The True Spirit of Christianity

By Bossuet ** Extinguish not the spirit ”’ (1 Thess. v. 19).

WE must, as we ponder these words, try to sound the full depth of the Apostle’s meaning; and in order to do this I would remind you that Christianity has two great obligations, which are imposed upon us by Jesus Christ. In the first place, He demands of His disciples that they should engage in warfare, and in warfare the sternest and deadliest possible; secondly, that they should practise, cultivate, and maintain a holy and divine peace. He prepares them for warfare, when He warns them that all men will oppose and resist them; this is why He requires of them that they should be combative and violent. And He makes peace an absolute obligation, when He commands them to be (in spite of all contradictions) peaceable. He prepares them for war, when He sends them forth in the midst of wolves (Matt. x. 16); and He makes peace obligatory, when He desires them to be as sheep (Matt. x. 16). He prepares them for war, 114 when He says in His Gospel that He came not to send peace but the sword, meaning that He was throwing down a sword among the people of the world as a signal of combat; and He, so to speak, binds them over to keep the peace, when He promises to kindle a fire which shall be the source and principle of charity: I am come to cast fire on earth (Luke xii. 49). There is, then, a holy war which is to be waged against the world, and there is a peace of Christianity which is to unite us to one another in our Divine Lord. In order to sustain protracted and desperate conflict we need a spirit of strength; and in order to maintain this peace the spirit of charity is necessary to us: that is why St. Paul teaches us that God has not given us a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power and of love (2 Tim. i..7); and such was the spirit of Christianity with which the Apostles were filled.

CHRISTIAN STRENGTH.

We may, then, assert, as a first principle, that Christians ought to be strong, and that the spirit of Christianity is a spirit of strength and firmness. This is indisputable; for if in history we see that nations prided themselves on their warlike character and qualities, because from their earliest youth the individuals composing those nations had been trained for war, made hardy by labour, and inured to dangers, how much more ought we to be strong, we who from our infancy have been enrolled by holy Baptism in a spiritual army, we whose whole life is temptation, we whose daily exercise is conflict, we who in the midst of the world are, as on a vast battle-field, exposed to the attacks of a thousand enemies, visible and invisible? Encompassed as we are by so many difficulties and in many perils, ought we not to be nourished and sustained by a spirit of strength and stability, so as to be always unmovable in spite of the pleasures which tempt us, the afflictions which scourge us, the storms which sweep over us? We see too in the Scriptures that God, foreseeing the conflicts in which it was His will that His faithful ones should be engaged, commands them to wait in quiet inactivity and seclusion until He shall have armed them with strength: Stay you in the city, till you be endued with power from on high (Luke xxiv. 49),—showing them by these words that in order to stand their ground against the desperate attacks of their enemies in this world the children of God need an extraordinary, a supernatural supply of strength and stability.

This consideration it is which impels me to bring before your notice three fundamental maxims of Christian generosity which you will see practised in the history of primitive Christianity and in the conduct of those Apostles on whom, on the first Christian Pentecost, the Holy Ghost descended, filling their souls with all power and wisdom. These are the maxims, and I ask you to imprint them upon your heart and memory. First, to despise all the gifts of this world, its riches, its honours, its pleasures. But, because by refusing the world’s proffered gifts we infallibly incur its displeasure and odium, the second maxim is, not only to despise its favours but even to despise its hatred and not to fear displeasing it. And, as its hatred being despised turns at once into the most implacable fury, the third maxim is, not only to despise its hatred, but even its rage, its threats, and so by a last supreme effort to put ourselves beyond and above the reach of every evil which the most extravagant, outrageous fury can inflict upon our innocence.

