litigant finding his case going against him, could accuse 
 a witness of perjury, and challenge him to the combat, 
 thus adjourning the case and deciding it. This privilege 
 was finally extended to the power of challenging the court 
 itself; and the extraordinary spectacle was presented of a 
 defeated suitor fighting with the judge who had decided 
 his case adversely. 
 
 The mode of conducting these combats will, perhaps, be 
 best shown by referring to the English practice. In the 
 thirteenth century, the accused had the right to choose 
 only in doubtful cases, between trial by jury and combat. 
 The latter for a long period determined all questions of 
 fact ; and in the reign of Henry II. it decided in pleas con- 
 cerning freehold, and in writs of right in regard to land 
 or goods sold, debts upon mortgage or promise, sureties 
 denying suretyship, validity of charters, manumission of 
 serfs, questions concerning service, etc., etc.^ 
 
 According to the English law, the defendant in doubtful 
 cases could choose his trial, either /^r corpus ox per patriam, 
 by battle or by jury. But in certain cases the justices had 
 the right to control the mode of trial : thus, if a person was 
 accused of poisoning another, he was compelled to accept 
 the wager of battle or to confess ; and again, other cases 
 were too clear to admit of risking any doubtful decision. 
 When the trial by battle had been decided upon, the defend- 
 ant gave security that he would defend his case, and the 
 plaintiff that he would maintain his appeal. Each made 
 oath ; the plaintiff in a form of this nature : " Hear this, O 
 man ! whom I hold by the hand, called John by the name 
 
 ' Reeves' Hist, of English Law. See also Mirror of Justices' 
 (Trans, by W. H., 1768, p. 160.)
 
 !66 GESTA CHRISTT. 
 
 of baptism, that thou art perjured because thou didst 
 wickedly and feloniously kill my brother, etc., etc., and 
 this I saw, so help me God and these Holy Gospels." ^ 
 
 Both parties were then committed to two knights or 
 " other lawful men " to lead them to the field assigned. 
 Each then took another oath of innocence, and, after cer- 
 tain ceremonies, engaged in combat. If the defendant 
 supported the combat all day till the stars appeared, he 
 was acquitted. If the plaintiff was defeated he suffered 
 capital punishment under certain circumstances and for- 
 feited all his goods, both his own and those which would 
 come to his heirs. If he withdrew his charge when he 
 appeared on the field, he was committed to gaol. 
 
 In cases of suits in regard to titles of land, the form of 
 oath was thus : " 1 am ready to prove it by my freeman, 
 John, whom his father at his death-bed enjoined by the 
 duty he owed him, that if at, any time he should hear of 
 a suit for this land, he should hazard himself in a duel for 
 it, as for that which his father had seen and heard." ^ 
 
 Glanville gives the following form in a suit against a 
 tenant : " I demand against this H., half a knight's fee or 
 plough-lands in such a village, etc., and this I am ready 
 to prove by my freeman, I., and if any accident happen 
 to him by such a one, or by a third, etc." ^ 
 
 The tenant had the right to defend himself upon the 
 the king's grand assize, and so prove his right to the land. 
 
 The Mirror says : " In personal combat for felony none 
 can combat for another, but in actions personal it is lawful 
 to make battle by their bodies or by loyal witnesses." 
 "The battle of two men sufficeth to declare the truth, so 
 that victory is holden for truth." ^ "And in cases where 
 
 ^ Bracton. ' Reeves. Ihacton. 
 
 * Beame's Glanville, p. 41. 
 
 < Mirror of Justices. A. Home, trans. 1646, pp. 155, 158, 159
 
 JUDICIAL DUEL IN ENGLAND. 167 
 
 battle could not be joined, nor was there any witnes.3, the 
 people in person acting were to help themselves by the 
 miracle of God in this manner, as if the defendant were a 
 woman." 
 
 Green, in his History of England, gives a striking in- 
 stance of the wager of battle and its effects. 
 
 " At Leicester," says the historian, " one of the chief aims of the 
 burgesses was to regain their old English jury trial (or practice of 
 compurgation) which had been abolished by the Earls in favour of the 
 foreign trial by duel. It chanced, says a charter of the time, that two 
 kinsmen, Nicholas the son of Aeon, and Geoffrey the son of Nicholas, 
 waged a duel about a certain piece of land, concerning which a dis- 
 pute had arisen between them, and they fought from the first to the 
 ninth hour, each conquering by turns. Then one of them fleeing from 
 the other till he came to a certain little pit, as he stood on the brink of 
 the pit and was about to fall therein, his kinsman said to him, ' Take 
 care of the pit, turn back lest thou shouldest fall into it.' Thereat so 
 much clamour and noise was made by the bystanders and those who 
 were sitting around, that the Earl heard these clamours as far off as 
 at the castle, and he inquired of some how it was there was such a 
 clamour, and answer was made to him, that two kinsmen were fight- 
 ing about a certain piece of ground, and that one had fled till he 
 reached a certain little pit, and that as he stood over the pit and was 
 about to fall into it, the other warned him. Then the townsmen being 
 moved with pity, made a covenant with the Earl that they should give 
 him the pence yearly for each house in the High Street that had a 
 gable, on condition that he should grant to them that the twenty- four 
 jurors who were in Leicester from ancient times, should from that time 
 forward discuss and decide all pleas they might have among them- 
 selves." 
 
 The customs of continental Europe varied somewhat 
 from the English in regard to the judicial combat and 
 ito results, but it is not necessary to particularize them. 
 Throughout the whole Christian world, for many centuries, 
 the personal battle was the final decision of cases of law. 
 Beginning with criminal cases, it was soon transferred to 
 civil, and it survived in parts of Europe, at least nominally, 
 to the present century. Its great power in the Middle
 
 i68 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 Ages was as one of the privileges of the fighting class, the 
 feudal aristocracy, while it appealed to the superstition of 
 all classes. 
 
 In the struggle everywhere between the crown and 
 the nobles, and in the growing influence of Roman law 
 after the thirteenth century, this was upheld as one of the 
 institutions which resisted the Roman tendency to central- 
 ization and royal encroachment. Its great enemy was the 
 new spirit which Christianity had spread abroad in the 
 world, and which thus far had especially imbued the com- 
 mercial classes. These everywhere opposed trial by battle, 
 and one of the privileges granted to commercial com- 
 munities was often freedom from this necessity.^ These 
 communities were also especially influenced by Roman 
 law, and in the Admiralty law which they derived from it, 
 there is no mention of trial by battle. 
 
 The Church in its attitude toward this barbarous practice 
 was for a long time faithful to the spirit of its professed 
 Leader. Both the Councils and the Popes declared boldly 
 against it. In 1080 the Synod of Lillebonne adopted a 
 canon, punishing by fine any of the clergy who should 
 engage in these combats without special licence. The 
 practice however was still continued, though condemned by 
 Popes Innocent II., Alexander III., and Clement III. 
 Celestin III. even deposed the clergy who had engaged 
 in it, while all these prohibitions were confirmed by 
 Pope Innocent III. and the Lateran Council of 1215, 
 and as late as 1492 the Synod of Schwerin published a 
 canon prohibiting Christian burial to those who fell in such 
 combats.^ 
 
 ^ Ferrum . . . pugnam, aquam vobis non judicabit vel judicari 
 faciei. (From a charter granted to Bari by Roger, King of NapleSi 
 1 1 32 A.D.) Muraiori, quoted by Lea. See Muratori; Ani. Ital. 
 
 ■•' Lea^ p. 148.
 
 CHRISTIAN OPPOSITION. 169 
 
 Louis VII., in granting the privilege to certain of the 
 clergy of exemption from this combat, said boldly, " We 
 hold that these wicked habits should be uprooted from the 
 foundation." ^ The power of Christianity tended naturally 
 to do away with this relic of barbarism, and where it was 
 freshly introduced at once affected legislation. 
 
 One of the best known arguments against the practice 
 was written by St. Agobard, Archbishop of Lyons, as 
 early as 826 A.D., in a treatise entitled, " Liber contra 
 judicium Dei." ^ In his letter to the Emperor he says, 
 " The faithful mind must not suppose that Almighty God 
 desires to reveal the secret things of man by hot water or 
 hot iron, much less by cruel battle." ^ It is a foolish and 
 proud presumption to suppose that the Divine judgments 
 can be manifested by battle.* " Such contests are strongly 
 opposed to Christian simplicity and piety and adverse to 
 the doctrine of the Gospels." ^ All these efforts of the 
 Church did not however prevent its spread through 
 Europe. The first code in which the judicial duel was for- 
 bidden was among the most warlike tribes of the German 
 stock, the Norsemen of Iceland, about the same time with 
 the introduction of Christianity (ion A.D.). The Danes 
 soon imitated the Icelanders. Both reforms were clear fruits 
 of the doctrine of Jesus. Prince Luitprand, in his laws of 
 
 * Lea^ p. 148. Tenemus pravas consuetudines fundetus extirpari. 
 Duellas et alias purgationes vulgares prohibitae sunt. 
 
 ^ See St. Agobardi, Ep. Ecc. L. opera. Parisiis, MDCV. Ad Im- 
 peratorem de duello, p. 103. Contra damnabilem opinionem putantium 
 divini judicii veritatem igne vel aquis vel conflictu armorum patefieri. 
 (p. 287.) 
 
 ' Ad Ludov. Imp. Epist. •* De Pace. 
 
 * Talia certamina vehementer contraria sunt simplicitati et pietati 
 Christianas et doctrinao Evangelicas nimis adversa. {^St. Agob., c. 7.) 
 
 Proinde experimenta hsec appellata fuere Judicia Dei quasi ad 
 omniscientis Judicium controversia deferretur et inde justa sententia 
 expectanda foret. (Muratori, De Judiciis Dei.)
 
 IT© GESTA CHRT^TL 
 
 the Lan_^obards, ^ even earlier (712 A.D.), protests against 
 this settlement of disputes, though he avows himself power- 
 less to prevent it, and calls the law, " impiam legem." 
 
 Another legal measure taken against it was by the 
 Emperor Frederick II. in 123 1, in his Neapolitan code; 
 be pronounces the trial by battle as more a kind of fortune- 
 telling than legal proof, and equally inconsistent with 
 common law, nature, and the principles of equity.^ 
 
 The Emperor Rudolph of Hapsburg, in his charter to 
 the Duchy of Styria, in 1277, forbade the wager of battle. 
 Other princes also prohibited it. Alfonso the Wise of 
 Castile, in his celebrated code, Siete Partidas, stigmatized 
 the combat as an " effort to tempt the Lord our God." ^ 
 
 The Duke of Burgundy, Philip le Bon, abolished the 
 wager of battle, and in his code of 1459 there is no mention 
 of it. In Hungary it was prohibited in 1492, and in Italy 
 in 1505.* 
 
 The Christian spirit, as affecting the imperial Roman 
 code in regard to gladiators, worked upon the Middle 
 Ages with respect to the " champions " employed in these 
 judicial combats. All the contempt and disabilities thrown 
 by the Christianized Roman law on the former, were 
 transferred by those following Roman legislation to the 
 hired fighters in these duels. ^ They were held incapable 
 of being witnesses or of succeeding to property, and even 
 their children were disgraced. 
 
 ' If by respect for the usages of our Langobard realm we cannot 
 forbid the judgment of God, it none the less appears to us uncer- 
 tain, having learnt that many persons have lost their causes unjustly 
 by an impious combat. (Quoted by Lea, Lex Long., p. 63.) 
 
 ^ Non tarn vera probatio quamqujedam divinatio . . . quae na- 
 tur£e non consonans, a jure communi deviat, nequitae rationibus non 
 consensit. Lea, p. 149. 
 
 • Que quiere tentava Dios nuestro Senor. 
 
 * /^a. 6 Ibid.
 
 APPEAL OF MURDER. 17T 
 
 All these influences, however, were slow in uprooting 
 this unreasonable practice among the nations of Europe, 
 It endured in Russia till the middle of the seventeenth 
 century. It was not abolished in England in civil cases 
 till the reign of Elizabeth. In 1571, in order to determine 
 a disputed title to real estate, Westminster Hall was forced 
 to adjourn to a duelling ground at Tothill Fields, " not 
 without great mental disturbance of the learned lawyers " 
 (non sine magna jurisconsultorum perturbatione). All the 
 forms of combat were passed through, but the contest was 
 compromised.^ 
 
 In criminal cases, a man indicted for a capital offence, 
 was allowed to confess his crime and to charge any one as 
 accomplice. This appeal was usually decided by wager of 
 battle. In 1539 there was legislation on this, and even in 
 the seventeenth century instances occurred of the judicial 
 duel ; Sir Matthew Hale, at the close of the century, 
 speaks of it as " an unusual trial at this day." Sir 
 Thomas Smith, as late as near the close of the sixteenth 
 century (1570-77), says of the judgment by battle: "This 
 at this time is not much used, partly because of long time 
 the Pope and the clergy, to whom in time past we were 
 much subject, always cryed against it as a thing danmable 
 and unlawful," and partly, as he explains, because of the 
 natural change in manners and customs. " But," he adds, 
 "I could not learn that it was ever abrogated."^ And of 
 the appeal to battle in murder cases, he says : " The Popes 
 of Rome, and men of the Church who of long time have 
 had dominion in our consciences, and would bring t^Mngs 
 to a more moderation, have much detested this kind of 
 triall and judgment , . . This kind of trial! of long 
 
 * Spell. Gloss., p. T03. 
 
 2 The Coinmowi'calih of England, 1589, p. 100,
 
 172 GESTA CHRIST!, 
 
 time hath not been used. . . . Nevertheless, the lav 
 remaineth still and is not abolished." 
 
 In 1775, one of the grievances of the American colonies 
 was being deprived by English legislation of the right of 
 wager of battle in criminal cases ; that is, a man acquitted 
 of a charge of murder could be again prosecuted by the 
 nearest relative, and the question was to be determined by 
 the judicial duel.^ The English Liberals denounced, in 
 the strongest terms, this oppression of the colonists. 
 Dunning, afterwards Lord Ashburton, described the 
 appeal for murder as " that great pillar of the constitu- 
 tion." " It is called," he said, " a remnant of barbarism 
 and Gothicism. The whole of our constitution, for aught 
 I know, is Gothic, Are you then to destroy every part 
 of that Gothic constitution, and set up a Macaroiii one 
 instead," 
 
 Burke said, " If there is an appeal for rape and robbery, 
 you ought to have one for murder. ... I allow that 
 judicial combat was part of this appeal — which was super- 
 stition and barbarism to the last degree. Yet I cannot 
 consent that the subject should be dealt with piecemeal." 
 Wedderburn, in reply, said on behalf of the ministry : 
 *' They allow that the appeal for murder is only an effort 
 for a private revenge, that it may lawfully be stopped at 
 any time by the appellant on the receipt of a sum of 
 money, and that if it proceeds the appellor or the accused, 
 by throwing down his glove, is entitled to have his guilt or 
 innocence determined by a deadly combat," etc., etc. The 
 clause objected to in the Bill was subsequently withdrawn 
 by the ministry. The appeal for murder was attempted 
 also previously (1699), in the case of Lord Cowper's brothen 
 but was quashed on account of informality. Lord Holt 
 
 * Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors of England, vol. vi. p. 112,
 
 WAGER OF BATTLE IN NINETEENTH CENTURY. 173 
 
 declared it " a noble badge of the liberties of an English- 
 man." 1 
 
 In 1818, in England, a probable murderer, acquitted 
 on a jury trial, was challenged by a brother of the girl 
 murdered, when he pleaded " not guilty, and I am ready 
 to defend the same by my body." The Chief Justice 
 sustained his right to this mode of trial, and but for the 
 challenger's withdrawing, the world would have seen a 
 wager of battle in the nineteenth century before the Lord 
 Chief Justice of England. 
 
 In the next year, by Act 59 Geo. Ill, cap. 46," this 
 relic of ante-Christian barbarism was abolished, and law 
 finally substituted for force between individuals in Great 
 Britain.^ The wager of battle or appeal of murder appears 
 even to have been inherited in American legislation,'^ and 
 Lea states that it probably exists legally in several of the 
 United States. 
 
 The reflection of the reader will no doubt be of wonder 
 that such a barbaric folly and abuse should have lasted 
 so long under even the apparent reign of Christianity 
 and right leason. But in all matters connected with the 
 instincts of pugnacity and the fiercer passions, the teachings 
 of Christ work very slowly. They are just beginning in 
 the nineteenth century, their appropriate and lasting work. 
 As we shall show later, their influence is only now felt on 
 the relations of nations and the passions of war. The 
 
 ' Campbell, vol iv. p. 275. 
 
 2 All appeals of treason, murder, felony or other offences shall 
 cease, determine and become void, and become entirely void, and be 
 utterly abolished, and in any point of right, the tenant shall not be 
 received to wage battel nor shall issue be joined nor trial be had by 
 battel in any writ of right. (59 Geo. III. c. 46.) 
 
 ^ Lea, Campbell, Reeves, and others ; the case of Ashford v, 
 Thornton. 
 
 ♦ Siat. of S. Carol., vol. ii. p. 715, note.
 
 tU GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 \vager of private battle is perhaps only a shade more un- 
 reasonable and uncliristian than public battle. Time has 
 given a slow victory of this Faith in one ; it will yet bring 
 about a like success in the other. 
 
 The Ordeal. — The Carlovingian Capitularies, which 
 expressed the most intelligent legal judgments of the early 
 Middle Ages, make this formal and solemn statement : 
 " In doubtful cases our opinion should be reserved for 
 the judgment of God. What men certainly know they 
 reserve for their own, what they are ignorant of, for 
 the Divine judgment ; since he cannot be condemned by 
 human examination, whom God hath reserved for His 
 own judgment."^ The "judgment of God" was the 
 famous ordeal by fire, water, red-hot iron, the cross and 
 the Eucharist. It was no doubt an early barbarian prac- 
 tice, which survived after Europe had become civilized. 
 Almost all nations have employed the ordeal in a primitive 
 stage of their development. In various forms, it endured 
 in some civilized countries till the last and the present 
 century. 
 
 The early history of the Church is consistent in its oppo- 
 sition to the practice. Christianity, as cultivating brotherly 
 love and the spirit of justice, tended to weaken the power 
 of this custom. As early as the sixth century, Avitus, the 
 Archbishop of Vienne, remonstrated with Gundobald on 
 account of admitting the ordeal in the Burgundian code ; 
 and in the ninth century, St. Agobard, Archbishop of 
 Lyons, in a famous treatise, attacked the whole system. ^ 
 Leo IV. in the middle of the ninth century condemned it 
 in a letter to the English bishops, and many succeeding 
 
 ' In ambiguis, Dei judicio reservitur scntentia. Quod certe agnos* 
 cunt suo, quod nesciunt, divino reservunt judicio, etc Carlov. Cap, 
 lib. \li. c. 239, quoted by Lea. 
 
 ' St, Agobai di opera, previously cited.
 
 OPPOSITION OF CHURCH. 175 
 
 pontiffs opposed it. ^ Great numbers, however, of the 
 clergy defended the practice, and it received the approval 
 of many synods and councils. The ordeal, by the religious 
 ceremonies accompanying it, was too powerful a help to 
 the Church to be easily abandoned ; and bigotry and super- 
 stition found in it a ready means of punishing heretics 
 
 The Popes, on the other hand, in the latter part of the 
 twelfth century and the beginning of the thirteenth, con- 
 demned it in the strongest terms. Alexander III. with 
 his whole apostolic authority forbade it. ^ Tlie Fourth 
 Council of Lateran (1 2 15) prohibited the employment of 
 any ecclesiastic ceremonies in such trials. In 1200 Philip 
 Augustus, in bestowing certain privileges on the students 
 of the University of Paris, made a condition that a citizen 
 accused of assaulting a student shall not be allowed to 
 defend himself by the duel or water ordeal.^ In the third 
 year of Henry III. of England,^ when so many reforms 
 were begun, an order was issued to the justices not to try 
 persons charged with robbery, murder or similar crimes, by 
 fire and water, but to keep them in prison under safe cus- 
 tody, so as not to endanger them in life and limb, seeing 
 that the judgment of fire and water is forbidden by the 
 Church of Rome. ^ The canons which especially are 
 thought by Glanville and others to have abolished ordeal 
 in England, are those forbidding man to tempt the Lord 
 his God. ^ 
 
 Matthew of Westminster, in 1250, speaks of ordeal by 
 fire and water as abolished ; and Bracton does not allude 
 
 ' Lea, p. 267. 
 
 ' Imo apostolica auctoritate proliibemus firmissime. Alex. Ill 
 Ep , 74- (Quoted by Lea.) 
 
 ' Lea. * Peeves. 
 
 * Spcllman, Gloss. 
 
 " Ch. xiv. Cum sit contra preceptum Domini, non tentabis Dcminuni 
 Deum tuum. {Dec, part 2.)
 
 176 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 to it as still practised. Throughout the same century it 
 was gradually done away with in Italy, Iceland, Norway, 
 and Sweden. In France it fell into disuse about the same 
 time ; but in Germany the superstition of the people 
 resisted the mandates of the Church, and even in the 
 fourteenth century the practice was not uncommon. In 
 Spain, the celebrated code of Alfonso the Wise (1260) had 
 expressly prohibited it; but even in 1322 a Church Council 
 was obliged to threaten with excommunication all engaged 
 in administering this test. ^ Lea, in his admirable work 
 from which we have quoted so often, says that the well- 
 known Muratori affirms his belief in the ordeal, and that it 
 was common in Transylvania in the seventeenth century, 
 and in the eighteenth century in West Prussia. 
 
 The treatment of witches in the early history of the 
 United States must have contained a large element of 
 the belief in the supernatural "judgment of God." Even 
 in 1 81 5 there was a trial for witchcraft in Belgium, and in 
 1836 the population of Bela, near Dantzic, twice plunged 
 an old woman accused of being a sorceress, into the sea, 
 and, as she rose, she was pronounced guilty and beaten to 
 death. 2 
 
 Other causes besides the influence of the Church or the 
 spread of Christian ideas tended to remove this abuse — 
 the revived influence of the Roman law, and the spirit of 
 the mercantile communes and commercial leagues, who 
 were more imbued with correct principles of evidence, less 
 affected by superstition, and more inspired by religion. 
 The early codes of commercial law make no reference to 
 ordeal. * 
 
 * Du Cange, Ferrum candens. Lea. Muratori, Ital. Aniiq. 
 3 Lea. 
 
 • I desire to make especial acknowledgments for the assistance I 
 have derived in these chapters from LeaV, admirable work on Super- 
 ttition and Force.
 
 ABOLITION OF ORDEAL. 177 
 
 The abolition of ordeal is not one of the most undisputed 
 victories of the Christian religion. We can only say with 
 confidence, that as this Faith imbues men with benevolence 
 and the desire to render to all their due, the injustice, 
 cruelty, and absurdity of such means of arriving at truth 
 become more apparent. 
 
 N
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 TORTURE. 
 
 The Roman law, in recognising one system of injustice, 
 
 permitted of necessity the cruel and unjust proceedings 
 legally connected with it. Slavery was assumed and ac- 
 knowledged as legal, and with it, the torture to exact the 
 truth from one who was in the view of the law scarcely a 
 human being. Even the Stoical jurists allow torture to a 
 slave who is a witness. But such an injustice once suffered 
 to exist would be easily propagated to other classes. It 
 was first applied to freemen suspected of crimes against 
 the State or the emperor ; and, under the imperial legisla- 
 tion of Rome, was employed against many offencesof free- 
 born Romans. Still, under the Roman practice, there were 
 many safeguards for the accused. The plaintiff was obliged 
 to inscribe himself formally, and was exposed to the lex 
 talionis, or reprisals, if he failed to prove his charge. 
 Under Constantine, a person accused of treason, whatever 
 his rank, was liable to torture, but accusers and informers, 
 if they could not prove their charge, were equally liable 
 to this penalty. These provisions were preserved by 
 Justinian. 1 Even freemen were tortured as witnesses, and 
 so enlightened a ruler as Justinian could order a rod to 
 persons suspected of false witness, in order to extract 
 the truth. It is certainly one of the extraordinary per- 
 
 » 13 Theod. Cod., ix. 8. 
 178
 
 TORTURE. 179 
 
 versities of the human reason, that for so many centuries 
 in Europe, alike under Roman law and the Christian 
 Church, the innocent could be exposed to frightful pains 
 in order to obtain evidence ; and the accused, who might 
 be innocent, were given up to fearful agonies to com- 
 pel a confession, which might be the result of fear or 
 pain. This savage procedure was unknown to the great 
 race related to the European races — the Hindoos — and 
 was not a part of the code of the people who, through 
 Christianity, have so much influenced modern progress 
 the Jews. The northern barbarians, owing to their sense 
 of individual independence, did not usually permit the 
 torture of freemen, but only that of slaves ; and then under 
 strict conditions. The wager of battle, the compurgators' 
 oath, and the ordeal took the place of torture, as a means 
 of obtaining truth. The Gothic tribes, who were more 
 influenced by Roman legislation, early adopted the prac- 
 tice, though with many of the Roman protections for the 
 accused. 
 
 Christianity in its essential spirit was utterly opposed to 
 such a cruel and unjust practice. One of the wisest kings 
 of Europe expressed in his code the foundation principle 
 of this Faith, when he said, " The person of man is the 
 noblest thing on earth." ^ Yet even Alfonso the Wise was 
 obliged to admit torture in his legislation, though he modi- 
 fied its effects by provisions which were afterwards imitated 
 throughout Europe. No confession under torture was held 
 technically valid ; the victim was sent back to prison ; he 
 was again brought before the judges ; if he persisted, he 
 was condemned ; if he recanted, he was again tortured, and 
 these steps were repeated ; the accused never being con- 
 victed except by free confession.^ Even after that, if the 
 
 ' La persona del home es la mas noble cosa del mundo. Sieti 
 Partidas, '^ Lea.
 
 i8o GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 judges found reason to consider the confession an effect of 
 fear or pain, he might be acquitted. 
 
 The history of the early Church, when perhaps the 
 teachings of Christ were fresher to the minds of men, is 
 full of instances of opposition to this cruel practice. But 
 gradually, as the study of the Roman law revived in the 
 thirteenth century, and later, as the spirit of bigotry in- 
 creased, torture, and all the dark accompanyi:ng practices 
 were borrowed from the old code, and employed by the 
 Roman Church in the processes of the Inquisition. Under 
 this new spirit of persecution they became tenfold worse 
 than they had ever been under Roman law. For centuries, 
 the very light of justice passed away under the shadow of 
 the Inquisition. Men were tortured on the feeblest sus- 
 picions ; all the maxims of Roman equity were forgotten ; 
 their confessions were allowed to implicate others, and 
 often they charged themselves when innocent, to escape 
 further pain. Agents were permitted to enter their prison- 
 cells to worm out their confidence, and even judges falsely 
 promised them mercy to win a confession. 
 
 The following were some of the tortures habitually used 
 in Europe for hundreds of years : " The strappado, so 
 common in Italy, and which is yet forbidden under Roman 
 law ; . . the vigils of Spain, which oblige a man to 
 
 support himself by sheer muscular effort for seven hours, 
 to avoid sitting on a pointed iron which pierces him with 
 an insufferable pain ; iron stools heated to redness on which 
 we place poor half-witted women accused of witchcraft, ex- 
 hausted by frightful imprisonment, rolling from their dark 
 and filthy dungeons, loaded with chains, fleshless and half- 
 dead, and we pretend that the human frame can resist 
 these devilish practices, and that the confessions which ouf 
 wretched victims make, are true." ^ 
 
 ^ Nicholas, Diss. M rale etjurid. sur la Torture. (Quoted by Le&X
 
 THE STRAPPADO. i8r 
 
 The strappado, to which alhision is here made, was a 
 species of torture used to extract the truth fiom witnesses 
 or accused persons. The hands were tied behind the 
 back, with a piece of iron between them ; a cord was 
 fastened to the wrists by which, with a pulley, the 
 unfortunate person was hoisted from the ground with a 
 weight of 125 lbs. fastened to his feet. In extraordinary 
 cases the weight was increased to 250 lbs. When the 
 victim was raised to a sufficient height, he was dropped 
 with a jerk which dislocated the joints, and this was 
 repeated three times. The most agonising and efficacious 
 of all torture was considered to be enforced sleeplessness. 
 The person was placed between two jailors, who slept in 
 alternate periods, but kept the unhappy victim awake for 
 several days and nights. 
 
 In applying torture to those suspected of witchcraft, 
 one judge (according to Nicholas) boasted of despatching 
 nine hundred victims in his district in fifteen years ; and 
 another in the diocese of Como burnt one thousand persons 
 in a year. The cruelty and arbitrary character of the 
 system of torture reached such a degree in Europe, that 
 intelligent persons decided, if chance should expose them 
 to any suspicion, they would at once admit every charge, 
 preferring a speedy death to these long-continued agonies. 
 
 Under the German Code after the sixteenth century, 
 the rule of the Roman law was followed, of beginning 
 with the weakest in torture. If husband and wife were to 
 be tortured, they commenced with the wife. Von Rosbach 
 warns the tribunals that their greatest fault was in looking 
 only at the testimony adverse to the accused, and that 
 they " used torture as though nature had created the feel- 
 ings of prisoners to be lacerated at will." ^ 
 
 As soon as a charge was made, the judges began by 
 * Quoted bj Lea.
 
 i82 GESTA CHRISTI 
 
 torturing all who were suspected, without waiting to ascer-" 
 tain if any crime had really been committed. The accused 
 generally did not see a copy of the accusation ; often was 
 not allowed to be heard in defence, and was tortured at 
 once after the adverse evidence was heard. Even the right 
 of appeal was evaded, by the judges sending the accused 
 to the rack without a preliminary formal order. The rule 
 prevailed that torture should not be so prolonged as to 
 endanger life and limb, but, in fact, the unfortunate victim 
 was often crippled for life under a false accusation. Von 
 Boden says, that the devil himself could not invent any 
 worse torment for the human body than these judges 
 often used on the innocent.^ The judge himself was obliged 
 to be present during the torture, and naturally grew callous 
 to the misery he inflicted. He was liable to indictment 
 if the prisoner did not confess, so that every motive urged 
 him to torment the miserable sufferers. It is said that in 
 these refinements of cruelty over nine hundred different 
 instruments for inflicting pain were invented and used. 
 Torture was permitted even after conviction, to prevent 
 appeals ; and if the unhappy person asserted his innocence 
 at the place of execution, he was hurried back to the rack 
 again. 
 
 One candid magistrate of Milan is reported by Nicholas 
 to have tested the system, by killing a favourite mule and 
 allowing the accusation to fall upon a servant. The man 
 denied the offence, was put to the rack, and confessed ; and 
 subsequently, after the torture, persisted in the confession. 
 The judge, it is said, resigned his office and became a 
 cardinal. 
 
 In France, at the close of the fifteenth century, all the 
 
 ' Sic adhiberi soteant ut diabolum ipsum asperius quid quo corpori 
 humano in hac vita noceat, excogitaie posse dubium sit. (Quoted by 
 Lea.
 
 TORTURE. 183 
 
 worst accompaniments of this cruel practice were in con- 
 tinual use ; the secret investigation of criminal cases ; the 
 separate and secret examination of witnesses ; the prisoner 
 not being informed of the accusation against him, nor 
 allowed an opportunity of preparing a defence. The prin- 
 ciple of French legislation in this matter in the sixteenth 
 century being, as Lea well puts it, that it were better that 
 one hundred innocent persons should suffer, than that one 
 guilty one should escape. 
 
 The old maxim of Roman law, that no one who had 
 confessed his guilt should be examined as to the guilt of 
 another accused, was forgotten, and the new method was 
 the application of the rack to compel a confession as to the 
 guilt of others. This continued even under the reign of 
 Louis XIV. Silence under the agony inflicted was not 
 considered evidence of innocence ; so that a man not found 
 guilty after torture, could be punished for some other of- 
 fence of which he had not been convicted. This horrible 
 condition of legislation endured in France till the eighteenth 
 century. 
 
 In Spain, as might have been expected, this barbarous 
 practice and all the abuses of secret inquest had their 
 especial seat. The dreadful procedure of the Inquisition 
 was transferred to secular legislation. Torture was adopted 
 even on charges of theft or counterfeiting, and for all 
 weighty offences. Evidence sufticient to justify it was con- 
 sidered to lie in common report, or in unexplained absence 
 before accusation, or in prevarication at examination, or 
 even in silence and pallor.^ The magistrates went so far 
 as to employ the lot or divination to obtain proofs suf- 
 cient to justify to their minds the rack or the strappado. 
 Witnesses were not spared either in civil or criminal cases. 
 
 * Deinde a pallore et similibus oritur judicium ad torturam secun- 
 dum. (yoii Rosbach) Lea, p. 358.
 
 i84 GESTA CHRISTi 
 
 In general, torture was seldom practised in their early 
 history by the nations where jury trial prevailed and 
 evidence was open, and where Roman law had little or no 
 influence. In the Danish and Swedish Codes, from the 
 fifteenth to the end of the sixteenth centuries, when this 
 cruel process was so common in Europe, it is not men- 
 tioned. It does however appear very early in the Icelandic 
 Code, but seems afterwards to have fallen into disuse. 
 
 Torture in England. — It is the boast of the common law 
 of England, that this practice was never recognised in its 
 provisions. Among the Anglo-Saxons, the ordeal, the 
 wager of battle, and the gradual growth of the jury took 
 its place. 
 
 By the laws of Henry I. it is laid down that no credit 
 is to be given to a confession about another's guilt, and 
 that a confession extorted by fear or fraud is invalid.^ It 
 is thought that the expression in Magna Charta, " No 
 freeman may be arrested or imprisoned except by legal 
 judgment of his peers," - may refer to this power of magis- 
 trates and kings, so freely exercised on the Continent at 
 that time. 
 
 In the fourteenth century, this cruelty was almost 
 unknown in legal proceedings in England. The Arch- 
 bishop of York states this publicly, and asks in a letter, 
 which has been preserved, what he shall do in regard to 
 the examination of certain knights templar. 
 
 Yet torture was occasionally employed during suc- 
 ceeding reigns, and gradually, as the royal prerogative was 
 strengthened, it gained ground. Under Henry VIII. it was 
 held that a royal warrant justified the use of this means 
 of investigation and of secret inquest. Arguments were 
 
 * Nemini de se confesso super alienum crimen, credatur ; confessia 
 per metum vel per fraudem extorta, ron valet" (Z,, Hen. /., 5, 16.) 
 
 * C. XXX.
 
 TORTURE IN ENGLAND. 185 
 
 made against its practice during Elizabeth's reign, but still 
 it was held that the royal command rendered it legal. Sir 
 Thomas Smith says of torture in his time (1570): "Like- 
 wise torment of question which is used by the order of 
 the civil law and custom of other countries, to put a 
 malefactor to excessive paine, to make him confesse of 
 himselfe, or of his fellows or complices, is not used in Eng- 
 land ; it is taken for servile. . . The nature of English- 
 men is to neglect death, but to abide no torment. . . 
 Likewise confession by torment is esteemed for nothing." ^ 
 Even Lord Bacon, at as late a period as 161 9, recom- 
 mended its use to King James. As was the experience 
 in other countries, this method of examination was trans- 
 ferred from cases of treason and of offences against the 
 State, to ordinary offences — even to the examination of 
 persons accused of theft and horse-stealing. 
 
 After 1640, pain as a means of investigation was never 
 applied to those accused of political offences. The Rebel- 
 lion put an end to such practices. 
 
 In Scotland the use of torture began somewhat late, 
 after the fifteenth century, but it was applied fearfully, 
 especially in the trials for witchcraft in the sixteenth and 
 seventeenth centuries. It was not abolished in that coun- 
 try till after the Union, in 1709.^ 
 
 TJie Opposition of the Church. — As we stated before, the 
 Church in its early history was consistent with its doctrines 
 in opposing this cruelty and injustice. Under the Mero- 
 vingian line, torture was only exceptionally employed, 
 except against scorcerers. A Church Council in 587 A.D, 
 forbade by special decree every elder or deacon from being 
 
 * Commonwealth of England 1589, p. loa See also Jardine On Usi 
 of Torture, etc. 
 2 Lea.
 
 1 86 GESIA CHRIST!. 
 
 present at the infliction of this pain. ^ Another canon 
 (585 A.D.) prohibited any of the clergy from even behold- 
 ing these agonies. ^ A prominent Bishop, Hildebert, in 
 1 125, in a letter to his clergy, says, "To torment criminals. 
 or to extort confession by torture, is not a part of the 
 discipline of the Church."^ The early Popes were not be- 
 hindhand in their denunciation of the practice. Gregory L 
 in the sixth century speaks with contempt of a confes- 
 sion where the innocent are compelled to avow them- 
 selves guilty.* Nicholas I. in his Epistle to the Bulga- 
 rians, says that this is a process which no divine or human 
 law can approve of, " for a confession ought not to be 
 unwilling but spontaneous." ^ " Abandon all such prac- 
 tices," is his command. Ivo of Chartres, in the beginning 
 of the twelfth century, proclaimed that the confession of 
 the clergy, whatever they were accused of, should always 
 be spontaneous, not forced. ^ 
 
 Fifty years later, Gratian proclaims that confessions 
 must not be obtained by torments. '^ 
 
 This cruel practice was not adopted by most of the coun- 
 tries of Europe till the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. 
 
 * Non licet presbytero nee diacono ad trepalium ubi rei torquentur 
 stare. Cone. Aufiss., con. 33. 
 
 " Ad locum examinationis reorum nullus clericorum accedat. Cone. 
 Mat.^ ii. I. {Lea.) 
 
 ^ Reos tormentis afficere vel suppliciis extorquere confessionem 
 ... est non ecclesia; disciplina. {Hild., Ep. xxx. Lea.) 
 
 * . . . noxios se fated cogantur etiam innoxii. Greg., lib. viii. 
 Ep. I, 3 c. 
 
 * Quam rem nee divina lex nee humana prorsus admittit, cum non 
 juvita sed spontanea debet esse confcssio. (Ep. 97, 86.) . . Rclin- 
 quite itaque talia. (Quoted by Lea.) 
 
 * Ministrorum confcssio non sit extorta sed spontanea. (Quoted by 
 Lea) 
 
 ' Confcssio ciuciatibus extorquenda non est. Dec. ervs, xv. 6, 1 
 (Sec Lea.)
 
 THE CHURCH AND TORTURE. 187 
 
 Italy, which was the centre of Romaxi ideas, was the 
 earhest to employ it in obtaining evidence, and the last 
 to abandon it. Frederick II. in his Neapolitan Code 
 (1231) is said to have substituted torture for ordeal in judi- 
 cial trials. In the thirteenth century the Church began to 
 drift far from the principles of its Master, and to be imbued 
 with a spirit of cruel bigotry. The Inquisition accepted 
 torture and secret investigation as its appropriate imple- 
 ments; and Pope Innocent IV. ordered this process in the 
 examinations for heresy. The influence of the Inquisition 
 on secular law was widespread and most disastrous. 
 
 Two causes began now to spread abroad this cruel pro- 
 ceeding : one, the revived study of Roman law, and the 
 consequent desire by the Royalist party through Europe to 
 restore to imperial and kingly power its privileges — among 
 them the rignt to obtain evidence by inflicting pain — and 
 the other this terrible anti-christian spirit of the Church 
 and the Inquisition. 
 
 The spirit of humanity taught by Christ, wherever K 
 could struggle against ecclesiastical tyranny, opposed this 
 barbarity through every century. As the Scriptures be- 
 came more circulated among the common people after the 
 fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, all men felt more of the 
 compassion taught by Him, and this abuse seemed more 
 and more a shame to the faith they professed. The in- 
 fluence of the Roman law indeed upheld it, and the bigotry 
 of priests and cruelty of rulers, but the Teacher of love 
 everywhere through the Gospels preached against it in the 
 hearts of men. Nothing but His influence seems finally to 
 have uprooted it among European nations. 
 
 The author? from whom we have quoted, A. Nicholas 
 Von Boden, Bernhardi, are filled with the Christian spirit, 
 and strike telling blows at the evil. The latter writer states 
 that the abuse was abolished in Holland, because in Utrecht,
 
 1 88 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 a man brought a false charge of theft against a shoe- 
 maker.^ The workman was tortured, confessed, and was 
 finally executed. It subsequently appeared that the ac- 
 cusation arose from the shoemaker's refusal to buy a pair 
 of shoes from the man. Such instances were no doubt 
 constantly occurring and aiding to bring Europe to right 
 reason. This author says, that the system of torture ought 
 to be cast out of the doors of Christianity, and that it is 
 destitute of any appearance even of a divine test of truth. 
 
 It is but just to say that in these matters of humanity 
 and public right, the sceptics were often in their practice 
 nearer Christ than were the popes, bishops and clergy. 
 The Christian spirit affected the ideas of those who were 
 nominally unbelievers. The French free-thinkers and 
 their followers opposed the use of torture with all their 
 eloquence. Montaigne uttered his condemnation of it, 
 Voltaire addressed (in 1777) an earnest appeal to Louis 
 XVI. against it, and the philosopher king, Frederick the 
 Great, made it the first act of his reign to abolish it (1740), 
 though his humanity was not sufficient to prevent his 
 using it on those accused of treason and rebellion against 
 himself. 
 
 In Saxony, Switzerland, and Austria, it was abolished 
 towards the end of the eighteenth century ; in Russia it 
 survived till 1801 ; in Wurtemburg and Bavaria it was in 
 use in 1806 and 1807; in Hannover till 1822; and in 
 Baden till 1831,^ In France, the storm of the Revolution 
 swept it away ; and almost at the same time it came to 
 an end in North Italy, but was used in the prisons of 
 Naples and Palermo down to the middle of this century. 
 
 It is remarkable that, according to Lea, ^ instances of 
 
 ' Quoted by Lea. 
 
 ' A Reading on the nse of Torture, etc. D Jnrdine, London, 1837. 
 
 * Page 522.
 
 ABOLITION OF TORTURE. 189 
 
 judicial torture to extort evidence have occurred in 
 Europe within a few years : one in Roumania in 1868, 
 and the other in the enhghtened RepubHc of Switzerland, 
 in the Canton of Zug, in 1869. 
 
 The civiHzed world has happily for ever passed beyond 
 this great abuse and injustice, which has caused such 
 untold pain and misery, and has broken the courage and 
 endurance of such countless numbers of human beings 
 Unfortunately for the name of Christianity, the Church 
 sustained and employed this diabolical system of cruelty 
 and oppression. But the teachings of Christ, and the 
 protests of many of His followers have opposed it in every 
 age. As men have become more and more filled with His 
 spirit, or indirectly influenced by Christian ideas, torture 
 has disappeared, and is now as one of the horrible spectres 
 of a dismal and bloody past. In non-Christian countries, 
 however, it exists, but is gradually abolished as their codes 
 of law come under the influence of the doctrines of Jesus. 
 In one of the most civilized of these — Japan — it was form- 
 ally abolished as a means of procuring evidence, ^ in 1873, 
 — the new code being reformed after those of Christian 
 countries. 
 
 * Reed's yia/a«. voL i. d. 324.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE stranger's RIGHT. 
 
 Under the old Greek and Roman habits of mind, the 
 stranger was mainly looked upon as a barbarian and 
 enemy.^ Something of the same savagery, which in 
 Stanley's travels through Central Africa made almost 
 every new tribe he met with at once attack him like a 
 dangerous wild beast, animated the ancient races, both 
 barbarous and civilized, in their relations to foreigners, 
 Stoicism indeed cultivated a more humane feeling among 
 the learned and refined ; but the masses of the people in 
 the ancient world were full of prejudices and hostility 
 against those not of their own race or country. It is true 
 that the Roman empire, with its imperial unity, tended 
 to melt different peoples together under one rule, and 
 strangers and enemies gradually became only those outside 
 of the limits of this grand domain. Toward those, how- 
 ever, the old barbaric feeling and custom were strong as 
 ever. That expression in Plautus, " A man is a wolf to a 
 man he does not know,"^ is probably an echo of an old 
 Roman proverb, and utters a common sentiment of the 
 
 ' Hostis enim apud majores nostros is dicebatur quern nunc pere- 
 grinum dicimus. {Cic.) Aristotle says, Of all wars those are most 
 necessary and just which are made by men against wild beasts, and 
 next those made by Greeks against strangers, " who are naturally 
 our enemies." {Pol., li. 8.) 
 
 ^ As.^ 2, 4, 88. Homo homini ignoto lupus, etc 
 
 190
 
 HUMANITY TO THE STRANGER. igt 
 
 Italian peoples. When the Empire broke up and the 
 Teutonic codes to a large degree controlled Europe, we see 
 the revival of the inhuman spirit towards strangers, and at 
 the same time the larger humanity taught by the Jewish 
 Scriptures and by Christ, struggling with and mitigating 
 the spirit of old and savage legislation. 
 
 That humane command of the Old Testament, "Thou 
 shalt not vex the stranger" (Lev. xix. 33, 34), seems to 
 have rung in the ears of almost every Christian legislator 
 of the German, Keltic, and Anglo-Saxon tribes ; and the 
 spirit of the new Revelation is seen everywhere in- 
 spiring and teaching a broader humanity, though often 
 in vain against the ingrained and inherited habits of bar- 
 barism. 
 
 There were indeed certain justifications of the old 
 Teutonic dislike of strangers. The land of the tribe was 
 held in common, and a stranger, as a lawless man, was out 
 of connection with the community, with no possessions and 
 no obligations ; he was no doubt often a runaway, vagrant, 
 or thief, or a disturber of the peace ; if he came as a 
 merchant he was outside of the " mutual pledge " system 
 which bound, for instance, the Anglo-Saxons to good 
 conduct. It followed almost naturally that the laws in 
 regard to him were often very strict or cruel. According 
 to the Burgundian law^ he could be tortured under sus- 
 picious circumstances, and even one of Charlemagne's 
 capitularies permits the same treatment. By a law of the 
 Salian Franks, when a stranger wished to settle in a village 
 or canton he was not permitted the privilege if a single 
 resident opposed. If also within ten days any member of 
 the tribe presented himself with witnesses, and summoned 
 
 ' Quicumqiie hominem extraneum cujuslibet nationis ad se veni- 
 «ntem suscepeiit, discutiendum praesentet ut cujus sit tormentis 
 adhibitis fateatur. Lex. Burg., i. 39, and Cap. 2 (803 A.D.).
 
 192 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 him to quit the village, and this was repeated twice after 
 the ten days, he was obliged to depart. If he refused, he 
 was summoned to the viallnin, and not only expelled, but 
 compelled to abandon his property and pay a fine. In 
 England, as we shall shortly show, a stranger who was 
 accused of any crime must be at once put in jail; if he 
 was found off from the four main roads and making no 
 noise of bell, he could be killed as a thief ; no one could 
 harbour him more than three nights, and whoever did so 
 even for that time was responsible for his good conduct. 
 He was taxed wherever possible. Even as late as the time 
 of Henry VII I. all foreign artificers were prohibited from 
 working in the kingdom.^ The Saxons are said to have 
 sold into slavery a stranger who had no patron.^ By a law 
 of many German tribes, if a stranger had resided twelve 
 months in a district he was safe ; if he was guest of 
 a member of the tribe, the host after three nights became 
 responsible for him. The proverb was common, "Two 
 nights a guest, the third night a servant." In Gaul, 
 among the Keltic tribes, the stranger was equally held 
 as one outside of the community and unable to own the 
 property of a warrior. The early German codes soon 
 begin to show the eftect of the new spirit in this matter. 
 The laws of the Bavarians of the twelfth century quote 
 the Bible text in regard to vexing the stranger, and lay 
 a heavy fine on him who shall plunder, sell, or wound a 
 stranger, while a burdensome fine must be paid to the 
 treasury for his murder. 
 
 That great legislator, Charlemagne, in 803, calls upon 
 every one in his empire, as he would that Christ should be 
 merciful unto him, not to refuse hospitality to strangers 
 
 » 32 H. VIII., c. 16. 
 
 2 Peregrinum qui patronem non habcbant, vendebant Saxonis. 
 
 Wegtnkordt.
 
 DROIT UAUBAINE. 193 
 
 and travellers.^ He directs all judges to give just judg- 
 ment, and to make no distinction between tlie stranger 
 and the citizen, because that is the true judgment of God.* 
 No official is permitted to oppress strangers with taxes 
 or any other burden.^ 
 
 Alfred, in the Anglo-Saxon code, orders his subjects not 
 to vex the stranger and far-comer, in memory of the Lord's 
 people being strangers in the land of Egypt ; and each of 
 his successors repeats this injunction on religious grounds. 
 
 The ancient Hungarian law enjoins humanity towards 
 strangers in that we ever have the example of the Master, 
 and the command " I will have mercy and not sacrifice." * 
 
 Droit d" Aitbaine. — One of the most remarkable instances 
 of the continuance of a barbaric custom in a Christian 
 country, down to modern times, has been the droit d'au- 
 baine, ^ or stranger's right, in France. The stranger for 
 centuries in France was looked upon in law as a serf, and 
 treated accordingly. An aitbain, or stranger, living a year 
 and a day in a French community, and not professing 
 citizenship or attaching himself to a baron, became serf 
 to the seigneur on whose lands he resided. It was the 
 fourteenth century before the strangers ceased to be 
 regarded as bound to the soil in France, and features of 
 the droit d" aitbaine have survived to the present day. The 
 
 ' Volumus ut infra regna, Christo propitio nostro, omnibus iteran- 
 tibus, nuUus hospitium denegat, mansionem et focum tantum. Char. 
 3 Cap., and others. 
 
 2 Quod justum est, judicata. Sive civis sit ille, sive peregrinus 
 nulla sit distantia personarum, quia Dei judicium. (62.) 
 
 ' 72, 9 c. 
 
 * Semper illud Domini exemplum, etc. 
 
 * Probably derived from Albanus, or Scotchman, as being the foreign 
 people most often strangers in France. It may also be from alibi 
 natus. Others give, Celt, all, autre ; batm, juridiction, district, 
 contrde, pays. (See Hist, de la Cotid. civ. d' Etrangkrs en France- 
 Par C. Demangeat, Paris, 1844.)
 
 I9A GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 oppressive custom had indeed been lightened by the greed 
 of the seigneurs for money obtained by selling their rights 
 over foreigners, and by the power of the kings, who pro- 
 tected strangers in the interest of royalty against feudal 
 barons. The Christian religion, too, softened, though fot 
 centuries it could not remove, the oppression. The abso- 
 lute servitude of strangers was formally abolished from 
 the thirteenth to the fourteenth century. In the earlier 
 times the seigneur at the death of the stranger took, 
 by law, all his inheritance. But toward the end of the 
 thirteenth century, if he had left children, half the pro- 
 perty was permitted to descend to them. Louis X. (13 15) 
 ordered servitude to be changed to freedom,^ but the efforts 
 failed against the struggles of the feudal gentry. 
 
 The aubains, or strangers, of the Middle Ages seem to 
 have been in almost the same position with serfs. They 
 were bound to the soil, and masters could pursue them if 
 they ran away ; they sold their rights over them like any 
 other property. The stranger was obliged to pay dues 
 to the baron ; if married to a person of another class, 
 he must pay a fine, and, if his marriage was without the 
 consent of his master or seigneur his goods could be confis- 
 cated and the marriage declared null and void. In divers 
 ways the unfortunate foreigners in France were plundered 
 and taxed throughout the Middle Ages. They could not 
 inherit or bequeath property. Even as late as the six- 
 teenth century the aubains could not transmit property, 
 except a fixed small sum, or succeed to an estate. In 
 146 1, Louis XI. exempted from the droit d'aubaitie and 
 the correlated right of barbarism, the droit de naiifrage — 
 wreckers' right — certain large districts in Flanders and the 
 adjacent regions. It was not till 1606 that England and 
 France released merchants by treaty from these oppressive 
 * Servitude fust ramende ^ franchise.
 
 ABOLITION OF DROIT D'AUBAINE. 195 
 
 dues and exactions. Henry 1 1., in 1554, expressly exempted 
 Scotch merchants from the droit d'aubaine. Still with 
 these various exemptions, the general law for centuries in 
 France was that a stranger, if he did not recognise the 
 seigneur on whose land he lived, could, after a year and 
 a day, be arrested and his goods confiscated, or he be 
 forced to pay a heavy fine. He became the man of the 
 baron and must bestow on him a certain sum by will, or 
 the baron inherited all his property. Even native French- 
 men wandering to some other than their native district 
 were liable to become native aubains. 
 
 This odious right was finally abolished by the humane 
 impulse of the Revolution in 1790 ; that is, strangers could 
 transmit property to other than French children, but they 
 were not permitted to collect property left to them in 
 France, nor were they made equal with Frenchmen in 
 regard to imprisonment for debt, the transference of pro- 
 perty, or the ability to appear as plaintiffs in court. 
 
 It was not till this century (1819) that strangers in 
 France were placed by other than treaty law on an equality 
 with native Frenchmen, and allowed to receive bequests 
 and to own real estate. In 1832 a still further improve- 
 ment was made in their condition by their being delivered 
 from imprisonment for small debts. 
 
 As regards foreign countries, these odious relics of a 
 barbarous age were abolished by treaty in France, first 
 in 1760; — the privilege of exemption being secured by the 
 United States in 1778, and by Russia and England in 
 
 1787. 
 
 Similar inequalities in regard to strangers, derived from 
 the ancient customs of half-civilized tribes and from 
 feudalism, still exist under the common law of England, 
 and have been continued in many of the United States. 
 The right of a stranger to own real estate in most of the
 
 196 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 American States is only given by special statute or on 
 application to the court. 
 
 The struggle of Christianity against this spirit of in- 
 tolerance is only seen in the early legislation of the 
 German and Keltic tribes, because then the motive power 
 was fresher and more distinctly expressed. But when 
 Paul on Mars' Hill uttered to the race most proud of its 
 blood in antiquity and who held all foreigners as bar- 
 barians, that watch-word of modern humanity, " God hath 
 made of one all races of men," and when He repeated it 
 in so many forms to the great conquering race of the past 
 — the Romans — we may be sure that an idea from the 
 great Master was thrown into human society which must 
 everywhere break down the hatred of race to race. 
 
 As this humane principle became more an element in 
 human progress, it was less spoken of as a religious in- 
 fluence. It entered into legislation silently, and after long 
 struggles began the reforms which are not yet finished ; for 
 under the teachings of Christianity, there can be no unjust 
 and oppressive discriminations made against the stranger 
 and foreigner, but all nations are of " one blood."
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE WRECKERS' RIGHT AND ITRACY. 
 
 Of all persons claiming the offices of common humanity, 
 it would seem that the unfortunate sailor or stranger, 
 wrecked on a foreign shore, was the one most innocent and 
 most deserving. And yet in all ages before Christianity, 
 and often since, either the shipwrecked mariner and 
 traveller were held to be the slaves or captives of those 
 who rescued them, or their property became lawful plunder 
 of any into whose hands it fell. They were considered 
 the outlaws of mankind. 
 
 The Visigoths, more than any of the German tribes, 
 were at least externally influenced by the Christian 
 principle, and their code showed one of the first efforts to 
 do away with this barbaric practice towards the ship- 
 wrecked. Severe penalties were threatened against plun- 
 dering the goods of wrecked vessels. The Anglo-Saxons 
 too were somewhat touched with the higher humanity of 
 the new Faith, and one law proclaims (about 978 A.D.) 
 " Let every merchant-ship have frith (peace) that comes 
 within port, though it be a hostile port, if it be not (storm-) 
 driven ! If it be (storm-) driven, and it flee to any peace- 
 burgh, then let these men and what they bring with them 
 have peace." 
 
 Henry I. (1130 A.D.) referring to the wreckers' right, 
 says : " Hanc abhorrens consuetudinem," abhorring this 
 
 197
 
 198 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 custom, he ordains a law, that whoever escapes from a 
 wreck should be allowed to possess his property. 
 
 Richard II. (i 190) proclaims that, having himself ex- 
 perienced the calamities of shipwreck, he does "for the 
 love of God and the salvation of his soul demand safet} 
 and protection for all shipwrecked persons and their goods 
 in whatever land or sea."^ 
 
 The ancient mercantile community was the first to 
 feel the new spirit of humanity, and their interests would 
 naturally move them to resist barbaric practices. Every 
 old mercantile code contains provisions against the ill- 
 treatment of these unfortunate persons. The Code d'Oleron 
 (dating before the fourteenth century) is full of honest in- 
 dignation against those who injure the shipwrecked, and 
 commands the plunderers to be half-drowned and stoned 
 like dogs. 
 
 It is said to be " against the command of God the 
 All-powerful, notwithstanding any custom or ordinance, 
 to plunder the shipwrecked, and all such are accursed " 
 (Art. 38) ; and whoever should put up false lights to mis- 
 lead the unwary and thus cause disaster and wreck, ought 
 to be bound in the midst of his house and fire to be set 
 to its four corners and be burned with it, and the whole 
 place be turned into a hog-yard.^ Nothing however 
 seemed to uproot this barbarous practice. In the tenth 
 and eleventh centuries the Dukes of Brabant still claimed 
 the right to plunder all persons who were so unfortunate 
 
 ' Ricardus Rex jam expertus calamitates naufragorum, pro amore 
 Dei et salute animse suas et parentum suorum quictem clamavit in 
 perpetuum Wrec per totani terram suam citra mare, et ultra statuens ; 
 quod omnis naufragus qui ad terram pervenerit, omnes res suas liberas 
 et quietas habeat. Leg. Sax., Wilkins, p. 342. 
 
 ^ Et doibt estre li^ k une esteppe en millieu de sa maison, et on doibt 
 mettre le feu es quatres cornieres de sa maison et faire tout brusler, 
 etc. Art. 41, c. 8.
 
 CRUELTY TO SHIPWRECKED. 199 
 
 as to be cast on their coasts. The Council of Nantes 
 (i 127) thundered against it ; and in 1231, the good king, 
 St. Louis, made a treaty with the Duke of Brabant, 
 endeavouring to convert these rights into money pay- 
 ments. 
 
 Among the reh'gious efforts made to Hmit this odious 
 custom of a cruel age, may be mentioned, the " Judgments 
 of the Sea," a code of St. Louis, in 1266. By these new 
 regulations, the seigneur on whose domains unfortunate 
 vessels were cast, was not permitted to seize the property 
 or to enslave the persons of the crew ; but he is required 
 to aid the sufferers and to save the property. " Whoever 
 shall do the contrary, shall be excommunicated from the 
 church, and punished as a robber " (Art. 29), and by Art. 
 30, if, after a year, no owner appear, the baron shall pub- 
 licly sell the wrecked property, and distribute the money 
 among the poor, and otherwise do works of compassion 
 with the proceeds. 
 
 The Lateran Council (1179) promulgated one article 
 agamst the inhuman practice, and forbade any one de- 
 spoiling the wrecked. ^ 
 
 These efforts however did not avail, for in 1277 Philip 
 the Bold was obliged to issue an ordinance, excepting 
 from the usual royal claims the property of Italian 
 merchants thus brought to misfortune. 
 
 Louis XI. (1465-69) claimed all shipwrecked goods as 
 legal property of the crown ; the only exceptions being in 
 favour of the Dutch and Flemings, and of the Hanseatic 
 League. The ordinance of 1543 is said to be the first 
 legal evidence of a reform in this practice in France ; by 
 
 ^ Ne patientes naufragium quisquam spoliare prjesumat. (C. 21.) 
 Excommunicatione quoque poenas siibdantur qui Romanos aiit alios 
 Christianos pro negotio vel aliis causis honestis navigio vectos, aut 
 capere aut rebus suis praesumunt. (3 Cotu. Lat.)
 
 200 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 this act, the wrecked persons were permitted to reclaim 
 their property within a year and a day. ^ 
 
 In other portions of Europe there was much humane 
 legislation against this evil. In Spain, Sicily, and Italy, 
 the commercial cities and Republics strove everywhere to 
 include humane treatment towards the wrecked in the privi- 
 leges granted to them by treaties. The religious bodies 
 universally denounced the practice of cruelty towards these 
 unfortunate persons. It existed on the coasts of Scotland 
 till the thirteenth century ; and in Germany it was only in 
 the twelfth century that the right of the baron or the crown 
 over wrecked property was changed to a fine for protec- 
 tion. On the coasts of Prussia the ancient right of plun- 
 dering and enslaving the shipwrecked was believed to be 
 derived from the old Rhodian Law. 
 
 Many treaties were made in the thirteenth century 
 between Christian and Mohammedan countries, endeavour- 
 ing to protect Europeans from this cruel practice. The 
 final abolition of this inhuman custom was due to a com- 
 bination of influences. The sense of humanity taught 
 and encouraged by the new Faith was also stimulated by 
 the broadening effects of commerce, and by the mutual 
 interests of traders and their customers. 
 
 The only nations among whom this barbarism still en- 
 dures in modern times, are the non-Christian, especially 
 the Mohammedan peoples of the north of Africa. But 
 even here, the power of civilized races has checked it ; 
 and humanity to the shipwrecked is now stamped by the 
 Christian Faith on the public law and custom of all lead- 
 ing nations. It would not only be considered in this age 
 a violation of international law to plunder or treat cruelly 
 the shipwrecked, but the religious and humane spirit of 
 
 * Pardessus. Collcc/ion de Lois Maritimes,
 
 PIRACY. 20I 
 
 Christian countries has made it a duty and satisfaction to 
 aid these unfortunate persons. 
 
 Piracy. — The practice of indiscriminate plundering on 
 the sea in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, was only a 
 part of the private war prevailing on the land. Every in- 
 dividual, or town, or state who chose, could equip a vessel 
 and plunder all others. No richly freighted ship was safe. 
 Entire coasts became asylums for marine freebooters. 
 Towns employed vessels against other towns ; and cities 
 thus waged war with one another. 
 
 The leagues of commercial towns did much to clear the 
 seas of these free-booters, and piracy was finally checked 
 by privateering. The evil (in a mitigated form) has lasted 
 down to our own day in the practice of " Private War " 
 under letters of marque, or privateering. 
 
 The new spirit infused into international law by the 
 great Teacher is gradually abolishing privateering, and this 
 century will probably see the end of " Private War " on the 
 sea, as a former century saw that of a similar savage 
 custom on land.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 CHARLEMAGNE'S CAPITULARIES. 
 
 No student of the Middle Ages can be othervv'Ise than 
 deeply impressed with the wonderful personality which 
 led the work of reforming and re-organizing that portion 
 of Europe held by the German and Keltic tribes. Charle- 
 magne's legislation bears the constant impress of the new 
 moral power in the world ; and though his practical action 
 was by no means always guided by Christianity, these laws 
 often give a fair example of the influence of the religion of 
 Jesus on the laws of barbaric tribes. 
 
 One of his capitularies (789 A.D.) uses almost the lan- 
 guage of the Bible, when he says, " Let no one claim 
 wrongfully the lands of another, and pass not the bound- 
 aries of his fathers." " No one should turn away the 
 offerings which may be the whole patrimony of the poor ! " 
 " Let peace and good intelligence rule among bishops, 
 abbots, counts, judges, and men of all conditions, for with- 
 out peace, nothing pleases the Lord." " If ye love one 
 another, all will know ye are Christ's disciples ! " Accord- 
 ing to the command of our Lord, let no murder be com- 
 mitted in the spirit of vengeance, avarice, and rapine ; 
 wherever this crime be discovered, let our judges punish 
 it in virtue of our orders, but let no one in future lose his 
 life if the law do not condemn him.^ Widows and orphans 
 
 ' Cap. Eccles., 61, 66, ttc.
 
 LAWS OF CHARLEMAGNE. 203 
 
 and minors are to be protected, as under the peculiar care 
 of God, and are everywhere to have peace and receive 
 justice." ^ " And it pleases us that the faithful should be 
 admonished concerning hatred and discord, which extin- 
 guish charity among those nearest, and destroy affection." ' 
 The true charity which loveth God and our neighbour is 
 to be cultivated ; ^ and friendship and affection are to be 
 observed according to the words of the Apostle to the 
 Corinthians.^ The people were exhorted to peace and 
 concord, because they have one Father in heaven,^ and 
 because the blessed book had taught them that " Blessed 
 are the peace-makers." They are warned against feud,^ 
 and in the words of Scripture against any rash shedding 
 of Christian blood.''' The powerful are cautioned against 
 the oppression of the poor ; * and all are exhorted to be 
 imitators of Him who would save the souls of men.^ And 
 all Christians are most solemnly warned to give their 
 utmost diligence, lest they be for ever separated from the 
 kingdom of God, by their strifes and contentions and 
 falsehood and wicked vices. ^° 
 
 The great sin of the Middle Ages was the habit of false 
 swearing. These laws bid the citizen beware of perjury, 
 not only on the holy Gospels, the relics of the saints and 
 the altar, but in common conversation. "There are some 
 
 ' Ut vi(/uce, orphani et minus potentes sub Dei defensione, etc, 
 (c. ccxxvii.j 
 
 * Placuit ut fideles admonentur de odio et discordia, etc. (c. cclxL) 
 ^ Vera caritas qua Deus proximusque diligitur, etc. (ccc.xlvii.) 
 
 * c. cccxlii. 
 
 ' Quia unum Deum patrem habemus in coelo, etc. (Lib. 7.) 
 
 * Pro Faida, etc. (Lib. 5, c. ccv.) 
 ' c. cccxxvii. 
 
 ® c. ccclxxxii. 
 
 * c. cccxxxiii. 
 
 " , , . a regno Dei se alienos faciant. {Add. 2, cxxiL)
 
 204 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 who swear by charity and truth, and know not that the 
 same God is charity and truth " ^ ; they urge honest weights 
 and measures in towns and monasteries, for " my soul 
 hateth false measures." ^ 
 
 On the question of marriage, no one is permitted to 
 marry a divorced woman (43) ; and if a man abandon hi*, 
 wife, he is to be punished. No husband shall desert his 
 wife, except for the cause allowed in Scripture — criminal 
 conduct.^ And still more remarkable, the slave is pro- 
 tected in his marriage, and even if the partners be sold 
 to different masters, the union is still lawful and must be 
 respected.^ The Christian abhorrence which first animated 
 the Roman law against unnatural vice, appears in the 
 capitularies. The great emperor speaks of the Roman 
 Law as " the mother of all human laws ; " and draws a 
 warning from the fate of the nations of Spain and the 
 tribes of the Burgundians, who had been given up to 
 unnatural vices and were therefore permitted by God to 
 be enslaved by the Saracens.^ 
 
 His law also shows mercy to the outlaw {tvargendtim') 
 by making his blood-money the same as for killing a 
 Frank. He repeats the humane phrase, unfortunately too 
 often only a phrase : " Ecclesia abhorret sanguine " (the 
 
 * . . , ut caveant perjurium, non solum in sancto Evangelio, 
 vel in altare, seu in sanctorum reliquiis, sed in communi loquella, 
 etc. (63.) 
 
 2 Lib. 7. c. cclii. 
 
 3 NuUus conjugem propriam nisi ut sanctun) conjugium docet, for- 
 nicationis causa, relinquat. Cap. Reg. Fr., c. Ixxxvii. 
 
 * Unde nobis visum est ut conjugiaservorum non dirimuntur, etiamsi 
 diversos dominos habeant sed in uno conjugio permanentes. {Add^ 
 Tert., c. iv.) 
 
 * Sicut aliis gentibus Hispanic et Province at Burgundiorum populis 
 contigit, quas, sic a Deo recedentes, fornicatas sunt, donee Judex 
 Omnipotens, etc. (Cap. 4, 16.) See also lib. 7, cxlii. Ut monachi se- 
 cundum regulam vivant.
 
 CHRISTIAN IN LEGISLATION. 205 
 
 Church abhorreth blood) ; he calls cupidity the root 
 of all evil ; and recommends hospitality for the reason 
 that he who receiveth a little child in the name of 
 Christ, receiveth Him ; the observance of Sunday was 
 ordered, which is a special legislation for the working- 
 classes ; respect for the dead was encouraged, and the 
 obligation of prayer impressed on all. The laity were 
 ordered to learn the Apostles' Creed ; and, to soften them, 
 the emperor quotes incessantly from the precepts of 
 Christianity, forbidding the oppression of the poor and 
 humble, and ordering the judges to hear the cause of the 
 poor before that of the rich. To break up the ancient 
 feuds which desolated society, he orders that whoever 
 slays his enemy after peace has been declared, must lose 
 his hand and pay a fine (cap. 50). The stranger and far- 
 comer are especially protected, under the injunctions in 
 the Bible, and because such may be journeying in the 
 service of their common Master.^ 
 
 It is true that much of this legislation was violated in 
 practical experience, and that it was largely swept away 
 after the death of the great reformer. But it shows with 
 remarkable clearness, what the direct influence of this Faith 
 from Judaea was upon legislation through the wild period 
 of the Middle Ages, and what it tended to bring about. 
 
 ' Advenam non contristabis, etc. (Lib, xxviii.) Nemo enim auttu 
 sit inquietare vel nocere peregrinum, etc. (Lib. 7,)
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 ANGLO-SAXON LAW. 
 
 There are two opposite difficulties in weighing correctly 
 the influence of reh'gious faith on the laws, and thus on 
 the morals of a country : one, that the laws may be far in 
 advance of the practice of a people and thus merely repre- 
 sent the ideals of conduct ; and the other, that the practice 
 and customs may have far preceded the legislation, which 
 is thus only a "survival" of an ancient period. In regard 
 to the Anglo-Saxons or Old English, it would appear that 
 the legislation of their kings and assemblies was much in 
 advance morally of the habits of the people ; and that it 
 represented the new and living moral forces which were 
 gradually to change England from barbarism to civili- 
 zation. That these forces were essentially Christian, is 
 evident from the chronicles and biographies of the period, 
 and especially from the language of the legislation, and the 
 motives habitually employed in it to promote good action. 
 The great peculiarity of the Christian system of morals is 
 the impulse given to virtuous and disinterested action by 
 regard to a Person, to a perfect life and character, which 
 has supernatural relations, and by a consideration of con- 
 sequences in another existence. These features are espe- 
 cially stamped in the Anglo-Saxon legislation. Whether 
 the well-known religious character of some of the kings, or 
 the deep religious tendencies of the law-makers, have given 
 these peculiarities to old English laws, is uncertain. It is 
 
 306
 
 ANGLO-SAXON LAW. 207 
 
 well-known that the ministers of religion at that era in 
 England were, to a large degree, lawyers ; and they exer- 
 cised a povrerful influence on the making of laws. It was 
 an influence, however, moral rather than ecclesiastical or 
 technical. The Anglo-Saxon laws certainly form a great 
 contrast, in this respect, to most other codes of that age. 
 Society in England was more barbarous, and more stained 
 by crime and violence than on the continent of Europe. 
 But no ancient code of the German or Keltic tribes in 
 France and Germany (with the exception of Charlemagne's 
 Capitularies), or of the Welsh in Britain of the same period 
 breathes any such religious spirit or such pure morality 
 founded on Christian faith. The Anglo-Saxon laws, too, 
 have avoided the errors of the Christian Church in separat- 
 ing morality and faith : they are nearer the great Master, 
 in teaching the direct connection of good action or pure 
 thoughts, and respect or love for Him. It is true that in 
 England, as in all other countries, the teachings of Christ 
 were forgotten or obscured by superstition, or submerged 
 by tides of human passion and selfishness, and Christianity 
 was eclipsed there as it has been everywhere in the world. 
 But for a time we see its clear light shining in English 
 history, and we know how many fogs of ancient prejudice 
 it dispelled ; how many abuses it silently melted, and 
 what a soil it prepared for all that is best in English 
 growth since. It did not indeed accomplish all that 
 might be expected from its power. But history is long; 
 and the life of one nation can show but an inconsiderable 
 part of the effects of this renovating influence. It is 
 sufficient to describe forces which are capable in their 
 nature of bringing about a complete and perfect moral 
 transformation of society. 
 
 In the British Islands, as through all Europe, among 
 the tribes outside of Roman law, persor al revenge, as we
 
 2o8 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 have already stated, and family feuds took the place fof 
 a long period of legal and judicial punishments. Society 
 was resolved almost to its primeval savage elements. 
 The first influence of Christianity in England (as else- 
 where) was to curb personal revenge, by encouraging the 
 existing system of bot or fines, so that every kind of ofi"ence 
 should be compensated for by some amend, paid in pro- 
 perty, in part to the suflerer, in part to the king. From 
 this, the next step is to a strict legal and perhaps bloody 
 punishment by the proper authorities, instead of which no 
 payment can be accepted. Then, beyond this, come the 
 milder punishments, inculcated by the spirit of humanity. 
 Religion aids in each of these steps, but in England, as 
 throughout Europe, it checked private revenge, especially 
 by the " Peace of God " enforced on certain holy days, and 
 in certain places ; and by the refuge ofi"ered in the churches 
 to the victim fleeing from the anger of a powerful enemy. 
 All these privileges offered by the Church tended to re- 
 strain passion in that wild age. It is an instance, too, of the 
 peculiar effect of Christianity, that the freeing of bondmen 
 or the prohibition of their sale in foreign countries, from 
 the earliest Saxon laws down into the Norman period, is 
 always accompanied by such words as that " it is not right 
 to sell him for whom Christ hath died." The commands 
 against unchastity, or cruelty, or oppression, are all ac- 
 companied with religious motives. In fact, the laws often 
 sound more like pastoral letters than legislation from war- 
 like kings. A remarkable heading of a law in regard to 
 honesty in King Canute's code, "Ad Eucharistiam et 
 probitatem " (about the sacraments and integrity) might 
 give a rebuke to the Christianity of our own day. 
 
 The Laws of Old Ejiglisk Kings. — From King Wiht- 
 raed, ^ about 690 A.D., we hear that " men living in illicit 
 * Thorpe's Collection of Anglo-Saxon Laws (No. 3).
 
 MORAL TEACHINGS OF SAXON KINGS. 209 
 
 intercourse should take to a righteous life with repent- 
 ance of their sins, or that they be separated from the 
 Church." Howell the Good, in the beginning of the tenth 
 century, ordered his Welsh subjects to hold their assem- 
 blies in Lent, " because in holy tyme every one should 
 be pure, and should do no wrong at a time of purity." 
 
 One provision of his laws shows the effort of the reli- 
 gious officials to promote the integrity of the judges. "A 
 judge is to serve a year's apprenticeship, and then the king's 
 chaplain is to take him to the church, having with him 
 twelve principal ecclesiastical officers, to celebrate Mass. 
 And after Mass and an offering by every one, let the chap- 
 lain require him to swear by the relics, and by the altar, 
 and by the consecrated elements placed on the altar, that 
 he will never deliver a wrong judgment knowingly."^ 
 
 King Alfred (about 870 A.D.) introduces his code with the 
 ten commandments and other laws taken from the Bible: he 
 quotes almost directly from Exodus a command especially 
 applicable to his age : " Vex not the far comers and stran- 
 gers : for ye were once strangers in the land of Egypt." 
 (No. 33.) The " doom " on slaves has the humanity of the 
 Mosaic law : " If any one buy a Christian bondsman, let 
 him be bondsman to him six years ; the seventh be he free 
 unbought. With such clothes as he went in, with such go 
 he out." Justice is to be impartial. " Doom thou very 
 evenly ; doom thou not one doom to the wealthy, another 
 to the poor ; nor one doom to the more loved, other to the 
 more loathed, doom thou not." (No. 41.) Of his laws, the 
 king says : " These are the dooms that the Almighty God 
 Himself spake to Moses, and bade him to hold ; and when 
 the Lord's only begotten Son, that is Christ the Healer, on 
 middle earth came, He said that He came not these dooms 
 to break nor to gainsay, but with all good to do, and with 
 * Quoted by Bridgett {Hadda7n and Stubbs, i, 229.). 
 
 P
 
 2IO GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 all mild hcartedncss and lowly mindedness to teach them"^ 
 " That ye will that other men do not to you, do ye not 
 that to other men. From this one doom, a man may think 
 that he should doom every one rightly ; he need keep nc 
 other doom-book. Let him take heed that he doom to no 
 man that he would not that he doom to him, if he sought 
 doom over him." 
 
