diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/50205-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/50205-0.txt | 21043 |
1 files changed, 0 insertions, 21043 deletions
diff --git a/old/50205-0.txt b/old/50205-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7308e50..0000000 --- a/old/50205-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,21043 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mystical Element of Religion, as -studied in Saint Catherine of Genoa , by Baron Friedrich von Hügel - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: The Mystical Element of Religion, as studied in Saint Catherine of Genoa and her friends, Volume 1 (of 2) - -Author: Baron Friedrich von Hügel - -Release Date: October 14, 2015 [EBook #50205] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION, VOL 1 *** - - - - -Produced by Julie Barkley, High-res images and replacement -pngs from TIA and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team -at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - -TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: Volume II is available as Project Gutenberg ebook -number 50206. - - - - - THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT - OF RELIGION - - _All rights reserved._ - - [Illustration: _Walker & Boutall, ph, sc_ - - _St. Catherine of Genoa. (Caterina Fiesca Adorna.)_] - - THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT - OF RELIGION AS STUDIED - IN SAINT CATHERINE OF - GENOA AND HER FRIENDS - - BY BARON FRIEDRICH VON HÜGEL - MEMBER OF THE CAMBRIDGE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY - - VOLUME FIRST - INTRODUCTION AND BIOGRAPHIES - - LONDON: J. M. DENT & CO. - NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO. - MCMVIII - - RICHARD CLAY & SONS, LIMITED, - BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND - BUNGAY, SUFFOLK. - - - - -PREFACE - - -The following work embodies well-nigh all that the writer has been able -to learn and to test, in the matter of religion, during now some thirty -years of adult life; and even the actual composition of the book has -occupied a large part of his time, for seven years and more. - - * * * * * - -The precise object of the book naturally grew in range, depth and -clearness, under the stress of the labour of its production. This -object will perhaps be best explained by means of a short description -of the undertaking’s origin and successive stages. - -Born as I was in Italy, certain early impressions have never left me; -a vivid consciousness has been with me, almost from the first, of the -massively virile personalities, the spacious, trustful times of the -early, as yet truly Christian, Renaissance there, from Dante on to the -Florentine Platonists. And when, on growing up, I acquired strong and -definite religious convictions, it was that ampler pre-Protestant, -as yet neither Protestant nor anti-Protestant, but deeply positive -and Catholic, world, with its already characteristically modern -outlook and its hopeful and spontaneous application of religion to -the pressing problems of life and thought, which helped to strengthen -and sustain me, when depressed and hemmed in by the types of devotion -prevalent since then in Western Christendom. For those early modern -times presented me with men of the same general instincts and outlook -as my own, but environed by the priceless boon and starting-point -of a still undivided Western Christendom; Protestantism, as such, -continued to be felt as ever more or less unjust and sectarian; and the -specifically post-Tridentine type of Catholicism, with its regimental -Seminarism, its predominantly controversial spirit, its suspiciousness -and timidity, persisted, however inevitable some of it may be, in its -failure to win my love. Hence I had to continue the seeking and the -finding elsewhere, yet ever well within the great Roman Church, things -more intrinsically lovable. The wish some day to portray one of those -large-souled pre-Protestant, post-Mediaeval Catholics, was thus early -and has been long at work within me. - -And then came John Henry Newman’s influence with his _Dream of -Gerontius_, and a deep attraction to St. Catherine of Genoa’s doctrine -of the soul’s self-chosen, intrinsic purification; and much lingering -about the scenes of Caterinetta’s life and labours, during more than -twenty stays in her terraced city that looks away so proudly to the -sea. Such a delicately psychological, soaring, yet sober-minded -Eschatology, with its striking penetration and unfolding of the soul’s -central life and alternatives as they are already here and now, seemed -to demand an ampler study than it had yet received, and to require a -vivid presentation of the noble, strikingly original personality from -whom it sprang. - -And later still came the discovery of the apparently hopeless -complication of the records of Catherine’s life and doctrine, and how -these had never been seriously analyzed by any trained scholar, since -their constitution into a book in 1552. Much critical work at Classical -and Scriptural texts and documentary problems had, by now, whetted my -appetite to try whether I could not at last bring stately order out of -this bewildering chaos, by perhaps discovering the authors, dates and -intentions of the various texts and glosses thus dovetailed and pieced -together into a very Joseph’s coat of many colours, and by showing -the successive stages of this, most original and difficult, Saint’s -life and legend. All this labour would, in any case, help to train -my own mind; and it would, if even moderately successful, offer one -more detailed example of the laws that govern such growths, and of the -critical method necessary for the tracing out of their operation. - -But the strongest motive revealed itself, in its full force, later than -all those other motives, and ended by permeating them all. The wish -arose to utilize, as fully as possible, this long, close contact with -a soul of most rare spiritual depth,--a soul that presents, with an -extraordinary, provocative vividness, the greatness, helps, problems -and dangers of the mystical spirit. I now wanted to try and get down to -the driving forces of this kind of religion, and to discover in what -way such a keen sense of, and absorption in, the Infinite can still -find room for the Historical and Institutional elements of Religion, -and, at the same time, for that noble concentration upon not directly -religious contingent facts and happenings, and upon laws of causation -or of growth, which constitutes the scientific temper of mind and its -specific, irreplaceable duties and virtues. Thus, having begun to write -a biography of St. Catherine, with some philosophical elucidations, -I have finished by writing an essay on the philosophy of Mysticism, -illustrated by the life of Caterinetta Fiesca Adorna and her friends. - - * * * * * - -The book’s chief peculiarities seem to spring inevitably from its -fundamental standpoint: hence their frank enumeration may help towards -the more ready comprehension of the work. - -The book has, throughout, a treble interest and spirit; -historico-critical, philosophical, religious. The historico-critical -constituent may attract critical specialists; but will such specialists -care for the philosophy? The philosopher may be attracted by the -psychological and speculative sections; but will the historical -analysis interest him at all? And the soul that is seeking spiritual -food and stimulation, will it not readily be wearied by the apparent -pettiness of all that criticism, and by the seemingly cold aloofness of -all that speculation?--And yet it is the most certain of facts that the -human soul is so made as to be unable to part, completely and finally, -with any one of these three great interests. Hence, I may surely hope -that this trinity of levels of truth and of life, which has so much -helped on the growth of my own mind and the constitution of my own -character, may, in however different a manner and degree, be found to -help others also. This alternation and interstimulation between those -three forces and interests within the same soul, and within this soul’s -ever-deepening life, is, in any case, too fundamental a feature of this -whole outlook for any attempt at its elimination here. - -Then there is a look of repetition and of illogical anticipation about -the very structure of the book. For the philosophical First Part -says, in general, what the biographical Second Part says in detail; -this detail is, in reality, based upon the critical conclusions -arrived at in the Appendix, which follows the precise descriptions -of the biography; and then the Third, once more a philosophical, -Part returns, now fortified by the intervening close occupation -with concrete contingent matters, to the renewed consideration, and -deeper penetration and enforcement, of the general positions with -which the whole work began.--Yet is not this circular method simply a -frank application, to the problems in hand, of the process actually -lived through by us all in real life, wherever such life is truly -fruitful? For, in real life, we ever start with certain general -intellectual-emotive schemes and critical principles, as so many -draw-nets and receptacles for the capture and sorting out of reality -and of our experience of it. We next are brought, by choice or by -necessity, into close contact with a certain limited number of concrete -facts and experiences. And we then use these facts and experiences -to fill in, to confirm or to modify that, more or less tentative and -predominantly inherited, indeed ever largely conventional, scheme -with which we began our quest. In all these cases of actual life, -this apparently long and roundabout, indeed back-before, process is, -in reality, the short, because the only fully sincere and humble, -specifically human way in which to proceed. The order so often followed -in “learned” and “scientific” books is, in spite of its appearance of -greater logic and conciseness, far longer; for the road thus covered -has to be travelled all over again, according to the circular method -just described, if we would gain, not wind and shadow, but substance -and spiritual food. - -Then again, there is everywhere a strong insistence upon History as -a Science, yet as a Science possessing throughout a method, type -and aim quite special to itself and deeply different from those of -Physical Science; and an even greater stress upon the important, indeed -irreplaceable function of both these kinds of Science, or of their -equivalents, in the fullest spiritual life. Here the insistence upon -History, as a Science, is still unusual in England; and the stress upon -the spiritually purifying power of these Sciences will still appear -somewhat fantastic everywhere.--Yet that conception of two branches -of ordered human apprehension, research and knowledge, each (in its -delicate and clear contrastedness of method, test, end and result) -legitimate and inevitable, so that either of them is ruined if forced -into the categories of the other, has most certainly come to stay. -And the attempt to discover the precise function and meaning of these -several mental activities and of their ethical pre-requisites, within -the full and spiritual life of the soul, and in view of this life’s -consolidation and growth, will, I believe, turn out to be of genuine -religious utility. For I hope to show how only one particular manner -of conceiving and of practising those scientific activities and -this spiritual life and consolidation allows, indeed requires, the -religious passion,--the noblest and deepest passion given to man,--to -be itself enlisted on the side of that other noble, indestructible -thing, severe scientific sincerity. This very sincerity would thus not -empty or distract, but would, on the contrary, purify and deepen the -soul’s spirituality; and hence this spirituality would continuously -turn to that sincerity for help in purifying and deepening the soul. -And, surely, until we have somehow attained to some such interaction, -the soul must perforce remain timid and weak; for without sincerity -everywhere, we cannot possibly develop to their fullest the passion for -truth and righteousness even in religion itself. - -And then again a Catholic, one who would be a proudly devoted and -grateful son of the Roman Church, speaks and thinks throughout the -following pages. Yet it is his very Catholicism which makes him feel, -with a spontaneous and continuous keenness, that only if there are -fragments, earlier stages and glimpses of truth and goodness extant -wheresoever some little sincerity exists, can the Catholic Church -even conceivably be right. For though Christianity and Catholicism be -the culmination and fullest norm of all religion, yet to be such they -must find something thus to crown and measure: various degrees of, or -preparations for, their truth have existed long before they came, and -exist still, far and wide, now that they have come. Otherwise, Marcion -would have been right, when he denied that the Old Testament proceeds -from the same God as does the New; and three-fourths or more of the -human race would not, to this very moment, be bereft, without fault -of their own, of all knowledge of the Historic Christ and of every -opportunity for definite incorporation into the Christian Church, -since we dare not think that God has left this large majority of His -children without any and every glimpse and opportunity of religious -truth, moral goodness, and eternal hope. Yet such a recognition of some -light and love everywhere involves no trace of levelling down, or even -of levelling up; it is, in itself, without a trace of Indifferentism. -For if some kinds or degrees of light are thus found everywhere, yet -this light is held to vary immensely in different times and places, -from soul to soul, and from one religious stage, group or body to -another; the measure and culmination of this light is found in the -deepest Christian and Catholic light and holiness; and, over and above -the involuntary, sincere differences in degree, stage and kind, there -are held to exist, also more or less everywhere, the differences caused -by cowardice and opposition to the light,--cowardices and oppositions -which are as certainly at work within the Christian and Catholic Church -as they are amongst the most barbarous of Polytheists. I may well have -failed adequately to combine these twin truths; yet only in some such, -though more adequate apprehension and combination resides the hope for -the future of our poor storm-tossed human race,--in a deep fervour -without fanaticism, and a generous sympathy without indifference. - -And lastly, a lay lover of religion speaks throughout, a man to -whom the very suspicion that such subjects should or could, on that -account, be foreign to him has ever been impossible. A deep interest -in religion is evidently part of our very manhood, a thing previous -to the Church, and which the Church now comes to develop and to save. -Yet such an interest is, in the long run, impossible, if the heart -and will alone are allowed to be active in a matter so supremely -great and which claims the entire man. “Where my heart lies, let my -brain lie also”: man is not, however much we may try and behave as -though he were, a mere sum-total of so many separable water-tight -compartments; he can no more fruitfully delegate his brains and his -interest in the intellectual analysis and synthesis of religion, than -he can commission others to do his religious feeling and willing, his -spiritual growth and combat, for him.--But this does not of itself -imply an individualistic, hence one-sided, religion. For only in close -union with the accumulated and accumulating experiences, analyses and -syntheses of the human race in general, and with the supreme life and -teaching of the Christian and Catholic Church in particular, will such -growth in spiritual personality be possible on any large and fruitful -scale: since nowhere, and nowhere less than in religion, does man -achieve anything by himself alone, or for his own exclusive use and -profit. - -And such a layman’s views, even when thus acquired and expressed with a -constant endeavour to be, and ever increasingly to become, a unit and -part and parcel of that larger, Christian and Catholic whole, will ever -remain, in themselves and in his valuation of them, unofficial, and, at -best, but so much material and stimulation for the kindly criticism and -discriminating attention of his fellow-creatures and fellow-Christians -and (should these views stand such informal, preliminary tests) for the -eventual utilization of the official Church. To this officiality ever -remains the exclusive right and duty to formulate successively, for the -Church’s successive periods, according as these become ripe for such -formulations, the corporate, normative forms and expressions of the -Church’s deepest consciousness and mind. Yet this officiality cannot -and does not operate _in vacuo_, or by a direct recourse to extra-human -sources of information. It sorts out, eliminates what is false and -pernicious, or sanctions and proclaims what is true and fruitful, and a -development of her own life, teaching and commission, in the volunteer, -tentative and preliminary work put forth by the Church’s unofficial -members. - -And just because both these movements are within, and necessary to, -one and the same complete Church, they can be and are different from -each other. Hence the following book would condemn itself to pompous -unreality were it to mimic official caution and emphasis, whilst ever -unable to achieve official authority. It prefers to aim at a layman’s -special virtues and function: complete candour, courage, sensitiveness -to the present and future, in their obscurer strivings towards the -good and true, as these have been in their substance already tested -in the past, and in so far as such strivings can be forecasted by -sympathy and hope. And I thus trust that the book may turn out to be as -truly Catholic in fact, as it has been Catholic in intention; I have -striven hard to furnish so continuous and copious a stream of actions -and teachings of Christian saints and sages as everywhere to give the -reader means of correcting or completing my own inferences; and I -sincerely submit these my own conclusions to the test and judgment of -my fellow-Christians and of the Catholic Church. - - * * * * * - -My obligations to scholars, thinkers and great spiritual souls are far -too numerous and great for any exhaustive recognition. Yet there are -certain works and persons to whom I am especially indebted; and these -shall here be mentioned with most grateful thanks. - -In my Biographical and Critical Part Second, I have had, in Genoa -itself, the help of various scholars and friends. Signor Dottore -Ridolfo de Andreis first made me realize the importance of Vallebona’s -booklet. Padre Giovanni Semeria, the Barnabite, put me in touch with -the right persons and documents. The Cavallière L. A. Cervetto, of the -Biblioteca Civica, referred me to many useful works. The Librarian of -the Biblioteca della Missione Urbana copied out for me the inventory -of St. Catherine’s effects. And Signor Dottore Augusto Ferretto, of the -Archivio di Stato, made admirably careful, explicitated copies for me, -from the originals, so full of difficult abbreviations, of the long -series of legal documents which are the rock-bed on which my biography -is built. - -The courteous help of the Head Librarian of the Genoese University -Library extended to beyond Genoa. For it was owing to his action, -in conjunction with that of the Italian Ministry, of the English -Embassy in Rome, and of the British Museum Authorities, that the three -most important of the manuscripts of St. Catherine’s life were most -generously deposited for my use at the latter institution. I was thus -enabled to study my chief sources at full leisure in London. - -The Rev. Padre Calvino, Canon Regular of the Lateran, made many kind -attempts to trace any possible compositions concerning St. Catherine -among the Venerable Battista Vernazza’s manuscripts, preserved by the -spiritual descendants of Battista’s Augustinian Canonesses in Genoa; it -was not his fault that nothing could be found. - -The Society of Bollandists lent me, for a liberal length of time, -various rare books. I shall indeed be proud if my Appendix wins their -approbation, since it deals with subject-matters and methods in which -they are past-masters. Father Sticker’s pages on St. Catherine, in -their _Acta Sanctorum_ (1752), are certainly not satisfactory; they -are, however, quite untypical of the Bollandists’ best work, or even of -their average performances. - -My obligations in my Psychological and Philosophical Parts First and -Third are still more numerous and far more difficult to trace. Indeed -it is precisely where these obligations are the most far-reaching that -I can least measure them, since the influence of the books and persons -concerned has become part of the texture of my own mind. - -But among the great religious spirits or stimulating thinkers of -Classical and Patristic times, I am conscious of profound obligations -to Plato generally; to Aristotle on two points; to St. Paul; to -Plotinus; to Clement of Alexandria; and to St. Augustine. And the -Areopagite Literature has necessarily been continuously in my mind. -Among Mediaeval writers St. Thomas Aquinas has helped me greatly, in -ways both direct and indirect; Eckhart has, with the help of Father H. -S. Denifle’s investigations, furnished much food for reflection by his -most instructive doctrinal excesses; and the extraordinarily deep and -daring spirituality of Jacopone da Todi’s poetry has been studied with -the greatest care. - -The Renaissance times have given me Cardinal Nicolas of Coes, whose -great Dialogue _de Idiota_ has helped me in various ways. And in the -early post-Reformation period I have carefully studied, and have been -much influenced by, that many-sided, shrewdly wise book, St. Teresa’s -Autobiography. Yet it is St. John of the Cross, that massively virile -Contemplative, who has most deeply influenced me throughout this work. -St. Catherine is, I think, more like him, in her ultimate spirit, than -any other Saint or spiritual writer known to me; she is certainly far -more like him than is St. Teresa. - -Later on, I have learnt much from Fénelon’s Latin writings concerning -Pure Love, of 1710 and 1712; together with Abbé Gosselin’s admirably -lucid _Analyse de la Controverse du Quiétisme_, 1820, and the Jesuit -Father Deharbe’s solid and sober _die vollkommene Liebe Gottes_, 1856. - -Among modern philosophers I have been especially occupied with, and -variously stimulated or warned by, Spinoza, with his deep religious -intuition and aspiration, and his determinist system, so destructive -because taken by him as ultimate; Leibniz, with his admirably -continuous sense of the multiplicity in every living unity, of the -organic character, the _inside_ of everything that fully exists, and -of the depth and range of our subconscious mental and emotional life; -Kant, with his keen criticisms and searching analyses, his profound -ethical instincts, and his curious want of the specifically religious -sense and insight; Schopenhauer, with his remarkable recognition of the -truth and greatness of the Ascetic element and ideal; Trendelenburg, -with his continuous requirement of an operative knowledge of the chief -stages which any principle or category has passed through in human -history, if we would judge this principle with any fruit; Kierkegaard, -that certainly one-sided, yet impressively tenacious re-discoverer -and proclaimer of the poignant sense of the Transcendent essential to -all deep religion, and especially to Christianity, religion’s flower -and crown; and Fechner, in his little-known book, so delightfully -convincing in its rich simplicity, _die drei Motive und Gründe des -Glaubens_, 1863. - -Of quite recent or still living writers, two have been used by me -on a scale which would be unpardonable, had the matters treated -by them been the direct subjects of my book. In Part First whole -pages of mine are marked by me as little but a _précis_ of passages -in Dr. Eduard Zeller’s standard _Philosophy of the Greeks_. I have -myself much studied Heracleitus, Parmenides, Plato and Plotinus; and -I have, also in the case of the other philosophers, always followed -up and tested such passages of Zeller as I have here transcribed. -But I did not, for by far the most part, think it worth while, on -these largely quite general and practically uncontested matters, to -construct fresh appreciations of my own, rather than to reproduce, -with due consideration and acknowledgments, the conclusions of such an -accepted authority. And already in Part First, but especially in Part -Third, I have utilized as largely, although here with still more of -personal knowledge and of careful re-examination, considerable sections -of Professor H. J. Holtzmann’s _Lehrbuch der Neutestamentlichen -Theologie_, 1897--sections which happen to be, upon the whole, the -deepest and most solid in that great but often daring work. The -same Professor Holtzmann is, besides, a most suggestive religious -philosopher; and his penetrating though very difficult book _Richard -Rothe’s Speculatives System_, 1899, has also been of considerable use. - -Other recent or contemporary German writers to whom I owe much, are -Erwin Rhode, in his exquisite great book, _Psyche_, 2nd ed., 1898; -Professor Johannes Volkelt, in his penetratingly critical _Kant’s -Erkenntnisstheorie_, 1879; Professor Hugo Münsterberg, in his largely -planned although too absolute _Grundzüge der Psychologie_, Vol. I., -1900; Professor Heinrich Rickert, in his admirably discriminating -_Grenzen der naturwissenschaftlichen Begriffsbildung_, 1902; and also -two friends whose keen care for religion never flags--Professors -Rudolf Eucken of Jena and Ernst Troeltsch of Heidelberg. Eucken’s -_Lebensanschauungen der grossen Denker_, 1st ed., 1890; _der Kampf -um einen geistigen Lebensinhalt_, 1896; and the earlier sections of -_der Wahrheitsgehalt der Religion_, 1902, have greatly helped me. -And Troeltsch’s _Grund-probleme der Ethik_, 1902, has considerably -influenced certain central conceptions of my book, notwithstanding the -involuntary, rough injustice manifested by him, especially elsewhere, -towards the Roman Church. - -Among present-day French writers, my book owes most to Professor -Maurice Blondel’s, partly obscure yet intensely alive and religiously -deep, work _L’Action_, 1893; to Dr. Pierre Janet’s carefully -first-hand observations, as chronicled in his _Etat Mental des -Hystériques_, 1894; to Monsieur Emil Boutroux’s very suggestive paper -_Psychologie du Mysticisme_, 1902; to various pregnant articles of the -Abbé L. Laberthonnière in the _Annales de Philosophie Chrétienne_, -1898-1906; and to M. Henri Bergson’s delicately penetrating _Essai sur -les Données Immédiates de la Conscience_, 2nd ed., 1898. - -And amongst living Englishmen, the work is most indebted to Professor -A. S. Pringle-Pattison, especially to his eminently sane _Hegelianism -and Personality_, 2nd ed., 1893; to Professor James Ward, in his -strenuous _Naturalism and Agnosticism_, 1st ed., 1899; to the Reverend -George Tyrrell’s _Hard Sayings_, 1898, and _The Faith of the Millions_, -2 vols., 1901, so full of insight into Mysticism; and, very especially, -to Dr. Edward Caird, in his admirably wide and balanced survey, _The -Evolution of Theology in the Greek Philosophers_, 1904. - -But further back than all the living writers and friends lies the -stimulation and help of him who was later on to become Cardinal Newman. -It was he who first taught me to glory in my appurtenance to the -Catholic and Roman Church, and to conceive this my inheritance in a -large and historical manner, as a slow growth across the centuries, -with an innate affinity to, and eventual incorporation of, all the -good and true to be found mixed up with error and with evil in this -chequered, difficult but rich world and life in which this living -organism moves and expands. Yet the use to which all these helps have -here been put, has inevitably been my own doing: nowhere except in -direct quotations have I simply copied, and nowhere are these helpers -responsible for what here appears. - -And then there have been great souls, whom I cannot well name here, but -whom I would nevertheless refer to in reverent gratitude; souls that -have taught me that deepest of facts and of lessons,--the persistence, -across the centuries, within the wide range of the visible and indeed -also of the invisible Church, of that vivid sense of the finite and the -Infinite, of that spacious joy and expansive freedom in self-donation -to God, the prevenient, all-encompassing Spirit, of that massively -spontaneous, elemental religion, of which Catherine is so noble an -example. Thus a world-renouncing, world-conquering, virile piety, -humble and daring, humane, tender and creatively strong, is at no time -simply dead, but it merely sleepeth; indeed it ever can be found, -alive, open-eyed irresistible, hidden away here and there, throughout -our earthly space and time. - - * * * * * - -In matters directly connected with the publication of the work I have -especially to thank Messrs. Sciutto of Genoa, the photographers to -whom I owe the very successful photographs from which the plates that -stand at the head of my volumes have been taken; Mr. Sidney E. Mayle, -publisher, of Hampstead, for permission to use the photogravure of -St. Catherine’s portrait which appeared as an illustration to a paper -of mine, in his scholarly _Hampstead Annual_, 1898; Miss Maude Petre, -who helped me much towards achieving greater lucidity of style, by -carefully reading and criticizing all my proofs; and my publisher, -who has not shrunk from undertaking the publication of so long a work -on so very serious, abstruse-seeming a subject. Even so, I have had -to suppress the notes to my chapter on “Catherine’s Teaching,” which -throughout showed the critical reasons that had determined my choice of -the particular sayings, and the particular text of the sayings, adopted -by me in the text; and have had to excise quite a third of my Appendix, -which furnished the analysis of further, critically instructive texts -of the _Vita e Dottrina_, the _Dicchiarazione_ and the _Dialogo_. If a -new edition is ever called for, this further material might be added, -and would greatly increase the cogency of my argument. - - * * * * * - -The work that now at last I thus submit to the reader, is doubtless -full of defects; and I shall welcome any thoughtful criticism of any -of its parts as a true kindness. Yet I would point out that all these -parts aim at being but so many constituents of a whole, within which -alone they gain their true significance and worth. Hence only by one -who has studied and pondered the book as a whole, will any of its parts -be criticized with fairness to that part’s intention. To gain even but -a dozen of such readers would amply repay the labour of these many -years. - -I take it that the most original parts are Chapter Eight, with its -analysis of Battista Vernazza’s interesting Diary; the Appendix, with -its attempts at fixing the successive authors and intentions that -have built up the _Vita e Dottrina_; Chapter Nine, which attempts to -assign to psycho-physical matters, as we now know them, their precise -place and function within the vast life-system, and according to the -practical tests, of the great Mystical Saints; and Chapter Fifteen, -with its endeavour to picture that large Asceticism which alone -can effect, within the same soul, a fruitful co-habitation of, and -interaction between, Social Religion, the Scientific Habit of Mind, and -the Mystical Element of Religion. - - * * * * * - -Kirkegaard used to claim that he ever wrote _existentially_, pricked on -by the exigencies of actual life, to attempt their expression in terms -of that life, and in view of its further spiritual development. More -than ever the spiritual life appears now as supremely worth the having, -and yet it seems to raise, or to find, the most formidable difficulties -or even deadlocks. I can but hope that these pages may have so largely -sprung from the exigencies of that life itself,--that they may have -caught so much of the spirit of the chief livers of the spiritual life, -especially of St. Catherine of Genoa and of St. John of the Cross, and, -above all, of the One Master and Measure of Christianity and of the -Church,--as to stimulate such life, its practice, love and study, in -their readers, and may point them, spur them on, through and beyond all -that here has been attempted, missed or obscured, to fuller religious -insight, force and fruitfulness. - - FRIEDRICH VON HÜGEL. - -_Kensington_, _Easter 1908._ - - “Grant unto men, O God, to perceive in little things the - indications, common-seeming though they be, of things both - small and great.” - - ST. AUGUSTINE, _Confessions_, Bk. XI, ch. xxiii, 1. - - - - -CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME - - -The frontispiece photogravure reproduces an oil-painting preserved -in the sacristy of the Santissima Annunciata in Portorio, the Church -of the Pammatone Hospital in Genoa. This painting is probably a copy -(perhaps not older than 1737) of the portrait which hangs in the -superioress’s room in the same hospital, and which is presumably the -picture referred to by documents as extant in 1512, eighteen months -after Catherine’s death. The copy has been reproduced in preference to -the original, because the original has been considerably and clumsily -restored, whereas the copy gives us the older portrait as it existed -before this restoration. - - - PAGE - - PART I.--INTRODUCTION - - CHAPTER I.--THE THREE CHIEF FORCES OF WESTERN - CIVILIZATION 3-49 - - Introductory 3-10 - - I. The First of the Three Forces: Hellenism, the Thirst - for Richness and Harmony 10-25 - - II. The Second of the Three Forces: Christianity, the Revelation - of Personality and Depth 25-39 - - III. The Third Force: Science, the Apprehension and Conception - of Brute Fact and Iron Law 39-48 - - IV. Summing up: Hellenism or Harmonization, Christianity - or Spiritual Experience, and Science or Acceptance - of a Preliminary Mechanism, all three necessary to - Man 48, 49 - - CHAPTER II.--THE THREE ELEMENTS OF RELIGION 50-82 - - Introductory 50 - - I. The Three Elements, as they successively appear in the - Child, the Youth, and the Adult Man 50-53 - - II. Each Element ever accompanied by some amount of the - other two. Difficulty of the Transition from one Stage - to the other 53-55 - - III. Parallels to this Triad of Religious Elements 55-58 - - IV. Distribution of the Three Elements amongst Mankind - and throughout Human History 58-65 - - V. Causes operative in all Religion towards minimizing or - suppressing one or other Element, or towards denying - the need of any Multiplicity 65-70 - - VI. The Special Motives operating in each Element towards - the suppression of the other Elements 70-77 - - VII. Three Final Objections to such a conception of Religion, - and their Answers 77-82 - - PART II.--BIOGRAPHICAL - - CHAPTER III.--CATHERINE FIESCA ADORNA’S LIFE, UP - TO HER CONVERSION; AND THE CHIEF PECULIARITIES - PREDOMINANT THROUGHOUT HER CONVERT YEARS. 85-127 - - Introductory 85, 86 - - I. Proposed Study of the Mystical-Volitional Element in - a Particular, Concrete Instance: St. Catherine of - Genoa 86-90 - - II. The Materials and Aids towards such a Study 90-93 - - III. Peculiarities of the Genoese Climate and Geographical - Position; of the Ligurian Character; and of the Times - into which Catherine was born. Her Family, Father - and Mother 93-97 - - IV. Catherine’s Life, up to the Preliminaries of her Conversion: - Autumn 1447 to Mid-March 1474 97-104 - - V. Her Conversion, with its immediate Preliminaries and - Consequences, March 1474 104-109 - - VI. The Two Conceptions concerning the Character and - _Rationale_ of her Penitential Period and of her whole - Convert Life. The Position adopted here 109-113 - - VII. Catherine and the Holy Eucharist 113-116 - - VIII. Catherine and Confession and Direction 117-123 - - IX. Catherine and Indulgences 123-126 - - X. Peculiarities concerning the Invocation of Saints and - Intercessory Prayer 126, 127 - - CHAPTER IV.--CATHERINE’S LIFE FROM 1473 TO 1506, AND - ITS MAIN CHANGES AND GROWTH 128-174 - - I. First Period of Catherine’s Convert Life: Giuliano’s - Bankruptcy and Conversion; their Work among the - Poor, March 1473 to May 1477 128-131 - - II. Catherine and Tommasa Fiesca: their Difference of - Character and _attrait_. Peculiarity of Catherine’s Penitence - and Health during this Time 131-133 - - III. Change in the Temper of Catherine’s Penitence, from - May 1474 onwards 133-135 - - IV. Catherine’s Great Fasts 135-137 - - V. Second, Central Period of Catherine’s Convert Life, - 1477-1499: its Special Spiritual Features 138-141 - - VI. Catherine and Giuliano move into the Hospital in 1479, - never again to quit it. She is Matron from 1490 to - 1495 141-143 - - VII. Catherine and the Plague. The Outbreak of 1493 143-145 - - VIII. Catherine and Ettore Vernazza, 1493-1495 145-147 - - IX. Catherine’s Health breaks down, 1496; other Events of - the same Year 147-149 - - X. Events of 1497 149-154 - - XI. Beginning of her Third, Last Period; End of the - Extraordinary Fasts; First Relations with Don Marabotto 155-159 - - XII. Her Conversations with her Disciples; “Caterina Serafina.” - Don Marabotto and the Possessed Maid 159-162 - - XIII. Catherine’s Sympathy with Animal-and Plant-Life: her - Love of the Open Air. Her Deep Self-knowledge as to - the Healthiness or Morbidness of her Psycho-physical - States 163-166 - - XIV. Catherine’s Social Joys and Sorrows, 1501-1507 166-174 - - CHAPTER V.--CATHERINE’S LAST FOUR YEARS, 1506-1510. - SKETCH OF HER CHARACTER, DOCTRINE, AND - SPIRIT 175-250 - - I. Catherine’s External Interests and Activities up to May - 1510. Occasional slight Deviations from her old Balance. - Immensely close Interconnection of her whole - Mental and Psycho-physical Nature. Impressions as - connected with the Five Senses 175-181 - - II. More or less _Maladif_ Experiences and Actions 182-200 - - III. Catherine’s History from May to September 9, 1510 200-211 - - IV. The Last Six Days of Catherine’s Life, September 10-15 211-219 - - V. Sketch of Catherine’s Spiritual Character and Significance 220-250 - - CHAPTER VI. CATHERINE’S DOCTRINE 251-294 - - Introductory 251-260 - - I. God as Creative Love. The Creature’s True and False - Self; True and False Love 260-266 - - I. Sin, Purification, Illumination 266-272 - - III. The Three Categories and the Two Ways 273-280 - - IV. The Other Worlds 281-294 - - CHAPTER VII.--CATHERINE’S REMAINS AND CULTUS; THE - FATE OF HER TWO PRIEST FRIENDS AND OF HER - DOMESTICS; AND THE REMAINING HISTORY OF - ETTORE VERNAZZA 295-335 - - Introductory 295, 296 - - I. The Burial and the Events immediately surrounding it. - September 15 to December 10, 1510 296-300 - - II. The Different Removals of the Remains, and the Chief - Stages of her Official Cultus 300-306 - - III. The Fate of Catherine’s Priest Friends 307-311 - - IV. The Fate of Catherine’s Three Maid-servants 311-314 - - V. The Two Vernazzas: their Debt to Catherine, and - Catherine’s Debt to them 314, 315 - - VI. Ettore Vernazza’s Life, from 1509 to 1512 316-321 - - VII. Ettore in Rome and Naples; his Second Will; his - Work in the Genoese Prisons 321-329 - - VIII. Ettore again in Naples; his Death in Genoa, June 1524; - Peculiarities of his Posthumous Fame 329-335 - - CHAPTER VIII.--BATTISTA VERNAZZA’S LIFE 336-367 - - Introductory 336, 337 - - I. Battista’s Life, from April 1497 to June 1510 337-339 - - II. Battista and her God-father, Tommaso Moro 339-344 - - III. Battista’s _Colloquies_, November 1554 to Ascension Day - 1555 344-358 - - IV. Some further Letters of Battista, 1575-1581 358-366 - - V. Battista’s Death, May 1587 366, 367 - - CONCLUSION TO VOLUME I - - WHEREIN LIES THE SECRET OF SPIRITUAL PERSUASIVENESS 367-370 - - APPENDIX TO PART II - - CHRONOLOGICAL ACCOUNT AND CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF - THE MATERIALS FOR THE RE-CONSTITUTION OF - SAINT CATHERINE’S LIFE AND TEACHING 371-466 - - Introduction: The Three Laws that govern the Growth of - Religious Biography; Complexity of the Materials for - Catherine’s Life 371-376 - - FIRST DIVISION: ACCOUNT AND ANALYSIS OF THE DOCUMENTS - PREVIOUS, AND IMMEDIATELY SUBSEQUENT - TO, THE “VITA E DOTTRINA” WITH THE “DICCHIARAZIONE,” - IN SEVEN STAGES 376-433 - - I. First Stage: August 1456 to September 12, 1510, all - Legal 376-380 - - II. Second Stage: Five further Official and Legal Documents, - 1511-1526; and Four Mortuary Dates, 1524-1587 380, 381 - - III. Third Stage: Bishop Giustiniano’s Account of Catherine’s - Life, Remains, and Biography, 1537 382-384 - - IV. Fourth Stage: The Two Oldest Extant Manuscripts of - the “Vita e Dottrina” with the “Dicchiarazione.” - Manuscript A (October 1547 to February 1548), and - Manuscript B 384-395 - - V. Fifth Stage: Manuscript C (copy of a MSS. of 1550?), - first appearance of the “Dialogo,” “Chapter” First 395-410 - - VI. Sixth Stage: First Printed Edition of the - “Vita-Dottrina-Dicchiarazione,” 1551; Examination of all it - possesses in addition to Manuscripts A, B, and C, apart - from the “Dialogo” 411-417 - - VII. Seventh Stage: The Second “Chapter” of the “Dialogo,” - which appears for the first time in the Printed “Vita,” - 1551 417-424 - - VIII. Seventh Stage continued: Minute Analysis of one Passage - from the Second “Chapter” 424-427 - - IX. Seventh Stage concluded: Character and Authorship of - this Second “Chapter” 427-433 - - SECOND DIVISION: ANALYSIS, ASSIGNATION, AND APPRAISEMENT - OF THE “VITA-DOTTRINA-DICCHIARAZIONE” - CORPUS, IN EIGHT SECTIONS 433-466 - - I. The “Dicchiarazione”: the Two Stages of its Existence 434-440 - - II. The Earlier “Dicchiarazione,” and its Theological - Glosses 440-447 - - III. Five Conclusions concerning the History of the - “Dicchiarazione” 447-449 - - IV. The “Vita”-Proper, its Divisions and Parts, and its - Chief Secondary and Authentic Constituents 449-453 - - V. Age and Authorship of the Literature retained 453-457 - - VI. Analysis of the Conversion-Narratives 458-462 - - VII. The Sayings-Passages: Three Tests for discriminating - Authentic from Secondary Sayings 462, 463 - - VIII. Conclusion: At least Six Stages in the Upbuilding of the - Complete Book of 1551. The Slight Changes introduced - since then. First Claims to Authorship for Catherine 463-466 - - - - - “He is not far from every one of us; for in Him we live, and - move, and have our being.”--Acts xvii, 27, 28. - - “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”--2 - Corinthians iii, 17. - - - - -THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION - - - - -PART I - -INTRODUCTION - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE THREE CHIEF FORCES OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION - - -INTRODUCTORY. - - -1. _An enigma of life: the Universal and Abiding does not move the -will; and what does move it is Individual and Evanescent._ - -Amongst the apparent enigmas of life, amongst the seemingly most -radical and abiding of interior antinomies and conflicts experienced -by the human race and by individuals, there is one which everything -tends to make us feel and see with an ever-increasing keenness and -clearness. More and more we want a strong and interior, a lasting yet -voluntary bond of union between our own successive states of mind, -and between what is abiding in ourselves and what is permanent within -our fellow-men; and more and more we seem to see that mere Reasoning, -Logic, Abstraction,--all that appears as the necessary instrument -and expression of the Universal and Abiding,--does not move or win -the will, either in ourselves or in others; and that what does thus -move and win it, is Instinct, Intuition, Feeling, the Concrete and -Contingent, all that seems to be of its very nature individual and -evanescent. Reasoning appears but capable, at best, of co-ordinating, -unifying, explaining the material furnished to it by experience of all -kinds; at worst, of explaining it away; at best, of stimulating the -purveyance of a fresh supply of such experience; at worst, of stopping -such purveyance as much as may be. And yet the Reasoning would appear -to be the transferable part in the process, but not to move; and the -experience alone to have the moving power, but not to be transmissible. - - - -2. _Our personal experience as regards our own convictions._ - -Experience indeed and its resultant feeling are always, in the first -instance, coloured and conditioned by every kind of individual -many-sided circumstances of time and place, of race and age and sex, -of education and temperament, of antecedent and environment. And it -is this very particular combination, just this one, so conditioned -and combined, coming upon me just at this moment and on this spot, -just at this stage of my reach or growth, at this turning of my way, -that carries with it this particular power to touch or startle, to -stimulate or convince. It is just precisely through the but imperfectly -analyzable, indeed but dimly perceived, individual connotation of -general terms; it is by the fringe of feeling, woven out of the past -doings and impressions, workings and circumstances, physical, mental, -moral, of my race and family and of my own individual life; it is -by the apparently slight, apparently far away, accompaniment of a -perfectly individual music to the spoken or sung text of the common -speech of man, that I am, it would seem, really moved and won. - -And this fringe of feeling, this impression, is, strictly speaking, not -merely untransferable, but also unrepeatable; it is unique even for the -same mind: it never was before, it never will be again. Heraclitus, if -we understand that old Physicist in our own modern, deeply subjective, -largely sentimental way, would appear to be exactly right: you cannot -twice step into the same stream, since never for two moments do the -waters remain identical; you yourself cannot twice step the same man -into the same river, for you have meanwhile changed as truly as itself -has done, Πάντα ῥεῖ: all things and states, outward and inward, appear -indeed in flux: only each moment seems to bring, to each individual, -for that one moment, his power to move and to convince. - - -3. _Our experience in our attempt to win others._ - -And if we transmit this emotion or conviction to another mind, or if we -seem to be able to trace such transmission when it has been actually -effected in ourselves or in others, we shall find that, in proportion -as one mind feeds, not forces, another, the particular bond and -organization of the mental and emotional picture which cost us so much, -moved us so much, has, in each case, been snapped and broken up; the -whole has been again resolved into its constituent elements, and only -some of these elements have been taken up into the already existing -organization of the other mind, or have joined together in that mind, -to form there a combination which is really new. Even a simple scent or -sound or sight comes charged to each of us with many but most differing -connotations, arousing or modifying or supplanting old or new ideas -and impressions in the most subtle, complex, and individual manner. -Insist upon another mind taking over the whole of this impression, -and you will have rightly and necessarily aroused an immediate or -remote hostility or revolt against the whole of what you bring. Hence -here too we are again perplexed by the initial enigma: the apparently -insurmountable individuality of all that affects us, and the equally -insurmountable non-affectingness of all that is clearly and certainly -transmissible from any one man to another. - - -4. _This mysterious law appears to obtain in precise proportion to the -depth and importance of the truths and realities in view._ - -And if we seem boxed up thus, each one away from our fellow, in all our -really moving and determining inclinations and impressions, judgments -and affections, with regard to matters on which we feel we can afford -to differ deeply and to be much alone; we appear to be more and not -less so, in exact proportion as the importance of the subject-matter -increases. In moral and spiritual, in religious and fundamental -matters, we thirst more, not less, for identity of conviction and of -feeling; and we are, or seem to be, more, not less, profoundly and -hopelessly at variance with each other than anywhere else. - -And more than this: the apparent reason of this isolation seems but to -aggravate the case, because here more than anywhere else imagination, -feeling, intuition seem indeed to play a predominant, determining part; -and yet here more than anywhere else we feel such a predominance to -be fraught with every kind of danger. Thus here especially we feel as -incapable of suppressing, indeed of doing without these forces, as of -frankly accepting, studying, and cultivating them. Now and then we -take alarm and are in a panic at any indication that these springs and -concomitants of life are at work within us; yet we persist in doing -little or nothing to find sufficient and appropriate food and scope -and exercise for the right development and hence the real purification -of these elemental forces, forces which we can stunt but cannot kill. -Nothing, we most rightly feel, can be in greater or more subtle and -dangerous opposition to manly morality or enlightened religion than -the seeking after or revelling in emotion; nothing, we most correctly -surmise, can equal the power of strong feeling or heated imagination to -give a hiding-place to superstition, sensuality, dreamy self-complacent -indolence, arrogant revolt and fanaticism; nothing, even where such -things seem innocent, appears less apt than do these fierce and -fitful, these wayward and fleeting feelings, these sublimities and -exquisitenesses, to help on that sober and stable, consistent and -persistent, laborious upbuilding of moral and religious character, -work, and evidence which alone are wanted more and more. Indeed, what -would seem better calculated than such emotion to strain the nerves, -to inflame the imagination, to blunt common-sense and that salt of the -earth, the saving sense of the ridiculous, to deaden the springs of -research and critical observation, to bring us, under the incalculably -sapping influences of physical abnormalities, close up to where sanity -shades off into madness, and ethical elevation breaks down into -morbidness and depravity? - - -5. _The experience of the human race: the two series of personalities, -movements, races._ - -And the secular experience of the race would seem fully to bear -out such suspicions. For have we not there a double series of -personalities, events, and movements far too long and widespread not -to be conclusive? On the one hand, there are those that seem to spring -from dimly lit or dark feeling, to arise,--as it were, hydra-like, to -sting and madden, or mist-like, to benumb all life, and turn it into -mere drift and dreaming,--from out of the obscure, undrained, swampy -places of human ignorance and passion. On the other hand, there are -those that are formed and fashioned by clear, transparent thought; and -these flourish in the cultivated, well-drained plains of human science -and strict demonstration. - -Among the first series, you have the Pantheistic schools and -personalities of the decaying Roman Empire, Plotinus the Ecstatic, and -Jamblichus, and such other dreamers, straining up into the blue; the -somewhat similar, largely subterranean, Jewish and Christian sects -and tendencies of the Middle Ages; the Anabaptist and other like -groups, individualistic, fantastic, in considerable part anomistic and -revolutionary, of the Reformation period; and such phenomena as the -Eternal-Gospel troubles and the Quietistic controversy in the Roman -Church. And above all, in the East, we have, from time immemorial, -whole races, (in the midst of a world crying aloud for help and -re-fashioning, but which is left to stagnate and decay,) still dreaming -away their lives in Buddhistic abstraction and indifference. - -Among the second, the light, clear series, you have whole races, -the luminous, plastic, immensely active Greek, the strong-willed, -practical, organizing Roman, and the Anglo-Saxon determined “to stand -no nonsense”; you have an Aristotle, sober, systematic; one side at -least of the great Mediaeval Scholastic movement, culminating in -St. Thomas, so orderly and transparent; above all, modern Physical -Science, first subjecting all phenomena to rigorous quantitative and -mathematical analysis and equation, and then reacting upon philosophy -as well, and insisting, there and everywhere, upon clearness, direct -comparableness, ready transferableness of ideas and their formulae, as -the sole tests of truth. Descartes; Kepler, Galileo; Hobbes, Spinoza -are, in increasing degrees, still perhaps the most perfect types of -this clear and cool, this ultimately mathematical and Monistic tendency -and position. - - -6. _The dark, intuitive personalities and schools, apparently a mere -stop-gap, transition, or reaction against the clear, discursive ones._ - -And further, the personalities and schools of the interiorly -experimental, emotional kind seem to appear upon the scene but as -stop-gaps or compensations for the other series, in periods of -transition or reaction, of uncertainty or decay. So at the break-up -of the Roman Empire (Neo-Platonism); so at the end of the Patristic -period and just before the official acceptance of Scholasticism (St. -Bernard); so during the foundering of the Mediaeval fabric of life and -thought in the Renaissance of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries -(Pico, Paracelsus); so in the German Romanticism of sixty years -ago, as a reaction against the survivals of the eighteenth-century -Rationalism; so now again in our own day, more slightly, but not less -really, in a revival of spiritual philosophy. It looks then as though -the experimental-emotional strain could only thrive fitfully, on the -momentary check or ruin of the clear and “scientific” school; as -though it were a perhaps inevitable disease breaking in occasionally -upon the normal health of the human mind. For the eventual result -of the world’s whole movement surely seems to be the reclamation of -ever-increasing stretches of knowledge and theory from the dominion of -vague, irresponsible, untestable feeling, and their incorporation in -the domain of that unbroken, universal determinism, of those clear and -simple, readily analyzable, verifiable, communicable, and applicable -laws which, more and more, are found to rule phenomena wheresoever we -may look. - - -7. _This seems especially to apply to the Intuitive-Emotional element -of Religion._ - -And if the prima facie trend of centuries of thought and conflict -appears to rule out of court even such a fringe of individual -experience and emotion as ever accompanies and stimulates all religion: -the verdict of history, indeed of any survey of contemporary life, -if only this be sufficiently large, would seem fatal to any type -of religion in which this individual experience and emotion would -form religion’s core and centre, as in the case of the specifically -experimental-emotional school generally, and of the Mystics in -particular. - -To take some such survey, let us look, to begin with, outside of where -Catholic discipline and unity somewhat obscure, at first sight, even -the legitimate and indeed the really existing diversities of school -and tendency. In the Church’s organism each divergence has ever been -more largely tempered and supplemented by the others; and since the -Reformation, indeed in part even more recently, owing to an entirely -intelligible and in part inevitable, reaction, even most legitimate -and persistent divergencies, which flourished in rich and enriching -variety throughout the Middle Ages, have largely ceased to appear in -any obvious and distinct embodiments. Let us look then first to where -such diversities grow unchecked, and indeed generally tend to excess -and caricature. Let us take contemporary English Protestantism, and -then Foreign Protestantism in the large lines of its history. In both -cases the experimental-emotional strain and group will seem to compare -unfavourably with its competitors. - -For if we look about us in England, we seem to have little difficulty -in classing the tendencies within the Established Church under the -headings of High, Broad, and Low; indeed we can readily extend this -treble classification to all the various schools and bodies of English -Protestantism. We can easily conceive of the greater portion of English -Nonconformity as but a prolongation and accentuation of the Evangelical -school in the Established Church: the readiness and ease with which -the former at certain moments unite and coalesce with the latter, show -quite conclusively how close is the affinity between them. We almost -as readily think of the Unitarian and Theistic bodies as prolongations -and further sublimations of the Anglican Broad Church view, though -here, no doubt, the degrees and kinds of difference are more numerous -and important. And if it would be hard to find an extension, still more -an accentuation, of the Anglican High Church party amongst the English -Nonconformists, a strain largely identical with the sacerdotal current -elsewhere has always existed in the Presbyterian churches. Nor must -we forget the powerful and constant, both repellent and attractive, -influence exercised by Rome upon even those outside of her obedience. -To be quite philosophical, the survey ought to include all types of -English Christianity; and, in that case, the High Church position would -rank rather as a dilution, as a variety, incomplete and inconsistent -though it be, of the type represented most strikingly and emphatically -by Rome, than as a variant of the types having their centres at -Wittenberg and Geneva. - -And if we next turn to German Protestantism, especially to the -simultaneous variations of its short-lived, fluid, formative period, -we shall there too find this treble tendency. The Evangelical strain -will be represented here by the numerous Illuminist and Anabaptist -personalities, groups and movements to which Luther himself had -given occasion, which but emphasized or caricatured his own earlier -Mysticism; but which, when they threatened, by their revolutionary, -communistic fanaticism and violence, completely to discredit and ruin -his own movement, he suppressed with such ruthless and illogical -severity. And the Broad Church strain will here be found emphasized and -caricatured in Socinianism, and in such milder forms of Rationalism as -prepared the way for it or followed in its wake. And finally, the High -Church strain is not so hard to discover in much of the doctrine and -in some of the forms and externals of Orthodox, official Lutheranism. -Indeed in foreign Protestantism generally,--in Zwinglianism, in -Calvinism, and in its other bodies and sects, we can trace various -forms of, and degrees of approximation to, one or other of these three -types, the Historical, the Experimental, the Rational. - -Now looking at the scene of battle, for the moment quite generally, -it would seem as though, of these three types and tendencies, the -Emotional and Experimental had proved itself decidedly the weakest -for good, the strongest for evil of the three, and this both in the -past and in the present, both in England and abroad. We have here in -England, in the past, the Puritan excesses in Ireland, Scotland, and -England itself; and later on and down to the present, the largely -dreary and unlovely, narrow and unjust monotony of Evangelicalism. We -have there abroad, in the past, the Peasants’ War and the Anabaptist -Saturnalia at Münster; and later on and down to the present, that -Pietism which has so often barred the way to a just appreciation of -Historical Christianity and to a candid acceptance of rational methods -and results, and this without its being able to find any constructive -or analytic working principle of its own. Both in England and in -Germany, indeed throughout the cultivated West, only the Historical, -Traditional school on the one hand, and the Rationalistic, Scientific -school on the other hand, seem to count at all: it is they which alone -seem to gain ground, or at least to hold it, at the Universities and -amongst the thinking, ruling classes generally. - - -8. _Yet this adverse judgment will appear largely misleading, if we -study the matter more fully._ - -And yet this first aspect of things will, I think, turn out to be -largely deceptive, to be but one side and one teaching of that -noble inheritance, that great output of life and experience, past -and present, which is ready to our hand for ever-renewed study and -assimilation in human history and society, and which, taken as -it really is,--as the indefinite prolongation of our own little -individual direct experiences,--can alone help us to give to these -latter experiences a full, life-regulating value. Let us take then the -foregoing objections, and let us do so as but so many starting-points -and openings into our great subject. This preliminary discussion will -but prepare the ground and method for the following detailed study, -and for the final positions of the whole book. Indeed even the book’s -opening question can be answered only by the whole book and at our -labour’s end. - - -I. THE FIRST OF THE THREE FORCES: HELLENISM, THE THIRST FOR RICHNESS -AND HARMONY. - -We revert then to the apparent interior antinomy from which we -started,--the particular concrete experience which alone moves us and -helps to determine our will, but which, seemingly, is untransferable, -indeed unrepeatable; and the general, abstract reasoning which _is_ -repeatable, indeed transferable, but which does not move us or help -directly to determine the will. And we here begin by the study of the -antinomy, as this has been explicated for us by Hellenism, the earliest -and widest of the three main mental, indeed spiritual, forces that are -operative within each of us Westerns, on and on. - - -1. _The antinomy in the pre-Socratics._ - -Heraclitus appeared to us an impressive exponent of the former truth, -of the apparent utter evanescence of these particular impressions -and experiences, of the complete shiftingness of the very faculty -within us and of the environment without us, by which and in which we -apprehend them. An ever-changing self in the midst of an ever-changing -world, basing its persuasiveness and persuadableness, indeed even its -conscious identity with itself and its communion with others, upon the -ever-changing resultants of all these changes: this would surely seem -to be a house built not upon the sand but upon the quicksands. - -Now we have to remember that Parmenides had, already in early Greek -times, been equally emphatic, perhaps equally impressive, on the other -side of this very question,--on the impossibility of Becoming, of -Change; and on the certainty and knowableness of the utter Oneness -and Permanence of all Being.[1] All that really _is_, he maintained, -excludes all Becoming: the very notion of Being is incompatible with -that of Becoming: the first is utterly without the second. All real -Becoming would be equivalent to the real existence of Non-Being. Hence -all Multiplicity and Becoming is necessarily but apparent, and masks -an underlying absolute Unity and Permanence, which can be reached by -the intellect alone. And this position of Parmenides was felt to be -so strong, that all the subsequent Greek Physicists took their stand -upon it: the four unchangeable elements of Empedocles, the Atoms of -Leucippus and Democritus (atoms of eternally unchanging shape and -size, and of one absolutely uniform and unchanging quality) are but -modifications of the doctrine of Parmenides concerning the Oneness and -Unchangeableness of Being. - -But even Heraclitus himself is far removed from denying all Oneness, -all Permanence. For, according to him, a permanent law of permutation -runs through and expresses itself in the shiftingness of all things -perceptible by sense; or rather one eternal physical substance, Fire, -of ceaselessly active properties, is continually manifesting itself, -in a regular succession of appearances, from fire to air, from air to -water, from water to earth, and then backwards up again to fire. - -And when once the Greeks begin to break away from all this -Hylozoism,--these systems which uniformly, from Thales to Democritus, -attempt to explain all things by some one living or moving Matter, -without the intervention of Spirit or of Mind,--Spirit appears in -Anaxagoras as the One, and as present, everywhere and in varying -degrees, as the principle of the motion of that co-eternal matter -which is here, on the contrary, conceived of as but apparently -homogeneous anywhere, and as really composed of an indefinite number -and combination of qualitatively differing constituents. - -Thus in all its schools, even before Socrates and Plato, Greek -philosophy clung to the One and the One’s reality, however differently -it conceived the nature of this Unity, and however much it may have -varied as to the nature and reality of the Many, or as to the relation -and the bond subsisting between that Unity and this Multiplicity. Only -at the end of this first period do the Sophists introduce, during a -short time marked by all the symptoms of transition, uncertainty, -and revolution, the doctrine, of the unknowableness, indeed of the -unreality, of the One, and with it of the exclusive reality of mere -Multiplicity, of evanescent Appearances. - - - -2. _In Socrates._ - -But Socrates opens out the second and greatest period of Greek -philosophy, by reverting to, indeed by indefinitely deepening, the -general conviction that Oneness underlies Multiplicity. And he does -so through the virtual discovery of, and a ceaseless insistence upon, -two great new subject-matters of philosophy: Dialects and Ethics. It -is true that in both these respects the Sophists had prepared the -ground: they had, before him and all around him, discussed everything -from every then conceivable point of view; and they had, at the same -time, helped to withdraw man’s attention from pure speculation about -physical nature to practical occupation with himself. But the Sophistic -Dialectic had ended in itself, in universal negation and scepticism; -and the Sophistic Anthropology had, partly as cause, partly as effect -of that scepticism, more and more completely narrowed and dragged down -all human interest, capacity, and activity to a selfish, materialistic -self-aggrandizement and a frank pleasure-seeking. Socrates indeed took -over both these subjects; but he did so in a profoundly different -spirit, and worked them into a thoroughly antagonistic view of -knowledge and of life. - -Socrates begins, like the Sophists, with the Multiplicity of impression -and opinion, which we find occasioned by one and the same question -or fact; and like them he refuses to take the Physicists’ short cut -of immediate and direct occupation with things and substances, say -the elements. Slowly and laboriously he works his way, by the help of -Dialectics, (for these have now become a means and not an end,) around -and through and into the various apprehensions, and, at last, out of -and beyond them, to a satisfactory concept of each thing. And the very -means taken to arrive at this concept, and the very test which is -applied to the concept, when finally arrived at, for gauging the degree -of its finality, both these things help to deepen profoundly the sense -of a certain Multiplicity in all Oneness and of a certain Oneness in -all Multiplicity. For the means he takes are a careful and (as far as -may be) exhaustive and impartial discussion and analysis of all the -competing and conflicting notions and connotations occasioned by each -matter in dispute; and the test he applies to the final concept, in -view of gauging the degree of its finality, is how far this concept -reconciles and resolves within its higher unity all such various and -contrary aspects suggested by the thing, as have stood the brunt of -the previous discussion and have thereby proved themselves true and -objective. - -Socrates again, like the Sophists, turns his attention away from -Physics to Ethics; he drops speculation about external nature, and -busies himself with the interior life and development of man. But the -world in which Socrates’ method necessarily conceives and places man, -and the work and standard which he finds already latent in each man, -for that man to do and to endorse in himself and in the world, are -both entirely different from those of the Sophists, and occasion a -still further, indeed the greatest of all possible deepenings of the -apprehension of Oneness and of Multiplicity. - -For the world of Socrates is a world in which Reality and Truth reign -and are attainable by man; never does he even ask whether truth _is_ -or can be reached by us, but only what it is and where it lies and -how it can be attained. And since Socrates instinctively shares the -profoundly Greek conviction that Reality and Truth are necessarily -not only one but unchanging, he assumes throughout that, since Truth -and Reality do exist, Oneness and unchanging Being must exist also. -And thus the Oneness of Reality and the Multiplicity of Appearance -are re-established by him in Greek philosophy. And their apprehension -is indefinitely deepened and extended, since, whatever _is_ being -knowable, and knowable only through Dialectics, and Dialectics having -left us with concepts each in a sense a one and a many, Life itself, -Reality and all Nature must, somehow and to some extent, be also a one -and a many. And man according to Socrates is required, already as a -simple consequence of such convictions, to discover and acknowledge and -organize the One and the Many in his own interior life and faculties. -For if his senses tell him of the Many, and his reason alone tells him -of the One, and the Many are but appearances and the One alone is fully -real,--then it will be in and through his reason that he is and will be -truly man. - -Thus immediately within himself does man have a continuous, uniquely -vivid experience of the One and the Many, and of the necessity, -difficulty, and fruitfulness of their proper organization; and from -hence he will reflect them back upon the outer world, adding thus -indefinitely, by means of Ethics, to the delicacy and depth of -his apprehension of such Oneness and Multiplicity as, by means of -Dialectics, he has already found there. But further, he now thus -becomes conscious, for the first time at all adequately, of the -difference between his own body and his own mind. And here he has no -more a Oneness _and_ a Multiplicity, he is directly conscious of a -Oneness _in_ Multiplicity, of a ruling and organizing power of the mind -in and over the body; and the One here is unseen and spiritual, and -the Many is here found to be an organism of forces and of functions -designed, with profound wisdom, to correspond with and to subserve -the soul. And this Microcosm is readily taken as a key and an analogy -wherewith to group and explain the appearances of the world without. -Much appears in that outer world as unreduced to system; but then -similarly within us much is still in a state of chaos, of revolt. In -that world no one ruler can be directly perceived; but then similarly -within us, the one ruling mind is perceptible only in its effects. And -this inner organization, ever required more than realized, is not a -matter of abstract speculation, of subtle induction, adjournable at -will; it is a clamorous consciousness, it is a fact that continually -requires acts to back it or to break it. Strengthen it, and you have -interior expansion and life; weaken it, and you bring on shrinkage and -death. For the passions are there, active even if _we_ refuse to be -active, active against us and above us, if not under us and for us; -and their submission to the reason, to effort, cannot fail, once our -attention is fully turned that way, more than anything else to keep -alive and to deepen our sense of the organization of all that lives, of -the presence of the One _and_ the Many, of the One _in_ the Many, in -all that truly lives at all. - - -3. _In Plato._ - -Now this dialectical method and this ethical subject-matter get -applied, investigated, and developed, with ever-increasing complexity -and interaction, by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the three spiritual -generations of this, the greatest period of Greek Philosophy. And the -more penetrating the method becomes, and the more deeply it probes the -subject-matter, the more intense and extensive is found to be this -Unity in Multiplicity both within man and without him. - -In the teaching of Socrates both the method and the apprehension of -Unity and Multiplicity are as yet, so to speak, in bud. Dialectics are -here still chiefly a Method, and hardly as yet a Metaphysic as well. -The soul here is as yet but simply one, and virtue is also simply one, -and simply and directly identical with knowledge, and hence directly -teachable: the very possibility that the will may not or indeed cannot -follow, necessarily, automatically, the clear perception of what is -really good for it, is one quite foreign to the mind of Socrates, -indeed to all Greek thinkers up to the very end of the classical -philosophy. - -In Plato the methods and the results are both, as it were, in -flower. Dialectics have here become both a systematic method, and -a metaphysical system: not only are Ideas true, and the only means -for reaching truth, but they alone are true, they alone fully _are_, -and exist as separate self-subsisting realities. And as in the world -within, Goodness is, in this profoundly ethical system, seen and willed -and striven for as supreme, so also in the world without, is the Idea -of Goodness considered as existing supreme from all eternity, and as -somehow the Cause of all that truly _is_. - -It is true that Plato nowhere succeeds in finding in his system -a fitting place for a Personal God: for, among other reasons, -the Platonic Ideas are all, from the lowest to the highest, but -Hypostasized Concepts of Kinds, and are hence, quite consistently, -considered to be perfect and supreme, in precise proportion as they are -general. The highest Idea will thus of necessity be the most general, -the most devoid of all determination, and hence the least personal of -them all. - -It is true also that in his Metaphysics generally he insists so much -upon the complete severance and self-sufficingness of the Ideas as -over against Appearances, that he prepares his own inevitable failure -again to bridge over the gulf that he himself has thus dug too deep -and broad. Especially is his half-suggestion misleading, that the -transition to Phenomenal Multiplicity is but a further extension of -the Multiplicity already observable in the world of Ideas. For these -two Multiplicities are evidently entirely different in kind. Each Idea -is conceived as necessarily eternal, unchanging, complete and perfect -in its own way; whereas each appearance is conceived as necessarily -temporal, changing, incomplete, and imperfect even in its own way. - -It is true again, that, in Psychology, Plato breaks up the Soul -into the three parts of the Reason, the Irascible Passions, and the -Concupiscible Passions, and that he discriminates between them even -as to their place of residence in the body. And correspondingly -he distinguishes, in Ethics, the four Cardinal Virtues, Prudence, -Fortitude, Temperance, and Justice: he distributes the first three -virtues among the three parts of the soul, allotting ever one of these -virtues specially to one part; and makes Justice to be the general -virtue that sees to each part carrying out its own special work and -virtue, and respecting the work of the other two. And thus we seem to -get away from the Oneness of the soul and the Oneness of virtue, as -already taught by Socrates. - -It is finally true that not only does Matter remain unexplained and -treated as though in itself a mere nothing; but that it is considered, -nevertheless, as somehow strong enough to hinder and hamper the Idea -which really constitutes that Matter’s sole reality. Hence also -springs Plato’s saddening aloofness from and contempt for all trades -and handicrafts, for all the homely tastes, joys, and sorrows at all -peculiar to the toiling majority. And herein he but considerably -deepens and systematizes one of the weakest and most ruinous traditions -of his class, age, and people, and falls far short of Socrates, with -his deep childlike love of homely wisdom and of technical skill and -productiveness. Indeed Matter is considered to be the one occasion -of all sin, just as ignorance is considered to be the one true cause -of sin. For although Plato throughout holds and proclaims free-will, -in the definite sense of freedom of choice; and although he, in some -passages, declares the ignorance which (according to him) is the -necessary condition of a wrong choice, to be itself voluntary and -culpable and to spring from an avoidable attachment to the world of -sense: yet he clings, nevertheless, to the Socratic position that all -ignorance and immorality are involuntary, that no man does or can act -against what he sees to be for his own good. - -All this would of itself suffice to show how and why the Platonic -system has, as such, long ceased to live or to be capable of -resuscitation. And yet even some of the apparent weaknesses just -referred to are nearly or even entirely strong points in his scheme. So -with his treble division of the Soul, if we but soften the distinction -of actual parts into a difference of function or of object. For, -already in Plato’s own judgment, these parts admit of and require a -regular hierarchy of subordination: the Irascible part is the natural -ally, if properly tamed and broken in by the Reason, of this Reason -against the Concupiscible part: it is the winged steed amongst the two -horses of the chariot of the soul, and the charioteer, the Reason, -has to see to it that this his winged steed flies not recklessly, but -lends all its strength to keep its heavy, wingless, downwards-tending -yoke-fellow from plunging them all into the deep and dark. Hence all -this really makes for a true, because rich and laborious, Unity in -Multiplicity. The same applies to the scheme of the four Cardinal -Virtues; for here also there is a balancing and interaction of forces -and of duties, which together are well fitted to deepen and fruitfully -to unify the soul. - -But above all, there are four main conceptions which, with varying -degrees and kinds of clearness, consistency, and proof, run throughout -the Dialogues, and which not all the ever-increasing perception of the -complexity of their implications, nor all the never-ending costingness -of their reproduction, have long kept mankind from accepting and -working into their own inner life and into their outlook and labour -upon the world without. - -There is, first, the sense of the Universal nature of philosophy. -Philosophy is here not a science alongside of other sciences, nor -a sect existing with a view to the advantage of its members, nor a -substitute for religion or science, art or action; but it stands -for the totality of all mental activity, the nearest approach to an -adequate realization of the reasonable nature of man. Hence philosophy -has constant relations with all departments of human thought and -action; or rather they all, with their several methods and ideals, -come to enrich and stimulate philosophy, whilst philosophy, in return, -reacts upon them all, by clarifying and harmonizing them each with -itself and each with all the others. - -There is, next, the constant conviction of the reality of moral -accountableness on the one hand, and of the strength of the passions -and of the allurements of sense on the other, of the costing ethical -character of the search for light and truth, of the ceaseless necessity -of a turning of the whole man, of conversion. “As the bodily eye -cannot turn from darkness to light without the turning of the whole -body, so too when the eye of the soul is turned round, the whole soul -must be turned from the world of generation unto that of Being, and -become able to endure the sight of Being, and of the brightest and -best part of Being, that is to say of the Good.”[2] Hence Philosophy -is a Redemption, a Liberation, a Separation of the soul from the -body, a Dying and seeking after death, a constant Purification and -Recollection of the soul; and the four Cardinal Virtues are so many -purifications;[3] and men who have once come to lay the blame of their -own confusion and perplexity upon themselves, will hate themselves and -escape from themselves into Philosophy, in order to become different -and get rid of their former selves.[4] - -There is, in the third place, the dominant consciousness of -Multiplicity in Unity and of Unity in Multiplicity, and of the -necessity of the soul’s ever moving from one to the other--moving out -of itself and into the world of Multiplicity, of sense and exterior -work; and moving back into itself, into the world of Unity, of spirit -and interior rest. Hence there is and ought to be a double movement -of the soul. And this double action does not continue on the same -plane, but the moving, oscillating soul is, according to the faithful -thoroughness or cowardly slackness of these its movements, ever either -mounting higher in truth and spirit, or falling lower away into the -sensual and untruthful. For these its ascensions are “effortful,” -painful, gradual; they are never fully finished here below, and they -nowhere attain to that absolute knowledge which is possessed by God -alone.[5] “We ought,” he tells us, “to strive and fly as swiftly as -possible from hence thither. And to fly thither is to become like God”; -but he adds, “as far as this is possible.”[6] - -And there is, lastly, an unfailing faith in an unexhausted, -inexhaustible, transcendent world of Beauty, Truth, and Goodness, -which gives of itself, but never gives itself wholly, to that -phenomenal world which exists only by participation in it; and in -a Supreme Goodness, felt and half conceived to be personal and -self-communicative, as the cause of all that is anywhere beautiful and -one and good. - -These four characteristics of Universality, Conversion, Unification, -Transcendence, we find them together in Greek philosophy once, and once -only, namely in Plato. Twice again we have indeed a world-embracing, -world-moving scheme placed before us, and in each case two of these -four characteristics reappear in a deepened and developed form. For -Aristotle works out, more fully and satisfactorily than Plato, the -characters of Universality and of Unification; especially does the -latter find a great improvement. And Plotinus insists, even more -constantly and movingly than Plato, upon Conversion as a necessary -means, and upon Transcendence as a necessary characteristic of all -true philosophy. But Aristotle has lost the Conversion from out of -his scheme, and also the Transcendence conceived as at the same time -immanent in the world; and Plotinus has lost the Universality, and the -Unification conceived as a Unity in Multiplicity. - - -4. _In Aristotle._ - -As to Aristotle, the improvements upon Plato are marked and many. -There is the doctrine of the non-existence of the General apart from -the Particular; the doctrine of Matter as not simple Non-Being, but -as Not-yet-Being, the Possible, the Not-yet-Actual, which is waiting -the presence of the Form to give it the Actuality for which it is -destined, since Matter requires Form, and Form requires Matter; and -the doctrine, here first fully developed, of Motion, the Moved and the -Moving. - -Since all Motion, Change, Natural Life spring from Form (and a -particular Form), working in and with Matter (a particular and -appropriate Matter), the ultimate First Moving Cause must Itself be -all-moving and all-unmoved, that is, it must be Pure Form. We thus get -the first at all adequate philosophical presentation of Theism: for -this Pure Form is then shown to be eternal, unchanging, all thought, -self-thinking, and absolutely distinct from the world which it moves. -In all other real Beings the Form has, in various degrees, to contend -with the manifold impediments of Matter; and in proportion to the -Form’s success, does the resultant Being stand high in the scale of -Creation. The plant, with its vegetative and plastic soul, stands -lowest in the scale of organic life; next comes the animal, with its -sensitive and motive soul; and highest stands man, with his rational -and volitional soul. And each higher Being takes over, as the lower -part of his own nature, the functions and powers of the lower Being; -and hence, since all Beings constitute so many several parts of the -world’s systematic whole, they are all deserving of the closest study. -And Man, destined to be the highest constituent of this whole, can -become so only by moving as much as may be out of his entanglement in -the lower, the passive functions of his soul, and identifying himself -with his true self, with that active power, that pure reason which, -itself pure Form, finds its proper objects in the Forms of all things -that are. - -Thus we get a system of a certain grand consistency and an impressively -constant re-application of certain fundamental ideas to every kind of -subject-matter. But the Platonic Dualism, though everywhere vigorously -attacked, is yet nowhere fully overcome. - -For in Metaphysics, Plato’s “One alongside of the Many” becomes with -Aristotle the “One throughout the Many”: to the mind of the latter, -the Separate General, Pure Form as existing without Matter, is a mere -abstraction; Matter without Form is a simple potentiality; Matter and -Form together, and they only, constitute the Particular, and (in and -by it) all actual and full Reality. And only Reality, in the highest -and primary sense, can, according to him, form the highest and primary -object of Knowledge. Yet knowledge never refers to the Particular, but -always to the General; and, in the Particular, only to the General -manifested in it. And this is the case, not because, though the -Particular is the fuller Reality, we can more easily reach the General -within it; but, on the contrary, because, though we can more easily -reach the Particular, the General alone is abiding and fully true and -really knowable. - -Again, for Aristotle the Particular, which alone really exists, is -constituted a particular and really existent Being, in virtue of its -participation in Matter; but it is constituted as abiding, true, -and knowable, in virtue of its Form. The cause of its Reality is -thus different from that of its Truth; the addition of the simple -Potentiality of Matter has alone given Reality to the pure Actuality of -Form. - -Finally, for Aristotle all Movement, as comprehensive of every kind of -change, being defined as the transition from Potentiality to Reality, -as the determination of Matter by Form, can be called forth, in the -last resort, only by a pure Form which, though the cause of all Motion, -is itself unmoved, is pure Thought and Speculation, a thinking of -thinking,--God eternally thinking God and Himself alone. Yet this -God is, if thus safely distinguished from the world, yet hardly more -Personal than Spirit was in Anaxagoras, or the Idea of Good was in -Plato. For not only does Aristotle refuse Him a body and all psychic -life, but with them he eliminates all Doing and all Producing, all -Emotion and all Willing, indeed all Thinking except that of His own -lonely Self-Contemplation. And yet the activity of the will is as -essential to Personality as that of thinking; and thinking again we can -conceive as personal only if conditioned by a diversity of objects and -a variety of mental states. And this God’s relations with the world are -strangely few and still curiously materialistic. For He but sets the -world in motion, and has no special care for it or detailed rule over -it; and since, of the three or four kinds of motion, spacial motion is -declared to be the primary one, and its most perfect form to be the -circular, and since a circle moves quickest at its circumference, He is -conceived as imparting to the world a spacial and a circular movement, -and this, apparently, from a point in space, since He does so from -outside. His transcendence is, so far, but a spacial one. - -In Physics, Aristotle still constantly describes Nature as an -harmonious, reasonable Being, an all-effecting force. There is here a -mythical strain at work, and yet nowhere is a subject clearly defined -to which these various qualities could be attributed. - -In Anthropology again, the active soul, the rational and free-willing, -the immortal principle, is that which specially distinguishes and -constitutes Humanity, and which indeed is the Form of the lower -soul-powers and of the body as well. Yet it is these lower soul-powers, -it is the passive, the vegetative and sensitive, the mortal soul-powers -which, in and with the body, constitute this particular man, and only -particular men are really existent. Where and how then is this living -man’s Personality, his indelible consciousness of the unity of his -nature, to arise and to be found in all this medley? - -And finally, in Ethics, Aristotle maintains and develops, it is true, -the great Socratic tradition of conceiving all virtue as active, -and demands with Plato that the whole man should, as much as may -be, put himself into all his moral acts. Indeed Aristotle makes -here the great advance of definitely denying the Socratic doctrine -that virtue consists in knowledge, and of abolishing the Platonic -distinction between ordinary and philosophic virtue. All moral -qualities are, according to him, matters of the will; and arise, in -the first instance, not through instruction, but through exercise and -education. But in place of Plato’s grandly organic, though still too -abstract scheme of the Cardinal Virtues, each of the three partial -ones pressing upwards and requiring and completing the others, and all -three bound together by the general fourth, we get a more detailed and -experimental, but only loosely co-ordinated enumeration and description -of the virtuous habits, all of them so many means between two vicious -extremes. The purificatory, recollective, self-fleeing, grandly -organic, deeply religious tone and drift of Plato’s philosophy, that -priceless conviction that we must give all if we would gain all, has -disappeared. - -Everywhere then we get in Aristotle that noble Greek insistence, upon -Action and Energy, upon Reason and Clearness, upon the General and -Unification. But at all the chief turning-points we get a conflict -between the General, which is alone supposed to be fully true, and the -Particular, which is alone supposed to be fully real. And hence we are -left with an insufficient apprehension of the inexhaustibleness of -all Reality, of its indefinite apprehensibleness but ever inadequate -apprehendedness. And above all, as both cause and effect of all this, -we find here only a slight and intermittent hold upon the great -fact and force of Personality in both God and man. In a word, if in -Plato the abstracting process went in general still further than -in Aristotle: in Aristotle the supply of experimental material of -a spiritual kind which in Plato was ever enriching, supplementing -and correcting the abstract reasoning and its results in matters of -spirituality, is almost entirely in abeyance. - - -5. _In Plotinus and Proclus._ - -In the third and last period of Greek Philosophy, we can pass by the -Stoic and Epicurean, and also the Sceptical schools. For, great as -was their practical importance and influence, these schools never -aimed at embracing the totality of life; no one of them ever, as a -matter of fact, cultivated more than one side of a purely individual -self-education and peace-seeking. They reproduced and continued, on -a larger scale, those interesting three minor Socratic schools which -themselves had, even during the full times and universal systems of -Plato and Aristotle, constituted as it were the backwaters away from -the main stream of Greek speculation. The Stoic system carries on the -Cynic school; the Epicurean, the Cyrenaic; and the Sceptical, the -Megaric. Unity and Rest is monopolized by the Stoic, and Multiplicity -and Movement by the Epicurean; whilst the Sceptic attempts to stand -apart from and above both. What Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, living -in still many-sided and public-spirited times, had, in their lives and -teaching, seen and practised together; now, in a period of spiritual -poverty and self-seeking, is seen and practised by separate schools -separately, each in external conflict with the other. - -Only the system of that great mystical soul, Plotinus, has, for our -present purposes, a claim on our close attention. Indeed this, the -last great attempt at synthesis of the ancient Greek mind, will have -to occupy us in such detail throughout a great part of this book, that -here we can but briefly indicate its chief characteristics as regards -the One and the Many. - -It is then clear that Plotinus is an even more intensely and -exclusively religious spirit than is Plato himself. Some of his -descriptions of the soul’s flight from the world of sense and of the -soul’s substantial touch of God in ecstasy, and again his penetrating -apprehension of the timeless and spaceless characteristics of Spirit, -have never ceased, at least indirectly, to leaven, and to lend much of -their form to, the deepest recollective aspirations of religious souls -in Europe and Western Asia, for some fourteen centuries at least. - -Yet this religious sense is here so exclusive, and it thirsts so -vehemently for perfect unity and for an infinite Superiority and -utter Self-sufficingness of God, that it readily allies itself -with, and reinforces by a massive enthusiasm and asceticism, the -abstractive trend which, so strong at all times in Greek philosophy, -was at this period already, for other reasons, growing more intensely -abstractive than ever. Under this double influence Plotinus reduces -the two great, deliberate, alternating movements of the soul,--its -Outgoing to the Particular and Contingent, and its Incoming to the -General and Infinite, as they are taught by Plato,--to one only, that -of Recollection and Abstraction, a movement ever up and away, from -all Multiplicity, to the One alone. And he denies to this One all -Multiplicity whatsoever,--hence all such conscious, volitional action -upon the world as is involved in Plato’s magnificent, though never -worked out, intuition that it is love, (some energizing analogous to -our thinking, loving and willing the existence, the self-realization -and the happiness of other self-conscious beings,) which moves the -Good, as it were, to go out from Itself, and to communicate Itself -to others. Here, in Plotinus’s scheme, Man begins indeed with -sense-impressions and imaginative picturings, with discursive reasoning -and intuitive reason, with feelings, volitions, and energizings -of every kind. But the more he moves up, the more of all this he -leaves utterly behind; till, in ecstasy, all will, love, thought, -consciousness, cease altogether. For man has thus been getting nearer -and nearer, and more and more like, the One; and this One is just -nothing besides sheer, pure Oneness,--it is neither Will, nor Love, nor -Thought, nor Self-consciousness, in any degree or sense of these words. - -Plotinus’s scheme is thus indeed prompted by some of the deepest -Mystical aspirations. But whilst in its one deliberate movement--that -of man up to God--it starts from convictions and requirements that are -deeply ethical, libertarian, spiritual, theistic: it will be shown, in -its conception of the nature of the One and of this One’s relations -down into the world, to be curiously naturalistic and determinist, and -subtly materialistic. Thus does Greek Philosophy end in an impressively -all-devouring Abstraction, in an intense Realism destructive, step by -step, of precisely all that concrete, individual, personal Beauty, -Truth, and Goodness, of all the spiritual, hence organic, interior, -self-conscious reality, which had given occasion to this system. -We have now but so many hypostatized abstractions, each more pale -and empty than the other, each ever more simply a mere category of -the human mind, indeed, but a category appropriate to Things and -to Mathematico-Physical Laws, not to Spirit and to Ethico-Personal -Organisms. The system, in its ultimate upshot and trend, is thus -profoundly anti-Immanental, anti-Incarnational: a succession of -increasingly exalted and increasingly empty Transcendences, each of -which is, as it were, open upwards but closed downwards, takes the -place of all deliberate operations and self-expressions of the Higher -in and through the Lower, hence of all preveniences and condescensions -of God. - -And in Proclus, practically the last non-Christian Greek Philosopher, -all these intensely abstractive, naturalistic features get finally and -fully systematized, whilst but intermittent traces remain of Plato’s -richly manifold, organized activities and his at times strikingly -incarnational conceptions; and only skeleton-schemes persist of those -rapt recollective experiences of Plotinus which, derived in his case -from direct experience, constitute him, among all Philosophers, as Dr. -Edward Caird most aptly calls him, the “Mystic par excellence.” - - -II. THE SECOND OF THE THREE FORCES: CHRISTIANITY, THE REVELATION OF -PERSONALITY AND DEPTH. - -Now the whole of this clear, conceptual, abstractive Greek method, in -as far as it identified abstractions with realities, and names with -things, and reasoning with doing, suffering, and experience; and sought -for Unity outside of Multiplicity, for Rest outside of Energizing, for -the Highest outside of Personality and Character as these are developed -and manifested in the permeation and elevation of the lower; has in -so far been succeeded and superseded by two other great world-moving -experiences of the human race, experiences apparently even more -antagonistic to each other than either appears to be to the Greek view: -Christianity and Scientific Method. - - -1. _The unique fulness and closeness of unity in multiplicity of our -Lord’s life._ - -As to Christianity, it is really impossible to compare it directly -with Hellenism, without at once under-stating its originality. For -its originality consists not so much in its single doctrines, or even -in its teaching as a whole, and in the particular place each doctrine -occupies in this teaching, as in its revelation, through the person -and example of its Founder, of the altogether unsuspected depth and -inexhaustibleness of human Personality, and of this Personality’s -source and analogue in God, of the simplicity and yet difficulty and -never-endingness of the access of man to God, and of the ever-preceding -condescension of God to man. Hence if Christianity is thus throughout -the Revelation of Personality; and if Personality is ever a One in -Many, (and more deeply One and more richly Many, in proportion to the -greatness of that spiritual reality): then we need not wonder at the -difficulty we find in pointing out any one particular doctrine as -constitutive of the unique originality of Christianity. - -For a Person came, and lived and loved, and did and taught, and died -and rose again, and lives on by His Power and His Spirit for ever -within us and amongst us, so unspeakably rich and yet so simple, so -sublime and yet so homely, so divinely above us precisely in being -so divinely near,--that His character and teaching require, for an -ever fuller yet never complete understanding, the varying study, and -different experiments and applications, embodiments and unrollings -of all the races and civilizations, of all the individual and -corporate, the simultaneous and successive experiences of the human -race to the end of time. If there is nothing shifting or fitful or -simply changing about Him, there is everywhere energy and expansion, -thought and emotion, effort and experience, joy and sorrow, loneliness -and conflict, interior trial and triumph, exterior defeat and -supplantation: particular affections, particular humiliations, homely -labour, a homely heroism, greatness throughout in littleness. And in -Him, for the first and last time, we find an insight so unique, a -Personality so strong and supreme, as to teach us, once for all, the -true attitude towards suffering. - -Not one of the philosophers or systems before Him had effectually -escaped falling either into Pessimism, seeing the end of life as -trouble and weariness, and seeking to escape from it into some -aloofness or some Nirvana; or into Optimism, ignoring or explaining -away that suffering and trial which, as our first experience and as our -last, surround us on every side. But with Him, and alone with Him and -those who still learn and live from and by Him, there is the union of -the clearest, keenest sense of all the mysterious depth and breadth and -length and height of human sadness, suffering, and sin, _and_, in spite -of this and through this and at the end of this, a note of conquest and -of triumphant joy. - -And here, as elsewhere in Christianity, this is achieved not by some -artificial, facile juxtaposition: but the soul is allowed to sob -itself out; and all this its pain gets fully faced and willed, gets -taken up into the conscious life. Suffering thus becomes the highest -form of action, a divinely potent means of satisfaction, recovery, -and enlargement for the soul,--the soul with its mysteriously great -consciousness of pettiness and sin, and its immense capacity for joy in -self-donation. - -And again, His moral and spiritual idealism, whilst indefinitely higher -than that of any of the philosophers or prophets before Him, has -nothing strained or restless, nothing rootless or quietistic, nothing -querulous or disdainful, or of caste or sect about it: the humblest -manual labour, the simplest of the human relations, the universal -elemental faculties of man as man, are all entered into and developed, -are all hallowed in smallest detail, and step by step. - -And finally His teaching, His life, are all positive, all constructive, -and come into conflict only with worldly indifference and bad faith. -No teacher before Him or since, but requires, if we would not be led -astray by him, that we should make some allowances, in his character -and doctrine, for certain inevitable reactions, and consequent -narrownesses and contrarinesses. Especially is this true of religious -teachers and reformers, and generally in exact proportion to the -intensity of their fervour. But in Him there is no reaction, no -negation, no fierceness, of a kind to deflect His teaching from its -immanent, self-consistent trend. His very Apostles can ask Him to call -down fire from heaven upon the unbelieving Samaritans; they can use -the sword against one of those come out to apprehend Him; and they -can attempt to keep the little ones from Him. But He rebukes them; He -orders Peter to put back the sword in its scabbard; and He bids the -little ones to come unto Him, since of such is the Kingdom of Heaven. -Indeed St. Mark’s Gospel tells us how the disciples begged Him to -forbid a man who did not follow them from casting out devils in His -name; and how He refused to do so, and laid down the great universal -rule of all-embracing generosity: “He that is not against us, is with -us.”[7] - - - -2. _This rich unity of life occasions three special presentations of -it, the “Petrine,” “Pauline,” “Joannine.”_ - -Now it is this very reality and depth, and hence the rich Unity, the -growth, variety, and manifold fruitfulness of His life and teaching, -which explain, as a necessity and an advantage, that we should have -those successive pictures and conceptions of Him which already the New -Testament presents. _Because_ Socrates was so great and impressive, we -have the two successive, remarkably divergent, portraits of him: the -external, historical, by Xenophon; the internal, typical one, by Plato; -and _that_ is all. _Because_ our Lord is so unspeakably greater, and -continues, with inexhaustible freshness, to be the very life of the -lives of Christians, we have three or four classical portraits of Him -in the New Testament; and, in a certain true manner and degree, each -successive age, in a measure each single soul, forms, and has to form, -its own picture of Him. - -We can roughly classify these pictures under the three successive types -of the “Petrine,” the “Pauline,” and the “Joannine,” provided we do -not forget that the precise limits of the first of these divisions are -difficult to draw, and that there are growths and diversities of aspect -to be found within the Pauline type. For the Petrine type will here be -sought in the Synoptic Gospels, and in particular in those accounts -and sayings there which appear to give us the closest reproduction -of our Lord’s very acts and words and of the impressions produced by -these upon the original witnesses. The Pauline type will embrace four -main stages or developments: that of the four or five of the earlier -Epistles--the two to the Thessalonians and those to the Galatians, -Corinthians, and Romans; that of the Epistles of the Captivity, -Colossians, Philippians, Ephesians; that of the Pastoral Epistles; and -that of the Epistle to the Hebrews. And even in the least diversified, -the Joannine type, there is the variation between the Gospel and -Epistles on the one hand, and the Apocalypse on the other. - -But taking these three types as each a unity, we shall hardly be guilty -of an empty schematization, if the Petrine or Primitive-Apostolic -group represents to us mainly the simplest statement of the external -facts, and specially of the traditional, the Jewish side of our Lord’s -teaching; and if the Pauline and Joannine groups each mainly represent -to us, in various degrees and combinations, the two manners in which -the hidden significance of these facts, as intended for all men and for -all time, can be penetrated, viz. by thought and speculation, and by -feeling and operative experience. - -Of course none of the three groups is without a large element common to -it and to the other two: it is the same facts that are looked at and -loved, by means of the same powers of the soul, and within the same -great common principles and convictions. Only the precise antecedents, -point of view, temper of mind; the selection, presentation, and -degree of elaboration of the facts and of their spiritual meaning; -the preponderance of this or that mental activity; the reasons and -connections sought and seen, are often widely different in each, -and produce a distinctiveness of impression which can be taken to -correspond roughly to the three main powers of the soul: to the range -of sense-perception and of memory; to that of reasoning; and to that -of intuition, feeling, and will. If each group had _only_ that element -which can be taken as being its predominant one, then any single group -would be of little value, and each group would imperatively require -ever to be taken in conjunction with the other two. But, as a matter of -fact, neither are the “Petrine” writings free from all reasoning and -mystical affinities; nor are the “Pauline,” free from the historic, -positive spirit, or, still less, from the mystical habit; nor the -“Joannine” free from the deepest teaching as to the necessity of -external facts, or from some argument and appeals to reason. Hence each -group, indeed each writing even singly, and still more all three groups -if taken together, profoundly embody and proclaim, by the rich variety -of their contents and spirit, the great principle and measure of all -life and truth: unity in and through variety, and steadfastness in and -through growth. - -Specially easy is it to find in all three types the two chief among -the three modalities of all advanced religion: the careful reverence -for the external facts of nature (so far as these are known), and -for social religious tradition and institutions; and the vivid -consciousness of the necessity and reality of internal experience and -actuation, as the single spirit’s search, response, and assimilation -of the former.[8] - - -3. _The “Petrine” attestations: their special message._ - -Thus the “Petrine” group gives us, as evidence for the observation and -love of the external world: “Behold the birds of the air, how they sow -not, neither harvest nor gather into barns”; “Study the lilies of the -field how they grow, they toil not, neither do they spin: yet I say -unto you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of -these”; “The seed sprouts and shoots up, whilst the man knows not; the -earth beareth fruit of itself, first the stalk, then the ear, then the -full grain in the ear”; “When now the fig-tree’s shoot grows tender and -putteth forth leaves, you know that summer is nigh”; and, “When it is -evening, you say: ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in -the morning: ‘It will be foul weather to-day, for the heaven is red and -lowering.’”[9] - -And as to reverence for tradition we get: “Think not that I have come -to destroy the law or the prophets; I have come not to destroy but to -fulfil.” And this respect extends to existing religious practices: -“Beware,” He says, “lest you do your justice before men, to be seen -by them,” but then describes the spirit in which they are to practice -their “_sedaka_,” this “justice” which they are to do, with its three -quite traditional divisions of alms-deeds, prayer, fasting, the three -Eminent Good Works of Judaism. And again: “If thou offer thy gift upon -the altar,” the doing so is in nowise criticised.[10] - -Indeed there is no shrinking from the manifestation, on the part of the -crowd, of new and even rude forms of trust in the visible and external: -“A woman who had been suffering from an issue of blood during twelve -years, … coming in the crowd behind Him, touched His garment, for she -said: ‘If I but touch His garments I shall be saved.’ And straightway -the issue of blood was dried up”; and the crowds generally “put the -sick in the open places, and begged Him that they might but touch the -hem of His garment; and such as touched it were healed”; and this “hem” -consisted doubtless in the blue tassels, the Zizith, worn by every -religious Jew at the four corners of his cloak.[11] - -And the twelve Apostles, whom He sends out with special instructions, -“going forth preached that men should repent, and went casting out many -devils, and anointing many sick with oil and healing them.” Indeed -there is, as the act preliminary to His public ministry, His baptism in -the Jordan; and there is, as introductory to His Passion, the supremely -solemn, visible, and audible act which crowns the Last Supper.[12] - -But this same group of documents testifies also to a mystical, interior -element in Our Lord’s temper and teaching. “Blessed are the poor in -spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” “Blessed are the clean -of heart, for they shall see God,” are Beatitudes which cannot be far -from the _ipsissima verba_ of Our Lord. “In that hour Jesus answering -said: ‘I confess to Thee, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, that Thou -hast hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed -them unto babes: yea, Father, for this hath been well-pleasing before -Thee.’ … ‘Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I -will refresh you. Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me, for I am meek -and humble of heart, and you shall find refreshment for your souls: for -My yoke is sweet and My burden is light.’” is deeply mystical passage -doubtless expresses with a vivid exactitude the unique spiritual -impression and renovation produced by Him within the souls of the first -generations of His disciples. And the three Synoptists give us five -times over the great fundamental mystical paradox: “If a man would -come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow -Me. For whosoever shall be determined to save his soul, shall lose it; -but whosoever shall lose his soul for My sake, shall find it.” And the -great law of interiority is recorded in St. Mark: “Listen unto Me, ye -all, and understand: nothing that entereth from without into a man can -defile him, but only the things that proceed from a man are the things -that defile a man.”[13] - -And we get in Mark the fundamental interior virtue of childlikeness, -and the immanence of Christ in the childlike soul: “If anyone wish -to be first, let him be the last of all men and all men’s servant.” -“And taking a little child He placed it in the midst of them; and -having embraced it, He said unto them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive -the kingdom of God as a little child, shall not enter therein.’” -“Suffer little children to come unto Me, for of such is the kingdom of -heaven.”[14] - -And the spirituality of the soul’s life in heaven, and the eternal -_Now_ of God, as the Living and Vivifying Present, are given in all -three Synoptists: “In the Resurrection they neither marry nor are -given in marriage, but are as the angels in heaven. But concerning the -resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken by -God, saying, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the -God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead but of the living.”[15] - - -4. _The “Pauline” group of writings: its special teaching._ - -The Pauline group furnishes by far the greater amount of the explicit -reasoning to be found in the New Testament; where, _e.g._, does the -New Testament furnish a parallel to the long and intricate argument -of chapters Third to Eleventh of the Epistle to the Romans, with -its constant “therefores” and “buts” and “nows”? Yet this same -group of writings also emphasizes strongly, though more rarely, the -external-fact side of religion, and is deeply penetrated by the -intuitive-emotional, the mystical spirit of Christianity. - -The external, historical side is represented by the careful description -and chronological arrangement observable in the account of six -successive apparitions of the Risen Christ; and by the reference -back to the acts and words used in the Eucharistic act at the Last -Supper.[16] - -Yet throughout the writings of St. Paul and of his school, it is -the mystical, interior, experimental element that permeates the -argumentative-speculative and the historical constituents. The chief -manifestations of this mystical spirit and conviction, which really -penetrates and knits together the whole of the Pauline teaching, can -perhaps best be taken in a logical order. - -First then it is St. Paul who, himself or through writers more or -less dependent on him, gives us by far the most definite and detailed -presentation of by far the most extraordinary experiences and events -to be found in the New Testament outside of the Gospels themselves. -For the author of the Acts of the Apostles gives us the lengthy -description of the Pentecostal Visitation, and, three times over, -that most vivid account of Our Lord’s apparition to Saul on the way -to Damascus. And St. Paul himself describes for us, at the closest -first hand, the ecstatic states of the Christian communities in their -earliest charismatic stage; he treats the apparition on the way to -Damascus as truly objective and as on a complete par with the earlier -apparitions accorded to the chosen Apostles in the first days after -the Resurrection; and he gives us the solemn reference to his own -experience of rapture to the third Heaven.[17] We should, however, -note, in the next place, as the vital complement, indeed as the -necessary pre-requisite, to this conviction and to the effectiveness -of these facts,--facts conceived and recorded as external, as temporal -and local,--St. Paul’s profound belief that all external evidences, -whether of human reasoning and philosophy or of visible miracle, fail -to carry conviction without the presence of certain corresponding -moral and spiritual dispositions in those to whom they are addressed. -“The word of the Cross,” the very same preaching, “is to those that -are perishing foolishness, but to us that are being saved the power -of God.” And the external, taken alone, can so little convince, that -even the seeking after the external, without requisite dispositions, -will but get us further away from its hidden function and meaning. “The -Jews ask for signs (miracles), and the Greeks seek wisdom (philosophy); -but we preach Christ crucified, who is to the Jews a stumbling-block, -and to the Gentiles foolishness; but to those who are called, both -Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For -the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is -stronger than men.” And the cause of this difference of interpretation -is shown to lie in the various interior dispositions of the hearers: -“The animal man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for -they are foolishness to him, and he is incapable of understanding -them, because they are spiritually discerned; but the spiritual man -discerneth all things.”[18] - -And yet this mystery of religion has to be externally offered, to be -preached to us, and is preached to all men; it is intended by God to -be known by all, and hence it is He who stimulates men to external -preaching and external hearing, as to one of the pre-requisites of its -acceptance: “The mystery which was hidden from the ages has now been -made manifest”; he desires the Colossians to be strengthened in “the -knowledge of the mystery of God and Christ”; and has to “speak the -mystery of the Christ,” to “make it manifest.”[19] - -And since this preaching, to be effective, absolutely requires, as -we have seen, interior dispositions and interior illumination of the -hearers, and since these things are different in different men, the -degrees of initiation into this identical mystery are to be carefully -adapted to the interior state of those addressed. “We preach wisdom -amongst the perfect τέλειοι,” the technical term in the heathen Greek -Mysteries for those who had received the higher grades of initiation. -“I was not able to speak unto you as unto spiritual men, but (only) as -unto fleshly ones, as unto infants in Christ. I have fed you with milk, -not strong food, for you were not yet able.”[20] - -And since all good, hence also the external preaching, comes from God, -still more must this all-important interior apprehension of it come -from Him. In a certain real sense the Spirit is thus organ as well as -object of this interior light. “God has revealed unto us the wisdom of -God through the Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, even the -deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, unless -the spirit of man that is in him? even so no man knoweth the things of -God, except the Spirit of God.”[21] - -But further, the mystery revealed in a unique degree and form in -Christ’s life, is really a universal spiritual-human law; the law of -suffering and sacrifice, as the one way to joy and possession, which -has existed, though veiled till now, since the foundation of the world. -“The mystery of Christ, which in former generations was not made -manifest unto the sons of men, but has now been revealed to His holy -apostles and prophets in the spirit.” And this law, which is Christ’s -life, must reappear in the life of each one of us. “We have been -buried together with Him through Baptism unto death, in order that, as -Christ rose again from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we -also may walk in the newness of life”; “We know that our old man has -been crucified together with Him. But if we have died with Christ, we -believe that we shall live with Him”; “If the Spirit who raised Jesus -from the dead dwelleth in you, He who raised Jesus from the dead will -quicken your mortal bodies through His Spirit dwelling within you.”[22] - -Christ’s life can be thus the very law of all life, because “He is -the first-born of all creation, for in Him all things were created -in heaven and on earth,” “all things were created through Him”; “and -He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together”; “all -things are summed up in Christ”; “Christ is all in all.” So that in -the past, before His visible coming, the Jews in the desert “drank -from the spiritual rock which followed them, and the rock was Christ.” -And as He Himself is the perfect image of God, so all things are, in -varying degrees, created in the image of Christ: “(Christ) who is the -image of the living God”; “all things were created unto Him.” And -since man is, in his original and potential essence, in a very special -sense “the image and glory of God,” his perfecting will consist in a -painful reconquest and development of this obscured and but potential -essence, by becoming, as far as may be, another Christ, and living -through the successive stages of Christ’s earthly life. We are bidden -“all attain unto a full-grown man, unto the measure of the stature of -the fulness of Christ,” so that, in the end, we may be able to say -with the Apostle himself: “I live no more in myself, but Christ lives -in me”; a consummation which appears so possible to St. Paul’s mind, -that he eagerly, painfully longs for it: “My children, with whom I am -again in travail, until Christ be formed in you.” And indeed “we all, -with unveiled face reflecting as a mirror the glory of the Lord, are -transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the -Lord, the Spirit.”[23] - -We have then in St. Paul not only a deeply mystical element, but -mysticism of the noblest, indeed the most daringly speculative, -world-embracing type. - - -5. _The “Joannine” group: its characteristic truths._ - -And finally the Joannine group furnishes us with an instance, as -strong as is conceivable within the wide pale of a healthy Christian -spirit, of the predominance of an interior and intuitive, mystical, -universalistic, spiritual and symbolic apprehension and interpretation -both of external fact and of explicit reasoning. - -The Visible and Historical is indeed emphasized, with a full -consciousness of the contrasting Gnostic error, in the culminating -sentence of the solemn Prologue of the Gospel, “And the Word was made -Flesh and tabernacled amongst us, and we saw His glory,” and in the -equally emphatic opening sentence of the First Epistle: “That which -was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our -eyes, what we have beholden, and our hands have handled, … we announce -unto you.” Hence too the Historical, Temporal Last Judgment, with its -corporal resurrection, remains as certainly retained in this Gospel as -in St. Matthew: “The hour cometh in which all those that are in the -monuments shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and those that have -done good shall come forth unto the resurrection of life, but those -that have worked evil, unto the resurrection of judgment.”[24] - -And Reasoning of a peculiarly continuous, rhythmically recurrent -pattern, is as present and influential everywhere, as it is difficult -to describe or even to trace. For it is here but the instrument and -reflex of certain Mystical conceptions and doctrines, of a tendency -to see, in everything particular and temporal, the Universal and -Eternal; to apprehend Unity, a changeless Here and Now, in all -multiplicity and succession, and hence to suppress explicit reasoning -and clear distinctions, movement, growth, and change, as much as may -be, both in the method of presentation and in the facts presented. If -the Synoptists give us the successive, and write, unconsciously but -specially, under the category of Time: the Fourth Gospel consciously -presents us with simultaneity, and works specially under the category -of Space. - -The Successive is here conceived as but the appearance of the -Simultaneous, of the Eternal and Abiding. Hence the historical -development in the earthly experiences, teachings, and successes of -Christ is ignored: His Godhead, that which _is_, stands revealed -from the first in the appearances of His earthly life. Hence too the -various souls of other men are presented to us as far as possible under -one eternal and changeless aspect; they are types of various abiding -virtues and iniquities, rather than concrete, composite mortals. - -God appears here specially as Light, as Love, and as Spirit. Yet these -largely thing-like attributions co-exist with personal qualities, and -with real, ethical relations between God and the world: “God so loved -the world, as that He gave His only begotten Son, in order that anyone -who believeth in Him may not perish, but may have everlasting life.” -The Father “draws” men, and “sends” His Son into the world.[25] - -And this Son has eternally pre-existed with the Father; is the very -instrument and principle of the world’s creation; and “is the true -Light that enlightened every man that cometh into the world.” And this -Word which, from the first, was already the Light of all men, became -Flesh specially to manifest fully this its Life and Light. Indeed He is -the only Light, and Way, and Truth, and Life; the only Door; the Living -Bread; the true Vine.[26] - -This Revelation and Salvation is indeed assimilated by individual souls -and is received by them at a given moment, by a birth both new and from -above, and is followed by a new knowledge. But this knowledge is not -absolute nor unprogressive. Everywhere the Evangelist has indeed the -verb γιγνώσκω, but nowhere the noun Gnosis; and the full meaning of the -Revelation of the Father by the Son is to be only gradually revealed -by the Holy Spirit. And this special new knowledge is not the cause -but the effect of an ethical act on the part of the human soul,--an -act of full trust in the persons of God and of His Christ, and in the -intimations of the moral conscience as reflections of the divine will -and nature. “If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the -doctrine, whether it be from God, or whether I speak from myself”; “He -who doeth the truth, cometh to the light.”[27] - -And this trust, and the experimental knowledge which flows from it, -lead to an interior conviction so strong as to make us practically -independent of external evidences. Hence in the First Epistle, this -“we _know_” is repeatedly emphasized: “We _know_, that, if He shall -be manifested, we shall be like Him”; “You _know_, that He was made -manifest, that He might take away sins.” And this knowledge is -communicated by the Spirit of God to man’s soul; the spirit bearing -witness, there within, to the truth of Christ’s words, communicated -from without. “The Spirit it is that beareth witness, for the Spirit -is the Truth.”[28] - -External signs (miracles), and a certain un-ethical assent given to -them and their implications, these things are, even at their best, -but preliminary, and, of themselves, insufficient. Hence Our Lord can -find “many who believed in His name, seeing His signs (miracles) which -He did”; and yet could “not trust Himself to them.” Nicodemus indeed -can come to Our Lord, moved by the argument that “thou hast come a -teacher from God, for no man can do the signs (miracles) that thou -doest, unless God be with him.” But then Our Lord’s whole conversation -with him renders clear how imperfect and ignorant Nicodemus is so -far,--he had come by night, his soul was still in darkness. So also -“many Samaritans believed in Him, because of His sign,”--His miraculous -knowledge of her past history, shown to the Woman at the Well; but more -of them believed because of His own words to them: “We ourselves have -(now) heard, and we _know_ that this man is of a truth the Saviour of -the world.” Hence He can Himself bid the Apostles, in intimation of -their full and final privilege and duty, “believe in Me” (that is, My -words and the Spirit testifying within you to their Truth), “that I -am in the Father, and the Father is in Me”; and, only secondarily and -failing that fulness, “but if not, then believe, because of the very -works.” And the whole Joannine doctrine as to the object and method of -Faith is dramatically presented and summed up in the great culminating -scene and saying of the Fourth Gospel: “Thomas” (the Apostle who -would see a visible sign first, and would then build his Faith upon -that sight) “saith to Him: ‘My Lord and my God.’ Jesus saith to him: -‘Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed; blessed are -they that have not seen, and have believed.’”[29] - -And this Faith and Knowledge arising thus, in its fulness, at most only -on occasion, and never because, of spacial and temporal signs, are -conceived as a timeless, Eternal Life, and as one which is already, -here and now, an actual present possession. “He who believeth in the -Son, hath eternal life”; “He who heareth and believeth My word, hath -eternal life”; “We know that we have passed from death unto life”; -“We know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, in His Son -Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.”[30] There is then -a profound immanence of Christ in the believing soul, and of such a -soul in Christ; and this mutual immanence bears some likeness to the -Immanence of the Father in Christ, and of Christ in the Father. “In -that day” (when “the Father shall give you the Spirit of Truth”) “ye -shall know that I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I in you.”[31] - - -III. SCIENCE: THE APPREHENSION AND CONCEPTION OF BRUTE FACT AND IRON -LAW. - -But now, athwart both the Hellenic and the Christian factors of our -lives, the first apparently so clear and complete and beautiful, -the latter, if largely dark and fragmentary, so deep and operative, -comes and cuts a third and last factor, that of Science, apparently -more peremptory and irresistible than either of its predecessors.[32] -For both the former factors would appear to melt into mid-air before -this last one. _They_ evidently cannot ignore _it_; _it_ apparently -can ignore _them_. If Metaphysics and Religion seem involved in a -perpetual round of interminable questions, solved, at most and at -best, for but this man and for that, and with an evidence for their -truth which can be and is gainsaid by many, but cannot be demonstrated -with a peremptory clearness to any one: Science, on the other hand, -would appear to give us just this _terra firma_ of an easy, immediate, -undeniable, continually growing, patently fruitful body of evidence and -of fact. - -And not only can Metaphysics and Religion not ignore Science, in -the sense of denying or even overlooking its existence; they cannot -apparently, either of them, even begin or proceed or end without -constant reference, here frank and open, there tacit but none the -less potent, to the enterprises, the methods, the conclusions of the -Sciences one and all, and this even in view of establishing their own -contentions. And more and more of the territory formerly assigned to -Metaphysics or Religion seems in process of being conquered by Science: -in Metaphysics, by experimental psychology, and by the simple history -of the various philosophical systems, ideas, and technical terms, -and of the local and temporal, racial and cultural antecedents and -environments which gave rise to them; in Religion, by an analogous -observation and study of man in the past and present, of man studied -from within and from without. - - -1. _Three characteristics of this scientific spirit._ - -Now this scientific spirit has hitherto, since its birth at the -Renaissance, ever tended to the ever-increasing development of three -main characteristics, which are indeed but several aspects of one -single aim and end. There was and is, for one thing, the passion -for Clearness, which finds its expression in the application of -Mathematics and of the Quantitative view and standard to all and every -subject-matter, in so far as the latter is conceived as being truly -knowable at all. There was and is, for another, the great concept -of Law, of an iron Necessity running through and expressing itself -in all things, one great Determinism, before which all emotion and -volition, all concepts of Spontaneity and Liberty, of Personality -and Spirit, either Human or Divine, melt away, as so many petty -subjective wilfulnesses of selfish, childish, “provincial” man, bent -on fantastically humanizing this great, cold thing, the Universe, into -something responsive to his own profoundly unimportant and objectively -uninteresting sensations and demands. There was and is, for a third -thing, a vigorous Monism, both in the means and in the end of this -view. Our sources of information are _but one_,--the reasoning, -reckoning Intellect, backed up by readily repeatable, directly -verifiable Experiment. The resultant information is _but one_,--the -Universe within and without, a strict unbroken Mechanism. - -If we look at the most characteristically modern elements of Descartes, -and, above all, of Spinoza, we cannot fail to find throughout, as -the reaction of this Scientific spirit upon Philosophy, the passion -for those three things: for Clearness and ready Transferableness of -ideas; for one universal, undeniable Common Element and Measure for -all knowledge of every degree and kind; and for Law, omnipresent and -inexorable. That is, we have here a passion for Thing as over against, -as above, Person; for the elimination of all wilfulness, even at the -cost of will itself, of all indetermination, obscurity and chance, even -at the cost of starving and drying up whole regions of our complex -nature, whole sources of information, and of violently simplifying and -impoverishing the outlook on to reality both within us and without. - - - -2. _Fundamental motive of entire quest, deeply legitimate, indeed -religious: Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant._ - -And yet how unjust would he be who failed to recognize, in the case of -Spinoza especially, the noble, and at bottom deeply religious, motives -and aspirations underlying such excesses; or the new problems and -necessities, the permanent growth and gain, which this long process of -human thought has brought to Religion itself, especially in indirect -and unintentional ways! - -For as to the motives, it ought not to be difficult to any one who -knows human history and human nature, to see how the all but complete -estrangement from Nature and Physical Fact which, from Socrates -onwards, with the but very partial exception of Aristotle, had, for -well-nigh two thousand years, preceded this reaction; how the treatment -of Matter and the Visible as more or less synonymous with Non-Being and -Irrationality, as a veil or even a wall, as a mere accident or even -a positive snare, lying everywhere between us and Reality, could not -fail to require and produce a swing of the pendulum in the opposite -direction. And the feeling and the perception of how superficial and -unreal, how oppressively confined, how intolerably fixed and ultimate, -how arrogant and cold and fruitless, such persistent neglect of the -Data of Sense had somehow, at last, rendered philosophy, gave now -polemical edge to men’s zealous study and discovery of _this_ world. -This study was perceived, even by the shallower thinkers, to be fair -and rational and fruitful in itself; and it was found, by some few -deep spirits, to be a strangely potent means of purifying, enlarging, -“deprovincializing” man himself. The severe discipline of a rigorous -study of man’s lowly, physical conditions and environment, things -hitherto so despised by him, was now at last to purify him of his own -childish immediacy of claim. The pettily selfish, shouting Individual -was to pass through the broad, still, purgatorial waters of a temporary -submergence under the conceptions, as vivid as though they were direct -experiences, of ruthless Law, of Mechanism, of the Thing; so as to pass -out, purified and enlarged, a Person, expressive of the Universal and -Objective, of Order and of Law. - -It is especially in Spinoza that this deeper, universally human and -ethical, indeed we can say religious, implication and ideal of the -rigorously scientific spirit is present in all its noble intuition -and aspiration, and that at the same time, alas, this deep truth is -forced into a ruinously inappropriate method and formulation. For the -original end of the entire quest, an end which is still emotionally -dominant and which furnishes the hidden dialectic of the whole,--Man, -his nobility and interior purification and beatitude,--has here, -intellectually, become but a means; Man, in the real logic of this -system, is, hopelessly and finally, but a wheel in the huge mechanism -of that _natura naturata_ which Spinoza’s own richness and nobility of -character transcends with potent inconsistency. And this very system, -which is so nobly human and Christian in its ethical tone and in its -demand of a Conversion of the whole man, in its requiring man to -lose and sacrifice his petty self that he may gain his true self and -become a genuine constituent of the Universe and Thought of God, is -also the very one which, by its ruthless Naturalism and Determinism of -Doctrine and its universally Mathematical and Quantitative form and -method, logically eliminates all such qualitative differentiation and -conversion as impossible and futile. - -The prima facie view of life as it presents itself to the clarifying, -Scientific Intellect, namely the omnipresence of the determinist -mechanism, has never been more impressively felt and pictured than by -Spinoza; the dispositions and happiness of the purified, disinterested -soul have rarely been experienced and described with more touching -elevation and power. But there is no real transition, indeed no -possibility of such, in his system, from that first aspect to this -latter state; for that first aspect, that apparent determinism, is for -his logic _not_ merely apparent or secondary, but the very truth of -truths, the very core and end of things. - -And this bondage of mind to matter, this enslavement of the master to -the servant, this narrow, doctrinaire intellectualism and determinism, -is more hidden than cured in Leibniz, who, if he brings the immense -improvement because enrichment of a keen sense and love of the -Historical, loses, on the other hand, Spinoza’s grandly Conversional -tone and temper. A cheerful, easy, eminently sane but quite inadequate -bustle of manifold interests; a ready, pleasant optimism; an endless -laboriousness of the reasoning faculty; all this, even though carried -out on a scale unique since the days of Aristotle, is necessarily -unequal to face and bear “the burthen of all this unintelligible -world.” - -And yet here, in him who may not unfitly be called the last of the -Dogmatic Rationalists and Optimists, we have already those great -perceptions which were destined more and more to burst the bonds of -this cold, clear, complete, confining outlook. For one thing, as -already stated, there is, alongside the love of the Material and -Mathematical, an almost equal love of the Historical and Human. There -is, for another thing, the deep consciousness of the Individuality -and Interiority of all real existences,--all that _is_ at all, has -an inside to it. And, finally, in further enforcement of this latter -doctrine, there is the fruitful conception of Subconscious States of -feeling and of mind in all living things. - -Yet it is only in Kant that,--with all his obscurities and numberless -demonstrable inconsistencies, with all his saddening impoverishment -of the outlook in many ways,--we get, little conscious as he himself -is of such a service, the deep modern explanation of the ancient -pre-scientific neglect and suspicion of natural research. Here we are -led to see that the strictly Scientific view of Nature is necessarily -quantitative, but that the strictly Ethical, Spiritual view of man is -as necessarily qualitative; that the analysis of all natural phenomena -but leads to judgments as to what _is_, whereas the requirements of -human action lead to judgments of what _ought to be_. Here the weak -point lies in the contrast, established by him and pushed to the degree -of mutual exclusion, between Reason and Will. For the contrast which we -find in actual life is really between the deeper reason, ever closely -accompanied by deep emotion, this reason and emotion occasioning, and -strengthened by, the action of the whole man,--and all this is not -directly transferable; and the more superficial reasoning, having with -it little or no emotion,--the action of but one human faculty,--and -this action is readily transferable. - - -3. _Place and function of such science in the totality of man’s life._ - -The mistake in the past would thus lie, not in the doctrine that the -Visible cannot suffice for man and is not his mind’s true home; nor in -the implication that the Visible cannot directly and of itself reveal -to him the Spiritual world. The error would lie entirely in the double -implication or doctrine, that there is really nothing to be known about -Nature, or that what can be known of it can be attained by Metaphysical -or Mystical methods; and again that strictly quantitative, severe -scientific method and investigation can, even in the long run, be -safely neglected by the human soul, as far as its own spiritual health -is concerned. - -We take it then that mankind has, after endless testings and -experiences, reached the following conclusions. We encounter -everywhere, both within us and without, both in the physical and -mental world, in the first instance, a whole network of phenomena; -and these phenomena are everywhere found to fall under certain laws, -and to be penetrable by certain methods of research, these laws and -methods varying indeed in character and definiteness according to the -subject-matter to which they apply, but in each case affording to man -simply indefinite scope for discovery without, and for self-discipline -within. - -And all this preliminary work and knowledge does not directly require -religion nor does it directly lead to it; indeed we shall spoil both -the knowledge itself, and its effect upon our souls and upon religion, -if religion is here directly introduced. The phenomena of Astronomy and -Geology, of Botany and Zoology, of human Physiology and Psychology, of -Philology and History are and ought to be, in the first instance, the -same for all men, whether the said men do or do not eventually give -them a _raison d’être_ and formal rational interest by discovering the -metaphysical and religious convictions and conclusions which underlie -and alone give true unity to them and furnish a living link between the -mind observing and the things observed. Various as are these phenomena, -according to the department of human knowledge to which they severally -belong, yet they each and all have to be, in the first instance, -discovered and treated according to principles and methods immanent and -special to that department. - -And the more rigorously this is accomplished, both by carrying -out these principles and methods to their fullest extent, and by -conscientiously respecting their limits of applicability and their -precise degree of truth and of range in the larger scheme of human -activity and conviction, the more will such science achieve three -deeply ethical, spiritually helpful results. - -Such science will help to discipline, humble, purify the natural -eagerness and wilfulness, the cruder forms of anthropomorphism, of the -human mind and heart. This turning to the visible will thus largely -take the place of that former turning away from it; for only since the -Visible has been taken to represent laws, and, provisionally at least, -rigorously mechanical laws characteristic of itself, can it be thus -looked upon as a means of spiritual purification. - -Such science again will help to stimulate those other, deeper -activities of human nature, which have made possible, and have all -along preceded and accompanied, these more superficial ones; and this, -although such science will doubtless tend to do the very opposite, if -the whole nature be allowed to become exclusively engrossed in this -one phenomenal direction. Still it remains true that perhaps never has -man turned to the living God more happily and humbly, than when coming -straight away from such rigorous, disinterested phenomenal analysis, as -long as such analysis is felt to be both other than, and preliminary -and secondary to, the deepest depths of the soul’s life and of all -ultimate Reality. - -And finally, such science will correspondingly help to give depth and -mystery, drama and pathos, a rich spirituality, to the whole experience -and conception of the soul and of life, of the world and of God. -Instead of a more or less abstract picture, where all is much on the -same plane, where all is either fixed and frozen, or all is in a state -of feverish flux, we get an outlook, with foreground, middle distances, -and background, each contrasting with, each partially obscuring, -partially revealing, the other; but each doing so, with any freshness -and fulness, only in and through the strongly willing, the fully active -and gladly suffering, the praying, aspiring, and energizing spiritual -Personality, which thus both gives and gets its own true self ever more -entirely and more deeply. - - -4. _Science to be taken, throughout our life, in a double sense and -way._ - -In such a conception of the place of Science, we have permanently -to take Science, throughout life, in a double sense and way. In the -first instance, Science is self-sufficing, its own end and its own -law. In the second instance, which alone is ever final, Science is -but a part of a whole, but a function, a necessary yet preliminary -function, of the whole of man; and it is but part, a necessary yet -preliminary part, of his outlook. Crush out, or in any way mutilate or -deautonomize, this part, and all the rest will suffer. Sacrifice the -rest to this part, either by starvation or attempted suppression, or by -an impatient assimilation of this immense remainder to that smaller and -more superficial part, and the whole man suffers again, and much more -seriously. - -And the danger, in both directions,--let us have the frankness to admit -the fact,--is constant and profound: even to see it continuously is -difficult; to guard against it with effect, most difficult indeed. -For to starve or to suspect, to cramp or to crush this phenomenal -apprehension and investigation, in the supposed interest of the -ulterior truths, must ever be a besetting temptation and weakness for -the religious instinct, wherever this instinct is strong and fixed, and -has not yet itself been put in the way of purification. - -For Religion is ever, _qua_ religion, authoritative and absolute. What -constitutes religion is not simply to hold a view and to try and live -a life, with respect to the Unseen and the Deity, as possibly or even -certainly beautiful or true or good: but precisely that which is over -and above this,--the holding this view and this life to proceed somehow -from God Himself, so as to bind my innermost mind and conscience to -unhesitating assent. Not simply that I think it, but that, in addition, -I feel bound to think it, transforms a thought about God into a -religious act. - -Now this at once brings with it a double and most difficult problem. -For Religion thus becomes, by its very genius and in exact proportion -to its reality, something so entirely _sui generis_, so claimful -and supreme, that it at once exacts a two-fold submission, the one -simultaneous, the other successive; the first as it were in space, the -second in time. The first regards the relations of religion to things -non-religious. It might be parodied by saying: “Since religion is -true and supreme, religion is all we require: all things else must be -bent or broken to her sway.” She has at the very least the right to a -primacy not of honour only, but of direct jurisdiction, over and within -all activities and things. The second regards the form and concept of -religion itself. Since religion always appears both in a particular -form at a particular time and place, _and_ as divine and hence -authoritative and eternal; and since the very strength and passion of -religion depend upon the vigorous presence and close union of these two -elements: religion will ever tend either really to oppose all change -within itself, or else to explain away its existence. Religion would -thus appear doomed to be either vague and inoperative, or obscurantist -and insincere. - -And it is equally clear that the other parts of man’s nature and of his -outlook cannot simply accept such a claim, nor could religion itself -flourish at all if they could and did accept it. They cannot accept -the claim of religion to be immediately and simply all, for they are -fully aware of being themselves something also. They cannot accept her -claim to dictate to them their own domestic laws, for they are fully -aware that they each, to live truly at all, require their own laws -and their own, at least relative, autonomy. However much man may be -supremely and finally a religious animal, he is not _only_ that; but -he is a physical and sexual, a fighting and artistic, a domestic and -social, a political and philosophical animal as well. - -Nor can man, even simply _qua_ religious man, consent to a simple -finality in the experience and explication, in the apprehension and -application of religion, either in looking back into the past; or -in believing and loving, suffering and acting in the present; or in -forecasting the future, either of the race or of himself alone. For the -_here and now_, the concrete “immediacy,” the unique individuality of -the religious experience for _me_, in this room, on this very day, its -freshness, is as true and necessary a quality of living religion as any -other whatsoever. And if all life sustains itself only by constant, -costing renovation and adaptation of itself to its environment, the -religious life, as the most intense and extensive of all lives, must -somehow be richest in such newness in oldness, such renovative, -adaptive, assimilative power. - - -5. _All this seen at work in man’s actual history._ - -Now it is deeply instructive to observe all this at work historically. -For here we find every variety of attitude towards this very point. -There are men of Religion who attempt to do without Science, and -men of Science who attempt to do without Religion. Or again, men of -Religion attempt to _level up_,--to assimilate the principles and -results of the various sciences directly to religion, or at least to -rule those scientific principles and results directly by religion. -Or men of Science attempt to _level down_, to make religion into a -mere philosophy or even a natural history. Yet we find also,--with -so persistent a recurrence in all manner of places and times, as -itself to suggest the inherent, essential, indestructible truth of the -view,--another, a far more costing attitude. This attitude refuses -all mutilation either of normal human nature or of its outlook, all -oppression of one part by the other; for it discovers that these -various levels of life have been actually practised in conjunction by -many an individual in the past and in the present; and that, where they -have been practised within a large organization of faith and love, -they have ever led to a fuller reality and helpfulness both of the -science and of the religion concerned. Hence the mind thus informed -cannot doubt the truth of this solution, however difficult at all times -may be its practice, and however little final at any time can be its -detailed intellectual analysis. - - -IV. SUMMING UP: HELLENISM OR HARMONIZATION, CHRISTIANITY OR SPIRITUAL -EXPERIENCE, AND SCIENCE OR ACCEPTANCE OF A PRELIMINARY MECHANISM, ALL -THREE NECESSARY TO MAN. - -To sum up all this first chapter, we have got so far as this. We have -seen that humanity has, so far, found and worked out three forces and -conceptions of life, forces which are still variously operative in each -of us, but which find their harmonious interaction in but few men, -their full theoretical systematization in none.