CHAPTER V.

CONSECRATED MEDIATORS.

Having seen the manner in which individuals devote themselves to the special service of their deities, we have now to observe the further fact that a whole class of men is devoted to this service by the demands of society. This class is the priesthood. They differ from the persons last treated of, inasmuch as the consecration of ascetics has reference exclusively to their own personal salvation, while the consecration of priests has reference exclusively to the salvation of others. A monk or a nun becomes by the act of profession a holier being; less occupied with the world; mentally nearer to God; better fitted to communicate with him than ordinary unchaste mortals. A priest becomes by the act of ordination a being endowed with special powers; better entitled to offer up the public prayers than others; more likely to be heard when he does so; more eligible as a channel of communication between men and God than unordained mortals. In other words, his functions are of a public, those of the monk of a private, kind.

We must not be confused by the fact that among Buddhists and among Catholics the two species of consecration are no longer completely distinct, the monks in both of those great religions being at the same time priests. The early writings of Buddhism sufficiently evince the fact that no kind of public ministry was at first connected with the profession of a mendicant. He had simply to observe the precepts of his order, and to aim at such perfection as should ensure the deliverance of his soul. Priestly duties are now indeed performed by monks in Buddhist countries, but this is an addition to their regular vocation, not a necessary part of it; while in Catholic countries, the ecclesiastical character which the monks at present enjoy in no way belonged to them when the monastic orders were first established. The monks, as Montalembert observes, were at first an intermediate body between laity and clergy, in whom the latter were to see an ideal which it was not possible for all to attain. Technically, however, the monks formed a part of the laity, and the steps by which they came to be considered as the "regular clergy" are, according to the same high authority, difficult to follow (M. d'O., vol. i. p. 288; vol. ii. p. 57). Self-consecration, and consecration to ecclesiastical duties were therefore two very different things, and the distinction between regular and secular clergy shows that, though somewhat obliterated in appearance, the two ideas are still kept apart.

In all religions that have risen above the rudest stage, those who desire to become priests are initiated by certain fixed ceremonies. Thus is the consecration given which fits them to convey to God the wishes of mortals, and to mortals the will of God. To take an example from a very primitive form of faith, the "Angekoks," or priests of the Greenlanders, receive their commission only after long and exhausting rites, in which a familiar spirit is supposed to appear to them, and to accompany them to heaven and hell. Should they fail ten times in obtaining the assistance of such a spirit, they are compelled to lay down their offices. The spirit, when he comes, holds a conversation with the Angekok, who is thus installed in his profession by supernatural means (H. G., p. 253-256). So also, among the American tribes in New France, we are told that the "Jongleurs" by profession never obtained this character till after they had been prepared for it by fasts, which they carried to a great extent, and during which they beat the drum, cried, shouted, sung and smoked. Their installation was subsequently accomplished in a sort of Bacchanalia, with ceremonies of a highly extravagant nature (N. F., vol. iii. p. 363). Among a certain tribe of negroes, the priests are taken from a class of men termed "living sacrifices" (G. d. M., p. 328), who live at the expense of others, taking whatever they require, and who wear their hair, like the Nazarites, unshorn. Here their consecration is marked by these peculiar characteristics, and appears to be impressed upon them by some dedication made without their own consent. In another negro nation, there is a priestess of a certain snake, who is marked in a peculiar way over the whole body, and held in great esteem. Every year some young girls are seized by force and taken to this priestess, who marks them artistically, initiates them in religious songs and dances, marries them in a manner to the snake, and consecrates them as priestesses of that divinity. With others again the priesthood is hereditary, the consecration in this case being imprinted once for all on certain families, and not imparted, as in the instances given above, by rites affecting only the individual who undergoes them. A peculiar modification of the hereditary principle is where the preference is given to him, among several sons, who dares to pull certain grains (which have been previously put in) out of the teeth of his deceased father, and place them in the mouth of the corpse. Here the consecration is partly inherited, partly personal. Elsewhere a priest or fetich-maker is made "by all sorts of silly ceremonies at a meal," and a string with consecrated objects is hung round his neck in token of his condition (G. d. M., p. 328).

Both principles, the hereditary and the personal, were known in Mexico. The priests of Vitziliputzli succeeded by right of birth; the priests of other idols by election or by an offering made in their infancy. Priests were consecrated to their holy office by an unction which, as Father Acosta justly observes, resembled that of the Catholic Church. They were anointed from head to foot, and the hair was left to hang down in tresses moist from the application of the ointment. But when they were going to perform the offices of their sacred calling on mountains, or in dark caves, they were anointed with an altogether different substance, compounded by a peculiar process from certain venomous reptiles. This was supposed to give them courage (H. I., b. 5, ch. 26).