 Through all the Saxon and early Norman laws, the 
 interests of the working classes are protected in the matter 
 of Sunday. If a bondman work on Sunday by his lord's 
 order, the lord must pay a fine of thirty shillings; if without 
 this order, he must be flogged. If a freeman work with- 
 out his lord's order, he must forfeit his freedom or pay 
 sixty shillings ; a priest pays double. Under Edgar and 
 Guthrum (about 900 A.D.) we find : " If any one engage in 
 Sunday marketings, let him forfeit the chattel. ... If 
 a lord oblige his slave to work on a festival day, let him 
 pay the fine." (No. 7.) In another law, a wrong to a 
 foreigner is held as wrong done to Christ and the king. 
 (No. 12.) We have already stated that by the customs 
 of the country, if a wreck happened on the coast, the cargo 
 and crew fell into the hands of the king, and in many 
 countries the crew might be enslaved, and that every 
 foreign merchant trafficking among the English must give 
 hostages for his good conduct, — so that it will be understood 
 how important were the Jewish and Christian directions of 
 kindness to the stranger in the Anglo-Saxon law. The 
 following law of King Wihtraed (700 A.D.) gives a curious 
 picture of the state of England : " If a far-coming man or 
 a stranger get out of the high way, and he then neither 
 shout nor blow a horn, he is to be accounted a thief, eithef 
 to be slain or redeemed." ^ (No. 28.) 
 
 ' Hughes' Translation. 
 
 * The r ne law appears in King Ine's code. No. 20.
 
 RELIGIOUS LAWS. 21 1 
 
 False Stvearing. — King Edward (940-946) commands 
 that " those who swear falsely and work enchantments, 
 let them be for ever cast out of all communion with God, 
 unless they turn to repentance/' (No. 6.) 
 
 The religious impulse appears especially in King Ethel- 
 red's dooms. (978 A.D.) " This then first : that we all love 
 and worship one God, and zealously hold one Christianity 
 . . . that every man be regarded as entitled to right ; 
 and that peace and friendship be lawfully observed within 
 the land before God and before the world." (No, i.) 
 "And let every Christian man carefully eschew unlawful 
 concubinage and rightly observe the Divine laws." (No. 
 16). "And at those holy tides (certain religious days) 
 let there be, as is right, to all Christian men, general peace 
 and concord and let every strife be appeased." (No. 19.) 
 The following seems the injunction of a Christian pastor 
 rather than of a king : " And let God's law be henceforth 
 zealously loved by word and deed, then will God soon be 
 merciful to this nation." (No. 26.) " We will also yet 
 earnestly admonish every friend, as it is our duty fre- 
 quently to do, that every one earnestly consider himself, 
 and that he earnestly turn from his sins and that he correct 
 other men for injustice, and that above all things he love 
 his Lord." (No. 42.) " And that they comfort and feed 
 God's poor . . . And that they do not too often 
 oppress widows and step-children, but willingly gladden 
 them." (Nos. 46-49.) " And let every injustice be care- 
 fully cast out from this country as far as can be done. 
 And let fraudulent deeds and hateful illegalities be ear- 
 nestly shunned ; that is, false weights and wrong measures, 
 and lying witnesses, and shameful fightings," etc, "And 
 It is the ordinance of the General Assembly, that Christian 
 men be not for altogether too little cau'-e condemned to 
 death ; but in general let mild punishments be decreed fof
 
 212 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 the people's need ; and let not for a little, God's own 
 handiwork and His purchase be destroyed, which He 
 dearly bought . . . And let him who judges others 
 bear in mind very seriously what he himself desires, when 
 he says : Et dimitte nobis debita nostra." (vi. lo.) 
 
 The ancient laws of King Canute (1017 A.D.) have the 
 tone of a sermon : "Let every Christian man do as is needful 
 for him, let him keep his Christianity," etc. " Let every 
 man guide his words and works aright, and carefully keep 
 oath and pledge, and let every injustice be strictly cast out 
 of this country, as far as it can be done, and let God's law 
 be henceforth earnestly loved by word and by work, then 
 will God's mercy be more ready for us all." (No. 19.) 
 " And we instruct that every one ever guard himself against 
 foul lasciviousness, and against every kind of fornication, 
 and against every kind of adultery. And we also instruct 
 every man that he earnestly have the dread of God in his 
 mind, and by day and by night that he fear for sins, 
 dread doomsday, and shudder for hell, and ever suppose 
 the end of his day near to him." (Nos. 24, 25.) This again 
 has the special stamp of the new teaching : " Let us ever 
 help those who especially stand most in need of help, 
 then shall we obtain the reward of it where it will be most 
 pleasing to us. For we ought always for love and fear 
 of God, to doom and command more lightly to the feeble 
 than to the strong, because we know full well that the 
 powerless cannot raise a like burthen with the powerful, 
 nor the unhale alike with the hale . . . And both in 
 religious shrifts and socular dooms, these things ought to 
 be scattered abroad." (No. 6y.) In regard to the sale of 
 a woman as ward or wife Canute's law says : "And let no 
 one compel either woman or maiden to him, when she 
 mislikes, nor for money sell her." {L. Can., Ixxv.) And as 
 to mercy to wrong-doers, this humane legislation directs :
 
 SAXON PIETY 2IJ 
 
 " If any one will earnestly turn him from wrong again tc 
 right, let him have mercy shown hin:, or fear of God, as 
 best may be, very earnestly." In a very ancient Anglo- 
 Saxon writing, " The Institutes of Polity," it is said, that 
 "seven things are befitting a righteous king : first, that 
 he have very great awe of God ; second, that he ever love 
 righteousness ; third, that he be humble before God ; 
 fourth, rigid towards evil ; fifth, that he comfort and feed 
 God's poor ; sixth, further and protect God's Church ; and 
 seventh, that towards friends and strangers alike, he be 
 guided by just judgment." ^ (No. 1 1 1.) 
 
 Of judges, it is said: "they need to love justice before 
 God, and before the world, and nowhere through unjust 
 judgment for money or for friendship neglect their duty, 
 so that they turn justice to injustice, or adjudicate unjust 
 judgment to the injury of the poor; but it is their duty 
 above all things to honour and defend the Church, and 
 gladden widows and step-children, and help the poor and 
 protect the slaves, if they will rightly execute God's will. 
 Thieves and public wrong-doers they shall hate, and 
 spoilers and robbers they shall condemn, unless they 
 desist, and they shall ever rigidly shun injustice. Woe 
 to him who practises wrong too long, unless he desist right 
 surely shall he pass through the dim and dark abyss of 
 hell, of all help deprived. , . . Let every one guard 
 himself, so that he anger not God too greatly, but pro- 
 pitiate his Lord with righteous deeds." (v.) 
 
 Feuds. — Nearly all the Teutonic tribes, as we have said, 
 had a custom or a law, that the inheritance of the land 
 carried with it the inheritance of the armour, and the 
 family- feud or ultio proxinii. 
 
 * Thorpe's Laws and Institutes,
 
 ZU GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 One of the first objects of the English rulers under the 
 new impulse of humanity is to curb this bloodthirsty spirit. 
 
 In the ancient Welsh laws, feud was lessened by estab- 
 lishing certain protections for every attendant of the court, 
 and for given hours of the day and fixed places.^ 
 
 King Edmund also makes " known to all people, both 
 old and young, that are in my dominion, what I have 
 deliberated in the Council of my Assembly, first, How J 
 might most promote Christianity. To me and to us all 
 are exceedingly offensive the unrighteous and manifold 
 fightings that are among ourselves. If any one henceforth 
 slay any man, that he himself bear the feud unless with 
 the aid of his friends, and within twelve months he com- 
 pensate with the full amend, be he born as he may. But 
 if the kindred forsake him and will not pay for him, then 
 I will that all the kindred be free of the feud, except the 
 doer, if afterwards they do not give him either food or 
 protection." 
 
 Almost the first provision of the ancient Saxon code of 
 -^thelbirht (who was baptized in 597 A.D.) was to make the 
 fine for revenging a feud in the refuge of the Church, double 
 of that in any other violation of sanctuary. 
 
 By King Ine's law, " If any one take revenge before he 
 demand justice, let him give up what he has taken to 
 himself, and pay the damage done and make amend with 
 thirty-five shillings." (No. 9.) 
 
 Feuds were restrained by the " Peace of God " declared 
 on certain days,^ to violate which would expose the of- 
 fender to severe punishments. Certain places also were 
 made inviolable sanctuaries. Vengeance at private festivals, 
 
 ' See Thorpe's La%vs of Wales. This curious code is full of pro- 
 visions to restrain feud ; and the most archaic penal provisions. 
 
 - Ab advcntu Domini usque ad octavum Epiphanic pax Dei, et 
 sancte Ecclcsie per omne regnum. Leg. Ed. Can., No. 2. (1047 A.D.)
 
 RESTRAINING FEUD. 215 
 
 was restrained by such remarkable laws as the following : 
 "At a banquet or any gathering, those assembling must 
 first agree to maintain the peace of God and of the house- 
 master. If any one has a feud he must engage to satisfy 
 his adversary by pledge in a certain place ; but if they 
 cannot arrange, the guilty one must leave the banquet ; 
 but if after this, one troubles it, he shall pay a fine." (Laws 
 — Henry I. iioi A.D. No. i, 2.) In the ancient laws in 
 regard to the Dun Sctas^ (mountain-dwellers) or the natives 
 of Wales, a new spirit will be seen after the introduction 
 of Christianity. The Welshman is no longer hunted as a 
 wild beast ; he is permitted to pay fines like an English- 
 man, and personal raids on his territory are not per- 
 mitted. " If a Welshman slay an Englishman, he need 
 not pay for him on this side, except with half his fine, no 
 more than an Englishman, on that side," etc. (No. 5.) 
 
 These provisions only express the early substitution of 
 humanity for barbarism in the bitter feuds and enmities 
 between two neighbouring peoples, and this under the in- 
 fluence of the new Faith — a single instance of the trans- 
 formation going on throughout Europe. 
 
 Alfred, in the introduction to his laws, expressly states 
 it as a special result of the " Faith of Christ," that many 
 nations through their religious assemblies had ordained, 
 " out of that mercy which Christ had taught," that secular 
 lords might without sin take for almost every misdeed, on 
 the first offence, a money bot or fine which was fixed by 
 law. This at once took away the necessity for revenge, 
 and substituted law and legal punishment for personal ven- 
 geance. Individual passion he seeks in every way to 
 restrain. " We also command that the man who knoweth 
 his foe to be home-sitting, fight not before he demandetb 
 ' Thorpe's Collection.
 
 2l6 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 of him " (No. 42) ; and in various laws, the good king 
 seeks to hold back the bloodthirsty passions of the day. 
 There are more than thirty laws in his code, establishing 
 bots or fines for various offences. 
 
 In all these words of human brotherhood, of piety, and 
 the spirit of justice, of pity and humanity, uttered by the 
 barbaric lawgivers of a wild race, there speaks a great 
 Personility — the embodiment of the highest sympathy 
 and most disinterested virtue of mankind. 
 
 It cannot be said indeed that these religious influences, 
 so apparently genuine, produced any powerful effect on 
 society in Anglo-Saxon England, though they modified 
 the laws. Still they began the history of the religious 
 forces in England, which, though obscured by much for- 
 malism and hypocrisy and weakened by selfishness, have 
 yet worked out slowly the great moral and humane reforms 
 in the history of that country, and have tendevl with other 
 influences to make it one of the great leaders of modern 
 progress.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 EDUCATION IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the peculiar interpretation 
 given by the early Fathers, especially by Augustine, to 
 the Old Testament, and their views of inspiration, often 
 caused the Church to be opposed to science and mental 
 progress. Christianity, however, in its essential power, 
 tends to open the intellect to truth ; to cultivate the 
 humility and the fair-mindedness which especially enable 
 the mind to see what is, as it is ; and, awakening the whole 
 moral nature, to indirectly arouse the purely intellectual 
 faculties. 
 
 The mental stimulus given to Europe in different ages 
 by non-Christian forces, is ever to be gratefully acknow- 
 ledged. Roman law, Greek and Roman literature have 
 not yet spent their influences on human progress. Arabic 
 science had for one period a prodigious power. Yet it 
 becomes increasingly evident that the races which have 
 been partially (though imperfectly) moulded by Chris- 
 tianity, are to be the leading powers in the intellectual 
 and scientific progress of mankind. The especial truths 
 of Christ were not apparently intended to affect science 
 or intellectual advancement. Yet, being in harmony with 
 the most complete and healthy moral condition of man, 
 they did so arouse and dignify the whole nature as to 
 fit it for high mental progress. They tended to form a 
 candid, generous, self-forgetting character, intensely in-
 
 2i8 CESTA CHRIS TL 
 
 terested in moral truths, and things in . seen and eternal ; 
 a character which would naturally also concern itself with 
 other researches, beside those religious. Hence it is proba- 
 bly, that for eighteen centuries, the Christian believer has 
 been the especial leader in science ; for we include under 
 the " Christian " character, even those scientific sceptics 
 who have grown up under all the peculiar influences of 
 Christianity. 
 
 The Church, it must be admitted, has often been entirely 
 false to the candid, charitable and humble type of cha- 
 racter, taught by the Master. Its bigotry, intellectual 
 narrowness and one-sidedness, its opposition to science 
 and freedom of thought, its cruelty towards those of dif- 
 fering opinion and indifference to intellectual activity, and 
 its want of charity, have no foundation or excuse in the 
 Gospels. But, while lamenting its errors, we must never 
 forget its great services to intellectual progress. In ages 
 of brutal violence and of barbarous ignorance, the religious 
 associations of convents and monasteries became the 
 shelter of learning and study. The classics were revived 
 under the shades of the cloister. The lamp of science and 
 literature was kept burning during the " dark ages " in 
 the monk's cell. Manuscripts were painfully copied and 
 the relics of a higher intellectual age were preserved to 
 animate a future century. Without the influence of these 
 monasteries and churches, Europe would have sunk into 
 a yet darker ignorance, and we might have had in Ger- 
 many, France and Italy, the history repeated of the 
 Byzantine Empire ; — a degradation and ignorance which 
 would require the shock of foreign conquest to dispel and 
 remove. 
 
 The Christian Church, from the very first centuries, 
 naturally connected itself with the school. The child 
 under the view of Christianity took (as we have often
 
 EARLY CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS. 219 
 
 said) a very different position from that under Roman law 
 or classic custom. When Christ called the little ones to 
 His arms and blessed them, they became for ever con- 
 secrated in Christian tradition. Their mental condition 
 must also not be neglected. The Councils early began 
 to consider this. 
 
 The Council of Vaison (529 A.D.) thus treats of edu- 
 cation : " It hath seemed good to us that priests with 
 parishes should receive into their houses, according to a 
 sound custom in Italy, young readers to whom they give 
 spiritual nourishment, teaching them to study, to attach 
 themselves to holy books and to know the law of God." 
 The Synod of Orleans (799) thus exhorts : " Let the priest? 
 in villages and towns hold schools, in order that all the 
 children entrusted to them, can receive the first notion 
 of letters. Let them take no money for their lessons." 
 {Theod., cap. 20.) 
 
 The Council of Chalons (813) decreed^ that bishops 
 should establish schools where both literature and Scrip- 
 tures should be taught. Still another Council proclaimed 
 (859) : " Let one raise everywhere public schools, that the 
 Church of God may everywhere gather the double fruit of 
 religion." {Cone. Ling., cap. 10.) 
 
 The Council of Mayence (813) orders the priests to 
 exhort the fathers of families to send children to schools 
 opened in monasteries, in order that they may learn to 
 pray and be fortified in the Christian faith. Another 
 Council (826) at Rome orders three kinds of schools to 
 be founded in all Christendom ; firstly, episcopal schools 
 in towns ; secondly, village schools ; and thirdly, wherever 
 necessary. 
 
 ' ". . . lit episcopi scholas constiluant in <iiiibus et litteraria 
 solertia disciplinae et sacrae Scripturae documenta discantur." {jConc 
 Cub., cap. 3.)
 
 220 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 The Council of Trent commands that the children of 
 the poor have at least one master to teach poor scholars 
 grammar gratuitously.^ Charlemagne had already (789) 
 given these wise instructions : " Let one open schools to 
 teach children to read ; let, in every monastery, in every 
 bishopric, some one teach psalms, writing, arithmetic, gram- 
 mar, and employ correct copies of holy books ; for often 
 men seeking to pray to God, pray badly on account of 
 the unfaithfulness of copyists." {Cap. Ecc, 61-66.) 
 
 A beautiful letter on this topic, nominally from this 
 remarkable man, has come down to us, addressed to the 
 Abbot of Fulda (787 A.D.): "During past years we have 
 often received letters from different monasteries, informing 
 us that at their sacred services, the brethren offered up 
 prayers on our behalf; and we have observed that the 
 thoughts contained in those letters, though in themselves 
 most just, were expressed in uncouth language. And while 
 pious devotion dictated the sentiments, the unlettered 
 tongue was unable to express them aright. Hence there 
 has arisen in our mind the fear, lest if the skill to write 
 correctly were thus lacking, so too would the power of 
 rightly comprehending the sacred Scripture be far less 
 than was fitting. And we all know, that though verbal 
 errors be dangerous, errors of the understanding are yet 
 more so. We exhort you, therefore, not only not to 
 neglect the study of letters, but to apply yourselves thereto 
 with that humility which is well pleasing to God ; so that 
 you may be able to penetrate with greater ease and cer- 
 tainty the mysteries of the Holy Scripture. For as these 
 contain images, tropes and similar figures, it is impossible 
 to doubt that a reader will arrive far more readily at the 
 spiritual sense, according as he is better instructed in 
 
 * " . . . qui clericos aliosque scholajres pauperes grnmmaticam 
 gratis doceat." {Cone. Trid. occ.)
 
 LETTER OF CHARLEMAGNE. 221 
 
 learning. Let there therefore be chosen for this work, men 
 who are both able and wilHng to learn and also desirous 
 of instructing others ; and let them apply themselves to 
 the work with a zeal equal to the earnestness with which 
 we recommend it to them. 
 
 " It is our wish that you may be what it behoves the 
 soldiers of the Church to be, religious in heart, pure in act, 
 eloquent in speech, so that all that approach your house, 
 in order to invoke the Divine Master, or to behold the 
 excellence of your religious life, may be edified in be- 
 holding you, and instructed in hearing you discourse or 
 chant, and return home, rendering thanks to God most 
 high." {Const, de Scholis. Bahise.) 
 
 We have again an instruction of Theodolfus (796 A.D.), 
 under Charlemagne : 
 
 " Let the elders found schools through the towns and 
 villages ; and if any of the faithful desire their little chil- 
 dren to be commended to them for learning liberal studies, 
 let them not refuse to receive them, but teach them with 
 the utmost charity." ^ 
 
 All these exhortations were not without their effect, and 
 great numbers of schools sprang up throughout Christen- 
 dom ; an immense quantity of manuscripts were also 
 copied by the monks. 
 
 From the sixth to the fifteenth centuries there was a 
 deep interest in the monasteries in copying and binding 
 manuscripts, especially of classic authors. The following 
 striking words are from a monk who has exerted a deep 
 influence on the world : " Do not trouble yourself at the 
 fatigue of your work, for God, who is the source of every 
 good and just labour, will give the reward, according to 
 your efforts, in eternity. When you shall be no more, 
 
 ' Presbyteri per villas etvicos scholas habeant et si quilibet fideliuM 
 suos parvulos ad discendas literas, etc.
 
 222 GESTA CHRIS TL 
 
 those who will read the books, once copied by you with 
 elegance, will pray for you ; and as he who gives a glass 
 of cold water does not lose his reward, so /le who gives 
 forth the living water ^i wisdom, will receive more surely 
 his recompense in heaven." ^ 
 
 A Council (1179) proclaims : "As the Church of God is 
 provider of those who have need of the nourishment of 
 such, as well as of those who fail of success of body ; in 
 order that the poor whose relatives fail of resources may 
 have the possibility of learning to read and to be in- 
 structed, we appoint in every Cathedral church a master 
 to instruct clerks and poor scholars. . . . Let one re- 
 establish this in monasteries where it has existed anciently; 
 but let no one demand pay for teaching." {Cone. Co)icl.) 
 
 All classes studied in these monastic schools, so that rich 
 and poor were brought together on the field of learning. 
 Nor were the popes altogether wanting to the intellectual 
 movement. Pope Innocent IV. (1254) publicly recom- 
 mended philosophic study instead of legal. A decree of 
 Clement V. directed Hebrew, Arabic and Chaldee to be 
 taught in the monasteries. Sylvester II. is said to have 
 introduced Arabic numbers into Christian Europe. 
 
 We do not continue the enumeration of these evidences 
 of the services of the Church to learning in the Middle 
 Ages, because they are only indirectly the effect of Chris- 
 tianity All that we urge is, that the Christian teachings, 
 in their natural and legitimate influence, open the mind of 
 man to truth, and by their moral power awaken the whole 
 nature and tlus stimulate the intellect. 
 
 The position of the Church on Biblical inspiration, and 
 therefore towards science, and her fierce bigotry towards 
 differing opinions, receive no countenance from the Mastet. 
 1 Thomas k Kempis, Doct. Juv., c. iv.
 
 CHRISTIANITY STIMULATES THE INTELLECT. 223 
 
 It is true that He teaches that child-like humility and 
 purity will lead to higher spiritual and moral truth than 
 mere learning or scholarship. And Paul proclaims that 
 in a future existence, the moral powers will exist when 
 intellectual acquirements have been found to be of little 
 worth. 
 
 But neither of these aspects belittle science in this 
 world. Indeed, the Christian " simplicity " is one of the 
 guarantees to the scholar that he will attain truth and not 
 be led away, as have been so many, by the false lights of 
 conceit and prejudice. The whole world might be entirely 
 inspired with the Faith of Christ, and yet no obstacle 
 offered anywhere to the freest scientific research, but 
 the path of knowledge be made easier, in that all men 
 sought justice and mercy and truth was the holiest thing.
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 
 SERFDOM AND SLAVERY IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 Under the Romans, in the Later Empire, as we ha/e 
 already said, serfdom arose almost naturally from the 
 universal disorder and chaos of society. The slave, if 
 freed, could not protect himself, and preferred the state 
 of half freedom and of safety which serfdom offered. The 
 small farmer found himself better guarded from robbers 
 and invaders, by attaching himself as serf {inqtiiliniis) to 
 the estate of some powerful nobleman or leader. The 
 wealthy patron at Rome rewarded his faithful clients by 
 bestowing on them parcels of land in the provinces, where 
 they were attached, as colofii, to the soil ; and again, the 
 government settled bodies of prisoners or immigrants 
 on large districts of public land, and made them serfs to 
 the soil. These ^ coloni (or adscriptitii) were considered as 
 free-born, but attached to the soil ; they could fall into 
 slavery, and if they ran away from their estates, they 
 might be punished with servitude. Their marriage was 
 held legitimate, and the children, by a mild provision due 
 to religious influences, followed the condition of the father; 
 they were excluded from the army and from public 
 honours, but could become priests with the consent of the 
 master ; — this provision showing one mode in which the 
 Church could indirectly emancipate them. They were freed 
 
 ' Du Cange, Coloni. 
 
 334
 
 CHRISTIAN INFLUENCE UPON SLAVERY. 22 <; 
 
 from any tax to the government, and could only be sold 
 with the land ; the land could not be sold without them. 
 As far back as Marcus Aurelius, the legacy left by a mas- 
 ter of a serf not attached to an estate, was not good in 
 law.^ A coloiiiis could be, under certain circumstances, a 
 freeholder. Salvian speaks of the poor farmers whr> had 
 made themselves serfs for the sake of protection. 
 
 As we have noticed before, the Roman laws modified 
 by the new teachings began at once to protect the serfs. 
 The penalty of death was denounced in Gaul on him who 
 should seize the persons of serfs or serf-stewards (villici) 
 in payment of debts or taxes. The laws of Constantine 
 forbade the separation of near relatives among slaves of 
 the soil ; husband could not be separated from wife, nor 
 parents from children.^ 
 
 A runaway slave or serf who had been free for twenty 
 years, or had held a public office, or had been in military 
 service, or had voted in the assembly, was presumed to be 
 free, and could defend his own rights. A free-born person, 
 or one who became a slave by violence, could always 
 reclaim his liberty.^ I'he child became free, even if the 
 mother had been enslaved within the nine months before its 
 birth ; or if the mother was a slave and was emancipated 
 without her own knowledge, the child was free. The effect 
 of the Faith from Galilee was to make all the presumptions 
 in favour of liberty. Freed slaves became Roman citizens 
 in the presence of the assembly {ecclesia) and the bishops 
 who signed the acts of manumission. The clergy did not 
 need such formalities, but could free by word of mouth.^ 
 
 * Si quis inquilinos sine praediis quibus adhaerent legaverit, inutile 
 est legatum. {D. de legai., 11, 12.) 
 
 ^ Cod. Theod., 11, 25, i. 
 ' Ibid., iv. 7, 2. 
 
 * Ibid.y iv. 7, II.
 
 426 GESTA CHRISTI 
 
 The various Church Councils thundered their anathemas 
 at those v/ho re-enslaved those freed under religious forms. 
 The reformed law under the influences from the Gospel 
 teaching differed from the Roman law in admitting a kind 
 of marriage between slaves {contuberniiiin), for the reason 
 that " We have a common Father in Heaven." ^ 
 
 Both slavery and serfdom descended into the Middle 
 Ages. The Christian Church struggled to a certain degree 
 against these abuses. But, whether this organization was 
 faithful or not to its Master, the spirit of Christianity 
 worked continually on individuals, and thus on society, to 
 mitigate and remove these evils. Still slavery in the 
 Middle Ages presented some of its most peculiar features. 
 Up to the twelfth century, there was an absolute power 
 of the master over the life of the slave. After this, only 
 a slight fine was inflicted for his death, while cruel punish- 
 ments by the owner were permitted. The latter had also 
 full control over the slave's property and earnings. Even 
 the marriage was not held fully equal to the Christian tie. 
 For several centuries after Christ, the barbarian nations 
 did not receive benediction, or hold religious ceremonials 
 at the nuptials of slaves. When this began to possess more 
 the character of a legal union, a slave marrying without 
 the consent of his master was liable to severe punishment, 
 even of death ; this was later reduced to a fine alone. All 
 the children of the slave became the property of the mas- 
 ter, and could be sold like any other property. 
 
 The slave had no title to anything but his clothes 
 and subsistence ; if he had a property {peciilinm) given 
 him by his master, he could not save out of it. All his 
 effects at his death fell to his master. He was distin- 
 guished by his dress and appearance from other classes ; 
 
 * , , . quia unum pat rem habemus in coelo.
 
 ACTS FAVOURABLE TO SLAVES, 227 
 
 even his testimony could not be received against freemen. 
 From this condition of severe bondage there was, through- 
 out Europe, a gradual and often unnoticed passage to 
 serfdom. 
 
 As early as 119 A.D. we hear that Hermes, a Prefect of 
 Rome, being converted, presented 1,250 slaves for baptism, 
 all having been freed. Another Prefect, Chromatins (284 
 A.D.), after his conversion to Christianity, is related to have 
 freed 40 slaves, first having baptized them, with the words : 
 " Those who begin to be children of God ought not to be 
 slaves of man." 
 
 Thirty-seven Church Councils are reported to have 
 passed acts favourable to slaves. In the year 305, any 
 master ill-treating his slaves is condemned ; in 517, the 
 murderer of a slave is excommunicated ; in 549, the right 
 of asylum in a Christian church is offered to the runaway, 
 and slaves freed by the Church are protected ; in 666, 
 bishops or priests ill-treating slaves are severely punished. 
 In 441, emancipation is protected and encouraged ; in 585, 
 the ornaments and property of the Church are permitted 
 to be sold for ransoming slaves ; in 566, Christians are 
 forbid reducing freemen to slavery, and in 922, no Chris- 
 tian is permitted to enslave a fellow Christian. In 656, 
 any slave compelled to work upon Sundays becomes free 
 by the fact, or if he be held over the font for baptism. 
 This idea that baptism made free, existed even as late as 
 the American colonial history, when American masters 
 hesitated to baptize, lest by the act they freed their slaves.^ 
 
 The forbidding the labour of slaves on Sunday and 
 
 * There are two acts reported of the Virginia Colonial Assembly, 
 assuring to the masters the undisturbed condition of slavery, after 
 the baptism of their slaves. (Anderson's Hist, of Col. Ch., vol. ii. 
 p. 552 ; vol. iii. p. 227.) See also Hefelen, Condliengeschichte, and 
 Landon's Manual of Councils.
 
 42^ GESTA CHRIST I. 
 
 Festival days was a humane protection ; the scourging of 
 slaves or drivhig away their cattle was denounced under 
 the strictest penalties. The West-Gothic laws were es- 
 pecially under the influences of the Church ; and they are 
 remarkable as carefully protecting the honour and the 
 marriage of bondmen. Under them, the serf could trans- 
 mit and inherit property, and appear in a court of law. 
 The monasteries gradually ceased to sell serfs, and forbade 
 their exchange. Step by step this class could give testi- 
 mony, and certain individuals act as judges ; they were 
 allowed to carry on trades and even to win knighthood. 
 In the twelfth century, Adrian IV. confirmed the mar- 
 riage of slaves against the will of the masters, in the 
 most solemn manner.^ The property of serfs was more 
 and more secured to them.^ The Church encouraged 
 manumissions at festivals, at births and deaths ; and 
 made all forms of manumission full forms of freedom. It 
 enacted laws that if a serf saved a certain sum, the 
 master was obliged to free him on payment of this ; and 
 it made all bondmen free who entered the service of 
 Church or State. 
 
 The Christian belief and impulse tended everywhere to 
 undermine both serfdom and slavery ; and encouraged the 
 ransoming of slaves and prevented the slave trade, espe- 
 cially the selling of Christians. 
 
 Among much similar legislation, the decree of the 
 Council of Chalons (650 A.D.), with forty-four bishops in 
 session, ordered that no Christian slaves should be sold 
 outside the kingdom of Clovis, with the words, "The 
 
 ^ Si contradicentibus dominis et invitis, matrimonia servoriim 
 contracta fuerint, nulla ratione sunt propter hoc dissolvenda. (Cap. 
 I. X. 4, 9). 
 
 - Non licet pecuniam suam servo auferre quam ipse labore suo 
 adquisiverit. Egberti. Conf., c. 35.
 
 RELIGIOUS EMANCIPATION. 229 
 
 highest pity and religion demand that Christians should 
 be removed entirely from the bonds of servitude."^ The 
 melancholy trains of slaves in the various slave markets of 
 Europe, which used to offend the eyes of the humane, were 
 gradually removed. The slave trade was punished, as an 
 act of "diabolic inspiration" in the ninth century, though 
 this indignation did not reach the trade in heathen slaves. 
 
 An edict^ of Charles le Chauve (864) threatened a heavy 
 fine on those who sold beyond sea such unfortunate 
 persons as were reduced to slavery by famine. 
 
 It was a not uncommon practice for the poor in the 
 Middle Ages to sell themselves into slavery, or to become 
 slaves by debt. The new humane legislation permitted 
 such persons to buy their freedom by paying the purchase 
 money with one-fifth in addition, or by a sufficient duration 
 of the service. 
 
 The religious element in emancipation is seen strikingly 
 in the forms of manumission of the Middle Ages, trans- 
 mitted to us by Marculfus, and in the words of those urging 
 the duty of freedom, as well as in the ceremonies used. 
 Pope Gregory the Great, at the end of the sixth century, 
 proclaims that inasmuch as the Redeemer of men had 
 taken upon Himself humanity, to restore us to liberty, so it 
 becomes us to restore those men whom nature had made 
 free, but the law of nations had made slaves, to their 
 natural condition — namely, liberty.^ The influence of the 
 
 ' Pietatis maximae et religionis intuitus ut captivitatis vinculum 
 omnino a Christianis redimatur, etc. 
 
 ^ Et quia hominum ingenia, qui non Deum timent, diabolo 
 suadente, multa mala excogitant, potest fieri ut qui tales homines 
 liberos, necessitate cogente, in servos suscipiunt, etc. {^Ed. Ris., c. 34.) 
 
 ^ Cum Redemptor noster. totius conditor naturae . . . humanam 
 carnem voluerit assumere ut . . . pristinje nos restituerit libertati, 
 salubriter iigitur, ut homines . , , libertati reddantur. {Greg; 
 Mag. op. Pol., lib. iv.)
 
 23© GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 Stoical jurists, as well as of Christianity, in these ideas, is 
 vvorth noting. 
 
 A common mode of manumission was for the master to 
 lead the slave with a torch around the altar ; he then took 
 hold of the horns of the altar, and the earnest words of 
 liberation were spoken. One form, given by Muratori, of 
 bestowing freedom, uttered these solemn words : " For fear 
 of Almighty God, and for the cure of my soul, I liberate 
 thee, and may the angel of our Lord Jesus Christ deem me 
 worthy of a place among His saints."^ 
 
 Another form utters the prayer of the master, that he 
 may by this act attain to eternal blessedness and shake off 
 the yoke of servitude to his sins." A common phrase of 
 emancipation is " pro remedio animse meae," " for the cure 
 of my soul," while the heirs are warned through their love 
 to the Lord Jesus Christ not to return the slave to bondage. 
 Another legal expression is, " I, in the name of God, think- 
 ing of the love of God, or eternal retribution ... do 
 free this slave from the bonds of servitude."^ Such words 
 3.S pro peccatis niiniiendis, "for lessening my sins," or "bond 
 and free are one in Christ," or " forgive, and it shall be for- 
 given," show the spirit animating the framers of these 
 ancient wills. Still another form says, " I, J. N., thinking 
 how I can attain to the absolution of my sins, and looking 
 to the time when the slave shall be freed from his master, 
 do hereby emancipate my slaves, fifty in number," etc. 
 Others look forward to the Divine tribunal, and would 
 show mercy, even as they hope for mercy ; others speak of 
 " Divine compassion inspiring."* Another form of manu- 
 
 1 . . . absolve te, Clerisa, pro timore omnipotentis Dei et reinedio 
 animae, etc. 
 
 2 . . . per quam ad eternam beatitudinam valcat pervenire, etc. 
 
 ' Ego, in nomine Dei, cogitans de Dei amore vel asterna retribU" 
 tionc . . . ab omni vinculo servitiitis . . . absolvo. 
 
 * Ego, in nomine Dei . . . ut quando de liac luce niigravero^
 
 FORMS OF EMANCIPATION. 231 
 
 mission (Muratori), wherein a countess grants freedom to a 
 female slave (1056 A.D.), makes this humane appeal : " Thus 
 we who are formed of the earth, in like manner ought to 
 pity our fellow-creatures . . . and whatever hath been 
 bequeathed unto us, we ought to make free."^ 
 
 This historian, who is an impartial observer of the 
 Middle Ages, holds that the great moving force in bestow- 
 ing freedom is the love implanted by the Christian reli- 
 gion.- Many charters and epitaphs bore the expression of 
 " liberty for the benefit of the soul." Even as late as the 
 thirteenth century, the early feelings in regard to Christian 
 emancipation were kept up, and it was the custom in 
 France to release caged pigeons on Christian festivals, and 
 prisoners were freed " in the name of Christ." The un- 
 wonted respect for humanity was shown in that term used 
 in the new rites of manumission, where freedom was called 
 ingenuitas, or " nobleness," as of one free-born.^ One form 
 emancipates a slave for the salvation of the soul, so that he 
 may henceforth lead a free life, as if he had been born 
 from free or noble parents."* If a slave became priest, and 
 his master did not oppose it, or had not reclaimed him for 
 a year after his ordination, he was free. One can see how 
 
 anima mea ante Christi tribunal : veniam merear accipere • . . 
 libero servos meos — inspirante divina misericordia. 
 
 ^ Ita nos qui de terra formati sumus, etc. A7it. Hal., p. 858. 
 
 2 Sed causa frequentior manumittendi miseruni hoc hominum 
 genus fuit Pietas et Caritas erga Deum, cujus amore plerumque manu- 
 missiones celebratte reperiuntur. p. 875. Muratori, ibid. 
 
 ^ . . . ne eorum ingenuitas vel nobilitas vilescat. {Dip. Cart. 
 Calv., 844 A.D.) 
 
 * Igitur ego in Dei nomine et conjux mea, pro remedio anims vel 
 retribut'one ^eterna, te ex familia nostra, a prsesente die, ab omni 
 vinculo servitutis absolvimus. Ita ut deinceps, tanquam si ab 
 ingenuis parentibus fuisses procreatus vel natus, vitam ingenuara 
 ducas. {Form. Sec, LXC. Horn, xii.)
 
 232 GESTA CHRISTl 
 
 directly this must have acted in lessening the number of 
 the slaves. 
 
 Peasants^ Wars. — The condition of the peasants during 
 many centuries in Europe forms one of the most melan- 
 choly pictures in human annals They were frequently 
 bound to the soil ; sometimes they could not bequeath 
 any property to their descendants ; the master was allowed 
 at their death to appropriate the choicest animal or most 
 valuable product of the farm ; they were obliged to sell 
 to him at his own prices, or to take certain necessaries 
 from him at rates fixed by him ; their children were held 
 as almost the property of the master, and the odious droit 
 de seigneur, or its equivalent in money, stamped upon 
 their feelings the sense of their degradation. 
 
 Even where the person was free, the serf was subject to 
 innumerable taxes and burdens ; he must keep his master's 
 buildings in order, do public work on the highways or for 
 the baron sometimes for five days in the week ; allow 
 his fields to be trampled down and his crops wasted by the 
 gentry in their hunt for game. Even where he could not 
 be sold away from the land, he could be disposed of with 
 the estate, or could be driven off by persecution. His food 
 was bad, his dwelling wretched, his children were without 
 education, he was robbed of all things, and lived without 
 hope, hating his master and the world which thus ground 
 him to the dust. 
 
 It may well be believed that the renewal of the Christian 
 message in the Protestant Reformation, preaching afresh 
 the dignity of the "child of God " and the "joint-heir with 
 Christ," and giving a strange emphasis to the Christian idea 
 of human brotherhood, fell upon these masses of wronged 
 human beings like an inspiration from on high. The serfs 
 saw clearly that their old religious teachers were imposing 
 upon them, and that such an injustice as serfdom could
 
 PEASANTS' REVOLTS. 233 
 
 not be reconciled with the teachings of Christ. They 
 accepted the reformed doctrines as a new gospel of liberty. 
 In different countries they burst out against this oppres- 
 sion of ages, and proclaimed freedom in Church and State. 
 Unfortunately, most of the chroniclers of the Middle Ages 
 have been on the side of the masters, and we know but 
 little of the real aims and designs of the much-oppressed 
 serfs. They committed great excesses, no doubt, but these 
 were the natural reaction against centuries of wrong and 
 injustice. The explosion, however, aided in finally re- 
 moving the heavy burdens which had so long weighed on 
 them. 
 
 In the fifteenth century especially, these outbreaks burst 
 forth in Germany. Many associations were formed among 
 the peasants to obtain release from their burdens, and these 
 all had religious mottoes or devices. One is spoken of on 
 the Upper Rhine,^ which had a banner with a picture of 
 Christ crucified, before whom kneeled a serf, with the 
 legend: "Nothing but God's justice!" The demands 
 made by the Schwabian peasants in the insurrection of 
 1525 ran somewhat thus :- (ist) " It hath been the custom 
 till now to hold us for serfs, which is a pity, seeing that 
 Christ hath bought us and redeemed us with His blood " ; 
 and (5th) " It is found in the Holy Writ that we are free, 
 and we . . . desire to be free, ... we would have 
 God as our Lord, and know our brother in our neighbour. 
 . . . We would willingly obey our chosen rulers, but we 
 have no doubt that they, as true and good Christians, will 
 willingly free us from serfdom, or prove to us from the Gospel 
 that we are serfs." The fourth article claims on religious 
 
 • Zi?nmerman, ^. 153. Der Bauentkrieg. 
 
 ^ Ibid., vol. ii. pp. 99, 102, See also Benson's Geschichte des 
 Bauernkrieges, p. 172.
 
 234 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 grounds, the use of wild game, and wood from the forests. 
 Article sixth protests against the increase of burdens upon 
 an oppressed people. It is striking that with the demand 
 for freedom from feudal burdens, is included always that 
 for a free and elected clergy. In conclusion, say the 
 peasants, " If any of these articles are opposed to Holy 
 Writ, and this can be proven to us, we will give them 
 up. The Peace of Christ be with us all ! " The oath of 
 the peasants banded in insurrection near Bietigheim, is 
 similar in tone : " Because God hath ever enlightened us 
 with His word, and hath made known to us how 
 utterly we have been despoiled, not of daily bread, 
 but of eternal ; and because He lendeth us power and 
 might according as we firmly believe," etc. Then follow 
 similar demands for a free Gospel and freedom from the 
 bonds and burdens of serfdom. The peasants of Elsass ^ 
 proclaimed that " the Gospel should be preached after its 
 true meaning, for it hath been preached for selfishness, and 
 great burdens have been laid on the poor peasant ; " they 
 demand freedom from tithes, from taxes on woods and 
 waters and game, and that serfdom be done away. The 
 peasants on the Neckar,^ under the inspiration of the 
 free ideas of Christianity, went beyond its teachings, and 
 claimed an absolute equality, under the Emperor, of all 
 men. " All worldly lords are to be reformed, so that the 
 poor cannot be burthened by them beyond the rules of 
 Christian freedom : the same law is to be for the highest 
 and lowest." " Princes and nobles must guard the poor 
 and hold themselves brotherly." . . . "All cities and 
 parishes are to be reformed in divine and natural rights 
 after the principles of Christian freedom." In England, a 
 little before this (1356), a monk, John Balle, had preached 
 liberty and equality as principles of the Christian Revela- 
 
 * Zimmerman. ' Ibid,
 
 RELIGIOUS IDEAS OF FREEDOM. 235 
 
 tion.^ These doctrines, and Wickliffe's religious influence 
 (1360), resulted in a great resistance of the lower classes to 
 serfdom and its burdens. The English peasants' uprisings 
 of 1381 proclaimed the entire abolition of villcnage ; and 
 Richard II. (13S0) consented to the doing away of many 
 of its vexatious burdens and payments, but these were 
 subsequently restored by Parliament. During the century 
 and a half after the Peasant Revolt, says Green (p. 230), 
 " villenage died out so rapidly that it became a rare and 
 antiquated thing." Stubbs - also notes that the result of 
 the rising of 1381 was, that "the landlords gave up the 
 practice of demanding base services," and emancipation 
 was greatly advanced. 
 
 We have touched upon these remarkable movements of 
 the peasant class in various countries, in the fifteenth and 
 sixteenth centuries, because they are so manifestly con- 
 nected with the liberalizing influences of the reformed 
 preaching of Christianity. They did not, it is true, succeed, 
 but they undoubtedly undermined serfdom, and causea 
 all classes to be more ready for gradual freedom. They 
 show the natural and inevitable action of Christ's teachings 
 on men's minds, where they have long been oppressed by 
 injustice. 
 
 Even the highest classes felt this inspiration of freedom 
 through the Gospel. The Emperor Sigismund (1436) 
 thus proclaims : " It is an unheard-of thing that in the 
 holy Christianity one should be so proud as to say to 
 a man. Thou art mine ! " " For whoever is baptized and 
 believeth, be he noble or ignoble, rich or poor, he is 
 counted among the members of Christ. Whoever there- 
 fore calleth a fellow-Christian his own, he is not a 
 
 ' Inter eos aequa libertas, eadem nobilitas, par dignitas, similisque 
 potestas. (Quoted by Siigenheim^ p. 295.) 
 
 ^ Constitutional History 0/ Etigland, vol. ii. p. 463.
 
 236 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Christian, is against Christ, and all the commandments 
 of God are lost on him."^ 
 
 The process of emancipation under the Christian in- 
 fluences was often gradual, first from slavery to serfdom, 
 and then from a lower to a higher form of serfdom. The 
 serfs of the public treasury (fiscalini) and of the Church 
 {ecclesiastici) acquired peculiar privileges. The laws for- 
 bade them to be reduced to the condition of ordinary serfs ; 
 they had a right to their own property ; the fines to pro- 
 tect their persons were double those for other serfs, and 
 one-half of those for freemen. They could appear in court 
 and testify ; while the ordinances of the Councils protected 
 them from forced labour and oppression. In Burgundy 
 and France, there was a gradual transition in the ninth 
 and tenth centuries from serfdom to a condition which was 
 intermediate between servitude and freedom. Persons in 
 this condition acquired the right to their own property^ 
 both in land and personal effects ; they had the power to 
 transmit to descendants, and even to dispose of their estate 
 by will, or, leaving no descendants, the State inherited 
 from them. They could use their Ortrn property to pur- 
 chase their liberty. 
 
 The coloni, as we have said, were a species of serfs 
 under Roman law, and they are found through the Middle 
 Ages. They were often bound to public labours and to 
 forced work for others. Some of the abuses from this 
 system extended down even to the eighteenth century in 
 the Jura. A colonist could buy and possess land, and 
 even slaves, but could only sell real estate with the con- 
 sent of the " Patron " ; and in France he was forbidden to 
 give or to sell to another seigneur. He could transmit 
 property in direct lines, but in collateral only tc brothers 
 and .c^'iters and their children. 
 
 ' Ziiiunervian, p. 107.
 
 MANUMISSION. 237 
 
 Gradually through the Middle Ages, there was a tran- 
 sition from the state of colonists and mainmortables ^ to 
 that of tenants and freeholders. Among the serfs, marriage 
 was not permitted outside of the domain without the con- 
 sent of the master. One of the fruits of religious influence 
 on the Roman law was that in a mixed marriage of a 
 serf woman and free man, the children did not follow the 
 mother, but, by a humane principle, the best condition.- 
 
 Up to the eleventh century there were, under religious 
 impulses, isolated acts of manumission at death-beds and 
 by will. The crusades, both as a grand movement of reli- 
 gious enthusiasm, and as breaking up classes of society, 
 increased the tendency. It was not uncommon, before 
 starting on a crusade, for a noble to free his serfs, as an act 
 of conscience towards God; he perhaps going to his death.^ 
 Many also manumitted in order to raise money for the 
 expedition. 
 
 In the eleventh century. Emperor Conrad speaks of the 
 sale of human beings as a " thing nefarious, and detestable 
 to God and men." ^ 
 
 In 1096, in France, Philip I. and Louis Le Gros (i 108) 
 
 ' Main7norte (the dead hand). An absolute incapacity to transmit 
 property — a condition of serfdom. Thus ancient French ordinances 
 say : Comme creature humaine qui est formee a I'image de nostra 
 Seigneur, dole generalment estre franche par droit naturel, . . . 
 que les hommes ... en laur vivant sont reputes ainsi comme 
 morts. {Ch. de Val. Ordon., vii. 12.) See Du Cange {Manns 
 niorluce). Homines manus mortuae sunt servi glebae. 
 
 2 Cod. Theod., iv. 3 c. ; Just., xi. 67, 4. It is singular that this 
 humane provision, bequeathed by Christianity through the Middle 
 Ages, was dropped in the American Law of Slavery. 
 
 ^ Ego Jerosolimam profecturum intelligens a viris religiosis, sa- 
 pientibus et discretis . . . ne si posteris et successionibus meis 
 exemplum hoc rapine et exactionis inique relinquerem . . . om- 
 nino remisi in perpetuum. {Lois de la ville de Lt'lle.) 
 
 * . . . etiam ut rem Deo hominibusque detestabilem, etc. {Pertz^ 
 xi. 38.)
 
 43S GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 gave examples of a more general freeing of slaves. The 
 leading nobles and clergy granted municipal charters 
 which were charters of emancipation. 
 
 In the fourteenth century, the Count of Valois, brother 
 of Philip the Beautiful, freed the serfs of his comte with 
 the words : "As the human creature who has been formed 
 in the image of our Lord, ought to be free by natural 
 right ... let these men and women be free," etc. 
 In 1256 Bologna, feeling the influences working through 
 European cities, freed all its serfs, paying an indemnity 
 to the masters, and decreeing that in the future none but 
 freemen should inhabit the city, with the remarkable 
 words : " Our Lord God hath established at the origin of 
 things, paradise, and hath placed man there, in giving him 
 a full and entire liberty. By sin all the human race hath 
 been poisoned, that which was immortal becoming mortal, 
 liberty perishing in servitude. It is then just and salutary 
 that men freed and saved, should be delivered from the 
 bonds of servitude in which the abuse of force has en- 
 chained them. It is for these reasons that the city of 
 Bologna, which has always combated for liberty, re- 
 membering the past, and its eyes fixed on the future, in 
 honour of our Saviour Jesus Christ, hath ransomed all the 
 serfs on its territory, and decreeth that it would not suffer 
 there a man not free." ^ 
 
 Many efforts are recorded of St. Louis (13 15) to abolish 
 mainmorte. 
 
 Slavery is spoken of in French annals up to the twelfth 
 century, but no traces appear in the thirteenth, as many oi 
 the laws prove. 
 
 The slave trade was common in Europe in the tenth 
 century, as is abundantly shown in the papal bulls ; there 
 
 ' Istoria di Bologna, Girarhacci, quoted by Laurent. {Sugenheim 
 and von Raihner, vol. iii. p. 16S.)
 
 CHRISTIAN EMANCIPATION. 239 
 
 are but few traces of it, however, in the fifteenth and none 
 in the seventeenth ; the trade was ahnost entirely in 
 heathen captives. In Florence as late as 1526, there was 
 a traffic in Mohammedan slaves. The right in France to 
 sell Christian slaves was first abolished, and finally the 
 whole traffic was done away with. 
 
 In Germany, the code of the thirteenth century, the 
 Sachsenspiegcl, or " Mirror," is full of traces of Christian 
 influence against slavery. The Lord is said to have " put 
 poor and rich equally under His own love." (3, 42.) 
 Slavery is declared to have its " origin from unjust cap- 
 tivity"; and quoting the Bible, the law affirms^ that man 
 belongs to God alone, and " whoever holds him as slave, 
 sins against the power of the Almighty." The stranger 
 under the heathen code was presumed a serf or slave ; 
 under this, the presumption was of liberty. " How can 
 those," asks the law, " who are not permitted to give them- 
 selves to slavery, reduce others to this state ? At the 
 great jubilee year of the Jews, in memory of the Seventh 
 Day and of the Rest of the Lord, did not one give liberty 
 to all the Israelites who had become slaves, even to those 
 who had not desired to be freed .-* " 
 
 The killing of a slave was forbidden in the strictest 
 terms,^ and the "half- free" were not allowed to hold slaves, 
 which was a marked softening of the old codes. 
 
 The abolition of slavery in Scandinavia in the early 
 centuries is unquestionably the effect of the Christian 
 religion.^ One of the first Christian kings of Norway — 
 Knut the Holy — at the end of the eleventh century, 
 
 * Ex his verbis colliLjitur, hominem ad Deum pertinere et qui eum 
 occupat, in Omnipotentis peccat potestatis. iSsp., 3, 42.) 
 
 ^ Wisse aber dass kein Herr seinen Knecht toedten mag. {Ibid.^ 
 11,32.) 
 
 • Die Aufhebttng cler Leibeigenschaft. Sugenheim.
 
 240 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 publicly proclaimed that slavery should be abolished. In 
 1 2 14, it would appear from the laws^ that it had almost 
 ceased, and in the fourteenth century are no traces of it 
 in Norway or Denmark. In Sweden, the king Magnus 
 Eriksen (1335) proclaimed that in honour of the Holy 
 Virgin and for the salvation of the soul of his father and 
 uncle, no Christian should be held in his kingdom as a 
 slave.^ Owing to the strong religious feeling against this 
 injustice, serfdom did not take deep root in Norway and 
 Sweden. This conscientious conviction of the Norse 
 people was strengthened by the natural independence of 
 a brave race, and the consequent weak hold which the 
 feudal system had in those countries. Nearly all the 
 peasants owned land, and the nobles did not acquire large 
 estates. Serfdom and all its attendant curses were com- 
 paratively unknown in that portion of Scandinavia. In 
 Denmark, however, owing to the many wars and the 
 greater success of the feudal system, considerable numbers 
 of the peasants were reduced to this condition. Terrible 
 insurrections broke out there in the fourteenth and fifteenth 
 centuries which only increased the burdens of the un- 
 fortunate serfs. 
 
 The religious impulse touched one king — Christian II. 
 (1513) — who made himself remembered as the "friend of 
 the serf," and who forbade, among other things, " the 
 wicked and unchristian custom of selling and giving away 
 free peasants " : he permitted also the free migration of 
 serfs, and ordered that their children be taught various 
 trades, and that they should not be oppressed with heavy 
 burdens.^ 
 
 The Middle Ages, however, did not see the disappear- 
 ance of serfdom in that portion of Europe. 
 
 * Die AicfJiebung der Leibeigenschaft, p. 542. 
 2 Ibid., p. 542. ' Ibid., p. 508.
 
 ENGLISH SERFDOM. 241 
 
 English Slavery and Serfdom. — In England, as upon the 
 Continent, slavery arose from various causes ; from birth, 
 trom captivity in war, as a punishment by the authorities, 
 as a penalty in gambling where a man staked himself, 
 and by marriage. By the Ripuarian Law, a free woman 
 marrying a slave became a slave ; by the Anglo-Saxon 
 law, under the Christian teaching, the offspring of the free 
 and slave followed the condition of the father,^ instead of 
 Hie mother, as according to the Roman law. 
 
 Residence also often brought about slavery. Die Luft 
 macht eigen (" The air makes the thrall "), says some old 
 German proverb. If runaways were found living on 
 strange properties, they could be enslaved. The blood- 
 money, or zvergeld, sometimes included bondage, and many 
 debtors became slaves. Thousands of Britons, in times of 
 famine, during the first century after the Norman Conquest, 
 sold themselves into thraldom. Children were even sold 
 by their parents to escape extreme poverty. " If a Chris- 
 tian," says Theodosius in his Penitentials, "sell another into 
 a foreign country, he will not be worthy to have repose in 
 the midst of the faithful until he has restored to liberty 
 and country him whom he sold.^ If a Christian has found 
 another Christian wandering and vagabond, whom he has 
 seized fraudulently and sold as slave, he ought to sit no 
 more in the assembly of the faithful, until he hath repaired 
 his fault and submitted to a penitence of seven years." 
 " A father," says another passage of the Penitentials, 
 " driven by necessity hath the power of delivering into 
 servitude a son, if he be under eight years ; after that he 
 hath no power, ex-'jpt by the will of the son."^ When a 
 
 * H. I., Ixxvii. 12. 
 2 Theod. Pan. i., 5, 13. 
 
 ' Pater filium servum VII. annorum, necessitate compalsus, potes- 
 
 R
 
 242 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 youth had pdsscd the age of thirteen, he had the power 
 of selling himself as a slave.^ 
 
 In Scotland there was the same privilege. " Ilk frey- 
 man may lefF his fredome gif him like is." 
 
 The later law in England required certain conditions : 
 among them, that the sale should be made by other than 
 the man himself.^ 
 
 " Though any one sell his daughter to servitude," says 
 an old English law, " let her not be altogether such a 
 theow as other female slaves. He ought not to sell her 
 among a strange folk." ^ 
 
 That feature of slavery, lower than anything "brutal," — 
 the raising children for the slave market, — was not unknown 
 in England. It is alluded to frequently by the historians,^ 
 and was preached against with righteous indignation by 
 the clergy. Bristol was the great slave market, and there 
 might be seen long trains of British youths and maidens — 
 the latter often ruined for the sake of selling their off-spring 
 — all to be sold either to Ireland or to foreign countries. 
 Bishop Wulfstan ^ of Worcester (about lo86 A.D.) was 
 in the practice of coming to this city every year and 
 spending several months in preaching the gospel against 
 this iniquity. The hardened Northumbrians at length 
 were deeply impressed by these truths, and finally in 
 solemn assembly vowed not only to give up this sinful 
 
 tatem habet tradere in servitutem : deinde sine voluntate filii, 
 licentiam tradendi non habet. {Theod. P(r;i., x\x. 28.) 
 
 ' Idiil, 29. 
 
 ^ . . . qu'il est vray que Thomme franc et sub jure se peut 
 vendre ... La premiere qu'il se fera vendre par autre, que par lui, 
 etc. (Co/. Celt. Lac.) ' Leg. Can.., ii. 74. 
 
 * Illud erat a natura abhorens, quod multi ancillas suas ex se 
 gravidas, ubi libidinem satis fecissent, aut ad eternum obsequium 
 vendicabant. (J////. Mat us. 57.) 
 
 ' Beda {Ecc. Hist.) makes this name Wulstan.
 
 SLAVES IN ENGLAND. 243 
 
 practice, but to induce all England to 1 enounce it. The 
 resolve made a deep impression throughout the country.^ 
 
 One authority says that from Aethehvulf to William the 
 Conqueror, for 230 years, a great part of the English 
 peasantry became reduced to slavery. After Malcolm's 
 invasion of England (1061 A.D.), so many young men and 
 maidens were carried away as slaves to Scotland, that it 
 was said not a village or a house could be found with- 
 out them.^ When Canterbury was burned by the Danes 
 in 1006 A.D., all the 8,000 inhabitants were killed ex- 
 cepting "four mass priests" and eighty lower monks; 
 these were severely whipped and, if they could not re- 
 deem themselves, were carried off into perpetual slavery. 
 
 By the Domesday Book (1068-71 A.D.) the number of 
 male slaves for Sussex is given as 9,200, which would 
 make the whole number about 50,000, while the free in- 
 habitants of the county were only 38,000. In the whole of 
 England enumerated, there appear to have been reckoned 
 25,000 servi or slaves ; 82,000 bordarii, and 7,000 cotarii 
 (different kinds of serfs), and 110,000 villeins.^ 
 
 Among the evidences of the deep root of English 
 slavery is the statement of Strabo,* that slaves are a 
 British export ; and the historical statement that the 
 sister of Canute and first wife of Godwin, derived a large 
 income from selling English slaves to Denmark. 
 
 • . . . ancillasque prius ludibrio lecti habitas, jamque praegnantes 
 venum proponebant. . . . Hunc tarn invetaratum morem . . 
 Wulfstanus paulatim delevit . . . divinas prsedicationis semina 
 spargens. Quse adeo per inter alia temporum apud eos convoluere, 
 ut non solum renuntiarent vitio, sed ad idem faciendum CEeteris per 
 Angliam essent exemplo. (2 Ang. Sac, 258.) 
 
 2 . . . repleta est Scotia servis et ancillis Anglici generis, etc. 
 {Frn. Dojn., 1070 A.D.) 
 
 » Villani dicuntur . , . qui villcB seu glebas adscript! sunt. 
 Lib. 4, 199-
 
 244 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 There is proof that slaves were branded, and even yoked 
 as cattle. 
 
 If a master killed his slave without knowledge of the 
 judge, the Church punished him, where the civil law could 
 not, with excommunication or with a penance of two 
 years.^ The Church, too, sentenced a mistress who should 
 beat her maid-servant with such violence that she died, to 
 seven years' penance ; if the death was accidental, the 
 penance was for five years. According to a law of King 
 Edward, whoever killed a slave man must fast three years. 
 The killing a slave was recognised in the law and by the 
 Church as a sin.^ 
 
 It can only be repeated that the gradual working of 
 Christianity had its usual effect on slavery and serfdom in 
 England. The prohibition, on religious grounds, against 
 selling Christian slaves to heathen countries, runs all 
 through Anglo-Saxon law, and is repeated by William the 
 Conqueror and other Norman kings.^ The provision in 
 Alfred's laws (taken from the Bible) that a Christian bonds- 
 man could only be held seven years, must have tended 
 gradually to free all slaves. Alfred's feelings in regard to 
 slavery are shown in his final will, and they only indicate 
 the religious sentiments of the day. " And I beseech in 
 God's name and His saints, that none of my relatives do 
 obstruct none of the freedom of those I have redeemed. 
 And for me the West Saxon nobles have pronounced as 
 lawful, that I may leave them free or bond, whether I will. 
 But I, for God's love and my soul's health, will that they 
 be masters of their freedom and of their will ; and I, in the 
 
 ' C. Theod. Pcen., 21, 12. 
 
 2 Qui servum suum occiderit, suum peccatum est et damnum 
 jJ75 Cone). 
 
 •'* Cavendum enim valde est ne aniinc in dampnacioncm vendantur, 
 pro quibus Christus vitam impendit. (4 Gul. V., xli.)
 
 CHRISTIAN BROTHERHOOD. 245 
 
 living God's name, entreat that no man do not disturb 
 them, neither by money exaction, nor by no manner of 
 means," etc. ^ 
 
 When Edward the Confessor (974 A.D.) utters such 
 expressions in regard to human equahty as the following, 
 we may be sure that the idea of Christian brotherhood is 
 beginning to penetrate barbaric society. "We know," 
 says the pious king, " that through God's grace a thrall has 
 become a thane, and a churl has become an earl (or squire), 
 a singer a priest, and a scribe a bishop ; and formerly, as 
 God decreed, a fisher became a bishop, etc. . . . We 
 have all one heavenly Father and one spiritual mother, 
 which is called Ecclesia, that is, God's Church, and there- 
 fore are we brothers." 
 
 A law of VVihtraed encouraged manumission, by making 
 it when performed at the altar absolute (No. 9). William 
 the Conqueror gives a form of liberation, and enacts that 
 if slaves remain a year and a day without calumny in the 
 royal cities or burghs, walled towns or camps, they should 
 be free for ever. 
 
 Still, under English law, the slave was a thing ; one of 
 the catalla, a chattel The Christian sentiment, as we have 
 said, first felt the iniquity of selling one " bought by the 
 blood of Jesus Christ" ; and later, of possessing him as a 
 bond-servant. 
 
 The slaves, as we have already shown, were protected in 
 England on Sundays and feast-days. Masters who com- 
 pelled them to work on those days lost their property 
 in them. Under Aethelred they were confiscated to the 
 treasury ; under Canute, emancipated. The slaves were 
 permitted to work for themselves for twelve days at Christ- 
 mas, in the week before and after Easter, and during the 
 week before Assumption, and could thus earn money to free 
 ^ Hughes' Life of Alfred.
 
 246 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 themselves. "The slaves shall be freed," say the Brehon 
 laws,^ " the plebeians be exalted by the orders of the 
 Church, and by performing penitential service to God." 
 St. Aidan, a bishop of Northumbria, is said to have ran- 
 somed slaves, instructed them, and then ordained them as 
 priests.^ The synod of Celchyth (8i6 A.D.) proclaimed 
 that, at the death of a certain bishop, all who had been his 
 slaves during life should be freed ; and that every bishop 
 throughout England should grant freedom to three men, 
 giving each three shillings for masses for the deceased 
 bishop's soul.^ 
 
 Bishop Wilfred having received an estate with two 
 hundred and fifty Christian slaves, emancipated them with 
 the words, " All those whom baptism hath rescued from the 
 service of the devil, become by that worthy of the liberty 
 which changeth them from servants to men." * 
 
 Among the steps towards gradual emancipation in 
 England, may be mentioned, the punishment of excom- 
 munication, threatened by Ecgberth of York, for any 
 sale of a child or kinsfolk ; slave-murder by the master 
 became a sin before the Church, though not always a 
 capital crime before the law.^ The slave was often attached 
 to the land and could only be sold with it ; he sometimes 
 acquired land and bought his emancipation. 
 
 One of the protective features of the Anglo-Saxon law, 
 the mutual responsibility of the citizens, was extended to 
 slaves as to free men, under .^thelstan. (924 A.D.) 
 
 A female slave who was led into sin by the master, 
 
 * Bridget t, I, 250. 
 ' Beda, 11, 5. 
 
 ' Landon's Manual of Councils. Celchyth. Haddan & Stubbs, 
 Councils. Bridgett's Hist, of Holy Eucharist. 
 
 * Beda, H. Ecc.^ iv. 13. 
 
 * Green.
 
 EM A NCI PA TION OF SL i VES. 247 
 
 became free ; ^ a provision which especially protected the 
 helpless, and was due to the influence of the religious 
 principle. Slaves were set free on the Church- porch or 
 before the altar, and the Gospel-book bore on the margin 
 a record of emancipation. Sometimes the master placed 
 the slave at a point where four roads met, and bade him 
 go whither he would. In a more solemn form the master 
 took him by the hand ^ in the full assembly, showed him 
 open road and door, and gave him the lance and sword of 
 a freeman. 
 
 Before Alfred, slaves could own nothing ; under his 
 legislation, they were permitted to dispose by will of what 
 was given them, or what they could earn in their free 
 hours. He forbids also any masters who have incurred a 
 fine or amend, from buying off by the sale of man as well 
 as beast. 
 
 The seven years' jubilee, taken from the Jewish system, 
 must have gradually destroyed slavery in England. Slaves, 
 too, were more and more permitted to ransom themselves. 
 Under Canute, when a slave had fallen in the presence of 
 his master on (x military expedition, his equipment and 
 possessions could be divided among his heirs.^ The slave 
 as soldier became thus a vassal. 
 
 A slave, even as far back as Wihtraed, if freed was 
 obliged to leave his property with his master for blood- 
 money (wergeld), so that he was thus transferred into a 
 kind of serf So a slave freed by the violence of his master, 
 did not at once enjoy all the rights of a freeman, but was 
 a client of the sheriff (gerefa). 
 
 Slave-birth prevents any one from appearing in court as 
 
 » Pen. of St. Theod., 14. 
 ' Green, and Leg. Gul. 
 8 L. Can., 75.
 
 448 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 witness. To be free, th. oondman needed not merely the 
 will of the master, but also certain public ceremonials. 
 
 Emancipation became more and more the Christian 
 work par excellence ; it was performed at death-beds and 
 in wills, pro remedio animcs, for the salvation of the soul ; 
 the ceremony was consecrated by the Church and the 
 priest ; and the written proof was preserved in the Church 
 records. 
 
 The forms of manumission show the spirit which worked 
 towards liberty , " Geatflced hath freed, for God's love, and 
 for her soul's sake, E. the smith, and A. his wife, and all 
 their offspring, born and unborn, and A. and C, and all the 
 men who bent their heads in the evil days. Whoso shall 
 set this aside and deprive her soul of this, may God 
 Almighty deprive him both of this life and of the kingdom 
 of heaven, and be he accursed, quick or dead, for ever and 
 ever." ^ 
 
 Another form has : " And we make all the serfs free 
 for both our souls' sake." ^ 
 
 As late as 1535, we find an act of manumission re- 
 peating the familiar expression of the Stoical jurists, 
 modified by Christianity, in regard to slavery. " Whereas 
 at the beginning, nature brought forth all men free, and 
 afterwards the law of nations placed certain of them under 
 the yoke of servitude, we believe that it is pious and meri- 
 torious towards God to manumit them and restore them 
 to the benefit of pristine liberty," and then the author 
 (Bishop Sherborne of Chichester) liberates a serf 
 
 The slave-trade was forbidden from English ports by 
 law, but legislation did not check the inhuman traffic. 
 One hundred years after Dunstan (946 A.D.) the n )blea 
 
 * . . , ewic aa on ecnysse. {Cod Dip., No. ^2^.) 
 
 • , , , for unker bother soule. {Ih'd. 979.)
 
 SLAVES AFTER THE NORMAN CONQUEST. 249 
 
 still acquired wealth from the breeding of slaves.'^ Under 
 William the Conqueror, the influence of the religion of 
 mercy at length secured the passage of a law forbidding 
 the slave-trade, whose principal port and centre was 
 Bristol.2 
 
 After the Norman conquest, the condition of the slaves 
 did not for a time improve, as the new conquerors were 
 understood to own the chattels of the native Saxons,^ 
 and did not at first permit the bondmen to buy themselvei. 
 into freedom. Henry II. enlarged the laws of emancipa- 
 tion. He recognised blood-money for a slave, with a dif- 
 ferent amend for different classes of slaves. The master's 
 power over the life of his bondman is limited ; if he kill 
 him, he must pay blood-money to the relatives of the 
 servant ; the reason in the law being one of those an- 
 tithetical passages of which our ancestors are so fond 
 "because a slave is a servant for serving, not for killing."'*^ 
 
 By an act of the same king, no born slave was admitted 
 to holy orders, unless manumitted:^ a provision which 
 must have had a compound influence on both the Church 
 and slavery, in diminishing bondage. 
 
 The Church councils thundered against the slave trade 
 in Christians. One called in London (1102), by Anselm, 
 forbade absolutely that nefarious business of selling human 
 beings like brute beasts ; ^ and another meeting at Armagh, 
 Ireland (i 171), declared all English Christian slaves free. 
 
 ^ Green. 
 ^ Leg. XX. 15. 
 
 ^ Quia omnia catalla cujusliDet nativi intelliguntur esse in potestate 
 domini sui. {Glatiz'ille, 5, 5.) 
 
 * Quia servus ad serviendum, non ad occidendum servus erat. {H., 
 
 his-) 
 
 » L. H., I. (Ixviii. 4.) 
 
 * Nequis illud nefarium negotium quo hactenus in Anglia solebant 
 homines, sicut bruta animalia, venundari, deinceps ulla ten us praesumat
 
 2SO GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Another decreed that no English thralls who had been 
 freed should be re-enslaved.^ 
 
 It is remarkable, that no one can say precisely when 
 slavery was merged into serfdom in England, or when 
 serfdom disappeared. 
 
 In the reigns of Henry III. and Edward I., some masters 
 transformed their serfs into freeholders ; but if the serf did 
 not do his service as vassal, the master could confiscate 
 his land ; if he performed this service, however, the master 
 had no power. 
 
 There is no evidence of a transference of the persons of 
 villeins in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. They 
 were only obliged to pay for a marriage licence, and were 
 not permitted to select their calling. 
 
 A petition was presented to Parliament in the reign of 
 Richard II. that villeins should not be permitted to send 
 their children to school in order to advance them in the 
 Church, which shows that many were then rising out of 
 their condition into that of freemen by becoming priests. 
 
 There were many influences throughout England gradu- 
 ally raising up the serf ; but the most powerful was the slow 
 action of religious motives on the conscience of the masters. 
 The selling one " for whom Christ died," — that is, a 
 Christian, — was felt from the earliest ages to be a great in- 
 consistency and offence. Gradually the holding such a 
 person in bondage was seen to be equally against the 
 teachings of the Master ; and finally, the laying unjust 
 burdens on fellow- Christians was perceived to be contrary 
 to the Gospel. This sense of justice worked silently and 
 gradually through English as well as European society in 
 the Middle Ages, and continually lightened serfdom by 
 reforms not necessary to be related here, until at length it 
 
 * ... in prisfinam revocentur libertatem. {Coticil. Lond. Girald. 
 Cambr.)
 
 MOTIVES FOR EMANCIPATION. 251 
 
 disappeared as snow melts before the spring sun, no one 
 being able to say precisely when winter ceased or the new 
 season began. 
 
 A trustworthy testimony as to the motives leading to 
 emancipation in England, is given by Sir Thomas Smith, a 
 statesman in the time of Elizabeth, who wrote his " Common- 
 wealth of England " -^ at the close of the sixteenth century 
 (about 1570). He argues without any partiality towards 
 the Church, though with a full sense of the value of religion ; 
 and states ^ that already in his time slaves were unknown 
 in England, and of serfs only a few survived, but that both 
 conditions were recognised in English law. Of the causes 
 working towards freedom, he says : " I think both in 
 France and England the change of religion to the more 
 gentle and more equal sort (as the Christian religion is in 
 respect to the Gentiles) caused this whole kind of servile 
 servitude and slavery to be brought into that moderation 
 . . . so that they almost extinguished the whole. . . , 
 This persuasion I say of Christians, not to make nor keep 
 his brother in Christ, servile, bond and underling for ever 
 under him, as a beast rather than as a man, and the 
 humanities which the Christian religion doeth teach, hath 
 engendered through Realmes (not near to Turks and bar- 
 barians) a doubt, a conscience and scruple to have servants 
 and bondmen ; yet necessitie on both sides, on the one to 
 have helpe, on the other to have service, hath kept a figure 
 or fashion thereof" (pp. 130, 131). And again: " Howbeit 
 since our Realme hath received the Christian religion which 
 maketh us all in Christ, breathren, anc in respect of God 
 and Christ, conscrvos, then began men to have conscience 
 to hold in captivitie and such extreme bondage, him whom 
 they mu.st acknowledge to be his brother, and, as we use to 
 
 ' The Commonwealth 0/ Efiglafui, by Sir Thamas Smith, 1589. 
 2 p. 129.
 
 252 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 term him, Christian ; that is, to have equall portion with 
 them in the gospel and salvation." And then with a sly 
 hit at the Church : " Upon this sample, in continuance of 
 time, and by long succession, the holy Fathers, munkes and 
 fryers in their confession, and specially in their extreme 
 and deadly sicknesses, burdened the consciences of them 
 whom they had under their hands ; so that temporall men, 
 by little and little, by reason of that terror in their con- 
 science, were glad to manumit all their villaines ; but the 
 same holy Fathers, with the abbots and friars, did not in 
 like sort by theirs, for they had also conscience to im- 
 poverish and dispoyle the Church so much, as to manumit 
 such as were bound to their Churches, or to their mannors, 
 which the Church had gotten, and so kept theirs still " 
 (c. lO, p. 129).! 
 
 In 1 39 1 serfs still appear in England ; but before the 
 middle of that century the majority had become hired 
 labourers. There were acts of enfranchisement in the 
 reigns of Mary and Elizabeth. The act of the latter 
 emancipating serfs in 1574 on certain manors was one of 
 the last.2 
 
 Even in 1610 James I. appears to have possessed rights 
 over serfs ; and serfdom was not finally swept away till 
 the reign of Charles II. 
 
 In Scotland the arbitrary rights of serfdom over the 
 labourers in the salt works endured till the middle of the 
 eighteenth century. 
 
 * See also on villenage, Mirro7- 0/ Justices, c. ll. p. 209. (Trans, by 
 W. H., 1768.) 
 
 2 Queen Elizabeth is reported to have commissioned Lord Burleigh 
 and Sir W. Mildmay to inquire into the condition of the villeins on 
 her domains in Cornwall, Devonsliirc, Somerset and Gloucestershire, 
 and make such as were born bond compound for their freedom. (£>r 
 Truster, quoted in Bell's Feudalism, p. 259.)
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 CHIVALRY. 
 
 THE phenomenon of chivalry is one of the most singular 
 in history. As an ideal of character and life it is 
 quite distinct from any classic ideals, and not entirely 
 corresponding either to the German or Christian concep- 
 tion. It may be said that the world of the Middle Ages 
 was peculiarly false to its chivalric ideal. But the same 
 may be said of the relations of the classic world to the 
 Stoic standard, or of the Christian world to its model. 
 Still, for some centuries — from certainly the eleventh to the 
 fourteenth — the chivalric ideal was that of the great body 
 of martial young men of the higher classes of Europe, 
 and exerted a very manifest influence on manners and 
 morals. It softened the cruelty of war in a barbarous 
 age, led the popular mind away from material ends to 
 certain ideas, sometimes whimsical, but more often generous 
 and noble ; it strengthened the position and power of 
 woman, cultivated some of the purest virtues, and formed 
 a conception of character which has come down into 
 modern society, and influenced countries where feudalism 
 was never known. 
 
 To determine the part which Christianity had in chivalry, 
 we must examine the customs and received ideals of the 
 latter. 
 