[33] - -There is the ancient, Greek contribution, chiefly intellectual and -aesthetic, mostly cold and clear, quick and conclusive, with, upon -the whole, but a slight apprehension of personality and freedom, of -conscience and of sin, and little or no sense of the difference and -antagonism between these realities and simply Mathematical, Mechanical -laws and concepts. It is a view profoundly abstract, and, at bottom, -determinist: the will follows the intellect necessarily, in exact -proportion to the clearness of information of the former. And the -strength of this view, which was possible even to that gifted race -just because of the restrictedness of its knowledge concerning the -length and breadth of nature and of history, and still more with regard -to the depths of the human character and conscience, consists in its -freshness, completeness, and unity. And this ideal of an ultimate -harmonization of our entire life and of its theory we must never lose, -more and more difficult though its even approximate realization has of -necessity become. - -There is next the middle, Christian contribution, directly moral and -religious, deep and dim and tender, slow and far-reaching, immensely -costly, infinitely strong; with its discovery and exemplification of -the mysterious depth and range and complexity of human personality -and freedom, of conscience and of sin; a view profoundly concrete -and at bottom libertarian. The goodwill here first precedes, and then -outstrips, and determines the information supplied by the intellect: -“Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God.” And the -strength of this position consists in its being primarily not a view, -but a life, a spiritual, religious life, requiring, implying, indeed -proclaiming, definite doctrines concerning God and man, and their -relations to each other, but never exhausted by these doctrines even -in their collectivity, inexhaustible though these in their turn are by -their union with the life of the spirit, their origin and end. - -There is finally the modern, Scientific contribution, intensely -impersonal and determinist, directly neither metaphysical nor -religious, but more abstract even than the Greek view, in the -mathematical constituent of its method, and more concrete in a sense -than Christianity itself, in the other, the sensible-experiment -constituent of its method. The most undeniable of abstractions, those -of mathematics, (undeniable just because of their enunciation of -nothing but certain simplest relations between objects, supposing -those objects to exist,) are here applied to the most undeniable of -concretions, the direct experiences of the senses. And this mysterious -union which, on the surface, is so utterly heterogeneous, is itself -at all explicable only on mental, metaphysical assumptions and on the -admission of the reality and priority of Mind. It is a union that has -turned out as unassailable in its own province, as it is incapable -of suppressing or replacing the wider and deeper truths and lives -discovered for us respectively by Hellenism and Christianity. - -Only in the case that man could but reckon mathematically and observe -with his senses, or in the case that man were indeed provided with -other faculties, but that he found Reality outside him and within him -to be properly apprehensible by the mathematico-experimental process -alone, could there be any serious question of such a final suppression -of by far the greater and deeper portion of himself. Instead of any -such deadlock the facts of these last four centuries bear out the -contention that neither can the religious life suppress or do without -the philosophical and the scientific, nor can either of these other two -lives suppress or permanently do without its fellow or without religion. - -But all this and its detailed practical application will, I trust, -become much clearer as we proceed. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE THREE ELEMENTS OF RELIGION - - -INTRODUCTORY. - -We have found then that all life and all truth are, for all their -unity, deeply complex, for us men at all events; indeed that they -are both in exact proportion to their reality. In this, our second -chapter, I should like to show the complexity special to the deepest -kind of life, to Religion; and to attempt some description of the -working harmonization of this complexity. If Religion turned out to -be simple, in the sense of being a monotone, a mere oneness, a whole -without parts, it could not be true; and yet if Religion be left too -much a mere multiplicity, a mere congeries of parts without a whole, it -cannot be persuasive and fully operative. And the several constituents -are there, whether we harbour, recognize, and discipline them or not; -but these constituents will but hinder or supplant each other, in -proportion as they are not somehow each recognized in their proper -place and rank, and are not each allowed and required to supplement -and to stimulate the other. And though no amount of talk or theory -can, otherwise than harmfully, take the place of life, yet observation -and reflection can help us to see where and how life acts: what are -the causes, or at least the concomitants, of its inhibition and of -its stimulation and propagation, and can thus supply us with aids to -action, which action will then, in its turn, help to give experimental -fulness and precision to what otherwise remains a more or less vague -and empty scheme. - - -I. THE THREE ELEMENTS, AS THEY SUCCESSIVELY APPEAR IN THE CHILD, THE -YOUTH, AND THE ADULT MAN. - -Now if we will but look back upon our own religious life, we shall -find that, in degrees and in part in an order of succession varying -indefinitely with each individual, three modalities, three modes of -apprehension and forms of appeal and of outlook, have been and are at -work within us and around.[34] - - -1. _Sense and Memory, the Child’s means of apprehending Religion._ - -In the doubtless overwhelming majority of cases, there came first, -as far as we can reconstruct the history of our consciousness, the -appeal to our infant senses of some external religious symbol or place, -some picture or statue, some cross or book, some movement of some -attendant’s hands and eyes. And this appeal would generally have been -externally interpreted to us by some particular men or women, a Mother, -Nurse, Father, Teacher, Cleric, who themselves would generally have -belonged to some more or less well-defined traditional, institutional -religion. And their appeal would be through my senses to my imaginative -faculty first, and then to my memory of that first appeal, and would -represent the principle of authority in its simplest form. - -All here as yet works quasi-automatically. The little child gets -these impressions long before itself can choose between, or even is -distinctly conscious of them; it believes whatever it sees and is told, -equally, as so much fact, as something to build on. If you will, it -believes these things to be true, but not in the sense of contrasting -them with error; the very possibility of the latter has not yet come -into sight. And at this stage the External, Authoritative, Historical, -Traditional, Institutional side and function of Religion are everywhere -evident. Cases like that of John Stuart Mill, of being left outside of -all religious tradition, we may safely say, will ever remain exceptions -to help prove the rule. The five senses then, perhaps that of touch -first, and certainly that of sight most; the picturing and associative -powers of the imagination; and the retentiveness of the memory, are -the side of human nature specially called forth. And the external, -sensible, readily picturable facts and the picturing functions of -religion correspond to and feed this side, as readily as does the -mother’s milk correspond to and feed that same mother’s infant. -Religion is here, above all, a Fact and Thing. - - - -2. _Question and Argument, the Youth’s mode of approaching Religion._ - -But soon there wakes up another activity and requirement of human -nature, and another side of religion comes forth to meet it. Direct -experience, for one thing, brings home to the child that these -sense-informations are not always trustworthy, or identical in its own -case and in that of others. And, again, the very impressiveness of this -external religion stimulates indeed the sense of awe and of wonder, but -it awakens curiosity as well. The time of trustful questioning, but -still of questioning, first others, then oneself, has come. The old -impressions get now more and more consciously sought out, and selected -from among other conflicting ones; the facts seem to clamour for -reasons to back them, against the other hostile facts and appearances, -or at least against those men in books, if not in life, who dare to -question or reject them. Affirmation is beginning to be consciously -exclusive of its contrary: I begin to feel that _I_ hold _this_, and -that _you_ hold _that_; and that I cannot do both; and that I do the -former, and exclude and refuse the latter. - -Here it is the reasoning, argumentative, abstractive side of human -nature that begins to come into play. Facts have now in my mind to -be related, to be bound to other facts, and men to men; the facts -themselves begin to stand for ideas or to have the latter in them -or behind them. The measuring-rod seems to be over all things. And -religion answers this demand by clear and systematic arguments and -concatenations: this and this is now connected with that and that; this -is true or this need not be false, because of that and that. Religion -here becomes Thought, System, a Philosophy. - - -3. _Intuition, Feeling, and Volitional requirements and evidences, the -Mature Man’s special approaches to Faith._ - -But yet a final activity of human nature has to come to its fullest, -and to meet its response in a third side of Religion. For if in -Physiology and Psychology all action whatsoever is found to begin with -a sense-impression, to move through the central process of reflection, -and to end in the final discharge of will and of action, the same final -stage can be found in the religious life. Certain interior experiences, -certain deep-seated spiritual pleasures and pains, weaknesses and -powers, helps and hindrances, are increasingly known and felt in and -through interior and exterior action, and interior suffering, effort, -and growth. For man is necessarily a creature of action, even more -than of sensation and of reflection; and in this action of part of -himself against other parts, of himself with or against other men, -with or against this or that external fact or condition, he grows and -gradually comes to his real self, and gains certain experiences as to -the existence and nature and growth of this his own deeper personality. - -Man’s emotional and volitional, his ethical and spiritual powers, are -now in ever fuller motion, and they are met and fed by the third side -of religion, the Experimental and Mystical. Here religion is rather -felt than seen or reasoned about, is loved and lived rather than -analyzed, is action and power, rather than either external fact or -intellectual verification. - - -II. EACH ELEMENT EVER ACCOMPANIED BY SOME AMOUNT OF THE OTHER TWO. -DIFFICULTY OF THE TRANSITIONS FROM ONE STAGE TO THE OTHER. - -Now these three sides of the human character, and corresponding three -elements of Religion, are never, any one of them, without a trace -or rudiment of the other two; and this joint presence of three such -disparate elements ever involves tension, of a fruitful or dangerous -kind.[35] - - -1. _Utility of this joint presence._ - -In the living human being indeed there never exists a mere apprehension -of something external and sensible, without any interior elaboration, -any interpretation by the head and heart. We can hardly allow, we -can certainly in nowise picture to ourselves, even an infant of a -few hours old, as working, and being worked upon, by nothing beyond -these sense-perceptions alone. Already some mental, abstractive, -emotional-volitional reaction and interpretation is presumably at -work; and not many weeks or months pass before this is quite obviously -the case. And although, on the other hand, the impressions of the -senses, of the imagination and the memory are, normally, more numerous, -fresh, and lasting in early than in later years, yet up to the end -they continue to take in some new impressions, and keep up their most -necessary functions of supplying materials, stimulants, and tests to -the other powers of the soul. - -Thus, too, Religion is at all times more or less both traditional -and individual; both external and internal; both institutional, -rational, and volitional. It always answers more or less to the needs -of authority and society; of reason and proof; of interior sustenance -and purification. I believe because I am told, because it is true, -because it answers to my deepest interior experiences and needs. And, -everything else being equal, my faith will be at its richest and -deepest and strongest, in so far as all these three motives are most -fully and characteristically operative within me, at one and the same -time, and towards one and the same ultimate result and end. - - - -2. _The two crises of the soul, when it adds Speculation to -Institutionalism, and Mysticism to both._ - -Now all this is no fancy scheme, no petty or pretty artificial -arrangement: the danger and yet necessity of the presence of these -three forces, the conflicts and crises within and between them all, -in each human soul, and between various men and races that typify or -espouse one or the other force to the more or less complete exclusion -of the other, help to form the deepest history, the truest tragedy or -triumph of the secret life of every one of us. - -The transition from the child’s religion, so simply naïve and -unselfconscious, so tied to time and place and particular persons and -things, so predominantly traditional and historical, institutional and -external, to the right and normal type of a young man’s religion, is -as necessary as it is perilous. The transition is necessary. For all -the rest of him is growing,--body and soul are growing in clamorous -complexity in every direction: how then can the deepest part of his -nature, his religion, not require to grow and develop also? And how can -it permeate and purify all the rest, how can it remain and increasingly -become “the secret source of all his seeing,” of his productiveness and -courage and unification, unless it continually equals and exceeds all -other interests within the living man, by its own persistent vitality, -its rich and infinite variety, its subtle, ever-fresh attraction and -inexhaustible resourcefulness and power? But the crisis is perilous. -For he will be greatly tempted either to cling exclusively to his -existing, all but simply institutional, external position, and to fight -or elude all approaches to its reasoned, intellectual apprehension -and systematization; and in this case his religion will tend to -contract and shrivel up, and to become a something simply alongside -of other things in his life. Or he will feel strongly pressed to let -the individually intellectual simply supplant the institutional, in -which case his religion will grow hard and shallow, and will tend to -disappear altogether. In the former case he will, at best, assimilate -his religion to external law and order, to Economics and Politics; -in the latter case he will, at best, assimilate it to Science and -Philosophy. In the first case, he will tend to superstition; in the -second, to rationalism and indifference. - -But even if he passes well through this first crisis, and has thus -achieved the collaboration of these two religious forces, the external -and the intellectual, his religion will still be incomplete and -semi-operative, because still not reaching to what is deepest and -nearest to his will. A final transition, the addition of the third -force, that of the emotional-experimental life, must yet be safely -achieved. And this again is perilous: for the two other forces will, -even if single, still more if combined, tend to resist this third -force’s full share of influence to the uttermost. To the external -force this emotional power will tend to appear as akin to revolution; -to the intellectual side it will readily seem mere subjectivity and -sentimentality ever verging on delusion. And the emotional-experimental -force will, in its turn, be tempted to sweep aside both the external, -as so much oppressive ballast; and the intellectual, as so much -hair-splitting or rationalism. And if it succeeds, a shifting -subjectivity, and all but incurable tyranny of mood and fancy, will -result,--fanaticism is in full sight. - - -III. PARALLELS TO THIS TRIAD OF RELIGIOUS ELEMENTS. - -If we would find, applied to other matters, the actual operation and -co-operation, at the earliest stage of man’s life, of the identical -powers under discussion, we can find them, by a careful analysis of our -means and processes of knowledge, or of the stages of all reflex action. - - -1. _The three constituents of Knowledge._ - -Even the most elementary acquisition, indeed the very possibility, -of any and all certitude and knowledge, is dependent for us upon the -due collaboration of the three elements or forces of our nature, the -sensational, the rational, the ethico-mystical.[36] - -There is, first, in the order of our consciousness and in the degree of -its undeniableness, the element of our actual impressions, the flux of -our consciousness as it apprehends particular sights and sounds, smells -and tastes and touches; particular sensations of rest and movement, -pleasure and pain, memory, judgment, and volition, a flux, “changeless -in its ceaseless change.” We have so far found neither a true object -for thought, nor a subject which can think. And yet this element, -and this alone, is the simply, passively received, the absolutely -undeniable part of our experience,--we cannot deny it if we would. And -again, it is the absolutely necessary pre-requisite for our exercise or -acquisition, indeed for our very consciousness, of the other two means -or elements, without which there can be no real knowledge. - -For there is, next in the logical order of the analysis of our -consciousness and in the degree of its undeniableness, the element -of the various forms of necessary thought, in as much as these are -experienced by us as necessary. We can, with Aristotle, simply call -them the ten categories; or we can, with greater precision and -extension, group them, so far with Kant, under the two main heads -of the two pure “aesthetic” Perceptions of time and space, on the -one hand; and of the various “analytic” Forms of judgment and of the -Categories of Unity, Reality, Substance, Possibility, etc., on the -other hand. Now it can be shown that it is only by means of this whole -second element, only through the co-operation of these “perceptions” -and forms of thought, that any kind even of dim feeling of ordered -succession or of system, of unity or meaning, is found by our mind in -that first element. Only these two elements, found and taken together, -present us, in their interaction, with even the impression and -possibility of something to reason _about_, and something _wherewith_ -to reason. - -The second element then differs from the first in this, that whereas -the first presents its contents simply as actual and undeniable, yet -without so far any necessity or significance: the second presents its -contents as both actual and necessary. By means of the first element -I see a red rose, but without any feeling of more than the fact that a -rose, or at least this one, _is_ red; it might quite as well be yellow -or blue. By means of the second element, I think of a body of any kind, -not only as actually occupying some particular space and time, but as -_necessarily_ doing so; I feel that I _must_ so think of it. - -And yet there is a third and last element necessary to give real -value to the two previous ones. For only on the condition that I -am willing to trust these intimations of necessity, to believe -that these necessities of my subjective thought are objective as -well, and correspond to the necessities of Being, can I reach the -trans-subjective, can I have any real knowledge and experience of -anything whatsoever, either within me or without. The most elementary -experience, the humblest something to be granted as really existing -and as to be reasoned from, is thus invariably and inevitably composed -for me of three elements, of which only the first two are directly -experienced by me at all. And the third element, the ethico-mystical, -has to be there, I have to trust and endorse the intimations of -necessity furnished by the second element, if anything is to come of -the whole movement. - -Thus, here also, at the very source of all our certainty, of the worth -attributable to the least or greatest of our thoughts and feelings -and acts, we already find the three elements: indubitable sensation, -clear thought, warm faith in and through action. And thus life here -already consists of multiplicity in unity; and what in it is absolutely -indubitable, is of value only because it constitutes the indispensable -starting-point and stimulation for the apprehension and affirmation -of realities not directly experienced, not absolutely undeniable, but -which alone bear with them all the meaning, all the richness, all the -reality and worth of life. - - - -2. _The three links in the chain of Reflex Action._ - -We can also find this same triad, perhaps more simply, if we look -to Psychology, and that most assured and most far-reaching of all -its results, the fact and analysis of Reflex Action. For we find -here that all the activities of specifically human life begin with a -sense-impression, as the first, the one simply _given_ element; that -they move into and through a central process of mental abstraction and -reflection, as the second element, contributed by the mind itself; and -that they end, as the third element, in the discharge of will and of -action, in an act of free affirmation, expansion, and love. - -In this endless chain composed of these groups of three links each, -the first link and the last link are obscure and mysterious: the -first, as coming from without us, and as still below our own thought; -the third, as going out from us, and seen by us only in its external -results, never in its actual operation, nor in its effect upon our -own central selves. Only the middle link is clear to us. And yet the -most mysterious part of the whole process, the effect of it all upon -the central self, is also the most certain and the most important -result of the whole movement, a movement which ever culminates in a -modification of the personality and which prepares this personality for -the next round of sense-perception, intellectual abstraction, ethical -affirmation and volitional self-determination,--acts in which light and -love, fixed and free, hard and cold and warm, are so mysteriously, so -universally, and yet so variously linked. - - -IV. DISTRIBUTION OF THE THREE ELEMENTS AMONGST MANKIND AND THROUGHOUT -HUMAN HISTORY. - -Let us now watch and see where and how the three elements of Religion -appear among the periods of man’s life, the human professions, and -the races of mankind; then how they succeed each other in history -generally; and finally how they exist among the chief types and phases -of the Oriental, Classical Graeco-Roman, and Judaeo-Christian religions. - - -1. _The Elements: their distribution among man’s various ages, sexes, -professions, and races._ - -We have already noticed how children incline to the memory-side, to -the external, social type; and it is well they should do so, and -they should be wisely helped therein. Those passing through the -storm-and-stress period insist more upon the reason, the internal, -intellectual type; and mature souls lay stress upon the feelings -and the will, the internal, ethical type. So again, women generally -tend either to an excess of the external, to superstition; or of the -emotional, to fanaticism. Men, on the contrary, appear generally -to incline to an excess of the intellectual, to rationalism and -indifference. - -Professions, too, both by the temperaments which they presuppose, and -the habits of mind which they foster, have various affinities. The -fighting, administrative, legal and political sciences and services, -readily incline to the external and institutional; the medical, -mathematical, natural science studies, to the internal-intellectual; -the poetical, artistic, humanitarian activities, to the -internal-emotional. - -And whole races have tended and will tend, upon the whole, to one or -other of these three excesses: _e.g._ the Latin races, to Externalism -and Superstition; the Teutonic races, to the two Interiorisms, -Rationalism and Fanaticism. - - - -2. _Co-existence and succession of the Three Elements in history -generally._ - -The human race at large has evidently been passing, upon the whole, -from the exterior to the interior, but with a constant tendency to -drop one function for another, instead of supplementing, stimulating, -purifying each by means of the other two. - -If we go back as far as any analyzable records will carry us, we -find that, in proportion as religion emerges from pure fetichism, -it has ever combined with the apprehension of a Power conceived, at -last and at best, as of a Father in heaven, that of a Bond with its -brethren upon earth. Never has the sacrifice, the so-to-speak vertical -relation between the individual man and God, between the worshipper -and the object of his worship, been without the sacrificial meal, the -communion, the so-to-speak lateral, horizontal relations between man -and his fellow-man, between the worshippers one and all. Never has -religion been purely and entirely individual; always has it been, -as truly and necessarily, social and institutional, traditional and -historical. And this traditional element, not all the religious genius -in the world can ever escape or replace: it was there, surrounding -and moulding the very pre-natal existence of each one of us; it will -be there, long after we have left the scene. We live and die its wise -servants and stewards, or its blind slaves, or in futile, impoverishing -revolt against it: we never, for good or for evil, really get beyond -its reach. - -And yet all this stream and environment of the traditional and social -could make no impression upon me whatsoever unless it were met by -certain secret sympathies, by certain imperious wants and energies -within myself. If the contribution of tradition is _quantitatively_ -by far the most important, and might be compared to the contribution -furnished by the Vocabulary to the constitution of a definite, -particular language,--the contribution of the individual is, -_qualitatively_ and for that individual, more important still, -and might be compared to the contribution of the Grammar to the -constitution of that same language: for it is the Grammar which, -though incomparably less in amount than the Vocabulary, yet definitely -constitutes any and every language. - -And there is here no necessary conflict with the claim of Tradition. -It is true that all real, actual Religion is ever an act of submission -to some fact or truth conceived as not only true but as obligatory, as -coming from God, and hence as beyond and above our purely subjective -fancies, opinings, and wishes. But it is also true that, if I could -not mentally hear or see, I should be incapable of hearing or -seeing anything of this kind or of any other; and that without some -already existing interior affinity with and mysterious capacity for -discriminating between such intimations--as either corresponding to -or as traversing my existing imperious needs and instincts--I could -not apprehend the former as coming from God. Without, then, such -non-fanciful, non-wilful, subjective capacities and dispositions, -there is for us not even the apprehension of the existence of such -objective realities: such capacities and dispositions are as necessary -pre-requisites to every act of faith, as sight is the absolute -pre-requisite for my discrimination between black and white. Hence as -far back as we can go, the traditional and social, the institutional -side of religion was accompanied, in varying, and at first small or -less perceptible degrees and forms, by intellectual and experimental -interpretation and response. - - -3. _The Three Elements in the great Religions._ - -Even the Greek religion, so largely naturalistic up to the very end, -appears, in the centuries of its relative interiorization, as a -triad composed of a most ancient traditional cultus, a philosophy of -religion, and an experimental-ethical life; the latter element being -readily exemplified by the Demon of Socrates, and by the Eleusinian and -Orphic Mysteries. - -In India and Tibet, again, Brahmanism and Buddhism may be said to have -divided these three elements between them, the former representing as -great an excess of the external as Buddhism does of abstruse reasoning -and pessimistic emotion. Mahometanism, while combining, in very -imperfect proportions, all three elements within itself, lays special -stress upon the first, the external element; and though harbouring, for -centuries now and more or less everywhere, the third, the mystical -element, looks, in its strictly orthodox representatives, with -suspicion upon this mysticism. - -Judaism was slow in developing the second, the intellectual element; -and the third, the mystical, is all but wholly absent till the Exilic -period, and does not become a marked feature till still later on, and -in writers under Hellenistic influence. It is in the Book of Wisdom, -still more in Philo, that we find all three sides almost equally -developed. And from the Hasmonean period onwards till the destruction -of Jerusalem by Titus, we find a severe and ardent external, -traditional, authoritative school in the Pharisees; an accommodating -and rationalizing school in the Sadducees; and, apart from both, more a -sect than a school, the experimental, ascetical, and mystical body of -the Essenes. - -But it is in Christianity, and throughout its various vicissitudes and -schools, that we can most fully observe the presence, characteristics, -and interaction of these three modalities. We have already seen how -the New Testament writings can be grouped, with little or no violence, -according to the predominance of one of these three moods, under the -heads of the traditional, historic, external, the “Petrine” school; the -reasoning, speculative-internal, the Pauline; and the experimental, -mystical-internal, the Joannine school. And in the East, up to Clement -of Alexandria, in the West up to St. Augustine, we find the prevalence -of the first type. And next, in the East, in Clement and Origen, in -St. Gregory of Nyssa, in the Alexandrian and the Antiochene school -generally, and in the West, in St. Augustine, we find predominantly a -combination of the second and third types. The Areopagitic writings of -the end of the fifth century still further emphasize and systematize -this Neo-Platonic form of mystical speculation, and become indeed -the great treasure-house from which above all the Mystics, but also -largely the Scholastics, throughout the Middle Ages, drew much of their -literary material. - -And those six or seven centuries of the Middle Ages are full of the -contrasts and conflicts between varying forms of Institutionalism, -Intellectualism, and Mysticism. Especially clearly marked is the -parallelism, interaction, and apparent indestructibleness of the -Scholastic and Mystical currents. Abelard and St. Bernard, St. Thomas -of Aquin and the great Franciscan Doctors, above all the often -largely latent, yet really ceaseless conflict between Realism and -Nominalism, all can be rightly taken as caused by various combinations -and degrees, insufficiencies or abnormalities in the action of the -three great powers of the human soul, and of the three corresponding -root-forms and functions of religion. And whereas, during the -prevalence of Realism, affective, mystical religion is the concomitant -and double of intellectual religion; during the later prevalence of -Nominalism, Mysticism becomes the ever-increasing supplement, and at -last, ever more largely, the substitute, for the methods of reasoning. -“Do penance and believe in the Gospel” becomes now the favourite text, -even in the mouth of Gerson (who died in 1429), the great Nominalist -Doctor, the Chancellor of the then greatest intellectual centre -upon earth, the University of Paris. A constant depreciation of all -dialectics, indeed largely of human knowledge generally, appears even -more markedly in the pages of the gentle and otherwise moderate Thomas -of Kempen (who died in 1471). - -Although the Humanist Renaissance was not long in carrying away many -minds and hearts from all deeper consciousness and effort of a moral -and religious sort, yet in so far as men retained and but further -deepened and enriched their religious outlook and life, the three -old forms and modalities reappear, during the earlier stages of the -movement, in fresh forms and combinations. Perhaps the most truly -comprehensive and Christian representative of the new at its best, is -Cardinal Nicolas of Coes, the precursor of modern philosophy. For he -combines the fullest adhesion to, and life-long labour for, External -Institutional authority, with the keenest Intellectual, Speculative -life, and with the constant temper and practice of experimental and -Mystical piety. And a similar combination we find in Blessed Sir Thomas -More in England, who lays down his life in defence of Institutional -Religion and of the authority of the visible Church and its earthly -head; who is a devoted lover of the New Learning, both Critical and -Philosophical; and who continuously cultivates the Interior Life. A -little later on, we find the same combination in Cardinal Ximenes in -Spain. - -But it is under the stress and strain of the Reformation and -Counter-Reformation movements that the depth and vitality of the three -currents gets specially revealed. For in Germany, and in Continental -Protestantism generally, we see (immediately after the very short -first “fluid” stage of Luther’s and Zwingli’s attitude consequent upon -their breach with Rome) the three currents in a largely separate -condition, and hence with startling distinctness. Luther, Calvin, -Zwingli, different as are their temperaments and both their earlier -and their later Protestant attitudes and doctrines, all three soon -fall back upon some form and fragmentary continuation, or even in -its way intensification, of Institutional Religion,--driven to such -conservatism by the iron necessity of real life and the irrepressible -requirements of human nature. They thus formed that heavy untransparent -thing, orthodox Continental Protestantism. Laelius and Faustus Socinus -attempt the construction of a purely Rationalistic Religion, and -capture and intensify the current of a clear, cold Deism, in which the -critical mind is to be supreme. And the Anabaptist and other scattered -sects and individuals (the latter represented at their best by -Sebastian Frank) attempt, in their turn, to hold and develop a purely -interior, experimental, emotional-intuitive, ecstatic Religion, which -is warm, indeed feverish and impulsive, and distrusts both the visible -and institutional, and the rational and critical. - -In England the same phenomenon recurs in a modified form. For in -Anglicanism, the most characteristic of its parties, the High Church -school, represents predominantly the Historical, Institutional -principle. The Latitudinarian school fights for the Rational, Critical, -and Speculative element. The Evangelical school stands in close -spiritual affinity to all but the Unitarian Nonconformists in England, -and represents the Experimental, Mystical element. We readily think -of Laud and Andrewes, Pusey and Keble as representatives of the first -class; of Arnold, Stanley, and Jowett as figures of the second class; -of Thomas Scott, John Newton, and Charles Simeon as types of the third -class. _The Tracts for the Times_, _Essays and Reviews_, and (further -back) Bunyan’s Works, would roughly correspond to them in literature. - -And this trinity of tendency can also be traced in Catholicism. Whole -Religious Orders and Congregations can be seen or felt to tend, -upon the whole, to one or the other type. The Jesuits can be taken -as predominantly making for the first type, for fact, authority, -submission, obedience; the Dominicans for the second type, for thought, -a philosophico-speculative, intellectual religion; the Benedictines, -in their noble Congregation of St. Maur, for a historico-critical -intellectual type; the French Oratory, for a combination of both the -speculative (Malebranche) and the critical (Simon, Thomassin); and -the Franciscans, for the third, for action and experimental, affective -spirituality. - -And yet none of these Orders but has had its individuals, and even -whole secondary periods, schools, and traditions, markedly typical of -some current other than that specially characteristic of the Order -as a whole. There are the great Critics and Historians of the Jesuit -Order: the Spanish Maldonatus, the New Testament Scholar, admirable for -his time, and helpful and unexhausted still; the French Denys Petau, -the great historian of Christian Doctrine and of its development; -the Flemish Bollandists, with their unbroken tradition of thorough -critical method and incorruptible accuracy and impartiality. There are -the great Jesuit Mystics: the Spanish Venerable Balthazar Alvarez, -declared by St. Teresa to be the holiest mystical soul she had ever -known; and the Frenchmen, Louis Lallemant and Jean Joseph Surin. There -are those most attractive figures, combining the Scholar and the -Mystic: Blessed Edmund Campion, the Oxford Scholar and Elizabethan -Martyr; and Jean Nicolas Grou, the French translator of Plato, who -died in exile in England in 1800. The Dominicans have, from the -first, been really representative of external authority as well of -the speculative rational bent; and the mystical side has never been -wanting to them, so amongst the early German Dominicans, Tauler and -Suso, and many a Dominican female Saint. The Benedictines from the -first produced great rulers; such striking types of external authority -as the Pope-Saints, Gregory the Great and Gregory VII (Hildebrand), and -the great Benedictine Abbots and Bishops throughout the Middle Ages -are rightly felt to represent one whole side of this great Order. And -again such great mystical figures as St. Hildegard of Bingen and the -two Saints Gertrude are fully at home in that hospitable Family. And -the Franciscans have, in the Conventuals, developed representatives of -the external authority type; and in such great philosopher-theologians -as Duns Scotus and Occam, a combination which has more of the -intellectual, both speculative and critical, than of the simply -ascetical or even mystical type. - -And if we look for individual contrasts, we can often find them in -close temporal and local juxtaposition, as in France, in the time of -Louis XIV, in the persons of Bossuet, Richard Simon, and Fénelon, so -strikingly typical of the special strengths and limitations of the -institutional, rational, experimental types respectively. And yet the -most largely varied influence will necessarily proceed from characters -which combine not only two of the types, as in our times Frederick -Faber combined the external and experimental; but which hold them all -three, as with John Henry Newman in England or Antonio Rosmini in Italy. - - -V. CAUSES OPERATIVE IN ALL RELIGION TOWARDS MINIMIZING OR SUPPRESSING -ONE OR OTHER ELEMENT, OR TOWARDS DENYING THE NEED OF ANY MULTIPLICITY. - -Let us end this chapter with some consideration of the causes and -reasons that are ever tending to produce and to excuse the quiet -elimination or forcible suppression of one or other of the elements -that constitute the full organism of religion, and even to minimize or -to deny altogether the necessity of any such multiplicity. - - -1. _The religious temper longs for simplification._ - -To take the last point first. How obvious and irresistible seems -always, to the specifically religious temper, the appeal to boundless -simplification. “Can there be anything more sublimely, utterly simple -than religion?” we all say and feel. In these regions, if anywhere, we -long and thirst to see and feel all things in one, to become ourselves -one, to find the One Thing necessary, the One God, and to be one -with Him for ever. Where is there room here, we feel even angrily, -for all these distinctions, all this balancing of divers faculties -and parts? Is not all this but so much Aestheticism, some kind of -subtle Naturalism, a presumptuous attempting to build up bit by bit -in practice, and to analyze part from part in theory, what can only -come straight from God Himself, and, coming from Him the One, cannot -but bear the impress of His own indistinguishable Unity? And can there -be anything more unforcedly, unanalyzably simple than all actual -religion,--and this in exact proportion to its greatness? Look at St. -Francis of Assisi, or St. John Baptist; look above all at the Christ, -supremely, uniquely great, just because of His sublime simplicity! -Look at, feel, the presence and character of those countless souls -that bear, unknown even to themselves, some portion of this His -impress within themselves, forming thus a kind of indefinitely rich -extension of His reign, of the kingdom of His childlikeness. Away then -with everything that at all threatens to break up a corresponding -simplicity in ourselves! Poverty of spirit, emptiness of heart, a -constant turning away from all distraction, from all multiplicity both -of thought and of feeling, of action and of being; this, surely, is -the one and only necessity for the soul, at least in proportion to the -height of her spiritual call. - - - -2. _Yet every truly living Unity is constituted in Multiplicity._ - -Now in all this there is a most subtle mixture of truth and of error. -It is profoundly true that all that _is_ at all, still more all -personality, and hence above all God, the Spirit of spirits is, just -in that proportion, profoundly mysteriously One, with a Unity which -all our best thinking can only distantly and analogously represent. -And all religion will ever, in proportion as it is vigorous and pure, -thirst after an ever-increasing Unification, will long to be one and -to give itself to the One,--to follow naked the naked Jesus. Yet all -the history of human thought and all the actual experience of each -one of us prove that this Unity can be apprehended and developed, by -and within our poor human selves, only in proportion as we carefully -persist in stopping at the point where it can most thoroughly organize -and harmonize the largest possible multiplicity of various facts and -forces. - -No doubt the living soul is not a whole made up of separate parts; -still less is God made up of parts. Yet we cannot apprehend this Unity -of God except in multiplicity of some sort; nor can we ourselves become -rightly one, except through being in a true sense many, and very many, -as well. Indeed the Christian Faith insists that there is something -most real actually corresponding to this our conception of multiplicity -even and especially in God Himself. For it as emphatically bids us -think of Him as in one sense a Trinity as in another a Unity. And it -is one of the oldest and most universal of Christian approaches to -this mystery, to conceive it under the analogy of the three powers of -the soul. God the Father and Creator is conceived as corresponding to -the sense-perception and Imagination, to Memory-power; God the Son and -Redeemer, as the Logos, to our reason; and God the Holy Spirit, as -corresponding to the effective-volitional force within us; and then we -are bidden to remember that, as in ourselves these three powers are -all united in One personality, so in God the three Persons are united -in One substance and nature. Even the supremely and ineffably simple -Godhead is not, then, a mere, undifferentiated One. - -And if we take the case of Our Lord, even when He is apprehended in the -most abstract of orthodox ways: we get either the duality of natures, -God and Man; or a trinity of offices, the Kingly, the Prophetic, -and the Priestly,--these latter again corresponding roughly to the -External, the Intellectual, and the Mystical element of the human soul. -And even if we restrict ourselves to His Humanity, and as pictured in -any one Gospel, nay in the earliest, simplest, and shortest, St. Mark, -we shall still come continually upon a rich multiplicity, variety, and -play of different exterior and interior apprehensions and activities, -emotions and sufferings, all profoundly permeated by one great end and -aim, yet each differing from the other, and contributing a different -share to the one great result. The astonishment at the disciples’ -slowness of comprehension, the flash of anger at Peter, the sad -reproachfulness towards Judas, the love of the children, the sympathy -with women, the pity towards the fallen, the indignation against the -Pharisees, the rejoicing in the Father’s revelation, the agony in the -Garden, the desolation on the Cross, are all _different_ emotions. The -perception of the beauty of the flowers of the field, of the habits -of plants and of birds, of the varieties of the day’s early and late -cloud and sunshine, of the effects of storm and rain; and again of -the psychology of various classes of character, age, temperament, -and avocation; and indeed of so much more, are all _different_ -observations. The lonely recollection in the desert, the nights spent -in prayer upon the mountains, the preaching from boats and on the -lake-side, the long foot-journeyings, the many flights, the reading and -expounding in the Synagogues, the curing the sick and restoring them to -their right mind, the driving the sellers from the Temple-court, and so -much else, are all _different_ activities. - -And if we take what is or should be simplest in the spiritual life -of the Christian, his intention and motive; and if we conceive this -according to the evidence of the practice of such Saints as have -themselves revealed to us the actual working of their souls, and of -the long and most valuable series of controversies and ecclesiastical -decisions in this delicate matter, we shall again find the greatest -possible Multiplicity in the deepest possible Unity. For even in such -a Saint as St. John of the Cross, whose own analysis and theory of -the interior life would often seem all but directly and completely to -exclude the element of multiplicity, it is necessary ever to interpret -and supplement one part of his teaching by another, and to understand -the whole in the light of his actual, deliberate, habitual practice. -This latter will necessarily ever exceed his explicit teaching, both in -its completeness and in its authority. Now if in his formal teaching -he never wearies of insisting upon detachment from all things, and -upon the utmost simplification of the intentions of the soul, yet he -occasionally fully states what is ever completing this doctrine in his -own mind,--that this applies only to the means and not to the end, and -to false and not to true multiplicity. “The spiritual man,” he writes -in one place, “has greater joy and comfort in creatures, if he detaches -himself from them; and he can have no joy in them, if he considers them -as his own.” “He,” as distinct from the unspiritual man, “rejoices in -their truth,” “in their best conditions,” “in their substantial worth.” -He “has joy in all things.”[37] A real multiplicity then exists in -things, and in our most purified apprehension of them; varied, rich -joys related to this multiplicity are facts in the life of the Saints; -and these varied joys may legitimately be dwelt on as incentives to -holiness for oneself and others. “All that is wanting now,” he writes -to Donna Juana de Pedraça, his penitent, “is that I should forget -you. But consider how that is to be forgotten which is ever present -to the soul.”[38] An affection then, as pure as it was particular, -was ever in his heart, and fully accepted and willed and acknowledged -to its immediate object, as entirely conformable to his own teaching. -St. Teresa, on the other hand, is a character of much greater natural -variety, and yet it is she who has left us that most instructive record -of her temporary erroneous ideal of a false simplicity, in turning -away, for a number of years, from the consideration of the Humanity of -Christ. And a constant, keen interest in the actual larger happenings -of her time, in the vicissitudes of the Church in her day, was stamped -upon all her teaching, and remained with her up to the very end. - -Perhaps the most classic expression of the true Unity is that implied -by St. Ignatius of Loyola, when he tells us that “Peace is the -simplicity of order.” For order as necessarily implies a multiplicity -of things ordered as the unity of the supreme ordering principle. -Fénelon, doubtless, at times, especially in parts of his condemned -_Explication des Maximes des Saints_, too much excludes, or seems to -exclude, the element of multiplicity in the soul’s intention. Yet, -both before and after this book, some of the clearest and completest -statements in existence, as to the true unity and diversity to be -found in the most perfect life, are to be found among his writings. In -his Latin Epistle to Pope Clement XI he insists upon the irreducible -element of multiplicity in the motives of the very highest sanctity. - -For he maintains first that, though “in the specific act of Love, the -chief of the theological virtues, it is possible to love the absolute -perfection of God considered in Himself, without the addition of any -motive of the promised beatitude,” yet that “this specific act of love, -of its own nature, never excludes, and indeed most frequently includes, -this same motive of beatitude.” He asserts next that though, “in the -highest grade of perfection amongst souls here below, deliberate -acts of simply natural love of ourselves, and even supernatural acts -of hope which are not commanded by love mostly cease,” yet that in -this “habitual State of any and every most perfect soul upon earth, -the promised beatitude is desired, and there is no diminution of the -exercise of the virtue of hope, indeed day by day there is an increase -in this desire, from the specific motive of hope of this great good, -which God Himself bids us all, without exception, to hope for.” And he -declares finally that “there is no state of perfection in which souls -enjoy an uninterrupted contemplation, or in which the powers of the -soul are bound by an absolute incapacity for eliciting the discursive -acts of Christian piety; nor is there a state in which they are -exempted from following the laws of the Church, and executing all the -orders of superiors.”[39] - -All the variety, then, of the interested and of the disinterested; of -hope and fear and sorrow; of gratitude and adoration and love; of the -Intuitive and Discursive; of Recollection and external Action, is to be -found, in a deeper, richer, more multiple and varied and at the same -time a more unified unity, in the most perfect life; and all this in -proportion to its approach to its own ideal and normality. - -Indeed the same multiplicity in unity is finely traced by St. Bernard, -the great contemplative, in every human act that partakes of grace -at all. “That which was begun by Grace, gets accomplished alike by -both Grace and Free Will, so that they operate mixedly not separately, -simultaneously not successively, in each and all of their processes. -The acts are not in part Grace, in part Free Will; but the whole of -each act is effected by both in an undivided operation.”[40] - - -VI. THE SPECIAL MOTIVES OPERATING IN EACH ELEMENT TOWARDS THE -SUPPRESSION OF THE OTHER ELEMENTS. - -Now the elements of Multiplicity and Friction and of Unity and -Harmonization, absolutely essential to all life, everywhere and always -cost us much to keep and gain. But there are also, very special reasons -why the three great constituents of religion should, each in its own -way, tend continually to tempt the soul to retain only _it_, and hence -to an impoverishing simplification. Let us try and see this tendency -at work in the two chief constituents, as against each other, and in -combination against the third. - - -1. _In the Historical and Institutional Element, as against all else._ - -We have seen how all religiousness is ever called into life by some -already existing religion. And this religion will consist in the -continuous commemoration of some great religious facts of the past. -It will teach and represent some divine revelation as having been -made, in and through such and such a particular person, in such and -such a particular place, at such and such a particular time; and -such a revelation will claim acceptance and submission as divine -and redemptive in and through the very form and manner in which it -was originally made. The very peculiarity, which will render the -teaching distinctively religious, will hence be a certain real, or -at least an at first apparent, externality to the mind and life of -the recipient, and a sense of even painful obligation answered by a -willing endorsement. All higher religion ever is thus personal and -revelational; and all such personal and revelational religion was -necessarily first manifested in unique conditions of space and time; -and yet it claims, in as much as divine, to embrace all the endless -conditions of other spaces and other times. - -And this combination of a clearly contingent constituent and of an -imperiously absolute claim is not less, but more visible, as we rise -in the scale of religions. The figure of Our Lord is far more clear -and definite and richly individual than are the figures of the Buddha -or of Mahomet. And at the same time Christianity has ever claimed for -Him far more than Buddhism or Mahometanism have claimed for their -respective, somewhat shadowy founders. For the Buddha was conceived -as but one amongst a whole series of similar revealers that were to -come; and Mahomet was but the final prophet of the one God. But Christ -is offered to us as the unique Saviour, as the unique revelation of -God Himself. You are thus to take Him or leave Him. To distinguish and -interpret, analyze or theorize Him, to accept Him provisionally or -on conditions,--nothing of all this is distinctively religious. For, -here as everywhere else, the distinctive religious act is, as such, an -unconditional surrender. Nowhere in life can we both give and keep at -the same time; and least of all here, at life’s deepest sources. - -With this acceptance then, in exact proportion as it is religious, -a double exclusiveness will apparently be set up. I have here found -my true life:--I will turn away then from all else, and will either -directly fight, or will at least starve and stunt, all other competing -interests and activities--I will have here a (so to speak) _spacial_, -a _simultaneous_ exclusiveness. Religion will thus be conceived -as a thing amongst other things, or as a force struggling amongst -other forces; we have given our undivided heart to _it_,--hence the -other things must go, as so many actual supernumeraries and possible -supplanters. Science and Literature, Art and Politics must all be -starved or cramped. Religion can safely reign, apparently, in a desert -alone. - -But again, Religion will be conceived, at the same time, as a thing -fixed in itself, as given once for all, and to be defended against all -change and interpretation, against all novelty and discrimination. -We get thus a second, a (so to speak) _temporal_, _successive_ -exclusiveness. Religion will here be conceived as a thing to be kept -literally and materially identical with itself and hence as requiring -to be defended against any kind of modification. Conceive it as a -paste, and all yeast must be kept out; or as wine, and fermentation -must be carefully excluded. And indeed Religion here would thus become -a stone, even though a stone fallen from heaven, like one of those -meteorites worshipped in Pagan antiquity. And the two exclusivenesses, -joined together, would give us a religion reduced to such a stone -worshipped in a desert. - -Now the point to notice here is, that all this seems not to be an -abuse, but to spring from the very essence of religion,--from two of -its specific inalienable characteristics--those of externality and -authority. And although the extreme just described has never been -completely realized in history, yet we can see various approximations -to it in Mahometan Egypt, in Puritan Scotland, in Piagnone Florence, in -Spain of the Inquisition. Religion would thus appear fated, by its very -nature, to starve out all else, and its own self into the bargain. - -What will be the answer to, the escape from, all this, provided -by religion itself? The answer and escape will be provided by the -intrinsic nature of the human soul, and of the religious appeal -made to it. For if this appeal must be conceived by the soul, in -exact proportion to the religiousness of both, as incomprehensible -by it, as exceeding its present, and even its potential, powers of -comprehension; if again this appeal must demand a sacrifice of various -inclinations felt at the time to be wrong or inferior; if it must come -home to the soul with a sense of constraining obligation, as an act -of submission and of sacrifice which it ought and must make: yet it -will as necessarily be conceived, at the same time, and again in exact -proportion to the religiousness both of the soul and of the appeal, -as the expression of Mind, of Spirit, and the impression of another -mind and spirit; as the manifestation of an infinite Personality, -responded and assented to by a personality, finite indeed yet capable -of indefinite growth. And hence the fixity of the revelation and of the -soul’s assent to it, will be as the fixity of a fountain-head, or as -the fixity of river-banks; or again as the fixity of a plant’s growth, -or of the gradual leavening of bread, or as that of the successive -evolution and identity of the human body. The fixity, in a word, will -be conceived and found to be a fixity of orientation, a definiteness of -affinities and of assimilative capacity. - -Only full trust, only unconditional surrender suffice for religion. But -then religion excites and commands this in a person towards a Person; -a surrender to be achieved not in some thing, but in some one,--a some -one who _is_ at all, only in as much as he is living, loving, growing; -and to be performed, not towards some thing, but towards Some One, -Whose right, indeed Whose very power to claim me, consists precisely -in that He is Himself absolutely, infinitely and actually, what I am -but derivatively, finitely and potentially. - -Thus the very same act and reasons which completely bind me, do so only -to true growth and to indefinite expansion. I shall, it is true, ever -go back and cling to the definite spacial and temporal manifestations -of this infinite Spirit’s personality, but I shall, by this same act, -proclaim His eternal presentness and inexhaustible self-interpreting -illumination. By the same act by which I believe in the revelation of -the workshop of Nazareth, of the Lake of Galilee, of Gethsemane and -Calvary, I believe that this revelation is inexhaustible, and that its -gradual analysis and theory, and above all its successive practical -application, experimentation, acceptance or rejection, and unfolding, -confer and call forth poignant dramatic freshness and inexhaustible -uniqueness upon and within every human life, unto the end of time. - -All this takes place through the present, the _hic et nunc_, -co-operation of the living God and the living soul. And this -ever-to-be reconquered, ever-costing and chequered, ever-“deepenable” -interpretation, is as truly fresh as if it were a fresh revelation. -For all that comes from the living God, and is worked out by living -souls, is ever living and enlivening: there is no such thing as mere -repetition, or differentiation by mere number, place, and time, in this -Kingdom of Life, either as to God’s action or the soul’s. Infinite -Spirit Himself, He creates an indefinite number of, at first largely -but potential, persons, no one of which is identical with any other, -and provokes and supports an indefinite number of ever different -successive acts on the part of each and all of them, that so, through -the sum-total of such sources and streams of difference, the nearest -creaturely approach may be achieved to the ocean of His own infinite -richness. - - - -2. _In the Emotional and Volitional Element, as against the Historical -and Institutional Element._ - -Now the tendency of a soul, when once awake to this necessary freshness -and interiority of feeling with regard to God’s and her own action, -will again be towards an impoverishing oneness. It will now tend to -shrink away from the External, Institutional altogether. For though it -cannot but have experienced the fact that it was by contact with this -External that, like unto Antaeus at his contact with Mother Earth, it -gained its experience of the Internal, yet each such experience tends -to obliterate the traces of its own occasion. Indeed the interior -feeling thus achieved tends, in the long run, to make the return to the -contact with the fact that occasioned, and to the act that produced -it, a matter of effort and repugnance. It seems a case of “a man’s -returning to his mother’s womb”; and is indeed a new birth to a fuller -life, and hence humiliating, obscure, concentrated, effortful, a matter -of trust and labour and pain and faith and love,--a true death of -and adieu to the self of this moment, however advanced this self may -seem,--a fully willed purifying pang. Only through such dark and narrow -Thermopylae passes can we issue on to the wide, sunlit plains. And both -plain and sunshine can never last long at a time; and they will cease -altogether, if they are not interrupted by this apparent shadow of the -valley of death, this concrete action, which invariably modifies not -only the soul’s environment, but above all the soul itself. - -Thus does a simply mental prayer readily feel, to the soul that -possesses the habit of it, a complete substitute for all vocal prayer; -and a generally prayerful habit of mind readily appears an improvement -upon all conscious acts of prayer. Thus does a general, indeterminate -consciousness of Christ’s spirit and presence, easily feel larger and -wider, to him who has it, than the apparent contraction of mind and -heart involved in devotion to Him pictured in the definite Gospel -scenes or localized in His Eucharistic presence. Thus again does a -general disposition of regret for sin and of determination to do better -readily feel nobler, to him who has it, than the apparent materiality -and peddling casuistry, the attempting the impossible, of fixing for -oneself the kind and degree of one’s actual sins, and of determining -upon definite, detailed reforms. - -Yet, in all these cases, this feeling will rapidly lead the soul on -to become unconsciously weak or feverish, unless the latter manfully -escapes from this feeling’s tyranny, and nobly bends under the yoke and -cramps itself within the narrow limits of the life-giving concrete act. -The Church’s insistence upon _some_ vocal prayer, upon _some_ definite, -differentiated, specific acts of the various moral and theological -virtues, upon Sacramental practice throughout all the states and stages -of the Christian life, is but a living commentary upon the difficulty -and importance of the point under discussion. And History, as we have -seen, confirms all this. - - -3. _In the Emotional and Volitional, singly or in combination with the -Historical and Institutional, as against the Analytic and Speculative -Element._ - -But just as the Institutional easily tends to a weakening both of -the Intellectual and of the Emotional, so does the Emotional readily -turn against not only the Institutional but against the Intellectual -as well. This latter hostility will take two forms. Inasmuch as the -feeling clings to historical facts and persons, it will instinctively -elude or attempt to suppress all critical examination and analysis -of these its supports. Inasmuch as it feeds upon its own emotion, -which (as so much pure emotion) is, at any one of its stages, ever -intensely one and intensely exclusive, it will instinctively fret under -and oppose all that slow discrimination and mere approximation, that -collection of a few certainties, many probabilities, and innumerable -possibilities, all that pother over a very little, which seem to make -up the sum of all human knowledge. Such Emotion will thus tend to be -hostile to Historical Criticism, and to all the Critical, Analytic -stages and forms of Philosophy. It turns away instinctively from the -cold manifold of thinking; and it shrinks spontaneously from the hard -opaque of action and of the external. All this will again be found to -be borne out by history. - -A combination of Institutionalism and Experimentalism against -Intellectualism, is another not infrequent abuse, and one which is -not hard to explain. For if external, definite facts and acts are -found to lead to certain internal, deep, all-embracing emotions and -experiences, the soul can to a certain extent live and thrive in and -by a constant moving backwards and forwards between the Institution -and the Emotion alone, and can thus constitute an ever-tightening bond -and dialogue, increasingly exclusive of all else. For although the -Institution will, taken in itself, retain for the Emotion a certain -dryness and hardness, yet the Emotion can and often will associate -with this Institution whatever that contact with it has been found to -bring and to produce. And if the Institution feels hard and obscure, -it is not, like the Thinking, cold and transparent. Just because the -Institution appears to the emotional nature as though further from its -feeling, and yet is experienced as a mysterious cause or occasion of -this feeling, the emotional nature is fairly, often passionately, ready -to welcome what it can thus rest on and lean on, as something having a -comfortable fixity both of relation and of resistance. But with regard -to Thinking, all this is different. For thought is sufficiently near -to Feeling, necessarily to produce friction and competition of some -sort, and seems, with its keen edge and endless mobility, to be the -born implacable foe of the dull, dead givenness of the Institutional, -and of the equal givenness of any one Emotional mood. One of the -spontaneous activities of the human soul, the Analytic and Speculative -faculty, seems habitually, instinctively to labour at depersonalizing -all it touches, and thus continually both to undermine and discrown the -deeply personal work and world of the experimental forces of the soul. -Indeed the thinking seems to be doing this necessarily, since by its -very essence it begins and ends with laws, qualities, functions, and -parts,--with abstractions, which, at best, can be but skeletons and -empty forms of the real and actual, and which, of themselves, ever tend -to represent all Reality as something static, not dynamic, as a thing, -not as a person or Spirit. - -Here again the true solution will be found in an ever fuller -conception of Personality, and of its primary place in the -religious life. For even the bare possibility of the truth of all -religion, especially of any one of the characteristic doctrines of -Christianity, involves a group of personalist convictions. Here the -human person begins more as a possibility than a reality. Here the -moral and spiritual character has to be built up slowly, painfully, -laboriously, throughout all the various stages and circumstances of -life, with their endless combinations of pleasure and pain, trouble -and temptation, inner and outer help and hindrance, success and -failure. Here the simply Individual is transformed into the truly -Personal only by the successive sacrifice of the lower, of the merely -animal and impoverishingly selfish self, with the help of God’s -constant prevenient, concomitant, and subsequent grace. And here this -constantly renewed dropping and opposing of the various lower selves, -in proportion as they appear and become lower, to the soul’s deepest -insight, in the growing light of its conscience and the increasing -elevation of the moral personality, involves that constant death to -self, that perpetual conversion, that unification and peace in and -through a continuous inner self-estrangement and conflict, which is the -very breath and joy of the religious life. - -Only if all this be so, to a quite unpicturable extent, can even the -most elementary Christianity be more than an amiable intruder, or a -morbid surplusage in the world. And at same time, if all this be so, -then all within us is in need of successive, never-ending purification -and elaboration; and the God who has made man with a view to his -gradually achieving, and conquering his real self, must have stored -means and instruments, for the attainment of this man’s true end, -constant readiness, within himself. Now our whole Intellectual nature -is a great storehouse of one special class of such instruments. For it -is clear that the moral and spiritual side of our nature will, more -than any other, constantly require three things: Rest, Expression, -and Purification. And the intellectual activities will, if only they -be kept sufficiently vigorous and independent, alone be in a position -sufficiently to supply some forms of these three needs. For they can -rest the moral-spiritual activities, since they, the intellectual -ones, primarily neglect emotion, action, and persons, and are directly -occupied with abstractions and with things. They can and should express -the results of those moral, spiritual activities, because the religious -facts and experiences require, like all other facts, to be constantly -stated and re-stated by the intellect in terms fairly understandable by -the civilization and culture of the successive ages of the world. Above -all, they can help to purify those moral-spiritual activities, owing -to their interposing, by their very nature, a zone of abstraction, -of cool, clear thinking, of seemingly adequate and exhaustive, but -actually impoverishing and artificial concepts, and of apparently -ultimate, though really only phenomenal determinism, between the direct -informations of the senses, to which the Individual clings, and the -inspirations of the moral and spiritual nature, which constitute the -Person. Thus this intellectual abstractive element is, if neither -minimized in the life of the soul, nor allowed to be its sole element -or its last, a sobering, purifying, mortifying, vivifying bath and fire. - - -VII. THREE FINAL OBJECTIONS TO SUCH A CONCEPTION OF RELIGION, AND THEIR -ANSWERS. - -Now there are three obvious objections to such a conception: with their -consideration, this Introduction shall conclude. - - -1. _This conception not excessively intellectual._ - -Does not, in the first place, such a view of life appear -preposterously intellectual? What of the uneducated, of the toiling -millions? What of most women and of all children? Are then all -these, the overwhelming majority of mankind, the objects of Christ’s -predilection, the very types chosen by Himself of His spirit and -of God’s ideal for man, precluded from an essential element of -religion? Or are we, at the least, to hold that an ethical and -spiritual advantage is necessarily attached, and this too for but -a small minority of mankind, to a simply intellectual function and -activity? If there was a thing specially antagonistic to Christ and -condemned by Him, it was the arrogance of the Schools of His day; if -there is a thing apparently absent from Christ’s own life it is all -philosophizing: even to suggest its presence seems at once to disfigure -and to lower Him. Is then Reasoning, the School, to be declared not -only necessary for some and for mankind at large, but necessary, in a -sense, for all men and for the religious life itself? - -The answer to all this appears not far to seek. The element which we -have named the intellectual, is but one of the faculties of every -living soul; and hence, in some degree and form, it is present and -operative in every one of us. And there is probably no greater -difference between these degrees and forms, with regard to this -element, than there is between the degrees and forms found in the other -two elements of religion. For this intellectual, determinist element -would be truly represented by every however simple mental attention to -_things_ and their mechanism, their necessary laws and requirements. -Hence, the Venerable Anna Maria Taigi, the Roman working-man’s wife, -attending to the requirements and rules of good washing and of darning -of clothes; St. Jean Batiste de la Salle, the Breton gentleman, -studying the psychology of school-children’s minds, and adapting -his school system to it; St. Jerome labouring at his minute textual -criticism of manuscripts of all kinds; St. Anselm and St. Thomas -toiling at the construction of their dialectic systems,--all these, -amongst endless other cases, are but illustrations of the omnipresence -and endless variety of this element, which is busy with the rules and -processes that govern things. - -And it is impossible to see why, simply because of their superior -intellectual gifts and development, men like Clement of Alexandria and -Origen, Cassian and Duns Scotus, Nicolas of Coes and Pascal, Rosmini -and Newman, should count as necessarily less near to God and Christ, -than others with fewer of such gifts and opportunities. For it is -not as though such gifts were considered as ever _of themselves_ -constituting any moral or spiritual worth. Nothing can be more certain -than that great mental powers can be accompanied by emptiness or -depravity of heart. The identical standard is to be applied to these -as to all other gifts: they are not to be considered as substitutes, -but only as additional material and means for the moral and spiritual -life; and it is only inasmuch as they are actually so used, that they -can effectively help on sanctity itself. It is only contended here that -such gifts do furnish additional means and materials for the devoted -will- and grace-moved soul, towards the richest and deepest spiritual -life. For the intellectual virtues are no mere empty name: candour, -moral courage, intellectual honesty, scrupulous accuracy, chivalrous -fairness, endless docility to facts, disinterested collaboration, -unconquerable hopefulness and perseverance, manly renunciation of -popularity and easy honours, love of bracing labour and strengthening -solitude: these and many other cognate qualities bear upon them the -impress of God and of His Christ. And yet they all as surely find but a -scanty field of development outside of the intellectual life, as they -are not the only virtues or class of virtues, and as the other two -elements each produce a quite unique group of virtues of their own and -require other means and materials for their exercise. - - - -2. _Such a conception not Pelagian._ - -But, in the second place, is not such a view of life Pelagian at -bottom? Have we not argued throughout, as if the religious life were to -be begun, and carried on, and achieved simply by a constant succession -of efforts of our own; and as though it could be built up by us, -like to some work of art, by a careful, conscious balancing of part -against part? Is not all this pure Naturalism? Is not religion a life, -and hence an indivisible whole? And is not this life simply the gift -of God, capable of being received, but not produced by us; of being -dimly apprehended as present, but not of being clearly analyzed in its -process of formation? - -Here again there is a true answer, I think. Simply all and every -one of our acts, our very physical existence and persistence, is -dependent, at every moment and in every direction, upon the prevenient, -accompanying and subsequent power and help of God; and still more is -every religious, every truly spiritual and supernatural act of the soul -impossible without the constant action of God’s grace. Yet not only -does all this not prevent the soul from consciously acting on her own -part, and according to the laws of her own being; but God’s grace acts -in and through the medium of her acts, inasmuch as these are good: so -that the very same action which, seen as it were from without, is the -effect of our own volition, is, seen as it were from within, the effect -of God’s grace. The more costly is our act of love or of sacrifice, the -more ethical and spiritual, and the more truly it is our own deepest -self-expression, so much the more, at the same time, is this action a -thing received as well as given, and that we have it to give, and that -we can and do give it, is itself a pure gift of God. - -What then is wanted, if we would really cover the facts of the case, is -evidently not a conception which would minimize the human action, and -would represent the latter as shrinking, in proportion as God’s action -increases; but one which, on the contrary, fully faces, and keeps a -firm hold of, the mysterious paradox which pervades all true life, and -which shows us the human soul as self-active in proportion to God’s -action within it, according to St. Bernard’s doctrine already quoted. -Grace and the Will thus rise and fall, in their degree of action, -together; and man will never be so fully active, so truly and intensely -himself, as when he is most possessed by God. - -And since man’s action is thus in actual fact mysteriously double, it -should ever be so considered by him; and he should, as St. Ignatius -of Loyola says, “pray as if all depended on his prayer, and act as if -all depended on his action.” Hence all man’s action, though really -incapable of existing for an instant without the aid of God, and though -never exclusively his own, can be studied throughout, preliminarily as -though it were his exclusive production on its analyzable, human side. -And man not only can, he ought to be as thoughtful and careful, as -reasonably analytic and systematic about this study of his action as he -was careful and consistent in its production,--in both cases, whilst -praying and believing as though it were all from God, he can and should -behave also as though this action were exclusively his own. As St. -Thomas admirably says: “We attribute one and the same effect both to -a natural cause and to a divine force, not in the sense of that effect -proceeding in part from God, and in part from the human agent. But the -effect proceeds entire from both, according to a different mode: just -as, in music, the whole effect is attributed to the instrument, and the -same entire effect is referred to man as the principal agent.”[41] - - -3. _Such a conception not Epicurean._ - -But, in the last place, is not such a view of life Epicurean? Where -is the Cross and Self-Renunciation? Is it not Christ Himself Who has -bidden us cut off our right hand and pluck out our right eye, if they -offend; Who has declared that he who hateth not his own father and -mother for His sake is not worthy of Him; Who has asked, “What doth -it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of -his own soul?” and Who has pronounced a special woe upon the rich, -and a special blessing upon the poor in spirit? Does not our view, on -the contrary, bid a man attend to his hands and eyes, rather than to -their possible or even actual offending, euphemistically described -here as “friction”; bid him love his father and mother, even though -this introduce a conflict into his affections; bid him take care to -gain, as far as may be, the whole of his own possible interior and -exterior world, as though this would of itself be equivalent to his -saving his soul; and thus bid him become rich and full and complex, -an aesthete rather than a man of God? In a word, is not our position -a masked Paganism, a new Renaissance rather than the nobly stern old -Christianity? - -Now here again a true answer is found in a clear intelligence of the -actual implications of the position. For if the Intellectual action -were here taken as capable of alone, or in any degree directly, forming -the foundation of all our other life, so that on a mathematically -clear and complete system, appealing to and requiring the abstractive -powers alone, would, later on, be built, according to our own further -determination, the Institutional and Experimental, or both or neither; -then such a position, if possible and actualized, would indeed save us -the simultaneous energizing of our whole complex nature, and would, so -far, well deserve the accusation of unduly facilitating life; it might -be taken as, at least, not beginning with the Cross. But here this is -not so. For from the first the External and the Mystical elements are -held to be at least as necessary and operative as the Intellectual -element; and it is impossible to see how the elimination of this -latter, and of the ever-expensive keeping it and its rivals each at -their own work, could deepen the truly moral sufferings and sacrifices -of the soul’s life. - -If again the Intellectual action were taken, as by Gnosticism of -all sorts, as the eventual goal of the whole, so that the External -and Mystical would end by being absorbed into the Intellectual, our -Knowledge becoming coextensive with Reality itself, then we might -again, and with still deeper truth, be accused of eliminating the -element of effort and of sacrifice,--the Cross. But here, on the -contrary, not only the Intellectual alone does not begin the soul’s -life or build up its conditions, but the Intellectual alone does not -conclude and crown it. Eternally will different soul-functions conjoin -in a common work, eternally will God and the souls of our fellows be -for us realities in diverse degrees outside and beyond of our own -apprehension of them, and eternally shall we apprehend them differently -and to a different degree by our intelligence, by our affection, and by -our volition. Hence, even in eternity itself we can, without exceeding -the limits of sober thinking and of psychological probability, find -a field for the exercise by our souls of something corresponding to -the joy and greatness of noble self-sacrifice here below. The loving -soul will there, in the very home of love, give itself wholly to and -be fulfilled by God, and yet the soul will possess an indefinitely -heightened apprehension of the immense excess of this its love and act -above its knowledge, and of God Himself above both. And here again it -is impossible to see how the elimination of the intellectual element, -which becomes thus the very measure of the soul’s own limitations, and -of the exceeding greatness of its love and of its Lover, would make the -conception more efficaciously humbling and Christian. - -Both at the beginning, then, and throughout, and even at the end of -the soul’s life, the intellectual element is necessary, and this above -all for the planting fully and finally, in the very depths of the -personality, the Cross, the sole means to the soul’s true Incoronation. - - - - -PART II - -BIOGRAPHICAL - - - - -CHAPTER III - -CATHERINE FIESCA ADORNA’S LIFE, UP TO HER CONVERSION; AND THE CHIEF -PECULIARITIES PREDOMINANT THROUGHOUT HER CONVERT YEARS - - -INTRODUCTORY. - -_Each of the three Elements of Religion, again multiple. The two main -functions of each._ - -We have so far considered religion as constituted, on its human -side, by the interaction of three modalities,--the Historical, the -Intellectual, the Experimental. But it is of course clear that each of -these is again, just because it is a living force, a Multiplicity in -Unity. The first distinction we can find in each would break each up -into two parts. - -The Historical modality readily gives us the function busy with the -Historical Person and the function occupied with the Historical Thing. -The former function will insist upon all the temporal and local -sayings, doings, and happenings, that together make up the picture and -memory of the Prophet or Founder; the latter will transmit certain -rites and symbols instituted or occasioned by him. And either the -suppression of these latter things, or the taking them apart from the -person from whom they issued and to whom they ever should lead back, -will turn out equally impoverishing: the very friction of this Thing, -coming from a Person, and leading to a Person, and operating within our -own personality, will be found to help to make the latter truly such. - -The Intellectual modality will as readily split up into the Analytic -and the Synthetic. The former will busy itself with distinguishing -and weighing, and with reducing everything as far as possible to its -constituent elements. The latter will attempt to reconstitute the -living whole, as far as may be, in such terms of clear reason. The -former will have more affinity with the discursive reason, the second -with the contemplative; the former with religious History, and the -approaches to religious Philosophy,--Physiology and Experimental -Psychology and the Theory of Knowledge; the latter with Religious -Philosophy proper,--the Metaphysics of Religion. - -The Experimental modality, finally, will as readily break up into -Intuitions and Feelings of every mental and moral kind, and Willings, -the determinations of which, close as they are to the feelings, are -not identical with them, but often exist more or less without or even -against them. - -And this whole series of six movements exists only in Persons; it -begins with an at least incipient Person and ends in the fullest -self-expression of Personality, the determination of the will. And -Things--both external (Institutions) and internal (analytic and -synthetic Abstractions)--are but ever operative, necessary means -towards the firm constitution and expansion of that rich life of the -living soul within which the first apprehension and ordering of such -thinkings and doings took their rise. - - -I. PROPOSED STUDY OF THE MYSTICAL-VOLITIONAL ELEMENT IN A PARTICULAR, -CONCRETE INSTANCE: ST. CATHERINE OF GENOA. - -Now it is the fact of the Multiplicity in Unity, to be found in each of -these modalities of religion, that makes it desirable to study each of -them, as far as may be, separately. And of these the deepest and most -near to our living selves, and hence also most far away from our clear -analysis, is the Experimental. It is this Element then that I propose -to study in a particular concrete instance: St. Catherine of Genoa. - - -1. _Disadvantages of such a method and of this particular instance._ - -The disadvantage arising from such a method of procedure is obvious: no -one life, even were it the richest and most completely knowable, can -exhaust, can indeed do more than simply suggest, the true questions, -let alone the adequate answers. But such a biographical study can hope -to arouse attention and interest in the living facts of religion, in -a manner in which no simple theory or generalization can do; and it -can stand out, in the midst of any such attempt at explanation, as an -emphatic reminder, to both writer and reader, of the inexhaustible -richness and mystery, of the awe-inspiring and yet stimulating -surplusage which is ever furnished by reality over and above all our -best endeavours at commensurate presentation or analysis. - -And quite special disadvantages attach to the study of this particular -Saint. Her character, for one thing, is distinctly wanting in humour, -in that shrewd mother-wit which is so marked a feature in some of the -great Spanish Mystics, in St. Teresa especially, but which is not -quite absent even in the less varied and very austere St. John of -the Cross. There is, on the contrary, a certain monotony, a somewhat -wearying vehemence, about our Genoese. Her experience, again, is -without the dramatic vicissitudes of the reform of an Order or the -foundation of Monasteries, as with St. Teresa; or of contact and even -conflict with the temporal and spiritual officiality of her time, as -with St. Catherine of Siena. Nor is her life lit up by the beautiful -warmth of happy, requited domestic affection, nor is it varied and -extended by the rich possession of children of her own. And again -her life is obscured and complicated, at least for our comprehension -of it, by a nervous ill-health which it is impossible for us to care -about, in itself. And, finally, special difficulties attach to the -understanding of her. Unlike St. Teresa, St. John of the Cross, and -many other Saints, she did not herself write one line of her so-called -“Writings”; and yet it is these, mostly very abstruse and at times all -but insuperably difficult, “Writings,” records which did not attain -their present form and bulk till a good forty years after her death, -that contain the most original part of her legacy to the Church. - - - -2. _The drawbacks of the instance outweighed by its rare combination of -characteristics._ - -Yet all this is balanced if not exceeded by a rare and stimulating -combination of characteristics. The very ordinariness of her external -lot,--a simple wife and widow, at no time belonging to any Religious -Order or Congregation; the apparently complete failure of her earthly -life, which gives occasion to the birth within her of the heavenly -one; the rich variety and contrasts of her princely birth and social -position, and the lowly, homely activity and usefulness of her forty -years of devotedness; the unusually perfect combination of a great -external action and administrative capacity with a lofty contemplation; -the apparent suddenness and whole-hearted swiftness of her Conversion, -succeeded by the long years of interior conflict and painful growth, -unhelped, practically unknown, by any one but God’s inspiring -Spirit, and these years again followed by a period of requiring and -practising the ordinary mediate docilities; the strange nervous -health of especially her later years, so carefully and truthfully -recorded for us, a psychic condition interesting if but for her own -lofty superiority to attaching any direct importance or necessarily -miraculous meaning to it: all this, even if it were all, helps to give -an extraordinary richness and instructiveness to her life. - -But stimulating, transfiguring, embracing all this, appears her special -spiritual apprehension and teaching, of a quite extraordinary depth, -breadth and balance, distinction and refinement. The central oneness -of the soul’s nature and sufferings and joys here and hereafter, and -the resultant psychological character and appeal, to be found in all -true experience or forecasting of such things; the never-ceasing -difference between Spirit and Matter; the incomprehensibility, but -indefinite apprehensibleness, for the clean of heart, of God and -spiritual realities; the pure disinterestedness of His love for us, -and the corresponding disinterestedness of all true love for Him; the -universality of His light and love, and the excess of His mercy above -His justice; the innate affinity between every human soul and Him, and -the immanence of Himself within us; the absence of all arbitrary or -preternatural action in the forces and realities constitutive of the -spiritual world and life; the constant union of right suffering with -deep peace, and the final note of joy and of self-conquering triumph -issuing from complete self-renunciation: all this and much more appears -in her teaching with a spontaneity, breadth, and balance peculiarly its -own. - - -3. _Men who have been devoted to her spirit. Its vitality._ - -No wonder then that, from the contemporary circle of her devoted -friends and disciples onwards, Catherine should have attracted, -throughout the centuries and in many lands, a remarkable number of -deep minds and saintly characters. The ardent young Spaniard, St. -Aloysius Gonzaga, and the shrewd and solid Savoyard Bishop, St. -François de Sales, love to quote and dwell upon her example and -her doctrine. Mature theologians, such as Cardinal Bellarmine, the -hard-headed controversialist; Cardinal Bona, the liturgical and -devotional writer; and Cardinal de Berulle, the mystical-minded founder -of the French Oratory; and again, such varied types of devotedness -as Madame Acarie, the foundress of the French Reformed Carmelites; -the Baron de Renté, that noble Christian soldier; Bossuet, the hard -and sensible; and Fénelon, the elastic and exquisite,--all love her -well. Such thoroughly representative ascetical writers again as the -Spanish Jesuits Francisco Arias and Alfonzo Rodriguez; the French ones, -Saint-Jure and Jean Joseph Surin; the Italian, Paolo Segneri; the -Pole, Lancisius; and the German, Drexel, all drew food and flame from -her character and doctrine. Then at the beginning of the Nineteenth -Century, Friedrich von Schlegel, the penetrating, many-sided leader -of the German Romantic school, translated her _Dialogue_. In our own -time Father Isaac Hecker, that striking German-American, loved her as a -combination of contemplation and external action; Father Faber strongly -endorsed her conception of Purgatory; Cardinal Manning occasioned and -prefaced an admirable translation of her _Treatise_; and Cardinal -Newman has incorporated her Purgatorial teaching in the noblest of his -poems, “The Dream of Gerontius.” Indeed, General Charles Gordon also -can not unfairly be claimed as her unconscious disciple, since her -teaching, embodied in Cardinal Newman’s poem, was, besides the Bible -and “Imitations,” his one written source of strength and consolation, -during that noble Christian captain’s heroic death-watch at Khartoum. -And among quite recent or still living writers, Mr. Aubrey de Vere has -given us a refined poetic paraphrase of her _Treatise_, and Father -George Tyrrell has developed its theme in one of his most striking -Essays.[42] - -I too have, in my own way, long cared for her example and teaching, -and for the great questions and solutions suggested by both. A dozen -times and more have I visited and lingered over the chief scenes of her -activity; and the literary sources of all our knowledge of her life -have been dwelt upon by me for twenty years and more. - -I have but very few new details and combinations to offer, in so far -as her external life is concerned. It is with regard to the growth of -her historic image and the curious vicissitudes which I have been -able to trace in the complication of her “Writings”; as to her spirit -and teaching; and as to the place and function to be allotted in the -religious life to such realities and phenomena as those presented by -her, that I hope to be able to contribute something of value. For -although the substance and the primary phenomena of religion are -eternal, they appear in each soul with an individuality and freshness -pathetically unique; and their attempted analysis and apprehension, and -their relations to the other departments of human life, necessarily -grow and vary. Indeed it would be truly sad, and would rightly tempt -to disbelief in an overruling Providence and divine education of the -human race, if the four centuries that intervene between our Saint and -ourselves had taught us little or nothing of value, in such matters -of borderland and interpretation as nervous health, the psychology of -religion, and the distinguishing differences between Christian and -Neo-Platonic Mysticism. Whole Sciences, indeed the Scientific, above -all the Historic spirit itself, have arisen or have come to maturity -since her day. Hence the realities of her life, as of every religious -life, remain fresh indeed with the deathless vitality of love and -grace, and but very partially explicable still; and yet the highest -intellectual honour of each successive period should be found in an -ever-renewed attempt at an ever less inadequate apprehension and -utilization of these highest and deepest manifestations of Authority, -Reason, and Experience,--of the Divine in our poor human life. - - -II. THE MATERIALS AND AIDS TOWARDS SUCH A STUDY. - - -1. _The “Vita e Dottrina,” 1551._ - -All the biographies of St. Catherine, and all the editions or -translations of her “Works,” are based upon the _Vita e Dottrina_ -published in Genoa, by Jacobo Genuti, in 1551. I work from the -thirteenth Genoese edition, a reprint of that of 1847 (_Tipi dei -Sordo-Muti_). All our knowledge of her mental and physical condition, -and of her spiritual doctrine, is practically restricted to this book, -and indeed, as we shall see, to its first two parts, the “Vita” and the -“Trattato.” - -The _Vita_ is, in its fundamental portions, the joint production of her -devoted disciples, Cattaneo Marabotto, a Secular Priest, her Confessor; -and Ettore Vernazza, a Lawyer, her “spiritual son.” Its fifty-two -chapters (166 octavo pages) are only in small part narrative; quite -thirty-five of them are filled with discourses and contemplations of -the Saint, evidently, in the simpler of the many parallel versions -accumulated here, taken down, at the time of the Saint’s communication -of them, with quite remarkable fidelity. But the whole suffers from the -inclusion of much secondary, amplifying, repetitive matter; is badly -arranged; is kept, almost throughout, above all definite indications of -the precise successions, dates, and places; and is deficient in unity -of view and literary organization. The result is, of necessity, largely -insipid and monotonous. - -The first of the “Works” is the _Treatise on Purgatory_, the seventeen -chapters of which (17 pages) are again hard reading, owing to their -evidently consisting of but a mosaic of detached, sometimes parallel -sayings, spoken on various occasions and according to the experience -and fulness of the moment, and without any reference to the previous -one. I shall show reason for holding that this little collection of -sayings was originally shorter still (consisting probably of but the -matter which now makes up the first seven of its seventeen chapters); -that the original chronicler and first redactor of these sayings was -Vernazza; and that certain obvious and formal contradictions which -appear in the present text must be theological glosses introduced some -time between 1520 (or rather 1526) and say 1530 (at latest 1547). - -The second of the “Works,” the _Spiritual Dialogue between the Soul, -the Body, Self-love, the Spirit, the Natural Man, and the Lord God_, is -divided into three parts, and fills forty-five chapters (120 pages). -I hope to show conclusively that this _Dialogue_ was at first no -longer than its present Part I; that even this did not exist before -1547; that the whole was written by one and the same person, some one -who had never (at least intimately) known the Saint, and who had no -other direct material than our present _Vita_ and _Trattato_; that -this person was the Augustinian canoness, Battista Vernazza, Ettore’s -eldest daughter; and that the whole has been written for the purpose -of attempting some unification and systematization of what in the -_Vita_ appeared to the writer as wanting in unity and in correctness -of wording or of feeling. In this case we get a fairly continuous -re-statement, in part a heightening, in part a minimizing of the -historical facts of Catherine’s life, which, just because we have thus -a pragmatic, theological transfiguration of the older materials, -caused by a penetrating admiration, and resulting in some true increase -of insight into its subject-matter, forms a precious document for the -psychology and the effect of such states of mind. - -The Oratorian Giacinto Parpera’s book: _B Caterina da Genova … -Illustrata_, Genova, 1682, gives, in its three parts, respectively the -opinions of Saints and Theologians concerning the Saint; a systematic -analysis of her doctrine; and an explanation of certain terms and -declarations more or less peculiar to her. It is decidedly learned and -in parts still useful; but pompously rhetorical and full of “anatomia,” -_i.e._ much wearisome numbering and indefinite sub-division. The Jesuit -Padre Maineri’s _Vita de S. Caterina di Genova_, Genova, 1737,--written -on occasion of her canonization,--contains nothing new. - - - -2. _Later books on Catherine._ - -A sensible discussion of difficult or obscure points connected with her -life occurs in the Bollandists’ Life of the Saint, written by Father -Sticken in 1752 (_Acta Sanctorum_, September, Vol. V, ed. 1866, pp. -123-195). But the greater part of the discussion is vitiated by the -assumption of the independent value, indeed of Catherine herself being -the author, of the entirely secondary _Dialogo_; Sticken had not seen a -single MS. life or document; and the most important part of her entire -personality, her doctrine, had, according to the general plan of the -work, to be passed over by him. - -I have also had before me Alban Butler’s accurate compilation; -Monseigneur Paul Fliche’s disappointing book, which, though he declares -that he has consulted the MSS. Lives, is but a rhetorical amplification -of the Life of 1551, with here and there a useful date or other detail -added by himself (Paris, 1881); and the Rev. Baring Gould’s hasty and -slipshod account, which completely ignores the “Works” (_Lives of the -Saints_, Vol. X, ed. 1898). - -But by far the most important printed matter which has hitherto -appeared since 1551, indeed the only one which contains anything at all -significant that is not already in the _Vita ed Opere_, is Sebastiano -Vallebona’s booklet, _La Perla dei Fieschi_, Genova, 2nd ed., 1887, -109 pp. It publishes many a painstaking recovery and identification -of various dates and sites, relationships, family documents and -contemporary events; and has helped me greatly in such matters. - - -3. _The Manuscripts._ - -It is, however, to the careful analysis of the important still extant -MS. material, that I owe far more than to all the printed matter -subsequent to 1551. And indeed I can say without exaggeration that this -is the first serious attempt at a critical presentation of Catherine’s -Life and Teaching. A detailed account of my materials and method will -be given in the Appendix to this volume. - - -III. PECULIARITIES OF THE GENOESE CLIMATE AND GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION; OF -THE LIGURIAN CHARACTER; AND OF THE TIMES INTO WHICH CATHERINE WAS BORN. -HER FAMILY, FATHER AND MOTHER. - -Catherine Fiesca was born in Genoa, towards the end of the year -1447.[43] She thus belonged to a race and a time full indeed of -violence and conflict, intrigue and cruelty, excessive in all things; -but hence full too of courage and of daring, of boundlessly expansive -energies, and of throbbing life. - - -1. _The Genoese country and character._ - -Lying at the foot of imposing mountain terraces, at the great central -bend and chief natural harbour of the rocky, sun-baked, mountain-backed -Riviera, Genoa formed, from early, pre-Roman days, the natural capital -of this thin strip of territory which, eastward from Spezia and -westward from Nice, looks all along towards the sea, and towards the -broad blue sea alone. And the natural influences of the country seem -ever to have been met and doubled by a fierce, explosive strain in the -characters of the successive races that peopled this narrow, steep, -hot sea-board. The ferocious, wild Ligurians gave the Romans trouble, -right up to the end of their dominion; and the subsequent Lombard -invasion and subjugation did little to change their character. The keen -rivals of Venice, in her trade and power in the East, and the mortal -foes of their competitor Pisa, so near to their own gates, the Genoese -did much for trade and commerce, but little for science and art, and -were feared and hated by the Tuscans, in their rich and fertile lands, -and with their large and liberal culture. Sailors, adventurers, -free-booters; great merchants and carriers and bankers; conspirators -and revolutionaries,--they have produced great admirals, such as Andrea -Doria; great administrative and warlike Popes, in the persons of the -two masterful, irascible della Roveres, from the twenty miles distant -Savona,--Sixtus IV, and Michael Angelo’s friend and patron, Julius II; -a great navigator, in Christopher Columbus; a fierce and fanatical, but -lofty and utterly disinterested revolutionary, in Mazzini; and a brave, -reckless condottiere in Garibaldi, born as far away as Nice, but whose -mother came from the near Chiavari. - - - -2. _The times into which Catherine was born._ - -And our Saint was born in the midst of singularly active, changeful, -far-outward-looking, swift-onward-moving times. Columbus had been born -the year before; Fust and Gutenberg were printing the first printed -books three years later; Constantinople was taken by the Turks when she -was six years old. - -The Mediaeval system was, at last, breaking up fast. That whole -conception of life and polity of peoples had rendered services too -great, indeed too unique, to civilization and religion; they had -been for too long the faithful instrument, expression and result -of a certain stage and aspect of human and Christian character and -development, for this break-up not to have been slow, reluctant, and -intermittent at first, notwithstanding the heavy blows levelled, -often unconsciously, at the system from both within and without the -Church. Pope Boniface’s Bull, _Unam Sanctam_, which stretched and -strained the Mediaeval conception to breaking-point (1302); the dreary -blank and confusion of the seventy years of the Avignon exile of the -Papacy (1309-1377); the thirty years’ distraction of the great Papal -Schism (1378-1409); the fierce revolts and tragic fates of Wycliffe -and of Hus, in 1384 and 1415; the ineffectual Council of Constance -(1414-1418),--all this had already taken place. And not even such -saintly figures as Tauler and Blessed Henry Suso in Germany, and -St. Catherine of Siena in Italy and France; or such nobly reforming -characters as the French Chancellor Gerson, who had died eighteen years -before our Saint’s birth (1429); or the bold and spiritual German -Philosopher-Cardinal Nicolas of Coes, who died when she was seventeen -(1464),--could achieve more than to announce and prepare the transition -to a great modification of Christendom, and to indicate the eternal -and necessary source from which it must spring, and the new temporal, -contingent form which it might take. - -But the scandals, revolts, and repressions, on a scale and with results -which turned Reform into Revolution, and broke up Western Europe into -those two hostile camps, which, towards the end of four centuries, -we see, alas! hostile still--these things were yet to come. Roderigo -Borgia was to be Pope (1492-1503) only towards the end of her life. And -only after she had been seven years dead, was Luther to nail his theses -on the University-Church door at Wittenberg (1517), and more than a -generation later were Mary Tudor in England and Philip II in Spain -(1553-1598) to attempt, for the last time on so large a scale, the task -of keeping and winning minds and souls, by ruthless physical repression. - -Catherine lived thus within a period which, in its depths, was already -modern, but not yet broken up into seemingly final, institutionalized -internecine antagonisms. And hence we can get in her a most restful -and bracing pure affirmativeness, an entire absence of religious -controversy, such as, of necessity, cannot be found in even such -predominantly interior souls as the great Post-Reformation Spanish -Mystics. Her whole religion can grow and show itself as simply -positive, and in rivalry and conflict with her own false self and with -that alone. - - -3. _The Fieschi family._ - -And the particular family from which she sprang, and the period of its -history at which she appeared, each helped to bring right into her -blood and immediate surroundings the more general conditions of her -race and time. - -The Fieschi had indeed a long past story, securely traceable through -a good two centuries and a half before Catherine’s birth. They sprang -from the little seaside town of Lavagna, twenty English miles east -of Genoa, where shipbuilding is still carried on. Here it was that -Sinibaldo de’ Fieschi, the first of the two Popes of the family, -Innocent IV (1243-1254), was born, whose whole Pontificate was one long -vehement struggle with his former friend, the masterful and sceptical -Emperor Frederic II of Germany. His nephew was Pope, under the title -of Hadrian V, for but a few months (1276). It was from Pope Innocent’s -brother Robert that St. Catherine was descended. - -The Fieschi were the greatest of the great Guelph families of Genoa, -such as the Grimaldi, Guarchi, and Montaldi. The great Doria family, -with the Spinola, Fregosi, and Adorni was as strongly Ghibelline. And -the endless, fierce conflict between these two factions, in Genoa -itself and along both Rivieras, led to the calling in, and to the -temporary supremacy over Genoa, of the Dukes of Milan, the Counts of -Montferrat, and of the Kings of Naples and of France. The Revolution -of 1339, which put an end to the exclusive rule of the Nobles, and -introduced elective Doges or Dukes as life-long heads of the Republic, -really altered little or nothing of all this. - -Indeed the Fieschi had, just now at Catherine’s birth, reached the -full height of their power and worldly splendour. For the two Popes -of the family had already reigned two centuries before, and Cardinal -Luca Fieschi lay buried in the Cathedral for over a hundred years; -but the Fieschi now possessed numerous fiefs in Liguria, Piedmont, -Lombardy, and even in the Kingdom of Naples; Nicolò Fieschi, a cousin -of the Saint, was, in Catherine’s time, a prominent member of the -College of Cardinals; and her own father was Viceroy of Naples to King -René of Anjou. There was indeed exactly a century yet to run, up to -the beginning of the downward course of the family,--the disastrous -conspiracy of the Fieschi against the Dorias (1547), which forms the -subject of Schiller’s well-known play. - -Catherine’s father had been Viceroy of Naples to that René Duc of -Anjou, Count of Provence, Duke of Lorraine, and titular King of Naples, -whose adventurous career and immensely popular character still stand -out so vividly in history. The “roi débonnaire,” the friend of the -Troubadours and father of Margaret of Anjou, Consort to King Henry VI -of England, figures life-like in Scott’s _Anne of Geierstein_; and his -strikingly _bourgeois_ profile may still be seen, as part of the vivid -portraiture of his kneeling figure which faces the corresponding one of -his Queen, upon the great contemporary triptyche picture, representing -in its central division the Madonna and Child in the branches of a tree -(in allusion to the Burning Bush and the Rod of Jesse), which hangs in -the choir of the cathedral of Aix, King René’s old wind-swept and now -sleepy Provençal capital. Since Charles I of Anjou (1265-1285), the -Angevine Kings had made Naples the capital of their Kingdom; Duke René -was the last of the Angevines to hold or seriously to claim it. He lost -it in 1442 to the Spaniards; but still in 1459 he attempted, by means -of a Genoese fleet, to repossess himself of his old kingdom, so that -Catherine’s father could, even up to the time of his death in 1462, -retain the title of Vice-Roy of Naples. Her mother, Francesca di Negro, -also belonged to an ancient and noble Genoese family. - - -IV. CATHERINE’S LIFE, UP TO THE PRELIMINARIES OF HER CONVERSION: AUTUMN -1447-MID-MARCH 1474. - - -1. _The house where she was born; her brothers and sister._ - -Catherine was born in one of the many palaces of the Fieschi, in the -one which stood in the Vico Filo, close to the dark grey limestone -façade of the Cathedral of San Lorenzo. The palace was hemmed in, on -its two sides and at its back, by the houses of Urbano and Sebastiano -di Negri, and was demolished when the then Piazza dei Fieschi was -enlarged and became the present Piazza di San Lorenzo. The house now -facing the Cathedral doorway occupies approximately the site of that -old palace. - -She was the youngest of five children. There were three sons: Giacomo, -named after his father; and Lorenzo and Giovanni, no doubt named -respectively after the great Roman deacon, the titular saint of the -Cathedral, and who already appeared upon his gridiron, on the quaint -Mediaeval relief over its portal; and after the Baptist, whose reputed -relics lay there, in the great Chapel, rebuilt for them soon after -this time (1451-1496). Last came the two daughters: Limbania, named -after a beatified virgin and contemplative, a Genoese Augustinian Nun -of the thirteenth century, and Catherine, christened and in all the -legal documents always called by this diminutive, presumably after St. -Catherine of Alexandria, who had an altar in the Cathedral. And the -Cathedral was their Parish Church. - - - -2. _Catherine’s physical appearance; her qualities and habits of body -and of mind._ - -In this house, then, Catherine grew up and lived till she was sixteen. -The beautiful, tall figure; the noble oval face with its lofty brow, -finely formed nose, and powerful, indeed obstinate chin; the winning -countenance with its delicate complexion and curling, sensitive, -spiritual mouth-line; deep grey-blue spiritual eyes; the long, tapering -fingers; the massive dark brown or black hair; still more the quickly -and intensely impressionable, nervous and extremely tense and active -physical and psychical organization; and then the very affectionate, -ardent, aspiring, impatient and absolute qualities and habits of her -mind and heart and will,--all these things we are not merely told, we -can still see them and find them, in part, even in her remains, but -more fully in her portrait, and above all, in her numerous authentic -utterances.[44] - - -3. _The few certain details concerning her early years. Santa Maria -delle Grazie._ - -We have, as only too often in such older biographies, but very few -precise and characteristic details concerning her early years. She -had in her room a Pietà, a representation of the Dead Christ in His -Mother’s arms, and we are told how deeply it affected her every time -she entered this room, and raised her eyes up to it. The other points -mentioned, her early bodily penances, silence, and gift of prayer (the -latter said to have been communicated to her at twelve years of age), -read suspiciously like simple assumptions made by her biographers, -and in any case do not help to individualize her, in these years of -uncertain, tentative, or as yet but little characteristic, forms of -goodness. - -But from thirteen, for three years onwards, the young girl is very -certainly and deeply drawn to the Conventual life, as she sees it -practised by her sister Limbania, who, true to the example of her -own Genoese Augustinian Patron Saint, had become a member of the -Augustinian Canonesses of our Lady of Graces, and now lived there happy -and devoted in the midst of that very fervent and cultivated Community. -Limbania was one of the nineteen Foundresses of this Convent, who, -on August 5, 1451, received the habit of Canonesses Regular of the -Lateran, from the hands of Padre Giovanni de’ Gatti, at that time -Superior of S. Teodoro outside the walls of Genoa, a house of the same -Order. Among these Novices occur a Simonetta di Negro, no doubt a -cousin of Catherine, and Nicola and Lucia da Nove, two sisters; these -facts will have helped Catherine to hope for admission together with -her own sister Limbania.[45] - -The Convent and its Chapel, both secularized, are still in existence, -at a quarter of an hour’s walk from Catherine’s palace-home. Moving -from here, along the Vico Chiabrera, up the Via dei Maruffi (now San -Bernardo), and across the latter, up one of the many steep, very -narrow little alleys, to the Piazza dei Embriaci, and again up by the -tall, slim, grey tower of the Crusader Guilielmo Embriaco, we arrive -at last at a level, all but deserted, sun-baked piazza, called, after -its Church, Sta Maria in Passione. Face this Church, and the long, -tall house on your left hand, covered with dim, faded frescoes, is -Limbania’s Convent, so loved by Catherine. The right door leads into -the Chapel, which Vallebona[46] found in 1887 in use as a wood-store, -and which I saw in May 1900 turned into a music-hall: where the altar -had stood, were a dingy stage, and tawdry wings. The pompous frescoes -and stuccos on the walls and ceiling are evidently of the seventeenth -century or even later. The adjoining Convent still retains a small -figure of St. Augustine sculptured on a corbel on the vault of the -first landing. The Byzantine, dark brown Madonna-and-Child picture, -which Catherine so often prayed before in the Chapel, can still be -seen, on the left-hand wall of the Chapel of St. Thomas Aquinas, in the -Church of S. Maria di Castello, which is close by, at a lower level -than the Piazza of the Convent. - - -4. _Catherine’s marriage. The Adorni family._ - -The Convent Chaplain was Catherine’s Confessor, and through him she -attempted to gain the permission of the Nuns to enter their Community. -But whilst they hesitated and put her off, on the very reasonable -ground of her unusual youth, her father died (end of 1461); and a -particular combination, from amongst the endless political rivalries -and intrigues of Genoa, soon closed in upon the beautiful girl, member -of the greatest of the Guelph families of that turbulent time. It was -a bad and sorry business, and one likes to think that the father, -had he lived, would not thus have sacrificed his daughter. For if in -Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet we have two youthful lovers joining -hands and hearts, in spite of the secular enmity of their respective -houses; here, alas! in real life, we have the contrary spectacle, the -deep because dreary tragedy of two great rival factions making--rather, -hoping to make--peace, by the enforced union of two mutually -indifferent and profoundly unsuited young people. - -Not but that socially the two were admirably matched. For Giuliano -Adorno belonged to a family hardly inferior in antiquity and splendour -to Catherine’s own. Six different Adorni had been Doges of Genoa in -1363, 1385, 1413, 1443, 1447, 1461; and the one of 1413 had been -Giuliano’s own grandfather. They were Lords of the Greek Island of -Chios (Scio), which they had helped to conquer for Genoa in 1349. - -And now the last Doge of the family, Prospero Adorno, had just been -driven from the Ducal throne by Paolo Campofregoso, the strong-willed -representative of the great rival, though also Ghibelline, family of -the Fregosi. Campofregoso was now both Duke and Archbishop of Genoa. By -an alliance with the Fieschi, the most powerful of the Guelph families, -the Adorni could hope, in their turn, to oust the Fregosi, and to -reinstate themselves at the head of the great Republic. The ideals, -antipathies or indifference of a girl of sixteen were not allowed to -stand in the way; and so the contract was signed on January 13, 1463. - -The marriage was celebrated soon afterwards in the Cathedral of San -Lorenzo, in the Chapel of St. John the Baptist, since the Campanaro -family, which had built it in 1299, and the Adorni, who had married -into and succeeded the Campanaro, were excepted from the rule -prohibiting the access of women to this Chapel. Since Cardinal Giorgio -Fieschi had recently died, Bishop Napoleone Fieschi, of Albenga, -presided at the ceremony. - - -5. _Giuliano’s character. Catherine’s pre-conversion married life._ - -Giuliano’s father was dead; only his widowed mother, Tobia dei Franchi, -remained. It was, however, with Catherine’s mother, in the old Palazzo -near the Cathedral, that the young couple were to live, and actually -stayed, during the first two years. - -Giuliano was young and rich; his two elder brothers occupied high -naval posts; his first cousin, Agostino Adorno, was a man of noble -character and great initiative; and a descendant of this cousin, also -Agostino, was later on Beatified. But Giuliano himself did at first -worse than nothing, and never did much throughout his life. A man of -an undisciplined, wayward, impatient, and explosive temper; selfish -and self-indulgent; a lover of obscure and useless, in one instance -criminal, squandering of his time, money, health, and affections, he -did not deserve the rare woman who had been sold to him; and would -possibly indeed have managed to be a better man with a wife he had -really loved, or with one of a temperament and outlook more ordinary -and nearer to his own. As it was, he was hardly ever at home, and, -according to his own later penitent admission and testamentary -provisions, he was, some time during the first ten years of his -marriage, gravely unfaithful to his wife. - -Catherine, on her part, spent the first five of these dreary years -in sad and mournful loneliness, at first in her mother’s house, and -afterwards, at least in the winter-time, in Giuliano’s own palace, -a building which stood exactly where now stands the Church of Saint -Philip Neri, in the Via Lomellina (at that time, Via Sant’ Agnese), and -near the Piazza Annunziata. In the summer-time she would stay, mostly -alone again, at Giuliano’s country seat at Prà on the Western Riviera, -just beyond Pegli, and six English miles from Genoa. - -This latter property is still in existence, but was, some twenty years -ago, on the extinction of the male line of the Adorni, sold to the -Piccardo family. The present moderate-sized house, standing close to -the high-road and sea-beach, although evidently rebuilt (probably -on a considerably smaller scale) since Catherine’s time, no doubt -occupies part at least of the old site. But the Chapel which, in the -Saint’s days, adjoined the house, was described by Vallebona (in 1887) -as turned into a stable; and in April 1902 an elderly serving-man of -the Piccardo family showed me the precise spot, on a now level meadow -expanse closely adjoining the house, where he himself, some fifteen -years since, had helped to pull down this chapel-stable. He showed me -the (probably seventeenth-century) picture representing the scene of -the Saint’s conversion, which had, at that time, been still in this -building, and which is now hung up in a small Confraternity-Chapel near -by in Prà. - -As to money of her own, Catherine had, as we shall see later on, her -dowry of £1,000, to which Giuliano had contributed £200. But we have no -evidence of any good works performed by her in this decade, although, -as we shall find, it must have been during these summers that she, at -least occasionally, walked or rode over the wooded hill-path to the old -Benedictine Pilgrimage Church and Monastery of San Nicolò in Boschetto, -three or four English miles away. These buildings are now secularized -and empty, but, even so, impressive still.[47] - -It is but natural to suppose that she was as yet too little at one -with her true self, to be able to surmount her lot, or even seriously -to attempt such a task, by escaping from the false self and from all -attempts at finding happiness within the four corners of the demands of -her most sensitive and absolute disposition. To learn to do things well -takes time,--and even if it be but the finding out that those things to -do are _there_, ready and requiring to be done; or the seeing that we -are doing them badly. Hence above all does the learning to suffer well, -the turning pain into self-expansion and self-escape, as well as into -fruitful action, require time, special graces, and unusual fidelity of -soul. And even the noblest nature will usually begin by thinking of -getting, rather than of giving; it will simply thirst to be loved, and -to find its happiness in its own heart’s perfect “comprehendedness.” - -Catherine tried to find relief, first in one attitude on her life’s sad -couch of mental suffering, and then in another; and neither brought -her any alleviation. During the first five years she had hidden -herself away, and had moped in solitude; the last five, she had given -herself to worldly gaieties and feminine amusements, short, however, -of all grave offence against the moral law. And at the end of these -experiences and experiments she, noble, deep nature that she was, found -herself, of course, sadder than ever, with apparently no escape of any -kind from out of the dull oppression, the living death of her existence -and of herself. - - -V. HER CONVERSION, WITH ITS IMMEDIATE PRELIMINARIES AND CONSEQUENCES, -MARCH 1474. - - -1. _Her prayer, March 20, 1474. Her conversion, March 22._ - -From after Christmas-time in 1472, Catherine’s affliction of mind had -become peculiarly intense, and a profound aversion to all the things -of this world made her fly anew from all human intercourse; and yet -her own company had become insupportable to her, as nothing whatsoever -attracted her will. - -And at the end of three months, on the 20th of March 1474--it was the -eve of the Feast of St. Benedict--she was praying in his little church -still standing close to the sea, at the western end of Genoa, not far -beyond Andrea Doria’s Palace, built so soon after her death. And in her -keen distress she prayed: “St. Benedict, pray to God that He make me -stay three months sick in bed.”[48] - -And two days later, when Catherine was visiting her sister at her -Convent, Limbania proposed to her, since she declared herself -indisposed to go to confession (although the Feast of the Annunciation -was at hand), at least to go and recommend herself in the Chapel to the -chaplain of the Convent, who was indeed a saintly Religious. And, at -the moment that she was on her knees before him, her heart was pierced -by so sudden and immense a love of God, accompanied by so penetrating a -sight of her miseries and sins and of His goodness, that she was near -falling to the ground. And in a transport of pure and all-purifying -love, she was drawn away from the miseries of the world; and, as it -were beside herself, she kept crying out within herself: “No more -world; no more sins!” And at that moment she felt that, had she had in -her possession a thousand worlds, she would have cast them all away.[49] - - - -2. _Views and truths concerning this Experience._ - -One of the various writers who have successively, and in great part -differently, moralized upon the chief events of her life, dwells on -this great moment as achieving in her soul all the usually lengthy -and successive effects of the purgative, illuminative, and unitive -progression, and as, in that one instant, bringing her soul to that -highest state of transformation, in which the will is wholly united -to God.[50] But having regard to the fact, patent on every page of -her biography and “Works,” that, for the remaining thirty-seven years -of her life, her interior history represents one continuous widening -and deepening and moving onwards of efforts, trials and pains, of -achievements and ideals--a fact actually schematized by another writer -(who, as I shall show, is the penultimate Redactor of the Life) not -two pages lower down--it is clear that we must be careful to conceive -this perfection as relative to her previous state or even to the final -goodness of many saintly souls. We must, in a word, try to realize -vividly, and constantly to recall, certain complex truths, without -which the very greatness of the experience here considered will but -help to check or deflect our apprehension of the spiritual life. - -For one thing, the deeper and the more unique the soul’s experience, -and the richer such experience is, the more entirely does all that -the soul is, and ever was, wake up and fuse itself in one indivisible -act, in which much of the old is newly seen to be dross and is so far -forth excluded; and in which the old that is retained reappears in a -fresh context, a context which itself affects and is itself affected -by all the other old and new ideas and feelings. It thus clearly bears -the stamp upon it of the profound difference between Time, conceived -as a succession of moments of identical quantity and quality, each in -juxtaposition and exterior to the other, mathematical time, such as -our clocks register on the dials,--a conception really derived from -space-perception and exterior, measurable _things_--and Duration, -with its variously rapid succession of heterogeneous qualities, each -affecting and colouring, each affected and coloured by, all the others, -and all producing together a living harmony and organic unity, all -which constitutes the essentially unpicturable experience of the -living _person_. Such a moment is thus incapable of adequate analysis, -in exact proportion as it is fully expressive of the depths of the -personality and of its experience: for each element here, whilst, -in its living context, an energy and a quality which at each moment -modifies and is modified by all the other elements, becomes, in an -intellectual analysis, when each is separated from the others, a mere -dead thing and a quantity. - -And secondly, such an experience is throughout as truly a work of pure -grace, a gift, as it is a work of pure energy, an act. And here again, -the grace and the energy, the gift and the act are not juxtaposed, but -throughout they stimulate and interpenetrate each other, with the most -entirely unanalyzable, unpicturable completeness. It is indeed in exact -proportion to the fulness of this interstimulation and penetration, to -the organic oneness of the act, that such an act is this one particular -soul’s very own act and yet the living God’s own fullest gift. Grace -does not lie without, but within; it does not check or limit, but -constitutes the will’s autonomy. - -And thirdly, it is an experience which leaves the soul different -forever from what it was before; which purifies her perfectly, in and -for that moment, from all her stains of actual sin committed up to -that moment; and which materially strengthens her inclinations towards -good and weakens her tendencies towards evil. But the soul herself -lives on; and she lives but in and through successive acts of all -kinds. Hence it is not an act,--there is none such, here below at -least,--which takes or can take the place of fresh acts to be produced -again and again throughout her life, The soul has not, in any sense -or any degree, been approximated to that utterly paradoxical thing, -a saintly automaton. She is not raised above the limitations and -imperfections, the obscurities and conflicts, the failings and sins -of humanity. She _could_ fall away and commit grave sin; she actually -_does_ commit minor sins of frailty and surprise. Her interior efforts -and experiences are now but on a larger, deeper scale, and on a higher -plane, and take place from a new vantage-ground, a position which has, -however, itself to be continually actively defended and reinforced. -Temptation, trial, sorrow, pain; hope, fear, self-hatred, love and joy, -with ever-renewed and increased aspiration and effort, all variously -change and deepen their combinations and qualities, outlook and -ideals. But they do not for one moment cease. All things but grow in -depth and significance, in variety within unity, in interiority and -interpenetration. - -And finally, although conversions of the apparent suddenness and -profound depth and perseverance of the one here studied, are rightly -taken to be very special and rare graces of God, yet it would be but -misinterpreting and depreciating their true significance to make their -suddenness the direct proof and measure of their own supernaturalness -or the standard by which to appraise the altitude of the goodness of -other lives. God is as truly the source of gradual purification as of -sudden conversion, and as truly the strength which guards and moves us -straight on, as that which regains and calls us back. Hence such acts -as Catherine’s should not be entirely separated off from those acts -of love, contrition and self-dedication which occur, as so many free -graces of God in and with the free acts of man, more or less frequently -in the secret lives of human beings throughout the world. - - -3. _The Second Experience, in the Palace._ - -Catherine then was kneeling on, in these great moments of her true -self’s self-discovery and self-determination, with her true Life -now at last felt so divinely near and yet still so divinely far: -she was kneeling on, oblivious of time and space, incapable of -speech--throughout a deep, rich age of growth, during but some minutes -of poor clock-time--whilst the chaplain was called away by some little -momentary matter. And when he returned, she was just able to utter: -“Father, if you please, I should like to let this confession stand over -to another time.” And returning home, she was so on fire and wounded -with the love which God had interiorly manifested to her, that, as -if beside herself, she went into the most private chamber she could -find, and there gave vent to her burning tears and sighs. And, all -instructed as she had suddenly become in prayer, her lips could only -utter: “O Love, can it be that Thou hast called me with so much love, -and revealed to me, at one view, what no tongue can describe?” And -her contrition for her offences against such infinite goodness was so -great, that, if she had not been specially supported, her heart would -have been broken, and she would have died.[51] - -And yet, though her biographer, no doubt rightly, represents her -feeling and dispositions as now at their uttermost,--they may well -have actually been so, at that moment for that moment,--they were -nevertheless evidently capable of indefinite subsequent increase. -Indeed it must have been on this same day, or on one of the next -three days, that, in one of the rooms of the palace in the Via S. -Agnese,--(the approximate spot is marked in the Church of St. Philip -by a fine picture representing the scene, hung over the altar of one -of the left-hand-side chapels),--“Our Lord, desiring to enkindle still -more profoundly His love in this soul, appeared to her in spirit with -His Cross upon His shoulder dripping with blood, so that the whole -house seemed to be all full of rivulets of that Blood, which she saw -to have been all shed because of love alone.” “And filled with disgust -at herself, she exclaimed: ‘O Love, if it be necessary, I am ready to -confess my sins in public.’”[52] - - -4. _Two peculiarities of this Experience._ - -Here two things are remarkable. This is, to begin with, her first and -last vision (_visione_), which I can find, in the sense of a picture -produced indeed “in the spirit,” but yet evidently apprehended with -a sense of apparently complete passivity in the perceiving mind -and of objectivity as to the perceived thing, and remembered as -such throughout her life. For the frequent subsequent “sights” or -picturings (_viste_) are avowedly only of the nature of profoundly -vivid, purely mental, more or less consciously voluntary and subjective -contemplations and intuitions; whilst her only other “visions,” those -seen during the last stage of her last illness, seem indeed to have -been of an even more sensible kind than this _visione_, but they were -entirely fitful and left no permanent impression behind them. - -And again, this is the one only picture of any, even of a voluntary, -meditational kind, concerning the Passion, to be found throughout her -life; all her other contemplations and impressions of whatever kind are -of other subjects. - - -5. _Her general confession._ - -It was after these fundamental experiences that, once more in the -Chapel of the Augustinianesses, apparently four days later, on the 24th -of March, “she made her general confession, with such contrition and -compunction as to pierce her soul.”[53] - - -VI. THE TWO CONCEPTIONS CONCERNING THE CHARACTER AND _RATIONALE_ OF HER -PENITENTIAL PERIOD AND OF HER WHOLE CONVERT LIFE. THE POSITION ADOPTED -HERE. - -At this point of the Life two successive reporters or redactors -introduce, respectively, a general reflection on the character and -_rationale_ of the period of penitence now immediately ensuing, and a -scheme and forecast as to the stages in the ascensional movement of her -entire convert life. - - -1. _The older conception._ - -The first reporter,--evidently the same who, in connection with the -Conversion scene, had described her soul as, there and then, at the -culmination of holiness,--here says: “And although God, at the moment -when,” four days before, “He had given her that love and pain, had -there and then pardoned her all her sins, consuming them in the fire -of His love; yet He, wishing her to satisfy the claims of justice, -led her by the way of satisfaction, in such wise as to cause this -special contrition, illumination, and conversion to last about fourteen -months,” and it is no doubt implied by him that frequent confession was -practised throughout this time.[54] - -Thus we get an impressive instance of the rich and complex experience -on which the Catholic doctrine is built, as to how, on the one hand, -pure and perfect love ever instantly obliterates all sin; how, on the -other hand, such perfect love, in those who explicitly know and accept -the Church’s claims, involves a determination to confess all such grave -sins as may have been committed; and how, finally, such subsequent -confession is itself operative within the soul. For as between the soul -and the body, so between the Mystical and Sacramental, there is a real -and operative connection, though one which, however inadequately known -by us, we know to be one not of simple identity or coextension. - -And the experiences and doctrines here specially considered appear -to require the conception of contrition and pardon as but the -necessary expression and effect of true, operative love; and to demand -the conclusion that purification participates in the essentially -positive nature of love, its cause. The removal of bodily impurity -is a negative act, and, as such, is limited and unrepeatable; but -spiritual purification would thus, as something positive, be capable of -indefinite increase and repetition. And hence the deep philosophical -justification of repeated contrition and confession for the same sins, -even though already pardoned. We shall find that such a view is also -to be found in St. Catherine’s own doctrine, though there is nothing -to show that the thought of this paragraph is derived from Catherine -herself. I take it to proceed from Cattaneo Marabotto. - - - -2. _The later conception._ - -The second writer, the penultimate Redactor of the book as we now have -it, finds three successive levels in her whole life’s constant growth -and upward movement, and discovers a type of each in some love-impelled -figure or scene of the Bible. And so the writer gets his periods -symbolized respectively by the two New Testament scenes of Christ’s -feet, and the Penitent Magdalen drawn by Him to them, and of Christ’s -breast, and the Beloved Disciple reposing peacefully upon it; and by -the Old Testament poetic picture, and its allegorical interpretation, -of Christ’s (the true Solomon’s) mouth, and the Bride’s kiss. And -some four years are assigned to the first period, “many” years to the -second, and her last years to the last: 1478 and 1499 would be the -approximate dates dividing off these periods. We shall find this scheme -to proceed from Battista Vernazza. - -Time-honoured though it be, this symbolism in no way fits Catherine’s -case. For, excepting during the short first period, her direct and -formal occupation with the Sacred Humanity is, throughout her convert -life, practically confined to the Eucharistic Presence; and again, her -words and contemplations are (as indeed the unhappiness of her marriage -experience would lead one to expect and as the whole temper of her mind -and devotion require) quite remarkably free from all affinity to the -Canticle of Canticles. And yet this, in so far inappropriate, framework -helps to emphasize the all-important fact of the constant growth and -deepening ever at work within her life. - -Indeed, the short, general characterization of each of these successive -periods which follows after each symbol here, is derived from passages -of the _Vita_ which are doubtless based upon direct communication -by herself. Thus the detailed sight of her own particular sins and -of God’s particular graces towards herself, characteristic of the -relatively short first period, is succeeded by the second, long and -profoundly lonely, period of an apparent union of the divine and of the -human personalities, in which all distinct perception of her own acts -appears to have usually been lost,--a union which can lead her to the -point of saying: “I have no longer either soul or heart of my own; but -my soul and my heart are those of my Love.” Yet in her third and last -period, the consciousness of her own acts and of their differentiation -is described as fully reappearing within her mind. For though we are -presented here with a kind of immersion in the Divinity, in which she -appears so to lose herself interiorly and exteriorly as to be able to -say with St. Paul: “I live no longer, but Christ lives in me”; and -though we are told that she was no longer able to discern between -the good and evil of her acts, by means of any direct examination of -them: yet her acts are now again perceived to be her own; to be some -of them good and some of them faulty; and are seen, as several and -as differing, by her own self, but “in God.”