Retrospect

     
     
      So the Christian monk has greatly changed since he first appeared in the deserts of Nitria, in Egypt. He has come from his den in the mountains to take his seat in parliaments, and find his home in palaces. He is no longer filthy in appearance, but elegant in dress and courtly in manner. He has exchanged his rags for jewels and silks. He is no longer the recluse of the lonely cliffs, chatting with the animals and gazing at the stars. He is a man of the world, with schemes of conquest filling his brain and a love of dominion ruling his heart. He is no longer a ditch-digger and a ploughman, but the proud master of councils or the cultured professor of the university. He still swears to the three vows of celibacy, poverty and obedience, but they do not mean the same thing to him that they did to the more ignorant, less cultured, but more genuinely frank monk of the desert. Yes, he has all but completely lost sight of his ancient monastic ideal. He professes the poverty of Christ, but he cannot follow even so simple a man as his Saint Francis.
      It is a long way from Jerome to Ignatius, but the end of the journey is nigh. Loyola is the last type of monastic life, or changing the figure, the last great leader in the conquered monastic army. The good within the system will survive, its truest exponents will still fire the courage and win the sympathy of the devout, but best of all, man will recover from its poison.

VII. THE FALL OF THE MONASTERIES

 

      The rise of Protestantism accelerated the decline and final ruin of the monasteries. The enthusiasm of the Mendicants and the culture of the Jesuits failed to convince the governments of Europe that monasticism was worthy to survive the destruction awaiting so many medieval institutions. The spread of reformatory opinions resulted in a determined and largely successful attack upon the monasteries, which were rightly believed to constitute the bulwark of papal power. So imperative were the popular demands for a change, that popes and councils hastened to urge the members of religious orders to abolish existing abuses by enforcing primitive rules. But while Rome practically failed in her attempted reformations, the Protestant reformers in church and state were widely successful in either curtailing the privileges and revenues of the monks or in annihilating the monasteries.

 

      Since the sixteenth century the leading governments of Europe, even including those in Catholic countries, have given tangible expression to popular and political antagonism to monasticism, by the abolition of convents, or the withdrawal of immunities and favors, for a long time a source of monastic revenue and power. The results of this hostility have been so disastrous, that monasticism has never regained its former prestige and influence. Several of the older orders have risen from the ruins, and a few new communities have appeared, some of which are distinguished by their most laudable ministrations to the poor and the sick, or by their educational services. Yet notwithstanding the modifications of the system to suit the exigencies of modern times, it seems altogether improbable that the monks will ever again wield the power they possessed before the Reformation,

 

      In the present chapter attention will be confined to the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII., in England. The suppression in that country was occasioned partly by peculiar, local conditions, and was more radical and permanent than the reforms in other lands, yet it is entirely consistent with our general purpose to restrict this narrative to English history. Penetrating beneath the varying externalities attending the ruin of the monasteries in Germany, Spain, France, Switzerland, Italy, and other countries, it will be found that the underlying cause of the destruction of the monasteries was that the monastic ideal conflicted with the spirit of the modern era. A conspicuous and dramatic example of this struggle between medievalism, as embodied in the monastic institution, and modern political, social and religious ideals, is to be found in the dissolution of the English monasteries. The narrative of the suppression in England also conveys some idea of the struggle that was carried on throughout Europe, with varying intensity and results.

 

      There is no more striking illustration of the power of the personal equation in the interpretation of history than that afforded by the conflicting opinions respecting the overthrow of monasticism in England. Those who mourn the loss of the monasteries cannot find words strong enough with which to condemn Henry VIII., whom they regard as “unquestionably the most unconstitutional, the most vicious king that ever wore the English crown.” Forgetting the inevitable cost of human freedom, and lightly passing over the iniquities of the monastic system, they fondly dwell upon the departed glory of the ancient abbeys. They recall with sadness the days when the monks chanted their songs of praise in the chapels, or reverently bent over their books of parchment, bound in purple and gold, not that they might “winnow the treasures of knowledge, but that they might elicit love, compunction and devotion.” The charming simplicity and loving service of the cloister life, in the days of its unbroken vows, appeal to such defenders of the monks with singular potency.

 

      Truly, the fair-minded should attempt to appreciate the sorrow, the indignation and the love of these friends of a ruined institution. Passionless logic will never enable one to do justice to the sentiments of those who cannot restrain their tears as they stand uncovered before the majestic remains of a Melrose Abbey, or properly to estimate the motives and methods of those who laid the mighty monastic institution in the dust.