The first maxim of strength, given to us by Christianity, is (as we have said) to despise the world’s gifts; and the reason of this is evident, for it is an indubitable principle that our esteem or our contempt depends upon the ideas which fill our minds and the hopes which these ideas give us. What, then, are the ideas with which the spirit of Christianity fills our minds, and what are the hopes which that spirit gives us? St. Paul answers this question in these words written to the Corinthians: We have received not the spirit of this world (1 Cor. ii. 12),—words from which we naturally conclude that the true Christian is not filled with the ideas of this world. What spirit, then, have we received? St. Paul tells us: The spirit which is of God; and he adds, as the reason for this, that we may know the things that are given us from God (1 Cor. ii. 12). What, then, are these things which are given us by God? The adoption of sons, equality with the angels, the inheritance of Jesus Christ, the communication of His glory, a promised place near His Throne. These, then, are the ideas which the Holy Ghost imprints upon our souls. He engraves upon them the idea of an eternal blessedness, of a treasure which is not to be lost, of a life which never ends, of a peace unchangeable and enduring. Ii my mind is full of these great matters, wholly occupied with hopes so lofty and sublime, can I possibly attach any value to the gifts of this poor world? For, what, O world of time and sense, what have you to offer that can be compared to those infinite, those inestimable blessings? Pleasures P— but will they be pure? Honours?—will they be substantial? Favour?—is it lasting? Fortune?—is it secure? A great estate?—are you able to insure or guarantee my undisturbed enjoyment of it? can you endow me with the gift of immortality so that I may possess these blessings, undisturbed by any anxieties?

Who does not know that all this is impossible? The fashion of this world passes away; all that men value in it is but folly and illusion; and the spirit of grace which I have received, filling my soul as it does with glorious pictures of the eternal goods which are bestowed upon me, has raised me far above and beyond this present world, so that its gifts henceforth are nothing to me. Such is the first maxim of Christian penerosity.

But that is not enough. If you do not love the world, it will hate you; those who despise the world’s favours will infallibly incur its displeasure; and you » must either bind yourself to it by accepting its offered benefits, or openly break with it, fearless of incurring its displeasure. This is the second maxim of the spirit of Christianity. For it is a most unvarying truth that men will never achieve anything worthy of the Gospel and of the spirit of the New Law, as long as they have not the courage to renounce all self-complacency and to make up their minds to bear the contempt, disfavour, dislike of their fellow-men. Consider indeed for a moment the tyrannical and pernicious laws the world imposes upon us in contravention of the obligations of our Baptism. Does not the world tell us that forgiveness of injuries is a weakness and that the curbing of ambition is cowardice? Is it not the world which encourages the young to indulge in every sort of idle folly and self-indulgence, while it urges those of more advanced years to give all their time and thoughts to the acquisition of money, position, all that self-interest craves to the very end of life? Is not self-advancement by any road (straight if possible, but if not, by any path, crooked, evil, even depraved) one of the world’s laws? And why are such laws and precepts obeyed? whence comes the authority which they have so universally acquired? from reason? or from justice? But Jesus Christ condemned them and shed every drop of His most Precious Blood to deliver us - from their bondage! How comes it, then, that these accursed laws still reign throughout the world, in opposition to the teaching of the Gospel? I do not hesitate to assert that it is the fear of displeasing men which gives them this authority.

But you may perhaps consider that all this evil must not be imputed to the effect of self-love only; that our other corrupt inclinations must have their share in the blame. No, that is not so; I bring my accusation against that one miserable infirmity only; for, although I am quite ready to admit that our evil inclinations lead us into evil habits and practices, yet I deny that it is those inclinations which give to those habits and practices the strength of laws which we dare not defy. What raises them to the dignity and power of laws, and what constrains us by a sort of necessity to obey them, is the tyranny of self-love; because we are ashamed to stand alone, because we cannot venture to deviate from the beaten track, because we are afraid of displeasing men, and the only reason which we can give for this conduct is that this is the way of the world, that we must do as others do. And as regards these accursed laws which the world formulates in opposition to the laws of Christianity, there must indeed be someone to propose them and someone to second the proposal, and it is true that our inclinations do both the one and the other; but, at the same time, it is the fear of displeasing men which gives these laws their great authority. That is what the divine Apostle foresaw when he gave this warning to the faithful: You are bought with a price, do not make yourselves the bond-slaves of men (1 Cor. vii. 23). In fact, do you not feel that you are putting yourself under the yoke when you are afraid of displeasing men and dare not set yourself up in opposition to what they may think and feel, making yourself thus a voluntary slave to the errors of others?