[55] So did the Lady of -Shallot, all turned away though she was from the world of sight, see in -her mirror the different figures as, good and bad, they moved on their -way, more truly and clearly than she had ever seen them formerly by any -direct perception. - - -3. _Position adopted in this study concerning Catherine’s spiritual -growth._ - -Now these periods of interior, experimental, mystical vicissitude -and growth have also their corresponding variations of religious -analysis and speculation, and of external actions and events; and these -variations are not only the concomitants and expressions of the inner -growth, but are also, in part, the subject-matter and occasion for -the next stage of mystical experience. And since Catherine’s special -characteristic consists precisely in the richness and variety of -her life at any one moment, and in the successive, ever-accelerated -enrichment which it achieves almost up to the end, any obliteration of -this successive growth, or any one-sided attention to any one aspect -of her life during any one of its chief periods, will readily take all -life-likeness out of her portrait. - -Yet to achieve anything like this comprehension is most difficult, if -only because it has to be attempted with the aid of materials which, -where their registration is contemporary with the events chronicled, -belong, all but the legal documents, to the last fifteen years of -her life; and because, even within this last period, they are rarely -furnished with any reference to their exact place within that period. -There is throughout the book a most natural and instructive, indeed -in its way most legitimate and even necessary, insistence upon the -apparently complete independence and aloofness, the transcendence of -her inner life. And this insistence goes so far that a self-sufficing -Eternity, a completely unchanging Here and Now, floating outside and -above even the necessary and normal affections, actions, and relations -of human life and fellowship, seems, especially from after her -conversion till up to the beginning of her physical incapacitation,[56] -to have taken the place of the characteristically human struggle in -and through time and space, with and through our fellow-creatures. -As in Leibniz we get a divinely pre-established harmony between the -dispositions and the acts of the body and those of the soul, which -appear indeed as though indestructibly interrelated, but which, in -reality, operate throughout without one instant’s direct interaction: -so here, the external is not indeed represented as neglected by her, -nor as anything but in complete harmony with her inner life, and as -indeed inspired by God, yet her own mind and soul are but reluctantly -permitted to appear as expressing themselves in it, as requiring and -affected by it. She appears as having got outside of, and away from, -all the visible and purely human, rather than deeper into and behind -it; to have achieved the ignoring of it rather than its conversion and -transfiguration and its appointment to its own intrinsic place and -function in the full economy of the soul’s new life. - -And yet all this is, even in the minds of the authors, but one aspect -of this complex life, and one which, taken alone, would at once do -injustice to its other aspect, the grand depth and range of its -immanental quality. And even in as much as the transcendental aspect -is really attributable to the predominant trend of Catherine’s own -character and teaching, it in no way invalidates the fact of the actual -astonishing many-sidedness and balance of her life, especially before -her last few years, but will be found to proceed essentially from -her rare mode of achieving this many-sidedness and balance, or, more -strictly still, from her own feeling as to this mode, and her analysis -and theory of it. We have no direct concern with this her reflection at -present: what she actually did and directly was, is all we would wish -to try and sketch just now. - - -VII. CATHERINE AND THE HOLY EUCHARIST. - - -1. _A daily Communicant from May 1474 onwards._ - -On the following day, then, on the Feast of the Annunciation, 25th -March, 1473, “her Lord gave her the desire of Holy Communion, a -desire which never again failed her throughout the whole course of her -remaining life. And He so disposed things that Communion was given her, -without any care on her part; she was often summoned to receive it, -without any asking, by priests inspired by God to give it to her.”[57] - -After trying every possible interpretation of this most annoyingly -obscure text by the light of three or four other passages, I have come -to think it to mean that, on this Lady-Day, she, for the first time -since now ten years, received Holy Communion with a keen desire for -its reception; and that this desire remained from this day forward -unintermittently with her, till the end of her life: but that this -desire, which at first may not have been set upon daily Communion, -began to be satisfied by a daily reception only some time in May 1474. -It is anyhow certain that from this latter date onwards she was a daily -communicant up to September 13, 1510, the day before her death.[58] The -exceptions were most rare,--I take it of an average of once or twice a -year,--and were always owing to some insuperable obstacle, mostly of -ill-health. - - - -2. _Her practice as regards the Holy Eucharist, throughout her Convert -Life._ - -Since Holy Communion was the great source and centre of her love and -strength, and the one partially external experience and practice which -was thus renewed day by day throughout her life, and in the spiritual -apprehension and effect of which we cannot trace any distinct periods, -I shall dwell here, once for all, upon the characteristics of this -devotion of hers, which were at all special to herself. - -For one thing, even her ardent love of Holy Communion did not suppress -a bashful dislike of being noticed or distinguished in the matter: -“At the beginning of her conversion she had at times a feeling as of -envy towards Priests, because they communicated on as many days as -they would, without any one wondering at it.” “Once when, for a few -days, the city was under an interdict, she went every morning a mile’s -distance outside of the city walls, so as to communicate; and she -thought that she would not be seen by any one.”[59] - -Next, there is a most characteristic eagerness for interiorization, for -turning the Holy Eucharist, perceived without, into the heart’s food -within; and a corresponding intensity of consciousness and tenderness -at the moment of reception. “When she saw the Sacrament on the altar in -the hands of the priests, she would say within herself: ‘Now swiftly, -swiftly convey it to the heart, since it is the heart’s true food.’” -And “one night she dreamt that she would be unable to communicate -during the coming day, and waking up, she found that tears were -dropping from her eyes, at which she wondered, since hers was a nature -very slow to weep.” And “when at Mass, she was often so occupied with -her Lord interiorly, as not to hear one word of it; but when the time -for Communion arrived, at that instant she would become conscious of -exterior things.” And she would say: “O Lord, it seems to me, that if -I were dead, I should return to life to receive Thee; and that if an -unconsecrated host were given to me, I should recognize it to be such -by the mere taste alone, as one discerns water from wine.”[60] - -Again, her Communion practice bears upon it the stamp of a staunch -virility; of a constant emulation between her own generous turning-away -from its sensible consolations and the divine action, which seems -to have maintained these consolations throughout her life; and of a -determination to abstain even from such deeply consoling Communions, -if such abstention were the more perfect practice for her. “One day, -when she had communicated, there came to her so much odour and so much -sweetness, that she felt as though in Paradise. But turning at once -towards her Love she said: ‘O Love, wouldest thou perchance draw me to -Thee with these savours (_sapori_)? I desire them not, since I desire -but Thee, and Thee whole and entire!’” And “one day a holy Friar,”--it -was probably the Observant Franciscan, Father Angelo of Chiavasso (near -Genoa), beatified later on,--“said to her: ‘You communicate every day: -what kind of satisfaction do you derive from it?’ And she answered -him simply, explaining to him all her desires and feelings. But he, -to test the purity of her intention, said: ‘There might possibly be -some imperfection in such very frequent Communion,’ and then left her. -And Catherine having heard this, fearing such imperfection, at once -suspended her Communions, but at the cost of great distress. And the -Friar, hearing a few days later of how she cared more not to do wrong -than to have all the consolation and satisfaction of Communion, sent -her word by all means to return to her daily Communions; and she did -so.”[61] - -And finally, her Communions produced effects direct and indirect, -spiritual and psychical. The indirect, psycho-physical effects being -variable, and related to the varying conditions of her health, will -be noted as far as possible under the different periods of her life -and, collectively, in the chapter on such psycho-physical questions. -The spiritual effects no doubt grew, but this growth we have no -sufficient materials for pursuing in detail. Yet they have throughout -this peculiarity, that, central and all-permeating as this Eucharistic -influence no doubt was, yet it nowhere takes the form of any specially -Eucharistic devotion or directly Eucharistic meditation or doctrine, -outside of Holy Communion itself and of the immediate occupation with -_it_. Some deep indirect effects on her general tone, imagery, and -teaching will be studied in our second volume. - - -VIII. CATHERINE AND CONFESSION AND DIRECTION. - - -1. _Catherine arouses criticism in the matter of Direction._ - -Now if Catherine occasioned some criticism and testing of her spirit by -the (for that period) very unusual frequency of her Communions,[62] it -is equally on record that she aroused some surprise and apprehension, -by the absence of all Direction, during the many years of the second -period of her convert life. And if, in the matter of her daily -Communions, she had readily entered into the suggestion that there -might be imperfection in this her dearest habit, and yet had to -continue along her unusual way, so too, in this matter of Direction, -she evidently was from the first ever ready to proceed in the ordinary -manner, and yet found herself compelled to follow a lonely course. -“If she attempted to lean upon any one (_accostarsi ad alcuno_), Love -instantly caused her mental suffering so great that she was obliged to -desist, saying, ‘O Love, I understand Thee.’ And when she was told that -it would be well, and more secure, if she were to put herself under -obedience to another, and whilst she was in doubt as to what to do, -her Lord answered her thus within her mind: ‘Confide in Me, and doubt -not!’”[63] Such suggestions will have been made and such scruples will -have been suffered many a time, during the long years in which, in this -matter, her way was an extraordinary one. - - -2. _The facts concerning Catherine’s confessions. Catholic obligations._ - -But in this matter of Direction and Confession, the _Vita_, if we were -to take its present constituents as of uniform value, is astonishingly -vague, ambiguous, and contradictory. Let us take the facts, in the -order of their certainty, moving from the quite certain to the less and -less certain ones; and let us then try and appraise the upshot of the -whole examination. - -We are then, first, absolutely certain that Catherine herself, not -later than 1499,--this date shall be justified later on,--said to Don -Marabotto, (and that he then and there, or shortly afterwards, wrote -down,) the following words: “I have persevered for twenty-five years in -the spiritual way, without the aid of any creature.” And he, in this -matter which concerns his own Confessing and Directing of her during -the last eleven years of her life (1499-1510), twice over solemnly -reaffirms and drives home the reality of the fact thus communicated -to him by herself. “She was guided and taught interiorly by her -tender Love alone, without the means of any [fellow-]creature, either -Religious or Secular”; “she was instructed and governed thus by God, -for about twenty-five years.”[64] And conformably with this, we get the -short dialogue between herself and Love, as just given, and such words -as the following, which she declared that Love itself spoke to her -mind,--evidently during, and probably at the beginning, of these many -years: “Take from the remainder of Scripture this one word ‘Love,’ with -which thou shalt ever walk straight … enlightened, without error, and -(all this) without guide or means provided by any other creature.”[65] - -In the next place, it is equally certain that, with all her biographers -down to this day (_e.g._ Monseigneur Fliche, pp. 350, 351), her words -must be understood to exclude at least all Direction from those -years. And it is, moreover, practically certain that at least the -second Redactor (R. 2) of the _Vita_ understood her words to apply -to Confession also. For whereas, in the older tripartite scheme of -R. 1, the four years of Penance of her first period were filled by -her labours for “satisfying her conscience by means of contrition, -confession, and satisfaction,” R. 2 breaks up those four years into -two periods,--the first, of “a little over a year”; and the second, -of (no doubt) three years,--and does so with a view to thus making -room for the “about twenty-five years” of Catherine’s affirmation. -Now whereas R. 2 in his first period talks thus of Confession; in his -second one, he talks twice of Contrition, and twice of Sorrow, but -nowhere of Confession; and again, whereas in his third (R. 1’s second) -period “many” (no doubt twenty-one) years, there is still no reference -to Confession, indeed here not even to Sin or Contrition in general; -in the fourth (R. 1’s third) period (of eleven years), when she was -being regularly confessed and directed by Marabotto, she, it is true, -“was incapable of recognizing, by direct examination, the nature of -her acts, whether they were good or bad,” but still she was able to -see, and actually “saw all things,” hence also these acts and their -difference, “in God.”[66] - -Thirdly, it is certain that some reasonable doubt can be entertained -as to whether Catherine’s words, solemnly emphatic though they are, -were not understood too literally by Marabotto and the second Redactor. -Nothing is, indeed, more obvious and striking throughout all the -authentic memorials of her, than the delightfully simple, grandly -fearless veracity of her mind. She never speaks but according to the -fulness of her conviction: like with all souls most near unto the -childlike Master, Christ, it can be said of her that “one never knows -what she is going to say next.” And we shall find her insight into -herself at any given moment, even with regard to such partly medical -matters as her psycho-physical condition, to be quite astonishing in -its depth and delicacy. Yet the fact remains, that she was as truly -a person of intense and swiftly changing feelings, exaltations, and -depressions, as she was one of a rich balanced doctrine and of a quite -heroic objectivity and healthy spiritual utilization of all such -intensities. This very heroism and objectivity of hers, so constant -and watchful in all her practical decisions and general doctrinal -statements, no doubt helped to make her feel both the need and the -licitness of giving full and truthful utterance also to the intense and -swiftly passing feelings of her heart. - -One such utterance is specially to the point. She had already been -for eleven years the much-helped penitent of that utterly devoted -priest-friend Don Marabotto, when, in January 1510, he overheard her -(the extant report of the scene is certainly his own and contemporary -with the event) saying to God, shut up alone, as she thought, in -one of her rooms: “There is no creature that understands me. I find -myself alone, unknown, poor, naked, a stranger and different from -all the world.” Yet this does not prevent her finding comfort and, -indirectly, even physical improvement, in and from Marabotto’s sympathy -and words, when these are offered to her not many hours later on.[67] -The abnormally rapid and complete change of feeling depicted here, no -doubt occurred during the last eight months of her life, long after -her health had begun to break up permanently; and cannot directly -illustrate her frame of mind during the years 1474-1499, when she was -in health and relatively strong. Still, she was clearly ever of a -high-strung, intense temperament; and her health was already seriously -impaired when, in 1499, she spoke the words concerning the utter -loneliness of that whole quarter of a century. And if the emphatic -words, spoken to God Himself in 1510, were compatible with confession, -and, indeed, a certain kind of continuous direction, at the very time -and during eleven years before they were spoken: her words uttered -in 1499 to Marabotto, will have been compatible with at least some -confession during a period of years of which the first lay almost a -whole generation behind her. And we shall find at least two other cases -in which Marabotto appears, on Catherine’s own authority, as having -clearly misunderstood the nature of some phenomena connected with -herself.[68] - -Yet for all this, the account which we shall have to give later on -of the characteristics of her confessions to Marabotto,--an account -directly derived from himself,--makes it practically impossible to -assume that even simple confession was practised, at all or otherwise -than quite exceptionally, during those many years. - -Now we have, as a fourth point, to remember that although the Fourth -Council of the Lateran, in the year 1215, had decreed that “All -the Faithful of either sex, after coming to years of discretion, -are bound to confess all their sins at least once a year”:[69] yet -already St. Thomas Aquinas had, in his Commentary on the Sentences of -Peter Lombard, composed in 1252-1257, taught that, since the divine -institution and obligation extends, strictly speaking, only to the -confession of mortal sins, “he that has not committed any mortal sins -is not bound to confess venial sins, but it is sufficient for the -fulfilling of the Church’s precept, for him to present himself to the -priest, and to declare himself free from the consciousness of mortal -sin.”[70] And nothing has changed, as to the nature and extent of -this obligation, since Catherine’s time. The Council of Trent, the -decrees of which were confirmed by Pope Pius IV in 1564, more than -half-a-century after her death, carefully explains that “_all_ the -sins” of the decree of 1215 means all “_mortal_ sins”; and further -declares that “the Church did not, by the Lateran Council, decree that -the faithful should confess,--a thing she knew to be instituted and -necessary by divine right,” but had simply determined the circumstances -and conditions under which this obligatory confession was to take -place.[71] And Father Antonio Ballerini, S.J. (_d._ 1881), gives us -the conclusions, identical with that of St. Thomas, of those great -authorities Francis Suarez (_d._ 1617), Cardinal John de Lugo (_d._ -1660), and Hermann Busenbaum (_d._ 1668),--all three, Jesuits like -himself,--and himself endorses their decision. Suarez indeed declares -this view to be the common opinion of Theologians.[72] - - -3. _Probable course of Catherine’s confession-practice._ - -With these four points before us, let us attempt to reconstruct some -outline of what really happened in her own case, and try and show what -constituted the specifically Catholic quality of this her practice, so -unusual in the middle and later ages of the Church. We shall, then, do -wisely, I think, by considering that the “twenty-five years,” alleged -by her own self, were, as a strict matter of fact, not more than -twenty-one;[73] that during the four first convert years that preceded -this middle period, just as during the last eleven which succeeded it, -she had recourse to confession with the frequency considered normal -in and for these times, in the case of a daily communicant living in -the world; but that, during the intervening period, she was allowed to -substitute that simple occasional, perhaps only annual, presentation -of herself and declaration to the priest in the place of confession -proper, which we have seen to be considered, in a case of such a purity -of soul as hers, as sufficient for fulfilling the Church’s precept, by -a practical consensus of all the great casuist authorities. And thus we -have here again a memorable, and this time a long-persisting, instance -of how the intrinsic and operative connection between the Individual -and the Social, the Mystical and the Institutional elements of Religion -is not a simple identity or coextension,--a point which we already -found exemplified during the first hours of her convert life. - -And the Catholic spirit in this her present course will consist in -her full observance of all to which the Church strictly obliges; in -her readiness at all times to walk in the ordinary way, and in her -repeated attempts, even during this second period, to do so; in her -actually and fervently following the ordinary course whenever she -could, _i.e._ in the first and last period; and finally in her ever -faithfully obeying the promptings of God’s Spirit which, by various -converging spiritual peculiarities, circumstances and means, showed, -with practical plainness, the kind and degree of extraordinary interior -acts and habits which were to be, in large part, _her_ form of the -“Mind of the Church.” For it is indeed certain that the special -characteristic of the Catholic mind is not, necessarily, universally -and finally, the conception and practice of sanctity under the precise -form of the devotional spirit and habits special to the particular part -or period of the Church in which that individual Catholic’s lot may be -cast. What _is_ thus characteristic, is the continuous and sensitive -conviction that there is something far-reaching and important beyond -the Church’s bare precepts, for every soul that aims at sanctity, to -find out and to do; that this something (_sc._ the Church’s mind) is, -always and for all, _presumably_, the most fervent form and degree of -the devotional temper and habits of the Church, as practised in that -time and country; and that it is for God Himself, if He so pleases, to -indicate to the soul that He now wants its fervour to consist in an -observance of the Church’s precepts and spirit under a form and with an -application partially different from the most fervent practice of the -ordinary devotions of that time and place, though this new observance -will be no less costing or heroically self-renouncing than the other. -And this He does usually by slow, often simply cumulative and indirect, -but always solid, painful, and practically unmistakable, because -unsought, means and experiences,--all these attained to well within the -Church. For the Church’s life and spirit, which is but the extension -of the spirit of Christ Himself, is, like all that truly lives at all, -not a sheer singleness, but has a mysterious unity in and by means of -endless variety. Even at any one moment that spirit expresses itself in -numerous variations, by means of various races, rites, orders, schools, -and individuals. And yet not the sum-total of all these simultaneously -present variations is ever as rich as is the sum-total of that spirit’s -successive manifestations in the past. Nor once more can this latter -sum be taken as anticipating all the developments and adaptations which -that ever-living spirit will first occasion and then sanction in His -special organ, the Church. Catherine’s particular, divinely impelled -substitute for the ordinary devotional practice shall be described -later on. - - -IX. CATHERINE AND INDULGENCES. - -A further peculiarity, somewhat analogous to the one just examined, -seems to have characterized her devotional practice--in this case, -throughout her convert life. It had therefore, perhaps, best be -described in this place. - - -1. _The assertions of the “Vita.”_ - -Three items of information are furnished by the _Vita_, on one and the -same half-page. - -(1) “She had such a hatred of self,” says the _Vita_, “that she did not -hesitate to pronounce this sentence: ‘I would not have grace and mercy, -but justice and vengeance shown to the malefactor.…’” - -(2) “For this reason it seemed that she did not even care to gain -the Plenary Indulgences. Not as though she did not hold them in great -reverence and devotion, and did not consider them to be most useful and -of great value. But she would have wished that her own self-seeking -part (_la sua propria parte_) should rather be chastized and punished -as it deserved, than to see it pardoned (_assoluta_), and, by means of -such satisfaction, liberated in the sight of God.” - -(3) “She saw the Offended One to be supremely good, and the offender -quite the opposite. And hence she could not bear to see any part of -herself which was not subjected to the divine justice, with a view to -its being thoroughly chastized. And hence, so as not to give this part -any hope of being liberated from the pains due to it, she abstained -from the Plenary Indulgences and also from recommending herself to the -intercessions of others, so as ever to be subject to every punishment -and condemned as she deserved.”[74] - - -2. _Three points to be noted here._ - -Here I would note three things. - -For one thing, there can be no serious doubt as to the authenticity -of the saying that opens out this group of communications and as to -the substantial accuracy of the two parallel, and (I think) mutually -independent, reports as to her practice: since the saying belongs to -the class of short declarations given in _oratio directa_, which we -shall find to be remarkably reliable throughout the _Vita_; and the -reports testify to something so unusual, so little sympathetic to the -hagiographical mind, so much in keeping with the remainder of her -doctrine and practice, that we cannot believe them misinformed. The -author of the _Dialogo_ evidently fully accepted these three passages, -when, in about 1549, she paraphrases them thus: “She therefore made no -account of her sins, with respect to their punishment, but only because -she had acted against that Immense Goodness”; “She found herself to be -her who alone had committed all the evil, and alone she wanted to make -satisfaction, as far as ever she could, without the help of any other -person.”[75] - -For another thing, we have absolutely final contemporary documentary -evidence of the importance attached by herself both to Indulgences, -and the gaining of them (at least by other people), and to Masses and -prayers for the Dead, inclusive of herself when she should be gone. For -as to Indulgences, we have entries in the Cartulary of the Hospital -(under the dates of March 11, April 10, May 29, and August 23, 1510) of -various considerable sums, amounting in all to over £300, paid by the -Hospital, at the first date, for Catherine’s nephew Francesco, at all -the other dates for herself, for the withdrawal of a suspension of the -Indulgences attached to the Hospital Church, and for the transference, -in that year, of the day appointed for their acquisition. Both these -matters were carried out in Rome by means of Catherine’s second nephew, -Cardinal Giovanni Fiesco. This, it is true, is evidence that only -covers the last six months of her life. - -But as to Masses and Prayers for her own soul after death, we have (1) -her second Will, of May 19, 1498, where she leaves one share in the -Bank of St. George (£100) to the Observant Franciscans of the Hospital -Church, “who shall be bound to celebrate Masses and Divine Offices for -the soul of Testatrix”; (2) her Codicil, of January 5, 1503, where she -leaves (in addition) £3 apiece to two Monasteries “for the celebration -of Masses for her own soul”; (3) her third Will, of May 18, 1506, which -confirms all this; and (4) her last Will, of March 18, 1509, where -she leaves £3 each to three Monasteries, which are each to “celebrate -thirty Masses for her soul,” £3 to a fourth Monastery for Prayers for -her soul, and £25 to the Franciscans of the Hospital Church for the -celebration of Masses to the same effect.[76] - -The reader will at once perceive that these facts are fully compatible -with the attitude so emphatically ascribed to her in the _Vita_, only -if we take these latter statements as expressive of certain intense, -emotional moods; or of some relatively short penitential period; or of -what she did and felt with regard to herself alone and for whilst she -was to live here below, not of what others should do for themselves at -all times and for herself when she was gone. - -And finally, we know exactly how and why the doctrine and practice -described in those passages in the _Vita_ were accepted by the -Congregation of Rites, as forming no obstacle to her canonization. -Pope Benedict XIV, in his great classical work on Beatification and -Canonization, says, “After I had ceased to hold the office of Promoter -of the Faith,” (the date will have been between 1728 and 1733,) “I -know that a controversy arose as to the doctrine of a certain _Beata_, -with regard to the truth of which it was possible to have different -opinions.” And after giving this _Beata’s_ doctrine and practice as -these are presented by Catherine’s _Vita_, and citing the arguments -used against their toleration, he proceeds: “But the Postulators -answered (1) that this _Beata_ had not omitted to gain Plenary -Indulgences from any contempt for them, since her veneration for them -was demonstrated by most unambiguous documents” (no doubt Cardinal -Fiesco’s action, in her name and at her expense, in Rome in 1510, is -meant); “(2) that it is the doctrine of very many theologians, that -those do not sin, who do not labour to gain Indulgences because they -desire to make satisfaction in their own persons in this world or -to suffer in the next; (3) that we should not confound safety with -perfection: it appears indeed to be safer to atone for one’s fault both -by one’s own good works _and_ by Indulgences; but not more perfect, -supposing that a man abstains from Indulgences because his love of -God and his detestation of having offended Him are so great that he -desires to make satisfaction to Him, by bearing the whole of the -merited punishment; and (4) that examples are not wanting of perfect -souls, that have, for a while, desired to bear, even for the sins of -others, the pains of Hell itself, although without falling away from -the friendship and grace of God. And hence the Congregation of Sacred -Rites considered that this doctrine did not militate against the -holiness of the said _Beata_ or against the approbation of her virtues -as heroic.”[77] - - -X. PECULIARITIES CONCERNING THE INVOCATION OF SAINTS AND INTERCESSORY -PRAYER. - -And a third and last peculiarity is particularly instructive as showing -how entirely an unusual, at first sight quietistic, practice is not -restricted, in her case, to specifically Catholic habits. - - -1. _The facts._ - -This peculiarity has already appeared in part in the second of the two -accounts as to her attitude towards Indulgences. “She abstained from -recommending herself to the intercession of others.” And this is borne -out, but (as we shall find) with certain unforeseeable restrictions, by -the rest of the _Vita_. As regards even the Saints, one only invocation -of any one of them is on record,--that of St. Benedict in 1474, already -given. - -And if she did not ask others for prayers for herself in her own -lifetime, her own prayers for others were evidently rare, were -apparently always concerned with their spiritual welfare, and were -generally produced only under some special interior impulsion. Hence -when asked, in 1496 or later, by Vernazza, in the name of several of -her spiritual children, to pray that God might grant them “some little -drops of His Love,” she answers that “for these I cannot ask anything -from this tender Love; I can but present them in His presence.” This -is, no doubt, because she sees them to be already full of the love of -God. Whereas in 1495 the poor working man, Marco del Sale, is dying -of a cancer in the face, and is in a state of wild impatience: so she -prays most fervently for him. It is true that the _Vita_ adds that she -did so, “having had an interior movement to this effect. For she never -could turn to pray for a particular object, unless she had first felt -herself called interiorly by her Love.” Still, this did not prevent -her, in 1497, from praying most fervently for patience for her husband, -(who was dying from a painful complaint,) simply “because she feared -that he might lose his soul,” and without any other more peculiar -incentive than this.[78] - - -2. _The rich variety of her life._ - -Evidently here again, as with the Confessions and Indulgences, her life -and practice were indefinitely varied and spontaneous, and incomparably -richer than the preconceptions and logic of at least some of her -biographers will admit, or indeed than many of her own fervent sayings, -so vividly expressive of certain moments or sides of her career or -character, suggest or even seem to leave possible. But the underlying -meaning and ultimate harmonization of these apparent inconsistencies -between her doctrine and her practice, we can only gradually hope to -find. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -CATHERINE’S LIFE FROM 1473 TO 1506 AND ITS MAIN CHANGES AND GROWTH - - -Let us now attempt, as far as the often scanty and obscure evidence -permits, to give, in the following two chapters, some general account -of the changes and growth observable in her external surroundings, -her human intercourse and social occupation, her physical health and -psychical mood, and above all of those inner experiences and spiritual -apprehensions of hers which dominated all the rest, during each of the -three main periods of her convert life. This general account will, -I trust, suggest the main points for our later investigations, and -will show at once how largely artificial, though necessary, all such -dividing into periods must be, in the case of so deeply unified and -diversified an inner life as Catherine’s. - - -I. FIRST PERIOD OF CATHERINE’S CONVERT LIFE: GIULIANO’S BANKRUPTCY AND -CONVERSION; THEIR WORK AMONG THE POOR, MARCH 1473 TO MAY 1477. - - -1. _Giuliano’s affairs. Catherine’s attitude._ - -The first six months of her first period (this latter we take to have -extended from March 1473 to May 1477) were still spent in Giuliano’s -Palace of the Via Agnese and in his country mansion at Prà.[79] But -all was now swiftly changing, or already greatly changed, both around -her and within. Anxiety, hope, grief, consolation--inasmuch as such -feelings could still for her cluster around events external to her -deepest spiritual life, and could make themselves at all separately -felt during this period of profound absorption in her new large life of -love and penance--must all have centred in her husband. For Giuliano -had by now got his affairs into such disorder as to be unable to keep -up his great social position; and by the autumn of 1473 he had sold his -mansion at Prà, and had vacated and let his palace in Genoa itself.[80] -He was also by now a very sincere convert, in his own manner and -degree; and it was no doubt now that he told Catherine, although -she can hardly have failed to know already, of the existence of a -poor little girl whom, with an apparently ominous indication of weak -indulgence on the part of his widowed mother, he had called Tobia. - -We shall be able to prove Catherine’s grand magnanimity and true, -cordial forgiveness--directly, no doubt only for and at a later -period; but the documents will show that she knew all the decisive -circumstances long before, and there is no room for doubt that her -dispositions had changed or grown as little as had her knowledge. - - -2. _Life in the little house outside the Hospital._ - -Catherine and Giuliano had now, in the autumn of 1473, moved into a -humble little house, in the midst of artisans, mostly dyers, and of the -poor of various sorts, close to the Hospital of the Pammatone, even -then already a vast Institution. This dwelling is probably identical, -as to the site, with the house still standing at the junction of the -Via S. Giuseppe with the Via Balilla, and which bears on its front -a picture of Saints Catherine Adorna and Camillus of Lellis[81] at -the feet of the Madonna. Since the income remaining to them still -amounted, up to Giuliano’s death in 1497, to the equivalent of some -£1,200 a year,[82] this self-abnegation and humble identification -with the lives of the toiling, nameless poor, must have been an act of -deliberate choice, and not one of any degree of necessity. It was never -suspended or revoked by either of them. - -They now agreed together to a life of perpetual continence; and -Giuliano became a Tertiary of the Order of St. Francis,[83] amongst -those attached to the Hospital-Church of the Santissima Annunciata in -Portoria, itself served by Observant Franciscans. Their only little -servant-maid, Benedetta Lombarda, was also a Franciscan Tertiary. -But Catherine herself now shows, in this matter of the Religious -State, an interesting clearing-up of her own special way and form of -sanctity. We saw how much the fervent but inexperienced girl of sixteen -had been moved and had longed to be an Augustinian nun; and now the -sadly experienced wife of twenty-six, even in the midst of her first -convert days, and though surrounded at home, in Church, and in the -Hospital, by Religious of the popular and expansive type presented -by the Franciscans, (a type which her own deep sympathy with, indeed -penetration by, the teaching of the great Franciscan Mystic Jacopone -da Todi, will show to have been closely akin to her own,) manifests no -thought of becoming a Religious, even in the slight degree represented -by the Third Order. And up to her death, thirty-seven years later, -she never wavers on this point. A highly characteristic scene and -declaration illustrative of this attitude of hers will be given further -on. - -The Hospital of Pammatone had been founded by Bartolommeo Bosco, one of -those large-hearted merchant princes of whom Genoa has had not a few, -in 1424, in the street of that name; and only quite recently, in 1472, -the Friars of the adjoining Church of the Annunciata had agreed to the -incorporation of their own infirmary for sick poor with Bosco’s larger -institution. Hence Catherine and Giuliano found 130 sick-beds always -occupied by patients, and over 100 foundling girls, who were being -trained as silk-workers, all ready to their hands and service.[84] -Catherine was besides gradually introduced to the poor of the district, -by the _Donne della Misericordia_--ladies devoted to such works of -mercy--and betook herself to her tasks with characteristic directness -and thoroughness.[85] She must first, and once for all, completely -master all squeamishness in this her lowly work. So she betook herself -to cleansing their houses from the most disgusting filth; and she -would take home with her the garments of the poor, covered with dirt -and vermin, and, having cleansed them thoroughly, would herself return -them to their owners. And yet nothing unclean was ever found upon -herself. She also tended the sick in the Hospital and in their homes, -with the most fervent affection, speaking to them of spiritual things -and ministering to their bodily wants, and never avoiding any form of -disease, however terrible.[86] - - -II. CATHERINE AND TOMMASA FIESCA: THEIR DIFFERENCE OF CHARACTER AND -_ATTRAIT_. PECULIARITY OF CATHERINE’S PENITENCE AND HEALTH DURING THIS -TIME. - - -1. _Catherine’s penances._ - -And throughout this first period of four years, her penances were -great. She wore a hair-shirt; she never touched either flesh-meat or -fruit, whether fresh or dried; she lay at night on thorns. And by -nature courteous and affable, she would do great violence to herself by -conversing as little as possible with her relations when they visited -her, and, as to anything further, paying heed neither to herself nor to -them; and she acted thus for the purpose of self-conquest; and if any -one was surprised at it, she took no notice.[87] - - -2. _Catherine and Tommasina._ - -But one visitor must, even during this period, have been treated by her -with much of her natural spontaneity and ardent expansiveness. She was -a cousin of her own age, a Fiesca and a married woman like herself; -like herself, too, in the wish, just now awakened, to belong entirely -to God, and in her ultimate complete conversion and ardent love of God. -We can attempt to describe her here, as throwing further light upon -Catherine’s idiosyncrasies, at this period in particular. - -Tommasina was different from Catherine in the slow, tentative character -of her first turning to God; and different, too, in the eventual form -of her life; for, when later on a widow, she became first, in 1490, -an Augustinian Canoness at Santa Maria delle Grazie; and then, in -1497, a Dominican Nun at the Monastero Nuovo di San Domenico. This -latter convent she had been given to reform and became its Prioress. -In both houses she was known as Suor Tommasina (Fieschi).[88] She -was different again in that she there spent some of her time in -painting many a religious picture, chiefly of the Pietà, and a highly -symbolical composition, illustrative of the moment of Consecration at -Mass.[89] She executed also in exquisitely fine needlework a piece -which represented, above, God the Father surrounded by many Angels, -and, below, Christ with other figures of Saints. Finally she occupied -herself in writing and produced in original composition a treatise on -the Apocalypse, and another on Denys the Areopagite. - -And the future Suor Tommasa showed now some of that precious gift of -humour, denied to her otherwise greater cousin. For, no doubt with a -bright twinkle in her eyes at the sight of Catherine’s characteristic -vehemence of onslaught, Tommasa would declare that Catherine was -pushing her and giving her no quarter; and that it would be a great -humiliation for herself if, after all said and done, she were to turn -back. But any such feeling of even the possibility of such a relapse, -was amazing to Catherine, and she said: “If I were to turn back, I -would wish that my eyes might be put out, and that I should be treated -with every other kind of indignity.”[90] - - -3. _Peculiarity of Catherine’s penitence._ - -But such intercourse as this must, during this first period, have been -the exception. For her dominant, closely interrelated characteristics -were now a continuous striving to do things contrary to her natural -bias and an alert looking to do the will of others rather than her -own. She moved about with her eyes bent upon the ground. Six hours a -day were spent in prayer, and this although--perhaps just now in part -because--the body greatly felt the strain: the strongly willing spirit -had dominated the weak flesh. Indeed, during this time she was so full -of interior feeling and so occupied within herself, that she was unable -to speak, except in a tone so low as to be barely audible; she seemed -dead to all exterior things.[91] - -And these external circumstances and practices are all only the -setting, material, occasion and expression of this her first period’s -actively penitential spirit, when she was persistently pursued by the -detailed sight of her own particular inclinations, her own particular -sins against God, and God’s particular graces towards her own self. -Her very acts of charity and of friendliness, her very prayers, get -all restricted or prolonged, willed or suffered, as, at least in -part, but so many occasions for a love-impelled, yet still reflective -self-mastery and mortification. And it was no doubt during this time -that, when present one day at a sermon in which the conversion of the -Magdalen was recounted, her heart seemed to whisper to her: “Indeed I -understand,” so similar did her own conversion appear to her to that of -the Magdalen.[92] - - -4. _Her physical health._ - -As to her physical health, the fire which she felt in her heart seemed -to dry up and burn her interiorly. And so great a physical hunger would -possess her, that she appeared insatiable; and so quickly did she -digest her food, that it looked as if she could have consumed iron. Yet -she had no inclination to other than ordinary food, and did not fail to -keep all the ordinary fasts and abstinences.[93] - - -III. CHANGE IN THE TEMPER OF CATHERINE’S PENITENCE, FROM MAY 1474 -ONWARDS. - -Time wears on, and Catherine is still in the same house, and with the -same health, and with the same companions and occupations, penances -and prayers. But the interior dispositions and emotional promptings, -and the mental apprehension of them all, are gradually changing and -are growing wider and freer and less particularized. “She now began -to experience a more affective way, so that she was often as though -beside herself; and” though still “moved by a great interior thirst -after self-hatred, and by a penetrating contrition, she would often lie -prostrate on the ground”; she would do so, “hardly knowing what she was -doing, yet somehow gaining thus some relief for her heart,” overflowing -as it was with a boundless, profound, but now more and more general, -sorrow and tender love.[94] The note of a spontaneous, expansive, -instinctive love is now growing in predominance in her prayer and human -intercourse; and her very penances, though still performed, are now -often practised from a general unreflective instinct of love-impelled -self-hatred, without any conscious application to any particular -inclinations or sins. - -For as to her intercourse with others, she will probably already now -have practised many an act of that beautiful and characteristic, -impulsive, expansive tenderness, of which we shall have a good many -examples from the end of her second period. And as to the character -of her mortifications, we hear the following: “Whilst engaged on such -great and numerous mortifications of all her senses, she was sometimes -asked, ‘Why are you doing this (particular) thing?’ And she would -answer, ‘I do not know, except that I feel myself interiorly drawn -to do so, without any opposition from within. And I think that this -is the will of God; but it is not His will, that I should propose to -myself any (particular) object in so doing.’”[95] I take it that, with -this growing intermittence in the sight of her particular sins, her -Confessions, though still practised, will have become less frequent, -and her Holy Communions more so. - - -IV. CATHERINE’S GREAT FASTS. - - -1. _The assertions of the “Vita.”_ - -And a little later on, again on the Feast of the Annunciation (March -25, 1476),[96] another change took place, a change primarily concerned -with her health, but one which brought out also the deep spirituality -of her religion. On this day she experienced one of those interior -locutions, which are so well authenticated in the lives of so many -interior souls; and “her Love said that He wanted her to keep the Forty -Days, in His company in the Desert. And then she began to be unable -to eat till Easter; on the three Easter Days she was able to eat; and -after these she again did not eat, till she had fulfilled as many days -as are to be found in Lent.”[97] Similarly with regard to Advent. “Up -to Martinmas” (November 12) “she would eat like all the world; and then -her fast would begin, and would continue up to Christmas-Day.” Her -subsequent Lenten fasts are described as beginning with Quinquagesima -Monday and ending on Easter Sunday morning.[98] - - -2. _Substantial accuracy of these accounts. Three facts to be -remembered._ - -I take it that there can be no reasonable doubt as to the substantial -accuracy of this account. But the following three facts must be borne -in mind as regards the physical aspect of the matter. - -The fast, for one thing, is not an absolute one. The account itself -declares that she now and then drank a tumblerful of water, vinegar, -and pounded rock-salt.[99] And to this must be added both the daily -reception of wine--I suppose as much as a wineglassful--which was, -according to a Genoese custom of that time, received by her, as a kind -of ablution, immediately after her Communion;[100] and such slight -amount of solid food as, when in company, she would force herself to -take and would sometimes, though rarely, manage to retain.[101] - -Again, the fast varies partly, in different years, in the date of its -inception; and partly it does not synchronize with the beginning of -the ecclesiastical fast. In the first year her Lenten fast begins on -Lady-Day, in the following years on Quinquagesima Sunday; her Advent -fast begins throughout on Martinmas, November 12. - -And finally, the number of such fasts cannot be more than twenty-three -Lents and twenty-two Advents. The MS. of 1547 has preserved the -right tradition of a difference in the numbers of the Lenten and -Advent fasts, but has raised the number of the former to a round, -symmetrical one. It gives twenty-five Lents and twenty-two Advents. -The printed _Vita_ of 1551 levels the numbers respectively down and -up to twenty-three Lents and as many Advents.[102] Some further minor -physical points will be considered in a later chapter. - - -3. _Effect of these Fasts, and her attitude towards them._ - -But two other matters are here of direct spiritual interest: the -effect of these fasts on her spiritual efficiency, and her own -two-fold attitude towards them. For we are told, again I think quite -authentically, that during these fasts she was more active in good -works, and felt more bright and strong in health, than usual;[103] -answering thus to one of the tests put forward by Pope Benedict XIV, -for discriminating supernatural, spiritually valuable fasts from -simply natural ones. But with him we can find our surest tests in -what is altogether beyond the range of the physical and psychical: -in her own moral estimate of all these matters. For one thing, there -appears here again that noble shrinking from any singularity of this -kind within herself, and from all notice on the part of others. “This -inability to eat gave her many a scruple at first, ignorant as she -was as to its cause, and ever suspecting some delusion; and she would -force herself to eat, considering that nature required it. And though -this invariably produced vomiting, yet she would make the attempt -again and again.” “She would go to table with the others, and would -force herself to eat and drink a little, so as to escape notice and -esteem as much as possible.”[104] And again here, as in all matters -visible and tangible, she shows an impressive loneliness in the midst -of her more carnal-minded disciples. “She would say within herself, -in astonishment” at their stopping to wonder at things so much on the -surface: “If you but knew another thing, which I feel within myself!” -And she would declare: “If we would rightly estimate the operations -of God, we should wonder more at interior than at exterior things. -This incapacity to eat is indeed an operation of God, but one in -which my will has no part; hence I cannot glory in it. Nor is there -cause for our wondering at it, since for God this is as though a mere -nothing.”[105] - - -4. _The fasts form no part of her penitence._ - -These fasts, although beginning within her first period are not -characteristic of it; and her biographers rightly put them into a -chapter distinct from her penances, properly speaking. These penances -will have continued alongside of, and in between, these fasts for about -a year after the beginning of the latter. And then at last, at the -end of this first period of four years, “all thought of such (active) -mortifications was, in an instant, taken from her mind in such guise -that, even had she wished to carry out such mortifications, she would -have been unable.” For “the sight of her sins was now taken from her -mind, so that she henceforth did not catch a glimpse of them,--as -though they had all been cast into the depths of the sea.”[106] - - -V. SECOND, CENTRAL PERIOD OF CATHERINE’S CONVERT LIFE, 1477-1499: ITS -SPECIAL SPIRITUAL FEATURES. - -We now come to the second, longest, and central period of her life, -1477-1499. But though at first sight Chapters VI to XLII, and XLV -of the _Vita_ would seem exclusively to treat of these twenty-two -years, examination proves this to be far from the case. If little or -nothing from the first period is to be found there, very much from the -third is embedded in those pages. And this scantiness of information -springs from the simple fact that, during these twenty-two years, -her inner life is led by herself alone, without any direct human aid -of companionship; and her sufficient health, and the correspondingly -large amount of external activity among the sick and poor, leave her -but little or no time for those conferences and discourses amongst -friends, of which her last period is full. This dearth of evidence is -all the more to be regretted, since these central years represent the -culmination of her balance and many-sided power. - - -1. _Interior change._ - -For the first two years of this time she and Giuliano continued to -live in their small house of the Portoria quarter, very busy, both of -them, amongst the sick and poor, as well in the houses round about as -in the Hospital. Indeed, externally, little or no change can have been -apparent. It was the interior change, the moving away from the actively -and directly penitential state into one of expansive love and joy, -which alone, as yet, marked a new period. - - -2. _The Three Rules of Love. The Divine method of the soul’s -purification._ - -Some time during these new beginnings it must have been that “her Love -once said within her mind: ‘Observe, little daughter, these three -rules. Never say “I will,” or “I will not.” Never say “mine,” but ever -say “our.” Never excuse thyself, but be ever ready to accuse thyself.’” -And another time He said: “When thou sayest the ‘Our Father,’ take for -thy foundation ‘Thy Will be done.’ In the Hail Mary, take ‘Jesus.’ In -Holy Scripture take ‘Love,’ with which thou wilt ever go straightly, -exactly, lightly, attentively, swiftly, enlightenedly, without error, -without guide, and without the means of other creatures, since Love -suffices unto itself to do all things without fear or weariness, so -that martyrdom itself appears unto it a joy.”[107] - -But this her love, just because it is so real and from God, appears -indeed to fill her at any given moment, yet it grows and shows -her, at each fresh stage, both its own incompleteness and her own -imperfection, in her and its former stages. “At any one moment the love -of that moment seemed to me to have attained to its greatest possible -perfection. But then, in the course of time, my spiritual sight having -become clearer, I saw that it had had many imperfections.” “Day by day -I perceive that motes have been removed, which this Pure Love casts -out and eliminates. This work is done by God, and man is not aware of -it at the time, and cannot then see these imperfections; indeed God -continuously allows man to see his (momentary) operation as though it -were without imperfection, whilst all the time He, before Whom the -heavens are not pure, is not ceasing from removing imperfections from -his soul.”[108] - -As ever throughout her life so now also, consolations are not the aim -and end, but only the actual effects of her devotedness, and the ever -fresh incentives to increased disinterestedness and self-surrender. -And, with regard to these consolations, she again strove to escape all -notice. “She would at times have her mind so full of divine love, as to -be all but incapable of speaking; and would be in so great a transport -of feeling as to be obliged to hide herself so as not to be seen. -She would lose the use of her senses and remain like one dead; and, -to escape the occurrence of such things, she would force herself to -remain in company as much as possible. And she would say to her Lord: -‘I do not want that which proceedeth from Thee, but I want Thee alone, -O tender Love.’ But just because her love was so sincere and she fled -from consolations, her Lord gave her of them all the more.”[109] - - -3. _Her Ecstasies._ - -If on one of the many occasions when she had hidden herself away in -some secret spot, she was ever discovered by any one, they would find -her walking up and down, and seeming as though she would wish to do -so without end; or they would come upon her with her face in her -hands, prostrate on the ground, entranced, and with feelings beyond -description or conception. “These ecstasies would almost always last -three or four hours; and if, on coming to herself, she spoke of the -wonders she had seen, there was no one to understand her, and so she -kept silence.” “And if called during one of these trances, she would -not hear, even though they did so loudly.”[110] - -This inattention would, however, occur only in case the call was simply -one of curiosity. For on other occasions “she would remain as though -dead for six hours; but on being called to the doing of any duty, -however trifling it might seem, she would instantly arise and respond -and go about the doing of this her obligation. And she would thus leave -all, without any kind of trouble, according to her wont of flying from -self-will as though it were the devil. And coming thus forth from her -hiding-place she would have her face flushed, so as to look like a -cherub, and to seem to have upon her lips the ‘who then shall separate -me from the love of Christ?’ of the glorious Apostle.” And “on thus -arising from those trances, she seemed to feel stronger both in body -and in soul,”[111] as in the case of the fasting. - -Even in the midst of her work absorptions would occur like unto these -in all but their length of duration: “At times her hands would sink, -unable to go on, and weeping she would say, ‘O my Love, I can no more’; -and would thus sit for a while with her senses alienated, as though -she had been dead. And this would occur oftener at one time than at -another, according to the varying fulness of experience present in that -purified mind.”[112] - - -4. _Pure Love, independent of any particular state or form of life._ - -And she was full of the conviction, and cared much for the formal -acknowledgment on the part of others, that the possession and the -increase of the most perfect love is independent of any particular -state or form of life, and is directly dependent upon two things -only, the grace of God and the generosity of the human will. “One -day a Friar and Preacher,[113] perhaps to test her or because of some -mistaken notion, told her that he himself was better fitted for loving -than she, because he having entered Religion and renounced all things -both within and without, and she being married to the world as he was -to Religion, he found himself more free to love God, and more acted -upon by Him. And the Friar went on, and alleged many other reasons. -But when had spoken much and long, an ardent flame of pure love seized -upon Catherine, and she sprang to her feet with such fervour as to -appear beside herself, and she said: ‘If I thought that your habit had -the power of gaining me one single additional spark of love, I should -without fail take it from you by force, if I were not allowed to have -it otherwise. That you should merit more than myself, is a matter that -I concede and do not seek, I leave it in your hands; but that I cannot -love Him as much as you, is a thing that you will never by any means -be able to make me understand.’ And she said this with such force -and fervour, that all her hair came undone, and, falling down, was -scattered upon her shoulders. And yet all the while this her vehement -bearing was full of grace and dignity.--And when back at home, and -alone with her Lord, she exclaimed: ‘O Love, who shall impede me from -loving Thee? Though I were, not only in the world as I am, but in a -camp of soldiers, I could not be impeded from loving Thee.’”[114] - -There is probably no scene recorded for us, so completely -characteristic of Catherine at her deepest: the breadth and the -fulness, the self-oblivion and the dignity, the claimlessness and the -spiritual power--all are there. - - -VI. CATHERINE AND GIULIANO MOVE INTO THE HOSPITAL IN 1479, NEVER AGAIN -TO QUIT IT. SHE IS MATRON FROM 1490 TO 1495. - -The special character, both in form and content, of Catherine’s -spiritual life and doctrine will occupy us in Chapter VI. Here we -have as yet specially to busy ourselves with its external and social -occasions and effects. And these effects were both large and constant; -indeed they were on the increase up to 1497, two years before this -second period comes to a close. - - -1. _Catherine and Giuliano occupy two small rooms in the Hospital._ - -For in 1479 the couple shift their quarters from outside the Hospital -to within that great building, and there, for eleven years, they -together occupy two little rooms, living without pay and at their own -expense, but entirely devoted to the care of the poor sick and dying -and of the orphans collected there.[115] Indeed Catherine never again -lived outside the walls of the Hospital during the thirty-one years -that still remained to her on earth. - - -2. _Catherine’s double life here, 1479-1490._ - -And here in these rooms, and for eleven years, she worked among -the sick, as but one of their many nurses. The spacious, high, -white-washed, stone-flagged wards, with the great tall windows shedding -floods of glaring light or cheering sunshine, according to the season -without and to the mood of the poor sick within, stand still as -they stood in Catherine’s day. True, new wards have been added; the -lay female Nurses of her time have been in part replaced by Nursing -Sisters, and the Observant Friars by Capuchins; much, very much has -been discovered since, both as to man’s body and as to the facts and -functions of his mind; all things, and man’s interpretation of all -things, seem as though irretrievably changed. And yet the mystery of -devoted love, its necessity, difficulty, and actual operative presence, -as an occasional pang and aspiration in us all, as a visible, dominant -influence in some of us, remain with and in us still unchanged, with -all the freshness of an elemental force, indestructible, inexhaustible. -This devoted work of Catherine, this her serving of the sick “with -the most fervent affection, and immense solicitude,”[116] had also -the remarkable circumstance about it that, “notwithstanding all -this her attentive,” outward-looking “care, she never was without -the consciousness of her tender Love; nor again did she, because -of this consciousness, fail in any practical matter concerning the -Hospital.”[117] - - -3. _Matron of the Hospital, 1490-1496._ - -And this double life continued thus, and grew in depth and breadth. And -at the end of fourteen years of such humble service, she was, in 1490, -appointed Matron (_Rettora_) of the whole Institution, apparently the -same year as that in which her now widowed cousin Tommasina entered the -Augustinian Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie. During the six years -in which she held this office, she had much administrative business and -responsibility weighing upon her. Large sums of money passed through -her hands, and she always managed to spend and to account for them with -the greatest care and success. Indeed “her accounts were never found -wrong by a single _danaro_ (farthing).”[118] - - -VII. CATHERINE AND THE PLAGUE. THE OUTBREAK OF 1493. - -It must have been after she had thus shown a rare devotedness -and talent in an ordinary Nurse’s work, and had next, as Matron, -manifested, for some years, a remarkable administrative ability, that, -in 1493, she rose, in both capacities, to the very height of heroism -and efficiency. - - -1. _Catherine’s general activity._ - -Early in January of that year, quite exceptionally cold weather visited -the city: the harbour was frozen over; and early in the spring the -Plague broke out so fiercely, and raged so long--till the end of -August--that of those who remained in the stricken city, four-fifths -succumbed to the terrible disease. Most of the rich and noble, all -those that did not occupy any official post, fled from the town. But -Catherine not only remained at her post, but she it was no doubt -who organized, or helped to organize, the out-of-door ambulance and -semi-open-air wards which we know to have been instituted at this -juncture on the largest scale. The great open space immediately at the -back of and above the Hospital, where now still stretch the public -gardens of the Acquasola, she managed to cover with rows of sailcloth -tents, and appointed special Doctors (mostly Lombards), Nurses, and -Priests and Franciscan Tertiaries, for the physical and spiritual care -of their occupants. Throughout the weeks and months of the visitation -she was daily in their midst, superintending, ordering, stimulating, -steadying, consoling, strengthening this vast crowd of panic-stricken -poor and severely strained workers. - - -2. _The pestiferous woman._ - -And “on one occasion, she found” here, “a very devout woman, a Tertiary -of St. Francis, dying of” this “pestilential fever. The woman lay there -in her agony, speechless for eight days. And Catherine constantly -visited her, and would say to her, ‘Call Jesus.’ Unable to articulate, -the woman would move her lips; and it was conjectured that she was -calling Him as well as she could. And Catherine, when she saw the -woman’s mouth thus filled, as it were, with Jesus, could not restrain -herself from kissing it with great and tender affection. And in this -way she herself took this pestilential fever, and very nearly died of -it. But, as soon as ever she had recovered, she was back again at her -work, with the same great attention and diligence.”[119] - -How much there is in this little scene! Beautiful, utterly -self-oblivious impulsiveness; a sleepless sense of the omnipresence -of Christ as Love, and of this Love filling all things that aspire -and thirst after it, as spontaneously as the liberal air and the -overflowing mother’s breast fill and feed even the but slightly -aspiring or the painfully labouring lungs and the eager, helpless -infant mouth; swift, tender, warm, whole-hearted affection for this -outwardly poor and disfigured, but inwardly rich and beautiful -fellow-creature and twin-vessel of election; an underlying virile -elasticity of perseverance and strenuous, cheerful, methodical -laboriousness; all these things are clearly there. - -Only when everything had again returned to its normal condition did -she once more restrict herself to the administrative work of the -Hospital.[120] - - -VIII. CATHERINE AND ETTORE VERNAZZA, 1493-1495. - -It must have been during this epidemic of 1493 that Catherine first got -to know, or at least first to work with, a man hardly less remarkable -than herself. - - -1. _Ettore’s family, marriage, and philanthropic work._ - -The Genoese notary Ettore Vernazza, Catherine’s junior by some -twenty-three years, (as in the cases of his still greater -contemporaries and compatriots, Columbus, Pope Julius II, and Andrea -Doria, the year of his birth remains uncertain, but is probably 1470,) -was a scion of the ancient house of Vernaccia, which derived its name -from a wine-producing village on the Eastern Riviera. A Riccobono -Vernaccia had been Chancellor of Genoa, as far back as 1345. Ettore, -the first of the family to write his name Vernazza, was the son of -the Notary Pietro Vernaccia and of Battistina Spinola, his wife. A -sister of his, Marietta, married into the Fieschi family.[121] And if -Catherine really did go among the pestiferous sick, she can hardly -have failed to meet Ettore, now twenty-three years old. For his eldest -daughter, the Augustinian Canoness, the Venerable Battista Vernazza, -a most careful writer and one full of a life-long vivid remembrance -of her father, in an account of Ettore, written by her in Genoa in -1581 (she was born in 1497, four years after the event she describes), -tells of “a great compassion which he had conceived when still very -young, at the time that the pestilence raged in Genoa, and when he used -to go around to aid the poor, and when he found that, by means of a -preparation of cassia, he could bring them back from (certain) death to -life.”[122] - - -2. _Ettore’s character; Catherine’s chief biographer._ - -Ettore was, and he kept and made himself, and rare graces fashioned -him ever increasingly into, a man of fine and keen, deep and -world-embracing mind and heart, of an overflowing, ceaseless activity, -and of a will of steel. To him, the earliest and perhaps up to the -end the most intimate, certainly the most perceptive, of Catherine’s -disciples and chroniclers, we owe the transmission of many of the -reminiscences of her conversion and early strivings (no doubt -primarily derived from her own self), and of probably more than half -of such authentic sayings and discourses of hers, as were recorded -contemporaneously with their utterance. Indeed all that remains to us -of written testimony, contemporaneous in this strict sense of the word, -and that is other than legal documents, can, up to 1499, be safely -attributed to him. And all such constituents of the now sadly mixed up, -and most varyingly valuable, materials and successive layers of the -_Vita ed Opere_ as can with probability be assigned to his composition, -are characterized by a remarkable clearness and consistency, restraint -and refinement, elasticity and freshness of spiritual apprehension -and sympathy. Thus Ettore’s influence back upon the formation of -Catherine’s literary image and of our entire, especially of our -authentic, conception of her, was predominant, and her influence -upon his whole life was decisive; and hence his life can be rightly -taken as an indefinite extension and new application and necessary -supplementation of her own life and doctrine. I shall then, for both -these reasons, try and work up what we can recover concerning the -successive stages of his intercourse with Catherine and of the growth -of his own life up to her death, into the corresponding vicissitudes of -her remaining years. - -It must have been two years later (1495) that Vernazza became her -disciple; and probably some two or three years still further on, that -Ettore began to keep (no doubt at first only quite occasional) records -of her Sayings and Doings.[123] - - -IX. CATHERINE’S HEALTH BREAKS DOWN, 1496; OTHER EVENTS OF THE SAME YEAR. - -The year 1496 is marked by various events external and internal. - - -1. _Three external changes._ - -In June, or some time before, Vernazza marries the beautiful -Bartolommea Ricci, of the distinguished family of that name. On -the 17th of June Giuliano sells his Palace in the Via St. Agnese. -And, probably at Midsummer, perhaps at Michaelmas, Catherine, forced -to do so by increasing physical infirmities, resigns her office of -Matron.[124] - - -2. _End of the extraordinary Fasts._ - -Catherine “was now no more able to have a care of the government of -the Hospital or of her own little house” (within its precincts) “owing -to her great bodily weakness. She would now find it necessary, after -Communion, to take some food to restore her bodily strength, and this -even if it was a fast day.” We thus get the beginning of a third -period with regard to such fasting powers. In the first, she had done -as all the world, but had been able to keep all the Church fasts and -abstinences. In the second, she had, during Lent and Advent, eaten -little or nothing, and had, during the remainder of the time, lived as -she had done before. And now, for the rest of her life, her eating and -fasting are entirely fitful and intermittent, and she has to abandon -all (at least systematic) attempts to keep even the ordinary Church -fasts and abstinences. - -If we are determined to insist on the accuracy of the “twenty-three -Lents and twenty-two Advents” of her extraordinary fasts affirmed -already by MS. “A,” we shall have to understand this present inability -to fast as applying, till after Lent 1496, only to the times outside -of Lent and Advent, since this fasting period cannot be made to begin -earlier than Lent 1476. I take it that in this, as certainly in most -other cases, there was, in reality, a much more gradual transition than -the _Vita_ accounts would lead one to expect. - - -3. _She continues within the Hospital precincts. Her two maid-servants._ - -Catherine had ceased to be Matron, but she did not leave the ample -precincts of the Hospital; indeed she continued in the separate little -house, which she had, probably since 1490, been occupying with -Giuliano. But it will be better to describe her abode a little later -on, when we can be quite sure as to its identity. - -She had now, as I think had been the case since soon after she had -left her Palace, two maids in her service: the widow and Franciscan -Tertiary, Benedetta Lombarda, who appears, already then as an old and -valued servant, in Giuliano’s will of October 1494, and who never left -Catherine till her death; and a younger, unmarried maid, either Mariola -Bastarda or a certain Antonietta. Argentina del Sale, too, will have -often, perhaps continually, been about Catherine, aiding her in various -ways; but she will not as yet have been living under the same roof with -her. As we shall find, this little perfervid and untrained intelligence -became the instrument, or at least the occasion, of the introduction of -the largest legendary incident into the ultimate _Vita_ of her mistress. - - -X. EVENTS OF 1497. - -The next year, 1497, is marked by two events, of all but contradictory -import and effect. - - -1. _Birth of Tommasina (Battista) Vernazza._ - -On April 15 Vernazza’s first child, a daughter, is born; and Catherine -is her God-mother and holds her at the Font. Dottore Tommaso Moro, a -learned lawyer friend of Ettore, is the God-father, and the child is -given his name and is called Tommasina. What would Catherine have felt -or said had she foreseen the vicissitudes--they will occupy us in due -course--through which this, her fellow God-parent, was to pass, during -the storms of that Religious Revolution which were to break out so soon -after her death? She would, we may be sure, have at all events been -glad at the action and influence of her God-daughter towards and upon -her God-father, in those sad and most difficult times. - - -2. _Giuliano’s death._ - -And Giuliano was gravely ill ever since the beginning of the year, -if not before; and some time in August or September he died.[125] He -had been suffering long from a chronic and most painful illness; and -towards the end, “he became very impatient; and Catherine, fearful -lest he should lose his soul, withdrew into another chamber, and there -cried aloud for his salvation unto her tender Love, ever repeating -with tears and sighs these words alone: ‘O Love, I demand this soul of -Thee; I beg Thee, give it me, for indeed Thou canst do so.’ And having -persevered thus for about half-an-hour with many a plaint, she was -given at last an interior assurance of having been heard. And returning -to her husband, she found him all changed and peaceful in his ways, -and giving clear indications, both by words and signs, that he was -fully resigned to the will of God.” And “some time after his death she -said to a spiritual son of hers,” no doubt Vernazza: “‘My son, Messer -Giuliano has gone; and you know well that he was of a somewhat wayward -nature, whence I suffered much mental pain. But my tender Love, before -that he passed from this Life, certified me of his salvation.’ And -Catherine, having spoken these words, showed signs of regret at having -uttered them; and he was discreet and did not answer this remark of -hers, but turned the conversation to other topics.”[126] At all events -this conversation is thoroughly authentic, and Catherine’s reserve, -and her regret at having somewhat broken through her usual restraint, -are profoundly characteristic: the contributors to and redactors of -her Life have been increasingly blind, or even opposed, to all such -beautifully spontaneous and human little shynesses and regrets for -momentary indiscretions. - - -3. _Giuliano’s Will._ - -Giuliano had, by his Will of the 20th October 1494, ordered his body -to be buried in the Hospital Church; and this was now carried out by -Catherine. A vault of some dimensions must have been made or bought, -since later both she herself and Argentina del Sale declared their wish -to be buried in Giuliano’s “monument.” Perhaps the wish of the latter -was carried out. - -But Giuliano had left two far more important and difficult matters to -the management of Catherine,--matters which, indeed, were respectively -full of pain and of anxiety for her,--Thobia, and his share in the -Island of Scios. As to Thobia, he had left £500 to the Protectors of -the Hospital, among which were reckoned £200 which he had already paid -them through his late mother, Thobia Adorna, for the keep of this -daughter of his, and had warmly recommended her to their kind care; and -had arranged, in case they refused this responsibility, that Thobia -(who must by now have been quite twenty-six years of age) should be -regularly paid the interest on this money. He also left to Catherine, -for payment to “a certain person in Religion,”--possibly a member of -a Third Order, and whose identity is carefully concealed, but who -cannot fail to be Thobia’s mother--“£150, in repayment of the same sum, -borrowed from her by himself and the said Catherine,”--money which this -poor mother will have spent on the child’s keep, up to the time when -Giuliano told his story to Catherine. - -As to his two _carati_ (shares) in the lands of the Island of Scios, -farmed by the Genoese Merchant Company “Maona,” he desires that, -if sold, his cousins Agostino and Giovanni Adorno shall be able to -buy these _carati_ for a lower price than would be required of any -other purchaser. There are also elaborate conditions and alternatives -attached to a legacy of £2,000 to his unmarried nephew Giovanni -Adorno, with a view to his marrying and having legitimate children: an -anxiety which of itself would show how sincere had been Giuliano’s own -conversion, and which was evidently not far-fetched, since in this very -Will he leaves £125 to a natural sister of his, Catherine, daughter of -his father Jacobo, for the boarding (no doubt during the latter years -of her life) of his late mother, Thobia Adorna. - -Giuliano had also left Catherine herself £1,000,--a return of her -marriage dowry, and £100 from himself; and in addition “all garments, -trinkets, gold, silver, cash, furniture, and articles of vertu, which -might be found either in his dwelling-place or elsewhere.” And he -does so because he “knows and recognizes that the said Catherine, his -beloved wife and heiress, has ever behaved herself well and laudably -towards himself,” and “wants to provide the means for her continuing -to lead, after his death, her quiet, peaceful, and spiritual mode of -life.” And he adds the condition that, “if the said Catherine were -to proceed to a second marriage (a thing which he does not think she -will ever do), then he deprives her of all the legacies and rights and -duties of heirship mentioned in this Will, and confers them upon the -honourable Office of the Misericordia of Genoa,”--a society with and -for which, as we have seen, Catherine had worked so much and so well. - -Altogether Giuliano had left by this Will about £6,000 for Catherine -to allot and appropriate; and quite £4,000 of this sum-total demanded -careful and even anxious consideration, whilst £650 of it could not but -provoke painful memories and make a call upon all her generosity. And -by his Codicil of January 1497, he had given her still greater latitude -of action, by declaring that, as regarded his legacy to the Hospital, -Catherine should have full power and leave to abrogate or to modify -it, according to her will and pleasure.[127] Thus these documents -constitute an impressive proof of Giuliano’s full trust in the wisdom, -balance of mind and magnanimity of his wife, now herself already so -broken in health. - - -4. _Catherine’s execution of Giuliano’s Will._ - -It is nine months after Giuliano’s death, on May 19, 1498, that we can -watch and see how Catherine has been attempting to execute her trust, -and how her nature has responded to these various difficult calls -upon it, and to the claims of her own family. She first of all, then, -orders her body to be buried in the same grave with her husband, in the -Hospital Church; and that only the Friars and Clergy of the Hospital -shall be present at the funeral; and leaves £10 for her obsequies and -£50 for Masses for herself. She next leaves to the Priest Blasio Cicero -four shares of the Bank of St. George (about £200), of which he is to -pay £150 to a certain female Religious, in satisfaction for a certain -debt. And she abrogates Giuliano’s legacy to the Hospital, and, in its -place, herself leaves it four shares of St. George’s (at the time about -£200, but always tending to increase in value), in liquidation of the -£300 that remained unpaid from among the £500 of that legacy. She next -leaves to Benedetta Lombarda one share of Saint George’s, in addition -to the similar share left her by Giuliano; and to “Antonietta, dwelling -with Testatrix, £25, in case she shall live with her up to her death.” -As to the two _carati_, she leaves them to Giovanni Adorno, in lieu -of the money bequeathed to him by Giuliano. As to her own relations, -she leaves two shares of St. George’s apiece to her two nieces Maria -and Battista, the daughters of her eldest brother Jacobo, for their -marriage portions; and, if they all die before marriage, then all this -money is to go to their father. She leaves £10 to her Augustinian -Canoness sister Limbania; and institutes her three brothers Jacobo, -Giovanni and Lorenzo, and their heirs, her residuary legatees. - -Here four things are noticeable. Catherine has herself undertaken the -expenses of Thobia’s keep; the apparent lessening on her part of the -sum originally apportioned for the purpose by Giuliano is doubtless -only apparent, and must proceed from the same cause which has produced -a similar apparent diminution in the amount of Giuliano’s legacy to -his nephew from £2,000 to £1,500. In the next place, this is the only -one out of the couple’s four Wills, in which the second maid is not -Mariola Bastarda, but a certain Antonietta. Catherine feels uncertain -as to whether Antonietta will persevere in her service to the end; -and we shall find that she has again disappeared in Catherine’s next -Will of 1506, and that Mariola has again taken up her old place. We -shall find that a story, of which the authenticity and significance -are most difficult to fix, attaches without doubt to one or the other -of these maids. In the third place, Catherine does not sell the two -_carati_, but leaves them, in lieu of the money bequeathed to him, to -Giovanni Adorno; no doubt from the feeling that thus, at her death, -this her share in the government and exploitation of the Greek island -would be in the hands of a man in the prime of life, who could help to -check malpractices. And lastly, she shows a generous forgiveness of -Giuliano, a delicate magnanimity towards Thobia and Thobia’s mother, -and a thoughtful affection for all her own near and grown-up relations, -by ordering her body to be buried in the same grave with Giuliano; -by herself undertaking the charges of Thobia’s keep, and appointing a -priest by name for handing over Giuliano’s legacy to the still unnamed -mother of Thobia; and by remembering her sister, although she had long -been provided for in her Convent, her three brothers, who were no doubt -indefinitely richer than herself, and especially her two marriageable -nieces. Altogether, of the £2,304 definitely accounted for in the -Will, she leaves £69 for her own funeral and for Masses for herself; -£400 for Thobia and her mother; £210 to her own relations; £125 to -servants; and £1,500 to her husband’s nephew. There is no trace here of -any indifference to the natural ties of kindred, or of an abstraction -of mind rendering her incapable of a careful consideration and firm -decision in matters of business: a point which we shall find to be of -much importance, later on. - - -5. _Ettore’s “Mandiletto”-work._ - -In this year, too, if not already in the previous one, Vernazza founded -the institution of the “Mandiletto.” Still a young man--for he was -now at most but twenty-eight--Ettore had been noticing, in his work -among the poor, how much misery of all kinds obtained in commercial, -money-making, hazard-loving Genoa, amongst persons who, even though -ill, refused to take refuge in the hospitals; and who, however poor -at present, had known better, even brilliant days, and were too proud -to beg, or even to accept alms from any one who could recognize them. -And hence he now organized a system for discovering and visiting such -persons in their own homes and for minimizing their pain in accepting -help, by arranging that the members of this little fraternity should -never visit such houses, except with some kind of little veil or -handkerchief (_fazzoletto_, _mandiletto_) applied to their faces.[128] - -Catherine, who had helped the Uffizio della Misericordia so much, and -who herself so greatly disliked being noticed or even simply seen -whenever she was doing or suffering anything at all out of the common, -had no doubt, at least in a general way, inspired this beautifully -delicate means of preserving and sparing the bashfulness of the giver -and the dignity of the recipient. Throughout the remaining years of her -life she must have cared to hear Vernazza’s report as to the progress -of this work. - - -XI. BEGINNING OF HER THIRD, LAST PERIOD; END OF THE EXTRAORDINARY -FASTS; FIRST RELATIONS WITH DON MARABOTTO. - -But it is in the next year, 1499, that we reach the actual beginning of -the third and last period of Catherine’s Convert life. - - -1. _End of the Fasts; transfer of the “carati.”_ - -Some of the events of this year are again predominantly external, or -but continuations or consequences of previous inclinations of her will. -It must have been at the end of the Lent of this spring-time that all -extraordinary fasting-power, of a kind that could be foreseen and -that more or less synchronized with the ecclesiastical season, left -her for good and all. And she had gone on feeling strongly her share -of responsibility for the government of that far-off island. Hence -she betook herself, on September 18 of this year, with the Notary -Battista Strata, who has drawn up nine out of the fourteen Legal Acts -of Giuliano and herself, to the great palace of the Cardinal Giuliano -della Rovere, who, four years later, became Pope Julius II. This palace -stood by the (now destroyed) Church of San Tommaso, and was at this -time the residence of Giovanni Adorno. And there, in the great Loggia -looking south, Catherine dictated the substance of an Act of Cession -then and there to her husband’s nephew of those two _carati_, which -weighed so heavily on her mind. Perhaps Giovanni was in poor health, -and Catherine was too eager to eschew her responsibility in the matter -to be willing to wait any longer.[129] - - -2. _Beginning of Catherine’s relations with Don Marabotto._ - -The chief event, however, from the point of view of her inner life, -and which gives us a second close and most important eyewitness for -her last period, was the beginning of her spiritual relations with Don -Marabotto.[130] “At the end of the twenty-five years during which she -had persevered the way of God without the means of any creature,” says -the _Vita_, “the Lord gave her a priest, to take care both of her soul -and of her body; a spiritual man and one of holy life, to whom God gave -light and grace to understand His operations within her. He had been -appointed Rector of the Hospital; and hence was in a position to hear -her Confession, say Mass for her, and give her Holy Communion according -to her convenience.”[131] Now the rare and profound isolation and -independence of her middle period render this turning to and finding -of human help specially significant; the numerous sayings addressed -to her Confessor to be found throughout the _Vita_ were all, with the -sole exception of those contained in the Conversion-scene, spoken to -Marabotto and transmitted by him to us;[132] and probably at least half -of the narrative of her Life and well-nigh all her Passion are due to -Don Marabotto’s pen. It is then important, and it is possible to get a -fairly clear idea as to the sort of man he was. - - -3. _Don Marabotto’s family and character; Catherine’s attitude towards -him._ - -Don Cattaneo came from a stock even more ancient and distinguished -than that of Vernazza. A Marabotto had had a lawsuit with the Bishop -of Genoa in 1128; Roggiero Marabotto had lent money to the King of -Sardinia in 1164; Martino Marabotto had been Ambassador to Rome, -Florence, and Lucca in 1256; Pelagio of that name had been Notary to -the Mint in 1435; Giorgio, a Doctor of Medicine in 1424; Ambrosio, -Lieutenant-Governor of Corsica in 1459. And the family, like the -Fieschi, had always been Guelph: Federico Marabotto had armed nine -galleys against the Ghibellines and had had a narrow escape from the -latter, during a dark night of 1330; and Antonio and Domenico were -known Guelph leaders in 1450 and 1452. Indeed the latter was Procurator -to the Fieschi family in 1443, and thus anticipated, by sixty years -and on a larger scale, Don Cattaneo’s management of Catherine Fiesca’s -modest affairs.[133] - -Don Cattaneo himself we find ever gentle, patient, devoted and -full of unquestioning reverence towards Catherine; most valuably -accurate and detailed in his reproduction of things, in proportion -to their tangibleness; naïf and without humour, thoroughly matter of -fact, readily identifying the physical with the spiritual, and thus -often, unconsciously, all but succeeding in depriving Catherine’s -spirit, for us who have so largely to see her with his eyes, of much -of its specially characteristic transcendence and of its equally -characteristic ethical and spiritual immanence. Such a mind would -appear better fitted to follow,--at a respectful distance,--than to -lead such a spirit, as Catherine’s; and, indeed, to be more apt to help -her as a man of business than as a man of God. As a matter of fact, -however, he was quite evidently of very great help and consolation, -even in purely spiritual matters, to Catherine, during these last -eleven years of her life. Not as though there were any instances -of his initiating, stimulating, or modifying any of her ideals or -doctrines: she entirely remains, in purely spiritual matters, her -own old self, and continues to grow completely along the lines of -her previous development. And again he did attend, with an all but -unbroken assiduity, to matters not directly belonging to his province -_qua_ priest,--to her much-tried, ever-shifting bodily health, and, -probably some three or four years later on, to her financial affairs, -which latter were still of some variety and complication, owing to her -generous anxiety to do much for others, with but little of her own. But -between these two opposite extremes of possible help or influence lay -another middle level, in which his aid was considerable. For “whenever -God worked anything within her, which impressioned her much either in -soul or body, she would confer about it all with her Confessor; and he, -with the grace and light of God, understood well-nigh all, and would -give her answers which seemed to show that he himself felt the very -thing that she was feeling herself.” “And she would say, that even -simply to have him by, gave her great comfort, because they understood -each other, even by just looking each other in the face without -speaking.”[134] Marabotto’s Direction consists, then, in giving her the -human support of human understanding and sympathy, and, no doubt, in -reminding her, in times of darkness, of the lights and truths received -and communicated by her in times of consolation. Never does Marabotto -see, or think he sees, as far or as clearly as she sees, when she sees -at all; and it is the light derived by him from herself at one time, -which he administers to her soul at another. - - -4. _Catherine’s first Confession to Don Cattaneo._ - -The general tone and character of her first Confession to him are -described to us, no doubt from his own contemporary record. “She said: -‘Father, I know not where I am, either as to my soul or as to my body. -I should like to confess, but I cannot perceive any offence committed -by me.’” “And as to the sins which she mentioned,” adds Marabotto, “she -was not allowed to see them as so many sins, thought or said or done by -herself. But her state of soul was like unto that of a small boy, who -would have committed some slight offence in simple ignorance; and who, -if some one told him: You have done evil, would at these words suddenly -change colour and blush, and yet not because he has now an experimental -knowledge of evil.” “And many a time she would say to her Confessor: -‘I do not want to neglect Confession, and yet I do not know to whom to -give the blame of my sins; I want to accuse myself, and cannot manage -it.’ And yet, with all this, she made all the acts appropriate to -Confession.”[135] - -We shall see, indeed, how keen, right up to the end, was her sense of -her frailty and of her general and natural inclination to evil. And her -teaching as to numerous positive and active imperfections remaining -in the soul, in every soul, up to the very end, is so clear and -constant, and so admittedly derived from her own experience, that we -can explain the above only by the supplementary part of her doctrine -(also derived from her own experience), which insists that some greatly -advanced souls do not, at the time of committing them, as yet see these -their imperfections, and that, by the time they have so far further -advanced as to see these imperfections, they are no more inclined to -commit them. In this way, then, there would be no fully formal sin or -deliberate imperfection to confess. - - -XII. HER CONVERSATIONS WITH HER DISCIPLES; “CATERINA SERAFINA.” DON -MARABOTTO AND THE POSSESSED MAID. - - -1. _Pure Love and Heaven._ - -It is probably during the next two years of her life, that occurred the -beautiful scene and conversation,--so typical of her relations with her -disciples during this first part of her last period (1499 to 1501), -which we can think of as her spiritual Indian summer, her Aftermath. -The scene has been recorded for us by her chief interlocutor, Vernazza. -Probably Bartolommea, Ettore’s wife, was present, and possibly also -Don Marabotto. “This blessed soul,” he writes, “all surrounded though -she was by the deep and peaceful ocean of her Love, God, desired -nevertheless to express in words, to her spiritual children, the -sentiments that were within her. And many a time she would say to them: -‘O would that I could tell what my heart feels!’ And her children -would say: ‘O Mother, tell us something of it.’ And she would answer: -‘I cannot find words appropriate to so great a love. But this I can -say with truth, that if of what my heart feels but one drop were -to fall into Hell, Hell itself would altogether turn into Eternal -Life.’”[136] “And one of these her spiritual children, an interior soul -(_un Religioso_),”--Vernazza, present on this occasion,--“dismayed at -what she was saying, replied: ‘Mother, I do not understand this; if -it were possible, I would gladly understand it better.’ But Catherine -answered: ‘My son, I find it impossible to put it otherwise.’ Then he, -eager to understand further, said: ‘Mother, supposing we gave your word -some interpretation, and that this corresponded to what is in your -mind, would you tell us if it was so?’ ‘Willingly, dear son,’ rejoined -Catherine, with evident pleasure.” - -“And the disciple continued: ‘The matter might perhaps stand in this -wise.’ And he then explained how that the love which she was feeling -united her, by participation, with the goodness of God, so that she -no more distinguished herself from God. Now Hell stands for the very -opposite, since all the spirits therein are in rebellion against God. -If then it were possible for them to receive even a little drop of such -union, it would deprive them of all rebellion against God, and would -so unite them with Love, with God Himself, as to make them be in Life -Eternal. For Hell is everywhere where there is such rebellion; and Life -Eternal, wheresoever there is such union. And the Mother, hearing this, -appeared to be in a state of interior jubilation; whence with beaming -face she answered: ‘O dear son, truly the matter stands as you have -said; and hearing you speak, I feel it really is so. But my mind and -tongue are so immersed in this Love, that I cannot myself either say or -think these or other reasons.’ And the Disciple then said: ‘O Mother, -could you not ask your Love, God, for some of these little drops of -union for your sons?’ She answered, and with increased joyousness: ‘I -see this tender Love to be so full of condescension to these my sons, -that for them I can ask nothing of It, and can only present them before -His sight.’”[137] - -I sincerely know not where to look for a doctrine of grander depth -and breadth, of more vibrating aliveness; for one more directly the -result of life, or leading more directly to it, than are those few -half-utterances and delicately strong indications of an overflowing -interior plenitude and radiant, all-conquering peace. - -And even one such scene is sufficient to make us feel that the -following passage of the _Dialogo_ is, in its substance and tone, -profoundly true to facts: “This soul remained henceforth” (in this -third period) “many a time in company with its many spiritual friends, -discoursing of the Divine Love, in such wise that they felt as though -in Paradise, both collectively, and each one in his own particular way. -How delightful were these colloquies! He who spoke and he who listened, -each one fed on spiritual food of a delicious kind; and because the -time flew so swiftly, they never could attain satiety, but, all on fire -within them, they would remain there, unable at last to speak, unable -to depart, as though in ecstasy.”[138] - - -2. _“Caterina Serafina”._ - -Five times the _Vita_ compares her countenance, which, when she was -deeply moved, had a flushed, luminous and transparent appearance, to -that of an Angel or Cherub or Seraph;[139] and it even gives a story, -which purports to explain how she came to be called the latter. And -though this anecdote may be little more than a literary dramatization -of this popular appellation of Catherine; and although, even if the -scene be historical, Catherine has no kind of active share in bringing -it about; yet the passage is, in any case, of some real interest, since -it testifies to and typifies Catherine’s abundance of moral and mental -sanity and strong, serene restorative influence over unbalanced or -tempted souls, and this at a time when she herself had already been in -delicate health for about five years. - -The story is interesting also in that it shows how strikingly like -the superficial psycho-physical symptoms of persons described as -possessed by an evil spirit were, and were thought to be, to those -of ecstasy, hence to Catherine’s own. Thus when an attack seized -this “spiritual daughter of Catherine,--a woman of large mind (_alto -intelleto_), who lived and died in virginity, and under the same -roof with Catherine” (no doubt Catherine’s second, unmarried servant -Mariola Bastarda is meant, and each must have had experience of the -other’s powers and wants from or before 1490 till 1497, and again -from 1500 onwards),--“she would become greatly agitated and be thrown -to the ground. The evil spirit would enter into her mind, and would -not allow her to think of divine things. And she would thus be as one -beside herself, all submerged in that malign and diabolic will.”--And -similarly we are told that Catherine would “throw herself to the -ground, altogether beside herself,” “immersed in a sea,”--in this -case, “of the deepest peace”; and “she would writhe as though she were -a serpent.”[140] - -Yet this superficial likeness between these two states,--a likeness -apparent already in the similar double series of phenomena described -in St. Paul’s Epistles and in the Acts of the Apostles,--serves, -here also, but to bring out in fuller relief the profound underlying -spiritual and moral difference between the two conditions of soul. -For it is precisely in Catherine’s company that, when insufferable -to her own self, the afflicted Mariola would recover her peace and -self-possession, so that “even a silent look up to Catherine’s face -would help to bring relief.”[141] - -It is in 1500, soon after Mariola’s return to her mistress (I take the -maid’s state of health to have occasioned her absence from Catherine -for two years or so), that this spiritual daughter is represented as -declaring in the first stage of one of these attacks,--or rather “the -unclean spirit” possessing her is said to have exclaimed to Catherine -“We are both of us thy slaves, because of that pure love which thou -possessest in thy heart”; and “full of rage at having made this -admission, he threw himself on the ground, and writhed with the feet.” -And then when,--all this is supposed to take place in the presence of -both Catherine and Don Marabotto,--the possessed one has stood up, the -Confessor forces the spirit step by step to speak out and to declare -successively that Catherine is “Caterina,” “Adorna or Fiesca,” and -“Caterina Serafina,” the latter being uttered amidst great torment.[142] - - -XIII. CATHERINE’S SYMPATHY WITH ANIMAL- AND PLANT-LIFE: HER LOVE OF THE -OPEN AIR. HER DEEP SELF-KNOWLEDGE AS TO THE HEALTHINESS OR MORBIDNESS -OF HER PSYCHO-PHYSICAL STATES. - - -1. _Increase of suffering and of range of sympathy._ - -It is indeed in this last period of her life that we can most clearly -see a deeply attractive mixture of personal suffering and of tender -sympathy with even the humblest of all things that live. And this is -doubtless not simply due to the much fuller evidence possessed by us -for these last years, but is quite as much owing to the actual increase -of these twin things within herself. “She was most compassionate -towards all creatures; so that, if an animal were killed or a tree -cut down, she could hardly bear to see them lose that being which -God had given them.”[143] And a beautiful communion of spirit can -now be traced even between plant-life and herself; and an innocent -self-diversion from a too exciting concentration, and help towards a -patient keeping or a bracing reconquering of calmness, is now found by -her, Franciscan-like, in the open air and amidst the restful flowers -and trees. Thus “at times she would seem to have her mind in a mill; -and as if this mill were indeed grinding her, soul and body”; and then -“she would walk up and down in the garden, and would address the plants -and trees and say: ‘Are not you also creatures created by my God? Are -not you, too, obedient to Him?’”--even though, I think she meant to -say, your life moves on so instinctive, calm, and freely expansive in -the large, liberal air, as I feel it to do, by its very contrast to my -own eager, crowded life, struggling in vain for a sustained perfection -of equipoise and for an even momentary adequacy of self-expression. -“And doing thus, she would gradually be comforted.”[144] - -Indeed she would, in still intenser moods, use plants and other -creatures of God in a more violent fashion. But this is now no more -done as of old, for direct purposes of mortification; but, at one -time, from an unreflective transport of delight, delight which itself -seems ever to impel noble natures to seek to mix some suffering with -it; and, at another time, for the purpose of producing strong physical -impressios, counter-stimulations and escapes from a too great intensity -of interior feeling. “She would at times, when in the garden, seize -hold of the thorn-covered twigs of the rose-bushes with both her hands; -and would not feel any pain whilst thus doing it in a transport of -mind. She would also bite her hands and burn them, and this in order to -divert, if possible, her interior oppression.”[145] - - -2. _She alone keeps the sense of the truly spiritual, in the midst of -her psycho-physical states._ - -Indeed nothing is more characteristic of her psychic state, during -these years, than the ever-increasing intensity, shiftingness and -close interrelation between the physical and mental. But we shall find -that, whereas those who surround her, Confessor, Doctors, Disciples, -Attendants, all, in various degrees and ways, increasingly insist -upon and persist in finding direct proofs of the supernatural in the -purely physical phenomena of her state even when taken separately, -and indeed more and more in exact proportion to their non-spiritual -character: Catherine herself, although no doubt not above the medical -or psychical knowledge of her time, remains admirably centred in the -truly spiritual, and continually awake to the necessity of interior -spiritual selection amongst and assimilation and transformation of all -such psycho-physical impressions and conditions. Even in the midst -of the extreme weaknesses of her last illness we shall see her only -quite exceptionally, and ever for but a few instants, without this -consciousness of the deep yet delicate difference in ethical value and -helpfulness between the various psycho-physical things experienced by -herself, and of the requirements, duties and perceptions of her own -spirit with regard to them. - -And this attitude is all the more remarkable because, to the outer -difficulty arising from the persistent, far more immediate, and -apparently more directly religious, view of all her little world -about her, came two peculiarities working in the same direction from -within her own self. There was the old constitutional keenness and -concentration of her highly nervous physical and psychical temperament, -and the rarely high pitch and swift pace of her whole inner life, which -must, at all times, have rendered suspense of judgment and detachment -with regard to her own sensations and quasi-physical impressions -specially difficult. And there was now the new intensity and closeness -of interaction between soul and body, which must have made such lofty -detachment from all but spiritual realities a matter of the rarest -grace and of the most heroic self-conquest. - - -3. _Catherine’s health does not break up completely till 1507._ - -The _Vita_, indeed, as we now have it, tells us that “about nine years -before her death,” hence in 1501, “an infirmity came upon her, which -neither her attendants nor the doctors knew how to identify”; and that -“there was confusion, not on her own part, but on the part of those -who served her.”[146] But this whole Chapter XLVII (pp. 127-132) of -the present _Vita_, which opens out thus, is wanting in MSS. “A” and -“B”; and is composed of documents which appear, in a fuller and more -primitive form and in their right chronological place, in the next -three chapters (pp. 132-160), chapters without doubt predominantly -due to Marabotto; and of the documents making up the present Chapter -XXXVIII (pp. 98, 99), which are earlier again, in both contents and -composition, and are very certainly the work of Vernazza. And this -means that, though the present Chapter XLVII claims to give a general -account of her condition during 1501-1510, it does not, as a matter of -fact, give us anything but details belonging without doubt to 1507-1510. - -The manner in which this late compiler insists upon the directly -spiritual, indeed supernatural, character of even the clearly secondary -and physical phenomena of her state, make it highly probable that, -having once exaggerated the quality, he readily snatched at any -indications (possibly a slip of the pen in some MS., writing 1501 -instead of 1507; we have a similar slip in MS. “A” which on p. 193 -twice writes 1506 for 1509), which favoured an early date for the -beginning of her last illness. Certainly the legal documents at our -disposal show her to us still variously interested and active, right up -to 1507. - -It will, then, be better first to describe this activity up to 1507, -and to take even the general questions concerning her illness in -connection with her last four years, 1507-1510. - - -XIV. CATHERINE’S SOCIAL JOYS AND SORROWS, 1501-1507. - - -1. _Birth of Ettore’s last two daughters._ - -It will have been during these years 1501 to 1507, unless indeed -already between 1497 and 1501, that Vernazza’s second and third -daughters were born; and if Catherine had stood God-mother to his -eldest child, Tommasina, it is inconceivable that she should not -have cared for Tommasina’s sisters, Catetta and Ginevrina. Certainly -their father, Catherine’s closest friend and disciple, gave detailed -attention, right up to the end of his strenuous life, to all three -children; and made most thoughtful particular provision, in his still -extant remarkable Will of 1517, for the youngest, Ginevrina, who at -that time was the only one not yet settled in life.[147] Thus Vernazza -knew how to combine all this detailed thought for his own children -with the spacious public spirit of which his Dispositions are a still -extant, most impressive monument; and Catherine, who was his deepest -inspirer, clearly led the way here, right up to the last four years of -her life. For we have already seen how she managed to conjoin, in a -fashion similar to Ettore’s, a universalist love for Love Transcendent, -with a particularism of attachment to individual souls, in which that -Love is immanent. - - -2. _Deaths of Limbania, Jacobo, and Giovanni._ - -And if she had joy over souls coming into the world, she had sorrow -over souls leaving it. For in the single year 1502 she lost her only -sister, Limbania, and her two elder brothers Jacopo and Giovanni. It -is true that the _Vita_ says: “There died several of her brothers and -sisters; but, owing to the great union which she had with the tender -will of God, she felt no pain, as though they had not been of her -own blood.”[148] But then we have already often found how subject to -caution and rebate are all such general, absolute statements; this -passage in particular is, by its vagueness and ambiguity (she had but -one sister of her own), stamped as late and more or less secondary; -and we shall trace, later on, a similar even more extensive _a priori_ -modification of her authentic image in the _Dialogo_. Certainly her -Wills show no kind of indifference to her own relations. In that of -1498 she specially and carefully remembered these very three relations; -and in proportion as these two brothers’ children grow up and at all -require her help, Catherine specially refers to and plans for them,--so -for Jacobo’s eldest daughter Maria, in view of getting her married -(Wills of 1498, 1503, 1506, 1509); and for Giovanni’s three sons (Wills -of 1503, 1506, 1509). Jacobo’s second daughter seems also to have died -at this time, as she no more appears after the Will of 1498. We shall -see how exactly the same affectionate interest is shown by her towards -her still remaining brother and his two sons.[149] - - -3. _The Triptych “Maestà.”_ - -And she evidently still went on increasing the number of the objects -of her interest and affection, and the degree of her attachment to -such objects as she already loved. For in her Codicil of the next -year, January 1503, she gives a careful description of a picture -now belonging to herself, “a ‘Majesty,’ representing the Virgin -Mary with Saint Joseph, and the Lord Jesus at their feet, with her” -(Fieschi-Adorni) “coat-of-arms painted within and without.” The -picture evidently represented the Adoration of the Infant Jesus, and -was painted on wood,--a triptych: with Catherine’s arms painted both -inside and outside the two wings. She again describes it thus fully in -her Wills of 1506 and 1509, leaving it, on all those occasions, to a -certain Christofero de Clavaro (Christofer of Chiavari?). It is then -quite clear both that this picture had been specially painted by some -one for Catherine, and that Catherine, for some reason or reasons, -greatly treasured it. Who then was the painter and what was the reason? -I think both are not difficult to find. - -We have seen how Catherine’s much-loved cousin, the widowed Tommasina -Fiesca, had in 1497 moved into the Monastero Nuovo in the Aquasola -quarter,--close to Catherine’s abode; so that the cousins will have -met constantly from that time forward. We have also seen that this -distinguished artist painted many a “Pietà” (the dead Christ on -His Mother’s lap, possibly with Angels on each side), and executed -a piece of needlework again representative of a group,--this time -God the Father with many Angels above, and Christ below. Indeed -Federico Alizeri has succeeded in rediscovering one of her works, a -representation of Christ crowned with thorns and surrounded by the -Instruments and Mysteries of His Passion, painted in fine outline upon -sheepskin mounted on a wood-panel.[150] And we have seen how much -Catherine had, as a child, been affected by a “Pietà,” and shall find -her, even after this date, still affected by a religious picture. There -can then be no reasonable doubt that Suor Tommasina was the painter -and giver of this picture,--again a group, a “Maestà,” instead of the -usual “Pietà.” - -And the facts of Catherine caring to possess, to preserve, and to -transmit something thus specially appropriated to herself, with her -family arms upon a religious picture, are all deeply significant -touches, and quite unlike what all the secondary, and even some of the -primary, parts of the _Vita_ would lead one to expect. - - -4. _Increasing care for Thobia._ - -And this same Codicil shows us how her care, and no doubt her genuine -affection, for Thobia was growing. For she now leaves her the income -on two shares of the Bank of St. George (no doubt only a slight gift, -about £2 10_s._ a year; but Catherine possesses but very little that -she is free to leave as she likes, the claims upon her are very many, -and the young woman is already well provided for, considering her -social station), her better silk gown, a skirt, and various veils. The -poor girl died in 1504 or 1505, for in Catherine’s Will of 1506 she -appears as “the late Thobia.” She must have been about thirty years old -at the time. - - -5. _Argentina del Sale; story of Marco del Sale’s death._ - -But in lieu of poor Thobia, Catherine was now given by Providence a -new lowly object of affection and interest. For it was doubtless in -the late spring of 1505 that occurred the incident, of which we have -the beautifully simple and naïf record in Chapter XLVI of the _Vita_; -a record certainly based upon information supplied by Argentina, but -which I take to be the literary work of Vernazza, and to be more or -less contemporary with the events described. A humble young friend -or acquaintance of Catherine’s, who had perhaps already been her -occasional little day-servant, one Argentina de Ripalta, had now been -away from her and married, for a year, to a poor navvy working in the -Molo (Quay) quarter of the town; and this her husband, Marco del Sale, -was now dangerously ill, indeed he was dying of a cancer in the face. -And, having tried every kind of remedy, and seeing himself incurable, -and being thus in great and hopeless pain, Marco had lost all patience -and was as one beside himself. And then Argentina bethought herself of -Catherine, and came to the Hospital, and begged her to come and see her -husband, and pray to God for him. - -And Catherine was at once at Argentina’s disposal, and straightway went -off with her. And having come into Marco’s room, she greatly comforted -him with her few but homely and fervent words. Then starting off again -in company with Argentina, Catherine entered, near to the house and -still close to the sea, into the little Church of Santa Maria delle -Grazie la Vecchia,--so called to distinguish it from the more recent -Chapel of the Augustinianesses, which bore the same general title,--and -there, kneeling in a corner, Catherine prayed for Marco. The little -seamen’s Church is still in use, with its many mementoes of four -centuries and more of ships foundered and of ships safely come to port. -And having here finished her prayer, Catherine returned with Argentina -to the Hospital. There Argentina left her, and returned to Marco, and -found him so changed that from a Devil he seemed turned into an Angel. -And with joyous tender feeling he asked: “O Argentina, come, tell me -who is that holy soul that you brought me?” But Argentina answered: -“Why, that is Madonna Caterinetta Adorna, a woman of most perfect -life.” And the sick man replied: “I beg of thee, by the love of God, to -take care to bring her here a second time to me.” - -And so the next day Argentina returned to the Hospital and told all to -Catherine. And Catherine again promptly came back with Argentina. But -when Catherine had entered the room and approached the bed, Marco threw -his arms round her, and wept for a long space of time. And then, still -weeping, but with great relief, he said to her: “Madonna, the reason -why I wished you to come is, first to thank you for the kindness you -have shown me; and next to ask a favour of you, which I beg you not to -refuse me. For when you had left this room, Our Lord Jesus Christ came -to me visibly and in the form in which He appeared to the Magdalen in -the garden, and gave me His most holy blessing, and pardoned me all my -sins, and told me that I should prepare for death, because that I shall -go to Him on Ascension-Day. Hence I pray you, most tender Mother, deign -to accept Argentina as your spiritual daughter, and to keep her with -you constantly. And thou, Argentina, I pray thee, be content with this -plan.” They both gladly declared themselves ready and content. - -When Catherine had gone away, Marco sent for a certain Augustinian -Friar of the Monastery of the Consolation, and carefully confessed his -sins and received Holy Communion; and then ordered all his worldly -affairs with a notary and with his relations. And he did all this in -spite of them all, who thought that his intense pain had driven him -off his head, and who kept saying: “Take comfort, Marco, soon you will -be well again; there is no occasion as yet for you to attend to these -things.” - -And the Eve of the Ascension having come round, he again sent for the -same Confessor, and again confessed and communicated, and got him this -time to add Extreme Unction and the Recommendation of the Dying, and -all this with great composure and devotion. But as the night came on, -he said to the Friar: “Return to your Monastery; and when the time -comes, I will give you notice.” And then, alone with Argentina, he -took his crucifix in his hand, and turning towards his wife he said: -“Argentina, see, I leave thee Him for thy husband; prepare thyself to -suffer, for I declare to thee that suffering is in store for thee.” -This did not fail to come about, for she suffered later on, both -mentally and physically. And for the rest of the night he continued to -comfort her, and to encourage her to give herself to God and to accept -suffering as the ladder for mounting up to Heaven. Then when the dawn -had come he said: “Argentina, abide with God; the hour has come.” And -having finished these words, he expired; and his spirit straightway -went to the window of the cell of his Confessor, and tapping against -the pane said: “Ecce homo.” But the Friar hearing this, at once knew -that Marco had passed to his Lord. - -And as soon as Marco’s body had been buried, Catherine took Argentina -to live with her as her spiritual daughter, and thus kept her promise. -And since she loved this daughter much, she was wont to take her with -her when she went out. And hence one day, when once more passing by -the little Church on the little square by the Quay, she and her young -daughter again went in and prayed. And on coming out, Catherine said to -Argentina: “This is the place, where grace was gained in prayer for thy -husband.”[151] - - -6. _Catherine’s social interests in 1506._ - -And in the following year, 1506, we still find Catherine full of -interest and activity of the most varied kind. On March the 13th and -16th Catherine was again busy for the Hospital, by receiving the -Foundlings and the various articles and monies anonymously deposited -there for their keep. And these can hardly have been altogether -exceptional acts, even for this period of her life.[152] And on the -21st of May she made her third Will, which is interesting for various -reasons. For it is in this document that we first hear of the deaths -of her two elder brothers and of Thobia, and (by implication) of that -of her sister Limbania and of her second niece Battista. And we can -once more trace here the continuity of her interests and attachments. -Her elder niece Maria is again provided with a marriage dowry; her -brother Lorenzo remains (now sole) residuary legatee; Thobia’s mother -gets her legacy compounded for an immediate settlement and payment; the -maids Benedetta and Mariola have their legacies somewhat increased; -the “Maestà” is again carefully described and allotted; and she again -orders her body to be buried alongside of that of her husband.[153] -Indeed fresh interests appear here. For the three sons of her second -brother and the eldest son of her third brother are now grown up; and -so she makes these four nephews her residuary legatees, should her -brother Lorenzo die before herself. Don Marabotto has now been her -Confessor and Chaplain for seven, and her Almoner for three years; and -so she leaves him the income of eight shares of St. George’s for his -lifetime, which, at 4 per cent. would make £16 a year,--the capital to -go, at Marabotto’s death, to her heirs. And Argentina del Sale has been -with her for just about a year; and so she leaves her various articles -of personal linen and bedding.[154] - -But, above all, the place of this Will’s redaction is new amongst -the memorials of her life, and directly indicative of a still -further enlargement of her influence and interests. For if of the -fourteen legal documents drawn up for, and in the presence of, -Giuliano or herself, eleven were composed in the small house within -the great Hospital of the Pammatone, and only two others,--the -Marriage-Settlement, and the Deed of Transfer in favour of Giovanni -Adorno,--had hitherto been written elsewhere, this Will was executed in -the Refuge for Incurables, in the Portorio quarter, in the evening of -the day mentioned, in the presence of three weavers and one dyer,--two -trades strongly represented in this poor and populous quarter. Now -the choice of this place is deeply suggestive, because it became the -chief care and final home of Ettore Vernazza’s later years. Indeed it -is certain that, on the death of his wife, Vernazza came and lived -in the midst of these poor Incurables; and that this residence here -of Catherine’s closest friend did not begin later than three years -from this date--hence still during Catherine’s lifetime, in 1509. His -far-reaching Wills of 1512 and 1517 are both dated from this Refuge, -of which he was, by then, manager and chief supporter; and it is there -that he died his heroic death in 1524. Hence it is certain that now -already Vernazza must have been deeply interested in this fine, but -at that time still languishing, work (its fixed income did not as -yet amount to fully £400 a year), and he must often have been there; -possibly he had even already a room of his own in the house. - -There can, in any case, be no doubt, that in the choice of this place -for the drawing-up of this Will, we have an indication, all the more -interesting because entirely incidental, of the wide and ever-widening -range, and of the entirely solid, indeed heroic character of -Catherine’s interest and influence. It also shows us that she was still -able to get about, although this Refuge, now the Spedale dei Chronici, -is, no doubt, not far away from her Pammatone home. If she could still -go there, she no doubt still could and did go to her cousin Suor -Tommasina’s Convent, which was certainly no further off. And I surmise -that many a spiritual colloquy will have taken place, with Catherine -as chief interlocutor, and Suor Tommasina and Ettore Vernazza as chief -questioners and listeners, in the parlour of San Domenico and in that -of the Refuge respectively. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -CATHERINE’S LAST FOUR YEARS, 1506 TO 1510--SKETCH OF HER CHARACTER, -DOCTRINE, AND SPIRIT - - -I. CATHERINE’S EXTERNAL INTERESTS AND ACTIVITIES UP TO MAY 1510. -OCCASIONAL SLIGHT DEVIATIONS FROM HER OLD BALANCE. IMMENSELY CLOSE -INTERCONNECTION OF HER WHOLE MENTAL AND PSYCHO-PHYSICAL NATURE. -IMPRESSIONS AS CONNECTED WITH THE FIVE SENSES. - - -1. _Indications of external interests._ - -Even during the next four years, up to May 1510, we still find -various most authentic and clear indications of external interests -and activities in Catherine’s life. Thus, on the 21st June 1507, the -Protectors of the Hospital address a letter to Don Giacobo Carenzio -(who had, as they tell him, been elected Master--_Rettore_--already -fifteen months previously), urging him to come and take up his post; -and Catherine, who, as we shall see, was later on variously helped -by this Priest, and who cared so much for the Hospital, cannot have -remained indifferent to that first election and to this present -reminder. - -Again on the 6th December 1507, the Protectors, Lorenzo Spinola, -Manfredo Fornari, and Emmanuele Fiesco, met in Catherine’s room, and -decided, no doubt with her advice and co-operation, to allow another -widow-lady and devotee of the Hospital, Brigidina, wife of the late -Giacomo Castagneto, to settle within its precincts.[155] Then on -27th November 1508 she makes a Codicil, leaving an additional £25 to -Mariola, and a further article of dress to Argentina; and declaring -that she is “entirely content” with Don Marabotto’s administration of -her monies and charities. Don Cattaneo has then now become her Almoner, -and her charitable activity continues large. The document is drawn up -by Ettore Vernazza, an unimpeachable witness to Marabotto’s rectitude -and exactness.[156] - -Indeed as late down as 18th March 1509 her long Will of that date shows -an admirable persistence of her old attachment for and interest in her -surviving brother, niece (the provision for Maria’s possible marriage -is particularly careful and detailed), and nephews (the youngest of -the latter, Giovanni, is omitted, no doubt because he had now become a -Cardinal, with a corresponding income); in Don Marabotto, who retains -the same little pension; in her three maids Benedetta, Mariola, and -Argentina, all of whose legacies get somewhat increased; and in the -fortunes of the Hospital and of Thobia’s mother (she repeats her -account of what she has already done for them).[157] - - -2. _Occasional imperfection of judgment._ - -Yet now at last we can find symptoms of the final break-up of her -health, and of an occasional slight or momentary deviation from, or -diminution of, her old completeness of balance in both judgment, -taste, and feeling,--although even now this occurs only in matters of -relatively secondary importance, and but heightens the impressiveness -of the still unbroken front which she maintains, in all her fully -deliberate acts, with regard to all essential matters. Indeed, it -is not difficult to feel, even where one cannot directly trace, in -all such acts and matters, a still further deepening of the heroic -watchfulness and childlike spontaneity, and of the humility and tender -_naïveté_ and creatureliness, of her general tone and attitude. - - -3. _Close-knittedness of her psycho-physical organism: her spiritual -utilization of this._ - -But before recounting the few instances in which we can trace an -indication of partly physical depression, or of some lessening of -mental alertness or volitional power in secondary matters, or of slight -passing unwilled _maladif_ impressions, let us attempt a somewhat -methodic description of the extreme sensitiveness and immensely close -interconnection of her whole psycho-physical nature, and of the general -modifications, both in quality and in quantity, which these impressions -were wont to go through; and all this, just now, on occasion of -incidents closely similar to those already experienced in her past life. - -It would indeed be altogether mistaken to class all this sensitiveness -as necessarily but a form of illness; for the great majority, and all -the most characteristic, of her apparently physical pains and troubles, -are but varieties and heightenings of the always unusually swift and -profound impressionableness of her whole psycho-physical organism. With -the sole exception of that attack of pestilential fever (probably in -the year 1493), I can nowhere, right up to three days before her death, -find any trace in her life of illnesses or disturbances of any but a -psycho-physical, nerve-functional type. - -Indeed her psychic self is throughout so impressionable, and the mind -is, ever since her Conversion, so active, dominant, and absorbed in -the actual and attempted apprehension of the great realities which, -though invisible, require for their vivid apprehension an imaginative -pictorial embodiment: that we shall have, in a later chapter, to ask -ourselves the question whether it was not the mind, or the imagination -at the mind’s bidding, which thus affected the psycho-physical life, -rather than the psycho-physical life which, primarily independent -of the former, offered itself as but so much raw, still unrelated -material, to the fashioning, transforming mind. Especially will it be -necessary to consider carefully the influence upon her mind, and upon -the chronicler’s accounts of her state, which may have been exercised -by the writings of the Areopagite and of Jacopone. It will then become -clear that these authors have undoubtedly contributed to the form in -which these truths and realities were, if not actually apprehended by -Catherine, at least described by her disciples. - -Yet even this point remains, in Catherine’s case, (and indeed in that -of all the great Saints,) of no real spiritual or moral importance, -since all these great and generous souls persist in ever using these -psycho-physical things, whether they be projections or “givennesses,” -as but so many instruments and materials for the apprehension, -illustration, acquisition, and purification of spiritual truth and of -the spirit’s own fulness and depth. And Catherine’s persistence in this -attitude of utilization and transcendence of what the natural man so -continuously tends to make his direct aim and final limit continues -practically unbroken to the end. I will group these psychic impressions -according to the five senses. - - -4. _Impressions connected with the sense of touch._ - -The earliest, and up to the end the most marked and general, of all -such unusual impressions appears to have been one connected with the -sense of touch,--that feeling of mostly interior, but later on also -of exterior, warmth, indeed often of intense heat and burning, which -comes to her, the first as though sunshine were bathing her within or -without, the second sometimes as though a great fire were enveloping -her, and sometimes as though a living flame were piercing her within. - -Already in 1473, on occasion of her Conversion, we find unmistakable -indications of such sensations; they are, however, of a predominantly -pleasurable kind. And I take it that during her great lonely -middle-period they will, in so much as present, have been of a similar -nature. But later on, from after 1499 onwards, these sensations and -attacks become increasingly painful,[158] and are specially described, -and variously alluded to, under the terms of _operation_, _assault_, -_siege_. When specially keen and concentrated, and accompanied by some -piercing psycho-spiritual perception, they appear under the terms of -_arrow_, _wound_; and the perception itself bears then the name of -_ray_ or _spark_ (of divine love).[159] - -Now we lookers-on can, of course, with more or less ease, mentally -separate, in a general way, the latter, the spiritual apprehension, -creation and content, from the former, the psycho-physical occasion, -material and form; although it is certainly difficult, and probably -impossible, to decide, at least in any one case, how far it is her -mental activity that occasions her psycho-physical condition, or how -far it is the latter which occasions the former. But what actually and -demonstrably happened in Catherine’s case, was something incomparably -beyond the range to which such psycho-physical considerations apply. -For to her, psychically, a keenly sentient; rationally, a deeply -thinking, feeling, and willing creature,--these experiences, howsoever -classable, were most real, and, in course of time, more and more -penetrating and painful; and they were, to her own consciousness, -entirely prior to any interpretation or utilization of them. Hence, -for the present at all events, we had better take these states as they -presented themselves to her immediate and ordinary consciousness. And -this very same immensely sentient soul was so firmly centred, deep down -below and beyond the psycho-physical, in the Moral and Spiritual, that -these experiences were welcomed and actively used but as so many means -and materials for ethical purification and character-building, and for -the analogical apprehension and illustration of spiritual truths. - -Thus it is that these sensations of burning which, during her years -of health, were themselves so pleasurable and peaceful, helped, as -we shall find when we come to consider her doctrine, to suggest and -illustrate for her the joys and health-giving influence of the presence -of God, both here and in Paradise, and of the soul’s apprehension of -God, as light for the understanding and warmth for the affections and -the will. And when, with her failing health, these sensations turned -into painful, in part seemingly physical attacks,--attacks which, -however, left the mind in an increased and ever-increasing peace and -contentment,--they again helped her to gain and develop her doctrine -concerning Purgatory. - -In both cases her teaching gained thus a vividness of quasi-directly -sensible experience, of something in a manner actually seen and -felt, since it was built up out of suggestions derived from direct -sensations and psycho-physical states. And yet in both cases not all -such sensations, of themselves quite valueless and uninstructive from -an ethical and religious point of view, could have helped towards -anything of spiritual significance, had they not been sifted, taken -up, organized and transformed in and into a large and deep spiritual -experience and personality. There is absolutely nothing automatic or -necessary in the crowning, ethically significant stages of this whole -process, however rapid and instinctive and effortless, and simply of -a piece with the psycho-physical occasions, these utilizations and -grace-impelled and grace-informed creations may appear. We shall, -in proof of this, soon see how physical and literal and spiritually -insignificant remained, during the last four months of her life, -the apprehensions of her disciples as to these heats and piercing -sensations: these good, indeed devoted, people seem incapable of -measuring spiritual love by anything higher than thermometer-readings -or other physical tangibilities. And we shall also have to record one -or two momentary instances when this heat-feeling and apprehension -clearly assumed a _maladif_ character in Catherine herself. - - -5. _Impressions connected with taste and smell._ - -The unusual sense-perceptions which were the next to be aroused -were apparently those of taste and smell: although the one -certain indication I can find of such an unusual psycho-physical -taste-and-smell impression, of a pleasurable and not clearly _maladif_ -character, is not earlier than 1499.[160] It came to her in connection -with the one great devotion of her whole convert life,--the Holy -Eucharist. “Having on one occasion received Holy Communion, so much -odour and sweetness came to her, that she seemed to be in Paradise. -Whence, feeling this, she straightway turned towards her Love and -said: ‘O Love, dost Thou perhaps intend to draw me to Thyself with -these savours? I want them not, since I want nothing but Thee -alone, and all of Thee.’”[161] Here, then, she turns away from and -transcends, precisely as St. John of the Cross was soon to insist so -strongly that we should do, the sensible and immediate, and reaches -on to the spiritual, ultimate, and personal. And similarly some such -psycho-physical experience seems presupposed in her declaration: “If -a Consecrated Host and unconsecrated ones were to be given to me, -I should distinguish the former from the latter as I do wine from -water.”[162] Yet her biographer can truthfully insist upon love being -the original cause of such recognition: “She said this, because the -Consecrated Host sent forth a certain ray of love which pierced her -heart.” And she herself gives a still more spiritual parallel instance -and explanation of such recognition: “If I were to be shown the Court -of Heaven, with all its members robed in one and the same manner, in -suchwise that there would, so far, be no perceptible difference between -God and the Angels: the love which I have in my heart would still -recognize God, as readily as the dog recognizes his master.” This love -indeed would move out to Him even more swiftly and easily, because -“love, which is God Himself, finds in an instant, without any means, -its own end and ultimate repose.”[163] - -Clearly _maladif_ over-sensitiveness and shiftingness of the senses of -taste and scent will appear presently, during the last months of her -life. - - -6. _Hearing and Sight._ - -The most important and mental of the senses, hearing and sight, appear, -on the contrary, with little or nothing particularly unusual about -them, throughout her life. - -For as to her sense of hearing, the inner voices already described as -heard by her at different times, cannot fairly be classed under this -or any other sense-perception, healthy or otherwise; since they appear -to have been most vivid and clear thoughts presented to her mind, -with in each case the consciousness that they were the suggestions of -Mind,--of a Spirit other than her own. They appear to have always been -described by herself as “words spoken to the mind,” “words as it were -heard.”[164] Traces of any _maladif_ affection of this sense will be -difficult or impossible to find, even during her last illness. - -And as to sight, always so closely akin to mental processes, anything -at all really exceptional cannot, I think, be found in her life so far -at all. For her evidently great impressionableness to certain religious -pictures,--so as a child, in regard to the “Pietà,” and now again -apparently with the “Maestà,”--and to certain sights of nature, cannot -fairly be considered abnormal. And as to Visions, the only one recorded -so far, that of the Bleeding Christ, was primarily a mentally mediated -experience: “the Lord showed Himself to her in the spirit,” says the -account, no doubt in full accordance with her own analysis of such -experiences.[165] Some few disturbances of this sense will, however, -appear during the course of her last illness. - - -II. MORE OR LESS _MALADIF_ EXPERIENCES AND ACTIONS. - -The amplest proof of the deep and delicate impressionableness of her -nature is probably, however, to be found in that profound melancholy, -that positive disgust with everything within her and without, and that -strong desire for death which we found to have possessed her during -the three months previous to her Conversion in March 1473. For we -should note that that melancholy did not directly spring from spiritual -motives or considerations: it was previous to all definite sorrow for -sin and to all full and willed sense of things religious and eternal. -Indeed, with the appearance of the religious standards and certitudes, -that crushing universal feeling of melancholy and of positive disgust -breaks up, and yields to contrasted joys and sorrows, and to a buoyant -energy in the very midst and through the very means of suffering and -of sacrifice. Thus the dawn of her spiritual re-birth was indeed dark -and oppressive; but this oppression did not directly proceed from any -clear consciousness of the Perfect and Eternal which arose within her -only as part and parcel of this explicit Conversion. The oppression -simply indicated, of itself, a nature so sensitive and claimful, as to -require, in order to achieve any degree of contentment, a spiritual, -regenerative, re-interpretative power capable of responding to and -matching the deepest realities of life. That nature was thus full of -the need of such realities and of such contact with them, but was -without the power of producing, or of adequately responding to, such -realities,--or indeed of imaginatively forecasting them. And similarly -in 1507, the dawn of her painful, joyful-sorrowful birthday to eternity -was again dark and oppressive and productive of an intense desire for -death, a desire which had, apparently, been entirely absent from her -soul ever since 1473. Here again this oppression was not directly -religious or moral, but, taken in itself, was simply psycho-physical. -Indeed this oppression marks the beginning of the special limitations, -difficulties, and slightly deflecting influences now introduced into -her life by henceforth steadily increasing positive illness. I propose, -then, to begin with this opening depression of hers, and next to go -through the main incidents of her remaining life, as far as possible, -in strictly chronological order. I will group all this around six main -facts and dates. - - -1. _Desire for death, 1507._ - -“In the year 1507 she on one occasion was present at the recitation -of the Offices for the Dead. And a desire to die came upon her. And -she said: ‘O Love, I desire nothing but Thee, and Thee in Thine own -manner: but, if it pleases Thee, allow me at least to go and see others -die and be buried, in order that I may see in others that great good, -which it does not please Thee should as yet be in myself.’ And her Love -consented to this; and consequently, for a certain space of time, she -went to see die and be buried all those who died in the Hospital. And -as, later on, her union with this her tender Love increased, her desire -for death disappeared little by little.”[166] - -She is, then, still active, and moves about in the spacious Hospital -and in the adjoining Church. And this desire, as it gradually -disappeared, will, doubtless, not have left mere blanks in her -consciousness, or have reduced the sum-total of her feelings; but, with -that diminution, some of her old tenderness for and interest in others, -will have reappeared. And again we see how no one set of feelings, -one “psychosis,” ever simply repeats itself, in even one and the same -soul: for Catherine’s positive disgust with all things, which prepared -and accompanied her desire for death in 1473, is absent from the -otherwise similar desire of 1507. In both cases there is the same sheer -“givenness” and isolation of the feeling. _Then_, she did not desire -death to escape temptation or sin; _now_, she does not desire it, -directly and within her emotional nature, in order to get to God: in -each case the feeling stands simply by itself, and is not immediately -connected with religion at all. And finally, this incident, and its -later equivalent repetitions in November 1509 and September 1510, prove -once again on what a veritable bed of Procrustes those determined -_a-priorists_, the Redactors of the _Vita_, have placed, pulled about -and mutilated, as far as in them lay, the immensely spontaneous and -rich personality of Catherine, in their determination to find her ever -all-perfect, and perfect after their own fixed pattern. For it proves -to demonstration, either that Catherine continued liable to human -imperfections, or that not all desires are imperfect. And both these -things are true, beyond the possibility of doubt. - - -2. _The scent-impression from Don Cattaneo’s hand._ - -And next we get an instance of clearly abnormal sense-perception, -which is deeply interesting because of the vivid, first-hand form in -which the fact has come down to us, and still more on account of its -impressive illustration of the two possible mental attitudes towards -such matters. It will have occurred in 1508; and Don Marabotto is, in -any case, the other interlocutor in the scene, and its chronicler. -And if there is undoubtedly a somewhat ludicrous _naïveté_ about his -attitude at the time of the occurrence, there is also a striking -simplicity and self-oblivion in the perfectly objective manner in -which he chronicles the scene in all its bearings, and Catherine’s -marked superiority to himself. It is this complete directness and -simplicity of motive which, on the side of character, will have bound -these otherwise strangely diverse souls together; and which rendered -Don Marabotto, even simply as a character, not unworthy of his close -intimacy with Catherine. - -The abnormality here concerns the sense of smell alone; the impression -here lasts a considerable time: and now she acquiesces in it, but only -for the purpose of moving through it, as a mere means. “Having been -infirm for many days, Catherine one day took the hand of her Confessor -and smelt it: and its odour penetrated right to her heart,” so that -“for many days this perfume restored and nourished her, body and soul.” -Don Marabotto then asks her what kind of thing this odour is that she -is smelling. And she tells him that it is an odour so penetrating and -sweet, as to seem capable of bringing the dead to life; that God had -sent it to her, to strengthen her soul and body, now that these were -so much oppressed; and hence “since God grants me this odour, I am -determined to derive strength from it, as long as He shall please that -I shall do so.” But Marabotto, “thinking that he must surely be able -to perceive what was being transmitted by himself, went smelling his -own hand, but to no effect.” And Catherine gently rebuked his action by -declaring: “The things which depend entirely upon God’s own free gift, -He does not give to those that seek them. Indeed He gives such things -at all, only in cases of great necessity, and as an occasion of great -spiritual profit.”