On the Dance as a Religious Exercise

EXERCISE

June, 1904.

It is a curious fact that while the impending catastrophe in Russia excites wide interest, the deposition of at least one of the arts from her throne is wholly unrecognized by the majority of those who form what are called the civilized nations of the world. Originally both dancing and acting had their representatives upon Olympus; now Melpomene and her sisters have come to dwell in scarcely even a genteel retirement in such places as Leicester Square and Drury Lane; but Olympus knows them no more. This, possibly, is an overstatement of fact, but it is an understatement of theory; for in more than one pulpit with which I am acquainted the Muse of Make-Believe presents a punctual appearance on Sunday evenings; yet in theory she is supposed to be somebody else; she rants incognita in surplice and coloured stole. Dancing, too, with an exception which I shall state presently, not only is deposed from her religious throne — for an Englishman cannot be expected to count such benighted places as Seville on Corpus Christi — but the children of those who once venerated her now are astounded at the profane follies of their fathers, and consider that God Almighty cannot but be insulted by the pious prancings of the Hottentot.

I said, with one exception; and it is that of which I wish to treat, for it is that which has suggested to me the subject of this paper.

I confess that I am not one of those persons who think that it is an evidence of their own spiritual superiority to misbehave during the worship of other people. The Baedeker gentlemen and ladies — for I am sure that is what they wish to be called — who stare and talk in the churches of Italy and France, and audibly contrast the possibly ill-shaven priest at the altar with their cultivated vicar at home, to the disadvantage of the former — these people rouse in me no spirit of emulation. Possibly, my own eleven o'clock Morning Prayer, Litany, Ante-Communion and Sermon, which I occasionally attend in the country, may be infinitely more pleasing to my Maker than the curious series of actions which can be witnessed in such Catholic churches; yet for all that I am not certain that the latter is nothing better than a piece of insolence, and 1 conceive it to be more proper to stand still than to walk about, to hold my tongue than to engage in conversation.

It was during High Mass, then, not in France but in England, that the thought first came into my mind that perhaps here was a survival of the ancient religious dance — that stately, magnificent series of slow movements which surely may express devotion of the most solemn and reverent kind, as well as can the colour of vestment or sanctuary, or the sounds of melody.

I am aware that some writers on ceremonial declare that movements and postures are nothing more than such as arise from the necessity of going from one place to another, and of standing still; and that each such movement and posture must find its justification in its utility; it is for this reason that they condemn such actions as the Elevation of the Alms-dish so frequently witnessed in our pure Protestant devotions, declaring that it signifies nothing more than the foolishness of the man who performs the ceremony.

But I must confess that I think the theory, so stated, somewhat misleading. No doubt at the beginning it was as they say. The primitive clergyman who knocked upon his breast did so because it was a natural action for a gesture-loving Southerner who wished to express his sorrow; the unlettered deacon who requested a blessing before reading the Gospel possibly desired it to safeguard him in the face of the darkness of the catacombs and his own imperfect education; even the Bishop who put on his mitre may have done so for fear of a draught. All that I maintain is that these things are neither natural nor necessary in modern well-lighted, well-ventilated churches for clerics, who are sufficiently educated not to stumble over the Latin, and sufficiently self-restrained to repent of their sins without striking themselves in public. Yet these actions and others like them are not only deliberately practised but minutely regulated in the rubrics of the most divinely human Institution on earth; and it is surely far more illuminating to see in this fact a sense that movement no less than language may be the vehicle of internal intentions and external worship, than to dismiss, with the scholars, the whole matter as an utilitarian survival.

I remember being reproved as a boy for indulging in gestures. I was told that the modulations of the voice were sufficient for any emotions proper to my age and condition; and that gesticulation was an evidence of barbaric impulse. I resented the rebuke at the time, and I resent it still; it appears to me singularly unwarranted. We have no more right to condemn the language of the hands and arms than the lanfjuaore of the tongue. We are furnished by our Creator with all these members; we desire to express ourselves as forcibly as possible; and why in the world shoidd we not do so by all the means at our coniiniind?