The consecration of the Levitical priesthood, originally personal, descended from father to son, and was moreover confined to the members of this single tribe. It could not be repeated after its first performance. Hence we have in this case an interesting example, not only of an hereditary priesthood, but also of the manner in which its exclusive sanctity was supposed to have been originally established. Moses, who derived his appointment directly from Jehovah, was employed to consecrate Aaron and his sons by means of an elaborate and imposing ritual communicated to him by that deity himself. The means thus taken (in Jehovah's own words) "to hallow them, to minister unto me in the priest's office," were effectual for all time; the descendants of Aaron after that being priests by nature. How great was the value of the consecration thus given, may be seen by the fact that Moses was ordered to threaten the penalty of death against any one who should dare to manufacture oil similar to that used in anointing Aaron and his sons (Exod. xxviii. 29; xxx. 30-33).

Priestly power among Christian nations is communicated in a solemn ceremonial, and is conferred only upon the individual recipient. It does not descend in his family, but it is capable of being imparted by bishops, who have themselves received a higher grade of priestly consecration. By some it is actually supposed that a mysterious virtue, derived directly from Christ through the apostles, is conveyed to the recipient of holy orders. But whether the apostolical succession be conveyed or not in the Ordination Service of the Church of England, it is certain that a high authority is held to be given to the priest by the laying on of the hands of the Bishop and of the other priests present at the time.

The rights which he receives are thus expressed:—

"Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a priest in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained, and be thou a faithful dispenser of the Word of God, and of his holy sacraments. In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen."

After this the Bishop delivers the Bible to each of the candidates, saying:—

"Take thou authority to preach the Word of God, and to minister the holy sacraments in the congregation where thou shalt be lawfully appointed thereunto."

Here it may be observed that there are three powers conveyed by this ordination: the power of preaching, the power of administering the sacraments, and the power of forgiving and retaining sins. Since the salvation of Christians depends upon their admission to the sacraments, and upon the forgiveness of their sins, it is obvious that the priest who may debar them from the one, and refuse the other, receives in his consecration the keys of the kingdom of heaven. In their communications to the Almighty through the mediation of such priests, men are in possession of an instrument of the very highest efficacy.

The terrible reality which the belief in the ecclesiastical privilege of forgiving sins may sometimes have, is graphically exhibited in M. de Lamartine's touching poem entitled "Jocelyn." Therein a bishop, taken prisoner and condemned to death in the French Revolution, sends for a young deacon who was living in concealment in the Alps with a maiden who loved him deeply, and whom (since the irrevocable vows of a priest were not yet taken) he intended to marry. Regardless of all his pleading the Bishop, under the threat of his dying anathema, forces the unhappy youth to receive priestly orders at his hands, solely in order that he may then listen to the episcopal confession and forgive the episcopal sins. Marriage was now rendered impossible by the vow he had taken; and thus two lives were consigned to enduring misery that a bishop might die in peace. Surely the morality which could lead to such a consummation is self-condemned!

EXTERNAL MANIFESTATIONS OF RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT.

SECOND PART.

_MEANS OF COMMUNICATION DOWNWARDS._

CLASSIFICATION.

We proceed now from the several methods by which men, in all ages and in all countries, have sought to convey their wishes, aspirations, and emotions upwards, to those by which their several deities have in their opinion conveyed their commands, decisions, and intentions downwards. The classification will follow as closely as the subject permits that of the preceding part. Consecration, the quality pertaining to man's instruments of communication with God, will be replaced by holiness, the quality pertaining to God's instruments of communication with man. Thus, corresponding to the consecrated actions of prayer, sacrifice, and praise, we shall have the holy events of omens, signs, miracles, and so forth. Corresponding to the consecrated places where men pay their devotions, we shall find the holy places which some higher being has blessed with tokens of his presence. Corresponding to the consecrated objects bestowed by the creature on the Creator, we shall discover holy objects through which some peculiar grace is conveyed by the Creator to the creature. To consecrated men will correspond holy men, who speak to their fellows with an authority higher than their own; and these holy men will fall into two classes, those whose regular work it is to represent the deity on earth and those who are sent on some special occasion for some special purpose. Lastly, a separate division (having no correlative among means of communication upwards) must be given to holy books, for a most important place in the history of religions is occupied by treatises written by the gods for the use of men. To these then the final chapter of this portion of the work must be devoted. Pass we now to holy events.