 The initiation of the knight was essentially religious in 
 
 *53
 
 254 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 form ; but the outward ceremony seems to have descended 
 from the ancient Germans. Tacitus tells us that the young 
 German who aspired to be a warrior, was brought into the 
 midst of the assembly of the chiefs, where his father, or 
 a relative, solemnly equipped the youth for his future 
 vocation, with shield and javelin. The act was looked 
 upon as a rite of religious solemnity. So chivalry taught 
 that the youthful knight was to enter on his calling 
 under religious ceremonies. He was first divested of his 
 clothes and put into the bath as an emblem of purification ; 
 then a white robe, symbol of purity, was wrapped around 
 him ; next a red robe, symbol of the blood which he 
 should shed for the Faith, and of the blood shed for him ; 
 and finally a black garment was worn, to remind of the 
 death which would be always near him. He was then 
 to fast twenty-four hours, and in the evening to enter the 
 Church and pass the night in solitary prayer, or sometimes 
 in company with his godfathers. The next day his first 
 act was to be confession ; after this, he was present at mass 
 and listened to a solemn sermon on the duties of knight- 
 hood ; finally, he kneeled before the altar, his sword was 
 blessed by the priest, and he made solemnly his knightly 
 oaths. Among these was one that "Avarice, recompense, 
 gain, or profit should never oblige the knight to any action, 
 but only glory and virtue." Another, that he would " never 
 fight with more than one against one, and to avoid all 
 fraud and deceit." Another bound him " to conduct a lady 
 or maiden whom he might meet in danger, to a safe retreat, 
 to serve her, protect her, and save her from all danger and 
 all insult, or die in the attempt ; to never do violence to 
 ladies or maidens without their will and consent, although 
 they had been won by arms.^ 
 
 A more formal statement of the knight's oaths is the 
 ^ Guizot, Hist, of Civ. voL iiL p. il.
 
 OATHS OF CHIl iLRY. 255 
 
 following : — i. I shall fortify and defend the Christian 
 religion to the uttermost of my power. 2. I shall be loyal 
 and true to my sovereign lord the king, to all orders of 
 chivalry, and to the noble office of arms. 3. I shall fortify 
 and defend justice with all my power, and that without 
 favour or vanity. 6. I shall defend the just action and 
 quarrel of all ladies of honour, of all true and friendless 
 widows, of orphans of good fame. 7. I shall do diligence 
 wheresoever I hear that there are any murderers, traitors, 
 or masterful robbers who oppress the king's lieges and 
 poor people, to bring them to the law with all my power.^ 
 
 An old French ballad," quoted by Saint Palaye, says : 
 " You who desire the order of knighthood, you must lead a 
 new life ; devoutly watch and pray, shun sin, pride and 
 villainy, the Church you must defend, the widow's cause 
 and the orphan's undertake, be hardy and loyal, and 
 plunder nothing from others — thus must the knight guide 
 himself." 
 
 The mother of the celebrated knight, Bayard, is said to 
 have uttered these words when he received his sword : 
 " Serve God and He will aid thee ; be sweet and courteous 
 to every gentleman in divesting thyself of all pride. Be 
 not a flatterer or talebearer, for this kind of people come 
 not to great perfection ; be loyal in word and in deed ; 
 keep thy word, be helpful to the poor and orphan, and 
 God will reward it to thee." ^ The young aspirant for 
 knighthood was not uncommonly trained to serve in some 
 
 ' Selden, quoted by Mill, Hist, of Chivalry, p. 153. 
 - Vous qui voulez Tordre de chevalier 
 II vous convient mener nouvelle vie ; 
 Devotement en oraison veiller, 
 Peche fuir, orgueil et villenie, etc. 
 ' Servez Dieu et il vous aidera ; soyez doux et courtois k tout 
 gentilhomme en otant de vous tout orgueil ; ne soyez flatteur ni rap- 
 porteur.
 
 256 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 noble family, and was thus early taught one of the virtues 
 of chivalry — a dignified obedience, and a subordination 
 to elders and superiors, which had no mixture of obse- 
 quiousness. 
 
 The Helden-Buch, an old authority on Chivalry, says of 
 the duties of knighthood : — 
 
 "The Princes young were taught to protect all ladies fair, 
 Priests they bade them honour and to the mass repair ; 
 All holy Christian love were they taught, I plight ; 
 Hughdietrich and his noble queen, caused priests to guide them 
 aright." ^ 
 
 The ideal of knighthood is thus given in an old chroni- 
 cle, translated by Bullfinch : " Then King Arthur stablished 
 all his knights and to them that were not rich he gave 
 lands and charged them all never to do outrage or murder 
 and always to flee treason ; also by no means to be cruel, 
 but to give mercy unto them that ask mercy, upon pain 
 of forfeiture of their worship and lordship; and always to 
 do ladies, damosels and gentlewomen service, upon pain 
 of death ; also that no man take battle in a wrongful 
 quarrel for no law or any world's goods. Under this 
 were all the knights sworn of the Table Round, both old 
 and young ; "and at every year were they sworn at the 
 high feast of Pentecost." 
 
 The Church itself strove in every way to confirm these 
 ideas. Thus the Council of Clement made solemn 
 declaration that every noble person should, at the age of 
 twelve, take solemn oath before the bishop to defend to 
 the uttermost widows and orphans ; that women of noble 
 birth, both single and married, should enjoy his special 
 care, and that nothing should be wanting in him to render 
 travelling safe, and to overthrow tyranny.* 
 
 * Quoted by Mills, p. 224. 
 2 Ibid.^ p. 216.
 
 LESSONS OF CHIVALRY. 2S7 
 
 The translator of St. Palaye's " MemoioTs of Ancient 
 Chivalry," says eloquently : " Women in particular, ought 
 to hold these ancient writers on chivalry in high esteem, 
 for the deference they paid to modesty and the same they 
 so liberally bestowed on virtue. They taught generous 
 firmness, judicious observance of superiors and constant 
 love to unite in the same hearts. They taught to honoui 
 the valiant, to attend the wounded, to relieve the dis- 
 tressed and to dispense the sweet solace of cheerful and 
 gentle manners to all around them ; they taught them 
 to respect themselves and to prefer others ; to be silent 
 observant, and industrious in youth, graceful and dignified 
 in maturity, venerable in age and lamented in death.'' 
 Foulque, a young knight, is thus described by St. Palaye^ : 
 " He is eager to expand his heart and to diffuse his wealth 
 to all who approach him and ever without partiality or 
 limitation to all the world, the declared enemy of injustice 
 and of all who dare to be its patrons. The being unable 
 to redress wrong is his sole cause of grief ; if this ever 
 happens, he is inconsolable. He is taught ^ that simplicity 
 and modesty alone gave a lustre to victory and he has 
 been directed from a child to be the last who should speak 
 high things and the first who should do them, to be mild 
 among the aged and stout among the brave, and that he 
 can never praise himself too little or others too much." 
 Spenser gives us the same ideal in his " Red Cross 
 Knight " : 
 
 " And many hard adventures did achieve 
 Of all the which they honer wonne, 
 Seekuig the weak oppressed to reheve. 
 And to recover right for such as wrong did grieve." • 
 
 * St. Palaye, p. 67. ' Ibid., p. 31, 
 
 ' Fairy Queen, i" 1-3.
 
 258 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 An old French ballad savs : — 
 
 " A true knight the people must defend 
 And his heart's blood for the Faith expend.*' 
 
 Chaucer also thus pictures the knight — 
 
 "A knight there was and that a worthy man 
 That from the time he first began 
 To riden out, he loved chivalry 
 Truth and honour, freedom and courtesy. 
 * * * * 
 
 And tho' that he was worthy, he was wise, 
 And of his port as meek as is a maid, 
 He never yet no villainy ne said, 
 In all his life unto no manner wight ; 
 He was a very gentle perfect knight." * 
 
 One of the first virtues taught the knight which has 
 greatly influenced modern warfare, was pity for his enemy. 
 It was a common phrase, that " a warrior without pity 
 was without worship." " In all the wars of chivalry," says 
 the historian^ of Brittany, "true soldiers never injure the 
 tillers of the ground." 
 
 The celebrated knight, Du Quesclin, is reported to have 
 said on his death-bed to his companions in arms : " Neither 
 the clergy nor women nor children are your enemies." 
 
 Chevalier Bayard, being told that it was permitted to 
 live in an enemy's country upon the inhabitants, replied : 
 " It is true, but I think we ought not to do all that is 
 permitted ; the right of war is one thing, the right of 
 justice another. I rebuke not what others do, but I will 
 not do it myself" * 
 
 The courtesy and pity of the knight evidently enteied 
 
 * lis doivent le pen pie defendre 
 Et la sange pour la foi espandre. 
 • Prologue Canterbury Tales. ^ Argentre. 
 
 * Si. Pal aye, p. 196.
 
 COURTESY OF CHIVALRY. 259 
 
 into practical affairs and became characteristics of warfare 
 in certain countries. " King Edward," says Froissart, after 
 the battle near Calais (1346), "sat down to supper and 
 made the captive French knights sit down also, greeted 
 them honourably and ordered them to be served with the 
 first course, while the gentle Prince of Wales and the 
 knights of England were served with the second course 
 at another table." To the knight who had nearly killed 
 him, King Edward said : " I have never found in battle 
 any man who man to man hath given me so much trouble 
 as thou hast done, I therefore give thee the prize by a 
 just decision above all the knights of my court." The 
 courtesy of the Prince of Wales to the French King John 
 as prisoner after the battle of Poictiers is too well known 
 to need recounting. The English prince constantly re- 
 fused to sit down at the table of his captive, and gave him 
 the highest honours. 
 
 "Can it be conceived possible," says Froissart, "that in 
 a hot fire of the squadrons of the French and English met 
 near Cherbourg (1379), the knights and squires having 
 dismounted to fight closer, stopped in the midst of these 
 furious transports to give one among them who remained 
 on horseback the leisure to challenge that knight among 
 his enemies whom he esteemed to excel the most in love." 
 This historian relates again that after a battle between the 
 French and English, in 1344, "the English dealt like good 
 comrades with their prisoners, and suffered many to depart 
 on their oaths and promises to return again on a fixed 
 day to Bordeaux." ^ After the battle at Otterbourne, the 
 Scots are said to have set their English prisoners to 
 ransom, and every man said to his prisoner : " Sir, go and 
 unarm yourself and take your ease," and so made their 
 
 * Friissari, i. 107.
 
 26o GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 prisoners good cheer as if they had been brethren, without 
 doing them any injury.^ The chivalric custom of ransom 
 undoubtedly mitigated to a great degree the horrors of 
 war in the Middle Ages. The knights were punctilious to 
 the last degree in keeping the pledges made to their 
 captors. Thus the Duke of Gueldres is said to have 
 been captured by a squire of low degree and carried to 
 his stronghold. The forces of the duke approaching, 
 the squire made him promise that he would come to him 
 wherever he might be on a fixed day and remain his 
 prisoner till ransom was paid. The duke was imme- 
 diately liberated by his comrades, but held himself bound 
 by his pledge, and after months of delay and against 
 many remonstrances, penetrated the enemy's lines and 
 delivered himself to his captor, from whom he was subse- 
 quently ransomed. As an instance of knightly manners, 
 the romance of Farumbras relates that the famous knight 
 Oliver, in a battle with the Saracen cavalier Farumbras, 
 assisted his foe to lace his helmet, and before they fought, 
 both bowed politely to one another. 
 
 Such an action as the following, related of the wars of 
 Robert Bruce, shows what a humanizing reality chivalry 
 might be : — 
 
 *' The king has heard a woman cry : 
 He asked what that was in hy (haste) 
 It is the layndar (kumdress) sir, said one, 
 That her child-ill (bed) right now has taen, 
 And must leave now behind us here, 
 Therefore she makes an evil cheer. 
 The king said, Certes it were pity 
 That she in that point left should be, 
 For, certes, I trow there is no man 
 That he no will rue a woman than. 
 
 ' Froissart ii. io8
 
 HUMANITY OF CHIVALRY. a6l 
 
 His hosts all then arrested he 
 And gert a tent soon stinted (pitched) be 
 And gert her gang in hastilie 
 And other women to be her by 
 While she was delivered, he bade, 
 And syne forth on his way's rade ; 
 And how she forth should carried be, 
 Or he forth fare (journeyed) ordained he ; 
 This was a full great courtesie 
 That swilk a king and so mightie 
 Gert his men dwell on this manner 
 But for a poor lavender." ' 
 
 Writing of knightly courtesy, Froissart says, "there 
 is no pause between them (the EngHsh and Scotch) as 
 long as spears, swords, axes, or daggers will endure. When 
 one party hath obtained the victory, they then could 
 glorify in their deeds of arms, and are so joyful that such 
 as are taken, are ransomed ere they go out of the field, so 
 that shortly each of them is so content with the other, that 
 at their departing, they will say courteously, God thank 
 you ! " 2 That incident of Sir Philip Sidney, the chevalier 
 of more modern days, refusing the cup of cold water when 
 dying that he might give it to a wounded soldier, will 
 probably never depart out of human memory. It shows 
 what Christianity can do, acting on the traditional habits 
 of the gentleman and soldier. 
 
 The chivalric ideal forbade all violence to the prisoner. 
 An Italian writer of eminence even blames the soldier 
 who struck the tyrant of Padua, " since it is as vile an act 
 to wound a prisoner whether noble or otherwise, as to 
 strike a dead body." ^ 
 
 ' The Bruce, x. i, 270. This humane incident is said to have 
 occurred in Robert Bruce's campaign in Ireland, in 13 19. 
 
 - Froissart, ii. 142. 
 
 3. . . quam gladio casdere cadaver. {RolaKderius.) Quoted by 
 Hallam.
 
 262 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 The model of the knight was that of exceeding gentle- 
 ness. Arthur is described as replete with all grace and 
 virtue, "for he is free, meek and gentle as a lamb."^ 
 
 A common motto of a noble family in France was "the 
 braver the milder" {quo fortior eo initior). 
 
 When the chronicles picture a knight wandering in a 
 wilderness and asking his way of some cowherd, they 
 describe him as riding away " while commending the lad 
 to God." When King Arthur met some unknown ladies 
 in the forest, the biographers relate that " as soon as he saw 
 them, he lyghted downe of his hors and ryght sweetly 
 saluted them." 
 
 Of Rodrigo it is said that, — 
 
 " Journeying on he greeted whom he met 
 With such short interchange of courtesie 
 As each to other gentle traveller gives." 
 
 Hospitality was equally a duty with courtesy. "Then it 
 was," says Perceforest, "that in Great Britain charity of 
 manners reigned in all ; noble dames and gentle knights 
 placed on the tops of their castles a helmet, as a sign that 
 all good knights and worthy ladies travelling that way 
 should enter as freely into their castle as if it were their 
 own," Handsome presents were given to the guests, " but 
 the courtesy they learned in those castles was above all 
 riches ; no spirit of discord or peevishness was ever allowed 
 in these knights to one another. Their manners displayed 
 every kind of friendship and goodwill." ^ " Nothing was 
 small or despicable in the eyes of a knight, if it compre- 
 hended the welfare of an individual ; if he in his voyage 
 or expedition received the hospitality of the meanest 
 person, gratitude would never suffer him to consider that 
 person but as a noble and generous benefactor ; he declared 
 himself for ever his knight, and swore to renounce all the 
 » Quoted by Digby. » St. Palaye, p. 28a,
 
 IDEALS OF CHIVALRY. 263 
 
 glory that could be proposed to him, to acquit himself of 
 the debt to defend, protect, and succour him in time of 
 need." ^ 
 
 The following passage shows the Norman ideal of 
 chivalry in the twelfth century. Geoffrey says of the reign 
 of King Arthur : " Britain had arrived at such a pitch of 
 grandeur that in abundance of riches, luxury of ornaments, 
 and politeness of inhabitants, it far surpassed all other 
 kingdoms. The knights in it that were famous for chivalry, 
 wore their clothes and arms all of the same colour and 
 fashion ; and the women also, no less celebrated for their 
 wit, wore all the same kind of apparel, and counted none 
 worthy of their love but such as had given proof of their 
 valour in three successive battles. Thus was the valour of 
 the men an encouragement for the women's chastity, and 
 the love of the women a spur to soldiers' bravery." ^ 
 
 The brotherhoods in arms were one of the remarkable 
 features of chivalry, undoubtedly a survival of German 
 customs. There is said to have been one association called 
 the " Order of the White Lady with the Green Shield," 
 whose especial object was to restore to ladies, property 
 taken from them by unjust plunderers. 
 
 A celebrated cavalier, named Hugh de Carvalai, being 
 forced to separate from his brother in arms, Boucicaut, is 
 related by the Chronicle to have thus spoken : " Gentle 
 lord, we who have been together in happy companionship, 
 have had the same wills, the same conquests, and the same 
 joys ; nor has either received a joy that the other has not 
 partaken of. But in the account, I think, I have received 
 more from you than I have given ; therefore I pray you 
 that we may settle, and what I owe you I will pay or 
 assign over to you." 
 
 * St. Pal aye, p. 228. 
 
 • Quoted in Troubadours, etc., p. 250, by H. W. Preston.
 
 264 CESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 " This is a sermon indeed ! " answered Bertrand, "I have 
 never thought of this account, nor know I whether I am 
 indebted to you or you to me, but I pray you, as we are 
 about to separate, let us be quit therein. But if we meet 
 again, we will make a new debt and will have it written ; 
 it now only remains for each of us to act nobly, and for 
 you to follow }'our master. May that affection which 
 hath ever been, continue with us ; and since it must be 
 so, in love let us depart." ^ 
 
 Of these fraternities the old ballad says, — 
 
 " From this day forward ever mo' 
 Neither fail either for weal or woe, 
 To help other at need : 
 Brother be now true to me, 
 And I shall be as true to thee !• 
 
 The ballad then pictures the knights as vowing never to 
 injure or villify each other, and to share one another's 
 dangers and trials. 
 
 Froissart says, that there was a bond of brotherhood 
 among all knights, and that " nobleness and gentleness 
 ought to be aided by nobles and gentles." It was evidently 
 a custom among them that no ransom should be set so 
 high that the knight could not pay it with ease, and 
 maintain a suitable rank afterwards. 
 
 In the tribunals of justice, the title of knight was 
 especially respected, it being presumed that those who had 
 borne it were always disposed to defend the cause of right. 
 For this very reason, when condemned for any offence, the 
 knight paid a double fine. 
 
 The devotion to ladies was the crowning grace of 
 chivalry. This respect for the sex went so far that an 
 act is on record of James II., of Aragon, that any man. 
 
 * St. Palaje, p. 224.
 
 DEVOTION TO WOMEN. 265 
 
 whether soldier or civilian, native or foreign, travelling 
 through the kingdom in company with a high-born ladV; 
 should be safe from all attack or pursuit, unless he were 
 a criminal under the charge of murder.^ 
 
 " You should elect," says an ancient chivalric history, 
 addressing the young knight, " a lady of noble blood who 
 has the ability to advise and the power to assist you ; and 
 you should serve her so truly and love her so loyally as to 
 compel her to acknowledge the honourable affection which 
 you entertain for her. . . . But he who loyally serves 
 his lady will not only be blessed to the height of man's 
 felicity in this life, but will never fall into those sins which 
 will prevent his happiness hereafter. Pride will be entirely 
 effaced from the heart of him who endeavours by humility 
 and courtesy to win the grace of the lady. The true faith 
 of a lover will defend him from the other deadly sins of 
 anger, envy, sloth and gluttony ; and his devotion to his 
 mistress renders the thought impossible of his conduct 
 ever being stained with the vice of impurity." * There 
 can be no doubt of the capacity of the knight of chivalry 
 for this pure, unsensual devotion to his mistress. The 
 romances, chronicles, and histories are full of instances of 
 it, and it certainly formed the ideal of great numbers of 
 young men of the higher classes. Each sex too elevated 
 the other, as the "Romance of the Rose" says. "The 
 better the chevaliers the better the ladies, and the more 
 chastely did they love." * 
 
 • Statuimus quod omnis homo, sive miles sive alius qui iverit cum 
 domina generosa salvus sit, etc. (Quoted by Halliun, 3, 375.) 
 
 * UHistoire, etc. du Petit Jehan, etc., 1, 36. 
 
 * Les chevaliers mieux en valoient 
 Les dames meilleures dtoient 
 Ft plus chastement en vivoient. 
 
 — Romance of the Rose.
 
 266 GESTA CHRIST I. 
 
 The peculiar home of chivalry was France and England, 
 If we may trust Froissart, the Germans were too rude 
 and covetous in the Middle Ages, to feel powerfully the 
 especial influences of the system. " Their excessive 
 covetousness quencheth the sense of honour." ^ " When a 
 German hath taken a prisoner, he putteth him into irons 
 and hard prison without any pity, to make him pay the 
 greater penance and ransom."" No chivalric spirit checked, 
 in Teutonic countries, feudal licentiousness, and it was the 
 democratic influence of the cities rather than the generosity 
 and chivalry of the knights, which protected the people 
 from oppression. In Italy, too, there was little influence of 
 chivalry to soften the barbarisms of war or raise the position 
 of woman. The frequency of cruel massacres in the 
 Italian wars and of assassination in time of peace, shows 
 how superficial was the power of this ideal. Even in 
 Spain, the model knight, the Cid, is described as cheating 
 without scruple the unfortunate Jews who had lent him 
 money. All the knights, too, were bigoted to the last 
 degree. That " sainted knight and most Christian king," 
 Louis IX., is said thus to have instructed his knights : 
 "Argue not with an unbeliever, be he infidel or heretic, 
 but thrust the Christian lance or sword into his body as 
 fast and as far as you can ! " ^ 
 
 Still, from all the above and innumerable similar ex- 
 tracts from ancient chronicles, ballads and histories, there 
 comes forth a very distinct ideal of character, which un- 
 questionably exceedingly influenced the higher classes of 
 the Middle Ages, and has not yet lost its power. It 
 is a conception of a character, self-centered, ruling its 
 
 • Froissart^ ii. 125. 
 " Ibid., i. 435. 
 
 * . . . mais k bonne esp^e tranchant ct en frapper les m^di* 
 Bans et mescreans, etc. {^oinvillc, i. 23.)
 
 CHIVALRIC IDEAL OF CHARACTER. 267 
 
 life by an elevated standard of self-respect, the elements 
 of which are unshaken fidelity to a pledge, indifference 
 to danger and hardship, generosity to the weak, forget- 
 fulness of self in small things, and devotion to certain 
 ideal and noble ends, as the main objects of life. There 
 go with it too, in its highest forms, unselfish devotion 
 to woman, courtesy and consideration to the lowest 
 and poorest, an eager passion for adventure, danger and 
 warfare in a good cause, and a supreme consecration to 
 some supposed supernatural guide or inspirer. It need 
 not be said that the highest moral traits of this ideal 
 are an inheritance from the Faith whose influence we 
 are studying. They bear the clear traces of their origin. 
 Other and more earthly features belong to the vigorous 
 and ardent temperament of the ancient Germans. 
 
 By what means could pity for the unfortunate, gener- 
 osity to the enemy, charity for the widow and orphan, 
 unselfishness and consideration for others' feelings and 
 unswerving truthfulness, be taught the wild soldiers of 
 the Middle Ages, as by the Gospels ? 
 
 The ideal before them, though mingled with many 
 earthly qualities, was a Christian one. 
 
 The defects of this character, as history has described 
 them, are but too well known. The knight cared most of 
 all for his class, and soon began to be indifferent to, or to 
 oppress, the common people. Even the chivalric times 
 are stained with terrible acts of cruelty and brutality 
 against labouring men and citizens. The enthusiastic 
 devotion to woman degenerated into a licentiousness which 
 contaminated a great part of European society, and af- 
 fected considerable portions of literature. The barbaric 
 jousts and tournaments of the Middle Ages, with the 
 class feeling cultivated by chivalry, transmitted the modern 
 duel, one of the barbarisms which still endures in modern
 
 268 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 society. The spirit of chivalry long supported feudah'sm, 
 which was so great an obstacle to popular liberty and 
 to material progress. The crusades were an offshoot of 
 chivalry, and though they indirectly removed so many 
 abuses, and awakened in a few directions the human 
 intellect, yet they brought untold calamities on Europe, 
 and strengthened the power of bigotry and superstition for 
 centuries. 
 
 It is of course very difficult to say how far chivalry, as 
 an institution, was a reality. It certainly was an ideal and 
 a sentiment, and left a deep impress on society among 
 the upper classes. But to what extent the great body of 
 knights were governed by their vows and professed prin- 
 ciples, and whether this devotion, purity and disinterested- 
 ness existed more in the fancy of poets than in the real 
 life of the Middle Ages, is a question not easy to deter- 
 mine. 
 
 Whatever in the chivalric ideal was a direct product 
 of Christian influence, has endured, and still exerts its 
 power. The high respect for woman, a combined result, 
 as we have often said, of old German habit and Christian 
 teaching, still remains and is strongest in non-feudal lands. 
 The remarkable respect and courtesy shown to women 
 throughout the United States, is at once a chivalric and 
 Christian inheritance. If any one would find a modern 
 " survival " of the journeys of the knight of chivalry 
 with his fair ladye through a savage wilderness, let him 
 follow Miss Bird's ride^ through the Rocky Mountains for 
 six hundred miles, accompanied by desperadoes and wild 
 trappers. Her influence in those solitary camps is pre- 
 cisely the chivalric ideal and the Christian reality. 
 
 The error of chivalry was in centering all things on .'ielf- 
 regard and the opinion of a class, 
 
 ' Ride ihrough the Rocky Mountains.
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IDEAL IN CHIVALRY. a6q 
 
 Chivalry as an institution has passed away ; — 
 
 ** The knights are dust, 
 And their good swords are rust j 
 Their souls are with the saints we trust." 
 
 But the ideal of character endures. Christianity, acting 
 on the German temperament, has contributed this ideal 
 to the humane and moral progress of the leading races. It 
 has its definite and peculiar features, 
 
 A character and life, where the smallest stain on in- 
 tegrity is felt as a sin ; where the " word is as the bond ; " 
 where the weak and unbefriended, the orphan and op- 
 pressed always claim the immediate and unhesitating 
 defence and support ; where woman is held in purest 
 honour ; where an habitual consideration and gentle cour- 
 tesy, especially for inferiors, govern the feelings and man- 
 ners ; where there is a capacity for true friendship and for 
 self- forgetting services, and the habit of hospitality ; where 
 high aims and generous purposes, give an inherent and 
 unconscious elevation and dignity to the whole nature ; a 
 character in which there is a silent heroism and courage 
 that would face death and every ill cheerfully, in a cause 
 pleasing to the Master — this still lives. 
 
 Certainly true chivalry has net died out in modern days, 
 and is more distinctly Christian than ever before.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 RESUMfi OF REFORMS IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 The " Gesta Christi" the achievements of Christianity, 
 are not like the victories of a great general, distinct con- 
 quests in a given place, or on a fixed date ; they rather 
 resemble the triumphs of science or of civilization. Here 
 and there, indeed, a definite and convincing step will 
 be made in humane progress, but in general, the minds 
 of man will become first silently imbued with Christ's 
 principles and be personally transformed by affection for 
 Him. Then, as love and unselfishness more and more 
 control their lives, and the responsibility with reference to 
 a future life grows, and the habit increases of living for 
 distant and impersonal good, certain great abuses which 
 they have hitherto supported through ignorance and selfish- 
 ness, will drop away, and gradually the great injustices 
 of human society will be either be uprooted by such men, 
 or will melt away under the fervour of their benevolent 
 sympathies and the example of their upright lives. 
 
 Of many great social evils, it is often difficult to say 
 when they came to an end. They disappeared before the 
 new Spirit in the world. 
 
 The victories of __Q ii'ist are silent v ictories, won in the 
 individual heart and life. No history chronicles them. 
 Their fruits are seen later in the lessening or overthrow of 
 great social abuses, and in the gradual growth of justice,
 
 RESUME OF REFORMS. 271 
 
 benevolence, purity, truth, and all those feelings and 
 practices which specially result from Christian teachings. 
 The Spirit of God everywhere works in human society, 
 and there is a "natural progress" apart from Christianity. 
 Many forces, too, of selfishness or of the intellect have aided 
 in the final results of human progress. The tendencies 
 of commerce, the struggles of kings with barons, the asso- 
 ciated life in cities, the opening influences of science, 
 have all worked throughout the Middle Ages to advance 
 mankind ; but no help to right living and towards a more 
 perfect state of society has ever been found like the 
 religion of Jesus. 
 
 (i) Its first and most powerful effect on barbaric and 
 half civilized society in Europe was the new position 
 which it gave to woman, and the sacred value it attached 
 to marriage. As centuries go on, the test of advancing 
 civilisation in each country is the advancement in the 
 social, legal and political position of the weaker sex. The 
 influence of Christianity from the beginning tended to 
 make woman in all appropriate things the equal of man, 
 to throw her influence into every department of life, and 
 even to surround her with a certain sacredness. In this, we 
 need hardly repeat, the new Faith was aided by German 
 habits of thought. Christianity purified the morals of 
 woman, bound her to sacred duties as wife and mother, 
 pledged her to labours of humanity when single, and 
 everywhere sought to make her worthy of the homage she 
 began to inspire. It changed the low idea of marriage, 
 common even in the German tribes. It protected woman's 
 rights and her property, and throughout Europe, en- 
 couraged the system of dower, which was so important a 
 safeguard in a wild age. Family life in these disturbed 
 centuries was first purified by the religion of Christ, and 
 from that has sprung whatever of good now exists in
 
 Z72 GBSTA CHRJSTl. 
 
 European social life. The best human condition which 
 has been transmitted, which gives the truest fore-gleam of 
 a higher earthly life yet to be attained, is marriage ; 
 and no power known in history has done so much to 
 elevate and strengthen that as the teachings of the great 
 Master. The ** free marriage " and easy divorce custom- 
 ary throughout Europe in the early Middle Ages, were 
 especially struggled against by the influence of Chris- 
 tianity ; and whatever is stable in the union of husband 
 and wife has been won by it against masculine selfishness 
 and caprice. 
 
 The reactions of the human mind at this period are not 
 chargeable on Christianity ; neither the asceticism and 
 celibacy of one portion of society nor the strictness of the 
 canon-law. The Gospels give no countenance to any of 
 these extremes. 
 
 (2) Human society rises out of its low estate, not merely 
 by elevating woman, but also by curbing the barbaric 
 passion for blood-revenge. The first influence of a love 
 and faith towards Jesus Christ is to lead men to imitate 
 and obey Him by controlling revenge and hatred. This 
 religion accordingly acts on the half-savage tribes by 
 making legal satisfactions take the place of blood-revenge 
 and feuds, and elevating law in place of violence. In 
 doing this, it may sometimes sanctify capital punishment, 
 as placing a legal retribution higher than " blood-money." 
 This, the first step of barbaric Europe from anarchy and 
 violence to a condition of law and order, was plainly 
 assisted by the new Faith. 
 
 (3) A feudal and wild society falls naturally into "private 
 war," where each chieftain fights " for his own hand," but 
 under definite forms and laws. Europe, as we have seen, 
 was nearly reduced to anarchy under these uncontrolled 
 habits. The figure which appeared in the storm, and
 
 PEACE OF GOD. 273 
 
 quieted, if only for a time, the waves of strife, was Christ, 
 It is a touching history — to read of the plundered peasants, 
 the desolated towns, the wasted fields, the weeping 
 widows and orphans under this curse of unrestrained war 
 and then of some simple, enthusiastic believer, who holding 
 aloft an Agnus Dei, goes from village to village preaching, 
 as if a new truth, the doctrine of human brotherhood, the 
 " Peace of God," until all men are inspired by a new spirit, 
 and for months or years the bloody swords are left to 
 rust, the homes of the poor are unplundered, and an un- 
 wonted peace of God falls on a land drenched with 
 brothers' tears and blood. Or the messenger of religion 
 declares certain places and certain days sacred to peace, 
 and the wild soldiers and pirates are awed into seeming 
 quiet, and the poor and down-trodden have a brief respite 
 from the savage tempest, and society, under religion, gets 
 its first experience of peace. Surely the most materialistic 
 of sceptics reading of that " Peace of God " of the Middle 
 Ages, and of that sacred person, the Friend of man, calm- 
 ing the bitter storms of human wrath and strife, must 
 be grateful that even the so-called "myth" of a Jesus 
 survived, and that it could thus control, even for a mo- 
 ment, the passions and hate and blood-thirst of men. 
 
 (4) The arbitrations {Ajistrdge) of the Middle Ages, 
 are the fruits at once of the Christian and of the com- 
 mercial spirit : they show the first settlement of European 
 society, and foretoken that higher system of Christian 
 arbitration, which shall yet reform the relations of nations. 
 For in the light of the teachings of the great Master, and 
 of the higher reason, it cannot be claimed that " private 
 war" is less justifiable than "public war," as a means of 
 redressing injuries. 
 
 (5) Among the great impediments to progress in Europe 
 through the Middle Ages, and the brutalizing influenceS| 
 
 T
 
 274 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 were the unreasonable and cruel methods of obtaining 
 truth and determining justice in both civil and criminal 
 cases. The " wager of battle " and the " ordeal " were 
 opposed from the beginning to the spirit of the " Religion 
 of humanity." The teachings by Christ allowed no such 
 mode of testing facts or obtaining justice, as single combat; 
 and superstitious tests have no support in His words oi 
 in the spirit of His life, The purest among His followers 
 in every age have objected to them and argued against 
 them. As His spirit has slowly imbued more and more 
 individuals of all classes, the barbarous "judicial duel" has 
 dropped out of use, even as His influence in modern times 
 has swept away the " duel of honour." To one inspired 
 by Him the appeal to irregular methods of ascertaining 
 the will of God, is an irreverence to the Father of all, and 
 opposed to the very spirit of His life. The abolition of 
 the ordeal is not indeed one of the most apparent Gesta 
 Christi, but it can be distinctly traced to Him. 
 
 (6) Had the " Son of Man " been in body upon the 
 earth during the Middle Ages, hardly one wrong and 
 injustice would have wounded His pure soul like the 
 system of torture. To see human beings, with the con- 
 sciousness of innocence, or professing and believing the 
 purest truths, condemned without proof to the most har- 
 rowing agonies, every groan or admission under pain 
 used against them, their confessions distorted, their nerves 
 so racked that they pleaded their guilt in order to end their 
 tortures, their last hours tormented by false ministers of 
 justice or religion who threaten eternal as well as temporal 
 damnation, and all this going on for ages, until scarce 
 any innocent felt themselves safe under this mockery of 
 justice and religion, — all this would have seemed to the 
 Founder of Christianity as the worst travesty of His 
 faith and the most cruel wound to humanity.
 
 ABOLITION OF TORTURE. 275 
 
 It need not be repeated that His spirit in each century 
 struggled with this tremendous evil and inspired the great 
 friends of humanity who laboured against it. The main 
 forces in mediaeval society, even those which tended towards 
 its improvement, did not touch this abuse. Roman law 
 supported it ; Stoicism was indifferent to it ; Greek litera- 
 tui-e did not affect it ; feudalism and arbitrary power 
 em ouraged a practice which they could use for their own 
 enc^s ; and even the hierarchy and a State Church so far 
 forj^ot the truths they professed as to employ torture to 
 support the " Religion of Love." But against all these 
 powers were the words of Jesus, bidding men "Love your 
 enemies ! " " Do good to them that spitefully use you ! " 
 and the like commands, working everywhere on individual 
 souls, heard from pulpits and in monasteries, read over 
 by humble believers, and slowly making their way against 
 barbaric passion and hierarchic cruelty. Gradually, in the 
 sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the books containing 
 the message of Jesus circulated among all classes, and 
 produced that state of mind and heart in which torture 
 could not be used on a fellow-being, and in which such an 
 abuse and enormity as the Inquisition was hurled to the 
 earth. 
 
 (7) The Jewish religion and the gospel of Jesus both 
 taught protection to the stranger, and help to the unfor- 
 tunate. The old abuses inflicted on the stranger and 
 the shipwrecked accordingly melt away before the new 
 teachings. Almost every code in Europe, Charlemagne's 
 capitularies, the laws of the Northern tribes, the Sachsen- 
 spiegel, the Anglo-Saxon laws and others, contain touching 
 reference to the scriptural commands in regard to the 
 stranger and " far-comer," and enforce the duties of hos- 
 pitality and mercy. The shipwrecked and homeless are to 
 be gently and mercifully dealt with, even as all men hope
 
 276 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 to be dcitlt mercifully with at the great tribunal. The 
 change from that century when a stranger in England 
 was shut up in jail like a thief, or a foreigner {aubain) 
 in France became a serf of the seigneur, to the compara- 
 tively hospitable laws of the seventeenth and eighteenth 
 centuries, and the contrast between the age when vessels 
 were brought to wreck by false lights, and all shipwrecked 
 were slaves and their property fair plunder, to the age 
 when the laws of all nations protect the shipwrecked, and 
 almost all civilized peoples feel it a duty to help such un- 
 fortunates, — these changes are among the most apparent 
 and blessed of the Gesta Christi, — the achievements of 
 Christianity. Jesus in human annals, were He less than 
 He is, might well be the patron-saint of the stranger and 
 the shipwrecked. 
 
 (8) The progress of the Middle Ages was largely assis- 
 ted by their codes of law. These early efforts to establish 
 order, restrain passion, cultivate self-control and promote 
 humanity, are deeply stamped with the teachings of the 
 Master. Some of these codes, like the Anglo-Saxon laws, 
 seem like religious and moral exhortations, rather than a 
 body of legislation. Nearly all of them call up the sanc- 
 tions of religion to enforce earthly injunctions : some appeal 
 directly to the teachings of our Lord, or the Bible : all 
 inculcate the gospel lessons of purity, good-will, integrity, 
 honesty, truth and neighbourly kindness, not alone as 
 moral and legal duties, but as portions of religion ; as 
 pleasing Him who embodied such virtues, and as part of 
 men's responsibility to God. 
 
 The Roman law too, wherever modified by Christian 
 influence, carried down the spirit of the humane Teacher 
 through ages of lust, cruelty, and barbarism. That it did 
 not accomplish more is scarcely to be wondered at. Laws 
 can only effect their best work when they represent the
 
 EDUCATION. 277 
 
 united opinion and feeling of society. Christianity had 
 not yet sufficiently impregnated individuals to transform 
 society and make laws one of the manifestations of 
 religion. 
 
 (9) Along with improvement of the laws in the Middle 
 Ages, went advance in education. Christianity opened 
 men's minds to all truth ; it produced that humility which 
 is the best guarantee of the intellect against conceit and 
 pride, — often the greatest obstacles to discovery and pro- 
 gress ; it withdrew the faculties of superior men from 
 pursuits tending to damage and destruction, towards those 
 which would benefit humanity. The same result was ex- 
 perienced in the " Dark Ages," which has often been since, 
 that a high moral advance is favourable to the intellect. 
 When the spiritual and moral faculties and sensibilities 
 are elevated, the probability is that the other powers of 
 the soul will feel their inspiration, and reason, judgment 
 and imagination be elevated by the same influences. 
 
 The mere turning of the mind by thousands of the 
 youth of Europe from war to matters of religion was an 
 immense gain to the intellect. There is only a certain 
 amount of vital force in a generation, and this during 
 many centuries was in some degree drawn from plans of 
 mutual injury, to truths and thoughts connected with the 
 Christian faith. The human mind could not but gain a 
 great advance from this influence alone. To this effect of 
 religion was added the power of the Church, exerted, as 
 we have seen, in founding schools and institutions of learn- 
 ing, and the influences of monastic life encouraging the 
 study and copying of the classics. Against this latter is 
 to be weighed the depressing and retrograding power of 
 bigotry and superstition, which found their appropriate 
 home in the monastic life, and indeed all the opposition 
 of the Church to pure science.
 
 278 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 While recognising the elevating force of the Christian 
 faith on the intellect of Europe during the Middle Ages, 
 we should never fail to acknowledge the remarkable 
 influence on intellectual progress in the revival of classic 
 literature and of Arabic science. 
 
 (lo) One of the great steps in humane progress in these 
 centuries, and one on which the influence of the truths 
 preached in Palestine is peculiarly apparent, is the gradual 
 diminution or cessation of serfdom and slavery. The 
 gospel of Christ in its pure form is not consistent with 
 permanent slavery. His early ministers were called "the 
 brothers of the slave." They felt " for them in bonds, as 
 those in bonds with them." Wherever He is truly loved 
 and revered, there the fetters of the slave are broken. 
 This power is shown at this period in the humane legisla- 
 tion of various countries towards serfs and slaves, based 
 often on the avowed motive that " he for whom Christ 
 died, ought not to be held in bondage." It is shown in the 
 innumerable forms of will and bequests where bondsmen 
 are liberated pro remedio aniince, for the salvation of the 
 soul, and to prepare for coming judgment. It is proved by 
 the general influence of the clergy in emancipating captives ; 
 and in the gradual change of slavery into serfdom, and of 
 serfdom into freedom. Sometimes a great act of emanci- 
 pation, like that of the city of Bologna, avows the religious 
 impulse. Sometimes an eloquent preacher breaks up by 
 his appeals the slave trade, as was done by Bishop Wulf- 
 stan, in Bristol, in the eleventh century. More often the 
 minds of men and women in all classes become touched 
 by the truths of the Gospel, until they feel that to hold 
 a fellow-being in slavery or serfdom is contrary to Christ's 
 commands, and they privately manumit ; or they permit 
 laws to be passed which gradually relieved the oppressed 
 of their burdens ; or they accept some form of compen-
 
 MANUMISSION AND CHARITY. i1^ 
 
 sation for the services due to them, and the injustice slowly 
 melts away. As the Scriptures circulate among the 
 peasants, these become filled with the new feelings of 
 human dignity imparted by the teachings of the Gospels, 
 and they everywhere demand their liberty— in terrible 
 outbreaks which measure the burdens under which they 
 suffered; yet these violent protests, though met with 
 greater violence, bring after them new rights and liberties 
 for the serf. Throughout the Middle Ages conscience was 
 on the side of manumission, as shown in countless death- 
 bed acts of emancipation. The Church itself became a 
 citadel of liberty to the bondman. It is true that other 
 forces worked with the religious motive : the influence of 
 cities and independent communes; the Stoic philosophy 
 as felt in legislation ; the struggles of rival powers in the 
 State, and the inconveniences of slavery itself— all these 
 tended towards emancipation. But the great Emancipator 
 of history is Jesus Christ. Where He rules, there all 
 chains are finally broken and the oppressed go free. 
 
 (ii) It scarcely need be said that all the countless 
 institutions of human compassion and charity, which 
 attempted throughout Europe to relieve the horrible misery 
 following the overthrow of the Roman empire, came from 
 Him. The blessed associations of mercy, the hospitals, 
 asylums, refuges, schools and centres of charity, which 
 everywhere radiated human mercy and goodwill; the 
 lives of beneficence to which so many noble souls devoted 
 themselves; the innumerable actions of benevolence, 
 philanthropy, and heroic self-sacrifice which light up these 
 dark ages— these are all from the "Son of Man"— the 
 true Gesta Christi. 
 
 And not entirely to be passed over among His grander 
 achievements, are the grace and heroism and humanity 
 infused into Middle Age society, and so into modern life.
 
 28o GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 by the action of His faith on the German temperament 
 Chivalry has indeed a large proportion of transitory, whim- 
 sical and earthly elements ; but the humanity infused by it 
 into wars, the respect inspired for women, the courtesy 
 and consideration taught, the grace and gentleness cast 
 over society, the compassion it illustrated, belong to 
 Him who embodied such pure qualities without the alloy 
 of class-feeling, and who, as the " Son of Man," was in 
 sympathy with all conditions of men, and an eternal ideal 
 of compassion to the unfortunate. 
 
 It is true that Christianity in the Middle Ages never 
 accomplished what should be appropriately expected of it 
 in the reform of human evils. But various circumstances 
 were peculiarly unfavourable to it as a moral power. It 
 was first made known among degenerate and corrupt 
 races, inheriting the vices and conceit of ages of successful 
 violence and unrestrained lust. It then reached the wild 
 tribes of the north, who were stamped with their own 
 savage qualities, or tainted by contact with Roman depra- 
 vity. But most fatal of all were the entire overthrow 
 and confusion of society, and the invasion of ignorance and 
 lawlessness consequent on the destruction of the Roman 
 empire ; and the formation of a State Church and hier- 
 archy, with the natural paganization of large classes, who 
 were only nominal followers of the great Teacher. 
 
 This combination of unfavourable circumstances has 
 delayed the triumph of Christianity for many centuries.
 
 III. 
 
 ^iE FORMS IN HUAfANE PROGRESS BROUGHT ABOUi 
 
 BY THIS MORAL POWER DURING THE 
 
 MODERN PERIOD.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE POSITION OF WOMAN UNDER MODERN INFLUENCES, 
 
 "E have seen in previous chapters that the steady- 
 drift of law and custom in Christian countries has 
 been towards " the personal and proprietary independence " 
 of woman, towards equality of rights with man, and a posi- 
 tion of high moral and spiritual influence in family and 
 social life. 
 
 In the Roman period the inanus or absolute power of 
 the husband over the wife, yielded to the new spirit abroad 
 and became but a weak authority. Tutelage was dons 
 away with, dower was guaranteed, and the right of the 
 wife secured over her personal property. While the 
 moral position of woman in the Christian portion of the 
 empire grew into one of remarkable sacredness and power, 
 the example of Christ and the apostles elevated the 
 feebler sex in the moral field, and threw into their hands 
 the management of many of the charitable and spiritual 
 interests of the new communities of believers. 
 
 The Middle Ages brought into the world a fresh senti- 
 ment of respect for woman — a characteristic of the Teutonic 
 tribes — to strengthen the Christian feeling of reverence. 
 But the German habit of mind — of measuring civil rights 
 and social position by physical power or the capacity of 
 bearing arms — tended to depress the standing of woman 
 
 in all countries under the influence of Teutonic customs; 
 
 383
 
 284 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 while the ascetic and Oriental theories in regard to marriage 
 and woman which had arisen in the Church also com- 
 bined to make the legal and social status of the female 
 sex below that resulting from the example and teach- 
 ings of the Master, and below what was suited to the con- 
 ditions of progress. 
 
 The greatest inequalities and injustices rested upon 
 woman in the oldest and most characteristic Teutonic 
 tribes, the Scandinavians, and among the Norman-English. 
 Greater privileges were allowed her among the German 
 tribes of Central Europe, and in countries where Roman 
 law (Christianized) had a greater power. But here again, 
 ascetic influences, under the canon law, depressed her 
 position, especially in the married state One ideal, 
 however, survived throughout Europe among the higher 
 and more martial classes, which everywhere exalted the 
 weaker sex and produced an effect unknown to antiquity, 
 even greatly influencing modern society. To chivalry 
 woman is indebted in the Middle Ages for a position she 
 had never before enjoyed in history, which gave her a 
 charm almost unknown till then, and which spread over 
 a society steeped in barbarism a grace and refinement 
 that have come down to our day. 
 
 It will be seen then that the position of woman from the 
 advent of Christianity till the modern period, has been a 
 composite one in civilized countries. In some countries 
 she has lost personal independence and control of property 
 in marriage ; in others she has retained her proprietary 
 power, and has been substantially independent of her 
 husband ; again in others she has entered into a partner- 
 ship in property and interests in marriage. 
 
 In some regions, under feudal rights, her hand had been 
 under the control of her guardian and became venal. In 
 others she had been under the guardianship of the king
 
 MODERN POSITION OF WOMAN. 285 
 
 alone ; and finally she achieved such independence as to 
 control her property herself and govern her own vassals. 
 
 Tutelage continued much longer in some parts of Europe 
 than in others ; and canon law in many portions of the 
 Continent brought the wife under a peculiar subjection, 
 though leaving the maiden singularly free. 
 
 The Christian idea we believe to be the entire equality of 
 man and woman in rights and responsibilities, though this 
 must be limited by practical necessities and the present 
 condition of society. The drift, in all ages, under the 
 teachings of the Master, has been towards this ideal ; but 
 like His teachings in regard to war and utter unselfishness, 
 they must be compromised somewhat to suit the present 
 state of the world. Each age will see an approach towards 
 that happy condition, wherein bond and free, male and 
 female, learned and ignorant, are "one in Him," with equal 
 rights and equal possibilities (so far forth as nature permits). 
 
 The modern position of woman, as related to Christi- 
 anity, is perhaps best tested by her position in the society 
 and under the law of the United States. 
 
 The American Union naturally inherited, through Eng- 
 land, the old Teutonic ideas in regard to woman's position 
 in marriage. They were certainly not the ideas of the 
 Founder of Christianity, whose few words in regard to 
 marriage and His whole bearing towards women, gave an 
 impression of His tender respect for them, and of His sense 
 of the sacredness and equal value of the tie. Nor are they 
 ideas of the German tribes of the centre and south of 
 Europe, who allowed a much greater independence to the 
 married woman, and more personal rights over her property. 
 Nor are they altogether the principles of the canonists or 
 the advocates of the extreme churchly view. 
 
 The ecclesiastical authorities held indeed the theory of 
 the inferiority and subjection of woman in marriage ; but
 
 286 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 they were equally earnest in favour of the coinmunio bono- 
 mm, the partnership of property, and of the protection to 
 the woman in securing her dower. Then they held to the 
 idea, which nowhere appears in the English common law, 
 of marriage as an impurity and a degradation to man and 
 woman. 
 
 The English common law ideas of woman and marriage 
 evidently came down from the old Scandinavian customs 
 and principles. The sex incapable of bearing arms 
 could not appear in the highest form of legal trial, the 
 judicial duel, and hence must be represented by a tutor 
 or guardian. The husband became the natural guardian 
 of his wife, and both represented and absorbed the 
 person and property of his ward. Legal rights were 
 measured by physical power. Then the archaic idea 
 came in of retaining the property of the woman in her 
 new family, and preventing both her relatives or herself 
 separating it from her husband's. Thus, perhaps, arose 
 the peculiar English idea of the married woman which has 
 come to us in the common law. Under it the wife's legal 
 existence was suspended or extinguished during marriage ; 
 her property was sacrificed, and she was placed almost 
 absolutely in the hands of her husband as regards civil 
 rights. Her fortune passed to her husband for his tem- 
 porary or permanent enjoyment. She could not earn 
 anything for herself, nor in general make any legal 
 contract, sue or be sued, because she was not legally a 
 person.^ The great dramatist only pictures the common 
 lav when he makes one of his characters declare : " I will 
 be master of what is mine own. She is my goods, my 
 chattels ; she is my house, my household stuff, my field, 
 my barn, my horse, my ox, my ass, my anything." 
 
 The husband, on the other hand, loses little or nothing 
 * Schouler, Domestic Relations, etc.
 
 THE WIFE UNDER COMMON LAW. 287 
 
 of his independence; but, as a compensation, the law 
 compels him to pay his wife's debts, not only when she 
 acted as his agent, but those incurred before marriage. 
 The husband and wife have each an interest in one 
 another's landed property, but the advantage is always with 
 the husband. The wife has an interest alone after her 
 husband's death, she has none as wife. He is permitted 
 despotic sway. Under the old legal nomenclature he was 
 the baron, she the feme. If the husband killed the wife, 
 under the old laws, he was tried as if he had killed any 
 other person ; but with the wife, the offence was like 
 treason, a more atrocious crime, and she was denied 
 *' benefit of clergy." In case of children and real estate 
 left without a will, a son, though younger, inherited before 
 a daughter. The wife's personal property belonged to her 
 husband, which he can bequeath to another ; if he dies 
 without will, she has one-third of the personal property 
 if there are children; one-half if there are none. This, 
 however, is a provision derived from the Roman rather 
 than from the old English law. 
 
 The husband is absolute master of the wife's rents and 
 profit from landed property during their marriage, and 
 if there are children he retains a life interest in the real 
 estate. If the wife survive, she has only a right to dower, 
 or one-third of the real estate for life. The husband, aftei 
 his wife's death, has a right of " curtesy " in her estate ; 
 but the wife at his death has no such right ; she is taxed 
 on other property than her dower, without representation.- 
 "The very goods which a man giveth to his wife," says a 
 curious work of the seventeenth century, the " Woman's 
 Lawyer," 2 "are still his owne ; her chaine, her bracelets, 
 
 ' Blackstone, \. 445, Note. 
 
 2 The Lawwes Resolutions oj Women! s Rights, p. 129. 1632, 
 London. It should be remarked that Magria Charta protected dower.
 
 288 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 her apparcll, are all her good-man's goods. If before 
 marriage the woman were possessed of horses, sheepe, 
 corne, Woole, Plate and Jewels, all manner of moveable 
 substance is presently by conjunction the husband's, to 
 sell, keep, or bequeath if he die." ^ 
 
 The husband's and wife's legal existence was merged 
 into one, and that was the husband's.^ 
 
 This state of coverture was defined as that of o«e 
 " covered," or sub potestate viri, under the absolute power 
 of the husband. " The Law of Nature hath put her under 
 the obedience of her husband, and hath submitted her will 
 to his," which she is not permitted to contradict during her 
 life.^ She wants free will as minors want judgment.^ 
 
 Among other singular injustices inflicted on women by 
 this old Teutonic system, is that the wife, at the decease 
 of her husband, was not allowed to administer in pre- 
 ference to his kindred, on the personal estate, though it had 
 once been entirely hers. He, on the other hand, could 
 administer on her estate for his own benefit, and exclude 
 her kindred altogether even from a share in the assets.^ 
 
 If she survived, she had only her own real estate and 
 such of her personal property as he had not appropriated 
 to his own use, and a {ew unimportant articles ("para- 
 phernalia"). She cannot restrain his rights by will. 
 
 Till the reign of William and Mary, Blackstone states," 
 woman by the English common law could receive sentence 
 of death and be executed for the first offence in such 
 crimes as larceny, bigamy, and manslaughter, while a 
 man (who could read) was, for the same offences, subject 
 
 1 P. 130. 
 
 2 Sa feme et lui ne sont fors que un person en ley. {Littleton^ Liv. 
 tL sect. 168). 
 
 2 Baron ct Feme, p. 71. ^ Ibid., p. 71 (1719). 
 
 * Schouler^ p. 61. • VoL i. p. 445,
 
 WOMAN UNDER COMMON LAW. 289 
 
 only to the burning of the hand or a few months' imprison- 
 ment. This, however, is a discrimination against woman as 
 not being admitted to spiritual orders, rather than against 
 her as woman. In case of a daughter's ruin by the 
 deceits of a pretended lover, the only reparation to the 
 unhappy father was through the plea, that she was his 
 servant and that he was deprived of the benefit of her 
 labour, and that the seducer had trespassed on his 
 premises. 
 
 " Female honour, which is dearer to the sex than their 
 lives," says this authority, "is left by common law to the 
 sport of an abandoned calumniator," referring of course to 
 oral defamation. The elopement of a wife with a guilty 
 partner took away from her, by an ancient statute, all right 
 of dower. The husband might commit the same offence 
 and still retain a right over his wife's property. 
 
 "A poor woman," says the " Woman's Lawyer,"^ "shall 
 have but the third foote of her husband's lands when he is 
 dead, for all the service she did him during the acouple- 
 ment (a long time and tedious), and if she be extravagant 
 with a friend, this is an elopement and a forfeiture." The 
 criminal conduct of men, the author claims, is not noticed , 
 "they may lope over ditch and dale, a thousand out-ridings 
 and out-biddings is no forfeiture, but as soon as the good 
 wife is gone the bad man will have her land, not the third, 
 but every foote of it." ^ 
 
 The husband, too, as in almost all the Teutonic codes, 
 had the right to beat his wife. "Justice Brooke," says the 
 Woman s Lawyer, " affirmeth plainly that if a man beat 
 an outlaw, a traitor, a pagan, his villein, or his wife, it is 
 dispunishable, because by the Law Common these persons 
 
 The Lawwcs Resolutions of Women's Rights. 
 
 9 P. 146. 
 
 u
 
 290 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 can have no action. God send gentlewomen better sport 
 or better companie ! " ^ 
 
 The tendency of the early English common law, was met 
 in the English legislation, by the influences of right reason, 
 and Christianity. The principles of the Roman law and 
 of equity were early applied to correct the evils and the 
 injustices of the old Teutonic code. The Lord Chancellor's 
 Court or Court of Chancery, which was essentially a Court 
 of Equity, became a court of great importance and of 
 ordinary jurisdiction, even as far back as Edward III. 
 In the reign of James I. adjudication was obtained through 
 this court to secure to the married woman a separate use 
 of her property ; and by 1695, it was clearly established 
 that a wife might have her separate estate in trust. ^ 
 Especially during the last hundred years, a doctrine of 
 woman's rights more consonant to humane and Christian 
 ideas has been maintained in the Equity Courts of England. 
 The great truth everywhere urged by the Master, of the 
 distinct personality and responsibility of each human 
 being, has been applied to the woman as wife by these 
 courts, and her equality with man more and more ad- 
 vanced. The Married Women's Property Acts of 1870, 
 1874, and especially that of 1882, seem to give absolute 
 liberty to the wife of acquiring, holding, and disposing of 
 any property as her separate property ; so that even the 
 wages of a married woman in Great Britain, the profits 
 of her literary, artistic or scientific skill, her deposits in 
 savings banks, and indeed all property which may belong to 
 her at marriage, or be acquired by her during marriage, is 
 hers, as if she were a fevic sole. We do not dwell on these 
 important stages of humane progress, because the American 
 legislation better shows the high-water mark of this drift 
 of ideas and of practices under the power of Religion. 
 ' P. 128. ' Spencer's Equity yurispnuicncey p. 596
 
 AMERICAN LEGISLATION ON WOMAN, 291 
 
 American Legislation. — The highest fruit of this influence 
 on legislation as to women, is to be seen undoubtedly in 
 the United States, and particularly in the legislation of 
 the State of New York, which has always led in the field 
 of humane administration. 
 
 The reforms in this matter seem to have begun in 
 the New England States — especially in Massachusetts and 
 Maine — early in this century. The first object was to 
 secure the independence of wives who were abandoned, 
 or of those whose husbands were convicts, runaways or 
 profligates. A public recognition was made of marriage 
 settlements and of trusts for the wife's separate benefit. 
 Then her right was secured to her of disposing of her 
 property by will, and, in some States, her estate was 
 exempted from liability for her husband's debts. The 
 great and sweeping reforms in this direction, however, date 
 from American legislation in 1848.^ These laws extend 
 the doctrine of a separate estate for the wife ; they provide 
 that her real and personal property shall not be put at the 
 disposal of the husband or made liable for his debts. It 
 continues her sole estate, and she is permitted to receive 
 property in like manner by gift, grant, devise or bequest. 
 This humane and advanced legislation has been imitated 
 and followed. Most liberal provisions have been enacted, 
 securing the property held by a woman before her 
 marriage, and all acquisitions made through her husband 
 or third persons, after marriage. All her earnings are in 
 her own power, and there is almost complete emancipation 
 from marital dominion. She can bequeath by will as if 
 she were single.^ 
 
 In 1860-62, these rights were still farther enlarged.' 
 
 ' Schoider, p. 209. These are reforms especially in the legislation 
 of the State of New York. 
 2 New York legislation. See Schouler^ • Ibid,
 
 292 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 Married women were permitted entire control of theif 
 personal property, and could carry on any trade or per- 
 form any labour on their sole account ; and their earnings 
 could be invested for themselves. A wife is permitted to 
 sell or convey her own real estate, to sue and be sued, to 
 bring an action in her own name against any person or 
 body corporate, and to make any bond to bind her separate 
 property. None of these transactions bind her husband. 
 
 A judgment can be enforced against her separate 
 estate.^ Of the general position of married women in 
 the legislation of New York, a high authority, Schouler, 
 says, " Married women in that State are well nigh eman- 
 cipated altogether from marital restraints, so far as 
 concerns their property, while the husband's own rights 
 therein are exceedingly precarious " ^ 
 
 A recent case in the courts of New Hampshire, gives a 
 practical illustration of the advanced American view of the 
 position of woman. A husband was sued for slanderous 
 words of his wife against another woman. He took the 
 ground that he was not responsible for the torts of his 
 wife ; that her property was not his, nor her earnings his, 
 nor her legal subjection to him any greater than his to her, 
 and that he was no more liable for her wrong doing than 
 she for his. The court sustained his demurrer, stating that 
 " the husbands of these female parties are strangers to the 
 proceedings." The Boston Herald (April 15, 1882), quotes 
 thus from Judge Foster's decision : — 
 
 "As Judge Foster states it, the woman being thus by the common 
 law utterly within her liusband's control, his chattel, his 'ox,' he became 
 personally and solely answerable for her torts, as for the trespasses of 
 his other domestic cattle ; and, of course, the law could pursue no other 
 consistent system than that wiiich declared all her contracts absolutely 
 void. Such was the social and legal status of a married woman 
 
 ' Kent's Comm.y ii ill, note. ^ Domestic Relaiioiii, p. 214.
 
 POSITION OF THE MOTHER. . 293 
 
 centuries ago ; and the change of her condition before the law seems 
 to be much less in England than in New Hampshire, The influences 
 of Christianity and a more widely diffused and higher system of moral 
 and religious education have gradually ameliorated woman's social 
 condition, and elevated her to the state of dignity and importance she 
 possesses to-day. Like all the changes of advancing civilization, this 
 change has been very gradual, but it has been a steady march from 
 slavery to freedom. Herbert Spencer says that in the United States 
 women have reached a higher status in the social structure than any- 
 where else, and Judge Foster adds that it is equally true that in many 
 of the States, certainly in New Hampshire more than anywhere else, 
 have the legal distinctions between the sexes been swept away." He 
 continues : 
 
 " Thus, by progress in the same direction, by changes religious, 
 social, customary, legislative and judicial, the rule of the common law 
 has been abolished and obliterated ; and it is no longer possible to say 
 that in New Hampshire a married woman is a household slave or a 
 chattel, or that in New Hampshire the conjugal unity is represented 
 solely by the husband. By custom and by statute the wife is now 
 joint master of the household and not a slave or a servant. The rule 
 now is that her legal existence is not suspended. So practically has 
 the ancient unity become dissevered and dissolved that the wife may 
 not only have her separate property, contracts, credits, debts, wages, 
 and causes of separate action growing out of a violation of her personal 
 rights, but she may enter into legal contract with her husband and 
 enforce it by suit against him." - 
 
 We have observed how, in the history of the past, 
 Christianity has strengthened the pcjsition of the mother. 
 
 From the allusion in Justinian's Code,^ where reverence 
 is enjoined on the sons towards their mother, but no legal 
 lights are given her, and the dictum of Blackstone, that 
 " a mother as such is entitled to no power, but only to 
 reverence,"^ to the American legislation of i860, there is 
 
 ' This case has not yet, however, become a precedent. It only 
 shows the tendency of judicial decisions. 
 
 2 Code, lib. viii. tit. xlvii. 4. , . . reverentiam autem debitam 
 exhibere matri filios coget. 
 
 ^ Comm.y i. 453.
 
 394 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 a progress which shows the profound power of the ideas 
 scattered by this Faith. 
 
 The inferior legal position of the mother in the English 
 courts of law, as distinguished from equity, was no fiction. 
 An English case ^ has often been qucfted where a father 
 was permitted by the court to take the children from 
 a blameless wife, and place them under the charge of his 
 guilty partner. Judge Story, even before the reformed 
 legislation, ventured to contradict the presumption of the 
 English law, that the father has any vested right in the 
 custody of the children. But in the United States, such is 
 the power of the humane principles of the Gospels taught 
 in every pulpit and school, the people become imbued 
 with sentiments of justice and mercy before the lawyers or 
 the judges, and legislation has been usually in advance of 
 the courts. 
 
 By the legislation of i860 (afterwards changed), every 
 married woman was declared joint guardian, with the 
 husband, of their children, with equal rights. Earlier 
 statutes gave the custody of the child to the mother where 
 the partners lived separated without divorce. In some 
 States, the preference was given to the mother, where the 
 child was very young. In general by American legis- 
 lation, the custody of the child is determined by its 
 interests and not the claim of the parents. The mother 
 in a legal point of view may be said to stand on an 
 equality, in most respects, with the father in the more 
 advanced American legislation. 
 
 Another peculiarity of legislation in the same direction, 
 is the protection afforded to the young girl against the 
 deceptions of the other sex. In many States, seduction 
 accompanied with promise of marriage is a serious crime, 
 and is severely punished; and the loss to the girl o\ 
 ' Rex V. Greenhill.
 
 PARTNERSHIP IN PROPERTY. igs 
 
 hitherto pure character is not measured by the value of her 
 services to her father or her guardian, but by the higher 
 considerations in the new estimate of woman. 
 
 Judge Kent says very justly of all this class of legis- 
 lation in woman's favour ; " The pre-eminence of the 
 Christian nations in Europe and of their descendants and 
 colonists in every quarter of the globe, is most strikingly 
 displayed in the equality and dignity which their insti- 
 tutions confer upon the female charcicter." ^ 
 
 The Civil law in such southern portions of the Union 
 as had been brought more closely under the influence 
 of Roman law, secured a remarkable independence to 
 the wife. But the coimnnnio bonorum or partnership in 
 property, which is a feature of marriage under this legis- 
 lation, was one of the slow gains won by Christianity ; — 
 Roman law having substantially dropped it before Justinian. 
 
 In the Middle Ages, where we find this feature, it is 
 a fruit of the religious sentiment, urging justice and 
 equality in the marriage relation. It cannot be regarded, 
 however, as so high a stage of progress, or so pre-eminently 
 Christian, as the position assigned to woman in miarriage 
 by the American legislation ; for each human being, 
 under the Faith taught in Galilee, is an independent 
 responsible existence having a right from all others to 
 the same justice and consideration which he is bound to 
 extend. Each woman under these teachings has a claim 
 to the utmost exercise of her capacities, and to perfect 
 equality with all others as to rights of property and per- 
 sonal rights. Woman from the earliest times of Christianity 
 held a position of independence and of great responsibility. 
 Marriage under the religious conception is the highest 
 moral union, and whatever is yielded by the one sex is 
 given up from motives of unselfish afiection, and the 
 ' Coiiiin., vol. ii. p. 187.
 
 296 GESTA CHRIST/, 
 
 claims of the one sex are balanced by those of the other 
 Accordingly rights of property in both are equal ; and 
 personality may be asserted in them, if it be for the 
 highest interest of both. 
 
 The progress of the religious sentiment and of right rea- 
 son will be continually in this direction, towards asserting 
 the absolute legal independence and equality of woman. 
 
 It will here be asked : Does not this lead to the share 
 of women in government? Undoubtedly it does ultimately. 
 Christianity by itself no more teaches female suffrage than 
 it does republicanism or free trade. But it throws into 
 human society that sentiment of equality before God, that 
 principle of equal rights and equal responsibility, and of 
 universal brotherhood, which all lead logically to these 
 results. The thorough application and carrying out of 
 Christian principles in human society is a result only to be 
 expected in distant ages. In the meantime it is the part 
 of wisdom to prepare the world for these great changes, 
 and to begin them by slow and careful steps. In the 
 United States, and England, a useful beginning has been 
 made in regard to woman, by admitting her vote in elec- 
 tions for school trustees and in municipalities. The time 
 is not far distant when in some communities her vote, 
 limited by education and property, will be received on 
 larger fields of suffrage. So great and vital a change 
 will thus be made slowly and with careful prepara- 
 tion. Woman will be trained and educated for her new 
 duty. 
 
 The final effects on society of this important reform can- 
 not now be predicted ; but as it is in the line of all the 
 other great changes which have attended humane progress 
 under Christianity, we may reasonably hope that the ulti- 
 mate results will be equally happy for mankind. 
 
 The moral position of woman in the leading Christian
 
 WOMAN IN THE UNITED STATES. 297 
 
 races is far advanced beyond anything known in the past. 
 A very considerable portion of the education of the youth 
 of the United States, for instance, is in the hands of female 
 teachers. The public and private schools, the academies, 
 high schools, ward and village schools are taught to a very 
 large degree by women. Colleges for women, too, have 
 sprung up in various States, in many of which advanced 
 courses of instruction are pursued. The medical profession 
 is open to a certain extent to women ; and there are female 
 physicians with large and profitable practices. But the 
 field where women publicly are most efficient is the 
 management of charities, especially for the young. They 
 conduct most of the orphan asylums, "homes" for the 
 poor, industrial schools, foundling asylums and similar 
 chanties throughout the United States. Hundreds of 
 thousands of the poor are brought continually under their 
 influence. The ladies of the educated classes organized, 
 during the Civil War, the remarkable agency for helping 
 the wounded, which worked in co-operation with the Sani- 
 tary Commission, and relieved an untold amount of misery. 
 This association was in affiliation with hundreds of socie- 
 ties of relief throughout the country, and was as remark- 
 able for its organization as its humanity. 
 
 Since the war, women have mainly founded the various 
 important societies for inspecting public charities, and the 
 charity organization associations which have reformed so 
 many public abuses, and prevented and relieved so much 
 misfortune. 
 
 Women are now being appointed for the State boards 
 of charity, the school boards, and similar important public 
 organizations. 
 
 Almost equally important work has been done by 
 women in Europe, in labours of public charity, in assist- 
 ance to the wounded, and in the direction of education.
 
 298 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 In England, ladies of position have been elected to the 
 school boards, and have been placed in public offices con- 
 nected with charities. They have long been (wjhere they 
 represented property) members of vestries and have voted 
 in municipalities. 
 
 In Germany, during the Franco-German War, associa- 
 tions of women everywhere sought to heal the terrible 
 evils of war, and to relieve the wounded, whether among 
 the enemy or their own countrymen. 
 
 In social and private life in the United States, womar 
 has profound and often well-deserved influence. In hei 
 early direction of the education and religious training of 
 the young, in her social influence and the moral power 
 she exerts over the other sex in all classes, we begin to 
 observe the true and legitimate effects of the faith of Jesus. 
 In the lower classes she checks intemperance, and con- 
 tinually strives to raise the children to a higher range of 
 life. In the middle classes she urges the moral side of all 
 causes, promotes honesty in the payment of debts, sup- 
 ports the best movements of charity and religion, and has 
 often a high ambition for the education and advancement 
 of her children. In the fortunate classes, amid much fri- 
 volity and display, the sex still keeps family life pure, and 
 leads the other in all humane efforts, and in real religious 
 feeling. It is true that the sex has much to answer for in 
 the United States, in stimulating extravagance and vulgar 
 ambition. But woman still leads the nation in all the 
 higher and more unselfish aims and labours. 
 
 And if, as often seems, a night of scepticism in America 
 and Europe is to descend upon the most generous minds 
 among the men, woman will still keep lighted the torch 
 of faith, and guide the race till the morning shines again 
 to all. Whatever position woman holds in civilized 
 society is clearly a fruit of Christianity. Even should,
 
 WOMAN UNDER AGNOSTICISM. 899 
 
 by evil chance, agnosticism at length become for a time 
 the creed of the world, Christian traditions would long 
 survive. But if after the lapse of ages all men and all 
 women should live " without God and without hope " 
 in the world, and the Christian " Good News " be as 
 a long-forgotten, once welcome sound of Sabbath bells 
 heard in a dream, and reverence for anything supernal 
 have faded away, and the ties of earth be but the acci- 
 dental bonds of beings soon to disappear, and the unselfish 
 living for others an " altruism " to end in nought in a few 
 days, then will woman become but as a weaker fellow- 
 animal, with no especial respect encircling her, and 
 perhaps will herself lose the purity and sanctity which 
 made her under Christianity the object of so much reve- 
 rence. 
 
 Woman, in a society to which immortality is a dream 
 and Christ a myth, would after the course of centuries lose 
 the ideal position which Christianity had given her. On 
 her would especially fall the degeneracy and melancholy 
 of the race. 
 
 We need not say, however, to those who have studied 
 the laws of human progress, that a reaction must come to 
 any such degeneracy, or the race must die. Faith and 
 hope must resume their power ; unselfishness must become 
 again the highest ideal of the soul ; Christianity, or some 
 new revelation of the unseen, must shine again after ages of 
 darkness, and as the human race advances, woman must 
 retake the position the Faith of Jesus had given her. 
 
 Either this, or an utter degeneracy and the final ruin of 
 mankind.
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 DIVORCE. 
 
 Humane and moral progress is almost coincident with 
 the increasing sacredness attached to the marriage-bond. 
 That earliest of evolutionists, Lucretius, justly dates the 
 first true refinement ^ of the human race from " chaste 
 single marriage." We have shown to what degree the 
 extraordinary social depravity and degradation of Roman 
 society under the emperors were due to the looseness 
 of this tie. In the modern world, that form of faith 
 which has most neglected monogamy and has most clearly 
 taught freedom of divorce, has been followed by the 
 greatest degradation of woman. The Mohammedan 
 countries show what social fruits a license in this matter 
 brings forth. 
 
 We have already spoken of Christ's view of marriage, 
 repeated and followed by the Apostles and the early Chris- 
 tians. The Master regarded it as one of the most holy and 
 permanent of human relations. He evidently set a value 
 upon it as upon no other external relation or institution. 
 All other human connections were to be abandoned for it : 
 God Himself had formed it, and it was only to be broken 
 and a new relation joined for the most serious and profound 
 reasons. The Apostles, indeed, did not always so fully 
 
 ' Turn genus humanum primum mollescere coepit. {De Rcr. Nat., 
 
 Ub. 5.) 
 
 300
 
 CHRISTIAN VIEW OF DIVORCE. 301 
 
 appreciate it ; yet they compared it to the most mysterious 
 and earnest bond known to man — that uniting the soul to 
 its Redeemer. All these, too, have everywhere taught 
 that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and that 
 any connection, other than that of marriage, defiles that 
 temple. 
 
 It is true that the Church early fell into an extreme of 
 asceticism and celibacy. Still the distinctive teachings of 
 Christ must be admitted to present the highest possible 
 ideal of marriage, and the utmost sense of its sacredness. 
 We are not, however, prepared to say that the words of 
 Jesus are to be followed, without admitting any possible 
 limitation or exception. In the few precepts quoted from 
 Him, He apparently admits but one ground of divorce — 
 unfaithfulness; and He forbids re-marriage if the partners 
 are separated through any other cause. Paul extends the 
 grounds to malicious desertion by an unbelieving partner, 
 ^nd apparently permits re-marriage ; yet this permission 
 is doubted by many commentators. 
 
 It may fairly be reasoned in so difficult and important a 
 -natter, that the Master included in unfaithfulness anything 
 which openly and clearly perverted the ends of the relation ; 
 and that Paul, who probably knew of teachings by Him 
 of which we have not heard, inferred even a greater latitude, 
 where so great a separating power as difference of religious 
 faith came in between the partners. 
 
 As we have stated before, the true inference from these 
 early teachings is that the utmost sanctity is to be attached 
 to marriage, and that divorce is only to be permitted from 
 the most serious grounds, which affect the veiy existence 
 of the relation. 
 
 Under the Christian teachings, men are not lightly to 
 enter on marriage ; they are to observe it loyally ; it is a 
 bond for life and death ; much is to be endured for the
 
 30J CESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 sake of sustaining it, even if it be not in all respects 
 complete ; perfect faithfulness and purity are demanded 
 from man as from woman ; if separation occur from light 
 cause, the partners are not permitted to marry another ; 
 and if a final breaking of the tie take place, it must be 
 from very profound and serious reasons, such as make the 
 marriage no true union of body and soul. This we believe 
 to be substantially the Christian doctrine of marriage. 
 
 But as this is the one exception in which Christ's words 
 apply to institutions or outward acts, and not to principles, 
 we may easily be mistaken as to the aj^plication of His 
 teachings. 
 
 What has this moral doctrine accomplished in the world's 
 progress ? The words of the Lord were first uttered amid 
 a community — the Jewish — where polygamy had been 
 tolerated, and free divorce of the wife by the husband 
 was permitted. 
 
 They were thrown as seeds into another society — the 
 Roman — where, as we have shown, divorces were daily, 
 and the marriage relation had reached its lowest state of 
 degradation, and family morals were corrupt to the last 
 degree. The struggle against free divorce, as we have 
 indicated, was a changing one under the so-called Christian 
 emperors of Rome, and throughout the ancient world. 
 Even Justinian was obliged to issue a law,^ which revoked 
 what he had promulgated against too free divorce. Still 
 everywhere into Roman and barbaric society was pene- 
 trating a new conception of marriage, or at least a respect 
 and reverence for it, and an opposition to divorce, such as 
 the ancient world had never known. The Christian con- 
 ception was in harmony with the German, though the 
 northern tribes permitted polygamy, and often indulged in 
 too free divorce. This fresh principle of purity and respect 
 
 ' Nov., 14a
 
 DIVORCE AND ROMAN LAW. 303 
 
 for marriage, did more than anything towards saving the 
 barbaric tribes from the degeneracy which had overtaken 
 the Greeks and Romans. Roman law, before Justinian, 
 showed the effect of the new Faith, in strengthening this 
 bond, but not by any means to the degree which might 
 have been hoped for. Where divorce occurred on account 
 of the guilty conduct of one of the partners, the conse- 
 quences to the guilty one in a pecuniary direction were 
 made more heavy than under the old Roman law, and 
 occasionally re-marriage was restricted ; but divorce by 
 mutual consent, with liberty of re-marriage, was finally 
 permitted. 
 