Christians, this is not our spirit, it is not the spirit of Christianity. Listen to what St. Paul says with - so much power and authority: We have not received the spirit of this world (1 Cor. ii. 12). I do not think I am wrong in saying that the spirit of this world of which the Apostle here speaks is that self-love and human respect which corrupt the noblest souls, and which by undermining the poor remains of our tottering virtue make us participators in so many sins, not so much from inclination as from the pressure of example and the influence of our surroundings, which rob us of that invincible strength with which our Baptism endued us, and make us so timid, shrinking, cowardly, that we are ashamed even in the service of a Divine Master to displease men. Ah, my dearest Saviour, that is not the spirit which on the feast of Pentecost Thou didst send down upon us: We have received not the spirit of this world but the spirit which is of God (1 Cor. ii. 12). No, we have not received the spirit of this world which makes us the slaves of men; but our spirit coming from God Himself raises us above and beyond their judgments, making us despise their hatred. That is the second maxim of the generosity of Christianity.

We must however rise to even sublimer heights; and this third maxim which still remains to be considered will stir all our senses and fill us with trembling awe and wonder, for it is that which prompted the passionate cry of the great Apostle: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation? or distress? or famine? or nakedness? or danger? or persecution? or the sword? But in all these things we overcome, because of Him Who hath loved us (Rom. viii. 85). Therefore, let the world rage and threaten, let it kindle the fires of persecution in all the corners of the earth; no matter, Christian generosity will rise triumphant above all its impotent fury; and we know the cause of so glorious a victory. St. John teaches us that when he says: Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world (1 John iv. 4). Yes, greater because He that is in us is the Holy Ghost Whom God has shed forth into our hearts. And who does not know that this almighty Spirit is infinitely greater than the world; consequently that whatever that world may attempt, whatever evil forces it may bring to bear upon the faithful, all will be of no avail; the stronger will never yield to the weaker? The generous Christian will rise superior to all that the world can do to harm him, because he is filled with a spirit which is above and beyond that world.

Those, then, are the thoughts, vigorous and animating, which through long ages of persecution and opposition have supported the Church. In the course of the early ages what has she not seen! a whole Empire conspiring against her, the sentence of death set up against her faithful children in every market place, on every wayside signpost; yet she has never been afraid. Conscious of the Spirit abiding within her, she has known well how to maintain the glorious right to profess Christianity; and although the laws refused it to her, she gave it to herself by her own blood, for to acquire it by any other means was accounted in her a crime, and no other way remained to her of shaking off the cruel yoke, except that of dying with fortitude and constancy. That is why Tertullian expresses his amazement that in those terrible days of persecution any Christians should be found base enough to purchase life and liberty with money. ‘*‘ What! ’”’ he cries, ‘‘ can it be that the - Church is thus brought to shame! that a Christian can save his life by the payment of money! that a Christian can sacrifice his wealth only to escape suffering! Has he forgotten, then, that Jesus Christ poured forth for him all the riches of His most Precious Blood? ’? Can you not hear Tertullian saying to such an unworthy disciple: ‘‘ Tell me, Christian, you who wished to save yourself by your gold, where was your blood? had you none in your veins when you went to your money bags to find the shameful price of your liberty? I would have you know that being redeemed by Blood, being delivered by Blood, we do not owe money for our lives, we do not owe money for our liberties; our own blood must preserve for us what the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ merited for us.’? Those who live in this spirit are the true Christians, the true successors of those incomparable men who were filled on the feast of Pentecost with the spirit of strength, who in all their actions were guided by those three maxims of which I have been speaking, and whose example we should strive to follow.