It is this, then, that the Catholic Church recognizes in her rubrics.

Neither can she be accused of inculcating formalism. It is exactly as formal, neither more nor less, for one man to knock upon his breast when he is far from contrite, as for another to declare himself an erring and straying sheep when he is congratulating himself on his extraordinary probity (let us say) in his Saturday operations in the City. Both gesture and word may be formal, but neither need be. Indeed, the Catholic Church is less liable to the charge than the Establishment; for it is perfectly recognized in the one that the priest is the representative not only of the congregation, but of the entire Christian world, and stands where he does in that capacity and in no other; while in the other such views are denounced as popish and unscriptural superstitions. The one has her eyes on the whole body, the other on the individual; the one, roughly speaking, conceives of a religion as consisting in an objective piece of honour done to God, the other as a subjective devotional attitude of soul.

Catholic ceremonial, then, I maintain, is far more than a way of doing things — it is a thing in itself; and, again, roughly speaking, Protestant ceremonial is the reverse.

An instance or two, perhaps, may serve to illustrate the difference.

A year or two ago it was declared by our Archbishops at Lambeth that incense was not recognized as part of the worship of the Church of England; but upon being pressed to consider Primitive Christianity, they conceded that a purely fumigatory use of the censer would not be considered disloyal. Now, the Catholic does not use incense that he may smell it, but, to employ a straightforward Scriptural phrase, that God may do so.

Lights u})()u the Holy Table, again, in the Chancellor's phrase, are not permitted "except when required for the purpose of giving light." To whom.^ Obviously to the clergyman, and to no other; for the Edwardine symbolism, referring to the signification of the Light of the AYorld, has been expunged from the Book of Common Prayer: not even the congregation is considered.

Ceremonial, therefore, for the Protestant is a way of doing things; for the Catholic it is an offering that he makes to God together with incense, candle-wax, and such things. His movements, his bows, the carriage of the hands, his knocking upon the breast, his osculations — all, in fact, which is summed up by the urbane and amiable Protestant as his "bowings and scrapings" — are not necessarily the expression of his own emotion, nor of that of the possibly distracted congregation which observes them

— they are neither more nor less than official actions done before God's majesty as a means of confessing what is due to Him, and obtaining from Him what is desired.

With this in mind, then, observe once more with me the motions of those three men in green at the foot of that lighted, fragrant altar, and see how orderly and exquisite is the whole affair. It is no less than a sacred dance, and there is hardly one religious emotion that does not find its representative there.

First, then, the actors in this drama, representing, let us say, a father and his two sons, are so swathed as to present the least possible resemblance to men. Their humanity, their corporal defects or advantages, the lines of their bodies, even their passions, their stupidities, their brilliancies,

— all are obliterated as far as possible beneath the stiff folds of an antique dress; for they are not there as the Reverend Smith, Jones, and Brown, but, as performers in a stupendous drama, figures in a sacerdotal act done primarily to God, and secondarily with as little distraction as possible before men. They resemble giant images of which the mechanism is studiously concealed.

The movement begins with an adoration reduced to the lowest minimum of a descent on to one knee, performed, I dare say, sometimes with the nonchalance of a courtier entering the first ante-room, but not the less significant on that account. Then, after a pause. Contrition makes her appearance, bending as if to deprecate wrath, striking her breast as if to chastise the body. Then, ascending, the choragus kisses the place of sacrifice; and proceeds with a swaying movement to and fro, accompanied by his partners, to offer incense.