 The drift of influence, as the Christian doctrines came 
 more and more into power in the Middle Ages, was in 
 favour of the permanence of marriage. Yet this was 
 modified by non-Christian views which also imbued society 
 under the influence of the Church. Celibacy became too 
 highly honoured, and marriage was looked upon as a 
 species of impurity. A vast deal of concealed vice and 
 concubinage existed, especially among the clergy— a 
 natural reaction against these extreme views. The clergy, 
 who were generally unmarried, had the framing of the 
 canon-law on marriage, and in consequence made it the 
 expression of the extreme ascetic doctrine. Under their 
 influence marriage became a sacrament, and for scarcely 
 any cause could be broken ; while the position of the 
 woman was inferior in this relation to what it had been 
 under the purely Christian view. The general churchly 
 view of divorce in the Middle Ages is thus concisely stated 
 by Pres. Woolsey in his excellent essay : ^ (i) That no 
 crime of either partner, being Christian, justified re-marriage 
 to another during the life of the offender. (2) If an 
 
 ' Essay on Divorce. This valuable little book is the clearest and 
 most able monogram on divorce, in modern writing.
 
 304 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 infidel partner deserted a Christian the latter could re- 
 marry. (3) Consorts separated by criminal conduct could 
 unite u ith each other again, but the guilty one must do 
 penance. 
 
 There were conflicting views in regard to the right of 
 re-marriage after separation for criminal conduct ; but on 
 the whole, the prevailing belief was that this should be 
 only a separation, not a divorce. 
 
 These extreme views, going far beyond the Christian 
 doctrine, first discouraging marriage, then making marriage 
 a very heavy burden which could never be removed, pro- 
 duced naturally a great reaction. The Protestant Reformers 
 expressed in their lives and doctrines this reaction. They 
 were, as might be expected, indignant at the fearful amount 
 of corruption and vice, natural and unnatural, which had 
 grown up under the extreme Roman Catholic ideas. They 
 saw that the worst offence against the marriage-bond was 
 looked upon with indifierence or excuse ; and that where 
 this crime separated the partners, it did not relieve the 
 innocent one ; ^ she, perhaps, being compelled to a life of 
 solitude and penury, while her guilty partner continued his 
 round of wicked pleasures, or lived in open concubinage ; 
 or, if of weak nature, she was left to temptations which she 
 could with difficulty resist. The Protestant Reformers 
 were accordingly in favour of freer divorce. There was a 
 difference of view among the Churches, some few holding 
 that the bond could only be broken by death or criminal 
 conduct, but the majority extending the causes of divorce 
 to malicious desertion, and some permitting even cruel 
 treatment or the opinion of the judge to determine a 
 lawful breaking of the tie.^ 
 
 The modern tendency of opinion in Europe, partly as 
 a re-action against excessive strictness, is unquestionably 
 * Woolsey. * Jbid,
 
 EUROPEAN TENDENCIES. 305 
 
 towards freer separation. France has passed through the 
 period of revolutionary ideas, and under the famous Code 
 Civil has permitted great laxity in this matter, but with 
 the fall of the first Empire, she returned to the old eccle- 
 siastical legislation on marriage ; yet this stage of opinion 
 will probably not endure long, and legislation will be ob- 
 tained for more ready divorce. Much freedom of divorce 
 is given by the Prussian Code, yet certain obstacles are 
 thrown in the way of separation from mere caprice ; and 
 in case of criminal conduct, provision is made to compel 
 the guilty partner to make compensation for the benefi*" 
 of the children of the innocent partner.^ 
 
 The Austrian Code is very lax in its restrictions on 
 divorce towards non-Catholics, though retaining the ecclesi- 
 astical laws for Catholics. In Switzerland there is also 
 very considerable freedom of divorce. In England the 
 legislation is much stricter than in other Protestant 
 countries. Separation from " bed and board " is permitted 
 for injuries and cruel treatment, for desertion during two 
 years, or for criminal conduct. Divorce is allowed for 
 the adultery of the wife, and for " incestuous adultery," or 
 bigamy, with other similar offences of the husband. Both 
 parties can remarry at once after divorce ; and the guilty 
 member be united with the partner in crime. The courts 
 are permitted to settle the guilty wife's property on the 
 husband and children. 
 
 United States Law. — The views expressed by courts and 
 jurists in the United States in regard to marriage, bear 
 evidently the stamp of the Christian doctrine, but it cannot 
 be said that American legislation has been at all in har- 
 mony with it. Thus Chief Justice Robertson ^ says, 
 
 * Woolsey, p. 147. 
 
 ^ Logan V. Logan. Quoted by Co7d, sect. 936.
 
 3o6 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 " Marriage being more fundamental and important than any of the 
 social relations, is controlled as to its obligation by a peculiar policy, 
 deemed essential to the welfare of the whole community. Being a 
 contract for life, indissoluble by the consent of the parties merely, it 
 should not be dissolved by the sovereign will for any other causes 
 than such as are subversive of its essential ends, or inconsistent with 
 the general welfare. And it is certainly important to the general 
 stability and harmony of that relation, that the parties should know 
 that having taken each other with all their infirmities and vowed 
 reciprocal fidelity and forbearance for life, it is their interest as well as 
 their duty to bear and forlaear, as far as the resources of love, philoso- 
 phy and religion can enable them." 
 
 And again, 
 
 "The institution of marriage, commencing with the race and at- 
 tending man in all periods, and in all countries, has ever been con- 
 sidered the particular glory of the social system. It has shone forth 
 in dark countries and in dark periods of the world, a bright luminary 
 on his horizon. And but for this institution, all that is valuable, 
 all that is virtuous, all that is desirable in human existence, would 
 long since have faded away in the general retrogression of the race, 
 and in the perilous darkness in which its jOys and its hopes would 
 have been wrecked together.' 
 
 A careful writer on the " Domestic Relations," Schouler, 
 says, 
 
 "When parties united in the solemn responsibility of marriage, can 
 coolly discuss and arrange the preUminaries of final dissolution, and 
 haste to obtain judicial relief for the purpose of forming a new union, 
 as is sometimes done in our land, they are hardly fitted to discharge 
 nature's highest obligations to one another ; certainly they cannot do 
 justice to their children nor to society. Thus may marriage lose half 
 its significance by parting with all its sanctity." ^ 
 
 Judge Story says, 
 
 "It (marriage) appears to me sometimes more than a mere contract. 
 It is rather to be deemed an institution of society, iounded upon the 
 
 * Bishop, On Divorce, p. 13. 
 
 • Schouler. On the Domestic Relations, p. 302.
 
 AMERICAN LEGISLATION. yyj 
 
 conseat and contract of the parties, and in this view it has some 
 pecuharities in its nature, character, operation, and extent of obhga- 
 tion, different from what belongs to ordinary contracts." ^ 
 
 In a work of this nature, it is not necessary to give a 
 detailed sketch of the legislation on divorce in the different 
 American States. In what we have to say, we follow 
 mainly Prest. Woolsey's admirably clear resume. The State 
 where the marriage law was most strict before the civil 
 war, was South Carolina, in which it is stated that no case 
 of divorce ever came before the courts, and no divorce was 
 ever granted by the legislature, nor was ever even a legal 
 separation granted by law. In New York State, the law 
 greatly resembles the English legislation : divorce is per- 
 mitted for adultery, and separation for specific acts, the 
 great differences being that if one of the partners is found 
 guilty of adultery, a re-marriage is not permitted during 
 the lifetime of the innocent member, and that husband and 
 wife are put on precisely the same footing as to criminal 
 conduct as a ground of divorce. 
 
 The majority of the States, however, permit divorce 
 for a great variety of causes, and present a looseness of 
 procedure which has increased the facility for a legal 
 separation on trivial grounds to an alarming extent. In 
 most of the States, adultery, malicious desertion under 
 various conditions, imprisonment for crime, neglect to 
 provide for a wife's maintenance, cruelty and habitual 
 drunkenness, are held as grounds of divorce, and in a 
 few the membership of a religious society which regards 
 marriage to be unlawful. But beyond these, in certain 
 States " divorce is left to the discretion of the court ; and 
 
 * Confi. of Laws, io8, 
 
 ' Maine, North Carolina, Iowa, Rhode Island and Connecticut, 
 {Woolsey, pp. 204, 205.)
 
 308 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 in Connecticut a statute allows divorce for " any such 
 misconduct as permanently destroys the happiness of the 
 petitioner, and defeats the purpose of the conjugal i ela- 
 tion." This particular clause in the statute was repealed 
 in 1878, with very good results in the following year, there 
 being 316 divorces against 401 of the previous year. The 
 effects, however, since that date have not been remark- 
 able. 
 
 It is in the above State, and Indiana, that divorce laws 
 have been most loose. A year's residence in the latter 
 qualified a person to petition for divorce ; the case could 
 be tried thirty days after notices had been published in 
 a newspaper of the county ; the defendant was often 
 ignorant of the proceedings, and both parties were freed 
 by the divorce from the marriage contract. 
 
 The liberty of re-marriage varies exceedingly in the 
 different States, the greater number however putting no 
 restriction on the union of divorced persons. 
 
 The result of this license of divorce in the average 
 number of divorces to the marriages is an instructive fact. 
 Thus from i860 to 1867, in Vermont, out of 15,710 
 marriages there were 730 divorces, or i to 2r5 ; in Mas- 
 sachusetts, from 1 861 to 1866, I to 44"4 ; in Ohio, from 
 1865 to 1866, I to 26 ; and in Connecticut, from i860 
 to 1867, I to 1 1 '40; and in 1864, there was one divorce 
 in that State to nearly every ten marriages. ^ We have 
 not the figures for Indiana. In Prussia, the ratio for 
 non-Catholics in 1855 was i to 29; in Belgium in 1874, 
 I to 272; in France, from 1871 to 1874, i to 152.^ 
 
 It will be seen from this brief sketch, that the Christian 
 doctrine of divorce, as we understand it, has seldom in the 
 world's history been accepted in its pure form. Christi- 
 
 ' Woolscy, pp. 221, 222. 
 Naquet, Le Divorce.
 
 LICENSE IN DIVORCE. 309 
 
 aflity has strenL,^thened marriage in every age. But on 
 one side, has been too much asceticism, or too much 
 strictness with the marriage-tie, and on the other, too much 
 looseness of the bond. 
 
 The present drift is the opposite to that of the Middle 
 Ages, and towards an excessive Hcense in divorce. There 
 can be httle question that the extreme difficulties thrown 
 about separation, such as the English law presents, or 
 such as have been offered in South Carolina, have been 
 unwholesome. They bring about great hardships and 
 injustices in the marriage relation, and tempt to con- 
 cubinage. The latter is said to have been very common in 
 South Carolina under the old law ^ English society among 
 the higher classes is reported as much more contaminated 
 with this relation than is American society under freer 
 divorce laws. Catholic countries under the strict canon 
 law do not present certainly nearly so happy a condition 
 in regard to marriage, as do Protestant countries, where 
 much latitude is allowed. 
 
 On the other hand, the conviction is growing among 
 the most thoughtful persons in the United States, that if 
 a license in divorce increases, such as has been allowed in 
 a few of the States, the utmost peril threatens the most 
 important interests of society. There is danger of marriage 
 losing all its sacredness ; of its being taken up and dropped 
 like concubinage, and the children of these unhappy con- 
 nections floating about, uncared for, on the currents of 
 society. There is nothing as yet in American society of 
 the old Roman license of morals in reijard to marriaue 
 and divorce, and there could not be where Christianity 
 had the faintest influence ; but there are dangers ominous 
 for this relation which are arousing general anxiety. 
 Public opinion in surh States as Indiana and Connecticut, 
 ^ See Bishop, On Divorce,
 
 3TO CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 is strongly running towards greater strictness, and some 
 changes in legislation have been made in this direction. 
 
 Perhaps the most striking modern instance of the efifect 
 of utter freedom of divorce, and liberty of re-marriage, is 
 given in the habits and life of the foreign poor in a city 
 like New York. Here the Irish or German peasant, being 
 removed from the restraints of home and priesthood, ap- 
 plies to his " civil contract " a freedom of action which he 
 would not use in any other contract As the wife grows 
 older and less attractive, she is thrown aside for some more 
 pleasing companion ; the husband migrates to distant 
 parts of the country and disappears, and the unhappy 
 woman and children are left on the world to struggle as 
 they best may. Or again, the wife abandons the husband, 
 and he is compelled to leave the children in neglect ; or 
 marrying again, to place them under that relation, often 
 so cruel among the poor, of the step-mother. It is not 
 strange that one of the prolific causes of the extraordinary 
 crime and misery among children in New York is the 
 looseness of the marriage tie.^ 
 
 Of course, in a more cultivated class, many causes 
 will soften the effects of free divorce. But in the long 
 course of years, the influence upon family life and the 
 future of children, of weakening the marriage bond, even 
 among persons of education, will be parallel to what we 
 see of its effects on the poor in American cities. When 
 among modern races marriage is even less than a civil 
 contract, to be broken not merely by " mutual consent," 
 but by the whim or fancy of either party, when it can be 
 assumed and abandoned as easily as any relation of feel- 
 ing or imagination, then will the sacredness have departed 
 from many of our homes. Human selfishness and passion 
 
 ' See The Dangerous Classes of New York, p. 41. By the Author,
 
 FUTURE EFFECTS OF FREE DIVORCE. 311 
 
 will take the place of duty. Children will be left to un- 
 certain guidance ; the greatest security in modern life 
 undermined, and one of our purest wells of happiness 
 defiled. When this shall have occurred in the modern 
 world a physical degeneracy will commence which will be 
 contemporaneous with the moral, and such races will lose 
 power and virtue, until, as in the Roman empire, more 
 vigorous peoples take their places. 
 
 It is true that under a theory of free divorce a very 
 happy marriage in favourable circumstances may occur. 
 But so a happy concubinage is sometimes known. The 
 question is, How will society generally tend if there is 
 unlimited license of separation and re-marriage? Human 
 selfishness and masculine caprice and passion seem best 
 cured by throwing a peculiar sacredness and earnestness 
 about marriage, so that it be not lightly entered upon, and 
 be loyally carried through. The home must be made 
 secure and stable ; children must not be left to uncertain 
 care ; and each partner must feel constrained to govern 
 fancy or selfishness with a view to the loyalty of the 
 relation. 
 
 Notwithstanding the facts we have mentioned, on the 
 whole, especially in the Middle States, it may be said that 
 the marriage condition is happier and more often founded 
 on affection, and that concubinage is less known there 
 than anywhere else in the civilized world. Woman nearly 
 occupies, in America, the position which Christianity 
 seems to assign her — of the moral leader and inspirer 
 of society and the equal of man in personal rights, with 
 the liberty of nearly all possible development of her 
 capacities. 
 
 In a State like New York the strictness of the English 
 law is tempered by the freedom easily enjoyed by dis- 
 satisfied partners in other States. Marriage, among the
 
 3ia GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 intelligent classes, is highly reverenced, and not easily 
 broken. Only grave causes are usually held in society 
 to justify divorce, and yet there is no absolute yoke in 
 the relation. The conscious freedom enjoyed, and the 
 sacredness attached to the bond, have combined under 
 New York law to make marriages unusually stable and 
 often peculiarly happy. There is still too much license 
 of divorce, owing to the legislation of other States ; and 
 the partner who has separated for trivial causes often 
 takes the liberty of re-marriage to another too readily. 
 The Christian ideal (if we understand it correctly) is not 
 yet reached ; yet it is approached. 
 
 As society everywhere advances in morality and refine- 
 ment and intelligence, it will more and more draw near 
 the model which Christ and His apostles have sketched of 
 marriage, to the casta convcubia of which Lucretius speaks. 
 Equal chastity will be expected from man and woman ; 
 the body will be as " the temple of God " ; two natures 
 v/ill tend to be one in a relation formed by the Creator 
 and esteemed beyond all other relations, — a bond only 
 to be broken for extreme causes, so sacred that, if dis- 
 solved for light reasons, it is still in conscience held 
 binding. 
 
 Legislation, as it advances, will tend in this direction to 
 solidify and firmly establish marriage, to make quick di- 
 vorces difficult, to throw the burden and penalty of the vio- 
 lation of the bond on the guilty one, to protect the children, 
 and to give the dissatisfied or disagreeing partners time and 
 opportunity for reconciliation ; and yet it will not force an 
 unfortunate woman or man, bound to a brutal or unfaithful 
 partner, for ever to be in bondage to a relation which has 
 no foundation of affection or respect. The laws of the 
 future, like the Christian doctrine of marriage, will draw a 
 via media between the strictness of the Catholic canon-law
 
 CONCUBINAGE. 313 
 
 and the license of Protestant practice and law in regard 
 to marriage and divorce. 
 
 In regard to concubinage, Christianity works everywhere 
 to extirpate it. It has continually tended through all 
 modern history to do away with illicit connections between 
 the sexes. In this matter the Church, at certain periods 
 of its history, has been fearfully inconsistent with the 
 teachings of the Master. At present, however, it leads 
 the morality of the world on this subject. To the Faith 
 preached in Galilee, Roman law owed its first tinge of 
 humanity in regard to the children of these unfortunate 
 connections. As we have shown in an earlier chapter, 
 Constantine, under the influence of the new ideas in the 
 world, legitimated illegitimate children per subsequens ma- 
 trinio7iiuni, by a subsequent marriage, his object being, as 
 the code states, to break up this permitted habit of semi- 
 matrimony.^ Justinian continued and confirmed this 
 humane legislation ; and, under the Popes, it was preserved 
 by two rescripts of Pope Alexander, in the Decretals ^ of 
 Gregory (i 172 A.D. and 11 80). This legislation was imi- 
 tated in Scotland and in most of Central Europe. Similar 
 provisions protecting the unhappy children of unlawful con- 
 nections, have been engrafted in the legislation of most of 
 the States of the American Union, and in some States even 
 a formal declaration of the father,^ affirming a subsequent 
 marriage, is sufficient to legitimate the children, if it be 
 filed in court and recorded. 
 
 Humane progress in the matter of divorce and con- 
 cubinage has been more influenced by the teachings of 
 Galilee than by any other one cause in history. Yet it is 
 evident that civilized society has not at all in general 
 
 • Licita consuetudo semi-matrimonii. {Cod. Lib. 6, tit. 57.) 
 
 • Dec, iv. 17, I, 
 
 • Schouler,
 
 314 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 reached the ideal of purity and of marriage presented by 
 the great Teacher. As mankind becomes better and 
 happier it continually approaches that ideal ; and the 
 perfection of humanity will be almost attained when the 
 Christian conception of marriage is realized by man and 
 by woman.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 DEGRADATION OF WOMAN. 
 
 It would seem at first thought that one terrible social evil 
 existed which Christianity had not only not mitigated, but 
 scarcely even touched — the prostitution of women. The 
 class of human beings who live by selling that which is 
 above all price is still the most hopeless and irredeemable 
 under modern civilization. Christ Himself had evidently 
 felt a profound compassion for these unfortunate and guilty 
 persons ; and this example in all ages has led His followers 
 to special efforts to improve and save these victims of 
 their own folly and poverty and man's passions. But as 
 society has become more and more permeated with the 
 Christian sentiment and sense of obligation of purity, 
 these persons, who persistently and openly violated it, 
 have become more and more sunken by contrast. Their 
 own sense of degradation is the measure of the prevailing 
 standard of society. When the Greek wives and maidens 
 were as they were in the time of Socrates, the lietairae 
 might well be the leaders of society. And when Roman 
 married life had reached the low stage of the period of 
 the early empire, legislation to prevent high-born matrons 
 from becoming prostitutes would be natural.^ One of tne 
 safeguards of modern society is in the perhaps exaggerated 
 sentiment of contempt and condemnation against those who 
 
 * Tacttus (Ann. 2. 83). 
 3»*
 
 3i6 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 are lewd for hire. But this protection around the virtuous 
 seems to still more shut out the vicious from the sacred 
 circle of purity. Society generally is purified, marriage is 
 more sacred, woman is in a higher position of respect and 
 influence, but the class of female offenders against sexual 
 virtue is even lower than in antiquity. 
 
 But even with this class some great steps in advance 
 have been made. There are no longer those, except in 
 non-Christian lands, who sacrifice virtue and purity as an 
 offering to base ideals of superstition, and become prosti- 
 tutes at the shrine of a deity. There are no longer large 
 classes of persons, like those under the Roman Empire, 
 who as slaves held their virtue at the will of another, or 
 were compelled as libidinous actors to live for the lusts of 
 men. Neither religion nor law nor social custom compels 
 the " lost women " to remain as they are. They have no 
 unchangeable profession any further than their own weak- 
 ness of will fixes it. They are the victims of their own 
 idleness or folly or bad habits. 
 
 On the other hand, all the best influences of society arc 
 seeking to reclaim them and to diminish this source of so 
 many calamities. Christianity has, as it were, only begun 
 its century-long struggle with this tremendous social evil. 
 If the student reads carefully Plato's Laws,^ he will find 
 there a curious passage, already partially quoted in this 
 work, where the philosopher of love regards the terrible 
 unnatural lusts of men in Greece at that day with some- 
 what of the hopelessness that a fervent Christian philo- 
 sopher of this century might feel in regard to this vice 
 among women. 
 
 Plato believes that certain great moral forces or ideals 
 will, in a far distant future, purify society of these morbid 
 passions \ but to him this result is as far away as, for 
 
 * JSIomoi, ix.
 
 REFORM BEGUN. 317 
 
 instance, universal peace is now to the Christian. The 
 modern student has seen society almost cleansed of these 
 imiDurities, under the influence of the new ideal before the 
 world. So, after many ages, it will be under Christianity 
 with woman's vice and impurity. 
 
 The first great step has been made under the new Faith. 
 Woman's fall could not happen without man's temptation. 
 The duty of masculine purity (though only partially recog- 
 nized by Christians) is most clearly taught by Christ. As 
 we have said before, He was not alone in preaching this 
 doctrine. The stoical moralists had taught it. But in 
 every form He and His apostles seek to impress this obli- 
 gation on the human conscience. A certain number of 
 His followers in every age are so inspired by His spirit, 
 that they endeavour " to become pure even as He is pure." 
 This number will continually increase, and their opinion 
 and practice will more and more influence society. As 
 man becomes pure one great source of temptation will 
 be diminished to women who are idle or frivolous or des- 
 perate. When the conviction spreads through every com- 
 munity, that in this offence, man sins with the woman ; 
 and, though the moral evil be not to him as to her, yet 
 that he, as she, holds a temple sacred to the Holy Spirit, 
 and equally with her has soiled and profaned it ; and that 
 he, as she, has separated himself from his ideal and Lord, 
 and must answer in his own soul, not only for the injury 
 he has brought upon himself, but for that ruin he has 
 aided to bring upon another, — then will an enormous dyke 
 as it were be formed against the spread of prostitution. 
 
 Another great power restraining its increase will be 
 the Christian and moral influences which are now thrown 
 more and more around the childhood of the working and 
 poorer classes. Public women of this kind are not gene- 
 tally, as is supposed, the victims of deception and wrong
 
 3i8 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 by men. They are usually poor girls who have grown up 
 without good influences, and not in habits of regular work 
 or industry ; they fall early into ways of idleness, among 
 bad company, and are ready to earn pleasures and luxu- 
 ries by unnatural means. It is this great class of untaught 
 and neglected poor children who mainly supply the class 
 of prostitutes. Of course there are other elements, but 
 these form the immense majority. Now to this class, 
 Christianity, under modern methods, offers at once its 
 peculiar influences. It holds before these children a 
 sublime ideal of purity ; it teaches each one her immense 
 value in the universe ; it trains the little ones to habits 
 of industry and daily work ; it inculcates purity of per- 
 son and heart, and prepares each character for the tough 
 struggle of life, and takes the child almost out of the class 
 of persons who are exposed to this great vice. 
 
 A remarkable instance is given of the effect of such 
 influences on many thousands of very poor children, during 
 a space of twenty-five years, in the charitable work of an 
 association — the Children's Aid Society in New York.^ 
 From the careful reports of this charity, it appears that 
 but very few children among the many thousands who go 
 forth from the industrial schools of this society, ever fall 
 into criminal courses, but become honest and industrious 
 working women. 
 
 Now it is quite conceivable that such influences could 
 be vastly extended, and everywhere the children of the 
 poor brought under this moral discipline and training, 
 so that one great source of this evil should be much 
 dried up. 
 
 Then, as Christianity prevails in the world, marriage 
 will be held in higher and higher esteem, and all irregular 
 connections be discouraged, and legislation which inter- 
 * See Dangerous Classes of New York, by the Author
 
 EFFECTS OF RELIGION. 319 
 
 feres with early marriage be discountenanced. Moreover, 
 the morality of the Gospel works against selfish display, 
 luxury and extravagance, which now under modern habits 
 so much prevent marriage. Where self-control, sobriety 
 and economy are the rule, there early and natural con- 
 nections between the sexes will be more the custom. To 
 the young man, next to religion, the strongest safeguard 
 against vice is a chivalric ideal of woman, and certainly 
 the influence of this faith has always been to give her this 
 exalted position. 
 
 The specific Christian influences will be more and more 
 to exalt marriage, to make it the perfect example of all hu- 
 man relations, to lead the young to sacrifice self-indulgence 
 for it, and above all, to present an ideal of purity, for 
 both man and woman, in the life and teachings of the 
 great Founder of the Faith, which will raise both sexes 
 above the reach of unlawful passions or unnatural indul- 
 gences. This will not be as in the past an ideal of 
 an unnatural and impossible asceticism, but simply of 
 purity and self-control. It is entirely possible that all 
 society may become as a few, inspired with this religion, 
 are now. We cannot bay that Christianity has as yet 
 made any vast change in regard to this vice. But we can 
 say that it has begun changes. We can see that it 
 has purified society, that it is redeeming many thousands 
 of youth from this evil, and that it has implanted a power 
 of resistance and a sense of purity almost unknown before. 
 We see clearly that it only needs time to perfect its work- 
 ings and to greatly diminish if not extirpate, one of tile 
 monster evils of liumanity
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 INTERNATIONAL LAW.— ARBITRATION. 
 
 There is evidently one field in which the great moral 
 forces of history have had little effect, and where Chris- 
 tianity itself at first sight seems a failure ; we mean the 
 public relations between nations. War still remains the 
 most fearful curse upon mankind ; it still desolates thou- 
 sands of homes, making innumerable orphans and widows, 
 destroying in a day the results of long and patient labour, 
 and laying up in taxation and the support of armies im- 
 mense burdens upon the labouring classes. Nations are 
 in the same relations to one another in regard to questions 
 of right or property in which the barons of the fourteenth 
 century were to each other. As then a dispute throughout 
 Europe upon the title to real estate was settled by duel, 
 and as private gentlemen and individual cities in any 
 difference with their neighbours resorted at once to 
 "private war," declared under due formalities, so now 
 between peoples, disputes in regard to territory or on 
 questions of right and honour are supposed to have but 
 one court of decision — the arbitrament of armies. Leaving 
 out of view the wars where great principles are involved, 
 like the war for the independence of Hungary, the Franco- 
 Austrian struggle for the freedom of Italy, the American 
 Civil War and others, there are still numerous either use- 
 less or unjust contests, such as those of the United States 
 
 aas
 
 EXPENSE OF WAR. 321 
 
 with the Indian tribes, of Great Britain with inferior races 
 like the Chinese, Zuhis, and Afghans, sufficient to phow 
 that Christianity has barely touched international relations 
 among the most highly civilized communities. It is esti- 
 mated by De Card that recent wars alone in Europe have 
 cost the people fifty milliards (50,000,000,000) of franca 
 The present peace establishment of Europe embraces over 
 2,000,000 men, with a liability of 4,000,000 more to be 
 called out, and a constant expense to the people of 
 i^6oo,000,000 per annum. Every country of Continental 
 Europe is eaten up by the taxation necessary on account 
 of the hostile position of peoples who have substantially 
 the same interests. 
 
 To the Christian Church, international law, or the cus- 
 toms and rules of conduct between nations, owes little ; 
 but to the moral and religious principles with which 
 Christianity has been slowly impregnating mankind, it 
 has a deep obligation and will be more and more indebted. 
 It must be remembered that international law, as a body, 
 is a creation of the times since Christianity was a living 
 force in public affairs. It is true that many of its rules 
 and principles are derived from the Roman law, but the 
 modern spirit which has especially characterized it since 
 Grotius will be seen to be essentially influenced by the 
 new Faith. 
 
 Among ancient peoples, the Greeks appear to have 
 had no body of international law which they recognised 
 as binding them to other nations. The stranger to 
 them was an enemy and a "barbarian." There were 
 indeed customs often acknowledged between their own 
 different tribes and States which rested on principles of 
 justice and humanity. But even among themselves such 
 actions were permitted, as the slaughter of prisoners in 
 cold blood, the execution of generals after misfortune in 
 
 Y
 
 322 GESTA CHRISTI 
 
 war, the infliction of perpetual slavery on captives, the 
 absolute annihilation of hostile cities, the violation of 
 women and murder of children after victory, the useless 
 punishment of hostages and violence to ambassadors, and 
 bloody personal revenge on enemies,^ and similar bar- 
 barisms. 
 
 The Romans possessed the germs of international law 
 in their "Fecial rules" {jura Jccialia) or religious customs, 
 recognized by the various Italian states in their early 
 history, in regard to declaring war and other duties be- 
 tween States. It was something that a band of priests 
 could restrain warriors and that war could not be made 
 without legal forms. The Roman Jus Gentium arose 
 later, and was not the law of nations in the modern sense, 
 nor does it appear that the Romans believed in a code or 
 collection of customs and laws between nations which 
 would, for instance, restrain Rome itself if it were not 
 Roman law. No members of a foreign and independent 
 nation not in alliance with Rome had any rights which 
 the Roman tribunals could enforce. Even Justinian's 
 code, in a well known passage,- asserted that a people 
 not in alliance with Rome could keep what it could take 
 from the Romans, and that the latter had an equal right 
 towards the other. In other words, the natural relation of 
 nations to one another was that of hostility. 
 
 The Jus Gentium was gradually extracted from the codes 
 and customs of the several provinces and from the Roman 
 law, being the common element in both, or that part which 
 rested on principles of equity or fairness. It was naturally 
 a more liberal code than the civil law, and finally entered 
 into ar.d partly absorbed Roman law itself. As Cicero 
 
 ' Ward, Laws of Nations, vol. i. p. 178. 
 * Dig., Lib. xlix. 15, 3.
 
 INTERNATIONAL LAW IN ROME. 323 
 
 says, " the civil law was not always the law of nations, but 
 the law of nations must always be the civil law." ^ 
 
 The Stoical jurists, and after them the codifiers of Justi- 
 nian's code, assumed that this common element in the law 
 of nations was \.\v&jus tiaturale, or natural law, so that the 
 definition of the law of nations by Gaius' and Justinian's 
 code would not be a bad statement now. " What natural 
 reason has determined among all men, that among all is 
 constituted and called the law of nations." ^ But in practice 
 the Romans scarcely recognised any law of nations binding 
 great and weak powers, Rome and the barbarians. There 
 is but little trace in their writings or public action of a 
 belief in a code of rules and customs obligatory on the 
 mutual conduct of Rome and independent nations. 
 
 "Against a public enemy there is always authority,"^ 
 was an ancient maxim. " Whatever I have done in regard 
 to enemies of the State, the law of war defends," * is an 
 axiom of the Roman general, according to Livy. Cicero,^ 
 indeed, in a very eloquent passage describes a universal 
 law, for all times and nations, one and' eternal, governing 
 all ; but his grand rhetoric did not picture anything which 
 existed, or was likely to exist, in the Roman world. 
 
 Ward {Laws of Nations) says very justly that the theory 
 of the classic nations in regard to international relations 
 
 1 . , . quod civile, non idem continuo gentium ; quod autem 
 gentium idem civile esse debet. {De Offic, 3, 17.) 
 
 2 Quod vero naturalis ratio inter omnes homines constituit, id apud 
 omnes peraeque custoditur, vocaturque Jus gentium, quasi quo jure 
 omnes gentus utuntur. {JiisL, lib. i, tit. 2. Gains, lib. 2, tit. 10.) 
 
 2 Adversus hostem, aeterna auctoritas. {Tab. Duod.y and Cic. d£ 
 
 Offic.) 
 
 * Quidquid in hostibus feci, jus belli defendit. {Liv., xxvi. 30.) 
 
 * Nequo erit alia lex Romae, alia Athenis, alia nunc, alia post hac ; 
 sed et omnes gentes et omni tempore una lex et sempiterna et immu 
 tabilis, etc. (Z?e Rep., 1. iii. c. 22.)
 
 324 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 was, that men were bound to no duties to one another 
 without some express contract, Foreigners could any- 
 where be seized, imprisoned, enslaved or killed, without 
 any breach of human or Divine laws. 
 
 Even Justinian's code seems to allow that a prisoner of 
 war may rightly be made a slave.^ 
 
 In the Middle Ages, from the fall of the Roman empire 
 to the eleventh century, there may be said to have been 
 no international law, or only a confusion of customs, some 
 of which had been influenced by principles of equity, while 
 others rested on barbarism. The Italian States, which 
 were especially under the influence of commerce, in the 
 twelfth century, were among the first to frame treaties in 
 regard to the liberty of the seas and the right of prize in 
 the time of peace. The early commercial codes of the 
 north of Europe, in the Mediterranean, and of Europeans 
 in the East, contained many features of modern inter- 
 national law. Piracy, however, was still allowed in the 
 time of war. The first check to " private war " on the 
 sea was made by privateering, near the beginning of the 
 eleventh century, as we shall hereafter detail. 
 
 One of the first appeals of one nation to the others, as if 
 they formed one commonwealth, was in the twelfth cen- 
 tury ; and in the thirteenth century we find the good king, 
 St. Louis of France, chosen arbitrator between Henry 
 III. of England and his barons. In 1356 Edward III. 
 made an appeal to " all Christendom " against John of 
 France, as if a certain bond united all European peoples. 
 Yet so little progress had international right made, that in 
 the reign of St. Louis, we are told by his biographer that 
 if two kings were at war and one of them died, the ambas- 
 sadors who were sent reciprocally remained prisoners and 
 
 ' Et liber homo noster ab eis captus, servus fit et eorum. {Dig^ 
 lib. xlix. tit. IS, 3)
 
 BARBARITIES IN MIDDLE AGES. 325 
 
 slaves.* The barbarities of the Middle Ages in warfare 
 were equal to those of the worst of the Roman times. The 
 Normans are said by historians to have put their prisoner.-^ 
 to death under terrible tortures ; some were suspended over 
 slow fires and hung by their feet or thumbs ; some had 
 their brains crushed by tight ligatures ; some were thrown 
 into dungeons with serpents. Female prisoners were 
 exposed to the most brutal treatment. The Scotch, in 
 their invasion of England under David I., murdered the 
 sick and the aged in their beds, infants on the breasts of 
 the mother, and priests at the altar. The Italians in their 
 invasion of Sicily at the close of the twelfth century were 
 equally cruel, burying prisoners alive, burning priests and 
 throwing them into the sea. Of the many wars between 
 the French and English, an old author describing their 
 effects says, " Churches are despoiled ; men everywhere 
 murthered or wounded, others put to death or tortured ; 
 matrons ravished ; maydes forcibly drawn out of their 
 parent's arms to be deflowered ; towns daily taken, daily 
 spoiled, daily defaced ; the riches of the inhabitants carried 
 whither the conquerors thinke good ; houses and villages 
 round about set on fire ; no kind of cruelty is left unprac- 
 tised." 2 
 
 Nor were wanting in the Middle Ages prominent indi- 
 vidual instances of similar barbarism. The natural son of 
 Frederick II. in 1264, in his war with the Pope, punished 
 with mutilation and death all priests taken prisoners. 
 Prisoners were not uncommonly either mutilated or killed. 
 The old Roman custom or law,^ that an enemy who had 
 
 1 Suivant la coutume alors usitee en Payennie comme en Chretiente 
 que quand dcix Princes cstaicnt en guerre, si I'un d'eux venoit a 
 mourir, les Ambassadeurs qui s'estoient envoyes reciproquement, 
 demeuroient prisonniers et esclaves. (jfoiiiville, Vie de St. I^uis.) 
 
 2 Quoted by Ward, in Laws of Nations. 
 
 • Varum in pace qui pervenerunt ad akeros, si bcllum subito exar-
 
 326 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 come to another country, even in time of peace, could, i( 
 war broke out, be enslaved, existed in Europe in the Middle 
 Ages ; and the enslavement of prisoners did not cease till 
 the middle of the seventeenth century ; the treaties in 
 that century generally stipulating that prisoners should 
 not be sent by their captors to the galleys. 
 
 Among the individual instances of cruelty, it is related 
 by the chroniclers that Rufus, son of William the Con- 
 queror, cut off the hands and feet of the Welsh prisoners 
 taken by him. The Emperor Barbarossa is said to have 
 delivered all the prisoners taken in Milan to the ex- 
 ecutioner or to have shot them off from military engines. 
 These instances of cruelty in that age could be multi- 
 plied without limit. Poisoned weapons and missiles were 
 used even as late as the fifteenth century. In the same 
 century it was a public custom to hang prisoners taken 
 in a siege ; and it appears to have been a recognised law 
 of war that a relieving force, entering a fortified place after 
 the siege was commenced, was liable to the severest punish- 
 ments. 
 
 Officers who had fought gallantly and were beaten in 
 the open field, were often, after capture, executed by the 
 victor. Ambassadors were frequently killed on their mis- 
 sions of peace. In fact, it may be said that from the time 
 of Caesar till the fifteenth century there was very little 
 progress in the laws of war. Christianity had not so 
 touched the peoples of Europe as even to soften super- 
 ficially the barbarism of ancient times. 
 
 The only redeeming features were an indirect result 
 of Christianity — the compassion and courtesy introduced 
 by chivalry and the ransoming of prisoners among the 
 knights. But these were humanities which were ex- 
 
 sisset, eorum servi efficiuntur, apud quos jam hostes suo facto depre- 
 henduntnr. {Di^.y xlix. 15, 12.)
 
 ENSLAVEMENT OF PRISONERS. 327 
 
 etjised only among a class. They did not reach the 
 common soldier, or benefit the peasant and labourer. 
 Fearful acts of atrocity against peasants and citizens by 
 the kings and generals of the Middle Ages are often 
 reported. 
 
 The first great change was in the treatment of prisoners. 
 Suarez, in the sixteenth century, states that the old custom 
 of the Roman law of nations, of making slaves of prisoners, 
 had been changed in the Church, and was no longer ob- 
 served among Christians.^ An old English historian, Sir 
 Thomas Smith (1570 a.d.) thus states the reform: — 
 " Howbeit since our Realme hath received the Christian 
 religion, which maketh us all brethren in Christ, conservos 
 (fellow-servants), men beganne to have conscience to hold 
 in captivitie and such e.xtra-bondage, him whom they must 
 acknowledge to be their brother ; that is, who looketh in 
 Christ and by Christ to have equal portion with them in 
 the gospel and salvation." ' 
 
 Ayala writing in the sixteenth century says, that in 
 the wars of Christians, the enslavement of prisoners is not 
 permitted, nor perpetual imprisonment, and that all such 
 wars are only civil wars, because all , are " brethren in 
 Christ." 3 
 
 It was not, however, till the treaty of Munster (1648) 
 that it became the general custom of European nations to 
 release all prisoners at the end of the war, without ransom. 
 This important step in humane progress, it should be 
 
 ' Sic enim Jus Gentium de servitute captivorum in bello justo, in 
 Ecclesia mutatum est, et inter Christianos, id non servatur. (JDe legi- 
 bus. Suarez) Ward, vol. ii. p. 27. 
 
 2 Commonwealth of England, previously cited. 
 
 3 Et in prima receptum est ut in bellis Christianorum servitus non 
 sit. Haec enim bella non plus quam civilia sint quia omnes in 
 Christi fratres, etc. (Lib. iii.-ix., De Jure et Bellicis officiis, 1597.) 
 See also p. 54, ibid.,ss\6. Alberici Gentilis, De Jure Belli, Oxford, 1877.
 
 528 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 noted, is coincident with the revival of pure Christianity 
 in England and many portions of the Continent. Previous 
 to this treaty, in 1 630 we find a distinct allusion to the 
 slavery of prisoners of war in the treaty of Madrid be- 
 tween Spain and England (Art xxviii.). " Prisoners 
 taken in war on both sides, although condemned to the 
 galleys, shall be set at liberty and dismissed upon payment 
 of their expenses by those who are not in the galleys, and 
 upon payment of their ransom by those who had formerly 
 agreed to it." 
 
 Many of the non-Christian nations held that no faith 
 was to be kept with those not of their own belief Even 
 the Koran taught this.^ The Mohammedan powers in 
 the north of Africa enslaved all shipwrecked persons and 
 prisoners, and tortured their captives. Only direct treaties 
 with European powers " secured the abolition of these 
 barbarities. 
 
 The Turks in the sixteenth century treated even am- 
 bassadors with inhumanity, though European customs had 
 become gradually humane towards these officials, and 
 resident ambassadors were permitted to dwell with safety 
 in the country of a rival or enemy. The Spaniards 
 imitated the Turks in putting prisoners to death or send- 
 ing them to the galleys ; even in the declaration that no 
 faith was to be kept with heretics. 
 
 It was not till 1828, that Turkey and Persia agreed to 
 exchange prisoners according to the custom of Christian 
 nations.^ 
 
 One of the earliest expositions of international duties 
 was made about 1506 A.D. by Prior Honore Bonnor, in a 
 
 * Hedaya, ix. 3. 
 
 * Treaty with Algiers in 1686, and with Tripoli and Tunis. IVard^ 
 ro\ ii. p. 331. 
 
 * Manning's Laws of Nations, p. 162.
 
 IVA/?S AGAINST INFIDELS. 329 
 
 work called " L'arbre des Batailles." ^ This writer shows 
 strongly the influence of his professed faith^ in his recom- 
 mendations : he teaches that battles should be avoided on 
 holy days; that those dying in unjust wars do not go to 
 heaven, and claims the exemption of Churchmen, pilgrims, 
 the sick and infirm from the duties and evils of war. He 
 even permits the students of belligerent powers to visit the 
 universities of one another during the struggle. 
 
 The early writers on international law seem to have 
 been in advance of the practice of the Church in respect 
 to wars with non-Christian nations. The author quoted 
 above says : " By what right can we make war against 
 Sarassins or other infidels ? I will prove that we cannot 
 do it lawfully for their being infidels . . . Moreover 
 we should not and cannot, according to the Holy Scrip- 
 tures, oblige infidels to embrace the holy faith and baptism, 
 but must leave them with the free will which God has 
 given them." ^ Ayala makes a similar humane protest 
 (lib. 1-28). 
 
 A striking instance of the influence of Christianity in 
 the barbarous period of Europe, is contained in Alcuin's 
 letter to Charlemagne, wherein he reminds him to show 
 mercy to prisoners, even as God will show mercy to him.^ 
 
 Grotms. — The great reforms in modern international 
 law, due especially to the spirit of Christianity, began in 
 great part with the eminent Dutch publicist, Grotius, early 
 in the seventeenth century. He thus states the motives 
 which prompted him to his great work : 
 
 " For I saw, prevailing through the Christian world, a license in 
 
 * Uarbre des Batailles, 1 506, Lyon. 
 
 ' Ibid., quoted by Digby, 3,153 {Mor. Cath). 
 
 ' Memor sit pietas vestra captivorum, etc. {Al. Ep, 90).
 
 330 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 making war, of which even barbarians would have been ai^hameJ ; 
 recourse being had to arms for slight reason or no reason, and when 
 arms were once taken up, all reverence for divine and human law was 
 thrown away, just as if men were thenceforth authorized to comiiiit 
 all crime without restraint." ' 
 
 The Law of Nature, on which, as is well known, he 
 especially bases his Law of Nations, he ascribes to God, 
 and speaks of express laws of God as "restraining 
 passion," and touches the key-note of modern humane 
 progress in these words : 
 
 " The Sacred History doth not a little provoke us to mutual love by 
 leaching that we are all of us born of the same first parents." - 
 
 The reforms of the laws of war in modern times have 
 been especially in the direction of limiting, so far as 
 possible, its evil effects to the combatants, of allowing no 
 damage which did not conduce to the purpose of the war, 
 and of abolishing the dictum of barbarism, that if two 
 nations are at war, all the citizens of each must be also 
 enemies. The last principle still lingers in the writings of 
 many publicists, but Grotius was too much imbued with 
 the Religion of Love to be willing to recognise it. Of 
 war, some of his opinions are still worth quoting and 
 remembering. 
 
 " We Christians are especially taught to expose our own lives to the 
 greatest perils that can be, to preserve the lives and procure the ever- 
 lasting welfare of others, in imitation of our great Lord and Master. 
 . . . How much more reason have we to forbear the prosecution of 
 our just rights when they cannot be obtained without the effusion of so 
 much blood, and the destruction of so many men's lives and estates, 
 besides other mischiefs which war usually brings with it." "When 
 we consider that by the Hebrew Law, he who had slain a man even 
 
 ' De Jure Belli^ etc., Hugo Grotius (preliminr ry statement). Evait'f 
 tians. 1782. 
 * Preface.
 
 CROTIUS' IDEAS IN ADVANCE OF HIS AGE. 331 
 
 without intending it, was obliged to fly ; that God forbade His templr 
 to be built by David, who is related to have carried on private wars, 
 because he had shed much blood ; that even among the ancient Greeks, 
 those who had stained their hands with manslaughtei', even without 
 fault, had need of expiation, how can any one fail to see, especially 
 among Christians, what an unhappy and disastrous thing and how 
 strenuously to be avoided, is a war, even when not unjust '' (p. 283). 
 
 " Good faith," which was at that day so generally violated 
 in the relations of nations, is thus urged, on both secular 
 and religious grounds : 
 
 "And, therefore, it is especially the office of kings to cherish good 
 faith, first for the sake of conscience, and then for the sake of good 
 opinion, by which the authority of kingdoms stands. Let them be 
 certain, therefore, that they who instil into them acts of deceit, arc 
 themselves the deceivers they would make them. Doctrines cannot 
 long work well which make men unfit for society with man, and we 
 may add, hateful to God" (c. 25, t. 11). 
 
 His views of privateering have anticipated the reforms 
 of this century, and are evidently guided by the Christian 
 theory of life. 
 
 " But even if justice, strictly speaking, be not violated, there may be 
 an offence against loving our neighbour, especially in a Christian 
 aspect, as if it appears that such privateering will not hurt the general 
 body of the enemy, or their king, or the guilty portion of them, but the 
 innocent ; and it will inflict upon them calamities which it would be 
 cruel to inflict even on those who are personally indebted to us. And 
 if besides this, such a privateering is not likely to conduce either to 
 the termination of the war, or to any notable damage of the enemy's 
 public power, then it must be considered unworthy of a right-minded 
 man, and especially a Christian, to make a gain in this way out of the 
 unhappiness of the times" (c. 18, t. 14). 
 
 He opposes from religious grounds that rule of the 
 Law of Nations, derived from Roman Law, that prisoners 
 should be slaves, 
 
 " But even among Christians, it is universally agreed that being at 
 war among themselves, they that are taken prisoners are not made
 
 J32 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 slaves, so as to sell them, or to enforce them to servile ofifices, or ta 
 impose upon them such things as they usually do in slavery. . , , 
 And this at least (though but a small matter), hath the Christian 
 religion brought to perfection, which Socrates attempted to have done 
 among the Greeks but could not. . . . That such as are taken in 
 war, are kept in safe custody till their ransom be paid" (c. 3, t. 7, 8). 
 . . . " But in our days, not only among Christians, but even among 
 Mohammedans, this right of captivity without the time of war, is worn 
 out of use. The necessity being taken away by virtue of that con- 
 nection or affinity, wherein nature hath joined us, which is now re- 
 acknowledged to be between all mankind" (c. 3, 9, 19). 
 
 In harmony with his faith, he exhorts humanity towards 
 women, clerks, farmers, merchants, and to all in battle who 
 cry quarter, or offer to yield. He quotes the lines 
 
 " Quique suos cives quod signa adversa tulerunt 
 Non credat fecisse nefas ! 
 
 And declares " cives " to mean not neighbours of the same 
 town or country, but citizens of the same world (3, 11, 16), 
 as if he anticipated the modern doctrine of international 
 law, that governments may be enemies, and yet their 
 citizens not hostile. 
 
 "All duels," he adds, "and trials by combatants, seeing that they 
 are of no use, either to the decision of right or the ending of a war, 
 but merely for ostentation of strength, are not only repugnant to our 
 Christian profession, but to the laws of humane society" (c. 3, 15, 14). 
 " No useless damage is to be done, and therefore what some divines 
 have observed and taught, I must needs assent unto, that it is the 
 duty of such commanders as would be thought Christians (as far as in 
 them lies) to intercede for, and hinder the sacking and pillaging of 
 towns and cities, especially of such things in them as add but little to 
 the conquest being taken away, so that such acts Christian clemency 
 and justice itself doth abhor. Surely there is a greater tie and obli- 
 gation among Christians than there ever was anciently among the 
 Greeks." 
 
 The great Christian publicist urges also to spare the 
 property of those who have in no way offended as the
 
 GROTIUS ON ARBITRATION. 333 
 
 authors of the war, " for the rules of charity are of larger 
 extent than those of justice " (3, 14, 4). 
 
 The violation of women, so common after the assault of 
 fortified places, he condemns as contrary to the laws of 
 war. On the latest conquest of Christianity and humane 
 principle in the field of international relations, 
 
 Arbitration, the Dutch publicist of the seventeenth 
 century is in harmony with the most advanced views of 
 the nineteenth century. He says, — 
 
 " For if, both Jews and Christians have thought fit to appoint 
 arbitrators among themselves to determine all controversies to the 
 intent that brotliers should not go to law with unbelievers, how much 
 more reason is there that such arbitrators or judges should be chosen 
 by us to prevent mischief far greater than going to law, namely : spoil, 
 rapine, murther, yea and sometimes desolation, which are the unhappy 
 concomitants of cruel war." " And indeed, it is very unfit for princes 
 who profess themselves to be followers of Christ, to rush into arms one 
 against another with so much bitterness, seeing that there are other 
 means found out to compromise their quarrels " (p. 463). " And for 
 this as for many other reasons, it will be very convenient, nay 
 necessary, that constant diets and conventions of Christian princes 
 should be held where, by the prudence and moderation of such as 
 are not interested, all controversies may be composed ; yea, and that 
 some expedient may be found, to force both parties to accept of peace 
 upon equal and just terms." 
 
 And the great publicist closes his immortal work with 
 these memorable words : 
 
 "A safe and honoured peace is not too dearly bought if it may be 
 had by foregoing as well the offending as the charges and damages of 
 war, especially to us Christians, to whom our great Lord and Master 
 hath bequeathed Peace as His last legacy." " God, who alone can do 
 it, instil these things into the hearts of those who manage the affairs 
 of Christendom!" 
 
 We have dwelt thus at length on the views of Grotius, 
 because they have affected the relations of nations more, 
 probably, than the writings of any publicist before or since
 
 334 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 his time, and because they are so distinctly the fruit of 
 Christian forces in the world. 
 
 Right over Heathen Territory. — One of the curses of the 
 world has been the supposed right of nominally Christian 
 oeoples to take possession of heathen territory, and despoil 
 non-Christian tribes. The Church has always supported 
 this right. The famous bull of Pope Alexander VI. (1493) 
 gave up in effect all the lands in North and South 
 America, 100 leagues west of the line of the Azores, to 
 the empire of Spain ; and this supposed right was the 
 source of endless wars and oppression, and the slaughter 
 and slavery of thousands of Indians. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth gave a similar title to Sir Humphrey 
 Gilbert over certain " remote heathen and barbarous lands" 
 in North America. Though the Church was false to its 
 Master in the spirit of these claims, the great writers on 
 international law, imbued with His spirit, were nearer the 
 truth. Grotius objects to any power or claim of the 
 Christian Church over remote and heathen peoples. 
 
 Bonnor, a still earlier writer on this topic, declares, as we 
 have seen, that war cannot lawfully be made by Christian 
 powers against Saracens, merely on account of their faith.^ 
 Victoria^ (about 1557 A.D.) says that the Pope has no 
 temporal authority over the barbarous Indians or other 
 infidels, and that Christian princes have no right, merely 
 from the authority of the Pope, to coerce barbarians or to 
 punish them.^ Ayala holds the same views, and Alberici 
 Gentilis. 
 
 * Uarbre des batailles^ c. 35, 
 
 2 Papa nulluin potestatem temporalem habet in barbaros Indos^ 
 neque in alios infideles. (^Relectio de Ind., 2, 6.) 
 
 •* Principes Christiani non possunt etiam auctoritate papae coercere 
 barbaros, etc
 
 PRIVA TEERING, 335 
 
 Puffendorf advocated equally liberal principles. 
 
 It cannot be said that the Spirit of the Great Teacher 
 has as yet much affected modern international law on this 
 important topic. Still a beginning has been made in 
 teaching universal justice as obligatory ftom Christian to 
 heathen, and from a great power to a weak. 
 
 Progress in Modern International Law. — Progress in 
 international law we shall now proceed to test by the 
 humane changes, both in practice, custom and law, shown 
 in the public settlements, codes, treaties and acts of nations 
 of the nineteenth century, and in the views of eminent 
 publicists. The high-water mark of humane practice and 
 theory in public law in this century is probably best shown 
 in two documents — the Code of Instructions issued by 
 the Government of the United States during the great 
 Civil War, to their officers and soldiers, compiled by Prof. 
 Lieber, and the proposed Code for a Law of Nations, 
 compiled by Prof Bluntschli, who has himself borne so 
 distinguished a part in the practical application of these 
 Christian and humane principles in the arbitration settle- 
 ment of Geneva between Great Britain and the United 
 States. From these two sources we shall attempt to 
 ascertain what the Christian system has already accom- 
 plished in public law and custom, and what it proposes to 
 accomplish in the future. 
 
 Privateering. — Apart from these, we will first examine, 
 however, the changes made in " Private War " on the seas, 
 or Privateering. Under the combined influences of the 
 religious spirit and the mercantile habits, Private War on 
 land, especially in Germany, as we have seen, was put an 
 end to, and Courts of Arbitration {Austrdge) in the twelfth 
 and thirteenth centuries decided between the incessant 
 contests and disputes of separate cities, counties and
 
 336 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 provinces, until at length Law took the place of Foice. 
 Private War or piracy, however, still lingered on the sea, 
 and individual merchants and different sea-ports were 
 obliged to associate together to defend themselves from 
 incessant robbery and plundering by corsairs. 
 
 The first great check to this was caused in the end of 
 the fourteenth century, by the issuing of letters of marque 
 or reprisal by various princes, authorizing certain indi- 
 viduals to plunder on the high seas in time of peace. 
 Privateering was thus originally in the interest of public 
 order. The first law in the history of France authorizing 
 privateering appeared in 1400, and distinctly characterized 
 it as a means of preventing Private War, where indi- 
 viduals took vengeance in their own hands.^ 
 
 In the same century similar authorizations were issued 
 by the Low Countries, England and various powers. 
 
 An English Act of Parliament (1414) required privateers 
 to bring their prizes to an English port, and to make 
 declaration of capture to the justices of the peace, under 
 penalty of confiscation of the prize and the captor. 
 
 During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, privateering 
 was often well regulated, and, owing to the comparative 
 unimportance of commerce then, did not attain to so great 
 and injurious a development as in the succeeding centuries. 
 During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the com- 
 merce of both neutral and belligerent powers suffered 
 immensely from this species of robbery. The Christian 
 spirit (as the words of Grotius show) was always opposed 
 to it. Isolated efforts were made to abolish it. Thus in 
 1675, Holland and Sweden make a treaty, agreeing not to 
 
 1 Aucun . . . k ses propies despens pour porter guerre k nos 
 ennemis ce sera par le cong^ et consuitement de nostre dit amiral ou 
 son lieutenant. L'Ordonnance sur Icfaict de I'ainirandc {Hixutefeuille^ 
 vol. ii. p. 340).
 
 PRIVATEERING. 337 
 
 issue letters of marque, but this does not appear to have 
 been a permanent agreement. In her w irs with Turkey be- 
 tween 1767-74, Russia did not employ privateers. In the 
 eighteenth century, privateering had become an organized 
 piracy, and almost every treaty attempted, but in vain, to 
 restrain it. In that century an American, who though 
 often called an unbeliever, was filled with the truest spirit 
 of Christianity, has the credit of bringing about one of the 
 first important treaties which abolished it. 
 
 " It is for the interest of humanity in general," says Franklin in 
 a pubhc despatch to the British Commissioner in 1783, "that the 
 occasions of war and the inducements to it, should be diminished. If 
 rapine is abolished, one of the encouragements of war is taken away, 
 and peace therefore more likely to continue and be lasting. The 
 practice of robbing merchants on the high seas, a remnant of the 
 ancient piracy, though it may be accidentally beneficial to pubhc 
 persons, is far from being profitable to all engaged in it, or to the 
 nation that authorizes it." * 
 
 And again, 
 
 "The United States though better situated than any other nation 
 to profit by privateering, are, so far as in them lies, endeavouring to 
 abolish the practice by offering in all their treaties with other powers, 
 an article engaging solemnly that in case of a future war, no privateer 
 shall be commissioned on either side, and that merchant ships shall 
 pursue their voyages, unmolested."^ 
 
 Through Franklin's influence, the treaty between Prussia 
 and the United States in 1785, contained the well-known 
 clause in which each power gave up the right of commis- 
 sioning privateers against the other, in case of war. This 
 provision however was not revived in the renewal of the 
 treaty in 1799. 
 
 So well entrenched was this practice, that a distir^guished 
 
 ' Letter to Mr. Oswald, British Commissionet {Franklin's Writings^ 
 vol. ii. p. 485 ; ix. pp. 41, 267). 
 ■•^ Letter 0/ Franklin, 17S5. 
 
 Z
 
 338 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 French publicist (Hautefeuille) even in this century ven- 
 tured to say, "The opinion generally adopted on the 
 utility of privateering against an enemy, and especially, 
 the object not avowed but real, the ruin of neutral nations, 
 will always prevent a certain nation from consenting to 
 the abolition of a practice, upon which it founds its mari- 
 time greatness." ^ This publicist might have lived to see 
 " a certain nation " taking part in the congress which 
 abolished it. Still it is to be admitted that the general 
 policy of Great Britain up to this century has been adverse 
 to humane progress in maritime law, with reference to 
 privateering, blockade, and the law of contraband. Her 
 course has certainly tended to make war " bellum omnium 
 contra omnes " (a war of all against all) instead of limiting 
 it, under the modern and more reasonable view. 
 
 The great reform in international law, as limiting the 
 effects of war, dates from the Congress of Paris, 1856, 
 wherein all the great Powers of Europe, together with 
 Turkey and, later, forty other States, agreed to the abolition 
 of privateering, and to the rules which protected neutral 
 commerce," and confined wars as far as practicable to 
 belligerents. Unfortunately for the fame of the United 
 States as a pioneer in humane progress, it will be remem- 
 bered that her government refused to accept the rule 
 abolishing privateering, unless there were accompanied 
 with it a stipulation of the inviolability of private property 
 on the sea, excepting only contraband of war. This last 
 is a reform which, as is the case with the partial protection 
 of private property on land, requires the slow action of 
 
 ' Les Dfoits des nations ncittres, vol. ii. p. 340. 
 
 2 That the neutral flag covers an enemy's goods, and neutral gooas 
 are not seizable among an enemy's goods — contraband of war in both 
 cases being excepted ; and that a blockade, to be real, must be 
 efifective.
 
 INVIOLABILITY OF PRIVA TE MARITIME PROPERTY. 339 
 
 Christianized opinion. Whether the American government 
 were sincere in urging it at that time, is at least open to 
 question. At this time, there can be no doubt that the 
 American people are heartily in favour of it. The mercan- 
 tile community of Continental Europe, especially in Ger- 
 many, urged this reform in the years 1859 ^"^1 i860, with 
 much enthusiasm. It was presented and voted on favour- 
 ably in many legislatures. There is little doubt that a 
 future year, not far distant, will see its general adoption. 
 It rests on the reasonable idea, that war as a terrible and 
 barbarous Court of Arbitrament, should do no needless 
 damage, but only what furthers the decision and determines 
 the final issue. 
 
 The United States during the war of the rebellion 
 offered to accede to the Declaration of Paris, without the 
 condition it had before demanded. The proposed separate 
 conventions, however, on this subject fell through. No 
 letters of marque were issued by the American govern- 
 ment during the civil war, though authorized by Congress, 
 
 The German and French governments in the war of 
 1876, held to their agreement and employed no privateers. 
 Prof Bluntschli in his proposed code (No. 670), declares it 
 to be an article of modern international law, that priva- 
 teering is abolished. 
 
 Inviolability of private maritime property. — The inviola- 
 bility of private property on the sea was admitted in the 
 treaty to which we have already referred — that of 1785 
 between Prussia and the United States : and was recog- 
 nised in treaties of the South American States, in 1851 and 
 1856 In the wars of Great Britain and France with China, 
 the right of maritime capture was suspended.^ In March 
 1865, the Emperor of the French made public restoration 
 of such private vessels, belonging to Mexican citizens, as 
 * Field's Code, p. 530,
 
 340 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 had been condemned by prize courts, and the proceeds ol 
 which had not been finally adjudicated upon. European 
 governments have often at the close of wars, restored 
 captured ships and formed mixed commissions to ascertain 
 the damages incurred. In 1861, a treaty was framed 
 between France and Peru, which exempted all private 
 property from capture.^ The same principle was admitted 
 by Prussia, Italy and Austria in the war of 1866 : in 1868- 
 the parliament of Germany passed a resolution, inviting 
 the chancellor to obtain the acknowledgment of the 
 safety of private property on the sea, during war ; no 
 public acknowledgment however was obtained. In the 
 Franco-German war of 1870, King William in his procla- 
 mation of 1 8th July, declares that French merchant ships 
 can neither be brought in nor captured by the Federal 
 marine. This advanced measure however was not re- 
 sponded to by the French government, so that before the 
 close of the war, the German military authorities believed 
 themselves obliged to suspend this rule. The French 
 Government of National Defence however (28th Oct. 1870) 
 expressed the hope that the progress of ideas would in 
 this matter ultimately soften the evils of war.^ 
 
 In July, 1870, the Secretary of State of the United 
 States publicly gave utterance to the expectation, that 
 the people would soon have the satisfaction of seeing the 
 principle universally recognised of the abolition of mari- 
 time prizes. 
 
 The objections made to this reform, even by so enlight- 
 ened a publicist as Dana, seem of little weight. Modern 
 wars are of so concentrated and terrible a character, that 
 the damage done to individual property on the sea, has 
 little influence on the issue. It is merely a useless damage, 
 which modern humanity condemns, even toward an en^-my 
 
 * Field's Code, art. 846. * Bluntschli, 6615 n.
 
 INVIOLABILITY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY. 341 
 
 These two great reforms then — the abolition of pri- 
 vateering and the inviolability of private property on the 
 sea — may be considered as almost won by the humane 
 influences working in the world under Christianity. The 
 principle which lies at the base of this and similar reforms, 
 is one which will be more and more recognised by all those 
 truly feeling the modern teachings of humanity : the prin- 
 ciple that war is between states and not individuals. War, 
 like the "judicial duel" of the Middle Ages, is a process, 
 terrible and barbarous indeed, whereby justice is sought 
 between two contestants. The citizens of each state are 
 only considered as enemies, when they take a personal 
 part in the struggle, or discharge public duties.^ It is true 
 that many eminent publicists, American and English, do 
 not admit this principle. According to Sir J. Nicholl, 
 " There could be no such thing as a war for arms and a 
 peace for commerce." Twiss, in his " Law of Nations," 
 says with more antithesis than truth, " because private 
 war is inconsistent with public peace, it follows that 
 public war is equally inconsistent with private peace " ; 
 Vattel (book III. c. 5) declares all the citizens of belligerent 
 nations, enemies, even the women and children ; and 
 Kent states that all citizens of belligerents are in hostility 
 with one another. 
 
 Modern practice however under the influence of " the 
 enthusiasm of humanity " is more and more conforming 
 itself to the humane principle. Even as far back as 
 the French Revolution, Portalis, minister of the Republic, 
 uttered these remarkable words at the opening of the 
 Council of Prizes : " Between two or more belligerent 
 nations, the individuals of which those nations are com- 
 posed are only enemies by accident ; they are not so 
 as men ; they are not so even as citizens ; they are so 
 ' BlwUschli, Nos. 530, 532, etc
 
 342 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 only as soldiers."^ In the war of 1870, King William of 
 Germany proclaimed : " I make war against French 
 soldiers not against French citizens,' assuring the citizens 
 of protection to their property, so long as they did not 
 indulge in acts of hostility against the German troops. 
 
 TJie New Codes. — The American Instructions and Prof. 
 Bluntschli's Code, forbid putting human beings to death 
 in war, without object or utility, or the wounding, tor- 
 turing, maltreating or enslaving a prisoner, or violating 
 or assailing women.^ Both demand the protection of the 
 religion, the language, the intellectual culture and honour 
 of the vanquished.^ When one recalls the bloody wars of 
 the past, whereby one form of religion was to be forced 
 on a people dissenting, the advance in modern interna- 
 tional customs is made clear to the most doubting. Both 
 of these codes forbid all carnage and destruction which 
 does not tend to the re-establishment of justice — the 
 object of war. Even the killing of an armed enemy use- 
 lessly is forbidden.* Under the general principle of which 
 we have spoken, the plundering of property in an enemy's 
 country ^ is absolutely forbidden by the more advanced 
 rules of modern international law, excepting it be the 
 fortune of the belligerent state itself, the arms and equip- 
 ment of the conquered soldiers, and articles contraband 
 of war. There is still also left in question the plunder- 
 ing of the property of citizens in a place taken by assault, 
 and the right of maritime prizes ; but both these barbarous 
 privileges of war may be said to be passing away. All 
 public buildings for scientific, aesthetic or philanthropic 
 
 • Bhmtschli, No. 531. 
 
 • A?ner. Jnstr., 16, 23, 42. Blunt schli, No. 574. 
 
 • Ainer. Instr.^ 37. Bluntschli, No. 579. 
 
 • Avier. Instr., 68. Bh^ntschli, No. 579 
 
 • Ibid., No. 657.
 
 THE NEW CODES. 343 
 
 purposes are required to be respected in an enemy's 
 country ; and it is no longer according to international 
 usage^ to carry off works of art from a conquered country 
 or to sell them to defray the expenses of the war. It is 
 true that many of the reforms spoken of above have been 
 cnly carried out in the practice of one or two nations, 
 or are merely proposals of eminent publicists. Still the 
 whole body of international law is merely the expression 
 of the moral ideas and principles of leading nations with 
 regard to their relations, without any fixed authority but 
 custom, and no basis but justice or the highest utility. 
 The theories of eminent writers resting on the strictest 
 morality, and above all, the practice of any one nation, 
 must profoundly influence all nations. 
 
 One of the terrible abuses of war is in " reprisals." 
 Humanity and religion have as yet scarcely influenced 
 these. The American Instructions contain indeed excellent 
 sentiments on this subject, and they were not violated 
 by the United States during the civil war. " Civilized 
 nations," says Art. 27, " acknowledge in retaliations the 
 sternest feature of war. A reckless enemy often leaves to 
 his opponent no other means of securing himself against 
 the repetition of barbarous outrage. Retaliation will there- 
 fore never be resorteu to as a measure of mere revenge, but 
 only as a means of protection and retribution, and more- 
 over cautiously and unavoidably ; that is to say, retaliation 
 shall only be resorted to after careful enquiry into the real 
 occurrence and the character of the misdeeds that may 
 demand retribution. Unjust or inconsiderate retaliation 
 removes the belligerents farther and farther from the miti- 
 gating rules of a regular war, and by rapid steps leads 
 them to the internecine wars of savages." (Art. 28.) 
 
 Prof. Bluntschli is equally humane in his view of this 
 ' Blimtschli, No. 650. A men Instr.^ 36.
 
 344 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 terrible measure.^ The recent European conventions have 
 however been able in no degree to mitigate the law of 
 reprisals, and they remain the great cruelty of war. 
 
 Three recommendations are now made from various 
 quarters, as to changes in international customs which will 
 tend to prevent collisions and limit war. They are first, 
 that the right of blockade be limited to naval arsenals and 
 places defended by armed forces. This would leave trade 
 in food or similar articles with small and undefended ports, 
 open and undisturbed. Another is that the definitic^n of 
 " contraband " should be restricted to articles intended 
 directly for war, such as guns and ammunition. This 
 again would render trade freer, and preserve non-combat- 
 ants from much annoyance and suffering. A third is, that 
 the right of search be restricted so as only to touch contra- 
 band articles, and impede efforts to break a blockade. All 
 these are in the line of modern reforms. 
 
 The Wounded. — Nothing disgraced the humanity of the 
 past, like the neglect and cruelty practised towards the 
 wounded in war. Under modern law, the ambulances and 
 military hospitals for the wounded are held to be neutral 
 property, and are respected and protected by the belli- 
 gerents. In 1864, a convention was held at Geneva for 
 the amelioration of the fate of the wounded during military 
 campaigns ; and this compassionate effort led the series of 
 international movements, one of the latest fruits of the 
 Christian spirit, designed to alleviate the evils of war. An 
 agreement was signed and adopted by the Swiss Con- 
 federation, the United States of America, and nearly all 
 the Great Powers of Europe, having for its object to 
 neutralize everything employed in the care of the wounded. 
 This agreement was adopted by Austria after the war of 
 1866, and by Russia in 1867. In a conference, held at 
 ' Blunlschli, No. 502, etc.
 
 CARE OF THE WOUNDED. 345 
 
 Geneva, in 1868 of the principal European States, this 
 humane agreement was extended to the care of the 
 wounded on the sea. The duty of both beUigerents to 
 provide, so far as is practicable, even for wounded 
 enemies, is now a recognised feature of international law, 
 and may be considered as the first public effort in the 
 history of mankind to carry out one of the foundation 
 rules of Christianity, *' Love your enemies." 
 
 The care of the wounded in the American civil war, and 
 the Franco-German war, by private associations of philan- 
 thropic persons working in combination with the govern- 
 ments, is one of the latest practical fruits of religion, and 
 has relieved an untold amount of human misery. 
 
 The Convention of St. Petersburg in 1868, entered into 
 on the proposal of Russia, bound the leading European 
 Powers to greater humanity. It limited the objects of war 
 " to weaken the military forces of the enemy : " that for 
 this purpose, "it is sufficient to disable the greatest possible 
 number of men ; that this object would be exceeded by 
 the employment of arms which uselessly aggravate the 
 sufferings of disabled men or render their death inevitable ; 
 that the employment of such arms would therefore be 
 contrary to the laws of humanity." The Great Powers 
 accordingly renounced the employment of projectiles, 
 explosive or charged with inflammable substances, below 
 a given weight. 
 
 The drift of all international policy in regard to neutral 
 powers has been in the peaceful direction, and therefore 
 in the channels which religion would suggest. War is as 
 much as possible to be limited in its evils. As we have 
 already said, the abolition of privateering will lessen to an 
 immense extent the curses of war to those who are engaged 
 in peaceful occupations. The customary notice now given 
 to merchant vessels, allowing them several w/?eks to depart
 
 346 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 after the declaration of war, is a reform in a similai 
 direction. The Rules of Paris (1856) have settled the 
 dispute of ages in favour of neutral powers. A free ship 
 carries a free cargo, and a free cargo cannot be seized on 
 an enemy's ship. Blockade can no longer annoy a whole 
 world of peaceful persons, any farther than it is a real 
 blockade. 
 
 The British Government, among others, have been ready 
 to acknowledge that the progress of civilization has brought 
 about stricter obligation in regard to neutral supplies to 
 belligerents,! and the duty of limiting war to the smallest 
 extent possible. 
 
 Arbitration. — The highest result of the Christian spirit, 
 as seen in public affairs in this century, is the disposition 
 to settle disputes and prevent war, by arbitration. The 
 great reform of the Austrage in the Middle Ages was 
 the beginning of modern civilization, or the era in which 
 law and courts took the place of arms between individuals 
 and opposing cities. It is by no means improbable that 
 the arbitration of the nineteenth century is also the begin- 
 ning of a higher Christian civilisation, when international 
 law and international courts shall take the place of war 
 and force in the settlement of disputes between nations. 
 As it may be supposed, settlement of public disputes by 
 arbitration is not entirely a modern discovery. While the 
 instincts of right and justice existed, there must always 
 have been a possibility of such a settlement. Among old 
 instances, is that of Henry II. of England between the 
 States of Castile and Navarre — a decision contained in 
 twenty-eight articles ; ^ and another according to the latest 
 proposals of international jurists, between the Emperor 
 
 ' Despatch of Earl Granville to the Prussuin Government, SepU 
 15th, 1870. 
 ' Rytner'' F/vdera, p. 48.
 
 ARBITRA TION. 347 
 
 Frederick and certain cities of Lombardy (1158 A.D.). 
 The question was as to the justice of his claims to be 
 the successor of Augustus and Charlemagne, and the 
 arbitration was made by four professors of the School 
 of Bologna.^ Even as far back as the sixteenth century, 
 different kings of European States are found determining 
 difficulties by this reasonable mode. In one instance 
 (1546), the Kings of France and England settled a dis- 
 pute in regard to a large sum of money by a reference 
 of the matter to four learned jurisconsults, an instance 
 of a practice to become common, of referring matters of 
 international law to private students of the science. Sub- 
 jects more difficult to settle than differences about money 
 were referred in that century to arbiters. The King of 
 Spain, and Switzerland, decided a dispute in regard to the 
 boundaries of Franche Comte by arbitration. ^ Even the 
 claims of a sovereign power were referred to a foreign 
 decision ; as when the Archduke of Austria and the Duke 
 of Wiirtemberg, each claiming a certain county (Mont- 
 beliard), laid the litigation before the Parliament of 
 Grenoble.^ 
 
 It is to the credit of both Great Britain and the 
 United States, that they resorted to arbitration in one 
 of their first treaties. After the Independence of the 
 American Colonies, difficulties arose between them and 
 the mother country as to the north-eastern boundary of 
 the Union. By the Treaty of 1794, the dispute was to be 
 finally decided by Commissioners chosen in the follow- 
 ing manner : one by the King of Great Britain, another 
 by the President of the United States with the advice and 
 consent of the Senate, and the third — in case of disagree- 
 
 * Wheatotu 
 
 * L Arbitrage International^ De Card, p. 19. 
 
 * Jbid.
 
 348 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 ment between the two — to be chosen by the above Com-i 
 inissioners. Two other Commissioners were appointed to 
 determine indemnities due the subjects of each power, for 
 damages. In this treaty is undoubtedly indicated that 
 greatest practical exemplification in modern times of 
 humane principles — the settlement by the Geneva Arbitra- 
 tion. 
 
 Mediation. — The famous Conference of Paris (1856), as 
 we have said, originated or confirmed some of the impor- 
 tant reforms of modern international law. It discussed 
 another subject of the deepest importance to the future of 
 humanity — the prevention of war, by the mediation and 
 collective decision and arbitration of the Great Powers of 
 Europe. Article eighth required if there arose between 
 the Sublime Porte and one or more of the signatory 
 Powers, a disagreement which threatened their peaceful 
 relations, that these powers before resorting to force should 
 apply to the other contracting powers for their mediation. 
 
 The discussion on this advanced and reasonable propo- 
 sition showed that the representatives of the Great Powers 
 of Europe were by no means peculiarly favourable to such 
 proposals. The results of the last few years have proved 
 that even this mild suggestion, and the wishes expressed 
 by the plenipotentiaries, that " All states among whom 
 disagreements arose, would, before appealing to arms, have 
 recourse to the good offices of a friendly Power," were far 
 beyond the old barbaric habits of Europe, and produced 
 little practical effect. Still they indicate the ideal which 
 has arisen before the thoughtful minds of the age, — the 
 constitution by the Great Powers of Europe of a kind of 
 combined Court of Mediation and Arbitration, which 
 should prevent war and even enforce its decisions in the 
 interest of general peace. 
 