[167] - -The impression and consolation are here still connected with the -Holy Eucharist: for the hand which she smells is no doubt the right -one,--the hand which was wont daily to consecrate in her presence and -daily to communicate her. The declaration as to the odour’s power to -raise the dead to life has occurred already in connection with the -Holy Eucharist, and will have been in part suggested to her by such -Johannine passages as “I am the … Life,” “I am the Living Bread,” “he -that eateth this Bread shall live,” shall be made to live, “for ever.” -And although the odour is here the prominent impression, and “savours” -are wanting, yet “sweetness” still occurs, probably as a sort of -sensation of tasting.--Marabotto’s mind has in it, on this occasion, -two plausible assumptions, each strengthening the other; and Catherine -controverts both. He evidently thinks: “Catherine’s states are all most -valuable, hence real, hence objective: if then she says she smells this -or that, others will be able to do so too.” And: “What a man transmits, -that he can himself experience: hence, on this ground also, I should -be able to smell this perfume.”--And Catherine’s mind evidently also -contains two very different convictions: the first, that experiences, -even when thus but semi-spiritual, are, for all their reality, not -directly transferable from soul to soul; and the second, that all such -sensible and semi-sensible experiences, whether normal or exceptional, -are all but means at the disposal of the free-willing spirit, means -which become limits and obstacles as soon as they are treated as ends. - -Thus if this experience points to a certain abnormality of condition -in the peripheral, psycho-physical regions of the soul, Catherine’s -attitude towards it, and towards the whole question occasioned by -it, has got a massive depth of sanity about it, perhaps unattainable -by, certainly untested in, the always and simply, even peripherally, -healthy soul. - - -3. _Shifting of her burial-place._ - -And in her Will of March 1509 we find traces of a certain weakening of -her former ample business capacity, and of her vigilance, perseverance, -and balance, in spite of friendly pressure or criticism, with regard -to matters of practical import. For, as to her general incapacity for -business, the Will contains a clause exempting Marabotto from all -future challenge of his administration of her monies, up to the date -of the making of this Will. And this clause finds its explanation in -the admission of the _Vita_, with regard to her life during these -last years, that, owing to the mysterious and shifting nature of her -infirmity, “there was confusion in governing her,” “confusion not -on her own part, but on that of those who served her,”[168] words -which will grow still clearer in our account of her last four months. -For this state of her health must have rendered the administration -of her affairs by another both necessary and difficult. And as to -the diminution of her vigilance and perseverance in matters of not -directly spiritual or moral import, we have here, for the first time, -a departure from her resolution, emphatically expressed in the Wills -and Codicil of 1498, 1503, 1506, of being buried beside her husband. -She now orders herself to be buried in the Church of San Nicolò in -Boschetto, and that so much is to be spent on the funeral as shall seem -fit to Don Marabotto. - -Three points should here be borne in mind. For one thing, Catherine -had a long-standing affection for that beautifully situated -Pilgrimage-Church, partly no doubt from associations dating back to -her summer _villegiatura_ days at the neighbouring Prà, and partly, -probably, from memories connected with her sister Limbania, since, as -we have already seen, Limbania’s Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie -was the joint foundation of the two Genoese Monasteries of San Teodoro -fuore le Mura and of San Nicolò in Boschetto. Limbania had died in -that Convent in 1502, and Catherine had, in her Codicil of 1503, left -a small sum for mortuary Masses for herself to the Monastery of San -Nicolò. - -But, next, it was doubtless the growing conviction as to her sanctity -amongst her immediate friends, and their desire to keep her grave -and remains, as an eventual place and object of veneration, distinct -from any others, perhaps specially from those of her husband, whose -defective reputation might otherwise damage or delay the growth of such -a cultus of his wife, which was the determining cause of this change -in the place of sepulture. These friends were able to prevail, no -doubt because her interest and determination in such matters had become -weakened by ill-health of now thirteen years’ duration. And they will -have fixed upon this place some four English miles away, partly because -it happened to be one she loved, but also because thus no question of -separating her remains from those of Giuliano would formally arise. -Her later Codicil will prove the presence of both these motives, and -Catherine’s unconsciousness as to the situation, and the vagueness of -her acquiescence. - -And, finally, we must note that, if this action of her _entourage_ -offends our present-day tastes and susceptibilities, it was yet -thoroughly in accordance with a quite hoary tradition and feeling in -such matters, and was in no sense an idea special to, or originated -by, this group of persons; and again, that the four Protectors of the -Hospital (the trustees and executors of the Will), her sole surviving -brother Lorenzo (the residuary legatee), and above all her closest, -great-souled friend Vernazza (one of the six witnesses), are all -parties to the pious stratagem, and share its responsibility with -Marabatto. - - -4. _The “scintilla”-experience; spiritual refreshment derived from a -picture._ - -We have next an important group of experiences and convictions in -November 1509. “On the 11th November 1509, there came upon her an -insupportable fire of infinite love; and she declared that there had -been shown to her one single spark (scintilla) of Pure Love, and that -this had been but for a short moment; and that, had it lasted even a -little longer, she would have expired because of its great force. She -could hardly eat, nor speak so as to be heard, in consequence of this -penetrating wound of love that she had received in her heart.”[169] - -Few events of her life have left such profound traces, so many -echoes and waves and wavelets as it were, throughout both her -authentic sayings and the various secondary and tertiary imitations, -re-castings, and expansions of her original account as has this -scintilla-experience. I will here translate the nine varying -impressions and exclamations which, proceeding from different minds -and different dates, have, all but one, been worked up by the _Vita_ -into a single paragraph, which, by its very multitude of flickerings -as to meaning and of experimentations as to form, gives us a striking -picture of the deep and many-sided influence of this single event, so -short in its clock-time duration. “This creature, all lost in her own -self, found her true self in one instant in God.” “Although she reputed -herself to be very poor, yet she remained rich in the divine love.” -“She, knowing the grace and operation to be all from God, remained lost -in herself, and living only in God.” “She gave her free-will to God, -and God then restored it to her.” “She gave her free-will to God, and -God thereupon worked with its means.” “O the great wonder, to see a -man established in the midst of so many miseries, and yet God having -so great a care of him! All tongues are incapable of expressing it, -all intellects of understanding it.” “That man becomes foolish in the -eyes of the world, to whom Thou, O Lord God, dost manifest even but the -slightest spark of Thine unspeakable Love.” “Thou, O God, desirest to -exalt man, and to make him as though another God, by means of love.” -Of later date or type: “In God she saw all the operations, by means of -which He had caused her to merit (in the past).” And of still later, -clearly secondary, character: “God showed her in one instant the -succession of His (future) operation, as though she would have to die -of a great martyrdom.”[170] - -And this great experience of hers led on to a scene which, whilst -emphasizing the psycho-physical effect, occasion or concomitant of -such spiritual experiences, also gives us the strongest instance of -her impressionableness to pictures in particular. “Finding herself -in such ardour, she felt herself compelled to turn to a figure of the -Woman of Samaria at the well with her Lord; and in her extreme distress -Catherine addressed Him thus: ‘O Lord, I pray Thee, give me a little -drop of this water, which of old Thou didst give to the Samaritan -woman, since I can no more bear so great a fire.’ And suddenly, in -that instant, there was given her a little drop of that divine water; -and by it she was refreshed within and without, and she had rest for -some appreciable time.”[171] But, above all, this experience and its -precursor were, if not the actual beginning, at least the culminating -point in the experiences or projections which led to or articulated -her doctrine on Purgatory. In a later chapter I hope to trace the -connection between those experiences and this doctrine. Here we must -add two other vivid interior experiences and convictions of hers which -are placed by the _Vita_, no doubt rightly, in direct succession to, -and in more or less connection with, the great “scintilla”-operation, -although neither of them appears amongst the images and conceptions -which make up the _Trattato del Purgatorio_. - -“One day” (she recounted this herself) “she appeared to herself to -abide suspended in mid-air. And the spiritual part wanted to attach -itself to heaven; but her other part wished to attach itself to earth: -yet neither the one nor the other managed to become possessed of its -object, and simply abode thus in mid-air, without achieving its desire. -And after abiding thus for a long time, the part which was drawing her -to heaven seemed to her to be gaining the upper hand (over the other -part), and, little by little, the spiritual part forcibly drew her -upwards, so that at every moment she saw herself moving further and -further away from earth. And although this at first seemed to be a -strange thing to the part that was being drawn, and this part was ill -content to be thus forced; yet when it had been so far removed, as no -more to be able to see the earth, then it began to lose its earthly -instinct and affection, and to perceive and to relish the things which -were relished by the spiritual part. And this spiritual part never -ceased from drawing it heavenward. And so at last these two parts came -to a common accord.”[172] And again on another occasion: “The soul is -so desirous of departing from the body to unite itself with God, that -its body appears to it a veritable Purgatory, which keeps it distant -from its true object.”[173] - -This group of experiences straightway enforces some important spiritual -laws. For one thing, this scintilla-experience, since her Conversion -the deepest of her life, is clearly also the richest and most -complex,--witness the numerous, mutually supplementary or critical, -attempts at analysis furnished by even her immediate companions. And -this experience is only simple in the sense in which white light, which -combines all the prismatic colours, or a living healthy human body, -composed of numberless constituents, is simple. - -And next, nothing indicates that this experience was of a character -essentially different from that of her older contemplations; and -everything appears to show that it was, substantially, a grace -addressed to, and an act performed by, her spiritual nature,--her -intelligence and free will, God’s Spirit stimulating and sustaining -hers in a quite exceptional degree, and hence less than ever weakening -or supplanting this her spirit’s action. It was as much a gift of -herself by herself to God, as if it had not been a pure grace from Him; -and yet her very power and wish and determination to give herself, -were rendered possible and became actual through that pure prevenient, -accompanying and subsequent gift of God. - -Again, it is certain that either there was no clear mental scheme, -reasoning, or picture during the experience, or that, if there was, -it consisted of a spacial simultaneity rather than of a temporal -succession, and that it showed her, if her own soul at all, then that -soul in its most universally human, typical aspects and relations. -In no case was there anything historical or prophetical, strictly -biographical about it. - -And then we have, even though she could give no kind of definite -account of it, the most solid reasons for accepting this experience as -genuine, wholesome, and valuable. For she evidently fully believed in -it herself; and we shall see how clearly and readily she continued, -even after this experience, to distinguish between wholesome and -mental, and _maladif_ and simply psychic, states of abstraction. -Again it became the occasion and material of most deep and fruitful -spiritual doctrine; whereas nothing is more empty and unsuggestive -than are the bare, brute “facts” of all merely nervous or hysterical -hallucinations. It also demonstrably strengthened her will for the -last deep sufferings and sacrifices yet to be gone through, and no -doubt added a fresh stimulus to her already profound influence over -Vernazza, and pricked him onwards on his career of the most solid, -heroic philanthropy and self-sacrifice. And yet we can see that her -psycho-physical organism is now functionally weak and ill. For great -physical exhaustion now follows upon an experience substantially the -same as those which used to strengthen her so markedly even in physical -respects. - -As to the scene with the picture, we again get a case not unlike the -odour of Marabotto’s hand, in so much as here too the experience hovers -between the mental and physical, and there is a sensible impression as -from a physical substance with reference to a Person,--this taste of -a “divine water” moving here on to Christ, to God, the Living Water, -as that smell of sweetness moves on to the “Living Bread,” Christ, and -God. It is, unfortunately, impossible to identify that picture, which -may well have been a fresco-painting in some building or passage of the -Hospital, since destroyed, or on some extant wall, white-washed since -those days. The vivid picturings of the soul in mid-air, and of the -soul in the purgatory of its body, will be considered in connection -with her psycho-physical states and her doctrine. - -But before leaving this November experience, we must give two -significant conversations held by her with Vernazza at the time, and -which have been no doubt handed down to us by himself. “One day, -speaking of this” (the scintilla-) “event with a spiritual person -(_Religioso_) she called it ‘a giddiness’ (_vertigine_). But that -person said to her: ‘Mother, I beg of you that you will yourself -select a person who may happen to suit your mind (_soddisfaccia alla -mente vestra_), and will narrate to this person the graces which God -has granted to you, so that, when you come to die, these graces may -not remain hidden and unknown, and an opportunity for God’s praise -and glory may not thus be lost.’ And she then answered that she was -entirely willing (_ben contenta_), if this be pleasing to her tender -Love; and that, in that case, she would not choose another person than -himself, although she was convinced that it was impossible to describe -even a small fragment of such interior experiences as occurred between -God and her soul; and that as to exterior things, few or none had taken -place in her case.” Here again we have evidence as to her habit of -making light of and transcending all psycho-physical phenomena, however -striking and mysterious; and we get a positive authorization conferred -by herself upon Vernazza, such as is claimed by no other contributor to -the _Vita_. - -And “speaking with him some days later, she said: ‘Son, I have had a -certain prick of conscience, of which I will tell you. The other day, -when you told me that I might possibly remain dead some day during one -of those giddinesses, there seemed to arise in me, at that moment, a -feeling of joy, a profound aspiration which said: ”O, if that hour -would but come!“ And then this feeling suddenly ceased. Now I declare -to you, that I do not wish that in this matter there should be any -glimpse (scintilla) of a desire of my own for earth or heaven, or for -any other created thing; but that I wish to leave all things to the -disposition of God.’ Then this person answered, that there was no -occasion for her to have a prick of conscience, because, although joy -had awaked in her mind, and a sudden exclamation had occurred there, -at the mention of the word ‘death,’ yet that nothing of this had -proceeded from the will, nor had it been endorsed by the reason; but -that it had proceeded solely from the instinct of the pleasure-loving -soul (_anima_), which ever, according to its nature, tends to such an -end. And how the proof that this was a correct account, lay in this, -that her prick of conscience had not really penetrated to the depths of -her heart, but had remained on the surface, at the same slight depth -at which the movement of joy had remained. And she confessed that the -matter really stood thus, and remained satisfied.”[174] - -Here three points are of interest. I take her impulse of deep longing -to die in one of those trances, to have arisen, not simply from joy -at the thought of dying, but from joy at the prospect of dying of -joy,--of dying with the joy fixed in that moment in the soul for -ever. For heaven itself appears here not as a synonym for God, but as -a creature, as the summing up of infinite and endless consolation of -all right kinds, spiritual and psycho-physical. And it is this that -makes her scruple thoroughly understandable, and but one more instance -of her virile fight with all direct attachment to the consequences and -concomitants of devotedness.--And next we should note her deep trust -in the spiritual experience and wisdom of Vernazza, the layman and -lawyer, some twenty-five years her junior; and her asking his advice -on a matter which we would readily suppose her to reserve for Don -Marabotto, who by now had been her Confessor and Spiritual Adviser for -many years.--And lastly, the depth and delicacy of Vernazza’s analysis -are most striking, with their clear perception of the various levels -and degrees of true selfhood and volition within the human soul: she -had really had neither a full will, nor a deliberate wish, nor indeed -any penetrating, spontaneous reproach of conscience; she had, in fact, -been suffering from a scruple, and he was required, and was able, to -make her see that this had been the case. - - -5. _Catherine’s sense of intense cold, and her attitude towards Don -Marabotto._ - -And in December 1509 and January 1510 we come across a group of -experiences and actions, in some respects different from, and -supplementary of, the set just concluded. For “in the month of December -she suffered from great cold,”--I take this cold to have been, at least -partially, special to her state, and not to have proceeded primarily -from the winter temperature,--“but she paid no attention to it.” “And -behold one night there came so great an attack (_assalto_) upon her, -that she could not conceal it. There was a great heaving of the body, -much bile was evacuated, and the nose bled. And she then sent for her -Confessor, and said to him: ‘Father, it seems to me that I must die, -because of the many weakenings of various sorts (_accidenti_) that have -happened to me.’” “And this attack (_assalto_) lasted for about three -hours,” “her body trembling like a leaf.” “And then her body became -quiet again, but was now so broken and weak that it was necessary to -give her minced chicken to revive her; and a good many days had to pass -before she returned to her (latter-day) vigour.”[175] - -And “on the 10th of January 1510, she appeared determined to see her -Confessor no more, either as to help and comfort for her soul or as -to her bodily health. It seemed to her that he was too indulgent to -herself, in her sayings and doings. But the fact was, that he saw it -to be necessary that she should do all that her instinct prompted her -to say or do; and it would indeed have been well-nigh impossible to -force her to act against these interior movements of hers. Yet since -she was herself in cause, she did not acknowledge such necessities -(_ordinazioni_); rather these actions of hers appeared to her but as -so many disordered doings, and she went forcing herself to try and -not give trouble to those who were good enough to put up with her -(_chi la comportava_).--And when night came, she locked herself up -alone into a separate room, refusing food or conversation or comfort -from any one. But after a while she had to come out, with a view -to rendering a certain service, and her Confessor managed to slip -into the room unobserved and to hide himself there. And she, having -returned and locked herself in, and thinking herself quite alone, -said with a sobbing voice to her Lord: ‘O Lord, what wouldest Thou -have me do further in this world? I neither see nor hear, nor eat -nor sleep; I do not know what I do or what I say. I feel as though I -were a dead thing. There is no creature that understands me; I find -myself lonely, unknown, poor, naked, strange, and different from the -rest of the world; and hence I know not any more how to live with (my -fellow-) creatures upon earth.’ These and such-like words she spoke -so piteously, that her Confessor could bear it no longer; and he -discovered himself, and came up to and spoke to her. And God gave him -grace, so that she remained comforted in mind and body by his words, -and was in fair health for a good many days after.”[176] - -Nevertheless “her Confessor, since his continual intercourse and close -familiarity with Catherine gave occasion to murmurs on the part of -some who did not fully understand his special work and its necessity, -left her and was absent for three days” (probably shortly after the -scene just related), “for the purpose of testing that work of his, -and seeing whether it was indeed all from God, and thus to escape -all scruple in the matter. But when, three days later, he returned -to her house and had learnt and considered the various accidents and -incidents which had occurred meanwhile, he was so entirely satisfied -with the evidence afforded by experiment, that he lost all scruple in -the matter, and indeed regretted having made the trial, because of the -great distress which she had suffered from it.” It will have been on -this occasion that she said to him: “I seem to see that God has given -to you this one care of myself, and hence that you should not attend to -anything else. For now I can no longer support alone so many exterior -and interior oppressions (_assedi_). When you leave me, I go lamenting -about the house, saying that you are cruel and do not understand my -extreme necessity; for if you did, you would pay greater attention to -it.”[177] - -And it will have been later on again, in February and March, that she -intimated, during two of her violent attacks (on the first occasion by -signs, on the second by words), her impression that she would succumb, -and her wish to receive Extreme Unction. But Don Marabotto correctly -judged that she would safely get through these seizures, and the -anointing was put off for the present.[178] - -This group is again interesting. For it gives us evidence as to -how dependent this character and career of the rarest loneliness -and independence had now become upon human help and sympathy; and -lets us see how illness had now introduced an excessive suddenness, -absoluteness, and shiftingness into her feelings and minor actions, -and an occasional slight querulousness into her remarks. It shows us -her old social, altruistic instincts and standard still at work within -her; for she still suffers from the consciousness, whenever she is -thrown back upon herself, of being different from other people; she -still longs to attend to the wants of others, regrets the trouble -she gives them, and feels grateful for the services they render; and -she still busies herself, in the reduced measure now possible to -her, with services of her own to others,--a “certain service,” which -she had to render, had sufficed to break through her self-imposed -seclusion. It lets us see how watchful against and suspicious of -self, and of what could flatter and indulge it, she still remained; -and how independent her judgment continued, even with regard to her -Confessor. And this her judgment we shall have good reason to hold to -have been remarkably well-grounded, in so far as this, that had only -Marabotto possessed a deeper insight into her psycho-physical state -and less of a determination to treat all her states and impulses as -equally solid and spiritual, or at least as equally to be yielded to, -he could have helped her more; and she would then, thus helped, have -been able, even now, fully to resist or to give way, in proportion to -the healthiness or the morbidness of the attack. And finally we see -how truly serviceable and necessary, and indeed repeatedly right where -her own estimate was wrong, was the help and sympathy and judgment -of her Confessor; and how difficult, entirely unselfish, and devoted -was his action and attitude. It is interesting to note that Catherine -was probably always right in her instinct as to matters directly -affecting herself, where the will came in, or could be made to come -in; and that she was wrong only in such a point of mere physical fact -and determinism as whether or not, and how long, her physical strength -would hold out. - - -6. _Events from January to May 1510._ - -I will here try and put together, in their actual succession from -January to May 1510, the chief psycho-physical phenomena and their -parallel utilizations, together with such mental and spiritual -experiences and actions as seem to have been only quite indirectly, -or not all, occasioned by her state of health. In a later chapter I -propose to study all this health matter in some detail. Here I would -simply warn the reader against treating, with certainly most of her -chroniclers, these psycho-physical phenomena as separately and directly -spiritual or miraculous or ethically significant. Found alone, they -would now, on the contrary, directly suggest simply nervous disorder of -some kind or other, a thing which, in itself, is always an evil. Their -interest and spiritual importance arises for us entirely from their -predominantly mental qualities; from their appearance in a person of -such powerful mind and large and efficient character; and from their -splendidly ethico-religious utilization by that same person. - -On one day “she had an impression (‘wound,’ _ferita_) which was so -great, that she lost her speech and sight, and abode in this manner -some three hours. She made signs with her hands, of feeling as it were -red-hot pincers attacking her heart and other interior parts. But for -all this, she did not lose her full consciousness (_intelletto_).” -This was the second occasion on which she indicated her wish to be -anointed.[179] On another day “it was impossible to keep her in bed: -she seemed like a creature placed in a great flame of fire, and it was -impossible to touch her skin, because of the acute pain which she felt -from any such touch.”[180] - -A little later on “she abode in so great a peace and interior -contentment that she was” in all respects “considerably relieved and -reinvigorated (_ristorata_). But she did not long remain in this -condition. For very soon she was in a state of interior nudity and -aridity, and she prayed: ‘Never hitherto, O my Lord, have I asked -Thee for anything for myself: now I pray Thee with all my might, that -Thou mayest not will to separate me from Thee. Thou well knowest, O -Lord, that I could not bear this.’ And to her disciples she said, in -connection with this desolation: ‘If a man were to take a soul from -Paradise, how do you think such a soul would feel? You might give it -all the pleasures in the world, and as much more as you can imagine: -and yet all would be but Hell, because of the memory of that divine -union’ (formerly possessed and now lost).”[181] - -Again a little later on “she had another attack (_assalto_), when all -her body trembled, especially her right shoulder. It was impossible -to move her from her bed; she did not eat, drank next to nothing, and -did not sleep.”[182] On another day, “she had another attack,”--this -was the occasion of her third indication of a wish to receive Extreme -Unction,--“a spasm in the throat and mouth, so that she could not -speak, nor open her eyes, nor keep her breath except with extreme -difficulty.” “They applied cupping-glasses, with a view to aiding -her to find her breath and to regain speech, yet these helped but -little.”[183] For another day we are told that “in her flesh were -certain concavities, as though it were dough, and the thumb had been -pressed into it. And she called out in a loud voice, because of the -great pain.”[184] - -On another day “her pains made her call out as loudly as she could, -and she dragged herself about on her bed. And those that stood by were -dumfounded, at seeing a body, which appeared to be healthy, in such -a tormented state. And then she would laugh, speak as one in health, -and say to the others, not to be sorrowful on her account, since she -was very contented. And this “set of attacks” lasted four days; she -then had a little rest; and, after this, those attacks returned as -before.”[185] - -This group is in so far particularly difficult, as we have to try and -decide whether, and if so how far, these pains of hers were primarily -psychical, and, in some way and degree, originally, and by force -of long habits of concentrated religious thinking and picturing, -suggested, or at least stimulated, by the mind itself; or whether these -pains were primarily physical, although evidently only functional and -preponderantly nervous. For on the answer to that question depends, -if not our selection from amongst, at least our interpretation of, -the largely contradictory, successively “doctored,” and more or less -violently schematized evidence, of which the above passages give the -most characteristic and primitive parts. If it was the mind itself -which, unconsciously to its owner, suggested these pains, then we can -and must accept, as quite contemporary and indeed fully exact, those -passages which make her peace and even sensible consolation arise -during the same moments as, and in exact proportion to, the presence -of the pains. If, on the other hand, the pains arose independently -of the subconscious mind, and were merely mastered by the conscious -intelligence and will, then it seems reasonable to assume that we -have here, as is certainly the case in other matters and places in -the _Vita_, an ideal foreshortening, juxtaposition, and unification -of what, in the actual experience, occurred more lengthily and -successively. - -It is certainly remarkable in this connection, that, whereas we have -had a clearly marked case of mental, spiritual desolation, outside of -one of these attacks, it is at least very difficult to find anything -certainly of the kind during one of them; indeed the juxtaposition of, -not simply profound spiritual peace, but of sensible, also psychic -or quasi-psychic, consolation with those pains, is so constant and -apparently spontaneous, that secondary, or at least schematic and _a -priori_, reporting seems to have been at work rather in the passages -which affirm the excessiveness of those pains, than in those which -insist that those pains were, so to speak, _not_ pains. All her own -authentic sayings leave the impression of immense psycho-spiritual -sensitiveness, of much actual mental and emotional suffering as well as -joy, but not, I think, of purely physical suffering. “I find so much -contentment on the part of my spirit and so much peace in my mind, that -tongue could not tell nor reason comprehend it; but on the part of my -humanity” (her psycho-physical organism) “all my pains are, so to say, -not pains,” she says, shortly after a particularly violent attack, -with four “accidents.” And a contributor declares that the joy and the -torment ever arose together. It is true that another passage says that, -during such attacks, “her disciples, seeing her suffer so much, desired -that she should expire, so as no more to have to see her in such great -and continuous torment”; but then this desire of theirs was evidently -rather a sympathetic feeling than a deliberate judgment, for, once -she has got over the attack, all this desire of theirs disappears as -rapidly as it had come.[186] - - -III. CATHERINE’S HISTORY FROM MAY TO SEPTEMBER 9, 1510. - - -1. _Catherine and the Physicians._ - -It is at the end of the preceding months that we are told how -“the Physician” (possibly the Hospital House-Surgeon) “attempted -to administer medicine to her. But it gave rise to such repeated -‘accidents’ (vomitings), that she all but died of it, and remained very -weak.”[187] - -“And four months before she died,” hence in mid-May, “many physicians -were called together. And they saw and examined the patient, but -failed to find any trace of bodily infirmity, in spite of the care -and attention bestowed by them on the case. And she declared her -conviction that her infirmity was not of a kind requiring physicians -or bodily physic. But on the physicians persevering and ordering -her, she obediently took all that they prescribed, although with -great difficulty and to her hurt. Until at last those same physicians -concluded that there was no remedy within the art of medicine -applicable to the case, and that the infirmity was supernatural.”[188] - -“But now there supervened, on his return from England, an excellent -Genoese physician, Maestro Giovan Battista Boerio, who, for many -years, had been in the service of the English King, Henry VII. And -Boerio visited Catherine, and warned her to beware of giving scandal -by refusing medical treatment. And she, in return, assured him that it -grieved her much if she scandalized any one; and that she was prepared -to use any remedy for her ailment, if such could be found.” And indeed -“joy arose within her, at the hope of being cured by him. But in the -following night much” psycho-physical “pain and trouble came upon her,” -and “she then reproved her natural self (_umanità_), saying: ‘Thou -sufferest this, because thou didst rejoice without (just) cause.’” Yet -after about three weeks’ trial of every kind of remedy, a trial which -left her as it found her, Boerio abandoned the task, but “henceforward -held Catherine in esteem and reverence, calling her ‘Mother,’ and often -visiting her.”[189] - -Here we have an interesting group of facts. For one thing, we know how -King Henry “had for years been visited by regular fits of the gout; -his strength visibly wasted away, and every spring the most serious -apprehensions were entertained of his life.” “He had also pains in the -chest and difficulty of respiration.” And, “in the spring of 1509 the -King sank under the violence of the disease.”[190] And thus Boerio -will, a year after the death of his royal master, have been called -in to the sick-bed of the Viceroy’s daughter, not simply as a court -physician or as a generally skilful doctor, but as a man known to have -had long experience of a case which prima facie was not all unlike -Catherine’s. - -Then it is impossible not to feel throughout these and other passages -of the _Vita_ which are concerned with physicians, a curious -combination of contradictory feelings. There is reproof of the doctors’ -presumption in venturing to begin by treating her illness as though -it were a simply natural one; and there is the proud pleasure at thus -getting, through the breakdown of this their presumptuous undertaking, -professional testimony to the supernatural character of her infirmity. -And the two motives lead to the self-contradictory over-emphasizing -both of the Physicians’ moral worth and finality of testimony at the -end of each experience, and of their rationalistic rashness in being -willing to try again, a rashness assumed to be apparent to every one -but themselves before each new attempt. For they must be represented -as worthy and skilful men; else what value has their testimony? And -their action must be intrinsically foolish from the outset; else what -becomes of the transparently and separately supernatural character of -her illness?[191] - -And then we can still see fairly clearly that Catherine does not share -the views of practically all her attendants, and of certainly all the -later contributors to and revisers of the _Vita_. For even now the book -still leaves intact the passages which show her as hoping to be cured -by Boerio, and as then condemning herself for having rejoiced without -cause,--evidently, without supernatural justification; as prepared -to believe that the physicians might be able to find an appropriate -remedy, and as willingly trying the remedies they actually offer her; -and as indeed declaring her doubt whether any physic would do her -any good, yet nowhere announcing a conviction as to the directly and -separately supernatural character of her illness. “Her attendants,” -says the obviously most authentic continuation of the passage -concerning the cupping-glasses given further back, “let these attacks -come and go, with as little damage as possible. Her body had to be and -was sustained without the aid of medicine, and solely by means of great -care and great vigilance.”[192] - - -2. _Catherine and Don Carenzio, Argentina, and Ettore Vernazza._ - -It will have been the end of June, or the beginning of July, when -these medical experiments ceased. But before them (on March 11 and -twice in April), and again three times during them (in May and June), -monies were paid, in Catherine’s name, by Don Giacomo Carenzio, now -resident as Rettore in the Hospital, in the matter of the granting -of Indulgences to the Church attached to the Hospital. And although -this affair, occurring thus so late on in her illness, in which we -have already found her not always to have dominated the plans of her -attendants, cannot well be pressed as necessarily characteristic of -her, yet I take it to be quite likely that she still took some active -part in the matter.[193] - -Catherine certainly still attended to business, even two months later; -for, on August 3, Vernazza drew up a Codicil in her presence “in the -bedroom of Argentina del Sale,” says the document itself. Since the -Inventory, still extant, of the things found in Catherine’s rooms at -the time of her death, gives a list of the bedclothes of only two beds, -and these two beds are then both in the same room, and the one bed is -Catherine’s, and the other is that of the _famiglia_ (the servant) -Argentina: it is clear that, for at least the last six weeks of her -life, Catherine had only one person sleeping in her little house with -her, and that this person was the navvy Marco’s little widow. I take -it, with Vallebona, that the room was really Catherine’s ordinary -bedroom; but that, as Argentina now slept there as regularly as her -mistress herself, Catherine preferred, whether from humility or -affection (the latter motive seems the more probable), to think of the -room as belonging to Argentina.[194] - -For some reason unknown to us, Vernazza, Catherine’s closest friend, -must have left Genoa soon after drawing up this Codicil. For he did not -draw up or witness her final Codicil of September 12, although, when in -Genoa at all, he now lived close by, and although this final Codicil -but gave effect to the plan regarding her sepulture which underlay the -change introduced into the Will of March 1509, a Will which had been -witnessed by himself. And, as we shall see, he was absent, indeed far -away (_lontano_), from her death-bed, some six weeks after the date at -which we have now arrived. I think we can only explain this departure -by assuming that already now, before his inspirer’s death, his zeal and -activity had expanded beyond the limits of the Genoese Republic; and -that, dying as she already was, and devoted to her as he ever remained, -he nevertheless (since there was now so little that he could hope to -do for her own person, and there was so much to do elsewhere in the -way of developing and applying her spirit and teachings) now rode off -to Venice or to Rome, as we know him to have done, so often and for so -long, during the fourteen remaining years of his life. And we have in -this a fact peculiarly characteristic of these two expansive souls,--of -the influence of the one, the frail woman, dying in her little -sick-room, and of the execution of her world-embracing aspirations by -the other, the strong man, battling, often at the risk of his very -life, for the poor and oppressed, outside, on the great trysting-field -of men’s passions and requirements. - - -3. _Psycho-physical condition and its utilization, August 10 to 27._ - -But Catherine, lying in her sick-room, suffered on August 10 from one -of her great burnings. “And next day, whilst her body was still in pain -and trouble, God drew her mind upwards to Himself. And she fixed her -eyes on the ceiling, and remained thus almost immovable for an hour, -and spoke not but laughed joyously. And when she had returned to her -more ordinary consciousness, she said this one thing only: ‘O Lord, do -with me whatsoever Thou wilt.’”[195] - -On August 15, she, “when about to communicate, addressed many -beautiful words to the Blessed Sacrament, so that every one present -was moved to tears.”[196] During the following day and night she -suffered so greatly, that “all considered she would certainly die. She -asked,”--this was the third or even fourth time,--“for Extreme Unction, -and” this time “it was given her, and she received it with great -devotion.” - -“On the day following,” the 17th, “she was in a state of jubilation -of heart (_giubilo di cuore_), which manifested itself exteriorly in -merry laughter. And, having been asked as to the cause, she said that -she had seen various most beautiful, merry, and joyous countenances, so -that she had been unable to refrain from laughing. And this impression -continued throughout several days, during which she appeared to be -improved in health.”[197] But on August 22 or 23, “she again had a -day of much heat and trouble. She remained maimed (paralyzed) in her -right hand and in one finger of the left hand. And then she remained as -though dead for about sixteen hours.”[198] - -In the night of the 23rd or 24th (Feast of St. Bartholomew) she had “a -great attack in mind and body; and being unable to speak, she made the -sign of the Cross upon her heart. And, later on, she was understood to -have been molested by a diabolical temptation.”[199] - -On the 25th “she was in great weakness. And she caused her windows to -be opened, so as to be able to see the sky. And, as the night came -on, she had many candles lit; and she chanted, as well as she could, -the ‘Veni, Creator Spiritus.’ And when she had finished she fixed her -eyes upon the sky, and remained thus an hour and a half, making many -gestures with her hands and eyes. And when she had resumed her ordinary -consciousness (_quando fù ritornata in sè_), she said repeatedly: -‘Let us go’; and then added: ‘No more earth, no more earth.’ And her -body remained greatly shaken from this contemplation (_vista_).” And -on August 27 “she saw herself as though bereft of her body and of its -animating soul, and her spirit alone in God above. And after this she -addressed those present and said: ‘Let only those come in who may be -necessary.’”[200] - -This particular group is specially interesting. For it shows us -Catherine’s love of the large and expansive, of the spiritually simple -and interior, and of the supernatural and transcendent in her look-out -into the open; in her vivid apprehension of her spirit bereft of all -things except the Supreme Spirit, that spirit’s native element and -home; and in her gaze into the starlit Italian August sky above. And it -gives us indications, elsewhere so rare in her life, of her attachment -to the visible, audible, tangible vehicles and expressions of religion, -as so many helps and occasions of its immanence in our minds and -hearts, in her signing her heart with the sign of the Cross, her having -the candles lit and her chanting a definite traditional Church hymn, -and in her fourth demand of Extreme Unction and devout reception of -it. It is also noticeable how vivid and yet how undefined are her -impressions of those countenances, since neither she herself anywhere, -nor even her chroniclers in this place, explicitly identify them with -Angels; and how still more general and indefinite remains the “diabolic -temptation,” since in this case, only when it was over, was she -“understood” to have been thus tempted. Indeed any directly diabolical -temptation would be profoundly uncharacteristic of her special call -and way: all through the records of her life and teaching it is the -selfish, claimful Self that she fears “more than a demon,” “worse than -the devil”; she is, in a very true sense, too busy watching, fighting, -ignoring, supplanting Self, and ever putting, keeping, and replacing -God, Love, in Self’s stead, to give or find occasion for what, in this -her immensely strenuous inner life, would have been a remoter conflict. - - -4. _Persistent self-knowledge and excessive impressionableness._ - -The _Vita_ next gives us five most vivid but undated paragraphs as to -her health. I will take them together with such other dated occurrences -as will bring us down to September 10. - -There is first a characteristic general fact, and a probably often -repeated remark of Catherine’s. “At times she would have no pulse, -and at other times she would have a good one; often she would seem to -sleep; and from this state she would awake, at one time completely -herself again, and at other times so limp, oppressed, and shattered -as to be unable to move. And those that attended on her did not know -how to distinguish one state from the other. And hence, on coming to, -she would sometimes say, ‘Why did you let me remain in this quietude, -from which I have almost died?’”[201] Thus Catherine’s attendants -are helplessly at sea concerning her psycho-physical condition, and -they identify, and directly supernaturalize, each and all of her -successive and simultaneous states. But Catherine herself remains -clearly conscious of different levels and values in these states: of -normal, grace-impelled, freely-willed, strength-bringing contemplations -and quietudes; and of sickly, weakening, more or less hysterical, -lassitudes and failures. And she is thus aware of the deep difference -between the two sets of states, that are externally so similar, at -the very time of experiencing the one or the other of them; and is -conscious, at the same time, both of being unable, by her own unaided -will, to give effect, from within, to this her own knowledge, and of -being able and willing, indeed anxious, to follow the lead and the -pressure of wisely discriminating will-acts, proceeding from without, -and, as it were, meeting her own wishes half-way, and thus turning them -into effective willings. She herself has still the knowledge, but, now -she is ill, she has no more the power. They have the power, but not the -knowledge. And she knows all this, through God’s illumination working -in and upon her own long and rich experiences, sound good sense, severe -self-detachment, close self-observation, and incorruptible veracity of -mind; and she knows it in spite of, and in direct opposition to, the -far more flattering misconceptions, and entirely well-meant and sincere -opinions (representative of the traditional and contemporary consensus -of view on these obscure matters) of the servants, lawyers, physicians, -relatives, and priests about her. The incident is closely parallel to -her scruple as to Marabotto’s spoiling her; and one more similar detail -will be mentioned later on. - -But next, we get now abundant evidence that she was ill indeed. There -is the rapidly shifting fancifulness of the senses of taste and smell, -together with an ever-increasing difficulty of swallowing. “She would, -at times, be so thirsty as to feel capable of drinking all the water of -the sea, and yet she could not, as a matter of fact, manage to swallow -even one little drop of water.” “Seeing on one occasion a melon, and -conceiving a great desire to eat it, she had it given to her. But -hardly had she a piece of it in her mouth, but she rejected it with -great disgust.” “She often bathed her mouth with water, and then -suddenly she would reject it.” “To-day the smell of wine would please -her, and she would bathe her hands and face in it, with great relish; -and to-morrow she would dislike it so much, as to be unable any longer -to see or smell it in her room.”[202] And, in strict conformity with -this detail, I find an entry in the Hospital account-book for this -time, of money disbursed to the account of Catherine, for a cask of -wine for her use.[203] - -Yet her biographers are evidently only stating the simple truth -when they declare that she continued to receive Holy Communion with -ease and safety; for not only are there three quite unsuspicious -passages, descriptive of her receptions of It, under most difficult -circumstances; but we find, on counting up the incidental and bare -mentions of her Communions, that, during the fourteen days from -September 2 to 15, her death-day, she communicated ten times, and one -or two further Communions may have been accidentally omitted. - -There is, again, an occasional abnormal sensitiveness to colours, -and their mental connotations, at least in connection with red. -“On September 2, a Physician, a friend of hers,”--no doubt Maestro -Boerio,--“came to visit her, robed in his Doctor’s ‘scarlet,’” as was -no doubt the custom when visiting patients of quality. “And she bore -this sight for a little, so as not to hurt his feelings. But when -she could bear it no longer, she said to him: ‘Sir, I can no further -bear the sight of this gown of yours, because of what it represents -(suggests) to me.’ The Physician departed at once and returned clad -in another,” a black “gown.” The Chronicler, probably Boerio’s -priest-son, is no doubt substantially right in interpreting this as -meaning that the scarlet suggested to her a seraph aflame with divine -love. Yet I find, from the inventory of her final possessions, that -she possessed, and doubtless used, among her bedclothes a vermilion -silk coverlet and a vermilion blanket,--an undoubted indication -of her love for this colour.[204] These two vicissitudes of her -colour-affection no doubt mutually supplement and explain each other: -when not over-impressionable and not already stimulated to the full -of her capacity, this colour would suggest her central doctrine and -experience, and would be pleasurable; when over-impressionable and -already stimulated as much as, then and there, she could bear and -utilize, the colour would but strain and disturb her. - -And, finally, there are sensations and impressions of extreme heat and -cold, and excessive sensibility or insensibility in tactual matters. -“At one time she was cold; and at another, burning hot.” “On one day,” -early in September, “she suffered great cold in her right arm, followed -by acute pain”; and on September 7, “her body felt all on fire; and, -since it seemed to her as though the whole world were aflame, she asked -whether this were the case, and had her windows opened, so as to be -reassured as to the real facts.”[205] - -“At times she would be sensitive to such a degree, that it was -impossible to touch her sheets or a hair of her head; she would, -if this were done, cry out as though she had been grievously -wounded.”[206] The temporary paralysis and anaesthetic conditions have -been already described. - - -5. _Three spiritually significant events, September 4-9._ - -We can next consider together three spiritually significant incidents -which occurred during these penultimate days of hers. - -“On September 4 she lay there in her bed, in great pain, her arms -stretched out in suchwise that she appeared like a body nailed to a -cross; as she was within, so did she appear without.” Here, then, -she finds a certain attraction and help in an external, quasi-ritual -attitude and act; for this attitude, however spontaneous and but -subconscious, was doubtless not simply accidental or the mere result -of pain. It is, with the Pietà-picture of her childhood and the -Conversion-vision of the Bleeding Christ, one of the only three direct -references to the Passion which I can find throughout her whole -life and teaching. This little act gave occasion to the “Spiritual -Stigmata”-legend, which is inserted here, in two paragraphs, by the -_Vita_, on the alleged, and I think actual, authority of the credulous -and long-lived Argentina. The legend is wanting in all the MSS.; its -late genesis and growth is clearly traceable.[207] - -“On September 5, some time after her Communion, she suddenly had a -sight (_vista_) of herself, as dead and lying in a truckle-bed, with -many Religious, robed in black, around her. And she rejoiced greatly -at this sight. But afterwards, having a prick of conscience because of -this rejoicing, she confessed it to her Confessor.”[208] Here we have -once more a particular desire within Catherine’s soul, and a scruple -consequent upon it; and all this but ten days before her death. - -And on the 9th, after Communion, there was “suddenly shown her a sight -of her (spiritual) miseries; and this gave great annoyance (_noia_) to -her mind. And, as soon as she was able to tell (confess) them, she did -so; and the sight then departed from her.”[209] Here, then, we have -clear testimony to imperfections perceived by herself as still within -her, and to her Confession of them as such; things characteristic -of her third as against her second period, but which most of the -contributors to the _Vita_ try hard to obscure even here. - - -IV. THE LAST SIX DAYS OF CATHERINE’S LIFE, SEPTEMBER 10-15. - -And now the events of real significance which occurred during the last -six days of her life can be grouped under six heads. - - -1. _A great consultation of Physicians, September 10._ - -On the 10th there occurred a second, and last, great consultation of -Physicians. The number is this time given--they were ten: “of whom -several are still alive,” writes the final Redactor of the printed -_Vita_ of 1551. And, in this case, they did not prescribe any remedies; -but “examining her and inspecting everything with great diligence, -they finally concluded that such a case was (must be) a supernatural -and divine thing, since neither the pulse, nor any of the secretions, -nor any other symptom, showed any trace of any infirmity. They were -astounded, and departed recommending themselves to her prayers.” “When -she was not oppressed or tormented by her attacks (_accidenti_), she -seemed well; when she was being stifled by them (_suffocata_), she -seemed dead: and again, suddenly, the opposite condition would be seen. -And hence it was most clearly understood, that all this operation was -produced (_ordinata_) by the divine goodness itself.”[210] - -Here we have a clear exposition of the two sets of phenomena which -specially impressed her _entourage_, and of the reasoning by which -these appearances were turned into direct proofs of the Metaphysical, -indeed of the Supernatural. There are three assumptions at work here. -What exceeds the knowledge of the Physicians of any one period, can be -safely held to exceed not only human knowledge throughout all coming -ages, but the powers of nature itself. All purely natural illness is -either simply physical or simply mental, and always shows traces -of a simply physical or of a simply mental kind. And all purely -natural illness is either slow in its transitions, or, at least, not -sudden in its transitions back and up to apparent health. And these -assumptions must have lain in those minds as part and parcel of their -hereditary furniture, in so far as they did not energize and aspire, -and did not, by moving out and up into the regions of Action and of -the Spiritual, of the Dynamic and of Love, transcend all that is -mechanically transmissible, and, with it, all that was bound to change -and be proved inadequate in the knowledge of their time. It was their -very religion which, with its strong predisposition and determination -to find immediate, independent, tangible, medically certified proofs -for an exceptional, indeed exclusive action of God, kept these -Physicians thus, even religiously, tied down in and by the Contingent -and Transitory. And it was her very religion which, by its grandly -ethico-spiritual Transcendence, kept Catherine above and outside the -very possibility of growing obsolete or old. We now see, with even -painful clearness, how inadequate, indeed how directly suggestive -of the contrary, were those Physicians’ and Redactors’ treasured -proofs. For neither the absence of all symptoms of physical or of -clearly mental disease, nor the presence of an astounding frequency, -abruptness, and completeness of change in the psycho-physical actions -and functions of the living person, nor, above all, the conjunction of -these two peculiarities, are for us now, taken by themselves, anything -but indications of nervous, hysterical derangement. It is in spite of -these things, or at least only on occasion of them, that Catherine -is great. Indeed one fails to see how, in any case, such purely -psycho-physical phenomenal data could, of themselves and directly, ever -compel any such metaphysical and spiritual conclusions. And, be it -noted, only in proportion as men abandon such impossible enterprises, -do they become sufficiently detached from these phenomena to be able -accurately to gauge their nature. These attendants who build so much -on these phenomena, do not see them as they are; Catherine, who builds -nothing on them, and who simply uses them as fresh means and occasions -of ethico-spiritual growth, sees them, to an astonishing extent, as -they really are. - - -2. _The final Codicil, September 12._ - -On the 12th, “she communicated as usual, but tasted no other food, -and after this she remained a very long time without speaking. And -after they had been bathing her mouth for some time, she exclaimed, -‘I am suffocating’ (_io affogo_). She said this because a little drop -of water had trickled into her throat, and she could not gulp it -down.” And in the evening the Notary Saccheri drew up in her presence, -with her nephew Francesco Fiesco and the maid Argentina del Sale as -two of the seven witnesses, a last Codicil, in which she, “although -languishing in body, yet possessed of her faculties (_in sua sana -memoria esistente_), ordained that her body should be buried in such -a place and Church as should be ordained by Don Jacobo Carenzio, the -present Rector of the Hospital, and Don Cattaneo Marabotto.” And “at -ten o’clock at night she complained of a very great heat (fire), and -then ejected from the mouth much black blood. And black spots appeared -all over her body, with very severe suffering. And her sight became so -weak that she could barely distinguish one person from the other.”[211] - -Here at last we can plainly see the object which had moved her -friends, eighteen months before, to get her to fix upon San Nicolò in -Boschetto as her burial-place. They now, when she is at the point of -death, and in the last moment of fairly lucid mind, get her finally -to declare,--not that she is to be buried in the Hospital Church -apart from her husband, though this is what they themselves intend -to do, but simply that her grave is to be wheresoever Dons Marabotto -and Carenzio shall decide. It is interesting to note to how late a -date her friends thought it wise to postpone such a move, and in how -indirect and roundabout a fashion they had to attain their end. Yet it -is again plain that the whole scheme was willed and executed by her -family and friends unanimously; for, if Vernazza had been a witness -to the previous Will, so was Francesco Fiesco now a witness to this -Codicil.--We should also note that, if the difficulty in swallowing -of the early day is still entirely in keeping with her life-long -psycho-physical peculiarities, the attack at night is the first in her -life when the blood lost is described as of bad quality and where -spots appear on her person, indeed where any symptom of definite -illness is recorded. But now at last it is evident that downright -physical mischief is at work. - - -3. _Symptoms of organic lesion and delirium, September 13._ - -Before dawn “on the 13th, she evacuated much blood of a bad quality and -great heat, so that she remained even weaker than before. Nevertheless -she again communicated at her usual hour.” And later on “she fixed her -gaze immovably upon the ceiling, and made many gestures with her mouth -and hands. The bystanders asked her what it was that she was seeing, -and she said: ‘Drive away that beast that wants to eat…,’ and the -remainder of the words could not be made out.”[212] - -Here two points are of pathetic interest. This great heat of her -blood was considered, no doubt from the first by at least some of -her attendants, and then later on more and more by the Redactors, as -so directly marvellous, spiritually significant, and confirmatory of -sayings of her own as to her interior ardours, that three various -though parallel anecdotes and proofs as to the intensity of its heat -are solemnly printed here by the _Vita_, only the first of which -appears in the MSS. Purely secondary, physical matters are thus, with a -short-sighted good faith and admiration, eagerly utilized to naturalize -and obscure a soaringly spiritual personality. Truly, she was not -simply mistaken as to her isolation: she too had the privilege to share -some of the piercing loneliness of Christ. - -And next, we have here her last coherent utterance; and the care and -fearless honesty with which it has been chronicled and printed as -such--and as the concluding words of a chapter (Chapter L), up to at -least the fourth edition, Venice 1601--are truly admirable. The words, -“that wants to eat,” appear in MSS. “A” and “B,” and are, I think, -authentic. They may mean that the beast was looking about for some -unspecified food, or that it was wanting to devour her (the former is, -I think, the more likely meaning, for there is no indication of fright, -and _devorare_ would, in the latter case, be the more natural word). We -have, in any case, a quasi-physical, distinctly _maladif_ impression; -one which, as regards at least its apparently sensible embodiment, was -the simple projection of her own mind. And indeed there is nothing -to show that she had any consciousness of any spiritual significance -about it. It has got all the opaque, uninteresting character of mere, -given, unrelated, and unsuggestive fact, which all such purely nervous -projections always have; and stands thus in complete and instructive -contrast to her finely suggestive and transparent, spiritually -significant _Viste_, which contributed so largely to the volitional -stimulation and moral and religious witness and truth of her life. - - -4. _Catherine’s death, dawn of September 15, 1510._ - -During the early night hours of “the 14th, she again lost much blood, -and she weakened much in her speech. Yet she once more, and it was -the last time, communicated as usual. And throughout this day she lay -there, with her pulse so slight as to be unfindable.” And “many devoted -friends were present.” - -And as the subsequent night ceased to be Saturday and became Sunday, -the 15th, “she was asked whether she wished to communicate. But she -then pointed with her right index-finger towards the sky.” And her -friends understood that she wished to indicate by this that she had to -go and communicate in heaven. “And at this moment, this blessed soul -gently expired, in great peace and tranquillity, and flew to her tender -and much desired Love.”[213] - -Here three points are of interest. Catherine undoubtedly died at, or -shortly before, dawn on the 15th September, as is clearly required by -the older account on page 160_c_ of the _Vita_. Yet a second account, -sufficiently early to appear in all the MSS., is given on page 161_c_, -according to which she died on the 14th. The reason of this latter -pragmatic “correction” is obvious: the 15th is but the Octave of the -Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, the 14th is the Feast of the Exaltation -of the Cross. The temptation to find a final, strikingly appropriate -synchronism, when, to do so, her death need only be pushed back some -six hours at most, was too great to be resisted to the end; and an -untrained, enthusiastic, imaginative mind like Argentina’s would, -probably from the very first, have almost unconsciously helped to -establish, or perhaps she single-handedly fixed, this date. - -And next, the “many friends” present will no doubt have included her -sole surviving brother Lorenzo and his son Francesco, who, only three -days before, had witnessed her Codicil; one or other of the four -“Protectors” of the Hospital; Don Carenzio, the Rector; and Argentina -del Sale. But Vernazza, as we already know, was far away; and, as we -shall find in a moment, Mariola, and, above all, Marabotto, though both -in Genoa, were both absent from her death-bed. Now it is certain that -the absence of Marabotto cannot have been accidental, for death had -evidently been recognized by all to be imminent, ever since the 12th -at least; and he himself would certainly not have put anything in the -world before attending Catherine at the moment of her death. Nor, as -we shall find, was he ill just now. Yet we must, I think, suppose him -to have been (at least off and on) about her person, during the 12th, -up to the drawing up of the Codicil, which directly concerns himself -together with Carenzio. His own name appears second, no doubt because, -as the document itself mentions, Carenzio and not he is now Rector of -the Hospital in which the document is being drawn up. Marabotto will -have withdrawn after the attack on that night which left Catherine -hardly capable of any further distinguishing one person from another; -and he will have retired because Carenzio, from some little jealousy -or feeling of punctilio, cared to claim the right, as Rector, alone -to attend her at the last; or for some other slight reason such as -this. In any case, there is here one more indication of a certain -friction and rivalry amongst her attendants and chroniclers, which, -however painful, will help us in our study of the peculiarities of her -biography. There is, however, nothing to show that Marabotto’s final -withdrawal took place at the instigation, or even with the knowledge, -of Catherine; and the cause of that withdrawal can certainly not have -been a grave one. - -And finally, there appeared eventually, at earliest in the fifth -edition, 1615, but possibly not till the sixth, in 1645, or even later, -a gloss which effectually prevents her “unedifying” remark of the 13th -from being her last utterance. After the words, “and at this moment, -this blessed soul,” there then appears the clause: “saying: ‘Into Thy -hands, O Lord, I commend my Spirit.’” The passage occurs in the late -and entirely secondary MS. “F,” which contains also other demonstrably -legendary “embellishments.” - - -5. _Intimations of her death vouchsafed to friends._ - -The _Vita_ gives an account of seven intimations or apparitions, -vouchsafed at the moment of her death to as many chosen friends and -disciples,--so many communications of her passage and instant complete -union with God. Although no names are given, it is easy to identify the -first six persons as Argentina del Sale, “a spiritual daughter of hers, -present at her death”; Mariola Bastarda, “another spiritual daughter of -hers, who had an evil spirit upon her (_il demonio adosso_)”; Maestro -Boerio, “a physician, her devotee”; Ettore Vernazza, “a very spiritual -man and her devotee”; Tommasa Fiesca, “a holy Religious woman, most -devoted to her”; and Benedetta Lombarda, “another Religious woman, who -had been a member of her household (_sua famigliare_).” The seventh -and last, “a nun” (_una monaca_), is so little characterized, as to -be incapable of certain identification: possibly Battista Vernazza is -meant, who, though but thirteen years old, was already an Augustinian -Novice.[214] - -The order in which the first six names appear is evidently determined -partly by the degree of physical proximity to Catherine--Argentina by -her bedside, comes before Boerio in another house in Genoa, and Boerio -comes before Vernazza, since the latter is far away (_lontano_); partly -by sex--Boerio and Vernazza, though simple laymen, appear before the -three Religious women; and partly by the abnormal spiritual condition, -and consequent increase in the value of the testimony, of the souls -concerned--Mariola the Possessed comes first among all those not -actually present at the death. Even this order, and still more the form -of all these little notices, show plainly that the stress is laid, not -so much on the intimation of the death, as on that of the immediate -entrance into glory. Note that there is no reference anywhere to Don -Carenzio, certainly as much present at the death as Argentina; nor, -within this particular list, to Don Marabotto, as certainly absent as -Ettore Vernazza. - -It is disappointing to find that, whereas such intimations, or at least -communications as to death at the moment of its occurrence, belong -to the best authenticated of the more mysterious human experiences, -and although we would expect to find some such unmistakably vivid and -first-hand accounts at this point in the life of one so spiritually -great and so deeply loved as was Catherine, the accounts are all, -with the possible exception of that concerning Boerio, very general -and colourless. As to Boerio we are told: “A Physician, her devotee, -was asleep, but awoke at the moment of her passing, and heard a voice -which said to him: ‘Abide with God; I am now going to Paradise.’ And -he called his wife and said to her: ‘Madonna Caterina has died at this -moment’; and this turned out to have been the case.”[215] - -Two insipid, vague, and gossipy fragments concerning Don Marabotto -strive to make up for his absence from the list of the seven recipients -of synchronizing intimations. “Her Confessor during that night (14th to -15th) and throughout the following day (15th), had no notice whatever -concerning her.” This is told as if it had been something spiritually -remarkable, whereas it was evidently but strangely unkind on the part -of the other friends of Catherine. “The next day (16th) he attempted -to say a Mass for the Dead for the soul of Catherine.” He evidently -had been told on the evening of the 15th, or quite early on the 16th, -for there is here no claim to any supernatural intimation. “And he -found himself unable to pray for her in particular. And again on the -following day, whilst saying a Mass in honour of several Martyrs, his -mind was suddenly, from the Introit onwards, fixed upon Catherine’s -spiritual martyrdom, so that his abundant weeping made it difficult for -him to finish his Mass.”[216] There is, as so often with Marabotto, -something slightly comical, and yet respectable, because thoroughly -genuine, loyal, and truthful, about this his eager desire to experience -something unusual, the careful registration of something quite -commonplace, and the wistful attempt to make it out extraordinary after -all. - - -6. _Alleged miraculous condition of Catherine’s skin and heart._ - -There remain two more medical details, which are, however, of some -significance in connection with the spirit of her _entourage_. - -Her skin is declared to have been, after death, of a yellow colour -throughout. Indeed in various places of the _Vita_ yellow or red colour -is noted in connection with her person, but generally as localized -about the region of the heart. But the accounts vary, indeed contradict -each other, so much, that I shrink from finally adopting any one -account.[217] - -The action of her heart was often laborious or even acutely painful: -“At the last, owing to the great fire of pure and penetrating love, -that burnt within her heart, the skin over it became so tender as to be -unable to be touched. It seemed as though she had a wound right through -her heart. And she often held her hand over it; and it would pant like -a pair of bellows, on one day more than on another.”[218] And how -often had not Catherine spoken of the wondrous things, the spiritual -joys and sufferings, that she felt within her heart! And so some of -her materializing biographers, probably some of her attendants before -them, doubt not that “if only her (physical) heart had been examined -after death, some marvellous sign would have been found upon it.”[219] -We even find a report that “this holy soul, several months before her -death, left an order that, after her death, her body should be opened -and her heart examined, because they would find it all consumed (burnt -up) by love. Nevertheless her friends did not dare to do so.”[220] This -sheer legend will have been due to Argentina, and will have become -articulate long after the first deposition of Catherine’s remains. -There is certainly no other, indeed no kind of authentic, evidence of -any such wish or hesitation on the part of any one at the time. It is -sad to note how rapidly and easily, all but inevitably, the vivid, -spiritual ideas and experiences of Catherine were thus materialized and -spoilt. - - -V. SKETCH OF CATHERINE’S SPIRITUAL CHARACTER AND SIGNIFICANCE. - -Before proceeding further to what is really still a necessary part -and elucidation of Catherine’s spiritual character and special -significance,--her doctrine and the posthumous effect, extension, -and application of her life and teaching upon and by means of her -greatest disciples,--it may be well to pause a little, and to try and -give, as far as the largely fragmentary and vague evidence permits, a -short and vivid picture and summary, in part retrospective and in part -prospective, of the special type, meaning and importance of Catherine’s -personality and spiritual attitude, and of the interrelation of the -two. In so doing I propose to move, as far as possible, from the -psycho-physical and temperamental peculiarities and determinisms -of her case, up to the spiritual characteristics and ethical -self-determinations; and to try and note everywhere what she was not as -definitely as what she was. For only thus shall we have some adequate -apprehension of the “beggarly elements” which she found, and of the -spiritual organism and centre of far-reaching influence which she left. -And only thus too will it be possible to see at all clearly the cost, -the limitations, and the special functions, temporary and permanent, of -her particular kind of soul and sanctity. - - -1. _Her special temperament._ - -It is clear then, first, that in her we have to do with a highly -nervous, delicately poised, immensely sensitive and impressionable -psycho-physical organism and temperament. It was a temperament which, -had it been unmatched by a mind and will at least its equals; had -these latter not found, or been found by, a definite, rich, and -supernaturally powerful, historical, and institutional religion; and -had not the mind and will, with this religious help, been kept in -constant operation upon it, would have spelt, if not moral ruin, at -least life-long ineffectualness. Yet, as a matter of fact, not only -did this temperament not dominate her, with the apparently rare and -incomplete exceptions of some but semi-voluntary, short impressions -and acts during the last months of her life; but it became one of the -chief instruments and materials of her life’s work and worth. Only -together with such a mind and will, is such a temperament not a grave -drawback; and even with them it is an obvious danger, and requires -their constant careful checking and active shaping. - -And this temperament involved an unusually large subconscious life. All -souls have some amount of this life, but many have it but slight and -shallow: she had it of a quite extraordinary degree and depth. A coral -reef, growing up from, and just peering above, a hundred fathom-deep -ocean, would be an appropriate picture of the large predominance of -subconsciousness in this spacious soul. And even this circumstance -alone would cause her spiritual lights and fully conscious experiences -to come abruptly, and in the form of quasi-physical seizures and -surprises. Continuous, and possibly long, incubations of ideas and -feelings would thus be taking place in the subconscious region, and -these feelings and ideas would then, when fully ripe, or on some slight -stimulation from the conscious region or directly from the outer world, -make sudden irruptions into that full consciousness. Nor would such -natural suddenness of full consciousness really militate against the -claim to supernaturalness of the ideas and feelings thus revealed. For -they would still be most rightly conceived as the work of God’s Spirit -in and through the action of her own spirit: not their causation and -their source, but simply the suddenness of their revelation and the -channel of their outlet would lose in supernaturalness. - -And hers was a soul with habitually large fields of consciousness. -Apparently from her conversion onwards, and certainly during the last -fourteen years of her life, the moments or days of narrow fields -were, till quite the last weeks or even days, comparatively rare; -and their narrowness was evidently always felt as most painful and -oppressive. And the interior occupation was so intense; the several -fields succeeded each other with such an apparent automatism and -quality of even physical seizure; and they were either so entrancing -by their largeness or so depressing by their narrowness: that to souls -not in tune with hers, she must, in the former moods, have appeared as -egoistic, as (in a sense) too much of a man, as one absorbed in great -but purely general, super-personal ideas which were making her forget -both her own and her fellow-creature’s minor wants; and, in the latter -moods, as downrightly egotistic, as (in a way) too much of a woman, as -one engrossed in her own purely individual, small and fanciful troubles -and trials. Yet the “Egoism” is not dominant during her middle period, -since it is certain that her charitable and administrative activities, -and close affective interest in the daily, physical and emotional lot -and demands of the poor and lowly, were most real and considerable. -And, in her third period, it was this very “Egoism” which, as we shall -see, was the form and means of the interior apprehension and exterior -elaboration of her most original and suggestive doctrines, and became -the occasion for her stimulation of other intensely active souls on -to great nation-wide enterprises of the most practical, permanent, -and heroic kind. And the “Egotistic” moods are unapparent before the -last two years or less of her life; and they then are clearly but -the occasional, involuntary suspensions or partial yieldings of her -normally iron will,--rare checks and intermittences which, with little -or no preventible faultiness on her own part, give us pathetically -vivid glimpses of what that normal life of hers cost her to achieve -and to maintain, and of what she would have been, if bereft of God’s -generosity ever awakening, deepening, and operating through her own. - -All this sensitiveness, subconsciousness, spaciousness, variety, and -suddenness of apprehension and feeling; all this largely chaotic, -mutually conflicting, raw material of her spiritual life, even if it -had existed alongside of but feeble and inert powers of organization -and transformation, would not have failed to produce considerable -suffering; although, in such a case, that suffering would have -remained largely inarticulate, and would have left the soul checked -and counterchecked by various tyrannous passions and fancies. The soul -would thus have been less efficient and persuasive than the least -subconscious and sensitive specimens of average and “common-sense” -humanity. But, in her case, all this unusually turbulent raw material -was in unusually close contiguity to powers of mind and of will of a -rare breadth and strength. And this very closeness of apposition and -width of contrast, and this great strength of mind and will, made -all that disordered multiplicity, distraction, and dispersion of her -clamorous, many-headed, many-hearted nature, a tyranny impossible and -unnecessary to bear. And yet to achieve the actual escape from such a -tyranny, the mastering of such a rabble, and the harmonization of such -a chaos, meant a constant and immense effort, a practically unbroken -grace-getting and self-giving, an ever-growing heroism and indeed -sanctity, and, with and through all these things, a corresponding -expansion and virile joy. It can thus be said, in all simple truth, -that she became a saint because she had to; that she became it, -to prevent herself going to pieces: she literally had to save, and -actually did save, the fruitful life of reason and of love, by -ceaselessly fighting her immensely sensitive, absolute, and claimful -self. - - -2. _Catherine and Marriage._ - -Catherine’s mind was without humour or wit; and this was, of course, a -serious drawback. And her temperament was of so excessive a mentality, -as to amount to something more or less abnormal. For not only is there -no trace about her, at any time, of moral vulgarity of any kind, or of -any tendency to it; and this is, of course, a grand strength; but she -seems at all times to have been greatly lacking in that quite innocent -and normal sensuousness, which appears to form a necessary element of -the complete human personality. It is true that in the anecdotes of -her impulsive and yet reverent affection for the pestiferous woman and -the cancerous workman, with the finely self-oblivious sympathy which -moves her to kiss the mouth of the first, and long to remain with her -arms around the neck of the other, there is the beautiful tenderness -and daring of a great positive purity, of the purity of flame and not -of snow. And her love of her servants, Argentina in particular, and -of poor Thobia, is exquisitely true and constant. Yet even all this -can hardly be classed with the element referred to, with that love of -children and of women as the bearers of them, that instinct of union -with all that is pure and fruitful in the normal life of sex, such as -is so beautifully present throughout St. Luke’s Gospel, but which is, -at least relatively, absent from St. John’s. - -Possibly her unhappy and childless marriage determined the -non-development or the mortification of any tendencies to such a -temper. But the absence referred to was more probably caused by her -congenital psychical temperament and state themselves; and, if so, -it would point to her as a person hardly intended for marriage, and -as one who, through no fault of her own, could not satisfy the less -purely mental of the perfectly licit requirements which make up the -many-levelled wants of a normal, or at least ordinary, man’s and -husband’s nature. Pompilia’s dying words, in Browning’s “Ring and the -Book,” would, probably at any time after her premature involuntary -marriage, have found an appropriate place upon Catherine’s lips, had -she ever thought it loyal or kind to utter them: “‘In heaven there is -neither marriage nor giving in marriage.’ How like Jesus Christ to say -that!” - -Yet it is at least as difficult to think of her as really intended for -the cloister. That early wish of hers to join a religious community, -sincere and keen as it no doubt was at the time, evidently faded -away completely, probably already before her conversion thirteen -years later, and certainly before her widowhood. Perhaps she would -have been best suited, throughout her adult years, to the life of an -unmarried woman living in the world,--to the kind of life which she -actually led during her widowhood, with such changes in it as her -earlier, robuster health would have involved for those earlier years. -She would thus, throughout her life, have divided her energies, in -various degrees and combinations, between attention to the multiform, -practical, physico-emotional wants of the poor; the give and take of -stimulation and enlightenment to and from some few large-hearted, -heroically operative friends; and, as source and centre of all such -actual achievements and of indefinitely greater possibilities, indeed -as a life already largely eternal and creative,--contemplative prayer -of various degrees and kinds. But such a life, if it would have left -out much disappointment and suffering, and not for herself alone, yet -would also have been without the special occasions and incentives to -her sudden conversion and long patience and detailed magnanimity. Her -life, in appearing on the surface as less of a failure, would at bottom -have been less of a spiritual success. - -Indeed the failures and fragmentarinesses of her life, even if and -where more than merely apparent to us or even to herself, helped and -still help to give a poignant forcefulness to her example and teaching. -There is nothing pre- or post-arranged, nothing artificial or stagey, -nothing, in the deliberate occupations of her convert life, that is -simply brooding about this woman: when she thinks or prays, she does -so; when she acts, she acts; when she suffers, she suffers; and there -is an end of it. The infinitely winning qualities of a simple veracity; -of a successive livingness, because ever operative occupation with the -actual real moment, and not with the after-shadow of the past nor with -the fore-shadow of the future; and, through all this, of a healthy -creatureliness are thus spread over all she does,--over her virtues, -which are never reflected as such within her own pure mind, and over -her very weaknesses and failings which, summed up in their source, her -false self, are ever being acknowledged, feared, and fought, with a -heroism not less massive because its methods are so wisely indirect. - - -3. _Catherine and Friendship and the Poor._ - -It is plain that Catherine’s temperament was naturally a profoundly -sad one, although her acutest attacks of melancholy were generally -succeeded by some unusually great expansion, illumination or -consolidation of soul. She had, to adopt a term of recent psychology, -a very low “difference-threshold”: easily and swiftly would her -consciousness be affected by every kind of irritant: even a slight -stimulation would at once produce pain, anxiety, or oppression of mind -or soul. She was thus evidently made for a few life-long friends, -for such as would deserve the privilege of giving much sympathy and -patience, and of getting back helps and stimulations indefinitely -greater both in quality and kind; and was not fitted for many -acquaintances of the ordinary kind, with their hurry of disjointed, -hand-to-mouth, half-awake thinking, feeling, and doing. - -And it is very noticeable that her friendships and attachments of -all kinds were of a steadiness and perseverance to which there are -no real exceptions. To Giuliano, markedly inferior in nature though -he evidently was to her, and positively unfaithful during the early -years of their long, ill-assorted marriage, she remained faithful even -during those first years which she herself never ceased to condemn as -her pre-conversion period; she behaved with true magnanimity towards -himself and Thobia and Thobia’s mother; and she even evinced a certain -affective attachment to him and to his memory. And it would hardly -be fair to quote the change in the dispositions as to her place of -burial in proof of a change in her dispositions towards him. She whose -affectionate interest in Thobia is shown, by irrefragable documentary -proof, to have persevered, indeed increased, to the end of the poor -young woman’s life, will not have changed in her feelings towards her -own dead husband. Towards her brothers and sister, her nephews and -nieces, her numerous Wills and Codicils show that she entertained a -constant and operative affection. - -These same documents prove that her affection and gratitude towards -Don Marabotto were equally sincere and provident. It is true that she -twice broke off relations with him, although only for a day and three -days respectively; and, at the last, this devoted friend of the last -eleven years of her life was no more about her. Yet we have remarked -that those two former absences were but caused by reasonable fears of -getting spoilt by him; and that the final absence was no doubt in no -way her doing. And perhaps the most impressive of all her attachments -were that to the Hospital, as representative of the sick poor whom -she had served, so actively and at such cost to self, for twenty-five -years and more,--all her legal dispositions and her very domicile for -the last thirty years of her life proclaim the permanent prominence of -this interest; and her affection towards her servants, since nothing -could be more considerate, thoughtful, equable, and persevering than -her care and love for Benedetta, Mariola, and Argentina. Here again I -cannot find any certain exceptions: for we know nothing of the history -of the servant Antoinetta except that, even on the one occasion of her -mention, it appeared already doubtful whether the girl herself would -care to remain with her mistress to the end. - -There is but one apparent, and indeed a startling, exception to this -unbroken continuity of affection. Ettore Vernazza, certainly the -greatest and closest, the most docile and the most influential, of -her disciples, he to whom we owe the transmission of the larger and -the most precious part of her teaching and spirit, and who, as will -be seen, became, after her death even more than before it, and more -and more right up to his own heroic end, the living reproduction and -extension of the very deepest and greatest experiences and influences -of her life: Vernazza appears nowhere in her Wills, except as, on one -occasion, the actual drawer of the document, and, on another, as a -witness. And he was far away, and clearly not accidentally, at the time -of her death. I take it to be quite certain that we have here not an -exception, at the point of her fullest sympathy, to that gratitude and -permanence of feeling which obtained demonstrably in the other, lesser -cases; but that this silence and this departure are to be explained, -the former entirely, and the latter in part, by the special character -as much of Ettore as of Catherine, and by the special form which their -friendship assumed in consequence. I shall return to this point in my -chapter on Vernazza. - - -4. _Her Absorptions and Ecstatic States._ - -Catherine’s states of absorption in prayer, such as we find ever since -her conversion, were transparently real and sincere, and were so swift -and spontaneous as to appear quasi-involuntary. They were evidently, -together with, and largely on occasion of, her reception of the Holy -Eucharist, the chief means and the ordinary form of the accessions of -strength and growth to her spiritual life. - -Possibly throughout the four years of the first period of her convert -life, certainly and increasingly throughout the twenty-two years of the -second, middle period, these absorptions occurred frequently, indeed -daily; they were long, and lasted up to six hours at a stretch; and -they were apparently timed by herself, and never rendered her incapable -of hearing or attending to any call to acts of duty or of charity, and -of breaking off then and there. And throughout these years she seems -to have known but one kind of absorption, this primarily spiritual -one, which appears to have been a particularly deep Prayer of Quiet; -and she appears to have always been, if exercised, yet also profoundly -sustained and strengthened, by it, even physically, for the large -activity and numerous trials and sufferings awaiting her on her return -to her ordinary life. And these were the years during which she lived -with no mediate guidance. - -During the last eleven, perhaps even thirteen years of her life, first -one, and then, considerably later, a second change occurs in these -respects. First these profound, healthy, and fruitful absorptions, and -the power to occasion or effect, to bear or endorse them, diminish -greatly, though apparently gradually, in length, regularity, and -efficiency; indeed they do so almost as markedly as does the capacity -for external work, their former complement and correlative. The -spiritual life now breaks up into a greater variety of shorter and -more fitful incidents and manifestations. The sympathy of friends, -the sustaining counsel of priests, and the communication on her part -of many spiritual thoughts and experiences take, in large part, the -place of those long spells of the Prayer of Quiet or of Union, and -still more of that external activity which are both now becoming more -and more impossible to her. And next,--though not, as far as our -evidence goes, before the last six months or so of her life,--there -arises a second series of absorptions, externally closely similar, yet -internally profoundly different. These latter absorptions are primarily -psychical and involuntary, indeed psychopathic. And she herself shows -and declares her knowledge of this their pathological character, her -ability to distinguish them from their healthy rivals, her inability -to throw them off unaided, her wish that others should rouse her from -them, and her power to accept and second such initiation coming to her -from a will-centre other than her own. - -Now her attendants and biographers, possibly all of them and even -during her lifetime, considered and called those healthy absorptions -“ecstasies”; and though we have clear evidence of her ever having -shrunk from so naming them herself, and though, here as everywhere, she -habitually turned away from considering the form and psycho-physical -concomitants of her spiritual experiences, and concentrated her -attention on their content and ethico-religious truth and power, there -seems to be no special reason for quarrelling with their application -of this term. Yet it is of great importance to observe that none of -her teaching can with propriety be called directly Pneumatic. For I -can find nothing that even purports to have been spoken in a state -of trance, nor anything authentic that claims to convey, during -her times of ordinary consciousness, anything learnt during those -states of absorption other than what, in a lesser degree, is probably -experienced, during at least some rare moments, by all souls that have -attained to the so-called Prayer of Quiet. It is quite clear, I think, -that in all these authentic passages, the states of absorption are -treated substantially as times when the conscious region of her soul, -a region always relatively shallow, sinks down into the ever-present -deep regions of subconsciousness; and hence as experiences which can -only be described indirectly,--in their effects, as traced by and in -the conscious soul, after its rising up again, from this immersion in -subconsciousness, to its more ordinary condition of so-called “full -consciousness,” _i.e._ as full a consciousness as is normal, for this -particular soul, in the majority of moments as are not devoted to -physical sleep. - -But if apparently none of Catherine’s contemplations are derived -directly from things learnt during these times of absorption; those -contemplations are, none the less, all indirectly influenced, in -the most powerful and multiform manner, by these absorptions. For -these absorptions constituted the moments of the soul’s feeding and -harmonization, and they enriched and concentrated it, for the service -of its fellows, the occasion of further self-enlargement. And these -absorptions, with their combination of experienced fruitfulness and -undeniable obscurity, for the very soul that has passed through them, -when this soul has returned to ordinary consciousness, give to all, -even to the most lucid of her sayings, a beautiful margin of mist and -mystery, a never-ceasing sense of the incomprehensibility, and yet of -the soul’s capacity for an intellectual adumbration, of the realities -and truths in which our whole spiritual life is rooted,--realities and -truths which she is thus, without even a touch of inconsistency, ever -struggling to apprehend and to communicate a little less inadequately -than before. - - -5. _Catherine’s teaching._ - -Catherine’s teaching, as we have it, is, at first sight, strangely -abstract and impersonal. God nowhere appears in it, at least in so -many words, either as Father, or as Friend, or as Bridegroom of the -soul. This comes no doubt, in part, from the circumstance that she -had never known the joys of maternity, and had never, for one moment, -experienced the soul-entrancing power of full conjugal union. It comes, -perhaps, even more, from her somewhat abnormal temperament, the (in -some respects) exclusive mentality which we have already noted. But it -certainly springs at its deepest from one of the central requirements -and experiences of her spiritual life; and must be interpreted by the -place and the function which this apparently abstract teaching occupies -within this large experimental life of hers which stimulates, utilizes, -and transcends it all. For here again we are brought back to her rare -thirst, her imperious need, for unification; to the fact that she was a -living, closely knit, ever-increasing spiritual organism, if there ever -was one. - -This unification tended, in its reasoned, theoretic presentation, even -to overshoot the mark: for it would be impossible to press those of -her sayings in which her true self appears as literally God, or her -state of quiet as a complete motionlessness or even immovability. -Yet in practice this unification ever remained admirably balanced -and fruitful, since, in and for her actual life, it was being ever -conceived and applied as but a whole-hearted, constantly renewed, -continuously necessary, costing and yet enriching, endeavour to -harmonize and integrate the ever-increasing elements and explications -of her nature and experience. And even on the two points mentioned, -her theory gives an admirably vivid presentment of the prima facie -impression produced by its deepest experiences upon every devoted soul. - -And on other points her theory is, even as such, admirably sober, -closely knit, and stimulating. For, as to the cause of Evil, she ever -restricts herself to finding it in her own nature, and to fighting it -there: hence the personality of Evil, though nowhere denied, yet rarely -if ever concerns her, and never does so directly in her strenuous and -practical life. Yet, on the other hand, this fight takes, with her, the -form not primarily of a conflict with this or that particular fault, -these several conflicts then summing themselves up into a more or less -interconnected warfare; but it makes straight for the very root-centre -of all the particular faults, and, by constantly checking and starving -that, suppresses these. And hence the Positive, Radical character of -Evil is, in practice, continuously emphasized by her. - -Yet this root-centre of Evil within her was most certainly not -conceived by her as a merely general and abstract false self or -self-seeking. Her biographers, mostly over-anxious to prove the -innocence of her nature, even at the expense of the heroism of her life -and of the reasonableness and truthfulness of her statements, are no -doubt responsible for the constant air of would-be devout and amiable -(!) exaggeration which she wears on all this self-fighting side of -her. Yet we have, I think, but to take the simplest and most authentic -of the rival accounts,--those which give us the smallest quantity -of self-denunciation, and we can understand the quality of this -self-blame, and can fix its special, entirely concrete and pressing, -occasion and object. For considering the immense claimfulness, the -cruel jealousy, the tyrannous fancifulness, the brooding inventiveness, -the at last incurable absoluteness of the weak and bad side and -tendency of a temperament and natural character such as hers, had -it been allowed to have its way, there is, I think, nothing really -excessive or morbid, nothing that is not most healthy and humble, -and hence sensible and admirably self-cognitive and truthful, about -this heroic strenuousness, this ever-watchful, courageous fear of -self, and those declarations of hers that this false self was as bad -as any devil. To such a temperament and _attrait_ as hers only one -master could be deliberately taken, or could be long borne, as centre -of the soul: God _or_ Self;--not two: God _and_ Self. And hence all -practice on even tolerance of, as it were, separate compartments of -the soul; all “a little of this, and not too much of that” spirit; all -“making the best of both worlds” temper; all treatment of religion as -a means to other ends, or as so much uninterpreted inheritance and -dead furniture or fixed and frozen possession of the mind, or as a -respectable concomitant and condiment or tolerable parasite to other -interests: all such things must have been more really impossible to her -than would have been the lapse into self-sufficiency and self-idolatry, -and the attempt to find happiness in such a downward unification. - -And the one true divine root-centre of her individual soul is ever, -at the same time, experienced and conceived as present, in various -degrees and ways, simply everywhere, and in everything. All the world -of spirits is thus linked together; and a certain slightest remnant -of a union exists even between Heaven and Hell, between the lost and -the saved. For there is no absolute or really infinite Evil existent -anywhere; whilst everywhere there are some traces of and communications -from the Absolute Good, the Source and Creator of the substantial -being of all things that are. And to possess even God, and all of -God, herself alone exclusively, would have been to her, we can say it -boldly, a truly intolerable state, if this state were conceived as -accompanied by any consciousness of the existence of other rational -creatures entirely excluded from any and every degree or kind of such -possession. It is, on the contrary, the apprehension of how she, as -but one of the countless creatures of God, is allowed to share in the -effluence of the one Light and Life and Love, an effluence which, -identical in essential character everywhere, is not entirely absent -anywhere: it is the abounding consciousness of this universal bond and -brotherhood, this complete freedom from all sectarian exclusiveness and -from all exhaustive appropriation of God, the Sun of the Universe, by -any or all of the just or unjust, upon all of whom He shines: it is all -this that constitutes her element of unity, saneness, and breadth, the -one half of her faith, and the greater part of her spiritual joy. - -And the other half of her faith constitutes her element of difference, -multiplicity and depth, and is itself made up of two distinct -convictions. No two creatures have been created by God with the same -capacities; and, although they are each called by Him to possess Him -to the full of their respective capability, they will necessarily, -even if they all be fully faithful to their call, possess Him in -indefinitely and innumerably various degrees and ways. And, so far, -there is still nothing but joy in her soul. Indeed we can say that the -previous element of unity and breadth calls for this second element -of diversity and depth; and that only in and with the other can each -element attain to its own full development and significance, and thus -the two together can constitute a living whole. - -But the second conviction as to difference is a sombre and saddening -one. For she holds further that the diversity is not only one of -degrees of goodness and a universal fulness of variously sized living -vessels of life and joy; but that there is also a diversity in the -degree of self-making or self-marring on the part of the free-willing, -self-determining creatures of God. Here too she still, it is true, -finds the omnipresent divine Goodness at work, and in a double fashion -and degree. The self-marring of some, probably, in her view, of most -souls, gets slowly and blissfully albeit painfully unmade by the -voluntary acceptance, on the part of these souls, of the suffering -rightly attaching, in a quite determinist manner, to all direct, -deliberate, and detached pleasure-seeking of the false self. And this -is Purgatory, which is essentially the same whether thus willed and -suffered in this world or in the next. And the self-marring of other, -probably the minority of, sinful souls, though no longer capable of -any essential unmaking, is yet in so far overruled by the divine -Goodness (which, here as everywhere, is greater than the creature’s -badness), that even here there ever remains a certain residue of -moral goodness, and that a certain mitigation of the suffering which -necessarily accompanies the remaining and indeed preponderant evil is -mercifully effected by God. And this is Hell, which is essentially -the same, whether thus, as to its pain, not willed but suffered here -or hereafter. Thus she neither holds an _Apocatastasis_, a Final -Restitution of all things,--what might be called a Universal Purgatory, -nor a Gradual Mitigation of the sufferings of the lost; but the -eventual complete purgation and restitution applies only to some, -though probably to most, souls, and the mitigation of this suffering, -in the case of the lost, is not gradual but instantaneous. - -Here again, then, we find her thirst for unification strikingly at -work. For she discovers one single divine Goodness as active and -efficient throughout the universe; and she everywhere finds spiritual -pain to consist in the discordance felt by the rational creature -between its actual contingent condition and its own indestructible -ideal, and such pain to be everywhere automatically consequent upon -deliberate acts of self-will. Hence the suffering is nowhere separately -willed or separately sent by God; and, in all cases of restoration, -the suffering, in proportion as it is freely willed by the sufferer, -is ever medicinal and curative and never vindictive. It is these -considerations which make her able to endure this sombre side of -reality. - -Now it is all this second set of beliefs, all this faith in diversity, -multiplicity, and depth, which prevents any touch of real Pantheism -or Indifferentism from defacing the breadth of her outlook, and -effectually neutralizes any tendency to a sheer Optimism or Monism. -She loves God’s Light and Love so much, that she is indefatigable in -seeking, and constantly happy in finding, and incapable of not loving, -even the merest glimpses of it, everywhere. And yet, precisely on that -same account, everywhere the central passion of her soul is given -to fostering the further growth of this Light and Love, to already -loving it even more as it will or may be than as it already is, and -thus deeply loving it already, in order that it may be still more -lovable by and by. And thus the universality, and what we may call -the particularity, of God’s self-communication and of the creature’s -response, are equally preserved, and in suchwise that each safeguards, -supplements, and stimulates the other. And thus her grace-stimulated -craving, both for indefinite expansion and breadth and for indefinite -concentration and depth, is met and nourished by this width and -distance, this clarity and dimness of outlook on to the rich and -awe-inspiring greatness of God and of His world of souls. - -And union with this one Centre is, for all rational free-willing -creatures, to be achieved, at any one and at every moment, by the -whole-hearted willing and doing, by the full endorsing, of some one -thing,--some one unique state and duty offered to the soul in that -one unique moment. Thus life gets apparently broken up into so many -successive steps and degrees of work, each to be attended to as though -it were the first and last; and as so much special material and -occasion for the practice of unification, ostensibly in the matter -supplied and for the moment which supplies it, but really in the soul -to which it is offered and for the totality of its life. Her soul -is, even if taken at any one moment, and still more, of course, if -considered in its successive history, overflowing with various acts, -with (as it were) so many numberless waves and wavelets, currents -and cross-currents of volition; and the warp and woof of her life’s -weaving is really close-knit with numberless threads of single -willings, preceded and succeeded by single perceptions, conceptions, -and feelings of the soul. Yet the very fulness of this flow and the -closeness of this weaving, their great and ever-increasing orderliness -and spontaneity, such as we can and must conceive them to have been -present during the majority of the moments of her convert and waking -life, tended, during such times, to obliterate any clear consciousness -of their different constituents, and to produce the impression of -one single state, even one single act. And this very action, even -inasmuch as thus felt to be simple and one, is furthermore experienced -psychically as a surprise and seizure from without, rather than as a -self-determination from within. And this psychic peculiarity is taken -by her as but the occasion and emotional, quasi-sensible picturing of -the ever-present and ever-growing experience and conviction that all -right human action, the very self-donation of the creature, is the -Creator’s best gift, and that the very act of her own mind and heart, -in all its complete inalienableness and spontaneity, is yet, in the -last resort, but an illumination and stimulation coming from beyond the -reaches of her own mind and will, from the mind and will of God. And -thus Ethics are englobed by Religion, Having by Doing, and Doing by -Being: yet not so that, in her fullest life, any of the higher things -suppress the lower, but so that each stimulates the very things that it -transcends. - - -6. _Catherine’s literary obligations. Her corrections of the -Neo-Platonist positions._ - -We shall trace further on how largely and spontaneously she has, from -out of the many different possible types and forms of spirituality, -chosen out, assimilated and further explicated certain Platonic and -especially certain Neo-Platonic conceptions. We shall be unable to -suggest any likely intermediary, or to assume with certainty a direct -derivation, for these conceptions from Plato, or indeed from Plotinus -or Proclus; and shall nevertheless be obliged to postulate some now -untraceable communication, on some most important points, between Plato -and herself. Besides this, she derives one Platonic conception from the -Book of Wisdom and a corresponding passage in St. Paul; and a certain -general Platonic tone and imagery from the Joannine Gospel and First -Epistle. Her Neo-Platonism, on the contrary, she derives, massively -and all but pure, through two of the Pseudo-Dionysian books and her -dearly loved Franciscan Mystic Poet, Jacopone da Todi. It is indeed -to the Pauline, Joannine, Dionysian, and Jacopone writings that she -owes, with the exception of a certain group of Platonic conceptions, -practically all that she did not directly derive from her own psychical -and spiritual experiences. - -Now her assimilation of this particular strain of doctrine has -remained but partial and theoretical with respect to those parts of -Dionysian Neo-Platonism which were not borne out by the facts of her -own Christian experience; but it has extended even to her emotional -attitude and practice, in cases where the doctrine was borne out by -these facts. - -Thus we shall find that she often speaks theoretically of Evil as -simply negative, as the varyingly great absence of Good. Yet, in -practice and in her autobiographical picturings, she fights her bad -self, to the very last, as a truly positive force. The force of God -is everywhere conceived as indefinitely greater, as, indeed, alone -infinite; yet the force of Evil is practically experienced and pictured -as real and positive also, in its kind and degree. - -Again, she often speaks as though her spiritual life had, at some one -particular moment, simply arrived at its final culmination, and had -attained God and perfection with complete finality,--such, at least, as -this particular soul of hers can achieve. Yet, very shortly after, we -find her unmistakably in renewed movement and conflict, and observe her -mind to be now fully aware of that past “perfection” having been but -imperfect, because that act or state is now seen from a height higher -than that former level: hence that “perfection” was perfect, at most, -in relation to its helps and opportunities in and for its own special -moment. - -Again, it is at times as though she conceived her body to be a sheer -clog and prison-house to the soul, and as though the soul’s weakness -and sinfulness were essentially due to its union with the flesh. But -here especially her later commentators have amplified and systematized -her teaching almost beyond recognition; the authentic sayings of this -kind, though too strong to be pressed, are few, and belong exclusively -to the last stages of her illness; and, above all, these declarations -are checked and entirely eclipsed by her normal and constant view as -to the specific nature of Moral Evil. For this Evil consists, for her, -essentially in the self-idolatry, the claimful self-centredness of -the natural man, ever tending, in a thousand mostly roundabout ways, -to make means and ends, centre and circumference, Sun and Planet -change places, and to put some more or less subtle wilfulness and -pleasure-seeking in the place of Duty, Happiness, and God. Few, even -amongst the Saints, can have realized and exemplified more profoundly -the indelible difference between pleasure and happiness, between -the false and the true self; and few have more keenly, patiently -felt and taught that the soul’s true life is, even eventually, not a -keeping or a getting what the lower instincts crave: but that, on the -contrary, a whole world of pleasures which, however base and short -and misery-productive, can be intensely and irreplaceably pleasurable -while they last, has successively to be sacrificed, for good and all; -and that what is retained has gradually to proceed from other motives, -to be grouped around other centres, and be ever only a part and a -servant, and never a master or the whole. The gulf between every kind -of Auto-centricism and the Theo-centric life, between mere Eudaemonism -and Religion, could not be found anywhere more constant or profound. - -Again, it is at times as though the absence or suppression of even -the noblest of human fellow-feelings and of particular parental and -friendly, attachments, and not their purification and deepening, -multiplication and harmonization, were the end and aim of perfection. -But little or nothing of this belongs, I think, to any deliberate and -enduring theory of hers, still less to her full and normal practice; -and the impression of such inhumanity is, in so far as it is derived -from authentic documents, entirely caused by and restricted to her -early convert reaction, and her late over-strained or worn-out -psycho-physical condition. - -Again, it is sometimes as though she believed indeed in an -energizing and progress of the soul, yet held this progress to be, -after conversion, an absolutely unbroken, equable, necessary and -automatic increase in perfection; and that such a soul’s last state -is, necessarily and in all respects, better than were its previous -stages.--The Redactors of her life most undoubtedly think this. -Because, for instance, she was Matron from 1490 to 1496, and could no -more fill the post from 1496 to 1510:--therefore “not to give part of -her activity to such external work was more perfect than to give it,” -is the argument that underlies their scheme for these two periods.--Yet -I can find nothing in her teaching to show that she held any such -view. She was, indeed, ever too much absorbed, by the experiences and -duties of her successive moments, to find even the leisure of mind -requisite for the manufacture of so doctrinaire a system. And indeed -there is nothing in the conception of sanctity, or in that of a gradual -and general increase in generosity and purity of the saintly soul’s -dispositions and intentions, which requires us to hold that such a -soul’s last state and efficiency is, in every respect, better than the -first. For the range and volume of the efficiency, wisdom, balance, -appropriateness of even our goodness is not determined by our will and -the graces given to our will alone. Physical and psychical health and -strength, illness and weakness; helps and hindrances from friends and -foes; the changing influences and limitations of growing age; and the -ever-shifting combinations of all these and of similar things,--things -and combinations which are all but indirectly attainable by our wills -in any way: all this is ever as truly at work upon us as our wills and -God’s spiritual graces are in operation directly within ourselves. And -if Catherine’s richness, breadth and balance of soul are, considering -her special and successive health and circumstances, remarkable up -to the very end, and probably actually grew to some extent with the -growing obstacles, yet those qualities hardly grew or could grow _pari -passu_ with these obstacles. The manifold efficiency and the unity in -multiplicity were distinctly greater before 1496 than after. And thus -the Saints too join their lowlier brethren in paying the pathetic debt -of our common mortality. They too can be called upon to survive the -culmination of their many-sided power, and to retain perpetual youth -only as regards their intention and the central ideas and the spiritual -substance of their soul. - -Once more she seems as though, to make up for this apparent suppression -of the element of time, unduly to press the category of space, at least -in her contemplations. We shall see how often in these contemplations -God Himself, and the soul, or at least its various states, appear as -places; so that the whole spiritual life and world come thus to look -rather like an atomic co-ordination, a projection on to space and a -static mechanism, than an interpenetrative subordination, a production -in time or at least in duration, and a dynamic organism.--Yet it will -be found that all this imagery is consciously, though no doubt quite -naturally, used only _as_ imagery, and that it is thus used both -because it was spontaneously presented to her mind by her psychic -peculiarities and because it readily adapted itself as a vehicle to -express one of the deepest experiences and convictions of her spirit. - -For her psychic peculiarities involved, on the one hand, a curiously -rapid and complete change and difference of states of consciousness, -and, on the other hand, a remarkable absence (or at least dimness) of -consciousness as to this transition itself, which, however abrupt, -was of course as truly a part of her inner life as were the several -completed states and outlooks. Now the apparently static element and -harmony in any one of these states could, of course, be at all clearly -presented in no other form than that of a spacial image; whereas the -changing element in all these states seems to have accumulated chiefly -in the subconscious region, to have at last suddenly burst into the -conscious sphere, and to have there effected the change too rapidly to -permit of, or at least to require, the presentation of this element -as such, a presentation which could only have taken the form of a -consciousness of time or of duration. From all this it follows that, to -her immediate psychic consciousness, each of her successive experiences -presented itself as ever one spacial picture, as one “place.” - -And the imagery, thus quasi-automatically presented to her, could -not fail to be gladly used and emphasized by her to express the -deepest experiences of her spiritual life. For it was the element of -simultaneity, of organic interpenetration, of the God-like _Totum -Simul_, which chiefly impressed her in these deepest moments. And hence -the soul is conceived by her as, in its essence, eternal rather than an -as immortal--as, in its highest reaches and moments, outside of time -and not as simply wholly within it; and as, on such occasions, vividly -though indirectly conscious of the fact. Heaven itself is thought -of not as eventually succeeding, with its own endless succession, -to the finite succession of these our fleeting earthly days; but as -already forming the usually obscure, yet ever immensely operative, -background, groundwork, measure and centre of our being, now and here -as truly as there and then. And hence again, Heaven, Purgatory, and -Hell are for her three distinct states of the soul, already effected -in their essence here below, and experienced as what they are, in part -and occasionally here, and fully and continuously hereafter. Thus -the fundamental cleavage in the soul’s life is not between things -successive,--between the Now and the Then, and at the point of death; -but between things simultaneous, between the This and the That, and at -the point of sin and of self-seeking. - -And finally, she seems at times to speak Greek-wise, as though -the soul’s life consisted essentially, or even exclusively, in an -intellection, a static contemplation. Yet we have already seen how -robust and constant is her ethical dualism, how essentially, here -below at least, happiness consists for her in a right affection and -attachment, in the continuous detaching of the true self from the false -self, and the attaching of the true self unto God. And we should note -how that intellection itself is conceived as ever accompanied by a -keen sense of its inferiority to the Reality apprehended, and as both -the result and the condition and the means of love and of an increase -of love. And again we should note that this sense of inferiority -does not succeed the intellection, as the result of any reasoning on -the disparity between the finite and Infinite, but accompanies that -intellection itself, and corresponds to the surplusage of her feelings -over her mental seeings, and of her experience over her knowledge. And -we should add the fact that, in the most emphatic of her sayings, she -makes the essence of Heaven to consist in the union of the finite with -the Infinite Will; and that this doctrine alone would seem readily to -harmonize with her favourite teaching as to Heaven beginning here below. - - -7. _Her attitude towards Historical and Institutional Religion._ - -If the Platonic and Neo-Platonic elements appear, at first sight, -as massive and even excessive constituents of Catherine’s doctrine, -Historical and Institutional Christianity seems, on a cursory survey, -to contribute strangely little even to her practice. Not one of her -ordinary contemplations is directly occupied with any scene from Our -Lord’s life. The picture of the “Pietà,” so impressive to her in her -nursery-days; the great Conversion-Vision of the Bleeding Christ; and -the slighter cases of the signing of herself with the sign of the Cross -and of her lying with outstretched arms, which occurred during the -last stage of her illness, are the sole indications of any immediate -occupation with the Passion; whilst the two cases of the Triptych -“Maestà” and the painting representative of Our Lord at the well, -(cases which indicate an attraction to the Infancy and to at least one -incident of the Public Life,) complete the list of all direct attention -to any incidents of Our Lord’s earthly existence. As to occupation with -or invocation of the Saints, inclusive of the Blessed Virgin, I can -find but one instance, the invocation of St. Benedict, two days before -her Conversion. We have seen, as to Sacramental Confession, how little -there can have been of it, throughout the long middle period of her -Convert Life; and how she was, during this time, simply without any -priestly guidance. And she never was a Tertiary, nor did she belong to -any Confraternity, nor did she attempt to gain Indulgences, nor did she -practise popular devotions, such as the Rosary or Scapular. - -Nor could these facts be quite fairly met, except to a certain -relatively small extent with regard to Confession, by insistence upon -the changing character of the Church’s discipline, if we thus mean -to assert that she did not, in these matters, act exceptionally with -regard to the practice and theory of fervent souls of her own time. -For, on all the points mentioned, the ordinary fervent practice was -already, and had been for centuries, different; and, in the matter of -priestly guidance, her chroniclers have not failed to transmit to us -the wonders and murmurs of more than one contemporary. - -Yet here again the prima facie impression is but very incompletely -borne out by a closer study. - -For first, none of these historical and institutional elements are ever -formally excluded, or attacked, or slighted. Indeed, in the matter of -Indulgences, we have seen how she arranged or allowed that monies of -her own should be spent in procuring certain facilities for gaining -them by others. - -And next, special practices, more than equivalent in their irksomeness, -are throughout made to take the place of ordinary practices, in so -far and for so long as these latter are abstained from. An unusually -severe ascetical penitential time, and then the rarest watchfulness and -continuous self-renouncement, take thus, for a considerable period, the -place of the sacramental forms of Penance. - -And thirdly, if there is an unusual rarity in Confession there is an -almost as rare frequency of Communion; and authentic anecdotes show us -how she scandalized some good souls as truly-by this frequency as by -that rarity. Indeed throughout her convert life, an ardent devotion -to the Holy Eucharist forms the very centre of her daily life; during -probably thirty-five years she only quite exceptionally misses daily -Communion; and she has the deepest attraction to the Mass, and a holy -envy of priests for their close relation to the Blessed Sacrament. -And though there are no contemplations of hers directly occupied with -the Holy Eucharist, yet we shall find this experience and doctrine -to have profoundly shaped and coloured teachings and apprehensions -which, at first sight, are quite disconnected with It. We can already -see how all-inclusive a symbol and stimulation of her other special -attractions and conceptions this central devotion could not fail to -be. She found here the Infinite first condescending to the finite; so -that the finite may then rise towards the Infinite; the soul’s life, -a hunger and a satisfaction of that hunger, through the taste of -feeling rather than through the sight of reason; God giving Himself -through such apparently slight vehicles, in such short moments, and -under such bewilderingly humble veils; and our poor _a priori_ notions -and _a posteriori_ analyses thus proved inadequate to the living soul -and the living God.--Extreme Unction also was highly esteemed: she -spontaneously demanded it some four times and finally received it with -great fervour. Church hymns too--witness the “Veni, Creator,” chanted -on her death-bed--and liturgical lights are spontaneously used. - -And lastly, her practice in the matter of Confession and of priestly -advice became, during her last thirteen years identical in frequency -with that of her devout contemporaries; and thus her life ended with -the practice, on all the chief points, of the average, ordinary -devotional acts and habits of her time. And this final practice of the -ordinary means, together with her life-long dislike of singularity and -of notice; her humble misgivings in the midst of her most peaceful -originalities, and the utter absence of any tendency to think her way, -inasmuch as it was at all singular, the only way or even the best -way, except just now and here for her own self alone; her complete -freedom from the spirit of comparing self with others, of dividing -off the sheep from the goats, or of having some short, sure, and -universal means or test for holiness: all this shows us plainly how -Catholic and unsectarian, how truly free, not only from slavish fear -and pusillanimous conformity, but also from all enthralment to merely -subjective fancies, from all solipsism or conceit was her strong soul. - - -8. _Three stages of the Spiritual Life; Catherine represents the third._ - -It has been well said that there are three stages of the spiritual -life, and three corresponding classes of souls. - -There are the souls that are characterized, even to the end of -their earthly lives, by that, more or less complete, naturalistic -Individualism, with which we all in various degrees begin. Catherine’s -own time and country were full of such thoroughly Individualistic, -unmoral or even anti-moral men, who, however gifted and cultivated as -artists, scholars, philosophers, and statesmen, must yet be counted as -essentially childish and as clever animals rather than as spiritual -men. And she herself had, during the five years which had preceded her -conversion, tended, on the surface of her being, towards something of -this kind. - -Next come the souls that have recognized and have accepted Duty and -Obligation, that are now striving to serve God as God, and that are -attempting, with a preponderant sincerity, to live the common and -universal life of the Spirit. These of necessity tend to suspect, or -even to suppress and sacrifice, whatever appears to be peculiar to -themselves, as so much individualistic subjectivity and insidious high -treason to the objective law of Him who made their souls, and who now -bids them save those souls at any cost. The large majority of the souls -that were striving to serve God in Catherine’s times belonged, as souls -belong in these our days, and will necessarily and rightly belong up to -the end, to this second, universalistic, uniformative type and class. -And Catherine herself evidently belonged prominently to this type and -class, during her first four convert years. - -And there are, finally, an ever relatively small number of souls that -are called, and a still smaller number that attain, to a state in which -the Universality, Obligation, Uniformity, and Objectivity, of the -second stage and class, take the form of a Spiritual Individuality, -Liberty, Variety, and Subjectivity: Personality in the fullest sense -of the term has now appeared. And this fullest Spiritual Personality -is the profoundest opposite and foe of its naturalistic counterfeit, -of those spontaneous animal liberalisms which reigned, all but -unrecognized as such because all but uncontrasted by the true ideal and -test of life, prior to that prostration before absolute obligation, -that poignant sense of weakness and impurity, and that gain of strength -and purity from beyond its furthest reaches, experienced by the soul at -its conversion. - -Yet that merely subjective, liberalistic Individualism of the first -stage can only be kept out, even at the third stage, by retaining -within the soul all the essential characteristics of the second -stage,--by a continuous passing and re-passing under the Caudine Forks -of the willed defeat of wayward, self-pleasing wilfulness, and of the -deliberate acceptance of an objective system of ideas and experiences -as interiorly binding upon the self. For if the second stage excludes -the first, the third stage does not exclude the second. Yet now all -this, in these rare souls, leads up to and produces a living reality -bafflingly simple in its paradoxical, mysterious richness. For now -the universality, obligation, and objectivity of the Law become and -appear greater, not less, because incarnated in an eminently unique and -unreproduceable, in a fully personal form. And at this stage only do we -find a full persuasiveness. - -Catherine attained unmistakably, after her four years of special -penitence, to this rare third stage. For not only is she essentially -as individual and unique as if she were not universal and uniform; and -essentially as universal and uniform as if she were not individual: but -she is indefinitely more truly original and subjective, because of her -voluntary boundness and objectivity. Indeed she is solidly and really -free and personal, because the continuous renunciation and expulsion -of all naturalistic individuality remains, to the very end, one of the -essential functions of her soul. - -From all this it is clear how easy it would be to misread the lesson -of her manifold life, and to turn such examples as hers from a help -into a hindrance. For her melancholy temperament, her peculiar psychic -health, her final external inefficiency: all this is too striking -not to tempt the admiration, perhaps even, the hopeless and ruinous -imitation, of such crude and inexperienced souls as know not how to -distinguish between the merely given materials and untransferable -determinisms of each separate soul’s psychical and temperamental native -outfit, and the free, grace-inspired and grace-aided use made by each -soul of these its, more or less unique, occasions and materials. -Those materials were, of themselves, of no moral worth, and lent -themselves only in part with any ease to the upbuilding and realization -of her spirit’s ideal. And it is only this, her wise and heroic use -of her materials,--though this also, of course, is not directly -transferable,--that represents the spiritually valuable constituent of -the life. - -Similarly with the form, and the psychic occasions or accompaniments -of her very prayer and spiritual absorptions, and with some of the -constituents of her doctrine, if taken as speculative and analytic and -final, rather than as psychological and descriptive and preliminary. -These things again could easily be misused. For the former are largely -quite special and, in themselves, morally indifferent peculiarities, -transformed and utilized by quite special graces and life-long -spiritual heroisms. And the latter, we shall find, were never intended -to be systematic, complete or ultimate; and indeed they owe their -true force and value to their being the occasional, spontaneous and -immediate expressions and adumbrations of an experience indefinitely -richer and more ultimate than themselves. - -And finally, it would of course be absurd to take the limitations of -her activity and interests, even if we were to restrict ourselves to -those common to all the stages of her life, as necessarily admirable, -or as universally inevitable. For there is, in the very nature of -things, no equation between her one soul, however rich and stimulating, -or even all the souls of her class and school, or of her age or -country, on the one hand, and the totality of religious experience, -and its means and incorporations, on the other hand, even if, by -totality, we but mean that part of it already achieved and accepted by -grace-impelled mankind. - - -9. _The lessons of Catherine’s life._ - -And yet Catherine’s life and teaching will be found full of suggestion -and stimulation, if they are taken in their interpenetration, and if -due regard is paid to their fragmentary registration, to the necessary -distinction between what, amongst all these facts, was mere means, -occasion, and temporal setting, and what amongst them was aim and -end, utilization and abiding import, and to the fact that all this -experience is but one out of the indefinitely many applications, -extensions, and mutually corrective and supplementary exemplifications -of the spirit and life of Christ, as it lives itself out throughout -the temperaments, races and ages of mankind. Above all it can teach -us, I think, with a rare completeness, wherein lies the secret of -a persuasive holiness. For Catherine lets us see, with unusual -clearness, how this winningness lies in the pathetically dramatic -spectacle and appeal presented by a life engaged in an ever-increasing -ethical and spiritual energizing,--whether in a slow shifting and -pushing of its actual centre, down and in from the circumference of -the soul to its true centre, and from this true centre enlarging -and reorganizing its whole ever-expanding being again and again; or -in an apparently sudden finding itself placed, and loyally placing -itself, in this true centre, and then from there prosecuting and -maintaining the organization and transformation of its varyingly -peripheral life, a life treated at one time as central and complete. -And this persuasiveness can here be discovered to be greater or -less in proportion to the thoroughness and continuousness of this -centralization and purification; to the degree in which this issues in -a new, spontaneously acting ethico-spiritual personality; and to the -closeness and costingness of the connection between those means and -this result. Such a soul will be persuasive because of its ever seeking -and finding a purifying intermediacy, a river of death, to all its -merely naturalistic self-seeking. - -And it is this nobly ascetic requirement and search and end which no -doubt explain what, at first sight, is strange, both in its presence -and in its attractiveness, in her own case and more or less in that of -all the mature and complete Saints,--I mean, the large predominance of -an apparently Pantheistic element in her life, the strong emphasis laid -upon an apparent Thing-Conception of God and of the human spirit. - -It was clearly not alone because of the Neo-Platonist element and -influence of the books she chiefly used that she, in true Greek -fashion, finds and allows so large a place for conceptions of -things, for images derived from the natural elements, and for mental -abstractions, in her religious experiences and teachings: God appearing -in them predominantly as Sun, Light, Fire, Air, Ocean; Beauty, Truth, -Love, Goodness. For, after all, other elements could be found in these -very books, and other writings were known to her besides these books: -hence this her preference for just these elements still demands an -explanation. - -Nor was it ultimately because, nervously high-pitched and strained -as she was by nature, she even physically craved and required an -immense expansion for this her excessive natural concentration. She -thus evidently longed first to move through, and to bathe and rest and -spread out her psychic self, in an ample region, in an enduring state -of quasi-unconsciousness, in an (as it were) innocently animal or even -simply vegetative objectivity, indeed in an apparent bare element and -mere Thing, before, thus rested, braced, and as it were now healthily -reconcentrated, she more directly met the Infinite Concentration and -Determination, the Personal Spirit, God. For, after all, hers was so -heroic a spirit, and so self-distrustful, indeed self-suspecting, a -heart, that a mere psychic affinity or requirement would have failed so -permanently and deliberately to captivate her mind. - -Nor, finally, was it ultimately because her domestic sorrows or -inexperiences, or even her very psychic peculiarities and apparent -lack of all even innocent sensuousness, left the images of Bride and -Bridegroom, of Parent and Child, perhaps even of Friend, respectively -painful, empty, or pale to her consciousness. For, even so, she could -and did care, with a beautiful affectiveness of her own, for her -brothers and sister, for Vernazza, her “spiritual son,” and for many a -humble toiler or domestic. And indeed her whole tendency is ultimately -to find God’s special home, the only one of His dwelling-places which -we men really know, in the human heart of hearts. - -The ultimate and determining reason was no doubt her deep spiritual -experience and conviction (as vivid as ever was the psychic tendency -which gave it form and additional emotional edge and momentum) that -she must continuously first quench and drown her feverish immediacy, -her clamorous, claimful false self, and must lose herself, as a merely -natural Individual, in the river and ocean of the Thing, of Law, of -that apparently ruthless Determinism which fronts life everywhere, -before she could find herself again as a Person, in union with and in -presence of an infinite Spirit and Personality. - -Thus Greek Fate is here retained, but it is transformed through being -transplaced. For Fate has here ceased to be ultimate and above the very -gods, the poor gods who were so predominantly the mere projections of -man’s Individualism: Fate is here intermediate and a way to God--the -great God, the source and ideal of all Personality. And indeed this -Fate is not, ultimately, simply separate from God; it is indeed -omnipresent, but everywhere only as the preliminary and subaltern, -expression, for us men, of the Divine Freedom that lies hidden and -operating behind it. And we men attain to some of this Freedom only by -the inclusion within our spiritual life of that Fate-passage and of our -actual constant passing through it, on and on. - - -10. _Three points where Catherine is comparatively original; and a -fourth point where she is practically unique._ - -In the general tendency and form of her inner life and conviction -Catherine has, of course, substantially nothing but what she shares -with all the Mystics, in proportion as these retain Law, Ethics, and -Personality; and she has much that forms part of the convictions of -all Christians, indeed of all Theists. Yet in the degree and precise -manner of her elaboration and application of those things, and again in -the circumstances of their documentary transmission, Catherine will, I -think, be found in three points comparatively original, and in a fourth -point practically unique. - -First she has, as we have seen, not only a strikingly persistent -attitude of transcendence and detachment with regard to her -psycho-physical state in general (this is indeed an attitude common -to all ethically sound and fruitful Mystics: witness in particular -St. John of the Cross); but she has also a most remarkable faculty -and activity of discrimination between her own healthy and morbid -states. Even this latter power she probably shares, in various degrees, -with all such ethical-minded Mystics as nevertheless suffered from -a partially _maladif_ psycho-physical condition: witness especially -St. Teresa.--Yet contemporary documentary evidence, for not only such -actual variations between healthy and unhealthy states, but also for -the Mystic’s knowledge of and witness to the existence of both and -to the difference between the two, is necessarily rare. I know of no -evidence more vivid and final, although of much that is larger in -amount, than the evidence furnished by Catherine’s _Vita_. - -And next she has both a constant, deep sense that religion never -consists simply in ends but in means as well, and never ceases to use -and practise the latter; and a concomitant keen apprehension of the -difference between means and ends, and ever illustrates this sense -of difference by the striking variety and liberty of the practical -attitude which she is successively moved to take, and actually does -take, towards this or that of the Institutional helps of the Church. -Here again she but exemplifies a principle which underlies the -practice of all the Saints, in proportion to their maturity and full -normality. And indeed our Lord Himself, the Model and the King of -Saints, when asked which was the greatest of the Commandments, did -not answer that He could not and would not tell, since to distinguish -at all between greater and lesser Commandments would be liberalism; -but, on the contrary, fully endorsed and canonized such a distinction -and discrimination, by actually pointing out two Commandments as -the greatest, and by declaring that from them depended all the law -and the prophets. Hence to organize, and more and more to find and -give their right, relative place and influence to all the different -things practised and believed, is as important as is the corresponding -practice and acceptance of all these different things. Yet, here again, -full evidence both for such fidelity and docility and for such variety -and liberty of soul, with regard to the means of religion, is rare: -the records of the modern Saints mostly give us but the docility; -those of the Fathers of the desert generally give us but the liberty: -Catherine’s _Vita_ gives us both. - -And thirdly, she is, amongst formally canonized Saints, a rare example -of a contemplative and mystic who, from first to last, leads at the -same time the common life of marriage and of widowhood in the world. -Here again any misapprehension of the importance or significance of -this fact would readily lead to folly. For it is undeniable that it has -been the monastic life which, in however great variations of degree, -form and lasting success, has furnished Christendom at large with an -impersonation of self-renunciation sufficiently isolated, massive -and continuous, to be deeply impressive upon the sluggish spiritual -apprehension of the average man. And indeed self-renunciation is so -universally necessary and so universally difficult; upon its presence -and activity religion, and all and every kind of rational human life -depend so largely; without its tonic presence they are so necessarily -but a dilettantism, a delusion or an hypocrisy: that to body it forth -for all men must ever remain an honour and a duty specially incumbent -upon some kind of Monasticism. For it is but right, and indeed alone -respectful, to the Spirit of God, so manifold and mysterious in its -gifts and inspirations, that every degree and kind of healthy and -heroic self-renunciation should be practised and embodied; and that -special honour should attach to its most massive manifestations. - -Yet our general knowledge of poor, rarely balanced human nature -and our detailed historical experience respectively anticipate and -demonstrate how easy it is, on this point also, to confound the means -with the end, and a part with the whole. And by such confusion either -self-renunciation, that very salt of all truly human existence, gets -actually stapled up in one corner of the wide world and of multiform -life; or this apparent stapling becomes but a pedantic pretence and -would-be monopoly, the salt meanwhile losing all its savour. And these -two abuses and errors easily coalesce and reinforce each other. The -fact is that the total work and duty of collective humanity,--the -production of a maximum of true recollection, rest and detachment, -effected in and through a maximum of right dispersion, action, and -attachment; above all a maximum of ethico-spiritual transformation of -the world and, in and through such work, of each single worker,--is -too high for any single soul, or even class or vocation, to hope to -exhaust. Only by all and each joining hands and supplementing each -other can all these numberless degrees and kinds of call and goodness, -together, slowly, throughout the ages, get nearer and nearer to that -inexhaustible ideal which lies so deep and ineradicable within the -heart of each and all. And thus will the two fundamental movements of -the soul, as it were its expiration and its inspiration, the going -out to gather and the coming home to garner, be kept up, in various -degrees, by every human soul, and each soul and vocation will as keenly -feel the need of supplementation, as it will apprehend the beauty and -importance of the special contribution it is called to make to the -whole, a whole, here as everywhere, greater than any of its parts, -although requiring them each and all.