VIII. S. Francis of Sales

(Dublin Review.)

To show in any adequate measure the service rendered by Father Mackey in his excellent editions of the Letters of S. Francis of Sales, and of his golden Treatise on the Love of God, would require a longer and a more detailed review than we can give in the present short notice. In truth, to form a fair judgment of what we owe to him for his careful and instructive analysis of the Treatise on the Love of God, it is necessary to read and to weigh the valuable introduction prefixed to this edition. We can but indicate very briefly the reasons for believing that the publication of these volumes is very opportune at this time.

In his excellent introduction, Father Mackey has given a short account of the contention of Fonelon and Bossuet over the Treatise on the Love of God. Without doubt both misunderstood the words of S. Francis, and it would appear that neither of them had mastered, or perhaps could master, this wonderful work of the highest theology. Fenelon seems to have read it, not to learn, but to find a warrant for his own lofty but un guarded thoughts. Bossuet's intellect needed the donum pietatis to comprehend S. Francis. It would seem that they for a time rendered the work on the Love of God suspect. The canonisation of the Saint was sufficient to dispel this mist, and the recent elevation of S. Francis to the dignity of a Doctor of the Church has lifted his writings from the level of a nihil obstat to the authority of a teacher in the Universal Church. When the Bishops of the Church, with the common consent of their flocks in all parts of the Church, were petitioning the Holy See to lay upon his head the aureola of Doctor, there were some who would have restrained this dignity to theologians in whom the gifts of science and of intellect are supreme, forgetting that the gifts of counsel and of wisdom are equally from the Holy Ghost, and that the great teachers of moral theology, as S. Alphonsus, and of mystical theology, as S. Francis of Sales, are equally created by the Spirit of Truth to be guides and teachers of the Church.

It has always seemed to us that as S. Charles was an offspring of the Council of Trent in the life of pastoral charity, so was also S. Francis in the law of liberty, which is the law of love written on the heart. The delusive and ghastly heresy of justification by imputed justice drew from the Fathers of that Council the luminous decree and definition which teaches that "we are truly called and are just" by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost and of charity, inasmuch as " by the Holy Ghost the charity of God is poured out in the hearts of those who are justified, and is inherent in them," because " Christ Jesus Himself flows into them as the head into the members, or as the vine into the branches." In this the Council of Trent gave an impulse which created the Saints of active charity: S.

Philip, S. Vincent, and the group of uncanonised but saintly men who renewed everywhere the heroic charity of the apostolic time. So also it fashioned the mind of S. Francis, and of the Visitation from which sprang the devotion of the Sacred Heart. It is indeed true that S. Augustin had a forecast of this special adoration of the Sacred Humanity; and S. Bernard, S. Bonaventure, and S. Bernadine all but denned it. S. Gertrude put it into words, praying to the " deified Heart." But the time was not yet come. It was reserved for a humble and despised daughter of the Visitation, a true disciple of the Treatise on the Love of God, to be chosen as the teacher of this profound devotion, which opens the mystery of the Incarnation and of the Most Holy Eucharist as with a flood of light alike to the theologian and to the little child. The Treatise on the Love of God might be well called the Greater Manual of the Sacred Heart, and S. Francis the prophet of its adoration. But in so regarding this treatise as a work of exalted piety, we must not fail to see, as Father Mackey has fully shown in his analysis of it, its strictly scientific and dogmatic character. The ministration and office of the Holy Ghost the Sanctifier; His in dwelling and manifold operations of grace; the freedom and power of the regenerate will, are delineated and defined with the utmost doctrinal precision. It is a work of scholastic method and exactness: nevertheless it is a work of positive theology drawn from the Divine tradition of the Church, from Holy Scripture, and from the Fathers.

Father Mackey has very truly summed up the result of the teaching of S. Francis in these words: " This view of life, this continual gazing on the beloved Master for whom we work, this regarding the acts of life as a mere series of acts or offerings of love, is the very central point of the ascetic teaching of S. Francis. It not only gives the nobleness, the intensity, the meritoriousness of charity to every act, hut it gives also at the same time a great simplicity and largeness, preserving the soul from formality, and from getting lost or wearied in the multitudinous details and minute practices of the spiritual life. It creates a loving detachment and liberty of spirit, with a readiness to follow every slightest indication of God's will

Amongst all virtuous actions we should carefully practise those of religion and reverence to Divine things, those of faith, hope, and the most holy fear of God — often talking of heavenly things, thinking of and aspiring after eternity, frequenting churches and holy services, reading spiritual books, observing the cere monies of the Christian religion; for holy love feeds at will amid these exercises, and spreads its graces and properties more abundantly over them than over the simple human virtues" (Book xi. 8).... "In little and low exercises charity is practised not only more frequently, but also, as a rule, more humbly, and there fore more profitably and more holily " (xii. 6). S. Francis shows that legitimate occupation even in court or camp do not hinder the practice of Divine love. He gays it " is the silly, vain, superfluous undertakings with which we charge ourselves that turn us from the love of God, and not the true and lawful exercise of our vocations " (xii. 4). This sound common sense is spiritual wisdom, speaking with the voice of Holy Scripture. It has the Divine simplicity of S. Paul teaching the Corinthians the law of charity, and of S. James teaching the Christian world the law of liberty. The spiritual world has its mechanics and its dynamics, as well as the physical. They cannot be put asunder; and neither can have its due effect without the other. But they are not equal in vitality. The great primeval power of spiritual life and perfection is the love of God. Without this all mechanics of human device are life less. With this the regenerate will becomes a law to itself. It anticipates all commandments and goes beyond all obligations, and by the free, spontaneous generosity of love it is always seeking to do more for the beloved Master and the Divine Friend. Other perfection than this the revelation of faith does not teach: nor has the Church of God ever known.

Father Mackey has not hastily put his hand to the editing and interpreting the writings of h>. Francis. His four essays on the life and writings of the Saint have qualified him to speak with authority. He has diligently and conscientiously studied his text, and has patiently and with a judicious discernment of a translator's duty turned the antique and classical French of S. Francis into clear and faithful English. Every one who has endeavoured to read the old translation of Father Carr, or the modern translation of some un known hand, will be able to appreciate the difficulty of the task and the great boon Father Mackey has given us in his excellent version. We earnestly commend these volumes to all readers, and we desire their widest diffusion, as we desire also that the doctrine and spirit of S. Francis may reign in all our hearts, both of pastors and of people.

IX.

WILLIAM GEOKGE WARD.

(Dublin Review, 1882.)