 In only two cases has the mediation of the great Euro-
 
 MEDIA TION. 349 
 
 pean Powers since 1856 brought about peace: one in tlie 
 case of Luxembourg between France and Prussia in 1867 
 — a mediation on the part of England which only delayed 
 a few years the terrible war that afterwards broke out. 
 The other in 1869, the case of Candia between Turkey 
 and Greece — a settlement by the Great Powers which was 
 by no means in the permanent interest of either peace or 
 justice. 
 
 No mediation was able to prevent the terrible conflict 
 of 1870. 
 
 If we refer back to European history in this century we 
 shall find a number of instances, wherein the reasonable 
 settlement of differences between nations by arbitration 
 has been successfully attempted. 
 
 During a war of France with the Moors, certain English 
 merchant vessels were captured by the French on the coast 
 of Portendik, it was asserted without sufficient notice of 
 the blockade. The claims of the English merchants injured 
 were referred by the French and English cabinets to the 
 King of Prussia, and on November 9th, 1843, a decision 
 was given, that a fine should be paid to the English 
 merchants injured by the French government : — a fine 
 fixed afterwards at 4,770 francs by a mixed commission. 
 A war was thus avoided and justice done, to the satis- 
 faction of all parties. 
 
 The case of the Armstrong, wherein an American ship 
 was destroyed in a neutral harbour (Fayal) by an English 
 vessel of war, was a delicate one, involving a claim on a 
 neutral power for injuries sustained within its limits, by 
 a foreign power. The claim for damages on Portugal by 
 the United States was referred by both powers for settle- 
 ment to the President of the French Republic. The 
 arbiter decided (Nov, 30th, 1852) against the United 
 States ; the decision was quietly accepted and war averted.
 
 350 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 In 1862, a case of arbitration occurred, where national 
 pride might easily have led to violent measures. The 
 officers of a British ship, La Forte, insulted a Brazilian 
 sentinel and were thrown into prison, but soon afterwards 
 released on the demand of the British vice-consul. The 
 English Cabinet demanded reparation from the Brazilian 
 authorities, and the dispute was referred to the King of the 
 Belgians, as arbiter. He decided in favour of Brazil, and 
 the decision was accepted.^ A difference occurred in 1821 
 between Chili and the United States which aroused much 
 excitement, and nearly brought on a war between the two 
 countries. The Chilian vice-admiral had violated the rule 
 of international law which protects private property on 
 land, especially that of a neutral : he ordered the seizure 
 in the territory of Peru of considerable sums of money, 
 the fruit of the sale of merchandise brought in by an 
 American merchantship, the brig Macedonian. The United 
 States government addressed a note to the government 
 of Chili, demanding the restitution of the moneys seized. 
 The ministry of Chili refused to accede to the demand. 
 Popular feeling in the United States was in favour of war 
 to enforce the claim. The dispute however was at length 
 submitted to arbitration, and that wise monarch, Leo- 
 pold I., King of the Belgians, became again the arbiter. 
 His decision was not rendered till May, 1863, and was 
 fully in favour of the United States. Great waste of 
 property and loss of life were saved, and both parties re- 
 mained in amicable relations. An arbitration between the 
 governments of Peru and Japan in 1875, is interesting as 
 one of the first instances in which a non-Christian power 
 accepted this method of settlement. The case was that of 
 the Maria Luz, a Peruvian vessel arrested in the port 
 
 » De Card, p. 59.
 
 CASES OF ARBITRATION. 357 
 
 of Kanagawa by the Japanese authorities, and was decided 
 by the arbiter, the Emperor of Russia, in favour of Japan. 
 
 Disputes as to Territory. — Disputes however in regard to 
 claims on territory are thought to be of a more vital nature, 
 and not so easily settled by umpires. The discussion 
 between Great Britain and the United States in regard to 
 rights of territory on Puget's Sound was one of this nature, 
 and endangered the relations of the two countries durmg 
 a considerable period. A treaty however was signed on 
 June 1st, 1863, whereby the question was referred to two 
 arbiters, one being named by each government, who had 
 power to name a third, if they disagreed. They were not 
 even obliged to choose the third, so fair and just were their 
 views, and their decision, rendered September, 1867, was 
 received by both parties without protest. 
 
 The similar dispute in regard to the north-western 
 boundary with Great Britain had seemed to the American 
 government so unreasonable, that it had declined arbi- 
 tration six times in regard to it. The case however was 
 finally referred for arbitration to the Emperor of Germany, 
 and was decided in favour of the United States, October, 
 1872 ; this decision closing a century-long dispute on 
 boundaries. 
 
 A difference occurred also between Great Britain and 
 Portugal, relative to the rights of each government to the 
 island of Balama, on the western coast of Africa. The 
 matter was referred in 1869 to the President of the United 
 States as arbiter : his decision was in favour of Portugal 
 and was received by England without opposition. 
 
 The Alabama. — The great affair of the Alabama and of 
 the injuries inflicted by the rebel cruisers is too fresh to 
 need much recapitulation. The American people felt itself 
 profoundly injured and wounded in the civil war, by the 
 tacit permission given by the British government for the
 
 352 
 
 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 manning and fitting out of the rebel cruisers, and the con- 
 nivance of numbers of the English people in this violation 
 of neutrality. The injuries inflicted by these vessels, and 
 especially by the Alabama, upon American commerce, were 
 enormous. Indirectly the American commercial marine 
 was almost annihilated by them. So bitter was the re- 
 sentment throughout the Union against what seemed a 
 flagrant violation of the rules of justice and fair dealing 
 on the part of the British government, that popular feeling 
 was entirely ready for war, and only the prudence of the 
 American authorities, already sufiiciently burdened by the 
 immense civil struggle, restrained the passions of the people. 
 
 The correspondence with Earl Russell of so cool a 
 diplomat as Mr. Adams shows the degree to which feelings 
 on each side were aroused. The British minister, after 
 endeavouring to justify the action of his government 
 towards the rebel cruisers, went so far in his despatch of 
 Aug. 2nd, 1865, as to declare that the British government, 
 having fulfilled all legal obligations, would never consent 
 to refer the contest to arbitration. 
 
 Nor did the close of the struggle and the success of 
 the Union diminish the bitterness of feeling against the 
 British Government throughout the North. The ministry, 
 however, of both Powers appear not to have given up 
 ill hopes of ultimately settling the difficulty by a recourse 
 to measures of justice and right reason. The American 
 ambassador, Reverdy Johnson, submitted a proposition for 
 arbitration to the British government, which was readily 
 accepted. But he had accompanied or preceded it by 
 public utterances, so far from expressing the real opinions 
 of the American people on the gravity of their wrongs, 
 that they created an extreme opposition to the proposal 
 in the United States. The reference to arbitration was 
 rejected by the American Senate by 54 votes to i.
 
 THE ALABAMA ARBITRATION. 353 
 
 The President, in communicating this decision to the 
 American minister, declared the conditions of the proposal 
 unsatisfactory, but affirmed his readiness at the proper 
 time to meet this question on a friendly footing. The 
 dispute seemed thus as far from settlement as ever. 
 
 It is fortunate that in each country there is a large 
 body of persons somewhat guided by Christian principles, 
 whose opinions exercise considerable influence on public 
 men. Under any popular excitement, the voice of reason 
 and religion is not heard ; but as soon as this dies away, 
 the statesmen are more or less governed by the Christian 
 belief of the nation. 
 
 It was not till January, 1871, that an offer of arbitration 
 was again made — this time by the British Government. 
 The offer was accepted, and a mixed commission was 
 formed of five Englishmen and five Americans, to frame 
 a tribunal of arbitration. This tribunal (May 8) was com- 
 prised of five members, to be chosen respectively by the 
 President of the United States, the Queen of England, the 
 King of Italy, the President of the Swiss Confederation, 
 and the Emperor of Biazil. The Commission were to 
 meet at Geneva. It is not necessary to describe the treaty 
 in detail. 
 
 The Treaty of Washington was ratified on May 8th, 
 1 87 1, by the American Senate by a large majority, and 
 approved by the British Parliament, though with many 
 objections. Earl Grey said justly of this treaty in a pub- 
 lic banquet, that it wouid exercise an incalculable influence 
 on the future of the world in procuring for it the first of 
 earthly blessings — peace. 
 
 The Commission met December 15th, 1871, at Geneva, 
 and on the 14th September, 1872, rendered its decision, 
 condemning England to pay to the United States the sum 
 of $15,000,000, as indemnity for the direct injuries done
 
 354 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 to its commerce, by three of the Confederate cruisers. 
 The British Commissioner alone refused to sign the 
 sentence. 
 
 The English Government, after some objections tc the 
 interpretation of the rules, accepted the decision, and paid 
 the indemnity. 
 
 The Geneva Arbitration of 1872 may be fairly held as 
 one of the great steps in modern progress towards right 
 reason in the settlement of international difficulties. It 
 is true that its influence for the time is somewhat dimi- 
 nished by the disgraceful delays and disputes in regard to 
 the distribution of the indemnity among claimants in the 
 United States. Then the settlement, since, of the fishery 
 question with Great Britain by an arbitration which 
 seemed to the American people unfair and unjust to their 
 interests, has for the time weakened the power of this 
 method of settlement in the United State.s, as did the 
 results of the Geneva arbitration in England. But these 
 are only passing objections. The two leading commer- 
 cial powers of the world, in a time of great bitterness 
 of popular feeling, and when one side felt itself deeply 
 injured, under circumstances which in all past history 
 would have been thought to justify war, have deliberately 
 controlled passion and submitted their differences to the 
 most impartial earthly arbiters. This is one of the first 
 prominent instances in history of the influence of Chris- 
 tianity on the relations of nations. 
 
 The sketch we have given of different cases of arbitration 
 is a list of the "victories of peace." It is well completed 
 by the most momentous of all — the Geneva settlement. 
 
 In some future and better age, when Christianity no 
 longer touches only the surfice of society but has imbued 
 whole races of men and affected the relations of govern- 
 ments, it will not be battles which constitute history or
 
 CHRISTIANITY AND WAR. 355 
 
 the record of fields of blood which makes a nation's 
 glory, but the historian will delight to chronicle these first 
 gleams of a higher civilization, when reason was taking 
 the place of passion, and law of force, and Christianity 
 of hatred and revenge in the relation of one nation to 
 another. 
 
 The question is often put, whether arbitration can ever 
 become universal, or whether the principles of Christianity 
 can ever imbue whole peoples as they have inspired in- 
 dividuals. 
 
 Looking at what this Religion has done with a few indi- 
 viduals, we may judge of the far future with mankind, and, 
 from a few traces now in international laws and customs, 
 we may fairly infer what it may accomplish after ages of 
 influence upon nations and governments. 
 
 We have beheld it redeeming the lot of the prisoner 
 of war from one exposed to massacre and slavery to that 
 of the captive humanely treated under modern international 
 customs ; we have seen it ministering to the wants of the 
 wounded and protecting all that belongs to their care even 
 in the army of an enemy. We have found it prohibiting 
 even the killing of an unarmed enemy, forbidding all use- 
 less destruction of life and property, all injury of women 
 or defenceless persons, all objectless wasting of fields 
 and fruits. We have seen it doing away with piracy and 
 privateering, with the plunder of philanthropic and scien- 
 tific buildings, with all private booty, and even urging the 
 protection of private property on the sea. 
 
 What but the influence of the " Religion of Love," direct 
 or indirect, has done so much to limit the evils of war, and 
 to confine them to the belligerents ? 
 
 It is true war is still the gigantic evil of history — the 
 one great travesty of the faith which leading nations 
 profess. Yet the spirit of this Faith has won its greatest
 
 35^ GESTA CHR/S2V. 
 
 triumph in finally introducing arbitration between dispu- 
 ting nations. 
 
 There can hardly be a doubt that in the distant future 
 arbitration in some form will be the great method of 
 settling international differences. For the coming few 
 centuries it will probably only be applicable to exceptional 
 cases, when national pride and passion are not too much 
 aroused. But the increasing power of the religious senti- 
 ment and of right reason among men, and it may be the 
 growing influence of the labouring classes, who suffer most 
 from war, will force cabinets more and more to this mode 
 of settlement. 
 
 If we look at the progress in the slow abolition of "Pri- 
 vate War " in Europe, we shall conclude that in some form 
 the civilized world will go through a similar change and 
 development, and rise out of the comparatively low moral 
 condition of the nineteenth century, as Europe rose out of 
 the barbarism of the thirteenth. The probable course of 
 development will be first in the Great Powers of the world 
 agreeing beforehand when a given treaty is framed, that 
 any difference in relation to that particular treaty shall be 
 determined by arbitration. The postal treaties of the 
 United States with foreign powers contain a clause of this 
 character. In 1853 the American senate adopted a reso- 
 lution designed to accomplish this humane purpose, to the 
 effect that the President should insert in all future treaties 
 an article binding the contracting parties to submit all 
 differences between them to impartial arbiters. In Decem- 
 ber, 1873, a resolution even more extended, by Senator 
 Sumner, was presented in the senate requiring the govern- 
 ment to recommend the adoption of arbitration in its rela- 
 tions with other nations. The greater part of the European 
 treaties of commerce and the international postal treaties 
 contain provisions relating to arbitration, in case of dis-
 
 INTERNATIONAL CODES, 357 
 
 agreement as to the treaties. As we shall show later, the 
 arbitration clause has been recommended to the atten- 
 tion of ministers by the votes of the Belgian, Dutch, and 
 Swedish chambers. The habit of arbitration will thus be 
 introduced in international relations. And in all great 
 legal reforms habits have a marvellous power. At first 
 it could only be employed in comparatively unimportant 
 disputes, but gradually it would come into play in more 
 vital matters. 
 
 The next great step in the application of right reason to 
 international affairs will be the formation of international 
 codes or rules of law, which will affect the opinion and the 
 practice of the civilized world. We have already seen 
 the great influence of Grotius in softening the severities 
 of war, and binding different peoples in more merciful 
 relations. It is a matter deeply to be regretted that 
 American and British publicists since his time have done 
 so little to express Christian and humane ideals in their 
 treatises on international law. In a science which rests 
 so much on opinion and the principles of equity, each 
 author might have advanced it almost as Grotius did, by 
 urging all practicable principles of Christianity. The new 
 Codes of which we have spoken are both great steps in 
 advance, and must influence all future relations of nations. 
 Another project of an international code by an American 
 publicist, D. D. Field, has attracted much attention, from 
 its just proposals. It will be a long period before these 
 merciful essays towards a form of law which shall govern 
 all the civilized world will be accepted. Yet they make a 
 foundation for the better future. The opinion of the world 
 already has an immense power over all nations. And 
 these careful embodiments of its humane feelings and ideas 
 must add to this power. 
 
 Courts of Arbitration. — But the final step towards the
 
 358 GESTA CHRIST/, 
 
 " Universal Peace " so long dreamed of by moralists, will 
 be the formation of international courts of arbitration, 
 vested with the powers of courts by all the great nations. 
 It is true that the times are not ripe for this as yet, and 
 may not be for many centuries. In 1873, Mr. Richard 
 presented a motion to the British Parliament, only indi- 
 cating an approach towards such a reform, to the effect 
 that the Queen be humbly requested to instruct her Mini- 
 ster of Foreign Affairs to enter into communication with 
 
 o 
 
 foreign powers, having for his object to ameliorate inter- 
 national law, and to institute a system of permanent and 
 general international arbitration. 
 
 Mr. Gladstone and other orators expressed many doubts 
 of the project : but the motion passed (July 9th) after 
 much discussion, and on the nth the Queen replied to 
 it in conciliatory words which guardedly expressed much 
 sympathy in the project, without committing the govern- 
 ment to fixed promises. 
 
 In the Italian Parliament, Sig. Mancini presented (24th 
 August, 1873) a somewhat similar motion to Mr. Richard's, 
 except that he confined arbitration more particularly to 
 disputes on commercial interests or similar subjects, and he 
 would introduce into all treaties a clause referring disputes 
 on them to arbiters, and pursue the previous policy of 
 Italy in rendering uniform and obligatory, the rules of 
 " private international law." This moderate position was 
 well received in Italy. 
 
 Other States followed this example. The Lower Cham- 
 ber of the Kingdom of Holland (Nov. 27th, 1874) passed 
 a motion of a similar character, and urging arbitration 
 for all international difficulties. The Belgian House of 
 Representatives adopted a similar resolution unanimously 
 in favour of arbitration (Feb. 17th, 1875). The Swedish 
 Second Chamber voted by a large majority an address tg
 
 COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 359 
 
 the king, praying for efforts towards a permanent tribunal 
 of arbitration between nations. 
 
 It will thus be seen that many public bodies in Europe 
 and America have seriously considered this benevolent 
 project. It is well known that eminent individuals in 
 advance of their age, have long urged it as the greatest 
 reform needed among nations. Grotius, as we have shown, 
 contemplated it as a possibility. Leibnitz, William Penn, 
 Bentham and many others argued for it ; Kant's project 
 for a universal peace through arbitration, and the similar 
 views of the Abbe de St. Pierre and of Rousseau, are too 
 well known to need recapitulation. 
 
 These humane purposes and projects took a definite form 
 in the International Conference of Brussels in 1874, called 
 especially at the request of the Russian government. The 
 invitation to this Conference contains words worth citing. 
 
 "The more that solidarity," says Prince Gortscnakoff, "becomes 
 developed which tends in these times to bring together and to unite 
 nations as one family, the more their military organisation tends to 
 give to their wars the character of conflicts between armed nations, 
 liie more necessary does it become to determine with greater pre- 
 cision the laws and usages admissible in a state of war, in order to 
 limit the consequences and diminish the calamities attendant upon it, 
 so far us may be possible or desirable." ' 
 
 The fifty-six articles which were especially to be con- 
 sidered by the Conference embraced most of the points 
 io thoroughly treated in the American Instructions and 
 the Bluntschli Code, The Conference does not seem to 
 have produced much effect, perhaps partly from the want 
 of sympathy in its objects by the British government,* 
 and partly because the Great Powers have not reached the 
 
 * Despatch of Prince Gortschakoff, March 4th, 1874. 
 
 ' Despatch of Lord Derby to Lord Loftus, June 20th, 1875.
 
 36o GESTA CHRIS Tl. 
 
 point of moral advance in which these reforms seem in* 
 dispensable. 
 
 The formation of an" Institute for the Codification and 
 Improvement of International Law " in Europe and the 
 United States, which has already urged the most advanced 
 reforms through eminent authorities, is another evidence 
 of the power of Christian opinion on this great subject. 
 
 The main objections to the formation of a permanent 
 Court of Arbitration with executive powers furnished by 
 each nation, are undoubtedly the fear that such an authority 
 would threaten the independence of single States, and that 
 the execution of its decisions would only create new wars, 
 instead of abolishing old. But it would not be difficult to 
 form a judicial authority with limited powers, which would 
 only have the right to decide and act upon definite ques- 
 tions, such as do not affect the independence of a State. 
 Each nation would yield up certain of its rights to a power 
 of which it was a part, in the interest of general peace. 
 Of course, great care would be necessary to prevent the 
 Court from becoming corrupt or an agent itself of tyranny 
 and injustice. These objections, though formidable, do not 
 seem insurmountable. Almost as great were overcome in 
 constituting the Federal Court of the United States. The 
 interest of all nations is especially in peace. And many 
 temporary annoyances might be endured, in a certain 
 yielding of powers, for the sake of so great a blessing. 
 The enormous expense of large standing armies would be 
 in part saved, as each power would need only to contribute 
 its quota to the executive forces of the International Court. 
 Even questions which are supposed to affect the honour or 
 independence of a State, would often come before such a 
 Court, not for executive decision but for its opinion. And 
 an opinion from sucli an authority would have an incal- 
 culable effect on any civilized power. Even the mere
 
 PEACE THE IDEAL OE CHRIST. 361 
 
 stopping, before the rush to arms, to hear an impartial 
 judgment on the quarrel would exert a profound influence 
 on the coming belHgerents. The voice of reason and re- 
 ligion would thus have a chance to be heard. 
 
 The full christianization of international law awaits the 
 slow action of christianized public opinion. But much 
 may be done, as much as has been done, to humanize the 
 relations of nations, to soften the asperities of war, to lessen 
 its causes and finally to prevent it. If the Christian Church 
 throughout the world were finally aroused to its duties in 
 this matter, and were aware how far behind the precepts of 
 the Master His nominal followers are, there would long ago 
 have been a public opinion in Europe and America which 
 would have rendered any war difficult if not impossible. 
 
 Peace among all men and all nations is the ideal pre- 
 sented by Christ. And by one class of means or other, 
 when at length His teachings have thoroughly permeated 
 mankind, this ideal will be attained. 
 
 Outside of the nominally Christian nations, there is no 
 international law. The Turks appear to have had little 
 idea of it till instructed by European nations. The 
 Koran's teachings tended in the very opposite direction, 
 and made war the natural condition towards non-Moham- 
 medan races, and treachery justifiable towards an " infidel." 
 The Mohammedan peoples in the north of Africa lived 
 in a constant state of hostility with all foreigners. The 
 Chinese, with all their advancement in arts and sciences, 
 seem never to have thought of any code of humanity and 
 justice towards foreign nations. 
 
 The Japanese have indeed recently made efforts to in- 
 troduce the international law known to the Christian 
 nations, to their own people ; and one proposed code ^ at 
 least has been translated. 
 
 ' D. D. Field's,
 
 362 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 No Buddhist, so far as we are aware, has written on 
 this topic, nor does a Buddhistic code of laws and customs 
 between different peoples exist. 
 
 Nor, as we have shown, does international law owe much 
 to Greek culture or to Roman law. The first general tinge 
 of humanity in the world's relations, mercy to the wounded 
 and helpless, the softening the rugged face of war, the 
 binding different nations in a certain bond (feeble though 
 it be) of brotherhood, the disposition to refer injuries to 
 arbitration rather than violence — these are the Gcsta 
 CJiristi. And when at length Cicero's dream ^ shall be 
 realized, and there no longer be one law at Athens and 
 another at Rome, but one universal law for all nations 
 and times, simple, eternal and immutable, " the ruler and 
 deity of all men," — even the law of humanity and justice, 
 then will the great law-giver and embodiment of it be the 
 " Son of Man," whose words shall then guide and inspire 
 nations, as now individuals. 
 
 * Fragm. de Rep., lib. iii. 3t«
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 SLAVE TRADE AND SLAVERY IN MODERN TIMES. 
 
 Slavery, as we have previously shown, had mainly dis- 
 appeared in Europe at the close of the Middle Ages. The 
 peculiar influence of the Christian religion in tcacliing the 
 brotherhood of man, and the priceless value of each human 
 being, had everywhere undermined it ; the formation of free 
 communes in the large towns had given it a deadly blow. 
 One effect of the crusades had been to break up classes 
 and loosen the bonds of slavery, and thus under various 
 forces, but roost of all the moral, slavery had given place 
 to serfdom, and serfdom itself had in many countries 
 almost passed away. 
 
 In the fifteenth century there was still a trade in 
 Mohammedan captives among the Italian states, and here 
 and there in such countries as Greece, the enslavement of 
 whites, and slaves were occasionally held in various civilized 
 states. International custom recognised also the right of 
 enslaving prisoners of war. But slavery, under the power 
 of strong moral forces, was virtually disappearing, when 
 two momentous events occurred which overbore the moral 
 power working in European society, and let loose a swarm 
 of curses on the world such as mankind had scarce ever 
 known. One was the first voyaging to a populated and 
 barbarous coast where human beings were a familiar article 
 
 of traffic ; and the other, the discovery of a new world, 
 
 363
 
 364 GESTA CHRIS TI. 
 
 where mines of glittering wealth were open, proviJed 
 labour could be imported to work them. 
 
 The introduction of negro slaves into Europe in the 
 fifteenth century would have been of little account, had 
 America never been discovered. They would have been 
 merely ornaments of wealthy houses, but as labourers 
 would have been speedily vanquished in the struggle with 
 the peasantry of Europe. In the West Indies and 
 America, however, they entered into competition with a 
 weak race already disappearing — the native Indians ; and 
 they became tools of a powerful and covetous people, 
 who used them to extract sudden wealth from the 
 "round or the mine. Hence arose the most dreadful 
 curse which has perhaps ever afflicted humanity — the 
 African slave trade. Almost all other human ills have 
 their mitigating features. War is a struggle where heroism 
 and courage and effort may come into play, where men 
 stake all on a last effort, and expect wounds and death 
 if defeat come. Even women and children may take with 
 resignation that which follows the misfortune of those 
 nearest them, and which belongs to the chances of war. 
 Captivity, too, may not always be to them worse than their 
 former condition. 
 
 The vices of men bring with them a certain degree of 
 pleasure, and their penalties are in part self-inflicted. 
 Disease and pestilence and earthquake seem to convey 
 calamities as if from upper powers, and are borne by 
 multitudes of men in common. They appear unavoidable 
 and necessary. 
 
 But when one thinks that during four hundred years, 
 men and women and children were torn from all whom they 
 knew, and sold on the coast of Africa to foreign traders ; 
 that they were chained between low decks so that there 
 vas not even room to rise, and thus in filth and disease
 
 THE "" MIDDLE PASSAGE » 365 
 
 and loneliness, the dead often chained to the living, made 
 that horrible " middle passage," each morning the corpses 
 being thrown into the sea, the living when temporarily 
 released, plunging into the ocean as the least of sufferings, 
 or the sick dying from heart-ache and home-sickness ; 
 that durmg all these hundred years the sighs and groans 
 and prayers of these wretched creatures rose to heaven ; 
 and when they reached the New World, they were consigned 
 to only a less degree of misery in the mines, or under 
 the lash in the cane and rice-fields ; that many millions 
 were thus treated, and out of three and a quarter millions 
 of negroes, according to an impartial historian,^ thus im- 
 ported to various colonies in a century by Great Britain, 
 250,000 were thrown into the sea on the passage — one may 
 well feel that this is the great crime of history, the one 
 before which all others pale in enormity and wickedness. 
 It would seem at first sight as if such gigantic injustices 
 and cruelties could not possibly happen where Christianity 
 had the slightest influence. As Montesquieu, with his 
 characteristic irony, says ; " Negroes could not be human 
 beings, for if they were, the whole of Christendom would 
 have united in a league to put down the African slave 
 trade." 
 
 Worse still, the guilt of this great crime rests on the 
 Christian Church as an organized body. It is true that 
 many Popes thundered against slavery, and Church Coun- 
 cils proclaimed emancipation ; but it is no less true that 
 one fatal error of the Church stimulated the traffic in 
 negroes and upheld slavery — the belief that the conversion 
 of the stolen black would outweigh the sin of man-stealing 
 or slavery. It is not true, though often repeated, that one 
 of the most devoted followers of the Church and one of the 
 mc^st humane of men, Las Casas, first introduced negro 
 
 * Bancroft.
 
 366 GESTA CHRISII. 
 
 slavery into the New World, The importation had begun 
 before his time under Charles V. He did indeed recom- 
 mend the first large importation, in order to relieve his 
 beloved Indians ; but he lived bitterly to repent his mis- 
 take. His Church, however, supported by all its influence 
 both the royal grants for purchasing negroes, and all the 
 subsequent policy by which slavery was planted and per- 
 petuated in Spanish America. The dark stain of African 
 slave trade and of human bondage on a new continent is 
 for ever on the garments of the Roman Catholic Church. 
 It is a singular travesty on the '' Religion of Love " 
 that the Spanish government during two centuries con- 
 cluded more than ten treaties in "the name of the most 
 Holy Trinity " (el nombre del Santissima Trinidad), 
 which authorized the sale of more than 500,000 human 
 beings, and received from it a tax of over fifty million 
 livres. 
 
 Nor docs the Protestant Church escape. The first ship 
 which sailed from England in 1562, under Sir John 
 Hawkins, on the diabolical errand of buying human 
 beings in Africa, and selling them in the West Indies, 
 bore in a similar travesty the sacred name of Jesus. 
 Henceforth for about a century and a half, a Protestant 
 power — Great Britain — led in that most shameless traffic, 
 — the plundering one continent of human beings to sell 
 them as slaves in another. During all these years various 
 English monarchs encouraged this trade. Elizabeth her- 
 self, the pillar of the Protestant Church, knighted Hawkins 
 for his successes, and his crest became a manacled negro. 
 Bishops and clergy favoured it ; Parliament supported it 
 by repeated resolutions and acts ; the judges approved it, 
 and even so distinguished a jurist as Lord Eldon had the 
 presumption to say (in 1807) in parliament, "It (the slave 
 trade) has been sanctioned by parliament, where sat juris-
 
 THE SLAVE TRADE. 367 
 
 consults the most wise, theologians the most enlightened, 
 statesmen the most eminent." 
 
 It is true that the Protestant Church, as a Church, is 
 not so guilty in the encouragement of the traffic as the 
 Catholic, but on the other hand, its followers had less 
 excuse. They did not profess to believe that " the end 
 justified the means." They knew they were sinning 
 against both God and man in their horrible trade. 
 
 TJie Slave Trade. — The first considerable cargo of slaves 
 seems to have been brought in 1444, under Prince Henry 
 of Portugal, by a Portuguese captain, from the coast of 
 Guinea to the country near Lagos ; they numbered 235. 
 Other cargoes were brought, but the trade began to fall 
 ofi", and would have undoubtedly ended but for the dis- 
 covery of America. It is not known who was the person 
 in whose mind the diabolical inspiration was first sug- 
 gested, to supplant the weak race of the Indians in 
 Hispaniola and on the main land by the vigorous African 
 slaves. Charles V. had granted licenses for this trade to 
 various persons before, in part at the suggestion of Las 
 Casas, he granted a monopoly to Gov. de Bresa in 1517, 
 to import 4,000 negroes during eight years into the 
 Spanish colonies ; this was renewed with a smaller num- 
 ber in 1523, but in 1542 the monopoly covered 23,000 
 slaves, and in 1542 2,000 were imported annually into 
 Hispaniola alone. In 155 1 licenses were offered for sale 
 in Spain, giving authority to import 17,000 negro slaves. 
 Slaves were first carried to St. Domingo in 15 10, and to 
 Cuba in 1521. Many treaties were made by the Spanish 
 government with different companies to authorize this 
 odious traffic ; and, so far had the idea of a common 
 humanity died out, that one Spanish treaty with a Por- 
 tuguese Company of Guinea in 1700, irtipulated to furnish
 
 368 GESTA CHRISTT. 
 
 " 10,000 tons * of negroes," and another between Great 
 Britain and Spain stipulated to import 4,800 " Indian 
 pieces " (piezas de Indias), as if they were pieces of mer- 
 chandise. This was the notorious provision in the cele- 
 brated Treaty of Utrecht, which gave Great Britain as 
 one of the prizes of a successful war, a monopoly in the 
 slave trade for thirty years from 17 13 to 1743 ; and during 
 this period the British government agreed to import 144,000 
 negroes of both sexes into Spanish America at 33^ piastres 
 per head.- 
 
 As we have said, the British slave trade began under 
 Queen Elizabeth. In 1662, Charles II. granted an exclu- 
 sive right to Queen Catharine and others to carry on the 
 trade, they stipulating to supply the West India islands 
 with 3,000 negroes annually. In 1695, the House of 
 Commons resolved that "for the better supply of the 
 plantations, all the subjects of Great Britain should have 
 liberty to trade with Africa for negroes with such limits 
 as Parliament should prescribe." Certain statutes of 
 William declared that "the trade was highly beneficial 
 and advantageous to the kingdom, and to the plantations 
 and colonies thereunto belonging," and opened it to all. 
 In 1708 the House of Commons declared by the report 
 of a Committee, that "the trade was important and ought 
 to be free and open to all the Queen's subjects trading to 
 Great Britain," In 1729 the House of Commons resolved 
 
 ' Dies mil toneladas de negros, 
 
 2 " First then to procure by this means a mutual and reciprocal 
 advantage to the subjects and sovereigns of both crowns, our British 
 Majesty does offer and undertake for the persons whom she shall 
 name and appoint, that they shall oblige and charge themselves with 
 the West Indies of America, belonging to his Catholic majesty, in the 
 said thirty years, . . . viz., 144,000 negroes, Piezas de Indias, in 
 eacli of the said thirty years, etc." (Assiento Treaty b<itweeD Great 
 Britain and Spain, 1 713. — Coll. of Treaties, 3, 375).
 
 THE SLAVE TRADE. 369 
 
 that the trade in slaves should be open to all, and that it 
 ought not to be taxed for the support of the forts on the 
 African coast which protected it, and that an appropriation 
 ought to be made for the maintenance of such forts. Still 
 other statutes under George II. (1749) declared the slave 
 trade very advantageous to Great Britain, and necessary 
 for the supplying the plantations and colonies with a suf- 
 ficient number of negroes at reasonable rates. In a well- 
 known case referred to the judges, Lord Chief Justice 
 Holt and eight other judges showed how far the poison 
 of the system had worked to neutralize Christianity, by 
 declaring in a decision negroes to be merchandise. Pre- 
 viously to this, Charles II. had offered special inducements 
 to emigrants to settle in the West Indies ; among them, 
 lands which should be cultivated by negroes. And not 
 only did the British government seek in every way to 
 encourage this iniquity, but it checked any beginnings of 
 virtuous action in the colonies directed against the evil. 
 Various acts of the American colonies protesting against 
 the importation of slaves, or bills proposed for this pur- 
 pose, were rejected by the British government — two in 
 the year 1774 alone. It is but just to say, however, that 
 the people of many of the colonies became soon as eager 
 for forced labour, or for the gains in this bloody traffic, as 
 the people of the mother country itself 
 
 The treaty of Utrecht (17 13) showed the utmost point 
 to which this un- Christian spirit reached, and is probably 
 the most disgraceful treaty (in so far as it touched the 
 slave trade) in human annals. The English policy hence- 
 forth turned about this trade as a pivot. 
 
 Between Christmas, 1752, and the same day, 1762, it is 
 estimated that 71,115 slaves were imported into Jamaica 
 alone. Bancroft, the highest authority, estimates, as we 
 stated before, that for one century previous to 1776, 
 
 B B
 
 370 
 
 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 3,250,000 negroes were torn from Africa by Great Britain 
 alone, and exported to the English, Spanish, and French 
 colonies, of whom 250,000 perished in the Atlantic. 
 Helps,^ also a careful writer, estimates that from 15 19 to 
 1807 between five and six millions of negroes were carried 
 from Africa by various European powers to the New 
 World, and sold as slaves. In one year alone (1768) he 
 states the importation to have been 97,000. 
 
 So gigantic a crime under the full light of modern 
 Christianity is one of the most discouraging facts in his- 
 tory. The very foundation elements of Christ's teachings 
 would forbid the least approach to the trade. The maxim 
 "to love one's neighbour as one's self," must have belonged 
 to another age and religion, when an English Bishop could 
 sign the Treaty of Utrecht.^ 
 
 The colonies, whether as more influenced by simple 
 Christianity, or for other reasons, early (as we have said) 
 protested against the slave trade. The great founder of 
 Georgia, Oglethorpe, even went so far as to testify that 
 they prohibited slavery in that colony, "because it is 
 against the Gospel as well as against the fundamental law 
 of England." " We refused as trustees to make a law 
 permitting such a horrid crime" (Bancroft, vol. iii. p. 227). 
 Within two years, however, the inhabitants petitioned for 
 slaves. 
 
 There seem strong reasons to believe that slavery was 
 encouraged in the British colonies, in order to make them 
 more dependent on Great Britain. It is certain that before 
 they became independent, in 1776, some 300,000 negro 
 slaves had been introduced into them. So perverted was 
 
 * Span. Conq.^ vol. iv. p. 371. 
 
 " John, Bishop of Bristol. It seems appropriate that the central 
 slave market in the time of the Norman conquest should continue to 
 be the centre of the African slave trade.
 
 RELIGIOUS OPPOSITION. 371 
 
 public opinion in England at this time, that a " Society 
 for Propagating- the Gospel in Foreign Lands," which had 
 sent missionaries to the coast of Guinea to convert the ne- 
 groes, was found to have owned plantations of slaves in 
 the Barbadoes, and had not even thought it worth while 
 to give Christian instruction to these victims of tyranny. 
 That sect which has in many matters represented more 
 purely than any other the principles of Christ, the Quakers, 
 began their noble series of protests in Germantown (Pa.) 
 in the latter part of the seventeenth century. They made 
 a public declaration that, 
 
 " Though the negroes are black, we cannot conceive there is more 
 liberty to have them slaves, than it is to have other white ones. 
 There is a saying that we should do to all men like as we will be done 
 by ourselves, making no difference of what generation, descent, or 
 colour they are. . . . Ah ! do consider well this thing if you 
 would be done at this manner, and if done according to Christianity. 
 . . . Truly we cannot do so, except you should inform us better 
 thereof, namely, that Christians have liberty to practise these thino-s. 
 Pray what thing in the world can be done worse towards us than 
 if men should rob or steal us away, and sell us as slaves to strange 
 countries, separating husbands from their wives and children," etc. ^ 
 
 The poet Whittier - has well said, 
 
 " It was not the rigour of her northern winter, nor the unfriendly 
 soil of Massachusetts, which discouraged the introduction of slavery 
 during the first half-century of her existence as a colony. It was the 
 recognition of the brotherhood of man in sin, suffering, and redemp- 
 tion; the awful responsibilities and eternal destinies of humanity; her 
 hatred of wrong and tyranny, and her stern sense of justice which led 
 her to impose upon the African slave trade the terrible penalty of the 
 Mosaic code." 
 
 As early as 1675 the devoted missionary, John Eliot, 
 presented a memorial to the government of Massachusetts 
 
 ^ Moore's History of Slavery in Mass., p. 76. 
 
 ' Whittier, quoted iu Wilson's History of the Slave Pover, vol. i. p. 7
 
 37a GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 against selling captive Indians into slavery, on the ground 
 that "it prolonged the war, hindered the enlargement of 
 Christ's kingdom, and that the selling of souls is a danger- 
 ous merchandise." In 1688, the " Friends " of Pennsylvania 
 protested publicly against slavery. In 1701 a petition 
 against slavery was presented to the represent itives of 
 Boston, and in 1703 an attempt was made to hinder the 
 odious traffic by imposing a duty of £^ on every slave 
 introduced into Massachusetts. In 1716 the Quakers 
 of New England sent a public letter to the Rhode 
 Island Quarterly Meeting, with the following question : — 
 " Whether it be agreeable to truth for the Friends to 
 purchase slaves and keep them for a term of life." In 
 1729 the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting showed the action 
 of Christian conscience by protesting publicly against 
 buying slaves. At the same time Elihu Coleman wrote 
 a pamphlet against slavery as "anti-Christian, and very 
 much opposed to both grace and nature." During the 
 latter part of the eighteenth century devoted members of 
 the Quaker body laboured against slavery and strove to 
 awaken Christians to the sin of slave-holding. Among 
 these should be especially mentioned Benezet and John 
 Woolman, in Pennsylvania. The great divines, Wesley 
 and Whitefield, also preached against the slave trade. 
 Among the Congregational divines, Dr. Hopkins of Rhode 
 Island particularly distinguished himself by his efforts to 
 break up slavery and the slave trade, until, in 1774, Rhode 
 Island gave up the wicked traffic, and in 1784 abolished 
 slavery. The Society of Friends was however the only 
 religious body in America which, as a whole, forbade the 
 holding of slaves. In 1773, Dr. Rush, one of the great 
 opponents of slavery in Philadelphia, said very justly, 
 •'Future ages, when they read the accounts of the slave 
 trade, if they do not regard them as fabulous, will be at a
 
 PROTESTS ON RELIGIOUS GROUNDS. 373 
 
 loss which to condemn most, our folly or our guilt in abet- 
 ting this direct violation of nature and religion.'" 
 
 The earlier abolition societies in America in the 
 eighteenth century all protested against this abuse op 
 religious grounds, and the writings of the anti-slavery 
 reformers of that day are full of their objections to the 
 system, based on similar motives. " Nearly all," says 
 the historian - of the slave power, " who engaged in the 
 formation of anti-slavery societies were members of Chris- 
 tian Churches, and were taking an active part in the 
 religious and missionary and philanthropic enterprizes of 
 the day," 
 
 One of the celebrated protests against selling slaves 
 came from Dr. Gordon in Massachusetts, in 1776. "If 
 God," he says " hath made of one blood all races of men, 
 I can see no reason why a black rather than a white man 
 should be a slave." ^ 
 
 In 1774 the Quakers of Pennsylvania excluded from 
 membership all who bought, sold, or kept negro slaves. 
 So strong was the impression that the Christian religion 
 freed a slave, that, as we stated previously, the Virginia 
 assembly in 1667 was obliged to pass a resolution de- 
 claring that the act of baptism did not emancipate : this 
 was renewed in 1705.* 
 
 Slave Trade in Great Britain. — In Great Britain, the 
 earliest opposition to the slave trade and to slavery arose 
 among religious men and was impelled by Christian 
 motives. Among the prominent opponents of this abuse 
 may be mentioned Baxter, Bishop Warburton, Paley, John 
 Wesley, Bishop Porteous, Whitefield, and others. It is 
 
 ' Quoted in Wilson, vol. i. p 13. 
 
 * Wilson, vol. i. p. 230. 
 
 ' Moore's History of Slavery, p. 178. 
 
 ^ Anderson's History 0/ Col. Church, vol. ii. p. 552 ; vol. iii. p. 227.
 
 374 GESTA CHRTSTT. 
 
 unfortunately true, however, that Whitefield sub-^icquently 
 permitted the introduction of slavery into Georgia, The 
 first petition presented to Parliament against the slave 
 trade (in 1776) was based on religious grounds : "that the 
 slave trade is contrary to the laws of God and the rights 
 of man." Previously to this, the Quakers, through George 
 Fox, had made the following protest against the slave 
 trade in the Barbadoes : " And therefore consider seri- 
 ously of this, and do you for them and to them, as you 
 would willingly have them or any others do unto you, 
 were you in the like slavish condition, and bring them to 
 know the Lord Christ." Again, in 1783, the Quakers 
 presented to the House of Commons a like petition against 
 the slave trade : " Your petitioners regret, that a nation 
 professing the Christian faith should so far counteract the 
 principles of humanity and justice as by the cruel treatment 
 of this oppressed race, to fill their minds with prejudice 
 against the mild and beneficent doctrines of the Gospel." 
 A certain portion of English society was becoming gradually 
 permeated with the opinion that both slavery and the 
 slave trade were contrary to the principles of the Christian 
 religion. The writings of those earnest men who did more 
 than any others to abolish these terrible evils, are full of 
 religious expression and feeling in regard to these wrongs 
 Clarkson and Sharpe and Wilberforce always urge Chris- 
 tian motives against slavery. "If," says Clarkson, "we 
 oppress the stranger as I have shown, and if by a knowledge 
 of his heart we find he is a person of the same passions 
 and feelings as ourselves, we are certainly breaking by the 
 prosecution of the slave-trade that fundamental rule of 
 Christianity which says, we shall not do that unto another 
 which we wish should not be done to ourselves."^ 
 
 The slave trade had brought to Great Britain, during the 
 * Clarkson's History, p. 246.
 
 THE SLAVE TRADE. 375 
 
 two centuries and more of its continuance, hunJreds of 
 millions of its ill-gotten wealth. It had been protected 
 as we have seen, by the most powerful interests. The 
 struggle against it was commenced by a small band of 
 Christian men who waged their war on this powerful 
 system of injustice almost solely from motives of humanity 
 and religion. Sixty years after the Treaty of Utrecht 
 was signed, Wilberforce began (1773) to write against the 
 slave trade. Clarkson followed in 1780. The struggle 
 was long, bitter and severe. It was not till 1806-7 that 
 the final victory was gained, and the slave trade was 
 abolished in the British empire. The Congress of Vienna 
 followed in 1815, by engaging the European powers "to 
 use especial efforts to abolish the traffic reproved by the 
 laws of religion and nature." 
 
 The United States had included their judgment on the 
 slave trade in their constitution, but adjourned the linal 
 abolition till 1807. The example of Great Britain was 
 followed by nearly all the civilized Powers,^ and it is noted 
 as an evidence of the advance of opinion that the slave 
 trade has been condemned by three European congrcs.es, 
 a papal bull, twenty-six treaties and more than two hundred 
 conventions with African sovereigns. England, as if 
 feeling the enormity of her previous policy, has been 
 indefatigable in her efforts to make the only redress 
 possible, by breaking up the present traffic. She has 
 made treaties, maintained cruisers on the coast of Africa, 
 established consulates and commissions, and her officials 
 have carried on an immense correspondence, organizing 
 meetings, missions, voyages and protests without number, 
 having for their sole object the breaking up of this de- 
 testable trade. There is certainly no public policy recorded 
 
 ' Denmark even preceded her and abolished the slave trade in 
 1794, so far as it touched Danish ports, and in her colonics after 1S04
 
 376 GESTA CHRIS TL 
 
 in history of a higher and more disinterested nature oi 
 having more the stamp of true Christianity. Despite these 
 efforts and those of other civilized powers, the traffic 
 continued, and it is believed that as late as 1849, 50,000 
 slaves were imported into Brazil alone. 
 
 Many countries have even made slave trading piracy for 
 their own citizens, but it is not as yet held piracy by in- 
 ternational law ; though no doubt in another generation, 
 the public opinion of the world will thus stamp it.^ 
 
 Slavery hi the British Colonies. — The struggle in England 
 against West India slavery was like that against the slave 
 trade, throughout caused and urged on by motives of Chris- 
 tian philanthropy. It cannot be said that the English 
 people or government had any material interest or profit 
 ill the abolition of slavery in their colonies. The whole 
 proceeding seems an act of justice and humanity, and bears 
 the stamp of religious influence. The writings and 
 speeches of the reformers, the arguments presented to the 
 people, the mottoes of the anti-slavery societies, the feelings 
 expressed by the people, all prove that this great reform 
 proceeded from religious and humane feelings, was caused 
 by Christianity and urged especially from Christian motives, 
 Colquhoun,^ who writes with anything but a favourable 
 spirit to revealed religion, confesses that "a religious 
 delirium and morbid sentimentalism dictated this measure " 
 (emancipation). 
 
 Under religious influences many ameliorating features 
 had been introduced into the colonial slavery about the 
 years 1823 and 1826. But the conscience of England had 
 
 ' In full and just acknowledgment of the interests and principles ol 
 Christian philanthropy for the entire rooting out of this criminal trade, 
 slave trading shall be punished like piracy, (Resolve of (Jerman Con 
 federation, June 19th, 1845.) 
 
 * Roman Civil Law, vol, i. p. 42a
 
 ABOLITION OF COLONIAL SLAVERY. 377 
 
 come to the conclusion, that the only right course with 
 this evil was to utterly abolish it. 
 
 After a long struggle of the most embittered nature, in 
 which the great statesmen of England sided in Parliament 
 with the representatives of the religious sentiment of the 
 nation, slavery was abolished (1833) throughout the British 
 colonies at an immediate cost to the nation of ;^2O,ooo,000 
 ($100,000,000) paid to the planters, and an estimated loss 
 to the latter of ;^40,ooo,ooo (|200,ooo,ooo) in the value of 
 the slaves and the depreciated price of the lands. 
 
 This may certainly be looked upon as one of the greatest 
 triumphs of Religion. The example of England was fol- 
 lowed in 1846 by Sweden, in 1849 by Denmark, Uruguay, 
 VVallachia and Tunis; in 1848 by France, and in 1855 
 by Portugal. A strong effort was made in 1880 in the 
 Spanish Cortes to abolish the evil in Cuba, which it is 
 believed will succeed. Slavery is also mainly done away 
 with in Brazil — a law for gradual emancipation having 
 been passed in 1871. 
 
 Slavery in the United States. — The opposition to this 
 unjust system in both the Northern and Southern States, 
 began very early from religious motives. Dr. Sewall, who 
 is so prominent in the early history of Massachusetts in 
 his opposition to both the trafific in slaves and the hold- 
 ing of them, draws his arguments especially from Christian 
 doctrines. The Quakers opposed and at length entirely 
 renounced slavery from religious grounds. Emancipation 
 took place in the Northern States however from a com- 
 bination of causes — the influence of climate, the competition 
 of free labour, and the little profit of the system, as well 
 as from conscientious motives. In the South, where at 
 first there had been a deep moral opposition to the system, 
 gradually, through its profitable returns, the pride of class 
 which it nourished and the political power it conferred.
 
 378 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 there came to be a strong conviction and even passion iii 
 its favour. As time went on the minds of thoughtful and 
 otherwise good men in the Southern States, became com- 
 pletely perverted and led astray on this great moral evil. 
 Such sophisms as excused the horrors of the slave trade 
 to the early Spanish traders, blinded the intellects of great 
 numbers who on all other matters were just and humane. 
 The religious influences of American slavery were supposed 
 to outweigh all the injustice of the system. Then the evils 
 of freedom were believed by many to be greater than 
 all those which fell to these ignorant creatures from 
 bondage. They were said to be like children, unable to 
 guide or support themselves without their masters. More- 
 over, there was the apparent practical difficulty of what to 
 do vv'ith millions of slaves when they were emancipated ; 
 and the fear, bred of ignorance, that when freed, they would 
 massacre their former masters, and commit the most 
 savage atrocities. Emancipation was thus believed to 
 mean, — poverty to the masters, perhaps servile war, and 
 certainly the introduction of a vast elcinent of ignorance, 
 unassimilable by society, into the American body politic ; 
 and beyond this, the entire political humiliation of the 
 South in the councils of the nation. Every practical in- 
 ducement and interested motive seemed to work against 
 emancipation at the South. The reformer who should ad- 
 vocate it apparently preached utter ruin to himself and his 
 associates; he threatened the very existence of civil order; 
 he consigned his bondsmen to unknown evils ; he humbled 
 and weakened politically that community which had 
 become to him more than his nation — his State. Tiic 
 property which he would attack had come finally to hold a 
 value of over tzvo thousand inilliojis of dollars. And he did 
 all this, when his false religious advisers urged upon iiim 
 that slavery was right, Christian and benevolent to the black,
 
 SOPHISMS ABOUT SLAVERY. 379 
 
 Let none of us who have never been in these circum- 
 stances and have not felt these temptations, say too confi- 
 dently that we could have kept the mind clear and have 
 deliberately chosen the path of right and justice though it 
 led to ruin and humiliation. 
 
 On the other hand, at the North, many circumstances 
 combined to blind the eyes of just and God-fearing men. 
 Thousands believed that their fathers had entered into 
 a political compact which for ever forbade them from 
 abolishing slavery in the Slave States by the power of the 
 Federal government. Their hands were tied by solemn 
 engagements. Under their view of the constitution, they 
 did not hold themselves responsible for this system of in- 
 justice, where it was under State power. They could only 
 bring about emancipation by breaking this compact, or by 
 civil war. Jesuitical sophisms had also perverted the judg- 
 ment of many. The negroes were under a Christian system 
 of instruction ; they were better off than as heathen in 
 Africa ; emancipation would mean the chaos of society 
 at the South, and perhaps servile war. Moreover this 
 enormous property-interest in the Southern States was 
 connected by a thousand ties to the wealth and prosperity 
 of the North. The greed of gain, even from this unjust 
 source, stupefied the conscience of a large part of the re- 
 ligious community of the Free States. Again, as so often 
 in history, the organized Church, in many of its branches, 
 became arrayed against true Christianity. Many of the 
 nominally religious bodies of the country became pro- 
 slavery, and therefore false to the teachings of Christ. 
 
 The opinion of the Presbyterian Synod in the United 
 States is given as early as 1787, in favour of universal 
 liberty and of constant preparation by the masters for 
 emancipation, by providing education for the slaves, and 
 by granting them a small property of their own, and fmall)-
 
 38o GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 they "recommended it to all their people to use the most 
 prudent measures, consistent with the interests and the 
 state of civil society in the countries where they live, 
 to procure eventually the final abolition of slavery in 
 America." ^ 
 
 Again this advice is repeated in 1815 ; and in 18 18, the 
 General Assembly venture to say that slavery is a gross 
 violation of the most precious and sacred rights of human 
 nature; "utterly inconsistent with the law of God, which 
 requires us to love our neighbour as ourselves, and totally 
 irreconcilable with the spirit and principles of Christ." ^ 
 They then adopted a declaration, which was repeatedly 
 reafiirmed by subsequent assemblies, that " it is manifestly 
 the duty of all Christians who enjoy the light of the 
 present day, to use their honest, earnest and unwearied 
 endeavours, as speedily as possible, to efface this blot on 
 our holy religion, and obtain the complete abolition of 
 slavery throughout Christendom." ^ 
 
 The Congregationalists, Unitarians and other sects were 
 in their early history even more opposed to slavery, both 
 in their formal resolutions and in their practical action. 
 The Methodist Episcopal Church, in an early conference 
 (1780) plainly condemned tlie system of human bondage ; 
 but, as with many of the sects in the United States, the 
 corrupting influences of the system gradually penetrated 
 the Church and weakened its moral force. In 1800, the 
 Annual Conference was directed to draw up an address 
 for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, to such legis- 
 latures as had passed no laws on this subject. By a sub- 
 sequent action, however, this and other similar paragraphs 
 were struck out, and the following words were added (1804) ; 
 
 ' Digest of Records of the General Assonbly of the Preid. Churchy 
 p. 338. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 342. ^ Ibid., p. 342.
 
 WEAKNESS OF THE CHURCH 381 
 
 " Let all our preachers, from time to time as occasion serves, 
 admonish and exhort all slaves to render due respect and 
 obedience to the commands and interests of their respec- 
 tive masters." ^ 
 
 It is from 1830 to 1850 that the so-called "Church of 
 Christ " in the United States was, in many of its branches, 
 especially false to His principles as regards justice and 
 benevolence to our fellow-men. This was true not only 
 of the public action of many religious bodies, but of the 
 private views and arguments of individual leaders of the 
 Church in all sects, both Roman Catholic and Protestant. 
 Many sophistical arguments were put forth by Northern 
 religious men to prove the right of slavery ; and the 
 Churches were exceedingly timid in hearing or pleading 
 the cause of the oppressed, A distinguished Presbyterian 
 divine, Dr. Albert Barnes, said in a well known address, 
 " There is no power out of the Church that could sustain 
 slavery an hour if it were not sustained in it." ^ 
 
 Even the Quakers, in this hour of trial, were often found 
 inconsistent with the doctrines their predecessors had so 
 consistently taught, and gave little encouragement to move- 
 ments for emancipation.^ It is stated that only certain 
 small sects, such as the Free Will Baptists and Old School 
 Covenanters, were always and consistently opposed to 
 slavery.* Individual Churches, however, in all sects were 
 true to the spirit of their Master — especially among Con- 
 gregationalists and Unitarians. 
 
 In the meantime, the profound principles of Christianity 
 were working on such minds as Garrison's, Lovejoy's, 
 Phillips', Johnson's and others, and producing in them 
 the intense conviction, that the slave was a brother, that 
 
 '. Bowen's Methodist Episcopal Church and Slavery^ p. 24. 
 
 * Johnson's Garrison, p. 248. 
 
 ^ Ibid. * Ibid.
 
 382 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 for him Christ had lived and died, and we were bound ta 
 do to him as we would have others do to us in like condi* 
 tion, and that no compact or constitution could hold which 
 permitted such an atrocious injustice as American slavery. 
 It is true that subsequently the false position of a large 
 part of the American Church on this question forced many 
 of the early abolitionists to an apparent opposition to 
 religion ; it was only however an asserting of the rea' 
 character of Christianity against those who had falsified it 
 
 Garrison at an early period said, " Emancipation must 
 be the work of Christianity and the Church. They must 
 achieve the elevation of the blacks and place them on the 
 equality of the Gospels." ^ And again in an impassioned 
 passage, the great emancipator exclaims, " I call upon the 
 spirits of the just made perfect in heaven, upon all who 
 have experienced the love of God in their souls here below, 
 upon the Christian converts in India and the isles of the 
 sea, to sustain one in the assertion, that there is power 
 enough in the religion of Jesus Christ to melt down the 
 most stubborn prejudices, to overthrow the highest wall 
 of partition, to break the strongest caste, to improve and 
 elevate the most degraded and to equalize all its recipients."" 
 
 No one who knew anything of the anti-slavery reformers 
 in the United States, will doubt that their career was 
 begun and carried on under the purest influence of Christ's 
 truths. It was these and similar men and women who 
 founded, in 1833, the American Anti-Slavery Society. 
 
 But beyond them was a great host of religious men and 
 women in all sects, who felt the deepest opposition to 
 slavery from humane and religious grounds. They con- 
 scientiously believed their hands tied by a political com- 
 pact ; they did not hold themselves responsible for the 
 existence of slavery in the Southern States ; but they were 
 
 * yohnsoHy p. 68. * Ibid.,T^. 106. Words spoken in 1832.
 
 ANTI-SLAVERY PARTY. 383 
 
 unalterably opposed to its extension or to any increase of 
 its power. From this great body, the prayer for emancipa 
 tion went up by night and day ; they scattered innumerable 
 documents, and furnished speakers and arguments against 
 the system ; they did their utmost to hem the slave power 
 within fixed boundaries ; they poured free labour over the 
 new territories, and from them were organized the great 
 party which started, with all the enthusiasm of a moral 
 reform, its triumphant opposition to the extension of the 
 slave power and finally to its very existence.^ 
 
 The natural effect and tendency of slavery at the South 
 tended more and more to awaken the Northern conscience. 
 The increasing cruelty of the masters ; the laws against 
 instruction of the negroes ; the breeding of slaves for the 
 market, and the separation of families ; the violence and 
 arrogance of the slaveholders, and beyond all other things, 
 the pursuing of fugitive bondmen on free territory, aroused 
 each day a deeper hostility to this organized injustice 
 among even the most cautious of the citizens of the Free 
 States. When slaves were sold under the shadow of the 
 
 ' In an interesting sketch of the struggle which prevented Illinois 
 in 1823 from becoming a Slave State, the Life of Gov. Coles, the 
 biographer (Mr. Washburne), says, " the press teemed with publica- 
 tions on the subject. The stump-orators were invoked, and the pulpit 
 thundered anathemas against the introduction of slavery. The relig- 
 ious community coupled freedom and Christianity together, which was 
 one of the most powerful levers used in the contest." At one meeting 
 of the Friends of Freedom in St. Clair county, more than thirty 
 preachers of the Gospel attended and opposed the introduction ot 
 slavery into the State.* 
 
 " It may be said to the eternal honour of the clergy of Illinois at 
 that day, that they were almost without exception opposed to the Con- 
 vention (which favoured the making it a Slave State}, and that they 
 exerted great influence in securing the rejection of the Convention pro- 
 position at the polls " (p. 171). 
 
 • Sketch of Gov. Coles, p. 136.
 
 384 * GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 Capitol of the United States, and when government tioops 
 conducted a chained runaway through Boston to his 
 master, the most conservative felt that no American citizen 
 could escape a certain responsibility for the existence of 
 slavery ; and a deep and burning indignation was kindled 
 in many minds that such a shame and tyranny could 
 exist under the republic. 
 
 In all great reforms and changes, there are many forces 
 that bring about the final result. The wrath of man as 
 well as the love of God, mingle often in the ultimate 
 abolition of human ills. It was the anti-slavery feeling, 
 begotten of Christianity, which prepared the minds of the 
 p-reat intellisrent masses of the Free States for their final 
 struggle with the slave power. And no reasonable ob- 
 jector should belittle this motive, because these very men 
 were held back from forcible opposition to slavery by a 
 loyal conviction of their obligations under the consti- 
 tution. They saw that to strike directly at the slave 
 power meant revolution and civil war. Considering the 
 probable fearful nature of such a conflict and the un- 
 certainty of its issue, they do not deserve reproach that 
 diey waited for the other side to give the first blow. 
 
 And then, beginning the difficult struggle with a large 
 element of the population in sympathy with the slave- 
 masters, it may be excused that these doubting ones 
 were attracted by other cries, than those of anti-slavery. 
 The government, too, kept its old traditions, and still feared 
 to avow, what was the great impelling power of the North- 
 ern uprising — its hostility to slavery. American states- 
 men in their proclamations and public despatches, even 
 made light of the objects of the struggle, and seldom pro- 
 fessed the moral enthusiasm which fired the thousands of 
 individuals who pressed forward to the ranks. But those 
 who knew the people at this time, knew that in ever>'
 
 THE UP-RISING AGAINST SLAVERY. 385 
 
 company and regiment enlistrng for the war, there were 
 men animated with an unquenchable enthusiasm for Hberty 
 and hatred of slavery. They loved the Union indeed, but 
 they loved it as the ideal of liberty for all men of all races. 
 A moral fervour burned through all classes of men at 
 the North. The first regiments came from the most anti- 
 slavery districts of the most religious communities. Many 
 of the leaders were avowed abolitionists. The popular 
 songs breathed the spirit of emancipation. A thousand 
 pulpits pleaded the cause of the negro and denounced 
 slavery. The feeling had stamped itself deep into the 
 heart of the Northern people, that slavery, as a great 
 wrong and injustice, would injure the white and the whole 
 country equally with the negro, and was against the laws 
 of Providence. 
 
 Innumerable other feelings and motives mingled in the 
 spirit which opened and sustained the war : love of the 
 Union, pugnacity, the hostility of a free-labour class to 
 a slaveholding class, political sympathy and a careful 
 weighing of the chances of the future if a slaveholding 
 republic were allowed unlimited sway side by side with 
 a free republic. But deeper than all these, among the 
 religious bodies, and in every class, was an intense moral 
 opposition to slavery, and a determination now that hands 
 were unbound as to the compacts of the constitution, to 
 get rid of it once and for ever. 
 
 The mere pecuniary and commercial interest of the 
 Free States was undoubtedly to leave the status quo, to 
 enjoy the indirect profits of slave-labour, and not suddenly 
 to destroy two thousand millions worth of apparent 
 property in a portion of the republic. The moral forces, 
 as well as enlightened policy, prevailed. 
 
 It is true that emancipation was at length declared as 
 a " war-measure." But the way was prepared for it by 
 
 Z G
 
 386 GESTA CHRISTJ. 
 
 the moral opposition to slavery as a wrong and in^ 
 justice. 
 
 The whole population of the Free States had been 
 educated by events as to the real character of the system, 
 and conscience and religious sentiment had been en- 
 lightened by what seemed the revelation of Providence 
 itself. In such vast social reforms as the abolition of 
 American slavery, many influences must combine with the 
 purely moral and religious. Christianity acts merely as 
 stimulating the conscience, increasing human sympathy, 
 and awakening the mind to the horror and injustice of 
 such an oppression of a fellow-man. It does not show the 
 way to revolution, though indirectly it does often " bring 
 a sword into the world." But it works upon the most tre- 
 mendous motive-power in human affairs — the conscience 
 and sympathy, and under it, convulsions must come ; until 
 finally men approach in institutions and laws its divine 
 principles. 
 
 Without the passion a;:d rashness of the South, it is 
 difficult to see how emancipation would have come for 
 centuries. There might have been two republics indeed, 
 but one would have been slaveholding. Still ultimately in 
 the far future, after untold horrors, and convulsions and 
 wars, freedom would have dawned on the American con- 
 tinent also, for " where the Spirit of Christ is, there i.s 
 liberty."
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 MODERN SERFDOM. 
 
 The history of serfdom and emancipation in the Middle 
 Ages virtually includes the similar history in modern 
 times. 
 
 This relic of a barbarous period reached down to a more 
 civilized era. The oppression and exactions of serfdom 
 in every country of Europe, except Norway and Sweden, 
 have weighed down and degraded the labouring class, 
 crippled their producing power, and in many states, pre- 
 pared the way for the outbreaks which accompanied or 
 followed the French Revolution. The ignorance and de- 
 gradation of a large part of the European peasantry in 
 this century are due most of all to serfdom. Even as 
 late as 1750 (it is stated by careful writers)^ more than 
 one-half of the German people were in the state of serf- 
 dom. The profound moral and religious forces which 
 gradually change such a system of injustice as this, are 
 not easily recognised. The most powerful influences 
 working to the overthrow of serfdom were the silent. 
 
 Throughout the eighteenth century, the presb n Europe 
 became imbued with humane and religious ideas, and 
 thundered incessantly against this ancient injustice. 
 
 The philosophers, who often, while deriding religion, 
 
 ' Sugenheim. Zimmerman, 
 
 387
 
 388 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 showed the purest Christian spirit, constantly protested 
 against this wrong. Men's minds became everywhere 
 stamped with the ideas of equaHty of rights for all, and 
 of humanity toward the weak. The incredible burdens 
 and exactions of serfdom in France, Germany, Italy, Spain 
 and other countries, were felt to be violations of Christian 
 and humane obligations. Here and there prominent acts 
 of emancipation by individual masters betray the deep 
 impulses at work. 
 
 Thus a certain Count Rantzan in Holstein, in 1766, 
 published a pamphlet, giving his own experience in 
 freeing his serfs, which was afterwards circulated as a 
 document of emancipation in Russia, and is believed to 
 have had much effect there. This owner of serfs gives a 
 powerful picture of the hopelessness, degradation and ir- 
 religion of his bondmen ; how they had no heart in their 
 labours, no courage and no hope ; and how they even 
 became indifferent to the strongest impulses of human 
 nature, and did not care for marriage or to leave descend- 
 ants who should inherit such misery. "This condition 
 (of serfdom)," says the Count, " naturally extinguished all 
 moral good in them ; one observed in them a beastly cold- 
 bloodedness towards God and religion.^ 
 
 In various countries, the sovereigns were sufficiently in 
 advance of their times to press emancipation on an unwil- 
 ling nobility and gentry ; in others, the storms of revolu- 
 tion swept away the last relics of feudal oppression. But 
 in almost all, the ideas and principles derived from religion 
 had prepared men's minds for removing the heavy burdens 
 on the poor. 
 
 One of the earliest royal ordinances against .serfdom 
 in modern times was from Frederick I. of Prussia (1702), 
 doing away with it on the royal domains ; this, however 
 * Su^-enheiniy p. 517.
 
 ABOLITION OF SERFDOM, 389 
 
 was withdrawn in 171 1. Frederick II. attempted to renew 
 the injunction in 17 19, especially on the royal territory 
 in Prussian Pomerania. These efforts were followed by 
 those of Frederick the Great (1763), but they all failed, 
 thoutjh the oppression was much softened in the Polish 
 provinces. 
 
 In France, an edict of Louis XVI. proclaims (1779) that, 
 "considering that a great number of our subjects are still 
 servilely attached to the soil, and regarded as making part 
 of it,^ they shall be free on the royal domain." Yet, 
 nothing but the explosion of the revolution broke up the 
 exactions and burdens of ages, and freed France from this 
 injustice. Previous to this, in North Italy the princes had 
 abolished these ancient oppressions of the people, Vic- 
 tor Amadeus of Savoy having abolished forced labour in 
 1729, and removed all similar burdens in Sardinia in 1761. 
 In Germany, it was in this century before the various 
 oppressions of serfdom were done away with. As usual, 
 the revolutions bore in their train emancipation from 
 feudalism. The outbreak of 1830 was followed by free- 
 dom to the poor peasant in Hanover (183 1), in Saxony and 
 Bavaria (1832), and Wiirtemburg (1836). The Revolution 
 of 1848 was followed by entire liberty in Prussia (1850) from 
 feudal burdens, though serfdom had been abolished forty 
 years before ; and by the utter doing away with forced 
 labour and service among the peasants by the Magyar 
 nobility (1849) in Hungary. In Austria, the Imperial 
 house had done much for the serfs through different reigns, 
 but serfdom was not ended in Gallicia till 17S2 ; and all 
 traces of feudalism were not swept away till this cen- 
 tury. 
 
 This abuse in some of its forms survived in Denmark 
 till 1835, and in Switzerland till 1846. 
 * Sugtnheim.
 
 39© GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 In Russia, as is well known, serfdom survived till 1861. 
 It is probable that in this latter country, and in Hungary, 
 the religious impulse had less share in emancipation than it 
 has had in the rest of Europe. Still both countries felt 
 the current of the age, which has been strongly directed 
 by the ideals presented in the Gospels. The conception 
 of man as a " a brother in Christ," and one for whom He 
 has died, always tends to shake down tyranny and under- 
 mine injustice. As Religion spreads abroad the ideas of 
 human brotherhood, equality before God, responsibility 
 to Him and liberty, the ancient systems of injustice are 
 brought to the ground , and Freedom and Justice begin 
 to rule and prevail.
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 THE DUEL. 
 
 T£IE progress which has been made in Christianized 
 opinion in regard to this custom, may be best measured 
 by the views of one of the most acute philosophical writers 
 on law in modern times ; an author, too, who considered 
 all these subjects (so far as his training permitted), unin- 
 fluenced by Christian traditions. Bentham, in his " Princi- 
 ples of Penal Law" ; says of the duel : " It entirely effaces 
 the stain which an insult imprints upon honour," He then 
 praises courage, justly, as one of the highest qualities of 
 the citizen, and regards it as especially tested by this mode 
 of trial, 
 
 " In the state of neglect," he adds, " in which the laws till the 
 present time have left the honour of the citizens, he who endures an 
 insult without having recourse to the satisfaction which public opinion 
 prescribed to him, by thus acting exhibits himself as reduced to a 
 state of humiliating dependence, and exposed to receive an indefinite 
 series of affronts ; he exhibits himself as devoid of the sentiment of 
 courage which produces general security, and, indeed, as void of 
 sensibility to reputation, — sensibility, protection of all the virtues and 
 safeguard against all the vices." 
 
 Or again, 
 
 " Duelling is a preservative of politeness and peace — the fear of 
 
 ' Benthani^s Works, vol. i. p. 380. There is reason to think from 
 a letter of Bentham to the Duke of WellingVjn, that he modified 
 these views in later life.
 
 392 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 being obliged to give c r receive a challenge, destroys a quarrel in the 
 germ," 
 
 " If the legislator had always applied a proper system of satisfaction 
 for offences, there would have been no duelling, which has been and 
 is still but a supplement to the insufliciency of the laws." 
 
 The Christian system, it need not be said in reply, 
 differs in toto from the modern theory of " honour," as it 
 does from the spirit which supports war. It requires the 
 behever indeed to scrupulously regard the opinion of the 
 just and honourable, and to avoid even the appearance 
 of evil ; but its standard is not reputation, even that of the 
 highest and most civilized persons, but character, and 
 character continually tested by Christ. Its "sensibility " 
 is constantly called out, not towards a public opinion which 
 ever changes, but towards the supposed approval of the 
 purest moral character which history has known. Ben- 
 tham's argument at this late day hardly seems worth 
 replying to. A devout Christian of his time would have 
 said : " We hope through the gradual influences of the 
 Christian religion and right reason, to change the public 
 opinion of all civilized states, so that the politeness and 
 peace of which you speak will be the national outflow 
 of improved morals and manners, and not the effect of 
 fear or prudence ; so that affronts will not be so often 
 offered, or will not be so much felt, or will be punished by 
 law and public reprobation. We hold that courage may be 
 tested in far more sensible and useful ways than in personal 
 combat ; and that the duel settles nothing, and cannot 
 affect in one way or the other the reputation assailed. We 
 hold that a nobler courage may be shown by refusing a 
 challenge than accepting it ; and that the Christian has a 
 higher standard to measure himself by than a changing 
 public opinion, inherited from barbaric times, which often 
 approves selfish and base actions. We trust to change
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE DUEL. 393 
 
 both opinion and law, so that duelling will become con- 
 sidered as a relic of barbarism, as it is known to be con- 
 trary to the spirit of the Christian religion." 
 
 The struggle, however, between the spirit of this Faith 
 and this custom has been an exceedingly slow and doubt- 
 ful one for the past three centuries. In this matter, the 
 Church has been indeed more consistent with the teachings 
 of the Master than in any other. The Church as well as 
 Christianity has nearly always opposed the duel of revenge, 
 or that fought on account of wounded honour. 
 
 The Council of Toledo (1477) made a solemn declara- 
 tion that Christian burial should be refused to duellists. 
 Pope Julius II. (1509) issued a bull, prohibiting the duel 
 on pain of excommunication, and Leo X. (15 19) threat- 
 ened the same punishment to all witnesses, seconds, or 
 abettors of the offence. Pius V. extended the prohibition 
 to all Christendom. The celebrated Council of Trent 
 gave forth no uncertain sound on this custom. All 
 duellists were threatened with excommunication and loss 
 of Christian burial, and the duel was called " an invention 
 of the devil to ruin the soul, by the bloody death of the 
 body." GregoryXIII, (1582) also issued a bull, threatening 
 terrible spiritual penalties on all duellists, and Clement 
 V. extended the punishment to all seconds and abettors ; 
 and as late as 1752, Benedict XIV. proclaims a refusal 
 of Christian burial even to those who died away from 
 the field of contest, but through the effects of the duel. 
 
 The Protestant and Catholic Church has each been 
 equally opposed to it during all their history. The books 
 of religious instruction, and the volumes of sermons, in 
 all Christian countries, are full of arguments and appeals 
 against the practice. And yet it was late in this century 
 before Christian influences produced much effect. 
 
 The "duel of honour" is to be distinguished from the
 
 394 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 "judicial duel" of the Middle Ages. It is an off-shoot 
 of chivalry, and especially made its appearance in France 
 in the sixteenth century in the reign of Francis I. It 
 represented the exaggerated sensitiveness of a class to 
 any slight affecting its reputation, which was an especial 
 feature of chivalry and feudalism. Reversing the rule of 
 the Roman law,^ the modern gentleman felt trie light blow 
 of a stick or the hand on the face as a greater insult than 
 a stroke by a deadly weapon, because the peasants and 
 villains alone fought with sticks and fists, and with un- 
 covered faces. The lie was the highest insult, because 
 this was the common reproach or accusation made against 
 the slave, the villain, or the peasant. 
 
 The duel became the badge or sign of a class : and the 
 chivalric habit of a barbaric age of fighting in the cause 
 of the weak or for any wound of honour or the most 
 trifling reason, became transferred to a more enlightened 
 time, and was the mode of showing membership in an 
 undefined body, of restraining rudeness and satisfying 
 enmity. It is the "survival" of barbarism in a civilized 
 age. 
 
 So rife did the practice become in France, that during 
 the eighteen years of the reign of Henry IV., four thousand 
 French gentlemen are said to have perished in the duel, 
 and this good-natured king is reported to have granted 
 14,000 pardons to those who had offended against the 
 law in this matter. From his reign to 1757, no less than 
 twelve royal ordinances and eight acts were published 
 against duelling, and yet as late as the minority of Louis 
 XIV. three hundred of the first nobles of France perished 
 by this practice. 
 
 Duels were almost equally common in England and 
 Ireland. In the reign of George III. there were, according 
 
 ' Ictus fustium infamiam non importat. (De his qui infamia, etc.)
 
 DUELS IN ENGLAND. 395 
 
 to Gilchrist, one hundred and seventy-two duels, in which 
 one-fifth of the combatants were killed, and one-half re- 
 ceived wounds ; only eighteen of these were tried (though 
 the statute books are full of laws against the practice), of 
 whom six were acquitted, seven were found guilty of man- 
 slaughter, three of murder, two were executed, and eight 
 sentenced to imprisonment. Every state in Europe has 
 legislated against duelling, and in many armies, an officer 
 is cashiered who takes part in a duel. "Courts of Honour" 
 have been formed in various countries to take jurisdiction 
 of offences against honour. Yet duelling still continues 
 in France, and to a limited degree in Germany. Even 
 so celebrated a general and old a soldier as the Duke of 
 Wellington, after all his victories, felt it necessary to fight 
 a duel as late as 1829 ; and a duel between Englishmen in 
 England was fought as late as 1845, while one occurred 
 in England between Frenchmen in 1852.^ 
 
 As late as 1 841, an address was presented to the House 
 of Lords, in relation to a particular duel, and protesting 
 against this barbaric custom, and obviously under the 
 impression that public feeling among the higher classes 
 was very much in its favour. 
 