Yes, whatever evil may be suggested to us, whatever troubles may befall us, let us be strong in Jesus Christ and in the maxims of His Gospel. Why should they think to intimidate us by the loss of this world’s goods? Tertullian says: ‘‘ Faith knows no such thing as necessity.’’ The world says: ‘“ You will lose what you love best.’? Is it necessary that I should possess it? ‘*‘ Your conduct will displease men.’? Is it necessary that I should please them? ** You will be ruined; you will lose your fortune.”’’ Is it necessary that I should keep it? And should one’s life even be in peril—though the infinite mercy of God does not often expose our weakness to so severe a test,—even in such a case I repeat that faith knows no such thing as necessity. It is not even necessary that you should live, but it is necessary that you should serve God; and whatever the world may do, whatever the malice and cunning of evil men may devise to harm you, though the very elements may seem to conspire against you, though the heavens grow black above you and the earth totter under your feet, always that eternal unchanging truth will abide, the truth that there can never be any necessity for committing sin.

Those are the maxims of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Let us meditate upon them in all their strength and depth of meaning; let us meditate upon them, and engrave them on our hearts.

CHRISTIAN GENTLENESS.

At first sight it might seem as though the spirit of Christianity, while making our forefathers stronger, would at the same time have made them less sensitive, less sympathetic, the very vigour and stability of their minds detracting in a measure from the tenderness of their charity. For, whether it is that these two qualities, gentleness and dauntless courage, depend on temperament; or whether it is that men brought up in the very midst of dangers and threatening calamities, but trained from their infancy to absolute contempt of personal hardships and peril, cannot easily be moved by any other elements of disturbance, by the troubles of States or the griefs of individuals,—however that may be, it is certainly very often the case that these strong characters which have been formed amid all the chances and perils of war acquire in the course of that training a something which is (to say the least) not gentle, sensitive, or sympathetic, which we might even call stern, severe, and phlegmatic.

But it is not so with our genuine Christians. Strong and unflinching they are indeed in suffering and danger, but tender and loving always towards their brethren; and the all-powerful Spirit Who animates them knows well how to harmonize in them every contradiction and anomaly of temperament. This is why we read in the Scriptures that the Holy Ghost forms the faithful out of two very different materials. The one is soft and impressionable, as the Prophet Ezechiel tells us: Thus saith the Lord God: I will give you a heart of flesh (Eizec. xxxvi. 26); the other of brass and iron, as Almighty God Himself tells

Jeremiah when He says: I have made thee as a pillar of iron and a wall of brass (Jer. i. 18). Is it not most evident that He makes His people of brass, that they may be able to stand firm and unmoved in the midst of all perils; but at the same time He makes them of flesh, that they may be touched, moved, melted by charity? And just as it is with the element of earthly fire which so distributes its virtue that it hardens some things while it softens others, so is it with that heavenly fire which came down upon the faithful on the feast of Pentecost. It hardens and softens, but in a supernatural manner, since those hearts of the disciples which from their unconquerable firmness seemed to be of adamant are the very same hearts which, becoming also human hearts and hearts of flesh, burn and glow with charity and tenderness. This is the effect of that celestial fire which on Pentecost rested upon them. It softens the hearts of the faithful; it has, so to speak, melted them, so that they flow into one another, mingling and losing themselves in each other’s very existence by the power of charity, so as to form that marvellous union and unity of heart and soul of which we read in the Acts of the Apostles, where we are told that the multitude of believers had but one heart and one soul (Acts iv. 82).