This surely is what we may call the "first figure." To and fro they go, the children linked to their parent by a single finger and thumb, to the chink of chains, till the altar is encompassed by smoke; and I must confess that the result of this on the beholder is to put him curiously in tune with the spirit of worship. Mystery, awe, expectation, a chastened familiarity, a sense of rhythm and order and seemliness, such as befits the initiated Christian in the presence of His Fatherly Majesty — of all these emotions I am conscious as I look from my pew in the distant nave. God remains God to me; He is not degraded in my eyes to the proportions of "an immeasurable clergyman," to the fashion in which I am compelled to think of Him when at home I witness my estimable Rector stride up the steps, as if they belonged to him, bury his face and arms in a velvet cushion, and proceed to deliver the opening paragraphs of the Communion service with an air of never having seen it before.

Here, on the other hand, I am still able to think of my Maker as a Spirit who, since He has descended in human form and has reassumed that nature to His throne, must be approached through actions apparent to the senses, yet stiffened by the remoteness of His Splendour into a kind of Court etiquette.

The second figure begins by a gatliering of the three performers round the illuminated book, suggesting to me the inadequacy of a single man, however highly consecrated, to approach his God. His companions, like Aaron and Hur, stand about him and help him to utter the formula of "entering in," and the ninefold cry for mercy as the glory becomes visible through the far-distant, open door. The cluster breaks, for order must be observed, and reassured the three wheel about and come up to the altar in line for the song of praise that is God's due. And here it may be noted, as a remarkable piece of liturgical insight, that at every moment of poignancy during the entire audience, the three stand together in one line — when they cry glory to God in the highest, when they protest their loyalty, when they call him by His supreme name and make one with the ushers of His Court, when they entreat mercy and peace from the Lamb of God — at these occasions, and these only, are the three stiff figures in one horizontal line, as if need demanded that one man should not speak alone, as if enthusiasm or agony of desire propelled his supporters from their positions in the rear. They too must look upon God's face. Yet in all the set speeches, in the more formal addresses, when instances of the King's graciousness are solemnly quoted, and He receives the formal homage due to His threefold being, the assistants are content to stand behind and observe the most precise rules of precedence.

The singing of the Epistle and Gospel are accompanied with peculiar rites; the subdeacon, like a child called suddenly to an important ofiice, goes here and there as if excited: he clasps the precious book, is led by the prompter to make his bow, reads the words on a monotone, allowing his voice to crack upwards at the close; then he runs to his father as if to ask whether he has done it well, kisses his hand in a passion of pride and hears him say, " God bless you, my son." Then in a burst of ontliusiasm he breaks the figure and runs across with the Gospel-book to the proper place.

But at his elder brother's singing of the Gospel, an astonishing elaborateness is observed. They go about here and there, lights are brought in, and blessings distributed. The youngest child is not allowed to touch the holy thing except in the capacity of a lectern. Incense is blessed, and the white pages are soaked in the sacred antiseptic, for fear that the eyes and lips of a mortal man might smirch the purity of the Incarnate Life which he proclaims. The father, too, faces about towards his eldest son, and obediently kisses the page which the imperious child points out to him — so imperious, so absorbed in his precious burden that he omits to make his reverence as he passes through the beam of light that pours downward from the Tabernacle.

At the Offertory, the harmony of movement is disturbed, for matters have to be arranged, and deacon and subdeacon become for the moment ordinary persons who hand about bread and wine and water, and make things ready. The youngest, too, is forced to stand aside for the present, and a mere man in a surplice takes his place to turn the pages; for to the boy is given an important duty. To him is co«mmitted the silver cradle in which the Body of the Prince is to lie presently; so he muffles his hands and the utensil all together in a cloth for fear that he should breathe upon it or touch it, and stands breathless down below while the other two go about their business on the highest step. He partakes of the character of a sentry, a servant, and an observer. He has nothing to say or do; he must stand perfectly still till he is wanted. He would give the world to go up and down again with the other two and the censer in that rhythmical dance with which the door of the second ante-room is approached; but it is not allowed him. He must comfort himself with reflecting on the high honour bestowed on him with the guardianship of the j)aten, and the pleasure of looking through the door. Ilis one relief is to step up for an instant for the Sanctus and return.