 ^Wf society" say the petitioners, "is to be preserved, it must be 
 christianized. Your lordships have acknowledged this great truth 
 by your exertions to preserve the Christian principle in education. 
 . . . But it would be mockery to hold forth the Decalogue with 
 one hand, and with the other, a Charter of legitimacy to that spurious 
 offspring of human vice and folly, which, involving as it does a direct 
 transf -ession not of one only but almost every law in the Decalogue, 
 virtually annuls it. . . . We call upon your lordships therefore in 
 the name of God and man ... to accompany your verdict with 
 
 ^ It is reported that in the same year a trial occurred in England for 
 slander, between two English Naval Officers, which would have been 
 settled earlier by duel
 
 396 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 the fearless and u..q_alified expression of your united abhorrence of 
 the unhallowed system of duellins^." ' 
 
 A duel occurred in England in 1843, which gave rise 
 to the " Anti-duelling Association," and was followed by 
 an order of the Queen through the War-office in 1844. 
 This order 2 has perhaps broken up duelling in the British 
 army, though previous experience shows that such orders 
 are successful only when they are the voice of public 
 opinion. By this regulation, an officer engaging in a duel 
 is cashiered and his second punished. In the third article, 
 approbation is expressed of 
 
 "The conduct of those who having had the misfortune to give 
 offence to or injure or insult others, shall frankly explain, apologize, or 
 offer redress for the same, or who, having received offence, shall 
 cordially accept frank explanation or apology for the same ; . . . 
 and lastly, all officers and soldiers are acquitted of disgrace or dis- 
 advantage, who, being willing to make or accept such redress, refuse 
 to accept challenges," etc. 
 
 This certainly is at length the voice of Christianity speak- 
 ing through governmental regulation and military law. 
 
 In the United States, the duel has been so common, 
 that a modern English historian of duelling, Dr. Millingen,"' 
 writing in 1841, says, with suitable modesty, he is con- 
 fident from the progress already made, that within half 
 a century, duels will become as rare in the United States 
 as in Great Britain, if not rarer. In its early history, the 
 Republic lost the greatest statesman it has ever possessed 
 — Alexander Hamilton — in a duel with a worthless ad- 
 venturer who was determined * to murder him, and when 
 
 ' The Times, Feb. nth, 1841. 
 
 2 Quoted in Steinmetz's Romance of Duelling, vol. ii. p. 366. 
 
 ^ History of Duelling, vol. i. p. 179. 
 
 * Bentham, on hearing from Burr's lips the account of this duel 
 said, "it was nothing less than murder." See Bentham! s Works, 
 voL xi
 
 SOUTHERN PROTESTS AGAINST DUELLING. 397 
 
 Hamilton, disapproving the practice, fired into the air. 
 The feeling throughout the country at this useless sacrifice, 
 aided much in breaking up the practice in the Free States. 
 The savage influence of the slave system kept it up fo( 
 many years, especially in Washington, wh.ere the members 
 from Free and Slave States met in bitter discussion. It 
 was, however, a Southern statesman — Gen. Pinckney, of 
 South Carolina — who, after Hamilton's death, addressed 
 in 1804 a celebrated memorial against duelling to the 
 Senate and House of Assembly of South Carolina. 
 
 "Your memorialists," he says, "are deeply impressed with grief at 
 ihe prevalence of the custom of duelling, which trampling on all laws, 
 human and divine, sweeps off many useful citizens, leaving the families 
 a prey to sorrow, and often to poverty and vice. That this custom 
 originated in dark and barbarous ages, when a regular and impartial 
 administration of justice was unknown and unpractised, etc. That 
 restraining personal resentments by giving the attribute of vengeance 
 to the laws, was the greatest victory obtained by civilization over 
 barbarism, but the custom of duelling is too well calculated to defeat 
 the beneficent effects of that triumph, and to weaken the effect of all 
 laws, etc. That the pretence of those who would excuse this custom 
 on the ground that it polishes society and prevents assassination, is 
 wholly unfounded ; . . . a custom, which though in direct hos- 
 tility of the principles of Christianity, prevails only in Christian 
 iilurope and America." 
 
 Again still later (in 1838) it was a Southerner, Henry 
 Clay, who in a debate on a bill to prohibit duelling in the 
 District of Columbia, said, as the last word in the debate, 
 " When public opinion is renovated and chastened by ' 
 religion, reason and humanity, the practice of duelling will 
 be at once discountenanced." 
 
 This bill, it should be remarked, passed with only a 
 single vote in the negative. So in every State, strict laws 
 were passed against duelling, and provisions against it 
 included in the constitution of many even of the Slave 
 States. The rules and regulations governing the United
 
 398 GESfA CHRISTI. 
 
 States army strictly forbade it. But all this was of no 
 avail. Public opinion even in the North for a long time 
 upheld it ; and in the South, the influence of slavery and 
 the society based upon it, preserved the custom till within 
 a very few years. The gradual permeation of the people 
 by Christian ideas and by right reason, has finally utterly 
 done away with duelling in the Free States ; while the 
 same causes with the destruction of a slave oligarchy at 
 the South, have gradually uprooted it there. It is not 
 found in practice that the abolition of duelling, as was 
 so freely predicted, has increased assassination or cases 
 of bodily attacks ; nor does it make language in political 
 debates more personal or violent. Politeness of manner 
 through the Union is even more common than in the times 
 when challenges were so customary. Political debates are 
 no more abusive, and on the whole, less so, than under 
 the duelling regime. Instances of personal violence and 
 murderous conflict are more rare in all the States. The 
 press, often vituperative enough, is not as bad as it was 
 when a scandalous article brought after it a challenge. 
 The whole country has been much softened by religion 
 and the progress of civilization. Courage has been suffi- 
 ciently tested in the awful ordeal of civil war. Public 
 opinion has been elevated and Christianized. Laws ex- 
 press the higher feeling on this subject, and are executed. 
 The duel, as will be in some distant day with war, is 
 simply regarded as a relic of a barbarous age and will 
 soon utterly pass out of use or observance.
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 PRISON REFORM AND CHARITIES. 
 
 It is certainly one of the marked steps in humane progress 
 among civilized nations, that the convict and prisoner for 
 crime or transgression is no longer merely left to his 
 punishment, or treated with brutality and unnecessary 
 cruelty. There is scarcely a trace in the ancient world 
 of any important attempt to reform the offender against 
 human law or to render his confinement less miserable. 
 It was seldom remembered that many offenders are only 
 technical violators of human legislation, and that many 
 others are led into crime by the entire neglect of their 
 education by the community. 
 
 Prison reform began under Christian influences, as we 
 have previously shown, during the reign of the first 
 (nominally) Christian Emperor of Rome. Constantine's 
 legislation (320 A.D.) thus provides for improvement in 
 the treatment of convicts. Those accused of crimes are 
 to be examined with promptness and not to be detained 
 in confinement, while those arrested are to be confined in 
 a humane manner. The cells are to be furnished with 
 means for air and light. Persons under accusation are 
 not to be put in jails or scourged, but are to be placed 
 under " military arrest " and in a prison open to the light^ 
 
 In 340 a law forbade the mingling of sexes in prison.' 
 
 ' Cod. Theod, lib. ix. tit. 4. ^ Ibid., tit I. 
 
 399
 
 400 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 The Emperor Honorius cliarged the judges to visit the 
 prisons every Sunday, to see that the prisoners received 
 sufficient nourishment and to take care that propei 
 humanity be shown the convicts by the jailers.^ 
 
 In 549 the Council of Clermont orders the prisons to 
 be visited every Sunday by the archdeacon or some other 
 church official, to provide for the wants of the prisoners. 
 
 The great reform of European prisons commenced by 
 Howard, is most clearly a fruit of the teachings of the 
 " Friend of man." Every line of the private journals of 
 this devoted philanthropist, his dying words and prayers, 
 show the religious inspiration which prompted his effi^rts. 
 " Do Thou, O Lord ! " says this friend of the unfortunate, 
 a little before his death, " visit the prisoners and captives 
 and manifest Thy strength in my weakness. Help, Al- 
 mighty God ! for in Thee do I put my trust, for Thou 
 art my rock."^ 
 
 A biographer says of him: "The mid-day sun is not 
 more evidently the cause of light and warmth and fruitful- 
 ness, than that Christian love which animated, induced 
 and constrained Howard to consecrate himself entirely 
 to God's service, and to sacrifice life rather than that 
 fellow-men should suffer whom he might assist and re- 
 lieve." ^ 
 
 The great reforms of this century in the treatment of 
 convicts and prisoners ; the individual moral influences, 
 the stimulus introduced of hope and a kind of moral pro- 
 bation within prison walls, the grading and separation of 
 prisoners, the introduction of schools, libraries and the 
 services of religion to those under the sentence of the law, 
 
 » Cod. T/ieod., lib. xi. tit. 2',\ 
 * Life of Howard (Field's), p. 4. 
 " Ibid.^ p. 65.
 
 PRISO.Y-REFORM UNDER CHRISTIANITY. 401 
 
 the gradual avoidance of degrading and useless penalties, 
 the employment of more humane and conscientious prison 
 officers, the use of reformatory as well as deterrent mea- 
 sures in the treatment of offenders, in fine, the best features 
 of the "Irish" prison system — all these are the clear 
 and natural fruits of Christian teachings. We know of no 
 similar influence among those sentenced by law or of 
 similar effects under any other religious system. To the 
 modern believer as well as to the ancient, Christ still goes 
 down among the weary and heavy-laden, the prisoner and 
 captive, and attempts to lift the heavy burdens, and the 
 true follower seeks to walk in His footsteps. The great 
 conventions of prison reformers and those who would ele- 
 vate and improve the lot of convicts and prisoners, held in 
 all civilized countries, are only another appropriate expres- 
 sion of human sympathy under the inspiration of the 
 "Teacher of Galilee." 
 
 The immense reforms in the prison system of the 
 United States are a striking feature of the times. We 
 read in American colonial history that a preacher in the 
 principal Philadelphia prison was obliged to be supported 
 by a cannon with a lighted match at hand ; that the Con- 
 necticut prisoners were kept in one place ^ in underground 
 cells dripping with moisture, where the light of day never 
 penetrated, and where vice and riot prevailed ; that in the 
 leading city, New York, old and young, male and female, 
 sane and insane, innocent and criminal, were confined in 
 jails together; that drunkenness, debauchery, profanity and 
 rioting ruled in these places, so that all prisons and jails 
 became schools of crime. Neither hope nor religion ever 
 entered these abodes of misery. 
 
 It was the Christian spirit that inspired the first great 
 effort in the United States to save the youthful criminal, 
 * The Simsbury mine. 
 
 D D
 
 402 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 in founding in 1824 the first American Reformatory — the 
 New York House of Refuge. The same inspiration has 
 gradually lightened the fate of the prisoner and sought to 
 reform him, until, in 1874, the following were some of the 
 practical fruits of this great influence among the re- 
 formatories of the United States. 
 
 There were, in 1874, in twenty States and one Territory, 
 thirty-four reformatories for youthful criminals ; they owned 
 in the aggregate 6,153 acres of land; the total estimated 
 value of buildings and land, with the personal property, 
 was $7,826,480 ; the average number of inmates was 8,924, 
 and the whole number received since their opening was 
 91,402, of whom 77,6y^ were boys and 13,724 girls; the 
 whole number of persons engaged in this work was 771, 
 and the total annual cost for maintenance was $1,358,885, 
 or $152, (about ;^3o) for each inmate. Three- fourths of 
 the inmates, or nearly seventy thousand, are reported as 
 permanently reformed. These figures, however, are to be 
 received with great caution, as there is no accurate tabu- 
 lating of the results. 
 
 Educational Charities. — It may be urged that the sym- 
 pathy with the prisoner is indeed humane, and a mark of 
 progress in compassionate feeling, but that it does not 
 necessarily advance mankind or prevent crime in the 
 future. In all countries, and especially in the United 
 States, have arisen, however, movements of Christian 
 philanthropy directly inspired by the " Friend of man," 
 having for their objects to root out criminality and 
 pauperism in the germ and prevent the formation of 
 criminal classes. We allude to the educational charities 
 for children, especially in the large cities like New York. 
 This is a feature of moral advancement unknown to 
 antiquity and scarcely heard of except where Christian 
 teaching has reached.
 
 CHARITIES FOR CHILDREN. 403 
 
 These charities take the homeless and unfortunate victim 
 of poverty or vice — the child : they provide him shelter and 
 protection while cultivating his self-help ; they find him 
 labour, give him education, put him under the best habits 
 of civilization, throw around him religious influences, and 
 at length place him in a compassionate family on a farm 
 where he can work in the ground. 
 
 If a girl, devoted women of the fortunate classes seek to 
 lead her to better things. The habits in which she has 
 lived are met by influences of industry, order and purity ; 
 she is improved day by day, until at length she too is 
 transplanted to a good home. 
 
 The agencies through which these influences are con- 
 veyed, the lodging-house, industrial school, emigration plan, 
 and the like are skilfully contrived to elevate the class 
 through natural means. It is not surprising that after 
 twenty-five years ^ of these charities the prison statistics 
 of New York should show distinct and encouraging evi- 
 dences of the diminution of juvenile crime and vagrancy 
 against many local evils and obstacles, and that fifty 
 thousand children are reported as rescued from the vice 
 and misery of New York and turned into self-supporting 
 and industrious farmers and housekeepers. 
 
 These and similar movements throughout England and 
 the United States are a plain and natural fruit of Chris- 
 tianity. They are inspired by Him who bore the burdens 
 of men and was especially the Friend of the poor. There 
 seems no reason why, under the same impulse, they should 
 not increase and become one of the great curative move- 
 ments of society to remedy its most threatening evils. 
 
 It is almost a common place to say that all the varied 
 and blessed institutions of charity throughout Christendom, 
 all the asylums, hospitals and reformatories, the provisions 
 • See The Dangerous Classes of New York^ by the Author.
 
 404 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 for the lame, blind and deaf, for the idiot and insane, foi 
 the sick of every possible disease, for the widow and 
 orphan and homeless, for the aged and infirm, are only 
 blossoms and fruit of the life and teachings and death of 
 the great Benefactor. They are the true victories of Christ 
 — the Gesta Chris ti. 
 
 To these must be added a more humble but not less 
 significant expression of sympathy in modern society, the 
 efforts to care for the dumb animals, those patient instru- 
 ments of man's convenience ; to alleviate their inevitable 
 sufferings, to restrain the tyranny of their masters, and to 
 prevent any unnecessary pain. 
 
 Many societies have been formed in the United States 
 and other countries to prevent cruelty to animals and to 
 check any useless suffering in scientific operations with 
 them. There is little doubt that these compassionate 
 efforts, which find their strongest support among women, 
 have made the lot of dumb brutes much more endurable 
 in many civilized countries. 
 
 They are not, however, peculiar to the followers of 
 Christianity. The Buddhists have often been equally 
 merciful, and in some Oriental countries great sympathy 
 for animals seems consistent with great indifference to 
 human suffering.^ 
 
 Humanization of Punishments. — One remarkable advance 
 in humanity, due to religious forces, should not be 
 passed over — the gradual mitigation of severe and " afllic- 
 tive " punishments to those sentenced by the law, and the 
 doing away with degrading penalties, We do not regard 
 the Christian system as necessarily opposed to the death 
 punishment in all cases, but as aiming to limit it to only 
 
 ' See passage quoted, Chapter XXX"^'l. pa>;e 447, of a traveller's ex- 
 perience in India.
 
 THE DEATH PENALTY. 
 
 40s 
 
 the most extreme instances of crime. Nor are the Christian 
 teachings responsible for any of the false sentiment of the 
 modern world towards those guilty of crime. The teach- 
 ings of Christ and the apostles evidently do not look upon 
 death as the greatest of evils ; nor do they discourage 
 severe penalties on wrong-doers. There is no direct 
 instruction in regard to the death penalty any more than 
 on a thousand similar topics. The inference from the 
 teachings might fairly be, that so valuable a thing as 
 human life, with the tremendous destinies of the soul, must 
 be very carefully and reverently dealt with, not sacrificed 
 except for the very highest interests of the community, and 
 that humanity towards even the most guilty must guide 
 human actions. It is certainly possible that under these 
 principles the punishment by death will gradually pass 
 away, as have the strappado and the rack. 
 
 The natural effect of these teachings, however, from the 
 beginning was against any degrading penalties. Even the 
 laws of Constantine show this, where they forbid any 
 marring of the beauty and dignity of the human face 
 made in the Divine image.^ 
 
 They equally oppose any penalty which brutalizes the 
 offender or the spectator. The criminal may deserve 
 severe pains and punishment, but this Faith would en- 
 courage no penalty which in its nature makes him worse, 
 or which in its natural effect degrades the on-lookers and 
 society in general. It does not object to the offender 
 suffering pain and loss, but this must be of a nature to 
 reform him and benefit others. The penalty must not be 
 useless, or degrading, or crushing, or brutalizing to the 
 world. The prison administration is to be guided by love 
 and severity combined. 
 
 1 Cod. Theod., lib ix. tit. 40; 1,9.
 
 4o6 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 The progress in this matter has been remarkable in the 
 modern ages. In the Classical and Middle Age periods, 
 such punishments as crucifixion, exposure to wild beasts, 
 burying alive, impaling, tearing to pieces, and breaking on 
 the wheel were common. 
 
 In the Middle Ages, the powers of human invention 
 were continually employed in devising instruments and 
 machines for the production of pain. 
 
 Screws were invented for compressing the thumbs ; 
 straight boots of iron for enclosing the legs, between which 
 and the flesh wedges were driven by mallets ; racks of 
 various and hideous forms, capable of occasioning the most 
 exquisite agony, were constantly devised. We have 
 already described the stj'appado'^ (p. i8i) ; another agonis- 
 ing punishment was " picketing," where the offender was 
 suspended so that the weight of his body was supported 
 by a spike on which he was made to stand with one foot;^ 
 and still another was the use of the "wooden horse,"^ 
 a narrow ledge or board on which the criminal was made 
 to sit astride with weights fastened to his legs. Ducking 
 or half drowning was often employed even for trivial 
 offences. 
 
 Bentham relates* that a description of the various 
 methods of inflicting torture and punishment which had 
 been in use in the Austrian dominions, was ordered by the 
 Empress Maria Theresa to be drawn up, this investigation 
 being made with a view to ameliorate the existing laws. 
 A large folio volume was accordingly put forth, containing 
 engravings of the instruments of torture, and all the 
 methods of execution. The book was only exposed for 
 sale a few days when the prime minister, Prince Kaunitz 
 
 * See Bentham's Works, vol. i, p. 413. 
 a Ibid. ' Ibid. 
 
 * Vol. i. p. 413.
 
 CRUEL PUNISHMENTS. A07 
 
 ordered it to be suppressed, for fear that it would inspire a 
 horror of the laws. 
 
 In England, high treason was punished by dragging at 
 the horse's tail, through the streets, from the prison to the 
 place of execution ; or by plucking out and burning the 
 entrails, while the patient was yet alive ; or by hanging 
 by the neck so as not to destroy life ; also by beheading, 
 quartering, and the exposure of the fragments of the body 
 in such places as the king should direct. Under the pro- 
 gress of the humane sentiment, this has all been changed 
 to beheading and hanging. 
 
 Even in this century most frightful punishments were 
 inflicted in the British West Indies on negroes breaking the 
 laws — punishments as savage as anything in the bloody 
 history of the past. In the time of George III., public 
 whipping for dog-stealing was common in England, and 
 the common law enforced the slitting of nostrils and 
 cutting of ears for many offences. In the reign of Henry 
 VIII., the mere drawing blood in the palace in a quarrel 
 was punished by the loss of the right hand ; and in that 
 of Elizabeth, " the export of sheep " brought after it the 
 loss of the left hand. Branding and whipping have been 
 common in all countries. 
 
 Within fifty years, men have been hanged in England 
 for sheep-stealing and stealing in a house ; and in the early 
 history of the United States, many offences, like forgery, 
 stealing, and horse-stealing brought the death penalty 
 after them. 
 
 In Massachusetts, under the early legislation after the 
 Revolution, ten different crimes were punished with death, 
 among them being burglary ; blasphemy was punished 
 with pillory and stripes till the year 1829 ; branding was 
 employed for several offences. In Pennsylvania, in 1776, 
 twenty crimes were liable to the death penalty, among
 
 4o8 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 them such offencrs as witchcraft and counterfeiting. In 
 Virginia and Kentucky, twenty-seven offences were pun- 
 ished by death or maiming ; among them perjury, the 
 destroying or concealing of a will, the obtaining of money 
 or goods on false pretences, horse-stealing, and the like. 
 In New York, on several occasions in the eighteenth 
 century, negroes were burned alive for extreme crimes, and 
 the tread-mill was in use as late as 1822. 
 
 The public whipping-post now only survives in some of 
 the old Slave States in America, and will soon be ranked 
 with the pillory or the strappado. Whipping as a penalty 
 is still inflicted by law in England for very brutal offences, 
 such as wife-beating and the like. The humane opinion, 
 however, of the United States is opposed to it, on the 
 ground that it brutalizes and degrades not only the 
 criminal, but his associates. A result of this and other 
 causes is, that in no other country are brutal crimes so 
 rare. The tread-mill, also, is mainly abolished there. 
 Whipping is still sometimes employed by prison officials 
 on refractory criminals, and other severe prison penalties 
 are used (often too freely), but public opinion is adverse to 
 their frequent employment. All public degrading penalties, 
 such as the stocks, the pillory, branding and the like, have 
 mainly passed away in the United States. In some of the 
 old Slave States gangs of negro prisoners are still em- 
 ployed on public works ; but, in general, punishment is 
 private and reformatory. 
 
 Among other merciful reforms, executions are made 
 private, and are only inflicted where murder is clearly 
 proved and of an aggravated character. They are destined 
 evidently to be less and less common. 
 
 Imprisonment for Debt. — One of the frightful abuses of 
 the past was imprisonment for debt. It is perfectly just 
 that a person should be punished, who wrongfully and
 
 DEBTORS' PRISONS. 409 
 
 knowingly defrauds another of his property. But so large 
 a proportion of debts are incurred with the best of motives, 
 accident and misfortune so often cause inability to pay, 
 and the degradation of the debtor to the level of the 
 criminal and pauper has so bad an influence on a large 
 class, that Christianized and humane sentiment is opposed 
 to imprisonment as a punishment for non-payment ; while 
 the modern experience is that the severe punishment does 
 not necessarily tend to make the community more honest 
 or the recovery of debts easier. 
 
 The accounts transmitted of the treatment of debtors 
 in England and America in the past century, arc harrow- 
 ing. Thus it is said that in the eighteenth century, four 
 thousand unhappy individuals were committed to prison 
 every year for misfortune and poverty, and treated like 
 criminals and outcasts. " One indiscreet compact could 
 doom a wretch to a life-long confinement;"^ a small debt 
 exposed the unhappy person to perpetual imprisonment. 
 Oglethorpe succeeded in 1728, with the help of parliament, 
 in delivering from jails great multitudes of these unhappy 
 creatures. 
 
 In the United States, even as late as 1829, it was 
 estimated that there were as many as 3,000 of these un- 
 fortunate persons confined in the prisons of Massachusetts ; 
 10,000 in New York ; 7,000 in Pennsylvania ; 3,000 in 
 Maryland, and a like proportion in other States. In many 
 of these debtors' prisons no provision was made for sick- 
 ness, or even for ordinary cleanliness or comfort. There 
 was often no separation of sexes ; and these victims of 
 misfortune were confined with robbers, vagrants and mur- 
 derers. 
 
 Between 1821 and 1845, imprisonment for debt in the 
 
 • Bancroft,
 
 4IO GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 various United States was abolished, except in cases 
 where fraud was reasonably suspected. 
 
 The bloody era of the past, when man under the forms 
 of law could inflict such useless torture and pain on the 
 offender, is over. The humanity of Christ enters the 
 prison, and fills it with hope and the sentiment of human 
 brotherhood ; it excludes bloody and useless and de- 
 grading penalties ; it aims at reform as well as punish- 
 ment ; it seeks to do away with the gallows by the power 
 of the school and the religious teacher. 
 
 T/ie Sunday. — It is not enough considered by students 
 of progress, how great a gift to the labouring classes and 
 to the whole world is the Christian Sunday. It has be- 
 come so great a necessity to the civilized world, that the 
 wonder is how the non-Christian races or classic peoples 
 were able to do without such a day. 
 
 Plato says somewhere that leisure is necessary to the 
 acquisition of virtue, and that therefore no working man 
 can acquire it. Plutarch calls it one of the most beautiful 
 and happy inventions of Lycurgus, that he obtained for 
 the citizens the greatest leisure by forbidding them to 
 occupy themselves witii any mercenary work. ^ 
 
 Christianity early obtained for the working classes of 
 the Roman empire this great blessing, and not through 
 the Greek method, of creating a class of helpless helots, 
 but by the institution of the Lord's Day. 
 
 Under the prodigious impulse of the leading races of 
 modern times toward production and the acquiring of 
 material wealth, there would have come, without some 
 such day, an absolute breaking down of the physical power, 
 a wearing out of the brain, and a correspcinding mora) 
 
 ' Code, iii. 411, 11. 
 ' Lye, 24.
 
 THE LORD'S DAY TO LABOURERS. 411 
 
 degeneracy. In fact the Christian Sabbath may be said 
 to have saved the modern European and Anglo-American 
 races. Had the greed for money never known an enforced 
 rest ; had the wheels of the factory, the hum of the market 
 and din of business sounded through the streets seven days 
 as now through six, and no customary day called away 
 thoughts to things not bought or sold and to principles 
 unseen and eternal, the modern people might have run 
 down to the lowest point of materialism. 
 
 The Lord's Day is the greatest external gift of the 
 Christian religion to the working classes. The labourer is 
 insured his rest. His production is apparently cut short 
 one-seventh, but as in the limiting the hours of a day's 
 labour, he is found to effect more in the year, owing to the 
 refreshment and rest given, and his moral value is in- 
 creased. Where the Sunday is made a social and religious 
 day (as in New England) without excessive strictness, 
 the working man or woman returns to the task, revived, 
 and morally as well as physically strengthened. 
 
 A religious Sunday is the best safeguard against the 
 vice of the labouring class, intemperance. 
 
 In the chapters on Roman Law, we have shown what a 
 step in humanity was the enforced rest of the Sunday to 
 Roman slaves, after the empire became nominally Christian. 
 
 The Anglo-Saxon law under Christian influences, was 
 equally regardful of the rest of the Sunday to the British 
 slave and serf In all countries under the nominal teach- 
 ings of Jesus, that day has relaxed the muscles of toil, 
 wiped away the sweat of incessant labour, and restored 
 the worker to his family, reminding him that he is some- 
 thing beside an instrument of gain, and that he has 
 other wants than those of earth. 
 
 The business and professional man of modern days owes 
 fully as much to this blessed day. It is a festival of
 
 412 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 humanity ; it re.ninds the fortunate of their duties to the 
 unfortunate ; it calls away the mind from things material 
 to the truths which belong to all times. It compels the 
 scheming brain to rest. It is the day above all to remem- 
 ber Him who has brought such unmingled blessings to 
 humanity. 
 
 If the world by any madness or degeneracy should ever 
 renounce its faith in the supernatural, it would be com- 
 pelled to renew the Sabbath under some other name; so 
 indispensable is it for human progress. 
 
 We may surely count the Christian Sunday as one of 
 the most blessed institutions conferred on the race by 
 this faith.
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 CO-OPERATION AND PAUPERISM. 
 
 Christianity, as we have frequently said, only touches 
 indirectly on the distribution of the profits of labour. It 
 inculcates constant benevolence, unselfishness, and con- 
 tinual imparting of wealth to the necessities of others ; it 
 discourages excessive accumulation, and teaches especial 
 sympathy with the poor and labouring classes. There is 
 an ideal taught by it in regard to property, which, like its 
 ideal in respect to war, mankind has not yet reached. 
 Property is evidently to be held for the good of others, 
 and not for selfish enjoyment or the aggrandizement of 
 a family. The employers of labour are to be guided by 
 the golden rule, and to hold each one employed as a 
 " brother in the Lord." The modes in which this benevo- 
 lent principle is to be expressed to the world will be 
 various. Without doubt, " co-operation " is precisely in 
 the direction of the Christian law. 
 
 It tends to reduce the selfishness of trade and com- 
 petition, it diminishes the deceit and falsehood which 
 belong to some branches of business, it makes the buyer 
 and seller one in interest and brotherly feeling, and it 
 plants among men the seeds of brotherhood which Christ 
 teaches. Its obvious influence is to bring into one body 
 the labourers and capitalists of the /orld, making them 
 
 4x3
 
 414 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 feel that their interests are the same, and their rights 
 equally to be respected. 
 
 This does not, however, include as a corollary that in- 
 dividual property shall come to an end. It may indeed 
 tend to limit its accumulation, but the more probable 
 tendency of the Christian principle will be in the future 
 towards a careful distribution of wealth for the good of 
 others, in promoting science, art, charities, and education, 
 and in curing the inevitable ills of humanity. 
 
 Commerce, production, and trade as they are now 
 conducted, cannot be considered the final and completed 
 condition of mankind. 
 
 Selfishness and dishonesty are too much its features to 
 be consistent with the Christian ideal. In all probability 
 some form of co-operation will be the final and Christian 
 form in which production and distribution will develop 
 themselves, where the interests of customer and dealer, of 
 manufacturer and workman, of capitalist and labourei, 
 are correlative, and Christian and just principles govern all. 
 
 Communism. — There is no doubt in many of the aspira- 
 tions and aims of communism, a certain marked sympathy 
 or harmony with the ideals of Christianity. 
 
 What is best in it has come from the teachings of 
 Galilee. The sense of human brotherhood between rich 
 and poor, the sympathy with the unhappy labouring 
 masses of the world, the duty of allowing every human 
 being the highest possible use of his faculties, the aversion 
 to the deceit and fraud so often characterising commerce, 
 and the opposition to the selfishness of competition, the 
 horror of war of the Socialists, the aspect of property as 
 a fund for the good of all — all these are plainly reflec- 
 tions from that light which shone eighteen centuries ago, 
 from the hills of Judea. 
 
 Some of the Socialistic writers feel this; thus Proudhon
 
 CHRISTIANITY AND SOCIALISM. 415 
 
 says, " Love thy neighbour as thyself, and society will be 
 perfect ; love thy neighbour, and all distinctions of prince 
 and shepherd, of rich and poor, of learned and ignorant 
 disappear, all the contrarieties of human interests vanish ; 
 love thy neighbour, and happiness with labour, without 
 any anxiety for the future will fill thy days."^ 
 
 Mario 2 also says, " The heathenish principle is, grant to 
 the few enjoyment at the expense of the many ; Christian 
 principle demands a moral regard for those natural con- 
 ditions which ensure general prosperity with a view to 
 effect the highest possible happiness for all in due propor- 
 tion." 
 
 Christianity of course recommends no definite system 
 for applying its humane principles, and therefore has no 
 sympathy with Socialism in its plans for grouping human 
 beings, or the power it would give to the State, or its 
 hostility to propert}^ as such, or its methods of dividing the 
 returns from labour, or its phalansteries or communities ; 
 indeed the Christian view of marriage and the family 
 is directly opposed to that of many (though not all) 
 Socialists. 
 
 The point of view however of both is somewhat similar, 
 and some of the objects identical. 
 
 The Christian, like the Socialist, feels that this depres- 
 sion and abject poverty and dependence of great masses of 
 human beings is not the ideal of humanity ; that the fearful 
 inequalities of human condition, the immense wealth of the 
 few and the bitter penury or daily anxiety of the many, 
 the intense selfishness of competition and the frauds or 
 deceits of trade, the greed for money and struggle for the 
 prizes of life, do not belong to the kingdom of God on 
 earth, promised by the Master, or to any human condition 
 
 ' Syst. des Consid. Econ., vol. i. p. 329. 
 * Quoted by Kaufmann, Socialism, p. 158.
 
 4i6 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 which the Friend of man might reasonabl}' tliink a reward 
 of his desires and his struggles. The Christian holds the 
 key to the final solution of all these problems. How and 
 by what various means it shall be applied he cannot fully 
 say ; the method must be the result of careful scientific 
 study of all the conditions. 
 
 Socialism as interfering with individual development, or 
 producing a monotony of life, or destroying the identity 
 of the family, has no sympathy from Christianity. 
 
 Insurance. — The greatest practical benevolent discovery 
 of modern life, and one destined yet to produce enormous 
 effects in diminishing poverty and relieving misfortune — 
 the application of insurance to human ills — is not directly 
 ; fruit of Christianity, and yet no doubt in the stimulus 
 given to the benevolent feelings by this Faith, is to be 
 found its indirect source. Insurance is the application 
 of the savings of the fortunate to the assistance of tho 
 unfortunate, and yet not necessarily through benevolent 
 motives. This ingenious device takes advantage of a self- 
 regarding impulse to promote the good of all. Its appli- 
 cation more and more to relieve the misfortunes of the 
 labouring classes through government annuities, private 
 life insurance provisions against accident, sickness, cala- 
 mity and old age made by savings in time of health and 
 prosperity and guaranteed by the whole community, will 
 be one of the greatest blessings of modern society, and 
 will undoubtedly be stimulated, if not caused by the influ- 
 ence of Christ in the world. We do not dwell on this 
 important topic because it is not a feature of progress 
 directly produced by the Christian religion, though under 
 its influence ; yet we regard it as the mode in which as 
 civilization advances wealth will be especially distributed. 
 
 It is not an unlikely eventuality that in a distant future 
 all men and women can be guarded against the inevitable
 
 INSURANCE AGAINST POVERTY. 417 
 
 calamities and losses of life, and thus preserved from sink- 
 ing into the lowest depths of misery, by a wise system of 
 insurance by society or government — the insured contri- 
 buting a fixed annual payment during health and strength 
 (itself a preservative from pauperism), and the State 
 taking charge of the funds, and appropriating from taxa- 
 tion enough to fill out the necessary annuity. It will be a 
 kind of Christian communism, but not of a nature to pro- 
 duce dependence, because the ultimate enjoyment of the 
 insurance would depend on savings made during health 
 and prosperity ; but it would be a poor law, or taxation 
 of the fortunate for the benefit of the unfortunate, yet in 
 a mode to promote self-respect and human brotherhood. 
 Like the distribution of the surplus of the rich now made 
 by taxation for schools, it would not be an appropriation 
 of wealth which would embitter the rich or pauperize the 
 poor. 
 
 Perhaps the best form of insurance, as in harmony with 
 Christianity, would be voluntary annuity-associations, made 
 from benevolent motives by the fortunate, and where the 
 surplus needed over the annual premiums to form com- 
 fortable annuities, was contributed by the charitable. 
 
 As we have often argued in this work, the influence of 
 the great Master is directly to lessen one of the greatest 
 of human ills — Pauperism. 
 
 The self-control, sobriety, temperance and moderation 
 He teaches, tend to a certain control over circumstances. 
 The good-will He encourages, brings sympathy and help 
 from others. The great sources of poverty are idleness, 
 intemperance and vice. 
 
 The Christian, other things being equal, is less likely to 
 be very poor, and a pauper he cannot easily be, — that is 
 he cannot have that spirit of dependence, idleness and 
 dishonesty, which are the essentials of pauperism. If by 
 
 E E
 
 4i8 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 misfortune he come to the lowest depths of human ills, he 
 bears as a greater One hath taught him to bear, and does 
 not become degraded in spirit. Having a sense of his 
 great dignity as a child of God, and one for whom Christ 
 hath lived and died, he is less likely to become a parasite on 
 society And ever being in the mental habit of looking for- 
 ward to the judgment of another life, he will be the more apt 
 to provide for the ills of this ; so under Christianity society 
 tends, as has often been seen on the rugged soil and under 
 the harsh climate of New England, to throw off pauperism 
 and eliminate poverty. Many villages are known in that 
 region, apparently so little favoured otherwise by Provi- 
 dence, where not a pauper and scarcely an abjectly poor 
 person can be found for miles around ; — the causes of this 
 good fortune being mainly moral. 
 
 It is not claimed that Religion alone in future ages can 
 remove pauperism from the world, but the Christian belief 
 will tend towards a more just distribution of property ; it 
 will promote temperance and good morals ; it will stimulate 
 co-operation between labourers and between labour and 
 capital ; it will encourage many forms of insurance, and 
 above all elevate and train the character, so that the human 
 being, though unfortunate, cannot be degraded, and thus 
 under the influence of Christ on the world, the labouring 
 classes will be less likely to fall into extreme poverty, and 
 if they do will be more readily assisted, or will not sink 
 morally. 
 
 The Church in past history, especially in Europe, has so 
 often been on the side of power and of the oppressor ; it 
 apparently now feels so little sympathy there in the great 
 movements of social reform, that the labourer and the over- 
 burdened worker may well be pardoned if he do not behold 
 at all in Christ His true form, that of the Friend of the 
 poor and heavy-laden ; but gradually as light spreads, even
 
 THE FRIEND OF THE POOR. 419 
 
 the working classes of Europe will see that no influence in 
 human history has ever done so much to remove the heavy 
 burdens on labouring people, to produce such equitable dis- 
 tribution of wealth, to lessen the ills of poverty, and give 
 dignity to the humble toiler, and everywhere to promote 
 human brotherhood, a.s the doctrine and life of the Teacher 
 of Galilee. 
 
 Cabet, a socialistic writer, Vv'cll says : 
 
 " If Christianity had been interpreted and applied in the spirit of 
 Jesus Christ, if it had been well known and faithfully practised by the 
 numerous portions of Christians who are animated by a sincere piety, 
 and who have only need to know truth well to follow it, this Christi 
 anity, its morals, its philosophy, its precepts would have sufficed and 
 would still suffice to establish a perfect society and political organi- 
 zation, to deliver humanity from the evil which weighs it down, and to 
 assure the happiness of the human race on the earth."' 
 
 * Le vrai Christianisme. Preface.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 FREE TRADE. — HUMANITY. — LIBERAL GOVERNMENT. 
 
 The progress of mankind under the Christian ideal has 
 been continually towards greater unity of races and nations. 
 The Greek and Roman contempt for the foreigner has 
 passed away ; the Middle Age distrust and hostility to 
 the stranger and " far-comer " has mainly vanished, except 
 among non-Christian races. Different nations are approach- 
 ing one another in feeling, ideas, habits and interests. 
 There still remain, however, the relics of a more barbaric 
 past in the separation made between different peoples or 
 provinces by taxes and tariff duties. Yet even here there 
 is progress. It is only about 900 years since a London 
 merchant, trading with York, Chester or Bristol, paid 
 duties and taxes as he does now with New York and Havre, 
 and it was only in ion A.D. that a law was passed estab- 
 lishing free trade between London and other English 
 towns.^ 
 
 On the European continent, the Rhine for centuries was 
 crossed with incessant lines of tariff at every border of 
 a petty province, and freedom of commerce was only 
 
 ^ The men of London are to be safe and free over all England, and 
 in all sea-ports, from toll, transit-duty and tonnage and all other duties 
 (Hen. I. 2, 4). " If any one takes toll or custom from the citizens of 
 London, the citizens may take as much from the burg with damages " 
 (Hen. 1. 2, 9).
 
 FREE TRADE. 421 
 
 secured by armed leagues of cities ; in like manner, every 
 large river was impeded by revenue exactions. In Ger- 
 many, the baron or rural prince descended from his moun- 
 tain castle and levied what taxes he chose on the passing 
 merchant. The value of an estate in Germany in the 
 Middle Ages was publicly measured by its nearness to any 
 point where various roads met, and thus the opportunities 
 for vexatious tariffs and plunderings were the greatest. 
 
 In France, as we have seen, the old savage feeling towards 
 the stranger, which lingers in legislation still, showed itself 
 during hundreds of years, in the odious droit d'aubaine. It 
 was only in the close of the last century, as we stated before, 
 that this right was abolished, and it is only in this century 
 that the last disabilities of the stranger have been removec 
 in French legislation. This relic of the Middle Ages still 
 exists under the Common Law of England, and under the 
 statutes of many American States, which impose disabilities 
 on the right of aliens to hold real estate. 
 
 The savage "wrecker's right" or droit de naufrage, is a 
 similar remain of the old savagery which prevailed, as we 
 have shown, throughout Europe for many centuries. The 
 unfortunate crew and passengers of wrecked vessels could 
 be imprisoned and enslaved, and their property reverted to 
 the lord of the coast or to the crown. It is only in modern 
 times that this barbarism has been completely done away 
 with. 
 
 Free Trade. — Christianity, as such, has nothing to say 
 as to fiscal systems and financial or economical theories. 
 It only increases human sympathy and struggles against 
 human selfishness. But the great ideas which have been at 
 the basis of modern political economy — the principles that 
 the interests of all nations are really one ; that the losses 
 of one are the losses of all, and the gains of one become 
 finally the gains of the whole ; that selfish obstructions to
 
 422 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 trade and intercourse re-act at last against the power which 
 places them, so that the most liberal will end by being the 
 most prosperous — these conceptions have received their 
 greatest impulse from the teachings of Religion. One of the 
 earliest statements of the effect of the Christian belief on 
 freedom of trade is put forth in 1553, by Edward VI. king 
 of England, in a letter ^ carried by two navigators. Sir 
 Hugh Willoughby and Richard Chancellor, starting on a 
 voyage to discover Cathaye. 
 
 The letter sets forth the disposition to cultivate the love 
 and friendship of his kind, implanted in man by the 
 Almighty, and the consequent duty to maintain and aug- 
 ment this desire, and " to show good affection to those who 
 come from farre countries." . . . 
 
 " And if it be right and equity to show such humanitie to all men, 
 doubtlesse the same might chiefly to be showed to merchants, who, 
 wandering about the world, search both the land and the sea, to carry 
 such good and profitable things as are found in their countries to 
 remote regions and kingdoms, and again to bring from the same such 
 things as they find there commodious for their own countries . . . 
 for the God of Heaven and Earth, greatly providing for mankind, 
 would not that things should be found in one region, to the end that 
 all should have need of another, that by this means, friendship might 
 be established among all men, and every one seeke to gratifye all." 
 
 As liberal ideas have, century after century, more and 
 more taken possession of men's minds, there has been an 
 increasing readiness for unrestrained intercourse and un- 
 shackled trade. The prosperity of large countries with 
 varied productions — like the United States or Germany — 
 where perfect internal free trade prevails through all 
 interests and communities, suggests the feasibility of larger 
 unions of different countries and races, and foretokens the 
 more complete and grander union of all nations in the dis- 
 tant future, when the productions of one shall be open to all, 
 ' Quoted by Ward, Laws of Natio)is, vol. ii., p. 332.
 
 PROGRESS IN ECONOMICAL IDEAS. 423 
 
 and all men shall buy and sell wherever it seemeth them 
 good, without obstruction of tax or tariff — a day in which 
 wealth shall be more evenly distributed among all human 
 beings, than thus far history has known. 
 
 In this matter, fortunately, the selfish impulse which is 
 struggled against by Christianity, is f and on the broad 
 scale and in a long period to be the injurious one. It will 
 become more and more evident that for countries like 
 Southern Germany to tax the manufacturers of North 
 Germany is only a little less unprofitable than taxing the 
 manufacturers of Belgium ; and for Illinois to obstruct 
 the entrance of the products of Massachusetts is a pro- 
 ceeding of the same kind as shutting out the manufactures 
 of England. So extended and complicated are the con- 
 nections of nations, that the true effects of selfishness are 
 finally made more apparent than they are in narrow and 
 personal relations. As civilization advances the Free 
 Trade Powers will be more prosperous, and will confirm, 
 by their success, the worth of the principle of humanity as 
 a prudential maxim. The interests of one will be seen to 
 be the interests of all. 
 
 Some of the old economical ideas of the past have been 
 already removed by the progress of right reason and 
 sentiments of justice, and fruitful causes of dissensions 
 and wars taken away. Thus the exclusive possession 
 by a nation of gold mines, or a rich colony, is no longer 
 considered a loss to other nations ; and the flow of the 
 precious metals to the markets of one power is no longer 
 regarded as necessarily an injury to the exporting power. 
 A great calamity of one people is now known not to be 
 a blessing to any other. 
 
 The tendency of the new ideas in political economy is 
 clearly towards a greater unity of all states and nations. 
 
 In the meantime, the Christian influence, as in regard
 
 424 CESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 to war, will be towards a compromise between the ideal 
 of Christianity and the necessities of the times — a com- 
 promise ever approaching unchecked intercourse and un- 
 limited trade, looking towards the time when all human 
 beings shall be acknowledged to be of one blood and one 
 family. 
 
 Another expression of the new humanity may be found 
 in the charitable aid and sympathy, extended by one 
 country to another in cases of public calamity. This 
 century has been peculiarly rich in such expressions of a 
 common compassion. They are the legitimate fruits of 
 the Faith from Judaea. The aid given by the United 
 States to the sufferers from the Irish famine, to the victims 
 of floods in France and Hungary, to the wounded in 
 France and Germany in the Franco-German War, to the 
 struggle for Hungarian Independence, and similar gifts by 
 the British people to sufferers from fire and accident and 
 pestilence in America, and all other countries, as well as 
 to those striving for liberty, are familiar instances of the 
 new expressions of sympathy which now binds all nations 
 together. 
 
 No such expressions of common feeling among inde- 
 pendent nations were known to the classic world, or are 
 witnessed now outside of professed Christianity. 
 
 With this advance in international sympathy may be 
 considered the higher principles which govern the relations 
 of civilized with inferior races. The old notion for which 
 the Church is so much responsible, that a Christian nation 
 discovering a barbarous land has absolute power over the 
 property and persons of the pagan barbarians, has nearly 
 passed away. The effort of every great nation, or at 
 least the ideal of their conduct, towards barbarous and
 
 INFERIOR RACES. 425 
 
 Inferior races is to elevate and civilize them. We say 
 this, acknowledging how wofully inconsistent the conduct 
 of individuals and nations has often been towards weaker 
 or more savage peoples. The dealings of the Americans 
 with the Indians, the wars of the English with the Chinese, 
 Afghans, Zulus, and others seem to show no advance in 
 the Christian sentiment of compassion towards the weak 
 or justice to the inferior. Yet all who are familiar with 
 the United States know that the most persistent and 
 honest efforts are made now to civilize and improve 
 these tribes ; and though individuals entirely forget their 
 compassion and religion in dealing with these unfortunate 
 savages, yet the best classes and the government are 
 honestly trying to atone for the sins of the past, and to 
 do the best for this decaying people. 
 
 The British people also in the past few years have 
 so far governed the instincts of pugnacity and pride, as 
 to abandon an unjust campaign against an inferior race 
 (the Zulus), even after a defeat ; and to retreat from the 
 country of another weaker people (the Afghans), which 
 they had conquered, merely because the Christianized con- 
 science of the nation regarded the war as useless or unjust. 
 These are surely considerable victories for the Christian 
 principle, and could not have happened even a century 
 ago. 
 
 Then the efforts of the English to civilize such tribes 
 as the Fijis,^ are a new feature in history. 
 
 Such public measures as the attempts to force opium on 
 China, and some features in the administration of India, 
 are, we admit, miserable exceptions to this influence of 
 the Christian faith on the relations of nations with inferior 
 powers. But, on the whole, it must be admitted that there 
 has been great progress in this matter ; and that the 
 * See Miss Cumming's book on the Fijis.
 
 426 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 tendency Is more and more for the powerful races to be 
 guided in their deaHngs with inferior by humane and 
 Christian principles. We are far enough in this from the 
 Christian ideal, but we are approaching it. 
 
 As particular evidence of this new spirit of compassion 
 we may also mention the treatment by the American 
 government of those whom they considered " rebels," at 
 the close of the Civil War in 1865. 
 
 The struggle had been one of extraordinary intensity 
 and bitterness. A million of lives are believed to have 
 been sacrificed on both sides. The President of the Union 
 had been assassinated. According to the precedents of 
 history, the victorious party and the central government 
 would have been justified in executing the leaders of the 
 rebellion and confiscating their property. Many persons 
 advised this course. But the American people, in some 
 directions, are singularly imbued with the compassion of 
 the Christian teachings. The voice of religion and sound 
 wisdom prevailed over the cries of revenge and passion ; 
 and not a life was taken or a dollar confiscated by judicial 
 process after the close of the war, for complicity in the 
 rebellion. On the contrary, in a iew years the " rebels " 
 were restored to equal rights with all other citizens of the 
 Union. 
 
 The very large sums spent and the devotion of thou- 
 sands of lives by nearly all Christian countries to the 
 work of teaching and improving distant and often .savage 
 peoples, is also an expression of the higher humanity 
 and brotherhood, now a fixed part of the moral habits of 
 leading nations. It is impossible to imagine a Greek or 
 Roman society even thinking of such an object. The 
 only thing parallel to it, is the efforts of the Buddhist 
 priests to proselytize distant tribes. 
 
 Popular Education. — The great movements for populaf
 
 POPULAR EDUCATION. 427 
 
 education are stimulated by the same principles of human- 
 ity. The child of the poorest is equal to the richest in 
 the new fraternity, and should have the same essential 
 opportunities. In all countries even faintly touched by 
 the Christian spirit of equality and brotherhood, there are 
 widespread efforts to educate the masses. 
 
 Schools are open to all. The rich are forced to give 
 of their abundance for the education of the poor. Not 
 only are common schools open to every class, but higher 
 schools and colleges of learning are provided for the masses. 
 Even laws are passed compelling attendance : and pro- 
 visions are made by individual charity for those who are 
 poor and ill-clad. 
 
 This is one of the most remarkable fruits of this Re- 
 ligion in modern times. It is a forcible distribution of 
 wealth to confer the highest possible blessings on the 
 needy. It is a confession by society that the most 
 ignorant, degraded and destitute person is a brother of 
 the most fortunate, and must have every fair opportunity 
 to exert his powers. 
 
 If one could imagine the proposition made to the archai 
 of Athens to tax the rich in order that the helots might 
 learn to read the Greek classics ; or a measure before the 
 Roman senate to set apart a new revenue for providing 
 teachers for the plebs and the slaves, one can rightly 
 measure the progress of the Christian sentiment of equality 
 in these eighteen centuries. 
 
 And as one of the marked fruits of Christianity, a seed 
 of good almost unknown to the classic times — we may 
 mention the societies of lovers of men and of God, which 
 exist now in all civilized countries. These associations 
 may often be bigoted or worldly, still on the whole they 
 attempt to teach men to love one another, to be just and 
 temperate and pure and unselfish. No moralist can re-
 
 428 GESTA CHRTSTI. 
 
 gafd them with indifference. They must exert a profound 
 influence on the whole morality of the modem world, 
 and nothing of a popular nature like them was known 
 before the Christian era — though there did exist under 
 the Roman empire, certain " clubs " of a private char- 
 acter, which were partly benevolent in their offices, and 
 perhaps formed a basis for the later Christian Churches.^ 
 
 As a more intangible result, but not less real, of this great 
 moral power in the world, we should not omit the new 
 Hope given to mankind. When one considers how vast 
 a proportion of the human race are exposed to inevitable 
 sorrows and disappointments, how many are crushed by 
 poverty and oppression, what multitudes never rise to 
 any condition of prosperity, and how all must go through 
 pain, sickness and the shadow of death, it will be under- 
 stood what an immense happiness such a faith as the 
 Christian has spread among the poor, the oppressed, the 
 sorrowful and unfortunate, and all the weary and heavy 
 laden, for eighteen centuries. 
 
 It has made the world a much brighter place to mul- 
 titudes of people, has wiped away tears without number, 
 has consoled the lot of countless slaves and captives, has 
 upheld unnumbered widows, orphans and grief-laden, and 
 has thrown a light and hope over millions of death-beds. 
 These results may be alleged by the objector to be 
 imaginary, yet they are none the less real. In counting 
 the fruits of this Faith, we may fairly reckon the happi- 
 ness scattered in the modern world as compared with the 
 ancient. 
 
 Among the somewhat intangible fruit, should not be 
 
 forgotten the greater number of lives in modern times 
 
 inspired and more or less pervaded by moral ideas and 
 
 purposes, by purity and truth and universal good-will 
 
 ' See Boissier, De Rossi, and Le Blant, previously cited.
 
 LIBERAL GOVERNMENT. 429 
 
 The fevi in all ages have felt moral impulses, but how 
 many tiiousands exist now in every small community 
 whose lives are conscientiously guided by these ideals and 
 who often try to live up to them. This is a result which 
 cannot always be measured in figures, but it none the less 
 continually works upon the customs, laws and institutions 
 of modern society, and has been the source of all the best 
 reforms. 
 
 All these are pre-eminently the Gesta Christi : for such 
 lives are inspired by and modelled after Christ. 
 
 Liberal Government. — Christianity in itself teaches 
 nothing in regard to any particular form of government. 
 Christ appears to have inculcated submission to the then 
 existing government of Rome — one of the most despotic 
 of tyrannies. He probably saw that the best reform of po- 
 litical institutions lay in the reform of individual character. 
 He scattered seed which eventually must ripen in a har- 
 vest of equal rights to all. Where men should do to one 
 another as they would have others do to them ; where the 
 poorest and lowest was regarded as the child of God and 
 friend of Christ, for whom He lived and to save whom He 
 died, there after the course of ages could be no tyranny 
 or political injustice, or inequality of rights, or legal op- 
 pression. All persons and classes would eventually, as a 
 matter of equal right, have a share in the government. 
 Such principles lead ultimately, as to a logical conclusion, 
 to each individual man or woman having a part, though 
 perhaps not an equal part, in making the laws, choosing 
 the rulers, and otherwise administering the affairs which 
 relate to the welfare of all. What the form is by which 
 this should be effected is a matter of indifference to 
 Christian teachings. These merely demand equal rights, 
 equal protection and an equal use of their faculties for all. 
 But under their influence, the tendency of the world is
 
 430 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 plainly towards bestowing political rights on the masses ; 
 towards parliamentary and democratic institutions. The 
 races or peoples, which profess to be governed most 
 directly by the words of Christ, the Anglo-Saxons, Anglo- 
 Americans, and Northern Germans, are those most inclined 
 to free institutions. The freedom they have gained in 
 religion, and the habit of listening to the reported words 
 of Christ rather than to ecclesiastical teachers, have led 
 them towards freedom in government, and a respect for 
 the rights of all. 
 
 We do not mention these peoples as necessarily em- 
 bodying or following all Christ's principles more than the 
 Romanic or Keltic races, but as applying them especially 
 to political rights. 
 
 A sceptical writer, distinguished for his eloquence and 
 learning — Renan — has said that *' the Gospels are the 
 Democratic 'Book par excellence."^ 
 
 Great respect for the individual, equal justice to all, 
 and a deep sense of humanity and equity — these are the 
 natural fruits of the teaching of Jesus, and these lead to 
 democracy. Undoubtedly, modern liberal institutions are 
 an indirect effect of the religion first taught in Galilee. 
 They seem nowhere to have flourished outside of Chris- 
 tianity, though the sense of humanity and love of liberty 
 belong to the whole race. No moral instincts and no 
 other religion have ever given such a stimulus to liberty 
 and such a sanction to justice for all. But it need not be 
 said that this Faith is equally opposed to tyranny by the 
 people as to tyranny by the king ; and objects to license, 
 disorder and aimless revolution, as it does to despotism. 
 
 Its influences, have, as it were, only begun, in the political 
 field. Under it, women are without doubt destined to take 
 continually more part in the government of all civilized 
 ' L,e Livre Democratique par excellence. {M. Aur., p. 634.)
 
 PESTILENCES. 431 
 
 countries, and the working classes will be more and more 
 relieved of inequalities pressing upon them. 
 
 We cannot at present foresee all the consequences to 
 result from these changes, certain to come. They will no 
 doubt produce reactions and many difficulties. But they 
 are in the line of human progress under the stimulus of 
 this religion ; and their final result we cannot question. 
 
 Diminution of Pestilences. — The reduced mortality from 
 pestilence in modern times, and certain moral facts con- 
 nected with these ravages, at first struck the mind of the 
 writer as evidences of a sanitary progress in human history 
 due to the influences of a pure religion. 
 
 The fearful ravages of various diseases throughout the 
 world, both in the classic period and in the Middle Ages, 
 are hardly credible to modern ears. Taking a single 
 century and one disease (the so called " Black Death "), 
 we find from Hecker, that during the fourteenth century 
 it raged from China to Iceland and Greenland, almost 
 depopulating vast countries, the highways being covered 
 with corpses in Syria and Armenia ; the ships on the 
 Mediterranean floating without sailors and steersmen ; in 
 Europe two queens, and many bishops and distinguished 
 persons perishing ; in Germany alone, a million and a 
 quarter, or more than half of the population, dying ; and 
 in England, hardly one-tenth of the inhabitants escaping, 
 and 50,000 corpses being buried in London alone. The 
 total destruction was estimated in Europe and Asia, at 
 23,840,000.1 
 
 In every century, similar though not so destructive 
 pestilences are mentioned. They arose from the non- 
 Christian countries in almost all cases, and were stimulated 
 in every country by intemperate and immoral habits. 
 ' Hecker, p. 85.
 
 43* GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 They found their appropriate nidi, in which to ripen their 
 seeds, in those wicked and heathenish centres of nominally 
 Christian cities, which form in all ages exceptions to the 
 rule and influence of Christianity. 
 
 They have gradually diminished in power in modern 
 times, though the non-Christian lands still form their source 
 and centre. The most moral and religious populations are 
 in all Christian countries the most exempt from them. 
 
 Still, the increasing control over these ravaging pestil- 
 ences, the diminution of the mortality from them, the 
 narrower sweep of their power in Christian countries, 
 seem to be due more to the advance of science and civiliza- 
 tion, than to the direct influence of Christianity. The 
 increased skill in the treatment of disease, the more careful 
 5ystem of separation and exclusion of infected cases, the 
 cleaner and more wholesome habits of modern life, the 
 greater comfort enjoyed and the more wide-spread morality 
 and self-control of the poorer classes, are undoubtedly 
 the special causes of the diminution of the fatal ravages 
 of pestilence in modern, as compared with ancient, times. 
 The last cause, however, is one indirectly due to Chris- 
 tianity ; so that we can at least say that a pure religion is 
 one of many causes of the comparative freedom of the 
 modern Christian peoples from very deadly plagues ; and 
 in like manner of the lower death-rate and longer 
 average of life, peculiar to the experience of modern 
 civilized races.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 INTEMPERANCE. 
 
 At first thought it will seem remarkable that the vice of 
 intemperance under alcoholic stimulus has grown with 
 civilization. The modern European and American leading 
 peoples are certainly more under this terrible curse than 
 were the oldest races known to us, the Egyptians, Hindoos, 
 Persians, Assyrians, and Jews, or the Classic nations. The 
 reasons are to be found partly in the fact that nearly all 
 ancient civilization, and almost all these great peoples, 
 found their central seats in mild or warm climates. In- 
 temperance is a vice especially of northern races, and under 
 cold climates. Then as arts and sciences have advanced, 
 new stimulants have continually been discovered or in- 
 vented ; and above all, the complex work of modern 
 society demands a greater variety of nerve stimulus, and 
 the wear of the brain naturally seeks some real or supposed 
 counter-agency in narcotics and alcoholic stimuli. The 
 human family seems utterly unable to do without some 
 of these stimulants, whether contained in tea, coffee, 
 tobacco, alcohol, opium, or the manifold substitutes known 
 to barbarous tribes. 
 
 The leaders of modern civilization have been the northern 
 races, and climate and transmitted habits have made them 
 peculiarly sensitive to all these various forms of stimulant. 
 Under those influences, and the demands for excessive 
 
 433 f F
 
 434 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 brain-work peculiar to modern conditions, or the exhaus- 
 tion from muscular labour in confined air, the temptation 
 to the over-use of these stimuli for all classes in modern 
 times has been very powerful. The chill and dampness 
 of northern climates, the inherited German and Keltic 
 habits of conviviality, the want of comparatively innocent 
 alcoholic stimulants, the over-work of brain in one class 
 and the wear of muscles in crowded factories in another, 
 acting with ignorance and inherited weakness of will, are 
 the causes of the astounding intemperance among such 
 peoples as the Swedes, Scotch, English, and Northern 
 Americans, compared with the moderation of such nations 
 as the Hindoos, Jews, and Romans. No language can 
 exaggerate the evils of this fearful curse in modern times, 
 especially on the labouring classes of the countries we have 
 named. Only war surpasses it in the harvest of misery 
 and poverty and crime it sows for the families of the poor. 
 It desolates homes, breaks the hearts of women, turns out 
 children worse than orphans on a cold world and thus 
 makes them criminals, impoverishes the labourer, sows 
 quarrels, violence, disturbance, and murders, fills prisons 
 and almshouses and hospitals, and is the prolific cause of 
 idiocy, insanity, disease, and moral and physical degenera- 
 tion. It would be safe to say that in all northern countries, 
 more than half of all the oft"ences against person and 
 property, are caused directly or indirectly by excessive use 
 of alcoholic drinks. The amount spent by the labouring 
 classes on them would alone prevent pauperism in all 
 Christian countries. Thus Dr. Lees estimates that the 
 English working classes spend every year the enormous 
 sum of ;^3 5 0,000,000 for liquors alone. In i860, the value 
 of the distilled and fermented liquors in the United States 
 was estimated at $740,000,000. In 1869-70, one person 
 in every thirty is said by Dr. Beard, to have been arrested
 
 THE CURSES OF INTEMPERANCE. 435 
 
 foi drunkenness in Liverpool, and one in thirty-eight in 
 Manchester. The number arrested every year in New 
 York alone for offences caused by drunkenness, is some 
 4S,ooo. 
 
 It was reported by the Massachusetts Bureau of Statis- 
 tics of Labour in 1879 and 1880, after careful investigation, 
 that eighty-four per cent, of all the crimes of the State 
 which came before the courts, came directly or indirectly 
 from the abuse of alcoholic stimulants. The Prison Com- 
 miissioners of the same State report that for the year 1880, 
 ninety out of every hundred persons committed to the 
 prisons, were intemperate ; and that the cost of protecting 
 the State from this army of criminals during the year was 
 $1,971,198. 
 
 It is estimated by a careful investigator (Judge Aldrich), 
 that the American people spend annually some $600,000,000 
 on intoxicating drinks. 
 
 There needs no amplification of figures showing the 
 fearful curses coming from Intemperance. 
 
 Does Christianity work against it } Has it made pro- 
 gress in that direction in the past, and is it likely to make 
 more in the future ? 
 
 There can be little doubt to any familiar with social 
 customs in civilized countries, that among all classes there 
 has been a great change in the direction of Temperance 
 during the past hundred years. 
 
 This is largely due to the grand ascetic movement in 
 favour of entire abstinence from alcoholic drinks, which, 
 beginning in the United States under the influence of 
 religion, has spread over Sweden, Great Britain, and 
 America, and influenced thousands who have never taken 
 the vow of abstinence. Movements in the United States 
 against the extreme use of alcoholic drinks began very 
 early.
 
 436 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 Thus in the Massachusetts Bay records, as far back as 
 1646, we find a law, that, "forasmuch as drunkenness is a 
 vice to be abhorred of all nations, especially of those who 
 hold and profess the gospel of Christ Jesus, and seeing any 
 strict law against the sin will not prevail, unless the cause 
 be taken away,"^ it is enacted that no wine under a. 
 quarter-cask shall be sold except by paid licence, and 
 severe penalties are threatened to any one selling drink at 
 cinseasonable hours, or guilty of drunkenness. 
 
 In 165 1, a law is recorded in Easthampton, Long Island, 
 ^necking the sale of ardent spirits. Many similar laws are 
 found in American colonial history, influenced by the fer- 
 vent Puritan spirit. In 1760 the various religious societies 
 ^)rotested against the use of alcoholic beverages at funerals ; 
 and the Friends early abolished the practice. In 1/77 
 the first Congress at Philadelphia, influenced by the re- 
 ligious sentiment of the country, passed a resolution against 
 distilling grain for liquors, and against excessive drinking. 
 In 1788 an act was passed by the New York Legislature, 
 regulating the sale of liquors, and controlling the taverns. 
 In 1789 the first Temperance Society is said to have been 
 formed at Litchfield, Connecticut, by the active members 
 of the church. In 1797 the Quarterly Methodist Episcopal 
 Conference of Virginia passed a series of resolves, pledg- 
 ing their honour as Christians, not only to abandon entirely 
 the use of ardent spirits themselves, except as medicine, 
 but also to use their influence to induce others to do the 
 same. The Pennsylvania Synod even recommended their 
 pastors to preach against " the sin of intemperance." The 
 National American Temperance Society was formed in 
 1826 in Boston. Still, with all these efforts, habits of in- 
 temperance prevailed in this country to an alarming extent. 
 Even as late as 1836, a distinguished divine of Andover is 
 ' Quoted by F. W. Bird. Papers of Amer. Soc. Ass., p. 98, 1 88 1.
 
 TEMPERANCE IN AMERICA. 437 
 
 reported to have stated publicly that he knew ovci forty 
 ministers who were either drunkards, or addicted to habits 
 of hard drinking. The "Temperance" movement, however, 
 grew into the "Total Abstinence" movement about 1833; 
 the churches of the country everywhere struggled against 
 the ruinous vice, and the discussion of the subject, especially 
 by pastors and lecturers, roused the conscience of the entire 
 nation. Great numbers of drunkards were reclaimed, and, 
 more important still, the young were started with a horror 
 of this excess, and the convivial habits of society entirely 
 changed. Whereas formerly few families of the fortunate 
 classes were to be found without an intemperate member, 
 in latter years it is an exception to hear of such instances. 
 The ascetic movement has reached all classes. In no 
 country of the world are there so many families of com- 
 fortable circumstances who never have wine or liquors on 
 their tables, or so many hard-working operatives who never 
 touch these stimulants. What is called the Total Absti- 
 nence movement, which is a kind of ascetic off-shoot of 
 Christianity, has scattered untold blessings in this country, 
 and should ever be remembered with profound gratitude. 
 Like most ascetic efforts, it is not destined to be per- 
 manent ; but it was needed and will be needed. There 
 are signs already of its yielding, especially under foreign 
 influence in the United States, to a Temperance based on 
 rational self-control ; and the aid to this will be all the 
 civilizing influences of society. For the man under the 
 fatal spell of this appetite, the only possibility of regaining 
 self-control is by entire abstinence ; and the best of all 
 reformatory influences is the power of Christianity. The 
 shock which the dread of retribution threatened by this 
 belief gives, will awaken from vice, and then the trans- 
 forming power of Love, spoken of by Plato, for a " divine 
 Person" will fill the soul with such an enthusiasm, as to
 
 438 CESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 raise it above the power of these base appetites, and per- 
 manently reform the nature. 
 
 The writer in these statements does not speak of 
 theories, but of facts, which he has often seen exempHfied 
 in most striking life-histories. ^ The best of all safeguards 
 against intemperance is the Christian Faith. 
 
 The power of Religion in checking this vice is seen now 
 in tens of thousands of families throughout the land, and 
 in the higher standard of temperance spread abroad among 
 the whole people. 
 
 Many of the States have adopted prohibitory laws, pre- 
 venting all public sale of liquors, and others, strict license 
 laws. 
 
 It is true that with all this there is a fearful amount of 
 intemperance in the United States, especially in the large 
 cities among the foreign poor and their descendants. But 
 here Christian philanthropy is discovering very ingenious 
 means of diminishing its growth. A great deal of intem- 
 perance arises from idleness, from want of education, from 
 lack of virtuous amusement and proper sociability, from 
 contact with bad example, and from want of hope and the 
 consciousness of social degradation. The religious bodies 
 in the cities have sought to meet these wants by opening 
 coffee and club rooms for working people ; by providing 
 virtuous amusements, and above all by opening "industrial 
 schools " for the children of the poor. It is found by long 
 practical experience that the daughters of habitual drunk- 
 ards being brought under the daily influences of order, 
 industry and purity in these schools, having better food, 
 coming in contact with superior and refined women, and 
 hearing lessons of morality daily, hardly ever grow up in 
 the way of their parents, but become naturally sober and 
 decent women. ^ 
 
 * See T/ie Dangerous Classes of New Ycrk, ■ IHd.
 
 REFORMS IN SOCIAL HABITS. 439 
 
 It may fairly be said that a considerable diminution in 
 intemperate habits has been caused in the United States 
 by the influence, direct and indirect, of the religious prin- 
 ciple. Social habits are much improved, and great numbers 
 of the poor have been rescued from the control of this vice. 
 It needs only the same influences, continued in manifold 
 forms, to eradicate the vice from thousands of families. 
 We have beheld the beginnings of this renovating power 
 in American social life, and we can logically argue to its 
 future wide influence as time goes on. In Europe, also, 
 there has been, in the countries most given to intoxication 
 and extreme habits of drinking, a very marked improvement 
 in the past few years. The reform in favour of abstinence 
 in Sweden has been especially impelled by religious con- 
 siderations and by the religious teachers. It has already 
 accomplished untold good in that country. ^ 
 
 The various Temperance and Total Abstinence move- 
 ments in England and Scotland have received their great 
 impulse from a like source. They have not only affected 
 great numbers of the common people, but their reflex 
 power has worked upon the middle and wealthiest classes, 
 and produced or aided a general reform in the convivial 
 habits of society. In the higher English society there is 
 not nearly the amount of drunkenness which prevailed a 
 century since. 
 
 The great diminution in the consumption of spirits by 
 the British working classes for the past few years, as 
 shown by the revenue returns, is another evidence of m- 
 creasing sobriety. 
 
 We do not doubt the mingling of many other influences 
 
 in bringing about a greater sobriety through all classes in 
 
 the British Islands. In some respects the progress of the 
 
 arts and sciences works against a low habit like this ; 
 
 ' See Aforse Folk, by the Author.
 
 440 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 more nourishing food, purer water, higher amusements, and 
 a better social tone, all tend to diminish its power. But 
 the direct and indirect influence of religion' is the most 
 powerful obstacle to the spread of such a vice, and to this 
 is largely due the improvement sometimes among persons 
 who themselves may be indifferent to the Christian Faith. 
 
 It is not claimed of course that the Christian Religion 
 has done all that lay in it towards removing intemperance 
 from the world. It has only begun its workings. Men 
 have not received its teachings as they will yet receive 
 them. But the essential influence of this Faith is to raise^ 
 the man above a low appetite, to strengthen his self- 
 control, and reform his whole nature. Where Christianity 
 had full power, there could be no drunkenness. From the 
 results accomplished in a few centuries, all can judge what 
 will be the effects after long periods of time. 
 
 ' One of the most striking instances of the power of this Faith over in- 
 temperance is in llie results accomplished by the Women's Christian Tern- 
 perance Union of the United States with its three thousand auxiliary 
 societies, and its vast number of devoted women working for this end. See 
 its reports and Mrs. Willard's writings.
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 PERSECUTION. 
 
 The most disgraceful feature in the history of the 
 Christian Church is its persecution of opposing or dif- 
 fering beliefs. There is nothing whatever in tlie words of 
 Christ or the teachings of the Apostles to countenance 
 this practice. On the contrary, it is opposed to the very 
 essence of the Christian system ; and John, in defining 
 God as Love, would for ever put an end to such travesties 
 of faith in Him as would lead men to hate and persecute. 
 The evil tendency arose, however, very early from the idea, 
 born of ignorance and bigotry, that a change of opinion 
 produced by force would be for the advantage of the new 
 Faith, and for the good of the believer thus compelled, 
 and that men were guilty who held incorrect beliefs. 
 These ideas were early engrafted in Roman law, — an evil 
 feature which was derived from the influence of the Church. 
 Justinian's legislation against Arians and other heretics 
 bears a stamp of ecclesiastical bigotry scarce known to 
 Roman legislation. The Emperor Theodosius reached 
 the acme of bigotry when he threatened death as the 
 legal punishment of heretics, with the words that " no 
 place must be left them where they could do injury even 
 to the elements themselves "; ^ and where he declares that 
 with apostates even penitence does not obliterate their 
 
 * Quoniam his nihil relinquendum loci est, in quo ipsis etiam ele- 
 mentis fiat injuria {Cod. i.-v. Leg. 3, etc.). 
 
 44»
 
 442 
 
 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 crime.^ But nothing in all history has been so stupid 
 and useless and cruel as the persecution from the earliest 
 ages, by nominal Christians, of a gifted race, united to 
 them by many ties — the Jews. 
 
 The legislation against this unfortunate race began as 
 far back as the time of Justinian. They were persecuted 
 and pillaged incessantl}' ; they were forced to pay immense 
 sums to remain under the protection of the common law, 
 and many were farmed out to particular men for purposes 
 of extortion. The code of the Visigoths early showed the 
 bigoted influences of ecclesiasticism, and under it the Jews 
 were forbidden to testify in courts of justice, and were 
 spoken of as " beasts " in law, and their property as 
 belonging to the noblemen on whose lands they chanced 
 to be. In Germany the}' were long considered the serfs 
 of the Emperor ; in England they were frequently held in 
 common servitude. In France the whole body at times 
 was banished, and many were put to death with tortures. 
 It was even decreed that communication with Jewish 
 women should be punished as with beasts, and both parties 
 burned alive. 
 
 The persecutions of the Moors by the Christians of 
 Spain ; of heretics and Protestants under the Inquisi- 
 tion ; of Protestants by Catholics, and Catholics by 
 Protestants ; of the Puritans by the Church of England, 
 and of Baptists and Quakers by Puritans, are all too well 
 known to need relating. The history of the Christian 
 Church has been a history of opposition to her Master 
 in the matter of hate and persecution of opposing beliefs. 
 The vestures of the historical Church are stained deep 
 with the blood of the innocent, shed for ideas which they 
 believed true. Individuals in every age, inspired with the 
 spirit of the Teacher of Love, have urged the hatefulnes<j 
 ^ Nee flagitium eoriim oblitcrabitur poenitentid.
 
 PROTESTS AGAINST PERSECUTION. 443 
 
 of persecution, the tolerance of differing opinions, and the 
 difference between character and mere intellectual belief 
 Though uttering only the common-places of Christian 
 teaching, they were derided or not listened to, and the 
 religious world went on violating the first principles of the 
 Gospel. 
 
 In each century more and more individuals became 
 imbued with Christian truths, and believed and urged 
 that man was responsible to God alone for his religious 
 opinions; that character rather than belief was the test, 
 and that any injury done to a human being for his religious 
 ideas or practices (so long as they did not conflict with 
 common morals), was a violation of the principles of 
 Christ's doctrine, and a wrong and injustice. These pro- 
 tests arose, too, from those nominally outside of Chris- 
 tianity who had felt its influence though denying the 
 name, and thus the current of opinion moved gradually 
 against the practice of religious persecution. Thus the 
 celebrated John Robinson, father of Puritanism in New 
 England, says, 
 
 " It is no property of religion to compel to religion what ought to be 
 taken up freely ; that no man is forced by Christians against his will, 
 seeing that he that wants faith and devotion is unserviceable to God, 
 and that God not being contentious, would not be worshipped of the 
 unwilhng . . , and lastly, considering that neither God is pleased 
 with unwilhng worshippers, nor Christian societies bettered, nor the 
 persons themselves." ' 
 
 Grotius ^ is equally in advance of his times : 
 
 " But they that persecute others for no other cause but because 
 they either teach or profess the Christian religion, are most unreason- 
 able. For certainly our Christian doctrine considered in its sincerity 
 
 ' Works, vol. i. p. 40. 
 
 2 Right of War and Peace, book iL c. 20. i^Evait's translation, 
 1782).
 
 444 GEb'TA CHRISTL 
 
 without any commixture, contains nothing prejudicial to humane 
 society, nay that doth not rather advance it ; it shall speak for itself 
 and its enemies shall confess no less." 
 
 In the United States, where both practice and legislation 
 are much under the influence of Christian motives, all 
 persecution for religious opinion, or withdrawing of civil 
 rights on account of belief, or interference in any way 
 with religious worship or practices (where not conflicting 
 with common morals), has passed entirely out, not only of 
 use, but even from the thought of men. 
 