--Now Catherine suggests and -illustrates such a doctrine with rare impressiveness: for the pure and -efficient love of God and man, the one end and measure for us all, ever -consciously dominates all and every means within her admirably balanced -and unified mind; and the renunciative element is, under mostly quite -ordinary exterior forms, as complete and constant as it could be found -anywhere. - -And lastly, her doctrine contains one conviction, or group of -convictions, as original as, in such matters, one can expect to find. -We get here the soul’s voluntary plunge into Purgatory, its seeking -and finding relief, from the now painful pleasure of sin, in the now -joy-producing pain of purification; and the soul’s discovery and -acquisition, if and when in predominantly good dispositions, of its -ever-fuller peace and bliss, because its ever-increasing harmonization, -in freely willing the suffering intrinsically consequent upon its -own past evil pleasures and the resulting present imperfections of -its will. And this cycle of facts and laws here springs from, and -begins with, the soul’s life Here and Now, and is held to extend (on -the ever-present assumption of the substantial persistence of the -spirit’s fundamental spiritual properties and laws) to the soul’s life -Then and There. Thus these two lives differ with her rather in extent -and intensity than in kind. I think that, taken just thus, and with -this degree of explicitness, this group of convictions is practically -unique. We shall study and illustrate this particular cycle of doctrine -in full detail. But it is indeed time now to move on to a more -systematic and general account of her teaching. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -CATHERINE’S DOCTRINE - - -The attentive reader will no doubt have perceived how great have been -the difficulties at every step taken, in the previous chapters, towards -a critically clear and solid account of Catherine’s life. He will, -then, be quite prepared again to find difficulties, though largely of -another order, in the task that now lies before us,--the attempt at a -clear and authentic reproduction of her teaching. - - -1. _Four difficulties in the utilization of the sources._ - -The sources are, it is true, at first sight, fairly -abundant,--altogether about one hundred of the two hundred and eighty -pages of the _Vita ed Opere_. But four peculiarities render their -utilization a matter of much labour and caution. - -For one thing, they certainly include no piece written by herself, -and probably none written down before 1497. Catherine’s memory can no -doubt be trusted, and with it much of the oldest version of those great -turning-points of her inner life which occurred long before that date, -and which she thus, later on, communicated to her two closest friends. -Yet hers was a mind so constantly absorbed in present experiences and -in self-renewal as to be all but incapable of dwelling, in any detail, -upon her past experiences or judgments. - -And next, within and for this her “doctrinal,” her “widowed” and -“suffering” period, we are perplexed by the total absence of logical -or indeed of any other order in the presentation of these discourses -and contemplations. We have either to do without any order at all, or -to construct one for ourselves,--which latter course of itself already -means a reconstruction of the book. - -But far more delicate is the task presented by the third -peculiarity,--the fact, demonstrated both by the internal evidence -and analysis and by the external evidence of the MSS., of the -bewildering variety of forms and connections in which one and the same -doctrine, sometimes an obviously unique saying, will appear. Six, -ten, even twelve or more variants are the rule, not the exception. -And I am specially thinking, under this heading, of _contemporary -variations_--that is, variations of form that can reasonably be -attributed either to her own initiative at work under differences -of mood and of starting-point; or to the variety of the minds who -apprehended and registered this teaching at the time of its delivery; -or to both influences simultaneously. In the first case we get, say, -her doctrine as to man’s weakness and sinfulness, in two moments of -depression and consolation respectively, registered by one and the same -disciple,--say, by Vernazza or by Marabotto. In the second case we get -some such two sayings as rendered the one by Vernazza and the other by -Marabotto severally. And in the third case we get both the depressed -and the joyful original sayings, as they have passed through the minds -of both Vernazza and Marabotto. - -And lastly, we get another class, _redactional variations_; and these -it is often as difficult as it is always necessary to detect. I mean -the parallel passages, evolved in course of time by her attendants or -constructed by successive redactors, more or less on the model of, but -also with more or less of departure from, her own authentic sayings: -blurred, partly inaccurate echoes, as it were, of her own living voice. -These will generally have grown up but semi-consciously, or at least -have arisen from simple motives of her glorification or of literary -filling-in or rounding-off. For we must not forget the forty years -which passed between her death and the _Vita_. - -I am thinking here too of the _theological limitations and -corrections_, introduced into the older text in the form of definite -counter-statements, which we shall find to be especially visible in -the _Trattato_; and of the, doubtless preponderatingly unconscious, -modifications of an analogous kind which determined the composition -of the _Dialogo_, and are traceable throughout that whole long work. -For here again we have to remember how, between her living teachings, -so ardent and familiar, so entirely from within and unoccupied with -the world without, which reached up to 1510, and even the earliest -MS. redaction of the contemporary jotting down of those sayings -which we still possess,--that of 1547,--runs the great upheaval of -the Protestant Reformation, beginning with Luther’s Theses of 1517. -Catherine’s own fellow God-parent to Vernazza’s eldest daughter, the -Doctor of Laws Tommaso Moro, had meanwhile become a Calvinist (1537), -and then had returned to the Catholic Obedience in 1539, first under -this his God-daughter’s influence. No wonder that what, under the -magic suasion of her living personality, in times as yet free from -the controversial and polemical tone and temper, and through and for -her friends already won to and comprehensive of her teachings, had -been certainly registered, and perhaps for a while transmitted, in -its own pristine, winningly daring and unguarded, form, would, with -her old friends dead and a new generation grown up and engrossed in -attack and defence of various points of the Catholic position, be felt -to require tempering and safeguarding, rewriting and controversial -utilization. Hence we get three successive steps. The theological -counter-statements in the _Trattato_, probably introduced between -1524 and 1530. The controversial point and utilization attempted in -the very title of the _Vita_ which promises, “una utile e cattolica -dimostrazione e declarazione del Purgatorio,” and in the Preface, which -declares the book to contain things “specially necessary in these our -turbulent times,” touches which go back probably to 1536, perhaps even -to 1524-1530. And the composition of the entire _Dialogo_, hardly begun -before 1546.[221] - -It is interesting to note how neither for the approbation of the first -edition in 1551 (by the Dominican Fra Geronimo of Genoa), nor during -the examination by the Congregation of Rites and the final approbation -by Pope Innocent XI, 1677-1683, was any additional correction required -or (as far as I know) even suggested. The latter point is particularly -striking; for we have thus the very Pope who, in 1687, condemned -Molinos’ teaching, solemnly approving Catherine’s doctrine four years -before, after a seven years’ examination. - - -2. _Catholic principles concerning the teaching of Canonized Saints._ - -Now it is a well-known principle of Catholic theology, propounded -with classic clearness and finality by Pope Benedict XIV, in his -standard work _On the Beatification and Canonization of the Servants -of God_, that such an approbation of their sayings or writings binds -neither the Church nor her individual members to more than the two -points, which are alone necessary with respect to the possibility -and advisability of the future Beatification and Canonization of the -author of the sayings or writings in question. The Church and her -individual members are thus bound only to hold the perfect orthodoxy -and Catholic piety of such a saintly writer’s intentions, and again the -(at least interpretative) orthodoxy of these his writings, and their -spiritual usefulness for some class or classes of souls. But every -kind and degree of respectful but deliberate criticism and of dissent -is allowed, if only based upon solid reasons and combined with a full -acceptance of those two points. - -And indeed it is plain that heroism in action and suffering is one -thing, and philosophical genius, training and balance is another; -and even, again, that deep and delicate experiences on the one hand, -and the power of their at all adequate analysis and psychological -description, are two things and not one. Still, it is also evident -that in proportion as a Saint’s doctrine is, professedly or at all -events actually, based upon or occasioned by his own experience will -it rightly demand a double measure of respectful study. For, in such -a case, we can be sure not only of the saintly intentions of the -teacher, but also of his doctrines being an attempt, however partially -successful, at expressing certain first-hand, unusually deep and vivid -experiences of the religious life, experiences which, taken in their -substance and totality, constitute the very essence of his sanctity. - -Now this is manifestly the case with Catherine. And hence she furnishes -us with those very conditions of fruitful discussion, so difficult -to get in religious matters. On the one hand, her undoubted sanctity -and the personal experimental basis of her doctrine gain for her our -willingness, indeed determination, first of all patiently to study and -assimilate and sympathetically to reconstruct her special spiritual -world from her own inner starting- and growing-point, and all this, -at this first stage, without any question as to the completeness or -final truth and value of the intellectual analyses and syntheses of -these experiences elaborated by herself. And, on the other hand, we -find ourselves driven, at our second stage, to examine the literary -sources and philosophical and theological implications of this her -teaching--if pressed; and to make various respectful, but firm and -free distinctions and reservations, with regard to these sources -and affinities. For here, in these her analyses and syntheses, a -special quality of her own temperament is ever at work, and causes -her to express, as best she can, a concentration of a whole host of -the strongest feelings concerning just the one point of that one -moment’s experience, with a momentary complete exclusion of all the -rest. Here, again, her dependence, for her categories of thought and -general language, imagery and scheme of doctrine, upon Fra Jacopone da -Todi and upon the Pseudo-Dionysian writings is readily traceable,--the -latter, compositions which we have only now succeeded in tracing, with -final completeness and precision, to their predominantly Neo-Platonist -source. And here we cannot but carefully consider the impressive series -of Church pronouncements which have occurred since Catherine spoke and -her devotees wrote. All these matters shall be carefully studied in the -second volume. - - -3. _The fortunate circumstances of Catherine’s teaching._ - -It was a rare combination of numerous special circumstances,--several -of them unique,--which rendered possible the retention and indeed -solemn approbation of the difficult and daring doctrine and language -not rarely to be met with in the _Vita_ (in contradistinction to the -so-called _Opere_). - -For one thing, the originator, the subject-matter and form, above -all the school of her doctrine, all combined to secure it the -largest possible amount of liberty and sympathetic interpretation. -The originator, the soul from whom the doctrine had proceeded, had -not herself written down one word of it; but she had spoken it all, -warm from the very heart which loved and lived it: the cold and -chilling process of deliberate composition had but little part in -the whole matter, and that part was not hers. The subject-matter was -not primarily dogmatic, and not at all political or legal; it dealt -not with theological systems or visible institutions, but with the -experiences of single souls: and at all times a great latitude has been -allowed in such subject-matter, when proceeding, as here, from some -saintly soul as the direct expression of its own experience. The form -was not systematic, and aimed at no completeness; all was incidentally -addressed to a few devoted disciples, in short monologues or homely -conversations. The title _Trattato_, given later on to the collection -of her detached thoughts on Purgatory, is thoroughly misleading; her -whole spirit and form were precisely not that of the treatise. And -the school to which she so obviously belonged was probably her chief -protection. Indeed, the doctrinally difficult passages are, in a true -sense, the least personal of her sayings: we shall find all their -doctrinal presuppositions,--as to the immobility, indefectibility, -deification of the soul; the possession by the soul of God without -means or measure; and the like,--to go back to the writings which, -purporting to be by the Areopagite Dionysius, the Convert of St. Paul, -but composed in reality between A.D. 490-520, so profoundly influenced -all mystical thinking and expression for one thousand years and more of -the Church’s life. - -And again, the period during which the corpus of Catherine’s doctrine -was in process of formation was specially favourable to such large -toleration. For if she died in 1510, ten years before the outbreak of -the Protestant Reformation, with its inevitable reaction, her chief -chronicler, the saintly philanthropist Vernazza, did not die, a true -martyr to that boundless love of souls which he had derived from -his great-souled friend, till 1524; and her Confessor Marabotto did -not depart till 1528. Thus her doctrine would remain substantially -untouched and treasured up till some twenty years after her death, and -thirteen years after the great upheaval. - -We have already noted that (somewhere about 1528, and on to 1551) -her teaching _did_ meet with some opposition. It will be interesting -to study (in the Appendix) how the objection arose and was met. Here -it must suffice to point out that, whereas Catherine’s Purgatorial -doctrine is free from any final difficulty on the score of orthodoxy, -it is just that doctrine which was hedged in and glossed before all -the rest; and that whereas other parts of her teaching, in the form -given in the _Vita_, are full of such difficulty, they remain strangely -unmodified to this very day. It will appear that the _Dialogo_ was in -part composed to perform an office towards those doctrinal chapters of -the _Vita_, similar to that performed by the glosses in and towards the -text of the _Trattato_. Hence the glosses of the _Trattato_ will have, -in the following collection of sayings, to be removed from my text, and -the statements of the _Dialogo_ will have to be ignored in my text. -These glosses or re-statements shall be considered later on, whenever -these additions or substitutions are of sufficient interest. - - -4. _The theological order of presentation adopted._ - -Then again, it is far from easy to settle upon the right order and -method of presentation. The more closely we study the chapters in -question the more do we find that the strange discomfort and disgust, -engendered by any lengthy reading of them, proceeds from the curiously -infelicitous manner of their composition. These chapters, in so much as -they supply genuine materials, consist of a large number of detached, -usually short sayings, of every kind of tone and mood, occasion and -mental and emotional context and connotation, and yet all concerning -but a few great central realities and truths. These sayings in -themselves do not at all represent links in a chain of reasoning; they -are numberless variations on some few fundamental experiences of the -soul. Hence they require to be given in loose co-ordination, or in free -grouping around some great central truth; somewhat like what is done, -with such marked felicity, for Our Lord’s own sayings, which also are -occasional and freely various, by the oldest of our Gospels, St. Mark. -“And,” “and again,” can be used to join these recurrent similitudes, -aspirations, emotional reflections; not “because” nor “therefore,” -still less “firstly,” “secondly,” “thirdly,” as the Redactors have -been so fond of doing. Hence the reader in the _Vita_ feels himself -in a constant state of abortive motion, and is ever being promised a -precision which usually ends in vagueness. - -Let us then group these parallel sayings around some few great central -truths or dispositions. But what is the order of these great centres -to be? Here again a difficulty occurs, and this time from the very -nature of the doctrine concerned. For the special characteristic of her -teaching, a teaching so largely derived both from her own intensely -unitive character and (through the Dionysian writings, Proclus and -Plotinus) from Plato himself, is precisely an infinitely close-woven -organization, in which part vibrates in sympathy with part, in which -each point carries with it the whole, and in which each one idea -and feeling passes, as it were, right through, and colours and is -coloured by all the rest. It would be almost as satisfactory to turn -the impassioned discourse of Diotima in the Symposium into a series -of numbered propositions, as here to try and detach any one feeling -or idea from out of the living network of its fellows, in and through -which it is, and gets and gives, its special self. - -The historical order (_i.e._ the order in which, successively, each -doctrine grew up and dominated her thinking) is, alas! as we have seen, -out of the question.--The psychological order (_i.e._ the order in -which the doctrines, such as we have them, would reproduce themselves -within her own mind during that last period of her life, 1496-1510) -would doubtless throw most light upon the special characteristics of -her spirituality, and upon the hidden springs of her doctrine. But it -is far too difficult, and must remain too largely hypothetical, to be -even distantly aimed at here and now: some such attempt will be made -in a later chapter, with the help of the materials first collected and -grouped here in a more conventional way.--The theological order (_i.e._ -the order in which these doctrines would appear if made to find their -places in an ordinary manual of scholastic theology) is the one that -I shall here endeavour to follow as far as possible. For thus I can -start with a scheme so thoroughly familiar as nowhere itself to require -any explanation; and I can thus help to bring out, from the first, the -characteristic peculiarities of the mystical position generally, and of -her own variety of it in particular. - -I will then take here, successively, her teachings as to God in -Himself, and Creation; Sin, Redemption, and Sanctification; and the -Last Things. But I do so quite loosely, for I shall try nowhere to -break off any bridge that she herself has thrown across from one -subject to the other, and shall be satisfied if I can succeed in -grouping her doctrine even approximately within those three divisions, -according to the predominance of this or that point of her teaching. -And, for this, I shall not shrink from a repeated utilization of -one and the same text, when (as happens so often) it looks in many -directions, and becomes fully clear only in juxtaposition with various -parts of her teaching. - - -5. _Literary sources of Catherine’s teaching._ - -We have evidence, as regards literary influences, that Catherine -fed her mind on three books or sets of books: the Bible, the -Pseudo-Dionysian Treatises, and the _Lode_ of Jacopone da Todi. - -The allusions to passages of Scripture are continual, but mostly of -a swiftly passing, combinatory, allegorizing kind. Direct quotations -and attempts at penetrating the objective sense of particular passages -are rare, for most of the direct quotations are clearly due to her -historians, not to herself; yet they exist and put her direct study of -Scripture beyond all doubt. Her favourite Bible books were evidently -Isaiah and the Psalms, and the Pauline and Joannine writings. Some -touches (remarkably few for a mystic) are derived from the Canticle of -Canticles, and many less obvious ones from the Synoptic Gospels; but -there are no certain traces, I think, of any other Old Testament books, -nor, in the Pauline group, of any passage from the Pastoral Epistles. - -The evidence for her direct knowledge and use of Dionysius is, it -is true, but circumstantial. But the following three facts seem, -conjoined as they are in her case, sufficient to prove this knowledge. -(i) We have already seen how her cousin and close spiritual friend, -Suor Tommasa, wrote a devotional treatise on Denys the Areopagite, -presumably before Catherine’s death, since Tommasa was sixty-two years -of age in that year 1510; it would be strange indeed if Catherine did -not, even if but from this quarter, get to know some of the Dionysian -writings, perhaps even whilst they could still only be read in MS. -form. (ii) Marsilio Ficino published in Florence, in 1492, his Latin -translation of the _Mystical Theology_ and of the _Divine Names_, with -a copious commentary; and the book, dedicated to Giovanni de’ Medici, -Archbishop of Florence and future Pope Leo X, found its way at once to -all the larger centres of life, learning and devotion in Italy. Thus -Catherine lived still eighteen years after the publication of this, the -first printed, edition of any part of Denys (original or translation); -even if she did not know these writings before, it seems again very -unlikely that she would not get to know them now. (iii) There are, it -is true, no direct quotations from Denys, nor does his name appear -in the _Vita ed Opere_, except in that account of Suor Tommasa. But -numerous sayings of Catherine bear, as we shall see later on, so -striking a resemblance to passages in those two books of Denys, that -it is difficult to explain them by merely mediate infiltration; and -that those sayings ultimately, as to their literary occasion, go back -to the Areopagite, is incontestable. I quote Denys from the usually -careful translation of the Rev. John Parker: _The Works of Dionysius -the Areopagite_, Pt. I, London, Oxford, 1897, with certain corrections -of my own. - -The proofs for her knowledge and love of Jacopone da Todi’s Italian -“Praises” is, on the other hand, direct and explicit. The _Vita_, -p. 37, makes her say: “Listen to what Fra Jacopone says in one of -his _Lode_, beginning: ‘O amor di povertade,’” and then gives her -word-for-word commentary on verse 23 of this his _Loda_ LVIII. Words -from this same verse are again quoted by her on p. 62; the opening line -of this _Loda_ is put into her mouth on p. 83; and another verse, the -sixth, is quoted by her, as by the Blessed Jacopone, on p. 92. I have -been able to find many other sayings of hers which are hardly less -directly suggested by the great Umbrian than these. Here, again, she -probably knew the _Lode_ in MS. form, before they appeared in print in -1490; but will in any case have known them in this their printed form. -I have carefully studied in this, the first printed edition (Florence: -Bonaccorsi), all the _Lode_ bearing upon subjects and doctrines dear -to Catherine. They are twenty in all, from among the hundred and two -numbers of that collection.[222] - - -6. _The Psycho-physical Occasions or Reflexes of her Doctrine. Her -special reaction under and use of her literary sources shall be -examined in a later chapter._ - -The psycho-physical occasions or reflexes of her various teachings, as -far as the interconnection can be traced with probability, shall also -be studied in the second volume. But already here I would have the -reader clearly to understand, that nowhere are such psycho-physical -conditions and experiences to be considered the _causes_ of her -doctrine, as though the lower produced the higher, and as though the -spiritual were the automatic resultant and necessary precipitate of -certain accidental, involuntary conditions in time and space. For -everywhere such conditions can only, at best, be accepted as the -occasions or materials for the development or illustration of some -spiritual doctrine, or, contrariwise, as the psychic effects and -embodiments of some vividly realized invisible truth or law; whilst -this spiritual teaching itself is derived from far other and deeper -causes,--the interaction of her own experience and free spiritual -powers and of God’s grace, and the conflict of these with her own -passions, the whole helped or hindered by the world without. - - -I. GOD AS CREATIVE LOVE. THE CREATURE’S TRUE AND FALSE SELF; TRUE AND -FALSE LOVE. - - -1. _Creation, an overflow of Goodness._ - -First, then, we will take the sayings about Creation, and the original, -substantially indelible character of all created beings. “I saw a -sight which satisfied me much. I was shown the Living Fountain of -Goodness, which was (as yet) all within Itself alone, without any kind -of participation. And next I saw that It began to participate with the -creature, and made that very beautiful company of Angels, in order that -this company might enjoy His ineffable glory, without asking any other -return from the Angels than that they should recognize themselves to be -creatures created by His supreme goodness.… And hence, when they were -clothed in sin by their pride and disobedience, God suddenly subtracted -from them the participation of His goodness.… Yet He did not subtract -it all, for in that case they would have remained still more malign -than they (actually) are, and they would have had Hell infinite in -pain, as they now have it in time.” … “When we ourselves shall depart -from this life,--supposing we are in mortal sin,--then God would -subtract from us His goodness and would leave us in our own selves, -yet not altogether, since He wills that in every place there should -be found His goodness accompanied by His justice. And if any creature -could be found that did not participate in His goodness, that creature -would be as malignant as God is good.”[223] - - -2. _Natural conformity between God and all rational creatures._ - -From her sayings as to Creation and Pure Love, Creation’s cause, we -come to those as to the Natural Conformity between God and Rational -Creatures; His constant care for the human soul; and the consequent -law of imitative love incumbent upon us. “I see God to have so great -a conformity with the rational creature, that if the Devil himself -could but rid himself of those garments of sin, in that instant God -would unite Himself to him, and would make him into that which he, the -Devil, attempted to achieve by his own power. So too with regard to -man: lift off sin from his shoulders, and then allow the good God to -act,--God who seems to have nothing else to do than to unite Himself -to us.”--“It appears to me, indeed, that God has no other business -than myself.”--“If man could but see the care which God takes of the -soul, he would be struck with stupor within himself.”--“I see that God -stands all ready to give us all the aids necessary for our salvation, -and that He attends to our actions solely for our good. And, on the -contrary, I see man occupied with things that are opposed to his true -self and of no value. And at the time of death God will say to him: -‘What was there that I could do for thee, O man, that I did not do?’ -And man himself will then see this clearly.”--“When God created man, -He did not put Himself in motion for any other reason than His pure -love alone. And hence, in the same way as Love Itself, for the welfare -of the loved soul, does not fail in the accomplishment of anything, -whatever may be the advantage or disadvantage that may accrue from -thence to the Lover, so also must the love of the loved soul return -to the Lover, with those same forms and modes with which it came from -Him. And then such love as this, which has no regard for aught but love -itself, cannot be in fear of anything.”[224] - - -3. _Relations between Love, God; love of our true self; and false -self-love._ - -We can take next her teachings as to the relations between the love -of God, love of our true self, and false self-love. “The love of God -is our true self-love, the love characteristic of and directed to our -true selves, since these selves of ours were created by and for Love -Itself. The love, on the other hand, of every other thing deserves to -be called self-hatred, since it deprives us of our true self-love, -which is God. Hence ‘Him love, Who loveth thee,’ that is, Love, God; -and ‘him leave who doth not love thee,’ that is, all other things, from -God downwards.”[225] - -“God so loves the soul, and is so ready to give it His graces, that, -when He is impeded by some sin, then men say: ‘Thou hast offended God,’ -that is, thou hast driven away God from thee, Who, with so much love, -was desiring to do thee good. And men say this, although it is really -man who then suffers the damage and who offends his own true self. But -because God loves us more than we love our own selves, and gives more -care to our true utility than we do ourselves, therefore does He get -designated as the one who is offended. And, indeed, if God could be the -recipient of suffering, it would be when, by sin, He is driven away -by and from us.” “This corrupt expression: ‘Thou hast offended God.’” -“Thou couldst discover, (O soul,) that God is continually willing -whatsoever our true selves are wishing; He is ever aiming at nothing -but at our own true spiritual advantage.”[226] - -Hence happiness and joy, different from all mere pleasure, ever -accompany this reconquest of our true self-love and this our -re-donation of it to its true source. “Man was created for the end -of possessing happiness. And having deviated from this his end, he -has formed for himself a false, selfish self, which in all things -struggles against the soul’s true happiness.” “This divine love is our -proper and true love.” “Man can truly know, by continual experience, -that the love of God is our repose, our joy, and our life; and that -(false) self-love is but constant weariness, sadness, and a (living) -death of our true selves, both in this world and in the next.” “All -sufferings, displeasures, and pains are caused by attachment to the -false self. And although adversities many a time seem to us to be -unreasonable, because of certain considerations which we believe to be -true and indeed quite evident; yet the fact remains that it is our own -imperfection which is preventing us from seeing the truth, and this it -is which causes us to feel pains, suffering, and displeasure.” “O Love! -if others feel an obligation to observe Thy commandments, I, on my -part, freely will to have them all ten, because they are all delightful -and full of love.… This is a point which is understandable only to him -who himself experiences it; for in truth the divine precepts, although -they are contrary to our sensuality, are nevertheless according to our -own spirit which, of its very nature, is ever longing to be free from -all bodily sensations, so as to be able to unite itself to God through -love.”[227] - - -4. _The true self instinctively hungers after God._ - -The sayings as to the close correspondence between the true self and -God lead us on easily to those about the true self’s instinctive -recognition of God, and its hunger for the possession, for the -_interiorization_ of God. “If I were to see the whole court of heaven -all robed in one and the same manner, so that there would be no -apparent difference between God and the Angels: even then the love -which I have in my heart would recognize God, in the same manner as -does a dog his master. Love knows how, without means, to discover its -End and ultimate Repose.” “If a consecrated Host were to be given me -together with other non-consecrated ones I would, I think, distinguish -It by the taste, as wine from water.”--“When she saw the Sacrament upon -the Altar in the hand of the priest, she would exclaim within herself -(as it were, addressing the priest): ‘O swiftly, swiftly speed It to -the heart, since It is the heart’s own food.’”[228] - - -5. _Superiority of interior graces over exterior manifestations. No -good within herself apart from divine grace._ - -Catherine’s hunger for the interiorization of all the external helps -of religion, even, indeed specially, of the Holy Eucharist Itself, -leads us on to her statements as to the superiority of interior -graces and dispositions over all exterior manifestations and sensible -consolations, and as to the nature of acts produced by the false self -or apart from the grace of God. “If we would esteem the operations of -God” as they truly deserve, “we should attend more to things interior -than to exterior ones.… The true light makes me see and understand that -we must not look to what proceedeth from God to aid us in some special -necessity and for His glory, but that we must look solely to the pure -love with which He performs His work with regard to us. When the soul -perceives how direct and pure are the operations of love, and that this -love is not intent upon any benefit that we could confer upon It, then -indeed the soul also desires, in its turn, to love with a pure love, -and from the motive of the divine love alone.”[229] - -“This not-eating of mine is an operation of God, independent of my -will, hence I can in nowise glory in it; nor should we marvel at it, -for to Him such an operation is as nothing.”--And to her Confessor -Don Marabotto she says reprovingly, when he too wanted to smell the -strange, strengthening odour which she smelt on his hand: “Such things -as God alone can give” (_i.e._ states and conditions in the production -of which the soul does not co-operate) “He does not give to him who -seeks them; indeed, He gives them only on occasion of great need, and -in order that we may draw great spiritual profit from them.”[230] - -“If I do anything that is evil, I do it myself alone, nor can I -attribute the blame to the Devil or to any other creature but only to -my own self-will, sensuality, and other such malign movements. And if -all the Angels were to declare that there was any good in me, I would -refuse to believe them, because I clearly recognize how that all good -is in God alone, and that in me, without divine grace, there is nothing -but deficiency.”--“I would not that, to my separate self, even one -single meritorious act should ever be attributed, even though I could -at the same time be certified of no more falling from henceforward and -of being saved; because such an attribution would be to me as though -a Hell.” “Rather would I remain in danger of eternal damnation than -be saved by, and see, such an act of the separate self.” “The one sole -thing in myself in which I glory is that I see in myself nothing in -which I can glory.” - -“Yet it is necessary that we should labour and exercise ourselves, -since divine grace does not give life nor render pleasing unto God -except that which the soul has worked; and without work on our part -grace refuses to save.”--“We must never wish anything other than what -happens from moment to moment, all the while, however, exercising -ourselves in goodness. And to refuse to exercise oneself in goodness, -and to insist upon simply awaiting what God might send, would be simply -to tempt God.”[231] - - -6. _God is Pure Love, Grace, Peace, and the Soul’s True Self._ - -The passages concerning the close relations between man’s pure love -and instinct for God, and Pure Love, God Himself, easily lead us on -to those in which Pure Love, Peace, Grace, the True Self, indeed the -Essence of all things are positively identified with God. “Hearing -herself called” to any office of her state or of charity, “she would,” -even though apparently absorbed in ecstatic prayer, “arise at once, -and go without any contention of mind. And she acted thus, because she -fled all self-seeking as though it were the devil. And she felt at such -times as though she could best express her feelings by means of the -glorious Apostle’s words: ‘Who then shall separate me from the love of -_God_?’ and the remainder of the great passage. And she would say: ‘I -seem to see how that immovable mind of St. Paul extended much further -than he was able to express in words; since Pure Love is God Himself: -who then shall be able to separate Him from Himself?’” Elsewhere and -on other occasions we find her declaring: “Love is God Himself”; “Pure -Love is no other than God”; “the Divine love is the very God, infused -by His own immense Goodness into our hearts.”[232] - -She also declares that: “Grace is God”; that “Peace is God,”--“wouldest -thou that I show thee what thing God is? Peace,--that peace which no -man finds, who departs from Him.” And further still: “The proper centre -of every one is God Himself”; “my _Me_ is God, nor do I recognize any -other _Me_, except my God Himself;” “my Being is God, not by simple -participation but by a true transformation of my Being.” “God is my -Being, my _Me_, my Strength, my Beatitude, my Good, my Delight.” Indeed -“the glorious God is the whole essence of things both visible and -invisible.”[233] - -All these startling statements are but so many expressions of one of -the most characteristic moods and attitudes of her mind and heart. For -in her vehemence of love and thirst for unification she would exclaim: -“I will have nothing to do with a love that would be _for_ God or _in_ -God; this is a love which pure love cannot bear: since pure love is -(simply) God Himself”; “I cannot abide to see that word _for_, and that -word _in_, since they denote to my mind a something that can stand -between God and myself.”[234] - -All this doctrine would be summed up by her in certain favourite -expressions. “She was wont often to pronounce these words: ‘Sweetness -of God, Fulness of God, Goodness of God, Purity of God’”; and at a -later time “she had continually on her lips the term ‘(clear) Fulness’” -(Self-adequation, _nettezza_).[235] - - -II. SIN, PURIFICATION, ILLUMINATION. - - -1. _The soul’s continuous imperfection. Self-love and Pure Love, their -contradictory characters. Every man capable of Pure Love._ - -Catherine’s extreme sensitiveness is no doubt a chief cause of the -peculiar form in which she experiences her sinfulness and faults -and their actually slow purification, as expressed in those of her -sayings which refer to the growth of love and to the continuous -imperfections of the soul. “From the time when I began to love Him, -that love has never failed me”; “indeed it has continually grown unto -its consummation in the depths of my heart.” This growth takes place -only step by step; and is in reality never complete, and never without -certain imperfections. “The creature is incapable of knowing anything -but what God gives it from day to day. If it could know (beforehand) -the successive degrees that God intends to give it, it would never -be quieted.” “When from time to time I would advert to the matter, -it seemed to me that my love was complete; but later, as time went -on and as my sight grew clearer, I became aware that I had had many -imperfections.… I did not recognize them at first, because God-Love was -determined to achieve the whole only little by little, for the sake of -preserving my physical life, and so as to keep my behaviour tolerable -for those with whom I lived. For otherwise, with such other insight, -so many excessive acts would ensue, as to make one insupportable to -oneself and to others.” “Every day I feel that the motes are being -removed, which this Pure Love casts out (_cava fuori_). Man cannot see -these imperfections; indeed, since, if he saw these motes, he could -not bear the sight, God ever lets him see the work he has achieved, as -though no imperfections remained in it. But all the time God does not -cease from continuing to remove them.” “From time to time, I feel that -many instincts are being consumed within me, which before had appeared -to be good and perfect; but when once they have been consumed, I -understand that they were bad and imperfect.… These things are clearly -visible in the mirror of truth, that is of Pure Love, where everything -is seen crooked which before appeared straight.”[236] - -And yet the slowness of this purification is, in the last resort, -caused, if not by the incomplete purity of her love, at least by the -deep-rootedness and evasive character of the wrong self-love that has -to be extirpated. “This our self-will is so subtle and so deeply rooted -within our own selves, and defends itself with so many reasons, that, -when we cannot manage to carry it out in one way, we carry it out in -another. We do our own wills under many covers (pretexts),--of charity, -of necessity, of justice, of perfection.” But pure love sees through -all these covers: “I saw this love to have so open and so pure an eye, -its sight to be so subtle and its seeing so far-reaching, that I stood -astounded.” “True love wills to stand naked, without any kind of cover, -in heaven and on earth, since it has not anything shameful to conceal.” -And “this naked love ever sees the truth; whilst self-love can neither -see it nor believe in it.” “Pure love loves God without any _for_ (any -further motive).”[237] - -And man, every man, is capable of this pure love and of the truth which -such love sees: “I see every one to be capable of my tender Love.” -“Truth being, by its very nature, communicable to all, cannot be the -exclusive property of any one.”[238] - - -2. _Exactingness of Pure Love._ - -The next group of sayings deals with the purity of Love, and the -severity with which this purity progressively eliminates all selfish -motives and attachments, whilst itself becoming increasingly its -own exceeding great beatitude. “Pure Love loves God without why or -wherefore (_perchè_)” “Since Love took over the care of everything, -I have not taken care of anything, nor have I been able to work with -my intellect, memory and will, any more than if I had never had -them. Indeed every day I feel myself more occupied in Him, and with -greater fire.” “I had given the keys of the house to Love, with ample -permission to do all that was necessary, and determined to have no -consideration for soul or body, but to see that, of all that the law of -pure love required, there should not be wanting the slightest particle -(_minimo chè_). And I stood so occupied in contemplating this work of -Love, that if He had cast me, body and soul, into hell, hell itself -would have appeared to me all love and consolation.”[239] - -Yet the corresponding, increasing constraint of the false self is most -real. “I find myself every day more restricted, as if a man were -(first) confined within the walls of a city, then in a house with an -ample garden, then in a house without a garden, then in a hall, then in -a room, then in an ante-room, then in the cellar of the house with but -little light, then in a prison without any light at all; and then his -hands were tied and his feet were in the stocks, and then his eyes were -bandaged, and then he would not be given anything to eat, and then no -one would be able to speak to him; and then, to crown all, every hope -were taken from him of issuing thence as long as life lasted. Nor would -any other comfort remain to such an one, than the knowledge that it was -God who was doing all this, through love with great mercy; an insight -which would give him great contentment. And yet this contentment does -not diminish the pain or the oppression.”[240] - - -3. _Blinding effect of all self-seeking. The gradual transformation of -the soul._ - -There is next a group of sayings as to the immense, blinding and -staining effect of even slight self-seekings, and as to how God -gradually transforms the soul. “God and Sin, however slight, cannot -live peaceably side by side (_stare insieme_). Since some little thing -that you may have in your eye does not let you see the sun, we can make -a comparison between God and the sun, and then between intellectual -vision and that of the bodily eye.” “After considering things as they -truly are, I find myself constrained to live without self.” “Since the -time when God has given the light to the soul, it can no more desire -to operate by means of that part of itself which is ever staining -all things and rendering turbid the clear water of God’s grace. The -soul then offers and remits itself entirely to Him, so that it can no -more operate except to the degree and in the manner willed by tender -Love Himself; and henceforth it does not produce works except such -as are pure, full and sincere; and these are the works that please -God-Love.”[241] - -“I will not name myself either for good or for evil, lest this my -(selfish) part should esteem itself to be something.” “Being determined -to join myself unto God, I am in every manner bound to be the enemy -of His enemies; and since I find nothing that is more His enemy than -is self in me, I am constrained to hate this part of me more than any -other thing; indeed, because of the contrariety that subsists between -it and the spirit, I am determined to separate it from all the goods of -this world and of the next, and to esteem it no more than if it were -not.”[242] - -“When she saw others bewailing their evil inclinations, and forcing -themselves greatly to resist them, and yet the more they struggled to -produce a remedy for their defects, the more did they commit them, -she would say to them: ‘You have subjects for lamentation (_tu hai li -guai_) and bewail them, and I too would be having and bewailing them; -you do evil and bewail it, and I should be doing and be bewailing it -as you do, if God Almighty were not holding me. You cannot defend -yourself, nor can I defend myself. Hence it is necessary that we -renounce the care of ourselves unto Him, Who can defend this our true -self; and He will then do that which we cannot do.’”[243] - -“As to the annihilating of man, which has to be made in God, she spoke -thus: ‘Take a bread, and eat it. When you have eaten it, its substance -goes to nourish the body, and the rest is eliminated, because nature -cannot use it at all, and indeed, if nature were to retain it, the -body would die. Now, if that bread were to say to you: “Why dost thou -remove me from my being? if I could, I would defend myself to conserve -myself, an action natural to every creature”: you would answer: “Bread, -thy being was ordained for a support for my body, a body which is of -more worth than thou; and hence thou oughtest to be more contented with -thine end than with thy being. Live for thine end, and thou wilt not -care about thy being, but thou wilt exclaim (to the body): ‘Swiftly, -swiftly draw me forth from my being, and put me within the operation -of that end of mine, for which I was created.’” … The soul, by the -operation of God, eliminates from the body all the superfluities and -evil habits acquired by sin, and retains within itself the purified -body, which body thenceforth performs its operations by means of -these purified senses.… And, when the soul has consumed all the evil -inclinations of the body, God consumes all the imperfections of the -soul.’”[244] - -In each particular instance, the process was wont to be as follows: -“When her selfish part saw itself tracked down by Love, Catherine -would turn to Him and say: ‘Even though it pain sense, content Thy -will: despoil me of this spoil and clothe me with Love full, pure and -sincere.’”[245] - - -4. _Suddenness and gratuitousness of God’s light; the obstacles to its -operation._ - -We get next a set of apparently contrary sayings, concerning the -suddenness of God’s illumination; how the degree of this light cannot -be determined by man; and what are, nevertheless, the conditions under -which it will not act. In some cases, “the soul is made to know in an -instant, by means of a new light above itself, all that God desires it -to know, and this with so much certainty that it would be impossible to -make the soul believe otherwise. Nor is more shown it than is necessary -for leading it to greater perfection.” “This light is not sought by -man, but God gives it unto man when He chooses; neither does the man -himself know how he knows the thing that he is made to know. And if -perchance man were determined to seek to know a little further than he -has been made to know, he would achieve nothing, but would remain like -unto a stone, without any capacity.”[246] - -And she would pray: “Be Thou my understanding; (thus) shall I know that -which it may please Thee that I should know. Nor will I henceforth -weary myself with seeking; but I will abide in peace with Thine -understanding, which shall wholly occupy my mind.” “If a man would see -properly in spiritual matters, let him pluck out the eyes of his own -presumption.” “He who gazes too much upon the sun’s orb, makes himself -blind; even thus, I think, does pride blind many, who want to know too -much.” “When God finds a soul that does not move, He operates within it -in His own manner, and puts His hand to greater things. He takes from -this soul the key of His treasures which He had given to it, so that it -might be able to enjoy them; and gives to this same soul the care of -His presence, which entirely absorbs it.”[247] - - -5. _God’s way of winning souls and raising them towards pure love. The -fruits of full trust._ - -The next group can be made up of passages descriptive of the dealings -adopted by God with a view to first winning souls as He finds them, -and then raising them above mercenary hope or slavish fear; and of the -childlike fearlessness inspired by perfect trust in God. As to the -winning them, she says: “The selfishness of man is so contrary to God -and rebellious against Him, that God Himself cannot induce the soul -to do His will, except by certain stratagems (_lusinghe_): promising -it things greater than those left, and giving it, even in this life, -a certain consoling relish (_gusto_). And this He does, because He -perceives the soul to love things visible so much, that it would never -leave one, unless it saw four.”[248] - -And, as to God’s raising of the soul, she propounds the deep doctrine, -which only apparently contradicts the divine method just enunciated, -as to the necessary dimness of the soul’s light with regard to -the intrinsic consequences of its own acts, a dimness necessary, -because alone truly purificatory, for the time that runs between its -conversion, when, since it is still weak, it requires to see, and its -condition of relative purity, when, since it is now strong, it can -safely be again allowed to see.“ If a man were to see that which, in -return for his good deeds, he will have in the life to come, he would -cease to occupy himself with anything but heavenly things. But God, -desiring that faith should have its merit, and that man should not do -good from the motive of selfishness, gives him that knowledge little -by little, though always sufficiently for the degree of faith of which -the man is then capable. And God ends by leading him to so great a -light as to things that are above, that faith seems to have no further -place.--On the other hand, if man knew that which hereafter he will -have to suffer if he die in the miserable state of sin, I feel sure -that, for fear of it, he would let himself be killed rather than commit -one single sin. But God, unwilling as He is that man should avoid doing -evil from the motive of fear, does not allow him to see so terrifying a -spectacle, although He shows it in part to such souls as are so clothed -and occupied by His pure love that fear can no more enter in.”[249] - -And as to the full trust of pure love, we have the following: “God let -her hear interiorly: ‘I do not want thee henceforward to turn thine -eyes except towards Love; and here I would have thee stay and not to -move, whatever happens to thee or to others, within or without’; ‘he -who trusts in Me, should not doubt about himself.’”[250] - -And this Love gives of itself so fully to those that give themselves -fully to It, that when asked by such souls to impetrate some grace -for them she would say: “I see this tender Love to be so courteously -attentive to these my spiritual children, that I cannot ask of It -anything for them, but can only present them before His face.” In other -cases, as in those of beginners when sick and dying, she would be -“drawn to pray for” a soul, and would “impetrate” some special “grace -for it.” “Lord, give me this soul,” she would at times pray aloud, “I -beg Thee to give it me, for indeed Thou canst do so.” And “when she was -drawn to pray for something, she would be told in her mind: ‘Command, -for love is free to do so.’”[251] - - -III. THE THREE CATEGORIES AND THE TWO WAYS. - -The next set of sayings so eminently constitutes the aggregation, if -not the system, of categories under and with which Catherine habitually -sees her types and pictures, and thinks and feels her experiences of -divine things, that it will require careful discrimination and grouping. - - -1. _The Three Categories: “In” Concentration; “Out” Liberation; “Over,” -Elevation._ - -There is, first, the great category of _in_, _within_, _down into_; -that is, recollection, concentration. “The love which I have within -my heart.” “Since I began to love It, never again has that Love -diminished; indeed It has ever grown to Its own fulness, within my -innermost heart.” Hence she would say to those who dwelt in admiration -of her psycho-physical peculiarities: “If you but had experience -(_sapeste_) of another thing which I feel within me!” And again,“If -we would esteem (aright) the operations of God, we must attend more -to interior than to exterior things.” And, with regard to the Holy -Eucharist, she would whisper, when seeing at Mass the Priest about to -communicate: “O swiftly, swiftly speed It down to the heart, since it -is the heart’s own food ”; and she would declare, with regard to her -own Communion: “In the same instant in which I had It in my mouth, I -felt It in my heart.”[252] - -There is, next, the category of _out_, _outside_, _outwards_; that is, -liberation, ecstasy. “The soul which came out from God pure and full -has a natural instinct to return to God as full and pure (as it came).” -“The soul finds itself bound to a body entirely contrary to its own -nature, and hence expects with desire its separation from the body.” -“God grants the grace, to some persons, of making their bodies into -a Purgatory (already) in this world.” “When God has led the soul on -to its last stage (_passo_), the soul is so full of desire to depart -from the body to unite itself with God, that its body appears to it a -Purgatory, keeping it far apart from its (true) object.” “The prison, -in which I seem to be, is the world; the chain is the body”; “to noble -(_gentili_) souls, death is the end of an obscure prison; to the -remainder, it is a trouble,--to such, that is, as have fixed all their -care upon what is but so much dung (_fango_).” And, whilst strenuously -mortifying the body, she would answer its resistances, as though so -many audible complainings, and say: “If the body is dying, well, let -it die; if the body cannot bear the load, well, leave the body in the -lurch (O soul).”[253] - -And all this imprisonment is felt as equivalent to being outside of -the soul’s true home. “I seem to myself to be in this world like those -who are out of their home, and who have left all their friends and -relations, and who find themselves in a foreign land; and who, having -accomplished the business on which they came, stand ready to depart and -to return home,--home, where they ever are with heart and mind, having -indeed so ardent a love of their country (_patria_), that one day spent -in getting there would appear to them to last a year.”[254] - -And this feeling of outsideness, seen here with regard to the relations -of the soul to the body and to the world, we find again with regard to -sanctity and the soul. In this latter case also the greater is felt to -be (as it were) entrapped, and contained only very partially within the -lesser; and as though this greater could and did exist, in its full -reality, only outside of the lesser. “I can no more say ‘blessed’ to -any saint, taken in himself, because I feel it to be an inappropriate -(_deforme_) word”; “I see how all the sanctity which the saints -have, is outside of them and all in God.” Indeed she sums this up in -the saying: “I see that anything perfect is entirely outside of the -creature; and that a thing is entirely imperfect, when the creature can -at all contain it.” Hence “the Blessed possess (_hanno_) blessedness, -and yet they do not possess it. For they possess it, only in so far -as they are annihilated in their own selves and are clothed with God; -and they do not possess it, in so far as they remain (_si trovano_) in -their particular (_proprio_) being, so as to be able to say: ‘_I_ am -blessed.’”[255] - -There is, in the third place, the category of _over_, _above_, -_upwards_; that is elevation, sublimation. We will begin with cases -where it is conjoined with the previous categories, and will move on -into more and more pure aboveness. “I am so placed and submerged in His -immense love, that I seem as though in the sea entirely under water, -and could on no side touch, see, or feel anything but water.” And “if -the sea were the food of love, there would exist no man nor woman that -would not go and drown himself (_affogasse_) in it; and he who was -dwelling far from this sea, would engage in nothing else but in walking -to get to it and to immerse himself within it.”[256] The soul here -feels the water on every side of it, yet evidently chiefly above it, -for it has had to plunge in, to get _under_ the water. - -“Listen to what Fra Jacopone says in one of his Lauds, which begins, -‘O Love of Poverty.’ He says: ‘That which appears to thee (to be), is -not; so high above is that which _is_. (True) elevation (_superbia_) -is in heaven; earthy lowness (_umiltà_) leads to the soul’s own -destruction.’ He says then: ‘That which appears to thee,’ that is, all -things visible, ‘are not,’ and have not true being in them: ‘so high’ -and great ‘is He who _is_,’ that is, God, in whom is all true being. -‘Elevation is in heaven,’ that is, true loftiness and greatness is -in heaven and not on earth; ‘earthy lowness leads to the soul’s own -destruction,’ that is, affection placed in these created things, which -are low and vile, since they have not in them true being, produces -this result.”--“I feel,” she says in explanation of what and how she -knows, “a first thing above the intellect; and above this thing I feel -another one and a greater; and above this other one, another, still -more great; and so up and up does one thing go above the other, each -thing ever greater (than its predecessors), that I conclude it to be -impossible to express even a spark (scintilla) as to It” (the highest -and greatest of the whole series, God). Here it is interesting still to -trace the influence of the same passage of Jacopone (again referred to -in this place by the _Vita_), and to see why she introduced “greatness” -alongside of “loftiness” into her previous paraphrase.[257] - -Now this vivid impression of a strong upward movement, combined with -the feeling of being in and under something, gives the following image, -used by her during her last illness: “I can no longer manage to live -on in this life, because I feel as though I were in it like cork under -water.” And this “above,” unlike to “outside,” is accompanied by the -image, not of clothing but of nakedness; the clothes are left below. -“This vehement love said to her, on one occasion: ‘What art thou -thinking of doing? I want thee all for myself. I want to strip thee -naked, naked. The higher up thou shalt go, however great a perfection -thou mayest have, the higher will I ever stand above thee, to ruin all -thy perfections’”--this, of course, inasmuch as she is still imperfect -and falls short of the higher and higher perfections to which her soul -is being led.[258] - -And as to man’s faculties, she says: “As the intellect reaches higher -(_supera_) than speech, so does love reach higher than intellect.” -And again, as a universal law: “When pure love speaks, it ever speaks -above nature; and all the things which it does and thinks and feels are -always above nature.”[259] - - -2. _The Two Ways: the Negative Way, God’s Transcendence; the Positive -Way, God’s Immanence._ - -Now these three categories of within and inward, outside and outward, -above and upward position and movement, can lead, and do actually lead -in Catherine’s case, to two separate lines of thought and feeling. And -these lines are each too much a necessary logical conclusion from the -constant working of these categories, and they are each again far too -much, and even apart from these categories, expressive of two rival but -complementary experiences, for either of them to be able to suppress -or even modify the other. Each has its turn in the rich, free play -of Catherine’s life. I will take the negative line first, and then -the positive, so as to finish up with affirmation, which will thus, -as in her actual experience and practice, be all the deeper and more -substantial, because it has passed, and is ever re-passing, through a -process of limitation and purification. - -First, then, if grace and God are only within, _and_ only without, -_and_ only above, she will and does experience contradiction and -paradox in all attempts at explaining reality; she will thus find -things to be obscure instead of clear; and she will end by affirming -the unutterableness, the unthinkableness of God, indeed of all reality. -“I see without eyes, I understand without understanding, I feel without -feeling, and I taste without taste.” “When the creature is purified, -it sees the True; and such a sight is not a sight.” “The sight of how -it is God” who sends the soul its purifying trials “gives the soul -a great contentment; and yet this contentment does not diminish the -pain.” Still, “pure love cannot suffer; nor can it understand what is -meant by pain or torment.” “The sun, which at first seemed so clear -to me, now seems obscure; what used to seem sweet to me, now seems -bitter: because all beauties and all sweetnesses that have an admixture -of the creature are corrupt and spoilt.” “As to Love, only this can -we understand about It, that It is incomprehensible to the mind.” “So -long as a person can still talk of things divine, and can relish, -understand, remember and desire them, he has not yet come to port.” For -indeed “all that can be said about God is not God, but only certain -smallest fragments which fall from (His) table.”[260] - -And yet those experiences of God’s presence as, apparently, in a -special manner within us, and without us, and above us, also lead, by -means of another connection of ideas, to another, to a positive result. -For those experiences can lead us to dwell, not upon the difference of -the “places,” but upon the apparent fact that He is in a “place” of -some sort, in space somewhere, the exact point of which is still to -find; and, by thus bringing home to the mind this underlying paradox -of the whole position, they can help to make the soul shrink away from -this false clarity, and to fall back upon the deep, dim, true view of -God as existing, for our apprehension, in certain states of soul alone, -states which have all along been symbolized for us by these different -“places” and “positions.” And thus what before was a paradox and -mystery _qua_ space, because at the same time within and without, and -because not found by the soul “within” unless through getting “without” -itself, becomes now a paradox and mystery _qua_ state, because the soul -at one and the same time attains to its own happiness and loses it, -indeed attains happiness only through deliberately sacrificing it. And -we thus come to the great central secret of all life and love, revealed -to us in its fulness in the divine paradox of our Lord’s life and -teaching. - -God, then, first seems to be in a place, indeed to be a place. “I see -all good to be in one only place, that is God.” “The spirit can find no -place except God, for its repose.”[261] - -If God be in a place, we cannot well conceive of Him as other than -outside of and above the soul, which itself, even God being in a -place, will be in a place also. “God has created the soul pure and -full, with a certain God-ward instinct, which brings happiness in its -train (_istinto beatifico_).” And “the nearer the soul approaches” (is -joined, _si accosta_) “to God, the more does the instinct attain to -its perfection.” Here the instinct within pushes the soul “onwards, -outwards, upwards.” And the nearer the soul gets to God in front, -outside and above of it, the happier it becomes: because, the more it -satisfies this its instinct, the less it suffers from the distance from -God, and the more does it enjoy His proximity.[262] - -This approach is next conceived of as increasingly conveying a -knowledge to the soul of God’s desire for union with it; but such -an approach can only be effected by means of much fight against and -through the intervening ranks of the common enemies of the two friends; -and, as we have already seen, chief amongst these enemies is the soul’s -false self. “The nearer man approaches to (_si accosta_) God, the more -he knows that God desires to unite Himself with us.” “Being determined -to approach God, I am constrained to be the enemy of His enemies.”[263] - -And then, that “place” in which God was pictured as being, is found -to be a state, a disposition of the soul. Now as long as the dominant -tendency was to think God with clearness, and hence to picture Him as -in space, that same tendency would, naturally enough, represent this -place He was in as outside and above the soul. For if He is in space, -He is pictured as extended, and hence as stretching further than, and -outside of, the soul, which itself also is conceived as spacially -extended; and if He is in a particular part of space, that part can -only, for a geocentric apprehension of the world, be thought of as -the upper part of space. But in proportion as the picture of physical -extension and position gives way to its prompting cause, and the latter -is expressed, as far as possible, unpictorially and less clearly, but -more simply as what it is, viz. a spiritual intention and disposition, -she is still driven indeed, in order to retain some clearness of -speech, to continue to speak as of a place and of a spacial movement, -but she has now no longer three categories but only one, viz. _within_ -and _inwards_. For a physical quantity can be and move in different -places and directions in space; but a spiritual quality can only be -experienced within the substance of the spirit. “God created the soul -pure and full, with a certain beatific instinct of Himself” (_i.e._ -of His actual presence). And hence, “in proportion as it (again) -approaches to the conditions of its original creation, this beatific -instinct ever increasingly discovers itself and grows stronger and -stronger.”[264] - -And God being thus not without, nor indeed in space at all, she can -love Him everywhere: indeed the _what_ she is now constitutes the -_where_ she is; in a camp she can love God as dearly as in a convent, -and heaven itself is already within her soul, so that only a change in -the soul’s dispositions could constitute hell for that soul, even in -hell itself. “O Love,” she exclaims, after the scene with the Friar, -who had attempted to prove to her that his state of life rendered him -more free and apt to love God, “who then shall impede me from loving -Thee? Even if I were in the midst of a camp of soldiers, I could not -be impeded from loving Thee.” She had, during the interview, explained -her meaning: “If I believed that your religious habit would give me -but one additional glimpse” (spark, scintilla) “of love, I would -without doubt take it from you by force, were I not allowed to have -it otherwise. That you may be meriting more than myself, I readily -concede, I am not seeking after that; let those things be yours. But -that I cannot love Him as much as you can do, you will never succeed -in making me even understand.” “I stood so occupied in seeing the work -of Love (within my soul), that if it had thrown me with soul and body -into hell, hell itself would have appeared to me to be nothing but love -and consolation.” And, on another occasion, she says to her disciples: -“If, of that which this heart of mine is feeling, one drop were to fall -into hell, hell itself would become all life eternal”; and she accepts -with jubilation this interpretation of her words, on the part of one -of them (no doubt Vernazza): “Hell exists in every place where there -is rebellion against Love, God; but Life Eternal, in every place where -there is union with that same Love, God.”[265] - -And she now cannot but pray to possess all this love,--love being now -pictured as a food, as a light, or as water, bringing life to the soul. -“O tender Love, if I thought that but one glimpse of Thee were to be -wanting to me, truly and indeed I could not live.” “Love, I want Thee, -the whole of Thee.” “Never can love grow quiet, until it has arrived at -its ultimate perfection.” And, in gaining all God, she gains all other -things besides: “O my God, all mine, everything is mine; because all -that belongs to God seems all to belong to me.”[266] - -But if she loves all God, she can, on the other hand, love only Him: -how, then, is she to manage to love her neighbour? “Thou commandest me -to love my neighbour,” she complains to her Love, “and yet I cannot -love anything but Thee, nor can I admit anything else and mix it up -with Thee. How, then, shall I act?” And she received the interior -answer: “He who loves me, loves all that I love.”[267] - -But soon her love, as generous as it is strong, becomes uneasy as -to its usual consequences,--the consolations, purely spiritual or -predominantly psychical or even more or less physical, which come in -its train. And even though she is made to understand that at least the -first are necessarily bound up with love, in exact proportion to its -generosity, she is determined, to the last, to love for love itself, -and not for love’s consequences, battling thus to keep her spirituality -free from the slightest, subtlest self-seeking. “This soul said to its -Love: ‘Can it really be, O tender Love, that Thou art destined never to -be loved without consolation or the hope of some advantage in heaven or -on earth” accruing to Thy lover?’” “And she received the answer, that -such an union could not exist without a great peace and contentment of -the soul.” And yet she continues to affirm: “Conscience, in its purity, -cannot bear anything but God alone; of all the rest, it cannot suffer -the least trifle.”[268] - -And she practices and illustrates this doctrine in detail. “One day, -after Communion, God gave her so great a consolation that she remained -in ecstasy. When she had returned to her usual state, she prayed: ‘O -Love, I do not wish to follow Thee for the sake of these delights, but -solely from the motive of true love.’” On another similar occasion she -prays: “I do not want that which proceedeth from Thee; I want Thyself -alone, O tender Love.” And again, “on one occasion, after Communion, -there came to her so much odour and so much sweetness that she seemed -to herself to be in Paradise. But instantly she turned towards her -Lord and said: ‘O Love, art Thou perhaps intending to draw me to Thee -by means of these sensible consolations (_sapori_)? I want them not; I -want nothing except Thee alone.’”[269] - - -IV. THE OTHER WORLDS. - -We have now gone through Catherine’s contemplations and conceptions as -regards the soul’s relations with its true Life and Love, here and now, -on this side the veil. We have, in conclusion, to try and reproduce -and illustrate her teaching as to these relations on the other side of -death. - - -1. _No absolute break in the spirit’s life at the body’s death._ - -Now here especially is it necessary ever to bear in mind her own -presupposition, which runs throughout and sustains all her doctrine. -For she is sure, beyond ever even raising a question concerning the -point, that her soul and God, her two great realities and experiences, -remain substantially the same behind the veil as before it, and hence -that the most fundamental and universal of the soul’s experiences -_here_ can safely be trusted to obtain _there_ also. Hence, too, only -such points in the Beyond are dwelt on as she can thus experimentally -forecast; but these few points are, on the other hand, developed with -an extraordinary vividness and fearless, rich variety of illustration. -And it is abundantly clear that this assumption of the essential unity -and continuity of the soul’s life here and hereafter, is itself already -a doctrine, and a most important one. We will then take it as such, and -begin with it as the first of her teachings as to the Beyond. - -“This holy soul,” says the highly authoritative prologue to the -_Trattato_, in close conformity with her constant assumptions and -declarations, “finding herself, whilst still in the flesh, placed in -the Purgatory of God’s burning love,--a love which consumed (burnt, -_abbrucciava_) and purified her from whatever she had to purify, in -order that, on passing out of this life, she might enter at once -into the immediate presence (_cospetto_) of her tender Love, God: -understood, by means of this furnace of love, how the souls of the -faithful abide in the place of Purgatory, to purge themselves of every -stain of sin that, in this life, had been left unpurged. And as she, -placed in the loving Purgatory of the divine fire, abode united to the -divine Love, and content with all that It wrought within her, so she -understood it to be with the souls in Purgatory.”[270] - - -2. _Hell._ - -The details of her doctrine as to the Beyond we can group under three -heads: the unique, momentary experience and solitary, instantaneous act -of the soul, at its passing hence and beginning its purgation there; -the particular dispositions, joys and sufferings of the soul during -the process of purification, as well as the cause and manner of the -cessation of that process; and (generally treated by her as a simple -contrast to this her direct and favourite purgatorial contemplation) -the particular dispositions, sufferings, and alleviations of lost -souls. Since her teachings on the last-named subject are more of an -incidental character, I shall take them first, and make them serve, -as they do with her, as a foil to her doctrine of the Intermediate -State: whilst her conception of Heaven, already indicated throughout -her descriptions of Pure Love, is too much of a universal implication, -and too little a special department of her teaching, to be capable of -presentation here. - -As to the cause of Hell, she says: “It is the will’s opposition to -the Will of God which causes guilt; and as long as this evil will -continues, so long does the guilt continue. For those, then, who have -departed this life with an evil will there is no remission of the -guilt, neither can there be, because there can be no more change of -will.” “In passing out of this life, the soul is established for good -or evil, according to its deliberate purpose at the time; as it is -written, ‘where I shall find thee,’ that is, at the hour of death, -with a will either determined to sin, or sorry for sin and penitent, -‘there will I judge thee.’” Or, in a more characteristic form: “There -is no doubt that our spirit was created to love and enjoy: and it is -this that it goes seeking in all things. But it never finds satiety in -things of time; and yet it goes on hoping, on and on, to be at last -able to find it. And this experience it is that helps me to understand -what kind of a thing is Hell. For I see that man, by love, makes -himself one single thing with God, and finds there every good; and, on -the other hand, that when he is bereft of love, he remains full of as -many woes as are the blessings he would have been capable of, had he -not been so mad.”[271] - -And yet, and this is her own beautiful contribution to the traditional -doctrine on this terrible and mysterious subject, neither are the -sufferings of the lost infinite in amount, nor is their will entirely -malign. And both these alleviations evidently exist from the first: -I can find no trace anywhere in her teaching of a gradual mitigation -of either the punishment or the guilt. Indeed, although she always -teaches the mitigation of the suffering, it is only occasionally that -she teaches the persistence of some moral good. Thus her ordinary -teaching is: “Those who are found, at the moment of death, with a will -determined to sin, have with them an infinite degree of guilt, and the -punishment is without end”; “the sweet goodness of God sheds the rays -of His mercy even into Hell: since He might most justly have given to -the souls there a far greater punishment than He has.” “At death God -exercises His justice, yet not without mercy; since even in Hell the -soul does not suffer as much as it deserves.” But occasionally she -goes further afield, and insists on the presence there, not only of -some mercy in the punishment, but also of some good in the will. “When -we shall have departed from this life in a state of sin, God will -withdraw from us His goodness, and will leave us to ourselves, and yet -not altogether: since He wills that in every place His goodness shall -be found and not His justice alone. And if a creature could be found -that did not, to some degree, participate in the divine goodness, that -creature would be, one might say, as malignant as God is good.”[272] -There can be no doubt, as we shall see further on, that this latter is -her full doctrine and is alone entirely consistent with her general -principles. - -Certain details of her Hell doctrine which appear in immediate contrast -to, or in harmony with, some special points of her Purgatorial -teaching, had better appear in connection with the latter. - - -3. _Purgatory; the initial experience and act._ - -Let us now take, in all but complete contrast to this doctrine as -to Hell, what she has to say about Purgatory. And here we have -first to deal with the initial experience and act, both of them -unique and momentary, of the soul destined for Purgatory. As to that -experience, only one description has been preserved for us. “Once, -and once only, do the souls (that are still liable to, and capable -of, purgation) perceive the cause of (their) Purgatory that they bear -within themselves,--namely in passing out of this life: then, but -never again after that: otherwise self would come in (_vi saria una -proprietà_).”[273] - -And this unique and momentary experience is straightway followed by -as unique and momentary an act, free and full, on the part of the -experiencing soul. Catherine has described this act in every kind of -mood, and from the various points of view, already drawn out by us, of -her doctrine, so that we have here again a most impressive and vivid -summing-up and pictorial representation of all her central teaching. - -“The soul thus seeing” (its own imperfection) and, “that it -cannot, because of the impediment” (of this imperfection) “attain -(_accostarsi_) to its end, which is God; and that the impediment cannot -be removed (_levato_) from it, except by means of Purgatory, swiftly -and of its own accord (_volontieri_) casts itself into it.”[274] Here -we have the continuation of the outward movement: the soul is here -absolutely impeded in that, now immensely swift, movement, and is -brought to a dead stop, as though by something hard on the soul’s own -surface, which acts as a barrier between itself and God; it is offered -the chance of escaping from this intolerable suffering into the lesser -one of dissolving this hard obstacle in the ocean of the purifying -fire: and straightway plunges into the latter. - -“If the soul could find another Purgatory above the actual one, -it would, so as more rapidly to remove from itself so important -(_tanto_) an impediment, instantly cast itself into it, because of the -impetuosity of that love which exists between God and the soul and -tends to conform the soul to God.”[275] Here we have an extension of -the same picturing, interesting because the addition of an upwards to -the outwards introduces a conflict between the image (which evidently, -for the soul’s plunge, requires Purgatory to lie beneath the soul), and -the doctrine (which, taking Purgatory as the means between earth and -heaven, cannot, if any spacial picturing be retained at all, but place -Heaven at the top of the picture, and Purgatory higher up than the soul -which is coming thither from earth). The deep plunge has become a high -jump. - -“I see the divine essence to be of such purity, that the soul which -should have within it the least mote (_minimo chè_) of imperfection, -would rather cast itself into a thousand hells, than find itself with -that imperfection in the presence of God.”[276] Here the sense of -touch, of hardness, of a barrier which is checking motion, has given -way to the sense of sight, of stain, of a painful contrast to an -all-pure Presence; and the whole picture is now devoid of motion. We -thus have a transition to the immanental picturing, with its inward -movement or look. - -“The soul which, when separated from the body, does not find itself in -that cleanness (_nettezza_) in which it was created, seeing in itself -the stain, and that this stain cannot be purged out except by means -of Purgatory, swiftly and of its own accord casts itself in; and if -it did not find this ordination apt to purge that stain, in that very -moment there would be spontaneously generated (_si generebbe_) within -itself a Hell worse than Purgatory.”[277] Here we have again reached -her immanental conception, where the soul’s concern is with conditions -within itself, and where its joys and sorrows are within. Its trouble -is, in this case, the sense of contrast, between its own original, -still potential, indeed still actual though now only far down, -hidden and buried, true self, and its active, obvious, superficial, -false self. In so far as there is any movement before the plunge, it -is an inward, introspective one; the soul as a whole is, for that -previous moment, not conceived as in motion, but a movement of her -self-observing part or power takes place within her from the surface -to the centre; and only then, after her rapid journey from this her -surface-being to those her fundamental ineradicable requirements, and -after the consequent intolerably painful contrast and conflict within -herself, does she cast herself, with swift wholeheartedness, with all -she is and has, into the purifying place and state. - -And, in full harmony with this immanental conception, the greater -suffering which would arise did she abide with this sight of herself -and yet without any moral change is described as springing up -spontaneously within herself. “The soul, seeing Purgatory to have been -ordained for the very purpose of purging away its stains, casts itself -in, and seems to find a great compassion (on the part of God) in being -allowed (able) to do so.” This appears to be only a variety of the -immanental view just given.[278] - - -4. _Purgatory: the subsequent process._ - -We have finally to give her doctrine as to the particular dispositions, -joys, and sufferings of the soul during the process of its purgation, -and as to the cause and manner of the cessation of that process. - -As to the dispositions, they are generally the same as those which -impelled the soul to put itself in this place or condition. Only -whereas then, during that initial moment, they took the form of a -single act, an initiation of a new condition, now they assume the shape -of a continuous state. Then the will freely tied itself; now it gladly -though painfully abides by its decision and its consequences. Then the -will found the relief and distraction of full, epoch-making action; -now it has but to will and work out the consequences involved in that -generous, all-inclusive self-determination. The range and nature of -this, its continuous action will thus be largely the very reserve of -those of that momentary act. “The souls that are in Purgatory are -incapable of choosing otherwise than to be in that place, nor can -they any more turn their regard (_si voltare_) towards themselves, -and say: ‘I have committed such and such sins, for which I deserve to -tarry here’; nor can they say, ‘Would that I had not done them, that -now I might go to Paradise’; nor yet say, ‘_That_ soul is going out -before me’; nor, ‘I shall go out before _him_.’ They are so completely -satisfied that He should be doing all that pleases Him, and in the way -it pleases Him, that they are incapable of thinking of themselves.” -Indeed they are unable even to see themselves, at least directly, for -“these souls do not see anything, even themselves in themselves or by -means of themselves, but they (only) see themselves in God.” Indeed we -have already seen that to do, or to be able to do, otherwise, would now -“let self come in (_sarebbe una proprietà_).”[279] - -And the joys and sufferings, and the original, earthly cause of the -latter, are described as follows. “The souls in Purgatory have their -(active) will conformed in all things to the will of God; and hence -they remain there, content as far as regards their will.” “As far as -their will is concerned, these souls cannot find the pain to be pain, -so completely are they satisfied with the ordinance of God, so entirely -is their (active) will one with it in pure charity. On the other hand, -they suffer a torment so extreme, that no tongue could describe it, -no intellect could form the least idea of it, if God had not made -it known by special grace.” And indeed she says: “I shall cease to -marvel at finding that Purgatory is” in its way as “horrible as Hell. -For the one is made for punishing, the other for purging: hence both -are made for sin, sin which itself is so horrible and which requires -that its punishment and purgation should be conformable to its own -horribleness.” For in Purgatory too there still exist certain remains -of imperfect, sinful habits in the will. “The souls in Purgatory think -much more of the opposition which they discover in themselves to the -will of God,” than they do of their pain. And yet, being here with -their actual will fully at one with God’s purifying action (an action -directed against these remains of passive opposition), “I do not -believe it would be possible to find any joy comparable to that of a -soul in Purgatory, except the joy of the Blessed in Paradise.”[280] - -Now the sufferings of the soul are represented either as found by it, -under the form of an obstacle to itself, whilst in motion to attain to -God, a motion which in some passages is outward, in others inward; or -as coming to it, whilst spacially at rest. Only in the latter case is -there a further attempt at pictorially elucidating the nature of the -obstacle and the cessation of the suffering. It is fairly clear that -it is the latter set of passages which most fully suits her general -teaching and even imagery. For, as to the imagery: after that one -movement in which the soul determines its own place, we want it to -abide there, without any further motion. And, as to doctrine: more and -more as the soul’s history is unfolded, should God’s action within it -appear as dominating and informing the soul’s action towards God, and -should change of disposition supplant change of place. - -First, then, let us take the clearer but less final conception, -and see the soul in movement, in a struggle for outward motion. -“Because the souls that are in Purgatory have an impediment between -God and themselves, and because the instinct which draws the soul -on to its ultimate end is unable as yet to attain to its fulfilment -(_perfezione_), an extreme fire springs up from thence (within them), -a fire similar to that of Hell.” We have here an application and -continuation of the transcendental imagery, so that the impediment is -outside or on the surface of the soul, and God is outside and above -this again: but the whole picture here, at least as regards the fire, -is obscure and tentative.[281] - -Or the soul is still conceived as in movement, but the motion is -downwards from its own surface to its own centre, a centre where -resides its Peace, God Himself. “When a soul approaches more and more -to that state of original purity and innocence in which it had been -created, the instinct of God, bringing happiness in its train (_istinto -beatifico_), reveals itself and increases on and on, with such an -impetuousness of fire that any obstacle seems intolerable.”[282] -Here we have the immanental picturing, the soul moving down, under -the influence of its instinct for God, to ever fuller masses of -this instinct present within the soul’s own centre. But the extreme -abstractness and confusion of the language, which mixes up motion, -different depths of the soul, and various dispositions of spirit, and -which represents the soul as capable of approaching a state which has -ceased to exist, cast doubts on the authenticity of this passage. -In both these sets where the soul is in motion, we hear only of an -impediment in general and without further description; and, in both -cases, the fire springs up because of this impediment, whereas, as we -shall see, in the self-consistent form of her teaching the Fire, God, -is always present: the impediment simply renders this Fire painful, and -that is all. - -And next we can take the soul as spacially stationary, and as in -process of qualitative change. Here we get clear and detailed pictures, -both of what is given to the soul and of what is taken away from it. -The images of the positive gain constitute the beautiful sixth chapter -of the _Trattato_. But its present elaborate text requires to be broken -up into three or four variants of one and the same simile, which are -probably all authentic. I give them separately. - -“If in the whole world there existed but one loaf of bread to satisfy -the hunger of every creature: in such a case, if the creature had not -that one bread, it could not satisfy its hunger, and hence it would -remain in intolerable pain.”[283] Note how, so far, the nature of the -possession of the bread is not specified, it is simply “had”; and how -the pain seems to remain stationary. - -“Man having by nature an instinct to eat: if he does not eat, his -hunger increases continually, since his instinct to eat never fails -him.”[284] Here all is clearer: man now takes the place of the creature -in general; the possession is specified as an eating; the pain is a -hunger; and this hunger is an ever-increasing one. - -“If in all the world there were but one loaf of bread, and if only -through seeing it could the creature be satisfied: the nearer that -creature were to approach it (without seeing it and yet knowing -that only the said bread could satisfy it), the more ardently -would its natural desire for the bread be aroused within it (_si -accenderebbe_),--that bread in which all its contentment is centred -(_consiste_).”[285] Here the image for the nature of the appropriation -has been shifted from the least noble of the senses, taste and touch, -to the noblest, sight: there is still a longing, but it is a longing to -see, to exercise and satiate fully the intellectual faculties. And yet -the satiety is evidently conceived not as extending to these faculties -alone, but as including the whole soul and spirit, since bread would -otherwise cease to be the symbol here, and would have been replaced by -light. Note too the subtle complication introduced by the presentation, -in addition to the idea of an increase of hunger owing to lapse of -time, of the suggestion that the increase is caused by a change in the -spacial relations between the hungering creature and its food, and by -an ever-increasing approach of that creature to this food. - -“And if the soul were certain of never seeing the bread, at that moment -it would have within it a perfect Hell, and become like the damned, who -are cut off from all hope of ever seeing God, the true Bread. The souls -in Purgatory, on the other hand, hope to see that Bread, and to satiate -themselves to the full therewith; whence they suffer hunger as great as -will be the degree to which they will (eventually) satiate themselves -with the true Bread, God, our Love.”[286] Here it is noticeable how the -specific troubles of Hell and Purgatory are directly described, whereas -the corresponding joys of Heaven are only incidentally indicated; and -how the full sight is not preceded by a partial sight, but simply -by a longing for this full sight, so that, if we were to press the -application of this image, the soul in Purgatory would not see God at -all. And yet, as we have seen above, souls there see, though not their -particular sins, yet their general sinful habits; for what are the -“impediment,” the “imperfection,” the “stain,” which they go on feeling -and seeing, but these habits? And they see themselves, though not in -themselves, yet in God. But, if so, do they not see God? - -The answer will doubtless be that, just as they do not see their sins -any more in their specific particularity, but only feel in themselves -a dull, dead remainder of opposition and imperfection, so also they do -not, after the initial moment of action and till quite the end of their -suffering, see God clearly,--as clearly as they do when the process is -at an end. During one instant at death they had seen (as in a picture) -their sins and God, each in their own utterly contrasted concrete -particularity; and this had been the specific cause of their piercing -pain and swift plunge. And then came the period of comparative dimness -and dulness, a sort of general subconsciousness, when their habits of -sin, and God, were felt rather than seen, the former as it were in -front of the latter, but both more vaguely, and yet (and this was the -unspeakable alleviation) now in a state of change and transformation. -For the former, the blots and blurrs, and the sense of contrariety are -fading gradually out of the outlook and consciousness; and the latter, -the light and life, the joy and harmony of the soul, and God, are -looming clearer, nearer, and larger, on and on. And even this initial -feeling, this general perception, this semi-sight and growing sight of -God, is blissful beyond expression; for “every little glimpse that can -be gained of God exceeds every pain and every joy that man can conceive -without it.”[287] - -The imagery illustrative of what is taken from the soul, and how it is -taken, is two-fold, and follows in the one case a more transcendental, -in the other case a more immanental, conception, although in each case -God is represented as in motion, and the soul as abiding in the same -place and simply changing its qualitative condition under the influence -of that increasing approach of God and penetration by Him. - -The illustration for the more transcendental view is taken from the -sun’s light and fire’s heat and a covering. It is, as a matter of fact, -made up of three sayings: one more vague and subtle, and two more clear -and vivid, sayings. “The joy of a soul in Purgatory goes on increasing -day by day, owing to the inflowing of God into the soul, an inflowing -which increases in proportion as it consumes the impediment to its -own inflowing.”--God’s action upon the imperfect soul is as the sun’s -action upon “a covered object. The object cannot respond to the rays -of the sun which beat upon it (_reverberazione del sole_), not because -the sun ceases to shine,--for it shines without intermission,--but -because the covering intervenes (_opposizione_). Let the covering -be consumed away, and again the object will be exposed to the sun -and will answer to the rays in proportion as the work of destruction -advances.”--Now “Sin is the covering of the soul; and in Purgatory -this covering is gradually consumed by the fire; and the more it is -consumed, the more does the soul correspond and discover itself to the -divine ray. And thus the one (the ray) increases, and the other (the -sin) decreases, till the time (necessary for the completion of the -process) is over.”[288] - -It is clear that we have here three parallel passages, each with its -own characteristic image, all illustrative of an identical doctrine: -namely, the persistent sameness of God’s action, viewed in itself, and -of the soul’s reaction, in its essential, central laws, needs, and -aspirations; and the accidental, superficial, intrinsically abnormal, -inhibitory modification effected by sin in that action of God and in -the corresponding reaction of the soul.--The first, dimmer and deeper -saying speaks of an inflowing of God, with her usual combination of -fire-and-water images. We seem here again to have the ocean of the -divine fire, Itself pressing in upon the soul within It, yet here with -pain and oppression, in so far as the soul resists or is unassimilated -to It; and with peace and sustaining power, in so far as the soul -opens out to, and is or becomes similar to, It. We hear only of an -“impediment” in general, perhaps because the influx which beats against -it is imaged as taking place from every side at once.--The second -saying, the most vivid of the three, speaks of sun-light, and of how, -whilst this sun-light itself remains one and the same, its effect -differs upon one and the same object, according as that object is -covered or uncovered. Here we get a “covering,” since the shining is -naturally imaged as coming from one side, from above, only. But here -also it is the same sun which, at one time, does not profit, and, at -another time, gives a renewed life to one and the same object; and it -is clear, that either Catherine here abstracts altogether from the -question as to what consumes the covering, or that she assumes that -this consumption is effected by the sun itself.--The third saying is -the least simple, and is indeed somewhat suspicious in its actual form. -Yet here again we have certainly only one agent, in this case fire, -which again, as in the case of the influx and of the sun-light, remains -identical in itself, but varies in its effects, according as it does -or does not meet with an obstacle. The ray here is a ray primarily -of heat and not of light, but which is felt by the soul at first as -painful, destructive flame, and at last as peaceful, life-giving warmth. - -Now, amongst these three parallel sayings, it is that concerning -the inflowing, which leads us gently on to the more immanental -imagery--that of fire and dross. And this image is again given us in a -number of closely parallel variants which now constitute one formally -consecutive paragraph,--the third of Chapter X of the _Trattato_. -“Gold, when once it has been (fully) purified, can be no further -consumed by the action of fire, however great it be; since fire does -not, strictly speaking, consume gold, but only the dross which the gold -may chance to contain. So also with regard to the soul. God holds it -so long in the furnace, until every imperfection is consumed away. And -when it is (thus) purified, it becomes impassible; so that if, thus -purified, it were to be kept in the fire, it would feel no pain; rather -would such a fire be to it a fire of Divine Love, burning on without -opposition, like the fire of life eternal.”[289] Here the imperfection -lies no more, as a covering, on the surface, nor does the purifying -light or fire simply destroy that covering and then affect the bare -surface; but the imperfection is mixed up with the soul, throughout -the soul’s entire depth, and the purification reaches correspondingly -throughout the soul’s entire substance. Yet, as with the covering and -the covered object, so here with the dross and the impure gold, sin -is conceived of as a substance alien to that of the soul. And, so -far, God appears distinct from the fire: He applies it, as does the -goldsmith his fire to the gold. But already there is an indication -of some mysterious relation between the fire of Purgatory and that -of Heaven. For if the very point of the description seems, at first -sight, to be the miraculous character of the reward attached, more -or less arbitrarily, to the soul’s perfect purification, a character -indicated by the fact that now not even fire can further hurt the -soul, yet it remains certain that, the more perfect the soul, the more -must it perceive and experience all things according to their real and -intrinsic nature. - -Another conclusion to the same simile is: “Even so does the divine -fire act upon the soul: it consumes in the soul every imperfection. -And, when the soul is thus purified, it abides all in God, without any -foreign substance (_alcuna cosa_) within itself.”[290] Here God and -the fire are clearly one and the same. And the soul does not leave the -fire, nor is any question raised as to what would happen were it to be -put back into it; but the soul remains where it was, in the Fire, and -the Fire remains what it was, God. Only the foreign substance has been -burnt out of the soul, and hence the same Fire that pained it then, -delights it now. Here too, however, God and the soul are two different -substances; and indeed this Fire-and-Gold simile, strictly speaking, -excludes any identification of them. - -“The soul, when purified, abides entirely in God; its being is -God.”[291] Here we have the teaching as to the identity of her true -self with God, which we have already found further back. But the soul’s -purification and union with God which there we found illustrated by -the simile, so appropriate to this teaching, of the absorption of food -into the living body, we find indicated here by the much less apt -comparison of the transformation of gold by fire. For in this latter -case, the gold remains a substance distinct from the fire, whereas -the doctrine requires a simile such as a great pure fire expelling -all impurity from a small, impure fire, and then itself continuing -to live on, with this small fire absorbed into itself. But we shall -see later on, why, besides the intrinsic difficulty of finding an at -all appropriate simile for so metaphysical a doctrine, the imagery -always becomes so ambiguous at this point. We shall show that a -confluence of antagonistic doctrines, and some consequent hesitation -in the very teaching itself, contribute to keep the images in this -uncertain state. However, the possibly glossorial importation of this -most authentic teaching of hers into this place and simile only helps -to confirm the identity of the Fire with God, and the non-moving of -the soul, throughout this group of texts. For the gold abides in the -fire, as the soul abides in God; and the identification which is thus -established of the painful with the joyous fire, and of both with God, -is what will have suggested the introduction in this place of the -further identification of the soul with God. And it is the continued -abiding of the identical soul, a soul which has not moved spacially -but has changed qualitatively, in the identical fire, God, which has -helped to suggest the insertion in this place of the doctrine that the -soul, in its true essence, is identical with God. God, in this final -identification, would be the gold, the pure gold of the soul; and this -pure gold itself would generate a fire for the consumption of all -impurity, in proportion as such impurity gained ground within it. And, -in proportion as this consumption takes place, does the fire sink, and -leave nothing but the pure gold, the fire’s cause, essence, and end. In -any case, we have here one more most authentic and emphatic enforcement -of the teaching that the place of Purgatory is really a state; that its -painfulness is intrinsic; and that it is caused by the partial discord -between spirit and Spirit, and is ended by the final complete concord -between both. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -CATHERINE’S REMAINS AND CULTUS; THE FATE OF HER TWO PRIEST FRIENDS AND -OF HER DOMESTICS; AND THE REMAINING HISTORY OF ETTORE VERNAZZA - - -INTRODUCTORY. - -I now propose to attempt, in these last two biographical chapters, -to give, first, an account of the fate of Catherine’s remains and -possessions; and, next, of the vicissitudes in the lives of her -companions and immediate disciples. I shall thus range from the day -of her death on Sunday, September 15, 1510, up to 1551, the year of -the publication of the _Vita e Dottrina_; indeed, in the instance of -one particular disciple, up to 1587. And I shall do so, partly as a -further contribution to the knowledge of her own character and even -of her doctrine, this finest expression of what she spiritually was, -and of her influence upon her immediate little world; and partly in -preparation for the study of the influence of this _entourage_ back -upon the apprehension and presentation of her figure, upon the growth -of her “Legend,” and upon the contemporary and gradual, simultaneous -and successive, upbuilding of that complex structure, her “Life.” This -latter inquiry is probably too technical to interest the majority of -readers, and will be found relegated to the Appendix at the end of this -volume. - -I shall group all the facts, alluded to above, under five heads: her -burial, and the events immediately surrounding it; the different -removals of the remains, and the chief stages of her Official Cultus; -the fate of her two priest friends and advisers, and of her domestics; -the remaining history of her closest friend Ettore Vernazza; and -finally the long career, rich in autobiographical annotations, of -Ettore’s daughter, Catherine’s God-child, Tommasina (Battista) -Vernazza. We shall thus first finish up what is predominantly the -story of things, and of the more external, even although the most -splendid and authoritative, appreciation and authentication of her -holiness; and shall only then go back to what is (almost exclusively) -an interior history of souls, and one which will materially contribute -to our apprehension of Catherine’s special character and influence -and to a vivid perception of the advantages, strength, limits, and -difficulties of that particular kind of religion and of its attestation -and transmission. Ettore’s and Battista’s stories, however, are so full -that I must give three entire sections to Ettore, and one whole chapter -to Battista. - - -I. THE BURIAL AND THE EVENTS IMMEDIATELY SURROUNDING IT. SEPTEMBER 15 -TO DECEMBER 10, 1510. - - -1. _The Burial, September 16._ - -We have seen how, in the evening of Thursday, September 12, the already -dying Catherine had, in a Codicil, declared that she desired to be -buried wheresoever the priests Jacobo Carenzio and Cattaneo Marabotto -should decide. She died in the early morning of Sunday, the 15th; and -already on the next day, with the rapidity which, in such matters, -continues characteristic of southern countries, the burial took place. - -First, Dons Jacobo Carenzio and Cattaneo Marabotto declared, in a -written document, that “knowing the late Donna Caterinetta to have -ordained that her body should be buried in such a place as they -themselves might ordain: they, in consequence, willed and ordained that -her said body be buried in the Church of the Hospital.”[292] And next, -the funeral took place with a certain amount of pomp: for authentic -copies are still extant of the expenses incurred,--among other things -for wax candles, including three white-wax flambeaux, amounting in -all to over one hundred pounds weight of wax.[293] The evidently -highly emaciated, and hence naturally flexible, body had been enclosed -in a “fine coffin of wood,” and was now, at this first deposition, -put in “a resting-place (_deposito_) against one of the walls” of -the Church. There can be no doubt that this first resting-place -was not the monument of her husband Giuliano, although the latter -was still visible and readily accessible for a considerable time -after,--certainly up to 1522, and probably down to 1537.[294] - - -2. _Catherine’s possessions at the time of her death._ - -And next, on Tuesday the 17th, an Inventory was drawn up of the things -possessed by Catherine at the moment of her death, for the use of the -Hospital “Protectors,” the Trustees and Executors of her Will. An -authentic copy of it is still extant, and furnishes first-hand evidence -for the presence, up to the very last, and amongst the tangible objects -and small possessions in daily use, of memorials and expressions of -the three great stages of her life, and of the (in part successive and -past, in part simultaneous and still present) layers, or as it were -concentric rings, of her character. We thus get a vivid presentation -of that variety in unity and unity in variety, which is of the very -essence of the fully living soul; and we also see how incapable of -being otherwise than caricatured, if expressed in but a few hyperbolic -words, was even her spirit of poverty and of mortification, in this -her last stage, which, in some sense and degree, still retained and -summed up, and in other ways added a special touch of a large freedom -to, all the various previous stages of her life. - -The list gives the things according to the rooms in which they stood, -beginning with her own death-room, and, here, with her own bed. In this -“_the_ room” (_camera_) there are “a down coverlet” and “two large -mattresses”; “three” (other) “coverlets, one of vermilion silk” and -“two of” some simpler “white” material; “two blankets, one vermilion, -the other white”; “five-and-a-half pairs of sheets”; and “a pillow”: -all this for Catherine’s bed. And these clothes, together with those of -the bed of the “famiglia” (the maid Argentina), constitute, together -with the two bedsteads, absolutely all the chattels present in this -“bedroom” (_camera_). - -“In the” adjoining “room with the blue wall-hangings and the” -intervening “curtain,” there were: “three stuff gowns, one black and -the other Franciscan-colour,” _i.e._ grey; “two silk gowns”; “two -jackets, one” of which was again “of grey stuff, without a lining”; -seven other garments, “one being of black silk”; a very small amount -of body-linen; “three table-cloths and twenty-one towels”; “two silver -cups and saucers” and “six silver spoons”; “eight pewter candlesticks”; -“one casserole”; “four wooden basins”; “a kettle”; and a few other poor -odds-and-ends, for kitchen and sick-room use; and a three-legged table -and one or two other articles of simple furniture. - -And finally “a closet” (_recamera_) is mentioned, with a press in it. - -It is noticeable that here, again, no printed book or manuscript of -any kind is mentioned: but it is clear that she herself had, some -time after her Will of March 18, 1509, given away her dearly prized -“Maestà”-triptych to Christoforo di Chiavaro, for this picture nowhere -occurs in this list; and something of the same kind may have occurred -with one or two books. - -But if we group these things somewhat differently, we at once get a -vivid conception of the precise, and hence complex, sense in which -she can be said to have died very poor; and we get clear indications -of the three stages of her life. For the silver service is a survival -from her pre-conversion, worldly-wealthy days; the pewter candlesticks, -and the rough, sparse furniture, belong to her directly penitential -first-conversion period and mood; and the soft, warm, gay-coloured -coverlets and apparel of rich material are no doubt predominantly -characteristic of her last years when, largely under Don Marabotto’s -wise advice, she allowed herself a greater freedom in matters of -external mortification, and readily accepted bodily attentions and -comforts, reserving now the fulness of her attention to matters of -interior disposition and purification. She thus attained, by means of -and after all those previous forms of mortification, to a perfected, -evangelical liberty, in which the death to self was, if somewhat -different, yet even more penetrative than before. - -In the evening of this day, the Protectors of the Hospital formally -renew their acceptance of the office of Trustees and Executors, imposed -on them by Catherine’s Will of March 18 of the previous year.[295] - - -3. _Distribution of Catherine’s chattels._ - -And thirdly, there are the various sellings, re-sellings, and -distributions of her humble little collection of things, which take -place with the slow multiplicity of steps, dear to all corporations. -Workmen get paid, on November 22, for carrying her property on to the -market-place, for the sale. On the same day Argentina receives “such -things left to her in Catherine’s Will as Catherine had not herself -already given to her maid.” And, on December 10, the remainder of -that property, which had evidently been bought in by the Hospital on -that November day, is finally re-valued, bought, and divided up by -and between the Protectors, who take most of the large furniture; -Marabotto, who buys ten things (a pair of fire-irons, a wardrobe, and -a gilt article amongst them); her brother Lorenzo, who acquires four -things (amongst them “a woman’s work-box?--_capsetina a domina_”); and -the Rector, Don Carenzio, who becomes possessed of the down coverlet -and of a piece of vermilion cloth.[296] - -Here the absence of all buying by or for Vernazza or a representative -of his is noticeable. He was evidently still far away, busy in putting -his and his dead Saint-friend’s large ideas into practice; and his -three daughters, the eldest of whom was but thirteen, were being -brought up in two Convents. - -The fate of Catherine’s little house is too closely bound up with that -of one of her friends for its history to be easily severable from his. -It stands over to the third section. - - -II. THE DIFFERENT REMOVALS OF THE REMAINS, AND THE CHIEF STAGES OF HER -OFFICIAL CULTUS. - - -1. _Opening of the “Deposito.” Successive “translations.”_ - -Catherine’s remains were left “for about eighteen months” in their -first resting-place, (_deposito_) by one of the walls of the “Hospital -Church.” But then “it was found that the spot was damp, owing to a -conduit of water running under the wall. And the resting-place was -broken up, and the coffin was opened: and the holy body was found -entire from head to foot, without any kind of lesion.” “And so great a -concourse of people took place, to see the body, that the remains were -left exposed indeed for eight days; but, owing to a part of them having -been abstracted,” apparently at the opening of the coffin, “they were -exhibited shut off (from the crowd) in a side-chapel, where they could -be seen but not touched.” “And after this, the remains were deposited -high up, in a sepulchre of marble, in the Church of the Hospital.”[297] - -The interest of this removal consists in three sets of facts, the last -set being of capital importance among the determining causes of her -cultus and eventual canonization. For one thing, we still have the -accounts of the expenses incurred in connection with it, the Hospital -repaying, to two ladies (one of them Donna Franchetta, the wife of -Giuliano’s cousin Agostino Adorno) and to Don Marabotto, the sums -expended by them upon this translation and sepulchre: Marabotto’s -expenses being in part for “causing the stone for the sepulchre to be -brought.” These accounts are put down in the Hospital Cartulary under -July 10, nearly twenty-two months after the first deposition; but the -expenses may well have been incurred by those three friends, three or -four months before. We thus find two ladies (a relative and a friend), -and Don Marabotto, to the fore; but no mention of Carenzio, although -the latter was at the time, as we shall see, still Rector of the -Hospital and living in Catherine’s little house there. - -And secondly, it is on this occasion that mention is made of the -picture which I have more or less identified with the portrait -reproduced in this volume. There are two highly ambiguous entries -concerning it. “To account of the Sepulture of the late Donna -Caterinetta Adorna, for divers expenses incurred by Don Cattaneo -Marabotto: to wit, for a picture, and for causing the stone for the -sepulture to be brought, £7 10_s._”; “the Maintenance Committee -(_fabrica_) of the Hospital, for a picture erected in the Church of the -Hospital, above the Altar: to the credit of Don Cattaneo Marabotto, -£9 7_s._”[298] Now I take it that only one interpretation is at all a -probable one, viz. that both these entries, in the comfortably slipshod -way in which most of these accounts were kept, refer somehow to one and -the same picture; and that this picture was a portrait of Catherine. -For it is certain that the second account refers in some way to -Catherine and to this first transference of her remains; it is highly -unlikely that two pictures of herself would be produced and paid for, -on one and the same occasion; and it is most improbable that Marabotto -would care, on occasion of all this popular enthusiasm for his deceased -friend and penitent, to spend money on a picture representative of some -figure other than her own. - -The reader will note that the portrait which I thus connect with this -picture has not, as yet, got any nimbus, an absence hardly possible -in any much later picture.[299] And I take it that the picture was -placed above an altar, possibly even _the_ Altar (the High Altar) of -the Church, not only because _that_ was the most honorific place, but -also a little because the sepulchre had been placed too high up for the -relatively small picture to be sufficiently visible if attached to the -monument itself. - -And thirdly, we have here, in this week-long public veneration of the -remains, and in this erection of her picture over one of the Church -Altars, the first unmistakable beginnings of a popular cultus. For the -evidences and expressions of devotion to her, which I have recorded -at the time of her death, were all restricted to the circle of her -personal friends, and her first deposition remained, apparently, free -from any popular concourse or commotion. The series of cures attributed -to her intercession does not begin till this opening of the _deposito_. -Certainly the first, and possibly the first four, of these cases, as -given by Padre Maineri (1737), occurred in connection with this first -opening.[300] And it is certain that, if the (greater or lesser) -incorruption of the body was possibly nothing even physically so very -remarkable, given all the circumstances;[301] and if this fact left -the question of her sanctity intrinsically entirely where it found -the matter: yet the incorruption it was that gave the first, and, as -it turned out, an abiding impulse to the popular devotion. Indeed, -as we shall see later on, it is highly improbable that, but for this -condition of the body, a cultus would ever have arisen sufficiently -popular and permanent to lead on to her Beatification and Canonization. -But as things now stood, the movement had been set going, and it -continued on and on. - -The remaining translations were: a second one, into “an honourable -sepulchre lower down,” still before 1551, and already mentioned in -the first edition of the _Vita_ of that year; a third, in 1593, when -the remains were placed in their present position, but in a marble -monument, up in the choir, above the Church entrance; and a fourth and -fifth, in 1642 and 1694, when the body was placed, for the first and -second time, in shrines having glass sides, so that the relics could -be seen: that of 1694 is the one in which the remains still repose. -And in 1709, Cardinal Lorenzo Fiesco being Archbishop of Genoa, the -body was reclothed, on June 13, by ladies, amongst whom was a Maria -B. Fiesca.[302] We thus see how unbroken was, in this case, the -authentication of the remains, and how fresh remained, most naturally, -the interest taken in their cultus by Catherine’s most powerful family. - - -2. _Motives operating for Catherine’s Canonization._ - -It is indeed clear that Catherine’s greatness,--what made her a large, -rich mind and saintly spirit,--is one thing; and that Catherine’s -popularity,--what occasioned the official recognition of that -greatness,--is another thing. Her mind and teaching, her character and -special grace and _attrait_, were of rare width and penetration; in -part, they were strikingly original through just this their depth of -psychological and spiritual self-consistency and closeness of touch -with the soul’s actual life. And these points had profoundly impressed -a very small group of friends. And again, her work among the poor and -sick had been long, varied, and utterly devoted. And here she had been -widely appreciated. Yet these, the two lives which, between them, -constituted all her sanctity and significance, had, the former nothing, -and the latter but little and only mediately, to do with the forces -which led on eventually to her formal canonization. - -The motives for putting Rome in motion for this her canonization were, -no doubt, predominantly three. There was the popular devotion, which -apparently was first aroused, and was then instantly turned into -a downright cultus, by the discovery, in May or June 1512, of the -incorruption of her remains; and which from thenceforward continued -and grew, in connection with these relics and with the physical cures -and ameliorations attributed to the touch of the dead body, or of -its integuments, or even of the oil of the lamp which evidently soon -(presumably on occasion of that first outburst of devotion) was kept -lit before Catherine’s resting-place.[303] There was next the gratitude -of the Hospital authorities to Catherine for her life-work amongst -them; and their most natural and laudable wish to utilize her sanctity -and its recognition for the benefit of the ever-continuous and pressing -necessities of their vast institution and its Church. And finally, -there was the feeling of clanship and the active interest taken in the -matter by the (all but regal) family of the Fieschi, backed, as they -were, by the Republic of Genoa and various other sovereign bodies and -persons. - -The combination of these three things proved sufficiently powerful to -take the place of certain ordinary incentives which were wanting, and -even to overcome certain unusual difficulties which were undoubtedly -present, in the case. Certain incentives were lacking. For there was, -in this instance, no Religious Order to put forward and to work, with -all the continuous, unresting, unhasting momentum of an institution, -for a saintly subject of its own, a subject whose glorification would -bring honour and profit to the body from which she sprang, and an -accession of popularity to the special object and work of that Order. -And certain obstacles were present. For few characters, interior -ideals and explicit teachings, could be found more _sui generis_, more -profoundly, even daringly original and all re-constitutive, and less -immediately understandable and copyable, than are these of Catherine. -But the enthusiasm and self-interest of the populace, of a charitable -institution, and of a powerful family, replaced what was thus lacking -and overcame what was thus operative; and the directly visible and -universally understandable part of her life and example, was allowed to -outweigh any objection that could be urged on the ground of the less -obvious and more difficult, far more original and profound, sides of -her special personality and piety. - -And a matter which further helped on the canonization was that when -Pope Urban VIII, in 1625, published his Bull forbidding thenceforth, -under grave penalties, that any one, “even though he have died with the -reputation of extraordinary Christian perfection, be called ‘Blessed’ -or ‘Saint,’ until he has first been declared to be such, and to merit -religious worship, by the Holy Roman See”; and ordaining that the same -rule should be practised concerning persons already deceased, who were -currently recognized as saints: he excepted, with regard to this second -class, those who, “during an immemorial course of time” previous to the -publication of this Bull, had been venerated as saints by the people, -without opposition or complaint on the part of the Church authorities. -For this “time immemorial” was considered by theologians to amount, as -a minimum, to a hundred years. And since religious worship had begun -to be paid to her certainly not later than 1512, and the title “Beata” -had already then been publicly given to her, Catherine continued, even -after Pope Urban’s Bull, to be invoked and venerated as “Blessed,” with -the knowledge, though without any positive and express approbation, of -the Roman Church.[304] - - -3. _Canonization, 1737._ - -But the devotees of Catherine, naturally enough, were not content -with less than a formal approbation, and, as usual, the obtaining of -the latter was a very long and elaborate affair. At the beginning of -1630 a petition was sent in to Cardinal Cesarini in Rome; who, after -much examination, gave his opinion on May 24, 1636. There the matter -again rested for twenty-four years.--But in 1670 the very active -and able Florentine, Cardinal Azzolini, (the same whose interesting -correspondence with that undisciplined and wayward, but thoroughly -sincere and much-maligned woman, Queen Christina of Sweden, has been -recently published,) became the “Ponente,” the Advocate, for the -cause.[305] The Cardinal wrote in 1672 to Archbishop Spinola of Genoa -for his opinion; and the latter, after much further examination, -declared that the cultus of Catherine, having existed for over a -century before Pope Urban’s Bull, she ought, in accordance with the -tenor of that Bull, to be maintained in possession of that same cultus. -The Congregation of Rites approved of this sentence on March 30, 1675, -and Clement X, the now eighty-five years old Altieri Pope, gave it his -assent. Thus Catherine had a full official recognition as “Beata.” - -Next came the examination of her doctrine and “writings,” from -1676 onwards, culminating in their approbation, for purposes of -Canonization, by Pope Innocent XI (Odescalchi) in 1683. It is this -investigation which, with some of the discussions concerning her -virtues, adds considerably to our materials and means for judging of -her teaching. I have already touched on these discussions; and they -will occupy us again in the second volume. - -And then, in 1682, Cardinal Azzolini, supported by King Louis XIV of -France and the King of Spain, again presses Rome,--this time with a -view to reaching Canonization. And on Cardinal Azzolini dying, Cardinal -Imperiali became second “Ponente” of the cause. In 1690 the City of -Genoa obtained leave from the Congregation of Rites for the recitation -of the Office and for the Celebration of the Mass of the Common of -Widows, in honour of Blessed Catherine; in 1733 an Office and a Mass -proper to herself were approved; and in 1734 her eulogy was inserted in -the Roman Martyrology, under date of March 22 (her conversion-day): “At -Genoa, the Blessed Catherine, widow, distinguished by her contempt of -the world and love of God.” - -But meanwhile the long process as to the heroic degree of her virtues -had issued in the Report of the Commission in 1716; and in the -affirmative decree of the Congregation of Rites, confirmed by Clement -XII (Corsini) in 1733. - -And, before the conclusion of this investigation of her virtues, the -examination of the miracles ascribed to her intercession had been -begun in Genoa in 1730, by a deputation consisting of the Archbishop -De-Franchi and two Bishops, sitting in the Archiepiscopal Palace; -and six miracles were, in 1736, approved as valid, from amongst the -numerous cases alleged to have occurred in 1730. And then three from -amongst these six miracles were finally approved by Rome, on April 5, -1737, as efficient towards Canonization. - -And at last, on April 30 of the same year, Feast of St. Catherine of -Siena, Pope Clement, “in order that the faithful of Christ may, in -Blessed Catherine, have a perfect example of all the virtues, and -especially of the love of God and of their neighbour; and that a -new honour and ornament may shine forth for the Republic of Genoa; -orders the present Decree for the Canonization of the said Blessed -Catherine,--a Canonization which has still to be carried out,--to be -expedited and published.”--And on May 18 following, on the Feast of -the Holy Trinity, the same Pope performed, in the Basilica of St. -John Lateran, the function of the Canonization of Blessed Catherine, -together with that of three other Beati: the two Frenchmen, Vincent -de Paul, Founder of the Congregation of the Mission (the Lazarists) -(1576-1660), and Jean François Regis, a Jesuit Mission-Preacher in -the Huguenot parts of France (1597-1640); and the Italian Giuliana -Falconieri, Foundress of the Third Order of Servites (1270-1341).[306] - -It was now, on this canonization-day, over two hundred and sixteen -years since Catherine Fiesca Adorna, that keen and ardent spirit, had -flown to God, her Love. We must return to those earlier times. - - -III. THE FATE OF CATHERINE’S PRIEST FRIENDS. - -_Introductory._ - -In thus reverting to the period which immediately succeeded Catherine’s -death, and to the predominantly obscure and humble persons who had -directly known her well, we bid adieu, indeed, to things massive, -fixed, and final: yet we exchange the description of what, after all, -was but an authoritative declaration of accomplished facts, for the -study of that alone directly soul-stirring thing, the picture and -drama of living, energizing human souls; of how these souls were being -influenced by a greater one than themselves; and again of how these, -thus influenced, lesser minds and hearts transmitted, developed, and -coloured the tradition of the life to which they owed so much. - -Now the effect, or at least the record of the effect, of the conception -of Catherine formed by her two Priest friends and by her domestics -back upon her transmitted image and upon the growth of her Legend, is, -apart from the indications in the _Vita_ already given or still to be -considered, upon the whole, but slight. Still, as we shall eventually -find, the few facts as to the subsequent lives of these persons, which -shall now be given, are of very distinct use in appraising their -respective shares in the gradual constitution of the _Vita e Dottrina_. - - -1. _Don Carenzio, 1510-1513._ - -I take Don Jacopo Carenzio first, since he was the Priest in actual -attendance upon Catherine at the last, and because he now, no doubt -immediately after the funeral or at latest on the day of the removal of -her chattels to the market-place, became possessed, as we shall see, of -Catherine’s little house. He was thus the one who alone could continue -and augment a cultus as strictly local as even Argentina’s had been, -during those weeks, perhaps months, of sole night-charge of her dying -mistress in these very rooms. - -The identification of the building is complete. For as far back as -October 6, 1497, not long after Giuliano’s death,--he was still alive -on July 14,--the Protectors of the Hospital referred to their “grant -to Catherine, during her lifetime, of the enjoyment and use of a -house with a greenhouse, forming part of the Hospital.” And in this -greenhouse she, on the evening of Sunday, March 18, 1509, had, in the -presence of Vernazza and four other witnesses, dictated her Fourth Will -to Battista Strata. It was, then, of a size sufficient to render it -worth mentioning, and it was evidently closed in. Now there is a legal -instrument, dated Saturday, August, 30, 1511, drawn up at a meeting -held by the four “Protectors,” “in the chief (sitting-) room of the -Residence of the Rector, in which the late Donna Caterinetta was wont -to live.” And in this they declare that, “seeing that the Reverend Don -Jacopo Carenzio, the Rector, is about to go to his home at Diano, for -the purpose of carrying out a matter of the greatest importance to -himself, and is shortly to return from thence, and that he wishes to -persevere throughout his life in the said office of Rector; and since -they desire that he should willingly hasten his return, and should be -able to persevere with full confidence, and should not, as long as -he lives, be moved from this room together with the whole building -contiguous with it, to the room which, with its appurtenant building, -is at present in the course of erection as the official residence of -the Rector; they have altogether conceded to the above-named Reverend -Jacopo, Rector, present and accepting, the said room together with the -whole building belonging to this room, for him to hold and inhabit -throughout his life, together with the greenhouse.”[307] - -Here three points are of interest. Don Carenzio is, then, a native -of the little Diano Castello on the Western Riviera hillside, some -fifty English miles from Genoa and some twenty short of San Remo; -and must have belonged to some humble family in that insignificant -little place. His origin is thus in marked contrast to Marabotto’s, -and still more to Vernazza’s. And next, it is clear that the house -and greenhouse inhabited and used by Don Carenzio till his death are -identical with those tenanted by Catherine, ever since at least the -death of Giuliano. And thirdly, it is equally clear that this house was -in no part identical with the two rooms still shown as the Saint’s. For -these latter are high up from the ground; do not now form, and probably -never formed, part of a disconnected house; and they no doubt stand on -another site. The little house will have been demolished at latest in -1780, when the present great quadrangle was built.[308] - -Now here, in these rooms full of the memory of Catherine, Don Carenzio -will, not unreasonably, have hoped to live during many years. For it is -not likely that he was older than, or indeed as old as, Don Marabotto, -since he was now occupying that same office of Rector which Marabotto -had held some six years previously. And yet Marabotto did not die till -eighteen years later, whereas Carenzio’s death came soon. For his -funeral took place on January 7, 1513, for which day there is an entry -in the Hospital Cartulary for the cost of twenty-three pounds-weight -of wax candles,--less than one-fourth the amount used at Catherine’s -obsequies; and for that of the Priest’s vestments in which the body was -robed and buried.[309] - -It seems unlikely that Carenzio was not buried in the Hospital Church, -seeing that he died whilst, apparently, still _ex-officio_ Rector of -the Hospital. But, if he was interred there, his monument, like that -of Giuliano, was cut off and buried away in and with the Church end -in 1537, or was covered up in some restoration; for there is no trace -of it either in the Church itself or in any book treating of the -sepulchral monuments of Genoa. - -It is remarkable also that, though he had been the one priest present -at Catherine’s death, and had tenanted Catherine’s own rooms throughout -the two years and two or three months since her death, and had, -alongside of Marabotto, been appointed by Catherine herself as the -person to determine the place of her sepulture: his name nowhere occurs -in connection with the plan for the opening of her _deposito_ some -eighteen months after her death; nor with the execution of that plan; -nor with any of the consequent initiations of a public cultus. It is -impossible to doubt that we have here some little counter jealousy and -return exclusion, a sort of answer by Marabotto to his, Marabotto’s, -own enforced absence from the death-chamber and his twenty-four hours’ -ignorance of his Penitent’s death, which we had to note in its proper -place. Poor little human frailties which may have appeared less petty -and more completely excusable at close quarters than they look at this -distance of time! I take it that, if there was a deliberate exclusion -of Carenzio, the ceremony of opening the resting-place will have been -timed to tally with some absence of the Rector,--say, on another visit -to his native Diano. - - -2. _Don Marabotto, 1510-1528._ - -As to Don Cattaneo Marabotto, I have not been able to discover much. We -have already seen how he bought ten of Catherine’s chattels on December -10, after her death. On July 7, 1511, he pays over to Catherine’s old -servant, the maid Maria (Mariola Bastarda), her late mistress’s little -legacy, in a form to be described presently. - -But the most important facts concerning him--apart from his share in -the _Vita_, which shall be considered at length hereafter--are the -following three. There is, first, the fact (already dwelt upon) that -he, and apparently he alone, initiated, or at least led and directed, -the plan of opening the _deposito_, exposing the body, giving it a -marble sarcophagus, and erecting a picture over an altar in the Church -to Catherine. And next, that “still in 1523 Argentina del Sale was his -servant,”--she had evidently then, on Catherine’s death in 1510, become -his attendant.[310] And thirdly, that he did not die till 1528.[311] - -There seems to be but little doubt that he was, at least slightly, -Catherine’s junior. Yet already on his first intercourse with her, -he, the Rector of the Hospital, must have been a fully mature man. I -suppose him to have been born somewhere about 1450; in which case he -will have been about seventy-eight at the time of his death. - -In any case, he lived long enough to see and hear much of a kind to -console and strengthen his devotion to Catherine and his faith in the -self-rejuvenating powers of the Church, and much of a nature to dismay -and alarm the gentle, peaceable old man. For there were the opening of -the coffin; the incorruption; the popular concourse and enthusiasm; -the graces and the cures of May to July 1512. And there were Luther’s -ninety-five Theses nailed to the University Church of Wittenberg, on -the Eve of All-Saints, 1517; and Pope Leo X’s condemnation of forty -of them in 1520, and amongst them three Theses which concerned the -doctrine of Purgatory, one of which must have seemed strangely like -one of Catherine’s own contentions. And there were the books of Henry -VIII of England and of Erasmus against Luther, in 1522, 1524, and in -Italy the foundation of the Capuchin Order in 1527; there were, too, -the Peasants’ War and Luther’s marriage in Germany in 1525, and, in -1527, the sacking of Rome by the Imperial troops. And through all this -world-wide, epoch-making turmoil and conflict we think of him, probably -not simply from our lack of documents, as leading a quiet, obscure, -somewhat narrow existence; yet one redeemed from real insignificance by -his silent watchfulness and action, and still more by his writing, in -honour of his large-souled Penitent, ever so sincerely felt by him as -indefinitely greater than himself. - -I do not know where he was buried. It was not, however, in the Hospital -Church; for in that case there would have been some entry in the books -of the expenses incurred in connection with his funeral. - - -IV. THE FATE OF CATHERINE’S THREE MAID-SERVANTS. - -As to Catherine’s three maid-servants the facts that can still be -traced are as follow. - - -1. _Benedetta._ - -The widow and Franciscan Tertiary Benedetta Lombarda, although her -name had continued to appear in the documents from Giuliano’s Will in -1496 down to Catherine’s last will of March 1509, disappears after -this latter date entirely from sight. Since both Mariola and Argentina -reappear in the Hospital books, (although Mariola had, like Benedetta, -ceased to serve Catherine at the last), it looks as though Benedetta -had died between the Will of March 1509 and Catherine’s death in -September 1510. Yet it is possible that Catherine herself handed over -to Benedetta her little share in the former’s money and chattels; and -that Benedetta is no more mentioned after her mistress’s death because, -unlike Mariola and Argentina, she did not continue to live in and -belong to the Hospital, whose accounts alone are our extant sources of -information for the other two servants. - - -2. _Mariola._ - -But as to Mariola and Argentina, and their lives after 1510, we do -know something. Mariola (Maria) Bastarda had, on leaving Catherine’s -service, (probably only some weeks, but possibly some months before -her mistress’s death), become one of the servants, or under-nurses -(_filia_), of the Hospital; and, on July 7 of the following year (1511) -she was clothed a Novice in the Convent of Bridgettines in Genoa, with -the money left to her in Catherine’s Will.[312] - -The latter fact is interesting as showing how purposely vague and -ambiguous, and how little capable of being pressed, are at least -some of the statements of the _Vita_, if taken as they stand and -prior to any distinction of documents and of their varying degrees -of trustworthiness. For there we read, after the scene where the -evil spirit within the maid declares Catherine’s true surname to be -“Serafina”: “this possessed person (_spiritata_) was endowed with a -lofty intelligence, and lived to the end in virginity.” Who would -readily guess that we have here to do with little Mariola? The passage -is, I think, in part modelled upon Acts xxi, 9: “And he” (Philip the -Evangelist, one of the seven Deacons) “had four daughters virgins, -who did prophesy.” Even so then did Catherine, the teacher, have “a -spiritual daughter,” a virgin, who “prophesied,” divined and announced, -the true character of her mistress.--“We believe,” continues the -_Vita_, “that the Lord had given her this spirit to keep her humble. -She finished her life in a holy manner.” Who would guess that this -meant profession as a Nun? The point is, I take it, kept vague in part -to make the insertion of the words which follow possible. “Nor did the -evil spirit ever depart from her, till well-nigh the very end, when she -was about to die.” It is evident that this cannot be pressed: and that -either the attacks continued to the end, but were rare and slight; or -that they were serious and frequent, but ceased a considerable time -before her death. For, though we do not know when she died, we have no -right to assume, in evidently still so young a person, that death came -soon. - - -3. _Argentina._ - -And Argentina appears in several documents. So in an entry of the -Hospital Cartulary for November 22, 1510, as to the value of the things -then handed over to her in accordance with Catherine’s Will. So again -in three legal documents drawn up for her and in her presence,--a Will -of October 1514, a Codicil of some later (unspecified) date, and a -second Will of January 15, 1522. In the Codicil she doubles the little -sum she had left to the Hospital in 1514; and in the last document -she declares her wish to be buried “in the Church of the Annunciata, -in the monument (vault) of the late Giuliano Adorno, or in such other -as may seem good to …”; and leaves moneys “for Masses to be said for -her soul, by two of the Brethren of the Monastery of San Nicolò in -Boschetto.”