Here indeed I might enlarge upon those sublime principles of theology which teach us that as the Holy Ghost is the eternal bond uniting the Father and the Son, so too it is His function to unite all the faithful to one another; and that, possessing to an infinite extent this power of uniting, He effects their union in a manner far closer, far more intimate than that in which are united the various members of the pRaee nee individual human body. But taking these sacred — truths for granted, I would without any further discussion of the matter remind you of the practical result of this teaching. It is, that since we are firmly persuaded by the Scriptures that we are all one and — the same body, being so made by charity, we ought to look upon ourselves, not as ourselves separate and distinct from one another, but as one in heart and soul in the unity of that same body, and therefore as making the welfare of our neighbour the guiding rule of our conduct. In doing this we shall be following the example of the early Church, whose birthday we keep on the festival of Pentecost.

We may notice in the Acts of the Apostles, in which the history of that Church is recorded for us, that two kinds of multitudes are indicated. When the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles, the rumour of this marvel brought together a great multitude, con- | fused, tumultuous, some agitated by one thought or conjecture, some by a totally different one. Some ery: ‘‘ What is this? ’’ Others mockingly declare with shouts of derision: ‘‘ These men are full of new wine! ’’ Others again with indignant denial protest that ‘* they are not.’? Truly, a confused multitude. But a little later we see a very different sort of multitude, calm, orderly, united in purpose and conviction, being of one heart and one soul (Acts iv. 82). What is the explanation of this great difference? It is this. In that first assembly every individual was self-centred, thinking his own thoughts, following his own impulses; hence their extraordinary diversity, and hence the fact that it was a.confused, a tumultuous multitude. But in that multitude of new believers, no one regards himself as a separate individual, each considers himself merely as a part of the great body into which he has been enrolled with so many others; a spirit of comradeship, of concord and of peace, pervades this vast society, and it is the spirit of Christianity which makes a well-ordered multitude having but one heart and one soul.*

And who could enumerate all the many and splendid results of this teaching which makes us look upon ourselves not as separate individuals, but as forming part of one another in the unity of the Holy Catholic Church? It would be perhaps impossible; but from their vast number I would select one in particular for your careful consideration, namely, the extermination of two vices which are the chief scourge of Christianity—envy and uncharitableness. The envy which is troubled by the well-being of others; the uncharitableness, or hard-heartedness, which is insensible to their sufferings: the envy which impels us to bring about the ruin of our neighbour; the spirit of self-love which makes us refuse to alleviate his misery by any sacrifice of our own interests.

Now, the malignity of envy cannot possibly disturb a soul conscious of its membership with others in the unity of the Church, because envy is only born in our hearts through a sense of our own want and need;

• ** Taine has said, and before him Montesquieu had said it, and I repeat, that certainly it is Christianity that has founded the rights of man.’’—EmiLe FaGuer.

** Homer is not so much the father of all our poetry, nor Socrates so much the master of all our intellectual discipline, as is Christ the fountain-head of the humanitarian love that makes men helpful to the weak and the wronged.’’—Bisnor J. L. SPALDING.

‘* The Catholics constitute the most republican and the most democratic class of citizens which exists in the United States.””— Dr TocquevymLe, Democracy in America, vol. i., chap. xvii.