 Persecution is passing away also in Europe, though sur- 
 viving here and there in disabilities of Jews (as in regard 
 to the marriage of Christians and Jews in Hungary), or 
 violence against Jews (as in Russia), or legislation against 
 Catholics (as in Germany), or proceedings against heretics 
 or schismatics. 
 
 The day is not far distant in which the charity of Christ 
 will be embodied in all the legislation, practice, and 
 opinion of the civilized nations, and all men shall be 
 free to think, worship, and practice (within reasonable 
 restraints) as to them may seem good. Then at length 
 will the Church of Christ be like its Head.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 HUMANE PROGRESS AMONG NON-CHRISTIAN PEOPLES.* 
 
 It is a grand and consoling thought, harmonious with 
 reason and the utterances of inspired men, tl>at there is 
 in human history a "continuity" of Divine revelations. 
 That is, that the Spirit of God has not merely manifested 
 itself to one race in a remote corner of the world during 
 a few years, but that He has been struggling with human 
 souls during all ages and among all races. Certain indi- 
 viduals have especially received these inspirations, and 
 have so grasped certain moral and spiritual truths, or have 
 led such pure and unselfish lives, as to profoundly affect 
 the humane and moral progress of whole races of men. 
 Indeed the continuance and relative advance of great 
 nations have often depended on the degree to which they 
 followed the instructions and truths taught by their great 
 religious leaders. Under this aspect, GOD is an ever- 
 acting force in human history, and men and women in the 
 most widely scattered countries and among races given up 
 to superstition or degrading practices, have opened their 
 souls to this Divine light. The light which they in turn 
 have given to the world, has not been indeed like the pure 
 radiance shining forth from the " Son of Man" in Judaea, 
 
 ^ We object strongly to the invidious implication of the term 
 " Heathen " peoples, as though such races were all wild tribes, given 
 up to idolatrous and barbarous practices. Some of the heathen 
 peoples have grasped a great deal of Divine truth. 
 
 445
 
 446 GESTA CHRJSTI. 
 
 but it has contained rays of the heavenly Hght, and, though 
 obscured by mists of superstition and the clouds of human 
 ignorance, it has yet guided many a weary soul in the 
 dark ways of the world. 
 
 Paul evidently had these truths in mind, when he de- 
 clares that " the invisible things of HiM from the creation 
 of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the 
 things that are made, even His everlasting power and 
 Divinity" (Rom. i. 20); and again, "For when Gentiles 
 which have no law, do by nature the things of the law, 
 these, having no law, are a law unto themselves, in that 
 they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their 
 conscience bearing witness therewith, and their thoughts 
 one with another accusing or else excusing them " (Rom. 
 xii. 14, 15) ; or, when on Mars' Hill, he said to the ap- 
 parently superstitious worshippers of an " unknown God," 
 " Whom ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you " 
 (Acts xvii. 1-23). Peter too expressed a like thought in 
 the words " Of a truth, I perceive that God is no respecter 
 of persons : but in every nation, he that feareth Him and 
 worketh righteousness is acceptable to Him " (Acts x. 
 
 34, 35)- 
 
 In comparing humane progress under peoples nominally 
 
 Christian and those non-Christian, it is but just to take 
 
 among the latter, nations who have reached a high state oi 
 
 organization and the most complete civilization which we 
 
 find outside of Christianity. In this view we shall choose 
 
 the Hindoos, the Chinese, and the Arabs. Our comparison, 
 
 under the limits of this work, must of necessity be very 
 
 brief, and only touch on points familiar to students. 
 
 The Hindoos are admitted by historians to have attained 
 
 to a very high intellectual and moral advancement. The 
 
 ancient books of their faith contain scattered through 
 
 them moral and spiritual truths which in power and depth
 
 GREAT TRUTHS AMONG THE HINDOOS. 447 
 
 equal many of the doctrines of Christianity. Their sages 
 and poets frequently saw the, truths of the Unity and 
 Spirituality of God, of a superintending Prov^idence, of 
 man's sin and his want of forgiveness, of the need of an 
 " Angel Messiah " or Incarnation of Divinity, of immor- 
 tality, of judgment to come, of human brotherhood and 
 equality before God, and all the duties to God and man 
 that spring from these doctrines. 
 
 But with all these truths, were included soon so many 
 falsehoods, so many superstitions, vagaries, bloody, cruel 
 and licentious ideas and practices, and the want of any 
 one simple and pure life and doctrine like those of Jesus, 
 that the people very early fell into debasing practices 
 which checked progress. Mr. Mill, in his History of India, 
 justly says, 
 
 " If those qualities which render a man amiable, respectable and 
 useful as a human being; if wisdom, beneficence and self-command 
 are celebrated as the chief recommendations to the favour of the 
 Almighty; if the production of happiness is steadily and constantly 
 represented as the most acceptable worship to the Creator, no other 
 proof is requisite that they who framed and they who understood this 
 religion, have arrived at high and refined notions of an All-Perfect 
 Being" (vol. i. p. 263). 
 
 The corruptions of the early Brahmanic faith show that 
 such an idea of Deity had long passed away among the 
 masses in India. The deification of licentiousness and 
 cruelty in the Hindoo faith has degraded the people, and 
 no doubt tended to produce the singular indifference to 
 human suffering, noticed by travellers,^ and the licentious- 
 
 • We have again and again witnessed along the great pilgrim-routes 
 of India, harrowing illustrations of this sad truth ; we have seen poor 
 creatuies smitten with disease, lying on the road-side, passed b5 
 hundreds of their co-religionists with no more concern than if they 
 were dying dogs ; we have seen the poor parched sufferers with folded 
 hands and pleading voice crave a drop of water to moisten their lips, 
 but all in vain." (Vaughan's Tfidciit, Crescent and Cross, p. 31.)
 
 448 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 ness of many classes. The two great causes, however, of 
 the want of progress in India, as compared with Europe, 
 are the existence of caste and the position of woman. 
 
 Caste is not improbably a result of conquest, but it has 
 been strengthened instead of weakened by the religion of 
 the Hindoos. The laws or precepts of Manu (supposed 
 to date back to the early centuries after Christ) speak of 
 caste (book i. 8) as a law of nature and of Divine appoint- 
 ment, as much as the creation of different animals. 
 
 " Since the Brahman sprang from the most excellent part, since he 
 has the priority arising from primogeniture, and since he possesses 
 the Veda, he is by right lord of this whole creation " (i. 93). 
 
 Even the Rig-veda, as quoted by Williams ("Indian 
 Wisdom") makes the Brahman to issue from the mouth 
 of Vishnu, the kingly soldier from his arms, the hus- 
 bandman from his thighs, and the servile Sudra to come 
 from his feet. It is obvious that a people whose religion 
 stamps such social divisions on their organization, cannot 
 advance under modern conditions. All observers agree 
 that caste in India makes anything like modern European 
 progress impossible. The first effort of Christianity on 
 individual Hindoos is of course to abolish caste ideas 
 and prejudices. Such immovable divisions of class are 
 opposed to the foundation principles of Christ's doctrine. 
 
 But even more than caste, has the position of woman 
 in India retarded her progress. The oldest religious 
 documents and many of the older laws appear to have 
 recognised a higher influence and position for woman than 
 do the modern. Still, even the laws of Manu assign her a 
 very inferior rank. The wife is permitted to be sold or 
 beaten ; she is spoken of as having no will of her own and 
 as unfit for independence.^ A husband must constantly 
 
 ' Williams' Indian Wisdom, p. 529.
 
 POSITION OF WOMAN IN INDIA. 449 
 
 be revered as a god by a virtuous wife. No sacrifice is 
 allowed to women apart from their husbands ; no reh"gious 
 rites, no fasting. ^ Even the Bhajavad - Gita represents 
 woman as entering heaven along with the lowest caste.^ 
 Mill ^ quotes from an ancient Hindoo writing — the Hito- 
 padesa, or " Book of Friendly Advice," — 
 
 "In infancy, the father should guard her; in youth, her husband ; 
 and in old a;4e, her children ; for at no time is a woman fit to be 
 trusted with Hberty." " InfideHty, violence, deceit, envy, extrava- 
 ;,^ance, a total want of good qualities, with impurity, are the innate 
 faults of women." 
 
 According to this author, she could not under the old 
 code give evidence ; she could not share in the paternal 
 property ; she was by system deprived of education ; as 
 a wife she was held unworthy to eat with her husband. 
 The latter could dismiss her on the smallest pretexts, but 
 no violence or desertion or sale could absolve woman from 
 obligation to her lord." " Day and night," say the pre- 
 cepts of Manu, " must woman be held by her protector in 
 a state of dependence."^ " By a girl or a young woman, 
 or by a woman advanced in years, nothing must be done 
 even in her own dwelling according to her own mere 
 pleasure."^ Nor is the modern position of woman in India 
 superior to that assigned to her in ancient law and custom. 
 
 " No Hindoo woman," says Williams, " has in theory any inde- 
 pendence. It is not merely that she is not her own mistress ; she is 
 not her own property, and never under any circumstances can be. 
 She belongs to her father first, who gives her away to her husband, tc 
 whom she belongs /"f/- ever. She is not considered capable of so high 
 a form of religion as man, and she does not mix freely in society." ' 
 
 ' Manu,v. 155. » Williams,^. 145. 
 
 • Hist, of India, p. 295. * Mill, vol. i. p. 297. 
 
 • Manu, quoted by Mill. • Ibid. 
 ' Indian Wisdom, p. 435. 
 
 G 6
 
 4SO GESTA CHRTSTI. 
 
 " Home ' is so shut in by the close shutters of caste that heahhy 
 ventilation is impossible. The fresh air of heaven and the light ol 
 God's day have no free entrance. Weakly children are brought up 
 by ignorant, superstitious, narrow-minded mothers in a vitiated atmo- 
 sphere. Hence, in my opinion, the present deteriorated character and 
 condition of a large majority of the people of India." 
 
 A Hindoo convert to Christianity thus describes his 
 feelings in regard to marriage : 
 
 "Escaping the maladies of superstition and standing under the 
 light of true religion with feelings of love and refinement in my heart 
 I shudder at and clearly see the defects in the system we have con- 
 sidered. The very thought of marrying a person whose joys and 
 sorrows I am to participate in, who is to become one with me, without 
 knowing her character and seeing her face at all, makes me shudder. 
 . . . In Bengal, with many, the affection between husband and 
 wife is rather compulsory than heart-felt. True love does rarely grace 
 the connubial life of the Hindoo. The children do not know what 
 innocent social comforts are. Vice with its thousand branches twines 
 round their lives. Faithlessness to the married relation, discord be- 
 tween and separation of two who are strictly required to be one, are 
 the defective features of Hindoo families in general." ^ 
 
 We hav^e purposely refrained from quoting to any large 
 extent from the views of missionaries, who may be sup- 
 posed on this subject to be prejudiced. But even Sir 
 Henry Maine, who regards these matters from a peculiarly 
 philosophical standpoint, attributes in a passage we have 
 already quoted (p. 35), the lack of progress of this great 
 branch of the Aryan family, as compared with the Euro- 
 pean, to the different position they gave to woman. 
 Whence the European sentiment and practice are mainly 
 derived, we have already seen. 
 
 The cruel practices once habitual in India, and now not 
 
 • Indian Wisdom, p. 137. 
 
 • Gangooly's Life and Religion of the Hindoos, p. 53.
 
 BUDDHA AN INSPIRED TEACHER. 451 
 
 wholly ^ abolished by the influence of a Christian people, 
 are painful evidences of the want of humane progress. 
 Self-immolation, human sacrifices, the burning of widows, 
 the exposure of the sick and feeble, and like practices 
 could not possibly exist where Christianity had the 
 slightest power. 
 
 Buddhism. — One faith has existed in India as a reform 
 of Brahmanism, and has extended to China, Japan, and 
 other countries, which in the life of its founder and the 
 truths he taught, showed a peculiar Divine inspiration that 
 brought it in some respects very near to Christianity. 
 Undoubtedly in the original form of this religion are seen 
 the workings of the Divine Spirit on a most pure and 
 exalted human soul. Indeed the truths taught by Gautama- 
 Buddha seem to be fore-gleams of those taught by Chris^.^ 
 Never has compassion been more Divinely illustrated in a 
 human life ; nowhere are self-sacrifice, human brotherhood, 
 universal benevolence and sympathy, and purity of heart 
 and life more directly taught than in the words transmitted 
 of Sakya Muni. The Buddhist legends might well teach 
 that all nature budded into spring and a thrill of joy reached 
 every animated being, that the blind saw and the dumb 
 spake, that prisoners were set free and the flames of hell 
 extinguished, and a mighty sound of music arose from 
 heaven and earth,^ when a human soul so pure and holy 
 and thus filled with an almost infinite compassion, began 
 its life in the body. 
 
 ' Ball speaks of sacrifices of children practised in India as late as 
 1 861, and as not wholly broken up in 1879. {Jungle Life, etc., p. 608 ) 
 
 - See Alabaster's Wheel of the Law, and numberless Lives 0/ 
 Buddha. Also The Aiigel Messiah, by E. von Bunsen, 1880 ; and 
 Beal's Roinaiit. Hist, of Sakya Budda, from the Chinese Sanscrit, 
 1875 ; and Catena of Buddh. Script., frona the Chinese, 187 1, 
 
 ^ Alabaster's IVheel, etc
 
 4?2 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 Nor has this life been a failure. The humanity, courtes}'^ 
 mercy and brotherhood exhibited by countless multitudes 
 of Asiatics, are without doubt largely the fruit of these 
 teachings.^ 
 
 But the soul of the saintly Hindoo seemed not sufficiently 
 open to the Divine influences, or his mind was too much 
 under the power of Indian mythology, so that the final aim 
 and consummation of his belief lacked the simplicity and 
 reality of Christianity. He could not offer a great hope 
 to mankind, but only a cessation of the eternal changes 
 of metempsychosis, and the quietude of Nirvana, where 
 no desire or pain or pleasure or sin should ever invade 
 the eternal repose. It has to some of his followers been 
 the repose of annihilation ; to others the pcice of blessed 
 absorption into Deity and of loss of personality ; to 
 others the eternal rest of the heavy-laden in the bosom 
 of God. The vagueness of the hope, the lack of sublime 
 simplicity in the teachings, the want of an overpowering 
 faith in the " Heavenly Father," and a certain absence of 
 consciousness of perfect union with the Infinite Spirit, 
 will perhaps account for the failure of Buddhism in pro- 
 moting the progress of Asia as compared with Christianity 
 in Europe. The Divine Spirit was moving in the self- 
 sacrificing Indian prince and in many of his intuitions 
 and the truths taught by him ; but not as in Christ. His 
 truth early gathered around it gross superstitions ; it 
 degenerated into senseless idolatry ; it developed useless 
 asceticism and ecclesiasticism ; it was accompanied with 
 the most mechanical routine service, instead of a free moral 
 and spiritual life. Buddhism has not seemed cajoable of 
 urging on a steady moral and humane progress as Chris- 
 
 ' See Miss Bird's description of the remarkable kindness and good 
 nature of the Japanese, the effects of a failh they had given up, — 
 T^'"^dhism.
 
 THE FATLITRE OF BUDDHISM. 453 
 
 tianity has done. It was evidently not fit for all stages 
 of human growth. Yet the student of moral develop- 
 ment must ever be grateful, that so high a type of 
 human Faith has sustained such countless millions of the 
 human race during so many centuries. Back of all its 
 idolatry, superstition and wild fancies, many a simple 
 believer must have seen a noble form, bearing the burdens 
 of mankind, most "like unto the Son of man," and through 
 him, he has been led to worship, " ignorantly " it may be, 
 the Infinite Father, and to work "righteousness," so far as 
 human weakness permitted, and " hath been accepted with 
 Him " ^ through His infinite mercy. 
 
 Some forms, too, of practical charity have sprung up 
 under it — such as shelters for travellers, hospitals for the 
 sick, foundling asylums, and similar charities. It is prob- 
 able that the first hospitals in the world's history for 
 diseased men and animals were founded by the Indian 
 Buddhists. But these have not been continued to any 
 great extent. 
 
 Buddhism entered China when two systems held sway ; 
 one of a philosophic transcendental Rationalism, Taoism,^ 
 and the other of a most exalted philanthropy, which neither 
 denied nor affirmed supernatural facts, Confucianism. 
 
 In China, Buddhism besides exerting its higher influence, 
 supplied in its corrupt form a gross superstition as a satis- 
 faction to the religious wants of man's nature. The truths 
 of Confucius, though in many respects elevated and filled 
 with the sense of human brotherhood, not being connected 
 with pure Religion, failed to stimulate to an ever-moving 
 progress. They cultivated good will, and filial pity, and 
 public duty, and outward propriety ; but they did not offer 
 inducements so powerful, or such personal aff"ection for a 
 supernatural Teacher, or the sense of God and Immortality, 
 ^ Acts X. 34, 35. * See Johnson's Oriental Religions — China.
 
 454 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 sufficient to overcome human selfishness. They gave a 
 great and ingenious race enough to satisfy present needs, 
 and with the superstition of Buddhism, to leave it in one 
 fixed condition. We find in consequence in China, abuses 
 which belonged to Europe before Christianity had attained 
 to much influence. Infanticide, despite the denials of certain 
 authorities, is undoubtedly fearfully prevalent in certain 
 districts ; children are sold as slaves ; ^ even a wife is some- 
 times sold ; slavery is common and torture is still in use. 
 Confucius taught blood-revenge : 
 
 " Recompense injury with justice," he said, " and kindness with 
 kindness."^ "He who recompenses injury with kindness is a man 
 who is careful of his person." " With the slayer of his father, a man 
 may not Hve under the same heaven ; against the slayer of his brother, 
 a man must never have to go home to fetch a weapon ; with the slayer 
 of his friend, a man may not live in the same state." ^ 
 
 From such teachings may have arisen the long con- 
 tinuance of " feuds " in China. 
 
 The alleged insincerity of the Chinese is thought to be 
 due to certain instructions of this great teacher, where he 
 permits truth to be waived. * 
 
 There is no such teaching of humanity by Confucius as 
 to affect the relations of China with other countries ; there 
 is no especial respect for foreigners, and other races are 
 looked at as barbarians. The peculiar isolation of China, 
 as regards other countries, is no doubt partly due to this 
 defect in this great teacher's instructions. Woman is 
 undoubtedly in an inferior position in China. 
 
 • A vigorous effort has been made by the British during the year 1883 
 to break up this atrocious tniffic by parents in their own chikhcn ia 
 Hong Kong. (See London spectator, April 26, 1882). 
 
 ^ Ana, XXV. 26. 
 
 ' Legge's Life of Confucius, p. 1 14. 
 
 * Aua, xvii. 20 ; vi. 13.
 
 FAILURE OF CONFUCIANISM. 455 
 
 **Man is the representathe of heaven," says this philosopher, " and 
 is the supreme over all things. Woman yields obedience to the 
 instruction of man and helps to carry out his principles. On this 
 account, she can determine nothing of herself, and is subject to the 
 rule of the three obediences: when j'oung she must obey her father 
 and elder brother; when married, her huoijand; when her husband 
 is old, she must obey her son." ' 
 
 The position of woman in China is evidently one of the 
 causes of the skiggish condition of that country during so 
 many centuries. Woman has apparently Httle important 
 part there, either socially, politically or morally ; though 
 she has figured somewhat in Chinese literature. 
 
 And yet for the assistance of its moral progress, there 
 has been no deification of vice in the Chinese religion, nor 
 human sacrifice, and a most pure and elevated literature. 
 
 It is to be admitted, however, when all things are said, 
 that we know but little about the permanent and profound 
 influences affecting the Chinese people. It would seem that 
 this benevolent and monotonous type of society, without 
 enthusiasm and with many secret vices, with no element in 
 it of great and heroic progress and suited to a certain 
 condition of immovability for countless centuries, may be 
 a type of the future of the civilized world, should a phil- 
 anthropic Rationalism take the place of the Christian 
 Religion. 
 
 Confucius might well be the saint of modern Agnosti- 
 cism. 
 
 It may be justly urged, however, that the followers of 
 both Gautama-Buddha and of Confucius have never fully 
 lived up to the principles and teachings of their masters. 
 But on the other hand it may be fairly replied, that there 
 was not in themselves and their doctrines sufificient of the 
 life-giving impulse, or of Divine power, to overcome the 
 selfishness and indifference of men ; so that as ages go by 
 * l-egge's Transladon, p. 103.
 
 4S6 GESTA CHRISTT. 
 
 and civilization advances, those religious or moral beliefs 
 no longer greatly influence their believers and are poorly 
 adapted to the new conditions of the world. A lamentable 
 instance of the failure of Buddhism ^ seems to be afforded 
 by the present condition of Japan. Travellers picture the 
 Japanese as people without religion and without hope. A 
 current and favourite proverb is, that " the worst thing you 
 can wish a man is to live again." As the old faith has died 
 out there is nothing left but its unconscious effects and the 
 habits taught by it, to stem the tide of selfishness ; and 
 the people seem given up, say very candid observers, to 
 " licentiousness and untruthfulness," while a deep shade oi 
 melancholy settles over all. The great doctrine of Sakya 
 Muni that the " End of Righteousness is Rest," has de- 
 generated into the dogma that the "End of Righteousness 
 is Nothingness," and a night of unbelief and hopelessness 
 has fallen over a whole race. 
 
 The Arabs. — The Arabs, whom we have chosen also for 
 comparison with European peoples, were in a high con- 
 dition of civilization when Europe was in barbarism. The 
 Spanish Arabs of the tenth and eleventh centuries, drawing 
 their inspiration perhaps from an older civilization, were 
 as much superior intellectually to the French, Germans, 
 and English of that age, as are these peoples now to 
 Afghans or Turks. In the arts and sciences and many 
 of the best fruits of civilization, in refinement and intellect, 
 the Mohammedans of the Middle Ages, both of Europe 
 and Asia, far exceeded the Christian nations. They fol- 
 lowed, too, a faith which contained one great Divine truth, 
 the existence of one infinite and spiritual Creator, to whom 
 all men were responsible. They abhorred idol worship, 
 and no doubt often came in contact with nominal Chris- 
 tians, who were farther removed than themselves from 
 ' See Miss Bird's interesting journey in Japan.
 
 INFLUENCE OF MOHAMMEDANISM. 457 
 
 the spiritual worship taught in the Bible. But the 
 sensuality encouraged by their faith ; the cruelty and 
 bigotry taught by it ; the fatalism implied in it ; the per- 
 mission given in it to polygamy, divorce and slavery, 
 proved that it was not the religion of the future, not the 
 religion of humanity, and must come to an end. In fact, 
 the many false and evil elements in Mohammedanism 
 have made it one of the curses of mankind. It has 
 spread abroad the spirit of cruelty and lust, and under 
 it are found the unnatural vices, ^ and the oppression of 
 subject races, and the degradation of women, which be- 
 longed to Europe before the era of Christianity. Its 
 teachings of the doctrine of fatalism are an insurmount- 
 able obstacle to all advance, whether in civilization or 
 morals. Man becomes the mere sport and implement of an 
 irresistible destiny. It has in it no element of permanent 
 social and moral progress. The science and intellect of 
 some of the races which embraced it could not save it. 
 It so lacks the Christian respect for the individual, and 
 the Christian benevolence, that it never suits itself to 
 liberal government or to advanced civilization. The 
 splendour of Spanish and Asiatic Arab art and archi- 
 tecture is only seen in ruins ; the science which once led 
 the world in investigation only remains in words which 
 have become histories, and in discoveries which have pre- 
 ceded modern research, while the barbaric tribes whom 
 
 ' See Mussulmans of India, W. W. Hunter ; and many travels 
 in Turkey. It is difficult even to speak on this subject to modern ears, 
 but the testimony of intelligent travellers and observers, long resident 
 in Turkey, show that the Turkish race is eaten up with unnatural 
 vices, and that the Mohammedan faith does not check them. See 
 also Monier Williams, Nineteenth Century, July, 1882. 
 
 Williams writes the name Muhammad, as directly derived from the 
 passive participle of the verb hamada^ " to praise," " the praised one," 
 " the glorious,"
 
 458 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 the followers of Mohammed then so despised, and who 
 were in such low intellectual and moral condition during 
 the Arabic period of glory, now lead the world's progress. 
 
 The difference has not been evidently in vigour of race, 
 or in intellect, or acquired science and learning, or in 
 language. The Turkish conquest is, of course, one reason 
 of the change ; but the great cause has lain in those 
 peculiar and subtle influences which Christianity has 
 gradually instilled into European races.^ 
 
 On the other hand, Mohammedanism could not rise 
 above its source. It illustrated or exaggerated every- 
 where the vices of its leader. It left behind it, whether 
 in Spain, Sicily, Egypt, or Bagdad, anarchy, corruption, 
 and horrible social evils. Still it is but just to note that 
 certain Mohammedans, who have probably come under 
 the influence of the purer Persian faith and of Buddhism, 
 as well as of the " Soofi " mysticism, have attained to a 
 religion as elevated and earnest, though not so humane 
 and practical, as Christianity itself. The Divine Spirit 
 apparently inspired such a preacher as Ghazzali.^ 
 
 With Mohammedan races, slavery largely prevails ; 
 polygamy is permitted ; divorce is comparatively free. 
 In Arabia and on the African coast, blood revenge and 
 feud still exist. In Turkey, unnatural vice is common ; 
 woman is in a most degraded position ; divorces are 
 almost daily ; ^ and cruelty of the most horrible descrip 
 
 ' Les peuples d'Orient sont tellement imbues de I'idde de la force, 
 ils sont tellement fagonn^s depuis des siecles k la soumission, qu'ils 
 ne comprennent pas au juste la puissance du droit. — Des causes de la 
 decadence, etc. Acad. d. Sc. etc., 1877, p. 193. 
 
 - He appeared in the eleventh century. See the beautiful trans- 
 lation of his Alchemy of Happiness, by H. A. Homes, 1873. 
 
 ^ Rev. Dr. Washburne, President of Robert's College, Constanti- 
 nople, assures me that he has known Turks to divorce their wives 
 day after day. It is a very general practice.
 
 EFFECTS OF MOHAMMEDANISM. 459 
 
 tion towards prisoners or those conquered is well known. 
 In Arabia, a favourite proverb is "The threshold weeps 
 four days when a girl is born.^ Another Arabic proverb 
 teaches that " to send women beforehand to the other 
 world is a benefit," and that " the best son-in-law is the 
 grave." Wife-beating seems taught in the Koran,^ as it 
 is the custom in Mohammedan countries, and wife murdei 
 is not uncommon in Syria.^ The modern testimony as 
 to the effect of Mohammedanism on the Arabs of Syria 
 is overwhelming ; we have space for but few quotations. 
 Says a convert, 
 
 " How few of the hundreds of thousands of women in Syria know 
 how to read ! How few are the schools ever established for teaching 
 women. Any one who denies the degradation and ignorance of 
 Syrian women, would deny the existence of the noonday sun. Do 
 not men shun even allusion to women, and if obliged to speak of 
 them, do they not accompany the remark with 'ajellak Allali, as if 
 they were speaking of a brute beast or filthy object ? Are they not 
 treated among us very much as among barbarians?"* 
 
 An article from Le Liban, an official journal of Daud 
 Pasha, Governor of Mount Lebanon, printed in 1867,^ says, 
 
 " So in former times, the man was the absolute tyrant of the 
 family. The wife was the slave, never to be seen by others. And if 
 in conversation it became necessary to mention her name, it would be 
 by saying this was done by my wife, 'ajellak Allah !® But now there 
 is a change, and woman is no longer regarded as worthy of contempt 
 and abuse ; and the progress being made in the emancipation and 
 
 * Jessup's Women of the Arabs. 
 
 ' Sura iv. " But chide thou those for whose refractoriness ve have 
 cause to fear . . . and scourge them." 
 ^ yessup. 
 
 * Essay of Mr. Bistany, read before the Beirut Literary Society 
 1849, quoted by Mr. Jessup, p. 159. 
 
 ' Jessup, p. 1 78. 
 
 ^ The Irish phrase is parallel, " Saving your Reverence I"
 
 46o GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 elevation of woman is one of the noblest and best proofs of the reai 
 progress of Lebanon in the paths of morality and civilization.'' 
 
 ** In Algiers," Seguin says, "the Mohammedan invariably 
 buys his wife ; he pays a price for her to her family." ^ 
 
 "When an Arab woman marries, she is sure only that she will be a 
 slave ; but who can tell how many domestic tortures she will have to 
 endure ? " 
 
 The conception of God in the Koran is not of a father, 
 but of an inscrutable despot. " Verily," says this book, 
 "there is none in the heavens and on earth but shall 
 approach the God of mercy as a slave," and the duty is 
 laid upon the faithful of being the agents of God's wrath 
 on those who believe not.^ The two great Christian ideas 
 at the base of modern progress — the fatherhood of God 
 and brotherhood of man — are wanting in Islam. The 
 Christian ideas at the basis of modern international law 
 are unknown to Mohammedanism. War is the ordinance 
 of God, and public faith need not be kept with infidels or 
 aliens^ 
 
 * Walks in Algiers, p. 517. 
 
 * See Osborne's Islam in Arabia, p. 27. 
 
 3 Hedaya ix. Mill's Koran, p. 330. " Oh, Prophet ! stir up the 
 faithful to war ; if twenty of you persevere with constancy, they 
 shall conquer two hundred ; and if there be one hundred of you, they 
 shall overcome two thousand by the permission of God, for God is 
 with those who persevere. It hath not been granted to any prophet 
 that he should possess captives, until he had made a great slaughter 
 of the infidels on the earth" (Sale's Koran, chap. 5). "When ye 
 encounter the infidels, strike off their heads until ye have made a 
 great slaughter among them. . . Verily if God is pleased, he 
 
 could take vengeance on them without your assistance ; but he com- 
 manded you to fight his battles that he might prove the one of you 
 by the other. As to those who fight in defence of God's true 
 religion, God will not suffer their works to perish ; he will lead them 
 into Paradise ol which he hath told them. Oh ! true believers ! for 
 his religion he will assist you against your enemies " {Idid., chap. 47),
 
 CLIMATE NOT THE CAUSE OF DIFFERENCE. 461 
 
 It should be noted, however, that Mohammedanism en- 
 couraged kindness to the poor. Alms are "a loan to 
 God " ; they " deliver from hell and secure Paradise." 
 The first lunatic asylums are said to owe their origin to 
 this Faith. It taught also great kindness to animals, and 
 admitted them to a future state of existence. 
 
 We should not forget also that Mohammed attempted 
 to reform his times by suppressing infanticide, inculcating 
 temperance, and prohibiting gambling and divination.^ 
 
 It can hardly be urged that climate alone has caused all 
 these differences between the non-Christian and the Chris- 
 tian peoples. The Christian religion, looked at materially, 
 is a product of a warm climate. Some of its purest and 
 noblest disciples, who still profoundly influence the world, 
 were natives or residents under almost a tropical sun. Its 
 great conquests indeed have been won among northern 
 races ; but with them it had especial obstacles, owing to the 
 northern predisposition to intemperance and the greater 
 struggle for existence necessary in colder climates. On the 
 other hand, two of these faiths, the system of Confucius 
 and the religion of Mohammed, cover many regions where 
 the climates are severe and cold. The great standard- 
 bearers of Mohammedanism — the Turks — were a northern 
 and vigorous race, and the Arabs have none of the habits 
 of a tropical people ; indeed the latter are closely allied to 
 the founders of Christianity — the Jews. 
 
 A tropical climate undoubtedly tends to degrade the 
 position of woman, in relaxing her energy and exposing 
 her purity. But this evil is no greater than the tendency 
 of a northern climate to stimulate intemperance. Chris- 
 tianity is adapted to restrain and remove both evils. It 
 may be true that for this Faith some races are more fitted 
 Monier Williams.
 
 462 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 than others ; but all races can be improved and perhaps 
 regenerated by it. 
 
 Buddhism and Brahmanism have substantially failed of 
 d great moral progress in India, China, and Japan ; they 
 are proved not to be the absolute religions. Confucianism 
 has produced no great progress in China ; and Mohamme- 
 danism has utterly failed everywhere except with certain 
 barbarous tribes in Africa. 
 
 It would not perhaps be reasonable to argue from the 
 imperfect fruits of these religions, that they were failures. 
 It might fairly be alleged that they had not yet existed 
 during sufficient time. But we can urge that, from their 
 very nature and structure, they are not fitted for all phases 
 of human development. They are not universal and abso- 
 lute religions, and adapted to bring about the highest 
 humane and moral progress. 
 
 Were the world thoroughly and consistently Buddhistic 
 or Confucian, it would be anything but a world fitted for 
 the highest conditions of human advancement, or for the 
 ideals of the mind. It could not long live up even to its 
 own principles, as it would lack the life-giving powei 
 aftbrded by Christianity.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 OBJECTIONS. RESUME OF REFORMS BEGUN. THE 
 FUTURE OF MANKIND UNDER CHRISTIANITY 
 
 The points necessary at the close of our investigation to 
 consider, are : whether, supposing the Christian system to 
 prevail and to thoroughly imbue individuals and society 
 in all directions, this would form the highest type of char- 
 acter and the final and perfect development of mankind ; 
 whether if all the world were Christian, it would be the 
 world of our ideals. 
 
 It is often and naturally objected^ that the Christian 
 character of the future will be deficient in the courageous 
 and manly principles, and will not have been tried in the 
 fiery furnace of discipline of the past — namely War. 
 
 But it should be remembered that the natural conditions 
 of the world, the struggle with the great forces of nature, 
 ,vill always cultivate physical courage ; and the eternal 
 necessity in human society of defending the weak, rebuking 
 wrong, standing by the unpopular cause, and even incurring 
 shame and loss for the truth, will always train moral 
 courage. Kven if csons lience, society should approach its 
 complete development, the inevitable accidents and chances 
 of life would continually call for the highest kind of 
 courage. Even now in modern wars, there is little demand 
 for savage pugnacity or a bloody revengeful temper, but 
 
 ' See Renan, A/arc Aurde, p. ;95. , . . mais une societd de 
 parfaits serait si faible ! 
 
 4«3
 
 464 GESTA CHRISTL 
 
 rather for a cool brain, unshaken nerve, the will which 
 defeat cannot break, and that state of mind which simply 
 disregards death and wounds where duty lies before. The 
 courage most needed in modern battles is simply a readi- 
 ness to be torn in pieces by machinery at the post of duty. 
 Great numbers of persons fight through a campaign with- 
 out ever seeing a personal opponent. 
 
 As civilization advances the moral courage will be more 
 and more demanded ; and physical nerve and resolution 
 will be gained, without exciting the violent passions, by 
 struggles with nature. The unconquerable determination 
 to overcome difficulties, the contempt of death, the scorn 
 of cowardice as worse than death, the heroism which could 
 throw away life like a straw for victory — which have been 
 the crowning gains and glories of war in the past — might 
 easily be shown by men in a world which had grown 
 beyond war in their struggles with nature, with the tre- 
 mendous forces around them, and amid the inevitable 
 accidents and chances of life. 
 
 The Christian ideal has always been far in advance of 
 past ages ; it is still beyond our present condition. Men 
 can only make a compromise between it and the necessary 
 demands of the times. But the compromise continually 
 approaches, century by century, the original ideal. It would 
 be difficult now (though not impossible) for an individual 
 to conform his life to these higher principles and survive 
 in the struggle for existence. As each century passes 
 it becomes easier. It would be in this age apparently 
 impossible for a nation to conform to these principles, and 
 survive. But in each century the nations approach them 
 more nearly. As society advances, the Christian type ot 
 character will become more suited to the surrounding con- 
 ditions, and there is no reason to fear, that man under this 
 moulding, will be shaped in any weak or unmanly form.
 
 OBJECTIONS TO CHRISTIAN IDEAL. 465 
 
 All that a barbarous and bloody past gave of vigour and 
 courage, will be given by a future of peace and humanity 
 under the unavoidable dangers and chances of life. 
 
 A similar objection is that the Christian type of char- 
 acter would in its unselfishness unfit men for the struggle 
 for existence, and that the followers of this morality and 
 Religion would be over-reached by the " children of this 
 world," and finally worsted in the contest. But the Chris- 
 tian teachings do not require to love others more than self, 
 but as ourselves. And the highest Christian benevolence 
 teaches that the selfishness of others must sometimes be 
 resisted for their sake, even more than our own. It is true 
 that as society and trade are constituted now, a complete 
 living after the Christian ideal is difficult, but with each 
 generation, a greater harmony arises between the conditions 
 and this type of character. Even now it is not certain that 
 a society completely governed by the Christian morality 
 might not exist successfully amid the selfish and jarring 
 interests of the world. It is easily conceivable that the 
 world might advance with all its present progress, and yet 
 all societies be inspired by these elevated principles. There 
 is nothing in the Christian ideal which unfits a man for the 
 utmost activity and vigour ; and if this activity regard 
 the rights of others and consult their interests, it will not 
 be the less likely to attain its objects. At all events, with 
 each advancing century, this type of character will be moro 
 fit for its conditions and surroundings. 
 
 It has often been urged in these pages that the teachings 
 of the great Master were in no way inconsistent either 
 with modern advance in rational accumulation of wealth 
 or in institutions of political liberty, though objections 
 urging this have often been made against this moral system.^ 
 
 ' See even so candid a writer as Laurent {Hist, du Droit des Gens) 
 and Renan, and others. 
 
 H H
 
 466 GESTA CHRISTI 
 
 The type of character moulded by this system is essen« 
 tially the self-controlled, the earnest, the one careful of the 
 claims of others and responsible to a higher Power. Such 
 a character under modern conditions must be industrious 
 and saving and laborious. Idleness, dependence, self- 
 indulgence or extravagance would equally be inconsistent 
 with its ideals. It is true that the teachings of Jesus set 
 themselves against an excessive pursuit of wealth, and to 
 His immediate disciples, enforced communism of goods. 
 But, considering Oriental metaphors and the peculiar con- 
 ditions which surrounded our Lord, it may be doubted it 
 He urged for all men anything more than a greater dis- 
 tribution of property than had ever been known. The 
 Apostles apparently thus interpreted His words. There 
 is in His teachings, an ideal in regard to property which is 
 far in advance of the social progress of mankind. A future, 
 in which, after all reasonable tastes and wants of every 
 kind had been satisfied, accumulation was entirely devoted 
 to the public good, would not be one with which political 
 economy has reason to quarrel or which would discourage 
 industry. It would offer to labour the highest reward which 
 the most benevolent nature could seek. Nothing like de- 
 pendence or idleness is a legitimate fruit of Christianity. 
 The monasticism of history has not come from Christ, 
 nor is that charity which degrades the sufferer in helping 
 him and which sows other evils in curing the nearest, His 
 teaching. The drift of all His words is to seek one's 
 happiness in the ultimate highest happiness of all ; to love 
 others as one's self, and God above all. The true Christian 
 cannot knowingly do a man good in a way which will 
 injure him ultimately, or will injure society. 
 
 The peculiarity of Christ's teachings, as has often been 
 said^ in regard to political matters, was that He left them 
 entirely on one side, but threw in a principle into human
 
 CHRISTl 4NITY AND LIBERTY. 467 
 
 society which was destined in after ages to overthrow or 
 modify all existing institutions and governments. The 
 value attached by Him to the individual, has affected all 
 modern political systems and is destined to do so more 
 and more. The bond of humanity He taught is already 
 connecting persons under various forms of government, 
 and is certain hereafter to reform governments and the 
 relations of nations. 
 
 It is true that the early Apostles, under the peculiar 
 conditions of the Roman empire at the time, taught a 
 submission to authority which cannot be a universal 
 duty. But the essential character exemplified by Christ 
 contained no elements which form the instrument or the 
 victim of tyranny. A man trained to live in the great 
 Task-master's eye, looking at all men as equal before 
 God, holding beliefs which no human authority could 
 give or take away, determined to render to all their dues, 
 and habitually looking beyond human ranks and dis- 
 tinctions, could not in the nature of things be long a 
 supporter of despotism whether in church or state. The 
 Christian is essentially a believer in individual liberty 
 whatever be the form of government ; the tendency of 
 the Christian system is to permit all men to enjoy the 
 utmost development of their faculties, and to oppose un- 
 limited authority. The highest development of a con- 
 trolled liberty to ivery man and every woman, is the 
 natural fruit of the teachings of Jesus. 
 
 As a collateral evidence of the truth of this position, it 
 may fairly be urged that those races and peoples whose 
 members attempt (though only partially) to guide their 
 lives by His direct teachings, and who, however imper- 
 fectly, seek, or profess to seek, to model themselves on 
 Him, are those who have most developed free institutions. 
 
 The opposition in the past of the nominal expression of
 
 468 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 Christianity — the Church — to Science is indeed on«e of the 
 apparent objections to this system which has had most 
 weight. 
 
 It is undoubtedly true that a false theory of inspiration 
 and a false interpretation of the scriptures, together with 
 the spirit of bigotry, have thrown the religious bodies often 
 in contest with science. But the teachings of the Master 
 are not responsible for this. There is nothing in them 
 which is opposed to the freest investigation and most 
 thorough research. On the other hand, the humility and 
 love of truth taught by Him, are favourable to the pur- 
 suit of truth and would tend to make the scholar more 
 thorough and earnest. 
 
 The faith in Supernaturalism cannot be urged as op- 
 posed to Science, for the believer holds also to a system 
 of laws in a sphere higher than that which science searches 
 out, and to him also there is a "continuity" in the uni- 
 verse. The victories of science are won in a domain which 
 faith scarcely touches ; and from all that appears, a most 
 devout believer in the supernatural might lead the re- 
 searches of modern investigation in nature. To him in- 
 deed there would be an intelligent Power behind nature, 
 and a light shining through the mystery of the universe, 
 but all known laws of existence could be as closely and 
 impartially followed out, as by the most sceptical ma-^ 
 terialist. Many of the great investigators of nature in all 
 ages have been religious. 
 
 An objection of greater weight to the Christian system 
 is that, if of supernatural origin, or if the ultimate system 
 of morals, it has been extraordinarily slow in imbuing the 
 world with its principles and that some of the most terri- 
 ble evils of society still survive. The reply has often been 
 made to this objection, and to the philosophic mind would 
 «eem a not unsatisfactory one, that with regard to all
 
 THE SLOW INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 469 
 
 agencies, whether physical or moral, shaping this world, 
 long periods of time seem necessary. Whatever be the 
 theory of the universe, immense time appears indispen- 
 sible for the working out of any of the great forces. It 
 is no more inconsistent with supernatural Power to be 
 during a thousand centuries slowly remoulding through 
 natural influences the moral world, than during a like 
 period to be gradually remoulding matter under the laws 
 of Evolution, or to be laying the foundation for future 
 kingdoms of life during uncounted centuries under the 
 natural forces. 
 
 All that we need to show is, that Jiere is a moral Force 
 producing certain definite though small residts during a 
 certain period of time ; and of a nature adapted to produce 
 indefinite similar residts in unlimited time. If these two 
 premises be allowed of the Christian system, we can pro- 
 nounce it safely the ultimate system of morals. 
 
 The first of these, it has been the object of this volume 
 to demonstrate. We have endeavoured to show what in 
 a few centuries the Christian System has brought about ; 
 what changes it, in harmony with other influences working 
 secondarily, has effected, what sufierings mitigated, what 
 evils removed, what abuses reformed, and what new bonds 
 of sympathy and humanity it has joined. 
 
 Before showing what it is adapted to accomplish, we 
 must point incidentally to certain obstacles, outside of 
 itself, which have obstructed its progress in the past. 
 
 It will be remembered that this Religion and morality 
 have never acquired a full control over mankind. The 
 great historical blunder of the Church — the early union 
 with the State — lessened and crippled the moral influence 
 of Christianity in Europe. The too speedy and superficial 
 convev-,ion of the masses in Europe, left a wide-spread 
 paganization, especially of the peasantry. The influence
 
 470 GESTA CHRISTl. 
 
 of state churches, of wealthy hierarchies, of political 
 priests, and all the corruption and bigotry of the Church 
 in the Middle Ages, tended to counteract the true working 
 of the Faith. No doubt in modern days, the worldliness 
 of the Church has equally interfered with the legitimate 
 influence of this system. Even among its followers, the 
 effects and inherited tendencies of ages of barbarism and 
 unrestrained selfishness, still survive in mental habits and 
 social customs. War is a relic of unchristian times, and 
 is in many forms utterly opposed to the Religion of Love. 
 Yet the power of this kind of co-operation and the evil 
 passions engendered affect the minds of all believers, and 
 but {q^w have escaped as yet its influences. 
 
 So as regards the more selfish competition of trade, the 
 teachings of Christ, even with His nominal followers, have 
 reached but a few. Then, when we consider the relations 
 of bodies of men, we find that in all governmental connec- 
 tions, these instructions have had but the feeblest influence, 
 and that this century only has seen the first important 
 application of Christian principles to international rela- 
 tions. We may therefore fairly say that Christianity has 
 merely begun its workings in the world, and many hundred 
 centuries must pass before it will show any important part 
 of its true influence. 
 
 Evolution. — But what Christianity is adapted to effect 
 may be best seen from examining the laws which seem to 
 govern all human development. In the struggle for exist- 
 ence, that individual or that race of men is the most sure to 
 survive, which is the most fitted for its conditions, physical, 
 mental, and moral. And as every faculty and power de- 
 velops, and the relations of human beings with one another 
 become more complicated, that race will lead the world 
 which is most ii harmony with the most advanced and re-
 
 EVOLUTION AND CHRISTIANITY. 471 
 
 fined conditions. The elements which especially govern the 
 relations of men to one another in their highest associa- 
 tions, are sympathy, justice, the love of others' happiness, 
 the control of selfish tendencies, and the aiming at uni- 
 versal good. 
 
 In lower relations, we see in the history of the past, that 
 such races as violated habitually ordinary morals, and 
 were greedy of wealth, indifferent to injustice, tyrannical 
 to the weak, corrupted by pleasure, weakened by unnatural 
 passions, oppressive to the masses, or eager for mere 
 conquest and unjust glory, finally were overthrown and 
 perished. Their victors or survivors who took their places 
 at first were perhaps little better than their predecessors, 
 but they had gained the victory by some moral advantage, 
 and this, acted upon by favouring circumstances, trans- 
 mitted and increased by heredity, continually advanced 
 these races. 
 
 The races with lower moral development went to the 
 wall, and those with higher, grew in moral power. Still 
 this was not a steady moral advance, as many of the cir- 
 cumstances were not favourable to it ; and temporarily a 
 victory in the struggle for existence was often given to 
 a race lower in the moral scale. But on the whole and 
 in a long period, vice weakens the physical power of a 
 nation ; injustice raises up enemies internal or external ; 
 excessive luxury saps vigour ; selfishness repels allies ; and 
 in one form or other, a low moral standard as compared 
 with the prevailing, weakens its resisting power, and causes 
 it finally to succumb. As we rise to higher relations, we 
 can see that as man develops and society advances, the 
 races in which there is the highest development of sym- 
 pathy, of benevolence, of sexual purity, of truth and 
 justice, will tend to be the strongest in body, the most 
 closely united, the most prosperous, the most free, the
 
 47a GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 most influential on inferior races, and tht most powerful 
 as attracting other members to themselves. All the des- 
 tructive influences of the world will be less operative on 
 them. The death-rate of such a race will tend to be the 
 lowest possible ; the physical vigour the highest ; the 
 inequalities of fortune will be the most compensated for ; 
 the trade and intercourse with all other nations the freest ; 
 the laws and social customs will the most approach perfect 
 justice and humanity ; all the resources and abilities of the 
 most favoured members will be habitually used for the 
 most unfortunate, but only so far as to strengthen them. 
 The power of such a race will far transcend anything 
 hitherto known, for each member is permitted the utmost 
 possible development of all his faculties, and vigour of 
 intellect is almost sure to accompany great moral advance. 
 
 In the struggle for existence, a perfected race like this 
 will be as much beyond the races which history has known, 
 as the Aryan races now are beyond the African. It will 
 tend to supplant them. It will win the fruits of nature 
 first. It will absorb from them. It will lesist destructive 
 influences better. If driven to physical contest, it would 
 conquer them ; it would inevitably lead all other races. 
 Though opposed to war, and living habitually in bene- 
 volence, such a people in the defence of rights would be 
 almost irresistible. But its final triumphs would be like 
 those of civilization — gentle, profound, and full of blessing 
 to all others. Men would follow such a nation, as they 
 have followed prophets and saviours. It would be the 
 centre of the higher life of the world. 
 
 The currents of Evolution plainly set towards such an 
 end. The struggle for existence, heredity, and the survival 
 of the fittest, must give the final triumph in the life of 
 men to the races of high morality ; to such qualities as 
 sympathy, unselfish benevolence, purity, justice and truth
 
 EVOLUTION AND BENEVOLENCE. 473 
 
 These are alone suited to the highest development of 
 society, and the most complete and perfect working 
 of each individual with every other. Selfishness, vice, 
 injustice, violence, hate, and lust, tend to weaken, to 
 destroy, to disorganize, and finally to cause defeat in the 
 struggle. 
 
 A profound and acute writer, a Positivist, Mr. Fiske, 
 has somewhere said that the drift of society under Natural 
 Selection and the other forces of Evolution is " towards 
 weakening the power of selfishness, and strengthening the 
 power of sympathy." 
 
 If it be objected that this theory leaves out of view one 
 of the great and solemn facts of life — the drift toward 
 evil or inherited and accumulated tendency to depravity — ■ 
 the reply is that with the race we have imagined. Inherit- 
 ance may eventually be turned toward good. After 
 hundreds of generations of human beings, guided by such 
 principles as we have indicated, and inspired by the 
 Divine Spirit, the immense power of heredity reduplicating 
 any tendencies physical or moral would be accumulated 
 in favour of benevolence, purity and truth, and would open 
 the mind to spiritual and moral truth even from infancy. 
 No human knowledge can measuie the results when at 
 length under Divine influences that mysterious tendency 
 towards evil which has so tormented earnest thinkers — 
 that principle of heredity, reduplicating in its power at 
 every new generation — shall be turned towards good, and 
 the first unconscious impulses be in the direction of 
 unselfishness and of religion. Then the " gemmules " 
 which may have descended for a thousand generations, 
 whether containing physical forces or influencing moral 
 tendencies, will be preponderatingly those which make 
 the body pure and self- controlled, and draw the soul 
 towards goodness and God.
 
 474 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 It need not be said that Christianity is adapted to form 
 such a race as we have described above. Its tendency is 
 to remove all the destructive agencies. It teaches the 
 brotherhood of man and the priceless value of each human 
 being, and therefore undermines serfdom and slavery, 
 which have overthrown so many commonwealths, and 
 steadily elevates the masses who make the strength of a 
 state. It urges universal love and justice, and therefore 
 leads men to aid one another in every possible way, to 
 assist by wise charity, to remove unjust burdens, to take 
 off the trammels on trade and intercourse, to pass just 
 laws and abolish ancient abuses. Under its teachings of 
 " doing to others as we would have others do to us," and 
 "loving our neighbours as ourselves," sympathy and un- 
 selfish benevolence are the controlling elements in this 
 higher condition. It opposes and must finally do away 
 with War — perhaps the greatest curse on mankind. In 
 defending marriage and presenting the highest ideal of 
 purity as a religious obligation, it strengthens physical 
 power and diminishes the great offence of women, and 
 will at length remove it. It binds families together, and 
 tends thus to preserve the greatest physical vigour. It 
 teaches temperance and moderation, and by religious 
 motives resists the fatal appetite of modern days — that 
 for extreme alcoholic stimulus. 
 
 In presenting the dignity of man it tends to root out the 
 degraded character of Pauperism ; and by teaching that 
 benevolence must ever regard the highest welfare of the 
 recipient, it prevents indiscriminate alms-giving. Trade 
 under it will be governed by honest and unselfish principles. 
 Under the guiding words of the Master, a new principle 
 of the distribution of wealth will prevail in the completed 
 society of the future. Men will hold riches for all. 1 he 
 surplus beyond reasonable wants and desires will be con-
 
 FUTURE UNDER CHRISTIANITY. 475 
 
 tinually distributed in means of education, of wise charity, 
 and of public improvement. Possibly the laws themselvea 
 will forbid accumulation beyond a fixed amount ; or all such 
 matters will be left to a Christianized public opinion. Vice, 
 lust, violence, cruelty, neglect of offspring, robbery, thievery 
 and all the practices which disorganize a community will be 
 resisted by the most powerful motives which can work on 
 the human mind. That which especially ensures the future 
 of a race — its physical and moral cart for its young — is 
 especially encouraged by this Faith. Under it sympathy 
 and unselfish benevolence are stimulated to their utmost. 
 It offers all the conditions which Evolution requires to form 
 the perfect race or society. 
 
 But it does more than present a system of ultimate 
 morals. It throws in a Force which Evolution does not 
 reckon upon, and which hastens on all the currents for good, 
 working in human life. It offers the love for an unequalled 
 character, for a divine Person who embodies all abstract 
 morality : it throws about Him and His teachings, the halo 
 and mystery of a Religion : it presents to the individual 
 struggling for a higher morality, hopes and fears which take 
 Iiold of all that is grand and awful in the universe. It even 
 makes morality only the blossom and fruit of the love it 
 would implant for this transcendent Being and of the faith 
 in unseen and eternal realities. In loving the highest ex- 
 cellence as personified in CHRIST, the man unconsciously 
 loves the happiness of all created beings, and is planted in 
 the highest morality. 
 
 We have thus attempted to show in this volume, what 
 improvements in human condition, and what assistance to 
 humane and moral progress have originated in a compara- 
 tively brief period, from Christianity. We have inferred 
 from these changes which it has caused during a few
 
 476 GESTA CHRIST!. 
 
 centuries, what it will probably bring about in a very loi g 
 period. From its own nature too, we have reasoned that 
 Christianity is adapted to produce a perfect system of 
 human society. Nothing better has been or can be con- 
 ceived by the miad of man, to make man better or happier. 
 Is it not then reasonable to infer that the Christian Religion 
 is "the absolute and universal Religion : " that its Founder, 
 Jesus the Christ, was substantially what he claimed to be, 
 and that His revelation of the future life may be received 
 with the same confidence, as His instruction about the 
 present. 
 
 A Being who can lead for all future ages, the moral and 
 humane progress of humanity, may well claim a respect 
 for His words which no other being can demand. The 
 " Son of man " may well be the " Son of God : " the Gesta 
 Christi may become the Gesta Dei, and He r^^veal not 
 only Life but Immortality to man
 
 SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER. 
 
 THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART IN 
 THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 Some sceptical writers of distinction and even of con- 
 siderable impartiality have spoken with depreciation or 
 contempt of the share of the Christian religion in the 
 aesthetic history of the race; and the position of the 
 early Iconoclasts destroying statues and images, or of 
 the Catholic Savonarola burning works of art, or of the 
 English Puritans defacing the Episcopal churches, has 
 been supposed to represent that of Christians generally 
 towards Art.^ 
 
 The "Religion of Sorrow" has not been thought fa- 
 vorable to those arts which minister to pleasure, and the 
 Faith which teaches self-denial, the crowning event of 
 whose history is an ignominious and painful death, could 
 not, it was believed, look with sympathy on whatever 
 belongs to the fulness and luxury of life. But in this 
 theoretical view of Christianity were left out of sight its 
 ideal and dramatic elements. Its story from the manger- 
 birth to the death on the cross is full of poetry and scenic 
 effect. Childhood and womanhood are both glorified in 
 
 - Renan however takes a broader view: "Jamais le probldme de I'art reli- 
 i;loux n'a etc plus completement resolu qu'au moyen ^ge, en ce sens qu'3 
 aiicune autre epoque de I'histoire de I'humanite la religion ne s'est traduita 
 au dehors par un ensemble de formes plus imposantes, plus rapproch^s & la 
 Divinity. (Nmtvelles £tudes.) 
 
 477
 
 478 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 its narrative. Its truths take hold of the noblest aspira* 
 tions and most heroic purposes in this life; and bear on 
 the grandest possibilities of the soul in the life to come. 
 Whatever is sweet in humble affection, whatever is beau- 
 tiful in purity, or heroic in sacrifice, or elevated in aspira- 
 tion, or unquenchable in hope, can be painted on the 
 canvas or chiseled in marble or built in imperishable 
 stone by him who is inspired with its teachings. 
 
 In point of fact the two most striking fruits of the 
 feeling for beauty and harmony known to man since the 
 days of the highest Greek Art, have come directly from 
 the religious sentiment in Christianity acting upon the 
 temperament of the Teutonic and Romanic peoples. 
 The power of Christ over the human mind shows itself 
 in different forms in different ages. His influence on the 
 imagination, the dramatic faculty, and the sense of 
 beauty may not perhaps be the highest form, but it 
 is one. 
 
 There was a certain portion of the Middle Ages, a 
 century or century and a half, from the middle of the 
 fourteenth to the early part of the sixteenth century 
 — the most brilliant in human annals — when this power 
 was exerted on the European mind as it never had been 
 before and doubtless never will be again in the his- 
 tory of the race. 
 
 The great religious and aesthetic conception of the 
 Middle Ages was undoubtedly that of the holy Madonna. 
 The Madonna, so far as we can recall, has no exact coun- 
 terpart in Classic or Pagan Art. It is the conception of 
 the glorified woman, whose passions, affections and whole 
 nature have been purified and beatified by suffering and 
 devotion, by the pangs of earth and the joys of heaven. 
 It is the wife unstained by sin, hearing in sweet humility
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 479 
 
 and unspeakable joy from the Infinite Spirit, that she is 
 to bear in her bosom the Hope of the human race; it is 
 the mother first looking upon the face of the blessed 
 Infant, who is to be the joy of the whole earth; it is the 
 beatified woman, rising on the rose-tinged clouds, every 
 feature of the angelic face moulded with awe and devo- 
 tion and the sense of union with God, holding the divine 
 Child, whose deep and solemn eyes seem to predict the 
 career of suffering, shame and agony before Him; or it is 
 the mother bereft, bending in pain over the lifeless form 
 of the beloved Son, but with eyes that look through tears 
 to the triumph of His spirit on the earth, and to the glad 
 re-union in Heaven. 
 
 In all the best schools the Madonna is the highest 
 Christian conception of woman, of woman indeed ex- 
 alted and beautified by being chosen to be the mother of 
 the Lord; but woman softened by suffering, elevated by 
 consciousness of divine union, bearing the burdens of 
 humanity as her Son had done, purified of human dross 
 by love, sharing human weakness but made almost super- 
 human "in having been permitted to bring forth into the 
 world the Holy One. 
 
 It is true that this pure and elevated conception of the 
 mother of Christ ran at length into an extreme, and led 
 to a worship of the human rather than the divine. But 
 let any one stand before such a picture as Raphael's Sis- 
 tine Madonna, and ask himself whether Art could give 
 purer or higher or more religious conceptions. As he 
 gazes on that graceful and noble figure with floating 
 drapery, "rising on the empurpled cloud," the sweet 
 and solemn face bearing on it the shadow of life's sor- 
 row and of future pain, the features so pure and beau- 
 tiful that he involuntarily says to himself, " such and 
 not more beautiful be the angel faces that shall meet
 
 48o GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 me in the blessed life beyond ! " and as he feels the 
 wonderful harmony of the painting, the effect which 
 the very contrast of the earthly faces of the Pope and 
 Santa Barbara make to the spiritual Madonna, and as 
 he looks into the deep, earnest eyes of the Infant 
 Christ, who seems gazing into the vistas of eternity, 
 he feels the full effect of the highest religious thought 
 and dramatic representation. He does not worship the 
 Madonna. He has a conception of divine purity, of in- 
 finite beauty, of the possibility of human beatification 
 and purifying in the light of HiM who is the soul of the 
 universe. He prays for purity. He worships GOD. 
 
 No temple or church or religious emblem could pro- 
 duce such a profound spiritual impression on the beholder. 
 No other religion, no Classic or Oriental Art has given 
 to the world such an ideal of woman. We know the 
 elevated and heroic ideal of the Greeks; the stately and 
 pure conception of the Romans; but no statue in ancient 
 Art thus speaks of almost superhuman sorrow, of purity 
 and affection, of intense aspiration for goodness, of the 
 love which beareth all things and of adoration of the 
 divine. The Madonna of the purest schools of the Middle 
 Ages is a gift of Christianity, working on the Teutonic 
 and Italian temperament, to the treasures of beauty of 
 the human race. 
 
 From causes which we need not here investigate, the 
 century beginning with the middle of the fifteenth was 
 conspicuous for a new life in Christian thought and feel- 
 i!ig, and this movement, though not reaching every 
 branch of human society, yet acted especially on the 
 sense of beauty and the dramatic power in painting and 
 architecture. The story of Christ and the Apostles, 
 the doctrines of His Faith as relating to the unseen 
 and the future life, and many of His highest moral
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 481 
 
 truths, gained a new power and freshness. In some 
 directions men beHeved as they had not before since 
 the early Christian ages. 
 
 The ItaHan monks preached with great power to vast 
 audiences the eternal truths of penitence and duty to 
 God. Men were aroused in every direction to their duties. 
 The sense of sin and of the higher obHgations was in- 
 tensely stimulated. Italian monks,' like Sartiano, Capis- 
 trano, Da Lecce, Bernardino of Sienna, and others, held 
 large assemblies in rapt attention, as they spoke with 
 thrilling eloquence of sin and repentance. Savonarola 
 thundered at the conscience of the masses in his beloved 
 Florence, scourged the vices of the Church and the civil 
 rulers, and pleaded for the purest religious feelings in Art. 
 Luther preached to increasing multitudes the highest 
 truths of Christianity, and drove home to the conscience 
 of men the sense of sin, the need of a Divine Redeemer 
 and the hypocrisy of outward ceremonial with the heart 
 corrupt and selfish. Yet with all this went on a corrup- 
 tion in the Church and in social life, which showed how 
 partial and incomplete was the work of the Faith once 
 preached in Judea. 
 
 Still its action on the sense of beauty was most strik- 
 ing. A century and a half previous to this period, Cim- 
 abue (1302), in Florence, had painted a Madonna with 
 such freshness of religious feeling that Vasari relates it 
 was carried to church in a solemn procession, followed 
 by the whole population, with such rejoicing that the 
 quarter is still called Borgo Allegri (Joyful Quarter). His 
 illustrious pupil, Giotto (about 1300), has been called 
 " the father of Christian Art," and the influence of the 
 Latter was felt for centuries in Italy in the expression 
 ^f religious emotion. Of this school Vasari says: "We 
 
 J Burckhardt, Renaissance in Italv, ii. 264,
 
 ♦§3 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 painters occupy ourselves entirely in tracing saints on 
 the walls and on the altars, in order that by this means 
 men, to the great despite of the demons, may be better 
 and more devout."' 
 
 Of Giotto, Vasari declares that " he was no less re- 
 markable as a Christian than as a painter."'^ Religious 
 Art had been encouraged by popes and synods. Pope 
 Gregory the Great (1073) had proclaimed: "Wherefore 
 let pictures be employed in the churches, that those who 
 do not understand letters may at least be able to read on 
 the walls what they do not read in books" (Ep. 105). 
 The Synod of Arras (1205) decreed that what the illit- 
 erate cannot behold in the Scripture, that they should 
 contemplate in the features of pictorial art.^ The paint- 
 ing (miniature) in manuscripts and on vellum was carried 
 to a high degree of perfection in the convents, and in 
 France religious art was beautified in the twelfth century 
 by the use of painting on glass — a discovery, probably, of 
 Byzantine origin. A cure in Troyes painted three win- 
 dows of a church to serve as catechism and instruction 
 to the people (pour servir de catechisme et d'instruc- 
 tion au peuple). 
 
 But the greatest impulse to the progress of Christian 
 art was given by the voluntary associations of earnest- 
 minded painters, sculptors, and masons through Northern 
 Italy. These workingmen and artists were filled with re- 
 ligious emotions. Vasari relates that one fraternity of 
 pointers (1350) held periodical meetings to render praise 
 and thanks to God (per rendere lode et grazie a Dio). 
 Rio says, "The studio of the painter became an orato- 
 
 * Piu divoti et migliori. 
 
 s Non meno buon Christiano che eccellente pittore. 
 
 3 Illiterati quod per Scripturam non possunt intuen hoc per quaedam 
 pi'-turae lineamenta contemplantur.
 
 mPLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 483 
 
 rio." The Florentine associations are said to have laid 
 great stress on personal piety and minute acts of de- 
 votion; the Siennese insisted more on the religious 
 vocation of art; all were fraternities for mutual moral 
 and religious edification. The painters of Sienna open- 
 ly declared that "we, by the grace of God, make man- 
 ifest to rude and ignorant men the miraculous events 
 operated by virtue of and in confirmation of our holy 
 faith." 
 
 A wonderful personality had lived and acted in a lit- 
 tle village of Umbria, Assisi, in the thirteenth century. 
 He had been truly inspired with love of man and of God. 
 St. Francis' story has received the usual setting of leg- 
 endry, but there was beneath it a spark of the divine 
 fire. This has kindled not only the monks and preachers 
 of Italy, but affected successive generations of artists and 
 sculptors. He who most felt this inspiration has become 
 the great representative of Christian art in all centu- 
 ries — Fra Angelico of Fiesole (1387-1455). Vasari says 
 of him that he never could have reached such heights of 
 art but for his devoted and holy life (uomo di santissima 
 vita). In his funeral oration he declares: "Some say 
 that Fra Giovanni never took up pencil without first 
 having recourse to prayer. Whenever he painted a cru- 
 cifixion the tears streamed down his cheeks, and in the 
 countenance and attitudes of his figures it is easy to per- 
 ceive the goodness of his soul and his great love of the 
 Christian religion." Again, "He shunned altogether the 
 commerce of the world, and, living in holiness and in 
 purity, was as loving towards the poor on earth as I 
 think his soul must be now in heaven. He worked 
 incessantly at his art, nor would he paint other than 
 sacred subjects. He might have been rich, but cared 
 qot to be so, saying that true riches consisted rather
 
 484 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 in being content with little. He niii^ht have ruled over 
 many, but he willed it not. . . . Dignity and au- 
 thority were within his grasp, but he disregarded them, 
 saying that he sought no other advancement than to 
 escape Hell and draw nigh to Paradise. He was most 
 meek and temperate, and by a chaste life loosened him- 
 self from the snares of the world, ofttimes saying that 
 the student of painting hath need of quiet and to live 
 without anxiety, and that the dealer in the things of 
 Christ ought to dwell perpetually with Christ." He 
 never yielded to the sensual tastes of the age, or to 
 the demands of the great patrons of his art, the Medici, 
 who ordered the free and licentious nude subjects of 
 antiquity. After spiritual communings he seized the 
 pencil, and believed his pictures to be inspirations. "As 
 he was devout in heart, so he formed his figures full 
 of devotion." ^ Of these lovely creations, faces filled 
 with an unearthly sweetness, reflecting the peace which 
 passeth understanding, lit with a light not of earth, 
 humble as in the presence of the Ineffable One, har- 
 monious and beautiful as if Heaven shone around them, 
 all succeeding ages have agreed with the historian that 
 " the spirits of the blessed in heaven could scarcely be 
 otherwise." ^ 
 
 The epitaph of the saintly artist expresses his spirit, 
 and that of the highest Christian Art of the fifteenth 
 century: "To me be it no glory that I was as a sec- 
 ond Apclles; but that all my gains I laid at thy feet, 
 oh Jesu ! " ' 
 
 ' Sicut ipse erat devotus in corde, ita et figuras pingebat devotione plenas. 
 ' Spirit! beati non possimo essere in cielo altrimente. 
 
 3 Non niihi sit laudi quod eram velust alter Apelles; sed quod lucra tuia 
 omnia, Christe, dabam ! — Vasari.
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 485 
 
 A like spirit is seen in the Bologna School. Lippo 
 Dalmasio (at the end of the fourteenth century) is re- 
 lated never to have commenced painting without a severe 
 fast the evening before and partaking of the sacraments 
 during the same day, that his imagination might be 
 purified; so that Guido said of him, it was impossible for 
 any modern artist — no matter with what talent or study 
 — to unite so much holiness, modesty and piety in one 
 figure.^ In his later life, he never painted for money but 
 only to give expression to devotional feelings — he him- 
 self being supported by his convent. 
 
 Savonarola. — This remarkable reformer and preacher 
 of the fifteenth century had a marked and extraordinary 
 influence on the Christian Art of North Italy, and on the 
 artists personally. He especially denounced the pagan 
 and licentious influences which were degrading painting 
 and sculpture in his native land. " Ye make the Virgin 
 appear like a prostitute!"* he said in one of his impas- 
 sioned addresses to those who were corrupting Art. The 
 decline of Art, he declared was owing to the decline of 
 Religion. "Your ideas are stamped with the grossest 
 materialism. ... It is in something beyond the visible 
 that we must seek for the essence of true Beauty. The 
 more nearly the creature participates in and approaches 
 to the Divine Beauty, the more beautiful it is, because 
 the beauty of the body depends in great measure on the 
 beauty of the soul." This idea he repeats in innumerable 
 forms. "Imagine what must have been the beauty of 
 the Virgin who possessed such sanctity — sanctity that 
 shone from all her features. Imagine how beautiful was 
 Christ who was God and man ! " St. Ambrose had said 
 
 ' Rio, De la Poesie Chretienne, etc., p. 185. 
 
 * Voi fate parer Vergine Maria vestita come una meretnce.
 
 486 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 before of the Virgin that the appea) ance of the body was 
 an image of the beauty of the soul.^ 
 
 Savonarola adds, " It is related that at the sight of 
 the Virgin, at the sight of her great beaut) , all men re- 
 mained stupefied; but such was the sanctity that shone 
 in her that she never inspired an evil thought; every one 
 felt himself inspired with respect for her. ... If natural 
 virtues like prudence, justice, force and temperance are 
 ornaments of the soul and contribute to render it beauti- 
 ful, how much more beauty ought to belong to super- 
 natural virtues, such as faith, hope and especially charity. 
 Love God first, then your neighbor, and your soul will 
 be beautiful.* Every painter paints himself; that is to 
 say, he realizes his conceptions. . . . Carnal and de- 
 bauched men have the intellect obscured."' "Love is 
 like a painter. The works of a good painter charm men 
 so that in contemplating them one remains in suspense; 
 sometimes one is ravished in ecstacy and one forgets him- 
 self This is what the love of Jesus Christ does in the 
 soul. . . . The beauty and the charm of similar paint- 
 ings take captive all the forces of the soul, and make it 
 despise riches, honor and all earthly goods."* 
 
 These words of the great preacher of the Middle Ages 
 show what was the ideal of its highest Art in picturing 
 the Madonna. She was the earthly image of the divine 
 beauty. 
 
 Savonarola's influence was deeply felt by Lorenzo di 
 Credi, early in the sixteenth century, and especially by 
 Fra Bartolommeo, who has shown in his works so beauti- 
 fully the aspirations of Christian Art. Ridolfo Ghirlan* 
 
 Ut ipsa corporis species simulacrum fuerit mentis. 
 * Les illust. d'ecrits de Savonarola f ir G. Gruyer, (Paris, 1879) p 19. 
 3 Sermons oti the Psalms. * Ibid.
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 487 
 
 dajo (about 1500) and Michele di Ridolfo transmitted 
 still farther the piinciples of the great Christian teacher; 
 and the quaint and devout Botticelli (1480) was so af- 
 fected by his words and life that at his death, as Vasari 
 relates, he gave up painting and resolved never to touch 
 pencil again. 
 
 Michael Angelo in his grand and solemn themes is also 
 believed to have shown the deep impression of the great 
 reformer's words. Savonarola was as a Hebrew prophet 
 in a corrupt age, and the imagination of the great artist 
 was equally filled with solemn visions and the thoughts 
 of the "Judgment to come." 
 
 In Venice, Art kept its religious character later than 
 in Florence. G. Bellini (about 1500) has expressed the 
 secret aspirations of the soul after repose in God, and 
 his Madonnas, according to Rio, are marked by the 
 mysterious, profound expression of one who looks for- 
 ward to suffering and sacrifice, but is sustained by 
 love. 
 
 Cimo di Corregliano (early in the sixteenth century) 
 is another in the line of religious painters; and of Car- 
 paccio, so devout was he, it is said, that his fellow- 
 citizens mourned while the blessed mansions smiled at 
 his coming.* 
 
 TJie Umbrian School. — In the upper valleys of the Tiber, 
 the religious influences which had gone out from the self- 
 sacrificing life of St. Francis of Assisi, and from the pure 
 aspirations and gentle soul of Fra Angelico, were felt 
 for several centuries, and aided in producing the most 
 perfect expression of religious feeling, in the art of paint- 
 ing, yet known to man. But in this development the 
 art of Sienna had its share; the tender and devotional 
 
 ' Pianto dai cittadini, sorrisa nelle beate stanze del cielo.
 
 *88 GESTA CIIRISTI. 
 
 Taddec Bartoli (141 3) undoubtedly influenced Perugino 
 and Raphael.^ With tiiese two painters — names im- 
 mortal in the histo/y of Art — may be associated Francia 
 (about 1500) as reaching the utmost heights in picturing 
 to after ages the purest human feelings of devotion, awe 
 and rapt religious ecstacy, combined with the highest 
 sense of harmony and beauty. 
 
 Though the Renaissance had begun and the drift was 
 strong towards Paganism in painting and sculpture, 
 Raphael felt from some sources the pure influences of 
 spiritual inspiration, and has left for all succeeding ages 
 the highest expression of religious Art. Under the work- 
 ing of Christianity, he has contributed an ideal or con- 
 ception of beauty and religious emotion which has been 
 and is still an element in human progress. 
 
 We do not claim of course that, even without Chris- 
 tianity, the world would not have developed its sentiment 
 of beauty, or that great artists would not have arisen in 
 this wonderful century of the Middle Ages. The bril- 
 liant names that adorned the close of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, of artists who derived most of their inspiration from 
 Pagan Art, are a proof of the contrary. We only urge 
 that the Christian Faith, which in its essential objects 
 has little concern with Art, did in this remarkable period 
 make these beautiful contributions, as a kind of side-in- 
 fluence to the progress of mankind — a gift which will 
 ilways aid the lovers of the beautiful towards the highest 
 ideals. 
 
 The Cathedral in Pointed Gothic. — About a century 
 and a half before the period of which we are speaking — 
 early in the thirteenth century — a new expression of the 
 
 ' Rumohr, ii. 311.
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRTSTIANITY UPON ART. 48^ 
 
 feelin<^ for the beautiful in religious Art made itself known 
 in various countries of Europe. Its origin is uncertain; 
 but it first manifested itself in all probability in Germany/ 
 whence it had its name of the "German Style" {Ma7iiera 
 TedescJui), and under the contempt of the Italian peoples 
 for German Art, it was early denominated the "Gothic,"* 
 and now in its most developed style receives the more 
 specific title of the " Pointed Gothic." Its appearance 
 in various and distant countries at such near periods was 
 truly remarkable; it reached its highest and most perfect 
 development in the sixteenth century, and in the land 
 from which it probably sprang — Germany. 
 
 The Pointed Gothic Cathedral has been called "the 
 petrifaction of the Christian Religion." It would seem 
 that various persons in that century of mental activity, 
 inspired with awe and devotion under the teachings of 
 the Master, and filled with the instinct of beauty, 
 having the intellect trained under the most exact laws 
 of science then known, and the rules of the Greek 
 and Saracenic and Lombard architecture, had con- 
 ceived the idea of erecting a temple which should be 
 harmonious to the purer and grander ideas of worship in 
 the new Revelation. Everything in it should be aspir- 
 ing. The thoughts of the worshipper should be called 
 upwards to the infinite and everlasting. The great aerial 
 spaces within, the mystery of arch beyond arch, and 
 
 ' See Hope's Historical Essay on Architecture, London, 1840. 
 
 2 Vasari speaks of it as " monstruosi et barbari " — and of " maledittione di 
 fabbriche." 
 
 The origin of the Pointed Gothic is probably either from the north of France 
 or Germany. 
 
 Tlic Pointed Arch itself has been known from a remote antiquity even in tha 
 F'ast, and the style which arose from its use in Europe in the thirteenth century, 
 may well have received a great impulse from the "\perience of Saracenic axcl»i« 
 tfctuie jrained by Europeans in the crusades.
 