[313] - -This group of papers is interesting. For we see from it how even an -obscure little serving-woman was wont, in Italy, the classic country -of Law and Lawyers, and during these claimful, pushing times, to have -Wills and Codicils drawn up for her. We perceive, too, how proud and -fond Argentina remained of her former avocation of servant to Giuliano, -since only he and not his Saint-wife lay in that vault; and how, -nevertheless, an uncertainty possesses her mind as to whether this -can or will be carried out--no doubt owing to the fact that the vault -had not received the remains of his wife, and had not indeed probably -been opened again at all since his death, twenty-five years before. -And we can note how Argentina, together with, and no doubt at least in -part because, of her late mistress, has an affection for the Monastery -and Pilgrimage Church of San Nicolò, on that wooded hill, so near to -Catherine’s former villa. - -And Argentina appears finally in that list of conclusions (already -referred to in Marabotto’s case) as continuing to live in the -Hospital; and as still living in it in 1523; and, similarly, as -continuing in the capacity of servant to Don Marabotto. I have already -pointed out the difficulties inherent in this statement, but believe it -to be correct. Yet it would be of considerable importance if we could -reach lower down, and could fix the exact death-date of poor Marco del -Sale’s ardent-minded, imaginative little widow. Since she was doubtless -considerably, I think quite twenty years, younger than Marabotto, and -since even the latter lived on, we know, till 1528, six years after -this Will, there was nothing, in the matter of actual age, to prevent -her living on up to 1550 or beyond. And circumstances connected with -the growth of Catherine’s legend seem to point, as we shall find, to -Argentina having died in any case after Marabotto, and probably not -before 1547. Similarly, Catherine herself did not die till twenty-six -years after her first Will (1484-1510). - - -V. THE TWO VERNAZZAS: THEIR DEBT TO CATHERINE, AND CATHERINE’S DEBT TO -THEM. - -We now move on from these four figures which, seen against the -living background of those strenuous times, appear indeed small and -contracted; and which, in relation to Catherine, appear rather as -a mere memory and mechanical continuation of her limitations, and -specially of the phenomenal accidents and relative monotony of her -sick-room period, than as a rich and vigorous, because truly personal, -expansion and re-application of her many-sided action, breadth and -warmth, and human practicality, during the times of her fullest -self-expression. Such a new facing of the new problems, with a strength -both old and new, enkindled indeed at her light and warmth, and yet -developed also from the vigorously fresh centres of other deep hearts -and virile minds and wills, we must now attempt to picture, in the -case of the two greatest of Catherine’s disciples, Ettore Vernazza and -his eldest daughter Battista. And yet if, in the former four cases, -while the results of this influence appeared few and insignificant, the -actual fact and source of this influence were plain beyond all cavil: -in these latter two instances we have, indeed, a rich crop of thoughts -and acts, of wisdom and of heroism, but then it is mostly impossible -to sort out what is here the direct and unmistakable outcome of -Catherine’s influence. - -The great, open, spiritual and even temporal, battlefield, if not -of Europe at least of Italy; the abuses and tyrannies, but also the -necessity and the power for good, of governments; and the strenuous, -tragic, and transformatory conflicts of single wills within their own -soul’s world, and again with other wills, both single and combined: all -this lies spread out here like a map before us, seen from the bracing -heights of time. There is nothing here, at least in the Ettore’s case, -that the most intolerantly robust, or even the most hysterically -would-be strong, mind could suspect of sickliness. And yet, if -undoubtedly much of all this fruitful virility in Catherine’s closest -friend, and in Catherine’s God-daughter, proceeds from Catherine -herself, it nevertheless springs up and grows within them, not as an -avowed, nor probably, for the most part, even as conscious, imitation -or reminiscence. - -Thus here again we get an impressive instance of one profound sense -in which the grain of wheat of any great and wholesome influence must -die. For only if and when broken up, selected from, and assimilated to -and within, another mind’s and heart’s life and system, can that older -living organism, which yet was, in the first instance, so moving just -because of its unique organization round a centre possible only to -that one other soul, truly and permanently develop and enrich a living -centre not its own. And so in this case too: Catherine’s influence is -all the more real in Ettore and Battista, because the latter are in -no sense simple copies of the former. She has lived on in them, at -the cost of becoming in part ignored, in part absorbed, by them: and -continues to influence them through certain elements of her life that -have been assimilated, and through the reinterpreted image of that -life’s historic reality, an image which is ever reinviting them to do -and to be, _mutatis mutandis_, what she herself had done and been. - -But, indeed, (even apart from all direct influence exercised by -Catherine’s personality upon them, or by them upon Catherine’s legend), -these two lives are interesting as further authentic illustrations of -Catherine’s school and spirit, and, indeed, of the mystical element of -religion in general. - -I shall first take the father, devoting three sections to him. - - -VI. ETTORE VERNAZZA’S LIFE, FROM 1509 TO 1512. - -_Introductory._ - -We possess, if few, yet quite first-rate materials for the -reconstruction of the remaining part of Vernazza’s life. For there are -his own testamentary provisions as to the disposition of his property, -(as elaborate and vividly characteristic as Mr. Cecil Rhodes’s), drawn -up in 1512 and 1517, and occupying twelve closely-printed octavo pages; -and there is a long, homely, and admirably realistic description of his -life and character, written by Battista, not, it is true, till 1581, -when she was eighty-four years of age, and nearly sixty years after her -father’s death, but which is, there is no reason to doubt, perfectly -truthful, generally accurate, and all the more moving, in that the -living man and his large-hearted heroism were thus continuing to touch -and inspire his daughter, at the very moment of her writing, with a -finely restrained emotion, of deeds and personalities witnessed, by -her own eyes and spirit, over half a century before. I shall take the -several documents, not each as they stand but piecemeal, according to -the dates of the events recorded or of the legal act performed. - - -1. _Ettore’s married life; and thought of the monastic state._ - -“My Father and Mother,” writes Battista, “lived together” from 1496 -to 1509 “in the greatest peace, since they wished each other every -kind of good; so that I do not remember ever having heard one word of -dissension pass between them.--And although my Mother was a beautiful -and attractive young woman, and was loved by persons deserving of -esteem, yet she would stay at home, alone, with her children. And my -Father acted similarly, except when he was obliged to go out on some -business. Otherwise I do not remember having ever noticed either of -them going out to some late party (_veglià_), as is the custom in -Genoa.”--And she tells how “he was so abstemious” in the matter of -food, “that he was wont strictly to limit the amount of bread that -he ate. But my Mother, noticing this, had the breads baked very -substantial.” - -“And when my Mother died” in the spring of 1509, “my Father thought of -becoming a Lateran (Augustinian) Canon. But, on asking the advice of -Padre Riccordo da Lucca,” (I take it, himself a Lateran Canon,) “who -was just then preaching in Genoa with very great fervour, the latter -did not encourage him to carry out his intention, observing, as he -did, my Father’s inclination for founding works of charity.” And her -father proved docile. Indeed she says of him generally that “he greatly -mortified his self-will, and for this reason had put himself under -obedience to a priest, who had the reputation of being exceptionally -devoted (_molto buono_), and obeyed him as though he had been the very -voice of God.” “And my Father then gave up his own house, and went to -live in rooms which had been got ready for him in the Hospital for -Incurables, of which he was one of the Managers and indeed one of the -first _Builders_. And here he always lived, when he was in Genoa; here -he died; and this institution he made his heir.”[314] - -Here it is interesting to note the similarities and differences -between this union, so happy and thus blessed with three children, and -Catherine’s marriage, so unhappy and childless; between his thought -of a religious vocation after his marriage was over, and Catherine’s -before hers was begun; and between his fifteen years of residence in -the midst of the incurable poor at the _Chronici_, and Catherine’s -similar, though earlier and longer, life surrounded by the sick poor -at the _Pammatone_. There is some likeness, too, in the matter of -corporal mortification; although, with Vernazza, it is less acute, -but is apparently kept up throughout his life, whilst with Catherine -the active bodily mortifications are very prominent whilst they last, -but are kept up thus for but a few years. As to obedience, we have -here, for Vernazza, a more authoritative account than are any of the -general statements on the same point with regard to Catherine; but in -Catherine’s case many concrete instances give us a definite idea as to -the character and limits of this docility, whereas all such instances -are, in Vernazza’s case, restricted to the above incident alone. Yet -this one example of his obedience shows how largely conceived, how -simply divinatory and stimulative of his own deepest (although as -yet but half-born) ideals, how ancillary to his own grace-impelled -self-determination, and hence how truly liberating, were this direction -and docility. The Venerable Cardinal de Berulle’s determination of -Descartes to a philosophical career, and St. Philip Neri deciding -Cardinal Baronius to write his entirely open-minded, indeed severe, -_Ecclesiastical Annals_, would doubtless be true parallels to this -particular relationship. - - -2. _Ettore’s great Will of 1512._ - -We have already seen that Ettore was away from Genoa from about -September 10, 1510, onwards, and that he was far away at the time of -Catherine’s death. He may well have been away most of the year 1511, -nor is there indeed any indication that he was in Genoa at the opening -of Catherine’s _deposito_ in May to July 1512. But he was certainly -there in October 1512, for on the 16th of that month he drew up a -munificent and far-sighted deed of gift, of one hundred shares of the -Bank of St. George, to various charitable and public purposes. - -Vernazza had already previously provided for his three daughters; -and now orders that the interest of these other shares (a capital -amounting, at the time, to the value of some £10,400) should, for the -first nine years, be used by the “Protectors” of the Incurables for the -benefit of that Institution, which thus occupies the first place in his -solicitudes. - -And then these shares should be allowed to multiply, by means of their -accumulated interests and of the reinvestments of the latter, till they -had reached the number of five hundred shares; and then, if and when -an epidemic arose and the citizens fled from the city, the income of -these shares for three years should be given to the Board of Health, -for the use of those suffering from the epidemic. And when the shares -had become two thousand, a commodious Lazaretto-house should be bought -or built, with the income of not more than ten years. And after this, -when the shares had become six thousand, one half or more of their -interest should go towards the keep and nursing of the patients in this -Lazaretto. - -After these three stages devoted to the victims of the Plague, he -determines the point at which the interest of the moneys shall be -applied successively to providing marriage portions for honest poor -girls of Genoa and of his home villages of Vernazza, Arvenza, and -Cogoleto, preference being always given to the large clan of Vernazzi; -to providing means for honest poor girls desiring to enter Convents -that keep their Rule (_monasteria observantiae_), up to £100 each, with -a similar preference as in the previous case. - -And then he attends to the poor in general. To providing extra pay -for the Notaries and Clerks of the “Uffizio della Misericordia,” “on -condition that they devote all their time to the interests of the poor -exclusively; and that they make diligent inquiry as to the means of the -poor and their several characters, and find out whether they are in -real want or not, and draw up a book in which all the poor, individuals -and families, shall be inscribed clearly and by name,--in each case -with a note indicating whether they belong to the first, second, or -third degree of necessitousness.” To paying two Physicians and two -Surgeons, for otherwise entirely gratuitous service of the sick poor -alone, and doubling this pay during the prevalence of an epidemic, -“but strictly enforcing the loss, in salary, of double the amount of -any moneys they can be proved to have accepted from their patients.” -All this, together with these four Doctors’ names, to be annually -proclaimed in the streets by the town-crier. To paying a Dispenser and -instituting a Dispensary, exclusively for the sick poor and entirely -gratuitous, up to £2,000 a year for the latter. To appointing two -Advocates and two Solicitors, for the exclusive and gratuitous service -of the poor, in any and all cases of law-suits and molestations. The -same proclamation as with the Doctors, to be made in this matter also. -And to maintaining foundling boys and girls of Genoa, under provisions -which are carefully laid down. - -And then he turns to the three Institutions and their like with which -he, as notary, as father and as philanthropist, has been specially -identified. He fixes the point when two lectures in Philosophy or -Theology, one by a Dominican and another by a Franciscan, are to be -instituted, for every working day, in the Chapel of the Notaries of -Genoa; when one free meal a month is to be provided for eight monastic -and charitable institutions, amongst which are the Franciscans of -the SS. Annunziata, the Benedictines of San Nicolò in Boschetto, -the Canonesses of S. Maria delle Grazie, and the Hospital for -Incurables,--“but the expenses are not to exceed £600 a year” (about -six guineas each meal)--“nor is money to be given, but the eatables -themselves are to be bought for, and given to, the institutions”; and -when a Superintendent (_Sindaco_) of the Incurables is to be appointed, -with £100 pay a year. - -And then he comes back to the poor in general; and thinks also, -(somewhat like unto his and Catherine’s ideal, St. Paul as “a citizen -of no mean city,”) of the external appearance and utility of his native -town of Genoa. The point is fixed when they are to “pay for the poor -their hardest imposts, especially those on food”; and when they are to -“repair, decorate, and enlarge the Cathedral Church of San Lorenzo,” -and to “build a harbour-mole, improve the harbour, and attend to the -decoration and look of the town (_ornamentis civitatis_), according to -their discretion.” - -And he then finishes up with a characteristic reversion to efficacious -solicitude for his clan, by marriage benefits for his young kinswomen -in the future and by thought for his ancestors and predecessors in -the past; and with a no less characteristic divinatory greatness of -mind, by the creation of a kind of People’s College or Working-man’s -University, which appears here curiously wedged in between the thoughts -for his clan in the future and in the past. For he determines the -points when the Protectors shall again provide for marrying honest poor -girls of his three home villages, and for comforts for the prisoners at -Christmas and Easter; when they are to “buy a large and well-situated -house, and therein organize a public course of studies, with four -Doctors of Law, four very learned Physicians, and two Masters of -Grammar and Rhetoric, who shall, all ten, be each bound to deliver one -lecture on every working day, and to devote all the rest of their time -to the interests of the poor”; and when finally they are to provide for -“Masses for his ancestors and predecessors,”--Masses for himself and -immediate belongings having been already, no doubt, provided for in his -previous Will, since we find such provisions repeated in his last Will, -to be given later on.[315] - -We thus get here a persistent preoccupation with the most manifold -interests of the poor; a shrewd knowledge of men, and careful -provisions calculated to rouse their indolence and to check their -self-seeking; an utterly unsentimental, realistic, Charity-Organization -sort of spirit shown in the insistence upon a careful and complete -knowledge of the real degree and kind of want, and of the precise means -appropriate for helping the various kinds of poor; a high estimate of -knowledge, which he desires to offer to all, according to their various -capacities and needs; and lastly, an entire freedom from pietism, for -he thinks of, and provides for, harbour-works and the beautifying of -the town. There is a large, open-air, operative, sanely optimistic and -statesmanlike spirit about it all. - -And if all this is in full keeping with, and but expands and -supplements, the tenacious realism of a born organizer and -administrator: the soaring idealism and universalism of his -saint-friend Catherine’s stimulation, and his and her joint experiences -and interests, are also directly suggested to us. For there is the -special stress laid on the plague-stricken, whom they had tended -together in 1493; the interest in physicians and in drugs for the -poor, an interest in which she must have preceded him by twenty years -or more; and the repeated preoccupation with the marrying of poor -young women, and, next after it, with the convent-dowries of girls in -socially similar circumstances, in each case especially of kinswomen -of his own. This preoccupation was no doubt occasioned chiefly by -the thought of his own most happy marriage and of his own children, -the two elder now already well settled as Nuns, but the third still -possibly to be married; yet we are also vividly reminded of Catherine’s -own repeated occupation with the marrying of relatives of her own, -and Limbania’s and her own early entrance, and wish to enter, into -the Religious state. And then his benefactions include Catherine’s -Hospital Church, her favourite Boschetto Church, and that Convent of -the Grazie, the scene of her own conversion and the home of her sister -Limbania, as well as of his daughters Battista and Daniela. But indeed -the whole character of the outlook, in its successive absorption in, -each time, just _one_ particular task; in its occupation with succour -in proportion to the divinely ordained and ready-found bonds and ties -of nature, bonds and ties so dear to the omnipresent God; and in its, -nevertheless, in nowise restricting itself to this interest, but moving -on and on, distance appearing beyond distance, with love and welcome -for all the heroisms and helplessnesses: is all marked with Catherine’s -imperial spirit of boundless self-donation. - - -VII. ETTORE IN ROME AND NAPLES; HIS SECOND WILL; HIS WORK IN THE -GENOESE PRISONS. - - -1. _Ettore in Rome._ - -And perhaps already in 1513, but, if so, not before March of that year -(the date of Pope Leo’s accession), Vernazza was in Rome,--hardly, I -think, for the first time. And Battista again tells us, in her long -letter of 1581, how that “the incurables in Rome”--which was then, at -the beginning of Giovanni de’ Medici’s (Leo X’s) reign, the brilliant -centre of the Renaissance at its zenith--“were left to lie in baskets, -moaning” for alms, “in the Churches. It was piteous to see them thus -forsaken and badly cared for.” - -Now there is good reason to think that Vernazza had known the Pope -when, as Cardinal de’ Medici, he had, in 1500, stayed for some time in -Genoa, in the house of his married sister, Donna Maddalena Cibò. And -so Vernazza now presented himself before the Pope, “and said to him: -‘You, Holiness, have a fine work in hand, in patronizing the Arts and -Letters: but you cannot leave this Rome of yours saddened by so piteous -a spectacle.’” And the Pope thanked him, and begged him to accept the -charge of founding and undertaking the government of the Arch-Hospital. -And the two “Cardinals, Caraffa,” the vigorous and devoted, but harshly -austere Neapolitan, who was, later on, joint-founder of the Theatines -and then Pope Paul IV, “and Sauli,” the Genoese, “helped him in his -work. Indeed the latter said to him: ‘If you require money, come to -me.’” - -And this Roman work of Vernazza straightway put forth two offshoots, -far away. For “Caraffa founded in Venice a hospital on the model of -the one in Rome.” And “there happened to be in Rome” at this time “a -certain Bartholommeo Stella, a rich and very generous (_molto galante_) -young man. And Vernazza saw him and gained such an influence with him -as to end by sending him to Brescia, to promote there also these fruits -of Christian faith.” - -And in Rome itself “Leo X gave Vernazza practical proofs of his -gratitude, and set him forth on his return journey with demonstrations -of great honour (_magnifiche demonstrazioni_). And the Arch-Hospital -having been thus set going and Vernazza being back in Genoa, Leo X -addressed a Brief to him, informing him that his Hospital in Rome was -in a state of confusion (_andava sossopra_); ‘I think’ (adds Battista) -‘because its Governors wanted each to be above the other.’ And he -returned to Rome, and quieted all controversy.”[316] I take this second -Roman journey to have been not before 1515; but it may have occurred -any time before 1522, the year of Pope Leo’s death. - -This group of facts shows Vernazza’s directness and independence of -observation, his initiative and energy, and his courage and respectful -liberty of speech, qualities which are all reminiscent of Catherine’s -scene with the Friar; the rapidity with which a necessary work, -which has been delayed for centuries, and which has required the -whole-hearted vigour of a rare personality to call it into being, grows -and multiplies, when once it is in existence; and the manner in which -the petty, sterilizing ambitions of men can be efficiently checked only -by a combination of strength of will, administrative ability, gentle -tact and complete disinterestedness,--a combination which again reminds -one of Catherine, the successful Rettora. - - -2. _Ettore in Naples._ - -It will have been after this second visit to Rome that Vernazza first -went to Naples. And there again “he formed a Hospital,” in this case -“at the risk of his life; for some evil-wishers there wanted to -kill him, being unable to bear the idea that a ‘foreigner’ should -have anything to do with the affairs of the city (_ordinasse quella -città_). Once the ‘Ave Maria’ had sounded, he did not again issue -from his lodging during that day. And yet” even among such untoward -circumstances, “he managed not to leave Naples before having, with -God’s help, achieved his object,--of providing his much-loved poor with -such an institution ready to their hand.” - -It was in Naples, too, evidently at the beginning of this very visit, -that another generous idea and institution of his first occurred to -him, or at least was first put into execution. The whole occurrence -reveals a curious mixture of the most divers qualities and, indeed, -requires in part to be excused, on the ground of numerous external -difficulties which stood in the way of an excellent work, and of the -finessing methods evidently deemed, even by good people, to be quite -allowable for attaining a good end, in this age of violence, suspicion -and intrigue. “A certain Religious, Padre Callisto of Piacenza, was -preaching at that time in Naples. Vernazza went to him and said: -‘Father, these Neapolitans are a haughty people, and refuse to bend so -low as to found hospitals. But during last night the thought came to me -that if a person refuses to mount ten steps--it is still possible to -get him to go up fifteen; and when such a person had done the latter, -he would find that he had unconsciously mounted the ten as well. Now I -cannot discover a more humiliating act than the accompanying of those -who have been condemned to death, on their way to execution; and in -this city they are led to the gallows with their minds in a state of -desperation and without any one to comfort them. Well, then, do this. -Preach to the people and tell them that the very first men of Naples -have been to see you, with a view to founding a society for escorting -these unhappy persons; and say to them: “Let him who cares to enter -this society, come to me, to be inscribed on the rolls in a secrecy so -complete that even a husband shall be unable to tell his wife.”’ And -Padre Callisto, after hearing these words, did, devoted man that he -was, his very best, and with such good effect that many went to have -themselves inscribed. “But many of those Neapolitan nobles reproved -him, saying: ‘Perchance you think yourself still in your Lombardy! We -are nobles, and we refuse to form an escort for these culprits.’ And -he would answer: ‘If your Lordship does not care to go, do not go. It -was the very first men of Naples who sought me out, for the purpose of -instituting this society.’ And thus it was actually founded, and indeed -became very numerous and much honoured; and those unhappy men received -much comfort. And later on, this same society proceeded to found the -Hospital.”[317] - -There is one repulsive feature in this story. For if the declaration -that the very first men of the city had visited the preacher was a -statement that damaged no one; which but anticipated what actually -occurred soon after; and was the means for the effecting of two works, -profoundly useful to all concerned in them and which could not, -otherwise, at that time and place, have been carried out at all: yet -it was a clear untruth. But all the rest, how admirable it is! Moral, -and indeed physical courage; cool-headed, humorous, manly because -unflinching, and yet quite uncynical and hopeful, knowledge of the -petty perversities of the human heart; and entirely devoted, slow -excogitation, concentration of will, and toughly resisting perseverance -in a work of the purest philanthropy: all this and much else is visibly -present. - - -3. _Ettore’s Will of 1517._ - -It may well have been after his return from this journey that Vernazza -drew up the Will which we still possess, dated 7th November 1517, -and which is interesting in several respects.[318] For one thing, he -orders his body to be buried in the Church of the SS. Annunziata,--the -Hospital Church, and leaves a legacy for Masses “to the Friars of the -Annunziata of Genoa.”[319] And he leaves a similar bequest to the -Benedictines of San Nicolò in Boschetto. It is clear that he wanted to -be buried in the same Hospital Church as Catherine, and had a devotion -similar to hers for the Pilgrimage Church upon the hill. - -Secondly, there are careful records and provisions concerning his -three children. As to his two eldest, Tommasa (Battista) and Catetta -(Daniela), he simply looks back and “declares that he gave to his -two daughters that are in the Monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie, -to them or to the said Monastery, three thousand Genoese pounds from -his own property, and two hundred pounds in addition,--(the latter) -spent upon their rooms, habits, and other requisites.” And that “these -sums are to be counted as taking the place of dowries which would -have accrued to them” (in case of marriage). But as to the youngest, -Ginevrina, he looks both back and forwards. “The same Testator is well -aware that he placed the said Ginevrina in the Monastery of Saint -Andrew,[320] that she might grow up with good morals and in the fear of -God, since Testator was unable to keep her by him, having very often -been obliged, for the transaction of business in favour of the poor -and for other charitable works, to proceed to Rome and other places; -and that there existed written directions (of his) in the hands of the -Nuns, as to Ginevrina being free, in due time and at the proper age, to -choose either to serve God (in Religion), or to marry according to the -social rank of the Testator.” And he confirms a legacy of £500, already -promised by him to Ginevrina “as appears from a certain document signed -by the Abbess of the said Monastery of Saint Andrew”: this money -being no doubt in addition to another sum already paid by him to the -Convent; and the whole is evidently intended to pay for Ginevrina’s -keep, if necessary for life, in case she neither entered Religion nor -married. “In case of her becoming a Nun and making her Profession in -the said Monastery, he leaves her £100, for the adapting and furnishing -of one room for her use; nor can these £100 be spent otherwise.” And -if she chooses to wed, the Protectors of the Incurables, his Executors -and Heirs, “are to marry her to some young man of good reputation and -behaviour, apt at managing his own affairs and at earning money,--all -this as perfectly as possible, according to the judgment of the said -Protectors.” If she thus marries with their consent, she is to have -£3,000 for her dowry; but if she marries without it, she is to have -only £1,500. - -Here we note Ettore’s high esteem for business capabilities: they are -to be required of his possible son-in-law, as one of the conditions for -gaining the full dowry; and the curiously unmodern certainty with which -he assumes that his still quite young daughter will desire, should she -become a Nun, to do so at Sant’ Andrea, and, should she neither wed -nor enter Religion, is sure to care to live on for life in this one -convent. As a matter of fact Ginevrina, who was evidently very happy at -Sant’ Andrea, took the veil there, still during her father’s lifetime, -hence within seven years of this date, as Sister Maria Archangela.[321] - -And thirdly, we get the striking provision that “any member of the -Society of Priests and Laymen” who administer the Hospital for -Incurables, “shall have the use of the furniture of the Testator (there -remaining), on condition that such member live in this Hospital or in -that of the Pammatone (hard by), and not otherwise.” He thus comes back -here, once again, to one of the deepest convictions of his life: that -only by actually living amongst and with the poor, poor yourself; only -by doing the work which the right hand finds to do, with such might -and thoroughness that both hands, indeed the whole man, body and soul, -are drawn into, and are, as it were, coloured by it: that only by such -fraternal-paternal sympathetic identification with its object can such -service really rise above the dreary perfunctoriness and the ghastly -optimism of mere officialism, and have the fruitfulness begotten only -by life directly touching life. And here Catherine’s spirit and -example, her long life in the very midst of the great Hospital close at -hand, are once more fully apparent. - - -4. _Ettore in the Genoese prisons._ - -And, about this time, Vernazza introduced into Genoa the practice and -Society which he had first founded in Naples. It was carried out, -here also, in the profoundest secrecy. His “Company of St. John the -Baptist Beheaded” consisted of himself and three companions: Salvage, -Lomellino, and Grimaldo. The Lomellini now owned Giuliano’s former -Palace in the Via S. Agnese, and the Grimaldi were one of the great -Guelph families of Genoa. These four “took a house with a garden, in -an out-of-the-way position; and there they started their association. -And ever after, when the members met, they always prayed for these -their four founders; and always, my Father being dead, began with his -name: ‘Dominus Hector de Vernatia requiescat in pace.’” “I once,” adds -Battista, “asked the priest who was their Confessor: ‘What matters do -they discuss, when they are thus assembled?’ But he answered: ‘I may -not tell’; and put on a particular expression and said: ‘The Hospital -for Incurables has only ten thousand lire, and it spends twenty-six -thousand. And the _Giuseppine_ and the _Convertite_’ (two other -favourite good works of Vernazza) ‘have also to be provided for!’”[322] -Evidently the subject-matter of all this elaborate secrecy consisted -in plans and means for aiding the condemned (often enough innocent -or but politically guilty persons) and benefiting the poor; and the -privacy was an imperious necessity in those harsh, turbulent and -suspicious times. It was Vernazza’s own Roman patron and collaborator, -the Neapolitan Cardinal Caraffa, who later on, as Pope, imprisoned -for two years (1557-1559), in the Castle of St. Angelo, the great and -saintly Cardinal Morone, on ungrounded suspicion of heresy; and it was -his other patron and most intimate fellow-worker, the Genoese Cardinal -Sauli, who, later on, was himself tortured and put to death, the victim -of political hatred and suspicion, in his own native city. - -And now, (conversely from 1461, when a Fregoso Doge had driven out an -Adorno,) an Adorno Doge had just driven out and exiled a Fregoso, and -had executed Paolo da Novi. And Vernazza “knew well a close friend of -this Doge Adorno, one who indeed had helped him to his dignity. And -yet afterwards they became mortal enemies, and the Doge condemned his -former close friend to death. Now this man having been,” continues -Battista, “attended by some one all night, who tried to comfort him -and bring him to patience, the poor prisoner somehow derived no -consolation from his attendant’s endeavours, but went on repeating: -‘When I remember all that I have done for him…!’ And it was impossible -to quiet him. Then he who was spending the wakeful night with him, -having noted that all his words had been hitherto of no avail, inspired -by God, took another way and said: ‘Indeed and indeed you are right,’ -and made himself infirm with the infirm, and echoed all that the -prisoner said, making it appear as though he himself, in a similar -case, would be likely to act identically. And then, and only then, -the condemned man began to feel relief, and started the telling of -his own trouble. And when his companion had agreed to all his points, -and at last noticed that the prisoner had thoroughly ventilated all -his grievance, he said: ‘Indeed, my dear brother, you do not merit -this death; but reflect whether, before these occurrences, you did not -perform some action which merited it.’ Then the latter reconsidered -his case, and said at last: ‘Yes,--I killed a man.’ And his companion -replied: ‘Behold, my brother, the true cause of your death’; and added -other most appropriate words with such good effect that the man became -profoundly contrite and died in the very best dispositions of soul.” -“Now I think,” comments Battista, “that the companion was a member of -the Society of St. John Baptist, and was, indeed, my Father himself; -since my Father told me the story too much in vivid detail (_troppo per -sottile_) for him to have been only a reporter. I believe that, to this -hour, this society is carrying on the same kind of work.”[323] - -Here again we have the same irrepressible, humorously resourceful, -tenderly shrewd and world-experienced service of God, in and -through His image, in any and every fellow-man; the same breadth -in thoroughness; the same universality working itself out, and -achieving its substance and self-consciousness, in the particular, -as we saw at work in Naples. And this activity, all but its humour, -recalls the soaring, world-embracing spirit of Catherine absorbed in -self-identification with the pestiferous woman’s dying aspirations and -with the cancer-disfigured navvy’s preoccupations for his little wife. - - -VIII. ETTORE AGAIN IN NAPLES; HIS DEATH IN GENOA; PECULIARITIES OF HIS -POSTHUMOUS FAME. - - -1. _Naples and the Signora Lunga._ - -It must have been before this prison experience, for Ottaviano -Fregoso was still Doge, that Vernazza was again in Naples, and that a -thoroughly characteristic, romantic little episode occurred, which not -all her seventy-one years of convent life, and the sixty years that had -elapsed since its happening, prevent Battista from recounting with a -delightfully entire sympathy. - -Here in Naples, then, “he joined hands with a certain rich lady, -called the Signora Lunga, for the purpose of procuring as many things -as possible” for the institutions which he himself had founded or -occasioned. This lady, a Spaniard, had been the wife (she was now -the widow) of Giovanni Lungo or Longo, President of the Sacred -Council.[324] “They went together from house to house, begging for -mattresses” for the Hospital. “And this lady now withdrew from the -world at large, and lived in that Hospital, and governed and ruled it; -and combined with this the execution of other works of mercy. And she -had so great a devotion for my Father, that she was wont to say to -him: ‘If you were to tell me to cut and wound my own person, indeed I -would straightway do it.’ But on Fregoso writing and pressing him to -return to Genoa, Vernazza wrote back, that if he, the Doge, promised -to be favourable to him, and to help him in a good work which he had -in his mind, he, Vernazza, would come at once. And the Doge wrote back -that he would do all that Vernazza wished. And then, one morning early” -(no doubt at dawn), “not wishing that the Signora Lunga should see him -depart, he got into the saddle. And she, by good chance, saw him, and -asked him: ‘Where are you going?’ And he struck his spurs into his -mule: ‘To Genoa,’ he cried; and flew away; and never saw the Signora -Lunga any more.”[325] - -Something fresh and bracing breathes and beats here still. We -have here the same man who, devoted in every good and filial way -to Catherine, had yet left her, no doubt then also on an errand of -large-hearted mercy, even in those last days of her life; who now, -once again, breaks suddenly away; and who does so again at the call of -souls entirely without conventional claims upon him, and who are quite -unable to repay him with anything that merely drifting nature ever can -hold dear. But here the relation is evidently not that of a man towards -a woman much older than himself, and of the spiritual discipleship -of a relatively inexperienced soul towards one already far advanced -in sanctity: it is clearly one of at least parity of age,--perhaps, -indeed, the woman was the younger of the two,--and of largely equal -companionship, which would presumably, unchecked, have easily led on -to an entirely honourable and happy marriage. And thus, once again, -his devotedness had to live and thrive on concrete, untransferable -renouncements and sacrifices claimed by his true self in that unique -moment and situation: and this too although he will have been at -least tempted wistfully to try and delude himself with the monstrous -superstition of an automatic sanctity, a merely theoretic and yet -somehow real heroism. - - -2. _The Plague and Ettore’s death in Genoa, June 1524._ - -“And, arrived in Genoa,” Vernazza “revealed the secret of his heart -to the Doge, and his Lordship gave him seven thousand lire and the -Privilege,”--the latter being necessary, “since no one cared to -have the Lazaretto” (for this was Vernazza’s project) “in proximity -to their villas,” and hence the Government had to insist upon its -foundation upon the least inconvenient of the various possible sites. -And Vernazza in consequence “began to construct a great building for -the poor victims of the Plague, and presented it with an endowment of -one hundred shares of St. George’s, leaving them to multiply, so that -at his death they had increased by eleven shares; and now” (in 1581) -“they have reached a great number of thousands of pounds.” And after -continuing with an account of his further Bank dispositions, and of -his early attempts to help the poor (already given by us), Battista -finishes up this part of her account by declaring: “he was wont to go -about saying, with conviction and great confidence, that he hoped all -things from God; and that, whenever he put his hand to anything, God -put the yeast into that paste.”[326] - -And her mention of the Lazaretto then leads her on to the final, still -vivid and yet self-restrained, account of her father’s death. “The -Plague being very severe (_calda_) in Genoa,”--it was past mid-June -1524,--“he came to visit me, and said to me: ‘What do you think I had -better do? I am determined in no manner to forsake the poor. Do you -think I had better go about on horseback or on foot? In which way do -you think I would be safest from infection?’ ‘Oh, Father,’ I said, -‘here we are coming to the Feast of the Baptist, and are at the highest -of the heat; and you are determined to go amongst them?’ And he: ‘And -is it my fate, to hear such things from you? How truly happy should I -be, if I were to die for the poor!’ Then I, seeing so much fortitude -in that holy soul, said to him: ‘Father, go.’ But he was not content -with looking after the Lazaretto: I think that he scoured the country -far and wide. And hence he caught the infection. And on the” (Eve of) -“the Feast of the Nativity of St. John Baptist,” June 23, “he confessed -and communicated. And in three days he quietly fell asleep in the -Lord.”[327] - -Surely rarely has so noble a finish been so nobly told! And two things -in particular are deserving of special notice. First, there is here -again that characteristic combination of quiet reflective common-sense -and self-oblivious devotedness. Who could anticipate that the man -who so carefully weighed the respective risks of different methods -of visiting the sick, would, at the same time, be full of a glad -willingness, indeed desire, to die for them? Yet not only does this -rich soul exhibit such a living paradox, with an apparent ease and -spontaneity, but it is this very extraordinary variety in unity that is -an operative cause and element both of the greatness of the act and of -its appealingness. - -And secondly, it is, I think, not far-fetched to find in this heroic -death-ride, if not a direct or even a conscious effect, yet at all -events an impressive illustration of, and practical parallel to, -Catherine’s teaching as to Heaven being already present everywhere -where pure love energizes, and to her picture of the soul’s glad -Purgatorial plunge. We know that it was Vernazza himself who, say in -1497, drew forth from her that teaching; and we shall find that it -was predominantly he who so carefully registered for us in writing -those numerous, vivid picturings of the soul’s joyously voluntary -self-dedication to suffering and apparent death. And whether at the -moment fully conscious of this or not, his act of some twenty years -later illustrates and embodies that teaching; and that teaching again -universalizes and brings home to us this action. High on horseback he -goes forth, the strong, sound-bodied, whole-hearted man, deliberately -sure of finding and of bringing Heaven, wheresoever pure love may be -wanted and may joyously appear: joyously fruitful, amidst the very -ghastliness of death. And he is rapidly brought low, first on to his -bed of sickness, and in a few days into the grave. Indeed he himself -had, by his own act, gladly accepted, we may say willed, all this: he -himself had cast himself down and away into that deep common fosse, -amongst the many thousands of his ever-obscure and now disfigured -friends and fellow-dead. - - -3. _His posthumous fame; its unlikeness to Catherine’s celebrity._ - -For so it was indeed. Instead of burial in the Pammatone Church, under -the same roof with his saintly inspirer, the poor pestilential body was -buried away, amongst the whole army of others who, like himself, had -died of the Plague, without a stone or token of any kind, to mark where -this simple hero lay. Nor was it till 1633, over a century later, that -a statue was erected to him at his Lazaretto. For the bust in the rooms -of his “Compagnia del Mandiletto” is hardly older; and the hideous -gaunt plaster statue in the Albergo dei Poveri is no doubt much younger -still. - -Only in 1867, on June 23, the anniversary of the day on which he -prepared himself to die, was a memorial erected to him which is truly -worthy of the man. Santo Varni’s more than life-size marble statue, -which represents Vernazza seated, a strongly built man still in his -years of vigour, with a head and countenance striking because of -their lofty brow, powerful chin, spiritual, mobile lips, large, keen, -far-outward-looking eyes; and with thoroughly individual, operative -yet sensitive hands, the left extended open, as though to give and -ever again to give, and the right reposing upon the case containing -the Chart of the Hospital’s foundation: stands, a striking symbol, -in the vestibule of the Hospital for Incurables which he founded, -where for fifteen years he lived, and where he died.[328] One would -be glad to think that the likeness of this admirable work of art -reposed upon grounds more direct than one or other of the very late -and unworthy representations that preceded it; the authentic portrait -of his daughter Battista,[329] who may, after all, have been unlike -him in looks; and the sympathetic imagination of a great artist. It -was Vernazza himself who prevented any contemporary representation of -his own features. For Battista tells us, in her letter of 1581, “he -also mortified himself in any inclination to honour. Thus, as is well -known, when the Lazaretto had been erected, and he was asked to have -his portrait painted to be placed there, he answered: ‘I do not want -smoke,’ and refused to act as he was bidden.”[330] - -Now here we cannot but find a contrast between Catherine and Ettore; -yet it only concerns their posthumous earthly fate and fame. A picture -of Catherine was, no doubt, no more painted in her lifetime with her -knowledge than was a portrait of Ettore. Yet we know that, in her case, -a picture was painted, if not secretly during her lifetime, in any case -by some eyewitness, and not more than eighteen months after her death; -and a popular religious Cultus to her sprang up and grew, on occasion -of that early opening of her coffin. But Ettore has to wait over a -century for his first artistic embodiment, and of religious Cultus -there was never any question.[331] Whence this difference? Have we any -kind of reason for suspecting Ettore’s heroism, indeed sanctity of life -and death? Was he indeed clearly much the lesser in the Kingdom of God -than was his friend? - -The question, it will be noted, does not imply any criticism of -the Church’s wise requirement of a previous Cultus, as one of the -conditions for the introduction of any and every Process; still less -is there any disposition to call in question the choice of Catherine -for saintly honours, a choice which this whole book would hope to -demonstrate as particularly courageous, wise and indeed providential. -The point raised concerns simply the psychology of popular devotion, -and the human reason why, given that one was certainly a Saint and the -other was presumably another one, there is this marked contrast in the -posthumous history of these two lives. - -Now if the question be taken thus, the answer can hardly be doubtful. -Certainly not because of her profoundly original doctrine, by which -Catherine is speculatively more interesting and humanly more complete -than Vernazza, was Catherine prized and preferred to Vernazza by the -crowd. Nor did they single her out precisely because of her works -and long life of mercy, for Vernazza’s labours of this kind no doubt -exceeded Catherine’s, both in their variety and in their visible -extension. But it was the psycho-physical peculiarities of the life -of Catherine, and the more or less complete incorruption of the body: -these two things, neither of which has any necessary connection with -that faithful and heroic use of free-will and that spirit and grace -of God in which the whole substance of sanctity consists, which, each -leading on and back to and strengthening the impression and tradition -of the other, determined the outbreak and onflow of popular devotion -in the one case, and the absence of which prevented the growth of any -such cultus in the other. And thus we have here one more instance of -the pathetic irony of fate, or rather one of those many mysterious -operations of the divine will which, under the ebb and flow of -influences that seem merely human and deteriorative, works in history -for the slow upward-raising of our poor kind. - -When the well-known ecstatic Augustinian Nun, Anne Catharine Emmerich, -died at Dülmen, in Westphalia, on February 6, 1824, her remains also -were not long allowed to rest undisturbed in the grave. Already in -mid-March the poetess Luise Hensel, who had much loved and venerated -her, caused the grave to be opened quite privately, in hopes of -finding the body still incorrupt, and of once more being able to gaze -on that striking countenance. And a few days later, on March 21 and -22, the grave and coffin were again, this time officially, opened. In -both cases the body was found still incorrupt, and two pale red spots -appeared on the cheeks. But when, on October 6, 1858, the grave was -opened a third and last time, nothing was found of the coffin but -one nail, and the body was now represented only by so many separate -bones.[332] Now when, some twenty years ago, I visited Dülmen in the -company of a distinguished Münster Priest, the latter told me, as we -stood together by the grave-side, that this discovery had greatly -checked the survivals or beginnings of any such local and popular -cultus as had been expected and hoped for by Anne Catharine’s, mostly -distant or foreign, admirers. - -Similar cases it would be easy to multiply; and they all point to the -great advantage, probably to the actually determining incentive, which -accrued to the Cultus of Catherine, in that her body continued more -or less incorrupt, and thus added a sensible marvel after death to -the sensible marvels of her fasts and ecstasies during life. Whereas -Catharine Emmerich’s analogous psycho-physical condition during -life was not thus reinforced by an unusual physical condition after -death. And Ettore, again, had evidently nothing physically, or even -psycho-physically, abnormal about him, either in life or in death. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -BATTISTA VERNAZZA’S LIFE - - -INTRODUCTORY. - -We have, in the characters described in the previous Chapter, dwelt -upon figures remarkably unlike Catherine, on her psycho-physical side. -Yet it would be only too easy for us now-a-days, by dwelling too much -upon the foregoing contrast, to grow actually unfair to Catherine’s -kind of temperament and health, and to her mode of apprehending -truth and of attaining sanctity. We might thus come to overlook or -to underestimate the important fact that certain psycho-physical, -neural peculiarities or states most certainly constitute the general -antecedents, concomitants or consequences (probably, indeed, one of the -necessary though secondary conditions), not indeed of sanctity, but of -at least some forms of the contemplative gift, habit, and attainment. -We might, too, forget that neither this contemplative gift itself, nor -even those neural peculiarities, are at all incompatible with great -practical shrewdness and an unusually large external activity; indeed -that such rare and costly contemplative picturings and symbolizations -of the Unseen are, when true and deep, means and helps for the -contemplative, in his own life and often still more in his influence -upon others, towards a great recollection and concentration, which -would not only turn the soul away from the dispersion and feverishness -that sets in towards the close of external action, but would also bring -it back renewed to such outward-moving, joyful-humble creativeness, as -wholesome recollection itself requires. For without such contact with -the material and the opposition of external action, recollection grows -gradually empty; and without recollection, external action rapidly -becomes soul-dispersive. Hence it is plain, that the true significance -and living system of any such deep soul may be on too large a scale not -to require, for its due exhibition, that we survey it in connection -with some other supplementary life,--like unto some Gobelin design or -cloth-pattern, so large as to require two contiguous walls or two human -figures to show its totality by means of their combination. - -Now Vernazza the father, who throughout his life possessed the -most robust and normal health, can fairly be taken as Catherine’s -supplementary figure, for the years when ill-health was limiting her -normal range of energies, on their operatively outgoing, philanthropic -side; and is thus a living protest against isolating Saints’ lives from -their complementary extensions and effects. But Battista, his daughter, -gives us, in her own person and up to the end of her life, an example -of the combination and stimulating interaction of the Contemplative -and the Practical, the Transcendent and the Immanental, the heroically -normal and Universal and the tenderly Personal, indeed the more or less -psycho-physically peculiar. Catherine was the greater, more original, -and more winning Contemplative, and Ettore was more massively Practical -than was Battista. Yet Battista possessed both gifts, from early -times up to the end, apparently unclouded and unbroken by any kind of -incapacitation. - - -I. BATTISTA’S LIFE, FROM APRIL 1497 TO JUNE 1510. - -We have already seen how Ettore’s eldest child was born on April 15, -1497, and was held at the font by Catherine, receiving, however, -the name of Tommasa, after the God-father, the celebrated Doctor of -Law, Tommaso Moro. Giuliano was still alive, but already gravely -ill. Nothing could well prove more clearly Vernazza’s closeness of -friendship for the Adorna and for Moro than his making them thus his -first-born’s God-parents. And Moro’s subsequent history makes this, his -intimate collocation and spiritual affinity with Catherine a matter -suggestive of much reflection. - -With her beautiful young mother still alive and living at home with -her, Tommasa, a child of precocious intelligence, took to writing -verse of various kinds, as early as at ten years of age. Vallebona -quotes, from Semeria’s _Secoli Christiani della Liguria_, ten short -lines written by her at that age, and which he apparently holds to have -been addressed to her God-mother. They are, however, too vague and -hyperbolical for one to be sure as to whom they are dedicated; her own -mother or the Blessed Virgin would, I think, fit the case respectively -as well as, or better than, Catherine. The “short days” prophesied -for herself by the little girl, were destined to amount to ninety -years![333] - -On her mother dying, some time in 1508 or 1509,--Bartolommea can -hardly have been more than thirty-two years of age, and Ettore some -six years older,--Vernazza decided, as we know, against continuing an -establishment of his own and keeping his three daughters with him. It -is certain from his Wills that he had no near female relative whom he -could have asked to come and help, or to take, the children; and clear -that he was determined not to marry again, so as to remain completely -free for his philanthropic work. And hence he was driven to the -alternative of boarding the girls in the two convents that we know. - -And already on June 24, 1510, on the feast of her father’s favourite -Saint and prison-work Patron, Tommasa received the habit of an -Augustinian Canoness of the Lateran, and changed her name to Battista. -Catherine had still not quite twelve weeks to live, and may well have -been deeply interested in her God-daughter’s taking of the veil in -that very Convent and at the very age where and when she herself had, -half-a-century before, desired to receive it.[334] We cannot but feel -that the Superiors were wise who, at that earlier date, had found -thirteen too young an age for even an Italian, so early physically -mature, and a Catherine, so little suited for marriage, to take even -this first and revocable step in the Religious life; and we would -doubtless have experienced some uneasiness at the time when Tommasa -was somehow allowed to take this identical step at the very same age. -Yet we have, as we shall see, full and absolutely conclusive, because -first-hand, evidence, that every one concerned in the case acted with -true insight. Rarely indeed can a woman have been more emphatically in -her right place, than Battista during her seventy-seven years at Santa -Maria delle Grazie. And this complete and comfortable appropriateness -of vocation no doubt helped her large, balanced, virile mind to feel, -with the Church, that such a vocation is but one amongst the numberless -forms of even heroic devotedness, a devotedness of which the essence is -interior and is capable of being exercised, and which requires to be -represented in every honest circumstance and calling of God’s great, -many-coloured world. - -Of Catetta’s further history, beyond her reception of the veil in the -same Convent, under the name of Daniela, some time before November -1517, and of Ginevrina’s later lot, beyond her becoming a Cistercian -Nun, under the name of Maria Archangela, at Sant’ Andrea, some time -between 1517 and 1524, I have been unable to discover anything. But -as to Battista, I wish to dwell upon three characteristic episodes of -her long life; they all three throw much light both upon Catherine and -(still more) upon the whole question of Mysticism. - - -II. BATTISTA AND HER GOD-FATHER, TOMMASO MORO. - -The first episode illustrates the rigoristic side of the -pre-Reformation Catholic temper and teaching, and the terrible -complications, perplexities and pitfalls of those strenuous, confusing -times. For we must now move on fifteen further years from that -interview with her father, a few days before his death, in June 1524, -to reach this event, the first fresh one in Battista’s life of which we -have a record. - - -1. _The early stages of Lutheranism and Calvinism._ - -The Religious Revolution had now well nigh reached its culmination. -Battista’s father had only lived to see what may rightly be termed -the first step in the Teutonic stage and element of the movement, a -stage which, in spite of its political and social, indeed religious, -violences and fanaticisms,--and even these came mostly after Vernazza’s -death,--retained, if in large part illogically yet with great practical -advantage, a considerable portion of the old Catholic convictions -and spiritual attitude. Luther had indeed, as we saw, published his -Theses in 1517, and Pope Leo X had condemned nearly one-half of them -in 1520 in his Bull of Excommunication. And Melanchthon, the mild and -deeply learned, had also broken with the Old Church, and had begun, in -1521, the publication of his _Loci_. But an earnest Catholic (in this -case a Teutonic) Reformer had become Pope, in the person of Adrian -Dedel of Utrecht (Hadrian VI), in 1522, 1523. And in the very year of -Ettore’s heroic death, Erasmus, proving, under the stress of the times, -substantially true to the Old Faith, was writing against Luther; whilst -in Italy, Vernazza’s old patron, Cardinal Caraffa, was helping to found -the Theatine Order. - -But within the next fifteen years matters move on and further. For -first the Teutonic stage of the Revolution takes its second step, and -hardens, and formally and permanently organizes itself; whilst its -socially anarchical effects reach their zenith. For there are the -Peasants’ War and Luther’s marriage in 1525; and the capture and the -sack of Rome by the Imperial (largely Lutheran) troops in 1527; and the -Revolutionists’ assumption of the name of “Protestants,” at the Diet -of Speyer, in 1529. And, on the Roman Church’s part, the Capuchins are -founded in 1525, and the Barnabites in 1530. And this whole Teutonic -stage of the Revolution can be taken as closed, for the time, by the -terrible Saturnalia of the Anabaptists at Münster, 1533-1535; the -executions of the Catholic Humanists, Bishop Fisher and Chancellor -More, in England, 1535; and Erasmus’s death in 1536. - -And the second element and stage, the Romanic Revolution, was now fully -and independently at work, with its indefinitely greater coldness and -logical completeness, and its systematic antagonism to the Old Faith. -And if the Saxon Mystical-minded Peasant-monk, Luther, stood at the -head and in the centre of the first movement, the Picardese bourgeois -lawyer and Humanist, Calvin, stands now at the head of this second -movement. Born in 1509, he flees, now an avowed Protestant, in 1535 to -Basle; and in the spring of 1536 publishes his _Institutio Religionis -Christianae_, which was destined to remain his chief work. - -Now it was in the summer of that year that Calvin went to stay at the -Court of Renée de Valois, daughter of the French King Louis XII, and -Duchess of Ferrara, who had already been gained over to the cause of -the Lutheran Reformers; and who was now influenced, by her grim, -relentless guest, to move still further away from the Old Church. And -though the Roman Inquisition succeeded in forcing Calvin to leave -Italy, after not many weeks’ stay: yet the cases of Vittoria Colonna, -Bernardino Occhino, and of our Tommaso Moro, show us all plainly, -though each differently, how complex and difficult, how obscure and -full of pitfalls, was the situation for even permanently loyal and -indeed saintly, and still more for simply earnest and eager, souls. -For Vittoria Colonna, that truly saint-like daughter of the Church, -not only stays, during the following year, with the Duchess Renée at -Ferrara, and indeed stands God-mother to her daughter Eleonora (born -June 19, 1537), the child that, later on, became the friend of the poet -Tasso: but Vittoria is the close friend and confidante of that most -zealous preacher, that restless, ardent, absolute-minded Bernardino -Occhino, who, born in Siena in 1487, had joined the Franciscan -Reform, the later Capuchins, in 1534, and indeed, in 1539, became -their General. It is to Vittoria indeed that, on his deciding not to -obey the summons to Rome, there to defend himself against the (no -doubt, in part, unfair) attacks upon his teaching, he, in the night -of August 22, 1542, before his flight and abandonment of his Order -and of the Church, writes his still extant sad and saddening letter -of self-exculpation.[335] But this latter catastrophe was not to take -place till three years after the date at which I would now linger. - - -2. _Moro becomes a Calvinist: probable causes of this step._ - -It must, I think, have been through some influence emanating from the -not very far away Ferrara, that the Genoese Tommaso Moro was, just -about this time, carried away into Calvinism. We must not forget that, -deplorable as was such an aberration, there were two excuses for him, -which would apply no doubt, in varying degrees, to many others even of -those who were, at this time, permanently lost to the Church. - -For one thing the views held, and allowably held, during two or three -generations, on points of Grace and Free-will, of Predestination and -the corruption of the natural man, by even those whom the Church -eventually raised to her Altars, were, as a matter of fact, less -removed from the Protestant Reformers’ positions, than were probably -any views (with the exception of the extreme Jansenist position) which -have prevailed in the Catholic Church since the Protestant Reformation. -St. Catherine, Moro’s fellow God-parent, had expressed herself, in -certain moods, in so rigoristic a sense on these deep matters, as to -invite the comment of the Bollandist Sticker that these passages are -_caute legenda_.[336] Yet Catherine, in speaking thus, simply resembled -probably all her really earnest contemporaries--witness the great Paris -Chancellor Jean Gerson, some time before, and the devoted Cardinals -Contarini and Morone and Vittoria Colonna, a little after Catherine’s -own zenith.[337] - -Again, the practical, moral abuses were most real and often very -pressing; and whilst the numerous attempts at Reform extending now -over a century (the Council of Constance had assembled in 1414) had -emphasized this fact, they had also plainly shown, by their practical -abortiveness, how very difficult the attainment of such a universally -desired Reform persisted in appearing, if there was to be no final -breach with Rome. - -And the fullest consequences of such a breach could not be present -to the experience, or even to the imagination, of the first who made -it, as they are to us, or even as they were after the second step of -the Romanic Revolution had been taken by Lelio Socino, the Sienese -and his nephew Fausto Socino, the founders of Socinianism, who died -respectively in 1562 and 1604,--the former shortly after Occhino had -died, in 1560, miserably alone and out of the Catholic Roman Church. - - -3. _Battista’s letter to Moro, September 1537; its effect._ - -Now it was on September 10, 1537, that his Augustinian God-daughter -wrote, to her now Calvinist God-father, a letter which occupies five -pages of print in the fifth, a handsome octavo, edition of her works -published in Genoa in 1755. Though the earliest of all her extant, -or at least of her printed, letters, it is evidently an answer to a -communication of his, in which he had urged certain objections against -the Roman Church. And that communication must have been provoked by -a first letter from herself--a letter which, though probably less -theologically interesting and learned, will have been more uniformly -touching than the one preserved. Yet if that first note had clearly -succeeded in getting him to state his case, this second letter also, -we shall see, completely attained its still more important object. - -Moro had insisted that the Roman Church followed merely human -inventions in the matter of (1) Fasting; (2) Confession; (3) the Real -Presence; (4) Public Prayer and Psalmody; (5) Vows; and (6) Extreme -Unction.--The order is curious, but is evidently not hers but his. -Extreme Unction stands in the obvious position--at the end. The vows -of Religion immediately precede it, probably because, at this time, -they typified something not only irrevocable but sepulchral to this -ardent Calvinist. Public Prayer and Psalmody would naturally precede -these vows, as an appropriate link between the life of the cloister, -so largely given to the Divine Office, and the Real Presence, its -celebration being and requiring the most marked of all the exhibitions -of Public Prayer. Confession would stand before the Real Presence, -as being actually practised before the reception of Communion. -And Fasting, finally, would precede Confession, and would, most -characteristically, head the whole list, because the completest and -most universally binding of all Fasts is that which is antecedent to -Holy Communion; and because, in beginning thus, Moro can start his -attack on the Church by the criticism of something that is obviously -and avowedly external. - -The tone of Battista’s answer is interesting throughout, for a double -reason. There is in it a successful, very difficult combination of -filial respect and of lofty reproof; and there runs through all the -argumentation a sort of legal hard-headedness, entirely in its place -on the lips of the lawyer’s daughter in dealing with her lawyer -correspondent. I give her answers to his second and fifth objections, -since the former is interesting as touching on the point of the -obligation and frequency of Sacramental Confession, which has occupied -us much in her God-mother’s life; and the latter gives a vivid insight -into Battista’s own deeply genuine and happy vocation. - -As to Confession, she writes: “You hold one opinion, and the Church -holds another; and to this Church it has not appeared good to constrain -us to confess ourselves in public, nor always to manifest our whole -interior to any and every man who may reprehend us. In this latter case -we should have been left without any protection. You grudge obeying her -once a year; how then would you carry out the other plan? Certainly -the said Church would have but little authority if she could not lay -down ordinances, according to her own judgment, concerning the mode (of -administration and reception) of the Sacraments already ordained by -Christ.” - -As to Vows, she finishes up by declaring: “According to my humble -judgment, that thing cannot be called slavery which a soul elects for -itself, by an act of free choice alone, and with a supreme desire. And -in this matter you really can trust me, since here I am, living under -the very test of experience, and yet I have no consciousness of being -bound to any obligation: so little indeed that, if I had full licence -from God to do all those things of which I have deprived myself by my -vows, I would do neither more nor less than what I now am actually -doing; indeed no taste for anything beyond these latter things arises -within me. How then do you come to give the name of servitude to that -which gets embraced thus with supreme delight? Perchance you will say -‘not every one is thus disposed.’ My dear Sir: he who does not find -this inclination within him, let him not execute it. Neither Christ nor -His Church constrain any one in this matter.”[338] - -The effect of this homely and sensible, straightforward and firm, -first-hand witness to a strong soul’s full daily life of faith and -self-expansion in and for Christ in His extension, the Old Church, was -evidently decisive, perhaps immediate. It is at least certain that -Tommaso Moro came back to the Roman obedience; that he became and died -a Priest and Religious; and that his return is universally attributed -to the instrumentality of this letter.[339] - - -III. BATTISTA’S _COLLOQUIES_, NOVEMBER 1554 TO ASCENSION-DAY 1555. - -Yet her letters form but a small part of the literary output of this -many-sided woman. Her printed writings fill six stout volumes, in -all some 2,400 octavo pages, and fall into four chief divisions. The -independent verses consist only of four “Canticles of Divine Love,” -twelve “Spiritual Canticles,” and five “Sonnets.” Yet even the second -division, which alone fills quite five out of the six volumes, and -consists of Spiritual Discourses or Dissertations, contains much -verse, since the Discourse (which invariably takes its title and -starting-point from some, originally or interpretatively, Mystical -Biblical text) usually finishes up with a chapter of eight verses, -in which she sums up metrically the doctrine which she has just -expounded in finely balanced and stately prose. Mostly proceeding -from some Pauline, or, more often still, some Joannine text, these -writings evince throughout a fine Christian-Platonist breadth of -outlook and concentration and expansion of devotional feeling, and -have much of that unfading freshness which appertains to the universal -experiences of religion, wherever these are experienced deeply and -anew and are communicated largely in the form and tone of their actual -experimentation. These Discourses would also, of course, furnish all -but endless parallels and illustrations to Catherine’s teachings. - -Yet it is the last two divisions of Battista’s writings which are -the most entirely characteristic and suggestive--her _Colloquies_ -and her _Letters_. As to the seventy-five pages of letters, I have -already given extracts from two, of the years 1581 and 1589, and shall -presently give portions of two others, of the years 1575 and 1576. But -in this section I want to translate and comment upon a considerable -portion of her _Colloquies_, so interesting for various reasons, all -directly connected with the subject of this book. These contemporary -annotations occupy only eleven pages of print, but they constitute, I -think, one of the most instructive first-hand documents of mystical and -religious psychology in existence, and have nowhere, as yet, received -any of the comparative and analytic study they so richly deserve. - -It is but right to remember throughout, that even all her other -writings (including the Discourses which are so general and, in a -manner, quite public in their tone) were, with the sole exception of -her Sonnets, none of them printed with her knowledge and consent. A -certain Secular Priest, Gaspare Scotto, did indeed print some at least -of the Discourses, without her knowledge, during her long lifetime; but -the _Colloquies_ were certainly never meant for any eyes other than her -own, and were doubtless not printed, or indeed known, until after her -death. I suppose them to have first appeared in the collected edition -of her works, published in 1602, fifteen years after her demise. - -Now these _Colloquies_ belong to three periods. The first set is timed -vaguely _una volta_; and the third is also but approximately fixed; -but the second, by far the longest and most important series, is, at -its main turning-points, dated with absolute precision. And since its -authenticity, the identity of the chronicler with the experiencing -person, and the complete contemporaneousness of the record, are all -beyond cavil or question (the majority of the entries were evidently -put down by her on the very day, often probably within the hour, of the -cessation of the experience thus chronicled)--the document can serve as -a simply first-hand illustration of, and commentary on, the analogous -experiences of Battista’s God-mother, experiences which, in the latter -case, were nowhere recorded by their subject, nor indeed by others till -probably, in some cases, a considerable time after their occurrence. -And if here again there can be no difficulty, for any sincere and -consistent believer, in holding that we have to do with enlightenments -of the mind and stimulations of the affections and will, proceeding -as truly from God as they led back to Him: we cannot but, here again, -find plentiful indications of the antecedent material, and of the -co-operation, response, and special colour furnished throughout by the -human subject’s special sex and age, race and period, temperament, -training, and reading. Not all the latter conditions put together would -explain even half of the total experience; yet had these conditions -been different, the total experience would have differed, not indeed in -its fundamental contents, yet in its special forms and applications. As -matters stand, these latter are often strikingly like those manifested -in the teaching of Catherine, Battista’s fellow-Genoese. I will now -take the nine most interesting days of this series,[340] stopping after -certain of them to point out parallels and peculiarities. - - -1. _Experience of November 17, 1554._ - -“On (Saturday) November 17, 1554” (Battista was now fifty-seven and a -half years old), “having, before Holy Communion, a great desire to -die to all things, I prayed with all my heart that God, in the most -perfect manner possible, would slay me and unite me with Himself. -And in so doing I renounced into His hands all myself and everything -existing under heaven, whilst electing God anew as my only Love, my -only Solace, my only Comfort, and my All. And I refused to accept -every consolation arising from such interiorness, however holy the -latter might be, except inasmuch as the consolation arises whilst the -interior is distinctly occupied with God, and does not turn its gaze -upon itself or upon any (other) belovèd object. Even if I could enjoy -all this, quite justly, till the day of judgment, I renounce it all. -Nothing pleases me, except my God. And if I were assured, which God -forbid, of going (to abide) under Lucifer, still would I will, neither -more nor less than my God alone. And it would be grievous to me to -embrace, even for one single hour, anything else but Him.--After this -Communion I remained with a most intense impression of renouncing, -with regard to all things and to all moments, all myself and every -other thing that is lower than Thee; and with a determination to keep -Forty Days of silence, depriving myself during them, as far as my -own will and inclination went, even of such reasoning as turned on -religious subjects.--And acting thus, by means of Thy grace alone, I -arrived, in my inner heart, at having no other actions left, except -those of adoring Thee and praying for all men. Whence it happened that -I experienced the most quiet and consoling week that, possibly, I have -ever had, up to this hour, in all my life.” - -It is clear that even the first part of this week’s experience was -not written down later than at the end of that week; indeed it reads -more as if written down on at least two, and perhaps three, occasions. -We have here many close parallels to Catherine: to her exclamation -of “God is my Being … my Delight”; to the Divine Voice heard by her, -“I do not wish thee henceforth to turn thine eyes to right or left”; -to the question asked, and the interior answer heard, by her, as to -“love and union not being able to exist without a great contentment -of soul”; to her assertions that “the attribution to her own separate -self of even one single meritorious act, would be to her as though a -Hell,” and that “she would rather remain in eternal condemnation than -be saved by such an act of the separate self”; to her Love saying -within her, “that He wanted her to keep the Forty Days in His Company -in the Desert”; and to her declaration that she could not pray for -Vernazza and his fellow-disciples separately, but could only “present -them” collectively “in His presence.” And in Battista’s phrase of -“going under Lucifer,” we have again, if we take it together with the -renunciation of “all things lower than God,” an illustration of those -sayings of Catherine which I have grouped under the special category of -“up” and “above.”[341] - -And note, in Battista’s record, how the contradiction, which appears -between her affirmation of having love for God alone, and the admission -that she loved herself and other things (since she is determined not -to let her mental gaze rest upon these latter beloved objects), is -more apparent than real. For the former love is the direct and central -object of her fully deliberate and free endeavours; the latter is -instinctive, continuous, inevitable, but, inasmuch as it now still -remains actively willed at all, it is but the consequential and -peripheral object of that willing. As in all deep religion there is -here an heroic willing at work to effect a genuine displacement of the -centre and object of interest; the system from being instinctively -man-centred, becomes a freely willed God-centredness. - - -2. _Experience of November 25, 1554._ - -“On Sunday” (November 25), “the Feast of St. Catherine” (Virgin Martyr -of Alexandria) “was being celebrated. And I communicated with new -emotion. And when I received the Host, I willed Thee, my God, alone; -renouncing all the rest into Thy hands: I but desired to die and unite -myself with Thee. And I felt within me those colloquies of Thine own -extreme love; and Thou didst say unto me, O my Joy, ‘The thing that -thou seekest is (already) produced eternally in My Divine Mind. Thou -desirest to feed on mutability, and I desire to feed thee on eternity.’ -And I do not remember in what connection Thou didst say,‘ Ego ero -merces tua magna nimis’ (Gen. xv, 1).” - -Here, on her God-mother’s Saint’s day, we find that act of pure love -at the moment of Holy Communion so dear to Catherine also; and we get -here, as in the previous group (but here, even on occasion of the Holy -Eucharist), prayer and aspiration directed to God pure and simple, or -to God conceived as Love and Joy, precisely as in the Fiesca’s ordinary -practice.[342] And the inner voice, if it says deeply mystical things, -also directly quotes Scripture in Latin, whilst the scrupulous care of -Battista, in registering her oblivion of the precise context in which -this quotation appeared, is interestingly characteristic of her nature -and experience. - - -3. _Experience of December (9?), 1554._ - -“On Sunday” (December 9?) “I communicated; and I experienced within -myself the most tender colloquies of Thy Majesty, which said to me, -‘The time will come when thou must be so occupied with Me--with My -Divinity, My Infinity, My Glory--that, even if thou shouldst so wish, -thou wouldest be unable to break off this preoccupation. I have elected -thee from amongst thousands. I want to make thee My very Self.’ … Then -Thou saidst unto me, ‘I do not want thee to merit, but to return the -love which I ever bear thee.’”[343] - -Here we have parallels to Catherine’s practice and declarations in -Battista’s ever-growing occupation with God; in her, at first sight, -strongly pantheistic, because apparently substantial, identification -of her true self with God; and in her doctrine that God desires not -that we should merit, but that we should, by purely loving, make Him a -return of His own pure love. And, as but an apparent contrast, note how -here it is God Who chooses out Battista’s soul from amongst thousands; -whilst, with Catherine, we have herself instinctively choosing out -God, even were He, _per impossible_, like to one of the whole Court of -Heaven (the angels, “whose number is thousands of thousands,” Apoc. v, -11). For the difference consists, at bottom, only in the fact that each -dwells, in these special instances, upon the other half of the complete -mystic circle of the divine and human intercourse. The same complete -scheme is, in reality, experienced and proclaimed both by the widow -and the nun,--indeed God’s prevenient election of the soul, and His -special attention to it, is even more strongly emphasized by the older -woman: “It appears to me, indeed, that God has no other business than -myself.”[344] - -Remark, too, how here again an unmistakable text of Scripture appears -as part of the words heard by Battista. But since it is a composite -quotation--“I have elected thee,” coming from Isa. xliii, 10; xliv, 1; -xlviii, 10; and “elected among thousands,” coming from Cant. v, 10, -where the elect is (as with Catherine) the Bridegroom, and not (as with -Battista) the Bride,--therefore, no doubt, it does not appear in Latin -or with any reference. - - -4. _Experience of December 16, 1554._ - -“The following Sunday” (December 16) “I communicated with a -greater desire for Union than usual, and with a more detailed sight -concerning it. And after this communion I prayed in such a state of -Union,--without any means either of thoughts or of anything else that -could be made to intervene, remaining naked in Thy bosom as I have -been from eternity. And whilst praying thus, I felt that certain words -were being spoken within me, the gist of which (_la sentenza_) seems -to me to have been, that my prayer did not reach to the reality of -Union itself. So that there then came to my mind that which Paul says, -Rom. viii (26), that ‘we do not know how to pray _sicut oportet_.’ And -Thou saidst to me that, above all understanding of mine, Thou wouldest -produce the effect; indeed the thing is already effected continuously -in Thy divine mind. And Thou saidst to me, my only Love, that Thou -didst will to make me Thyself; and that Thou wast all mine, with all -that Thou hadst and with all Paradise; and that I was all Thine. That I -should leave all, or rather the nothing; and that (then) Thou wouldst -give me the all. And that Thou hadst given me this name--at which words -I heard within me ‘dedi te in lucem gentium’--not without good reason. -And it seemed then, as though I had an inclination for nothing except -the purest Union, without any means, in accordance with that detailed -sight which Thou hadst given me. So then I said to Thee: ‘These other -things, give them to whom Thou wilt; give me but this most pure Union -with Thee, free from every means.’” - -Here we again have numerous parallels. Battista’s state of Union, -without any means that could be made to intervene, compares readily -with Catherine’s declaration: “I cannot abide to see that word ‘for’ -(God) and ‘in’ (God), since they denote to my mind something that can -stand between God and myself.” Battista’s description, “remaining naked -in Thy bosom, as I have been from eternity,” resembles Catherine’s -sayings: “True love wills to stand naked. This naked love sees the -truth”; “the soul in that state of cleanness in which it was created”; -“the angels and man, when disobedient, were clothed in sin”; and the -words heard by her: “I want thee naked, naked.” The answer granted to -Battista, that “possessing her Lord, her only Love, she possessed at -the same time all Paradise,” recalls Catherine’s declaration that “if -of what her heart felt but one drop were to fall into Hell, Hell itself -would become Eternal Life.” And Battista’s prayer, “these other things, -give them to whom Thou wilt; give me but this most pure Union with -Thee,” is substantially like Catherine’s answer to the Friar, “that -you should merit more than myself--I leave that in your hands; but that -I cannot love Him as much as you, is a thing that you will never by any -means get me to understand.”[345] - -And we get here two further interesting particularities as to such -“locutions.” In this case Battista only “feels,” at the time of their -occurrence, that certain words are being spoken within her (once before -she has used that remarkably general term, instead of the more obvious -and specific “hear”); and she possesses, on coming (evidently soon -after) to write them down, a but approximate remembrance of them, and -a certainty as to their substance alone. And then we find here the -interesting case of two different simultaneous locutions: one voice -referring to the name which our Lord had given her, and another, at -this point, quoting the text, “dedi te in lucem gentium.” The text, -in this full form, occurs in Isaiah xlix, 6, and is there spoken by -God to His servant Israel, v. 3; but part of it, expanded to “a light -to the revelation of the Gentiles,” is, in Luke ii, 32, quoted by -Simeon of Christ. We thus, in this place, get three different, yet -simultaneous, levels of consciousness within Battista’s soul: her own -(more or less ordinary) consciousness and “voice” recognized by her own -self, as such; another, deeper, extraordinary consciousness and “voice” -proceeding, according to her apprehension, from our Lord’s presence -and action within her; and finally a third, deepest consciousness and -“voice” taken, I presume, to be directly communicated by God Himself. -It is to be noted that, though interior “locutions” seem to have been -fairly frequent with Catherine, there is no case on record in her life -of more than two levels of consciousness, two “voices,” at one and the -same moment, her own and Love’s. - - -5. _Experience of December 23, 24, 1554._ - -“The following night” (December 23 to 24), “I woke up and found -impressed upon my mind (the words): ‘comedite bonum,’ Isaiah lv -(2). And this impression remained with me (throughout the day),--an -impression of eating God, and of inviting all others to the same -Divine food.--In the evening,--it was the Vigil of the Nativity,--I -had a sight of how, God Himself having taken our nature, and having -done so as the Infinite one, the very greatest virtue must be diffused -throughout this same (human) nature: a truth which he knew who says: -‘Plena est omnis terra gloria eius,’ Isaiah vi (3). If by one man sin -entered into all, by a God-man how much good has not entered into us -all? Romans v, 15-19. If God has made Himself Flesh, what virtue is -there which He has denied to this same flesh?--And in the night of -the Nativity, after Matins, I had a sight of that extreme, eternal -and incomprehensible Love, which, unable to abide within Itself, had -become ecstatic into the thing It loved, and had indeed, by means of -Its Almighty power, become that very thing. Whence it is that, seeing -Thy Majesty gone forth out of Thyself and become me, I was determined, -in virtue of that self-same love, to go forth from myself and, in every -manner, make myself into Thy very Self. And Thou, my God, didst say -that Thou hadst descended to the same degree as that to which Thou -wantedst man to ascend.” - -Here Battista’s “impression of eating God, and of inviting all -others to the same Divine food” is substantially identical with -Catherine’s doctrine as to the “One Bread, God,” and “all creatures -hungering for this One Bread.” Battista’s sight of “God being diffused -throughout human nature,” is analogous to Catherine’s teaching as to -no creature existing that does not, in some measure, participate in -His goodness,--although, with characteristic difference, Battista -dwells on the ennoblement of that nature through the Incarnation of -God, and Catherine insists upon the nobility contemporaneous with, and -intrinsic to, Man’s original Creation. And Battista’s determination to -go forth from herself is identical, in substance, with all the sayings -of Catherine which I have grouped under the “outside” “outwards” -category.[346] - -And note how, in this group, Battista mentally sees, instead of -interiorly hearing, the truth of the Incarnation of the Infinite, and -of the consequent ennobling of our whole nature; how this sight then -suggests to her mind a definite text (recognized by herself as such), -and then an amplification of another text (not perhaps identified by -her as such at all): and how the transition from that sight to these -texts is so smooth and rapid that it is practically impossible to mark -off precisely where she held the simply given experience to end, and -her own action and comment to begin. The fact of the matter no doubt is -that, in both cases, though very possibly in different degrees, there -was divine and human action indistinguishably co-operant throughout. - -And mark again how her “vista”--“of that extreme, eternal, and -incomprehensible Love which had become ‘ecstatic’ into the Thing it -loves”; her consequent determination to “go forth from herself,” -and the voice which told her that He wanted her “to ascend in the -same degree as He had descended”: all goes back, for its literary -suggestion, to the Dionysian “Divine Names”: “Divine Love is ecstatic, -not permitting any to be lovers of themselves but of those beloved. The -very Author of all things, through an overflow of His loving goodness, -becomes ‘out of Himself,’ and is led down from the eminence above -all, to being in all.” “He is at once moving and conducting Power to -Himself, as it were a sort of everlasting circle.” “Let us restore all -loves back to the one and enfolded Love and Father of them all.”[347] -Not the less truly did Battista’s mental lights and voluntary -determinations come from God, because they consisted, for the most -part, in a vivid realization and acceptation, in and for her particular -case, on this Christmas night in 1554, of spiritual facts and truths -which had been slowly and successively revealed, experienced, and -formulated as far back as the Hebrew Prophets and the Greek Plato, and -above all by our Lord, and in St. Paul’s writings and the Gospel of -St. John. These truths were none the less hers, because they had been -successively experienced and proclaimed, so long ago by others; and -their suggestion and realization to and in her, were as truly the work -of God in her own case as they were in that of those others. - - -6. _Experience of December 27, 1554._ - -“This morning” (December 27), “which is the Feast of the Evangelist -John, when I awoke, I suddenly heard the words being spoken within my -mind: ‘To-day I am determined to divide thy soul from thy spirit’--and -later on, when the Host was being elevated at Mass and I was praying -about this matter, I had a sight or Thou didst say unto me--I cannot -remember precisely which it was,--enough, it appeared to me that -as, when the soul is divided from the body, the soul, in so far as -immortal, flies to its destined place, and the entire body remains -dead: so also, when the almighty hand of God makes a similar division -of the soul from the spirit, the former, the animal part (of man), -remains dead, but the spirit, (truly) free (at last), flies to its -natural place, which is God, the Living Fountain.” - -Here we are at once reminded of Catherine’s experience of “Love -once speaking within her mind”; of her sayings which dwell on the -separation of the soul from the body, and on the flight of the spirit -to its natural place, God; and of her sight of “the living Fountain” -of Goodness.[348] But Battista’s psychology is entirely clear and -self-consistent, as to the precise extension of, and the precise -distinction between, the terms “spirito” and “anima”; whereas, in the -authentic sayings of Catherine, “anima” is used sometimes as inclusive -of, and sometimes in contradistinction to, “spirito.” We shall see how -it is only the later systematizing _Dialogo_-writer who brings perfect -consistency, and a scheme identical with Battista’s, into Catherine’s -terminology. Yet in Catherine’s image of the assimilation of bread by -man, in illustration of the assimilation of man’s nature by God, we -find Battista’s two stages of the divisional process. For there the -body is first purified up to the actual level of the soul, and then the -soul itself is purified perfectly, its animal part being eliminated or -dominated by the spiritual part.[349] - -It is interesting, too, to note how Battista cannot decide here whether -this interpretation of the short sentence she had heard was mentally -seen or interiorly heard by her; indeed, she is sure only that, whilst -she was praying to understand the meaning of that sentence, the meaning -thus sought appeared to her, by some means or other, to be so and so. -It is then abundantly clear from this, that the difference between an -interior sight and an interior voice, and again between either of these -and the admittedly normal workings of her own mind, was, at times, so -delicate, as either not to be clear to her own consciousness, even at -the very time of the experience; or, at least, to fade away from her -memory before she came to chronicle the experience. - - -7. _Experience of January 6, 1555._ - -“On the Feast of the Epiphany” (January 6, 1555), “before Communion, -I felt ineffable and most tender colloquies, and greatly I rejoiced -because of them. For I had caused Masses to be said and prayers to be -prayed, by various persons during many days, with the intention that, -if these colloquies were not from Thee, I might no more experience -them; but that, if they were Thine, they might be produced within me -more clearly and more efficaciously. And seeing that I now felt them -more than usual, and in a more admirable manner, I had and have a firm -hope that they were Thine. Whence it happened that (having, on that -same blessed day, to go up to receive Thee in the Sacrament), I felt -Thy Majesty more than once calling me within me, ‘Come, since I want -to devour thee entirely.’ … It seems to me that ‘entirely’ was one of -the words, but I have no firm remembrance of this. But I know well that -Thou saidst several times, ‘Come, since I want to devour thee.’ … To -me it seemed that I merited rather to go under Lucifer, than into the -Infinite Light (_Luce_).” - -We get here a number of interesting parallels and contrasts to -Catherine’s teaching and practice. God’s devouring of the soul; God -pictured as Light; souls conceived as higher up or lower down in -space, according to their degree of goodness or of badness; even the -pleasure in a play upon words: all this finds its close counterpart -in Catherine.[350] But far more important is the difference in the -subject-matter of their scruples and in their respective attitudes -towards psychically unusual experiences. In Catherine’s case there -is no record of anxieties concerning other things than her degree -of detachment and her administrative responsibilities; indeed her -whole practice and teaching, continuously bent as they were upon the -ethico-spiritual truth and upon the practical application of her -unusual experiences, make it morally certain that her anxieties never -turned upon these forms and means themselves. She was, as it were, -too much occupied with the content of the cup, ever to be actively -perplexed as to the cup itself. Battista, on the contrary, seems to -have been quite free from scruples of Catherine’s melancholic type; -but did not, evidently, always soar as highly as her God-mother above -all anxious occupation with the form of her experiences. And, indeed, -if, in this instance, it was evidently the form of her experiences -which perplexed her, it was also the renewed and heightened experience -of this peculiar form which reassured her.--Yet the very fact of -such a perplexity, and again the moderation with which, even at the -end of it all, she but “hopes that it all comes from God,” shows a -healthy reluctance to trust too readily or too much to such tests and -indications. It would probably not be unfair to put her attitude -towards such things midway between Don Marabotto’s readiness of belief -and Catherine’s soaring ethico-spiritual transcendence. - -It is noticeable too that, if the inner voice is more distinct than -before, Battista’s anxious care for accuracy is also, if possible, more -on the alert than ever: witness her remarks as to the word “all.” - - -8. _Experience of the Second Sunday in Lent, 1555._ - -“On the second Sunday (in Lent), having communicated, I felt Thine -ineffable reasonings; but, since I did not write them down at once, I -do not any more venture to write them down, having in great part lost -the memory of them. But this I remember, that the words were like those -which the Bridegroom says to the Bride in the Canticle (of Canticles).” - -Here the difference between this form of apprehension and that of -ordinary vivid thinking is so faintly distinct, that she can only -declare that she “felt” (without deciding between hearing, seeing, or -any other of the more definite senses) “reasonings” (without being -sure of their “explicitation” in words or images); and she herself -recognized at the time, and later on remembers that contemporary -recognition of, their likeness to the texts of the Canticle of -Canticles. It is evidently the profound reluctance, cultivated by her -for half a century or more, to treat the deepest acts of the soul as -other than directly and exclusively the acts of God in that soul, which -makes her not see and admit here the large co-operation of her own mind. - -Remark also a characteristic difference from Catherine, in that the -latter’s teaching is, we have already seen, entirely free from any -influences characteristic of the Song of Songs. - - -9. _Experience of Ascension Day, 1555._ - -“On the Lord’s Ascension Day Thou didst say to me, O my Love, that, up -to this point, I had walked by Faith, but that now Thou wast determined -to give me direct assurance (_certezza_); and that there was no -occasion for me to go on writing down Thy words, since I should read -them in my own experience. And on my asking what Thou wouldst operate -within me, Thou didst affirm to me that I should ever possess Thee in -my heart.”--“Another time I felt that I was being told: ‘I generate My -Son, having an infinite Cognition of Myself; similarly I generate thee, -by infusing into thee that same cognition. But (this) My Cognition is -without measure; and thine shall be according to that measure which -I shall, by My goodness, be impelled to give thee, in suchwise that -of this cognition and of thine intellect there shall be effected one -identical thing; so that I shall place My Word, My Concept, which I -possess within Myself, in thee, according to the capacity for it which -I shall deign to give thee; and so that, again, thy spirit shall be a -son within My Son, or rather one only son with Him: and thus will I -have generated thee.’ Hence, O Lord, according to this Thy showing, -those are generated by Thee, who, united by grace to Thy Majesty, -repose in Thy Paternal Bosom, together with Thine only Begotten. But -He is by nature one sole substance with Thee--He whom Thou art ever -ineffably generating; and we are united with Thee, through reposing in -Thy bosom by simple grace and by a singular privilege of Thy love; and -in so far as we thus abide there in Thee, Thou generatest us in more -and more light and ardour. Hence then Thou generatest him who abides in -Thee.” - -We have here, in the last locution of this series, the most complicated -and seemingly original of them all. Yet here we can still find -parallels to Catherine: in the addressing of God as “my Love”; in -the fact that the locution proceeds from, and its interpretation is -submitted, not to our Lord, but to God, to Him who indeed generates His -Son without measure and directly, yet all other souls also, though in -measure and by and through His Son; and in the declaration that now she -should have a kind of direct assurance in lieu of Faith.[351] - -And here especially we can trace the large Neo-Platonist (Dionysian) -element in Battista’s Mysticism. There is the first, perfect circle, -God’s perfect cognition of Himself, a cognition which produces a -fresh (though co-eternal) centre of cognition, which latter in return -perfectly cognizes Him who perfectly cognized it. And then there is -a derivative imperfect circle--since that perfect cognizedness and -cognizing, which is God’s Son, can only be imperfectly imparted to the -souls of creatures: yet again we have a circle for the very thing which -is cognized by God is, in this instance also, the same which cognizes -Him. And lastly, this distance between the perfect and imperfect -circles is, as far as possible, overcome by an attempted and momentary -identification of the perfectly cognized and cognizing circle, Christ, -with the perfectly cognized but imperfectly cognizing one, every human -soul in its potentiality and divinely intended end. - -And this large Platonist scheme of a progression of Ideas appears -here coloured and Christianized, by means of four scriptural texts in -particular: Ps. cix, 31, “in the brightness (splendours) of the saints, -from the womb, before the day star (Lucifer) I begot thee”; John i, -18, “the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father”; xiii, -23, “there was leaning on Jesus’ bosom one of His disciples whom Jesus -loved”; and Luke xvi, 23, “the rich man beheld Abraham from afar, and -Lazarus in his bosom.” The first two passages give her the eternal and -continuous generation and abiding of the Son by and in the Father; -and the last two suggest a similar abiding and (interpretatively) -generation, together with that Son, of the faithful soul, in and by -God, continuously and for ever. - -Note, too, the double meaning, so characteristic of mystical -utterances, contained in the sentence, “I generate My Son, having -an infinite Cognition of Myself”; which indicates both the mode of -generation (“by means of an infinite cognition”), and the nature of the -generated one (“who has an infinite cognition”). And by this literary -device, the intense close-knitness of the perfect circle is strikingly -adumbrated. - -And remark how Battista finishes up this soaring flight by an -interpretation of a perfect sobriety. Indeed it is this moderation and -good sense along with so immense an Idealism and intense Interiority -which, together, constitute her noblest characteristic and should make -us overlook the comparative absence of spontaneous charm and tender -freshness, which cannot but strike us if we allow ourselves to contrast -the piety of Battista with that of Catherine. - - -IV. SOME FURTHER LETTERS OF BATTISTA, 1575 TO 1581. - -Before the experiences and confidences of an almost painful privacy -and emotional intensity, which require, in part, a considerable amount -of patient interpretation from us, if they are to move and touch -us, we found and dwelt upon a moral attitude and a document full of -immediately understandable heroism and virile common-sense: the scene -with her father before his death-ride, and the letter to Dottore Moro. -And, somewhat similarly, three further documents succeed to these -intermediate confidences, documents full of love and esteem for the -externally ordinary vocation of the vast majority of us all, of a large -undaunted outlook, and of a shrewd and persevering public spirit. -The apparent mental contraction and subjectivity we have just passed -through with her is but the recollective movement, the, as it were, -drawing itself together for the spring of action on the part of an -already large and expansive soul, and leads on and out to fresh and -still larger horizons, and, indeed, effects them. - - -1. _Letter to Donna Anguisola, 1575._ - -We have first a letter of June 10, 1575 (Battista was now seventy-eight -years of age, and had been a Religious for sixty-five years) addressed -to a widowed noblewoman with young children--the Illustrious Lady -Andronica Anguisola.[352] The reader will note the transition, -evidently quite natural and spontaneous in the writer, from a soaring -Mysticism, full of Pauline, Joannine, and Dionysian forms, and of deep, -personally experimental content, to the most practical and shrewd, -wisely unflinching, homely heroism. There are few documents, I think, -which show with an equal impressiveness how startlingly direct and -immediate can be and is the application of such, apparently, purely -transcendental, serene contemplations and affections to the struggling, -clamorous world of our human passions, circumstances, difficulties, and -duties: and how only that transcendence and this immanence, taken and -working thus together, give to the soul a height without inflation, and -a concrete particularity without pettiness. I shall break up the long -letter into three sections, omitting only two, relatively commonplace, -passages in the middle and at the end; and shall again point out -certain parallels and peculiarities at the end of each section. - -(1) _Opening of the letter._ - -“Most Honoured Madam in the Crucified, - -“‘I have come to place (cast) fire upon the earth, and what will I -but that it be enkindled’ (Luke xii, 49). By these most divine words -we can understand, in part, to what a supreme degree such a most happy -fire is of importance, since the Eternal Word came down from Heaven to -kindle it in His so dearly-loved rational earth. And this great effect -could not but follow, since the Paternal goodness willed to communicate -to our misery the ardour which He possesses eternally in His Heart. -And what else is this communication to us of His infinite love than -the planting within our minds of His own intrinsic, incomprehensible -delights? His Majesty, in His infinite courtesy, takes His delights -in abiding with the children of men (Prov. viii, 31). But He desires -that these delights should proceed from both sides, so that, as He -takes these delights in us, by His own intrinsic natural goodness, He -similarly wills that we, by means of that same goodness which is poured -into us by that fire which Christ places upon our earth,--as Paul -demonstrates when he says (Rom. v, 5), ‘The charity of God is poured -forth in our hearts by the Holy Ghost who is given to us,’--He wills, I -say, that, set in motion by the immense potency of this infused fire, -we should place, in return, all our delights in His Majesty; and then, -to speak according to our human fashion, His unmeasured love attains -to its intent. In this correspondence lie hidden away delights beyond -all comprehension, considering that it is His own goodness that comes -down (into us), as He demonstrates when he says, ‘We will come to him, -and will make our abode with him’ (John xiv, 23); and that He raises us -up beyond all measure in suchwise that, of the Increate Heart and of -the created one, there is made, by the operation of Him who says, ‘The -Father who is in Me, worketh’ (John x, 38; v, 17), a single most secret -and inestimable union.” - -Here, again, we find close parallels to Catherine in “His own -intrinsic incomprehensible delights,” “His infinite courtesy,” “the -immense virtue of this infused fire,” and “to speak according to -our human fashion.” And the whole general conception of a mutual -and corresponding action and circle between God and the soul, the -whole movement beginning in and by God, and leading back and ending -in Him, is here, once more, the common property of Battista and her -God-mother.[353] Yet “The Crucified,” with which the whole letter -opens, and “His Heart,” the “Increate Heart,” applied directly to God -Himself, are expressions we should seek in vain in Catherine. The -historical Christ, and a most legitimate anthropomorphism, find here -a place, indeed a prominence, which they have not there. And note the -sobriety with which Battista insists on the analogical character of -all this speculation, for she “speaks” only “according to our human -fashion”; and the allegorizing involved in the “His dearly-loved -rational earth,” the earth that souls dwell on having here become -simply identical with those souls themselves. And especially remark the -mystically characteristic doubleness of meaning, and the conception of -the substantiality of the divine indwelling, involved in the phrase, -“His own intrinsic, incomprehensible delights.” For this phrase means -both “the delight which, for our minds, is intrinsically bound up with -the thought of God,” and the “delight which He himself takes in His -indwelling whilst abiding within us”; and the latter idea involves -a belief in the soul’s delight in Him being but a sympathetic echo -and answer to His delight in this His own indwelling, a delight thus -actually in operation within the human soul. - -Mark, too, how her opening her letter with a formally announced text -is but an instance of her life-long literary form of composition--the -homily; how saturated is the whole with (evidently first-hand) -scriptural meditation; and how wise and like her own father is her -treatment of this soul, so near to delusion in the very intemperance of -her search after perfection. A warning note of a claim about to be made -upon her correspondent’s effective self-immolation has been struck, -from the first, by the words, “the Crucified”; and yet this note is -first followed by a paragraph sufficiently soaring to satisfy even the -most lofty moods of the Signora Andronica. - -(2) _Central part of the letter._ - -“I have taken up my pen from a desire that you may be wholly and -entirely devoted to the Lord, with a whole-hearted abandonment. I do -not mean that you should abandon the care of your children: on the -contrary, I wish that you may give the greatest care to them, both -within and without. For the within, by desiring heart-wholly that -they may be joined (cleave) to God, with all they are; and for the -without, by helping them studiously to avoid everything that leads -to sin.” She then gives the examples of SS. Felicitas and Monica, -and of St. Louis of France, and proceeds: “Now note, dear Madam, how -great is the fruit of good government on the part of parents. Indeed, -according to the little light which God deigns to give me, this alone -appears to me necessary--that your Ladyship should observe the counsel -of St. Paul, where he says (Eph. iv, 1) ‘that we should walk worthily -in the vocation in which we are called.’ Now _you_ are called to the -government of your children. Hence I pray you to study how to act, -that you may be able to render a good account of it to God. You will -remember how our Christ, on the point of going to His death, renders -an account to His eternal Father concerning those whom His Father had -given into His charge, saying, ‘of them whom Thou hast given Me (in -charge), I have not lost one’ (John xviii, 9). - -“Consider, my very dear Friend, how that our great God, being -infinitely perfect, or, in better terms, perfection itself, we cannot -either add to or detract from His glory even the slightest point, as -the Prophet saw who said (Ps. ci, 13), ‘Thou, O Lord, art ever the -same’ (endurest for ever), ‘unchangeable and invariable.’ All that we -can do for Him, is to come in aid to His dear images, to His beloved -children, as the Lord shows in Matt, xxv, 40, ‘that which ye shall do -unto one of these My least, ye shall have done it unto Me.’--I know -well that you desire to withdraw yourself from all the cares of the -world, in order to be able to occupy yourself entirely with God. But -do you not know that ‘Charity seeketh not the things that are her own’ -(1 Cor. xiii, 5), that is, her own utility? That desire which your -Ladyship has for herself, let her have it equally for her children. -Are we not obliged to love our neighbours as ourselves? (Matt. xix, -19). And hence, how much more our children! That step in perfection, -of entirely abandoning all things, your Ladyship cannot take, without -great damage to your neighbour,--damage, I mean, to souls. Remember how -full of perils is the period of youth; I beg of you, with all possible -insistence, for God’s sake, to have a greater care of these young souls -than of yourself, since the necessity is greater.” - -Here, again, there are parallels to the God-mother: in the love of -that intensely unifying term, “si accostino,” “cleave to,” “be joined -to,” of St. Paul, so dear to Catherine also; in the love of all souls, -as God’s dear images, but specially of those bound to us by blood, so -marked in Catherine’s testamentary dispositions, as distinct from the -descriptions, possibly even from the surface-appearances, of her last -nine years; and in the greater care to be given to others than to our -own selves, when their necessity is greater than ours, so heroically -practised by Catherine in the case of the Plague.[354] The chief -difference, here again, is the prominence given by Battista to the -Historic Christ, by her quotation of the words of St. Matthew,--words -which, though so obviously applicable to Catherine’s work and -duties, nowhere occur throughout Catherine’s own contemplations or -discourses.--Note again the ambiguity of the “within and without” in -connection with the care to be bestowed, since the words are intended -to cover respectively both Donna Anguisola’s intention and exterior -action, and her children’s interior dispositions and visible acts. - -(3) _Conclusion of the letter._ - -“But pray indeed to His Majesty that He may give you grace so great -as to enable you to abandon all things interiorly. Here is the point -in which all perfection consists. And I will pray to Him for this, in -union with yourself. I most certainly desire, for my part, that your -generous heart may have no other delight but God. And do you convert -that human consolation which men are wont to take in their children, -into a great desire that they may cleave to God; that they may not -offend Him, and that they may bear His Majesty in their hearts. And -when those things have been actually effected, do you then take the -greatest delight in them, whilst mortifying that merely human pleasure -which men take in the mutable prosperity of their children, in the most -pleasing consolation which arises from their company, and in such-like -things. And, from such a course of action, various advantages will -follow. First, you will, I think, be thus doing what is most pleasing -to God; next, you will be most useful to your neighbour; and lastly, -your Ladyship will have carried off a great victory over your own self.” - -Here we can trace two close parallels to special points of Catherine’s -practice and teaching. In the doctrine that the point of all perfection -consists in the interior abandonment of all things, we get but a -re-statement of Catherine’s teaching as to God’s love being practicable -everywhere; and in the advice to practise interior mortification in -the matter of resting in the consolation of her children’s company, we -have not only a parallel to Catherine’s early and transitory convert -practice, but also an application to human intercourse of Catherine’s, -and indeed also Battista’s, continuous and ever-growing practice of -detachment from sensible consolations in the soul’s intercourse with -God.[355] - -We can hardly doubt that this letter was as effectual in keeping -Donna Anguisola within the limits of family duties, as the letter of -forty-six years before had been in bringing back Dottore Moro to the -world-wide spiritual family of the Ancient Church. - - -2. _Letter to Padre Collino, 1576._ - -And we have next a letter, written in 1576, when she was seventy-nine, -to that Father Serafino Collino at Cremona, to whom, five years later, -she was to write the truly classical account of her father, which has -been the main source of our study of that heroic figure. - -And indeed already in this letter she preludes, as it were, to that -outburst of filial praise, by first dwelling here upon the effects -of her father’s life as they were maturing visibly around her. “A -very spiritual, wise, and noble person,” writes Battista, “has been -visiting me; and in the course of talk she asked me, ‘Well, and what -did you think of the great miracles that God has been working during -these times of acute conflict, in this our city--miracles such as no -one ever heard of throughout the course of ancient Roman history or -in connection with any other warfare?’ And I, knowing well that this -person has three Doctors of Theology living continuously in her house, -guessed that these men must have carefully scrutinized and examined -the whole matter. So I simply asked, ‘What miracles do you mean?’ And -she answered me, ‘The city has been for so long a time in arms, a prey -to the good and to the wicked, to the wise and to the mad, and has -been affording the greatest possible opportunity for acts contrary to -justice. And yet, throughout the city within the walls, no one has ever -been offended,--no man, in his person; no woman, in her honour; and no -man or woman, in their possessions.’” - -And then Battista comments on her visitor’s declaration. “As to their -persons, all men went about in the city with swords drawn and erect, -and spoke injurious words to those of the opposite party. And it really -seems as though their hands were tied, for they used their tongues -indeed but not their hands; not one drop of blood has been spilt. -Within the city two homicides were, no doubt, committed during this -time, because of a difference on a point of honour; but none on account -of party spirit. Similarly outside of Genoa the son of Signer Antonio -d’Oria was killed--not by the opposite party, but by another nobleman -like himself,--they had come to words. As to female honour, the women -went and came to visit each other, and frequented Mass, whether they -belonged to one party or to the other; and the greater number of -gentlewomen went out of Genoa, accompanied by their daughters, passing -through the very midst of the city, and going down the wharf to get on -board their boats; and yet never was any discourtesy shown to any one -of them. Similarly, with regard to possessions: quantities of these -were sent out of Genoa; great masses of them were deposited in the -Monasteries--and yet never even a trifle was ever taken. On this latter -point we of this Convent can bear direct witness. For although so much -property and money was brought to the Monastery delle Grazie, that -it became difficult to move about the house because of the quantity -of cases and stray boxes deposited there, nevertheless not even to -the poor carriers who brought them was the slightest violence done, -although they had to pass through all those drawn and raised swords; -nor was a single word said to us Nuns, who appeared in the gateway to -receive the goods.”[356] - -Now the well-informed lawyer, Professore Morro, thinks that all this -was the direct result of Ettore Vernazza’s far-sighted and devoted -philanthropy. And he is no doubt right. For we still possess the -entries, in the Cartulary of St. George, of the great works carried -out by that powerful Banking Body, in conformity with and by means of -Ettore’s directions and moneys, amongst Genoa’s teeming poor and sick -and ignorant, in the years 1531 and 1553.[357] Indeed even the printed -documents bring the administration of this great, ever-growing fund -down to the year 1708. - -And the points that here concern the character of Battista are this -her omnipresent and yet bashful pride in her large-hearted father; her -virile joy in the public good; her immensely sane and direct tastes -as to the city’s improvement; and her glad finding of a miracle in -things thus readily verifiable, universal, interior, and yet profoundly -operative in the visible work-a-day life of man. There is something -strikingly modern in this severely social, and already more or less -statistical, way of testing improvement, an improvement which is found -here, not in any vaguely assumed increase of impulsive or perfunctory -almsgiving in the one class, or of dependence and passivity in the -other, but in the closely scrutinized proofs of a remarkable growth in -general self-respect, self-maintenance, public spirit and sense of -social interdependence, on the part of all parties and classes. - -And in the daughter’s judgment concerning all this it is again easy -to trace a likeness to her father, with his careful regulations for a -great Register of the Poor, and his provisions for harbour-works and -the embellishment of the city. But Catherine’s spirit is also present, -with its emphatic insistence upon God’s love as practicable everywhere, -and upon truth as, of its very nature, public-spirited and meant for -all.[358] - - -3. _Second letter to Padre Collino, 1581._ - -And five years later still (she was now eighty-four) Battista writes -her long account of her father’s life, which we studied in connection -with him, but which would well deserve a detailed analysis from the -standpoint of the daughter’s dispositions, so keen and large, so -tender, true and immensely operative, long after most men have died, or -are living on in a selfish second childhood. - - -V. BATTISTA’S DEATH, 1587. - -And then at last, six years afterwards, at four o’clock in the -afternoon of May 9, 1587, Pope Sixtus V being Pope and Mary Stuart -having but six months still to live, Battista died in her Convent, -fully three generations old. During her last years she had been -allowed to communicate daily, and had thus, at the end, added one more -trait of resemblance to her God-mother, who, as we know, had, for -some thirty-five years of her life, found her greatest strength and -consolation in this the simplest, most central and deepest of all the -Christian devotions and means of Grace.[359] - -One hundred and forty years had now passed since the birth of -Catherine, and seventy-seven since her death. It is indeed time that we -should, having accumulated so much material, proceed in the next volume -to an examination and exposition of the underlying spiritual facts and -laws specially brought home to us by the group of lives we have been -studying, and of which the central figure was that, for us, largely -elusive but immensely suggestive, many-sided and yet rarely beautiful, -soul and influence, which the Church venerates as St. Catherine of -Genoa. - - - - -CONCLUSION - -WHEREIN LIES THE SECRET OF SPIRITUAL PERSUASIVENESS - - -But let us first conclude this volume by attempting an answer, however -preliminary and general, to the definite question with which it opened -out. - - -I. THE QUESTION. - -We asked there, how any deeper, will-moving intercommunication can even -be possible amongst men? For the mere possession of, and appeal to, -the elementary forms of abstract thinking, which seem to be our only -certain common material, instrument and measure of persuasion, appear -never, of themselves, to move the will, or indeed the feelings; whereas -all that is endowed with such directly will-moving power appears, not -only as specifically concrete and as hopelessly boxed up within the -four corners of our mutually exclusive individualities, but also as -vitiated, even for each several owner, by an essentially fitful and -fanciful subjectivity. - - -II. THE ANSWER. - -Now I think that even the survey of the three great lives, and of those -four minor ones, which has been just attempted, forcibly suggests, both -positively and negatively, at least the general outlines of the true -answer to this pressing question. - - -1. Only a life sufficiently large and alive to take up and retain, -within its own experimental range, at least some of the poignant -question and conflict, as well as of the peace-bringing solution and -calm: hence a life dramatic with a humble and homely heroism which, in -rightful contact with and in rightful renunciation of the Particular -and Fleeting, ever seeks and finds the Omnipresent and Eternal; -and which again deepens and incarnates (for its own experience and -apprehension and for the stimulation of other souls) this Transcendence -in its own thus gradually purified Particular: only such a life can be -largely persuasive, at least for us Westerns and in our times. - -We would thus have an attempt, ever renewed, ever widening, ever -deepening, at the formation of, as it were, a concrete, living, -breathing image of the Abiding and the One; of Law, Love, and Duty; -of God: an image formed out of the seemingly shifting, shrinking -flux, and the apparently shapeless mass of our actual, bewildering -human manyfold; our flesh and sweat, and tears and blood, our joy -and laughter, our passions and petty revolts, our weariness and -isolations. Attend primarily to minimizing or eliminating all such -friction and pain; to being clear, materially simple and static, a -fixed Thing, rather than vivid, formally unified, and dynamic, a -growing Personality: or again, let the friction be so great, or the -courage and fidelity so small, as to lead to the break-up of all -genuine recollection and harmonization; and, in the former case, -such a character or outlook may be considered “safe” or “correct” or -“sensible”; and, in the latter, the character and outlook will not be -consolidated at all, or will be breaking up: but in neither case will -the life be persuasive. For to be truly winning, the soul’s life must -become and must keep itself full and true. - - -2. Now it is simply false that man can, even for his own self alone, -hold spiritual reality, even from the first, in a simply passive, -purely dependent, entirely automatic and painless fashion; or that he -can, even at the last, possess it in a full, continuous and effortless -harmony and simultaneousness. - -God no doubt holds all Truth and Reality as one great Here and Now, or -rather He possesses them entirely outside of space and time; nor can we -attribute to Him directly any interior conflict, effort, or suffering. -And, again, we ourselves too possess within our minds an element -and an apprehension of the Abiding and the Simultaneous; and their -rudiments operate within us, if all-diffusively yet most powerfully, -from the very first. Indeed the continuous increase in definiteness -and influence of that element and of its apprehension here, and the -indefinite expansion and continuously conscious possession of this -same element hereafter, are respectively the highest aim and fullest -achievement of our spiritual life. And finally, the further the soul -advances, the more it sees and realizes the profound truth, that all it -does and is, is somehow given to it; and hence that, inasmuch as it is -permanent at all, it is grounded upon, environed, supported, penetrated -and nourished by Him who is its origin and its end. Here all the soul’s -actions tend to coalesce to simply being, and this being, in so far as -there and then acceptable to the conscience, comes more and more to be -felt and considered as the simple effect of the one direct action of -God alone. - -And yet as to God, some kind and degree of Incarnational doctrine is -necessary, and is indeed (in varyingly perfect or imperfect forms) the -common property of all higher religion; and Christians have learnt -to think the profound thought, of God Himself being in a mysterious -closeness to even our most secret perplexities and inarticulate -pain.--And by ourselves, poor weaklings, that vast, continuous -Simultaneity and Harmony of God can only be more and more nearly -approached, if, upon our mostly shadowy, and (when at all clear) our -short-lived consciousness of an inchoate simultaneity and harmony of -our own, we work an orderly successiveness, and attempt a Melody: an -humble, creaturely imitation of the Eternal, Spaceless Creator, under -the deliberately accepted conditions and doubly refracting media -of time and space. Real temptation, true piercing conflict, heavy -darkness, and bewildering perplexity; the constant encountering (as -a necessary condition and occasion of all growth) of numberless and -multiform remoter risks of failing and of falling: all this forms an -essential part of this painful-joyous probation and virile, because -necessarily costing and largely gradual, self-constitution of man’s -free-willing spirit. - -And the place and function, in all this spiritual growth-in-conflict, -of Science, both in its most determinist and apparently -most anti-spiritual mood, and in its subtler though no less -destructive-seeming attitudes, will turn out, we shall find,--now -that our generation is getting to know Science’s special scope and -implications,--to be of simply irreplaceable value and potency. - -And though, in the other life, our earthly pain and temptation -are to be no more, we may be sure that, even there, the essential -characteristics of our nature will not be reversed. Hence we may -be able, later on in this book, to hazard some not all-ungrounded -conjecture as to the possible substitute and form in Heaven for -what is essentially noble and creaturely in our sufferings and -self-renunciations here on earth. - -And lastly, though God’s action in all things in general, and in -our individual soul in particular, be more and more recognized as -all-pervasive in proportion as the soul advances: yet this action will -have to be conceived as operating in and through and with our own; as -in each case finding, in one sense, its very matter, in another, its -very form, in our own free-willings. For Spirit and spirit, God and the -creature, are not two material bodies, of which one can only be where -the other is not: but, on the contrary, as regards our own spirit, -God’s Spirit ever works in closest penetration and stimulation of our -own; just as, in return, we cannot find God’s Spirit simply separate -from our own spirit within ourselves. Our spirit clothes and expresses -His; His Spirit first creates and then sustains and stimulates our own. -The two, as regards the inner life of the human soul, rise and sink -together. But more as to this too hereafter. - - -3. We shall indeed, throughout the next volume, have ample -opportunities for noting how numerous, definite, far-reaching and at -all times operative, even though still but partially unfolded, are -the evidences for, and the consequences and applications of, such a -fundamental conception, as they are furnished and required by all -deeper human life; hence, above all, by Religion; and in Religion, -again, specially by its ever largely elusive, yet ever profoundly -important, constituent, the Mystical Element. - - - - -APPENDIX TO PART II - -CHRONOLOGICAL ACCOUNT AND CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE MATERIALS FOR THE -RE-CONSTITUTION OF SAINT CATHERINE’S LIFE AND TEACHING. - - -INTRODUCTION. - -The following laborious study of the growth and upbuilding of the Life -and Legend of St. Catherine is a study worth the making. For this study -will bring out fully the test and reasons which have guided the process -of documentary selection and estimation adopted throughout the second -part of this book, indicating thus the precise degree of reliability -pertaining to my narrative. But especially will it furnish a detailed, -and peculiarly instructive, example of what, with numberless -differences in degree, kind, and importance, can be traced throughout -the history of the transmission of the image and influence of great -religious personalities and teachers. These continuously recurring -phenomena can be taken as, together, constituting the general forms and -laws which regulate the growth of all religious devotional biography. - -I. - -These general laws appear to be as follows. - - -1. _Three Laws._ - -There is the law of _contemporary, simultaneous, spontaneous variation -of apprehension_. Vernazza and Marabotto, writing down, at the time of -their occurrence or communication, certain facts and sayings with an -equal self-oblivion, sincerity, and truthfulness, give us apprehensions -which, in great part objectively valuable, are, nevertheless, more -or less differing pictures of one and the same fact or saying, or -different selections from amongst the moods and manifestations of one -living personality observed by them.--There is the law of _posterior, -successive, reflective variation of elaboration_. The Dominican -Censor and Battista Vernazza, re-thinking Catherine and her teaching, -in other times and away from her direct influence, necessarily see -her differently again: they are, as it were, spiritual grandchildren, -who rather themselves absorb her and re-state her to their generation -than they are themselves absorbed by her.--And there is the law of -_conservation_, _juxtaposition_, and _identification_. First the -Redactor of the Book of 1528-1530, and lastly the Redactor of that -of 1551--probably, both times, Battista--with, in between, in 1547, -the Redactor who attempted a quadripartite reschematizing of the -_Life_--could not but try and soften the variations produced by the two -other laws. - - -2. _The third law tends to confuse the operation of the other two._ - -And note how it is precisely this third law and stage which largely -tends to make the effects of the two other laws into causes of -vagueness, confusion, and scepticism. For instead of conceiving -the unity and identity of the subject-matter (a deep spiritual -personality) as essentially inexhaustible, and as requiring, for its -least inadequate apprehension, precisely both those simultaneous and -spontaneous, and those successive and reflective experiences and -reproductions of it, as furnished by the two other laws, this stage -tends to confuse the identity of the apprehended subject-matter with -a sameness in the apprehension of it; and, whilst thus robbing that -subject-matter of its richness and movement, to introduce an element of -arrangement and timidity into the originally quite _naïf_, and hence -directly impressive, evidences of the observers. Yet the instinct -and object of this third law is as legitimate and elementary as are -those of the other two, since a real unity and utilization of all the -preceding variety is as necessary as the variety to be thus integrated, -and since the other two laws show a similar variety of actuation -throughout religious literature. - - -3. _Examples._ - -We find (to move in Church History back from St. Catherine) these three -tendencies at work in the constitution of the Life and Legend of St. -Francis of Assisi, A.D. 1181(?)-1226, traced for us now, with so much -sympathy and acumen by M. Paul Sabatier and the Bollandists. We get -them again in the case of St. Thomas of Canterbury, A.D. 1118-1171, -especially in that of his Death and Miracles, so carefully studied in -Dr. Edwin Abbot’s remarkable book (1898). And, once more, in those -Merovingian Saints, the great Martin of Tours in their midst, at the -end of the fourth century, whose Lives have been so interestingly -described by Bernouilli (1900). And we find them, with especial -clearness, in the growth of the Life of St. Anthony, about A.D. -250-356, as contained in Palladius’s _Historia Monachorum_, now that -Abbot Cuthbert Butler has given us his admirable analysis and edition -of that deeply instructive compiler (1898, 1904). - -If we take the Bible, we find (on moving here in a contrary direction) -these laws again at work in the elucidation and elaboration of the -great figure of Moses and of his world-historic life-work. For if -here we get but little that can claim to be by his pen, or even, -as literature, to be contemporaneous with him (since the earliest -Corpus of Laws, the Book of the Covenant, reaches probably only in -its substance back to him), yet here, too, the earliest consecutive -descriptions of his life, by the Jahvist and Elohist writers, give -us two different, though probably more or less simultaneous, largely -_naïve_, accounts and impressions of his life and work. And these -simultaneous variations are followed, later on, by the successive, -increasingly reflective variations and developments of Deuteronomy -and of the Priestly Code. And lastly, these documents get constituted -(in probably two great stages), by Redactional work, into the great -composite History and Legislation of our present last four Books -of Moses.--So again with David. We have the David of some few of -the Psalms; the David of the Books of Samuel, in a double series of -most vivid and spontaneous, more or less simultaneous but somewhat -differing, accounts; the David of the greater part of the Psalter, -the result of a long process of devout successive reflection and -re-interpretation; and the David of the Books of Chronicles, where -pragmatic systematization reaches its height.--And so too with the -Maccabean Heroes, whose history appears, apprehended with varying -degrees of contemporary, simultaneous, spontaneous vividness, and of -subsequent, successive, reflective pragmatism, in the documents and -redactional settings of the First and Second Books of Maccabees.--And -the growth indicated in these three cases covered respectively some -eight hundred, seven hundred, and one hundred years. - -But it is, of course, in the New Testament that the interest and -importance of these laws reaches its height. If here we once more -move backwards, the case of St. Paul (martyred A.D. 64) furnishes us -with parallel contemporary accounts of the spontaneous type, in his -own Epistles and in the six “We”-passages by the eyewitness St. Luke -in the Acts of the Apostles; whilst the remaining account in the Acts -is doubtless by a later, more reflective and pragmatic, writer.--And -in the apprehension and interpretation of Our Lord’s inexhaustible -life, character, teaching, and work, we find very plainly the three -tendencies and stages. We get the contemporary, simultaneous, -spontaneous stage, in the cases of the Aramaic annotations of -the Apostle Levi-Matthew, which we still possess, translated and -incorporated both in the larger and later book, our canonical Greek St. -Matthew, and in the corresponding parts of our St. Luke; and in the -reminiscences of another eyewitness, presumably St. Peter, given us by -a disciple in what is still the substance of our Canonical St. Mark. We -get the posterior, successive, increasingly reflective or contemplative -stage, chiefly in the two great types furnished, first by the Pauline, -and then by the Joannine writings. And we get the juxtaposing, -unifying, largely identifying stage and law operating above all in -the, partly successive, Canonization of the New Testament _Corpus_. -And these three stages can be taken as having their downward limits in -about A.D. 30, 100, 200; so that here we cover a period of some hundred -and seventy years. - - -4. _Three different attitudes possible._ - -And, in all these and countless other cases, we can take up three -different attitudes: the impoverishing, sectarian, “purity” attitude; -the destructive, sceptical, “identity” attitude; or the fruitful, truly -Catholic “approximation” and “development” attitude. The first attitude -assumes (ever in part unconsciously) the possibility and necessity of -a purely objective apprehension of Personality, of such a Personality -being a static entity, both in itself and in its effects upon, and -its apprehendedness by, other souls, and of the earliest among the -observations concerning such a Personality ever giving us such a -purely objective, exhaustive picture and experience, or at least the -nearest approach (in all respects) to such an exhaustive objectivity. -The third attitude would so understand the admitted identity of the -Personality observed as practically to identify also the simultaneous -and successive observers and observations, and to eliminate all variety -and growth in that spirit’s own inner life and in its apprehension -by other minds. Only the second attitude would, by recognizing both -the constant, necessary presence of a subjective element in all these -simultaneous and successive apprehensions, and the indefinite richness -and many-sided apprehensibleness of all great spiritual Personalities, -welcome and draw out all the difference in unity of these many -“reactions,” as so many means, for a growing soul, towards a growing -knowledge of that life and character, whose very greatness is, in part, -measurable by the depth, variety, and persistence of these several -effects, pictures, and embodiments of itself in different races, times, -and souls. - -Let us, then, betake ourselves to a systematic examination of one -example of these world-wide three laws: the trouble taken will be well -spent. - -II. - -Had I found room to print my notes in justification of the text -adopted by me, the reader would have gained some idea of the exceeding -complexity of the materials furnished by the printed _Vita e Dottrina_. -Indeed the original Preface to that book (1551) finds it necessary to -conclude with the words “we therefore” (because of the book’s utility, -indeed necessity, “in these turbulent times”) “beg the devout reader -not to be disturbed” (_stomacharsi_ now changed to _meravigliarsi_) -“if he finds here matters which appear to be out of their proper -order” (_non ben ordinate_), “and which are sometimes repeated; since -attention has been given, neither to much precision” (_distinzione_), -“nor to the order of events, nor to elegance of form, but only to that -truth and simplicity with which its facts and discourses were gathered -by devout spiritual persons” (“her Confessor and a Spiritual Son of -hers”) “from the very lips of that Seraphic Woman.” Both the praise -and the blame of this pregnant sentence will appear to be most fully -deserved. - -In our Second Part we have, in imitation of all experience in life -itself, been thrown _in medias res_, and have thus gained some general -idea and curiosity as to the sources of our knowledge; in this Appendix -we will now, without repeating details already given, take this -evidence, as much as possible, in its chronological order. And at each -stage I shall attempt so to analyze the evidence of that stage, as -to be able to use it as a check and test of the evidence of the next -stage.--We shall, however, have to bear in mind that this method has -necessarily, at each earlier stage, somewhat to beg the question; for, -in order to make its meaning everywhere sufficiently clear, it has from -the first to assume a confidence of tone, which can be justified only -by the whole argument, and which therefore has its logical place only -at the very end. - -This Appendix shall consist of two Divisions, of seven stages and eight -sections respectively. The first Division gives the dated Documents, -or such as can readily be restricted to within certain years; and the -second Division analyses the remaining, undated Corpus and attempts to -fix its origin and value. - - -FIRST DIVISION: ACCOUNT AND ANALYSIS OF THE DOCUMENTS PREVIOUS, -AND IMMEDIATELY SUBSEQUENT TO, THE “VITA E DOTTRINA” WITH THE -“DICCHIARAZIONE.” - - -I. FIRST STAGE, 1456 TO SEPTEMBER 12, 1510, ALL LEGAL. - -The documents of the first stage are all legal papers, and entirely -contemporary and authentic. They have to furnish the skeleton which -receives its clothing of flesh from the other documents. I shall here -describe only those not described in Part II, and shall refer back to -that Part for those already described there. - - -1. _Deed of 1456._ - -There is, first, a deed of August 27, 1456. From amongst the shares -belonging to Pomera (formerly) wife to (the late) Bartolommeo de Auria -(Doria), but now (Sister) Isabella, in the convent of St. David; at the -instance of Andrea de Auria, her only son, her heir, and of Francesca, -the mother of Catherine, daughter of Jacobo de Fiesco: two shares of -the Bank of St. George (£200) are set apart, for the benefit of the -said Catherine, for her marriage, if she marries according to her -Mother’s advice.[360] Note how early (Catherine is not yet nine years -old) her mother, Francischetta (so a note to the copy of this document, -no doubt correctly, calls her, and suspects Pomera to have been -her sister), is thinking of Catherine’s marriage; and how, although -Catherine’s father is still alive, nothing is said as to his consent, -perhaps simply because, this money coming from a maternal aunt and -cousin, only the mother’s wishes are considered to be important here. - - -2. _Catherine’s Marriage Settlement, January 1463._ - -There is, next, Catherine’s marriage settlement, made “at Genoa, in -the quarter of St. Laurence, to wit in the sitting-room (_caminata_) -of the residence of Francisca, formerly wife to the late Don Jacobo -de Fiescho,” “with the public street in front, the house of Urbano de -Negro at its right, and that of Sebastiano de Negro at its left and -back”; “in the evening of Thursday, January 13, 1463”; between Giuliano -Adorno, son of the late Don Jacobo, on the one hand, and Francisca, -mother of Caterinetta and Jacobo and Giovanni de Fiesco, brothers of -the same. Giuliano thereby pledges himself to give Catherine on their -marriage, £1,000, and he “mortgages to her,” up to this amount, “a -certain house of his own, situate in Genoa in the quarter of St. Agnes, -with the public street in front, the house of Baldassare Adorno at the -right hand” (it belonged before this to Don Georgio Adorno), “and on -the other hand the public street.” And Francesca, Jacobo, and Giovanni -promise to pay Giuliano, in bare money and in wedding outfit for -Catherine, £400 on completion of the marriage, and another £400 in the -course of the following two years; and they mortgage to him, up to this -amount, the house in which the settlement is being made. Giuliano is to -be free to live with his wife and her family in this same house, for -these first two years after his marriage, without any payment. - -At this date, then, Giuliano is already fatherless, and Catherine’s -brother Lorenzo is still too young to have any legal voice in the -matter. Although Catherine is, after the first two years, not -guaranteed anything beyond £1,000 capital, or say £40 a year income, -her outfit is a handsome one. - - -3. _Catherine’s first Will, June 1484._ - -Then there is Catherine’s first Will, June 23, 1484, after twenty-one -years of marriage. She is “lying” although “fully herself in mind, -intellect, and memory,” yet “languid in body and weighted down by -bodily infirmity, in the room, her residence, in the women’s quarters -of the Hospital of the Pammatone,” which “she has inhabited for a -considerable time (_jamdiu_).” “And knowing herself to be without -children, and without hope of future offspring,” she leaves the -life-interest in her marriage-dowry of £1,000 to her husband, Giuliano; -bids divide up, at his death, the bulk of this capital between the -Hospital and her eldest brother Jacobo (£300 to each), and her two -younger brothers Giovanni and Lorenzo (£150 to each); and orders her -body to be buried in the Hospital Church.