** Catholicism laid the very foundations of modern civilisation.” —Lecky, Rationalism in Europe.

sd which sense cannot exist when we realize the infinite riches which are ours in common with all who are one © in the unity of the Church. Perhaps you say to yourself: ‘‘ That person has great graces, extraordinary talents and powers of mind and body.’? Human nature may and does suggest, even to the best among us, a passing thought of disquietude as this superiority in another seems to diminish our own. But if such an envious and unworthy thought arises, here is the remedy always close at hand. Do not look at yourselves as yourselves, it is by doing so that you discover your inferiority and deficiency; do not compare yourselves with others, it is that which makes you feel your inequality with them; but look at yourselves and at others as one in the unity of the body of the Church; in that unity all things are yours, and through the brotherhood of Christianity all goods are in common among the faithful. St. Augustine teaches us that lesson when he says: © ** Never complain because you are wanting in some gifts and graces; if only you love unity, you will understand that others only have those same gifts for your benefit.’? If the hand felt as it should feel, it would rejoice in all the eye illumines and makes visible, because the eye does this for the benefit of the whole body; and the eye would not envy the hand its strength or its skill, because they save its own delicate organism from so many shocks and injuries. Look at the Apostles of the Son of God. We find them on one occasion, in the early days of their following their Divine Master, disputing with one another as to which should be the greatest among them; but as soon as the Holy Ghost descends upon them, making them of one heart and one soul, they are no longer jealous or contentious. They now believe that when St. Peter speaks they all speak by his mouth, that with him they preside over every assembly of the faithful, and that if his shadow passing by heals the sick the whole Church participates in this marvellous gift and glories in it and in the God Who bestows it. ‘* Let us,’’ says St. Augustine, ** follow their example; only envy can make us poor, for that alone can deprive us of a share in all the blessings, all the riches of the Church.”’

But if we have the consolation of participating in our neighbour’s good, his happiness, his gifts and graces, our hearts must be hard indeed if they will not feel his sorrows, his needs, his sufferings; and that we do not feel them is a terrible and deplorable blot upon Christianity. Have we ever truly realized that we are all members of one body? Which of us has fainted and languished with the sick? tottered and stumbled with the weak? hungered and thirsted and suffered the want of all things with the poor? When I think of all the calamities that surround us, the poverty, the desolation, the despair of so many ruined households, it seems to me that a cry of misery is rising up to Heaven on every side; a cry which ought to pierce our hearts, and which yet perhaps does not even fall upon our ears! For if it did, surely the rich now so self-absorbed, so hard, so pitiless, would be startled out of their apathy, would retrench some of their extravagances, cut off some of their superfluities, and realize that their luxury is sapping the very life of innocent orphans whose existence was given to them by Divine Providence in dependence on that help which those self-indulgent members of the community deny them.

But you may tell me that there are charitable institutions set on foot and maintained by the Church. Charities? Say, rather, paltry alms, feeble and useless aid proffered to the most dire necessity, which we dole out with a miserly hand, as we might pour one single drop of water upon a mighty conflagration or put one crumb of bread into the mouth of a famished beggar! That is not the way in which charity gives. She gives liberally, because she feels the misery which she is relieving, because she suffers with the suffering, and while giving help to the needy is herself strengthened and satisfied. This was how they lived and acted in those early days which I have been trying to recall to you. When the faithful saw any member of the Church in want and misery, their hearts were instantly and unanimously moved with pity, everyone began to accuse himself, everyone looked upon the distress of this poor afflicted member as a reproach not only to the whole body but to each particular individual composing it.* This was why they threw all their goods into one common stock, so that no one should be to blame for the poverty of one of his neighbours. Ananias, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles, having violated this law which was imposed by charity, was treated as a criminal guilty of theft, although he had only kept back what was his own. Hence it is that St. Chrysostom calls him ‘* the thief of his own goods.’ As for ourselves, we may well tremble and fear lest having sinned as he sinned, we should incur the same punishment.

Nor can we venture to shelter ourselves under the

*** It is incredible how ardently the people of the Christian religion help one another in their wants. They spare nothing. Their first legislator has put into their heads that they are all brethren.’’—Lucian.

plea that we are no longer bound by these laws, because this community or fellowship has ceased to exist among us. Such a plea would only redound to our shame. It is true that our goods are no longer held in common; but have we, because that is so, ceased to be Christians? Nay, for charity will always be compassionate, charity will always consider others rather than herself, charity will always regard her own goods as the property of her neighbour. Yes, and Divine Providence, by making what might seem

_ to be an unequal division and bestowing wealth on certain individuals rather than on others, has in truth only devised a new and wonderful way of making all things in common among Christians, by committing the distribution of these goods to the care of brotherly charity, which always regards the interests of others before its own.

That is the spirit of Christianity. Take heed to the Apostle’s words: See that you extinguish it not.