 490 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 arcade over arcade, the broad sweeps of richly-colored 
 light and deep shadows, the immense height of the in- 
 terior, the continual upward tendency of every port'on 
 of the building — from the foundation and flying buttress 
 and external pinnacle through the arches and groins 
 meeting in the elevated nave, to the succession above of 
 galleries, clerestories, arches, broaches, cusps, pinnacles, 
 crockets, and roof, till the top of the dizzy spire was 
 reached by the eye — all gave the mind of the spectator 
 an impression of the boundless and the eternal. He 
 was as one, 
 
 " Watching with upturned eye the tall tower grow, 
 And mount, at every step with living wiles 
 Instinct, to rouse the heart and lead the will 
 By a bright ladder to the world above." ' 
 
 The characteristic conception at the basis of this archi- 
 tecture from which it derives its name was in itself aspir- 
 ing, and controlled the whole structure. The pointed 
 arch" seemed to lead upwards towards heaven. It shaped 
 the mullions and divisions of the windows; it led to sup- 
 ports by piers rather than walls, and these again of neces- 
 sity to flying buttresses and pinnacles and outer aisles. 
 
 ' Wordsworth. 
 
 2 In construction the pointed arch has a greater power of carrying weight 
 with lessened thrust outwards, and a facility of proportioning its height to that 
 of supporting jambs. Its tendency is especially vertical, and it has great ad- 
 vantage in groined vaulting; it permits broad window spaces, so much neg- 
 lected by the Greeks, and naturally leads to decoration by window glass— the 
 great ornament of the Pointed Gothic. It almost compels the adoption of the 
 buttress and flying buttress, and the sharp gabled roof (a feature unknown to 
 the Greeks), and connects naturally with the bell tower or campanile. Its 
 advantage would at once be seen in the wide spanning arches of vaulting, 
 in the arches carrying the central tower, and in the gables and the wide archci 
 nf the nave arcades.
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 49I 
 
 It created the pointed vault, high gable, and slender 
 vaulting shaft; it was in harmony with an apparently 
 light and aerial building, wherein stained windows occupy 
 so large a wall space, and traceries and filigrees of stone 
 cover the surface. It naturally led to arch above arch, 
 to triforia and clerestories, and that wonderful pyramid- 
 iiing of arches, pinnacles, buttresses, roofs, and spires 
 which make the best Gothic cathedral seem like a sym- 
 metrical product of vegetation, a natural growth.^ It is 
 impossible for any thoughtful person to stand under that 
 wonderful structure of the Pointed Gothic, the Cologne 
 Cathedral, without feeling some such impression as he 
 does in the ancient forests or near a mighty cliff — of an 
 unseen Power, of Infinite Majesty. The vast heights 
 and mysterious spaces strike him with awe. The won- 
 derful symmetry and airiness of this astonishing struct- 
 ure, the rich breadths of colored light and mellowed 
 shadows, the delicate network of mullions, arches, ribs, 
 stays, and tracery, the vast masses which seem to hover 
 in air, so perfect is their support, and the gradual growth 
 as it were of all from the earth, through flying buttresses, 
 pinnacles, and roofs to the spires above, touch his sense 
 of harmony, and he feels himself in presence of the spirit 
 of beauty. Worship becomes the natural language of the 
 place. 
 
 Uhland has partially expressed some of these feelings 
 in his poem on the " Lost Church" : 
 
 Wie mir in jenen Hallen war. 
 
 Das kann ich nicht mit Worten schildem, 
 
 Die Fenster gllihten dunkelklar 
 
 Mit aller Martrer frommen Bildern; 
 
 Hopt.
 
 49a GESTA CHRIST! 
 
 Dann sah ich, wundcrsam erhellt. 
 Das Bild zum Leben sich erweiternr 
 Ich sah hinaus in eine Welt 
 Von heilgen Fraucn, Gottesstreitem. 
 
 Die Verlcrne Kirc\e, 
 
 "Words cannot paint what there within 
 A.woke my spirit's ecstasies. 
 The darkly brilliant windows glowed 
 With martyrs' pious effigies. 
 Into a new and living world. 
 Rich imaged forth I gazed abroad, 
 A world of holy women and 
 Of warriors of the host of God." 
 
 Lord Lindsay'' s Translation. 
 
 The Gothic cathedral is certainly a new gift in the 
 world of art to the civilized races. It is an indirect pro- 
 duct of Christianity. We would not in this assume that 
 there was any mysterious or supernatural appearance of 
 the Pointed Gothic in the history of the Middle Ages. 
 This style was a fruit of evolution or development from 
 the previous styles. It arose naturally from the Rounded, 
 the Norman or Lombard or Early Gothic, and perhaj.** 
 ultimately from the Byzantine and Saracenic and Greek. 
 
 But stimulating the sense of beauty and the desire to 
 develop new resources in the forms of architecture then 
 known, there was in that age a peculiar religious sen- 
 timent, which found its best expression in the aspiring 
 and reverential features of the Pointed Gothic cathedral. 
 This was assisted by a remarkable social institution of 
 those ages, of which we shall now speak. 
 
 The Gilds. — We have already observed that the paint- 
 ers of Italy in the thirteenth century formed themselves 
 into associations, which had for their objects spiritual 
 and moral improvement as well as proficiency in theii
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHKIST/A.VITY UPON ART. ^93 
 
 art. These fraternities, no doubt, had a profound infli 
 ence in shaping the character of the religious schooh 
 of art of Sienna and Umbria. 
 
 The various gilds throughout Europe were filled in 
 the beginning with this same religious enthusiasm. In 
 their charters and laws they all connected charities and 
 acts of devotion with their professional objects. The 
 regulations nearly always begin: " After these things 
 are done which are appropriate to the Christian relig- 
 ion and belong to God ' V then follow more practical 
 directions to the confratriis or fraternities. 
 
 The Associations were said to be formed "not only 
 for present advantage and temporal gains, but more for 
 celestial and eternal benefits." ^ No one in the com- 
 mencement of them was admitted as a member, even 
 of the lowest trade, "whose moral conduct and honor 
 were not stainless; no one who had not proved himself 
 a proper workman, and therefore no one who had not 
 served a regular apprenticeship.^ No member was al- 
 lowed to possess tools unless these were proven by 
 competent testimony to be good and honest." 
 
 "In the worship of God Almighty," says the con- 
 stitution of an ancient English gild (Garklekhith, 
 1375 A.D.), and of the Blessed Virgin, his mother, 
 this fraternity is begun of good men for the amend- 
 ment of our lives and souls, and to nourish more 
 love between the brethren and sisteren of the Broth- 
 erhood, etc."* 
 
 ' Post peracta ilia quae Dei sunt et Christianae Religion i conveniunt, et cet 
 (Labb. Cone. t. v. 16.) 
 
 * Non solum pro commodis presentibus et lucris temporalibus sed magis 
 pro beneficiis celestibus et perpetuis. Das Gildenwcsen im Miitel Alter. IVilda, 
 p. 358. -Halle, 1835. 
 
 2 English Gilds. — T, Smith, London, 1870. •* 3id., cxxix-
 
 «94 GESTA CHRIST/. 
 
 In a similar spirit the gild of goldsmiths in Svenburgh 
 begin their charter, " How lovely when brethren dwell 
 together in unity." And the merchants' gild at Olden- 
 see (1476) open theirs with, "Inasmuch as God is Love, 
 and whosoever dwelleth in love dwelleth in Him," etc. 
 That of St. Olaf's at Store Heddingen proclaims: "Be 
 it known to you, brethren and sisteren, that this as- 
 sociation is founded not for the sake of wassail, but 
 to assist law and order, and that brother may help 
 brother." ^ Such phrases are common in all these an- 
 cient charters. 
 
 The gilds of masons and builders were especially in- 
 spired with this religious enthusiasm. It was often said of 
 them that they " worked not for profit, but the salvation 
 of their souls " (pro salute animae non pro crumena). 
 They were a kind of laical church.' 
 
 These gilds were, no doubt, as exclusive and as selfish 
 in competition as are the modern trades' unions. They 
 held in their hands the business of architecture of Europe, 
 and did their best to keep it. They were at times cruel 
 and oppressive towards their own offending members. 
 They were a laical church, and, like their more religious 
 exemplar, often violated the professed principles of re- 
 ligion in their association. But there was burning among 
 them a spark of the Christian fire which enlightened and 
 inspired their professional work. 
 
 Their work became known for its singularly conscien- 
 tious, thorough, and reverent character. The ornamen- 
 tation and detail labored upon by them in hidden parts 
 of the sacred buildings, the religious structures erected 
 
 ' Fratres et sorores notum sit v )bis, istud convivium, non causS potationii 
 esse inchoatum std ordini, et cet, ut frater fratri auxilietur, et cet {^GildeUm 
 Wfsen, p. 33.) 
 
 » FiM.
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 49$ 
 
 in forests and wildernesses and remote and inaccessible 
 places, showed the same spirit of conscientiousness and 
 devotion. 
 
 Never in the history of human art has such painstaking, 
 honest, and conscientious work on the inaccessible and 
 unseen portions of sacred buildings been seen as in the 
 pious labors of the builders of cathedrals of the thirteenth 
 and fourteenth centuries. The architectural investigator 
 of the nineteenth century is amazed and awed to discover 
 sometimes on remote portions of a church of the thir- 
 teenth century beautifully carved and delicate stonework, 
 with every detail perfect, which no human eye had been 
 able to see for six hundred years, as if the workman had 
 chiseled these exquisite ornamentations " for the love 
 of God," and not for praise or hire^ from men. Nor does 
 it lower the aspiration that, once being imbued with the 
 devotion of the age, the architect and builder did his 
 work not conscious always of the divine, but from the 
 habit of honest and reverent work taught him by his 
 faith. It was simply unconscious religion in practi- 
 cal life. 
 
 The devout tone and remarkable skill of these ma- 
 sons made them favorites of the clergy and the popes. 
 The builders carried with them from Italy to other 
 Christian countries Pontifical bulls to protect and aid 
 them. Yet they were a reaction against ecclesiastical 
 power. It is without doubt these gilds of masons, where 
 each laborer felt himself at once an artist and a relig- 
 ious missionary, that in the thirteenth century carried 
 the inspiration and the science of the Pointed Gothic 
 
 ' A remarkable instance of this was related to me by a friend in the re. 
 newal of the celebrated Sainte Chapelle m Pans, erected under Louis XI. (1202), 
 where the most exquisitely carved stone 'lowers ^vere discovered on the pin* 
 nacles upon the roof. They had remained unseen for six hundred years.
 
 496 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 architecture' to all the leading countries of Europe.* It 
 is difficult otherwise to account for so many wonderful 
 cathedrals arising or being restored in various parts of 
 Europe, in similar general style, and yet with so much 
 individual invention and genius and such deep reverence 
 expressed in the designs. These devout laborers, trained 
 in certain scientific methods of building which they held 
 as secrets, went from one country to another as artists to 
 express their love of beauty and their adoration of Christ 
 in temples which should be houses of worship and sym- 
 bols of majesty and harmony for all succeeding ages. 
 They began under the sole conditions of the pointed arch, 
 suitability to climate, and the cruciform ground plan, and 
 then chiseled their aspirations in arch above arch, in tri- 
 foria and elevated arcades, in elongated windows and 
 rich window spaces, in clustered columns supporting on 
 delicate ribs great expanses of roof, in pointed vault, 
 high gable, and slender shaft, in flying buttress and 
 pinnacle and sharp roof, and in towers with gradually 
 diminishing galleries and arches till the tall spire is 
 ended. 
 
 These wonderful symmetrical structures of stone, ris- 
 ing like rounded pines to the skies, are the prayers of 
 the medieval laborer. This lace-work of stone mullions 
 and arches and ribs and stays, this gossamer made of the 
 rock, this filigree of masonry, are his offerings of beauty 
 and perfected work to Him who, he believed, had sacri- 
 ficed all for men. The rich windows and broad beams of 
 colored light, the exquisite span of the pointed arch, the 
 
 ' See Dallaway's Hist, of Architecture, Wren's Parentalia, and Pownall's 
 Archaologia. 
 
 2 A ceite epoque, la franc ma9onnerie 6tait une institution tout & fait artis- 
 tiqus, une Academie, ou tous les travailleurs avaient une place. {Hist, de k 
 Ste. Chapelle. Decloux, Paris, 1857.)
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 497 
 
 high and solemn nave, the mysterious vistas, are his 
 thoughts of worship and love to the unspeakable One. 
 We know but little about the history of these humble 
 and inspired workingmen. In England we hear of legis- 
 lation against them in the time of Edward III. (i35i)and 
 of Henry VI. (1425), showing that the ruling authorities 
 had become independent of them. But as far back as 
 1202, we read that Bishop de Lacy founded or introduced 
 a fraternity of masons, to last five years, to repair the 
 Cathedral of Winchester, held to be the first completed 
 specimen of Pointed Gothic in England.^ They are 
 said ' to have been first encouraged by Henry III.' (1216). 
 In 1427, Bishop Lacy sends Free Masons to Bere to pro- 
 vide stone for the Cathedral of Exeter. In the reign of 
 Henry VI. (1422) the Masons in Suffolk stipulated in 
 their contracts, that they should be provided with a 
 lodge by the parishes, and with various articles of ap- 
 parel.* Liberty to impress Masons was given by law in 
 1435. Ii"^ the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Henry 
 VIII., Prior Gybbs grants office for life of "Master of all 
 
 ' Anno 1202, D. Winton, G. de Lacy constituit confratriam pro repara- 
 done ecclesiae Winton, duraturam ad quinque annos completos. — Annalei 
 Winton (Britton). 
 
 * Storer's Gothic Architect. Convocati sunt artifices Angli et Franci; this 
 V as for the completion of Westminster Abbey. See Dallaway. 
 
 3 Britton's Exeter Cath., p. 97. Smirke [Archaologia) thinks the Free 
 Masons brought the Pointed Arch to perfection. 
 
 " From the first use of the Gothic in the twelfth century," says Dallaway, 
 in a quotation, "to its completion in the fifteenth century, the improvements 
 were owin.7 to the munificence of the Church and the vast abilities of the Free 
 Masons of the Middle Ages. These scientific persons have great claims to our 
 admiration from the richness and fertility of their inventive powers." 
 
 The History of Canterbury Cathedral(y^\.\\s''\ says nothing of Free Masons, 
 but speaks of foreign architects and workmen. 
 
 See Krauser- t 'irchettiau, i. 522, on Masonic Brotherhoo Is. 
 
 * Hope, i. 211
 
 498 GESTA CHRISTI 
 
 works" of convent, commonly called " Free Masonry," to 
 a certain person, "Free Mason"* (Britton, ^«/A Abbey 
 Ck., p. 37). The Free Masons are spoken of in an act 
 of C. II. (1684) and a special assize was set for them. 
 
 In Scotland they are related to have built the Abbey 
 of Kilwinniny about the end of the fifteenth century. In 
 Picardy and the Isle of France, they are spoken of as 
 early as the twelfth century.'' 
 
 In Germany they were held in honor for the longest 
 period, as we hear of a lodge of Free Masons placed at 
 the head of all the lodges of that country in 1459 for fin- 
 ishing the Cathedral of Strassburg,' which may rank 
 with the Cologne Cathedral as the most complete speci- 
 men of the Pointed Gothic* 
 
 The foundation of the churches and cathedrals of 
 England has always some religious expression connected 
 with it. 
 
 Thus the Abbot of Fulda (820 A.D.) built a little round 
 church in the cemetery of the Church o^ Glastenbury 
 "This edifice," says the historian, "the Aobot and his 
 
 ' "John Hylmer and William Virtue, Free Masons, undertook the vault of 
 the roof of the choir (St. George's Chapel) for ;^700 in 1506." (Dallaway, 
 St. George^ s Chapel, p. 169.) 
 
 2 Vitet, Notre Dame de Noyon, p. 123. Van Overstraeten {Arch, des Tem- 
 ples Chret.) attributes the origin of the Free Masons and the Pointed Gothic 
 to England. 
 
 » Hope's Essay, ii. 376. 
 
 4 It should be remarked that Street did not find in Spain any trace of liic 
 Free Masons in the Gothic architecture. — (Street's Gothic Architecture in 
 Spain.) Possibly this " lay church " (as Vitet calls them) found themselves out 
 of place in this bigoted country. Or possibly, Street has not correctly translated 
 the names of the Masons in the old contracts. 
 
 Le Due speaks of the work of the Free Masons and of the Pointed Gothio 
 M •• a protest against monastic power."
 
 INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON ART. 499 
 
 companions erected under divine teaching-, figuring some 
 great thing. I know not what, but conceive it may be 
 considered a figure of Christ and the Church. . . . And 
 the eight columns standing in the te^aple of God may 
 shadow forth the eight beatitudes. . . . But the round 
 form of the Church having no end, and encircling the 
 principle of life — that is, the divine sacraments — ma}- 
 fairly be taken to signify the Kingdom of Eternal Ma- 
 jesty, and the hope of Life everlasting, and the never- 
 failing rewards with which the just shall finally be 
 crowned."^ 
 
 So in the Church of Ely, the Lady-chapel was begun 
 by John of Wisbeach in 1321, " but he had not sufificient 
 means, but firmly trusted in the divine aid, and com- 
 mending himself and his work to God Almighty and 
 the Blessed Virgin, prayed earnestly and without in- 
 termission that He would assist him in all his need, 
 and God Almighty who according to His mercy, mak- 
 eth poor and maketh rich,^ abaseth and lifteth up, never 
 suffered him to abound or to be in want during his 
 whole work." 
 
 The histories of the Cathedrals show a like spirit 
 of piety and devotion in their construction. It is not 
 to be supposed of course that every mason and work- 
 man and architect engaged in these structures was 
 equally animated with this religious fervor; but the 
 prevailing tone, the inspiration at the basis was relig- 
 ious, and this affected all employed and influenced the 
 whole work. 
 
 These then are the side-gifts of Christianity to the 
 modern world; the ideal of the Madonna as the beatified 
 woman, and the conceptirn of the Pointed Gothic Ca- 
 
 » Vita Eigilis. 2 Hist. Eli, Wharton, i. 651.
 
 500 GESTA CHRISTI. 
 
 thedral as the temple of worship and aspiratioi and sa- 
 cred thought. They are not to be ranked with the great 
 achievements of this Faith chronicled in this volume, 
 but they have had their share in the advancing culture 
 of the leading races of mankind, and are destined not to 
 be forgotten.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 ANCIENT HUNGARIAN LEGISL4TI0N. 
 
 The ancient laws of St Stephen, King of Hungary, who reigned 
 about looo a.d., bear out all that has been said of the humane 
 progress urged by Christianity in other ancient codes of Europe. 
 
 Manumission of slaves is encouraged, and if made by will, no 
 one is allowed to break it ; and if only promised by a master, his 
 widow must carry out the purpose of her husband /r^ redemptione 
 aiiimce, for the salvation of her soul (ii, 17). No free man is 
 permitted under any pretext to be enslaved (11, 20). 
 
 Piety and compassion and the Christian virtues are urged by 
 the king, as if he were a pastor rather than a ruler, especially on 
 the ground that " the Lord of virtues is the King of kings " (Nam 
 Dominus virtutum ipse est Rex Regum, ii-io). 
 
 The religious prmciple of equality is seen in the law that the 
 property of a peasant should be divided equally among sons and 
 daughters (iii, 29), and respect for woman in the entire power 
 given to the widow over her property (11, 24). 
 
 The barbaric element, not yet modified by religion, is found in 
 these laws, in the compensation affixed to the murder of a wife. 
 The nobleman escapes with the payment of fifty bullocks and a 
 penance of fasting ; the soldier with ten bullocks and a fast, and 
 the ignoble with five bullocks and a like penance (11, 14). 
 
 This legislation is so soon after the introduction of Chris- 
 tianity, that the idea of the dower has a barbaric tinge, as a 
 compensation to the wife for what she has endured in marriage. 
 Dotem dicimus, quae uxori propter ejus deflorationem, et con- 
 cubitum, de bonis mariti datur (i, 90).
 
 502 APPENDIX. 
 
 The dower had not yet received its new character under reli- 
 gion. It was only the coarse Morgengabe. 
 
 (See Corpus Jicris Hungari(z Budae, 1779. Saridi Steph. Reg. 
 Dec. about 1000 a.d.) 
 
 The remarkably free position of woman in Hungarian history, 
 and her legal independence now, is no doubt due to these early 
 influences of the Christian Religion. It certainly did not come 
 from Roman Law or the Teutonic codes and customs. 
 
 (See also Die Ungar. Staaisburgerinn, etc. J. v. Fejes. Pest 
 i8ia).
 
 INDEX. 
 
 yEmilius, Paulus, referred to, 25. 
 
 /Ethclbirht, King, law againstfeuds, 
 214. 
 
 Aethelhert, law of, concerning mar- 
 riage and wives, 122. 
 
 Affection, the modern link between 
 parent and child, 14, 15 
 
 Agnosticism, woman under, 298, 
 299. 
 
 Agobard, St., quoted, 119. 
 
 Aim, the author's, in this work, 2-5. 
 
 Alabama, case of the, 351 ; arbi- 
 tration on, 353, 354. 
 
 Alemanns, lav,"s of, concerning 
 marriage, i-z. 
 
 Alfred, King, law concerning 
 strangers, 1 93 ; moral laws of, 
 209, 2io; concerning feuds, 
 215 ; extract from the will of, 
 concerning slaves, 244 ; slaves 
 under, 247, 
 
 Algiers, woman in, 460. 
 
 Alms-giving, the root of excessive, 
 104. 
 
 America, appeal for murder in, 172, 
 173 ; the stranger in, 195, 196 ; 
 legislation respecting woman in, 
 291 ; law of divorce in, 307, 308 ; 
 and privateering, 337-339; in- 
 structions for regulating war, 
 343 ; oj)ponents to slavery, 371- 
 373} final struggle to ubolish 
 
 slavery, 384-386; duelling in, 
 396-398 ; reformatories in, 402 ; 
 educational charities in, 402, 403 ; 
 societies for the protection of 
 animals, 404 ; cruel punish- 
 ments in, 407, 408 ; imprison- 
 ment for debt, 409 ; intemper- 
 ance in, 434, 435, 436, 444. 
 
 Anniens, " Peace of God " at, 148. 
 
 Anecdote, refusing to fight, 89. 
 
 Anglo-Saxon, marriage laws of, 
 129, 130; law, nature of, 206, 
 207, 208. 
 
 Anglo-Saxons and the shipwrecked, 
 197, 198. 
 
 Animals, societies for the protection 
 of, 404. 
 
 Anti-Slaveiy Society, American, 
 founded, 382. 
 
 Appendix, 477, 478. 
 
 Apostles, their idea of marriage, 
 3',32. 
 
 Arabia, a proverb of, 459. 
 
 Arabs, early civilization of, 456 ; 
 influence of Mohammedanism 
 upon, 456, 457. 
 
 Aragon, the decree of a king of, 
 464, 465. 
 
 Arbitration, origin of, 85 ; history 
 of, in Germany, 155, 156 ; forms 
 of, 157; instances of, 158; the 
 result of Christianitv. 27 j ,
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Grotius on, 333 ; Christian and 
 
 possible, 346 ; instances of, 346- 
 
 354; will it become universal, 355. 
 Aristotle, suggestion of, to relieve 
 
 poverty, 99. 
 Arms, brotherhood of, 263, 264 ; 
 
 an old ballad on, 264. 
 Arms, use of, restricted in vi'ar, 345. 
 Armstrong, the case of the, 349. 
 Arthur, King, the Round Table of, 
 
 256 ; gentleness of, 262 ; Britain 
 
 under, 263. 
 Asceticism and celibacy, evil effects 
 
 of, 32, 33- 
 Associations, peace, 148. 
 Asylums for orphans in Europe, 
 
 82. 
 Augustine, St., quoted (note), 91. 
 Austria, instruments of torture used 
 
 in, 406. 
 Austrian Code, divorce under the, 
 
 305- 
 
 Authority, Roman parental, 9; modi- 
 fied by Stoics and Christian 
 emperors, 12. 
 
 Authors, immorality of classical, 
 
 38. 
 Authors, Latin, on the exposure of 
 
 children, 72-75. 
 Authors, Roman, on parental power, 
 
 10, II ; on divorce and woman's 
 
 degradation, 23-25. 
 Austrage, the, 154-159- 
 
 Ballad, an old, quoted, 255, 258 ; 
 
 on brotherhood in arms, 264. 
 Balle, John, preaching of, referred 
 
 to, 234. 
 Barbadoes, protest against sla- 
 very in, 374. 
 Barbarossa, Emperor, cruelty of, 
 7.26. 
 
 Barnes, Dr. A , on slavery, 381. 
 
 Battle, wager by, 1 61-163 ; pre- 
 valence of, 164 ; mode of pro- 
 cedure, 165-167 ; form of oaths, 
 165, 166 ; instances of, 167 
 opposed by the Church, 168 
 opposed by monarchs, 169, 170 
 opposed to the Christian spirit, 
 170; slow abolition of, 171 ; in 
 capital offences, 171, 172 ; 
 abolished by Christianity, 273, 
 
 274. 
 
 Bayard, precepts of the mother of, 
 255 ; noble words of, 258. 
 
 Benevolence and evolution, 473. 
 
 Bentham on duelling, 391, 392. 
 
 Bequests, ancient charitable, xoo. 
 
 Bernhardi on torture, 187, 188. 
 
 Bietigheim, demands of the peas- 
 ants of, 234. 
 
 Blackstone, on woman under Com- 
 mon Law, 288, 289. 
 
 Blood-money, 138. 
 
 Blood-revenge, taught by Confucius, 
 
 454- 
 Bluntschli, Prof., on private marine 
 property, 339 ; new war code of, 
 
 342, 343. 
 
 Book, the democratic, 430. 
 
 Boston Herald quoted, 292, 293. 
 
 Bourges, Archbishop of, charter of 
 peace, 150. 
 
 Brahmanic faith, corruption of, 447. 
 
 Bristol, the slave market of, 242. 
 
 Britain, condition under King 
 Arthur, 263. 
 
 Britain, Great, and Brazil, arbitra- 
 tion between, 350. 
 
 British colonies, slavery in, 376 ; 
 abolition of, 377, 
 
 British slave trade, commencement 
 of, 368, 369 ; reasons for encou-
 
 INDEX. 
 
 505 
 
 raging it in the colonies, 370 ; 
 opponents to, 373, 374 ; Parlia- 
 ment petitioned to abolish, 374 ; 
 Clarkson on, 374 ; the long 
 struggle against and abolition of, 
 
 375- 
 Brotherhood, Christian, 245. 
 Bruce, King, and the poor woman, 
 
 260, 261. 
 Brussels, International Conference 
 
 at, 359- 
 Buddhism, influence of, on woman's 
 position, 36; teachings of, 451 ; 
 defects of, 452 ; in China, 453 ; 
 in Japan, 456. 
 
 Cabet on Christianity, 419. 
 Caesar referred to, 61. 
 Canute, King, laws of, 212, 213. 
 Capitularies, Charlemagne's, 302- 
 
 305- 
 Cargoes, first African slave, 366, 367. 
 Caste, Hindoo, 448. 
 Cato, Porcius, stricture on woman, 
 
 24 ; on slavery, 47, 48. 
 Cavalai, Hugh de, and his fellow- 
 knight, 263, 264. 
 Celibacy, evil effects of, 32, 33. 
 Centurion, the Christian, 89. 
 Challenge, form of, in the middle 
 
 ages, 142 ; instances of, 143. 
 Chalons, council of, and schools, 
 
 219; decree concerning slaves, 
 
 228, 229. 
 Character, Paul's ideal, for man, 
 
 103 ; ideal of chivalric, 265-268 ; 
 
 type of, moulded by Christ, 466. 
 Charities, educational, in the 
 
 United States, 402, 403. 
 Charity, 96 ; and the ancient 
 
 world, 97; modern, the result of 
 
 Christ's teaching, loi; Roman 
 
 emperors advocate, 102 ; effects 
 of, 103 ; an institution of Chris- 
 tianity, 279, 280. 
 
 Charlemagne, injunction concern 
 ing widows, 131 ; laws concern- 
 ing strangers, 192, 193 ; capitu- 
 laries, 202-205 ; and schools, 220 ; 
 letter to the abbot of Fulda, 220, 
 221. 
 
 Charles V. and the African slave 
 trade, 367. 
 
 Chastity, Justinian on, 35 ; German, 
 and Roman impurity, 1 18, 119. 
 
 Chaucer, description of a knight 
 by, 258. 
 
 Child, position of, under Chris- 
 tianity, 218, 219. 
 
 Childhood, safeguards for, 317, 318. 
 
 Children, Roman, exposure of, 72 ; 
 Latin authors on, 72-75 ; Stoics 
 protest against, 75 ; early Fathers 
 protest against, 76, 'J^ ; laws 
 against, 77-80. 
 
 Children, sale of, in Europe, 81, 82 ; 
 rewards for the increase of, 99. 
 
 Children, charities for, 402, 403. 
 
 Childrens' Aid Society, New 
 York, 318. 
 
 Chili and the United States, arbi- 
 tration between, 350. 
 
 China, Buddhism in, 453 ; Con- 
 fucianism in, 453 ; position of 
 woman in, 454, 455. 
 
 Chivalry, character of, 253 ; oaths 
 of, 254, 255 ; woman and, 257 ; 
 pity for an enemy taught by, 
 258 ; courtesy, 259 ; humanity 
 of, 260 ; the prisoner of, 261 ; 
 gentleness an attribute of, 262 ; 
 and hospitality, 262 ; ideals of, 
 263 ; brotherhood in arms, 263 ; 
 devotion to ladies, 264 ; the ideal
 
 5o6 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 of character, 267 ; survival of the 
 Christian element in, 268, 269. 
 
 Christ, a new moral force, i ; and 
 personal purity, 29 ; and mar- 
 riage, 30, 300 ; silence on slavery, 
 42, 43 ; principles of His teach- 
 ing, 43, 44 ; opposed to war, 88 ; 
 upon property, 93 ; communism 
 of, 94, 95 ; modern charity and, 
 loi ; and the conquest of the 
 Roman world, 106 ; teaching 
 opposed to torture, 109 ; silent 
 victories of, 270, 271. 
 
 Christian II. of Denmark, and 
 serfdom, 240. 
 
 Christianity, influence on Roman 
 parental power, 12-14 ; on the 
 law of succession, 16-18 ; in- 
 fluence on Roman marriage, 21- 
 23, 28, 33, 34 ; position of woman 
 under, 35 ; and slavery, 45 ; 
 versus the Church, 46 ; and 
 rehabilitation of labour, 69 ; and 
 children, 83 ; a barbarous race 
 without, 112, 113; a blessing to 
 the Germans, 119, 120; and 
 divorce, 128 ; and feuds, 141 ; 
 and mental progress, 217, 218 ; 
 position of the child under, 218, 
 219 ; charity an institution of, 
 279, 280 ; and duelling, 292 ; 
 basis of political economy, 421 ; 
 a grand restraint, 461 ; liberty 
 and, 466, 467 ; slow influence of, 
 
 468, 469 J what has retarded, 
 
 469, 470 ; evolution and, 470 ; 
 the race to be made by, 474. 
 
 Christians, opposition to gladia- 
 torial shows by, 62, 63 ; humane 
 laws concerning, 84. 
 
 Church, character of the, seen, 2 ; 
 0e true and invisible, 3 ; slaves 
 
 in the, 45 ; versus Christianityi 
 46 ; slavery and the, 53, 60 ; 
 forbids the mutilation of slaves, 
 67 ; slaves ransomed by the, 68 ; 
 care of foundlings by, 81, 82 ; 
 inefficiency of a State, 112 ; and 
 feuds, 140 ; superstition encou- 
 raged by, 160, 161 ; wager by 
 battle opposed by, 168, 169; 
 opposes the ordeal, 174 ; op- 
 poses torture, 185, 186; services 
 to intellectual progress, 218 ; and 
 chivalry, 256 ; and concubinage, 
 313 ; and the African slave trade, 
 365, 366 ; opposes duelling, 393. 
 
 Church and State, effects of the 
 union of, 51, 52. 
 
 Churches, enriched by charity, loi, 
 102 ; the blessings of Christian, 
 427, 428. 
 
 Cicero, and Roman parental power, 
 1 1 ; and woman, 20 ; on divorce, 
 23 ; wives of, 25. 
 
 Citizen, Grotius on the, 332 ; dur- 
 ing war, 341, 342. 
 
 Civilization, woman a factor in, 36 ; 
 moral courage and, 464. 
 
 Clarkson on the slave trade, 374. 
 
 Classic nations and international 
 law, 323, 324. 
 
 Clay, Henry, on duelling, 397. 
 
 Clergy, ordeal approved by some 
 of the, 175 ; English, opposition 
 to slavery, 373. 
 
 Climate versus religion, 461. 
 
 Clubs, Roman, 100. 
 
 Code, Justinian, Roman parental 
 power under, 13, 14 ; and laws of 
 succession, 16-18 ; and marriage, 
 22. 
 
 Code, the Napoleon, referred t(% 
 134-
 
 INDEX, 
 
 507 
 
 Code, the Theodosian, referred to, 
 12, 39. 
 
 Codes, New, for regulating war, 
 
 342 ; probable international, 357. 
 Co-emption, the marriage called, 
 
 20, 21. 
 Coleman, Elihu, on slavery, 372. 
 Collegia, the Roman, 100. 
 Coloni, the, 70, 224, 225 ; in the 
 
 Middle Ages, 236. 
 Colonies, and slavery, the, 370 ; the 
 
 British, 376 ; abolition of slavery 
 
 in, 377- 
 
 Communism, Christ's, 94, 95 ; and 
 Christianity, 414, 416. 
 
 Communities, mercantile shipping, 
 198. 
 
 Comnenus referred to, 59. 
 
 Concubinage, law relating to 
 Roman, 28 ; and the Church, 
 313 ; influence of Christian 
 teaching on, 313, 314. 
 
 Conference, International, at 
 Brussels, 359. 
 
 Confarreation, form of marriage, 
 20, 21. 
 
 Confession under torture, 179. 
 
 Confucianism, teaching of, 453, 454. 
 
 Congress of Paris, 1856, referred to, 
 338, 346, 348. 
 
 Connecticut, laws of divorce in, 308. 
 
 Conrad, Emperor, referred to, 237. 
 
 Constantine, Emperor, and Roman 
 parental power 13 ; and the 
 laws of succession, 16 ; union 
 of Church and State under, 
 51, 52 ; slavery laws under, 
 52-54 ; quoted, 63 ; and the 
 protection of children by, 78 ; 
 review of the humane legisla- 
 tion of, 84, 85. 
 
 Convert, the, and the gladiato- 
 rial show, 62, 63. 
 
 Co-operation, the advantages o^ 
 
 413, 4x4- 
 
 Council of Limoges, ordinance ol 
 peace of, 149. 
 
 Councils, and the exposure of chil- 
 dren, 79 ; efforts to establish 
 peace, 148-150 ; and schools, 
 219, 220 ; and slavery, 249. 
 
 Courage, and future Christian 
 character, 463. 
 
 Courtesy, chivalry and, 259-261. 
 
 Courts, formation of arbitration, 
 357 ; objections to, 360. 
 
 Crime, fines inflicted for, 139; 
 the result of drink, 434, 435. 
 
 Crusades, the effects of, on man- 
 umission, 237. 
 
 Dana referred to, 340. 
 Daughters, the Roman's power 
 
 over his, 10, 11. 
 Days, sacred, and feuds, 139. 
 Death, the penalty of, 404, 405. 
 Debt, imprisonment for, 408-410. 
 December, the month of offerings, 
 
 102. 
 Democracy, what leads to, 430. 
 Denmark, serfdom in, 240. 
 Depravity, Roman, in the first 
 
 Christian century, 24, 25 ; and 
 
 legislation, 26. 
 Devices, religious, of revolted 
 
 peasants, 233. 
 Divisions, objects of, in this work, 
 
 3-5- 
 Divorce, Roman freedom of, 23 ; 
 authors on, 23, 24 ; instances of 
 Roman, 25 ; three conditions of, 
 26 ; under the Justinian code, 
 27; Scandinavian, 124, 125; 
 Christianity opposed to, 128 ; 
 Christian view of, 301 j and
 
 5o8 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Roman law, 302, 303 ; Church 
 view of the Middle Ages, 303 ; 
 Protestant reformers in favour of, 
 304 ; modern tendency in favour 
 of freer, 304, 305 ; in the United 
 States, 307, 308 ; result and dan- 
 ger of license in, 308, 309 ; evils 
 of freedom of, 310, 311. 
 
 Dooms, King Ethelred's, 211, 212. 
 
 Dos, Roman laws relating to, 129. 
 
 Dower, the modern, in marriage, 
 129. 
 
 Drink, statistics of, 434, 435. 
 
 Droit d'Aubame, the, 193-19S ; 
 abolition of, 195. 
 
 Du Quesclin, dying words of, 258. 
 
 Duel, the judicial, 165 ; of honour, 
 
 393> 394- 
 Duelling, Bentham's views of, 391, 
 
 392 ; Christian views of, 392 ; 
 
 the Church opposed to, 393 ; in 
 
 France, 394 ; in England, 396 ; 
 
 in the United States, 396-398. 
 Duels, Grotius on, 332. 
 
 Economical ideas, progress in, 423. 
 
 Edmund, King, law of, against 
 feuds, 214. 
 
 Education, a better form of charity, 
 105 ; the councils and, 220 ; pro- 
 moted by Christianity, 277; the 
 popular fruits of Christianity, 
 426. 
 
 Edward III. and his French pri- 
 soners, 259. 
 
 Edward IV., letter on trade by, 422. 
 
 Edward the Confessor, law against 
 false swearing, 211; and Chris- 
 tian brotherhood, 245. 
 
 Eldon, Lord, on slavery, 366. 
 
 Ehot, John, petition of, against 
 slavery, 371, 372. 
 
 Elsass, demands of the peasants of^ 
 
 234- 
 
 Emancipation, the religious duty 
 of, 53 ; progress of legal, 54, 55 ; 
 the religious element in, 229, 231 ; 
 forms of, 230, 231 ; gradual pro- 
 cess of, 236-238. 
 
 Emancipation of slaves in England, 
 245, 246 ; forms of, 248 ; motives 
 for, 251, 252. 
 
 Empire, Roman, condition of, in the 
 first century of Christianity, 44. 
 
 Emperors, Christian, and Roman 
 parental authority, 12. 
 
 Emperors, Roman, and unnatural 
 vices, 40 ; charity advocated by, 
 102. 
 
 Endowment, commencement of 
 ecclesiastical, 102. 
 
 Enemy, the knight taught pity for 
 his, 258. 
 
 England, wager by battle in, 165- 
 167 ; the ordeal forbidden in, 
 175; torture in, 184;- laws 
 against strangers in, 191 ; slavery 
 in, 241,252; forms of manumis- 
 sion in, 248 ; serfdom in, 250, 
 252 ; laws of divorce in, 305 ; 
 efforts against the slave trade in, 
 375 ; cruel punishments in, 407 ; 
 intemperance in, 434, 435. 
 
 England, duelling in, 394 ; petition 
 to the Lords against, 395 ; Anti- 
 duelling Association formed, 
 396 ; the Queen's order against, 
 396. 
 
 English law concerning woman, 
 134-136 ; statesmen on the ap- 
 peal for murder, 172 ; laws of, 
 kings, 208-216; peasants' up- 
 risings, 235; and Scotch courtesy, 
 261.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 509 
 
 Epigram, Juvenal's, 23, 24. 
 
 Equality, Christianity teaches the 
 principles of, 296. 
 
 Erixon, the Roman knight, referred 
 to, 10. 
 
 "Essay on Divorce," Woolsey's, 
 quoted, 303. 
 
 Ethelred, the dooms of, 211, 212. 
 
 Europe, sale of children in, 81, 82 ; 
 important work of woman in, 
 297, 298 ; modern, and divorce, 
 304, 305 ; cost of the peace 
 establishments of, 321 ; abolition 
 of serfdom in, 388, 389 ; persecu- 
 tion in, 442, 444. 
 
 European prisons, great reforms in, 
 400, 401. 
 
 Evolution and Christianity, 470 ; 
 and benevolence, 473. 
 
 Faiths lacking Christianity, 462. 
 
 Family, the ancient Roman, 15. 
 
 Fathers, early, and personal purity, 
 30; and the exposure of children, 
 ■76, 77 ; oppositions to war by, 
 89-91. 
 
 Fathers, Roman, power over their 
 children, 9-1 1 ; power modified 
 by the Stoics, 12 ; influence of 
 Christianity on, 12 ; Constantine 
 and, 13. 
 
 Feuds, nature of personal, 137 ; and 
 fines, 138 ; places and days sacred 
 from, 139 ; decree against, 140; 
 efforts of the Church against, 
 140; Saxon laws against, 213; 
 and the "Peace of God," 214; 
 King Alfred's laws concerning, 
 
 215- 
 
 Fines, institution of, for injuries, 
 
 138 ; scale of, 139. 
 Fiske, Mr., quoted, 473. 
 
 Force, Jesus a new moral, i. 
 
 Forces, non-Christian, and menta! 
 stimulus, 217. 
 
 Foundlings, care of, by the Church, 
 81, 82. 
 
 Foulque, the knight, 257. 
 
 France, tutelage abolished in, 132 ; 
 rules of private war in, 143 ; in 
 the nth century, 144 ; torture in, 
 182, 183 ; the stranger in, 193- 
 195 ; slavery in, 238 ; divorce 
 in, 305 ; freedom of royal serfs 
 in, 389 ; duelling in, 394. 
 
 Franco-Prussian war, proclamation 
 during, 342. 
 
 Franklin, B., efforts to abolish 
 privateering, 337. 
 
 Free marriage, the Roman, 21 ; in 
 the Middle Ages, 127. 
 
 Free trade, 422-424. 
 
 Freedom, religious ideas of, 335, 
 
 336. 
 Froissart quoted, 259, 261, 264. 
 Fulda, abbot of, Charlemagne's 
 
 letter to, 220, 221. 
 Future under Christianity, the, 474, 
 
 475- 
 
 Gains on the reason for the tutf- 
 lage of woman, 20. 
 
 Games, gladiatorial, Roman, 61, 62. 
 
 Garrison on the duty of emancipa- 
 tion, 382. 
 
 Geneva arbitration, the, 353, 354. 
 
 Gentleness a knightly attribute, 
 262. 
 
 German code, torture under the, 
 181, 182. 
 
 Germans, character of the, iii ; 
 absence of chivalry among, 266. 
 
 Germans, marriage of the anc ienL 
 125-127.
 
 §io 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Germany, *' Peace of God " in, 153, 
 
 154; arbitration in, 155-159; 
 
 peasant revolts in, 233, 234 ; 
 
 Christian influence against 
 
 slavery in, 239. 
 Gesta Christi, the real, 3. 
 Gesta Dei, the, 476. 
 Giving, the dutyof, taught by Christ, 
 
 96. 
 Gladiatorial games, Roman, 61 ; 
 
 instances of, 61, 62 ; Christian 
 
 opposition to, 62, 63 ; laws 
 
 against, 63. 
 Glanville on laws concerning 
 
 woman, 134, 135 ; quoted, 166. 
 God, societies of lovers of, 427, 
 
 428. 
 Good faith, Grotius on, 331, 
 Gordon, Dr., on slavery, 373. 
 Gortschakoff, Prince, quoted, 359, 
 
 360. 
 fiovernment, Christianity and 
 
 Liberal, 429. 
 Greeks and international law, the, 
 
 321. 
 Green, "History of England" by, 
 
 quoted, 167. 
 Grotius on international law, 329- 
 
 332 ; on arbitration, 333 ; on 
 
 persecution, 443, 444. 
 Guelders, Duke of, and his pledge, 
 
 260. 
 Guilds, origin of Italian, 147. 
 
 Habits, reform of, a check to in- 
 temperance, 439. 
 
 Hautefeuille on privateering, 338. 
 
 Hawkins, Sir J., first slave voyage 
 of, 366. 
 
 Henry, Prince of Portugal, and 
 slavery, 367. 
 
 Hindoo law, woman utidcr. jj ; 
 
 position of wcman, 448-430. 
 Hindoos, religious ideas among, 
 
 446, 447 ; indifference to suffer- 
 ing by the (note), 447. 
 Hindoo caste, 44S. 
 History, influence of unknown live? 
 
 on, 2, 3 ; God ever working in 
 
 human, 445, 446 
 Honour, the duel of, 393, 394. 
 Hope, implantation of, in man, 428. 
 Hospitality, knighthood and, 262. 
 Hospitals, the first, 102, 103. 
 Howard, John, 400. 
 Howell the Good, laws of, 209. 
 Humanity, the watchword of, 196 ; 
 
 increase of, between nations, 
 
 424. 
 Hungarian law, and the stranger, 
 
 193 ; ancient legislation, 477, 
 
 478. 
 Husband, the Roman, 20 ; power 
 
 of the German, 117, 118, 125, 
 
 126. 
 
 Iceland, " Peace of God" in, 159. 
 Ideas, lives inspired by moral, 428, 
 
 429. 
 Ideas, progress in economical, 423. 
 Ideal, the Christian, 464; objections 
 
 to, 464, 465. 
 Illinois, struggle to prevent slavery 
 
 in (note), 383. 
 India, reasons for want of progress 
 
 in, 448 ; position of woman in, 
 
 448, 450. 
 Indiana, laws of divorce in, 308. 
 Individual, legal reform and the 
 
 rights of the, 35. 
 Industry, Christ teaches, 95. 
 Ine, King, law against feuds, 2 1 4. 
 Infidels, wars against, 329.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 5" 
 
 Inqiisition, torture by the, 1 80. 
 
 Institutions, ancient charitable, loi, 
 102. 
 
 Insurance societies, ancient, 99 \ 
 modern, 416, 417. 
 
 Intellect. Christianity stimulates 
 the, 222, 223. 
 
 Intemperance, causes of, 433, 438 ; 
 fearful et^ects, 434 ; statistics of, 
 434) 435 ; American laws against, 
 436 ; best safeguard against, 437, 
 
 438. 
 
 International codes, probable form- 
 ation of, 357 ; objections to, 360. 
 
 International law, 320; early writers 
 on, 328, 329 ; progress in modern, 
 
 Islam, what is wanting in, 460. 
 Italy, absence of chivalry in, 266. 
 
 Jamaica, ininortation of slaves to, 
 
 369. 370. 
 Japan, failure of Buddhism in, 456. 
 Jesus, a new moral force, i. 
 Jews, persecution of the, 442. 
 Jubilee, the seven years, in England, 
 
 248. 
 Judges, King Canute's advice to, 
 
 213. 
 "Judgments of the Sea" quoted, 
 
 199. 
 Judicial duel, the, 165. 
 Julian law referred to, 22, 23. 
 Jurisprudence, Roman, influence of 
 
 the Stoics on, 46. 
 Jus Geniium, the Roman, 322, 
 
 3-4- 
 Justinian code, parenta* power 
 under, 13, 14 ; and succession, 
 16-18 ; and marriage, 21 s)n un- 
 natuial vices, 39; concerning 
 slavery, 55-58 ; and the protec- 
 
 tion of voman, 66, 67 ; and the 
 protection of children, 79, 80. 
 
 Justinian, houses of mercy founded 
 by, 80, 81. 
 
 Juvenal, an epigram by, 22, 23. 
 
 Keltic races, character of the, in. 
 Kempis, Thomas k, on copying 
 
 manuscripts, 221, 222. 
 King, the, the protector of widows, 
 
 i3i- 
 
 " King's Quarantine," the, 151. 
 
 Kings, laws of old English, 20S-2 16. 
 
 Knight, description of a young. 257; 
 described by Chaucer, 258 ; gen- 
 tleness an attribute of the, 262 ; 
 in courts of justice, 264. 
 
 Knighthood, the initiation into, 253- 
 256 ; duties of, 256 ; the ideal 
 of, 256 ; the Church and, 256 ; 
 and hospitality, 262. 
 
 Knights, honourable conduct of, 
 260 ; parting of two, 263, 264 ; 
 advice of Louis IX. to his, 266. 
 
 Koran, the conception of God in 
 the, 460 ; quoted (note), 260. 
 
 Labour, the rehabilitation of, 69. 
 
 Labourer, blessing of the Sabbath 
 to the, 410, 412 ; effects on in- 
 temperance on, 434. 
 
 Ladies, devotion to the crown of 
 chivalry, 264. 
 
 Law, Anglo-Saxon, 206 ; nature 
 of, 207, 208. 
 
 Law, English, concerning womait, 
 i34-'36. 
 
 Law, Grandeur of the Roman, 160, 
 161. 
 
 I aw. International, 320 ; early wri- 
 tes on, 328, 329 ; progress in 
 mo^rn, 335-361.
 
 SI2 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Law, Julian, referred to, 22, 23. 
 
 Law, maritime, England opposed 
 to progress in, 338. 
 
 Law, wager of, 163. 
 
 Law, Welsh, on buying a wife, 123. 
 
 Law, woman under English com- 
 mon, 286-290. 
 
 Laws influenced by Christianity, 
 276,277. 
 
 Laws of nations, Grotius on the, 
 
 329-334- 
 
 Laws of old English kings, 208-216. 
 
 Laws, religious, 211, 212. 
 
 Laws, Roman, for the amelioration 
 of slaves, 50, 51 ; Constantine's, 
 52-54; Justinian's, 55-58; Leo's, 
 58 ; for the protection of actresses, 
 66, 67 ; against exposing children, 
 77-80. 
 
 Legge's " Confucius" quoted, 455. 
 
 Legislation, American, respecting, 
 woman, 291-296. 
 
 Legislation, Charlemagne's, imbued 
 with Christianity, 202-205. 
 
 Legislation, Constantine's humane, 
 84, 85. 
 
 Legislation, European, for the ship- 
 wrecked, 200. 
 
 Legislation, Hungarian, ancient, 
 
 477, 478. 
 
 Legislation in advance of morahty, 
 206. 
 
 Leicester, wager of battle at, 167. 
 
 Leo, Emperor, slave laws of, 58 ; 
 on the observance of Sunday,86. 
 
 Lex Pompeia de Parric, 11. 
 
 Liberal Government and Chris- 
 tianity, 466, 467. 
 
 Liberty, a Stoic's apothegm on, 
 48, 49 ; Justinian's laws concern- 
 irio' 55) 1)6 ; Christianity and^ 
 466, 467. 
 
 Life, influence of woman in social 
 
 298. 
 
 Limoges, council of, and peace, 
 149. 
 
 Lives inspired b/ moral ideas, 428, 
 429. 
 
 Londo n, free trade for the men of, 
 420. 
 
 Louis, Saint, letter of, 152 ; instruc- 
 tion to his knights, 266. 
 
 Love, power of the religion of, 355. 
 
 Maine, Sir H., " Early History of 
 Institutions " quoted, 35. 
 
 Maiuma, the Roman show, 65. 
 
 Mankind, character of the progress 
 of, 9. 
 
 Manners, an instance of knightly, 
 260. 
 
 Manu, laws of, quoted, 448 ; on 
 woman, 449. 
 
 Manumission, forms of, 330, 331. 
 
 Manumission, forms of in England, 
 248. 
 
 Manuscripts, copying of ancienti 
 221, 222. 
 
 Marcian quoted, 12. 
 
 Mario quoted, 415. 
 
 Marriage, three forms of ancient 
 Roman, 20 ; influence of Chris- 
 tianity on, 21, 109, no ; Constan- 
 tine's legislation affecting, 26, 27 ; 
 Christ's ideas of, 30, 31 ; the 
 apostles' ideas of, 31, 32 ; Chris- 
 tianity and Roman, 33, 34 ; Jus- 
 tinian on, 34, 35 ; humane laws 
 concerning, 87, 88. 
 
 Marriage, ancient German, 1 19 ; 
 original form of the Teutonic, 
 121, 122; Scandinavian, 124; 
 under German customs, 125-127 ; 
 gradual elevation of, 129; Charle-
 
 INDEX. 
 
 513 
 
 lagne's laws affecting,, 204 ; puri- 
 fied by Christianity, 271, 272. 
 
 Marriage and morals, 300-303 ; 
 Christ's estimate of, 300 ; Chris- 
 tian doctrine of, 301, 302 ; 
 Chinch's idea of, 303 ; Ameri- 
 can ideas of, 305-307 ; how re- 
 garded in New York, 311, 312 ; 
 the model of, taught by Christ, 
 312 ; future legislation concern- 
 ing, 312; a Hindoo's feelings 
 about, 450. 
 
 Maximilian, the Christian soldier, 
 89. 
 
 Mayence, council of, and schools, 
 219. 
 
 Mediation, war to be prevented 
 by, 348 ; instances of, 348-350. 
 
 Mercantile communities and the 
 shipwrecked, 198. 
 
 Mercy, houses of, for foundlings, 
 80, 81. 
 
 Messenger, a Divine peace, 151. 
 
 Middle Ages, arbitration in, 154- 
 159 ; wager by battle in, 161-172; 
 the ordeal in, 174-177 ; and in- 
 ternational war, 324 ; barbarities 
 of the, 325. 
 
 Middle passage, horrors of, 364, 
 
 365- 
 Mill's "History of India "quoted, 
 
 447- 
 
 Minors, selling the home of, 87. 
 
 Missions, 426. 
 
 Mohammedanism, influence of, 
 456-458 ; effects of, 459 ; en- 
 courages kindness to the poor, 
 461. 
 
 Monarchs, English, and the slave 
 trade, 366-368. 
 
 Monarchs, opposition of, to wager 
 by battle, 169, 170. 
 
 Montesquieu, a saying of, 365. 
 Moore's "History of Slavery" 
 
 quoted, 371, 373. 
 Morality, Christ and personal, 30 ; 
 
 debasement of ancient, 38. 
 Morals, ultimate system of, 469. 
 Morgengabe, the, 119, 129. 
 Monastery, slaves entering a, 56. 
 Mother, position of the American. 
 
 293, 294. 
 Mother, the Roman, 19, 20 ; under 
 
 Justinian law, 22, 23. 
 Munster, Treaty of, referred to 
 
 327- 
 Murder, appeal to battle in, 171, 
 172 ; English statesmen on, 172 ; 
 an instance of, 173 ; abolition 
 
 of, 173- 
 Mussulmans of India (note), 457. 
 
 Napoleon III., Mexican vessels 
 restored by, 339, 340 
 
 Nations, modern relations between, 
 320 ; and mercantile private pro- 
 perty, 339, 340 ; international 
 law and non- Christian, 361, 362 ; 
 unity of, increased by freedom in 
 trade, 422, 423 ; humanity be- 
 tween, 424. 
 
 Neckar, the revolted peasants of, 
 
 234 
 
 New York, divorce in, 307 ; mar- 
 riage in, 311, 312. 
 
 New World, slaves introduced into 
 the, 364, 365. 
 
 NichoU, Sir J., quoted, 341. 
 
 Norman Conquest, slavery after 
 the, 249. 
 
 Norman, ideal of chivalry, the, 
 263. 
 
 Northern nations and intemper- 
 ance, 43.3, 434-
 
 514 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Novella, Justinian's, on marriage, 
 34. 
 
 Oath, the compurgator's, 163, 
 
 Oaths, form of, in wager by battle, 
 165. 166. 
 
 Oaths, knighthood, 254, 255. 
 
 Offerings, the month of, 102. 
 
 Oppressed, Roman laws favouring 
 the, 85. 
 
 Ordeal, the, 1 74 ; Church opposed 
 to, 174 ; gradual abolition of, 
 175-177; abolished by Chris- 
 tianity, 273, 274. 
 
 Origen quoted, 90, 91. 
 
 Orleans, synod of, and schools, 219, 
 
 Orphans, laws concerning, 85. 
 
 Otterburne, the Scots after, 259. 
 
 Ovid referred to, 73. 
 
 Palaye, St., on knighthood, 255, 257. 
 Paris, congress of, 1856, referred to, 
 
 338, 346, 348. 
 Parliament, English, petitioned 
 
 against slavery, 374. 
 Paternal authority, Roman, 9, 12. 
 Paul, St., on God working in man, 
 
 446. 
 Paul the Stoic, on woman, 25. 
 Pauperism and the Christian, 417, 
 
 418. 
 Pauperism, causes of Roman, 96 ; 
 
 imperial relief of, 98. 
 Paulus, JuHus, referred to, 75. 
 Peace establishments, cost of Euro- 
 pean, 321. 
 " Peace of God," nature of the, 
 
 145, 146 ; preaching the, 151, 
 
 152 ; restraining feuds. 214. 
 Peace, the pledge of, 147 ; efforts 
 
 to establish, 148, 149 ; versus 
 
 war, 333. 
 
 Peace, victories of, 346-354 ; fina* 
 step to universal, 357 ; vhe idea 
 of Christ, 361. 
 
 Peasants, condition of, in the Middle 
 Ages, 232 ; revolts and demands, 
 233, 234 ; revolt of the English, 
 
 235- 
 
 Penitentials, Theodosius, quoted, 
 241. 
 
 Perceforest on knightly hospitality, 
 262. 
 
 Period, Roman, resum^ of reforms 
 in, 106. 
 
 Perjury, Charlemagne's law con- 
 cerning, 303, 304. 
 
 Persecution, origin and cause, 441 ; 
 of the Jews, 442 ; opposed to 
 Christianity, 442 ; protests 
 against, 443, 444. 
 
 Person, love for a Divine, 38 ; 
 Christianity embodied in a, 106. 
 
 Peru and Japan, arbitration be- 
 tween, 350. 
 
 Pestilence, diminution of, 431,432. 
 
 Philosophers, the i8th century, 
 ,2,^7, 388. [397. 
 
 Pinckney, General, on duelling, 
 
 Piracy, 201. 
 
 Places sacred from feuds, 139. 
 
 Plato on unnatural vices, 37, 38. 
 
 " Pledge of Peace," the, 147. 
 
 Pliny referred to, 'J2>- 
 
 Poictiers, council of, and private 
 war, 148. 
 
 Political economy, Christianity the 
 basis of, 421. 
 
 Popes, efforts in the cause of peace, 
 150 ; and wager by battle, 168 ; 
 and the ordeal, 175 ; learning en- 
 couraged by, 222. 
 
 Poor, number of Roman, 98; evils 
 of free divorce among, 310;
 
 INDEX. 
 
 515 
 
 Christ the true friend of the, 
 4(8,419. 
 
 Portalis on the citizen during war, 
 341- 
 
 Poverty, relief of, by Christians, 68 ; 
 insurance against, 416, 417. 
 
 Powers, neutral, during war, 345, 
 346. 
 
 Pravada, character of the, 140. 
 
 Principles, Plato's three, 2>7 » ulti- 
 mate issue of Christ's, 45. 
 
 Prison, early reforms of, 86, 87. 
 
 Prison reforms the result of Chris- 
 tianity, 400, 401. 
 
 Prisons, old American, 401 ; 
 debtors', 409. 
 
 Prisoners, courtesy to, 259 ; chiv- 
 alry and, 261 ; treatment of, in the 
 Middle Ages, 325, 326 ; enslave- 
 ment of, 327 ; treatment by non- 
 Christian nations, 328 ; Grotius 
 on the enslaving of, 331, 332. 
 
 Privateering, Grotius on, 331, 335, 
 336 ; history of European, 336- 
 340 ; gradual abolition of, 341. 
 
 Problem to work, a, 2. 
 
 Property, Roman parents' power 
 over, 13, 14 ; Roman woman and, 
 19 ; in marriage, 20, 21 ; Christ 
 and the distribution of, 93 ; 
 industrial system of, 93, 94 ; 
 partnership in, 295, 296 ; pri- 
 vate marine, 334, 340 ; Christian 
 teaching respecting, 413, 414. 
 
 Prostitution, problem of, 315, 316 ; 
 safeguards against, 317-319. 
 
 Protestant Church and slavery, 
 the, 366. 
 
 Proudhon quoted, 414, 415. 
 
 Proverb, an old Roman, 25. 
 
 Prussia and United States, treaty 
 referred to, 337. 
 
 Prussian, code, divorce under, 305 ; 
 
 ordinance about serfdom, 388. 
 Purity, Christ and personal, 29 ; 
 
 and the early Fathers, 30 ; duty 
 
 of masculine, 317, 
 
 Quakers, opponents to the slave 
 trade, 371-374- 
 
 Race, degeneracy of the Roman, 
 1 10, 1 1 1 ; a new one needed, 1 1 1, 
 113 ; a barbarous, with Christi- 
 anity, 112, 113. 
 
 Races, treatment of inferior, 424- 
 426 ; power of highly developc^d, 
 
 471-473- 
 
 Rantzan, Count, and his serfs, 388. 
 
 Rebels, treatment of by United 
 States, 426. 
 
 Reform, early prison, 86, 87 ; com- 
 mencement of modern prison, 
 399 ; result of Christianity, 400, 
 401. 
 
 Reforms, basis of modern legal, 35. 
 
 Reforms, Justinian, 66. 
 
 Religion, safeguard against vice, 
 319 ; safeguard against intem- 
 perance, 437, 438, 440; and 
 science, 468. 
 
 Religious laws, 211, 213. 
 
 Renan quoted, 430. 
 
 Revelation, a continuity of Divine, 
 445, 446. 
 
 Revenge, law substituted for, 207 
 208 ; curbed by Christianity 
 272. 
 
 Rights, royal claims to wreckers' 
 199. 
 
 Rig- Veda referred to, 448. 
 
 Reprisals during war, 343. 
 
 Robertson, Chief Justice, on mat>i 
 riage, 306.
 
 I6 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Robinson, J., on persecution, 443. 
 " Romance of the Rose " quoted, 
 265. 
 
 Roman, parental authority, 9- 
 14 ; laws of succession, 15-18 ; 
 woman, 19 ; the forms of mar- 
 riage, 20 ; free marriage, 21 ; 
 divorce, 23 ; unnatural vices, 36- 
 40 ; slavery, 41, 47-50 \ gladia- 
 torial games, 61-63 ; human 
 sacrifices, 64 ; licentious shows, 
 64 ; serfdom, 70 ; exposure of 
 children, 72 ; law, 84, 160 ; pau- 
 perism, 96, 97 ; collegia, 100 ; 
 resum^ of reforms, 106; torture, 
 178. 
 
 Romans and international law, 
 332-334; persecution under,44i. 
 
 Rome, Church of, and the African 
 slave trade, 365, 366. 
 
 "Royal Truce," the, 151. 
 
 Rufus, King, cruelty of, 326. 
 
 Rush, Dr., on the slave trade, 372. 
 
 Russia, serfdom abolished in, 389. 
 
 Russian code, character of an old, 
 140. 
 
 Sachsenspiegel, the German code, 
 
 239- 
 Sakya-muni, legend of, 451 ; 
 
 defects in his teaching, 452. 
 Salvian quoted, 68. 
 Saxon kings, moral teaching of, 
 
 208 ; laws against feuds, 213. 
 Saxons, voluntary death of, 62. 
 Scandinavia, abolition of slavery in, 
 
 239- 
 Scandinavian woman, position of, 
 
 123, 124. 
 Sceptics and torture, 188. 
 Schools, early Christian, 219, 220, 
 
 23X 
 
 Schouler on marriage, 306. 
 
 Schwabia, dema nds of the pea- 
 sants of, 233, 234. 
 
 Science, Christians the leaders in, 
 218 ; and religion, 468. 
 
 Scotland, torture in, 185 ; serfdom 
 in, 252. 
 
 Sects, persecution among, 442. 
 
 Seigneur and his ward, the, 131, 
 132. 
 
 Seneca and Roman parental power, 
 ID, II; on divorce, 23 ; on 
 woman, 24 ; and the exposure 
 and mutilation of children, 73, 
 
 74- 
 Serfdom, Roman law concerning^ 
 
 70, 71 ; influence of Christianity 
 
 upon, 107, 225, 228, 229 ; Roman, 
 
 224. 
 Serfdom, modern, 387 ; influences 
 
 at work to abolish, 387, 388 ; 
 
 royal ordinances against, 388 ; 
 
 general abolition in Europe, 389, 
 
 390- 
 Serfdom in the Middle Ages, 228, 
 
 232, 238. 
 Serfs, English, 250, 252. 
 Shipwrecked, cruelty to, 197 ; and 
 
 mercantile communities, 198 ; 
 
 efforts on behalf of the, 199 ; 
 
 European legislation for, 200; 
 
 humanity to, 200. 
 Shoemaker, the torture of a poor, 
 
 188. 
 Shows, Roman, licentious, 62 ; laws 
 
 against, 65. 
 Sidney, Sir Phihp, and the 
 
 wounded soldier, referred to, 
 
 261. 
 Sigismund, Emperor, proclamation 
 
 of, 235. 
 Slave, the Roman, 41 ; legal status.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 517 
 
 50; moral and social condition, 
 50, 51 ; and judge, 69. 
 
 Slave-market, raising children for, 
 242. 
 
 Slave, punishment for killing a, 244. 
 
 Slavery, ancient and modern, 41 ; 
 Christ silent on, 42,43; influence 
 on the Roman empire, 42 ; and 
 Christianity, 45 ; Stoics and, 47 : 
 laws of Constantine on, 52-54 ; 
 laws of Justinian on, 55 58. 
 
 Slavery in the Middle Ages, 226, 
 238-24C ; gradual disappear- 
 ance of, 363. 
 
 Slavery in England, 241 ; eman- 
 cipation from, 245-248 ; after 
 the Norman Conquest, 249 ; 
 and the Church councils, 249. 
 
 Slavery, influence of Christianity 
 upon, 278, 279. 
 
 Slavery, in British colonies, 376 ; 
 in the United States, 377 ; soph- 
 isms regarding, 377-379 ; protest 
 of religious bodies to, 379, 380 ; 
 noble men opposed to, 381, 382 ; 
 final struggle against, in America, 
 
 384- 
 
 Slave trade, forbidden in England, 
 248, 249. 
 
 Slave trade, modern African, 364, 
 368 ; licenses granted for, 367 ; 
 religious opposition to, 371 ; 
 opponents in Great Britain, n^i '■> 
 struggles for and abolition of, 
 374-376. 
 
 Slaves, Roman, cruelty to, 47 ; 
 number of Roman, 49, 50 ; duty 
 of emancipating, 53 ; humanity 
 towards, 54 ; gradual emanci- 
 pation of, 58-60 ; mutilation of, 
 forbidden, 67 ; ransomed by the 
 Church, 6S. 
 
 Slaves, condition of, in the Middle 
 Ages, 226 ; freeing, 227 ; Acts in 
 favour of, 227 ; decree of the 
 council of Chalons, 228 ; forms 
 of emancipation, 230. 
 
 Slaves, number of, in England, 243 ; 
 protection and emancipation of 
 245-248 ; motives for emanci- 
 pation, 251. 
 
 Slaves, introduction of negro, into 
 Europe, 364 ; first cargoes, 367 y 
 number imported, 369, 370. 
 
 Sleeplessness enforced, 181. 
 
 Smith, Sir T., on English wives, 
 134 ; on appeal to battle, 171, 
 172 ; on torture, 185 ; "Common- 
 wealth of England " quoted, 251 ; 
 quoted, 327. 
 
 Socialism and Christianity, 414, 
 415. 
 
 Societies, ancient insurance, 99 ; 
 American temperance, 436. 
 
 Society, natural selection and, 473 ; 
 Christianity and a perfect, 475, 
 476. 
 
 Soldiers, anecdotes of Christian, 89 ; 
 early Christians not, 91. 
 
 Soul, Christ's object the renovation 
 of, 43 ; God's kingdom the human, 
 
 43, 44- 
 South Carolina, divorce in, 307, 
 
 309- 
 Southern States of America, slavery 
 
 in, 383- 
 
 Spain, and the ordeal, 176 ; torture 
 in, 183, 184 ; chivalry in, 266. 
 
 Spencer's '• Red Cross Knight" 
 quoted, 257. 
 
 St. Petersburgh, convention of, re- 
 ferred to, 245. 
 
 Stage, laws protecting women of 
 the, 66, 67.
 
 518 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Statesmen, English, on appeal for 
 murder, 172. 
 
 Stoics, influence of, on Roman juris- 
 prudence, 46 ; cruelty to slaves, 
 47, 48, 55 ; and the exposure of 
 children, 75. 
 
 Stoicism, superficial character of, 
 51 ; humane influence of, 106. 
 
 Story, Judge, on marriage, 306. 
 
 Stranger, how regarded by the 
 ancients, 190; humanity to, 191 ; 
 Teutonic laws concerning, 191 ; 
 Charlemagne and the, 192; 
 King Alfred and the, 1 93 ; Hun- 
 garian law, 193 ; in France, 
 193-195 ; in America, 195; 
 Saxon law concerning, 210; 
 and Christianity, 275, 276. 
 
 Strappado, the, 181. 
 
 Succession, character of Roman, 
 15; reforms under Christianity, 
 16-18. 
 
 Suffering, nulifference of the Hin- 
 doo to (note), 448. 
 
 SuflVage, woman and the, 296. 
 
 Sunday, first laws concerning, 85, 
 86; Saxon law concerning, 210; 
 blessings of, 410-412. 
 
 Superstition, encouragement of, by 
 the Church, 160, 161. 
 
 Supplementary Chapter on rela- 
 tions of Christianity to Art in 
 Middle Ages, 477. 
 
 Swearing, Saxon law against false, 
 211. 
 
 Symmachus, the Saxon slaves of, 62. 
 
 Syrian woman, 459. 
 
 System, property under the indus- 
 trial, 93, 94. 
 
 Tacitus, an incident of slavery from, 
 
 47 ; referred to, 61. 
 Tariff, continental exactions of, 420, 
 
 421. 
 
 Teaching, ultimate issue of Christ's, 
 
 45- 
 Temperance, spread of, 435 Ameri- 
 can societies, 436 ; in I ngland, 
 
 439- 
 
 Territory, rights over heathen, 334 ; 
 disputes as to, 351. 
 
 Teutonic tribes, woman in, 117; 
 marriage among, 121, 122. 
 
 Theodolfus on founding schools, 
 221. 
 
 Theodore, St., of Stude, and slavery, 
 42, 59- 
 
 Theodosian code referred to, 12. 
 
 Theodosius, "Penitentials " of, quo- 
 ted, 241. 
 
 Theodosius, Emperor, persecuting 
 laws of, 441. 
 
 Tomb, inscription on a, 100. 
 
 Total abstinence movement, 437. 
 
 Torture, use of, opposed by the 
 Church, 162, 185 ; under the Ro- 
 mans, 178 ; confession under, 179 ; 
 and the inquisition, 180, 187 ; 
 various forms of, 180 ; under the 
 German code, 181 ; in France, 
 182 ; in Spain, 183 ; in England, 
 184 ; in Scotland, 185 ; causes of 
 its spreading, 186 ; humanity op- 
 posed to, 187 ; sceptics and, 188; 
 abolition of, 188 ; latest incidents 
 of, 188, 189 ; abolished by Chris- 
 tianity, 274, 275 ; instruments of, 
 406. 
 
 Trajan, Emperor, gladiatorial show 
 of, 61 ; supporter of orphan chil- 
 dren, 99. 
 
 Trent, council of, referred to, 220. 
 
 "Truce of God," the, 152. 
 
 Turks, results of the conquests o^ 
 112, 113. 
 
 Tutelage, character of German, 120^
 
 INDEX. 
 
 S19 
 
 121 ; of woman, 130, 131 ; abol- 
 ished in France, 132. 
 Twiss' " Laws of Nations " quoted, 
 341- 
 
 United States, and privateering, 
 337-339 ; slavery in, 377-386 ; 
 duelling in, 396 - 39S ; refor- 
 matories in, 402 - 404 ; cruel 
 punishments in, 407, 408 ; prisons, 
 409 ; intemperance in, 434, 436 ; 
 persecution, 444. 
 
 Usus, the marriage called, 20, 21. 
 
 Utrecht, treaty of, referred to, 368, 
 369- 
 
 Vaison, council of, on education, 
 219. 
 
 Valentinian and Roman laws of 
 succession, 16 ; laws for protect- 
 ing children, 79. 
 
 Valois, count of, serfs freed by, 238. 
 
 Velabrum, children exposed in the, 
 
 74. 
 Vessels, disputes concerning, 348- 
 
 351- 
 
 Vice, depth of Roman, 24 ; safe- 
 guards against, 317-319. 
 
 Vices, unnatural, 36 ; Plato on, ■^■], 
 
 38 ; influence of Christianity on, 
 
 39 ; the emperors and, 40. 
 Victims, gladiatorial, 61, 62. 
 Villeins, EngHsh, 250. 
 Visigoths and the shipwrecked, 197. 
 
 Wager by battle, 161-163 ; preva- 
 lence of, 164 ; mode of, 165-167 ; 
 forms of oaths, 165, 166; instances 
 of, 167 ; Church opposes, 168 ; 
 opposed by monarchs, 169, 170 ; 
 slow abolition of, 171 ; in capital 
 offences, 171, 172. 
 
 Wallon on slavery, 41, 42. 
 
 War, Christ's opposition to, 88 ; the 
 early Fathers and, 89, 90. 
 
 War, the citizen during, 341. 342 ; 
 new codes of, 342 ; an abuse of, 
 343 ; reasons for restricting, 344; 
 use of arms restricted in, 345 ; 
 the great evil of history, 355. 
 
 War, private, 142 ; in France, 143 ; 
 effects of, 144, 145 ; efforts to 
 check, 147; curbed by Christianity, 
 272, 273. 
 
 Wars, peasant, 282 ; cost of modern, 
 320, 321 
 
 Wealth, distribution of, 104, 105 ; 
 teaching of Jesus concerning, 
 465, 466. 
 
 Welsh, law respecting the, 215. 
 
 West Gothic laws respecting serfs, 
 228. 
 
 West Indies, slavery in, 376, 377. 
 
 Whipping, the punisliment of, 408. 
 
 Whittier, J. G., on slavery, 371. 
 
 Widow, the protection of the, 131. 
 
 Widows, laws concerning, 85. 
 
 Wife, the Roman, 20-23 ; the Ger- 
 man, 1 18-127; under English 
 common law, 286, 290 ; the Ameri- 
 can, 291, 293. 
 
 Wives, reasons for repudiating, 25 ; 
 German's power to sell, 122. 
 
 Wihtraed, King, laws of, 208, 210. 
 
 Wilson's " History of the Slave 
 Power" quoted, 371, 372. 
 
 Witchcraft, torture employed in, 
 181. 
 
 Witches, cruel treatment of, 176. 
 
 Wladimir and the bishops, 140, 141. 
 
 Woman under the Roman law, 19 ; 
 as a mother, 19, 20 ; and divorce, 
 23 ; degraded condition of, 24 ; 
 depravity of, 24, 25 ; Stoic Paul's 
 view of. 34.
 
 520 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Woman, under Christianity, 35, 36 ; 
 under the Hindoo law, 35 ; influ- 
 ence of Buddhism on the position 
 of, 36 ; laws to protect Christian, 
 65, 66 ; position influenced by 
 Christianity, 107-109 ; 271, 272. 
 
 Woman, in Teutonic tribes, 117, 
 127; purity of, 118; tutelage of 
 120, 121, 130, 131 ; Scandinavian, 
 123. 
 
 Woman, condition of, improved by 
 Christianity, 133, 136 ; English 
 law and, 134-136 ; legal emanci- 
 pation of, 134 ; and chivalry, 257. 
 
 Woman, gradual elevation of, 283 ; 
 modern position of, 285 ; under 
 
 English common law, 286-2901 
 American legislation and, 291 ; 
 leading to legal equality, 296 ; 
 moral influence of, 297 ; social 
 influence, 298 ; under agnosticism, 
 299. 
 
 Woman, position of, in India, 448- 
 450 ; in China, 454 ; Syrian, 459 ; 
 effects of tropical climate on, 461 
 
 Work, object of the present, i, 2. 
 
 Work, woman's, in America, 297. 
 
 Wounded, care of, during war, 344; 
 result of religion, 345. 
 
 Writers, Roman, on parental power, 
 ID, 1 1 ; on divorce and the degra- 
 dation of woman, 23-25.
 
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