[361] - -Ten years, then, after her Conversion, Catherine had already been -living for a considerable time within the Hospital. They do not as -yet occupy a separate building, or even a set of rooms within the -Hospital; and, though both live within it, they evidently occupy -separate rooms in different parts of the great complex of buildings; -for the room here mentioned is simply Catherine’s (_camera residentiae -testatricis_, where _residentiae_ must be a descriptive and not a -partitive genitive), and forms part and parcel of the women’s wards -(_in domibus mulierum_). Her absence of hope as to offspring evidently -arises primarily from the life of continence she is leading. Yet this -latter determination is clearly not caused by any specific knowledge -of her husband’s past infidelity: for Thobia must have been now some -ten years old, yet there is no kind of mention of her; whilst, later -on, Catherine never fails to remember her, with one exception to -be presently explained. There is no mention of nephews and nieces, -doubtless because her brothers were, as yet, either unmarried or -childless, or, at least, daughterless. She is fairly well off, for -besides this possession of £1,000 she gets her room and board free, -and Giuliano has still some property of his own more considerable than -hers. And the share left by her to relations is large--£600--as over -against £300 to a public charity (the Hospital), and £100, presumably, -for the funeral, minor charities, and Masses. If she says nothing, as -yet, as to burial in the same grave with her husband, this is doubtless -because she herself appears now to be the one likely to die first. - - -4. _Giuliano’s Will, October 1494._ - -There is, fourthly, the first and last Will, October 20, 1494, of -“the Reverend Sir, Brother Giuliano Adorno, professing the Third -Order of St. Francis, under the care of the Friars Minor Observants,” -already described on pages 151, 152. The will is drawn up in the -“sitting-room” (_caminata_) of the “habitation” of the Testator. Now -the Notary, Battista Strata, in a foot-note to a first draft of an -(unfinished) Will of Catherine, writes: “On the day on which I drew up -Don Giuliano’s”; which words (owing to a multiplicity of converging -indications) can only refer to this Will of October 2, 1494. And -in this draft Catherine leaves legacies to the servants Benedetta -(Lombarda) and Mariola Bastarda, as “abiding with, and dwelling in the -house with, Testatrix.” It is clear then that, by now, Catherine and -Giuliano are living under the same roof, in a distinct house within the -hospital precincts, with two personal attendants for their common use. -They will have moved, out of their separate single rooms, into this -house, upon Catherine becoming Matron, in 1490. In this draft there -appear also, for the first time, her brother Jacobo’s two daughters -(£100 each); and her sister, the Augustinianess Limbania (£10). - - -5. _Four minor documents, 1496-1497._ - -There are, next, certain minor documents of 1496-1497, which modify -points of previous Wills and clear up details of her life. Thus, -on June 17, 1496 Catherine signs a deed of consent to the sale of -the Palace in the S. Agnese (Adorni) quarter.--On January 10, 1496, -Giuliano, “sane in mind although languid in body,” orders, in a -Codicil, that Catherine shall carry out, according to the directions -of a certain Friar Minor, a vow made by himself to St. Anthony of -Padua; notes that the Palace has been sold; and declares that she is -to be free to annul, amend or diminish, according to her own judgment, -his legacy of £500 to the Hospital.[362] And, in the Cartulary of the -Bank of St. George, Catherine’s name appears as an Investor: on July -14, 1497 as “wife of Giuliano Adorno”; but on October 6 as “wife and -testamentary heiress of the late Giuliano Adorno.”[363] These entries -were considered on page 149 note. On the second occasion she orders -that the Bank shall, after her death, annually pay over the interest -of the fourteen shares (£1,400), now bought by her, to the Hospital of -the Pammatone, in return for “the enjoyment and usufruct of a house and -a greenhouse (_viridario_) of (within) the said Hospital,” which had -been conceded to her for her lifetime. The sum (about £56 a year) thus -ceded by her is a handsome one, as she had, by now, well earned the use -of this house by her constant labours for the Hospital, including her -matronship from 1490 to 1496. I take it that she was again thinking of -Thobia; so that this relatively large sum would cover at least part of -the Hospital’s expenses incurred for this poor girl. - - -6. _Catherine’s second Will, May 1498._ - -This has been studied on pages 152-154. - - -7. _Deed of Cession, September 18, 1499; and Codicil of January 1503._ - -These have been studied on pages 155, and 168, 169. - - -8. _Third Will, May 21, 1506; and Codicil of November 1508._ - -These have been described on pages 172-174; and 175, 176. - - -9. _Fourth and last Will, March 18, 1509; and two last Codicils, August -3 and September 12, 1510._ - -These have been described on pages 185-187; 202, 203; and 212-214, -respectively. - -We have thus described all the fifteen documents which alone still -bear dates within the range of Catherine’s lifetime, and whose -contemporaneousness is above all challenge. They all have the pedantic, -at first sight unmoving, indeed repulsive, form of legal documents. -Yet the substance of quite ten of them undoubtedly proceeds from -Catherine; and they all give us a most precious, precise certainty -with regard to many cardinal points of locality, date, sequence, and -self-determination in her life. True, neither the day, nor even the -month, of her Birth or Baptism; nor the year of her Conversion; nor -the date of the beginning of her Daily Communions; nor the facts -as to the rarity or frequency of her Confessions; nor the day or -month of Giuliano’s death, have been recoverable by any contemporary -attestations. But on other points we thus possess a series of -absolutely reliable documents, ranging from 1456 to 1510, whose -testimony nothing can be allowed to shake. - - -II. SECOND STAGE: FIVE FURTHER OFFICIAL AND LEGAL DOCUMENTS, 1511-1526; -AND FOUR MORTUARY DATES, 1524-1587. - -And this first stage of the evidence is followed by a second, as dry -and legal, and as absolutely reliable, as the other; yet which still -does not refer to any chronicle or notes of her life, (as either -already extant or as in process of registration or radaction), but only -to the fate of her remains and to certain turning-points in the lives -of her disciples and eyewitnesses. I note here only those documents -which fix for us the dates of the beginning of her Cultus, and which -give us the latest contemporary proof for those persons being still -alive. - - -1. We get thus the Hospital Account for the Moneys spent on the -Religious Clothing of the Maid-Servant Mariola Bastarda, July 7, 1511; -the entry in the Hospital Cartulary of the expenses incurred for the -transport of stone and for a picture, in connection with the first -opening of Catherine’s Deposito, July 10, 1512; the account, in the -same book, concerning the funeral of Don Jacobo Carenzio, who had died -occupying Catherine’s little house within the Hospital precincts, on -January 7, 1513; a Will of the little widow-attendant Argentina del -Sale, of January 15, 1522; and the Will of Don Cattaneo Marabotto, -still “in good bodily and mental health,” May 11, 1526,--a document -drawn up in his dwelling-place, the house belonging to his friends, the -Salvagii.[364] - - -2. And to this group we can add four further dates, the first and -last two of which are completely certain. Ettore Vernazza died on -June 26 or 27, 1524; the year is fixed by the great plague epidemic -which carried him off, and the month and day, by his daughter’s -letter. Cattaneo Marabotto died, there is no reason to doubt, in 1528. -Catherine’s Dominican cousin and close friend, Suor Tommasa Fiesca, -died, eighty-six years of age, in 1534. And Battista Vernazza died, -aged ninety, on May 9, 1587.[365] - -Hence, up to eighteen years after her death, the two closest of -Catherine’s confidants were alive; whilst one who had known her, and -had been thirteen at the time of Catherine’s death, was still alive -seventy-seven years after that event. - - -III. THIRD STAGE: BISHOP GIUSTINIANO’S ACCOUNT OF CATHERINE’S LIFE, -REMAINS, AND BIOGRAPHY, 1537. - -Our third stage is in strikingly manifold contrast to the other two. -It is represented by but one single, largely vague and rhetorical, but -human and directly psychological, document; and is the first that tells -us of a Life. - - -1. _The text._ - -Monsignore Agostino Giustiniano, Bishop of Nibio, published his -_Castigatissimi Annali … della Republica di Genova_, in Genoa, in -1537. There, on p. 223, he tells us that he was born (of socially -distinguished parents) in that city in 1470. And under the date of 1510 -(p. 266) he writes: “And in the month of September, it pleased God to -draw to Himself Madonna Catarinetta Adorna, who was daughter of Giacobo -di Flisco, Vice-Roy of Naples for King René, and wife to Giuliano -Adorno, with whom she lived many years in marital chastity. And her -life, after the Divine goodness had touched her heart in the years -of her youth, was all charity, love, meekness, benignity, patience, -incredible abstinence, and a mirror of every virtue, so that she can be -compared to St. Catherine of Siena. And all the city has participated -in, and has perceived, the odour of the virtues of this holy matron, -who, when rapt in the spirit, spoke, amongst other matters, of the -state of the souls that are in Purgatory, things excellent and rare -and worthy of being attended to by such persons as have a taste for -the religious and spiritual life. Her body is deposited in the Oratory -of the larger Hospital, and offers a spectacle no less admirable than -venerable, appearing (_come che sia_) all entire with its flesh, so -that she looks alive,--as though she had been placed there to-day; and -yet full twenty-five years have passed since she began to lie there -dead. The great consciousness of God, the special virtues, the saintly -deeds, accompanied by an immense love, which were manifested by this -venerable matron, would furnish matter well worthy of being recorded -here. Yet we shall pass them over, for the sake of brevity; especially -since a book worthy of respect (_un digno libro_) has been composed, -concerning these things exclusively, by persons worthy of confidence -(_digne di fede_).” - - -2. _Its testimony._ - -Now this is a statement which we have every reason to trust. For Bishop -Giustiniano, himself a native of Genoa, forty years of age at the -time of Catherine’s death, was a man of education, of solid character, -and of social position; who, throughout his long book, is uniformly -truthful and generally accurate; and who had here no conceivable reason -for inventing or seriously misstating the few facts alleged by him. -These facts, as regards the matter in hand, are three: that she spoke -of various (evidently various spiritual) matters, and, amongst these, -of the state of the souls in Purgatory; that a Book was extant at the -end of 1535, which concerned itself exclusively with Catherine; and -that persons worthy of trust had produced this Book. - -(1) Giustiniano knows of no writings of hers: she had not written, but -had only “spoken excellent and rare things,” and she had done so “when -rapt in the spirit.” The exaggeration here (for when in ecstasy, she -spoke nothing, or but a few broken words at most) is interesting, since -it probably grew up as an explanation of, and consolation for, her not -having herself written anything; since during the ecstasy she would be -incapable of anything but speech, and out of the ecstasy she would not -remember the sights and sounds perceived during the trance. And yet, -thus, what had to be written down by others, whilst she was in ecstasy, -would be more precious, because more immediately “inspired,” than what -she herself could have thought, remembered, and written down, in her -ordinary psycho-physical condition. - -(2) The Book, in existence at the end of 1535, not only contained -sayings concerning the state of the souls in Purgatory, but must have -contained these sayings already collected together in a separate -chapter or division. For her sayings concerning this matter by no -means form the larger, or the most immediately striking, part of her -authentic teaching, taken as a whole; and only if already collected -into a more or less separate _corpus_ would they have been singled -out in this manner.--But, if this reasoning is sound and proves -the existence of the _Trattato_, already more or less separate as -at present, similar reasoning will prove the non-existence of the -_Dialogo_. For the _Trattato_, even in its present length, fills but -fifteen large-print octavo pages; while the _Dialogo_ fills ninety. It -is practically inconceivable that the latter document, which can never -have existed otherwise than more or less separately, should have been -overlooked here, where another, so much shorter, and at first sight -less authoritative, is dwelt on with emphasis. - -(3) More than one hand had participated in the production of the Book. -It is characteristic of the rhetorically loose phraseology of the times -that the word “composto” is so used as to leave it quite uncertain -whether several original contributors of materials and but one Redactor -who constituted these materials into a Book are meant, or whether a -succession of Redactors is already implied. - - -3. _Surviving eyewitnesses._ - -Certainly by this time the three chief eyewitnesses of her later -earthly existence, Carenzio, Vernazza, and Marabotto were all dead, -since respectively twenty-two, eleven, and seven years. Tommasa Fiesca -had died in the previous year. Only Mariola Bastarda and Argentina del -Sale, her old maid-servants, were probably still alive, from among -the circle of Catherine’s constant companions; and Battista Vernazza, -who was but thirteen when her God-mother died, had still fifty-two -years to live. Yet we have to come still later down amongst extant -documents before we can get any further evidence, whether external -or internal, as to which of these persons, or who else (probably or -certainly) wrote down the original contemporary notes; and as to who -constituted these notes, (on one or on successive occasions) into this -“Giustiniano-book,” as I shall call the manuscript “Vita e Dottrina,” -extant in 1535. - - -IV. FOURTH STAGE: THE TWO OLDEST EXTANT MANUSCRIPTS OF THE “VITA E -DOTTRINA” WITH THE “DICCHIARAZIONE.” - -The fourth stage of evidence is, as to its contents, the most -important of all: but it is, as we shall see, twelve years younger: it -belongs to the years 1547, 1548. It consists of two Manuscripts, the -duodecimo-volume B. 1. 29 of the University Library; and the square -octavo-volume of the Archives of the Cathedral Chapter, both in Genoa. -Here, at last, we are face to face with an actual _Life_ of our Saint. -I have carefully collated them both upon the ninth Genoese Edition of -the _Vita ed Opere_, Genova, Sordi Muti: the first MS., throughout, and -the second one, sufficiently to make sure of its entire dependence upon -the first. I have named them MS. A and MS. B respectively. - - -1. MANUSCRIPT A. - - -1. _Its date and scribe._ - -Manuscript A is very interesting. It opens out as follows: “Jesus. Here -beginneth the book in which is contained the admirable life and holy -conversation of Madonna Catherinetta Adorna.… This book was begun and -written at the request of her Magnificent Ladyship, the Lady Orientina, -Consort to the most magnificent and generous, illustrious Lord Adam -Centurione, when she was being vexed by a grave and well-nigh incurable -infirmity, during now already thirteen months, by a Religious of the -Observance … on the 7th of October of the year fifteen hundred and -forty-seven.”--And Catherine’s Life concludes with the words: “_Laus -Deo semper._ This book was written at the request of the Consort, of -happy memory, of the … Lord Adam Centurione, who lay vexed by a most -grave infirmity, during now two years. Many a time she would sit and -find consolation, in her most painful torments, by reading of the -burnings (_incendii_) which were suffered, for so long a time, by this -holy woman.… At the thirteenth hour of the fourth of February God took -her to Himself. She, a few days before she passed away, begged me with -tears, in the presence of the Magnificent Lady, the Lady Ginetta, her -most beloved daughter, to finish that which I had undertaken to produce -for her own self. And so it will be of use to the latter, and will help -her to bear her pains and travails, which may the Lord alleviate, by -giving her good patience.”--After this follow thirty pages; containing -an Italian version of St. Bernard’s Sermon on the death of his Brother -Gerard, (Chapter XXVI of his _Sermons on the Canticle of Canticles_). -And the whole concludes with the words: “Finished in the year Fifteen -hundred and forty-eight, on the thirteenth of February.” - -We have here, then, very precise dates: this _Life_ was written between -October 7, 1547, and February 4-13, 1548, by a Franciscan Observant, -first for the wife, and then for the daughter, of a Doge of Genoa. - - -2. _Comparison with the Printed “Life.”_ - -Now the whole forty-two chapters of this _Life_, together with the -Sermon, are engrossed throughout, in a careful and upright uncial -script. On close comparison with the Printed _Life_ the differences -turn out to consist, either of vocabulary and dialect, of a simply -formal kind; or of additions and variations in the subject-matter, -of an exceedingly trite and would-be edifying character; or of a -very few additional passages of genuine importance; or of divisions, -transpositions, and _lacunae_--the latter mostly of a significant and -primitive kind; or, finally, of one highly interesting change, effected -in his own copy, by the copyist himself. - -(i) _Vocabulary._ - -The Observant’s vocabulary is a curious mixture of downright (late) -Latin, old French, and modern Italian. So “pagura” (_paura_); “in -si” (_se_, Fr. _soi_); “despecto” (_dispetto_); “alchuna,” “anchora” -(_alcuna_, _ancora_); “lingeriare” (_ligare_, Fr. _lier_); “summissa” -(_sommessa_, Fr. _soumise_); “una fiata” (_una volta_, Fr. _une fois_); -“dido” (_digito_, o. Fr. _doight_).[366] Some of these and such-like -forms no doubt stood in his Prototype. Thus, whilst he simply copies, -he writes--“pecto” and “licet”; when he makes up sentences of his -own, he writes “petto” and “abenchè.” And his single Chapter XIII -has, on two pages, “per il che”; but, on its last two pages, it has -the elsewhere universal “perochè” (_perchè_).--Yet his language is, -upon the whole, so uniform, whilst his sources (as we shall see) are -so varied; and again his uniform language is in such marked contrast -to Giustiniano’s educated Genoese Italian of 1535, and to that of the -Printed _Vita_ of 1551: that much of it, even where he is copying the -substance of his Prototype, must be his own. - -(ii) _Worthless additions and variations, of two kinds._ - -The additions and variations are mostly of two kinds. They are either -of a directly edificatory character. So the three pages descriptive of -the devotion of the crowd, on occasion of the opening of the coffin, -in the spring of 1512; the very general statement as to the miracles -that occurred on that occasion; and, further back, the expansion (by -this Franciscan scribe) of Catherine’s comments on (the Franciscan) -Jacopone da Todi’s “la superbia in cielo c’è.”[367] And in one place, -to produce edification by a sense of contrast, he adopts a touch of -(doubtless legendary) gossip against Giuliano, for the heading of his -Chapter XXIV runs: “How she comported herself towards her husband, who -was very contrary to her temperament; and concerning her indefatigable -patience in bearing with him, and even with the beatings which he gave -her”;[368]--where the end marked off by me is no doubt the Observant’s -own addition,--possibly, as we shall see, on the authority of Argentina -del Sale.--Or these additions are introduced to minimize or ward off -scandal. So when, after expanding the parallel between the conversions -of St. Paul and Catherine, he adds: ‘“For He spoke, and they were -(re-)made’ (Ps. xxxii, 9). But we must not curiously seek for the -reason of this action”; and then proves his point by three further -Biblical texts. So too when, after giving an abbreviated account of -the contrast between Thommasina’s and Catherine’s rate of spiritual -advancement, he again adds some Bible text and some moralizing of -his own. And so again where, after reproducing the passage as to her -being linked to God with a thread of gold, he expatiates, once more -in Scriptural words, on the presence of filial fear and the absence -of all servile fear within her. And so where, after following his -Prototype (as still preserved in the Printed _Life_), and declaring -his belief that it is reasonable and licit to believe her soul to have -entered Heaven immediately after death, he continues: “Hence he who -does believe this, does not lose in merit” (_non demerita_; an obvious -litotes for “merits”), “and he who believes it not, does not offend.” -In all these cases the Biblical texts appear in the Vulgate Latin.[369] - -There can be no doubt that it is this slight recasting of the language, -and this insertion of trite and timid moralizing of his own, which, -together with the careful engrossing of his copy throughout, and its -occasional pretty decoration and illumination, permitted the Observant -to talk (although, even thus, in a manner most misleading for our -present habits of language) of having “written this Book.” - -(iii) _Two genuine dates and accounts._ - -Yet, even amongst the passages which appear in his MS. as additional -to the later texts, are two evidently genuine and suggestive dates and -accounts. There is a description of Catherine’s great attack of “fire -at her heart,” more full and primitive, and more definitely dated than -any one of its many variants and echoes to be found in the Printed -_Life_: the slip in the date (he writes November 11, 1506, when his -own age-indications, and the position of the anecdote, clearly require -1509) will have had something to do with the strangely uncertain -position of this episode in the Printed _Life_.[370]--And further -back, in opening out the beautiful story of Marco and Argentina, he -writes: “There being in the quarter of the Quay (_contrada del Molo_) -one Marco del Sale, suffering from a cancer in the nose, who, fourteen -months before his infirmity, had taken to wife a virtuous young woman -named Argentina, spiritual daughter of Madonna Catherinetta, as is said -above.”[371] This very precise distance of time, between that humble -wedding and the poor navvy’s illness, will have been derived by the -Observant from Argentina herself, probably still living at the time of -his writing, even now hardly sixty years old.--Hence his long-winded -addition, as to the mediation of the “spiritual daughter” (certainly -Argentina), in the matter of our knowledge of Catherine’s prayer for -the dying Giuliano,[372] may also have been derived from that gossipy -little woman. - -(iv) _Divisions and transpositions._ - -As to the divisions and transpositions, the chief of these consist in -the first six chapters of the Printed _Vita_ appearing here broken up -into (the first) ten chapters; in the MS. Chapters XI to XVI being -gradually caught up by the Printed series,--indeed the MS. Chapter XVI -corresponds to Chapters XVI to XVIII of the published book; in the -Chapters XVII to XIX of the MS. corresponding to Chapters XX and XXI -of the Print; and Chapters XX, XXI, and XXII of the MS., corresponding -respectively to Chapters XXIV, XXV, and XXVII of the Print. Then for -three Chapters follows considerable variation: the MS. Chapters XXIII, -XXIV, and XXV hold the positions respectively of the Printed Chapters -XXXVII, XLV and XLVI there. And then again there is likeness for three -Chapters--MS. Chapters XXVI to XXVIII corresponding to Printed Chapters -XXVIII and XXIX there. And once more three MS. Chapters (XXIX to -XXXI), quite different in sequence to anything there, are followed by -two Chapters (XXXII and XXXIII) corresponding to the Printed Chapters -XXIX and XXX. Four more MS. Chapters (XXXIV to XXXVII), without any -match, as to order, in the Printed book, are followed by two Chapters -(XXXVIII and XXXIX), corresponding, respectively, to the beginning -and end of Chapter XXXI there; and by Chapter XL, identical with the -opening of Chapter XL and with Chapter XLI there. And, above all, -Chapter XLI here, corresponds to the _Dicchiarazione_ (_Trattato_) -there; and is followed here by a final Chapter (XLII), made up of a -bewilderingly different succession of paragraphs,--paragraphs which, in -the Printed _Life_, stand in Chapters XLIX; XVII; and XLVIII to LII. -And, whereas the first forty Chapters of this MS. average six or seven -pages in length, Chapters XLI and XLII are respectively forty-five and -forty-eight pages long. - -(v) _Lacunae._ - -These transpositions would alone suffice to show how complicated is the -textual history of the _Vita_: we may have to consider some of them -later on. But it is the _lacunae_ which are especially interesting. -One of these is quite certainly right, as against the printed text. -Paragraphs 23 to 25 of Chapter L of the Print are wanting here. Those -pages give an entirely fantastic, and formally vague, account of a -supposed interior stigmatization of Catherine, and of a preposterous -elongation of one of her arms,--both “facts” based explicitly upon -the authority of Argentina.[373] And the circumstance of the scribe -being a disciple of the stigmatized St. Francis, and the probability -that Argentina was still accessible, conjoin to render the absence of -these paragraphs from this MS. simply decisive against their historical -character.--The longest of all the omissions, that of the _Dialogo_, -must, even more, be explained on the ground of its non-existence at -this time, or, at least, of its not being known to the Scribe, or -again, of its having as yet no kind of authority. For not only does he -make no use of, or allusion to this, very long, and (were it primitive) -simply supreme document, but, as we shall find, quite a number of his -facts contradict the _Dialogo’s_ version of them; and we shall soon see -that, had he known and esteemed the document, he would not have allowed -such a defiance of it to remain without correction. - -Over against these two non-appearances of spurious or secondary matter, -we have to set three omissions of highly valuable material. The two -interconnected, obviously entirely historical, paragraphs concerning -Maestro Boerio,--his attempt to cure Catherine, and the excessive -impression made upon her by his scarlet robes,[374]--are both wanting -here. But we shall see that they were probably not incorporated in any -_Vita_, till the preparation of the Printed _Life_ of 1551.--Matters -stand differently with respect to the third omission,--the -beautifully vivid, inimitably daring and characteristic, Chapter -XIX, containing Catherine’s dialogue with the Friar, who, according -to the well-informed Parpera, was a Franciscan Observant.[375] It is -impossible to hold that this, most historical and well-preserved, -story did not stand in the Observant’s Prototype, or that it was -otherwise unknown to him; its omission is doubtless deliberate and -“prudential.”--An interesting instance of demonstrable omission on his -part, is indeed furnished also by his version of the beautiful story -of Suor Tommasa’s life: his abbreviation of it is so obvious and yet -so unintelligent, that only a reference to the full account, which lay -certainly before him and is still preserved in the Printed _Life_, -makes any satisfactory sense of what he has retained.[376] - - -3. _Modification from a tripartite scheme to a quatripartite one._ - -But the most interesting of all the differences between this MS. A of -1547 and the Printed _Life_ of 1551 is another group of omissions, -connected, as these are, with the one single modification introduced -into his own text by the Scribe himself. The whole of the matter -corresponding to the Printed _Life’s_ Chapter XLIV (all but the first -seven lines) and that corresponding to the first three paragraphs of -its Chapter XLIX, which treat consecutively, and with an inimitable -vividness and a daring, unreflective truthfulness, of her most -unusual self-revelations to her Confessor Don Marabotto,[377] is -omitted--possibly, again, in part at least, from fear of scandal; but -more probably because, even at this time, this (the most private and -consecutive) contribution to the _Life_, still existed separately, -perhaps from all, and presumably from most, copies of the _Vita_ -then in circulation. And such a copy will have been the Observant’s -Prototype.--Only when he had finished copying out his manuscript, will -he have discovered that, if he would take any, even though silent, -account of that contribution, which, by now, will have become known to -him, he must, at all costs, break up and seriously modify one of his -chapters. We have already studied the treble, most solemn affirmation, -by Catherine and her Confessor themselves, in that Printed Chapter -XLIV, as to her twenty-five years of spiritual loneliness and guidance -by God alone;[378] and we have seen that (since we cannot place her -Conversion before 1474, nor the beginning of her later practice of -Confession after 1499) we are forced (if we take her words in their -obvious sense, as applying to Confession as well as to Direction, and -assume her First Convert-Period, the penitential time, to have been -accompanied throughout by repeated Confessions) to make this first -Period very short. - -Now the volume of 1547, 1548, consists throughout of paper, all but -the first three leaves and the tenth leaf, which are of parchment. -The first leaf remains blank; the second contains the Observant’s -Preface on its obverse; the third holds, on its two sides, the first -two pages of the _Vita_. That Preface was certainly written before all -the rest, or at least certainly during the lifetime of Donna Orientina -Centurione, _i.e._ before February 4, 1548; nor does anything in those -first two (parchment and paper) pages of text suggest that they are an -insertion subsequent to the following (paper) pages. At first, then, -the copy will have consisted of three parchment leaves, and then of -nothing but paper leaves; and the Observant will have made the last of -these parchment leaves the sole and opening parchment leaf of the text -of the Book. - -But matters stand differently with the tenth leaf, pp. 19, 20 of -the MS., which begins with the words “bisogna, sono apparecchiata -a confessar”--“(if) necessary, I am prepared to confess my sins in -public” (Catherine’s words, on occasion of her Conversion); and ends -with “(abru) savano insino al core. Poi fù tirata al Petto”--“Love, -with those penetrating rays of its own, which burnt her, even to the -heart. She was then drawn to the Breast” (narrative words which, in the -scheme of her _Life_ that follows upon the Conversion-story, mark the -transition from one of this scheme’s stages to another). - -Now here we have clear indications that these two parchment pages -hold a modified text. For that last parchment-leaf word “Petto” is -picked up, on the paper continuation, by “Pecto,” the ordinary form of -the Observant’s Prototype: see his page 81. And the whole book (all -but this parchment leaf and its highly restricted effects), still -attributes _four years_ to her First Convert-Period, her Penitential, -Purgative Stage. - -Indeed, this solitary parchment leaf itself still allows us to trace, -(as though the leaf were a Palimpsest), both this, the original, -length of that Period, and the fact of that Period having then been -the first of three, and not, as now, of four such periods.--For this -leaf, in finishing up the manuscript’s fourth chapter, the history -of her Conversion,[379]--declares that “this sight (of her sins) and -this contrition (for them) lasted _fourteen months_, during which she -went on confessing herself, continually increasing her self-accusation -(_aggravando la colpa_); after the passing of which months, all sadness -was lifted from her, nor did she have any memory of her sins,--as -though she had cast them into the depths of the sea.” And then, in -the opening of the fifth chapter,[380] the scheme and conspectus of -her Convert Life runs as follows. She is first “drawn to the feet -of Christ” and abides there “_one year_ until she had satisfied her -conscience by Contrition, Confession, and Satisfaction.”--“She next -felt herself drawn, with St. John, to repose on the Breast of her -Loving Lord.… _The sight of the sins committed by her against God would -come to her_, so that she would be, as it were, wild (_arrabbiava_) -with grief, and would lick the ground with her tongue; and in this wise -she appeared to derive relief for her tempestuous feelings (_affannato -cuore_). And she abode thus for _three years_, during which she was, -as it were, wild with grief and love, with those penetrating rays of -its own, which burned her to the very heart.[381] She was then drawn -to the Breast”--which last parchment-leaf word is taken up by the -next, ordinary paper-leaf: “Breast; and here she was shown the Heart -of Christ.… And she abode _many years_ with this impression of His -burning Heart.--And then she was drawn (still) further up, that is, to -the Mouth; and there she was found worthy of being kissed by the true -Solomon.… And she no more (directly) recognized her human acts, whether -they had been done well or evilly; but she saw all in God.”[382] - -We see here how the original four years of her First Period, which are -still retained elsewhere by the Printed _Vita_,[383] have been broken -up by the scribe of this Manuscript into two shorter (first and second) -Periods, of fourteen months (one year), and three years respectively; -how the copyist, both in his first apportionment of length to his new -First Period, “fourteen months,” and in his second assignment, now -of one year (since he has to divide up the original Four years so as -to get them again by addition, “_one_ year” and “_three_ years”), -leaves us two curious echoes of the “Four” of his Prototype; how his -amended description of his new second Period is still largely the old -Penitential description, for she still sees her sins (a sight which -is here an anachronism), and she is still prostrate on the ground (a -prostration which exactly suits the Feet, but in no way the Breast of -Christ); how the Observant has been half-hearted and clumsy, for he has -now left two successive Breast-Periods, hardly differentiated from each -other; and how he was able to shift (though not to change) the original -single Breast-Period (now his second Breast-Period), because of its -conveniently vague time-note of “many years.” All this laborious, yet -timid, incomplete and ineffectual change, thus forced upon an evidently -long-established, toughly resisting composition, can only have taken -place under some severe pressure of evidence; and the root-causes of -the change are somehow connected with the question as to the duration, -in her life, of the perception and Confession of her sins. For the -Confession of her sins, which (in the old scheme) extended over four -years, is now restricted to fourteen months or one year; and if -contemplative and restful love are now anticipated (from the original -second Period) in the new second Period of three years, yet an intense -sight of her particular sins, piercing contrition for them, and a -complete prostration on the ground, are all indeed retained, from the -original Feet-Period, for this new second Period, but Confession has -disappeared from these three years. - -Now we have precisely such absolutely constraining evidence in -Marabotto’s treble chronicle of Catherine’s own words, with regard to -the twenty-five years during which she was led by God’s spirit alone. -It is clear then that the most important of Marabotto’s notes did not -exist incorporated with, or at least had not originally formed part of, -and did not dominate, the scheme of the _Vita_ which the Observant had -before him; and that, upon his later knowledge of, or pondering over -them, he understood Catherine’s words to have applied, not simply to -Direction but to (at least at all habitual) Confession as well. - - -2. MANUSCRIPT B. - - -1. _Its very primitive heading._ - -Manuscript B starts indeed with a heading demonstrably older than that -of MS. A. For its “De la Mirabile Conversione et Vita de la q(uondam) -donna Catherinetta Adorna” is more primitive, because of its “the -late,” which indicates a time of writing not yet far removed from the -date of her death; its “Donna,” less honorific than the “Madonna” of -the other MSS.; and, above all, its giving “Conversione” before “Vita,” -instead of “Conversatione” after “Vita,” since thus we are assured of -“Conversione” being no slip of the pen for “Conversatione,”--Conversion -coming necessarily before, and holy Conversation coming after, in -consequence of, an admirable life.--And this title will originally have -headed a booklet containing simply the story of her Conversion and -early Convert life, say, up to the end of Chapter VI of the Printed -_Vita_, p. 17_b_; or, since even the “et Vita” of this title reads like -a later addition, only up to the end of the present printed Chapter -II, p. 6_c_. I think there is no doubt that we have here the original -heading of a tract put together on occasion of the first public Cultus, -in the summer of 1512. - - -2. _Body of MS. B dependent upon MS. A._ - -But the body of MS. B is demonstrably later than, indeed dependent -upon, MS. A; for here the scribe silently adopts the modification, -effected by the writer of MS. A in his own text, with regard to -doubling the Breast-Period; and yet, even here, we have still the -Observant’s “Petto” for the first period, and the “Pecto” of the -Observant’s Prototype for the second period.[384] “Come” now appears -throughout, in lieu of MS. A’s “Como.” And Giuliano’s name is omitted -(all but once, in Catherine’s mouth) in the Husband-Chapter.[385] - - -3. _Order, division, numeration of the Chapters._ - -The order, division, and numeration of the Chapters is identical with -those of MS. A, all but that Chapter XXXIX of MS. A (equivalent to the -unimportant pp. 82_b_-83_a_ of Chapter XXXI in the Printed _Life_) -is here omitted. No Chapter numbered XXXIX appears here, but, after a -small break behind Chapter XXXVIII, the _Trattato_ follows, as Chapter -XL. - - -4. _Laceration at end of Manuscript._ - -And this Chapter XL is abruptly broken off in the midst of a -penultimate paragraph: “et per gratia li sono monstrati et” are the -last words. The authentication of the MS., appended immediately after -this rough ending, shows this laceration to be at least as old as 1672. -Nor is it a case of some complete set or sets of leaves being lost, -since one leaf has had to be torn off, from the still remaining other -half-sheet.[386] The last part, no doubt, contained the end of the -_Trattato_ and the Passion-Chapter; and will, like its Prototype, MS. -A, have been without a trace of the _Dialogo_. Indeed I suspect that it -was the latter circumstance which, when once this elaborate composition -had come to be prized, gave rise to the, surely deliberate, destruction -of the evidence for its absence here. MS. A will, in that case, have -been saved from a similar fate, by its special appropriation to a -powerful family; by its superior, uncial kind of script; and, above -all, by its important contemporary date and dedication at the end. - - -V. FIFTH STAGE: MANUSCRIPT C. - -Our next, deeply interesting stage, is represented by one single MS. -in the University Library, Genoa,--catalogued as B. VII 17. It is a -careful copy, made throughout by the Protonotary Angelo Luigi Giovo, -and subscribed by himself on April 20, 1671, of, as he there says, -“Another ancient MS. received from the Signora ----, Matron of the -Great Hospital, who declared that she had herself received it from -the Nuns of the Madonna delle Grazie; and which is believed, with -great probability, to be the MS. copied by Ettore Vernazza and sent to -the Venerable Donna Battista, his daughter. The book, in view of the -antiquity of the paper, of the character of the binding of the copy, -and of the other peculiarities, has been judged by experts to belong -to the above-mentioned Period.” The reader will soon see why I place -(not necessarily the execution, but the text of) the MS. thus copied -by Giovo, before the printing of the _Vita_ in 1551, and will thus be -helped to a decision as to the “greatly probable” attribution to Ettore -Vernazza. - - -1. _Differences in text of MS. C from MSS. A and B._ - -Giovo’s Copy (my MS. C) follows, up to the end of its Chapter XLI -(the _Trattato_), the division, number, and sequence of the chapters, -and the peculiarities of the text, of MS. A, with an all but unbroken -closeness: even the slip, of 1506 (for 1509), in the date of the -great attack of “fire at heart,” reappears here as it stands there -(fol. 33_v_ of MS. C, compared with p. 193 of MS. A). But the “Petto” -and “Pecto,” of respectively the first and second Breast-Periods -in MSS. A and B, read here, in both cases, as simply “Petto” (MS. -C, fol. 3).--There is but one at all remarkable addition in this, -the _Vita_-part of the MS. In the account of the refusal to accept -Catherine on the part of the Nuns of the very Convent where, as we -shall see, the Prototype copied by Giovo was no doubt written, there -occur the new words: “Although her Confessor was instant with them -(to take her), knowing her, as he did, better than the Nuns knew her” -(MS. C, fol. 1_v_).--And, in concluding further on (on its fol. 71_v -seq._) with the Passion-Chapter, as this stands in MS. A (Chapter -XLII), a Chapter which here (for a reason to be given in a minute) -is not numbered, the MS. still follows closely (although now with a -few generally unimportant additions, omissions, and transpositions of -paragraphs), the matter, order, and literary form of MS. A.--Only one, -formally slight, but materially significant, difference exists here -between Giovo’s text and the Printed _Life_. The Printed _Life_, p. -142_b_, reads: “After this, she felt a hard nail at heart”; to this MS. -C adds (fol. 72_r_) “so that she seemed nailed to the Cross.” Neither -set of words occurs in MSS. A and B. MS. C here gives us something -unlike Catherine’s, but very like Battista’s, special spirit. - - -2. _The great addition: the “Dialogo,” Part First._ - -(1) _The “Dialogo” originally no longer._ - -But it is in the pages intermediate between the _Trattato_ and the -Passion (foll. 53_v_ to 71_v_), that lies the interest of this MS. For -here we get, for the first time, the _Dialogo_, although, as yet, only -its eventual First Part (pp. 185-225 in the Printed _Life_). Chapter -XLI (the _Trattato_) has just finished, by only six lines short of its -printed form, with the words “because that occupation with Himself -which God gives to the soul, slight though it be, keeps the soul so -occupied, that it exceeds everything, nor can the soul esteem anything -else.” And immediately next there come (53_v_) the title-words: “Here -follows a certain beautiful Allegory (_Figura_) which this holy soul -institutes (_fà_) concerning the Soul and the Body.”--The eventual -division into (17) chapters is still absent, and the work seems, at -this time, to have been planned to be no longer than it is here. For -it concludes with the emphatic climax: “Now the Spirit, having come -to hold this creature in this manner, declared: ‘I am determined -henceforth no more to call her a human creature, because I see her -(to be) all in God, without any (mere) humanity.’” For these words -simply re-cast the last words of the scheme of her entire life, given -by the _Vita_: “She said: ‘I live no more, but Christ lives in me.’ -Hence she could no more recognize the quality of her human acts, in -themselves--whether they were good or evil; but she saw all in God” -(Pr. L., p. 6_c_). - -(2) _The “Dialogo’s” two stages, each comprising two steps, and their -suggestions in the “Vita.”_ - -Now the _Dialogo_, as here given, consists of two chief stages, and -each stage contains two steps. - -Chapters I to VI give the first stage--the history of a soul in a state -of moral and spiritual decline and contraction: all this, in the form -of a Dialogue between the Soul, the Body, and Self-Love.--Throughout -this first stage Self-Love holds dominion. But, during the first step, -the Soul (although it already distinguishes, with regard to what it -intends to practise, between simply avoiding grave sin and striving -after perfection) still continues fairly determined not to commit sin, -and still leads the Body. During the second step, on the contrary, even -this simple avoidance of grave sin has ceased, for now the Body leads -the Soul. Thus first the Soul, and then the Body, each leads the other -during one step, for “one week.”--These two steps or weeks stand for -the two lustres of Catherine’s pre-Conversion-Period, for the lukewarm, -and then the positively dissipated, lustre respectively. Chapters I -to III give the first week, equivalent to the first five years of her -married life, 1463 to 1468; and Chapters IV to VI give the second week, -and correspond to the second five years, 1468 to 1473.[387] - -Chapters VII to XXI describe the second stage, that of Conversion and -Transformation, which (notwithstanding its appearance of instantaneous -and complete attainment of its end) is here presented as, in reality, -by far the longer and the more difficult, although the alone fruitful -and happy one. Chapters VII to XIII describe the first step. Chapters -VII to IX give us the Soul’s longing for Light; the spark of Pure Love -shown to it, on its conversion-day; and a long address by the Soul to -the Body and Self-Love, and the answers of these two.[388] In this -address the Soul for the first time speaks of “_the Spirit_.”[389] -Chapter X makes the Soul for the first time address “_the Lord_,” “O -Signore,” on the one hand: and her “_Humanity_” “O Umanità,” on the -other.[390] In Chapters XI and XII the Soul stands alone, face to face -with the Lord, who appears to it in two successive visions,--first as -Christ alive and walking along all stained with blood from head to -foot; and, on a later occasion, as Christ evidently motionless and -presumably dead, with His five fountain-wounds, which are sending drops -of burning blood towards mankind. And these two visions, so carefully -kept apart, doubtless typify the two periods of Catherine’s Convert -life,--the two steps of her second stage: the moving, scourged and -cross-bearing Christ stands for the active penance of the first four -years or fourteen months; and the motionless, crucified Christ stands -for the passive purification of the rest of her life.[391] Chapter XIII -has no dialogue, but describes her active penances and good works, and -mentions the Soul, Humanity, and the Spirit.[392] - -And then, up to the end, in Chapters XIV to XXI, which give us -the second step, the dialogue reappears, but now no more between -the three _Dramatis Personae_ (Soul, Body, and Self-Love) of the -pre-Conversion-Period; but between the two interlocutors of the -post-conversion time (the Spirit and Humanity).[393] And there is here -but one sporadic mention, an invocation, of “the Lord” (p. 214_c_). - -Thus only after its Conversion does the Soul itself become aware of, -or does it name, either the Spirit or its “Humanity”; and only after -the two successive Christ-Visions do these two new experiences and -conceptions entirely replace the three old ones of Soul, Body, and -Self-Love. In a word, we have here, carefully carried through, the -scheme, so clearly enunciated by Battista Vernazza in 1554, of the two -successive divisions effected by God in Man, during the process of -Man’s purification: first, the separation (division) of the Soul from -the Body; and then the separation (division) of the Spirit from the -Soul.[394] And, in strict accordance with this scheme, the Soul here -becomes conscious of being, in its upper reaches, Spirit, only on the -day that it has broken away from the domination of the downward-tending -Body, and of Self-Love. And once the Soul has thus affirmed the -Spirit and denied the Body, the “Body” and the “Soul” cease to be -directly mentioned; the one term “Humanity” now takes the Soul’s and -the Body’s place. For now the Soul, in so far as it has still not -completely identified itself with the Spirit, does not any more attach -itself directly to the Body and the Body’s pleasures,--to, as it -were, the upper fringe of the Body,--but to the sensible-spiritual -consolations which are the necessary concomitants and consequences of -the Soul’s affirmation and acceptance of the Spirit,--hence, as it -were, to the lower fringe of the Spirit. “I would have thee know,” the -Spirit now says to Catherine, “that I fear much more an attachment -to the spiritual than to the bodily taste and feeling. Man goes his -way ‘feeding’ his spiritual sensuality upon the things which proceed -from God, and yet these things are a very poison for the Pure Love of -God.”[395] - - -3. _The “Dialogo” intensifies or softens certain narratives and sayings -given by the “Vita.”_ - -Now these interesting forty pages of the first _Dialogo_ derive (with -the sole exception of three little touches) their entire historical -materials from the _Vita e Dottrina_, and, indeed, from but those -parts of this _corpus_ which already appear in MSS. A and B, and in -the previous pages of MS. C itself. But all these materials have been -re-thought, re-pictured, re-arranged throughout, by a new, powerful, -and experienced mind, a mind dominated by certain very definite, -schematic conceptions as to the constitution of the human personality, -the nature of holiness, and the laws of its growth, and which is -determined to find or form concrete examples of these conceptions, in -and from the life of Catherine. - -(1) _Cases of intensifying._ - -There are, first, five cases of the intensifying of authentic -_Vita_-accounts, intensifications necessary, or at least ancillary, to -the scheme underlying the whole _Dialogo_-composition. - -As to the pre-conversion sinfulness, during her second “week,” -Catherine’s soul is made to say: “In a short time I was enveloped in -sin; and, abiding in that snare, I lost the grace (of God) and remained -blind and heavy, and from spiritual I became all earthly.”[396] Yet -there is no evidence that Catherine, even at that time, ever committed -grave sin; nor does there exist an authentic saying of hers which, -however intense its expressions of contrition, conveys an impression -really equivalent to this passage.--As to the form of her contrition, -“so greatly was this soul alienated (from her own self) and submerged -in the sight of the offence of God, that she no longer seemed a -rational creature, but a terrified animal.”[397] Yet the earlier -accounts, which certainly do not minimize here, keep well within -the limits of normal, though intense, human feeling and expression -of feeling.--As to the forcible means taken by her to overcome her -fastidiousness in the matter of cleanliness and in the sense of taste, -“she would put the impurities into her mouth, as though they had been -precious pearls.”[398] Yet the original versions, drastic enough in -all conscience, nowhere imply that there was any such relish, even -of a merely apparent kind.--As to her post-conversion poverty, the -Spirit says to her: “Thou shalt work to provide for thy living,” and -the narrative declares: “The Spirit made her so poor, that she would -have been unable to live, had not God provided for her by the means -of alms.”[399] Yet we know from her wills that (though the Hospital -authorities gave her free lodging, and perhaps, at first, free board as -well) she retained, up to the last, an appreciable little income, and -herself conferred many an alms out of these her own means. - -Nevertheless, in each of these cases, the _Dialogo_ exaggeration is -suggested by some phrase or word in the _Vita_ which has been taken -up into the new context and medium of this other mind, and has come -to mean something curiously (though often in form but slightly) -different from that older account.--Thus, in this fourth instance, -the _Vita_-accounts had said: “nel _principio_ di sua conversione, -molto si _esercitò_.” “Viveva ancora molto _sottomessa ad ogni -creatura_.” “Quantunque ella fosse in tutto dedicata ed occupata -negli _esercizii_ di esso Spedale, nondimeno mai volle godere ne -usare una minima cosa di quello per _viver suo_; ma, per quel poco -che abbisognava, si serviva della _povera_ sostanza sua: onde ben si -scorgeva che il suo dolce Amore era quello il quale operava in lei -ogni cosa per vera unione.” “Si _esercitò_ nelle opere pie, cercando i -_poveri_, essendo condotta delle Donne della Misericordia, e le davano -danari ed altre _provvisioni_.”[400] The _Dialogo_-writer has worked -all this up as follows: “Io (lo Spirito) ti avviso _primieramente_ -voler io che tu pruovi che cosa sia esser ubbidiente, acciò tu -divenghi umile e _soggetta ad ogni creatura_; ed acciochè ti possi -_esercitare_, lavorerai per provedere al _viver tuo_.” “Primieramente -la fece tanto _povera_, che non avrebbe potuto vivere, se Dio non -l’avvesse _provveduta_ per via di limosine. Poi quando le Signore della -Misericordia l’addimandavano per andare a’poveri … ella sempre con loro -andava.”[401] I have italicized the words taken over by the _Dialogo_. -Thus her own poor substance (_i.e._ her own modest income), and the -money given to her by the _Misericordia_-ladies for distribution among -the poor, becomes a substance, alms and money, given to herself as to a -poor person. - -The fifth case concerns the affections. In the _Vita_-proper nothing -is more characteristic of Catherine, up to the spring of 1509, than -her swift and deep affective sympathy, and the fearless forms of its -manifestation. True, Catherine “would” (certainly up to 1490, perhaps -more or less up to 1496) “abide at times,” up to six hours on end, -“as though dead.” But, “on hearing herself called, she would suddenly -arise and betake herself, in answer, to whatever was required of her, -however small a service this might be.” And indeed “she served the -sick with most fervent affection:” thus she attended throughout a week -upon a poor pestiferous woman; and at the end, “unable further to -contain herself, kissed” the dying woman “upon the mouth with great -affection of heart, and so caught the pestilential fever, and well-nigh -died of it.”[402]--Then, too, there is the _Vita’s_ quite general, -indeterminate remark, “she (Catherine) felt no pain at the deaths of -her (two elder) brothers and of her sisters” (the latter should be -“sister,” unless, perhaps, a sister-in-law is included) in 1502.[403] -But her extant wills have shown us how actively thoughtful she -remained, even in 1506 and 1509, for her brother, nephews and nieces, -and humble retainers; and the deeply affectionate scenes with Marco -and Argentina occurred between 1503 and 1506. Marco, the poor navvy, -was dying “of a cancer in the face,” and Catherine, at Argentina’s -asking, “as though with prompt obedience, betook herself to him”; and -he “threw his arms round Catherine’s neck, and, pressing her with sobs, -seemed unable to have done with weeping.[404] And then, still weeping, -with great tenderness he besought Catherine to adopt his wife as her -spiritual daughter,” and Catherine did so, and “loved this spiritual -daughter much.”[405]--Only in the very late actions, the change as to -her burial-place (Will of March 1509), and the exclusion of all her -attendants on January 10, and of most of them on and after August 27, -1510,[406] are there indications of any absence or renunciation of -tender and spontaneous human affection. - -But here again the _Dialogo_ both closely presses and profoundly -changes the original accounts. For here the Spirit declares to her: “in -these exercises” of work among the poor, “I shall keep thee … as though -thou wast dead. I will not allow thee to make friends with any one, -nor that thou shouldst have any particular affection for any relative; -but I want thee to love all men, and this without affection, both poor -and rich, both friends and relatives. I do not want thee, in thine -interior, to know one person from the other, nor would I have thee go -to any one from motives of friendship; it will suffice to go when thou -art called.” And thus “she went, when the _Misericordia_-ladies asked -her to go into dwellings that would have frightened away all ordinary -mortals. But she, on the contrary, deliberately touched these sick -(_voleva toccarli_), for the purpose of giving them some refreshment -to soul and body.”[407]--Note how skilfully the call, and the going -at the call, the affection and its spontaneous manifestations in the -original accounts, have been altered and crossed by the _Dialogue’s_ -re-statement.--Here again we are strongly reminded of Battista, in -her letter to the Signora Andronica in 1575, encouraging her to -“abandon all things,” her children included, “interiorly,” and “to -mortify the most pleasing consolation which arises from the children’s -company.” Indeed, already in 1554, Battista has, in one of her own -_Colloquies_, refused to accept every avoidable consolation arising -from her pure election by God.[408] Only by such a reference of these -_Dialogo_-passages to Battista, the many-sided, the ever-affectionate -daughter and public-spirited woman, can we come to see them in a wider -context; indeed only thus can they cease to be profoundly repulsive. - -(2) _Cases of softening._ - -There are two instances of the softening of (doubtless authentic) -doctrinal sayings given by the _Vita_-proper. Her evidently impulsive -exclamation: “I would not have grace or mercy, but justice and -vengeance exercised against the malefactor,”--has here become: “She did -not attach any importance to her sins, on the ground of the punishment -awaiting them, but solely because they had been enacted against the -infinite goodness of God.”--And her bold declaration: “If any creature -could be found which did not participate in the divine goodness, that -creature would be as malignant as God is good,” here reads: “The soul -bereft of the Divine love becomes _well-nigh_ as malignant as the -Divine love is good and delightful. I say ‘well-nigh,’ for God shows -it a little mercy.”[409] The proclamation of some moral good even in -lost souls, is thus weakened to an admission of some consolation in the -latter. - - -4. _Re-statement of the Conversion-experiences of March 1474._ - -But it is in the matters of Catherine’s Conversion in the -Convent-Chapel, on March 22, 1474, and of the Vision of the Bleeding -Christ in the Palazzo Adorno, soon after, that the _Dialogo’s_ -transformation of the _Vita_-accounts reaches its highest interest. -I give it here as the chief of many such re-statements which I have -carefully analyzed. - - _Vita_-proper, _Vita_ (_Dialogo_), pp. 199_c_, - pp. 4_a_-5_b_. 200_c_, 202_c_, 208_c_, 209_a_, - _b_. 209_c_, 210_a_, 211_a_, _b_. - - Subitocchè se gli fù inginocchiata Quando Iddio vuole purgare - innanzi, receve una un anima … le manda il - ferita al cuore d’immenso suo divino lume, facendola - amore di Dio, con una vista vedere una scintilla di quel - così chiara delle sue miserie puro amore con quale ci ama - e diffetti, e della bontà di Dio … essendo noi nemici per - che ne fù per cascare in terra. molte offese che gli abbiamo - Onde … restò quasi fuor di fatte.… E le fà vedere quel - sè: e perciò internamente affocato amore.… Tutto - gridava con ardente amore: questo fù dimostrato da Dio - “Non più mondo, non più peccati.” in un instante, coll’ operazione - Ed in quel punto.… sua purissima.… Questo - … Per la viva fiamma d’infocato raggio d’amore fù quello che - amore il dolce Iddio ferì quell’ anima in un istante - impresse in quell’ anima … … che la fece restare in - tutta la perfezione.… quel punto quasi fuori di sè.… - - Vedeva ancora le offese che Le fù ancora mostrato … quanti - gli aveva fatte; e perciò gridava: erano tutti i suoi diffetti - “O amore mai più, mai … in modo che sommerse - più, peccati.” Se le accese poi sè stessa con tal - un odio di sè medesima, che dispregio che avrebbe detto - non si poteva sopportare, e i suoi peccati pubbliccamente - diceva: “O amore, se bisogna, per tutta la città, nè altro - sono apparecchiata di confessare poteva dire se non: “O Signore - i miei peccati in pubblico.” mai più mondo, nè peccati.” - - Ma volendo il Signore accendere Stando l’anima in questa - intrinsecamente più quasi disperazione di sè - l’amor suo in quest’ anima, ed medesima … vedendosi un - insieme il dolore dei suoi carico da disperato alle spalle, - peccati, se le mostrò in ispirito … era come una cosa insensata - colla Croce in spalla, piovendo ed attonita fuori di sè.… - tutto sangue, per modo che la Essendo un giorno in casa, - casa le pareva tutta piena di le apparve in vista interiore - rivoli di quel sangue, il quale il Signor Nostro Gesù - vedeva essere tutto sparso per Christo, tutto insanguinato - amore: il che le accese nel da capo a’ piedi, in modo che - cuore tanto fuoco, che ne pareva che da quel corpo - usciva fuor di sè, e pareva piovesse sangue per tutta la - una cosa insensata per tanto terra dove andava; e le fù - amore e dolore che ne sentiva. detta in occulto questa parola: - “vedi tu questo sangue? tutto - è sparso per amor tuo, e per - soddisfazione de’ tuoi peccati.” - In queste parole le fù data - una gran ferita d’amore verso - esso Signor nostro Gesù - Christo, con una confidenza - tale, che disparve quella prima - vista tanto disperata e si - rallegrò un poco in esso - Signore.… - - Questa vista le fù tanto Le fù mostrata un altra - penetrativa che vista maggior di quella, e - tanto più grande che con - lingua non si potrebbe dire - … le fù infuso un raggio - d’amore nel cuore.… Gridava - e sospirava molto più e - le pareva sempre vedere (e senza comparazione che della - cogli occhi corporali) prima vista, la quale fù dell’ - esser maligno di sè stessa. - Questo raggio d’amore le fù - il suo Amore tutto insanguinato lasciato impresso con quelle - e confitto in Croce. cinque fontane di Christo, le - quali mandavano goccie - d’affuoccato sangue di acceso - amore verso dell’ uomo. - -Hence _D._ gives but one exclamation as to “world” and “sins,” and -constructs this out of the two (mutually differing) exclamations of the -same kind given by _V._, the second of which now stands in _V._ after -the Bleeding-Christ episode. Whilst spacing all out, _D._ keeps to the -order and context of _V.’s_ paragraphs. And _D._ utilizes the curious, -silent change from the moving Christ to the affixed Christ in _V.’s_ -account of the single vision in the Palace, so as to constitute two -perfectly distinct visions. The Cross of both these doublets of _V._, -(the “Croce” which, in the first part of _V.’s_ single account, is -“in spalla,” on His shoulder; and the Cross which, in the second part -of the same account, He is nailed to), has, in _D._, disappeared from -both separate visions. And yet the Cross hovers about the first vision, -here transformed into a “carico alle spalle,” a load upon Catherine’s -shoulders,--an oppression on her mind; and is presupposed in the second -vision, since those “five fountains sending forth burning blood” are, -of course, the wounds of Christ, whilst He hangs affixed to the Cross -as described in _V.’s_ second part. And the “Signore piovendo tutto -sangue,” and the “rivoli di sangue, sparso per amore, il che accese -nel cuore tanto fuoco,” of _V._, have, in _D._, become “quelle cinque -fontane di Christo, le quali mandavano goccie d’affuocato sangue e -di acceso amore.”--This fountain-imagery is derived from numerous -authentic sayings and “viste” of Catherine as to the “living Fount -(_fonte_) of the divine goodness,” or “of infinite love,” and “the -clear waters coming from the divine fount.” The very word “fountain” -(_fontana_) occurs in one of _V.’s_ descriptive passages; and the idea -appears in Catherine’s address to Our Lord at the well (_pozzo_) of -Samaria, and in her thereupon receiving refreshment of soul, by the -gift of “a little drop (_gocciola_)” of that divine water.[410] And the -fountains are here made to proceed from a ray of love; and this again -comes from numerous authentic sayings of hers: in one case the “raggio -d’amore” appears split up into several rays: “raggi … affocati di -divino amore.”[411] - - -5. _Three new authentic details._ - -And yet these remarkable forty pages furnish us with three fresh -statements or implications of detail, respectively too precise, vivid -and verisimilar and too little obvious, to be easily attributable to -any but a new and authentic source of information. There is the vividly -precise information that, during Catherine’s actively penitential -period, “the love of God, wishing that she should lose all relish in -what she ate, made her always carry some epatic aloes and pounded -agaric about with her; and whenever she suspected that one kind of -her food was about to give her more pleasure than another, she would -furtively put a little of that most bitter compound upon it, before -eating it.” There is the formal declaration that “she also went to the -poor of San Lazaro.” And there is the statement, already noticed, that, -after her conversion, she had “to work to provide for her living,” and -“that she would have been unable to live, unless God had provided for -her by way of alms.”[412] - -Now the first statement should be compared with Battista Vernazza’s, -similarly precise, pharmaceutical detail as to the cassia used by her -father in doctoring the poor in 1493, recorded by Battista, nearly -ninety years later, in 1581:[413] Battista would, then, have been -quite capable of remembering and recording that aloes-and-agaric -detail some seventy years after the event. As to the second statement, -I have already given the various solid reasons which point to -Catherine’s co-operation with Battista’s father in his work amongst -the Pestiferous, as far back as the year 1493.[414] And as to the -third statement (in apparently direct conflict with the declaration -in the _Vita_-proper, that, although entirely devoted to the service -of the Hospital, she never would enjoy or use the slightest thing -belonging to it for her own living[415]) the Wills prove to us that, -however exaggerated be the language of _D._, it, and not _V._, is here -substantially in the right. For, though she could have afforded to -live in modest style, on her own little income, she did, as a matter -of fact, hold her little house rent-free from the Hospital, in return -for her services to it. Here also Battista would have known the precise -facts from her father, who had himself drawn up or witnessed three -documents referring to these matters. - - -6. _Battista Vernazza, the author of this first “Dialogo.”_ - -The reader will by now be concluding with me, that all these -peculiarities of the _Dialogo_ point to one person as its author: -Battista Vernazza. And all its other circumstances and characteristics -make for the same conclusion. - -(1) _Particular circumstances._ - -There is the place. For the original of MS. C., in which appear the -first traces, (this whole first part), of _D._, came from Battista’s -own Convent; and thus a document which, in its later narrative part, -contained, as we shall find, so much primary matter due to Vernazza -the father, and so much secondary composition and arrangement due to -Vernazza the daughter; and which, in its dialogue part, gave much -original literary work due to a Vernazza: would easily (no doubt soon -after Battista’s death), come to be considered as the work and the -copying of Ettore Vernazza alone. And there is the date. For if this -first part was written in 1548, 1549, Battista would have been fifty -or fifty-two years old. And we have already considered writings of -hers, written, with equal subtlety of psychological distinctions and -even greater vigour of style, in 1554, 1555, and even in 1575, at -seventy-eight and eighty-four years of age.[416] - -There is, too, the form, so curiously schematic and abstract, and, -in part, far-fetched, yet based upon a minute, most ingenious use -of scriptural texts. Thus those two “weeks,” (symbols for the two, -respectively lukewarm and sinful, lustres), are no doubt suggested -by the “seventy weeks” which “the man Gabriel” declares to Daniel -“shall be shortened upon the Jewish people, that transgression may -be finished, and everlasting justice may be brought and vision may -be fulfilled”;[417] and by Jacob’s twice seven years of servitude -under Laban, and by Laban’s words “make up the week of days of this -match.”[418] We thus get Catherine’s two weeks (of years) of servitude -to sin, and her two successive “matches” or alliances, entered into -between her soul and body under the influence of self-love. We found a -similar minute ingenuity in Battista’s use of Scripture in 1554.[419] - -And there is a complex, abstract, astonishingly self-consistent -psychology running through the whole, and one simply identical with the -psychology treated by Battista as more or less a point of revelation to -herself in 1554. And, partly as effect or as cause of that psychology, -the _Dialogo_ has a painfully great, at times downrightly repulsive, -insistence upon detachment from emotional feeling, both in intercourse -with fellow-creatures, and in spiritual commerce with God, that is -simply identical, in its parallelism, range, depth, and doctrinal -setting, with the position which Battista takes up in her _Colloquii_ -of 1554.[420] - -Again we get here a prominent and persistent occupation with the -historic Christ and His passion, that are as unlike Catherine’s as -they are identical with Battista’s spiritual trend. For, during her -Conversion-Vision, Catherine here sees that “burning love which Our -Lord Jesus Christ manifested when upon earth, from His Incarnation up -to His Ascension”; and this corresponds precisely with Battista’s sight -(_vista_), in 1554, of “the Infinite Love manifested unto men, in -and by the life of Christ, at the Nativity and at the Ascension.” And -the Christ-Vision here becomes two separate apparitions; that of the -Crucified Christ is declared “greater than” that of the Walking Christ; -and there is an insistence upon “those five Fountains,” an image -derived indeed from Catherine’s “living fountain of Goodness, which -participated with the creature,” but which, in Catherine, is conceived -in connection with God and metaphysically, and here is transferred to -the historic and crucified Christ, in close keeping with Battista’s -whole emphatic Christo-centrism.[421] - -And, finally, we find here certain daring anthropomorphisms without -any full parallel in Catherine’s sayings, but entirely matched by -expressions of Battista. God is here not as, in Catherine’s manner, -Himself an irradiating Love, but is “ever standing with burning rays -of love in His hand, to inflame and penetrate the hearts of men,” a -combination of the Thing-imagery dear to Catherine (for Love is here -still a luminous, burning substance), and of the human, Personal -picturing prominent with Battista (for God here has a hand, in which -He holds that substance). This latter picturing (probably in 1550) is -not unlike the more spiritual anthropomorphism of “the Increate Heart” -of God, used by Battista in 1575 a passage already exceeded here, in -the _Dialogo_, by the words, “God showed her the love with which He had -suffered”--words which, if pressed, would introduce suffering into the -divine nature Itself.[422] - -(2) _General considerations._ - -All these cumulative reasons of detail will be indefinitely fortified -by what I shall have to say as to the character of the subsequent -parts of the _Dialogo_, and in proof of these parts and the first -instalment being by one and the same author. But, meanwhile, we can -press this further general consideration, that only a person with -considerable traditional authority in matters concerning Catherine, and -yet a person, not a direct eyewitness or full contemporary, hence an -individual without any additional information, and unhampered by the -(otherwise necessary) regard for the sensitiveness of still living -contributors to the original biography, can possibly have written such -a document. For this production, when it first appears complete, in -the first Printed _Vita_ of 1551, will there occupy quite one third -of the whole book; and yet, whilst incorporating practically all, -and only all, the material of those other two-thirds (the _Trattato_ -alone excepted), it gives to everything a fresh grouping and setting, -colour and atmosphere, drift and character. Only a remarkable, powerful -mind; a writer skilled in mystical subjects; one with leisure for -such a careful composition; one, too, sufficiently in sympathy with -Catherine to be attracted to, and helped through, the difficult task; -a person living now, thirty-eight years after Catherine’s death, in -an environment of a kind to preserve her memory green: all these -conditions must, more or less, have met and been realized in the -writer of this curious, forcible book.--And Battista, the God-daughter -of the heroine of the work, and the eldest, devoted daughter of the -chief contributor to the already extant biography; a Contemplative -with a deep interest in, and much practical experience of, the kind of -spirituality to be portrayed and the sort of literature required; a -Nun, during thirty-eight years, in the very Convent where Catherine’s -sister (one of its foundresses) had lived and died, and where Catherine -herself had desired to live and where her Conversion had taken place; -a woman who was but thirteen at the time when Catherine died, after -nine years of much suffering and seclusion, and who, even now but -fifty-one years of age, had outlived all the close friends and original -chief biographers of Catherine by thirty-five, twenty-four, and twenty -years: Battista, and Battista alone, united in her own person all these -necessary conditions. And it will have been the sensitively original -and strongly synthetic cast of Battista’s mind which made the strangely -fragmentary, repetitive, contradictory, static, and yet abrupt and -unharmonized multiplicity of the _Vita_ both irritating as it stood, -and yet (with its considerable elements of unmistakably first-hand -portraiture of a rarely large and lofty mind and character) profoundly -stimulative to a re-thinking, re-feeling, re-stating of the whole,--at -least, up to the zenith of that Soul’s perfection. - -But our next stage will make all this clearer still. - - -VI. SIXTH STAGE: FIRST PRINTED EDITION OF THE -“VITA-DOTTRINA-DICCHIARAZIONE,” 1551; EXAMINATION OF ALL IT POSSESSES -IN ADDITION TO MSS. A, B AND C, APART FROM THE “DIALOGO.” - -At last we reach the publication of the _Life_, in Genoa, in -1551.[423] A printing-press had not been established in Genoa till -1536 (by Bellone); hence the _Life_ appeared only fifteen years -after the earliest date possible for its publication,--other cities -not being, as yet, sufficiently interested in Catherine to think of -such an undertaking.--Only further on shall I attempt some analysis, -estimation, and attribution of that _corpus_ of earlier and earliest -constituents of the Book, which, although frequently referred to at our -last two stages, had there to remain unanalyzed. In these remaining two -stages I intend to treat only, first of the Introductory parts of the -Book, special to its printed form, and then of the Second “Chapter” of -the _Dialogo_ (its present Second and Third Parts). - -Here then we have to deal with the matter which, amongst our extant -documents, appears for the first time in the Printed _Vita_ of -1551, and first with that part of it which is there devoted to the -publication of the Book. This part of the matter consists, in the -order of its place in the Book, of the Title with its Picture; the -Approbation; the Preface; and the Subscription. - - -1. _Title-page._ - -The Title-page has: “Book of the Admirable Life and Holy Doctrine of -the Blessed Catarinetta of Genoa, in which is contained a Useful and -Catholic Demonstration and Declaration of Purgatory.” And underneath -appears a picture of Our Lord Crucified, and Blessed Catherine on her -knees before Him, and crowned with a Diadem; with the text: “I confess -to Thee, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, that Thou hast hid these -things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto little -ones” (Matt. xi). - -Note here, in the Title, the correct and most attractive baptismal -form of her Christian name, Catarinetta, which appears here for the -last time, either in the Title, the Heading, or the Subscription of -her _Life_; and the disappearance, which is final, of her family name -Adorna, which had figured in the titles of all the MSS. Thus “La -miranda vita e sancta conversation di Madonna Catherinetta Adorna,” the -older heading of MS. A, which will have been that of the Giustiniano -book (a heading which itself had succeeded to “De la Miranda -Conversione di quondam Donna Catherinetta Adorna” of the booklet of -1512, still preserved in MS. B), has here become “La vita mirabile e -dottrina santa de la Beata Catarinetta da Genoa.”--And note how, for -the first time, mention is made in the title of what has hitherto been -but a long Chapter of the _Vita_; and how what in the MSS. had, in that -Chapter’s heading, claimed but to be a matter of devotional experience -(“How, by comparison of the divine fire, which she felt in her heart -and which purified her soul, she saw interiorly and understood how -the Souls abide in Purgatory”), has here been given, some thirty -years after the Papal condemnation of Luther’s theses on Purgatory, a -controversial point,--it is now “a Useful and Catholic Demonstration -and Declaration of Purgatory.” We have here an attitude of mind -inevitably different from Catherine’s pure positiveness.--And remark, -too, the continued non-indication of the _Dialogo_, although this is -now present, like the “Dimostrazione,” as a distinct document in the -Book: the Dialogue is evidently still too new to be able to modify the -old title-page, and to appear there alongside of a composition which, -though but one-sixth of its own length, is now some thirty and more -years old. - -In the Picture Catherine wears a diadem, a compromise between an -indication of her noble birth and a hint of the nimbus which they -shrink from giving to her unequivocally. And she is kneeling before the -Christ Crucified,--evidently an attitude chosen as specially typical -of her whole life and doctrine, because of the passages in the _Vita_: -“She ever seemed to see her Love affixed to the Cross”; “she was next -drawn to the side of the Crucified”; “she appeared in very truth as a -body affixed to a Cross,” with the dependent account of her “interior -stigmatization,”--“she received a new wound at her heart, so that she -might feel within herself the wound in the side of her tender Love”; -and the amplifications of some of these passages in the _Dialogo_.[424] -Yet only the first three passages occur in the MSS.; and the first -two are carefully restricted there to her first Conversion-Period -(of four years at most), whilst the third passage refers to a (quite -unusual) bodily posture, assumed by her on one single occasion during -her last illness, an attitude which remained uninterpreted by herself. -The fact is that the precise contrary of what this picture suggests is -one of the chief characteristics of Catherine, for she is habitually -absorbed in contemplations remarkably lacking in historical imagery and -setting. And the _Dialogo_ parallels and variants which, as we have -seen, so largely increase this historical element, and especially this -occupation with Christ Crucified, are characteristic, not of Catherine -but of Battista. The picture is, no doubt, the consequence of this -increasing emphasis laid, in her successive _Vitae_, upon a side of -religion all but entirely absent from the middle and last periods of -Catherine’s actual life; and fully expresses Battista’s feeling, who, -just as she addressed her whole long letter of 1575 in Donna Anguisola, -“in the Crucified,” will have seen to it that the whole book concerning -her own God-mother was placed at the feet of the Crucifix. - - -2. _The Approbation._ - -The Latin Approbation runs: “I, Fra Geronimo of Genoa of the Order of -Preachers, Apostolic Inquisitor into Heretical Pravity throughout the -whole Dominion of Genoa, assent to this Book being committed to print, -for the consolation and instruction of spiritual persons. Witness -this my autograph.” The points of interest in connection with this -Approbation will appear, as we proceed, to consist in the reasons why -such theological “corrections” as were actually introduced into the -doctrinal parts of the _Vitae_ had all been made long before this date, -probably none of them later than 1530; and why they were, throughout, -practically restricted to her very sober and correct Purgatorial -teaching, and left her other, far more daring, sayings more or less -untouched. I can find no traces of any theological changes introduced, -for this edition of 1551, into the _Vita-Dicchiarazione_ sections; -but we shall see how three points and tendencies of the _Vita_-proper -have been indirectly criticised and “corrected” by means of their -re-statement in the _Dialogo_, which was certainly finished, and -possibly begun, with a view to its appearance in the company of the -_Vita_ and the _Dicchiarazione_. - - -3. _The Preface._ - -The Preface consists of seven full and balanced, dignified and -self-restrained, thoroughly well-informed and yet, in part, -deliberately obscure and illusive, sentences. It still excludes the -idea of any literary authorship on the part of Catherine: “Madonna -Caterinetta, of whose admirable Conversion, Life, and Doctrine, -together with her many privileges and particular graces, we shall -write.… Here, in her Life and Holy Doctrine is to be found.…” Not -Catherine writes, but “we,” _i.e._ the final Redactor, or all the -Contributors together with him; and not her Writings are to be found -here, but her “Doctrine” only. Indeed, it all “has been collected with -truth and simplicity by two devout spiritual persons, from the very -lips of the Seraphic Woman herself.” More would quite evidently have -been claimed, if more had been true. - -And it contains two or three evident additions to its original text, -made for this publication in view of the entire _Dialogo’s_ first -appearance here; additions which contain an expression which may well -have occasioned or helped on the legend of “Catherine, an Author,” -a legend which was sure to spring up at the first opportunity and -provocation. The fifth sentence reads at present as follows: “Sono in -questo libro [dignissimi suoi trattati dell’ amor di Dio e dell’ amor -proprio] una bellisima e chiarissima dimostrazione del Purgatorio, e -in che modo vi stiano dentro le anime contentissime, [e un bel dialogo -dell’ Anima con il Corpo e Amor poprio, dal quale ne seguita un amoroso -colloquio dell’ Anima con il suo Signore] ed altre dignissime cose da -sapere, veramente tutte di eccellentissima speculazione ed utilità [e -massime in questi turbolenti tempi necessarie].”[425] - -Now even the last set of bracketed words seems an addition, and points -to the existence of the body of this Preface at a period prior to -“questi turbolenti tempi,” times that I take to be 1536-1537, when -Battista’s God-father Moro lapsed into Calvinism. Ever since 1520, -when Luther’s Purgatory doctrines were condemned, these writings -would have been held, if not “necessary,” at least “of most excellent -utility.”--There is, any way, no doubt as to the two previous sets -being insertions. For note, if they be retained, the slovenly -repetition, by the first set, of “dignissimi” in the midst of a most -finished composition; the extraordinary use of the word “Trattati,” -to signify either Chapter XXV (which bears the title “Dell’ Amor -Proprio e del Divino Amore,” and is a collection of sayings pronounced -on at least three different occasions), or Chapters XXV and XXVI,--in -either case, Chapters which are no more significant or authentic than -any other of the doctrinal chapters. And remark, in the second set, -the curiously mild praise for the _Dialogo_ contained in the one -positive “un bel,” wedged in between the two superlatives lavished on -the “Dimostrazione” and the two superlatives given to the remaining -doctrinal parts of the Book. The object of that first “Trattati” -insertion is evidently to pick out some one or other of the already -ancient Chapters of the _Vita_, which have some special likeness to the -subject-matter and title of the _Dialogo_, so as to prevent the latter -from looking too suspiciously different from the rest of the doctrine -traditionally ascribed to Catherine. - -I take this Preface to have existed, without these additions, in the -“worthy book” described by Giustiniano in 1536. But as that careful -writer insists upon the precise length of time, because it had been -considerable, during which Catherine’s body had lain incorrupt, and -says nothing about the antiquity of the book, a point he would hardly -have failed to urge had he been able to do so, I hesitate to push this -Book, and this its Preface, further back than 1530, a very probable -date for the first (at least complete) fusion of Vernazza’s and -Marabotto’s separate contributions, since these two chief disciples -would then have been dead six and two years respectively, and the -culmination of Protestant “turbulence” in Calvin’s open revolt and -Moro’s defection would not be taking place for another five and -six years respectively.--Catherine indeed appears here no more as -the “quondam Donna Catarinetta” of MS. B, but still as “Madonna -Catherinetta, figliuola di M. Giacomo della nobilissima casa Fiesca, -maritata a M. Giuliano Adorno,” a designation distinctly earlier -than the “Beata Catarinetta di Genoa” of the Title. And the Book, -its substance, is declared to have been “collected by two spiritual -persons (_Religiosi_), her devotees, from the very lips of the Seraphic -Woman herself.” This passage, it is true, now reads “Raccolto dai -divoti religiosi (suo Confessore e un figliuolo suo spirituale).” But, -where the Preface is above the suspicion of having been touched up, a -“cioê” introduces such a bracket; the rhythm of this sentence, in the -midst of this otherwise exquisite Preface, is woefully imperfect; and -the evidently deliberate ambiguity of “divoti religiosi” is rendered -all but nugatory by the considerable clearness of the bracketed -information. The clause will originally have read, “Da due religiosi -sui divoti,” for this obviates all three objections. But, in this -deliberately mysterious form, it must have been written when both were -dead, and yet when the death of the last was still recent; and this -again brings us to a date soon after Marabotto’s death in 1528. - -Who wrote this Preface? Much in it points to Battista. So the use -of “cioè,” so characteristic of her _Colloquies_ and _Letters_ and -also of the _Dialogo_; and the phrase “divote persone,” recurring -in the _Dialogo_;[426] and the doctrinal tone of “l’amoroso Signor -Nostro, sitibondo della salute delle sue razionali creature,” “il suo -consolatorio spirito,” “la perfetta e consummata unione possibile ai -viatori,” and “quasi non più fide, ma già certezza,” all closely like -passages in her _Colloquies_ and in her Letter to Donna Anguisola. -The mysteriousness and equality of designation, applied to both -Ettore and Don Cattaneo, would come with a special naturalness from -Battista, spontaneously anxious to place her heroic father’s sanctity -and intimacy with Catherine on a level with those of Catherine’s -priest-friend and Confessor Marabotto. And, if written in 1530, -Battista would at the time have been a formed writer,--a woman of -thirty-three years of age.--There are, no doubt, certain differences. -The _Dialogo_ nowhere has such an “ancorchè … niente (non) dimeno” -clause. “Un Serafino,” “essa Serafica Donna” of this Preface, are, -in strictness, unmatched in Battista’s, otherwise even intenser, -writings. “La perfetta e consummata unione possibile ai viatori” is -a more ordinary and technical phrase than I can find elsewhere in -Battista’s writings. Above all, the general style and rhythm is here, -somehow, a little different from that of those other writings.--Still, -these differences are explicable by the writer of the Preface finding -himself largely bound by the existing _Vita_-materials, and by their -very niceties of expression. The Author of the Preface is certainly -identical with the Redactor of the first (tripartite) _Vita e -Dottrina_; and this Redactor, we shall find, must be Battista. The -insertions in the Preface, containing the praise of the _Dialogo_, -are certainly the work of another hand.--Upon the whole, then, we -can safely attribute the Preface, in its original form, to Battista -Vernazza. - - -4. _The Subscription._ - -The subscription to the _Vita_-proper, in this first Edition, runs: -“Here ends the life of the noble Matron, Catarinetta Adorna”; which -thus still retains (like the Preface, but against the Title) the warmly -human and precise, domestic and familiar designation of the first -heading of MS. A. - - -VII. SEVENTH STAGE: THE SECOND “CHAPTER” OF THE “DIALOGO,” WHICH -APPEARS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE PRINTED “VITA,” 1551. - - -1. _Three remarks concerning the two Parts of this “Chapter.”_ - -(1) The additions to the _Dialogo_ which appear here for the first -time, and which amount to its present Parts Second and Third, are given -in this First Edition as one single, the Second, “Chapter,” following -upon the older part here designated “Chapter First.” In the Fourth -Edition, 1601, this division of the _Dialogo_ is formally announced on -the Title-page: “With a Dialogue, divided into two Chapters, between -the Soul, the Body, and Self Love; and (the Soul and) the Lord.” I -do not know precisely when those two “Chapters” were replaced by the -present Three Parts, and when these Parts were divided up into the -present Chapters; it was, in any case, after the sixth edition (1645). - -(2) These last two Parts seem to have been written, from the first, -with a view to eventual division into two. For though the whole of this -Second Chapter is not much longer than the First Chapter (forty-seven -and a half pages, against forty), it yet divides up very well at about -half-way, since the first half here ends with a piece of moralizing -narrative, applied to the whole earthly existence: “The more valiant -a man is at the beginning, the greater martyrdom should he expect at -the end … nor does God cease to make provision … up to that Man’s -death.”[427] - -(3) This whole “Chapter” Second is by the same author as “Chapter” -First; in this Second, even more than in that First “Chapter,” there -are no historical materials other than those still present, more or -less untouched, in the _Vita_-proper; and yet these materials have -again been modified, in their sequence and setting, their tone and -pitch, their drift and meaning, and all this throughout by the same -powerful and experienced, often deep and touching, but also, in great -part, painfully abstract and straining, absolute-minded and excessive -writer. - - -2. _General indications of identity of authorship for “Chapters” First -and Second._ - -(1) “Chapter” First had, we know, concluded with a paraphrase of the -last stage in the scheme of Catherine’s spiritual growth as given -in the _Vita_-proper, and had thus reached the _ne plus ultra_ of -perfection for any creature, either here or in the world to come. -“And now the Spirit said: ‘I am determined no further to call her -a human creature, since I now see her (to be) all in God, without -any Humanity’”: a statement which may well (like the corresponding -Spiritual-Kiss stage in the _Vita’s_ scheme)[428] have been intended, -at the time of its composition, both to describe directly her great -middle years, 1474-1499, and to sum up generally her later life, -1499-1510.--But no such hyperbolic language, when thus applied to man -as we know him, or as we can even conceive him here below, can, of -course, be kept up. And thus here in the _Dialogo_ (as previously in -the corresponding place in the _Vita_-proper), what had originally been -the conclusion of a self-contained account of her Conversion, became, -owing to the desire of utilizing much extant material which directly -described her years of physical break-up, but one chapter in the story -of her total life. Hence we now find, both in the _Vita_-proper and the -_Dialogo_, an instructive anti-climax, in an attempted description (the -_Dialogo_ gives this in its “Chapter” Second) of her successive states -from 1497 to her death in 1510, states and changes which, were we to -take the concluding words of the _Vita_-scheme and of the _Dialogo’s_ -“Chapter” First at all strictly, would, in great part, be impossible. - -(2) In the _Dialogo’s_ First “Chapter” we found a remarkably free, -deliberately pragmatic handling of the _Vita_-materials, in the making -two different visions on two separate occasions (the Vision of the -blood-stained Moving Christ, and the Vision of the blood-pouring -Fixed Christ) out of the one, curiously composite, Moving-Fixed -Christ-Vision of the _Vita_; and this doubling introduced, into that -First Part, a special kind of obscurity, a sort of eddying, circular, -repetitive movement and practical fixedness. Similarly we find here, -in the Second “Chapter,” the one description of her resumption of -Confession, given by the _Vita_-proper, is made into two accounts, -accounts still further separated from each other here than the two -visions were separated from each other there. For the first ten and a -half Chapters, pages 226_b_ to 242_b_, give us her history from 1497 -to 1501. And, amongst these, Chapter First to Third cover the years -1497 to 1499; and at the end of Chapter Third, page 232_b_, we get -an account of how “she began to confess her sins” (necessarily, at -this period, to Marabotto) “with such Contrition, that it appeared a -marvellous thing”--a description which has been taken from the story -of her First Conversion-Period, but which is made to do duty here, at -the date of her beginning to confess, in a very different manner, to -Don Marabotto, twenty-five years after those Conversion-Confessions. -Yet only at the beginning of the second half of Chapter Tenth (p. -242_c_) do we hear, (wedged in between two passages, pp. 242_b_, -243_b_, which are re-castings of descriptions of a scene which occurred -on January 10, 1510, _Vita_, pp. 139_a_-140_c_) of God giving her -the help of a “Religioso,” “suo Confessore,” _i.e._ Marabotto (p. -242_c_). This is followed, not two pages later on (p. 244_b_), by a -description of the experience of the “Scintilla” on August 11, 1510 -(_Vita_, p. 148_b_), and by an allusion to her death on September 15, -1510 (p. 245_c_).--This doubling was no doubt effected for the purpose -of introducing as much variety as possible into what is, anyhow, a -monotonous narrative; of being thus able to produce a more ordinary -and “correct” account of her dispositions and acts, on occasion of -the resumption of her Confessions in 1499, than could be given by the -direct utilization of Marabotto’s description of them; and of thus, -by these two narratives in lieu of that single one, giving greater -place and prominence to the practice of Confession than this practice -actually occupied in her real life. - - -3. _Closer examination of the earlier portion of “Chapter” Second._ - -A closer examination of the whole Second “Chapter” of the _Dialogo_ -fully substantiates this conclusion, and brings out other interesting -points. Let us take the eleven Chapters of the present Part Second. - -(1) The first two Chapters describe her condition when “the Soul -could no more correspond to the sensations of the Body,--the Body -remained, as it were, without its natural being, and dwelt confused and -stunned, without knowing where it was or what it should do or say” (pp. -226_c_, 227_a_). And then the Soul begins to address “the Lord” (p. -229_a_). And on p. 230_b_ we hear, for the first time, of its “sweet -and cruel Purgatory.” And Chapter Third tells of the Soul’s painful -prison-life, and of vomitings, emaciation, and occasional inability -to move (pp. 230_b_-232_a_).--Now Purgatory, prison-house and these -psycho-physical conditions do not appear, in the _Vita_-proper, till -“nine years before her death,” and, indeed, in great part only within -the last year of her life.[429] Indeed it is only the characteristic -intensity with which the _Dialogo_ here describes the fresh access of -Contrition, and the resumption of frequent Confession for evidently new -offences (a description entirely inappropriate to this late stage of -her life), that makes it difficult to realize that these three Chapters -are dealing with 1497 to 1499. And the exaggeration here exactly -corresponds to the exaggeration, in Part (“Chapter”) First, of her -earlier sinfulness, and her first Conversion and Contrition. - -(2) Chapter Fourth then gives a short description of another “ray of -love”; and then apostrophizes, in seven “oh” and “che” sentences, -such a state of soul (pp. 232_c_-233_c_). Chapter Fifth contains one -question and answer exchanged between the Soul and the Lord, and then -three narrative-exclamatory paragraphs (pp. 233_c_-235_a_). Chapter -Sixth gives two explanations by the Lord of the Soul’s sufferings, -interrupted by the Soul’s thanks and acceptance (pp. 235_b_-237_a_). -And then Chapter Seventh describes a lull in the Soul’s battles and -trials (pp. 237_a_-238_a_). And this lull is followed, in Chapter -Eighth, by a declaration from the Lord that she has now been led up to -the door of Love but has not yet entered in (pp. 238_a_-239_a_); and, -in Chapter Ninth, by a dialogue (for the first time in the entire work) -between the Spirit and the Soul, the former being now determined to -separate itself from the latter; and, at the end of this same Chapter, -by a description of this, now more or less achieved, separation (pp. -239_a_-241_a_; 241_b_).--These conflicts and dialogues between the -Spirit and the Soul, are closely like the conflicts and dialogues -between the Spirit and “Humanity” in Part First.[430] Yet there, the -historical materials are derived chiefly from the _Vita_-proper, pp. -20_a_-21_b_, 96_b_-97_c_ (which give an account of her work from 1473 -to 1497); whilst here they come exclusively from pp. 133_b_-138_b_ of -the _Vita_-proper (which tell her experiences from November 11 to the -end of December 1509). - -(3) And the last two Chapters, Tenth and Eleventh, are particularly -difficult and self-destructive, obscure and disappointing. The Tenth -(to be fully analyzed presently), is difficult, because it starts -with fragments of _Vita_-information which, in the _Vita_, rightly -refer, in large part, to the beginning of the last ten years of her -life, and even to 1499 in particular,--hence to a period long anterior -to all that has been described in the _Dialogo_ ever since Chapter -Third of this Part. And these fragments are here made to lead up -to a re-statement of the scene of January 10, 1510, when she shut -herself off from every one, but when Marabotto managed to overhear her -soliloquy (pp. 241_c_-244_a_ compared with pp. 139_b_, 113_c_.) And the -Eleventh Chapter is obscure and disappointing, because, after giving -the “scintilla”-incident of August 11, 1510, and a final short dialogue -between the “Lord” and her “Humanity” (again a combination of _Dramatis -Personae_ which has occurred nowhere else), it finishes, not with any -description or even affirmation of her earthly end, but simply with an -account as to the necessity of Purgation, and, in particular, with the -words “a martyrdom which never ceases until death” (pp. 244_a_-245_c_). - - -4. _Closer examination of later portion of “Chapter” Second._ - -Part Third, on the contrary, is peculiar in this, that its Dialogue -passes exclusively between but two interlocutors, the Soul and the -Lord: it thus brings back the whole composition to its opening form of -strict duologue,--although there the speakers had been the (unpurified) -Soul and the Body. The present thirteen Chapters constitute, in -substance, a single, all but unbroken, disquisition on God’s love for -the Soul, and on the Soul’s growth in the love of God; although the -form alternates between Chapters of questions and answers, and Chapters -of rapturous descriptions and apostrophizings of Love. - -(1) Chapters First and Second consist of such questions and answers, -and conclude with an, abruptly introduced, account of her former -spiritual conversations with her friends, which (though based upon the -beautiful document in the _Vita_-proper, pp. 94_b_-95_c_, and upon -the fragment there, p. 97_b_, and though the narrative here has a -certain noble warmth of its own) is given here merely as a something -to be transcended, and which, by now, had been actually left far -behind. Thus, as in Parts First and Second the _Dialogo_ had given a -characteristically rigoristic, indeed exaggerating, account of her -Conversation and her later Purification respectively, so here again -this curious book is more severe than are the authentic accounts on -which it otherwise relies. - -(2) Chapter Third gives a question and answer as to the -comprehensibility of this love. The answer incorporates Catherine’s -description of her soul as, so to speak, under water in an ocean of -peace; and interestingly turns the “scintilla,” the “spark of love,” -into a “stilla,” a “drop,” suggested, no doubt, by the “goccia,” “the -drop of love,” which figured so prominently in Catherine’s great -conversation with her spiritual children.[431]--Chapters Fourth to -Sixth open out with a page where the Lord declares how the pure and -love-absorbed Soul alone holds Love (p. 253); and consist, for the -rest, of exclamatory descriptions of this love, the soul proffering -first ten “O Amore” apostrophes (pp. 253_c_-258_b_), then one “O Amore -puro” address (pp. 259_c_, 260_a_). And the tenth of those apostrophes -introduces a characteristic sentence from the _Vita_-proper: “the -Soul,--if bereft of charity,--when it is separated from the Body, -would, rather than present itself thus before that (Divine) cleanness -and simplicity, cast itself into Hell.”[432]--And Chapter Seventh then -makes the Lord ask the Soul to tell him some of the words which it -addresses to Love; the Soul does so, and the Lord approves of them (pp. -260_b_-261_b_). - -(3) And then Chapter Eighth begins a narrative piece (pp. -261_c_-263_c_); but which, after a transitional, exclamatory paragraph -(p. 263_c_), arrives at three short questions and answers. The first -two questions and answers are by the Soul and the Lord respectively; -the third question and answer are respectively by the Lord and the Soul -(pp. 264_a_, _b_). We shall presently see that, in this set of short -sentences, we have reached the culmination of the whole _Dialogo_, and -that, in astonishingly explicit daring, they exceed any and all of -Catherine’s authentic sayings. - -(4) Chapter Ninth then gives a narrative description of the apparently -empty and abandoned condition of the advanced Soul, and, for this -purpose carefully utilizes (whilst completely altering the meaning and -context of) Marabotto’s description of Catherine’s first Confession to -him. And in its last paragraph it again (but here with less change) -incorporates other passages of that descriptive Chapter.[433] Then -comes Chapter Tenth, with a short question and answer between the -Lord and the Soul, the latter partly in verse (p. 267_a_). And this -is followed by two descriptive paragraphs, how that this soul “seemed -to mount above Paradise itself”; “this heart is transformed into a -tabernacle of God”; and “such souls, were they but known, would be -adored upon earth” (pp. 267_b_, _c_; 268_a_). - -(5) This description is followed by a long rapturous suspension of the -dialogue form, since here the Writer himself addresses successively, -in three “O” paragraphs, the “soul, heart, and mind”; “Love”; and “the -Spirit naked and invisible.” And, after a little exclamation as to -the inadequacy of all words (this also is introduced by an “O”), he -similarly invokes (in three other “O” paragraphs), “my tender Lord”; -the “infinite Good”; and “the Lord” (pp. 268_b_-269_c_).--The present, -most unskilful, division makes Chapter Eleventh begin with these last -three of the seven “O’s.” And after the seventh “O” paragraph and a -descriptive passage, still addressed to “the Lord,” composed of five -“Thou” sentences, follows another short interruption,--apologizing -for the delay in the narrative and the inadequacy of the words used. -And then two “Oimè,” and one “O terra, terra” paragraph finish up -the Writer’s exclamations, and bring us back to the interrupted -dialogue-form (pp. 269_c_-271_b_). Here again a violent division has -been effected in the text by Chapter Twelfth being made to exclude the -first, but to include, the second “Oimè” (p. 271_a_). And this Chapter, -after finishing the “Terra-terra” paragraph, and, with it, the whole -digression, re-opens the dialogue with a curious, serpentine, all -but unbroken series of seven questions of the Soul and answers of the -Lord, in which each successive question picks up the previous answer -and point reached, and tries to reach a deeper one. “What is Thine -Operation within man? A Moving of the heart of man. And this Movement? -A Grace. And this Grace? A Ray of Love. And this Ray of Love? An Arrow. -And this Arrow? A Glimpse (Scintilla) of love. And this Glimpse? An -Inspiration.” And at this point, description is declared to be unable -to proceed further (pp. 271_b_-272_c_.) - -(6) And then Chapter Thirteenth finishes up the whole by two questions -and descriptive answers. The first question and answer passes between -the Writer’s own mind and his heart, and thus again constitutes a break -in the dialogue; and the second question and answer occurs between the -Lord and the Soul. The first answer dwells upon personal experience, -as the sole means of some real apprehension of Love; and the second -answer concludes the whole book with a majestic paraphrase of -Catherine’s doctrine as to the immanental, inevitable, self-determined, -and self-endorsed character of the Soul’s joys and sufferings, here -and hereafter, on Earth, in Purgatory, indeed in Hell itself (pp. -273_a_-275_a_). Such passages as these make up for much of the often -painfully intense, abstract, schematic, rigoristic, and too exclusively -transcendental character of this remarkable book, and explain its -fascination for a mind of such rare experience and breadth as was that -of Friedrich Schlegel. I shall presently group together the finest -sayings peculiar to the work. - - -VIII. SEVENTH STAGE CONTINUED: MINUTE ANALYSIS OF ONE PASSAGE FROM THE -SECOND “CHAPTER.” - -But I must still give for this last “Chapter,” as I did for the First -“Chapter,” a synoptic demonstration, by means of one example among -many, of the strange manner in which the _Dialogo_-writer combines the -most detailed dependence on the materials of the _Vita_-proper with the -most sovereign independence concerning the chronology, context, and -drift of those same materials.--And again I choose an originally unique -occurrence and description, so as to eliminate all possibility of an -explanation by an original multiplicity of facts and accounts. - -_Catherine as “Garzonzello” or “Figliuolino.”_ - - _Dialogo_ (_Vita_), p. _Vita_-proper, pp.-- - 266_a_, _b_, _c_. - - Il corpo, essendo costretto 117_b_. Non potendosi - seguire l’anima, resta per quel sopportare, per non aver più - tempo quasi senz’ anima, operazione nè sentimenti dell’ - senza umano conforto, anima, col corpo tutto debole.… - - … e non si sà nè si può 117_c_. “Io non so dove mi - aiutare. sia.” - - Però è di bisogno che dagli 127_a_. Quali la servivano - altri sia aiutato, ovvero restavano stupefatti, non sapendo - occultamente da Dio gli sia che farle. - provveduto, altrimenti restarebbe 120_a_. … provveduto tal - quella creatura abbandonata bisogno, a lui non restava di - essa provisione memoria - alcuna. - - 121_a_. Perseverò molti anni - con bisogno che il Confessore - le stasse d’ appresso, per - sostentare l’umanità. - - 117_c_. Dei peccati che diceva - non le erano lasciato vedere - come peccati che avesse … - come un figliuolino, il quale, fatti, ma come d’un garzonzello, - non avendo i suoi bisogni, il quale da giovinetto fà - altro riparo non ha se non di qualche cosa di cui è ignorante, - piangere tanto che gli sieno il quale, essendogli - dati. detto “tu hai fatto male” per - questa parola muta subito di - colore e diventa rosso, ma non - già perchè conosce il male. - - Non è dunque meraviglia, 119_c_. “Non posso più sopportare - se a simili creature Iddio tanti assedi esteriori - provvede di particolari persone ed interiori; per questo mi - che le aiutino, e per ha Iddio provveduto del - mezzo loro sia alle necessità vostro mezzo … quando da - dell’ anima e del’ corpo sovvenuto, mè siete partito, vò lamentadomi - altrimenti non potriano per la casa.” - vivere. - - 120_a_. era di bisogno che il - Confessore non si partisse da - lei.… Dio, sempre glieli - Vedi come il nostro Signor dava … tutti i sussidi all - Gesù Christo lasciò _a_ San anima e al corpo … per - Giovanni [al]la sua diletta mezzo di lui, al quale in quell’ - Madre in particolar cura; e instante provedeva di lume - così fece ai suoi discepoli e fà e di parole convenienti alla di - sempre all’ altre sue divote lei necessità. - persone; di modo che l’uno 121_b_. Questa tutto divina - soccorre l’altro, così all’anima … operazione. Il Confessore - come al corpo, con quella era legato col vincolo del - unione divina. divino amore. - - E perchè in generale le 117_b_. Dio gli diede lume e - persone non conoscono queste grazia di consoscere quell’ - operazioni, nè hanno insieme operazione. - quella unione, perciò a simili 120_b_. E perchè quella continua - cure bisognano particolari persone, conversazione e stretta - colle quali Iddio operi famigliarità facevano alcuni - colla sua grazia e lume. mormorare, non intendendo - l’opera e la necessità.… - - Chi vide queste creature e 117_b_. … col corpo tutto - non le intende, gli sono più senza vigore, quasi derelitto - presto d’ ammirazione che in se medesimo. - di edificazione, dunque non - giudicare, se non vuoi errare - … resta l’umanità senza - vigore ed abandonata quasi - come morta. - -The _Dialogo_-writer having, as we saw, combined, for the purpose -of describing Catherine’s latter-day habits, _V.’s_ account of her -unusually peaceful dispositions of soul, obtaining in 1499, with -_V.’s_ account of her Penance and Confessions in 1473: now utilizes -here Marabotto’s account of her Confessions to him from 1499 onwards -(an account which the writer had rejected there), for an entirely -different purpose and context than those developed by the Confessor -himself. For, in the _Vita_-proper account, it is in connection with -the Confession of her sins that we get the highly original and curious -“garzonzello” parallel; and Catherine’s lamentations do not there occur -in any relation to this parallel, but they arise only when Marabotto is -not at hand to comfort her. In the _Dialogo_-version it is simply in -relation to this requirement of his presence and to its postponement, -that Catherine behaves like a “figliuolino,” and cries till she gets -what she wants. And yet there is not the slightest doubt that it is -really the “Garzonzello” Confession-passage which (left unutilized by -the writer in his account of the Contrition and Confessions of her -last period, _Dialogo_, pp. 231_c_-232_b_, no doubt because of the -difficulty and apparent temerity of the facts and doctrines implied), -has here been used after all, but with all its originality and daring -carefully eliminated from it. For nowhere else, in the _Vita_-proper, -does a “Garzonzello”-passage or language, or anything like them, occur; -nowhere else again, in the _Dialogo_ does a “figliuolino”-passage or -wording, or anything really resembling them, appear; and these two, -respectively unique and very peculiar, passages, both occur at one and -the same stage of her life, and in connection with one and the same -couple of persons. - - -IX. SEVENTH STAGE CONCLUDED: CHARACTER AND AUTHORSHIP OF THIS SECOND -“CHAPTER.” - -Let us take these two points simultaneously, and move, from the more -formal and literary qualities, through indications of the more or less -external life-circumstances of the author, on to the writer’s special -views and aims in psychology and spirituality. - - -1. _The writer’s power._ - -The following passages, all more or less peculiar to the _Dialogo_, -suffice, I think, to prove his power. - -At the beginning of these, her last nine years, the Lord explains to -Catherine the means by which Love may be known: “My love can be better -known by means of interior experience than in any other way; if man -is to acquire it, Love must snatch man from man himself, since it is -man himself who is his own chief impediment,”[434]--a passage that -recalls Thackeray’s _Arthur Pendennis, his Friends and his Greatest -Enemy_--namely, his own self. - -These years are, a little later, described in language no doubt -suggested, probably through some Patristic passage, by Plato, the -harmonious. “This soul now abode like a musical instrument which, as -long as it remains furnished with chords, gives forth sweet sounds; -but which, bereft of them, is silent. Thus she too, in the past, by -means of the sentiments of soul and body, was wont to render so sweet a -harmony, that every one who heard it rejoiced in it; but now, alienated -from those sentiments, as it were without” psychic “chords, she -remained entirely bare and mute.”[435] - -And we are told of “words which the heart alone speaks to the soul -alone”[436]--a passage which recalls Pascal’s saying, “The heart has -reasons which Reason does not know.” - -Amongst the rapturous addresses we find, “O Spirit naked and invisible! -No man can hold thee (here below), because of thy very nakedness! Thy -dwelling-place is in Heaven, even whilst, joined to the body, thou -happenest still to tarry upon earth! Thou dost not know thine own self, -nor art thou known by others in this world. All thy friends and (true) -relatives are in Heaven, recognized by thee alone, through an interior -instinct infused by the Spirit of God.”[437] An apostrophe which, in -part, strongly recalls Henry Vaughan’s poem, “They are all gone into a -world of light, and I alone am lingering here.” - -The final address in this series of apostrophes to Love, God, contains -the sentences: “O Lord, how great is Thy loving care, both by day and -by night, for man who knows not even his own self, and far less Thee, -O Lord. Thou art that great and high God, of whom we cannot speak or -think, because of the ineffable super-eminence of Thy Greatness, Power, -Wisdom, and Goodness infinite. Thou labourest in man and for man with -Thy Love, and in return Thou willest that the whole man should act for -Love, and this because, without Love, nothing good can be produced. -Thou workest solely for man’s true utility; and Thou willest that man -should operate solely for Thine honour, and not for his own (separate) -utility.”[438] A passage strongly coloured by Dionysian ideas. - -And yet the writer continues to think and to write, but says: “These -words of mine are like ink: for ink is black and of an evil odour; and -yet, by its means, many ideas are apprehended, which otherwise would be -ignored altogether.”[439] Here we have an image, based as it is upon a -vivid sensible perception of a chemical compound, which reminds one of -the epatic-agaric passage in “Chapter” First of the _Dialogo_, and of -the reference to cassia in Battista’s letter of 1581.[440] - -And the whole Book finishes up with two impressive passages. The -first, as to the means of knowing Love, is as Pauline as is most of -the remaining doctrine of the _Dialogo_: “Not by means of external -signs, nor even by martyrdoms, can this love be comprehended. Only he -who actually experiences it can understand something of it.”[441] And -the second concludes all with a forcible and comprehensive paraphrase -of Catherine’s central doctrine,--as to the Soul’s condition and -action, revealed at the moment of death: “Every man bears within his -own self the sentence of his own judgment, pronounced indeed by God, -yet each man himself ratifies it, in and for his own case and self. -There is no place totally bereft of God’s mercy. The very souls in Hell -itself would suffer a greater Hell outside of it than they do within -it.”[442]--We have had repeated proofs of how great were Battista’s -gifts and experience in such-like eloquent writing, from the earlier -_Dialogo_-Chapter, and from her _Colloquies_ and _Letters_. - - -2. _Indications of special knowledge._ - -I am compelled to pass over the emotional rhythm, and the mystical -ambiguity and paradox, that appear, in identical forms, in Battista’s -avowed writings and here. But we must briefly dwell upon some special -sources of interest in Catherine, and of certain knowledge of a -peculiar kind, traceable in the writer of this second “Chapter”; both -sets of passages clearly point to Battista as their author. - -(1) There is the deeply-felt description of Catherine’s conversation -with her disciples: “This soul would many times abide with her -spiritual friends, discoursing of the Divine Love, in suchwise that -it appeared to them all as though they were in Paradise. And indeed, -what delightful colloquies took place! Both he who spoke and he who -listened, one and all would get nourished by spiritual food, of a -sweet and delectable kind. And, because the time sped so quickly, -they could not attain to satiety; but they would abide so enkindled -and inflamed, that they knew not what more to say. And yet they could -not depart, and would seem as though in an ecstasy. Oh! what loving -repasts, what delightful food, what sweet viands, what a gracious -union, what a divine companionship!”[443]--Now it is true that the -writer has here certainly utilized four pregnantly descriptive lines in -the _Vita_-proper, and the fine account there, undoubtedly by Ettore -Vernazza, as regards these conversations.[444] Yet one readily feels, -at the moved and moving tone of the re-telling here, that the writer -was specially impelled to dwell with a tender, living sympathy upon -those meetings of forty years ago. Now Battista must, of course, again -and again, have heard from her Father’s own lips, during those fourteen -years that he lived on after Catherine’s great soul had gone to God, of -these unforgettable talks, in which he himself had played so large a -part, as questioner, interpreter, and chronicler. - -(2) And the other set of passages points, even more definitely, to the -same daughter and father. Catherine’s “humanity,” being threatened by -the Spirit with various future sufferings, asks to be told the precise -offence, charge (_la causa_), which will bring so great a martyrdom -with it, without hope of any help. But “she was answered that this -grace,” of knowing exactly what and why she should suffer, “would be -accorded to her in due time, as happens with men condemned to death, -who, by hearing read aloud to them the precise sentence pronounced -upon their specific misdeeds, support with a greater peace of mind -their ignominious death.”--And: “Since I am forsaken on all sides,” -Catherine says to God, “give me at least, O Lord, some person that -may be able to understand and comfort me, amidst the torments that I -see coming upon me--as men are wont to do for those who are condemned -to death, so that the latter may not despair.”--And the natural man -in such advanced souls is described as suspended in mid-air, “like -unto one who is hung, and who touches not the ground with his feet, -but abides in the air, attached to the cord which has caused his -death.”[445] Ettore’s life-long, detailed interest in, and experience -of, prisoners and condemned men, whom he, the Founder of the Society -of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, so loved to attend and help -throughout their last night and at the scaffold, speak here through -the devoted daughter who, countless times, must have listened to that -father’s prison-experiences, which we found her describing, still -most vividly, in 1581, thirty years after the publication of these -_Dialogo_-passages.[446] - - -3. _Schematic, intensely abstract psychology._ - -At this spiritual stage “there was, as it were, a chain. God, Spirit, -draws to Himself the Spirit of man, and there this Spirit abides -completely occupied. The Soul, which cannot abide without the Spirit, -follows the Spirit, and is there kept occupied. And the Body, which -is subject to the Soul, thus prevented from possessing its natural -sensations and its natural sustenance, remains, as it were, forsaken -and outside of its natural being.”--“God at times allowed the Spirit -to correspond with the Soul, and the Soul with the Body.… But when God -withdrew that Spirit into Himself, all the rest (the Soul) followed -after it; and hence the Body remained like dead.” The two dividings, -first of the Soul from the Body, and then of the Soul from the Spirit, -so much emphasized in those other documents,[447] is thus carried -through in this “Chapter” also. - - -4. _Rigorism._ - -We find here the same exaggeration as to Catherine’s faults and -contrition, and the same rigoristic doctrine as in “Chapter” First, -although, here also, counterbalanced by a noble tenderness of heart. -Thus her but semi-conscious attachment to, and self-attribution of, -spiritual consolations, is here magnified into a grave sin. “How can I -act, so as to make satisfaction for this sin, which is so great and so -subtle?” her soul asks God, concerning but semi-conscious attachment -to spiritual consolations. And of her social affections, as manifested -in her great colloquies with her friends, Catherine now says, “All -other loves” than the direct love of God “now appear to me as worse -than sheer self-loves.”--“She began to confess her sins with so great -a contrition that it appeared a wonderful thing,” we are told of -Catherine, in 1499-1510; yet we know, from the unimpeachable testimony -of Don Marabotto himself, that “the wonderful thing” about these latter -Confessions was precisely the absence of that former keen sense of, and -sorrow for, specific sins.[448] - - -5. _Pronounced Christo-centrism and daring Anthropomorphism._ - -We get, again, the predominance of the Personal conceptions and -imagery over those of Thing or Law, and the same greater attention -to the historical element of religion, that characterize Battista’s -writings and “Chapter First” of the _Dialogo_, as against Catherine’s -authentic sayings. - -Catherine’s energetic repudiation of “the corrupt expression, ‘You have -offended God,’” is replaced by God saying to Catherine, “Know that I -cannot be offended by man, except when he raises an obstacle to the -work which I have ordained for his good.”[449] Catherine has angrily -declared that the term could never be correctly used; the _Dialogo_ -explains how special and metaphorical is its correct use. - -The Lord declares here: “I descend with a fine thread of gold, which is -My secret love, and to this thread is bound a hook, which seizes the -heart of men. I hold this thread in My hand and ever draw it towards -Myself.” The hook and hand are additions to her authentic declaration, -“She seemed to herself to have in her heart a continuous ray of Love -… a thread of gold, as to which she had no fear that it would ever -break.”[450]--We get here the Wedding-feast imagery that is entirely -wanting in Catherine’s authentic sayings. “There is no shorter way -to salvation than (the owning of) this delightful wedding-garment -of charity”[451] A garment, generally in a bad sense, is quite -Catherinian; a wedding-garment is exclusively Battistan.--And the -parallel between St. John’s care of the Blessed Virgin, and Marabotto’s -attendance upon Catherine[452] is quite foreign to Catherine’s mind. - -And the whole _Dialogo_ culminates in a double, daring yet graduated, -anthropomorphic picturing of the deification of the perfect soul, -interestingly different from Catherine’s favourite Ocean and Fire -similes, and from her description of the Soul as respectively submerged -in, and transformed by, this infinite and all-penetrating living -Ocean-Fire, God. The Soul asks what is the name which the Lord gives to -perfect souls; and the Lord answers (in Latin, as ever with Battista) -with the text of Ps. lxxxi, 6: “I have said, ye are Gods, and all of -you sons of the Most High”; a text which still leaves us with separate -human personalities face to face with the distinct Spirit-Person, God. -And then, to the Lord’s question, as to what the Soul declares its -heart to be, the Soul answers (this climax has been carefully led up -to all along): “I say that it is my God, wounded by love,--in Whom -I live joyful and contented.”--For, as in Battista’s own _Colloquy_ -of December 10, 1554, we get three simultaneous “voices” at different -depths of her consciousness, so here, in this composition of 1550, -Catherine hears simultaneously within herself three voices--of the -Lord, of her own soul, and of her own heart. And Catherine can here -declare that now her heart is God, and God wounded by Love; for -Battista can write in 1576 that, in the perfect state, “of the Increate -Heart and of the created heart there is made a single, most secret -and inestimable union,”[453] and that Increate Heart appears here as -wounded, because God is ever, in Battista’s mind, explicitly identified -with Christ, and Christ’s Passion is ever in her thoughts. Catherine -identifies her true self with God, and God with Love; and conceives -her own heart as filled with love and inflamed and pierced by it; but -nowhere figures God with a Heart, or that Heart as wounded, for she has -little or nothing of Battista’s anthropomorphic tendency in regard to -God, or of her historical picturings with regard to Christ. - -The entire _Dialogo_ then is the work of Battista Vernazza; and we -have to eliminate it, all but completely, from the means and materials -directly available for the constitution of Catherine’s life and -doctrine. The next Division will now attempt to deal finally with -the chief of these means--the _Dimostrazione_ (_Trattato_) and the -_Vita_-proper. - - -SECOND DIVISION: ANALYSIS, ASSIGNATION, AND APPRAISEMENT OF THE -“VITA-DOTTRINA-DICCHIARAZIONE” CORPUS, IN EIGHT SECTIONS. - -We now find ourselves in face of the most difficult, and the alone -directly important, _corpus_ of documents concerning Catherine’s inner -life: the _Vita e Dottrina_, together with the _Dicchiarazione_ or -_Trattato_. It will be best to begin with this _Trattato_, and only -after a careful study of this little book, which, as we know, contains -the most original and valuable part of Catherine’s teaching, to finish -up with an examination of the, now separate, Life and (other) Doctrine. - - -I. THE “DICCHIARAZIONE”: THE TWO STAGES OF ITS EXISTENCE. - - -1. _The “Dicchiarazione,” from the first a booklet by itself._ - -All the Manuscripts give the _Dicchiarazione_ (_Trattato_) -substantially as we have it at present, although ever as but a Chapter -of the _Vita e Dottrina_, and not, as yet, itself divided up in any -way. Even the last Editions of the Printed _Vita_ still retain a -reference to this old arrangement: “The soul purifies itself, as do the -souls in Purgatory, according to the process described in the Chapter -appropriated to this matter.”[454] - -Yet the very length of this “Chapter,” then as now, and the solemn -introductory paragraph, both point to its having, at first, formed a -booklet by itself. Thus the longest of the other doctrinal Chapters of -MS. A (Chapters XV, XVI, XX, and XL) are respectively 29, 22, 19, and -17½ pages long; whilst the _Trattato_-Chapter XLII runs to 46 pages. -Only the Narrative-Chapter XLI, the Passion, is of an exactly equal -length; but we shall find that this Chapter also existed, originally, -in part at least, as a separate document. And the introduction to -Chapter XLII is unparalleled by anything in such a position. “This -holy Soul, whilst yet in the flesh, finding herself placed in the -purgatory of God’s burning love, which consumed and purified her from -whatever she had to purify, in order that, in passing out of this life, -she might enter at once into the immediate presence of her tender -Love,--God: understood, by means of this fire of love, how the souls -of the faithful abide in the place of Purgatory to purge away every -stain of sin that, in this life, they had not yet purged.” I have here -omitted (after “understood”) “in her soul,” as marring the rhythm; and -(before “stain of sin”) “rust and,” since the whole group of words -appears in MS. A as “ogni rubigine di macchia di peccato,” requiring -the suppression of at least one of the first two nouns: we shall find -that “rubigine” is secondary. - -I have also omitted, from what I hold was the first form of this -Introduction, the present second sentence and comparison: “And as -she, placed in the loving purgatory of the divine fire, abode united -to this Divine Love, and content with all that He wrought within her: -so she understood the state of the Souls that are in Purgatory.” For -all the circumstances and dispositions of this contentment have already -been anticipated in the “How the Souls abide in Purgatory” of the -first sentence.--We can still show, I think, when and why this second -sentence was added. Let us get at the reason slowly. - - -2. _Three differences between the first seven and the last ten -Chapters._ - -The first seven of the present seventeen Chapters of the -_Dicchiarazione_ (_Dic._) are indeed like, but also unlike, the last -ten Chapters, in three important matters.[455] - -(1) All the seventeen Chapters are full of ideas, even of special words -and peculiar groups of words, appearing also in various places of the -_Vita_-proper. Yet the last ten Chapters alone have, in addition, four -complete paragraphs standing, as such, in the _Vita_-proper. The two -paragraphs of Chapter Eight, and the first paragraph of Chapter Nine, -of the _Dicchiarazione_ (“Più ancora dico che io veggio”--“se fosse -possibile,” _Vita_, pp. 175_c_-176_c_), are identical with paragraphs -four and five of Chapter Thirty of the _Vita_-proper (“E perciò diceva: -io veggio”--“se fosse possibile,” _Vita_, pp. 78_c_, 79_a_). - -_Dic._’s text still keeps two primitive readings: “Gate” of Paradise, -in a first saying, unassimilated to the plural “arms” of God in the -second saying; against _V.’s_ assimilation, “gates” and “arms.” Again -“stain” and “stains,” alongside of “imperfection”; against _V.’s_ -treble “imperfection.” But in all else _V._ is clearly the older text: -thus “His company” (against “His glory”); “un minimo chè” (against “un -minimo brusculo”); “appear before God” (against “find himself in the -presence of the Divine Majesty”); “purge” (against “lift away”); and -other points. - -But if this general priority of the _V._-text be admitted, then this -part of _Dic._ must have been constituted at a time when these parts -of _V.’s_ text were already so definitely fixed in themselves, and so -firmly worked into their present contexts, that the Redactor of this -part of _Dic._ dared not take them simply away from their old home, and -did not modify them so as to conform with the glosses traceable in the -earlier Chapters of _Dic._ (note here, in Ch. VIII, the absence of the -“rubigine” present in the earlier Chapters). And this means that this -part of _Dic._ was constituted when this part of _V._ was no more new, -and _Dic.’s_ own earlier chapters had been fixed for some time. - -(2) All the _Dicchiarazione_ Chapters are based on the assumption of a -true analogy, indeed a continuity, between the soul’s purgation, Here -and There. But only the last ten Chapters give passages (three whole -Chapters) treating exclusively of this-world sufferings, and an address -to souls that, in this world, run the risk not simply of Purgatory but -of Hell hereafter. - -Thus Chapter Eleven (_Vita_, pp. 178_b_-179_a_) is now indeed -superscribed, “Of the desire of the souls in Purgatory to be quite free -from the stains of their sins”; and contains the clause “non che possa -guardare il Purgatorio siccome un Purgatorio” (179_a_). But all the -chapter-headings are recent, and the heading here is quite inaccurate, -for throughout the account (with the probable exception of the clause -quoted, which is a gloss) the soul is simply in this world, as on pp. -23_b_, 49_b_, 61_b_, 106_a_, 114_c_ of the _Vita_, which readily calls -such this-world sufferings a “Purgatory,” 128_b_, 136_c_, 137_a_. Here, -however, much of the form (_e.g._ “to contaminate,” “to occasion”), and -some of the doctrine (the resurrection effected by Baptism) is alien to -Catherine’s habits. The Chapter is, then, made up, about equally, of -genuine sayings referring exclusively to this-world purgations, and of -redactional amplifications of a systematizing and sacramental kind. - -Chapter Twelve (_Vita_, p. 179_b_, _c_) is now subscribed, “How -suffering conjoins itself with joy in Purgatory,” and concludes with -“Thus the souls in Purgatory experience.…” Yet here too the body of -the text nowhere directly refers to, or consciously implies, the -other-world Purgatory; for its last clause, “ma questa contentezza non -toglie scintilla di pena,” requires freeing from the gloss, “alle Anime -che sono in Purgatorio,” which now stands between “contentezza” and -“non.” - -Chapter Seventeen (_Vita_, pp. 182_c_-184_c_) now indeed opens with an -explicit reference by Catherine of “this purgative form that I feel it -in my mind, especially since the last two years” to the souls in “the -true Purgatory”; but this reference and the five last words of this -long Chapter, “e il Purgatorio lo purifica,” are clear glosses, since -Catherine is here exclusively occupied with the purgative character -of her this-world sufferings, and not with any likeness of them to -the other-world Purgatory. And indeed, since considerations about -the other-world Purgatory first occur, in any certainly authentic -_Vita_-passages, only after the great “ray”-experience of November 11, -1509 (the experience stands on p. 133_b_, where the MSS. give the date; -the considerations appear only on pp. 136_b_-137_a_, 144_b_, 146_b_), -the “last two years” here must mean that already three years or so -before her death she had come to dwell much on the purifying function -of her sufferings. Only during the last ten months does she seem to -have dwelt upon these sufferings as illustrating the purgations of the -other life. - -And finally, Chapter Fifteen (_Vita_, p. 181_b_, _c_) is headed now: -“Reproofs addressed by the souls in Purgatory to worldly persons.” -But the text still begins with “a desire comes over me (Catherine) -to cry out so as to strike fear into every man on earth,” and deals -throughout with her this-life fears for such persons, not with respect -to Purgatory, but with regard to Hell. - -(3) Even the first seven _Dicchiarazione_ Chapters we shall find to -contain short theological glosses. But only in the last ten Chapters -can we find extensive passages incompatible with Catherine’s authentic -teaching, or at least quite unlike her undoubted utterances. - -Chapter Thirteen (_Vita_, p. 180_a_, _b_) is now entitled: “How the -souls in Purgatory are no longer in a state to merit; and how they -regard the charity exercised in the world for them.” Yet this very -_Dicchiarazione’s_ utterly authentic opening sayings (_Vita_, pp. -169_c_, 170_a_, _b_) eliminate clearly the second question: such souls -do not and cannot regard such charity at all. And though Catherine -(who put the question of merit, even as to the soul’s this-world -action, so emphatically behind that of love)[456] never considers -merit in connection with Purgatory, yet she conceives the souls in -Purgatory as purifying themselves of certain passive habitual defects, -by one initial free election of the condition of suffering, and by -then continually willing the painful condition,--volitional acts and -dispositions that are usually held to imply merit. - -The first paragraph then opens with: “If the souls in Purgatory could -purge themselves with contrition, in one instant they would pay all -their debt.” Yet there is no such dilemma in Catherine’s authentic -thought as “instant purgation through contrition, of a necessarily -perfect kind,” or “no purgation through such contrition”; for -throughout the first seven Chapters purgation takes place through love -and general contrition, in a thorough but gradual, seemingly slow, -manner, and this not because God prevents the soul’s self-purification -by what would be the normal means, but, contrariwise, because He does -not interfere with the intrinsic, normally necessary interconnection of -sin and suffering, sorrow, self-renunciation, love and joy. - -The second paragraph runs: “Of the payment not one penny is remitted to -those souls.…” This imagery of the payment of something as external to -the payer as is money, in view of so external a change as getting out -of prison, can hardly be Catherine’s, at least not as the deliberate -expression of her purgatorial conception. The last paragraph reads: -“They are henceforth incapable of seeing except [so much as] God’s -will[s] … they can no more turn [with any attachment] to see the alms -given for their intention by those that are living upon earth [except -within the (general) apprehension of that all-just balance of the -divine will], leaving God to do as He pleases in all things [God, who -pays Himself as it pleases His infinite goodness]. And if they could -turn to see those alms [outside of the divine will], this would be an -act of self-love (_proprietà_)…” (180_b_). We have here a substantially -authentic saying, but the bracketed words are certain glosses, -introducing the utterly un-Catherinian ideas and images of the souls -being allowed to see what is being done for them, of God’s balance, and -of His paying Himself. - -Chapter Fifteen’s last paragraph (_Vita_, p. 181_c_), which warns -the soul that “the (kind of) Confession and Contrition necessary for -such a Plenary Indulgence (as shall instantly purify it from all sin) -is a thing most difficult to gain,” is also quite unlike Catherine’s -preoccupations, tone, and teaching. - - -3. _Remaining passages of the last ten Chapters not accounted for by -the three peculiarities just detailed._ - -The three last paragraphs of Chapter Nine (_Vita_, pp. 176_c_-177_b_) -and the very similar short Chapter Fourteen (_ibid._ pp. 180_c_, -181_a_) are more painfully composite and more repeatedly worked over -than, I think, even the most tormented passages of the first seven -Chapters. - -We thus are left with but four paragraphs, the last two of Chapter -Ten (_Vita_, pp. 178_a_, _b_) and the two of Chapter Sixteen (pp. -181_c_-182_b_). These two sets form two couples of illustrative -descriptions of the Purgatorial process; and, in each set, the first -paragraph is easier to read but is less authentic than the second, -very composite, much-glossed paragraph. The second paragraph of the -first set reads: “L’oro quando è purificato [per sino a ventiquattro -caratti] non si consuma poi più, per fuoco che tu gli possi dare; -perchè non si può consumare se non la sua imperfezione. Così | fâ -il divin fuoco | dell’ anima: Dio la tiene tanto al fuoco, che le -consuma ogni imperfezione [e la conduce alla perfezione di ventiquattro -caratti, ognuna però in suo grado]. E quando è purificata, resta tutta -| in Dio [senz’ alcuna cosa]| in sè stessa; ed il suo essere è Dio | -[il quale quando ha condotta a sè] l’anima così purificata [allora -l’anima] resta impassibile [perchè più non le resta da consumare] e se -pure, così purificata, fosse tenuta al fuoco, non le saria penoso, anzi -le saria fuoco di divino amore, come vita eterna, senza contrarietà.” -The bracketed words are all more or less certain glosses. But there -is here, besides, a conflation (indicated by vertical lines) of two -applications of the gold-dross-fire simile: “Così dell’ anima: Dio la -tiene … imperfezione. E quando è purificata, resta tutta in Dio; e se -pure, così purificata, fosse tenuta …”; and “così fà il divin fuoco -dell’ anima, che le consuma ogni imperfezione; e quando è purificata -resta in sè stessa, ed il suo essere è Dio.” Both applications -are probably authentic; the latter is too daringly simple and too -delicately consistent with Catherine’s surest purgatorial conceptions -not to be genuine. - -The second paragraph of the second set contains the important passage: -“Perchè sono in grazia l’intendono e capiscono | Dio | così come -sono, secondo la loro capacità; [e perciò a quel] le da un gran -contento, il quale non manca mai; anzi lo và loro accrescendo tanto, -quanto più si approssimano a Dio.” This seems a conflation of two -authentic sentences: “Perchè--grazia, l’intendono e capiscono così come -sono--capacità;” and “perchè--grazia, Dio le da un gran contento--a -Dio.” And the paragraph concludes with: “Ognì poca vista che si possa -avere di Dio, eccede ogni [pena ed ogni] gaudio che l’uomo può capire, -[e benchè la eccede, non leva loro però una scintilla di gaudio o di -pena];” where the brackets indicate glosses, since the sight of God is -directly ever a source of joy. - - -4. _“Dic.” 1 and “Dic.” 2 referred to, respectively, by the first and -second sentences of the Dicchiarazione’s present Introduction._ - -Now the result reached by our analysis of the _Dicchiarazione’s_ last -ten Chapters, viz. that this group (with the possible exception of the -two sets of similes in Chapters Ten and Sixteen and much of Chapter -Seventeen), was constituted under different, later circumstances than -was that of the first seven Chapters, is borne out, indeed required, -by the present Narrative-paragraph that introduces all the seventeen -Chapters. For the two sentences of this paragraph are similar in form -but different in matter. In the first sentence the soul is “placed in -Purgatory” in order that, “passing from this life, it may be presented -in the sight of its tender Love, God”; Purgatory is “a place”; and the -souls are in that place “to purge away every stain of sin.” And this -corresponds exactly to Chapters Four, Six, and Seven respectively, -which deal with the diverse souls that “have passed from this life” (p. -172_c_); with the sight or non-sight of “God, our Love” possessed by -them (p. 174_c_); and with God and Hell as “places,” and of the soul’s -purgatorial plunge “so as to join God” (p. 175_c_). In the second -sentence, the soul, “placed in the loving Purgatory of the divine -fire, stands united to the divine Love and content with all that It -operates within her,” and Purgatory is not called a “place.” And this -corresponds precisely with Chapter Twelve (p. 179_b_), “as though a man -stood in a great fire … the love of God gives him a contentment.…” - -The second sentence, a pale, at first sight redundant, double of the -first, will, then, have been added to the first sentence, when the -second set of chapters was added to the first set. - - -II. THE EARLIER “DICCHIARAZIONE,” AND ITS THEOLOGICAL GLOSSES. - -I will here analyse such paragraphs of these first seven chapters, as -most fully illustrate the astonishing complexity of the whole, and as, -between them, furnish all the theological “corrections” to be found in -this earliest _Dicchiarazione_. - - -1. _The two Sayings-paragraphs of Chapter First_ (“_Vita_,” pp. 169_c_, -170_a_, _c_.). - -I print these sayings (here now broken up) in parallel columns and in -the order of their present position. Columns first and third (numbered -together as I) will turn out to contain original sayings, and column -second (numbered II) will appear as but a Redactor’s re-statement, -which (a sort of link between the two sets) first paraphrases the -set that has just preceded, and then restates the set that will -immediately follow. The arabic numbers indicate the several sayings, -in their original and secondary forms (the numbers of the latter being -bracketed): thus II (1), (2), (3), stands for the secondary versions of -I 1, 2, 3, respectively. I double-bracket the additions (theological -glosses) of the Printed text, and I single-bracket two MS. clauses -which are clearly a gloss. - - I 1 II (1) I - - Le Anime che Non _possono avere_ - sono nel Purgatorio alcuna memoria - _non possono _propria_ neppure d’ - avere_ altra elezione _altri_, nè in _bene_ - che di essere in nè in _male_ [[dacui - esso luogo; [e ricevano maggior - questo è per _ordinazione afflizione del suo - di Dio_, il quale ordinario]]; ma hanno - ha fatto questo tanto contento - giustamente;] _nè_ di essere nell’ - si _possono_ più voltare _ordinazione di Dio_, - verso _sè stesse_, e che adoperi tutto - nè dire: “io ho quello che gli piace - fatto tali peccati, e come gli piace, - per i quali merito che di _sè medesime_ - di _star qui_”; non ne possono - nè possono dire pensare [[con maggiore - “non vorrei averli lor pena.]] - fatti, perchè _anderei_ - ora _in Paradiso_”; - nè dire ancora - “_quello_ ne esce più - presto di mè,” ovvero - “_io_ nè usciro più - presto di _lui_.” - - (2) e solamente 2. La causa del - _veggiono_ l’operazione Purgatorio che hanno - della divina in loro, _veggiono_ - bontà, la quale ha una sol volta - tanta misericordia nel passare di - dell’ uomo per condurlo questa vita, e poi - a sè, che di mai più, imperocchè - pena o di bene vi saria una - che possa accadere _proprietà_. - in _proprietà_, non se - ne può vedere. - - (3) e se’l potessero 3. Essendo dunque - vedere, non sarebbero in carità, e da - in _carità pura_. quella _non potendo_ - Non _possono_ più deviare con - vedere che siano _attual diffetto_, non - in quelle pene possono più volere - per i loro peccati, se non il puro volere - e _non possono_ aver della _pura - quella vista nella carità_. - mente: imperocchè - vi sarebbe una - _imperfezione attiva_. - - (4) la quale non [4. ed essendo in - può essere in esso quel fuoco del - luogo, perchè non Purgatorio, sono nell’ - vi si può attualmente ordinazione divina - peccare. (la quale è carità - pura), e non possono - più in alcuna cosa - da quella deviare, - perchè sono - privati così di - attualmente peccare - come sono di - attualmente meritare.] - -Here the middle sayings are sufficiently recent to have in II (1) -imitated the secondary “ordinazione di Dio” clause present in I 1. -And the two theological “corrections,” still absent from MSS. A and -B, both appear among these middle sayings; they attempt to explain -the non-attention of the souls to all particular things, as a -non-remembrance of such things as would add to their distress. - - -2. _The first two paragraphs of Chapter Second_ (pp. 170_c_-171_b_). - -Originally single sentences have here been repeatedly broken up and -scattered about amongst other similarly broken-up passages: we can -still trace the motive for this procedure. I first print them as -they stand, double-bracketing, at the end, the interestingly obvious -theological “correction” that immediately follows a most authentic, -directly contrary, statement. - -“Non credo che si possa trovare contentezza da comparare a quella di -un’ anima del Purgatorio, eccetto quella de’ Santi di Paradiso: ed -ogni giorno questa contentezza cresce per l’influsso di Dio in esse -anime, il quale và crescendo, siccome si và consumando l’impedimento -dell’ influsso. La ruggine del peccato è l’impedimento, e il fuoco và -consumando la ruggine: e così l’anima sempre più si và discuoprendo al -divino influsso. Siccome una cosa coperta non può corrispondere alla -riverberazione del sole, non per diffetto del sole, che di continuo -luce, ma per l’opposizione della copertura: così sè si consumerà la -copertura, si discoprirà la cosa al sole, e tanto più corrisponderà -alla riverberazione, quanto la copertura più si andrà consumando. - -“Così la ruggine (cioè il peccato) è la copertura dell’ anima, e nel -Purgatorio si và consumando per il fuoco: e quanto più si consuma, -tanto sempre più corrisponde al vero sole Iddio: però tanto cresce la -contentezza, quanto manca la ruggine e si discopre al divin raggio: e -così l’uno cresce e l’altro manca, finchè sia finito il tempo. [[Non -manca però la pena, ma solo il tempo di stare in essa pena.]]” - -Here the last (double-bracketed) sentence is a deliberate theological -correction, for it formally contradicts the precise point and -necessary consequences of the whole preceding, most authentic, -specially characteristic doctrine.