And now there is no movement. The hierarch has wheeled on his heel and begged his assistant to pray for him; he has whispered his first sentence in the King's ear, a hint at the secret boon he will ask presently, and has then stepped back to make a cheerful noise to the God of his salvation. Then again he comes close for his long, mysterious colloquy. He is explaining matters, with his hands now held out in entreaty, now brought together in a passionate clasp at the close of his sentences, as he names the Prince's name. He refers, I learn from my book of words, to other eminent instances of His Majesty's clemency; and he winds up by an appeal that makes all sure.

Qui pridie....

Then he bends very near indeed, all drop on their knees in astonishment at such condescension; he wipes his fingers with a nervous, hasty movement, and then the astounding event to which all has been tending takes place. A little bell rings, and he receives in his arms the Body of the Infant Prince for which he has been begging so long... just to hold Him, just to hold Him for a minute or two....

Ah! was not the posturing and the drama and the runnings to and fro, and the tapping on closed doors, and the plucking of courtiers by the sleeve, and the whispered entreaties to be spoken for — was not all this worth it? For he holds now, at his mercy, the precious Person whom God loved so much, and whom yet for love of another He was willing to give to the shame and pain of the Cross. Is there anything on earth that His Majesty can refuse, now that He has given the most precious thing in Heaven? And is there any limit to what that priest can ask, who has asked so much and got it? Even to me, Protestant as I am, it did seem completely suitable that an event so stupendous could scarcely be approached by any other process than that of a sacred dramatic dance, with an accompaniment of rjf^id and minute Court etiquette. To leave the conduct of such a thing to the individual personality and the private taste of a sim])le clergyman in a surplice, would be nothing else than bathos of the worst description; human outlines must be obliterated by some overpowering uniform, personal tastes and methods of behaving must be rigidly supplanted by set movements and gestures. In fact, for such a drama as this we need not clericalism, but the most emphatic sacerdotalism. Originality in the sanctuary, as has been well observed, is the grossest vulgarity known to men.

The rest of the Mass followed the lines already indicated; but the movements were less elaborate, more confident — (no wonder!)— and slightly more human. The youngest son restores the paten presently, and takes off the silk cloth; he receives at the proper time the kiss of peace — that inexpressibly tender fragment from a simpler and more loving age — and in his turn passes it on till it dies in a ripple of movement among those others who stand and wait; later again he bows low, with his brother on the other side, and, as his supreme privilege, is permitted to take the cover from off the Precious Blood.... Then he finishes the wiping of the vessels which his father has begun, puts them away, and returns if he can to take part in the last simple movement. There is less deliberation here, for the audience is at an end; so he kneels with his brother to be blessed, answers his father, shuts the book, and comes down to form into line for the last time. The three make another adoration towards the palace-windows, and with the crash of brass and wood and the shrilling of strings, they join the deputation that has accompanied them to the gates; and Mass is done.

But how surprisingly graceful and eloquent the whole affair has been! Emotions have been expressed in four or five languages simultaneously; by sound, colour, smell, words, and movement. Could anything be more explicit, more likely to obtain its object before God to whom all hearts are open, more likely to save His worship-pers from distraction? Of course each is unnecessary regarded from one point of view; some may be bewildering to an uninstructed observer, and yet all should stand or fall together, in spite of the privilege of the sectarian to exclude any one of those vehicles according to his private taste. The Anglican repudiates the unknown tongue in his worship of God, who, however, as a seminary priest said on the scaffold, "well understands it." The Baptist banishes smell, and as far as possible, colour and grace of movement; the Quaker refuses these and the sound of words besides. But the Catholic who aspires to count all men as his brethren employs every vehicle that his romantic brain can suggest: he batters the Kingdom of Heaven by five portals at once; he is not ashamed to take his place with the worshij)pers of Isis and Cybele, with King David, and with the naked

Fijean, and to dance with all his might before the Lord.

I must confess that I shall look with dismay upon my clergyman next Sunday. It is not that he does not dance, but that he has nothing to dance about, and has not learnt the steps....