--In that preceding part three -parallel illustrative similes (between the intact general statement -and the equally untouched general conclusion) have been broken -up, and dovetailed into each other, in a most bewildering manner; -and this from a (possibly but semi-conscious) desire to obscure a -characteristic feature of her teaching. I shall now give these five -sentences in English, and will disentangle the three middle ones from -each other.--The general statement: “I do not think that a contentment -could be found comparable to that of a soul in Purgatory, except that -of the Saints in Paradise; and every day this contentment is on the -increase.”--The three images descriptive of the cause and mode of this -increase, arranged according to the increasing materiality of their -picturings. (1) “The influx of God into the soul goes increasing, in -proportion as it consumes the impediment to that influx, and as the -soul opens itself out more and more to the influx.” (2) “As an object, -if covered up, cannot correspond to the beating of the sun upon it, not -through any defect in the sun, which indeed shines on continuously, but -because of the opposition of the covering, (so that) if this covering -be consumed, the object will open itself out to the sun: even so does -the soul in Purgatory more and more correspond with the true sun, God, -when its covering, sin, gets consumed.” (3) “Rust is an impediment to -fire, and fire goes consuming rust more and more: so does the rust, -that is the sin, of the souls in Purgatory, get consumed by the fire; -and their contentment grows in proportion as the rust diminishes and as -the soul uncovers itself to the divine ray (of fire).”--The conclusion, -which perhaps applies grammatically only to the last image, but which, -as to the sense, most certainly refers to all three pictures. “And -thus does the one (the influx, sun-light, fire-ray) increase, and does -the other (the impediment, covering, rust) decrease, until the time -(necessary for the whole process) be accomplished.”--The three images -are in no case supplementary, but each is complete and parallel to the -other two. As the fire that meets with the obstacle of the rust is the -same fire as that which removes the rust, so is it in all three cases: -in each case God, and His direct presence and action, are the “influx,” -“sun-light,” “fire-ray”; in each case a sinful, morally imperfect, -habit of the soul is the “impediment,” “covering,” “rust”; and in each -case the suffering as well as the joy, and the changing relations -between the two, proceed exclusively from the differing relations of -but two forces: the soul and God. It is only the peculiar, Redactional -dovetailing of the fragments of these three parallel similes which now -conveys the impression that the divine sun-light and fire-ray reaches -the uncovered soul in proportion as the soul’s covering and rust is -destroyed by material fire; and to convey this very impression, was, -no doubt, the motive of this dovetailing. The authentic passage on p. -178b, tells how the same divine fire which, at first, pains because -it has still to purify the soul, increasingly fills the soul with joy -in proportion as it can penetrate the soul unopposed: a doctrine also -explicitly taught by Catherine, in her dialogue with Vernazza as to the -effect of a drop of Love were it to fall into Hell (pp. 94_c_, 95_b_). - - -3. _Third paragraph of Chapter Third._ - -The much-tormented Chapter Third has, at the opening of its third -paragraph (p. 172_b_), an interesting theological “correction.” The -complete passage now reads: “E perchè le anime che sono nel Purgatorio -[[sono senza colpa di peccato perciò non]] hanno impedimento tra Dio -e loro, [[salvo che quella pena, la quale le ha ritardate, che]] -l’istinto non ha potuto avere la sua perfezione: e vedendo per certezza -quanto importi ogni minimo impedimento, ed essere per necessità di -giustizia ritardato esso instinto: di qui nasce un estremo fuoco.” The -bracketed words are two interdependent glosses. For though in some -other, possibly authentic, passages the souls in Purgatory “non hanno -colpa di peccato,” this most certainly applies only to mortal sin or a -still active, formal affirmation of venial sin; since the very _raison -d’être_ of Purgatory is “the rust of sin,” pp. 169_b_, 170_c_, 171_b_, -173_c_, 181_a_; “the stain of sin,” pp. 169_b_, 171_c_, 176_b_; “a mote -of imperfection,” p. 176_a_; “a stain of imperfection,” p. 176_b_; “a -passive defect,” p. 170_b_; “opposition to the will of God,” p. 177_b_; -an “impediment of sin,” 177_b_. And the _Vita_-proper says quite -plainly: “Both Purgatory and Hell are made for Sin: Hell to punish -and Purgatory to purge it” (p. 64_b_).--And this gloss is in strict -conformity with the glosses that affirm static suffering: in both cases -all change is excluded from the soul in Purgatory, since this Purgatory -is neither intrinsically necessary nor amelioratively operative within -the soul. - - -4. _First paragraph of Chapter Fourth._ - -Chapter Fourth is comparatively easy, but probably largely secondary, -because uncharacteristic of her teaching. Yet it contains a -“correction” deserving of notice. I give the two sentences which prove -both points. “Quei dell’ Inferno … hanno seco la colpa infinitamente, -e la pena [non però tanta, quanta meritano; ma pur quella] che hanno è -senza fine. Ma quei del Purgatorio hanno solamente la pena, perciocchè -la colpa fù cancellata nel punto della morte … e così essa pena è -finita, e và sempre mancando [[quanto al tempo, come s’è detto]]” (p. -173_a_).--The double-bracketed passage, directly referring to the -gloss on p. 171_b_, is, like the latter, a theological “correction.” -But also the single-bracketed words are a gloss, since they disturb -both grammar and rhythm of the passage, and introduce a point foreign -to the argument which is being conducted in this place.--Indeed, even -the remaining parts of these sentences are misleading, since Catherine -held no such simple and absolute distinction as infinite guilt in the -one case, and apparently no moral imperfection in the other. For of -the lost she says: “If any creature could be found which did in nowise -participate in the divine goodness, that creature would be as malignant -as God is good” (p. 33_b_); and as to the souls in Purgatory, they are -imperfect in precise proportion as they do and can suffer. - - -5. _First two sentences of Chapter Fifth._ - -Here we find the strongest instance of the strange clumsiness -characteristic of the theological “corrections.” I give the sentences -as they now stand, simply numbering the sentences thus amalgamated, and -bracketing at once the undoubted glosses. - -(1) “Le Anime del Purgatorio hanno in tutto conforme la loro volontà -a quella di Dio; e però corrisponde loro colla sua bontà, e restano -contente quanto alia volontà, e purificate d’ogni lor peccato quanto -alla colpa. [[Restando così quelle Anime purificate, come quando Dio le -creò]] - -(2) “e per essere passate di questa vita malcontente e confessate di -tutti i loro peccati commessi. … [Iddio subito perdona loro la colpa e] -non resta se non la ruggine del peccato, del quale poi si purificano -nel fuoco, mediante la pena; [e così] - -(3) “purificate d’ogni colpa, unite a Dio per volontà [[veggiono -chiaramente Dio, secondo il grado che fà lor conoscere, e]] veggiono -[ancora] quanto importi la fruizione di Dio, e che l’anime sono state -create a questo fine.” (Pp. 173_c_, 174_a_.) - -According to Catherine’s unvarying authentic teaching, souls go to -Purgatory precisely because they are _not_ already “pure as when God -created them,” and they there do _not_ “clearly see God.” Indeed, the -second sentence here distinctly states, that “there” still “remains” in -them “the rust of sin,” from which they “there” purify themselves. And -the two “veggiono” conclusions of the third sentence contradict each -other: for if they see clearly how much the fruition of God matters to -them, then they do not as yet possess that full fruition, _i.e._ they -do not as yet clearly see God. - -These glosses are made entirely intolerable by a third Redactional -sentence here, which announces “an example,” or figure, of the doctrine -here conveyed, and then proceeds to do so in the beautiful Chapter -Sixth. For Chapter Sixth gives us the simile of the One Bread, “the -bare sight of which would satiate all creatures”; and the division of -all souls into those “in Purgatory,” which “have the hope of seeing the -Bread”; those in Hell, which “are bereft of all hope of ever being able -to see the Bread”; and, by implication, those in Heaven, that see and -satiate themselves with the Bread. And “the nearer a man were to get -to the Bread, without being able to see it, the more would the natural -desire for this Bread be enkindled”; “not having it, he would abide in -intolerable pain” (p. 174_b, c_). - - -III. FIVE CONCLUSIONS CONCERNING THE HISTORY OF THE “DICCHIARAZIONE.” - - -1. The authentic sayings, collected throughout the Seventeen Chapters, -all belong, at earliest, to the last nine, and indeed probably to -the last two or three, years of Catherine’s life.--At the latter -date Vernazza had been her close friend for twelve, and Marabotto, -her Confessor for eight years. To one or the other, or to both, we -undoubtedly owe the first writing down of this, originally small, -nucleus of authentic sayings,--probably in (many cases) on the very -day when Catherine uttered one or several of these thoughts.--The -One-Bread-Simile Chapter, and one or two other passages, contain -slightly varying doublets of the same saying, the registration of one -of which may well be by Vernazza, and the registration of the other -by Marabotto, each of these two auditors getting, perhaps, addressed -by Catherine in a slightly different form, or himself looking out for -that part or context of a saying which specially appealed to him, or -slightly, and probably quite unconsciously, giving to the identical -declaration a somewhat differing characteristic “colour” of his own. -Vernazza is, however, doubtless the first chronicler of the majority of -these sayings, in 1508-1510. - - -2. These sayings must have been collected together in a first shorter -_Dicchiarazione_ (equivalent to the greater part of the present first -seven chapters and possibly one or two other passages), not long after -her death, probably simultaneously with, but separately from, a short -“Conversione” account. The first public Cultus in May-July, 1512, -giving rise as it did to a painter’s picture of her, cannot have failed -to suscitate some such manuscript booklets. This short _Dicchiarazione_ -will already have had the first sentence of the present introduction -prefixed to it, and this sentence, so like and yet somewhat unlike -Battista’s writings (Battista who was as yet only fifteen), will have -been written by Ettore. These Chapters already, I think, contained -the “colpa di peccato” and other technically theological passages, -probably introduced by Marabotto; but the Chapters will as yet -have been free from the theological “corrections,” which still come -away too easily from the rest of the text (in contradistinction to -the difficulty in the analysis of its other, much more resistant -components) not to be considerably younger than these latter. - - -3. The “corrections” insist upon three doctrines, in each case in -demonstrable contradiction with Catherine’s authentic teaching: -the complete absence of all guilt, sin, imperfection, even though -merely passive and habitual, in the soul, even in its first moment in -Purgatory; the simply vindictive, not curative, hence static, nature -of the suffering throughout the soul’s prison time, right up to this -time’s sudden cessation; and this soul’s clear vision of God from first -to last. Thus no increase or extension of purity, no work of love, is -effected in or by the soul during, or by means of, its Purgatory.--Now -Pope Leo the Tenth, in his Bull _Exsurge Domine_ of May 16, 1520, -against Luther, reprobated four propositions concerning Purgatory; -and the second part of the second of these propositions declares: -“It is not proved, by any reasons or by any texts of Scripture, that -the souls in Purgatory are out of a state capable of merit or of an -increase of Charity.”[457] The Censure of this doctrine must have -seemed to menace Catherine’s teaching on this same point. For she -nowhere indeed declares these souls to be capable of meriting, nor does -she teach that there is any increase in the intensity of their love; -yet by the one free act of self-determination to Purgatory, and by the -gradual extension of this determination of active love throughout all -the regions and degrees of the passive will and habitual dispositions -of the soul, her teaching must, to an at all nervous theologian, -have seemed, at the time, to come perilously near to the admission, -respectively, of merit and of an increase of love in the Beyond. And -the degree in which the fight with nascent Protestantism was raging -precisely around such Purgatorial questions, and the solemnity of the -Pope’s condemnation, at this early stage of Catherine’s Cultus and -reputation, must have combined to render the introduction of these -disfiguring glosses an apparent necessity.--I take them to have been -introduced soon after Vernazza’s death in 1524, hence some twelve years -after the constitution of these seven Chapters; presumably by the -Inquisitor to the Republic of Genoa for the time being. - - -4. The addition of the last ten Chapters to the first seven Chapters, -and of the second sentence to the Introduction, will have occurred some -time after the constitution of the _Vita_-proper, say, in 1531 or 1532; -but, in any case, was not due to Vernazza or Marabotto. And the glosses -will have been introduced into these ten Chapters quasi-automatically, -and simply as a consequence to the very deliberate “corrections” of -those previous seven Chapters; for now Catherine’s reputation had had -another twelve years in which to grow, and the Bull had been studied -for another twelve years.--But no such glosses were introduced into the -_Vita_-proper, either as to this, or indeed, perhaps, any other point. -For this _Vita_ treated only quite incidentally of the other-world -Purgatory; and this, in those times specially delicate, subject-matter -had received every precautionary attention in the _Dicchiarazione_ -professedly devoted to it. And other, intrinsically more important -points, even though treated here with great boldness, were felt to -remain as open as before. - -But we must now get on to this _Vita_-proper. - - -IV. THE “VITA”-PROPER, ITS DIVISIONS AND PARTS, AND CHIEF SECONDARY AND -AUTHENTIC CONSTITUENTS. - - -1. _The three great divisions, and their clearly secondary parts._ - -The _Vita_-proper, as we now have it in print, falls into three great -Divisions, of respectively two, four, and two parts each. The first and -last Divisions hold by far the greater amount of the primary material; -whereas the middle Division only gives us here and there chapters or -paragraphs of admirable freshness and beauty. - -The eight opening Narrative Chapters, pp. 1_b_ to 21_b_, and the next -nine Chapters of Discourses, pp. 21_b_ to 50_c_, form the two parts -of the first Division, each part being more or less complete and -homogeneous within itself; and yet they are together in marked contrast -to most of the materials of the following Division. It is within the -limits of this first Division, and probably even of its first part, -that must subsist the materials, predominantly derived from Ettore -Vernazza, of that first “Conversione”-booklet of 1512. - -The second Division opens out with the most important Narrative -Chapter Nineteenth, pp. 51_a_-53_c_; but the remaining seven Chapters -of this its first part (pp. 53_c_-70_a_), contain very little which -is not findable elsewhere in a more primary form. Then follow, as a -second part, seven Chapters of a bewildering variety of form: three -are largely Narrative and important (Chapters XXVII to XXIX, pp. -70_b_-77_b_); the next (Chapter XXX, pp. 77_b_-79_a_) gives Discourses, -only in part authentic; the next again (Chapter XXXI, pp. 79_b_-83_c_) -is chiefly Narrative and important; Chapter XXXII, pp. 83_c_-88_b_, -is now one long Discourse which incorporates some short but important -authentic sayings; and Chapters XXXIII to XXXV (pp. 88_c_-96_b_) are, -the first, a Narrative; the last two, Discourses; and, in all three -cases, preponderatingly secondary and negligible. Then a third part -consists of a largely Narrative Chapter of delightful authenticity -and freshness (Chapter XXXVI, pp. 94_b_-96_b_); a tryingly composite -but valuable Narrative Chapter (Chapter XXXVII, pp. 96_b_-97_c_); -and an important Narrative Chapter with dates (Chapter XXXVIII, pp. -98_a_-100_a_). And, as a fourth part, we get a group of three Chapters, -of which the first and last contain highly original matter (Chapters -XXXIX-XLI, pp. 100_a_-103_b_, 106_a_-111_b_), but of which the middle -one (Chapter XL, pp. 103_c_-105_c_) can safely be neglected. Ettore’s -chroniclings are again strongly represented in this Division. - -And the last Division consists, in its first part, of five important -Narrative Chapters. (Chapters XLII-XLVI, pp. 111_c_-126_c_), clearly by -various hands, and of markedly manifold tone and emotional pitch. And -the second part consists of the six Chapters concerning her Passion, -Death, and Cultus (Chapters XLVII-LII, pp. 127_a_-166_a_), of which -we can safely neglect Chapter XLVII, pp. 127_a_-131_c_ (wanting in -the MSS., and a mere collection of passages still present, in a more -primitive form and connection, in other parts of the _Vita_); and pp. -161_c_-166_a_ (which treat of events subsequent to Catherine’s death). -This last Division gives the most important of the communications that -can with certainty be attributed to Marabotto. And as Division First’s -first part, Catherine’s Conversion, will have existed very early in -a separate form, and its second part will have, if added later, been -thus added very soon; so this Third Division’s second part, Catherine’s -Passion, will early have existed separately; and to this will have been -prefixed, still in early times, the Narrative Chapters XLII, XLIII, -XLV, and XLVI of the first part, all dealing with matters occurring -from 1496 onwards. - - -2. _Five main additions of the Printed Vita as against the extant MSS._ - -We have now reduced the bulk of the _Vita_-proper by 34½ pages, but -the remaining 132 pages are capable of further reduction. For the -Printed _Vita_, as compared with the MSS., contains, besides the -already rejected Chapter XLVII, five main additions. - -The first addition (in the order of the Printed Vita) is the -beautifully vivid and daring, certainly historical scene between -Catherine and the Friar (Chapter XIX, pp. 51_a_-53_b_), a record -doubtless due to Ettore Vernazza, and which will have been omitted -by the Franciscan Scribe of MS. A from scruples with regard to the -doctrine implied. - -The second is Chapter XLIV, omitted from p. 117_b_ to p. -121_b_,--Catherine’s declarations as to her lonely middle period and -the account of her Confessions to Don Marabotto, undoubtedly here -recorded by this Priest; matter again which the Franciscan Friar might -well consider dangerously daring, but which, we have seen, had not yet -been incorporated with the Franciscan’s Prototype, perhaps indeed not -with any copy of the then extant _Vita_. - -The third is the fourth paragraph of Chapter XLVIII, p. 133_b_, giving -a new and beautiful description of the “Scintilla” experienced by -Catherine on November 11, 1509. It is of late composition, and Battista -Vernazza is no doubt its author. - -The fourth consists of three new paragraphs to Chapter XLIX, -descriptive of Maestro Boerio’s three-weeks’ attempt at curing her, -sometime in May-July 1510 (pp. 146_c_-147_c_), and of evidently the -same Physician’s visit in his scarlet robes on September 2 (p. 154_b_). -Both passages, of transparent authenticity and still but little -enlarged, will have been contributed by this Physician’s Priest-son -Giovanni Boerio, who, dying in his seventies, in 1561,[458] must -himself have been twenty at the time of his Father’s attendance, and -may well have had his Father’s contemporary notes before him when -composing these interestingly vivid contributions. - -And the fifth brings three new paragraphs for the events of September -4, 1510 (Chapter L, pp. 155_b_-156_a_), already referred to here, on -pp. 209, 210. - -The MSS. read: “On the following day [4th September], being in great -pain and torment, she extended her arms in suchwise as to appear -in truth a body fixed to a cross; so that, according as she was -interiorly, so also did she show in her exterior, and she said--”[459] -Hereupon follows a long prayer so obviously modelled throughout upon -Our Lord’s High-Priestly prayer (John xvii, 1-26), and so elaborately -reflective, that it cannot but most distantly represent anything spoken -now by her who had been so interjectional in her remarks ever since -August 16 (pp. 149_b_-155_b_).--Now the Printed _Vita_ introduces -between “… exterior,” and “and she said,” the following account: -“Whence, it appears to me, we should indeed believe that the spiritual -stigmata were impressed in that body which was so afflicted and -excruciated by her Love; and although they did not appear exteriorly, -they nevertheless could easily be recognized through the Passion which -she felt; and that she suffered in her body that pain which her Love -had suffered on the Cross: as we read of the Apostle (Gal. vi [17]) -who bore the stigmata of Our Lord Jesus Christ, not indeed exteriorly -but interiorly, through the great love and desire which he felt within -himself for his Lord.” - -“In proof that this holy woman bore the stigmata interiorly, a large -silver cup was ordered to be brought in, which had a very high-standing -saucer”; the cup was “full of cold water, for refreshing her hands, in -the palms of which, because of the great fire that burned within her, -she felt intolerable pain. And on putting her hands into it, the water -became so boiling that the cup and the very saucer were greatly heated. -She also sustained great heat and much pain at her feet, and hence she -kept them uncovered; and at her head she similarly suffered great heat -with many pains.” - -Argentina is then quoted as having seen how “one of” Catherine’s “arms -lengthened itself out by more than half a palm beyond its usual length; -yet she never said one word as to whence such great pains proceeded. -It is true that, on one occasion, before her last infirmity, she -predicted that she would have to suffer a great malady, which would not -be natural but different from other infirmities, and that she would -die of it; and that, before her death, she would have within herself -(_in sè_) the Stigmata and the Mysteries of the Passion: and this the -aforesaid Argentina revealed later on to many persons. - -“Now this Beata being thus, with her arms extended, in pains so great -that she could not move.…” And then follows the “said” with the long -prayer, as given in the MSS.[460] Stigmatization is thus attributed, -but in two degrees and of two kinds. “Spiritual Stigmata,” like St. -Paul, who had them “through the great love and desire which he felt -within himself for his Lord”: this is the conception of the writer of -the first paragraph, doubtless Battista Vernazza. “Stigmata impressed -within her body,” intense interior physical pain, proved to be such by -the intense interior physical heat, and this heat proved by the insides -of Catherine’s hands causing cold water to boil: this was no doubt -Argentina’s view--at least as time went on. And note the interesting -combination of both views effected by the Redactor in the clauses “the -spiritual stigmata were impressed in her body,” “through the Passion -which she felt,” and “she bore the stigmata interiorly.” - - -V. AGE AND AUTHORSHIP OF THE LITERATURE RETAINED. - -The next points to consider, in detail, are the authorship and -antiquity of the literature retained by us. - - -1. _Indications concerning Ettore Vernazza._ - -The indications to be found within the _Vita_ begin at pp. 98_c_, -99_a_, where, after six lines concerning “several ecstasies” which -occurred in one particular year and which Catherine herself had called -“giddiness” (_vertigine_), we are told: “One day that she was talking -with a Religious, that Religious said to her: ‘Mother, I beg you, for -the glory and honour of God, to elect some person that would satisfy -your mind, and to narrate to this person the graces which God has -granted to you, so that, when you die, these graces may not remain -… unknown, and the praise and glory due for them to God may not be -wanting.’ And then this Soul answered that she was quite willing (_ben -contenta_), if this were pleasing to her tender Love; and that, in -that case, she would elect no other person than himself.” “And then, -speaking on another occasion with the said Religious, she began to -narrate to him her Conversion. And she acted similarly later on, as -well as she could, with regard to many other things, which have been -faithfully collected and put into the present book” (_Vita_, pp. 98_c_, -99_a_). The Preface, we know, mentions “two Religious, her devotees, -her Confessor and a Spiritual son of hers, by whom the (matter of -the) book has been collected from the very lips of the Seraphic -Woman herself” (_Vita_, p. viii_c_): and we know, beyond all cavil, -that these two men were Cattaneo Marabotto, the Priest, and Ettore -Vernazza, the Lawyer. The passage just given, _Vita_, pp. 98_c_, 99_a_, -unmistakably refers to one of these two; and the address of “Mother,” -and the answer of “Son,” which occurs here immediately after the words -translated (p. 99_b_), fit only Vernazza. - -Now the opening words of the first two, closely interconnected, -paragraphs of that Chapter XXXVIII (_Vita_, p. 98_a_, _b_) are: “In -the year 1507”; the first words of the next two paragraphs, which also -belong together, are: “It happened in a certain year.” The subjects and -sequences of those two sets correspond pretty closely; and the second -set is in simple juxtaposition to the first set. Yet the sets differ: -the first contains a definite date but no allusion to any interlocutor, -and Catherine moves about and overcomes her scruples by intercourse -with God alone; the second is without a date but refers repeatedly to a -witness, and Catherine is physically quiescent and solicits spiritual -help from a disciple. Each set is, in its own way, equally vivid and -peculiar: they can hardly be doublet narratives of the same event.--The -second set, then, gives a later stage of her health and dispositions; -and the “ecstasies,” “giddinesses,” which left her “half dead,” must -refer to the “assault” of November 11, 1509, which left many other, -similarly deep, impressions and definite records. The penultimate -paragraph of the Printed _Vita_ (p. 165_c_) reads in the MSS.: “Now -those who saw and observed these wonderful operations _during fifteen -years_;” and this (since Marabotto did not become Catherine’s Confessor -nor presumably know her, at least intimately, till 1499) must refer -specially to Vernazza, Thus 1495 marks the beginning of his intimacy -with Catherine; in 1497 he could ask Catherine to stand God-mother -to his first child; and the _Vita_ gives, pp. 122_c_, 123_a_, “what -she said after her husband’s death,” hence in the autumn of 1497, “to -a spiritual son of hers,” who is certainly Vernazza, “concerning the -character of Messer Giuliano.”--The conversation of November 1509 is, -then, not the starting-point of Vernazza’s observations, or even of his -registrations, but only the date from when Catherine began deliberately -to tell him about her past history.--All this gives us the following -canon: whatever in the _Vita_ is attributable to Vernazza can, if its -subject-matter is posterior to 1495, have been observed and written -down by him, then and there, as it occurred; if its subject-matter is -prior to 1495, then we have what, at best, is derived from Catherine’s -memory and communication to him. And there exists no earlier trained -and reliable witness of Catherine’s spiritual dispositions and sayings -than Vernazza from this date onwards. - -Two beautiful scenes and compositions have undoubtedly been directly -witnessed and contemporaneously chronicled by Vernazza,--the -conversation about Love and Hell, with Ettore as the chief interlocutor -after Catherine herself (_Vita_, pp. 94_b_,-95_c_), between July 1495 -and 1502; and the Scene with the Friar, which it is best to put back -to the end of 1495 or the beginning of 1496, since it is more natural -to take her words, “if the world or a husband,” as referring to a -still living husband.--We can also, I think, attribute to the same -intermediary the authentic central part of the analogous discourse as -to “that corrupt expression: you have offended God,” Chapter XXXIX, -pp. 100_c_-101_b_.--And it is Ettore again through whom, doubtless, we -derive all but everything that is authentic in the _Dicchiarazione_, as -we have already found. - -Vernazza’s contributions to the second category, _i.e._ reminiscences -of Catherine brought to paper by him, are also very important and more -numerous; but they are, I think, generally worked up with parallel -accounts due to Marabotto, as we shall presently note. - - -2. _Indications of Marabotto._ - -The _locus classicus_ concerning Don Cattaneo appears in the _Vita_ in -Chapter XLIV, p. 117_b_, of which long and most important Chapter (pp. -116_c_-121_b_) only the first seven lines occur in the MSS. The passage -(omitting a highly glossed bracketed clause and a parallel, secondary -half-sentence) runs: “After this, ( ), the Lord gave her a Priest -(_Prete_) to have a care of her soul and body. [ ] He was elected -Rector of the Hospital in which she abode, and he was wont to hear her -Confessions, to say Mass for her, and to give her Communion, as often -as she liked. This Priest (_Sacerdote_), at the request of various -spiritual persons devoted to this Beata, has written a considerable -part (_buona parte_) of this work, having many times tempted her on -and incited her to tell him of the singular graces which God had given -her and had effected within her [; especially since (_massime che_) -this Religious, owing to long experience and intercourse, knew and -understood particularly well (_molto bene_) the sequence of her life].” - -This introductory authentication is followed by the highly reliable -and important matters described in my Chapter IV,--her manner of -Confession; the incident of the perfume from Marabotto’s hand; her -solemn declaration as to her twenty-five years of complete interior -loneliness with God; and the murmurs of some of her friends as to the -closeness of their intimacy, and his consequent absence from her for -three days. All this (pp. 117_b_-121_b_) was certainly written down by -Marabotto himself, at the time, in substantially its present form. - -Although this whole series now opens out with “la prima volta che si -volle confessare a questo Religioso” (p. 117_c_), the words “a questo -Religioso” are doubtless an addition of the Redactor. For everywhere -else Marabotto is always “il Confessore” or “suo Confessore,” whilst -“un Religioso” is reserved for Vernazza: and wherever she uses any -specific appellation to the Confessore,--a thing which is quite -exceptional,--she says “Padre”; whilst where she does so to the -Religioso, she says “Figliuolo.”[461] And, wherever the Confessore -addresses her, there is never any specific address; whereas the -Religioso constantly addresses her as “Madre.”[462] - -As to “Confessore,” we get one mentioned as Confessor to the Convent of -S. Maria delle Grazie in 1460, p. 2_b_ the same or another Confessor -of the same Convent in 1473, p. 4_a_, _c_, is called “buon Religioso.” -Both these men, or this one man, heard Catherine’s Confessions at those -dates. But, a most important point: all the other Confessore-passages -throughout the book refer to after 1499, and to Marabotto alone. For -this is a list of them all. On p. 7_c_: here she is “so gravely ill, -as to be unable to eat,” a thing belonging to the times after 1499. -(In events of an obviously earlier date,--her fervent Communions,--pp. -8_a_, _c_, we get not “Confessore” but simply “Sacerdote.”) On p. -10_c_: here “to test her, he commanded her to eat,” an action of which -the results are described on pp. 117_b_, 119_c_. On page 108_b_: but -here her fasting is liable to damage her health, which points to after -1501. On p. 113_b_: but here the Confessore remains her sole aid, as -in the accounts referring to Marabotto in January 1510 and shortly -before, pp. 120_a_, 121_b_; 120_b_, 139_a_-_c_. On p. 115_b_: but here -the possessed “spiritual daughter” is certainly Mariola Bastarda, who -did not live with Catherine till after Giuliano’s death in 1497. On -pp. 117_b_-121_b_: the Confessore is throughout avowedly Marabotto, -and a treble indication here forces us to date his Confessorship from -not before 1499. The remaining “Confessore”-references,--pp. 130_a_, -138_c_, 139_a_, _b_, _c_; 140_b_, _c_; 143_c_, 156_c_, 157_b_,--are all -explicitly subsequent to 1501 and pertinent to Marabotto alone. - -Now there is no good reason for doubting Marabotto’s original, and -still largely unmodified, authorship of all the above passages in which -he himself occurs. Only as to the scene with the possessed Mariola, -Chapter XLIII, pp. 115_a_-_c_, have I long hesitated to attribute -something so insignificant in substance, and yet so pompous in form, to -Marabotto, either as action or as composition. Yet I have ended, for -the reasons given in my Chapter IV, by thinking that, after all, this -scene does go back, more or less, to him. - - -3. _References to other witnesses._ - -There are but few other references to witnesses in the _Vita_. On p. -124_a_, in the account of Suor Tommasa Fiesca, there are “the Nuns -of her first and second Monastery”--San Silvestro and the Monastero -Nuovo,--and “secular persons, her familiar and devoted friends.” I -take this admirably vivid and _naïve_ account, pp. 123_b_-124_b_ -(which exists in the MSS. without this sentence and Tommasa’s -death-date, 1534), to rest upon Suor Tommasa’s own reminiscences of -her heaven-storming cousin, but to be the composition of Battista -Vernazza.--And on p. 158_c_ “several of the ten Physicians,” who -assembled by Catherine’s bedside on September 10, 1510, “are still -alive in this year (1551),” but the very vague account of their -examination is no doubt due to a non-medical pen. - - -VI. ANALYSIS OF THE CONVERSION-NARRATIVES. - -Let us now take the first of the four Narrative Passages in which -the largest or clearest conflations of original documents and of -subsequent glosses are traceable: the Conversion-Scene and subsequent -Apparition, March 1473; the “Scintilla”-Experience, November 11, -1509; the Temptation of August 23, 1510; and her Death on September -14, 1510. Roman and Arabic numerals indicate the probable provenances -from different contributors, and from different narratives of each -contributor, respectively; square brackets indicate glosses; and E, -C, and B stand respectively for the handiwork of Ettore Vernazza, of -Cattaneo Marabotto, and of Battista Vernazza. - -THE TWO CONVERSION-SCENES, pp. 4_a_-5_c_. - -(_a_) _In the Chapel._ - -I. 1. Il giorno dopo la Festa di San Benedetto [ad istanza di sua -sorella monaca] andò Caterina [per confessarsi d’] al Confessore di -esso Monistero, benchè non fosse disposta a confessarsi: ma la sorella -le disse, “almanco vattegli a raccommandare, perchè è buon religioso”; -ed, in verità era un uomo santo. 2. Subitochè se gli fù inginocchiata -innanzi, ricevè una ferita al cuore d’immenso amore di Dio, con una -vista così chiara delle sue miserie e diffetti e della bontà di Dio, -che nè fù quasi per cascare in terra. - -II. 1. Onde per quei sentimenti d’immenso amore e delle offese fatte -al suo dolce Iddio, fù talmente tirata [per affetto purgato] fuor -delle miserie del mondo, che restò quasi fuor di sè; I. 3. e [perciò] -internamente gridava con ardente amore: “non più mondo, non più -peccati.” Ed in quel punto, se ella avesse avuto mille mondi, tutti gli -avrebbe gettati via. - -III. Per la viva fiamma del infocato amore che essa sentiva, il dolce -Iddio impresse in quell’ anima, e le infuse, in un subito, tutta la -perfezione per grazia: onde la purgò di tutti gli affetti terreni, la -illuminò col suo divin lume, facendola vedere coll’ occhio interiore la -sua dolce bontà, e finalmente in tutto la unì, mutò e trasformò in sè, -per vera unione di buona volontà, accendendola da ogni parte col suo -vivo amore. - -[Stando la Santa per quella dolce ferita quasi alienata da’ sensi -innanzi al confessore e senza poter parlare] - -I. 4. Nè avvedendosi il Confessore del fatto, per caso fù chiamato e -levasi. Dappoichè assai presto fù retornato, non potendo ella appena -parlare per l’intrinseco dolore ed immenso amore, allo meglio che -potè gli disse: “Padre, se vi piacesse, lascerei volontieri questa -Confessione per un’ altra volta”: e così fù fatto. 5. Si parti dunque -Caterina e retornata a casa [si sentì così accesa e ferita di tanto -amor di Dio, a lei interiormente mostrato colla vista delle sue -miserie, che pareva fuors di sè] ed entrata in una camera la più -segreta che potè, ivi molto pianse [e sospirò con gran fuoco]. - -[In quel punto fù istrutta intrinsecamente dell’ orazione, ma la sua -lingua] I. 6. non poteva dir altro salvo questo: “O Amore, può essere -che mi abbi chiamata [con tanto amore] e fattomi conoscere in un punto -quello che colla lingua non posso esprimere?” II. 2. Le sue parole in -tutti quei giorni altro non erano che sospiri, e così grandi che era -cosa mirabile: ed aveva una si estrema contrizione [di cuore] per le -offese fatte a tanta bontà, che se non fosse stata miracolosamente -sostenuta, sarebbe spirata e crepatole il cuore. - -(_b_) _In the Palace._ - -I. 7. (?) [Ma volendo] il Signore [accendere più intrinsecamente l’amor -suo in quest’ anima ed insieme il dolore dei suoi peccati,] se le -mostrò in ispirito colla Croce in spalla, piovendo tutto sangue, [per -modo che la casa le pareva tutta piena di rivoli di quel sangue,] il -quale vedea essere tutto sparso per amore: il che le accese nel cuore -tanto fuoco, che nè usciva fuor di sè [e pareva una cosa insensata per -lo tanto amore e dolore che ne sentiva.] - -II. 3. (?) [Questa vista le fù tanto penetrativa, che] le pareva sempre -vedere (e cogli occhi corporali) il suo Amore tutto insanguinato -e confitto in Croce; e perciò gridava: “O Amore, mai più, mai più -peccati.” I. 8 (?) Se le accese poi un odio di sè medesima, che non si -poteva sopportare, e diceva: “O Amore, se bisogna, sono apparechiata di -confessare i miei peccati in pubblico.” - -I. 9. Dopo questo fece la sua [generale] Confessione con tanta -contrizione e tali stimoli, che le passavano l’anima [. E benchè] -Iddio [in quel punto che le diede la dolce ed amorosa ferita, le -avesse perdonato tutti i suoi peccati, abbrucciandoli col fuoco del -suo immenso amore; nondimeno volendo soddisfare alla giustizia, la -fece passare per la via della soddisfazione] disponendo che questa -contrizione [lume e conversione] durasse [ro] circa quatt_r_o [dici] -_anni_, in capo a quali [, poichè ella ebbe soddisfatto, le fù levata -della mente la predetta vista in forma tale che] mai più non vide -neppure una minima scintilla dei suoi peccati, come se tutti fossero -stati gettati nel profondo del mare. - -There is a striking parallelism of sights, sayings, and their -sequences, between the dated events in the Convent-Chapel, and the -undated ones in the Palace, divided off by the passage II 2, with its -vague “all these days.” Both sets have a “Vista,”--partly of “offese -fatte”; have next “and hence she cried ‘no more sin’”; and the first -concludes with a wish, expressed to the Confessor, to put off her -Confession, and the second with an exclamation, addressed to God, of -her readiness for even a public Confession.--This Christ-Vision, or -any other Passion-scene, is nowhere implied or referred to in all her -recorded post-Conversion sayings and doings; the legendary instinct, we -know, developed, from this single adult occupation with the Passion, -the “interior stigmatization” story; and in the Palace Narrative itself -there has been, in any case, _some_ uncertainty, shifting, or doubling -of the tradition as to that figured vision,--for the actual vision -cannot have represented Christ both as walking and carrying His Cross, -_and_ as motionless and hanging upon it. Are the two sets, then, but -two variant records of one sole event, and is the second but the result -of an early determination to find more of an historical, pictorial -element in Catherine’s spiritual experiences than had actually been -present in it? - -Yet strong reasons operate on the other side. We have one, and only -one, absolutely certain detail from her childhood, the presence, in -her bedroom, of a Pietà (_Vita_, pp. 1_c_, 2_a_); yet nowhere, in her -subsequent actions and sayings, is there the slightest allusion to this -picture-scene which had so deeply moved her childhood.--And the most -vivid and characteristic details of the two Conversion-experiences are -delicately different in each set. - -The first set, (_a_), consists of three documents. Document I 1, -2; 3; 4-6 continues the story of Catherine’s relations with the -“monistero” of the Madonna delle Grazie, and of her prayer on the eve -of St. Benedict’s day, told on pp. 2_b_-3_c_; is most vivid, precise, -and homely; and is doubtless the work of E. Document II 1, 2 is a -colourless parallel to I 2, 6; yet in I 2 she sees her own miseries, in -II 1 she is drawn out of the miseries of the world: II is thus probably -an ancient doublet, and, if so, then part of some annotations by C. -And document III is obviously from yet another, later, hand,--that -which produced the originally tripartite scheme of Catherine’s Convert -life (pp. 5_c_-_bc_), for the three “la” (her, Catherine) after “onde” -of III require but three stages of perfecting; whilst now the printed -text attempts (by italicizing “unì” and “transformò”) to produce four -stages, in keeping with the following, now quadripartite scheme. The -second set, (_b_), begins as though nothing had yet happened or as if, -at least, the past event had been but a step towards something greater. -Yet precisely such series of apparent anti-climaxes occur demonstrably -elsewhere in her life.--The account of II 3 (?) is irreconcilably -different from that of I 7 (?): for there Christ is moving, carrying -His Cross and raining blood upon objects not Himself, here He is -motionless, probably dead, affixed to the Cross, and His blood has -merely stained His own body; there she sees “in the spirit,” here -“with bodily eyes”; there, for some minutes, here continuously; there, -followed by speechless ecstasy, here, by penitential exclamations. And -this II 3 (?) is not a later stage of the vision given in I 7 (?), as -though, dissolving-view-like, the Moving Christ had shaded off into -a Fixed Christ, (although Catherine’s Viste give us such changes, -_e.g._ that of the Divine Fountain’s successive self-communications, -_Vita_, pp. 32c, 33a). For the very Redactor treats the second “Vista” -as simply identical with the first; and Battista, we saw, so entirely -realizes the contradiction between the two accounts, as to make two -quite distinct events out of them (_Dialogo_, pp. 209_b_, 211_a_, -_b_).--This second account can hardly be a gloss, for Battista already -found and respected it when at work on the Giustiniani-book of 1529 -or 1530, and was thus powerfully influenced by it when composing -her _Dialogo_ in about 1547. Indeed, this II 3 (?) has been the -starting-point of all the stigmatization-glosses elsewhere, and can -hardly be a gloss itself.--If all this be so, then either Catherine -herself told the Christ-Vision to one disciple in two different ways; -or told it to two companions, to each in a different way; or told the -story so vaguely, or with such rich vividness and ambiguity, as to be -differently understood by these two different hearers. Only one of the -two latter alternatives would cover the facts, since no one writer -could remain unaware of the contradiction between these two accounts. -Hence we here require two writers, both considerably prior to Battista -and much respected by her; only E and C answer to these tests; and, in -that case, the Living Christ, seen in the Spirit, comes to us through -E, and the Dead Christ, seen with the bodily eyes, reaches us through -C.--And then comes I 8, of clearly first-hand authority, and belonging, -I think, to E’s account. - -I 9, concluding the _Vita’s_ Conversion-story, must evidently contain -some words, originally belonging to document I, concerning her -Confession, since I has already twice (I 4, I 8) referred to such a -coming Confession. And such words are here: “Dopo questo--l’anima”; -“Iddio disponendo-circa quattro _anni_” (this is the original text -here); and a vivid description of her suddenly ceasing to see her -particular sins. - - -VII. THE SAYINGS-PASSAGES: THREE TESTS FOR DISCRIMINATING AUTHENTIC -FROM SECONDARY SAYINGS. - -As to the Sayings, it is obviously more difficult to decide as to -their provenance, authenticity, and date of enunciation and literary -fixation. Yet three tests have proved solidly helpful towards gaining a -respectably large collection of texts which can, with high historical -probability or even certainty, be reasoned from as truly Catherine’s, -even in their form. - - -1. _Rhythm._ - -There is the test of rhythm and rhyme, since the _Vita_ describes her -“wont” of “making rhymed sayings in her joy,” and gives irrefragable -proofs of her deep love of Jacopone’s poetry.[463] The still obviously -rhymed or rhythmical sayings all answer to the other tests of -genuineness; and many sayings now turned, by successive Redactors, -into more or less sheer prose, can still be restored to their original -poetic form. All these rhythmic, rhymed sayings have an utterly -_naïve_, expansive tone, markedly different from the high-pitched -redactional rhetoric in which they are now embedded, or again from -Battista’s far more literary poetry: hence they cannot spring from this -strong and busy intellect.--Thus she hears her Love say: “Chi di Mè | -si fida, || di sè | non dubita”; possibly simply quoting, she says to -her soul, “ama chi t’ama, | e chi non t’ama lascia”; and she sums up -her life’s ideal as, “s’io mangio o bevo, | s’io [] taccio o parlo, -| dormo o veglio; | s’io son in chiesa, in casa, in piazza: | s’io -son inferma | o sana: | s’io muojo o non muojo: || ogni ora di vita -mia, | tutto voglio che sia, | Dio e prossimo: || non vorrei potere ne -volere, | fare, parlare nè pensare | eccetto tutto Dio.||”[464]--And -there are her repetitive utterances, beginning with “non più mondo, non -più peccati,” on March 22, 1472, and finishing with “andiàmo, non più -terra, non più terra,” of August 25, 1510.[465] - - -2. _Simplicity._ - -The second test requires the sayings to be short and simple, and to -be followed, in the present text, by carefully clausulated doublets, -or to be themselves now glossed and expanded. Such sayings occur -specially in Chapters I to VIII; XVIII and XIX; XXVII to XXIX; XXXVI to -XXXVIII; XLIV to XLVI; and in Chapter L. All these Chapters are largely -narrative; can in great part be traced to Vernazza or Marabotto; and -yield sayings readily attributable to her first Conversion-Period -(which she doubtless recounted to those Friends), or to 1495-1510, the -years of her intercourse with those intimates. - - -3. _Originality._ - -And the third test consists of a daring originality, which, often -softened and counteracted by the successive Redactors, precludes all -idea of sayings expressive of it proceeding from any one of less -authority than herself. These sayings again are all short; they too -occur, all but exclusively, in the Chapters indicated and in the -_Dicchiarazione_; they are all referable to the years 1495-1510, and to -the registration first of Vernazza, and, later on, of Marabotto. - -Very few of the sayings grouped together by me in my Chapter VI but -satisfy at least two of these three tests. - - -VIII. CONCLUSION. AT LEAST SIX STAGES IN THE UPBUILDING OF THE COMPLETE -BOOK OF 1551. THE SLIGHT CHANGES INTRODUCED SINCE THEN. FIRST CLAIMS TO -AUTHORSHIP FOR CATHERINE. - - -1. _The Stages._ - -It would appear, then, from the preceding analyses, that the successive -stages in the composition and redaction of the _Vita-Dicchiarazione_ -complex of documents cannot have been fewer than the following:-- - -(i) Description and Registration, (1) first by Vernazza (1495-1510), -(2) then also by Marabotto (1499-1510), more or less on the day of -their occurrence and utterance, of Catherine’s actions, psycho-physical -condition, and sayings expressive of her present spiritual experiences; -and of her deliberate reminiscences concerning her past, especially -her early Convert life. And similar contemporary Annotations, of much -lesser volume, by (3) Suor Tommasa Fiesca, (4) Maestro Boerio, and (5) -Don Giacomo Carenzio--the latter two, only since May 1510. - -(ii) Redaction, probably in connection with the first public Cultus in -the summer or autumn of 1512, of (1) a short _Conversione_-booklet, by -Vernazza, perhaps already with slight contributions by Marabotto; (2) -a short _Dicchiarazione_-booklet, also by Vernazza, probably as yet -without the theological “corrections”; and (3) a short Passion-account, -by Marabotto, with additions by Carenzio and, in substance, -contributions by Argentina. - -(iii) Redaction, after the death of the last of the two chief friends -(Marabotto, in 1528), by Battista Vernazza, in 1529 or 1530, of a -tripartite _Vita_, made up chiefly of II (1) and II (3), and a longer -_Dicchiarazione_, now with the theological glosses,--these latter -presumably from the pen of Fra Gaspar Toleto, O.P., the Inquisitor for -the Republic of Genoa, or his successor, Fra Geronimo da Genova. - -(iv) Partial change of the tripartite scheme of the _Vita-Dottrina_ to -a quadripartite one, early in 1548. - -(v) Composition by Battista Vernazza of (1) the _Dialogo_, “Chapter” -I alone, 1549; and then (2) of “Chapter” II (the present Parts II and -III), in 1550. - -(vi) Final Redaction of the text of the Printed -_Vita-Dicchiarazione-Dialogo_, by means of all the preceding Documents, -of which I (4) and possibly the Confession-descriptions of I (2) are -now incorporated in the complete _Vita_ for the first time; and, with -the help of gossipy reminiscences of Argentina, possibly only now -reduced to writing--in 1550, 1551. This final Redactor would again be -Battista Vernazza. - - -2. _The Changes._ - -Now from 1551 onwards this whole _corpus_ has remained stationary, -with the exception of purely formal modifications, such as one synonym -for another; of, since 1737, her designation, on the title-page and -in some other places, as “Santa Caterina da Genova,” and, throughout -the text, as “Caterina” (only the Ancient Preface still retains the -strictly correct “Caterinetta,” _Vita_, p. viii); and of two other, -more important changes. - -The first important change is the insertion (later than the fourth -edition, Venice, 1601) at her death-moment,--between “e in quel punto” -(after raising her forefinger heavenwards) “quest’ anima beata” and -“con una gran pace … spirò,”--of the words: “dicendo: In manus tuas -commendo spiritum meum.” This, intrinsically appropriate, last saying -prevented henceforth her last, directly recorded, words from being -something so little beautiful or characteristic as the “cacciate via -questa bestia” with which all the MSS., and all the editions till at -least 1601, had the fine courage to conclude the series of her sayings. - -And the second change is a modification in the titles of the Book and -of its several parts, of significance as indicating the growth of the -legend attributing literary composition to her. The First Printed -Edition (1551) has: “Book of the admirable Life and holy Doctrine of -the Blessed Caterinetta of Genoa, in which is contained a useful and -Catholic Demonstration and Declaration” (Elucidation) “of Purgatory”; -and in the body of the Book this “Demonstrazione” appears as _Trattato -del Purgatorio_, after the _Vita_-proper. But though the complete -_Dialogo_ appears here, behind the _Trattato_ and divided into two -“Chapters,” no mention is made of it on the title-page.--The Second -Edition, Florence, 1568, adds to the title: “with a Dialogue between -the Soul and the Body, composed by the same,” thus attributing, -apparently, full literary authorship by Catherine to precisely that -document with which she has least of all to do.--The Fourth Edition, -Venice, 1601, simply adds, after “Dialogue,” “divided into two -Chapters”; and the Fifth, 1615, modifies this to “three Chapters, -between the Soul, (and) the Body; Humanity, (and) Self-love; the Spirit -and the Lord God, composed by the Beata herself.” - -The first French translation, Paris, 1598, puts the _Dialogue_ before -the _Treatise_, and still attributes Catherine’s direct authorship to -the _Dialogue_ alone. But the first Latin translation, Freiburg in -Breisgau, 1626, has “Life and Doctrine of Blessed Catherine Adorna … -(and) the two excellent Treatises of the same: 1. Dialogue between -the Soul and the Body; 2. Concerning Purgatory.” Here both works are -attributed to her, in exactly the same degree; but that degree is not -clearly specified.[466] - -I do not know how soon after the Sixth Edition, Naples, 1645, which -is still without it, the quite unambiguous title of the Thirteenth -Edition, Genoa, of about 1880: “Vita ed Opere di S. Caterina da -Genova,” was adopted, nor how soon the present Second Title-page to -the _Trattato_ and _Dialogo_--“Works of St. Catherine”--was inserted. -Yet even here the old correct name for the whole Book still appears as -the heading on p. 1: _Vita e Dottrina_, although now, owing to that -Second Title-page, “Doctrine” only covers the Doctrinal Chapters of the -_Vita_-proper. - -Thus not till 1568 was anything claimed as a composition of Catherine’s -pen, and then only the _Dialogue_; and not till 1626 was the _Treatise_ -put into the same category as the _Dialogue_. Pope Clement XII, in -his Bull of Canonization in 1737, declares the _Dialogue_ to be her -composition, whilst nothing is said concerning the _Treatise_, although -the Bull itself most wisely follows the account of the _Vita_-proper, -and softens down or ignores the different version of the _Dialogue_, in -the two crucial cases of Catherine’s Vision of the Bleeding Christ and -of the degree of her poverty.[467] - - - - -FOOTNOTES - - -[1] The remainder of this section is for the most part expressed in the -words of Prof. Edouard Zeller’s standard _Philosophie der Griechen_. I -have used the German text. - -[2] _Rep._ VII, 518_b_. - -[3] _Phaedo_, 67_c_, 64, 69_c_. - -[4] _Theaetetus_, 168_a_. - -[5] _Parmenides_, 134_c_. - -[6] _Theaetetus_, 176_a_. - -[7] Luke ix, 51-56; Matt. xxvi, 51, 52; Mark x, 13-16; ix, 30-32. - -[8] I have been much helped throughout the remainder of this section -by many of the groupings and discussions of texts in Prof. H. J. -Holtzmann’s _Lehrbuch der N. T. Theologie_, 2 vols., 1897. Inge’s -_Christian Mysticism_, 1899, has also, in its pp. 44-74, furnished me -with some useful hints. - -[9] Matt. vi, 26, 28; Mark iv, 27, 28; Matt. xiv, 32; xvi, 2, 3. - -[10] Matt. v, 17; vi, 1, 2, 5, 16; v, 23. - -[11] Mark v, 25-29; vi, 56. - -[12] Mark vi, 12, 13; i, 9, 10; Matt. iii, 13-19; Mark xiv, 22-25; -Matt. xxvi, 26-29; Luke xxii, 15-19. - -[13] Matt. v. 3, 8; xi, 25, 26, 28-30; Mark viii, 34, 35; Matt. xvi, -24, 25; x, 38, 39; Luke ix, 23, 24; xiv, 27; xvii, 33; Mark vii, 14, 15. - -[14] Mark ix, 35, 36; x, 15; x, 14. - -[15] Mark xii, 24-27; Matt. xxii, 29-33; Luke xx, 34-38. - -[16] 1 Cor. xv, 3-8; xi, 23-26. - -[17] Acts ii, 1-13; ix, 1-9; xxii, 3-11; xxvi, 9-18; 1 Cor. xii; xiv; 2 -Cor. xii, 1-9. - -[18] 1 Cor. i, 18, 22-25; ii, 14, 15. - -[19] Col. i, 26; ii. 2; iv, 3, 4. - -[20] 1 Cor. ii, 6; iii, 1. - -[21] 1 Cor. ii, 10, 11. - -[22] Eph. iii, 5; Rom. vi, 6, 8; viii, 11. - -[23] Col. i, 15-17; Eph. i, 10; Col. iii, 11; 1 Cor. x, 4; Col. i, 15, -17; iii, 11; Eph. iv, 13; Gal. ii, 20; iv, 19; 2 Cor. iii, 18. - -[24] John i, 14; 1 John i, 1; John v, 28, 29. - -[25] 1 John i, 5; iv, 8; John iv, 24; iii, 16; vi, 44; xvii, 18. - -[26] John xvii, 24; viii, 58; i, 3, 10; i, 9; 1 John i, 2; John i, 11; -xiv, 6; x, 7-9; vi, 35; xv, 1. - -[27] John iii, 3, 5; 1 John v, 10; John vii, 17; iii, 21. - -[28] 1 John iii, 2, 5; v, 6. - -[29] John ii, 23, 24; iii, 2; iv, 39, 42; xiv, 11; xx, 29. - -[30] John iii, 36; v, 24; 1 John iii, 14; v, 20. - -[31] John xiv. 20, 21. - -[32] I have been much helped in this section by Prof. R. Eucken’s -admirably discriminating, vivid book, _Die Lebensanschauungen der -grossen Denker_, in its first and fourth editions, 1890, 1902. - -[33] I have been much helped, towards what follows here, by pages 51 to -128 in M. Maurice Blondel’s great book, _l’Action_, 1893. - -[34] I have found much help towards formulating the following -experiences and convictions in Professor William James’s striking -paper, “Reflex Action and Theism,” in _The Will to Believe_, pp. -111-114, 1897. - -[35] I have been much helped towards the general contents of the next -four sections by that profoundly thoughtful little book, Fechner’s _Die -drei Motive und Gründe des Glaubens_, 1863, and by the large and rich -conception elaborated by Cardinal Newman in his Preface to _The Via -Media_, 1877, Vol. I, pp. xv-xciv. - -[36] See, for this point, the admirably clear analysis in J. -Volkelt’s _Kant’s Erkenntnisstheorie_, 1879, pp. 160-234. This book -is probably the most conclusive demonstration extant of the profound -self-contradictions running through Kant’s Epistemology. - -[37] _Works of St. John of the Cross_, translated by David Lewis, Vol. -I, ed. 1889, p. 298. - -[38] _Ibid._ Vol. II, ed. 1890, pp. 541, 542. - -[39] _Œuvres de Fénelon_, Paris, Lebel, Vol. IX, 1828, pp. 632, 652, -668. - -[40] _Tractatus de Gratia et Libero Arbitrio_, cap. xiv, § 47. - -[41] _Summa c. Gentiles_, 1-3, c. 70, _in fine_. - -[42] For the recent instances, see Walter Elliott’s _Life of Father -Hecker_, New York, 1894, p. 369; _The Treatise on Purgatory_, by St. -Catherine of Genoa, with a Preface by Cardinal Manning, 1858, 1880, -19--; F. W. Faber’s _All for Jesus_, ch. ix, sections iii-v; Aubrey de -Vere’s _Legends and Records of the Church and the Empire_, 1898, pp. -355, 356; George Tyrrell’s _Hard Sayings_, 1898, pp. 111-130. - -[43] I have done my best to recover the day, or at least the month, but -in vain. The baptismal register of her Parish Church (the Duomo) is, as -regards that time, destroyed or lost. - -[44] Not a shadow of reasonable doubt is possible as to the -authenticity of these relics. Buried as she was in the Church of the -Hospital of Pammatone, which latter she had first simply served, -and then directed and inhabited, during thirty-seven years, her -resting-place remained a centre of unbroken devotion up to her -Beatification and Canonization, when the relics were removed but a few -yards upwards, and placed in their glass shrine above and behind the -altar in the Chapel of the Tribune--the Deposito di S. Caterina--where -they have rested ever since. The special character of the brow and of -the hands is still plainly recognizable. Of the four or five portraits -mentioned by Vallebona, not one can be traced back to her lifetime. - -In the _Manuale Cartularii_ of the Pammatone Hospital, under date -of 10th July 1512 (p. 62), (I quote from an authentic copy which I -found among various documents copied out by the protonotary P. Angelo -Giovo, and prefixed to his MS. Latin life of the Saint preserved in -the _Biblioteca della Missione Urbana_, Genoa, No. 30, 8, 140,) there -is an entry of money (7 lire 10 soldi, equivalent to about £7 10_s_.) -paid by the administrators of the Hospital to Don Cattaneo Marabotto, -her Confessor and Executor: “Ratio sepulturae q(uondam) D(ominae) -Catarinettae Adurnae pro diversis expensis factis p(er) D(ominum) -Cattaneum Marabottum, videlicet _pro pictura_ et apportari facere -lapides ipsius sepulturae.” The payment must have been either for -expressly painting a picture, or for buying one already painted. We -would, however, expect, in the former case, for the entry, in analogy -with its final clause, to run: “pro pingi facere picturam.” In the -latter case, we are almost forced to think of the picture as painted -by some friend or disciple of the Saint, not for herself or for her -relations or friends (for in that case it would hardly have been -sold, but would have been left or given to the Hospital), but for his -own consolation, or in hopes of its being eventually bought for the -Hospital (and this may well have been done during her lifetime). In any -case, this entry attests that a portrait of the Saint was in existence -at the Hospital not two years after her death, and which was approved -of by one of her closest friends. I take it that that portrait was -placed on her sepulchral monument erected to her in January 1512 in the -Hospital Church. If still extant, at least in a copy, that original or -copy is, presumably, at the Hospital still. - -Now there are but three pictures at the Hospital which claim to be -portraits of her and are not, avowedly, copies. (1) The large oil -painting of her standing figure, in the room adjoining the closet now -shown as the place where she died, is clearly a late, quite lifeless -composition. (2) The portrait-head in the Superioress’s room has been -carefully examined for me by a trained portrait painter, who reports -that the picture consists of a skilful ancient foundation now largely -hidden under much clumsy repainting. (3) The picture reproduced at -the head of this first volume, now in the sacristy of the _Santissima -Annunziata in Portorio_ (the Hospital Church), is clearly the work -of one hand alone. It is without the somewhat disagreeable look -present in the previous portrait, a look doubtless introduced there -by the unskilful restoration. If then the sacristy picture is a copy -of the Superioress’s picture, it will have been copied before the -latter picture was thus repainted. This sacristy picture now hangs -in an old-fashioned white-and-gold wooden frame with “Santa Catarina -da Genova” in raised letters carved out upon it, a carving which is -evidently contemporary with the frame’s make. The frame thus cannot be -older than 1737, the year of Catherine’s canonization. But the portrait -is without trace of a nimbus and carefully reproduces the very peculiar -features of a particular face, head, and neck. - -The original painting, thus still more or less before us in these -two pictures, was evidently by no mean artist, and strikes a good -connoisseur as of the school of Leonardo da Vinci (died 1519). There -were several good painters of this school resident in Genoa about -this time: Carlo da Milano, Luca da Novara, Vinzenzo da Brescia, -and Giovanni Mazone di Alessandria. In the very year of her death, -and still more two years later, she was publicly and spontaneously -venerated as Blessed, and this Cultus continued unbroken up to the -Bull of Urban VIII, of 1625. Hence the further back we place one or -both of these portraits, the more naturally can we explain the absence -of the nimbus. Everything conspires, then, to prove that one of these -portraits goes back, in some way, to the picture painted for or bought -by Marabotto, and which adorned her monument from 1512 to 1593. - -I have striven hard but in vain to find some scrap of Catherine’s -handwriting. The late Mr. Hartwell Grisell of Oxford, and the Cavaliere -Azzolini dei Manfredi of Rome, both of them life-long collectors of -Saints’ autographs, have kindly assured me that they have never come -across a word even purporting to be in her handwriting. The fourteen -wills and codicils made in her favour or by herself are all, according -to the universal custom of the time and country, written throughout -in a rapid, cursive hand by the lawyer himself alone, with certain -slight signs (crosses or lines) for further identification of his -authorship, but with no signature of any kind. There is no shadow of a -true tradition as to any of her sayings or thinkings having ever been -written down by herself. And the business books of the Hospital, kept, -at least in part, by Catherine from 1490 to 1496, when she was its -matron, have long ago been destroyed by fire. - -[45] See _Opere Spirituale della Ven. B. Vernazza_, Genova, 1755, 6 -vols., Vol. I, p. 3. - -[46] _Op. cit._ p. 45. - -[47] Although the Church and Monastery belonged, as Catherine’s Will -of 1509 puts it, to “the Order of St. Benedict of the Congregation of -Saint Justina in Padua”--a Congregation founded from Monte Cassino -between 861 and 874--yet the community were evidently closely bound up -with the Augustinian Canons Regular of the Lateran, or at all events -with the foundation of the Convent of Augustinian Canonesses at Santa -Maria delle Grazie. For the concession of Pope Nicolas V for the latter -Convent is addressed to his “Beloved sons of Saint Theodore of Genoa” -(Augustinian Canons) “and of Saint Nicolas in Boschetto.” And this -close connection with, and action for, a Church and Convent so dearly -loved by Catherine, will have necessarily been one of the causes of her -affection for the Benedictine country-side Church. - -[48] This evidently most authentic anecdote stands in the _Vita_, p. -3, in a doubly disconcerting context. Her prayers, always elsewhere -recorded together with their effects, are here abruptly left, without -any indication of their sequel; and the prayer for a _three months’ -illness_ is followed by an attempted explanation of it--that she had -gone through _three months_ of mental _affliction_. I take it that some -other continuation has been suppressed, or, at least, that the present -explanation owes its “three months” to a quaint determination to find -at least a retrospective correspondence between her prayer and the -happenings of her life. - -[49] _Vita_, p. 4, first two paragraphs. I hope to show in the Appendix -that we owe their getting on to paper to Ettore Vernazza, and that he -derived their contents from Catherine herself, some time after 1495. - -[50] _Ibid._ p. 4. § 3. - -[51] _Vita_, p. 4, § 3; p. 5, § 1. - -[52] _Ibid._ p. 5, §§ 2, 3. I have, together with the Bull of -Canonization, deliberately omitted the first two sentences of § 3, -which (with their representation of Our Lord as appearing not alive -with the Cross, but dead on it, and with their repetition here of the -exclamation as to “no more sins” of her conversion-moment) form an -interesting doublet, with a complex and eventful history attaching to -it. See Appendix to this volume. - -[53] _Vita_, p. 5_c_. - -[54] _Vita_, p. 5_c_. - -[55] _Vita_, pp. 5_c_, 6,--as they appear in MS. “A.” This matter of -these periods has given me much trouble, since there are two rival -traditions concerning them to be found, really unreconciled, within the -oldest documents of the _Vita_. The point is fully discussed in the -Appendix. - -[56] _Ibid._ cc. ix-xli, pp. 21_c_-111_c_. - -[57] _Vita_, p. 7_a_. - -[58] I take the above to have been the actual course of events, for the -following reasons. (1) The text just given talks of “the desire for -Holy Communion” having been given to her on that day in 1473, and of -this desire “never failing her throughout the remainder of her life”; -but it does not say, that the desire for _daily_ Communion was given -to her then, or that such a desire was continuously satisfied from the -first. (2) On page 18_b_ we have: “For about two years she had this -desire for death, and this desire continued within her, up to when she -began to communicate daily.” This passage, (which does not occur, here -or with this Communion notation, in the MSS.,) originally without doubt -referred to her later desire for death, carefully described by Vernazza -(pp. 98_a_, _b_; 99_b_, _c_) as occurring in 1507--a description in the -midst of which now occurs an account of certain death-like swoons which -attacked her in 1509 (pp. 98_c_, and 133_b_; this latter experience is -given in the MSS. as occurring in November 1509). Still this passage -points to a tradition, or early inference, that the beginning of the -daily communions did not synchronize with her conversion nor indeed -with any other very marked date, but took place not many years after -her return to fervour. (3) It is impossible to assume that she did -not communicate at all during these first fourteen months, since -there is no evidence that, even before her conversion, she had ever -abstained from Holy Communion altogether, and since two Eastertides -with their strict obligation recurred twice within this period. And if -she did communicate repeatedly within this time, then this Lady-Day, -three days after her conversion, would be a most natural occasion for -one of these communions. And the desire and not its gratification -would be mentioned, because the writer characteristically wants her -conversion to be followed by something absolutely unintermittent, and -such unintermittence attached, for the present, not to her communions -themselves, but only to her desire for them. - -[59] _Vita_, pp. 8, 9. A MS. list of conclusions concerning various -points of her life, which is contained in the volume _Documenti su -S. Caterina da Genova_, in the University Library of Genoa, declares -this interdict to have lasted ten days, and in the year 1489. This -information is probably correct. - -[60] _Ibid._ pp. 8, 9. - -[61] _Vita_, p. 7_b_. - -[62] I have been unable to discover more than one case illustrative of -the practice of that time and town. The Venerable Battista Vernazza, an -Augustinian Canoness from 1510 to 1587, was not allowed daily Communion -till the last years of her life. _Opere_, Genoa, 1755, Vol. I, p. 21. - -[63] _Vita_, p. 116_c_. This passage opens a chapter full of the -most authentic information, derived directly from Don Marabotto, her -Confessor and close friend from 1499 onwards. I have, in her saying, -read “Amore” for the “Signore” of the text of the _Vita_: my reasons -will appear later on. - -[64] _Vita_, pp. 119_c_, 116_c_, 117_b_. - -[65] _Ibid._ p. 16_b_. - -[66] _Vita_, p. 6. - -[67] _Ibid._ p. 140_b_, _c_. - -[68] See here, ch. v, § ii, 2 and 5. - -[69] Denzinger’s _Enchiridion Definitionum_, ed. 1888, No. 363. - -[70] _Summa Theologica_, III, supplem. quaest. 6, art. 3. - -[71] Denzinger, _op. cit._ No. 780; _Summa Theologica_, III, supplem. -quaest. 6, art. 3. - -[72] Antonii Ballerini, _Opus Theologicum Morale_, ed. Palmieri, S.J., -Prato, 1892, Vol. V, pp. 576-597. The large variations in the earlier -practice of Penitence and Confession are admirably described in Abbé -Boudhinon’s articles, “Sur l’Histoire de la Pénitence,” in the _Revue -d’Histoire et de Littérature Religieuses_, 1897, pp. 306-344, 496-524. - -[73] The reason for this lies in the emphatic, repeated conviction -of R. 1, based, no doubt, upon the authentic documents (probably -Vernazza’s memoranda) that he has incorporated, (a conviction which -appears wherever his scheme was not tampered with by R. 2,) that her -great penitential period lasted four years (so still on pp. 12_b_, -13_b_ twice, 14_c_; and originally, no doubt, on p. 6_a_, and probably -on p. 5_c_, where now we read “a little over a year,” and “about -fourteen months” respectively). For not all the subsequent doctoring, -that shall be traced later on as having been applied by R. 2 to some -of the refractory passages, succeeds in making it likely that these -penitential exercises outlasted the complete disappearance from -her sight of her sins, which we have already quoted from the last -likely passage. And it is equally improbable that formal and repeated -Confession should not have formed part and parcel of the whole of this -penitential time. On the other hand, “her Confessor,” on p. 7_7_, -and “the spiritual physician” on p. 8_a_, indeed all other mentions -of a Confessor throughout the Life subsequent to her first convert -Confession, will be shown in the Appendix to apply exclusively to Don -Marabotto, and to the last eleven years of her life. - -[74] _Vita_, p. 56_b_, _c_. Her words as printed there are: “Io non -vorrei grazia ne misericordia [nella presente vita] ma giustizia e -vendetta del malfattore.” But the words I have bracketed are certainly -a gloss; for she is speaking here out of the fulness of her feeling, -without the intrusion of reflection. And as regards temporal punishment -in the other life, and the soul’s attitude towards it there, she says -in the _Trattato_, p. 180_b_: “Know for certain, that of the payment -required from those souls (in Purgatory), there is not remitted even -the least farthing, this having been thus established by the divine -justice.… Those souls have no more any personal choice, and can no more -will anything but what God wills.” - -[75] _Dialogo_, pp. 203_a_, 208_b_. - -[76] From the authenticated copies of the entries in the Cartulary, -prefixed to the MS. Life of the Saint in the _Biblioteca della Missione -Urbana_, Genoa, Nos. 30, 8, 14; and from careful copies of the still -extant original Wills made for me by Dre. Ferretto, of the Archivio di -Stato, Genova. - -[77] Benedicti XIV, _De servorum Dei Beatificatione et Beatorum -Canonisatione_, ed. Padua, 1743, Vol. II, p. 239_a_. - -[78] _Vita_, pp. 56_c_; 3_c_; 95_c_; 124_c_, 125_b_; 122_b_. - -[79] I have followed here, for my _terminus a quo_, Vallebona rather -than the Bollandists (who prefer 1474 for the date of her conversion), -because the ten years required between her marriage in January 1463 -and her conversion, have fully elapsed by March 1473, and because the -earlier we place her conversion, the larger is the number of lonely -convert years that we can find room for, and the more nearly accurate -her own allegation of twenty-five years of such loneliness becomes. -If we follow the chronology given in the text we get a thoroughly -understandable sequence: Catherine’s conversion, March 1473; Giuliano’s -bankruptcy, summer of that year; his conversion under the joint -influence of her zeal and of his misfortune; the decision of the couple -to settle in the midst of the poor and suffering, whom they were now -determined to serve, and the execution of this decision, between -Michaelmas and Christmas of the same year. - -[80] Vallebona, p. 55. - -[81] Lived 1550-1614, worked heroically amongst the poor and -pestilential sick, founded the Order of the Fathers of a Good Death, -and was himself at Genoa, already gravely ill, in 1613. - -[82] Vallebona, pp. 55, 56, shows, from Giuliano’s still extant will -of 1497, how this income from his property in the Island of Scios -alone amounted to about 30,000 modern Italian lire. We shall study the -instructive growth of legend in the matter of Catherine’s “poverty” -later on. - -[83] _Vita_, p. 122_b_. - -[84] Vallebona, pp. 106, 108. - -[85] An interesting legendary development in the _Dialogo_ of this very -straightforward account of the _Vita_ will occupy us later on. - -[86] _Vita_, pp. 20, 21. - -[87] _Ibid._ p. 12. - -[88] See an interesting article: “De Suor Tommasina Fieschi,” by F. -Alizeri, in _Atti della Società Ligure di Storia Patria_, Genova, 1868, -pp. 403-415. - -[89] The choice of subjects may possibly betray the influence of -Catherine--of the Pietà which Catherine had so much loved as a child, -and of her special devotion to the Holy Eucharist. But the particular -form of the latter is in Tommasina unlike Catherine: had Catherine -painted that symbolical picture, it would have referred to the moment, -not Consecration, but of Communion. - -[90] _Vita_, pp. 123, 124. Suor Tommasa did not die till 1534, over -86 years of age. I have been unable to discover her baptismal and her -married names. We shall give some further details about Catherine’s -probable relations with her, as writer and as painter. - -[91] _Vita_, pp. 12, 13. - -[92] _Ibid._ pp. 5, 6, 14. - -[93] _Ibid._ p. 13. - -[94] _Vita_, p. 6_a_. - -[95] _Ibid._ 14_b_. I have introduced into my account a note of -gradualness which is presented by no single (even authentic) document -of the _Vita_, but which any attempt at harmonizing those documents -imperatively requires. For there is, on the one hand, the repeated -insistence upon her four years of particular penances for her own -particular sins; and the vivid account of the final complete withdrawal -of all sight of those sins and of all desire for those penances -(_Ibid._ pp. 12_b_, 13_c_; 14_b_, 5_c_). And there is, on the other -hand, the, apparently, equally authentic saying, as to her performing -her penances, before the end of those years, without any particular -object in view (_Ibid._ p. 14_b_). The only unforced harmonization is -then to assume that a period, in which the sight of her particular sins -had been at first all but unintermittent and then still predominant, -had shaded off into another period, in which this sight occurred in -ever fewer moments, until at last, at the end of four years, a day came -on which it ceased altogether. - -[96] The only possible dates are 1475 or 1476. For the change referred -to takes place “some appreciable time (_alquanto tempo_) after her -conversion” (_Vita_, p. 10_a_); and yet it must be early enough to -allow of twenty-three Lents and Advents between the beginning of the -change up to its end. And this end came at latest in 1501 (p. 127_a_), -but probably in 1499, the year in which Don Marabotto became her -Confessor. The Lent of 1496 (what remained of it on Lady-Day of that -year) seems to me the more likely of the two possible starting-points. - -[97] _Vita_, p. 10_a_. - -[98] _Ibid._ p. 11_a_. - -[99] _Ibid._ p. 10_b_. - -[100] _Vita_, p. 8_a_. - -[101] See below, next page. - -[102] MS. “A,” p. 24, title to chapter vii; _Vita_, p. 10_a_. -Twenty-five Lents are too many, because: (1) it is impossible to -interpret the “alquanto tempo dopo la sua conversione,” when these -fasts began (_Ibid._ p. 10_a_), as less than two years; and (2) it is -impossible to bring her resignation of the Matronship of the Hospital -lower down than the autumn of 1497, a resignation which the _Ibid._ (p. -96) tells us took place in consequence of her “great bodily weakness,” -which forced her to “take some food after Holy Communion to restore her -bodily forces, even though it were a fast day.” This allows for at most -twenty-three Lents and twenty-two Advents. - -[103] _Ibid._ p. 11_b_. - -[104] _Vita_, p. 11_c_. I take the last section of this chapter (pp. -11, 12) to be a later, exaggerating doublet to this account. - -[105] _Ibid._ p. 11_b_. - -[106] _Ibid._ p. 14_b_, 5_c_. - -[107] _Vita_, p. 16_b_. - -[108] _Ibid._ pp. 23_a_, 49_a_. - -[109] _Ibid._ p. 15_b_. - -[110] _Vita_, pp. 15_c_, 97_a_, 15_c_. - -[111] _Ibid._ pp. 15_c_, 16_a_, 47_b_. - -[112] _Ibid._ p. 17_b_. - -[113] I translate _Frate predicatore_ thus, because the generally -well-informed Parpera (in his _Vita_ of the Saint, 1681) identifies -him with Padre Domenico de Ponzo, an Observant Franciscan and zealous -preacher. Boll. p. 161 D. In other places, also, the _Vita_ makes use -of purely popular and misleading designations:--p. 117_b_ “questo -Religioso” is Don Marabotto, Secular Priest; pp. 94_c_, 95_a_, _c_, -98_c_, 99_b_, “Religioso” is Vernazza, layman; p. 123_b_, “Sorelle” is -a Sister and Sisters-in-law. Even the final Redactor in the Preface, -p. viii_c_, calls the Secular-Priest Marabotto and the Layman-Lawyer -Vernazza, “divoti religiosi.” - -[114] _Vita_, pp. 51, 52. I take this episode to have occurred whilst -the pair were still living out of the Hospital, because of the _giunta -in casa_, which could hardly be applied to their two little rooms in -the latter, whilst this sensitiveness to the opinion of others in -this matter of love appears psychologically to be more likely during -the early years of her convert life than from 1490 onwards, when, -as Matron, she occupied a separate little house within the Hospital -precincts (hence _sua casa_ in _Vita_, p. 96_b_). - -[115] I shall give reasons in due course for holding that the rooms -still shown in the Hospital as Catherine’s are different from any ever -occupied by herself, and that the little house within the Hospital -grounds, in which she died in 1510, and into which she (and Giuliano) -probably moved in 1490, has long ceased to exist. - -[116] _Vita_, p. 20_b_. This characteristic fact has been “explained -away” in the _Dialogo_. See Appendix. - -[117] _Vita_, p. 20_c_. - -[118] _Ibid._ p. 21_c_. All the books and papers of the Hospital -referring to these years up to her death, were long ago destroyed -by fire. I have, however, no doubt as to the, at least substantial, -accuracy of the above account. For ten wills and assignments, drawn -up, by various lawyers, in her presence, by her desire and at her -dictation,--nine of them during the years of her weakness and -illness,--are still extant, have been carefully copied out for me, and -will be analyzed further on. They are all, except on one minor point, -admirably precise, detailed, and wise. - -[119] _Vita_, p. 21_b_. - -[120] The above paragraph is based, with Vallebona, _op. cit._ pp. -67-72, upon the assumption that Catherine took the kind of share -described in the labours of this time; since it is practically -unthinkable that she should not have acted as is here supposed, given -the combination of the following facts, which are all beyond dispute. -(1) The fully reliable Giustiniani in his _Annali_ describes, under the -date of 1493, the incidents of the Pestilence as given above; tells us -how well, nevertheless, the sick and poor were looked after by those -who, from amongst the educated classes, remained amongst them; and -affirms that the Borgo di San Germano, identical with the Acquasola -quarter, was assigned to those stricken by the Pestilence. (2) Agostino -Adorno, Giuliano’s cousin, was Doge of Genoa during this year. And the -friendly terms on which the cousins were at this time are proved by -Giuliano’s Will of the following year (October 1494). (3) Catherine had -already been Matron of the Hospital for two years and more, and was -to continue to be so for another three years. She certainly did not -absent herself from her post at this time. And her Hospital directly -abutted against the Acquasola quarter. (4) The details furnished by -all the sources conjointly with regard to her six years’ Headship of -the Hospital, are so extraordinarily scanty, that we must not too much -wonder at the all but complete dearth of any allusion to a work which -cannot have lasted longer than as many months. (5) The _Dialogo_, p. -222_b_, says: “She would go, too,” (_i.e._ besides visiting the sick -and poor in their own houses,) “to the poor of San Lazzaro, in which -place she would find the greatest possible calamity.” This clearly -refers to some special (Lazar-, Leper-) Refuge, and the term can -certainly cover aid given to the pest-stricken. And we shall see that -the record here is derived from the writer’s father, Ettore Vernazza, -the heroic lover of the pest-stricken poor. - -I have, in my text, assumed that the _Vita_ gives us an anecdote -relative to her visiting the pestiferous sick of Acquasola. But to do -this, I have had (_a_) to take “pestiferous fever” as equivalent to -“Pestilence,” and to assume that it was not an isolated precursory case -of the coming general visitation; (_b_) to omit, in the _Vita’s_ text, -“nell’ ospedale,” as an indication where the sick woman was; and “allo -stesso servizio (dell’ ospedale),” as descriptive of where Catherine -went back to: the anecdote may well originally have been without -indication of the place in which the infection came to reduce her to -death’s door. - -[121] _Inaugurazione della Statua d’Ettore Vernazza_ (1863), Genova, -Sordo-Muti, 1867. Most of my facts concerning Ettore and his daughters -are taken from this _brochure_, with its careful biographical Discourse -by Avvocato Professore Giuseppe Morro (pp. 5-31), and its ample -collection of admirable wills and financial decisions (pp. 61-94). - -[122] Quoted _ibid._ p. 21. It is absolutely certain that these words -refer to the pestilence of 1493, since the epidemic did not again visit -Genoa till 1503, when Vernazza must have been over thirty years of -age. And Battista’s silence as to any meeting between her Father and -Catherine must not be pressed, since she nowhere mentions Catherine, -and yet we know for certain how close and long was the intimacy between -them. - -[123] The words of the _Vita_, p. 105_c_, that those who wrote this -Life “saw and experienced these wonderful operations for _many years_,” -are given in MS. “A” as “during _fifteen consecutive_ years (per -quindici continui anni),” p. 366. All points to her having got to know -Don Marabotto later than at this time and than Vernazza, yet only the -one or the other of these two men can be meant; hence Vernazza must -be intended here. But I have nowhere in the _Vita_ been able to trace -passages that could with probability be both attributed to Vernazza, -and dated before the years 1498-1499. - -[124] The precise date of Vernazza’s marriage is unknown. But since his -eldest child was born on April 15, 1497, it cannot have taken place -later than June 1496. The date of the sale of the Palazzo is derived -from Catherine’s act of consent to the sale, preserved in the Archivio -di Stato; a copy lies before me. The date of her resignation is derived -from the _Vita_, p. 96_b_, which says she did so “quando fù di anni -circa cinquanta.” This “circa” must no doubt here, as so often (as, -_e.g._, on p. 97_b_, where “circa sessanta-tre” refers to November -1509, when she was sixty-two), be interpreted as “nearly fifty”: she -was really forty-nine. - -[125] The date of Tommasina’s birth comes from _Ritratti ed Elogi di -Liguri Illustri_, Genova, Ponthenier; the date of the beginning of -Giuliano’s illness from his Codicil of January 10, 1497, in which -he declares himself as “languishing” and “infirm in body”; and the -approximate date of his death from two entries in the Cartulary of -the Bank of St. George, as to investments made by Catherine (copies -in _Documenti su S. Caterina da Genova_, University Library, Genoa, -B. VII, 31), of which the first, on July 14, 1497, gives her name -as “Catterinetta, filia Jacobi di Fiesco et uxor Juliani Adorni”; -and the second, on October 6, 1497, describes her as “uxor et heres -testamentaria quondam fratris Juliani Adorni.” - -[126] _Vita_, pp. 122_b_, _c_, 123_a_. I have preserved the descriptive -account of Catherine’s prayer and of its effect, although it may -possibly be but a later dramatized interpretation of the undoubtedly -authentic report of her declaration made to Vernazza.--The immediate -cause of Giuliano’s pain and impatience is given by _Vita_, p. 122_b_, -as “una gran passione d’urina”; Vallebona, p. 73, declares the malady -to have been a “cestite cronica” (tape-worm). I have omitted a short -dialogue which is given, after her remark to Vernazza, as having -occurred between her friends and herself, concerning her liberation -from much oppression, and her own indifference to all except the will -of God, because her answer is given in _oratio obliqua_, and is quite -colourless and general; the passage is doubtless of no historical -value: there never lived a less conventional, vapidly moralizing soul -than hers. - -[127] I work from careful copies specially made for me direct from the -originals, by Dre. Augusto Ferretto, of the Archivio di Stato in Genoa. - -[128] _Inaugurazione_, pp. 12, 13. - -[129] I work again from a copy made by Dre. Ferretto from the original -in the Archivio di Stato, Genoa. - -[130] Marabotto’s help in business matters cannot, on any large scale, -have begun till considerably later than his spiritual help. For -whereas her Codicil of 1503 nowhere mentions Marabotto, her Will of -1506 leaves him, as we shall see, a little legacy; her Will of 1509 -protects him against all harassing inquisition into the details of -his administration of her affairs; and her Codicil of 1510 mentions -only him and Don Carenzio. And it is incredible that business help -should have been given throughout four years, and should have failed -to gain any recognition in a document which commemorates so many -lesser services. Marabotto was Rector in 1504 (I owe this date to -the kindness of the Rev. Padre Vincenzo Celesia, author of the MS. -_Storia dell’ Ospedale di Pammatone in Genova_, 1897); he was no more -Rector in September 1509, but Don Jacobo Carenzio then held this post -(Catherine’s Codicil of that date). Indeed already in March 1509 -Marabotto seems not to have been Rector (Catherine’s Will of that date -mentions him repeatedly, but nowhere as Rector). I take the Offices -of _Rettore_ (Master), and of _Rettora_ (Matron), to have never been -exercised simultaneously: but that, at any one time, there was always -only a Rettore or a Rettora presiding over the whole Hospital. The -Office of Rettora was abolished altogether in 1730 (_Storia dell’ -Ospedale_, p. 1135). - -[131] _Vita_, p. 117_b_. - -[132] The Appendix will show that the “Religioso,” the “dolce -figliuolo,” of pp. 94, 95, and the “Religioso, figliuolo,” of pp. 98, -99, must be Ettore Vernazza, and not Cattaneo Marabotto. - -[133] I take all these facts from F. Federici’s careful MS. work, -_Famiglie Nobili di Genova_, _sub verbo_ Marabotto. - -[134] _Vita_, p. 118, _a_, _b_. The first of these two passages -is followed, in the same section, by two other slightly different -accounts. The third of these is no doubt authentic, but refers to a -still later period: it shall be given in its proper place. These two -authentic accounts are (as is often the case in the _Vita_) joined -together by a vague and yet absolute, unauthentic account, which -declares that she told him all things (apparently on all occasions): a -statement untrue of any time in her life. - -[135] _Vita_, pp. 117_c_, 118_a_. - -[136] _Vita_, p. 94_c_. The three lines which follow in the printed -_Vita_ are wanting in MS. “A” of 1547, p. 235, and are a disfiguring -gloss of R 2. - -[137] _Vita_, pp. 94, 95. - -[138] _Vita_, p. 97_b_; 250, _a_, _b_. - -[139] Angel, 50_b_; Cherub, 16_a_, 97_b_; Seraph, 130_b_. - -[140] _Vita_, pp. 47_b_, 50_a_, 72_b_. - -[141] _Ibid._ p. 115_b_. - -[142] _Ibid._ p. 115_b_. There are three passages in the _Vita_ -referring to cases of possession. (_a_) Page 39_b_ makes Catherine, in -finishing up a discourse as to Evil being essentially but a Privation -of Love, refer to a “Religioso” and to a “Spiritato,” and how the -latter, “costretto” by the former to tell him what he was, “answered -with great force: ‘I am that unhappy wretch bereft of love.’ And he -(the evil spirit) said so with a voice so piteous and penetrating, -that it moved me (Catherine) through and through with compassion.” The -Possessed One is here a man. In MS “A” (p. 92) the story is still quite -loosely co-ordinated with her speech; it was originally no doubt an -independent anecdote; and was, possibly after a good many intermediary -literary fixations, introduced into this place and connection by R 1 -or R 2. (_b_) Page 115_a_, _b_, gives the story reproduced in the text -above. The Possessed One is here a woman; and here the entire passage -formally claims directly to reproduce an actual scene from Catherine’s -life. (_c_) Page 162_a_ gives an anecdote of a “figliuola spirituale” -of Catherine, who had “il demonio adosso”; and tells how, at the -time of her Mistress’s death, the “spirito” within her, “costretto,” -declared that he had seen Catherine unite herself with God,--and all -this with “tormento,” so that “pareva a sè intollerabile.” This passage -clearly refers to the same person as that of passage _b_. - -As to the historicity of the event described in the text, we must -distinguish between the general fact of Catherine’s moral and psychic -ascendency over Mariola, a fact as entirely beyond dispute as it -is valuable and characteristic; and the occurrence of the scene as -given above. As to the latter, the question of its value is of course -distinct from that of its occurrence. Its supposed evidential worth is -_nil_, since Mariola had been intimate with and devoted to Catherine -for probably a good ten years at least. But the scene may nevertheless -have actually occurred. It is true that the partly parallel case of -the “Spiritato” shows how easily such a dramatization of doctrine or -transference of experience can occur. And Denys the Areopagite and -Jacopone da Todi are full of this comparison of the soul arrived at -a state of union to an Angel, Cherub or Seraph; and these writers -have greatly influenced not only Catherine’s authentic teaching, but -also the successive amplifications and modifications of her life and -sayings. And again we shall prove that certain legendary matters were -inserted in the _Vita_ at a late date--between 1545 and 1551. But these -passages all claim to be based upon evidence supplied by Argentina del -Sale; and they were evidently not accepted by Marabotto (1528); the -literary form of these legends differs much from that of our passage; -and if the former are still absent from MSS. “A” and “B,” the latter -is already present in both. And we have such entirely first-hand proof -for the curiously naïf, formal, exteriorizing character of Marabotto’s -mind, as to leave it always possible that he did bring about a little -scene of the sort here described. If so, Marabotto’s rôle in it will -have been prompted, in part, by a wish still further to increase -Catherine’s hold upon Mariola’s mind. - -[143] _Vita_, p. 112_a_. - -[144] _Vita_, p. 72_b_. - -[145] _Ibid._ p. 113_b_. I take these two motives alone to have -operated throughout such actions of hers during this last period. -The additional motive attributed to her (_Ibid._ pp. 129_c_, 130_a_, -and 134_a_), where she is represented as applying a lighted candle -or live coal to her bare arm, for the purpose of testing whether her -interior spiritual fire or this exterior material one is the greater, -is entirely unlike Catherine’s spirit. It belongs to the demonstrably -legendary and disfiguring interpretations which shall be studied -further on. The sentence on p. 134_a_, in which she herself is made to -declare this motive, is most certainly a worthless gloss. - -[146] _Vita_, p. 127_a_. - -[147] It is remarkable how tough-lived has been the legend which makes -Vernazza have an only child. Not only Father Sticken (_Acta Sanctorum_, -September, Vol. V, pp. 123-195) has it in 1752, but even Vallebona, -in his _Perla dei Fieschi_, still repeats it in 1887. And yet the -_Inaugurazione_ pamphlet had appeared in Genoa in 1867, giving on pp. -13, 14, 72, 73 the fullest proofs as to the reality of these two other -children. - -[148] _Vita_, p. 123_b_. - -[149] I get the date of 1502 for those three deaths from Angelo L. -Giovo’s MS. _Vita_ of the Saint in the _Biblioteca della Missione -Urbana_ (Part I, ch. iii). All three names are prominent in the Will of -1498; in the Codicil of 1503, Jacobo and Giovanni are both styled “the -late,” and her brother Lorenzo has become the sole residuary legatee. -Limbania appears nowhere after the Will of 1498. - -[150] _Atti della Società Ligure di Storia Patria_, Genova, 1868, p. -411 (with plate). The article is dated 1871. - -[151] _Vita_, pp. 124_b_-126. I get Argentina’s maiden name from a Will -of hers of the year 1522, of which a copy exists in the MS. volume -_Documenti relativi a S. Caterina da Genova_, in the Genoa University -Library, B. VII, 31. I have taken Argentina to have previously known, -perhaps even to have served, Catherine, because of her surprise at -Marco’s ignorance as to the identity of his visitor; and I have treated -such possible service as but slight, because in Giuliano’s Will of 1494 -and in Catherine’s Will and Codicil of 1498 and 1503, legacies are left -to the two maids Benedetta and Mariola, but not a word appears as yet -as to Argentina. The date as to the year I derive from the following -facts:--(1) Catherine, as soon as Marco is buried, carries out her -promise to him, and receives Argentina into her house: so the _Vita_, -pp. 126_c_, 125_c_. (2) Whereas in the Codicil of 1503 there is still -no trace of Argentina, in the Will of 1506 she appears, and receives -legacies of personal linen, etc. These gifts are somewhat increased in -the Will of 1509. Argentina has evidently not been long in Catherine’s -service at the time of the drawing up of the Will of 1506. (3) The -Protonotary Angelo L. Giovo (MS. _Vita_ of the Saint of the _Biblioteca -della Missione Urbana_ Part I, ch. iii) puts down the date of Marco’s -death as 1495. Although this is evidently wrong, I think it wise to -keep at least one of his numbers, which I do by fixing upon 1505. - -[152] _Documenti su S. Caterina da Genova_, University of Genoa -Library, gives a note by Angelo L. Giovo, based on the Book of the -Acts of the Protectors of the Hospital: “1506, Marzo, 16mo. Si vede -che detta Catarinetta Adorna haveva cura dell’ Hospitale, ricevendo li -figli esposti e li pegni per essi.” - -[153] From Dre. Ferretto’s copy of the original in the Archivio di -Stato. - -[154] The clause in this Will which says, “And Testatrix, knowing that -the said Giuliano her husband, left to a certain female Religious £150: -Therefore she herewith annuls the said legacy, in virtue of the power -given her for this purpose,” reads, at first sight, like a harsh, -unjust act. But it follows upon a similar annulation of the legacy to -the Hospital; and we may be quite sure that Catherine, who had now -loved and served this Institution for thirty-three years, would not -treat it unjustly. And in the Will of 1509 Catherine explains that the -former legacy has been annulled, “in consideration of the satisfaction -or settlement (_solutio_) already effected by Testatrix herself with -regard to the said legacy.” - -[155] _Documenti_: extracts by Giovo from “Acts of the Protectors.” - -[156] From Dre. Ferretto’s copy of the original in the Archivio di -Stato, Genoa. - -[157] From Dre. Ferretto’s careful copy of the original in the Archivio -di Stato, Genoa. - -[158] In the printed _Vita_ a passage occurs on p. 10_b_, describing -the interior heat which accompanied her great fasts (1476-1499). But -the passage is wanting in the MSS., and is no doubt only a gloss to -explain how, at those times, she came to drink water mixed with vinegar. - -[159] “Operazione”: _Vita_, pp. 106_c_, 117_b_, 121_b_, 143_b_, -148_b_, 149_c_. “Assalto”: pp. 138_b_, _c_ (3); 139_a_; 143, _b_, _c_ -(3); 144_a_ (2); 148_a_. “Assedio”: p. 118_b_. “Saetta”: pp. 141_a_, -145_a_. “Ferita”: p. 141_a_, _c_ (2). “Raggio”: pp. 133_b_, 157_c_. -“Scintilla”: pp. 132_a_, 148_b_. The “ferita” occurs already (as -a “dolce ferita”) in the account of her Conversion, pp. 4, 5; and -“saetta,” “ferita,” “raggio” and “scintilla,” appear very often in her -own sayings. - -[160] The passage in _Vita_, p. 10_b_, which declares that she “felt” -(tasted) something sweet within her, upon drinking that salt and sour -water during her long fasts, is wanting in the MSS., and is itself -an interesting attempt to materialize her saying, on p. 11_b_, as to -the “other thing” (_i.e._ the love of God), that she was “feeling” -(tasting) within herself. - -[161] _Vita_, p. 8_a_. - -[162] _Ibid._ p. 9_b_. The present conclusion of the sentence, and all -the parallels throughout the rest of the page, show plainly that the -sentence originally read as I have given it. - -[163] _Vita_, p. 9_b_. - -[164] _Ibid._ p. 16_b_. - -[165] _Ibid._ p. 5_b_. - -[166] _Vita_, p. 98, _a_, _b_. This is the first of three incidents, -given in chronological order, all referring to her desire for death, -which make up Chapter XXXVIII of the printed _Vita_. The last two are, -beyond all doubt, conversations with Vernazza; and this first incident -is also probably transmitted to us by him.--I have in my translation -left out the numerous glosses by which the various Redactors have -desperately attempted to eviscerate this story, attempts based on the -double conviction, that Catherine was already absolutely perfect, and -that “every desire is imperfect” (p. 100_a_). These changes will be -studied later on. - -[167] _Vita_, pp. 118, _b_, _c_, 119_b_, 119_a_. This vivid and simple -dialogue is followed (p. 119_b_) by a clearly secondary parallel -discourse of Catherine. Only the descriptive end of this latter -paragraph is no doubt authentic, and has been incorporated in the above -translation. - -[168] _Vita_, p. 127_a_. - -[169] I translate the above from the oldest account of the event, given -by MS. “A,” p. 193, at the opening of its Chapter XXIX (the number is -accidentally omitted), which is headed: “How in the year 1506, on the -11th of November, there came upon her so great a burning in the heart, -that she wondered at her not expiring.” This 1506, repeated in the -opening line of the chapter itself, is an undoubted slip; for she is -said to be 63 years old (and she was in her 63rd year in 1509), and the -place occupied by the corresponding paragraph in the printed _Vita_, -p. 133_b_ (within a year of her death, p. 132_b_, and some time before -December 1509, p. 138_b_), again clearly marks the date as 1509. - -[170] _Vita_, p. 132_a_, _b_. The first eight sentences have been in -part fused by R 1 into fewer larger periods. The last sentence is -wanting in MSS. “A”and “B”; although clearly formed upon the model and -with the material of the previous sentences, it appears in the printed -_Vita_ as referring to an “altra vista” (see p. 133_b_). - -[171] _Vita_, p. 135_a_. I have, in Catherine’s speech, omitted a final -clause, “which burns me entirely within and without,” because it is not -necessary to the sense, and violates the rhythm, which is ever present -in all Catherine’s authentic sayings. - -[172] _Ibid._ pp. 135_c_, 136_a_. I have omitted two glosses introduced -by “cioè,” “that is”; and three short amplifications, which introduce a -direct conflict between the two parts. There is, within this particular -picture and scene, no direct conflict, but, at first, a complete -contrariety of aim. - -[173] _Vita_, p. 136_c_. This is one out of four or five parallel -sayings which are accumulated here. They shall be examined later on. - -[174] _Vita_, pp. 98_c_, 99_a_; 99_b_, _c_. I have, in the first -conversation, omitted the introductory attribution of her use of -the word “giddiness” to humility; and, in the second, suppressed -the conclusion which repeatedly declares that never again did any -such desire arise within her. For both clauses have got a vague and -secondary form, and the second is in direct contradiction with the -facts. - -[175] _Vita_, 138_c_. - -[176] _Vita_, pp. 139_b_, 140_b_, _c_. I have omitted the evidently -derivative, transcendentally reflective, second of the three paragraphs -in which this story now appears; the explanatory glosses of the same -tone as that paragraph; a redundant sentence in Catherine’s speech; -and the evidently late and schematic designation of “assalto” for the -entire incident, which is, surely, nothing of the sort. - -[177] _Vita_, pp. 120_b_; 119_c_, 120_a_. The sequence and date assumed -above I think to be, all things considered, the most likely among the -possible alternatives. As to her remarks to Marabotto, they appear in -the _Vita_ before his three days’ absence. But the interior evidence -seems strongly in favour of my inversion of that (evidently, in any -case, very loose and quite unemphasized) order. - -[178] _Ibid._ pp. 141_c_, 143_c_. - -[179] _Vita_, p. 141_c_. - -[180] _Ibid._ 142_a_. MSS. “A” and “B” open out their chapter on her -last illness with the statement that it was (only) four months before -her death that she took to her bed. I take it that from the end of -January 1510 onwards, she was often in bed, yet still sometimes out of -it; but that from mid-May to the end she no more left it. - -[181] _Ibid._ p. 142_b_, _c_. I have, in her prayer, omitted the first -seven words of the present text: “(Già sono trentacinque anni in -circa, che) giammai, Signor mio …” For she would hardly inform God of -the approximate number of years of her convert life; the double “già” -points to a gloss; and such a gloss would almost irresistibly find -its way into this place, so as to mitigate the absoluteness of the -statement. - -[182] _Ibid._ p. 143_b_. I have omitted the words: “which (the right -shoulder) appeared as though severed from the body; and similarly one -rib seemed severed from the others …” They have precisely the same -“colour,” and no doubt proceed from the same contributor, as the longer -passage relative to her supposed stigmatization, absent from all the -MSS., but given in the printed _Vita_ on the authority of Argentina. - -[183] _Vita_, pp. 143_c_, 71_c_. The second passage, though occurring -in an early chapter of the _Vita_, undoubtedly belongs to these final -months and fits well into this particular day. - -[184] _Ibid._ p. 144_a_. I have accepted this passage, because of its -great vividness. But pp. 139_b_-145_b_ of the printed _Vita_ do not -exist in the MSS. - -[185] _Ibid._ p. 145_b_. On pp. 145_c_, 146_a_, she is said to have, -during this time, seen many visions of Angels, to have laughed in their -company, and to have herself recounted this after these occurrences. -She is similarly declared to have seen Evil Spirits (_i Demoni_), but -only with slight fear. And these passages occur also in the MSS.--But -they stand so entirely outside of any context or attribution to any -definite days; such general assertions prove, throughout the _Vita_, -to be so little trustworthy; and they are such vague and colourless -doubles of similar, but definitely dated and characterized, reports -to be accepted in their place a little lower down, that I cannot but -reject them here. - -[186] _Vita_, pp. 144_b_; 145_c_. - -[187] _Ibid._ p. 145_c_. - -[188] _Ibid._ p. 146_b_. - -[189] _Vita_, pp. 146_c_-147_c_. - -[190] Lingard’s _History of England_, ed. 1855, Vol. IV, p. 166; James -Gairdner, _Henry VII_, London, 1889, p. 208. - -[191] The five passages of the _Vita_ concerning Physicians (pp. 71_c_, -72_a_; 145_c_, 146_b_; 146_c_-147_c_; 158_c_, 159_a_) all bear very -clear marks of successive additions, glosses, and re-castings,--always -in the direction indicated above. - -The entire Boerio-episode (pp. 146_c_-147_c_), is wanting in all the -MSS. It is, however, most plainly authentic. I believe both the episode -and a further passage concerning Boerio to have been furnished by -Boerio’s son, a Secular Priest, who died a septuagenarian in 1561; -his monument still exists in the Church of the Santa Annunciata, at -Sturla, near Genoa. See the _Biografia Medica Ligure_, by Dottore G. -B. Pescetto, Genova, 1846, Vol. I, p. 104.--There are some suspicious -symptoms connected with that first consultation of Physicians: Boerio’s -interviews read as though they had not been quite recently preceded -by such an activity--and it is possible that we have here an account -produced by a retrogressive doubling of the undoubtedly authentic -consultation of the 10th of September, to be described presently. -Still, there is nothing intrinsically improbable in the account itself. -I have, then, allowed both consultations to stand. - -[192] _Vita_, p. 72_a_. - -[193] Copies of these six entries in the _Manuale Cartularii_ of the -Hospital exist attached to the MS. _Vita_ in the _Biblioteca della -Missione Urbana_. - -[194] From the copy of the original Codicil in the Archivio di Stato, -made for me by Dre. Ferretto. The Inventory exists attached to the MS. -_Vita_ just mentioned. - -[195] _Vita_, p. 148_b_. It is remarkable that, since January 10, -this is the first date given by the _Vita_; that a series of dated -days then extends onwards to August 28 (pp. 148_a_-152_a_); that -then a gap occurs, filled in with a general but authentic account -(pp. 152_b_-153_c_), evidently by another hand, the same writer who -gave us the (also dateless) account from mid-January to mid-May (pp. -141_b_-145_b_); and that the dated chronicle is finally carried on from -September 2 to the end, September 15 (pp. 153_c_-161_a_). If I am right -as to the oneness of authorship as regards these two undated parts, -then they are either not by Vernazza; or if they are, then Vernazza -must have been about Catherine till September 2. - -Now the _Vita_, p. 120_b_, tells us how Marabotto on one occasion left -her “for three days,” at a time when she was already suffering much -from “accidenti.” It is evident, that this absence fits in admirably -with the gap already mentioned. Hence these dateless accounts can -hardly be by Marabotto; and indeed their whole tone and point of view -are unlike his. They might be by Carenzio: we shall see how strikingly -objective and precise are the oldest constituents of the report as to -the last three days of her life, during which, or at least at the end -of which, Marabotto was as certainly absent as was Vernazza. There -is, however, I think, some difference of tone between this latter -report, and those dateless passages; whereas those passages are -strikingly similar, in form and tone, to the oldest constituents of the -_Trattato_, which are undoubtedly the literary work of Vernazza. - -The probabilities then are, that these dateless accounts are by -Vernazza; and that he left Genoa on September 1 or 2. - -[196] _Vita_, p. 148_c_. “Disse molte belle parole al santo Sacramento -[e ai circonstanti, con tanto fervore e pietà,] che ognuno ne piangeva -per divozione.” I have omitted the bracketed words, as a disfiguring -gloss. - -[197] _Vita_, p. 149_b_. I have neglected the numerous glosses to this -account, and have read “several” instead of “seven” days, since she -was again in great distress on August 22, or 23 at latest (_Ibid._ p. -149_c_). - -[198] _Ibid._ p. 149_c_. I have here omitted an evidently later -insertion and transition between that highly localized paralysis and -the death-like sickness of the whole of her; and have made the latter -come on after the former, for how otherwise could any one know about -that paralysis? - -[199] _Ibid._ p. 150_b_. This fact and passage have occasioned an -interesting succession of obvious accretions and re-statements. - -[200] _Ibid._ p. 151_a_, _b_. I have in the text followed the MSS. -as against the printed _Vita_, and have omitted a long clause, which -attempts to find the explanation of these words of hers in a subsequent -permanent change of attitude towards all those from whom she asked or -received a service. - -[201] _Vita_, p. 153_b_. - -[202] _Vita_, pp. 150_a_, 154_b_, 127_c_, 153_c_. - -[203] A copy of this entry exists, in the Priest Giovo’s handwriting, -in the collection of Documents prefixed to the MS. _Vita_ of St. -Catherine, in the _Biblioteca della Missione Urbana_, Genoa. - -[204] _Vita_, p. 154_b_, and the Inventory among the documents in the -_Vita_, volume of the _Biblioteca della Missione_. - -[205] _Vita_, pp. 153_a_, 155_a_; 157_c_, 158_a_. For this 7th -September three heat-and-light impressions are given: (1) “A ray of -divine love”; (2) “a vision of fiery stairs”; and (3) this apprehension -of the whole world on fire. Perhaps the first also is authentic; the -last is certainly so. The middle one seems to be secondary, and to have -slipped in to form a transition and link between the other two accounts. - -[206] _Ibid._ p. 153_a_. - -[207] _Vita_, p. 155_b_, _c_. A third paragraph, pp. 155_c_, 156_a_ -(equally wanting in all the MSS. and claiming to be based on the -authority of Argentina), follows here, and tells how the latter -saw one of her mistress’s arms grow over half a palm in additional -length, during the following night; and again how Catherine had told -her, Argentina, that she, Catherine, “would before her death bear -the stigmata and mysteries of the Passion in her own person.” These -“facts” are thoroughly characteristic of the source from which they -are no doubt derived.--A fourth paragraph, p. 156_b_, _c_, has also -been omitted by me, although it occurs also in the MSS. It contains a -long prayer put into Catherine’s mouth, and modelled on our Lord’s High -Priestly Prayer in John xvii, 1-13. It is far too long, elaborate, and -uncharacteristic to be authentic. - -[208] _Ibid._ p. 156_c_. - -[209] _Ibid._ p. 158_b_. I have here omitted, after “miseries,” the -clause “through which she had passed.” For during her middle period she -seems indeed not to have seen her faults till after she herself had -got beyond them: yet that particular dispensation was then vouchsafed -her because of the excessive pain which the sight of still present -imperfections would have caused her; and it is that peculiarity which -explains the extreme rarity or absence of Confession during that time. -But now we have both the pain and the Confession: and I cannot find -any instances, as in this case, of (evidently keen) annoyance, or -of Confession, with respect to past and overcome imperfections.--I -have also omitted a sentence after “departed from her”: “not that -they were matters of any importance, but every slightest defect was -intolerable to her.” For this is to judge the Saint by another standard -than that of her own conscience, and to make her sanctity consist -of scrupulosity.--And I have dropped a further notice for the same -day,--a “vista” vouchsafed to her of “a pure and perfect mind, into -which only the memory of divine things can still enter,” with her -corresponding laugh and exclamation: “O, to find oneself in this degree -(of perfection) at the time of death!” For, beautiful as it is, this -clause but reproduces, in the softened form of a general and joyous -aspiration, what the previous anecdote had given as a particular and -depressing consciousness. And the previous anecdote was evidently -offensive to both Redactors. - -[210] _Vita_, pp. 158_c_, 159_a_, _b_. - -[211] _Vita_, p. 159_c_. The Codicil I give from Dre. Ferretto’s copy -of the original in the Archivio di Stato, Genoa. I have, in the _Vita_ -passage, omitted a sentence which now stands between the drop-of-water -incident, and that of the attack at night, which declares: “All this -day she remained without speaking, without ever opening her eyes or -eating or drinking”; for it would be difficult, if we retain it, to -find room for the drawing up of the Codicil, which certainly took place -before the attack. - -[212] _Vita_, p. 160_a_. - -[213] _Vita_, pp. 169_c_, 161_a_. - -[214] _Vita_, pp. 161_c_-163_a_. - -[215] _Vita_, p. 162_b_. - -[216] _Ibid._ pp. 163_b_-164_a_. - -[217] _Ibid._ p. 153_a_ (end of August or beginning of September 1510), -“through the intense heat of this fire of love she became yellow all -over, like the colour of saffron”; p. 161_b_, (“after death) that -yellow colour was spread over her whole body, which at first had only -been around the region of the heart”; p. 164_c_ (on opening her coffin -in the autumn of 1511), “the skin which corresponded to the heart was -still red in sign of the ardent love which she had harboured in it, the -rest of the body was yellow.” - -[218] _Vita_, pp. 17_c_, 18_a_, (97_c_). - -[219] _Ibid._ p. 129_b_, (165_c_). In both places there is an explicit -reference to Saint Ignatius (of Antioch), “whose heart, when examined -after his martyrdom, was found to have written upon it, in letters of -gold, the sweet name of Jesus.” Perhaps also two lines of Jacopone da -Todi had some influence here. In _Loda_ LXXXVIII, v. 11, he says of the -perfected soul: “The heart annihilates itself, undone (melted down) -as though it were wax, and finds itself, after this act, bearing the -figure (the seal-impression) of Christ Himself.” - -[220] _Ibid._ p. 165_c_. - -[221] These and similar matters will be found carefully studied in the -Appendix. - -[222] _Lode_ III, XIII, XXXIII, XXXV, XLV, LVIII (_a_) and (_b_), -LXXIII, LXXV (_a_) and (_b_), LXXVII, LXXIX, LXXXI, LXXXIII, LXXXV, -LXXXVIII, LXXXIX, LXXXX, LXXXXVII, LXXXXIX. - -[223] _Vita_, pp. 32_c_, 33_a_, _b_. I must refer the reader, once for -all, to the Appendix, for the explanation of the methods used in the -selection and the emendation of the texts presented in this chapter. - -[224] _Vita_, pp. 29_c_; 91_c_; 30_b_; 55_c_, 56_a_; 61_a_. - -[225] _Ibid._ p. 76_c_. - -[226] _Ibid._ pp. 101_b_; 101_a_; 79_c_. - -[227] _Vita_, pp. 36_b_; 80_c_, 81_a_; 74_b_. - -[228] _Ibid._ pp. 9_b_; _ibid._, 8_c_. - -[229] _Vita_, p. 11_c_. - -[230] _Ibid._ p. 11_b_. - -[231] _Vita_, pp. 22_b_; 25_c_; 26_b_.--105_c_.--25_c_, 26_a_, 80_b_. - -[232] _Ibid._ pp. 15_c_, 16_a_.--9_b_; 53_b_; 67_c_. - -[233] _Vita_, pp. 26_b_; 50_b_.--36_b_; 36_c_.--36_b_. - -[234] _Ibid._ p. 48_b_. - -[235] _Ibid._ pp. 23_c_; 27_a_. The fact of “Nettezza” remaining -at last her only term for the perfection of God shows plainly how -comprehensive, definite, and characteristic must have been the -meaning she attached to the word. The history of this conception no -doubt begins with Plato’s “the Same”; and this, through Plotinus and -Victorinus Afer’s Latin translation of him, reappears as “the Idipsum, -the Self-Same,” as one of the names of God in St. Augustine; a term -which in Dionysius (largely based as he is upon Plotinus’s disciple -Proclus) occurs continually, and can there be still everywhere -translated as “Identity” or “Self-Identity” (so also Parker). But with -Catherine the idea seems to have been approximated more to that of -Purity, although I take it that, with her, “Purità” means the absence -of all excess (of anything foreign to the true nature of God’s or -the soul’s essence); and “Netezza,” the absence of all defect, in -the shape of any failure fully to actualize all the possibilities -of this same true nature. I have had to resign myself, as the least -inadequate suggestions of the rich meaning of “Netezza” and “Netto,” -to alternating between the sadly general terms “fulness” and “full,” -and the pedantic-sounding “self-adequation,” with here and there “clear -fulness.” - -[236] _Vita_, pp. 15_b_, 22_c_; 23_b_; 49_a_; 69_a_. - -[237] _Vita_, pp. 31_c_, 32_a_.--66_a_, 66_b_, 87_c_, 107_a_. - -[238] _Ibid._ pp. 75_b_, 66_b_. - -[239] _Ibid._ pp. 87_c_, 106_a_, 106_c_. - -[240] _Vita_, p. 114_a_. - -[241] _Ibid._ 28_c_, 29_a_, 29_b_. - -[242] _Ibid._ pp. 42_b_, 43_c_. - -[243] _Vita_, p. 42_a_. - -[244] _Ibid._ pp. 83_c_, 84_a_, 86_b_, 87_a_. - -[245] _Ibid._ p. 108_b_. - -[246] _Vita_, pp. 81_b_. - -[247] _Ibid._ pp. 81_c_; 82_a_; 103_b_. - -[248] _Ibid._ p. 31_b_. - -[249] _Vita_ p. 54_b_, _c_. - -[250] _Ibid._ pp. 52_c_, 53_a_. - -[251] _Ibid._ pp. 95_c_, 125_a_; 122_c_; 76_a_. - -[252] _Vita_, pp. 9_b_, 15_b_; 11_b_, 8_c_; 155_a_. - -[253] _Vita_, pp. 136_b_, 183_c_; 19_b_, 107_b_. - -[254] _Ibid._ p. 113_c_. - -[255] _Ibid._ pp. 24_b_, 23_b_, 24_b_. - -[256] _Vita_, pp. 59_c_, 76_c_, 77_a_. - -[257] _Ibid._ p. 37_a_. - -[258] _Vita_, pp. 94_a_; 109_b_. - -[259] _Ibid._ pp. 87_c_, 53_b_. - -[260] _Vita_, pp. 23_c_, 24_a_, 23_c_, 22_c_, 61_c_; 77_b_. - -[261] _Ibid._ pp. 34_c_; 175_c_. - -[262] _Vita_, pp. 171_c_, 172_a_. - -[263] _Ibid._ pp. 30_a_, 29_c_; 43_c_. - -[264] _Ibid._ pp. 171_c_, 172_a_. - -[265] _Vita_, pp. 52_a_; 51_b_; 106_c_.-94_c_; 95_b_. - -[266] _Ibid._ pp. 23_a_; 24_a_. - -[267] _Vita_, p. 60_c_. - -[268] _Ibid._ pp. 76_b_; 27_a_. - -[269] _Ibid._ pp. 8_a_; 15_b_.--8_c_. - -[270] _Vita_ (_Trattato_), p. 169_b_. See also _Vita_, Preface, p. -viii_b_; and p. 144_b_. - -[271] _Vita_, pp. 172_c_; _ibid._--38_b_, _c_; 39_a_. - -[272] _Vita_, pp. 173_a_.--173_b_.--33_b_. - -[273] _Ibid._ (_Trattato_), pp. 170_b_ (169_c_). - -[274] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 175_b_. - -[275] _Ibid._ (_T._), p. 177_b_. - -[276] _Ibid._ (_T._), p. 176_a_; _Vita_ proper, p. 78_c_. - -[277] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 175_a_ (see p. 169_b_). - -[278] _Ibid._ (_T._), p. 176_a_. - -[279] _Vita_ (_T._), pp. 169_c_, 170_a_.--182_b._ - -[280] _Vita_ (_T._), pp. 173_c_, 174_a_; 171_b_.--64_b_; -177_b_.--170_c_. - -[281] _Ibid._ (_T._), p. 172_b_. - -[282] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 172_a_. - -[283] _Ibid._ (_T._), p. 174_b_. - -[284] _Ibid._ - -[285] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 174_b_. - -[286] _Ibid._ - -[287] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 182_b_. - -[288] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 170_c_. - -[289] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 178_b_. - -[290] _Vita_ (_T._), p. 178_b_. - -[291] _Ibid._ - -[292] A copy of this document exists prefixed to the MS. _Vita_ of the -_Biblioteca delta Missione Urbana_. - -[293] Copy in the same volume. - -[294] _Vita_, p. 164_b_. This first coffin is still extant: it stands -now, empty in a glass case, in the smaller of the two rooms shown -in the Hospital as her last dwelling-place. Twice over the _Vita_ -talks of a “deposito,” although directly only in connection with -its opening “about eighteen months later,” _i.e._ not before March -1512. Now Argentina del Sale declares, in a Will of the year 1522 (a -copy, in Giovo’s handwriting, exists in the volume of the _Biblioteca -della Missione_), that she desires to be buried “in the Church of -the Annunciata, in the monument of the late Giuliano Adorno.” Thus -Giuliano’s grave was still generally known and fully accessible -twelve years after Catherine’s death; and it was a “monumento,” not a -“deposito.” I have been completely baffled in all my attempts to trace -the eventual fate of that monument, or even its precise site, or the -precise date of its disappearance. I can but offer two alternative -conjectures. (1) It stood in the choir-end of the Church. If so, it -will have been covered up, promiscuously with many another vault and -mortuary slab, when, in 1537, this end was cut off, for the purpose of -widening the bastion which still runs behind it and above it, outside. -(2) The “monument” was a slab on the floor of the nave or of some -side-chapel. The present flooring of all the former, and of a large -part of the Chapels, is relatively new; and it is (all but certainly) -superimposed upon the old flooring or at least upon the old sepulchral -slabs, since not one inscription remains visible in the nave. And if -Giuliano’s “monument” lay there, it will still be extant, hidden away -under the present flooring.--In either case it remains remarkable that -the slight trouble was not taken to shift nave-wards, or to raise to -the newer nave- or chapel-flooring, the “monument” of Catherine’s own -husband. There are certainly monuments still visible in the Church -older than 1497. It is impossible to resist the conclusion that some -occasion was gladly seized for _not_ moving or raising this monument, -and for thus letting the saintly wife appear entirely alone in the -Hospital Church, unattended by any memorial of her very imperfect -husband. - -[295] The Inventory and this Acceptance both exist, in copy, in the MS. -_Vita_ of the _Biblioteca della Missione_. I owe a careful copy of the -former to the kindness of Don Giacomo C. Grasso, the Librarian. - -[296] From the documents in the MS. _Vita_ of the _Biblioteca della -Missione_. - -[297] _Vita_, pp. 164_b_, _c_, 165_c_. Great and repeated stress is -laid here, with unattractively realistic proofs and details, upon the -damage done by the damp to the coffin and grave-clothes, and upon the -contrasting spotlessness of the body. - -[298] MS. _Vita_ of the _Biblioteca della Missione_. - -[299] Even the little engraving of the title-page of the first edition -of the _Vita_ (1551), which shows Catherine kneeling before a crucifix, -represents her, not indeed with a nimbus, but with a diadem upon her -head. - -[300] Reprinted in _Vita_, p. 282_b_. - -[301] A little Prayer-book marker picture, which will, I think, have -been first engraved in 1737, when the body was, as indeed it is to this -hour, considered quite incorrupt, already gives the large paper rose -which has lain ever since in the place of the mouth and nose, which -have perished long ago. But I have been unable to test the claim to -incorruption further back than this. - -[302] _Vita_, pp. 165_c_, 27_b_, 277_a_. In this last passage Maria -Fiesca makes a declaration as to the partial fleshiness and elasticity -of the body, _e.g._ of the right shoulder; and as to its extraordinary -weight. - -[303] All three classes of cases are represented in Padre Maineri’s -account, reproduced in the _Vita_, p. 282_b_, _c_. - -[304] Maineri, in _Vita_, p. 278, _b_, _c_. The first edition of the -_Vita_ calls her “Beata” on its title-page. MS. “A,” of 1547, 1548, has -simply “Madonna Catherineta Adorna” on the Franciscan copyist’s own -title, and “Beata” on the title copied by him from the MS. used by him. - -[305] There is evidence that the many-sided Queen took an interest in -Catherine, in the Oratorian G. Parpera’s very careful _Beata Caterina -di Genova Illustrata_, Genova, 1682. But the Index of her Latin (and -Italian) MSS. in the Vatican Library contains no indication of any MS. -“Life” or “Doctrine” possessed by Christina. - -[306] The main facts and dates of these paragraphs devoted to the -various Processes are derived from Padre Maineri’s very clear account, -first published in 1737, and reprinted at the end of the _Vita_, pp. -278-282. - -[307] Copy in MS. _Vita_ in the _Biblioteca della Missione_. - -[308] So Padre Celesia, _op. cit._ p. 1121. - -[309] Copy in the MS. _Vita_ of the _Biblioteca della Missione_. - -[310] From twenty-two conclusions concerning Catherine and her circle, -constituting one of the papers in the volume, _Documenti_, etc., of -the University Library. They were evidently written after 1675 and -before 1737 (Catherine is “Beata” throughout), but are, wherever I have -been able to test them, as a rule completely right, and never entirely -wrong. It is certainly somewhat strange that Argentina should, as is -there stated, have “continued in the said Hospital, and was living -in it still in 1523,” and should have “similarly continued to be the -servant of the Priest Cattaneo (Marabotto).” Still, she may have slept -at the Hospital and worked at Marabotto’s. I had thought of concluding -from this that Marabotto had been given Catherine’s house in the -Hospital, after Don Carenzio’s death there. But the apparently complete -absence of any mention of Marabotto in the Hospital books, after July -1512, makes me shrink from doing so. - -[311] I am proud of this important discovery, since even Giovo had to -leave a blank for this date in his Chapter IV of Part I of his MS. -_Vita_, in the _Biblioteca della Missione_, written in 1675. I found -the date amongst some notes and copies, in a sprawly handwriting, not -Giovo’s, but the same which copied out the entry as to Carenzio’s -funeral expenses. It is true that in Marabotto’s case this writer -gives no proof or document; yet there is no reason for distrusting his -assertion. - -[312] Copy from Hospital Cartulary in MS. _Vita_ of the _Biblioteca -della Missione Urbana_: “1511, 7 Julii: Hereditas quondam Caterinetae -Adurnae, pro Maria, olim famula ipsius et filia Hospitalis, pro legato -facto dictae Mariae per dictam q(uondam) Caterinetam, £50.--Maria -praedicta pro D. P. Cattaneo Marabotto, qui habuit curam guarnimentorum -ipsius Mariae, dedicatae in Monasterio Sanctae Brigidae, £50.”--I take -these two successive entries to refer to two successive stages of the -same transaction, and to but one and the same sum. - -[313] From the documents given in the MS. _Vita_ of the _Biblioteca -della Missione Urbana_. - -[314] My quotations from this letter are all taken from Giuseppe -Morro’s careful address on Vernazza, published in _Inaugurazione della -Statua d’Ettore Vernazza_, Genova, 1867, pp. 5-31. It stands _in -extenso_ in the fine edition of his daughter’s works: _Opere Spirituale -della Ven. Madre Donna Battista Vernazza_, 6 vols., Genoa, 1755; Vol. -VI, Letter XXV. - -[315] The document is given in fall, and carefully analyzed, in -_Inaugurazione_, etc., pp. 61-70. - -[316] Battista’s letter, as quoted in _Inaugurazione_, p. 16. - -[317] _Inaugurazione_, pp. 17, 18. - -[318] Printed in _Inaugurazione_, pp. 71-73. - -[319] The present, second and much larger and detached SS. Annunziata, -on the square of that name, was not built (for the Capuchins) till -1587. In Giuliano’s and Catherine’s Wills of 1494, 1498, and 1506, the -Hospital Church occurs indifferently as “Church of the Annunciation -of the Order of Friars Minor of the Observance” with and without the -addition of “adjoining the Hospital,” or “adjoining the Hospital of -Pammatone.” - -[320] This was a Cistercian Convent, founded in the twelfth -century, outside one of the Genoese gates. Only its Chapel survived -the destruction of the Convent at the time of the Revolutionary -secularization. And even this Chapel was in January 1903 in process of -demolition, to make room for the new Via Venti Settembre. - -[321] The three daughters’ names in Religion all occur in a document of -the Bank of St. George printed in _Inaugurazione_, p. 79. - -[322] _Inaugurazione_, p. 18, quoting Battista’s letter of 1581. - -[323] _Inaugurazione_, pp. 19, 20. - -[324] I derive this particular from Professore G. Morro’s -_Inaugurazione_, p. 20. - -[325] _Inaugurazione_, p. 20. - -[326] _Inaugurazione_, p. 21. - -[327] _Inaugurazione_, pp. 21, 22. Battista’s account would lead one -to place that last Communion on the Feast itself; but the various -inscriptions erected by the most careful Committee of 1867, shows that -it occurred really on the Eve. See _Inaugurazione_, pp. 37; 39, 40. One -more instance of a slight displacement of date effected by a (no doubt -unconscious) desire to find a full synchronism between the Feast of the -Baptist and the final Communion of one so devoted to that Saint. The -Committee evidently shrank from interpreting her “three days after”: it -may evidently mean either the 26th or the 27th. - -[328] As to the older monuments, see _Inaugurazione_, p. 5. An -excellent photograph of Varni’s statue forms the title-picture to this -publication. - -[329] An engraving of this (now lost) portrait exists in _Ritratti ed -Elogii di Liguri Illustri_, Genova, Ponthonier, and appears reproduced -here as the Frontispiece to Vol. II. - -[330] _Inaugurazione_, p. 26. - -[331] Even such a rhetorical apostrophe as occurs in the peroration -of Dottore Morro’s speech (_Inaugurazione_, p. 30): “Thou worthy of -incense and of altars, as was that Catherine Fieschi, whose friend and -confidant and spiritual son thou wast, and who was God-mother to thy -own first-born,” stands, I think, alone. - -[332] Schmöger: _Leben der gottseligen Anna Katharina Emmerich_, -Freiburg, 1867, 1870, Vol. II, pp. 892, 898, 900. - -[333] Vallebona, _op. cit._ p. 83: “Santissima mia Diva, | questo mio -cor ricevi: | che quando al sole apriva | le luci a giorni brevi, | -infin d’allor fei voto, | con animo devoto, | non mai, madre adorata, -| esser da Te sviata.” “My most holy Protectress” and “adored Mother” -may apply to Catherine. But I have had to punctuate so as to make -“che” = “perchè,” as in Jacopone throughout: so that we now have not -a declaration of time, as to when she, the Protectress, accepted -Tommasa’s heart (which might well have been at Baptism); but a prayer -that this Mother may accept her heart, in view of the fact that she, -Tommasa, had, from her first opening of her eyes to life (surely, on -coming to some degree of reason), vowed never to be parted from this -Mother. And thus the application to Catherine remains possible but -becomes uncertain. - -[334] I feel obliged to put the matter in this hypothetical form -because of the several undeniable indications of Catherine’s loss of -interest in many, perhaps most, events and occurrences, since, at -latest, the beginning of 1509. - -[335] See the admirably vivid account of, and wisely-balanced judgment -concerning, these events, in the Catholic Alfred von Reumont’s little -book, _Vittoria Colonna_, Freiburg, 1881, pp. 117-152; 194-215. - -[336] _Acta Sanctorum_, Vol. VI, pp. 192-196. - -[337] For Gerson’s “Rigorism,” see J. B. Schwab’s admirable monograph, -_Johannes Gerson_, Regensburg, 1858; and for Contarini’s, Morone’s, and -the Colonna’s views, see Reumont’s _Vittoria Colonna_. - -[338] _Opere_, Vol. VI, p. 192. - -[339] See the Preface to the _Opere_, Vol. I, p. 10. - -[340] _Opere_, ed. Genoa, 1755, Vol. V, pp. 218-227. - -[341] See here, pp. 265, 266; 272; 280; 264, 265; 135; 160, 274-276. - -[342] See here, pp. 116; 117, 266. - -[343] The last clause here is very obscure in the original: “non voglio -meritare te, ma rimeritare lo amore che ti porto”; but I take the above -translation to render correctly the substantial meaning. - -[344] See here, pp. 265; 262, 263, 261. - -[345] See here, pp. 266, 268; 285; 261; 275, 159, 141. - -[346] See here, pp. 260, 261, 273, 274. - -[347] Ch iv, §§ xiii, xiv, xvi (Parker, pp. 48-50). - -[348] See here, pp. 138; 277; 260. - -[349] See here, p. 270. - -[350] See here, pp. 270; 290; 275, 270. - -[351] See here, pp. 138, 139; 265, 260; 272. - -[352] _Opere_, ed. 1755, Vol. VI, pp. 247, 248. - -[353] See here, pp. 263, 266, 280; 272, 275; 292; 277, 262. - -[354] See here, pp. 284; 166-174; 143-145. - -[355] See here, pp. 140, 141; 131, 116. - -[356] _Inaugurazione_, pp. 26, 27. - -[357] _Ibid._ pp. 74, 75, 77, 78. _Ibid._ p. 94. - -[358] Here, pp. 319, 320; 140, 141, 268. - -[359] Date of death: _Ritratti ed Elogii di Liguri Illustri_, -Genova, Ponthenier (Elogio della Ven. Battista Vernazza). Communion: -_Opere della Ven. B. Vernazza_, ed. cit., Vol. I, p. 21. The -portrait-frontispiece of the second volume of this work is a faithful -facsimile of the portrait (a lithograph by F. Scotto) published among -the _Ritratti_, between 1823 and 1830. The original picture, which will -have hung in the convent of S. Marie delle Grazie, I have not been able -to trace. The portrait now in possession of the Nuns of the convent of -S. Maria in Passione, the successors of those Canonesses, is a quite -conventional, inauthentic likeness. - -[360] “A(nno) 1456, 27 Augti, ex Locis Pomerae uxore Bartolomaei de -Auria et a de modo Isabellae dedicatae in monasterio S. David, ad -instantiam Andreae Auria, unici ejus filii ex heredis, et Franciscae -matris Catherinetae filiae Jacobi de Flisco, Loci duo in ratione dictae -Catherinetae per ejus maritare et (si) dictae Franciscae fecerit -consilio.” From parchment-bound small folio vol.: _Documenti su S. -Catherina da Genova MSS._, in R. University Library, Genoa. - -[361] From Dre. Ferretto’s copy of original in the Archivio di Stato -Genoa. - -[362] The originals of both deeds are in the Archivio di Stato, Genoa, -Atti del Not. Battista Strata, folie 39, parte II, and 96 (parte III). - -[363] Copies of these two entries, in the MS. volume “Documenti … -Caterina da Genova,” University Library, Genoa, B VII 31. - -[364] The first four documents exist, copied, in the _Vita_ of the -_Biblioteca della Missione Urbana_; the last is in the Archivio di -Stato, and has been copied out plain for me by Dre. Ferretto. - -[365] Ettore Vernazza: _Inaugurazione_, pp. 21, 22; 39, 40. Cattaneo -Marrabotto: Don Giovo’s declaration among the “Conclusions” (in his -own handwriting) attached to the MS. _Vita_ of St. Catherine in the -_Biblioteca della Missione Urbana_, Genoa. Tommasa Fiesca: Fed. -Alizieri, in _Atti della Società di Storia Patria_, Vol. VIII, Genoa, -1868, p. 408. Battista Vernazza, _Opere Spirituali della Ven. B. -Vernazza_, Genoa, ed. 1775, Vol. I, Preface. - -[366] MS. A, pp. 3; 367; 368-398; 399. - -[367] _Ibid._ pp. 361-363; 364; 87, 88. - -[368] MS. A, p. 160. - -[369] _Ibid._ pp. 134; 168; 198-200; 329; in contrast respectively with -pp. 62; 124; 76; 161 of the Printed _Life_. - -[370] MS. A, p. 193, which appears, in a somewhat modified form, in the -Pr. L., p. 97_c_; and, with further transformations, on pp. 139_a_; -139_c_; 140_a_; 140_b_ of the same. - -[371] _Ibid._ p. 169, compared with Pr. L., p. 124_c_. - -[372] _Ibid._ p. 163, compared with Pr. L., p. 122_c_. - -[373] Pr. L., pp. 155_b_-156_a_. - -[374] Pr. L., pp. 146_c_-147_c_; 154_b_. - -[375] Pr. L., pp. 51_a_-53_b_. - -[376] MS. A, p. 168, compared with Pr. L. pp. 123_b_-124_b_. - -[377] Pr. L. pp. 116_c_-121_b_; 139_a_-140_c_. Retained lines: MS. p. -40 = Pr. L., p. 116_c_. - -[378] Pr. L., p. 119_c_. - -[379] MS. ch. iv = Pr. L., ch. ii, pp. 4_a_-5_c_. - -[380] MS. ch. v = Pr. L., ch. ii, pp. 5_c_-6_c_. - -[381] I purposely leave this sentence in its tell-tale clumsiness of -form. - -[382] This corresponds, as to its substance, to Pr. L., pp. 5_c_-6_c_. - -[383] Pr. L., p. 14_c_. - -[384] MS. B. fol. 2_r_ et _v_. - -[385] _Ibid._ fol. 19_r_ et _v_. - -[386] MS. B: the break, on fol. 30_r_; the abrupt ending, on bottom of -fol. 33_v_. - -[387] Hence _Dialogo_ (Pr. L.) pp. 185_c_-190_c_ is an expansion of the -_Vita_-proper (Pr. L.) p. 31; and _Dialogo_ pp. 191_a_-198_a_ is an -expansion of _Vita_-proper p. 33. - -[388] Hence _Dialogo_ (Pr. L.) pp. 198_b_-206_b_ corresponds to -_Vita_-proper pp. 4_a_-5_a_. - -[389] P. 205_c_. - -[390] Pp. 206_c_, 207_b_. - -[391] _Dialogo_ pp. 207_c_-212_a_ is thus equivalent to _Vita_-proper -p. 5_b_. - -[392] _Dialogo_, pp. 212_b_-212_c_ is hence equivalent to _Vita_-proper -pp. 12_b_-13_c_. - -[393] _Dialogo_ pp. 213_c_-225_c_ thus corresponds to _Vita_-proper pp. -9_b_, 15_b_; 13_c_, 14_a_; 20_a_, 21_a_; 123_b_; 13_b_; 96_b_-97_a_. - -[394] See here, pp. 353, 354. - -[395] _Dialogo_, pp. 215_c_, 216_a_. - -[396] _Dialogo_, p. 197_a_. - -[397] _Ibid._ p. 209_b_. - -[398] _Ibid._ p. 223_c_. - -[399] _Ibid._ p. 221_c_. - -[400] _Dialogo_, pp. 20_a_, 13_c_, 21_a_, 20_a_. - -[401] _Ibid._ pp. 220_c_, 222_c_. - -[402] _Ibid._ p. 21_b_. - -[403] _Dialogo_, p. 123_b_. - -[404] From MS. A, p. 174: “Li buttò le braccie al collo, e, -stringendola con singulti, non si poteva saziar di piangere.” The -Printed _Vita_, p. 125_b_, has only: “La abbracciò piangendo, per lungo -spazio di tempo.” - -[405] See here, pp. 169-171. - -[406] See here, pp. 185, 186; 194; 205. - -[407] _Ibid._ pp. 221, 222_a_. - -[408] See here, pp. 363; 346, 347. - -[409] _Ibid._ pp. 56_b_, 203_a_; 33_b_, 202_b_. - -[410] _Vita_, pp. 32_c_, 26_c_, 58_a_, 48_a_, 135_a_. - -[411] _Ibid._ pp. 76_a_, 157_c_; 103_b_. - -[412] _Vita_, pp. 212_c_, 213_a_; 222_b_; 220_c_, 221_c_. - -[413] See here, p. 146. - -[414] See here, pp. 145, 146. - -[415] _Vita_, p. 21_a_. - -[416] See here, pp. 344-358; 359-364. - -[417] Dan. ix, 24. - -[418] Gen. xxix, 20; xxx, 27. - -[419] See here, pp. 351, 355. - -[420] Compare, as to human intercourse, _Dialogo_ p. 221_b_, -with Battista’s advice, given here p. 363; and, as to spiritual -consolations, _Dialogo_ pp. 215_c_, 216_a_, with Battista’s -_Colloquies_, here pp. 346, 347. - -[421] Catherine, Pr. _Vita_, p. 209_c_; Battista, in one of the -_Colloquii_ given in the _Opere_, _loc. cit._, but not otherwise -reproduced here; Catherine, Pr. _Vita_, pp. 209_c_, 211_c_, 211_b_, 32; -Battista, here, pp. 359, 360. - -[422] Catherine, Pr. _Vita_, p. 97_b_; Battista, Pr. _Vita_, p. 201_b_; -here, p. 360; and _Dialogo_, p. 211_a_. - -[423] I have not succeeded in finding a copy of this rare book: the -six chief libraries of Genoa; the Ambrosian Library, Milan; and the -Vatican and Angelica Libraries, Rome, are certainly without it. My -general description, and my special reproduction of one passage, of -it are taken from a series of very careful accounts of the successive -early editions of the book, preserved among the Documents relative -to the Process of Catherine’s Beatification of 1630-1675, in the -Archiepiscopal Archives, Genoa. - -[424] _Vita_, pp. 5_b_, 6_b_, 155_b_-156_a_; 211_b_, 264_b_. - -[425] _Vita_, pp. vii_c_, viii_a_; viii_b_. - -[426] _Colloquies_, _Opere_, Vol. V, p. 219. _Letters_, _ibid._ Vol. -VI, p. 24. _Dialogo_, pp. 187_b_, 215_b_, 220_c_, 223_b_, 237_c_, -247_b_, 248_c_, 273_b_. _Dialogo_, p. 266_b_. - -[427] _Vita_: Chapter Second, pp. 226_a_-275_a_. Part Second, pp. -226_a_-245_c_; Part Third, pp. 246_a_-275_a_. The moralizing narrative: -last sentence, p. 245_c_. - -[428] _Dialogo_ p. 225_c_, paraphrase of _Vita_ p. 6_c_. - -[429] “Nine years before her death,” _Vita_, p. 127_a_; “one year -before she passed away,” p. 132_b_; Purgatory, pp. 128_c_, 129_a_; -136_c_, 144_b_; “Prison of the Body,” p. 137_a_; emaciation, pp. -144_a_, 160_b_; vomitings, pp. 127_c_, 138_c_, 160_a_, _b_; inability -to move, pp. 128_a_, 137_b_. - -[430] _Vita_, pp. 227_a_-241_b_; 213_c_-225_c_. - -[431] The “scintilla,” “stilla,” and “immersion in the sweetness of -Love”: _Dialogo_, p. 252_a_, _b_, _c_. In the Vita-proper “scintilla” -is but once (and in a doubtful passage) so used, p. 148_b_; in the -other passages “non una minima scintilla” means there “not a glimpse” -of this or that, pp. 5_c_, 62_a_. “Stilla” of Blessedness, p. 119_c_; -“goccia” of Love, pp. 94_b_-95_c_; “gocciola” of spiritual water -(refreshment), p. 135_b_. “Ocean” and immersion therein, pp. 59_b_, -60_b_. - -[432] _Vita_, pp. 78_c_, 79_a_. - -[433] Thus _Vita_ (_Dialogo_), p. 266_a_ = _Vita_ (proper), p. 117_b_, -_c_; and _Vita_ (_Dialogo_), p. 266_c_ = _Vita_ (proper), pp. 120_b_, -117_b_. - -[434] _Dialogo_, p. 234_b_. - -[435] _Dialogo_, p. 241_b_. - -[436] _Ibid._ p. 260_b_. - -[437] _Vita_, p. 268_c_. - -[438] _Ibid._ p. 269_c_. - -[439] _Ibid._ p. 270_b_. - -[440] _Dialogo_, p. 212_c_; and here, p. 146. - -[441] _Ibid._ p. 273_a_. - -[442] _Ibid._ p. 275_a_. - -[443] _Dialogo_, p. 250_b_. - -[444] _Vita_, p. 97_b_: “This creature would appear with a countenance -like unto a Cherub; she gave great consolation to every one who gazed -upon her, and those who visited her knew not how to depart from her.” -And pp. 94_b_-95_c_. See here, pp. 159-161. - -[445] _Ibid._ pp. 231_a_; 242_b_; 248_c_; 249_a_. - -[446] See here, pp. 327-329. - -[447] See here, pp. 353, 354. - -[448] _Dialogo_, pp. 242_b_; 221_b_; 232b; _Vita_-proper, 117_c_, -118_a_. - -[449] _Vita_-proper, pp. 101_b_; _Dialogo_, 247_b_. - -[450] _Dialogo_, p. 248_c_; _Vita_-proper, 76_a_. - -[451] _Dialogo_, p. 259_c_. - -[452] _Ibid._ 266_b_. - -[453] _Dialogo_, p. 264_b_; and here, pp. 349-351, 360. - -[454] _Vita_, p. 144_c_. - -[455] First seven Chapters: _Vita_, pp. 169_b_-75_c_. Last ten -chapters: _Ibid._ pp. 175_c_-184_c_. - -[456] See here, pp. 140, 141. - -[457] Denzinger, _Enchiridion Definitionum_, ed. 1888, p. 178, No. 38: -“Animae in Purgatorio non sunt securae de earum salute saltem omnes; -nec probatum est, ullis aut rationibus aut Scripturis, ipsas esse extra -statum merendi aut augendae charitatis.” - -[458] His Epitaph, in the Church of the Annunciation, at Sturla, -just outside Genoa, is given in full in Pescetto’s _Biografia Medica -Ligure_, Genova, 1846, p. 104. - -[459] MS. A, p. 348 = Pr. L., 155_b_, 156_b_. - -[460] Pr. _Vita_, pp. 155_b_, _c_, 156_a_. - -[461] _Padre_: pp. 117_b_, 118_b_; _Figliuolo_, pp. 99_b_; 94_b_, _c_, -95_a_, _b_; 122_c_. - -[462] _Madre_, pp. 98_c_; 94_b_, _c_, 95_a_, _b_ (twice). - -[463] _Vita_, pp. 50_b_, 37_a_-38_a_; 61_c_, 62_a_; 83_a_; 92_a_. - -[464] _Vita_, pp. 53_a_, 76_c_, 73_a_. - -[465] _Vita_, pp. 4_b_, 151_b_. - -[466] I derive all these titles from the Documents in the Curia -Arcivescovile of Genoa already referred to. The Editions 1568, 1601, I -have examined in the Ambrosian Library, Milan. - -[467] The Bull is given in full by Fr. Sticker: _Acta Sanctorum_, -Sept., Vol. V, ed. 1866, pp. 181 F-188 A. See there, p. 183 B, E. In -the former passage the double description is rightly attributed to -the same event; and the contradiction between them is ably eliminated -by the Bull’s words: “She seemed to herself to behold the image of -the suffering Saviour” (instead of _Vita_, p. 5_b_, “affixed to the -Cross”); and, in the latter passage, the description of her poverty is -kept free from the extravagances of the _Dialogo_, pp. 220_c_, 221_c_. - -END OF VOL. I - -_Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, London and Bungay._ - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mystical Element of Religion, as -studied in Saint Catherine of Genoa , by Baron Friedrich von Hügel - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION, VOL 1 *** - -***** This file should be named 50205-0.txt or 50205-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/0/2/0/50205/ - -Produced by Julie Barkley, High-res images and replacement -pngs from TIA and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team -at http://www.pgdp.net - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - |